An English Mystic

A SHEWING OF GOD'S LOVE (the shorter version of Sixteen Revelations of Divine Love) by Julian of Norwich, edited by Sister Anna Maria Reynolds, C.P. (Longmans Green and Co., 9s. 6d.).
JULIAN OF NORWICH: the Teaching of a 14th Century English Mystic, by Paul Molinari, S.J. (Longmans, Green and Co., 16s.).
THIS edition of the shorter 1version of Julian of Norwich's "Revelations" is of great importance, as it is the first account of her experience. written while all was still vivid in her mind, and it is now translated into modeenised English and published for the first time.
Sister Reynolds also gives a very informative introduction on Julian's personality, her mode of lifeas an anehoress. the profoundness of her teaching, and her greatness as the first English woman of Idlers.
"Julian of Norwich " by Fr. Molinari is a fit companion piece tor the above edition, although his searching analysis is based mainly on the longer version of Julian's work. As he states, his main purpose is to collect the ■ arious elements of Julian's teach ing on prayer and contemplation and to present them in a coherent and systematic way.
A sure teacher
HE is the first author to do this
on her behalf, and he has done it most notably one feels that no student of the English mystics can afford to be without this book. Ile makes one see Julian as he himself sees her, a great contemplative, a sure teacher, and a charming, original personality.
His work is divided into three parts. The first deals with the actual account of Julian's illness. her shewings, and her personal evaluation of her visions. In the second part, the most important, he gives a succinct account of her teaching. culled from the whole treatise, showing how she is in line with the mystical tradition of the Church, yet at the same time she presents this teaching with characteristic originality, He stresses particularly the fundamental idea of her doctrine: that there are two types of contemplation a "special shewing" or extraordinary. and a second form, offered to all, " our com mon working " which is " ordinary." He deals at length on this subject.
He stresses also her characteristic ideas of the homeliness of God, her teaching that detachment from creatures is more easily effected by fixing the mind on God rather than on ourselves or on our sufferings, and her insistence on trust as the keynote of her doctrine. God is the cause of our prayer and as such is the source of real trust.
In the third part. he writes of the object of our contemplation, the homely loving of God. " As for the way in which Julian tries to direct souls, she insists that the object of contemplation should be God in His goodness, in His 'homely loving,' His active tender motherly love. Thus Julian leads the soul to fix its attention on God. who in His motherly love is the giver of life. the source of our yearnings to be 'fastened' and *tined ' to Him."
TERESA FULLER