Finding God Within

"Universal Man" from a 13th.C copy of Hildegard von Bingen's 'Book of Divine Works'

What then is heaven to a reasonable soul?  Truly nothing else but Jesus God  For if heaven is only that which is above all things, then God alone is heaven to man's soul, for he alone is above the nature of a soul.  Then, if a soul can through grace have knowledge of that blessed nature of Jesus, truly he sees heaven, for he sees God.  So there are many men who err in understanding some things that are spoken of God, because they do not understand them spiritually.

Holy Scripture says that a soul who wants to find God must lift her inward eye upward, and seek God above herself.  Some people who want to put this teaching into practice, understand this word 'above' to signify the setting of one thing above another in place and worthiness of bodily position.  But that is not the case when the word is taken spiritually; for a soul is above every bodily thing, not visibly in location, but in purity and worthiness of his unchangeable blessed nature.

And therefore whoever wants to seek God wisely, and find him, must not run away with his thoughts as if he would climb above the sun, and cleave the firmament, and imagine his majesty to be like to a hundred suns.  But he must rather draw down the sun, and all the firmament, and cast it beneath the place where he stands, and put all this, and all physical things too, at nought.  And then, if he can, he should think spiritually both of himself and of God also.  And if he does so thus, then the soul will see above itself, then will it see into heaven.

In the same way this word 'within' should be understood.  It is often said that a soul shall see our Lord 'within' all things and 'within' itself.  It is true that our Lord is within all creatures, but not in the way that the kernel is hidden within the the nutshell, or as a little bodily thing is contained within a greater.  But he is within all creatures, as holding and preserving them in their being, through the subtlety and power of his own blessed nature, and invisible purity. 

For just as something which is most precious and clean is laid within wrappings, so it is said metaphorically that the nature of God, which is most precious, most clean, most goodly, most remote from bodily substance, is hidden within all things.  So whoever wants to seek God within, must first forget all bodily things, for all such things are on the outside, as with his own body.  And he must stop thinking of his own soul, and think on uncreated nature, that is, Jesus, who made him, keeps him alive, preserves him, and gives him reason, memory and the power to love.  Jesus God is within him through his power and sovereign subtlety.

Extract from 'The Ladder of Perfection' by the English Augustinian Mystic  Walter Hilton (1343-96)