Chapter I: Introduction

The object of the following unpretentious little volume is to give a simple and readable account in English of the life and writings of a remarkable Flemish Mystic of the fourteenth century, a contemporary of our own Walter Hilton. Though his memory and honour have never faded in his own native Belgium, and though France and Germany have vied with each other in spreading his teaching and singing his praises, the very name of Blessed John Ruysbroeck is practically unknown this side of the water. We are acquainted with only one small work in English dealing directly with the Saint or his work at all, viz. _Reflections from the Mirror of Mystic_,[1] giving the briefest sketch of his life and some short extracts from his writings as translated from the French rendering of Ernest Hello.

The original authorities for the history of Ruysbroeck are practically reduced to one, the biography by Henry Pomerius, a Canon Regular of Groenendael, entitled _De Origine monasterii Viridisvallis una cum vitis B. Joannis Rusbrochii primi prioris hujus monasterii et aliquot coaetaneorum ejus_, re-edited by the Bollandists, Brussels, 1885. It is certain that a disciple of John Ruysbroeck, John of Scoenhoven, also of Groenendael, who undertook the defence of Blessed John's writings against Gerson, composed a short biography, but this was embodied in the work of Pomerius, and thereby as a separate volume fell out of use and memory. Pomerius had Scoenhoven's MS. to work upon, and some of Ruysbroeck's contemporaries were still living at Groenendael when he composed his biography there. The brief references by the Venerable Thomas a Kempis in his _Vita Gerardi Magni_ are likewise of great interest and intrinsic worth.

For the purposes of this brief biography, which lays no claim whatever to original research, the compiler has made very great use of the labours of Dr. Auger, _De Doctrina et Meritis Joannis van Ruysbroeck_, Louvain, and Willem de Vreese, _Jean de Ruysbroeck_, an extract from the _Biographie Nationale_, published by l'Academie royale des sciences, des lettres et des beaux-arts de Belgique, Brussels, 1909. This indebtedness is especially true of the summarised analysis of the various works of Ruysbroeck.

Later it may be possible to give a complete and faithful English rendering of all Ruysbroeck's Works from the critical edition which is at present preparing in Louvain; where there is an active revival of interest in this great and holy Mystic of the Netherlands.

For the judgment of competent witnesses as to the permanent value and extraordinary sublimity of B. John's writings the reader is referred to the body of this work under the heading, _Some Appreciations_.

The usual protest is made according to the Decrees of Urban VIII. concerning alleged miracles, etc., recorded in these pages.

St. Ives, Cornwall,

_Feast of Our Lady's Nativity_, 1910.

A Mediaeval Mystic