Page:The Labyrinth of the World and the Paradise of the Heart.pdf/326

322 necessary, on their own hands, they shield them from injury. Here, too, I understood how great is the import of godliness; for these beautiful and pure spirits remained only where they smelt the perfume of virtue, while they were driven away by the stink of sin and uncleanliness.

2. I saw also (and it is not beseeming to conceal this) another advantage of this holy, invisible companionship—to wit, that the angels were not only as guards, but also as teachers to the chosen. They often give them secret knowledge of divers things, and teach them the deep secret mysteries of God. For as they ever behold the countenance of the omniscient God, nothing that a godly man can wish to know can be secret to them, and with God's permission they reveal that which they know, and which it is necessary that the chosen should know. Therefore the heart of the godly often feels that which has befallen elsewhere, mourns with the mournful, and rejoices with the joyful. Therefore, also, can they, by means of dreams and other visions, or of secret inspirations, imagine in their minds that which has befallen, or befalls, or will befall. Thence comes also other increase of the gifts of God within us, deep, valuable meditations, divers wondrous discoveries by means of which man often surpasses himself, though he knows not how he has that power. Oh, blessed school of the sons of God! It is this which often