s in sincerity after
God will find Him, for He is very nigh, even in the heart of the
seeker.[21] He deals in an interesting way with the important
contemporary problem--raised by the prevalence of the emphasis on an
inward Divine Presence--whether human Perfection is possible in this
life. His {217} conclusion is that the tendency to sin remains so long
as "the mortal body" lasts. No person will ever reach a stage of
earthly life in which the spur of the flesh is eradicated, and so no
person can be infallibly certain that he is beyond sin, but when Christ
is inwardly united to the soul and His Spirit dwells in us and reigns
in us and we are risen in soul, spirit, and mind with Him, then we live
no longer after the flesh, or according to its thrust and push, but
share His life and partake of the conquering power of His Spirit; and
thus, though "sown in imperfection we are raised in perfection."[22]
The important matter, however, is not that one call himself a
"Perfectist," but that he actually live "in this earthly pilgrimage and
in this vale of sinfull flesh" in the power of Eternity and by the
Light of Christ, whose fulness may be revealed in himself.[23]

John Ellistone, Sparrow's kinsman and able helper in the work of
bringing Boehme into English thought, holds the same fundamental ideas
as his co-labourer, though he has his own peculiar style and his own
unique way of uttering himself. The stress of his emphasis is always
on first-hand experience--what he calls "an effectual, living,
essential knowledge and real spiritual being of it in one's own
soul";[24] and the brunt of his attack is {218} always against a
religion of "notions"--what he calls "verball, high-flowne, contrived
knowledge and vapouring Notions," constructed from "the mental idolls
of approved masters."[25] Religion, he maintains, can no more consist
of "the letter" or of "a talkative historicall account" than music can
consist of a row of written notes. These things are only signs for the
direction of the skilful musician who must himself _make_ the sounds on
his instrument before there is any music. So, too, if there is to be
any real religion in the world, we Christians must do more than read
and approve "the deciphered writings of illuminated men," we must act
by the same Spirit that inspired those men, we must be "practitioners
of the Divine Light," we must give "living expression to Divine love
and righteousness," we must "practice the