The bodily weakness of the writer. His occupations. A blessing-wish from the child Jesus.

What this letter is. One of the rare, plainly autobiographical letters in the collection — a window onto Tersteegen's own frail health. He tells a brother that since their last meeting he has "twice again been visited with peculiar weaknesses, so that I thought the tent would fall in." He describes it concretely: very weak when the last letter came, then, trying to "walk a while in the sun," "overtaken by such a faintness that I thought I should die before I reached home," followed by "heart-palpitations, anxiety, and fever." Yet "God, who is merciful, has thus far left room for sanctification," and raised him up enough to keep visiting and serving the sick — for "there are here various people far sicker than I," from whom "I find no liberty to withhold myself." Then comes a stroke of pure humility: he trusts Jesus will not leave him "unvisited and unrefreshed" when he needs it — "not as a wage for my work, for then I should get hell, but because He is so good, and I so wretched." He asks the "dear children" to pray that God would "make the short remainder of my days truly fruitful," and reports that he has "given my few dealings quite away" and even withdraws "from medicine, as much as ever I can" — the point being to grow "empty of the images of things," and so "rightly receptive of the working of God." The letter ends in a wholly different, tender register: a New-Year-style blessing from "the child Jesus," "whose heart… is alone and wholly Love. Nowhere is there Love, save in this heart" — a love that "would sink itself into our heart," until "He make us, too, wholly into love. Amen! Jesus, greet your house!"

A few words and echoes.

• The tent that would fall in. His figure for his failing body — "the tent would fall in" — is Paul's, "if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved" (2 Corinthians 5:1): the body as a tent, temporary and ready to come down.
• Not as a wage. The letter's most disarming line: he expects Christ's help not as payment earned — "for then I should get hell" — but purely as gift, "because He is so good, and I so wretched." Grace, not merit, is his whole ground even in sickness.
• Emptying the head, not just the heart. An unusually precise spiritual note: it is "so good when not only the heart, but also the head, becomes more and more empty of the images of things." His withdrawal from business and medicine serves that inward emptying — receptivity to God requires quieting the mind's clutter, not only the affections.
• The heart of the child Jesus. The closing blessing locates all love in one place — "nowhere is there Love, save in this heart" — even the love of "saint… angel… seraph" being borrowed from it. It is his gentle gloss on "God is love" (1 John 4:8), with the accent on the Christ-child.