What is the ground, kernel, and aim of all godliness.

The Thirty-eighth Letter.

What is the ground, kernel, and aim of all godliness.

Beloved friend and brother!

Both your first letter, by way of D., and your latter one, of the fifth of this month, I duly received, and would gladly have written you something back long ago; I have all along waited for an opportunity to be able to send you a letter.

I hope, beloved brother, that you are there, in your place, still occupied in the great and only-needful work that lies upon us in this time of preparation, and to which the Lord has especially called us, and still ever calls us: namely, to exercise yourself in dying — through thorough self-denial — to all self-life, love, and pleasure in the creature and in ourselves, so as to live, in resigned dependence and love, in God's presence and in blessed fellowship, by the mighty aid of His grace. This little is the ground, kernel, and aim of all godliness. Whoever does not build his piety on this ground, his Christianity stands on a sand-foundation of vain thoughts, imaginations, and opinions, and, when the storm-winds blow, it will fall in a heap. Whoever does not dig after this kernel, but seeks and means it only in all outward means, exercises, and duties, will see at the end that he has but a dry, empty, wretched husk and show, wherein his eternal spirit will find no peace, nor the least satisfaction. And whoever does not keep this aim constantly before his eyes in all his doing and being, runs darkened in a maze, takes up, with good intent, a thousand ways, images, and exercises, and then sometimes sees, after many years, that he has only run round in a circle, and is still just the same man he was long ago.

Blessed is he to whom the Lord opens the eyes in good time, to know this one thing needful livingly, and who strives to spend his little lifetime with it! Only take good heed, inwardly, with a childlike, devout mind, to the hidden chastenings and instructions of the Spirit of Jesus, who little by little reveals to us our secret attachments and life in the creatures, as also our deep-rooted self-love, self-will, and many other abominations; and then let all this be denied and given up, out of free, hearty love to the Lord, however fast it may sit at the old Adam's heart — for which the Lord will not refuse us all the needful grace, when we seek it of Him with heartfelt prayer of the heart. And the more, thereby, all pleasure and love of the world and of everything is withdrawn, the easier and sweeter it always becomes to turn to God, to live in His presence and fellowship, and to have one's true delight in the Lord — who will then indeed give us what our heart desires: namely, Himself, with all His goods.

May He, the gracious, faithful Friend of man, grant us and all souls that long for it to experience it in substance! I greet and embrace you in His love, as brother N. and N. greet you too. Greet B. also on my behalf. May God's mercy bring him also right again, to seek God sincerely and with the whole heart. I remain

Your

Mülheim, 8 April 1728.

weak fellow-pilgrim toward Zion.

German

Der 38te Brief.

Was der Grund, Kern und Zweck der ganzen Gottseligkeit sey.

Geliebter Freund und Bruder!

Sowohl deinen ersten Brief über D., als auch deinen letzteren vom fünften dieses Monats habe wohl erhalten, hätte dir auch vorlängst gern etwas zurück geschrieben, und hab immer auf Gelegenheit gewartet, dir ein Brieflein überschicken zu können.

— Opening lines of the original German. The complete transcription of all 605 letters appears in the forthcoming Encounter Press critical edition; Brief 1 is shown in full as a sample.

German text: public domain (1773–75 first edition / 1845 Gesammelte Schriften).