The divine life in three treatises

2. Yea, your thoughts are erroneous and false, which is more than barely ignorant, if God be not in them. You have false thoughts of the world, of your houses and lands, and friends and pleasures, and whatsoever, is the daily employment of your minds. You take them to be something, when they are ⟨p. 214⟩nothing; you are covetous of the empty purse, and know not that you cast away the treasure: You are thirsty after the empty cup, when you wilfully cast away the drink. You hungrily seek to feed upon a painted feast: You murder the creature by separating it from God who is its life, and then you are enamoured on the carcass, and spend your days and thoughts in its cold embracements. Your thoughts are but vagabonds, straggling abroad the world, and following impertinences, if God be not in them. You are like men that walk up and down in their sleep, or like those that have lost themselves in the dark, who weary themselves in going they know not whither, and have no end, nor certain way.

2. Yea, your thoughts are erroneous and false, which is more than barely ignorant, if God be not in them. You have false thoughts of the world, of your houses and lands, and friends and pleasures, and whatsoever, is the daily employment of your minds. You take them to be something, when they are ⟨p. 214⟩nothing; you are covetous of the empty purse, and know not that you cast away the treasure: You are thirsty after the empty cup, when you wilfully cast away the drink. You hungrily seek to feed upon a painted feast: You murder the creature by separating it from God who is its life, and then you are enamoured on the carkass, and spend your daies and thoughts in its cold embracements. Your thoughts are but vagabonds, stragling abroad the world, and following impertinencies, if God be not in them. You are like men that walk up and down in their sleep, or like those that have lost themselves in the dark, who weary themselves in going they know not whither, and have no end, nor certain way.

3. If God be not in all your thoughts, they are all in vain. They are like the drone that gathereth no honey: They fly abroad and return home empty: They bring home no matter of honour to God, of profit or comfort to your selves: They are employed to no more purpose than in your dreams: Only they are more capable of sin: Like the distracted thoughts of one that doteth in a fever, they are all but non-sense, whatever you employ them on, while you leave out God who is the sense of all.