Book Recommendation: Spiritual Torrents

Title: Spiritual Torrents Author: de la Motte Guyon Year: 1790 Description: Available free at: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25133 Also available on Amazon. Amazon Customer Review: You will doubtless either love or hate this work of baroque Christian mysticism, depending on your interests and the stage of your own spiritual journey. Guyon is not an easy read. Her metaphors and imagery can be at times obscure and at times disconcerting- even grotesque. She was the genuine article. however, and sincerely believed in her visions and her mission to evangelize. To borrow a quote from the Bard, for Guyon the "time was out of joint/ O cursed spite". She was a Counter-Reformation, Baroque mystic in the tradition of a Teresa of Avila living however at the end of the 17th century in France, a time of scientific and intellectual progress which had little use for Christian mystics. A century earlier- even in France- she would probably have been canonized as a saint. As it was, she was condemned by the Church as a madwoman and a heretic. Still, if you are interested in the history of Christian mysticism or in French 17th century history in general, she is a woman who deserves- nay, demands- to be read and studied. She influenced such major authors as Bossuet and Fenelon (in very different ways, of course) and her influence was felt long after her death all across Europe (John and Charles Wesley read and admired her work.)