A pure heart is one which is worried by nothing and is tied to nothing...

 

And as true obedience should have no 'I want this,' so too one should never hear from it 'I don't want,' for 'I don't want' is an absolute bane of all obedience.
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The most powerful prayer, one well-nigh omnipotent to gain all things, and the noblest work of all is that which proceeds from a pure heart. The more pure it is, the more powerful, worthy, useful, praiseworthy and perfect the prayer and the work. A pure heart can do all things. What is a pure heart?
A pure heart is one which is worried by nothing and is tied to nothing, which has not bound its best part to any mode, does not seek its own in anything, that is fully immersed in God's dearest will and gone out of its own.
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Do you want to know who is a truly poor man? That man is truly poor in spirit who can do without anything unnecessary. That is why he who sat naked in his tub said to Alexander the Great, to whom the whole world was subject, 'I am a greater ruler than you, for I have rejected more things than you have ever possessed. What you think it a great thing to possess, is too petty for me to scorn.' He is far more blessed who can do without all things and have no need of them, than he who has possession of all things and has wants. That man is the best who can do without what he does not need. Therefore he who can do without and despise the most has abandoned most. It seems a great thing if a man gives up a thousand marks of gold for God's sake and builds many hermitages and monasteries and feeds all the poor: that would be a great deed. But he would be far more blessed who should despise as much for God's sake. That man would possess very heaven who could for God's sake renounce all things, whatever God gave or did not give.
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Concerning this inner, noble man in whom God's seed and God's image are impressed and sown, and how the seed and the image of divine nature and divine being, God's Son, appears and is made man­ ifest - but, too, is sometimes concealed - the great master Origen gives a simile: that God's image, God's Son, is in the ground of the soul like a living fountain. If earth is thrown on it (that is, earthly desire), that hinders and covers it up so that it is not recognized or perceived; yet it remains living within, and when the earth that was thrown on to it from without is removed, it appears visibly. He says this truth is indicated in the First Book of Moses, where it says that Abraham had dug wells of living water in his fi eld, and evildoers fi lled them with earth, and later when the earth was removed the living streams reappeared.

Here is another simile: the sun is always shining but, if there is a cloud or fog between us and the sun, we do not perceive its radiance.

Likewise, if the eye is weak and sick in itself, or is covered over, it perceives no light. I have also sometimes used a clear example: if an artist wants to make an image from wood or stone, he does not put the image into the wood, but he cuts away the chips that had hidden and concealed the image: he gives nothing to the wood but takes from it, cutting away the overlay and removing the dross, and then that which was hidden under it shines forth. That is the treasure hidden in a field of which our Lord tells in the Gospel (Matt. 13:44).

St. Augustine says that when the soul is turned entirely upward into eternity, into God alone, then God's image shines forth and glows; but when the soul is turned outward, if only to the outward practice of virtue, then the image is totally veiled.

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There are some poor people who will go back home and say, 'I shall settle down and eat my bread and serve God.' By the eternal truth I declare that these people will remain in error, and will never be able to strive for and win what those others achieve who follow God in poverty and exile. Amen.
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The other thing I want to tell you is that many a dull-witted man will declare that a lot of the things I have said in this book and elsewhere are not true. To this I reply with what St. Augustine says in the first book of his Confessions. He says God has now made all future things for thousands and thousands of years (if the world should last so long), and that He will make today all things which have passed away many thousand years ago. How can I help it if anyone does not understand this? And elsewhere he says that that man is obviously too fond of himself who wants to blind others to hide his own blindness. I am satisfied if what I say and write is true in me and in God. He who sees a stick thrust into the water thinks the stick is crooked, although it is quite straight; this is due to the water being denser than the air. But the stick is straight, not crooked, both in itself and in the eyes of him who sees it in clear air.

St. Augustine says, 'He who, free from all thoughts, all bodily forms and images, perceives within himself that which no outward seeing has conveyed to him, knows that this is true. But he who does not know this laughs and mocks at me, and I pity him. But such people want to behold and taste eternal things and divine activities, and stand in the light of eternity, while yet their heart is flitting about in yesterday and tomorrow.' A pagan master, Seneca, says, 'Great and lofty things should be discussed with great and lofty minds and with exalted souls.' And some will say that such teachings should not be uttered or written to the unlearned. To this I reply, if one may not teach the unlearned, then no one can teach or write. For we teach the unlearned so that from being unlearned they may become learned. If there were nothing new there would be nothing old. "Those who are well," says our Lord, "have no need of medicine" (Luke 5:31 ). The physician is there to heal the sick. But if anyone misinterprets this saying, how can he help it who rightly teaches this saying, which is right?

from the book The Complete Mystical Works of Meister Eckhart (Meister Eckhart, Maurice OC. Walshe etc.)