- Qui sequitur me, non ambulat in tenebris
- Regnum Dei intra vos est dicit Dominus
- De sacramento. Venite ad me omnes qui labo-
ratis
- Audiam quid loquator in me Dominus Deus
In other manuscripts and incunabula, treatises I, II,
and IV often appear as a unity. If one considers the
contents of these works and the titles given by Thomas
in his autograph of 1441, this unity is not purely a co-
incidence. A codex belonging to a monastery of Canons
Regular at Nijmegen, now in the Royal Library in Brus-
sels (manuscript no. 22084), makes clear that the four
libelli of De Imitatione Christi already circulated in
1427, fi fteen years before Thomas completed his fi nal
redaction in the autograph mentioned above.
In treatise I, Admonitiones ad spiritualem vitam
utiles, Thomas formulates, for beginners in spiritual
life, some points of advice concerning a life in silence,
prayer, and study. In treatise II, Admonitiones ad interna
trahentes, Thomas merely describes the mental state that
the young religious has to develop to consider prayer
as a privileged place where one is able to meet Christ
personally instead of a mechanical duty. Treatise III, De
interna consolatione, is Thomas’s personal testimony
of his intimate relationship with Christ in daily life of
the monastic community. Thomas points out that the
life of a person who is looking for God is not without
obstacles. He wrote this book, furthermore, to provide
consolation. Finally, treatise IV of the De Imitatio
Christi contains refl ections on the Holy Eucharist that
are characteristic of the time in which the Imitatio was
composed but not strictly coordinated with the contents
of the fi rst three books. It is especially in these books
that Thomas develops the concept of a “journey” for
the faithful. Here he fi rst describes the inner disposition
from which one can be open to Christ and follow Him
in the most appropriate and fruitful way. From stud-
ies made after those of Delaissé mentioned above, the
conclusion can be drawn that Thomas made the stylistic
improvements in the Imitatio not because of his love for
the beauty of the (Latin) language, the latinitas, but for
catechetical reasons.
Other treatises, like the Orationes et meditationes de
vita Christi, have a more theological character. In his
Hortulus rosarum and Soliloquium animae, Thomas
shows his gifts as a spiritual writer. All but one of his
works were composed in Latin; he wrote a small treatise
in Middle Dutch: Van goeden woerden to horen ende die
to spreken. Finally, he compiled his sermones in three
coherent cycles.
One can easily conclude that the quantity of schol-
arly contributions on the sources, style, and theology
in Thomas à Kempis’s opera omnia (complete works)
stands in no proportion to the enormous amount of
literature devoted to his authorship of the Imitatio. The
study of his theology is in an early stage; up until now,
no attempt has been made at a synthesis. Recent inves-
tigation has shown that Thomas’s originality lies in his
view that the ascetic structuring of life is explained by
the mystical longing that Thomas wants to develop in
each person. In his theological anthropology, mystical
aspirations are exclusively nourished and purifi ed by a
realization of the self in an ascetic way of life. Further-
more, his spirituality is strongly Christ-centered.
Further Reading
Ampe, Albert, and Bernhard Spaapen. “Imitatio Christi. I. Le
livre et l’auteur.—II. Doctrine,” in Dictionnaire de spiritu-
alité, ed. Marcel Viller. Paris: Beauchense, 1932ff, vol. 7,
cols. 2338–2355.
Delaissé, L. J. M. Le Manuscrit autographe de Thomas à Kempis
et “L’Imitation.” Examen archéologique et édition diplo-
matique du Bruxellensis 5855–5861. 2 vols. Paris: Erasme,
1956.
Ingram, John K., ed. The Earliest English Translation of the First
Three Books of De imitatione Christi ... London: K. Paul,
Trench, Trubner, 1893.
Pohl, Michael Joseph, ed. Thomae a Kempis canonici regularis
ordinis S. Augustini Opera Omnia, 7 vols. Freibourg im Bre-
isgau: Herder, 1902–1922.
Puyol, Pierre-Édouard. L’auteur du livre De Imitatione Christi.
Première section: la contestation. Paris: Retaux, 1899.
van Dijk, Rudolf, Th.M. “Thomas Hemerken à Kempis,” in Dic-
tionnaire de spiritualité, ed. Marcel Viller. Paris: Beauchense,
1932ff., vol. 15, cols. 817–826.
van Geest, Paul. “Thomas Hemerken a Kempis,” in Die deutsche
Literatur des Mittelalters: Verfasserlexikon, ed. Kurt Ruh et
al., vol. 9. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1978, cols. 862–882.
——. “Introduction,” in Thomas a Kempis: La vallée des Lis.
Bégrolles-en-Mauges: Abbaye de Bellefontaine, 1992, pp.
11–48.
——. “De sermones van Thomas a Kempis; een terreinverken-
ning.” Trajecta 2 (1993): 305–326.
——. Thomas a Kempis (1379/80–1471): een studie van zijn
mens- en godsbeeld: analyse en tekstuitgave van de Hortulus
Rosarum en de Vallis Liliorum. Kampen: Kok, 1996.
Weiler, Anton G. “Recent Historiography on the Modern Devo-
tion: Some Debated Questions.” Archief voor de geschiedenis
van de katholieke kerk in Nederland 26 (1984): 161–184.
“The works of Thomas à Kempis,” trans. Michael Joseph Pohl. 6
vols. Ph.d. diss., University of London, 1905–1908.
Paul J. J. van Geest
THOMAS D’ANGLETERRE
(fl. 2nd half of the 12th c.)
Eight fragments totaling 3,146 octosyllabic lines, dis-
tributed among fi ve manuscripts, are all that remain of
Thomas’s Tristan, composed ca. 1175 for the nobility
of Norman England. The author may have been a clerk
at the court of Henry II Plantagenêt in London. The
fragments of Thomas’s Tristan preserve essentially the
last part of the story, from Tristan’s exile in Brittany to
THOMAS D’ANGLETERRE
