Success Quote by Johannes Tauler

Tauler is doing something subtler than scaring people into moral compliance. He’s mapping a psychology of drift: the way small compromises don’t just add up, they re-train the soul. “Venial in themselves” acknowledges the official taxonomy of sin, but he refuses to let the category become a loophole. The point isn’t that minor sins secretly count as major ones; it’s that they rewire your appetites so that major ones become easier. In modern terms, he’s describing habit formation as spiritual formation.

The phrasing matters. “Do not kill all grace” grants that grace isn’t a fragile houseplant that dies the minute you look away; it has stamina. Yet “do harm, nevertheless” insists the damage is real even when it’s not immediately catastrophic. Then comes the slippery triad: “apt, ready, and inclined.” That’s not theological ornamentation; it’s a progression from capacity to preparedness to desire. Tauler isn’t obsessed with isolated acts as much as the person those acts are slowly producing.

Context sharpens the edge. As a 14th-century Dominican tied to the Rhineland mystical tradition, Tauler preaches inward discipline: the heart’s orientation, not just external correctness. The subtext is pastoral and suspicious of self-deception. If you treat “venial” as “safe,” you’ll start managing sin instead of resisting it, and your spiritual life becomes an accounting trick. Tauler’s intent is to restore moral seriousness without collapsing into despair: grace remains, but it’s not a permission slip. It’s a power that still needs cooperation.