Volumes ii and iii of the Works of Thomas Traherne contain Traherne's encyclopaedic Commentaries of heaven, a manuscript with a thrilling history. Found on a burning rubbish heap near Liverpool in 1967, it was picked up by a man who had gone to the tip to look for spare parts for his car. Little is known of the early provenance of the Commentaries. Twice, in 1844 and 1854, it passed through Sotheby's into and out of the hands of booksellers and collectors along with the Dobell poems, but was not identified as Traherne's. Irregular collation and glue seepage between leaves suggest that at least some of the manuscript was originally a stack of blank paper, gathered and folded as he worked rather than previously folded and sewn leaves. Seventeenth-century pins attest to the fact that Traherne attached extra pages as he went along; however, Commentaries of heaven is not an improvised or unplanned work. Numerous cross-references, signalled by the words ‘vid’, ‘vide’ or ‘see’, suggest that Traherne had planned what would be included under each topic in a multi-volume work. He had in mind what Ross calls ‘a transparent, unadorned classification of things’.

The inclusion of everything and the meaning of words is crucial in this, but for Traherne words needed commentary as well as definition. Commentaries fits within the general making of English dictionaries and study of etymology that was coming of age in the seventeenth century, but it is more than a dictionary. His entries typically begin with a definition of the word, followed by etymology, then an extensive exploration of the several meanings of the word, its associations and some misapprehensions related to it. He draws this wide range of comment into a poem at the end, and often links one entry to the next by images or phrases, so that they are related by more than alphabetical proximity. For instance the final stanza of ‘Baptism’ states ‘I am a Tree … My care must be to bear much fruit’, while the next entry ‘Baseness’ begins ‘That they that are Baptized should be Barren is inconsistent with their Duty Beauty and Felicite’.

As in The kingdom of God, in this work too Traherne intended to be comprehensive with titles that range in subject from ‘Abhorrence’ to ‘Arithmetick’, ‘Atom’ and ‘Bastard’. The title page promises that all things shall be ‘discovered to be Objects of Happiness’ and entry titles such as ‘Abundance’ and ‘All Things’ simply reiterate what its ambitious and inclusive design has suggested – that nothing is outside divine interest and notice, that nothing is outside theology. Theology was for him the ‘queen of sciences’; in Commentaries of heaven theology is placed within the heart of the acquisition of knowledge. Commentaries is not just a compendium of theological knowledge, but an interweaving of theology with science, natural history, politics, social theory, philosophy, in short an integrated study of the world.

Commentaries shows textual and thematic affinities with the Commonplace book, though he used a much broader range of sources than appear there. His entries ‘Antichrist’ and ‘Antiquitie’ use some of the same sources as he used for Romans forgeries: George Downame, John Jewel, John Rainoldes. It is likely that he composed several works at once, shifting material from one to the other as required – there are some short passages that are almost word for word the same as passages from The kingdom of heaven, whilst other passages show close similarities with the Church's year-book and Christian ethicks. Stylistically, Commentaries combines the desire to catalogue and describe that is seen in The kingdom of God and Christian ethicks with his more familiar forms – meditation and poetry. Commentaries also gives us rare glimpses of Traherne the man in the testimonial and anecdotal illustrations we see in such entries as ‘Ants’, ‘Apparel’ and ‘Baptism’. In common with most theological writers of the period, Traherne railed against heresy and schism – Socinians, Quakers, papists – anything that would threaten the autonomy and unity of the national Church. In Commentaries, Traherne's polemic, poetic, doctrinal, philosophical, meditative, scientific, naturalist, pastoral and political voices are all present. Felicity, that great theme of his Centuries and Poetry, is served, not silenced by all of this. As the title of Commentaries reminds us, the aim of the book is to show how all things may become objects of happiness. It is a work not to be missed not just by Traherne scholars, but by anyone interested in the integrated nature of thought in the early modern period.

In volume iv Ross includes three works connected by their shared sources. The first two, Traherne's Church's year-book (to which title she adds Meditations and devotions from the resurrection to All Saints Day) and his A serious and pathetical contemplation of the mercies of GOD in several most devout and sublime thanksgivings for the same most commonly known as the Thanksgivings, are clearly Traherne's. The third work in volume iv is the Meditations on the six days of creation, sometimes called the Hexameron, and also attributed to Susanna Hopton, the Herefordshire devotional writer and friend of Traherne's. The authorship of this work, Ross admits, is under question; she includes it so that its authorship might be made more certain by its being made available for scrutiny.

The Church's year-book is one of three manuscripts that belonged to book collectors Grossart and Dobell. Along with the better known Centuries and the Dobell poems, it was purchased in the Faringdon Road in the late 1890s but it is published here for the first time. Because it does not cover the entire church year, previous scholars have seen the Church's year-book as one in a series of manuscripts that were either lost or never completed. Ross's argument however, is that the book stands entire, articulating, along with so many of his other works, a passionate concern for the Restoration Church; her addition to the title of the Church's year-book highlights that period in the church's year – Easter, Pentecost and beyond – that looks at the foundation of the early Church which she sees as corresponding to the Restoration.

Both the Church's year-book and the Thanksgivings abound in praise and gratitude, both use lists and catalogue to show God's overflowing goodness. Where the Year-book offers prayers and praises, the Thanksgivings are an inventory of mercies. Ross's placing of the books together underlines their similar functions and suggests their usefulness for public worship as well as private prayer. A particular gem is the preface to the Thanksgivings, first published twenty-five years after Traherne's death, that gives us one of the few descriptions of his character.

Ross's thoughtful editing of these books illuminates the texts and brings new interpretations that will enrich even the most experienced readers of Traherne's works.