TREATISE

ON THE

LOVE OF GOD

xlviii 1

Dedicatory Prayer

MOST holy Mother of God, vessel of incomparable election, Queen of sovereign dilection, thou art the most lovely, the most loving and most beloved of all creatures! The love of the heavenly Father found its good pleasure in thee from all eternity, destining thy chaste heart to the perfection of holy love, to the end that one day thou mightest love his only Son with unique motherly love as he had done from all eternity with unique fatherly love. O Saviour Jesus, to whom could I better dedicate words on thy love, than to the most amiable heart of the well-beloved of thy soul?

But O all triumphant Mother! Who can cast his eyes upon thy majesty without seeing at thy right hand him whom for the love of thee thy Son deigned so often to honour with the title of father, having united him unto thee by the celestial bond of a most virginal marriage, that he might be thy coadjutor and helper in the charge of the direction and education of his divine infancy? O great S. Joseph! Most beloved spouse of the well-beloved Mother, ah! how often hast thou borne in thy arms the love of heaven and earth, while, inflamed with the sweet embraces and kisses of this Divine child, thy soul melted away with joy while he tenderly whispered in thy ears (O God what sweetness!) that thou wast his great friend and his well-beloved father.

Of old the lamps of the ancient temple were placed upon golden lilies. O Mary and Joseph, Pair without peer! Sacred lilies of incomparable beauty, amongst which the well-beloved 2feeds himself and feeds all his lovers—ah! if I may give myself any hope that this love-writing may enlighten and inflame the children of light, where can I better lay it than amongst your lilies, wherein the Sun of Justice, the splendour and brightness of the eternal light, did so sovereignly recreate himself that he there fulfilled the delights of the ineffable love of his heart towards us? O well-beloved mother of the well-beloved Son, O well-beloved spouse of the well-beloved mother! Prostrate before the feet of you who bore my Saviour, I dedicate and consecrate this little work of love to the immense greatness of your love. Ah! I conjure you by the heart of your sweet Jesus, King of hearts, whom your hearts adore—animate my heart, and all hearts that shall read this writing, by your all powerful favour with the Holy Ghost, that henceforth we may offer up in holocaust all our affections to his divine goodness, to live, die, and live again for ever, amid the flames of this heavenly fire, which Our Lord your son has so much desired to kindle in our hearts, that he never ceased to labour and sigh for this until death, even the death of the cross.

Preface

VIVE JÉSUS.

PREFACE.

THE Holy Ghost teaches that the lips of the heavenly Spouse, that is The Church, resemble scarlet and the dropping honeycomb,[1] to let every one know that all the doctrine which she announces consists in sacred love; of a more resplendent red than scarlet on account of the blood of the spouse whose love inflames her, sweeter than honey on account of the sweetness of the beloved who crowns her with delights. So this heavenly spouse when he thought good to begin the promulgation of his law, cast down upon the assembly of those disciples whom he had deputed for this work a shower of fiery tongues, sufficiently intimating thereby that the preaching of the gospel was wholly designed for the inflaming of hearts.

Represent to yourself beautiful doves amidst the rays of the sun; you will see their plumage break into as many different colours as you change your point of viewing them; because their feathers are so fitted to display the light, that when the sun comes to spread his splendour on them, a multitude of reflections are made, producing a great variety of tints and glancing colours, colours so agreeable to the eye that they surpass all other colours, even the enamel of richest jewels; colours so resplendent and so delicately gilded that the gilding makes their own colours more bright than ever; for it was this sight which made the royal prophet say If you sleep among the midst of lots; you shall be as the wings of a dove covered with silver, and the hinder parts of her back with the paleness of gold.[1] The Church is indeed adorned with an excellent variety of teachings, 4sermons, treatises and spiritual books, all very beautiful and pleasant to the sight by reason of the admirable mingling which the Sun of Justice makes of his divine wisdom with the tongues of his pastors, which are their feathers, and with their pens, which sometimes hold the place of tongues, and form the rich plumage of this mystic dove. But amongst all the divers colours of the doctrine which she displays, the fine gold of holy Charity is everywhere spread, and makes itself excellently visible, gilding all the science of the saints with its incomparable lustre, and raising it above every other science. All is love's, and in love, for love, and of love, in the holy Church.

But as we are not ignorant that all the light of the day proceeds from the sun and yet we ordinarily say that the sun does not shine, except only when it openly sends out its beams here or there; in like manner, though all Christian doctrine be about sacred love, yet we do not honour all theology indifferently with the title of this divine love, but only those parts of it which regard the birth, nature, properties and operations thereof in particular.

Now it is true that divers writers have already handled this subject; above all those ancient Fathers, who as they did lovingly serve God so did they speak divinely of his love. O how good it is to hear S. Paul speak of heavenly things, who learned them even in heaven itself, and how good to see those souls who were nursed in the bosom of love write of its holy sweetness! For this reason those amongst the schoolmen that discoursed the most and the best of it, did also most excel in piety. S. Thomas has made a treatise on it worthy of S. Thomas; S. Bonaventure and B. Denis the Carthusian have made divers most excellent ones on it under various titles, and as for John Gerson, Chancellor of the University of Paris, Sixtus Senensis speaks of him thus: "He has so worthily discoursed of the fifty properties of divine love which are described in the course of the Canticle of Canticles, that he alone would seem to have taken proper account of the affections of the love of God." Truly this man was extremely learned, judicious and devout.

And that we may know this kind of writings to be made more successfully by the devotion of lovers than by the learning 5of the wise, it has pleased the Holy Ghost that many women should work wonders in it. Who has ever better expressed the heavenly passions of sacred love, than S. Catharine of Genoa, S. Angela of Foligno, S. Catharine of Siena, S. Mechtilde?

In our age also many have written upon this subject, whose works I have not had leisure to read distinctly but only here and there so far forth as was requisite to discover whether this book might yet find place. Father Louis of Granada, that great doctor of piety, has placed a treatise of the love of God in his Memorial, which is sufficiently commended in saying it is his. Diego Stella, of the Order of S. Francis, made another, which is very effective and profitable for prayer. Christopher Fonseca, an Augustinian, brought out one still larger, wherein he has many excellent things. Father Louis Richeome of the Society has also published a book under the title of The Art of Loving God by his Creatures, and this author is so amiable in his person and in his beautiful writings that doubtless he is even more so when writing of love itself. Father John of Jesus Maria, a discalced Carmelite, has composed a little book which is also called The Art of Loving God, and which is much esteemed. That great and celebrated Cardinal Bellarmine has also lately issued a little book entitled: The Ladder for Ascending unto God by his Creatures, which cannot be but admirable coming from that most learned hand and most devout soul, who has written so much and so wisely in the Church's behalf. I will say nothing of the Parenetic of that river of eloquence[1] who flows at present through all France in the multitude and variety of his sermons and noble writings. The close spiritual consanguinity which my soul has contracted with his, when by the imposition of my hands he received the sacred character of the episcopal order, to the great happiness of the diocese of Belley and to the honour of the Church, besides a thousand ties of a sincere friendship which fasten us together, permits me not to speak with praise of his works, amongst which this Parenetic of divine love was one of the first sallies of the matchless wealth of intellect which every one admires in him.

We see further a goodly and magnificent palace which the R. Father Laurence of Paris, a Capuchin preacher, erected in honour of heavenly love, which being finished will be a complete course of the Art of loving well. And lastly the B. Mother (S.) Teresa of Jesus, has written so accurately of the sacred movements of love in all the books she has left us, that one is amazed to see so much eloquence masked under such profound humility, such great solidity of wit in such great simplicity: and her most learned ignorance makes the knowledge of many learned men appear ignorant, who after long and laborious study have to blush at not understanding what she so happily puts down touching the practice of holy love. Thus does God raise the throne of his power upon the ground of our infirmity, making use of weak things to confound the strong.[1]

And although, my dear reader, this Treatise which I now present you, comes far short of those excellent works, without hope of ever running even with them, yet have I such confidence in the favour of the two heavenly lovers to whom I dedicate it, that still it may be in some way serviceable to you, and that in it you will meet with many wholesome considerations which you would not elsewhere so easily find, as again you may elsewhere find many beautiful things which are not here. Indeed, it even seems to me that my design is not the same as that of others except in general, inasmuch as we all look towards the glory of holy love. But this you will see by reading it.

Truly my intention is only to represent simply and naďvely, without art, still more without false colours, the history of the birth, progress, decay, operations, properties, advantages and excellences of divine love. And if besides this you find other things, these are but excrescences which it is almost impossible for such as me who write amidst many distractions to avoid. But still I think that there will be nothing without some utility. Nature herself, who is so skilful a workwoman, intending to produce grapes, produces at the same time, as by a prudent inadvertence, such an abundance of leaves and branches, that there are very few vines which have not in their season to be pruned of leaves and shoots.

Writers are often treated too harshly: the censures that are passed on them are given hastily, and very often with more incorrectness than they committed imprudence in hastening to publish their writings. Precipitation of judgment greatly puts in danger the conscience of the judge, and the innocence of the accused. Many write amiss and many censure foolishly. The kindness of the reader makes his reading sweet and profitable. And, my dear reader, to have you more favourable, I will here give you an explanation of some points which might peradventure otherwise put you out of humour.

Some perhaps will think that I have said too much, and that it was not requisite to go so deep down into the roots of the subject, but I am of opinion that heavenly love is a plant like to that which we call Angelica, whose root is no less odoriferous and wholesome than the stalk and the branches. The four first books and some chapters of the rest might without doubt have been omitted, without disadvantage to such souls as only seek the practice of holy love, yet all of it will be profitable unto them if they behold it with a devout eye: while others also might have been disappointed not to have had the whole of what belongs to the treatise of divine love. I have taken into consideration as I should do, the state of the minds of this age: it much imports to remember in what age we are writing.

I cite Scripture sometimes in other terms than those of the ordinary edition (the Vulgate). For God's sake, my dear reader do me not therefore the wrong to think that I wish to depart from that edition. Ah no! For I know the Holy Ghost has authorized it by the sacred Council of Trent, and that therefore all of us ought to keep to it: on the contrary I only use the other versions for the service of this, when they explain and confirm its true sense. For example what the heavenly spouse says to his spouse: Thou hast wounded my heart:[1] is greatly illustrated by the other version: Thou hast taken away my heart, or, Thou hast snatched away and ravished my heart. That which our Saviour said: Blessed are the poor in spirit: is much amplified and cleared by the Greek: Blessed are the beggars in spirit: and so with others.

I have often cited the sacred Psalmist in verse, and this to recreate your mind and on account of the ease with which I could do it, by the beautiful translation of Phillip des Portes, Abbot of Tiron. This however I have sometimes departed from; not of course thinking I could improve the verses of this famous poet (for I should be too impertinent if never having so much as thought of this kind oŁ writing, I should pretend to be happy in it in an age and condition of life which would oblige me to retire from it in case I had ever been engaged therein), but in some places where the sense might be variously taken, I have not followed his verse, because I would not follow his sense, as in Psalm cxxxii., where he has taken a certain Latin word for the fringe of the garment which I thought ought to be taken for the collar, wherefore I have translated it to my own mind.

I have said nothing which I have not learned of others, yet it is impossible for me to remember whence I had everything in particular, but believe me, if I had taken any lengthy and remarkable passages out of any author, I would make it a matter of conscience not to let him have the deserved honour of it, and to remove a suspicion which you may conceive against my sincerity in this matter, I warn you that the 13th chapter of Book VII. is extracted from a sermon which I delivered at Paris at S. John's en Grčve upon the feast of the Assumption of our Blessed Lady, 1602.

I have not always expressed the sequence of the chapters, but if you notice you will easily find the links of their connection. In that and several other things I had a care to spare my own leisure and your patience. After I had caused the Introduction to a Devout Life to be printed, my Lord Archbishop of Vienne, Peter de Villars, did me the favour of writing his opinion of it in terms so advantageous to that little book and to me, that I should never dare to rehearse them: and exhorting me to apply the most of my leisure to the like works, amongst many rare counsels he favoured me with, one was that as far as the matter would permit I should always be short in the chapters. For as, said he, travellers knowing that there is a fair garden some twenty or twenty-five paces out of their way, readily turn aside 9so short a distance to go see it, which they would not do if it were further distant; even so those who know that there is but little distance between the beginning and end of a chapter do willingly undertake to read it, which they would not do though the subject were never so delightful, if a long time were required for the reading of it. And therefore I had good reason to follow my own inclination in this respect since it was agreeable to this great personage who was one of the most saintly prelates and learned doctors that the Church has had in our age, and who at the time that he honoured me with his letter was the most ancient of all the doctors of the faculty of Paris.

A great servant of God informed me not long ago that by addressing my speech to Philothea in the Introduction to a Devout Life, I hindered many men from profiting by it: because they did not esteem advice given to a woman, to be worthy of a man. I marvelled that there were men who, to be thought men, showed themselves in effect so little men, for I leave it to your consideration, my dear reader, whether devotion be not as well for men as for women, and whether we are not to read with as great attention and reverence the second Epistle of S. John which was addressed to the holy lady Electa, as the third which he directs to Caius, and whether a thousand thousand Epistles and excellent Treatises of the ancient fathers of the Church ought to be held unprofitable to men, because they are addressed to holy women of those times. But, besides, it is the soul which aspires to devotion that I call Philothea, and men have souls as well as women.

Nevertheless, to imitate the great Apostle in this occasion, who esteemed himself a debtor to every one, I have changed my address in this treatise and speak to Theotimus, but if perchance there should be any woman (and such an unreasonableness would be more tolerable in them) who would not read the instructions which are given to men, I beg them to know that Theotimus to whom I speak is the human spirit desirous of making progress in holy love, which spirit is equally in women as in men.

This Treatise then is made for a soul already devout that she may be able to advance in her design, and hence I have been forced 10to say many things somewhat unknown to the generality, and which will therefore appear more obscure than they are. The depths of science are always somewhat hard to sound, and there are few divers who care and are able to descend and gather the pearls and other precious stones which are in the womb of the ocean. But if you have the courage fairly to penetrate these words which I have written, it will truly be with you as with the divers, who, says Pliny, see clearly in the deepest caves of the sea the light of the sun: for you will find in the hardest parts of this discourse a good and fair light. Moreover, as I do not follow them that despise books treating of a certain supereminently perfect life, so for my part, I do not speak of such a supereminence; for I can neither censure the authors, nor authorize the censors of a doctrine which I do not understand.

I have touched on a number of theological questions, proposing simply, not so much what I anciently learnt in disputations, as what attention to the service of souls, and my twenty-four years spent in holy preaching have made me think most conducive to the glory of the Gospel and of the Church.

For the rest some men of note in various places have signified to me that certain little books have been published simply under the first letters of their author's name which are the same as mine. This made some believe that they were my works, not without some little scandal to such as supposed thereby that I had bidden adieu to my simplicity, to puff up my style with pompous words, my argument with worldly conceit, and my conceptions with a lofty and plumed eloquence. For this cause my dear reader, I will tell you, that as those who engrave or cut precious stones, having their sight tired by keeping it continually fixed upon the small lines of their work, are glad to keep before them some fair emerald that by beholding it from time to time they may be recreated with its greenness and restore their weakened sight to its natural condition,—so in this press of business which my office daily draws upon me I have ever little projects of some treatise of piety, which I look at when I can, to revive and unweary my mind.

However, I do not profess myself a writer; for the dulness of my spirit and the condition of my life, subject to the service 11and requirements of many, would not permit me so to be. Wherefore I have written very little and have published much less, and following the counsel and will of my friends I will tell you what I have written that you may not attribute the praises of another's labours to him who deserves none for his own.

It is now nineteen years since that, being at Thonon, a small town situated upon the Lake of Geneva, which was then being little by little converted to the Catholic faith, the minister, an adversary of the Church, was proclaiming everywhere that the Catholic article of the real presence of our Saviour's body in the Eucharist destroyed the symbol and the analogy of faith (for he was glad to mouth this word analogy not understood by his auditors, in order to appear very learned; and upon this the rest of the Catholic preachers with whom I was pressed me to write something in refutation of this vanity. I did what seemed suitable, framing a brief meditation upon the Creed to confirm the truth: all the copies were distributed in this diocese where now I find not one of them.

Soon afterwards his Highness came over the mountains, and finding the bailiwicks of Chablais, Gaillard and Ternier, which are in the environs of Geneva, well disposed to receive the Catholic faith which had been banished thence by force of wars and revolts about seventy years before, he resolved to re-establish the exercise thereof in all the parishes, and to abolish that of heresy, and whereas on the one side there were many obstacles to this great blessing from those considerations which are called reasons of State, and on the other side some persons as yet not well instructed in the truth made resistance against this so much-desired establishment, his Highness surmounted the first difficulty by the invincible constancy of his zeal for the Catholic religion, and the second by an extraordinary gentleness and prudence. For he had the chief and most obstinate called together, and made a speech unto them with so lovingly persuasive an eloquence that almost all, vanquished by the sweet violence of his fatherly love towards them, cast the weapons of their obstinacy at his feet, and their souls into the hands of Holy Church.

And allow me, my dear readers I pray you, to say this word 12in passing. One may praise many rich actions of this great Prince, in which I see the proof of his valour and military knowledge, which with just cause is admired through all Europe. But for my part I cannot sufficiently extol the re-establishment of the Catholic religion in these three bailiwicks which I have just mentioned, having seen in it so many marks of piety, united with so many and various acts of prudence, constancy, magnanimity, justice and mildness, that I seemed to see in this one little trait, as in a miniature, all that is praised in princes who have in times past with most fervour striven to advance the glory of God and the Church. The stage was small, but the action great. And as that ancient craftsman was never so much esteemed for his great pieces as he was admired for making a ship of ivory fitted with all its gear, in so tiny a volume that the wings of a bee covered all, so I esteem more that which this great Prince did at that time in this small corner of his dominions, than many more brilliant actions which others extol to the heavens.

Now on this occasion the victorious ensigns of the cross were replanted in all the ways and public places of those quarters, and whereas a little before there had been one erected very solemnly at Annemasse close to Geneva, a certain minister made a little treatise against the honour thereof, which was a burning and venomous invective, and to which therefore it was deemed fit to make answer. My Lord Claude de Granier, my predecessor, whose memory is in benediction, imposed the burden upon me according to the power which he had over me, who beheld him not only as my Bishop but also as a holy servant of God. I made therefore this answer, under the title: Defence of the Standard of the Cross, and dedicated it to his Highness, partly to testify unto him my most humble submission, and partly to render him some small thanksgiving for the care which he took of the Church in those parts.

Now lately this Defence has been reprinted under the prodigious title of Panthalogy, or Treasure of the Cross: a title whereof I never dreamed, as in truth I am not a man of that study and leisure, nor of that memory, to be able to put together so many pieces of worth in one book as to let it deserve the name of 13Treasure or Panthalogy, besides I have a horror of such insolent frontispieces:

A sot, or senseless creature we him call,

Who makes his portal greater than his hall.

In the year 1602, were celebrated at Paris, where I was, the obsequies of that magnanimous prince Philip Emanuel of Lorraine, Duke of Mercśur, who had performed so many brave exploits against the Turks in Hungary that all Christianity was bound to conspire to honour his memory. But especially Madam Mary of Luxembourg, his widow, did for her part all that her heart and the love of the deceased could suggest to her to make his funeral solemn. And because my father, grandfather, and great grandfather had been brought up pages to the most illustrious princes of Martigues her father and his predecessors, she regarded me as an hereditary servant of her house; and made choice of me to preach the funeral sermon in that great celebration, where there were not only several Cardinals and Prelates but a number of princes also, princesses, marshals of France, knights of the Order,[1] and even the Court of Parliament in a body. I made then this funeral oration and pronounced it in this great assembly in the great Church of Paris, and as it contained a true abridgment of the heroic feats of the deceased prince, I willingly had it printed, at the request of the widow-princess, whose request was to me a law. I dedicated this piece to Madam the Duchess of Vendôme, as yet a girl, and a very young princess, yet one in whom were very clearly to be recognized the signs of that excellent virtue and piety which now adorn her, and which show her to be worthy of the bringing forth and educating by so devout and pious a mother.

While this sermon was in the press, I heard that I had been made Bishop, so that I came here to be consecrated and to begin residence. And at first there was pointed out to me the necessity of instructing Confessors on some important points. For this reason I wrote twenty-five instructions, which I had printed to get them more easily spread amongst those to whom I directed them; since then they have been reprinted in various places.

Three or four years afterwards I published the Introduction to a Devout Life, upon the occasion and in the manner which I have put down in the preface thereof: regarding which I have nothing to say to you, my dear reader, save only that though this little book has generally had a gracious and kind acceptance, yes even amongst the most grave prelates and doctors of the Church, yet it did not escape the rude censure of some who did not merely blame me but bitterly attacked me in public because I tell Philothea that dancing is an action indifferent in itself, and that for recreation's sake one may make quodlibets; and I, knowing the quality of these censors, praise their intention which I think was good. I should have desired them however to please to consider that the first proposition is drawn from the common and true doctrine of the most holy and learned divines, that I was writing for such as live in the world and in courts; that withal I carefully inculcate the extreme dangers which are found in dancing;—and that as to the second proposition it is not mine, but S. Louis's, that admirable king, a doctor worthy to be followed in the art of rightly conducting courtiers to a devout life. For, I believe if they had weighed this, their charity and discretion would never have permitted their zeal, how vigorous and austere soever, to arm their indignation against me.

And therefore, my dear reader, I conjure you to be gracious and good to me in reading this Treatise. And if you find the style a little (though I am sure it will be but a very little) different from that which I used in the Defence of the Cross, know that in nineteen years one learns and unlearns many things, that the language of war differs from that of peace, and that a man uses one manner of speech to young apprentices and another to old fellow-craftsmen.

My purpose here is to speak to souls that are advanced in devotion. For you must know that we have in this town a congregation of maidens and widows who, having retired from the world, live with one mind in God's service, under the protection of his most holy Mother, and as their purity and piety of spirit have oftentimes given me great consolation, so have I striven to return them the like by a frequent distribution of the holy word which I have announced to them as well in public sermons as in 15spiritual conferences, and this almost always in presence of some religious men and people of great piety. Hence I have often had to treat of the most delicate sentiments of piety, passing beyond that which I had said to Philothea: and I owe a good part of that which now I communicate to you to this blessed Society because she who is the mother of them and rules them, knowing that I was writing upon this subject, and yet that scarcely was I able to accomplish it without God's very special assistance, and their continual urging, took a constant care to pray and get prayers for this end, and holily conjured me to pick out all the little morsels of leisure which she judged might be spared here and there from the press of my hindrances and to employ them in this. And because this soul is in that consideration with me which God knows, she has had no little power to animate me in this occasion. I began indeed long ago to think of writing on holy love, but that thought came far short of what this occasion has made me produce, an occasion which I declare to you thus simply and in good faith, in imitation of the ancients, that you may know that I write only as I get the chance and opportunity, and that I may find you more favourable. It is said amongst the Pagans that Phidias never represented anything so perfectly as the gods, nor Apelles as Alexander. One is not always equally successful: if I fall short in this treatise, let your goodness make progress and God will bless your reading.

To this end I have dedicated this work to the Mother of dilection and to the Father of cordial love, as I dedicated the Introduction to the Divine child who is the Saviour of lovers and the love of the saved. And as women, while they are strong and able to bring forth their children with ease, choose commonly their worldly friends to be godfathers, but when their feebleness and indisposition make their delivery hard and dangerous invoke the saints of heaven, and vow to have their children stood to by some poor body or by some devout soul in the name of S. Joseph, S. Francis of Assisi, S. Francis of Paula, S. Nicholas, or some other of the blessed, who may obtain of God their safe delivery and that the child may be born alive:—so I, while I was not yet bishop, having more leisure and less fears for my writings, dedicated my little works to princes of the 16earth, but now being weighed down with my charge, and having a thousand difficulties in writing, I consecrate all to the princes of heaven, that they may obtain for me the light requisite, and that if such be the Divine will, these my writings may be fruitful and profitable to many.

Thus my dear reader I beseech God to bless you and to enrich you with his love. Meanwhile from my very heart I submit all my writings, my words and actions to the correction of the most holy Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman Church, knowing that she is the pillar and ground of truth,[1] wherein she can neither be deceived nor deceive us, and that none can have God for his father who will not have this Church for his mother.

Annecy, the day of the most loving Apostles

S. Peter and S. Paul. 1616.

Blessed be God.

Book I. Containing a Preparation for the Whole Treatise.

THE LOVE OF GOD.

BOOK I.

CONTAINING A

PREPARATION FOR THE WHOLE TREATISE.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter I. That for the Beauty of Human Nature God has Given the Government of All the Faculties of the Soul to the Will

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter I.

THAT FOR THE BEAUTY OF HUMAN NATURE GOD HAS GIVEN THE GOVERNMENT OF ALL THE FACULTIES OF THE SOUL TO THE WILL.

Union in distinction makes order; order produces agreement; and proportion and agreement, in complete and finished things, make beauty. An army has beauty when it is composed of parts so ranged in order that their distinction is reduced to that proportion which they ought to have together for the making of one single army. For music to be beautiful, the voices must not only be true, clear, and distinct from one another, but also united together in such a way that there may arise a just consonance and harmony which is not unfitly termed a discordant harmony or rather harmonious discord.

Now as the angelic S. Thomas, following the great S. Denis, says excellently well, beauty and goodness though in some things they agree, yet still are not one and the same thing: for good is that which pleases the appetite and will, beauty that which pleases the understanding or knowledge; or, in other words, good is that which gives pleasure when we enjoy it, 18beauty that which gives pleasure when we know it. For which cause in proper speech we only attribute corporal beauty to the objects of those two senses which are the most intellectual and most in the service of the understanding—namely, sight and hearing, so that we do not say, these are beautiful odours or beautiful tastes: but we rightly say, these are beautiful voices and beautiful colours.

The beautiful then being called beautiful, because the knowledge thereof gives pleasure, it is requisite that besides the union and the distinction, the integrity, the order, and the agreement of its parts, there should be also splendour and brightness that it may be knowable and visible. Voices to be beautiful must be clear and true; discourses intelligible; colours brilliant and shining. Obscurity, shade and darkness are ugly and disfigure all things, because in them nothing is knowable, neither order, distinction, union nor agreement; which caused S. Denis to say, that "God as the sovereign beauty is author of the beautiful harmony, beautiful lustre and good grace which is found in all things, making the distribution and decomposition of his one ray of beauty spread out, as light, to make all things beautiful," willing that to compose beauty there should be agreement, clearness and good grace.

Certainly, Theotimus, beauty is without effect, unprofitable and dead, if light and splendour do not make it lively and effective, whence we term colours lively when they have light and lustre.

But as to animated and living things their beauty is not complete without good grace, which, besides the agreement of perfect parts which makes beauty, adds the harmony of movements, gestures and actions, which is as it were the life and soul of the beauty of living things. Thus, in the sovereign beauty of our God, we acknowledge union, yea, unity of essence in the distinction of persons, with an infinite glory, together with an incomprehensible harmony of all perfections of actions and motions, sovereignly comprised, and as one would say excellently joined and adjusted, in the most unique and simple perfection of the pure divine act, which is God Himself, immutable and invariable, as elsewhere we shall show.

God, therefore, having a will to make all things good and beautiful, reduced the multitude and distinction of the same to a perfect unity, and, as man would say, brought them all under a monarchy, making a subordination of one thing to another and of all things to himself the sovereign Monarch. He reduces all our members into one body under one head, of many persons he forms a family, of many families a town, of many towns a province, of many provinces a kingdom, putting the whole kingdom under the government of one sole king. So, Theotimus, over the innumerable multitude and variety of actions, motions, feelings, inclinations, habits, passions, faculties and powers which are in man, God has established a natural monarchy in the will, which rules and commands all that is found in this little world: and God seems to have said to the will as Pharao said to Joseph: Thou shalt be over my house, and at the commandment of thy mouth all the people shall obey.[1] This dominion of the will is exercised indeed in very various ways.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter II. How the Will Variously Governs the Powers of the Soul.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter II.

HOW THE WILL VARIOUSLY GOVERNS THE POWERS OF THE SOUL.

A Father directs his wife, his children and his servants by his ordinances and commandments, which they are obliged to obey though they are able not to obey; but if he have servants and slaves, he rules them by force which they have no power to contradict; his horses, oxen and mules he manages by industry, binding, bridling, goading, shutting in, or letting out.

Now the will governs the faculty of our exterior motion as a serf or slave: for unless some external thing hinder, it never fails to obey. We open and shut our mouth, move our tongue, our hands, feet, eyes, and all the members to which the power of this movement refers without resistance, according to our wish and will.

But as for our senses and the faculties of nourishing, growing, 20and producing, we cannot with the same ease govern them, but we must employ industry and art. If a slave be called he comes, if he be told to stop, he stops; but we must not expect this obedience from a sparrowhawk or falcon: he that desires it should return to the hand must show it the lure; if he would keep it quiet he must hood it. We bid our servant turn to the right or left hand and he does it, but to make a horse so turn we must make use of the bridle. We must not, Theotimus, command our eyes not to see, our ears not to hear, our hands not to touch, our stomach not to digest, or our body not to grow, for these faculties not having intelligence are not capable of obedience. No one can add a cubit to his stature. We often eat without nourishing ourselves or growing; he that will prevail with these powers must use industry. A physician who has to do with a child in the cradle commands him nothing, but only gives orders to the nurse to do such and such things, or else perchance he prescribes for the nurse to eat this or that meat, to take such and such medicine. This infuses its qualities into the milk which enters the child's body, and the physician accomplishes his will in this little weakling who has not even the power to think of it. We must not give the orders of abstinence, sobriety or continency unto the palate or stomach, but the hands must be commanded only to furnish to the mouth meat and drink in such and such a measure, we take away from or give our faculties their object and subject, and the food which strengthens them, as reason requires. If we desire our eyes not to see we must turn them away, or cover them with their natural hood, and shut them, and by these means we may bring them to the point which the will desires. It would be folly to command a horse not to wax fat, not to grow, not to kick,—to effect all this, stop his corn; you must not command him, you must simply make him do as you wish.

The will also exercises a certain power over the understanding and memory, for of many things which the understanding has power to understand and the memory has power to remember, the will determines those to which she would have her faculties apply themselves, or from which divert themselves. It is true she cannot manage or range them so absolutely as she does the 21hands, feet or tongue, on account of the sensitive faculties, especially the fancy, which do not obey the will with a prompt and infallible obedience, and which are necessarily required for the operations of the understanding and memory: but yet the will moves, employs and applies these faculties at her pleasure though not so firmly and constantly that the light and variable fancy does not often divert and distract them, so that as the Apostle cries out: I do not the good which I desire, but the evil which I hate.[1] So we are often forced to complain that we think not of the good which we love, but the evil which we hate.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter III. How the Will Governs the Sensual Appetite.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter III.

HOW THE WILL GOVERNS THE SENSUAL APPETITE.

The will then, Theotimus, bears rule over the memory, understanding and fancy, not by force but by authority, so that she is not infallibly obeyed any more than the father of a family is always obeyed by his children and servants. It is the same as regards the sensitive appetite, which, as S. Augustine says, is called in us sinners concupiscence, and is subject to the will and understanding as the wife to her husband, because as it was said to the woman: Be under thy husband, and he shall have dominion over thee,[1] so was it said to Cain, that the lust of sin should be under him and he should have dominion over it.[1] And this being under means nothing else than being submitted and subjected to him. "O man," says S. Bernard, "it is in thy power if thou wilt to bring thy enemy to be thy servant so that all things may go well with thee; thy appetite is under thee and thou shalt domineer over it. Thy enemy can move in thee the feeling of temptation, but it is in thy power if thou wilt to give or refuse consent. In case thou permit thy appetite to carry thee away to sin, then thou shalt be under it, and it shall domineer over thee, for whosoever sinneth is made the servant of sin, but before thou sinnest, so long as sin gets 22not entry into thy consent, but only into thy sense, that is to say, so long as it stays in the appetite, not going so far as thy will, thy appetite is subject unto thee and thou lord over it." Before the Emperor is created he is subject to the electors' dominion, in whose hands it is to reject him or to elect him to the imperial dignity; but being once elected and elevated by their means, henceforth they are under him and he rules over them. Before the will consents to the appetite, she rules over it, but having once given consent she becomes its slave.

To conclude, this sensual appetite in plain truth is a rebellious subject, seditious, restive, and we must confess we cannot so defeat it that it does not rise again, encounter and assault the reason; yet the will has such a strong hand over it that she is able, if she please, to bridle it, break its designs and repulse it, since not to consent to its suggestions is a sufficient repulse. We cannot hinder concupiscence from conceiving, but we can from bringing forth and accomplishing, sin.

Now this concupiscence or sensual appetite has twelve movements, by which as by so many mutinous captains it raises sedition in man. And because ordinarily they trouble the soul and disquiet the body; insomuch as they trouble the soul, they are called perturbations, insomuch as they disquiet the body they are named passions, as S. Augustine declares. They all place before themselves good or evil, the former to obtain, the latter to avoid. If good be considered in itself according to its natural goodness it excites love, the first and principal passion; if good be regarded as absent it provokes us to desire; if being desired we think we are able to obtain it we enter into hope; if we think we cannot obtain it we feel despair; but when we possess it as present, it moves us to joy.

On the contrary, as soon as we discover evil we hate it, if it be absent we fly it, if we cannot avoid it we fear it; if we think we can avoid it we grow bold and courageous, but if we feel it as present we grieve; and then anger and wrath suddenly rush forth to reject and repel the evil or at least to take vengeance for it. If we cannot succeed we remain in grief. But if we repulse or avenge it we feel satisfaction and satiation, which is a pleasure of triumph, for as the possession of good gladdens the 23heart, so the victory over evil exalts the spirits. And over all this multitude of sensual passions the will bears empire, rejecting their suggestions, repulsing their attacks, hindering their effects, or at the very least sternly refusing them consent, without which they can never harm us, and by refusing which they remain vanquished, yea in the long run broken down, weakened, worn out, beaten down, and if not altogether dead, at least deadened or mortified.

And Theotimus, this multitude of passions is permitted to reside in our soul for the exercise of our will in virtue and spiritual valour; insomuch that the Stoics who denied that passions were found in wise men greatly erred, and so much the more because they practised in deeds what in words they denied, as S. Augustine shows, recounting this agreeable history. Aulus Gellius having gone on sea with a famous Stoic, a great tempest arose, at which the Stoic being frightened began to grow pale, to blench and to tremble so sensibly that all in the boat perceived it, and watched him curiously, although they were in the same hazard with him. In the meantime the sea grew calm, the danger passed, and safety restoring to each the liberty to talk and even to rally one another, a certain voluptuous Asiatic reproached him with his fear, which had made him aghast and pale at the danger, whereas the other on the contrary had remained firm and without fear. To this the Stoic replied by relating what Aristippus, a Socratic philosopher, had answered a man, who for the same reason had attacked him with the like reproach; saying to him: As for thee, thou hadst no reason to be troubled for the soul of a wicked rascal: but I should have done myself wrong not to have feared to lose the life of an Aristippus. And the value of the story is, that Aulus Gellius, an eye-witness, relates it. But as to the Stoic's reply contained therein, it did more commend his wit than his cause, since bringing forward this comrade in his fear, he left it proved by two irreproachable witnesses, that Stoics were touched with fear, and with the fear which shows its effects in the eyes, face and behaviour, and is consequently a passion.

A great folly, to wish to be wise with an impossible wisdom Truly the Church has condemned the folly of that wisdom which 24certain presumptuous Anchorites would formally have introduced, against which the whole Scripture but especially the great Apostle, cries out: We have a law in our body which resisteth the law of our mind.[1] "Amongst us Christians," says the great S. Augustine, "according to holy Scripture and sound doctrine, the citizens of the sacred city of Gods living according to God, in the pilgrimage of this world fear, desire, grieve, rejoice." Yea even the sovereign King of this city has feared, desired, has grieved and rejoiced, even to tears, wanness, trembling, sweating of blood; though in him as these were not the motions of passions like ours, the great S. Jerome, and after him the School durst not use the name, passions, for reverence of the person in whom they were, but the respectful name, pro-passions. This was to testify that sensible movements in Our Saviour held the place of passions, though they were not such indeed, seeing that he suffered or endured nothing from them except what seemed good to him and as he pleased, which we sinners cannot do, who suffer and endure these motions with disorder, against our wills, to the great prejudice of the good estate and polity of our soul.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter IV. That Love Rules over All the Affections, and Passions, and Even Governs the Will, Although the Will Has Also a Dominion over It.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter IV.

THAT LOVE RULES OVER ALL THE AFFECTIONS, AND PASSIONS, AND EVEN GOVERNS THE WILL, ALTHOUGH THE WILL HAS ALSO A DOMINION OVER IT.

Love being the first complacency which we take in good, as we shall presently show, it of course precedes desire; and indeed what other thing do we desire, but that which we love? It precedes delectation, for how could we rejoice in the enjoyment of a thing if we loved it not? It precedes hope, for we hope only for the good which we love: it precedes hatred, for we hate not evil, except for the love we have for good: nor is evil evil but because it is contrary to good. And, Theotimus, it is 25the same with all the other passions and affections; for they all proceed from love, as from their source and root.

For which cause the other passions and affections, are good or bad, vicious or virtuous, according as the love whence they proceed is good or bad; for love so spreads over them her own qualities, that they seem to be no other than this same love. S. Augustine reducing all these passions and affections to four, as did also Boetius, Cicero, Virgil, with the greatest part of the ancients:—"Love," says he, "tending to the possession of what it loves, is termed concupiscence or desire; having and possessing it it is called joy; flying that which is contrary to it, it is named fear; but if this really seizes it and it feels it, love is named grief, and consequently these passions are evil if the love be evil, good if it be good. The citizens of the heavenly city fear, desire, grieve, love, and because their love is just, all their affections are also just. Christian doctrine subjects the reason to God that he may guide and help it, and subjects all these passions to the spirit, that it may bridle and moderate them and so convert them to the service of justice and virtue. The right will is good love, the bad will is evil love;"[1] that is to say, in a word, Theotimus, love has such dominion over the will as to make it exactly such as it is itself.

The wife ordinarily changes her condition into that of her husband, becoming noble if he be noble, queen if he be king, duchess if he be duke. The will also changes her condition according to the love she espouses; if this be carnal she becomes carnal, if this be spiritual she is spiritual, and all the affections of desire, joy, hope, fear, grief, as children born of the marriage between love and the will, consequently receive their qualities from love. In short, Theotimus, the will is only moved by her affections, amongst which love, as the primum mobile and first affection, gives motion to all the rest, and causes all the other motions of the soul.

But it does not follow hence that the will does not also rule over love, seeing that the will only loves while willing to love, and that of many loves which present themselves she can apply 26herself to which she pleases, otherwise there would be no love either forbidden or commanded. She is then mistress over her loves as a maiden over her suitors, amongst whom she may make election of which she pleases. But as after marriage she loses her liberty and of mistress becomes subject to her husband's power, remaining taken by him whom she took, so the will which at her own pleasure made election of love, after she has chosen one remains subject to it. And as the wife is always subject to the husband whom she has chosen as long as he lives, and if he die regains her former liberty to marry another, so while a love lives in the will it reigns there, and the will is subject to its movements, but if this love die she can afterwards take another. And again there is a liberty in the will which the wife has not, and it is that the will can reject her love at her pleasure, by applying her understanding to motives which make it displeasing, and by taking a resolution to change the object. For thus, to make divine love live and reign in us, we kill self-love, and if we cannot entirely annihilate it at least we weaken it in such a way that though it lives yet it does not reign in us. As, on the contrary, in forsaking divine love we may adhere to that of creatures, which is the infamous adultery with which the Divine lover so often reproaches sinners.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter V. Of the Affections of the Will.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter V.

OF THE AFFECTIONS OF THE WILL.

There are no fewer movements in the intellectual or reasonable appetite which is called the will, than there are in the sensitive or sensual, but the first are customarily named affections, the latter passions. The philosophers and pagans did in some manner love God, the state, virtue, sciences; they hated vice, aspired after honours, despaired of escaping death or calumny, were desirous of knowledge, yea even of beatitude after death. They encouraged themselves to surmount the difficulties which cross the way of virtue, dreaded blame, avoided some faults, avenged public injuries, opposed tyrants, without any self-interest. Now all these movements were seated in the reasonable part, 27since the senses, and consequently, the sensual appetite, are not capable of being applied to these objects, and therefore these movements were affections of the intellectual or reasonable appetite, not passions of the sensual.

How often do we feel passions in the sensual appetite or concupiscence, contrary to the affections which at the same time we perceive in the reasonable appetite or will? How clearly was shown at one and the same time the action of the pleasure of the senses and the displeasure of the will, in that young martyr mentioned by S. Jerom, who, forced to bear the attacks of sensuality, bit off a piece of his tongue and spat it in his tempter's face? How often do we tremble amidst the dangers to which our will carries us and in which it makes us remain? How often do we hate the pleasure in which the sensual appetite takes delight, and love the spiritual good with which that is disgusted? In this consists the war which we daily experience between the spirit and the flesh: between our exterior man, which is under the senses, and the interior which is under the reason; between the old Adam who follows the appetites of his Eve, or concupiscence, and the new Adam who follows heavenly wisdom and holy reason.

The Stoics, as S. Augustine remarks,[1] denying that the wise man can have passions, appear to have confessed that he has affections, which they term eupathies, or good passions, or, as Cicero called them, constancies: for they said the wise man did not covet but desired, had not glee but joy; that he had no fear, but only foresight and precaution, so that he was not moved except by reason and according to reason: for this cause they peremptorily denied that a wise man could ever be sorrowful, that being caused by present evil, whereas no evil can befal a wise man, since no man is hurt but by himself, according to their maxim. And truly, Theotimus, they were not wrong in holding that there are eupathies and good affections in the reasonable part of man, but they erred much in saying that there were no passions in the sensitive part, and that sorrow did not touch a wise man's heart: for omitting the fact that they 28themselves were troubled in this kind (as was just said), how could it be that wisdom should deprive us of pity, which is a virtuous sorrow and which comes into our hearts in order to make them desire to deliver our neighbour from the evil which he endures? And the wisest man of all paganism, Epictetus, did not hold this error that passions do not rise in the wise man, as S. Augustine witnesses, showing further that the Stoics' difference with other philosophers on this subject was but a mere dispute of words and strife of language.

Now these affections which we feel in our reasonable part are more or less noble and spiritual, according as their objects are more or less sublime, and as they are in a more eminent department of the spirit: for there are affections in us which proceed from conclusions gained by the experience of our senses; others by reasonings from human sciences; others from principles of faith; and finally there are some which have their origin from the simple sentiment of the truth of God, and acquiescence in his will. The first are called natural affections, for who is he that does not naturally desire health, his provision of food and clothing, sweet and agreeable conversation? The second class of affections are named reasonable, as being altogether founded upon the spiritual knowledge of the reason, by which our will is excited to seek tranquillity of heart, moral virtues, true honour, the contemplation of eternal things. The third sort of affections are termed Christian, because they issue from reasonings founded on the doctrine of Our Lord, who makes us love voluntary Poverty, perfect Chastity, the glory of heaven. But the affections of the supreme degree are named divine and supernatural because God himself spreads them abroad in our spirits, and because they regard God and aim at him, without the medium of any reasoning, or any light of nature, as it will be easy to understand from what we shall say afterwards about the acquiescences and affections which are made in the sanctuary of the soul. And these supernatural affections are principally three: the love of the mind for the beautiful in the mysteries of faith, love for the useful in the goods which are promised us in the other life, and love for the sovereign good of the most holy and eternal divinity.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VI. How the Love of God Has Dominion over Other Loves.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VI.

HOW THE LOVE OF GOD HAS DOMINION OVER OTHER LOVES.

The will governs all the other faculties of man's soul, yet it is governed by its love which makes it such as its love is. Now of all loves that of God holds the sceptre, and has the authority of commanding so inseparably united to it and proper to its nature, that if it be not master it ceases to be and perishes.

Ismael was not co-heir with Isaac his younger brother, Esau was appointed to be his younger brother's servant, Joseph was adored, not only by his brothers, but also by his father, yea, and by his mother also, in the person of Benjamin, as he had foreseen in the dreams of his youth. Truly it is not without mystery that the younger of these brethren thus bear away the advantage from the elder. Divine love is indeed the last begotten of all the affections of man's heart, for as the Apostle says: That which is animal is first; afterwards that which is spiritual:[1]—but this last born inherits all the authority, and self-love, as another Esau is deputed to his service; and not only all the other motions of the soul as his brethren adore him and are subject to him, but also the understanding and will which are to him as father and mother. All is subject to this heavenly love, who will either be king or nothing, who cannot live unless he reign, nor reign if not sovereignly.

Isaac, Jacob and Joseph were supernatural children; for their mothers, Sarah, Rebecca and Rachel, being sterile by nature, conceived them by the grace of the divine goodness, and for this cause they were established masters of their brethren. Similarly, divine love is a child of miracle, since man's will cannot conceive it if it be not poured into our hearts by the Holy Ghost. And as supernatural it must rule and reign over all the affections, yea, even over the understanding and will.

And although there are other supernatural movements in the soul,—fear, piety, force, hope,—as Esau and Benjamin were supernatural children of Rachel and Rebecca, yet is divine love 30still master, heir and superior, as being the son of promise, since in virtue of it heaven is promised to man. Salvation is shown to faith, it is prepared for hope, but it is given only to charity. Faith points out the way to the land of promise as a pillar of cloud and of fire, that is, light and dark; hope feeds us with its manna of sweetness, but charity actually introduces us into it, as the Ark of alliance, which makes for us the passage of the Jordan, that is, of the judgment, and which shall remain amidst the people in the heavenly land promised to the true Israelites, where neither the pillar of faith serves as guide nor the manna of hope is used as food.

Divine love makes its abode in the most high and sublime region of the soul, where it offers sacrifice and holocausts to the divinity as Abraham did, and as our Saviour sacrificed himself upon the top of Calvary, to the end that from so exalted a place it may be heard and obeyed by its people, that is, by all the faculties and affections of the soul. These he governs with an incomparable sweetness, for love has no convicts nor slaves, but brings all things under its obedience with a force so delightful, that as nothing is so strong as love nothing also is so sweet as its strength.

The virtues are in the soul to moderate its movements, and charity, as first of all the virtues, governs and tempers them all, not only because the first in every species of things serves as a rule and measure to the rest, but also because God, having created man to his image and likeness, wills that as in himself so in man all things should be ordered by love and for love.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VII. Description of Love in General.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VII.

DESCRIPTION OF LOVE IN GENERAL.

The will has so great a sympathy with good that as soon as she perceives it she turns towards it to delight therein as in her most agreeable object, to which she is so closely allied that her nature cannot be explained except by the relation she has thereto, just as one cannot show the nature of what is good except by the affinity it has with the will. For, tell me, 31Theotimus, what is good but that which every one wills. And what is the will, if not the faculty which bears us towards and makes us tend to good or what the will believes to be such?

The will then perceiving and feeling the good, by the help of the understanding which proposes it, feels at the same time a sudden delight and complacency at this meeting, which sweetly yet powerfully moves her towards this pleasing object in order to unite herself with it, and makes her search out the means most proper to attain this union.

The will then has a most close affinity with good; this affinity produces the complacency which the will takes in feeling and perceiving good; this complacency moves and spurs the will forward to good; this movement tends to union; and in fine the will moved and tending to union searches out all the means necessary to get it.

And in truth, speaking generally, love comprises all this together, as a beautiful tree, whose root is the correspondence which the will has to good, its foot is the complacency, its trunk is the movement, its seekings, its pursuits, and other efforts are the branches, but union and enjoyment are its fruits. Thus love seems to be composed of these five principal parts under which a number of other little pieces are contained as we shall see in the course of this work.

Let us consider, I pray you, the exercise of an insensible love between the loadstone and iron; for it is the true image of the sensible and voluntary love of which we speak. Iron, then, has such a sympathy with the loadstone that as soon as it feels the power thereof, it turns towards it; then it suddenly begins to stir and quiver with little throbbings, testifying by this the complacency it feels, and then it advances and moves towards the loadstone striving by all means possible to be united to it. Do you not see all the parts of love well represented in these lifeless things?

But to conclude, Theotimus, the complacency and the movement towards, or effusion of the will upon, the thing beloved is properly speaking love; yet in such sort that the complacency is but the beginning of love, and the movement or effusion of the heart which ensues is the true essential love, so that the one 32and the other may truly be named love, but in a different sense: for as the dawning of day may be termed day, so this first complacency of the heart in the thing beloved may be called love because it is the first feeling of love. But as the true heart of the day is measured from the end of dawn till sunset, so the true essence of love consists in the movement and effusion of the heart which immediately follows complacency and ends in union. In short, complacency is the first stirring or emotion which good causes in the will, and this emotion is followed by the movement and effusion by which the soul runs towards and reaches the thing beloved, which is the true and proper love. We may express it thus: the good takes, grasps and ties the heart by complacency, but by love it draws, conducts and conveys it to itself, by complacency it makes it start on its way, but by love it makes it achieve the journey. Complacency is the awakener of the heart, but love is its action; complacency makes it get up, but love makes it walk. The heart spreads its wings by complacency but love is its flight. Love then, to speak distinctly and precisely, is no other thing than the movement, effusion and advancement of the heart towards good.

Many great persons have been of opinion that love is no other thing than complacency itself, in which they have had much appearance of reason. For not only does the movement of love take its origin from the complacency which the heart feels at the first approach of good, and find its end in a second complacency which returns to the heart by union with the thing beloved,—but further, it depends for its preservation on this complacency, and can only subsist through it as through its mother and nurse; so that as soon as the complacency ceases love ceases. And as the bee being born in honey, feeds on honey, and only flies for honey, so love is born of complacency, maintained by complacency, and tends to complacency. It is the weight of things which stirs them, moves them, and stays them; it is the weight of the stone that stirs it and moves it to its descent as soon as the obstacles are removed; it is the same weight that makes it continue its movement downwards; and finally it is the same weight that 33makes it stop and rest as soon as it has reached its place. So it is with the complacency which excites the will: this moves it, and this makes it repose in the thing beloved when it has united itself therewith. This motion of love then having its birth, preservation, and perfection dependent on complacency, and being always inseparably joined thereto, it is no marvel that these great minds considered love and complacency to be the same, though in truth love being a true passion of the soul cannot be a simple complacency, but must needs be the motion proceeding from it.

Now this motion caused by complacency lasts till the union or fruition. Therefore when it tends to a present good, it does no more than push the heart, clasp it, join, and apply it to the thing beloved, which by this means it enjoys, and then it is called love of complacency, because as soon as ever it is begotten of the first complacency it ends in the second, which it receives in being united to its present object. But when the good towards which the heart is turned, inclined, and moved is distant, absent or future, or when so perfect a union cannot yet be made as is desired, then the motion of love by which the heart tends, makes and aspires towards this absent object, is properly named desire, for desire is no other thing than the appetite, concupiscence, or cupidity for things we have not, but which however we aim at getting.

There are yet certain other motions of love by which we desire things that we neither expect nor aim at in any way, as when we say:—Why am I not now in heaven! I wish I were a king; I would to God I were younger; how I wish I had never sinned, and the like. These indeed are desires, but imperfect ones, which, to speak properly, I think, might be called wishings (souhaits). And indeed these affections are not expressed like desires, for when we express our true desires we say: I desire (Je desire): but when we signify our imperfect desires we say: I should or I would desire (je desirerois), or I should like. We may well say: I would desire to be young; but we do not say: I desire to be young; seeing that this is not possible; and this motion is called a wishing, or as the Scholastics term it a velleity, which is nothing else but a 34commencement of willing, not followed out, because the will, by reason of impossibility or extreme difficulty, stops her motion, and ends it in this simple affection of a wish. It is as though she said: this good which I behold and cannot expect to get is truly very agreeable to me, and though I cannot will it nor hope for it, yet so my affection stands, that if I could will or desire it, I would desire and will it gladly.

In brief, these wishings or velleities are nothing else but a little love, which may be called love of simple approbation, because the soul approves the good she knows, and being unable to effectually desire she protests she would willingly desire it, and that it is truly to be desired.

Nor is this all, Theotimus, for there are desires and velleities which are yet more imperfect than those we have spoken of, forasmuch as their motions are not stayed by reason of impossibility or extreme difficulty, but by their incompatibility with other more powerful desires or willings; as when a sick man desires to eat mushrooms or melons;—though he may have them at his order, yet he will not eat them, fearing thereby to make himself worse; for who sees not that there are two desires in this man, the one to eat mushrooms, the other to be cured? But because the desire of being cured is the stronger, it blocks up and suffocates the other and hinders it from producing any effect. Jephte wished to preserve his daughter, but this not being compatible with his desire to keep his vow, he willed what he did not wish, namely, to sacrifice his daughter, and wished what he did not will, namely, to preserve his daughter. Pilate and Herod wished, the one to deliver our Saviour, the other his precursor: but because these wishes were incompatible with the desires, the one to please the Jews and Cćsar, the other, Herodias and her daughter, these wishes were vain and fruitless. Now in proportion as those things which are incompatible with our wishes are less desirable, the wishes are more imperfect, since they are stopped and, as it were, stifled by contraries so weak. Thus the wish which Herod had not to behead S. John was more imperfect than that of Pilate to free our Saviour. For the latter feared the calumny and indignation of the people and of Cćsar; the other feared to disappoint one woman alone.

And these wishes which are hindered, not by impossibility, but by incompatibility with stronger desires, are called indeed wishes and desires, but vain, stifled and unprofitable ones. As to wishes of things impossible, we say: I wish, but cannot; and of the wishes of possible things we say: I wish, but will not.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VIII. What Kind of Affinity (Convenance) It Is Which Excites Love.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VIII.

WHAT KIND OF AFFINITY (CONVENANCE) IT IS WHICH EXCITES LOVE.

We say the eye sees, the ear hears, the tongue speaks, the understanding reasons, the memory remembers, the will loves: but still we know well that it is the man, to speak properly, who by divers faculties and different organs works all this variety of operations. Man also then it is who by the affective faculty named the will tends to and pleases himself in good, and who has for it that great affinity which is the source and origin of love. Now they have made a mistake who have believed that resemblance is the only affinity which produces love. For who knows not that the most sensible old men tenderly and dearly love little children, and are reciprocally loved by them; that the wise love the ignorant, provided they are docile, and the sick their physicians. And if we may draw any argument from the image of love which is found in things without sense, what resemblance can draw the iron towards the loadstone? Has not one loadstone more resemblance with another or with another stone, than with iron which is of a totally different species? And though some, to reduce all affinities to resemblance, assure us that iron draws iron and the loadstone the loadstone, yet they are unable to explain why the loadstone draws iron more powerfully than iron does iron itself. But I pray you what similitude is there between lime and water? or between water and a sponge? and yet both of them drink water with a quenchless desire, testifying an excessive insensible love towards it. Now it is the same in human love; for sometimes it takes more strongly amongst persons of contrary qualities, than 36among those who are very like. The affinity then which causes love does not always consist in resemblance, but in the proportion, relation or correspondence between the lover and the thing loved. For thus it is not resemblance which makes the doctor dear to the sick man, but a correspondence of the one's necessity with the other's sufficiency, in that the one can afford the assistance which the other stands in need of: as again the doctor loves the sick man, and the master his apprentice because they can exercise their powers on them. The old man loves children, not by sympathy, but because the great simplicity, feebleness and tenderness of the one exalts and makes more apparent the prudence and stability of the other, and this dissimilitude is agreeable. On the other hand, children love old men because they see them busy and careful about them, and by secret instinct they perceive they have need of their direction. Musical concord consists in a kind of discord, in which unlike voices correspond, making up altogether one single multiplex proportion, as the unlikeness of precious stones and flowers makes the agreeable composition of enamel and diapry. Thus love is not caused always by resemblance and sympathy, but by correspondence and proportion, which consists in this that by the union of one thing to another they mutually receive one another's perfection, and so become better. The head certainly does not resemble the body, nor the hand the arm, yet they have such a correspondence and join so naturally together that by their conjunction they excellently perfect one the other. Wherefore, if these parts had each one a distinct soul they would have a perfect mutual love, not by resemblance, for they have none, but by their correspondence towards a mutual perfection. For this cause the melancholy and the joyous, the sour and the sweet, have often a correspondence of affection, by reason of the mutual impressions which they receive one of another by which their humours are reciprocally moderated.

But when this mutual correspondence is joined with resemblance, love without doubt is engendered much more efficaciously; for resemblance being the true image of unity, when two like things are united by a proportion to the same end it seems rather to be unity than union.

The affinity then of the lover and the thing loved is the first source of love, and this affinity consists in correspondence, which is nothing else than a mutual relation, which makes things apt to unite in order to communicate to one another some perfection. But this will be understood better in the progress of our discourse.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter IX. That Love Tends to Union.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter IX.

THAT LOVE TENDS TO UNION.

The great Solomon describes, in an admirably delicious manner, the loves of the Saviour and the devout soul, in that divine work which for its excellent sweetness is named the Canticle of Canticles. And to raise ourselves by a more easy flight to the consideration of this spiritual love which is exercised between God and us by the correspondence of the movements of our hearts with the inspirations of his divine majesty, he makes use of a perpetual representation of the loves of a chaste shepherd and a modest shepherdess. Now making the spouse or bride begin first by manner of a certain surprise of love, he first puts into her mouth this ejaculation: Let him kiss me with the kiss of his mouth.[1] Notice, Theotimus, how the soul, in the person of this shepherdess, has but the one aim, in the first expression of her desire, of a chaste union with her spouse, protesting that it is the only end of her ambition and the only thing she aspires after; for, I pray you, what other thing would this first sigh intimate? Let him kiss me with the kiss of his mouth.

A kiss from all ages as by natural instinct has been employed to represent perfect love, that is, the union of hearts, and not without cause: we express and make known our passions and the movements which our souls have in common with the animals, by our eyes, eyebrows, forehead and the rest of our countenance. Man is known by his look,[1] says the Scripture, 38and Aristotle giving a reason why ordinarily it is only the faces of great men that are portrayed,—it is, says he, because the face shows what we are.

Yet we do not utter our discourse nor the thoughts which proceed from the spiritual portion of our soul, which we call reason, and by which we are distinguished from beasts, except by words, and consequently by help of the mouth; insomuch that to pour out our soul and open out our heart is nothing else but to speak. Pour out your hearts before God,[1] says the Psalmist, that is, express and turn the affections of your hearts into words. And Samuel's pious mother pronouncing her prayers so softly that one could hardly discern the motion of her lips: I have poured out my soul before the Lord,[1] said she. And thus one mouth is applied to another in kissing to testify that we would desire to pour out one soul into the other, to unite them reciprocally in a perfect union. For this reason, at all times and amongst the most saintly men the world has had, the kiss has been a sign of love and affection, and such use was universally made of it amongst the ancient Christians as the great S. Paul testifies, when, writing to the Romans and Corinthians, he says, Salute one another in a holy kiss.[1] And as many declare, Judas in betraying Our Saviour made use of a kiss to manifest him, because this divine Saviour was accustomed to kiss his disciples when he met them; and not only his disciples but even little children, whom he took lovingly in his arms; as he did him by whose example he so solemnly invited his disciples to the love of their neighbour, whom many think to have been S. Martial, as the Bishop Jansenius[1] says.

Thus then the kiss being a lively mark of the union of hearts, the spouse who has no other aim in all her endeavours than to be united to her beloved, Let him kiss me, says she, with the kiss of his mouth; as if she cried out:—so many sighs and inflamed darts which my love throws out will they never impetrate that which my soul desires? I run—Ah! shall I never gain the prize towards which I urge myself, which is to be united heart 39to heart, spirit to spirit, to my God, my spouse my life? When will the hour come in which I shall pour my soul into his heart, and he will pour his heart into my soul, and thus happily united we shall live inseparable.

When the Holy Ghost would express a perfect love, he almost always employs words expressing union or conjunction. And the multitude of believers, says S. Luke, had but one heart and one soul.[1] Our Saviour prayed for all the faithful that they all may be one.[1] S. Paul warns us to be careful to preserve the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace."[1] These unities of heart, of soul, and of spirit signify the perfection of love which joins many souls in one. So it is said that Jonathan's soul was knit to David's, that is to say, as the Scripture adds, He loved him as his own soul.1[1] The great Apostle of France (S. Denis) as well according to his own sentiment as when giving that of his Hierotheus, writes a hundred times, I think, in a single chapter of the De Nominibus Divinis, that love is unifying, uniting, drawing together, embracing, collecting and bringing all things to unity! S. Gregory Nazianzen and S. Augustine say that their friends and they had but one soul, and Aristotle approving already in his time this manner of speech: "When," says he, "we would express how much we love our friends, we say his and my soul is but one." Hatred separates us, and love brings us into one. The end then of love is no other thing than the union of the lover and the thing loved.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter X. That the Union to Which Love Aspires Is Spiritual.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter X.

THAT THE UNION TO WHICH LOVE ASPIRES IS SPIRITUAL.

We must, however, take notice that there are natural unions, as those of similitude, consanguinity, and of cause and effect; and others which not being natural may be termed voluntary; for though they be according to Nature yet they are only made 40at our will: like that union which takes its origin from benefits—which undoubtedly unite him that receives them to the giver,—that of conversation, society and the like. Now natural union produces love, and the love which it produces inclines us to another and voluntary union, perfecting the natural. Thus the father and son, the mother and daughter, or two brothers, being joined in a natural union by the participation of the same blood, are excited by this union to love, and by love are borne towards a union of will and spirit which may be called voluntary, because although its foundation is natural, yet is its action deliberate. In these loves produced by natural union we need look for no other affinity than the union itself, by which Nature preventing the will, obliges it to approve, to love, and to perfect the union it has already made. But as to voluntary unions, which follow love, love is indeed their effective cause, but they are its final cause, as being the only end and aim of love. So that as love tends to union, even so union very often extends and augments love: for love makes us seek the society of the beloved, and this often nourishes and increases love; love causes a desire of nuptial union, and this union reciprocally preserves and increases love, so that in every sense it is true that love tends to union.

But to what kind of union does it tend? Did you not note, Theotimus, that the sacred spouse expressed her desire of being united to her spouse by the kiss, and that the kiss represents the spiritual union which is caused by the reciprocal communication of souls? It is indeed the man who loves, but he loves by his will, and therefore the end of his love is of the nature of his will: but his will is spiritual, and consequently the union which love aims at is spiritual also, and so much the more because the heart, which is the seat and source of love, would not only not be perfected by union with corporal things, but would be degraded.

It will not hence be inferred that there are not certain passions in man which, as mistleto comes on trees by manner of excrescence and over-growth, sprout up indeed amongst and about love. Nevertheless they are neither love, nor any part of love, but excrescences and superfluities thereof, which are so far from being suited to maintain or perfect 41love, that on the contrary they greatly harm it, weaken it, and at last, if they be not cut away, utterly ruin it: and here is the reason.

In proportion to the number of operations to which the soul applies herself (whether of the same or of a different kind) she does them less perfectly and vigorously: because being finite, her active virtue is also finite, so that furnishing her activity to divers operations it is necessary that each one of them have less thereof. Thus a man attentive to several things is less attentive to each of them: we cannot quietly consider a person's features with our sight, and at the same time give an exact hearing to the harmony of a grand piece of music, nor at the same instant be attentive to figure and to colour: if we are talking earnestly, we cannot attend to anything else.

I am not ignorant of what is said concerning Caesar nor incredulous about what so many great persons testify of Origen,—that they could apply their attention at the same time to several objects; yet every one confesses that according to the measure they applied it to more objects it became less for each one of them. There is then a difference between seeing, hearing and understanding more, and seeing, hearing, and understanding better, for he that sees better, sees less, and he that sees more, sees not so well: it is rare for those who know much to know well what they know, because the virtue and force of the understanding being scattered upon the knowledge of divers things is less strong and vigorous than when it is restrained to the consideration of one only object. Hence it is that when the soul employs her forces in divers operations of love, the action so divided is less vigorous and perfect. We have three sorts of actions of love, the spiritual, the reasonable, and the sensitive; when love exerts its forces through all these three operations, doubtless it is more extended but less intense, but when through one operation only, it is more intense though less extended. Do we not see that fire, the symbol of love, forced to make its way out by the mouth of the cannon alone, makes a prodigious flash, which would have been much less if it had found vent by two or three passages? Since then love is an act of our will, he that desires to have it, not only noble 42and generous, but also very vigorous and active, must contain the virtue and force of it within the limits of spiritual operations, for he that would apply it to the operations of the sensible or sensitive part of our soul, would so far forth weaken the intellectual operations, in which essential love consists.

The ancient philosophers have recognized that there are two sorts of ecstasies of which the one raises us above ourselves, the other degrades us below ourselves: as though they would say that man was of a nature between angels and beasts: in his intellectual part sharing the angelical nature, and in his sensitive the nature of beasts; and yet that he could by the acts of his life and by a continual attention to himself, deliver and emancipate himself from this mean condition, and habituating himself much to intellectual actions might bring himself nearer to the nature of angels than of beasts. If however he did much apply himself to sensible actions, he descended from his middle state and approached that of beasts: and because an ecstasy is no other thing than a going out of oneself, whether one go upwards or downwards he is truly in an ecstasy. Those then who, touched with intellectual and divine pleasures, let their hearts be carried away by those feelings, are truly out of themselves, that is, above the condition of their nature, but by a blessed and desirable out-going, by which entering into a more noble and eminent estate, they are as much angels by the operation of their soul as men by the substance of their nature, and are either to be called human angels or angelic men. On the contrary, those who, allured by sensual pleasures give themselves over to the enjoying of them, descend from their middle condition to the lowest of brute beasts, and deserve as much to be called brutal by their operations as men by nature: miserable in thus going out of themselves only to enter into a condition infinitely unworthy of their natural state.

Now according as the ecstasy is greater, either above us or below us, by so much more it hinders the soul from returning to itself, and from doing operations contrary to the ecstasy in which it is. So those angelic men who are ravished in God and heavenly things, lose altogether, as long as their ecstasy lasts, 43the use and attention of the senses, movement, and all exterior actions, because their soul, in order to apply its power and activity more entirely and attentively to that divine object, retires and withdraws them from all its other faculties, to turn them in that direction. And in like manner brutish men give up all the use of their reason and understanding to bury themselves in sensual pleasure. The first mystically imitate Elias taken up in the fiery chariot amid the angels: the others Nabuchodonosor brutalized and debased to the rank of savage beasts.

Now I say that when the soul practises love by actions which are sensual, and which carry her below herself, it is impossible that thereby the exercise of her superior love, should not be so much the more weakened. So that true and essential love is so far from being aided and preserved by the union to which sensual love tends, that it is impaired, dissipated and ruined by it. Job's oxen ploughed the ground, while the useless asses fed by them, eating the pasture due to the labouring oxen. While the intellectual part of our soul is employed in honest and virtuous love of some worthy object, it comes to pass oftentimes that the senses and faculties of the inferior part tend to the union which they are adapted to, and which is their pasture, though union only belongs to the heart and to the spirit, which also is alone able to produce true and substantial love.

Eliseus having cured Naaman the Syrian was satisfied with having done him a service, and refused his gold, his silver and the goods he offered him, but his faithless servant Giezi, running after him, demanded and took, against his master's pleasure, that which he had refused. Intellectual and cordial love, which certainly either is or should be master in our heart, refuses all sorts of corporal and sensible unions, and is contented with goodwill only, but the powers of the sensitive part, which are or should be the handmaids of the spirit, demand, seek after and take that which reason refused, and without leave make after their abject and servile love, dishonouring, like Giezi, the purity of the intention of their master, the spirit. And in proportion as the soul turns herself to such gross and sensible unions, so far does she divert herself from the delicate, intellectual and cordial union.

You see then plainly, Theotimus, that these unions which tend to animal complacency and passions are so far from producing or preserving love that they greatly hurt it and render it extremely weak.

Basil, rosemary, marigold, hyssop, cloves, chamomile, nutmeg, lemon, and musk, put together and incorporated, yield a truly delightful odour by the mixture of their good perfume; yet not nearly so much as does the water which is distilled from them, in which the sweets of all these ingredients separated from their bodies are mingled in a much more excellent manner, uniting in a most perfect scent, which penetrates the sense of smelling far more strongly than it would do if with it and its water the bodies of the ingredients were found mingled and united. So love may be found in the unions proper to the sensual powers, mixed with the unions of intellectual powers, but never so excellently as when the spirits and souls alone, separated from all corporeal affections but united together, make love pure and spiritual. For the scent of affections thus mingled is not only sweeter and better, but more lively, more active and more essential.

True it is that many having gross, earthly and vile hearts rate the value of love like that of gold pieces, the most massive of which are the best, and most current; for so their idea is that brutish love is more strong, because it is more violent and turbulent, more solid, because more gross and terrene, greater, because more sensible and fierce:—but on the contrary, love is like fire, which is of clearer and fairer flame as its matter is more delicate, which cannot be more quickly extinguished than by beating it down and covering it with earth; for, in like manner, by how much more exalted and spiritual the subject of love is, by so much its actions are more lively, subsistent and permanent: nor is there a more easy way to ruin love than to debase it to vile and earthly unions. "There is this difference," says S. Gregory, "between spiritual and corporal pleasures, that corporal ones beget a desire before we obtain them, and a disgust when we have obtained them; but spiritual ones, on the contrary, are not cared for when we have them not, but are desired when we have them."

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter XI. That There Are Two Portions in the Soul, and How.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter XI.

THAT THERE ARE TWO PORTIONS IN THE SOUL, AND HOW.

We have but one soul, Theotimus, and an indivisible one; but in that one soul there are various degrees of perfection, for it is living, sensible and reasonable; and according to these different degrees it has also different properties and inclinations by which it is moved to the avoidance or to the acceptance of things. For first, as we see that the vine hates, so to speak and avoids the cabbage, so that the one is pernicious to the other; and, on the contrary, is delighted in the olive:—so we perceive a natural opposition between man and the serpent, so great that a man's fasting spittle is mortal to the serpent: on the contrary, man and the sheep have a wondrous affinity, and are agreeable one to the other. Now this inclination does not proceed from any knowledge that the one has of the hurtfulness of its contrary, or of the advantage of the one with which it has affinity, but only from a certain occult and secret quality which produces this insensible opposition and antipathy, or this complacency and sympathy.

Secondly, we have in us the sensitive appetite, whereby we are moved to the seeking and avoiding many things by the sensitive knowledge we have of them; not unlike to the animals, some of which have an appetite to one thing, some to another, according to the knowledge which they have that it suits them or not. In this appetite resides, or from it proceeds, the love which we call sensual or brutish, which yet properly speaking ought not to be termed love but simply appetite.

Thirdly, inasmuch as we are reasonable, we have a will, by which we are led to seek after good, according as by reasoning we know or judge it to be such. Now in our soul, taken as reasonable, we manifestly observe two degrees of perfection, which the great S. Augustine, and after him all the doctors, have named two portions of the soul, inferior and superior. That is called inferior which reasons and draws conclusions according to what it learns and experiences by the senses; and 46that is called superior, which reasons and draws conclusions according to an intellectual knowledge not grounded upon the experience of sense, but on the discernment and judgment of the spirit. This superior part is called the spirit and mental part of the soul, as the inferior is termed commonly, sense, feeling, and human reason.

Now this superior part can reason according to two sorts of lights; either according to natural light, as the philosophers and all those who have reasoned by science did; or according to supernatural light, as do theologians and Christians, since they establish their reasoning upon faith and the revealed word of God, and still more especially those whose spirit is conducted by particular illustrations, inspirations, and heavenly motions. This is what S. Augustine said, namely, that it is by the superior portion of the soul that we adhere and apply ourselves to the observance of the eternal law.

Jacob, pressed by the extreme necessity of his family, let Benjamin be taken by his brethren into Egypt, which yet he did against his will, as the sacred History witnesses. In this he shows two wills, the one inferior, by which he grieved at sending him, the other superior, by which he took the resolution to part with him. For the reason which moved him to disapprove his departure was grounded on the pleasure which he felt in his presence and the pain he would feel in his absence, which are grounds that touch the senses and the feelings, but the resolution which he took to send him, was grounded upon the reason of the state of his family, from his foreseeing future and imminent necessities. Abraham, according to the inferior portion of his soul spoke words testifying in him a kind of diffidence when the angel announced unto him the happy tidings of a son. Shall a son, thinkest thou, be born to him that is a hundred years old?[1] but according, to his superior part he believed in God and it was reputed to him unto justice.[1] According to his inferior part, doubtless he was in great anguish when he was commanded to sacrifice his son: but according to his superior part he resolved courageously to sacrifice him.

We also daily experience in ourselves various contrary wills. A father sending his son either to court or to his studies, does not deny tears to his departure, testifying, that though according to his superior part, for the child's advancement in virtue, he wills his departure, yet according to his inferior part he has a repugnance to the separation. Again, though a girl be married to the contentment of her father and mother, yet when she takes their blessing she excites their tears, in such sort that though the superior will acquiesces in the departure, yet the inferior shows resistance. We must not hence infer that a man has two souls or two natures, as the Manicheans dreamed. No, says S. Augustine, in the 8th book, 10th chapter, of his Confessions, "but the will inticed by different baits, moved by different reasons, seems to be divided in itself while it is pulled two ways, until, making use of its liberty, it chooses the one or the other: for then the more efficacious will conquers, and gaining the day, leaves in the soul the feeling of the evil that the struggle caused her, which we call reluctance (contrecśur)."

But the example of our Saviour is admirable in this point, and being considered it leaves no further doubt touching the distinction of the superior and inferior part of the soul. For who amongst theologians knows not that he was perfectly glorious from the instant of his conception in his virgin-mother's womb, and yet at the same time he was subject to sadness, grief, and afflictions of heart. Nor must we say he suffered only in the body, or only in the soul as sensitive, or, which is the same thing, according to sense: for he attests himself that before he suffered any exterior torment, or saw the tormentors near him, his soul was sorrowful even unto death. For which cause he prayed that the cup of his passion might pass away from him, that is, that he might be excused from drinking it; in which he manifestly shows the desire of the inferior portion of his soul; which, dwelling upon the sad and agonizing objects of the passion which was prepared for him (the lively image whereof was represented to his imagination), he desired, by a most reasonable consequence, the deliverance and escape from them, which he begs from his 48Father. By this we clearly see that the inferior part of the soul is not the same thing as the sensitive degree of it, nor the inferior will the same with the sensitive appetite; for neither the sensitive appetite, nor the soul insomuch as it is sensitive, is capable of making any demand or prayer, these being acts of the reasonable power; and they are, specially, incapable of speaking to God, an object which the senses cannot reach, so as to make it known to the appetite. But the same Saviour, having thus exercised the inferior part, and testified that according to it and its considerations his will inclined to the avoidance of the griefs and pains, showed afterwards that he had the superior part, by which inviolably adhering to the eternal will, and to the decree made by his heavenly Father, he willingly accepted death, and in spite of the repugnance of the inferior part of reason, he said: Ah! no, my Father, not my will, but thine be done. When he says my will, he speaks of his will according to the inferior portion, and inasmuch an he says it voluntarily, he shows that he has a superior will.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter XII. That in These Two Portions of the Soul There Are Four Different Degrees of Reason.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter XII.

THAT IN THESE TWO PORTIONS OF THE SOUL THERE ARE FOUR DIFFERENT DEGREES OF REASON.

TREATISE

ON THE

LOVE OF GOD

Rev. Henry Benedict Mackey, O.S.B.

DEDICATION

TREATISE

ON THE

LOVE OF GOD

Dedicatory Prayer

VIVE JÉSUS.

PREFACE.

THE LOVE OF GOD.

BOOK I.

PREPARATION FOR THE WHOLE TREATISE.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter I.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter II.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter III.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter IV.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter V.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VI.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VII.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter VIII.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter IX.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter X.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter XI.

Treatise on the Love of God, a Christian online book, Chapter XII.