THE LOVE OE* GOB and the CKOSS OT JESUS By The Rev. REGINALD GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, O.P. Translated By SISTER JEANNE MARIE, O.P. St Marvs Hospital Sisters. VOLUME TJVO B. HERDER BOOK CO. I} 8c 17 SOUTH BROADWAY, ST. LOUIS 1, MO. AND 33 QUEEN SQUARE, LONDON, W. C. 1951 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Printed in U.S.A. NIHIL OBSTAT William M. Drumm Censor Librorum IMPRIMATUR ►£· Joseph E. Ritter Archiepiscopus Sti. Ludovici, die 6 Dec. 1950 Copyright 19 B. HERDER BOOK CO. Vail-Ballou Press, Inc., Binghamton and New York CONTENTS PART I CROSSES OF THE SENSES PAGE CHAPTER I. The Passive Purification of the Senses .... 3 Art. I. The Necessity for Purification .... 6 Art. II. Psychological Description of the Passive Purification of the Senses....... 10 Art. III. A Causal Explanation of the State of Purifi­ cation ................ ·. . . . 18 II. What Is to Be Done During the Night of the Senses........................................................................... 27 III. Effects of the Passive Purification of the Senses 40 IV. Trials Ordinarily Accompanying the Night of the Senses................................................................ 51 V. The Union with God Ordinarily Following the Night of the Senses................................................ 76 PART II CROSSES OF THE SOUL PURIFYING GRACES OF THE NIGHT OF THE SOUL VI. The Passive Purification of the Soul as De­ scribed by St. John of the Cross.......................... 97 VII. The Passive Purification of Faith........................ 123 VIII. The Passive Purification of Hope........................ 144 iii CONTENTS iv PAGK CHAPTER IX. The Passive Purification of Charity . . . .161 X. Characteristic Signs of the Passive Purification of the Soul.................................................. 176 PART III THE LIFE OF UNION THROUGH JESUS AND MARY XL The Abiding of the Blessed Trinity in Purified Souls and Transforming Union........... 199 XII. The Place of the Unitive Life and the Mystical Order........................................................................ 228 Art. I. The Spirituality of St. Alphonsus: Its General Characteristics.......... 229 Art. II. A Comparison of the Spirituality of St. Alphonsus with the Principles of St. Thomas and the Doctrine of St. John of the Cross ............................... 234 XIII. The Unity and Sublimity of the Apostolic Life: a Synthesis of Contemplation and Action . . 268 Art. I. The Apostolic Life: Its Difficulty and Superiority.......................... 269 Art. II. The Special End of the Apostolic Life . 273 Art. III. The Elements of Religious Life in Apos­ tolic Orders.......................... 282 XIV. The Priesthood of Christ and the Life of Union 291 Art. I. Christ’s Priesthood in the Epistle to the Hebrews................................293 Art. II. The Perfection of Christ’s Priesthood . . 297 Art. III. The Formal Cause of Christ’s Priesthood 308 XV. The Kingship of Christ............................................. 314 Art. I. Christ’s Universal Kingship in Holy Scrip­ ture .......................................... 315 CONTENTS v CHAPTER PAGK Art. IL The Nature, Basis, and Excellence of Christ’s Kingship............... 321 Art. III. The Exercise of Christ’s Royal Power . . 327 XVI. Exemplar for Our Free Will: Christ’s Impecca­ ble Liberty.............................................................. 331 Art. I. The World’s Notion of Liberty .... 333 Art. II. Christ’s Liberty on Earth.............................. 336 Art. III. The Liberty of the Saints.............................. 341 XVII. Mary, Model of the Life of Reparation .... 347 Art. I. Mary Mediatrix and the Grace of Final Perseverance.............................................. 348 Art. II. The Mystery of Mary’s Sorrows .... 354 XVIII. St. Joseph: Model of the Hidden Life and First AMONG THE SAINTS.......................................................................... 366 XIX. The Soul of the Sacrifice of the Mass .... 384 Epilogue. The Narrow Path of Perfection and the Full De­ velopment of the Illuminative and Unitive Ways 411 Consecration to the Holy Ghost........................................ 420 The Way of the The Mysteries Cross According to St. Thomas Aquinas 421 of the Rosary....................................................435 Index.......................................................................................... 449 PART I Crosses of the Senses I CHAPTER I The Passive Purification of the Senses When speaking of mortification or active purification we have already said that we must impose it upon ourselves chiefly for the following reasons: (i) to correct whatever inordinate tendencies resulting from original sin remain after baptism; (2) to destroy the results of our personal sins and to make reparation for offending God; (3) to prevent an over­ development of our natural activity and consequent injury to the life of grace, together with an increasing blindness to the infinite sublimity of our supernatural end ; (4) to imitate Christ crucified and to work with Him for the salvation of souls. Our Lord Himself pointed out this fourth reason to us when He said : “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” 1 In quoting these words, St. Luke remarks that Christ said them “to all.” To mortify ourselves still falls short, in fact, of what is necessary; we must bear patiently as well the crosses God sends us to purify us, to make us like to our Savior, and, in a sense, to so continue the mystery of redemption with Him, by Him, and in Him until the end of time. What Christian terminology calls “the Cross” by analogy with the sufferings and death of our Lord, is made up of the 1 Luke 9: 23; Matt. 16: 24; Mark 8: 34. 3 THE LOVE OF GOD 4 daily physical and moral trials arising from our relations with the world of things and of men but especially of those sufferings sent more directly by God to make us more like Christ Jesus, who became “obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross” 2 for the ransom of mankind. “As the Father hath given Me commandment, so do I.” 3 All Chris­ tians, each in tire measure of his capacity, must go even to these lengths to follow our divine Master. The necessity of the cross is laid on us principally for two reasons. The first is that the roots of evil we bear within us go much deeper than we may think, and we hardly know where these germs of death are to be found. Even when we have mortified ourselves and tried hard to be regular and fervent, we still have many unconscious faults: egoism in various forms, even in our prayers and devotions, in study and the apostolate. Natural eagerness, spiritual sensuality, intellectual pride, self-judgment and self-will, all these pre­ vent God’s kingdom from becoming deeply established in us and keep us from closer union with Him. A vast difference exists between regularity, even when accompanied with a certain fervor, and true sanctity. The cross patiently borne for love bridges the distance between these two. Our Lord knows better than we do where the evil in us lies; He sends messengers to tell us, not always too charitably, the truth about ourselves and to put a finger on our touchiest points. He comes Himself, when necessary, with metal and fire to cut and cauterize our wounds, the principles of corruption which prevent us from becoming the living image of His Son. The second reason why the cross is imposed on us has to do 2 Phil. 2:8. s John 14: 31. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 5 with our two great models, Jesus and Mary. They had no need for purification; they suffered for our redemption. We must imitate them in this. Our association with our Lord in His redemptive work keeps pace with the growth of our union with Him, and He Himself used the cross as the prin­ cipal means for redeeming the world, the supreme manifes­ tation of His love for the Father and for us. Consequently, as the lives of all the saints prove, the neces­ sity of the cross is proportionate to the purification souls need and to the degree of their union with Christ, as well as of the apostolic and reparative life God efficaciously wills for them. Some souls, still in their baptismal innocence, have less need for purification; others, though already quite pure, live in almost continual suffering because our Lord calls them to an incomparably higher perfection than that which contents so many easily satisfied Christians. The more God loves us, the heavier crosses He sends us, and the more they resemble the cross carried by Christ and shared by His Blessed Mother. To bear the cross patiently, we must understand it, see where it leads, and carry it in the light of love. It is therefore good for us to know the different ways in which God usually tries souls. Some crosses are intended to purify the senses and subject them to the spirit; these occur frequently and are common to many persons, especially to beginners. Other crosses are of the spirit. These have for their purpose the progressive supernaturalization of the soul and its growing subjection to God. Trials of this kind are the lot of a small number of advanced souls. Spiritual writers properly speak, then, of two kinds of trials, calling one passive purification of the senses and the other passive purification of the soul, designations that help 6 THE LOVE OF GOD us to determine what is essential to each and what trials commonly accompany them. And thus we can come to understand why souls must undergo a twofold passive puri­ fication to arrive at the full perfection of Christian life. For the sake of order, the following questions will be taken up in this chapter in regard to die passive purification of the senses: first, the necessity for purification; secondly, its psychological description; and thirdly, its theological and causal explanation. In subsequent chapters the rules for di­ rection appropriate for this state, together with its purifying effects and accompanying trials, will be discussed. Lastly we shall see just when the passive purification of the senses normally takes place, whether at the beginning of the il­ luminative way or considerably later. ARTICLE I THE NECESSITY FOR PURIFICATION The spiritual imperfections of beginners (possible paths to pride, sensuality, and sloth of a spiritual kind) make purifica­ tion necessary, as St. John of the Cross shows.4 These imper­ fections are, as it were, so many modulations of the seven capital sins appearing as different deviations in the spiritual life but all leading back to the principal ones just spoken of above. St. John of the Cross confines himself exclusively to the consideration of the trouble these cause in our relations with God, but they work no less harm to our relations widi our neighbor and to the apostolate entrusted to us. A man may become immoderately attached to sensible con­ solations and seek them for themselves, forgetting that they * The Dark Night, chaps. 2-9. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 7 are not an end but a means ; thus he may come to prefer the flavor of spiritual things to their essence. Spiritual greediness of this kind, when unsatisfied, begets impatience and, as soon as “the narrow path” has to be taken, spiritual sloth and a distaste for the work of sanctification so frequently re­ ferred to by early writers under the name of acedia.5 If, instead, everything goes as we would have it, we take pride in our perfection and judge others severely, posing as masters when we are nothing but poor disciples. Spiritual pride, St. John of the Cross says,0 leads beginners to avoid masters who disapprove of their spirit and even sometimes to harbor ill will toward them. They look for guides to suit their tastes, desire to be intimate with them, and confess their sins to them in such a way as “to excuse themselves rather than to accuse themselves. . . . And sometimes they seek another confessor to tell the wrongs they have done, so that their own confessor shall think they have done nothing wrong at all.”7 This hypocrisy pointed out by St. John of the Cross in beginners, who need to undergo the passive purification of the senses, shows clearly that, for him, they are beginners in the sense in which that term is generally understood and that we should take literally and in the ordinary sense of the words what is said in The Dar^ Night: “the night of sense is common and comes to many; these are the beginners.” 8 It cannot, therefore, be admitted, as some hold, that the begin­ ners referred to here are already living in the unitive way after passing through active purification and that they merit the 5Summa, Ila Ilae, q. 35. c The Dar!^ Night, Bk. I, chap. 2. 7 Ibid. 8 Op. cit., Bk. I, chap. 8. 8 THE LOVE OF GOD name of beginners only from a very special point of view, so far as they are making a beginning, not in the interior life, but in the passive ways, considered as more or less ex­ traordinary and beyond the normal way.9 The faults St. John of die Cross speaks of certainly show that he is talking about real beginners, not in a special sense, but in the traditional sense of the word, taken in its full and unwatered meaning with particular reference to those having either a contemplative vocation or a call to the apostolate, the overflowing of contemplation. Many other faults companion those remarked by St. John of the Cross, but he scarcely comments on them since he con­ cerns himself, as has been said, only with our relations with God and not, as it were, with the repercussions these faults have on study and the apostolate. However, to round out his thought on this point presents little difficulty. Beginners—and the retarded, too, of whom there are but too many—devote diemselves to study more out of curiosity than from love of truth and, as they fail to appreciate the value of truth, they take insufficient precautions against error. They are likely to overevaluate themselves, to become ir­ ritated when others seem not to recognize their worth. Jeal­ ousy and envy lead them to disparage fellow workers more talented and more disinterested than themselves and so to block the good influence diese might have exerted on others, who may fail, therefore, to advance or even to persevere be­ cause of this lack. People who do things like this may work 9 It is to be regretted that Tanquercy in his treatise on The Spiritual Life, tr. Branderis, and cd. (Tournai: Desclée, 1930), pp. 601 fl., favors this point of view, placing the night of the senses in Bk. Ill where he considers the unitive way. In doing so he departs not only from the terminology of St. John of the Cross but both from his teaching and from traditional doctrine as well. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 9 great harm to the general good without being conscious of it. Even in scholarly religious circles a thousand petty pas­ sions and intrigues may influence minds and result in books and reviews becoming tainted with untruth, even when, and perhaps especially when, all concerned profess to be quite objective. Irritating controversies arise only too often because those concerned have but relative good faith. Those who give themselves to the apostolate bring much natural eagerness and self-seeking to it and they unconsciously make themselves the center of their activity and attract souls either to themselves or to the groups to which they belong in­ stead of to our Lord Jesus Christ. And when trials come they complain and allow themselves to sink into discouragement. Anyone who sets out to indicate all the nuances of the seven capital sins on this level of human activity, either in begin­ ners or in the great number of retarded souls, would never be done. All this shows us the necessity for profound purification. Exterior, and especially interior, mortification can doubtless correct many of these faults, but what we impose on ourselves cannot suffice to tear up the roots that reach down into the depths of our faculties. The remains of sin impregnate, as it were, our temperament and character. We are unconscious of this, but our neighbor is not and sometimes, without say­ ing anydfing, suffers much because of it. St. John of the Cross says: But neither from these imperfections nor from those others can the soul be perfectly purified until God brings it into the passive purgation of that dark night whereof we shall speak presently. It befits the soul, however, in so far as it can, to contrive to labour, on its own account, to purge and perfect itself, so that it may merit 10 THE LOVE OF GOD being taken by God into that Divine care wherein it becomes healed of all things that it was unable of itself to cure. Because, however greatly the soul itself labours, it cannot actively purify it­ self so as to be in the least degree prepared for the Divine union of perfection of love, if God takes not its hand and purges it not in that dark fire, in the way and manner that we have to describe.10 Further, to remedy the faults of the proficient, there must later be another much more grievous and proportionately more fruitful purification of the spirit.11 ARTICLE II PSYCHOLOGICAL DESCRIPTION OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATON OF THE SENSES In describing this state, many authors place particular em­ phasis on its negative aspect: the loss of all sensible devotion and the great difficulty experienced in discursive meditation. They give us the impression that it is a time of relapse rather than of progress, not bringing out what is positive and prin­ cipal in the night of the senses: a strong desire for God, a sign of the beginning of infused contemplation, the entrance into a new way. It is commonly and truly said that, in the passive purifica­ tion of the senses, the soul experiences complete sensible aridity in prayer and pious exercises; nothing offered to it in meditation or in the books it used to love attracts it any more; it no longer has any taste for these things and everywhere finds dryness and sterility. It has the impression of being left in darkness and penetrating cold, as though the sun which 10 The Darl{ Night, Bk. I, chap. 3. 11 Ibid., Bk. II, chaps. 1, 2. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES II gave light and warmth to the spirit had ceased. Sometimes this painful aridity engenders a disgust for spiritual things and even a sort of desolation, especially in souls tempera­ mentally inclined to sadness, souls that formerly received sensible consolations. In the words of the Book of Job, they become a burden to themselves, "factus sum mihimetipsi gravis.”12 They have no spirit for prayer or for work, and yet they realize how necessary prayer is. They ask themselves whether their aridity is lukewarmness, whether it comes from some partly unconscious fault of their own, for example, from presumption which they have taken for zeal. If they consult others, many wish to persuade them that their trouble is due to melancholy and that they ought to take the ap­ propriate remedies for it: exercise, diversion, and exterior works. Authors usually add that sensible aridity is a privation of merely accidental, but not of substantial, devotion. The will to give oneself generously to the service of God is not lost,13 but the senses and imagination are left in a kind of emptiness and the sensuous appetency finds no savor in anything. The disgust experienced with everything is really involuntary and fails to affect the will, which is as far above the sensuous appetency as the intellect is above the senses and imagination. All this is true; but we must consider aridity or dryness of the sensuous appetency more closely so as to distinguish it from spiritual sloth or acedia, the privation of substantial devotion itself, a disgust for spiritual things both culpable and voluntary, if not in itself at least in the negligence which gives it birth.11 To confuse the night of the senses with 12 Job 7: 20. 13 Ila Hae, q. 82, a. I. 14 Ibid., q. 35. 12 THE LOVE OF GOD spiritual sloth would be a grave speculative and practical error leading straight to quietism. To draw a clear distinction between them, we shall have to return to the description of the passive night of the senses left us by St. John of the Cross, who plumbed the depths of St. Gregory the Great’s doctrine on this point.18 In the Mid­ dle Ages Hugh of St. Victor 10 and later Tauler 15 *1718 developed this teaching. Together with these masters, we must insist on stressing the positive aspect of the state of purification, that is, a strong desire for God and for perfection, rather titan the negative characteristics of aridity and difficulty in medi­ tating. Indeed the soul makes great progress during this period because of the profound working of God within it, and this divine activity ancj the passive state resulting from it are plainly the chief elements of the state, although die negative notes of dryness and quasi-impossibility to meditate serve as the chief means of evidencing it, especially at first. The description given by St. John of the Cross 18 brings out what is most fundamental, positive, and divine in this state and will serve to help us get beyond its negative aspects to the supernatural reality produced by God. According to St. John of the Cross three principal signs, already noted by Tauler, manifest this state. He expresses it thus in The Dark, Night:19 15 Moral., XXIV, chap. 6, no. ii; X, chap, io, no. 17. In Ezech., Bk. Π, hom. 2, nos. 2, 3, 13. 10 In Eccl., hom. 1. Here Hugh of St. Victor compares the passive purification of the soul by divine grace to the transformation of green wood into fire. 1T Institutions, chap. 35. From their master's sermons Tauler's disciples gathered together the essentials of this doctrine into the Institutions. 18 The Dark, Night, Bk. I, chap. 9. 1» Ibid. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 13 The first (sign) is whether, when a soul finds no pleasure or con­ solation in the things of God,20 it also fails to find it in anything created; for, as God sets the soul in this dark night to the end that He may quench and purge its sensual desire, He allows it not to find attraction or sweetness in anything whatsoever.21 Hence it may be laid down as very probable that this aridity and insipidity proceed not from recently committed sins or imperfections. For, if this were so, the soul would feel in its nature some inclination or desire to taste other things than those of God. . . . Since, how­ ever, this lack of enjoyment in things above or below might pro­ ceed from some indisposition or melancholy humour, which often­ times makes it impossible for the soul to take pleasure in anything, it becomes necessary to apply the second sign and condition. The second sign whereby a man may believe himself to be ex­ periencing the said purgation is that ordinarily the memory is centred upon God, with painful care and solicitude, thinking that it is not serving God, but is backsliding, because it finds itself with­ out sweetness in the things of God. And in such a case it is evident that this lack of sweetness and this aridity come not from weak­ ness and lukewarmness; for it is the nature of lukewarmness not to care greatly or to have any inward solicitude for the things of God ... for lukewarmness consists in great weakness and re­ missness in the will and in the spirit, without solicitude as to serv­ ing God; whereas purgative aridity is ordinarily accompanied by solicitude, with care and grief, as I say, because the soul is not serving God. And although this may sometimes be increased by melancholy or some other humour (as it frequently is) it fails not for this reason to produce a purgative effect upon the desire, since 20 What is meant is that the soul no longer finds consolation in things divine proposed to it in a sensible way, for example, by way of the imagination in discursive meditation. 21 Later it will be made evident that this is an effect of the gift of knowledge, which shows us the vanity of all created things and their inability to reveal to us God’s intimate life. 14 THE LOVE OF GOD the desire is deprived of all pleasure, and has its care centred upon God alone. . . . When the cause is aridity, it is true that the sensual part of the soul has fallen low, and is weak and feeble in its actions, by reason of the little pleasure which it finds in them; but the spirit, on the other hand, is ready and strong.22 St. John of the Cross insists on the positive character of the second sign : For the cause of this aridity is that God transfers to the spirit the good things and the strength of the senses, which, since the soul’s natural strength and senses are incapable of using them, remain barren, dry and empty. For the sensual part of a man has no ca­ pacity for that which is pure spirit, and thus, when it is the spirit that receives the pleasure, the flesh is left without savour and is too weak to perform any action. But the spirit, which all the time is being fed, goes forward in strength, and with more alertness and solicitude than before, in its anxiety not to fail God; and if it is not immediately conscious of spiritual sweetness and delight, but only of aridity and lack of sweetness, the reason for this is the strangeness of the exchange; for its palate has become accustomed to those other sensual pleasures upon which its eyes are still fixed, and, since the spiritual palate is not made ready or purged for such subtle pleasure, until it finds itself becoming prepared for it by means of this arid and dark night, it cannot experience spiritual pleasure and good. . . . These souls whom God is beginning to lead through these soli­ tary places of the wilderness are like to the children of Israel; to whom in the wilderness God began to give food from Heaven, containing within itself all sweetness, and, as is there said, it turned 22 Just as in the first sign we see the effects of the gift of knowledge, in the second we find manifest the gifts of fortitude and fear of the Lord. These, too, will be given further consideration later. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 15 to the savour which each one of them desired. But withal the children of Israel felt the lack of the pleasures and delights of the flesh and the onions which they had eaten aforetime in Egypt. This state has also been compared to the teething period of infants; when they begin to cut their teeth, they have con­ tinual pain, but after their teeth have come drrough they are ready for stronger food and will receive it. At first it has no appeal for them, but soon they grow to need and desire it. Because the same is true of the spiritual life, St. John of the Cross adds: The which food is the beginning of contemplation that is dark and arid to the senses; which contemplation is secret and hidden from the very person that experiences it; and ordinarily, together with the aridity and emptiness which it causes in the senses, it gives the soul an inclination and desire to be alone and in quietness, with­ out being able to think of any particular thing or having the de­ sire to do so. If those souls to whom this comes to pass knew how to be quiet at this time . . . then they would delicately experience this inward refreshment in that ease and freedom from care. So delicate is this refreshment that ordinarily, if a man have desire or care to experience it, he experiences it not; for, as I say, it does its work when the soul is most at ease and freest from care; it is like the air which, if one would close one’s hand upon it, es­ capes. . . . For in such a way does God bring the soul into this state, and by so different a path does He lead it that, if it desires to work with its faculties, it hinders the work which God is doing in it rather than aids it. . . . For anything that the soul can do of its own accord at this time serves only, as we have said, to hinder inward peace and the work which God is accomplishing in the spirit by means of that aridity of sense. . . . i6 THE LOVE OF GOD The third sign whereby this purgation of the senses may be recognized is that the soul can no longer meditate or reflect in its sense of the imagination, as it was wont, however much it may endeavor to do so. For God now begins to communicate Himself to it, no longer through sense, as He did aforetime, by means of re­ flections which joined and sundered its knowledge but by pure spirit, into which consecutive reflections enter not; for He com­ municates Himself to it by an act of simple contemplation.23 On the subject of this third sign, St. John of the Cross re­ marks that “the embarrassment and dissatisfaction of the faculties proceed not from indisposition, for, when this is the case, and the indisposition, which is never permanent, comes to an end, then the soul is able once more, by taking some care about the matter, to do what it did before, and the faculties find their needed support. But in the purgation of the desire this is not so: when once the soul begins to enter therein, its inability to reflect with the faculties grows ever greater . . . although, at first, and with some persons, it is not as continuous.” In the Ascent of Mount Carmel^ too, St. John of the Cross, while not following absolutely the same order, men­ tions these three signs when indicating at what time it is well to pass from discursive meditation to contemplation. This passage refers to infused contemplation. St. John of the Cross26 says that contemplation works not actively but pas­ sively, being received from God operating in us and having 23 When the gift of understanding is united to the gift of piety they make themselves evident by their effects, the gift of understanding serving as the principle of a knowledge of divine tilings that is not discursive but superior to reasoning, simple, and leading the soul to experience, as it were, tilings divine. Cf. Ila Ilac, q.8, a. I, 2, 4, 7. 24 Bk. II, chaps. 11, 12. 25 Ibid., chaps. 12,13. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 17 such subtlety and delicacy that the soul may hardly notice its presence. In this state “God communicates Himself to it passively, even as to one who has his eyes open, so that light is communicated to him passively without his doing more than keep them open. And this reception of light which is infused supernaturally is passive understanding.”20 *26 The state here referred to is the same as that described in The Dark, Night.-1 Therefore, although this state is made manifest by two negative characteristics,—aridity or the deprivation of all sensible consolation and difficulty or quasi-powerlessness to meditate—it has another more important and positive ele­ ment: the beginning of infused contemplation and the ardent desire for God which is born of it. Further, aridity of the sensuous appetency and difficulty in meditating spring pre­ cisely from this, that grace is starting to take on a new and purely spiritual form, superior to the senses and to discursive reasoning. At first sight we might be led to believe that God purifies us chiefly by depriving us of something, sensible grace; in reality He gives us much more than we had before because, far from taking grace away from us, He gives it to us more abundantly but in a higher form, far above the reach of any sense enjoyment. The state into which God thus leads the soul will be better understood when we have tried to dis­ cover its causes. 20 Ibid., chap. 15. 27 The quotations just given, as well as many other texts, show that these chapters of the Ascent of Mount Carmel and The Dark, Night (Bk. I, chap. 9) describe not two different states, one preceding the other in time, but the same state, the Ascent of Mt. Carmel dealing with its active aspect, The Dark Night with its passive. The earliest commentators took this view (cf. Diet, de thiol, cath., art. on St. John of the Cross); and more and more are coming to recognize it at the present time. i8 THE LOVE OF GOD ARTICLE III A CAUSAL EXPLANATION OF THE STATE OF PURIFICATION Some authors28 find the explanation for the state of puri­ fication chiefly in the deprivation of sensible grace. Since the beginner might, through spiritual greediness, become too attached to it, he is deprived of it for his own sake, as the author of The Dari^ Night remarks.29 Although the depriva­ tion of grace truly belongs to this state, it is not die principal thing at issue. The fundamental characterisdc for us to note is the beginning of infused contemplation due to the habitual intervention of the Holy Ghost. The texts already quoted from St. John of die Cross treadng of the three signs make this clear to us. The first sign is, as has already been said, that the soul can no longer find consolation either in things created or in the things of God presented in a sensible manner. The gift of knowledge effects this, making us understand as if experi­ mentally the emptiness of created things and their radical inability to tell us anything of God’s inner life. Knowledge differs from wisdom inasmuch as it knows diings not through their Supreme Cause but through their proximate and lower causes. Now the only thing in the world and in us that does not spring from the Supreme Cause is sin, the imperfection of our acts, our indigence, our weakness. All these arise solely from defectible and deficient created causes. Because St. Augustine and St. Thomas appreciated this truth, they have related the holy sadness spoken of by Christ in the fifth 28 For example, Anthony of the Holy Spirit, Directorium mysticum, tr. II, d.IV, sect. 2, no. 221. 28 Bk. I, chap. 8. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 19 beatitude to the gift of knowledge; for knowledge of the gravity of sin and of the nothingness of creatures brings us to tears of contrition. St. Augustine says that those who mourn are those who know what defeats they have suffered by seeking evils as good.30 St. Thomas, too, tells us that the gift of knowledge makes us judge as we should of human things, showing us how foolish a man is to seek the sovereign good in them even when they often prove an occasion for turning us from God.31 In the Old Testament the Book of Ecclesiastes is never done telling us of the vanity and poverty of all human things: riches acquired with great effort, worldly pleasures, human wisdom. “Vanity of vanities,” said Ecclesiastes, “and all things are vanity,” except to love and serve God. “Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, before the time of affliction come . . . before . . . the dust return into its earth, from whence it was, and the spirit return to God, who gave it. . . . Fear God, and keep His commandments: for this is all man. And all things that are done, God will bring into judgment from every error, whether it be good or evil.” 82 This deep sense of the vanity of things created when not ordered to God, when not directed to knowing, loving, and serving Him, penetrates every page of The Imitation. We are told, for example, “Without Me, friendship can neither profit nor endure”; “Never read anything in order that thou mayst appear more learned or more wise.” 33 Ruysbroeck gives us the same message: divine knowledge will teach us to be without presumption and not to place our 30 Lihr. 1 de sermone Domini in monte, c. 4. 31 Ila Ilac, q.9, a.4. 32 Eccles. 12: 1-14. 33 Bk. ΙΠ, chaps. 42, 43. 20 THE LOVE OF GOD joy either in perishable things or in our works but to be dis­ satisfied with ourselves as unprofitable servants and creatures weak in every way. Blessed are they who suffer this dissatis­ faction for they shall be comforted in the eternal kingdom of God.3435 36Ruysbroeck also notes the relationship between the gifts of the Holy Ghost and the passive purification of the senses, writing that Christ first comes to exercise His influ­ ence and action on a man’s lower powers to purify, uplift, and inflame them, and orient them toward his inner life. Working within the soul, God holds out His gifts to us or takes them away, enriches us or makes us poor, gives us joy or makes us desolate, quickens us or abandons us, sets our hearts on fire or binds them about with ice. No language whatever, Ruysbroeck tells us, can express these contrary gifts.38 They arc graces evidently connected with the passive purification of the senses.30 By them we begin truly to know by experience die emptiness of created things and really to see that God alone can be our ultimate end. The gift of knowl­ edge is having a profound influence on the soul.37 The gifts of fear of the Lord and of fortitude are deeply at work too, as shown by the second sign referred to above when, in the words of St. John of die Cross, the soul knows “painful care and solicitude, diinking that it is not serving God, but is backsliding; . . . the sensual part of the soul has fallen low . . . but the spirit, on the other hand, is ready and strong.”38 34 Le royaume des amants de Dieu, chap. 18. 35 L'Ornement des noces spirituelles, Bk. II, chap. 5. 36 Cf. ibid., Bk. II, chap. 63. 3T Cf. Livre de la Bienheureuse Angèle de Foligno, cd. Paul Doncœur (Paris: Lib. de l’art Cath., 26). The nindt step of the way of the cross as outlined here seems to correspond to the night of the senses; the nineteenth, to the night of the soul. 33 The Dark, Night, Bk. I, chap. 9. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 21 The care and solicitude experienced by the soul are cer­ tainly effected by the gift of fear of the Lord, the filial fear of sinning which grows with the progress of charity, while servile fear, tire fear of being punished, diminishes.38 Under the influence of this gift the soul resists the temptations against chastity and patience which often accompany passive puri­ fication of the senses. It repeats the words of the Psalmist, “Pierce Thou my flesh with Thy fear: for I am afraid of Thy judgments.” 40 According to St. Augustine, the gift of fear of the Lord corresponds to the beatitude of the poor in spirit, for he who fears God does not become puffed up, seeks neither honors nor riches, but is especially inspired to love poverty and the hidden life because they make him more like his Savior. “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” And even in this world their poverty will give them a share in the only true wealth.41 The influence of the gift of fortitude makes itself felt at this time in an ardent desire to serve God in spite of dryness, temptations, and every other possible difficulty. According to St. Augustine and St. Thomas, this gift corresponds to the fourth beatitude, “Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice: for they shall have their fill.” The relationship is evident. St. Thomas says: “Now it is very difficult, not merely to do virtuous deeds, which receive the common des­ ignation of works of justice, but furthermore to do them with an insatiable desire, which may be signified by hunger and thirst for justice.” 42 The gift of fortitude must come to the aid of the virtues of patience and longsuffering; other­ wise, amid the difficulties, misfortunes, and contradictions 30 Ha Ilae, q. 19, a. 9, 12. 40 Ps. 118:120. 41 Ila Hac, q. 19, a. 12. 42 Ibid., q. 139, a. 2. , 22 THE LOVE OF GOD that have to be met, we would lose our ardent desire for perfection. Enthusiasm based on sense feelings burns out like a fire of dried grass; we need ardor of another and wholly spiritual order, something God alone can give us. The Imitation says: “If thou carry the cross willingly, it will carry thee, and bring thee to thy desired end. . . . And the more die flesh is brought down by affliction, the more is the spirit strengthened by interior grace. . . . This is not man’s power, but the grace of Christ; which doth and can effect such great things in frail flesh that what it naturally abhors and flies, even this, through fervor of spirit, it now embraces and loves.” 43 Ruysbroeck says that the gift of fortitude allows us to rise above joys and sorrows, gains and losses, hope and care for earthly things, and every kind of intermediary and multi­ plicity. It delivers us and makes us free of all creatures. The man who has it will not let himself become dissipated by sensible affection or in covetousness for sweetness and con­ solation or for any divine gift. Even the rest and peace of his own heart will not lure him from going beyond all gifts and consolations to find the only one whom he desires and loves.44 Lastly, the third sign, that is, great difficulty in discursive meditation, certainly reveals to us the gift of understanding making itself evident as the principle of newly infused con­ templation. In explaining the third sign, St. John of the Cross says: “God now begins to communicate Himself to it, no longer through sense, as He did aforetime, by means of reflections which joined and sundered its knowledge, but 43 Bk. II, chap. 12. 44 L'Ornement des noces spirituelles, Bk. II, chap. 64. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 23 by pure spirit, into which consecutive reflections enter not; but He communicates Himself to it by an act of simple con­ templation, to which neither the exterior nor the interior senses of the lower part of the soul can attain.” 45 Here we have “the beginning of a contemplation that is dark and arid to the senses, . . . secret and hidden to the very person that experiences it. . . . So delicate is this refreshment that ordi­ narily, if a man have desire or care to experience it, he experi­ ences it not; for, as I say, it does its work when the soul is most at ease and freest from care.” 46 The gift of understanding and that of piety show their in­ fluence in producing this effect. Ruysbroeck says that the first result of the gift of understanding shines forth in the spirit of simplicity. A remarkable clarity floods simplicity, for the grace of God is the basis of all the gifts and dwells essentially in our passive intellect as a simple light, fixing and enlightening the mind in a simple manner so that it acquires a resemblance to God. And it is a property of the unity of God’s divine essence to attract whatever resembles it. Never­ theless a just man may sometimes diink that he fails really to love God and rest in Him. But this very fear itself springs from love, for his desire to love God more than he can leads a man to believe that he loves God less than he is able.47 Before the subject had been dealt with by these great mys­ tics, St. Thomas took it up when treating of the effects of the gift of understanding, pointing out the purifying action of the gift, saying that it cleanses the mind by purging it of 45 The Dark. Night, Bk. I, chap. 9. 46 Ibid. 4T L'Ornement des noces spirituelles, Bk. Π, chap. 66. THE LOVE OF GOD 24 “phantasms and errors, so as to receive the truths which are proposed to it about God, no longer by way of corporeal phantasms, nor infected with heretical misrepresentations.” 48 It makes us penetrate simply but deeply into the mysteries of faith, taking us beyond images to the divine reality they represent and through the letter to the life-giving spirit.49 During the dark night of the soul, the purifying influence of this gift penetrates much more deeply into the soul al­ though it is already plainly operative in the night of the senses. Furthermore, St. Thomas, following Dionysius, says that for tire soul to reach the uniformity of contemplation, sym­ bolized by circular motion without beginning or end, it must rid itself of a twofold lack of uniformity arising first from the variety of external things with which the mind is oc­ cupied and secondly from reasoning or discursive thought. The soul heals itself of its deformity by the simple contempla­ tion of intelligible truth.80 St. Augustine often says the same thing. We find a clear expression of it, for example, in the first book of the De quantitate animae 51 when he describes the seven degrees of life: (i) vegetative life; (2) sentient life; (3) the knowledge of human things and of the different sciences; (4) the life of true virtue; (5) the tranquillity of soul springing from con­ trol of the passions by solid virtue; (6) entrance into the higher spiritual fight; (7) contemplation and union with God. As early as in the fourth degree he gives a description 48 Ila Ilae, q.8, a.7. 49 Cf. ibid., a. I. 50 Ibid., q. 180, a. 6. 51 Bk. I, chap. 33. PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES 25 of the purification necessary for the soul to acquire true virtue and to understand practically how much more it is worth than the body and the whole material universe. He says that in the difficult work of purification the soul must place its whole confidence in God in order to resist all the temptations then arising and to persevere in virtue. The more the soul advances, the more it sees how far it still is from true purity of heart; but finally, God helping it, it lets itself be more and more animated by Him.52 The doctrine taught by St. John of the Cross and by Ruysbroeck shows, in regard to this subject and many others, a wonderful harmony with the teaching of St. Augustine and St. Thomas. What has been presented here is what seems to be the psychological description and theological explana­ tion of the state of purification according to the great masters. Although the soul appears at first to lose rather than gain by having sensible graces taken away from it, it is in reality en­ tering upon infused contemplation and standing on the threshold of the mystical life. Still to be considered are rules of guidance suitable for those in this state, the effects of passive purification, the trials usu­ ally accompanying it, and lastly the stage of spiritual progress at which it normally appears. Because of the importance of the question, we should do all we can to know the mind of the great masters concerning it. In regard to the first stage of development at which passive purification occurs, whether during the course of the unitive way, as some seem to think, or at the beginning of the illuminative, the great masters evidently regard the illuminative way as a period in which 02 Ibid. Cf. quartus gradus animae. 26 THE LOVE OF GOD the soul frees itself more and more from the senses and from reasoning so that it may go on under the special illumination of the Holy Ghost to the contemplation of divine things, to find, as all of us should, the soul of the interior life and of the apostolate in contemplation and charity. CHAPTER II What Is to be Done During the Night of the Senses Having given a psychological description of the passive purification of the senses and a theological explanation of the causes producing it and the end to which it is ordered, we must now speak of rules for direction suitable to this state. St. John of the Cross has treated the subject in die tenth chap­ ter of the first book of The Dark. Night; his teaching can be reduced to five principal observations explaining what ought not to be done, and dien afterward what positive action should be taken. God leads certain spiritual souls from meditation to con­ templation, suspending the activity of the soul’s faculties 1 so that there may be no obstacle to the infused contemplation He is preparing diem to receive, vivifying them with more abundant peace and enkindling them with the spirit of love.2 St. John of the Cross says that they particularly need some one to understand them at this time and that, lacking such help, they may “abandon the road or lose courage ; or, at least they may be hindered from going farther by the great trouble they take in advancing along the road of meditation and reasoning,” or by desiring to enjoy consolation and sadsfy their own inclinations. 1 The Dark. Night, Bk. I, chap. io. 2 Ibid. 27 28 THE LOVE OF GOD In other words, those who presently find themselves de­ void of all sensible grace must guard against backsliding and should choose, if they can, a learned and experienced director. Difficulties in interior prayer arise because of the withdrawal of sensible graces and of the quasi-impossibility of meditating and because of accompanying temptations against chastity and patience aroused by the devil to turn the soul from prayer. Our Lord’s words seem fully verified: “How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” 3 Our Lord permits aridity and temptations to make us live the life of the spirit more vigorously, but beginners get the impression that they have been left in a barren and waterless desert and they are afraid “of being lost on the road, think­ ing that all spiritual blessing is over for them and that God has abandoned them since they find no help or pleasure in good things.”4 In the midst of such difficulties they may turn back if they do not have a well instructed and experienced guide; and, as a matter of fact, many do grow tired and re­ treat. At this time more than at any other the old saying that “Not to go forward is to go back” is found true. And those who would help souls to advance while in this state must see more in it than melancholy of temperament or God’s punish­ ment; otherwise they may make those whom they would encourage lose heart.8 About directors St. Teresa has the same thing to say as St. John of the Cross. s Matt. 7: 14. * The Dark. Night, Bk. I, chap. I o. 5 Cf. what St. John of the Cross has to say on the subject in the prologue to Ascent of Mt. Carmel. DURING THE NIGHT OF THE SENSES 29 So then, it is of great consequence that the director should be prudent—I mean, of sound understanding—and a man of experi­ ence. If, in addition to this, he is a learned man, it is a very great matter. But if these qualities cannot be found together, the first two are the most important, because learned men may be found with whom we can communicate when it is necessary. . . . My opinion has always been, and will be, that every Christian should continue to be guided by a learned director if he can, and the more learned the better. They who walk in the way of prayer have the greater need of learning; and the more spiritual they are, the greater is that need.® We do well, then, to choose a learned and experienced director; if such cannot be found, then a well instructed and virtuous priest; and if he cannot be had, a pious even though ignorant priest who will have the humility to recognize his own limitations and to encourage us on occasion to consult others better informed than he is. According to St. Teresa, such a man is to be preferred to those with some learning who wish to seem to know it all, setting themselves up as judges of things they know nothing about and either leading souls astray or blocking their advancement. Besides having a good director, souls in this state should follow the advice of St. John of the Cross when he says: “It is well for those who find themselves in this condition to take comfort, to persevere in patience and to be in no wise afflicted. Let them trust in God, who abandons not those that seek Him with a simple and right heart, and will not fail to give them what is needful for the road, until He bring them into the clear and pure light of love. This last He will give them by e Life, by herself. Chap. 13, cd. Burke (N.Y.: Columbus Press, 1911). THE LOVE OF GOD 30 means of that other dark night, that of the spirit, if they merit that He should bring them thereto.”7 In aridity and powerlessness we must not become dis­ couraged nor abandon prayer, saying that it has become use­ less and fruitless. All spiritual writers tell us that at this time we have to persevere in humble, trusting prayer and keep on mortifying our inordinate inclinations. But some authors say all this somewhat sadly with an ascetic air indicating that the direction we are to take is along the line of mere duty, without showing us that prolonged aridity marks the begin­ ning of a new life, that we have come upon the bitter roots of a tree that bears sweet fruit. We must have recourse to prayer and mortification more than ever before to help us overcome present difficulties. This we must do because these very difficulties indicate the germinating of the mystical life within us. And so it is without any sadness but with real joy that an experienced director will encourage us to enter into the strait way that will, for faithful hearts, widen out into the immensity of God Himself. This time of trial is a time for making generous acts of faith, trust, and love, for we find ourselves in the happy neces­ sity of being unable to confine ourselves to imperfect acts of these virtues. Let us not forget St. Thomas’ doctrine that generous acts of charity obtain an immediate increase of charity, but imperfect acts {actus remissi') do not. The man who has five talents and acts as if he had only two does not immediately obtain a sixth; he receives it when he acts to the full power within him. If we are not to lose ground during the night of the senses, we must begin to love God with all our strength, no longer 7 Loe. cit. DURING THE NIGHT OF THE SENSES 31 by the virtues alone but by the special inspiration of the Holy Ghost. Then our strength will be the strength of ten. Far from giving up or shortening prayer, although it seems to have become useless, the beginner must often appeal to God, saying: “Lord, save me, keep my patience; make me do what You command, and command me to do what You will.” Sensible fervor doubtless is lost at this time, but normally substantial devotion greatly increases, for it proceeds from the virtue of religion and the gift of piety; the losses of the senses leave untouched the will’s readiness to serve God: “the will to do promptly what pertains to the service of God.” 8 The illuminative way is dawning and is well worth the trouble required for entering into it. Men climb the Alps and risk their lives to stand on Mt. Blanc and look down on the glaciers. We should be willing to accept much to enter into true intimacy with God.9 A third step in our inquiry deals with the question whether souls in this state can persevere patiently in prayer when they find meditation impossible. St. John of the Cross advises them what to do: The way in which they are to conduct themselves in this night of the sense is to devote themselves not at all to reasoning and meditation, since it is not the time for this, but to allow the soul to remain in peace and quietness, although it may seem clear to them that they are doing nothing. . . . The truth is that they will be doing quite sufficient if they have patience and persevere in prayer without making any effort. What they must do is merely to leave the soul free and disencumbered and at rest from all knowledge and thought, troubling not themselves, in that state, 8 Cf. Summa, Ila Ilac, q. 24, a. 6. 9 Ibid., q.82, a. I. 32 THE LOVE OF GOD about what they think or meditate, but contenting themselves with no more than a peaceful and loving attentiveness toward God.10 A little earlier, when speaking about those who desire to return to meditation, St. John of the Cross remarks: This effort they make not without great inward repugnance and unwillingness on the part of their soul, which was taking pleasure in being in that quietness and ease, instead of working with its faculties. So they have abandoned one pursuit, yet draw no profit from the other; for, while they seek what is prompted by thçir own spirit, they lose the spirit of tranquillity and peace which they had before. And thus they are like to one who abandons what he has done in order to do it over again, or to one who leaves a city only to re-enter it, or to one who is hunting and lets his prey go in order to hunt it once more. This is useless here, for the soul will gain nothing further by conducting itself in this way, as has been said. We give ourselves profitless trouble when we try to move against the current of grace instead of going with it. It is as if we were to go on looking for the source of living water when we already stand on the water’s edge; we will be cer­ tain to go past it if we do not give up searching. It is as if we wished to keep on spelling out words when we know how to read and can take in a whole line at a glance. We are strug­ gling downhill instead of letting God lift us up to the heights. Spiritual persons who find themselves in prolonged sen­ sible aridity and are not conscious of any recent outstanding fault, may conclude that they are gaining and not losing by being deprived of sensible fervor and that, although they 10 Loc. cit. DURING THE NIGHT OF THE SENSES 33 cannot feel it, grace is being accorded to them in another higher and more spiritual form. St. John of the Cross makes a fourth observation 11 that relates to those who do not exactly wish to return to discur­ sive meditation but who would like to feel some consolation again: What they must do is merely to leave the soul free and disen­ cumbered and at rest from all knowledge and thought, troubling not themselves, in that state, about what they think or meditate, but contenting themselves with no more than a peaceful and loving attentiveness toward God, and in being without anxiety, without the ability and without desire to have experience of Him or to per­ ceive Him. For all these yearnings disquiet and distract the soul from the peaceful quiet and sweet ease of contemplation which is here granted to it. . . . Let them remain in peace, as there is no question save of their being at ease and having freedom of spirit. For if such a soul should desire to make any effort of its own with its interior faculties,12 this means that it will hinder and lose the blessings which, by means of that peace and ease of the soul, God is instilling into it and impressing upon it. It is just as if some painter were painting or dyeing a face; if the sitter were to move because he desired to do something, he would prevent the painter from accomplishing anything and would disturb him in what he was doing. And thus, when the soul desires to remain in inward ease and peace, any operation and affection or attention wherein it may then seek to indulge will distract it and disquiet it and make it conscious of aridity and emptiness of sense. For the more a soul endeavors to « ibid. 12 That is, any effort outside the special inspiration of the Holy Ghost, in which it should rest. The description of the state given here by St. John of the Cross shows that it corresponds to St. Teresa’s "Fourth Mansion.” 34 THE LOVE OF GOD find help in affection and knowledge, the more will it feel the lack of these, which cannot now be supplied to it upon that road. This passage is psychologically profound, revealing how natural activity, when exerted contrary to the gifts of the Holy Ghost, serves as an obstacle to their delicate inspirations. We must not desire to feel God’s gift but seek to receive it widi docility in the obscurity of faith; then it will bear fruit. Aristotle says that as youth has its bloom, so has every act its pleasure; we must seek not pleasure but the object and end of the virtuous act itself; peace or the tranquillity of order will follow, bringing with it a pure joy which, though not the end of the act, is its result.13 Having seen what souls should not do, that they ought not to attempt to go back to discursive meditation and to ex­ periencing feelings, we should next find out what positive action is to be taken. St. John of the Cross tells us: Wherefore it behooves such a soul to pay no heed if the opera­ tions of its faculties become lost to it; it is rather to desire that this should happen quickly. For, by not hindering the operation of in­ fused contemplation that God is bestowing upon it, it can receive this with more peaceful abundance, and cause its spirit to be en­ kindled and to burn with the love which this dark and secret con­ templation brings with it and sets firmly in the soul. For contempla­ tion is naught else than a secret, peaceful and loving infusion from God, which, if it be permitted, enkindles the soul with the spirit of love.14 At the beginning of the same chapter, the holy doctor says that in this way God brings the soul from meditation to contemplation, that is, to infused contemplation, there be13 Cf. la, Ilac, q.4, a. 2, c. et ad 3. 14 Loc. cit. DURING THE NIGHT OF THE SENSES 35 ing no question here of acquired contemplation but only of the infusion of the sweet light of life. The soul should, in other words, content itself with “a peaceful and loving at­ tentiveness toward God.” 15 The general and obscure knowl­ edge of His presence which God infuses into the soul is superior to every sense image and distinct idea; it reaches the spirit quickening the letter of the Gospel, discovers the treas­ ure it contains, and fulfills our Lord’s words : “But the Para­ clete, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring all things to your mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you.” 16 These words were not addressed only to the apostles, for in his first epistle St. John writes to the faithful: “As for you, let tliat which you have heard from the beginning, abide in you. ... You also shall abide in the Son. . . . Let the unction, which you have received from Him, abide in you . . . as His unction teacheth you of all things.” 17 At first sight it may seem that, if we find ourselves in like circumstances, we should do nothing; in reality, the Gospels we have read and meditated on so often will communicate their spirit to us, opening up the rich treasure of their mean­ ing and giving us what apostles particularly need to be fit ministers not of the letter but of the spirit of the New Testa­ ment.18 Every Christian, too, must, in a sense, become truly interior and have some depth of understanding of Christ’s words, our “spirit and life.” 10 Infused prayer begins with a spiritual lifting up of our souls to God in a way senses and lilbid. 18 John 14: 26. 17 I John 2: 24, 27. 18 II Cor. 3:6. 19 John 6: 64. 36 THE LOVE OF GOD reasoning cannot reach; it is adoration in spirit and in truth, surpassing all figures of the imagination and formulas of reason, arriving at the divine reality which they seek to ex­ press, attaining to that infinite and diffusive goodness from which all life comes. When we are undergoing the passive purification of the senses which takes place, according to St. John of the Cross, at the beginning of the illuminative way,20 the conduct we should follow is then indicated for us. However, a difficulty remains to be cleared up. Suppose the soul has no such gen­ eral and obscure knowledge of God, should it then return to discursive meditation, giving itself, for example, to the con­ sideration of our Savior’s passion or slowly reflecting on the petitions of the Our Fatlier ? To resolve the difficulty proposed, a commentary was added to early editions of The Darl{ Night after the tenth chapter of Book I. No manuscript contains the commentary. Instead of recourse to an interpolation of this kind, it is quite simple to call attention to the fact that St. John of the Cross himself met the objection in the Ascent of Mount Carmel with the follow­ ing solution. He says: With regard to what has been said, there might be raised one question—if progressives (that is, those whom God is beginning to bring into this supernatural knowledge of contemplation whereof we have spoken) must never again, because of this that they are beginning to experience, return to the way of meditation and argument and natural forms. To this the answer is that it is not to be understood that such as are beginning to experience this loving knowledge must never again, as a general rule, try to re­ turn to meditation; for, when they are first gaining in proficiency, 20 Op. cil., Bk. I, chap. 14. DURING THE NIGHT OF THE SENSES 37 the habit of contemplation is not yet so perfect that whensoever they wish they can give themselves to the act thereof, nor, in the same way, have they reached a point so far beyond meditation that they cannot occasionally meditate and reason in a natural way, as they were wont. . . . The soul, then, will frequently find itself in this loving or peace­ ful state of waiting upon God without in any way exercising its faculties—that is, with respect to particular acts—and without working actively at all, but only receiving. In order to reach this state, it will frequently need to make use of meditation, quietly and in moderation.21 To meditate slowly on the Our Father or on some verses from the Gospel serves as an excellent preparation for receiving a general and obscure knowledge of God, the beginning of infused contemplation. In her Life St. Teresa describes how the noria, or water wheel, which symbolizes human effort under grace, has to be put to use during the beginning of the prayer of quiet, although the prayer of quiet is God’s gift and lies beyond the attainment of all the soul’s efforts,22 bringing with it some knowledge of the bliss of glory, giving new strength to the virtues, and manifesting a new and special work of God in the soul.23 In other words, it indicates a special inspiration of the Holy Ghost higher than ordinary actual grace. St. Teresa’s words about the noria as typifying the initial degree of the prayer of quiet agree exactly with what St. John of the Cross says about the work of the understanding in preparing the soul for deeper recollection and for what will be given 21 Bk. II, chap. 15. 22 These words show that the prayer of quiet is infused although the mind can prepare itself to receive it. 23 Chap. 14. THE LOVE OF GOD 38 to it during the passive night of the senses, the beginning of infused contemplation. The principal rules of direction for the state of purification having now been outlined, we still have to investigate its effects; for a tree is judged by its fruits, and the fruit of this tree is abundant and full of flavor. The accompanying trials, the temptations allowed by God to provoke the soul to energetic reaction and to the firm establishment of the virtues having their seat in the sensuous appetency, must also be considered. To find out precisely when the passive purifica­ tion of these senses ordinarily takes place is another task that lies ahead. Even now it is already evident how much this purgation achieves in making the soul holy and wholesome and the way in which it brings to pass our Lord’s words, “How nar­ row is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!”24 Blessed are they who will not let the difficulties of the way discourage them; with every forward step they make their hearts burn more and more ardently for God and they sing the song of the Psalmist widi their whole soul: “As die hart panteth after the fountains of water; so my soul panteth after Thee, O God. My soul hath thirsted after the strong living God; when shall I come and appear before the face of God? . . . Send forth Thy light and Thy truth: they have conducted me, and brought me unto Thy holy hill, and into Thy tabernacles. And I will go in to the altar of God : to God who giveth joy to my youth. To Thee, O God my God, I will give praise upon the harp.” 25 What is expressed here is not merely the conditional and 24 Matt. 7:14. 25 Ps. 41: I f.; 42: 3-5. DURING THE NIGHT OF THE SENSES 39 inefficacious desire to see the First Cause, the furnace of life from which creation flames up; 28 it is an increasingly press­ ing and burning supernatural desire enkindled in the heart by the Holy Ghost Himself. “Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice: for they shall have their fill.” Even in this life they shall know true intimacy with God. 2,1 Cf. Ia, q. ia, a. I. CHAPTER III Effects of the Passive Purification of the Senses Following die lead of St. Gregory the Great1 and Hugo of St. Victor,2 Tauler has touched on this subject many times in his Sermons? and St. John of the Cross has given it a search­ ing treatment in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth chapters of the first book of The Darf Night. To acquire an exact knowledge of his doctrine on the matter, a useful procedure is to give special consideration to the results effected as he in­ dicates them: purification of the sensuous appetency, knowl­ edge of self, knowledge of God, humility, a great increase of divine charity, and the twelve fruits of the Holy Ghost. Purification of the sensuous appetency The soul is freed from the necessity of seeking God by the weak, limited, and defective operations proper to the senses, which serve as means of transposing the disorder of the seven capital sins into the order of spiritual diings.4 At die beginning of the interior life, the soul desires sensible con­ solations somewhat as if they were not simply a minor means 1 Moral., XXIV, chap. 6, no. ii; X, chap. 10, no. 17. In Ezech., Bk. II, horn, a, nos. 2, 3, 13. 2 Hom. I in Ecd. 5 Tauler’s teaching on this point has been collected from different sermons and arranged in the Institutions, chaps. 8 and 35, by his disciples. *The Darl^ Night, Bk. I, chap. 11. 40 EFFECTS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 41 of the spiritual life, but its end; for the soul is still in the in­ fancy of its spiritual life, and infants are greedy for milk. Sometimes consolations have even had a disturbing, although involuntary, echo in the lower senses. The soul, with some­ thing like avarice, desires to hold on to everything conducive to sensible devotion and, if deprived of it, falls into spiritual sloth, impatience, and anger or it may even come to envy its neighbor’s graces. Sensible consolations often lead to pride because the soul that has them is likely to think itself well on the way to perfection and to judge others with severity and a somewhat bitter zeal. The night of the senses quenches sensible inclinations and, because of its darkness, puts an end to the habit of using rea­ son, together with the imagination, in interior prayer. The purification of die senses, at first sight seemingly such a loss, is in reality the best thing that could happen to any soul. De­ prived of the milk of infants, it can then begin to live on the bread of the strong. When the capacity to take pleasure in sensible things has dried up in the soul, God begins to com­ municate Himself to it by infused contemplation, His pri­ mary and principal benefit to it and the source from which all others are derived.5 The senses are subdued, reformed, silenced; they can no longer enjoy any taste or relish of a sensible kind, whether high or low. The force of inordinate passion has spent itself in emptiness and darkness and a blessed spiritual sobriety comes to take its place and marks the beginning of peace. Times of aridity dull the natural sensitive appetite. The in­ terior faculties leave off reasoned meditation and, together with the senses, are ruled by a higher harmony and lead be6 Ibid., chap. 12. THE LOVE OF GOD 42 yond sensible delights and the letter of God’s word to its spirit, which lies outside and above die reaches of all human poetry, however marked by genius.® This is the first and principal benefit caused by this aridity and dark night of contemplation: the knowledge of oneself and of one’s misery . . . these aridities and this emptiness of the facul­ ties compared with the abundance which the soul experienced aforetime and the difficulty which it finds in good works, make it recognize its own lowliness and misery, which in the time of its prosperity it was unable to see. . . . Wherefore the soul knows the truth that it knew not at first, concerning its own misery; for, at the time when it was clad as for a festival and found in God much pleasure, consolation and help, it was somewhat more satis­ fied and contented, since it thought itself to some extent to be serving God. . . . But, now that the soul has put on its other and working attire—that of aridity and abandonment—and now that its first lights have turned into darkness, it possesses these lights more truly in this virtue of self-knowledge, which is so excellent and necessary.7 Notice that this self-knowledge, so remarkably deeper than any that results from mere examination of conscience, is, according to St. John of the Cross, an effect of awakening infused contemplation. He certainly believes that infused contemplation, as also the self-knowledge accompanying it, belongs to the normal way of sanctity. At this period of devel­ opment the soul begins to know in a quasi-experimental fashion what both St. Augustine and St. Thomas have taught us, that our own efforts cannot make God’s grace efficacious, but God’s grace itself both arouses and sustains our efforts. G Ibid., chap. 13. 7 Ibid., chap. 12. EFFECTS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 43 The soul comes to realize that it does nothing and can do nothing of itself; that it is nothing; and so it takes no satis­ faction in itself and this, “together with the soul’s affliction at not serving God, is considered and esteemed by God as greater than all the consolations which the soul formerly ex­ perienced and the works which it wrought, however great they were, inasmuch as they were the occasion of many im­ perfections and ignorances.” 8 St. John of the Cross tells us that the other benefits following on aridity have their source in self-knowledge. The gift of knowledge evidently effects all this, for it judges things, not like wisdom, by their highest cause, but by their secondary, proximate causes. Its special function is to show us especially that the disordination of sin cannot come from God, but must come from deficient causes, from our­ selves, our defectibility, self-love, and radical egoism. Tears of true contrition flow from this supernatural knowledge given by the Holy Ghost.9 In its light, St. Benedict Joseph Labre used to begin his confessions by saying, “Have pity on me, I beg you, Father. I am a great sinner.” Those who have received much, who have been filled to overflowing, see revealed the relative gravity of faults that would be slight in others less illumined. The more we see of God’s greatness, the more we realize the absolute and infinite gravity of mortal sin, the attempt to snatch from God His dignity as last end by turning away from Him; tire more, too, we perceive the relative gravity of certain dangerous faults which, although venial in themselves, may proximately dis­ pose us for a mortal fall. In the light of the gift of knowledge 8 Ibid. 0 Summa, Ila Ilae, q-9, a. 2 et 4. THE LOVE OF GOD 44 our eyes are opened to our own misery, and we understand in what a singularly fragile vessel we bear the infinitely precious treasure of grace and of the indwelling Trinity. A higher knowledge of God always accompanies a deeper knowledge of self. They are, St. Catherine of Siena says, the highest and lowest points of an ever-growing circle; if we see one of these clearly we see the other by contrast, for these two kinds of knowledge grow together. As St. Augustine ex­ presses it, “'Noverim te, noverim me.” He who knows how powerless he is to do good and to per­ severe until death, knows by contrast and as if experimentally, how good and almighty is God, and how wonderful His grace, which owes its efficacy not to our consent but to it­ self. “For it is God who worketh in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to His good will,” St. Paul says.10 Elsewhere, after he had heard our Savior’s words, “My grace is sufficient for thee; for power is made perfect in infirmity,” he goes on to say, “For when I am weak, then am I power­ ful.” 11 When the soul experiences its own weakness and cries out to God, it becomes strong in His help and, “though our outward man is corrupted, yet the inward man is re­ newed day by day. For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, worketh for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory. While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen . . . (the) eternal.” 12 Growth in knowledge of our own weakness reveals to us the contrasting and infinite greatness of almighty God. And, 10 Phil. 2:13. 11II Cor. 12: 10. 12 Π Cor. 4: 17. EFFECTS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 45 as St. John of the Cross expresses it, the soul learns to com­ mune with God with more respect and courtesy than it showed to Him in times of pleasure and consolation. For that pleasant favour which it experienced made its desire towards God somewhat bolder than was fitting, and discourteous and ill-considered. Even so did it happen to Moses, when he felt that God was speaking to him ... he was making bold to go to Him, if God had not commanded him to stay and put off his shoes. When Moses had obeyed ... he became so discreet and so at­ tentive that the Scripture says that not only did he not make bold to draw near to God, but that he dared not even look at Him. . . . Even so likewise the preparation which God granted to Job in order that he might speak with Him consisted not in those de­ lights and glories which Job himself reports that he was wont to have in his God, but in leaving him naked upon a dunghill. . . . And then the Most High God, He that lifts up the poor man from the dunghill, was pleased to come down and speak with him face to face ... in a way that He had never done in the time of his prosperity.13 Then in the time of his testing, the saint answered his Lord: I know that thou canst do all things, and no thought is hid from thee. . . . Therefore I have spoken unwisely, and things that above measure exceeded my knowledge. . . . Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes.14 The Scripture says, “Then shall thy light rise up in dark­ ness.” 15 In the darkness of the night of die senses a light dawns that shows the soul its misery and God’s infinite great­ ness, a light that tests and frees and purifies the soul, for by it the soul comes to know God, and then God teaches it His wisdom, as He did not do in the days of its first delights and 13 Loe. cit., Bk. I, chap. 12. 14 Job 42: I ff. 15 Isa. 58: 10. 46 THE LOVE OF GOD satisfactions.16 “The soul habitually has remembrance of God, with fear and dread of backsliding upon the spiritual road . . . the soul is purified and cleansed of the imperfections that were clinging to it because of the desires and affec­ tions, which of their own accord debilitate and darken the soul.” 17 A knowledge of God, springing from living faith and en­ lightened by the gifts, strengthens the virtues very much, espe­ cially humility, hope, and charity, as St. John of the Cross makes clear to us: Likewise the soul draws from the aridities and voids of this night of the desire, spiritual humility, which is the contrary virtue to the first capital sin, which, as we said, is spiritual pride. Through this humility, which is acquired by the said knowledge of self, the soul is purged from all those imperfections whereinto it fell with respect to that sin of pride, in the time of its prosperity. For it sees itself so dry and miserable, that the idea never even occurs to it that it is making better progress than others, or outstripping them, as it believed itself to be doing before. On the contrary, it recognizes that others are making better progress than itself. . . . It is aware only of its own wretchedness, which it keeps before its eyes to such an extent that it never forgets it, nor takes occasion to set its eyes on anyone else. This was described wonderfully by David, when he was in this night, in these words: “If I was dumb and was humbled . . .” This he says because it seemed to him that the good that was in his soul had so completely departed. . . . In this condition, again, souls become submissive and obedient upon the spiritual road, for, when they see their own misery, not only do they hear what is taught them, but they even desire that anyone soever may set them on the way and tell them what they 16 The Dark Night, Bk. I, chap. 12. 17 Ibid., chap. 13. EFFECTS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 47 ought to do. The affective presumption which they sometimes had in their prosperity is taken from them.18 We begin to get a deep understanding of die beatitude, Beati pauperes spiritu. Spiritual humility, the fruit of nascent infused contemplation, far surpasses the humility produced in us by examination of conscience and meditation on the chief duties of our state of life. St. Teresa so informs us in her Life, where she remarks the fact that, when souls begin to advance in virtue and dien read in spiritual books an account of all they must do to be perfect, they lose heart. She says: “For instance, they read that we must not be troubled when men speak ill of us, that we are to be then more pleased than when they speak well of us; that we must despise our own good name, be detached from our kindred . . . with many other things of die same kind. The disposition to practice this must be, in my opinion, the gift of God; for it seems to me a supernatural good, contrary to our natural inclinations.” 19 At another time she observes that we can spend years of prayer and retain certain bad habits, such as standing on our dignity and possessions, whereas perfect prayer rids us of diem.20 All interior souls, not merely those in the purely contempla­ tive life like the Carmelites, but those in the mixed or apos­ tolic life and even those in the active life, should make such progress that they are at last free of such faults. For all of them, infused contempladon, which alone can produce such fruits, belongs to the normal way of sanctity, although it may be accorded earlier to some, later to others, in an evident way 18 Ibid., chap. 12. 18 Life, chap. 31. 20 The Way of Perfection, chap. 13. 48 THE LOVE OF GOD to one and in a less manifest form to another, according to the vocation of each and God’s own good pleasure. Spiritual humility being united to confidence in prayer, the petitions of the psalms are no longer words used more or less mechanically but become truly the soul’s spirit and life: “I cried to the Lord with my voice. ... In the day of my trouble I sought God with my hands lifted up to Him in the night, and I was not deceived. Thy way, O God, is in the holy place: who is the great God like our God? Thou art the God that dost wonders.” 21 Humble and trusting prayer obtains patience and long-suffering, virtues needful in dry­ ness and emptiness, when we must learn to persevere in spiritual exercises without either consolation or attraction.22 At the same time the soul grows in charity because it no longer acts for any satisfaction of its own but simply and solely for God’s sake and “often, in the midst of aridity and hard­ ship, God communicates to the soul, when it is least expect­ ing it, the purest spiritual sweetness and love, together with a spiritual knowledge which is sometimes very delicate, each manifestation of which is of greater benefit and worth than those which the soul enjoyed aforetime; although in its begin­ nings the soul thinks that this is not so, for the spiritual in­ fluence now granted to it is very delicate and cannot be per­ ceived by sense.”23 This period marks the evident passage of the soul from affective charity, content with saying “Lord! Lord!” to ef­ fective charity, the orientation of the whole of life toward God. The soul enters into His kingdom, has true conformity 21 Ps. 76: 2 f., 14 f. 22 The Dark Night, Bk. I, chap. 13. 23 Ibid. EFFECTS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 49 to the divine will in suffering as well as in joy, and loves with a will nourished by the hard bread of tribulation as well as by the milk of consolation. Love for God, growing together with love of neighbor, gradually takes first place in the soul, thanks to the spirit of sacrifice, which destroys whatever is inordinate within us and makes us love the destruction which God Himself works there. The spirit of sacrifice brings us peace, the tranquillity of the order of charity, wherein we truly love God more than ourselves and above all things. And the Lord begins to rule completely all our affections, purifying, ennobling, and super­ naturalizing them, and making us love everything lovable in Him. “Finally, inasmuch as the soul is now purged from the affections and desire of sense, it obtains liberty of spirit, whereby in ever greater degree it gains the twelve fruits of the Holy Spirit.” 24 To enumerate them is to reveal to our­ selves what God’s kingdom within us should be like; it should reign in “charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, good­ ness, longanimity, mildness, faith, modesty, continency, chas­ tity.” 26 Gradually the soul triumphs over its three enemies, the world, the flesh, and the devil; with the Psalmist it can say of the grievous state through which it has come: “I am brought to nothing, and I knew not. I am become as a beast before Thee : and I am always with Thee. Thou hast held me by my right hand: and by Thy will Thou hast conducted me, and with Thy glory Thou has received me. For what have I in heaven? and besides Thee what do I desire upon earth? . . . But it is good for me to adhere to my God, to put my 2« Ibid. 25 Gal. 5: 22. 5o THE LOVE OF GOD hope in the Lord God : that I may declare all Thy praises.” 20 These are the chief effects of the passive purification of the senses, the purpose of which is to spiritualize in some way the life of the senses, subordinating them to the spirit. The passive purification of the soul aims to bring about the entire super­ naturalization and complete submission of the soul to God, making it, so to say, deiform and preparing it for divine union in this life, a union which is the normal prelude, for those who become perfect, of the eternal union of life ever­ lasting.27 28 Ps. 72: 22. 27 St. Catherine of Siena teaches the same doctrine in the third chapter of her Dialogue. CHAPTER IV Trials Ordinarily Accompanying the Night of the Senses In discussing any interior state, we must distinguish be­ tween its essential character and the phenomena frequently accompanying it. Supernatural words, visions, and ecstasy may, for example, occur together with mystical union with­ out formally constituting it, since the latter continues after these transitory phenomena have passed away. The same is true in regard to the afflictions so commonly associated with the passive purification of the senses. It takes place because of the withdrawal of sensible grace and the purely spiritual in­ flux of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, especially the gifts of knowledge and fortitude. The former shows us the emptiness of things created; the latter makes us hunger and thirst for justice. In addition, usually come temptations against chastity and patience, permitted by God to provoke a vigorous reaction of these virtues so that they may grow strong, sink their roots more deeply in the sensitive appetite, and bring about its more complete purgation and fuller submission to reason and to grace. Other trials are sometimes joined to these, the loss of temporal goods, of fortune, of honors, and of friendships to which we have become too attached ; sometimes, too, sick­ ness is providentially sent to remind us diat of ourselves we can do nothing. 51 52 THE LOVE OF GOD We must here distinguish, as St. John of the Cross does,1 between the accentuated form these afflictions take in the relatively few souls that God will afterward lead on through the night of the soul, and the mitigated way in which they are found in others. But those who are very weak are kept for a long time in this night, and these He purges very gently and with slight temptations. Habitually, too, He gives them refreshments of sense so that they may not fall away, and only after a time do they attain to purity of perfection in this life, some of them never attaining to it. Such are neither properly in the night nor properly out of it; for, al­ though they pass on no farther, yet, in order that they may be preserved in humility and self-knowledge, God exercises them for certain periods and at certain times in those temptations and aridities; and at other times and seasons He aids them with con­ solations, lest they should grow faint and return to seek the con­ solations of the world.2 We shall first point out these trials as they occur in a tempered form and then afterward in that accentuated mode which is a forerunner of the night of the soul in those friends of God who are to be led by Him to die full perfection of the Christian life. The reason for the temptations of this period To gain a good understanding of traditional doctrine on the subject, we should recall, as St. Thomas and most theo­ logians teach, that we have in us, far below the purely spiritual or immaterial intellect and will, faculties like the animals’, essentially united to the organism: the external senses, die lThe Dark. Nig/il, Bk. I, chap. 14. 2 Ibid. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 53 imagination and sensory memory, and the sensuous appe­ tency, called concupiscible when tending toward a delectable sensible good, and irascible when it is bent on a sensible good difficult to attain. These are the two forms of sensitive ap­ petite in both men and animals; from them arises the whole gamut of the different emotions, according to whether die sensible good is present or absent, and whether it appears to be obtainable or not. The concupiscible appetite gives rise to the contrary passions of love and hate, desire and aversion, joy and sadness; the irascible, to hope and despair, fear and daring, and anger.8 To moderate the passions according to the rule of right reason, man must, by repeated acts, acquire the virtues of temperance, sobriety, chastity, fortitude, and patience. The first three give the concupiscible appetite a share, as it were, in the light of reason; the last two discipline the irascible in the same way. But Christians must live not only like reasonable beings but as sons of God, subordinating their passions to right rea­ son as the philosophers conceive it, and also to die life of grace and the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. This fact is why we receive at baptism the infused moral virtues of temperance, sobriety, chastity, fortitude, and pa­ tience. They give our sensitive appetite not merely a share in the light of reason but an entirely supernatural participa­ tion in God’s inner life, as the strength of martyrs and the abso­ lute purity of virgins consecrated to God make evident to us. For the thorough purgation of the sensuous appetency, the acquired and die infused moral virtues must become rooted in it and work its progressive perfection, determining it to 3Summa, la, q.8o, 81; la Ilae, 9.23, a.4; q.25, a.3, 4. 54 THE LOVE OF GOD follow the rule of reason and of faith more closely and to forsake evil in the form of excess and of defect, not falling into foolhardiness or cowardice, lust or insensibility. To fight temptations we have to make more energetic acts of the virtues, that they may penetrate deeply into the soil of the harrowed and upturned sensitive appetite and become fertile seeds of rational and divine life. Seen in this light, the struggle against temptation has something great and glorious about it. Lacking temptation, we often are content with less effort, with feeble virtuous acts that are without intensity and that are inferior to the degree of virtue we already possess, acting like clever but lazy people who let themselves be outstripped by others with less intelligence but more diligence. As we have already noted, St. Thomas holds that acts of this kind fail to increase the acquired virtue from which they proceed: only a more intense act of any virtue will win its increase.·* Hence, although the good but feeble acts of a just man are meritorious, they do not im­ mediately obtain an increase of charity and of the infused virtues; this increase will be given to him by God only after he makes a more generous act, proportionate to the degree of the infused virtues he possesses.45 Besides, very weak acts of virtue indirectly dispose us for venial sin in the sense that they do not sufficiently oppose certain inordinate inclinations, which gradually develop and may end by getting the upper hand some day. God permits us to be tempted but not beyond our strength aided by His grace ; otherwise sin would be inevitable and no longer sin, as happens when reason is entirely obliterated by 4 la Ilac, q. 52, a.3. 5 Ila Ilae, q.24, a. 6, ad lum. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 55 a sudden uprush of violent passion. Although temptation stays within tire limits of our strength, it makes us ill content with weak acts of virtue, for we must struggle with all our heart and strength, while begging for divine help. Because of this, if we are faithful to grace, we make very meritorious and sometimes even heroic acts, which deepen the acquired virtues and obtain for us an immediate and proportionate in­ crease of the infused virtues. The reason why temptation must come was told to Tobias by the angel Raphael: “And because thou wast acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove thee.” 6 When we are tempted, we receive help in proportion to our need, but we must be on guard not to forfeit the grace given. “Wherefore he that thinketh himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall. . . . And God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able: but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it.” 7 God, who is faithful, will give us grace so that we will not be vanquished but win merit in the struggle. From Him comes our constancy and our profit in tempta­ tion. If the temptation comes from the devil, God makes his evil influence itself serve to purify our soul. Undoubtedly the devil could defeat us if he were allowed, but, in the words of Isaias, the Lord “giveth strength to the weary, and increaseth force and might to them that are not. Youths shall faint and labor, and young men shall fall by infirmity. But they that hope in the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall take wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” 8 e Tob. 12:13. 71 Cor. 10: 12. 8 Isa. 40: 29. 56 THE LOVE OF GOD The soul grows hardy by passing through difficulties. Of course, we ought not to desire temptation, for it is not useful in itself, as a means to an end, but only accidentally, as an oc­ casion for more earnest prayer and more generous effort.8 In this sense we well understand the saying in Ecclesiasticus, “What doth he know, that hath not been tried?” 910 He is ignorant of his own weakness and misery; nor has he learned practically all that divine grace can accomplish in us. On the other hand, the man who is tempted knows his own frailty and learns to say with St. Paul, “For when I am weak, then am I powerful,” 11 because he gives up relying on himself and places his whole confidence in God. Therefore the apostle St. James tells us: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations; knowing that the try­ ing of your faith worketh patience. And patience hath a perfect work; that you may be perfect and entire, failing in nothing.” 12 St. Augustine says that He who permits the devil to tempt us accords us His mercy at the same time, giving us strength to fight and conquer, if we but humbly ask His help. Those who do not expose themselves to the scorching wind of pride but keep themselves humbly in the shadow of God’s help are not burnt. “Blessed is the man that endureth temptation; for when he hath been proved, he shall receive the crown of life, which God hath promised to them that love Him.” 13 Our Lord Himself willed to be tempted so that He might teach us to be watchful and prudent in these difficult times, 9 Illa, q.41, a.2, ad 2um. 10 Ecdus. 34: 9. 11II Cor. 12: 10. 12 Jas. i : 2. 13 Jas. 1:12. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 57 give us an example of generosity, increase our trust, and merit for us the help necessary for victory.14 We can understand why, out of jealousy, the devil tempts better people more directly,18 since he has a special interest in keeping them back so that they will not draw others forward with them; we understand, too, why he begins to tempt them in little things, hoping in this way to lead them on to grave sin. We shall take time to consider especially temptations against chastity and patience; against chastity because these temptations disturb people most and because the virtue it­ self is one of the loveliest forms of temperance; against pa­ tience, because such temptations happen so often, since the purpose of patience is to make us bear our daily troubles in a rational and Christian manner, whereas we exercise forti­ tude, properly speaking, only in times of great danger.16 Concupiscence and grace St. James speaks of the first type of temptation when he says: “But every man is tempted by his own concupiscence, being drawn away and allured. Then when concupiscence hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin. But sin, when it is completed, begetteth death. Do not err, therefore, my dearest brethren. Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration.” 17 According to this text, when temptation begins independ­ ently of the will, as long as concupiscence has not conceived, that is, as along as it has not obtained our consent, there is 14 Illa, q.41, a.4. 15 Ibid., a. 2. le Ila Ilac, q. 123, 136. 17 fas. 1:14. 58 THE LOVE OF GOD no sin; there can even be merit if the just man resists tempta­ tion immediately.18 But if concupiscence conceives, or obtains our consent, it brings forth sin, and when that sin is grave it does the soul to death by depriving it of the supernatural life of grace. Souls that have never experienced these temptations are rare. St. Teresa is cited as an example because, when asked by her daughters about such things, she could not give them any counsel, being ignorant of this evil; therefore she sent them to other older sisters. St. Thomas, too, after a first victory won in his youth against one of these assaults, was delivered from them forever after so that he could attend more freely to the contemplation of the tilings of God and teach them to others. On the contrary, many experience temptations of this kind, particularly during the passive purification of the senses. And as they already have a deep love for purity of body and soul, they are tortured interiorly, seeing their imagination sullied, their sensory appetite fanned and violently inflamed. St. John of the Cross tells us of this purgation: “It is wont to be ac­ companied by grave trials and temptations of sense, which last for a long time, albeit longer in some than in others. For to some the angel of Satan presents himself—namely, the spirit of fornication—that he may buffet their senses with abominable and violent temptations, and may trouble their spirits with vile considerations and representations which are most visible to the imagination, which things at times are a greater affliction to them than death.” 19 Not uncommonly, interior souls that have had a guarded 18 la Ilac, q.8o, a. 3, ad 31101. 19 rhe Dark. Night, Bk. 1, chap. 14. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 59 childhood and adolescence may pass many years with almost no trouble from the senses. Then a day comes when violent temptations surge up within them and last for months or even years, with intervals of calm. If the three signs of the night of the senses just described above are found in them, this new trial confirms the presence of the state of purgation. Souls going through this must not be discouraged, for they are beginning to live a higher spiritual life, and their director should give them firm assurance of this truth, exhorting them to bear themselves with courage. St. Paul tells us of himself: “And lest the greatness of the revelations should exalt me, there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me. And He said to me: My grace is sufficient for thee: for power is made perfect in infirmity. Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. For which cause I please myself in my infirmities, in re­ proaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ. For when I am weak, then am I powerful.” 20 Similar cases are remarked in the lives of the fathers of the desert, of St. Jerome, St. Benedict, St. Catherine of Siena, Blessed Angela of Foligno, St. Alphonsus Liguori, and many other saints. In explaining what St. Paul attested, St. Thomas says21 that a doctor often induces a less dangerous sickness to heal or prevent another that is more serious ; for example, he may cure a convulsion by bringing on a fever. The Apostle shows us that the physician of souls, our Lord Jesus Christ, acts 20 II Cor. 12: 7. 21 Exposit. in II Epist. ad Cor., 12: 3. 6o THE LOVE OF GOD in the same way. To rid us of serious spiritual maladies, or to immunize us against them, He permits most of His elect and even those who are not so holy to be much tried in the body; sometimes, to cure them of very grave sins, He even allows them to fall into lesser, though mortal, sins. Of all sins, pride is the most serious. Charity unites us to God and is the root of all the virtues. Pride makes us desire our own excellence without subordinating it to God and thus it separates us from God and is therefore die root of all the vices. For this reason God resists the proud. And since, in some respects, the good run a greater risk of taking pride in themselves precisely because of the good to be found within them, God at times permits some fault or failing of theirs, mortal sin even, to interfere with the good that they might do. They are led in this way to humble themselves and to recog­ nize drat by their own strength they cannot stand. St. Thomas adds that St. Paul was allowed to be so tempted to keep him from becoming puffed up by his exceptional vocation, super­ natural lights, apostolic works, virginity, and knowledge. In his testing God gave him a remedy to preserve him from pride. If St. Paul took refuge in prayer at such times, what should we not do, who are so much weaker than he was? We know how he was answered. A sick man who is ignorant of the nature of his illness may beg the doctor not to prescribe some strong and painful remedy; but the doctor, who wishes him to recover his health, pays no attention to him. God acted thus in regard to St. Paul, not putting an end to his trial but giving him more than he asked—help to keep him from yielding and to make him triumph over temptation. “My grace is sufficient for thee; for power is made perfect in in­ TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 61 firmity.” St. Jerome says that we see God’s goodness in this, that He often refuses to grant us what we ask of Him only to give us something better, which we should prefer. Besides prayer and work, a great devotion to Mary is recommended by spiritual authors to help us resist tempta­ tions against chastity. Blessed Grignon de Montfort gives a beautiful treatment of this subject in his treatise on True De­ votion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.22 He tells us that our devotion to Mary should be interior, tender, holy, constant, and disinterested; that it consists in the perfect consecration of our entire selves to Jesus through Mary, a renewing of our baptismal vows and a deeding over to Mary of all that is communicable in our good works and prayers so that she may use them all to benefit souls according to her good pleas­ ure. Alluding directly to the passive purifications, Blessed Grig­ non adds: “It is true that we can attain divine union by other roads; but it is by many more crosses and strange deaths, and with many more difficulties, which we shall find it hard to overcome. We must pass through obscure nights, through combats, through strange agonies, over craggy mountains, through cruel thorns and over frightful deserts. But by the path of Mary we pass more gently and more tranquilly. “We do find, it is true, great battles to fight, and great hard­ ships to master; but that good Mother makes herself so present and so near to her faithful servants, to enlighten them in their darknesses and their doubts, to strengthen them in their fears, and to sustain them in their struggles and their difficulties, that in truth this virginal path to find Jesus Christ 22 Tr. Faber, rev. cd., Montfort Fathers (St. Anthony Guild Press: Paterson, N.J., 1941). 62 THE LOVE OF GOD is a path of roses and honey compared with other paths.”23 Mary gives us special protection against the wiles and temptations of the devil, helps us to draw much profit from our struggle, and makes the battle both easier and more meritorious for us: easier, because she joins forces with us; more meritorious, because she obtains for us the means to fight valiantly—by a greater charity, the very principle of merit. The fruits of patience and meekness As our contest with temptations against chastity implants the virtue itself more deeply in the sensory appetite, weakens the appetite’s inclination to concupiscence, and subordinates it more and more to right reason and grace, so the exercise of patience and meekness serves to discipline the other and easily irritated part of our sensory appetite, the irascible.24 It is no wonder, then, that God so often allows temptations against the virtues of patience and mildness during the passive puri­ fication of the senses. We meet unforeseen and redoubled vexations, misfortunes, contradictions, and sometimes even persecutions, although we should take care not to exaggerate the importance of tire latter. These experiences, in one degree or another, prove the truth of St. Paul’s words, “And all that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.” 25 At the very least, they will suffer to see sin preventing the coming of God’s kingdom in souls. The way to true wisdom is wanting to none: it is the cross. Plato and Aristotle were of the opinion that few men would 23 Part Π, chap. 2, 5th motive. 24 Cf. Illa, q. 15, a.2; Ila Ilac, q.136, a.4, ad 411m. 25 II Tim. 3: 12. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 63 attain wisdom because the human means to reach it were not within the compass of all. Our Lord tells us, “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.” The cross, when carried with super­ natural love and patience, teaches us more and more of the deep meaning of the mysteries of faith. In St. Thomas’ words, “The principal act of fortitude is endurance, that is, to stand immovable in the midst of dangers rather than to attack them.” 20 Attack, with its strong and largely temperamental uprush of courage, is not the prin­ cipal act of fortitude. Endurance, the restraint of fear by rea­ son and will, is. To stand firm under assault, to pass through passion without any moral yielding to evil, to tire the adver­ sary by force of constancy, belongs to heroism and marks the martyr. To control fear is more difficult than to moderate daring; to bear up under a present evil demands more of us than to rush out to meet one still ahead. Now the chief act of fortitude, to endure or to stand firm, is found in a certain way in patience, not in regard to great dangers but in relation to our daily troubles; for patience makes us endure like Christians the sadness they cause us. Its companion virtue, meekness, restrains our anger, makes us masters of ourselves, and keeps us from answering sharply and hotly when people tell us the truth about ourselves. Thus it prepares us to receive the knowledge of the supreme truth, God.27 Our Lord teaches us all this when He says, “Blessed are the meek; for they shall possess the land.” They shall possess first the land of their own souls, if we may so express it; be28 Ila Hae, q. 123, a. 6. 2T Ibid., q. 157, a. 4. 64 THE LOVE OF GOD cause meekness, by restraining anger in the midst of contra­ dictions, gives us great self-possession inspired by faith, by love of God and of neighbor. All these virtues increase to­ gether when, instead of giving in to temptations of impatience and irritability, we resist them firmly. “Patience bears roses,” says an old proverb. Because of patience, Job, when deprived of possessions and health alike, could still say, “the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away . . . blessed be the name of the Lord.” 28 Analogously, we must practice patience in the night of the senses; it disposes us for the dawning of con­ templation. The crosses met in this period of the spiritual life are all the harder to bear when they come not only from the wicked but also from good people, particularly relatives and friends and those to whom we are especially devoted. When we are the only ones to suffer, we do well to remember our Lord’s words, “But I say to you not to resist evil: but if one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other.” 29 Meek­ ness often wins an adversary to God, a greater victory than the defense of our own rights and a display of anger. “Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou be made like him.” 30 However, immediately after these words in the Book of Prov­ erbs we read, “Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he imagine himself to be wise.” 31 When it is a question of the good of our adversary himself or the legitimate defense of the common good of family, country, or Church, then we do well to answer.32 The baseless opposition of good people with good inten­ 28 Job i:2i. 28 Matt. 5: 39. 80 Prov. 26: 4. slProv. 26:5. 82 Cf. Ila Hae, 9.72, a.3; q.io8, a. 1. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 65 tions is particularly hard to bear; for it makes us ask our­ selves whether those who grieve us, with their evident good will, have not genuine reasons for doing so. The more there are who judge us severely, the more this purgation hurts. St. Teresa went through such trials when priests and religious, some of them her own confessors, thought that she was de­ ceived by the devil and began to estrange themselves from her. She suffered great anguish at this, the more so because in certain respects her humility made her judge herself even more harshly than her critics did. The more we have done for friends and the more we have loved them, the harder it is to suffer persecution at their hands. “For if my enemy had reviled me, I would verily have borne with it. And if he that hated me had spoken great things against me, I would perhaps have hidden myself from him. But thou a man of one mind, my guide, and my familiar, who didst take sweetmeats together with me: in the house of God we walked with consent.”83 Betrayal by a friend is one of the most trying tilings to bear, and the spirit of evil sometimes makes use of it to introduce the worst kind of divisions in the Church and in religious communities. When we are wronged the temptation to curse presents itself.34 At times the devil tries to lead us to blaspheme.35 In Job’s trials, his wife said to him: “Dost thou still continue in thy simplicity? Curse God and die.” To which he answered: “Thou hast spoken like one of the foolish women: if we have received good things at the hand of God, why should we not receive evil ?” 38 In the same way, after Tobias, a man of many charities, had 33 Ps. 54: 13. 34 Ha Hae, q. 76, a.I. 33 Cf. St. John of the Cross, op. cit., Bk. I, chap. 14. 33 Job 2: 10. 66 THE LOVE OF GOD become blind but continued to give thanks to God daily, his wife and friends came to him saying: “Where is thy hope, for which thou gavest alms, and buriedst the dead ?” Tobias answered: “Speak not so; for we are the children of saints, and look for that life which God will give to those that never change their faith from him. . . . Thou art just, O Lord, and all Thy judgments are just, and all Thy ways mercy, and truth, and judgment: And now, O Lord, think of me, and take not revenge of my sins, neither remember my of­ fenses nor those of my parents.”37 Humility and compunc­ tion of heart, the fruit of trials like these, always speak in the same accents. Cursed by Semei, David answered forbearingly: “Let him alone that he may curse as the Lord hath bidden him. Perhaps the Lord may look upon my affliction, and the Lord may render me good for the cursing of this day.”38 The opposition of well-intentioned superiors may cause souls their greatest sorrow during this period. Preoccupied with what they consider tire common good, superiors may fail to appreciate spiritual attractions that come, nevertheless, from God. When this happens, we should, in a spirit of faith, recognize it as providential. Those who obey humbly and heroically in such times of testing show that they are being led by the spirit of God.38 Humility and patience and meekness are necessary in these contradictions; and God lets us be proven in exactly this 87 Tob. 2: 18; 3: 1. 38 II Kings 16: ii. 89 Obedience does not necessarily require conformity of the speculative judgment concerning the thing itself, such as a different interpretation of a doctrine, but it does demand conformity of the practical judgment and of the will to a superior’s legitimate command. He himself might later change his mind and his successor might see things differently but as long as the order stands, our practical judgment must conclude: this is what I must do in the practical order. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 67 way so that we may make very meritorious acts of these virtues and increase them tenfold by our exertion. The hail­ storm that seems to be beating us down is really a rain of diamonds. When our Lord told His disciples that they would have much to suffer, He said too: “But a hair of your head shall not perish. In your patience you shall possess your souls.”40 “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice’ sake; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake. Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in heaven.” 41 As a matter of fact, later, after the apostles had been beaten with rods, they went out of the Sanhedrin “rejoicing that they were accounted worthy to suffer reproach for the name of Jesus.”42 They accepted the cross not merely with resigna­ tion but with understanding and love, bearing their sufferings in such a way as to bring marvelous fruitfulness to their apostolate. When we are put to the proof, we should say to God: “It is good for me that Thou hast humbled me.”43 And when calm returns, we shall see the fruit of our ordeal and can say to God : “O how great is the multitude of Thy sweetness, O Lord, which Thou hast hidden for them that fear Thee! Which Thou hast wrought for them that hope in Thee. . . . Thou shalt hide them in the secret of Thy face, from the disturbance of men. Thou shalt protect them in Thy taber­ nacle from the contradiction of tongues. Blessed be the Lord. . . . But I said in the excess of my mind : I am cast away from 40 Luke 21: 19. 41 Matt. 5:10—12. 42 Acts 5:41. 43 Ps. 118: 71. THE LOVE OF GOD 68 before Thy eyes. Therefore Thou hast heard the voice of my prayer, when I cried to Thee.”44 What is said here of the purification of individuals is equally true of religious families, they being tried especially at the time of their foundation. Our Lord’s words must be fulfilled in both cases: “Everyone that heareth these My words, and doth them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock. And the rain fell, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And everyone that heareth these My words, and doth them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was die fall thereof.” 45 Our Lord gives us an even more striking image of this purgation when, after saying, “I am the true vine; and My Father is the husbandman,” he adds: “. . . and every [branch] that beareth fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit.” 46 The time for the night of the senses The last question to be considered concerning the passive purification of die senses is when it ordinarily takes place and how long it usually lasts in the spiritual life. Many modern authors treat of this question in chapters on the unitive way, as if it generally occurred after the soul had already entered there. Other authors, Vallgornera, for instance, discuss it at the end of the purgative way and take up the consideration 44 Ps. 30: 20. ,,a Matt. 7: 24. 40 John 15:1. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 69 of the night of the soul at the end of the illuminative way.47 To discover which of these viewpoints represents the tradi­ tional one, we must consult the great masters who have them­ selves experienced such a purgation and have considered it in itself and for itself and not in relation to numberless irrelevancies connected with it. Among the masters, St. John of the Cross, recently declared a doctor of the Church, takes precedence because he has treated the problem ex professo and gone into the subject more thoroughly than anyone be­ fore him and deserves to be considered a faithful witness to tradition. An attentive reading of St. John of the Cross reveals what Vallgornera saw so well, that, for him, the passive night of the senses is the normal transition from the purgative to the illuminative way, just as the night of the soul marks the pas­ sage from the illuminative to the unitive way. In The Dari{ Night we read: “When this house of sensual­ ity was now at rest—that is, was mortified—its passions be­ ing quenched and its desires put to rest and lulled to sleep by means of this blessed night of the purgation of sense, the soul went forth, to set upon the road and way of the spirit, which is that of progressives and proficients, and which, by another name is called the way of illumination or of infused contemplation, wherewith God Himself feeds and refreshes the soul, without meditation, or the soul’s active help. Such, as we have said, is the night and purgation of sense in the soul.”48 Earlier, when explaining tire third sign of the night 47 Vallgornera, O.P., Mystica theologia S. Thomae, q-Π, disp, viii; ς.ΙΠ, disp. vi. Father Regis Gerest, O.P., has adopted the same point of view in his modification and completion of Father Andre Mari Meynard's Traité de la vie intérieure (Paris, 1923)· 48 Bk. I, chap. 14. 70 THE LOVE OF GOD of the senses, St. John of the Cross says that infused con­ templation begins during the period of transition from the purgative to the illuminative way.49 Elsewhere in the same work we find another confirmation that this time marks the soul’s progress from the purgative to the illuminative way: “The night of sense is common and comes to many; these are the beginners; and of this night we shall first speak. The night of the spirit is the portion of tire very few, and these are they that are already practiced and proficient, of whom we shall treat hereafter.”50 Few souls are generous enough in fact to reach the full perfection of Christian life and to pass through the two purifications de­ manded by it. St. John of the Cross always calls those undergoing the passive purification of the senses “beginners” and, as has been done traditionally ever since the time of Clement of Alexandria, he distinguishes them from the proficient and the perfect.51 St. Teresa’s view is the same. In The Interior Castle, before taking up the subject of the prayer of quiet, she treats, at the end of the third mansions of sensible aridity, another designation for the night of the senses; later, at the beginning of the sixth mansions, she describes the night of the soul, a means of disposing the soul for a life of perfect union with God. In her Life, after saying that she endured sensible dryness for many years and all that time considered it a mercy of God if she got but one drop of water from the well of con­ solation, she adds: “I believe that it is our Lord’s good pleas48 Ibid., chap. 9. 50 Ibid., chap. 8. 51 Cf. The Dark, Night, Bk. I, chaps. 1, 9, 10; Bk. Π, chap. 1; Ascent oj Mt. Carmel, Bk. Π, chaps. 12, 13. St Marys Hospital Sisters. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 71 ure frequently in the beginning, and at times in the end, to send these torments, and many other incidental temptations, to those who love Him.” 52 The words “and at times in the end” seem to correspond to a thought St. John of the Cross had that the senses are truly purified only when the purga­ tion of the soul has begun.53 It seems an obvious mistake to maintain that St. John of the Cross gave a special meaning to the traditional terms “beginners,” “proficients,” and “perfect,” and that those he calls beginners are beginners in the sense of starting out on the unitive way. The beginners St. John of the Cross talks about have the faults of real beginners, as we can see from his description of them.54 He even says that some of them have two confessors, one to whom they relate their progress, another to whom they tell their failings: a tiling they would not do if they had really reached the unitive way. St. John of the Cross takes these three terms in the traditional sense in which they have been used since the time of Clement of Alexandria, by St. Augustine, by St. Gregory the Great, and by St. Thomas. He accepts, too, the corresponding terms of purgative, illuminative, and unitive ways, although he de­ scribes the latter two stages of the spiritual life not in any at­ tenuated form but as they exist in their fullness.55 The only comment that need be added is that interior souls not called to a purely contemplative life reach the illumina­ tive way more slowly and, in many instances, the passive 62 Chap. ii. 53 The Dark. Night, Bk. II, chap. 3. 84 Ibid., Bk. I, chap. 2. 85 Dom Chevallier, O.S.B., has recently made a critical study of the authentic text of The Spiritual Canticle of St. John of the Cross, confirming this point of view. A careful study of the Spanish text of The Darl^ Night leads to the same conclusion. 72 THE LOVE OF GOD purgations are hidden in the ordinary sufferings of life or the trials of the apostolate.50 The light of contemplation is less evident and more diffuse, yet quite real. The lives of saints devoted to the apostolate and to the corporal and spiritual works of mercy provide examples of this. As to how long the night of the senses usually lasts, St. John of the Cross says: For how long a time the soul will be held in this fasting and this penance of sense, cannot be told with any certainty; for all do not experience it after one manner, neither do all encounter the same temptations. For this is meted out by the will of God, in con­ formity with the greater or the smaller degree of imperfection which each soul has to purge away. In conformity, likewise, with the degree of love of union to which God is pleased to raise it, He will humble it with greater or less intensity or in greater or less time. Those who have the disposition and greater strength to suffer, He purges with greater intensity and more quickly.57 The purgation of others is not so hard but lasts longer.58 Some never come to the end of it, alternating between con­ solation and aridity, both sent by God, for if He did not seem to withdraw from them, some souls would never draw nearer to Him. In The Living Flame, when speaking of divine union as the end of purification, St. John of the Cross says: And here it behooves us to note the reason why there are so few that attain to this lofty state of the perfection of union with God. 58 Christian Perfection and Contemplation, p. 417. 67 Op. cil., Bk. I, chap. 14. 58 Facts substantiate this statement that the length of time the passive purification lasts differs with different individuals. St. Teresa had to endure it for eighteen years; St. Francis of Assisi, for ten; St. Mary Magdalen of Pazzi, five years at first, and then later, sixteen; Blessed Henry Suso, ten years; St. Mary of Egypt, seventeen; and St. Rose of Lima, for an equal length of time. Of. Card. Bona, Via comp, ad Deum, c. 10, no. 6. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 73 It must be known that it is not because God is pleased that there should be few raised to this high spiritual state, for it would please Him that all souls should be perfect, but it is rather that He finds few vessels which can bear so high and lofty a work. For, when He proves them in small things and finds them weak and sees that they at once flee from labour, and desire not to submit to the least discomfort or mortification, He finds that they are not strong and faithful in the little things wherein He has granted them the favour of beginning to purge and fashion them, and sees that they will be much less so in great things; so He goes no farther with their purification, neither lifts them up from the dust of the earth, since greater constancy and fortitude would be necessary for this than they exhibit.59 In her Life, St. Teresa, too, warns us that many begin to give themselves to the spiritual life but then make no further progress—although their failure saddens them—mainly be­ cause they have no love for the cross.00 The same thought is repeated by all the masters of the spiritual life: Tauler, Blessed Henry Suso, St. Catherine of Siena. In her Dialogue, St. Catherine says that patience in time of trial is the sign of perfect love, the touchstone of true obedience, and the mar­ row of charity. In answer to the question why good men never come to experience what he tells them of the wonderful things of God, Ruysbroeck says that they fail to respond to the divine motion by self-abnegation, care too little for self-knowledge, and also regard good works as more important than a right motive and love of God. They remain, therefore, ex­ terior and complex.01 The Imitation summarizes this whole doctrine as follows: 58 St. 2, v. 5. 80 Chaps, ii, 22. 81 The Book, of Supreme Truth, chap. 7. 74 THE LOVE OF GOD “Why, then, art thou afraid to take up thy cross, which leadeth to the kingdom ? In the cross is salvation ; in the cross is life ; in the cross is protection from enemies. In the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness; in the cross is strength of mind; in the cross is joy of spirit. In the cross is height of virtue; in the cross is perfection of sanctity. . . . Take up, therefore, thy cross, and follow Jesus, and thou shalt go into life everlast­ ing. ... If thou carry the cross willingly, it will carry thee, and bring thee to thy desired end.” 62 “And tliis is the reason why there are found so few con­ templative persons, because there are few that know how to sequester themselves entirely from perishable creatures.” 63* St. Paul taught tlie same high spiritual wisdom: “For the Spirit himself giveth testimony to our spirit, that we are the sons of God. And if sons, heirs also; heirs indeed of God, and joint heirs widi Christ: yet so, if we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him. For I reckon that the suf­ ferings of tliis time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, that shall be revealed in us.”04 Blessed Grignon de Montfort speaks of the passive purifica­ tions to be encountered in the apostolate. Having said that eternal Wisdom communicates all Its light and the virtues and gifts in an eminent degree to those who possess the spirit of wisdom, he adds that Wisdom inspires them to undertake great things for the glory of God and the salvation of souls. To prove them and make them worthy, Wisdom makes Its chief work the securing of great combats for them, laying up contradictions and crosses for them in almost everydiing 62 Bk. II, chap. 12. 83 Ibid., Bk. Ill, chap. 31. 84 Rom. 8: 16—18. TRIALS IN NIGHT OF THE SENSES 75 that they undertake. Sometimes the devil is permitted to tempt them, the world to calumniate and despise them, their enemies to overcome them and cast them down, their friends and relatives to abandon and betray them. They lose some treasure, meet sickness and sadness, and know what it is to be faint of heart and tried at every turn. Yet the Holy Ghost says: “Their affliction is light and their reward will be great because God has proven them and found them worthy of Him. He has tried them like gold in a furnace; He has re­ ceived them as a victim of holocaust and He will look upon them with favor when their time comes.” 65 Wisdom protects the just man against his enemies, defends him from seducers, and gives him a strong conflict so that he may overcome and know that wisdom is mightier than all.66 And Wisdom, being a lovable sovereign, does all things ac­ cording to number, weight, and measure, meting out crosses to friends only in proportion to their strength and pouring out so much sweetness on each cross that it becomes the de­ light of him who takes it up. Those who seek or possess eter­ nal Wisdom, have the cross as their portion and reward.67 65 Wisd. 3: 3—6. ee Wisd. 10: 12. 67 Amour de la divine sagesse, Pt. I, chap. 6. CHAPTER V Ordinarily The Union with God following the Night of the Senses Between the two nights of which St. John of the Cross speaks in his description of the soul’s ascending journey to­ ward perfect divine union, there is, as it were, a time of calm, when the soul keeps on advancing in the light without great difficulty or fatigue. Other spiritual authors speak of this period between what diey call the second and third conver­ sions. Father Lallemant, S.J., alludes to it several times in his beautiful book, The Spiritual Doctrine. The first con­ version takes place when we renounce the spirit of the world to give ourselves to God, for example, on entering religion. Since the engrafted plant is apt to go back to its wild state, it must experience a second conversion, or as St. John of the Cross calls it, the night of the senses, during which our Lord Himself teaches us the emptiness of created things and the value of the one thing necessary. The third conversion, if it takes place in this life in such a way as to enable us to avoid purgatory, consists of the different degrees of the night of the soul, when the Lord enlightens us much more concerning our weakness and misery and His own infinite greatness. The relatively calm period that takes place between the second and third conversions is what we wish to discuss now, following the teaching of St. John of the Cross and of St. 76 THE UNION WITH GOD 77 Teresa. They have both, in quite different ways, given exact­ ness to what had already been said by St. Gregory, Hugh of St. Victor, Tauler, St. Catherine of Siena, the author of The Imitation, and many other great spiritual writers. The view of St. John of the Cross St. John of the Cross says: When the house of sensuality was now at rest—that is, was mortified—its passions being quenched and its desires put to rest and lulled to sleep by means of this blessed night of the purgation of sense, the soul went forth, to set out upon the road and way of the spirit, which is that of progressives and proficients, and which, by another name, is called the way of illumination or of infused contemplation, wherewith God Himself feeds and re­ freshes the soul, without meditation, or the soul’s active help. Such, as we have said, is the night and purgation of sense in the soul.1 In the preceding chapter he had said that the soul is no longer moved by the pleasure of attraction and sweetness which it finds in its work, but only by God. It likewise practices here the virtue of fortitude, because, in these difficulties and insipidities which it finds in its work, it brings strength out of weakness and thus be­ comes strong. . . . It is no longer angry with itself and disturbed because of its own faults, nor with its neighbour because of his faults, neither is it displeased with God, nor does it utter unseemly complaints be­ cause He does not quickly make it holy. Then as to envy, the soul has charity toward others in this re­ spect also; for, if it has any envy, this is no longer a vice as it was before, when it was grieved because others were preferred to it xThe Dark Night, Bk. I, chap. 14. 78 THE LOVE OF GOD and given greater advantage. Its grief now comes from seeing how great is its own misery, and its envy (if it has any) is a virtue, since it desires to imitate others, which is great virtue. . . . Often, in the midst of these times of aridity and hardship, God communicates to the soul, when it is least expecting it, the purest spiritual sweetness and love, together with a spiritual knowledge which is sometimes very delicate, each manifestation of which is of greater benefit and worth than those which the soul enjoyed afore­ time; although in its beginnings the soul thinks that this is not so, for the spiritual influence now granted to it is very delicate and cannot be perceived by sense. Finally, inasmuch as the soul is now purged from the affections and desires of sense, it obtains liberty of spirit, whereby in ever greater degree it gains the twelve fruits of the Holy Spirit. These St. Paul enumerates as follows: “But the fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity, mildness, faith, modesty, continency, chastity.”2 These fruits are, as St. Thomas teaches, acts proceeding from the influence of the Holy Ghost in us and bringing us a holy delight.3 They are, therefore, entirely different not only from the fruits of concupiscence but also from the fruits of simple reason, even when enlightened by faith, as in discursive meditation. St. John of the Cross adds: The soul which God is about to lead onward is not led by His Majesty into this night of the spirit as soon as it goes forth from the aridities and trials of the first purgation and night of sense; rather it is wont to pass a long time, even years, after leaving the state of beginners, in exercising itself in that of proficients. In the 2 Gal. 5:22. * Summa, la Ilae, q.70, a.i, 2. THE UNION WITH GOD 79 latter state it is like to one that has come forth from a rigorous im­ prisonment; it goes about the things of God with much greater freedom and satisfaction of the soul, and with more abundant and inward delight than it did at the beginning before it entered the said night. For its imagination and faculties are no longer bound, as they were before, by meditation and anxiety of spirit, since it now very readily finds in its spirit the most serene and loving contemplation and spiritual sweetness without the labour of medi­ tation. To prevent our thinking that this means the soul will no longer experience any dryness, St. John of the Cross imme­ diately adds: Although, as the purgation of the soul is not complete (for the principal part thereof, which is that of the spirit is wanting . . .), it is never without certain occasional necessities, aridities, dark­ nesses and perils which are sometimes much more intense than those of the past, for those were as tokens and heralds of the com­ ing night of the spirit, and are not lasting. . . . For, having passed through a period, or periods, or days of this night and tempest, the soul soon returns to its wonted serenity; and after this manner God purges certain souls which think not to rise to so high a degree of love as do others, bringing them at times, and for short periods, into this night of contemplation and purgation of the spirit, causing night to come upon them and then dawn. The Imitation often speaks of the same thing. A final remark made on the subject in The Darf{ Night says: “This sweetness, then, and this interior pleasure which we are describing, and which these progressives find and experience in their spirits so easily and so plentifully, is com­ municated to them in much greater abundance than afore­ time, overflowing into their senses more than was usual pre­ 8o THE LOVE OF GOD vious to this purgation of sense; for, inasmuch as the sense is now purer, it can more easily feel the pleasures of the spirit after its manner.” * What St. John of the Cross has to say about the degrees or “cellars” of love contributes much to the clarification of this teaching. He writes: “And we may say that there are seven of these degrees or cellars of love, all of which the soul comes to possess when she possesses in perfection the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, in the manner wherein she is able to receive them.” 0 These seven cellars or cells of the soul remind us of St. Teresa’s seven mansions, which also cor­ respond to the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost, as Isaias ranked them in descending order: “And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him: the spirit of wisdom, and of understanding, the spirit of counsel and of fortitude, the spirit of knowledge, and of godliness. And he shall be filled with the spirit of the fear of the Lord.”8 In the night of the senses, as we have seen, the gifts of knowledge and of fear of the Lord have most prominence, making plain to us the emptiness of created things and strengthening us against the frequent temptations of this same period. In the night of the soul we shall see the special working of the gifts of understanding and fortitude. In the transforming union the gift of wisdom is in most evident operation. The gifts of counsel and of piety dominate the time of calm after the night of the senses, and at this time the gift of knowledge serves less to reveal the emptiness of created things than their symbolism of the divine. ♦ Loe. cit., Bk. Π, chap. i. 5 The Spiritual Canticle, st. 26. 6 Isa. 11:2. THE UNION WITH GOD 81 The gift of piety, as St. Thomas remarks,7 disposes us to receive docilely those inspirations producing in us an en­ tirely filial affection for our Father in heaven, such as St. Paul speaks of in his Epistle to the Romans: “For you have not received the spirit of bondage again in fear ; but you have received the spirit of adoption of sons, whereby we cry: Abba (Father). For the Spirit Himself giveth testimony to our spirit, that we are the sons of God.”8 The gift of piety corresponds to the beatitude of the meek, for it leads us to see other men not as rivals but as God’s children and our brothers. The gift of counsel, the guide of true piety, corresponds to the beatitude of the merciful, since in difficult cases it inclines us more toward mercy than to­ ward rigorous justice. The predominating influence of these two gifts imparts to the period under discussion its peculiar character of calm, the fruit of the passive purification of the senses. However, the soul has not reached the end of its up­ ward journey, although those who have come so far may be carried away like St. Peter on Thabor and say: “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here: and let us make three tabernacles, one for Thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias.”9 As St. Mark goes on to say, “He knew not what he said.” And soon afterward our Lord foretold His passion, “It is written of the Son of man, that He must suffer many things and be despised.” 10 The Passion finds its reflection in the purgation of soul which, for truly generous hearts, follows the period of calm spoken of here. 7 Ila Ilac, q. 121, a. 1, 2. 8 Rom. 8: 15. 0 Mark 9: 5. 10 Mark 9: II. 82 THE LOVE OF GOD St. Teresa’s testimony For anyone who has studied St. Teresa’s Interior Castle closely, it is apparent that the union with God enjoyed by the soul between the night of the senses and the night of the soul corresponds to the period covering the second phase of the fourth mansion and die whole of the fifth. The fourth mansion begins widi “supernatural recollecdon” following a period of dryness 11 and often accompanied by die aridity characterizing the passive night of the senses.12 Furthermore, the time of quiet following it may be arid because of the op­ position encountered from the imagination and sensitive appetite.13 The life and works of St. Jane Frances de Chantal show that this arid quiet can last a long time. In it we find the two elements which, according to St. John of the Cross, are char­ acteristic of the passive night of the senses: on one hand, the beginning of infused contemplation together with a strong desire for God and for perfection; and on the other, the dep­ rivation of what we call sensible grace and of die facility or even of the ability to enlist the cooperation of the imagina­ tion and devote oneself to discursive meditation. 11 Cf. Third Mansion, chap. 2. 12 Cf. Fourth Mansion, chap. 1. When discussing supernatural or passive recol­ lection, the beginning of infused prayer, St. Teresa speaks of the usefulness of temptations arising at that time and encourages those dismayed by their distractions during prayer, showing how these result from the fact that the imagination can­ not cooperate in infused prayer as it formerly did in discursive meditation. 13 Fourth Mansion, chap. 1: “When this (the imagination), wanders we at once imagine that all the powers of the soul follow it; we think everything is lost, and that the time spent in God’s presence is wasted. Meanwhile the soul is perhaps entirely united to Him in the innermost mansions, while the imagination is in the precincts of the castle, struggling with a thousand wild and venomous creatures and gaining merit by its warfare." Cf. also The Way of Perfection, chaps. 31, 34, 38. THE UNION WITH GOD 83 At the beginning of her sixth mansion St. Teresa describes the night of the soul as follows: I shall not enumerate these trials in their proper order, but will describe them as they come to my memory, beginning with the least severe. This is an outcry raised against such a person by those amongst whom she lives. . . . Persons she thought were her friends desert her, making the most bitter remarks of all. . . . Yet oh! the rest would seem trifling in comparison could I relate the interior torments met with here, but they are impossible to describe. . . . Let us first speak of the trial of meeting with so timorous and inexperienced a confessor that nothing seems safe to him; he dreads and suspects everything but the commonplace. . . . The poor soul, beset by the same fears, . . . feels a torture and dismay at his condemnation that can only be realized by those who have experienced it themselves. For one of the severe trials of these souls ... is their belief that God permits them to be de­ ceived in punishment for their sins . . . (their) fears become al­ most unbearable. Especially is this the case when such spiritual dryness ensues that the mind feels as if it never had thought of God nor ever will be able to do so.14 Anyone reading this chapter and meditating on it sees that it describes the night of the soul discussed by St. John of the Cross in the second book of The Dark. Night. We understand, then, that the union with God enjoyed by the advanced or proficient between the two nights corresponds to the second phase of St. Teresa’s fourth mansion: for these souls know a quiet of soul no longer arid but consoling, and when they enter her fifth mansion they experience some degree of simple union, whether complete or incomplete. 14 Sixth Mansion, chap. 1. 84 THE LOVE OF GOD In the prayer of quiet the will alone is captivated.15*A mysterious light manifesting the goodness of its indwelling God together with the gift of piety, present in the will itself and disposing it for an entirely filial affection for God, achieves this work within it. This state of soul has been com­ pared to a child at the breast.18 Better still, it is like pos­ session of that living water of which Christ told the Samaritan woman. This water has its source in God yet it springs up in the inmost depths of our being, giving us great peace and sweetness, enlarging our hearts and our whole interior life, accomplishing such things within us that the soul itself can­ not comprehend what it has received.17 In this state, however, the intellect, memory, and imagination are not captivated by the divine action. Sometimes they act as aids to the will and set themselves to serve it, at other times their cooperation causes it nothing but trouble.18 In her Life, St. Teresa uses the noria, a kind of water wheel, to symbolize the prayer of quiet. We remember the image she borrowed from the four ways of watering gardens: The first is by bucketing water from the well hand over hand, the symbol of discursive meditation.19 The second is by using the noria, a sort of water wheel or windlass that demands less effort than was required at the start to dispose us to re­ ceive God’s grace; here, the saint says, the flowers of virtue are ready to appear.20 The third is done by irrigation from a river or spring and corresponds to the sleep of the powers 15 St. Teresa, The Way of Perfection, chap. 31. »« Ibid. 17 The Interior Cartie, Fourth Mansion, chap. 2. 18 Ibid. 18 Chap. 11. 20 Chap. 15. THE UNION WITH GOD 85 captivated by God and unconscious of the things of the world; here the flowers of virtue blossom.21 Lastly, the watering is done by rain, symbol of the prayer of union, the source of heroic resolutions and of great growth in humility.22 Progress in prayer is, therefore, generally accompanied by progress in virtue; in fact, living faith, charity, and the gifts accompanying them are exercised in prayer; for charity in­ forms and animates, so to say, the other virtues resulting from it and increasing with it.23 According to St. Teresa,24 then, if the soul that has already reached the prayer of quiet is humble and generous, it will be raised still higher—to union. But the saint notes that regularity, a fidelity of a somewhat external kind, is not sufficient; we must have besides great docility to the Holy Ghost, because He requires more and more of us as He gives and desires to give us more.20 In simple union the divine action is so strong that it com­ pletely absorbs the activity of the interior faculties of the soul during the time of prayer. Their entire activity is directed to God and no longer strays away from Him. Not only the will, but die intellect, too, is captivated by Him, and the natural operations of the memory and imagination come to a standstill so that the soul is usually no longer troubled by dis­ tractions, at least when it experiences complete union. This fact explains why die higher faculties, the intellect and will, are positively captivated, fixed, and absorbed by God through the illuminadon and inspiration of the Holy 21 Chaps. 16, 17. 22 Chaps. i8, 19. 23 la Ilae, q. 66, a. 2. 24 The Interior Cattle, Fifth Mansion, chap. I. 25 Fifth Mansion, chap. I : “Outwardly wc may appear to practice the requisite virtues, but we have far more to do than this before it is possible to attain to contemplation, to gain which wc should neglect no means, either small or great.” 86 THE LOVE OF GOD Ghost necessary for infused loving contemplation. This los­ ing of themselves in God is the eminent exercise of the supernaturalized intellect and will in this life. Intensity of contemplation and of union with God brings about a cer­ tain suspension of the natural exercise of the lower faculties (the imagination and sensory memory) and, as a result, of reason as well. This happens because the entire activity of the soul is directed toward God by the higher faculties and these exert a spiritual influence over the lower powers, which are stilled, as it were, and lulled to sleep. The absorbed scholar who abstracts his attention from external things to the ex­ tent of no longer seeing them offers us a parallel in the natural order.20 The soul no longer makes any effort to get the health­ giving, refreshing, and purifying waters but simply receives the rain as it falls from heaven,27 God allowing it to co­ operate with Him only by complete submission of will.28 Yet we continue to merit, not that the vital will-act in such a case is the result of discursive meditation, but because it acts freely in its docility to the inspiration of the Holy Ghost.29 As St. Teresa says, “How beautiful is the soul after having been immersed in God’s grandeur and united closely to Him but for a short time!” 80 By dying wholly to self such a soul 28 The imagination would not be suspended in its activity but positively captivated if it were a case of an imaginary vision, which is sometimes granted in this state, although it is not at all essential to it. Suspension of the natural activity of the lower powers is not simply a consequence of the intensity of contemplation; it results from the fact that God in some way fetters these faculties as in rapture, so that they can give no trouble to the intellect and the will. 2T Life of St. Teresa by herself, chap. 18. 28 Fifth Mansion, chap. I. 29 Cf. St. Thomas, la Ilae, q.m, a.2, for the difference between operating and cooperating grace. The act spoken of here is a result of operating grace. 80 Fifth Mansion, chap. 2. THE UNION WITH GOD 87 becomes so changed that its transformation is comparable to the metamorphosis of a silkworm into a white butterfly.31 In both instances, life reaches maturity only after a trans­ formation. Thus we see why St. John of the Cross calls the period of the spiritual life which we have been discussing the age of the proficients or advanced. It should be remarked, with St. Teresa,32 that the prayer of union is often incomplete, without cessation of the activity of the imagination and memory, these powers sometimes making war on the intellect and will.33 Here again, as in the case of die prayer of quiet, we must pay no more attention to the imagination than we would to a fool. When treating of incomplete mystical union St. Teresa says: “Is it neces­ sary, in order to attain to this kind of divine union, for the powers of the soul to be suspended ? No; God has many ways of enriching the soul and bringing it to these Mansions be­ sides what might be called a ‘short cut.’ ”34 si Ibid. 82 Life, chap. 17. 88 Ibid. 8,1 Tlie “short cut” together with its delights referred to here is sometimes taken for infused or mystical contemplation but consists only in the suspension of the imagination and memory, or the beginning of ecstasy, which sometimes accom­ panies mystical union and does much to facilitate it. It is plain, in fact, that the states of prayer referred to in the Fourth Mansion—supernatural recollection and the prayer of quiet—are infused. With all the more reason we can say the same thing of those in the Fifdi Mansion. When starting to speak of these, St. Teresa herself told her daughters: “There are very few who never enter this mansion: some more and some less, but most of them may be said at least to gain admit­ tance into these rooms. I think that certain graces I am about to describe are be­ stowed on only a few of the nuns, but if the rest only arrive at the portal they receive a great boon from God, for ‘many are called, but few are chosen.’ ” Among these “certain graces” is the “short cut" of die suspension of imagination and memory. On this point, cf. Arintcro, O.P., Cuestiones misticas, and ed., p. 330; P. Garate, S.J., Razon y Fe, July, 1908, p. 325; Saudreau, Les degrés de la vie spirituelle, 5th ed., II, ιοί, note 2. 88 THE LOVE OF GOD The effects of the prayer of union are wonderfully sanctify­ ing. The soul knows deep contrition for sin and a burning de­ sire to praise and serve God ; it suffers much to see sinners lost and catches a glimpse of the sufferings Jesus Christ endured; and it really begins to practice heroic virtue.35* What distinguishes St. Teresa from St. John of the Cross is that she puts more stress than he does on the extraordinary favors which may accompany the different states of prayer. Yet she takes care not to confuse concomitant and accidental favors with the essential character of interior states, recogniz­ ing that certain graces are bestowed only on a few of those who gain admittance to the inner mansions.30 Moreover, St. Teresa emphasizes the progressive extension of the mystical state to the different faculties of the soul. To bring out the increasing intensity of this life she shows how the higher powers are more and more positively captivated by God and the natural exercise of the lower faculties becomes suspended. However, she knows, as the text cited above shows, that the binding of the imagination is only an attendant and acci­ dental phenomenon of the infused prayer of union and that ecstasy is not a sure sign of greater knowledge and love of God since it usually comes to an end in transforming union, the most perfect mystical state.37 In connection with this subject Father Lallemant has some­ thing most apt to say in his Spiritual Doctrine: It cannot be maintained that St. Teresa held that there were two ways, one mystical, one not mystical, for arriving at the Fifth Mansion. By stating that the prayer of supernatural recollection and the prayer of quiet arc infused, she said just the opposite. Cf. also The IFay of Perfection, chaps. 18, 19, 20, 21. 85 Fifth Mansion, chap. 2. 86 Ibid., chap. 1. 87 Seventh Mansion, chap. 3. THE UNION WITH GOD 89 The degrees of contemplation, according to some, are, first, recol­ lection of all the powers of the mind; secondly, semi-rapture; thirdly, complete rapture; fourthly, ecstasy. But this division ex­ presses not so much the essence of contemplation as its accidents; for sometimes a soul without rapture will be favoured with a sublimer light, a clearer knowledge, a more excellent operation from God, than another who is favoured with the most extraordi­ nary raptures and ecstasies. The Blessed Virgin was more elevated in contemplation than all the angels and saints united; and yet she had no raptures.38 Like the girl Bernadette, some saints had raptures and ecstasies when diey were children but afterward experienced diem less often or not at all. St. John of the Cross makes it quite clear that such phe­ nomena are accidental. To bring out die increasing intensity of union with God, rather than the extension of the mystical state to the different faculties, he lays stress on the passive purifications required by this union. They provide a much better indication of the soul’s progress in knowing and loving God because they belong to the very essence of the different stages of the spiritual life. As we have seen, St. Teresa has not neglected these signs,89 but neither has she elucidated them as well as St. John of the Cross. He, being a theologian, was more concerned dian she with linking contemplation and union with God to their causes and thus explaining them. So he has shown us how contemplation is connected with an eminent degree of the theological virtues and the gifts of the Holy Ghost and how the progressive purification of the virtues brings souls to a 38 Seventh Principle, chap. 6, art. 7. 39 Sixth Mansion, chap. 1. THE LOVE OF GOD 90 higher and simpler form of contemplation and to closer union with God. Thus he gives us an explanation of how virtue usually grows with prayer, since all the functions of the spiritual organism develop together.40 The passive puri­ fication of the soul evidences this truth more strikingly than any other state because it requires heroic acts of faith, con­ fidence, patience, and love of God and during it more than at any other time is verified the old maxim, Ad lucem per crucem. The cross frees men from illusions and leads anyone who carries it supernaturally to true contemplation and per­ fect love of God. With a view to keeping souls from falling into discourage­ ment, they should be advised at this time frequently to renew their consecration to Mary the Mediatress and, with all the more reason, to the Sacred Heart. It should also be suggested that they consecrate themselves to the Holy Ghost, the Master of our interior life, so as to be henceforth more and more docile to Him in darkness as well as in light, in dryness as well as in joy. If we place our full consent in such a conse­ cration, it will have marvelous consequences. If a formal pact with the devil, when fully consented to, can have such terrible results, we know that the will’s full consent has no less import in the order of good than in the order of evil. Doubtless it is easier to destroy than to build; yet, with the help of grace, the building of the spiritual temple is always possible, and the Holy Ghost is infinitely more powerful than the demons. We have only to place ourselves under the direction of our inner Master and set ourselves never to refuse Him anything plainly in conformity with the duties of our state and of our vocation; then the more faithful we 40 la Ilac, q. 66, a. 2. THE UNION WITH GOD 91 are, the more He will keep our chief obligations before our minds and so lead us, by a more and more generous practice of virtue, to perfect purification and union with God. The value of the hidden life Everything just said about the passive purification of the senses and the period normally following it, called the il­ luminative way, reveals the value of the hidden life to us. For a living and practical idea of it, we shall quote from a commentary on the Canticle of Canticles written by a priest friend long tried by illness, who obviously speaks from ex­ perience and desires to remain unknown. The great merit of this commentary is that it rises spontaneously and immedi­ ately from sensible symbols to spiritual realities and has pas­ sages of real beauty. The following pages relative to the first verses of the Canticle concern the apostolate of the hidden life. O my God, when I meet a soul that You seem to have called to the true life, I feel impelled to pray boldly: Here is one of Your children, O Father! Give him a new mark of Your affection. You have already given him so much! If anything is lacking in his preparation, supply it so that he may be worthy of You! Purify him, adorn him, surround him with Your love. Take him up, as it were, in Your arms and hold him against Your great heart. And, I dare ask it, Father, reverently, humbly, but ardently as well, put Your kiss upon his mouth. I shall know no peace until You fulfill my desire. It is good; it is legitimate. I ask it for Your glory, for the good of this soul, and for my own sake, O Jesus. Remember the words of Your holy precursor: “He that hath the bride, is the bridegroom : but the friend of the bridegroom, who standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth with joy because of the bridegroom’s voice.” 92 THE LOVE OF GOD And grant that I may be able to say as he did : “This my joy is there­ fore fulfilled.” The conditions necessary to make an apostle of the interior life can evidently be reduced to two: an ardent desire to lead the hidden life and perfect docility to grace, so that the Holy Ghost may make whatever use He will of us as instruments for others. If we are to help souls by speaking to them of the interior life, the preparation necessary for it, its nature and its crown and consummation, we must have more than a scientific knowledge of these mysterious realities, such as can be had from a serious study of the masters. In this matter personal experience means much and rounds out com­ mon doctrine. When a man is in immediate contact with the reality he is de­ scribing, his speech has an indescribable persuasiveness. He not only knows this reality but lives it and, in a sense, is it and, there­ fore, has no trouble putting it into words. Under the action of grace, his words become light and warmth and life to the listener. They have fire because the soul that expresses and is expressed by them is itself on fire and has, after striving long and patiently, been given this sometimes unmerited gift of utterance by God Himself. Then a man may give away the fruits of his garden, as St. Teresa puts it, without harm to himself. We must abide God’s time, the autumn of the soul. If we attempt to reap in the spring instead of at harvest time, we are liable to let others go hungry and to starve to death ourselves. But when the time is really ripe, we must not let false humility or sham prudence make us refuse to give of our good things to others lest we smother our fire with ashes and allow the children of our heavenly Father to go hungry for bread. Docility to grace is then most necessary for the apostle of the hidden life. Being only an instrument in the hands of the divine Worker, he must do nothing of himself and by himself. Ordinar­ ily, of course, he remains free and autonomous. Only at certain THE UNION WITH GOD 93 times and in certain events the Holy Ghost moves him without his taking the initiative of his own action. When this happens he has no other duty than to give his full and perfect consent to all his Master desires him to say or to do. In all other cases, he need only concern himself with cooperating disinterestedly, intelligently, and docilely with grace. God alone knows what He expects of a soul, what He desires to do with it, the plan of life He has sketched for it, the place He has set aside for it in His spiritual edifice, the part it has to play in time and in eternity. Nothing can prevail against the divine will. The apostle of the hidden life who has fulfilled the two necessary conditions has a wonderful mission. God’s mercy works but for one end: to teach us what heaven is, to make us desire it, to put in our hands the means to gain it. Now heaven is nothing else but perfect, conscious, and definitive participation in the inner life of God. And the interior life is nothing else but the imperfect but very real beginning of this participation : inchoatio vitae aeternae, inchoatio et praelibatio beatitudinis. Therefore, nothing on earth so resembles and so prepares us for eternal life as a life of intimacy with the adorable Trinity living at home in our hearts. And no more beautiful task exists in this world than to teach souls the art of beginning their heaven on earth. God is glorified, they are given happiness, and we are made glad. O my Jesus, since You love interior souls so much, increase the number of those who worship the Father “in spirit and in truth.” Let each one of them be more recollected, more earnest, more generous, and, in a word, more loving. Give to Your other selves, those to whom You have willed to confide the care of discovering, cultivating, and improving the souls so dear to You, an abundant share in Your priestly grace, that they may give themselves entirely to this divine task. Show them the beauty of these souls. See to it that they understand their full value. Illumine them with Your light. Surround them with Your love. Be their counselor and 94 THE LOVE OF GOD guide in such an important and difficult undertaking. Make them prudent, patient, devoted, forgetful of self and concerned only with making You known and loved.41 41 Robert de Langeac, Virgo Fidelis (Paris: Lcthiclleux, 1931). PART II Crosses of the Soul PURIFYING GRACES OF THE NIGHT OF THE SOUL CHAPTER VI The Passive Purification of the Soul Described by St. John of the Cross as One of the most profound and original parts of the doc­ trine of St. John of the Cross, his richest contribution to the development of mystical theology and his greatest claim to the title of doctor, is that which deals with what he calls the passive night of the soul. By following what he says concerning it in the second book of The Dar!{ Night, we wish first to show the necessity for such a purification, then to point out the principal features of his psychological descrip­ tion of it, and lastly to try to give a theological explanation of this grievous state by relating it to the supernatural cause which produces it and the end to which it is ordered. There are several reasons why really interior souls will not find such a knowledge of his doctrine useless. They may not profit from a first superficial reading; but if they reread it more attentively, it will reveal to them the worth of the daily cross which we all must carry and teach them not to confuse our self-made troubles widi those of real purifying value. It will make them see, too, the great differences between what beginners suffer in the night of the senses and what the advanced undergo in their preparation for the intimacy of divine union. And so they will come to understand how ridiculous it would be to believe ourselves in the second night 97 98 THE LOVE OF GOD when we have hardly entered the first. A meditative reading discloses the distance separating us from the full perfection of Christian life. Only a few attain to it, and they have all passed through the crucible in one way or another. Spiritual pride does much to deceive us into believing that, without having traveled the long hard road, we are ready to reach the summit. The Holy Ghost has deemed it wise to reveal these things to us in the great Book of Job and in some of the most beauti­ ful verses of the psalms. They give us foreknowledge of the sufferings awaiting us in purgatory, if we fail to profit suf­ ficiently from the crosses sent to us in this life. Finally, this sublime doctrine gives us a deeper understanding of the meaning of the seven last words of Christ on the cross, the best expression of the mystery of redemption and a subject for our daily meditation. The necessity for the passive purification of the soul Those who go forward into the illuminative way must undergo the passive night of the soul so that the highest part of the soul, the intellect and the will, may be purified and rid of imperfections.1 To enter into this way, they have already had to pass through the passive night of the senses for the purging of the lower, sensory part of the soul from the faults of beginners: spiritual greediness, laziness, jealousy, impa­ tience, and spiritual pride. By plunging the soul into aridity, the passive night of the senses has achieved its purgation from sensuality especially, and the soul has begun to live the life of the spirit, receiving a general and obscure mode of con1 The Dark. Night, Bk. I, chap. 14. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 99 templating what so attracts it, the infinite goodness of God. Having passed through this night and left the state of be­ ginners, the soul may spend a long time, even years, exercis­ ing itself in the way of proficients. Like someone liberated from rigorous imprisonment, it goes about the things of God with much greater freedom and satisfaction of soul and with more inward delight than it ever knew before.2 This relatively calm period, usually occurring between die two purifications, the first of the senses and the second of the spirit, corresponds, as mentioned before, to the fourth and fifth mansions of St. Teresa. It includes the period of quiet, during which the will is caught by an attraction for God, and the period of simple union, during which God’s action becomes strong enough at prayer to captivate not only the will but also the intellect, at times so completely that die operation of the memory and imagination is momentarily suspended. The imagination and other faculties are no longer bound, as before, by meditation and anxiety of mind, since the soul now finds within itself, without the labor of medita­ tion, a sweet, serene, and loving contemplation.3 Yet the soul is far from being completely purified since its spiritual powers still want for purgation; and as long as this is so, some dis­ order will always arise in the lower part of the soul, not com­ pletely at peace until after the second night. Those making progress in the illuminative way still have many imperfections, defects of the old man that remain in die soul like so much rust that only intense fire can remove. In fact, only too often the advanced are still distracted at 2 Ibid., Bk. II, chap. i. 3 Ibid. These important texts are quoted again because they are needed to grasp the meaning of what follows. ΙΟΟ THE LOVE OF GOD prayer, given to foolishness and natural affections, and to pouring themselves out on external things. At times they are still rude and impatient. Some use spiritual goods with too little detachment and thus expose themselves to greater danger than they met at the start, since excessive attachment to spiritual communications lays them open to the devil, and he delights to take them in with vain visions and false prophecies, making them presume to trust their own imagin­ ings as the voices of God and His saints.4 In this way he inflates their presumption, fills them with pride, and leads them to affect the manners of sanctity and to give a display of raptures and other visible signs of apparent holiness. People dedicated to the apostolate manifest the same weakness in a slightly different form. They can, for example, mistake a kind of romantic lyricism for the special inspiration of the Holy Ghost and go far astray in teaching and in directing souls; or they can apply quite true principles incorrectly; or make false mystics of those whom they would lead to divine union. In regard to some of the advanced, St. John of the Cross has something further to add: “In some of these souls so many falsehoods and deceits are multiplied and so persistent do they become, that it is very doubtful if such souls will re­ turn to the pure road of virtue and true spirituality.” The holy doctor says that this subject is inexhaustible, despite the fact that he considers only faults relative to the interior life. What would it be then if we were also to consider faults that wound charity and even justice in the relations of these souls with others, whether superiors, equals, or inferiors; also, if we took up whatever taints teaching, the apostolate, and the government and direction of souls, if those referred to are engaged in such work ? * ibid.. II, 2. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL ιοί Spiritual pride takes many different forms: jealousy, secret ambition, intellectual pride, and an autocratic assertion of authority on one hand, and broad-minded and culpable in­ dulgence on the other. For we meet the seven capital sins transposed into the spiritual life, where they work it grave harm. All this evidences the necessity for the “strong lye” of the night of the soul. Without it the purity necessary for divine union will always be lacking.5 Therefore, since these proficients are still at a very low stage of progress, and follow their own nature closely in the intercourse and dealings which they have with God, because the gold of their spirit is not yet purified and refined, they still think of God as little children, and speak of God as little children, and feel and ex­ perience God as little children, even as St. Paul says, because they have not reached perfection, which is the union of the soul with God. In the state of union, however, they will work great things in the spirit, even as grown men, and their works and faculties will then be divine rather than human.® In these words of St. John of the Cross we have a clear statement that the perfection of Christian life is normally of the mystical order, since it presupposes the purification of the senses and of the soul, both passive and distinctly defined mystical states. Description of the night of the soul As the night of die senses is marked by privation of sensible consolations, although it consists chiefly in the beginning of an unfelt and wholly spiritual life, die dawning of infused contemplation, so die night of the soul at first seems to mean 6 Ibid. « Ibid.. Π, 3· 102 THE LOVE OF GOD the loss of what lights the soul had previously received. In reality, what is happening is that a much more intense light has begun to illumine and almost to dazzle the soul in regard to the depths of its own misery and the infinite greatness of God. “He [God] strips their faculties, affections, and feelings, both spiritual and sensual, both outward and inward, leaving the understanding dark, the will dry, the memory empty, and the affections in the deepest affliction, bitterness and straitness, taking from the soul the pleasure and experience of spiritual blessings which it had aforetime.”7 This is the nakedness or poverty of spirit to which the beatitude refers when it says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” The understand­ ing knows darkness, the will constraint, for it loves and seeks its Lord in anxiety, the memory is anguished because of its inability to recall what it once knew. The soul must go for­ ward in blind faith, the darkness of night for the natural powers.8 Now we grasp the full meaning of St. Thomas’ prin­ ciple that the object of faith is hidden and unseen and can neither be immediately evident nor be proven to us, no mat­ ter how great our faith may be.9 With increasing experience of this truth, the soul leaves behind the base mode it had of understanding God, the miserable way it used to love Him, and the limited manner it once had of experiencing Him.10 It cannot be said that the soul discerns nothing in this dark night because, without seeing it, it is drawing nearer and nearer to the infinite greatness and purity of God, which no idea of ours could ever represent. Then by contrast the soul ’ Ibid. 8 Ibid., II, 4· 8 Summa, Ila Ilac, q. I, a. 5. 10 The Dark. Night, Bk. Π, chap. 4. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 103 perceives its own misery much better than ever before. This doctrine throws much light on the life of the Curé of Ars and the inner torments he experienced, since his greatest suf­ fering came from the fact that he felt himself to be so far from the priestly ideal. In the obscurity of faith, he saw more and more clearly the greatness of the priestly character and the immense needs of the countless souls that came to him.11 In such circumstances the soul’s pain resembles what weak and unhealthy eyes suffer when looking at an intense light. “When this pure light assails the soul, in order to expel its impurity, the soul feels itself to be so impure and miserable that it believes God to be against it, and thinks that it has set itself up against God. This causes it so much grief and pain (because it now believes that God has cast it away) that one of the greatest trials which Job felt when God sent him this experience, was as follows, when he said: ‘Why hast Thou set me against Thee, so that I am grievous and burdensome to myself?’ ”12 Seeing its own impurity, until now unsuspected, the soul is persuaded that it has lost all piety and is unfit for God or man. It cannot look forward to being any different or to possessing the good things it once knew and has now lost. In a flood of obscure divine light all its infidelities lie ex­ posed before it, and it sees that by its own power it cannot act 11 ‘In myself I see nothing but my sins," he said. "Yet God does not let me sec all of them because I would be too tempted to despair. I have no other defense against this temptation than to throw myself down before the tabernacle, a dog at the feet of his master." At another time he said: “There arc, of course, many good and upright priests; but to celebrate Mass a priest should be holy. Only in heaven will the full value of one Mass be known." He suffered much because of his sins and because of his inability to convert more sinners and bring them back to the way of salvation. 12 The Darh. Night, Bk. II, chap. 5. xo4 THE LOVE OF GOD otherwise. It suffers to find in itself nothing but reasons why God should abandon it, while it yet loves Him with all its strength. It experiences that holy hatred of self spoken of by St. Catherine of Siena, having nothing but contempt for that self compounded of pride, egoism, and self-love. What St. Augustine had to say about the two cities begins to be realized : from the love of self unto contempt of God arises the city of evil, and from the love of God unto contempt of self, the city of God.13 Our Savior’s words receive strong confirma­ tion: “He that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal.” 14 The just man now really begins to love to be forgotten and to be despised by men: amare nesciri el pro nihilo reputari. At times this imports such agony that the sufferer would regard it as a relief to be able to die, making us remember the words spoken by the prophet Elias when crushed by the difficulties of his apostolatc: “It is enough for me, take away my soul: for I am no better than my fathers.” 15 The infinite perfection of God, without being seen, in some way makes itself felt and becomes like an enormous and invisible burden weighing down the soul. Dominated by this oppression, the soul sees itself as entirely unacquainted with divine favor and believes itself deprived of every support and bereft of all pity. The twenty-first psalm, remembered by Christ on the cross, gives deep expression to this experience: “O God my God, look upon me: why hast Thou forsaken me? Far from my salvation are the words of my sins. O my God, I shall cry by day, and Thou wilt not hear: and by night, and it shall 1S The City of God, Bk. XIV, chap. 28. 14 John 12: 25. 15 III Kings 19:4. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 105 not be reputed as folly in me. But Thou dwellest in the holy place, the praise of Israel. In Thee have our fathers hoped: they have hoped, and Thou hast delivered them. They cried to Thee, and they were saved. . . . But I am a worm, and no man; the reproach of men, and the outcast of the people. . . . From my mother’s womb Thou art my God, depart not from me. For tribulation is very near: for there is none to help me.” Undergoing a similar trial, Job cried out: “Having pity on me, have pity on me, at least you my friends, because the hand of the Lord hath touched me.” 18 The soul feels itself languishing and dying by a cruel spiritual death and it must abide in the dark tomb until the coming of the spiritual resur­ rection for which it hopes.16 1718 Until that day, it seems to the soul that it has lost every natural and supernatural good, that prayer itself has become impossible. A deep void cleaves down into the soul, its higher and lower powers are completely im­ poverished, and it feels the shadow of death over it, experi­ encing an inner destruction that goes to its very substance. Every remedy appears useless, every hope, lost. If it prays, it does so with such aridity that God seems no longer to hear it. “Yea, and when I cry,” says Jeremias, “He hath shut out my prayer. » 18 The whole description of the night of the soul can be summed up in the statement that the soul now knows what it never before suspected, die depths of its own misery, and by contrast it has a growing realization of God’s infinite greatness, apparently inaccessible for such as itself. Three complementary signs complete the description: they will be 16 Job 19: 21. 17 The Dark. Night, Bk. II, chap. 6. 18 Lam. 3: 8. io6 THE LOVE OF GOD discussed later. For the present it is enough to say that purga­ tion of soul is usually accompanied by strong temptations against faith—its object seems so distant; against hope— God’s help no longer makes itself felt; against charity—the Lord has apparently cruelly deserted the tried man at the very time when his friends have forsaken him or remained at his side only to prove Job’s comforters. In comparison to sufferings such as these, the trials of the night of the senses and its concomitant temptations against chastity and patience are of small moment. On the degree to which the soul will later be raised depends the length and severity of its purgation. However, if such a refining process is to achieve its final end, its severest phase will last for some years.19 The soul works its way forward through a tunnel of darkness, catching occasional glimpses of daylight. Ordinarily the more intense a purgation is, the shorter it lasts.20 The description of it given by St. John of the Cross presents it as it takes place in all its intensity and fullness in the saints, as he himself had to undergo it. Often, however, it is found in lower degrees and in less contemplative forms, united to the trials encountered in the apostolate. St. Gregory spoke of this state in his commentaries on the Book of Job;21 after him, Hugh of St. Victor 22 and Tauler gave descriptions of it which, though lacking the compass and depth of that given by St. John of the Cross, provided the framework for it.23 St. Teresa treats of it somewhat at 19 The Dark. Night, Bk. Π, chap. 7. 20 Ibid., chap. 8. 21 Morales, XXIV, chap. 6, no. it; X, chap. 10, no. 17. 22 In Eccl., horn. I. 23 Cf. Tauler, those passages where he speaks of faith denuded of all consola­ tion, naked faith, especially the first sermon for the feast of the Blessed Trinity. His disciples have made a summary of this doctrine in the Institutions, chap. 12: THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 107 length at the beginning of the sixth mansion before taking up the subject of spiritual betrothal, showing at what period she thought this purification generally appears.* 2425 St. Angela of Foligno, too, has left us a description entirely in accordance with the one given in The Darf^ Night.26 Lastly, in almost all lives of the saints that make an attempt to unveil the mystery of their inner life, we find similar descriptions in those chapters dealing with their interior suffering and heroic practice of the theological virtues. Again and again we en­ counter different degrees of what at bottom is always the same purgation of soul, not merely in pure contemplatives, but in active souls like St. Vincent de Paul, too, as we realize when we recall the temptations which he had against faith for almost four years. So terrible were they that he wrote the Credo on a piece of paper and wore it over his heart so that “Very spiritual people who have arrived at the highest degree of contemplation sometimes feel themselves so overwhelmed by their own inner poverty that they would be willing to suffer any kind of death, no matter how hard or violent, if God so willed, that they might thereby be delivered from their indigence. No spiritual consolation relieves them, and their interior affliction penetrates to the very marrow of their bones . . . making them wither away with grief. . . . They can find no consolation in creatures. . . . God treats His elect in this way . . . often leaving them in such uttcr want and terrible interior dryness, that they believe themselves to be entirely deprived of grace, of faith, of charity, and of every kind of good.’’ · 24 Sixth Mansion, chap, i: “One of the severe trials of these souls ... is their belief that God permits them to be deceived in punishment for their sins. . . . Especially is this the case when such spiritual dryness ensues that the mind feels as if it never had thought of God nor ever will be able to do so. When men speak of Him, they seem to be talking of some person heard of long ago.” 25 “I see myself destitute of everything good, empty of every virtue and grace, and full of many vices and vanities. Hope has left me and mercy has hidden her­ self. I behold myself as the abode of Satan, his tool, his dupe, his daughter, with­ out uprightness or truth, worthy of the lowest depths of hell fire. ... In soul and body I see nothing but defects: God is shut away and hidden from me; to remember Him serves only to confound me. . . . There are no doors or windows through which to escape. ... In the deep abyss into which I have fallen I find no remedy for all these evils.” Le Livre de la Bse Angèle, p. 82; also Boll. Acta sand., January 4, nos. 39 and 40. io8 THE LOVE OF GOD he could put his hand over it and reassure himself that he had not consented to the thoughts that obsessed him. It was by passing through the crucible of this suffering that he was purified and attained to sanctity. The theological explanation of passive purification: its causes and end In describing this state, we have just determined where it is found—chiefly in the highest part of the soul, the spiritual powers, and what its essential character is—the deep experi­ mental knowledge of our misery and of God’s infinite majesty, together with great spiritual aridity and an earnest desire for perfection. These constitute what can be called the material and formal causes of this state. The proximate efficient cause, as well as the principle and end of this grievous and obscure contemplation remain to be considered. The causal explanation of the state of purgation given by St. John of the Cross is theological, given in the light of revelation as contained in Scripture and tradition. Theology teaches us that faith is a supernatural gift of God, that tire Holy Ghost is within us together with His sevenfold gifts, and from theology we learn also how faith and the gifts attain their full growth. The author of The Darf Night finds the principle for his explanation in scriptural texts. After noting the chief ones given, we shall go on to discover in what sense he understands them and how his thought conforms com­ pletely to what St. Thomas tells us of the purifying role of the gift of understanding. In the Book of Wisdom it is said of the just: “As gold in the furnace He hath proved them, and as a victim of a holocaust THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 109 He hath received them.” 26 In the crucible gold is purified of all dross, and holocaustal offerings are entirely consumed by fire for God’s honor. The soul of a saint is a sort of spiritual diamond offering no obstacle to divine light, and it takes no ordinary flame to make diamonds out of coal. In his Lamenta­ tions, Jeremias says: “From above He hath sent fire into my bones, and hath chastised me.” 27 In the light of the fire consuming him the prophet sees clearly both the gravity of Israel’s sins and the justice and goodness of the Most High, and he begs God earnestly for deliverance. Like gold, the soul is purified by fire ; but as the soul must realize its misery and desire to be freed of its dross, the fire purifying it must make God’s infinite riches and its own radically opponent poverty more evident to it in the obscurity of faith. Growth in diis knowledge leads to such an ardent love of God that die soul has nothing but contempt for it­ self. “Who can understand sins? From my secret ones cleanse me, O Lord.” 28 “My substance is as nothing before Thee.” 29 “The Lord . . . will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts.” 80 “Enlighten my eyes that I never sleep in death.”31 “O my God, enlighten my darkness.”82 “Create a clean heart in me, O God: and renew a right spirit within my bowels. Cast me not away from Thy face; and take not Thy holy spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation: and strengthen me 28 Wisd. 3: 6. 27 Lam. 1:13. 28 Ps. 18: 13. 28 Ps. 38:6. so I Cor. 4: 5. 81 Ps. 12: 4. 82 Ps. 17: 29. no THE LOVE OF GOD with a perfect spirit.”33 The soul asks Christ to realize within it His own words, “I am come to cast fire on die earth: and what will I, but that it be kindled?”34 Christ answers inwardly by His grace just as if He were saying: “You would not seek Me, if you had not already found Me.” The ardent love growing in a purified soul is a fire burning and con­ suming all that cannot be quickened by divine charity. Often we long for souls to receive light and strength, and in this way our desires for them are wonderfully fulfilled. St. John of the Cross explains diese texts of Scripture just quoted by saying simply: “This dark night is an inflowing of God into the soul, which purges it from its ignorances and imperfections, habitual, natural, and spiritual, and which is called by contemplatives infused contemplation, or mystical theology. Herein God secretly teaches the soul and instructs it in perfection of love, without its doing anything, or under­ standing of what manner is this infused contemplation.” 35 Repeating the comparison made by Hugh of St. Victor,38 the holy doctor adds: For the greater clearness of what has been said, and of what has still to be said, it is well to observe at this point that this purgative and loving knowledge or divine light whereof we here speak acts upon the soul which is purged and prepared for perfect union with it in the same way as fire acts upon a log of wood in order to transform it into itself; for material fire, acting upon wood, first of all begins to dry it, by driving out its moisture and causing it to shed the water which it contains within itself. Then it begins to make it black, dark, and unsightly, and even to give forth a bad sa Pi. 50: 12. s4Luke 12:49. S5 The Dark Night, Bk. Π, chap. 5. 34 In Eccl., hom. 1. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL m odour, and, as it dries it little by little, it brings out and drives away all the dark and unsightly accidents which are contrary to the nature of fire. And, finally, it begins to kindle it externally and give it heat, and at last transforms it into itself and makes it as beautiful as fire. . . . In this same way we have to philosophize with respect to this divine fire of contemplative love, which, before it unites and trans­ forms the soul in itself, first purges it of all its contrary accidents. It drives out its unsightliness, and makes it black and dark, so that it seems worse than before and more unsightly and abominable than it was wont to be. For this divine purgation is removing all the evil and vicious humours which the soul has never perceived because they have been so deeply rooted and grounded in it; it has never realized, in fact, that it has had so much evil within itself. But now that they are to be driven forth and annihilated, these humours reveal themselves, and become visible to the soul . . . and, as it sees in itself that which it saw not before, it is clear to it that it is not only unfit for God to see it, but that it deserves His abhorrence and that He does indeed abhor it.37 This means a purgatory before death, purifying the soul not by material fire but through the spiritual fire of contempla­ tion and of love. St. John of the Cross says that an hour of purgation here being worth many hereafter, a soul so treated in this world either has no need to make expiation in the next life or stays in purgatory only a short time.38 While on earth we are purified while meriting and growing in charity, whereas after death we are purified without meriting, the time of merit being past. The supernatural light coming from God to the soul at this time is not merely the light of infused faith, although 87 Op. at. Bk. II, chap. io. 38 Ibid., chap. 6. 112 THE LOVE OF GOD this surely is deeply at work because the soul lives more and more in the spirit of faith; but the Holy Ghost exercises a further and special influence over it through the gift of understanding, perfectly in harmony with faith. As St. John of the Cross says, the soul, being now united to divine love, no longer loves according to its own lowly nature but with the strength and purity of the Holy Ghost,39 receiving a new way of looking at things since the light and grace of the Holy Ghost is as different from natural knowledge as the divine is from the human. “For this night is gradually draw­ ing the spirit away from its ordinary and common experience of things and bringing it nearer the divine sense, which is a stranger and an alien to all human ways. It seems now to the soul that it is going forth from its very self, with much affliction.” 40 The doctrine of St. John of the Cross seems to be fully in accord with what St. Thomas teaches concerning the gift of understanding as principle of a new penetration and purifica­ tion. “The stronger the light of the understanding, the fur­ ther can it penetrate into the heart of things. Now the natural light of our understanding is of finite power; wherefore it can reach to a certain fixed point. Consequently man needs a supernatural light in order to penetrate further still so as to know what it cannot know by its natural light: and this supernatural light which is bestowed on man is called the gift of understanding.” 41 What God bestows is called the gift of understanding and not of reason, Because what is designated is somediing higher than reasoning, a kind of ϊβ Ibid., chap. 4. 40 Ibid., chap. 9. «Ha Ilae, q.8, a.I. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 113 knowledge as simple and penetrating as a shaft of light.42 Whereas faith makes us simply hold to revealed truths, this gift helps us to perceive them in some way, keeping us from taking them for inventions of men or doubting them because of objections from unbelievers.43 It perfects our first grasp of the truths of faith and disposes us the better to judge them and experience them by the gift of wisdom.44 It dis­ sipates dullness of mind; our Lord was thinking of it when He said: Qui potest capere, captat. Happy are those who have eyes to see and ears to hear, who grasp the spirit beneath the letter, who take hold of the divine reality hidden under figure, symbol, and parable. The gift of understanding is at once contemplative and practical, since it considers eternal truths both in themselves and so far as they are the supreme law of human conduct.45 It shows us what is blameworthy in ourselves much better than the most careful examination of conscience and reveals the value of our last end with the clarity of a lightning flash.46 Further, as St. Thomas tells us, the gift of understanding frees our mind of speculative and practical errors and from attachment to sensible imagery.47 Moreover, together with faith, it serves as the principle of a high degree of contempla­ tion. “The sight of God is twofold. One is perfect, whereby God’s essence is seen: the other is imperfect, whereby, though we see not what God is, yet we see what He is not; and whereby, the more perfectly do we know God in this life, 42 Ibid. 43 Ibid., a. 2. 44 Ibid., a. 6. 45 Ibid., a. 3. 43 Ibid. 47 Ibid., a. 8. 114 THE LOVE OF GOD the more we understand that He surpasses all that the mind comprehends. Each of these visions of God belongs to the gift of understanding; the first, to the gift of understanding in the state of perfection, as possessed in heaven; the second, to the gift of understanding in its state of inchoation, as possessed by wayfarers.”48 In the same article St. Thomas explains how the gift of understanding purifies our hearts and corresponds to the beatitude, “Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God.” By it we apprehend more and more clearly that the most highly endowed creature is noth­ ing of itself and that God alone is eternally subsistent being, in whom essence and existence are one and the same. “I am who am.”49 St. Thomas has much the same to say elsewhere when showing that uniform infused contemplation in some way demands the sacrifice of the senses and of discursive reason­ ing: In intelligible operations, that which is simply uniform is com­ pared to circular movement. . . . Wherefore Dionysius assigns the circular movement of the angels to the fact that their intuition of God is uniform and unceasing. . . . But on the part of the soul, ere it can arrive at this uniformity, its twofold lack of uni­ formity needs to be removed. First, that which arises from the variety of external things: this is removed by the soul withdrawing from externals, and so the first thing he mentions regarding the circular movement of the soul is the soul’s withdrawal into itself from external objects. Secondly, another lack of uniformity re­ quires to be removed from the soul, and this is owing to the dis­ coursing of reason. This is done by directing all the soul’s opera­ tions to the simple contemplation of intelligible truth, and this 48 Ibid., a. 7· 48 Exod. 3:14· THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 115 is indicated by his saying in the second place that the soul’s in­ tellectual powers must be uniformly concentrated; in other words, that discoursing must be laid aside and the soul’s gaze fixed on the contemplation of the one simple truth. . . . Afterwards these two things being done, he mentions thirdly the uniformity which is like that of the angels, for then all things being laid aside, the soul continues in the contemplation of God alone.50 This turning of the intellectual powers around their center, closes them, so to say, like the spirals of a conch, so that ex­ ternal things are shut out and they are left open only to a simple and obscure but more and more penetrating intuition of God. This penetration comes, we see, from the gift of under­ standing. Its infused and purifying light makes known to us the most hidden recesses of our conscience, the secret in­ tentions of our heart, and, on the other hand, it enables us to go beyond the letter of God’s word to reach its spirit, and it makes us see, as we could not see before, that, just as the firmament is far vaster than the stars that map it out for us, so is God above any distinct idea whatever that we can have of Him, even though it is given to us by revelation. The light of the gift of understanding discovers to us that the Deity or inner life of God (what makes God to be God) is above every perfection that is common in an analogous way to Him and to us, that the Deity is greater than being, unity, truth, goodness, intellect, and love. To grasp the intimate reconciliation of divine immutability and the freedom of the creative act, of inexorable justice and infinite mercy, of sovereign wisdom and of that good pleas­ ure which seems at times arbitrary, we would need to have 60 Ila Ilac, q. 180, a. 6. n6 THE LOVE OF GOD an immediate apprehension of the Deity itself.51 All these perfections exist formally and eminently in God and, far from being destroyed by being united in the eminence of the God­ head, they are found there in a pure state, with no trace of imperfection.52 Whereas the seven colors of the rainbow exist only virtually in white light, the divine perfections exist formally in the eminence of the Deity but according to a transcendent mode inaccessible to us. Deitas est super ens et super unum, as Dionysius says, and Cajetan joyfully re­ peats.53 The highest theological speculation accords then with what the mystics tell us of the great darkness that envelops the soul. “What my soul sees,” Angela of Foligno says, “can­ not be conceived by thought or expressed in words. I see nothing and I see all; the more the infinite good is beheld in darkness, the more certain it becomes to us and the more it surpasses all things. . . . All the graces that have been ac­ corded to me amount to very little in comparison to the in­ finite good that I see in the divine darkness.” 54 The reason for the darkness and suffering resulting from the infused light of understanding There are three reasons why the light God sends us seems like darkness and brings so much suffering. They are: the sublimity of God’s mysteries, our own impurity, and the 61 Certainly God need not have created. He is not greater for having brought the universe into existence; nevertheless, although His creative act is sovereignly free, it is not contingent and accidental and capable of non-existence. In God all that He is is identified with His absolutely necessary and immutable essence. For us to be able to reconcile His immutability with the freedom of His creative act we would have to see the divine essence such as it is in itself, sicuti est. 52 God, His Existence and His Nature, II, 187 ff. 53 Cf. Cajetan, in lam, q.39, a. 1, no. 7. 54 Arnaud, Boll. Acta sanct., January 4, c. 4, nos. 72—76. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 117 temptations of the devil. In regard to the first, it comes about precisely because the Deity or inner life of God is infinitely above every sensible image, whether actual or potential. To see the Godhead as It is in Itself, sicuti est, It would have to be presented to us without any intermediary.65 And the more we understand the incapacity of all created ideas, whether of men or of angels, to reveal the uncreated and infinite light to us, the more inaccessible this light seems to us. It has, not the infra-intellectual mysteriousness of matter, but the ultra-luminous darkness of supreme truth, of truth too intelligible for us to grasp. Sunlight is darkness for the owl. Its eyes are not strong enough to bear such brightness. Com­ parably, the intellectual and eternally subsistent brilliance of God is darkness to any created intelligence, whether angelic or human, as long as it is not uplifted and strengthened by the light of glory, as are the elect in the homeland of heaven. In order to prove the first point, we must here assume a certain doctrine of the philosopher, which says that, the clearer and more manifest are divine things in themselves, the darker and more hid­ den are they to the soul naturally; just as, the clearer is the light, the more it blinds and darkens the pupil of the owl, and, the more directly we look at the sun, the greater is the darkness which it causes in our visual faculty, overcoming and overwhelming it through its own weakness. In the same way, when this divine light of contemplation assails the soul which is not yet wholly enlight­ ened, it causes spiritual darkness in it . . . not that this is so in fact, but that it is so to our weak understanding, which is blinded and darkened by so vast a light, to which it cannot attain.56 65 Cf. la. q. 12, a. 2. 6e7'Ac Dar/{ Night, Bk. II, chap. 5. 118 THE LOVE OF GOD Now this is a thing that seems incredible, to say that, the brighter and purer is supernatural and divine light, the more it darkens the soul, and that, the less bright and pure is it, the less dark it is to the soul. Yet this may well be understood if we consider what has been proved above by the dictum of the philosopher—namely, that the brighter and the more manifest in themselves are super­ natural things the darker are they to the understanding.57 Our natural knowledge comes, in fact, from sensible things, a mirror through which from below and very imperfectly it reaches purely spiritual realities. For us the statement that “the sun exists” is clearer than that “God is,” notwithstand­ ing the fact that God alone is eternally subsistent being it­ self. Time seems clearer to us than eternity, in spite of the fact that a fleeting moment is in itself less intelligible than the nunc stans, the changeless now, of eternity, in which God possesses all at once, tota simul, His whole life without begin­ ning or end. The decrees of Providence that we find hardest to understand are the most enlightened in themselves. The Savior’s passion, the worst time of darkness and discourage­ ment for the apostles, was Christ’s greatest victory over sin and Satan, far greater than His triumph over death by the glorious miracle of the resurrection, itself only a sign of con­ firmation for the Consummatum est of Good Friday. The more hidden a revealed mystery is, the more devotion St. Teresa had for it. Her intense charity made her prefer to love and delight in all that is most obscure and mysterious in the faith, whatever transcends all rational evidence and every express formula. So, too, the most brilliant passages in the doctrine of St. Paul, of St. Augustine, and of St. Thomas on the transcendent efficacy of the divine causality working in ” Ibid., chap. 8. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 119 us both to will and to accomplish58 will always be enveloped in mystery in this life. A divine obscurity at the opposite pole from incoherence and absurdity enshrouds them. The higher, simpler, and more unalterable supernatural things are, the more obscure they seem to us, since our knowledge is generally drawn from sensible, multiple, composite, and changing things. Now the infused light of understanding be­ longs to the same order as the supernatural objects which it makes us able to penetrate ; like them it seems dark, although we receive from it die spirit of the divine word and enter by it into the supreme simplicity of God. St. John of the Cross tells us that the divine ray of con­ templation transcends the soul’s natural powers and thus darkens and deprives it of all natural affections and apprehensions which it apprehended aforetime by means of natural light; and thus it leaves it not only dark, but likewise empty, according to its faculties and desires, both spiritual and natural. And by thus leav­ ing it empty and in darkness, it purges and illumines it with divine spiritual light even when the soul thinks not that it has this light, but believes itself to be in darkness, even as we have said of the ray of light, which, although it be in the midst of the room, yet, if it be pure and meet nothing on its path, is not visible. With regard, however, to this spiritual light by which the soul is assailed, when it has something to strike—that is, when something spiritual pre­ sents itself to be understood, however small a speck it be and whether of perfection or imperfection, or whether it be a judgment of the falsehood or the truth of a thing—it then sees and under­ stands much more clearly than before it was in these dark places.69 St. Thomas makes an analogous observation concerning the 68 Phil. 2:13. 68 Op. at., Bk. II, chap. 8. 120 THE LOVE OF GOD inspiration or illumination coming to us from the angels.60 A second reason why the divine light seems obscure and sometimes causes much suffering, is the impurity of our own souls. As St. Augustine tells us, the same light that healthy eyes enjoy cannot be borne by those that are unsound. “And when the soul is assailed by this divine light, its pain, which results from its impurity, is immense; because, when this pure light assails the soul, in order to expel its impurity, the soul feels itself to be so impure and miserable that it believes God to be against it, and thinks it has set itself up against God.” 81 There are some truths that we do not wish to hear and will not let others tell us. If God efficaciously wills to lead us to perfection, He Himself will come to make us listen to them, even if this causes us terrible suffering. A third and further cause for suffering springs from tempta­ tions arising against faith, hope, and charity. Although mak­ ing heroic acts of these virtues, acts simple, direct, and often unperceived, the soul wonders whether it may not have con­ sented to temptation ; it becomes so bewildered in its reason­ ing that it begins to think itself abandoned by God and is unable to feel that it can ever reach Him.02 The more it loves Him, the more it suffers, knowing the same sort of ebb and flow that the souls in purgatory must bear, for it is carried toward God with the full uprush of its love and then feels 80 He remarks that men are not often conscious of having been enlightened by angels. la. q.m, a.i, ad jum; "Intellectual operation and enlightenment can be understood in two ways: First, on the part of the object understood; thus whoever understands or is enlightened, knows that he understands or is en­ lightened, because he knows that the object is made known to him. Secondly, on the part of the principle; and thus it docs not follow that whoever understands a truth, knows what the intellect is, which is the principle of the intellectual opera­ tion. In like manner, not everyone who is enlightened by an angel, knows that he is enlightened by him.” 61 The Dark. Night, Bk. II, chap. 5. ®2 Cf. Vie du Pkre Sunn, Bauix (Paris, 1876). THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SOUL 121 itself turned back by its well-known wretchedness, fearing much to offend Him whom it would love above all things. As a result of such a purgation the three dieological virtues show marked growth, having been frequently constrained to make heroic acts to overcome temptation and thus taking deep root in the soul and becoming purified of every defect. The gifts accompanying these great virtues also increase pro­ portionately with them. St. John of the Cross gives an ex­ cellent description of the state of deliverance of the purified soul when he says: “It has pleasure in nothing and under­ stands nothing in particular, but dwells in emptiness, dark­ ness, and obscurity”; yet, as he goes on to say, “it embraces everything with great adaptability, to the end that those words of St. Paul may be fulfilled in it: having nothing, and possessing all things. For such poverty of spirit as this would deserve such happiness.” 63 The fire of love, . . . like material fire acting upon wood, be­ gins to take hold upon the soul in this night of painful contempla­ tion. . . . This is an enkindling of love in the spirit, where, in the midst of these dark afflictions, the soul feels itself to be keenly and acutely wounded in strong divine love. . . . And inasmuch as this love is infused, it is passive rather than active, and thus it begets in the soul a strong passion of love . . . and may thus attain to a true fulfillment of the first commandment, which sets aside nothing pertaining to man nor excludes from this love anything that is his, but says: Thou shalt love thy God with all thy heart and with all thy mind, and with all thy soul and with all thy strength.64 For a completely faithful soul the living flame of love is the normal development of charity in this life. In darkness ®3 Op. at., Bk. II, chap. 8. &ilbid., chap. 11. 122 THE LOVE OF GOD and suffering, “in this vale of tears,” it is the prelude of eternal life.65 We can understand then how a soul purified in such a meritorious way, passes immediately from earth to heaven without remaining in purgatory, where merit is no longer possible.00 Such is the perfect order willed by God. The just who are even more docile in time of trial than in time of consolation and never give up pushing on toward God are ready for the rendezvous fixed by Him for the mo­ ment after death. They enter at once into their heavenly home and receive their reward, the very happiness of God; and they find the highest aspirations of our nature fulfilled and exceeded, and also the burning supernatural desires aroused during the night of the soul fully satisfied: “But as for me, I will appear before Thy sight in justice: I shall be satisfied when Thy glory shall appear.” 07 85 lia llae, q.24, a.3, ad 2um; Ia Hae, q.69, a.2; De veritate, q.14, a.2. eeCf. The Dark Night, Bk. II, chap. 6, at the end. Only through their own fault, by neglecting precious graces, do souls go to purgatory after death; if they had been faithful they would have been purified while meriting in this life accord­ ing to die order established by divine Providence for completely generous souls. 0T In a recent work, Vnidad espectfica de la contemplacion cristiana (a Ciencia Tomista abstract, 1926), pp. 15—20, Father Ign. G. Menendez-Reigada, O.P., shows that Christian contemplation is essentially supernatural and infused and, because of that, far superior to acquired contemplation, whether of a philosophical or theological kind. He makes it quite plain that the soul must therefore undergo a passive purification. He says that apparent evidences for supernatural truths re­ sulting either from the sensible symbols used to express them or from well ordered lines of reasoning employed to interpret them remain in the insufliciendy super­ naturalized mind as a sort of sediment or dregs. Such evidence is only subjective, for the mysteries of faith arc obscure and inevident. During the passive purification of the soul, the gift of understanding makes us discern this truth more and more clearly, showing us how the object of pure faith is above the light of sensible symbols and human reasoning. It seems to souls purified in this way that they lack faith; but they have lost nothing but its natural bases, certain natural evidences with which their supernatural act of faith has been alloyed. Thus faith is purified of every alloy, of every natural sediment, and it cleaves more and more to the mysteries of faith in their essentially supernatural character, for the wholly pure, entirely supernatural, supra-rational formal motive of divine revelation whereby, with one and the same act, we believe in God revealing and in what He reveals, Credimus Deo et credimus Deum, uno et eodem actu (essentialiter supernaturali). Cf. Ha Hae, q.2, a.2, c. et ad rum. CHAPTER VII The Passive Purification of Faith Trials accompanying the passive purification of the soul The period of trial which St. John of the Cross calls the night of the soul is necessary, not only to free souls from those things that still prevent them from enjoying the in­ timacy of divine union—the remains of unconscious egoism, self-love, and intellectual and spiritual pride—but also to give great strength to the higher virtues. Because of the temptations against chastity and patience often accompany­ ing initial infused contemplation, the night of die senses is a period of holy warfare, during which the virtues having their basis in the sensuous appetency show great gain. For the same reasons, the night of the soul is marked by still greater progress in the highest virtues, in humility, the virtue of religion, and die diree theological virtues. The means used by God to purify us in this way is, as St. Thomas1 and St. John of the Cross2 have shown, the super­ natural light of the gift of understanding. It illumines the soul about the infinite greatness of God, for we recognize more and more clearly how far He is above every idea and formula that we can frame of His greatness. By contrast, die 1 Summa, Ila Hae, q.8, a. 8. 2 The Dark. Night, Bk. I, chaps. 5, 8, 9, ii. 123 124 THE LOVE OF GOD soul discovers that it has miseries heretofore unsuspected. The light that God gives it is sometimes so intense that the eyes of the mind, as yet still weak, become dazzled and as if blinded by it and, although the soul is moving forward into greater clarity, it believes itself swallowed up in darkness. God purifies humility and the theological virtues chiefly by means of this light, but He also makes use of the enemy of salvation himself for this work, sometimes permitting the devil to try souls with violent temptations against faith, hope, and charity. Those tried in this way find that they must make intense and meritorious acts of virtue, and so temptation contributes to their growth. The soul is the arena for a strug­ gle between Satan and the Holy Ghost, a struggle that at times becomes terrible, the devil evidently desiring to attack God’s work with weapons like His own. The more the Lord attracts a soul toward the heights of faith, the more the devil strives to deny that they exist. The soul finds itself between two kinds of sufferings: one comes from God and is essentially purifying; the other comes from the spirit of evil, and God makes it serve His own ends indirectly. Something mavelous now happens, something reminiscent of the first conversion or justification of the impious, when the soul passes from the state of mortal sin into the state of grace. As St. Thomas taught3 and the Council of Trent later defined, the soul at the time of its first conversion is led by God to realize its own misery and to make an act of faith in the infinite merits of the Savior, to hope in God, to love Him above all things, and to hate sin as the greatest of evils. By justifying us, the good God has, as it were, plowed a furrow in the soul for the sowing of the divine seed there; now, in 3 la Ilae, q.113, a.4, 5, 7, 8. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 125 the passive night of the soul, He goes back over the same furrow again to extirpate all the evil roots still to be found there. This He does that the seed of eternal life, the semen gloriae, can give its full yield of thirty, sixty, or even a hun­ dredfold, according to the parable of the sower.4 By the light of the gift of understanding the Lord shows the soul not what He is in His infinite holiness, but what He is not; by opposition, it sees its own nothingness, weakness, and baseness, and, under the influx of the grace that it re­ ceives, makes profound acts of humility, of faith, of hope, and of charity, acts necessary and indispensable if it is to resist the temptations arising against these virtues. To get a better understanding of how this great purification is effected, let us compare what St. John of the Cross tells us of the infused light given in the night of the soul with what St. Thomas teaches about the formal motive of the highest supernatural virtues. Clearly, the more perfectly these virtues attain by their acts to the primary object and formal motive specifying them, the more purified they are of every natural alloy. Acts and habits are specified by their formal object.5 We are going to see the manner of purification described by St. John of the Cross. It often occurs in a less rigorous way, mixed with the sufferings of the apostolate; but even this mitigated form is properly understood only if we discern in it the other higher mode that represents the perfect develop­ ment of the supernatural seed within us. It must be noted, too, that not merely in the lives of individuals do these purgations take place but in the lives of groups of people, of 4 Matt. 13:23. 6 Cf. Summa, Ia Hac, q.54, a.2; la Ilae, q.7, a.4, ad 311m; la, q.78, a.i. 120 THE LOVE OF GOD religious families as well, especially at the time either of their foundation or of their full development, when trial is made to discover whether the house is built on rock or on sand. And the Lord waits, as it were, until these trials are done so that He may give crowns to those who are faithful to Him, whether they are individuals or whole peoples. Humility and piety on trial The good God teaches humility to the saints by showing them die abyss still separating them from Him. We can learn to practice die same virtue by looking at the distance dividing us from the saints. They show us how, in a truly Christian spirit, we ought to bear our crosses, so much less heavy than theirs. St. Augustine says that humility is the foundation of the spiritual structure. For the building to be sound its founda­ tion must go deep into the earth. Its cornerstone, St. Thomas says, is faith; the excavation necessary before the first stone can be laid is humility, which drives out spiritual pride so that we can receive the word of God with docility. As these things have been said to us again and again from the first days of our interior life, we have broken ground, done some excavating, and then begun to build our spiritual structure. But days stormy with temptations of pride and of revolt have made us realize that our building lacked sturdiness and might have been blown down, had the storm been worse. We should have made our foundation deeper. When the Lord desires to raise the spiritual edifice of a soul to great heights, He Himself takes charge of digging down into depths which we are unaware of. Saints whom He has so grounded, no matter to what heights He may later lead THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 127 them, find pride impossible because they have had sufficient experience of their own nothingness and wretchedness, less than mere nothingness. We too often forget that the interior sufferings of the Curé of Ars came from his growing enlight­ enment regarding the greatness of the priesthood and his consequent conclusion that he himself fell far short of being fit for it. Intense supernatural light gives the soul a lofty idea of perfection and shows it its own powerlessness and poverty incomparably better than the most careful examination of conscience. We then come to know experimentally the pro­ found meaning of Christ’s words, “Without Me you can do nothing.” 0 “No one can come to Me, except the Father, who hath sent Me, draw him.” 7 We discern much better than ever before what St. Paul meant when he wrote: “For who distinguished! thee? Or what hast thou diat thou hast not received ? And if thou hast received, why dost diou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?”8 Experience teaches the soul how truly the Church has spoken in teaching, against the Pelagians and Semi-Pelagians, that grace is necessary, not merely to accomplish supernatural acts better, but to accom­ plish them at all. It understands more truly how grace, as St. Augustine and St. Thomas say, is efficacious of itself and not because of our efforts, according to St. Paul’s deep pro­ nouncement: “For it is God who worketh in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to His good will.” 9 In the light of the gift of understanding, the soul discerns everything diat taints its best deeds. Just as when a ray of 6 John 15: 5. 7 John 6: 44. 81 Cor. 4: 7. 8 Phil. 2: 13. 128 THE LOVE OF GOD sunlight passes through apparently limpid water we detect a host of tiny particles imperceptible in diffused light, so now the soul sees such a multitude of faults within itself that it is completely humiliated and overwhelmed. The devil often takes this opportunity to tempt it to discouragement, and if the Lord were to withhold His special help, it would yield to the temptation. St. Anselm marks out the way to true humility as having seven degrees: first a man knows that he is worthy of con­ tempt; then he learns to endure being contemptible; goes on to own that he is so; and then to wish His neighbor to be­ lieve it of him; comes to put up with being told that he is; and after that to accept being treated with contempt; and finally to love to be so used.10 The humble man no longer glories in himself, but in God alone, and lives in the pro­ found conviction that whatever we have of ourselves—our worthlessness and our sins—is inferior to whatever another man holds from God.11 All the saints have had a realization of our nothingness. Full Christian perfection is impossible without it, for it sets the soul definitively in tire way of truth and gives to God the glory due Him. When Blessed Angela of Foligno was enduring the passive purification of which we are speaking, she saw herself as an abyss of sin and wished to make it known to everybody and make an end of what she called her hypocrisy. St. Benedict Joseph Labre began his confession by saying, “Have pity on me, Father. I am a great sinner.” The confessor, not finding anything grave in what he accused himself of, thought that he did not know how to make his confession and questioned 10 Ila Hac, q. 161, a. 6. 11 Ibid., a. 3. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 129 him on the commandments of God, receiving answers so humble and so penetrated with the spirit of faith, that he knew he was dealing with a saint. Together with humility, the virtue of religion grows might­ ily during such trials. In those who remain faithful, sub­ stantial devotion (which is nothing else but readiness of will in God’s service) shows fuller and fuller development in the absence of all accidental devotion, since the soul perseveres in prayer without experiencing either sensible or spiritual consolation. The gift of piety lends strong support to the virtue of religion, and prayer is infused but very arid. St. Jane Frances de Chantal spent long years in this state. Going into the matter more deeply, we find that the special end of this purgation is to rid the theological virtues of all de­ fects. By the light of St. Thomas’ doctrine, we see now more than at any other time that the purification of the great virtues is accomplished by freeing their absolutely supernatural mo­ tive from all human ends, now recognized as being infinitely below it. Despite all obstacles and notwithstanding its own foresakenness, the soul is led to cleave to God solely because He is first truth, infinite mercy, supreme and sovereignly lovable goodness. As already remarked, nominalist theologians and those who follow them, have frequently failed to appreciate the essen­ tially supernatural character, the quoad substantiam, of the formal motive of these virtues. The supernaturalness of a miracle belongs to a far lower order since it is naturally know­ able, whereas the formal motive of the theological virtues lies beyond the reach of any natural knowledge.12 What we are 12 The miracle of the resurrection gives back to the body in a supernatural way its natural life, vegetative and sentient, belonging to an order infinitely less than I3o THE LOVE OF GOD going to consider next will show us the magnitude of the mistake made by those with nominalistic leanings. Imperfections that stand in the way of a life of deep faith Faith is an infused, essentially supernatural virtue by which we believe the mysteries revealed by God because He has revealed them and as they are proposed to us by the Church, the proximate guide of our belief. Through the inspiration and illumination of the Holy Ghost* 13 our intellect, moved by the will, adheres to an essentially supernatural revelation and to the hidden mysteries which it makes known. These formulas are soon said, but what do they contain? Of course, every good Christian believes what God has re­ vealed because He has revealed it; but whereas we say that “the just man liveth by faith,” 14 it often happens that we live too little by the supernatural mysteries which are the primary object of divine revelation: the Blessed Trinity and the mysteries of salvation. Our thoughts may tend more to­ ward the natural truths of religion, such as the existence of God as the author of nature, His power, His providence in the natural order, and the spirituality and immortality of the soul. These are all revealed, too, but are accessible to reason and demonstrable as well. Or, if we do think of supernatural mysteries often enough, do we not, for example, dwell too much on the sensible symbolism of divine things when assist­ ing at Mass by paying too much attention to the external the order of grace. This point of doctrine and its consequences have been developed at length elsewhere. Cf. De revelatione. Vol. I. 1st and and ed., pp. I97--2I7, 337403, 482-500; Christian Perfection and Contemplation, pp. 56 £f., 269 ff. 13 The Council of Orange and die Council of the Vatican. 14 Rom. 1:17. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 131 mold, the letter of the liturgy, and all those things within the grasp of our natural faculties? Some people’s faith is so little enlightened that is could be called embryonic and bears no proportion to their literary, scientific, or professional development. Generally our faith is far too weak for us really to live by the mysteries of the Blessed Trinity, creation, the elevation of the first man to the life of grace, the redemptive Incarnation, the mission of tire Holy Ghost as the special guest and sanctifier of the just, and the beatific vision as reward of those faithful to grace. For many these are colorless and oft-repeated formulas, and their object seems as far removed as the remotest heaven. We fail to let these supernatural truths become the light of our life, points of reference for our judgment on every subject, guiding principles for our thinking. In the obscurity of faith God reveals to us the very object of His own contemplation, that which constitutes His own infinite happiness, and what a pity it is if we do not live by it! The weakness of our faith, our lack of the spirit of faith, becomes especially apparent in adversity, sickness, and in other sufferings badly borne. Our lack of kindness toward our neighbor reveals it, too, for it shows how slow we are to recognize him as a brother called to the same supernatural happiness as we are. The reason why we believe the truths of faith is that God has revealed them; but it is questionable whether we fully grasp die greatness of this uncreated and wholly supernatural motive. Nominalist theologians and their followers, let it be said, have not recognized it, nor have they grasped what an infinite distance lies between natural knowledge of God as the author of nature and essentially supernatural knowledge of God as the author of grace. Such a supernatural knowledge i32 THE LOVE OF GOD of God implies not merely knowing Him as the author of different corporeal and spiritual natures or as the worker of naturally knowable miracles. It implies knowing Him as He is in His inner life, which He Himself has revealed to us, giving our intellects a capacity beyond the natural powers of the greatest angels to adhere to His divine revelation of Himself.15 Acquired faith, immediately founded on the evidence of miracles, belongs to a far lower order than infused faith and is possessed by the devil himself, although he is bereft of every supernatural gift.10 Because we fail to grasp fully the sublimity of the formal motive of infused faith, we dwell too much on secondary motives, reasons not for believing supernaturally and infallibly, but for orientating ourselves toward the faith. Motives of this kind are many—the evident harmony of dogma with demonstrated truths, the higher intuition of great philosophers and poets, and our own natural aspira­ tions, whether individual or social, or again with our own personal experience when in a moment of consolation we are given some cognizance of God’s action within us. Those called Modernists have placed far too much emphasis on secondary motives like these, confusing them with the formal motive of infused faith. As a result they have failed utterly to recog­ nize the essentially supernatural character of infused faith, so infinitely beyond and above all natural knowledge, whether human or angelic. The final outcome of such a con­ fusion is the reduction of Christian faith to a kind of natural 15 Cf. St. Thomas, Ila Ilac, q. I, a. 1 ; q. 4, a. 1 ; q. 5, a. 1, a. a, a. 3, ad 1 ; q. 6, a. 1. De veritate, q.14, a.8, a.9, ad 4. In Boetium de Trinitate, q.3, a.i, ad. 4. Quodlibet II, a. 6, ad 3. In Joannem, c.4, lect. V, no. 2. 10 Ila Ilac, q.5, a.2; De veritate, q. 14, a.9, ad 4; "Credere aequivoce dicitur de hominibus et de daemonibus." THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 133 and Kantian belief in the existence of God and of free will, while denying the whole order of grace. Often men’s uncon­ scious and latent confusions lead, if we deduce their con­ sequences, to greater mistakes. In the present instance they would lead to a denial of the essentially supernatural char­ acter of the three theological virtues.17 God’s purification of our faith When God desires to purify our supernatural faith from every natural alloy, He brings out in relief its formal motive and seems even to do away with any secondary motives, for they are not geniune reasons for belief. We no longer have any sensible experience of the divine action within us; only dryness and aridity, not only of the senses but also of the soul, are our portion. The harmony of dogma with the truths of reason is blotted out, and the testimony of the world’s greatest thinkers in favor of the faith seems weak indeed. The life of Christ and the lives of His saints as well, seem more wonderful than ever; but the failings of churchmen do much to disconcert us, bringing to mind, it may be, the description of her times drawn by St. Catherine of Siena in her Dialogue. Motives of credibility, like miracles and prophecies, no longer have any force for tire tormented reason. Two contrary causes bring all this about: God accords us a new light to lead us away from our too human ways of do17 Cf. St. Thomas, Ha Ilae, q.2, a. 10 concerning how the natural alloy in a man’s actions decreases the merit of the acts of the theological virtues. A human motive intermixed with a divine motive, elicits not a supernatural act, but a con­ comitant natural act of inferior quality, as would happen in the case of a man who still desired to go to Sunday Mass for a supernatural reason because of a re­ maining vestige of Christian faith but also does it naturally because it is a family custom and he would no longer go should this custom disappear. 134 THE LOVE OF GOD ing things, and the devil makes use of this change, although it both liberates and elevates us, to tempt us and make us fall. As St. John of the Cross shows, we receive at this time a supernatural light that discloses to us the spirit of God’s word and obliges us to rise above its letter and our own in­ ferior way of conceiving the divine perfections.18 The wholly supernatural heights of the mysteries of infinite justice, of predestination, of the Savior’s passion, of the salvation and loss of souls, are all illumined by this infused light; the nar­ row concepts to which we have been used are, in a sense, blown wide open. We stand astonished before inexorable justice, asking how it can be reconciled with unbounded mercy. The question arises before us how such a good God can allow such great evils. Objections formulated by heretics and examined speculatively by theologians present themselves to us, not in the abstract, but at life’s core, for example, on the death of father or friend. Everything contributes to the impression that die understanding is lost in the dark, whereas in reality it is flooded with light too strong for its feeble vision. God plunges the soul into the depths of die mysteries of faith and it feels itself sinking and drowning, like a child put down in the sea before it knows how to swim, although held up by the unseen hand of its father. And souls that go down into the troubled sea of the dark night find that the hand of God yet bears diem up. At these times, the Lord also allows the devil to tempt His elect to doubt the existence of eternal life, the redemptive Incarnation, the mystery of grace, and all supernatural realities.19 To reason about the matter of the temptation 18 The Dark. Night, Bk. II, chaps. 5, 8, 9. 18 Cf. what St. John of the Cross has to say on this subject in The Living Flame, THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH i35 is not the way to meet such an attack. We cannot meet this adversary with arguments; we must turn our back on him in contempt and, although he will bend every effort to keep us from doing so, we must adhere firmly to God’s word. As St. John of the Cross says, the devil torments and afflicts the soul in ways that defy the telling, for now two spirits are engaged in open warfare within it.20 Secondary motives all seem poor weak things now. The harmony of dogma with the truths of reason, with philosophic and poetic intuitions, and with human aspirations, appear almost childish. God is, however, making temptation serve His ends. He sustains the soul in secret and, by the gift of understanding, preserves within it, even in times of greatest darkness, its certitude that it must believe,21 that it must be­ lieve for the single and supernatural reason that God has said it ; God, who can neither deceive nor be deceived ; God, the First Truth revealing. What will help us to adhere to the First Truth ? Some story from the life of Christ? An account of one of His miracles? Or any of the histories of the Church written by fallible st. 3, no. 55. Complete Works of St. John of the Cross (London: Burns, Oates and Washbourne, 1934), ΙΠ, 93. "For the evil one takes his stand, with great cunning, on the road that leads from sense to spirit, deceiving and luring the soul by means of sense, and giving it sensual things, as we have said, so that it may rest in them and not escape from them; and the soul is entrapped with the greatest ease, for it knows of nothing better dian this, and thinks not that anything is being lost by it, but rather considers it a great blessing, and receives it readily, thinking that God has come to visit it; and in this way fails to enter into the innermost chamber of the Spouse, but stands at the door to sec what is happening. . . . And, if perchance any soul enters into recollection, he labours to bring about its ruin by means of horrors, fears or pains of the body, or by outward sounds and noises, causing it to be distracted by sense, in order to bring it out and distract it from the inner spirit.” See too The Dark. Night, Bk. II, chap. 23. 20 The Dark. Night, Bk. II, chap. 23. 21 Ila Ilac, q.8, a. 2. i36 THE LOVE OF GOD men ? The rereading perhaps of a good historical and critical treatise of apologetics? Any rational inquiry, no matter how indispensable and unerring, serves only as an inferior dis­ position for the act of faith; between the two stretches the infinite distance separating nature and grace. To return to such a pursuit would mean going back to discursive reason­ ing at a time when we need to rise above it and fly over temptation, instead of fighting it with arguments. To suc­ ceed, we have to beg ardently for the actual grace of faith and we must also will to believe, for the object and the formal motive of faith is inevident and hidden, and the will must intervene to bring the intellect to give it firm adherence.22 With God’s help, the soul is inwardly led to say the apostles’ prayer, “Lord, increase our faith.”23 Lord, give me grace to believe, lift up my intellect to Thee, and to the uncreated Father. Raise my mind to what it cannot naturally attain, the infinite, grant that I may cleave supernaturally to Thyself, the First Truth revealing. Grant that I may believe. Give me refuge from my inconstancies in Thy immutability. I believe in God revealing and in God revealed.24 Presently the full sublimity of the formal motive of faith begins to appear not simply in a speculative but in an experi­ mental way. The First Truth revealing, tire authority of God die revealer, is a motive as essentially supernatural as the mysteries to which we hold because of it. It belongs to an 22 Ila Ilae, q.2, a. i; ibid., ad 311m; q.2, a.9. 23 Luke 17: 5. 24 Ila Ilae, q.a, a.2; ibid., ad lum. As Cajctan says in Ham Ilae, q. 1, a. 1, "veritas prima est id quo et quod creditur." Cf. also Ila Ilae, q.5, a.3, ad lum; ibid., q.6, a. I. Here we see how the Thomistic conception of the essential supcrnaturality of faith and the formal motive of faith far surpasses the nominalistic view as held by Molina, and de Lugo, and still maintained by many theologians. This point has been shown at length elsewhere, De revelatione, chap. 14, a. 3. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 137 order much higher than the natural knowledge of the angels; they too, in their state of wayfaring, had it as a supernatural gift. When faith has been purified and cleansed of every natural alloy, natural knowledge of the signs of revelation— miracles and prophecies—retains its force but we see plainly that it pertains to a much lower domain than the properly divine order, to which the act of infused faith belongs. By infused faith we adhere to revealed mysteries simply because of their infinite weight as truths proposed to us by God for our belief. In her Dialogue26 St. Catherine of Siena says that faith is an infused light received at baptism and serves as the pupil of the eye of the intellect, making us know supernaturally revealed things as though seen with the eye of God. She thought, in fact, diat, aldiough we still remain in darkness, we ought to judge human and divine things with the perfect clarity with which God judges diem. In sinners, the light of faith is clouded by a stained conscience so that they often judge things according to their own pride, self-love, and sensuality, and not by the spirit of God. No other way leads to perfect purity of faith but the pas­ sive purification of the soul. The infused virtue of faith must become so deeply rooted in our intellect that the intellect can no longer, so to say, do otherwise than judge things hu­ man and divine by the spirit of faith. This spirit has to be­ come second nature to it, and at the end of the period of purgation the healed and supernaturalized intellect should tend spontaneously toward divine mysteries and the First Truth revealing, just as the eye turns toward light and color and the mind reaches out to the first principles of reason. 25 Treatise I. 138 THE LOVE OF GOD A higher law in the order of grace That faith is purified in this way is not a notion peculiar to St. John of the Cross and a few other mystics because of the particular way they themselves followed. The apostles’ faith went through just such a purification during the dark night of the Passion. They had heard Christ’s sublime ser­ mons and seen them confirmed by His holiness and miracles, as well as by all the good works He had done ; three of them had been present at His transfiguration on Mount Thabor. But when Jesus was made a prisoner, condemned, scourged, crowned with thorns, and crucified, their faith was sorely tried, despite the fact that the Master had repeatedly fore­ told everything to them. What a dark night this was for the apostles, “the hour of darkness” 28 indeed! Christ seemed overcome and forsaken by God and man, His work brought to nothing. The Blessed Virgin, St. John, and Mary Magdalen re­ mained at the foot of the cross. Not for a moment did the Blessed Virgin stop believing that her Son was the Word of God made flesh, the Savior of mankind, and that in three days He would arise again as He had said. She alone grasped the full meaning of the seven last words of the agonizing Christ. When she heard tire Consummatum est she under­ stood that our apparently defeated Lord had conquered sin and Satan and she knew, too, that Christ’s victory on Good Friday was greater than His triumph over death by His glorious resurrection. Death being the result of sin, the resur­ rection of the body is only the sign and result of His great 26 Luke 22: 53. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 139 victory over sin. Mary the Co-Redemptress understood this in the dark night of the Passion according to the measure of her union with Christ the Redeemer. John and Mary Mag­ dalen continued to believe in proportion to the light and love given to them by our Lord in His last hours. What Christ had foretold of the other apostles came true: “Behold the hour cometh, and it is now come, that you shall be scattered every man to his own, and shall leave Me alone; and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me. . . . In the world you shall have distress: but have confidence, I have overcome the world.” 27 Christ warned Peter particu­ larly: “Simon, Simon, behold Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and thou, being once converted, confirm thy brethren.”28 Immediately afterward our Lord made known to Peter that he would deny Him. The apostles were indeed sifted by tribulation, thus learning their own power­ lessness and frailty and seeing their faith itself apparently on the point of shipwreck; but Christ sustained them, and Peter failed only tlirough weakness in the external confession of his faith, immediately afterward weeping abundant tears for his sin. The graces of Easter and of Pentecost confirmed his faith and the faith of his brethren for all time. They had had their dark night and, if we would share in their intimacy with Christ, we must first follow them into the shadows. The passive purification of faith occurs in some way in the lives of all the saints, although it may take different forms, being sometimes entirely interior, sometimes mixed with the sufferings of the apostolate. It can be safely said that in 27 lohn 16:32. 28 Luke 22: 31. I4o THE LOVE OF GOD the depth of every interior soul some cross of mind or heart is to be found, and none can really know that soul while unaware of the cause of its hidden suffering. All the saints have had to carry the cross and follow our Lord along the way of sorrows, praying in the depths of their hearts that God would grant them the grace to bear within them the death of Christ. Make me a bearer of Christ’s death in the company of Mary and John and the holy women around the cross. For ten years Blessed Henry Suso had temptations against faith. St. Vincent de Paul passed four years in this kind of torment, becoming a spiritual martyr, for he no longer quite knew whether he had or had not consented to temptation and could reassure himself only by holding to his heart a little piece of paper on which he had written the Credo.~rj In her last years St. Teresa of the Child Jesus also had to make her way through this dark tunnel; what she tells us of her trial brings the doctrine of St. John of the Cross down to the concrete for us. If we are to resist temptation and reach the place our Lord desires us to have, we must perform heroic acts of faith at this time. Such acts at once obtain a great in­ crease of the infused virtue so diat it receives a tenfold or even the promised hundredfold increase. When the time of purgation comes to a close, the night of the soul becomes a sparkling and delightful night, according to the verse which St. John of the Cross loves to quote: “and night shall be my light in my pleasure.” 30 Stars appear only after the sun has set and thus, too, supernatural mysteries shine forth only when the soul knows how to make a perfect sacrifice of reason in the order of grace, not permitting it to 29 Cf. Abdly, Vie de taint Vincent de Paul (Paris: Dcbecourt, 1843), HI, 167. 30 Ps. 138: ii. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 141 attempt to cross the boundaries of the region accessible to it.31 Souls walking in darkness have often been enlightened after calling on St. Thomas Aquinas. He often obtains for them the grace to rise above their affliction, to look down upon it and see the end to which its darkness leads. The passive purification of faith having been achieved, the soul is fully convinced that only supernatural truth and reality matter and everything else is only, as it were, a shadow of reality. It comes to understand how truly the Book of Wisdom says: “I called upon God, and the spirit of wisdom 31 To give a more concrete idea of such purification we shall quote from a manuscript giving the response of a soul of deep faith especially tempted against the mystery of the Incarnation. It sometimes seemed to her, especially at Communion, as though it were absolutely impossible. What liberal Protestants say about the absurd descent of the metaphysical, the divine, and the eternal into the temporal, she would experience with singular intensity; the infinite distance between the divine nature and the human nature of Christ struck her so forcibly that their union seemed incapable of realization and irreconcilable with God’s infinite mercy. St Paul’s words, exinanivit semetipsum (“He emptied himself”), rose up like an insurmountable stumbling block before her, and the annihilation of the cross became a scandal to her, as it was and still is for the Jews. Her director once asked her, “But you have never seriously doubted the In­ carnation?” She gave her answer in writing, part of which is quoted here: “If by that you mean that I have never voluntarily doubted, Father, then I hope not, although I cannot, however, assert it absolutely, for there arc times when I do not know where my will lies. But if by ‘doubting seriously’ you mean finding myself faced widi absolute negation and only able desperately to repeat acts of faith while wholly powerless to free myself but with the stubborn impres­ sion that such simple formulas avail nothing—this is what happens to me con­ stantly and haunts and harasses me some days until I am worn out. Where is my will then? I wish to hope that it is wholly on the side of that self which repeats the formulas and tries to abandon itself to God, in spite of die terrible sensation of falling down into emptiness. As far as I am able to judge at the very same time I would give my life with joy for the least truth of faith, unless I am deluding my­ self. During thanksgiving after Communion, all this redoubles in intensity. If I could tell you what my Communion was yesterday and today, Father, you would have pity on me and would see that I have not the strength to bear this daily. I beg you, give me permission to communicate only when I hope to be capable of it without provoking these assaults which confuse and shake me. I know well that afterward I shall reproach myself and find a greater emptiness within me than before, but at least I shall be sure of not having offended God.” 142 THE LOVE OF GOD came upon me. And I preferred her before kingdoms and thrones, and esteemed riches nothing in comparison of her . . . for all gold in comparison of her is as a little sand, and silver in respect to her shall be counted as clay. I loved her above health and beauty, and chose to have her instead of light; for her light cannot be put out.” 32 This is the kingdom of God, die pearl of great price, for which a man sells all that he has that he may buy it.33 Those who have understood and experienced these things have almost always left in the depths of their souls a memory of God, an obscure contemplation of His infinite perfection. The purification of faith proceeds thus and, until the Lord has completely purged the soul in the way that He wills, “no means or remedy is of any service or profit for the relief of its affliction . . . until the spirit is humbled, softened, and purified, one with the Spirit of God, according to the degree of union of love which His mercy is pleased to grant it.” 34 32 Wisd., 7:7. 83 Matt. 13: 46. 34 The Dar^ Night, Bk. II, chap. 7. The author of The Cloud of Unknowing, a work of the fourteenth century, anticipates St. John of the Cross by the way in which he speaks of divine obscurity, which is nothing other than God’s inner life, the Deity, above being, truth, good­ ness, wisdom, love, all of which the Godhead contains formally and eminently, much more truly and fully than white light contains light of other colors, for they are to be found in it only virtually. In the eighth chapter of this work we read: “And just as it is an unlawful thing, and would hinder a man that sat in his meditations, were he then to consider his outward bodily works, the which he had done or should do, although they were never so holy works in themselves: surely it is as unlawful a thing, and would as much hinder a man that should work in this darkness and in this cloud of un­ knowing with an affectuous stirring of love to God for himself, were he to let any thought or any meditation of God's wonderful gifts, kindness, and works in any of his creatures, bodily or ghostly, rise upon him to press betwixt him and his God; although they be never so holy thoughts, nor so pleasing, nor so com­ fortable. “And for this reason it is that I bid thee put down such a sharp subtle thought and cover him with a thick cloud of forgetting, be he never so holy and promise THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF FAITH 143 he never so well to help thee in thy purpose. For why, love may reach to God in this life, but not knowing.” Ed. Dom Justin McCann (London: Burnes, Oates and Washbourne, 1943), pp. 16 f. This recalls the doctrine often set forth by St. Thomas that, although knowledge draws God down to us and in some way imposes upon Him the limitations of our ideas, love lifts us up to Him and attains to Him without intermediary (Ila Ilae, q. 27, a.4, 5). Love is led toward what remains most obscure in God, to His inner and ineffable life, to the Deity, for our minds a great darkness. This is why the author of The Cloud of Unknowing often says we must penetrate this cloud of love, that is, we must tend toward God and His inner life with all the force of our charity in the obscurity of faith. In the same work, see also chaps. 5, 9, 36-44, 72-75. CHAPTER VIII The Passive Purification of Hope When faith has undergone its purgation, tire passive puri­ fication of hope almost always follows immediately, as in the conversion of a sinner an act of hope follows upon an act of faith. The Lord goes back over the same furrow that He has already plowed, further deepening it. The soul is now convinced that the only reality that matters, the one thing necessary, is eternal life, but it wonders whether it can ever attain to it. Hope is an essentially supernatural virtue by which we tend toward God as our supreme beatitude, while relying on His mercy and all-powerful help to bring us to Him. The primary object of hope is the possession of God for all eter­ nity; the formal motive of this theological virtue is God as our helper, Deus auxilians, just as the formal motive of faith is God as the revealer, Veritas prima revelans. Surely we have hope, for we desire to reach God and to possess Him forever and we often ask for the grace to be saved ; but do we not somehow allow our hope to go strag­ gling after temporal goods? These are things which we may deem useful for our salvation but which really are not, hu­ man goods which God knows will be harmful for us and prevent our having those greater goods that would come to 144 THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF HOPE 145 us through detachment and humility. And is there no alloy in the motive inspiring our hope? Certainly we hope; but do we not place too much confidence in ourselves, in our knowing how, our energy, our friends, in all the different human helps which we find at hand and which, when taken away, leave us discouraged and at a loss ? 1 God’s part in the purgation of hope To purify our hope, to give us a better understanding of its true object and pure motive, the good God may take away from us all temporal goods that are dear to us: position, apparently deserved honors, influence, and the human help that we can expect of friends. It may be that, by a special and mysterious dispensation of Providence, superiors who have always shown esteem for us, no longer give any evidence of confidence in us, without, however, being at fault in the mat­ ter. At the same time we awaken to our own frailty and pow­ erlessness and the gravity of our sins, and if unlooked-for obstacles rise up before us in our work and we meet stubborn opposition, calumnies, and illness, too, and all the natural props that once sustained us are withdrawn, shall wc not still hope against all human hope for the sole and entirely super­ natural motive that God has lost nothing of His infinite power to help us ? The saints have hoped with hope like this, placing their trust in divine grace, knowing that it is always offered for our salvation, believing firmly that the Lord does not first abandon us. The cry, “Never permit me to be separated from Thee,” has gone up continually to God. Secure my hope. 1 Cf. St. Thomas, Ila Ilae, q.2, a. 10. i46 THE LOVE OF GOD Grant that I may hope, whatever happens. "In te, Domine, speravi, non confundar in aeternum.’’2 When Job had been despoiled of everything, he kept on hoping in God, saying, “The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away: as it hath pleased the Lord so is it done: blessed be the name of the Lord.”3 St. John the Baptist, having announced the kingdom of God and then seen it set upon by all the powers of the world, never gave up hoping in his prison. The apostles, and all the martyrs, too, had hope in the midst of perse­ cution. Thrown into a dungeon with hardly enough light at any time of the day to say the Divine Office, St. John of the Cross did not relinquish his hope, although he could no longer see anything but obstacles to the work which it was his mission to accomplish. Those passing through the night of the soul should hope against all hope, too. The supernatural light which God makes use of for their purification reveals so clearly the height of the ideal to be attained, the greatness of Christian perfec­ tion, that they are convinced they have done nothing as yet to reach it, and that everything still remains to be done. As the Curé of Ars grew daily more enlightened in regard to the priesthood, his thoughts and feelings were of this kind, for the end to be attained seemed to him to be far, far, from what he was. The glimpses of the ideal which the soul catches in the God-given light accorded to it, make it perceive its own contrasting miseries so well, St. John of the Cross says, that it feels as if it were dying a cruel spiritual death, or as if God had rejected it in abhorrence and flung it into dark2 Ps. 70: I. 8 Job i: ai. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF HOPE 147 ness.4 It feels itself to be empty and poor, a stranger to grace.8 Added to all this are memories of happier times for, as a rule, such people have received many consolations from God and have served Him zealously. When they are deprived of happiness and convinced that it will not return, they suffer twice as much because of His remembered bounty.® Furthermore, the Lord now allows these souls to be tempted by the devil, who seeks to attack the work of God and of the guardian angels on their own ground, trying to close off the approach to divine union, attempting to terrify, dis­ turb, and harass.7 He tempts souls especially against the mystery of predestination, against the righteousness of God’s good pleasure, to make them see it as nothing more than an arbitrary caprice on His part. A voice seems to say to them: “If you are predestined, whatever you do you will be saved; if you are not, of what good are your prayers and struggles to make progress?” A wise director will answer to such sug­ gestions: “That is just as silly as if a farmer were to say: ‘If Providence has decreed for me to have wheat next summer, what good is it for me to till and sow ? If the harvest is not to be, the work will be so much loss.’ Such talk is foolishness, because Providence and predestination have to do not only with ends, but with the means leading there. Plow and sow if you wish to see the harvest.” Sometimes the director can recall St. Catherine of Siena’s tit-for-tat answer to the devil: “If I am predestined, what good are your efforts to bring about my ruin? And if I am not, why give yourself so much 4 The Dark. Night, Bk. II, chap. 6. s Ibid., chap. 9. ® Ibid., chap. 7. 7 Ibid., chap. 23. i48 THE LOVE OF GOD trouble?” Nevertheless, as St. Teresa remarks, the under­ standing of anybody so tempted is clouded and incapable of grasping the truth. It believes everything represented by the imagination and whatever foolery is suggested by the devil.8 The evil voice keeps on : “Perhaps you are predestined but you do not know it. How, then, can you have any sure hope ?” The devil would like to make us believe that the certitude of hope lacks validity because it is not speculative like the certi­ tude of faith, because it does not rest on the very fact of salva­ tion itself. But our salvation is not certain: we can resist God’s grace anil, as a result, be deprived of other divine helps, per­ haps the grace of a good death. Not only is the soul conscious of this fact, but it also believes diat it discovers indications to the contrary and fears reprobation. Henry Suso knew fears such as this when the devil would say to him: “Of what use are good works to you, since you are already condemned ? Why do you struggle against the eternal decrees of God ?” 9 Full of compassion, a spiritual director can reply with St. Thomas that hope has not the same kind of certitude as faith. Faith’s certitude in revealed mysteries is speculative whereas hope’s is practical, a certitude grounded on a tendency in­ fallibly directed toward the end to be attained, a trust in a God infinitely powerful and ready to help, who has given us divine promises of assistance.10 We must not attempt to search into the unfathomable designs of God,11 and one of the signs of predestination is found precisely in great interior 8 Interior Castle, Fourth Mansion, chap. I. 8 “Lcbcn Scuses," Fr. tr., G. Thiriot, O.P. (Paris: Lccoffrc, 1899); Œuvres mystiques du B. Henri Suso. 10 Ila Ilac, q. 18, a. 4. 11 Of. The Imitation of Christ, Bk. Ill, chap. 58. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF HOPE 149 trials like these. Whoever bears them in union with our Lord, repeating the seven words which He Himself uttered during His agony, has a certain participation in die redemptive Pas­ sion. Evildoers may often, on the contrary, drink iniquity like water and in apparent tranquillity. Answers of this kind fail to suffice when temptation grows more violent. St. Teresa tells us that during such storms we are incapable of receiving any consolation.12 From Angela of Foligno we hear die same cry uttered so long ago by Jeremias. She says, “I no longer have any hope,” 13 just as he exclaimed: “I am the man that sees my poverty by the rod of His indigna­ tion. He hath led me, and brought me into darkness, and not into light. Only against me He hath turned, and turned again Elis hand all the day. My skin and my flesh He hath made old, He hath broken my bones. He hath built round about me. . . . He hath built against me round about, that I may not get out. ... Yea, and when I cry and entreat, He hath shut out my prayer. He hath shut up my ways with square stones, . . . He hath made me desolate. He hath bent His bow, and set me as a mark for His arrows. . . . He hath filled me with bitterness. . . . And my soul is removed far off from peace, I have forgotten good things. And I said: My end and my hope is perished from the Lord.” 14 To overcome such temptations we, too, must make the same ardent prayer that the prophet then went on to add: “The mercies of the Lord that we are not consumed : because His commiserations have not failed; . . . therefore will I wait for Him.” 15 Lord, the tested soul cries, give me hope, 12 Op. cit., Sixth Mansion, chap. I. 13 Acta sanctorum, January 4, chap. 2, no. 26. 14 Lam. 3:1-18. 15 Lam. 3: 22-24. 150 THE LOVE OF GOD bring my hope back to life. And the soul never utters such a cry in vain. It may not always feel that it has been heard, but it keeps on praying, and that in itself is a sign that God has harkened to it for, without a new actual grace, prayer would not continue to well up from the heart. “You would not be seeking Me, had you not already found Me.” Sometimes temptations redouble, and the soul again cries out with the prophet: “Thou, O Lord, art just, if I plead with Thee, but yet I will speak what is just to Thee: Why doth the way of the wicked prosper: why is it well with all them that transgress, and do wickedly ?” 16 “How long, O Lord, shall I cry, and Thou wilt not hear? Shall I cry out to Thee suffering violence, and Thou wilt not save?” 17 Job in his grief went much farther still: “One thing there is that I have spoken, let Him kill at once, and not laugh at the pains of the innocent. The earth is given into the hand of the wicked.” 18*For a little while it may be the soul yields com­ pletely to the temptation to murmur. Sometimes even the urge to blasphemy raises its head. For this reason we must beg God anew to give us hope in Him, to create within us trust in His mercy: “Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed: save me, and I shall be saved: for Thou art my praise.” 18 “Convert us, O Lord, to Thee, and we shall be converted: renew our days, as from the begin­ ning.” 20 “Arise, O Lord, help us and redeem us for Thy name’s sake.”21 Then, with persevering prayer, heroic hope 18 Jer. 12:1. 17 Hab. I : I. 18 Job 9: 22-24. 18 Jer. 17: 14. 20 Lam. 5: 21. 21 Ps. 43: 26. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF HOPE 151 mounts higher and higher in the soul like a forgotten leitmo­ tiv, very sweet and very strong, and soon becoming salient until, with a great burst of song, the soul hymns its complete trust and perfect abandonment. “For the Lord will not cast off forever. For if He hath cast off, He will also have mercy, according to the multitude of His mercies.”22 “The Lord killeth and maketh alive, He bringeth down to hell and bringeth back again.” 23 “But they that hope in the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall take wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” 24 “In Thee, O Lord, have I hoped, let me never be confounded.” 25 The soul has a presentiment of the Savior’s answer: “You shall want for help only when I have none to give.” Under the higher illumination of the gift of understand­ ing, the soul discovers, as if at a glance, the infinite superiority of the formal motive of hope: almighty God as our help. What matter all the sorrows, the disillusionments, and contra­ dictions of the world, if I reach the end of my journey to eternity? And what are the helps of men in comparison to those of God who never first abandons us? Permit me not, O Lord, to be separated from Thee. Grant that I may hope in Thee unto the end. In Thy hands my salvation is incomparably more secure than in my own."'’ 22 Lam. 3: 31. 28 I Kings 2: 6. 24 Isa. 40: 31. 25 Ps. 30: 2. 26 It has sometimes been said that the Thomistic doctrine of grace cannot be reconciled with hope, an objection which is none other than that which presents itself to the mind during the night of the soul. St. Thomas’ answer is that tile formal motive of our hope cannot be our human effort, as though it were capable of making God’s grace efficacious; its formal motive is almighty God as our helper; from Him proceeds intrinsically efficacious grace. Everything that has just been 152 THE LOVE OF GOD The first star has already appeared in the night of the soul: God, the First Truth revealing. Now a second star becomes brighter and brighter: God our helper. Beneath Him shine the two great mediators: Christ our Savior and Mary, His Mother and our aid. The soul really knows how powerless all natural energy is to accomplish the least supernatural act and with what truth St. Paul has said: “Not that we are sufficient to think anything of ourselves, as of ourselves: but our sufficiency is from God.” 27 “For it is God who worketh in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to His good said about the passive purification of hope strongly confirms St. Thomas’ doc­ trine, which is exactly in line with St. Paul’s and St. Augustine’s and has its basis in our Lord’s words, "Without Me you can do nothing.” Giving an account of her conversion, St. Teresa relates: “I used to pray to our Lord for help; but, as it now seems to me, I must have committed the fault of not putting my whole trust in His Majesty, and of not thoroughly distrusting my­ self. ... I wished to live, but I saw clearly that I was not living . . . there was no one to give me life, and I was not able to take it. He Who could have given it me had good reasons for not coming to my aid, seeing that He had brought me back to Himself so many times, and I as often had left Him. “It came to pass one day, when 1 went into the oratory, that I saw a statue which they had put by there ... a representation of Christ most grievously wounded. . . . So keenly did I feel the evil return I had made for those wounds, that I thought my heart was breaking . . . and implored Him to strengthen me once for all, so that I might never offend Him any more. "I had a very great devotion to the glorious Magdalene, and very frequently used to think of her conversion—especially when I went to communion. But this last time ... I seem to have made greater progress; for I was now very distrustful of myself, placing all my confidence in God. It seems to me that I said to Him then that I would not rise up till He granted my petition. I do certainly believe that this was of great service to me, because I have grown better ever since.” Life, David Lewis, tr. (Westminster, Md.: Newman Book Shop, 1944), pp. 64-66. Here St. Teresa shows that she finally understood that even our cooperation with grace comes from God; this doctrine, understood as she comprehended it, docs not cause us to cross our arms and rest in quictistic sloth; on the contrary it leads us to give more sustained attention to the divine promptings and to prac­ tice greater fidelity. If we demand too little of ourselves, it is because wc fail suf­ ficiently to consider the fact that “It is God who worketh in you both to will and to accomplish.” “Lord,” said St. Augustine, “give what Thou commandest and then command what Thou wilt.” 27 II Cor. 3:5. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF HOPE 153 will.” 28 The same thought is expressed elsewhere in Scrip­ ture: “As the divisions of waters, so the heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord; whithersoever He will He shall turn it.” 29 “Who hath first given to Him ?”80 “So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.”31 “And there are diversities of operations, but tire same God, who worketh all in all.” 32 “For in Him we live and move and are.” 33 “For of Him and by Him and in Him are all things.” 34 The sweet and terrible mystery of predestination is no longer a stumbling block. The soul fully grasps the distance between the perfect holi­ ness of God’s good pleasure and the arbitrary nature of caprice and it says with St. Teresa that the harder divine things are to understand, the more devotion it has for them.35 Their obscurity arises not because of any absurdity or incoherence on their part but because of the feebleness of the eyes that look upon their light. Satan’s part in the purgation of hope In the twenty-third chapter of the second book of The Darl{ Night, St. John of the Cross makes it quite clear that in the passive purification of hope both the divine illuminat­ ing action and the activity of the devil are at work at one and the same time. Satan desires to keep the soul from mak28 Phil. 2: 13. 29 Prov. 21 : i. 30 Rom. ii: 35. 31 Rom. 9: 16. 32 I Cor. 12: 6. 83 Acts 17: 28. 34 Rom. 11:36. 35 Life, chap. 28. 154 THE LOVE OF GOD ing progress, but God shows us how He makes use of His enemy’s tempting to serve His own high purposes. Wherefore, the more spiritual, the more interior, and the more remote from the senses is the communication, the farther does the devil fall short of understanding it. And thus it is of great importance for the security of the soul that its inward communion with God should be of such a kind that its very sense of the lower part will remain in darkness and be without knowledge of it, and attain not to it . . . let it be a secret between the spirit and God alone. It is quite true that oftentimes, when these very intimate and secret spiritual communications are present and take place in the soul, although the devil cannot get to know of what kind and manner they are, yet the great repose and silence which some of them cause in the senses and the faculties of the sensual part make it clear to him that they are taking place and that the soul is re­ ceiving a certain blessing from them. And then, as he sees that he cannot succeed in thwarting them in the depth of the soul, he does what he can to disturb and disquiet the sensual part, to which he is able to attain—now by means of afflictions, now by terrors and fears, with intent to disquiet and disturb the higher and spiritual part of the soul by this means, with respect to that blessing which it then receives and enjoys. But often, when the communication of such contemplation makes its naked assault upon the soul and exerts its strength upon it, the devil, with all his diligence, is unable to disturb it. . . . At other times, when the spiritual communication is not made in any great measure to the spirit, but the senses have a part therein, the devil more easily succeeds in disturbing the spirit . . . the devil is occasionally able to see certain favours which God is pleased to grant the soul when they are bestowed upon it by the mediation of a good angel . . . partly so that he may do that which he can against them according to the measure of justice . . . in proportion THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF HOPE 155 as God is guiding the soul and communing with it, He gives the devil leave to act with it after this manner. . . . At other times the devil prevails and plunges the soul into a perturbation and horror which is a greater affliction to it than any torment in this life could be. For, as this horrible communication passes direct from spirit to spirit, in something like nakedness and clearly distinguished from all that is corporeal, it is grievous beyond what every sense can feel ; and this lasts in the spirit for some time, yet not for long, for otherwise the spirit would be driven forth from the flesh by the vehement communication of the other spirit. Afterwards there remains to it the memory thereof, which is suf­ ficient to cause it great affliction. All that we have here described comes to pass in the soul pas­ sively, without its doing or undoing anything of itself with respect to it. But it must be known in this connection that, when the good angel permits the devil to gain this advantage of assailing the soul with this spiritual horror, he does it to purify the soul and to prepare it by means of this spiritual vigil for some great spiritual favour and festival which he desires to grant it, for he never mortifies save to give life, neither humbles save to exalt, which comes to pass shortly afterwards. Then, according as was the dark and horrible purgation which the soul suffered, so is the fruition now granted it of a wondrous and delectable spiritual contempla­ tion, sometimes so lofty that there is no language to describe it. But the spirit has been greatly refined by the preceding horrors of the evil spirit, in order that it may be able to receive this blessing.36 • Earlier, when speaking of the yearning love which the soul experiences as its purgation progresses, St. John of the Cross says: “For it rises up by night (that is, in this purgative dark­ ness) according to the affections of the will. And with the yearnings and vehemence of the lioness or the she-bear gose The Dark, Night, Bk. IV, chap. 23. i56 THE LOVE OF GOD ing to seek her cubs when they have been taken away from her and she finds them not, does this wounded soul go forth to seek its God. For, being in darkness, it feels itself to be without Him and to be dying of love for Him. And this is that impatient love wherein the soul cannot long subsist with­ out gaining its desire or dying. Such was Rachel’s desire for children when she said to Jacob: Give me children, else I shall die.” 37 Suffering like this gives us some idea of what the souls in purgatory endure spiritually when they have reached the end of their purification and ardently desire the vision of God.38 Pure hope and true abandonment to God’s will Now it becomes strikingly evident how mistaken the quietists arc in counseling souls tried in this way and tempted to despair to make a sacrifice of their salvation on the pre­ text of attaining to pure love, just when they ought, with God’s help, to be making heroic acts of hope.39 Grace does not destroy but really perfects nature. Now man’s will be­ ing specified by die good, he cannot do otherwise than will his own happiness, his final end.40 Besides, the virtue of hope, far from being incompatible with perfect charity, draws more and more life from it. By hope we desire God, our supreme good, and subordinate ourselves to Him, instead of subordinating Him to ourselves.41 By charity we love Him 87 Ibid., Bk. II, chap. 13. 88 Sec St. Catherine of Genoa on this point. 80 For propositions condemned as contrary to the faith, cf. Denzinger. The propositions of Molinos, no. 1232; the propositions of Fenclon, nos. 1334, 1335. 1338. ■*° Cf. St. Thomas, la, q.82, a. 1; la Ilae, q.5, a. 4, ad 2um and a. 8. 41 The virtue of hope is connected, in St. Thomas’ opinion, with the love of concupiscence, which makes us will our own good, and is inferior to the love THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF HOPE 157 for Himself and desire our salvation so that we may glorify Him eternally. Any of us who endure trials of this nature should certainly accept them as long as it pleases God for them to last* 42 but this is not making a sacrifice of our salva­ tion. Any such sacrifice would include giving up the pure de­ sire to glorify God eternally—something contrary to the very nature of our will and of charity.43 The Church answers the counsels of the quietists widi the words of the Psalms: “Preserve me, O Lord, for I have put my trust in Thee.” 44 “In Thee, O Lord, have I hoped, let me never be confounded.” 45 “Behold, God is my savior, I will deal confidently, and will not fear: because the Lord is my of friendship, which makes us will good to God, His glory, the radiation of His goodness in understanding and loving hearts. But we should distinguish between the love of concupiscence for things below us and the love of concupiscence for things above us. If I desire some fruit, I desire it for myself and because of myself, for my own sake, mi/ii et propter me; I subordinate it to myself. Whereas when I desire God, it is indeed for myself that I desire His supreme goodness, but I do not desire it because of myself, for my own sake, propter me; to subordinate it to myself as a means to an end, would be a perversion. God is the supreme good and my last end; by hope and by every act of real virtue I am ordered to Him; by charity I love Him for Himself and desire that for His own sake He be eter­ nally known and loved. On this subject, see Cajetan, in Ham Ilae, q. 17, a. 5, no. 6. 42 On abandonment to the will of God, see the following works; Alexandre Piny, O.P., La plus parfaite des voies intérieures, ou la voie d'abandon (1683); De Caussade, S.J., Self-abandonment to Providence, tr. Thorold (London: Burns, Oates, 1933); Lchodey, O.C.R., Holy Abandonment (Dublin: Gill, 1948). Aban­ donment to the divine will should tower like a great peak above the two extremes and opposing errors of (1) quietism, which denies the necessity of our cooperation and sacrifices all hope; (2) Pelagianism or Semi-Pelagianism, which so exalts our cooperation as to belittle God's sovereign dominion and the efficacy of divine grace. The true doctrine of abandonment recognizes that even our cooperation comes from God’s grace: “Without Me you can do nothing." It sustains our hope by telling us that our salvation is incomparably better assured in God’s hands than in our own and makes us say always, “Never permit me to be separated from Thee, O Lord." 43 Cf. Vol. I, chap. 2 of the present work. 44 Ps. 15:1. 46 Ps. 30: 2. i58 THE LOVE OF GOD strength, and my praise, and He is become my salvation.”48 The purified soul comes at last to sing of God’s power: “The right hand of the Lord hath wrought strength. I shall not die, but live: and shall declare the works of die Lord.”47 An act of abandonment is united to its acts of perfect hope and perfect charity. “I love Thee, O my God, more than my­ self and above all things and I abandon myself to Thee, that Thou mayst give me to love Thee and glorify Thee eternally. My salvation is incomparably more assured in Thy hands than in mine. I adore Thy infinite justice and confide my­ self to Thy mercy.” In the midst of trials and calumnies saints have spoken these profound words: in the injustice of men we find die justice of God for the purgation of our hidden sins. Dur­ ing His passion our innocent Lord saw better than anyone else ever has seen how God’s justice lies in die injustice of men. That justice weighed upon Him, a victim in our stead, and He adored it with perfect abandonment, die fruit of love for God in this world. When die great purification of hope has been accom­ plished, the soul understands the entire meaning and full beauty of the psalm, Confitemini Domino: “Give praise to the Lord, for He is good: for His mercy enduretii forever. . . . In my trouble I called upon the Lord: and the Lord heard me, and enlarged me. The Lord is my helper. I will not fear what men can do unto me. ... It is good to trust in the Lord, rather than to have confidence in man. . . . The Lord is my strength and my praise: and He is become my salvation. ... I shall not die, but live: and shall declare 48 Isa. 12: 2. 47 Ps. 117:16. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF HOPE 159 the works of the Lord.” 48 Then indeed the Lord appears as the author of our salvation : “I am, I am the Lord : and there is no savior besides Me.” 49 The soul knows as if experimen­ tally that it is made for eternal life; it has a burning desire to possess God, yet God does not show Himself to it; and so begins its final purgation, the purification of charity or of love. Some penetrating pages on this subject are to be found in La Croix de Jésus, written in 1647 by Louis Chardon, a Do­ minican. As remarked earlier,50 the basic idea of this beauti­ ful dogmatic and mystical book is that Christ’s fullness of grace produced two great effects within His soul: first, the highest kind of happiness, an unalterable peace, that lasted even during the Passion, and secondly, an ardent desire for the cross as the means of our salvation, a desire which re­ duced Christ’s blessed soul to grief and anguish. Although the second effect seems contrary to the first, it springs from it, just as the charity that drove Christ to save our souls pro­ ceeded from His love for the Father. Louis Chardon shows clearly not only how these two effects were reproduced in the souls of tire Blessed Mother and the great saints but also how they ought to be found, too, in different degrees, in all members of Christ’s mystical body, according to the measure of their union with Him. He shows plainly how Christ is at once the source of grace and the principle of the cross, giving those intimately united to Him a share in His 48 Ibid. 49 Isa. 43: ii. 80 Vol. I, Part I, chap. 4. Cf. this work, soon to be given another publication by Lcthiclleux, Paris, in its original text. See ame entretien, “Des diverses sortes de consolations et de désolations par lesquelles Dieu se communique aux âmes saintes.” i6o THE LOVE OF GOD own deep peace, even when they are enduring those purify­ ing and redemptive sufferings which, through the mystical body, in some way continue His passion until the end of time. In accordance with these principles we do well frequently to ask God to make known to us the obstacles that we more or less consciously place in the way of grace. At times souls hear the question: Wilt thou be perfect? They cannot help but answer: “Lord, if it is Thy desire to purify me, then purify me, even if it means that I must suffer much, even if it means that I must shed my blood for Thee.” CHAPTER IX The Passive Purification of Charity Charity, like faith and hope, needs to be freed from every natural alloy in order to operate with utmost purity in the order of grace, so far above everything natural, no matter how richly endowed. In fact, charity has a special need for purgation because of the existence of a counterfeit charity compounded of culpable indulgence and weakness or hu­ manitarian sentimentality. It seeks the sanction of true char­ ity and, by its contact, often sullies it.1 The chief conflict of our day is not between what is good and what is evidently and cynically malicious, but between true and false charity. What was said of false Christs in the Gospel could apply to this so-called charity: “For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets.” 2 They are more dangerous when covert than when openly known as real enemies of the Church. Optimi corruptio pessima. The worse kind of corruption is that which attacks die best in us, the highest of the theolog­ ical virtues. If there is nothing in the world better than true charity, there is nothing worse than false, for the more an ap­ parent good resembles some real and great good the more it attracts and imperils us. If foolishness and more or less con1 In this sense the encyclical of Pope Pius XI, Mortalium animor, observes that pan-Christians are so absorbed in achieving the union of all the Churches that they forget that charity cannot triumph through working harm to the faith on which it is founded. 2 Matt. 24:24. 161 i6a THE LOVE OF GOD scious cowardice leads those who ought to represent true charity to give occasional approval to tire false, incalculable evil may result. Persecutors accomplish much less for they fight in the open, and we are clearly bound to oppose them or, if need be, to give our Lord the testimony of our blood in martyrdom. More could be said, but this is not the place for it. Yet a simple glance at the subject can give us a deeper appreciation of the necessity for purifying charity to free it of all dross, of all that seemingly resembles it but really forms only a silly or perverse caricature of virtue.3 To remind ourselves how much more we need the purify­ ing cross than most of us think, we have only to notice how much that is human insinuates itself into works for God. When the Lord desires to make one of His servants a saint, the divine will may be terrible on poor human nature. Years of suffering come, when the soul must carry the cross daily; but after it has passed through the time of trial, it rejoices because of what it has been through, understanding at the last something of the necessity of the cross for Christian life. Without the cross no Christian can become spiritual and really live the divine life, so mercifully accorded to us. The essential features of the purgation of charity The purification of charity has many different phases; St. 8 A fool, it has been said, is a dangerous weapon in some hands. We would willingly put up with fools if they were not so pleased with themselves. It takes effort to keep your own head while trying to get some common sense into theirs. If irony did not come to our aid, we could not keep our tempers with them. Christian charity might find a better way of expressing these observations but should not ignore the truth that they contain. The fear of rash judgment ought not to make us dupes; none have been kinder to their fellow men than the saints and none have been quicker to detect the artfulness and deceit of the enemy of good. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF CHARITY 163 Teresa speaks of die last, which precedes entrance into trans­ forming union, saying of it: She [the soul] sees herself still far away from God, yet with her increased knowledge of His attributes her longing and her love for Him grow ever stronger as she learns more fully how this great God and Sovereign deserves to be loved. As, year by year her yearn­ ing after Him gradually becomes keener, she experiences the bitter suffering I am about to describe. . . . Perhaps you will say this is an imperfection, and you may ask why she does not conform her­ self to the will of God since she has so completely surrendered her­ self to it. Hitherto she has been able to do so and she consecrated her life to it; but now she cannot because her reason is reduced to such a state that she is no longer mistress of herself, nor can she think of anything but what tends to increase her torment. . . . She is like one suspended in mid-air, who can neither touch the earth nor mount to heaven; she is unable to reach the water while parched with thirst and this is not a thirst that can be borne, but one which nothing will quench nor would she have it quenched save with the water of which our Lord spoke to the Samaritan woman, but this is not given to her.4 Although the soul suffers so much and “seems dying from its desire for death,” the saint says that it is conscious, even while suffering, that its suffering is a great boon. In other words, tire purification of love takes place in even greater darkness than the purgation of faith and of hope. This may be owing to either of two reasons : because the soul is still very imperfect; or because it has made a special offer­ ing of itself as a victim for sinners, and God has accepted its oblation. An attempt will be made here to outline the essen­ tial characteristics of this purification without emphasizing 4 Interior Castle, Sixth Mansion, chap. 11. i64 THE LOVE OF GOD its various phases. Afterward we shall see what it is like when accompanied by a special share in our Lord’s role of victim. Charity is that supernatural virtue which makes us love God for His own sake because He is infinitely good in Him­ self, and our neighbor as well, not just because of his natural qualities or the good things that we receive from him, but for love of God, who has loved him and called him, as He has called us, to glorify Him eternally. Charity is then real friend­ ship, a mutual love of benevolence between God, the author of grace, and the just man enlivened by grace, a sharer in the intimate life of the Most High.5 God’s love for us is not a response to any lovableness already in us but is itself the cause of our lovableness.8 Since God shares His intimate life with us and wills to make His eternal happiness ours, we in turn model our love on His, rejoicing that He is God, that He possesses infinite perfections, His wisdom, His holiness, and His happiness, and we will Him to be known, loved, and glorified as the First Trutli and the Supreme Good de­ serve to be known, loved, and glorified. The formal motive of the love of friendship between our Father in heaven and His children is therefore the uncreated Goodness as supernaturally known by faith to be supremely lovable, infinitely more lovable than any gifts that come to us from Him. To love God not merely for Himself but for the good things that we have received or hope to receive from Him falls short of being an act of charity, although a con­ sideration of God’s benefits disposes us for a better knowl­ edge of the sovereignly lovable divine goodness. Charity and perfect gratitude rise above the love of benefits to love the 5 Cf. St. Thomas, Ila Dae, q.23, a.i. 6 la, q. 20, a.2; la Ilae, q. no, a. i. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF CHARITY 165 Benefactor Himself.7 It is in this sense that God ought to be loved for Himself,8 and if charity leads us to desire our own happiness, it does so for a motive higher than mere hope,9 out of the will to glorify God eternally, so that His infinite goodness may be known and loved as He deserves: “Not to us, O Lord, not to us; but to Thy name give glory.” 10 The just, even when still imperfect, possess charity, al­ though many faults, such as unconscious egoism, self-love, pride, sensuality, and sloth, may keep it company. Even though charity makes us love God for Himself, we often dwell too much on the benefits of all kinds that He bestows on us, such as the sensible or spiritual consolations accorded to us in prayer which make Him felt, so to say, within us. Charity makes us love others, too, for love of God, but affection and gratitude also bind us to them. And who can tell what motive prevails in some affections, the divine or the human; and who knows whether the human is truly and fully subordinated to the divine ? When a soul has ardent hope and our good God wills its charity to become more disinterested, cleansed of all faults and imperfections, and freed from every trace of egoism, He deprives it at times of all consolation, both sensible and spirit­ ual. To put it more correctly, He does not exactly deprive it of these gifts but gives it such an ardent desire of Himself for His own sake that it suffers much at being still separated from Him, at having to wait for perfect union with Him. 7 Cf. la Ilae, q.62, a. 4. 8 Ila Ilae, q. 27, a. 3. 9 Hope makes us desire God as our supreme good and last end by subordinating ourselves to Him, as we have seen; however, it does not make us formally love Him for His own sake nor cause us to desire beatitude in order to glorify God eternally. Cf. la Ilae, q.62, a.4; Ila Ilae, q.27, a.3. 10 Ps. 113: I. ι66 THE LOVE OF GOD Like a banked fire, God remains in the soul’s center; no spark seems to come from Him. Nevertheless faith and hope frequently are almost purified in such souls. They are like the souls in purgatory who have come to the end of their sufferings and ardently desire the vision of God. No created good can any longer offer them consolation, so strong is their desire for an infinitely greater good. More clearly than ever before tire soul now sees that “Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity” save to love God and to serve Him. Yet the Lord seems to withdraw Himself from the soul; and the more it desires to be united to Him, the more this separation pains and racks it. As St. John of the Cross expresses it so well : “The very light and the loving wisdom which are to be united with the soul and transform it are the same that at the beginning purge and prepare it: even as the very fire which transforms the log of wood into itself, and makes it part of itself, is that which at the first was preparing it for that same purpose.” He adds that this figure serves to explain the sufferings of die souls in purgatory: “For die fire would have no power over them, even though they came into contact with it, if they had no imperfections for which to suffer. These are the material upon which the fire of purgatory seizes; when that material is consumed, there is nought else that can burn. So here, when the imperfections are consumed, the affliction of the soul ceases and its fruition remains.” 11 These sufferings, like personal purifications, last for a shorter time when more intense and when borne more supernaturally, with perfect abandonment.12 11 The Dark, Night, Bk. II, chaps. IO, 12. 12 It is true that when a tested soul offers itself for sinners it continues to have great sufferings, even when its personal purification is only just accomplished. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF CHARITY 167 It is no wonder that when the very core of a man’s soul is being purged that he feels forever bereft of any good that he once possessed?3 At this point, people are tempted to be­ lieve God cruel. Job complains that instead of God hearing him and coming to his aid : “I cry to Thee, and Thou hearest me not: I stand up, and Thou dost not regard me. Thou art changed to be cruel toward me, and in the hardness of Thy hand Thou art against me.” 14 The Psalmist makes the same plaint: “Arise, why sleepest Thou, O Lord? arise, and cast us not off to the end. Why turnest Thou Thy face away ? and forgetest our want and our trouble ?” 15 Above all, the words of the psalm uttered by Christ in His agony come back to memory at such times: “O God, my God why hast Thou forsaken Me ?” But with them comes the thought that in His hour of darkness our Savior offered Himself to His Fatlier who had delivered Him up for us. In union with Him, frequently repeating His seven last words, we too can make a great act of love for the single and pure motive that God is sovereignly lovable in Himself, in­ finitely more deserving of love than all the gifts that He has accorded to us or that we can hope to receive from Him. This realization marks the rising of the third star in the night of the soul; and contemplating it, a man resigns himself fully to God’s will. Whatever acts of faith, of hope, and of charity he makes are in some way all grounded in an act of perfect abandonment to the divine will. Christ consecrated the sacri­ fice of the cross with His dying words, “Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit.” The Christian now believes with ardent faith that Christ 18 Op. cit., Bk. Π, chap. 10. 14 Job 30: 21. 18 Ps. 43: 23. ι68 THE LOVE OF GOD continues to offer Himself to His Father and, together with Himself, all the members of His mystical body, by the minis­ try of His priests.16 Knowing this, the follower of Christ unites himself with the Eucharistic sacrifice that perpetuates the substance of Christ’s sacrifice on our altars. And those who suffer supernatural ly some particle of what our Lord endured and, mindful of the four ends of sacrifice, allow themselves to be offered to the Father by Him, have a special share in Christ’s offering. Our actions have only finite worth, but when Christ Jesus offers them, they are His oblation and, because of His divine personality, their value is beyond meas­ ure. Yet, even when our Lord offers up our personal sufferings to God, they are not the matter for the Sacrifice of the Mass: we must always distinguish between the victim of infinite worth and all others. The oblation which Christ makes of Himself includes us, however, for in offering Himself, He offers us as well. By embracing us, our Lord’s sacrifice be­ comes no more perfect in itself but radiates on us and through us; just as in creating the universe and having it reflect His goodness and hymn His glory, God becomes no greater than He was before. At this period of the spiritual life, the time for the purifica­ tion of our love of neighbor has also come. Therefore we no longer receive from him any marks of esteem or of gratitude, in spite of all the good that we would do for him. Sometimes those to whom we are most devoted cause us this apostolic suffering. Then we learn to love those dear to us purely for God’s sake, that they may be saved and sanctified and may 10 “Idem nunc offerens ministerio sacerdotum “ as the Council of Trent says in showing that the Sacrifice of the Mass is the same in substance as the sacrifice of the cross. In some recent works on the Mass this important point of doctrine is far from receiving the emphasis which, we believe, it should receive. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF CHARITY 169 glorify Him eternally, and we understand of what small moment this act of ours is in comparison to St. Peter Martyr’s supplication for the man who killed him and afterward be­ came a saint, in comparison to St. Stephen’s cry for those who stoned him, and our Lord’s prayer for those who crucified Him. What St. John of the Cross says of our intimate rela­ tions with God must also be affirmed of our relations with our neighbor, superiors and equals alike. At the end of this trial, charity for God and neighbor is purified of every alloy. Like gold out of the crucible, it has lost whatever dulled and tainted it and yet it comes out more abundant than it was before. Unlike feeble acts of charity, heroic acts obtain immediately the increase of charity which they merit, and they merit according to the measure of their fervor.17 And, with sanctifying grace, all the virtues and the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost united to charity, show a like • 1 ft increase. St. John of the Cross says: This is an enkindling of love in the spirit, where, in the midst of these dark afflictions, the soul feels itself to be keenly and acutely wounded in strong divine love. . . . And, inasmuch as this love is infused, it is passive rather than active, and thus it begets in the soul a strong passion of love. . . . The yearning and the grief of this soul in this enkindling of love arc greater because it is multi­ plied in two ways: first, by the spiritual darkness wherein it finds itself, which afflicts it with its doubts and misgivings; and then by the love of God, which enkindles and stimulates it, and with its loving wound, causes it a wondrous fear. . . . But in the midst of these dark and loving afflictions the soul feels within itself a certain 17 Cf. St. Thomas, Ilà Ilac, q. 24, a. 6, ad jum. 18 la Ilae, q.66, a.2; q.68, a.5. I7O THE LOVE OF GOD companionship and strength which bear it company and strengthen it.18 After the purification of charity, begins that “transform­ ing” union with God which both St. Teresa and St. John of the Cross speak of, she in seventh mansions of The Interior Castle and he in The Living Flame of Love. Our Lord’s words to His Father are as fully realized as they can be in this world: “That they all may be one, as Thou, Fadier, in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us.”20 The soul reaches its perfect age and experiences the fulfillment of St. Paul’s words, “But he who is joined to the Lord, is one spirit.” 21 The action of fire offers us some comparison to transforming union, for it first blackens and dries wood and then pervades and transforms it into fire itself.22 Crystal shot dirough with sunlight provides another parallel. As St. Thomas says, fire can transform bodies, but God alone can make souls God­ like.23 The more perfect deification possible to the soul in this life has now been achieved ; it has been brought into the inner sanctuary, the intimate center where the Blessed Trinity dwells; and it receives a supernatural peace that can never, so to speak, be lost; and lives only to contemplate and love God. Under certain substantial touches, it feels God so near that He seems to be just behind a thin veil and about to be seen. By the gift of wisdom it tastes more and more of God’s infinite goodness: “Taste and see diat the Lord is sweet.”24 12 Op. cit., Bk. II, chap. n. 20 John 17: 21. 211 Cor. 6: 17. 22 Op. cit., Bk. II, chap. 10. 23 la Ilae, q. 112, a. 1. 24 Ps. 33: 9. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF CHARITY 171 And it recalls the words of the Canticle of Canticles: “For winter is now past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers have appeared in our land, the time of pruning is come: the voice of die turtle is heard in our land . . . die vines in flower yield their sweet smell.” 25 Something like a prelude to eternal life has begun in time, yet sometimes at this junc­ ture new trials begin. Participation in our Lord’s victimhood Often souls in this state are lead by the Holy Ghost to offer themselves as victims for sinners, in union with Christ and following His example. Before making such an offering, we should do well to make satisfaction for our own sins and be­ come purified ourselves. But when the Holy Ghost Himself seems to incline a soul that way and it wins the approval of a wise director with the grace of state to recognize divine in­ spiration, should it not say: “If it is indeed Thou, Lord, in­ spiring this act, I have no desire to resist Thy appeal.” Then just as the cross has led to perfect love, now perfect love leads back to the cross, and the soul accepts it with much greater generosity than before, somewhat as our Lord and His Blessed Mother, who needed no purification for diemselves, took up the cross for our sakes. So, after some time of intimate divine union, the night of the soul begins again but in a different way. Now a partially perceptible peace reigns at the summit of the soul and holds its own even in the midst of the most terrible tempests, a dim but true image and reminder of our Lord’s peace during die anguish of die cross.26 25 Cant. 2: it. 28 Our Lord, says a disciple of St. Thomas, could have found in the beatific vision a defense against the evils which He was enduring. But He willed that the vision which beatified His soul should touch only the contemplative heights of His in- i72 THE LOVE OF GOD When souls have become united to God in this way, the sufferings that recommence thereafter are more redemptive than purifying. All at once the purification of the three theological virtues seems to begin again but it has a new character. When we offer ourselves for sinners, prayer alone fails to suffice. We must struggle with them, share thendangers and trials, feel in ourselves what they endure in losing God, and, in union with our Savior, in some way bear their sins, their unbelief, their despair, their discontent, and their anger. A soul thus put to die proof feels rejected by God, damned. Neverdieless, although grace is unfelt, it strengthens and sustains the sufferer, giving him, in the place of diose for whom he suffers, a holy hatred for the sins which they will one day repent of through die grace thus won for them. Souls called to follow diis hard path go through such dark­ nesses and torments that sometimes their directors have no idea where they arc going and, because of their anxiety, cause them much more suffering without meaning to do so. St. Teresa speaks of the trial of having confessors who dread and suspect everything.27 To go through all this means real agony, a terrible conflict with the spirit of evil, a martyrdom of the heart. But diose who are faidiful will find realized within diemselves what is greatest in die life of the Church militant, the spouse of Christ: “Love is strong as deadi, jealousy as hard as hell, the lamps thereof are fire and flames. Many waters cannot quench charity, neither can the floods drown it.”28 Supernatural love for God and souls is stronger tellect and not be diffused cither over the lower part of His spiritual powers or into His sense faculties. Cf. St. Thomas, Illa, q.46, a. 8 and the present work, Vol. I, Part 1, chap. 4. 27 Op. cit., Sixth Mansion, chap. 1. 28 Cant. 8: 6 f. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF CHARITY 173 than the death of the body, for it lives on eternally; it is stronger than spiritual death and hell, for it gives crucified souls a share in our Redeemer’s victory over sin and Satan. St. Catherine of Siena, St. Rose of Lima, St. Magdalen of Pazzi, and many others were made acquainted with tor­ ment of this kind and thus came to love God and souls for God so purely that their love had no trace of egoism.20 We admire the pure conjugal love of Christian widows who, with the courage of love, manage to raise their children to become living images of the father they have lost. How much more we should admire the spouses of Christ who, without consolation for years, remain faithful to Him in their life of prayer and immolation and keep on loving Him with a love as strong and as pure as it is sorrowful. Under the special influence of the gift of understanding, progressively enlightening us about the infinite greatness of God and our own weakness, the three theological virtues are purified of every alloy. Like three stars in the night, the three pure motives of these virtues shine out more and more clearly in their essential supernaturalness, inaccessible to the natural powers of any created intellect and will. Faith, hope, and charity, and the gifts of wisdom and understanding show considerable growth and, as the Holy Ghost generally moves souls according to the degree of the virtues and gifts to be found in them, He now gives them supernatural contempla­ tion and a proportionate degree of actual union. They are brought thus to the supreme and normal completion of the life of grace and the perfect realization of the first command28 St. Thomas says: "As Augustine adds in the same passage, the measure of our love for God is to love Him with our whole heart, that is, to love Him as much as He can be loved.” Ila Ilae, q. 27, a. 6, ad turn. 174 THE LOVE OF GOD ment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart and with thy whole soul and with all thy strength and with all thy mind : and thy neighbor as thyself.” 30 What practical conclusion should we draw from all this? When reading of the wonderful things that took place in the lives of the saints, let us not get big-headed and desire crosses that we could not carry or believe ourselves burdened with trials that exist only in our imagination; but let us carry the crosses which our Lord actually sends us—usually they are small. Let us carry them with resignation, with thankfulness, and with love. With resignation: we have to suffer. Modern progress has tried to do away with suffering but has cer­ tainly not succeeded; and to struggle against suffering only adds irritation to pain and robs us of merit. In the world there are, sad to say, many who carry a lost cross, gaining no more from it than the bad thief gained from his. Gratitude should be joined to resignation, for the cross is a hidden and precious grace sent to us for our purification. We may not see this immediately, but when we think about some of the crosses that have come to us in the past, we realize how useful and fruitful they have been for us. Sometimes we wish for crosses other than our own, but were they given to us, we would wish to take back the one that Providence has chosen for us, since it is perfectly adapted to our strength aided by grace. Love ought to accompany gratitude, or, if not love, at least a desire to love the cross. We should never consider the cross apart from our Savior. Let us look upon Christ crucified to be drawn to Him by sufferings that make us resemble Him. From Him will come our strength to bear them. Let us have 80 Luke io: 27. THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF CHARITY 175 the courage to allow Him to love and purify us and incor­ porate us into Himself. He desires to communicate to us something of His hidden and sorrowful life, before giving us a participation in His glorious life in heaven. We see this in the lives of saints with a special love for die cross, such as St. Benedict Joseph Labre. Shortly before his death, when in adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, he seemed to have the face of Christ, so much like Him had he become through sufferings accepted with love. Blessed are those who have a deep understanding of the mystery of redemption and live by it. In them Christ’s sufferings are in some way continued. The mystical body of the Savior can no more live without suffering than our eyes can function without light. The sor­ rowful mysteries are the way leading to the glorious mysteries of eternity, the beginning of eternal life in time. CHAPTER X the Characteristic Signs of Passive Purification of the Soul If all that glitters is not gold, neither is every kind of dark­ ness and suffering of soul a passive purification. Let us take a brief glance at the nature of those painful times of darkness that arc entirely different from the night of the soul, and then afterward take up the discussion of certain purifications that are real but very difficult to judge, pointing out, finally, the true signs of the night of the soul. In this we shall follow four Thomists: Philip of the Blessed Trinity, C.D., Valgornera, Alexander Piny, and Louis Chardon. Of the three Domini­ cans—all of whom have made a special study of the subject —Chardon will be quoted at length so that interior souls will be led to read his book, La Croix de Jésus, referred to earlier and far too little known.1 1 Louis Chardon has been referred to so frequently in this work that some facts about him seem to be indicated as helpful. According to Echard’s Scriptores ordinis Praedicatorum, Π, $66, Chardon was born in the Ile-de-France about 1595. Having completed his studies and desiring to retire from the world, he entered the Dominicans in 1618, became master of novices and an experienced director of souls seeking perfection. He died at the age of 56 in 1651. His principal works are: La Croix de Jésus, où les plus belles vérités de la théologie mystique et de la grâce sanctifiante sont établies (Paris: Antoine Bcrthier, 1647); Méditations sur la passion de Jésus-Christ pour tous les jours de l'année, (Paris: Hure, 1650); La doctrine de Dieu enseignée à sainte Catherine de Sienne en forme de dialogue, donnée au public en notre langue (Paris: Huré, 1648); Les divines institutiones des leçons de la perfection du ven. P. Jean Tanière, données avec éclaircissements en notre langue (Paris: Huré, 1650); Raccourci de l’art de 176 SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 177 Sufferings of a penal rather than of a purifying nature The spiritual afflictions described in the exposition of the night of the soul given by St. John of the Cross must not be confused with sufferings in some regards analogous to them but of a very different character. They ought not to be taken for morbid states, such as profound melancholia, neurasthe­ nia, or psychastenia—in other words, with nervous exhaus­ tion and its reverberations on moral life. People so afflicted distress themselves over nothing and sometimes end by devel­ oping a persecution mania. This may take any one of its many different forms, including the religious, depending on the person’s environment and ordinary preoccupations. méditer pour les âmes qui commencent les pratiques de la dévotion (Paris: Huré, 1649). Not having a first edition of La Croix de Jésus, wc have quoted from the edition “revised" by Father Bourgeois and published by Lethielleux in 1895. Louis Chardon was a master theologian, nourished by the doctrine of St. Thomas and St. Catherine of Siena and the teaching of Taulcr. He has related the high concepts of mystical theology to St. Thomas’ principles on Christ's fullness of grace, His mystical body, the invisible missions of the divine persons. Some exag­ gerations occur in his works where he indulges in an oratorical style of develop­ ment. But he frequently shows great depth as a speculative theologian and as a psychologist. He may have read St. John of the Cross, whose works had their first Spanish edition in 1618 and their first translation into French in 1621, another publication following in 1665. Whether he knew St. John of the Cross or not, Louis Chardon has written much which through its use of doctrinal principles clarifies the teaching found in slightly different form in the writings of Tauler and of St. John of the Cross. Louis Chardon has been particularly enlightening in regard to the two effects produced in Jesus’ soul by His fullness of grace: deep peace and an ardent desire for the cross as the means of our salvation. He has shown also that these two effects arc repro­ duced in the members of Christ's mystical body. Whereas St. John of the Cross inculcates in souls a love for suffering as a purifying means to divine union, Louis Chardon draws them to love suffering by emphasizing our Lord’s love for the cross. Those who have read The Darl( Night will surely see that the pages of La Croix de lésas deal with the same states and sometimes throw new light upon them relative to tire development of sanctifying grace which separates us from all that is not pure in things created that it may unite us more closely to God. i78 THE LOVE OF GOD Temptations against chastity and patience are certainly not enough to ensure that a soul has entered into the passive night of the senses; nor are temptations against the three theologi­ cal virtues a guaranty that it is undergoing the night of the soul. Describing the state of those who make bad use of spiritual consolations,2 Father Louis Chardon aptly remarks: Because they lack steady resoluteness, they are continually chang­ ing, desiring consolations without patience and seeking them with­ out temperance. Such over-eagerness leads to confusion, troubles and clouds the understanding, and robs the mind of peace. Rest­ lessness of this kind weakens the life and vigor of a man’s powers, depriving them of light and strength and abandoning them to their own resources. People who have fallen into a state like this fail to recognize it. Even if it is brought to their attention in such a way that they cannot help knowing it, or at least, suspecting it, the weakness which they have already contracted keeps them from making up their minds to practice those hard exercises demanded of all who would take the kingdom of God by storm. Souls such as these continue to make violent efforts to convince themselves that a liberal God desires to accord them nothing but a great deal of sweetness. Their lack of discretion may sometimes reach the point of weakening the body. Even if health is not lost, it is so affected that the soul cannot use the body for those opera­ tions that can be produced in this life only with its cooperation. There is a weight on the breast, the brain is fagged, and breathing shallow, the heart contracts and, whenever there is an attempt to apply themselves attentively to any consideration, they get a head­ ache. Then the imagination plays its part by representing this sorry state of affairs as worse than it actually is. Finding themselves so sadly off, people are likely to go seeking 2 La Croix de Jirur, 3me entretien, chap. 12. See also chap. 14. SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 179 relief in the senses and some succeed so well in finding it that they fall from their newly and generously undertaken spiritual life into what St. Paul calls an animal way of living. So reads the story of many who have left off the pursuit of perfection to which they were called by an abundance of graces from a generous God. Doc­ tors see the results of melancholy in bodily dispositions consequent on mental torment and conflict. Those so affected ultimately give up trying to resist the impulses that trouble them. Please God, may He give such souls the profound humility to draw nearer those of whom we are now going to speak.3 Lastly, true passive purification of the soul should also be distinguished from another state, not so much a trial sent by God’s mercy to dispose the soul for divine union as a chastisement of His justice. It must be remarked in regard to this subject that there are three different kinds of crosses, the same three that were raised on Calvary: the cross of Christ, the cross of the good thief, and the cross of the bad thief. Our Lord in no way merited His; He voluntarily ac­ cepted its sufferings in our stead. His was the redemptive cross. By contrast, the bad thief fully merited his cross and besides drew no profit from it. His was a lost cross, without any purifying effect, like many others in the world. The good thief certainly merited his. It was a punishment. Yet he was able to make it purifying and reparative by uniting his con­ trite heart to Christ.4 3 In regard to a case of this kind, Huysmans wrote: "It seems that nervous dis­ orders make cleavages in the soul and lay it open for the evil spirit to enter . . . ; in this matter medicine speaks nonsense, and theology holds its tongue." A Rebours, the preface written twenty years after the book and quoted by Dr. A. Hesnard, Les psychoses et les frontières de la folie, p. 122. * St Thomas says somewhere that the sufferings of a good religious are as different from those of a bad religious as the cross of the good thief from the cross of the bad one. ï8o THE LOVE OF GOD Crosses such as the good thief’s may indeed resemble the night of the soul without having all its characteristics. Some­ times, because of grave sins against the Savior which re­ mained unconfessed and entailed a number of sacrilegious Communions as well, a repentant sinner may have a heavy debt to pay divine justice although he has already been for­ given his sins. The torments that he suffers lead him to ask whether his sins have really been forgiven or whether he is on the way to damnation. Frequent temptations against hope and charity arise, and God Himself seems cruel. In such cases, there is no question of any passive purification or proxi­ mate preparation of the soul for divine union but chiefly of expiation which, although hard, is better endured in this life while meriting than after death in purgatory, when we can no longer merit. The different instances just examined—marked neurasthe­ nia, anxiety neurosis, and the painful expiation for grave sins already remitted, are plainly quite different from the true night of the soul. There are, however, cases of real passive purification about which it is difficult to decide. Obscure forms of passive purification The topic being a delicate one, it behooves us to listen to the best authorities on the subject. Father Louis Chardon de­ scribes states of this nature when speaking of three different kinds of interior crosses: first, those that make us cowardly and scrupulous; secondly, those that arouse our lower nature to rebellion; and finally, those caused by a sort of general lassitude. Of the crosses that stun and stupefy the will, he says: SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 181 In the course of the trials sent by God to the soul, it comes about that the will is forsaken at the same time that the intelligence is filled with knowledge, due either to its natural power of reason or to supernatural illumination. When this happens to a man, he then carries a cross far heavier than any he has ever known before. Light may flood the mind, but the will remains empty. Holy people so tried believe that they would have been better off ignorant than possessed of a sublime knowledge which yet gives them no power to love what their very nature forbids them to hate. They suffer much, feeling themselves forbidden to take hold of what they long for with a love beyond any power to express or prove. They see that the object of their love is worthy of all love, yet cannot turn to Him with all their strength. God’s mercy inspires no confidence, His justice excites no fear. . . . Meditation on His mysteries leaves the affections cold. A kind of constraint of heart results, a timid and repressed dis­ position of mind, a shrinking of the soul’s courage. . . . Souls that rose like eagles toward the sun become scared nestlings flutter­ ing along on the ground. They begin to be afraid of everything and see all their actions as tainted with sin. The wisest counsel suc­ ceeds in calming their fears only with great difficulty. Their minds remain cowardly, enervated, and depressed. They shun the remedy to be found in the advice of enlightened directors . . . defying them and doubting the uprightness of their intention. They come to Communion as if presenting themselves before the tribunal of some terrible judge. They have attention only for their own misery, are so conscious of it and feel themselves so evil that they think it impossible that they could be of any use to others. ... In other words, they know that they have offended God but are not sure that they have obtained His pardon.8 Lack of knowledge, together with its imaginings and ter­ rifying thoughts, causes a cross unparalleled, bowing down Op. at., ame entretien, chap. 13. ΐδ2 THE LOVE OF GOD the heart and breaking courage. An experienced director will see, however, that the grief experienced for their faults, proves that these souls love God above all things and that, to do His will, they are ready, in spite of everything, to suffer still more. When talking of the crosses that cause our lower nature to revolt, Louis Chardon relates that, according to Sulpicius Severus,® there was once an illustrious prelate of outstanding virtue who had often with his blessing freed those troubled by the devil. One day he was dismayed to find himself incited to pride and begged God that he himself might rather be­ come the habitation of the devil than be guilty of compla­ cency. And the result of his prayer was soon manifest.7 Louis Chardon adds: It seems that something analogous happens to some souls. Long experience of God’s guidance has given them a wonderful grace of discernment. Yesterday they knew the way that they must follow to go forward without fear on the road of perfection. And today they know nothing. They have to go asking light of others to whom they could have given it in abundance before. Souls accom­ plished in the practice of high virtue see themselves driven to the necessity of going to learn the first elements of the spiritual life in the school of less perfect people. . . . For a long time they have been penetrated by the vanity of everything that is not God and filled with horror at inordinate desires, having reason to believe that they were forever cut off from new temptations. And now they feel themselves harried and tormented with thoughts, and desires . . . and passions that almost make them lose hope of ever again finding the favors that they once knew. If they desire to find some solace for their misery in God, they see that the avenues leading to Him are closed. And were they open, their understanding would β Dialogue, treatise I. 7 Op. at., chap. 15. SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 183 be too darkened to be aware of it and their will too slack to get up and more toward Him. . . . All the faculties under the will’s direction revolt against it. The more it desires to rise toward the source of all good, the more it is held back by the deterrent weight of our lower nature, which represents to it only objects that crucify it. . . . With severity, yet full lovingly, God holds its interior acts as though in a state of suspension. It has no other support but Him. He Himself put it in this crucible where, almost without being able to act, it suffers through God, through creatures, and through itself. . . . People so tried are often tempted to impatience. Their nature is left to its own weakness. No sensible influence of any kind comes to them from heaven, and everything conspires to cause them desolation. . . . What has become of the pure flaming love that used to purify the imperfections of their heart and the efficacious strength once manifest in their actions ? They know only irksome disgust and aversion and are even tempted to turn from resigna­ tion and submission to God’s adorable designs. . . . Nature revolts against the spirit with such violence that nothing else can make itself felt. The higher faculties are as if unconscious and incapable of action; and such is the sway of our evil nature that it is impos­ sible even to distinguish for practical purposes between what is necessary and what is free, between consent and feeling.8 These passages make us think of the violent and prolonged temptations experienced by St. Alphonsus Liguori at the age of eighty. When reading his life, we might take this trial for the night of the senses, but it must have been a purification of a much higher order. Louis Chardon continues: “In this state, doubts, anxieties, and disturbances arise in the soul. Are not these aversions and revolts that it experiences acts of the will, freely consented 8 Ibid. j84 the love of god to? The truth is that they are as far from being acts of the will as they are from being sweet communications of holy love.” 9 All the effects of violent passions make themselves felt. . . . Thoughts of denying divine Providence haunt the mind. The senses are aroused and disturbed with an intensity reminiscent of delirium. Yet the fact that all this martyrdom results from con­ tinued resistance in the contest remains unknown. ... If it were otherwise, if the besieged gave way before these assaults, if the powers of the soul yielded their consent, all this travail, that makes us think of the dread spectacle of souls forever banished from God’s sight, would come to a halt. In resignation and silence these souls are really cleaving to all that God is pleased to decide for them. They practice patience just when their nature is most impatient; they enjoy peace in spite of anxiety and keep silence in the face of trouble, practicing indif­ ference in the midst of turmoil, and conformity in spite of up­ rushes of anger. Nevertheless, because their acts of submission are tacit rather than explicit, they remain ignorant of their own state.10 God permits all this for their advancement. May they then allow tliis trial to go forward and be accomplished in them, having their purgatory here on earth and coming at last to free themselves of every stain and imperfection. For those who have eyes to see, the full strength of love first appears in this conflict: Fortis est ut mors dilectio. Crosses caused by general helplessness : The rigorous action of love delivers others over to another form of passive puri­ fication difficult to judge. Having received great graces, these souls can no longer bring them back to mind. The under® Ibid. 10 Ibid., chap. 16. SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 185 standing is clouded ; the will, numbed ; and the devil is per­ mitted to interpose in order to exercise their fidelity. How can they ask God’s help? He is hidden. Faith sleeps so heavily that we could believe it dead. When St. Teresa was under­ going this trial it seemed to her that she was like a ball in the hands of her enemy. She wrote of it: “The mind feels as if it never had thought of God nor ever will be able to do so. When men speak of Him, they seem to be talking of some person heard of long ago.” 11 Elsewhere she says: Faith is then as dead, and asleep, like all the other virtues; not lost, however,—for the soul truly believes all that the Church holds; but its profession of the faith is hardly more than an outward pro­ fession of the mouth. And, on the other hand, temptations seem to press it down, and make it dull, so that its knowledge of God becomes to it as that of something which it hears of far away. . . . Vocal prayer or solitude is only a greater affliction. . . . To con­ verse with any one is worse, for the devil then sends so offensive a spirit of bad temper, that I think I could eat people up; nor can I help myself. I feel that I do something when I keep myself under control; or rather our Lord does so, when He holds back with His hand any one in this state from saying or doing something that may be hurtful to his neighbours and offensive to God. Then, as to going to our confessor, that is of no use; for there certainly results—and very often has it happened to me—what I shall now describe. Though my confessors, with whom I had to do then, and have to do still, are so holy, they spoke to me and reproved me with such harshness, that they were astonished at it afterwards when I told them of it. They said that they could not help themselves; for, though they had resolved not to use such language, and though they had pitied me also very much,—yea, 11 Interior Castle, Sixth Mansion, chap. 1. ι86 THE LOVE OF GOD even had scruples on the subject, because of my grievous trials of soul and body,—and were, moreover, determined to console me, they could not refrain. They did not use unbecoming words—I mean, words offensive to God; yet their words were the most offensive that could be borne with in confession. They must have aimed at mortifying me. At other times, I used to delight in this, and was prepared to bear it; but it was then a torment altogether.12 Louis Chardon has the same thing to say and adds some­ thing further in regard to directors: Sometimes eminent people, men of probity and of mild and in­ dulgent character, become brusque, rough, and forbiddingly severe with these poor afflicted souls. They reproach them with their sufferings, accuse them of impatience, and lay all their difficulties at the door of a lack of resignation. Or they begin to have doubts and misgivings about the state of their souls, becoming persuaded that they arc deceived by the devil and arc likely to impose on their acquaintances as well. Often directors have no patience to listen to their tales of woe . . . and sometimes those best versed in spiritual things are the ones to desert them.13 These pages of Chardon, at times verified to the letter, are all worth reading. To see such cases with some clarity, a director must either know the person for some time, or have some special grace of state akin to discernment of spirits. If he perseveres in prayer and patience, he will be enlightened and come to recognize in this state of affliction genuine love for God. These souls would indeed fear to lie by saying that they love the Lord, but at bottom they are His familiars. We recognize this chiefly in the fact that although they no longer desire the 12 Life, chap. 30. 12 Op. cit., ime entretien, chap. 17. SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 187 cross, they do not wish it to be taken from them. And al­ though their faith and hope seem dead, in the depth of their souls direct but imperceptible acts of these virtues take place and are seen by God, by Christ, and His Blessed Mother, and by all the angels and saints in heaven. And that suffices. Sometimes people offer to suffer in order to obtain the grace of conversion, or at least of a good death, for some unhappy and fallen soul, and God seems to accept their offering, judg­ ing by die crosses diat come to them and increase from day to day. After having frequendy renewed their act of obla­ tion, they reach a point where they no longer feel ready to do so, being too overcome and spent and tormented with frightful doubts about the mystery of predestinadon and the thought of the damned. Their faith seems to have gone to sleep. Then their director may somedmes suggest to them: “Perhaps you could say to our Lord: ‘My God, if Thou didst not inspire my act of oblarion, I do not renew it. It no longer holds.’ ” Apd not infrequently, after a moment of reflection and of pra, _τ, these poor victims will answer: “I really cannot say it. This thing is stronger than I. I feel diat if I were to renounce my oblation I would destroy what is best in my life.” In the depths of these souls a little breath of hope still stirs, making them cling to reparadon. This little breath is a heroic act of confidence in God in the midst of the sorrowful Pas­ sion continued in some way within them and of necessity so continued in some members of Christ’s mystical body until the end of dme. In a sense, Jesus Christ is in agony until the end of the world. It was at the moment when He suffered most that the disciples, with the exception of John, deserted Him, and so it is that sometimes when the saints are most THE LOVE OF GOD ι88 configured to the suffering Christ they too are forsaken. The cross is a mystery and, in its essential supernaturalness, lies infinitely beyond the grasp of the most gifted minds. “I have not loved you in jest,” our Lord said to Blessed Angela of Foligno. There are supernatural depths of love into which only the saints can look. Therefore we need not be surprised that there are forms of real passive purification most difficult to judge; such indeed are the greatest and deepest passive purifications, which are sometimes accompanied by sicknesses that exhaust the ner­ vous system.14 But to finish the subject let us come to the most evident signs. Three characteristic signs of the passive purification of the soul The characteristic signs of the passive purification of the soul are rarely as clear in concrete reality as they are in the abstract treatises that enumerate them. However, an atten­ tive examination quite often does enable us to recognize them when they occur. The distinctive signs of true passive purification of the soul are found in the effects produced by it; as our Lord has said, “By the fruit the tree is known.” 15 St. Thomas remarks that some effects reveal their cause wholly, not only its ex­ istence but also its nature; these belong to the same species as their causes. Only one plant produces the iris, and the fig tree alone gives figs. Other effects not having a specific likeness to their cause reveal only its existence but not its nature. The effects of the First Cause lack the capacity to 14 Cf. Life, chap. 30. 18 Matt. 12:33. SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 189 make known His inner nature, although some of them, such as existence, life, and intellect, for instance, can only come from a First Being, from the Author of life and the First Intellect. Other effects again manifest neither the nature nor the existence of the cause which produces them, for they could be produced by several causes. For example, physical depression can come either from a state of health due to atmospheric conditions like the sirocco or from moral causes such as overwhelming sadness. Among the signs of the night of the soul enumerated in the description given by St. John of the Cross and referred to earlier, some which are characteristic of it could come from no other source. Others, however, reveal it only imperfectly: do not make its nature known, or even fail to give us positive assurance of its existence, for they could spring from other causes. We wish therefore to enumerate the distinctive marks of these trials, to total those which, when taken together, show clearly that a soul is passing through the passive purifi­ cation of the soul, sent by God’s mercy to prepare it for divine union. Remembering that purgation of the spirit is accomplished chiefly by the gift of understanding, which reveals to us much more clearly than we ever knew before our own miseries and God’s infinite greatness, we should note first of all that this state can be either one of pure and simple purification dis­ posing the soul for divine union, or at one and the same time both a purification and a punishment due to sin. In the latter case, it may take on many shades of difference, from being more a testing than a chastisement, to being more a punish­ ment than a purification immediately ordered to divine union. Sometimes, toward the end of life, people who have I9o THE LOVE OF GOD not yet reached union properly speaking enter into this state and seem to have their purgatory, in part at least, before death. Finally, as has already been brought out, there are, on a much higher level, sufferings more redemptive than purifying, by which some souls are associated in Christ’s sor­ rowful life for the salvation of sinners. According to Philip of the Blessed Trinity,10 three characteristic signs of the true night of the soul proclaim it as a pure and simple puri­ fication or at least as much more a testing preparatory to divine union than a chastisement. The first of these signs consists in this: On one hand the soul has no consciousness of having recently committed any materially grave sin, and on the other hand it has passed from a state of consolation or spiritual sweetness into great aridity. There it meets with nothing but darkness and afflic­ tion and finds itself buried in a sort of purgatory or even in a kind of hell owing to violent temptations against the high­ est virtues. If this sign reveals nothing to the tormented soul itself, it serves to inform an enlightened and experienced director, much needed by souls at such times. He should offer en­ couragement, telling the soul that this trial is sent by divine mercy to lead it to perfect abandonment and a more intimate union with God. When, in fact, God leads souls as far as to make a resolution to serve Him on all occasions, He does not leave them for long at rest. He shows a sort of jealousy to­ ward them and will not suffer that their affection be attached to anything not Himself. He takes away from them every1β His text is conscientiously reproduced word for word by Vallgornera, who has transcribed besides many pages from John of St. Thomas on die gifts of the Holy Ghost. SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 191 thing that could distract them from Him, even divine con­ solations, and in this sense, we can say, with Chardon, that God withdraws His gifts from us so that we may have the Giver Himself.17 The second sign is a long-term avoidance of all fully de­ liberate sin, whether mortal or venial, together with disinter­ est in exterior things, an almost continual consciousness of the soul’s own miseries, and an ardent desire for perfection. This sign must accompany the preceding, because it con­ firms the fact that a person has not recently committed any serious sin that would rob it of the state of grace and God’s friendship. As St. Thomas shows, anyone deprived of divine grace and charity cannot long avoid deliberate sin and is not slow in betraying an attachment for creatures and a propen­ sity for external things.18 Chardon says: “The faithful soul soon shows what love possesses it and makes it act, how dif­ ferent is its love from that which is grounded in nature. . . . In the greatest tribulations hearts filled with disinterested charity do not lose the constancy and sweetness they acquired in the time of sensible communications. Their intention then becomes upright, pure, and perfect. . . . They order all things to God and do all things for Him. ... In this state, their intention not only grows established in absolute up­ rightness but becomes divine or deiform, transformed in God.” 18 The same doctrine was developed at length in the seventeenth century, thirty-six years after Chardon, by Fa­ ther Alexander Piny, O.P.20 17 Op. cit., 3me entretien, chap. 16. 18 la Ilae, q. 109, a.8, 9, 10. 19 Op. cit., chap. 18. 20 Cf. La plus parfaite des voies intérieures ou la voie d'abandon (1863), chaps. 7. 9> i5> 19· i92 THE LOVE OF GOD The third sign is an almost continual contemplation of the divine goodness despite the soul’s extreme aridity. This contemplation is general and obscure and, although it re­ sists, it does not exclude, temptations against faith. At the same time the soul has an ardent but unfelt love of God and for this reason suffers much at the sight of sin. The measure of its suffering is the measure of its love—for God first of all, whom sin offends, for our Lord, whom sin has crucified, and for souls, whom sin sends to death. This third sign, united to and confirming those preceding it, is proof positive to an enlightened director of the true night of the soul. This state certainly can be present, however, without giving such manifest signs of its existence. Louis Chardon says: The soul becomes divine or deiform, no longer having any life but God’s, or any knowledge or any love but His. ... A pure supernatural sight is given to it. It beholds the emptiness of all things sensible and everything that can harm the soul. It sees that God is all, and that consequently everything else is nothing. . . . It has come to the summit of contemplation, reached not without cost. . . . The soul is reduced to perfect poverty of spirit, to a state of pure dependence, of simple capacity, in which nothing human is to be found . . . and it lives in the darkness wherein the un­ created light dwells and is there more plainly seen. . . . Man draws nearer the inaccessible perfections of God when he is abased than when he is exalted and full of delights. When in this state he is unacquainted with any revelations whatsoever, undisturbed by transports or ecstasies, visions or apparitions. In a light unknown to itself, the soul sees that any other means can only represent God less perfectly than this state of nakedness and privation. Through it we are drawn to God in perfect purity.21 21 Op. cit., chap. 20. SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 193 These facts have led mystics to believe that at such times the understanding produces no vital act and operates without images —and without ideas—although these two are necessary conditions for the knowledge of wayfarers. Because a suspension of the knowl­ edge acquired by way of affirmation takes place in the understand­ ing and it apprehends by way of negation and in a manner above any sensory mode of knowledge or any positive concept; and be­ cause the divine light, without which knowledge of this kind would be impossible, is communicated in excess, . . . the understanding therefore remains submerged in the depths of a wise obscurity and hidden in the secrecy of a knowing ignorance.22 The attention of all the powers is plunged into the abyss of divine love. It is sometimes said that St. Thomas nowhere speaks of such a state. Louis Chardon cites to the contrary St. Thomas’ commentary on the following words of Dionysius: “There is a perfect knowledge of God, obtained in ignorance and in virtue of an incomprehensible union; this takes place when the soul, leaving all things and forgetting itself, is united to the splendors of divine glory and enlightened by the un­ fathomable divine wisdom.”23 St. Thomas writes in his commentary: “We know God in ignorance, by a certain supernatural union, in which the mind is enlightened by the deep, and to us impenetrable, divine wisdom.” 24 In other places the Angelic Doctor makes allusion to negative knowl­ edge and transluminous darkness, about which the Scrip­ tures have so often spoken.26 To read what he has to say on the following words of St. Paul will prove particularly help22 Ibid., chap. 21. 23 Dionysius, De divinis nominibus, chap. 7, lect. 3. 24 Ibid., lect. 4. 25 Ila Ilac, q.180, a. 5, ad aum. !94 THE LOVE OF GOD ful: “the Blessed and only Mighty . . . who . . . inhabiteth light inaccessible.” 26 Often the three characteristic signs of the night of the soul are not so plainly evident. The time of spiritual testing can be complicated by sickness and even by neurasthenia. Some­ times directors find it difficult to distinguish between suf­ ferings not of a purifying character and others more penal than purifying. They may also find it hard to tell the latter from others of a higher type, more redemptive than purify­ ing, and likely to be found in souls dedicated to a life of rep­ aration. Because of these difficulties, when those who have care of souls search for signs of true love for God, it is im­ portant for them not to judge any case by isolated acts or over a short period of time but in relation to the whole of life. Finally, it should be noted that, between the night of the senses and the night of the soul, various trials and afflictions of a transitory character occur. The author of The Imitation often speaks of them, and St. John of the Cross remarks: For, having passed through a period, or periods, or days of this night and tempest, the soul soon returns to its wonted serenity; and after this manner God purges certain souls which think not to rise to so high a degree of love as do others, bringing them at times, and for short periods, into this night of contemplation and purga­ tion of the spirit, causing night to come upon them and then dawn, and this frequently, so that the words of David may be fulfilled, that He send His crystal—that is, His contemplation—like the mor­ sels; although these morsels of dark contemplation are never as intense as is that terrible night of contemplation . . . into which, 28In Ep. I ad Tim., 6:16; likewise la Ilae, q.m, a.5, ad 311m. SIGNS OF THE PASSIVE PURIFICATION 195 of set purpose, God brings the soul that He may lead it to divine union.27 Sixty years later, Louis Chardon expounds the same doc­ trine; and after that we find it again in Alexander Piny’s beautiful pages on abandonment to God’s will. For all of them, this dark period means in reality an entrance into light, when the Lord harkens to the petition we make so often when reciting the psalms: “Give me understanding, and I will search Thy law.” 28 “Give me understanding, and I will learn Thy commandments.” 29 “Give me understand­ ing, and I shall live.”30 Longings like St. Paul’s for the Colossians are then realized: “Therefore we . . . cease not to pray for you, and to beg that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will, in all wisdom, and spiritual under­ standing: That you may walk worthy of God, in all things pleasing,” 81 “being instructed in charity, and unto all riches of fullness of understanding, unto the knowledge of die mys­ tery of God the Fadier and of Christ Jesus: in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”32 22 The Dark. Hight, Bk. II, chap. x. 28 Ps. 118: 34. 29 Ps. 118: 73. 30 Ps. 118: 144. 31 Col. 1:9. 32 Col. a: 2. PART III The Life of Union Jesus and Mary through CHAPTER XI The Abiding of the Blessed Trinity in Purified Souls and Transforming Union By way of synthesis, we should now like to show how per­ fect union with God, prepared for by the passive purifications of the senses and spirit, is the normal result of the mysterious indwelling of the Blessed Trinity in the just. To accomplish this we shall first recall to mind the mystery as understood by St. Thomas and his best commentators; then we shall speak of St. John of the Cross as a great mystical doctor with an ex­ ceptional insight into the results which are achieved by our giving ourselves without any reservation to the true interior life. Following the great spiritual authors who preceded him and stating their doctrine exactly, St. John of the Cross shows, from the prologue of the Ascent of Mount Carmel up to the last pages of The Spiritual Canticle, that the Christian who gives himself generously to the interior life and does not hesi­ tate to follow the royal road of the cross, should reach so close a union with the indwelling Trinity that it merits the name of transforming union. He sees the latter, coming as it does after the passive purification of the theological virtues and the gifts of the Holy Ghost, as the supreme and therefore the rare, although the normal, development of the spiritual life. 199 200 THE LOVE OF GOD The indwelling of the Blessed Trinity: source and end of the spiritual life Holy Scripture often speaks of the general presence of God in all things, which He conserves in existence but tells us just as positively—as was noted earlier 1—of the special presence of the Blessed Trinity in the just. Christ says: “If anyone love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him.” 2 Evidently He is not talking here of the general presence of God in everything which He conserves in ex­ istence, but of His presence in the just who love Him above all things and keep His word. He accords to them not only the created gift of grace but, as our Lord says, “My Father and I will come to him and will make Our abode with him.” Three verses later, He tells us in the same chapter of St. John’s Gospel: “But the Paraclete, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all tilings and bring all things to your mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you.” A little earlier,3 He had already said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments. And I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you forever.” St. John writes the same thought in his first epistle: “No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abideth in us, and His charity is perfected in us. . . . God is charity: and he that abideth in charity, abideth in God, and God in him.”4 The same doctrine is frequently affirmed by St. Paul, for example, in the Epistle 1 Vol. I, Part I, chap. 3. 2 John 14: 23. 3 John 14: 15 f. 4 I John 4:12, 16. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 201 to the Romans: “And hope confoundeth not: because the charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost, who is given to us.” 5 “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you ?” e “Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own ?” 7 Earlier we saw how theology gives some understanding of this mystery.8 After the discussion of the passive purifications, the meaning and implication of the mystery should be more within our reach, and we may also gain some insight into why the divine indwelling normally results in transforming union. Theology first shows what this special presence is in the just who have reached the perfect and definitive develop­ ment of the life of grace, that is, the blessed in heaven. Ac­ cording to divine revelation, it is certain that every soul in heaven is like a living, spiritual tabernacle. In each the triune God really dwells, is known as He knows Himself, and is loved and glorified eternally. Consummated grace, a par­ ticipation in the divine nature, acts as the principle from which the light of glory proceeds. Because of it the blessed see the divine essence face to face, better than we see people with whom we converse. They are external to us whereas the beatified behold Him who sustains their natural and divine life in the depths of their own souls. The life of grace and of charity in this world is basically the same as that in heaven: “If thou didst know the gift of 5 Rotn. 5: 5. ® I Cor. 3: 16. 7 I Cor. 6: 19. 8 Vol. I, Part I, chap. 3. 202 THE LOVE OF GOD God,” Jesus told the Samaritan woman, “and who He is that saitli to thee, Give me to drink; thou perhaps wouldst have asked of Him, and He would have given thee living water ... a fountain of water, springing up into life everlasting.”8 The life of grace is life eternal begun; for sanctifying grace, when definitively developed, consummated, and made inamissable, will be called glory, and will become tire radical principle of the beatific vision. As for the charity that we bear within our hearts, it is to last for all eternity. There are indeed two essential differences between a Christian’s life on earth and in heaven : in this life we attain to God only in the obscurity of faith and we also run tire risk of losing Him ; in heaven we shall take hold of Him in the clearness of vision with no fear or possibility of ever losing Him. In spite of these two differences, grace and glory are basically the same life, grace being the seed of glory. We see parallels in nature: basically the same life sleeps in the acorn and thrusts upward later in the vigorous oak ; and the same life of reason slumbers in the infant and makes itself actively evident in the grown man. If, therefore, the Blessed Trinity is present and seen un­ veiled in the souls of the blessed, it should surely be plain to us that the triune God dwells in the souls of the just here on earth. St. Paul’s words glow with light from on high when he says: “The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost, who is given to us.” 10 And so we gain a better understanding of what our Lord means and implies in the words: “If anyone love Me . . . Wc will come to him, and will make Our abode with him.” 9 John 4: 10, 14. 10 Rom. 5: 5. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 203 Theology gives us a more exact knowledge of the nature of this mysterious presence. It is not simply the presence of God through some representation of Him within us. A philosopher not in the state of grace can speculate about God and His attributes, and, according to revelation, the Blessed Trinity dwells not within him. Furthermore, a Christian in the state of mortal sin preserves infused faith and hope, thinks about God supernaturally, and even makes some inefficacious acts of love for God ; yet, according to Scripture, the Blessed Trinity dwells not within him. He knows the Blessed Trinity as a distant object imperfectly represented but not really present objectively within him. God is within him only as his conserving cause. Every just soul possesses the special presence of God, a real, objective, and affective presence of the Author of grace. God is within the just man not as some distant object might be represented and loved but as one really present, one known as we know things by experimental knowledge, as St. Thomas puts it.11 God is really present in beings inferior to us not as an object of knowledge and of love but only as their conserving cause. For the Christian in the state of mortal sin, He is, so to say, like a distant object of faith and of hope. In the just he dwells really as an object present to them, and capable of being known quasi-experimentally, of being loved and im­ perfectly possessed, sometimes making Himself felt there as the very life of their life.12 St. Thomas and many other doctors of the Church have thus understood this consoling point of revealed doctrine. 11 Cf. la, dist. 14, q.2, ad 3um; ibid., ad aum. 12 Ja, q.43, a. 3. 204 THE LOVE OF GOD The three divine persons are really and substantially within us as the conserving cause of our natural and supernatural life; and they dwell there besides as the object of loving, quasi-experimental knowledge, most mysterious but very real, and attested to not only by great theologians but by revelation itself. St. Paul speaks of it to the Romans: “For you have not re­ ceived the spirit of bondage again in fear; but you have re­ ceived the spirit of adoption of sons, whereby we cry: Abba (Father). For the Spirit Himself giveth testimony to our spirit, that we are the sons of God.”18 In commenting on this Epistle, St. Thomas says that the Holy Ghost gives us this testimony through the supernatural and filial love which He produces in us and which we know experimentally, al­ though we may find it difficult to distinguish between it and a more or less sentimental natural impulse of love sometimes resembling it. Our Lord Himself has said: “The Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not, nor knoweth Him; but you shall know Him; because He shall abide with you, and shall be in you.” 14 And St. John also tells his disciples, “His unction teacheth you of all things.” 15 Lastly, we read in the Apocalypse: “To him that overcometh, I will give the hidden manna, a spiritual nourishment and ... a new name written, which no man knoweth, but he that receiveth it.” 18 Scripture plainly speaks in these texts of a quasi-experi­ mental knowledge of God present within us. Such knowl13 Rom. 8: 15. 14 John 14:17. 15 I John 2: 27. 18 Apoc. 2:17. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 205 edge alone, according to St. Thomas, can offer an explanation of how God, already present in all things as their conserving cause, becomes really present in a new and special manner in the just as a knowable, known, and loved object. Sanctify­ ing grace, charity, and the gift of wisdom make us capable of possessing the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and, in the darkness of faith, taking a holy joy in Their presence before seeing Them face to face in eternity.17 According to revelation it must be so. If in fact the Holy Ghost has been given to us, we have received Him, and in a sense we possess Him and can revel with holy delight in His presence. Likewise the Fadier and the Son have come to us, with grace and charity, to make their abode. So divine revelation itself speaks and we ought now to have a better grasp of its sense and import. If, by an impossible assumption, God were not already present in a just man as the conserving cause of his natural being, He would become really present in him as the produc­ tive and conserving cause of grace and of charity, and result­ antly as an object of quasi-experimental knowledge and of the supernatural love of friendship.18 The loving and quasi-experimental knowledge of God proceeds, St. Thomas says, from the gift of wisdom, the high­ est of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, which makes us judge everything experimentally in relation to God, the author of salvation and our last end. Both theological wisdom and the gift of wisdom judge all things in relation to God. But theo­ logical wisdom is acquired by study and makes its judgments 17 Cf. St. Thomas, Summa, la, q.43, a.3, ad turn. 18 Earlier in the present work (Vol. I, Part I, chap. 3) we have shown how St. Thomas’ doctrine is superior to Vasquez’s opinion and to the entirely contrary posi­ tion of Suarez. 2o6 THE LOVE OF GOD according to reasoning founded on revelation; the gift of wisdom, on the other hand, makes us judge divine things by a certain connaturality, a sort of supernatural sympathy with them founded on charity.19 This takes place by the in­ spiration of the Holy Ghost, who uses this sympathy aroused by Him to make Himself felt within us.20 Our interior Master makes us in some way taste the mysteries of salvation, show­ ing us how much they conform, in spite of their obscurity, with our highest aspirations. He even gives us some fore­ sight that just what seems most obscure about them is most divine, the darkness shrouding them coming not from their incoherence or absurdity but from the failure of our weak eyes looking upon so brilliant a light. Under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, a special sympathy is established between this transluminous obscurity and charity, an actual and pro­ found sympathy that becomes the principle of a lived and living knowledge far superior to reasoning. We can thus in some manner taste the mystery of the indwelling of the Blessed Trinity when it becomes apparent that it fully con­ forms to the aspirations of charity awakened in us by God Himself. However mysterious this knowledge may be, we find anal­ ogies to it in the natural order. A pure heart, St. Thomas says, knows as if by instinct what is pure without being taught. A loving son needs no psychological studies to teach him what his mother’s ways reveal to him of her heart ; and she herself, through her deep sympathy with him and more truly than reasoning could discover to her, knows the heart of her son. 18 Ila Ilae, q.45, a. 2. ™Îbid., a. I. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 207 John of St. Thomas brings out another, and striking, anal­ ogy. In the natural order, our spiritual soul, without seeing itself as it will see it when separated from the body, at present knows itself experimentally in the acts of which it is the principle, the operations of intellect and will.21 It requires no reasoning to do this.22 Thus, in a sense, but in a mysterious manner, the Holy Ghost gives to the just, inspires in the just, a kind of experimental knowledge of God through the super­ natural acts of trust and filial love, of which He is the prin­ ciple. Such knowledge pertains to the gift of wisdom and is far superior to reasoning. God, die author of grace and of salvation, thus becomes more intimate to us than we are to ourselves, inspiring widiin us profound acts that we our­ selves could not produce, making Himself felt in some way within us as the life of our life.23 21 Cf. John of St. Thomas, in lam, q.43, a.3; also Gardcil, O.P., La structure de l'âme et l'expérience mystique, Π, 172-79. We must not forget, however, that for St. Thomas the separated soul and the angel do not know themselves experimentally without forming an inner word of themselves, for the separated soul and the angel are in themselves intelligible in act but not actually known of themselves. God alone is pure act in the order of intelligibility and of being. Cf. Contra Gentes, Bk. IV, chap. ii. Moreover, in saying this interior word, the soul images the Blessed Trinity: Summa, la, q.93, a. 7, 8. We regret not finding this point of doctrine sufficiently brought out in Father Garden's excellent book from which we have just quoted; in it he has plumbed the depths of so many other aspects of St. Thomas’ doctrine. 22 Likewise our intellect without reasoning apprehends or grasps obscurely the substantial and intelligible being of sensible things as soon as our sense of sight has seized their color or our sense of touch has felt their pressure. This is why Aristotle says that the substance of such things, which is not in itself sensible, is sensible per accidens, accidentally so, for it is immediately grasped by our intellect, without any reasoning, when presented with sensible things. Thus when I see the color of a living face, my intellect perceives its life immediately. Cf. St. Thomas’ De anima, Bk. II, lect. 13. Consciousness itself is enough to enable us to perceive of any individual act of our own intellect and will that it is ours; we have no need of reasoning to recognize it as an act of our soul, our person. "Homo percipit se intelligere.'' Summa, la, q. 87, a. 1. 23 In scholastic terms we would put it this way: Actus amoris filialis est simul id quod cognoscitur et id quo cognoscitur absque discursu Deus habitans et vivificans. 2o8 THE LOVE OF GOD Let us remember that, in regard to this subject, St. Thomas speaks of a knowledge not proper but rather quasi-experimental. Why? Because it is experimental in a sense, having to do with an object not distant but actually present and attaining to it without reasoning. However, it remains only quasi-experimental, as we have said earlier: 24 first, because it apprehends God not in an absolutely immediate way, as occurs in the beatific vision, but in the act of filial love which He produces within us; and secondly, because we cannot distinguish with complete certitude between supernatural acts of love and the natural impulses of the heart that re­ semble them ; moreover, without a special revelation we can­ not be absolutely certain of being in the state of grace.25 Here we have the teaching of theology, and in particular of St. Thomas, on the indwelling of the Blessed Trinity. The three divine persons abide with us permanently. Our union with Them endures as long as the state of grace lasts. Often, for example during sleep, it resembles the theological virtues when unexercised, being only habitual, a disposition or habit. At other times, on the contrary, it becomes actual through the exercise of the theological virtues and the gifts accom­ panying them. Divine union and the higher laws of the order of grace The great mystical doctors, St. John of the Cross particu­ larly, have built their works on the dogma of the indwelling of the Blessed Trinity. The merit of the author of The Darl^ Night consists in showing clearly how actual initial union, 24 Cf. Vol. I, Part I, chap. 3. 26 Cf. la Ilae, q. 112, a. 5. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 209 experienced at times by the just, ought normally to become more intimate, profound, frequent, and almost continual in the true unitive way. The unitive way forms the summit of die interior life in this world, a summit too rarely attained but none the less normal and entered by the saints, after the passive purification of the soul, as the ordinary prelude to eternal life. St. John of the Cross states this truth at die begin­ ning of his works and reaffirms it at die end.26 Let us look back for a moment over the way to be traveled. The journey described by the saint consists in an ascent to­ ward the summit of perfection. The just man keeps climbing upward toward the peace of divine union by struggling gen­ erously against whatever he finds inordinate and disorderly within him. From the start, the Author of grace dwells in the center of his soul, as in an inner sanctuary; but the soul remains too occupied with outside diings and fails to penetrate into its own depths, which remain as yet hidden to it. From time to time the Holy Ghost breathes into it some thought or impulse of heart, speaking softly in the low tones of friend to friend, and often His voice remains unheard because of a tumult of passions, too natural affections, wounded sus­ ceptibilities, and the secret pursuits of pride. To hear the voice of the Holy Ghost, we must keep an interior silence and must merit having His inspirations become less latent, more mani­ fest, luminous, frequent, and urgent. Exterior mortification of body and senses little by little silences inordinate and violent passions, and a beginning is made on the narrow and ascending path of abnegation. As St. Luke tells us, “And He said to all: If any man will come 28 Cf. Ascent of Mt. Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 4. aio THE LOVE OF GOD after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” 27 The Imitation of Christ frequently speaks of tire royal road of the cross, presenting it to us rightly as nothing extraordinary in itself, like prophetic visions and miracles, but the way that all of us should follow to reach heaven, especially if we would arrive there without passing through purgatory. Yet how few of us actually follow it! To encourage us on a way so difficult, our Lord accords us sensible graces that make it easier for us to advance, but after a time we run the risk of becoming attached to these as an end in themselves, although they are but means. Lest, then, sensible consolations should become an obstacle to our prog­ ress, our Lord takes them away from us, He weans us from them, and makes us feel the emptiness of everything created : honor, position, and too human friendships. We begin to see as if experimentally the truth of the words of Scripture: “Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity”—except to love and serve God. Infused contemplation has now begun. At the same time the Lord allows us to be tempted against chastity and patience, virtues grounded in the sensuous ap­ petency; and, as a consequence, we are obliged to react en­ ergetically and so strengthen the virtues greatly. Little by little the sense appetite is purified, subjected to the soul, and becomes less and less an obstacle to divine union. But the soul itself requires purification: it understands the letter of revealed mysteries but must grasp and live by their spirit. It halts at symbols and figures, or again at its own fabrica­ tions, reasonings, and too human, limited, and material in­ terpretations of the divine word. It must go farther into the 27 Luke 9: 23. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 211 depth of the mysteries of the Incarnation, die Redemption, the Eucharist, grace, and the Blessed Trinity; it must live by them for they must be to the soul the sort of nourishment that bread is to the body. This necessitates purification of the soul. St. John of the Cross tells us that the infused light of the gift of understand­ ing effects such a purgation, leading us to the heart of the mysteries of salvation, helping us to find the spirit beneath the letter and the wonderful meaning of the redemptive In­ carnation, and with it, a better discernment of infinite mercy and infinite justice. The soul comes to know as if experi­ mentally the boundless worth of the sacrifice of the cross and of the Mass, the value of the hidden life and the crosses sent to us by God, the abysmal misery of being lost and, by con­ trast, the great happiness of returning to God. The mysteries of faith, in particular the impenetrable mystery of predestination, appear in all their sublimity, and therefore in all their obscurity. Yet the soul in some way as­ certains that the obscurity arises not from the unintelligibility of the mystery but from light so strong as to dazzle us. Often temptations against faith also arise and begin their ques­ tioning: Is it possible that God loved the world enough to give His own Son for it ? If He really did, could the world be so uncomprehending? Is it possible that after this life there exists an eternity of happiness or of irreparable loss ? In the face of our own misery, temptations against hope also arise, temptations of such a character that we must hope on against all hope. In this hard travailing the virtues of faith and of hope sometimes increase tenfold. We believe more and more for the pure and simple motive that God has 212 THE LOVE OF GOD revealed mysteries inaccessible to reason. We hope more and more, unsustained by any human support, with unmixed hope in God’s help alone. Something similar takes place in purified charity: we come to love God for Himself alone, and not for the sensible or spiritual consolations that may come to us from Him; we keep on loving Him as generously in times of dryness as we do in times of joy ; and in the same way we have charity to­ ward our neighbor when he shows us no gratitude, loving him for the pure motive that God loves him, and whatever about him pleases God should please us too. We really ac­ quire some understanding of Christ’s words: “Love one an­ other, as I have loved you. ... By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another.” 28 The command to love God and neighbor in God is thus truly fulfilled and the perfection of charity is reached. The soul enters into its own center, the inner sanctuary, where, after baptism, the Blessed Trinity abides, as long as we re­ main in the state of grace. A deep and almost continual actual union with God succeeds what was heretofore simple habitual union. After this brief summary of matter covered previously, we are now in a better position to answer the important question posed earlier: In the grievous passive purifications is there a law higher than the order of grace at work? It has been sometimes asserted that the passive purifications do not con­ form to a universal law, but are peculiar only to some in­ dividuals, as a result of certain circumstances, like living a cloistered life, for example, or having a predominantly sensi­ tive temperament. 28 John 13: 34. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 213 St. John of the Cross together, we think, with the great masters of the spiritual life, comes to another conclusion. Of course, as has already been conceded, these trials do not al­ ways have the acute character described by Tauler or St. John of the Cross. These masters show them to us in the depths reached by contemplative souls called to great heights, and in a number of cases, given to a life of reparation. Certainly in people dedicated to the apostolate, these interior crosses, even if they exist, stand out less strikingly, for they are mixed with the difficulties of the apostolic life. However, in one way or another, must not all pass through the purifying crucible, where together with humility and patience, fraternal charity shows much growth and points to great love of God ? We agree that this experience constitutes no general law in the sense that no union with God can be achieved without it. In fact, union with God begins with the passive purifica­ tion of the senses, well in advance of the purification of the soul, although at that time it has a very imperfect character. However, we hold that not only predominantly sensitive temperaments need purgation of soul but, because it is a question of the spirit, others as well. Those who wish to reason out everything, who stop at the letter of supernatural mysteries and fail to enter deeply into their spirit, especially in the case of the mystery of the Cross, obviously have just as real a need for spiritual purification. Therefore the question is whether Christians must pass through the passive purification of the soul not to arrive at the lower degrees of the unitive life but to reach transform­ ing union, the true, high, and therefore rare, but normal prelude to the beatific vision. The law here is not universal in the sense of being common, of being frequently found 214 THE LOVE OF GOD in the concrete; it is universal in the sense of being a higher law, relating to a rarely attained but normal summit. We see the normality of this height in the lives of the only really normal people—God’s saints. To arrive at such a summit before death a purification anal­ ogous to purgatory would seem necessary. St. Thomas has not treated ex professo either the growth or the full develop­ ment of the theological virtues and the gifts in the way he has dealt with their nature and properties. However, what he says of the love of enemies, the degrees of humility, and the tribulations of the saints in his commentaries on Job, Isaias, Jeremias, the Psalms, and the Epistles of St. Paul, together with what he teaches concerning the great sufferings of purgatory,29 and what we know of his own deep interior life, show that he was not far from what St. Catherine of Siena,30 Tauler, and St. John of the Cross have expressly told us on the matter. Transforming union as described by St. John of the Cross St. John of the Cross describes transforming union as a state of spiritual perfection, the full flowering of the grace of the virtues and of the gifts.31 He says that perfect spiritual life consists in the possession of God through die union of 20 IV, d.2l, q. I. 30 Cf. The Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, tr. A. Thorold (Westminster, Md.: Newman Bookshop, 1944), pp. 38 f.: "I have already told thee that, by the in­ crease of love, grows grief and pain, wherefore he that grows in love grows in grief. . . . Consider that the love of divine charity is so closely joined in the soul with perfect patience, that neither can leave the soul without the other. Patience cannot be proved in any other way than by suffering, and patience is united with love." 31 Cf. Père Gabriel de Sainte-Madeleine, C.D., ‘‘L’union transformante selon saint Jean de la Croix," Vie Spirituelle, March, 1927, pp. 87 ff. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 215 love,32 and that transforming union is the perfect stage of the spiritual life.33 In The Spiritual Canticle, speaking of the “inner cellars,” he writes: And we may say that there are seven of these degrees or cellars of love, all of which the soul comes to possess when she possesses in perfection the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, in the manner wherein she is able to receive them. ... It must be known that many souls attain to the first cellars and enter therein, each accord­ ing to the perfection of love which he possesses, but few in this life attain to this last and innermost perfection, for in this there comes to pass that perfect union with God which they call the Spiritual Marriage.34 When the soul possesses the full perfection of the gift of wisdom, the highest of the seven gifts received at baptism to­ gether with sanctifying grace, it has arrived at the inner sanctuary wherein the Blessed Trinity abides, and union with God no longer remains habitual but becomes actual and in some way transforming. The soul is deified by receiving a perfect participation in the divine nature. The reason for this is given by St. John of the Cross in a principle stated in the Ascent of Mount Carmel. He says that the more purified and detached the soul becomes in living and perfect faith, the more it possesses infused charity, and the more charity it has, the more the Holy Ghost enlightens it and pours out upon it His gifts, in such a way that charity 82 The Living Flame, st. 2, especially the edition with notes by Father Gerardo, 1912, II, 426; Eng. tr. Peers, III, 55, Complete Works of St. John of the Cross (London: Burns, Oates and Washbourne, 1934). 83 Ibid., p. 427; tr. Peers, III, 56. 84 The Spiritual Canticle, st. 26, Gerardo, Π, 297; Eng. tr. Peers, ΙΠ, 329 f. 2i6 THE LOVE OF GOD is the cause and means of His communication.35 St. Thomas likewise says that the seven gifts are connected with charity and, as a result, like the infused virtues, grow together with it, like parts of the same organism, as fingers grow with the hand.30 In The Living Flame of Love St. John of the Cross adds: “And finally, all the movements and operations which the soul had aforetime, and which belonged to the principle of its natural life, are now in this union changed into move­ ments of God. For the soul, like the true daughter of God that it now is, is moved wholly by the Spirit of God, even as St. Paul says: that they that are moved by the Spirit of God are the sons of God.”36 37 He has something similar to say elsewhere in the same work: We term the deepest centre of a thing the farthest point to which its being and virtue and the force of its operation and movement can attain. . . . Accordingly, we shall say that a stone, when it is within the earth, is in its centre, because it is within the sphere of its activity and movement . . . but it is not in the deepest part of that element . . . and when it attains to its centre and there remains to it no more power of its own to move farther, we shall say that it is in the deepest centre. The centre of the soul is God; and, when the soul has attained to Him according to the whole capacity of its being, and according to the force of its operation, it will have reached the last and deep centre of the soul,38 which will be when with all its powers it loves, 36 Ascent of Mt. Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 29; also Peers, I, 211; The Spiritual Canti­ cle, st. 30. 30 la Ilae, q.68, a. 5; q.66, a. 2. 37 The Living Flame, st. 2, tr. Peers, III, 56 f. 38 The "depth of the soul" is also called die “peak of the soul” in relation to THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 217 understands, and enjoys God; and as long as it attains not as far as this, although it be in God, ... it is not in the deepest centre, since it is capable of going still farther. Love unites the soul with God, and the more degrees of love the soul has, the more pro­ foundly does it enter into God and the more it is centred in Him. ... If it attain to the last degree, the love of God will succeed in wounding the soul even in its deepest centre—that is, in trans­ forming and enlightening it as regards all the being and power and virtue of the soul, such as it is capable of receiving, until it be brought into such a state that it appears to be God. In this state the soul is like the crystal that is clear and pure; the more degrees of light it receives the greater concentration of light there is in it, and this enlightenment continues to such a degree that at last it attains a point at which the light is centred in it with such abundance that it comes to appear to be wholly light, and cannot be distinguished from the light, for it is enlightened to the greatest possible extent and thus appears to be light itself.* 39 38 We read in The Spiritual Canticle: “And thus I think that this estate is never attained without the soul being confirmed in grace therein.” This truth implies a certain participation in the impeccability of the blessed, brought about by God’s special protection.40 In this state God touches the soul so deeply that the mystics tell us that the divine contact makes an imprint on the very substance of die soul. What are we to understand by this statement in the light of St. Thomas’ principles? As has been explained elsewhere,41 God keeps die substance of the soul sensible things, according to whether they are considered as exterior or as in­ ferior to it. 38 Ibid., SL I, tr. Peers, III, 24 f, 40 Ibid., st. 22, Peers, II, 308. Cf. Salmanticcnses, De gratia, q. no, disp. Ill, dub. xi, no. 259. 41 Perfection chrétienne et contemplation, Fr. ed., II, 560. 2l8 THE LOVE OF GOD in existence by an act identified with His divine essence, the work of creation continued.42 Between the divine essence and the soul there exists a contact not quantitative and spatial, but supra-spatial, spiritual, and absolutely immediate. By this contact God operates immediately on the soul’s substance, although the soul cannot operate immediately on itself; it can act, as a matter of fact, only by its faculties, knowing only by its intellect, loving and willing only by its will.48 Further, God, the author of salvation, produces and con­ serves sanctifying grace in the very essence of the soul. From it the infused virtues and the gifts arise in the faculties.44 He also moves the faculties either by proposing an object to them, or by applying them to the exercise of their acts ab intus, from within.45 The divine touch which we are speaking of is a supernatural but deeper motion of this kind, acting on the very center of the will and of the intellect, where the faculties are rooted in the substance of the soul as their source.4® Closer to the soul titan the soul is to itself as the 42 la, q.8, a. I, 2, 3. 43 la, q. 54, a. I, 2, 3; q.77, a. 1, 2. 44 la Ilae, q. no, a.3, 4. 48 la Ilae, q.9, a. 4; q. 10, a. 4. 40 Cf. Louis de Blois, Institutio spiritualis, chap. 12, where he says that the depth of the soul spoken of by most mystics apropos of the subject of transforming union, is the point of origin of the higher faculties, "virium illarum est origo." Louis de Blois says, ibid., in summing up Tauler: “Then, wholly turned toward God in pure love and inundated at the very depth of its essence by light incom­ prehensible, the eye of reason and of intellect is as though dazzled. . . . Then it knows by experience that God is infinitely above every representation of Him and everything that the intellect can comprehend. ... It is lost in the solitary and obscure immensity of the Divinity, but lost in such a way as to find itself." St. John of the Cross also says in The Living Flame, st. 1: “The joy of the Holy Ghost is poured out in the substance of the soul, inaccessible to the senses and to Satan.” Does he mean by this that the substance of the soul itself knows, loves, joys, without its faculties? We see that he docs not from the context which reads: “At the soul’s centre and inmost depth only the Holy Ghost is capable of making it act and of operating without the intervention of the senses.” St. John of the Cross and the THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 219 conserving cause of its existence, God moves the center of its faculties from within by a spiritual contact, which, despite the obscurity of faith, reveals itself as divine. This does not mean that the purified soul knows in an im­ mediate and absolute manner its own substance and the sanctifying grace that it possesses, for the soul cannot operate immediately, without the concurrence of its faculties; but now it knows itself through the center of its supernaturalized faculties. Under the infused light of faith and of the gift of wisdom it has a quasi-experimental knowledge of the sancti­ fying grace which it possesses by the effect of a filial love more and more clearly distinguishable from sentimentality.47 This supernatural love derived from grace and charity acts without reasoning by the infused light of the gift of wisdom and makes manifest to us God Himself present within us, giving us life, leading us to love Him with ever greater purity and strength, stirring up within us the desire to behold Him. Let us add what The Spiritual Canticle has to tell us about spiritual betrothal: “It is not to be understood that to all such as arrive at this estate He communicates all that is ex­ pounded in these two stanzas, nor tliat He does so according to one single way and degree of knowledge and feeling. For to some souls He gives more and to others less; to some after one manner and to others after another; though souls be­ majority of mystics speak descriptively and not ontologically, like experimental psychologists rather than like metaphysicians who prove that an angel and a soul can act only through their faculties, establishing a real distinction between the soul and its faculties through the formal objects of the latter. St. Thomas wrote from a metaphysical point of view when he composed his famous articles, utrum essentia angeli sit sua virtus intellectiva (Ia. q.54, a.3); utrum essentia animae sit ejus potentia (la, q.77, a. 1). We have in the metaphysical and in the mystical two different but not contradictory viewpoints. 47 Cf. St. Thomas, in Ep. ad Rom. 8: 16. 220 THE LOVE OF GOD longing to either category can be in this estate of the spirit­ ual betrothal. But we set down here the highest that is possible because in this is comprehended all else.” 48 The same can be stated of quasi-continual transforming union as of spirit­ ual marriage: it certainly admits of different degrees, includ­ ing that enjoyed by the Blessed Virgin Mary during her lifetime on earth. Although souls may possess different de­ grees of transforming union we can truly say of all of them that they have reached their deepest and predestined center in this world. Thus understood, the transforming union seems like the normal result of the abiding of the Blessed Trinity in a really purified soul, that is, a soul that has gone through the pas­ sive purifications to the end. As St. Thomas shows us, the indwelling of the divine persons requires from the very begin­ ning a certain quasi-experimental knowledge of God, or at least the supernatural capacity for this knowledge through charity and the gift of wisdom. As the soul approaches the end of the passive purifications by the royal road of the cross, it reaches its full and normal development. Then the soul imitates our Lord perfectly. Throughout His lifetime on earth, because of His fullness of grace, He possessed supreme happiness, perfect peace, and a strong de­ sire for the cross as well, an ardor to accomplish fully His mission as Savior, priest, and victim. Perfect peace remained His even during the Passion and on the cross when He said, “It is consummated. . . . Father, into Thy hands I com­ mend My spirit.” Indeed here was true peace, the tranquil­ lity of order recovered through the reconciliation of sinning humanity with its Creator. Something of the peace of Christ, 48 The Spiritual Canticle, st. 14, tr. Peers, ΙΠ, 259. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 221 of the peace that holds fast even in the midst of adversities, belongs to the soul that has reached the transforming union. Jesus speaks of it in the beatitudes: “Blessed are they that mourn. . . . Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice. . . . Blessed are the peacemakers. . . . Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice’ sake” and that, in the very midst of persecution, keep a deep peace not only for themselves but for others, to whom they communicate it, lifting up the hearts of all, even the most discouraged. The commandment of love finds its complete realization in this life in perfect union with God : “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart” 49—from the very begin­ ning, die time of sensible consolations, we love God with our whole heart; “and widi thy whole soul”—when we are glad to spend ourselves in all kinds of work for our Lord then we love Him with our whole soul; “with all thy strength”—only later, especially during the painful purification of the soul can we be said to love God with all our strength; “and with thy whole mind”—before being purified die soul rarely mounted to the higher part of itself, the spirit, but after it has been purified it becomes established there, a true adorer in spirit and in truth. The realization of such a union with God means the per­ fect consummation of the life of grace in this world and serves as a normal prelude to the life of heaven. It disposes souls to receive the beatific vision immediately after death, widiout passing through purgatory. None of us pass that way but dirough our own fault, as a result of negligences that could have been avoided by a more generous acceptance of the cross. 49 Luke io: 27. 222 THE LOVE OF GOD Because this union forms a prelude to the life of heaven, it has, St. John of the Cross says, the “savor of eternal life.” St. Thomas designates it by the expression “inchoatio vitae aeternae" life eternal begun in the obscurity of faith before opening out into the definitive flowering of vision. Few Christians reach such perfection in this world; yet, because of the first commandment, all of us ought to aspire to a charity increasing day by day and all of us should recall that, as St. John of the Cross has pointed out, in the evening of life we shall be judged by love, on the reality of our love for God and of our neighbor in God.50 Ύhe life of union and the invisible missions of the divine persons Louis Chardon stands out among Thomistic theologians for the skill with which he has shown how transforming union normally results from die indwelling of the Blessed Trinity in a truly purified soul. In La Croix de Jésus he says: That true friendship which should exist between God and the holy soul is founded on grace. Now it is a law that perfect friend­ ship produces union not merely by affection, but also, so far as possible,51 real and intimate presence, that there may be a trans50 The whole doctrine of St. John of the Cross is summarized in the beautiful verses which he uses for his commentary in The Living Flame, tr. Peers, III, 18: Oh, living flame of love That tenderly woundest my soul in its deepest centre. Since thou art no longer oppressive, perfect me now if it be thy will, Break the web of this sweet encounter. Oh, sweet burn! Oh, delectable wound! Oh, soft hand! Oh, delicate touch That savours of eternal life and pays every debt! In slaying, thou hast changed death into life. 81 Even in this life created charity, since it constitutes an affective union, causes at least a desire for real union; on the other hand God, uncreated charity, pro­ duces this real union by preserving and increasing the life of grace within us and THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 223 formation of lover into the beloved, a complete union in which the beloved withholds nothing. Therefore, as the soul advances in God’s friendship, grace, the form or, if you will, the cause of this friendship, dominates its essence and powers more and more fully, taking more intimate possession of them. Because of this, the divine persons have a more perfect presence within the soul. They dwell in souls only by means of grace and its properties and They pro­ duce within them effects that reveal to us more the action of God than of creatures. This transformation reaches a point in some souls where we can hardly discern anything human any more. As a drop of water spilt into a cask of wine is entirely lost by taking on the color, the odor, and the taste of wine; as the glowing iron resembles the fire which penetrates it; and as the air filled with the sun’s rays becomes transformed into light and seems to be light itself rather than another element illuminated by it: in like manner souls die a wonderful and mysterious death to all affection and to every human operation and become so perfectly possessed by the Spirit of God, so united to Him and so deified in Him, that the glorious Trinity lives, operates, and acts in them more really than they do in themselves.52 Louis Chardon deduces three important truths from the relation of the growth of charity to the divine and invisible missions. The first is that (having already received the divine missions with the state of grace) souls must make considerable progress in grace to receive them anew. . . . Those who make no advance in the spiritual life fail to dispose themselves to receive the divine persons anew (or to enter into greater intimacy with Them). bringing us to perform supernatural acts. See Vol. I, Part I, chap. 3, of the present work. 62 La Croix de Jésus, entretien 3, chap. 6, at end. (Paris: cd. Lcthicllcux, 1895), Π, 297 S. 224 THE LOVE OF GOD The second truth is that no kind of knowledge of God, how­ ever profound, subtle, or clear it may be, can render a soul worthy of these missions. ... It must be rooted in grace . . . and in grace that grows, is fruitful, acts with increasing energy, and at­ tains to greater heights of perfection. Savants fail to dispose them­ selves for these blessed missions when they trouble themselves more about knowing the mystery of the Trinity than of making themselves pleasing to the glorious and triune God, when they possess more curiosity about divinity than attentive and eager love for the divine Being, when, in a word, their charity lags be­ hind their knowledge. The third truth is that no grace, no knowledge, no perfection of the spiritual (i.e., the supernatural) order can exist without the invisible missions of the divine persons. It is not enough for Paul to plant, for Apollo to water: God must give the increase. ... I dare add that the visible sending of the divine persons (the In­ carnation and Pentecost) have effect and application in souls only through the invisible missions. ... It should not astonish us to find Jesus deeming His mother happier for having conceived Him in her spirit than for having conceived and borne Him in her womb. The mystery of the Incarnation gave Him to her but once; the invisible mission gives Him to her again every time the super­ abundant grace within her increases. . . . The first plenitude of grace was given to her at the Immaculate Conception. . . . The second came to her with her divine Son, when she became His mother. . . . The third descended upon her when the Holy Ghost was given to her visibly in the Cenacle on the day of Pentecost. The first served as a preparation for the second, and the third per­ fected the other two.53 Chardon skillfully applies the doctrine of the invisible mis­ sions to the spiritual crosses received by advanced souls, b3lbid., pp. 299-306. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 225 either for their purification or for their participation, with Jesus and Mary, in the work of their neighbor’s salvation.64 He shows that the hardest crosses are reserved for the most perfect, that they bring about great perfection and close union with God, drawing into the soul a new sending of the divine persons. The original edition contains these words: Spiritual crosses, being powerful means of purifying the spirit, help to attract a more perfect mission of the divine persons. The more afflicting the cross, the more it severs the soul from other things, and the more perfectly it prepares the soul for an increas­ ingly intimate abiding of the Trinity. Crosses rather than con­ solations introduce God into the most secret and profound recesses of the soul. The soul grows from tenderness into strength, leaving aside sensible affections to receive whatever impressions God Himself will make upon it. Lest too frequent consolations interfere with our tending toward Him, God stops up the sweet stream of consola­ tion to make our thirst drive us in search of the source. He keeps back His gifts that He may bestow Himself. . . . Gently He enters our souls and makes Himself master, claiming the attention of all our powers, that they my enjoy the one necessary Good and, as they should, love Him with a love far above the love of all other things, since He is the Creator and they arc His creatures.56 How beautifully all this is said! Could wc find a more closely knit union of speculative theology and true mysticism ? Could there be a better demonstration that the transforming union alluded to by the saints is the normal result of the 54 Ibid., entretien 3, chap. 8. 65 Original edition, pp. 471-76, 149. 220 THE LOVE OF GOD indwelling of the three divine persons in a truly purified soul?56 Evidence in St. Teresas writings The account of the transforming union given by St. John of the Cross and Louis Chardon’s explanation of it by the progress of grace and the invisible missions of the divine persons are both sublime. St. Teresa’s writings in the seventh mansions belong to the same high level. She remarks that some people in these mansions have an intellectual vision of the Blessed Trinity present within them; but that this in­ sight varies in clarity and occurs intermittently, does not be­ long to the essence of transforming union, and even seems to have no necessary connection with it, St. John of the Cross contenting himself with describing it as a very high contem­ plation of the divine perfections. St. Teresa also observes57 that when such union has been reached ecstacies generally come to an end, and that what constitutes the bedrock of this most eminent state is nothing miraculous; the higher faculties are passively attracted to their deepest center, where the Blessed Trinity abides. Be­ cause of this grace, the soul cannot doubt the presence of the divine persons within itself and is almost never deprived of their companionship. St. Teresa says that the soul recognizes by certain secret aspirations that God is giving it life.58 Many authors consider the graces of this mansion the equiv60 Blessed Grignon de Montfort leads us to the same conclusion under a dif­ ferent form in his excellent books, La vraie dévotion à Marie, tr. Montfort Fathers (Bayshore, N.Y.: 1941), Lettre circulaire aux amis de la Croix (Paris: A. Le Clerc, 1845), L’Amour de la divine Sagesse (Paris: Gaumc frères, 1856). The last named work recalls the beautiful pages of Blessed Henry Suso, which arc penetrated with the same traditional doctrine just set down here. 57 Interior Castle, Seventh Mansion, chap. 3. 58 Ibid., chap. 2. THE ABIDING OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 227 alent of a special revelation making the soul certain of its state of grace and predestination.59 The effects of the transforming union are those of the fully developed theological virtues and the gifts. The passions hardly trouble at all the souls that possess it; while they ex­ perience the actual grace of the transforming union they commit no deliberate venial sin.60 Outside of these times they may happen to commit some faults, but they quickly make reparation for them. What is striking about them is their self-forgetfulness, their great desire to suffer after our Lord’s example, and their real joy in persecution. They share in the very strength of Christ and in His boundless love of neighbor; they practice at the same time seemingly contra­ dictory virtues, justice and mercy, strength and gentleness, the simplicity of the dove and the wisdom of the serpent, uniting the highest possible contemplation with practical common sense about their daily concerns, bearing a marked likeness to Christ.61 St. Catherine of Siena in her Dialogue62 gives a like report of this state. Wherever we find it described we see set before us the dispositions of a soul purified and prepared for immediate entrance into heaven after death. 59 Cf. Philip of the Blessed Trinity, T/ieologia mystica, Proem., a. 8; Scaramclli, Dir. myst., tr. II, c.22, no. 258; Mcynard, O.P., Vie intérieure, Vol. II, no. 270. Certain passages from great orthodox mystics arc thus reconciled with what the Council of Trent says, that without a special revelation no one in this life can be sure of being in the state of grace, and with greater reason, of persevering in grace until death. Sess. 6, chap. 9 ct 12; can. 13, 14, 16. 60 St. Teresa, op. cit., Seventh Mansion, chap. 2. 61 Pascal greatly admired the harmony between virtues apparently quite con­ trary: “I admire an excess of one virtue, like bravery, only if I sec at the same time its opposite virtue, as in the case of Epaminondas, who was extremely brave and extremely benign, for to have one and not the other is not to mount high but to fall low. Greatness is not to be found in reaching one extreme but in touching both extremes at the same time and in fulfilling too all drat lies between them.” Penséer no. 353, ed. E. Brunschvicg. 02 Treatise of Divine Providence, tr. Thorold, pp. 26 ft. CHAPTER XII The Place of the Unitive Life and the Mystical Order A comparison of the views of St. Alphonsus with the thought of St. Thomas and St. John of the Cross1 All that has gone before shows clearly enough, we believe, that the unitive life, like the passive purifications of the senses and of the soul presupposed by it, belongs to die mystical order, that is to say, it requires infused contemplation of the mysteries of faith. The testimony of St. John of the Cross is explicit on the point and seems to conform perfectly to tradition.2 However, because St. Alphonsus Liguori has some­ times been quoted as opposed to him, we should like to make certainty more certain by comparing the two. Father Charles Keusch of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer has recently published a study on the spirit­ uality of St. Alphonsus which will be of service in making this comparison.3 His work purposes to make people more familiar widi St. Alphonsus’ thought on the relationship between the ascetical and the mystical life : whether the ascet­ ical is ordered to the mystical as to its normal fulfillment, or 1 Author’s note: The reading of the present chapter is not at all necessary to follow the thought developed throughout the whole work. It serves as a sort of ap­ pendix to the preceding chapter. 2 Elsewhere, in Christian Perfection and Contemplation, pp. 178, 235—38, 259 f., 268 (f., we have shown the accord of the masters concerning the normal although eminent character of infused contemplation. 3 La vie spirituelle, June, 1927, pp. [189] to [210]. 228 PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 229 whether, on the contrary, infused contemplation of the mys­ teries of faith consists in something by nature extraordinary and outside of the normal way of sanctity, like revelations and visions. Because St. Alphonsus has sometimes been quoted as supporting the second point of view, defended by many authors of his time, we are fortunate to have the different shadings of his doctrine brought out with great delicacy and distinction by one of his sons dedicated in a special way to the study of his spiritual doctrine. With him let us examine the general characteristics of St. Alphonsus’ teaching on spirituality and then let us compare it with the doctrine set forth in this work, following St. Thomas’ principles and their application to spiritual progress as worked out by St. John of the Cross. ARTICLE I THE SPIRITUALITY OF ST. ALPHONSUS: ITS GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS After twenty years of work, Father Keusch has put be­ fore us his explanation of St. Alphonsus in the book, Die Aszetil^ des hl. Alfons Maria von Liguori, im Lichte der Lehre vom geistlichen Leben in alter und neuer Zeit* This work has had three editions in ten years and has been highly praised at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, where the author brilliantly defended his doctrinal thesis. It contains a pene­ trating study of the personality of St. Alphonsus, an examina­ tion of the early and modern sources on which he drew, and the entire literature concerning the subject. 4 Druc^ und Verlag der Bonijacius-Drucl^erei, Paderborn, 1926, Zweite und drittc Auflagc, i vol. in-8, 407 pp. 230 THE LOVE OF GOD The doctrinal points gone into most deeply include the concept of perfection, the call to perfection for Christians in general, and for priests and religious in particular, detach­ ment, and divine union. To reach some conclusion on the value of this spirituality, Father Keusch considers it in the light of St. Thomas’ principles and then compares it with the more modern schools of spirituality of St. Ignatius, St. Francis de Sales, and St. Vincent de Paul. Some critics ac­ cuse him of straining to prove the harmony of St. Alphonsus’ views with St. Thomas’ and do not believe that the Doctor of Salvation was actually so completely Thomistic in his doctrine. The author answers that he has made his appraisal from a theological rather than from a historical point of view and that, to arrive at an exact definition of doctrine, he could choose no better guide than St. Thomas. St. Alphonsus’ at­ tachment to the Angelic Doctor is furthermore deeper than is generally supposed. Shortly after his death, a Dominican master of theology, Father Vincenzo Gregorio Lavazzoli, professor at the Theological College of St. Thomas at Naples, wrote: “We are fully aware of how much the servant of God loved our Order and especially St. Thomas, whom he took as his only and sure guide in all his works.”5 The spiritual works of St. Alphonsus are to be recom­ mended because of their doctrinal certainty, the saintly unc­ tion found on every page and, above all, because of their eminently practical character. They are calculated to round out the great speculative views to which St. Thomas ac6 Reproduced at the beginning of A. M. Tannoja’s Mémoires stir la vie et Vinstitut de saint Alphonse, 3 vols. (Naples, 1793-1802). PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 231 customs us, and to show how these ought to give direction to our daily actions in advancing toward perfection. St. Alphonsus has been declared a doctor of die Church precisely because of his sure doctrine on moral and spiritual matters. He was given by God to His Church at a time when the Jansenist heresy was turning souls away from the con­ templation of infinite mercy, when quietist errors tended to drive generosity out of the service of God, when the doctrines of Voltaire, Rousseau, and the Encyclopedists were ravag­ ing the minds of men. In die sorry eighteenth century this great saint served as die voice of God reminding men of His indefeasible rights and even more of His boundless mercy, restating the greatness of the divine law and the Christian conscience. He gave new life to moral doctrine, dien so often smothered under the vain discussions of casuists more inter­ ested in the material circumstances of human acts than in the divine exigencies of the last end; and he re-established, for the greater good of souls, the confessional as the center of parochial life. As to spirituality properly so called, he condnued the work of the sanctification of the common people undertaken by St. Dominic and St. Francis of Assisi in the thirteenth cen­ tury and continued by St. Francis de Sales in the seventeenth. The latter had, as it were, brought spirituality out of die cloister and among seculars but his Introduction to the De­ vout Life addressed only people of culture. St. Alphonsus Liguori, like the great popular preachers of the Middle Ages, brought himself down to poor folk, to country people, who were receiving all too little care, that he might teach them, in language wonderfully suited to dieir understanding, the 232 THE LOVE OF GOD beauty of the mysteries of faith and of the Christian life. His excellent hymns to the Blessed Sacrament, always so popular in Italy, lifted up the souls of the simple, revealing to them the grandeur of the mysteries of the Rosary, the beauties of the Eucharist, the practice of the love of God, the great means of prayer. In his day he became throughout the whole region around Naples an incarnation of the gospel spirit: “The poor have the gospel preached to them.” ® After perusal of his wonderful life, no one could travel through that part of the country or visit the shrine of Pagani, where his relics are ven­ erated, without being deeply stirred and moved to thank God for having raised up for His Church at such a time a saint who has left us both his teachings and sons to difluse them.7 St. Alphonsus’ influence is not limited to this one field only; he deeply affected the clergy and religious, both men and women. We can always read with much profit the Selva or The Sanctified Priest, the different writings relative to pas­ toral life and its great responsibilities, the counsels given to his sons, particularly to student novices, on the relations be­ tween piety and study. In these he shows how piety should animate and supernaturalize study and how study should preserve piety from errors due to imagination and sentiment. Many religious find their spiritual nourishment in The True Spouse of Jesus Christ, Visits to the Blessed Sacrament, The Glories of Mary, The Way of Salvation, the second part of “Mart. 11:5. 7 One of the best popularizcrs of St. Alphonsus in France is Père Achille Desurmont. He has published several well-known books, I'Art d’assurer son salut, Le Credo el la Providence, La Chanté sacerdotale. The second of these works partic­ ularly contains a study of the mysteries of Providence in the spirit of St. Alphonsus, considered from a doctrinal, ascctical, and social viewpoint. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 233 which contains the best “reflections for souls desiring to ad­ vance in divine love.” These “reflections” of some sixty pages suffice of themselves to show the sublimity of the doctrine proposed by the saint to every really interior Christian de­ sirous of advancing in God’s love. A soul of deep and unremitting prayer and of perfect ab­ negation, the founder of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer went through, as we know, the most grievous in­ terior purifications and the most wounding exterior trials that the founder of an order could know. This is why, even when St. Alphonsus treats only questions of the ascetical or­ der or when he speaks of moral virtues and gives practical advice for beginners, his words have the inspiration of mysti­ cal truths, the breath of the theological virtues, the greatness of the spirit of faith, the confidence of abandonment, and the generosity of charity. These presuppose the light of the gifts of wisdom and of understanding and point ahead to the higher end to which asceticism is ordered, the intimacy of divine union. If many of St. Alphonsus’ works have a clearly defined practical character, let us not forget that the great height of his spirit of faith and the increasingly generous aspiration of his heart belong to the mystical order and serve well to turn souls toward all that belongs to the normal way of salvation, toward everything that ought to dispose them for the life of heaven, the possession of God through the beatific vision. When, for example during a retreat, we take time to read slowly and in God’s presence the spiritual writings of this great servant of His, we see how much he was ruled by the Holy Ghost and what a high degree of divine union he en­ joyed. Under the influence of the seven gifts, his union with 234 THE LOVE OE GOD God was not only active but passive as well, patiebatur divina. From this source his life drew its sublimity, its power, and, in spite of the multiplicity of acts involved in certain practices of his,8 its unity. This could not help but be apparent to the good Christian people to whom he preached; his words awoke in them a desire for union with God in the full sense of the commandment of love, which sets no limits whatever to charity but bids us love with all our heart. Some people with their minds full of external things felt his power less because of his great prudence, his care to warn them against exaltation; others, of a more spiritual mold, felt it all the better for that, his very prudence dispelling all compromise, simulation, and illusion. ARTICLE II A COMPARISON OF THE SPIRITUALITY OF ST. ALPHONSUS WITH THE PRINCIPLES OF ST. THOMAS AND THE DOCTRINE OF ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS We now return to a question introduced at the beginning of the chapter: Does St. Alphonsus consider, as we have often taught,9 that the ascetical is ordered to the mystical as to its normal consummation? To put it more precisely, does he hold that infused contemplation—absolutely distinct from 8 In his life of the saint. Père Berthe relates, chap. 6, that each evening before going to sleep the saint made himself say ten acts of love, ten acts of trust, ten acts of contrition, ten acts of conformity to God’s will, to which he adds acts of love and abandonment to our Lord and the Blessed Mother. This multiplicity of acts belonged chiefly to the lower faculties but in the intellect and will there was rather a continuous act such as that performed by a man of prayer when reciting the Rosary. His attentive search for ways of pleasing God evidences St. Alphonsus’ great charity. 9 Cf. Christian Perfection and Contemplation and a number of articles appearing in La vie spirituelle from 1919 to 1929· PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 235 extraordinary graces such as prophetic revelations, visions, stigmatizations, and so forth—forms part of the normal way of sanctity, is die full perfection of the Christian life; or radier, since in fact we so rarely encounter infused contem­ plation or perfection itself for that matter, does he look upon it as something extraordinary, like private revelations? The question often arises these days, and we encounter it stated in oversimplified terms not only to the neglect of the nuances of the subject but also to the disregard of its essen­ tials. As a result, it is robbed of significance, and the answer to it which we maintain as traditional also loses meaning and importance and becomes strangely distorted either by those who admit it spontaneously without sufficient reflection or those who reject it without any thorough examination. Father Keusch, who has spent his life studying the spiritual doctrine of St. Alphonsus and desires to follow him faith­ fully, tells us of diis matter: La vie spirituelle has given new life ... to St. Thomas’ doctrine on perfection, the gifts of the Holy Ghost, and contemplation. It has broken down, so to say, the barriers of the school of pure as­ ceticism to allow the integral notion of sanctity to shine out with much greater luster than before. ... In themselves, it seems . . . these beautiful doctrines are not in opposition to the deep thought of St. Alphonsus. The holy doctor admits—we have no formal text to deny it—the unicity of the interior life, and for sanctity the possibility of the existence of . . . and even a certain necessity for, transitory infused prayer. For reasons of theology, of experi­ ence, and of conscience, which we have set forth, he thinks that mystical states of more intense development are not necessary, although elsewhere he concedes their high efficacy and excellence.10 10 La vie spirituelle, June, 1927, pp. [207] fl. 236 THE LOVE OF GOD Father Keusch’s judgment, because of his profound knowl­ edge of St. Alphonsus’ spirituality, is of great interest, and we are happy to see it formulated in this wise. He adds a little farther on : The apparent opposition between St. Alphonsus’ doctrine and that given in La vie spirituelle arises in my opinion from diversity of method. La vie spirituelle sees things “from the heights.” . . . It shows us the origins, development, and consummation of the interior life in the light of Thomistic principles. Its point of view we share in many ways and believe that its sublime outline cor­ rectly sketches the approaches to heaven. The zealous apostle St. Alphonsus has followed the opposite method. A man in the midst of an active life, he sees things “from the valleys” . . . and builds his theory from experience, although he takes into consideration the data of theology.11 “We conclude then,” Father Keusch finishes by saying, “that there seems to be no fundamental doctrinal discord be­ tween St. Alphonsus and La vie spirituelle, although in questions of method diversity appears. Let us add a prayer that it be often given us to complete the teachings of the Angelic Doctor with the thought of the Zealous Doctor for the inevitable profit of souls.” Having taken up again recently the invigorating spiritual works of St. Alphonsus, which we propose to study further with the purpose that Father Keusch desired to have pursued, we are led to believe that the doctrinal accord is even more complete than he thinks and that the difference of method, although it exists, seems more apparent than real. A brief examination of these two questions will therefore follow. 11 Ibid., p. [209]. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 237 Diversity of method In speaking of method, we must make a distinction here between the method of doctrinal exposition that is followed in such articles as we have written for La vie spirituelle and the method of practical teaching to be used for preaching, which must be adapted to different audiences, and lastly, the method of direction, which must be suited to individual souls. In the latter case, the question arises not only of the preservation of a logical sequence of ideas, but of prudence; and when we recall how St. Thomas cautions us to practice this virtue,12 we can, it seems, fully agree with St. Alphonsus. St. Thomas is the first to tell us that a foreseen and desired end is first in the order of intention but last in the order of realization.13 Accomplishment must begin by employing the lowest kinds of means in order to rise by degrees to the use of higher means and so to come at last to achieve the end, conceived, desired, and willed before anything else. Else­ where 14 we have developed the consequence of this principle of spirituality. The most elementary prudence moves us never to lose sight of it. A saying goes that a good life is thought out during youth and realized during maturity. The conception of an ideal comes at the beginning; its realiza­ tion only at the end. The architect first conceives the building that he plans to erect in all its grandeur and beauty and then he decides on the means that he must use to build it, and when he starts 12 Ila Ilae, q.47, a. 56. 13 la Ilae, q.i, a. 4. 14 Cf. La vic spirituelle, September, 1927, pp. 573-89, ‘"Ne brûlons pas les étapes,” an article reproduced in the 7th edition of Perfection chrétienne et contem­ plation, pp. 776-89. 238 THE LOVE OF GOD construction it never occurs to him to begin the arches be­ fore laying the foundation. What must we think of any director who, having disclosed to someone under his direc­ tion the beauty of Christian perfection by reading the evan­ gelical beatitudes to him from the Sermon on the Mount, then attempts to begin the construction of his spiritual edifice not with the foundation, by the spade work of humility, mortification, and obedience, but with the topmost part of the building? He would be like an architect essaying to be­ gin the erection of a cathedral with the spire or a young bird trying to fly before growing its wings. From this viewpoint, the most elementary common sense demands that we admit as indispensable the first of the three propositions drawn up by Father Keusch as representing St. Alphonsus’ thought. Father Keusch summarizes it thus: “Be­ fore introducing a soul into the higher regions of the spiritual life constituted by the presence of the mystical element or by the exercise of the prayer of contemplation properly so called, St. Alphonsus demanded with redoubled insistence that the life of ordinary virtue be first quite solidly established.” 15 Following St. Thomas,1® we have always said the same thing: that the active life or the practice of the moral virtues regulat­ ing the movements of our sensuous appetency and the acts of our will must precede the contemplative life, which be­ comes thereafter the soul of the apostolate.17 The expression “rushing souls into the mystical way” shocks us no less than tire disciples of St. Alphonsus. No serious theologian, and no director with even a modicum of 15 La vie spirituelle, June, 1927, p. [199]. 18Ila line, q. 182, a.4. 1T Ibid., q. 188, a. 6. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 239 prudence, would adopt such a policy. There seems little dif­ ference between pushing people into the mystical way and forcing them to prophesy or work miracles; for, after all, de­ spite the fact that we maintain that infused contemplation of the mysteries of faith belongs to the normal way of sanctity, we firmly hold that God infuses it into our souls and that none of us can acquire it by our own efforts or introduce others into it by means of direction. The quietists, on the con­ trary, upheld their passivity as acquired, as entered upon at will through the cessation of all activity, a sort of pious sleep. A much more understandable expression is to be found earlier in Father Keusch’s work where he says: “St. Alphon­ sus does not belittle mystical graces; quite the opposite, he presents them as desirable but only for those souls who are prepared for them by God’s invitation.” We should recognize the great prudence that St. Alphonsus shows here. He is more the mystic than he would have us know. When he speaks of these sublime things to the general run of pious souls, he prudently tones down what he has to say in order to avoid the risk of having them overreach God’s grace. In this prudence, every director should imitate him, especially when dealing with youthful imaginations, for he was, as Father Keusch says, one of the most skilled handlers of souls that ever lived.18 Let us not forget, however, that he avoided 18 We have no need of a great deal of experience with «ouïs to know that when we speak too soon to young religious about passive purifications instead of simply saying that we should carry our cross daily, some of them are going to conclude that they have entered the dark night of the soul at the first experience of dryness or darkness. Nothing could be more ridiculous. They could well have the first chapters of The Dark, Night read to them, since these deal with the faults of beginners, the seven capital sins as they are encountered in the life of piety under the guise of spiritual sensuality or spiritual pride; but it is wise to wait before giving them all the works of St. John of the Cross, for some of them, thinking that they have already overcome the faults of beginners, will 24o THE LOVE OF GOD both of two extremes. He knew that a director should inter­ vene neither too early nor too late and he said that sometimes “God calls us without being heard.” 19 As soon as “God’s invitations” began in souls under his direction he would detect them because of his supernatural vigilance. Many other directors discover them only much later and allow souls to mark time for a long period because, for example, they at­ tribute to melancholy the aridities attendant on the begin­ ning of habitual infused prayer.20 The prudent practical direction given by St. Alphonsus in no way runs counter to the speculative doctrine that the normal development of the gifts of the Holy Ghost includes not an individual and proximate but a general and remote call to all interior souls to enter upon infused contemplation of the mysteries of faith.21 St. Alphonsus’ prudence makes him give that kind of direction which leads souls to desire divine union without telling them exactly how contempla­ tion of the mysteries of faith contributes to that end. We go on to read with avidity the second book of The Dark. Night and The Living Tlame as well; they will thus rob these beautiful works of their freshness by attempt­ ing to become acquainted with them too soon and grasping no more than their outer expression; later others more humble than they will be nourishing them­ selves with these living fruits but they will be incapable of assimilating them be­ cause they have not grown up, resembling toddlers who despise milk but cannot yet chew meat. Everything in its place and time: otherwise we shall have something like spirituality rather than spirituality itself, an absolutely deplorable thing. Monstrosi­ ties can be made by applying a form beautiful in itself to matter not yet disposed to receive it. To make a beautiful statue of the Blessed Virgin we need not only a good mold; but we need also clay that is neither too dry nor too wet, otherwise in a day or two our statues will not be worth much. 10 St. Alphonsus, Opere (Torino: Marictti, 1887), III, 295. 20 Cf. St. John of the Cross, Arcent of Mt. Carmel, the prologue. 21 Cf. St. Thomas, la Ilac, q.68, a. 5: "Whether the gifts of the Holy Ghost are connected." The meaning of the expression “remote and general call" as distin­ guished from "individual and proximate call" has been explained at length else­ where. Cf. Christian Perfection and Contemplation, pp. 337-427. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 241 can see clear evidence of this in the saint’s meditations for the time of Ascension and Pentecost22 and in his reflections for those desiring to advance in divine love.23 In his novena to the Holy Ghost he tries to draw souls out of the shadow of sin by telling them: “The Holy Ghost, called the lux beatis­ sima, inflames our hearts with His divine splendor, making us know the vanity of earthly goods, the value of those of eternity, the importance of salvation, the worth of grace, God’s goodness and Christ’s infinite love for us. . . . St. Teresa says that God is not loved because He is not known. Wherefore the saints are always asking God for light: 'Emitte lucem; illumina tenebras meas; revela oculos meos. Without divine light we can neither avoid destruction nor find God.” 24 Can anyone say that the saint had no thought of infused con­ templation when speaking in this way of the supernatural light received from the Holy Ghost? Similar passages are found throughout his spiritual works. Addressing all of us and speaking from the abundance of his heart, he goes be­ yond the strict limits of the purely ascetical and leads us to aspire, with humility and discretion, to a closer union with God and to whatever that normally requires of the under­ standing. The saint invites those whom he directs, whenever they say the Office, to be supcrnaturally attentive to the words of the psalms. If we follow his advice, we shall grasp more and more perfectly the meaning of the aspirations that they con­ tain: “Da mihi intellectum, et scrutabor legem tuam; da mihi intellectum, et discam mandata tua; da mihi intellectum, et 22 Opere (Torino: Marietd, 1887), II, 393. 23 Ibid., II, 249-314. 24 Ibid., Π, 394. 242 THE LOVE OF GOD vivam.”25 God inspires this petition said so often by all priests and religious; it contains and expresses a holy and humble desire for the light of the gift of understanding, which, to­ gether widi the gift of wisdom, constitutes the principle of infused contemplation.26 St. Alphonsus used these aspirations often, even when speaking to the general public, and certainly not because he had forgotten the rule of prudence: nulla nimia securitas, ubi periclitatur aeternitas. He knew full well that complete secu­ rity can be found only in perfect docility to the inspirations of the Holy Ghost. And if, as Father Keusch says, “Above all he never left off recommending St. John of the Cross to young confessors for a deeper study of things mystical,” he did so because he knew that in these matters no one has done more to warn us against the desire for extraordinary graces like visions and revelations than the author of The Darl^ Night, while at the same time he continually leads interior souls to desire the light of the Holy Ghost, without which they can­ not grow in the spirit of faith and reach divine union. He even makes the profound remark that a desire for extraordi­ nary graces turns us away from true contemplation wherein die soul lives more and more in the blessed darkness of faith.27 The difference of method between St. Alphonsus and St. John of the Cross arises in large part from the different en25 Ps. 118:34, 73, 144· 20 Cf. St. Thomas, Da Ilae, q.8; q.45. 27 In the Ascent of Mt. Carmel, Bk. Π. chaps. 18, 19, 20, 26, 27, St. John of the Cross puts much insistence on the mistake imprudent directors make by concern­ ing themselves through curiosity with souls favored by visions and revelations. We can find nothing stronger than these passages in their condemnation of the desire for revelations and at the same time in the encouragement of a desire for the per­ fect spirit of failli found in infused contemplation of tile mysteries of salvation, the way to divine union. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 243 vironment in which they made their influence felt. St. Al­ phonsus wrote in an age suffering from the aberrations of the quietists and, as Father Keusch says, he had in mind two classes of readers: one, young confessors, to whom he directed his scientific works particularly; the other, a circle of men and women readers made up of average pious persons for whom he intended his works on spirituality. St. John of the Cross says himself at the end of the prologue to the Ascent of Mount Carmel that he was speaking principally to the men and women religious of his own Order, at whose request he wrote ; then he adds the remark that the solid and substantial doctrine given was addressed to all, provided that they had made up their minds to pass through the detachment of soul which he preached. The difference of method seems, therefore, more apparent than real, if we compare the practical direction given by St. Alphonsus not with the speculative teaching founded on the principles of St. Thomas and St. John of the Cross, but with the practical direction inspired by these principles and in­ strumental in applying them with prudence and according to different circumstances. Comparison of method: a path to comparison of doctrine Without trying to make their teaching identical, we seem justified in recognizing agreement and accord in doctrinal matters between these doctors of the Church. St. Alphon­ sus, having told souls that they can desire contemplation properly so called, redoubles his insistence that they must first solidly establish the life of ordinary virtue. Father Keusch 244 THE LOVE OF GOD points this out in the first of the three propositions with which he summarizes the teaching of his master. This rule of direction in no way runs counter to the doc­ trine which we have set forth here, if by an “ordinary virtuous life” is meant the virtues which ought to be commonly prac­ ticed in the way usually called purgative: self-imposed morti­ fication, both exterior and interior, patience, meekness, humility, obedience, and the rest. But does St. Alphonsus con­ sider that these virtues reach a notably higher degree with­ out the soul passing through the interior trials remarked by St. Augustine,28 St. Gregory the Great,29 St. Bernard,30 Hugh of St. Victor,31 and St. Thomas?32 It seems that in the crucible of purgation infused contem­ plation begins in aridity and with the realization of the emptiness of all things created. The Holy Ghost opens our minds to this view through the gift of knowledge,33 giving us, by contrast, a glimpse of die infinite greatness of God. This “seeing,” distinctly different from discursive meditation, serves, according to St. Alphonsus, as the principle of perfect detachment in the practice of solid virtue. All this sounds remarkably like St. Teresa’s reflections on the indifference demanded by some spiritual reading books. To their require­ ment that we be indifferent to the evil said of us, that we rejoice even more than if something good were said, that we care nothing for honor and become quite detached from our 28 De quantitate animae, c.33, a description of the difficult work of purification; De sermone Domini in monte, Bk. I, c.3, 4, on the beatitudes and the gifts of the Holy Ghost. 29 In Ezech. Bk. Π, hom. 2, nos. 2, 3. 30 Sermo 71, 12-14; 23> ιβ· 81 In Ecel., hom. 1. 32 la Ilae, q.6t, a.5. 38 Ila Ilae, q.g, a. 4. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 245 relatives and a whole host of other things, she observes that in her opinion all this is a pure gift of God, a supernatural good.3' She warns us, too, that, even after years of prayer, or better, of meditation, we shall not advance much if we cling to love of honor and of temporal goods; whereas perfect prayer frees us from these faults.30 St. Alphonsus evidently thinks no differently when, treat­ ing of love of solitude, he says: God does not speak to us in the midst of the talk and transactions of the world; or if He does speak, we do not hear Him. God’s words are the inspirations, lights, and secret invitations by which saints are enlightened and encompassed by divine love; but who­ ever has no love for solitude cannot hear the sound of God’s voice. . . . When He desires to lift a soul to an eminent degree of per­ fection, He leads it to withdraw into some place of solitude and there He speaks to it, not through the ears of the body but of the soul; and in this way He enlightens it and encompasses it with His divine love. "Ducam eam ad solitudinem et loquar ad cor ejus!’ I will lead her into the wilderness: and I will speak to her heart (Osee 2:14). ... At least let us try as far as possible to secure some place of retreat where we can be alone with God and thus obtain the strength to overcome the disadvantages of our necessary dealings with the world. . . .80 Those whose position obliges them to live in the world may have to carry on its business, walk its streets, appear in its public places, but they can have, nevertheless, solitude of heart and union with God, provided that they keep their hearts detached from worldly things. . . . “Be still and see that I am God” (Ps. 45:11). To be enlightened with divine light and so to realize and love God’s goodness, we must put a check upon our84 St. Teresa, Lt/e, chap. 31. 88 Way of Perfection, chap. 12. 38 Opere, ed. cit., Π, 295. 246 THE LOVE OF GOD selves, that is, we must rid ourselves of earthly attachments, for they prevent us from knowing God.37 All these pages compose a discreet invitation to desire con­ templation under a title which runs no risk of exciting flights of imagination: “Love of solitude; solitude of heart.” 38 In the beautiful chapter on aridity of soul in the same “Reflec­ tions” 39 the saint shows die dawning of contemplation which, though ignorant of its own existence, instinctively leads us byond and above our own miseries to God. We come to know true humility, learning from ourselves yet taught by God. St. Alphonsus cites the example of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, who remained a long time in this arid quiet, telling us that she imagined herself to have neither love of God nor hope nor faidi, yet kept her gaze always on God and sought her rest in the arms of the divine will. St. Francis de Sales observed that her soul reminded him of a deaf person gifted with a beautiful voice but unable to enjoy her own singing. In the Praxis confessarii40 St. Alphonsus says that the soul often has (infused) prayer of quiet widiout any sensible sweetness. When we meditate on the “Reflections” written for souls desiring to advance in God’s love and deeply lived by the saint himself, we see how closely St. Alphonsus approaches what St. John of the Cross has to say about the necessity of those periods of aridity which he calls the night of the senses and die night of the soul. St. Alphonsus encouraged young confessors to read The DarJ{ Night of the Soul and would 37 Ibid., p. 297. 38 Ibid., p. 298. 30 Ibid., p. 306. 40 Praxis, no. 134. Λί Marys Hospital Sisters. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 247 never deny the two following propositions contained in its pages. The first reads : “The passive purification of the senses is common and occurs in a great number of beginners.” 41 Under the illumination of the Holy Ghost, those starting to live the interior life recognize the emptiness of created things much better than they ever could have done by meditating from many books. The second reads: “The proficient or advanced belong in the illuminative way, wherein God nourishes and strengthens their souls by infused contempla­ tion.” 42 God accomplishes this through the gifts of under­ standing and wisdom, generally given according to the meas­ ure of our charity.43 Yet often, let us not forget it, passive prayer is marked by aridity and provides no sensible con­ solation. The spirit of prayer ordinarily develops together with the virtues, especially the love of God. St. Alphonsus, like the other saints, recognizes this. Without solitude of heart, in which the lights of the Holy Ghost are received, we can have only a certain degree of virtue but not generally those deep and solid virtues of the illuminative and the unitive way— humility without fear of contempt, and patience almost without any shadow of change, one of the marks of true perfection. We do not, then, see that any serious difference exists between the doctrine of St. Alphonsus as summarized by Father Keusch in his first proposition and the doctrine generally taught in La vie spirituelle. We come then to the second proposition: “A life of virtue being realized, St. Alphonsus excludes from his plan of per­ 41 The Dark. Night, Bk. I, chap. 8. 42 Ibid., Bk. I, chap. 14. 43 Ascent of Mt. Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 27. 248 THE LOVE OF GOD fection and the ends that he would seek neither passive tran­ sitory graces nor more lasting passive states. Although he upholds the latter as more perfect in themselves than the works of the active life, he does not believe them necessary for sanctity.” 4445 From the way Father Keusch expresses the thought of St. Alphonsus, it seems that he has a better grasp of it than some of his predecessors. He has labored long and arduously over it, made it a scholarly work, apparently a work of con­ science. This would seem clear from many passages treating of the agreement between the doctrine expounded by St. Alphonsus and that generally taught in La vie spirituelle.™ Like Father Keusch, we too believe such a reconciliation pos­ sible; and the doctrines seem even closer akin to one another than Father Keusch states in his second proposition. Passive purifications, even those of the senses, are already in fact, be­ cause of their aridity, a passive state lasting some time, and we believe that St. Alphonsus judges them no less necessary for sanctity than does St. John of the Cross, although his terminology may be different. He notes in the Praxis confessarii: 46 Before leading the soul into the prayer of contemplation, God generally purifies it by supernatural aridity called the purgatio spiritualis, a spiritual purgation intended to free it from those im­ perfections which hinder contemplation. . . . When aridity is supernatural, it throws the soul into profound darkness, lasts longer than natural aridity, and increases daily. Placed in this state {in tali statu constituta), the soul feels itself separated from 44 La vie spirituelle, June, 1927, p. [199]. 45 Die Aszetik. des hl. Alfons Maria von Liguori, 3rd ed., p. 296, note 814. 40 Praxis, c.ix, no. 128. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 249 creatures and its gaze remains fixed on God and it has an ardent desire and a firm purpose to love Him perfectly; yet it discovers itself powerless to do so because of its imperfections, which seem to make it detestable in God’s eyes. However, it continues practic­ ing virtue. . . . This trying aridity is an effect of grace, of a supernatural fight, a light bringing suffering and, through its brilliance, darkness. Grace would communicate itself to the soul but finds the soul incapable because its powers are not sufficiently detached from sensible consolations, are still too material and full of sensible forms, images, and symbols; then this supernatural light produces in the soul an effect of darkness, a trying but profitable night. Through it, in fact, the soul comes to detach itself from all earthly pleasures and from the sensible consolations of the life of piety. Moreover, it acquires in this way a deep knowledge of its miseries and its impotence for good without the help of grace, and at the same time a great reverence for God, manifest to it in all His strength and majesty.47 . . . After the purification of the senses, God usually accords the gift of contemplation, that is, supernatural recollection, and then quiet and union, which we shall speak of later. But before union, after passive recollection and quiet, God generally makes the soul undergo the passive purification of the spirit, willing it to experi­ ence a sort of death.48 . . . Divine light makes the soul recognize its own nothingness and leads it into a real agony. . . . Sometimes 47 If close attention is given to these words of St. Alphonsus, which well sum­ marize the teaching of St. John of die Cross, it will be seen that external trials cannot produce the same effect as that infused light which penetrates to the depth of the faculties in order to detach them from things created and to make them bear in a supernatural way the exterior crosses so often borne with little profit. 48 A little farther on, no. 137, St. Alphonsus speaks precisely and in conformity with St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa, who places the night of the soul at the beginning of the Sixth Mansion before spiritual betrothals, after the simple union of the Fifth Mansion. This passage shows that for him, as well as for St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa, the night of the soul is a high passive state, since it comes after the prayer of quiet and simple passive union and prepares for transforming union, the fullness of the unitive way. 25o THE LOVE OF GOD God allows this state of desolation to be accompanied by tempta­ tions to impurity, anger, blasphemy, incredulity, and despair. The saint’s words tell us plainly that he is talking about puri­ fications proper to the mystical state. In all causes considered for beatification and in almost all die lives of the saints, the question of these purifications comes up under the title of “interior trials” and during the discus­ sion of the heroic character of their faith and hope. Can anyone think that St. Alphonsus judged these passive purifica­ tions unnecessary for sanctity or that he rejected the teach­ ing of St. John of the Cross on the subject? The essential lines of St. John’s teaching are well known:4950 Exterior trials cannot suffice to accomplish purgation of soul widiout this purifying interior light, which alone teaches us how to bear them with resignation, thankfulness, and love. In the “Reflections” already quoted, St. Alphonsus aptly remarks: “Naturally all suffering repels us, but when divine love reigns in the heart, it makes it pleasing.” 80 In the eleventh chapter, explaining our Savior’s words, “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me,” he says: “To carry the cross that we must carry is not enough. Sinners carry theirs but with­ out merit. To carry it meritoriously we must embrace it with love. . . . Since God wills that we keep on bearing it patiendy, should we not carry it until death ?... Those who love the Lord disinterestedly never abandon prayer, no mat­ ter what aridity and boredom diey may experience. . . . Their actions have but one end, to please God; if He wills 49 See the present work, Parts I, II, and ΠΙ, chap. II. 50 Reflections, chap. to. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 251 it, they are ready to suffer aridity until death and even for all eternity.” This goes beyond the bounds of asceticism and pertains to the mystical life, necessitating a special inspiration of the Holy Ghost and manifesting a suprahuman mode of the gifts of piety, fortitude, understanding, and wisdom, all grow­ ing togedier with charity. And if this abandonment to God endures in the midst of such sufferings as have been alluded to, then it comprises a state and presupposes the continual inspiration of the Holy Ghost. We can dispose ourselves for this or we can fail and lose it, but no personal efforts of ours can acquire abandonment of such a sort; it is infused. For this reason St. Alphonsus adds in the same passage: “O how dear to God is a soul who suffers and loves like this ! O inef­ fable gift ! O gift above all gifts ! to love while suffering and to suffer while loving. . . . Give me, Lord, Thy love, which will bring me strength to suffer everything for love of Thee. Take everything from me, deprive me of all that I possess, parents, friends, health of body, indeed life itself, but leave me Thy love.” A little later in the same “Reflections” addressed to all generous interior souls, St. Alphonsus gives an explanation of St. Teresa’s words: “Detach your heart from creatures, then seek God and you will find Him.” He says: “You will not always obtain spiritual sweetness,51 for our Lord does not always give it to those who love Him during their life, only from time to time bestowing it upon them to make them S1 Here we really have the sense in which we must understand the proposition so commonly accepted: ‘Infused contemplation is not always accorded to the per­ fect.” There are moments when they do not actually have it, especially when they do not have it in a consoling form; but it remains as if latent within them and they also preserve diat peace quae exsuperat omnem sensum. 252 THE LOVE OF GOD desire heaven more ardently; but He makes them experience an inner peace which is such that no sense pleasure can be compared with it: Pax Dei, quae exsuperat omnem sensum. . . . Divine love despoils us of everything else. . . . Lose all rather than be despoiled of God’s love.” In the fourteenth chapter, which treats of the necessity of mental prayer, St. Alphonsus also writes: “Let us hear what St. John of the Cross has to say on the subject: ‘Now it is that God teaches me His heavenly wisdom, enlightens my mind, and gives me His heart.’ St. Louis Gonzaga also tells us that none of us can reach a high degree of perfection without much prayer, giving ourselves to it, continuing it, never quitting it, no matter what weariness may come to us.” 62 “We must pray to obtain the lights of the Holy Ghost . . . not to taste spiritual consolations, but to learn of God what He expects of us. . . . When we find ourselves powerless, let us humble ourselves ; such prayer will profit us more than any other.”63 St. Alphonsus realizes that a purifying light is at work in these times of trial and that is why he adds: “Happy are those who in times of desolation cleave to prayer! God will overwhelm them with His graces.” 54 Later he adds: “God lovingly contemplates acts of trust and resignation made in the midst of darkness.” 58 This and other references through­ out the same chapter certainly relate to obscure infused con­ templation, such as that experienced for some time by St. Jane Frances de Chantal. It consists in nothing extraordi­ nary, like visions and revelations, but in something eminent 32 Reflections, chap. 14. 63 Ibid., chap. 15. « Ibid. 35 Ibid., chap. 39. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 253 yet normal in the development of sanctity; and that is the reason why St. Alphonsus talks about it in his reflections for the use of those who desire to advance in God’s love. Many similar texts could be quoted; these suffice, we be­ lieve, to show that St. Alphonsus does not reject the doctrine of St. John of the Cross that passive states of infused arid prayer—in other words, passive purification—are necessary for sanctity. Anyone familiar with the doctrine will grasp the cogency of this argument. An examination of some difficulties Perhaps it will be objected that in the Praxis confessarii, when St. Alphonsus comes to speak of passive union, hav­ ing already described the passive purifications, the infused prayer of recollection and of quiet, infused negative and ob­ scure contemplation, he says it is not necessary for perfection and that, as Cardinal Petrucci says, active union suffices.50 By way of corroboration he cites a text of St. Teresa as quoted by Bernardo del Castelvetere to the effect that perfection con­ sists not in ecstasy but in the union of our will with the divine will. He even remarks in passing that in the passive state of contemplation the soul gains no merit.57 On this subject something further should be said: (1) In a new edition of the Praxis confessarii, published at Rome, 1912, by Father G.-M. Blanc, C.SS.R., a footnote58 points out that St. Alphonsus here quotes St. Teresa as given by Bernardo del Castelvetere and that the exact text is not found in the saint’s writings. The editor notes that St. Teresa,68 68 Praxis, chap. 9, no. 136 (St. Teresa’s Fifth Mansion). 67 Ibid., no. 127. 68 Praxis, no. 136, p. 229. 254 THE LOVE OF GOD when referring to people whom she knew, does not say that few souls are led by supernatural paths but rather just the opposite.60 The fact that she says that perfection does not consist in ecstasy creates no difficulty for us, since ecstasy is only a concomitant phenomenon of passive union, which can, of course, exist without it.80 Further, in this passage of the Praxis, St. Alphonsus expressly says that he understands by “passive union” a state higher than the passive purification of the senses, passive recollection, and the prayer of quiet. Therefore, even if passive union thus understood were not necessary for perfection, it would not follow that the passive states below it were also unnecessary, especially since the 50 In these texts of St. Teresa and in others like them we must be careful to dis­ tinguish between those which relate to the general and remote call to contemplation and those dealing with the individual and proximate call. See what has been said on this subject in Christian Perfection and Contemplation, pp. 337-45. 60 We have shown elsewhere, Christian Perfection and Contemplation, pp. 250-53, from St. Teresa's texts in the Fifth Mansion, chap. 3, and her Ltje, chap. 17, that simple passive union often occurs without suspension of the imagination and the memory, which sometimes even make war on the intellect and will. St. Teresa speaks of this incomplete mystical union in the Interior Castle, Fifth Mansion, chap. 3, saying that for the union in question suspension of the faculties is not necessary because the Lord can give His bounties in different ways and can lead souls to these mansions without bringing them by the "short cut” which she had pointed out. This “short cut” and the delights to be found there have often been insufficiently understood. Some theologians—and this seems to be the interpretation given by Cardinal Petrucci and Bernardo de Castelvetere—have believed that this “short cut” is infused or mystical contemplation and have stated that therefore, according to St. Teresa, mystical contemplation is not required for the full perfection of Christian life. Actually, as the context shows, this “short cut” is only the suspension of the imagination and the memory or the beginning of ecstasy, which sometimes accompanies and forwards passive union, although it constitutes no part of it. When St. Alphonsus, without referring to Cardinal Petrucci or Bernardo de Castelvetere, speaks personally and spontaneously about St. Teresa's mansions, he draws better distinctions than they do—because he himself experienced such things —between what essentially and formally constitutes the prayer of quiet and of union and what is merely concomitant and forms only secondary and accidental phenomena. In a way this distinction is indicated in The Great Means of Prayer, chap. 3, 5 2 (II, 542), where St. Alphonsus takes up the commentary of Monsignor Palafox on the eighteenth letter of St. Teresa, a passage quoted by Father Kcusch in his article in La vie spirituelle, June, 1927, pp. [ 200 ] if. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 255 saint previously remarked 61 that the passive prayer of quiet often takes place without any sensible sweetness. How could it be proven that such prayer does not exist in the prolonged aridities through which perfect souls pass without abandon­ ing prayer ? We notice, too, that when St. Alphonsus describes trans­ forming union 62 as St. Teresa presents it in her seventh man­ sions, he really gives such a complete description of the full perfection of Christian life that it seems unrealizable before tliis summit. He recalls that in this higher state a suspension of the powers no longer occurs and that they, being purified, thereafter are capable of divine union. But for them to have die capacity for union, they must pass through the passive purification of the senses and of the soul, a purification which ought, St. John of the Cross says,®3 to free us from the neces­ sity of passing dirough purgatory. We pass through purga­ tory in fact only to expiate without meriting faults which we should have avoided or should have atoned for in this life while meriting. What St. Alphonsus describes surely seems to be the normal earthly prelude to the beatific vision, that is, a perfect proximate disposition to receive it immediately after death. The radical order of grace, let us not forget, would require that we receive the beatific vision as soon as we have drawn our last breath. This is why the separated soul suffers so much at being deprived of the vision of God in purgatory.®4 A careful reading of St. Alphonsus’ text reveals that his description of transforming union follows St. Teresa’s and presents it not as a grace in itself extraordinary, like prophetic 61 Praxis, no. 134. 62 Ibid., no. 138. es The Dark Night, Bk. Π, chap. 20. 64 This point is developed in Christian Perfection and Contemplation, pp. 362 if. 2 56 THE LOVE OF GOD revelations or miracles, but the summit, the high and rarely attained but normal development, of the life of grace. In other words, just as the saints achieve that high perfection in which sanctity consists while on earth, so do they enter into that union with God which serves in this life as the normal prelude to the life of heaven.85 (2) If we grant this as true, how does it happen that St. Alphonsus says a little previously in no. 136 of the Praxis that passive union forms no necessary requirement for per­ fection and that active union suffices for it? He reproduces here, as he expressly states, Cardinal Petrucci’s ideas, and, as a matter of fact, active union is sufficient for a certain degree of perfection. But is it enough to bring us to perfect detach­ ment from creatures and from self? Is it enough to lead us to the end which St. Alphonsus holds out to us all saying: “The sum of perfection lies in conformity to God’s will: it must be entire and without reserve, unwavering and ir­ revocable. All our perfection consists in this; I repeat it, all our actions, desires, and prayers must tend to this end.” 88 When spontaneously expressing his own thought and not quoting from the theologians of his own day like Cardinal Petrucci or Bernardo del Castelvetere, St. Alphonsus far out­ distances them and overtakes St. John of the Cross, whose thought and authority, needless to add, far surpasses theirs. He says, in agreement with the author of The Darl{ "Night, that true Christian perfection cannot exist without great do­ cility to the lights and inspirations of the Holy Ghost, char­ acteristic of the illuminative and unitive ways. However short a time they may last, they introduce the soul into a passive 65 Praxis, chap. 9, no. 138. 60 Conformity to the Will of God, chap. 1. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 257 state, at least for a few minutes, whether it is a state of aridity and purgation or of consolation. To obtain a clear idea of St. Alphonsus’ position, we need only read his novena to the Holy Ghost.07 These texts and others like them show that, according to die mind of the saint, the full perfection of Christian life demands a stronger unifying principle dian acquired union can supply. The reason why is pointed out by St. Thomas when showing the necessity for the gifts of the Holy Ghost and their connection with charity: But in matters directed to the supernatural end, to which man’s reason moves him, according as it is, in a manner, and imperfectly, informed by the theological virtues, the motion of reason does not suffice, unless it receive in addition the prompting or motion of the Holy Ghost, according to Rom. 8:14, 17: “Whosoever are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God . . . and if sons, heirs also”: and Ps. 142: “Thy good Spirit shall lead me into the right land,” because, to wit, none can receive the inheritance of that land of the Blessed, except he be moved and led thither by the Holy Ghost. Therefore, in order to accomplish this end, it is necessary for man to have the gift of the Holy Ghost.08 “Whether we consider human reason as perfected in its natural perfection, or as perfected by the theological virtues, it does not know all things. Consequently it is unable to avoid folly and other like things mentioned in the objection. God, however, to whose knowledge and power all things are sub­ ject, by His motion safeguards us from all folly, ignorance, dullness of mind, and hardness of heart, and the rest. Con67 Opere, cd. ciL, pp. 395 fF.; Mcdit. 3. 68 Cf. la Ilac, q.68, a. 2. The doctrine is developed in Christian Perfection and Contemplation, pp. 278-80. 258 THE LOVE OF GOD sequently the gifts of the Holy Ghost, which make us ame­ nable to His promptings, are said to be given as remedies to these defects.”69 The gifts are necessary for salvation as habitual dispositions to receive God’s inspirations readily and docilely, just as the moral virtues serve to render the sensu­ ous appetency and the will docile to the direction of pru­ dence. Because the seven gifts are connected with charity, which unites us to the Holy Ghost,70 they form part of the spiritual organism and grow together with it, as the five fingers and the hand develop together.71 It would be inconceivable for a just man to have a high degree of charity without having a corresponding degree of the gifts of wisdom and under­ standing connected with this virtue. Now the Holy Ghost usually moves souls according to their supernatural disposi­ tions, unless some accidental obstacle prevents it. Every soul with a high degree of charity therefore normally receives contemplation of the mysteries of faith. The form it takes may be evident and sometimes striking or diffuse but very real, giving a truly supernatural tone to the life of the soul and manifesting the soul as indeed the temple of the Holy Ghost. Without contemplation saints dedicated to the active life, such as St. Vincent de Paul, would not have continually be­ held the sick poor and abandoned children as suffering mem­ bers of Christ. Without it we cannot begin to fathom the infinite value of the Sacrifice of the Mass or live sufficiently by the solemn moment of Eucharistic consecration. Now all 09 la Ilae, q.68, a. 2, ad 311m. 70 Ibid., a. 5. 71 la Ilae, q.66, a. 2. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 259 Christians are called to live, and live deeply, by it, that they may have life more abundantly, even as all men are called to the beatific vision of the very essence of God, although many woefully neglect their salvation. St. Alphonsus certainly denies none of these Thomistic principles but, as we see from his nôvena to the Holy Ghost, teaches them to all interior souls, thus far surpassing certain mystical theologians of his own time, whom he found useful to quote but whom our own times no longer remember. (3) When reproducing the statements of these theologians, St. Alphonsus comments in passing that souls in a passive state acquire no merit because they do nothing but simply receive.72 Later, when speaking for himself, he has some­ thing else to say that conforms to St. Teresa’s thought: “In the (passive) prayer of quiet, the will is as if bound, for it cannot love any other object than God, who attracts it to Him­ self.” 73 In this passive state, therefore, the soul is acting, it is freely loving God, and, as a result, meriting. St. Teresa, when speaking of a more passive state of union, says the same tiling: “Here God allows us nothing else but the con­ currence of an entirely submissive will,” 74—which merits by its docility. According to St. Thomas and all his disciples, the will’s docility to the Holy Ghost makes the acts of the seven gifts meritorious. No doubt they are not, properly speaking, deliberate acts, like those reached by discursive deliberation and ruled by prudence under the inspiration of the gift of counsel. Acts of the gift of piety, for example, are above human deliberation and yet are vital, free, and meri72 No. 127. Likewise Haeresum historia et confutatio, Confut. XIV, De Michaelis Molinos haeresi, no. 3. 73 Praxis, no. 134. 74 Interior Castle, Fifth Mansion, chap. 1. 200 THE LOVE OF GOD torious, and, when they last some time, are called passive states.75 We see then that, when St. Alphonsus denies merit to pas­ sive states and holds passive union unnecessary for perfection, he utters the opinion of certain theologians of his own time rather than his own deep thought, so much more like that of St. Thomas and of St. John of the Cross. He would cer­ tainly not deny the statement from the Ascent of Mount Carmel that “the more intense charity a soul has, the more the Holy Ghost enlightens it and communicates His gifts to it,” 78 These gifts are, in fact, as St. Thomas says,77 connected with charity, and all the infused habitus, like the different parts of a spiritual organism, grow together.78 Nothing in St. Alphonsus’ writings contradicts these principles; rather, everything that he tells us of the Holy Ghost and of the in­ crease of charity repeatedly confirms them. The objection still arises that Benedict XIV, using the words of Cardinal de Laurea, has written: “Many servants of God have been canonized without any mention, in their process of canonization, of infused contemplation; it is suf­ ficient to prove the heroism of their virtues, confirmed by miracles.”79 The objection is easily met, for Benedict XIV was not talking from a theological point of view with the intention of describing what normally belongs to the full 75 The subject has been developed elsewhere at length, Christian Perfection and Contemplation, pp. 281 f., for the continual necessity of greater and greater docility to the Holy Ghost; pp. 285-98, for a comparison of the special inspiration of the Holy Ghost with common actual grace. 78 Ascent of Mt. Carmel, Bk. Π, chap. 29. 77 la llae, q.68, a. 5. 78 la Ilac, q.66, a. 2. 70 De servorum Dei heatificatione . . . , Bk. ΠΙ, chap. 26. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 261 perfection of Christian life; he was speaking rather from a juridical point of view, stating that in the process of beatifica­ tion nothing need be examined but the heroic character of the virtues and the miracles confirming it: that is certain. However, can heroic virtue exist without the activity of the gifts of the Holy Ghost? We know St. Thomas’ response to the question and what St. John of the Cross has to say when reproducing the teaching of St. Augustine and St. Gregory the Great.80 Now the activity of the gifts of understanding, of wisdom, and of piety takes place chiefly in prayer, which, when dominated by their influence, is called infused. Besides, in almost every process of canonization, when the demonstration of the saints’ heroic faith and hope makes reference to their interior trials, these are nothing else but the passive purifications so clearly analyzed by St. John of the Cross in The Dark, Night. They are certainly not graces gratis datae, extraordinary gifts like prophecy, but they con­ stitute a grievous passive state, marked by a high degree of contemplation of God’s infinite majesty together with a deep recognition of our misery, knowledge such as only the Holy Ghost can give. For example, when we read the chapter in the life of the Curé of Ars about his interior trials, we find expressed in terms within the reach of all, what St. John of the Cross has to say of the night of the soul. Finally, Benedict XIV, when speaking of mystical ques­ tions, reproduces word for word Cardinal de Laurea’s work, De oratione Christiana. This author, when speaking not from a juridical but from a theological point of view, tells us: “It is permissible to desire mystical union, usually given by God 80 la Ilae, q. 68, a. 5. 202 THE LOVE OF GOD to the perfect with infused contemplation.” 81 His presenta­ tion here belongs to traditional teaching as commonly formu­ lated by Dominican and Carmelite Thomists.82 Father Keusch, at the end of his article, is kind enough to say of La vie spirituelle: “We believe that it correctly outlines the theory of the sublime ways to heaven” and adds that practically “the shortness and difficulty of life, the vehemence of concupiscence, and original sin with all its consequences . . . these are the facts that struck St. Alphonsus.” 8384 Original sin and its results certainly make die realization of the ideal difficult. St. Augustine is the first to say so when combating the Pelagians. Nevertheless, in his commentary on the Ser­ mon on the Mount he speaks to all Christians about what the full development of charity and of the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost should be in them. Opposed as the evangelical beati­ tudes are to all the maxims of human wisdom, our Lord preached them to all. If the founder of the Congregation of the Most Holy Re­ deemer has taken full account of the çonsequences of original sin, he also bears as his motto die words Copiosa apud eum redemptio and he loved to quote St. Paul to the Romans 5:20: “And where sin abounded, grace did more abound,” a pas­ sage he explains in the same way as St. Thomas does in his beautiful commentary in the Summa.&i St. Paul also told the Ephesians: “Wherefore I also . . . cease not to give dianks for you, making commemoration of you in my prayers, that 81 Laurentius Brancati, Card. De Laurea, De oratione Christiana, Opusc. VII, chap. 10; Opusc. VIII, chap. 9. 82 Vallgornera, Mystica theologia S. Thomae, q.3, d.3, a.3, no. 430; Philip of the Blessed Trinity, Summa theol. myst., cd. 1874, Π, 299; ΙΠ, 43. 83 La vie spirituelle, June, 1927, p. [209]. 84 Cf. St. Thomas in Ep. ad Rom. 5: 20; also Summa, Illa, q. 1, a.3, ad 3um. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 263 the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation, in the knowledge of Him: the eyes of your heart enlightened, that you may know what the hope is of His calling, and what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. And what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us, who believe according to the operation of the might of His power.” 85 Such is indeed the great doctrine preserved by St. Alphonsus in his treatment of the triumph of charity in souls.8® If our wounded nature falls far below the perfection which our nature had when it was gifted with integrity, as it existed in the state of innocence, yet the Son of God made man, the new Adam, is infinitely above the first Adam; and Mary, the new Eve, is incomparably more perfect than the first Eve. The Eucharistic worship taking place in the smallest country church, especially at the moment of consecration, infinitely surpasses the worship that went on in the Garden of Paradise. Really faithful and generous souls never lack for graces but continually receive more. Jesus Christ our Mediator and Mary our mediatrix will lead them, through increasingly fervent Communions, to a union with God no less intimate than that which man knew in the state of original justice, although now this union is often accompanied by hard purgation, which serves, moreover, as a means of increased merit. With this in mind, St. Paul tells us, “I exceedingly abound with joy in all our tribulation.” 87 If St. Alphonsus in no way disparages the results of original 85 Eph. 1:18. 80 Reflections, § 13. 87 II Cor. 7: 4. 204 THE LOVE OF GOD sin, he believes no less in baptismal regeneration and in everything which it contains in germ: gratia, semen gloriae. Like his guide, St. Thomas, he teaches that the grace of the virtues and of the gifts develops in such a way as to dispose the soul through purgation for the beatific vision, being wholly ordered to that end. Through the power of the Re­ deemer then practice catches up with the great doctrinal principles, and the real rises by degrees to the level of the ideal, once glimpsed from afar off. We believe that St. Al­ phonsus subscribed entirely to the assertion of the author of The Imitation that: “If there are few contemplatives, the rea­ son lies in the fact that few know how to detach themselves wholly from creatures and from all temporal things.”88 St. Alphonsus tells us this earlier in the “Reflections”89 when explaining St. Teresa’s statement: “Detach your heart from creatures, then seek God, and you will find Him.” He says, “You will not always obtain spiritual consolations, for the Lord does not give them continually to those who love Him. . . . But He does make them experience an interior peace that surpasses all understanding, quae exsuperat om­ nem sensum. O how good God is to those who seek Him only!”90 The peace that He gives, quae exsuperat omnem sensum, constitutes the blessedness of peacemakers promised by our Lord to all generous souls; and, as both St. Augustine91 and St. Thomas92 show, this beatitude corresponds to the gift of wisdom, which makes us in some way see all the events of 88 Imitation, Bk. Ill, chap. 31. 89 Reflections, chap. 13. 90 Ibid., chap. 41. 91 Lib. I de term. Domini in monte, chap. 4. 92Ila Ilae, q.45, a.6. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 265 life through God’s eyes rather than with our own, whether these events are pleasant or unpleasant and even if they sur­ prise and baffle us. A practical and lofty contemplation gives deep direction to the activity of life just because it comes to us from on high; in the words of St. Thomas, “Wisdom as a gift is not merely speculative but practical.” 03 Just because it outdistances natural wisdom, the gift of wisdom extends to conduct and directs action. “The higher a virtue is, the greater the number of things to which it extends.” 04 A very interesting work remains to be done, we think, one that should tempt Father Keusch to complete his work on the ascetical doctrine of St. Alphonsus. It would consist in doing research on the saint’s spiritual work to bring out his ideas on the indwelling of the Blessed Trinity, the increase of charity, the seven gifts, and the perfect divine union at­ tained by complete detachment from creatures. Far from denying the connection between charity and the gifts of the Holy Ghost so plainly asserted by St. Thomas,05 St. Alphonsus expresses what is equivalent to the same thing in different places in his works, for example, in the novena to the Holy Ghost.00 There he shows that the love of charity is not simply a fire but also a light that illumines, a living water that refreshes, a power that grows, an unction that con­ secrates our souls as temples for the increasingly intimate abiding of the Holy Ghost.07 On this subject he quotes the scriptural texts in which St. Augustine and St. Thomas found 03 Ha Ilae, q.45, a.3. 84 Ibid., ad lum. 85 la Hae, q.68, a. 5. 88 Opere, ed. cit., II, 393. 87 Wc should note however that from the moment of justification or conversion the act of loving God precedes the act of hating sin, since sin is hated because it is displeasing to God. 206 THE LOVE OF GOD the doctrine of the seven gifts and of their relationship with charity. A work of this kind would be a useful contribution to mystical studies. It would show, we believe, that the spiritual­ ity of St. Alphonsus in no way runs counter to the doctrine here set forth according to Thomistic principles. It would make it possible for people to see that die saint’s great pru­ dence led him in no way whatever to reduce the height of the end to which all interior souls should aspire, but reminds us that, although this end is first in the order of intention it is last in the order of execution, and we must begin our spirit­ ual edifice with a foundation of humility, mortification, and obedience, and by the practice of solid virtue. Although men never begin cathedrals with the arches, an architect must have from the very beginning a plan for the whole building, arches and all, since the foundation must be made with its height in mind. Not only do we believe in a real harmony between the doctrine of La vie spirituelle and St. Alphonsus’ spirituality, but we consider the reading of his works very useful as a practical completion to the great speculative views to which St. Thomas accustoms us. St. Alphonsus shows how these should be reflected in the details of daily life ; in the order of execution, he directs our steps toward the high ideal pro­ posed to us all in the beatitudes preached by Christ at the beginning of His Sermon on the Mount.98 The beatitudes are nothing but the highest acts of the virtues and the gifts, the beginning, as it were, of eternal life in time, the end 98 St. Thomas begins moral theology, la Ilae, q. i, by a study of our last end or the beatitude of heaven. PLACE OF THE UNITIVE LIFE 267 glimpsed while we are as yet afar off.89 “Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God”: in a way pure hearts begin to see God in the penumbra of faith while still on earth 100 and the more the light of life makes Him known to them the more they love Him, completely fulfilling the demands of die great commandment to love God “with thy whole heart and with thy whole soul and with all diy strength and with all thy mind.” 101 99 la Ilae, q.69, a.i, 2. 100 Ila Ilae, q.8, a.3, 7. 101 Luke 10: 27. CHAPTER XIII The Unity and Sublimity of the Apostolic Life: A Synthesis of Contemplation and Action “For the letter killeth, but the spirit quickeneth.” Il Cor. 3:6 “The work of the active life is two­ fold. One proceeds from the fullness of contemplation, such as teaching and preaching. . . . The other work of the active life consists entirely in outward occupation, for instance, almsgiving, receiving guests.” Summa theol., Ila Ilae, q. 188, a. 6 Having dealt with the union of the purified soul with God and the contemplation presupposed by such union, we would now do well to discuss its fruits in the apostolic life as main­ tained in its unity and sublimity. To define purely contem­ plative religious life is an obviously less exacting task than to define the kind of life that unites both contemplation and apostolic activity. The difficulty here arises partly from the fact that the ideal of apostolic religious life is realized under quite a number of different forms, according to the place given to action. This place varies somewhat in the Carmelites, the Dominicans, and the sons of St. Francis, not to mention the older orders. 268 UNITY OF THE APOSTOLIC LIFE 269 Nevertheless the difficulty we experience in defining the apostolic religious life, in grasping what really constitutes its spirit, arises chiefly from the fact that we are prone to materialize it, to stop short at the letter, at the multiplicity of somewhat tangible elements within it, without rising above these to its well-balanced unity, which alone can explain the true role of these different elements and give them life. Here is a case where we need to recall St. Paul’s words : “Our suf­ ficiency is from God. Who also hath made us fit ministers of the new testament, not in die letter, but in the spirit. For the letter killeth, but the spirit quickeneth.” 1 When we have looked, as St. Thomas generally does, at the difficulty of the problem, we shall afterward be in a better position to understand die worth of its solution as the holy doctor gives it to us. ARTICLE I THE APOSTOLIC LIFE: .ITS DIFFICULTY AND SUPERIORITY As higher organisms have many clearly differentiated but convergent functions, so the apostolic or mixed life is obvi­ ously more complex than the purely contemplative life of the Carthusians and the active life of die hospitalers. Precisely this complexity makes die apostolic life particularly difficult. In religious orders like St. Dominic’s, St. Francis’, the Carmelites, the Premonstratensians, and others, monastic ob­ servances such as fasting and abstinence, night watches, the deep study of philosophy and theology, integral liturgical prayer, that is, the Divine Office chorally recited, and finally, 1II Cor. 3: 6. 270 THE LOVE OF GOD the apostolate through oral or written teaching and preach­ ing, all find a place. If one of these elements is overstressed, the harmony of the apostolic life is endangered ; there occurs hypertrophy of one organ and atrophy of another, a lack of balance of functions, and consequently more or less serious disorder. Every evi­ dence points to the necessity of maintaining a close unity in such diversity. Unity is breath to this life; when it is lost, all is lost. The mixed life disintegrates into its various elements and perishes. Substitutes resembling it take its place but have not its high nature. Someti.mes we hear people say that the old orders have had their day. If they have remained faithful to the ideals of the saints who founded them, how can this be true ? If we lose sight of that higher unity which is the very soul of apostolic life, some of us come to think that monastic ob­ servances harm study ; others consider that deep study works against proper monastic observance. We even manage to establish an apparent opposition between study and preach­ ing. Some romantic preachers depreciate philosophical and theological teaching as too abstract and lifeless: “baseless, formless, alright for the classroom.” On the other hand, we find men of learning occupied in patient historical and critical research who belittle preaching, looking upon it as something superficial and meaningless. In one way or another what constitutes the life of all great apostles is forgotten. Men of deep meditation, prayer, true contemplatives, the Pauls and Dominies of every age, have given to other souls for their salvation, their own living contemplation of God and of Christ. Blessed Henry Suso in his Boo\ of Eternal Wisdom clearly UNITY OF THE APOSTOLIC LIFE 271 points out how the spiritual life is only too frequently ma­ terialized by two opponent groups, the one devoting them­ selves almost exclusively to study, and the other to observances and austerities; he makes no allusion to those who give them­ selves entirely to the externals of the apostolate or to natural, and largely unsanctified, activity. The disciple desired to know if somewhere a man might not exist who had reached the noble height of renouncement (about which the Truth had spoken to him), a man really transformed into Christ; and he desired that God would make this man known to him so that he might speak familiarly with him. And as the disciple was thinking seriously of this, he was lifted out of him­ self and taken into a country where the senses cannot go. There he beheld an image hanging between heaven and earth, the image of a man whose look was full of goodness though he was held fast to a cross. And the disciple saw ranged about the cross yet unable to draw near to it two classes of people. One of these saw the image interiorly but not exteriorly; the others exteriorly but not in­ teriorly. . . . Oh! Eternal Truth, said the disciple, tell me the meaning of this marvellous vision. And a voice answered him interiorly saying: The image which you have seen represents the only Son of God, inasmuch as He has taken upon Himself our human nature. You saw but one image and yet it was diversified and multiplied, representing as it does all the men who are His members and, through Him and in Him, sons of God. The Head rules the many members of the one body. He is the first born by reason of His assumption into the Divine Person; the others, on the contrary, become sons only in so far as they are transformed in union with this image. The cross signifies that a man who has really renounced himself ought always to live interiorly as well as exteriorly, in complete abnega­ tion, accepting all that God wills him to suffer, no matter from THE LOVE OF GOD whence it comes, dying to himself and being ready to take any­ thing for the glory of our Heavenly Father. Such men are noble within and on guard without. Those who see this image interiorly but not exteriorly merely reason about the life of Christ, considering it only speculatively but not practically, failing to mortify their nature by imitating this image. They think of it but afterwards give themselves up to their natural tendencies and false liberty, deeming those of a dif­ ferent outlook than themselves as narrow and unintelligent men. Those who consider this image exteriorly but not interiorly, seem hard and severe. They perform penitential exercises, live circumspectly, and enact before men a kind of honorable and holy life, but neglect the interior consideration of Christ, Whose life was sweet and lovable. They are absolutely unlike the model which they themselves propose. . . . Self will remains, preserved to such a degree that they never come to possess the divine virtues of obedience, patience, submissiveness, and others of like character which make men conformable to the image of Christ.2 Blessed Henry Suso then understood why “these two kinds of people stood about the cross but would not approach it.” He understood much better than he had before, that “God has given the potentiality and the power to become the sons of God only to those who are born of God. . . . The man who has renounced himself, who has God alone as his fa­ ther, sees nothing temporal purely in its temporality but looks upon and understands all things in God.”3 The “opened eyes” with which he regards everything get their sight from the contemplation of revealed mysteries, a con­ templation superior to the exterior practices of penance and 2 Part III, chap. 5. 3Fr. tr. Thiriot, Œuvres mystiques du Bx. H. Suso (Paris: Lccoffre, 1899), Π, 233 A- UNITY OF THE APOSTOLIC LIFE 273 to mere study. It ought to be, together with the love of God, the soul of the apostolate. This truth can become more evi­ dent to us if we consider the genuine purpose of religious life, ordered not to personal sanctification alone but to the salva­ tion of souls as well. ARTICLE II THE SPECIAL END OF THE APOSTOLIC LIFE To see more clearly what should be the relationship be­ tween the different elements of the religious life, particularly in the case of the orders already mentioned, we need to ask ourselves what is their special end, since the end, the reason for which the means exist, is first in the order of intention, although last in the order of execution. As an answer to the problem, we have St. Thomas’ remark that preaching the great mysteries of faith ought to flow from the contemplation of these divine mysteries, “ex pleni­ tudine contemplationis, derivatur.’’ This serves as the prin­ ciple of his response: “It is better to give to others the fruits of one’s contemplation than merely to contemplate. . . . Ac­ cordingly the highest place in religious orders is held by those which are directed to teaching and preaching, which, moreover, are nearest to the episcopal perfection. . . . The second place belongs to those which are directed to contem­ plation, and the third to those which are occupied with ex­ ternal actions.” 4 In other words, the apostle, like Jesus Christ and the Twelve, should be a contemplative, passing on his contemplation to others in order to save and sanctify them. St. Thomas’ words expressing the particular end of religious 4 Ila Ilae, q. 188, a. 6. 274 THE LOVE OF GOD life dedicated to the apostolate have become the motto of his Order: Contemplari et contemplata aliis tradere: to contem­ plate and to give to others the fruits of contemplation. But how are these words to be understood? Three inter­ pretations are proposed, plainly corresponding to three dif­ ferent mentalities, each more or less aware of its own spirit. The Carmelites of Salamanca5 set them down as follows: According to the first interpretation, reminiscent of some views expressed by Suarez, the mixed or apostolic life tends equally to contemplation and to action, as to two principal and immediate ends, ex aequo. According to the second interpretation, a more or less conscious opinion of many preachers, the mixed or apostolic religious life has apostolic action for its primary and principal end, but it also tends toward some sort of contemplation as a means necessary to action. The third interpretation gives us a much loftier view, hold­ ing that the mixed or apostolic religious life tends, on the contrary, principally and primarily to that contemplation and union with God which it implies and secondarily to action, an effect of the apostle’s own contemplation and a pos­ sible means of disposing his hearers in their turn for the contemplation of divine things and for union with God. We need now to evaluate these three interpretations, so strikingly different in spirit. From St. Thomas’ point of view, the first cannot be admitted. The mixed or apostolic life can­ not tend to contemplation and to action, as to two principal and immediate ends ex aequo. The notion of two entirely adequate ends, neither of which would be subordinate to the other implies a duality without subordination and there5 Curtus theologicus, tr. XX, de statu religioso, disp. Π, dub. 3, no. 29. UNITY OF THE APOSTOLIC LIFE 275 fore the destruction of unity in religious life. Action and con­ templation sought as two principal and immediate ends would be prejudicial to each other. Finally, a choice between them would have to be made. The hound cannot chase two rabbits at once. The second interpretation is no more admissible. If in fact the mixed life has action for its primary and principal end and tends to contemplation only as a means to action, noth­ ing remains to distinguish it from the active religious life, which also ought to give some place to prayer in order that the corporal works of mercy may be exercised in a super­ natural manner. Besides, contemplation and union with God cannot conceivably be made a means subordinated to action, for they are greater than action. Obviously this life can hold nothing higher than union with God through contempla­ tion and love.® As a result, apostolic action has real worth only so far as it stems from this source, in no way a subordinate means to it but its eminent cause. Moreover, apostolic action itself is a means subordinated to divine union, for the pur­ pose of the apostle is to lead souls to union with God. The order of agents corresponds to the order of ends: "Ordo agentium debet correspondes ordini finium." 7 The apostle seeks to lead others to divine union, and his own union with God serves to bring them to share the same divine gift and to be saved. The third interpretation holds that the mixed or apostolic life tends primarily and principally toward contemplation and union with God, not stopping there as the purely con­ templative life does, but flowing over into apostolic action, e la Ilae, q. 182, a. 1 ; ibid., ad jum. T la Ilae, q. 109, a. 6. rf, THE LOVE OF GOD preaching, the administration of the sacraments, and spirit­ ual direction.8 The Carmelites of Salamanca expressed thenview in this wise, and the Dominican Passerini followed Blessed Humbert of Rome8 in holding die same opinion: “The mixed or apostolic life has as its principal end contem­ plation or union with God, a source of fruitfulness for the salvation of souls.” 10 St. Thomas clearly took the same position when he said that theological teaching and preaching are works of the active life but ought to overflow from the fullness of con­ templation if they are to bear fruit.11 He adds that our Lord Jesus Christ was not content to limit Himself to a purely contemplative life but chose one that presupposed abundant contemplation and shared it with souls through preaching.12 St. Thomas puts it this way: “For it is becoming to that kind of life, which we hold Christ to have embraced, wherein a man delivers to others the fruits of his contemplation, that he devote himself first of all to contemplation, and that he afterward come down to the publicity of active life by as­ sociating with other men.” 13 8 Sal manticenscs, loc. cit. 9 Lettre sure les trois vœux et explication de la Règle de saint Augustin, chap. 5, on prayer. 10 De hominum statibus, in Ham Ilae, q. 188, a. 6. 11 Ila Ilae, q.188, a.6. St. Thomas makes no denial that in the purely contempla­ tive life, that of Chartreux for example, there is a virtual and hidden apostolate, a profound influence on souls through prayer and immolation; the solitary in this way reaches souls in Christ, in whom he regards them, and can obtain for them great graces of conversion and sanctification. But the hidden apostolate of prayer and immolation is to be found in the apostle also, in St. Paul and St. Dominic, and they have the apostolate properly so called as well, which, if it does not add to the intensity of their contemplation and union with God, is an extension and visible reflection of it. Christ’s life is more complete with His preaching of the gospel than it would have been without it. 12 Illa, q.40, a. I, ad sum. 13 Ibid., a. 2, ad 3um. UNITY OF THE APOSTOLIC LIFE 277 Disciples of St. Thomas have even pointed out that the relationship of contemplation and union with God to the apostolic life bears a likeness to the relationship of the In­ carnation to Redemption. The Incarnation, the hypostatic union of the human nature of Christ with the uncreated per­ son of the Word, is not ordered to our redemption as a means to a higher end, but as an eminent cause to an inferior effect. St. Thomas tells us: “God loves Christ not only more than He loves the whole human race, but more than He loves the entire created universe: because He willed for Him the greater good in giving Him a name that is above all names, so far as He was true God. Nor did anything of His excel­ lence diminish when God delivered Him up to death for the salvation of the human race; rather did He become thereby a glorious conqueror: The government was placed upon His shoulder, according to Isa. 9: 6.” 1415 From all eternity, by the formal motive of mercy,18 God has willed not an Incarnation subordinated to the Redemp­ tion, as a means to a higher end, but the redemptive Incarna­ tion, in view of which He permitted the sin of the first man.16 Similarly, the purpose of an order dedicated to the mixed or apostolic life is not the apostolate, with contemplation sub­ ordinated to it as to a higher end, but contemplation becom­ ing fruitful in the apostolate. The view here expressed conforms, moreover, to the Church’s habit of making a distinction in the constitutions of religious orders between their primary and principal end: religious perfection, union with God by the spirit of faith and 14 la, q.20, a. 4, ad lum. 15 Ila Ilae, q.30, a. 1. 16 Illa, q. I, a.4, ad 311m. xfl THE LOVE OF GOD charity, the end to which the three virtues and vows of pov­ erty, chastity, and obedience are subordinated; and the secondary or derivative end: one or other of the works of mercy. Only St. Thomas’ doctrine clearly shows the unity and sub­ limity of the apostolic life. He brings out plainly how the apostolate must have contemplation as its source. Then the good news of the gospel is preached in an enlightening, liv­ ing, simple, and penetrating way, with unction to draw hearts and deep conviction to win them.17 An apostolic order can then be said to have a unique end, contemplation bearing fruit in the apostolate. Apostolic work, preaching, when they well up from the contemplation of divine things, give not only the letter but the spirit of the word of God, of supernatural mysteries, the commandments, and the counsels. The letter of the gospel can be easily known and even easily preached in a literary fashion. The conclusions of moral theology as expounded in most manuals can also be stated with a little application. What the faithful demand of a preacher, however, is the soul of things, that breath and supernatural flame, altogether dif­ ferent from romantic lyricism, which burns with the brief blaze of straw quickly set on fire and just as quickly turns to ashes. The breath of any apostolate, of preaching, should be the breath of divine truth, a great spirit of faith, of trust, of essentially supernatural love, putting the accent where it belongs on the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Re­ demption, the Eucharist, die indwelling of the Blessed Trinity, eternal life begun on earth and consummated in heaven. 17 Cf. Ila Ilae, q. 177, a. I. UNITY OF THE APOSTOLIC LIFE 279 As St. Paul says, God is indeed our sufficiency, making us fit ministers of the new testament, not in the letter, but in the spirit, the letter bringing death but the spirit giving life. “Our sufficiency is from God. Who also hath made us fit ministers of the new testament, not in the letter, but in the spirit. For the letter killeth, but the spirit quickeneth.” “For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowldge of the glory of God, in the face of Christ Jesus. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency may be of the power of God, and not of us.” 18 Here St. Paul is telling us of infused contemplation of revealed mysteries, which bears good fruit in the apostolate. The letter of the Old Law, St. Thomas remarks,10 made known what we must do to avoid sin but put no check on concupiscence, and wrought no justification in men like the New Law, which is, more than anything else, spirit and charity poured forth in our hearts. The letter of the Old Law even in a sense provided an occasion for sin, because con­ cupiscence moves with more ardor after forbidden pleasures; and the knowledge that we are forbidden to do something which we continue to covet will kill us, if we deviate from righteousness to follow our inclinations. In fact, to sin at the same time against the natural law and die written law is a more serious matter than to sin only against the former. In this sense the letter of the Old Law occasionally did work death; not that it was bad, for it forbade evil; but because it was imperfect; for it failed to remove the cause of evil. Law, widiout the spirit engraven in men’s hearts, is an occasion 18 II Cor. 3: 6; 4: 6 f. 19 In II ad Cor. 3: 6. 28ο THE LOVE OF GOD for death. We need to receive that law which is spirit and life and pours forth charity into our hearts.20 To grasp what the preaching of the gospel should be like, we must recall, as St. Thomas says,21 that the New Law is only secondarily a written law, but above and before all a law infused into men’s souls. Now that which is preponderant in the law of the New Testa­ ment, and whereon all its efficacy is based, is the grace of the Holy Ghost, which is given through faith in Christ (Rom. 7:2). The law of the spirit of life, in Christ Jesus, hath delivered me from the law of sin and of death. . . . Nevertheless the New Law con­ tains certain things that dispose us to receive the grace of the Holy Ghost, and pertaining to the use of that grace: such things are of secondary importance, so to speak, in the New Law; and the faithful needed to be instructed concerning them, both by word and writing, both as to what they should believe and as to what they should do.22 The preaching of the gospel ought therefore above all to be spirit and life; that is, it should spring from contempla­ tion of the mysteries of salvation in order that the faithful may truly live by them. The apostle carries the light of con­ templation in a fragile vessel “that the excellency may be of the power of God, and not of us.” Had our Lord’s apostles been rich, powerful, of noble blood, all the great things they did would have been attributed to them and not to God. Therefore St. Paul adds: “In all things we suffer tribulation, 20 As St. Thomas observes (la Ilac, q. 106, a. 1, a