Volume 37 · pp. 533–534
Chapter X. Actual and sensible devotion is not to be cared for so much as adhering to God by the will.
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Caput X. Actualis devotio et sensibilis non tantum curanda est, sicut voluntate Deo adhaerere.
Praeterea, non multum cures actualem devotionem, aut sensibilem dulcedinem, vel lacrymas, sed tantum per bonam voluntatem in intellectu sis mente cum Deo intra te unitus. Quippe super omnia placet Deo mens nuda a phantasmatibus, id est, imaginibus, speciebus, ac similitudinibus rerum creatarum. Decet namque monachum esse alienum ab omni creatura, ut soli Deo intra se nude et expedite intendat, vacet, et adhaereat.
Quamobrem abneges temetipsum, ut nude sequaris Christum Dominum Deum tuum, qui vere pauper, obediens, castus, humiliatus est, et passus: in cujus etiam vita et morte multi scandalizati fuerunt, ut liquet ex decursu Evangelii.
Praeterea, anima separata a corpore non advertit quomodo aut quid agatur de suo corpore derelicto, sive comburatur, sive suspendatur, sive maledicatur, et nihil propter has injurias corpori illatas contristatur, sed solum cogitat illud nunc aeternitatis, et illud unum quod dicit Dominus in Evangelio necessarium. Sic et tu te habeas ad corpus tuum, quasi jam non sis in corpore, et cogita semper de aeternitate animae tuae in Deo, et dirige sedulo cogitatum tuum in illud unum de quo Christus dixit: Porro unum est necessarium 1: et senties ex hoc magnam gratiam, ad mentis nuditatem et cordis simplificationem acquirendam.
Chapter X. Actual and sensible devotion is not to be cared for so much as adhering to God by the will.
Furthermore, do not care greatly for actual devotion, or sensible sweetness, or tears, but only be united in mind with God within you, through good will in the intellect. Indeed, above all things a mind bare of phantasms, that is, of images, species, and likenesses of created things, pleases God. For it is fitting that a monk be alien from every creature, so that he may attend to God alone within himself nakedly and readily, be free for him, and adhere to him.
Wherefore deny yourself, so that nakedly you may follow Christ, the Lord your God, who was truly poor, obedient, chaste, humbled, and suffering; in whose life and death also many were scandalized, as is clear from the course of the Gospel.
Furthermore, a soul separated from the body does not notice how or what is done concerning its abandoned body, whether it is burned, or hanged, or cursed; and it is not saddened at all on account of these injuries brought upon the body, but thinks only of that now of eternity, and that one thing which the Lord in the Gospel says is necessary. So also you should hold yourself toward your body as if you were now not in the body, and always think about the eternity of your soul in God, and earnestly direct your thought into that one thing about which Christ said: Moreover one thing is necessary 1. And from this you will feel great grace for acquiring nakedness of mind and simplification of heart.
Verumtamen istud unum est tibi praesentissimum, si te nudaveris a phantasmatibus, et quibuscumque aliis implicationibus, moxque senties sic esse, videlicet te nuda et expedita mente vacare et adhaerere Deo: et sic eris invictus etiam in omnibus qualitercumque inferri possunt, sicut et sancti Martyres, Patres, et electi, beatique omnes: qui, despectis omnibus, solum cogitabant animae securitatem et aeternitatem in Deo; et ita armati intus, et per bonam voluntatem Deo uniti, omnia mundi spreverunt, ac si omnino anima jam divisa esset a corpore.
Ex his ergo perpende, quantum potest bona voluntas cum Deo unita, imo per illam animae impressionem in Deo, ut per ejus a carne virtualem et spiritualem divisionem, anima quodammodo respiciat a longe hominem exteriorem suum tamquam non suum; et sic vilipendit omnia quae inferuntur sibi vel carni suae, ac si fierent alteri, vel non homini. Qui enim adhaeret Domino, unus spiritus est 2, scilicet cum eo. Numquam ergo audeas omnino coram Domino Deo tuo intra te aliquid cogitare, vel imaginari, quod coram hominibus erubesceres vel audiri, vel videri, propter Dei reverentiam principalem.
Est etiam hoc justum, omnem tuum cogitatum et cogitationem ad solum Deum erigere: eumque, tamquam nihil aliud praeter ipsum sit, sola mentis acie intueri, sicque inhaerendo frui, quod est perfecta inchoatio vitae futurae.
Nevertheless, that one thing is most present to you if you have bared yourself of phantasms and of whatever other entanglements; and soon you will feel that it is so, namely that with bare and unencumbered mind you are free for God and adhere to him. And thus you will be unconquered even in all things, however they can be brought upon you, just as also the holy martyrs, fathers, and all the elect and blessed, who, despising all things, thought only of the security and eternity of the soul in God. And thus, armed within and united to God through good will, they despised all things of the world, as if the soul were already altogether divided from the body.
Therefore from these things consider how much good will united with God can do, indeed through that impression of the soul in God, so that through its virtual and spiritual division from the flesh, the soul in a certain manner may look from afar upon its own exterior man as not its own. And thus it holds as vile all things that are brought upon itself or upon its flesh, as if they were done to another, or to one who is not a man. For he who adheres to the Lord is one spirit 2, namely with him. Therefore never dare at all, before the Lord your God within you, to think or imagine anything that before men you would blush either to have heard or to have seen, on account of the principal reverence of God.
This also is just: to lift up every thought and thinking of yours to God alone, and to behold him with the point of the mind alone, as though there were nothing else besides him, and thus by adhering to enjoy him; this is the perfect beginning of future life.
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