Chapter XXXIII. On Contemplation.

Chapter XXXIII.

On Contemplation.

A. True and perfect contemplation is a gathering of the affections and of all the powers of the soul toward knowing with delight and admiration of mind something about the divine nature: namely about power, wisdom, goodness, charity, nobility, largesse, and so on, or the hidden judgments of God, or his most holy will, or some perfection which tends into God. In this contemplation were the Patriarchs and Prophets and the holy Apostles. For he revealed his hidden things to the Patriarchs and Prophets through the Holy Spirit: to Noah concerning the flood ¹, to Abraham concerning the overthrow of Sodom ², to Jeremiah concerning the migration and captivity of the Jews, to Joseph concerning the famine of Egypt ³, to Daniel concerning the statue of Nebuchadnezzar ⁴, and so concerning the other Patriarchs and Prophets to whom he revealed other secrets, as diverse visions to Ezekiel ⁵. Hence Amos says: The Lord God will not do a word unless he has revealed his secret to his servants the Prophets ⁶. But to the Apostles through his only-begotten Son he indicated all his will and all perfection, as he himself says: All things whatsoever I have heard from my Father, I have made known to you ⁷, so that they too might reveal the same things to their descendants, which they also faithfully did. For their sound has gone out into every land, and their words to the ends of the world ⁸. But among the other Apostles he revealed and indicated the most hidden things to blessed John the Evangelist and blessed Paul. Among other things he opened to them the eight beatitudes, saying: Blessed are the poor in spirit, because, etc.; Blessed are the meek, because, etc. ⁹. These beatitudes contain great perfection in themselves and indicate the perfect will of God.

B. Contemplation, meditation, and thought differ. For in thought there is wandering of the mind; in meditation, investigation; in contemplation, admiration of mind. Thought is without labor and without fruit; meditation is with labor and fruit; contemplation is without labor and with fruit.

C. Three degrees ought to induce us to the contemplation of God, concerning which St. Gregory says: "The first is that it, namely the soul, gather itself to itself. The second, that it see what sort it is when gathered. The third, that it submit itself above itself, by applying itself to the contemplation of the invisible author. But it in no way gathers itself to itself unless it has first learned to restrain from the eye of the mind the phantasms of earthly and heavenly images: whatever from sight, whatever from hearing, whatever from smell, whatever from bodily touch and taste has occurred to its thought, to reject and trample down, so that it may seek itself inwardly as it is without those things. For when it thinks of these things, it turns within itself, as it were, certain shadows of bodies. Therefore all things must be driven away by the hand of discretion from the eyes of the mind, so that the soul may consider itself as it was created under God above the body: so that, being given life by the superior, it may give life to the inferior which it administers ¹⁰."

Ineffable sweetness, which is perceived there, ought to induce us to the same; the admirable perfection which is learned there; the beginning of all blessedness which is found there. For the highest God, the fountain of all blessedness, is known there; and what is known is loved; and what is truly loved is desired; and that for which one labors zealously is at last acquired; and when at last it has been acquired, it is possessed with unending delight. Concerning this St. Bernard says: "For the soul which has once learned and received from the Lord to enter into itself, and always in its inmost parts to sigh after the presence of God and to seek his face: for God is spirit, and those who seek him must walk in spirit and not in flesh, so that they live according to the flesh. Such a soul, I say, I do not know whether it would think it more horrible or more penal to experience even hell itself for a time, than after once tasting the sweetness of this spiritual pursuit, to go out again to the enticements, or rather the troubles, of the flesh, and to seek again the insatiable curiosity of the senses; Ecclesiastes says: The eye is not filled with sight, nor the ear with hearing ¹¹. Hear, indeed, an experienced man speaking what he says: You are good, Lord, to those hoping in you, to the soul seeking you ¹². If anyone tried to turn that holy soul away from this good, I think it would receive it no otherwise than if it saw itself thrown down from paradise and from the very entrance of glory. Hear still another like him: My heart said to you, he says, my face has sought you; your face, Lord, I will seek ¹³. Hence he used to say: But for me it is good to cling to God ¹⁴. And likewise, speaking to his soul, he says: Return, my soul, into your rest, because the Lord has done good to you ¹⁵. Therefore I say to you, there is nothing which anyone who has once received this benefit fears so much as lest, being abandoned by grace, he must go out again to the consolations of the flesh, indeed to desolations, and again endure the tumults of the carnal senses ¹⁶." St. Augustine was in this contemplation when he said: "But what I was doing in the world was displeasing to me, and it was very burdensome to me, with desires no longer inflaming me, as they had been accustomed, by hope of honor and money. For those things no longer delighted me, before your sweetness and the beauty of your house, which I loved ¹⁷."

D. He has the proof of true contemplation whom it wearies to live in the misery of this world, saying with blessed Tobias: It is expedient for me to die rather than to live ¹⁸. And with Job: My soul is weary of my life ¹⁹. And with blessed Paul: Unhappy man that I am! who will free me from the body of this death ²⁰? And who thirsts for the fountain of life, saying with the Psalmist: As the deer longs for the fountains of waters, so my soul longs for you, O God ²¹. Hence St. Gregory says: "The contemplative life is indeed to retain charity of God and neighbor with the whole mind, but to rest from exterior action, to cleave to the desire of the creator alone, so that it now ought to do nothing; but with all cares trampled down, the soul burns to see the face of its creator, so that it now knows how to bear with sorrow the weight of corruptible flesh, and with all desires to desire to be present among those hymn-singing choirs of angels, to be mingled with heavenly citizens, and to rejoice over eternal incorruption in the sight of God ²²."

E. He has the proof of false contemplation who knows something about God, or about some perfection of his, to which the truth of sacred Scripture is opposed, and nevertheless rashly defends this by reasons. From this heresies once proceeded, namely that of Arius, who denied the Son to be coeternal and consubstantial with the Father, and that of Sabellius, who confused the persons in the Trinity, positing only a nominal difference, although they truly differ in properties. For the Father properly has unbegottenness, the Son properly birth, and the Holy Spirit procession.