6 See IIa IIae, q.161, a.6.

6 See IIa IIae, q.161, a.6.

   ¹ See his Life by Guillaume de Tocco; also the Bollandists, March 7. Cf. the recent work of Father Petitot, O.P.: Saint Thomas d'Aquin, la vocation, l'œuvre, la vie spirituelle, 1923.

   ² Encyclical Studiorum ducem, June 29, 1923: "Haec igitur a Deo delapsa seu infusa sapientia, ceteris comitata donis Sancti Spiritus, perpetuum in Thoma accepit incrementum, aeque ac caritas, omnium domina et regina virtutum. Etenim illa huic erat certissima doctrina, amorem Dei numquam non oportere crescere 'ex ipsa forma praecepti: Diliges Dominum tuum ex toto corde tuo; totum enim et perfectum idem sunt. . . . Finis praecepti caritas est, ut Apostolus dicit, I Tim. 1:5; in fine autem non adhibetur aliqua mensura, sed solum in his quae sunt ad finem' (IIa IIae, q. 184, a. 3). Quae ipsa est causa quare sub praeceptum perfectio caritatis cadet tanquam illud quo omnes pro sua quisque conditione niti debent. . . . Itaque praeceptum de amore Dei quam late pateat, caritas eique adjuncta dona Sancti Spiritus quomodo crescant, multiplices vitae status, ut perfectionis, ut religiosorum, ut apostolatus, quid inter se differant et quae cujusque natura visque sit, haec et talia asceticae mysticaeque theologiae capita si quis pernosse volet, is Angelicum in primis Doctorem adeat oportebit."

   ³ The encyclical written by Pope Pius XI for the third centenary of St. Francis de Sales, January 26, 1923, calls attention to this doctrine in the following terms: "Christ constituted the Church holy and the source of holiness, and all those who take her for guide and teacher must, according to the divine will, aim at holiness of life: 'This is the will of God,' says St. Paul, 'your sanctification.' What type of sanctity is meant? Our Lord Himself explains it in the following manner: 'Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.' Let no one think that this invitation is addressed to a small, very select number and that all others are permitted to remain in a lower degree of virtue. As is evident, this law obliges absolutely everybody without exception. Moreover, all who reach the summit of Christian perfection, and their name is legion, of every age and class, according to the testimony of history, all have experienced the same weaknesses of nature and have known the same dangers. St. Augustine puts the matter clearly when he says: 'God does not command the impossible, but in giving the commandment, He admonishes us to accomplish what we can according to our strength, and to ask aid to accomplish whatever exceeds our strength.' " Concerning this doctrine, see St. Francis de Sales, Treatise on the Love of God, Bk. III, chap. 1.

   ⁴ Following the example of St. Thomas, he distinguishes infused contemplation from the extraordinary phenomena that sometimes accompany it.

   ⁵ This table differs slightly from that published by Father Gerest, O.P., in his excellent little Memento de la vie spirituelle, 1922, in which he expresses the ideas which we hold in common, and according to which he revised the work of Father Meynard, O.P., Traité de la vie intérieure.

   ⁶ See IIa IIae, q.161, a.6.

   ⁷ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 9, 3d sign.

   ⁸ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 13.

   ⁹ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 14.

   ¹⁰ Ibid., chap. 8.

   ¹¹ The Interior Castle, fourth mansion, chap. 3.

   ¹² The Way of Perfection, chap. 28.

   ¹³ See the explanation of these degrees of humility in St. Thomas, IIa IIae, q.161, a.6.

   ¹⁴ Luke 10: 27.

   ¹⁵ Matt. 5: 48.

   ¹⁶ John 1: 14, 16.

   ¹⁷ John 6: 47; 8: 51.

   ¹⁸ John 14: 21.

   ¹⁹ John 14: 16, 26.

   ²⁰ John 13: 34.

   ²¹ John 15: 13.

   ²² John 17: 11, 22.

   ²³ Matt. 11: 25.

   ²⁴ Col. 3: 5, 10.

   ²⁵ Rom. 6: 4-6; 12: 2.

   ²⁶ Gal. 5: 24.

   ²⁷ See II Cor. 4: 10.

   ²⁸ John 12: 24.

   ²⁹ Col. 3: 10, 12, 14; cf. Eph. 4: 1-6; Gal. 2: 9.

   ³⁰ Phil. 2: 5; I Cor. 11: 1.

   ³¹ Rom. 8: 7.

   ³² Rom. 6: 5.

   ³³ Rom. 6: 4–11.

   ³⁴ Col. 3: 1.

   ³⁵ Ephes. 2: 6.

   ³⁶ Gal. 4: 19.

   ³⁷ Phil. 3: 8.

   ³⁸ Col. 3: 1–4.

   ³⁹ Col. 3: 15–17.

   ⁴⁰ See infra, pp. 311 f., what St. Paul says about the spirit of wisdom.

   ⁴¹ Col. 3: 4.

   ¹ Summa theol., Ia, q. 1, a. 2, 8.

   ² With certain modern authors, we may say that "mystical theology is based on dogmatic theology, as ascetical theology is based on moral theology," to use the expression of an anonymous authority quoted by Sauvé in his excellent treatise Les états mystiques, 6th ed., p. 1. We believe, however, that this manner of speaking gives rise to a less lofty conception of moral theology than that formulated by St. Thomas Aquinas, and that it would perhaps lead to an exaggerated distinction between ascetical and mystical theology, and to a lack of perception of the continuity of spiritual progress. We shall return to this question, on which Sauvé often expresses himself in a precise and traditional manner in the same treatise.

   ³ An example of this type of book is Les grâces d'oraison by the learned and regretted Father A. Poulain, S.J. This book should be read attentively by all who wish to treat of these problems.

   ⁴ Father Poulain, Les grâces d'oraison, 9th ed., pp. 132, 164.

   ⁵ "Sanctifying grace is nobler than gratuitous grace" (Ia IIae, q.3, a.5).

   ⁶ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chaps. 10, 19, 20, 25.

   ⁷ Cf. infra, p. 59.

   ⁸ Bossuet, Manière courte et facile de faire l'oraison en foi et de simple présence de Dieu (a short work addressed to the Visitation Sisters of Meaux). This prayer may be called contemplation, but if it is compared with even the inferior passive states described by St. Teresa, evidently it does not deserve the name of essentially mystical contemplation, except perhaps for short moments, and in its second phase.

   ¹ This is quite distinct from visions and private revelations.

   ² For example, Philip of the Blessed Trinity, Summa theolog. mysticae (1874 ed.), says: "Debent omnes ad supernaturalem contemplationem aspirare: nihil honestius, utilius, delectabilius" (II, 299). "Debent omnes et maxime Deo specialiter consecratae animae, ad actualem fruitivam unionem cum Deo aspirare et tendere" (III, 43). "Contemplationis supernaturalis gratia aliquando conceditur imperfectis, aliquando denegatur perfectis" (II, 310). "Aliquando" indicates the exception rather than the rule. Cf. also Thomas of Jesus, De contemplatione divina, Bk. I, chap. 9.

   ³ Louis de Blois sums up the traditional teaching on this point in his Institutio spiritualis, chap. 1: "All men should aspire to union with God"; chap. 12: "How the mystical union with God is brought about in the soul which has reached perfection: (1) He who perseveres ordinarily obtains the mystical union; . . . (3) Some opinions on this union; (4) Its effects."

   ⁴ Summa, IIa IIae, q.181, a.1, 2.

   ⁵ Ibid., q. 182, a.3.

   ⁶ Ibid., a. 4.

   ⁷ Ibid., ad 2um.

   ⁸ Ibid., ad 3um.

   ⁹ Ibid.

   ¹⁰ Ibid., a. 2.

   ¹¹ Ibid.

   ¹² City of God, Bk. XIX, sec. 19.

   ¹³ Summa, IIa IIae, q.182, a.2 ad lum.

   ¹⁴ Ibid., ad 3um.

   ¹⁵ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chaps. 2, 3, 8.

   ¹⁶ Ibid., pp. 202 f.

   ¹⁷ "There is no more disturbing or more painful state for the soul than that of not seeing clearly into itself and of not finding anyone who understands it. Led by God to the heights of obscure contemplation and of aridity, it will seem to it that it is going astray; and in the midst of darkness, sufferings, anguish, and temptations, its director will say to it, as Job's consolers did to him: 'That is all melancholy and weakness. Perhaps you are guilty of hidden malice, as a result of which God leaves you in this abandoned condition' " (Prologue, p. 5).

   ¹⁸ La doctrine spirituelle, 7th principle, chap. 6, a.3, sec. 11; 4th principle, "Docility to the Inspiration of the Holy Ghost," chap. 1, a.3; chap. 11, a.2. Among later Jesuit authors, consult also the works of Father de Caussade and Father Grou.

   ¹⁹ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chaps. 10, 11, 16, 17, 20, 28.

   ²⁰ Supernatural quoad substantiam, says sound theology in contradistinction to supernatural quoad modum of sensible miracles or of prophetic knowledge of future events.

   ²¹ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 1.

   ²² La Contemplation (1912), pp. 61–71.

   ²³ St. John of the Cross (The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 9) certainly says: "Let it be well understood that God does not lead to perfect contemplation all who give themselves resolutely to the interior life. Why is that? God alone knows. Whence it comes that there are souls from whom God never completely withdraws the power to consider and reason except for a time." The words "God alone knows," show that that is not the fundamental law of spiritual progress; quite the contrary. These words are an allusion to predestination, which St. John of the Cross understands as St. Thomas does, for he says, in The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 5: "It is true that souls, whatever their capacity may be, may have attained union, but all do not possess it in the same degree. God disposes freely of this degree of union, as He disposes freely of the degree of the beatific vision." This is what St. Thomas says in Ia, q.23, a.5. The predestination of one soul rather than another does not directly concern the question proposed in this article: Is the mystical union in this life the summit of the normal development of the sanctifying grace of the virtues and of the gifts? The proof of this lies in the fact that, in all the just, grace is essentially ordained to glory, and yet all are not predestined to glory; some, in fact, lose grace and die in the state of mortal sin. "Many are called, but few are chosen."

   ²⁴ The Way of Perfection, chap. 20.

   ²⁵ Certain restrictions, expressed by St. Teresa in the Way of Perfection (chap. 17) and in The Interior Castle (fifth mansion, chap. 3), when they are compared with the general principle which she formulates and develops in The Way of Perfection (chaps. 18, 20, 25, 29), must be understood in this way. Consult the harmonizing of the different texts of St. Teresa by Father Arintero, O.P., Evolución mística, p. 639 note 2, and Cuestiones místicas, pp. 305 ff., as well as the excellent work of Father Garate, Razón y Fe, July, 1908, p. 325. It is certain that the joys of the mystical union are not necessary to perfection, and that supernatural contemplation is often very arid and painful. In The Interior Castle (fifth mansion, chap. 1), St. Teresa, speaking of the religious of her monasteries, says: "There are very few who do not enter this fifth mansion. As there are some who enter more and some less, I say the majority enter. Certain graces which are found therein, are, I believe, the portion of the few; but if the others merely reach the door, even that is an immense mercy on the part of God, for 'Many are called, but few are chosen.' "

   ²⁶ St. John of the Cross, The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Prologue: "In order to attain the divine light and the perfect union of the love of God, I speak of what can be realized in this life, the soul must pass through the dark night. Without a doubt, to explain this night and to make it understood, one should have deeper learning and greater experience than mine. . . . I hope that the Lord will help me to express useful truths, in order that I may in this way assist so many souls who are in urgent need of help. After the first steps in the path of virtue, when the Lord desires to make these souls enter the dark night, to lead them to the divine union, there are some who do not go any farther. Sometimes the desire to do so is lacking, or they are not willing to be led therein; sometimes it is because of ignorance, or because they seek in vain a guide capable of leading them to the summit. It is truly heartrending to see how many souls, favored by the Lord with gifts and exceptional graces (at times they would need only a little courage to attain high perfection), are content with inferior relations with God." The aim of this entire prologue is to correct many errors in the matter of direction. We know that, in the judgment of St. John of the Cross, the dark night is a period of mystical contemplation. In this same prologue he says so: "Led by God to the heights of obscure contemplation and of aridity, it will seem to the soul that it is going astray."

   ²⁷ These gifts are specifically distinct from the infused virtues (Ia IIae, q.68, a.1).

   ²⁸ See Ia IIae, q.68, and Bk. I of the Sentences, d.14, q.2, a.2 ad 3um.

   ²⁹ On this point, consult the following Dominican authors: Suso, Mystical Works; Tauler, Sermons; Piny, L'abandon à la volonté de Dieu. The following Jesuit authors should be read: Father Lallemant, La doctrine spirituelle; Father Grou, Maximes spirituelles (2d maxim); Father de Caussade, L'abandon à la Providence. See also St. John of the Cross, The Dark Night of the Soul, Part I.

   ³⁰ A miraculous, sensible effect, such as life restored to a dead body, is not supernatural in its essence, but only in the mode of its production; while the exercise of the gifts of the Holy Ghost is supernatural both in its essence and in its mode, quoad substantiam et quoad modum.

   ³¹ Lamballe, La Contemplation, p. 195. Arintero, Evolución mística, pp. 460–80; Cuestiones místicas, pp. 60, 571 note: "Explanation of the graces necessary for the transforming union." Sauvé seems favorably inclined to this thesis in États mystiques, pp. 85, 90–96, 100–05, 139–41, 162.

   ³² Saudreau, in the first editions of his books, did not clearly affirm that the transforming union is the summit of the normal development of the life of grace on earth. It even seemed to us that, in his opinion, this summit did not reach beyond the prayer of quiet, a thesis which we could not admit. It is clear, from what he says in the second edition of L'état mystique (pp. 51, 192) and in the third edition of the Vie d'union à Dieu (p. 259), that we agree completely. In this last reference he says clearly: "With these ordinary supernatural prayers, the soul may attain even the transforming union, the summit of the spiritual life, without ever having had an ecstasy or a vision."

   ³³ St. Teresa, Life, chap. 15: "Many are the souls who attain to this state (the prayer of quiet), and few are they who go farther." In The Interior Castle, fourth mansion, chap. 3, and fifth mansion, chap. 1, with regard to entrance into the fifth mansion (superior to the prayer of quiet), she says: "Even though all of us . . . are called to contemplation . . . there are few who prepare themselves so that the Lord may reveal to them this precious pearl of which we are speaking. For although in what concerns the exterior there is nothing reprehensible in our conduct, this does not suffice to reach so high a degree of perfection. How necessary it is to banish all negligence."

   ³⁴ Particularly when he describes (The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chaps. 18–20) the ten degrees of charity enumerated by St. Bernard, it is evident he believes that the inferior degrees should normally lead to the higher degrees, and to the highest of all. Besides, he adds that the progress of contemplation is proportionate to that of charity. The entire work of St. John of the Cross seems to manifest clearly the continuity of the degrees of the mystical union up to the transforming union. Some writers, it is true, have thought that St. John of the Cross writes only for a few rare contemplatives. He himself says, however, at the end of the Prologue of The Ascent of Mount Carmel, that he proposes "a solid and substantial doctrine which is addressed to all, on condition that they decide to pass through nudity of the spirit."

   ³⁵ See I Cor. 14: 20.

   ³⁶ We have proved this at length elsewhere: De revelatione, I, 202–17, 458–515. Cf. St. Thomas, IIa IIae, q.5, a. 1: "In the object of faith, there is something formal, as it were, namely, the First Truth surpassing all the natural knowledge of a creature, and something material, namely, the thing to which we assent while adhering to the First Truth."

   ³⁷ "Whether gratuitous grace is nobler than sanctifying grace" (Ia IIae, q.111, a.5).

   ³⁸ Summa, IIa IIae, q.184, a. 3.

   ³⁹ Luke 10: 27.

   ⁴⁰ Bk. II, chaps. 12, 13.

   ⁴¹ Fifth ed., pp. 227–36, 409.

   ⁴² Father Poulain, S.J., concedes this: "Almost all canonized saints have had the mystical union, and as a rule abundantly" (Les grâces d'oraison, 9th ed., p. 554). Father Poulain also recognizes the existence of a period of transition between the ascetical way and the mystical, a period which denotes a certain continuity between the two. Cf. Les grâces d'oraison, pp. 13, 122.

   ⁴³ Life, chap. 15; Foundations, chap. 4; The Interior Castle, fifth mansion,chap. 1.

   ⁴⁴ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chaps. 10, 19, 20, 25.

   ⁴⁵ John 27: 21.

   ⁴⁶ "Man's third pursuit is to aim chiefly at union with and enjoyment of God: this belongs to the perfect who desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ" (IIa IIae, q.24, a.9).

   ⁴⁷ St. Thomas, In Matthaeum (5: 2), speaking of the eight beatitudes, says: "These merits are either acts of the gifts or acts of the virtues according as they are perfected by the gifts"; "in a superhuman manner," as he said a few lines previously in the same passage.

   ⁴⁸ Luke 9: 23.

   ¹ Cf. infra, pp. 338 f.

   ² A nominal definition contains confusedly the real definition, and it may be more or less precise according as it is taken, for example, from an ordinary vocabulary or from a philosophical or theological dictionary.

   ³ We mean especially the Carmelites Philip of the Blessed Trinity, Anthony of the Holy Ghost, and Joseph of the Holy Ghost, the Dominican Vallgornera, several Jesuit theologians, some Franciscans, and some members of other orders.

   ⁴Summa, IIa IIae, q. 180, a. 1,6.

   ⁵ Cf. infra, pp. 221–35.

   ⁶ Cf. infra, pp. 235–38.

   ¹ See II Cor. 3: 6.

   ² These confusions have also been made, in a certain measure, by theologians who have undergone the sad influence of nominalism, which is a tendency that must end in seeing only words in everything which exceeds the immediate object of experience, sensible phenomena. For the nominalist there is no longer any human nature essentially distinguished from grace, but only an aggregation of human individuals. With greater reason, according to them, spiritual realities are naturally unknowable. For example, we cannot be certain of the spirituality and immortality of the soul unless God reveals them to us, and our intelligence cannot comprehend revealed formulas, because of the insufficiency of its ideas. This doctrine leads finally to a negation of theology and philosophy, to actual positivism. Occasionally, as a reaction, it has led certain souls to a mysticism, but a mysticism without doctrinal foundation, often composed of sentimentality proceeding from the powerlessness of diminished reason and from the necessity of finding something to cling to rather than from the idea of the infinite grandeur of God. One can be a nominalist by tendency without knowing it; indeed, this happens frequently.

   ³ Sensation has two elements: one material, the action of the nervous system carrying a stimulus from an exterior object to the brain, an action that follows laws governing similar actions in the lower order of nature; and one formal and specific, the rôle of which is to produce a representation of what disturbs the sense. It is almost always in this latter sense that St. Thomas uses the word ' "sensation." To restrict his use of the term to the material element is to materialize his doctrine still further. On the real sense of sentient being, cf. St. Thomas, Ia, q. 14, a. 1; q.78, a. 3

   ⁴ "It cannot be said that sensible knowledge is the total and perfect cause of intellectual knowledge, but rather that it is in a way the material cause" (Ia, q.84, a.6).

   ⁵ "For the intellectual light itself which is in us, is nothing else than a participated likeness of the uncreated light, in which are contained the eternal types" (Ia, q.84, a.5). "Therefore there must needs be some higher intellect, by which the soul is helped to understand" (Ia, q.79, a.4). Cf. Ia, q.105, a.3. Some Scholastics seem to consider in this intellectual light only its abstractive function and not its illuminating function which continues after the abstraction. Cf. De veritate, q. 10, a.6.

   ⁶ De veritate, q. 11, a. 1.

   ⁷ "Since the created intellect is naturally capable of apprehending the concrete form, and the concrete being abstractedly, by way of a kind of resolution of parts; it can by grace be raised up to know separate subsisting substance, and separate subsisting existence" (Ia, q. 12, a.4 ad 3um). "The soul is naturally capable of grace; since from its having been made to the likeness of God, it is fit to receive God by grace, as Augustine says" (Ia IIae. q.113, a. 10).

   ⁸ See Ia, q.1, a.8 ad 2um: q.2 ad 1um. q.60, a.5.

   ⁹ See Ia IIae, q.85, a.3; IIIa, q.69, a.3, 4 ad 3um; Contra Gentiles, Bk. IV, chap. 52.

   ¹⁰ See Ia IIae, q.113, a.9 ad 2um.

   ¹¹ The nominalists (such as Occam, Gabriel Biel, and Pierre d'Ailly) judged everything by the facts of experience and not by the formal reasons of things which alone, however, can render facts intelligible. Unable to discern in human individuals that which constitutes human nature, they no longer saw what distinguishes human nature from the gift of grace. In their view this gift was supernatural only by a contingent institution by God, as metal or paper has money value only in virtue of a law promulgated by civil authority. Grace thus conceived is no longer really and formally the seed of glory.

   ¹² They lost sight of the abyss which separates the natural object of the divine intelligence from that of created intelligence.

   ¹³ See Ia IIae, q. 110, a. 3.

   ¹⁴ "All perfections existing in creatures divided and multiplied, pre-exist in God simply and united" (Ia, q. 13, a.5). "As regards the object intended by the name, this name God is more proper than the name 'He who is,' as it is imposed to signify the divine nature" (Ia, q.13, a. 11 ad 1um). "The formal reason of the Deity is before all in its being and in all its attributes, for it is above being and above unity, etc." (Catejan on Ia, q.39, a. 1, nos. 7, 8).

   ¹⁵ "For it is as necessary that God alone should deify, bestowing a partaking of the divine nature by a participated likeness, as it is impossible that anything save fire should enkindle" (Ia IIae, q. 112, a. 1).

   ¹⁶ De revelatione, I, 197–217.

   ¹⁷ See IIa IIae, q. 110, a.3, 4; q.112, a.1.

   ¹⁸ De revelatione, I, 206, 337–403, and especially pp. 395–403: Why there cannot be in our nature or in that of the angels an innate desire of the supernatural life or an active obediential power, but only a faint desire and the passive capacity of being raised to this infinitely superior order.

   ¹⁹ See IIIa, q.79, a.1 ad 2um.

   ²⁰ Discours sur l'histoire universelle, Part II, chap. 19.

   ¹ See Ia IIae, q.63, a.4.

   ² Cf. B. Froget, De l'habitation du Saint-Esprit dans les âmes justes, Part IV, chap. 5, no. 3: "The infused moral virtues specifically distinct from the acquired moral virtues."

   ³ See Ia IIae, q.61, a.5.

   ⁴ See Ia IIae, q.63, a. 4; IIa IIae, q.6, a.1.

   ⁵ John 6: 44, 45, 47.

   ⁶ John 10: 27.

   ⁷ John 18: 37.

   ⁸ Heb. 11: 1.

   ⁹ Sess. VI, chap. 7.

   ¹⁰ Cf. St. Thomas, De veritate, q.14, a. 8 ad 4um.

   ¹¹ Cf. Cajetan, In IIa IIae, q.1, a. 1; and on the same subject, John of St. Thomas, Bannes, the Salamanca theologians, Billuart, etc. Capreolus expresses himself in the same manner in his Commentary on the Sentences, III Sent., d.24, q.1, a.3, 4.

   ¹² St. Augustine, In Joan., 8: 14, tr. 35. Migne, XXXV, 1658: "Light gives testimony of itself . . . and is a witness to itself that the light may be known. . . . Likewise Wisdom, the Word of God."

   ¹³ "Accordingly if we consider, in faith, the formal aspect of the object, it is nothing else than the First Truth. For the faith we are speaking of does not assent to anything, except for the reason that it is revealed by God. Hence the mean on which faith is based is the divine Truth" (IIa IIae, q.1, a. 1). "Now it has been already stated that the object of faith is the First Truth. as unseen, and whatever we hold on account thereof" (q.4, a. 1). "Nevertheless, we must observe that in the object of faith, there is something formal, as it were, namely, the First Truth surpassing all the natural knowledge of a creature, and something material, namely, the thing to which we assent while adhering to the First Truth" (q.5, a. 1).

   De veritate, q.14, a.8, corp.: "All created truth is defectible. . . . Therefore faith, which is set down as a virtue, must make the intellect of man adhere to the truth which consists in divine knowledge, by transcending the truth of his own intellect. And so the faithful soul through simple and unchanging truth is free from the fickleness of unstable error, as Dionysius says: De div. nom. c. VII." Cf. Ibid., ad 2um, ad 3um, ad 9um, ad 16um.

   ¹⁴ "A heretic does not hold the other articles of faith about which he does not err in the same way as one of the faithful does, namely, by adhering simply to the divine truth, because in order to do so, a man needs the help of the habit of faith; but he holds the things that are of faith by his own will and judgment" (IIa IIae, q.5, a.3 ad 1um). "For, since man by assenting to matters of faith, is raised above his nature, this must needs accrue to him from some supernatural principle moving him inwardly; and this is God" (q.6, a. 1). In Boetium de Trinit., q.3, a. 1 ad 4um: "The things which are proposed exteriorly relate to the knowledge of faith, as though received through the senses for the recognition of principles."

   ¹⁵ De veritate, q. 14, a.9 ad 4um: "To believe is used equivocally of the faithful and of demons."

   ¹⁶ Quodlibet II, a. 6 ad 3um.

   ¹⁷ See I Cor. 2: 14. See the commentary of St. Thomas on this text. In the encyclical Providentissimus, Leo XIII says: "The sense of Holy Scripture can nowhere be found incorrupt outside the Church, and cannot be expected to be found in writers who, being without the true faith, only gnaw the bark of the Sacred Scripture, and never attain its pith." To discover the literal meaning of Scripture, it is not always sufficient to have grammar, a dictionary, and the rules of rational exegesis, but one must also follow positively those of Christian and Catholic exegesis which proceeds under the divine light of faith, as is stated in all good treatises on interpretation of Scripture.

   ¹⁸ De praedestinatione sanctorum, PL, XLIV, 970. Also PL, XLV, 1019.

   ¹⁹ St. Thomas, In Joann., chap. 4, lect. 5, no. 2.

   ²⁰ Eph. 3: 17.

   ²¹ In Ep. ad Gal., 3: 11.

   ²² On this important point, Capreolus, Cajetan, Cano, Lemos, John of St. Thomas, and the Carmelites of Salamanca have always energetically opposed the nominalist conceptions or any that have sprung from nominalism, which disregard the essential supernaturalness of infused faith and of the motive which specifies it. Suarez agrees with St. Thomas on this point.

   ²³ Salmanticenses, De gratia, tr. XIV, disp. III, dub. 3, no. 40: "The formal motive of infused faith is the testimony of God, the Author of grace, which establishes a supernatural certitude. Man by his natural powers can rely on the testimony of God, the Author of nature (and of naturally knowable miracles), but he cannot without grace rely on the testimony of God, the Author of grace, on the voice of the heavenly Father, which is the principle of an essentially supernatural certitude, relative to an object and to an end of the same order." Cf. Ibid., nos. 28, 40, 42, 45, 60. Salmant., De fide, disp. I, dub. 5, nos. 163, 193. Divine revelation is that by which we believe mysteries, and revelation itself is believed by the same act; we adhere to it supernaturally by faith. Thus we have said with St. Thomas (De veritate, q.14, a. 18 ad 4um), light is seen and makes us see colors. These last formulas, as we have noted, are current among all the great commentators of St. Thomas (Dominicans or Carmelites), and are also used by Suarez.

   Lastly, the same doctrine is well defended by Father G. Mattiussi, S.J., Rivista di filosofia neo-scolastica, December, 1918, pp. 416–19, "L'atto di fede," and by Father M. de la Taille, S.J., Recherches de science religieuse, September, 1919, p. 275, "L'oraison contemplative." Likewise several years ago Father G. Petazzi, S. J., in an interesting study, Credibilità e fede, rightly contrasted the faith of the devils, springing from the natural perspicacity by which they discern miracles (IIa IIae, q.5, a. 2 ad 2um) with the infused faith of the faithful. "The acquired faith of the devils," he rightly says, "is neither essentially supernatural nor meritorious. It is not supernatural; although the formal motive of their belief is the authority of God, yet this is not the authority of God as the author of the supernatural order and in relation to a supernatural end. Consequently it is neither meritorious nor laudable, for the devils, while admitting the mysteries of faith, do not seek the good of God, but only their own (it would be stupid for them to deny the divine origin of a word confirmed by such striking signs). And since the authority of God as the author of the supernatural order, in relation to a supernatural end, constitutes a formal motive different from the authority of God considered simply as First Truth naturally knowable, it follows that the faith of the devils differs specifically from that of the faithful, as St. Thomas says in De veritate, q. 14, a.9 ad 4um: 'Belief is equivocally postulated of the faithful and of devils; in the latter there is no faith from any infused light of grace, as there is in the faithful.' "

   ²⁴ St. Francis de Sales, Treatise on the Love of God, Bk. II, chap. 14: "The Almighty, to impart to us the gift of faith, penetrates the soul and speaks to it; not by reasoning, but by inspiration. He proposes to the understanding the objects of its belief in so gentle and persuasive a manner, that the will is powerfully inclined to exert its freedom and authority over the understanding, and thereby reduce it to acquiesce unhesitatingly and fully in the truths revealed." Bossuet (Elèvations sur les mystères, 18th week, 17th elevation) says: "Above all, you must believe that those who believe owe all to God; that they are, as our Savior says, taught by God (John 6: 45): that it is necessary that He speak within, and that He search out the hearts of those He wishes especially to make hear Him. Therefore reason no longer: humble yourself. He who has ears to hear, let him hear (Matt. 11: 15): but let him know that it is God who gives these ears which hear."

   ²⁵ Scheeben, Dogmatik, I, sec. 40, no. 681.

   ²⁶ Lacordaire, Conférences de Notre Dame de Paris, 17th conference.

   ²⁷ Les vertus chrétiennes, I, 159 f., in the chapter on faith: "The senses and reason can indeed give us a physical or historical knowledge of supernatural, divine facts. This is their loftiest employment and in this their concurrence is indispensable. Without them the act of faith would be radically impossible; they are the soil in which this act germinates and which serves it as a support. But in regard to the real, commanded, meritorious perception of revealed supernatural truths, the most exquisite senses and the most highly cultivated reason remain utterly incapable of it. Faith alone can give us this perception. Faith is necessary to make us adhere to the content of revelation, that is, to the divine reality expressed in human language; and without grace, which inaugurates it in us, we could not surrender to the proofs on which it rests. Without faith the most intelligent and most learned person remains the purely natural man that St. Paul calls sensual; and the Apostle says that such a one 'perceiveth not these things that are of the Spirit of God . . . and he cannot understand' (I Cor. 2: 14). Even were the human mind capable of this adherence, there would still be the heart, which of necessity has its part here, and truly a very large part."

   ²⁸ If this doctrine is expounded to those who see things in the other way, some reply: "Those are mere words." Thus, without wishing to do so, they confess their unconscious nominalism. This nominalism is bound to lead them to see only meaningless words in the intimate life of God, inasmuch as that life underlies the order of the supernatural mysteries, essentially superior to the order of natural divine mysteries, which reason by itself can know. For the nominalists this distinction between the two orders was only a contingent distinction depending on the free will of God and not on the infinite elevation of His intimate life. Cf. De revelatione, I, 340.

   Others say: "What you are speaking of presupposes an extraordinary mystical illumination," whereas we are speaking only of Christian faith, such as that possessed by a believer even in the state of mortal sin; faith with a value and grandeur often unknown.

   ²⁹ Dionysius, De nom. div., chap. 7, no. 4: "The Logos [divine intelligence] is the simple and really existing truth, around which, as a pure and unerring knowledge of the whole, the divine Faith, the enduring foundation of the believers, is that which establishes them in the truth, and the truth in them, by an unchangeable identity, they having the pure knowledge of the truth of the things believed." The contemplative becomes more and more convinced that God is superior to every conception. "Then," says Dionysius, "the soul being freed from the sensible and from the intellectual world enters the transluminous obscurity of a holy ignorance and, renouncing every scientific fact, is lost in Him who can neither be seen nor understood" (Theol. mystic., chap. 1). See also chap. 2.

   ³⁰ Tauler in his Sermons often speaks of entirely pure, naked faith, stripped of images and rational knowledge. He declares this type of faith very superior to consolations and revelations. This pure faith is certainly accompanied by the gifts of understanding and of wisdom in an eminent degree. Tauler's teaching on this point has been summed up in the Institutions, chapters 8 and 35. This work seems not to have been written by him, but to have been drawn from his writings.

   ³¹ Œuvres mystiques (Thiriot ed.), II, 357.

   ³² Bk. II, chap. 9.

   ³³ Ibid., Bk. II, chap. 24.

   ³⁴ Ibid., Bk. II, chap. 4.

   ³⁵ Ibid. St. John of the Cross speaks in like manner in The Living Flame of Love, 3d str., verse 3: "Spiritual directors, who do not know the spiritual ways and their characteristics, turn souls away from the delicate unctions by which the Holy Ghost prepares them for divine union. . . . They persist in not allowing souls–even if the desire of God formally manifests itself–to pass beyond their principles and methods which are limited to the discursive and the imaginary. They forbid souls to pass beyond the limits of a natural capacity. How poor is the fruit which they draw from it." Does not he who conceives faith itself as a discursive process, particularly merit these reproaches? If, on the contrary, we consider the act of faith as a simple act without any reasoning, we prepare ourselves by this very consideration to follow the way pointed out by St. John of the Cross.

   ³⁶ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 29.

   ³⁷ Father Poulain, in our opinion, correctly interprets St. John of the Cross on this point. Cf. Les grâces d'oraison, 9th ed., p. 227.

   ³⁸ Bk. II, Part II, chap. 2; also The Living Flame, 3d str., vers. 3, no. 9.

   ³⁹ That is, as explained farther on, the sight of God of which infused faith is a faint impression, since this faith is the prelude of the beatific vision.

   ⁴⁰ The Spiritual Canticle, Part I, str. 12. Likewise in Maxims and Spiritual Counsels, maxim 24 (p. 557): "No perception or supernatural knowledge can aid us as much to love God as the slightest act of living faith and of hope freed from all intellectual support." Likewise maxim 27. See also The Living Flame of Love, str. 3, vers. 2: The overshadowings of the soul, the shadow of the divine perfections.

   ⁴¹ See IIa IIae, q.5, a. 1 ad 1um.

   ⁴² "But on the part of the soul, before it arrives at this uniformity, its twofold lack of uniformity needs to be removed. First, that which arises from the variety of external things . . . and secondly, that which arises from the discoursing of reason" (IIa IIae, q. 180, a.6 ad 2um).

   ⁴³ St. Thomas, In libr. de divinis nomin., chap. 7, lect. 4. Likewise, I Sent., d.8, q. 1, a. 1 ad 5um.

   ⁴⁴ Comment, in Mysticam theologiam Dionysii, chap. 1. See also De adhaerendo Deo, chap. 3, a work which for a long time was attributed to St. Albert.

   ⁴⁵Le livre des visions et instructions de la B. Angèle de Foligno, chap. 26.

   ⁴⁶ One of them writes on this subject: "This First Truth gives the soul great independence toward everything created, as though the soul had received shelter in the immutable. It can no longer suffer, as before, from exterior happenings, yet it endures continual suffering. This world, where it must continue to live, has its material, passing realities from which it cannot escape, and it sees itself subjected to deception. Everything but the contemplation of this First Truth is a heavy burden to it, which it bears without impatience. It performs all its external occupations with courage, although without any taste for them, because during the time of trial such is the will of God. And the will of God is truth. The soul loves it passionately no matter what suffering it may find therein. Thus the things of heaven and those of earth, immense happiness and continual suffering, harmonize in peace under this ray of Truth, which now illumines my life. I say 'O Truth,' as others say, 'O Love, O Mercy.' This is my ejaculatory prayer, my spiritual communion which gives me all my God. This First Truth, this subsistent truth, is God; it is His Being. This First Truth it is which gives me life and, by inclining toward me, nothingness and sin, it assumes the name of love and mercy.

   "I well know that I have not seen this Truth, since it is not given to us to see God while we are in the prison of our body; but my faith possesses this Truth in this dark light.

   "During one of these prayers of great darkness which I sometimes have, I was permitted to contemplate this essential glory of the Blessed Trinity, in comparison with which the most magnificent works of His wisdom, even that of the incarnation, do not count. And it seemed to me that the contemplative act of faith corresponded to this intimate life of God. I understood then the truth of that saying of St. John of the Cross, that the smallest act of pure love is of greater value in the eyes of God and more profitable to the Church than the greatest works. The desire to give contemplative souls to God and to His Church was greatly strengthened as a result. And I understood that the doctrine of St. Thomas on the supernaturalness of faith is intimately bound up with the contemplative and mystical life, which is none other than the life of faith par excellence."

   ⁴⁷ "The species of every habit depends on the formal aspect of the object, without which the species of the habit cannot remain" (IIa IIae, q.5, a.3).

   ⁴⁸ Summa, Ia IIae, q.68. See infra, chap.5, art.5. "The rôle of the gifts of the Holy Ghost; their predominance in infused contemplation."

   ¹ St. Thomas did not, as a rule, otherwise designate the theologians whose opinion he did not share; but he set forth their thought very exactly in their own words. Charity gained thereby, and the discussion was more serene. We will follow his example so far as we can. At this point we merely recall the principal assertions of these theologians of whom we are speaking: "Whether a sufficient help is efficacious or inefficacious depends on the will of him to whom it is given. With equal grace one sinner may be converted and another not. One person may arise from sin and that with a lesser help of grace, when another with greater help will not arise and will remain hardened. Not that he who accepts a grace accepts it by his liberty alone, but this distinction arises from liberty alone, and not from a difference of antecedent grace (auxilium praeveniens)."

   ² In this conception, what depends on the divine good pleasure is that Peter be placed in circumstances where, according to God's prevision, he will infallibly be saved, and Judas in another order of circumstances where he will infallibly be lost. The divine good pleasure might have made the inverse choice. Setting aside this choice of circumstances, we see that in this theory such a one is saved without being aided by grace more than another who is lost. Furthermore, certain elect souls have been less aided by grace than certain reprobate souls, not only in the course of their life but also at the last moment.

   ³ Cf. Salmanticenses, De gratia, tr. XIV, disp. VII, "De gratia efficaci": a comparison of the aforesaid doctrine with that of St. Thomas. The latter is set forth in this treatise according to the texts in a much more correct manner than in the article "Grâce" in the Dictionnaire de théologie catholique.

   ⁴ See I Cor. 4: 7.

   ⁵ John 15: 5. St. Thomas says (In Matth. 25: 15): "He who attempts more, has more grace in fact; but to attempt more, he needs a higher cause." See also In Ep. ad Ephes. 4: 7.

   ⁶ St. Cyprian, Ad Quirin., Bk. III, chap. 4 (PL, IV, 734): "We should glory in nothing, because of ourselves we have nothing." St. Basil, HoM. 22, "De humilitate": "Nothing is left to thee, O man, in which thou canst glory." St. Chrysostom, Sermones, 2, In Ep. ad Colos. (PG, LXII, 312): "In the business of salvation all is the gift of God." St. Augustine, De praedest. sanct., chap. 5. St. Thomas, Ia, q.23, a.5: "There is no distinction between what flows from free will, and what is of predestination; as there is no distinction between what flows from a secondary cause and a first cause." The first cause and the second cause are not, in fact, two partial co-ordinated causes, as two men tugging a ship, but two total subordinated causes, in such a way that the first applies or moves the second to act. Cf. Ia, q. 105, a.5; De pot., q.3, a.4, 7 ad 7um and ad 13um; Contra Gent., III, chaps. 66, 149; De malo, q.3, a.2 ad 4um; Contra errores Graecorum, chap. 23.

   ⁷ They are absolutely future or future under certain conditions only by virtue of a divine decree, because, being of themselves free, future events are not determined. If they were, they would impose themselves on God Himself as a fatality that would be superior to Him. Cf. IIa IIae, q. 171, a.3: "Things remote from the knowledge of all men, through being in themselves unknowable: such are future contingencies, the truth of which is indeterminate." Cf. also Ia, q. 14, a.5, 8, 13; q. 19, a.8; q.22, a.4; q.23, a.4, 5.

   ⁸ Cf. Ia, q. 16, a.7 ad 3um; q. 19, a.4; q. 14, a.8; Ia IIae, q.79, a.1, 2.

   ⁹ Cf. Del Prado, O.P., De gratia et libero arbitrio, III, 364 ff. (1907 ed.). As this learned author shows, it is inconceivable that God can infallibly foresee from all eternity a determination which would in no way come from Him. He alone is eternal; and no act of ours is future (absolutely or conditionally) from all eternity without being founded on a positive or permissive eternal decree of God. This is what St. Thomas establishes in the celebrated articles already cited: Ia, q.14, a.5, 8, 13; q.19, a.8; q.23, a.5, which we have explained elsewhere (God, His Existence and His Nature, II, 71–93).

   ¹⁰ Phil. 2: 13.

   ¹¹ Ezech. 36: 26.

   ¹² Prov. 21: 1.

   ¹³ Rom. 11: 35.

   ¹⁴ Rom. 9: 16.

   ¹⁵ See I Cor. 12: 6

   ¹⁶ Acts 17: 28.

   ¹⁷ Rom. 11: 36.

   ¹⁸ Prov. 21: 1; Phil. 2: 13.

   ¹⁹ Contra Gentiles, Bk. III, chap. 89. See also De veritate, q.22, a. 8; "Every act of the will, in so far as it is an act, is not only from the will as from an immediate agent, but from God as from a first agent that impresses it more vehemently; wherefore, just as the will can change its act into another, so much the more can God." Ibid., q.22, a.9: "God alone can transfer the inclination of the will, which He gave to it, from one thing to another according as He wills."

   ²⁰ No supernatural good without a supernatural aid; no natural good without the natural aid of God.

   ²¹ Denzinger, Enchiridion, pp. 193, 195.

   ²² Summa, Ia IIae, q.112, a. 3: "Man's preparation for grace is from God, as Mover, and from the free will, as moved. Hence the preparation may be looked at in two ways: first as it is from free will, and thus there is no necessity that it should obtain grace, since the gift of grace exceeds every preparation of human power. But it may be considered, secondly, as it is from God the Mover, and thus it has a necessity—not indeed of coercion, but of infallibility—as regards what it is ordained to by God, since God's intention cannot fail, according to the saying of Augustine in his book on the predestination of the saints (De dono persev., XIV) that by God's good gifts whoever is liberated, is most certainly liberated. Hence if God intends, while moving, that the one whose heart He moves should attain to grace, he will infallibly attain to it, according to John 6: 45: Everyone that hath heard of the Father and hath learned cometh to Me."

   ²³ Cf. Ia, q.105, a.4; Ia IIae, q.10, a.4 c ad 3um; q. 111, a. 2 ad 2um; q.113 passim; Ia IIae, q.24, a. 11; De malo, q.6, a. 1 ad 3um; De caritate, a. 12; Rom., 9, lect. 3; Eph., 3, lect. 2; Heb., 12, lect. 3; 13, lect. 3.

   ²⁴ Osee 13: 9.

   ²⁵ Cf. Ia IIae, q.79, a.I, 2; Ia, q.2, a.3 ad 1um; q.49, a.2.

   ²⁶ Contra Gentes, Bk. III, chaps. 160, 161; Ia IIae, q.2, a.5 ad 1um.

   ²⁷ Cf. Ia, q.23, a.3–5. Of this mystery it is said: "He that is a searcher of majesty, shall be overwhelmed by glory" (Prov. 25: 27).

   ²⁸ phil. 2: 13.

   ²⁹ See I Cor. 10: 12.

   ³⁰ phil. 2: 12.

   ³¹ Rom. 14: 4.

   ³² De correptione et gratia, chap. 11.

   ³³ Phil. 4: 13.

   ³⁴ Cf. Ia, q. 19, a. 8, fundamental article of the Summa theologica on this great problem. Cf. Del Prado, O.P., De gratia et libero arbitrio, Vol. II, chap. 9.

   ³⁵ Cf. Ia, q.83, a.1 ad 3um.

   ³⁶ Cf. ibid.

   ³⁷ De malo, q.6, a. l ad 3um: "Deus movet quidem voluntatem immutabiliter propter efficaciam virtutis moventis, quae deficere non potest" (St. Thomas does not say because of the prevision of our consent). The dominating indifference which constitutes liberty is potential in the faculty and it becomes actual in the choice itself. The divine motion, far from destroying, actualizes it: at the moment when the divine motion desires it, our will, which is directed toward the universal good, actually dominates the attraction of the particular good which it chooses.

   ³⁸ Cf. Ia IIae, q.2, a.8: "Now the object of the will, i.e., of man's appetite, is the universal good: just as the object of the intellect, is the universal truth. Hence it is evident that naught can lull man's will, save the universal good. This is to be found, not in any creature, but in God alone: because every creature has goodness by participation."

   ³⁹ Cf. Ia IIae, q.10. a.2; q.2, a.8; q.5, a.3, 8.

   ⁴⁰ Cf. Ia, q.105, a.4 ad 1um.

   ⁴¹ See Ia, q.8, a.1; Ia IIae, q.10, a.4; q.113, a.3; Contra Gentes, Bk. III, chap. 89.

   ⁴² St. Bernard, De gratia et libero arbitrio, chap. 14. Cf. Dict, théol., art. "Saint Bernard," col. 776.

   ⁴³ Cf. Ia IIae, q.113, a. 9 ad 2um.

   ⁴⁴ Is. 40: 31.

   ⁴⁵ St. Thomas, In Epist. ad Rom., chap. 9, lect. 4; Ia, q.23, a.5 ad 3um.

   ⁴⁶ Bossuet, Élévations sur les mystères, 18th week, 12th elevation.

   ¹ John 15:5.

   ² Phil. 2: 13.

   ³ See I Cor. 4: 7.

   ⁴ God, His Existence and His Nature, II, 365 ff. It is not necessary that our failure precede the refusal of efficacious grace, in priority of time; priority of nature is sufficient, in the order of material causality, according to the principle of the mutual relations of causes explained by St. Thomas (Ia IIae, q.113, a.8 ad 1um; cf. Ia IIae, q. 109, a. 1, a.8, 9, 10). It is God who anticipates us by His grace when He justifies us, and it is we who are the first to abandon Him when we lose divine grace: "God will not desert the justified, unless He is first deserted by them." Council of Trent, Sess. VI, chap. 2.

   ⁵ Bossuet, Œuvres complètes, 1845, I, 643. Cf. the general index of Bossuet's works for references to "grace" (resistance to grace). See particularly Défense de la tradition, Bk. XI, chaps. 19–27: Demonstration of the efficacy of grace by the permission of sins into which God allows the just to fall in order to humble them. Permission of the triple denial of St. Peter: "Peter was justly punished for his presumption by the withdrawal of an efficacious help which would have effectively hindered his denial." Bossuet shows that such is the doctrine not only of St. Augustine but of St. John Chrysostom, of Origen, of St. Gregory the Great, and of St. John Damascene, since they say that Peter was deprived of help, a statement which cannot apply to sufficient grace, for without this grace he would have been utterly powerless to avoid the sin. The statement applies to an efficacious help which would have made him effectively avoid this fall. From all of which we see that sufficient grace indeed leaves our will without excuse before God, and that the efficacious grace which St. Peter received later does not permit us to glory in ourselves.

   ⁶ Canon 22: "No one has anything of his own except his deceitfulness and his sin." Denzinger, no. 195.

   ⁷ See II Cor. 3: 5

   ⁸ Cf. Ia IIae, q.109, a. 2, 8, 9, 10.

   ⁹ Wis. 9: 14.

   ¹⁰ Luke 17: 10.

   ¹¹ Cf. Del Prado, O.P., De gratia, III, 151.

   ¹² Ps. 113: 1.

   ¹³ Eccles. 33: 13; Jer. 18: 6.

   ¹⁴ p_s. 118: 73.

   ¹⁵ Apoc. 5: 9.

   ¹⁶ Lam. 3: 22.

   ¹⁷ Ps. 30: 6; Luke 23: 46.

   ¹⁸ De dono perseverantiae, chap. 13.

   ¹⁹ See I Cor. 4: 7.

   ²⁰ Lam. 5:21.

   ²¹ On these prayers of the Church, cf. St. Augustine, Epist. ad Vital., 217 (al. 107), and Bossuet, Défense de la tradition, Bk. X, chap. 10.

   ²² Luke 18: 1.

   ²³ See I Thess. 5: 17–18.

   ²⁴ Ephes. 5: 19–20.

   ²⁵ Tob. 13: 2.

   ²⁶ Wis. 16: 12.

   ²⁷ Rom. 8: 26–27.

   ²⁸ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chap. 20.

   ²⁹ Cf. IIa IIae, q.83, a.2; St. Augustine, Enchirid., chap. 32; Bossuet, Défense de la tradition, Bk. XII, chap. 38.

   ³⁰ Rom. 8: 28–31.

   ³¹ St. Paul also says in the Epistle to the Ephesians, 1: 3–6, 11–12: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with spiritual blessings, in heavenly places, in Christ: as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity. Who hath predestinated us unto the adoption of children through Jesus Christ unto Himself: according to the purpose of His will: unto the praise of the glory of His grace, in which He hath graced us in His beloved Son. . . . In whom we also are called by lot, being predestinated according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things according to the counsel of His will. That we may be unto the praise of His glory, we who before hoped in Christ."

   ³² De praedestinatione sanctorum, chaps. 3, 6–11, 14, 15, 17; De dono perseverantiae, chaps. 1, 6, 7, 12, 16–20, 23; De correptione et gratia, chaps. 9, 12, 13, 14. See also on these texts, Del Prado, De gratia et libero arbitrio, III, 555–564; II, 67–81, 259; and Bossuet, Défense de la tradition, Bk. XII, chaps. 13–20.

   ³³ In Ep. ad Rom. 8: 28; In Ep. ad Ephes., I, no.5; Ia, q.23.

   ³⁴ Cf. II Pet. 3: 9.

   ³⁵ Bossuet, Méditations sur l'Évangile, Part II, 72d day.

   ³⁶ Rom. 11: 33–36.

   ³⁷ Matt. 11: 25–26.

   ³⁸ John 6: 43–44.

   ³⁹ Prov. 21: 1.

   ⁴⁰ Phil. 2: 13.

   ⁴¹ John 10: 27–30.

   ⁴² Jer. 18: 6.

   ⁴³ Rom. 9: 21–23.

   ⁴⁴ John 3: 35.

   ⁴⁵ John 6: 47.

   ⁴⁶ John 17: 6, 9, 11, 12, 15, 20, 24.

   ⁴⁷ Prov. 28: 26,

   ⁴⁸ Phil. 2: 12.

   ⁴⁹ See I Cor. 10 :12.

   ⁵⁰ Ps. 24: 2.

   ⁵¹ Ps. 30: 6.

   ⁵² p_s. 33:9.

   ⁵³ p_s. 15: 1.

   ⁵⁴ Ps. 30: 2.

   ⁵⁵ Is. 12: 2.

   ⁵⁶ Phil. 4: 13.

   ⁵⁷ Bossuet, Médit, sur l'Évangile, Part II, 72d day.

   ⁵⁸ See II Cor. 12:9, 10.

   ⁵⁹ Cf. Catechism of the Council of Trent, chap. 45, "On temptation."

   ⁶⁰ Ps. 36: 39 f.

   ⁶¹ See I John 4: 10.

   ⁶² John 15: 16.

   ⁶³ Rom. 8: 35, 37–39.

   ⁶⁴ John 17: 12, 24, 26.

   ⁶⁵ John 10: 10.

   ⁶⁶ Ps. 117: 17.

   ⁶⁷ De gratia et libero arbitrio, chaps. 1 and 14. Cf. Diet. Théol, art. "Saint Bernard," col. 776.

   ⁶⁸ See II Sent., dist. 26, q.2.

   ⁶⁹ We find the same doctrine in St. Thomas, Ia, q.23, a.5.

   ⁷⁰ Bk. IV, chap. 4, no. 2; chap. 8, no. 1; chap. 9, no. 2; chap. 55, no. 5; chap. 58. These passages are from The Imitation of Christ (edited by Brother Leo, F.S.C., 1926). They are quoted by permission of The Macmillan Company, publishers.

   ⁷¹ The directing thought of St. Teresa is found in St. Paul's words, "It is God who worketh in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to His good will" (Phil. 2: 13). In chapter 21 of her Life she writes: "Why His Majesty doeth this is, because it is His pleasure, and He doeth it according to His pleasure: even if the soul be without the fitting disposition, He disposes it for the reception of that blessing which He is giving to it." After examining why a certain soul reaches contemplation and perfection more rapidly than another, she concludes: "In short, the whole matter is as His Majesty wills. He gives His grace to whom He pleases" (Life, chap. 22). "God bestows His favors when He pleases, after the manner He pleases, and on whom He pleases. Being Master of His goods, He can bestow them thus without wronging anyone" (The Interior Castle, fourth mansion, chap. 1).

   In the account of her conversion (Life, chaps. 8, 9), she says: "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 myself. . . . 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. . . . I 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. . . . 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, chap. 9). "Now our Lord set me at liberty, and gave me strength also to use it" (Life, chap. 24). As someone has well said, in the face of this formidable mystery, against which so many heresies have arisen, and over which there have been so many sad controversies, even among true children of the Church, the Seraphic Virgin bows with serenity and gratitude. "O my God," she exclaims, "well is it for me that Thou didst not leave such a wretch as myself at liberty to fulfil or to frustrate Thy will. Mayest Thou be blessed forever, and may all creation praise Thee" (The Way of Perfection, chap. 32). "The more difficult things are to understand, the more devotion they inspire in me, and this in proportion to their difficulty" (Life, chap. 28).

   ⁷² The Spiritual Canticle, Part IV, stanza 38: "On that day of eternity, that is to say, before creation, and according to His good pleasure, God predestined the soul to glory, and the degree that it would occupy there. From that moment this glory became the property of the soul, and that in so absolute a manner that no vicissitude either temporal or spiritual can radically remove it; for what God has given gratuitously to the soul cannot fail to remain its property forever." In The Ascent (Bk. II, chap. 5): "God disposes freely of this degree of union (mystical), as He disposes freely of the degree of the beatific vision." In the Prayer of the Inflamed Soul, he says again: "For if Thou dost await my works, O Lord, in order thus to grant me what I ask, give them to me, perform them in me, and join thereto the pains Thou art willing to accept from me."

   ⁷³ Treatise on the Love of God, Bk. II, chap. 12. The author says in the same chapter: "Grace is so gracious and so graciously seizes on our hearts to draw them, that it in no way offends the liberty of our will; it touches powerfully but yet so delicately the springs of our spirit that our free will suffers no violence from it."

   ⁷⁴ Father Grou, S.J. (Maximes spirituelles, 2d maxim) writes as do the most faithful disciples of St. Thomas: "Grace alone can free us from the slavery of sin and assure us true liberty; whence it follows that the more the will subjects itself to grace, the more it will do all that depends on it to become absolutely,fully, and constantly dependent, the more free it will be. . . . Thus for the will all consists in putting itself in the hands of God, in using its own activity only to become more dependent on Him. . . . Is not our salvation incomparably more certain in God's hands than in our own? And fundamentally what can we do to save ourselves except what God enables us to do?" Cf. also Father de Caussade, S.J., L'abandon à la Providence, Bk. III, chaps. 1, 2; and Father Lallemant, S.J., La doctrine spirituelle, 4th principle, "La docilité au Saint-Esprit," chaps. 1,2.

   ⁷⁵ Bossuet, Elévations sur les mystères, 18th week, 15th elevation.

   ¹ Matt. 5: 48.

   ² John 3:36; 5:24, 39; 6:40, 47. Cf. 6: 55 ff., and the Commentary of St. Thomas on the Gospel of St. John dealing with these passages.

   ³ Summa, IIa IIae, q.24, a.3 ad 2um. "Grace is nothing else but the beginning of glory in us." Cf. Ia IIae, q.69, a.2; De veritate, q.14, a. 2.

   ⁴ John 17: 3.

   ⁵ See I John 3: 2.

   ⁶ See I Cor. 13: 12.

   ⁷ See I Tim. 6: 16.

   ⁸ Denzinger, Enchiridion, no. 530.

   ⁹ Ibid., no. 475.

   ¹⁰ St. Thomas, Ia, q. 12, a. 5.

   ¹¹ Cf. Ia, q. 12, a. 2.

   ¹² Wis. 7: 26.

   ¹³ See Ia, q.21, a .4.

   ¹⁴ See Ia, q.82, a.2.

   ¹⁵ Ps. 16: 15

   ¹⁶ See IIIa, q.3, a.8; in In Ep. ad Rom., 8: 29.

   ¹⁷ See I John 3: 1.

   ¹⁸ John 1: 13.

   ¹⁹ See II Pet. 1:4.

   ²⁰ Rom. 8: 29.

   ²¹ See I Cor. 2: 9.

   ²² Luke 14: 21. "Then the master of the house, being angry, said to his servant: Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor and the feeble and the blind and the lame."

   ²³ Matt. 11: 25.

   ²⁴ John 4: 10, 13 f.

   ²⁵ John 7: 37.

   ²⁶ John 3: 36; 6: 40, 47.

   ²⁷ John 6: 55.

   ²⁸ Luke 17: 20 f.

   ²⁹ This point is well explained in the beautiful exegetical study of Father J. B. Frey, S.Sp., "Le Concept de 'Vie' dans S. Jean," which appeared in the review Biblica, 1920, pp. 38–58, 213–239.

   ³⁰ See I John 3: 14 f.

   ³¹ Ibid., 5:13.

   ³² John 17: 3.

   ³³ John 15: 4; 17: 26.

   ³⁴ See I John 5: 11 f.

   ³⁵ John 8: 51–53.

   ³⁶ John 11: 25 f. See also John 4: 14; 8: 51; 10: 28; 13: 8.

   ³⁷ John 6: 49, 59.

   ³⁸ Preface of the mass for the dead.

   ³⁹ Cf. the Carmelites of the Salamanca School, De gratia, disp. IV, dub. 6, nos. 107, 109; dub. 7, no. 141; Sanctifying grace is the same habitus, which, having received its final perfection, is called glory or grace consummated.

   ⁴⁰ See I Cor. 13: 8, 13; and St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q.67, a.6. Charity differs from faith and hope in that it does not imply any imperfection, and that it can love God either in the obscurity of faith or in the clarity of vision.

   ⁴¹ As the Carmelites of Salamanca show (De caritate, disp. VII, dub. 4, no. 66), theologians commonly admit that the charity of a just man living on earth can equal that of one of the blessed in heaven. The reason for this is that the charity of each of the blessed in heaven has a determined degree beyond which it will never progress. But this degree can be attained and even surpassed by a just soul here on earth. It is certain that the Blessed Virgin, while still on earth, had a charity which far surpassed that of every soul in heaven and that of the angels. But the charity which an adult possesses on earth is always inferior to that which he will have in heaven, where nothing will hinder the impulse of his love. Cf. Ia, q. 117, a. 2 ad 3um.

   ⁴² Cf. Ia IIae, q.68, a. 6.

   ⁴³ See I Thess. 2: 13.

   ⁴⁴ See I Cor. 2: 10.

   ⁴⁵ Heb. 11: 1.

   ⁴⁶ Gal. 1: 8.

   ⁴⁷ See II Cor. 4: 6 f.

   ⁴⁸ Cant. 8: 6 f.

   ⁴⁹ John 1: 13.

   ⁵⁰ John 14: 23.

   ⁵¹ See I John 4: 16.

   ⁵² John 16: 13.

   ⁵³ See I Cor. 3: 16.

   ⁵⁴ Ibid., 6: 19.

   ⁵⁵ See II Cor. 6: 16.

   ⁵⁶ Cf. St. Thomas, Ia, q.43, a.3: "For God is in all things by His essence, power, and presence, according to His one common mode, as the cause existing in the effects which participate in His goodness. Above and beyond this common mode, however, there is one special mode belonging to the rational creature wherein God is said to be present as the object known is in the knower, and the beloved in the lover. And since the rational creature by its own operation of knowledge and love attains to God Himself, according to this special mode, God is said not only to exist in the rational creature, but also to dwell therein as in His own temple. . . . Again, we are said to possess only what we can freely use or enjoy, but to have the power of enjoying the divine Person can only be according to sanctifying grace. Moreover, the Holy Ghost is possessed by man, and dwells within him in the very gift itself of sanctifying grace. Hence the Holy Ghost Himself is given and sent."

   I Sent., Dist. XIV, q.2, a. 2 ad 3um: "Any knowledge whatsoever does not suffice to indicate that there is a mission (and indwelling of the Holy Ghost). There must be a knowledge which proceeds from a gift attributed to that person, from a gift which unites us to God according to the mode proper to that person, that is to say, by love. Moreover, this knowledge is quasi-experimental." It presupposes, then, the presence of God who thus makes Himself felt by us as the principle which vivifies us. This explanation, while allowing the mystery to subsist, is considerably cleared up if we recall that charity is the same virtue in heaven and on earth; in the quality of perfect friendship charity, even on earth, demands real union with God, loved above all. God, who is pure spirit, not being by His nature in one place, is not separated from us by space. He is in us, as in all things, as first preserving cause. For several Thomists, if, by an impossibility, He were not already thus present in us, He would become so by charity. Cf. B. Froget, O.P., De l'habitation du Saint-Esprit dans les âmes justes, 3d ed., pp. 156–71, and Ia, q.43, a.3; IIa IIae, q.27, a.4; see Gonet, Salmanticenses, Billuart. John of St. Thomas has a different opinion about this hypothesis, "by an impossibility" mentioned above. His opinion, however, seems less probable.

   ⁵⁷ Méditations sur l'Évangile, Part II, 37th day; In Joan., 17: 3: "Now this is eternal life: that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent."

   ⁵⁸ Ibid.

   ⁵⁹ See I Cor. 13: 1 ff.

   ⁶⁰ John 3: 36.

   ⁶¹ Cf. St. John of the Cross, The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 5: "The greater love is, the more intimate is union; and this means that the conformity of the will with God's will is more perfect. The will, wholly conformed, realizes in its totality union and the supernatural transformation in God.

   "This doctrine makes it clear that if the soul is occupied with creatures or with its faculties, either by attraction or by habitual dispositions, it thereby lacks preparation for such a union. The reason for this is that the soul does not offer itself entirely to God, who wishes its supernatural transformation. It must, therefore, concern itself solely with the rejection of obstacles, natural dissimilarities, in order that God, who already communicated Himself naturally, according to nature, may communicate Himself supernaturally by grace." This teaching confirms the doctrine which we defended earlier in this work on the relations between ascetical and mystical theology.

   ⁶² Rom. 8: 16.

   ⁶³ In Ep. ad Rom., 8: 16, and Ia IIae, q.112, a.5. B. Froget, O.P., De l'habitation du Saint-Esprit dans les âmes justes, p. 183.

   ⁶⁴ This does not mean that in fact the transforming union must be reached before death in order to avoid purgatory. Certainly some souls—for example, the souls of children who have died immediately after baptism—go directly to heaven without having attained on earth this degree of intimate union. But here, considering a question of principle rather than of fact, what we mean and will explain farther on, is that the transforming union is the normal prelude of the beatific vision; it is a normal summit. The first of these two words should not make us forget the second; nor the second, the first. Many of those who die immediately after baptism or religious profession are far from being perfect. If they had continued to live, they would have committed faults, which would have required the purification of which we are speaking.

   ¹ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 184. We will follow the order of the articles of this question, supplementing them by such articles of the treatise on charity as bear directly on this subject.

   ² Summa, IIa IIae, q. 184.

   ³ Cf. Father Mainage, O.P., Les principes de la théosophie, 1922.

   ⁴ See I Cor. 14: 20.

   ⁵ Ibid., 2:6, 15 f.

   ⁶ Perfection does not consist especially in contemplation, which is an intellectual act, as we shall see farther on. Perfection consists in charity. However, the loving contemplation of God is here below the most efficacious means to attain the perfection of charity; and it is a means united to the end.

   ⁷ Matt. 7: 26.

   ⁸ See I Cor. 8: 1.

   ⁹ St. Thomas, IIa IIae, q.17, a. 6 ad 3um.

   ¹⁰ Jas. 1: 4

   ¹¹ It can aptly be said: "The best thing that one can do with the best of things is to sacrifice it," on condition, however, that we safeguard the hierarchy of the gifts of God and of the virtues, and that we do not sacrifice something superior to what is inferior.

   ¹² St. Thomas says in substance that the reason of greater virtue consists in the good rather than in the difficult; although the difficulty springing from the magnitude of the work increases merit. Ia IIae, q.114, a.4 ad 2um; IIa IIae, q. 155, a.4 ad 2um; q. 123. a. 12 ad 2um. The principle of merit resides in charity. Moreover, it is more meritorious to accomplish easy things with great charity than to perform very difficult acts with less charity. Thus many tepid souls carry their cross without great merit, whereas the Blessed Virgin merited more by the easiest acts of charity than all the martyrs together in their torments.

   ¹³ On this subject, St. Thomas (IIa IIae, q. 188, a. 7 ad 1um) says: "This saying of our Lord does not mean that poverty itself is perfection, but that it is the means of perfection. Indeed, as shown above, it is the least of the three chief means of perfection, since the vow of continence excels the vow of poverty, and the vow of obedience excels them both. Since, however, the means are sought, not for their own sake, but for the sake of the end, a thing is better, not for being a greater instrument, but for being more adapted to the end. Thus, a physician does not heal the more, the more medicine he gives, but the more the medicine is adapted to the disease. Accordingly, it does not follow that a religious order is the more perfect according as the poverty it professes is more perfect, but according as its poverty is more adapted to the end, both common and special."

   ¹⁴ Cf. St. Thomas, IIa IIae, q.161, a.5 ad 2um: "Just as the orderly assembly of virtues is, by reason of a certain likeness, compared to a building, so again that which is the first step in the acquisition of virtue is likened to the foundation, which is first laid before the rest of the building. . . . Humility holds the first place inasmuch as it expels pride, which God resisteth, and makes man open to receive the influx of divine grace. Hence it is written (Jas. 4: 6): 'God resisteth the proud and giveth grace to the humble.' In this sense humility is said to be the foundation of the spiritual edifice." But it is, nevertheless, inferior to the virtues which unite us immediately to God; that is, to the theological virtues and also to the intellectual virtues, such as wisdom, and to legal justice. Cf. Ibid.

   ¹⁵ Cf. IIa IIae, q.81, a.5: Why is not the virtue of religion a theological virtue, but only the first of the moral virtues? Because its object is the worship due to God and not God Himself.

   ¹⁶ Osee 2: 14.

   ¹⁷ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 188, a. 8.

   ¹⁸ Introduction to a Devout Life, chap. 1.

   ¹⁹ Eph. 6: 11, 13.

   ²⁰ Col. 3: 12–15.

   ²¹ Luke 10: 27.

   ²² See I Cor. 13: 1 ff.

   ²³ Ibid., 13: 4–7.

   ²⁴ Ibid., 13: 8–13.

   ²⁵ Eph. 3: 17–19.

   ²⁶ See I John 4: 16.

   ²⁷ Ibid., 4: 8.

   ²⁸ Ibid., 3: 14.

   ²⁹ See I Pet. 4: 8.

   ³⁰ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 184, a. 1.

   ³¹ Ibid.

   ³² Summa, IIa IIae, q.184, a.3.

   ³³ Cf. St. Thomas, in his Commentary on the Epistle to the Colossians, 3: 14; Summa, IIa IIae, q.23, a. 6–8.

   ³⁴ See I Cor. 13: 2.

   ³⁵ Summa, IIa IIae, q.27, a. 4; Ia, q.43, a. 3.

   ³⁶ See Ia, q.82, a. 3.

   ³⁷ "And so it is with an intelligible end. For at first we desire to attain an intelligible end. We attain it (God) through His being made present to us by an act of the intellect; and then the delighted will rests in the end when attained. So, therefore, the essence of happiness consists in an act of the intellect: but the delight that results from happiness pertains to the will. In this sense St. Augustine says (Conf., X, 23) that happiness is joy in truth, because, to wit, joy itself is the consummation of happiness."

   ³⁸ See Ia, q.82, a. 3.

   ³⁹ Ibid.

   ⁴⁰ Ibid.

   ⁴¹ See IIa IIae, q.27, a. 4.

   ⁴² Ibid., ad 2um.

   ⁴³ See IIa IIae, q.23, a. 6.

   ⁴⁴ See I John 4: 16.

   ⁴⁵ See IIa IIae, q.45, a. 2, 4.

   ⁴⁶ "The theological virtues are more excellent than the gifts of the Holy Ghost, and regulate them. Hence . . . the seven gifts never attain perfection . . . unless all that they do be done in faith, hope, and charity" (Ia IIae, q.68, a. 8).

   ⁴⁷ Some theologians (for example, Suarez) teach that perfection consists formally in the virtue of charity, antecedently and concomitantly in its acts. Father Passerini, O.P., we think, states the opinion of the Thomistic school. He teaches that perfection, to which the state of perfection is ordered, consists formally in the acts of charity and antecedently in the virtue, as in the principle of perfect operation. The reason for this is that perfection consists in actual union with God, mihi adhaerere Deo bonum est. It is found, therefore, in active charity or in the activity of charity, which in truly perfect souls should be morally continual or unceasing. Virtue is ordered to its act as to its perfection; and we tend not only to be able to love God perfectly, but to love Him in fact by avoiding all sin as much as possible. Life consists especially in the act of living.

   ⁴⁸ Cajetan, on IIa IIae, q. 184, a. 1, and Suarez, on the same article.

   ⁴⁹ See IIa IIae, q. 184, a.3.

   ⁵⁰ Passerini, O. P., De statibus hominum (on IIa IIae, q. 184, a. 1), p. 20, no. 8: "Actual perfection consists essentially not in the act alone of charity, but also in the acts of the other virtues ordered by charity according as they are of precept." Cf. Ibid., pp. 22–27, 49, 54. "Actual perfection consists chiefly and principally in charity alone, because charity perfects simply, and the other virtues relatively. . . . Furthermore, actual perfection is formally in charity alone, which is the bond of perfection. . . . Yet other virtues pertain to the essence of perfection just as matter to the essence of a natural composite" (p. 21, no. 10). "The acts of the other virtues as they are of counsel, are accidents of perfection" (p. 23, nos. 20 ff.). By this distinction between what is of counsel and what is of precept in the virtues inferior to charity, Passerini introduces a precision which Cajetan had forgotten, and clearly expresses the thought of St. Thomas which, as we shall see in regard to article 3, was not understood by Suarez.

   ⁵¹ Particularly (specialiter) is the term used by St. Thomas when he treats the question ex professo (IIa IIae, q. 184, a. 1). He says elsewhere (De perfectione vitae spiritualis): "Spiritual life consists principally in charity."

   ⁵² "Principally as to the love of God, secondarily, as to the love of our neighbor" (IIa IIae, q.184, a. 3).

   ¹ Phil. 3: 12.

   ² Cf. St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q.24, a.9; II Sent., Dist. IX, 2 ad 8um. In the latter text, St. Thomas, speaking of the purgative, the illuminative, and the unitive ways, observes that all who truly lead souls to perfection, also illumine them and purify them, but the reverse is not true. He who purifies them from sin, may not always be able to illumine them and a fortiori may be unable to lead them to perfection, to divine union.

   ³ Certain authors merely say rather timidly: "To have an ensemble of the unitive life, the mystical state must be joined thereto." Thus Father Meynard, O.P., expresses his opinion in his Traité de la vie intérieure, I, 464 note, 22–28.

   ⁴ Cf. supra, chap. 2, art. 2.

   ⁵ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 1.

   ⁶ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Prologue.

   ⁷ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chaps. 1–7.

   ⁸ See II Tim. 3: 12.

   ⁹ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 3.

   ¹⁰ As St. John of the Cross says, in The Dark Night of the Soul (Bk. I, chap. 8): "The passive purification of the senses is common. It takes place in the greater number of beginners." Consequently we are surprised to see the night of the senses placed in the last chapter consecrated to the perfect, or to the unitive way, in a plan of ascetical and mystical theology (published in the Revue d'ascétique et de mystique, January, 1921, p. 35). According to St. John of the Cross, the night of the senses ordinarily takes place much earlier.

   ¹¹ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 14.

   ¹² The saint speaks of infused contemplation also in the first text cited (The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 1), and even in The Ascent (Bk. II, chap. 13). When he uses the word "contemplation," he is speaking of contemplation properly so called, or infused contemplation, which is more or less passive at the beginning. These correspond to the first supernatural prayers of St. Teresa, those of passive recollection and of quiet (fourth mansion). She describes the night of the spirit in the sixth mansion. We mention these texts infra (chap. 5, art. 3, no. 2).

   ¹³ Discourse or reasoning is no longer found in the knowledge proceeding from the gifts of the Holy Ghost, which at this point intervene more and more. See St. Thomas, IIa IIae, q.8, 45.

   ¹⁴ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chap. 1.

   ¹⁵ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chap. 2.

   ¹⁶ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chap. 18.

   ¹⁷ Ibid., chap. 20. There are doubtless souls that avoid purgatory, without having passed through the passive purifications of the spirit; for example, those who died immediately after baptism, and religious who died immediately after their solemn profession; but if these had continued to live, they would have fallen into many imperfections, which would have necessitated the purifications mentioned here by St. John of the Cross. He does not consider accidental cases, but what is ordinarily required to attain a lofty perfection in this life, and in heaven, a proportionate degree of glory.

   ¹⁸ The Spiritual Canticle, Part III, st. 22 to the end.

   ¹⁹ Ibid., st. 24.

   ²⁰ See I Cor. 6: 17.

   ²¹ The Spiritual Canticle, st. 26. This teaching of St. John of the Cross on the spiritual marriage, the acme of the development of the mystical life, does not differ from that of the other saints who have commented on the Canticle of Canticles. These commentaries become truly the light of life only for souls that are in the way of this perfect union. On this subject, see the last work of Father Arintero, O.P., Cantar de los Cantares, Exposición mística.

   ²² The Spiritual Canticle, st. 24.

   ²³ Ibid., st. 26.

   ²⁴ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. III, chap. 1. It would be manifestly an error to believe that The Ascent of Mount Carmel deals only with the ascetical way, and that the contemplation mentioned therein is not infused or mystical contemplation. Cf. Bk. II, chap. 13. But in The Ascent the soul learns what it must do, while in The Dark Night of the Soul it learns how it should allow itself to be formed by God. Cf. Father Gabriel of Jesus, C.D., La Subida del Monte Carmelo es ascética o es mística?" in La Vida Sobrenatural, 1923, p. 24. The author holds the same opinion as we do.

   ²⁵ For example, Father Naval in his recent Cursus theologiae asceticae et mysticae, pp. 240–259, demands for the ordinary unitive life only the contemplation which is called acquired. According to him, the soul reaches this state without having undergone the strongest passive purifications of the senses, and without having experienced those of the spirit.

   ²⁶ In Ep. ad Hebraeos, 6:1, lect. 1.

   ¹ A. Poulain, S.J., The Graces of Interior Prayer, chap. 31, no. 45.

   ² In this division there would be the purgative-ascetical way, the illuminative-ascetical way, and the unitive-ascetical way below the three corresponding mystical ways.

   ³ Thus the same doctrine explained to several students is clearly understood by one of them, less clearly by another.

   ⁴ "Both groups will find a substantial doctrine in this book, but it is on condition that they decide to pass through nudity of spirit. I confess, however, that in this treatise I have had in mind especially some members of our holy order."

   ⁵ Cf. Father Arintero, O.P., La Ciencia tomista, May, 1919. The expression "full perfection" shows that we are speaking not only of its essence but of its integrity. Thus to have five fingers on each hand belongs to the integrity of the human body, without being of its essence.

   ⁶ Cf. De la Taille, S.J., L'oraison contemplative, 1921.

   ⁷ The same is true in the physical order. A cedar will not attain its normal height if it is not planted in suitable ground, or if certain exterior circumstances are lacking. Similarly, from an intellectual point of view, by reason of a lack of serious foundation, of favorable environment, or because of an unreceptive temperament, certain laborious minds never attain their full normal development.

   ⁸ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Prologue.

   ⁹ Cf. John of St. Thomas, commentary on Ia IIae, q.68, De donis Spiritus Sancti, disp. XVIII, a. 2, no. 31: "The actual inspiration of the Holy Ghost is not within our power, but it is within our power to have our heart always ready to obey, in order that we may be easily moved by the Holy Ghost."

   The Carmelite theologians and those of the Dominican school teach that all souls should aspire to supernatural or infused contemplation, and that this contemplation can be merited at least de congruo: "All ought to aspire to supernatural contemplation." This thesis is defended by Philip of the Blessed Trinity, Theol. myst. (1874), II, 299, 311; by Anthony of the Holy Ghost, Directorium mysticum (1732), p. 99; by Vallgornera, O.P., Theol. mystica (Berthier éd.), 1,428; by Father Meynard, O.P., Traité de la vie intérieure, II, 131.

   ¹⁰ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 15. This is true in principle. However, we must keep in mind predestination, about which St. John of the Cross writes: "It is true that souls, whatever their capacity may be, can have attained union, but all do not possess it in the same degree. God disposes freely of this degree of union as He disposes freely of the degree of the beatific vision" (The Ascent, Bk. II, chap. 5). From the fact that all the just are not predestined to glory and do not infallibly attain it, one cannot claim that it is not the normal consummation of grace as well as of the mystical union in this life. We must not confound vocation and predestination: "Many are called, but few are chosen." This difference should, however, be noted: it is through his own fault only that an adult fails to attain salvation, while he may fail through no fault of his own to attain contemplation.

   ¹¹ This doctrine stands out as a happy medium between and a culminating point above two opinions which are contrary to each other. The first opinion reduces mystical contemplation to an act of living faith more intense than other acts of faith, and this because it fails to understand the specific distinction between the virtues and the gifts, established by St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q.68, a. 1–3. The second opinion seems to elevate the mystical life greatly, though in reality it reduces it, because it does not see clearly enough the profound difference which exists between the gifts of the Holy Ghost (supernatural by their essence and their mode, and present in all souls in the state of grace) and the graces gratis datae, which are not generally supernatural by their very essence, but only by their mode (quoad modum); which do not necessarily presuppose the state of grace, and which are, so to speak, not only actually but essentially exterior and extraordinary. Cf. Ia IIae, q.3, a. 5.

   ¹² See supra, chap. 5, art. 2.

   ¹³ See chap. 6.

   ¹⁴ It may be conceded that materially and in fact there are two unitive ways, although formally and in principle there is only one, now perfectly, now imperfectly, realized. We must not elevate a material or actual distinction into a formal or essential distinction.

   ¹⁵ Bk. IV, chap. 31.

   ¹⁶ See the commentary on this passage by Father Dumas, S.M., in his excellent book, L'Imitation de Jésus-Christ: introduction à l'union intime avec Dieu, pp. 360–370.

   ¹⁷ The mistress of novices in a French Carmelite convent recently wrote us the following letter on this subject: "I have been a religious for many years, and for a long time mistress of novices. In my opinion, many souls remain at the door of the true life because they lack instruction and are deluded in believing that meditation alone is a sure state. Ordinarily when one enters our monasteries with the required dispositions (and it ought to be the same in all cloisters), and when one strives seriously to acquire the virtues, the soul is, in a very short time, subjected by God to aridity and powerlessness, the prelude of the passive purifications. It is almost impossible to make those who have been trained according to the method of reasoned meditation believe that this state is good, and that it is made to lead them to the divine union. They do not understand the teaching of St. John of the Cross: 'To apply oneself at this time to the comprehension and the consideration of particular objects, were they ever so spiritual, would be to place an obstacle in the way of the general, subtle, and simple light of the spirit; it would be to overcloud one's spirit' (The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 15).

   "The contrary is true of souls that submissively accept these first trials. In a short time they enjoy peace, and then the knowledge of how to find God in this darkness. As a result of this knowledge, they make rapid progress. Those who cling to meditation are still waiting after thirty and more years of religious life for someone to lift them up and show them what they are still seeking. They lead a colorless and dull spiritual life. In the contemplative life the secret of happiness is in knowing how to live this life under the eye of God.

   "May I continue to teach that contemplation, properly so called, in its divers degrees, always comes from God and that it is infused? One of the reasons, which has always led me to believe this, is that a soul, after making a little progress in prayer, is content only when it feels that all it has and all it experiences comes to it directly from God and not from self. Every soul that is even slightly contemplative, instinctively seeks to rid itself of everything personal and places no value on it. I clearly understand acquired contemplation which follows a fascinating study or an interesting book; this is merely admiration called forth by the discovery of truth. But in prayer the subjects are always practically the same. How can one then persist for a time and habitually in this undertaking without the grace of infused contemplation? Is a person not on the road to this contemplation as soon as he wills to accept the purifications which lead to it?"

   The substance of this letter seems to us the same as the doctrine of St. John of the Cross, who holds that contemplation, properly so called, is infused. See chap. 5, arts. 2–6.

   ¹⁸ These words clearly indicate the mystical union, and even the perfect mystical union.

   ¹⁹ St. Catherine of Siena, Dialogue, chaps. 74, 78, 79, passim.

   ²⁰ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 184, a.2.

   ²¹ Summa, Ia IIae, q.68, a.2.

   ²² Summa, IIa IIae, q.24, a.6.

   ²³ Summa, IIIa, q.80, a. 10.

   ²⁴ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 129, a.3 ad 4um.

   ²⁵ Summa, IIa IIae, q.161, a.6, On the Degrees of Humility.

   ²⁶ Summa, Ia IIae, q.61, a.5.

   ²⁷ Summa, IIa IIae, q.8, a.4, 7; q.45; q. 180, a.6.

   ²⁸ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 18, a.4; q. 129, a.6.

   ²⁹ Summa, IIa IIae, q.24, a.9.

   ³⁰ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 184, a. 2 ad 3um.

   ³¹ St. Bonaventure, De gradibus virtutum, chap. 1; De triplici via vel incendium amoris.

   ³² Summa, Ia IIae, q.61, a.5. Manifestly the perfection of the virtues of the purified soul, described by St. Thomas, belongs to the mystical order.

   ³³ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 180, a.6. Dionysius the Carthusian, De donis, tr. II, a. 15, has well described these three degrees of the gifts; the third certainly belongs to the mystical order.

   ³⁴ P. 349, no. 1.

   ³⁵ Ibid., no. 7.

   ³⁶ See IV Sent., d.4, q.1, a.1, q.3, and II Sent., d.9, q.1, a.2, c. and ad 8um. This entire article, which is entitled "Whether one angel purifies another," should be read to see how exactly St. Thomas, following Dionysius, takes the words purgation, illumination, and union. Cf. also the general index of the works of St. Thomas, called Tabula aurea, under the heading Illustratio. An idea of what he understands by the illuminative life can be obtained by reading what he says of the gift of understanding, III Sent., d.34, q.1, a.1, c: "The gift of understanding, as Gregory says, illumines the mind in regard to things that are heard, so that man, even in this life, receives a foretaste of the future manifestation." This illumination of the gift of understanding gives us a foretaste of the beatific vision. 37 Chap. 1, no. 1.

   ³⁷ Chap. 1, no. 1.

   ³⁸ Bk. IX, chap. 10.

   ³⁹ Bk. I, chaps. 1, 12, 13.

   ⁴⁰ These works are found in Migne, PL, Vol. XXXII. Pourrat has clearly brought out these texts in La spiritualité chrétienne, pp. 332–44. Their meaning would be clearer, in our opinion, if they were more closely related to those quoted in the preceding chapter of the same work, which is entitled "The Spiritual Doctrine of St. Augustine." St. Augustine's mysticism is certainly not separated from his spiritual doctrine. We do not see why Pourrat has dealt with them separately in two distinct chapters.

   ⁴¹ De quantitate animae, Bk. I, chap. 33.

   ⁴² Ibid.

   ⁴³ Bk. IX, chap. 10.

   ⁴⁴ Certainly he is speaking here of infused and, indeed, of lofty contemplation.

   ⁴⁵ Cf. St. Augustine, De natura et gratia, chap. 70, nos. 82, 84. Commentary on the First Canonical Epistle of John (Tract. V, 4) "As soon as charity is born it takes food . . . , after taking food, it waxes strong . . . and when it has become strong it is perfected. . . . If a man be ready even to die for his brethren, charity is perfect in him." St. Thomas quotes this classic text in IIa IIae, q.24, a. 9, sed c.

   ⁴⁶ Enarr. in psalm., CXIX, no. 3. See Pourrat, La spiritualité chrétienne, p. 313.

   ⁴⁷ Enarr. in psalm., LXXXIII, no. 10.

   ⁴⁸ Confessions, XIII, 8.

   ⁴⁹ Summa, IIIa, q.62, a. 2.

   ⁵⁰ St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 111, a.5.

   ⁵¹ The Spiritual Canticle, IV, st. 39.

   ⁵² Ps. 41: 3.

   ⁵³ Notably Joseph of the Holy Ghost, in his Cursus theol. scolastico-mysticae, in which he considers the perfect according to the teaching of St. John of the Cross.

   ⁵⁴ Cf. St. John of the Cross, The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chap. 1.

   ⁵⁵ Ibid.

   ⁵⁶ St. John of the Cross explains them: The Dark Night of the Soul (Bk. II, chap. 20), following a short work attributed to St. Thomas.

   ⁵⁷ On this point, cf. St. Thomas on the question of martyrdom, IIa IIae, q. 124, a. 1 ad 3um.

   ⁵⁸ Summa, IIa IIae, q.81, a.8.

   ⁵⁹ Cf. infra, chap. 5, art. 6.

   ¹ Luke 10: 27.

   ² This opinion is expressed by Suarez, De statu perfectionis, chap. 11, nos. 15, 16. He admits that St. Thomas and before him St. Augustine seem to teach clearly that the perfection of Christian life is not only counseled, but commanded, by the first precept, as an end toward which one must tend. But he himself replies in the negative: "Respondeo nihilominus, si proprie et in rigore loquamur, perfectionem supererogationis non solum non praecipi, ut materiam in quam obligatio praecepti cadat, verum etiam neque per modum finis in praeceptis contineri." Thus he admits above the precept of the love of God, which in his opinion is limited, counsels of charity superior to those of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Perfection, according to him, consists essentially in these counsels of charity, instrumentally in the other three. Cf. ibid., no. 16.

   This doctrine of Suarez is criticized at length by the great canonist Passerini, O.P., who was a profound theologian and most faithful to St. Thomas. Cf. his De hominum statibus et officiis, on IIa IIae, q.184, a.3, p. 50, no. 70, and p. 57, no. 106, where he shows that this doctrine of Suarez is opposed to that of St. Augustine and of St. Thomas, which was accepted by St. Antoninus, Cajetan, and Valentia. This will be easily understood by reading the article quoted from the Summa theologica, which we are going to translate. We will then, in a footnote, briefly answer the objections of Suarez.

   St. Thomas has also occasionally (e.g., In Ep. ad Phil., chap. 3, lect. 2) used the expression "perfection of supererogation," but in a different sense from that in which Suarez uses it. Cf. G. Barthier, O.P., Perfection chrétienne et perfection religieuse, I, 229. When St. Thomas uses this phrase, he simply means that the three counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience are not obligatory.

   ³ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 184, a.3 ad 2um: "Whether perfection consists in the observance of the precepts or of the counsels."

   ⁴ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 184, a.3.

   ⁵ Deut. 6: 5.

   ⁶ Lev. 19: 18.

   ⁷ Matt. 22: 40.

   ⁸ In this sense, that everyone ought by charity to wish for himself salvation, eternal life, and not only an inferior degree of glory, but eternal life without fixing any limit; for we do not know to what degree of glory God wishes to raise us.

   ⁹ See I Tim. 1: 5.

   ¹⁰ See I Polit., chap. 3.

   ¹¹ See IIa IIae, q.184, a.3. St. Augustine means that even the perfection of heaven falls under the precept of the love of God, not as something to be realized immediately, but as the end toward which one must tend. It is thus that Cajetan explains it (commentary on IIa IIae, q.184, a.3).

   ¹² Summa, Ia IIae, q.64, a.4: Whether the theological virtues observe the mean.

   ¹³ For example, faith between infidelity and credulity; and hope between presumption and despair.

   ¹⁴ Likewise, from this secondary and accidental point of view, on the part of man, and not of God, hope is found between despair and presumption. The presumptuous man does not hope too much in God—that is impossible; but he hopes for a good which exceeds his condition—for example, pardon without true repentance. In the same way, credulity does not consist in believing too much in God, but in believing as if revealed by Him, what is only invention or human imagination (Ia IIae, q.64, a.4). On the other hand, the moral virtue which rules a passion ought essentially to constitute a happy mean between the excess and the absence of this passion. Thus the virtue of fortitude is essentially a rational, happy mean, between cowardice and temerity; a happy mean, moreover, which, by reason of its rationality, stands out as a culminating point above these irrational forms of human action. To forget, as Epicurus does, that the rational, happy mean must thus be a summit, and to wish to make the essentially theological virtues consist in a mean as the moral virtues do, is the peculiarity of mediocrity or of tepidity, erected into a system under pretext of moderation.

   ¹⁵ Conferences of the Fathers, Bk. I, chap. 7.

   ¹⁶ Matt. 19: 21.

   ¹⁷ In Luc., 5: 27.

   ¹⁸ Chap. 8.

   ¹⁹ Ibid., and De Spiritu et littera, chap. 36.

   ²⁰ See I Cor. 9: 24: "Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain."

   ²¹ Cajetan (commentary on IIa IIae, q.84, a.3) says on this subject: "The perfection of charity is prescribed as an end. We must will to attain the complete end; but precisely because it is an end, if we are to avoid failing in the matter of the precepts, it suffices that we be in the state to attain this perfection some day, even though only in eternity. Whoever possesses even the weakest degree of charity, and thus makes progress heavenward, is in the way of perfect charity, and thereby avoids the transgression of the commandment which is necessary for salvation." But whoever dies in the state of grace without having sufficiently utilized the time of life, will have to pass through purgatory in order to be profoundly purified therein. There he will experience the ardent desire for the vision of God.

   ²² Summa, IIa IIae, q. 184, a. 4 ad 3um.

   ²³ Matt. 13: 4–6: "And whilst he soweth some fell by the wayside, and the birds of the air came and ate them up. And other some fell upon stony ground, where they had not much earth; and they sprung up immediately, because they had no deepness of earth. And when the sun was up, they were scorched: and because they had not root, they withered away."

   ²⁴ This truth has been clearly stated by Cardinal Mercier in his La vie intérieure, appel aux âmes sacerdotales (1919), p. 98. He draws this conclusion: "We are all called to ascend the summits of perfection, to ascend from that spiritual condition in which the fear of losing charity is the ordinary and predominating motive of conduct, to that state in which the soul more willingly allows itself to be guided by the purpose of progress in virtue; to ascend even higher, even to complete detachment from created things and to the spirit of union with God alone for Himself alone. In regard to this ascent, there are in the world, and at times among the clergy, sad and profound prejudices, which we ought all to apply ourselves to extirpate. I repeat, everyone is called to the fulness of evangelical perfection. . . . To all it is said: 'Be ye therefore perfect as also your heavenly Father is perfect' (Matt. 5: 48). 'To all the faithful,' says the Catechism of the Council of Trent, Part II, De matrimonii sacramento, 'pastors must recommend the perfect life . . . the source of the most complete happiness that man can taste in this life.' The liturgy asks for all souls the grace 'not to allow themselves to be tossed about by the fluctuations of the world, but to keep their hearts fixed on Him who alone can render us truly happy' " (prayer for the fourth Sunday after Easter).

   ²⁵ Perhaps some will object that the precept does not impose an act of charity every minute, and therefore such an act of charity, not being obligatory, is only a matter of counsel. Passerini answers correctly (op. cit., p. 50, no. 72) that this act is not obligatory, as something to be fulfilled immediately, but it is obligatory as an intermediary end toward which we must tend.

   Some insist that we are not bound by precept to make each act of charity more intense than the preceding one, for what falls under the precept is the substance of the act and not its more or less perfect mode. This is of precept, at least in so far as it is an end which we should try to attain, for man should aspire to love God ever more and more. St. Thomas explains the matter (Ia IIae, q. 100, a. 10, ad 2um): "If he who honors his parents is obliged to honor them by a motive of supernatural charity, this act does not spring from the particular commandment, 'Honor thy father and thy mother,' but from the supreme commandment, 'Thou shalt love the Lord with thy whole heart.'" Thus what falls under the inferior precept is the substance of the act, but the mode of the act is commanded by the supreme precept. Cf. IIa IIae, q.44, a. 1 ad 1um. In addition under the precept of charity falls the mode, which is expressed by the words "with all thy heart" (IIa IIae, q.44, a.4 ad 1um), and also the order of charity (ibid., a. 8).

   ²⁶ Cf. St. Thomas, IIa IIae, q.24, a. 6 ad 1um; ibid., ad 2um; also Ia IIae, q. 114, a. 8 ad 3um. On this point, consult also the commentators of St. Thomas, Tract on charity.

   ²⁷ Theologians commonly teach, with St. Thomas (IIa IIae, q.24, a. 10), that the virtue of charity, although it may be lost by mortal sin, does not directly diminish in itself by venial sin, or by the cessation of acts. Venial sin is, in fact, a disorder that has to do with the means, without affecting the final end, which is the object of charity. And as this virtue is infused, and not acquired by the repetition of acts, it is not directly increased by them, nor diminished by their cessation.

   But this inactivity and venial sins indirectly diminish charity because they hinder its application or influence and permit the formation of bad habits, which are obstacles to the radiation of charity. These obstacles deserve a lessening of God's actual, special graces, and they dispose finally to mortal sin.

   ²⁸ For a discussion of retarded and lukewarm souls, cf. Saudreau, Degrés de la vie spirituelle, 5th ed., I, 46, 49.

   ²⁹ "Souls begin to enter this dark night (passive) when God Himself frees them little by little from the state of beginners, that division of the spiritual life in which one meditates, and introduces them into the state of proficients, which is that of contemplatives. They must pass through this way in order to become perfect, in other words, to attain the divine union of the soul with God" (The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 1). "The soul has therefore gone forth; it has begun to penetrate into the way of the spirit, followed by the proficients and the advanced. This way is also called the illuminative way, or the way of infused contemplation" (ibid., chap. 14).

   ³⁰ Cf. Salamanticences, Theol. moralis, Vol. IV, "De statu religioso."

   ³¹ St. Thomas, IIa IIae, q. 184, a.8. "A man must possess inward perfection in order to exercise worthily the acts of the priesthood" (ibid., a.6). In a.8: "If one compares the religious priest who has care of souls with the secular priest who also has care of souls, they are equal in order and office or function, but the first is superior to the second in his state of life, since he is in a state of perfection. If the religious priest has not care of souls, he is more excellent than the secular priest in state, less excellent in office, and equal in order" (ibid., a.8). The holy doctor adds that the goodness or perfection of the religious state, in which one pledges one's whole life, is more excellent than that of the office of parish priest, which does not bind for life. As to the difficulty of persevering in good, it is greater for the priest who lives in the world because of the obstacles to be found there. In the religious life there is another difficulty, that which comes from the dignity of the work to be accomplished, the practice of obedience, of poverty, and the austerity of observances. Now, this second difficulty increases merit, which is not always true of the difficulty springing from exterior obstacles, for it may be that one does not love virtue sufficiently to put away these obstacles and leave secular life. Cf. ibid., ad 6um.

   ³² We read in the Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, chap. 47: "Inasmuch as the counsels are bound up in the commandments, no one can observe the latter who does not observe the former, as least in thought, that is to say, that they possess the riches of the world humbly and without pride."

   ³³ Cf. St. Thomas, In Ep. ad Hebr., 10: 25.

   ³⁴ Matt. 5: 48.

   ³⁵ See I Pet. 2: 2.

   ³⁶ See II Pet. 3: 18.

   ³⁷ Eph. 4: 15.

   ³⁸ Col. 1: 9–11.

   ³⁹ St. Thomas, In Ep. ad Hebr., 6: 1.

   ⁴⁰ "As far as exterior acts are concerned, because he is not obliged to the doubtful good, man is not obliged to the best; but as far as his desire is concerned, he is obliged to the best, whence he who does not always wish to be better, cannot without contempt refrain from wishing it" (St. Thomas, In Matth., 19: 12). The same idea is expressed in IIa IIae, q. 186, a.2 ad 2um: "All, both religious and secular, are bound, in a certain measure, to do whatever good they can; for to all without exception it is said: 'Whatsoever thy hand is able to do, do it earnestly' (Eccles. 9: 10). Yet there is a way of fulfilling this precept, so as to avoid sin, namely, if we do what we can as required by the conditions of our state of life; provided there be no contempt of doing better things, which contempt sets the mind against spiritual progress."

   ⁴¹ Treatise on the Love of God, Bk. III, chap. 1.

   ⁴² Apoc. 22: 11.

   ⁴³ Prov. 4:18.

   ⁴⁴ See I Cor. 9: 24.

   ⁴⁵ Phil. 2: 8. On the general obligation of every Christian to strive according to his condition for more perfect charity, see Passerini, De statibus hominum, p. 758, no. 13; G. Barthier, O.P., De la perfection chrétienne et de la perfection religieuse (1907), I, 315–73; P. A. Weiss, O.P., Apologie des Christenthums, Vol. V, Index: "Vollkommenheit."

   ⁴⁶ Cant. 5: 2: "I sleep but my heart watcheth."

   ⁴⁷ Cf. E. Hugon, O.P., Marie mère de la divine grâce, pp. 112–24.

   ⁴⁸ Thus, in five seconds the initial speed multiplied by the time increases according to the following progression: 20, 20 x 2, 20 x 3, 20 x 4, 20 x 5, or 20, 40, 60, 80, 100.

   ⁴⁹ In I de Coelo, lect. 17. St. Thomas explains this fact by the Aristotelian theory of the natural place. See also Ia IIae, q.35, a.6, where he says that, contrary to violent movement, every natural motion is more intense at the end than at the beginning, for it approaches the end which agrees with the nature of the motion and which attracts it as an end.

   ⁵⁰ St. Thomas, In Ep. ad Hebraeos, 10: 25.

   ⁵¹ Ibid.

   ⁵² In virtue of the principle set forth in this article, it can be explained why Thomistic theologians (such as Philip of the Blessed Trinity, Vallgornera, and Anthony of the Holy Ghost) maintain not only that all may laudably desire infused contemplation and the union of fruition, but that all should desire it. At first glance this statement seems exaggerated, and it would be so if they were speaking of a special obligation (which may exist for a contemplative religious). They speak only of a general obligation based on the first precept, which makes it everyone's duty to tend toward the perfection of heaven and consequently toward what is normally found even in a very lofty degree on the way to heaven, toward that which is the normal prelude of the beatific vision. This explains the theses that these theologians also formulate in their mystical theology in the chapters on infused contemplation and the union of fruition: "All should aspire to supernatural contemplation. All, and most especially souls consecrated to God, should aspire and tend to actual fruitive union with God." These two theses have already been pointed out and will be referred to again.

   ⁵³ Osee 13: 9.

   ⁵⁴ Ps. 41: 7, 9, 12.

   ¹ See IIa IIae, q .83, a. 2.

   ² Summa, IIa IIae, q.83, a. 15.

   ³ Man, though in himself he does not suffice to desire and will salutary good, is sufficient in himself to fail, and to fail freely. God often lifts him up again. This, however, is not always the case. Therein lies a mystery.

   ⁴ See IIa IIae, q.83, a. 5, 6.

   ⁵ Matt. 17: 20.

   ⁶ Summa, IIa IIae, q.83, a. 15 ad 2um.

   ⁷ Matt. 15: 22, 24–28.

   ⁸ See Ia, q.23, a. 1.

   ⁹ See IIa IIae, q.83, a. 6.

   ¹⁰ See IIa IIae, q. 83. a. 15 ad 2um.

   ¹¹ Matt. 6: 7; Luke 11:9, 11, 13.

   ¹² Pensées (Havet ed.), art. 17, 1.

   ¹³ Matt. 6: 5 f.

   ¹⁴ Life of St. Teresa by Herself, chap. 8.

   ¹⁵ It is true that the prayer of this peasant was already contemplation.

   ¹⁶ See IIa IIae, q.84.

   ¹⁷ Hope thus leads to the prayer of petition, which is an act of the virtue of religion. Cf. IIa IIae, q.83, a. 3.

   ¹⁸ Ps. 41: 1.

   ¹⁹ Cf. Ia IIae, q.62, a. 4.

   ²⁰ ps. 33:9.

   ²¹ The Word and the other two Persons of the Blessed Trinity dwell in us: "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." The humanity of Jesus is, as St. Thomas shows (III, q.48, a.6), the physical, instrumental cause of all the graces we receive, after meriting them for us here on earth.

   ²² This expression shows that this prayer is in our power, at least in its beginning, as the context makes evident.

   ²³ This is the symbol of the breath of the Holy Ghost. Prayer then becomes infused, as we shall see farther on.

   ²⁴ The Way of Perfection, chap. 28. When we speak of so-called acquired contemplation (chap. 5, art. 2), we shall quote at length from this chapter of St. Teresa in which she treats of the acquired prayer of recollection, which disposes to supernatural recollection and to quiet, which is spoken of in the fourth mansion, chaps. 1, 3.

   The passage from acquired prayer to infused contemplation is well described in the little work where Bossuet treats of the prayer which he calls the prayer "of simplicity or of the simple presence of God." The first phase of this prayer is acquired; the second infused, as we shall see more clearly farther on.

   ²⁵ Matt. 18: 3.

   ²⁶ Summa, Ia IIae, q.89, a.4.

   ²⁷ Cf. chap. 5, a. 2, 3. We shall see that St. Teresa understands by "drinking from the fountain of living water" infused contemplation, which is given to us by the Holy Ghost. He Himself is the fountain.

   ²⁸ John 4: 10, 13 f.

   ²⁹ John 7: 37 f.

   ¹ Summa, IIa IIae, q. 180, a. 1, 6.

   ² We suppose that this absorption does not spring from the fact that the soul has on previous occasions often meditated on these words of our Lord. Infused contemplation, however, is not always received unexpectedly; we can dispose ourselves to receive it.

   ³ See what St. Thomas says about operating grace, Ia IIae, q. 111, a. 2.

   ⁴ St. Teresa, The Interior Castle, fourth mansion, chap. 3.

   ⁵ Dom Vital Lehodey, Les voies de l'oraison mentale, 5th ed., p. 205.

   ⁶ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chap. 18. It is infused contemplation which is discussed at the beginning of The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 1, and also in The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 13.

   ⁷ The Interior Castle, fifth mansion, chap. 1; seventh mansion, chap. 4. The Way of Perfection, chaps. 17,19, 20, 21, 25, 27, 31. See infra in this chapter, art. 3.

   ⁸ Traité de l'amour de Dieu, Bk. VI, chap. 7.

   ⁹ Etat mystique, 2d ed., pp. 109, 357.

   ¹⁰ Published in 1620.

   ¹¹ Grados de oración, 1609.

   ¹² Father Andrew of the Incarnation, C.D., undertook in 1574 to restore the true text of the saint's writings, but he did not publish his work. Only recently Father Girard, C.D., gave us a critical edition which contains 55 corrections in Book I, 207 in Book II, and 71 in Book III. Several problems of textual criticism remain to be solved. Cf. La vie spirituelle, March, 1923, p. 154.

   ¹³ At this time the expression infused or supernatural contemplation was not yet clearly understood by all. By these terms some apparently indicated contemplation united to certain graces gratis datae which St. Teresa received abundantly and which she often mentioned.

   ¹⁴ Disceptatio mystica, tr. 2, q.4, a. 8, no. 34.

   ¹⁵ Cursus theol. scol.-mysticae (1721), II, 224, 236.

   ¹⁶ Life, chap. 12, p. 81; The Interior Castle, fourth mansion, chap. 3, pp. 108 f.

   ¹⁷ This is the teaching of Thomas of Jesus, Philip of the Holy Ghost, Anthony of the Holy Ghost, Dominic of Jesus, and Joseph of the Holy Ghost. They agreed on this point with the Dominicans, John of St. Thomas (cf. his Catechism) and Vallgornera.

   ¹⁸ St. Teresa, The Interior Castle.

   ¹⁹ The Way of Perfection, chap. 28.

   ²⁰ Ibid.

   ²¹ The words "by its means the soul collects together all the faculties and enters within itself," denote manifestly an acquired prayer. Everyone agrees on this point.

   ²² St. Teresa does not mean that, without going beyond this acquired prayer of recollection, a person will slake his thirst at the fountain of living water, which she always proposes to her daughters as the goal of their course. For she has declared clearly in The Way of Perfection (chap. 19): "I do not call prayer made by thinking over a subject, 'living water.' " From what is said in The Way of Perfection (chap. 19), evidently the living water is the image of contemplation, which is given to us by the Holy Ghost.

   ²³ This is the symbol of the Holy Ghost, who breathes where He will.

   ²⁴ Symbol of prayer which remains discursive.

   ²⁵ The Way of Perfection, chap. 28.

   ²⁶ Father Bañez noted on the original: "By supernatural she means that which is not left to our choice with the ordinary grace of God."

   ²⁷ The Way of Perfection, chap. 29.

   ²⁸ Fourth mansion, chap. 3.

   ²⁹ Life, chap. 12. The saint expresses the same opinion in this earlier work.

   ³⁰ La vie spirituelle, October, 1922, contains an excellent article entitled "La doctrine de sainte Thérèse; les oraisons communes," by a Carmelite nun. But in the Études Carmélitaines (1920–22), the author of several articles on acquired contemplation gives this name to the prayers of supernatural recollection, quiet, mystical sleep, and spiritual intoxication. Without intending to do so, he strays from the thought of St. Teresa and forgets that she expressly declared that these supernatural prayers are not within our power; they cannot, therefore, be called acquired. The saint's text is very clear on this point. If these prayers are called acquired because they are often preceded by a preparation which disposes us to receive them, then it would be necessary to admit an acquired rapture, for this grace is often given "at the end of a long mental prayer" (Life of St. Teresa, chap. 18). To avoid all confusion on this point, it will suffice to note the difference established by St. Teresa between supernatural recollection (fourth mansion, chap. 3) and the acquired prayer of recollection (The Way of Perfection, chap. 28).

   ³¹ The prayer of simplicity, described by Bossuet in his famous work on the subject, seems to be acquired in its first phase and infused in its second; it is clearly the transition from one to the other. "The soul, leaving off reasoning, makes use of a sweet contemplation which holds it peaceful, attentive, and susceptible to the divine operations and impressions which the Holy Ghost communicates to it. (It is here with this communication that the prayer becomes infused.) It does little and receives much; its work is sweet and nevertheless more fruitful. As it more nearly approaches the source of all light, grace, and virtue, its capacity is greatly increased. . . . God becomes the sole Master of its interior, and He operates therein more particularly than is usual; the less the creature works, the more powerfully God operates. Since the operation of God is a repose, the soul becomes in a certain way like to Him in this prayer, and also receives marvelous effects from it . . . the divine influences which enrich it with every virtue. . . . This same light of faith, which keeps us attentive to God, will cause us to discover our slightest imperfections and to conceive a great sorrow and regret for them." Manière courte et facile pour faire l'oraison en foi et de simple présence de Dieu.

   ³² The Way of Perfection, chap. 28.

   ³³ The Way of Perfection, chaps. 18–21, 25, 27, 33. The Interior Castle, fourth and fifth mansions. These texts will be quoted later in the present chapter (art. 2).

   ³⁴ Bk. II, chap. 18: "Contemplation is a science of love; it is an infused loving knowledge of God." Cf. Bk. I, chap. 1.

   ³⁵ Elucidatio phrasium mysticarum operum Joannis a Cruce, Part II, chap. 4.

   ³⁶ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 15: "In this state God communicates himself to the soul remaining passive, as the light to one who keeps his eyes open and does nothing to receive it. For the soul which thus receives supernaturally infused light understands all while remaining passive."

   ³⁷ Treatise on the Love of God, Bk. VI, chap. 7. Immediately after having discussed meditation, without speaking of acquired contemplation, St. Francis de Sales describes the different degrees of infused contemplation, as St. Teresa does, beginning with supernatural recollection which is not in our power. And he considers this transition normal: "Contemplation is the term to which all these means are directed" (Bk. VI, chap. 6).

   ³⁸ Theologia mystica, chap. 3.

   ³⁹ Las tres vidas, Introduction, and III, 4.

   ⁴⁰ La théol. myst. de S. Bonaventure, by Lompré, O.F.M., 1921.

   ⁴¹ Institutio spiritualis, chap. 12.

   ⁴² Saudreau, État mystique (2d ed.), pp. 103, 357.

   ⁴³ The Way of Perfection, chap. 28.

   ⁴⁴ Cuestiones místicas (2d ed.), pp. 291–311.

   ⁴⁵ The Interior Castle, fourth mansion.

   ⁴⁶ The Interior Castle, fourth mansion.

   ⁴⁷ Idem., fourth mansion, chap. 3.

   ⁴⁸ The saint called this the (acquired) prayer of recollection.

   ⁴⁹ Cf. Denzinger, no. 1243, 23d proposition of Molinos.

   ⁵⁰ Le quiétisme espagnol, Michel de Molinos, 1921, p. 260: "There is no contemplation worthy of this name other than passive contemplation . . . and God in His common providence favors with it those who, by the heroic generosity of their virtue, show that they are worthy to be treated as privileged friends." "Certain doctors of the twentieth century teach, as Molinos did, a contemplation intermediate between meditation and passive contemplation. . . . One can and must prove this fact without instituting against the writers in question the slightest prosecution of tendency" (p. 265).

   ⁵¹ The Way of Perfection, chap. 28.

   ⁵² It would be suitable to define ordinary first, if the present difficulties did not bear exactly on this word.

   ⁵³ This is true at least of the holiness generally required for entrance into heaven immediately after death; for no one goes to purgatory except through his own fault, by reason of negligences which could have been avoided.

   ⁵⁴ This is the meaning which St. Thomas gives to the grace gratis data called sermo sapientiae, the highest degree of the gift of wisdom. This degree not only makes one contemplate the loftiest mysteries, but renders the recipient of it capable of manifesting them to others and of directing his neighbor. Cf. IIa IIae, q.45, a.5.

   ⁵⁵ Among extraordinary graces we may place interior words and visions, even if they are directly ordered to the sanctification of the soul that receives them. They are not then graces gratis datae, but concomitant phenomena of the mystical life; accessory and passing phenomena which in the majority of cases are not necessary to reach sanctity.

   ⁵⁶ This definition is given by Father Arintero in his Cuestiones místicas, 2d ed., p. 45.

   ⁵⁷ St. Thomas observes on this subject (Ia, q.23, a.7 ad 3um): "Since eternal happiness, consisting in the vision of God, exceeds the common state of nature, and especially in so far as it is deprived of grace through the corruption of original sin, the fewer will be saved. In this, however, appears the mercy of God that He has chosen some for salvation, from which very many in accordance with the common cause and tendency of nature fall short."

   ⁵⁸ This is particularly the teaching of St. John of the Cross, as Joseph of the Holy Ghost observes several times in his great Cursus theologiae mystic-oscolasticae. Cf. supra, chap. 4, art. 4.

   ⁵⁹ Cf. Dom Vital Lehodey, Les voies de l'oraison mentale. Cf. also the Treatise on the Love of God by Father Surin, S.J.

   ⁶⁰ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. I, chap. 3; Bk. II, chap. 1.

   ¹ For example, Dionysius, Richard of St. Victor, St. Bonaventure, Tauler, Ruysbroeck, Louis de Blois, St. John of the Cross, and St. Francis de Sales.

   ² St. Thomas, IIa IIae, q.24, a. 3 ad 2um.

   ³ John 1: 13.

   ⁴ A miracle (for example, life restored to a dead body) is natural in its essence and supernatural only in the mode of its production. Hence it is very inferior to grace, which is essentially supernatural. The same must be said of the prophetic announcement of a future and free occurrence in the natural order. This is what theologians mean when they say that the life of grace is essentially supernatural, quoad substantiam, while miracles and prophecies are supernatural only as to the mode of their production, quoad modum, or preternatural.

   ⁵ The angels themselves must have received the life of grace to be able to merit the beatific vision, which infinitely surpasses the powers and claims of their nature. Cf. St. Thomas, Ia, q.62, a. 2.

   ⁶ John 14: 26; 16: 13.

   ⁷ See I John 2: 27.

   ⁸ The Way of Perfection, chaps. 21–27; The Interior Castle, second and third mansions.

   ⁹ The Way of Perfection, chap. 28. This important text we here quote in part, as follows: "This kind of prayer has many advantages. It is called 'recollection' because by its means the soul collects together all the faculties, and enters within itself to be with God. The divine Master thus comes more speedily than He otherwise would to teach it and to grant it the prayer of quiet. . . . Those who are able thus to enclose themselves within the little heaven where dwells the Creator of both heaven and earth . . . may feel sure that they are travelling by an excellent way and that they will certainly attain to drink of the water from the fountain. . . . These souls may be said to have already put out to sea." In chapter 29, St. Teresa clearly points out the nature of this active recollection: "You must understand that this is not a supernatural state, but something which, with the grace of God, we can desire and obtain for ourselves." Father Bañez noted on the original: "By supernatural she means what is not left to our choice with the ordinary grace of God."

   ¹⁰ Ibid., chap. 29.

   ¹¹ Ibid., chap. 19.

   ¹² Matt. 11: 28: "Come to Me all you . . ."

   ¹³ The Way of Perfection, chap. 19.

   ¹⁴ On this general and distant call of all interior souls to the living waters of infused contemplation, see also The Way of Perfection, chap. 20: "The last chapter seems to contradict what I said, when in order to console those who were not contemplatives, I told them that God had made many ways of reaching Him. . . . His majesty, being God, knows our weakness and has provided for us. He did not say: 'Let some men come to Me by drinking this water, but let others come by some other means.' His mercy is so great that He hinders no one from drinking of the fountain of life. May He be forever praised. . . . Indeed He calls us loudly and publicly to do so. . . . You see, sisters, there is no fear you will die of drought on the way of prayer. . . . Take my advice; do not loiter on the road, but struggle manfully, until you perish in the attempt." St. Teresa says further (The Way of Perfection, chap. 21): "I maintain that this is the chief point; in fact, that everything depends on their having a great and a most resolute determination never to halt until they reach their journey's end, happen what may, whatever the consequences are, cost what it will, let who will blame them . . . whether the earth itself goes to pieces beneath their feet."

   ¹⁵ This superior life is in fact doubly supernatural, not only in its essence, as common Christian life, but by the divine mode of knowing and loving, which is inspired by the Holy Ghost.

   ¹⁶ It will be seen from the texts which follow why we cannot admit that in St. Teresa's opinion mystical contemplation is an immediate perception of God in Himself and not in His effects, or a knowledge by infused ideas similar to that of the angels, which completely excludes the possibility of reasoning. Mystical contemplation would thus become not only an eminent grace, but a miraculous grace; it would be properly speaking extraordinary and, contrary to what St. Teresa says, all interior souls could not aspire to it as to the fountain of living water. On this point, consult the following article in this chapter. St. Teresa's texts, which we have brought together here, answer the objections made to our teaching on this subject in the Revue d'ascétique et de mystique, July, 1922, p. 272.

   ¹⁷ The Interior Castle, fourth mansion, chap. 3, pp. 104–13.

   ¹⁸ The Interior Castle, fourth mansion, chap. 3. St. Teresa's remark concerns the individual, proximate call to infused contemplation. Evidently she does not admit, after the acquired prayer of recollection (described in The Way of Perfection, chap. 28, and afterward called simplified, affective prayer) and before the beginning of infused contemplation which we are here considering, an intermediate state that can rightly be called acquired contemplation. If she admitted it, she would grant that the soul "can stop the movement of thought" before receiving the grace of supernatural recollection.

   If the term "acquired contemplation" is applied to the last of the acquired prayers, which is simplified, affective prayer, called by St. Teresa the prayer of (acquired) recollection (The Way of Perfection, chap. 28), the saint's doctrine is kept, but not her terms; for, like all the great mystics, by contemplation she understands infused contemplation, which we cannot obtain for ourselves by our own efforts. Cf. The Way of Perfection, chaps. 18–21, 25, 27, 31; The Interior Castle, fourth and fifth mansions.

   If, on the contrary, the term "acquired contemplation" is applied to any other than the acquired prayer of recollection, and if anyone should desire to introduce it into the category of supernatural prayers described in the fourth and fifth mansions, he would be doing violence to the words of St. Teresa and to her doctrine, since she expressly states that we cannot by our own industry aided by grace place ourselves in the supernatural prayers of (passive) recollection, quiet, spiritual intoxication, and mystical sleep.

   We need not here interpret the saint's teaching, but merely read what she has written. If it were necessary to apply "acquired" to these supernatural prayers, which are not in our power, because we can dispose ourselves to receive them, and if the qualification "infused" or "mystical" were refused them because some preparation is brought to them, then we would have to refuse this title also to rapture which she speaks of in her Life, chap. 18. She says: "The truth is that, in the beginning, this almost always happens after much mental prayer." To be logical, we would have to speak of an acquired rapture and even of an acquired transforming union.

   Quite in harmony with St. Teresa's teaching is that of the Carmelites, John of Jesus Mary (Theol. mystica, chap. 3) and Michael de la Fuente (Las tres vidas, Introduction), who place infused contemplation immediately after simplified, affective prayer, or the acquired prayer of recollection. St. Francis de Sales does the same in The Love of God (Bk. VI, chap. 7).

   ¹⁹ The Way of Perfection, chap. 31.

   ²⁰ Relation LIV to Father Rodriguez Alvarez, p. 295. See what is said also on the work of the mind, analogous to that of a noria (water wheel), disposing to the supernatural prayer of quiet which we cannot procure for ourselves by our personal effort. Cf. Life, chap. 14.

   ²¹ Life, chap. 12.

   ²² The Way of Perfection, chap. 25.

   ²³ Life, chap. 10.

   ²⁴ God is therefore not perceived in Himself or immediately, as certain interpreters of St. Teresa have claimed. She speaks as St. Thomas does (Ia, q.94, a. 1 ad 3um; IIa IIae, q.5, a. 1; q.97, a. 2 ad 2um).

   ²⁵ Life, chap. 27, where St. Teresa distinguishes between mystical prayer and the visions that sometimes accompany it.

   ²⁶ The Way of Perfection, chap. 25.

   ²⁷ Nevertheless it continues in the dryness of the dark night.

   ²⁸ Pensées sur le Cantique, chap. 4.

   ²⁹ St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 111, a. 2.

   ³⁰ The Way of Perfection, chap. 19.

   ³¹ Life, chap. 15.

   ³² The Way of Perfection, chap. 19.

   ³³ In fact, St. Teresa says in her Life (chap. 14) that to make people understand what a supernatural prayer is she would have to speak of the particular assistance which the soul sees, in a way, with its own eyes in this prayer. She does not speak of infused ideas.

   ³⁴ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chap. 18. By thus defining contemplation, St. John of the Cross shows that in his opinion contemplation, properly so called, is infused; it is of this infused contemplation that he speaks constantly. Moreover, the Carmelite, Nicholas of Jesus Mary, in his Elucidatio phrasium myst. operum Joannis a Cruce (Part II, chap. 4), is right in saying that infused contemplation is discussed not only in The Dark Night of the Soul but also in The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chap. 13. Cf. Études Carmélitaines, July, 1912, pp. 263, 270.

   ³⁵ Cf. IIa IIae, q.180, a. 1. From this quotation, taken from St. Thomas by St. John of the Cross, we can clearly see how greatly mistaken people are who claim today that the Angelic Doctor did not speak of essentially mystical contemplation in his Summa.

   ³⁶ The Dark Night of the Soul, Bk. II, chap. 17; and chap. 5.

   ³⁷ The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. II, chaps. 6, 7.

   ³⁸ Summa, IIa IIae, q.24.

   ³⁹ The Interior Castle, fifth mansion, chap. 1, p. 120. When St. Teresa begins to discuss the prayer of union, which follows quiet, and which is sometimes accompanied by a beginning of ecstasy, she says to her daughters: "The majority may be said at least to gain admittance into these rooms. I think that certain graces I am about to describe are bestowed on only a few; but if the rest only arrive at the portal, they receive a great boon from God, for 'many are called, but few are chosen.' " Farther on in the fifth mansion, chap. 3, she says: "God has many ways of enriching the soul and bringing it to these mansions (which means, to the supernatural prayer of union) besides what might be called a shortcut." We shall see later on what she means by this shortcut: not the mystical state as has been believed at times, but the ecstatic state or a beginning of ecstasy. Moreover, in the fifth mansion, chap. 3, St. Teresa also speaks of a union of conformity to the divine will, which is not a degree of prayer but an excellent disposition not to have any self-will, a disposition which one can have without having received a beginning of ecstasy.

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