Meaning Of The Terms Of The Problem
CHAPTER II
THE ACTUAL MYSTICAL PROBLEM
ARTICLE I
Object and Method of Ascetical and Mystical Theology
WHAT is to be understood by ascetical and mystical theology? Is it a special science or a part of theology? What is its particular object? Under what light does it proceed? What are its principles? What is its method? These questions must be settled before we seek the distinction between asceticism and mysticism, and before we take up the chief problems they must solve.
I. THE MEANING OF ASCETICAL AND MYSTICAL THEOLOGY; ITS OBJECT
Theology is the science of God. We distinguish between natural theology or theodicy, which knows God by the sole light of reason, and supernatural theology, which proceeds from divine revelation, examines its contents, and deduces the consequences of the truths of faith.
Supernatural theology is usually divided into two parts, dogmatic and moral. Dogmatic theology has to do with revealed mysteries, principally the Blessed Trinity, the incarnation, the redemption, the Holy Eucharist and the other sacraments, and the future life. Moral theology treats of human acts, of revealed precepts and counsels, of grace, of the Christian virtues, both theological and moral, and of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, which are principles of action ordained to the supernatural end made known by revelation.
Modern theologians have often exaggerated the distinction between moral and dogmatic theology, giving to the latter the great treatises on grace and on the infused virtues and gifts, and reducing the former to casuistry, which is the least lofty of its applications. Moral theology has thus become, in several theological works, the science of sins to be avoided rather than the science of virtues to be practiced and to be developed under the constant action of God in us. In this way it has lost some of its pre-eminence and is manifestly insufficient for the direction of souls aspiring to intimate union with God.
On the contrary, moral theology, as expounded in the second part of the Summa theologica of St. Thomas, keeps all its grandeur and its efficacy for the direction of souls called to the highest perfection. St. Thomas does not, in fact, consider dogmatic and moral theology as two distinct sciences; sacred doctrine, in his opinion, is absolutely one and is of such high perfection that it contains the perfections of both dogmatic and moral theology. In other words, it is eminently speculative and practical, as the science of God from which it springs.1 That is why he treats in detail in the moral part of his Summa not only human acts, precepts, and counsels, but also habitual and actual grace, the infused virtues in general and in particular, the gifts of the Holy Ghost, their fruits, the beatitudes, the active and contemplative life, the degrees of contemplation, graces gratuitously bestowed, such as the gift of miracles, the gift of tongues, prophecy, and rapture, and likewise the religious life and its various forms.
Moral theology thus understood evidently contains the principles necessary for leading souls to the highest sanctity. Ascetical and mystical theology is nothing but the application of this broad moral theology to the direction of souls toward ever closer union with God. It presupposes what sacred doctrine teaches about the nature and the properties of the Christian virtues and of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, and it studies the laws and conditions of their progress from the point of view of perfection.
To teach the practice of the highest virtues and perfect docility to the Holy Ghost and to lead to the life of union with God, ascetical and mystical theology assembles all the lights of dogmatic and moral theology, of which it is the most elevated application and the crown.
The cycle formed by the different parts of theology, with its evident unity, is thus completed. Sacred science proceeds from revelation contained in Scripture and tradition, preserved and explained by the teaching authority of the Church. It arranges in order all revealed truths and their consequences in a single doctrinal body, in which the precepts and counsels are set forth as founded on the supernatural mystery of the divine life, of which grace is a participation. Lastly, it shows how, by the practice of the virtues and by docility to the Holy Ghost, the soul not only arrives at belief in the revealed mysteries, but also at the enjoyment of them and at a grasp of the profound meaning of the word of God, source of all supernatural knowledge, and at a life of continual union with the Blessed Trinity who dwells in us. Doctrinal mysticism thus appears as the final crown of all acquired theological knowledge, and it can direct souls in the ways of experimental mysticism. This latter is an entirely supernatural and infused loving knowledge, full of sweetness, which only the Holy Ghost, by His unction, can give us and which is, as it were, the prelude of the beatific vision. Such is manifestly the conception of ascetical and mystical theology which has been formulated by the great masters of sacred science, especially by St. Thomas Aquinas.
This conception corresponds perfectly to the current meaning and etymology of the words "ascetical" and "mystical." The term "asceticism," as its Greek origin indicates, means the exercise of the virtues. Among the first Christians those were called ascetics who devoted themselves to the practice of mortification, exercises of piety, and other Christian virtues. Therefore asceticism is that part of theology which directs souls in the struggle against sin and in the progress of virtue.
Mystical theology, as its name indicates, treats of more hidden and mysterious things: of the intimate union of the soul with God; of the transitory phenomena that accompany certain degrees of union, as ecstasy; and of essentially extraordinary graces, such as visions and private revelations. In fact, it was under the title of "Mystical Theology" that Dionysius and many after him dealt with supernatural contemplation and the intimate union of the soul with God. By so doing, they pointed out the principal subject of this teaching.2 All this is equivalent to saying that ascetical and mystical theology, or spiritual doctrine, is not a special science but a division of theology. The great body of theologians has always so understood it.
This does not in any way hinder a psychologist, even though an unbeliever, from studying the outward aspects of ascetical and mystical phenomena in Christianity or in other religions. But this study would be only psychological and would in no way deserve the name of ascetical and mystical theology. It would be mostly descriptive. If it should try to explain all these facts by the merely natural powers of the soul, it would be declared false by all Catholics, because we would see in it a materialistic explanation of the higher by the lower, similar to that which the mechanists propose for vital phenomena.
Having stated these considerations, we may easily answer the question proposed as to what is the object of ascetical and mystical theology, without as yet making a distinction between these two branches of spiritual doctrine. It is Christian perfection, union with God, the contemplation which this presupposes, the ordinary means leading to it, and the extraordinary helps favoring it.
We might now ask what distinguishes ascetical from mystical theology. But as this delicate problem is solved in a somewhat different way according to the method of treating these matters, it is better to propose at once the question of method.
II. THE PRINCIPLES AND METHOD OF ASCETICAL AND MYSTICAL THEOLOGY
After what has just been said about the object of this branch of theology, it is easy to see what principles it must follow to attain this object.
The light of revelation contained in Scripture and tradition is explained by the teaching authority of the Church and commented upon by dogmatic and moral theology. From the principles of faith theology deduces the conclusions that they implicitly contain. By the light of these principles the facts of the ascetical and mystical life must be examined if we wish to go beyond simple psychology, and by this light the rules of direction must be formulated that they may be something more than unmotivated, practical prescriptions.
This much is clear and is admitted by all Catholic writers. But if we attempt a more exact statement of the question of method, we find among authors certain divergencies, which are not without influence on their theories. Some writers, especially in mystical theology, use almost exclusively the descriptive and inductive method, which proceeds from facts; others, on the contrary, follow principally the deductive method, which proceeds from principles.
A. Descriptive or inductive method. The descriptive school, without scorning the doctrine of the great theologians on the life of grace and on the ordinary or extraordinary helps of God, undertakes to describe the different spiritual states and particularly the mystical states by their signs, rather than to determine their nature theologically and to examine whether they proceed from the Christian virtues, from the gifts of the Holy Ghost, or from graces gratuitously bestowed, such as prophecy and the charisms connected with it.
Recently several works have been written that are instructive in certain respects. They are especially collections of descriptions of mystical states, followed by practical rules of direction and by some supplementary material on theoretical questions, such as the nature of the mystical union.3 These treatises are analogous, as their authors declare, to manuals of practical medicine which teach how to make a diagnosis quickly and how to prescribe suitable remedies without an extensive examination into the nature of the ailment or into its relations with the whole organism.
These works, which are very useful from one point of view, contain only part of the science: the inductive bases or the facts, and practical conclusions. The light of theological principles and doctrinal co-ordination, however, are lacking. Therefore, the rules of direction contained in these books are generally, in the opinion of theologians, too empirical and insufficiently classified and justified. Science is the knowledge of things, not only from their appearances and their signs, but from their very nature and their causes. And, as action springs from the nature of things, no one can in a practical manner tell the interior soul what it must do, if he has not determined the very nature of the interior life. How can anyone say whether the soul may and ought without presumption to desire the mystical union, before determining the nature of this union and before recognizing whether it is an essentially extraordinary gift or an eminent grace generally accorded to the perfect, a grace necessary, at least morally, for high perfection? If this question is treated merely as an appendix, as a purely speculative and quasi-insoluble problem, the rules of direction previously formulated will not have sufficient doctrinal foundation.
Certain partisans of the descriptive school, although admitting the truth of the theological doctrine of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, which are the principles of mystical contemplation, declare that it "has only historical interest," 4 because, they say, it does not throw light on the facts or on the practical questions of direction. Many theologians think, on the contrary, that it makes possible the solution of the important question we have just been speaking of, and also permits a distinction between what in the spiritual life belongs to the order of sanctifying grace in its eminent forms, and what pertains to gratuitous graces (gratis datae) which are essentially extraordinary. Perhaps this doctrine alone enables us to determine the culminating point of the normal development of the life of grace in an interior soul which is perfectly docile to the Holy Ghost. This problem is, in fact, one of the most important in the realm of spirituality.
To supply this doctrinal lacuna and absence of directing principles, authors who adhere too exclusively to the descriptive method sometimes give, at the outset of their treatise on mysticism, and as it were a priori, a so-called nominal definition of the mystical state (quiet or union), which declares it as extraordinary, or almost so, as visions or private revelations. Such a definition presupposes a whole theory. These partisans of the method of observation, struck by certain signs of the mystical state, which are perhaps only accidental signs, precipitately determine its nature, before asking theology what it thinks about the matter. But this supreme science alone, enlightened as it is by revelation, can say whether the state in question is the full, normal blossoming of the supernatural life of union with God, or whether it is an extraordinary gift in no way necessary for the highest sanctity.
The exclusive use of this descriptive method would lead one to forget that ascetical and mystical theology is a part of theology, and to consider it as a part of experimental psychology. In other words, whoever neglects to have recourse to the light of theological principles, will have to be content with the principles furnished by psychology, as do so many psychologists who treat of mystical phenomena in the different religions. This procedure, however, does not take faith into consideration at all; it permits a supernatural cause to be assigned only to facts which are essentially and manifestly miraculous. Other mystical facts, which are deeper and hence less apparently supernatural, it declares inexplicable, or it tries to explain them by placing undue stress on the merely natural powers of the soul. The same remark applies to biographies of the saints, and to the history of religious orders and even of the Church.
The descriptive method, useful and necessary as it may be, cannot be exclusive. It is inclined not to appreciate the value of a fundamental theological distinction which can throw light on all mystical theology: the distinction between the intrinsically supernatural (supernaturale quoad substantiam), characteristic of the intimate life of God, of which sanctifying grace, or "the grace of the virtues and the gifts," is a participation, and the extrinsically supernatural or preternatural (supernaturale quoad modum tantum), which is the character of the signs or extraordinary phenomena that the devil can imitate. St. Thomas 5 and also St. John of the Cross 6 have often stated that an abyss exists between these two forms of the supernatural. We have it, for example, between the essentially supernatural life of invisible grace (which even an angel cannot know naturally) and the visible resurrection of a dead person, which is supernatural only by the mode according to which natural life is restored to the corpse; or again, between infused faith in the mystery of the Blessed Trinity and the supernatural knowledge of a future event in the natural order, such as the end of a war.7 This is the difference between Christian doctrine and life on the one hand and, on the other, the miracles and prophecies which confirm its divine origin and which are merely concomitant signs.
This notable distinction between the two forms of the supernatural dominates all theology, and is quite indispensable in mystical theology. But the purely descriptive method pays scarcely any attention to this distinction; it is impressed especially by the more or less sensible signs of the mystical states, and not by the fundamental law of the progress of grace. The essentially supernatural character of the latter is too profound and too elevated to fall within the scope of observation. Yet this supernatural element is what most interests faith and theology.
Moreover, the works of purely descriptive mysticism, useful as they may be, contain hardly anything but the material of mystical theology. That is why we fully agree with the following words of an excellent Thomist who wrote to us, saying: "Mystical theology as a special science does not exist; there is only theology, along with certain applications of it that concern the mystical life. To treat mystical theology as a science with principles of its own is to impoverish and diminish it all, and to lose its directing light. The mystical life must be set forth by the great principles of theology. Then all is illuminated, and we have a science, not a mere collection of phenomena."
B.Deductive method. We must not, however, fall into the other extreme and employ simply the deductive theological method. Some, with a tendency to simplify everything, would be led to deduce the solution of the most difficult problems of spirituality by proceeding from St. Thomas' doctrine about the infused virtues and the gifts of the Holy Ghost (clearly distinct from the graces gratis datae) without sufficiently considering the admirable descriptions of the various degrees of the spiritual life, notably of the mystical union, given by St. Teresa, St. John of the Cross, St. Francis de Sales, and other great saints. And since, according to St. Thomas and tradition, the gifts of the Holy Ghost are in every soul in the state of grace, some persons might suppose that the mystical state or infused contemplation is very frequent, and might confound with them what is only their prelude, as, for example, the prayer of simplicity, so well described by Bossuet.8 Hence the inclination not to take sufficient account of the concomitant or auxiliary phenomena of certain degrees of the mystical union, such as the suspension of the faculties and ecstasy, and hence the danger of falling into an extreme opposed to that of the partisans of the solely descriptive method.
These two extremes should be avoided. They recall the opposition in philosophy between those who consider only miracles and prophecies (concomitant signs of revelation) and those who speak only of the harmony and sublimity of Christian life and doctrine.
As a result of these two excesses, there are two other extremes to be avoided in spiritual direction: advising souls to leave the ascetical way either too soon or too late. We will return to this point.
Union of the two methods. Evidently these two methods, the inductive and the deductive, or the analytical and the synthetical, must be combined.
In the light of the principles of theology we must determine what Christian perfection should be, without in any way diminishing it; what is the nature of the contemplation it supposes, the ordinary means leading to it, and the extraordinary helps favoring it. To do this, we must analyze the concepts of Christian life, perfection, and holiness furnished by the Gospel; and we must also describe the facts of the ascetical and mystical life by studying the testimony of the saints who have best experienced them and revealed them. In this description of facts, accompanied by the analysis of the corresponding theological concepts, we must seek to determine the nature of these facts or interior states, and to distinguish them from the concomitant and auxiliary phenomena. The authors most helpful in this study are those who were both great theologians and great mystics, as St. Thomas, St. Bonaventure, Richard of St. Victor, St. John of the Cross, and St. Francis de Sales.
After analyzing these concepts and facts, we must synthesize them in the light of the evangelical conception of perfection or sanctity. We must show: (1) what is essential or conformable to Christian perfection, and what is contrary to it; (2) what is necessary or very useful and desirable to reach it, and what is essentially extraordinary and not required for the highest sanctity.
In all this study, a supremely important distinction is that between the intrinsically extraordinary (the miraculous) and the extrinsically extraordinary, which is the ordinary or the normal in the lives of the saints, being at the same time as rare as sanctity itself. The omission of this distinction is the source of frequent ambiguities in several modern works, which do not sufficiently appreciate the great divisions of the supernatural. Thus, in the light of theological ideas and principles, we shall be able to discern the facts and to formulate rules of direction by motivating them. In our opinion, this is the true method of ascetical and mystical theology. No other method will serve, since mystical theology is the application of theology to the direction of souls toward an ever closer union with God.
We must now examine the distinction between ascetical and mystical theology, their relations, and the unity of spiritual doctrine. This is a delicate question. In its consideration we must not forget that God calls all interior souls to drink from the fountain of living water, where they will find life in abundance, even beyond their desires, "that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly." According to the saints, the soul which, for the love of God, labors to strip itself of all that is not God, is soon penetrated with light and so united to God that it becomes like Him and enters into the possession of all His goods.
ARTICLE II
The Distinction Between Ascetical Theology and Mystical Theology and the Unity of Spiritual Doctrine
Ascetical and mystical theology is the application of theology in the direction of souls toward an ever more intimate union with God. It must use the inductive and deductive methods, studying the facts of the spiritual life in the light of revealed principles and of the theological doctrines deduced from these principles. We must now see what distinguishes ascetical from mystical theology; and whether this distinction is such as to exclude continuity in the passage from one to the other, or unity in the spiritual doctrine. Earlier writers and a number of modern authors are not in agreement on this point.
I. TRADITIONAL THESIS: THE UNITY OF SPIRITUAL DOCTRINE
Until the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it was generally held that mystical theology included not only the mystical union, infused contemplation, its degrees and the extraordinary graces that sometimes accompany it (visions and private revelations), but also Christian perfection in general, and the first phases of the spiritual life, the normal progress of which thus seemed directed toward the mystical union as its culminating point. All these together formed a whole that was truly one: a spiritual doctrine dominated by a very high idea of perfection, drawn from the Gospel and the saints, and unified by the commonly accepted principle that infused or mystical contemplation 1 is ordinarily granted to the perfect and proceeds especially from the gift of wisdom, the progress of which is proportionate to that of charity. In other words, they agreed in recognizing that an eminent degree of charity, which is the principle of a very intimate union with God, is normally accompanied by eminent, confused contemplation, which is at the same time very penetrating and delightful. This charity is likewise accompanied by a quasi-experimental knowledge of the mystery of God who is closer to the soul than it is to itself, of God who makes Himself felt by it and who acts constantly on it, in trial as well as in consolation, as much to destroy what should die as to renovate and build up.
These assertions may be verified by consulting the mystical theologies of Vallgornera (Dominican), of Thomas of Jesus, Dominic of the Blessed Trinity, Anthony of the Holy Ghost, Philip of the Blessed Trinity (Carmelites),2 and, farther in the past, the works of St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa, Venerable Louis de Blois,3 Venerable Dionysius the Carthusian, Tauler, Blessed Henry Suso, Blessed Bartholomew of the Martyrs, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, St. Albert the Great, Dionysius the Mystic, and St. Augustine.
St. Thomas especially showed the relation between what are today called ascetical theology and mystical theology, by treating of the mutual relations of action and contemplation. With St. Augustine and St. Gregory, this is what he teaches: The active life, to which is attached the exercise of the moral virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance,4 and the outward works of charity, prepares for the contemplative life, in so far as it regulates the passions that disturb contemplation, and in so far as it makes us grow in the love of God and of our neighbor.5 Then the contemplation of God, which is proper to the perfect, leads to action, directs it, and renders it much more supernatural and fruitful.6 Thus in the natural order the image precedes the idea and then serves to express it; the emotion precedes the will and then serves to execute with greater ardor the thing willed; and so again, says St. Thomas, our acts engender a habit, then this habit makes us act more promptly and easily.7 In this way asceticism does not cease when the contemplative life begins; on the contrary, the exercise of the different virtues becomes truly superior when the soul receives the mystical grace of almost continual union with God.
Some souls, remarks St. Thomas, by reason of their impetuosity are more fitted for the active life; others have by nature the purity of spirit and the calm which prepare them more for contemplation;8 but all can prepare themselves for the contemplative life,9 which is the most perfect and in itself the most meritorious.10 "Love of God is in fact more meritorious than love of our neighbor."11 It is love which leads us, says St. Augustine, to seek the holy repose of divine contemplation.12 "And if one of the signs of charity is the external labor that we impose on ourselves for Christ's sake, a far more expressive sign is to put aside all that pertains to the present life and to find our happiness in giving ourselves up exclusively to the contemplation of God." 13 "The more closely a man unites his own or another's soul to God, the more acceptable is his sacrifice to God." 14
St. John of the Cross insists on this point: supernatural contemplation, which he speaks of in The Ascent of Mount Carmel and in The Dark Night, appears there as the full development of "the life of faith" and of the spirit of wisdom. "Faith alone," he says, "is the proximate and proportionate means which can unite the soul to God." 15 "Pure faith, in the denudation and abnegation of all, inclines far more to divine love than spiritual visions." 16
This is true if we do not diminish, as several modern authors do, the essentially supernatural character of faith, and if we remember that even when this virtue is obscure and imperfect or separated from charity, it is, by reason of its first object and its motive, infinitely superior to the loftiest natural knowledge of the angels, or even to the supernatural prevision of natural, contingent futures. It is of the same essentially divine order as the beatific vision. St. Paul says that infused faith, the gift of God, is "the substance of things to be hoped for." Especially when accompanied by the gifts of wisdom and understanding in an eminent degree, it is, so to speak, the beginning of eternal life, inchoatio vitae aternae, as St. Thomas says in De veritate, q. 14, a. 2.
If we wish to understand all the grandeur of the life of faith in which every Christian should make progress, we must read the masters of traditional mysticism. Once we have grasped their point of view, we will not be surprised that the perfect mystical life is the culminating point of the normal development of the life of grace. Thus the unity of doctrine and of the spiritual life is maintained in spite of the diversity of interior states.
II. THESIS OF SEVERAL MODERN AUTHORS: SEPARATION OF ASCETICAL FROM MYSTICAL THEOLOGY
Since the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, several authors have thought that it was necessary to separate ascetical from mystical theology, which since then have often become the subjects of special treatises called "Ascetical Directory" and "Mystical Directory."
This division followed upon lively discussions that were occasioned by abuses springing from a premature and erroneous teaching of the mystical ways. From the time of St. Teresa, these ways seemed to many theologians so suspect that the writings of St. John of the Cross had to be defended against the charge of illuminism, and superiors were roused to the point of forbidding their religious to read the works of Venerable John Tauler, Ruysbroeck, Blessed Henry Suso, St. Gertrude, and St. Mechtildis. After the condemnation of the errors of Molinos, the mystical ways were even more suspect.
Since then a rather large number of authors, who are excellent in many respects, have agreed on making an absolute distinction between ascetical and mystical theology. Excessively eager to systematize things and to establish a doctrine to remedy abuses, and consequently led to classify things materially and objectively, without a sufficiently lofty and profound knowledge of them, they declared that ascetical theology should treat of the "ordinary" Christian life according to the three ways, the purgative, the illuminative, and the unitive. As for mystical theology, it should treat only of extraordinary graces, among which they included not only visions and private revelations, but also supernatural, confused contemplation, the passive purifications, and the mystical union.
Therefore the mystical union no longer appears in their arrangement as the culminating point of the normal development of sanctifying grace, of the virtues, and of the gifts. According to their view, infused contemplation is not the life of faith and the spirit of wisdom carried to their perfection, to their full efflorescence; but it seems rather to be attached to graces gratis datae, such as prophecy, or at least to an entirely extraordinary or miraculous mode of the gifts of the Holy Ghost. Because they place the mystical union and infused contemplation among the graces gratis datae, these authors counsel already fervent souls against seeking not only visions and private revelations, but also the mystical union and infused contemplation, if they would avoid all presumption and would advance in humility: altiora te ne quaesieris. This seems quite like the mistake made by those spiritual directors who refused daily communion to these same souls, alleging that humility does not permit one to aim so high.
These authors thus distinguish a unitive life called "ordinary," the only one necessary, they say, to perfection, from a unitive life called "extraordinary," which, according to them, is not even required for great sanctity. From this point of view, asceticism does not lead to mysticism, and the perfection, or "ordinary" union, to which it leads, is normally an end and not a disposition to a more intimate and more elevated union. Hence mystical theology is of importance only to some very rare, privileged souls; we may just as well, then, almost ignore it in order to avoid presumption and delusion.
In their desire to remedy one abuse, are they not falling into another which is clearly and repeatedly pointed out in The Ascent of Mount Carmel17 and in The Spiritual Canticle? Father Lallemant, one of the best spiritual writers of the Society of Jesus, complains rather bitterly of this conception of the mystical life as quasi-inaccessible. In his opinion, this conception bars the way to high perfection and intimate union with God.18 As a result of this teaching, many souls have been diverted from reading St. John of the Cross, although he is the master who best fortifies against illusion and the desire for graces which are essentially extraordinary.19
III. RETURN TO THE TRADITIONAL THESIS: UNITY OF SPIRITUAL DOCTRINE
The question may arise as to whether this absolute distinction and lack of continuity between ascetical and mystical theology does not notably diminish the elevation of Christian perfection which is the end of the normal progress of sanctifying grace and of charity in this life; whether it does not lose sight of the fact that the progress of the gifts of the Holy Ghost is proportionate to that of charity, which ought always to grow; and whether it does not confound strictly extraordinary graces with eminent and rather uncommon graces granted ordinarily to lofty perfection, a state that is rather uncommon by reason of the very great abnegation which it supposes. In short, does not this distinction confound the extrinsically extraordinary, which is the very elevated ordinary of the life of union with God in the saints in this life, and the intrinsically extraordinary or the miraculous, which, more often than not, is only a sign or a transitory help inferior in order to the life of grace?
We may ask whether this teaching does not misunderstand and lessen the traditional doctrine of the great theologians and mystics on the essentially supernatural quality20 of the life of grace, of faith, of charity, of the gifts of the Holy Ghost. That life is incomparably above the phenomenon of ecstasy, which in a certain sense is external, above miracles and prophecies, since in its perfection it is, as it were, the prelude to the beatific vision, which a holy soul, already perfectly purified, normally obtains without passing through purgatory.
During the past few years these questions have led several writers, such as Father Saudreau, Father Lamballe, and Father Arintero, O.P., to reject such an absolute distinction between ascetical and mystical theology and to note the continuity existing between them. They appealed to the testimony of St. John of the Cross, who says: "Those, who in the spiritual life still exercise themselves in meditation, belong to the state of beginners. When it pleases God to make them leave it, it is for the purpose of introducing them into the way of progress, which is that of contemplatives, and of making them arrive safely and surely by this means at the state of the perfect, that is to say, divine union." 21 This last, in the language of the author of The Dark Night of the Soul, is manifestly in the mystical order. As Father Lamballe22 shows in various texts taken from St. John of the Cross, it follows that mystical contemplation is ordinarily granted to the perfect, although certain perfect souls have it only in an imperfect manner and for short periods of time.23
St. Teresa expresses the same opinion, when she says: "His mercy is so great that He hinders no one from drinking of the fountain of life [infused contemplation]. . . . Indeed, He calls us loudly and publicly to do so. He is so good that He will not force us to drink of it." 24 The saint always teaches her daughters that they must direct all their efforts toward preparing themselves to receive this precious grace, even though certain souls, in spite of their good will, do not experience its joys in this life. Contemplation may, in fact, be arid for a long time, during which one may be a contemplative without knowing it.25 Pius X, in his letter (March 7, 1914) on the teaching of St. Teresa, says that the degrees of prayer enumerated by the saint are so many steps up toward the summit of Christian perfection: "Docet enim gradus orationis quot numerantur, veluti totidem superiores in Christiana perfectione ascensus esse."
Moreover, according to several contemporary theologians, whose number is growing daily and who are eager to preserve the traditional teaching as it is formulated in the great classics of mystical theology, it is laudable for every interior soul to desire the grace of mystical contemplation and to prepare for it with the help of God by increasing fidelity to His holy inspirations.26
According to these theologians, especially Father Arintero, O.P., the mystical life is characterized by the predominance of the gifts of the Holy Ghost.27 Ascetical theology, they say, treats of the Christian life of beginners, and of those who advance with the help of grace in the exercise of the Christian virtues, the mode of which remains a human mode adapted to that of our faculties. On the other hand, mystical theology treats especially of the unitive life of the perfect, in which there is clearly manifest the divine mode of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, in the exercise of which the soul is more passive than active, and in which it obtains a "quasi-experimental" knowledge of God present in it, as St. Thomas explains.28 "These gifts," the great doctor tells us, "exist in all souls in the state of grace"; but normally they do not predominate, nor do they act in a manner both frequent and manifest except in very humble, mortified souls that are habitually docile to the Holy Ghost. Some souls excel in the gifts relating to the active life, such as the gift of fortitude; others in those of the contemplative life, as understanding and wisdom. The latter especially enter the "passive ways," because they no longer direct themselves, but are habitually directed immediately by God. He gives to their acts that mode which He alone can communicate to them, as, for example, when a master directs his pupil by holding his hand. These acts are thus doubly supernatural (reduplicative, as the Scholastics say): by their essence, as acts of the Christian virtues of the ascetical life; and by this superior mode, which surpasses the simple exercise of the Christian virtues aided by actual grace. This is what makes it possible for St. Teresa to speak of "supernatural prayer" when the passive ways begin.29 But this divine mode of the supernatural acts, which spring immediately from the inspirations of the Holy Ghost, is not essentially extraordinary, like a miracle, a vision, a prophecy, but something eminent and ordinary in the perfect, who live habitually recollected in adoration of the mystery of the Blessed Trinity present in them.30
Such, in fact, is the principal subject treated by all the great mystical theologians from Dionysius to Tauler and St. John of the Cross, who often uses the single word "faith" to indicate this virtue and the gift of wisdom in a superior degree.
These masters discuss secondarily the so-called exterior phenomena, which accompany certain degrees of the mystical union—for example, ecstasy, which disappears with the transforming union. They always make a sharp distinction between this very intimate union with God, which is the goal of their desires and of their entire life, and the extraordinary graces of inferior order, such as visions, or the prophetic knowledge of the future; graces which, in their opinion, we ought not to desire.
From this point of view, interpreters of St. John of the Cross, such as Father Lamballe and Father Arintero, O.P.,31 consider that the transforming union or spiritual marriage is in this life the summit of the normal development of the life of grace in souls which are entirely faithful to the Holy Ghost, especially in those consecrated to God and called to the contemplative life. Some theologians have thought that this normal goal of spiritual progress does not pass beyond the prayer of quiet, after which the extraordinary, properly so called, would begin with union and ecstasy.32 According to what St. Teresa says of souls which do not progress beyond the prayer of quiet, it seems clear, however, that they failed in fidelity to the Holy Ghost, and that normally they should have arrived at a closer union with God, which she calls a "higher degree of perfection." 33 St. John of the Cross teaches the same doctrine.34
It may well be that ecstasy does not (at least necessarily) imply anything extraordinary in the real sense of the word. It seems often to come from the weakness of the organism which swoons under the divine action. It may be only the reaction of a profound interior grace, which absorbs all the attention and all the strength of the soul in God, who is intimately present to the soul and who makes Himself felt by it. From this point of view, continuity would exist between all the degrees of the mystical union, from the prayer of quiet to the transforming union, in which the soul no longer experiences "the weakness of ecstasy," to use the expression of St. Hildegarde.
This is the opinion of Father Lamballe, of Father Arintero, O.P., and of several other contemporary theologians whom we have consulted. They hold, moreover, that simplified affective prayer, which precedes essentially mystical or passive prayer, is normally a disposition to receive the latter. Thus continuity would exist between the ascetical and the mystical life; the first would be characterized by the human mode of the Christian virtues, the second by the divine mode of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, intervening no longer in a latent or transitory way, but in a manner both manifest and frequent. Before the mystical or passive state, in a period of transition (the prayer of simplicity described by Bossuet) there would be transient mystical acts, which by their nature would dispose the soul for the true life of union. This would be the adult or perfect age of the spiritual life, or the life of grace aware of itself.
If the above is true—as we shall see, the authors cited adduce weighty reasons for their view—the soul which as yet possesses nothing of the mystical life has not passed beyond infancy or the adolescence of spiritual life. Such a soul should recall St. Paul's words: "Brethren, do not become children in sense: but in malice be children, and in sense be perfect." 35 This soul has not reached spiritual maturity, the perfect age attainable in this life. It may have great learning even in theology, may know how to live, may possess prudence, faith, charity, zeal, enthusiasm, and a great apostolic activity; but, in spite of its solid Christian virtues and zeal, it is not sufficiently spiritualized. Its manner of living remains too human, too exterior, and still too dependent on temperament. It does not give evidence of the entirely supernatural, divine mode of thinking, of loving God, and of acting, which characterizes those who are truly dead to themselves and perfectly docile to the Holy Ghost. Ordinarily the latter alone have, in all circumstances whether agreeable or painful, "the mind of Christ," which enables them to judge soundly of spiritual things and to reconcile habitually in their lives virtues apparently contradictory in nature: the simplicity of the dove and the prudence of the serpent; heroic fortitude and gentle sweetness; humility of heart and magnanimity; a faith absolutely unyielding when principles are at stake and a great mercy for the misguided; an intense interior life, continual recollection, and a fruitful apostolate.
This last conception of the connection between ascetical and mystical theology deserves consideration. Those who have often read and meditated on the great masters of traditional mystical theology will be inclined to acquiesce, we believe, in this interpretation, when they recall the following principles, which are the certain expression of the teaching of St. Thomas.
1) Christian perfection consists in union with God, which supposes in us the full development of charity, of the other virtues, and of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, which supply for the imperfection of these virtues and are in us the immediate principle of supernatural contemplation.
2) The three theological virtues are supernatural in their essence (quoad substantiam) because of their formal motive and their proper object, both of which are unattainable by reason alone or even by the highest natural knowledge of the angels. Several theologians, following the inferior teaching of nominalism, have thought, on the contrary, that acts of faith and of the other Christian virtues are essentially natural acts, clothed with a supernatural modality (supernatural in manner only, not by reason of their formal object). They would thus more closely resemble a supernaturalized natural affection than an affection supernatural in its essence and by its formal motive. An immense difference exists between these two conceptions of faith and of the other theological virtues. Only the former is true,36 and shows clearly why faith in the mystery of the Blessed Trinity is infinitely superior to the natural intuitions of genius, and superior in general to graces gratis datae, even, for example, to the supernatural prevision of a future event, such as the end of a plague.37
3) The gifts of the Holy Ghost are doubly supernatural, not only in their essence (as the theological virtues and the other infused virtues), but in their mode of action. By them the soul no longer directs itself with the assistance of grace, but is directed and moved immediately by divine inspiration; and when, by perfect fidelity to the Holy Ghost, it lives habitually under the régime of the gifts, it is in a passive state.
4) These gifts, rendering us docile to the breath of God, grow with charity like the infused virtues. Now, charity ought always to increase in this life by our merits and by holy communion. Whoever does not advance, falls back, because, according to the observation of St. Augustine and of St. Thomas,38 the first precept has no limit and only the saints fulfil it perfectly. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind." 39
5) If we consider, not what actually is, but rather what ought to be, not the weakness of our nature and the fickleness of our free will, but rather the very essence of the grace received at baptism and of charity, we must admit that normally, or according to its fundamental law, grace ought never to be lost (although many Christians fall into mortal sin). Similarly this life of grace, the germ of glory, the beginning of eternal life, should normally develop to such an extent that the fire of charity would purify us of all stains before death and permit us to enter heaven without passing through purgatory. Through their own fault souls are detained in purgatory, where they no longer have any opportunity to merit. To see God face to face immediately after death would be in the radical order; that is why the souls in purgatory suffer so greatly at being deprived of this vision. Therefore, according to the fundamental law of the life of grace, the painful purifications that cleanse the soul of its impurities should be meritorious and should precede death, as they do in the saints; they should not follow death. Since all this is true, why should not the mystical union, accompanied by these passive purifications, be the normal flowering of the life of grace, although few souls actually reach it, just as few preserve baptismal innocence? If the mystical union, as a matter of fact, is not ordinary, why should it not at least be expected at the end of a very generous interior life? The extraordinary would then still consist in the bestowal of these eminent graces from infancy on, as has happened in the lives of several saints.
Everyone agrees that practically two excesses must be avoided in the direction of souls: urging souls to leave the ascetical way too soon or too late. If they leave too soon, they are exposed to the danger of falling into the idleness of quietism or a practical semi-quietism; if too late, they are in danger of abandoning prayer because they no longer find any profit in discursive meditation, where the director wishes to keep them, or in danger of not understanding anything about the obscure, but much more spiritual, way along which the Lord is beginning to lead them. On this point St. John of the Cross, in The Ascent of Mount Carmel40 and in The Dark Night, has left us valuable teaching. Among recent works on this subject, one of the soundest is Les voies de l'oraison mentale, by Dom Vital Lehodey.41
What does experience teach? Does it not say that the actual condition and the normal ideal (that which should be expected) finally harmonize, at least at the end of a holy life? All the canonized saints seem to have had the mystical union often, except some martyrs who may have had it only at the moment of their torture.42 St. Teresa declares that in her monasteries are many souls that reach the essentially mystical prayer of quiet; that some, more advanced, habitually enjoy the prayer of union; and that a number of others enjoy it at intervals.43
Especially in contemplative religious orders, at times souls are found that have certainly passed beyond discursive meditation or the prayer of simplicity. These souls experience great distress when they are obliged to cease their thanksgiving after holy communion; they are wholly caught up by God, as it were absorbed in Him, and live by the mysteries of the Blessed Trinity, the incarnation, and the redemption, in an incomparably deeper manner than the most learned theologian, if the latter is not truly a man of prayer. These lives, although acquainted with rather uncommon interior joys and sufferings, are not really extraordinary in the true sense of this word. They alone, on the contrary, are entirely in order. They even avoid the extraordinary as much as possible, according to the advice of St. John of the Cross,44 which is their daily sustenance. This great doctor directs them more and more toward the Blessed Trinity dwelling in us; they experience great joy in reading the beautiful pages of St. Augustine and St. Thomas on this mystery; and they express themselves even on the Fatherhood of God, on the infinite value of the merits of Christ, on the fruit of a fervent communion, with a spontaneity and freshness quite different from that produced by scholarly learning obtained from books. To the end that we may live in this way, these supernatural mysteries have been revealed to us. Such is Christian life in its full development, the profound reign of God in our hearts.
Grace superabounds in these souls after they have passed through the painful purifications, which are the veritable dark night. They have, so to speak, caught a glimpse of the most pure, holy, and fathomless abyss of God. They overflow with love and, in their great desire to love God, they long to do so immeasurably, with the heart of the Word made flesh. The Spirit of love has penetrated them and, in trial as in joy, they rest in the charity of the heavenly Father like a child in the arms of its mother. They see the fulfilment of Christ's prayer: "That they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee." 45 This is the unitive life, but without anything extraordinary, in the sense of the miraculous. And this is truly the mystical, contemplative life. This is also the apostolic life; in their profound faith in the superabundance of the redemption, these souls make an offering of themselves that the chalice may overflow on sinners. Moreover, they earnestly desire to leave this land of exile for heaven. This is the perfection described by St. Thomas when, after speaking of those who start and of those who advance in the spiritual life, he says of the perfect: "They tend principally to unite themselves with God, to enjoy Him, and they desire to die in order to be with Christ." 46
Therefore we find not only a continuity between ascetical and mystical theology, but also a certain compenetration. They are not two distinct divisions of theology, but two parts or two aspects of the same branch, which shows us spiritual life in its infancy, adolescence, and maturity. Ascetical and mystical theology or, more simply, spiritual doctrine, is one. It must begin by setting before us the end attainable in this life, that is, spiritual perfection toward which spiritual progress should tend. It ought to show this perfection in all its elevation and grandeur, according to the testimony of the Gospel and of the saints. Then it should point out the means to this end: the struggle against sin, the practice of the virtues, perfect docility to the Holy Ghost. But the end proposed, such as we find it, for example, in the eight beatitudes when their full meaning is accepted, reaches beyond the domain of simple asceticism.47 Ascetical life, however, does not cease when the soul enters the mystical union. The practice of the virtues becomes, on the contrary, much more perfect, as is shown by the great austerities of the saints, their patience, and their zeal. Even to the end the soul must remember our Lord's words: "If anyone will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily." 48
This brings us back to the statement, based on the teaching of St. Thomas, which we made at the beginning of this article: Asceticism prepares the soul for the mystical union, which then renders the exercise of the virtues and our apostolate much more supernatural and fruitful. The practice of the virtues prepares for contemplation and is then directed by it.
When ascetical and mystical theology are separated from each other, the ascetical lacks vitality, depth, and elevation; the mystical loses its importance, its gravity, and its depth, and seems to be solely a luxury in the spirituality of some privileged souls.
Such seems to us the conception of ascetical and mystical theology, or of the spiritual doctrine, which conforms most closely to traditional teaching. This is the conception that we will attempt to formulate in this work.
ARTICLE III
Meaning of the Terms of the Problem
The question of vocabulary presents one of the main difficulties encountered by those who study mystical problems. Many controversies arise on account of the lack of a previous agreement as to the meaning of the words used. For instance, in the question as to whether the mystical life is the normal crown of the interior life, the word "mystical" is understood by some in so broad a sense that the mystical life seems almost identified with a barely fervent Christian life, or with mere perseverance in the state of grace. Other authors use the word "mystical" in so limited a sense that there seems to be no mystical life without ecstasy, visions, and prophetic revelations. Likewise the word "contemplation" has for some a very broad sense, while for others it can be used only with the exact meaning of infused and passive contemplation. The same thing is true of the word "normal." If used by speculative theologians, it is applicable only to a general and superior law of the life of grace, a law which in very diverse ways applies sooner or later, perfectly or imperfectly, to the development of generous souls that are called to the contemplative or even to the active life. And this law exacts many conditions that may be lacking; it will have difficulty in functioning in the person who receives the grace, for instance, in an unfavorable environment, in too absorbing a life of study, or where proper direction is lacking, or in the case of a person who has an ungrateful temperament and certain imperfections, even though they are involuntary. Despite all these obstacles, this law governs the growth of the divine seed, a fact which the theologian considers and which experience proves. If, on the contrary, the word "normal" is used by a non-mystical director, seeing hardly anything but the particular phenomena and those from without, he gives the term "normal" a more concrete and material meaning, which seems to be contrary to fact when exceptions are noted. These exceptions he does not scrutinize from within that he may ascertain whether they proceed from grace itself or from the defects of the person receiving the grace, from the nature of the seed itself or from the effects of the barren soil which requires extraordinary labor for its transformation.
The same difficulty arises if we express the problem by asking whether all interior souls are called to the mystical life. Some who reply in the negative use the word "called" almost in the sense of "raised," "led," "predestined," or "chosen"; and then it is clear that all interior souls are not called to the mystical life. This view ignores the statement of Scripture, "Many are called, but few are chosen." These two words, "called" and "chosen," differ greatly. On the other hand, some authors admit the general call of souls to the mystical life, but seem to forget the common teaching about the special signs of the individual call, signs that are not present in every pious soul. They are three in number and are enumerated by St. John of the Cross, and before him by Tauler. We will refer to them later on.1 The many consequent problems require a statement of the exact meaning of the word "call," which may designate a remote or an immediate call. The same difficulty occurs in connection with the word "merit" in the question: Can a soul merit mystical contemplation?
We must try to establish precise meanings for the terms we are using. Although we would meet with difficulties in coming to an immediate agreement as to the real definitions, which express the basis of things and are the fruit of long research, yet we ought at least to have an understanding about nominal definitions, about the meaning of the principal terms of mystical theology in use today. Since mystical terminology was given precision by St. Teresa, St. John of the Cross, and St. Francis de Sales, we should take into account this established precision which rests on their authority and is a real progress. If, for example, since the days of these great masters, the expression "essentially mystical prayer" means manifestly passive prayer, we ought henceforth to use the expression only with this precise meaning, which includes many degrees of prayer.
With a view to fixing the vocabulary, we wish to propose some definitions, at least nominal ones,2 which are quite generally accepted by mystical theologians who follow simultaneously the doctrine of St. Thomas and that of St. John of the Cross, of St. Teresa, and of St. Francis de Sales.3 In the course of this work, we will show the basic soundness of these definitions, or their real value.
St. Thomas defines contemplation as a simple intellectual view of the truth, superior to reasoning and accompanied by admiration.4 It may be purely natural, as, for example, in an artist, a scholar, or a philosopher. Christian contemplation dwells on revealed truths and presupposes faith. Several theologians admit the existence of an acquired contemplation which follows upon meditation. They generally define this acquired contemplation as the loving knowledge of God which is the fruit of our personal activity aided by grace. On the contrary, infused contemplation, that which the mystics speak of, is a loving knowledge of God, which is not the fruit of human activity aided by grace, but of a special inspiration of the Holy Ghost; so that it is not producible at will, as is an act of faith.5
In the supernatural life, we understand by the word "ordinary" every grace, every act, every state, which is in the normal way of sanctity; all that is morally necessary in the majority of cases for attaining sanctity. And by "sanctity" we must, at the very least, understand that which is generally required to enter heaven immediately after death, because a soul suffers in purgatory only through its own fault. The "ordinary" thus defined comprises eminent graces that may be called extraordinary in point of fact because they are rather uncommon, but that are ordinary according to the normal law if they are truly necessary for the attainment of sanctity, for the full perfection of Christian life, or for the complete purity of soul which merits immediate entrance into heaven.
Every favor, on the contrary, which is out of the normal way of sanctity and which is not at all necessary for its attainment, is extraordinary. We classify as such especially the graces called gratis datae, as miracles, prophecies, visions, and other phenomena of the same kind.6
As regards the word "call" or "vocation," we will attempt to distinguish in this work the different meanings it may have, according as it concerns a general and remote call of all just souls to mystical contemplation or, on the contrary, an individual and proximate call. As we shall see, this last may be merely sufficient and remain sterile; or it may be efficacious. In the latter case it may be an efficacious call either to lower degrees, or to higher degrees, of the mystical life.
In all these questions we must consider the full, normal development of the life of grace as such, and then see what it is in more or less well disposed souls which have received this germ of eternal life. To do this, we need to recall first of all the traditional doctrine of grace, such as it has been conceived, following St. Paul and St. Augustine, by the prince of theologians, St. Thomas Aquinas, and by the great Catholic mystics.