Chapter I
BOOK IV Chapter I Concerning the fifth and sixth kinds of contemplation It still remains for us to treat of the fifth and sixth kinds of contemplation, which Moses seems to indicate by a mystical description in these words: "You ought also to make two cherubim of (^old and of beaten work for both sides of the oracle.
Let one cherubim be on one side and the other on the other side. Let them, spreading their wings and covering the oracle, cover both sides of the propitiatory. And let them look at each other with their faces turned toward the propitiatory" (Exod. 25:18-20).
It gives us pleasure to turn our attention eagerly to this description, both to affirm the rule of our teaching from the similitude that is set forth and in accord with the formula of this description to forge the form and manner of our work. For I think that something great, something excellent, is proposed to us in this work since it is represented to us under such a form, since it is assigned such a name and it seeks to imitate the form of angels: "You ought to make two cherubim of gold and beaten work." That which it is necessary to represent to us under angelic form must be something truly great, excellent, even above the earthly, and completely other than human. Certainly the word "cherub" means "fullness of knowledge," and under the indication of this word it seems that a kind of great thing of hidden knowledge is being proposed and promised. But still we ought also to observe this, that we are accustomed to call not just any angels
"cherubim," but only those who are supreme and united immediately to God. And so the form of this sort of work challenges us to supermundane—no, to supercelestial—things, and under
RICHARD OF ST. VICTOR
this demand it invites our understanding to the speculation of supreme and divine things.
It is evident that things that seem to pertain to these two last kinds of contemplation are above a person and go beyond the mode and capacity of human reason. For this reason it is necessary to represent these things according to the expression of a similitude by means of a figure that is angelic rather than human. For unless the matter of these speculations goes beyond the limitation of human thinking, it is necessary that the model for forming our work have a form of human rather than angelic similitude. Therefore, it is necessary for us to raise ourselves above ourselves and to rise up by means of contemplation to those things which are above reason if we desire to form the flight of our understanding according to the manner of the angelic similitude. And so let us seek what those things are which are above reason, which transcend the power of human reason and the mode of our thinking.
Chapter H That the thingspertaining to these last speculationsgo beyond human reason
Just as it is evident that there are certain things that are below reason, so without doubt it is evident that there are certain things that are above reason. And between these there are certain other middle things, which are at least accessible to reason although they are below reason; these things we perceive by means of corporeal sense. Those things which we investigate by reason are according to reason only. Those things are above reason which we learn by a showing or prove by authority only. White and black, hot and cold, sweet and sour, we learn by corporeal sense; we do not prove them by reasoning. True and false, just and unjust, beneficial and unbeneficial, we discern by reasoning and not by any corporeal sense.
However, no corporeal sense teaches, nor does any human reason fully convince us, that God is three in person in one substance and one in substance in three persons. But yet some learn this by a showing while others believe and prove it incontestably by authority only. And so corporeal things are below reason, but divine