SPIRITUAL CANTICLE: STANZAS 31 THROUGH 40

A SPIRITUAL CANTICLE OF THE SOUL AND THE
BRIDEGROOM CHRIST

( ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS)

By that one hair Thou hast observed fluttering on my neck, And on my neck regarded, Thou wert captivated; And wounded by one of my eyes.

THERE are three things mentioned here. The first is, that the love by which the virtues are bound together is nothing less than a strong love; for in truth it need be so in order to preserve them. The second is, that God is greatly taken by this hair of love, seeing it to be alone and strong. The third is, that God is deeply enamoured of the soul, beholding the purity and integrity of its faith.

2. The neck signifies that strength in which, it is said, fluttered the hair of love, strong love, which bound the virtues together. It is not sufficient for the preservation of virtues that love be alone, it must be also strong so that no contrary vice may anywhere destroy the perfection of the garland; for the virtues so are bound up together in the soul by the hair, that if the thread be once broken, all the virtues are lost; for where one virtue is, all are, and where one fails, all fail also. The hair is said to flutter on the neck, because its love of God, without any hindrance whatever, flutters strongly and lightly in the strength of the soul.

3. As the air causes hair to wave and flutter on the neck, so the breath of the Holy Ghost stirs the strong love that it may fly upwards to God; for without this divine wind, which excites the powers of the soul to the practice of divine love, all the virtues the soul may possess become ineffectual and fruitless. The Beloved observed the hair fluttering on the neck--that is, He considered it with particular attention and regard; because strong love is a great attraction for the eyes of God.

4. This shows us that God not only esteems this love, seeing it alone, but also loves it, seeing it strong; for to say that God regards is to say that He loves, and to say that He observes is to say that He esteems what He observes. The word 'neck' is repeated in this line, because it, being strong, is the cause why God loves it so much. It is as if the soul said, 'Thou hast loved it, seeing it strong without weakness or fear, and without any other love, and flying upwards swiftly and fervently.'

5. Until now God had not looked upon this hair so as to be captivated by it, because He had not seen it alone, separate from the others, withdrawn from other loves, feelings, and affections, which hindered it from fluttering alone on the neck of strength. Afterwards, however, when mortifications and trials temptations and penance had detached it, and made it strong, so that nothing whatever could break it, then God beholds it, and is taken by it, and binds the flowers of the garlands with it; for it is now so strong that it can keep the virtues united together in the soul.

6. But what these temptations and trials are, how they come, and how far they reach, that the soul may attain to that strength of love in which God unites it to Himself, I have described in the 'Dark Night,' [254] and in the explanation of the four stanzas [255] which begin with the words, 'O living flame of love!' The soul having passed through these trials has reached a degree of love so high that it has merited the divine union.

7. O joyful wonder! God captive to a hair. The reason of this capture so precious is that God was pleased to observe the fluttering of the hair on the soul's neck; for where God regards He loves. If He in His grace and mercy had not first looked upon us and loved us, [256] as St. John saith, and humbled Himself, He never could have been taken by the fluttering of the hair of our miserable love. His flight is not so low as that our love could lay hold of the divine bird, attract His attention, and fly so high with a strength worthy of His regard, if He had not first looked upon us. He, however, is taken by the fluttering of the hair; He makes it worthy and pleasing to Himself, and then is captivated by it. 'Thou hast seen it on my neck, Thou wert captivated by it.' This renders it credible that a bird which flies low may capture the royal eagle in its flight, if the eagle should fly so low and be taken by it willingly.

8. The eye is faith. The soul speaks of but one, and that this has wounded the Beloved. If the faith and trust of the soul in God were not one, without admixture of other considerations, God never could have been Wounded by love. Thus the eye that wounds, and the hair that binds, must be one. So strong is the love of the Bridegroom for the bride, because of her simple faith, that, if the hair of her love binds Him, the eye of her faith imprisons Him so closely as to wound Him through that most tender affection He bears her, which is to the bride a further progrees in His love.

9. The Bridegroom Himself speaks in the Canticle of the hair and the eyes, saying to the bride, 'Thou hast wounded My heart, My sister, My bride; thou hast wounded My heart with one of thy eyes, and with one hair of thy neck.' [257] He says twice that His heart is wounded, that is, with the eye and the hair, and therefore the soul in this stanza speaks of them both, because they signify its union with God in the understanding and the will; for the understanding is subdued by faith, signified by the eye, and the will by love. Here the soul exults in this union, and gives thanks to the Bridegroom for it, it being His gift; accounting it a great matter that He has been pleased to requite its love, and to become captive to it. We may also observe here the joy, happiness, and delight of the soul with its prisoner, having been for a long time His prisoner, enamoured of Him.

GREAT is the power and courage of love, for God is its prisoner. Blessed is the soul that loves, for it has made a captive of God Who obeys its good pleasure. Such is the nature of love that it makes those who love do what is asked of them, and, on the other hand, without love the utmost efforts will be fruitless, but one hair will bind those that love. The soul, knowing this, and conscious of blessings beyond its merits, in being raised up to so high a degree of love, through the rich endowments of graces and virtues, attributes all to the Beloved, saying:

When Thou didst regard me, Thine eyes imprinted in me Thy grace: For this didst Thou love me again, And thereby mine eyes did merit To adore what in Thee they saw.

IT is the nature of perfect love to seek or accept nothing for itself, to attribute nothing to itself, but to refer all to the Beloved. If this be true of earthly love, how much more so of the love of God, the reason of which is so constraining. In the two foregoing stanzas the bride seemed to attribute something to herself; for she said that she would make garlands with her Beloved, and bind them with a hair of her head; that is a great work, and of no slight importance and worth: afterwards she said that she exulted in having captivated Him by a hair, and wounded Him with one of her eyes. All this seems as if she attributed great merits to herself. Now, however, she explains her meaning, and removes the wrong impression with great care and fear, lest any merit should be attributed to herself, and therefore less to God than His due, and less also than she desired. She now refers all to Him, and at the same time gives Him thanks, saying that the cause of His being the captive of the hair of her love, and of His being wounded by the eye of her faith, was His mercy in looking lovingly upon her, thereby rendering her lovely and pleasing in His sight; and that the loveliness and worth she received from Him merited His love, and made her worthy to adore her Beloved, and to bring forth good works worthy of His love and favour.

2. That is, with loving affection, for I have already said, that where God regards there He loves.

3. The eyes of the Bridegroom signify here His merciful divinity, which, mercifuly inclined to the soul, imprints or infuses in it the love and grace by which He makes it beautiful, and so elevates it that He makes it the partaker of His divinity. When the soul sees to what height of dignity God has raised it, it says:

4. To love again is to love much; it is more than simple love, it is a twofold love, and for two reasons. Here the soul explains the two motives of the Bridegroom's love; He not only loved it because captivated by the hair, but He loved it again, because He was wounded with one of its eyes. The reason why He loved it so deeply is that He would, when He looked upon it, give it the grace to please Him, endowing it with the hair of love, and animating with His charity the faith of the eye. And therefore the soul saith:

5. To say that God shows favour to the soul is to say that He renders it worthy and capable of His love. It is therefore as if the soul said, 'Having shown Thy favour to me, worthy pledges of Thy love, Thou hast therefore loved me again'; that is, 'Thou hast given me grace upon grace'; or, in the words of St. John, 'grace for grace'; [258] grace for the grace He has given, that is more grace, for without grace we cannot merit His grace.

6. If we could clearly understand this truth, we must keep in mind that, as God loves nothing beside Himself, so loves He nothing more than Himself, because He loves all things with reference to Himself. Thus love is the final cause, and God loves nothing for what it is in itself. Consequently, when we say that God loves such a soul, we say, in effect, that He brings it in a manner to Himself, making it His equal, and thus it is He loves that soul in Himself with that very love with which He loves Himself. Every good work, therefore, of the soul in God is meritorious of God's love, because the soul in His favour, thus exalted, merits God Himself in every act.

7. That is, 'By the grace and favour which the eyes of Thy compassion have wrought, when Thou didst look upon me, rendering me pleasing in Thy sight and worthy of Thy regard.'

8. That is: 'The powers of my soul, O my Bridegroom, the eyes by which I can see Thee, although once fallen and miserable in the vileness of their mean occupations, have merited to look upon Thee.' To look upon God is to do good works in His grace. Thus the powers of the soul merit in adoring because they adore in the grace of God, in which every act is meritorious. Enlightened and exalted by grace, they adored what in Him they saw, and what they saw not before, because of their blindness and meanness. What, then, have they now seen? The greatness of His power, His overflowing sweetness, infinite goodness, love, and compassion, innumerable benefits received at His hands, as well now when so near Him as before when far away. The eyes of the soul now merit to adore, and by adoring merit, for they are beautiful and pleasing to the Bridegroom. Before they were unworthy, not only to adore or behold Him, but even to look upon Him at all: great indeed is the stupidity and blindness of a soul without the grace of God.

9. It is a melancholy thing to see how far a soul departs from its duty when it is not enlightened by the love of God. For being bound to acknowledge these and other innumerable favours which it has every moment received at His hands, temporal as well as spiritual, and to worship and serve Him unceasingly with all its faculties, it not only does not do so, but is unworthy even to think of Him; nor does it make any account of Him whatever. Such is the misery of those who are living, or rather who are dead, in sin.

FOR the better understanding of this and of what follows, we must keep in mind that the regard of God benefits the soul in four ways: it cleanses, adorns, enriches, and enlightens it, as the sun, when it shines, dries, warms, beautifies, and brightens the earth. When God has visited the soul in the three latter ways, whereby He renders it pleasing to Himself, He remembers its former uncleanness and sin no more: as it is written, 'All the iniquities that he hath wrought, I will not remember.' [259]

God having once done away with our sin and uncleanness, He will look upon them no more; nor will He withhold His mercy because of them, for He never punishes twice for the same sin, according to the words of the prophet: 'There shall not rise a double affliction.' [260]

Still, though God forgets the sin He has once forgiven, we are not for that reason to forget it ourselves; for the Wise Man saith, 'Be not without fear about sin forgiven.' [261] There are three reasons for this. We should always remember our sin, that we may not presume, that we may have a subject of perpetual thanksgiving, and because it serves to give us more confidence that we shall receive greater favours; for if, when we were in sin, God showed Himself unto us so merciful and forgiving, how much greater mercies may we not hope for when we are clean from sin, and in His love?

The soul, therefore, calling to mind all the mercies it has received, and seeing itself united to the Bridegroom in such dignity, rejoices greatly with joy, thanksgiving, and love. In this it is helped exceedingly by the recollection of its former condition, which was so mean and filthy that it not only did not deserve that God should look upon it, but was unworthy that He should even utter its name, as He saith by the mouth of the prophet David: 'Nor will I be mindful of their names by My lips.' [262] Thus the soul, seeing that there was, and that there can be, nothing in itself to attract the eyes of God, but that all comes from Him of pure grace and goodwill, attributes its misery to itself, and all the blessings it enjoys to the Beloved; and seeing further that because of these blessings it can merit now what it could not merit before, it becomes bold with God, and prays for the divine spiritual union, wherein its mercies are multiplied. This is the subject of the following stanza:

Despise me not, For if I was swarthy once, Thou canst regard me now; Since Thou hast regarded me, Grace and beauty hast Thou given me.

THE soul now is becoming bold, and respects itself, because of the gifts and endowments which the Beloved has bestowed upon it. It recognises that these things, while itself is worthless and underserving, are at least means of merit, and consequently it ventures to say to the Beloved, 'Do not disregard me now, or despise me'; for if before it deserved contempt because of the filthiness of its sin, and the meanness of its nature, now that He has once looked upon it, and thereby adorned it with grace and beauty, He may well look upon it a second time and increase its grace and beauty. That He has once done so, when the soul deserved it not, and had no attractions for Him, is reason enough why He should do so again and again.

2. The soul does not say this because it desires in any way to be esteemed--for contempt and insult are of great price, and occasions of joy to the soul that truly loves God--but because it acknowledges that in itself it merits nothing else, were it not for the gifts and graces it has received from God, as it appears from the words that follow.

3. �If, before Thou didst graciously look upon me Thou didst find me in my filthiness, black with imperfections and sins, and naturally mean and vile,'

4. After once looking upon me, and taking away my swarthy complexion, defiled by sin and disagreeable to look upon, when Thou didst render me lovely for the first time, Thou mayest well look upon me now--that is, now I may be looked on and deserve to be regarded, and thereby to receive further favours at Thy hands. For Thine eyes, when they first looked upon me, did not only take away my swarthy complexion, but rendered me also worthy of Thy regard; for in Thy look of love,--

5. The two preceding lines are a commentary on the words of St. John, 'grace for grace,' [263] for when God beholds a soul that is lovely in His eyes He is moved to bestow more grace upon it because He dwells well-pleased within it. Moses knew this, and prayed for further grace: he would, as it were, constrain God to grant it because he had already received so much 'Thou hast said: I know thee by name, and thou hast found favour in My sight: if therefore I have found favour in Thy sight, show me Thy face, that I may know Thee, and may find grace before Thine eyes.' [264]

6. Now a soul which in the eyes of God is thus exalted in grace, honourable and lovely, is for that reason an object of His unutterable love. If He loved that soul before it was in a state of grace, for His own sake, He loves it now, when in a state of grace, not only for His own sake, but also for itself. Thus enamoured of its beauty, through its affections and good works, now that it is never without them, He bestows upon it continually further grace and love, and the more honourable and exalted He renders that soul, the more is He captivated by it, and the greater His love for it.

7. God Himself sets this truth before us, saying to His people, by the mouth of the prophet, 'since thou becamest honourable in My eyes, and glorious, I have loved thee.' [265] That is, 'Since I have cast Mine eyes upon thee, and thereby showed thee favour, and made thee glorious and honourable in My sight, thou hast merited other and further favours'; for to say that God loves, is to say that He multiplies His grace. The bride in the Canticle speaks to the same effect, saying, 'I am black, but beautiful, O ye daughters of Jerusalem.' [266] and the Church adds, [267] saying, 'Therefore hath the King loved me, and brought me into His secret chamber.' This is as much as saying: 'O ye souls who have no knowledge nor understanding of these favours, marvel not that the heavenly King has shown such mercy unto me as to plunge me in the depths of His love, for, though I am swarthy, He has so regarded me, after once looking upon me, that He could not be satisfied without betrothing me to Himself, and calling me into the inner chamber of His love.'

8. Who can measure the greatness of the soul's exaltation when God is pleased with it? No language, no imagination is sufficient for this; for in truth God doeth this as God, to show that it is He who does it. The dealings of God with such a soul may in some degree be understood; but only in this way, namely, that He gives more to him who has more, and that His gifts are multiplied in proportion to the previous endowments of the soul. This is what He teaches us Himself in the Gospel, saying; 'He that hath to him shall be given, and he shall abound: but he that hath not, from him shall be taken away even that which he hath.' [268]

9. Thus the talent of that servant, not then in favour with his lord, was taken from him and given to another who had gained others, so that the latter might have all, together with the favour of his lord. [269] God heaps the noblest and the greatest favours of His house, which is the Church militant as well as the Church triumphant, upon him who is most His friend, ordaining it thus for His greater honour and glory, as a great light absorbs many little lights. This is the spiritual sense of those words, already cited, [270] the prophet Isaias addressed to the people of Israel: 'I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour: I have given Egypt for thy atonement and Saba for thee. I will give men for thee, and people for thy life.' [271]

10. Well mayest Thou then, O God, gaze upon and prize that soul which Thou regardest, for Thou hast made it precious by looking upon it, and given it graces which in Thy sight are precious, and by which Thou art captivated. That soul, therefore, deserves that Thou shouldest regard it not only once, but often, seeing that Thou hast once looked upon it; for so is it written in the book of Esther by the Holy Ghost: 'This honour is he worthy of, whom the king hath a mind to honour.' [272]

THE gifts of love which the Bridegroom bestows on the soul in this state are inestimable; the praises and endearing expressions of divine love which pass so frequently between them are beyond all utterance. The soul is occupied in praising Him, and in giving Him thanks; and He in exalting, praising, and thanking the soul, as we see in the Canticle, where He thus speaks to the bride: 'Behold, thou art fair, O My love, behold, thou art fair; thy eyes are as those of doves.' The bride replies: 'Behold, thou art fair, my Beloved, and comely.' [273] These, and other like expressions, are addressed by them each to the other.

2. In the previous stanza the soul despised itself, and said it was swarthy and unclean, praising Him for His beauty and grace, Who, by looking upon the soul, rendered it gracious and beautiful. He, Whose way it is to exalt the humble, fixing His eyes upon the soul, as He was entreated to do, praises it in the following stanza. He does not call it swarthy, as the soul calls itself, but He addresses it as His white dove, praising it for its good dispositions, those of a dove and a turtle-dove.

The little white dove Has returned to the ark with the bough; And now the turtle-dove Its desired mate On the green banks has found.

IT is the Bridegroom Himself who now speaks. He celebrates the purity of the soul in its present state, the rich rewards it has gained, in having prepared itself, and laboured to come to Him. He also speaks of its blessedness in having found the Bridegroom in this union, and of the fulfilment of all its desires, the delight and joy it has in Him now that all the trials of life and time are over.

2. He calls the soul, on account of its whiteness and purity-- effects of the grace it has received at the hands of God--a dove, 'the little white dove,' for this is the term He applies to it in the Canticle, to mark its simplicity, its natural gentleness, and its loving contemplation. The dove is not only simple, and gentle without gall, but its eyes are also clear, full of love. The Bridegroom, therefore, to point out in it this character or loving contemplation, wherein it looks upon God, says of it that its eyes are those of a dove: 'Thy eyes are dove's eyes.' [274]

3. Here the Bridegroom compares the soul to the dove of Noe's ark, the going and returning of which is a figure of what befalls the soul. For as the dove went forth from the ark, and returned because it found no rest for its feet on account of the waters of the deluge, until the time when it returned with the olive branch in its mouth--a sign of the mercy of God in drying the waters which had covered the earth--so the soul went forth at its creation out of the ark of God's omnipotence, and having traversed the deluge of its sins and imperfections, and finding no rest for its desires, flew and returned on the air of the longings of its love to the ark of its Creator's bosom; but it only effected an entrance when God had dried the waters of its imperfections. Then it returned with the olive branch, that is, the victory over all things by His merciful compassion, to this blessed and perfect recollection in the bosom of the Beloved, not only triumphant over all its enemies, but also rewarded for its merits; for both the one and the other are symbolised by the olive bough. Thus the dove-soul returns to the ark of God not only white and pure as it went forth when He created it, but with the olive branch of reward and peace obtained by the conquest of itself.

4. The Bridegroom calls the soul the turtle-dove, because when it is seeking after the Beloved it is like the turtle-dove when it cannot find its desired mate. It is said of the turtle-dove, when it cannot find its mate, that it sitteth not on the green boughs, nor drinketh of the cool refreshing waters, nor retireth to the shade, nor mingleth with companions; but when it finds its mate then it doeth all this.

5. Such, too, is the condition of the soul, and necessarily, if it is to attain to union with the Bridegroom. The soul's love and anxiety must be such that it cannot rest on the green boughs of any joy, nor drink of the waters of this world's honour and glory, nor recreate itself with any temporal consolation, nor shelter itself in the shade of created help and protection: it must repose nowhere, it must avoid the society of all its inclinations, mourn in its loneliness, until it shall find the Bridegroom to its perfect contentment.

6. And because the soul, before it attained to this estate, sought the Beloved in great love, and was satisfied with nothing short of Him, the Bridegroom here speaks of the end of its labours, and the fulfilment of its desires, saying: 'Now the turtle-dove its desired mate on the green banks has found.' That is: Now the bride-soul sits on the green bough, rejoicing in her Beloved, drinks of the clear waters of the highest contemplation and of the wisdom of God; is refreshed by the consolations it finds in Him, and is also sheltered under the shadow of His favour and protection, which she had so earnestly desired. There is she deliciously and divinely comforted, refreshed and nourished, as she saith in the, Canticle: 'I sat down under His shadow Whom I desired, and His fruit was sweet to my palate.' [275]

THE Bridegroom proceeds to speak of the satisfaction which He derives from the happiness which the bride has found in that solitude wherein she desired to live--a stable peace and unchangeable good. For when the bride is confirmed in the tranquillity of her soul and solitary love of the Bridegroom, she reposes so sweetly in the love of God, and God also in her, that she requires no other means or masters to guide her in the way of God; for God Himself is now her light and guide, fulfilling in her what He promised by the mouth of Oseas, saying: 'I will lead her into the wilderness, and I will speak to her heart.' [276] That is, it is in solitude that He communicates Himself, and unites Himself, to the soul, for to speak to the heart is to satisfy the heart, and no heart can be satisfied with less than God. And so the Bridegroom Says:

In solitude she lived, And in solitude built her nest; And in solitude, alone Hath the Beloved guided her, In solitude also wounded with love.

IN this stanza the Bridegroom is doing two things: one is, He is praising the solitude in which the soul once lived, for it was the means whereby it found the Beloved, and rejoiced in Him, away from all its former anxieties and troubles. For, as the soul abode in solitude, abandoning all created help and consolation, in order to obtain the fellowship and union of the Beloved, it deserved thereby possession of the peace of solitude in the Beloved, in Whom it reposes alone, undisturbed by any anxieties.

2. The second is this: the Bridegroom is saying that, inasmuch as the soul has desired to be alone, far away, for His sake, from all created things, He has been enamoured of it because of its loneliness, has taken care of it, held it in His arms, fed it with all good things, and guided it to the deep things of God. He does not merely say that He is now the soul's guide, but that He is its only guide, without any intermediate help, either of angels or of men, either of forms or of figures; for the soul in this solitude has attained to true liberty of spirit, and is wholly detached from all subordinate means.

3. The turtle-dove, that is, the soul, lived in solitude before she found the Beloved in this state of union; for the soul that longs after God derives no consolation from any other companionship,--yea, until it finds Him everything does but increase its solitude.

4. The previous solitude of the soul was its voluntary privation of all the comforts of this world, for the sake of the Bridegroom-- as in the instance of the turtledove--its striving after perfection, and acquiring that perfect solitude wherein it attains to union with the Word, and in consequence to complete refreshment and repose. This is what is meant by 'nest'; and the words of the stanza may be thus explained: 'In that solitude, wherein the bride formerly lived, tried by afflictions and troubles, because she was not perfect, there, in that solitude, hath she found refreshment and rest, because she has found perfect rest in God.' This, too, is the spiritual sense of these words of the Psalmist: 'The sparrow hath found herself a house, and the turtle a nest for herself, where she may lay her young ones; [277] that is, a sure stay in God, in Whom all the desires and powers of the soul are satisfied.'

5. In the solitude of perfect detachment from all things, wherein it lives alone with God--there He guides it, moves it, and elevates it to divine things. He guides the understanding in the perception of divine things, because it is now detached from all strange and contrary knowledge, and is alone. He moves the will freely to love Himself, because it is now alone, disencumbered from all other affections. He fills the memory with divine knowledge, because that also is now alone, emptied of all imaginations and fancies. For the instant the soul clears and empties its faculties of all earthly objects, and from attachments to higher things, keeping them in solitude, God immediately fills them with the invisible and divine; it being God Himself Who guides it in this solitude. St. Paul says of the perfect, that they 'are led by the Spirit of God,' [278] and that is the same as saying 'In solitude hath He guided her.'

6. That is, the Beloved not only guides the soul in its solitude, but it is He alone Who works in it directly and immediately. It is of the nature of the soul's union with God in the spiritual marriage that God works directly, and communicates Himself immediately, not by the ministry of angels or by the help of natural capacities. For the exterior and interior senses, all created things, and even the soul itself, contribute very little towards the reception of those great supernatural favours which God bestows in this state; yea, rather, inasmuch as they do not fall within the cognizance of natural efforts, ability and application, God effects them alone.

7. The reason is, that He finds the soul alone in its solitude, and therefore will not give it another companion, nor will He entrust His work to any other than Himself.

8. There is a certain fitness in this; for the soul having abandoned all things, and passed through all the ordinary means, rising above them unto God, God Himself becomes the guide, and the way to Himself. The soul in solitude, detached from all things, having now ascended above all things, nothing now can profit or help it to ascend higher except the Bridegroom Word Himself, Who, because enamoured of the bride, will Himself alone bestow these graces on the soul. And so He says:

9. That is, the love of the bride; for the Bridegroom not only loves greatly the solitude of the soul, but is also wounded with love of her, because the soul would abide in solitude and detachment, on account of its being itself wounded with love of Him. He will not, therefore, leave it alone; for being wounded with love because of the soul's solitude on His account, and seeing that nothing else can satisfy it, He comes Himself to be alone its guide, drawing it to, and absorbing it in, Himself. But He would not have done so if He had not found it in this spiritual solitude.

IT is a strange characteristic of persons in love that they take a much greater pleasure in their loneliness than in the company of others. For if they meet together in the presence of others with whom they need have no intercourse, and from whom they have nothing to conceal, and if those others neither address them nor interfere with them, yet the very fact of their presence is sufficient to rob the lovers of all pleasure in their meeting. The cause of this lies in the fact that love is the union of two persons, who will not communicate with each other if they are not alone. And now the soul, having reached the summit of perfection, and liberty of spirit in God, all the resistance and contradictions of the flesh being subdued, has no other occupation or employment than indulgence in the joys of its intimate love of the Bridegroom. It is written of holy Tobias, after the trials of his life were over, that God restored his sight, and that 'the rest of his life was in joy.' [279] So is it with the perfect soul, it rejoices in the blessings that surround it.

2. The prophet Isaias says of the soul which, having been tried in the works of perfection has arrived at the goal desired: 'Thy light shall arise up in darkness, and thy darkness shall be as the noonday. And the Lord will give thee rest always, and will fill thy soul with brightness, and deliver thy bones, and thou shalt be as a watered garden and as a fountain of water whose waters shall not fail. And the deserts of the world shall be builded in thee: thou shalt raise up the foundations of generation and generation; and thou shalt be called the builder of the hedges, turning the paths into rest. If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy will in My holy day, and call the Sabbath delicate, and the Holy of our Lord glorious, and glorify Him while thou doest not thine own ways, and thy will be not found, to speak a word: then shalt thou be delighted in the Lord, and I will lift thee up above the heights of the earth, and will feed thee with the inheritance of Jacob thy father,' [280] Who is God Himself. The soul, therefore, has nothing else to do now but to rejoice in the delights of this pasture, and one thing only to desire--the perfect fruition of it in everlasting life. Thus, in the next and the following stanzas it implores the Beloved to admit it into this beatific pasture in the clear vision of God, and says:

Let us rejoice, O my Beloved, Let us go forth to see ourselves in Thy beauty, To the mountain and the hill, Where the pure water flows: Let us enter into the heart of the thicket.

THE perfect union of love between itself and God being now effected, the soul longs to occupy itself with those things that belong to love. It is the soul which is now speaking, making three petitions to the Beloved. In the first place, it asks for the joy and sweetness of love, saying, 'Let us rejoice.' In the second place, it prays to be made like Him, saying, 'Let us go forth to see ourselves in Thy beauty.' In the third place, it begs to be admitted to the knowledge of His secrets, saying, 'Let us enter into the heart of the thicket.'

2. That is, in the sweetness of our love; not only in that sweetness of ordinary union, but also in that which flows from active and affective love, whether in the will by an act of affection, or outwardly in good works which tend to the service of the Beloved. For love, as I have said, where it is firmly rooted, ever runs after those joys and delights which are the acts of exterior and interior love. All this the soul does that it may be made like to the Beloved.

3. 'Let us so act, that, by the practice of this love, we may come to see ourselves in Thy beauty in everlasting life.' That is: 'Let me be so transformed in Thy beauty, that, being alike in beauty, we may see ourselves both in Thy beauty; having Thy beauty, so that, one beholding the other, each may see his own beauty in the other, the beauty of both being Thine only, and mine absorbed in it. And thus I shall see Thee in Thy beauty, and myself in Thy beauty, and Thou shalt see me in Thy beauty; and I shall see myself in Thee in Thy beauty, and Thou Thyself in me in Thy beauty; so shall I seem to be Thyself in Thy beauty, and Thou myself in Thy beauty; my beauty shall be Thine, Thine shall be mine, and I shall be Thou in it, and Thou myself in Thine own beauty; for Thy beauty will be my beauty, and so we shall see, each the other, in Thy beauty.'

4. This is the adoption of the sons of God, who may truly say what the Son Himself says to the Eternal Father: 'All My things are Thine, and Thine are Mine,' [281] He by essence, being the Son of God by nature, we by participation, being sons by adoption. This He says not for Himself only, Who is the Head, but for the whole mystical body, which is the Church. For the Church will share in the very beauty of the Bridegroom in the day of her triumph, when she shall see God face to face. And this is the vision which the soul prays that the Bridegroom and itself may go in His beauty to see.

5. That is, to the morning and essential knowledge of God, [282] which is knowledge in the Divine Word, Who, because He is so high, is here signified by 'the mountain.' Thus Isaias saith, calling upon men to know the Son of God: 'Come, and let us go up to the mountain of our Lord'; [283] and before: 'In the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared.' [284]

6. That is, to the evening knowledge of God, to the knowledge of Him in His creatures, in His works, and in His marvellous laws. This is signified by the expression 'hill,' because it is a kind of knowledge lower than the other. The soul prays for both when it says 'to the mountain and the hill.'

7. When the soul says, 'Let us go forth to see ourselves in Thy beauty to the mountain,' its meaning is, 'Transform me, and make me like the beauty of the Divine Wisdom, the Word, the Son of God.' When it says 'to the hill,' the meaning is, 'Do Thou instruct me in the beauty of this lower knowledge, which is manifest in Thy creatures and mysterious works.' This also is the beauty of the Son of God, wherewith the soul desires to shine.

8. But the soul cannot see itself in the beauty of God if it be not transformed in His wisdom, wherein all things are seen and possessed, whether in heaven or in earth. It was to this mountain and to this hill the bride longed to come when she said, 'I will go to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense.' [285] The mountain of myrrh is the clear vision of God, and the hill of frankincense the knowledge of Him in His works, for the myrrh on the mountain is of a higher order than the incense on the hill.

9. This is the wisdom and knowledge of God, which cleanse the understanding, and detach it from all accidents and fancies, and which clear it of the mist of ignorance. The soul is ever influenced by this desire of perfectly and clearly understanding the divine verities, and the more it loves the more it desires to penetrate them, and hence the third petition which it makes:

10. Into the depths of God's marvellous works and profound judgments. Such is their multitude and variety, that they may be called a thicket. They are so full of wisdom and mystery, that we may not only call them a thicket, but we may even apply to them the words of David: 'The mountain of God is a rich mountain, a mountain curdled as cheese, a rich mountain.' [286] The thicket of the wisdom and knowledge of God is so deep, and so immense, that the soul, how much soever it knows of it, can always penetrate further within it, because it is so immense and so incomprehensible. 'O the depth,' cries out the Apostle, 'of the riches of the wisdom and of the knowledge of God! How incomprehensible are His judgments, and how unsearchable His ways!' [287]

11. But the soul longs to enter this thicket and incomprehensibility of His judgments, for it is moved by that longing for a deeper knowledge of them. That knowledge is an inestimable delight, transcending all understanding. David, speaking of the sweetness of them, saith: 'The judgments of our Lord are true, justified in themselves, to be desired above gold and many precious stones, and sweeter than honey and the honey- comb. For Thy servant keepeth them.' [288] The soul therefore earnestly longs to be engulfed in His judgments, and to have a deeper knowledge of them, and for that end would esteem it a joy and great consolation to endure all sufferings and afflictions in the world, and whatever else might help it to that end, however hard and painful it might be; it would gladly pass through the agonies of death to enter deeper into God.

12. Hence, also, the thicket, which the soul desires to enter, may be fittingly understood as signifying the great and many trials and tribulations which the soul longs for, because suffering is most sweet and most profitable to it, inasmuch as it is the way by which it enters more and more into the thicket of the delicious wisdom of God. The most pure suffering leads to the most pure and the deepest knowledge, and consequently to the purest and highest joy, for that is the issue of the deepest knowledge. Thus, the soul, not satisfied with ordinary suffering, says, 'Let us enter into the heart of the thicket,' even the anguish of death, that I may see God.

13. Job, desiring to suffer that he might see God, thus speaks 'Who will grant that my request may come, and that God may give me what I look for? And that He that hath begun may destroy me, that He may let loose His hand and cut me off? And that this may be my comfort, that afflicting me with sorrow, He spare not.' [289] O that men would understand how impossible it is to enter the thicket, the manifold riches of the wisdom of God, without entering into the thicket of manifold suffering making it the desire and consolation of the soul; and how that the soul which really longs for the divine wisdom longs first of all for the sufferings of the Cross, that it may enter in.

14. For this cause it was that St. Paul admonished the Ephesians not to faint in their tribulations, but to take courage: 'That being rooted and founded in charity, you may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth, and length, and height, and depth; to know also the charity of Christ, which surpasseth all knowledge, that you may be filled unto all the fulness of God.' [290] The gate by which we enter into the riches of the knowledge of God is the Cross; and that gate is narrow. They who desire to enter in that way are few, while those who desire the joys that come by it are many.

ONE of the principal reasons why the soul desires to be released and to be with Christ, is, that it may see Him face to face, and penetrate to the depths of His waysand the eternal mysteries of His incarnation, which is not the least part of its blessedness; for in the Gospel of St. John He, addressing the Father, said: 'Now this is eternal life: that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ Whom Thou hast sent.' [291] As the first act of a person who has taken a long journey is to see and converse with him whom he was in search of, so the first thing which the soul desires, when it has attained to the beatific vision, is to know and enjoy the deep secrets and mysteries of the incarnation and the ancient ways of God depending on them. Thus the soul, having said that it longed to see itself in the beauty of God, sings as in the following stanza:

We shall go at once To the deep caverns of the rock Which are all secret; There we shall enter in, And taste of the new wine of the pomegranate.

ONE of the reasons which most influence the soul to desire to enter into the 'thicket' of the wisdom of God, and to have a more intimate knowledge of the beauty of the divine wisdom, is, as I have said, that it may unite the understanding with God in the knowledge of the mysteries of the Incarnation, as of all His works the highest and most full of sweetness, and the most delicious knowledge. And here the bride therefore says, that after she has entered in within the divine wisdom--that is, the spiritual marriage, which is now and will be in glory, seeing God face to face--her soul united with the divine wisdom, the Son of God, she will then understand the deep mysteries of God and Man, which are the highest wisdom hidden in God. They, that is, the bride and the Bridegroom, will enter in--the soul ingulfed and absorbed--and both together will have the fruition of the joy which springs from the knowledge of mysteries, and attributes and power of God which are revealed in those mysteries, such as His justice, His mercy, wisdom, power, and love.

2. 'This rock is Christ,' as we learn from St. Paul. [292] The deep caverns of the rock are the deep mysteries of the wisdom of God in Christ, in the hypostatical union of the human nature with the Divine Word, and in the correspondence with it of the union of man with God, and in the agreement of God's justice and mercy in the salvation of mankind, in the manifestation of His judgments. And because His judgments are so high and so deep, they are here fittingly called 'deep caverns'; deep because of the depth of His mysteries, and caverns because of the depth of His wisdom in them. For as caverns are deep, with many windings, so each mystery of Christ is of deepest wisdom, and has many windings of His secret judgments of predestination and foreknowledge with respect to men.

3. Notwithstanding the marvellous mysteries which holy doctors have discovered, and holy souls have understood in this life, many more remain behind. There are in Christ great depths to be fathomed, for He is a rich mine, with many recesses full of treasures, and however deeply we may descend we shall never reach the end, for in every recess new veins of new treasures abound in all directions: 'In Whom,' according to the Apostle, 'are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.' [293] But the soul cannot reach these hidden treasures unless it first passes through the thicket of interior and exterior suffering: for even such knowledge of the mysteries of Christ as is possible in this life cannot be had without great sufferings, and without many intellectual and moral gifts, and without previous spiritual exercises; for all these gifts are far inferior to this knowledge of the mysteries of Christ, being only a preparation for it.

4. Thus God said to Moses, when he asked to see His glory, 'Man shall not see Me and live.' God, however, said that He would show him all that could be revealed in this life; and so He set Moses 'in a hole of the rock,' which is Christ, where he might see His 'back parts'; [294] that is, He made him understand the mysteries of the Sacred Humanity.

5. The soul longs to enter in earnest into these caverns of Christ, that it may be absorbed, transformed, and inebriated in the love and knowledge of His mysteries, hiding itself in the bosom of the Beloved. It is into these caverns that He invites the bride, in the Canticle, to enter, saying: 'Arise, My love, My beautiful one, and come; My dove in the clefts of the rock, in the hollow places of the wall.' [295] These clefts of the rock are the caverns of which we are here speaking, and to which the bride refers, saying:

6. That is, in the knowledge of the divine mysteries. The bride says not 'I will enter' alone, which seems the most fitting-- seeing that the Bridegroom has no need to enter in again--but 'we will enter,' that is, the Bridegroom and the bride, to show that this is not the work of the bride, but of the Bridegroom with her. Moreover, inasmuch as God and the soul are now united in the state of spiritual marriage, the soul doeth nothing of itself without God. To say 'we will enter,' is as much as to say, 'there shall we transform ourselves'--that is, 'I shall be transformed in Thee through the love of Thy divine and sweet judgments': for in the knowledge of the predestination of the just and in the foresight of the wicked, wherein the Father prevented the just in the benedictions of His sweetness in Jesus Christ His Son, the soul is transformed in a most exalted and perfect way in the love of God according to this knowledge, giving thanks to the Father, and loving Him again and again with great sweetness and delight, for the sake of Jesus Christ His Son. This the soul does in union with Christ and together with Him. The delight flowing from this act of praise is ineffably sweet, and the soul speaks of it in the words that follow:

7. The pomegranates here are the mysteries of Christ and the judgments of the wisdom of God; His power and attributes, the knowledge of which we have from these mysteries; and they are infinite. For as pomegranates have many grains in their round orb, so in each one of the attributes and judgments and power of God is a multitude of admirable arrangements and marvellous works contained within the sphere of power and mystery, appertaining to those works. Consider the round form of the pomegranate; for each pomegranate signifies some one power and attribute of God, which power or attribute is God Himself, symbolised here by the circular figure, which has neither beginning not end. It was in the contemplation of the judgments and mysteries of the wisdom of God, which are infinite, that the bride said, 'His belly is of ivory set with sapphires.' [296] The sapphires are the mysteries and judgments of the divine Wisdom, which is here signified by the 'belly'--the sapphire being a precious stone of the colour of the heavens when clear and serene.

8. The wine of the pomegranates which the bride says that she and the Bridegroom will taste is the fruition and joy of the love of God which overflows the soul in the understanding and knowledge of His mysteries. For as the many grains of the pomegranate pressed together give forth but one wine, so all the marvels and magnificence of God, infused into the soul, issue in but one fruition and joy of love, which is the drink of the Holy Ghost, and which the soul offers at once to God the Word, its Bridegroom, with great tenderness of love.

9. This divine drink the bride promised to the Bridegroom if He would lead her into this deep knowledge: 'There Thou shalt teach me,' saith the bride, 'and I will give Thee a cup of spiced wine, and new wine of my pomegranates.' [297] The soul calls them 'my pomegranates,' though they are God's Who had given them to it, and the soul offers them to God as if they were its own, saying, 'We will taste of the wine of the pomegranates'; for when He states it He gives it to the soul to taste, and when the soul tastes it, the soul gives it back to Him, and thus it is that both taste it together.

IN the two previous stanzas the bride sung of those good things which the Bridegroom is to give her in everlasting bliss, namely, her transformation in the beauty of created and uncreated wisdom, and also in the beauty of the union of the Word with flesh, wherein she shall behold His face as well as His back. Accordingly two things are set before us in the following stanza. The first is the way in which the soul tastes of the divine wine of the pomegranates; the second is the soul's putting before the Bridegroom the glory of its predestination. And though these two things are spoken of separately, one after the other, they are both involved in the one essential glory of the soul.

There thou wilt show me That which my soul desired; And there Thou wilt give at once, O Thou, my life, That which Thou gavest me the other day.

THE reason why the soul longed to enter the caverns was that it might attain to the consummation of the love of God, the object of its continual desires; that is, that it might love God with the pureness and perfection wherewith He has loved it, so that it might thereby requite His love. Hence in the present stanza the bride saith to the Bridegroom that He will there show her what she had always aimed at in all her actions, namely, that He would show her how to love Him perfectly, as He has loved her. And, secondly, that He will give her that essential glory for which He has predestined her from the day of His eternity.

2. That which the soul aims at is equality in love with God, the object of its natural and supernatural desire. He who loves cannot be satisfied if he does not feel that he loves as much as he is loved. And when the soul sees that in the transformation in God, such as is possible in this life, notwithstanding the immensity of its love, it cannot equal the perfection of that love wherewith God loves it, it desires the clear transformation of glory wherein it shall equal the perfection of love wherewith it is itself beloved of God; it desires, I say, the clear transformation of glory wherein it shall equal His love.

3. For though in this high state, which the soul reaches on earth, there is a real union of the will, yet it cannot reach that perfection and strength of love which it will possess in the union of glory; seeing that then, according to the Apostle, the soul will know God as it is known of Him: 'Then I shall know even as I am known.' [298] That is, 'I shall then love God even as I am loved by Him.' For as the understanding of the soul will then be the understanding of God, and its will the will of God, so its love will also be His love. Though in heaven the will of the soul is not destroyed, it is so intimately united with the power of the will of God, Who loves it, that it loves Him as strongly and as perfectly as it is loved of Him; both wills being united in one sole will and one sole love of God.

4. Thus the soul loves God with the will and strength of God Himself, being made one with that very strength of love wherewith itself is loved of God. This strength is of the Holy Ghost, in Whom the soul is there transformed. He is given to the soul to strengthen its love; ministering to it, and supplying in it, because of its transformation in glory, that which is defective in it. In the perfect transformation, also, of the state of spiritual marriage, such as is possible on earth, in which the soul is all clothed in grace, the soul loves in a certain way in the Holy Ghost, Who is given to it in that transformation.

5. We are to observe here that the bride does not say, 'There wilt Thou give me Thy love,' though that be true--for that means only that God will love her--but that He will there show her how she is to love Him with that perfection at which she aims, because there in giving her His love He will at the same time show her how to love Him as He loves her. For God not only teaches the soul to love Himself purely, with a disinterested love, as He hath loved us, but He also enables it to love Him with that strength with which He loves the soul, transforming it in His love, wherein He bestows upon it His own power, so that it may love Him. It is as if He put an instrument in its hand, taught it the use thereof, and played upon it together with the soul. This is showing the soul how it is to love, and at the same time endowing it with the capacity of loving.

6. The soul is not satisfied until it reaches this point, neither would it be satisfied even in heaven, unless it felt, as St. Thomas teaches, [299] that it loved God as much as it is loved of Him. And as I said of the state of spiritual marriage of which I am speaking, there is now at this time, though it cannot be that perfect love in glory, a certain vivid vision and likeness of that perfection, which is wholly indescribable.

'And there Thou wilt give me at once, O Thou my life, that which Thou gavest me the other day.'

7. What He will give is the essential glory which consists in the vision of God. Before proceeding further it is requisite to solve a question which arises here, namely, Why is it, seeing that essential glory consists in the vision of God, and not in loving Him, the soul says that its longing is for His love, and not for the essential glory? Why is it that the soul begins the stanza with referring to His love, and then introduces the subject of the essential glory afterwards, as if it were something of less importance?

8. There are two reasons for this. The first is this: As the whole aim of the soul is love, the seat of which is in the will, the property of which is to give and not to receive--the property of the understanding, the subject of essential glory, being to receive and not to give--to the soul inebriated with love the first consideration is not the essential glory which God will bestow upon it, but the entire surrender of itself to Him in true love, without any regard to its own advantage.

9. The second reason is that the second object is included in the first, and has been taken for granted in the previous stanzas, it being impossible to attain to the perfect love of God without the perfect vision of Him. The question is solved by the first reason, for the soul renders to God by love that which is His due, but with the understanding it receives from Him and does not give.

10. I now resume the explanation of the stanza, and inquire what day is meant by the 'other day,' and what is it that God then gave the soul, and what that is which it prays to receive afterwards in glory? By 'other day' is meant the day of the eternity of God, which is other than the day of time. In that day of eternity God predestined the soul unto glory, and determined the degree of glory which He would give it and freely gave from the beginning before He created it. This now, in a manner, so truly belongs to the soul that no event or accident, high or low, can ever take it away, for the soul will enjoy for ever that for which God had predestined it from all eternity.

11. This is that which He gave it 'the other day'; that which the soul longs now to possess visibly in glory. And what is that which He gave it? That what 'eye hath not seen nor ear hath heard, neither hath it ascended into the heart of man.' [300] 'The eye hath not seen,' saith Isaias, 'O God, beside Thee, what things Thou hast prepared for them that expect Thee.' [301] The soul has no word to describe it, so it says 'what.' It is in truth the vision of God, and as there is no expression by which we can explain what it is to see God, the soul says only 'that which Thou gavest me.'

12. But that I may not leave the subject without saying something further concerning it, I will repeat what Christ hath said of it in the Apocalypse of St. John, in many terms, phrases, and comparisons, because a single word once uttered cannot describe it, for there is much still unsaid, notwithstanding all that Christ hath spoken at seven different times. 'To him that overcometh,' saith He, 'I will give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of My God.' [302] But as this does not perfectly describe it, He says again: 'Be thou faithful unto death; and I will give thee the crown of life.' [303]

13. This also is insufficient, and so He speaks again more obscurely, but explaining it more: 'To him that overcometh I will give the hidden manna, and will give him a white counter, and on the counter a new name written which no man knoweth but he that receiveth it.' [304] And as even this is still insufficient, the Son of God speaks of great power and joy, saying: 'He that shall overcome and keep My works unto the end, I will give him power over the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron, and as a vessel of the potter they shall be broken: as I also have received of My Father. And I will give him the morning star.' [305] Not satisfied with these words, He adds: 'He that shall overcome shall thus be vested in white garments, and I will not put his name out of the book of life, and I will confess his name before My Father.' [306]

14. Still, all this falls short. He speaks of it in words of unutterable majesty and grandeur: 'He that shall overcome I will make Him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more; and I will write upon him the name of My God, and the name of the city of My God, the new Jerusalem which descendeth out of heaven from My God, and My new name.' [307] The seventh time He says: 'He that shall overcome I will give unto him to sit with Me in My throne: as I also have overcome, and sat with My Father in His throne. He that hath an ear let him hear what the Spirit saith to the Churches. [308]

15. These are the words of the Son of God; all of which tend to describe that which was given to the soul. The words correspond most accurately with it, but still they do not explain it, because it involves infinite good. The noblest expressions befit it, but none of them reach it, no, not all together.

16. Let us now see whether David hath said anything of it. In one of the Psalms he saith, 'O how great is the multitude of thy sweetness, O Lord, which Thou hast hidden for them that fear Thee.' [309] In another place he calls it a 'torrent of pleasure,' saying, 'Thou shalt make them drink of the torrent of Thy pleasure.' [310] And as he did not consider this enough, he says again, 'Thou hast prevented him with blessings of sweetness.' [311] The expression that rightly fits this 'that' of the soul, namely, its predestined bliss, cannot be found. Let us, therefore, rest satisfied with what the soul has used in reference to it, and explain the words as follows:

17. That is, 'That weight of glory to which Thou didst predestine me, O my Bridegroom, in the day of Thy eternity, when it was Thy good pleasure to decree my creation, Thou wilt then give me in my day of my betrothal and of my nuptials, in my day of the joy of my heart, when, released from the burden of the flesh, led into the deep caverns of Thy bridal chamber and gloriously transformed in Thee, we drink the wine of the sweet pomegranates.'

BUT inasmuch as the soul, in the state of spiritual marriage, of which I am now speaking, cannot but know something of this 'that,' seeing that because of its transformation in God something of it must be experienced by it, it will not omit to say something on the subject, the pledges and signs of which it is conscious of in itself, as it is written: 'Who can withhold the words He hath conceived?' [312] Hence in the following stanza the soul says something of the fruition which it shall have in the beatific vision, explaining so far as it is possible the nature and the manner of it.

The breathing of the air, The song of the sweet nightingale, The grove and its beauty In the serene night, With the flame that consumes, and gives no pain.

THE soul refers here, under five different expressions, to that which the Bridegroom is to give it in the beatific transformation. 1. The aspiration of the Holy Spirit of God after it, and its own aspiration after God. 2. Joyous praise of God in the fruition of Him. 3. The knowledge of creatures and the order of them. 4. The pure and clear contemplation of the divine essence. 5. Perfect transformation in the infinite love of God.

2. This is a certain faculty which God will there give the soul in the communication of the Holy Ghost, Who, like one breathing, raises the soul by His divine aspiration, informs it, strengthens it, so that it too may breathe in God with the same aspiration of love which the Father breathes with the Son, and the Son with the Father, which is the Holy Ghost Himself, Who is breathed into the soul in the Father and the Son in that transformation so as to unite it to Himself; for the transformation will not be true and perfect if the soul is not transformed in the Three Persons of the Most Holy Trinity in a clear manifest degree. This breathing of the Holy Ghost in the soul, whereby God transforms it in Himself, is to the soul a joy so deep, so exquisite, and so grand that no mortal tongue can describe it, no human understanding, as such, conceive it in any degree; for even that which passes in the soul with respect to the communication which takes place in its transformation wrought in this life cannot be described, because the soul united with God and transformed in Him breathes in God that very divine aspiration which God breathes Himself in the soul when it is transformed in Him.

3. In the transformation which takes place in this life, this breathing of God in the soul, and of the soul in God, is of most frequent occurrence, and the source of the most exquisite delight of love to the soul, but not however in the clear and manifest degree which it will have in the life to come. This, in my opinion, is what St. Paul referred to when he said: 'Because you are sons, God hath sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying Abba, Father.' [313] The blessed in the life to come, and the perfect in this, thus experience it.

4. Nor is it to be thought possible that the soul should be capable of so great a thing as that it should breathe in God as God in it, in the way of participation. For granting that God has bestowed upon it so great a favour as to unite it to the most Holy Trinity, whereby it becomes like unto God, and God by participation, is it altogether incredible that it should exercise the faculties of its understanding, perform its acts of knowledge and of love, or, to speak more accurately, should have it all done in the Holy Trinity together with It, as the Holy Trinity itself? This, however, takes place by communication and participation, God Himself effecting it in the soul, for this is 'to be transformed in the Three Persons' in power, wisdom, and love, and herein it is that the soul becomes like unto God, Who, that it might come to this, created it to His own image and likeness.

5. How this can be so cannot be explained in any other way than by showing how the Son of God has raised us to so high a state, and merited for us the 'power to be made the sons of God.' [314] He prayed to the Father, saying: 'Father, I will that where I am they also whom Thou hast given Me may be with Me, that they may see My glory which Thou hast given Me.' [315] That is, 'that they may do by participation in Us what I do naturally, namely, breathe the Holy Ghost.' He says also: 'Not for them only do I pray, but for them also who through their word shall believe in Me; that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us: that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me. And the glory which Thou hast given Me, I have given to them: that they may be one as We also are one. I in them and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one, and the world may know that Thou hast sent Me, and hast loved them as Thou hast also loved Me,' [316]--that is, in bestowing upon them that love which He bestows upon the Son, though not naturally as upon Him, but in the way I speak of, in the union and transformation of love.

6. We are not to suppose from this that our Lord prayed that the saints might become one in essence and nature, as the Father and the Son are; but that they might become one in the union of love as the Father and the Son are one in the oneness of love. Souls have by participation that very God which the Son has by nature, and are therefore really gods by participation like unto God and of His society.

7. St. Peter speaks of this as follows: 'Grace to you and peace be accomplished in the knowledge of God, and Christ Jesus our Lord; as all things of His divine power, which pertain to life and godliness, are given us by the knowledge of Him Who hath called us by His own proper glory and virtue, by Whom He hath given us most great and precious promises: that by these you may be made partakers of the divine nature.' [317] Thus far St. Peter, who clearly teaches that the soul will be a partaker of God Himself, and will do, together with Him, the work of the Most Holy Trinity, because of the substantial union between the soul and God. And though this union be perfect only in the life to come, yet even in this, in the state of perfection, which the soul is said now to have attained, some anticipation of its sweetness is given it, in the way I am speaking of, though in a manner wholly ineffable.

8. O souls created for this and called thereto, what are you doing? What are your occupations? Your aim is meanness, and your enjoyments misery. Oh, wretched blindness of the children of Adam, blind to so great a light, and deaf to so clear a voice; you see not that, while seeking after greatness and glory, you are miserable and contemptible, ignorant, and unworthy of blessings so great. I now proceed to the second expression which the soul has made use of to describe that which He gave it.

9. Out of this 'breathing of the air' comes the sweet voice of the Beloved addressing Himself to the soul, in which the soul sends forth its own sweet song of joy to Him. Both are meant by the song of the nightingale. As the song of the nightingale is heard in the spring of the year, when the cold, and rain, and changes of winter are past, filling the ear with melody, and the mind with joy; so, in the true intercourse and transformation of love, which takes place in this life, the bride, now protected and delivered from all trials and changes of the world, detached, and free from the imperfections, sufferings, and darkness both of mind and body, becomes conscious of a new spring in liberty, largeness, and joy of spirit, in which she hears the sweet voice of the Bridegroom, Who is her sweet nightingale, renewing and refreshing the very substance of her soul, now prepared for the journey of everlasting life.

10. That voice is sweet to her ears, and calls her sweetly, as it is written: 'Arise, make haste, My love, My dove, My beautiful one, and come. For winter is now past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers have appeared in our land, the time of pruning is come: the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.' [318] When the bride hears the voice of the Bridegroom in her inmost soul, she feels that her troubles are over and her prosperity begun. In the refreshing comfort and sweet sense of this voice she, too, like the nightingale, sends forth a new song of rejoicing unto God, in unison with Him Who now moves her to do so.

11. It is for this that the Beloved sings, that the bride in unison with Him may sing unto God; this is the aim and desire of the Bridegroom, that the soul should sing with the spirit joyously unto God; and this is what He asks of the bride in the Canticle: 'Arise, my love, my beautiful one, and come; my dove in the clefts of the rock, in the hollow places of the wall, show me thy face, let thy voice sound in my ears.' [319]

12. The ears of God signify the desire He hath that the soul should sing in perfect joy. And that this song may be perfect, the Bridegroom bids the soul to send it forth, and to let it sound in the clefts of the rock, that is, in the transformation which is the fruit of the mysteries of Christ, of which I spoke just now. [320] And because in this union of the soul with God, the soul sings unto Him together with Him, in the way I spoke of when I was speaking of love, [321] the song of praise is most perfect and pleasing unto God; for the acts of the soul, in the state of perfection, are most perfect; and thus the song of its rejoicing is sweet unto God as well as to itself.

13. 'Thy voice is sweet,' [322] saith the Bridegroom, 'not only to thee, but also to Me, for as we are one, thy voice is also in unison and one with Mine.' This is the Canticle which the soul sings in the transformation which takes place in this life, about which no exaggeration is possible. But as this song is not so perfect as the new song in the life of glory, the soul, having a foretaste of that by what it feels on earth, shadows forth by the grandeur of this the magnificence of that in glory, which is beyond all comparison nobler, and calls it to mind and says that what its portion there will be is the song of the sweet nightingale.

14. This is the third thing which the Bridegroom is to give the soul. The grove, because it contains many plants and animals, signifies God as the Creator and Giver of life to all creatures, which have their being and origin from Him, reveal Him and make Him known as the Creator. The beauty of the grove, which the soul prays for, is not only the grace, wisdom, and loveliness which flow from God over all created things, whether in heaven or on earth, but also the beauty of the mutual harmony and wise arrangement of the inferior creation, and the higher also, and of the mutual relations of both. The knowledge of this gives the soul great joy and delight. The fourth request is:

15. That is, contemplation, in which the soul desires to behold the grove. It is called night, because contemplation is dim; and that is the reason why it is also called mystical theology--that is, the secret or hidden wisdom of God, where, without the sound of words, or the intervention of any bodily or spiritual sense, as it were in silence and in repose, in the darkness of sense and nature, God teaches the soul--and the soul knows not how--in a most secret and hidden way.

16. Some spiritual writers call this 'understanding without understanding,' because it does not take place in what philosophers call the active understanding which is conversant with the forms, fancies, and apprehensions of the physical faculties, but in the understanding as it is possible and passive, which without receiving such forms receives passively only the substantial knowledge of them free from all imagery. This occurs without effort or exertion on its part, and for this reason contemplation is called night, in which the soul through the channel of its transformation learns in this life that it already possesses, in a supreme degree, this divine grove, together with its beauty.

17. Still, however clear may be its knowledge, it is dark night in comparison with that of the blessed, for which the soul prays. Hence, while it prays for the clear contemplation, that is, the fruition of the grove, and its beauty; with the other objects here enumerated, it says, let it be in the night now serene; that is, in the clear beatific contemplation: let the night of dim contemplation cease here below, and change into the clear contemplation of the serene vision of God above. Thus the serene night is the clear and unclouded contemplation of the face of God. It was to this night of contemplation that David referred when he said, 'Night shall be my light in my pleasures'; [323] that is, when I shall have my delight in the essential vision of God, the night of contemplation will have dawned in the day and light of my understanding

18. This flame is the love of the Holy Ghost. 'Consumes' means absolute perfection. Therefore, when the soul says that the Beloved will give it all that is mentioned in this stanza, and that they will be its possession in love absolute and perfect, all of them and itself with them in perfect love, and that without pain, its purpose is to show forth the utter perfection of love. Love, to be perfect, must have these two properties: it must consume and transform the soul in God; the burning and transformation wrought in the soul by the flame must give no pain. But this can be only in the state of the blessed, where the flame is sweet love, for in this transformation of the soul therein there is a blessed agreement and contentment on both sides, and no change to a greater or less degree gives pain, as before, when the soul had attained to the state of perfect love.

19. But the soul having attained to this state abides in its love of God, a love so like His and so sweet, God being, as Moses saith, [324] a consuming fire--'the Lord thy God is a consuming fire'--that it perfects and renews it. But this transformation is not like that which is wrought in this life, which though most perfect and in love consummate was still in some measure consuming the soul and wearing it away. It was like fire in burning coals, for though the coals may be transformed into fire, and made like it, and ceased from seething, and smoke no longer arises from them as before they were wholly transformed into fire, still, though they have become perfect fire, the fire consumes them and reduces them to ashes.

20. So is it with the soul which in this life is transformed by perfect love: for though it be wholly conformed, yet it still suffers, in some measure, both pain and loss. Pain, on account of the beatific transformation which is still wanting; loss, through the weakness and corruption of the flesh coming in contact with love so strong and so deep; for everything that is grand hurts and pains our natural infirmity, as it is written, 'The corruptible body is a load upon the soul.' [315] But in the life of bliss there will be neither loss nor pain, though the sense of the soul will be most acute, and its love without measure, for God will give power to the former and strength to the latter, perfecting the understanding in His wisdom and the will in His love.

21. As, in the foregoing stanzas, and in the one which follows, the bride prays for the boundless knowledge of God, for which she requires the strongest and the deepest love that she may love Him in proportion to the grandeur of His communications, she prays now that all these things may be bestowed upon her in love consummated, perfect, and strong.

None saw it; Neither did Aminadab appear The siege was intermitted, And the cavalry dismounted At the sight of the waters.

THE bride perceiving that the desire of her will is now detached from all things, cleaving unto God with most fervent love; that the sensual part of the soul, with all its powers, faculties, and desires, is now conformed to the spirit; that all rebellion is quelled for ever; that Satan is overcome and driven far away in the varied contest of the spiritual struggle; that her soul is united and transformed in the rich abundance of the heavenly gifts; and that she herself is now prepared, strong and apparelled, 'leaning upon her Beloved,' to go up 'by the desert' [326] of death; full of joy to the glorious throne of her espousals,--she is longing for the end, and puts before the eyes of her Bridegroom, in order to influence Him the more, all that is mentioned in the present stanza, these five considerations:

2. The first is that the soul is detached from all things and a stranger to them. The second is that the devil is overcome and put to flight. The third is that the passions are subdued, and the natural desires mortified. The fourth and the fifth are that the sensual and lower nature of the soul is changed and purified, and so conformed to the spiritual, as not only not to hinder spiritual blessings, but is, on the contrary, prepared for them, for it is even a partaker already, according to its capacity, of those which have been bestowed upon it.

3. That is, my soul is so detached, so denuded, so lonely, so estranged from all created things, in heaven and earth; it has become so recollected in Thee, that nothing whatever can come within sight of that most intimate joy which I have in Thee. That is, there is nothing whatever that can cause me pleasure with its sweetness, or disgust with its vileness; for my soul is so far removed from all such things, absorbed in such profound delight in Thee, that nothing can behold me. This is not all, for:

4. Aminadab, in the Holy Writings, signifies the devil; that is the enemy of the soul, in a spiritual sense, who is ever fighting against it, and disturbing it with his innumerable artillery, that it may not enter into the fortress and secret place of interior recollection with the Bridegroom. There, the soul is so protected, so strong, so triumphant in virtue which it then practises, so defended by God's right hand, that the devil not only dares not approach it, but runs away from it in great fear, and does not venture to appear. The practice of virtue, and the state of perfection to which the soul has come, is a victory over Satan, and causes him such terror that he cannot present himself before it. Thus Aminadab appeared not with any right to keep the soul away from the object of its desire.

5. By the siege is meant the passions and desires, which, when not overcome and mortified, surround the soul and fight against it on all sides. Hence the term 'siege' is applied to them. This siege is 'intermitted'--that is, the passions are subject to reason and the desires mortified. Under these circumstances the soul entreats the Beloved to communicate to it those graces for which it has prayed, for now the siege is no hindrance. Until the four passions of the soul are ordered in reason according to God, and until the desires are mortified and purified, the soul is incapable of seeing God.

6. The waters are the spiritual joys and blessings which the soul now enjoys interiorly with God. The cavalry is the bodily senses of the sensual part, interior as well as exterior, for they carry with them the phantasms and figures of their objects. They dismount now at the sight of the waters, because the sensual and lower part of the soul in the state of spiritual marriage is purified, and in a certain way spiritualised, so that the soul with its powers of sense and natural forces becomes so recollected as to participate and rejoice, in their way, in the spiritual grandeurs which God communicates to it in the spirit within. To this did the Psalmist refer when he said, 'My heart and my flesh have rejoiced in the living God.' [327]

7. It is to be observed that the cavalry did not dismount to taste of the waters, but only at the sight of them, because the sensual part of the soul, with its powers, is incapable of tasting substantially and properly the spiritual blessings, not merely in this life, but also in the life to come. Still, because of a certain overflowing of the spirit, they are sensibly refreshed and delighted, and this delight attracts them--that is, the senses with their bodily powers--towards that interior recollection where the soul is drinking the waters of the spiritual benedictions. This condition of the senses is rather a dismounting at the sight of the waters than a dismounting for the purpose of seeing or tasting them. The soul says of them that they dismounted, not that they went, or did anything else, and the meaning is that in the communication of the sensual with the spiritual part of the soul, when the spiritual waters become its drink, the natural operations subside and merge into spiritual recollection.

8. All these perfections and dispositions of the soul the bride sets forth before her Beloved, the Son of God, longing at the same time to be translated by Him out of the spiritual marriage, to which God has been pleased to advance her in the Church militant, to the glorious marriage of the Church triumphant. Whereunto may He bring of His mercy all those who call upon the most sweet name of Jesus, the Bridegroom of faithful souls, to Whom be all honour and glory, together with the Father and the Holy Ghost,

[1] 'Los nombres de Cristo.' Introduction. [2] This exceptionally severe legislation, justified by the dangers of the time, only held good for Spain and the Spanish colonies, and has long since been revised. It did not include the Epistles and Gospels, Psalms, Passion, and other parts of the daily service. [3] Ann de Lobera, born at Medina del Campo, November 25, I545, was a deaf-mute until her eighth year. When she applied for admission to the Carmelite convent at Avila St. Teresa promised to receive her not so much as a novice, but as her companion and future successor; she took the habit August 1, 1570, and made her profession at Salamanca, October 21 1571. She became the first prioress of Veas, and was entrusted by St. Teresa with the foundation of Granada (January 1582), where she found St. John of the Cross, who was prior of the convent of The Martyrs (well known to visitors of the Alhambra although no longer a convent), St. John not only became the director and confessor of the convent of nuns, but remained the most faithful helper and the staunchest friend of Mother Ann throughout the heavy trials which marred many years of her life. In 1604 she went to Paris, to found the first convent of her Order in France, and in 1607 she proceeded to Brussels, where she remained until her death, March 4, 1621, The heroic nature of her virtues having been acknowledged, she was declared 'Venerable' in 1878, and it is hoped that she will soon be beatified. [4] See 'Life of St. Teresa': ed. Baker (London, I904), ch. xiv. 12, xvi. 2, xviii. 10. [5] 'Manuel Serrano y Sanz,' Apuntos para una Biblioteca de Escritores espa�oles. (1903, p. 399). [6] Cf. Berthold-Ignace de Sainte Anne, 'Vie de la MŠre Anne de J‚sui' (Malines, 1876), I. 343 sqq. [7] On this subject see Fray Eulogio de San JosE 'Doctorado de Santa Teresa de Jes�s y de San Juan de la Cruz.' C�rdoba, 1896. [8] (This canticle was made by the Saint when he was in the prison of the Mitigation, in Toledo. It came into the hands of the Venerable Anne of Jesus, at whose request he wrote the following commentary on it, and addressed it to her.) [9] Wisdom 8:1 [10] Rom. 8:26 [11] Job 14:5 [12] Matt. 7:14 [13] Peter 4:18 [14] 2 Kings 14:14 [15] Matt. 5:26 [16] Sophon, 1. 12. [17] Matt. 20:6 [18] John 1:18 [19] Is. 45:15 [20] Job 9:11 [21] Eccles. 9:1 [22] Cant. 1:6 [23] 'Soliloq.,' c. 31. Opp. Ed. Ben. tom. vi. app. p. 98. [24] Luke 17:21 [25] 2 Cor. 6:16 [26] 'Mt. Carmel,' Bk. 2, c. 5. sect. 3. [27] Matt. 13:44 [28] Matt. 6:6 [29] Is. 26:20 [30] Prov. 4:23 [31] Is. 45:3 [32] 1 Cor. 13:10 [33] Exod. 33:22,23 [34] Sect. 4. [35] Sect. 2. [36] Ps. 17:12 [37] John 15:7 [38] Judg. 16:15 [39] Ps. 16:15 [40] Rom. 8:23 [41] Cant. 2:9 [42] Ps. 72:21,22 [43] Cant. 3:2, 5:7 [44] Cant. 5:6,7 [45] Tob. 12:12 [46] Deut. 31:21 [47] Exod. 3:7,8 [48] Luke 1:13 [49] Ps. 9:10 [50] Ps. 34:3 [51] Ps. 35:9 [52] Deut. 30:20 [53] Lam. 3:19 [54] Col. 2:3 [55] Apoc. 10:9 [56] Deut. 32:33 [57] John 2:3 [58] John 11:3 [59] Luke 11:9 [60] Cant. 3:1 [61] Cant. 3:4 [62] Wisd. 6:13 [63] Ps. 61:11 [64] Ps. 33:20 [65] Ps. 53:5 [66] Job 41:24 [67] Eph. 6:11 [68] Gal. 5:17 [69] Rom. 8:13 [70] Rom. 1:20 [71] Conf. 10. 6. [72] Ordo commendationis animae. [73] Heb. 1:3 [74] Gen. 1:31 [75] John 12:32 [76] Ps. 144:16 [77] Cant. 5:8 [78] Cant. 4:9 [79] See 'Living Flame,' stanza 3, line 3, sect. 20. [80] Gen. 30:1 [81] Job 6:8,9 [82] Acts 17:28 [83] John 1:3. The Saint adopts an old punctuation, different from the usual one. He reads thus: 'Omnia per Ipsum facta sunt, et sine Ipso factum est nihil: Quod factum est, in Ipso vita erat� ('All things were made by Him, and without Him nothing was made: What was made in Him was life'). [84] Job 7:2-4 [85] John 20:15 [86] Cant. 5:6,7 [87] Ps. 37:11 [88] Tob. 5:12 [89] Apoc. 21:23 [90] Zach. 2:8 [91] Is. 65:24 [92] Prov. 2:4,5 [93] See 'Ascent of Mount Carmel,' bk. 2, ch. 5, sect. 3. [94] Ps. 83:3 [95] Exod. 33:12,13 [96] Exod. 33:20 [97] Stan. vii. sect. 10. [98] Supra, sect. 4. [99] 2 Cor. 5:4 [100] Phil. 1:23 [101] Judg. 13:22 [102] 1 John 4:18 [103] Ecclus. 41:3 [104] Ps. 115:15 [105] Ps. 33:22 [106] Ecclus. 41:1 [107] Heb. 1:3 [108] Os. 2:20 [109] John 4:14 [110] John 7:39 [111] Ps. 67:14 [112] Cant. 1:10 [113] 1 Cor. 13:10 [114] Gal. 2:20 [115] Cant. 8:6 [116] Ps. 41:1,2 [117] 1 Paral. 11:18 [118] Cant. 8:6 [119] Job 3:24 [120] Ps. 96:2,3 [121] Ps. 17:12,13 [122] Ps. 138:12 [123] See St. Teresa, 'Life,' ch. 20 sect. 16, or 'Las Mordadas,' 6. ch. 11. [124] Sect. 1. supra. [125] Sect. 4. supra. [126] 2 Cor. 12:3 [127] See 'Relation' 8. [128] Sect. 1. [129] 1 Cor. 13:2 [130] Col. 3:14 [131] 1 Cor. 13:4-7 [132] Gen. 8:9 [133] Gen. 6:21 [134] John 1:3,4. See Stanza viii. [135] Isa. 66:12 [136] Luke 1:52 [137] Acts 2:2 [138] John 12:29 [139] Ps. 67:34 [140] Apoc. 14:2 [141] Ezech. 1:24 [142] Cant. 2:14 [143] 1 Kings 19:12 [144] 2 Cor. 12:4 [145] Job 42:5 [146] Sect. 20. [147] 'De Mystica Theologia,' cap. i. [148] Cant. 6:4 [149] Job 4:12-16 [150] Is. 24:16 [151] Stan. xiii. sect. 1. [152] Dan. 10:16 [153] Ps. 101:8 [154] Apoc. 14:2 [155] Wisd. 1:7 [156] Apoc. 3:20 [157] Stanza xxvi. [158] Ps. 33:8 [159] Ps. 62:2 [160] Gal. 5:17 [161] Cant. 6:11 [162] Cant. 2:15 [163] Exod. 34:30 [164] Luke 22:8 [165] Cant. 1:11 [166] Cant. 4:16 [167] Prov. 8:31 [168] Cant. 6:1,2 [169] Bar. 3:10,11 [170] Jer. 2:14,15 [171] Wisd. 9:15 [172] 2 Cor. 12:2-4 [173] Exod. 33:23 [174] 2 Cor. 12:4 [175] Cant. 8:8 [176] Ps. 68:2 [177] Ps. 118:131 [178] Ps. 38:4 [179] Stanza xiii sect. 4; xiv sect. 26. [180] John 4:14 [181] Cant. 6:9 [182] Prov. 15:15 [183] Phil. 4:7 [184] Cant. 4:12 [185] Cant. 3:5 [186] Luke 15:5,8,9 [187] Cant. 3:11 [188] Gen. 2:24 [189] 1 Cor 6:17 [190] Cant. 5:1 [191] Gal. 2:20 [192] Cant. 8:1 [193] Cant. 2:11,12 [194] Eph. 2:15 [195] Cant. 8:5 [196] Ezech. 16:5-14 [197] Cant. 2:1 [198] Ps. 49:11 [199] Cant. 1:15 [200] Prov. 8:31 [201] Cant. 8:1 [202] Cant. 3:9,10 [203] 1 John 4:18 [204] Cant. 3:7,8 [205] Cant. 4:4 [206] Cant. 1:3 [207] Ps. 118:32 [208] Cant. 5:4 [209] Ps. 38:4 [210] Ecclus. 9:15 [211] Ecclus. 9:14 [212] Cant. 2:6 [213] Ps. 35:9 [214] Apoc. 22:1 [215] Isa. 11:3 [216] Luke 2:25. Justus et timoratus. [217] Cant. 5:6 [218] Cant. 8:2 [219] Cant. 2:4 [220] 1 Cor. 3:19 [221] Prov. 30:1,2 [222] 1 Cor. 2:14 [223] Cant. 6:11 [224] Ps. 72:21,22 [225] Luke 12:37 [226] Isa. 66:12 [227] Cant. 7:10-12 [228] Ps. 61:2,3 [229] Col. 3:14 [230] Matt. 13:44 [231] John 15:15 [232] Ps. 58:10 [233] Cant. 7:13 [234] Luke 10:42 [235] Cant. 3:5 [236] Matt. 10:33 [237] Matt. 6:24 [238] Phil. 1:21 [239] Matt. 16:25 [240] Cant. 6:2 [241] 2 Cor 12:9 [242] Ps. 44:10 [243 James 1:17 [244] Cant. 1:3 [245] Cant. 3:11 [246] Col. 3:14 [247] Job 41:6,7 [248] Cant. 7:1 [249] Cant. 6:3 [250] Cant. 2:5 [251] Cant. 2:1 [252] Col. 3:14 [253] 1 Kings 18:1 [254] 'Dark Night,' Bk. 1, ch. 14. [255] Stanza ii. sect. 26 sqq. [256] 1 John 4:10 [257] Cant. 4:9 [258] John 1:16 [259] Ezech. 18:22 [260] Nahum 1:9 [261] Ecclus. 5:5 [262] Ps. 15:4 [263] John 1:16 [264] Exod. 33:12,13 [265] Isa. 43:4 [266] Cant. 1:4 [267] Antiphon in Vesper B. M. V. [268] Matt. 13:12 [269] Matt. 25:28 [270] Sect. 7. [271] Isa. 43:3 [272] Esth. 6:11 [273] Cant. 4:1, 6:3 [274] Cant. 4:1 [275] Cant. 2:3 [276] Os. 2:14 [277] Ps. 83:4 [278] Rom. 8:14 [279] Tob. 14:4 [280] Isa. 58:10-14 [281] John 17:10 [282] St. Augustine, ' De Genesi ad Litt.' iv., xxiv. (and elsewhere) and the scholastics (St. Thomas, 'S. Th.' I. lviii. 7) distinguish between the 'morning knowledge' whereby angels and saints know created things by seeing the Divine Word, and 'evening knowledge' where they derive their knowledge from the created things themselves. [283] Isa. 2:3 [284] Isa. 2:2 [285] Cant. 4:6 [286] Ps. 67:16 [287] Rom. 11:33 [288] Ps. 18:10-12 [289] Job 6:8-10 [290] Eph. 3:17-19 [291] John 17:3 [292] 1 Cor. 10:4 [293] Col. 2:3 [294] Exod. 33:20-23 [295] Cant. 2:13,14 [296] Cant. 5:14 [297] Cant. 8:2 [298] 1 Cor. 13:12 [299] 'Opusc de Beatitudine,' cap. 2. [300] 1 Cor. 2:9 [301] Isa. 64:4 [302] Apoc. 2:7 [303] Apoc. 2:10 [304] Apoc. 2:17 [305] Apoc. 2:26-28 [306] Apoc. 3:5 [307] Apoc. 3:12 [308] Apoc. 3:21,22 [309] Ps. 30:20 [310] Ps. 35:9 [311] Ps. 20:4 [312] Job 4:2 [313] Gal. 4:6 [314] John 1:12 [315] John 17:24 [316] John 17:20-23 [317] 2 Pet. 1:2-4 [318] Cant. 2:10-12 [319] Cant. 2:13,14 [320] Stanza xxxvii. sect. 5. [321] Stanza xxxviii. sect. 6. [322] Cant. 2:14 [323] Ps. 138:11 [324] Deut. 4:24 [325] Wisd. 9:15 [326] Cant. 3:6; 8:5 [327] Ps. 83:3

A SPIRITUAL CANTICLE OF THE SOUL AND THE BRIDEGROOM CHRIST ( ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS)
INDEX AND INTRODUCTION	PART 1 PROLOGUE AND 40 STANZAS OF THE SPIRITUAL CANTICLE	PART 2 EXPLANATION OF STANZAS 1 TO 10	PART 3 EXPLANATION OF STANZAS 11 TO 21	PART 4 EXPLANATION OF STANZAS 22 TO 30	PART 5 EXPLANATION OF STANZAS 31 TO 40 AND ENDNOTES