V. 8-2O.

Pastoral Rule: i. 5, 6, 7; ii. 5, 7.
It will be found that in his teaching on contemplation St Gregory stands where we should expect the Roman to stand, midway be- tween St Augustine and St Bernard less intellectual than St Augustine, less emotional than St Bernard. But if he falls short of the elevation of the former and of the unction of the latter, he has a value all his own for his Roman actuality and practicality; nor will he be found devoid either of eloquence or of devotion.
One of the Homilies on Ezechiel (Bk. n. Horn, ii.) is a complete sermon on the contemplative and active lives, and the nature of contemplation. So far as I know, the only modern writer who has used it is Bishop Ullathorne in the chapter on e Prayer' in the book Christian Patience. The second portion of it ( 12-14) is given in Benedictine Monachism (p. 83) as a summary of St Gregory's teaching on contemplation. It is here reproduced in order to provide a pre- liminary general idea as to St Gregory's mind on the subject.
12. There is in contemplation a great effort of the mind, when it raises itself up to heavenly things, when it fixes its attention on spiritual things, when it tries to pass over all that is outwardly seen, when it narrows itself that it may be enlarged. And sometimes indeed it prevails and soars above the resisting darkness of its blind- ness, so that it attains to somewhat of the unencompassed Light by stealth and scantily; but for all that, to itself straightway beaten back it returns, and out of that light into which panting it had passed, into the darkness of its blindness sighing it returns. In the wrestling of Jacob with the Angel, the Angel symbolizes the Lord, and Jacob, who contends with the Angel, represents the soul of each perfect man who exercises contemplation. Such a soul, when it strives to contemplate God, as if placed in a wrestle, now comes uppermost, because by understanding and feeling it tastes somewhat of the unemcompassed Light; and now falls underneath, because in the very tasting it faints away. Therefore, so to say, the Angel is worsted when by the innermost intellect God is apprehended.
13. Almighty God, when He is now known through desire and intellect, dries up in us every fleshly pleasure; and whereas afore- time we seemed to be both seeking God and cleaving to the world, after the perception of the sweetness of God, the love of the world grows feeble in us, and the love of God alone waxes strong; and
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 67
while there increases in us the strength of inmost love, without doubt the strength of the flesh is weakened.
The sweetness of contemplation is worthy of love exceedingly, for it carries away the soul above itself, it opens out things heavenly, and shows that things earthly are to be despised; it reveals things spiritual to the eyes of the mind, and hides things bodily.
14. But we must know that so long as we live in this mortal flesh no one so advances in power of contemplation as to fix the mind's eyes as yet on the unencompassed ray itself of Light. For the Almighty God is not yet seen in this brightness, but the soul beholds something beneath it, by the which refreshed it may progress, and hereafter attain to the glory of the sight of Him. When the mind has made progress in contemplation it does not yet contemplate that which God is, but that which is under Him. But in that contempla- tion already the taste of interior quiet is experienced. And as it is, so to say, partial and cannot now be perfect, rightly is it written in the Apocalypse: There was silence in heaven about half an hour. 5 For heaven is the soul of the righteous. When therefore the quiet of contemplation takes place in the mind, there is silence in heaven; because the noise of earthly doings dies away from our thoughts, that the mind may fix its ear on the inward secret. But because this quiet of the mind cannot be perfect in this life, it is not said that there was silence in heaven a whole hour, but about half an hour: because^ as soon as the mind begins to raise itself, and to be inundated with the light of interior quiet, the turmoil of thoughts soon comes back, and it is thrown into disorder from itself, and, being disordered, it is blinded.
St Gregory's conception of contemplation gathered from this and other passages, I summarized as follows in Benedictine Monachism
(P- 59):
It is a struggle wherein the mind disengages itself from the things of this world and fixes its attention wholly on spiritual things, and thereby raises itself above itself, and by dint of a great effort mounts up to a momentary perception of the 'unencompassed Light', as through a chink; and then, exhausted by the effort and blinded by the vision of the Light, it sinks back wearied to its nor- mal state, to recuperate its spiritual strength by exercising the works of the active life, till in due time it can again brace itself for the effort of another act of contemplation.
This is in full accord with the general teaching of mystics; but there is a strongly marked and most convincing personal tone run- ning through all St Gregory's descriptions of the various phases in the process of contemplation. It will be well to distinguish the phases, and to bring out his teaching on each of them.
68 WESTERN MYSTICISM
A. PRELIMINARY PHASES Remote Preparation: Purgation
It was shown at some length that according to St Augustine's mind the remote preparation for contemplation, and its indispens- able condition, is a prolonged and serious exercise in self-discipline, self-control, self-denial, and the cultivation and practice of the virtues: that is, Christian asceticism, when rightly understood as a course of training in the spiritual life. There is no need to labour the point that St Gregory's view is .the same. Most of his teaching on contemplation is contained in the Morals on Job, and thus is set in a solid background of Christian ethical practice, recognized on all hands as being of a high religious order.
One of the principal passages on contemplation is Morals, Book vi. 56-61. Here we find such warnings as these: The mind is first to be cleansed from the affection for temporal glory and from all taking pleasure in carnal concupiscence, and then to be raised up to the ken of contemplation (58). Again: It is needful that every perfect man first discipline his mind in virtuous habits, and after- wards lay it up in the granary of rest, i.e. contemplation (60). And this fundamental truth breathes through the entire work. 1
St Gregory insists in particular that for contemplation a special measure of love is requisite:
It is necessary that whoever eagerly prosecutes the exercises of contemplation, first question himself with particularity, how much he loves. For the force of love is an engine of the soul, which, while it draws it out of the world, lifts it on high (Mor. vi. 58) .
The greatness of contemplation can be given to none but them that love (Horn, in Ezech. n. v. 17).
Thus for St Gregory, as for all true mystics, purification, purga- tion, is the first stage in the spiritual life. In the following piece the order is: (i) mortification; (2) active good works; (3) contemplation.
Whoever has already subdued the insolencies of the flesh, has this task left him, to discipline his mind by the exercises of holy working; and whosoever opens his mind in holy works, has over and above to extend it to the secret pursuits of inward contemplation (Mor. vi. 56).
Proximate Preparation: Recollection, Introversion St Gregory describes very precisely the manner in which the mind sets itself to get under way in raising itself to contemplation. His
1 Cf. also Mor. v, 54, 55.
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 69
formal teaching on this point is contained in another of the Homilies on Ezechiel (n. v.).
The preliminary condition for contemplation is that the mind has been through a process of spiritual training, whereby it is able to empty itself of images and sense perceptions: 'it must first have learned to shut out from its eyes all the phantasmata of earthly and heavenly images, and to spurn and tread underfoot whatever pre- sents itself to its thought from sight, from hearing, from smell, from bodily touch or taste, so that it may seek itself interiorly as it is without these sensations' (9).
Only when this power has by practice been acquired is the soul able to take the first step in contemplation, viz. 'Recollection': the first step is that the mind recollect itself gather itself to itself* (se ad se colligit). The second step is Tntro version' : 'that it should see itself as it is when recollected' (9) ; should turn its eyes inwards upon itself, and consider itself thus stript of sense perceptions and free from bodily images. In this way the soul 'makes of itself a ladder for itself (sibi de seipsa gradus ascensionis facit, 8), and mounts to the third stage, 'Contemplation': c that it rise above itself, and make the effort to yield itself up to the contemplation of the invisible Creator.' 1
This passage, extending over 8-20 of the Homilies on Ezechiel, n. v. 3 is the one piece in St Gregory's writings that may claim to be in any way a scientific or psychological exposition of the process of contemplation. Striking passages of the kind have been adduced from St Augustine, wherein is described under the act of introversion the soul's search to find God within itself, a search which for St Augustine appears to have been a process predominantly intellect- ual, but culminating in a fully religious experience. St Gregory's passage on introversion, though of greatly inferior power, is of much interest, as being the only account he gives, known to me, of the intellectual side of contemplation. It is difficult in places to under- stand, and very difficult to translate, the doctrine of contemplation being couched in terms of an allegorical interpretation of the doors and windows of Ezechiel's Temple. An attempt will be made to reproduce the teaching positively, detached as far f as may be from the references to the Temple, and in a contracted form. He starts from the words of Ezechiel xl. 13, *A door against a door/ that is, an inner door opposite to an outer one. He proceeds:
8. In the cognition of the Almighty God our first door is faith, and
1 'Primus gradus est ut se ad se colligat; secundus ut videat quails est collecta; tertius ut super semetipsam surgat, ac se contemplation! Auctoris invisibilis intendendo subiciaf (loc. cit. 9).
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our second is sight (species) to which, walking by faith, we arrive. For in this life we enter the door of faith, that afterwards we may be led to the other. And the door is opposite the door, because by the entrance of faith is opened the entrance of the vision of God. But if any one wishes to understand both these doors as of this life, this by no means runs counter to a sound meaning. For often we desire to contemplate (considerare) the invisible nature of Almighty ^ God, but we are by no means able; the soul, wearied by these difficulties, returns to itself and uses itself as a ladder by which it may mount up, that first it may consider itself, if it is able, and then may explore, as far as it can, that Nature which is above it, But if our mind be distracted (sparsa) by earthly images, it can in no way consider either itself or the nature of the soul, because by how many thoughts it is led about, by so many obstacles is it blinded.
9. And so the first step is that it collect itself within itself (recollec- tion); the second, that it consider what its nature is so collected (introversion); the third, that it rise above itself and yield itself to the intent contemplation of its invisible Maker (contemplation). But the mind cannot recollect itself unless it has first learned to repress all phantasmata of earthly and heavenly images, and to re- ject and spurn whatever sense impressions present themselves to its thoughts, in order that it may seek itself within as it is without these sensations. So they are all to be driven away from the mind's eye, in order that the soul may see itself as it was made, beneath God and above the body, that receiving life from What is above, it may impart life to that which it governs beneath. ...
When the soul, stript of bodily images, is the object of its own thought, it has passed through the first door. But the way leads from this door to the other, that somewhat of the nature of the Almighty God may be contemplated. And so, the soul in the body is the life of the flesh; but God, who gives life to all, is the life of souls. And if life that is communicated (vita vivificata) is of such greatness that it cannot be comprehended, who will be able to comprehend by his intellect of how great majesty is the Life that gives life (vita vivifi- cans)? But to consider and to grasp this fact is already in some measure to enter the second door; because the soul from its estimate of itself gathers what it should think concerning the unencompassed Spirit, who incomprehensibly governs what He has incomprehens- ibly created.
1 1 . When the soul raised up to itself understands its own measure, and recognizes that it transcends all bodily things, and from the knowledge of itself passes to the knowledge of its Maker, what is this, except to see the door opposite the door? However much it strive, the soul is not able fully to fathom itself; how much less the greatness of Him who was able to make the soul. But when, striving and straining, we desire to see somewhat of the invisible Nature, we are fatigued and beaten back and driven off: and if we are not able to penetrate to what is within, yet already from the outer door we see the inner one. For the very effort of the looking is the door, because
ST GREGORY THE GREAT Jl
it shows somewhat of that which is inside, although there be not yet the power of entering.
So much for recollection and introversion: what is said in 1 7-20 of Horn, in Ezech. n, v. on contemplation will be reproduced under the next heading, B.
The foregoing account of the process of contemplation may be illustrated by the following shorter pieces:
When with marvellous efforts it strives to rise up from corporeal things and images, it is a great thing indeed if the soul, thrusting aside the bodily form, be brought to the knowledge of itself, so as to think of itself without bodily figure, and by thus thinking of itself, to prepare a pathway to contemplate the substance of eternity. In this way it exhibits itself to itself as a kind of ladder, whereby in ascending from outward things it may pass into itself, and from itself may tend unto its Maker (Mor. v, 61, 62).
The three stages recollection, introversion, contemplation are found in the short passage:
The appearance (species) of corporeal figures the soul has drawn to itself within through the infirmity of the body. But to its utmost power it is on its guard that, when it is seeking Truth, the imagina- tion of circumscribed vision shall not delude it, and it spurns all images that present themselves to it. For since it has fallen by them beneath itself, it endeavours without them to rise above itself; and after it has been in unseemly manner scattered over the Many, it strives to gather itself together to the One (in unum se colligere nititur), that, if it can prevail by the great force of love, it may contemplate the Being that is one and incorporeal (Mor. xxiii. 42) .
With these may be contrasted a less intellectual account of con- templation:
When the word of God is read in secret, and the mind, conscious of its faults, strikes itself with the spear of sorrow or pierces itself with the sword of compunction, and can do nothing but weep and by its tears wash away its stains; then also at times is it caught up to the contemplation of things on high, and in the desire of them is tortured with a sweet weeping. ... And because it cannot yet cleave to heavenly things, in its fervour it finds rest in tears, being wearied out (Horn, in Ezech. 1 1 . ii. i ) .
B. AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PASSAGES
Under this heading were given in the section on St Augustine certain wonderfully vivid and convincing descriptions of his personal experiences in contemplation. In St Gregory's writings I know of
72 WESTERN MYSTICISM
only one such definitely personal piece, and in it he hardly more than makes the claim to have frequently enjoyed contemplation. But there are a number of passages which, though not explicitly autobiographical, certainly are really such, being undoubtedly his endeavours to express what he had experienced.
The autobiographical piece occurs in the well-known lament at the beginning of the Dialogues, wherein the Saint deplores the loss of the spiritual light he had enjoyed in his monastery, before the cares of the Papacy weighed upon him:
My sad mind, labouring under the soreness of its engagements, remembers how it went with me formerly in the monastery, how all perishable things were beneath it, how it rose above all that was transitory, and, though still in the body, went out in contemplation beyond the bars of the flesh (Dial. i. Pref.).
Speaking elsewhere of his manner of life in the monastery, he says lie was able to keep his mind almost continually on the stretch in prayer. 1 This shows that it was in prayer he found contemplation.
Of St Gregory's descriptions of contemplation, that which follows those of recollection and introversion just cited from Horn, in Ezech. n. v. will first be given, in order to keep more or less together that which is the most scientific and formal exposition of his doctrine on mysticism. The Latin of this and the subsequent pieces is given in the footnotes.
He starts from the text 'Slanting windows in the chambers' (Ezech. xl 1 6):
17. In slanting, or splayed, windows that part by which the light enters is narrow, but the inner part which receives the light is wide; because the rninds of those that contemplate 3 although they have but a slight glimpse of the true light, yet are they enlarged within themselves with a great amplitude. For even the little they see, they are scarcely able to hold. It is very little indeed that those who contemplate see of eternity; but from that little the fold of their minds is extended unto an increase of fervour and love.
1 8. He who keeps his heart within, he it is who receives the light of contemplation. For they that still think immoderately of external things, know not what are the chinks of contemplation from the eternal light. For that infusion of incorporeal light is not received along with the images of corporeal things; because while only visible things are thought of, the invisible light is not admitted to the mind. 2
1 'In monasterio positus valebam in intentione orationis pene continue mentem tenere 3 (Horn, in Ezech, I. xi. 6).
2 'Etjenestras obliquas in tkalamis'.
'In feneslris obliquis pars ilia per quam lumen intrat angusta est, sed pars interior quae lumen suscipit lata, quia mentes contemplantium quamvis aliquid
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 73
One of the descriptions of the act of contemplation occurs in the continuous explanation of St Gregory's theory in Homilies on Ezechiel, n. ii. which has been cited (p. 66) as the basis of this exposition of his mystic doctrine ( 12); it should be read again the Latin is given in the footnote. 1
Other descriptions occur in the Morals on Job\ such are the follow- ing (Oxford Library of Fathers) :
The mind of the elect already bears down all earthly desires be- neath itself, already mounts above all the objects that it sees are of a nature to pass away, is already lifted up from the enjoyment of things external, and closely searches what are the invisible good things, and in doing the same is frequently carried away into the sweetness of heavenly contemplation; already it sees something of the inmost realities as it were through the mist, and with burning desire strives to be admitted to the spiritual ministries of the angels; it feeds on the taste of the unencompassed Light, and being carried beyond self, disdains to sink back again into self. But forasmuch as the corruptible body still weighs down the soul, it is not able to cleave for long to the Light which it sees in a momentary glimpse. For the mere infirmity of the flesh drags down the soul, as it mounts above itself, and brings it down sighing to think of lowly cares and wants 2 (Mor. viii. 50).
Sometimes the soul is admitted to some unwonted sweetness of interior relish, and is suddenly in some way refreshed when breathed
tenuiter de veto lumine videant, in semetipsis tamen magna amplitudine dilatan- tur. Quae videlicet et ipsa quae conspiciunt capere pauca vix possunt. Exlguum quippe valde est quod de aeternitate contemplantes vident, sed ex ipso exiguo laxatur sinus mentium in augmentum fervoris et amoris; et inde apud se amplae fiunt, unde ad se veritatis lumen quasi per angustias admittunt. Quae magnitude contemplationis concedi nonnisi amantibus potest.
*Qui cor intus habet ipse quoque lumen contemplationis suscipit. Nam qui adhuc exteriora immoderatius cogitant, quae sint de aeterno lumine rimae contemplationis ignorant. Neque enim cum corporearum rerum imaginibus ilia infusio incorporeae lucis capitur, quia dum sola visibilia cogitantur, lumen invisible ad mentem non admittitur' (Horn, in Ezech. n. v. 17, 18).
1 'Est autem in contemplativa vita magna mentis contentio, cum sese ad caelestia erigit, cum in rebus spiritualibus animum tendit, cum transgredi nititur omne quod corporaliter videtur, cum sese angustat ut dilatetur. Et aliquando quidem vincit, et reluctantes tenebras suae caecitatis exsuperat, ut de incircum- scripto lumine quiddam furtim et tenuiter attingat; sed tamen ad semetipsam protinus reverberata revertitur, atque ab ea luce ad quam respirando transiit, ad suae caecitatis tenebras suspirando rediit' (Home in Ezech. n. ii. 112).
* *Ecce enim electorum mens iam terrena desideria subicit, iam cuncta quae considerat praeterire transcendit, iam ab exteriorum delectatione suspenditurj et quae sint bona invisibilia rimatur, atque haec agens plerumque in dulcedinem supernae contemplationis rapitur, iamque de intimis aliquid quasi per caliginem conspicit, et ardenti desiderio interesse spiritalibus angelorum ministeriis conatur; gustu incircumscripti luminis pascitur, et ultra se evecta ad semetipsam relabi dedignatur; sed quia adhuc corpus quod corrumpitur aggravat animam, inhaerere diu luci non valet, quam raptim videt. Ipsa quippe carnis infirmitas transcend- entem se animam retrahit, atque ad cogitanda ima ac necessaria suspirantem reducit' (Mor. viii. 50).
74 WESTERN MYSTICISM
on by the glowing spirit; and is the more eager the more it gains a taste of something to love* And it desires that within itself which it feels to taste sweet within, because it has in truth, from the love of its sweetness,, become vile in its own sight; and after having been able in whatever way to enjoy it, it discovers what it has hitherto been without it. It endeavours to cling closely to it, but is kept back from its strength by its own remaining weakness; and because it is unable to contemplate its purity, it counts it sweet to weep, and sinking back to itself, to strew the tears of its own weakness. For it cannot fix its mind's eye on that which it has with hasty glance seen within itself, because it is compelled by its own old habits to sink downwards. It meanwhile pants and struggles and endeavours to go above itself, but sinks back, overpowered with weariness, into its own familiar darkness. A soul thus affected has to endure itself as the cause of a stubborn contest against itself, and all this controversy about ourselves causes no small amount of pain, when we are engaged in it, whatever pleasure may be blended therewith 1 (ibid, xxiii. 43).
The intervening mist of evils is first washed away from the eye of the mind by burning sorrow; and then it is illumined by the bright coruscations of the unencompassed Light flashing upon it. When this is in any way seen, the mind is absorbed in a sort of rapturous security; and carried beyond itself, as though the present life had ceased to be, it is in a way remade in a certain newness [it is re- freshed in a manner by a kind of new being: Oxf. Lib.]. There the mind is besprinkled with the infusion of heavenly dew from an inexhaustible fountain; there it discerns that it is not sufficient for that to which it has been carried, and from feeling the Truth, it sees that it does not see how great Truth itself is 2 (Mor. xxiv. 1 1).
It will be of interest to consider how far, if at all, these passages may be beholden to St Augustine. St Gregory was well versed in
1 *Aliquando (anima) ad quamdam inusitatam dulcedinem interni saporis admittitur, ac raptim aliquo modo ardenti spiritu afflata renovatur; tantoque magis inhiat, quanto magis quod amet degustat. Atque hoc intra se appetit quod sibi dulce sapere intrinsecus-sentit, quia videlicet eius amore dulcedinis sibi coram se viluit; et postquam hanc utcunque percipere potuit, quid sine ilia dudum fuisset invenit. Cui inhaerere conatur, sed ab eius fortitudine sua adhuc infirmitate repellitur; et quia eius munditiam contemplari non valet, flere dulce habet, sibique ad se cadenti infirmitatis suae lacrimas sternere. Neque enim mentis oculum potest in id quod intra se raptim conspexerit figere, quia ipso vetustatis suae usu deorsum ire compellitur. Inter haec anhelat, aestuat, super se ire conatur, sed ad familiares tenebras suas victa fatigatione relabitur. Anima sic aflfecta contra semetipsam grave certamen tolerat semetipsam, et omnis haec de nobis contro- versia, cum nos afficit, quamvis delectatione permixta, non modicum dolorem parit" (Mor. xxiii. 43).
* Trius a mentis acie exurente tristitia interposita malorum caligo detergitur, et tune resplendente raptim coruscatione incircumscripti luminis illustratur. Quo utcunque conspecto, in gaudio cuiusdam securitatis absorbetur, et quasi post defectum vitae praesentis ultra se rapta, in quadam novitate aliquo modo recreatur. Ibi mens ex immenso fonte infusione superni roris aspergitur; ibi non se sufficere ad Id quod rapta est contemplatur, et veritatem sentiendo videt quia quanta est ipsa veritas non videt' (Mor. xxiv, n).
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 75
St Augustine's writings, and, as Mr Dudden shows, 1 his theology is little more than a popularization of that of Augustine, which he presented in the form that remained current throughout the early Middle Ages, so that the staple theology of those ages was in the main that of St Augustine as diluted by St Gregory.
For all that, in the passages describing his mystical experiences, traces of any dependence on Augustine seem to be few and slight. Only a single expression occurs in those just cited recalling verbally St Augustine's language: The soul 'aliquando ad quamdarn inusitatam dulcedinem interni saporis admittitur' (Mor. xxiii. 43); cf. Augustine: 'Aliquando intromittis me in affectum multum inusitatum introrsus ad nescio quam dulcedinem' (Conf. x. 65).
The pieces portraying the height of contemplation, Morals, xxiv. ii, and de Genesi ad Hit., xii. 54 (p. 53), may be compared, especially the sentences: c ibi mens ex immenso fonte infusione superni roris aspergitur' (Greg.), and %i beata vita in fonte suo bibitur, unde aspergitur aliquid huic humanae vitae' (Aug.) ; but there is no real resemblance of thought.
Perhaps more striking are: 'primitias sui spiritus in caelestis patriae amore ligant' (Greg. Horn, in Ezech. I. v. 13), and c reliquirnus ibi'religatas primitias spiritus' (Aug. Conf. ix. 24).
In bringing out the momentary character of the act of contempla- tion Augustine uses the expressions: Terstrictim et raptim, quasi per transitum' (Enar. in Psalm, xli. 10); and in Gregory we find in the same connexion 'per transitum' (Horn, in Ezech. i. v. 12), and 'raptim' frequently. There may here be borrowing.
Again, in describing the recoil or revulsion which follows the act of contemplation, they both use the text, Wisd. ix. 15: 'the corrupt- ible body weigheth down the souP (Aug. Enar. in Psalm, xli. 10, Serm. lii. 16, c. Faust, xxii. 53; Greg. Mor. v. 58, viii. 50, xvii. 39, xxx. 53); and there is a general resemblance in the descriptions. But it is a resemblance not of language, but of the mental state described, which is a common experience of those who have attained to contemplation.
In short, it is likely that St Gregory was familiar with the mystical passages of St Augustine's writings, and it is possible he borrowed the expressions 'inusitata dulcedo* and 'per transitum*; but there is no reason for thinking that his passages are based on St Augustine's, or are anything else than the first-hand expression of genuine personal experience.
1 Gregory the Great, ii. 293, 468.
7 WESTERN MYSTICISM
(C, D). THE ACT OF CONTEMPLATION
When dealing with St Augustine's descriptions of contemplation we found it necessary to examine his idea of the nature of the act of contemplation under two headings, a supplementary section, D, being introduced in order to find the answer to the question: Is what he speaks of merely Platonism, or is it real religious mysticism? In the case of St Gregory there is no room for any question of the kind, for he was neither Platonist nor adherent of any philosophical school. 1 Though highly intelligent, he was not pre-eminently in- tellectual, and what he tells of contemplation is nothing else than the endeavour to utter, as well as he can, experiences which he looked on as purely religious, in language uncoloured by any system of philosophy.
It is true he uses the same sort of expressions as Augustine, and speaks of contemplation as 'the search for Truth', and 'the con- templation of Truth'; as e a sight of the true Light' or of c the eternal Light.' 2 But in his mouth the words Truth and Light lack the deep content they have in Augustine's: they are not the great, vital, onto- logical Realities that the Platonic Ideas were to Augustine. They are but the commonplaces of theological language taken over from St John,
I do not find that St Gregory anywhere explicitly identifies this Truth with God; but there can be no. doubt that by the 'Boundless Truth' (incircumscripta Veritas, Mor. v. 66) he means God Him- self. And he does identify with God the 'Eternal Light' and the 'True Light'. 3 But there is no suggestion of Augustine's conceptions that all truth is perceived in the unchangeable Truth above the mind, and that the Light in which purely intellectual truths are seen Is God Himself.
Truth and Light
For all that, it will be instructive, as in the case of Augustine, to group under headings Gregory's ways of speaking of contemplation. In the first place, then, we saw that there was a series of passages wherein Augustine spoke of the Object contemplated in the language of pure metaphysics. Of this I find in Gregory only a
1 The only passage known to me that in any way may re-echo neo-Platonic ideas is that cited from Mor. xxiii. 42, above (p. 71), which speaks of the Many and the One; but this is probably due to Augustine (see p. 159; but cf. St Luke x. 41, 42).
* Mor. xxiii. 42, v. 66; Horn, in Ezech. n. v. 17, 18.
* *Lux aeterna, quae Deus est' (Mor. xxv. n); 'Lumen verum, Creator videlicet noster* (ibid. xxv. 9).
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single instance, where he says that in contemplation 'the One and Incorporeal Being, "Esse", is contemplated.' 1
We saw how Augustine depicts his elevations to contemplation as the result of the effort to attain to the Being that it is not subject to change. In Gregory no such intellectual hunger for the Un- changeable manifests itself. In one place, describing contemplation, he speaks of 'transcending all things changeable and inhering in the Unchangeable 5 (Mor. xxii. 35).
Augustine's predominant idea of the object of contemplation is 'Truth', the ontological Truth that is God Himself. With Gregory also the effort to attain to contemplation is to search for the Truth, 2 and its achievement is to contemplate or to feel the Truth. 3 More fully: Contemplation is *a subtle tasting of the savour of boundless, or unencompassed, Truth,' 4 and 'the receiving the food of love from the pasture of contemplated Truth.' 5
But St Gregory's favourite symbol, to which he returns again and again in describing contemplation, is Light. He conceives of God as the boundless or unencompassed Light 'Lumen incircum- scriptum' and contemplation is the endeavour c to fix the eye of the heart on the very ray of the unencompassed Light.' 6 With this may be compared his description of the Beatific Vision enjoyed by the Saints in Heaven: 'To behold God's face and see the unen- compassed Light.' 7 But in this life 'no one is able to fix the mind's eye on the unencompassed ray itself of Light' 8 : all it can do is 'to attain to somewhat of the unencompassed Light by stealth and scantily/ 9 To this we shall return in F.
The 'unencompassed Light' constantly recurs as the object of con- templation: the effort to attain to contemplation is the desire to see the unencompassed Light, the striving to gaze on its radiance, the gaping at it; the achievement of contemplation is to attain to some- what of it, by understanding and feeling to taste somewhat of it, to be fed on its taste, to be illumined by its flash or coruscation. 10
He uses the same epithets as Augustine: thus he speaks of the
1 *Ut xinum atque incorporeum Esse contempletur' (ibid, xxiii. 42).
2 Ibid, xxiii. 42.
8 Ibid. v. 66,xxiv. II.
* 'Sapor em incircumscriptae veritatis contemplatione subita subtiliter degustare (ibid. v. 66). .
5 'Amoris pastum de pabulo contemplatae veritatis accipere (Horn, in Ezech.
I V I2^
* 'Cordis oculum figere in ipso radio incircumscriptae lucis intendit' (Mar. xxiii. 412). . . .
7 'Gloriae Gonditoris assitere, praesentem Deivultum cernere, mcircumscnp- tum lumen videre' (Horn, in Evang. xxxvii. i).
8 Horn, in Ezech. n. ii. 14.
9 Ibid. 12. .
30 Afar. vi. 59, x. 13 bis; Horn, in Ezech. n. ii. 12 bis; Mor. vm. 50, xxiv. n.
78 WESTERN MYSTICISM
Light eternal of contemplation, the Light invisible, the Light in- corporeal, an infusion whereof is received in contemplation; 1 of the true Light, somewhat whereof may scantily be seen; 3 of the inward Light, a sight whereof flashes in the soul with a ray of brightness by the grace of contemplation, 3 but which man, placed in darkness, knows not as it really is; 4 of the unchangeable Light which does not in contemplation burst forth as it is on the mind's eye; 5 of the incorruptible Light; 6 of the supernal Light which our contemplation discloses to us, agape for it, and anon hides from us, failing through weakness. 7
For St Gregory, contemplation is to pass into the Light; 8 to inhere in it, to see it hastily and taste it scantily; 9 it is to gaze on the very Fountain of Light. 10 This Light is the Light of Truth which, though not yet perceived as it is, still is let into the mind as it were through a narrow slit. 11
The chink of contemplation' is a favourite symbol with St Gregory: in contemplation the eternal or unencompassed Light is seen as is a sunbeam coming through a chink. 12 This is a suggestive idea, and perhaps brings out more simply than any other description his conception of the nature of contemplation. The infinite divine Light is the figure under which he conceives God's Essence: man cannot look directly on It, but may see Its ray, subdued and indistinct, as a sunbeam passing through a chink into a darkened room,
God the Object
But whatever be the figures and symbols employed, God is the Object contemplated. One in contemplation is on fire to see the face of the Creator; it is an effort to contemplate God; in contemplation God is apprehended by the innermost intellect, and with the inmost sweetness. 13 Similarly, those in contemplation endeavour to behold with their mind the brightness of the Creator, 14 and a knowledge of the divine Presence is contemplated and felt. 15 The mind is caught up to unwonted ground when it explores the Essence of the Divinty. 16
Whoever is so rapt by contemplation, as, being raised up by divine grace, already to engage his thought on the choirs of angels,
1 Horn, in Ezech. n. v. 18. * Ibid. 17.
3 Mor. xxiii. 41. * Ibid, xxvii. 67.
* Ibid. v. 53. * Ibid. xxxi. 101,
7 Ibid. v. 58. 8 Horn, in E&ck. u. ii. 12.
Mor. viii. 50. 10 Ibid. xxx. 8. 11 Horn, in Ezech. n. v. 16, 17.
13 Mor. v. 52; Horn, in Ezeck, n. v. 16, 18.
18 Horn, in Ezech. n. ii. 8, 12, 13: 'apprehenditur Deus.'
14 Mor. xxx. 8. 16 Ibid. xxiv. 12. u Ibid. v. 62.
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 79
and fixed on things on high to hold himself aloof from all action below, is not contented with beholding the glory of angelic bright- ness, unless he is able to behold Him also Who is above angels. For the vision of Him is alone the true refreshment of our mind. Hence, from these choirs of angels he directs the eye of his mind to con- template the glory of the Majesty on high: and not seeing it, he is still hungry: and at length [in the next life] seeing it he is satisfied. But while weighed down by the interposition of the corruptible flesh, we cannot see God as He is (Mor. xxxi. 99, 100).
In contemplation it is the divine Wisdom that is contemplated, and even touched: When in contemplation we are brought to the contemplation of Wisdom, the mere immensity thereof, which by itself lifts man to itself, denies the human mind full knowledge, so that it should by touching (tangendo) love this Wisdom, and yet never by passing through penetrate it (Mor. xxii. 50).
In one place is the suggestion that in contemplation God's Voice speaks in the soul:
By the grace of contemplation the Voice of the Supernal Intelli- gence occurs in the mind. ... The words of God are perceived in the ear of the heart . . . and by supernal grace we are led to under- stand higher things (Horn, in Ezech. n. i. 17, 18).
Fervour and Joy
After this brief analysis of the more intellectual side of St Gregory's conception of contemplation, it will be well to cite a few passages of a more general character, giving a fuller account, and bringing out those elements of fervour, love, and rapturous joy which are the constant characteristics of the descriptions of their contemplations left by the great mystics.
The first passage is of interest in that it associates contemplation with prayer; this we did not find explicitly in Augustine, though it is certainly implied in many places.
When the mind, employed in prayer, pants after the form (spe- cies) of its Maker, burning with divine longings, it is united to that which is above, it is disjoined from that below; it opens itself in the affection of its fervent passion, that it may take in, and while taking in kindles itself; and whilst, with longing desire, the soul is agape after heavenly objects, in a marvellous way it tastes the very thing it longs to get (Mor. xv. 53).
Holy men, with the feeling of delight, are caught away unto interior things from the strife of temporal desires, so that whilst their mind is stretched wholly to the love of God, it is not rent and torn
8O WESTERN MYSTICISM
by any useless anxieties, and it hides itself in the bosom of inward love from all the disquietudes of external things (ibid. v. 9).
Falling back upon herself [from a contemplation] the soul is drawn to Him with closer bonds of love. Whose marvellous sweet- ness, being unable to bear, she has but just tasted of under an indistinct vision (Mor. v. 53).
When the mind tastes that inward sweetness, it is on fire with love (ibid. v. 58).
Many passages give utterance to the sweetness and joy which Gregory, like Augustine and Bernard and all the mystics, experi- enced in his contemplations and unions:
The soul is admitted to a certain unwonted sweetness of inward savour (Mor. xxiii. 43); it seeks after, and attains to, the sweetness of iifward knowledge (ibid. xxx. 39); it is caught away to the sweet- ness of supernal contemplation (ibid. viii. 50); it tastes a wondrous sweetness (ibid. v. 53); it touches by a foretaste the sweetness of inmost delight, and knows the sweetness of eternal delight (Horn, in Ezech. i. v. 12). Thus it is absorbed in the joy of a certain security (Mor. xxiv. n); it is brought into the secret joys of quiet (Horn, in Ezech, n. v. 1 6); it is overflowed by the light of inmost quiet (ibid, ii. ii. 14); and it already tastes with inward savour the rest that is to come (ibid. I. iii. 9).
Some of these passages show that St Gregory shared the thought explicitly uttered by St Augustine (above, p. 46), that the height of contemplation is a momentary experience, a transient glimpse and foretaste, of the heavenly joys. So elsewhere: It is very little that those raised to contemplation see of eternity (Horn, in Ezech. n. v. 17); still they do attain to a subtle knowledge of eternity (Mor. v. 66) . Elsewhere contemplation is spoken of as an irradiation of the light of the heavenly country (ibid. x. 17). Often the mind is so hung aloft in divine contemplation, that it already rejoices that it per- ceives by a certain image somewhat of that eternal liberty which eye hath not seen nor ear heard (Horn, in Ezech. n. i. 17).
Such experiences in contemplation often surpass the power of utterance and even of comprehension:
Their minds are inflamed with the love of that interior brightness, which they are able neither to see as it is, nor to utter as they see it (ibid. i. v. 13).
Often the mind of him that loves is filled with so great a gift of contemplation, that it has power to see what it has not the power to utter. The inundation of the Holy Spirit in exuberant outpouring is gathered in the soul of one in contemplation, when his mind is full beyond what he is able to comprehend (Mor. xv. 20).
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 8l
Transiency
The transiency and momentariness of the act of contemplation is insisted on habitually by St Gregory in such expressions as these:
The contemplation is enjoyed by stealth and scantily, by stealth and in passing, delicately, suddenly, not fixedly but by snatch 1 c raptim 3 , which word constantly occurs in the descriptions of con- templation. 2
It was St Gregory's experience, as we have seen it to have been St Augustine's, that the soul can maintain itself in the act of con- templation only for a brief moment, and then, exhausted by the effort, it falls back to its normal state. This recoil is graphically and eloquently described in various passages, some of which have already been cited (Horn, in Ezech. n. ii. 12; Mor. viii. 50, xxiii. 43), (pp. 66, 73-74)-
Others follow:
When the mind is suspended in contemplation; when, exceeding the narrow limits of the flesh, with all the power of her ken she strains to find something of the freedom of interior security, she cannot for long rest standing above herself, because though the spirit carries her on high, yet the flesh sinks her down below by the yet remaining weight of her corruption (Mor. v. 57).
Not even in the sweetness of inward contemplation does the mind remain fixed for long, in that, being made to recoil by the very immensity of the light, it is called back to itself. And when it tastes that inward sweetness, it is on fire with love, it longs to mount above itself; yet it falls back in broken state to the darkness of its frailty (ibid. v. 58).
After the contemplation described in Morals, xxiv. n (cited above p. 74):
The effort of the mind is driven back when directed towards the contemplation of Truth, by the bright encircling of its boundless nature, ... It accordingly falls back speedily to itself, and having seen as it were some traces of Truth before it, is recalled to a sense of its own lowliness (loc. cit. 12).
Like other mystics, Gregory tells of the ineffaceable memory of the experience once enjoyed 3 and the longing for its renewal:
Such an one, returning to good works, feeds on the memory of God's sweetness, and is nourished by pious acts without and holy
1 Turtim et tenuiter* (Horn* in Ezech. n. ii. 112, n. v. 17); 'furtim. et per transitum* (ibid, I. v. 12); 'subtiliter, subita contemplatio' (Mor. v. 66); *non solide sed raptim* (ibid. v. 58).
* 'Raptim' (Mor. v. 58, viii. 49, 50, xxiii. 43, xxiv. ii).
WM K
82 WESTERN MYSTICISM
desires within; and they strive always to utter the memory of it by recollecting it and speaking of it (Horn, in Ezech. I. v. 12).
Effects of Contemplation on the Soul
The principal effects, as expressed by St Gregory, may be grouped under the following heads:
(a) Self-knowledge. The higher the elevation whereat the mind of man contemplates the things that are eternal, so much the more, terror-struck at her temporal deeds, she shrinks with dread, in that she thoroughly discovers herself guilty in proportion as she sees herself to have been out of harmony with that light which shines in the midst of darkness above her; and then it happens that the mind, being enlightened, entertains the greater fear, as it more clearly sees by how much it is at variance with the rule of truth (Mor. v. 53). (Compare Mor. xxiii. 43).
(b) Humility (cf. Horn, in E&ch. i. viii. 17). The more that holy men advance in contemplation, the more they despise what they are, and know themselves to be nothing, or next to nothing (Mor. xxxv. 3),
This is like Fr Baker's teaching, that only by a Passive Union can one attain to an experimental realization of one's fundamental nothingness, and thereby to essential humility (Sancta Sophia, 3^ ff., 534).
(c) Fervour and lorn. It is very little that those who contemplate can see of eternity, but by that little the folds of their minds are extended unto an increase of fervour and love (Horn, in Ezech. n. v. 17).
Other passages have already been cited to the same effect (Mor. v* 53> 5 8 )-
(d) Lessens concupiscence. It dries up in us every fleshly pleasure, and weakens the strength of the flesh (Horn, in Ezech. n. ii. 13; see the whole piece, p. 66).
(e) Temptations. Commonly he who is most carried away in con- templation is most harried by temptation: and so, often it is wont to happen to some who make good progress, that while contempla- tion carries their mind above itself, temptation also immediately follows, that it be not puffed up by those things to which it is carried; so that the temptation may weigh it down lest the contemplation should puff it up, and the contemplation raise it up lest the tempta- tion should sink it. For if contemplation so raised the mind that temptation was altogether wanting, it would fall into pride; and if temptation so weighed it down that contemplation did not lift it up, it would surely fall into sin (Horn, in Ezech. n. ii. 3).
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It often befalls that the Spirit raises up the mind to things aloft, and, for all that, the flesh assails it with importunate temptations; and when the mind is drawn to contemplate heavenly things, it is beaten back by the images presented to it of illicit actions. For the sting of the flesh suddenly wounds him whom holy contemplation was carrying off outside the flesh, and at once the flight of con- templation illumines and the importunity of temptation obscures one and the same mind (Mor. x, 17).
E. PSYCHO-PHYSICAL PHENOMENA: ECSTASY The examination of St Augustine's teaching on this subject led to the highest elevations of religious experience. It is not so with St Gregory. Still, the matter of the physical side of contemplation and ecstasy, emphasized as it has been in more modern times, must always be of importance; and the ideas thereon of any great practical mystic, as Gregory pre-eminently was, must needs repay study and prove a valuable contribution to the psychology of religious experience.
In the passages already cited, and in many others, St Gregory habitually speaks of the soul being c rapf in contemplation (rapere, rapi) ; of its being borne out of itself, or above itself, or above the world, or being carried beyond the confines of the flesh. We have to inquire whether such terminology implies those psycho-physical phenomena rapture, trance, ecstasy, alienation of the mind or of the senses that are the frequent concomitants of certain phases of the mystic life, certain states of prayer. The most satisfactory answer will be given by supplying the material for forming a first-hand judgement.
By contemplation we are lifted up above ourselves (Horn, in Ezech. i. iii. i).
Our mind becomes above itself (Dial. ii. 35).
The mind, passing beyond the barriers of flesh, endeavours to go above itself (Mor. x. 31). ,
We are lifted up outside the confines of the flesh (ibid. x. 13).
I strove daily to become outside the world, outside the flesh
(Ep. i. 5). The mind becomes above the world outside the world (Dial.
The mind cannot stand for long above itself (in contemplation) (Mor. v. 57). *
1 *Per contemplationem super nosmetipsos tollimur.' *Anima fit super semetipsam.* ^ ^
'Carnis claustra transgrediens super semetipsam ire conatur. 'Extra carnis angustias sublevati.' ^ 'Extra mundum, extra carnem fieri,* f . > ,
*Mens superior existat mundo . extra mundum fuit (p. 87). "Mens stare diu super semetipsam non potest.*
84 WESTERN MYSTICISM
The following are instances of the word 'rapere', c rapi 5 :
Contemplation ravishes (rapit) the soul above itself (Horn, in E&ch. i\. ii. 13).
The mind is caught up above itself (Dial. ii. 35), beyond itself (Mor. xxiv. ii), outside itself (ibid. x. 17).
Caught up inwardly above themselves, they fix their mind on high (Mor. vii. 53).
Caught up in God (Dial. ii. 35).
These are only specimens of expressions constantly occurring; the following passages will supply the proper interpretation.
On the fact that the same words, c He returned" to himself/ are used of the Prodigal Son and of St Peter, Gregory comments:
In two ways we are led out of ourselves: either by sinful thoughts we fall below ourselves, or by the grace of contemplation we are raised above ourselves. The Prodigal fell below himself; but Peter, whose mind was rapt in ecstasy, was out of himself indeed, but above himself. Each 'returned to himself' the former when, conscience smitten, he forsook his evil ways; the latter when from the height of contemplation he returned to the normal state of intellect as before. When the ardour of contemplation bears one aloft, he leaves himself beneath himself (Dial. ii. 3) .
Desiring nothing, fearing nothing in this world, I seemed to my- self to stand as it were on the summit of things; for he is lifted up 'upon the high places of the earth' who in his mind despises and tramples down even the things which in the present world seem high and glorious (Ep. i. 5, ad Theoctistam) .
Merely to love things above is already to mount on high (Mor. xv. 53).
Speaking of his own contemplation in his monastery, he says:
My mind, while still enclosed in the body, did yet by contempla- tion pass beyond the barriers of the flesh 1 (Dial Pre).
Similarly:
The mind by the force of its contemplation is carried out of the flesh, while by the weight of its corruption it is still held in the flesh 2 (Mor. x. 13).
While in the world it is out of the world 3 (ibid. xxii. 35).
1 'Retentus corpora ipsa iam carnis claustra contemplatione transibat.*
2 'Contemplationis suae vi extra carnem tollitur, quae corruptionis suae pondere adhuc in carne retinetur.'
& *In mundo extra mundum est.*
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 85
These passages show that St Gregory's ordinary language, as adduced above, is figurative and has no reference to psycho- physical phenomena. The only passages known to me that can suggest any such interpretation are the two following:
Often the mind of the righteous is so suspended in contemplating things on high, that outwardly their face seems to have been struck with stupefaction (obstupuisse) (Mor. xii. 35).
After the struggles of labour [in contemplation], after the waves of temptations, the mind is often hung aloft in a transport (in excessu suspenditur) , in order that it may contemplate a knowledge of the divine Presence (ibid. xxiv. 12).
These two passages do seem to suggest something of the nature of physical concomitants of contemplation; but they are on the most ordinary, the least abnormal and questionable, grade of such phenomena, and hardly find a place among those bodily effects of prayer and contemplation discoursed of so largely by modern writers on mysticism and by mental physiologists. They suggest little more than a profound absorption of mind. It is certain that St Gregory's frequent expressions that in contemplation the mind is carried out of the body or out of the world, do not mean any such phenomenon as that called by St Teresa 'the flight of the spirit', and described in Interior Castle, 'Sixth Mansion', c. v.
He does speak of alienation of mind:
Because fright when it strikes the mind makes it alien from itself, the Latin interpreters sometimes translate ecstasy by fright, as in the Psalm: 'I said in my fright (pavor) I am cast away from the face of thy eyes,' where not 'fright' but 'ecstasy' (departure, 6 ex- cessus') might have been said; but 'fright' was used in place of 'ecstasy', because the mind is alienated in fright just as in ecstasy (Mor. xxvii. 31).
This may remind us of the passage cited from St Augustine (Enar. in Psalm. Ixvii. 36, above, p. 51), where it is said that fright may cause an ecstasy or alienation of mind from the senses.
A perusal of the foregoing pieces shows that there is little to be learned from St Gregory on any psycho-physical concomitants of contemplation, as raptures, alienations, and so forth. All this side of mysticism seems to have been outside of his horizon. And yet it must be felt that the experiences he describes in such a passage as that cited in B from Morals, xxiv. n (p. 74), though falling far short in power of expression, still does describe a religious mystical experience the same in kind and degree as even the highest and
86 WESTERN MYSTICISM
most intellectual of St Augustine's elevations of spirit, as told in the passage from de Genesi ad litteram, xii. 54, cited above (p. 52).
It is necessary to examine with especial attention the passage wherein St Gregory describes St Benedict's great mystical experi- ence (Dial. ii. 35); because the language employed suggests eleva- tions of spirit beyond what is suggested in the passages portraying Gregory's own experiences; because it has given rise to the question whether St Benedict is to be joined to the group of supreme mystics who have enjoyed in this life the vision of God; and also because St Gregory here formulates a theory in explanation of such ex- periences.
Let St Gregory first describe the vision:
While Benedict was standing at the window of the tower, be- seeching Almighty God, suddenly, at dead of night, looking out he saw that a light shed from above had dissipated all the darkness of the night, and was shining with such splendour that the light that had shone forth amid the darkness surpassed the day. And a very wonderful thing followed in that spectacle: for, as afterwards he himself narrated, the whole world, gathered as it were under one ray of the sun, was brought before his eyes. And while he fixed the steady gaze of his eyes in this splendour of the shining light, he saw the soul of Germanus, bishop of Capua, carried to heaven by the angels in a fiery ball.
On the interlocutor Peter expressing wonder how the whole world could be seen by one man, St Gregory expounds his own theory as to the vision:
To the soul that sees the Creator every created thing is narrow. For however little it be of the light of the Creator that it beholds, all that is created becomes to it small: because by the very light of the inmost vision the bosom of the mind is enlarged, and it is so ex- panded in God that it is above the world. But the seer's soul itself becomes also above itself, and when in the light of God it is rapt above itself, it is broadened out interiorly; and while raised aloft it looks downwards, it understands how small is that which in its lowly estate it could not understand. Therefore the man of God, who, looking on the fiery globe, saw also angels returning to heaven, assuredly could see these things only in God's light. And so, what wonder is it if he saw the world gathered together before him, who, being raised up in the light of his mind, was out of the world? And that the world is said to have been gathered before his eyes, it is not that the heaven and earth were contracted, but the seer's mind was enlarged, who, being rapt in God, could see without difficulty all that is beneath God. In that light, therefore, which shone on his outward eyes, there was a light in his inward mind, which, by
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 87
ravishing the seer's mind to things above, showed him how small were all things below. 1
It will be noticed that the various expressions suggesting rapture, alienation, departure from the world occur here in their most acute form. And yet St Gregory says that at the height of the vision St Benedict thrice called out with a loud voice to the deacon Servandus, who was in the room beneath, to come up and see the wonder, and related to him what had occurred. Thus it is seen that, even in an experience that seems to have transcended any of his own, St Gregory represents St Benedict as retaining full possession of his mind and external senses, and as in no wise carried away by ecstasy, rapture, or trance. This is strong and decisive confirmation of the view already expressed, that all such psycho-physical phenomena were outside of St Gregory's horizon.
F. THE VISION OF GOD
St Gregory's doctrine on the Vision of God possible in this life is in marked contrast to what we have seen was St Augustine's; his practical Roman mind could not easily attune itself to the elevations of such a thorough-going Platonist as Augustine, and his customary teaching, embodying his own settled view, is that God cannot be seen or known as He is by mortal man in this life. A number of quite clear passages show this.
One such occurs in the long continuous exposition found in Homilies on Ezechiel, n. ii (p. 66). Others occur in other of these Homilies:
On Ezechiel ii. i: Visio similitudinis gloriae Domini. He does not say:
1 'Animae videnti Creator em angusta est omnis creator a. Quamlibet etenim parum de luce Creatoris aspexerit, breve ei fit omne quod creatum est; quia Ipsa luce visionis intimae mentis laxatur sinus, tantumque expanditur in Deo ut superior existat mundo. Fit vero ipsa videntis aruma etiam super semetipsam; cumque in Dei lumine rapitur super se, in interioribus ampliatur; et dum sub se conspicit exaltata, comprehendit quam breve sit quod comprehendere humiliata non poterat. Vir ergo Dei, qui intuens globum igneum, angelos quoque ad caelum redeuntes videbat, haec proculdubio cernere nonnisi in Dei lumine poterat. Quid itaque mirum si mundum ante se collectum vidit, qui sublevatus in mentis lumine extra mundum fuit? Quod autem collectus mundus ante eius oculos dicitur, non caelum et terra contracta est, sed videntis animus est dilatatus, qui in Deo raptus videre sine difficultate potuit omne quod infra Deum est. In ilia ergo luce quae exterioribus ocuiis fulsit, lux in interiore mente fuit, quae videntis animum quia ad superiora rapuit, ei quam angusta essent omnia inferiora monstravit* (Dial. ii. 35; ed. Mittermuller, 1880).
Compare terminology: 'Quanto se foras per desideria dilatant, tanto ad recep- tionern illius sinum cordis angustant' (Mor, v. 50).
'Laxatur sinus mentium' (Horn, in Ezech. n. v. 17).
'Laxato mentis sinu' (Mor. iv. 62).
*Ad eadem desideria laxato mentis sinu dilatentur' (ibid. v. 6).
*Sinum cordis extendere* (ibid. vi. 55).
'Dilatet ... angustet' (ibid. vi. 57, xxiv. 12; E&ch. n. ii. 12).
88 WESTERN MYSTICISM
The vision of the glory, but of the likeness of the glory; that it may be shown that with whatever effort the human mind strains, even if it have repressed the phantasies of bodily images from its thoughts, and have removed from the eyes of its heart all finite spirits, still while placed in mortal flesh it is not able to see the glory of God as it is. But whatever of it that is which shines in the mind, is a likeness, and not itself (Horn, in Ezech. i. viii. 30).
The following are from the Morals:
With whatever force the eye of our mind in the exile of this life strains after the light of eternity, it is not able to penetrate it; and when we raise the gaze of our mind to the ray of the supernal Light, we are clouded over by the obscurity of our weakness. While man is yet weighed down by the corruptible flesh, he is by no means able to see the eternal Light as it is. The mind often is so inflamed that, though it be placed in the flesh, it is caught up (rapitur) to God, every carnal thought being subdued; but, for all that, it does not see God as He is (Mor. iv. 45) .
So long as we are beset by the corruptions of the flesh, we in no wise behold the brightness of the divine Power as it abides un- changeable in itself,, in that the eye of our weakness cannot endure that which shines above us with intolerable lustre from the ray of His Eternity (ibid. v. 52).
The Divinity never imparts Himself as He is to those that con- template Him while still in this life, but shows forth His Brightness scantily to the blinking eyes of our mind (ibid. v. 66). 1
Whatever progress any one may have made when placed in this life, he does not as yet see God in His real appearance (per speciem), but in enigma and through a glass. Holy men raise themselves up to lofty contemplation, and yet they cannot see God as He is. They resolutely direct the keenness of their intention, but they cannot yet behold Him nigh, the greatness of Whose brightness they are not at all able to penetrate. For the mist of our corruption darkens us from the incorruptible Light; and when the light can both be seen in a measure, and yet cannot be seen as it is, it shows how distant it is. And if the mind already saw it perfectly it would not see it as it were through fog [or darkness 'per caliginem 3 ] (Mor. xxxi. 101).
Here we meet an idea that became classical in the literature of mysticism in the West with that of the East I am not conversant that contemplation in this life is as seeing the sun through a fog or cloud. It is based on the verse of the psalm: 'Caligo sub pedibus eius' 'Darkness is under his feet 5 (Ps. xvii. 10), thus commented on by St Gregory: 'By those beneath He is not seen in that bright- ness wherewith He exercises dominion among those above* (Mor. xvii. 39).
This is the ground idea of the remarkable English fourteenth- 1 Cf. Mor. xxiii. 39, xxxi. 100.
ST* GREGORY THE GREAT 89
century mystical treatise, The Cloud of Unknowing, and it is a symbol much used by the later mystic writers. I am not in a position to affirm that the conception, so far as Western mystical thought is concerned, originated with St Gregory; but I do not recollect having met it in the West before him: not in St Augustine, with whose mode of thought it would not be consonant, for he speaks of St John as having 'contemplated the interior and eternal Light with steady gaze' 'fixis oculis' (Tract in loan, xxxvi. 5).
In the passage cited at length in B, from Morals, viii. 50 this idea of seeing through a fog occurs: When the mind is caught up in contemplation 'it beholds something of the inmost realities as through a fog.' 1
It occurs also in the following piece:
Whatever the progress in virtue, the mind does not yet compass any clear insight into eternity, but still looks on it under the fog of some sort of imagining (sub cuiusdarn caligine imaginationis) . And so it is called a vision of the night. And therefore, as contemplating the ray of the interior Sun, the cloud of our corruption interposes itself, nor does the unchangeable Light burst forth such as It is to the weak eyes of our mind, we as it were still see God in a vision of the night, since we must surely go darkling (caligamus) under an uncertain contemplation (Mor. v. 53).
This teaching of the indistinctness of the vision and knowledge of God revealed in contemplation runs through the whole section, Morals , v. 52-66; it is summed up in these sentences:
When the mind is hung aloft in the height of contemplation, what- ever it has power to see perfectly is not God. ... Then only is there truth in what we know concerning God, when we are made sensible we cannot fully know anything concerning Him (Mor. v. 66).
The following passage from this section is of interest, as the only one of St Gregory (known to me) of a theologico-philosophical character:
Every man that apprehends something of the Eternal Being by contemplation, beholds the same through His co-eternal Image. When then His Eternity is perceived as far as the capability of our frail nature admits, His Image is set before the eyes of the mind, in that when we really strain towards the Father, as far as we receive Him we see Him by His Image, i.e. by His Son. And by that Image which was born of Himself without beginning, we strive in some sort to obtain a glimpse of Him who hath neither beginning nor ending (Mor. v. 63, 64).
1 4 De intimis aliquid quasi per caliginem conspicit*
gO WESTERN MYSTICISM
Thus the settled teaching of St Gregory, discordant from that of St Augustine, but concordant with ordinary theology in the West, is that even in the highest contemplation in this life God is never seen as He is. Yet in a single passage St Augustine makes his in- fluence felt, and St Gregory reproduces his idea:
As long as we live this mortal life, God may be seen by certain semblances, but by the actual appearance (species) of His Nature He cannot, so that the soul, being breathed on by the grace of the Spirit, should by certain figures behold God, but not attain to the actual power of His Essence 1 (ipsa vis eius essentiae). ... [Moses* request 'Show me Thyself is thus interpreted:] He was athirst to perceive, through the Brightness of His uncircumscribed Nature, Him Whom he had begun to see by certain semblances, that so the supernal Essence might be present to the eyes of his mind, in order that for the vision of Eternity there might not be interposed to him any created semblance with the circumstances of time. ... By persons living in this mortal flesh, Wisdom, which is God, was able to be seen by certain circumscribed images, but not able to be seen by the uncircumscribed Light of Eternity. But if by certain ones still living in this corruptible flesh, yet growing in incalculable power by a certain piercingness of contemplation, the Eternal Brightness of God is able to be seen, 2 this is not at variance with the words of Job: 'Wisdom is hidden from the eyes of all the living' ; because he that sees Wisdom, which is God, wholly dies to this life, that henceforth he should not be held by the love thereof. He who sees God dies by the mere circumstance alone, that either by the bent of the interior, or by the carrying out of practice, he is separated with all his mind from the gratifications of this life. Hence yet further it is said to Moses: e No man shall see me and live 3 : as though it were plainly expressed, 'No man ever at any time sees God spiritually and lives to the world carnally' (Mor, xviii. 88, 89) .
Here it is admitted that the 'eternal Brightness of God' may be has been seen by some still in this life, by a piercing contemplation. And in the following paragraph it is laid down that God's Brightness and His Nature are identical. 3
Thus, 'to see the eternal Brightness of God' is to see the divine
1 'Quamdiu hie mortaliter vivitur, videri per quasdam imagines Deus potest, sed per ipsain naturae suae speciem non potest, ut anima, gratia spiritus afflata, per figuras quasdam Deum videat, sed ad ipsam vim eius essentiae non pertin- gat ..' ^
a *Sapientia, quae Deus est, in hac mortal! carne consistentibus et videri potuit per quasdam circumscriptas imagines, et videri non potuit per incircumscriptum lumen aeteraitatis. Sin vero a quibusdam potest in hac adhuc corruptibili carne viventibus, sed tamen inaestimabili virtute crescentibus, quodam contemplationis acumine aeterna Dei claritas videri,'. &c.
8 'Neque illi simplici et incommutabili essentiae aHud est claritas et aliud natura, sed ipsa ei natura sua claritas, ipsa claritas natura est* (loc. cit. 90).
ST GREGORY THE GREAT 91
Nature. In his careful and valuable summary of St Gregory's theo- logy, Mr. Dudden makes him draw a distinction between the know- ledge of God's Nature and the knowledge of His Essence: 'God's Nature is the object of the knowledge of angels and blessed spirits, and sometimes of mortal men, raised in contemplation; but God's Essence can be known only by Himself, and cannot be the object of the knowledge of any created intelligence.' 1 I am not prepared to accept this distinction between God's Nature and His Essence as being really St Gregory's; for it is not in itself theologically sound, and it is not to be found in the places referred to in the note as justifying it. The principal of these is as follows;
Then Almighty God is found out by clear thought, when, the corruption of our mortality being once for all trodden underfoot, He is seen by us, taken up (into heaven) in the Brightness of His Divinity. ... In the height of the rewarding [i.e. in heaven] the Almighty may be found in the appearance (per speciem) afforded to contemplation, but not; in perfection. For though sooner or later we see Him in His Brightness, yet do we not fully behold His Essence. For the mind, whether of angels or men, while it gazes toward the unencompassed Light, shrinks into little by the mere fact that it is a creature (Mor. x. 13).
All that is said here is that even in the Beatific Vision of heaven no created intelligence can see fully God's Essence or ever know Him as He knows Himself (cf. Mor. xviii. 92, 93). In the passage, Morals xviii. 88, it seems hardly possible to draw any distinction between God's Nature and Essence in the expressions: God cannot be seen by the very 'species* of His Nature; and: the soul does not reach to the very power of His Essence (see Latin in note, p. 90) .
And so it is not doubtful that when, in the next paragraph (89), he says that it may be possible that by some in this life 'the eternal Brightness of God has been seen', he allows, in contradiction to his own constant teaching everywhere else, but in agreement with St Augustine, that the divine Nature or Essence may have been seen (partially) in contemplation by some in this life. But when we com- pare St Gregory's passage with those wherein St Augustine gives utterance to his speculations, its lower level of thought is all too painfully apparent, and especially in the sense attached to that 'dying to the world' which both take to be the condition of such a contemplation. For Augustine it is an ecstasy the highest and most spiritual that can fall to the lot of man, as St Paul's, wherein he knew not 'whether he was in the body or out of the body'; for Gregory it is no more than the spiritual commonplace of dying to the love and 1 Gregory the Great, ii. 313.
92 WESTERN MYSTICISM
the pleasures of the world. This watering down of Augustine's sublime conceptions would open wide the gate to the Vision of God to almost all comers in the spiritual life, as the condition admits of many degrees, and so is relatively easy of fulfilment. So that it is a satisfaction to reflect that the whole idea is not St Gregory's own, and is foreign to his true range of thought.
It remains to consider whether St Gregory intended to assert that in the vision described in Dialogues ii. 35 (cited above, p. 86), St Benedict saw the divine Essence. He unquestionably asserts that St Benedict saw God 'animae videnti Greatorem' and that he beheld somewhat, albeit little, of the light of God; that he was caught up in the light of God, and what he saw, he saw in the light of God.
St Thomas in Quodlibetales i. i (cf. Summa 2 2 ae quaest. clxxx. art. 5, ad 3) formally discusses the question and concludes negatively, basing himself on St Augustine's teaching that only in an ecstasy involving entire alienation of the mind from the bodily senses can God's Essence be seen; whereas St Gregory's narrative shows that St Benedict was not in such ecstasy, for he called out to his disciple to come up and see the vision. If St Augustine's view be accepted, it is clear that St Benedict did not enjoy this supreme vision. But our question is: Did St Gregory believe St Benedict to have had the vision of God's Essence? rather than: Did St Benedict really have it? And it has been seen that St Gregory did not demand the condition postulated by St Augustine, but only one of spiritual death to the world that certainly was amply fulfilled in St Benedict. Haeften shows that the question has been discussed among the later scholastics, some of whom do not regard St Thomas's solution as final. 1 St Bernard held that St Gregory's words mean that St Benedict was momentarily raised to the manner of knowledge of the angels, who see God face to face, contemplate His wisdom clearly in itself, and know creatures in God. 2
When we remember that in one place St Gregory, against his customary teaching, does hold the vision of God's Essence to be attainable in this life, it is difficult to understand the extraordinary language he uses of St Benedict otherwise than does St Bernard; but as in the case of St Augustine, the question what St Gregory meant, is quite distinct from the question whether his meaning is in con- formity with the reality.
1 Monasticae Disquisitiones, Comm. in Vitain S.P.B., p, 168.
2 Serm. de Dwersis^ ix. i. (see below, p. 120).
CONTEMPLATION 3. ST BERNARD
ANALYSIS
PAGE
INTRODUCTORY GENERAL SKETCH 95
A. PRELIMINARY PHASES 98
REMOTE PREPARATION: PURGATION
PROXIMATE PREPARATION: RECOLLECTION, INTROVERSION,
DEVOTION
B. AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PASSAGE 100