It is, then, the loss of this imperceptible support, and the experience of this misery, which causes death.
We should be very careful, in such times as these, not to let our senses be led away willingly to creatures, seeking willingly consolation and diversion. I say willingly, for we are incapable of mortifications and attentions reflected upon ourselves, and the more we have mortified ourselves, the stronger will be the bearing in the contrary direction, without being aware of it; like a madman, who goes wandering about, if you attempt to keep him too rigorously within bounds, apart from its being useless, it would retard his death.
[p 183]
What must we do then? We must be careful to give no support to the senses, to suffer them, and to let them find recreation in innocent ways; for as they are not capable of an inward operation, by endeavouring to restrain them we should injure health, and even mental strength. What I say applies only to this degree; for if we were to make this use of the senses in the time of the strength and activity of grace, we should do wrong; and our Lord Himself in His goodness makes us see the conduct that we should pursue; for at first, He puts such a pressure on the senses, they have no liberty. They only have to desire something in order to be deprived of it; God orders it thus that the senses may be drawn from their imperfect operation, to be confined within the heart; and in severing them outwardly, He binds them inwardly so gently, that it costs them little to be deprived of everything; they even find more pleasure in this deprivation than in the possession of all things. But when they are sufficiently purified, God, who wishes to draw the soul out of itself with a contrary movement, permits the senses to expand outwardly, which appears to the soul as [p 184] a great impurity. However, it has now happened seasonably, and to endeavour to order things otherwise, would be to purify ourselves in a different way from that which God desires, and therefore to defile ourselves anew.
This does not prevent our making mistakes in this outward development of the senses; but the confusion which it occasions us, and our fidelity in making use of it, is the furnace in which we are most quickly purified, by dying the soonest to ourselves. It is here also that we lose the esteem of men. They look on us with contempt, and say, “Are not these the persons whom we formerly admired? How are they become thus disfigured?” “Alas!” we reply, “look not upon me, because I am black” (Cant. i. 6). “It is the sun which has thus discoloured me.” It is at this point that we suddenly enter the third degree, that of burial and decay.
[p 185]
CHAPTER VIII.
THIRD DEGREE OF THE PASSIVE WAY OF FAITH IN ITS CONSUMMATION—CONSUMMATED STATE OF SPIRITUAL DEATH—BURIAL—DECAY—ADVICE AS TO THE CONDUCT OF PERSONS IN THESE CONDITIONS, WHICH ARE FOLLOWED BY A NEW LIFE.
The torrent, as we have said, has passed through every imaginable vicissitude. It has been dashed against rocks; indeed, its course has been but a succession of falls from rock to rock; but it has always reappeared, and we have never seen it really lost. Now it begins to lose itself in gulf after gulf. Formerly it still had a course, though it was so precipitate, so confused, and so irregular; but here it is engulphed with a yet greater precipitation in unsearchable depths. For a long time it disappears altogether from view, then we perceive it slightly, but more by hearing than by sight, and it only appears to be again precipitated in a deeper gulf. It falls from abyss to abyss, from precipice to precipice, [p 186] until at last it falls into the depths of the sea, where, losing all form, it is lost to be found no more, having become one with the sea itself. The soul, after many deaths, expires at last in the arms of Love; but it does not even perceive those arms. It has no sooner expired, than it loses all vital action, all desire, inclination, tendency, choice, repugnance, and aversion. As it draws near to death, it grows weaker; but its life, though languishing and agonising, is still life, and “while there is life there is hope,” even though death be inevitable. The torrent must be buried out of sight.
O God! what is this? What were only precipices become abysses. The soul falls into a depth of misery from which there is no escape. At first this abyss is small, but the further the soul advances, the stronger does it appear, so that it goes from bad to worse; for it is to be remarked, that when we first enter a degree, there clings to us much that we have brought in with us, and at the end we already begin to feel symptoms of that which is to come. It is also noticeable that each degree contains within it an infinitude of others.
[p 187]
A man, after his death and before his burial, is still among the living: he still has the face of a man, though he is an object of terror; thus the soul, in the commencement of this degree, still bears some resemblance to what it was before; there remains in it a certain secret impression of God, as there remains in a dead body a certain animal heat which gradually leaves it. The soul still practises devotion and prayer, but this is soon taken away from it. It must lose not only all prayer, every gift of God, but God Himself to all appearance—that is, so far as He was possessed selfishly by the ego—and not lose Him for one, two, or three years, but for ever. All facility for good, all active virtue, are taken from it; it is left naked and despoiled of everything. The world, which formerly esteemed it so much, begins to fear it. Yet it is no visible sin which produces the contempt of men, but a powerlessness to practise its former good works with the same facility. Formerly whole days were spent in the visitation of the sick, often even against natural inclination; such works as these can be practised no longer.
The soul will soon be in an entire oblivion. Little [p 188] by little, it loses everything in such a degree, that it is altogether impoverished. The world tramples it under foot, and thinks no more of it. O poor soul! thou must see thyself treated thus, and see it with terror, without being able to prevent it. It must suffer itself to be buried, covered with earth, and trodden under foot by all men.