This king shall choose councillors in his country, the wisest to be found in the land. These will be two divine virtues, knowledge and discretion, enlightened by the grace of God. They will dwell near the king, in a palace which is called the soul’s strength of reason; but they will be clothed and adorned with a moral virtue which is called temperance, so that the king may always act or refrain from acting according to their counsels. By knowledge we shall purge the conscience from all its faults and adorn it with every virtue; and by discretion we shall give and take, do and leave undone, speak and be silent, fast and eat, listen and reply; and in all things we shall act according to knowledge and discretion, clothed with their moral virtue, which is called temperance or moderation.
This king, free will, shall also set up in his kingdom a judge, who shall be called justice, a divine virtue when it springs from love; and it is one of the highest moral virtues. This judge shall dwell in the conscience, in the centre of the kingdom, in the strongest passions. And he will be adorned with moral virtue, which is called prudence. For justice cannot be perfect. This judge, justice, shall travel through the kingdom with the power and the force of the king, accompanied by wisdom of counsel and by his own prudence. He will promote and dismiss, judge and condemn, kill and keep alive, mutilate, blind and restore sight, lift up and put down, organise, punish, and chastise every sin with perfect justice, and at last destroy all vices.
The people of this kingdom—that is all the pure of soul—shall be established on and in the fear of God; they shall be subject unto God in all virtues, each according to his own capacity. He who has thus occupied, adorned, and regulated the kingdom of his soul, has gone forth in love and virtue towards God, himself, and his neighbour.
Christ the Sun of the Soul
The sun shines in the east, in the centre of the world, on the mountains; it hastens summer in that region, and creates good fruits and potent wines, filling the earth with joy. The same sun shines in the west, at the ends of the earth; there the country is colder, and the power of its heat is less, yet nevertheless it produces a great many excellent fruits; but few wines are found there.
Those men who dwell in the west of their own being, remain in the outward senses, and by their good intentions, their virtues, and their outward practices, through God’s grace, they produce abundant harvests and virtues in various ways, but they seldom taste the wine of inward joy and of spiritual consolation.
The man who will feel the shining of the Eternal Sun, which is Christ Himself, will have clear vision, and will dwell on the mountains of the east, concentrating all his energies and raising his heart towards God, free and careless as regards joy, sorrow, and all creatures. There Christ the Sun of Righteousness shines on the free and uplifted heart; and these are the mountains which I have in mind. Christ, the glorious sun and the divine brightness, shines and illumines and enkindles by His inward coming, and the power of His Spirit, the free heart and all the powers of the soul.
When summer draws near, and the sun rises higher in the heavens, it draws the moisture of the soil through the roots and the trunk of the trees, until it reaches the branches, and hence come foliage, flowers, and fruits. So likewise, when Christ, the Eternal Sun, rises in our hearts, so that the summer reigns over their adornment of virtues, He sends His light and His fire into our will, and draws the heart from the multitude of earthly things, and creates unity and close fellowship, and makes the heart to grow and become green through inward love, and to bear the flowers of loving devotion and the fruits of gratitude and affection, and preserves these fruits in the sorrow and humility we feel because of our impotence.
The Lesson from the Bee
Observe the wise bee and make it your model. It dwells in a community in the midst of its companions, and it goes forth, not during the storm, but when the weather is calm and still and the sun is shining; and it flies towards all the flowers on which it can find sweetness. It does not rest on any flower, neither in its beauty nor in its sweetness, but it draws from each calix honey and wax—that is to say, the sweetness and the substance of its brightness—and it bears them back to the community in which all the bees are assembled, so that the honey and wax may profitably bear fruit.