SEDENS LUCIDUS
From WIESBADEN CODEX B fo. 153 r
Plate XXIV. ZELUS DEI
The condition from which she was suffering was clearly a functional nervous disorder; this is sufficiently demonstrated by her repeated complete recoveries, her activity between the attacks, and the great age to which she lived. At first sight, the long procession of figures and visions suggests that she might have been the victim of a condition similar to that of which Jerome Cardan has left us so complete a personal record. But on reading the books of visions, the reader will easily convince himself that we are not here dealing with a dream-state. The visions are indeed essentially vivid. ‘These visions which I saw’, she repeatedly assures us, ‘I beheld neither in sleep, nor in dream, nor in madness, nor with my carnal eyes, nor with the ears of the flesh, nor in hidden places; but wakeful, alert, with the eyes of the spirit and with the inward ears I perceived them in open view and according to the will of God. And how this was compassed is hard indeed for human flesh to search out.’[117]
Nevertheless, though the visions exhibit great originality and creative power—the reader will often be reminded of William Blake—all or nearly all present certain characters in common. In all a prominent feature is a point or a group of points of light, which shimmer and move, usually in a wavelike manner, and are most often interpreted as stars or flaming eyes. In quite a number of cases one light, larger than the rest, exhibits a series of concentric circular figures of wavering form; and often definite fortification figures are described, radiating in some cases from a coloured area. Often the lights gave that impression of working, boiling or fermenting, described by so many visionaries, from Ezekiel onwards.
This outline of the visions the saint herself variously interpreted. We give examples from the more typical of these visions, in which the medical reader or the sufferer from migraine will, we think, easily recognize the symptoms of scintillating scotoma. Some of the illuminations, here reproduced in their original colours, will confirm this interpretation.
‘I saw a great star most splendid and beautiful, and with it an exceeding multitude of falling sparks which with the star followed southward. And they examined Him upon His throne almost as something hostile, and turning from Him, they sought rather the north. And suddenly they were all annihilated, being turned into black coals ... and cast into the abyss that I could see them no more’[118] (Plate [XXI]).
This vision, illustrated by the beautiful figure of stars falling into the waves, is interpreted by her as signifying the Fall of the Angels.