This page copyright © 2002 Blackmask Online.
http://www.blackmask.com
DEAR brother in Christ, I understand by your own speech, and also
by the word of another man, that you yearn and long to have more
knowledge and understanding than you have of angel's song and heavenly
sound—what it is, how it is perceived and felt in the soul, how to be
sure that it is true and not feigned, and how it is made by the
presence of the good angel and not by the inputting of the evil angel.
These things you desire to learn from me, but, truthfully, I cannot
tell you with certainty the truth of this matter; nevertheless I will
show you something of my opinion in a short word.
Note well that the end and pinnacle of perfection is true
union of God and the soul by perfect love. This union is truly made
when the powers of the soul are reformed by grace to the dignity and
the state of the first condition—that is, when the mind is firmly
established, without changing and wandering, in God and spiritual
things, and when the reason is cleared from all attention to worldly
and fleshly things, and from all bodily images, figures, and fantasies
of created things, and is illumined by grace to see God and spiritual
things, and when the will and the affection are purified and cleansed
from all fleshly, natural, and worldly love and inflamed with burning
love of the Holy Spirit. This wonderful union may not be fulfilled
perfectly, continuously, and wholly in this life, because of the
corruption of the flesh, but only in the bliss of heaven.
Nevertheless, the nearer that a soul in this present life may come to
this union, the more perfect it is. For the more that it is reformed
by grace to the image and the likeness of its Creator here, in this
way, the more joy and bliss shall it have in heaven.
Our Lord God is an endless being without changing, almighty
without failing, supreme wisdom, light, truth without error or
darkness, supreme goodness, love, peace, and sweetness. Therefore the
more that a soul is united, fastened, conformed, and joined to our
Lord, the more stable and strong it is, the more wise and clear, good
and peaceable, loving and virtuous it is, and so it is more perfect.
For a soul that has by the grace of Jesus and long, hard work of
bodily and spiritual exercise, overcome and destroyed lusts, passions,
and unreasonable impulses within itself, and without in the
sensuality, and is clothed all in virtues, as in meekness and mildness,
in patience and softness, in spiritual strength and righteousness, in
continence, in wisdom, in truth, hope and charity—then it is made as
perfect as it may be in this life. Much comfort it receives from our
Lord, not only inwardly, in its own secret nature, by virtue of the
union to our Lord that lies in knowing and loving God, in illumination
and spiritual burning from Him, in transforming of the soul into the
Godhead; but also many other comforts, savors, sweetnesses, and
wonderful feelings in various manners, because our Lord graciously
visits His creatures here on earth, and because the soul profits and
grows in charity.
Some souls, by virtue of the love that God gives them, are
so cleansed that all creatures and everything they hear, or see, or
feel by any of the senses, turns them to comfort and gladness; and the
sensuality receives new savor and sweetness in all creatures. And just
as previously the sensual appetites were carnal, vain, and corrupt,
because of the pain of original sin, so now they are made spiritual
and clean, without bitterness and biting of conscience. And this is
the goodness of our Lord, that since the soul is punished in the
sensuality, and the flesh shares the pain, that afterward the soul be
comforted in the sensuality, and the flesh join in joy and comfort
with the soul, not carnal, but spiritual, as it was a fellow in
tribulation and pain.
This is the freedom and the lordship, the dignity, and the
worth that a man has over all creatures, which dignity he may so
recover by grace here, that every creature appear to him as it is. And
that occurs when by grace he sees, he hears, he feels only God in all
creatures. In this way a soul is made spiritual in the sensuality by
abundance of love, that is, in the nature of the soul.
Also, our Lord comforts a soul by angel's song. This song
cannot be described by any bodily likeness, for it is spiritual, and
above all imagination and reason. It may be felt and perceived in a
soul, but it may not be showed. Nevertheless, I will speak of it to
you as I think.
When a soul is purified by the love of God, illumined by
wisdom, and stabilized by the might of God, then the eye of the soul
is opened to see spiritual things, as virtues and angels and holy
souls, and heavenly things. Then, because it is clean, the soul is
able to feel the touching, the speaking of good angels. This touching
and speaking is spiritual and not bodily. For when the soul is lifted
and ravished out of the sensuality, and out of mind of any earthly
things, then in great fervour of love and light (if our Lord deigns)
the soul may hear and feel heavenly sound, made by the presence of
angels in loving God.
Not that this song of angels is the supreme joy of the soul;
but because of the difference between a person's soul in flesh and an
angel, due to uncleanness, a soul may not hear it except by ravishing
in love, and it must be much purified and well cleaned, and filled
with much love, before it will be able to hear heavenly sound. For the
supreme and essential joy is in the love of God by Himself and for
Himself, and the secondary is in communing with and beholding angels
and spiritual creatures. For just as a soul, in understanding
spiritual things, is often touched and moved through bodily
imagination by the work of angels, as when Ezekiel the prophet saw in
bodily imagination the truth of God's hidden mysteries, just so, in
the love of God, a soul by the presence of angels is ravished out of
mind of all earthly and fleshly things and filled with a heavenly joy,
to hear angel's song and heavenly sound, according to the measure of
its love.
I think that no soul may truly feel the angel's song or
heavenly sound, unless it is in perfect love, though not all that are
in perfect love have felt it, but only the soul that is so purified in
the fire of love that all earthly savor is burned out of it, and all
obstacles between the soul and the cleanness of angels are broken and
put away from it. Then truly may he sing a new song, and truly may he
hear a blessed heavenly sound, and angel's song, without deceit or
feigning. Our Lord knows the soul that, for abundance of burning love,
is worthy to hear angel's song.
Whoever would hear angel's song, and not be deceived by
feigning of himself, or by imagination, or by the illusion of the
enemy, should have perfect love. That is when all vain love and fear,
vain joy and sorrow, are cast out of the heart, so that it loves
nothing but God, nor fears anything but God, nor joys, nor sorrows in
anything but God, or for God. Whoever by the grace of God goes this
way will not err.
Nevertheless, some are deceived by their own imagination or
by the illusion of the enemy in this matter. Such a person, who may
have worked long and hard, bodily and spiritually, in the destroying of
sins and gaining of virtues, and perhaps received by grace a little
rest, and a clarity in conscience, may soon leave prayers, readings of
holy scriptures, meditations on the passion of Christ, and thoughts of
his wretchedness. Before he is called by God, he tries, by his own
skill and by violence, to seek and to see heavenly things, before his
eyes are made spiritual by grace. He overcomes his reason by
imagination, and by indiscreet effort turns the brains in his head,
and overworks the powers and the wits of the soul and of the body. And
then, because of weakness of the brain, he thinks that he hears
wonderful sounds and songs. But it is nothing but a fantasy, caused by
troubling of the brain, as a person in a frenzy thinks that he hears
and sees what no one else does. It is all vanity and a fantasy of the
head, or else it is by the work of the wicked enemy that feigns such
sounds in his hearing.
For if a person has any presumption in his fantasies and in
his workings, and falls by them into indiscreet imagination, as in a
frenzy, and is not ordered or ruled by grace, or comforted by spiritual
strength, the devil enters in, and by his false illuminations, and by
his false sounds, and by his false sweetnesses, he deceives that soul.
And of this false ground spring errors, heresies, false prophecies,
presumptions, false reasonings, blasphemings, slanderings, and much
other mischief. And, therefore, if you see any spiritually-occupied
person fall in any of these sins or deceits, or into frenzies, know
well that he never heard or felt angel's song or heavenly sound. For,
he who truly hears angel's song is made so wise that he will never err
by fantasy, or by indiscretion, or by deceptive working of the devil.
Also, some people feel in their hearts what seem to be
spiritual sounds and sweet songs in various manners, and this is often
good, but sometimes it may turn to deceit. This sound is felt in this
way. A person sets the thought of his heart only in the name of Jesus,
and firmly holds it there, and in a short time he thinks that that
name brings him great comfort and sweetness, and he thinks that the
name sounds delectably in his heart, like a song; and this pleasure is
so strong that it draws all the powers of the soul to it. Whoever
feels this sound and this sweetness truly in his heart, knows that it
is of God, and, as long as he is humble, he shall not be deceived.
But this is not angel's song; it is a song of the soul by
virtue of the name and by a touching of the good angel. For when a soul
offers himself to Jesus truly and humbly, putting all his trust and
his desire in Him, and busily keeping Him in mind, our Lord Jesus,
when He will, purges the affection of the soul, and fills it and feeds
it with sweetness of Himself, and makes His name feel in the soul as
honey, and as song, and as anything that is delectable; so that the
soul evermore wants to cry Jesus, Jesus. And he has comfort not
only in this, but also in psalms and hymns, and anthems of holy
Church; the heart sings them sweetly, devoutly, and freely, without any
effort of the soul or bitterness, in the music that the holy Church
uses.
This is good, and a gift of God, for the substance of this
feeling lies in the love of Jesus, which is fed and illuminated by
such songs. Nevertheless, in this manner of feeling, a soul may be
deceived by pride—not while the affection sings to Jesus, and loves
Jesus in sweetness of Him, but afterward, when it ceases and the heart
cools down from the love of Jesus. Then pride may enter in.
Also, a man may be deceived in this way: he hears it said
that it is good to have Jesus in his mind, or any other good word of
God, so he strains his heart mightily to that name, and by habit he
has it nearly always in his mind. Nevertheless, he does not feel by it
sweetness in his affection or light of knowing in his reason, but only
an abstract thought of God, or of Jesus, or of Mary, or of any other
good word. Here may be deceit, not that it is evil to have Jesus in
mind in this way, but if he holds this feeling and this thought (which
is only by his own effort and habit) to be a special visitation of our
Lord, he thinks it more than it is.
For note well that an abstract thought or imagination of
Jesus, or of any spiritual thing, without sweetness of love in the
affection, and without light of knowing in reason, is but a blindness,
and a way to deceit, if a man hold it to be more than it is. Therefore
I think it safer that he be humble in his own feeling, and not esteem
this thought at all, till he may, by habit and use of this thought,
feel the fire of love in his affection, and the light of knowing in
his reason.
Now, I have told you in this matter a little of what I
think, not affirming that this suffices, or that this is the truth of
the matter. But if you think otherwise, or if anyone else savor by
grace the contrary, I defer to him; it suffices for me to live in
truth principally, and not in feeling.