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From all that has been said above it may be clearly
understood and inferred how great is the evil that
may come to the soul from the devil by way of these
supernatural apprehensions.
For not only can he represent to the memory and
the fancy many false forms and ideas, which seem true
and good, impressing them on spirit and sense with
great effectiveness and certifying them to be true by
means of suggestion (so that it appears to the soul
that it cannot be otherwise, but that everything is
even as he represents it; for, as he transfigures
himself into an angel of light, he appears as light
to the soul); but he may also tempt the soul in many
ways with respect to true knowledge, which is of God,
moving its desires and affections, whether spiritual
or sensual, in unruly fashion with respect to these;
for, if the soul takes pleasure in such
apprehensions, it is very easy for the devil to cause
its desires and affections to grow within it, and to
make it fall into spiritual gluttony and other evils.
2. And, in order the better to do this, he is wont
to suggest and give pleasure, sweetness and delight
to the senses with respect to these same things of
God, so that the soul is corrupted and
bewildered[509] by that sweetness, and is thus
blinded with that pleasure and sets its eyes on
pleasure rather than on love (or, at least, very much
more than upon love), and gives more heed to the
apprehensions than to the detachment and emptiness
which are found in faith and hope and love of God.
And from this he may go on gradually to deceive
the soul and cause it to believe his falsehoods with
great facility. For to the soul that is blind
falsehood no longer appears to be falsehood, nor does
evil appear to be evil, etc.; for darkness appears to
be light, and light, darkness; and hence that soul
comes to commit a thousand foolish errors, whether
with respect to natural things, or to moral things,
or to spiritual things; so that that which was wine
to it becomes vinegar.
All this happens to the soul because it began not,
first of all, by denying itself the pleasure of those
supernatural things. At first this is a small matter,
and not very harmful, and the soul has therefore no
misgivings, and allows it to continue, and it grows,
like the grain of mustard seed, into a tall tree. For
a small error at the beginning, as they say, becomes
a great error in the end.
3. Wherefore, in order to flee from this great
evil, which comes from the devil, the soul must not
desire to have any pleasure in such things, because
such pleasure will most surely lead it to become
blind and to fall. For of their own nature, and
without the help of the devil, pleasure and delight
and sweetness blinds the soul. And this was the
meaning of David when he said: 'Perhaps darkness
shall blind me in my delights and I shall have the
night for my light.'[510] |