|
The second kind of distinct and delectable good
wherein the will may rejoice vainly is that which
provokes or persuades us to serve God and which we
have called provocative.
This class comprises preachers, and we might speak
of it in two ways, namely, as affecting the preachers
themselves and as affecting their hearers. For, as
regards both, we must not fail to observe that both
must direct the rejoicing of their will to God, with
respect to this exercise.
2. In the first place, it must be pointed out to
the preacher, if he is to cause his people profit and
not to embarrass himself with vain joy and
presumption, that preaching is a spiritual exercise
rather than a vocal one. For, although it is
practised by means of outward words, its power and
efficacy reside not in these but in the inward
spirit.
Wherefore, however lofty be the doctrine that is
preached, and however choice the rhetoric and sublime
the style wherein it is clothed, it brings as a rule
no more benefit than is present in the spirit of the
preacher. For, although it is true that the word of
God is of itself efficacious, according to those
words of David, 'He will give to His voice a voice of
virtue,'[692] yet fire, which has also a virtue --
that of burning -- will not burn when the material is
not prepared.
3. To the end that the preacher's instruction may
exercise its full force, there must be two kinds of
preparation: that of the preacher and that of the
hearer; for as a rule the benefit derived from a
sermon depends upon the preparation of the teacher.
For this reason it is said that, as is the master,
so is wont to be the disciple. For, when in the Acts
of the Apostles those seven sons of that chief priest
of the Jews were wont to cast out devils in the same
form as Saint Paul, the devil rose up against them,
saying: 'Jesus I confess and Paul I know, but you,
who are ye?'[693] And then, attacking them, he
stripped and wounded them.
This was only because they had not the fitting
preparation, and not because Christ willed not that
they should do this in His name. For the Apostles
once found a man, who was not a disciple, casting out
a devil in the name of Christ, and they forbade him,
and the Lord reproved them for it, saying: 'Forbid
him not, for no man that has done any mighty works in
My name shall be able to speak evil of Me after a
brief space of time.'[694]
But He is angry with those who, though teaching
the law of God, keep it not, and, which preaching
spirituality, possess it not. For this reason God
says, through Saint Paul: 'Thou teachest others and
teachest not thyself. Thou who preachest that men
should not steal, stealest.'[695] And through David
the Holy Spirit says: 'To the sinner, God said: "Why
dost thou declare My justice and take My law in thy
mouth, when thou hast hated discipline and cast My
words behind thee?"'[696] Here it is made plain that
He will give them no spirituality whereby they may
bear fruit.
4. It is a common matter of observation that, so
far as we can judge here below, the better is the
life of the preacher, the greater is the fruit that
he bears, however undistinguished his style may be,
however small his rhetoric and however ordinary his
instruction.
For it is the warmth that comes from the living
spirit that clings; whereas the other kind of
preacher will produce very little profit, however
sublime be his style and his instruction. For,
although it is true that a good style and gestures
and sublime instruction and well-chosen language
influence men and produce much effect when
accompanied by true spirituality, yet without this,
although a sermon gives pleasure and delight to the
sense and the understanding, very little or nothing
of its sweetness remains in the will.
As a rule, in this case, the will remains as weak
and remiss with regard to good works as it was
before. Although marvelous things may have been
marvellously said by the preacher, they serve only to
delight the ear, like a concert of music or a peal of
bells; the spirit, as I say, goes no farther from its
habits than before, since the voice has no virtue to
raise one that is dead from his grave.
5. Little does it matter that one kind of music
should sound better than another if the better kind
move me not more than the other to do good works.
For, although marvellous things may have been said,
they are at once forgotten if they have not fired the
will. For, not only do they of themselves bear little
fruit, but the fastening of the sense upon the
pleasure that it finds in that sort of instruction
hinders the instruction from passing to the spirit,
so that only the method and the accidents of what has
been said are appreciated, and the preacher is
praised for this characteristic or for that, and
followed from such motives as these rather than
because of the purpose of amendment of life which he
has inspired.
This doctrine is well explained to the Corinthians
by Saint Paul, where he says: 'I, brethren, when I
came to you, came not preaching Christ with loftiness
of instruction and of wisdom, and my words and my
preaching consisted not in the rhetoric of human
wisdom, but in the showing forth of the spirit and of
the truth.'[697]
6. Although the intention of the Apostle here,
like my own intention, is not to condemn good style
and rhetoric and phraseology, for, on the contrary,
these are of great importance to the preacher, as in
everything else, since good phraseology and style
raise up and restore things that are fallen and
ruined, even as bad phraseology ruins and destroys
good things . . .[698] |
|
|
692. |
Psalm lxvii, 34 [A.V., lxviii,
33]. |
693. |
Acts xix, 15. |
694. |
St. Mark ix, 38-9. |
695. |
Romans ii, 21. |
696. |
Psalm xlix, 16-17 [A.V., l,
16-17]. |
697. |
1 Corinthians ii, 1-4. |
698. |
E.p. adds: 'End of the Ascent of
Mount Carmel.' The treatise thus remains incomplete, the
chapter on the preacher being unfinished and no part of any
chapter upon the hearer having come down to us. Further, the
last two divisions of the four mentioned in Chap. xxxv, Sect.
1 are not treated in any of the MSS. or early editions.
The fragments which P. Gerardo [Obras, etc., I, 402-10] added
to the Ascent, forming two chapters, cannot be considered as a
continuation of this book. They are in reality a long and
admirable letter [Letter XI in The Complete Works of St. John
of the Cross: Vol. III, p. 255], written to a religious, who
was one of the Saint's spiritual sons, and copied by P.
Jer�nimo de San Jos� in his History of St. John of the Cross
(Bk. VI, Chap. vii). There is not the slightest doubt that the
letter which was written at Segovia, and is fully dated, is a
genuine letter, and not an editor's maltreatment of part of a
treatise. Only the similarity of its subject with that of
these last chapters is responsible for its having been added
to the Ascent. It is hard to see how P. Gerardo could have
been misled about a matter which is so clear.
[This question was re-opened, in 1950, by P. Sobrino (see Vol.
III, p. 240), who adds TG and a codex belonging to the
Discalced Carmelite Fathers of Madrid to the list of the MSS.
which give the fragments as part of the Ascent, making six
authorities in all, against which can be set only the proved
and admitted reliability of P. Jer�nimo de San Jos�. P.
Sobrino, who discusses the matter (Estudios, etc., pp. 166-93)
in great detail, hazards a plausible and attractive solution,
which he reinforces with substantial evidence -- that of a
'double redaction.' According to this theory, the Saint, in
writing to the religious of Letter XI, made use, for the
substance of his instruction, of two fragments which were to
have gone into the Ascent. Considering how often in his
writings he doubled passages, to say nothing of whole works,
it is quite understandable that he should have utilized two
unincorporated, and indeed unfinished, passages for a private
letter.] |
|