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What is more, as is said in the book On the Spirit and the Soul
(of St. Augustine), to ascend to God means to enter into oneself.
He who entering within and penetrating his inmost nature, goes
beyond himself, he is truly ascending to God. So let us withdraw
our hearts from the distractions of this world, and recall them to
the inner joys, so that we can establish them to some degree in
the light of divine contemplation. For this is the life and peace
of our hearts - to be established by intent in the love of God,
and to be sweetly remade by his comforting.
But the reason why we are in so many ways hindered in the
practical enjoyment of this matter and are unable to get into it
is clearly because the human mind is so distracted by worries that
it cannot bring its memory to turn within, is so clouded by its
imaginations that it cannot return to itself with its
understanding, and is so drawn away by its desires that it is
quite unable to come back to itself by desire for inner sweetness
and spiritual joy. Thus it is so prostrate among the sense objects
presented to it that it cannot enter into itself as the image of
God.
It is therefore right and necessary for the mind to raise itself
above itself and everything created by the abandonment of
everything, with humble reverence and great trust, and to say
within itself, He whom I seek, love, thirst for and desire from
everything and more than anything is not a thing of the senses or
the imagination, but is above everything that can be experienced
by the senses and the intellect. He cannot be experienced by any
of the senses, but is completely desirable to my will. He is
moreover not discernable, but is perfectly desirable to my inner
affections. He cannot be comprehended, but can be loved in his
fullness with a pure heart, for he is above all lovable and
desirable, and of infinite goodness and perfection. And then a
darkness comes over the mind and it is raised up into itself and
penetrates even deeper.
And the more inward-looking the desire for it, the more powerful
this means of ascent to the mysterious contemplation of the holy
Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity in Jesus Christ is, and the
more interior the yearning, the more productive it is. Certainly
in matters spiritual the more inward they are the greater they are
as spiritual experiences.
For this reason, never give up, never stop until you have tasted
some pledge, as I might say, or foretaste of the future full
experience, and until you have obtained the satisfaction of
however small a first fruits of the divine joy. And do not give up
pursuing it and following its scent until you have seen the God of
gods in Sion. Do not stop or turn back in your spiritual journey
and your union and adherence to God within you until you have
achieved what you have been seeking.
Take as a pattern of this the example of those climbing an
ordinary mountain. If our mind is involved by its desires in the
things which are going on below, it is immediately carried away by
endless distractions and side tracks, and being to some extent
divided against itself, is weakened and as it were scattered
amongst the things which it seeks with its desires. The result is
ceaseless movement, travel without an arrival, and labour without
rest.
If on the other hand our heart and mind can withdraw itself by its
desire and love from the infinite distraction below of the things
beneath it, can learn to be with itself, abandoning these lower
things and gathering itself within itself into the one unchanging
and satisfying good, and can hold to it inseparably with its will,
it is correspondingly more and more gathered together in one and
strengthened, as it is raised up by knowledge and desire.
In this way it will become accustomed to the true supreme good
within itself until it will be made completely immovable and
arrive securely at that true life which is the Lord God himself,
so that it can now rest in him within and in peace without any
changeability or vicissitude of time, perfectly gathered within
itself in the secret divine abode in Christ Jesus who is the way
for those who come to him, the truth and life.
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