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1. This is like saying: Since the superior portion of my soul is now, like the
lower, at rest in its appetites and faculties, I went out to divine union with
God through love.
2. Insofar as the soul is buffeted and purged through the war of the dark night
in a twofold way (in the sensory and spiritual parts with their senses,
faculties, and passions), she also attains a twofold peace and rest in the
faculties and appetites of both the sensory and spiritual parts. Consequently
the soul repeats this verse of the first stanza. The sensory and spiritual parts
of the soul, in order to go out to the divine union of love, must first be
reformed, put in order, and pacified, as was their condition in Adam's state of
innocence. This verse, which in the first stanza refers to the quiet of the
lower and sensory part, refers particularly in this second stanza to the
superior and spiritual part, and consequently the soul has repeated it.
3. By means of the acts of substantial touches of divine union, the soul obtains
habitually and perfectly (insofar as the condition of this life allows) the rest
and quietude of her spiritual house. In concealment and hiding from the
disturbance of both the devil and the senses and passions, she receives these
touches from the divinity. By their means the soul is purified, quieted,
strengthened, and made stable so she may receive permanently this divine union,
which is the divine espousal between the soul and the Son of God.1
As soon as
these two parts of the soul are wholly at rest and strengthened, together with
all the members of the household, the faculties and appetites (also put to sleep
and in silence regarding earthly and heavenly things), Divine Wisdom is united
with the soul in a new bond of the possession of love. This union is wrought, as
is asserted in the Book of Wisdom, Dum quietum silentium contineret omnia, et
nox in suo cursu medium iter haberet, omnipotens sermo tuus, Domine, a regalibus
sedibus prosilivit2 [Wis. 18:14-15]. The bride in the Song of Songs explains the
same thing when she states that after she passed by those who took away her veil
and wounded her, she found him whom her soul loved [Sg. 5:7; 3:4]. 4. One cannot
reach this union without remarkable purity, and this purity is unattainable
without vigorous mortification and nakedness regarding all creatures. "Taking
off the bride's veil" and "wounding her at night," in her search and desire for
her Spouse, signify this denudation and mortification, for she could not put on
the new bridal veil without first removing her other one. Persons who refuse to
go out at night in search for the Beloved and to divest and mortify their will,
but rather seek the Beloved in their own bed and comfort, as did the bride [Sg.
3:1], will not succeed in finding him. As this soul declares, she found him when
she departed in darkness and with longings of love.
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