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While the great King Solomon, possessing as yet the
Spirit of God, was composing the sacred Canticle of
Canticles, he had, according to the permission of
those ages, a great variety of ladies and maidens
attached to his service in different conditions and
qualities. For 1. There was one, his singularly dear
and wholly perfect one, most rare, as a singular
dove, with whom the others entered not into
comparison, and for this reason she was called by his
own name, Sulamitess.(1) 2?. There were sixty, who,
next to her, had the first rank of honour and
estimation, and were called queens. 3?. There were,
further, eighty ladies who were not indeed queens,
but were in a recognized and honourable relation to
him. 4?. There were young maidens without number,
kept ready to be put in the place of the foregoing as
was required.
Now under the figure of what passed in his palace,
he described the various perfections of souls who in
time to come were to adore, love and serve the great
Pacific King Jesus Christ, our Saviour; amongst whom
there are some, who being newly freed from their
sins, and quite resolved to love God, are yet
novices, apprentices, tender and feeble: so that they
love indeed the divine sweetness, yet with such
mixture of other affections that their sacred love
being still as it were in its infancy; they love
together with our Saviour, many superfluous, vain and
dangerous things.
And as a phoenix newly hatched from out its ashes,
having as yet but little, tender feathers and its
first down, can only essay short flights, in which it
should be said rather to leap than to fly; so these
tender young souls, newly born from the ashes of
their penance, cannot as yet soar on high, or fly in
the broad air of sacred love, being held captives by
the multitude of bad inclinations and evil habits
which the sins of their past life have left them.
Still they are living, they are animated with and
possessed of love, yea and with true love too, else
bad they never forsaken sin; yet with a love still
feeble and young, which, environed with a number of
other loves, cannot produce fruit in such abundance
as it would do if it had the full possession of the
heart.
Such was the prodigal son, when, quitting the
infamous company or the swine, amongst which he had
lived, he returned into his father's arms,
half-naked, unclean and bemired, and smelling most
offensively of the filth which he had contracted in
the company of those vile beasts. For what is it to
forsake the swine, but to withdraw from sins? And
what is it to return all ragged, tattered and
unclean, but to have our affections engaged in the
habits and inclinations which tend to sin ? Yet still
was he possessed of the life of the soul which is
love; and as a phoenix rising out of its ashes, he
found himself newly raised to life. He was dead, said
his father, and is come to life again,(2) he has
revived.
And these souls are called young maidens in the
Canticles, forasmuch as, having perceived the odour
of the name of the beloved who breathes nothing but
salvation and mercy, they love him with a true love,
but a love, which is as themselves, in its tender
youth. For even as young girls love their husbands
properly if they have one, yet do not cease to
greatly love rings and trifles, or their companions,
with whom they amuse themselves extravagantly in
playing, dancing and silliness, busying themselves
with little birds, little dogs, squirrels and other
such playthings; - so these young and novice-souls
have truly an affection for the sacred lover, yet
admit they with it a number of voluntary distractions
and diversions: so that loving him above all things,
they yet busy themselves in many things, which they
love, not according to him but besides him, out of
him, and without him. In truth, though little
irregularities in words, in gestures, in apparel, in
pastimes and follies, are not, properly speaking,
against the will of God; yet are they not according
to it, but out of it and without it.
But there are souls who, having already made some
progress in the love of God, have also cut off all
the love they had to dangerous things, and yet
entertain dangerous and superfluous loves: because
they love with excess, and with a love too tender and
passionate, what God ordains they should love. It
stood with God's pleasure that Adam should love Eve
tenderly, yet not with such tenderness that, to
content her, he should violate the order given him by
his divine majesty. He loved not then a superfluous
thing, nor a thing in itself dangerous, but he loved
it superfluously and with danger.
The love of our parents, friends and benefactors,
is in itself according to God, yet we may love them
with excess; as also our vocations, be they never so
spiritual: our exercises also of devotion (which yet
we ought so greatly to love) may be loved
inordinately, as when we prefer them before
obedience, or before a more general good; or when we
love them as if they were our last end, while they
are only means and furtherances to our final
intention, which is the divine love.
And these souls, who love nothing but what God
would have them to love, and yet exceed in the manner
of loving, love indeed the divine goodness above all
things, yet not in all things: for the things, which,
not only by permission but even by command, they are
to love according to God, they love not only
according to God, but for other causes and motives,
which though indeed not contrary to God, yet are out
of him.
So that these souls resemble the phoenix, when,
having got its first feathers and beginning to grow
strong it already soars at large in the air, but has
not yet strength enough to remain long on the wing,
and often descends to earth to rest there. Such was
the poor young man, who having from his tender age
observed God's commandments, desired not his
neighbour's goods, yet clung to his own over
tenderly: so that when our Saviour counselled him to
give them to the poor, he became sad and melancholy.
He loved nothing but what he might lawfully love, yet
he loved. it with a superfluous and too attached a
love.
It is plain, Theotimus, that these souls love too
ardently and with superfluity; still, as they love
not the superfluities, but only the thing, which may
be loved, therefore they are entitled to the favours
of the heavenly Solomon, namely, unions,
recollections, and the repose of love, whereof we
spoke in Books V. and VI.: but they do not enjoy them
in quality of spouses, because the superfluity with
which they love good things, hinders them from a
frequent entry into these divine unions with the
spouse; they are engaged in, and distracted by,
loving that out of him and without him, which they
ought not to love but in him and for him.
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