John, Spiritual Canticle 15

STANZA XVI

Catch us the foxes,
For our vineyard hath flourished;
While of roses
We make a nosegay,
And let no one appear on the hill.

1 THE soul, anxious that this interior delight of love, which is theflowers of the vineyard, should not be interrupted, either byenvious and malicious devils, or the raging desires of sensuality,or the various comings and goings of the imagination, or any otherconsciousness or presence of created things, calls upon the angelsto seize and hinder all these from interrupting its practice ofinterior love, in the joy and sweetness of which the soul and theSon of God communicate and delight in the virtues and graces.

'Catch us the foxes, for our vineyard hath flourished.'

2. The vineyard is the plantation in this holy soul of all thevirtues which minister to it the wine of sweet taste. The vineyardof the soul is then flourishing when it is united in will to theBridegroom, and delights itself in Him in all the virtues.Sometimes, as I have just said, the memory and the fancy areassailed by various forms and imaginings, and divers motions anddesires trouble the sensual part. The great variety and diversityof these made David say, when he felt the inconvenience and thetrouble of them as he was drinking of the sweet wine of thespirit, thirsting greatly after God: 'For Thee my soul haththirsted, for Thee my flesh, O how many ways.' (159)

3. Here the soul calls the whole troop of desires and stirringsof sense, foxes, because of the great resemblance between them atthis time. As foxes pretend to be asleep that they may pounce upontheir prey when it comes in their way, so all the desires andpowers of sense in the soul are asleep until the flowers of virtuegrow, flourish, and bloom. Then the desires and powers of senseawake to resist the Spirit and domineer. 'The flesh lustethagainst the spirit,' (160) and as the inclination of it is towardsthe sensual desires, it is disgusted as soon as it tastes of theSpirit, and herein the desires prove extremely troublesome tospiritual sweetness.

'Catch us the foxes.'

4. The evil spirits now molest the soul in two ways. Theyvehemently excite the desires, and employ them with otherimaginations to assail the peaceful and flourishing kingdom of thesoul. Then--and this is much worse--when they do not succeed instirring up the desires, they assail the soul with bodily painsand noises in order to distract it. And, what is still moreserious, they fight with spiritual horror and dread, and sometimeswith fearful torments, which, at this time, if God permits them,they can most effectually bring about, for inasmuch as the soul isnow spiritually detached, so as to perform its spiritualexercises, the devil being himself a spirit presents himselfbefore it with great ease.

5. At other times the evil spirit assails the soul with otherhorrors, before it begins to have the fruition of the sweetflowers, when God is beginning to draw it forth out of the houseof sense that it may enter on the interior exercises in the gardenof the Bridegroom, for he knows well that once entered into thisstate of recollection it is there so protected that,notwithstanding all he can do, he cannot hurt it. Very often, too,when the devil goes forth to meet the soul, the soul becomesquickly recollected in the secret depths of its interior, where itfinds great sweetness and protection; then those terrors of Satanare so far off that they not only produce no fear, but are eventhe occasion of peace and joy. The bride, in the Canticle, speaksof these terrors, saying, 'My soul troubled me for the chariots ofAminadab.' (161) Aminadab is the evil spirit, and his chariots arehis assaults upon the soul, which he makes with great violence,noise, and confusion.

6. The bride also says what the soul says here, namely: 'Catch usthe little foxes that destroy the vineyards; for our vineyard hathflourished.' (162) She does not say, 'Catch me' but 'Catch us,'because she is speaking of herself and the Beloved; for they areone, and enjoy the flourishing of the vineyard together.

7. The reason why the vineyard is said to be flourishing and notbearing fruit is this: the soul in this life has the fruition ofvirtues, however perfect they may be, only in their flower,because the fruit of them is reserved for the life to come.

'While of roses we make a nosegay.'

8. Now, at this time, while the soul is rejoicing in theflourishing of the vineyard, and delighting itself in the bosom ofthe Beloved, all its virtues are perfect, exhibiting themselves tothe soul, and sending forth great sweetness and delight. The soulfeels them to be in itself and in God so as to seem to be onevineyard most flourishing and pleasing belonging to both, whereinthey feed and delight. Then the soul binds all its virtuestogether, makes acts of love in each of them separately, and inall together, and then offers them all to the Beloved, with greattenderness of love and sweetness, and in this the Beloved helpsit, for without His help and favour it cannot make this union andoblation of virtue to the Beloved. Hence it says, 'We make anosegay'--that is 'the Beloved and myself.'

9. This union of the virtues is called a nosegay; for as a nosegayis cone-like in form, and a cone is strong, containing andembracing many pieces firmly joined together, so this cone-likenosegay of the virtues which the soul makes for the Beloved is theuniform perfection of the soul which firmly and solidly containsand embraces many perfections, great virtues, and rich endowments;for all the perfections and virtues of the soul unite together toform but one. And while this perfection is being accomplished, andwhen accomplished, offered to the Beloved on the part of the soul,it becomes necessary to catch the foxes that they may not hinderthis mutual interior communication. The soul prays not only thatthis nosegay may be carefully made, but also adds, 'And let no oneappear on the hill.'

10. This divine interior exercise requires solitude and detachmentfrom all things, whether in the lower part of the soul, which isthat of sense, or in the higher, which is the rational. These twodivisions comprise all the faculties and senses of man, and arehere called the hill; because all our natural notions and desiresbeing in them, as quarry on a hill, the devil lies in wait amongthese notions and desires, in order that he may injure the soul.

'And let no one appear on the hill.'

11. That is, let no representation or image of any objectwhatever, appertaining to any of these faculties or senses, appearin the presence of the soul and the Bridegroom: in other words,let the spiritual powers of the soul, memory, understanding, andwill, be divested of all notions, particular inclinations, orconsiderations whatsoever; and let all the senses and faculties ofthe body, interior as well as exterior, the imagination, thefancy, the sight and hearing, and the rest, be divested of alloccasions of distractions, of all forms, images, andrepresentations, and of all other natural operations.

12. The soul speaks in this way because it is necessary for theperfect fruition of this communication of God, that all the sensesand powers, both interior and exterior, should be disencumberedand emptied of their proper objects and operations; for the moreactive they are, the greater will be the hindrance which they willoccasion. The soul having attained to a certain interior union oflove, the spiritual faculties of it are no longer active, andstill less those of the body; for now that the union of love isactually wrought in love, the faculties of the soul cease fromtheir exertions, because now that the goal is reached allemployment of means is at an end. What the soul at this time hasto do is to wait lovingly upon God, and this waiting is love in acontinuation of unitive love. Let no one, therefore, appear on thehill, but the will only waiting on the Beloved in the offering upof self and of all the virtues in the way described.

NOTE

FOR the clearer understanding of the following stanza, we mustkeep in mind that the absence of the Beloved, from which the soulsuffers in the state of spiritual betrothal, is an exceedinglygreat affliction, and at times greater than all other trialswhatever. The reason is this: the love of the soul for God is nowso vehement and deep that the pain of His absence is vehement anddeep also. This pain is increased also by the annoyance whichcomes from intercourse with creatures, which is very great; forthe soul, under the pressure of its quickened desire of union withGod, finds all other conversation most painful and difficult toendure. It is like a stone in its flight to the place whither itis rapidly tending; every obstacle it meets with occasions aviolent shock. And as the soul has tasted of the sweetness of theBeloved's visits, which are more desirable than gold and all thatis beautiful, it therefore dreads even a momentary absence, andaddresses itself as follows to aridities, and to the Spirit of theBridegroom:--



STANZA XVII

O killing north wind, cease!
Come, south wind, that awakenest love!
Blow through my garden,
And let its odours flow,
And the Beloved shall feed among the flowers.

1 BESIDE the causes mentioned in the foregoing stanza, spiritualdryness also hinders the fruition of this interior sweetness ofwhich I have been speaking, and afraid of it the soul had recourseto two expedients, to which it refers in the present stanza. Thefirst is to shut the door against it by unceasing prayer anddevotion. The second, to invoke the Holy Ghost; it is He Whodrives away dryness from the soul, maintains and increases itslove of the Bridegroom--that He may establish in it the practiceof virtue, and all this to the end that the Son of God, itsBridegroom, may rejoice and delight in it more and more, for itsonly aim is to please the Beloved.

'Killing north wind, cease.'

2. The north wind is exceedingly cold; it dries up and parchesflowers and plants, and at the least, when it blows, causes themto draw in and shrink. So, dryness of spirit and the sensibleabsence of the Beloved, because they produce the same effect onthe soul, exhausting the sweetness and fragrance of virtue, arehere called the killing north wind; for all the virtues andaffective devotions of the soul are then dead. Hence the souladdresses itself to it, saying, 'Killing north wind, cease.' Thesewords mean that the soul applies itself to spiritual exercise, inorder to escape aridity. But the communications of God are now sointerior that by no exertion of its faculties can the soul attainto them if the Spirit of the Bridegroom do not cause thesemovements of love. The soul, therefore, addresses Him, saying:

'Come, south wind, that awakenest love.'

3. The south wind is another wind commonly called the south-westwind. It is soft, and brings rain; it makes the grass and plantsgrow, flowers to blossom and scatter their perfume abroad; inshort, it is the very opposite in its effects of the north wind.By it is meant here the Holy Ghost, Who awakeneth love; for whenthis divine Breath breathes on the soul, it so inflames andrefreshes it, so quickens the will, and stirs up the desires,which were before low and asleep as to the love of God, that wemay well say of it that it quickens the love between Him and thesoul. The prayer of the soul to the Holy Ghost is thus expressed,'Blow through my garden.'

4. This garden is the soul itself. For as the soul said of itselfbefore, that it was a flourishing vineyard, because the flowers ofvirtue which are in it give forth the wine of sweetness, so hereit says of itself that it is a garden, because the flowers ofperfection and the virtues are planted in it, flourish, and grow.

5. Observe, too, that the expression is 'blow through my garden,'not blow in it. There is a great difference between God'sbreathing into the soul and through it. To breathe into the soulis to infuse into it graces, gifts, and virtues; to breathethrough it is, on the part of God, to touch and move its virtuesand perfections now possessed, renewing them and stirring them insuch a way that they send forth their marvellous fragrance andsweetness. Thus aromatic spices, when shaken or touched, giveforth the abundant odours which are not otherwise so distinctlyperceived. The soul is not always in the conscious fruition of itsacquired and infused virtues, because, in this life, they are likeflowers in seed, or in bud, or like aromatic spices covered over,the perfume of which is not perceived till they are exposed andshaken.

6. But God sometimes is so merciful to the bride-soul, as--theHoly Ghost breathing meanwhile through the flourishing garden--toopen these buds of virtue and expose the aromatic herbs of thesoul's gifts, perfections, and riches, to manifest to it itsinterior treasures and to reveal to it all its beauty. It is thenmarvellous to behold, and sweet to feel, the abundance of thegifts now revealed in the soul, and the beauty of the flowers ofvirtue now flourishing in it. No language can describe thefragrance which every one of them diffuses, each according to itskind. This state of the soul is referred to in the words, 'Let itsodours flow.'

7. So abundant are these odours at times, that the soul seemsenveloped in delight and bathed in inestimable bliss. Not only isit conscious itself of them, but they even overflow it, so thatthose who know how to discern these things can perceive them. Thesoul in this state seems to them as a delectable garden, full ofthe joys and riches of God. This is observable in holy souls, notonly when the flowers open, but almost always; for they have acertain air of grandeur and dignity which inspires the beholderswith awe and reverence, because of the supernatural effects oftheir close and familiar converse with God. We have anillustration of this in the life of Moses, the sight of whose facethe people could not bear, by reason of the glory that rested uponit--the effect of his speaking to God face to face. (163)

8. While the Holy Ghost is breathing through the garden--this isHis visitation of the soul--the Bridegroom Son of God communicatesHimself to it in a profound way, enamoured of it. It is for thisthat He sends the Holy Spirit before Him--as He sent theApostles (164)--to make ready the chamber of the soul His bride,comforting it with delight, setting its garden in order, openingits flowers, revealing its gifts, and adorning it with thetapestry of graces. The bride-soul longs for this with all itsmight, and therefore bids the north wind not to blow, and invokesthe south wind to blow through the garden, because she gains muchhere at once.

9. The bride now gains the fruition of all her virtues in theirsweetest exercise. She gains the fruition of her Beloved in them,because it is through them that He converses with her in mostintimate love, and grants her favours greater than any of thepast. She gains, too, that her Beloved delights more in herbecause of the actual exercise of virtue, which is what pleasesher most, namely, that her Beloved should be pleased with her. Shegains also the permanent continuance of the sweet fragrance whichremains in the soul while the Bridegroom is present, and the brideentertains Him with the sweetness of her virtues, as it iswritten: 'While the King was at His repose,' that is, in the soul,'my spikenard sent forth its odour.' (165) The spikenard is thesoul, which from the flowers of its virtues sends forth sweetodours to the Beloved, Who dwells within it in the union of love.

10. It is therefore very much to be desired that every soul shouldpray the Holy Ghost to blow through its garden, that the divineodours of God may flow. And as this is so necessary, so blissfuland profitable to the soul, the bride desires it, and prays forit, in the words of the Canticle, saying, 'Arise, north wind, andcome, south wind; blow through my garden, and let the aromaticalspices thereof flow.' (166) The soul prays for this, not becauseof the delight and bliss consequent upon it, but because of thedelight it ministers to the Beloved, and because it prepares theway and announces the presence of the Son of God, Who cometh torejoice in it. Hence the soul adds:

'And my Beloved shall feed among the flowers.'

11. The delight which the Son of God finds now in the soul isdescribed as pasture. This word expresses most forcibly the truth,because pasture not only gladdeneth, but also sustaineth. Thus theSon of God delights in the soul, in the delights thereof, and issustained in them--that is, He abides within it as in a placewhich pleases Him exceedingly, because the place itself reallydelights in Him. This, I believe, is the meaning of those wordsrecorded in the proverbs of Solomon: 'My delights were to be withthe children of men;' (167) that is, when they delight to be withMe, Who am the Son of God.

12. Observe, here, that it is not said that the Beloved shall feedon the flowers, but that He shall feed among the flowers. For, asthe communications of the Beloved are in the soul itself, throughthe adornment of the virtues, it follows that what He feeds on isthe soul which He transformed into Himself, now that it isprepared and adorned with these flowers of virtues, graces, andperfections, which are the things whereby, and among which, Hefeeds. These, by the power of the Holy Ghost, are sending forth inthe soul the odours of sweetness to the Son of God, that He mayfeed there the more in the love thereof; for this is the love ofthe Bridegroom, to be united to the soul amid the fragrance of theflowers.

13. The bride in the Canticle has observed this, for she hadexperience of it, saying: 'My Beloved is gone down into Hisgarden, to the bed of aromatical spices,to feed in the gardens,and to gather lilies. I to my Beloved, and my Beloved to me, Whofeedeth among the lilies' (168) That is, 'Who feedeth anddelighteth in my soul, which is His garden, among the lilies of myvirtues, perfections, and graces.'

NOTE

IN the state of spiritual espousals the soul contemplating itsgreat riches and excellence, but unable to enter into thepossession and fruition of them as it desires, because it is stillin the flesh, often suffers exceedingly, and then moreparticularly when its knowledge of them becomes more profound. Itthen sees itself in the body, like a prince in prison, subject toall misery, whose authority is disregarded, whose territories andwealth are confiscated, and who of his former substance receivesbut a miserable dole. How greatly he suffers any one may see,especially when his household is no longer obedient, and hisslaves and servants, forgetting all respect, plunder him of thescanty provisions of his table. Thus is it with the soul in thebody, for when God mercifully admits it to a foretaste of the goodthings which He has prepared for it, the wicked servants of desirein the sensual part, now a slave of disorderly motions, now otherrebellious movements, rise up against it in order to rob it of itsgood.

2. The soul feels itself as if it were in the land of enemies,tyrannised over by the stranger, like the dead among the dead. Itsfeelings are those which the prophet Baruch gave vent to when hedescribed the misery of Jacob's captivity: 'How happeneth it, OIsrael, that thou art in thy enemies' land? thou art grown old ina strange country, thou art defiled with the dead: thou artcounted with them that go down into hell.' (169) This misery ofthe soul, in the captivity of the body, is thus spoken of byJeremias, saying: 'Is Israel a bondman or a home-born slave? Whythen is he become a prey? The lions have roared upon him, and havemade a noise.' (170) The lions are the desires and the rebelliousmotions of the tyrant king of sensuality. In order to express thetrouble which this tyrant occasions, and the desire of the soul tosee this kingdom of sensuality with all its hosts destroyed, orwholly subject to the spirit, the soul lifting up its eyes to theBridegroom, as to one who can effect it, speaks against thoserebellious motions in the words of the next stanza.



STANZA XVIII

O nymphs of Judea!
While amid the flowers and the rose-trees
The amber sends forth its perfume,
Tarry in the suburbs,
And touch not our thresholds.

IT is the bride that speaks; for seeing herself, as to the higherpart of the soul, adorned with the rich endowments of her Beloved,and seeing Him delighting in her, she desires to preserve herselfin security, and in the continued fruition of them. Seeing alsothat hindrances will arise, as in fact they do, from the sensualpart of the soul, which will disturb so great a good, she bids theoperations and motions of the soul's lower nature to cease, in thesenses and faculties of it, and sensuality not to overstep itsboundaries to trouble and disquiet the higher and spiritualportion of the soul: not to hinder even for a moment the sweetnessshe enjoys. The motions of the lower part, and their powers, ifthey show themselves during the enjoyment of the spirit, are somuch more troublesome and disturbing, the more active they are.

'O nymphs of Judea.'

2. The lower, that is the sensual part of the soul, is calledJudea. It is called Judea because it is weak, and carnal, andblind, like the Jewish people. All the imaginations, fancies,motions, and inclinations of the lower part of the soul are callednymphs, for as nymphs with their beauty and attractions entice mento love them, so the operations and motions of sensuality softlyand earnestly strive to entice the will from the rational part, inorder to withdraw it from that which is interior, and to fix it onthat which is exterior, to which they are prone themselves. Theyalso strive to influence the understanding to join with them intheir low views, and to bring down reason to the level of sense bythe attractions of the latter. The soul, therefore, says ineffect: 'O sensual operations and motions.'

'While amid the flowers and the rose-trees.'

3. The flowers, as I have said, are the virtues of the soul, andthe rose-trees are its powers, memory, understanding, and will,which produce and nurture the flowers of divine conceptions, actsof love and the virtues, while the amber sends forth its perfumein the virtues and powers of the soul.

'The amber sends forth its perfume.'

4. The amber is the divine spirit of the Bridegroom Who dwells inthe soul. To send forth the perfume among the flowers and therose-trees, is to diffuse and communicate Himself most sweetly inthe powers and virtues of the soul, thereby filling it with theperfume of divine sweetness. Meanwhile, then, when the DivineSpirit is filling my soul with spiritual sweetness,

'Tarry in the suburbs.'

5. In the suburbs of Judea, which is the inferior or sensual partof the soul. The suburbs are the interior senses, namely, memory,fancy, and imagination, where forms and images of things collect,by the help of which sensuality stirs up concupiscence anddesires. These forms are the nymphs, and while they are quiet andtranquil the desires are also asleep. They enter into the suburbsof the interior senses by the gates of the outward senses, ofsight, hearing, smell, etc. We can thus give the name of suburbsto all the powers and interior or exterior senses of the sensualpart of the soul, because they are outside the walls of the city.

6. That part of the soul which may be called the city is thatwhich is most interior, the rational part, which is capable ofconverse with God, the operations of which are contrary to thoseof sensuality. But there is a natural intercourse between thosewho dwell in the suburbs of the sensual part--that is, the nymphs--and those who dwell in the higher part, which is the city itself;and, therefore, what takes place in the lower part is ordinarilyfelt in the higher, and consequently compels attention to itselfand disturbs the spiritual operation which is conversant with God.Hence the soul bids the nymphs tarry in the suburbs--that is, toremain at rest in the exterior and interior senses of the sensualpart,

'And touch not our thresholds.'

7. Let not even your first movements touch the higher part, forthe first movements of the soul are the entrance and thresholds ofit. When the first movements have passed into the reason, theyhave crossed the threshold, but when they remain as firstmovements only they are then said merely to touch the threshold,or to cry at the gate, which is the case when reason and sensecontend over an unreasonable act. The soul here not only bidsthese not to touch it, but also charges all considerationswhatever which do not minister to its repose and the good itenjoys to keep far away.

NOTE

THE soul in this state is become so great an enemy of the lowerpart, and its operations, that it would have God communicatenothing to it when He communicates with the higher. If He willcommunicate with the lower, it must be in a slight degree, or thesoul, because of its natural weakness, will be unable to endure itwithout fainting, and consequently the spirit cannot rejoice inpeace, because it is then troubled. 'For,' as the wise man says,'the body that is corrupted burdeneth the soul.' (171) And as thesoul longs for the highest and noblest converse with God, which isimpossible in the company of the sensual part, it begs of God todeal with it without the intervention of the senses. That sublimevision of St. Paul in the third heaven, wherein, he says, he sawGod, but yet knew not whether he was in the body or out of thebody, must have been, be it what it may, independent of the body:for if the body had any share in it, he must have known it, andthe vision could not have been what it was, seeing that he 'heardsecret words which it is not lawful for a man to speak.' (172) Thesoul, therefore, knowing well that graces so great cannot bereceived in a vessel so mean, and longing to receive them out ofthe body,--or at least without it, addresses the Bridegroom in thewords that follow:



STANZA XIX

Hide thyself, O my Beloved!
Turn Thy face to the mountains,
Do not speak,
But regard the companions
Of her who is travelling amidst strange islands.

1 HERE the bride presents four petitions to the Bridegroom. Sheprays that He would be pleased to converse with her mostinteriorly in the secret chamber of the soul. The second, that Hewould invest and inform her faculties with the glory andexcellence of His Divinity. The third, that He would converse withher so profoundly as to surpass all knowledge and expression, andin such a way that the exterior and sensual part may not perceiveit. The fourth, that He would love the many virtues and graceswhich He has implanted in her, adorned with which she is ascendingupwards to God in the highest knowledge of the Divinity, and intransports of love most strange and singular, surpassing those ofordinary experience.

'Hide Thyself, O my Beloved!'

2. 'O my Bridegroom, most beloved, hide Thyself in the inmostdepths of my soul, communicating Thyself to it in secret, andmanifesting Thy hidden wonders which no mortal eyes may see.

'Turn Thy face to the mountains.'

3. The face of God is His divinity. The mountains are the powersof the soul, memory, understanding, and will. Thus the meaning ofthese words is: Enlighten my understanding with Thy Divinity, andgive it the divine intelligence, fill my will with divine love,and my memory with divine possession of glory. The bride hereprays for all that may be prayed for; for she is not content withthat knowledge of God once granted to Moses (173)--the knowledgeof Him by His works--for she prays to see the face of God, whichis the essential communication of His Divinity to the soul,without any intervening medium, by a certain knowledge thereof inthe Divinity. This is something beyond sense, and divested ofaccidents, inasmuch as it is the contact of pure substances--thatis, of the soul and the Divinity.

'Do not speak.'

4. That is, do not speak as before, when Thy converse with me wasknown to the outward senses, for it was once such as to becomprehended by them; it was not so profound but they could fathomit. Now let Thy converse with me be so deep and so substantial,and so interior, as to be above the reach of the senses; for thesubstance of the spirit is incommunicable to sense, and thecommunication made through the senses, especially in this life,cannot be purely spiritual, because the senses are not capable ofit. The soul, therefore, longing for that substantial andessential communication of God, of which sense cannot becognizant, prays the Bridegroom not to speak: that is to say, letthe deep secret of the spiritual union be such as to escape thenotice of the senses, like the secret which St. Paul heard, andwhich it is not lawful for a man to speak. (174)

'But regard the companions.'

5. The regard of God is love and grace. The companions here arethe many virtues of the soul, its gifts, perfections, and otherspiritual graces with which God has endowed it; pledges, tokens,and presents of its betrothal. Thus the meaning of the words seemsto be this: 'Turn Thou Thy face to the interior of my soul, O myBeloved; be enamoured of the treasures which Thou hast laid upthere, so that, enamoured of them, Thou mayest hide Thyself amongthem and there dwell; for in truth, though they are Thine, theyare mine also, because Thou hast given them.'

'Of her who travels amidst strange islands.'

6. That is, 'Of my soul tending towards Thee through strangeknowledge of Thee, by strange ways'--strange to sense and to theordinary perceptions of nature. It is as if the bride said, by wayof constraining Him to yield: 'Seeing that my soul is tendingtowards Thee through knowledge which is spiritual, strange,unknown to sense, do Thou also communicate Thyself to it sointeriorly and so profoundly that the senses may not observe it.'

NOTE

IN order to the attainment of a state of perfection so high asthis of the spiritual marriage, the soul that aims at it must notonly be purified and cleansed from all the imperfections,rebellions, and imperfect habits of the inferior part, which isnow--the old man being put away--subject and obedient to thehigher, but it must also have great courage and most exalted lovefor so strong and close an embrace of God. For in this state thesoul not only attains to exceeding pureness and beauty, but alsoacquires a terrible strength by reason of that strict and closebond which in this union binds it to God. The soul, therefore, inorder to reach this state must have purity, strength, and adequatelove. The Holy Ghost, the author of this spiritual union, desirousthat the soul should attain thus far in order to merit it,addresses Himself to the Father and the Son, saying: 'Our sisteris little, and hath no breasts. What shall we do to our sister inthe day when she is to be spoken to? If she be a wall, let usbuild upon it bulwarks of silver; if she be a door, let us join ittogether with boards of cedar.' (175)

2. The 'bulwarks of silver' are the strong heroic virtuescomprised in the faith, which is signified by silver, and theseheroic virtues are those of the spiritual marriage, which arebuilt upon the soul, signified by the wall, relying on thestrength of which, the peaceful Bridegroom reposes undisturbed byany infirmities. The 'boards of cedar' are the affections andaccessories of this deep love which is signified by the cedar-tree, and this is the love of the spiritual marriage. In order 'tojoin it together,' that is, to adorn the bride, it is necessaryshe should be the door for the Bridegroom to enter through,keeping the door of the will open in a perfect and true consent oflove, which is the consent of the betrothal given previous to thespiritual marriage. The breasts of the bride are also this perfectlove which she must have in order to appear in the presence ofChrist her Bridegroom for the perfection of such a state.

3. It is written in the Canticle that the bride in her longing forthis presence immediately replied, saying: 'I am a wall: and mybreasts are as a tower'--that is, 'My soul is strong, and my lovemost deep'--that He may not fail her on that ground. The bride,too, had expressed as much in the preceding stanzas, out of thefulness of her longing for the perfect union and transformation,and particularly in the last, wherein she set before theBridegroom all the virtues, graces, and good dispositions withwhich she was adorned by Him, and that with the object of makingHim the prisoner of her love.

4. Now the Bridegroom, to bring this matter to a close, replies inthe two stanzas that follow, which describe Him as perfectlypurifying the soul, strengthening and disposing it, both as to itssensual and spiritual part, for this state, and charging allresistance and rebellion, both of the flesh and of the devil, tocease, saying:




John, Spiritual Canticle 15