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"Dark Night of the Soul" by St. John of the Cross

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Title: Dark Night of the Soul
Creator(s): John of the Cross, St. (1542-1591)
CCEL Subjects: All; Classic; Mysticism;
LC Call no: BV5080
LC Subjects:

Practical theology

Practical religion. The Christian life

Mysticism
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DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL

by

Saint John of the Cross

DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH

THIRD REVISED EDITION

Translated and edited, with an Introduction,

by E. ALLISON PEERS

from the critical edition of
P. SILVERIO DE SANTA TERESA, C.D.

TO THE
DISCALCED CARMELITES OF CASTILE,

WITH ABIDING MEMORIES OF THEIR HOSPITALITY AND KINDNESS
IN MADRID, AVILA AND BURGOS,
BUT ABOVE ALL OF THEIR DEVOTION TO
SAINT JOHN OF THE CROSS,
I DEDICATE THIS TRANSLATION
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PREFACE TO THE ELECTRONIC EDITION

This electronic edition (v 0.9) was scanned in 1994 from an
uncopyrighted 1959 Image Books third edition of the Dark Night. The
entire text except for the translator's preface and some of the
footnotes have been reproduced. Nearly 400 footnotes (and parts of
footnotes) describing variations among manuscripts have been omitted.
Page number references in the footnotes have been changed to chapter
and section where possible. This edition has been proofread once, but
additional errors may remain. The translator's preface to the first and
second editions may be found with the electronic edition of Ascent of
Mount Carmel.
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PRINCIPAL ABBREVIATIONS

A.V.--Authorized Version of the Bible (1611).

D.V.--Douai Version of the Bible (1609).

C.W.S.T.J.--The Complete Works of Saint Teresa of Jesus, translated and
edited by E. Allison Peers from the critical edition of P. Silverio de
Santa Teresa, C.D. London, Sheed and Ward, 1946. 3 vols.

H.--E. Allison Peers: Handbook to the Life and Times of St. Teresa and
St. John of the Cross. London, Burns Oates and Washbourne, 1953.

LL.--The Letters of Saint Teresa of Jesus, translated and edited by E.
Allison Peers from the critical edition of P. Silverio de Santa Teresa,
C.D. London, Burns Oates and Washbourne, 1951. 2 vols.

N.L.M.--National Library of Spain (Biblioteca Nacional), Madrid.

Obras (P. Silv.)--Obras de San Juan de la Cruz, Doctor de la Iglesia,
editadas y anotadas por el P. Silverio de Santa Teresa, C.D. Burgos,
1929-31. 5 vols.

S.S.M.--E. Allison Peers: Studies of the Spanish Mystics. Vol. I,
London, Sheldon Press, 1927; 2nd ed., London, S.P.C.K., 1951. Vol. II,
London, Sheldon Press, 1930.

Sobrino.--Jose Antonio de Sobrino, S.J.: Estudios sobre San Juan de la
Cruz y nuevos textos de su obra. Madrid, 1950.
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DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL

INTRODUCTION

SOMEWHAT reluctantly, out of respect for a venerable tradition, we
publish the Dark Night as a separate treatise, though in reality it is
a continuation of the Ascent of Mount Carmel and fulfils the
undertakings given in it:

The first night or purgation is of the sensual part of the soul,
which is treated in the present stanza, and will be treated in the
first part of this book. And the second is of the spiritual part; of
this speaks the second stanza, which follows; and of this we shall
treat likewise, in the second and the third part, with respect to
the activity of the soul; and in the fourth part, with respect to
its passivity. <1>

This fourth part' is the Dark Night. Of it the Saint writes in a
passage which follows that just quoted:

And the second night, or purification, pertains to those who are
already proficient, occurring at the time when God desires to bring
them to the state of union with God. And this latter night is a more
obscure and dark and terrible purgation, as we shall say afterwards.
<2>

In his three earlier books he has written of the Active Night, of Sense
and of Spirit; he now proposes to deal with the Passive Night, in the
same order. He has already taught us how we are to deny and purify
ourselves with the ordinary help of grace, in order to prepare our
senses and faculties for union with God through love. He now proceeds
to explain, with an arresting freshness, how these same senses and
faculties are purged and purified by God with a view to the same
end--that of union. The combined description of the two nights
completes the presentation of active and passive purgation, to which
the Saint limits himself in these treatises, although the subject of
the stanzas which he is glossing is a much wider one, comprising the
whole of the mystical life and ending only with the Divine embraces of
the soul transformed in God through love.

The stanzas expounded by the Saint are taken from the same poem in the
two treatises. The commentary upon the second, however, is very
different from that upon the first, for it assumes a much more advanced
state of development. The Active Night has left the senses and
faculties well prepared, though not completely prepared, for the
reception of Divine influences and illuminations in greater abundance
than before. The Saint here postulates a principle of dogmatic
theology--that by himself, and with the ordinary aid of grace, man
cannot attain to that degree of purgation which is essential to his
transformation in God. He needs Divine aid more abundantly. However
greatly the soul itself labours,' writes the Saint, it cannot actively
purify itself so as to be in the least degree prepared for the Divine
union of perfection of love, if God takes not its hand and purges it
not in that dark fire.' <3>

The Passive Nights, in which it is God Who accomplishes the purgation,
are based upon this incapacity. Souls begin to enter' this dark night

when God draws them forth from the state of beginners--which is the
state of those that meditate on the spiritual road--and begins to
set them in the state of progressives--which is that of those who
are already contemplatives--to the end that, after passing through
it, they may arrive at the state of the perfect, which is that of
the Divine union of the soul with God. <4>

Before explaining the nature and effects of this Passive Night, the
Saint touches, in passing, upon certain imperfections found in those
who are about to enter it and which it removes by the process of
purgation. Such travellers are still untried proficients, who have not
yet acquired mature habits of spirituality and who therefore still
conduct themselves as children. The imperfections are examined one by
one, following the order of the seven deadly sins, in chapters
(ii-viii) which once more reveal the author's skill as a director of
souls. They are easy chapters to understand, and of great practical
utility, comparable to those in the first book of the Ascent which deal
with the active purgation of the desires of sense.

In Chapter viii, St. John of the Cross begins to describe the Passive
Night of the senses, the principal aim of which is the purgation or
stripping of the soul of its imperfections and the preparation of it
for fruitive union. The Passive Night of Sense, we are told, is common'
and comes to many,' whereas that of Spirit is the portion of very few.'
<5> The one is bitter and terrible' but the second bears no comparison
with it,' for it is horrible and awful to the spirit.' <6> A good deal
of literature on the former Night existed in the time of St. John of
the Cross and he therefore promises to be brief in his treatment of it.
Of the latter, on the other hand, he will treat more fully . . . since
very little has been said of this, either in speech or in writing, and
very little is known of it, even by experience.' <7>

Having described this Passive Night of Sense in Chapter viii, he
explains with great insight and discernment how it may be recognized
whether any given aridity is a result of this Night or whether it comes
from sins or imperfections, or from frailty or lukewarmness of spirit,
or even from indisposition or humours' of the body. The Saint is
particularly effective here, and we may once more compare this chapter
with a similar one in the Ascent (II, xiii)--that in which he fixes the
point where the soul may abandon discursive meditation and enter the
contemplation which belongs to loving and simple faith.

Both these chapters have contributed to the reputation of St. John of
the Cross as a consummate spiritual master. And this not only for the
objective value of his observations, but because, even in spite of
himself, he betrays the sublimity of his own mystical experiences. Once
more, too, we may admire the crystalline transparency of his teaching
and the precision of the phrases in which he clothes it. To judge by
his language alone, one might suppose at times that he is speaking of
mathematical, rather than of spiritual operations.

In Chapter x, the Saint describes the discipline which the soul in this
Dark Night must impose upon itself; this, as might be logically deduced
from the Ascent, consists in allowing the soul to remain in peace and
quietness,' content with a peaceful and loving attentiveness toward
God.' <8> Before long it will experience enkindlings of love (Chapter
xi), which will serve to purify its sins and imperfections and draw it
gradually nearer to God; we have here, as it were, so many stages of
the ascent of the Mount on whose summit the soul attains to
transforming union. Chapters xii and xiii detail with great exactness
the benefits that the soul receives from this aridity, while Chapter
xiv briefly expounds the last line of the first stanza and brings to an
end what the Saint desires to say with respect to the first Passive
Night.

At only slightly greater length St. John of the Cross describes the
Passive Night of the Spirit, which is at once more afflictive and more
painful than those which have preceded it. This, nevertheless, is the
Dark Night par excellence, of which the Saint speaks in these words:
The night which we have called that of sense may and should be called a
kind of correction and restraint of the desire rather than purgation.
The reason is that all the imperfections and disorders of the sensual
part have their strength and root in the spirit, where all habits, both
good and bad, are brought into subjection, and thus, until these are
purged, the rebellions and depravities of sense cannot be purged
thoroughly.' <9>

Spiritual persons, we are told, do not enter the second night
immediately after leaving the first; on the contrary, they generally
pass a long time, even years, before doing so, <10> for they still have
many imperfections, both habitual and actual (Chapter ii). After a
brief introduction (Chapter iii), the Saint describes with some
fullness the nature of this spiritual purgation or dark contemplation
referred to in the first stanza of his poem and the varieties of pain
and affliction caused by it, whether in the soul or in its faculties
(Chapters iv-viii). These chapters are brilliant beyond all
description; in them we seem to reach the culminating point of their
author's mystical experience; any excerpt from them would do them an
injustice. It must suffice to say that St. John of the Cross seldom
again touches those same heights of sublimity.

Chapter ix describes how, although these purgations seem to blind the
spirit, they do so only to enlighten it again with a brighter and
intenser light, which it is preparing itself to receive with greater
abundance. The following chapter makes the comparison between spiritual
purgation and the log of wood which gradually becomes transformed
through being immersed in fire and at last takes on the fire's own
properties. The force with which the familiar similitude is driven home
impresses indelibly upon the mind the fundamental concept of this most
sublime of all purgations. Marvellous, indeed, are its effects, from
the first enkindlings and burnings of Divine love, which are greater
beyond comparison than those produced by the Night of Sense, the one
being as different from the other as is the body from the soul. For
this (latter) is an enkindling of spiritual love in the soul, which, in
the midst of these dark confines, feels itself to be keenly and sharply
wounded in strong Divine love, and to have a certain realization and
foretaste of God.' <11> No less wonderful are the effects of the
powerful Divine illumination which from time to time enfolds the soul
in the splendours of glory. When the effects of the light that wounds
and yet illumines are combined with those of the enkindlement that
melts the soul with its heat, the delights experienced are so great as
to be ineffable.

The second line of the first stanza of the poem is expounded in three
admirable chapters (xi-xiii), while one short chapter (xiv) suffices
for the three lines remaining. We then embark upon the second stanza,
which describes the soul's security in the Dark Night--due, among other
reasons, to its being freed not only from itself, but likewise from its
other enemies, which are the world and the devil.' <12>

This contemplation is not only dark, but also secret (Chapter xvii),
and in Chapter xviii is compared to the staircase' of the poem. This
comparison suggests to the Saint an exposition (Chapters xviii, xix) of
the ten steps or degrees of love which comprise St. Bernard's mystical
ladder. Chapter xxi describes the soul's disguise,' from which the book
passes on (Chapters xxii, xxiii) to extol the happy chance' which led
it to journey in darkness and concealment' from its enemies, both
without and within.

Chapter xxiv glosses the last line of the second stanza--my house being
now at rest.' Both the higher and the lower portions of the soul' are
now tranquillized and prepared for the desired union with the Spouse, a
union which is the subject that the Saint proposed to treat in his
commentary on the five remaining stanzas. As far as we know, this
commentary was never written. We have only the briefest outline of what
was to have been covered in the third, in which, following the same
effective metaphor of night, the Saint describes the excellent
properties of the spiritual night of infused contemplation, through
which the soul journeys with no other guide or support, either outward
or inward, than the Divine love which burned in my heart.'

It is difficult to express adequately the sense of loss that one feels
at the premature truncation of this eloquent treatise. <13> We have
already given our opinion <14> upon the commentaries thought to have
been written on the final stanzas of the Dark Night.' Did we possess
them, they would explain the birth of the light--dawn's first
breathings in the heav'ns above'--which breaks through the black
darkness of the Active and the Passive Nights; they would tell us, too,
of the soul's further progress towards the Sun's full brightness. It is
true, of course, that some part of this great gap is filled by St. John
of the Cross himself in his other treatises, but it is small
compensation for the incomplete state in which he left this edifice of
such gigantic proportions that he should have given us other and
smaller buildings of a somewhat similar kind. Admirable as are the
Spiritual Canticle and the Living Flame of Love, they are not so
completely knit into one whole as is this great double treatise. They
lose both in flexibility and in substance through the closeness with
which they follow the stanzas of which they are the exposition. In the
Ascent and the Dark Night, on the other hand, we catch only the echoes
of the poem, which are all but lost in the resonance of the
philosopher's voice and the eloquent tones of the preacher. Nor have
the other treatises the learning and the authority of these. Nowhere
else does the genius of St. John of the Cross for infusing philosophy
into his mystical dissertations find such an outlet as here. Nowhere
else, again, is he quite so appealingly human; for, though he is human
even in his loftiest and sublimest passages, this intermingling of
philosophy with mystical theology makes him seem particularly so. These
treatises are a wonderful illustration of the theological truth that
grace, far from destroying nature, ennobles and dignifies it, and of
the agreement always found between the natural and the
supernatural--between the principles of sound reason and the sublimest
manifestations of Divine grace.
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<1> Ascent, Bk. I, chap. i, sect. 2.

<2> Op. cit., sect. 3.

<3> Dark Night, Bk. 1, chap. iii, sect. 3.

<4> Op. cit., Bk. I, chap. i, sect. 1.

<5> Dark Night, Bk. 1, chap. viii, sect. 1.

<6> Op. cit., Bk. I, chap. viii, sect. 2.

<7> Ibid.

<8> Dark Night, Bk. I, chap. x, sect. 4.

<9> Op. cit., Bk. II, chap. iii, sect. 1.

<10> Op. cit., Bk. II, chap. i, sect. 1.

<11> Dark Night, Bk. II, chap. xi, sect. 1.

<12> Dark Night, Bk. II, chap. xvi, sect. 2.

<13>

<14> Cf. pp. lviii-lxiii, Ascent of Mount Carmel (Image Books edition).
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MANUSCRIPTS OF THE DARK NIGHT

The autograph of the Dark Night, like that of the Ascent of Mount
Carmel, is unknown to us: the second seems to have disappeared in the
same period as the first. There are extant, however, as many as twelve
early copies of the Dark Night, some of which, though none of them is
as palaeographically accurate as the best copy of the Ascent, are very
reliable; there is no trace in them of conscious adulteration of the
original or of any kind of modification to fit the sense of any passage
into a preconceived theory. We definitely prefer one of these copies to
the others but we nowhere follow it so literally as to incorporate in
our text its evident discrepancies from its original.

MS. 3,446. An early MS. in the clear masculine hand of an Andalusian:
MS. 3,446 in the National Library, Madrid. Like many others, this MS.
was transferred to the library from the Convento de San Hermenegildo at
the time of the religious persecutions in the early nineteenth century;
it had been presented to the Archives of the Reform by the Fathers of
Los Remedios, Seville--a Carmelite house founded by P. Grecian in 1574.
It has no title and a fragment from the Living Flame of Love is bound
up with it.

This MS. has only two omissions of any length; these form part
respectively of Book II, Chapters xix and xxiii, dealing with the
Passive Night of the Spirit. It has many copyist's errors. At the same
time, its antiquity and origin, and the good faith of which it shows
continual signs, give it, in our view, primacy over the other copies
now to come under consideration. It must be made clear, nevertheless,
that there is no extant copy of the Dark Night as trustworthy and as
skilfully made as the Alcaudete MS. of the Ascent.

MS. of the Carmelite Nuns of Toledo. Written in three hands, all early.
Save for a few slips of the copyist, it agrees with the foregoing; a
few of its errors have been corrected. It bears no title, but has a
long sub-title which is in effect a partial summary of the argument.

MS. of the Carmelite Nuns of Valladolid. This famous convent, which was
one of St. Teresa's foundations, is very rich in Teresan autographs,
and has also a number of important documents relating to St. John of
the Cross, together with some copies of his works. That here described
is written in a large, clear hand and probably dates from the end of
the sixteenth century. It has a title similar to that of the last-named
copy. With few exceptions it follows the other most important MSS.

MS. Alba de Tormes. What has been said of this in the introduction to
the Ascent (Image Books edition, pp. 6-7) applies also to the Dark
Night. It is complete, save for small omissions on the part of the
amanuensis, the Argument' at the beginning of the poem, the verses
themselves and a few lines from Book II, Chapter vii.

MS. 6,624. This copy is almost identical with the foregoing. It omits
the Argument' and the poem itself but not the lines from Book II,
Chapter vii.

MS. 8,795. This contains the Dark Night, Spiritual Canticle, Living
Flame of Love, a number of poems by St. John of the Cross and the
Spiritual Colloquies between Christ and the soul His Bride. It is
written in various hands, all very early and some feminine. A note by
P. Andres de la Encarnacion, on the reverse of the first folio, records
that the copy was presented to the Archives of the Reform by the
Discalced Carmelite nuns of Baeza. This convent was founded in 1589,
two years before the Saint's death, and the copy may well date from
about this period. On the second folio comes the poem I entered in--I
knew not where.' On the reverse of the third folio begins a kind of
preface to the Dark Night, opening with the words: Begin the stanzas by
means of which a soul may occupy itself and become fervent in the love
of God. It deals with the Dark Night and is divided into two books. The
first treats of the purgation of sense, and the second of the spiritual
purgation of man. It was written by P. Fr. Juan de la Cruz, Discalced
Carmelite.' On the next folio, a so-called Preface: To the Reader'
begins: As a beginning and an explanation of these two purgations of
the Dark Night which are to be expounded hereafter, this chapter will
show how narrow is the path that leads to eternal life and how
completely detached and disencumbered must be those that are to enter
thereby.' This fundamental idea is developed for the space of two
folios. There follows a sonnet on the Dark Night, <15> and immediately
afterwards comes the text of the treatise.

The copy contains many errors, but its only omission is that of the
last chapter. There is no trace in it of any attempt to modify its
original; indeed, the very nature and number of the copyist's errors
are a testimony to his good faith.

MS. 12,658. A note by P. Andres states that he acquired it in Madrid
but has no more detailed recollection of its provenance. The Dark
Night,' it adds, begins on folio 43; our holy father is described
simply as "the second friar of the new Reformation," <16> which is
clear evidence of its antiquity.'

The Codex contains a number of opuscules, transcribed no doubt with a
devotional aim by the copyist. Its epoch is probably the end of the
sixteenth century; it is certainly earlier than the editions. There is
no serious omission except that of six lines of the Argument.' The
authors of the other works copied include St. Augustine, B. Juan de
Avila, P. Baltasar Alvarez and P. Tomas de Jesus.

The copies which remain to be described are all mutilated or
abbreviated and can be disposed of briefly:

MS. 13,498. This copy omits less of the Dark Night than of the Ascent
but few pages are without their omissions. In one place a meticulous
pair of scissors has removed the lower half of a folio on which the
Saint deals with spiritual luxury.

MS. of the Carmelite Friars of Toledo. Dates from early in the
seventeenth century and has numerous omissions, especially in the
chapters on the Passive Night of the Spirit. The date is given (in the
same hand as that which copies the title) as 1618. This MS. also
contains an opuscule by Suso and another entitled Brief compendium of
the most eminent Christian perfection of P. Fr. Juan de la Cruz.'

MS. 18,160. The copyist has treated the Dark Night little better than
the Ascent; except from the first ten and the last three chapters, he
omits freely.

MS. 12,411. Entitled by its copyist 'spiritual Compendium,' this MS.
contains several short works of devotion, including one by Ruysbroeck.
Of St. John of the Cross's works it copies the Spiritual Canticle as
well as the Dark Night; the latter is headed: 'song of one soul alone.'
It also contains a number of poems, some of them by the Saint, and many
passages from St. Teresa. It is in several hands, all of the
seventeenth century. The copy of the Dark Night is most unsatisfactory;
there are omissions and abbreviations everywhere.

M.S. of the Carmelite Nuns of Pamplona. This MS. also omits and
abbreviates continually, especially in the chapters on the Passive
Night of Sense, which are reduced to a mere skeleton.

Editio princeps. This is much more faithful to its original in the Dark
Night than in the Ascent. Both the passages suppressed <17> and the
interpolations <18> are relatively few and unimportant. Modifications
of phraseology are more frequent and alterations are also made with the
aim of correcting hyperbaton. In the first book about thirty lines are
suppressed; in the second, about ninety. All changes which are of any
importance have been shown in the notes.

The present edition. We have given preference, as a general rule, to
MS. 3,446, subjecting it, however, to a rigorous comparison with the
other copies. Mention has already been made in the introduction to the
Ascent (Image Books edition, pp. lxiii-lxvi) of certain apparent
anomalies and a certain lack of uniformity in the Saint's method of
dividing his commentaries. This is nowhere more noticeable than in the
Dark Night. Instead of dividing his treatise into books, each with its
proper title, the Saint abandons this method and uses titles only
occasionally. As this makes comprehension of his argument the more
difficult, we have adopted the divisions which were introduced by P.
Salablanca and have been copied by successive editors.

M. Baruzi (Bulletin Hispanique, 1922, Vol. xxiv, pp. 18-40) complains
that this division weighs down the spiritual rhythm of the treatise and
interrupts its movement. We do not agree. In any case, we greatly
prefer the gain of clarity, even if the rhythm occasionally halts, to
the other alternative--the constant halting of the understanding. We
have, of course, indicated every place where the title is taken from
the editio princeps and was not the work of the author.

The following abbreviations are adopted in the footnotes:

A = MS. of the Discalced Carmelite Friars of Alba.

B = MS. 6,624 (National Library, Madrid).

Bz. = MS. 8,795 (N.L.M.).

C = MS. 13,498 (N.L.M.).

G = MS. 18,160 (N.L.M.).

H = MS. 3,446 (N.L.M.).

M = MS. of the Discalced Carmelite Nuns of Toledo.

Mtr. = MS. 12,658.

P = MS. of the Discalced Carmelite Friars of Toledo.

V = MS. of the Discalced Carmelite Nuns of Valladolid.

E.p. = Editio princeps (1618).

MS. 12,411 and the MS. of the Discalced Carmelite nuns of Pamplona are
cited without abbreviations.
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<15> of those in Ascent, Bk. I, chap. xiii, and is of no great literary
merit. P. Silverio reproduces it in Spanish on p. 302 (note) of his
first volume.]

<16> The first friar' would be P. Antonio de Jesus, who was senior to
St. John of the Cross in the Carmelite Order, though not in the Reform.

<17> The longest of these are one of ten lines in Bk. I, chap. iv, the original] and those of Bk. II, chaps. vii, viii, xii, xiii, which
vary from eleven to twenty-three lines. Bk. II, chap. xxiii, has also
considerable modifications.

<18> The chief interpolation is in Bk. I, chap. x.
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DARK NIGHT

Exposition of the stanzas describing the method followed by the soul
in its journey upon the spiritual road to the attainment of the
perfect union of love with God, to the extent that is possible in
this life. Likewise are described the properties belonging to the
soul that has attained to the said perfection, according as they are
contained in the same stanzas.

PROLOGUE

IN this book are first set down all the stanzas which are to be
expounded; afterwards, each of the stanzas is expounded separately,
being set down before its exposition; and then each line is expounded
separately and in turn, the line itself also being set down before the
exposition. In the first two stanzas are expounded the effects of the
two spiritual purgations: of the sensual part of man and of the
spiritual part. In the other six are expounded various and wondrous
effects of the spiritual illumination and union of love with God.

STANZAS OF THE SOUL

1. On a dark night, Kindled in love with yearnings--oh, happy
chance!--
I went forth without being observed, My house being now at rest.

2. In darkness and secure, By the secret ladder, disguised--oh,
happy chance!--
In darkness and in concealment, My house being now at rest.

3. In the happy night, In secret, when none saw me,
Nor I beheld aught, Without light or guide, save that which burned
in my heart.

4. This light guided me More surely than the light of noonday
To the place where he (well I knew who!) was awaiting me-- A place
where none appeared.

5. Oh, night that guided me, Oh, night more lovely than the dawn,
Oh, night that joined Beloved with lover, Lover transformed in the
Beloved!

6. Upon my flowery breast, Kept wholly for himself alone,
There he stayed sleeping, and I caressed him, And the fanning of the
cedars made a breeze.

7. The breeze blew from the turret As I parted his locks;
With his gentle hand he wounded my neck And caused all my senses to
be suspended.

8. I remained, lost in oblivion; My face I reclined on the Beloved.
All ceased and I abandoned myself, Leaving my cares forgotten among
the lilies.

Begins the exposition of the stanzas which treat of the way and manner
which the soul follows upon the road of the union of love with God.

Before we enter upon the exposition of these stanzas, it is well to
understand here that the soul that utters them is now in the state of
perfection, which is the union of love with God, having already passed
through severe trials and straits, by means of spiritual exercise in
the narrow way of eternal life whereof Our Saviour speaks in the
Gospel, along which way the soul ordinarily passes in order to reach
this high and happy union with God. Since this road (as the Lord
Himself says likewise) is so strait, and since there are so few that
enter by it, <19> the soul considers it a great happiness and good
chance to have passed along it to the said perfection of love, as it
sings in this first stanza, calling this strait road with full
propriety dark night,' as will be explained hereafter in the lines of
the said stanza. The soul, then, rejoicing at having passed along this
narrow road whence so many blessings have come to it, speaks after this
manner.
__________________________________________________________________

<19> St. Matthew vii, 14.
__________________________________________________________________

BOOK THE FIRST

Which treats of the Night of Sense.

STANZA THE FIRST

On a dark night, Kindled in love with yearnings--oh, happy chance!--
I went forth without being observed, My house being now at rest.

EXPOSITION

IN this first stanza the soul relates the way and manner which it
followed in going forth, as to its affection, from itself and from all
things, and in dying to them all and to itself, by means of true
mortification, in order to attain to living the sweet and delectable
life of love with God; and it says that this going forth from itself
and from all things was a dark night,' by which, as will be explained
hereafter, is here understood purgative contemplation, which causes
passively in the soul the negation of itself and of all things referred
to above.

2. And this going forth it says here that it was able to accomplish in
the strength and ardour which love for its Spouse gave to it for that
purpose in the dark contemplation aforementioned. Herein it extols the
great happiness which it found in journeying to God through this night
with such signal success that none of the three enemies, which are
world, devil and flesh (who are they that ever impede this road), could
hinder it; inasmuch as the aforementioned night of purgative <20>
contemplation lulled to sleep and mortified, in the house of its
sensuality, all the passions and desires with respect to their
mischievous desires and motions. The line, then, says:

On a dark night
__________________________________________________________________

CHAPTER I

Sets down the first line and begins to treat of the imperfections of
beginners.

INTO this dark night souls begin to enter when God draws them forth
from the state of beginners--which is the state of those that meditate
on the spiritual road--and begins to set them in the state of
progressives--which is that of those who are already contemplatives--to
the end that, after passing through it, they may arrive at the state of
the perfect, which is that of the Divine union of the soul with God.
Wherefore, to the end that we may the better understand and explain
what night is this through which the soul passes, and for what cause
God sets it therein, it will be well here to touch first of all upon
certain characteristics of beginners (which, although we treat them
with all possible brevity, will not fail to be of service likewise to
the beginners themselves), in order that, realizing the weakness of the
state wherein they are, they may take courage, and may desire that God
will bring them into this night, wherein the soul is strengthened and
confirmed in the virtues, and made ready for the inestimable delights
of the love of God. And, although we may tarry here for a time, it will
not be for longer than is necessary, so that we may go on to speak at
once of this dark night.

2. It must be known, then, that the soul, after it has been definitely
converted to the service of God, is, as a rule, spiritually nurtured
and caressed by God, even as is the tender child by its loving mother,
who warms it with the heat of her bosom and nurtures it with sweet milk
and soft and pleasant food, and carries it and caresses it in her arms;
but, as the child grows bigger, the mother gradually ceases caressing
it, and, hiding her tender love, puts bitter aloes upon her sweet
breast, sets down the child from her arms and makes it walk upon its
feet, so that it may lose the habits of a child and betake itself to
more important and substantial occupations. The loving mother is like
the grace of God, for, as soon as the soul is regenerated by its new
warmth and fervour for the service of God, He treats it in the same
way; He makes it to find spiritual milk, sweet and delectable, in all
the things of God, without any labour of its own, and also great
pleasure in spiritual exercises, for here God is giving to it the
breast of His tender love, even as to a tender child.

3. Therefore, such a soul finds its delight in spending long
periods--perchance whole nights--in prayer; penances are its pleasures;
fasts its joys; and its consolations are to make use of the sacraments
and to occupy itself in Divine things. In the which things spiritual
persons (though taking part in them with great efficacy and persistence
and using and treating them with great care) often find themselves,
spiritually speaking, very weak and imperfect. For since they are moved
to these things and to these spiritual exercises by the consolation and
pleasure that they find in them, and since, too, they have not been
prepared for them by the practice of earnest striving in the virtues,
they have many faults and imperfections with respect to these spiritual
actions of theirs; for, after all, any man's actions correspond to the
habit of perfection attained by him. And, as these persons have not had
the opportunity of acquiring the said habits of strength, they have
necessarily to work like feebler children, feebly. In order that this
may be seen more clearly, and likewise how much these beginners in the
virtues lacks with respect to the works in which they so readily engage
with the pleasure aforementioned, we shall describe it by reference to
the seven capital sins, each in its turn, indicating some of the many
imperfections which they have under each heading; wherein it will be
clearly seen how like to children are these persons in all they do. And
it will also be seen how many blessings the dark night of which we
shall afterwards treat brings with it, since it cleanses the soul and
purifies it from all these imperfections.
__________________________________________________________________

CHAPTER II

Of certain spiritual imperfections which beginners have with respect
to the habit of pride.

AS these beginners feel themselves to be very fervent and diligent in
spiritual things and devout exercises, from this prosperity (although
it is true that holy things of their own nature cause humility) there
often comes to them, through their imperfections, a certain kind of
secret pride, whence they come to have some degree of satisfaction with
their works and with themselves. And hence there comes to them likewise
a certain desire, which is somewhat vain, and at times very vain, to
speak of spiritual things in the presence of others, and sometimes even
to teach such things rather than to learn them. They condemn others in
their heart when they see that they have not the kind of devotion which
they themselves desire; and sometimes they even say this in words,
herein resembling the Pharisee, who boasted of himself, praising God
for his own good works and despising the publican. <21>

2. In these persons the devil often increases the fervour that they
have and the desire to perform these and other works more frequently,
so that their pride and presumption may grow greater. For the devil
knows quite well that all these works and virtues which they perform
are not only valueless to them, but even become vices in them. And such
a degree of evil are some of these persons wont to reach that they
would have none appear good save themselves; and thus, in deed and
word, whenever the opportunity occurs, they condemn them and slander
them, beholding the mote in their brother's eye and not considering the
beam which is in their own; <22> they strain at another's gnat and
themselves swallow a camel. <23>

3. Sometimes, too, when their spiritual masters, such as confessors and
superiors, do not approve of their spirit and behavior (for they are
anxious that all they do shall be esteemed and praised), they consider
that they do not understand them, or that, because they do not approve
of this and comply with that, their confessors are themselves not
spiritual. And so they immediately desire and contrive to find some one
else who will fit in with their tastes; for as a rule they desire to
speak of spiritual matters with those who they think will praise and
esteem what they do, and they flee, as they would from death, from
those who disabuse them in order to lead them into a safe
road--sometimes they even harbour ill-will against them. Presuming
thus, <24> they are wont to resolve much and accomplish very little.
Sometimes they are anxious that others shall realize how spiritual and
devout they are, to which end they occasionally give outward evidence
thereof in movements, sighs and other ceremonies; and at times they are
apt to fall into certain ecstasies, in public rather than in secret,
wherein the devil aids them, and they are pleased that this should be
noticed, and are often eager that it should be noticed more. <25>

4. Many such persons desire to be the favourites of their confessors
and to become intimate with them, as a result of which there beset them
continual occasions of envy and disquiet. <26> They are too much
embarrassed to confess their sins nakedly, lest their confessors should
think less of them, so they palliate them and make them appear less
evil, and thus it is to excuse themselves rather than to accuse
themselves that they go to confession. And sometimes they seek another
confessor to tell the wrongs that they have done, so that their own
confessor shall think they have done nothing wrong at all, but only
good; and thus they always take pleasure in telling him what is good,
and sometimes in such terms as make it appear to be greater than it is
rather than less, desiring that he may think them to be good, when it
would be greater humility in them, as we shall say, to depreciate it,
and to desire that neither he nor anyone else should consider them of
account.

5. Some of these beginners, too, make little of their faults, and at
other times become over-sad when they see themselves fall into them,
thinking themselves to have been saints already; and thus they become
angry and impatient with themselves, which is another imperfection.
Often they beseech God, with great yearnings, that He will take from
them their imperfections and faults, but they do this that they may
find themselves at peace, and may not be troubled by them, rather than
for God's sake; not realizing that, if He should take their
imperfections from them, they would probably become prouder and more
presumptuous still. They dislike praising others and love to be praised
themselves; sometimes they seek out such praise. Herein they are like
the foolish virgins, who, when their lamps could not be lit, sought oil
from others. <27>

6. From these imperfections some souls go on to develop <28> many very
grave ones, which do them great harm. But some have fewer and some
more, and some, only the first motions thereof or little beyond these;
and there are hardly any such beginners who, at the time of these signs
of fervour, <29> fall not into some of these errors. <30> But those who
at this time are going on to perfection proceed very differently and
with quite another temper of spirit; for they progress by means of
humility and are greatly edified, not only thinking naught of their own
affairs, but having very little satisfaction with themselves; they
consider all others as far better, and usually have a holy envy of
them, and an eagerness to serve God as they do. For the greater is
their fervour, and the more numerous are the works that they perform,
and the greater is the pleasure that they take in them, as they
progress in humility, the more do they realize how much God deserves of
them, and how little is all that they do for His sake; and thus, the
more they do, the less are they satisfied. So much would they gladly do
from charity and love for Him, that all they do seems to them naught;
and so greatly are they importuned, occupied and absorbed by this
loving anxiety that they never notice what others do or do not; or if
they do notice it, they always believe, as I say, that all others are
far better than they themselves. Wherefore, holding themselves as of
little worth, they are anxious that others too should thus hold them,
and should despise and depreciate that which they do. And further, if
men should praise and esteem them, they can in no wise believe what
they say; it seems to them strange that anyone should say these good
things of them.

7. Together with great tranquillity and humbleness, these souls have a
deep desire to be taught by anyone who can bring them profit; they are
the complete opposite of those of whom we have spoken above, who would
fain be always teaching, and who, when others seem to be teaching them,
take the words from their mouths as if they knew them already. These
souls, on the other hand, being far from desiring to be the masters of
any, are very ready to travel and set out on another road than that
which they are actually following, if they be so commanded, because
they never think that they are right in anything whatsoever. They
rejoice when others are praised; they grieve only because they serve
not God like them. They have no desire to speak of the things that they
do, because they think so little of them that they are ashamed to speak
of them even to their spiritual masters, since they seem to them to be
things that merit not being spoken of. They are more anxious to speak
of their faults and sins, or that these should be recognized rather
than their virtues; and thus they incline to talk of their souls with
those who account their actions and their spirituality of little value.
This is a characteristic of the spirit which is simple, pure, genuine
and very pleasing to God. For as the wise Spirit of God dwells in these
humble souls, He moves them and inclines them to keep His treasures
secretly within and likewise to cast out from themselves all evil. God
gives this grace to the humble, together with the other virtues, even
as He denies it to the proud.

8. These souls will give their heart's blood to anyone that serves God,
and will help others to serve Him as much as in them lies. The
imperfections into which they see themselves fall they bear with
humility, meekness of spirit and a loving fear of God, hoping in Him.
But souls who in the beginning journey with this kind of perfection
are, as I understand, and as has been said, a minority, and very few
are those who we can be glad do not fall into the opposite errors. For
this reason, as we shall afterwards say, God leads into the dark night
those whom He desires to purify from all these imperfections so that He
may bring them farther onward.
__________________________________________________________________

<21> St. Luke xviii, 11-12.

<22> St. Matthew vii, 3.

<23> St. Matthew xxiii, 24.

<24>

<25>

<26>

<27> St. Matthew xxv, 8. oil from without.']

<28>

<29>

<30>
__________________________________________________________________

CHAPTER III

Of some imperfections which some of these souls are apt to have,
with respect to the second capital sin, which is avarice, in the
spiritual sense.

MANY of these beginners have also at times great spiritual avarice.
They will be found to be discontented with the spirituality which God
gives them; and they are very disconsolate and querulous because they
find not in spiritual things the consolation that they would desire.
Many can never have enough of listening to counsels and learning
spiritual precepts, and of possessing and reading many books which
treat of this matter, and they spend their time on all these things
rather than on works of mortification and the perfecting of the inward
poverty of spirit which should be theirs. Furthermore, they burden
themselves with images and rosaries which are very curious; now they
put down one, now take up another; now they change about, now change
back again; now they want this kind of thing, now that, preferring one
kind of cross to another, because it is more curious. And others you
will see adorned with agnusdeis <31> and relics and tokens, <32> like
children with trinkets. Here I condemn the attachment of the heart, and
the affection which they have for the nature, multitude and curiosity
of these things, inasmuch as it is quite contrary to poverty of spirit
which considers only the substance of devotion, makes use only of what
suffices for that end and grows weary of this other kind of
multiplicity and curiosity. For true devotion must issue from the
heart, and consist in the truth and substances alone of what is
represented by spiritual things; all the rest is affection and
attachment proceeding from imperfection; and in order that one may pass
to any kind of perfection it is necessary for such desires to be
killed.

2. I knew a person who for more than ten years made use of a cross
roughly formed from a branch <33> that had been blessed, fastened with
a pin twisted round it; he had never ceased using it, and he always
carried it about with him until I took it from him; and this was a
person of no small sense and understanding. And I saw another who said
his prayers using beads that were made of bones from the spine of a
fish; his devotion was certainly no less precious on that account in
the sight of God, for it is clear that these things carried no devotion
in their workmanship or value. Those, then, who start from these
beginnings and make good progress attach themselves to no visible
instruments, nor do they burden themselves with such, nor desire to
know more than is necessary in order that they may act well; for they
set their eyes only on being right with God and on pleasing Him, and
therein consists their covetousness. And thus with great generosity
they give away all that they have, and delight to know that they have
it not, for God's sake and for charity to their neighbour, no matter
whether these be spiritual things or temporal. For, as I say, they set
their eyes only upon the reality of interior perfection, which is to
give pleasure to God and in naught to give pleasure to themselves.

3. But neither from these imperfections nor from those others can the
soul be perfectly purified until God brings it into the passive
purgation of that dark night whereof we shall speak presently. It
befits the soul, however, to contrive to labour, in so far as it can,
on its own account, to the end that it may purge and perfect itself,
and thus may merit being taken by God into that Divine care wherein it
becomes healed of all things that it was unable of itself to cure.
Because, however greatly the soul itself labours, it cannot actively
purify itself so as to be in the least degree prepared for the Divine
union of perfection of love, if God takes not its hand and purges it
not in that dark fire, in the way and manner that we have to describe.
__________________________________________________________________

<31> The agnusdei was a wax medal with a representation of the lamb
stamped upon it, often blessed by the Pope; at the time of the Saint
such medals were greatly sought after, as we know from various
references in St. Teresa's letters.

<32> roll,' refers to a relic on which were written the names of saints. In
modern Spanish it can denote a medal or amulet used superstitiously.]

<33> on Palm Sunday, like the English palm crosses of to-day. Palm Sunday'
is in Spanish Domingo de ramos: Branch Sunday.']
__________________________________________________________________

CHAPTER IV

Of other imperfections which these beginners are apt to have with
respect to the third sin, which is luxury.

MANY of these beginners have many other imperfections than those which
I am describing with respect to each of the deadly sins, but these I
set aside, in order to avoid prolixity, touching upon a few of the most
important, which are, as it were, the origin and cause of the rest. And
thus, with respect to this sin of luxury (leaving apart the falling of
spiritual persons into this sin, since my intent is to treat of the
imperfections which have to be purged by the dark night), they have
many imperfections which might be described as spiritual luxury, not
because they are so, but because the imperfections proceed from
spiritual things. For it often comes to pass that, in their very
spiritual exercises, when they are powerless to prevent it, there arise
and assert themselves in the sensual part of the soul impure acts and
motions, and sometimes this happens even when the spirit is deep in
prayer, or engaged in the Sacrament of Penance or in the Eucharist.
These things are not, as I say, in their power; they proceed from one
of three causes.

2. The first cause from which they often proceed is the pleasure which
human nature takes in spiritual things. For when the spirit and the
sense are pleased, every part of a man is moved by that pleasure <34>
to delight according to its proportion and nature. For then the spirit,
which is the higher part, is moved to pleasure <35> and delight in God;
and the sensual nature, which is the lower part, is moved to pleasure
and delight of the senses, because it cannot possess and lay hold upon
aught else, and it therefore lays hold upon that which comes nearest to
itself, which is the impure and sensual. Thus it comes to pass that the
soul is in deep prayer with God according to the spirit, and, on the
other hand, according to sense it is passively conscious, not without
great displeasure, of rebellions and motions and acts of the senses,
which often happens in Communion, for when the soul receives joy and
comfort in this act of love, because this Lord bestows it (since it is
to that end that He gives Himself), the sensual nature takes that which
is its own likewise, as we have said, after its manner. Now as, after
all, these two parts are combined in one individual, they ordinarily
both participate in that which one of them receives, each after its
manner; for, as the philosopher says, everything that is received is in
the recipient after the manner of the same recipient. And thus, in
these beginnings, and even when the soul has made some progress, its
sensual part, being imperfect, oftentimes receives the Spirit of God
with the same imperfection. Now when this sensual part is renewed by
the purgation of the dark night which we shall describe, it no longer
has these weaknesses; for it is no longer this part that receives
aught, but rather it is itself received into the Spirit. And thus it
then has everything after the manner of the Spirit.

3. The second cause whence these rebellions sometimes proceed is the
devil, who, in order to disquiet and disturb the soul, at times when it
is at prayer or is striving to pray, contrives to stir up these motions
of impurity in its nature; and if the soul gives heed to any of these,
they cause it great harm. For through fear of these not only do persons
become lax in prayer--which is the aim of the devil when he begins to
strive with them--but some give up prayer altogether, because they
think that these things attack them more during that exercise than
apart from it, which is true, since the devil attacks them then more
than at other times, so that they may give up spiritual exercises. And
not only so, but he succeeds in portraying to them very vividly things
that are most foul and impure, and at times are very closely related to
certain spiritual things and persons that are of profit to their souls,
in order to terrify them and make them fearful; so that those who are
affected by this dare not even look at anything or meditate upon
anything, because they immediately encounter this temptation. And upon
those who are inclined to melancholy this acts with such effect that
they become greatly to be pitied since they are suffering so sadly; for
this trial reaches such a point in certain persons, when they have this
evil humour, that they believe it to be clear that the devil is ever
present with them and that they have no power to prevent this, although
some of these persons can prevent his attack by dint of great effort
and labour. When these impurities attack such souls through the medium
of melancholy, they are not as a rule freed from them until they have
been cured of that kind of humour, unless the dark night has entered
the soul, and rids them of all impurities, one after another. <36>

4. The third source whence these impure motions are apt to proceed in
order to make war upon the soul is often the fear which such persons
have conceived for these impure representations and motions. Something
that they see or say or think brings them to their mind, and this makes
them afraid, so that they suffer from them through no fault of their
own.

5. There are also certain souls of so tender and frail a nature that,
when there comes to them some spiritual consolation or some grace in
prayer, the spirit of luxury is with them immediately, inebriating and
delighting their sensual nature in such manner that it is as if they
were plunged into the enjoyment and pleasure of this sin; and the
enjoyment remains, together with the consolation, passively, and
sometimes they are able to see that certain impure and unruly acts have
taken place. The reason for this is that, since these natures are, as I
say, frail and tender, their humours are stirred up and their blood is
excited at the least disturbance. And hence come these motions; and the
same thing happens to such souls when they are enkindled with anger or
suffer any disturbance or grief. <37>

6. Sometimes, again, there arises within these spiritual persons,
whether they be speaking or performing spiritual actions, a certain
vigour and bravado, through their having regard to persons who are
present, and before these persons they display a certain kind of vain
gratification. This also arises from luxury of spirit, after the manner
wherein we here understand it, which is accompanied as a rule by
complacency in the will.

7. Some of these persons make friendships of a spiritual kind with
others, which oftentimes arise from luxury and not from spirituality;
this may be known to be the case when the remembrance of that
friendship causes not the remembrance and love of God to grow, but
occasions remorse of conscience. For, when the friendship is purely
spiritual, the love of God grows with it; and the more the soul
remembers it, the more it remembers the love of God, and the greater
the desire it has for God; so that, as the one grows, the other grows
also. For the spirit of God has this property, that it increases good
by adding to it more good, inasmuch as there is likeness and conformity
between them. But, when this love arises from the vice of sensuality
aforementioned, it produces the contrary effects; for the more the one
grows, the more the other decreases, and the remembrance of it
likewise. If that sensual love grows, it will at once be observed that
the soul's love of God is becoming colder, and that it is forgetting
Him as it remembers that love; there comes to it, too, a certain
remorse of conscience. And, on the other hand, if the love of God grows
in the soul, that other love becomes cold and is forgotten; for, as the
two are contrary to one another, not only does the one not aid the
other, but the one which predominates quenches and confounds the other,
and becomes strengthened in itself, as the philosophers say. Wherefore
Our Saviour said in the Gospel: That which is born of the flesh is
flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.' <38> That is to
say, the love which is born of sensuality ends in sensuality, and that
which is of the spirit ends in the spirit of God and causes it to grow.
This is the difference that exists between these two kinds of love,
whereby we may know them.

8. When the soul enters the dark night, it brings these kinds of love
under control. It strengthens and purifies the one, namely that which
is according to God; and the other it removes and brings to an end; and
in the beginning it causes both to be lost sight of, as we shall say
hereafter.
__________________________________________________________________

<34>

<35>

<36>

<37> All writers who comment upon this delicate matter go into lengthy
and learned explanations of it, though in reality there is little that
needs to be added to the Saint's clear and apt exposition. It will be
remembered that St. Teresa once wrote to her brother Lorenzo, who
suffered in this way: As to those stirrings of sense. . . . I am quite
clear they are of no account, so the best thing is to make no account
of them' (LL. 168). The most effective means of calming souls tormented
by these favours is to commend them to a discreet and wise director
whose counsel they may safely follow. The Illuminists committed the
grossest errors in dealing with this matter.

<38> St. John iii, 6.
__________________________________________________________________

CHAPTER V

Of the imperfections into which beginners fall with respect to the
sin of wrath.

BY reason of the concupiscence which many beginners have for spiritual
consolations, their experience of these consolations is very commonly
accompanied by many imperfections proceeding from the sin of wrath;
for, when their delight and pleasure in spiritual things come to an
end, they naturally become embittered, and bear that lack of sweetness
which they have to suffer with a bad grace, which affects all that they
do; and they very easily become irritated over the smallest
matter--sometimes, indeed, none can tolerate them. This frequently
happens after they have been very pleasantly recollected in prayer
according to sense; when their pleasure and delight therein come to an
end, their nature is naturally vexed and disappointed, just as is the
child when they take it from the breast of which it was enjoying the
sweetness. There is no sin in this natural vexation, when it is not
permitted to indulge itself, but only imperfection, which must be
purged by the aridity and severity of the dark night.

2. There are other of these spiritual persons, again, who fall into
another kind of spiritual wrath: this happens when they become
irritated at the sins of others, and keep watch on those others with a
sort of uneasy zeal

[datasuspect]

1. damn i guess there is a character limit

here's a link to the text: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/john_cross/dark_night.txt

[Ptah]

2. click

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=hide_thread&forum=105&thread=8890560

[datasuspect]

3. maybe you'll like St. Anselm better?

Title: Proslogium; Monologium; An Appendix in Behalf of the Fool by
Gaunilon; and Cur Deus Homo
Creator(s): Anselm, Saint, Archbishop of Canterbury (1033-1109)
CCEL Subjects: All; Classic; Theology; Proofed;
LC Call no: B765 .A83 P73
LC Subjects:

Philosophy (General)

By Period (Including individual philosophers and schools of philosophy)
__________________________________________________________________

ST. ANSELM

PROSLOGIUM; MONOLOGIUM;

AN APPENDIX IN BEHALF OF THE FOOL BY GAUNILON;

AND

CUR DEUS HOMO

TRANSLATED FROM THE LATIN

BY

SIDNEY NORTON DEANE, B. A.

WITH AN INTRODUCTION, BIBLIOGRAPHY, AND REPRINTS

OF THE OPINIONS OF LEADING PHILOSOPHERS AND

WRITERS ON THE ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT


REPRINT EDITION


CHICAGO

THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING COMPANY

1926

TRANSLATION OF

PROSLOGIUM, MONOLOGIUM, AND APPENDIX

COPYRIGHTED BY

THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING CO.

1903
__________________________________________________________________

INTRODUCTION.

THE present volume of St. Anselm's most important philosophical and
theological writings contains: (1) The Proslogium (2) the Monologium,
(3) the Cur Deus Homo, and (4) by way of historical complement, an
Appendix to the Monologium entitled In Behalf of the Fool by Gaunilon,
a monk of Marmoutiers. The Proslogium (which, though subsequent in
point of time to the Monologium, is here placed first, as containing
the famous ontological argument), the Monologium and the Appendix
thereto were translated by Mr. Sidney Norton Deane, of New Haven,
Conn.; the Cur Deus Homo was rendered by James Gardiner Vose, formerly
of Milton, Conn., and later of Providence, R. I., and published in 1854
and 1855 in the Bibliotheca Sacra, then issued at Andover, Mass., by
Warren F. Draper. The thanks of the reading public are due to all these
gentlemen for their gratuitous labors in behalf of philosophy.

Welch's recent book Anselm and His Work, by its accessibility, renders
any extended biographical notice of Anselm unneccessary. We append,
therefore, merely a few brief paragraphs from Weber's admirable History
of Philosophy on Anselm's position in the world of thought, and we
afterwards add (this, at the suggestion of Prof. George M. Duncan, of
Yale University) a series of quotations regarding Anselm's most
characteristic contribution to philosophy--the ontological
argument--from Descartes, Spinoza, Locke, Leibnitz, Kant, Hegel,
Dorner, Lotze, and Professor Flint. A bibliography also has been
compiled. Thus the work will give full material and indications for the
original study of one of the greatest exponents of Christian doctrine.
__________________________________________________________________

ANSELM'S PHILOSOPHY.

(AFTER WEBER. <1> )

"The first really speculative thinker after Scotus is St. Anselmus, the
disciple of Lanfranc. He was born at Aosta (1033), entered the
monastery of Bec in Normandy (1060), succeeded Lanfranc as Abbot
(1078), and as Archbishop of Canterbury (1093). He died in 1109. He
left a great number of writings, the most important of which are: the
Dialogus de grammatico, the Monologium de divinitatis essentia sive
Exemplum de ratione fidei, the Proslogium sive Fides quoerens
intellectum, the De veritate, the De fide trinitatis, and the Cur Deus
Homo?

"The second Augustine, as St. Anselmus had been called, starts out from
the same principle as the first; he holds that faith precedes all
reflection and all discussion concerning religious things. The
unbelievers, he says, strive to understand because they do not believe;
we, on the contrary, strive to understand because we believe. They and
we have the same object in view; but inasmuch as they do not believe,
they cannot arrive at their goal, which is to understand the dogma. The
unbeliever will never understand. In religion faith plays the part
played by experience in the understanding of the things of this world.
The blind man cannot see the light, and therefore does not understand
it; the deaf-mute, who has never perceived sound, cannot have a clear
idea of sound. Similarly, not to believe means not to perceive, and not
to perceive means not to understand. Hence, we do not reflect in order
that we may believe; on the contrary, we believe in order that we may
arrive at knowledge. A Christian ought never to doubt the beliefs and
teachings of the Holy Catholic Church. All he can do is to strive, as
humbly as possible, to understand her teachings by believing them, to
love them, and resolutely to observe them in his daily life. Should he
succeed in understanding the Christian doctrine, let him render thanks
to God, the source of all intelligence! In case he fails, that is no
reason why he should obstinately attack the dogma, but a reason why he
should bow his head in worship. Faith ought not merely to be the
starting-point,--the Christian's aim is not to depart from faith but to
remain in it,--but also the fixed rule and goal of thought, the
beginning, the middle, and the end of all philosophy.

"The above almost literal quotations might give one the impression that
St. Anselmus belongs exclusively to the history of theology. Such is
not the case, however. This fervent Catholic is more independent, more
of an investigator and philosopher than he himself imagines. He is a
typical scholastic doctor and a fine exponent of the alliance between
reason and faith which forms the characteristic trait of mediaeval
philosophy. He assumes, a priori, that revelation and reason are in
perfect accord. These two manifestations of one and the same Supreme
Intelligence cannot possibly contradict each other. Hence, his point of
view is diametrically opposed to the credo quia absurdum. Moreover, he
too had been besieged by doubt. Indeed, the extreme ardor which impels
him to search everywhere for arguments favorable to the dogma, is a
confession on his part that the dogma needs support, that it is
debatable, that it lacks self-evidence, the criterion of truth. Even as
a monk, it was his chief concern to find a simple and conclusive
argument in support of the existence of God and of all the doctrines of
the Church concerning the Supreme Being. Mere affirmation did not
satisfy him; he demanded proofs. This thought was continually before
his mind; it caused him to forget his meals, and pursued him even
during the solemn moments of worship. He comes to the conclusion that
it is a temptation of Satan, and seeks deliverance from it. But in
vain. After a night spent in meditation, he at last discovers what be
has been seeking for years: the incontrovertible argument in favor of
the Christian dogma, and he regards himself as fortunate in having
found, not only the proof of the existence of God, but his peace of
soul. His demonstrations are like the premises of modern rationalism.

"Everything that exists, he says, has its cause, and this cause may be
one or many. If it is one, then we have what we are looking for: God,
the unitary being to whom all other beings owe their origin. If it is
manifold, there are three possibilities: (1) The manifold may depend on
unity as its cause; or (2) Each thing composing the manifold may be
self-caused; or (3) Each thing may owe its existence to all the other
things. The first case is identical with the hypothesis that everything
proceeds from a single cause; for to depend on several causes, all of
which depend on a single cause, means to depend on this single cause.
In the second case, we must assume that there is a power, force, or
faculty of self-existence common to all the particular causes assumed
by the hypothesis; a power in which all participate and are comprised.
But that would give us what we had in the first case, an absolute
unitary cause. The third supposition, which makes each of the first
causes' depend on all the rest, is absurd; for we cannot hold that a
thing has for its cause and condition of existence a thing of which it
is itself the cause and condition. Hence we are compelled to believe in
a being which is the cause of every existing thing, without being
caused by anything itself, and which for that very reason is infinitely
more perfect than anything else: it is the most real (ens realissimum),
most powerful, and best being. Since it does not depend on any being or
on any condition of existence other than itself it is a se and per se;
it exists, not because something else exists, but it exists because it
exists; that is, it exists necessarily, it is necessary being.

"It would be an easy matter to deduce pantheism from the arguments of
the Monologium. Anselmus, it is true, protests against such an
interpretation of his theology. With St. Augustine he assumes that the
world is created ex nihilo. But though accepting this teaching, he
modifies it. Before the creation, he says, things did not exist by
themselves, independently of God; hence we say they were derived from
non-being. But they existed eternally for God and in God, as ideas;
they existed before their creation in the sense that the Creator
foresaw them and predestined them for existence.

"The existence of God, the unitary and absolute cause of the world,
being proved, the question is to determine his nature and attributes.
God's perfections are like human perfections; with this difference,
however, that they are essential to him, which is not the case with us.
Man has received a share of certain perfections, but there is no
necessary correlation between him and these perfections; it would have
been possible for him not to receive them; he could have existed
without them. God, on the contrary, does not get his perfections from
without: he has not received them, and we cannot say that he has them;
he is and must be everything that these perfections imply; his
attributes are identical with his essence. Justice, an attribute of
God, and God are not two separate things. We cannot say of God that he
has justice or goodness; we cannot even say that be is just; for to be
just is to participate in justice after the manner of creatures. God is
justice as such, goodness as such, wisdom as such, happiness as such,
truth as such, being as such. Moreover, all of God's attributes
constitute but a single attribute, by virtue of the unity of his
essence (unum est quidquid essentialiter de summa substantia dicitur).

"All this is pure Platonism. But, not content with spiritualising
theism, Anselmus really discredits it when, like a new Carneades, he
enumerates the difficulties which he finds in the conception. God is a
simple being and at the same time eternal, that is, diffused over
infinite points of time; he is omnipresent, that is, distributed over
all points of space. Shall we say that God is omnipresent and eternal?
This proposition contradicts the notion of the simplicity of the divine
essence. Shall we say that he is nowhere in space and nowhere in time?
But that would be equivalent to denying his existence. Let us therefore
reconcile these two extremes and say that God is omnipresent and
eternal, without being limited by space or time. The following is an
equally serious difficulty: In God there is no change and consequently
nothing accidental. Now, there is no substance without accidents. Hence
God is not a substance; he transcends all substance. Anselmus is
alarmed at these dangerous consequences of his logic, and he therefore
prudently adds that, though the term substance' may be incorrect, it
is, nevertheless, the best we can apply to God--si quid digne dici
potest --and that to avoid or condemn it might perhaps jeopardise our
faith in the reality of the Divine Being.

"The most formidable theological antinomy is the doctrine of the
trinity of persons in the unity of the divine essence. The Word is the
object of eternal thought; it is God in so far as he is thought,
conceived, or comprehended by himself. The Holy Spirit is the love of
God for the Word, and of the Word for God, the love which God bears
himself. But is this explanation satisfactory? And does it not
sacrifice the dogma which it professes to explain to the conception of
unity? St. Anselmus sees in the Trinity and the notion of God
insurmountable difficulties and contradictions, which the human mind
cannot reconcile. In his discouragement be is obliged to confess, with
Scotus Erigena, St. Augustine, and the Neo-Platonists, that no human
word can adequately express the essence of the All-High. Even the words
wisdom' (sapientia) and being' (essentia) are but imperfect expressions
of what he imagines to be the essence of God. All theological phrases
are analogies, figures of speech, and mere approximations.

"The Proslogium sive Fides quoerens intellectum has the same aim as the
Monologium: to prove the existence of God. Our author draws the
elements of his argument from St. Augustine and Platonism. He sets out
from the idea of a perfect being, from which he infers the existence of
such a being. We have in ourselves, he says, the idea of an absolutely
perfect being. Now, perfection implies existence. Hence God exists.
This argument, which has been termed the ontological argument, found an
opponent worthy of Anselmus in Gaunilo, a monk of Marmoutiers in
Touraine. Gaunilo emphasises the difference between thought and being,
and points out the fact that we may conceive and imagine a being, and
yet that being may not exist. We have as much right to conclude from
our idea of an enchanted island in the middle of the ocean that such an
island actually exists. The criticism is just. Indeed, the ontological
argument would be conclusive, only in case the idea of God and the
existence of God in the human mind were identical. If our idea of God
is God himself, it is evident that this idea is the immediate and
incontrovertible proof of the existence of God. But what the theologian
aims to prove is not the existence of the God-Idea of Plato and Hegel,
but the existence of the personal God. However that may be, we hardly
know what to admire most, --St. Anselmus's broad and profound
conception, or the sagacity of his opponent who, in the seclusion of
his cell, anticipates the Transcendental Dialectic of Kant.

"The rationalistic tendency which we have just noticed in the
Monologium and the Proslogium meets us again in the Cur Deus Homo? Why
did God become man? The first word of the title sufficiently indicates
the philosophical trend of the treatise. The object is to search for
the causes of the incarnation. The incarnation, according to St.
Anselmus, necessarily foIlows from the necessity of redemption. Sin is
an offence against the majesty of God. In spite of his goodness, God
cannot pardon sin without compounding with honor and justice. On the
other hand, he cannot revenge himself on man for his offended honor;
for sin is an offence of infinite degree and therefore demands infinite
satisfaction; which means that he must either destroy humanity or
inflict upon it the eternal punishments of hell. Now, in either case,
the goal of creation, the happiness of his creatures, would be missed
and the honor of the Creator compromised. There is but one way for God
to escape this dilemma without affecting his honor, and that is to
arrange for some kind of satisfaction. He must have infinite
satisfaction, because the offence is immeasurable. Now, in so far as
man is a finite being and incapable of satisfying divine justice in an
infinite measure, the infinite being himself must take the matter in
charge; he must have recourse to substitution. Hence, the necessity of
the incarnation. God becomes man in Christ; Christ suffers and dies in
our stead; thus he acquires an infinite merit and the right to an
equivalent recompense. But since the world belongs to the Creator, and
nothing can be added to its treasures, the recompense which by right
belongs to Christ falls to the lot of the human race in which he is
incorporated: humanity is pardoned, forgiven, and saved.

"Theological criticism has repudiated Anselmus's theory, which bears
the stamp of the spirit of chivalry and of feudal customs. But,
notwithstanding the attacks of a superficial rationalism, there is an
abiding element of truth in it: over and above each personal and
variable will there is an absolute, immutable, and incorruptible will,
called justice, honor, and duty, in conformity with the customs of the
times."
__________________________________________________________________

<1> From Weber's History of Philosophy. Trans. by F. Thilly. New York
Scribner's. Price, $2.50.
__________________________________________________________________

CRITICISMS OF ANSELM'S ONTOLOGICAL

ARGUMENT FOR THE BEING OF GOD.
__________________________________________________________________

DESCARTES <2> ^

"But now, if from the simple fact that I can draw from my thought the
idea of anything it follows that all that I recognise clearly and
distinctly to pertain to this thing pertains to it in reality, can I
not draw from this an argument and a demonstration of the existence of
God? It is certain that I do not find in me the less the idea of him,
that is, of a being supremely perfect, than that of any figure or of
any number whatever; and I do not know less clearly and distinctly that
an actual and eternal existence belongs to his nature than I know that
all that I can demonstrate of any figure or of any number belongs truly
to the nature of that figure or that number: and accordingly, although
all that I have concluded in the preceding meditations may not turn out
to be true, the existence of God ought to pass in my mind as being at
least as certain as I have up to this time regarded the truths of
mathematics to be, which have to do only with numbers and figures:
although, indeed, that might not seem at first to be perfectly evident,
but might appear to have some appearance of sophistry. For being
accustomed in all other things to make a distinction between existence
and essence, I easily persuade myself that existence may perhaps be
separated from the essence of God, and thus God might be conceived as
not existent actually. But nevertheless, when I think more attentively,
I find that existence can no more be separated from the essence of God
than from the essence of a rectilinear triangle can be separated the
equality of its three angles to two right angles, or, indeed, if you
please, from the idea of a mountain the idea of a valley; so that there
would be no less contradiction in conceiving of a God--that is, of a
being supremely perfect, to whom existence was wanting, that is to say,
to whom there was wanting any perfection--than in conceiving of a
mountain which had no valley.

"But although, in reality, I might not be able to conceive of a God
without existence, no more than of a mountain without a valley,
nevertheless, as from the simple fact that I conceive a mountain with a
valley, it does not follow that there exists any mountain in the world,
so likewise, although I conceive God as existent, it does not follow,
it seems, from that, that God exists, for my thought does not impose
any necessity on things; and as there is nothing to prevent my
imagining a winged horse, although there is none which has wings, so I
might, perhaps, be able to attribute existence to God, although there
might not be any God which existed. So far from this being so, it is
just here under the appearance of this objection that a sophism lies
hid; for from the fact that I cannot conceive a mountain without a
valley, it does not follow that there exists in the world any mountain
or any valley, but solely that the mountain and the valley, whether
they exist or not, are inseparable from one another; whereas from the
fact alone that I cannot conceive God except as existent, it follows
that existence is inseparable from him, and, consequently, that he
exists in reality; not that my thought can make it to be so, or that it
can impose any necessity upon things; but on the contrary the necessity
which is in the thing itself, that is to say, the necessity of the
existence of God, determines me to have this thought.

"For it is not at my will to conceive of a God without existence, that
is to say, a being supremely perfect without a supreme perfection, as
it is at my will to conceive a horse with wings or without wings.

"And it must not also be said here that it is necessarily true that I
should affirm that God exists, after I have supposed him to possess all
kinds of perfection, since existence is one of these, but that my first
supposition is not necessary, no more than it is necessary to affirm
that all figures of four sides may be inscribed in the circle, but
that, supposing I had this thought, I should be constrained to admit
that the rhombus can be inscribed there, since it is a figure of four
sides, and thus I should be constrained to admit something false. One
ought not, I say, to allege this; for although it may not be necessary
that I should ever fall to thinking about God, nevertheless, when it
happens that I think upon a being first and supreme, and draw, so to
speak, the idea of him from the store-house of mind, it is necessary
that I attribute to him every sort of perfection, although I may not go
on to enumerate them all, and give attention to each one in particular.
And this necessity is sufficient to bring it about (as soon as I
recognise that I should next conclude that existence is a perfection)
that this first and supreme being exists: while, just as it is not
necessary that I ever imagine a triangle, but whenever I choose to
consider a rectilinear figure, composed solely of three angles, it is
absolutely necessary that I attribute to it all the things which serve
for the conclusion that there three angles are not greater than two
right angles, although, perhaps, I did not then consider this in
particular."
__________________________________________________________________

<2> The Philosophy of Descartes in Extracts from His Writings. H. A. P.
Torrey. New York, 1892. P. 161 et seq.
__________________________________________________________________

SPINOZA <3>

PROP. XI. God, or substance, consisting, of infinite attributes, of
which each expresses eternal and infinite essentiality, necessarily
exists.

"Proof.--If this be denied, conceive, if possible, that God does not
exist: then his essence does not involve existence. But this (by Prop.
vii.) is absurd. Therefore God necessarily exists.

"Another Proof.--Of everything whatsoever a cause or reason must be
assigned, either for its existence, or for its non-existence--e. g., if
a triangle exist, a reason or cause must be granted for its existence;
if, on the contrary, it does not exist, a cause must also be granted,
which prevents it from existing, or annuls its existence. This reason
or cause must either be contained in the nature of the thing in
question, or be external to it. For instance, the reason for the
non-existence of a square circle is indicated in its nature, namely,
because it would involve a contradiction. On the other hand, the
existence of substance follows also solely from its nature, inasmuch as
its nature involves existence. (See Prop. vii.)

"But the reason for the existence of a triangle or a circle does not
follow from the nature of those figures, but from the order of
universal nature in extension. From the latter it must follow, either
that a triangle necessarily exists, or that it is impossible that it
should exist. So much is self-evident. It follows therefrom that a
thing necessarily exists, if no cause or reason be granted which
prevents its existence.

"If, then, no cause or reason can be given, which prevents the
existence of God, or which destroys his existence, we must certainly
conclude that he necessarily does exist. If such a reason or cause
should be given, it must either be drawn from the very nature of God,
or be external to him--that is, drawn from another substance of another
nature. For if it were of the same nature, God, by that very fact,
would be admitted to exist. But substance of another nature could have
nothing in common with God (by Prop. ii.), and therefore would be
unable either to cause or to destroy his existence.

"As, then, a reason or cause which would annul the divine existence
cannot be drawn from anything external to the divine nature, such cause
must perforce, if God does not exist, be drawn from God's own nature,
which would involve a contradiction. To make such an affirmation about
a being absolutely infinite and supremely perfect, is absurd;
therefore, neither in the nature of God, nor externally to his nature,
can a cause or reason be assigned which would annul his existence.
Therefore, God necessarily exists. Q. E. D.

"Another proof.--The potentiality of non-existence is a negation of
power, and contrariwise the potentiality of existence is a power, as is
obvious. If, then, that which necessarily exists is nothing but finite
beings, such finite beings are more powerful than a being absolutely
infinite, which is obviously absurd; therefore, either nothing exists,
or else a being absolutely infinite necessarily exists also. Now we
exist either in ourselves, or in something else which necessarily
exists (see Axiom i. and Prop. vii.). Therefore a being absolutely
infinite--in other words, God (Def. vi.)--necessarily exists. Q. E. D.

"Note.--In this last proof, I have purposely shown God's existence a
posteriori, so that the proof might be more easily followed, not
because, from the same premises, God's existence does not follow a
priori. For, as the potentiality of existence is a power, it follows
that, in proportion as reality increases in the nature of a thing, so
also will it increase its strength for existence. Therefore a being
absolutely infinite, such as God, has from himself an absolutely
infinite power of existence, and hence he does absolutely exist.
Perhaps there will be many who will be unable to see the force of this
proof, inasmuch as they are accustomed only to consider those things
which flow from external causes. Of such things, they see that those
which quickly come to pass--that is, quickly come into
existence--quickly also disappear; whereas they regard as more
difficult of accomplishment--that is, not so easily brought into
existence --those things which they conceive as more complicated.

"However, to do away with this misconception, I need not here show the
measure of truth in the proverb, What comes quickly, goes quickly,' nor
discuss whether, from the point of view of universal nature, all things
are equally easy, or otherwise: I need only remark, that I am not here
speaking of things, which come to pass through causes external to
themselves, but only of substances which (by Prop. vi.) cannot be
produced by any external cause. Things which are produced by external
causes, whether they consist of many parts or few, owe whatsoever
perfection or reality they possess solely to the efficacy of their
external cause, and therefore their existence arises solely from the
perfection by their external cause, not from their own. Contrariwise,
whatsoever perfection is possessed by substance is due to no external
cause; wherefore the existence of substance must arise solely from its
own nature, which is nothing else but its essence. Thus, the perfection
of a thing does not annul its existence, but, on the contrary, asserts
it. Imperfection, on the other hand, does annul it; therefore we cannot
be more certain of the existence of anything, than of the existence of
a being absolutely infinite or perfect--that is, of God. For inasmuch
as his essence excludes all imperfection, and involves absolute
perfection, all cause for doubt concerning his existence is done away,
and the utmost certainty on the question is given. This, I think, will
be evident to every moderately attentive reader."
__________________________________________________________________

<3> The Chief Works of Benedict de Spinoza. Translated by R.H.M.Elwes.
London, 1848. VoI. II., P. 51 et seq.
__________________________________________________________________

LOCKE <4>

"Our idea of a most perfect being, not the sole proof of a God.--How
far the idea of a most perfect being which a man may frame in his mind,
does or does not prove the existence of a God, I will not here examine.
For, in the different make of men's tempers, and application of their
thoughts, some arguments prevail more on one, and some on another, for
the confirmation of the same truth. But yet, I think this I may say,
that it is an ill way of establishing this truth and silencing
atheists, to lay the whole stress of so important a point as this upon
that sole foundation: and take some men's having that idea of God in
their minds (for it is evident some men have none, and some worse than
none, and the most very different) for the only proof of a Deity; and
out of an over-fondness of that darling invention, cashier, or at least
endeavor to invalidate, all other arguments, and forbid us to hearken
to those proofs, as being weak or fallacious, which our own existence
and the sensible parts of the universe offer so clearly and cogently to
our thoughts, that I deem it impossible for a considering man to
withstand them."
__________________________________________________________________

<4> An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. London: Ward, Lock, Co. P.
529 et seq.
__________________________________________________________________

LEIBNITZ <5>

"Although I am for innate ideas, and in particular for that of God, I
do not think that the demonstrations of the Cartesians drawn from the
idea of God are perfect. I have shown fully elsewhere (in the Actes de
Leipsic, and in the Memoires de Trevoux) that what Descartes has
borrowed from Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, is very beautiful and
really very ingenious, but that there is still a gap therein to be
filled. This celebrated archbishop, who was without doubt one of the
most able men of his time, congratulates himself, not without reason,
for having discovered a means of proving the existence of God a priori,
by means of its own notion, without recurring to its effects. And this
is very nearly the force of his argument: God is the greatest or (as
Descartes says) the most perfect of beings, or rather a being of
supreme grandeur and perfection, including all degrees thereof. That is
the notion of God. See now how existence follows from this notion. To
exist is something more than not to exist, or rather, existence adds a
degree to grandeur and perfection, and as Descartes states it,
existence is itself a perfection. Therefore this degree of grandeur and
perfection, or rather this perfection which consists in existence, is
in this supreme all-great, all-perfect being: for otherwise some degree
would be wanting to it, contrary to its definition. Consequently this
supreme being exists. The Scholastics, not excepting even their Doctor
Angelicus, have misunderstood this argument, and have taken it as a
paralogism; in which respect they were altogether wrong, and Descartes,
who studied quite a long time the scholastic philosophy at the Jesuit
College of La Fleche, had great reason for re-establishing it. It is
not a paralogism, but it is an imperfect demonstration, which assumes
something that must still be proved in order to render it
mathematically evident; that is, it is tacitly assumed that this idea
of the all-great or all-perfect being is possible, and implies no
contradiction. And it is already something that by this remark it is
proved that, assuming that God is Possible, he exists, which is the
privilege of divinity alone. We have the right to presume the
possibility of every being, and especially that of God, until some one
proves the contrary. So that this metaphysical argument already gives a
morally demonstrative conclusion, which declares that according to the
present state of our knowledge we must judge that God exists, and act
in conformity thereto. But it is to be desired, nevertheless, that
clever men achieve the demonstration with the strictness of a
mathematical proof, and I think I have elsewhere said something that
may serve this end."
__________________________________________________________________

<5> New Essays Concerning Human Understanding. Translated by A.G.
Langley. New York, 1896. P. 502 at seq.
__________________________________________________________________

KANT <6>

"Being is evidently not a real predicate, or a concept of something
that can be added to the concept of a thing. It is merely the admission
of a thing, and of certain determinations in it. Logically, it is
merely the copula of a judgment. The proposition, God is almighty,
contains two concepts, each having its object, namely, God and
almightiness. The small word is, is not an additional predicate, but
only serves to put the predicate in relation to the subject. If, then,
I take the subject (God) with all its predicates (including that of
almightiness), and say, God is, or there is a God, I do not put a new
predicate to the concept of God, but I only put the subject by itself,
with all its predicates, in relation to my concept, as its object. Both
must contain exactly the same kind of thing, and nothing can have been
added to the concept, which expresses possibility only, by my thinking
its object as simply, given and saying, it is. And thus the real does
not contain more than the possible. A hundred real dollars do not
contain a penny more than a hundred possible dollars. For as the latter
signify the concept, the former the object and its position by itself,
it is clear that, in case the former contained more than the latter, my
concept would not express the whole object, and would not therefore be
its adequate concept. In my financial position no doubt there exists
more by one hundred real dollars, than by their concept only (that is
their possibility), because in reality the object is not only contained
analytically in my concept, but is added to my concept (which is a
determination of my state), synthetically: but the conceived hundred
dollars are not in the least increased through the existence which is
outside my concept.

"By whatever and by however many predicates I may think a thing (even
in completely determining it), nothing is really added to it, if I add
that the thing exists. Otherwise, it would not be the same that exists,
but something more than was contained in the concept, and I could not
say that the exact object of my concept existed. Nay, even if I were to
think in a thing all reality, except one, that one missing reality
would not be supplied by my saying that so defective a thing exists,
but it would exist with the same defect with which I thought it; or
what exists would be different from what I thought. If, then, I try to
conceive a being, as the highest reality (without any defect), the
question still remains, whether it exists or not. For though in my
concept there may be wanting nothing of the possible real content of a
thing in general, something is wanting in its relation to my whole
state of thinking, namely, that the knowledge of that object should be
possible a posteriori also. And here we perceive the cause of our
difficulty. If we were concerned with an object of our senses, I could
not mistake the existence of a thing for the mere concept of it; for by
the concept the object is thought as only in harmony with the general
conditions of a possible empirical knowledge, while by its existence it
is thought as contained in the whole content of experience. Through
this connection with the content of the whole experience, the concept
of an object is not in the least increased; our thought has only
received through it one more possible perception. If, however, we are
thinking existence through the pure category alone, we need not wonder
that we cannot find any characteristic to distinguish it from mere
possibility.

"Whatever, therefore, our concept of an object may contain, we must
always step outside it, in order to attribute to it existence. With
objects of the senses, this takes place through their connection with
any one of my perceptions, according to empirical laws; with objects of
pure thought, however, there is no means of knowing their existence,
because it would have to be known entirely a priori, while our
consciousness of every kind of existence, whether immediately by
perception, or by conclusions which connect something with perception,
belongs entirely to the unity of experience, and any existence outside
that field, though it cannot be declared to be absolutely impossible,
is a presupposition that cannot be justified by anything.

"The concept of a Supreme Being is, in many respects, a very useful
idea, but, being an idea only, it is quite incapable of increasing, by
itself alone, our knowledge with regard to what exists. It cannot even
do so much as to inform us any further as to its possibility. The
analytical characteristic of possibility, which consists in the absence
of contradiction in mere positions (realities), cannot be denied to it;
but the connection of all real properties in one and the same thing is
a synthesis the possibility of which we cannot judge a priori because
these realities are not given to us as such, and because, even if this
were so, no judgment whatever takes place, it being necessary to look
for the characteristic of the possibility of synthetical knowledge in
experience only, to which the object of an idea can never belong. Thus
we see that the celebrated Leibnitz is far from having achieved what we
thought he had, namely, to understand a priori the possibility of so
sublime an ideal Being.

"Time and labor therefore are lost on the famous ontological
(Cartesian) proof of the existence of a Supreme Being from mere
concepts; and a man might as well imagine that he could become richer
in knowledge by mere ideas, as a merchant in capital, if, in order to
improve his position, he were to add a few noughts to his cash
account."
__________________________________________________________________

<6> Critique of Pure Reason. Translated by F. Max Muller. New York,
1896. P. 483 et seq.
__________________________________________________________________

HEGEL <7>

"This proof was included among the various proofs up to the time of
Kant, and--by some who have not yet reached the Kantian standpoint--it
is so included even to the present day. It is different from what we
find and read of amongst the ancients. For it was said that God is
absolute thought as objective; for because things in the world are
contingent, they are not the truth in and for itself--but this is found
in the infinite. The scholastics also knew well from the Aristotelian
philosophy the metaphysical proposition that potentiality is nothing by
itself, but is clearly one with actuality. Later, on the other hand,
the opposition between thought itself and Being began to appear with
Anselm. It is noteworthy that only now for the first time through the
Middle Ages and in Christianity, the universal Notion and Being, as it
is to ordinary conception, became established in this pure abstraction
as these infinite extremes; and thus the highest law has come to
consciousness. But we reach our profoundest depths in bringing the
highest opposition into consciousness. Only no advance was made beyond
the division as such, although Anselm also tried to find the connection
between the sides. But while hitherto God appeared as the absolute
existent, and the universal was attributed to Him as predicate, an
opposite order begins with Anselm--Being becomes predicate, and the
absolute Idea is first of all established as the subject, but the
subject of thought. Thus if the existence of God is once abandoned as
the first hypothesis, and established as a result of thought,
self-consciousness is on the way to turn back within itself. Then we
have the question coming in, Does God exist? while on the other side
the question of most importance was, What is God?

"The ontological proof, which is the first properly metaphysical proof
of the existence of God, consequently came to mean that God as the Idea
of existence which unites all reality in itself, also has the reality
of existence within Himself; this proof thus follows from the Notion of
God, that He is the universal essence of all essence. The drift of this
reasoning is, according to Anselm (Proslogium, C. 2), as follows: It is
one thing to say that a thing is in the understanding, and quite
another to perceive that it exists. Even an ignorant person (insipiens)
will thus be quite convinced that in thought there is something beyond
which nothing greater can be thought ; for when he hears this he
understands it, and everything that is understood is in the
understanding. But that beyond which nothing greater can be thought
cannot certainly be in the understanding alone. For if it is accepted
as in thought alone, we may go on farther to accept it as existent;
that, however, is something greater' than what is merely thought. Thus
were that beyond which nothing greater can be thought merely in the
understanding, that beyond which nothing greater can be thought would
be something beyond which something greater can be thought. But that is
truly impossible; there thus without doubt exists both in the
understanding and in reality something beyond which nothing greater can
be thought.' The highest conception cannot be in the understanding
alone; it is essential that it should exist. Thus it is made clear that
Being is in a superficial way subsumed under the universal of reality,
that to this extent Being does not enter into opposition with the
Notion. That is quite right; only the transition is not
demonstrated--that the subjective understanding abrogates itself. This,
however, is just the question which gives the whole interest to the
matter. When reality or completion is expressed in such a way that it
is not yet posited as existent, it is something thought, and rather
opposed to Being than that this is subsumed under it.

"This mode of arguing held good until the time of Kant; and we see in
it the endeavor to apprehend the doctrine of the Church through reason.
This opposition between Being and thought is the starting-point in
philosophy, the absolute that contains the two opposites within
itself--a conception, according to Spinoza, which involves its
existence likewise. Of Anselm it is however to be remarked that the
formal logical mode of the understanding, the process of scholastic
reasoning is to be found in him; the content indeed is right, but the
form faulty. For in the first place the expression the thought of a
Highest' is assumed as prius. Secondly, there are two sorts of objects
of thought--one that is and another that is not; the object that is
only thought and does not exist, is as imperfect as that which only is
without being thought. The third point is that what is highest must
likewise exist. But what is highest, the standard to which all else
must conform, must be no mere hypothesis, as we find it represented in
the conception of a highest acme of perfection, as a content which is
thought and likewise is. This very content, the unity of Being and
thought, is thus indeed the true content, but because Anselm has it
before him only in the form of the understanding, the opposites are
identical and conformable to unity in a third determination only--the
Highest--which, in as far as it is regulative, is outside of them. In
this it is involved that we should first of all have subjective
thought, and then distinguished from that, Being. We allow that if we
think a content (and it is apparently indifferent whether this is God
or any other), it may be the case that this content does not exist. The
assertion Something that is thought does not exist' is now subsumed
under the above standard and is not conformable to it. We grant that
the truth is that which is not merely thought but which likewise is.
But of this opposition nothing here is said. Undoubtedly God would be
imperfect, if He were merely thought and did not also have the
determination of Being. But in relation to God we must not take thought
as merely subjective; thought here signifies the absolute, pure
thought, and thus we must ascribe to Him the quality of Being. On the
other hand if God were merely Being, if He were not conscious of
Himself as self-consciousness, He would not be Spirit, a thought that
thinks itself.

"Kant, on the other hand, attacked and rejected Anselm's proof--which
rejection the whole world afterwards followed up--on the ground of its
being an assumption that the unity of Being and thought is the highest
perfection. What Kant thus demonstrates in the present day--that Being
is different from thought and that Being is not by any means posited
with thought--was a criticism offered even in that time by a monk named
Gaunilo. He combated this proof of Anselm's in a Liber pro insipiente
to which Anselm himself directed a reply in his Liber apologeticus
adversus insipientem. Thus Kant says (Kritik der reinen Vernunft, P.
464 of the sixth edition): If we think a hundred dollars, this
conception does not involve existence. That is certainly true: what is
only a conception does not exist, but it is likewise not a true
content, for what does not exist, is merely an untrue conception. Of
such we do not however here speak, but of pure thought; it is nothing
new to say they are different--Anselm knew this just as well as we do.
God is the infinite, just as body and soul, Being and thought are
eternally united; this is the speculative, true definition of God. To
the proof which Kant criticises in a manner which it is the fashion to
follow now-a-days, there is thus lacking only the perception of the
unity of thought and of existence in the infinite; and this alone must
form the commencement."
__________________________________________________________________

<7> Lectures on the History of Philosophy. Translated by E. S. Haldane
and F.H. Simson. London, 1896. Vol. III., p. 62 et seg.
__________________________________________________________________

J. A. DORNER <8>

"According to the Monologium, we arrive at the mental representation of
God by the agency of faith and conscience, therefore by a combined
religious and moral method; by the same means we arrive at the
representation of the relativity of the world. But as there seemed to
Anselm something inadequate in making the Being of the Absolute
dependent upon the existence of the Relative, as if the latter were
more certain than the former, he has interpolated in the Proslogium
(Alloquium Dei) the Ontological method. The thought of God, which is
always given, and the being of which is to be proved, claims, at any
rate, to be the highest thought possible; indeed, upon close comparison
with all other thoughts which come and go, with thoughts of such things
as may just as well not exist as exist, it has the essential
peculiarity, the prerogative, so to speak,--and this is Anselm's
discovery,--that, if it is actually thought of as the highest
conceivable thought, it is also thought of as existent. Were it not
thought of as being, it would not for a moment be actually thought.
Anselm then proceeds with his proof as follows: We believe Thou art
something, beyond which nothing greater can be thought. The fool (Ps.
xiv.) denies the existence of such a Being. Is He therefore
non-existent? But the very fool hears and understands what I say,
"something, greater than which there is nothing," and what he
understands is in his understanding. That it also exists without him
would thus have to be proved. But that, beyond which nothing greater
can be thought, cannot exist in mere intellect. For did it exist only
in intellect, the thought might be framed that it was realised, and
that would be a greater thought. Consequently, were that, a greater
than which cannot be thought, existent in mere intellect, the thought
quo majus cogitari non potest would at the same time be quo majus
cogitari potest, which is impossible. Consequently, there exists, in
reality as well as in the understanding, something a greater than which
cannot be thought. And this is so true that its non-existence cannot be
thought. Something may be thought which is only to be thought as
existent, and that is a majus than that the non-existence of which may
be thought, and that Thou art, O Lord, my God, I must think though I
did not believe.' The nerve of the Anselmic argument lies therefore in
the notion that an idea which has an objective existence is a majus
than that to which mere subjective existence appertains; that,
consequently, as under the idea of God the highest thought possible is
at any rate expressed, the idea of God is not thought unless it is
thought as existent. For, he says in another place, it may be thought
of everything that it does not exist, with the exception of that quod
summe est to which being pre-eminently belongs. That is, the
non-existence may be thought of everything which has beginning or end,
or which is constituted of parts and is nowhere whole. But that, and it
alone, cannot be thought as non-existent which has neither beginning
nor end, and is not constituted of parts, but is thought of as
everywhere existing whole. Gaunilo, Count of Montigny, makes a twofold
answer in defence of the atheist. He says that that highest essence has
no being in the understanding; it only exists therein by the ear, not
by being; it only exists as a man who has heard a sound endeavors to
embrace a thing wholly unknown to him in an image. And therein, he
says, it is concluded that the mental representation of God in mankind
is already a purely contingent one, and is produced from without by the
sound of words; its necessary presence in the spirit is not proved.
Thus, he adds, much is wanting to the ability of inferring its
existence from the finding of such an image in the spirit. In the
sphere of mere imagination no one thing has a less or a greater
existence than any other thing; each has equally no existence at all.
Therefore, he writes, granted that the presence of the idea of God in
the spirit is not contingent, still the thought or the concept of God
does not essentially argue the being of God. Similarly says Kant later
on: We are no richer if we think of our ability as one cipher more.'
That Anselm also undoubtedly knew, but he opined that the concept of
God is different to any other thought, which remains unaltered, whether
it is thought of as existent or non-existent; the concept of God is
that thought, which is no longer thought unless it is thought as
existent, and which, therefore, essentially involves being. But, of
course, it is insufficiently established by Anselm that a concept of
God which does not necessarily include existence, is not the highest
thought, and therefore is not the concept of God, and that,
consequently, the really highest thought must also be thought of as
existent. To this the following objection attaches. Inasmuch as Anselm
treated existence as a majus compared with non-existence, he treated
existence as an attribute, whereas it is the bearer of all attributes.
So it is not proved by Anselm that the origin of this idea, which, when
thought, is thought as existent, is not contingent to the reason, but
necessary; and that reason only remains reason by virtue of this idea.
Finally, Anselm thinks, thus overrating the Ontological moment, that he
has already attained therein the full concept of God. These
shortcomings were to be obviated, stage by stage, by his successors."
__________________________________________________________________

<8> A System of Christian Doctrine. Translated by A. Cave and J. S.
Banks, Edinburgh, 1880. Vol. I., p. 216 et seq
__________________________________________________________________

LOTZE <9>

"To conclude that because the notion of a most perfect Being includes
reality as one of its perfections, therefore a most perfect Being
necessarily exists, is so obviously to conclude falsely, that after
Kant's incisive refutation any attempt to defend such reasoning would
be useless. Anselm, in his more free and spontaneous reflection, has
here and there touched the thought that the greatest which we can
think, if we think it as only thought, is less than the same greatest
if we think it as existent. It is not possible that from this
reflection either any one should develop a logically cogent proof, but
the way in which it is put seems to reveal another fundamental thought
which is seeking for expression. For what would it matter if that which
is thought as most perfect were, as thought, less than the least
reality? Why should this thought disturb us? Plainly for this reason,
that it is an immediate certainty that what is greatest, most
beautiful, most worthy is not a mere thought, but must be a reality,
because it would be intolerable to believe of our ideal that it is an
idea produced by the action of thought but having no existence, no
power, and no validity in the world of reality. We do not from the
perfection of that which is perfect immediately deduce its reality as a
logical consequence; but without the circumlocution of a deduction we
directly feel the impossibility of its non-existence, and all semblance
of syllogistic proof only serves to make more clear the directness of
this certainty. If what is greatest did not exist, then what is
greatest would not be, and it is not impossible that that which is
greatest of all conceivable things should not be."
__________________________________________________________________

<9> Microcosmus. Translated by E. Hamilton and E. E. C. Jones.
Edinburgh, 1887. Vol. II., p. 669 et seq.
__________________________________________________________________

PROFESSOR ROBERT FLINT <10>

"Anselm was the founder of that kind of argumentation which, in the
opinion of many, is alone entitled to be described as a priori or
ontological. He reasoned thus: The fool may say in his heart, There is
no God; but he only proves thereby that he is a fool, for what he says
is self-contradictory. Since he denies that there is a God, he has in
his mind the idea of God, and that idea implies the existence of God,
for it is the idea of a Being than which a higher cannot be conceived.
That than which a higher cannot be conceived cannot exist merely as an
idea, because what exists merely as an idea is inferior to what exists
in reality as well as in idea. The idea of a highest Being which exists
merely in thought, is the idea of a highest Being which is not the
highest even in thought, but inferior to a highest Being which exists
in fact as well as in thought.' This reasoning found unfavorable
critics even among the contemporaries of Anselm, and has commended
itself completely to few. Yet it may fairly be doubted whether it has
been conclusively refuted, and some of the objections most frequently
urged against it are certainly inadmissible. It is no answer to it, for
example, to deny that the idea of God is innate or universal. The
argument merely assumes that he who denies that there is a God must
have an idea of God. There is also no force, as Anselm showed, in the
objection of Gaunilo, that the existence of God can no more be inferred
from the idea of a perfect being, than the existence of a perfect
island is to be inferred from the idea of such an island. There neither
is nor can be an idea of an island which is greater and better than any
other that can ever be conceived. Anselm could safely promise that he
would make Gaunilo a present of such an island when he had really
imagined it. Only one being--an infinite, independent, necessary
being--can be perfect in the sense of being greater and better than
every other conceivable being. The objection that the ideal can never
logically yield the real--that the transition from thought to fact must
be in every instance illegitimate--is merely an assertion that the
argument is fallacious. It is an assertion which cannot fairly be made
until the argument has been exposed and refuted. The argument is that a
certain thought of God is found necessarily to imply His existence. The
objection that existence is not a predicate, and that the idea of a God
who exists is not more complete and perfect than the idea of a God who
does not exist, is, perhaps, not incapable of being satisfactorily
repelled. Mere existence is not a predicate, but specifications or
determinations of existence are predicable. Now the argument nowhere
implies that existence is a predicate; it implies only that reality,
necessity, and independence of existence are predicates of existence;
and it implies this on the ground that existence in re can be
distinguished from existence in conceptu, necessary from contingent
existence, self-existence from derived existence. Specific distinctions
must surely admit of being predicated. That the exclusion of
existence--which here means real and necessary existence --from the
idea of God does not leave us with an incomplete idea of God, is not a
position, I think, which can be maintained. Take away existence from
among the elements in the idea of a perfect being, and the idea becomes
either the idea of a nonentity or the idea of an idea, and not the idea
of a perfect being at all. Thus, the argument of Anselm is
unwarrantably represented as an argument of four terms instead of
three. Those who urge the objection seem to me to prove only that if
our thought of God be imperfect, a being who merely realised that
thought would be an imperfect being; but there is a vast distance
between this truism and the paradox that an unreal being may be an
ideally perfect being."
__________________________________________________________________

<10> Theism. New York, 1893. Seventh edition. P. 278 et seq.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

Patrologioe Cursus Completus. Series Secunda. Tomi CLVIIICLIX. S.
Anselmus. . Paris, 1853.

CHURCH. A. W. St. Anselm. . London, 1873

FRANCK, G F. Anselm von Canterbury. Tubingen, 1842.

HASSE, F. R. Anselm von Canterbury. Leipzig, 1843. 2 volumes.

-The same. Translated and abridged by W.Turner. London, 1850.

REMUSAT, CHARLES DE. Anselme de Canterbury. Paris, 1854; 2nd ed., 1868.

RIGG, J. M. St. Anselm of Canterbury. London, 1896.

RULE M. The Ltfe and Times of St. Anselm. London, 1883. 2 volumes.

DE VOSGES, LE COMTE DOMET. Saint Anselme, in the series Les Grands
Philosophes. Paris, 1901.

WELCH, A. C. Anselm and His Work. Edinburgh, 1901.

BAUR, F. C. Vorlesungen uber die christliche Dogmengeschichte. Leipzig,
1866. Zweiter Band, 249-251, 298 ff.

ERDMANN, J. E. A History of Philosophy. English Translation HOUGH]. London, 1891. Vol I., 303-314.

HEGEL, G. W. F. Lectures on the History of Philosophy. Translated from
the German by E. S. Haldane and F. H. Simson. London, 1896. Vol. III.,
61-67.

HOOK, W. T. Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury. London, 1862. Vol.
VIII., 169-276.

MAURICE, F.D. Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy. London, 1882. Vol. I.,
507-533.

PFLEIDERER, 0. The Philosophy of Religion. Translated by A. Menzies.
London, 1888. Vol. III., 271-276.

UEBERWEG, F.^1 History of Philosophy. Translated by G. S. Morris. New
York, 1892. Vol. I., 377-386.

^1 Ueberweg gives the titles of German and Latin dissertations on
Anselm not included in this list.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

ANSELM'S PROSLOGIUM

OR DISCOURSE ON THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
__________________________________________________________________

PREFACE.

In this brief work the author aims at proving in a single argument the
existence of God, and whatsoever we believe of God.--The difficulty of
the task.--The author writes in the person of one who contemplates God,
and seeks to understand what he believes. To this work he had given
this title: Faith Seeking Understanding. He finally named it
Proslogium,--that is, A Discourse.

AFTER I had published, at the solicitous entreaties of certain
brethren, a brief work (the Monologium) as an example of meditation on
the grounds of faith, in the person of one who investigates, in a
course of silent reasoning with himself, matters of which he is
ignorant; considering that this book was knit together by the linking
of many arguments, I began to ask myself whether there might be found a
single argument which would require no other for its proof than itself
alone; and alone would suffice to demonstrate that God truly exists,
and that there is a supreme good requiring nothing else, which all
other things require for their existence and well-being; and whatever
we believe regarding the divine Being.

Although I often and earnestly directed my thought to this end, and at
some times that which I sought seemed to be just within my reach, while
again it wholly evaded my mental vision, at last in despair I was about
to cease, as if from the search for a thing which could not be found.
But when I wished to exclude this thought altogether, lest, by busying
my mind to no purpose, it should keep me from other thoughts, in which
I might be successful; then more and more, though I was unwilling and
shunned it, it began to force itself upon me, with a kind of
importunity. So, one da

[petronius]

4. Perhaps I'm shallow, but it seems to me that if the dude had written a better poem,

he wouldn't have needed a 500 page book to explain it... :shrug:

[datasuspect]

5. it's actually a rather slender volume

i'd lend you mine, but some of the pages are stuck together.