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S. Augustine: As long, then, as we are absent from the Lord, we walk by faith and not by sight,[350] whence it is said: The just man shall live in his faith.[351] And this is our justice as long as we are on our pilgrimage—namely, that here now by the uprightness and perfection with which we walk we strive after that perfection and fulness of justice[Pg 191] where, in all the glory of its beauty, will be full and perfect charity. Here we chastise our body and bring it into subjection; here we give alms by conferring benefits and forgiving offences against ourselves; and we do this with joy and from the heart, and are ever instant in prayer; and all this we do in the light of that sound doctrine by which is built up right faith, solid hope, and pure charity. This, then, is our present justice whereby we run hungering and thirsting after the perfection and fulness of justice, so that hereafter we may be filled therewith (De Perfectione justitiæ Hominis, viii. 18).
S. Augustine: You know, then, I think, not only how you ought to pray, but what you ought to pray for; and this not because I teach you, but because He teaches you Who has deigned to teach us all. The Life of Beatitude is what we have to seek; this we have to ask for from the Lord God. And what Beatitude means is, with many, a source of much dispute. But why should we appeal to the many and their many opinions? For pithily and truly it is said in God's Scripture: Happy is that people whose God is the Lord![352] Oh, that we may be counted amongst that people! Oh, that we may be enabled to contemplate Him, and may come one day to live with Him unendingly! The end of the commandment is charity from a pure heart and a good conscience, and an unfeigned faith.[353] And among these three, hope stands for a good[Pg 192] conscience. Faith, therefore, with hope and charity, leads to God the man who prays—that is, the man who believes, who hopes, and who desires, and who in the Lord's Prayer meditates what he should ask from the Lord (Ep. cxxx. ad probam).
"For my heart hath been inflamed, and my reins have been changed: and I am brought to nothing, and I knew not. I am become as a beast before Thee; and I am always with Thee. Thou hast held me by my right hand; and by Thy will Thou hast conducted me; and with glory Thou hast received me. For what have I in Heaven? and besides Thee what do I desire upon earth? For Thee my flesh and my heart hath fainted away; Thou art the God of my heart; and the God that is my portion for ever. For behold they that go far from Thee shall perish; Thou hast destroyed all them that are disloyal to Thee. But it is good for me to adhere to my God, to put my hope in the Lord God: that I may declare all Thy praises, in the gates of the daughter of Sion."[354]
S. Gregory says[355]: "In contemplation it is the Principle—namely, God—which is sought."
A thing may come under the contemplative life in two ways: either primarily, or secondarily—that is, dispositively. Now primarily the contemplation of Divine Truth belongs to the contemplative life, since such contemplation is the goal of[Pg 193] all human life. Hence S. Augustine says[356]: "The contemplation of God is promised to us as the goal of all our acts and the eternal consummation of all our joys." And this will be perfect in the future life when we shall see God face to face—when, consequently, it will render us perfectly blessed. But in our present state the contemplation of Divine Truth belongs to us only imperfectly—namely, through a glass and in a dark manner; it causes in us now a certain commencement of beatitude, which begins here, to be continued in the future. Hence even the Philosopher[357] makes the ultimate happiness of man consist in the contemplation of the highest intelligible truths.
But since we are led to a contemplation of God by the consideration of His Divine works—The invisible things of God ... are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made[358]—it follows also that the contemplation of the Divine works belongs in a secondary sense to the contemplative life—according, namely, as by it we are led to the knowledge of God. For this reason S. Augustine says[359]: "In the study of created things we must not exercise a mere idle and passing curiosity, but must make them a stepping-stone to things that are immortal and that abide for ever."
Thus from what we have said it is clear that four things belong, and that in a certain sequence, to the contemplative life: firstly, the moral virtues; secondly, other acts apart from that of contemplation; thirdly, the contemplation of the Divine[Pg 194] works; and fourthly—and this is the crown of them all—the actual contemplation of the Divine Truth.
Some, however, say that the contemplative life is not merely confined to the contemplation of God but is extended to the consideration of any truth whatsoever, thus:
1. In Ps. cxxxviii. 14 we read: Wonderful are Thy works! My soul knoweth right well! But the knowledge of the works of God is derived from a certain contemplation of the truth. Whence it would seem that it belongs to the contemplative life to contemplate not only the Divine Truth, but also any other truth we please.
But David sought the knowledge of God's works that he might thereby be led to God Himself, as he says elsewhere: I meditated on all Thy works, I mused upon the works of Thy hands; I stretched forth my hands to Thee.[360]
2. Again, S. Bernard says[361]: "The first point in contemplation is to marvel at God's majesty; the second, at His judgments; the third, at His benefits; the fourth, at His promises." But of these only the first comes under the Divine Truth—the rest are effects of it.
But from the consideration of the Divine judgments a man is led to the contemplation of the Divine justice; and from a consideration of the Divine benefits and promises a man is led to a knowledge of the Divine mercy[Pg 195] and goodness, as it were by effects either already shown or to be shown.
