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of the love of God.
2. Inasmuch as, by means of that war of the dark night, as has been said, the
soul is combated and purged after two manners namely, according to its sensual
and its spiritual part with its senses, faculties and passions, so likewise after two
manners namely, according to these two parts, the sensual and the spiritual with
all its faculties and desires, the soul attains to an enjoyment of peace and rest. For
this reason, as has likewise been said, the soul twice pronounces this line
293
Canticles viii, 1.
294
The word translated 'at rest' is a past participle: more literally, 'stilled.'
95
namely,295 in this stanza and in the last because of these two portions of the soul,
the spiritual and the sensual, which, in order that they may go forth to the Divine
union of love, must needs first be reformed, ordered and tranquillized with respect
to the sensual and to the spiritual, according to the nature of the state of innocence
which was Adam's.296 And thus this line which, in the first stanza, was understood
of the repose of the lower and sensual portion, is, in this second stanza, understood
more particularly of the higher and spiritual part; for which reason it is repeated.297
3. This repose and quiet of this spiritual house the soul comes to attain,
habitually and perfectly (in so far as the condition of this life allows), by means of
the acts of the substantial touches of Divine union whereof we have just spoken;
which, in concealment, and hidden from the perturbation of the devil, and of its own
senses and passions, the soul has been receiving from the Divinity, wherein it has
been purifying itself, as I say, resting, strengthening and confirming itself in order
to be able to receive the said union once and for all, which is the Divine betrothal
between the soul and the Son of God. As soon as these two houses of the soul have
together become tranquillized and strengthened, with all their domestics namely,
the faculties and desires and have put these domestics to sleep and made them to
be silent with respect to all things, both above and below, this Divine Wisdom
immediately unites itself with the soul by making a new bond of loving possession,
and there is fulfilled that which is written in the Book of Wisdom, in these words:
Dum quietum silentium contineret omnia, et nox in suo cursu medium iter haberet,
omnipotens sermo tuus Domine a regalibus sedibus.298 The same thing is described
by the Bride in the Songs,299 where she says that, after she had passed by those
who stripped her of her mantle by night and wounded her, she found Him Whom
her soul loved.
4. The soul cannot come to this union without great purity, and this purity is
not gained without great detachment from every created thing and sharp
mortification. This is signified by the stripping of the Bride of her mantle and by her
being wounded by night as she sought and went after the Spouse; for the new
mantle which belonged to the betrothal could not be put on until the old mantle was
stripped off. Wherefore, he that refuses to go forth in the night aforementioned to
seek the Beloved, and to be stripped of his own will and to be mortified, but seeks
Him upon his bed and at his own convenience, as did the Bride,300 will not succeed
in finding Him. For this soul says of itself that it found Him by going forth in the
dark and with yearnings of love.
295
[Lit., 'twice repeats' a loosely used phrase.]
296
H omits this last phrase, which is found in all the other Codices, and in e.p. The latter adds:
'notwithstanding that the soul is not wholly free from the temptations of the lower part.' The
addition is made so that the teaching of the Saint may not be confused with that of the Illuminists,
who supposed the contemplative in union to be impeccable, do what he might. The Saint's meaning is
that for the mystical union of the soul with God such purity and tranquillity of senses and faculties
are needful that his condition resembles that state of innocence in which Adam was created, but
without the attribute of impeccability, which does not necessarily accompany union, nor can be
attained by any, save by a most special privilege of God. Cf. St. Teresa's Interior Castle, VII, ii. St.
Teresa will be found occasionally to explain points of mystical doctrine which St. John of the Cross
takes as being understood.
297
[Lit., 'twice repeated.']
298
Wisdom xviii, 14.
299
Canticles v, 7.
300
Canticles iii, 1.
96
CHAPTER XXV
Wherein is expounded the third stanza.
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.
EXPOSITION
THE soul still continues the metaphor and similitude of temporal night in
describing this its spiritual night, and continues to sing and extol the good
properties which belong to it, and which in passing through this night it found and
used, to the end that it might attain its desired goal with speed and security. Of
these properties it here sets down three.
2. The first, it says, is that in this happy night of contemplation God leads the
soul by a manner of contemplation so solitary and secret, so remote and far distant
from sense, that naught pertaining to it, nor any touch of created things, succeeds in
approaching the soul in such a way as to disturb it and detain it on the road of the
union of love.
3. The second property whereof it speaks pertains to the spiritual darkness of
this night, wherein all the faculties of the higher part of the soul are in darkness.
The soul sees naught, neither looks at aught neither stays in aught that is not God,
to the end that it may reach Him, inasmuch as it journeys unimpeded by obstacles
of forms and figures, and of natural apprehensions, which are those that are wont to
hinder the soul from uniting with the eternal Being of God.
4. The third is that, although as it journeys it is supported by no particular
interior light of understanding, nor by any exterior guide, that it may receive
satisfaction therefrom on this lofty road it is completely deprived of all this by this
thick darkness yet its love alone, which burns at this time, and makes its heart to
long for the Beloved, is that which now moves and guides it, and makes it to soar
upward to its God along the road of solitude, without its knowing how or in what
manner.
There follows the line:
In the happy night.301
301
Thus end the majority of the MSS. Cf. pp. lxviii-lxiii, Ascent of Mount Carmel (Image Books
edition), 26-27, on the incomplete state of this treatise. The MSS. say nothing of this, except that in
the Alba de Tormes MS. we read: 'Thus far wrote the holy Fray John of the Cross concerning the
purgative way, wherein he treats of the active and the passive [aspect] of it as is seen in the treatise
of the Ascent of the Mount and in this of the Dark Night, and, as he died, he wrote no more. And
hereafter follows the illuminative way, and then the unitive.' Elsewhere we have said that the lack of
any commentary on the last five stanzas is not due to the Saint's death, since he lived for many years
after writing the commentary on the earlier stanzas.
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