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Chapter 92Ansl.1.92

MEDITATIO XVI. Sive meditationis quintae decimae pars secunda.--De praesentibus beneficiis Dei.

The Gift of Life and Faith

The meditator marvels at God's goodness in granting life, bodily integrity, the Incarnation, Christian upbringing, and protection from countless dangers.

I do not consider it a small benefit — that God, making good use of the wrongdoing of our parents, created us from their flesh and breathed into us the breath of life, setting us apart from those who were either miscarried and cast from the womb, or who, suffocated within the maternal womb, seem to have been conceived not for life but for punishment.✦ That he also created our limbs whole and sound for us, so that we would not be a grief to our own family and a disgrace to others. This is certainly a great thing. But how will we ever reckon the greatness of that goodness — that God chose to be born in that time and among such people, through whom we have come to his faith and sacraments? We see that this has been denied to countless people — the very thing we rejoice to have been granted — even though they share the same human condition as we do. They are abandoned by justice; we are called by grace. Let us go further, considering what a gift it was that we were raised by Christian parents. That flame did not harm us, that water did not swallow us up, that we were not devoured by a demon, that we were not struck down by beasts, that we were not killed by a fall from a height — that we were nurtured to a fitting age in his faith and good will.

One Womb, Two Destinies

The meditator pauses to acknowledge the shared origin of both siblings — the same father, the same womb — before turning to the contrast between them.

Up to this point, sister, we have covered those things in which we shared one and the same condition — begotten by the same father, held in the same womb, brought forth from the same womb.1

Exile from God's Presence

The brother laments his spiritual separation from God, comparing himself to Cain in exile and to a lost sheep forsaken by its shepherd.

Now, sister, look at me and see what great things God has done for your soul. For he has separated me from you, as if between light and darkness, keeping you for himself and leaving me to myself.2 My God, where have I gone? Where have I fled to? Where have I escaped to? Cast out from your presence like Cain, I have lived in the land as a wanderer and a fugitive, and whoever finds me will kill me.✦3 For what would a wretched creature do, abandoned by its own Creator? Where could a stray sheep go, or where could it hide, forsaken by its own shepherd?✦

The Savage Beast and the Protected Virgin

The brother contrasts his own fall into lust with his sister's preserved virginity, urging her to recognize how divine mercy shielded her from the same destruction.

O sister, a most savage beast has devoured your brother. Look, then, at me, and consider how much God bestowed on you there, where he kept you safe and unharmed from such a beast. How wretched am I, who lost my chastity; how blessed are you, whose virginity divine mercy protected. How often you were tempted, how often your chastity was assailed — and yet it was kept safe for you — while I, willingly pressing forward into every kind of shameful act, heaped up for myself fuel for the fire by which I would be burned, fuel for the stench by which I would be killed, fuel for the worms by which I would be gnawed away. Recall, if you will, those filthy acts of mine over which you wept and often rebuked me — a girl rebuking a little one, a woman rebuking a man. But Scripture is not wrong when it says: No one can correct the one whom God has rejected. O how God is to be loved by you — who, when he was driving me away, drew you to himself; and when the condition of both of us was the same, nevertheless he rejected me and loved you. Recall now, as I said, my corruptions — how a cloud of lust was raised up from the wanton desire of the flesh, and there was no one to snatch me away and make me safe.

The Descent into Sin and Divine Patience

The meditator recounts how he was seduced by false affection into a flood of vice, how God's wrath came upon him unrecognized, and how divine patience nevertheless preserved him from destruction.

For the words of the wicked prevailed over me — those who, in the sweet cup of love, kept offering me the poison of lust. The sweetness of affection and the impurity of desire came together as one, and they seized my still-tender youth, dragging me along the steep edges of vice, and plunged me into the flood of shameful acts.4 Your wrath and indignation came upon me, God — and I didn't know it. I wandered farther from you, and you let me go. I was tossed about, and poured out, and swept away through my own impurities — and you were silent. Come now, sister — listen carefully to all these shameful and abominable things into which my own will hurled me. And understand this: you would have fallen into the same, if the mercy of Christ hadn't preserved you. I don't say this as though no good came to me — for setting aside what we said earlier about the two of us compared together, a remarkable patience sustained my iniquities.5 To whom do I owe it that the earth didn't swallow me up, that the sky didn't strike me with lightning, and that the floods didn't overwhelm me?6

Grace That Pursues the Fugitive

The meditator reflects on the extraordinary grace that pursued him in his flight, lifted him from despair, broke the chains of evil habit, and received him back — all to God's praise and his own shame.

For how could any creature endure such a great injury against its own Creator, if he who founded it — who does not want the death of the sinner, but rather that the sinner be converted and live — did not himself restrain its impulse?✦ Think of how great the grace was in all this: he pursued the one who was fleeing, he was gentle with the one who was afraid, he lifted up into hope the one who had despaired of everything, he overwhelmed the ungrateful one with his own benefits, by the taste of an inner sweetness he drew and enticed one who was accustomed to impure pleasures, he dissolved the unbreakable chains of an evil habit, and he kindly received the one who had been drawn away from the world. I am passing over many things — the great works of his mercy toward me — lest any part of his glory, which belongs entirely to him, should seem to be transferred to me. So also, by human estimation, the grace of the giver and the blessedness of the receiver cling together, so that not only is the one who gave praised — since he alone would deserve praise — but also the one who receives. For who has anything that they have not received?✦ But if the gift was received freely, why is the receiver praised as though they had earned it? To you, therefore, my God, be praise; to you be glory; to you be thanksgiving. But for me, let there be the shame of my face — I who have done so many evil things and received so many good things.✦ What then? (you say.) Did you receive less?

The Shipwrecked Slave and the Virgin's Riches

Using the image of shipwreck, the brother acknowledges his sister's greater blessedness and urges her to consider the intimate consolations Christ bestowed upon her — sustaining, strengthening, comforting, and filling her with love.

O sister, happier is the one whose ship, full of goods and laden with riches, the blowing of the winds brought back intact to harbor, than the one who, having suffered shipwreck, escaped death naked. You therefore rejoice in the riches that divine grace has preserved for me; but the greatest labor presses upon me, so that I may restore what is broken, recover what is lost, and mend what is torn. Nevertheless I want you to emulate me, and to think it greatly something to be ashamed of, if after so many disgraces in that life I shall have been found equal to you, since often certain intervening vices diminish the glory of virginity, and the imitation of the old preservation puts to shame the morals, and virtues succeeding vices efface them.7 But now examine the gifts in which you alone are aware of divine goodness, with how pleasant a countenance Christ has met you as you renounce the world, with what delights he has fed the hungry one, what riches of his mercies he has shown, what affections he has inspired, and with the cup of charity he has made you drunk.✦ For if he did not leave the fugitive and rebellious slave, called back by his own mercy alone, untried of spiritual consolations — what sweetness would I believe he bestowed on a virgin? If you were being tempted, he was sustaining you; if you were wavering, he was strengthening you. How often did the pious comforter stand by you as you withered from fear? How often, as you burned with love, did he pour himself into your inmost parts?

Heavenly Delights and Detachment from the World

The meditator recalls the sister's contemplative experiences — spiritual illumination, ineffable longing, and transport to paradise — and exhorts her to detach from the world, fix her heart on heaven, and live each day as though it were her last.

How often did he illuminate you, singing psalms or reading, with the light of spiritual understanding? How often did he snatch you away, at prayer, into a kind of ineffable longing? How often, once your mind was withdrawn from earthly things, did he carry you across to heavenly delights and the pleasures of paradise? Turn all these things over in your mind, so that your whole heart may be turned toward him. Let the world grow worthless to you, let all carnal love become foul, let you not know yourself to be in this world — since you have transferred your purpose to those who are in heaven and live to God. Where your treasure is, there let your heart be also.✦ Don't shut up your soul in your cheap purse along with silver idols — because you'll never be able to fly across to heaven weighed down with the weight of coins.8 Consider that you are going to die each day, and you won't give a thought to tomorrow.

Trust in God Alone

The meditator exhorts his sister to place all her trust in God, who feeds the birds and clothes the lilies, and to let God alone be her everything — then concludes this portion on present blessings.

Don't let the barrenness of the time ahead terrify you, and don't let the fear of future hunger cast your mind down — let your whole trust rest in him alone, who feeds the birds and clothes the lilies. Let him be your granary, your storehouse, your purse; let him be your riches, your delight — let him alone be everything to you, in everything.✦ For now, let this much suffice concerning present blessings.

Read the original Latin

Non parvum aestimo beneficium, quo Deus bene utens malo parentum nostrorum creavit nos de carne illorum, et inspiravit in nobis spiraculum vitae, discernens nos ab illis qui vel arbortivi projecti sunt ab utero, vel qui inter materna viscera suffocati poenae videntur concepti non vitae. Quod etiam integra nobis et sana membra creavit, ne essemus nostris dolori, alienis opprobrio. Magnum est hoc certe. Sed quomodo illud quantaeve bonitatis aestimabimus, quod eo tempore et inter tales nasci voluit, per quos ad fidem suam et sacramenta pervenimus? Videmus innumerabilibus hominibus hoc negatum, quod nobis gratulamur esse concessum, cum quibus una est et nobis conditio. Illi derelicti sunt per justitiam, nos vocati sumus per gratiam. Procedamus intuentes munus ejus fuisse, quod educati a parentibus fuimus Christianis. Quod nos flamma non laesit, quod aqua non absorbuit, quod non vorati a daemone, quod non percussi a bestiis, quod praecipitio non necati, quod usque ad congruam aetatem in ejus fide et bona voluntate nutriti.

Huc usque ea percurrimus, soror, quibus fuit nobis una conditio, quos idem pater genuit, ac idem venter complexus est, eadem viscera profuderunt.

Jam nunc, soror, in me adverte quanta fecerit Deus animae tuae. Divisit enim inter me et te, quasi inter lucem et tenebras, sibi te servans, me mihi relinquens. Deus meus, quo abii? quo fugi? quo evasi? Ejectus a facie tua sicut Cain, habitavi in terra vagus et profugus, et quicunque invenerit me, occidet me. Quid enim ageret miserabilis creatura, a suo derelicta Creatore? Quo iret, quove lateret ovis erronea suo destituta pastore?

O soror, fera pessima devoravit fratrem tuum. In me ergo cerne, quantum ibi contulerit qui te a tali bestia conservavit illaesam. Quam miser ego sum, qui meam pudicitiam perdidi; tam beata tu, cujus virginitatem misericordia divina protexit. Quoties tentata, quoties impetita tua tibi castitas est servata, cum ego libens in turpia quaeque progrediens, coacervavi mihi materiam ignis quo comburerer, materiam fetoris quo necarer, materiam vermium a quibus corroderer? Recole si placet illas foeditates meas pro quibus plangebas, et corripiebas saepe, puella parvulum, femina masculum. Sed non fallit Scriptura quae ait: Nemo potest corrigere, quem Deus despexit. O quam diligendus est a te, qui cum me repelleret, te attraxit; et cum aequa conditio foret utriusque, tamen me despexerit, te dilexerit. Recole nunc, ut dixi, corruptiones meas, cum exaltaretur nebula libidinis ex luxuriosa concupiscentia carnis, et non esset qui eriperet et salvum faceret.

Verba enim iniquorum praevaluerunt super me, qui in suavi poculo amoris propinabant mihi venenum luxuriae. Convenientes in unum affectionis suavitas et cupiditatis impuritas, rapiebant imbecillem adhuc aetatem meam per abrupta vitiorum, atque mergebant gurgite flagitiorum. Venerunt super me ira et indignatio tua, Deus, et ego nesciebam. Ibam longius a te, et sinebas. Jactabar, et effundebar, et defluebar per immunditias meas, et tacebas. Eia, soror, diligenter attende omnia ista turpia et nefanda, in quae me praecipitavit meum arbitrium; et scito quod in haec corruisses, si te Christi misericordia non servasset. Non haec dico quasi nihil mihi contulerit boni, dum exceptis iis quae superius diximus utriusque collata, mira patientia meas sustinuerit iniquitates. Cui debeo quod terra non me absorbuit, noc fulminavit coelum, nec flumina submerserunt?

Quomodo enim sustineret creatura tantam injuriam Creatoris sui, si non impetum ejus cohiberet ille ipse qui condidit, qui non vult mortem peccatoris, sed magis ut convertatur et vivat? Ad illud quantae fuit gratiae, quod fugientem persecutus est, metuenti blandiebatur, quod erexit in spem totius desperatum, quod suis obruit beneficiis ingratum, quod gustu interioris dulcedinis, immundis assuetum delectationibus attraxit et illexit, quod indissolubilia malae consuetudinis vincula dissolvit, et abstractum saeculo benigne suscepit? Taceo multa, et magnae misericordiae suae circa me opera, ne aliquid gloriae suae, quae tota illius est, ad me videatur transire. Ita etiam secundum hominum aestimationem sibi cohaeret gratia dantis et felicitas recipientis, ut non solum laudetur, quia solus laudandus esset ille qui dedit, sed etiam ille qui recipit. Quis enim habet aliquid quod non receperit? Si autem gratis accepit, quare laudatur velut promeruerit? Tibi igitur laus, Deus meus, tibi gloria, tibi gratiarum actio; mihi autem confusio faciei meae, qui tot mala feci, et tot bona recipi. Quid igitur (inquis) me minus accepisti?

O soror, quia felicior est ille, cujus navem plenam mercibus et onustam divitiis flatus ventorum integram revexit ad portum, quam qui passus naufragium nudus evasit mortem. Tu ergo in his, quas tibi divina gratia conservavit, exsultas divitiis; mihi maximus labor incumbit ut fracta redintegrem, amissa recuperem, scissa resarciam. Verumtamen et me volo ut aemuleris, valdeque putes erubescendum, si post tot flagitia in illa vita tibi inventus fuero aequalis, cum saepe virginitatis gloriam intervenientia quaedam vitia minuant, et veteris conservationis opprobrium morum imitatio et succedentes vitiis virtutes oblitterent. Sed jam illa, in quibus tibi sola conscia es divinae bonitatis, inspice nunc munera, quam jucunda facie abrenuntianti saeculo Christus occurrerit, quibus esurientem deliciis pavit, quas miserationum suarum divitias ostendit, quos inspiravit affectus, quo te charitatis poculo ebriavit. Nam si fugitivum servum et rebellem sola sua miseratione revocatum spiritualium consolationum non reliquit inexpertum; quid dulcedinis crediderim eum virgini contulisse? Si tentabaris, ille sustentabat; si fluctuabas, ille solidabat. Quoties prae timore arescenti pius consolator astabat? Quoties aestuanti prae amore, ipse se tuis visceribus infundebat?

Quoties psallentem vel legentem spiritualium sensuum lumine illustrabat? Quoties orantem in quoddam ineffabile desiderium suum rapiebat? Quoties mentem tuam a terrenis subtractam, ad coelestes delicias et paradisi amoenitates transportabat? Haec omnia revolve animo, ut in eum tuus totus revolvatur affectus. Vilescat tibi mundus, omnis amor carnalis sordeat, nescias te esse in mundo hoc; quoniam ad illos qui in coelo sunt et Deo vivunt, tuum transtulisti propositum. Ubi est thesaurus tuus, ibi sit et cor tuum. Noli cum argenteis simulacris vili marsupio tuo tuum includere animum; quia nunquam cum nummorum pondere poteris transvolare ad coelum. Puta te quotidie morituram, et de crastino non cogitabis.

Non te futuri temporis sterilitas terreat, non futurae famis timor mentem tuam dejiciat, sed ex ipso tota fiducia tua pendeat qui aves pascit, lilia vestit. Ipse sit horreum tuum, ipse apotheca, ipse marsupium tuum, ipse divitiae, ipse deliciae tuae; solus tibi sit omnia in omnibus. Haec interim de praesentibus satis sint.

Scripture echoes

  1. ↩Gen.2.7;Job.33.4 — Then the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. Job.33.4 — The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.
  2. ↩Gen.4.14 — Look, you have driven me out today from the face of the ground, and from your face I will be hidden, and I will be a fugitive and a wanderer in the land, and whoever finds me will kill me.
  3. ↩Luke.15.4-Luke.15.6 — Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the lost one until he finds it? Luke.15.5 — And when he finds it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. Luke.15.6 — And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.'
  4. ↩Ezek.33.11 — Say to them, 'As I live, declares the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways! For why should you die, O house of Israel?'
  5. ↩1Cor.4.7 — For who makes you different? And what do you have that you did not receive? But if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you had not received it?
  6. ↩Ezra.9.6;Dan.9.7-Dan.9.8 — And I said, 'My God, I am ashamed and humiliated to lift my face to you, my God, for our iniquities have multiplied above our heads, and our guilt has grown up to the heavens.' Dan.9.7 — O Lord, righteousness belongs to you, but to us, shame of face, as it is this day—to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the countries where you have driven them, because of the treachery they have committed against you. Dan.9.8 — O LORD, to us belongs shame of face — to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers — because we have sinned against you.
  7. ↩Matt.25.35;Luke.6.21 — For I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you welcomed me in; Luke.6.21 — Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.
  8. ↩Matt.6.21;Luke.12.34 — For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Luke.12.34 — For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
  9. ↩1Cor.15.28 — When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to the one who subjected all things to him, so that God may be all in all.

Notes

  1. 1 ↩viscera (entrails/inward parts) rendered as 'womb' in both instances to preserve the parallel with venter and the sense of shared maternal origin; the Latin viscera carries a broader sense of 'inward parts' but the context of birth and shared condition favors the concrete maternal reading.
  2. 2 ↩The simile 'as if between light and darkness' carries overtones of both Genesis 1:4 (God separating light from darkness) and the spiritual separation between the saved and the reprobate; the conditional 'quasi' keeps it figurative rather than dogmatic.
  3. 3 ↩The Cain imagery echoes Genesis 4:14 (Cain's complaint of being driven from the face of the earth and becoming a fugitive and wanderer); the conditional threat 'quicunque invenerit me, occidet me' closely mirrors Cain's fear in Gen 4:14.
  4. 4 ↩abrupta vitiorum rendered as 'steep edges of vice' to capture the precipice metaphor; could also mean 'headlong paths of vice.'
  5. 5 ↩utriusque collata is syntactically difficult; rendered as 'the two of us compared together' to capture the sense of a comparison between the speaker and the sister previously discussed.
  6. 6 ↩noc is a variant spelling of nec; rendered as 'that... not' to preserve the parallel negative clauses.
  7. 7 ↩The phrase 'veteris conservationis opprobrium morum imitatio et succedentes vitiis virtutes oblitterent' is syntactically dense. The sense appears to be that imitating the former state of preservation brings reproach when vices recur, and that new virtues can be obscured by the vices that preceded them.
  8. 8 ↩argenteis simulacris likely figurative for worldly attachments given coinage imagery, not literal idols.

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