Quod triplex sit causa spiritualis visitationis.
The Threefold Purpose of Spiritual Visitation
Spiritual visitation comes to rouse the sluggish, comfort the laboring, and reward those who sigh toward heavenly things.
We know, then, that this kind of spiritual visitation doesn't always reveal holiness; for it often stirs a person up, and it often preserves what's already there. Now as far as we can see at present, the cause of this visitation is threefold. For it comes sometimes to stir a person up, at other times to bring comfort, and more often still as a reward. To stir up those who are asleep, to comfort those who are laboring, and as a reward for those who sigh toward heavenly things. The first, then, rouses the sluggish; the second restores those who are laboring; the third receives those who are rising up. The first kind of compunction stirs a person toward holiness; the second preserves holiness; the third rewards it.1 The first frightens the one who despises, or draws in the one who fears; the second cherishes and advances the one who is striving; the third embraces the one who comes. The first is like a goad, correcting the one who has wandered off; the second is like a staff, supporting the weak; the third is a place of rest, welcoming the one who comes.2
Mercy's Hidden Work in the Soul
Divine mercy rouses the lukewarm through hidden compunction, visiting the elect for growth and the reprobate for judgment.
In the same way, divine mercy often rouses those who are living lukewarmly or wastefully to salvation — now by a word, now by example, sometimes by rebuke, and at times even by the lash — and likewise, through a hidden compunction stirred up by fear or brought forth by the heart's affection, it invites them to a better way of life.3 The cause of this visitation is twofold. It comes to the elect for their growth, and to the reprobate for their judgment.
Read the original Latin
Noverimus ergo quia hujusmodi visitatio non semper sanctitatem ostendit; nam saepe provocat, saepe et conservat. Est autem, quantum in praesentiarum occurrit, triplex hujus visitationis causa. Fit enim aliquando ad excitationem, nonnunquam ad consolationem, plerumque etiam ad praemium. Ad excitationem dormientibus, ad consolationem laborantibus; pro praemio ad coelestia suspirantibus. Prima ergo excitat torpentes, Secunda reficit laborantes, tertia suscipit ascendentes. Prima haec compunctio ad sanctitatem provocat, secunda sanctitatem conservat, tertia remunerat. Prima terret contemnentem, vel illicit timentem; secunda fovet et promovet adnitentem, tertia amplectitur venientem. Prima est quasi stimulus devium corrigens, secunda quasi baculus debilem sustentans, tertia lectulus quietem suscipiens.
Sicut igitur divina clementia plerumque verbo, plerumque exemplo, nonnunquam correptione, aliquando etiam flagello, tepide vel perdite viventes provocat ad salutem, ita etiam occulta compunctione, quam vel timor excitat, vel generat affectus, ad melioris vitae statum invitat. Hujus autem visitationis causa bipertita est. Fit enim electis ad profectum, reprobis ad judicium.
Notes
- 1 ↩Compunctio here is rendered as 'compunction' per lexeme policy — grace-pierced sorrow, not generic guilt.
- 2 ↩Lectulus rendered as 'place of rest' rather than literal 'little bed' to preserve the metaphor's force in contemporary English.
- 3 ↩affectus rendered as 'the heart's affection' to capture the interior-devotional sense of the Latin rather than mere emotion.
Speculum caritatis (The Mirror of Charity) companion
Reorder one love at a time, daily
Use the study map with the free Chosen Portion app's daily readings to work through Aelred at a sustainable pace.
Aelred wrote the Mirror as a rule for daily interior discipline in community, and Chosen Portion carries that discipline forward as a short ordered reading each day.
- All 3 books and 102 chapters mapped into 4 weekly themes with page-level pointers
- Aelred's choice-motion-fruit test, turned into a one-page self-examination worksheet
- 16 discussion questions ready for personal journaling or a 4-session small group