The six and sixty chapitre. Of the other secondari might, sensualité bi name; and of the werkes, and of the obedience of it unto wille bifore sinne and after.
The Nature of Sensuality
This pericope defines sensuality as a power of the soul that operates through the bodily senses, describes its two parts (need and appetite), and illustrates its characteristic responses of grumbling and delight toward pleasant and unpleasant creatures, all contained within the mind.
Sensuality is a power of our soul that extends into and governs the bodily senses, through which we have physical awareness and sensation of all bodily creatures, whether pleasant or unpleasant.1 And it has two parts: one through which it attends to the needs of our body, and another through which it serves the appetites of the bodily senses. For this same power is what grumbles when the body lacks what it needs, and what, when taking what is needed, prompts us to take more than necessary in feeding and indulging our appetites. It grumbles at the lack of pleasant creatures, and is eagerly delighted by their presence. It grumbles at the presence of unpleasant creatures, and it is eagerly pleased by their absence. Both this power and the realm in which it operates are contained in the mind.2
Sensuality Before and After the Fall
This pericope contrasts the perfect obedience of sensuality to the will before original sin with its disordered state after sin, emphasizing the need for grace to rule it so that we do not wallow in beastly desires.
Before humanity ever sinned, sensuality was so obedient to the will — to which it is, so to speak, a servant — that it never offered the will any disordered craving or complaint about any physical thing, or about any spiritual pretense of liking or disliking produced by a spiritual enemy in the bodily senses. But now it is not so. For unless it is ruled by grace in the will — so that it suffers meekly and in due measure the pain of original sin, which it feels when needed pleasure is absent and when wholesome discomfort is present, and restrains itself from lust when needed pleasure is present, and from lustful delight when wholesome discomfort is absent — it will otherwise wallow wretchedly and wantonly, like a pig in the mud, in the world's riches and the foul flesh, so much that all our living will be more beastly and fleshly than either human or spiritual.
Read the original Middle English
Sensualité is a mighte of oure soule, rechyng and regnyng in the bodely wittes, thorow the whiche we have bodely knowyng and felyng of alle bodely creatures, whether thei be likyng or gruchyng. And it hath two partyes: one thorow the whiche it beholdeth to the needfulnes of oure body, another thorou the whiche it serveth to the lustis of the bodely wittys. For this same might is it that gruchith when the body lackyth the needful thinges unto it, and that in the takyng of the nede stereth us to take more than nedith in fedyng and fortheryng of oure lustys. It grochith in lackyng of likyng creatures, and lustely is delited in theire presence. It grochith in presence of mislikyng creatures, and it is lustely plesid in theire absence. Bothe this might and the thing that it worcheth in ben contened in the mynde.
Before er man synnid was the sensualité so obedyent unto the wille -- unto the whiche it is as it were servaunt -- that it ministred never unto it any unordeinde likyng or groching in any bodely creature, or in any goostly feynyng of likyng or mislikyng maad by any goostly enmye in the bodely wittes. Bot now it is not so; for bot yif it be reulyd by grace in the wille, for to suffre meekly and in mesure the pyne of the original synne -- the whiche it felith in absence of needful likyng and in presence of speedful groching -- and therto also for to streyne it fro luste in presence of needful lykyng, and fro lusty plesaunce in absence of speedful groching, elles wil it wrechidly and wantounly weltre, as a swine in the myre, in the welthes of this woreld and the foule flessche so mochel, that alle oure levyng schal be more beestly and fieschly then outher manly or goostly.
Notes
- 1 ↩Sensuality (ME sensualité) is kept as the Cloud's technical name for the soul's secondary faculty that works through the bodily senses, not as modern "sensuality" in the moralizing sense.
- 2 ↩"That in which it works" renders "the thing that it worcheth in": the domain or object-field of sensuality's operation, itself held within the mind as the encompassing power.
The Cloud of Unknowing companion
A daily portion of stillness
Chosen Portion delivers one short contemplative reading and a guided moment of silence each day — the ascent, one step at a time.
Chosen Portion is the paced doorway into this collection: it portions the dense mystical treatises into one daily reading plus guided silence, exactly as the 14-day plan teaches.
- Daily bite-sized excerpts from the contemplative classics, never a wall of text
- A built-in timed stillness practice that grows from 2 minutes to 10
- Gentle progression through the tradition — the app remembers where you are on the ascent