Discourse 67

The Illumination of the Inquiries concerning the Distinctions of the Known Things: what manner of thought belongs to each one of these. 67. The intellect is a spiritual sensation, which is made a receiver of the visual power, like the pupil of the bodily eyes, through which the sensible light is perceived. The contemplative vision is the natural knowledge, which in its power was mingled with the strength of the pure one, that which names the natural light. The holy power is the discriminating sun of grace for those who are placed in the light for vision. The natures are what? The intermediate wills, which are distinct, that from the light for vision. The passions, however, are like material essences, which when they interpose between the light for vision, the distinction of the wills ceases from it. Purity is the emptiness of the known air, through which the spiritual nature moves in its revolution. If the intellect is not firm in its purity, knowledge does not act through it. Like the bodily sensation, when it is purified from causes, vision is taken from it. If the intellect is firm, but knowledge is not, the intellect does not make a distinction without it in the spiritual things.

like the eye of a healthy person in all its own functions, and it is clearer than the sensation of sight, however many times it may be exercised. If, therefore, all these natures are in their own properties, grace is not near, so that it does not cause all the powers to be occupied with the service of their distinctions. Just as also in the hours of night, because of the absence of the sun, the works remain unperformed, while all are true and complete in themselves. But the eye, sight, and colors are said to be neither distinguished nor distinguishable. And this is what is said: that in the light, you see the light. If, then, grace is also the sun that is known, when it is near, it stirs, draws, causes, and awakens. Purity is not that in which, as in an empty space devoid of worldly occupation and full of shadows, it is simply extended toward us, the rays of the sun and the subtle light, so that from them we are delighted by the spiritual vision of this whole spiritual thing: vision separated from distinction, nature nullified from action, the self hidden from the perception of the second sun that shines upon all, because the bodily organ in which the growth of the truth that is not preserved for us is dissolved. Therefore, all these things that have been said are necessarily sought.

And because all these are not found deficient in a single person, nor are many found who attain to the perfect natural state of spiritual knowledge. The deficiency, whether from the insufficiency of the intellect, or from the lack of life in the mind, or from the unpreparedness of the will, or from the deficiency of purity, or from the absence of the rays [of grace], or from the cessation of grace—it is not fitting that wealth be given to a fool, nor that a slave be set in authority over great matters, nor because of the bonds of time, place, and person.