This treatise was issued by way of explanation of some difficult passages
in his first work, concerning especially the gift of counsel, and indeed
as a kind of defence and apology of his whole mystic teaching. He
protests that he has never admitted that the creature can be raised to a
state of identity with God, and once more he explains his conception of
the union of the soul with her Divine Spouse. There is a union common to
all the just, brought about by the grace of God, with the forsaking of
vice, the practice of virtue, and submission to the authority of the
Church. Then there is a more intimate union, like unto that of fire and
iron, which, when united, seem but one matter, though in fact they remain
two distinct substances. Those who attain this love God and live in His
presence, but as yet arrive not at a complete knowledge of His essence.
After this again there is even a yet closer union, whereby the Eternal
Father and man become one, not indeed with oneness of substantial unity,
but in a oneness of love and bliss. It is evident that language here
fails the holy author to express the sublimity of his concept and his
experience; in his endeavour to show the intimacy of this last method of
union he is driven to use expressions which, taken as they stand, have
that pantheistic ring which it is his first object here to disclaim.