BONAVENTURA
The range and character of the ultimate intellectual interests of the
thirteenth century may be studied in the works of four men: St.
Bonaventura, Albertus Magnus and St. Thomas, and lastly, Roger Bacon. The
first and last were as different as might be; and both were Franciscans.
Albertus and Thomas represent the successive stages of one achievement,
the greatest in the course of mediaeval thought. In some respects, their
position is intermediate between Bonaventura and Bacon. Bonaventura
reflects many twelfth-century ways of thinking; Albert and Thomas embody
_par excellence_ the intellectual movement of the thirteenth century in
which they all lived; and Roger Bacon stands for much, the exceeding
import of which was not to be recognized until long after he was
forgotten. The four were contemporaries, and, with the possible exception
of Bacon, knew each other well. Thomas was Albert’s pupil; Thomas and
Bonaventura taught at the same time in the Faculty of Theology at Paris,
and stood together in the academic conflict between their Orders and the
Seculars. Albertus and Bonaventura also must have known each other,
teaching at the same time in the theological faculty. As for Bacon, he was
likewise at Paris studying and teaching, when the others were there, and
may have known them.[544] Albert and Thomas came of princely stock, and
sacrificed their fortune in the world for theology’s sake. Bacon’s family
was well-to-do; Bonaventura was lowly born.
John of Fidanza, who under the name of Bonaventura was to become
Minister-General of his Order, Cardinal, Saint, and _Doctor Seraphicus_,
saw the light in the Tuscan village of Bagnorea. That he was of Italian,
half Latin-speaking, stock is apparent from his own fluent Latin. Probably
in the year 1238, when seventeen years old, he joined the Franciscan
Order; and four years later was sent to Paris, where he studied under
Alexander of Hales. In 1248 he was licensed to lecture publicly, and
thenceforth devoted himself at Paris to teaching and writing, and
defending his Order against the Seculars, until 1257, when, just as the
University conferred on him the title of Magister, he was chosen
Minister-General of his Order, in the thirty-seventh year of his age. The
greater part of his writings were composed before the burdens of this
primacy drew him from his studies. He was still to become Prince of the
Church, for he was made Cardinal of Albano in 1273, the year before his
death.
For all the Middle Ages the master in theology was Augustine. Either he
was studied directly in his own writings, or his views descended through
the more turbid channels of the works of men he influenced. Mediaeval
theology was overwhelmingly Augustinian until the middle of the thirteenth
century; and since theology was philosophy’s queen, mediaeval philosophy
conformed to that which Augustine employed in his theology. This, if
traced backward to its source, should be called Platonism, or
Neo-Platonism if we turn our mind to the modes in which Augustine made use
of it. His Neo-Platonism was not unaffected by Peripatetic and later
systems of Greek philosophy; yet it was far more Platonic than Stoical or
Aristotelian.
Those first teachers, who in the maturity of their powers became Brothers
Minorites, were Augustinians in theology, and consequently Platonists, in
so far as Platonism made part of Augustine’s doctrines. Thus it was with
the first great teacher at the Minorites school in Oxford, Robert
Grosseteste, and with the first great Minorite teacher at Paris, Alexander
of Hales. Both of these men were promoters of the study of Aristotle; yet
neither became so imbued with Aristotelianism as to revise either his
theological system or the Platonic doctrines which seemed germane to it.
Moreover, in so far as we may imagine St. Francis to have had a theology,
we must feel that Augustine, with his hand on Plato’s shoulder, would have
been more congenial to him than Aristotle. And so in fact it was to be
with his Order. Augustine’s fervent piety, his imagination and religious
temperament, held the Franciscans fast. Surely he was very close to the
soul of that eloquent Franciscan teacher, who called Alexander of Hales
“master and father,” sat at his feet, and never thought of himself as
delivering new teachings. It would have been strange indeed if Bonaventura
had broken from the influences which had formed his soul, this Bonaventura
whose most congenial precursor lived and wrote and followed Augustine far
back in the twelfth century, and bore the name of Hugo of St. Victor.
Bonaventura’s writings did much to fix Augustinianism upon his Order;
rivalry with the Dominicans doubtless helped to make it fast; for the
latter were following another system under the dominance of their two
Titan leaders, who had themselves come to maturity with the new
Aristotelian influences, whereof they were _magna pars_.
But just as Grosseteste and Alexander made use of what they knew of
Aristotle, so Bonaventura had no thought of misprizing him who was
becoming in western Europe “the master of those who know.” In specific
points this wise Augustinian might prefer Aristotle to Plato. For example,
he chose to stand, with the former, upon the _terra firma_ of sense
perception, rather than keep ever on the wing in the upper region of ideal
concepts.
“Although the _anima_, according to Augustine, is linked to eternal
principles (_legibus aeternis_), since somehow it does reach the light
of the higher reason, still it is unquestionable, as the Philosopher
says, that cognition originates in us by the way of the senses, of
memory, and of experience, out of which the universal is deduced,
which is the beginning of art and knowledge (_artis et scientiae_).
Hence, since Plato referred all certain cognition to the intelligible
or ideal world, he was rightly criticized by Aristotle. Not because he
spoke ill in saying that there are _ideas_ and eternal _rationes_; but
because, despising the world of sense, he wished to refer all certain
cognition to those Ideas. And thus, although Plato seems to make firm
the path of wisdom (_sapientiae_) which proceeds according to the
eternal _rationes_, he destroys the way of knowledge, which proceeds
according to the _rationes_ of created things (_rationes creatas_). So
it appears that, among philosophers, the word of wisdom (_sermo
sapientiae_) was given to Plato, and the word of knowledge
(_scientiae_) to Aristotle. For that one chiefly looked to the things
above, and this one considered things below.[545] But both the word of
wisdom and of knowledge, through the Holy Spirit, was given to
Augustine, as the pre-eminent declarer of the entire Scripture.”[546]
So there is Aristotelian ballast in Bonaventura’s Platonic-Augustinian
theology. His chief divergence from Albert and Thomas (who, of course,
likewise held Augustine in honour, and drew on Plato when they chose) is
to be found in his temperamental attitude, toward life, toward God, or
toward theology and learning. His Augustinian soul held to the
pre-eminence of the _good_ above the _true_, and tended to shape the
second to the first. So he maintained the primacy of _willing_ over
knowing. Man attains God through goodness of will and through love. The
way of knowledge is less prominent with Bonaventura than with Aquinas.
Surely the latter, and his master Albert, saw the main sanction of secular
knowledge in its ministry to _sacra doctrina_; but their hearts may seem
to tarry with the handmaid. Bonaventura’s position is the same; but his
heart never tarries with the handmaid; for with him heart and mind are
ever constant to the queen, Theology. Yet he recognizes the queen’s need
of the handmaid. Holy Writ is not for babes; the fulness of knowledge is
needed for its understanding: “Non potest intelligi sacra Scriptura sine
aliarum scientiarum peritia.”[547] And without philosophy many matters of
the Faith cannot be intelligently discussed. There is no knowledge which
may not be sanctified to the purpose of understanding Scripture; only let
this purpose really guide the mind’s pursuits.
Bonaventura wrote a short treatise to emphasize these universally admitted
principles, and to show how every form of human knowledge conformed to the
supreme illumination afforded by Scripture, and might be reduced to the
terms and methods of Theology, which is Scripture rightly understood. He
named the tract _De reductione artium ad theologiam_[548] (The leading
back of the Arts to Theology).
“‘Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the
Father of lights,’ says James. This indicates the source of all
illumination, and the streaming of all enlightenment from that fontal
light. While every illumination is inner knowledge (_omnis illuminatio
cognitio interna sit_) we may distinguish the external light, (_lumen
exterius_), to wit, the light of mechanical art; the lower light, to
wit, the light of sense perception; the interior light, to wit, the
light of philosophical cognition; the superior light, to wit, the
light of grace and Holy Scripture. The first illuminates as to the
arts and crafts; the second as to natural form; the third as to
intellectual truth; the fourth as to saving truth.”
He enumerates the mechanical arts, drawing from Hugo of St. Victor; then
he follows with Augustine’s explanation of the second _lumen_, as that
which discerns corporeal things. He next speaks of the third _lumen_ which
lightens us to the investigation of truths intelligible, scrutinizing the
truth of words (Logic), or the truth of things (Physics), or the truth of
morals (Ethics). The fourth _lumen_, of Holy Scripture, comes not by
seeking, but descends through inspiration from the Father of lights. It
includes the literal, the spiritual, moral and anagogic signification of
Scripture, teaching the eternal generation and incarnation of Christ, the
way to live, and the union of God and the soul. The first of these
branches pertains to faith, the second to morals, and the third to the aim
and end of both.
“Let us see,” continues Bonaventura, “how the other illuminations have to
be reduced to the light of Holy Scripture. And first as to the
illumination from sense cognition, as to which we consider its means, its
exercise, and its delight (_oblectamentum_).” Its means is the Word
eternally generated, and incarnated in time; its exercise is in the sense
perception of an ordered way of living, following the suitable and
avoiding the nocuous; and as for its object of delight, as every sense
pursues that which delights it, so the sense of our heart should seek the
beautiful, harmonious, and sweet-smelling. In this way divine wisdom
dwells hidden in sense cognition.
Next, as to the illumination of mechanical art, which is concerned with
the production of the works of craft. Herein likewise may be observed
analogies with the light from Holy Scripture, which reveals the Word, the
order of living, and the union of God and the soul. No creature proceeds
from the great Artificer, save through the Word; and the human artificer
works to produce a beautiful, useful, and enduring work; which corresponds
to the Scriptural order of living. Each human artificer makes his work
that it may bring him praise or use or delight; as God made the rational
soul, to praise and serve and take delight in Him, through love.
By similar methods of reasoning Bonaventura next “reduces,” or leads back,
Logic, and Natural and Moral Philosophy to the ways and purposes of
Theology, and shows how “the multiform wisdom of God, which is set forth
lucidly by Scripture, lies hidden in every cognition, and in every nature.
It is also evident that all kinds of knowledge minister to Theology; and
that Theology takes illustrations, and uses phrases, pertaining to every
kind of knowledge (_cognitionis_). It is also plain how ample is the
illuminating path, and how in every thing that is sensed or perceived, God
himself lies concealed.”[549]
Ways of reasoning change, while conclusions sometimes endure.
Bonaventura’s reasoning in the above treatise is for us abstruse and
fanciful; yet many will agree with the conclusion, that all kinds of
knowledge may minister to our thought of God, and of man’s relationship to
Him. And with Bonaventura, all his knowledge, his study of secular
philosophy, his logic and powers of presentation, had theology unfailingly
in view, and ministered to the satisfaction, the actualization (to use
our old word) of his religious nature. He belongs among those
intellectually gifted men--Augustine, Anselm, Hugo of St. Victor--whose
mental and emotional powers draw always to God, and minister to the
conception of the soul’s union with the living spring of its being. The
life, the labours of Bonaventura were as the title of the little book we
have just been worrying with, a _reductio artium ad theologiam_, a
constant adapting of all knowledge and ways of meditation, to the sense of
God and the soul’s inclusion in the love divine. No one should expect to
find among his compositions any independent treatment of secular knowledge
for its own sake. Rather throughout his writings the reasonings of
philosophy are found always ministering to the sovereign theme.
The most elaborate of Bonaventura’s doctrinal works was his Commentary
upon the Lombard’s _Sentences_. In form and substance it was a _Summa
theologiae_.[550] He also made a brief and salutary theological compend,
which he called the _Breviloquium_.[551] The note of devotional piety is
struck by the opening sentence, taken from the Epistle to the Ephesians,
and is held throughout the work:
“‘I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom
the whole fatherhood in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant
you according to the riches of His glory to be strengthened by His
Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts through
faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to
comprehend with all saints, what is the breadth and length and height
and depth; and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge,
that ye might be filled in all the fulness of God.’ The great doctor
of the Gentiles discloses in these words the source, progress, and
state (_ortus_, _progressus_, _status_) of Holy Scripture, which is
called Theology; indicating that the _source_ is to be thought upon
according to the grace (_influentiam_) of the most blessed Trinity;
the _progress_ with reference to the needs of human capacity; and the
_state_ or fruit with respect to the superabundance of a superplenary
felicity.
“For the _Source_ lies not in human investigation, but in divine
revelation, which flows from the Father of lights, from whom all
fatherhood in heaven and earth is named, from whom, through His Son
Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit flows in us; and through the Holy Spirit
bestowing, as He wills, gifts on each, faith is given, and through
faith Christ dwells in our hearts. This is the knowledge of Jesus
Christ, from which, as from a source, comes the certitude and
understanding of the whole Scripture. Wherefore it is impossible that
any one should advance in its knowledge, unless he first has Christ
infused in him....
“The _Progress_ of Holy Scripture is not bound to the laws of
reasonings and definitions, like the other sciences; but, conformably
to supernatural light, proceeds to give to man the wayfarer (_homini
viatori_) a knowledge of things sufficing for his salvation, by plain
words in part, and in part mystically: it presents the contents of the
universe as in a _Summa_, in which is observed the _breadth_; it
describes the descent (from above) in which is considered the
_length_; it describes the goodness of the saved, in which is
considered the _height_; it describes the misery of the damned, in
which consists the _depth_ not only of the universe itself but of the
divine judgment....
“The _State_ or fruit of Holy Scripture is the plentitude of eternal
felicity. For the Book containing words of eternal life was written
not only that we might believe, but that we might have eternal life,
in which we shall see, we shall love, and all our desires shall be
filled, whereupon we shall know the love which passeth knowledge, and
be filled in all the fulness of God....
“As to the _progress_ of Scripture, first is to be considered the
_breadth_, which consists in the multitude of parts.... Rightly is
Holy Scripture divided into the Old and New Testament, and not in
_theorica_ and _practica_, like philosophy; because since Scripture is
founded on the knowledge of faith, which is a virtue and the basis of
morals, it is not possible to separate in Scripture the knowledge of
things, or of what is to be believed, from the knowledge of morals. It
is otherwise with philosophy, which handles not only the truth of
morals, but the true, speculatively considered. Then as Holy Scripture
is knowledge (_notitia_) moving to good and recalling from evil,
through fear and love, so it is divided into two Testaments, whose
difference, briefly, is fear and love....
“Holy Scripture has also _length_, which consists in the description
of times and ages from the beginning to the day of Judgment.... The
progress of the whole world is described by Scripture, as in a
beautiful poem, wherein one may follow the descent of time, and
contemplate the variety, manifoldness, equity, order, righteousness,
and beauty of the multitude of divine judgments proceeding from the
wisdom of God ruling the world: and as with a poem, so with this
ordering of the world, one cannot see its beauty save by considering
the whole....
“No less has Sacred Scripture _height_ (_sublimitatem_), consisting
in description of the ranged hierarchies, the ecclesiastical,
angelic, and divine.... Even as things have _being_ in matter or
nature, they have also being in the _anima_ through its acquired
knowledge; they have also _being_ in the _anima_ through grace, also
through glory; and they have also being in the way of the eternal--in
_arte aeterna_. Philosophy treats of things as they are in nature, or
in the _anima_ according to the knowledge which is naturally implanted
or acquired. But theology as a science (_scientia_) founded upon faith
and revealed by the Holy Spirit, treats of those matters which belong
to grace and glory and to the eternal wisdom. Whence placing
philosophic cognition beneath itself, and drawing from nature (_de
naturis rerum_) as much as it may need to make a mirror yielding a
reflection of things divine, it constructs a ladder which presses the
earth at the base, and touches heaven at the top: and all this through
that one hierarch Jesus Christ, who through his assumption of human
nature, is hierarch not in the ecclesiastical hierarchy alone, but
also in the angelic; and is the medial person in the divine hierarchy
of the most blessed Trinity.”[552]
The _depth_ (_profunditas_) of Scripture consists in its manifold mystic
meanings. It reveals these meanings of the creature world for the
edification of man journeying to his fatherland. Scripture throughout its
_breadth_, _length_, _height_, and _depth_ uses narrative, threat,
exhortation, and promise all for one end. “For this _doctrina_ exists in
order that we may become good and be saved, which comes not through naked
consideration, but rather through inclination of the will.... Here
examples have more effect than arguments, promises are more moving than
ratiocinations, and devotion is better than definition.” Hence Scripture
does not follow the method and divisions of other sciences, but uses its
own diverse means for its saving end. The Prologue closes with rules of
Scriptural interpretation.[553]
In our plan of following what is of human interest in mediaeval philosophy
or theology, prologues and introductions are sometimes of more importance
than the works which they preface; for they disclose the writer’s intent
and purpose, and the endeavour within him, which may be more intimately
himself, than his performance. So more space has been given to
Bonaventura’s Prologue than the body of the treatise will require. The
order of topics is that of the Lombard’s _Sentences_ or Aquinas’s _Summa_.
Seven successive _partes_ consider the Trinity, the creation, the
corruption from sin, the Incarnation, the grace of the Holy Spirit, the
sacramental medicine, and the Last Judgment. Each _pars_ is divided into
chapters setting forth some special topic. Bonaventura’s method, pursued
in every chapter, is to state first the scriptural or dogmatic
propositions, and then give their reason, which he introduces with such
words as: _Ratio autem ad praedictorum intelligentiam haec est_. The work
is a complete systematic compend of Christian theology; its conciseness
and lucidity of statement are admirable. For an example of its method and
quality, the first chapter of the sixth part may be given, upon the origin
of Sacraments.
“Having treated of the Trinity of God, of the creation of the world,
the corruption of sin, the incarnation of the Word, and the grace of
the Holy Spirit, it is time to treat of the sacramental medicine,
regarding which there are seven matters to consider: the origin of the
sacraments, their variation, distinction, appointment, dispensation,
repetition, and the integrity of each.
“Concerning[554] the origin of the Sacraments this is to be held, that
sacraments are sensible signs divinely appointed as medicaments, in
which under cover of things sensible, divine virtue secretly operates;
also that from likeness they represent, from appointment they signify,
from sanctification they confer, some spiritual grace, through which
the soul is healed from the infirmities of vice; and for this as their
final end they are ordained; yet they avail for humility, instruction,
and exercise as for a subsidiary end.
“The reason and explanation of the aforesaid is this: The reparative
principle (_principium_), is Christ crucified, to wit, the Word
incarnate, that directs all things most compassionately because
divine, and most compassionately heals because divinely incarnate. It
must repair, heal, and save the sick human race, in a way suited to
the sick one, the sickness and the occasion of it, and the cure of the
sickness. The physician is the incarnate Word, to wit, God invisible
in a visible nature. The sick man is not simply spirit, nor simply
flesh, but spirit in mortal flesh. The disease is original sin, which
through ignorance infects the mind, and through concupiscence
infects the flesh. While the origin of this fault primarily lay in
reason’s consent, yet its occasion came from the senses of the body.
Consequently, in order that the medicine should correspond to these
conditions, it should be not simply spiritual, but should have
somewhat of sensible signs; for as things sensible were the occasion
of the soul’s falling, they should be the occasion of its rising
again. Yet since visible signs of themselves have no efficiency
ordained for grace, although representative of its nature, it was
necessary that they should by the author of grace be appointed to
signify and should be blessed in order to sanctify; so that there
should be a representation from natural likeness, a signification from
appointment, and a sanctification and preparedness for grace from the
added benediction, through which our soul may be cured and made whole.
“Again, since curative grace is not given to the puffed up, the
unbelieving, and disdainful, so these sensible signs divinely given,
ought to be such as not only would sanctify and confer grace, and
heal, but also would instruct by their signification, humble by their
acceptance, and exercise through their diversity; that thus through
exercise despondency (_acedia_) should be shut out from the
desiderative [nature], through instruction ignorance be shut out from
the rational [nature], through humiliation pride be shut out from the
irascible [nature], and the whole soul become _curable_ by the grace
of the Holy Spirit, which remakes us according to these three
capacities (_potentias_)[555] into the image of the Trinity and
Christ. Finally, whereas the grace of the Holy Spirit is received
through these sensible signs divinely appointed, it is found in them
as an accident. Hence sacraments of this kind are called the vessels
and cause of grace: not that grace is of their substance or produced
by them as by a cause; for its place is in the soul, and it is infused
by God alone; but because it is ordained by divine decree, that in
them and through them we shall draw the grace of cure from the supreme
physician, Christ; although God has not fettered His grace to the
sacraments.[556]
“From the premises, therefore, appears not only what may be the origin
of the sacraments, but also the use and fruit. For their origin is
Christ the Lord; their use is the act which exercises, teaches, and
humbles; their fruit is the cure and salvation of men. It is also
evident that the efficient cause of the sacraments is the divine
appointment; their material cause is the figurement of the sensible
sign; their formal cause the sanctification by grace; their final
cause the medicinal healing of men. And because they are named from
their form and end they are called sacraments, as it were
_medicamenta sanctificantia_. Through them the soul is led back from
the filth of vice to perfect sanctification. And so, although
corporeal and sensible, they are medicinal, and to be venerated as
holy because they signify holy mysteries, and make ready for the holy
gifts (_charismata_) given by most holy God; and they are divinely
consecrated by holy institution and benediction for the holiest
worship of God appointed in holy church, so that rightly they should
be called sacraments.”
The _Breviloquium_ was Bonaventura’s rational compendium of Christian
theology. It offered in brief compass as complete a system as the bulkiest
_Summa_ could carry out to doctrinal elaboration. Quite different in
method and intent was his equally famous _Itinerarium mentis in
Deum_,[557] the praise of which, according to the great Chancellor Gerson,
could not fitly be uttered by mortal mouth. We have seen how in the
_Reductio artium ad theologiam_ Bonaventura conformed all modes of
perception and knowledge to the uses and modes of theology; the final end
of which is man’s salvation, consisting in the union of the soul with God,
through every form of enlightenment and all the power of love. The
_Breviloquium_ has given the sum of Christian doctrine, an intelligent and
heart-felt understanding of which leads to salvation. And now the
_Itinerarium_--well, it is best to let Bonaventura tell how he came to
compose it, and of its purpose and character.
“Since, after the example of our most blessed father Francis, I pant
in spirit for the peace which he preached in the manner of our Lord
Jesus Christ, I a sinner who am the seventh, all unworthy,
Minister-General of the Brethren,--it happened that by God’s will in
the thirty-third year after our blessed father’s death, I turned aside
to the mountain of Alverna, as to a quiet place, seeking the spirit’s
peace. While I lingered there my mind dwelt on the ascensions of the
spirit, and, among others, on the miracle which in that very spot came
to blessed Francis, when he saw the winged Seraph in the likeness of
the Crucified. And it seemed to me his vision represented the
suspension of our father in contemplation, and the way by which he
came to it. For by those six wings may be understood the suspensions
of the six illuminations, by which the soul, as by steps and journeys,
through ecstatic outpourings of Christian wisdom, is prepared to pass
beyond to peace. For the way lies only through love of the
Crucified, which so transformed Paul carried to the third heaven, that
he could say: ‘I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet
not I, but Christ liveth in me.’ So the image of the six seraph’s
wings represents the six rungs of illumination, which begin with the
creatures and lead on to God, to whom no one can come save through the
Crucified....
“For one is not prepared for the divine contemplations, which lead to
the rapt visions of the mind, unless he be with Daniel, a man of
desires.[558] Desires are stirred within us by the cry of prayer and
the bright light of speculation. I shall invite the reader first to
the sighings of prayer through Christ crucified, lest perchance he
believe that study might suffice without unction, or diligence without
piety, knowledge without charity, zeal without divine grace, or the
mirror (_speculum_) without the wisdom divinely inspired. Then to
those humble and devout ones, to whom grace first has come, to those
lovers of the divine wisdom, who burn with desire of it, and are
willing to be still, for the magnifying of God, I shall propose
pertinent speculations, showing how little or nothing is it to turn
the mirror outward unless the mirror of our mind be rubbed and
polished.”
Thus Bonaventura writes his prologue to this devotional tract, which will
also hold “pertinent speculations.” Remarkable is the intellectuality and
compacted thought which he fuses in emotional expression. He will write
seven chapters, on the seven steps, or degrees, in the ascent to God,
which is the mind’s true _itinerarium_. Since we cannot by ourselves lift
ourselves above ourselves, prayer is the very mother and source of our
upward struggle. Prayer opens our eyes to the steps in the ascent. Placed
in the universe of things, we find in it the corporeal and temporal
footprint (_vestigium_) leading into the way of God. Then we enter our
mind, which is the everlasting and spiritual image of God; and this is to
enter the truth of God. Whereupon we should rise above us to the eternal
most spiritual first cause; and this is to rejoice in the knowledge of
God’s majesty. This is the threefold illumination, by which we recognise
the triple existence of things, in matter, in the intelligence, and in the
divine way--_in arte divina_. And likewise our mind has three outlooks,
one upon the corporeal world without, which is called sense, another into
and within itself, which is called _spiritus_, and a third above itself,
which is called _mens_. By means of all three, man should set himself to
rising toward God, and love Him with the whole mind, and heart, and soul.
Then Bonaventura makes further analysis of his triple illumination into
“six degrees or powers of the soul, to wit, sense, imagination,
reason, intellect, intelligence, and _apex mentis seu synteresis
scintilla_. These degrees are planted within us by nature, deformed
through fault, reformed through grace, purged through righteousness,
exercised through knowledge, perfected through wisdom.... Whoever
wishes to ascend to God should shun the sins which deform nature, and
stretch forth his natural powers, in prayer, toward reforming grace,
in mode of life, toward purifying righteousness, in meditation, toward
illuminating knowledge, in contemplation toward the wisdom which makes
perfect. For as no one reaches wisdom except through grace,
righteousness, and knowledge, so no one reaches contemplation, except
through meditation, a holy life, and devout prayer.”
Chapter one closes with little that is novel; for we seem to be retracing
the thoughts of Hugo of St. Victor. The second chapter is on the
“Contemplation of God in His Footprints in the Sensible World.” This is
the next grade of speculation, because we shall now contemplate God not
only through His footprints, but in them also, so far as He is in them
through essence, power, or presence. The sensible world, the macrocosmus,
enters the microcosmus, which is the _anima_, through the gates of the
five senses. The author sketches the processes of sense-perception,
through which outer facts are apprehended according to their species, and
delighted in if pleasing, and then adjudged according to the _ratio_ of
their delightfulness, to wit, their beauty, sweetness, salubrity, and
proportion. Such are the footprints in which we may contemplate our God.
All things knowable possess the quality of generating their species in our
minds, through the medium of our perceptions; and thus we are led to
contemplate the eternal generation of the Word--image and Son--from the
Father. Likewise sweetness and beauty point on to their fontal source. And
from speculation on the local, the temporal, and mutable, our reason
carries us to the thought of the immutable, the uncircumscribed and
eternal. Then from the beauty and delightfulness of things, we pass to
the thought of number and proportion, and judge of their irrefragable
laws, wherein are God’s wisdom and power.
“The creatures of this sensible world signify the invisible things of
God; in part because God is the source and exemplar and end of every
creature; in part through their proper likeness; in part from their
prophetic prefiguring; in part from angelic operations; and in part
through superadded ordainment. For every creature by nature is an
effigy of the eternal wisdom; especially whatever creature in
Scripture is taken by the spirit of prophecy as a type of the
spiritual; but more especially those creatures in the likeness of
which God willed to appear by an angelic minister; and most especially
that creature which he chose to mark as a sacrament.”
From these first grades of speculation, which contemplate the footprints
of God in the world, we are led to contemplate the divine image in the
natural powers of our minds. We find the image of the most blessed Trinity
in our memory, our rational intelligence, and our will; the joint action
of which leads on to the desire of the _summum bonum_. Next we contemplate
the divine image in our minds remade by the gifts of grace upon which we
must enter by the door of the faith, hope, and love of the Mediator of God
and men, Jesus Christ. As philosophy helped us to see the image of God in
the natural qualities of our mind, so Scripture now is needed to bring us
to these three theological virtues (faith, hope, and love), which enable
the mind of fallen man to be repaired and made anew through grace.
From this fourth grade, in which God is still contemplated in his image,
we rise to consider God as pure being, wherein there is neither privation,
nor bound, nor particularity; and next in his goodness, the highest
communicability (_summam communicabilitatem_) of which may be
contemplated, but not comprehended, in the mystery of the most blessed
Trinity. “In whom [the persons of the Trinity] it is necessary because of
the _summa bonitas_ that there should be the _summa communicabilitas_, and
because of the latter, the _summa consubstantialitas_, and because of this
the _summa configurabilitas_, and from these the _summa coaequalitas_, and
through this the _summa coaeternitas_, and from all the preceding the
_summa cointimitas_, by which each is in the other, and one works with the
other through every conceivable indivisibility (_indivisionem_) of the
substance, virtue, and operation of the same most blessed Trinity....”
“And when thou contemplatest this,” adds Bonaventura, “do not think to
comprehend the incomprehensible.”
From age to age the religious soul finds traces of its God in nature and
in its inmost self. Its ways of finding change, varying with the
prevailing currents of knowledge; yet still it ever finds these
_vestigia_, which represent the widest deductions of its reasoning, the
ultimate resultants of its thought, and its own brooding peace. Therefore
may we not follow sympathetically the _Itinerarium_ of Bonaventura’s mind
as it traces the footprints of its God? Thus far the way has advanced by
reason, uplifted by grace, and yet still reason. This reason has
comprehended what it might comprehend of the traces and evidences of God
in the visible creation and the soul of man; it has sought to apprehend
the being of God, but has humbly recognized its inability to penetrate the
marvels of his goodness in the mystery of the most blessed Trinity. There
it stops at the sixth grade of contemplation; yet not baffled, or rendered
vain, for it has performed its function and brought the soul on to where
she may fling forth from reason’s steeps, and find herself again, buoyant
and blissful, in a medium of super-rational contemplation. This makes the
last chapter of the mind’s _Itinerarium_; it is the _apex mentis_, the
summit of all contemplations in which the mind has rest. Henceforth
“Christ is the way and door, the ladder and the vehicle, as the
propitiation placed on the Ark of God, and the sacrament hidden from
the world. He who looks on this propitiation, with his look full fixed
on him who hangs upon the cross, through faith, hope, and charity, and
all devotion, he makes his Passover, and through the rod of the cross
shall pass through the Red Sea, out of Egypt entering the desert, and
there taste the hidden manna, and rest with Christ in the tomb, dead
to all without; and shall realize, though as one still on the way, the
word of Christ to the believing thief: ‘To-day thou shalt be with me
in Paradise.’ Which was also revealed to the blessed Francis when in
ecstasy of contemplation on the high mountain, the Seraph with six
wings, nailed on a cross, appeared to him. There, as we have heard
from his companion, he passed into God through ecstasy of
contemplation, and was set as an exemplar of perfect contemplation,
whereby God should invite all truly spiritual men to this transit and
ecstasy, by example rather than by word. In this passing over, if it
be perfect, all the ways of reason are relinquished, and the _apex
affectus_ is transferred and transformed into God. This is the mystic
secret known by no one who does not receive it, and received by none
who does not desire it, and desired only by him whose heart’s core is
aflame from the fire of the Holy Spirit, whom Christ sent on earth....
Since then nature avails nothing here, and diligence but little, we
should give ourselves less to investigation and more to unction;
little should be given to speech, and most to inner gladness; little
to the written word, and all to God’s gift the Holy Spirit; little or
nothing is to be ascribed to the creature, and all to the creative
essence, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”
Here Bonaventura loses himself in an untranslatable extract from
Eriugena’s version of the _Areopagite_, and then proceeds:
“If thou askest how may these things be, interrogate grace and not
doctrine, desire and not knowledge, the groaning of prayer rather than
study, the Spouse rather than the teacher, God and not man, mist
rather than clarity, not light but fire all aflame and bearing on to
God by devotion and glowing affection. Which fire is God, and the man
Christ kindles it in the fervour of his passion, as only he perceives
who says: ‘My soul chooseth strangling and my bones, death.’ He who
loves this death shall see God. Then let us die and pass into
darkness, and silence our solicitudes, our desires, and phantasies;
let us pass over with Christ crucified from this world to the Father;
that the Father shown us, we may say with Philip: ‘it sufficeth us.’
Let us hear with Paul: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee.’ Let us exult
with David, saying: ‘Defecit caro mea et cor meum, Deus cordis mei et
pars mea Deus in aeternum’.”[559]
It is best to leave the saint and doctor here, and not follow in other
treatises the current of his yearning thought till it divides in
streamlets which press on their tortuous ways through allegory and the
adumbration of what the mind disclaims the power to express directly.
Those more elaborate treatises of his, which are called mystic, are
difficult for us to read. As with Hugo of St. Victor, from whom he drew so
largely, Bonaventura’s expression of his religious yearnings may
interest and move us; but one needs perhaps the cloister’s quiet to follow
on through the allegorical elaboration of this pietism. Bonaventura’s
_Soliloquium_ might weary us after the _Itinerarium_, and we should read
his _De septem itineribus aeternitatis_ with no more pleasure than Hugo’s
_Mystic Ark of Noah_. It is enough to witness the spiritual attitude of
these men without tracking them through the “selva oscura” to their lairs
of meditation.