Thought for the Day – 19 February – Of the Proper Use of the Exterior Senses: Contemplation of the Divinity (Part One)

Thought for the Day – 19 February – The Spiritual Combat (1589) – Dom Lorenzo Scupoli OSM (c1530-1610)

“None shall be crowned who has not fought well.” 2 Tim 2: 5

XXI: … Of The Proper Use of the Exterior Senses:
Contemplation of the Divinity
(Part One)

“Great watchfulness and continual exercise is needed, for the due ordering and regulation of the exterior senses – for the appetite which is, as it were, the captain of our corrupt nature, inclines us to an immoderate seeking after pleasure and enjoyment.
The appetite, being unable, by itself, to attain them, it uses the senses as its soldiers and as natural instruments for laying hold of objects, whose images it draws to itself and impresses on the mind.
Hence arises the pleasure which, by reason of the relationship subsisting, between it and the flesh, diffuses itself, over all the senses which are capable of it, infecting both soul and body with a common contagion which corrupts the whole.
You see the evil – now mark the remedy.

Take good heed not to let your senses stray freely where they will; nor to use them when pleasure alone and not utility, necessity, nor any good end, is the motive.
And, if inadvertently they have been allowed to wander too far, recall them at once; or so regulate them that, instead of remaining as before in a miserable captivity to empty pleasures, they may gather a noble spoil from each passing object and bring it home to the soul, that, collected within itself, if may rise with a steadier flight towards Heaven, to the contemplation of God.

Which maybe done in the following manner:
When any object is presented before one of your exterior senses, separate in your mind, from the material thing, the principle which is in it and reflect that, of itself, it possesses nothing of all that which it appears to have but, that all is the work of God, Who endows it invisibly, by His Spirit, with the being, beauty, goodness, or whatever virtue belongs to it.
Then rejoice that thy Lord alone is the Cause and Principle, of such great
and varied perfections and, that they are all eminently contained in Himself, all created excellences being but most minute degrees of His Divine and Infinite perfections.
When engaged in the contemplation of grand and noble objects, reduce the creature, mentally to its own nothingness, fixing your mind’s eye on the great Creator therein present, Who gave it that great and noble being and delighting yourself in Him alone, say:
“O Divine Essence and above all things to be desired,
how greatly do I rejoice that Thou alone
art the InfInite Principle of every created being!”

In like manner, at the sight of trees, plants, or such like objects, you will understand that the life which they have, they have not of themselves but, from the Spirit which you do not see,and which alone quickens them.
Say, therefore:
“Behold here the true Life from which, in which and through which,
all things live and grow!
O living Joy of this heart!”

So, at the sight of brute animals, raise your thoughts to God, Who gave them sensation and motion, saying:
“O Thou First Mover of all that moves, Thou art Thyself immovable;
how greatly do I rejoice in Thy steadfastness and stability!”

Dom Lorenzo Scupoli