Itinerarium mentis in Deum

1. But since, regarding the mirror of sensible things, we may contemplate God not only through them as through footprints, but also in them, inasmuch as he is in them by essence, power, and presence — and to consider this is higher than the former — therefore this consideration holds the second place, as the second step of contemplation, by which we must be led to contemplate God in all the creatures that enter our mind through the bodily senses.

2. Note, then, that this world, called the macrocosm, enters our soul, called the lesser world, through the gates of the five senses, according to the apprehension, delight, and judgment of the sensible things themselves. — Which is plain thus: for in it some things are generating, some generated, some governing, both the former and the latter. The generating are the simple bodies, namely the heavenly bodies and the four elements. For from the elements, through the power of light reconciling the contrariety of the elements in mixed things, are generated and produced whatever is generated and produced by the operation of natural power. — The generated are bodies composed of elements, such as minerals, plants, animals, and human bodies. — Ruling these and those are the spiritual substances: either wholly conjoined, as are the souls of brutes; or conjoined but separably, as are rational spirits; or wholly separate, as are the heavenly spirits, whom the philosophers call Intelligences and we call Angels. To whom, according to the philosophers, belongs the moving of the heavenly bodies, and hence to them is attributed the administration of the universe, receiving from the first cause, namely God, the influx of power, which they pour back according to the work of governance, which regards the natural consistency of things. But according to the theologians, to the same is attributed the rule of the universe by the command of the highest God as regards the works of reparation, according to which they are called ministering spirits, sent for those who receive the inheritance of salvation.

3. Man, then, who is called the lesser world, has five senses as five gates, through which enters into his soul the knowledge of all things that are in the sensible world. For through sight enter the sublime and luminous bodies and other colored things; through touch, solid and terrestrial bodies; through the three intermediate senses enter intermediate things: through taste watery things, through hearing airy things, through smell vaporous things, which have something of a humid nature, something of an aerial, something of a fiery or hot nature, as is plain in smoke released from spices. Through these gates, then, enter both simple bodies and composite ones mixed from them. But since by sense we perceive not only these particular sensibles — light, sound, odor, savor, and the four primary qualities which touch apprehends — but also the common sensibles — number, magnitude, figure, rest, and motion; and everything that is moved is moved by another, and some move and rest of themselves, as animals do: while through these five senses we apprehend the motions of bodies, we are led to the knowledge of spiritual movers, as from effect to the knowledge of causes.

4. According to the three genera of things, then, this whole sensible world enters the human soul by apprehension. But these exterior sensibles are what first enter the soul through the gates of the five senses; they enter, I say, not through their substances but through their likenesses: first generated in the medium, and from the medium in the organ, and from the outer organ in the inner, and from this in the apprehensive power; and so the generation of the species in the medium, and from the medium in the organ, and the conversion of the apprehensive power upon it, make the apprehension of all that the soul apprehends from without.

5. Upon this apprehension, if it be of a fitting thing, delight follows. The sense delights in the object perceived through the abstracted likeness, either by reason of beauty, as in sight, or by reason of sweetness, as in smell and hearing, or by reason of wholesomeness, as in taste and touch, to speak appropriately. But all delight is by reason of proportionality. And since the species holds the reason of form, of power, and of operation — according as it has regard to the principle from which it flows, to the medium through which it passes, and to the end upon which it acts — therefore proportionality is attended either in the likeness, according as it holds the reason of species or form, and then it is called beauty, for beauty is nothing but numerical equality, or a certain arrangement of parts with sweetness of color; or proportionality is attended inasmuch as it holds the reason of potency or power, and then it is called sweetness, when the acting power does not disproportionately exceed the recipient — for sense is saddened in extremes and delighted in middles; or it is attended inasmuch as it holds the reason of efficacy and impression, which is then proportional when the agent, by impressing, fills the need of the patient — and this is to save and nourish it, which appears most in taste and touch. And so through delight, delightful exterior things enter the soul through likeness, according to the threefold reason of delighting.

6. After this apprehension and delight comes judgment, by which is judged not only whether this be white or black — for this belongs to the particular sense; not only whether it be wholesome or harmful — for this belongs to the inner sense; but also by which is judged, and reason given, why this delights; and in this act is inquired the reason of the delight perceived in sense from the object. This is when the reason of the beautiful, the sweet, and the wholesome is sought; and it is found that this is the proportion of equality. But the reason of equality is the same in great and small, is not extended by dimensions, nor succeeds or passes with passing things, nor is altered by motions. It abstracts, then, from place, time, and motion, and hence is unchangeable, uncircumscribable, interminable, and wholly spiritual. Judgment, then, is the action which makes the sensible species, received sensibly through the senses, enter by purifying and abstracting into the intellective power. And so this whole world has to enter the human soul through the gates of the senses, according to the three aforesaid operations.

7. But all these are footprints in which we can speculate our God. — For since the apprehended species is a likeness generated in the medium and then impressed upon the organ itself, and through that impression leads to its principle, namely to the object to be known, it manifestly insinuates that that eternal light generates from itself a co-equal, consubstantial, and co-eternal likeness or splendor; and that he who is the image of the invisible God and the splendor of glory and the figure of his substance — who is everywhere by his first generation, just as the object generates its likeness in the whole medium — is united by the grace of union, as the species to the bodily organ, to an individual of rational nature, to lead us back through that union to the Father as to the fontal principle and object. If, then, all knowable things have to generate a species of themselves, they manifestly proclaim that in them, as in mirrors, can be seen the eternal generation of the Word, Image, and Son eternally emanating from God the Father.

8. In the same way, the delighting species, as beautiful, sweet, and wholesome, insinuates that in that first species is the first beauty, sweetness, and wholesomeness, in which is the highest proportionality and equality to the generator; in which is power, not through a phantasm but through the truth of apprehension flowing in; in which is the impression that saves and suffices and expels every need of the apprehender. If, then, delight is the conjunction of the fitting with the fitting; and the likeness of God alone holds the reason of the supremely beautiful, sweet, and wholesome; and it is united according to truth and according to intimacy and according to a fullness filling every capacity: it can manifestly be seen that in God alone is fontal and true delight, and that from all delights we are led to seek it.

9. But in a more excellent and immediate way, judgment leads us to speculate the eternal truth more certainly. For if judgment must be made through a reason abstracting from place, time, and changeability — and hence from dimension, succession, and transmutation — through a reason unchangeable, uncircumscribable, and interminable; and nothing is wholly unchangeable, uncircumscribable, and interminable except what is eternal; and everything eternal is God or in God: if, then, all things which we judge more certainly, we judge through such a reason, it is plain that he himself is the reason of all things and the infallible rule and the light of truth, in which all things shine infallibly, indelibly, indubitably, irrefragably, not subject to judgment, unchangeably, unrestrainedly, interminably, indivisibly, and intellectually. And therefore those laws by which we judge with certainty of all sensibles coming into our consideration — since they are infallible and indubitable to the intellect of the apprehender, indelible from the memory of the recollector as ever present, irrefragable and not subject to judgment to the intellect of the judger, for, as Augustine says, no one judges of them, but through them — must be unchangeable and incorruptible as necessary, unrestrained as uncircumscribed, interminable as eternal, and hence indivisible as intellectual and incorporeal, not made but uncreated, existing eternally in the eternal art, from which, through which, and according to which all beautiful things are formed; and therefore they cannot be judged with certainty except through that which was not only the form producing all things, but also conserving and distinguishing all things, as the being holding form in all things and the directing rule, and through which our mind judges all that enters it through the senses.

10. But this speculation is expanded according to the consideration of the seven differences of numbers, by which as by seven steps one ascends to God, as Augustine shows in the book on True Religion and in the sixth book on Music, where he assigns the differences of numbers ascending step by step from these sensible things to the Maker of all, that in all God may be seen.

For he says that numbers are in bodies, and especially in sounds and voices, and these he calls sounding; numbers abstracted from these and received in our senses, and these he calls occurring; numbers proceeding from the soul into the body, as is plain in gestures and dances, and these he calls advancing; numbers in the delights of the senses from the conversion of attention upon the received species, and these he calls sensual; numbers retained in memory, and these he calls memorial; also the numbers by which we judge of all these, and these he calls judicial, which, as was said, are necessarily above the mind as infallible and not subject to judgment. But from these are impressed upon our minds the artificial numbers, which Augustine does not enumerate among those steps, since they are connected with the judicial; and from these flow the advancing numbers, from which are created the numerous forms of artifacts, so that from the highest through the middle an ordered descent is made to the lowest. To these also we ascend step by step from the sounding numbers, through the mediation of the occurring, sensual, and memorial.

Since, then, all things are beautiful and in some way delightful; and beauty and delight are not without proportion; and proportion is first in numbers: all things must be numerous; and hence number is the principal exemplar in the mind of the Maker, and in things the principal footprint leading to Wisdom. Which, since it is most evident to all and closest to God, leads to God most closely, as through seven differences, and makes him known in all corporeal and sensible things, while we apprehend numerous things, delight in numerous proportions, and judge irrefragably through the laws of numerous proportions.

11. From these first two steps, by which we are led to speculate God in footprints after the manner of two wings descending about the feet, we can gather that all the creatures of this sensible world lead the mind of the contemplator and wise man to the eternal God, for the reason that they are shadows, resonances, and pictures of that first beginning, most powerful, most wise, and best — of that eternal origin, light, and fullness — of that, I say, efficient, exemplifying, and ordering art; they are footprints, likenesses, and spectacles set before us to behold God, and divinely given signs; which, I say, are exemplars, or rather exampled things, set before minds still rude and sensible, that through the sensible things they see they may be transferred to the intelligible things they do not see, as through signs to the signed.

12. But such creatures of this sensible world signify the invisible things of God: partly because God is the origin, exemplar, and end of every creature, and every effect is a sign of its cause, and the exampled of the exemplar, and the way of the end to which it leads; partly from their own representation; partly from prophetic prefiguration; partly from angelic operation; partly from superadded institution. For every creature is by nature a certain effigy and likeness of that eternal wisdom, but especially that which in the book of Scripture was assumed through the spirit of prophecy for the prefiguration of spiritual things; more especially those creatures in whose likeness God willed to appear by angelic ministry; most especially that which he willed to institute for signifying, which holds the reason of a sign not only according to the common name, but also of a Sacrament.

13. From all of which is gathered that the invisible things of God are seen from the creature of the world, understood through the things that are made; so that those who will not note these things, and know, bless, and love God in them all, are inexcusable, while they will not be transferred from darkness to the admirable light of God. But thanks be to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord, who has transferred us from darkness to his admirable light, when through these lights given from without to the mirror of our mind, in which divine things shine, we are disposed to re-enter.