Consideravit domum etc. ‘ The good housewife looks well to the ways of her house, not eating the bread of idleness.’ This house represents the soul as a whole, and the ways of the house are the powers of the soul. An ancient philosopher says the soul is made in between one and two. The one is eternity, ever alone and without variation. The two is time, changing and given to multiplication. He means to convey that the soul in her higher powers touches eternity, God to wit, while her lower powers being in contact with time make her subject to change and biased towards bodily things, which degrade her. Could the soul know God as well as the angels do she would never have come into body. If she could know God without the world the world would not have been made for her sake. The world was contrived on her account for training and bracing the eye of the soul to endure divine light. The sunshine falling on the earth is dimmed first in the air and diffused on various things, for no human eye can support the sun. And even so the light of God is over strong and bright for the soul’s eye to bear, without being fixed and given up by matter and reflection which accustom it to dwelling in the light divine.
In her superior powers the soul is in contact with God ; so she takes after God. God takes after himself ; he has gotten his form from himself and from no one beside. Ilis form is that of perfect self-knowledge, absolute light. When the soul comes in contact with him in real understanding, then she is like him in form. Suppose you press a seal into green wax or red, or into cloth, just enough for the seal, the seal being stamped right into the wax so that none of the wax is left over unsealed, then it is one and the same with the seal. In just the same way the soul is wholly united with God in image and form when she is in contact with him in actual gnosis. St Augustine says the soul is of more noble build than any other creature, and that is why no mortal thing, destined to perish at the latter day, can hold communication with or eke affect the soul save from a distance and by messengers. Such are the eyes and ears and the five senses : these are the soul’s ways out into the world, and by these ways the world gets back into the soul. According to one master, the powers of the soul flow back into the soul laden with fruits ; they never go out but they bring something back. So beware lest thine eyes bring back aught to hurt thy soul. My firm conviction is that everything a good man sees must better him. On seeing evil he thanks God for saving him therefrom and prays God to convert him to what he is. On seeing good his great desire will be to have it perfected in him.
This seeing serves two purposes : it scotches what is mischievous and makes us forthwith remedy our faults. Many a time I have laid it down that great workers, great fasters, great vigil-keepers, if they fail to mend their wicked ways, wherein true progress lies, do cheat themselves and are the devil’s laughing-stock. A man once had an arrow he grew rich on. lie was neighbour to a sower. When the arrow was in use a breeze from any quarter would catch it by the head and turn its tail into the wind. So this man approached the sower and quoth he, ‘ What will you give me to tell you the way of the wind ? ’ Thus he sold his arrow and waxed rich thereby. And so might we become right rich in virtue by finding out our frailties, and then, in rue, setting ourselves to cure them.
This St Elizabeth did with much care. She looked well to the ways of her house. She had no fear for the winter for her household was doubly clad. Probable ills she provided against. Any lack she worked hard to supply. So she ate not the bread of idleness. Withal her superior powers she kept oriented to God. The superior powers of the soul are three. The first is intuition ; the second irascibilis, i,e, the power of attack ; the third is will. In the act of imbibing knowledge of the very truth into the impartible power whereby we apprehend God, the soul is a light. And God too is light, and when the divine light is flooding the soul, soul becomes merged into God just like a light into light. Then she is called the light of faith which is a divine virtue. And whither the soul is unable to go with her senses and powers thither faith takes her.
The second is the attacking force whose special function it is to progress. As the eye is for seeing colour and shape and the ear is for hearing sweet voices and sounds, so the soul with this power is ever advancing ; if she glances aside to waver from him, that is sin. She cannot brook that aught should be above her. I trow she cannot brook God even being above her ; unless he be within her and she has gotten as good as God himself, she never rests. With this power God is apprehended by the soul, as far as that is feasible to creature and so it is called hope, whieh is a divine virtue also. Herein the soul has such a clear prospect of God that she fondly imagines God in his whole being has not a thing withholdcn from her. King Solomon says, ‘ Stolen waters are sweet.’ And St Augustine tells us, ‘ The pears I stole were nicer than the ones my mother gave me, because they were forbidden and locked up.’ So is that grace far sweeter to the soul which she has won by special work and wisdom than that which is our common property.
The third power is interior will, turned ever face-like towards God in godly will, drawing from God his love into itself. God is drawn by the soul and the soul is drawn by God, and this is divine love, another divine virtue. Divine felicity lies in three things. In knowledge and in liberation from the bondage of creature : in having enough of, having finished with, self and all creatures. Further, the soul’s perfection lies in gnosis, in conception, in conceiving God and in union of perfect love. Do we want to know what sin means ? Lapsing from felicity and virtue, that is the whole cause of sin. It behoves every soul to look to her ways. ‘ She had no fear for the winter with her household doubly clad,’ as the scriptures tell of her. She was clothed with strength to withstand imperfection and was adorned with the truth. To all appearance this woman was rich and had the world at her feet, but in secret she knelt at the shrine of true poverty. And when her outward comforts failed she fled to him to whom all creatures flee, setting at naught the world and self. In this way she transcended self, despising men’s despisery and not minding it, for all she had in mind was the tending of the sick and the cleansing of the foul, which she managed by dint of her pure heart. Even so let us look to the ways of our house and not cat the bread of idleness. So help us God. Amen.