4

When this is accomplished, our spirit is made hierarchical to mount

upward through its conformity to the heavenly Jerusalem, into which no one

enters unless through grace it has descended into his heart, as John saw in

his Apocalypse [21, 2]. But then it descends into one's heart when, by the

reformation of the image through the theological virtues and through the

delights of the spiritual senses and ecstatic elevation, our spirit has

been made hierarchical, that is, purged, illuminated, and perfected.

Likewise the soul is stamped by the following nine steps when it is

disposed in an orderly way: perception, deliberation, self-impulsion,

ordination, strengthening, command, reception, divine illumination, union,[ ¹]

which one by one correspond to the nine orders of angels, so that the first

three stages correspond to nature in the human mind, the next three to

industry, and the last three to grace.[ ²] With these acquired, the soul,

entering into itself, enters into the heavenly Jerusalem, where,

considering the orders of the angels, it sees God in them, Who living in

them causes all their operations. Whence Bernard said to Eugenius that -

"God in the seraphim loves as Charity, in the Cherubim He knows as Truth,

in the Thrones He is seated as Equity, in the Dominations He dominates as

Majesty, in the Principalities He rules as the First Principle, in the

Powers He watches over us as Salvation, in the Virtues He operates as

Virtue, in the Archangels He reveals as Light, in the Angels He aids as

Piety."[ ³]

From all of which God is seen to be all in all through the contemplation of

Him in the minds in which He dwells through the gifts of His overflowing

Charity.