Which describes how it is vanity to set the rejoicing of the
will upon the good things of nature, and how the soul must direct
itself, by means of them, to God.
BY natural blessings we here understand beauty, grace,
comeliness, bodily constitution and all other bodily endowments;
and likewise, in the soul, good understanding, discretion and
other things that pertain to reason. Many a man sets his rejoicing
upon all these gifts, to the end that he himself, or those that
belong to him, may possess them, and for no other reason, and
gives no thanks to God Who bestows them on him so that He may be
better known and loved by him because of them. But to rejoice for
this cause alone is vanity and deception, as Solomon says in these
words: 'Deceitful is grace and vain is beauty; the woman who fears
God, she shall be praised.'[584] Here he teaches us that a man ought
rather to be fearful because of these natural gifts, since he may
easily be distracted by them from the love of God, and, if he be
attracted by them, he may fall into vanity and be deceived. For
this reason bodily grace is said to be deceptive because it
deceives a man in the ways and attracts him to that which beseems
him not, through vain joy and complacency, either in himself or in
others that have such grace. And it is said that beauty is vain
because it causes a man to fall in many ways when he esteems it
and rejoices in it, for he should rejoice only if he serves God or
others through it. But he ought rather to fear and harbour
misgivings lest perchance his natural graces and gifts should be a
cause of his offending God, either by his vain presumption or by
the extreme affection with which he regards them. Wherefore he
that has such gifts should be cautious and live carefully, lest,
by his vain ostentation, he give cause to any man to withdraw his
heart in the smallest degree from God. For these graces and gifts
of nature are so full of provocation and occasion of evil, both to
him that possesses them and to him that looks upon them, that
there is hardly any who entirely escapes from binding and
entangling his heart in them. We have heard that many spiritual
persons, who had certain of these gifts, had such fear of this
that they prayed God to disfigure them, lest they should be a
cause and occasion of any vain joy or affection to themselves or
to others, and God granted their prayer.
2. The spiritual man, then, must purge his will, and make it
to be blind to this vain rejoicing, bearing in mind that beauty
and all other natural gifts are but earth, and that they come from
the earth and will return thither; and that grace and beauty are
the smoke and vapour belonging to this same earth; and that they
must be held and esteemed as such by any man who desires not to
fall into vanity, but will direct his heart to God in these
matters, with rejoicing and gladness, because God is in Himself
all these beauties and graces in the most eminent degree, and is
infinitely high above all created things. And, as David says, they
are all like a garment and shall grow old and pass away, and He
alone remains immutable for ever.[585] Wherefore, if in all these
matters a man direct not his rejoicing to God, it will ever be
false and deceptive. For of such a man is that saying of Solomon
to be understood, where he addresses joy in the creatures, saying:
'To joy I said: "Why art thou vainly deceived?"'[586] That is, when
the heart allows itself to be attracted by the creatures.
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