Sermons on the Song of Songs

But instead of saying, “Him Whom I love,” the Spouse says very beautifully, “Him Whom my soul loveth.” For to the soul alone belongs truly and properly the love wherewith one loves any spiritual object, such, for instance, as God, an angel, the human soul. The same remark applies to the love of justice, of truth, of piety, of wisdom, and of the other virtues. On the other hand, when a person loves, or rather desires (appetit) something according to the flesh, for example, food, or clothes, or dominion, or any such earthly and material good, this affection must be held to spring not from the spirit but from the flesh. So much concerning the very unusual yet equally proper expression of the Spouse, “I sought Him Whom my soul loveth,” whereby she insinuates that her Bridegroom is a Spirit and is loved by her according to the spirit, not according to the flesh.

Justly, too, does she say that she sought Him during the nights. For if, as St. Paul tells us, “they that sleep, sleep in the night, and they that are drunk, are drunk in the night”; if this be so, it may also be said without absurdity, as I think, that they who are ignorant are ignorant in the night, and consequently that they who seek, seek in the night. For who would seek for what he has plainly before his eyes? Now the day makes manifest what the night conceals, so that what you sought in the night you discover in the day. It is therefore night so long as the Bridegroom is sought; because if it were day He would certainly reveal Himself and there would be no necessity to seek Him. These remarks would suffice to elucidate this point only for the fact that the Spouse speaks of nights in the plural, which perhaps is significant of something requiring to be further investigated. For her words are, not “during the night,” but “during the nights I sought Him.”

The reason of this, my brethren, appears to be the following, unless some of yourselves can discover a more plausible explanation. The world in which we live has its own nights, and they are many. But why do I say that the world has its nights, since it is rather itself almost completely a night, and is totally and eternally buried in darkness? One night is the perfidy of the Jews, a second is the ignorance of the Gentiles, heretical depravity is a third night, and a fourth the carnal and animal conversation of many Catholics. Surely it must be then night when one “perceiveth not those things that are of the Spirit of God.” As for heretics and schismatics, there are amongst these as many different nights as there are distinct sects. Vainly shall you seek in these nights for the Sun of Justice or the Light of truth, that is to say, for the heavenly Bridegroom; for “what fellowship hath light with darkness?” But some one may tell me that the Spouse is not so stupid and blind as to seek for light amid darkness, as to seek her Bridegroom among those who have neither the knowledge nor the love of Him. As if, foresooth, she had declared that she is still seeking Him by night, and not that she has been seeking. She says not “I seek” but “I sought by night Him Whom my soul loveth.” And the sense is the same as if she had said with the Apostle, “when I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child.” She erringly sought the truth where it was not, and so failed to find it, according to what is written in the psalm, “I have gone astray like a sheep that is lost.” And she mentions that at the time of seeking she was still in her little bed, as being still but a little one herself both in strength and understanding.

If it be preferred, however, to construe the text in this manner, “Lying or reposing in my little bed by night I sought Him Whom my soul loveth,” the sense will be, not that she searched her bed to find Him there, but that whilst she herself was reclining in her little bed—that is to say, was but a little one—she sought her Bridegroom. According to this interpretation her words may be paraphrased thus, “when I was still weak and helpless and altogether incapable of following the Bridegroom whithersoever He went, of following Him up the steep and lofty heights to where He sits in glory, I fell in with many, who, knowing my desire, used to say to me, ‘Lo here is Christ, lo He is there,’ whereas He was neither here nor there. I fell in with such, I say, yet ‘not unto folly to me’; because the more nearly I approached and the more carefully I examined, the more speedily and thoroughly was I convinced that the truth was not to be found amongst them. For though I sought I could not find; and thus I perceived that they were only as nights trying to personate the day.

“Then I said. ‘I will rise and will go about the city. In the streets and in the broad ways I will seek Him Whom my soul loveth.’” Observe, my brethren, that she is even still reclining, since she says, “I will rise.” This has a beautiful significance. Why should she not rise now after hearing of the resurrection of her Beloved? But, O happy Bride, “If thou be risen with Christ.” it is necessary that thou shouldst relish “the things that are above,” not the things that are upon the earth; it is necessary that thou shouldst seek Christ above, where He sitteth at the Right Hand of the Father. But thou sayest, “I will go about the city.” Wherefore? “The wicked,” so speaks the Psalmist, “walk round about.” Leave to the Jews this circumambulation, of whom their own Prophet predicted that “they shall suffer hunger like dogs and shall go round about the city.” And if thou shouldst “enter into the city” according to another of their prophets, “behold them that are consumed with famine.” Now this could not have occured if in the city were found the Bread of Life. But He has arisen out of the heart of the earth, and has not even remained on its surface. He has mounted “up where He was before.” For “He That descended,” says the Apostle, “is the Same also That ascended,” “the Living Bread That came down from heaven,” and at the same time the Bridegroom of the Church, Jesus Christ, Our Lord, Who is over all things, God blessed forever. Amen.