Sermons on the Song of Songs

“The King brought me into the cellar of wine, He set charity in order in me.”

“The King brought me into the cellar of wine, He set charity in order in me.” The literal signification of this verse, my brethren, may be presented as follows. On the departure of the Bridegroom, after gratifying the wishes of His Bride, by holding with her a very sweet and familiar colloquy, the latter returns to her companions, the young maidens; but so filled is she and inflamed with charity from the presence and conversation of her Beloved, that she resembles one who is intoxicated with wine. The young maidens, astonished at the change they behold in her, anxiously inquire the cause. Her reply is that it is nothing surprising if she, who has been “brought into the cellar of wine,” should show some signs of intoxication. Such appears to be the direct and obvious meaning. If we now consider her words according to their mystical signification, the Spouse acknowledges that she is inebriated, not however with wine, but with holy love, unless indeed love may be regarded as wine. “The King,” she says, “brought me into the cellar of wine.” Observe that whenever the Bridegroom is present and the Spouse addresses her speech to Him, she calls Him by such names as “my Bridegroom,” or “my Beloved,” or “Thou Whom my soul loveth”; whereas, when speaking of Him to the young maidens, in His absence, she gives Him the title of “King.” What does this signify? It signifies, in my judgment, that, although the Bridegroom and Bride may with perfect propriety address each other by such familiar and affectionate names as love inspires, the young maidens, on the contrary, as still requiring discipline, must have their frowardness restrained by the august titles proper to majesty.

“The King brought me into the cellar of wine.” I will not pause now to explain what is meant by the “cellar of wine,” for, as I remember, the matter has been sufficiently discussed already. But if we regard these words as spoken by the Church, at the time when the disciples, filled with the Holy Ghost, were accused by the populace of being drunk from wine, then Peter must be considered the “friend of the Bridegroom,” for it was he who, “standing up in the midst,” replied in behalf of the Spouse, saying, “These are not drunk as you suppose.” And here I would have you notice, my brethren, how he did not absolutely deny that they were drunk, but only that they were drunk in the sense the people supposed. For they were in fact intoxicated, though not with wine, but with the Holy Spirit. So, as if bearing witness that he and his fellow-disciples had been brought “into the cellar of wine,” Peter again spoke in the name of all, “But this is that which was spoken of by the Prophet Joel: And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith the Lord, I will pour out of My Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams.” Nor do I suppose you would think me extravagant were I to regard as a “cellar of wine” the house where the disciples were gathered together when “suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a mighty wind coming, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting,” and verified the prophecy of Joel. And was not each one of the assembly, coming forth from that house, and “inebriated with the plenty” thereof, having “drunk of the torrent of its pleasures”—was not every one of them able to say with truth, “The King brought me into the cellar of wine”?

And thou, my brother, if recollected in spirit and with a mind sober and free from distracting thoughts, thou shouldst enter alone the house of prayer, and standing before God at one of the altars, shouldst touch the very gate of heaven with the hand of holy desire, and lifted up by the ardour of thy devotion to the choirs of glorified saints (for the prayer of the just man shall pierce the clouds) shouldst in their presence bemoan with tears of misery the afflictions and sorrows that oppress thee, and with frequent sighs and “unspeakable groanings” shouldst confess thy necessities and implore compassion—if, I say, thou shouldst act in this wise, I have too much confidence in the word of Him Who said, “Ask and you shall receive,” to believe that thou shalt go out empty-handed, provided only that thou dost persevere in knocking. And when thou art restored to us, full of devotion and charity, if in fervour of spirit thou art unable to conceal the grace bestowed on thee, but freely and without envy dost share it with all, if after having been so highly favoured, thou makest thyself not alone pleasing, but even admirable in the eyes of thy brethren, then canst thou truly declare with the Spouse, “The King brought me into the cellar of wine.” Nevertheless, thou shouldst be careful to glory not in thyself, but in the Lord. I would not say that every gift, even though belonging to the spiritual order, is brought forth from the “cellar of wine”; for there are different cellars and storerooms in the palace of the Bridegroom, wherein are hoarded up all His multiform treasures and graces, “according to the riches of His glory,” and of which I remember to have treated at length in an earlier sermon. “Are not these things stored up with Me,” saith the Lord, “and sealed in My treasures?” Therefore, according to the diversity of the storerooms are the distinctions of graces, and the Spirit manifests Himself to each soul in the way most conducive to her profit. But although “to one is given the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge, to another prophecy, to another the grace of healing, to another diverse kinds of tongues, to another interpretation of speeches,” and other similar gifts to others; nevertheless, the reception of such favours does not entitle any soul to say that she has been brought into the cellar of wine. For these gifts are taken out of the other cellars or repositories.

But if it were given to any one of us during prayer, in a spiritual ecstasy, to penetrate so far into the secret recesses of the Divinity that, when he comes back by and by, he is found to be all on fire with the love of God, animated with a burning zeal for justice, and full of fervour at every spiritual office or exercise, so that he can say in the words of the Psalmist, “My heart grew hot within me; and in my meditation a fire shall flame out,” such a one might justly claim to have been admitted into the cellar of wine; since he is beginning already to eructate from the abundance of holy love and the good and wholesome repletion of the wine of gladness. There are two kinds of ecstasy experienced in divine contemplation. One of them belongs to the intellect, the other to the will. One results from an excess of light, the other from an excess of love. Knowledge predominates in the one, charity in the other. Now it is evident that the affection of piety, and the love-enkindled heart, and the infusion of fervent devotion, and the spirit all inflamed with ardent zeal, can have no other source save the wine-cellar. Hence every soul to whom it is granted to rise from prayer replenished with graces of this kind, every such soul, I say, can confidently make her own the words of the Spouse, “The King brought me into the cellar of wine.”