Three Books on the Death of Christ and Self-Reflection, and Two Books on the Study of Divine and Human Philosophy

Evil in the good. Dionysius.

by which we might be able to reject the false goods that the flesh itself continuously proposes and administers to the spirit, and even moves it to accept, because it does not wish to be subject to it, but is always rebellious and hostile, as it has withdrawn itself from the obedience of the first father from the time he was not listening to divine precepts. We are also deluded by excessive passions by which the eyes of the mind are hallucinated and constricted, whence we very often grasp evil for good. For in every evil there is and is seen some good; otherwise, we would not desire or covet evil at all, since no one loves or affects evil as evil, as it is contrary to the will, according to the author Dionysius. Therefore, deceived by the appearance of that good, we often drink deadly poison instead of nectar, and we eagerly drain a particular good mixed with much malice, and prefer it to the supreme good, being softened by the allurements of pleasure. Hence we accumulate riches as if we were not going to die; hence we are submerged in the wallow of vices, forgetting the virtues by which the path to happiness lies. We nourish and cultivate the body; we subordinate and neglect the soul. Moreover, we can also be deluded in this way: if we cultivate goods that are conducive to attaining the supreme good, such as virtues (which we absolutely need), as if they were the supreme good, setting them up for ourselves as the ultimate end, End or being affected by a desire for perpetual fame or some other inordinate affection. By these things, it is brought about that we very often deviate now here, now there, according to the whim of the senses.

That some object ought to be assigned to the soul to help it in contemplating and loving God; otherwise, it is easily deceived. Chapter liii.

To avoid these errors, therefore, it is necessary that we have our end before our eyes, because from the end apprehended, love is born, and from there operations and duties arise. But since that supreme good which the soul always desires and follows, when joined to the body, cannot be possessed except after death, it is therefore distracted from both evil and many goods—but created and not supreme—while seeking it, because of the condition of the present life (as we have said before), and very