XII Cardinal's Preface | Cardinal's Preface XIII

eyes, or is shown to them, just as Moses saw the Lord in the burning bush, and the Fathers oftentimes visibly received angels. This category of vision can be brought forth through the experience of any sense, such as hearing, taste, smell, and touch; for it is customary to use "vision" for every sense. In Exodus 20, the people "saw" the voices and the lamps and the sound of the trumpets, which they could not perceive with sight, but with hearing. A spiritual or imaginary vision, however, is so named when we see the form or images of things in the spirit, whether sleeping or waking, such as were the visions of Ezekiel and Daniel, and other Saints in the New and Old Testament, to whom many things were shown through the forms and images of things while they were awake and in ecstasy a trance-like state. Similarly, one reads that many things were shown to many while they slept through this category of vision: for example, Jacob saw the Lord leaning on a ladder; Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar saw dreams that were a prophecy of future things. The third, however, is an intellectual vision, when through the revelation of the Holy Spirit we grasp with the understanding of the mind the truth of the mystery as it is in itself, just as the Evangelist John the Apostle saw that which is told in the Book of the Secret Revelation The Book of Revelation/Apocalypse. For he did not only see the forms in the spirit, but also understood their meaning with his mind.

According to this threefold category of vision, one reads that the blessed Birgitta had heavenly and divine revelations, just as one reads that many other Saints had them. For according to the first category of vision, namely that of the body, it is read that the blessed Birgitta saw the honorable Mother of Christ at different times, and even Christ her blessed Son Himself, and also the angels. It is said that she saw the Mother of Christ when she was still a young girl: for she saw an altar, and the Mother of God sitting upon it, who called her and placed a crown on her. Again, when she was in danger during childbirth, the Mother of God was seen to go in to her, who touched her limbs in the presence and sight of everyone and delivered her, as is mentioned in the Legend hagiographical account of her life. So also it is said that she saw Christ: thus it is told that she once saw fire fall from heaven upon the altar, and in the hand of the priest who was reading the Mass, an Oblat the Communion host, and in the same a Lamb, and the face of a Man in the Lamb, and the Lamb in the face; and again she saw in the hand of the priest in the host a living Child, who marked those standing around with the sign of the Cross and said: "I bless you, you faithful; to the unfaithful I will

be a Judge." See this in Book 6, Chapter 86. Likewise, specifically when she was about to die, she saw Christ bodily, who comforted her, as is told in her Legend. It is likewise said she sometimes saw the angels with bodily eyes, as her history testifies. Furthermore, according to the second manner of vision, which is spiritual or imaginary, and especially when we speak of that which happens while waking, it appears that her revelations were mostly given to her at such times: for she saw almost all visions while waking in prayer, and not sleeping, as is clearly seen in many chapters of this book, in which one reads how she was very often rapt in spirit and estranged from her senses, saw visions, and heard the speech of those persons who were presented in her spirit through bodily form and images. According to the third category of vision, which is intellectual, one reads similarly that the blessed Birgitta had revelations, because it is very often read of her that, when she was rapt and her thought and understanding were illuminated to grasp that which was shown to her, she was filled with a supernatural divine light of intellectual truth. But the uniformity of these revelations with Holy Scripture and the examples of the Saints lies in the manner of the revelations. Where it is to be noted that in Holy Scripture it is read that revelations happened at times through a voice and express words, just as to Peter, John, and James when they were with Jesus our Savior on the Mountain, when a voice fell from the cloud and said: "This is my beloved Son," etc. (Matt. 17). Likewise it was said to Peter: "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven" (Matt. 16). Or just as the word of the Lord came to Samuel at Shiloh (1 Sam. 3). Likewise, it sometimes happens through a dream, just as it was said to Joseph the husband of Mary in sleep that he should take the child and Mary and flee into Egypt; and afterward, that he should return (Matt. 2); and in many other places the same is found. Likewise, they sometimes happen through an angelic spirit, as in Zechariah 4: "The angel who talked with me said to me," etc., and in many other almost innumerable places. Likewise, several times the revelations happen through the Holy Spirit inwardly in the soul, of which the Prophet speaks: "I will hear what the Lord speaks in me" (Psalm 85). Of these last two, Gregory says (28 Moral. c. 3): "It is to be known," he says, "that a divine speech is called such in two ways. For either the Lord speaks through Himself, or His words are spoken to us through an angelic creature. But when God speaks through Himself, the power of inner inspiration alone is revealed in us. When He speaks through Himself, the heart is taught by His word without words and syllables."