we must
not love honour in this life, nor power; for _all things are vain under
the sun_. But we must love the toil itself which comes to us together
with such honour or power if it be rightly and profitably used--as
tending, that is, to the salvation under God of those under us.... Love
of truth, then, seeks for a holy leisure; the calls of charity compel us
to undertake the labours of justice. If no one lays on us this burden,
then must we devote our leisure to the search after and the study of the
truth; but if such burden be imposed upon us, we must shoulder it at the
call of charity; yet withal we must not wholly abandon the delights of
the truth, lest while the latter's sweetness is withdrawn from us, the
burden we have taken up overwhelm us (_Of the City of God_, xix. 19).

"O expectation of Israel, the Saviour thereof in time of
trouble: why wilt Thou be as a stranger in the land, and as a
wayfaring man turning in to lodge? Why wilt Thou be as a
wandering man, as a mighty man that cannot save? but Thou, O
Lord, art among us, and Thy Name is called upon us, forsake us
not."[337]

III

Does the Contemplative Life comprise many Acts?

By "life" is here meant any work to which a man principally devotes
himself. Hence if there were many acts or works in the contemplative
life, it would not be one life, but several.

It must be understood that we are speaking of the contemplative life as
it concerns man. And between men and Angels there is, as S. Denis
says,[338] this difference--that whereas an Angel knows the truth by one
simple act of intelligence, man, on the contrary, only arrives at a
knowledge of the simple truth by arguing from many premises. Hence the
contemplative life has only a single act in which it finds its final
perfection--namely, the contemplation of the truth--and from this one
act it derives its oneness. But at the same time it has many acts by
means of which it arrives at this final act. Of these various acts, some
are concerned with the establishment of principles from which the mind
proceeds to the contemplation of truth; others, again, are concerned
with deducing from these principles that truth the knowledge of which is
sought. But the ultimate act, the complement of the foregoing, is the
contemplation of truth.

Some, however, maintain that many acts pertain to the contemplative
life, thus:

1. Richard of S. Victor[339] distinguishes between contemplation,