s sense Dionysius says that "the Divine love causes
ecstasy," inasmuch as it makes man's appetite tend to the object
loved. Hence he says afterwards that "even God Himself, the cause of
all things, through the overflow of His loving goodness, goes outside
Himself in His providence for all beings." But even if this were said
expressly of rapture, it would merely signify that love is the cause
of rapture.

Reply Obj. 2: There is a twofold appetite in man; to wit, the
intellective appetite which is called the will, and the sensitive
appetite known as the sensuality. Now it is proper to man that his
lower appetite be subject to the higher appetite, and that the higher
move the lower. Hence man may become outside himself as regards the
appetite, in two ways. In one way, when a man's intellective appetite
tends wholly to divine things, and takes no account of those things
whereto the sensitive appetite inclines him; thus Dionysius says
(Div. Nom. iv) that "Paul being in ecstasy through the vehemence of
Divine love" exclaimed: "I live, now not I, but Christ liveth in me."

In another way, when a man tends wholly to things pertaining to the
lower appetite, and takes no account of his higher appetite. It is
thus that "he who fed the swine debased himself"; and this latter
kind of going out of oneself, or being beside oneself, is more akin
than the former to the nature of rapture because the higher appetite
is more proper to man. Hence when through the violence of his lower
appetite a man is withdrawn from the movement of his higher appetite,
it is more a case of being withdrawn from that which is proper to
him. Yet, because there is no violence therein, since the will is
able to resist the passion, it falls short of the true nature of
rapture, unless perchance the passion be so strong that it takes away
entirely the use of reason, as happens to those who are mad with
anger or love.

It must be observed, however, that both these excesses affecting the
appetite may cause an excess in the cognitive power, either because
the mind is carried away to certain intelligible objects, through
being drawn away from objects of sense, or because it is caught up
into some imaginary vision or fanciful apparition.

Reply Obj. 3: Just as love is a movement of the appetite with regard
to good, so fear is a movement of the appetite with regard to evil.
Wherefore either of them may equally cause an aberration of mind; and
all the more since fea