Page:The Classical Heritage of the Middle Ages.djvu/145

vi] BEAUTY AND LOVE 127 whose secret the whole creation sings. To this he can mount only by the self-made image of the Dove, which is the Holy Spirit, within himself. With this alone may the mind of man soar above this murky world to the true Purity, that atmosphere of light, where the soul itself becomes a Light, according to our Lord's promise that the righteous shall shine forth as the Sun. And so shall we become as the Light in our nearness to Christ's true light, if the true Light that shineth in the darkness comes down even to us, unless there is any foulness of sin spreading over our hearts. Thus may we be changed to something better than ourselves ; and this union of the soul with the incor- ruptible deity can only be attained by her reaching the virgin state of utmost pui-ity ; a state which being like God will grasp what is like, while she places her- self as a mirror under the purity of God, and moulds her own beauty at the touch and sight of all beauty's archetype. A character strong enough to turn from all that is human, will feel as a lover only toward that Beauty which has no source but itself, and is not beauty relative or particular, or changing, or waxing, or waning. To such a soul, by virtue of her inno- cence, comes the power of apprehending that light. And real virginity has no other goal than the power thereby of seeing God, the only absolute and primal Beauty and Goodness.^ The same Platonic Christian elsewhere says that the speculative and critical faculty is the property of the soul's godlike part, for by this we grasp the deity also. J On Virffinitv, Chaps. X, XI. Cf. Plato, Phaedrm and 5ym- potium.