Page:The Classical Heritage of the Middle Ages.djvu/172

II 154 THE CLASSICAL HERITAGE [chap. might live in contemplation of them. Such contem- plation filled the heart as well as mind, — this sweet Christian vita contemplativay this all-beloved Rachel, for whom even those active souls who have Leah for their portion must yearn in spiritual bereavement;^ to have this, is to be like Mary, and sit at the feet of the Lord — and did not the Lord say, Mary hath chosen the better part ? This fulness of spiritual life and love, which Chris- tianity brought, has always been a power making for monasticism. The Christian vita contemplativa, with its wealth of love as well as thought, might satisfy and enrapture thousands, while but few could have held to the pagan /Stos dciap-qriKoi which Aristotle declared the truly human life, and which Boethius be- held stamped on the garments of Philosophy. Women, as well as men, might love Christ and think of him alone ; but no woman and few men could follow Aris- totle's or Boethius' loveless ^tos Oaop-qTiKo^. Even when the pagan contemplative life had become one of attempted visioning or ecstasy, as well as one of thought, it was so empty of real and definitely directed feeling that it could not hold its votaries. Such fan- tasy could not people monasteries, much less nunner- ies. In the Christian vita contemplativa, there often entered a love intense and so personally directed, toward the bridegroom Christ, that the life which held such love was no life of ascetic renunciation, but one filled with the fruition of fulfilled desire, — a life ecstatic rather than ascetic. 1 See a beautiful passage in Gregory the Great's Ep. I, 6, Ad Teoctistam, and the opening of Gregory's Dialogi.