THE INTELLECTUAL LIFE, Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods - Sertillanges E-Book

A. D. Sertillanges

• Herausgeber: Lebooks Editora
• Kategorie: Bildung
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Seitenzahl: 334

Beschreibung

In 1920, the Dominican monk Sertillanges wrote "The Intellectual Life: Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods," a masterpiece that proposed to address the Sixteen Precepts of Saint Thomas, but which gained practical substance for preparation during and after study. "The Intellectual Life" goes beyond observations for studies. They are completely perennial and fundamental methods for the development of humans as intelligent beings. Praised by intellectuals, critics, and specialized journalists like Olavo de Carvalho, Felipe Moura Brasil, among numerous others, the enduring success of "The Intellectual Life" is the greatest proof of its value.

Leseprobe

A.D. Sertillanges,

THE INTELLECTUAL LIFE,

Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods

Original Title:

“La Vie Intellectuelle,

son Espirit, ses Conditions, ses Méthodes”

Contents

INTRODUCTION

THE INTELLECTUAL LIFE, Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods

Chapter 1 - The Intellectual Vocation

Chapter 2 - The Virtues of a Catholic Intellectual

Chapter 3 - The Organization of Life

Chapter 4 - The Time of Work

Chapter 5 - The Field of Work

Chapter 6 - The Spirit of Work

Chapter 7 – Preparation for Work

Chapter 8 - Creative Work

Chapter 9 - The Worker and the Man

INTRODUCTION

Antonin Sertillanges

1863-1948

A.D. Sertillanges, whose full name is Antonin-Dalmace Sertillanges, was a prominent French philosopher and theologian of the 20th century. Born in Aubeterre-sur-Dronne, France, Sertillanges was renowned for his profound erudition and extensive knowledge in various areas of human thought.

Sertillanges was recognized for his remarkable work in philosophy, theology, and ethics, as well as for his keen analysis and reflection on topics related to morality, spirituality, and intellectual life. His approach was based on the pursuit of truth, wisdom, and virtue, characterized by intellectual rigor and a commitment to excellence.

In addition to his prolific academic career, Sertillanges was also known for his devotion to contemplative and spiritual life. His deep Catholic faith greatly influenced his thinking and philosophical approach, leading him to explore the relationship between reason and faith, as well as to reflect on the importance of virtue and the pursuit of transcendence in human life.

Sertillanges's works have left a lasting mark on the philosophical and theological realm. His writings, marked by clarity and depth, have been widely studied and valued for their contribution to human thought. His multidisciplinary approach and ability to address complex issues in an accessible manner have made his works an important reference in the pursuit of truth and understanding of the world.

About the work: "The Intellectual Life"

"The Intellectual Life" is a groundbreaking work written by A.D. Sertillanges that invites us to reflect on the role and importance of intellectual life in our human development. First published in [year of publication], this masterpiece immerses us in a fascinating journey into the world of thought and the pursuit of truth.

In this book, Sertillanges presents a profound exploration of the foundations of intellectual life and provides practical tools for cultivating an inquisitive and active mind. Through his insightful analysis, the author invites us to reflect on the importance of reading, reflection, study, and dialogue as essential elements to enrich our intellectual life.

Sertillanges guides us through the various aspects of intellectual life, from the acquisition of knowledge and the importance of academic formation, to the need to cultivate curiosity, discipline, and perseverance in our search for truth. Furthermore, he urges us to integrate our intellectual life with our spiritual life and to recognize the value of contemplation and deep reflection in our personal growth.

"The Intellectual Life" stands out for its clear and accessible style, allowing the reader to delve into complex concepts in a straightforward manner. Sertillanges captivates us with his passion for knowledge and his conviction that intellectual life is a fundamental component for a fulfilling and meaningful life.

This work has been widely acclaimed by critics and readers, who have praised its insightfulness, depth, and ability to inspire and guide those seeking an enriching intellectual life. "The Intellectual Life" is a book that challenges us to develop our intellectual potential and invites us to be active participants in the dialogue of ideas and the pursuit of truth.

THE INTELLECTUAL LIFE, Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods

Chapter 1 - The Intellectual Vocation

I

When we speak of vocation, we refer to those who intend to make intellectual work their life, Whether they are entirely free to give themselves up to study, or whether, though engaged in some calling, they hold happily in reserve, as a supplement of their activity and as a reward, the development and deepening of their mind.

I say the deepening, in order to set aside the idea of a superficial tincture of knowledge. A vocation is not fulfilled by vague reading and a few scattered writings. It requires penetration and continuity and methodical effort, so as to attain a fulness of development which will correspond to the call of the Spirit, and to the resources that it has pleased Him to bestow on us.

This call is not to be taken for granted. To start precipitately on a road which one could not tread with a firm step would be merely to prepare the way for disillusionment. Everyone has the duty to work; and after a first early and toilsome training no one acts wisely if he lets his mind fall gradually back into its primitive ignorance; but the effortless maintenance of what one has acquired is one thing, and it is quite another to consolidate from the foundations upwards a sum of knowledge recognized as merely provisional, seen to be simply and solely a starting point.

This second state of mind is that of one who has the vocation. It implies a serious resolution. The life of study is austere and imposes grave obligations. It pays, it pays richly; but it exacts an initial outlay that few are capable of. The athletes of the mind, like those of the playing field, must be prepared for privations, long training, a sometimes superhuman tenacity. We must give ourselves from the heart, if truth is to give itself to us. Truth serves only its slaves.

This way of life must not be entered on without long self-examination. The intellectual vocation is like every other: it is written in our instincts, in our powers, in a sort of inner impulse of which reason must judge. Our dispositions are like the chemical properties which determine, for everybody, the combinations into which that body can enter. A vocation is something that cannot be had for the asking. It comes from heaven and from our first nature. The whole point is to be docile to God and to oneself as soon as they have spoken.

Understood in this sense, Disraeli's saying that you may do what you please, provided it really pleases you, contains a great meaning. Our liking, if correlated to our fundamental tendencies and to our aptitudes, is an excellent judge. If St. Thomas could say that pleasure characterizes functions and may serve to classify men, he must be led to conclude that pleasure can also reveal our vocation. Only we must search down into the depths where liking and the spontaneous impulse are linked up with the gifts of God and His providence.

Besides the immense interest of realizing oneself in one's fulness, the investigation into an intellectual vocation has a more general interest which no one may disregard.

Christianized humanity is made up of various personalities, no one of which can refuse to function without impoverishing the group and without depriving the eternal Christ of a part of His kingdom. Christ reigns by unfolding Himself in men. Every life of one of His members is a characteristic moment of His duration; every individual man and Christian is an instance, incommunicable, unique, and therefore necessary, of the extension of the "spiritual body." If you are designated as a light bearer, do not go and hide under the bushel the gleam or the flame expected from you in the house of the Father of all. Love truth and its fruits of life, for yourself and for others; devote to study and to the profitable use of study the best part of your time and your heart.

All roads but one are bad roads for you, since they diverge from the direction in which your action is expected and required. Do not prove faithless to God, to your brethren and to yourself by rejecting a sacred call.

That presupposes you to come to the intellectual life with unselfish motives, not through ambition or foolish vanity. The jingling bells of publicity tempt only frivolous minds. Ambition offends eternal truth by subordinating truth to itself. Is it not a sacrilege to play with the questions that dominate life and death, with mysterious nature, with God— to achieve some literary or philosophical celebrity at the expense of the true and independently of the true? Such aims, and especially the first mentioned, would not sustain the seeker; his effort would speedily be seen to slacken, his vanity to fall back on some empty satisfaction, with no care for the reality of things.

But it presupposes also that to the acceptance of the end you add the acceptance of the means; otherwise there would be no real obedience to your vocation. Many people would like to possess knowledge! A vague aspiration turns the eyes of the multitude towards horizons that the greater number admire from afar off, as the victim of gout or asthma looks up to the eternal snows. To get something without paying for it is the universal desire; but it is the desire of cowardly hearts and weak brains. The universe does not respond to the first murmured request, and the light of God does not shine under your study lamp unless your soul asks for it with persistent effort.

You are consecrated by your vocation. Will what truth wills; consent for the sake of truth to bestir yourself, to take up your abode within its proper realm, to organize your life, and, realizing your inexperience, to learn from the experience of others.

“If youth but knew!" The young, above all, need this warning. Science in the broad meaning of the word, scientia, is knowledge through causes; but actively, as to its attainment, it is a creation by causes. We must recognize and adopt the causes of knowledge, then provide them, and not defer attention to the foundations of our building until the moment of putting up the roof.

In the first free years after early studies, when the ground of our intelligence has been newly turned-up, and the seed sown, what splendid tillage could be undertaken! That is the time that will never come again, the time that we shall have to live on by and by. What it is, we shall be; for we can hardly put down new roots. The future is always the heir of the past; the penalty for neglecting, at the right time, to prepare it, is to live on the surface of things. Let each one think of that, while thinking may be of some avail.

How many young people, with the pretension to become workers, miserably waste their days, their strength, the vigor of their intelligence, their ideal! Either they do not work — there is time enough! — or they work badly, capriciously, without knowing what they are nor where they want to go nor how to get there. Lectures, reading, choice of companions, the proper proportion of work and rest, of solitude and activity, of general culture and specialization, the spirit of study, the art of picking out and utilizing data gained, some provisional output which will give an idea of what the future work is to he, the virtues to be acquired and developed, — nothing of all that is thought out and no satisfactory fulfillment will follow.

What a difference, supposing equal resources, between the man who understands and looks ahead, and the man who proceeds at haphazard! “Genius is long patience,” but it must be organized and intelligent patience. One does not need extraordinary gifts to carry some work through; average superiority suffices; the rest depends on energy and wise application of energy. It is as with a conscientious workman, careful and steady at his task: he gets somewhere, while an inventive genius is often merely an embittered failure.

What I have just said is true of everyone. But I apply it especially to those who know that they have at their disposal only a part of their life, the least part, in which to give themselves to the labors of the mind. They, more than others, must be men consecrated by their vocation. What they cannot spread out over all their years, they must concentrate in a small space. The special asceticism and the heroic virtue of the intellectual worker must be their daily portion. But if they consent to this double self-offering, I tell them in the name of the God of truth not to lose courage.

If genius is not necessary for production, still less is it necessary to have entire liberty. What is more, liberty presents pitfalls that rigorous obligations may help us to avoid. A stream narrowly hemmed-in by its banks will flow more impetuously. The discipline of some occupation is an excellent school; it bears fruit in the hours of studious leisure. The very constraint will make you concentrate better, you will learn the value of time, you will take eager refuge in those rare hours during which, the claims of duty satisfied, you can turn to your ideal and enjoy the relaxation of some chosen activity after the labor imposed by the hard necessity of getting a livelihood.

The worker who thus finds in a fresh effort the reward of previous effort, who prizes it as a miser prizes his hoard, is usually passionately devoted to his ideal; he cannot be turned aside from a purpose thus consecrated by sacrifice. If his progress seems slower, he is capable of getting farther. Like the poor drudging tortoise, he does not dawdle, he persists, and in a few years' time he will have outstripped the indolent hare whose agile movements were the envy of his own lumbering gait.

The same is true of the isolated worker, deprived of intellectual resources and stimulating society, buried in some little provincial spot, where he seems condemned to stagnate, exiled far from rich libraries, brilliant lectures, an eagerly responsive public, possessing only himself and obliged to draw solely on that inalienable capital.

He must not lose courage either. Though he have everything against him, let him but keep possession of himself and be content with that. An ardent heart has more chance of achieving something than a crammed head abusing the opportunities of great cities. Here again strength may spring from difficulty. It is in the steep mountain passes that one bends and strains; level paths allow one to relax, and a state of uncontrolled relaxation quickly becomes fatal.

The most valuable thing of all is will, a deeply-rooted will; to will to be somebody, to achieve something; to be even now in desire that somebody, recognizable by his ideal. Everything else always settles itself. There are books everywhere and only a few are necessary. Society, stimulation, one finds these in spirit in one's solitude: the great are there, present to those who call on them, and the great ages behind impel the ardent thinker forward. As to lectures, those who can have them do not follow them or follow them but ill, if they have not in themselves, at need, the wherewithal to do without such fortunate help. As to the public, if it sometimes stimulates, it often disturbs, scatters the mind; and by going to pick up two pennies in the street, you may lose a fortune. An impassioned solitude is better, for there every seed produces a hundredfold, and every ray of sunlight suffuses the whole landscape with autumnal gold.

St. Thomas of Aquin, as he was coming to settle in Paris and descried the great city in the distance, said to the brother who was with him: "Brother, I would give all that for the commentary of Chrysostom on St. Matthew.” When one feels like that, it does not matter where one is nor what resources one has, one is stamped with the seal; one is of the elect of the Spirit; one has only to persevere, and to trust life, as it is ruled for us by God.

You, young man who understand this language and to whom the heroes of the mind seem mysteriously to beckon, but who fear to lack the necessary means, listen to me. Have you two hours a day? Can you undertake to keep them jealously, to use them ardently, and then, being of those who have authority in the Kingdom of God, can you drink the chalice of which these pages would wish to make you savor the exquisite and bitter taste? If so, have confidence. Nay, rest in quiet certainty.

If you are compelled to earn your living, at least you will earn it without sacrificing, as so many do, the liberty of your soul. If you are alone, you will but be more violently thrown back, on your noble purposes. Most great men followed some calling. Many have declared that the two hours I postulate suffice for an intellectual career. Learn to make the best use of that limited time; plunge every day of your life into the spring which quenches and yet ever renews your thirst.

Do you want to have a humble share in perpetuating wisdom among men, in gathering up the inheritance of the ages, in formulating the rules of the mind for the present time, in discovering facts and causes, in turning men's wandering eyes towards first causes and their hearts towards supreme ends, in reviving if necessary, some dying flame, in organizing the propaganda of truth and goodness? That is the lot reserved for you. It is surely worth a little extra sacrifice; it is worth steadily pursuing with jealous passion.

The study and practice of what Père Gratry calls Living Logic, that is, the development of our mind, the human word, by contact direct or indirect with the Spirit and the Divine Word — that serious study and persevering practice will give you entry into the wondrous sanctuary. You will be of those who grow, who enrich themselves, and who make ready to receive magnificent gifts. You too, one day, if God so wills, will have a place in the assembly of noble minds.

II

It is another characteristic of the intellectual vocation that the Christian worker who is consecrated by his call must not be an isolated unit Whatever be his position, however alone or hidden we suppose him to be materially, he must not yield to the lure of individualism, which is a distorted image of Christian personality.

As life-giving as is solitude, so paralyzing and sterilizing is isolation.

By being only a soul, one ceases to be a man, Victor Hugo would say. Isolation is inhuman; for to work in human fashion is to work with the feeling for man, his needs, his greatness, and the solidarity which binds us closely together in a common life.

A Christian worker should live constantly in the universal, in history. Since he lives with Jesus Christ he cannot separate times, nor men, from Him. Real life is a life in common, an immense family life with charity for its law; if study is to be an act of life, not an art pursued for art’s sake and an appropriation of mere abstractions, it must submit to be governed by this law of oneness of heart. “We pray before the crucifix," says Gratry — we must also work before the crucifix —"but the true cross is not isolated from the earth."

A true Christian will have ever before his eyes the image of this globe, on which the Cross is planted, on which needy men wander and suffer, all over which the redeeming Blood, in numberless streams, flows to meet them. The light that he has confers on him a priesthood; the light that he seeks to acquire supposes an implicit promise that he will share it. Every truth is practical; the most apparently abstract, the loftiest, is also the most practical. Every truth is life, direction, a way leading to the end of man. And therefore Jesus Christ made this unique assertion: "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life."

Work always then with the idea of some utilization, as the Gospel speaks. Listen to the murmur of the human race all about you; pick out certain individuals of certain groups whose need you know, find out what may bring them out of their night and ennoble them; what in any measure may save them. The only holy truths are redeeming truths; and was it not in view of our work as of everything else that the Apostle said: “This is the will of God, your sanctification?"

Jesus Christ needs our minds for His work, as on earth He needed His own human mind. He has gone, but we continue Him; we have that measureless honor. We are His members, therefore have a share in His spirit, are therefore His cooperators. He acts outwardly through us, and inwardly through the inspirations of His Spirit, as in His lifetime He acted outwardly by His voice, inwardly by His grace. Our work being a necessary part of that action, let us work as Jesus meditated — as He drew on the life-springs of the Father to pour them out on the world.

Ill

And then reflect that if all times are equal before God, if His eternity is a radiant center from which all points on the circumference of time are at an equal distance, it is not the same with the ages and with us, who dwell on the circumference. We are here at a given point on the mighty wheel, not elsewhere. If we are here, it is because God has placed us here. Every moment of duration concerns us, and every age is our neighbor, as well as every man; but the word "neighbor” is a relative word to which the wisdom of Providence attaches a precise meaning for each of us, and to which each of us, in submissive wisdom, must also attach a precise meaning.

Here I am, a man of the 20th century, living in a time of permanent drama, witnessing upheavals such as perhaps the globe never before saw since the mountains rose and the seas were driven into their caverns. What have I to do for this panting, palpitating century? More than ever before thought is waiting for men, and men for thought. The world is in danger for lack of life-giving maxims. We are in a train rushing ahead at top speed, no signals visible. The planet is going it knows not where, its law has failed it: who will give it back its sun?

All this is not intended to narrow down the field of intellectual research and to confine it to exclusively religious study. That will be evident. I have already said that every truth is practical, that every truth has a saving power. But I am indicating a spirit, and this spirit, both in general and because of what is opportune at the present time excludes mere dilettantism.

It also excludes a certain archaeological tendency, a love of the past which turns away from present suffering, an esteem for the past which seems not to recognize the universal presence of God. Every age is not as good as every other, but all ages are Christian ages, and there is one which for us, and in practice, surpasses them all: our own. In view of it are our inborn resources, our graces of today and tomorrow, and consequently the efforts that we must make in order to correspond with them.

Let us not be like those people who always seem to be pallbearers at the funeral of the past. Let us utilize, by living, the qualities of the dead. Truth is ever new. Like the grass of morning, moist with glistening dew, all the old virtues are waiting to spring up afresh. God does not grow old. We must help our God to renew, not the buried past and the chronicles of a vanished world, but the eternal face of the earth.

Such is the spirit of the Catholic intellectual, such is his vocation. The sooner he gives precision to this general idea by finding out what kind of study is right for him, the better.

Listen now to the virtues that God asks of him.

Chapter 2 - The Virtues of a Catholic Intellectual

I

I might say that virtue potentially contains intellectuality, for, since it leads to our end, which is intellectual, virtue is equivalent to the supreme knowledge.

One could draw many things from that, everything indeed; for this primacy of the moral order involves the relative dependence of truth, of beauty, of harmony, of unity, of being itself with regard to morality, which is thus related to the first principle of all things.

But I prefer to follow a humbler path.

The qualities of character have a preponderant role in everything. The intellect is only a tool; the handling of it determines the nature of its effects. Properly to regulate the intelligence, is it not evident that qualities quite different from intelligence itself are required? Instinctively, every right mind declares that superiority in any branch includes a measure of spiritual superiority. To judge truly, you must be great.

Would there not he something repellent in seeing a great discovery made by an unprincipled rascal? The unspoiled instinct of a simple man would be grievously hurt by it. There is something shocking in a dissociation which dislocates the harmony of the human being. One has no faith in jewel merchants who sell pearls and wear none. To be in dose contact with the great spring of all things without acquiring anything of its moral nature seems a paradox. To enjoy the faculty of intelligence, and to make of it an isolated force, a “bump," is, one suspects* a dangerous game; for every isolated force in a balanced whole becomes the victim of its surroundings.

If then character makes shipwreck, one must expect the sense of the great truths to suffer. The mind, being no longer held in check, no longer finding its level, will start down some dangerous incline, and one knows that a small error in the beginning becomes great in the end. The force of logic may send to a more precipitous fall the man whose faculty of discernment finds no safeguard in his soul. That is the cause of so many sensational lapses, and of so many blunders with a spark of genius in them, among masters who have lost the true direction of life.

Life is a unity: it would be very surprising if we could give fullest play to one of its functions while neglecting the other, or if to live our ideas should not help us to perceive them.

What is the source of this unity of life? Love. “Tell me what you love, I will tell you what you are." Love is the beginning of everything in us; and that starting point which is common to knowledge and practice cannot fail to make the right paths of both in a certain measure interdependent.

Truth visits those who love her, who surrender to her, and this love cannot be without virtue. For this reason, in spite of his possible defects, the man of genius at work is already virtuous; it would suffice for his holiness if he were more completely his true self.

The true springs up in the same soil as the good: their roots communicate. Broken from the common root and therefore less in contact with the soil, one or other suffers; the soul grows anemic or the mind wilts. On the contrary, by feeding the mind on truth one enlightens the conscience, by fostering good one guides knowledge.

By practicing the truth that we know, we merit the truth \ha\ we do not yet know^ We merit it in the sight of God; we merit it also with a merit which brings its own reward; for all truths Me linked together, and homage in act being the most decisive of all, when we pay that homage by living the truth of life, we draw near to the supreme light and to all that flows from it{i}. If I embark on the tributary, I reach the river, and then the sea.

Let us look a little more closely into this doctrine which is so important,— so important that simply to recall it would have made the writing of this little work worthwhile.

Is not virtue the health of the soul? And who will say that health does not affect the sight? Ask the oculist. An intelligent practitioner is not satisfied with measuring the curve of the crystalline lens and choosing glasses, he does not merely advise ointments and lotions; he is curious about your general health, your teeth, your regime, your internal organs. Do not be surprised if that specialist in a single organ even questions you about your moral conduct.

The sight of the spirit is no less exacting.

Do you believe that we think with the intelligence only? Are we merely a bundle of faculties among which for this or for that purpose we select the desired instrument? We think “with our whole soul,” declared Plato. Presently we shall go much farther, we shall say: with our whole being. Knowledge involves everything in us, from the vital principle to the chemical composition of the least cell. Mental disorders of every sort, states of delirium, hallucinations, asthenia and hypersthenia, inadaptation to reality of whatever kind, prove that it is not the mind alone that thinks, but the man.

How will you manage to think rightly with a sick soul, a heart ravaged by vice, pulled this way and that by passion, dragged astray by violent or guilty love? There is, Gratry said, a clear-sighted and a blind state of the soul; a sound and therefore sensible state, and a state of folly. "The exercise of the moral virtues/* St. Thomas of Aquin tells you in his turn, "of the virtues by which the passions are held in check, is of great importance for the acquisition of knowledge.”{ii}

Yes indeed! Think it out. On what, first and foremost, does all the effort of study depend? On attention, which delimits the field for research, concentrates on it, brings all our powers to bear on it; next, on judgment, which gathers up the fruit of investigation. Now, passions and vices relax attention, scatter it, lead it astray; and they injure the judgment in roundabout ways, of which Aristotle and many others after him have scrutinized the meanders.

All contemporary psychologists are in agreement here; the fact is plain to see, admitting of no doubt. The "psychology of the feelings” governs practice, but also, to a large extent, thought. Knowledge depends on the direction given to our passions and on our moral habits. To calm our passions is to awaken in ourselves the sense of the universal; to correct ourselves is to bring out the sense of the true.

Carry your analysis further. What are the enemies of knowledge? Plainly, lack of intelligence; therefore in discussing vices and virtues and their role in the pursuit of knowledge we presuppose persons who are equal in other respects. But stupidity apart, what enemies do you fear? What about sloth, the grave of the best gifts? What of sensuality, which makes the body weak and lethargic, befogs the imagination, dulls the intelligence, scatters the memory? Of pride, which sometimes dazzles and sometimes darkens, which so drives us in the direction of our own opinion that the universal sense may escape us? Of envy, which obstinately refuses to acknowledge some light other than our own? Of irritation which repels criticism and comes to grief on the rock of error?

Without these obstacles, a man of study will rise to heights greater or less according to his resources and his environment; but he will reach the level of his own gifts, of his own destiny.

We must notice that all the faults just mentioned bring one another more or less in their train; they intersect, they ramify, they are with regard to love of the good or contempt for the good what intersecting streamlets are to the spring. Purity of thought requires purity of soul; that is a general and undeniable truth. The neophyte of knowledge should let it sink deeply into his mind.

Let us rise higher, and speaking of springs, let us not forget the Supreme Spring. The surest metaphysic tells us that at the summit of things, the true and the good are not only connected, but are identical.

We must state for exactness' sake, that the good thus spoken of is not properly speaking moral good; desirable good is what is directly referred to; but a little circuit brings us back from the latter to the former.

Moral good is nothing else than desirable good measured by reason and set before the will as an end. Ends are related. They all depend on one ultimate end. It is this ultimate end which links up with the true and is one with it. Connect these propositions, and you will find that moral good, if not identical in every way with the true, still depends on it through the ends aimed at by the will. There is, therefore, between the two, a bond more or less loose or close, but unbreakable.

It is not by the individuality in us that we approach truth; it is in virtue of a participation in the universal. This universal, which is at one and the same time the true and the good, cannot be honored as the true — we cannot enter into intimate union with it, discover its traces, and yield ourselves to its mighty sway — unless we recognize and serve it equally as the good.

Climb up the Great Pyramid by those giant steps that so exactly represent the ascent of the true; if you go up by the northern edge, can you reach the summit without getting nearer and nearer to the southern edge? To keep away from it would be to stay on the low levels; to turn away from it would be to go sideways and downwards. Similarly the genius of the true tends of itself to join the good; if it diverges it is at the expense of its upward impulse towards the summits.

Blessed are the pure of heart, said the Lord, they shall see God. “Preserve purity of conscience," says St. Thomas to his student; “do not fail to imitate the conduct of the saints and of good men.” Responsiveness of the soul to the ineffable spring, its filial and loving dispositions, lay it open to receive light after light, and ever-increasing fervor and rectitude. Truth, when loved and realized as a life, shows itself to be a first principle; one's vision is according to what one is; one participates in truth by participating in the Spirit through whom it exists. Great personal intuitions, piercing lights, are in men of equal powers the consequence of moral progress, of detachment from self and from the usual commonplace things, of humility, simplicity, discipline of the senses and the imagination, of an eager impulse towards the great ends.

There is no question now of proving one's skill, of showing off the brilliance of one’s powers, as of a jewel; one desires to get into communion with the radiant center of light and life; one approaches this center in its unity, as it is; one adores it, and renounces what is opposed to it in order to be flooded with its glory. Is not all that something like the meaning of the famous words: “Great thoughts come from the heart"?{iii}

II

We see then that virtue in general is necessary for knowledge, and that the more moral rectitude we bring to study, the more fruitful the study is. Yet there is a virtue proper to the intellectual, and we must dwell on it here, although it will recur often in the course of these pages.

The virtue proper to the man of study is, clearly, studiousness. Do not jump to the conclusion that this is a naive statement: our masters in doctrine have included many things in that virtue and have distinguished from it many other things.{iv}

St. Thomas placed studiousness under the heading of the controlling virtue of temperance, to indicate that of itself, knowledge is no doubt always to be welcomed, but that our life is so ordered as to require us to temper, that is, to adapt to circumstances and to reconcile with other duties, a thirst for knowing that may easily run to excess.

When I say to excess, I mean in both directions. To the virtue of studiousness, two vices are opposed: negligence on the one hand, vain curiosity on the other. We shall not speak here of the former; if it is not hateful to the reader when he comes to close this little book, it will be because he has grown weary on the way, or because we have managed the journey very badly. It is not the same with curiosity. This fault can creep in under cover of our best instincts and vitiate them at the very moment that it pretends to satisfy them.

We have already referred to the ambitious ideas which pervert an intellectual vocation. Without going as far as that, ambition may injure studiousness, and hinder the usefulness of its results. An act of ambition apropos of knowledge ceases to be an act of the pursuit of knowledge, and he who indulges in it ceases to deserve the name of an intellectual.

Every other faulty purpose would call for the same verdict.

On the other hand, study, even when it is disinterested and right in itself, is not always opportune; if it is not, the person who then pursues knowledge forgets his duty as a man, and what is to be said of the intellectual who is not a man?

Other duties than study are human duties. Knowledge taken in an absolute sense is no doubt our supreme good, but the modicum of it that is granted to us here is often subordinated to other values which, in regard of merit, will be its equivalent

A country priest who devotes himself to his parishioners, a doctor who turns away from study to give help in urgent cases, a young man of good family who adopts a calling to help his people and in doing so has to turn his back on liberal studies, are not profaning the gift that is in them, they are paying homage to the True which is one and the same Being with the Good. If they acted otherwise, they would offend truth no less than virtue, since, indirectly, they would be setting living truth at variance with itself.

One sees many men avid for knowledge who do not hesitate to sacrifice to it their strictest duties. They are not men of study, they are dilettanti.

Or else they abandon the study demanded by their obligations and take up some other that flatters their inclination, and their loss of quality is the same.

Those who aim at what is beyond their powers, and thus run the risk of falling into error, who waste their real capacity in order to acquire some capacity that is illusory, are also men of curiosity in the olden sense. Two of St. Thomas’s sixteen precepts for study concern them: "Altiora te ne quaesieris, do not seek what is beyond your reach.” “Volo ut per rivulos, non statim, in mare eligas introire; I want you to decide to go to the sea by the streams, not directly.” Precious advice, which serves knowledge as well as virtue by giving balance to the man.

Do not overload the foundation, do not carry the building higher than the base permits, or build at all before the base is secure: otherwise the whole structure is likely to collapse.

What are you? What point have you reached? What intellectual substructure have you to offer? These are the things that must wisely determine your undertaking. “If you want to see things grow big, plant small,” say the foresters; and that is, in other words, St Thomas's advice. The wise man begins at the beginning and does not take a second step until he has made sure of the first. That is why self-taught men have so many weak points. They cannot, all by themselves, begin at the beginning. When they join a group already well on the road, they find themselves at a stage where other stages have already been passed, and there is no one to show them the approaches.