St. John of the Cross: Dark Night of the Soul

CHAPTER XIX Begins to explain the ten steps231231[The word translated ’step’ may also (and often more elegantly) be rendered ‘degree.’ The same word is kept, however, throughout the translation of this chapter except where noted below.] of the mystic ladder of Divine love, according to Saint Bernard and Saint Thomas. The first five are here treated. WE observe, then, that the steps of this ladder of love by which the soul mounts, one by one, to God, are ten. The first step of love causes the soul to languish, and this to its advantage. The Bride is speaking from this step of love when she says: ‘I adjure you, daughters of Jerusalem, that, if ye find my Beloved, ye tell Him that I am sick with love.’232232Canticles v, 8. This sickness, however, is not unto death, but for the glory of God, for in this sickness the soul swoons as to sin and as to all things that are not God, for the sake of God Himself, even as David testifies, saying: ‘My soul hath swooned away’233233Psalm cxlii, 7 [A.V., …