The Greatest Kindness, the Highest Perfection, and the Final Happiness

A summary of where we are so far -- and, come to think of it, where we will always be -- in our metacosmic peripatetics, AKA wondering in the bewilderness (the pneumaticons are mine, of course):

The truth of man [ʘ]and the truth of God [O] are inseparably one. Man will be in the truth of his existence when he has opened [o] his psyche to the truth of God; and the truth of God will become manifest in history [↓] when it has formed the psyche of man into receptivity for the unseen measure.

Notice that grace is already required in order to be receptive to the grace, or, as they say, even the seeking of God is already the finding. 

A little bit, anyway. The first discovery is the psyche, AKA "the sensorium of transcendence," an act Voegelin calls apperception (in contrast to perception, which is of the external world and its objects).

But many people just ignore apperception and its implications, which causes problems, and I mean big ones. We'll get to these, but let's proceed in an orderly fashion. The subject is tricksy enough without jumping around all over the place.

Which reminds me: at this point, why do you blog, anyway, Bob? Two reasons: for the verticalisthenics and gymgnostics, i.e., because it's a little difficult, and naturally I want to keep the mind limber. 

The second reason is a little embarrassing, but I'm just a helpful guy, and I like to pass along anything I find useful on this endless journey between immanence and transcendence. 

To paraphrase Captain Beefheart, where I found it, it didn't cost me a thing, so why not give it back? I'm no Aquinas, but as far as I know, he didn't charge outrageous prices for books and seminars, but rather, was motivated by this:

The greatest kindness one can render to any man consists in leading him from error to truth. 

So mother was right: I am a kind man. Supposing, of course, it is truth I am passing along. If it's not, then it follows that I am doing a great cruelty to my fellow man. Hence my caution in passing it along. 

Oh, I guess there's a third reason, in that some day, after I'm gone, my son will have complete access to my head, supposing he's interested -- so far almost 18 solid years worth of blogviating, for what it's worth. 

I like to think we've made a little progress since October 2005, even though we're right were we started, which is to say, right here in the sensorium of transcendence between O and (¶), just downloading it as it becomes unveilable. 

That quote by Thomas is from a little compilation by Josef Pieper called The Human Wisdom of St. Thomas, and let me extract a few more relevant nuggets of h. w. from its pages; this first is from Pieper's preface, which sounds very Voegelinian:

the boundary between order and mystery passes through this world itself.

Sure does. Not only is it as free as the air, but

The least insight that one can obtain into sublime things is more desirable than the most certain knowledge of lower things (Thomas).

Yes, it's priceless, for which reason we cannot imagine monetizing it!

The complete perfection of the universe demands that there should be created natures which return to God.

Which implies that the universe isn't actually a static noun, but rather, an active verb; it is "universing," so to speak, back to its own source and ground. I could say a lot more about this, or rather, brother Nicolás could, but let's stick with Thomas for now:

The lowest member of a higher class of beings is always found in contact with the highest member of a lower class.

Vertically speaking, this is a full employment cosmos, so, low class apes to the south of us, classy angels to the north, and

The Divine Wisdom joins the last of the higher kind with the first of the lower kind.

Thus the eternal question, Who, haloed be his gnome, loiters on the threshold of the transdimensional doorway, looking for handouts from Petey?

For

it comes to pass that the intellectual soul is said to be like the horizon or boundary line between corporeal and incorporeal substance...

What's it all about, after all is zed and punned?

the last end of the universe must necessarily be the good of the intellect. This, however, is truth. Hence truth must be the last end of the whole universe.

And the greatest kindness we can render is to lead someone to this truth. Which, BTW, is a Person, of course. Moreover, "The further a being is distant" from this Being, "the nearer it is to nothingness." So, Pricelessness at one end, Worthlessness at the other. The Last Word:

the final happiness of man consists in this -- that in his soul is reflected the order of the whole universe.

Is this happiness possible? Of course it's possible:

it is possible for the perfection of the whole universe to have its existence in one single being. 

I know of a single being in whom the perfection of the whole universe is reflected. Or at least my mind is open (o) to this fleshlight:

The intellectual light dwelling in us is nothing else than a kind of participated image of the uncreated light in which the eternal ideas are contained.

The same eternal Light that plunges an undying fire into its own shadow and falls in love with the productions of time. He expectorated a mirrorcle, now you're the spittin' image!

Perfect?!

Each single being is perfect in the measure in which it reaches up to its own origin.

And

The highest perfection of human life consists in the mind being open to God.... Hence the last end of the creature endowed with a spiritual intellect is to see God in his essence.

A perfect circle, no less:

The last end is the first principle of being.... when the first cause in which all else can be known is reached, the quest of spirit comes to an end.

You'll be the first to know when we get there. Meanwhile, back to Voegelin:

The soul orients itself toward a God who rests in his immovable transcendence; it reaches out to divine reality [↑], but does not meet an answering movement from beyond [↓].

Sad! 

 But we're in luck: "The experience of mutuality in the relation with God,"

of the grace that imposes a supernatural form on the nature of man, is the specific difference of Christian truth.

You can call this difference a breakthrough, a discovery, a differentiation, a grace, a lucky break, a vertical hand-out and hand-up, a great kindness, but whatever it is, 

The revelation of this grace in history, through the incarnation of the Logos in Christ, intelligibly fulfilled the adventitious movement of the spirit in the mystic philosophers....

The critical authority over the older truth of society that the soul had gained through its opening and its orientation toward the unseen measure was now confirmed through the revelation of the measure itself.  

Confirmed: God becomes man that man might become God(like). But whew, I'm out of breath -- not due to the exertion, but the altitude. Who can breathe up here if someone isn't re-suscitating and in-spiring us?