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Secrets of the Art
Revealed
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3. most subtle
Three, this
Art is most subtle
My son,
"as humans are composed and constituted of sensual
nature and intellectual nature, some have subtlety of the
senses, others have intellectual subtlety (Lib. Contemp.
Vol. 2. cap. 215.) and others have both, as did the
philosophers of antiquity. And since the philosophers
treated of nature both universally and in particular,
they had subtle knowledge of things both sensual and
intellectual. (ibid.) To satisfy these three kinds of
persons, I provided an Art and Science to render the mind
as subtle and ingenious as possible, in sensual matters,
intellectual matters and matters both sensual and
intellectual. And so I composed the second volume of the
Book of Contemplation using the five sensual senses and
the five intellectual senses because these are
instruments with which the intellect can achieve both
sensual and intellectual subtlety. "And those who
seek first to have subtle knowledge of general things
from which they descend to specific sensual things cannot
achieve as much subtlety as those who begin with sensual
things and then rise to subtle knowledge of a general
nature (because an intellect that begins with
generalities must then descend to sensual things, whereas
an intellect that begins with sensual things rises aloft
to intellectual things) and thus the philosophers of
former times were deceived in many respects as compared
to the Teachers who treated of Philosophy and Theology in
a perfect and orderly way because they raised their
intellect from lower matters to make it subtle in matters
of a higher order. (ibid.)
And this is
why, in the Comment on the Demonstrative Art, I gave you
a prime, supremely universal rule for elevating your
intellect to great subtlety in its rise from the lowest
degree in the sensual matters of Philosophy, to the
loftiest degree in the intellectual subjects of Theology.
I taught the very same doctrine in the Book on the Ascent
and Descent of the Intellect. And since no one can
possibly ascend from the lowest to the highest degree of
Subtlety in the subtlest of Truths without a
perfect knowledge of the Transcendent Points (that I
discussed in the Book of Demonstrations, and expounded
clearly and at length in rule eight of Ars Inventiva),
heaven enlightened me and revealed the nature and use of
these Points that can also serve to detect any error in
demonstrations made with natural science by ancient and
modern philosophers who had no notion at all of these
points.
My son, the
supreme Point of all these Points is in Supernatural
Faith and Supernatural Reason. Now as the created human
intellect, being finite, cannot transcend finite being
and attain infinite Being through merely natural power,
infinite Being, through grace, wanted to give the
intellect an instrument for transcending its natural
confines so as to know the supernatural, infinite object,
wherein lies the final purpose for which it was primarily
created by God: and this is why in the Great Book of
Contemplation (Lib. Contempl.
Vol.3.Lib.4.Dist.36.cap.238. I placed the Tree of Faith
and Reason, and in Figure S, namely the Figure of the
Rational Soul, I placed the Red Quadrangle, which stands
for faith, and in Lib. Mirand. Demon.2. cap.27.fol.50. I
described what a Supernatural Demonstration is:
"whereas the Philosophers of old did not investigate
the truth with faith, but through reason alone, it
follows that their science, in their time, was not worth
as much as the science we have now; (Lib. Contempl. Vol.
3. Lib. 5. cap. 364.) because as the Philosophers of old
had a way and a means to be subtle through their
knowledge of the five universal generalities and the ten
predicates, in which all of philosophical subtlety
consists, likewise our Scientists and Teachers have a way
and a means to be subtle in Theology, because of their
faith and of their knowledge of the Soul's nature,
virtues and qualities. Lib. Contempl. Vol. 2. Lib. 3.
cap. 215.
Therefore,
my Son, you must learn my Art, and above all the topic of
the Transcendent Points and the way of making
supernatural Demonstrations; and learn this not through
mere speculation, but through experience and by following
what I taught in the abovementioned chapter of Lib. Mir.
Dem. and in the chapter following it, and you will know
without doubt that the said Art and Work are subtle in
the highest degree; "this Art and this Work were to
me a source of great sensual and intellectual toil and
peril, as a great weight injures and destroys the back of
a beast of burden, likewise, on account of its length and
subtlety and many new reasons, I sustained much sorrow,
toil and peril and bore many insults and much contempt
etc.; so that I often felt that I was about to perish in
this Book of Contemplation because of my great and
pitiful fragility and because of the protracted
continuation and great subtlety of this Work. (Lib.
Contempl. Vol. 3. Lib. 5. cap. 366. p. 4.)
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