draw the affections of carnal men, who could only love carnally, to a salutary love of His flesh, and then on to a spiritual love."
Conversely, the Saviour's example teaches men how they should love Him:
"He loved sweetly, wisely, and bravely: sweetly, in that He put on flesh; wisely, in that He avoided fault; bravely, in that He bore death. Those, however, with whom He sojourned in the flesh, He did not love carnally, but in prudence of spirit. Learn then, Christian, from Christ how to love Christ."
Bernard shows how even the Apostles failed sometimes to love Him according to His perfect teaching and example:
"Good, indeed, is this carnal love," he concludes, "through which a carnal life is shut out; and the world is despised and conquered. This love progresses as it becomes rational, and perfected as it becomes spiritual."[1]
From his own experiences Bernard could have spoken much of the winning power of Jesus, and could have told how sweetly it drew him to love his Saviour's steps from Bethlehem to Calvary. The fifteenth sermon upon Canticles is on the healing power of Jesus' name.
"Dry is all food for the soul unless anointed with that oil. Whatever you write is not to my taste unless I read Jesus there. Your talk and disputation is nothing unless that name is rung. Jesus is honey in the mouth, melody in the ear, joy in the heart. He is medicine as well. Is any one troubled, let Jesus come into the heart and thence leap to the lips, and behold! at the rising of that bright name the clouds scatter and the air is again serene. If any one slips in crime, and then desponds amid the snares of death, will he not, invoking that name of life, regain the breath of life? In whom can hardness of heart, sloth, rancour, languishment stand before that name? In whom at its invocation will not the dried fount of tears burst forth more abundantly and sweetly? To what fearful trembler did the power of that name ever fail to bring back confidence? To what man struggling amid doubts did not the clear assurance of that name, invoked, shine forth? Who despairing in adversity lacked fortitude if that name sounded? These are the languors and sickness of the soul, and that the medicine. Nothing is as potent to restrain the attack of wrath, or quell the tumour of pride, or heal envy's wound, or put out the fire of lust, or temper avarice. When I name Jesus, I see before me a man meek and humble of heart, benignant, sober, chaste, pitying, holy, who heals
- ↑ Sermo xx. in Cantica.
