MY BELOVED IS MINE AND I AM HIS: SELF-KNOWLEDGE IN THE ...

warning and why should it compel her to return to herself? Bernard’s readers will have
their answer if they consider from where and to where the Bride must go forth: “From
where to where if not from the spirit to the flesh, from the goods of the soul to worldly
desires, from the interior rest of the mind to the noise of the world and the restlessness of
exterior cares?” 96 The Bride, Bernard explains, has been taught by her Beloved and
received from him the grace “to enter into herself and to seek the presence of God in her
inmost depths, to seek his face always, for God is spirit and those who seek him ought to
walk in the Spirit and not in the flesh.” 97 She has learned from her experience of
contemplation that she is a rational and spiritual creature capable of withdrawing her
attention from the sensible world and into her heart where she may seek her
Bridegroom’s presence and in seeking him find, even in this life, some measure of rest
for her ardent longing.
Having once experienced the sweetness and peace that accompanies this
recollection and contemplation, Bernard continues, she fears nothing more than to have to
abandon this interior rest and “go forth once more to the enticements, or rather the vexing
demands, of the flesh and the insatiable curiosity of her bodily senses.” 98 For the Bride
knows by experience that the sensible, created goods her senses seek and her flesh desires
can never satisfy her deepest yearnings. However appealing they may appear to her eyes
96 SC 35.1 (I, 249): “Unde enim, quo putas, nisi de spiritu ad carnem, de bonis animi ad saecularia
desideria, de interna requie mentis ad mundi strepitum et inquietudinem curarum exteriorum.”
97 SC 35.1 (I, 249): “Quae enim anima semel a Domino didicit et accepit intrare ad seipsam, et in
intimis suis Dei praesentiam suspirare, et quaerere faciem eius semper, - spiritus est enim Deus, et qui
requirunt eum oportet eos in spiritu ambulare, et non in carne, ut secundum carnem vivant.”
98 SC 35.1 (I, 249): “Nihil est quod in tantum formidet quisquis hoc beneficium semel accepit,
quam ne gratia derelictus, necesse habeat denuo egredi ad carnis consolationes, immo desolationes, rursum
que carnalium sensuum sustinere tumultus.”
58