Ælfric

“ Some things it willeth, some things it willeth not; and every form of corporeal things it can shape within itself, and so shaped retain them in its mind. The soul's beauty consists in loving wisdom; not that earthly wisdom of which it is thus written, Sapientia hujus mundi stultitia est apud deum: 'The wisdom of this world is foolishness before God.' But this wisdom it should learn - to love God, and ever honour Him in all its works; to learn those things which please God, and forsake those things which are displeasing to Him. ”

“ Ego sum principium qui et loquor vobis: 'I who speak unto you am the beginning.' Now have ye heard how Jesus spake of Himself, that He is the Originator and Beginning of all things, together with His Heavenly Father and with the Holy Ghost. The Father is the Beginning, and the Son is the Beginning, and the Holy Ghost is the Beginning; they are not three Beginnings, but they all three are one Beginning, and One Almighty God, ever unbegun and unended. ”

“ The life of the body is the soul, and the life of the soul is God. If the soul leave the body, then the body dieth; and if God leave the soul because of very grievous sins, then dieth it in its better part, so that it is lost to the eternal life; but nevertheless it never cometh to an end in its eternal punishment. ”

“ This goodness, from which cometh to us every good thing, we must ever love, but the love of this goodness cannot exist except in the soul, and only that soul is nobly-born that loveth Him from whom it came, who created it such that it might have God's image and likeness in its understanding, and might be worthy of this thing, viz. that God should dwell in it. Philosophers say that the soul's nature is threefold : the first part in her is capable of desire, the second of anger, the third of reason. Two of these parts, beasts and cattle have in common with us, that is to say, desire and anger ”

“ That is, in English, 'I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the mind.' He singeth with the spirit who uttereth the words with his mouth and understandeth not the signification of their meaning; and he sings with the mind who understandeth the signification of their meaning. The soul is the mistress of the body, and governeth the five senses of the body, as out of a royal throne. ”

“ In this One God we must believe, and honour Him with our works, because all the holy books, both in the Old Law and in the New, speak indeed concerning the Holy Trinity and Very Unity. This One Creator knoweth all things, and seeth both that which hath been, and that which now is, and that which is to come; neither forgetteth He anything, nor may anything escape Him. Neither is He afraid of anything, because He hath none more powerful than Himself, nor even any equal to Him. He is ever bestowing, yet never loseth any part of Himself, neither is anything needful to Him. ”

“ Like as God Almighty excelleth all creatures, so excelleth the soul all created bodies by the dignity of its nature, and no bodily creature may be compared with it. We said before that the soul was without colour, because it is incorporeal. A body hath colour, and the soul will be adorned according as it hath merited on earth ”

“ Desire is given to man to desire that which profiteth him, both in things needful and for everlasting salvation; but if the desire be perverted, it begetteth Gluttony, and Lechery, and Avarice. Anger is given to the soul to the end that it may be angry against vice, and be subject to no sins, because that Christ said, “Whosoever committeth sins is the servant of sins.' If anger be turned to evil, then cometh therefrom Wrath and Sloth. Reason is given to the soul to direct and govern its own life and all its deeds ”

“ The creatures whom this one Creator created are manifold, and of various form, and move diversely. Some are invisible spirits without body, as are the angels in Heaven; some creep on the earth with their whole body as worms do; some go on two feet, some on four feet, some fly with wings, some swim in the waters, and yet all these are bowed down earthward, and thither is their desire, either because it pleaseth them or because they needs must; but man alone goeth upright, which signifieth that his thoughts should be more upward than downward, lest the mind be lower than the body ”

“ Wherefore every man is happy and blessed who is wise toward God, and if he order his deeds by the aid of wisdom. Concerning this spake blessed Job, 'Man's wisdom is righteousness, and his true knowledge is to depart from evil': Verily this is true wisdom, that a man desire the true life wherein he may live for ever with God in glory, if he merit it in this world. ”

“ These four virtues have one crown, that is, the true love of God and Man, because the soul is blessed that loveth the God who created it and its fellow-pilgrims, and [desireth] to do good to them to its utmost power. The soul is a rational spirit, which liveth for ever, and is capable of following either a good or an evil desire according to its own choice. The benevolent Creator letteth it have the command over its own choice ”

“ The sun which lighteth up the whole earth is God's creature, and we can understand that her light is from herself and not she from the light, and the heat proceedeth equally from the sun and from her light. ”

“ All these creatures have a beginning, and some also an end, as we before said, but the true Creator hath no beginning, because He is Himself the beginning, neither created nor made. He made all things and continueth from everlasting to everlasting; nothing could make Him, because nothing was before Him; and if He had been made, then could He never have been Almighty God. Again, if any witless man think that God made Himself, we ask him how He could have made Himself if He existed not before? ”

“ It is not our breath [spiritus] or our soul that we blow out and draw in, but air, in which all bodily things live, except only fishes that live in the waters. The soul is often so busy about one thing or one thought, that it heedeth not who may be near at hand, though it may be looking at him ”

“ So active is the soul, that even in sleep it resteth not; but when it thinketh of the city of Rome it cannot at the same time think of Jerusalem, neither when it is thinking about one thing can it at the same time think of another, but is busied with that one thing until that thought depart and another come. Verily God Almighty knoweth all things at the same time, and hath all things present to Him, and they are ever in His sight, and never unknown to Him, and this is that which is said, that God is, everywhere, all things ’ ”

“ Sometimes it sorroweth for its body's pains, sometimes it rejoiceth in good fortune ; sometimes it thinketh of things that it knew before; sometimes it desireth to know those things that it before knew not. ”

“ The Soul directeth these five senses according to its will, and it behoveth it that, as à mistress, it should carefully consider what it will command each limb to do, or what it permitteth to each limb as regards its natural desire, that nothing unseemly should befal by means of any limb's service. ”

“ It is invisible and incorporeal, without weight and without colour, clothed upon with the body, and dwelling in all the limbs. It cannot depart out of the body by its own power, nor return thither again except He who made it and sent it into the body should so will. ”