"Jesu nostra Redemptio
Amor et Desiderium!
Deus Creator omnium,
Homo in fine temporum!"
II
Is this division of Life into the Active and the Contemplative a
sufficient one?
These two kinds of life are signified by the two wives of Jacob--namely,
the active life by Lia, the contemplative by Rachel. They are also
signified by those two women who afforded hospitality to the Lord: the
contemplative, namely, by Mary, the active by Martha, as S. Gregory
says.[302] But if there were more than two kinds of life, these
significations would not be fitting.
As we have said above, the division in question concerns human life
regarded as intellectual. And the intellect itself is divided into the
contemplative and the active, for the aim of intellectual knowledge is
either the actual knowledge of the truth--and this belongs to the
contemplative intellect, or it is some external action--and this
concerns the practical or active intellect. Hence life is quite
sufficiently divided into the active and the contemplative.
But some argue that this division is not a sufficient one, thus:
1. The Philosopher[303] says that there are three specially excellent
kinds of life: the pleasurable, the civil--which seems to be identified
with the active--and the contemplative.
But the pleasurable life makes its end consist in the pleasures
of that body which we have in common with the brute creation.
Hence, as the Philosopher says in the same place, this is a
bestial life. Consequently it is not comprised in our division
of life into the active and the contemplative.
2. Again, S. Augustine[304] speaks of three different kinds of life: the
life of leisure, which is referred to the contemplative; the busy life,
which is referred to the active life; and he adds a third composed of
these two.
But things which hold a middle course are compounded of the
extremes, and hence are virtually contained in them, as the
tepid in the hot and the cold, the pallid in the white and the
black. And similarly, under the active and the contemplative
lives is comprised that kind of life which is compounded of them
both. But just as in every mixture one of the simple elements
predominates, so in this mixed kind of life now the
contemplative, now the active predominates.
3. Lastly, men's lives are diversified according to their various
occupations. But there are more than two classes of human occupations.
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