Moreover, the plain dogmatic teaching of the church, that man, as he is now born, is "saltem negative aversatus a Deo," "at least negatively averted from God," and absolutely incapable of even the first movement of the will to turn back to him without prevenient grace, cannot be explained on the theory we are opposing without resorting to the notion of a positive depravation of human nature by the fall, a notion completely irreconcilable with rational principles. If rational nature as such is borne by a certain impetus toward God as possessed in the beatific vision, it will spring toward him of itself and by its own intrinsic principles, as soon as he is extrinsically revealed to it, without grace. To say that it does so, is precisely the error of the Semipelagians which is condemned by the church. It is certain that it does not; and therefore we must explain its inability to do so, either with the Calvinists and Jansenists by maintaining that its intrinsic principles are totally perverted and depraved, or by maintaining that rational nature, as such, is determined by its intrinsic impetus to an inferior mode of apprehending and loving God as its last end, which is below the plane of the supernatural. This view accords fully with the teachings of the great mystic writers, who are the most profound of all philosophers and theologians. They all teach most distinctly, that when God leads a soul into a state of supernatural contemplation it has an almost unconquerable repugnance and reluctance to follow him, and is thrown into an obscure night, in which it undergoes untold struggles and sufferings before it can become fit for even that dim and imperfect light of contemplation which it is capable of receiving in this life. Why is it that the human soul turns toward the supernatural good only when excited, illuminated, and attracted by the grace of God, and even then with so much difficulty? Why does it so easily and of preference turn oh wait from it, unless it is, that it naturally seeks to attain its object by a mode more connatural to its own intrinsic and constitutive principles? The conclusion we draw is, that rational nature of itself is capable of attaining its proper perfection and felicity, without being elevated above its own order, by the mere explication of its rationality, and aspires no higher, but even prefers to remain where it is. The fact that it is in a state which in comparison with the state of elevation is merely inchoate existence, and is _in potentiâ_ to a state not realised _in actu_, does not show that its felicity or the good order of the universe requires it to be elevated any higher, unless it is elected as a subject of elevating grace. [Footnote 34]