The spiritual masters in every age are at agreement concerning the process by which the soul passes from a state of grace into a state of sin.They express it in various ways, and in varying degrees of elaboration, but when analysed it can be brought down to three steps given us by St. Gregory, Suggestion, Pleasure, Consent. Thomas a Kempis presents it somewhat more fully, and it is with his statement of the process that we purpose engaging ourselves.

First, he says, a bare thought comes to the mind; then a strong imagination; afterwards pleasure, and evil motion, and consent."

I. The Satanic Suggestion

First of all, then, the bare thought, simplex cogitatio, comes to the mind; or more literally runs upon (occurit), the mind.The word is full of action.The suggestion of evil does not drift into the mind in any merely accidental way.It is propelled from without by a strong, alert intelligence, none other than the Tempter, and under just the conditions and circumstances that his experience shows him are the most advantageous for his uses.A Kempis doubtless had here in mind St. Pauls thought, expressed to the Corinthians, There hath no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man"; the idea being that of the temptation laying hold of the soul as a warrior might take hold upon his adversary in battle.

He proposes the evil thing, not perhaps as a thing sinful in itself, for, as we have already seen, his experience has taught him that few souls, even of the most depraved, can be induced to accept evil for evil’s sake.He presents it sometimes under the guise of that which is positively good; or perhaps, with an assumption of great virtue, he acknowledges it to be wrong in itself, but seeks to persuade us that it would be right for us to make an exception of ourselves under the peculiar circumstances that are present.

It is necessary for us to study with care the subject of suggestion of sin, lest either through Satan’s wiles, or our own ignorance, we be deceived, to our soul’s hurt.It is at this point that we must understand the difference between temptation and sin.The failure to grasp this difference has been the cause of great distress to many faithful souls; it has been the root of fatal discouragement in numberless cases, and, in not a few, of downfall and final wreck.

The suggestion may often be the result of our past unfaithfulness.It is not always easy to trace the pedigree of a temptation, but in most cases it is highly likely that it is to be traced back to some failure of our own in the past.Men indulge themselves; they whet the imagination with evil thought and conversation and reading.They develop their passions by giving rein to them.By continued failure to resist, they go on in the same sin under many varying conditions, until a hundred commonplace, every-day happenings, entirely innocent in themselves, become charged with sinful suggestions, recalling the old sin whenever they occur.It is as though a commander should plant powerful batteries about his own fortress, preparing them to be used by the enemy.Thus learning from our past, we know how to guard ourselves for the future.Present faithfulness is the pledge, and the only pledge, of future security.

Or it may be that Satan, accustomed to success in leading us astray in certain things, is encouraged to suggest like evil to our minds again.However this may be, whether the suggestion arises from the evil bent that our minds have received through former yielding, or whether it be Satans device and unprovoked solicitation, there is no sin in the mere fact that evil is suggested to our minds, however persistently or strongly.

In any case it had its origin outside of us, and unless we have deliberately run into the occasion of sin, or in some culpable way invited it, we are in the immediate case not responsible for the suggestion.

Therefore, the suggestion can in no way be regarded as sin, for unless our wills have brought it about, or consciously encouraged it, our souls are unstained.Without the action of the will, no sin can enter the heart.What is done without, or against, our will, rather takes place in us, than is done by us."

“No risings, then, of any passion, yea, though it should rise again and again, against thee, and by rising weary thee, and almost wear thee out:no thought by night when thou hast not power over thy soul, and thy will is not conscious:no thoughts by day, which come to thee again and again, and besiege thee and torment thee, and would claim thee for their own:no distractions in prayer, even if they carry thee away, and thou lose thyself and awake, as it were, out of a dream, and thy prayer be gone, none of these things are thine.Nothing without thy will is thine, or will be imputed to thee.It is not the mere presence with thee of what thou hatest:it is not the recurrence, again and again, of what thou loathest, which will hurt thee:not even if it seems to come from thy inmost self, unless thy will consent to it."

II. The Response of the Natural Heart

Following upon the suggestion, a Kempis tells us there comes “a strong imagination.”The undisciplined soul does not instantly turn from the suggestion.It allows a vivid picture of it to attract and hold the attention.This may be quite involuntary, and, if so, is not in itself sin, but unless the attention be speedily withdrawn there follows the second stage of temptation, namely, Pleasure. Deletatio is the word a Kempis uses, which has the sense of a pleasure which entices one from the right way.

Here again, however, we must make the careful distinction between temptation and sin, if we would not be entangled in a fatal network of scruples.Though there may spring up in our hearts a distinct sense of delight at the thought of committing the sin suggested, yet in this delight itself there is no sin, unless the will enters in to confirm it.

This is not the kind of delight that St. Paul speaks of in his terrible condemnation of those who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness"; for if the will comes in promptly to resist the sense of delight, we are free from blame.The pleasure which often follows the suggestion of sin to a faithful soul, while definite, and perhaps even long continued, has its seat in our lower nature, in what spiritual writers call the “inferior will” of which we shall speak presently.So long as it does not capture the higher will, no sin has been committed.

A simple illustration will suffice to show what is here meant.One is walking with a companion on the street.Some one appears in sight who has recently wronged him.All the memory of the wrong surges up in the heart instantly, and there comes a sharp suggestion to say some unkind, revengeful thing.The heart responds to the suggestion, and it would be a real pleasure to speak this unloving thought.But, realizing the sin of it, we refrain; we even say to ourselves, “It would be an intense satisfaction to speak, nothing would give me so much pleasure; but I know it is not the will of God, and therefore nothing will induce me to do it.”

Here is the Satanic suggestion, followed by a definite sense of pleasure therein, and yet so met and disposed of that no sin, but rather the blessing of a victory, results.And this victory is more to God’s honour than it would have been had we rejected the temptation with disgust, having found no sort of pleasure in it.When we found pleasure in it, but refused it, there was a greater victory over self and Satan.

III. The “Inferior” and “Superior” Wills

The existence of the two operations of will in man is proved from Holy Scripture.St. Paul, writing to the Roman Christians, lifts the veil from his own spiritual experience and shows us how they operated in him.His experience we all recognize as our own.

“I find then a law,” he says, “that when I would do good” that is when I will to do good, “evil is present with me.For I delight in the law of God after the inner man, but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members."

It is well before going further to inquire what is this “inferior will” that manifests itself in the great Saints, as well as in us sinners, and in which this delight at the thought of sin is said to have its place.How is it to be distinguished from the higher will, which, while acknowledging the sense of pleasure, yet refuses to yield to it?And what relation have these two wills to the act of consent, which constitutes the sin?Let us find the answer to our question in one of the best of spiritual masters, the author of “The Spiritual Combat”:

Although we may be said in this combat to have within us two wills, the one of the reason, which is thence called reasonable and higher, the other of the senses, thence called sensual and lower, and commonly described by the words appetite, flesh, sense, and passion; yet as it is through the reason that we are men, we cannot truly be said to will anything which is willed by the senses, unless we are inclined thereto by the higher will.

“And herein does our spiritual conflict principally consist.The reasonable will being placed, as it were, midway between the Divine Will which is above it, and the inferior will or the will of the senses, which is beneath it, is continually warring against both, each seeking in turn to draw it, and bring it under obedience."

It is the inferior will that runs forward with delight to act upon Satan’s suggestion; it is the higher will that checks this precipitation and says, “I know it is not the will of God, and therefore nothing will induce me to do it.”This higher will is what is commonly meant when we speak of the human will being conformed to, or arrayed against, the Divine Will.It has to act before man becomes responsible.

It is this higher will that enjoys its freedom, and therefore constitutes in us a part of the divine image.There is no power that can compel it until, by its own free action, it yields itself to that power.God, reverencing His image, as He sees it in us, will not force a reluctant will to serve Him; and Satan cannot. Scupoli says again:

“God has, in truth, endowed our will with such freedom and such strength, that were all the senses, all the evil spirits, nay, the whole world itself, to arm and conspire against her, assaulting and oppressing her with all their might, she could still, in spite of them, will or not will, most freely all that she wills or wills not, and that how often soever, whensoever, howsoever, and to what end soever, best pleases her."

It is on these grounds that the “superior will” has been called the “Royal Faculty,” because like a king it sits enthroned over all other faculties, guiding and ruling them.No matter what dispositions we may have, they are inoperative until the will commands; and according as the will dictates, so is our whole life.We, and all that pertains to us, are good or bad according as the will operates for good or evil.

Let us understand clearly, however, what is meant by the freedom of the human will, lest we fall into error.As we have seen, the will is indeed free.Satan cannot force it; God will not.But this does not mean that the will is free to stand alone.It means simply that the will is free to choose.Man was made for service.It has been said that the dream of mankind has ever been of liberty, but the one practical question that faces us every moment from the cradle to the grave is, Whom shall I serve?Furthermore, there are but two alternatives of service, God or Satan.Man, from his very nature, cannot choose to serve himself.Brought down to its final analysis, all service is that of God or Satan, heaven or hell.

Nor is man and his life, so organized that the will can choose once for all, and have done with it.We may choose once for all, but that same choice must every day and hour be repeated and ratified, else it will not stand.

It is a thought that must give us pause, that in every waking moment of our lives, consciously or unconsciously, explicitly or implicitly, the will is choosing, and that each several choice is making for our eternal weal or our eternal woe; is gathering material for an immortal crown, or for our accusation and possible condemnation at the end.

Nor is it possible, as we have just seen, for the will to refrain from choosing.It is free to choose what it will, but choose it must.Some have thought it possible to stand neutral, but not so.“Not to choose is to choose amiss.”Not to choose the service of God is to choose the service of Satan.

The will, like our other faculties, does most readily that which it is accustomed to do.The law of habit holds good here as elsewhere, and habit is mostly acquired by the repeated performance of little acts.We do not ordinarily perform great deeds of love as a means of training; rather do we perform them because we are already trained.Some great act of love may confirm the will in its tendency Godward, but it is not in high and lofty things that we are to seek our training.Therefore in training the will so that it may acquire the habit of spontaneously choosing God in all things, it must be taught to acquiesce constantly in the little hourly leadings towards Him.If we make a habit of consenting to another person, after a time it is difficult to refuse consent.This holds equally good with the sweet and happy rule of the Holy Spirit when we have aligned our wills with His, and with the horrid slavery of hell when we have committed our wills to Satan.

In fitting the will for the great warfare, it must be taught little by little, in numberless minor things, to consent to God’s Will.So after a time the habit will be formed; God’s Voice will become the signal for prompt action, and the voice of Satan will be as the voice of a stranger whom the will, like the sheep in the parable, will not follow.

Surely then it will be worthy to be called the Royal Faculty, for as a king indeed will it reign, one with the Will of Him Who is the King of kings.

IV. The Fatal Consent

We see that there is no power that can compel the will, unless it be that the will has, by its own act, delivered itself to be bound by Satan.This brings us to the third stage Consent.The suggestion to evil may be strong, the pleasure that follows may be keen; and yet there is no sin until the will has yielded consent; until its denial, its hesitation, have been beaten down, and it has cried, “I yield.”

It is around this point that the conflict centres.The suggestion may count for nothing; it is often but a random shot that the enemy fires on the chance of striking a vital point, just as a besieging army sends rockets here and there into a city to try for the powder magazines." The pleasure that follows, great as it may be, is not in itself sinful, and may be the occasion of greater merit and grace to the soul that feels it and, instead of yielding, beats it down ruthlessly.But if Satan can induce the will to give consent, the deed is done, the evil has entered, and, in proportion to the seriousness of the matter, the divine love is quenched, and the power of the devil quickened and strengthened.

A distinction, too, must be made between deliberate and indeliberate consent.St. Francis de Sales refers to what he calls inclinations to sin, when the mind, not being thoroughly aroused, may amuse itself for some time with a thought or imagination, without reflecting that it is a temptation to sin.

Father Augustine Baker says likewise, The simple passing of such thoughts or imaginations in the mind is no sin at all, though they should rest there never so long without advertence, but only the giving of deliberate consent to them; and to constitute this deliberate consent he requires that the mind must be fully awake, that is, to the fact that these were of the nature of sin, and had reflected on them."

Our only hope lies in a stubborn refusal of consent.Our safety lies in fixing the will on this one thing.Never mind how fiercely the enemy may assault.He may deliver charge after charge with a rapidity that bewilders the soul, and makes it grow sick and dizzy.We may seem to be beaten down under his feet, and all the storms and billows of a fierce and terrible temptation may sweep over us, and yet so long as from the midst of the confusion we cry, I will it not, the soul is safe.

The refusal of consent should be instant upon the first consciousness of temptation.It is of great peril to dally even for a moment with the sinful suggestion.Not only does it encourage the tempter on the one hand, and weaken our powers of resistance on the other, but deliberate dallying with evil is a sin in itself.It means that an outpost has been surrendered, and even though in the end we reject the main suggestion, yet we have by no means come off unscathed.We are less capable of resisting the next attack than we were before; for the imagination of sin, the dallying with it, the indulgence of the senses, short of what the soul must own to itself to be a grave fall, steeps and drags the soul more thoroughly in sin, immerses it in a thicker and more blinding mist, interpenetrates more the whole moral texture of the soul with evil, than, at an earlier stage, does the actual sin itself."

It is not always, however, with confusion and noise of battle that Satan seeks to force our consent.Often the hardest temptations to endure are those in which he comes very gently, and with long continued pressure seeks to weary, and discourage, and break down the will.

It is a fatal error into which scrupulous souls are not infrequently led, to think that the long continuance of the suggestion, or even of the delight with which our lower nature responds, constitutes consent.The devils have a mysterious power, allowed them by God, of holding a temptation before the soul continuously or repeatedly, and we are often as powerless to put it away as we are to refuse to see an object which is actually reflected on the retina of the eye.

How many times have loving hearts that would choose death a thousand times rather than dishonour our Lord become sick with terror when in the midst of such prolonged temptation there comes a dread whisper within, “You have consented, though you knew it not.”It is the voice of the tempter, and the ruse is a favourite one in his warfare against the soul, for he knows that for us to think we have sinned is almost as fatal in its effects on the morale of the soul as to have actually yielded consent.

So when the lying whisper comes, let us cry out against him, charge him with his lie; and then turning swiftly to our Lord, renew our allegiance to Him with such strong, passionate acts of love, that the evil spirit, filled with despair, will take his flight, departing from us “for a season.”