Remedies, continued.

Contemplation
The first objection is interesting - "he who adds knowledge also adds pain". The reply clears it up a bit - increases pain either on account of the difficulty, failing to discover the truth, or because what is found is contrary to the will. These are three very different scenarios - the first one is simply fatigued with not getting results, the second could be a real depression about hte impossibility of knowing the truth - defectum inveniendae veritatis - which could mean which I just said or could mean that one doesn't find the whole truth and thus the therapy wouldn't be something complete even if they thought it was - and the third is "contrary to the will" - you find out what you don't want to know. This last point he finds it necessary to say there is still "pleasure" on the part of the contemplation of the truth - even when we don't like the truth, we are so constituted that we cannot help but take pleasure in seeing it. Powerful indeed force of contemplation as a pleasure, even before you get to specific kinds of contemplation which he speaks about later.
2. Speculatiev intellect doesn't really move (aristotle). The reply - not of itself - but the contemplatio as a certain good of man is naturally delectable.
3. The remedy for sickness is applied to the ailing place - talks here about dolorem particularly (actually - dolor is the term in all three of the objections). Contemplating truth is in the intellect - pain is in the senses. (Contemplation is in a different genus than pain).
Sed - Augustine- it seemed to me that if the brightness on the truth would break over our minds, I would not sense any pain (dolorem) or at least hold it as nothing."
Reply -
pleasure consists the most (maxime) in contemplation of the truth. Now every pleasure mitigates pain - ergo contemplatio of the truth - and so much more perfectly as one is a lover (amator) of wisdom (sapientia).
And therefore men rejoice from the contemplation of divine and future beatitude in tribulation.
(Not just any old contemplation - e.g. 2+2= 4 is not going to help me walking on hot coals.)
I don't want to read too much into this, but it seems to me a big jump from "contemplation of truth" to "contemplation of divine and future beatitude". Surely the latter is a species of the first but a general contemplation wouldn't do the trick. And this kind of "contemplatio" regards something as future beatitude - which means that it would represent something as under a stronger affection than what is being undergone at present.

Cites James "consider everything a joy, brothers, when you fall into various temptations." Again - it is "considering joys" when you are tested.

"What's more" Aquinas says, "this joy can be found in a wracked (cruciatus) body - cites the martyr Tiburtius who said as he walked on burning coals, "I feel that I am walking on roses, in the name of Jesus Christ."

What from "if physical pain is intense, preventing one even from recalling what one knows" to the overflowing from contemplation to the body so that it may bear its sufferings lightly? What did I miss between "toothache" and "burning coals" that made the second so much more bearable than the first? I think it is about the affective quality of certain specific contemplations. I get this from the expositio of his statement about being a lover of the truth - maybe truth is something unitarian - and yet the way we come to know it is fragmentary. Come back to this or maybe I'm belaboring something very minor.

SLEEPING AND BATHING

38.4
1. affect body, but sorrow in soul.
2. these things hinder contemplation of truth, which is a remedy. Incompatible things don't have same effect.
3. Sorrow and pain insofar as they pertain to the body (sec. quod pertinent ad corpus) consist in a certain transmutation of the heart. (medieval physiology would be interesting). But these remedies seem to pertain more to the exterior senses and members rather than to the interior disposition of the heart. (signal that sorrow has already sunk to the immobilization or hyper-activity?)

Cites Augustine who heard that baths derived their name from the ability to drive away anxiety. And again "I slept and woke up and my pain was greatly diminished" - Ambrose's hymn - repose makes tired limbs ready for work again - comfors weary minds - drives away sorrow and anxiety.

His reply:
We have seen that sorrow (trist) of its species opposes the vital motion of the body. And therefore what reforms the corporal nature to its balanced (debitum) state of vital motion, opposes sadnss and mitigates it.
OPPOSES AND MITIGATES - the others were more about mitigating. Okay, forget my progessive intensity of the remedies. That is not the order. There is something fundamentally powerful about baths and sleep that works against sorrow - not only mitigates BUT OPPOSES ITS MOTION. This is like the physiotherapy part - where a person doesn't yet have the use of the muscles but somebody moves their arms and legs externally - by this practicing of the motion the muscles are prepared to act on their own. Not quite. but this helped.)

Okay - re-capping - contemplatio was REDUNDANCY - FRIENDS was PERCIPERE AMOREM - weeping was DISPERSION and APPROPRIATE OPERATION - pleasure was REST and RELIEF.

So the order - REST, DISTRACTION AND OPERATION, PERCEIVING LOVE, REDUNDANCY, THERAPY.
Is there a temporal order of therapy here? Maybe it can be read in the intensity thing - because as a sorrow is not getting healed it is become more intense because of the temporal factor. This is something that appears in Aquinas as well as me insisting - as is clear from when he speaks about Augustine and his friend. The temporal factor in a line of therapy could mean great or lesser intensifications. Are they all key elements of a therapy - not one to be taken alone in isolation?
There seems to be a progression, at least with the first four, of growing reflection. "any pleasure whatsoever" is precisely open-ended - it could mean a cupcake or sex or a pretty pebble or an act of charity or a funny commercial - but let's not get too complex - keep it at the cupcake or pretty pebble - or better "any pleasure whatsoever".

The second shows that the intention needs to be "dispersed" or removed or that a "fitting operation" is needed. Certainly a greater degree of fixation - of sorrow is present. A cupcake is not going to "disperse the attention" of someone weeping the loss of his friend although it would undeniably have some effect, it's not going to help like weeping and mourning. We talk about "mourning periods" - we don't talk about "mourning parties" although even at funerals we have parties - however more or less they resemble parties depends on your ethnic heritage : )

"Perceiving someone's love" which causes pleasure - a very specific kind of pleasure. Any kind of sorrow would be mitigated by this - but there are some that can only be significantly mitigated by something of this kind.

"Contemplation" - this is the first that depends on the character of the person - so much more perfectly as one is a lover of wisdom. Doesn't really depend - because it is presented as a natural desire - and it happens only more perfeclty as one is a lover of wisdom. But when you present it with the article on pain making it impossible to learn, and if intense even to recall the things that one knows - then it really make this seem contingent upon character although the natural possibility is there in everyone. The natural strength is presented in the answer to the first objection - where even truth that is contrary to our will is delightful insofar as it is a contmeplation of the truth. But still, can't forget the toothache and the particular kind of contemplation that is presented when he gives actual examples.

Now. Sleeping and bathing. I have to read my teacher's article on this. I read it a while ago and it was great but I need refreshing. but I like to read the original text first so that I have something to bring to reading his text. Subconsciously I probably remember things which will influence how I read this text, but that's okay. I am bad in that I have a bad conscious memory but a great subconscious memory - and my subconscious memory can be more inconvenient in academic things because you want to give credit where credit is due (and on the other side, not to claim they have a paternity when they are not the ones responsible for weird things that I have come up with that I conceive to be vaguely "inspired" by them) but it's hard when you don't remember which is which. Gee. I'm only realizing my fallibility and finitude as I really try to focus my intention. But I got to outgrow this bloggy way of proceeding and thinking which slows as much as it helps - this is my temporary crutch until I gain confidence and proficiency.

It seems that bathing and sleeping are in a category of their own. And my teacher must have pointed this out since he did an article on this thing alone. Certainly the "opposing" is a new addition .
Here it is about "reducing nature to the "owed" state which is itself the cause of pleasure. So bodily restoration causes pleasure.
And since every pleasure mitigates sorrow - corporal remedies mitigate sadness.

So bodily restoration is presented as a particular kind of pleasure and as such the reflexivity helps - where the body influences the soul - like in contemplation where the soul influences the body. one is a redundancy ex superiori ad inferiori, the other is a "dispositio corporis redundat quoddammodo ad cor". So there is a nice symmetry between these last two articles. Still - the middle article about the friends - i want to find a conceptual reason for its placement.

I would REALLY love to know more about medieval physiology and what the heart is. Seems to be the "heart" of passion.