My task this week was to read Cantos 7-12 of Book II of Faerie Queene, along with lines 1-28 of Cantos X. I also had to read St. Philemon the Abba of the Philokalia. One thing that struck me when reading is the theme of how virtue is a choice as much as it is a godly characteristic. While some virtues are more superior than others, they certainly require the whole person to have enough strength and integrity to uphold such virtues.
Said Guyon, See the mind of beastly man,
That hath so soone forgot the excellence
Of his creation, when he life began,
That now he chooseth, with vile difference
To be a beast, and lack intelligence
To whom the Palmer thus, The donghill kind
Delights in filth and foule incontinence:
Let Grille be Grille, and haue his hoggish mind,
But let vs hence depart, whilst wether series and wind.
(Spenser 382)
This passage, spoken by Sir Guyon, is one of the last images described in Book II of the poem. Having just destroyed the pleasure-seeking witch Acrasia’s Bower of Bliss, Sir Guyon and the Palmer head back to leave her island. Along the way, the Palmer sees a man who was turned into a wild beast by Acrasia’s enchantments, and so he restores the man to a state of humanity. But even after being made human again, the man continues to act like a wild beast. As Sir Guyon concludes, this man was not just an innocent victim of Acrasia, but in fact someone who willingly chose to live a debased life and to reject higher virtues in favor of low pleasures. This passage represents sin as something crude and less-than-human—more suitable to mindless beasts. Humans who choose to wallow in sin, according to the poem, are little better than wild animals. As they say, “humans are the great combination of angel and animal”. Ultimately, this passage suggests that despite Sir Guyon’s triumph over Acrasia, individuals still have to make their own choice to live virtuous lives. Indeed, those who make the wrong choices are in danger of wasting their lives. In the Philokalia, it says “Moreover a man who has renounced the world and has united with Christ, a man who abides in silence loves God, preserves His image and is enriched by His likeness; for God sends him from above the gift of the Spirit, and he becomes the house of God, instead of the abode of the demons, and offers righteous deeds to God. Thus the soul that is pure in its life, free from defilements of the flesh, and that harbours no filth or vice, becomes finally crowned with truth and shines with the beauty of the virtues” (Philokalia 413). Essentially, St. Philemon of Abba argues that God makes humans beautifully entwined with virtue and truth. However, in the beginning, it says “soul that is pure in its life”, meaning that humans must make an effort to sort out the higher virtues and low pleasures in life.
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