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Id quod eo fecimus studiosius, quod plane perspectum, probeque cognitum habeamus, nostros omnes, qui bona cum gratia nostra, nostrarumque literarum commendatione, istuc, sub vestro imperio negotiaturi veniunt, pari, cum vestrae Maiestatis fauore, tum vestrorum subditorum humanitate, vbiuis acceptos esse.
For, as I have often remarked, a final cause does not impel a man by being real, but by being known; causa finalis non movet secundum suum esse reale, sed secundum esse cognitum. Whatever he failed to recognise or understand the first time could have no influence upon his will; just as an electric current stops when some isolating body hinders the action of the conductor.
Reversing the terms of the adage nihil volitum quin præcognitum, I have told you that nihil cognitum quin prævolitum, that we know nothing save what we have first, in one way or another, desired; and it may even be added that we can know nothing well save what we love, save what we pity.
Now consider St. Carlo’s direction, as quoted above: “Id omnino studebit, ut quod in concione dicturus est, antea bene cognitum habeat.” Now a parish priest has neither time nor occasion for any but elementary and ordinary topics; and any such subject he has habitually made his own, “cognitum habet,” already; but when the matter is of a more select and occasional character, as in the case of a University Sermon, then the preacher has to study it well and thoroughly, and master it beforehand.
Nevertheless, neither is faith transmissible or rational, nor is reason vital. The will and the intelligence have need of one another, and the reverse of that old aphorism, nihil volitum quin præcognitum, nothing is willed but what is previously known, is not so paradoxical as at first sight it may appear nihil cognitum quin prævolitum, nothing is known but what is previously willed.
Charles’s direction: “Id omnino studebit, ut quod in concione dicturus est antea bene cognitum habeat.” Nay, is it not expressly conveyed in the Scripture phrase of “preaching the word”? for what is meant by “the word” but a proposition addressed to the intellect? nor will a preacher’s earnestness show itself in anything more unequivocally than in his rejecting, whatever be the temptation to admit it, every remark, however original, every period, however eloquent, which does not in some way or other tend to bring out this one distinct proposition which he has chosen.
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