After we have excited a great many different pious affections by the multitude of considerations of which meditation is composed, we in the end gather together the virtue of all these affections, from which, by the pouring together and mixture of their forces, springs a certain quintessence of affection, and of affection more active and powerful than all the affections whence it proceeds, because, though it be but one, yet it contains the virtue and property of all the others, and is called contemplative affection.

 So it is an opinion amongst divines that the angels who are higher in glory have a knowledge of God and creatures much more simple than the inferior have, and that the species or ideas by which they see are more universal, so that what the less perfect angels see by various species and various regards, the more perfect see by fewer species and fewer acts of regard. And the great S. Augustine, followed by S. Thomas, says that in heaven we shall not have these vicissitudes, varieties, changes and returns of thoughts and cogitations, which come and go, from object to object and from one thing to another, but with one sole thought we shall be able to attend to the diversity of many things, and receive the knowledge of them. The further water runs from its source, the more does it divide itself, and waste its waters, unless it is kept in with a great care; and perfections separate and divide themselves according as they are more remote from God their source; but approaching near him they are united, until they are lost in the abyss of that sole sovereign perfection, which is the necessary unity and the better part, which Magdalen chose and which shall not be taken away from her.
 

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