✠ A TRIAD ON VIRTUE ✠

[Malins Welcome 742]

A TRIAD ON VIRTUE

 

 The Seven Canticles of the Scroll of Virtue, Personified.

 

PREFACE

 

To Holy Ser Armand-Philippe Talraen de Rennes,

Apostolic General and Shield of the Servants of GOD

 

Submitted for your approval is a thesis on virtue in three parts. The first, “The Mandates of GOD,” examines the commands of GOD contained in the Scroll of Virtue and asks if the whole life of Virtue can be expressed in these merely commands.

 

In the second part, “Fruit of Virtue,” your servant will set forth three important consequences of thinking of virtue as Godlikeness.

 

The third part, “Power and Virtue,” is dedicated to defending the proposition that power, the ability to affect change in some sphere, is a virtue and should be pursued alongside other virtues.

 

Your servant apologizes if the more polemical style in "Power and Virtue" is unsuitable for the purpose. She apologizes, also, for any error or oversight these works contained. She can only write within the confines of her knowledge, and hopes only that they are edifying to some portion of the faithful.

 

Yours,

C.S.B. 

 

BOOK I 

THE MANDATES OF GOD

 

 “And I am the Lord GOD without peer, 

and My order is the holy order,

and My law is the virtuous law, 

and all the blessings of the Virtue

shall serve the righteous king and servant alike.”

 

The Scroll of Virtue revealed to the Exalted Horen

 

If one set out to be as virtuous a person as possible, it may seem reasonable for them to turn to the Scroll of Virtue, write down all the commandments, and live rigidly by the list he produces as one would live by the Orenian Revised Code.

 

1. You shall not blaspheme My Word, nor any thing that is holy

2. You shall give your fellows the abundance of the spirit, which is My Word

3. You shall not desire the wealth of this world, nor the wealth of others, but the wealth of the spirit

4. And you shall take [worldly pleasures] carefully, and shall not become a creature of worldly indulgence

5. You shall not lie with your kin, nor those of other tribes, and none shall lie together but in holy union.

6. You shall not be idle, nor forget your duties in favor of sloth

7. You shall not raise a hand in wrath, nor in envy, nor in any kind of sin

8. You shall not envy the lives of others

9. You shall keep fast to your word and station, and aspire not to greatness among men, but to My glory.

10. You shall be without pretense or conceit

11.  You shall not judge your own virtue

 

There can be no doubt that, if he succeeds, such a man will have done well for himself. However, we must ask if his approach to a life of virtue is truly the one intended by GOD, if he is truly living out the fullness of virtue merely by observing this list.

 

Of important note is the character of these commandments are- besides the admonition to share the abundance of the spirit- very much like the legal codes of the nations in the respect that they are negative commands. They do not tell the faithful what to do, but what they are not to do. From this approach, one might get the impression that being virtuous mostly means the scrupulous avoidance of sin. Is this a correct characterization of our faith?

 

If we take as fact that the chief concern of “The Scroll of Virtue” is indeed virtue, we notice the oddity that relatively little about the Scroll are actual instructions for living. Each of the seven canticles is written with the same quinquepartite structure:

 

1. A repeated preface, beginning and ending with two assertions of GOD’S authority.

2. The recounting of an act of GOD creating and ordering the cosmos.

3. The recounting of a deed GOD has done for every person individually.

4. An admonition, a third assertion of divine authority, and a command.

5. A fourth assertion of GOD’s authority followed by His promise to the faithful.

 

Thus we see that the attention to GOD’s description of who He is and How he acts in the world fills the Scroll of Virtue, and the particular instruction to us arises only within and out of that context. Clearly, GOD did not deem a book-of-rules approach to virtue to be sufficient for His faithful.

 

Secondly, the book-of-rules conception of virtue would see virtue as a mere lack of sin. This cannot be. Can we say that there is a privation in GOD?  When the sun rises each day, do we say that it is merely without shadow? Indeed not, but we must say, with the scrolls, that the greatness of GOD is His fullness. 

 

It is our sin that is privation, sin is therefore not a weed to be plucked out or a gangrenous limb to be removed, but hole to be filled in, a missing arm to be restored. Crippled as misshapen as we are, how are we to begin repair when we know not what it is to be unbroken? This is why the Scroll of Virtue gives so much attention to the character of GOD, the only true model of virtue. Without this, our attempts to live virtuously would always err. We could only ever attempt to reform ourselves in our own image, and our sins would grow deeper as our work went on.

 

Therefore the explicit commands of the Scroll of Virtue are like a guide telling a traveler which paths to avoid. The advice must be heeded, but the true work of the journey is not avoiding wrong turns, which can be done without leaving the start, but by taking the long path to the destination, which is the likeness of GOD.

 

Said the blacksmith to the novice.

"See, I'm very careful taking the metal from the forge.

I warn you: do not touch iron until you know for certain

that it's cool, lest you burn yourself. Always be safe.

Now, look how I shape it."

 

BOOK II 

THE FRUIT OF VIRTUE

 

"The Lord GOD is the eternal GOD,
and He gives no exception to holiness."

 

The Heavenly Ascent

 

The fruit of virtue is resemblance to GOD. In one sense, one would be correct to say that Godlikeness is the only virtue, but it is useful for us to speak of different virtues for the purposes of identifying our shortfalls and overcoming them. A man who wishes to become strong will start by lifting light weights, and a drunkard could be helped by teaching himself the virtue of temperance in a far more direct way than if he tried to pursue Godlikeness as a single lump sum.

 

Furthermore, if one attempted to pursue Godlikeness directly, or rather, to only pursue those virtues that are present in GOD, he would fail to develop some virtues that, while not present in GOD, are nevertheless given to mankind by him so that mankind can better pursue Godlikeness. GOD has no need for any of them, but we creatures on the mortal plane could not hope to approach the seven skies if we did not have these and other divine ladders toward Godlikeness. 

 

These virtues are not lesser for not being present in GOD, just as an athlete’s victory is not diminished by his years of hard practice.

 

These are some of the mortal virtues that lead mankind to Godlikeness: faith, diligence, patience, obedience.

 

These are some of the immortal virtues that are themselves forms of Godlikeness: fidelity, wisdom, justice, mercy, charity, purity.

 

It is written in the Scrolls that “GOD has no part,” and “to divide holiness is to dismiss it.” To attempt to practice any virtue or virtues to the exclusion of any others will put a soul in great peril. This was the mistake of Krug, whose otherwise commendable war against the deceiver was waged without a love for GOD.

 

A man might have perfect diligence, another, total humility. A man may be eternally patient or charitable beyond measure. To these all, their great virtues will be counted as sin, unless they pursue Godlikeness in all ways possible to their path in life. Each virtue must be practiced in harmony with every other virtue.

 

Every aspect of GOD is a virtue. We can know this both because we know that there are no parts of GOD, and because we know that resemblance to GOD is the object of virtue. Therefore, GOD’s will, power and knowledge are identical, and all are ways in which the faithful should attempt to resemble Him. Knowledge therefore is an immortal virtue, and intelligence a mortal one. Men can be called virtuous inasmuch as their will resembles the will of GOD, and power is a virtue also.

 

There are some virtues that cannot be acquired by the choices of one who might wish to be virtuous, but are given by GOD as a part of each man’s station in life. It is, for example, a virtue to be intelligent, a virtue to be in a Canonist society, a virtue to be healthy, a virtue to be alive. GOD has not given these virtues in equal measure, but He who is perfect in justice will not demand much from whom He has given little.

 

Therefore, we must not falter, but pursue with our whole selves the wholeness of the virtue of GOD. May our only reward be the one true reward.

 

BOOK III

POWER AND VIRTUE

 

“And as I have ordered the estates of the earth,
so have I ordered your path as well,
and established the powers of My world.”

 

The Sovereign

 

Are we to pursue Godlikeness in all ways, or in some ways only? Is it not written that to divide holiness is to dismiss it? How then do we justify ourselves in cutting out a single aspect of the oneness of GOD and disposing of it as merely a profane distraction?

 

Shall we say that power should be left to GOD alone, as only He has perfect power? What else? Only GOD has perfect mercy, will that justify our cruelty? Will God’s perfect charity give us license to envy? GOD forbid.

 

All virtues can become a poison if a single virtue is omitted. So it is to forsake the pursuit of power, that is, the ability to enact one’s will in the world. Any other virtue that one attempts to cultivate without power will be thwarted, unable to find their proper expression exterior to their master’s mind. No virtue can grow in such a state, just as no child can reach proper maturity if prohibited from leaving their own house.

 

Why, in the Scroll of Virtue, is there more spoken of the power of GOD than any other aspect of His character? To intimidate us into obedience as if the faithful were petulant children? Fear, that antithesis of faith, that prized tool of the deceiver, has never inspired virtue in any soul. The Scroll meditates on power because power allows the other virtues to have effect.

 

Virtue is not content merely within itself. Were this not the case, there would have never been any creation, only GOD contemplating Himself, alone, for eternity. Even GOD, who is perfect wholeness itself, was not satisfied with Himself, but created the world to share His wealth of virtue through His infinite power. How then can we incomplete creatures attempt to bottle up virtue in our own interior lives?

 

How can a man with nothing exercise charity? Can an eunuch be chaste? Even the negative virtues require that you have the power to choose an alternative, else it is more virtuous than a stone. It is only when one has the power to rebel that loyalty is commended. GOD did not fill his theater of virtue with a race of worms.

 

It is said, foolishly, that “power corrupts”. So too can charity corrupt, and humility, and mercy. But there is no corruption in GOD. It is only pursuing power apart from any other virtue that can so darken the soul.

 

Those who say power corrupts have observed that many in positions of power are filled with corrupt, vicious men who have no interest in virtue. Their diagnosis reverses cause and effect. It is merely easier, in our sin-ridden world, to attain certain kinds of power if one is unconcerned about virtue. To such a person, the ability to affect the world is far more attractive, as, among other reasons, they do not have the next life to look forward to. Thus they flock to elections and titles and rank and wealth.

 

How much more urgent it is, then, that the virtuous attain power! There is work to be done, great deeds and small ones are waiting for a doer. Your place in the theater of virtue is vacant. Steel your soul, hone your body, fill your mind. It is the duty of the good to be strong.

[Guzr 2049]

Holy Sir Edwin whistles as he reads the triad, nodding. "Amen! Holy Sir Armand must be proud."

[LithiumSedai 4845]

"...Well, if this isn't one of the greatest theses written in the Order, maybe ever," commented Holy Sir Armand, eyeing the paper incredulously as if it were a Holy Scroll itself. He swiftly signed Catherine's credit form.

 

 

His Reverend Excellency, Armand-Philippe Talraen de Rennes

Apostle-General of the Supreme Order of Exalted Owyn

Custodian of the Faith and Sword of Exalted Owyn

Titular Bishop of Metz and Protector of Rennes