LOVE RULES OVER ALL EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS; IT EVEN CONTROLS THE WILL ALTHOUGH THE WILL HAS POWER OVER LOVE
Love is the first satisfaction that we have in the good. I shall explain it presently. Surely it goes before desire. Indeed what do we desire except what we love? It comes before delight. How can we rejoice in the enjoyment of a thing if we do not love it? It comes before hope because we do not hope for the good that we do not love. It goes before hatred because we hate evil only because we love good. So evil is not evil except in so far as it is opposed to good. It is the same, Theotimus, concerning all other passions and emotions, for they all have the same source and root, namely love.
That is why, all other passions and emotions are good or bad, corrupt or virtuous, depending on whether the love from which they take their origin is good or bad. For love communicates its characteristics to them so that they appear to be the same love. St. Augustine reduces all passions and emotions to four as did Boethius, Cicero, Virgil and the majority of the great men of ancient times.
“Love", he says, “seeking to possess what it loves, is called concupiscence or desire. Love is called joy when it gets and possesses what it loves. It is called fear when it takes flight from what is opposed to it. If it becomes subject to fear and experiences it, it is called sorrow. Thus these passions are bad if the love is bad, good if the love is good. The citizens of the city of God fear, desire, feel sorrow, rejoice. Since their love is righteous, all these emotions are also righteous. The Christian teaching subjects reason to God so that he guides it and helps it. It subjects all these passions to reason so that it controls and regulates them in such a way that they are directed to the service ofjustice and virtue. An upright will is good love and a bad will is bad love". In brief, Theotimus, love controls the will to such an extent that it changes the whole will into such as it is itself.
A wife usually takes the rank of her husband. She becomes noble if he is noble, a queen if he is a king, a duchess if he is a duke. The will changes its quality according to the love it chooses, carnal if it is carnal, spiritual if it is spiritual. All the emotions of desire, joy, hope, fear, sorrow are like children born of the marriage of love with the will. So they receive their qualities from love. In short, Theotimus, the will is moved solely by emotions. Among them, love is the first mover and the first emotion. It sets in motion all the rest and causes all other movements of the soul.
From all these, it does not follow that the will has no power over love. The will loves only in so far as it wants to love. Among the many loves which present themselves to the will, it binds itself to the one which seems good to it. Otherwise, there would not be any love either forbidden or commanded. The will, therefore, is mistress of [all kinds of] loves just as a young lady is over the lovers who court her. Among them, she can choose whom she likes. However, after the marriage she loses her freedom and the mistress becomes subject to the authority of her husband. She remains taken over by the one whom she chose.
It is the same with the will which chooses a love according to its liking. Once it has accepted a love, it remains under its service. The wife remains subject to the husband she has chosen as long as he lives and if he dies, she regains her earlier freedom to remarry another. Similarly, as long as love lives in the will, it reigns there. The will remains subject to its impulses. If this love dies, soon after it can take another. But there is a freedom in the will which is not found in the married woman. The will can reject its love when it wishes. It does so by reflecting over the motives which cause dislike for such love and by taking a deliberate decision to change the object.
In this way, to make love of God live and reign within us, we renounce self-love. If we cannot annihilate it entirely, at least we weaken it to such an extent that if it lives in us, it does not rule over us any longer. On the contrary, we can abandon sacred love and attach ourselves to that of creatures. This is disgraceful adultery, with which the heavenly Spouse often reproaches sinners.