The life of sense answers to nature or the material body; the virtue that is founded upon free-will and reason, to the soul; the contemplative life, as the result of complete purification from sense, to the Nous or Sphere of Ideas; finally, to the One or Good, supreme in the scale of existence, corresponds the state of Love, or, in its highest form, _Ecstasy_.

This peculiar elevation is something far above the highest intellectual contemplation, and is not reached by thought.

It is not even a mere intuition of, but a real union or contact with, the Good.
To attain it, there must be a complete withdrawal into self from the external world, and then the subject must wait quietly till perchance the state comes on.

It is one of ineffable bliss, but, from the nature of man, transitory and rare.
SCHOLASTIC ETHICS.
ABAELARD (1079-1142) has a special treatise on the subject of Ethics, entitled _Scito te ipsum_.

As the name implies, it lays chief stress upon the Subjective element in morality, and, in this aspect, is considered to supply the idea that underlies a very large portion of modern ethical speculation.