The Thomas Merton Center at Bellarmine University

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Author QuotedAnselmus of Canterbury
Title QuotedDe Casu Diaboli
Date (Year/Month/Day)1963/12/03
Imprint 
QuotationI finished De Casu Diaboli. If a first reading can be said to finish such a book. Must go through it again. Especially for the difference between real freedom and mere determination. Perhaps the devil's sin was after all merely to substitute (arbitrarily and out of his own will) one for the other. Freedom is God's. He wills us to share it by rectitudo-willing according to the principle that is in reality itself-but the devil willed to have it regardless of rectitudo and reality, by his own arbitrary fiat.
Quotation SourceDancing in the Water of Life: Seeking Peace in the Hermitage. The Journals of Thomas Merton, Volume 5, 1963-1965.; Edited by Robert E. Daggy. / San Francisco : Harper Collins. 1997, p. 42
Letter to 
Notes 
Link to Merton's Copy  

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