Guigues II le Chartreux
?-v. 1188 12th century
Praying out of a slowly read text, and letting reading turn into taste.
Who was Guigues II le Chartreux?
Almost nothing is known of him, except that he was the ninth prior of the Grande Chartreuse, from 1174 to 1180, and that he wrote a letter to a brother named Gervase. It runs to a few pages, and he can hardly have known what would become of it: copied for centuries under the name of Augustine, then under Bernard's, it travelled all through Europe without his own. His name was given back to him only in the twentieth century.
In their own words
Reading is the diligent study of the Scriptures with the whole attention of the mind. Meditation is the careful work of the understanding, searching out, led by its own reason, the knowledge of a hidden truth. Prayer is the heart's fervent reaching toward God, to put away evil and to obtain what is good. Contemplation is the lifting up of the mind, held suspended in God, tasting the joys of eternal sweetness.
Seek in reading, and you will find in meditating; knock in praying, and it will be opened to you in contemplating.
Reading brings solid food to the mouth, meditation chews it and breaks it up, prayer draws out its savour, contemplation is the sweetness itself, which gladdens and restores.