From the book
Centuries of Meditations
Thomas Traherne · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordConsideration is sustained attention that examines a thing's nature, relations, and worth.
- In TraherneThe animal consumes an acorn without considering its relations; the angelic intelligence receives a world of joy within it.
- In this editionConsideration is not confined to weighing an impending decision.
- A place to beginConsidering the acorn’s sustaining relations distinguishes spiritual from merely bodily feeding.
Meaning
Consideration is sustained attention that examines a thing's nature, relations, and worth. It is often the act by which a familiar object becomes an intelligible and enjoyed good.
Use in the book
The animal consumes an acorn without considering its relations; the angelic intelligence receives a world of joy within it. Wine similarly supplies bodily moisture without thought, but considering its source in love transforms its enjoyment. The faculty does more than add learned information. It discerns the services that join an object to the giver and to other recipients. Inconsideration is accordingly a spiritual lid: the soul can close itself to the love shining upon it. The later claim that one soul would convince atheists rests on the same confidence in directed attention. What is near, invisible, or habitual may demand more consideration precisely because it has not been absent enough to attract notice.
Places to read
- I.26Considering the acorn’s sustaining relations distinguishes spiritual from merely bodily feeding.
- I.27Consideration of the giver’s love transforms the enjoyment of wine.
- IV.81The soul’s powers are proposed as an object whose consideration reveals divine action.
- IV.86Inconsideration is a lid that interrupts the return of received love.
In this edition
Consideration is not confined to weighing an impending decision. It is often a continuing contemplative recognition of gifts already possessed.
Source note
Primary text: I.26, I.27, IV.81, IV.86. The positive verbs in I.26–272 and the negative “inconsideration” in IV.86 establish the active-attention sense.