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ix Acknowledgments This book had its genesis some fifteen years ago as a dissertation for Fordham University on the doctrine of the transcendentals in Meister Eckhart and Thomas Aquinas. For his wisdom, insight, and patience in shepherding an often wandering graduate student, I thank my dissertation mentor, Fr. Joseph Koterski, S.J. I also have to thank Fr. W. Norris Clarke, S.J., now deceased, who read my dissertation with great interest and offered many corrections and clarifications, always with consummate gentleness! For the continuation of my book project, especially when it morphed into a comparative study of Christian and Islamic mystical thought, I have many people at La Salle University to thank, including Marc Moreau, the chair of the philosophy department, whose moral support, good humor, and letters of recommendation did much to win me time and resources to do my research, and Michael J. Kerlin, who, as the senior member of the department, took me under his wing when I first started teaching at La Salle in 2002. Since he passed away in November 2007 he has been sorely missed, but I shall never forget his kindness to a new and inexperienced colleague. I want to thank the Catholic University of America Press for seeing the potential for a book in a rough manuscript, in particular James Kruggel, Theresa Walker, and Elizabeth Benevides for bringing the manuscript to publication, and Ellen Coughlin for expert copyediting of an often unruly manuscript. I would like to thank the readers, Donald Duclow, David Burrell, and William Chittick, for so carefully reading the manuscript and offering many valuable suggestions. Don, in particular, has been a good friend and mentor x acknowledgments to me and, since we are neighbors, I have had the pleasure hearing his insights on Western mysticism over many a refreshing beer! Needless to say, however, all errors of either fact or interpretation are mine alone. Most important of all, I want to thank my family and especially my wife, Aurora. Not only have her skills as a librarian and an artist given me much needed help at crucial stages in the writing of this book, but her warmth, love, and companionship have been a real refuge from the often lonely work of a scholar. I must also thank my son, Aubin Anthony, who, although he may not be aware of it, has filled my life with indescribable joy. Finally, I want to thank my parents, Robert Aubin and Margaret Rose Puglisi Dobie. The selfless love, generous support, and quiet Catholic faith with which they nourished me as a child have made possible so much of what is good in my life as an adult. ...

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