Caput 19. Amoris fervens desiderium. Beneficiorum Dei recapitulatio.
Fervent Love for God
The soul declares its fervent love for God, who is sweeter than honey and brighter than light, and begs to be kindled by divine love so that it may love God alone, for God first loved us.
I love you, my God, and I long always to love you more, because you truly are sweeter than any honey, more nourishing than any milk, and brighter than any light. That is why you are dearer to me than all gold, silver, and precious stones. For everything I was doing in the world displeased me compared with your sweetness and the beauty of your house, which I have loved.✦1 O fire that always burns and is never extinguished, O love that always burns hot and never grows lukewarm, Charity, my God, kindle me.✦2 Kindle all of me, I say, so that I may love you alone with my whole self. For anyone who loves something along with you, but does not love it for your sake, loves you less. I will love you, Lord, because you first loved me (1 John✦ 4:10).✦
Recapitulation of God's Benefits
The soul reflects on God's countless gifts, from creation in God's image to daily nourishment and the service of all creatures, marveling at the signs of God's love.
And where am I to find words to explain the signs of your love, especially toward me, for your countless gifts by which you have raised me from the beginning? After the gift of creation—that is, when in the beginning you created me from nothing in your image, honoring and exalting me among the creatures you made, and ennobling me with the light of your face, with which you marked the lintel of my heart, setting me apart both from things without sense and from brute beasts that have senses, and made me a little less than the angels (Ps.✦✦✦3 8:6).✦ This was too little in your goodness's sight, because you continually nourished me with the daily, special, and greatest gifts of your kindnesses, and like your own little tender child you nursed me at the breasts of your consolation and strengthened me. For so that I might serve you wholly, you handed over into my service everything you made.✦
Read the original Latin
Amo te, Deus meus, magisque semper amare cupio, quia tu es revera omni melle dulcior, omni lacte nutribilior, et omni luce clarior. Idcirco super omne aurum et argentum et lapidem pretiosum es mihi charior. Displicebat enim mihi quidquid agebam in saeculo prae dulcedine tua, et decore domus tuae, quam dilexi. O ignis qui semper ardes et nunquam exstingueris, o amor qui semper ferves et nunquam tepescis, charitas Deus meus, accende me. Accende, inquam, totum me, ut totus diligam solum te. Minus enim te amat, qui tecum aliquid amat quod non propter te amat. Diligam te, Domine, quoniam tu prior dilexisti me (I Joan. IV, 10).
Et unde mihi verbum, ut explicem signa dilectionis tuae, maxime erga me, propter innumera beneficia tua, quibus a principio educasti me? Post beneficium nempe creationis, quando in principio de nihilo ad imaginem tuam creasti me, honorificans et exaltans me inter eas creaturas quas fecisti, et nobilitans lumine vultus tui, quo signasti superliminare cordis mei, quo ab insensibilibus pariter et sensibilibus brutis discrevisti me, et paulo minus ab angelis minuisti (Psal. VIII, 6). Parum hoc fuit ante conspectum bonitatis tuae, quoniam quotidianis et singularibus maximisque donariis tuorum beneficiorum me sine intermissione nutrivisti, et quasi filium tuum parvulum tenellum uberibus tuae consolationis lactasti et confortasti me. Ut enim tibi totus servirem, omnia quaecumque fecisti, in meum servitium tradidisti.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Ps.26.8;Ps.27.8 — LORD, I love the dwelling place of your house, and the place where your glory dwells. Ps.27.8 — My heart says of you, 'Seek my face.' Your face, LORD, I will seek.
- ↩1John.4.8 — The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
- ↩1John.4.10 — In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
- ↩1John.4.10 — In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
- ↩Ps.8.6 — You have made him a little lower than God, and crowned him with glory and honor.
- ↩Gen.1.1 — In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
- ↩Ps.4.7 — Many are saying, "Who will show us good?" Lift upon us the light of your face, O LORD.
- ↩Ps.8.6 — You have made him a little lower than God, and crowned him with glory and honor.
- ↩Ps.8.7-Ps.8.8 — You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet— Ps.8.8 — the flocks and the herds—all of them—and also the beasts of the field
Notes
- 1 ↩prae + ablative taken comparatively: worldly action lost its appeal in comparison with God's sweetness, not merely 'because of' it in a vague causal sense.
- 2 ↩charitas kept as Charity because God is addressed as the theological virtue itself, not as a generic feeling of love.
- 3 ↩superliminare cordis mei: rendered as "lintel of my heart," preserving the Passover-doorpost image of a threshold marked/sealed by God.
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