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Why do hounds, think you, Theotimus, more ordinarily
lose the scent or strain of their quarry in the
spring-time than at other times?
It is, as hunters and philosophers say, because
the grass and flowers are then in their vigour, so
that the variety of smells which they send out so
fills the hounds' sense of smelling that they can
neither take nor follow the scent of their game,
among so many scents which the earth exhales.
In sooth those souls that ever abound in desires,
designs and projects, never desire holy celestial
love as they ought, nor can perceive the delightful
strain and scent of the divine beloved, who is
compared to the roe, and to the little fawn of the
doe.(1)
Lilies have no season, but flower soon or late, as
they are deeper or less deep set in the ground: for
if they be thrust three fingers only into the earth
they will presently blossom, but if they be put six
or nine, they come up proportionately later. If the
heart that aims after Divine love be deeply engaged
in terrene and temporal affairs, it will bud late and
with difficulty; but if it have only so much to do
with the world as its condition requires, you shall
see it bloom timely in love, and send out a delicious
odour.
For this cause the Saints betook themselves to
deserts, that being freed from worldly cares they
might more ardently apply to heavenly love. For this
the spouse shut one of her eyes,(2) to the end that
she might keep the sight of the other alone more
fixedly, and thereby take better aim at the very
midst of her beloved's heart, which she desires to
wound with love. And for this same reason she keeps
her hair so plaited and gathered up in a tress that
she seems to have one only hair which she makes use
of as a chain, to bind and bear away her spouse's
heart, whom she makes a slave to her love.
They who desire for good and all to love God, shut
up their understanding from discoursing of worldly
things, to employ it more earnestly in the meditation
of divine things, and gather up all their pretensions
under the sole intention which they have of loving
only God. Whosoever desires something which he
desires not for God that much less desires God.
A religious man demanded of the Blessed Giles what
he could do most grateful to God; and he answered him
by singing: "One to one, one to one;" that is, one
only soul to one only God. So many desires and loves
in a heart are like many children at one breast, who,
as they cannot all suck at once, struggle each one
for his turn, so that at last the fount dries up. He
who aspires to heavenly love, must sedulously reserve
for it his leisure, his spirit and his affections.
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