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And now let us consider what profit we shall have
from loving God.Even though our knowledge of this
is imperfect, still that is better than to ignore it
altogether. I have already said (when it was a
question of wherefore and in what manner God should
be loved) that there was a double reason
constraining us: His right and our advantage. Having
written as best I can, though unworthily, of God's
right to be loved. I have still to treat of the
recompense which that love brings.
For although God would be loved without respect
of reward, yet He wills not to leave love
unrewarded. True charity cannot be left destitute,
even though she is unselfish and seeketh not her own
(I Cor. 13.5). Love is an affection of the soul, not
a contract: it cannot rise from a mere agreement,
nor is it so to be gained. It is spontaneous in its
origin and impulse; and true love is its own
satisfaction. It has its reward; but that reward is
the object beloved.
For whatever you seem to love, if it is on
account of something else, what you do really love
is that something else, not the apparent object of
desire. St. Paul did not preach the Gospel that he
might earn his bread; he ate that he might be
strengthened for his ministry. What he loved was not
bread, but the Gospel. True love does not demand a
reward, but it deserves one. Surely no one offers to
pay for love; yet some recompense is due to one who
loves, and if his love endures he will doubtless
receive it.
On a lower plane of action, it is the reluctant,
not the eager, whom we urge by promises of reward.
Who would think of paying a man to do what he was
yearning to do already? For instance no one would
hire a hungry man to eat, or a thirsty man to drink,
or a mother to nurse her own child. Who would think
of bribing a farmer to dress his own vineyard, or to
dig about his orchard, or to rebuild his house? So,
all the more, one who loves God truly asks no other
recompense than God Himself; for if he should demand
anything else it would be the prize that he loved
and not God.
It is natural for a man to desire what he reckons
better than that which he has already, and be
satisfied with nothing which lacks that special
quality which he misses. Thus, if it is for her
beauty that he loves his wife, he will cast longing
eyes after a fairer woman. If he is clad in a rich
garment, he will covet a costlier one; and no matter
how rich he may be he will envy a man richer than
himself. Do we not see people every day, endowed
with vast estates, who keep on joining field to
field, dreaming of wider boundaries for their lands?
Those who dwell in palaces are ever adding house to
house, continually building up and tearing down,
remodeling and changing. Men in high places are
driven by insatiable ambition to clutch at still
greater prizes.
And nowhere is there any final satisfaction,
because nothing there can be defined as absolutely
the best or highest. But it is natural that nothing
should content a man's desires but the very best, as
he reckons it. Is it not, then, mad folly always to
be craving for things which can never quiet our
longings, much less satisfy them? No matter how many
such things one has, he is always lusting after what
he has not; never at peace, he sighs for new
possessions. Discontented, he spends himself in
fruitless toil, and finds only weariness in the
evanescent and unreal pleasures of the world. In his
greediness, he counts all that he has clutched as
nothing in comparison with what is beyond his grasp,
and loses all pleasure in his actual possessions by
longing after what he has not, yet covets.
No man can ever hope to own all things. Even the
little one does possess is got only with toil and is
held in fear; since each is certain to lose what he
hath when God's day, appointed though unrevealed,
shall come. But the perverted will struggles towards
the ultimate good by devious ways, yearning after
satisfaction, yet led astray by vanity and deceived
by wickedness. Ah, if you wish to attain to the
consummation of all desire, so that nothing
unfulfilled will be left, why weary yourself with
fruitless efforts, running hither and thither, only
to die long before the goal is reached?
It is so that these impious ones wander in a
circle, longing after something to gratify their
yearnings, yet madly rejecting that which alone can
bring them to their desired end, not by exhaustion
but by attainment. They wear themselves out in vain
travail, without reaching their blessed
consummation, because they delight in creatures, not
in the Creator. They want to traverse creation,
trying all things one by one, rather than think of
coming to Him who is Lord of all. And if their
utmost longing were realized, so that they should
have all the world for their own, yet without
possessing Him who is the Author of all being, then
the same law of their desires would make them
contemn what they had and restlessly seek Him whom
they still lacked, that is, God Himself.
Rest is in Him alone. Man knows no peace in the
world; but he has no disturbance when he is with
God. And so the soul says with confidence, 'Whom
have I in heaven but Thee; and there is none upon
earth that I desire in comparison of Thee. God is
the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.
It is good for me to hold me fast by God, to put my
trust in the Lord God' (Ps. 73.25ff). Even by this
way one would eventually come to God, if only he
might have time to test all lesser goods in turn.
But life is too short, strength too feeble, and
competitors too many, for that course to be
practicable. One could never reach the end, though
he were to weary himself with the long effort and
fruitless toil of testing everything that might seem
desirable. It would be far easier and better to make
the assay in imagination rather than in experiment.
For the mind is swifter in operation and keener in
discrimination than the bodily senses, to this very
purpose that it may go before the sensuous
affections so that they may cleave to nothing which
the mind has found worthless.
And so it is written, 'Prove all things: hold
fast that which is good' (I Thess. 5.21). Which is
to say that right judgment should prepare the way
for the heart. Otherwise we may not ascend into the
hill of the Lord nor rise up in His holy place (Ps.
24.3). We should have no profit in possessing a
rational mind if we were to follow the impulse of
the senses, like brute beasts, with no regard at all
to reason. Those whom reason does not guide in their
course may indeed run, but not in the appointed
race-track, neglecting the apostolic counsel, 'So
run that ye may obtain'. For how could they obtain
the prize who put that last of all in their endeavor
and run round after everything else first?
But as for the righteous man, it is not so with
him. He remembers the condemnation pronounced on the
multitude who wander after vanity, who travel the
broad way that leads to death (Matt. 7.13); and he
chooses the King's highway, turning aside neither to
the right hand nor to the left (Num. 20.17), even as
the prophet saith, 'The way of the just is
uprightness (Isa. 26.7). Warned by wholesome counsel
he shuns the perilous road, and heeds the direction
that shortens the search, forbidding covetousness
and commanding that he sell all that he hath and
give to the poor (Matt. 19.21).
Blessed, truly, are the poor, for theirs is the
Kingdom of Heaven (Matt. 5.3). They which run in a
race, run all, but distinction is made among the
racers. 'The Lord knoweth the way of the righteous:
and the way of the ungodly shall perish' (Ps. 1.6).
'A small thing that the righteous hath is better
than great riches of the ungodly' (Ps. 37.16). Even
as the Preacher saith, and the fool discovereth, 'He
that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with
silver' (Eccles. 5.10).
But Christ saith, 'Blessed are they which do
hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they
shall be filled' (Matt. 5.6). Righteousness is the
natural and essential food of the soul, which can no
more be satisfied by earthly treasures than the
hunger of the body can be satisfied by air. If you
should see a starving man standing with mouth open
to the wind, inhaling draughts of air as if in hope
of gratifying his hunger, you would think him
lunatic.
But it is no less foolish to imagine that the
soul can be satisfied with worldly things which only
inflate it without feeding it. What have spiritual
gifts to do with carnal appetites, or carnal with
spiritual? Praise the Lord, O my soul: who
satisfieth thy mouth with good things (Ps. 103.1ff).
He bestows bounty immeasurable; He provokes thee to
good, He preserves thee in goodness; He prevents, He
sustains, He fills thee. He moves thee to longing,
and it is He for whom thou longest.
I have said already that the motive for loving
God is God Himself. And I spoke truly, for He is as
well the efficient cause as the final object of our
love. He gives the occasion for love, He creates the
affection, He brings the desire to good effect. He
is such that love to Him is a natural due; and so
hope in Him is natural, since our present love would
be vain did we not hope to love Him perfectly some
day. Our love is prepared and rewarded by His.
He loves us first, out of His great tenderness;
then we are bound to repay Him with love; and we are
permitted to cherish exultant hopes in Him. 'He is
rich unto all that call upon Him' (Rom. 10.12), yet
He has no gift for them better than Himself. He
gives Himself as prize and reward: He is the
refreshment of holy soul, the ransom of those in
captivity. 'The Lord is good unto them that wait for
Him' (Lam. 3.25).
What will He be then to those who gain His
presence? But here is a paradox, that no one can
seek the Lord who has not already found Him. It is
Thy will, O God, to be found that Thou mayest be
sought, to be sought that Thou mayest the more truly
be found. But though Thou canst be sought and found,
Thou canst not be forestalled. For if we say, 'Early
shall my prayer come before Thee' (Ps. 88.13), yet
doubtless all prayer would be lukewarm unless it was
animated by Thine inspiration.
We have spoken of the consummation of love
towards God: now to consider whence such love
begins. |