Page:Essays on Catholicism, Liberalism, and Socialism.djvu/306

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
302
ESSAY ON CATHOLICISM,

so as to become as a fool for Him, and this one is the true God, because in God is happiness, and to be happy is to love; it is to be enraptured and transported with love, and forever to remain in this ecstasy of bliss. Unless love call me, I cannot answer; but if the voice I hear is that of love, I at once reply, "Behold me;" and I will follow my beloved whithersoever he goeth, without asking him to what place he goeth, or whither he leadeth me. For wherever he goeth or taketh me, there we shall still be with our love, and our love and ourselves is our heaven.

It is thus that I would love, but I know that I cannot thus love, and that I can find no object to love me in this manner, and this is why in anguish and torment I forever move in a circle without end. Who shall break this circle wherein I perish? and who shall give me the wings of a dove, that I may fly away to beatific heights where I shall be at rest?

CHAPTER VIII.

Of the incarnation of the Son of God and the redemption of mankind.

In order to fully comprehend how universal order and human order are constituted, we have two problems to solve. God brought good out of the primitive prevarication, and in this way manifested two of his greatest perfections—his infinite justice and his infinite mercy. This however was not enough. That the order and harmony, which attest the presence of God in all his works, should reign in the works of creation, and especially in

This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.