Proslogion: Chapter 25
PROSLOGION
nothing? In short, if there are many and great delights in delightful things, what kind and how great a delight is there in him who made those delightful things?
Chapter 25 What great goods there are for those who enjoy this good O those who enjoy this good: what will be theirs, and what will not be theirs!
Truly they will have everything they want and nothing they do not want.
There will be such goods of both body and soul that "neither eye has seen nor ear heard nor the human heart"41 conceived. So why are you wandering through many things, you insignificant mortal, seeking the goods of your soul and of your body? Love the one good, in which are all good things, and that is enough. Desire the simple good, which is the complete good, and that is enough.What do you love, O my flesh? What do you long for, O my soul? It is there; whatever you love, whatever you long for, it is there.
If it is beauty that delights you,"the righteous will shine like the sun."42 If it is swiftness, or strength, or the freedom of a body that nothing can withstand,
"they will be like the angels of God"43; for "it is sown an animal body, but it will rise a spiritual body,"44 with a power that is not from nature. If it is a long and healthy life, there is a healthy eternity and eternal health, for "the righteous will live for ever"45 and "the salvation of the righteous is from the Lord."46 If it is satisfaction,"they will be satisfied when the glory of God has appeared."47 If it is drunkenness, "they will be drunk with the abundance of the house"48 of God. If it is music, there the choirs of angels sing unceasingly to God. If it is some pleasure, not impure but pure, God "will give them to drink from the torrent of his pleasure."49 If it is wisdom, the very wisdom of God will show itself to them. If it is friendship, they will love God more than themselves and one another as themselves, and God will love them more than they do themselves; for they will love God and themselves and one another
41 1 Corinthians 2:9.
42 Matthew 13:43.
43 Matthew 22:30.
44 1 Corinthians 15:44.
45 Wisdom 5:16.
46 Psalm 37:39 (36:39). The word for 'salvation' (salus) is the same as the word for 'health'.
47 Psalm 17:13 (16:15).
48 Psalm 36:8 (35:9).
49 Ibid.
BASIC WRITINGS
through God, and God will love himself and them through himself. If it is concord, everyone will have but one will, for there will be no will among them but the will of God. If it is power, they will be omnipotent through their wills, just as God is through his. For just as God can do what he wills through himself, so they will be able to do what they will through God; for just as they will will only what God wills, so he will will whatever they will—and what he wills cannot fail to be. If it is wealth and honor, God will set his good and faithful servants over many things50; indeed, they will be called, and will truly be,"sons of God"51 and "gods."52 And where his Son is, there they too will be,
"heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ."53 If it is true security, they will be certain that they will never in any way lose this security—or rather, this good: just as they will be certain that they will never give it up of their own accord, and that the loving God will never take it away against their will from those who love him, and that nothing more powerful than God will separate them from God against their will.
What great joy is there where so great a good is present! O human heart, O needy heart, heart that has known troubles, that is indeed overwhelmed by troubles: how greatly would you rejoice if you abounded in all these things!
Ask your inmost self whether it can even comprehend its joy at such great happiness. And yet surely if someone else whom you loved in every respect as yourself had that same happiness, your joy would be doubled, for you would rejoice no less for him than for yourself. And if two or three or many more had that same happiness, you would rejoice as much for each of them as you would for yourself, if you loved each one as yourself. Therefore, in that perfect charity of countless happy angels and human beings, where no one will love anyone else less than he loves himself, each one will rejoice for each of the others just as he does for himself. If, then, the human heart will scarcely comprehend its own joy from so great a good, how will it be able to contain so many and such great joys? And indeed, since the more one loves someone, the more one rejoices in his good, it follows that, just as everyone in that perfect happiness will love God incomparably more than himself and all others with him,so everyone will rejoice inconceivably more in God's happiness than in his own, or in that of everyone else with him. But if they love God so much with "their whole heart, mind, and soul"54 that their whole heart, mind, and 50 Cf. Matthew 25:21, 23.
51 Matthew 5:9.
52 Psalm 82:6 (81:6); John 10:34.
53 Romans 8:17.
54 Matthew 22:37.