ever, to be loved, but those only which are either united with
CHAP. XXm.] GOD ALONE TO BE LOVED FOR HIS OWN SAKE. 19 state as when his whole life is a .journey towards the tinclian.c^eable lifej^nd his affections are entirely fixed npon that. ! If, v however, he loves himself for his own sake, he does not look at himself in relation to God, but turns his mind in upon himself, and so is not occupied with anything that is unchangeable. And thus he does not enjoy hnnself at his best, because he is better when his mind is fully fixed upon, and his affections wrapped up in, the unchangeable good, than when he turns from that to enjoy even himself ' Wherefore if you ought not to love even yourself for your own sake, but for His in whom your love finds its most worthy object, no other man has a right to be angry if you love him too for God's sake. i^'Fov this is the law of love that has been laid down by Divine authority : " Thou shalt love thy neigh- '^ hour as thyself ;" but, "Thou shalt love God with all thy
so that heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind you are to concentrate all your thoughts, your whole life, and your whole intelligence upon Him from whom you derive all that you bring. / For when He says, " With all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind," He means that no part of our life is to be unoccupied, and to afford room, as it were, for tlie wish to enjoy some other object, but that whatever else may suggest itself to us as an object worthy of love is to be borne into the same channel in which the whole current of our affections flows. Whoever, then, loves his neighbour aright, ought to urge upon him that he too should love God with his whole heart, and soul, and mind. For in this way, loving his neighbour as himself, a man turns the whole current of his love both for himself and his neighbour into the channel of the love of God, which suffers no stream to be drawn off from itself by whose diversion its own volume would be diminished.
Chap, xxiii.—ITan needs no Injunction to love himself and his own hody.
22. Those things which are objects of use are not all, however, to be loved, but those only which are either united with us in a common relation to God, such as a man or an angel, or are so related to us as to need the goodness of God through
Matt. xxii. 37-39. Comx^are Lev. xix. 18, Deut. vi. 5.