Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume IV/Manichaean Controversy/On the Morals of the Catholic Church/Chapter 8

Chapter 8.—God is the Chief Good, Whom We are to Seek After with Supreme Affection.

13.&#160; Let us see how the Lord Himself in the gospel has taught us to live; how, too, Paul the apostle,—for the Manich&#230;ans dare not reject these Scriptures.&#160; Let us hear, O Christ, what chief end Thou dost prescribe to us; and that is evidently the chief end after which we are told to strive with supreme affection.&#160; "Thou shalt love," He says, "the Lord thy God."&#160; Tell me also, I pray Thee, what must be the measure of love; for I fear lest the desire enkindled in my heart should either exceed or come short in fervor.&#160; "With all thy heart," He says.&#160; Nor is that enough.&#160; "With all thy soul."&#160; Nor is it enough yet.&#160; "With all thy mind." &#160;What do you wish more?&#160; I might, perhaps, wish more if I could see the possibility of more.&#160; What does Paul say on this?&#160; "We know," he says, "that all things issue in good to them that love God."&#160; Let him, too, say what is the measure of love.&#160; "Who then," he says, "shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?" &#160; We have heard, then, what and how much we must love; this we must strive after, and to this we must refer all our plans.&#160; The perfection of all our good things and our perfect good is God.&#160; We must neither come short of this nor go beyond it:&#160; the one is dangerous, the other impossible.