Page:Complete ascetical works of St Alphonsus v6.djvu/300

298 Scriptures, that God loves whoever loves him: I love them that love Me. If any one loves me … My Father will love Him; and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him. He that abideth in charity abideth in God, and God in him. Behold the beautiful union which charity produces; it unites the soul to God. Moreover, love supplies strength to practise and to suffer everything for God: Love is strong as death. St. Augustine writes: "Nothing is so hard that cannot be subdued by the fire of love." Wherefore the saint says, that where we love, either the labor is not felt, or if felt, the labor itself is loved: "In that which is loved, either there is no labor, or the labor is loved."

Let us hear from St. John Chrysostom what are the effects of divine love in those souls in which it reigns: "When the love of God has taken possession of a soul, it produces an insatiable desire to work for the beloved; insomuch that however many and however vast the works which she does, and however prolonged the duration of her service, all seems nothing in her eyes, and she is afflicted at doing so little for God; and were it permitted her to die and consume herself for him, she would be most happy. Hence it is that she esteems herself an unprofitable servant in all that she does; because she is instructed by love to know what God deserves, and sees by this clear light all the defects of her actions, and finds in them motives for confusion and pain, well aware how mean is all that she can do for so great a Lord."