Page:The Power of the Spirit.djvu/95



90 list suggests that it is not so much love to God that is here meant, as a state of Charity, springing from love to God, dwelling in it, and extending itself to all living creatures. The heart is melted and the heart is on fire. The barriers of self are broken down, and we have an absorbing interest in, and an intense affection for, all that is outside self—supremely for God. The emotional aspects of love vary much, but sacrifice is the test of its reality: where a mother will die for her child, a man for his friend, a martyr for his faith, or a boy for his country, there at least is love, since there is death. Love is the nature of God, and his very Being, the explanation of his Person, the cause of creation, the key to all mysteries, and the test of all action. Love is the beginning, and love is the end, the source of all life, and the meaning of life. Love is energy, as love is the supreme personality, but love is before everything a condition; and we can only enter into it by loving our fellow men, for till we love the divine in them we cannot love the God whom we have not seen, but when we dwell in love, we dwell in God.

As for Joy, one could almost wish S. Paul had used Hermas's word—'hilarity', so much has common religious usage spoilt the 'immense elation' of real joy: long afterwards, indeed, S. Bernard told his monks to be &lsquo;semper Hilares, gaudentes in Domino&rsquo;. Joy has sometimes come to be a cant term from which the suggestion of cheerfulness has