1. O Lord and Creator of all good, thou art good not in this or that manner, or in this or that kind of goodness, but perfectly, without beginning or end, without limitation, and without degree, except that in which, without measure, thou preoccupiest and embracest all good.
Thou art the very fulness and universality of good; to thee all created things, from the highest essence down to bare primary matter, owe all their good that they have received.
In thy own most pure essence, thou possessest all excellence, all perfection, all happiness, and all good. Nor have thy goodness and perfection any limit or end, because they are first and primary, and dependent upon nothing.
2. From thee all that is sweet draws its sweetness; all that is beautiful its beauty; all that is bright its splendour; all that lives its life: all that feels its feeling; all that moves its strength; all that has understanding its intelligence; all that is perfect its perfection; all, in short, that is good, in any way whatever, derives from thee its goodness.
3. Thou art great without quantity, good without quality, infinite without number, beautiful without figure, eternal without time, immense without space, diffused without extension, perfect without multiplicity, most high without situation.
4. Thou art the centre of the universe, to which all things are borne by their natural weight, in which all repose, by which all are sustained; in thee are the charms of all love, the consummation of all desire, the bounds of all motion, the satisfaction of all appetite.
How great the power of this supreme goodness, by a. little ray of whose splendour all created things are so forcibly attracted! While all of them desire and labour with their whole strength, each for its own peculiar good; a good which yet is nothing else than a slight trace and token of thy goodness! It is this that attracts so powerfully every creature; this that stirs up so great movements in the world. For whatever created thing moves, and is actuated, and works, is moved and actuated by the aspect of good. If the mere shadow of good attracts with so much force, how much more the reality of that infinite beauty and
- ↑ Psal cxviii. 68.
