THE TWENTY-FIRST CHAPTER.

A Prayer that we may perfectly follow and love Jesus.

O Jesus, my hope, life, nourishment and comfort, Thou light of my heart, joy of my soul, refreshment of my spirit, my health and my rest, what shall I render unto Thee for Thy numberless benefits, which Thou hast vouchsafed to bestow upon me, Thy most unworthy creature! How shall I be able to love Thee in return for Thine immense love, since it is so infinite and overflowing, that all my understanding and all the powers of my soul faint away for very wonder! How can I ever forget Thee in my heart? How can I ever love to labour, for aught save to repay Thee for Thy mighty love, and to satisfy it? For if I spend myself even a thousand times, what am I compared to 169my Lord? How ever can this marvellous work go out of my memory, that not only Thou, the Lord of lords, but also the Judge of all creatures, hast vouchsafed to become, as it were, the servant of servants, and a guilty and wicked man, and hast desired with the malefactors to be sentenced to a shameful death? Behold I, a wretched and vile sinner, condemned by my own conscience, desire in the eyes of men to appear just, and to have a zeal for virtue; and if aught of honour or praise is given me, if any, on that do I lean with satisfaction. Why is this, O loving Lord, except that I do not seek Thine honour and glory with all my strength, and all my power? But why do I not seek Thy glory, except that I do not love Thee with my whole heart? And why do I not love Thee as much as I ought, except that I still love myself, and have not as yet despised and denied myself? This is why I do not seek Thee, O my God, with my whole strength, but rather seek myself in many ways. This is why I do not walk in the holy footsteps of Thy lowliness, and patience, and obedience, and resignation. But, O most merciful God! have mercy on me, Thy most wretched creature, for I confess to Thee my weakness and perverseness. Help me, O Lord my God, to deny and destroy myself, and so to crucify my pleasure-loving nature, that 170I may resist sin even unto blood. I cannot do anything without the help of Thy grace. And although my love be not strong as death, so as to be able, like Thy holy martyrs, to suffer myself, by the death of my body, Thy shameful death, yet do Thou vouchsafe so to strengthen my spirit, that in part, and by degrees, I may pay my debt to Thee, which as a whole, and at once, I cannot pay; and that so much the more I may die to myself for Thy honour, in all things that please the senses, and offer obstacles to Thy love, as I am the less able to undergo the death of the Cross for Thy sake, as Thou hast done for me, and so many martyrs after Thee have done. And what other reason can there be, O loving God! that I am so frail, and useless, and unstable, and changeable, except that I do not love Thee, my God, with the whole strength of my heart? Help me, then, that I may love Thee exceedingly from my inmost heart. Inflame my heart with love of Thee, wound it with Thy love.

I confess, indeed, O gracious God, that Thou desirest to be loved by all men, nor dost Thou refuse Thy love to any man, who is fit and able to receive it. I know also, O sweet God, that to all my sins it must be ascribed, that Thy love hath grown cold within me. For my many faults come in between Thee and me, 171and are an obstacle to Thy love, so that it cannot have place in me, an4 accomplish its gracious work. For Thy Holy Spirit, Who is love itself, cannot dwell in a vessel that is unclean, nor in a body subject to sin. O Jesus, Thou Saviour Whom I cannot see, behold, I confess to Thee, that I am a vessel full of sin and uncleanness; but if Thou wilt Thou canst make me clean, for Thou art that Lamb without spot, Who ‘takest away all the-sins of the world, Who wast slain for our sins, crucified for our iniquities, and wounded that Thou mightest heal our wounds; and Thou hast shed Thy sacred Blood, to cleanse us from all stain of sin. Wherefore I pray Thee, O most loving Jesus, to wash away in Thy purest Blood whatever in me is displeasing to Thee, or can come between Thy naked love and my wretched soul. Oh! take the same, and uttterly consume and bring it to nothing in the abyss of Thy divine grace, that I may deserve, without anything coming between us, to be taken captive, and bound, and wounded, and swallowed up, and transformed by Thy love, so that the old man in me, which is all carnal and earthly, being crucified and dead, the new man may be raised by Thee, and born out of Thee; that new man, made according to Thine image, that knoweth not the things of earth, seeketh 172no fleshly pleasures, but standeth ever upright and ready before Thee Who made it; that new man, that is guiltless of this world’s evil and free therefrom; that new man, in a word, that may continually fix its inward gaze on Thee its Saviour, Whom it hopeth by Thy grace to see clearly in a blessed eternity, and in eternal blessedness face to face.