What do I love when I love you? Not the beauty of any body or the rhythm of time in its movement; not the radiance of light, so dear to our eyes; not the sweet melodies in the world of manifold sounds; not the perfume of flowers, ointments and spices; not manna and not honey; not the limbs so delightful to the body’s embrace: it is none of these things that I love when I love my God. And yet when I love my God I do indeed love a light and a sound and a perfume and a food and an embrace – a light and sound and perfume and food and embrace in my inward self. There my soul is flooded with a radiance which no space can contain; there a music sounds which time never bears away; there I smell a perfume which no wind disperses; there I taste a food that no surfeit embitters; there is an embrace which no satiety severs. It is this that I love when I love my God
And yet, when I love him, I do indeed love a certain kind of ligh, a voice, a fragrance, a food, an embrace; but this love takes place in my inner person, where my soul is bathed in light that is not bound by space; when it listens to sound that time never takes away; when it breathes in a fragrance which no breeze carries away; when it tastes food which no eating can diminish; when it clings to an embrace which is not broken when desire is fulfilled. This is what I love when
I love my God.
Confessions 10.6
H/T Byron. 10 points for the location of the picture
4 comments:
Oh dear, I see Byron has posted most of the same excerpt. Oh no.
Yeah, but it's ok, since I wasn't posting Augustine, but Moltmann quoting (and refuting) Augustine.
And you're on South Head looking west.
Close, but no donut.
And I grabbed the quote from "For all God's Worth."
North Head.
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