Therefore the first command which he gave us was this; Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with Thy whole heart.[1] And St. Paul says, that love is the fulfilling of the law: Love is the fulfilling of the law.[2] For "fulfilling" the Greek text has the "embracing of the law;"[3] love embraces the entire law.
Who, indeed, at the sight of a crucified God dying for our love can refuse to love him? Those thorns, those nails, that cross, those wounds, and that blood, call upon us, and irresistibly urge us, to love him who has loved us so much. One heart is too little wherewith to Jove this God so enamoured of us. In order to requite the love of Jesus Christ, it would require another God to die for his love. "Ah, why," exclaims St. Francis de Sales, "do we not throw ourselves on Jesus Christ, to die on the cross with him who was pleased to die there for the love of us?"[4] The Apostle clearly impresses on us that Jesus Christ died for us for this end, that we might no longer live for ourselves, but solely for that God who died for us: Christ died for all, that they also who lire may not now live to themselves, but unto Him who died for them.[5]
And the recommendation of Ecclesiasticus is here in point: Forget not the kindness of thy surety; for He hath given His life for thee.[6] Be not unmindful of him who has stood surety for thee; who, to satisfy for thy sins, was willing to pay off, by his death, the debt of punishment due from thee. Oh, how desirous is Jesus Christ that we should continually remember his Passion! and
- ↑ "Diliges Dominum Deum tuum ex toto corde tuo."—Deut. vi. 5.
- ↑ "Plenitude legis est dilectio."—Rom. xiii. 10.
- ↑ "Completio legis."
- ↑ Love of God, B. 7, ch. 8.
- ↑ "Pro omnibus mortuus est Christus, ut et qui vivunt, jam non sibi vivant, sed ei qui pro ipsis mortuus est."—2 Cor. v. 15.
- ↑ "Gratiam fidejussoris ne obliviscaris; dedit enim pro te animam suam."—Ecclus. xxix, 20.
