CIUDAD to - the Catholic Kingdom!

666 CITY OF GOD
tating between my unworthiness and my desire of wis
dom. I stretched forth my hands and bewailed my
insipidity; I led on my heart and I encountered knowl
edge, and with knowledge I came into the possession of
peace; and when I encountered and loved it, I found it
a goodly possession and I was not confounded. The
sweet and strong force of wisdom wrought within me;
it manifested to me the most hidden things and the
knowledge most uncertain. I placed before my eyes
Thee, the beautiful image of the Divinity and Mystical
City of his habitation, in order that through the dark
some night of this mortal life Thou mightest be my guid
ing star, and light me as the Moon of the immense Light,
in order that I
might follow Thee as my Leader, love
Thee as a Mother, obey Thee as a Mistress, hear Thee
as my Teacher, and that I
might see myself as in an im
maculate mirror and reach highest perfection by having
before me thy ineffable example, virtues and works.
789. But who could ever have bent the divine Majesty
to so vile a slave, if not Thou, O powerful Queen, who
art the greatness of love, the vastness of clemency, the
source of mercy, the prodigy of grace, and who has filled
up the abysses of the guilt
of all the children of Adam ?
Thine, O lady, is the credit and the glory for all that I
have written, not only because it records thy most holy
and admirable life, but because Thou hast given it a
beginning, hast furthered it, and brought
it to a close;
and if Thou hadst not been its Author and Controller, it
could never have entered into the thoughts of man. Let
then all thanks and credit be thine ;
because Thou alone
canst give a worthy return to thy divine Son and our
Redeemer for this new and peerless blessing. That
Thou make such a return, I can only ask Thee in the
name of the whole Church and in my own name. And
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