How wonderful, my God, my love, is your love for me! How wonderful your love for me–everywhere mindful of me, everywhere eager for the welfare of whoever is needy and poor, protecting him both from human arrogance and the might of evil spirits. Both in heaven and on earth, O Lord, you accuse my accusers; you attack my attackers. Everywhere you bring help, you are ever close to my right hand lest I be disturbed.
Let us return now to ourselves; let us examine our paths. And in order to accomplish this truth, let us invoke the Spirit of truth. Let us call to him from the deep into which he had led us because he leads us on the way by which we discover ourselves–without him we can do nothing. Nor should we be afraid that he will disdain to descend to us for the contrary is true: he is displeased if we attempt even the least thing without him. For he is not one passes never to return but he leads us from brightness to brightness because he is the Spirit of the Lord. Sometimes he fills us with rapture by communicating his light; sometimes he adapts himself to our weakness and sends beams of light into the dark about us. But whether we are raised above ourselves or left with ourselves, let us always stay in the light, always walk as children of the light.
Bernard of Clairvaux, Sermon 17 on the Song of Songs