How wonderful your love for me, my God, my love! How wonderful your love for me, everywhere mindful of me, everywhere eager for the welfare of one who is needy and poor, protecting him both from the arrogance of men and from 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, always you are 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 in truth, let us invoke the Spirit of truth, let us call to him from the deep into which he has led us, because he leads us on the way by which we discover ourselves, and without him we can do nothing. Nor should we be afraid that he will disdain to come down to us, for the contrary is true: he is displeased if we attempt even the least thing without him. For he is not one who passes never to return, he leads us on from brightness to brightness because he is the Spirit of the Lord. Sometimes he fills us with rapture by communication of 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 stay always in the light, always walk as children of the light.
From Sermon 17 by Bernard of Clairvaux On the Song of Songs (CF 4, pp 131-132)
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