GRATIFYING LOVE MAKES US LIKE LITTLE CHILDREN AT THE BOSOM OF OUR LORD
O God, how happy is the human spirit which rejoices in knowing and realizing that God is God. His goodness is an infinite goodness. For this heavenly Spouse through the door of gratifying love enters into us, sups with us and we with him (Rev 3: 20). We feed on his loving kindness by the delight we take in it. We satisfy our heart with divine perfections by the delight we take in them. This meal is a supper because of the rest which follows it. Gratifying love makes us gently rest in the sweetness of the good which delights us. We nourish our heart with it, For, as you know, Theotimus, the heart nourishes itself with the things in which it is pleased. Hence, in our French language, we say that one feeds on honour, another on riches. In the same vein, the wise man had said,... the mouths offools feed on folly (Prov 15:14). The supreme wisdom declares, his meat, that is to say his pleasure, is nothing else than to do the will of his Father (Jn 4: 34). The maxim of the physicians is true: What is tasty nourishes, and that of the philosophers: what is pleasing is sustaining.
Let my beloved come into his garden, says the sacred spouse, and let him eat there the fruit of his apple trees (Song 5:1). Now, the divine Spouse comes into his garden when he comes to the devout soul. For he is delighted to be with the children of men (Prov 8:31). Where can he dwell better than in the region of the spirit which he made in his own image and likeness? In this garden, he himself plants gratifying love which we have in his goodness. We nourish ourselves with it. So also, his goodness is pleased and delighted in our gratifying love. Thus our gratifying love increases anew as we realize that God is pleased with us as he sees us delighting in him. Thus these reciprocal joys make love an unparalleled, unrivalled, incomparable gratifying love. By it, our spirit becomes the garden of its Spouse. It has from his goodness the apple trees of his delight. So it offers him their fruit since he is pleased with the gratifying love which it has in him. Thus we draw the heart of God within our heart. There he pours out his precious balm (Song 1:3). Thus what the sacred spouse said with so much delight is practised: The king has brought me into his chambers. We will exult and rejoice in you; we will extol your love more than wine; rightly do they love you (Song 1:4). For, I pray you, Theotimus, what are the chambers of this King of love if not his bosom which abound in a variety of loving kindness and sweetness? The breast and the bosom of the mother are the chambers or treasures for the little child. It has no other riches than them. They are more precious to it than gold and topaz (Ps 119:127), more lovable than the rest of the world.
The human spirit, then, contemplates the infinite treasures of the divine perfections of its Beloved. It considers itself immensely happy and rich. It is all the more so because love makes its own all the good and contentment of this dear Spouse through delight [gratifying love]. It is exactly the same way as a baby making little movements at the breasts[1] of its mother. It dances with joy on seeing them uncovered. So also, the mother gives them to the baby with a love that is always a little eager.
In the same way, the devout soul experiences thrills and unparalleled enthusiasm of joy at the sight of the treasures of perfections of the King of its holy love. Above all, it experiences this when it sees that it is the King himself who shows them by love. Among all his perfections that of his infinite love shines brilliantly. Is not this beautiful soul right in crying out: O, my King, how lovable are your riches! How rich is your love! Well , who has greater joy, you who possess them or I who rejoice in them? We will be overwhelmed with joy at the remembrance of your breast and your bosom. They are so rich, so copious in all perfections of sweetness. I rejoice because my Beloved rejoices in it. You rejoice because your beloved rejoices in it. Thus both of us rejoice since your goodness makes you enjoy my happiness. Similarly, my love makes me rejoice in your enjoyment, Ah! the just and the good love you! How could one be good and not love such supreme goodness.
The princes of this world have their treasures in their chambers, their arms in their armouries. But the heavenly Prince has his treasures in his (heart) bosom, his arms in his breast. It is because his treasure is his goodness just as his arms are his love. His breast and bosom are like that of a kind loving mother. She has twin breasts like two chambers rich in the sweetness of good milk. She is armed with many [loving] strokes to compel the baby to draw milk by sucking.
Indeed nature has placed the breasts of a mother on the chest so that the warmth of the heart prepares the milk. As the mother is the nurse of a child, so too her heart is its foster- father. Milk is a food full of love. It is hundred times better than wine. All the same, note, Theotimus, that the comparison of milk and wine seems quite appropriate to the sacred spouse. So she is not satisfied with saying once that the breasts of her spouse surpass wine but she repeats it three times (Song 1:2,4; 4:10; 7:8). Wine, Theotimus, is the milk of grapes; milk is the wine of the breasts. The sacred spouse also says that her Beloved is a grape for her but a grape of Cypress (Song 1:14),[2] that is to say, of an excellent fragrance. Moses said that the Israelites could drink the very pure and very good blood of grapes (Deut 32:14). Jacob describing to Juda his son the fertility of the share which he would have in the Promised Land, prophesied under this figure the genuine happiness of Christians. He said that the Saviour would wash his robes, that is, the Holy Church in the blood of the grape, that is, in his own blood. The blood and the milk are not more different from one another than grape-juice and wine. Grape-juice nourished by the heat of the sun changes colour, becomes good wine and fit for nourishment. So also, the blood made palatable by the heat of the heart takes on a beautiful white colour. It becomes a food very suitable for infants.
Milk is a food from the heart full of love. It symbolizes mystical science and theology. This means a sweet taste flowing out from gratifying love which the heart receives when it meditates on the perfections of divine goodness. Wine means ordinary acquired knowledge. It is drawn by the power of speculation from the strength of many arguments and discussions. Now, our human spirits suck milk from the breasts of the charity of our Lord. It is beyond comparison, superior to the wine we draw from human reasonings. For this milk takes its origin from heavenly love. He prepares it for his children even before they have thought of it. It has a pleasing and sweet taste. Its fragrance surpasses that of all other perfumes. It makes the breath pure and sweet like that of a baby. It gives joy without pride. It inebriates without intoxicating. It does not take away consciousness but heightens it.
When the saintly Isaac embraced and kissed his dear son Jacob, he smelled the smell of his garments. Suddenly, he was filled by an extreme pleasure. O, he says, the smell of my son is like the smell of a field that the Lord has blessed (Gen 27:27). The dress and smell were of Jacob. But Isaac had the delight and enjoyment. The soul holds its Saviour in the arms of its affections. How delightfully it experiences the perfumes of infinite perfection which are found in him! With what gratifying love it says in itself: Ah! here is the fragrance of my God. It is like a smell ofa garden that is flowering. How precious are his breasts spreading precious perfumes! (Song 1:3). Thus, on the one hand, the great St. Augustine had sacred contentment on considering the mystery of the birth of his Master. On the other hand, [as he meditated] on the mystery of the passion he had the same delight. Poised between the two, he exclaimed, ecstatic in this gratifying love: “Between one and the other mystery to which should my heart turn? On one side, the bosom of the mother gives me her milk to drink. On the other, the salvific wound pours out his blood to satiate me."
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[1] Literally nipples
[2] Raisin Cyprin. This is differently translated by the authors: grape of Cypress; of the grape of Venus [goddess of love]; cluster of henna grapes. Henna is a flower of Arabia whose white flowers emit a very penetrating and sweet fragrance (Pleiade, p 1730,no.2). NRSV translates it as a cluster of henna blossoms and JB, a cluster of henna flowers