You know, O my God, I have never desired anything but to love You, and I am ambitious for no other glory. Your love has gone before me, and it has grown with me, and now it is an abyss whose depths I cannot fathom. Love attracts love, and, my Jesus, my love leaps toward Yours; it would like to fill the abyss which attracts it, but alas! it is not even like a drop of dew lost in the ocean! For me to love You as You love me, I would have to borrow Your own Love, and then only would I be at rest. (Emphasis original.) [1], [2]
[1] Thérèse, de Lisieux, Saint. Story of a Soul The Autobiography of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux . 3rd Edition. Translated by John Clarke, O.C.D. Washington D.C.: Washington Province of Discalced Carmelites, Inc., 1996, p.256.
[2] The words that struck me are these: "For me to love You as You love me, I would have to borrow Your own Love, and then only would I be at rest" -- original, profound and saintly. Only with the grace of God can one's love for God be so sweetly and humbly expressed. I would like to memorize this in the original French and use as a prayer. See http://www.archives-carmel-lisieux.fr/english/carmel/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=356:ms-c-35r&catid=11&Itemid=107 One day I hope to find someone to help me read her writing and pronounce the words. I think the sentence begins after the second exclamation mark (!) on the image and before "O mon Jésus ....
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