Men and sons of men.
But the same psalm says: "You save humans and animals, Lord, just as Your mercy is multiplied, God." Although merciful God, You have such abundant mercy that it reaches not only humans but also animals. Such is Your great mercy that You make Your sun rise on the good and the bad, and rain on the just and the unjust. Do Your saints receive nothing special from You, nothing peculiar to the pious that the impious do not also receive? Surely, they do. Listen to what follows. For he had already said: "You save humans and animals, Lord, just as Your mercy is multiplied, God," and he added and said: "But the children of men." So, what then? Were those you previously mentioned as humans not children of men? He says, "You save humans and animals, Lord; but the children of men." So what then? "The children of men will hope under the shadow of Your wings." Not with the animals. Why then are both these and those called humans? Are not even the humans children of men? Surely, the humans are children of men. So where does this distinction come from, if not because there is a human who was not a child of man. The man who was not a child of man, Adam; the man who is a child of man, Christ. Just as in Adam all die, so in Christ all shall be made alive. They seek salvation with the animals who die and will not live again. They seek salvation with the children of men who die, so that they may never die. That distinction is clear. Those referred to are humans; these children of men belong to the Son of Man.
God is the source of life.
What then follows? The children of men shall hope under the shadow of your wings. Behold, I hope, behold hope. But hope that is seen is not hope. Therefore, the future things that are promised shall intoxicate. They shall be intoxicated from the abundance of your house. I fear lest, as he was seeking the members of the body in God a little while ago, so in his intoxication he may not think of the satisfaction of ineffable goods, but of the debauchery of carnal feasts. Nonetheless let us say. Let him think what he can, if he cannot think higher. Let him not depart from the bosom when he grows. Let us follow, and those who can, let us delight spiritually as much as we can. They shall be intoxicated, he says, from the abundance of your house, and you shall make them drink from the torrent of your pleasure. With what wine, with what new wine, with what wave, with what honey, with what nectar? Do you ask with what? Since with you is the fountain of life. Drink, if you can, life. Prepare the conscience, not the gullet, the mind, not the belly. If you have heard, if you have understood, if you have loved as much as you could, you have already drunk from there.
Love charity.
Be attentive to what you drink. You have drunk love. If you know it, God is love. If, therefore, you have drunk love, tell me where you have drunk it. If you know it, if you have seen it, if you love, whence do you love? For whatever you love well, you love with love. But how do you love anything with love if you do not love with love? Therefore, if you love, whence do you love? It comes to you, and you know it and see it. And it is not seen in a place, nor is it sought with bodily eyes, so that it may be loved more vehemently. Nor is it heard by speech, and when it comes to you, it is not felt by walking. Have you ever felt the steps of love walking in your heart? What, then, is it? Whose is this that is already in you, and is not contained by you? Thus, learn to love God.
God can both appear and remain hidden.
But he walked in paradise, but he was seen at the oak of Mamre, but he spoke with Moses on Mount Sinai face to face. And what of it? Behold, He who is seen in place is not perceived by movement. Do you wish to hear Moses himself, lest you, as a restless child, cause me weariness despite my desire to nourish you? Do you then wish to hear Moses himself? Surely he spoke with God face to face. To whom then did he speak, if not to the one with whom he was speaking: If I have found favor in your sight, show me Yourself? He speaks with Him face to face, as one speaks to a friend, and says to Him: If I have found favor in your sight, show me Yourself plainly. What did he see, and what did he thirst for? If it was not He, how is it said to Him: Show me Yourself? We cannot say that it was not He. If it were not He, he would say to Him: "Show me God." Therefore, when he says: Show me Yourself, he manifests that it was He whom he wished to see. And he spoke with Him face to face, as one speaks to a friend. Do you then wish to hear, if you can grasp God? Moses appeared hidden. For if He did not appear, there would not be one speaking face to face saying to Him: Show me Yourself. But if He did not hide, he would not still seek to see the same. Therefore, if you can grasp, if you understand, God can both appear and hide simultaneously, appear in form, hide in nature.
Recognize the mystery in God.
If you have understood this as you were able, see to it that the thought does not slip into you that God, in order to appear in whatever form He wishes, changes His nature. God is immutable, God is unchangeable, not only the Father, but the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The very Word God is immutable, just as the God with whom He is God. Think of nothing detrimental in any person, nothing changeable. For God is the Father of lights, with whom there is no change or shadow of turning. "If, therefore, He is immutable," you ask, "What is that form in which He appeared as He wished, to whom He wished, by walking, speaking, or even showing Himself to corporeal eyes?" You ask me what substance God makes His presence from, as if I could now explain from what He made the world, from what He made heaven, from what He made the earth, from what He made you. "Now I see," you respond, "from the slime." Behold yourself from the slime. Whence the slime? You answer: "From the earth." But I think not from that earth which another made, but from that earth which He made who made heaven and earth. Wherefore, from what is that earth itself? From what heaven and earth? He spoke, and they were made. Well, you answer excellently. You recognize: He spoke, and they were made. I seek nothing more. But how, when you say: He spoke, and they were made, I seek nothing more; so you should seek nothing more when I say: He willed, and He appeared. He appeared as He judged fitting; He concealed as He existed.
Because, children, we will see him just as he is.
Our true affection, our love, our devotion, may it surge with that desire with which Moses surged, who said to Him whom he saw: "Show me yourself." If we thus seek this, we are His children. For we are children of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be. We know that when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is. Not as He appeared by the oak of Mamre, not as He appeared to Moses, that we might still say to Him: "Show us yourself," but we shall see Him as He is. By what merit? Because we are children of God. And this not by our own merits, but by the grace of His mercy. For God, you have generously separated the rain for your inheritance. And it was weakened, not by presuming to see what it does not see, but by believing what it desires to see. You, truly, have perfected it. Therefore, His inheritance being perfected, His children shall see Him as He is. But what did the Lord say about the children? "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God."
Let us seek peacefully.
Therefore, concerning such hidden and very difficult questions, if we understand less, let us seek peacefully. Let one not be inflated against another for the sake of another. For if you have bitter zeal and contentions are among you, that wisdom is not descending from above, but earthly, natural, demonic. Therefore, we are sons of God and let it be known that we are His sons, and we will not be known unless we have been peaceful. For we will not have the means to see God, if by contending among ourselves we have extinguished our own eye.
God wanted you to be a lover of good.
Pay attention to what he says, why I speak fearing and trembling. Pursue peace with all and holiness, without which no one shall see God. How did he terrify lovers? He did not terrify anyone but lovers. Did he perhaps say: Pursue peace with all and holiness, which if someone does not have, they will be cast into fire, tortured with eternal fire, given over to unwearied torturers? These things are true, and he did not say this. He wanted you to be a lover of good, not a fearer of evil, and from that very thing which you desired he terrified you. You will see God. Therefore do you despise this, therefore do you quarrel, therefore do you stir up conflicts? Pursue peace with all and holiness, without which no one shall see God. How foolish would it be for two wanting to see the rising sun, if they quarreled among themselves about from which direction it would rise and how it could be seen, and if a dispute arose between them, they fought, and by fighting they struck each other, by striking extinguished their own eyes, so that they could not see that rising? Therefore, so that we may see God, let us cleanse our hearts with faith, heal them with charity, strengthen them with peace, because this very thing, from which we love each other, is already from Him whom we desire to see.