O house most
lightsome and delightsome! I have loved thy beauty, and the place of
the habitation of the glory of my Lord, thy builder and possessor. Let
my wayfaring sigh after thee, and I say to Him that made thee, let Him
take possession of me also in thee, seeing He hath made me likewise. I
have gone astray like a lost sheep: yet upon the shoulders of my
Shepherd, thy builder, hope I to be brought back to thee.
"What say ye to me, O ye gainsayers that I was speaking unto, who
yet believe Moses to have been the holy servant of God, and his
books the oracles of the Holy Ghost? Is not this house of God, not
coeternal indeed with God, yet after its measure, eternal in the
heavens, when you seek for changes of times in vain, because you
will not find them? For that, to which it is ever good to cleave
fast to God, surpasses all extension, and all revolving periods of
time." "It is," say they. "What then of all that which my heart loudly
uttered unto my God, when inwardly it heard the voice of His praise,
what part thereof do you affirm to be false? Is it that the matter was
without form, in which because there was no form, there was no
order? But where no order was, there could be no vicissitude of times:
and yet this almost nothing,' inasmuch as it was not altogether
nothing, was from Him certainly, from Whom is whatsoever is, in what
degree soever it is.
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