enjoy over and above His general bounty._
For, besides such benefits as, according to this administration
of nature of which we have made some mention, He lavishes on good
and bad alike, we have from Him a great manifestation of great
love, which belongs only to the good. For although we can never
sufficiently give thanks to Him, that we are, that we live, that we
behold heaven and earth, that we have mind and reason by which to
seek after Him who made all these things, nevertheless, what hearts,
what number of tongues, shall affirm that they are sufficient to
render thanks to Him for this, that He hath not wholly departed from
us, laden and overwhelmed with sins, averse to the contemplation of
His light, and blinded by the love of darkness, that is, of iniquity,
but hath sent to us His own Word, who is His only Son, that by His
birth and suffering for us in the flesh, which He assumed, we might
know how much God valued man, and that by that unique sacrifice
we might be purified from all our sins, and that, love being shed
abroad in our hearts by His Spirit, we might, having surmounted all
difficulties, come into eternal rest, and the ineffable sweetness of
the contemplation of Himself?