Prccdica verhum (2 Tim. 42 ). St Dominic says, translating the words of St Paul, ‘ Publish, proclaim, bring forth and propagate the Word.’ It is remarkable that anything should come forth and at the same time stay within. That the Word should come forth and still remain within is very wonderful ; that all creatures should come forth and remain within is very wonderful ; what God gives and promises to give is most wonderful, it is incomprehensible, incredible. That is as it should be ; if it were comprehensible and credible it would not be appropriate to him. God is in all things. The more he is in things the more he is out of things : the more he is within the more he is without. I have often said, God is creating the whole world now this instant. Everything God made six thousand years ago and more when he made the world, God makes now all at once. God is in all things ; but as God is divine and intelligible, therefore God is nowhere so much as in the soul, and the angels if you will, in the innermost soul, in the summit of the soul. And when I say the innermost I mean the highest and when I say the highest I mean the innermost. In the depths, at the summit of the soul, they are both the same. Where time has never entered and no form was ever seen, at the centre, the summit, of the soul, there God is creating the whole world. All God’s creation of six thousand years ago, all his creation of a thousand years to come, if the world lasts so long, is wrought by God in the innem\ost recesses, at the apex of the soul. All the past and future is contrived by God at the summit of the soul. The Father bears his Son in the innermost recesses of the soul and begets thee with his only Son, no less. But if I am Son then I must be Son the same as he is Son, and in no other way. If I am a man I am a man manfashion. If I am the Man I am the Man Man-fashion. As St John says, ‘ Ye are God’s sons,’
‘ Speak the Word, tell it abroad, pronounce it, bring forth and propagate the Word.’ ‘ Tell it forth ! ’ What is spoken in from without is a gross, objective thing. ‘ Tell it forth ! ’ That implies that thou hast it in thee. The prophet says, ‘ God spake one and I heard two.’ True, God did speak but once. His utterance is but one. In his Word he speaks his Son and the Holy Ghost and the whole of creatures, all of which are but one utterance in God. But, ‘ I heard two,’ the prophet says. Meaning, I understood it to be God and creature. Yonder where God speaks it it is God ; but here it is creature. People fondly think that God became man yonder. No ; Gk)d was made man here as well as there, and he was made man for one purpose only : to beget thee his one-begotten Son.
Yesterday I quoted from the Paternoster the words, ‘ thy will be done.’ Better his will than mine. That I should do it, is what the Paternoster means. First, by being (oblivious or) asleep to things, ignoring time and images and ereaiurcs. Philosophers will tell you that being in deep sleep a man might pass a hundred years oblivious of creatures, time and images and yet aware of God at work within him. As the soul says in the Book of Love, ‘ I sleep, but my heart waketh.’ So when all creatures are asleep in thee thou durst be awake to God’s doings in thee.
‘ Labour in all things ’ says our text, and this is open to three interpretations. It means, turn all to good account, or, see God in everything, for God is everywhere. St Augustine says, God created all things not that he might leave them and go on his own way : no, he is still in them. People imagine they have more if they have' things plus God than if they have God without the things. They are mistaken. All things plus God amount to nothing more than God alone ; and he who fondly weens that if he has the Son and tJie Father wdth him he has more than if he had the Son without the Father, is mistaken too. The Father plus the Son is no more than the Son is by himself and the Son plus the Father is no more than the Father by himself. To find God in all things is a sign that he has begotten thee his only Son, no less.
Again, turn everything to good account, means, love God the same in poverty as wealth, hold him as dear in sickness as in health ; as dear in trials and in sufferings as in immunity from sufferings. The heavier to bear the lighter to bear : like two buckets, the heavier the one the lighter the otJier, and so the more one gets rid the easier the riddance. The God-lovcr parts with the world as cheerfully as with an egg. The more he gives up the easier it grows.
Thirdly, ‘ labour in all things ’ means : where thou findest thyself about manifold things, at variance wdth pure and simple essence, let that be thy work : ‘ work in all things ’ and ‘ fulfil thy destiny.’ It also means, lift up thy head, and this is twofold in its implication. The first meaning is : part with all that is thine and appropriate God ; then God will be thine as he is his own ; he will be God to thee as he is God to his very self, no less. What is mine I get from no one. If 1 get it from another it is not mine hut his from whom I got it. The other meaning is, dedicate all fhy acts to God. Many people cannot understand this, and I am not surprised ; to know the meaning of it the soul must be in great detachment and uplifted over all these things. May we attain to this perfection. So help us God. Amen.