all His gifts. Here Jesus comes, and sees the man, and tells Him in
the light of faith that He is, according to His Godhead,
immeasurable and incomprehensible, inaccessible and abysmal, and
that He surpasses all created light and all finite comprehension.
This is the highest knowledge acquired in the active life, to
recognise thus, in the light of faith, that God is inconceivable and
unknowable. In this light Christ saith to the desire of a man: "Come
down quickly, for I must lodge at thy house to-day." This rapid
descent to which God invites him is nothing else but a descent, by
desire and love, into the abyss of the Godhead, to which no
intelligence can attain in crested light. But where intelligence
remains outside, love and desire enter. The soul thus bending
towards God, by the intention of love, above all that the intellect
can comprehend, rests and abides in God, and God abides in her. Then
mounting by desire, above the multitude of the creatures, above the
work of the senses, above the light of nature, she meets Christ in
the light of faith, and is enlightened, and recognises that God is
unknowable and inconceivable. Finally, bending by her desires
towards this inconceivable God, she meets Christ and is loaded with
His gifts; by living and resting upon Him, above all His gifts,
above herself and above all the creatures, she dwells in God and God
in her.

This is how you will meet Christ at the summit of the active life,
if you have as your foundations justice, charity, and humility; and
if you have built a house above--that is to say, the virtues here
described, and if you have met Christ by faith--that is to say, by
faith and the intention of love, you dwell in God and God dwells in
you, and you possess the active life.