For our soul is so specially loved of Him that is highest, that it overpasseth the knowing of all creatures: that is to say, there is no creature that is made that may [fully] know[5] how much and how sweetly and how tenderly our Maker loveth us. And therefore we may with grace and His help stand in spiritual beholding, with everlasting marvel of this high, overpassing, inestimable[6] Love that Almighty God hath to us of His Goodness. And therefore we may ask of our Lover with reverence all that we will. For our natural[7] Will is to have God, and the Good Will of God is to have us; and we may never cease from willing nor from longing till we have Him in fullness of joy: and then may we no more desire. For He willeth that we be occupied in knowing and loving till the time that we shall be fulfilled in Heaven; and therefore was this lesson of Love shewed, with all that followeth, as ye shall see. For the strength and the Ground of all was shewed in the First Sight. For of all things the beholding and the loving of the Maker maketh the soul to seem less in his own sight, and most filleth him with reverent dread and true meekness; with plenty of charity to his even-Christians.[8] [1] MS. "To make many menys." So in _Letter_ 385 of _The Paston Letters_, 1422-1509 A.D.--"Our Soverayn Lord hath wonne the feld, & uppon the Munday next after Palmesunday, he was resseved in York with gret solempnyte & processyons. And the Mair & Comons of the said cite mad ther menys to have grace be [by] Lord Montagu & Lord Barenars, which be for the Kyngs coming in to the said cite, which graunted hem [them] grace." _Letter_ 472 (from Margaret Paston).--"Your ryth wele willers have kounselyd me that I xuld kownsell you to maken other menys than ye have made, to other folks, that wold spede your matyrs better than they have done thatt ye have spoken to therof" (ed. by James Gairdner, vol i.). See ch. iv. p. 8. [2] _i.e._ trustingly. [3] bond as of relationship. [4] "the bouke" = the bulk, the thorax. [5] "witten." [6] or, as in S. de Cressy, "immeasurable." The word, however, looks like "oninestimable" with the "on" blotted or erased. [7] "kindly." [8] "to his even cristen"--fellow-Christians ("even" = equal). _Hamlet_, Act v. Sc. i. "great folk ... more than their even Christian." CHAPTER VII "The Shewing is not other than of faith, nor less nor more"