11. And the mind presses forward to the sight of internal mysteries, to the place of rest of the Word, to the very dwelling of that chief Good, His light and brightness. In that haven and home-retreat she hastens to hear His words, and having heard, finds them sweeter than all other things. Learn of the Prophet who had tasted and saith, _O how sweet are Thy words unto my throat, yea sweeter than honey unto my mouth_. For what can that soul desire which hath once tasted the sweetness of the Word, and seen His brightness? When Moses received the Law he remained forty days on the mount and required no bodily food; Elijah, hastening to this rest, prayed that his life might be taken away; Peter, himself also beholding on the Mount the glory of the Lord’s Resurrection, would fain not have come down, saying, _It is good for us to be here_. How great then is the glory of the Divine Essence and the graces of the Word, _which things the Angels desire to look into_. Sidenote: Acts vii. 55. Sidenote: 2 Cor. xii. 2. 12. The soul then which beholds this chief Good, requires not the body, and understands that it ought to have as little connexion with it as possible; it renounces the world, withdraws itself from the chains of the flesh, and extricates itself from all the bonds of earthly pleasures. Thus Stephen beheld Jesus, and feared not being stoned, nay, while he was being stoned, prayed not for himself but for his murderers. Paul also, when _caught up to the third heaven_, knew not _whether he was in the body or out of the body: caught up_, I say, _into Paradise_, he became invisible to the presence of his own body, and having heard the words of God he blushed to descend again to the infirmities of the body. Sidenote: Col. ii. 20–22. Sidenote: 2 Cor. v. 8. 13. Thus, knowing what he had seen and heard in Paradise, he cried saying, _Why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances? Touch not, taste not, handle not, which all are to perish with the using._ For he would have us of this world in figure and semblance, not in use or possession, _using as though we used it not_, as our place of sojourn, not of rest, walking through it as in a vision, not with desire, so as to pass as lightly as possible over the mere shadow of this world. In this way S. Paul, who walked by faith not by sight, was _absent from the body and present with the Lord_, and although upon earth conversed not with earthly but with heavenly things. Sidenote: S. John i. 1. Sidenote: Acts xvii. 28. Sidenote: 2 Cor. i. 19. Sidenote: Exod. iii. 14.