Chapter XIII. The mystical interpretation of the length, and breadth, and height, and depth

What is God? Length, breadth, height, and depth. 'What?' you say. 'You do, after all, profess 'to believe in the fourfold Godhead which was an abomination to you.' face to face, \ve shall see Him as He is. When that blessed time shall come, the poor, weak blade of our intellect, however hard it may strike, will not recoil, or be broken to shivers. It will rather concentrate itself, and will conform itself to His unity, or rather to that Unity, so that we shall have one face corresponding to His one face. For 'we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is '. Blessed Vision ! well might he sigh for it who said, ' My face hath sought thee : thy face, O Lord, will I seek/ 2 And as our business is still to seek Him, let us for the present, inasmuch as we are weak and faint, and sorely need such a conveyance, let us mount this four-horse chariot, if haply we may thus lay hold of that for which we have been laid hold of, that is to say, the plan and working of the vehicle itself. For this admonition have we from the charioteer himself, who was the first to show us the chariot — that we strive to ' comprehend with all saints what is the length, and breadth, and height, and depth '. ' Comprehend ', he says, not ' know ' : so that, not content with the curiosity of knowledge 6 we may with all eagerness 1 ook for the fruit. The fruit is not to be found in knowledge, but in comprehension. Besides, ' to him who knoweth to do good, and doeth it not/7 as a certain one tells us, 'it is sin ' ; Paul also elsewhere says, ' So run that ye may comprehend/ * I will point out lower down the meaning of comprehending.

He is below all things. It is clear that in the Godhead there is no halting inequality; the Godhead stands firmly fixed, immovably self-consistent. Consider 'height' as corresponding to the Divine power, ' depth ' to the Divine wisdom. There is a correspondence no less between these two than between the former two, if we perceive that this ' height ' is unapproachable, this k depth ' unsearchable. Paul marvelled as he cried aloud, ' O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God ! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out ! ' ] We too, as we contemplate both these attributes in God, and their perfect unity with God; may with Paul exclaim, ' O powerful wisdom, reaching from one end of the world to the other with full strength ! O wise power, ordering all things sweetly ! ' 2 The thing is one, the effect is manifold, the operations are diverse. And that one thing is ' length ' because it is eternity ; ' breadth ' because it is love ; ' height ' because it is majesty ; ' depth ' because it is wisdom.