Letter 3012: God's gifts are doubled for those who hope, and heavenly grace overflows with a twofold blessing.

God's gifts are doubled for those who hope, and his grace, from on high, overflows with a twofold blessing: the wave of heavenly bounties rushes on in broad channels; the streams of the gifts that come from Christ surpass the compass of him who draws from them. There is one vein alone that knows no leanness and forswears all failing, supplying through its courses only as much as the breast of the thirsty deserves to receive. Mark in it what hidden savor it pours forth, when the clear water kindles ardor, and when, the soul seething, the moistness of the living river begets dryness upon the lips. Such is the manner of your letter, which, as great a satiety as it brings to our desires, just as great are the increases it engenders, whose depth is both drunk and longed for, and which so enrich us with their pure flood that from them our inward parts are flooded with a hidden fire. In them I see kindred flames and draughts, and a diversity of nature joined together in an unfamiliar concord. My lord, by the grant of our God set forth for the lands a long example of a most blessed life, and through the philosophy of holy religion show that, by contempt of the present age, hope is to be set not in this life alone.