Bibliotheca Christi

"by constant reading and long-continued meditation he had made his breast a library of Christ."

"lectione quoque adsidua et meditatione diuturna pectus suum bibliothecam fecerat Christi."

     St. Jerome, of Nepotian, Letter 60.10, trans. Fremantle, Lewis, & Martley (NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 2).  Latin from CSEL 54, p. 561, ll. 18-19.

"Ye who long pain and sorrow bear, | praise God and on Him cast your care!"

Ye who long pain and sorrow bear,
praise God and on Him cast your care!

     William Henry Draper, "All creatures of our God and king" (1899/1919), stanza free.  Free translation of the "Canticle of the Sun" ("canticum solis" or "laudes creaturarum"), by St. Francis of Assisi.  St. Francis of Assisi:  writings and early biographies:  English omnibus of the sources for the life of St. Francis, ed. Marion A. Habig, trans. Raphael Brown, Benen Fahy, Placid Hermann, Paul Oligny, Nesta de Robeck, Leo Sherley-Price (Quincy, IL:  Franciscan Press, Quincy University, 1991), vol. 1, p. 131 (127-131):

All praise be yours, my Lord, through those who grant pardon
     For love of you; through those who endure
     Sickness and trial.
Happy those who endure in peace,
     By you, Most High, they will be crowned.

Francis of Assisi:  early documents, vol. 1, The saint, ed. Regis J. Armstrong, OFM Cap, J. A. Wayne Hellmann, OFM Conv, and William J. Short, OFM (New York:  New City Press, 1999), 114 (113-114):

Praised by you, my Lord, through those who give pardon for Your love,
     and bear infirmity and tribulation.
     Blessed are those who endure in peace
          for by You, Most High, shall they be crowned.

Critical edition of the original:  Die Opuscula des hl. Franziskus von Assisi, Spicilegium Bonaventurianum 13, ed. Kajetan Esser; 2nd ed. Engelbert Grau (Grottaferrata:  1989), 129, which I haven't yet checked, but which is supposed to read:

Laudato si, mi signore, per quelli ke perdonano per lo tuo amore, et sostengo infirmitate et tribulatione.  Beati quelli ke ‘l sosterrano in pace, ka da te, altissimo, sirano incoronati.

Brian Maloney, Francis of Assisi and his 'Canticle of Brother Sun' reassessed, The new Middle Ages (New York:  Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), xxi-xxii:

Laudato si', mi' Signore, per quelli ke perdonano per lo Tuo amore | e sostengo infirmitate et tribulazione. | Beati quelli ke 'l sosterrano in pace, | ka da Te, Altissimo, sirano incoronati. 

Some fragments of Irenaeus lifted from Polanco on von Balthasar

"man, falling away from God altogether, should cease to exist. For the glory of God is a living man; and the life of man [is the vision of] God."

"in toto deficiens a Deo homo, cessaret esse.  Gloria enim Dei vivens homo:  vita autem hominis visio Dei."

     Irenaeus, Adv. haer. IV.xx.7, trans. Roberts & Rambaut, ANF 1, modification mine.  Latin ed. Harvey (1857), vol. 2, p. 219.



"The flesh is designed as receptive and capable of containing the power of God, and since the beginning has hosted God's art."

Εὑρεθήσεται δὲ καὶ δεκτικὴ ἅμα καὶ χωρητικὴ ἡ σὰρξ τῆς τοῦ θεοῦ δυνάμεως· εἰ γὰρ τὴν ἀρχὴν ἀπεδέξατο τὴν τέχνην τοῦ θεοῦ. . . .

"Invenietur autem perceptrix et capax caro virtutis Dei, quae ab initio percepit artem Dei".

     Irenaeus, Adv. haer. V.iii.2, trans. Balthasar, trans. Polanco, p. 123.  Greek & Latin ed. Harvey (1857), vol. 2, p. 326.  Roberts & Rambaut:  "And that flesh shall also be found fit for and capable of receiving the power of God, which at the beginning received the skilful touches of God".



"The real man is the soul in the body and grace in both . . . and, in the same way, neither is the eschatologically saved man a completed soul, freed from the body, but exclusively in flesh resurrected."

     von Balthasar on Irenaeus, Herrlichkeit II/1, 64, trans. Polanco, p. 123.

Cf. Anthony Esolen, In the beginning was the Word:  an annotated reading of the Prologue of John (Brooklyn, NY:  Angelico Press, 2021), 30:  "Superbia diaboli est moriens homo, . . . the devil's pride is a man dying inside."