"Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways" (Is 2:3). Yearnings, strivings, longings, thoughts and affections, and all that is within me, come and let us go up to the mountain or place where the Lord both sees and is seen! But worries and anxieties, concerns and toils, and all the sufferings involved in my enslaved condition, all of you must stay here... while we hasten up the mountain; so that, when we have worshiped (cf. Gn 22:5), we may come back to you. For we shall come back, and that unfortunately, all too soon.
"Lord God of hosts, restore us; show us your face, and we shall be saved" (Ps 80:20). But alas, O Lord, alas! To want to see God when one is unclean in heart is surely quite outrageous, rash and presumptuous, and altogether out of order and against the rule of the word of truth and of your wisdom! Yet you are he who is supremely good, goodness itself, the life of our heart and light of our inward eyes. For your goodness' sake, have mercy on us, Lord.
For the beholding of your goodness is of itself my cleansing, my confidence, my holiness. You have your own way, my Lord God, of saying to my soul: "I am your salvation" (Ps 35:3). Wherefore, Rabboni, Master supreme, you who alone can teach me how to see the things that I desire to see, say to your blind beggar: "What do you want me to do for you?” And you know, since it happens only by your gift... you know how my heart then says to you: "My face has sought you: your face then will I seek. Do not turn your face from me” (cf. Ps 27:8-9).
– William of Saint-Thierry (c.1085-1148), Benedictine, then a Cistercian monk.
