DAILY CONTEMPLATION

December 8, 2025 ~ Hathor 29, 1742

Any purchasable thing is either equal to the price, below it, or it exceeds it.
When anyone procures a thing for as much as it is worth, the price is equal to the thing which is procured;
when for less, it is below it; when for more, it exceeds it.
But to the Word of God, nothing can either be equaled, or to exchange can anything be below It, or above It.
For all things can be below the Word of God, for “all things were made by Him,”
yet​ they are not in such a manner below, as if they were the price of the Word,
that anyone should give something to receive That.
Yet, if we may say so, the price for procuring the Word is the procurer himself,
who will have given himself for himself to this Word.
Accordingly, when we buy anything, we look for something to give,
that for the price we give we may have the thing we wish to buy.
That which we give is without us;
and if it was with us before, what we give becomes without us, that that which we procure may be with us.
A purchaser must give what he has to receive what he has not;
yet he himself remains, and that thing for which he gives the price is added to him.
But whosoever would procure this Word, whosoever would have Him,
let him not seek for anything without himself to give; let him give himself.
And when he shall have done this, he does not lose himself, as he loses the price when he buys anything…
This is as it were the price of the Word, if so it may in any way be said,
when he that gives does not lose himself, and gains the Word for which he gives himself,
and gains himself too in the Word to whom he gives himself.
St Augustine