Confessions 1.1.1
Great are you, Lord, and to be praised highly. Great is your power, and of your wisdom there is no measure. And man wants to praise you, being some part of your creation - even man who carries around his mortality, who carries around the evidence of his sin and the evidence that you resist the proud; and nevertheless man wants to praise you, as he is a part of your creation. You arouse him that he should delight to praise you, since you have made us towards you and our heart is unquiet until it rests in you. Grant to me, Lord, to know and understand whether it comes first to call on you or to praise you, and whether knowing you comes before calling on you. But who calls upon you who does not know you? For the ignorant can invoke something for another. Or rather are you called upon so that you may be known? But how will they call upon him, in whom they have not believed? Or how will they believe without someone preaching? And they will praise the Lord who are seeking him: for those searching will find him and they who find will praise him. Let me seek you, Lord, calling on you and let me call on you believing in you: for you have been declared to us. My faith calls upon you, Lord - the faith which you gave to me, which you breathed into me through the humanity of your son, through the service of your preacher.
Translated from this J.J. O'Donnell text.
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