Moralia in Job 878

16. Both loves, of God and of the world, do not find room together in one heart. For he who is overcome by the love of earthly things is in no way delighted in God. The soul indeed can never be without delight, for it is delighted either in the lowest things or in the highest; and the more it is exercised with loftier zeal toward the highest, the more it grows torpid with disgust toward the lowest; and the more keenly it burns with care toward the lowest, the more it grows cold with damnable tepidity from the highest. For both cannot be loved at the same time and equally. Whence John the apostle, knowing that the harvest of supernal charity cannot germinate among the thorns of worldly loves, before he brings forth the seeds of eternal love, uproots from the hearts of his hearers the thorns of worldly loves by the holy hand of the word, saying:

«Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world» (1 John 2:15). And presently he subjoins: «For if any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.» As if he plainly said: Both loves do not find room in one heart; nor does the crop of supernal charity sprout in that heart in which the thorns of lowest delight choke it. And he enumerates those prickings arising from this lowest delight, saying: «For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world; and the world passeth away, and the concupiscence thereof» (ibid. 2:16).

The hypocrite, therefore, cannot be delighted in God, because in his mind supernal desires do not come forth—desires which assuredly the thorns of earthly love press down. Concerning which it is aptly subjoined: