On Grace

1. God is called grace

because He exercises free will

in readily bestowing forgiveness.

 

2. God bestowed grace upon man when He decided to create him,

for man by himself is not worthy of existing,

since whoever comes from nothing cannot be deserving of himself.

 

3. When He places them upon the path of salvation, God bestows grace

upon men who are sinners and abide in sin,

which men are judged by justice to <merit> damnation.

 

4. God bestows grace upon whomsoever He wishes, and should not be censured

if He bestows it upon one person rather than another, for He would be committing a sin

were He, within Himself, to suppress His free will.

 

5. In virtue of his freedom, man can ordain matters so that he receives grace from the Lord;

however, he cannot force God, because grace is bestowed as a consequence of love,

for which reason we must abide in hope and fear.

 

6. He who wishes to be ordered to (i.e. disposed to) receive grace

is already in receipt of <such> grace by virtue of the order he adopts,

for without grace he could not be <so> ordered.

 

7. We are barely able to consider that in which grace consists,

for it is not an action that can be felt or imagined,

nor can we affirm it separately from God’s freedom.

 

8. We possess no other counsel, should we wish to acquire grace,

than to love and serve God to the best of our ability,

in accordance with what our freedom can sustain.

 

9. Grace constitutes such great wealth to whomever lives in <a state thereof>

that nothing which falls within the scope of the senses is of equivalent worth to him:

foolish is he, therefore, who forfeits it for the sake of any sensory pleasure.

 

10. Alas! When I consider the grace God bestows upon those whom He allows to love Him,

and how many are those whom he does not allow to serve and honour Him,

then do I understand that grace is a gift which is very precious.