Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol I:
CLEMENT OF ROME: Chapter XLIX.—The praise of love.

Chapter XLIX.—The praise of love.

Let him who has love in Christ keep the commandments of Christ. Who can describe the [blessed] bond of the love of God? What man is able to tell the excellence of its beauty, as it ought to be told? The height to which love exalts is unspeakable. Love unites us to God. Love covers a multitude of sins. 221 Love beareth all things, is long-suffering in all things. 222 There is nothing base, nothing arrogant in love. Love admits of no schisms: love gives rise to no seditions: love does all things in harmony. By love have all the elect of God been made perfect; without love nothing is well-pleasing to God. In love has the Lord taken us to Himself. On account of the Love he bore us, Jesus Christ our Lord gave His blood for us by the will of God; His flesh for our flesh, and His soul for our souls. 223

Footnotes

Jas. v. 20; 1 Pet. iv. 8.

Comp. 1 Cor. xiii. 4, etc.

[Comp. Irenæus, v. 1; also Mathetes, Ep. to Diognetus, cap. ix.]