Now I love you alone, I follow you alone, I seek you alone, and I am ready to serve you alone, because you alone exercise your dominion with justice. I wish to belong to you.
Command me, I beg you, and order whatever you will; but heal and open my ears, that I may hear your voice. Heal and open my eyes, that I may see your signs. Take away from me whatever confuses me and distances me from you, that I may recognize you.
Tell me where I should look, that I may see you, and I hope to do whatever you ask of me.
Receive, I beg you, your fugitive, O Lord, Father full of mercy. I have now atoned enough for my punishment; I have served your enemies long enough, those whom you hold beneath your feet. I have been a victim of their deceptions long enough.
Receive me, your servant, who flees from them, because they too received me as a stranger when I fled from you.
I feel that I must return to you. Open your door to me, for I knock; teach me how to reach you.
I have nothing but my will. I know only that one must leave behind what is fleeting and destined to end, and seek what is certain and eternal.
This is what I do, Father, because this alone I know; but I do not know the way to reach you. You show me; show me the way. Give me what is needed for the journey.
If those who take refuge in you find you through faith, give me faith; if through virtue, give me virtue; if through knowledge, give me knowledge.
Increase my faith, increase my hope, increase my charity. O how great and unique is your goodness!
Saint Augustine, Soliloquies, I.1.5
