48. What person cannot see this who is able to discern the essential nature of love? For what is it to love oneself alone, and not someone apart from oneself capable of returning that love? It results in rupture rather than conjunction. A conjunction of love results from its reciprocation, and no reciprocation is possible in self alone. If it is supposed to exist, it is from an imagined reciprocation on the part of others.
From these observations it is apparent that Divine love cannot but be and have expression in others whom it loves and by whom it is loved. For inasmuch as there is such an ingredient in all love, it must exist especially, which is to say, infinitely, in love itself.
