If a very powerful earthly sovereign were to send his messengers to seek in marriage a maiden of humble birth and fortune, would not that maiden act very foolishly to reject the hand of the king, and take up with his messengers and servants instead?  And God, through the beauty of the works of His own hands, desires to call me to Himself and to incite me to love Him alone; why then should my soul, which Christ the heavenly Bridegroom seeks to unite to Himself, cling to a mere creature, as the messenger of this spiritual union which He desires to make with me? These creatures themselves exclaim, “Why dost thou cling so fondly to us? Why dost thou seek thy highest good in us? We cannot satisfy thy longings. Haste thee to our common Creator.” We dare not hope that the things of earth will reciprocate our love; nor do they first love us; but God, who is love (1 John iv. 16), cannot but love those who love Him; nay more, He even anticipates all our desires and all our love with His own love. Ah! how much then ought we love Him who first so dearly loved us. He loved us before we had any being, for it is because of His divine love that we were born into the world. He loved us when we were yet enemies (Rom. v. 10); for it is because of His divine love and compassion that He sent His Son to redeem us. (Gerhard’s Sacred Meditations – IX: Loving God Alone, Repristination Press, p. 50-51)

Rouse thyself, O faithful soul, and love thou Him who is the Highest Good, in whom is every good thing, and without whom there is nothing truly good. No created thing can really satisfy our souls’ desires, for no creature possesses all of perfect good in itself, but only that good in which it participates. A rivulet of goodness from the divine fountain may flow down to it from above, but the fountain itself always remains in God. Why then should we desire to leave the fountain and follow the rivulet? Every manifestation of good in the creature is but an image of the perfect goodness which is in God, nay, which is God Himself. Why then should we desire to leave the reality to grasp the image? The dove sent out from Noah’s ark could not find, amid the raging waters, a place of rest for her feet (Gen. viii. 8). Thus our souls, amid the vast multitude of earthly comforts, can find nothing to satisfy fully their immortal desires, because these things are so very frail and fleeting in character. Does not that man do himself injury who loves anything beneath the dignity of his nature? Our souls are far more noble than any created thing because redeemed by the passion and death of God. Why then should we stoop to love the creature? Would not that be inconsistent with the dignity to which God has exalted the human soul? Whatever we love, we love because of its power, its wisdom, or its beauty. Now what is more powerful, what is wiser, what is more beautiful, than God? All the power of earthly monarchs is from Him and is subject to Him; all human wisdom, compared with the divine, is foolishness; all creature beauty in comparison with God’s is absolute deformity. (Gerhard’s Sacred Meditations – IX: Loving God Alone, Repristination Press, p. 49-50)