Love of God as The Highest Good

the essence of God, or of the eternal and infinite being; not, indeed, all of them, but only
those which are able to lead us, as it were by the hand, to the knowledge of the human mind and its highest blessedness.


Theological-Politico Tractatus 04-P12-14:
Hither, then, our highest good and our highest blessedness aim - namely, to the knowledge and love of God; therefore the means demanded by this aim of all human actions, that is, by God in so far as THE IDEA OF HIM IS IN US, may be called the commands of God, because they
proceed, as it were, from God Himself, inasmuch as He exists IN OUR MINDS, and the plan of life which has regard to this aim may be fitly called the law of God.


As the love of God is man's highest happiness and blessedness, and the ultimate end and aim of all human actions, it follows that he alone lives by the Divine law who loves God not from fear of punishment, or from love of any other object, such as sensual pleasure, fame, or the like; but solely because he has knowledge of God, or is convinced that the knowledge and love of God is the highest good. The sum and chief precept, then, of the Divine law is to love God as the highest good, namely, as we have said, not from fear of any pains
and penalties, or from the love of any other object in which we desire to take pleasure.

The idea of God lays down the rule that God is our highest good - in other words, that the knowledge and love of God is the ultimate aim to which all our actions should be directed .
The worldling cannot understand these things, they appear foolishness to him because he has too meager a knowledge of God, and also because in this highest good he can discover nothing which he can handle or eat, or which affects the fleshly appetites wherein he
chiefly delights, for it consists solely in thought and the pure reason.

They, on the other hand, who know that they possess no greater gift than intellect and sound reason, will doubtless accept what I have said without question.