Jacopone da Todi: How a Man Can Know Whether He Is in Charity

Source: Google Books (transcription)

I cannot know with certainty whether I am in charity, but I may nevertheless have some indications of it. Here is one proof of the love of God within me: if, after having asked God for something, He does not grant it to me, I love Him even more than before; if, by granting me the opposite of what I wanted, I love Him twice as much as I had done until then.

As for the love of one’s neighbour, the sign is not to love him less when he has offended me. If I loved him less, it would be proof that I did not love him before, but that I loved myself. I must love my neighbour for his own sake and not for mine, love his good, his advantage, and rejoice in it. In acting thus, I derive greater profit from his good than he himself does.