Such is, and shall be still, my love to Thee.
Thy love, O Jesus, may I ever sing,
O God of love, kind Parent, dearest King."
The authorship is referred to Ignacio Loyola, to Francisco Xavier, to Pedro de los Reyes, and to the Seraphic Mother, Santa Teresa de Jesús, whose name in the world was Teresa de Cepeda y Ahumada (1515-82). None of these attributions can be sustained, and No me mueve, mi Dios, para quererte must be classed as anonymous.[13] Yet its fervour and unction are such as to suggest its ascription to the Saint of the Flaming Heart. Santa Teresa is not only a glorious saint and a splendid figure in the annals of religious thought: she ranks as a miracle of genius, as, perhaps, the greatest woman who ever handled pen, the single one of all her sex who stands beside the world's most perfect masters. Macaulay has noted, in a famous essay, that Protestantism has gained not an inch of ground since the middle of the sixteenth century. Ignacio Loyola and Santa Teresa are the life and brain of the Catholic reaction: the former is a great party chief, the latter belongs to mankind.
Her life in all its details may be read in Mrs. Cunninghame Graham's minute and able study. Here it must suffice to note that she sallied forth to seek martyrdom at the age of seven, that she entered literature as the writer of a chivalresque romance, and that in her sixteenth year she made her profession as a nun in the Carmelite convent of her native town, Ávila. Years of spiritual aridity, of ill-health, weighed her down, aged her prematurely. But nothing could abate her natural force; and from 1558 to the day of her death she marches from one victory to another, careless of pain, misunderstanding, misery, and persecution, a wonder of valour and devotion.
"Scarce has she blood enough to make
A guilty sword blush for her sake;
Yet has a heart dares hope to prove
How much less strong is Death than Love....
Love touch't her heart, and lo! it beats