O Parent of parents, and friend of all friends,
without entreaty you took me into your care
and by degrees led me from all else
that at length I might see and settle my love in you.

What had I ever done to please you?
Or what was there in me wherewith to serve you?
Much less could I ever deserve to be chosen by you.

O happy begun freedom, the beginning of all my good,
and more worth to me than the whole world besides.
Had I never hindered your will from working in me,
what degrees of grace should I now have.
Yet where as yet am I?

My Jesus, forgive me,
remembering what you have done for me,
and where you have brought me,
and for this excess of goodness and love
let me no more hinder your love in me.