34. The devil fills hearts empty of divine love.—By the name of the north, in sacred eloquence the devil is wont to be called, who, that he might bind the hearts of the nations with the cold of torpor, said: 'I will sit on the mount of the testament, in the sides of the north' (Isaiah XIV, 13). He is stretched out over the void, because he possesses those hearts which are not filled by the grace of divine love. But nevertheless it lies within the power of almighty God to fill even the vessels of the devil, empty of all virtues, with the gift of his grace, and to place in them the solidity of divine strength, whom he sees strengthened by no action of uprightness. Whence aptly it is subjoined: