More Fragments

I am a moth encircling a flame;
deterred by the heat from merging with the fire,
but incapable of parting from the light.

I'm learning to claim victory when my ego is defeated;
to relish a sweet aftertaste when my pride is bitterly stung.

What we call "preaching", the wise call "speaking".
If we aren't being accused of preaching,
we probably aren't saying anything.

It is easy to forgive a sin when it is overshadowed by a graver sin;
we would damn Peter and his denial without Judas and his betrayal.

The answers we give are never so revealing, enlightening, nor damning,

than the reasons we possess for answering as we do.

God is a great mystery because of the world,
and the world is a great mystery because of God.

That love exists -- 
that even the notion of love exists,
is proof that God exists, and that he loves us.

Look with the heart. Listen with the heart.
Think with the heart. Speak with the heart. Act with the heart.
All our faculties should be loyal subjects of the heart, who is their queen.

We are wiser than we know, but we dismiss our intuitions,
and let our passions carry us where they will.

While honoring truth as a noble ideal, it is equally important to remember that it is not static, like a destination, but dynamic, like a journey. Truth is not less subjective than objective. What this means is that each of us must progress at our own pace, not attempting to run ahead of ourselves; -- for that is to run ahead of the truth.

However incredible our pleasures, however fantastic our joys, however powerful our loves, however cherished our sentiments connected to hearth and home, -- nothing in our lives compares to the common experiences of sainthood; to the exquisite voluptuousness of being caught up, lifted out of oneself, and hurled into a whirlwind of divine effulgence; pierced, showered, and shattered by grace. Our gr

eatest natural successes cannot disfigure the reality as it appears in the supernatural light of heaven. We are failed saints; botched experiments at loftiness, salt without savour, fit only to be pitied and trodden upon by souls of keener quality than ourselves. If the realization of this fact does not pulverize and obliterate every idol erected by vanity, reducing our pretensions to nothing, to the fine ash of purest humility, then we are indeed lost; stricken; strangled in mediocrity; settled on something less than we were made for; dislocated utterly from the Absolute, which alone ought to inspire in us the most awful wonder, and the most wonderful awe. Our lives should be fodder. His to make, demolish, and remake. We should lust for our own destruction, and for the destruction of all that we have thought, amassed, and put into effect, if it is true (as it surely is) that such utter desolation is the only thing capable of heralding the rebirth of a Christian instinct.

Mankind harbors a sneaking suspicion that the deepest emotions, insights, and perceptions to which he is sensitive have already occurred to him, and are present in his earliest memories. The aim of all culture is to make infancy articulate.