Death, be not proud, though some have called thee/ Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so ;/ For those, whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,/ Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me./ From rest and sleep, which but thy picture[s] be,/ Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow,/ And soonest our best men with thee do go,/ Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery./ Thou'rt slave to Fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,/ And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,/ And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well,/ And better than thy stroke ; why swell'st thou then ?/ One short sleep past, we wake eternally,/ And Death shall be no more ; Death, thou shalt die.
~Holy Sonnet X, John Donne

Monday, August 8, 2011

"The going itself is the path."

"'I thought', she said, 'that I was carried in the will of Him I love, but now I see that I walk with it. I thought that the good things He send me drew me into them as the waves lift the islands; but now I see that it is I who plunge into them with my own legs and arms, as when we go swimming. I feel as if I were living in that roofless world of yours where men walk undefended beneath naked heaven. It is a delight with terror in it! One's own self to be walking from one good to another, walking beside Him as Himself may walk, not even holding hands. How has He made me so separate from Himself? How did it enter His mind to conceive such a thing? The world is so much larger than I thought. I thought we went along paths- but it seems there are no paths. The going itself is the path."

-from Perelandra, by C. S. Lewis
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