The Saint Endeavors To Recover A Gift

Silence Is Not Weakness And Decency Is Not Pride

The Saint Endeavors To Recover A Gift Which He Has Lost; The Sinner Tries To Obtain Something Which Was Never His. In Brief, He Repeats The Fall.

It Appears To Me That It [sin] Is Simply An Attempt To Penetrate Into Another And Higher Sphere In A Forbidden Manner. You Can Understand Why It Is So Rare. There Are Few, Indeed, Who Wish To Penetrate Into Other Spheres, Higher Or Lower, In Ways Allowed Or Forbidden. Men, In The Mass, Are Amply Content With Life As They Find It. Therefore There Are Few Saints, And Sinners (in The Proper Sense) Are Fewer Still.

Here Then Is The Pattern In My Carpet, The Sense Of The Eternal Mysteries, The Eternal Beauty Hidden Beneath The Crust Of Common And Commonplace Things; Hidden And Yet Burning And Glowing Continually If You Care To Look With Purged Eyes.

It Was Better, He Thought, To Fail In Attempting Exquisite Things Than To Succeed In The Department Of The Utterly Contemptible.