I Was Five Years Old The First

You Have Grudged The Very Fire In Your House Because The Wood Cost Overmuch!" He Cried. "you Have Grudged Life. To Live Cost Overmuch, And You Have Refused To Pay The Price. Your Life Has Been Like A Cabin Where The Fire Is Out And There Are No Blankets On The Floor." He Signaled To A Slave To Fill His Glass, Which He Held Aloft. "but I Have Lived. And I Have Been Warm With Life As You Have Never Been Warm. It Is True, You Shall Live Long. But The Longest Nights Are The Cold Nights When A Man Shivers And Lies Awake. My Nights Have Been Short, But I Have Slept Warm

The Most Beautiful Stories Always Start With Wreckage.

But This Is Not A World Of Free Freights. One Pays According To An Iron Schedule--for Every Strength The Balanced Weakness; For Every High A Corresponding Low; For Every Fictitious God-like Moment An Equivalent Time In Reptilian Slime. For Every Feat Of Telescoping Long Days And Weeks Of Life Into Mad Magnificent Instants, One Must Pay With Shortened Life, And, Oft-times, With Savage Usury Added.

He Had Come To Know Quite Thoroughly The World In Which He Lived. His Outlook Was Bleak And Materialistic. The World As He Saw It Was A Fierce And Brutal World, A World Without Warmth, A World In Which Caresses And Affection And The Bright Sweetness Of Spirit Did Not Exist.

Love, Genuine Passionate Love, Was His For The First Time.