Life Began For Me, When I Ceased

Beautiful Women, Whose Beauty Meant More Than It Said... Was Their Brilliancy Always Fed By Something Coarse And Concealed? Was That Their Secret?

There Seemed To Be Nothing To See; No Fences, No Creeks Or Trees, No Hills Or Fields. If There Was A Road, I Could Not Make It Out In The Faint Starlight. There Was Nothing But Land: Not A Country At All, But The Material Out Of Which Countries Are Made.

The Soul Cannot Be Humbled By Fasts And Prayer; It Must Be Broken By Mortal Sin To Experience Forgiveness Of Sin And Rise To A State Of Grace. Otherwise, Religion Is Nothing But Dead Logic.

The Condition Every Art Requires Is, Not So Much Freedom From Restriction, As Freedom From Adulteration And From The Intrusion Of Foreign Matter.

The Great Fact In Life, The Always Possible Escape From Dullness, Was The Lake. The Sun Rose Out Of It, The Day Began There; It Was Like An Open Door That Nobody Could Shut. The Land And All Its Dreariness Could Never Close In On You. You Had Only To Look At The Lake, And You Knew You Would Soon Be Free.