Armistice Day

“A true friend of mankind whose heart has but once quivered in compassion over the sufferings of the people, will understand and forgive all the impassable alluvial filth in which they are submerged, and will be able to discover the diamonds in the filth.”

Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821 – 1881), Russian writer and journalist, born on this day

“What I eat is divine
What I drink is divine
My bed is also divine
The divine is here, and it is there
There is nothing empty of divine
Jani says — Vithabai [Vishnu] has filled
everything from the inside out.”

Sant Janābāi, 14th century Hindu poet

“Everything has its season.
All is change and decay:
In each blossom
is contained the russet browns
foretelling the year’s end…

Take each day, each hour, each second,
the only certainty change
and within each dying minute
our reverent acceptance of
the harbingers of renewal.”

Richard Bober, Unitarian Meditation Fellowship, quoted in Fragments of Holiness for Daily Reflection

“When psalms surprise me with their music
And antiphons turn to rum
The Spirit sings: the bottom drops out of my soul
And from the center of my cellar Love, louder than thunder
Opens a heave of naked air…

The whole
World is secretly on fire. The stones
Burn, even the stones
They burn me. How can a man be still or
Listen to all things burning? How can he dare
To sit with them when
All their silence
Is on fire?

Be still
Listen to the stones of the wall
Be silent, they try
To speak your
Name.
Listen
To the living walls.
Who are you?
Who
Are you? Whose
Silence are you?”

Thomas Merton (1915 – 1968), Trappist monk, theologian, social activist and poet

“The Four Conditions of Happiness:
Life in the open air,
Love for another being,
Freedom from ambition,
Creation.”

Albert Camus, writer, philosopher, dramatist, journalist and political activist (1913 – 1960), born on this day

“Don’t trust in your reputation, money, or position, but in the strength that is yours – namely, your judgments about the things that you control and don’t control. For this alone is what makes us free and unfettered, that picks us up by the neck from the depths and lifts us eye to eye with the rich and powerful.”

From the Discourses of Epictetus (50 – 135)

“This is the very thing which makes up the virtue of the happy person and a well-flowing life – when the affairs of life are in every way tuned to the harmony between the individual divine spirit and the will of the director of the universe.”

Chrysippus, Greek Stoic philosopher (279 – 206 BC)

“This is the work
of the Sabbath.
All creatures flowering
out of themselves, a rose,
star pollen galaxy,
blue-green egg
in a well woven nest,
the little earth
in its swirl of distances.
This the work
of the effortless.
A prophet does not see
into the future.
A prophet sees
deeply
into the present moment.”

Fred LaMotte

“Drifter, on your feet, get moving!
You still have time, go look for the Friend.
Make yourself wings, take wing and fly.
You still have time, go look for the Friend.

Charge your bellows with breath
like the blacksmith taught you.
That’s how you turn your iron to gold.
You still have time, go look for the Friend…

I trapped my breath in the bellows of my throat:
a lamp blazed up inside, showed me who I really was.
I crossed the darkness holding fast to that lamp,
scattering its light-seeds around me as I went.

Wear the robe of wisdom,
brand Lalla’s words on your heart,
lose yourself in the soul’s light,
you too shall be free.”

Lalleshwari, aka Lal Ded, Kashmiri poet mystic (1320 – 1392)

“As we slowly tread towards winter,
let us learn how to befriend darkness.
May we find our way in the night and welcome the shapes we see.
Let us honour the voices of our ancestors,
and the faces of friends lost through death or conflict.
May we hear their whispers of wisdom,
of laughter and of love.
May their courage to live life fully
provide energy for our dance on the edge of fear.”

John Harley, Unitarian minister, quoted in Fragments of Holiness for Daily Reflection