Commonplace Book

  Robert McGuiness "Reason sits firm and holds the reigns...I shall follow the guiding of that still small voice which interprets the dictates of conscience." “I can live alone, if self-respect, and circumstances require me so to do. I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. I have an inward treasure born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld, or offered only at a price I cannot afford to give.” Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte I always thought it was Jane who made that first remark, but no, it's Rochester, describing Jane's character. Jane thoroughly impressed me as a young girl, and was always at the back of my mind as an example of true strength and beauty. Personally I don't think we can overestimate the value of a female protagonist who is described as "plain" yet is full of life, intelligence and inner strength. In an image-obsessed world, I find her unutterably refreshing.  Rereadi...

"In laughter we transcend not only the animals but also ourselves and our circumstances. We transcend disappointment and suffering. We transcend the jumbled contradictions of our lives. We transcend even the self-imposed requirement that life always make sense, conform to a plan, work out, give us our due, or be equitable and just." The Comic Vision & the Christian Faith: A Celebration of Life and Laughter, M. Conrad Hyers     " This [comedy] is the ultimate human transubstantiation, the true test of the alchemy of the human spirit...It is as though in some sacred sense this world for all its inequalities and this body for all its frailties and this time for all its inconsequentia is where one ought to be. It is as though life were intrinsically holy, and that to fail to savor it, rejoice in it, and be humored by it would be a great sacrilege." M. Conrad Hyers Transcendence, alchemy - no big thing.  I like that, " the sel...