In Thy light do we see light. (Psalm 36:10)

  from A Very Honorable Guy,  Damon Runyon OFF and on I know Feet Samuels a matter of eight or ten years, up and down Broadway, and in and out, but I never have much truck with him because he is a guy I consider no dice..... He asks me if I happen to have a finnif on me, but of course I am not giving finnifs to guys like Feet Samuels, and finally he offers to compromise with me for a deuce, so I can see things must be very bad with Feet for him to come down from five dollars to two. “My rent is away overdue for the shovel and broom,” Feet says, “and I have a hard-hearted landlady who will not listen to reason. She says she will give me the wind if I do not lay something on the line at once. Things are never so bad with me,” Feet says, “and I am thinking of doing something very desperate.” I cannot think of anything very desperate for Feet Samuels to do, except maybe go to work, and I know he is not going to do such a thing no matter what happens. In fact, in all the years I am...

  Christ as Savior, Andrei Rublev Matthew 16:24-25: Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? “You made us for yourself, and our hearts find no peace until they rest in you.” St. Augustine “To be Christian, to believe in Christ, means and has always meant this: to know in a transrational and yet absolutely certain way called faith, that Christ is the Life of all life, that He is Life itself and, therefore, my life. “In him was life; and the life was the light of men.” All Christian doctrines—those of the incarnation, redemption, atonement—are explanations, consequences, but not the “cause” of that faith. Only when we believe in Christ do all these affirmations become “valid” and “consistent.” But faith itself is the acceptance ...

  William Wordsworth (1770—1850)  I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud  I wandered lonely as a cloud  That floats on high o’er vales and hills,  When all at once I saw a crowd,  A host, of golden daffodils;  Beside the lake, beneath the trees,  Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.  Continuous as the stars that shine  And twinkle on the milky way,  They stretched in never-ending line  Along the margin of a bay:  Ten thousand saw I at a glance,  Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.  The waves beside them danced; but they  Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:  A poet could not but be gay,  In such a jocund company:  I gazed—and gazed—but little thought  What wealth the show to me had brought:  For oft, when on my couch I lie  In vacant or in pensive mood,  They flash upon that inward eye  Which is the bliss of solitude;  And then my heart with pleasure fills,  And d...

  Robert Burns, 1759-1796  “Many and sharp the num’rous ills    Inwoven with our frame!    More pointed still we make ourselves,  Regret, remorse, and shame!  And man, whose heav’n-erected face  The smiles of love adorn, —   Man’s inhumanity to man    Makes countless thousands mourn! Robert Burns, from Man was made to Mourn - A Dirge To a Mouse Wee, sleekit, cow’rin, tim’rous beastie,  O, what a panic’s in thy breastie!  Thou need na start awa sae hasty,                 Wi’ bickering brattle!  I wad be laith to rin an’ chase thee,                 Wi’ murd’ring pattle!  I’m truly sorry man’s dominion,  Has broken nature’s social union,  An’ justifies that ill opinion,                 Which makes thee startle  At me, thy poor, earth-born companion,  ...