For man, the vast marvel is to be alive. For man, as for flower and beast and bird, the supreme triumph is to be most vividly, most perfectly alive. Whatever the unborn and dead may know, they cannot know the beauty, the marvel of being alive in the flesh. The dead may look after the afterwards. But the magnificent here and now of life in the flesh is ours, and ours alone and ours only for a time. We ought to dance with rapture that we should be alive and in the flesh, and part of the living incarnate cosmos. I am part of the sun as my eye is part of me. That I am part of the earth, my feet know perfectly, and my blood is part of the sea. My soul knows that I am part of the human race, my soul is an organic part of the great human soul, as my spirit is part of my nation. In my very own self, I am part of my family. There is nothing of me that is alone and absolute except my mind, and we shall find that the mind has no existence by itself, it is only the glitter of the sun on the surface of the waters. 
     - D.H. Lawrence, Apocalypse

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From the Amazon description of the book:

Written while he was dying, Apocalypse is Lawrence’s final book. In it, he presents both a radical criticism of our civilization and a statement of unwavering belief in man’s power to create “a new heaven and a new earth.”

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I’m working on an updated edition of our best-seller, now sold out, The Heron Dance Book Of Love And Gratitude. My tentative title for the new edition:

Meditations on Gratitude:
The Beauty And Mystery of Life