A Pause For Beauty
One ought every day at least to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture,
and if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.
- Goethe
. . .
To let the spiritual,
unbidden and unconscious,
grow up through the common.
Nothing ever gets anywhere. The earth keeps turning round and round and round and gets nowhere. The moment is the only thing that counts.
- Jean Cocteau
My Symphony
To live content with small means.
To seek elegance rather than luxury,
and refinement rather than fashion.
To be worthy not respectable,
and wealthy not rich.
To study hard, think quietly, talk gently,
act frankly, to listen to stars, birds, babes,
and sages with open heart, to bear all cheerfully,
do all bravely, await occasions, hurry never.
In a word, to let the spiritual,
unbidden and unconscious,
grow up through the common.
This is to be my symphony.
- William Henry Channing