He will wipe the tears from all faces.' It takes nothing from the loveliness of the verse to say that is exactly what will be required
Marilynne RobinsonRead
I like to read in my own house, in any of the rooms I always mean to paint or otherwise improve and never do. Every detail is so familiar to me that it makes almost no claim on my attention.
Interpretation
Finding joy in the familiarity of one's home can lead to a sense of contentment.
In this quote, Marilynne Robinson expresses the comfort and happiness she derives from reading in her own home, a space filled with potential yet untouched by her aspirations for improvement. The familiarity of her surroundings allows her to immerse herself in the act of reading, suggesting that true contentment can be found in simplicity and stability, despite unfulfilled dreams of making changes.
In practice
During a speech about the importance of spaces that inspire creativity, one could quote this to emphasize the comfort of familiarity.
He will wipe the tears from all faces.' It takes nothing from the loveliness of the verse to say that is exactly what will be required
It seems to me there is less meanness in atheism, by a good measure. It seems that the spirit of religious self-righteousness this article deplores is precisely the spirit in which it is written. Of course he's right about many things, one of them being the destructive potency of religious self-righteousness. (p. 146)
A narrow pond would form in the orchard, water clear as air covering grass and black leaves and fallen branches, all around it black leaves and drenched grass and fallen branches, and on it, slight as an image in an eye, sky, clouds, trees, our hovering faces and our cold hands.
The moon looks wonderful in this warm evening light, just as a candle flame looks beautiful in the light of morning. Light within light...It seems to me to be a metaphor for the human soul, the singular light within that great general light of existence.
There are worries that seem to me sustained by the love of worry. For example, that people are reading from screens, or listening to recorded books. Why scold the impulse to enjoy language and narrative in whatever form it takes?
Teaching is a distraction and a burden, but it's also an incredible stimulus. And a reprieve, in a way. When you're trying to work on something and it's not going anywhere, you can go to school and there's a two-and-a-half-hour block of time in which you can accomplish something.
The main thing is to get what little happiness there is out of life in this wartorn world because ‘these are the good old days’ now.
Mankind is engaged in an eternal quest for that ‘something else' he hopes will bring him happiness, complete and unending.For those individual souls who have sought and found God, the search is over: He is that Something Else.
I realized the more fun I had, the more relaxed I was working, the better I worked.
I have perceiv’d that to be with those I like is enough, To stop in company with the rest at evening is enough, To be surrounded by beautiful, curious, breathing, laughing flesh is enough, To pass among them, or touch any one, or rest my arm ever so lightly round his or her neck for a moment—what is this, then? I do not ask any more delight—I swim in it, as in a sea.
The moment I stopped spending so much time chasing the big pleasure of life. I began to enjoy the little ones, like watching the stars dancing in moonlit sky or soaking in the sunbeams of a glorious summer morning.
Happiness is being at peace, being with loved ones, being comfortable...but most of all, it's having those loved ones.
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