"As
kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
As
tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones
ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's
Bow
swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each
mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals
out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves
— goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying
What I do is me: for that I came.
“I
say more: the just man justices;
Keeps
grace: that keeps all his goings graces;
Acts
in God's eye what in God's eye he is —
ChrÃst
— for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely
in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through
the features of men's faces.” —English Roman Catholic priest and poet Gerard Manley Hopkins
(1844–1889), “As Kingfishers Catch Fire,” in Gerard Manley Hopkins: Poems and Prose (Penguin Classics, 1985)
“Omnia
Christus est nobis! (Christ is everything for us!) If you want to heal a
wound, he is the physician; is you burn with fever, he is the fountain; if you
are oppressed by iniquity, he is justice; if you need help, he is strength; if
you fear death, he is life; if you desire heaven, he is the way; if you are in
darkness, he is the light. … Taste and see how good the Lord is. Blessed is the
man who hopes in him!”—St. Ambrose of Milan (ca. 340-397), De
virginitate (“On Virginity”), in St. Ambrose: Selected Works and Letters, translated
by the Rev. H. de Romestin, The Rev. E. de Romestin, and the Rev. H. T. F.
Duckworth (1896)
“Look for yourself, and you will find in that long
run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for
Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else.” —British academic,
Christian apologist, and novelist C.S. Lewis (1898-1963), Mere Christianity (1952)
"As
kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
