Commonplace Book

'Prayer was one of his hobby-horses over long glasses of coffee until two.

He would ask his listeners to notice the surge of the old prayers, how they contained the double emphasis of diminution and expansion, humility and eternity for each self, "We thine unworthy servants..." on the one hand, and "for ever and ever, amen," on the other. Didn't we all want to unload the burden of pretence about ourselves, be dust now, but also didn't we also want to feel "for ever and ever," feel we belong more than momentarily to an elusive essence which can never be dust[?]

And on war, in which he had played such a striking role, he would say, "It destroys life prematurely, but it puts in the way of millions a chance to show love as they might never otherwise have done. Those that volunteer to do jobs in which they may die may experience a feeling of sublime generosity which elevates life and differs them from Christ only in degree. Not all who were brave were in search of the bubble reputation. There are other struggles," he said, with his eyes glowing in his pale face, "which are the only important ones. And they are not international - they are internal. And now it is the curse of the atom bomb that it has promoted war to a false position, promoted it to the place of the greatest collective evil imaginable. It is not that. Indeed it may soon prove a device of nature to restore harmony which we have lost because we can analyse more than we can love. You must never, never analyse more than you can love."'

from A Share of the World by Hugo Charteris (Part Two, Chapter 5)