Commonplace Book

'...As for me, I have the Kirk a generation back - further back still, John Knox, beaten up in the galleys - and Glyndwr was Chapel till three years ago, and now neither of us are even vaguely deists. But the forms and the words are familiar to us. A century ago, in the dark times after the Napoleonic wars, the hungry 'forties, this man and I would have prayed together. As it was, we discussed Marxism ; but there's nothing in that but a difference of time. No, there is a difference. One way is looking out at a reflection of oneself in the empty skies ; the other way is looking inward at mankind, and the laws that govern the thoughts and action of men. But the intensity of looking, though not the same way, has the same effect on the soul.'

from Naomi Mitchison's Vienna Diary (March 14th)