The curt truth is that, in a deep secret way, the state of being beloved is intolerable to many. The beloved fears and hates the lover, and with the best of reasons. For the lover is forever trying to strip bare his beloved. The lover craves any possible relation with the beloved, even if this experience can cause him only pain.
All things are void. So how possibly could there be any obscurations since everything is void, when you're void itself? There's only the void. In the void, there's only shining, perfect clear light of reality.
The lover's pleasure is in the pleasure of the beloved. The lover is satisfied when the beloved is fed. The lover is vain when the beloved is adorned.
Full many mischiefs follow cruel wrath;
Abhorred bloodshed and tumultuous strife
Unmanly murder and unthrifty scath,
Bitter despite, with rancor's rusty knife;
And fretting grief the enemy of life;
All these and many evils more, haunt ire.
O Earth, so full of dreary noises!
O men, with wailing in your voices!
O delved gold, the wader's heap!
O strife, O curse, that o'er it fall!
God makes a silence through you all,
And "giveth His beloved, sleep.
The simplified life is a sanctified life, Much more calm, much less strife. Oh, what wondrous truths are unveiled- Projects succeed which had previously failed. Oh, how beautiful life can be, Beautiful simplicity.
Oh, night that guided me, Oh, night more lovely than the dawn,Oh, night that joined Beloved with lover, Lover transformed in the Beloved!
As that gallant can best affect a pretended passion for one woman who has no true love for another, so he that has no real esteem for any of the virtues can best assume the appearance of them all.
Love just seems to make life not just livable, but a gallant, gallant event.
Lovers cannot imagine any opposition, no matter how small, to the beloved. They cannot endure to see the beloved veiled by something that causes Him to be forgotten. Moreover, lovers regard as futile any speech not about the beloved, and any act not related to Him as ingratitude and disloyalty.
For certainly there cannot be a higher pleasure than to think that we love and are beloved by the most amiable and best Being.
The house of a childless person is a void, all directions are void to one who has no relatives, the heart of a fool is also void, but to a poverty stricken man all is void.
Full many a lady I have eyed with best regard, and many a time Th' harmony of their tongues hath into bondage Brought my too diligent ear; for several virtues Have I liked several women; never any With so full soul but some defect in her Did quarrel with the noblest grace she owed, And put it to the foil.
Oh my only friend, my best beloved, the gates are open in my house—do not pass by like a dream.
I have such a fantastic life that I feel an overwhelming sense of gratitude for it. . . . But I don't have anyone to express my gratitude to. This is a void deep inside me, a void of wanting someone to thank, and I don't see any plausible way of filling it.
Lenten practices of giving up pleasures are good reminders that the purpose of life is not pleasure. The purpose of life is to attain to perfect life, all truth and undying ecstatic love - which is the definition of God. In pursuing that goal we find happiness. Pleasure is not the purpose of anything; pleasure is a by-product resulting from doing something that is good. One of the best ways to get happiness and pleasure out of life is to ask ourselves, 'How can I please God?' and, 'Why am I not better?' It is the pleasure-seeker who is bored, for all pleasures diminish with repetition.