sunday musings

Public opinion is a weak tyrant compared with our own private opinion. What a man thinks of himself, that is which determines, or rather indicates, his fate.

Think also, of the ladies of the land weaving toilet cushions against the last day, not to betray too green an interest in their fates! As if you could kill time without injuring eternity.

-Walden, Henry David Thoreau-


When I read Walden recently, during a literature binge I am prone to during the autumn months, this quote smacked me upside the head. When reading Walden before, in early summer when I was on a classical literature binge, it made me pause for an unusual amount of time. So important, and why? As if you could kill time...without injuring eternity.

I starred it and moved on, compelled to let it alone for the time being. Apparently today was the day for the full meaning of the quote to hit me square in the chest, THUMP. As if you could kill time. Without injuring eternity...

!!

!

killing time, injuring eternity, eternally

(when nothing divine, including time, including life)

(the concept: eternity ceases to be a question, doesn't it? Not even a relevant one, but even a concept, at base.)

(at base? always the base in life.)

(if you kill time, sure.)
(then, that's true.)

(and you lose eternity without realizing the loss at all)

(some consequences are quiet)
shh

(some consequences are quiet and carnivorous)
sh

This just poses a slew of questions, doesn't it? Uproots a whole closetful of guilt about the crime of intellectual adaptation?

So here we are sunday, we're intellectually adapting. bringing back some concepts into life alive living. amplifying quiet consequences.