Lonely Cottage

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  “Among the few features of agricultural England which retain an appearance but little modified by the lapse of centuries, may be reckoned the high, grassy and furzy downs, coombs, or ewe-leases, as they are indifferently called, that fill a large area of certain counties in the south and south-west. If any mark of human occupation is met with hereon, it usually takes the form of the solitary cottage of some shepherd. Fifty years ago such a lonely cottage stood on such a down, and may possibly be standing there now. In spite of its loneliness, however, the spot, by actual measurement, was not more than five miles from a county-town. Yet that affected it little. Five miles of irregular upland, during the long inimical seasons, with their sleets, snows, rains, and mists, afford withdrawing space enough to isolate a Timon or a Nebuchadnezzar; much less, in fair weather, to please that less repellent tribe, the poets, philosophers, artists, and others who “conceive and meditate of ple...

Amor Fati: Waiting

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 “Have we recognized that our body is the temple of the Holy Ghost? If so, we must be careful to keep it undefiled for Him. We have to remember that our conscious life, though it is only a tiny bit of our personality, is to be regarded by us as a shrine of the Holy Ghost. He will look after the unconscious part that we know nothing of; but we must see that we guard the conscious part for which we are responsible.” (Oswald Chambers, “My Utmost for His Highest”)



“The Father in heaven is so interested in His child and so longs to have his life in His will and His love at every step that He is willing to keep his guidance in His own hand. He knows that we are unable to do what is holy and heavenly except as He works it in us, so His very demands become promises of what He will do in watching over and leading us all the day. Not only in special difficulties and times of perplexity, but also in the common course of everyday life, we may count upon Him to teach us His way and show us His path.” (Andrew Murray, “Waiting on God”)

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