Will of God

May the most just, most high, and most amiable will of God be done in all things; may it be praised and magnified forever.

(Pius VII, May 19, 1818.)

I would always rather be happy than dignified.
--Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

If I Should Learn

If I should learn, in some quite casual way,
That you were gone, not to return again --
Read from the back-page of a paper, say,
Held by a neighbor in a subway train,
How at the corner of this avenue
And such a street (so are the papers filled)
A hurrying man, who happened to be you,
At noon today had happened to be killed --
I should not cry aloud -- I could not cry
Aloud, or wring my hands in such a place --
I should but watch the station lights rush by
With a more careful interest on my face;
Or raise my eyes and read with greater care
Where to store furs and how to treat the hair.
--Edna St. Vincent Millay