There are men who dig for gold; [Monseigneur Bienvenu] dug for compassion. Poverty was his goldmine; and the universality of suffering a reason for the universality of charity. 'Love one another.' To him everything was contained in those words, his whole doctrine, and he asked no more. The senator to whom we have referred, the gentleman who thought himself a philosopher, once said to him, 'You see what the world is like, every man at war with every other, and victory to the strongest. Your "love one another" is pure folly.' - 'Well, if it is folly,' said Monseigneur without disputing the matter, 'then the soul must enclose itself within it like the pearl in the oyster.' Which is what he did.
Les Miserables, Book One: An Upright Man (Page 69)
23 May 2009
Wisdom of God; Foolishness of Man
More from Les Miserables:
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
LinkWithin
4 comments:
Beautiful quote, are you reading this? It's on my "list", but the list keeps growing :)
Yep, I'm reading it & making notes in my commonplace book. This is one of the ones that went in yesterday.
I love this book. It is a must read for our older children.
I am loving it too, and I suspect that Monkey will (someday) be required to read it. Gotta read the classics myself, so that I can teach them when the time comes!
Post a Comment