When we experience the Beautiful,
there is a sense of homecoming.
Some of our most wonderful memories are beautiful places
where we felt immediately at home.
We feel most alive in the presence of the Beautiful for it meets the needs of our soul.
For a while the strains of struggle and endurance are relieved
and our frailty is illuminated by a different light
in which we come to glimpse behind the shudder of appearances and sure form of things.
In the experience of beauty we awaken and surrender in the same act.
Beauty brings a sense of completion and sureness.
Without any of the usual calculation,
we can slip into the Beautiful with the same ease
as we slip into the seamless embrace of water;
something ancient within us already trusts that this embrace will hold us."
John O'Donohue