The Dazzling Presence of the All

"The first time it happened, I was in a forest in the north of France.  I must have been twenty-five or twenty-six.  I had just been hired to teach high school philosophy in a town on the edge of a canal, up in the fields near the Belgian border.  That particular evening, some friends and I had gone out for a walk in the forest we liked so much.  Night had fallen.  We were walking.  Gradually our laughter faded, and the conversation died down.  Nothing remained but our friendship, our mutual trust and shared presence, the mildness of the night air and of everything around us ....  My mind empty of thought, I was simply registering the world around me―the darkness of the underbrush, the incredible luminosity of the sky, the fair sounds of the forest (branches snapping, an occasional animal call, our own muffled steps) only making the silence more palpable.  And, then, all of sudden.... What"  Nothing: Everything!  No words, no meanings, no questions, only―a surprise.  Only―this.  A seemingly infinite happiness.  A seemingly eternal sense of peace.  Above me, the starry sky was immense, luminous and unfathomable, and within me there was nothing but the sky, of which I was a part, and the silence, and the light, like a warm hum, and a sense of joy with neither subject or object (no object other than everything, no subject other than itself).  Yes, in the darkness of that night, I contained only the dazzling presence of the All.  Peace.  Infinite peace!  Simplicity, serenity, delight."
-  André Compte-Spoonville, The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality, p.155

Spirituality and Gardening

The Ways of Walking:  Quotations, Poetry, Sayings, Lore, Facts