Bede Griffiths

I liked the solitude and silence of the woods and the hills.

I felt there the sense of a presence, something undefined and mysterious, which was reflected in the faces of the flowers and the movements of the birds and animals, in the sunlight falling through the leaves,

and in the sound of the running water, in the wind blowing on the hills and the wide expanse of earth and sky.

I was suddenly made aware of another world of beauty and mystery.

such as I had never imagined to exist, except in poetry.

It was as though I had begun to see and smell and hear for the first time.

The world appeared to me as Wordsworth describes,

with the glory and freshness of a dream.

The side of a wild rose growing on a hedge, the scent of lime tree blossoms, caught suddenly as I rode down a hill on a bicycle, came to me like visitations from another world.

But it was not only my senses that were awakened.

I experienced an overwhelming emotion in the presence of nature, especially at evening.

It began to have a kind of sacramental character for me.

I approached it with a sense of almost religious awe.

And in a hush that comes before sunset, I felt again the presence of an almost unfathomable mystery.

The song of the birds, the shape of the trees,

the colours of the sunset, were so many signs of the presence which seemed to be drawing me to itself.

I felt the need to surrender to the mother.

And this gave me the experience of being overwhelmed by love.

I realized that surrendering to death and dying to oneself is surrendering to total love.

I saw love as the basic principle of the whole universe.