A Trifle from the Cloister

AMUSE BOUCHE

A trifle to amuse - found in reading about François Villon by Wyndham Lewis with preface by Hilaire Belloc -

                          "Au moistier voy dont suis paroissienne

                           Paradis paint, ou sont harpes et lus."

                          (Rossetti)

[Within my parish-cloister I behold

A painted Heaven where harps and lutes adore]

Perhaps referring to  the church of Celestines near the Bastille celebrated for its wall paintings of heaven and hell.

THOUGHTS FROM THE CLOISTER - SOLITUDE

On Solitude - One of the few gifts of La Peste

By all means use sometimes to be alone.

Salute thyself: see what thy soul doth wear.

Dare to look in thy chest; for ‘tis thine own:

And tumble up and down what thou find’st there.

  Who cannot rest till he good fellows find,

  He breaks up house, turns not out of doors his mind.

                                             Herbert, The Church Porch

Friends and companions get you gone!

‘Tis my desire to be alone;

Ne’er well, but when my thoughts and I

Do domineer in privacy.

                                  Burton, Anatomy of Melancholy

Two Paradises are in one,

To live in Paradise alone.

                   Marvel, The Garden

LIFE IN THE CLOISTER - READING IN THE CLOISTER

THE CLOISTER STUDY

                                                   BOOKS I'm reading



                                  My Cool Reading Sox

FROM THE CLOISTR _ MEDIATION ON WORRY

A mediation from the cloister:

The time of La Peste is a time of worry. We worry about our families, will the virus strike them? We worry about our futures - will I have a job, will I be able to put food on the table, will I pay my rent or mortgage? More broadly we worry about solutions: Will my government rise to the occasion and formulate a national plan to combat the pandemic. Will I receive a stimulus cheque, will I be able to pay my employees, will I be able to save my business.

And perhaps the most personal worry will I get sick? And if I do will I live or die?

We think this time of worry is unique to our time or generation(s), our country our city or town.  But even cursory contemplation in this time of isolation will enlighten us that we are not unique in worrying.

I have, with the silence of self isolation and abundant time in the cloister, been reading The Partridge Diaries. In particular my recent reading has been in Frances Partridge's war (WWII) diary. For her and for much of the world this was a time of extreme worry. When will the next raid be? Will a bomb drop on my house? Will my children survive? Should I send them into the country? Where can I buy food?  What went wrong in Libya? Will there be an invasion?

Partridge had these and other worries - 

In response she wrote the following I think to console herself and others about the futility of worry. Perhaps she was a stoic and perhaps we all should be. 

“We talk a good deal about the futility of worry. Well all I can say is if one can’t stop worrying one must just endure it, futile and also exhausting though it is. Any way time goes on passing inevitably, and will in the end carry one into the grave where worrying stops.”

Frances Partridge – War Diary 1942 17,9

We also must endure - in the sure and certain hope that there will be an end, that we will come through this and create a better time, a better country and better World.

In hope and faith,

THOUGHT FROM THE CLOISTER

Ralph & Frances Partridge

Ham Spray House Wiltshire

"...at others, that it has thrown out couch-grass roots to undermine our peace of mind, invisibly creeping and choking the sources of vitality and enjoyment. We live in the present, as if each day might be our last, and to some degree in the past. The future is so nebulous that one barely thinks about it, and those who die...seem to have forfeited nothing we have ourselves. Late tonight I thought again about invasion, not in the abstract but as a solid possibility."

Frances Partridge - War Diary - 1941

Her reflection here on here feelings about WWII and the possibility of invasion is also applicable to how we reflect on La Peste in our time now.

FRUITS FROM THE CLOISTER II

IF YOU FAIL TO SEEE WHO TRULY LOVES YOU THEN IT IS YOUR HEART THAT IS BLIND NOT YOUR EYES


WHAT WE HAVE LOVED BEST IS OFTEN WHAT WE HAVE LOST


LIFE AND LOVE ARE THE SUM OF MANY MOMENTS


PERFECTION IS SELDOM A VIRTUE BUT OFTEN A CURSE

FRUITS FROM THE CLOISTER

Silence and stillness are the parents of reflection.


Only in silence can you hear yourself think.


The purpose of life is to lay up memories - in the end they are all we have.


The past is a closed door  - a sealed room which only memory might open.


Cambridge was not just a place but a state of mind and a way to live.