19 DECEMBER 1992, Page 77

Meditation

What we call purity lives in the eyes of animals.

Reality which strikes us as a revelation is always joyous, holy, and simple as grass. If it is true that our desire brings misery, if to be human is to desire, then the only way is to desire nothing.

If death is the debt we all pay, how precious the loan of life becomes. Almost as precious as death.

To have the door slammed on us by our own hand is to know at last the horror of time.

Philip Callow