Surprised by Joy

What I learned from the Idealists (and still most strongly hold) is this maxim: it is more important that Heaven should exist than that any of us should reach it. And so the great Angler played His fish and I never dreamed that the hook was in my tongue. But two great advances had been made. Bergson had showed me necessary existence; and from Idealism I had come one step nearer to understanding the words, ‘We give thanks to thee for thy great glory.’ The Norse gods had given me the first hint of it; but then I didn’t believe in them, and I did believe (so far as one can believe an Unding) in the Absolute.

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