Some things in nature will always remain a mystery, even to the brightest minds and boldest explorers. Human knowledge has limits it cannot cross. Universal knowledge belongs to God alone.

And if this is true of things we can see and touch, how much more true is it of spiritual and eternal matters? Why, then, have I been torturing my brain with speculations about destiny and will, fixed fate and human responsibility? These deep, dark truths are as far beyond my grasp as the ocean depths from which the seas draw their waters.

Why am I so desperate to know the reasons behind God's providence? The motives for his actions? The purpose of his trials? Shall I ever be able to clasp the sun in my fist? Hold the universe in my palm? Yet these are as a drop in a bucket compared with the Lord my God.

Let me not strive to understand the infinite, but spend my strength in love! What I cannot gain by intellect I can possess by affection—and let that suffice me.

I cannot penetrate the heart of the sea, but I can enjoy the healthful breezes that sweep over its surface. I can sail its blue waves with favorable winds. And even if I could enter the springs of the sea, what good would it do? It would not save the sinking ship or give back the drowned mariner to his weeping wife and children. Neither would solving deep mysteries avail me a single bit—for the least love to God, and the simplest act of obedience to him, are better than the profoundest knowledge.

My Lord, I leave the infinite to you. Keep me from such a love for the tree of knowledge as might keep me from the tree of life.