James Agee, Novelist

"All that each person is, and experiences, and shall ever experience, in body and mind, all these things are differing expressions of himself and of one root, and are identical: and not one of these things nor one of these persons is ever quite to be duplicated, nor replaced, nor has it ever quite had prededent: but each is a new and incommunicably tender life, wounded in every breath and almost as hardly killed as easily wounded: sustaining, for a while, without defense, the enormous assaults of the universe."
(Quoted by Philip Yancey in "Soul Survivor")

Pause to reflect upon yourself, and upon the person next to you in the universe; Pause to reflect upon the victims of poverty, abuse, neglect, prejudice; Pause to reflect upon the sick, the dying, the mentally ill, the suicide. Pick any one individual out of this mass. Pick yourself or some stranger to you and see this person as one who is "never quite to be duplicated, nor replaced." Pick even your enemy or the enemy of your friend and see him or her in these terms. Can we treat with more care, respect, and awe the one who is "wounded in every breath?" Can we wonder at the fact that we are "as hardly killed as easily wounded?" Can we marvel at how the starving, impoverished, abandoned child, of some African nation can "sustain, for a while, without defense, the enormous assaults of the universe?" Biology is the least of our concerns in trying to explain the wonder and origin of the human spirit.