[OFB Cafe] Who's Still on Here?

[Timothy Butler]

>
> An interesting question! My inclination is Christ or the Holy Spirit,
> but as you point out it may be a little out of time. I must check on
> Eliot's progress towards his eventual "Anglo-Catholic" beliefs, but  
> this
> would fit (but so would other interpretations- one of "The Kindly  
> Ones"
> perhaps!).

	I've been thinking about it, and I think Eliot is referring to Christ  
(or the Holy Spirit). It makes sense. It also makes sense that his  
conversion would start to appear in his poetry before anything public  
-- especially in a poem written as he regrouped his frayed psyche and  
sought for a new center of reality.

	Surely not the Kindly Ones!

	"I've never seen
       a tribe which could produce this company,
       a country which would admit with pride
       that it had raised them without paying a price,
       without regretting all the pain they cost."

> "The endless cycle of ideas and action,
> Endless invention, endless experiment,
> Brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness;
> Knowledge of speech, but not of silence;
> Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word"

	Indeed. "The world turns and the world changes/But one thing does not  
change."

	On another point, somewhat relatedly, Terence, is your nickname on  
here by any chance related to a certain man who liked to talk to his  
wine cups?

	"And fear not lest Existence closing your
	Account, and mine, should know the like no more;
	The Eternal Saki from that Bowl has pour'd
	Millions of Bubbles like us, and will pour."


	-Tim




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