As far as I'm concerned, I told you in what state I return to the front: I am now more clearly aware that my task for the rest of my life will be to develop within myself - humanly, faithfully, unwaveringly - that type of mysticism which leads a person to passionately seek God in the heart of every substance and every action (and at the same time to try to convey this mysticism to others as much as possible). I have never perceived so clearly as now that only God himself, not any personal efforts, can open our eyes to this light and preserve them for us...
(Pierre Teilhard de Chardin SJ /1881–1955/, letter from the front, to his cousin, March 19, 1917;
quoted from the book Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Birth of Thought. Letters 1914–1919, Malvern 2021)
