" Yes, one has felt that—I have felt it myself. It is very dark, very terrible...'

'It was not dark—it was light—blinding light—there was no shelter—no cover—no shadow.'

'We mean the same thing, though. For you it was light that was terrible, because you had hidden so long under cover and in deep shade. But for me it was darkness, not seeing my way ,being lost in the night. But the agony is the same—it is the knowledge of one's own nothingness and of being cut off from the love of God.'

Joan said slowly, 'And then—it happened—like a miracle. I saw everything. Myself—and what I had been. All my silly pretences and shams fell away. It was like—it was like being born again... "

― Mary Westmacott , Absent in the Spring