On Illuminations, a Passage -- by Alex Ranieri

The eye strains to fit through the aperture of an illumination; but how richly is the triumphant mind rewarded. She has slipped through the eye of a needle into heaven; before her lies a realm where men and women are more lustrous than pearls, and jewels themselves surpass any cut by mortal hand. And yet, did not a mortal hand make this? And did he afterwards turn on his paradise a critical eye, faulting it for its dissonance with imagination? Or did he cast from himself all authorship with all fault, and thank God?