Today, a calligrapher whom I commissioned to do some special work for me asked for the full quote, “Sit finis libri, non finis qaerendi.” She wanted to know where that came from and who wrote it for attribution. All of this invited to think of the whole quote and the one which continues to inspire and animate me as it did in the fall of 1978 when I first read it.
“But you shall taste the true solitude of My anguish and My poverty and I shall lead you into the high places of My joy and you shall die in Me and find all things in My mercy which has created you for this end, and brought you from Prades to Bermuda to St. Antonin to Oakham to London to Cambridge to Rome to New York to Columbia to Corpus Christi and St Bonaventure to the Cistercian abbey of the poor men who labor in Gethsemani: that you may become the brother of God and learn to know the Christ of the burnt men. Sit finis libri, non finis qaerendi.” — Thomas Merton in “The Seven Storey Mountain.”