“Mud is mankind in the moulding,
Heaven's mystery unfolding.”

Preface to Das Lied Von Bernadette [The Song of Bernadette] (1941)

Written on the Ninth Day of the Ninth Month of the Year yi-yu (A.D. 409)
Translated by William Acker
Context: Slowly, slowly,
the autumn draws to its close.
Cruelly cold
the wind congeals the dew.
Vines and grasses
will not be green again—
The trees in my garden
are withering forlorn.
The pure air
is cleansed of lingering lees
And mysteriously,
Heaven's realms are high.
Nothing is left
of the spent cicada's song,
A flock of geese
goes crying down the sky.
The myriad transformations
unravel one another
And human life
how should it not be hard?
From ancient times
there was none but had to die,
Remembering this
scorches my very heart.
What is there I can do
to assuage this mood?
Only enjoy myself
drinking my unstrained wine.
I do not know
about a thousand years,
Rather let me make
this morning last forever.

Sir Harry Johnston Liberia (1906), vol. 1, p. 257.
Criticism of The Martyrdom of Man

Source: Don Quixote de la Mancha (1605–1615), Part II (1615), Book III, Ch. 58.

As quoted in A Dictionary of Thoughts : Being a Cyclopedia of Laconic Quotations from the Best Authors, Both Ancient and Modern (1891) edited by Tryon Edwards. p. 327.
1890s and attributed from posthumous publications

Josh Billings: His Works, Complete (1873)

"The Holy Dimension", p. 341
Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity: Essays (1997)