When I look into the fishponds in my garden,
(And not mine only, for every garden is riddled
With eel holes and reflected moons), methinks
I see a Thing armed with a rake that seems,
Out of the ooze, out of the immanence
Among the eels of heaven, to strike at me —
At Me the holy, Me divine! And yet
How tedious is a guilty conscience! How
Tedious, for that matter, an unguilty one!
What wonder if the horror of the fishponds
Draws us toward the rake? And the Thing strikes,
And I, the uneasy Person, in the mud,
Or in the liquid moonlight, thankfully
Find others than myself to have that blind
Or radiant being.

— Aldous Huxley, Ape and Essence