G.K. Chesterton reminds us in one of his puns that wonders will never be lacking in this world of ours; what is lacking is wonderment. We need not look beyond natural laws for wonders. Natural laws themselves are wonderful enough and worth wondering. Piet Hein writes:
We glibly talk of nature’s laws
But do things have a natural cause?
Black earth becoming yellow crocus
Is undiluted hocus-pocus.If you can’t wonder at what is natural, what would it take to make you wonder? As long as you are full of yourself, you are incapable of wonderment, and life seems empty. But in wonderment you lose yourself. “Lost, all lost in wonder,” you are emptied of your little self, and suddenly you realize how wonderful everything is, how full of wonder, how full
David Steindl-Rast beautifully and simply sums up our need to develop wonderment - ono of the great themes in the writing of Abraham Joshua Heschel - see as a starting point his 'Who is Man'.
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