Review of the Day

Like many stepped in the Ignatian tradition, my daily prayer includes an Examen, a means of prayerful reflection on the events of the day to detect God’s presence.

I don’t know if George Eliot prayed the Examen, but her poem, Count That Day Lost offers a simple examination of our day.

If you sit down at set of sun
And count the acts that you have done,
And, counting, find
One self-denying deed, one word
That eased the heart of him who heard,
One glance most kind
That fell like sunshine where it went —
Then you may count that day well spent.

But if, through all the livelong day,
You’ve cheered no heart, by yea or nay —
If, through it all
You’ve nothing done that you can trace
That brought the sunshine to one face —
No act most small
That helped some soul and nothing cost —
Then count that day as worse than lost.

I pray we may all sit down at the end of today and count the day well spent.

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