Fishing

[poliphilo]

 I dreamed I was out in the desert- or among sand dunes- and a woman was telling me how she wasn't getting anywhere in her quest for God and I said,"It's like Evelyn Waugh says, once God has got his hook in you he'll play you like a fish and the end isn't in doubt." Then I went on to explain further how it might take many lifetimes- and a gnomelike little old man beside me said, "No need to overelaborate" and I told him to mind his own business. Then I apologised because he was right.

The line about God as a fisherman (though the dream has put its own spin on it) comes from Brideshead Revisited- but ultimately from "The Queer Feet", one of G.K. Chesterton's Father Brown stories...