Time: the Angel of Humankind

 This week's quotation is by the 18th century German playwright and poet, Friedrich Schiller. He wrote, "Time is the angel of man." Which I have translated as humankind.

And it has left me scratching my head - what does he mean?  Is the knowledge that we have limited time on this earth, and so we had better make the best of it, the angel? Or the message from the angel? 

Or does he mean that time is a gift from God, as the messages of angels often are?

Or that the things we experience in time can be messages from the Divine?

I think I'm going to go with the first one that occurred to me: that we need to be aware that our time on earth is limited - each of us has exactly 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and a limited span of life on earth. So it is up to us to make the best use of it we can, doing things which nourish our bodies, minds and souls and those of others. 

Because I do believe that wasting time can be seen as a sin. I have blogged about this before. It is up to us to make the best use of the time that we have, because we never know when or if that time may be cut short... by illness, or injury, or even untimely death. 

The greatest regret we may experience at the end of our lives is that we did not spend our time wisely, being our best selves, doing what we can to make the world we live in and those around us happier, more contented. Then one day, that opportunity may be taken from us, never to return...

So let us resolve to make the best of the time that we have, to spend it wisely, so that when our time to leave comes, we can give up our mortality contentedly, knowing that our sojourn on this earth has made it a slightly better place, for ourselves, for other human beings and for all living creatures.