Starry, starry night

After he heard the learn’d astronomer explain the mechanics and meaning of the universe, Walt Whitman penned these perspicacious words: I..."looked up in perfect silence at the stars." Biking for exercise while dying (Randy Pausch) or biking as the ultimate challenge while living ( Kathy Roche-Wallace) reflects a choice that, co-author of Pausch’s book, The Last Lecture, Jeff Zaslow, believes was made by an "optimist, realist, scientist." Both cyclists could have used a dose of Walt Whitman’s awe. The final cause for living would then be revealed. Life is worth living only for God, not for self. "There are virtues which become crimes by exaggeration," Dumas warns in The Count of Monte Cristo." Optimists, realists or scientists testing the limits of endurance would be better served - ultimately - by testing their limits with a leap of Faith. Somehow when I read about some earthly heroes, I get no sense of the divine.