History hangs detached somewhere in mid-air…

Like the knives and forks in the waiters’ hands that had not yet been separated, emotion and reason commingled in Honda; and not a single plan (a malicious tendency of reason) had been made—his will was still uninvolved. The pleasure which he had discovered at the end of his life entailed such an indolent abandonment of human will. As he thus relinquished it, the determination to engage himself in history that had so obsessed him since youth was also suspended in space, and history hung detached somewhere in mid-air.

Yukio Mishima, “The Temple of Dawn” (Chapter 41)

Mysteries and Miracles in an Ordered World…

He turned on all the lights, trying in vain to keep mystery at a distance. The miraculous had invaded his own ordered world, and he had no idea what might happen in the future…

…Such was the Buddhist explanation. Honda, of course, had once looked upon it as a mere fairy tale. And now all at once it had come to his mind. The process, he thought was certainly what mystery should be: something that arbitrarily made its appearance, independent of the wishes of any man. A dangerous gift. Like a shimmering sphere of changing colors, it came plunging into the midst of the cold but well-regulated structure of order and reason. Its colors, indeed, changed according to principle, but a principle that was entirely different from human reason. Hence the sphere had to be somewhat hidden from human eyes.

Yukio Mishima, “Runaway Horses” (Chapter 6)