The creation by word-power of something out of nothing — what is that but magic? And, may I add, what is that but literature? - Aldous Huxley

Not so much like drops of water, though water, it is true, can wear holes in the hardest granite; rather, drops of liquid sealing-wax, drops that adhere, incrust, incorporate themselves with what they fall on, till finally the rock is all one scarlet blob.

My father considered a walk among the mountains as the equivalent of churchgoing.

As if one believed anything by instinct! One believes things because one has been conditioned to believe them. Finding bad reasons for what one believes for other bad reasons — that's philosophy. People believe in God because they've been conditioned to believe in God.