What's eternity?  Without trying to answer this question directly, let's consider this quote from the Danish physicist Niels Bohr that, "A part of eternity lies in reach of those capable of staring, unblinking, at the sea's deranging expanses."

    Regardless of how we feel about the notion of eternity, we must admit that Bohrs has a fascinating point.  Living in a finite world, yet gripped daily by an urge to look beyond it, be it physically, culturally, or spiritually, we come to see that the only way we can legitimately do so is to stare down what we do not understand.  To stare it down until it crumbles, and to see in its crumbling clearer glimpses of the grand mysteries behind it.  We must break apart what we know to find what we do not.

    As long as we are creatures of finitude, there seems no other way to even begin to touch that from which it comes.  We step into the deranging expanses of the open seas before us, seeking to become, as it were, "insane."  We affirm the madness implicit in believing that life is only what we presently see.

    Personal transcendence or not, we can only touch eternity when we loose ourselves from the staid, settled, and certain.  And stare unblinkingly into the abyss of knowing.