“Wonder-the enthusiastic ardor for the sublimity of being, for its worthiness to be an object of knowledge-promises to become the point of departure for genuine insight only where it has reached the stage in which the subject, overwhelmed by the object, has, as it were, fused into a single point or into nothing... like the movement of hope and love toward God, which is genuine and selfless only where it has assumed the attitude of pure worship of God for his own sake.”
![“Wonder is defined by Thomas [Aquinas] in the Summa Theologiae [I-II, Q. 32, a. 8], as the desiderium sciendi, the desire for knowledge, active longing to know.” quote by Josef Pieper](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/ffe/josef-pieper-11414_active_wonder-is-defined-by-thomas-aquinas-in-t_3069488.jpg)
![“Wonder [admiratio astonishment, marvel] is a kind of desire for knowledge. The situation arises when one sees an effect and does not know its cause, or when the cause of the particular effect is one that exceeds his power of understanding. Hence, wonder is a cause of pleasure insofar as there is…” quote by Thomas Aquinas](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/79f/thomas-aquinas-837_arise_wonder-admiratio-astonishment-marvel-is_1916754.jpg)
