Music is pleasing not only because of the sound but because of the silence that is in it: without the alternation of sound and silence there would be no rhythm.

Francis of Assisi on 31st Street. Merton began routinely praying but discontinued the practice after leaving the school. During his initial months of schooling Merton begged his father to remove him.

O. T. Merton was a keen proponent of interfaith understanding.