Keeping the world from falling apart

I wonder if there are twenty men alive in the world who see things as they really are. That would mean that there are twenty men who were free, who were not dominated or even influenced by any attachment to any created thing or to their own selves or to any gift of God, even to the highest, the most supernaturally pure of his graces. I don't believe that there are twenty such men alive in the world. But there must be one or two. They are the ones who are holding everything together and keeping the universe from falling apart.

Thomas Merton, "Detachment," New Seeds of Contemplation, 1961