"The real theme for me is about something much more permanent and difficult: Death and Immortality: the mystery of the love of the world in the hearts of a race 'doomed' to leave and seemingly lose it; the anguish in the hearts of a race 'doomed' not to leave it, until its whole-evil aroused story is complete. But if you have now read Vol III and the story of Aragorn, you will have perceived that. (This story is in an appendix, because I have told the whole tale more or less through 'hobbits'; and that is because another main point in the story for me is the remark of Elrond in Vol. I: 'Such is oft the course of the deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the are elsewhere.' Though equally important is Merry's remark (Vol III): 'the soil of the Shire is deep. Still there are things deeper and higher; and not a gaffer could tend his garden in what he calls peace, but for them.')" (Letter 186).
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"He was sent by a mere prudent plan of the angelic Valar or governors; but Authority had taken up this plan and enlarged it, at the moment of its failure."
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