TERMS STARTING WITH
benevolent ::: a. --> Having a disposition to do good; possessing or manifesting love to mankind, and a desire to promote their prosperity and happiness; disposed to give to good objects; kind; charitable.
benevolent spirits, familiars, or angels. Socrates had
Benevolent angel of death; instructor of
Benevolent Kings Sutra. See RENWANG JING.
Benevolent Kings Sutra
TERMS ANYWHERE
A benevolent genie (in Assyro-Babylonian mythology) holding in his hand the pail of lustral water and the
A benevolent genie (in Assyro-Babylonian
affection ::: n. --> The act of affecting or acting upon; the state of being affected.
An attribute; a quality or property; a condition; a bodily state; as, figure, weight, etc. , are affections of bodies.
Bent of mind; a feeling or natural impulse or natural impulse acting upon and swaying the mind; any emotion; as, the benevolent affections, esteem, gratitude, etc.; the malevolent affections, hatred, envy, etc.; inclination; disposition; propensity;
Ahura Mazda: Literally Lord of Knowledge. The chief benevolent deity of Zoroastrianism, personification of the Good, leader of the powers of light.
and benevolent angel and is asked to share with
Angel: A living creature of the spirit world, intermediate between gods and humans, and either friendly or hostile toward humanity. Angels belong to the class properly known as demons. In the monotheistic religions, the word angel is usually applied to the benevolent agents and messengers of God.
association ::: n. --> The act of associating, or state of being associated; union; connection, whether of persons of things.
Mental connection, or that which is mentally linked or associated with a thing.
Union of persons in a company or society for some particular purpose; as, the American Association for the Advancement of Science; a benevolent association. Specifically, as among the Congregationalists, a society, consisting of a number of ministers,
benevolent ::: a. --> Having a disposition to do good; possessing or manifesting love to mankind, and a desire to promote their prosperity and happiness; disposed to give to good objects; kind; charitable.
benevolent spirits, familiars, or angels. Socrates had
Benevolent angel of death; instructor of
Benevolent Kings Sutra. See RENWANG JING.
Benevolent Kings Sutra
benevolous ::: a. --> Kind; benevolent.
charitable ::: a. --> Full of love and good will; benevolent; kind.
Liberal in judging of others; disposed to look on the best side, and to avoid harsh judgment.
Liberal in benefactions to the poor; giving freely; generous; beneficent.
Of or pertaining to charity; springing from, or intended for, charity; relating to almsgiving; eleemosynary; as, a charitable institution.
charity ::: n. --> Love; universal benevolence; good will.
Liberality in judging of men and their actions; a disposition which inclines men to put the best construction on the words and actions of others.
Liberality to the poor and the suffering, to benevolent institutions, or to worthy causes; generosity.
Whatever is bestowed gratuitously on the needy or suffering for their relief; alms; any act of kindness.
Church of the SubGenius "body, humour" A mutant offshoot of {Discordianism} launched in 1981 as a spoof of fundamentalist Christianity by the "Reverend" Ivan Stang, a brilliant satirist with a gift for promotion. Popular among hackers as a rich source of bizarre imagery and references such as "Bob" the divine drilling-equipment salesman, the Benevolent Space Xists, and the Stark Fist of Removal. Much SubGenius theory is concerned with the acquisition of the mystical substance or quality of {slack}. {(http://sunsite.unc.edu/subgenius/slack.html)}. (1996-01-02)
Demon: While the term originally meant any superhuman being, benevolent or malevolent, lacking the dignity of a deity, it is customarily used today as meaning an evil entity, hostile to human beings.
druid ::: n. --> One of an order of priests which in ancient times existed among certain branches of the Celtic race, especially among the Gauls and Britons.
A member of a social and benevolent order, founded in London in 1781, and professedly based on the traditions of the ancient Druids. Lodges or groves of the society are established in other countries.
earnestly adjure you, O benevolent and amicable
Elf: A wandering nature-spirit appearing in unfrequented places; elves are believed to appear in tiny human forms, and generally to be mischievous, often benevolent and helpful.
gcod. (cho). A Tibetan term, from the verb "to cut" or "to sever;" a Tibetan tantric practice for severing attachment. The full name of the practice is bdud kyi gcod yul, or "the demon to be severed," and is a Tibetan tantric practice in which the meditator, through visualization, offers his or her body to an assembly of benevolent and malevolent deities as a means of accumulating merit and eliminating attachment to the body. The tradition of gcod, together with that of ZHI BYED or "pacification," is commonly classified among eight important tantric traditions and transmission lineages that spread throughout Tibet, the so-called "eight great conveyances that are lineages of achievement" (SGRUB BRGYUD SHING RTA CHEN PO BRGYAD). The practice was originally promulgated by the twelfth-century female adept MA GCIG LAB SGRON, who described it as a practice that severs (gcod) attachment to one's body, dualistic thinking, and conceptions of hope and fear. Although usually practiced by solitary meditators in isolated and frightening locations, gcod liturgies are also performed by monastic assemblies-both accompanied by the ritual music of the hand drum (see dAMARU) and the human leg-bone trumpet. The meditation, rooted in PRĀJNĀPĀRAMITĀ and MAHĀMUDRĀ, involves the visualized offering of the adept's body, flesh, blood, bones, and organs, as food for a vast assembly of beings, including local spirits and demons. It is also commonly used as a ritual for healing or protection.
gentleness ::: n. --> The quality or state of being gentle, well-born, mild, benevolent, docile, etc.; gentility; softness of manners, disposition, etc.; mildness.
good ::: superl. --> Possessing desirable qualities; adapted to answer the end designed; promoting success, welfare, or happiness; serviceable; useful; fit; excellent; admirable; commendable; not bad, corrupt, evil, noxious, offensive, or troublesome, etc.
Possessing moral excellence or virtue; virtuous; pious; religious; -- said of persons or actions.
Kind; benevolent; humane; merciful; gracious; polite; propitious; friendly; well-disposed; -- often followed by to or toward,
gracious ::: 1. Characterized by kindness and warm courtesy. 2. Pleasantly kind, benevolent, and courteous; charming and elegant. 3. Tender, mild, gentle. 4. Of a merciful or compassionate nature.
Gruagach: A benevolent but mischievous fairy of Scottish folklore.
Guide: While this term is frequently used in spiritualism and occultism in general as a synonym for control (q.v.), properly used it means a continual, benevolent, protective supermundane influence. (Control may be any communicator who happens to make contact with a medium.)
his office, is the benevolent angel of death, Azrael
humane ::: a. --> Pertaining to man; human.
Having the feelings and inclinations creditable to man; having a disposition to treat other human beings or animals with kindness; kind; benevolent.
Humanizing; exalting; tending to refine.
humanitarian ::: a. --> Pertaining to humanitarians, or to humanitarianism; as, a humanitarian view of Christ&
I kuan: The "one thread" or central principle that runs through the teachings of Confucius. See Chung yung. This is interpreted as The Confucian doctrine of being true to the principles of one's nature (chung) and the benevolent exercise of them in relation to others (shu), by Confucius' pupil, Tseng Tzu. The central principle of centrality and harmony (chung yung) by which all human affairs and natural phenomena may be understood. (Earlv Confucianism.) "Man and things forming one organic unity," there being no discrimination between the self and the non-self. (Ch'eng I-ch'uan, 1033-1107.) Sincerity (ch'eng), which is the way of Heaven, indestructible, by which all things are in their proper places. Sincerity is the thread that runs through all affairs and things, and being true to the principles of one's nature and the benevolent exercise of them in relation to others is the way to try to be sincere. (Chu Hsi, 1130-1200.) The "one" is the Great Ultimate in general and the "thread" is the Great Ultimate in each thing. (Chu Hsi.)
in Hinduism they were divine and benevolent
Jen: Man. Goodness; virtue in general; the moral principle; the moral ideal of the superior man (chun. tzu); the fundamental as well as the sum total of virtues, just as the Prime (yuan) is the origin and the vital force of all things --jen consisting of "man" and "two" and yuan consisting of "two" and "man". (Confucianism.) True manhood; man's character; human-heartedness; moral character; being man-like; "that by which a man is to be a man;" "realization of one's true self and the restoration of the moral order." (Confucius and Mencius.) "The active (yang) and passive (yin) principles are the way of Heaven; the principles of strength and weakness are the way of Earth; and true manhood and righteousness (i) are the way of Man." "True manhood is man's mind and righteousness is man's path." It is one of the three Universally Recognized Moral Qualities of man (ta te), the four Fundamentals of the Moral Life (ssu tuan), and the five Constant Virtues (wu ch'ang). True manhood and righteousness are the basic principles of Confucian ethics and politics. (Confucianism.) The golden rule; "Being true to the principles of one's nature (chung) and the benevolent exercise of them in relation to others (shu)." "The true man, having established his own character, seeks to establish the character of others; and having succeeded, seeks to make others succeed." (Confucius.) Love; benevolence; kindness; charity; compassion; "the character of the heart and the principle of love;" "love towards all men and benefit towards things." (Confucianism.) "Universal love without the element of self," (Chuang Tzu, between 399 and 295 B.C.) "Universal Love." (Han Yu, 767-824.) The moral principle with regard to others. "True manhood is the cardinal virtue by which others are pacified, whereas righteousness is the cardinal principle by which the self is rectified." It means "to love others and not the self." (Tung Chung-shu, 177-104 B.C.) Love of all men and things and impartiality and justice towards all men and things, this virtue being the cardinal virtue not only of man but also of the universe. "Love means to devote oneself to the benefit of other people and things." "Love implies justice, that is, as a man, treating others as men." "The true man regards the universe and all things as a unity. They are all essential to himself. As he realizes the true self, there is no limit to his love." (Ch'eng Ming-tao, 1032-1068.) "Love is the source of all laws, the foundation of all phenomena." "What is received from Heaven at the beginning is simply love, and is therefore the complete substance of the mind." "Love is the love of creating in the mind of Heaven and Earth, and men and other creatures receive it as their mind." (Chu Hsi, 1130-1200.)
Jinn, Jinni, Jinnee (Arabic) Jinnī, singular jinniy, plural jinn; also genii. In the Koran a class of beings, both male and female, between angels and human kind and represented as being created from smokeless fire, abounding particularly in desert places. Popularly jinn are regarded as being able to appear to mankind in the form of domestic animals or of human beings of gigantic size, the benevolent ones appearing in beautiful shape, the malevolent in horrible guise.
kindly ::: n. --> According to the kind or nature; natural.
Humane; congenial; sympathetic; hence, disposed to do good to; benevolent; gracious; kind; helpful; as, kindly affections, words, acts, etc.
Favorable; mild; gentle; auspicious; beneficent. ::: adv.
kindly ::: of a sympathetic, helpful, or benevolent nature..
kind ::: of a good, benevolent nature.
kind ::: superl. --> Characteristic of the species; belonging to one&
Larzod, and Arzal. They are “benevolent and
Larzod—one of the “glorious and benevolent
Maitreya. (P. Metteya; T. Byams pa; C. Mile; J. Miroku; K. Mirŭk 彌勒). In Sanskrit, "The Benevolent One"; the name of the next buddha, who now abides in TUsITA heaven as a BODHISATTVA, awaiting the proper time for him to take his final rebirth. Buddhists believed that their religion, like all conditioned things, was inevitably impermanent and would eventually vanish from the earth (cf. SADDHARMAVIPRALOPA; MOFA). According to one such calculation, the teachings of the current buddha sĀKYAMUNI would flourish for five hundred years after his death, after which would follow a one-thousand-year period of decline and a three-thousand-year period in which the dharma would be completely forgotten. At the conclusion of this long disappearance, Maitreya would then take his final birth in India (JAMBUDVĪPA) in order to reestablish the Buddhist dispensation anew. According to later calculations, Maitreya will not take rebirth for some time, far longer than the 4,500 years mentioned earlier. He will do so only after the human life span has decreased to ten years and then increased to eighty thousand years. (Stalwart scholiasts have calculated that his rebirth will occur 5.67 billion years after the death of sākyamuni.) Initially a minor figure in early Indian Buddhism, Maitreya (whose name derives from the Indic MAITRĪ, meaning "loving-kindness" or "benevolence") evolved during the early centuries of the Common Era into one of the most popular figures in Buddhism across Asia in both the mainstream and MAHĀYĀNA traditions. He is also known as AJITA, although there are indications that, at some point in history, the two were understood to be different deities. As the first bodhisattva to become a figure of worship, his imagery and cult set standards for the development of later bodhisattvas who became objects of cultic worship, such as AVALOKITEsVARA and MANJUsRĪ. Worship of Maitreya began early in Indian Buddhism and became especially popular in Central and East Asia during the fifth and sixth centuries. Such worship takes several forms, with disciples praying to either meet him when he is reborn on earth or in tusita heaven so that they may then take rebirth with him when he becomes a buddha, a destiny promised in the SADDHARMAPUndARĪKASuTRA ("Lotus Sutra") to those who recite his name. Maitreya is also said to appear on earth, such as in a scene in the Chinese pilgrim XUANZANG's account of his seventh-century travels to India: attacked by pirates as he sailed on the Ganges River, Xuanzang prayed to and was rescued by the bodhisattva. Maitreya also famously appeared to the great Indian commentator ASAnGA in the form of a wounded dog as a means of teaching him the importance of compassion. Devotees across the Buddhist world also attempt to extend their life span in order to be alive when Maitreya comes, or to be reborn at the time of his presence in the world, a worldly paradise that will be known as ketumati. His earliest iconography depicts him standing or sitting, holding a vase (KUndIKĀ), symbolizing his imminent birth into the brāhmana caste, and displaying the ABHAYAMUDRĀ, both features that remain common attributes of his images. In addition, he frequently has a small STuPA in his headdress, believed to represent a prophecy regarding his descent to earth to receive the robes of his predecessor from MAHĀKĀsYAPA. Maitreya is also commonly depicted as a buddha, often shown sitting in "European pose" (BHADRĀSANA; see also MAITREYĀSANA), displaying the DHARMACAKRAMUDRĀ. He is said to sit in a chair in "pensive" posture in order to be able to quickly stand and descend to earth at the appropriate time. Once he is reborn, Maitreya will replicate the deeds of sākyamuni, with certain variations. For example, he will live the life of a householder for eight thousand years, but having seen the four sights (CATURNIMITTA) and renounced the world, he will practice asceticism for only one week before achieving buddhahood. As the Buddha, he will first travel to Mount KUKKUtAPĀDA near BODHGAYĀ where the great ARHAT Mahākāsyapa has been entombed in a state of deep SAMĀDHI, awaiting the advent of Maitreya. Mahākāsyapa has kept the robes of sākyamuni, which the previous buddha had entrusted to him to pass on to his successor. Upon his arrival, the mountain will break open, and Mahākāsyapa will come forth from a stupa and give Maitreya his robes. When Maitreya accepts the robes, it will only cover two fingers of his hands, causing people to comment at how diminutive the past buddha must have been. ¶ The cult of Maitreya entered East Asia with the initial propagation of Buddhism and reached widespread popularity starting in the fourth century CE, a result of the popularity of the Saddharmapundarīkasutra and several other early translations of Maitreya scriptures made in the fourth and fifth centuries. The Saddharmapundarīkasutra describes Maitreya's present abode in the tusita heaven, while other sutras discuss his future rebirth on earth and his present residence in heaven. Three important texts belonging to the latter category were translated into Chinese, starting in the fifth century, with two differing emphases: (1) the Guan Mile pusa shangsheng doushuo tian jing promised sentient beings the prospect of rebirth in tusita heaven together with Maitreya; and (2) the Guan Mile pusa xiasheng jing and (3) the Foshuo Mile da chengfo jing emphasized the rebirth of Maitreya in this world, where he will attain buddhahood under the Dragon Flower Tree (Nāgapuspa) and save numerous sentient beings. These three texts constituted the three principal scriptures of the Maitreya cult in East Asia. In China, Maitreya worship became popular from at least the fourth century: DAO'AN (312-385) and his followers were among the first to propagate the cult of Maitreya and the prospect of rebirth in tusita heaven. With the growing popularity of Maitreya, millenarian movements associated with his cult periodically developed in East Asia, which had both devotional and political dimensions. For example, when the Empress WU ZETIAN usurped the Tang-dynasty throne in 690, her followers attempted to justify the coup by referring to her as Maitreya being reborn on earth. In Korea, Maitreya worship was already popular by the sixth century. The Paekche king Mu (r. 600-641) identified his realm as the world in which Maitreya would be reborn. In Silla, the hwarang, an elite group of male youths, was often identified with Maitreya and such eminent Silla monks as WoNHYO (617-686), WoNCH'ŬK (613-696), and Kyonghŭng (fl. seventh century) composed commentaries on the Maitreya scriptures. Paekche monks transmitted Maitreya worship to Japan in the sixth century, where it became especially popular in the late eighth century. The worship of Maitreya in Japan regained popularity around the eleventh century, but gradually was replaced by devotions to AMITĀBHA and KsITIGARBHA. The worship of Maitreya has continued to exist to the present day in both Korea and Japan. The Maitreya cult was influential in the twentieth century, for example, in the establishment of the Korean new religions of Chŭngsan kyo and Yonghwa kyo. Maitreya also merged in China and Japan with a popular indigenous figure, BUDAI (d. 916)-a monk known for his fat belly-whence he acquired his now popular East Asian form of the "laughing Buddha." This Chinese holy man is said to have been an incarnation of the bodhisattva Maitreya (J. Miroku Bosatsu) and is included among the Japanese indigenous pantheon known as the "seven gods of good fortune"(SHICHIFUKUJIN). Hotei represents contentment and happiness and is often depicted holding a large cloth bag (Hotei literally means "hemp sack"). From this bag, which never empties, he feeds the poor and needy. In some places, he has also become the patron saint of restaurants and bars, since those who drink and eat well are said to be influenced by Hotei. Today, nearly all Chinese Buddhist monasteries (and many restaurants as well) will have an image of this Maitreya at the front entrance; folk belief has it that by rubbing his belly one can establish the potential for wealth.
Manes (Latin) [from manus good] Deified ancestral spirits, the benevolent class of shades, as distinguished from the larvae and lemures, which were malevolent. The word seems originally to have denoted a class of titans, kabiri, or dhyanis, and to have ranked in the sequence of patriarchs, heroes, and manes, who acted as divine instructors of earlier races. But far later, in Roman usage, the name became degraded and applied to the better astral shades or denizens in kama-loka, which in so many lands have been propitiated by offerings as is still the case with some peoples. Sometimes they wear a retributive aspect, as in Vergil, where the painful purification of the shades before they can pass to Elysium is described: “Each of us suffers his own Manes” (Aeneid 6:743).
manes ::: n. pl. --> The benevolent spirits of the dead, especially of dead ancestors, regarded as family deities and protectors.
Mencius: (Meng Tzu, Meng K'o, 371-289 B.C.) A native of Tsao (in present Shantung), studied under pupils of Tzu Ssu, grandson of Confucius, became the greatest Confucian in Chinese history. He vigorously attacked the "pervasive teachings" of Yang Chu and Mo Tzu. Like Confucius, he travelled for many years, to many states, trying to persuade kings and princes to practice benevolent government instead of government by force, but failed. He retired to teach and write. (Meng Tzu, Eng. tr. by James Legge: i.) -- W.T.C.
Michael, the benevolent angel of death, in the
nāga. (T. klu; C. long; J. ryu; K. yong 龍). In Sanskrit and Pāli, "serpent" or "dragon" (as in the Chinese), autochthonous beings said to inhabit bodies of water and the roots of great trees, often guarding treasures hidden there. They are depicted iconographically with human heads and torsos but with the tail and hood of a cobra. They inhabit an underwater kingdom filled with magnificent palaces, and they possess a range of magical powers, including the ability to masquerade as humans. Nāgas appear frequently in Buddhist literature in both benevolent and malevolent forms. They are said to be under the command of VIRuPĀKsA, the god of the west, and are guards of the TRĀYASTRIMsA heaven. They sometimes appear in the audience of Buddha, most famously in the twelfth chapter of the SADDHARMAPUndARĪKASuTRA ("Lotus Sutra"), where an eight-year-old nāga princess offers a gem to the Buddha. She instantaneously transforms into a male, traverses the ten bodhisattva stages (BHuMI), and achieves buddhahood. This scene is sometimes cited as evidence that women have the capacity to achieve buddhahood. In the story of the Buddha's enlightenment, the Buddha is protected during a rainstorm by the nāga MUCILINDA. The Buddha is said to have entrusted the sATASĀHASRIKĀPRAJNĀPĀRAMITĀ ("Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Lines") to the safekeeping of the nāgas at the bottom of the sea, from whom NĀGĀRJUNA recovered it. Digging the earth is said to displease nāgas, who must therefore be propitiated prior to the construction of a building.
nat. In Burmese, a generic term for a "spirit" or "god." Burmese (Myanmar) lore posits the existence of numerous species of nats, of both indigenous and Indian origin. Nats can range in temperament from benign to malevolent, including those who are potentially helpful but dangerous if offended. The most generally benevolent species of nats are the divinities (DEVA) of the Indian pantheon. This group includes such gods as Thakya Min (sAKRA) and Byama (BRAHMĀ). Nats of Indian origin are typically looked upon as servants of the Buddhist religion, which is how they are depicted in Burmese Pāli literature. Indigenous nats in the form of nature spirits are thought to occupy trees, hills, streams, and other natural sites, and may cause harm if disturbed. The guardian spirits of villages and of the home are also classified as nats. Certain nats guard medicinal herbs and certain minerals, and, when properly handled, aid alchemists in their search for elixirs and potions. One species of nat, the oktazaung, are ghosts who have been forced to act as guardians of pagoda treasures. These unhappy spirits are thought to be extremely dangerous and to bring calamity upon those who attempt to rob pagodas or encroach upon pagoda lands. The best-known group of nats is the "thirty-seven nats" of the Burmese national pantheon. For centuries, they have been the focus of a royal cult of spirit propitiation; the worship of national nats is attested as early as the eleventh century CE at PAGAN (Bagan). At the head of the pantheon is Thakya Min, but the remaining are all spirits of deceased humans who died untimely or violent deaths, mostly at the hands of Burmese monarchs. The number thirty-seven has remained fixed over the centuries, although many of the members of the pantheon have been periodically replaced. One of the nats who has maintained his position is Mahagiri Min, lord of the nat pantheon, occupying a position just beneath Thakya Min. Mahagiri dwells atop Mount Poppa and is also worshipped as the household nat in most Burmese homes. An annual nat festival of national importance is held in August at the village of Taungbyon near Mandalay. The festival is held in honor of Shwepyingyi and Shwepyinnge, two Muslim brothers who became nats as a consequence of being executed by King Kyanzittha of Pagan (r. 1084-1112) who feared their supernormal strength.
Ouyi Zhixu. (J. Goyaku/Guyaku Chigyoku; K. Uik Chiuk 益智旭) (1599-1655). One of the four eminent monks (si da gaoseng) of the late-Ming dynasty, along with YUNQI ZHUHONG (1535-1615), HANSHAN DEQING (1546-1623), and DAGUAN ZHENKE (1543-1604); renowned for his mastery of a wide swath of Confucian and Buddhist teachings, particularly those associated with the TIANTAI, PURE LAND, and CHAN traditions. In his youth, he studied Confucianism and despised Buddhism, even writing anti-Buddhist tracts. He had a change of heart at the age of seventeen, after reading some of Zhuhong's writings, and burned his previous screeds. According to his autobiography, Zhixu had his first "great awakening" at the age of nineteen while reading the line in the Lunyu ("Confucian Analects") that "the whole world will submit to benevolence" if one restrains oneself and returns to ritual. After his father's death that same year, he fully committed himself to Buddhism, reading sutras and performing recollection of the Buddha's name (NIANFO) until he finally was ordained under the guidance of Xueling (d.u.), a disciple of Hanshan Deqing, at the age of twenty-four. At that time, he began to read extensively in YOGĀCĀRA materials and had another great awakening through Chan meditation, in which he experienced body, mind, and the outer world suddenly disappearing. He next turned his attention to the bodhisattva precepts and the study of vinaya. Following his mother's death when he was twenty-seven, Zhixu rededicated himself to Chan meditation, but after a serious illness he turned to pure land teachings. In his early thirties, he devoted himself to the study of Tiantai materials, through which he attempted to integrate his previous research in Buddhism and began to write commentaries and treaties on Buddhist scriptures and on such Confucian classics as the Zhouyi ("Book of Changes"). In the late-sixteenth century, Jesuit missionaries such as Michele Ruggieri (1543-1607) and Matteo Ricci (1552-1610) had reintroduced Christianity to China and sought "to complement Confucianism and to replace Buddhism." This emerging religious challenge led Zhixu to publish his Bixie ji ("Collected Essays Refuting Heterodoxy") as a critique of the teachings of Christianity, raising specifically the issue of theodicy (i.e., why a benevolent and omnipotent god would allow evil to appear in the world); Zhixu advocates instead that good and evil come from human beings and are developed and overcome respectively through personal cultivation. After another illness at the age of fifty-six, his later years were focused mostly on pure land teachings and practice. In distinction to Japanese pure land teachers, such as HoNEN (1133-1212) and SHINRAN (1173-1262), who emphasized exclusively Amitābha's "other-power" (C. tali; J. TARIKI), Zhixu, like most other Chinese pure land teachers, advocated the symbiosis between the other-power of Amitābha and the "self-power" (C. jiri; J. JIRIKI) of the practitioner. This perspective is evident in his equal emphasis on the three trainings in meditation (Chan), doctrine (jiao), and precepts (lü) (cf. TRIsIKsĀ). Ouyi's oeuvre numbers some sixty-two works in 230 rolls, including treatises and commentaries on works ranging from Tiantai, to Chan, to Yogācāra, to pure land. His pure land writings have been especially influential, and his Amituojing yaojie ("Essential Explanations" on the AMITĀBHASuTRA) and Jingtu shiyao ("Ten Essentials on the Pure Land") are regarded as integral to the modern Chinese Pure Land tradition.
O you glorious and benevolent angels, Urzla,
Pentagram: A magical diagram, consisting of a five-pointed star, representing Man; it is considered by occultists to be the most potent means of conjuring spirits. When a single point of the star points upward, it is regarded as the sign of the good and a means to conjure benevolent spirits; when the single point points down and a pair of points are on top, it is a sign of the evil (Satan) and is used to conjure powers of evil.
Renwang jing. (J. Ninnogyo; K. Inwang kyong 仁王經). In Chinese, "Scripture for Humane Kings"; an influential indigenous Chinese scripture (see APOCRYPHA), known especially for its role in "state protection Buddhism" (HUGUO FOJIAO) and for its comprehensive outline of the Buddhist path of practice (MĀRGA). Its full title (infra) suggests that the scripture belongs to the "perfection of wisdom" (PRAJNĀPĀRAMITĀ) genre of literature, but it includes also elements drawn from both the YOGĀCĀRA and TATHĀGATAGARBHA traditions. The text's audience and interlocutors are not the typical sRĀVAKAs and BODHISATTVAs but instead kings hailing from the sixteen ancient regions of India, who beseech the Buddha to speak this sutra in order to protect both their states and their subjects from the chaos attending the extinction of the dharma (MOFA; SADDHARMAVIPRALOPA). By having kings rather than spiritual mentors serve as the interlocutors, the scripture thus focuses on those qualities thought to be essential to governing a state founded on Buddhist principles. The text's concepts of authority, the path, and the world draw analogies with the "humane kings" of this world who serve and venerate the transcendent monks and bodhisattvas. The service and worship rendered by the kings turns them into bodhisattvas, while the soteriological vocation of the monks and bodhisattvas conversely renders them kings. Thus, the relationship between the state and the religion is symbiotic. The sutra is now generally presumed to be an indigenous Chinese scripture that was composed to buttress imperial authority by exalting the benevolent ruler as a defender of the dharma. The Renwang jing is also known for including the ten levels of faith (sRADDHĀ) as a preliminary stage of the Buddhist path prior to the arousal of the thought of enlightenment (BODHICITTOTPĀDA). It is one of a number of Chinese Buddhist apocrypha that seek to provide a comprehensive elaboration of all fifty-two stages of the path, including the PUSA YINGLUO BENYE JING and the YUANJUE JING. The Renwang jing is not known in Sanskrit sources, but there are two recensions of the Chinese text. The first, Renwang bore boluomi jing, is purported to have been translated by KUMĀRAJĪVA and is dated to c. 402, and the latter, titled Renwang huguo bore boluomiduo jing, is attributed to AMOGHAVAJRA and dated to 765. The Amoghavajra recension is based substantially on the Kumārajīva text, but includes additional teachings on MAndALA, MANTRA, and DHĀRAnĪ, additions that reflect Amoghavajra's place in the Chinese esoteric Buddhist tradition. Furthermore, because Amoghavajra was an advisor to three Tang-dynasty rulers, his involvement in contemporary politics may also have helped to shape the later version. Chinese scriptural catalogues (JINGLU) were already suspicious about the authenticity of the Renwang jing as least as early as Fajing's 594 Zhongjing mulu; Fajing lists the text together with twenty-one other scriptures of doubtful authenticity (YIJING), because its content and diction do not resemble those of the ascribed translator. Modern scholars have also recognized these content issues. One of the more egregious examples is the RENWANG JING's reference to four different perfection of wisdom (prajNāpāramitā) sutras that the Buddha is said to have proclaimed; two of the sutras listed are, however, simply different Chinese translations of the same text, the PANCAVIMsATISĀHASRIKĀPRAJNĀPĀRAMITĀSuTRA, a blunder that an Indian author could obviously not have committed. Another example is the scripture's discussion of a three-truth SAMĀDHI (sandi sanmei), in which these three types of concentrations are named worldly truth (shidi), authentic truth (zhendi), and supreme-meaning truth (diyiyidi). This schema is peculiar, and betrays its Chinese origins, because "authentic truth" and "supreme-meaning truth" are actually just different Chinese renderings of the same Sanskrit term, PARAMĀTHASATYA. Based on other internal evidence, scholars have dated the composition of the sutra to sometime around the middle of the fifth century. Whatever its provenance, the text is ultimately reclassified as an authentic translation in the 602 catalogue Zongjing mulu by Yancong and continues to be so listed in all subsequent East Asian catalogues. See also APOCRYPHA; SANDI.
“Saint Germain recorded the good doctrine in figures and his only cyphered MS. remained with his staunch friend and patron the benevolent German prince from whose house and in whose presence he made his last exit — Home” (ML 280).
Sambhu (Sanskrit) Śambhu [from śam auspiciously, happily + bhu being, existing] Benevolent, causing happiness, kind, a title given to many of the Hindu gods.
Shotoku Taishi. (聖德太子) (572-622). Japanese statesman of the Asuka period (593-710) and second son of Emperor Yomei (r. 585-587), who is traditionally assumed to have played an important role in the early dissemination of Buddhism in Japan. He is also known as Umayado no Miko (Prince Stable Door), but by the eighth century, he became known as Shotoku Taishi (lit. Prince Sagacious Virtue). Given that the earliest significant writings on the life of Shotoku Taishi come from two early histories, the Kojiki (712) and Nihon shoki (720), which are both written nearly a century after his death, little can be said definitively about his biography. According to the traditional accounts in these two texts, Suiko (554-628), the aunt of Prince Shotoku and the Japanese monarch, appointed her nephew regent in 593, giving him broad political powers. Thanks to his enlightened leadership, Prince Shotoku is credited with numerous historical achievements. These include the promotion of Buddhism within the court under an edict he issued in 594; promulgation of the Seventeen-Article Constitution in 604, which stresses the importance of the monarchy and lays out basic Buddhist and Confucian principles; sponsorship of trade missions to China; construction of the monasteries of HoRYuJI and SHITENNoJI; authorship of two chronological histories (Tennoko and Kokki); and composition of three of the earliest Buddhist commentaries in Japan, on the SADDHARMAPUndARĪKASuTRA ("Lotus Sutra"), VIMALAKĪRTINIRDEsA, and sRĪMĀLĀDEVĪSIMHANĀDASuTRA ("Lion's Roar of Queen srīmālā"), which demonstrate his deep familiarity with Mahāyāna Buddhist doctrine. The credibility of Prince Shotoku's achievements as described in the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki is undermined by fact that both texts were commissioned by the newly empowered monarchy in an attempt to strengthen its political standing. Some scholars have thus argued that because the new royal family wanted to identify itself with the powerful instrument of the new religion, they selected the person of Prince Shotoku, who shared their lineage, to serve as the first political patron of Buddhism in Japan. This historical narrative focused on Prince Shotoku thus denigrated the importance of the defeated SOGA clan's extensive patronage of Buddhism. As early as the Nara period (710-794), Prince Shotoku began taking on legendary, even mythical status, and was eventually transformed into one of Japan's greatest historical figures, representing the quintessence of Buddhist religious virtue and benevolent political leadership. Priests often dedicated temples to him or transferred the merit of religious enterprises to Shotoku. Both SHINRAN (1173-1263) and NICHIREN (1222-82) dedicated written works to his name. Throughout the Heian (794-1185) and Kamakura (1185-1333) periods, what is now referred to as the cult of Shotoku Taishi was widely popular and members of the aristocracy regularly venerated him (a practice referred to as Taishi shinko, lit. devotion to the Prince).
Shu: "The benevolent exercise of the principle of human nature in relation to others;" "the extension of the principle of the self to other people and things;" "the application of the principle of true manhood (jen);" "the application of the principle of the central self (chung);" "putting oneself in the position of others;" "measuring others by oneself;" consideration; altruism; reciprocity; the Confucian "central thread" (i kuan) with respect to social relationship, as being true to the principles of one's nature (chung) is with respect to the self. -- W.T.C.
Solomon), one of the “glorious and benevolent
Spirits ::: On this site we view spirits as a sub-class of entities. Specifically, they are entities that are the genii of particular forms, parts of the human soul without physical form, or beings of nature. Typically we use the term spirits when the entities involved are benevolent in nature.
Sumati (Sanskrit) Sumati Benevolent, kindness; devotion, prayer. As a proper noun, the name of many celebrated people, such as a son of Bharata who gave his name to Bharata-varsha (India).
Sympathy: On psychological levels, a participation in and feeling for other living beings in adversity or other emotional phases, not always painful, which may or may not lead to participating or alleviating action, explained naturalistically as a general instinct inherent in all creatures, ethically sometimes as an original altruism, sociologically as acquired in the civilisatory process through needs of co-operation, mutual aid, and fellow-feeling in family and group action. Stressed particularly in Hinduism, fostered along with pity (q.v.) in Christianity, discussed and recommended as a shrewd social expedient by such men as Hobbes, Bentham, and Adam Smith, Schopenhauer raised sympathy Mitleid), as an equivalent to love, into an ethical principle which Nietzsche repudiated because to him it increases suffering and through weakness hinders development. Sympathy, as a cultural force, becomes progressively more evident in the increasing establishment of benevolent institutions, such as hospitals, asylums, etc., a more general altruism and ejection (Clifford), an extension of kindness even to animals (first taught by Buddhism, see Ahimsa), reform and relief movements of all kinds, etc. Still regarded highly as a praiseworthy virtue, it has been gradually rid of its dependence on individual ethical culture by scientific conditioning in social planning on a huge scale. See v. Orelli, Die philosophischen Auffassungen des Mttleids (1912); Scheler, Wesen und Formen der Sympathie (1926). -- K.F.L.
Teachers In theosophical writings, often used to designate masters of wisdom, adepts, mahatmas, or messengers qualified to instruct and guide pupils on the path of wisdom. Teachers are of various grades, belonging to different degrees of different benevolent hierarchies; at the summit are those buddhas and manus who serve as inspirers and light-bringers to the races of mankind. Below these highest come lesser teachers, pertaining to the lesser cycles of time. The mythology of ancient peoples contains reference to divine instructors of various ranks.
Technocratic Union, the: Powerful faction of Enlightened technomancers dedicated to the benevolent domination of humanity. Divided into five Conventions – Iteration X and the New World Order, Progenitors, Syndicate, and Void Engineers – this faction employs invention, subversion, and force in pursuit of global control.
There was an enmity lasting for ages between the benevolent and the selfish portions of the fourth root-race, which continued with the Aryan adepts of the nascent fifth root-race and finally ended in the triumph of the positive; but nevertheless the karma of Atlantean black magic even yet blights our own fifth root-race, for the people of today were imbodied as the humans of Atlantean times. Descendants of fourth root-race humanity even now are among the inhabitants of the earth, together with rapidly dying out remnants of the third root-race, and also various mixtures of all these.
Uma-kanya (Sanskrit) Umā-kanyā [from u-mā O [child], do not [practice austerities] — the exclamation addressed to Pārvatī by her mother + kanyā maid, virgin] The daughter of Himavat, who became the consort of Siva; also called Parvati and Durga. Uma-Kanya “being her esoteric name, and meaning the ‘Virgin of light,’ Astral Light in one of its multitudinous aspects” (SD 1:92). Now the goddess is worshiped as Durga-Kali (the black and inaccessible one); in this character “human flesh was offered to her every autumn; and, as Durga, she was the patroness of the once murderous Thugs of India, and the special goddess of Tantrika sorcery. But in days of old it was not as it is now. The earliest mention of the title ‘Uma-Kanya’ is found in the Kena-Upanishad; in it the now blood-thirsty Kali, was a benevolent goddess, a being of light and goodness, who brings about reconciliation between Brahma and the gods. She is Saraswati and she is Vach. In esoteric symbology, Kali is the dual type of the dual soul — the divine and the human, the light and the dark soul of man” (TG 352).
unfriendly ::: a. --> Not friendly; not kind or benevolent; hostile; as, an unfriendly neighbor.
Not favorable; not adapted to promote or support any object; as, weather unfriendly to health.
Virabhadra (Sanskrit) Vīrabhadra Heroically beneficent or benevolent; an avatara of Siva, the patron of occult study and achievement. Ancient Indian myth represents him as a monster to human vision, being a thousand-headed and thousand-armed entity born of the breath of Siva-Rudra — Siva under his form of Rudra, and therefore the great destroyer because regenerator. In the Mahabharata, Siva commissions this entity “to destroy the sacrifice prepared by Daksha. Then Virabhadra, ‘abiding in the region of the ghosts (ethereal men). . . . created from the pores of the skin (Romakupas), powerful Raumas, (or Raumyas)’ ” (SD 2:182-3). This allegory refers in human history to the evolution of the “sweat-born” or second root-race and the destruction of the remnants of the first root-race.
wellwisher ::: n. --> One who wishes another well; one who is benevolently or friendlily inclined.
who are “glorious and benevolent angels” in¬
Wuzhun Shifan. (J. Bujun Shihan/Bushun Shiban/Mujun Shihan; K. Mujun Sabom 無準師範) (1178-1249). Chinese CHAN master in the LINJI ZONG. After his ordination in the winter of 1194, Wuzhun studied under a series of famed Chan masters, including FOZHAO DEGUANG and Po'an Zuxian. Wuzhun eventually attained awakening under Po'an and succeeded his lineage. During his illustrious career at such important monasteries as WANSHOUSI on Mt. Jing, Wuzhun also taught the Japanese pilgrims Hoshin (d.u.), Doyu (1201-1258), and the famed ENNI BEN'EN, who is now regarded as the first exponent of ZEN in Japan. Wuzhun was later summoned by Emperor Lizong (r. 1224-1264) to provide a public lecture at the Pavilion of Benevolent Illumination in the imperial palace. The emperor later bestowed upon him the title Chan master Fojian (Buddha Mirror). Wuzhun left many famous disciples such as WUXUE ZUYUAN and Mu'an Puning, both of whom went to Kamakura in Japan and served as abbots of the powerful monastery of KENCHoJI.
Xexor —in occultism, a benevolent spirit in¬
Xomoy —a benevolent spirit, like Xexor,
Xonor —a benevolent spirit, like Xexor and
yaksa. (P. yakkha; T. gnod sbyin; C. yecha; J. yasha; K. yach'a 夜叉). In Indian mythology, a class of nature spirit, commonly serving as local guardians of the earth and of trees and the treasures hidden there. They possess supernatural powers-including the ability to fly, to change their appearance, and to disappear-which they can employ for good or for evil. They appear often in Buddhist texts, sometimes serving as benevolent protectors of and messengers for the Buddha and his disciples. The most famous of them is VAJRAPĀnI, who accompanies the Buddha as his bodyguard. They are commonly listed among the audience of the Buddha's sermons, with some attaining the rank of stream-enterer. There are also demonic yaksas, especially the female yaksas or yaksinī, who devour infants and corpses and must be subdued by the Buddha, an ARHAT, or a BODHISATTVA. The continent of UTTARAKURU and the island of Sri Lanka were considered to be abodes of the yaksas.
yakshas. ::: a broad class of nature-spirits, usually benevolent, who are caretakers of the natural treasures hidden in the earth and tree roots; beings controlled by Kubera, the God of wealth
KEYS (10k)
2 Book of Wisdom
2 The Mother
1 Robert Heinlein
1 Hadith
1 Fo'shu-tsrn-king-
1 Buddhist Text
1 Antoine the Healer: "Revelations."
NEW FULL DB (2.4M)
11 Friedrich Nietzsche
10 Thomas Jefferson
8 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
6 C S Lewis
5 Neil deGrasse Tyson
4 Victor Hugo
4 Sue Monk Kidd
4 Stephen King
4 Noam Chomsky
4 N K Jemisin
4 Mark Twain
4 Mahatma Gandhi
4 Lao Tzu
4 James Madison
4 Francis Chan
4 Dan Simmons
4 Benjamin Franklin
4 Anonymous
3 Thomas Paine
3 Ralph Waldo Emerson
1:The noblest deed is that a person should be benevolent towards his father's friends. ~ Hadith, @Sufi_Path #KEYS
2:Have compassion, have pity for all beings that live. Let thy heart be benevolent and sympathetic towards all that lives. ~ Fo'shu-tsrn-king-, the Eternal Wisdom #KEYS
3:We must distinguish between the knowledge which is due to the study and analysis of Matter and that which results from contact with life and a benevolent activity in the midst of humanity. ~ Antoine the Healer: "Revelations.", the Eternal Wisdom #KEYS
4:He who puts away from him all passion, hatred, pride and hypocrisy, who pronounces words instructive and benevolent, who does not make his own what has not been given to him, who without desire, covetousness, impatience knows the depths of the Permanent, he is indeed a.man of religion. ~ Buddhist Text, the Eternal Wisdom #KEYS
5:I have learnt all that was hidden and all that was yet undiscovered because I was taught by wisdom herself that created everything. For there is in her a spirit of intelligence which is holy, unique, multiple in her effects, fine, copious, agile, spotless, dear, soft, friendly to good, penetrant, which nothing can prevent from acting, benevolent, friendly to men, kind, stable, infallible, calm, that achieves all, that sees all, that can comprehend all minds in itself, that is intelligible, pure and subtle. ~ Book of Wisdom, #KEYS
6:What is to be done if a person comes to quarrel because one has accepted in one case and refused in another? What is to be done to avoid such bitterness around one, provoked by repeated refusals?
As for ill-will, jealousy, quarrels and reproaches, one must sincerely be above all that and reply with a benevolent smile to the bitterest words; and unless one is absolutely sure of himself and his reactions, it would be better, as a general rule, to keep silent.
~ The Mother, Words Of The Mother II,#KEYS
7:I have learnt all that was hidden and all that was yet undiscovered because I was taught by wisdom herself that created everything. For there is in her a spirit of intelligence which is holy, unique, multiple in her effects, fine, copious, agile, spotless, dear, soft, friendly to good, penetrant, which nothing can prevent from acting, benevolent, friendly to men, kind, stable, infallible, calm, that achieves all, that sees all, that can comprehend all minds in itself, that is intelligible, pure and subtle. ~ Book of Wisdom, the Eternal Wisdom #KEYS
8:the soul's seemingly magical influence :::
If you have within you a psychic being sufficiently awake to watch over you, to prepare your path, it can draw towards you things which help you, draw people, books, circumstances, all sorts of little coincidences which come to you as though brought by some benevolent will and give you an indication, a help, a support to take decisions and turn you in the right direction. But once you have taken this decision, once you have decided to find the truth of your being, once you start sincerely on the road, everything seems to conspire to help you to advance,
~ The Mother, Questions And Answers 1950-1951,#KEYS
9:We cannot perceive Chaos directly, for it simultaneously contains the opposite to anything we might think it is. We can, however, occasionally glimpse and make use of partially formed matter which has only probablistic and indeterministic existence. This stuff we can call the aethers.
* If it makes us feel any better we can call this Chaos, the Tao, or God, and imagine it to be benevolent and human-hearted. There are two schools of thought in magic. One considers the formative agent of the universe to be random and chaotic, and the other considers that it is a force of spiritual consciousness. As they have only themselves on which to base their speculations, they are basically saying that their own natures are either random and chaotic or spiritually conscious.
~ Peter J Carroll, Miscellaneous Excerpts Part 2,#KEYS
*** WISDOM TROVE ***
1:What can a man do with music who is not benevolent? ~ confucius, @wisdomtrove 2:I believe in benevolent dictatorship provided I am the dictator. ~ richard-branson, @wisdomtrove 3:Everyone feels benevolent if nothing happens to be annoying him at the moment. ~ c-s-lewis, @wisdomtrove 4:The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination. ~ voltaire, @wisdomtrove 5:Sometimes, we don't get what we want. . . But this is a benevolent universe. And once in a while, we do. ~ melody-beattie, @wisdomtrove 6:The aim of spiritual life is to awaken a joyful freedom, a benevolent and compassionate heart in spite of everything. ~ jack-kornfield, @wisdomtrove 7:You can't have it both ways. You can't have both free will and a benevolent higher power who protects you from yourself. ~ arthur-c-carke, @wisdomtrove 8:And to read the Bible without horror, we must undo everything that is tender, sympathizing and benevolent in the heart of man. ~ thomas-paine, @wisdomtrove 9:Beneficence is a duty; and he who frequently practices it, and sees his benevolent intentions realized comes, at length, really to love him to whom he has done good. ~ immanuel-kant, @wisdomtrove 10:How easy is it for one benevolent being to diffuse pleasure around him, and how truly is a kind heart a fountain of gladness, making everything in its vicinity to freshen into smiles. ~ washington-irving, @wisdomtrove 11:I could well believe that it is God's intention, since we have refused milder remedies, to compel [Christians] into unity, by persecution even. Satan is without doubt nothing else than a hammer in the hand of a benevolent and severe God. ~ c-s-lewis, @wisdomtrove 12:If the gods have the will to remove evil and cannot, then they are not all-powerful. If they are neither able nor willing, they are neither all-powerful or benevolent. If they are both able and willing to annihilate evil, why does it exist? ~ epicurus, @wisdomtrove 13:For centuries the Bible's emphasis on compassion and love for our neighbor has inspired institutional and governmental expressions of benevolent outreach such as private charity, the establishment of schools and hospitals, and the abolition of slavery. ~ ronald-reagan, @wisdomtrove 14:It would be very nice if there were a God who created the world and was a benevolent providence, and if there were a moral order in the universe and an after-life; but it is a very striking fact that all this is exactly as we are bound to wish it to be. ~ sigmund-freud, @wisdomtrove 15:There is a mystery within all beings bursting to reveal itself, in the ones who become quiet enough to discover it. In this discovery a benevolent force shines spontaneously from your presence towards all beings, and this light cannot help but illuminate the world. ~ mooji, @wisdomtrove 16:He wore a sprinkling of powder upon his head, as if to make himself look benevolent; but if that were his purpose, he would perhaps have done better to powder his countenance also, for there was something in its very wrinkles, and in his cold restless eye, which seemed to tell of cunning that would announce itself in spite of him. ~ charles-dickens, @wisdomtrove 17:The brown blotches of the benevolent skin cancer the sun brings from its reflection on the tropic sea were on his cheeks. The blotches ran well down the sides of his face and his hands had the deep-creased scars from handling heavy fish on the cords. But none of these scars were fresh. They were as old as erosions in a fishless desert. ~ ernest-hemingway, @wisdomtrove 18:While it is possible for intelligence to increase the range of benevolent impulse, and thus prompt a human being to consider the needs and rights of other than those to whom he is bound by organic and physical relationship, there are definite limits in the capacity of ordinary mortals which makes it impossible for them to grant to others what they claim for themselves. ~ reinhold-niebuhr, @wisdomtrove 19:To enlarge the sphere of social happiness is worthy of the benevolent design of a Masonic institution; and it is most fervently to be wished, that the conduct of every member of the fraternity, as well as those publications, that discover the principles which actuate them, may tend to convince mankind that the grand object of Masonry is to promote the happiness of the human race. ~ george-washington, @wisdomtrove 20:You pass by a little child, you pass by, spiteful, with ugly words, with wrathful heart; you may not have noticed the child, but he has seen you, and your image, unseemly and ignoble, may remain in his defenseless heart. You don't know it, but you may have sown an evil seed in him and it may grow, and all because you were not careful before the child, because you did not foster in yourself a careful, actively benevolent love. ~ fyodor-dostoevsky, @wisdomtrove 21:The real trouble is that & 22:It is pleasure that lurks in the practice of every one of your virtues. Man performs actions because they are good for him, and when they are good for other people as well they are thought virtuous: if he finds pleasure in helping others he is benevolent; if he finds pleasure in working for society he is public-spirited; but it is for your private pleasure that you give twopence to a beggar as much as it is for my private pleasure that I drink another whiskey and soda. I, less of a humbug than you, neither applaud myself for my pleasure nor demand your admiration. ~ william-somerset-maugham, @wisdomtrove *** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***
1:quantum moments are always benevolent. ~ Wayne W Dyer, #NFDB
2:I am a misanthrope yet utterly benevolent. ~ Alfred Nobel, #NFDB
3:He who wishes to be benevolent will not be rich. ~ Mencius, #NFDB
4:But benevolent patriarchy is still patriarchy. ~ Sue Monk Kidd, #NFDB
5:How dare I claim to be a sage or a benevolent man? ~ Confucius, #NFDB
6:What can a man do with music who is not benevolent? ~ Confucius, #NFDB
7:Benevolent patriarchy is still patriarchy. ~ Elizabeth A Johnson, #NFDB
8:congress - that great, benevolent asylum for the helpless ~ Mark Twain, #NFDB
9:benevolent throne set someplace high up on the moon. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert, #NFDB
10:Vanity well fed is benevolent. Vanity hungry is spiteful. ~ Mason Cooley, #NFDB
11:A benevolent act is like a locust: it sleeps until it is called. ~ Mark Helprin, #NFDB
12:Please be truthful, but also please be benevolent, please. ~ Jonathan Safran Foer, #NFDB
13:There's no pain on earth that doesn't crave a benevolent witness. ~ Sue Monk Kidd, #NFDB
14:There’s no pain on earth that doesn’t crave a benevolent witness. ~ Sue Monk Kidd, #NFDB
15:I believe in benevolent dictatorship provided I am the dictator. ~ Richard Branson, #NFDB
16:There's no pain on earth that doesn't require a benevolent witness. ~ Sue Monk Kidd, #NFDB
17:If any spirit created the universe, it is malevolent, not benevolent. ~ Quentin Smith, #NFDB
18:A small craft in an ocean is, or should be, a benevolent dictatorship. ~ Tristan Jones, #NFDB
19:Eleven Benevolent Elephants. Yeah! Say that five times real fast. ~ Donald Allen Kirch, #NFDB
20:The mission of the United States is one of benevolent assimilation. ~ William McKinley, #NFDB
21:Seeing my malevolent face in the mirror, my benevolent soul shrinks back. ~ Mason Cooley, #NFDB
22:Everyone feels benevolent if nothing happens to be annoying him at the moment. ~ C S Lewis, #NFDB
23:People do things that turn out badly, often for the most benevolent of reasons. ~ Lois Lowry, #NFDB
24:The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination. ~ Voltaire, #NFDB
25:I think [the virtual choir] speaks well to a benevolent future for the Internet. ~ Eric Whitacre, #NFDB
26:We love stress that is mild and transient and occurs in a benevolent context. ~ Robert M Sapolsky, #NFDB
27:Firstly I commit my Soul into the hands of God, its great and benevolent author. ~ Josiah Bartlett, #NFDB
28:How quickly a truly benevolent act is repaid by the consciousness of having done it! ~ Hosea Ballou, #NFDB
29:Some people mistakenly think nature is very nice and benevolent and never betrays. ~ Margaret Atwood, #NFDB
30:The future of humanity depends not on benevolent robots but on benevolent businesses. ~ Kate O Neill, #NFDB
31:Those whose kernels were cracked by benevolent spirit should not forget to be humble. ~ Chinua Achebe, #NFDB
32:When a man has been highly honored and has eaten a little he is most benevolent. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
33:he presented himself as floating through the world on a blanket of benevolent vacancy. ~ Sarah Bakewell, #NFDB
34:But history tells us that monopolies that are truly benevolent and effective are rare. ~ Michael E Porter, #NFDB
35:If there's a better definition of love than mutual benevolent insanity, I haven't heard it. ~ Leah Raeder, #NFDB
36:If there’s a better definition of love than mutual benevolent insanity, I haven’t heard it. ~ Leah Raeder, #NFDB
37:PRESIDENT BARTLETT: "See how benevolent I can be when everybody just does what I tell them. ~ Aaron Sorkin, #NFDB
38:Wine is the benevolent god, who gives back gaiety to men and restores youth to the old. ~ Michel de Montaigne, #NFDB
39:Love can be unselfish, in the sense of being benevolent and generous, without being selfless. ~ Mortimer Adler, #NFDB
40:My theory is that hope is a form of madness. A benevolent one, sure, but madness all the same. ~ Benjamin Wood, #NFDB
41:I firmly believe that the benevolent Creator designed the republican Form of Government for Man. ~ Samuel Adams, #NFDB
42:The spirits rose like an ether that spun an arabesque and touched down as gently as a benevolent mask. ~ Patti Smith, #NFDB
43:A benevolent mind, and the face assumes the patterns of benevolence. An evil mind, then an evil face. ~ Jimmy Sangster, #NFDB
44:Intelligent Design opens the whole possibility of us being created in the image of a benevolent God. ~ William A Dembski, #NFDB
45:Sometimes, we don't get what we want. . . But this is a benevolent universe. And once in a while, we do. ~ Melody Beattie, #NFDB
46:With so much at stake, and so many fortunes to be made, benevolent intentions can easily be drowned out. She ~ Tim Lebbon, #NFDB
47:BE KIND AND BENEVOLENT. MAKE A CASUAL STOP ON THE ENDLESS WAY TO THE FUTURE. and PUT ALL TROUBLES FROM YOUR MIND. ~ Lisa See, #NFDB
48:Lament is a cry of belief in a good God. ... Complaint is the bitter howl of unbelief in any benevolent God... ~ Ann Voskamp, #NFDB
49:It is an old dream: To travel on the back of a benevolent sea beast down to some secret underwater garden. ~ Stephen Harrigan, #NFDB
50:I’m on the benevolent side of antisocial. I don’t mind people, but I’d prefer not to have a lot of them around. ~ Jessica Bird, #NFDB
51:Is his benevolent art meant to distract us from Prospero’s absolutist exercise of authority over his subjects? ~ James Shapiro, #NFDB
52:I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, #NFDB
53:The sages do not act from (any wish to be) benevolent; they deal with the people as the dogs of grass are dealt with. ~ Lao Tzu, #NFDB
54:Clearly, children's charities struggle to find private sources of money to sustain their benevolent programs. ~ Dana Rohrabacher, #NFDB
55:Somewhere, somewhere in this house, lurked a problem. For some reason, Jane’s legacy wasn’t entirely benevolent. ~ Charlaine Harris, #NFDB
56:This shall be the last of my benevolent follies, and I will never be kind to anybody again as long as I live. ~ Nathaniel Hawthorne, #NFDB
57:Freedom received though the efforts of others, however benevolent, cannot be retained when such effort is withdrawn. ~ Mahatma Gandhi, #NFDB
58:I have no trouble selling out—I’m a benevolent hack, in a certain way—but I want to pander for something I believe in. ~ Harold Ramis, #NFDB
59:The aim of spiritual life is to awaken a joyful freedom, a benevolent and compassionate heart in spite of everything. ~ Jack Kornfield, #NFDB
60:America has an immense amount of power, but it doesn't use it in any benevolent way. It uses it to maintain a status quo. ~ Hamza Yusuf, #NFDB
61:Benevolent, enlightened, wise dictators are the most efficient form of government. The problem is what comes afterwards. ~ Reid Hoffman, #NFDB
62:To me it’s as if the day has been tossed into my lap by a benevolent god who likes to gives things to good-for-nothings. ~ Robert Walser, #NFDB
63:Little minds find gratification for their feelings, benevolent or otherwise, by a constant exercise of petty ingenuity. ~ Honor de Balzac, #NFDB
64:I mean, you can't be less ruthless than the opposition simply because your government's policy is benevolent, can you now? ~ John le Carre, #NFDB
65:Like God, art seemed to hover over us, perhaps benevolent, and often sublime, but constantly, maddeningly out of reach. ~ Matthew Gallaway, #NFDB
66:The charming aspect of Christmas is the fact that it expresses good will in a cheerful, happy, benevolent, non-sacrificial way. ~ Ayn Rand, #NFDB
67:You can't have it both ways. You can't have both free will and a benevolent higher power who protects you from yourself. ~ Arthur C Clarke, #NFDB
68:Watching Siri and Dtui 'run' to the administration block would have saddened even the most benevolent of athletic coaches ~ Colin Cotterill, #NFDB
69:Have compassion, have pity for all beings that live. Let thy heart be benevolent and sympathetic towards all that lives. ~ Fo’shu-tsrn-king-, #NFDB
70:And to read the Bible without horror, we must undo everything that is tender, sympathizing and benevolent in the heart of man. ~ Thomas Paine, #NFDB
71:Next to eating good dinners, a healthy man with a benevolent turn of mind, must like, I think, to read about them. ~ William Makepeace Thackeray, #NFDB
72:But deep this truth impress'd my mind:
Thro' all His works abroad,
The heart benevolent and kind
The most resembles God. ~ Robert Burns,#NFDB
73:Most people today couldn't tell a bombardier from a brigadier" - said during a lecture in aid of the Army Benevolent Fund in 2009 ~ Richard Holmes, #NFDB
74:Never give anyone the advice to buy or sell shares, because the most benevolent price of advice can turn out badly. ~ Francois de La Rochefoucauld, #NFDB
75:Be sure to lie to your kids about the benevolent, all-seeing Santa Claus. It will prepare them for an adulthood of believing in God. ~ Scott Dikkers, #NFDB
76:Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, #NFDB
77:To them the mine was a benevolent Moloch to whom they fed their children at an early age and from whom they took their daily bread. ~ Winston Graham, #NFDB
78:Grace is the state of being in which we are loved unconditionally and all that we need is provided for us by the benevolent hand of God. ~ Alan Cohen, #NFDB
79:Heaven and earth do not act from (the impulse of) any wish to be benevolent; they deal with all things as the dogs of grass are dealt with. ~ Lao Tzu, #NFDB
80:...we should deal with children as God does with us, who makes us happiest when He lets us stagger in benevolent delusion. ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, #NFDB
81:He was not my actual father-who would have loved me and spent time with me-but a benevolent and vaguely important figure named Mr. Brown ~ Gillian Flynn, #NFDB
82:The conqueror is regarded with awe; the wise man commands our respect; but it is only the benevolent man that wins our affection. ~ William Dean Howells, #NFDB
83:The consent of the governed" is more than a safeguard against ignorant tyrants: it is an insurance against benevolent despots as well. ~ Walter Lippmann, #NFDB
84:I hold the precepts of Jesus as delivered by Himself, to be the most pure, benevolent and sublime which have ever been preached to man. ~ Thomas Jefferson, #NFDB
85:In a child’s eyes, a mother is a goddess. She can be glorious or terrible, benevolent or filled with wrath, but she commands love either way. ~ N K Jemisin, #NFDB
86:I wish to become rich, so that I can instruct the people and glorify honest poverty a little, like those kind hearted, fat, benevolent people do. ~ Mark Twain, #NFDB
87:The concept of the benevolent dictator, just like the concepts of the noble thief or the honest whore, is no more than a meaningless fantasy. ~ Alaa Al Aswany, #NFDB
88:She ate from my plates and wore my clothes and slept in my bed like Goldilocks while the benevolent, lumbering bear went south for the holidays. ~ Ann Patchett, #NFDB
89:He was so benevolent, so merciful a man that, in his mistaken passion, he would have held an umbrella over a duck in a shower of rain. ~ Douglas William Jerrold, #NFDB
90:I don’t like speculation,” said Matthias.
“Of course you don’t. You like things you can see. Like piles of snow and benevolent tree gods. ~ Leigh Bardugo,#NFDB
91:inside each person lives two wolves. One was full of evil, jealousy, anger, resentment. The other wolf was kind, benevolent, generous, and dutiful. ~ Jeff Wheeler, #NFDB
92:Never give anyone the advice to buy or sell shares, because, where perspicacity is weakened, the most benevolent piece of advice can turn out badly. ~ John Brooks, #NFDB
93:Nobody ever inferred from the multiple infirmities of Windows that Bill Gates was infinitely benevolent, omniscient, and able to fix everything. ~ Simon Blackburn, #NFDB
94:The idea that no gentleman ever swears is all wrong. He can swear and still be a gentleman if he does it in a nice and benevolent and affectionate way. ~ Mark Twain, #NFDB
95:The more I learn about the universe, the less convinced I am that there's any sort of benevolent force that has anything to do with it, at all. ~ Neil deGrasse Tyson, #NFDB
96:Overwhelmingly strong proofs of intelligent and benevolent design lie around us... the atheistic idea is so nonsensical that I cannot put it into words. ~ Lord Kelvin, #NFDB
97:Spiritual joy is devotion, it's like a virus you know? It's a benevolent virus, but it spreads. It's infectious. Ram Dass was like a mentor in those days. ~ Surya Das, #NFDB
98:We know who is benevolent, by quite other means than the amount of subscriptions to soup-societies. It is only low merits that canbe enumerated. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson, #NFDB
99:We like where we live and we wanna participate in our neighbourhoods and communities and stuff and try to- we're not like benevolent- it's pretty basic. ~ Jon Fishman, #NFDB
100:I am a misanthrope and yet utterly benevolent, have more than one screw loose yet am a super-idealist who digests philosophy more efficiently than food. ~ Alfred Nobel, #NFDB
101:If Despotism failed only for want of a capable benevolent despot, what chance has Democracy, which requires a whole population of capable voters. ~ George Bernard Shaw, #NFDB
102:So the problem of Evil never really existed. To expect the universe to be benevolent was like imagining one could always win at a game of pure chance. ~ Arthur C Clarke, #NFDB
103:In our interactions with people, a benevolent hypocrisy is frequently required--acting as though we do not see through the motivesof their actions. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
104:Winnie, but I don’t believe in sin.” He smiled. It was a benevolent smile. Also unpleasant: sheep lips, wolf teeth. “That’s fine. But sin believes in you. ~ Stephen King, #NFDB
105:Benevolent dictator? No, I'm just lazy. I try to manage by not making decisions and letting things occur naturally. That's when you get the best results. ~ Linus Torvalds, #NFDB
106:In our interactions with people, a benevolent hypocrisy is frequently required— acting as though we do not see through the motives of their actions. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
107:My first baby looked neither new nor old. He was otherworldly, like a pure ray of intelligence, like an innocent visitor from a more benevolent planet. ~ Elizabeth Lesser, #NFDB
108:In our interactions with people, a benevolent hypocrisy is frequently required — acting as though we do not see through the motives of their actions. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
109:It’s not something we deserve. Rather, grace is the free and benevolent favor of God as manifested in the salvation of sinners and the bestowal of blessings. ~ Jon Meacham, #NFDB
110:I never read the scripts at all carefully and never wanted to know what was going on, because i felt that being a benevolent alien, that's the way it should be. ~ Tom Baker, #NFDB
111:To feel much for others and little for ourselves; to restrain our selfishness and exercise our benevolent affections, constitute the perfection of human nature. ~ Adam Smith, #NFDB
112:If you truly believed you had a benevolent bus driver, and you were certain he was taking you somewhere good, you could just settle in and appreciate the ride. ~ Maria Semple, #NFDB
113:The most benevolent souls are the one's who have had to drink some of life's worst poisons, yet protected others in their lives from ever having to taste them. ~ Jos N Harris, #NFDB
114:But friendship is precious, not only in the shade, but in the sunshine of life, and thanks to a benevolent arrangement the greater part of life is sunshine. ~ Thomas Jefferson, #NFDB
115:If God is Trinity and Jesus is the face of God, then it is a benevolent universe. God is not someone to be afraid of, but is the Ground of Being and on our side. ~ Richard Rohr, #NFDB
116:No, the idea of a benevolent god was very much an exception in the enormous pantheon of gods that people had invented over the course of human history. ~ Alexander McCall Smith, #NFDB
117:Stable government requires the free consent of those ruled. Tyranny, even the tyranny of benevolent despots, cannot bring lasting peace and prosperity. There ~ Ludwig von Mises, #NFDB
118:To feel much for others and little for ourselves, that to restrain our selfish, and to indulge our benevolent affections, constitutes the perfection of human nature. ~ Adam Smith, #NFDB
119:I had begun life with benevolent intentions and thirsted for the moment when I should put them in practice and make myself useful to my fellow beings ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, #NFDB
120:Benevolent desires, after passing a certain point, can not undertake their own fulfillment without incurring the risk of evils beyond those sought to be remedied. ~ Herman Melville, #NFDB
121:I have never understood why the pig is an animal whose name is used in derision. He is intelligent and kindly, often benevolent, in fact; in short, totally with it. ~ Jean Shepherd, #NFDB
122:A good deal of philanthropy arises in general from mere vanity and love of distinction gilded over to others and to themselves with some show of benevolent sentiment. ~ Walter Scott, #NFDB
123:At the heart of mature masculinity is a sense of benevolent responsibility to lead, provide for, and protect women in ways appropriate to man's differing relationships. ~ John Piper, #NFDB
124:Beneficence is a duty; and he who frequently practices it, and sees his benevolent intentions realized comes, at length, really to love him to whom he has done good. ~ Immanuel Kant, #NFDB
125:The world is intertwined and we therefore have to be gentle in the way that we treat one another and the Earth, so that our impact on others is benevolent and good. ~ Maya Soetoro Ng, #NFDB
126:It is clearly better that property should be private, but the use of it common; and the special business of the legislator is to create in men this benevolent disposition. ~ Aristotle, #NFDB
127:. . . wasn't it better to feel that when that chaos engulfed you, there was a benevolent God ready to help you through, rather than the emptiness of an indifferent universe? ~ Naomi Ragen, #NFDB
128:they talked, too, of their futures, as if they could shape the glittering course of their destinies with secret confessions offered like prayers to the room’s benevolent hush. ~ Libba Bray, #NFDB
129:It‘s easy to feel benevolent when you‘re wearing an apron and gloves over a Chanel suit and dishing out turkey and dressing to a long line of the “least of these. ~ Cassie Dandridge Selleck, #NFDB
130:... She might have thought that it was the case, that all things worked out in the end, and that the world was a benevolent place, but she knew better now, and had to fake it. ~ Emma Straub, #NFDB
131:Anyone who dares to lay hands on the highest image of the Lord commits sacrilege against the benevolent creator of this miracle and contributes to the expulsion from paradise. ~ Adolf Hitler, #NFDB
132:The director's in charge of every single decision [in film]. It's a dictatorship.It's a benevolent dictatorship, but it's true. It's every single shot. There's nothing arbitrary. ~ Matt Damon, #NFDB
133:We may mean nothing to time, but to each other we are kings and queens, and the world is a wild benevolent garden filled with chance meetings and unexplained departures. Magda ~ Simon Van Booy, #NFDB
134:Grace is not merited. It’s not something we deserve. Rather, grace is the free and benevolent favor of God as manifested in the salvation of sinners and the bestowal of blessings. ~ Jon Meacham, #NFDB
135:I do not want to live under a philanthropy. I do not want to be taken care of by the government.... We do not want a benevolent government. We want a free and a just government. ~ Woodrow Wilson, #NFDB
136:I think there are presences out there that we can't see or directly communicate with that have benevolent influence on us. Whether they're angels or something else, I'm not sure. ~ Misha Collins, #NFDB
137:there must be some hope that we can rise to a higher level … that consciousness can evolve to a plane more benevolent than its counterpoint of a universe hardwired to indifference. ~ Dan Simmons, #NFDB
138:I am loaded down to the guards with educational, benevolent, and other miscellaneous public work, I must not attempt to do more. I cannot without neglecting imperative duties. ~ Rutherford B Hayes, #NFDB
139:Freemasonry is an establishment founded on the benevolent intention of extending and conferring mutual happiness upon the best and truest principles of moral life and social virtue. ~ Andrew Jackson, #NFDB
140:25. Try how the life of the good man suits thee, the life of him who is satisfied with his portion out of the whole, and satisfied with his own just acts and benevolent disposition. ~ Marcus Aurelius, #NFDB
141:Shambhala is a tradition where there were rulers, kings, and powerful people who actually were very benevolent and kind. They got things done, and they didn't abandon their tradition. ~ Sakyong Mipham, #NFDB
142:What is it that affectionate parents require of their Children; for all their care, anxiety, and toil on their accounts? Only that they would be wise and virtuous, Benevolent and kind. ~ Abigail Adams, #NFDB
143:We both can be the most beautiful and benevolent creatures on the planet, but then there's another side that can be as harsh and as ugly as the darkest thing you could imagine seeing. ~ Terrence Howard, #NFDB
144:When the clergy get too big for their britches, they take these wonderfully benevolent writings from the Bible and crumble their intended integrity by slathering them with human nature. ~ Nick Offerman, #NFDB
145:How easy is it for one benevolent being to diffuse pleasure around him, and how truly is a kind heart a fountain of gladness, making everything in its vicinity to freshen into smiles. ~ Washington Irving, #NFDB
146:Nature is not benevolent; Nature is just, gives pound for pound, measure for measure, makes no exceptions, never tempers her decrees with mercy, or winks at any infringement of her laws. ~ John Burroughs, #NFDB
147:A universal peace, it is to be feared, is in the catalogue of events, which will never exist but in the imaginations of visionary philosophers, or in the breasts of benevolent enthusiasts. ~ James Madison, #NFDB
148:To be a hegemon is inherently ambiguous, usually implying some mixture of dominance and legitimacy, that is, being seen as contributing global leadership in a generally benevolent manner. ~ Richard A Falk, #NFDB
149:The artist makes art not to save mankind but to save himself. Every benevolent comment by an artist is a fog to cover his tracks, the bloody trail of his assault against reality and others. ~ Camille Paglia, #NFDB
150:A perfect character might be attended with the inconvenience of being envied and hated; and that a benevolent man should allow a few faults in himself, to keep his friends in countenance. ~ Benjamin Franklin, #NFDB
151:No man can possibly be benevolent or religious, to the full extent of his obligations, without concerning himself, to a greater or less extent, with the affairs of human government. ~ Charles Grandison Finney, #NFDB
152:In regard to the colored people, there is always more that is benevolent, I perceive, than just, manifested towards us. What I ask for the negro is not benevolence, not pity, not sympathy, ~ Frederick Douglass, #NFDB
153:I've decided the secret of parenting is benevolent neglect.I put my family last. Because if you don't, if you put them first, they never thank you. You'll never get a word of thanks from them. ~ Barry Humphries, #NFDB
154:There is nothing more man needs than Divine Mercy - that love which is benevolent, which is compassionate, which raises man above his weakness to the infinite heights to the holiness of God. ~ Pope John Paul II, #NFDB
155:There's a beast in me. I destroy those I cannot control. I must be certain that those close to me share my identical interests. I'm benevolent within that construction. I'm ghastly outside of it. ~ James Ellroy, #NFDB
156:Indeed, it is a benevolent dispensation of Providence that those who express most dread of an unorthodox advance are usually those whom Nature has most effectively protected from any risk of one. ~ Sarah Caudwell, #NFDB
157:It seems foolhardy to assume that the armed state will necessarily be benevolent. The American political tradition is, for good or ill, based in large measure on a healthy mistrust of the state. ~ Sanford Levinson, #NFDB
158:A small craft in the ocean is, or should be, a benevolent dictatorship. The skipper's brain is the vessel's brain and he must give up his soul to her, regardless of his own feelings or inclinations. ~ Tristan Jones, #NFDB
159:The pipe draws wisdom from the lips of the philosopher, and shuts up the mouth of the foolish; it generates a style of conversation, contemplative, thoughtful, benevolent, and unaffected. ~ William Makepeace Thackeray, #NFDB
160:In a child's eyes, a mother is a goddess. She can be glorious or terrible, benevolent or filled with wrath, but she commands love either way. I am convinced that this is the greatest power in the universe. ~ N K Jemisin, #NFDB
161:In a child’s eyes, a mother is a goddess. She can be glorious or terrible, benevolent or filled with wrath, but she commands love either way. I am convinced that this is the greatest power in the universe. ~ N K Jemisin, #NFDB
162:What am I writing for anyway? Is it like dreaming? Is it a benevolent process? Something that moves the past forward? And what about those people who say all you get from looking at the past is a stiff neck? ~ Selima Hill, #NFDB
163:It is in fact agreed that I am the plague, the cholera of the benevolent and generous men who are interested in art and that, when I show myself with my plasters, even the Emperor of the Sahara would flee. ~ Camille Claudel, #NFDB
164:We must distinguish between the knowledge which is due to the study and analysis of Matter and that which results from contact with life and a benevolent activity in the midst of humanity. ~ Antoine the Healer: “Revelations.”, #NFDB
165:Custom is, nevertheless, the greatest enchantress, and in a home one of the most benevolent of fairies. A wife was young, and becomes old; it is custom which hinders the husband from perceiving the change. ~ Timothy Shay Arthur, #NFDB
166:I don't think we need to agree with anyone in order to love the person. The command for Christians to love the other person, to be benevolent and beneficent toward them, is independent of what the other believes. ~ Miroslav Volf, #NFDB
167:That trip was like all my life, distilled: a compulsion to thrust myself toward adventure, offset by a longing to crawl into the pouch of some benevolent kangaroo who would take me bounding, protected, through life. ~ Ariel Levy, #NFDB
168:I feel obliged to withhold my approval of the plan to indulge in benevolent and charitable sentiment through the appropriation of public funds ... I find no warrant for such an appropriation in the Constitution. ~ Grover Cleveland, #NFDB
169:If I was the dictator, with my profound understanding of Marx’s real intent, and my universal benevolent compassion, uncontaminated by any proclivity toward darkness or sin, I would bring on the socialist Utopia. ~ Jordan Peterson, #NFDB
170:Mr Verloc extended as much recognition to Stevie as a man not particularly fond of animals may give to his wife’s beloved cat; and this recognition, benevolent and perfunctory, was essentially of the same quality. ~ Joseph Conrad, #NFDB
171:If I was the dictator, with my profound understanding of Marx’s real intent, and my universal benevolent compassion, uncontaminated by any proclivity toward darkness or sin, I would bring on the socialist Utopia. ~ Jordan B Peterson, #NFDB
172:If you see failure as a monster stalking you, or one that has
already ruined your life, take another look. That monster can
become a benevolent teacher, opening your mind to successes
you cannot now imagine. ~ Martha N Beck,#NFDB
173:A liberated person will indeed be generous and benevolent, but not because she has been conditioned to be so. She will be so purely as a manifestation of her own basic nature, which is no longer inhibited by ego. ~ Henepola Gunaratana, #NFDB
174:I like them all - I don't always approve. I see myself as a sort of benevolent uncle to these characters, and I can see why they do what they do; sometimes they make some mistakes, but at heart I think they're decent. ~ Patrick Marber, #NFDB
175:He strove to shelter her, as a fair exotic is sheltered by the gardener, from every rougher wind, and to surround her with all that could tend to excite pleasurable emotion in her soft and benevolent mind. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, #NFDB
176:great nation is like a great man: When he makes a mistake, he realizes it. Having realized it, he admits it. Having admitted it, he corrects it. He considers those who point out his faults as his most benevolent teachers. ~ Carol Tavris, #NFDB
177:Bouncer, recognizing a well-wisher, got up, and thrust his cold, wet nose under her hand, assuming as he did so the soulful expression of a dog who takes but a benevolent interest in cats, livestock, and stray visitors. ~ Georgette Heyer, #NFDB
178:Ah, how little you know of human happiness - you comfortable and benevolent people! For happiness and unhappiness are brother and sister - or even twins who grow up together - or in your case - remain small together! ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
179:All life will die, all mind will cease, and it will all be as if it had never happened. That, to be honest, is the goal to which evolution is traveling, that is the "benevolent" end of the furious living and furious dying. ~ David Eagleman, #NFDB
180:J. G. Ballard reminded us that ‘the suburbs dream of violence. Asleep in their drowsy villas, sheltered by benevolent shopping malls, they wait patiently for the nightmares that will wake them into a more passionate world. ~ George Monbiot, #NFDB
181:In a perfect world what poor countries at the lowest rungs of economic development need is not a multi-party democracy, but in fact a decisive benevolent dictator to push through the reforms required to get the economy moving ~ Dambisa Moyo, #NFDB
182:I would say that since the war, our methods-out and those of the opposition-have become much the same. I mean you can't be less ruthless than the opposition simply because your government's 'policy' is benevolent, can you now? ~ John le Carr, #NFDB
183:In a child’s eyes, a mother is a goddess. She can be glorious or terrible, benevolent or filled with wrath, but she commands love either way. I am convinced that this is the greatest power in the universe. My mother— No. Not yet. ~ N K Jemisin, #NFDB
184:The benevolent gentleman is sorry; but, then, the thing happens every day! One sees girls and mothers crying at these sales, always! it can't be helped, etc.; and he walks off, with his acquisition, in another direction. ~ Harriet Beecher Stowe, #NFDB
185:I have forbidden Adèle to talk to me about her presents, and she is bursting with repletion: have the goodness to serve her as auditress and interlocutrice; it will be one of the most benevolent acts you ever performed.” Adèle, ~ Charlotte Bront, #NFDB
186:Believe me, Frankenstein, I was benevolent; my soul glowed with love and humanity; but am I not alone, miserably alone? You, my creator, abhor me; what hope can I gather from your fellow creatures, who owe me nothing? ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, #NFDB
187:The Jews looked for a special savior, a messiah, who was to redeem mankind by the agreeable process of restoring the fabulous glories of David and Solomon, and bringing the whole world at last under the firm but benevolent Jewish heel. ~ H G Wells, #NFDB
188:Being made to feel like an irrelevant child was probably an asset. Benign negligence is not a bad parental attitude or at least a cross between a benevolent dictator and benign negligence - you should just let kids crack on with it. ~ Clare Balding, #NFDB
189:I could well believe that it is God's intention, since we have refused milder remedies, to compel [Christians] into unity, by persecution even. Satan is without doubt nothing else than a hammer in the hand of a benevolent and severe God. ~ C S Lewis, #NFDB
190:It is an oftentimes dangerous world and not all of the people in it are nice, sweet and benevolent. It is the nature of man to behave otherwise and we must find leaders who can show us a better way and still maintains a balanced view. ~ Mike Medavoy, #NFDB
191:If the gods have the will to remove evil and cannot, then they are not all-powerful. If they are neither able nor willing, they are neither all-powerful or benevolent. If they are both able and willing to annihilate evil, why does it exist? ~ Epicurus, #NFDB
192:However benevolent may be the intentions of Providence, they do not always advance the happiness of the individual. Providence has always higher ends in view, and works in a pre-eminent degree on the inner feelings and disposition. ~ Wilhelm von Humboldt, #NFDB
193:We will have an unchallenged, open, panoramic opportunity on a global scale to demonstrate the finest aspects of what we know in this country: peace, freedom, democracy, human rights, benevolent sharing, love, the easing of human suffering. ~ Jimmy Carter, #NFDB
194:Do you believe in the freedom of individuals to determine their own futures and solve problems cooperatively working together, or do you believe that a powerful but benevolent government can and should rearrange outcomes and make things better? ~ Matt Kibbe, #NFDB
195:From a pragmatic point of view, the difference between living against a background of foreigness (an indifferent Universe) and one of intimacy (a benevolent Universe) means the difference between a general habit of wariness and one of trust. ~ William James, #NFDB
196:do everything, I thought, on the contrary, whatever you can to resist the ingenious temptations of compromises, cling to the suffering, stir up the dread, for the monsters are also the benevolent guardians of the survivor's presence within me ~ H l ne Cixous, #NFDB
197:Selective ignorance, a cornerstone of child rearing. You don't put kids under surveillance: it might frighten you. Parents should sit tall in the saddle and look upon their troops with a noble and benevolent and extremely nearsighted gaze. ~ Garrison Keillor, #NFDB
198:The conception of the necessary unit of all that is resolves itself into the poverty of the imagination, and a freer logic emancipates us from the straitwaistcoated benevolent institution, which idealism palms off as the totality of being. ~ Bertrand Russell, #NFDB
199:Whether it was true or not, it eased his heart to think there was something beyond the physical plane, something that felt benevolent toward humans, because the gods knew there wasn’t much on the physical plane that felt benevolent toward them. ~ Anne Bishop, #NFDB
200:Pain and darkness have been our lot since the Fall of Man. But there must be some hope that we can rise to a higher level ... that consciousness can evolve to a plane more benevolent than its counterpoint of a universe hardwired to indifference. ~ Dan Simmons, #NFDB
201:I always found that if you handle a problem in a benevolent way and a transparent way and involve other people, so it's just not your personal opinion, that people get to the other side of these difficult conversations being more enthusiastic. ~ David M Kelley, #NFDB
202:What a racially segregated system once taught the young black about living with his inferiority is now taught by a benevolent social welfare system. The difference was that in an earlier age a black parent could fight the competing influences. ~ Charles A Murray, #NFDB
203:Without a criterion enabling us to distinguish genuine human rights from the many impostors we will never be sure that our legal provisions, however wise, benevolent and responsible, will be secure against the individual desire to escape from them. ~ Roger Scruton, #NFDB
204:Higher good is like water:
the good in water benefits all,
and does so without contention.
It rests where people dislike to be,
so it is close to the Way.
Good ground;
profound is the good in its heart,
Benevolent the good it bestows. ~ Lao Tzu,#NFDB
205:Jesus Christ represented God as the principle of all good, the source of all happiness, the wise and benevolent Creator and Preserver of all living things. But the interpreters of his doctrines have confounded the good and the evil principle. ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley, #NFDB
206:Lament is a cry of belief in a good God, a God who has His ear to our hearts, a God who transfigures the ugly into beauty. Complaint is the bitter howl of unbelief in any benevolent God in this moment, a distrust in the love-beat of the Father's heart. ~ Ann Voskamp, #NFDB
207:Surely death acquires a new and deeper significance when we regard it no longer as a single and unexplained break in an unending life, but as a part of the continuously recurring rhythm of progress-as inevitable, as natural and benevolent as sleep. ~ J M E McTaggart, #NFDB
208:Coal companies often justified their expansion and the recruitment of local populations into their workforce as benevolent actions that would bring backward mountaineers into their own as equal participants in America’s expanding spirit of industry. ~ Elizabeth Catte, #NFDB
209:For centuries the Bible's emphasis on compassion and love for our neighbor has inspired institutional and governmental expressions of benevolent outreach such as private charity, the establishment of schools and hospitals, and the abolition of slavery. ~ Ronald Reagan, #NFDB
210:It would be very nice if there were a God who created the world and was a benevolent providence, and if there were a moral order in the universe and an after-life; but it is a very striking fact that all this is exactly as we are bound to wish it to be. ~ Sigmund Freud, #NFDB
211:Happy will be the men who, having the power and the love and the benevolent forecast to [create a park], will do it. They will not be forgotten. The trees and their lovers will sing their praises, and generations yet unborn will rise up and call them blessed. ~ John Muir, #NFDB
212:I worship nothing. Not a good lie nor a dark one. If nature is proof of God's amazing creation then I have truly seen the light, and the light is black. Nature is genius at its most cruel and savage. No benevolent God could have come up with such an outrage. ~ Gary Numan, #NFDB
213:The ability to feel and express genuine gratitude for the help given when it is needed most, for the gift or boon that is given at just the right time and under the right circumstances, is a way of surrendering one’s self to benevolent external forces. ~ Stephen Richards, #NFDB
214:There is a mystery within all beings bursting to reveal itself, in the ones who become quiet enough to discover it. In this discovery a benevolent force shines spontaneously from your presence towards all beings, and this light cannot help but illuminate the world. ~ Mooji, #NFDB
215:A house of stone and glass and iron should be stark and sober, a watchtower from which a benevolent guard is kept over society. But the white stone of this particular house rippled as if reacting to a hand that had found its most pleasurable point of contact. ~ Helen Oyeyemi, #NFDB
216:A sense of contentment makes us kindly and benevolent to others; we are not chafed and galled by cares which are tyrannical because original. We are fulfilling our proper destiny, and those around us feel the sunshine of our own hearts. ~ Edward Bulwer Lytton 1st Baron Lytton, #NFDB
217:The idea is that one's temperament improves with age; that you learn to deal better with people and become more benevolent and loving. That's not necessarily true. I try to stay loose but sometimes the best thing to do is get yourself away and take a good nap. ~ Robert Duvall, #NFDB
218:To see an enemy humiliated gives a certain contentment, but this is jejune compared with the highly blent satisfaction of seeing him humiliated by your benevolent action or concession on his behalf. That is the sort of revenge which falls into the scale of virtue. ~ George Eliot, #NFDB
219:If a powerful and benevolent spirit has shaped the destiny of this world, we can better discover that destiny from the words that have gathered up the heart's desire of the world, than from historical records, or from speculation, wherein the heart withers. ~ William Butler Yeats, #NFDB
220:For our miserable species would never lavish worship on a just and benevolent God from whom they had nothing to fear; they would only feel an empty and thankless gratitude for their benefits. Without purgatory and hell, your God would indeed be a useless creature. ~ Anatole France, #NFDB
221:Absolute power corrupts even when exercised for humane purposes. The benevolent despot who sees himself as a shepherd of the people still demands from others the submissiveness of sheep. The taint inherent in absolute power is not its inhumanity but its anti-humanity. ~ Eric Hoffer, #NFDB
222:To see an enemy humiliated gives a certain contentment, but this is jejune compared with the highly blent satisfaction of seeing him humiliated by your benevolent action of concession on his behalf. That is a sort of revenge which falls into the scale of virtue [...] ~ George Eliot, #NFDB
223:A great nation is like a great man:When he makes a mistake, he realizes it.Having realized it, he admits it.Having admitted it, he corrects it.He considers those who point out his faultsas his most benevolent teachers.He thinks of his enemyas the shadow that he himself casts. ~ Laozi, #NFDB
224:How benevolent of them. And where was their compassion when they bombed thousands of innocents that day?”
“Some sacrifices needed to be made—”
“Then you die.” I snap. “If you think sacrificing any life is necessary, then I want to see you give yours up first. ~ Laura Thalassa,#NFDB
225:One nation is to another what one individual is to another; with this melancholy distinction perhaps, that the former with fewer of the benevolent emotions than the latter, are under fewer restraints also from taking undue advantage of the indiscretions of each other. ~ James Madison, #NFDB
226:Those who live by mystery & charlatanerie, fearing you would render them useless by simplifying the Christian philosophy - the most sublime and benevolent, but most perverted system that ever shone on man - endeavored to crush your well-earned & well-deserved fame. ~ Thomas Jefferson, #NFDB
227:But friendship is precious, not only in the shade but in the sunshine of life; & thanks to a benevolent arrangement of things, the greater part of life is sunshine. I will recur for proof to the days we have lately passed. On these indeed the sun shone brightly. ~ Thomas Jefferson, #NFDB
228:Satan and that man is still man even after 1000 years of the righteous, benevolent rule of Christ on earth. Even under the most ideal circumstances imaginable, man is still totally depraved and in desperate need of a new heart by the regeneration of the Spirit of God. ~ Mark Hitchcock, #NFDB
229:Shattered by the cumulative effect of so much horror and death, Joan was again afflicted by a crisis of faith. How could a good and benevolent God let such a thing happen? How could He so terribly afflict even children and babies, who were not guilty of any sin? ~ Donna Woolfolk Cross, #NFDB
230:I need a lot of support... Life is really hard, and I don't see some active benevolent force out there. I see it as basically a really cool survival game. You get on the right side of the tracks, and you now are actually working with what some people would call magic. ~ Robert Downey Jr, #NFDB
231:Less, as with a repentant worshipper, begins again to love his subject, and at last, one morning, after an hour sitting with his chin in his hand, watching birds cross the gray haze of the horizon, our benevolent god grants his character the brief benediction of joy. ~ Andrew Sean Greer, #NFDB
232:Dragons came in six colors, each with a unique set of powers that only they had. Blue dragons had the ability to heal anyone, even bring them back from the brink of death, and as such, they tended to be the most benevolent and self-sacrificing of the different breeds. Or ~ Terry Bolryder, #NFDB
233:welcomed the low-ranking Wolf 106 and her pups into the pack’s den. Under Wolf 42’s leadership, Wolf 106 blossomed. She became the finest hunter in the Druid Pack and eventually the leader of her own pack, the Geode Creek Pack, where she, too, instituted a benevolent reign. ~ Ted Kerasote, #NFDB
234:The exercise of my reason itself was forbidden. But the questions never stopped coming, eventually leading to this one: “Why would a benevolent God set up the world like this, marking one half of the population to be second-class citizens? Or was it just men who did this? ~ Ayaan Hirsi Ali, #NFDB
235:The reason why any one refuses his assent to your opinion, or his aid to your benevolent design, is in you: he refuses to accept you as a bringer of truth, because, though you think you have it, he feels that you have it not. You have not given him the authentic sign. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson, #NFDB
236:If I knew a miser, who gave up every kind of comfortable living, all the pleasure of doing good to others, all the esteem of his fellow-citizens, and the joys of benevolent friendship, for the sake of accumulating wealth. Poor man, said I, you pay too much for your whistle. ~ Benjamin Franklin, #NFDB
237:Some people call the sunset a creation of extraordinary beauty, and proof of God’s existence. But what benevolent force would bewitch the human spirit by choosing pink to light the path of a slave vessel? Do not be fooled by that pretty colour, and do not submit to its beckoning. ~ Lawrence Hill, #NFDB
238:That's the day I realized that there was this entire life behind things, and this incredibly benevolent force that wanted me to know there was no reason to be afraid, ever... Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world, I feel like I can't take it, and my heart is going to cave in. ~ Alan Ball, #NFDB
239:Bowing, ceremonious, formal compliments, stiff civilities, will never be politeness; that must be easy, natural, unstudied; and what will give this but a mind benevolent and attentive to exert that amiable disposition in trifles to all you converse and live with? ~ William Pitt 1st Earl of Chatham, #NFDB
240:I hate organized religion. I think you have to love thy neighbor as thyself. I think you have to pick your own God and be true to him. I always say 'him' rather than 'her.' Maybe it's because of my generation, but I don't like the idea of a female God. I see God as a benevolent male. ~ Julia Child, #NFDB
241:The original Zal story by Ferdowsi gives a very moving account of an infant who had all odds against him - he was left to die in the wilderness and a giant, benevolent bird rescued him and became his guardian angel. This tale thrilled me; I've always wanted to write about it. ~ Porochista Khakpour, #NFDB
242:We shall tell ourselves that it would be very nice if there were a God who created the world and was a benevolent Providence, and if there were a moral order in the universe and an after-life; but it is a very striking fact that all this is exactly as we are bound to wish it to be. ~ Sigmund Freud, #NFDB
243:For it cannot be denied that all over the world and in all ages there are beings who are perceived to be extraordinary, charming, and appealing, and whom many honor as benevolent spirits, because they make one think of a more beautiful, a freer, a more winged life than the one we lead. ~ Hermann Hesse, #NFDB
244:He who puts away from him all passion, hatred, pride and hypocrisy, who pronounces words instructive and benevolent, who does not make his own what has not been given to him, who without desire, covetousness, impatience knows the depths of the Permanent, he is indeed a.man of religion. ~ Buddhist Text, #NFDB
245:My theory is that hope is a form of madness. A benevolent one, sure, but madness all the same. Like an irrational superstition--broken mirrors and so forth--hope's not based on any kind of logic, it's just unfettered optimism, grounded in nothing but faith in things beyond our control. ~ Benjamin Wood, #NFDB
246:The Christian religion, when divested of the rags in which they [the clergy] have enveloped it, and brought to the original purity and simplicity of it's benevolent institutor, is a religion of all others most friendly to liberty, science, and the freest expansion of the human mind. ~ Thomas Jefferson, #NFDB
247:The Robespierre women (as one tended to think of them now) were all on display. Madame looked actively, rather intimidatingly benevolent; it was her aim in life to find a Jacobin who was hungry, then to go into the kitchen and make extravagant efforts, and say, “I have fed a patriot!”. ~ Hilary Mantel, #NFDB
248:Had it not been for Mr. Drawlight and Mr. Lascelles (benevolent souls!) the Town would have been starved of information of any sort, but they drove diligently about London making their appearance in a quite impossible number of drawing-rooms, morning-rooms, dining-rooms and card-rooms. ~ Susanna Clarke, #NFDB
249:If the role is right and it's another situation of having a benevolent genius at the head of it, someone who likes actors, and will protect the actors from the ravages of reality-TV drama. It's a brutal world, and you need to have a strong creative team who can stand up to the network. ~ Olivia Williams, #NFDB
250:Where are the heroes and the saints, who keep a clear vision of man's greatest gift, his freedom, to oppose not only the dictatorship of the proletariat, but also the dictatorship of the benevolent state, which takes possession of the family, and of the indigent, and claims our young for war? ~ Dorothy Day, #NFDB
251:For the Christian there can be no social or political panaceas, no easy escapes from personal responsibility achieved by collectivising guilt or virtue. The true ends of temporal life lie beyond it, and, though the tyrannical State may diminish virtue, the benevolent State cannot procure it. ~ Margaret Thatcher, #NFDB
252:I'm sympathetic to the people who go, "Whoa, we'd like to have the benevolent, wise dictator. It will all work much more efficiently," but the reason that we remain staunch democrats - with a small d - is it's a decades long, it's a centuries long, it's a country long process for being inclusive. ~ Reid Hoffman, #NFDB
253:A great nation is like a great man:
When he makes a mistake, he realizes it.
Having realized it, he admits it.
Having admitted it, he corrects it.
He considers those who point out his faults
as his most benevolent teachers.
He thinks of his enemy
as the shadow that he himself casts. ~ Lao Tzu,#NFDB
254:His system of morality was the most benevolent and sublime probably that has been ever taught, and consequently more perfect than those of any of the ancient philosophers... He was the most innocent, the most benevolent, the most eloquent and sublime character that ever has been exhibited to man. ~ Thomas Jefferson, #NFDB
255:Her strong passions were compromised by the limited nature of her objectives. My mother had seen this at an early stage; it was to Dolly’s advantage that she had never seen it at all. She needed a guide and had never found one; she needed a benevolent elder, who would watch over her and correct her. ~ Anita Brookner, #NFDB
256:It is the essence of truth that it is never excessive. Why should it exaggerate? There is that which should be destroyed and that which should be simply illuminated and studied. How great is the force of benevolent and searching examination! We must not resort to the flame where only light is required. ~ Victor Hugo, #NFDB
257:Touch-me-nots, their blooms, the soft, sugar-embroidered pink of a happy ending, shrink from the kiss of grumbling yellow bees. Butterflies coyly flutter their emerald-tipped silver wings as if dispensing benedictions from a benevolent god. High up in the coconut trees, the crows squabble and gossip. ~ Renita D Silva, #NFDB
258:When women defy gender roles by acting in a way that is perceived as too “masculine,” men use violence to punish them and remind them of their feminine role. Benevolent sexism is simply the reverse of this; it isn’t the punishment for acting too masculine, it’s the reward for acting appropriately feminine. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
259:The misfortunes which God is represented in the book of Job as allowing Satan to inflict on Job, merely to test his faith, are indications, if not of positive malevolence, at least of a suspicious and ruthless insecurity, which is characteristic more of a tyrant than of a wholly powerful and benevolent deity. ~ A J Ayer, #NFDB
260:Scientists can have their judgment clouded by their professional aspirations. And the pure truth of faith, which you can think of as this clear spiritual water, is poured into rusty vessels called human beings, and so sometimes the benevolent principles of faith can get distorted as positions are hardened. ~ Richard Dawkins, #NFDB
261:In a perfect world, what poor countries at the lowest rungs of economic development need is not a multi-party democracy, but in fact a decisive benevolent dictator to push through the reforms required to get the economy moving (unfortunately, too often countries end up with more dictator and less benevolence). ~ Dambisa Moyo, #NFDB
262:And that the best things that grownups do, we do for the children, and that they inspire great good in us. I also want them to remember that the world is intertwined and that we therefore have to be gentle in the way that we treat one another and the Earth, so that our impact on others is benevolent and good. ~ Maya Soetoro Ng, #NFDB
263:On the contrary, it made me feel that faith is all the more essential. Pain and darkness have been our lot since the Fall of Man. But there must be some hope that we can rise to a higher level … that consciousness can evolve to a plane more benevolent than its counterpoint of a universe hardwired to indifference. ~ Dan Simmons, #NFDB
264:Remember that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed. Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, #NFDB
265:Madison’s experience at both the state and the federal level had convinced him that “the people” was not some benevolent, harmonious collective but rather a smoldering and ever-shifting gathering of factions or interest groups committed to provincial perspectives and vulnerable to demagogues with partisan agendas. ~ Joseph J Ellis, #NFDB
266:There are many names to Allah plus one you don't know. And each name is an attribute that flexes his characteristics: the Benevolent, the Merciful, the All-Knower... And to me, my names be flexin' personalities of myself: Prince Rakeem, Bobby Digital, Bobby Steels, the RZA, the Rzarector... These are personalities of myself. ~ RZA, #NFDB
267:From Sextus, a benevolent disposition, and the example of a family governed in a fatherly manner, and the idea of living conformably to nature; and gravity without affectation, and to look carefully after the interests of friends, and to tolerate ignorant persons, and those who form opinions without consideration: ~ Marcus Aurelius, #NFDB
268:Despite all evidence to the contrary, I believed in a benevolent power guiding the universe, a loving force that somehow nudged us in the direction of good instead of evil. I believed that Jesus was part of that force, along with the Buddha, and all the spiritual beings that we called on in our moments of despair and need. ~ Yeonmi Park, #NFDB
269:Happiness is not the endless pursuit of pleasant experiences - that sounds more like a recipe for exhaustion - but a way of being that results from cultivating a benevolent mind, emotional balance, inner freedom, inner peace, and wisdom. Each of these qualities is a skill that can be enhanced through training the mind. ~ Matthieu Ricard, #NFDB
270:Esperanza’s dark beauty brought on images of moonlit skies, night walks on the beach, olive trees in a gentle breeze. She wore hoop earrings. Her long black hair always had the perfect muss to it. Her sheer white blouse had been fitted by a benevolent deity; it may have been open a button too low but it was all working. The ~ Harlan Coben, #NFDB
271:In the products of the culture industry human beings get into trouble only so that they can be rescued unharmed, usually by representatives of a benevolent collective; and then, in illusory harmony, they are reconciled with the general interest whose demands they had initially experienced as irreconcilable with their own. ~ Theodor Adorno, #NFDB
272:It sounds silly, I know. But for me, the power of music rests in its ability to reach inside and touch the places where the deepest cuts lie.
Like a benevolent god, a good song will never let you down.
And sometimes, when you're trying to find your way, one of those gods actually shows up and gives you directions. ~ Tiffanie DeBartolo,#NFDB
273:The charming aspect of Christmas is the fact that it expresses good will in a cheerful, happy, benevolent, non-sacrificial way. One says: “Merry Christmas”-not “Weep and Repent.” And the good will is expressed in a material, earthly form-by giving presents to one's friends, or by sending them cards in token of remembrance . . . . ~ Ayn Rand, #NFDB
274:Preacher who says that the sweet life is made from bitter parts is more or less telling those who have come to mourn the teenage suicide that this is just one bitter ingredient in the sweet thing foreordained by the benevolent god. To which I want to shake my fist and say: There is not one sweet thing about it. It is only bitter. ~ Kyle Minor, #NFDB
275:Thou believest in love as a divine attribute because thy thyself lovest; thou believest that God is a wise, benevolent being because thou knowest nothing better in thyself than benevolence and wisdom; and thou believest that God exists, that therefore he is a subject … because thou thyself existest, art thyself a subject[.] ~ Ludwig Feuerbach, #NFDB
276:The United States is a society in which people not only can get by without knowing much about the wider world but are systematically encouraged not to think independently or critically, and instead to accept the mythology of the United States as a benevolent, misunderstood giant as it lumbers around the world trying to do good. ~ Robert Jensen, #NFDB
277:Madison’s experience at both the state and the federal level had convinced him that “the people” was not some benevolent, harmonious collective but rather a smoldering and ever-shifting gathering of factions or interest groups committed to provincial perspectives and vulnerable to demagogues with partisan agendas. The question, ~ Joseph J Ellis, #NFDB
278:They always mean beautiful things like hummingbirds. I always reply by saying that I think of a little child in east Africa with a worm burrowing through his eyeball. The worm cannot live in any other way, except by burrowing through eyeballs. I find that hard to reconcile with the notion of a divine and benevolent creator. ~ David Attenborough, #NFDB
279:I knew the boys in my first novel, which I was writing at that time, weren't as raw as they could be, weren't real. I knew they were failing as characters because I wasn't pushing them to assume the reality that my real-life boys, Demond among them, experienced every day. I loved them too much: as an author, I was a benevolent God. ~ Jesmyn Ward, #NFDB
280:The conceited, benevolent tone of the prefaces, the abundance of translator’s notes, which disturb my concentration, the parenthetical question marks and sic’s that the translator generously scatters through the article or book, are for me like an encroachment both upon the person of the author and upon my independence as a reader. ~ Anton Chekhov, #NFDB
281:Good-nature is that benevolent and amiable temper of mind which disposes us to feel the misfortunes and enjoy the happiness of others, and, consequently, pushes us on to promote the latter and prevent the former; and that without any abstract contemplation on the beauty of virtue, and without the allurements or terrors of religion. ~ Henry Fielding, #NFDB
282:He wore a sprinkling of powder upon his head, as if to make himself look benevolent; but if that were his purpose, he would perhaps have done better to powder his countenance also, for there was something in its very wrinkles, and in his cold restless eye, which seemed to tell of cunning that would announce itself in spite of him. ~ Charles Dickens, #NFDB
283:Republics never survive, for their people do not like freedom but prefer to be led and guided and flattered and seduced into slavery by a benevolent, or not so, benevolent despot. They want to worship Caesar. So, American republicanism will inevitably die and become a democracy, and then decline, as Aristotle said into a despotism. ~ Taylor Caldwell, #NFDB
284:It was inevitable under a monarchy, however benevolent the monarch. The old virtues disappear. Independence and frankness are at a discount. Complacent anticipation of the monarch's wishes is then the greatest of all virtues. One must either be a good monarch like yourself, or a good courtier like myself—either an Emperor or an idiot. ~ Robert Graves, #NFDB
285:The Benevolent Vampires were mainly about preventing murder, sure, but every new recruit was offered a few justifiable homicides. To get it out of their system. To make the world a better place by getting rid of some of those people that just needed killing. Wife abusers, child abusers, rapists, Republicans—your basic scum of the earth. ~ David Sosnowski, #NFDB
286:The brown blotches of the benevolent skin cancer the sun brings from its reflection on the tropic sea were on his cheeks. The blotches ran well down the sides of his face and his hands had the deep-creased scars from handling heavy fish on the cords. But none of these scars were fresh. They were as old as erosions in a fishless desert. ~ Ernest Hemingway, #NFDB
287:What we should grasp, however, from the lessons of European history is that, first, there is nothing necessarily benevolent about programmes of European integration; second, the desire to achieve grand utopian plans often poses a grave threat to freedom; and third, European unity has been tried before, and the outcome was far from happy. ~ Margaret Thatcher, #NFDB
288:The soul of the truly benevolent man does not seem to reside much in his own body. Its life, to a great extent, is a mere reflex of the lives of others. It migrates into their bodies, and identifying its existence with their existence, finds its own happiness in increasing and prolonging their pleasures, in extinguishing or solacing their pains. ~ Horace Mann, #NFDB
289:Under the Providence of God, our means of education are the grand machinery by which the 'raw material' of human nature can be worked up into inventors and discoverers, into skilled artisans and scientific farmers, into scholars and jurists, into the founders of benevolent institutions, and the great expounders of ethical and theological science. ~ Horace Mann, #NFDB
290:The goodness of God is that which disposes Him to be kind, cordial, benevolent, and full of good will toward men. He is tenderhearted and of quick sympathy, and His unfailing attitude toward all moral beings is open, frank, and friendly. By His nature He is inclined to bestow blessedness and He takes total pleasure in the happiness of His people.1 ~ Chip Ingram, #NFDB
291:eighteenth-century British authors who argued against Hobbes and Mandeville that the very possibility of morality requires that we be capable of genuinely benevolent emotions. For this reason, distinctions between self-directed and other-directed emotions and between anti-social and sociable emotions were a common point of organization and contention. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
292:Chinese dragons are considered benevolent, much like ruler to subject, as long as the people were loyal to them. This is a Confucius principle. Japanese dragons, however, were believed to kill innocent people to force villages to give their maidens to them as food. - Kailin Gow On the Dragon King in Amazon Lee Adventures in China (Discussion Question) ~ Kailin Gow, #NFDB
293:Why do they do this? Because it gives them a license to act like tyrants and to feel like saints. “Do what I tell you!” roars the tyrant. “It’s for your own good, and one day you’ll be grateful,” says the saint. Few people, feeling themselves powerless in a world turned upside down, can or even wish to resist the temptation to play this benevolent despot. ~ John Holt, #NFDB
294:God only acts and is in existing beings or men. Embracing the fires of experience, God was consumed by the flames, rose from their ashes, and continues to rise as Jesus Christ, or Divine Imagination. Good and evil are not conditions imposed by some benevolent deity, but states the soul must experience in order to surpass them and awaken as God Himself. ~ Neville Goddard, #NFDB
295:The real security of Christianity is to be found in its benevolent morality, in its exquisite adaptation to the human heart, in the facility with which its scheme accommodates itself to the capacity of every human intellect, in the consolation which it bears to the house of mourning, in the light with which it brightens the great mystery of the grave. ~ Thomas B Macaulay, #NFDB
296:We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent and in doing good to all men; indeed we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul - We believe all things, we hope all things, we have endured many things and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things. ~ Joseph Smith Jr, #NFDB
297:You simplify because you cannot believe. You reduce; you diminish. Because you were raised to doubt and debunk. To reduce to a small set of knowns for easy digestion. Because you are a doctor, a man of science, and because this is America—where everything is known and understood, and God is a benevolent dictator, and the future must always be bright. ~ Guillermo del Toro, #NFDB
298:Every religion, Eastern and Western, has the same archetype of benevolent guides in Heaven helping us, whether they are called bodhisattvas, deities, devas, or angels, as they are called by the monotheistic religions of the West. Angels can unite people across religious and spiritual divides. Angels are something we all agree on. Nobody fights about angels. ~ Doreen Virtue, #NFDB
299:I believe we are trying to understand kingdom principles with a democratic mindset. It is programmed into our core thinking and reasoning. God is a dictator. Thankfully he is a benevolent one. but he has the final say in all aspects of life…..If we are going to try and follow God, we simply cannot use democratic reasoning in the way we respond to his leadership ~ John Bevere, #NFDB
300:Thou art my warmth, when I am cold. Thou art my strength, when I falter. Thou art my benevolent lord and master, when I desire direction. Thou art the father of my babe, when I require a partner for our fledgling family. Thou art my protector, when I need shielding. All these things, and more, thou art for me, so I have not nor have I ever doubted ye.” ~ Barbara Devlin, #NFDB
301:American citizens are instrumental in carrying on a traffic in enslaved Africans, equally in violation of the laws of humanity and in defiance of those of their own country. The same just and benevolent motives which produced interdiction in force against this criminal conduct will doubtless be felt by Congress in devising further means of suppressing the evil. ~ James Madison, #NFDB
302:When you get past all the acrimony and all the name-calling, the question we are all debating is really quite simple: Do you believe in the freedom of individuals to determine their own futures and solve problems cooperatively working together, or do you believe that a powerful but benevolent government can and should rearrange outcomes and make things better? More ~ Matt Kibbe, #NFDB
303:All life will die, all mind will cease, and it will all be as if it had never happened. That, to be honest, is the goal to which evolution is traveling, that is the “benevolent” end of the furious living and furious dying. . . . All life is no more than a match struck in the dark and blown out again. The final result . . . is to deprive it completely of meaning. ~ David Eagleman, #NFDB
304:I think that's a major reason. Instead of turning in their own lives to philosophy, religion, love, family life, or nature, they think of psychiatry; and today that means the "pill" as an ultimate answer. Also, if you have a desire for social control, "benevolent" control and "benevolent" authority, then again biological psychiatry offers a tremendous opportunity. ~ Peter Breggin, #NFDB
305:Madeleine stares through the window into the courtyard. On most days she feels something staring back: a God or a mother-shaped benevolent force. Today, nothing reciprocates. The streamers on the chained bicycles lift in the indifferent breeze. She is alone in old stockings she's repaired twice but still run. Life will be nothing but errands and gray nights. ~ Marie Helene Bertino, #NFDB
306:The moon! It smiled at her with all its might, she could see it! through the broken wood beams of a crude ceiling, nearly touch its cratered surface, stroke its circumference; oh, moon! bulbous and benevolent, guiding herds across planes on forlorn journeys; elucidating wisps of mist to lovers at midnight; absent to her for years but treasured still. ~ K I Hope, #NFDB
307:It started as a beautiful, sunny Saturday, with the air so clear and crisp, one couldn't help but inhale deep breaths of the cleansing freshness, and feel as if a multitude of God's benevolent blessings must be shining down upon the entire world. Terrorism, disease, poverty and hunger, grief and despair were distant threads of reality, too dim to possibly exist. ~ Catherine Spangler, #NFDB
308:The American culture ideal of the "self-made-man," of everyone "standing on his own feet" seemed as tragic a picture as the initiative-destroying dependence on a benevolent despot. He felt and perceived clearly that we all need continuous help from each other, and that this type of interdependence is the greatest challenge to maturity of individual and group functioning. ~ Kurt Lewin, #NFDB
309:While it is possible for intelligence to increase the range of benevolent impulse, and thus prompt a human being to consider the needs and rights of other than those to whom he is bound by organic and physical relationship, there are definite limits in the capacity of ordinary mortals which makes it impossible for them to grant to others what they claim for themselves. ~ Reinhold Niebuhr, #NFDB
310:I had only some dim and unformed sense, a sense which struck me now and then, and which I could not explain coherently, that for some years the South and particularly the Gulf Coast had been for America what people were still saying California was, and what California seemed to me not to be: the future, the secret source of malevolent and benevolent energy, the psychic center. ~ Joan Didion, #NFDB
311:Apart from outright fraud, there are all those “benevolent mistakes” that scientists make more or less unwittingly: poor experiment design, sloppy data management, bias in the interpretation of facts and inadequate communication of results and methods. Then, of course, there is the devilish complexity of reality itself, which withholds more than it reveals to the prying eyes of science. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
312:Philosophers should consider the fact that the greatest happiness principle can easily be made an excuse for a benevolent dictatorship. We should replace it by a more modest and more realistic principle - the principle that the fight against avoidable misery should be a recognized aim of public policy, while the increase of happiness should be left, in the main, to private initiative. ~ Karl Popper, #NFDB
313:Of course we're friends ... we are both civilized men, aren't we? We've shared bed and board and bottle. We'll always be friends, and the dog collar I have on you will always be ignored by mutual consent, and I'll take good and benevolent care of you. All I ask in return is your soul. Small item. We can even ignore the fact that you've handed it over, the way we ignore the dog collar. ~ Stephen King, #NFDB
314:To enlarge the sphere of social happiness is worthy of the benevolent design of a Masonic institution; and it is most fervently to be wished, that the conduct of every member of the fraternity, as well as those publications, that discover the principles which actuate them, may tend to convince mankind that the grand object of Masonry is to promote the happiness of the human race. ~ George Washington, #NFDB
315:His response is more than sensible. It reflects his understanding that evens unfold as a refelction of precise karmic order and that a benevolent response in all circumstances will be the most healing one. I think he is so universally admired becuase he exemplifies by his behavior the truth that the essence of natural mind, unclouded by greed or anger or delusion, is that of peace. ~ Sylvia Boorstein, #NFDB
316:The root problem with Christianity is that their god is supposed to be all-powerful and benevolent. It sounds like an easy sell, but when life turns completely to shit, you have to come up with all kinds of whacked-out reasons for why kindly old Jehovah saw fit to run over little Timmy with a combine harvester and leave him in a state of vegetative, limbless agony for eighteen years. ~ Yahtzee Croshaw, #NFDB
317:The liberal press cannot question the basic doctrine of the state religion, that the United States is benevolent, even though often misguided in its innocence, that it labors to permit free choice, even though at times some mistakes are committed in the exuberance of its programs of international goodwill. We must believe that we "Americans" are always good, though, to be sure, fallible. ~ Noam Chomsky, #NFDB
318:But the most fantastical of my imaginary worlds turned out to be the one I'd thought was real. As a child, I believed the world was run by competent, sane and benevolent adults. I believed this for much longer than I believed in Santa Claus.
That belief has since gone down like the Titanic (on which I also spent a lot of time as a child). The world is run by nitwits and psychopaths. ~ Karen Joy Fowler,#NFDB
319:A benevolent malefactor, merciful, gentle, helpful, clement, a convict, returning good for evil, giving back pardon for hatred, preferring pity to vengeance, preferring to ruin himself rather than to ruin his enemy, saving him who had smitten him, kneeling on the heights of virtue, more nearly akin to an angel than to a man. Javert was constrained to admit to himself that this monster existed. ~ Victor Hugo, #NFDB
320:Muslims have been an almost entirely benevolent force in the 20th century. They did not wreak the havoc the Western powers wreaked on the world. They have not come anywhere near to the environmental degradation that we've done to the planet. So I think Muslims need to be seen in the proper light. They're mostly decent, hardworking people, people with deep family values, and they want to live in peace. ~ Hamza Yusuf, #NFDB
321:The seventh myth was that Israel intended to conduct a benevolent occupation but was forced to take a tougher attitude because of Palestinian violence. Israel regarded from the very beginning any wish to end the occupation—whether expressed peacefully or through struggle—as terrorism. From the beginning, it reacted brutally by collectively punishing the population for any demonstration of resistance. ~ Noam Chomsky, #NFDB
322:If I had remained free, obscure, and alone placed in the situation Nature designed me for, I should have done nothing but what was right, for my heart bears not the feeds of any mischievous passion. Had I been invisible and powerful as the Almighty, I should have been benevolent and good like him: it is power and freedom that make good men, weakness and slavery never made any but wicked ones. ~ Jean Jacques Rousseau, #NFDB
323:The state machine, including the army, the police and the courts, is the instrument with which one class oppresses another. It is an instrument of oppression against all hostile classes; it means violence and is certainly not anything 'benevolent.' 'You are merciless.' Quite so. We definitely do not adopt a benevolent policy towards the reactionary activities of the reactionaries and the reactionary classes. ~ Mao Zedong, #NFDB
324:What drew me down there, I wonder, to the edge of the garden? I remember the summer light--the trees, the bushes,the grass luminously green, basted by the bland, benevolent late-afternoon sun. Was it the light? But there was the laughter, also, coming from where a group of people had gathered by the pond. Someone must have been horsing around making everyone else laugh. The light and laughter, then. ~ William Boyd, #NFDB
325:For instance, dragons are deeply revered by the Chinese. According to legend they have megapowers that include weather control and life creation. And they’re seen as kind, benevolent creatures. Funny. Every fairy tale I’d ever heard involving dragons starred daring knights trotting off to kill said dragons. Probably the real reason every time East meets West they get pissed off and throw tea in our faces. ~ Jennifer Rardin, #NFDB
326:Thin clouds form, and the shadows lengthen out. They have no breadth, as summer shadows have; there are no leaves on the trees or fat clouds in the sky to make them thick. They are gaunt, mean shadows that bite the ground like teeth. As the sun nears the horizon, its benevolent yellow begins to deepen, to become infected, until it glares an angry inflamed orange. It throws a variegated glow over the horizon. ~ Stephen King, #NFDB
327:No man, however benevolent, liberal, and wise, can use a large fortune so that it will do half as much good in the world as it would if it were divided into moderate sums and in the hands of workmen who had earned it by industry and frugality. The piling up of estates often does great and conspicuous good.... But no man does with accumulated wealth so much good as the same amount would do in many hands. ~ Rutherford B Hayes, #NFDB
328:To achieve respectability, to be admitted to the debate, they must accept without question or inquiry the fundamental doctrine that the state is benevolent, governed by the loftiest intentions, adopting a defensive stance, not an actor in world affairs but only reacting to the crimes of others...If even the harshest of critics tacitly adopt these premises, then the ordinary person may ask, who am I to disagree? ~ Noam Chomsky, #NFDB
329:She personified a principled regard for the community, which to me reflects Adam Smith’s vision: And hence it is, that to feel much for others, and little for ourselves, that to restrain our selfish, and to indulge our benevolent affections, constitutes the perfection of human nature; and can alone produce among mankind that harmony of sentiments and passions in which consists their whole grace and propriety.3 ~ Charles G Koch, #NFDB
330:Thin clouds form, and the shadows lengthen out. They have no breadth, as summer shadows have; there are no leaves on the trees or fat clouds in the sky to make them thick. They are gaunt, mean shadows that bite the ground like teeth.
As the sun nears the horizon, its benevolent yellow begins to deepen, to become infected, until it glares an angry inflamed orange. It throws a variegated glow over the horizon. ~ Stephen King,#NFDB
331:It is attributed to Henry IV of France, a man of enlarged and benevolent heart, that he proposed, about the year 1610, a plan for abolishing war in Europe. The plan consisted in constituting an European Congress, or as the French authors style it, a Pacific republic; by appointing delegates from the several nations who were to act as a court of arbitration in any disputes that might arise between nation and nation. ~ Thomas Paine, #NFDB
332:For the Hindu the creation was not a bringing into being of the wonder of the world. Rather it was a dismemberment, a disintegration of the original Oneness. For him the Creation seemed not the expression of a rational, benevolent Maker in wondrous new forms but a fragmenting of the unity of nature into countless limited forms. The Hindu saw the creation of our world as “the self-limitation of the transcendent. ~ Daniel J Boorstin, #NFDB
333:The core problem isn’t the fact that we’re lukewarm, halfhearted, or stagnant Christians. The crux of it all is why we are this way, and it is because we have an inaccurate view of God. We see Him as a benevolent Being who is satisfied when people manage to fit Him into their lives in some small way. We forget that God never had an identity crisis. He knows that He’s great and deserves to be the center of our lives. ~ Francis Chan, #NFDB
334:An intelligent haunting is just as it sounds—a spirit who is aware of its surroundings and (usually) its situation. Sometimes a spirit knows that it’s dead and its spirit has remained in the physical plane, but other times it doesn’t know. An intelligent haunting is a spirit that maintains its identity, memories, and personality after death. They can be good, bad, virtuous, benevolent, mischievous, evil, or just lonely. ~ Zak Bagans, #NFDB
335:Nathaniel Hawthorne, who was at the time American consul in Liverpool, provided a preface, then almost instantly wished he hadn’t, for the book was universally regarded by reviewers as preposterous hokum. Hawthorne under questioning admitted that he hadn’t actually read it. “This shall be the last of my benevolent follies, and I will never be kind to anybody again as long as [I] live,” he vowed in a letter to a friend. ~ Bill Bryson, #NFDB
336:Religion of every kind involves the promise that the misery and futility of existence can be overcome or even transfigured. One might suppose that the possession of such a magnificent formula, combined with the tremendous assurance of a benevolent God, would make a person happy. But such appears not to be the case.: unease and insecurity and rage seem to keep up with blissful certainty, and even to outpace it. ~ Christopher Hitchens, #NFDB
337:She remembered her first-ever boyfriend of over thirty years ago, who told her he preferred smaller breasts than hers, while his hands were on her breasts, as if she’d find this interesting, as if women’s body parts were dishes on a menu and men were the goddamned diners.
This is what she said to that first boyfriend: “Sorry.”
This was her first boyfriend’s benevolent reply: “That’s okay. ~ Liane Moriarty,#NFDB
338:The core problem isn’t the fact that we’re lukewarm, halfhearted, or stagnant Christians. The crux of it all is why we are this way, and it is because we have an inaccurate view of
God. We see Him as a benevolent Being who is satisfied when people manage to fit Him into their lives in some small way. We forget that God never had an identity crisis. He knows that He’s great and deserves to be the center of our lives. ~ Francis Chan,#NFDB
339:To my knowledge there are no good records that have been built by institutions run by committee. In almost all cases the great records are the product of individuals, perhaps working together, but always within a clearly defined framework. Their names are on the door and they are quite visible to the investing public. In reality outstanding records are made by dictators, hopefully benevolent, but nonetheless dictators. ~ Peter Cundill, #NFDB
340:Whatever sense we make of this world, whatever value we place upon our lives and relationships, whatever meaning we ultimately give to our joys and agonies, must necessarily be a gesture of faith. Whether we consider the whole a product of impersonal cosmic forces, a malevolent deity, or a benevolent god, depends not on the evidence, but on what we choose, deliberately and consciously, to conclude from that evidence. ~ Terryl L Givens, #NFDB
341:Is there anyone I can level with? Anyone I dare tell that I am benevolent and malevolent, chaste and randy, compassionate and vindictive, selfless and selfish, that beneath my brave words lives a frightened child, that I dabble in religion and pornography, that I have blackened a friend's character, betrayed a trust, violated a confidence, that I am tolerant and thoughtful, a bigot and a blowhard, that I hate hard rock? ~ Brennan Manning, #NFDB
342:The moral unity to be expected in different ages is not a unity of standard, or of acts, but a unity of tendency. . . . At one time the benevolent affections embrace merely the family, soon the circle expanding includes first a class, then a nation, then a coalition of nations, then all humanity, and finally, its influence is felt in the dealings of man with the animal world. —W. E. H. LECKY, The History of European Morals ~ Peter Singer, #NFDB
343:The statist looks at a population and sees an irrational and selfish horde that needs to be endlessly herded around at gunpoint – and yet looks at those who run the government as selfless, benevolent and saintly. Yet these same statists always look at this irrational and dangerous population and say: “You must have the right to choose your political leaders!” It is truly an unsustainable and irrational set of positions. ~ Stefan Molyneux, #NFDB
344:No specification is necessary—to add or subtract or divide is in vain. Little or big, learned or unlearned, white or black, legal or illegal, sick or well, from the first inspiration down the windpipe to the last expiration out of it, all that a male or female does that is vigorous and benevolent and clean is so much sure profit to him or her in the unshakable order of the universe and through the whole scope of it for ever. ~ Walt Whitman, #NFDB
345:A benevolent malefactor, merciful, gentle, helpful, clement, a convict, returning good for evil, giving back pardon for hatred, preferring pity to vengeance, preferring to ruin himself rather than to ruin his enemy, saving him who had smitten him, kneeling on the heights of virtue, more nearly akin to an angel than to a man. Javert was constrained to admit to himself that this monster existed. Things could not go on in this manner. ~ Victor Hugo, #NFDB
346:You pass by a little child, you pass by, spiteful, with ugly words, with wrathful heart; you may not have noticed the child, but he has seen you, and your image, unseemly and ignoble, may remain in his defenseless heart. You don't know it, but you may have sown an evil seed in him and it may grow, and all because you were not careful before the child, because you did not foster in yourself a careful, actively benevolent love. ~ Fyodor Dostoevsky, #NFDB
347:You pass by a little child, you pass by, spiteful, with ugly words, with wrathful heart; you may not have noticed the child, but he has seen you, and your image, unseemly and ignoble, may remain in his defenseless heart. You don’t know it, but you may have sown an evil seed in him and it may grow, and all because you were not careful before the child, because you did not foster in yourself a careful, actively benevolent love. ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky, #NFDB
348:I had rather enjoy my own mind than the fortune of another man. What is the poor pride arising from a magnificent house, a numerous equipage, a splendid table, and from all the other advantages or appearances of fortune, compared to the warm, solid content, the swelling satisfaction, the thrilling transports, and the exulting triumphs, which a good mind enjoys, in the contemplation of a generous, virtuous, noble, benevolent action? ~ Henry Fielding, #NFDB
349:Hear me Isis as I pray.
See her pain and take it all away.
Let the heaven's light shine bright from above.
And wrap her in your most benevolent love.
Let no evil touch this child.
Protect and hold her all the while.
Save her from the darkness, ills and fevers of all kind.
Heal her wounds by your most sacred design.
There is nothing more earnest I can say.
Except please accept my humble heart as I pray. ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon,#NFDB
350:A benevolent malefactor, merciful, gentle, helpful, clement, a convict, returning good for evil, giving back pardon for hatred, preferring pity to vengeance, preferring to ruin himself rather than to ruin his enemy, saving him who had smitten him, kneeling on the heights of virtue, more nearly akin to an angel than to a man. Javert was constrained to admit to himself that this monster existed.
Things could not go on in this manner. ~ Victor Hugo,#NFDB
351:The theory of an existing and benevolent god simply doesn't make sense to anyone who is rational. A benevolent and omnipotent god would never allow such imbalances as I see to exist for one second. If by chance I am wrong, however I must then assume that being born black called for some automatic punishment for sins I know nothing about, and being innocent it behooves me to defy god. ~ George Jackson, Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson, #NFDB
352:Health care in North Korea is supposedly free, but in reality it isn’t free at all. Poor people can’t get treatment without some form of payment. If you don’t have any money—bring some alcohol. Bring some cigarettes. Bring some Chinese medicine. Or forget it. I noticed a framed quotation on the clinic wall behind the doctor. It said, “Medicine is a benevolent art. A doctor must be a greater Communist than anybody.” The words of Kim Il-sung. ~ Masaji Ishikawa, #NFDB
353:Sir Alan Redmayne believed in the rule of law. It was, after all, the basis of any democracy. Whenever asked, Sir Alan agreed with Churchill that, as a form of government, democracy had its disadvantages, but, on balance, it remained the best on offer. But given a free hand, he would have opted for a benevolent dictatorship. The problem was that dictators, by their very nature, were not benevolent. It simply didn’t fit their job description. ~ Jeffrey Archer, #NFDB
354:The thing about nature is that each species does what it's best at. That's why it's all so locked together. I'm certain that at its center is some kind of peace or unity or harmony - the white light people speak of having when they come back from "the dead." And what does our species do best? We construct artificial systems wherein we are mighty predators, or mighty thinkers, or sagacious, benevolent rulers of the universe - allies with God even. ~ Rick Bass, #NFDB
355:Under the present dispensation, the great majority of factories are little despotisms, benevolent in some cases, malevolent in others. Even where benevolence prevails, passive obedience is demanded by the workers, who are ruled by overseers, not of their own election, but appointed from above. In theory they may be the subjects of a democratic state; but in practice they spend the whole of their working lives as the subjects of a petty tyrant. ~ Aldous Huxley, #NFDB
356:Hardship and ease walk hand-in-hand in this world, and embracing them both as being from the same benevolent source ensures that we walk with gratitude for our blessings and gratefulness for our challenges. We sincerely believe that mercy pervades the cosmos, and in recognizing that, we reconnect with the hope of spring, the serenity of summer, the beauty of autumn, and the majesty of winter. Each comes with its gifts, and each call us to reflect. ~ Hamza Yusuf, #NFDB
357:The tales told of the Cailleach can be seen as exemplifying the spiritual mindset, and changes therein, of the peoples of Britain, especially those of Scotland and Ireland. From being viewed as a benevolent pagan giantess who shaped the land, she became seen as a neutral figure by the early Christians, respected as part of the process of natural development, only to be demonized as time passed and Christianity became ever more rigid and unilateral. ~ Sorita d Este, #NFDB
358:The youthful volunteers who staffed the anti-poverty offices and community actions programs of the Kennedy-Johnson years were, like the religious and benevolent workers of the last century, fleeing events in the lowland South, namely the rise of Black Power…the liberal television commentators and welfare bureaucrats who displayed Appalachian poverty to the nation took obvious relish in the white skins and blue eyes of the region’s hungry children. ~ Elizabeth Catte, #NFDB
359:A house of stone and glass and iron should be stark and sober, a watchtower from which a benevolent guard is kept on society. But the white stone of this particular house rippled as if reacting to a hand that had found its most pleasurable contact. A notable newspaper critic had described this effect as being that of "a pernicious sensuality." And if that wasn't enough, the entire construction blushed a truly disgraceful peachy-pink at sunset and dawn. ~ Helen Oyeyemi, #NFDB
360:After all, our experience tends to confirm that on one end of the political spectrum we have autocrats and tyrants—horrible, selfish thugs who occasionally stray into psychopathology. On the other end, we have democrats—elected representatives, presidents, and prime ministers who are the benevolent guardians of freedom. Leaders from these two worlds, we assure ourselves, must be worlds apart! It’s a convenient fiction, but a fiction nonetheless. ~ Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, #NFDB
361:Oh, Frankenstein, be not equitable to every other and trample upon me alone, to whom thy justice, and even thy clemency and affection, is most due. Remember that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed. Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, #NFDB
362:From a philosophical perspective, Linde’s little story underscores the danger of assuming that the creative force behind our universe, if there is one, must correspond to the traditional image of God: omnipotent, omniscient, infinitely benevolent, and so on. Even if the cause of our universe is an intelligent being, it could well be a painfully incompetent and fallible one, the kind that might flub the cosmogenic task by producing a thoroughly mediocre creation. ~ Jim Holt, #NFDB
363:Sunday is a fixed star," he said.
"You shall see him a falling star," said Syme, and put on his hat.
The decision of his gesture drew the Professor vaguely to his feet.
"Have you any idea," he asked, with a sort of benevolent bewilderment, "exactly where you are going?"
"Yes," replied Syme shortly, "I am going to prevent this bomb being thrown in Paris."
"Have you any conception how?" inquired the other.
"No," said Syme with equal decision. ~ G K Chesterton,#NFDB
364:These kids don't have a little brother working in the coal mine, they don't have a little sister coughing her lungs out in the looms of the big mill towns of the Northeast. Why? Because we organized; we broke the back of the sweatshops in this country; we have child labor laws. Those were not benevolent gifts from enlightened management. They were fought for, they were bled for, they were died for by working people, by people like us. Kids ought to know that. ~ Utah Phillips, #NFDB
365:This state of mind brings a contentment he never finds with any passive form of entertainment. Books, cinema, even music can't bring him to this. Working with others is one part of it, but it's not all. This benevolent dissociation seems to require difficulty, prolonged demands on concentration and skills, pressure, problems to be solved, even danger. He feels calm, and spacious, fully qualified to exist. It's a feeling of clarified emptiness, of deep, muted joy. ~ Ian McEwan, #NFDB
366:Finally it should be the earnest wish and paramount aim of the military administration to win the confidence, respect, and affection of the inhabitants of the Philippines by assuring them in every possible way that full measure of individual rights and liberties which is the heritage of free peoples, and by proving to them that the mission of the United States is one of benevolent assimilation substituting the mild sway of justice and right for arbitrary rule. ~ William McKinley, #NFDB
367:Sam threw up his hands, his palms open like an entreaty, and said, utterly frustrated, “How—how—how…” I realized how carefully he had been controlling his features and voice. It made my mind twist, almost as much as seeing Victor shift, to hear Sam go from oozing calm to being a hot mess. It meant that Sam had been perfectly capable of presenting a benevolent mask to me all along, but that he had chosen not to. Somehow it changed the entire way I thought of him. ~ Maggie Stiefvater, #NFDB
368:The gods can either take away evil from the world and will not, or, being willing to do so, cannot; or they neither can nor will, or lastly, they are both able and willing. If they have the will to remove evil and cannot, then they are not omnipotent. If they can, but will not, than they are not benevolent. If they are neither able nor willing, then they are neither omnipotent nor benevolent. Lastly, if they are both able and willing to annihilate evil, how does it exist? ~ Epicurus, #NFDB
369:That bodies should be lent us, while they can afford us pleasure, assist us in acquiring knowledge, or doing good to our fellow creatures, is a kind and benevolent act of God - when they become unfit for these purposes and afford us pain instead of pleasure-instead of an aid, become an encumbrance and answer none of the intentions for which they were given, it is equally kind and benevolent that a way is provided by which we may get rid of them. Death is that way. ~ Benjamin Franklin, #NFDB
370:The gods can either take away evil from the world and will not, or, being willing to do so cannot; or they neither can nor will, or lastly, they are able and willing.
If they have the will to remove evil and cannot, then they are not omnipotent. If they can but will not, then they are not benevolent. If they are neither able nor willing, they are neither omnipotent nor benevolent.
Lastly, if they are both able and willing to annihilate evil, why does it exist? ~ Epicurus,#NFDB
371:His interest in India was too acquisitive; he felt he owned it by dint of his own efforts and suffering, and that partial ownership conferred upon him a benevolent proprietorship. Like certain missionaries who combined selflessness and spiritual arrogance, Hedges found himself dissatisfied with both sides, neither of which manifested the pure essence of their cultural selves. The Indians, especially the “Zentoos,” meaning Hindus, were already losing their integrity. ~ Bharati Mukherjee, #NFDB
372:Could I have everything for which I long, You would not still endure this banishment way from human nature,” I replied. “Your image - dear, fatherly, benevolent - Being fixed inside my memory, has imbued My heart: when in the fair world, hour by hour You taught me, patiently, it was you who showed The way man makes himself eternal; therefore, The gratitude I feel toward you makes fit That while I live, I should declare it here. And what you tell me of my future, I write ~ Dante Alighieri, #NFDB
373:If one yearns to see the face of the Divine, one must break out of the aquarium, escape the fish farm, to go swim up wild cataracts, dive in deep fjords. One must explore the labyrinth of the reef, the shadows of the lily pads. How limiting, how insulting to think of God as a benevolent warden, an absentee hatchery manager who imprisons us in the 'comfort' of artificial pools, where intermediaries sprinkle our restrictive waters with sanitized flakes of processed nutriment. ~ Tom Robbins, #NFDB
374:We are spirits. That bodies should be lent us while they afford us pleasure, assist us in acquiring knowledge or in doing good to our fellow-creatures, is a kind of benevolent act of God. When they become unfit for these purposes and afford us pain instead of pleasure, instead of an aid become an encumbrance and answer none of these intentions for which they were given, it is equally kind and benevolent that a way is provided by which we get rid of them. Death is that way. ~ Benjamin Franklin, #NFDB
375:Is it virtuous when a cell transforms itself into a function of a stronger cell? It has no alternative. And is it evil when the stronger cell assimilates the weaker? It also has no alternative; it follows necessity, for it strives for superabundant substitutes and wants to regenerate itself. Hence we should make a distinction in benevolence between the impulse to appropriate and the impulse to submit, and ask whether it is the stronger or the weaker that feels benevolent. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
376:I know that my work in this case is magnified by the fact that the streets of heaven are too crowded with angels. We know their names. They number a thousand for each one of the red ribbons that we wear here tonight. They finally rest in the warm embrace of the gracious creator of us all. A healing embrace that cools their fevers, that clears their skin, and allows their eyes to see the simple, self-evident, common sense truth that is made manifest by the benevolent creator of us all... ~ Tom Hanks, #NFDB
377:The promulgation of the great doctrines of religion, the being, and attributes, and providence of one Almighty God: the responsibility to him for all our actions, founded upon moral freedom and accountability; a future state of rewards and punishments; the cultivation of all the personal, social, and benevolent virtues-these these never can be a matter of indifference in any well-ordered community. It is, indeed, difficult to conceive how any civilized society can exist without them. ~ Joseph Story, #NFDB
378:My mother maintained the sort of parental mind-set that I now recognize as brilliant and nearly impossible to emulate - kind of unflappable Zen neutrality... She wasn't quick to judge and she wasn't quick to meddle. Instead, she monitored our moods and bore benevolent witness to whatever travails or triumphs a day might bring... When we'd done something great, we received just enough praise to know she was happy with us, but never so much that it became the reason we did what we did. ~ Michelle Obama, #NFDB
379:What is to be done if a person comes to quarrel because one has accepted in one case and refused in another? What is to be done to avoid such bitterness around one, provoked by repeated refusals?
As for ill-will, jealousy, quarrels and reproaches, one must sincerely be above all that and reply with a benevolent smile to the bitterest words; and unless one is absolutely sure of himself and his reactions, it would be better, as a general rule, to keep silent.
~ The Mother, Words Of The Mother II,#NFDB
380:which is to say the petal of FAITH, and pray, To Our Father Who is Benevolent and Reigns in Heaven, Your names are hallowed and sacred. Contemplate here your faith in the Lord your God and the grace of the Holy Spirit, while giving gratitude for the presence of both in your life and on earth. Embrace the second petal, which is to say the petal of SURRENDER, and pray, Your kingdom comes to us through obedience to your will. Thy will be done. Listen to the voice of your Father that you ~ Kathleen McGowan, #NFDB
381:He was a man of profound contradictions, one day preaching a message of racial exclusion (“I was sent solely to the lost sheep of Israel”; Matthew 15:24), the next, of benevolent universalism (“Go and make disciples of all nations”; Matthew 28:19); sometimes calling for unconditional peace (“Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the sons of God”; Matthew 5:9), sometimes promoting violence and conflict (“If you do not have a sword, go sell your cloak and buy one”; Luke 22:36). ~ Reza Aslan, #NFDB
382:I came to the realization that I had failed in some respects because I had been more of a benevolent narrator than the world I saw reflected around me, and in the lives of the people in my community, and in my family. There was no benevolent God sparing us pain and loss and grief and struggle. If I was going to continue to write about the place where I am from, and the kind of people who live in my community and who are in my family, I owed it to them to be honest with what our lives are like. ~ Jesmyn Ward, #NFDB
383:Beneficence is a duty. He who frequently practices it, and sees his benevolent intentions realized, at length comes really to love him to whom he has done good. When, therefore, it is said, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself," it is not meant, thou shalt love him first and do him good in consequence of that love, but, thou shalt do good to thy neighbor; and this thy beneficence will engender in thee that love to mankind which is the fulness and consummation of the inclination to do good. ~ Immanuel Kant, #NFDB
384:A love which is limited by faith is an untrue love. … [L]ove bound by faith … hides in itself the hatred that belongs to faith; it is only benevolent so long as faith is not injured. … [I]n order to retain the semblance of love, it falls into the most diabolical sophisms, as we see in Augustine's apology for the persecution of heretics. … [I]t interprets the deeds of hatred which are committed for the sake of faith as deeds of love. [T]he limitation of love by faith is itself a contradiction. ~ Ludwig Feuerbach, #NFDB
385:rose, which is to say the petal of FAITH, and pray, To Our Father Who is Benevolent and Reigns in Heaven, Your names are hallowed and sacred. Contemplate here your faith in the Lord your God and the grace of the Holy Spirit, while giving gratitude for the presence of both in your life and on earth. Embrace the second petal, which is to say the petal of SURRENDER, and pray, Your kingdom comes to us through obedience to your will. Thy will be done. Listen to the voice of your Father that you may ~ Kathleen McGowan, #NFDB
386:The men and woman who make the best boon companions seem to have given up hope of doing something else...some defect of talent or opportunity has cut them off from their pet ambition and has thus left them with leisure to take an interest in their lives of others. Your ambition may be, it makes him keep his thoughts at home. But the heartbroken people - if I may use the word in a mild, benevolent sense - the people whose wills are subdued to fate, give us consolation, recognition, and welcome. ~ John Jay Chapman, #NFDB
387:I had gone into the hospital with the stupid notion that its primary object was the care and comfort of the sick and wounded. It was long after that I learned that a vast majority of all benevolent institutions are gotten up to gratify the aesthetic tastes of the public; exhibit the wealth and generosity of the founders, and furnish places for officers. The beneficiaries of the institutions are simply an apology for their existence, and having furnished that apology, the less said about them the better. ~ Jane Swisshelm, #NFDB
388:I have learnt all that was hidden and all that was yet undiscovered because I was taught by wisdom herself that created everything. For there is in her a spirit of intelligence which is holy, unique, multiple in her effects, fine, copious, agile, spotless, dear, soft, friendly to good, penetrant, which nothing can prevent from acting, benevolent, friendly to men, kind, stable, infallible, calm, that achieves all, that sees all, that can comprehend all minds in itself, that is intelligible, pure and subtle. ~ Book of Wisdom, #NFDB
389:My core argument is that most assessments of the Internet fail to ground it in political economy; they fail to understand the importance of capitalism in shaping and, for lack of a better term, domesticating the Internet. When capitalism is mentioned, it is usually as the “free market,” which is taken as a benevolent given, almost a synonym for democracy. The conventional discussion of capitalism often degenerates into a bunch of clichés and is only loosely related to the capitalism that really exists. ~ Robert W McChesney, #NFDB
390:I have learnt all that was hidden and all that was yet undiscovered because I was taught by wisdom herself that created everything. For there is in her a spirit of intelligence which is holy, unique, multiple in her effects, fine, copious, agile, spotless, dear, soft, friendly to good, penetrant, which nothing can prevent from acting, benevolent, friendly to men, kind, stable, infallible, calm, that achieves all, that sees all, that can comprehend all minds in itself, that is intelligible, pure and subtle. ~ Book of Wisdom, #NFDB
391:Spenser Reynolds was a bit shorter than Web average, but far handsomer. His hair was curled but cropped short, his skin appeared bronzed by a benevolent sun and slightly gilded with subtle body paint, his clothes and ARNistry were expensively flamboyant without being outré, and his demeanor proclaimed a relaxed confidence that all men dreamed of and precious few obtained. His wit was obvious, his attention to others sincere, and his sense of humor legendary. I found myself disliking the son of a bitch at once. ~ Dan Simmons, #NFDB
392:There is in every breast a sensibility to marks of honor, of favor, of esteem, and of confidence, which, apart from all considerations of interest, is some pledge for grateful and benevolent returns. Ingratitude is a common topic of declamation against human nature; and it must be confessed, that instances of it are but too infrequent and flagrant both in public and in private life. But the universal and extreme indignation which it inspires, is itself a proof of the energy and prevalence of the contrary sentiment. ~ James Madison, #NFDB
393:There's something I never told you about that decision I made four years ago...I've never felt a middle ground between acceptance and remorse. Every day for the last four years, it's been one or the other. Black or white. There was no grey, but I could bear it because I had you. When I lost you, I began slipping into perpetual guilt. Carrying that secret, alone, for the first time, while trying to balance the idea of a benevolent God with a God who could let this happen to you - it was like falling into quicksand. ~ Tammara Webber, #NFDB
394:After the Second World War, facilitating the establishment of the UN and aiding the reconstruction of Europe, the United States was widely viewed, at least in the West, as a benevolent hegemon. In the non-West, the US was often perceived as a supporter of the colonial powers in their struggle to maintain control over their colonial possessions, and was viewed far more critically, especially by emerging elites that were more inclined to socialist development paradigms than to the capitalist ethos favoured by Washington. ~ Richard A Falk, #NFDB
395:if we have parents who raise us with love and respect; who allow us to experience consistent and benevolent acceptance; who give us the supporting structure of reasonable rules and appropriate expectations; who do not assail us with contradictions; who do not resort to ridicule, humiliation, or physical abuse as means of controlling us; who project that they believe in our competence and goodness—we have a decent chance of internalizing their attitudes and thereby of acquiring the foundation for healthy self-esteem. ~ Nathaniel Branden, #NFDB
396:Benevolent god playing happens when we use the needs of the poor to make our own move from good to great—to revel in the superior power of our technology and the moral excellence of our willingness to help. Benevolent god playing makes us, not those we are serving, the heroes of the story. It happens whenever technological and financial resources are deployed in such overwhelming force, and with so little real trust building or relationship, that we maintain a safe distance between ourselves and the recipients of our largesse. ~ Andy Crouch, #NFDB
397:there is a God, there always has been. I see him here, in the eyes of the people in this [hospital] corridor of desperation. This is the real house of God, this is where those who have lost God will find Him... there is a God, there has to be, and now I will pray, I will pray that He will forgive that I have neglected Him all of these years, forgive that I have betrayed, lied, and sinned with impunity only to turn to Him now in my hour of need. I pray that He is as merciful, benevolent, and gracious as His book says He is. ~ Khaled Hosseini, #NFDB
398:There is a striking parallel between the spreading of germs and the spreading of ideas or propaganda. On the one hand we are dealing with a virus which can be transported and transmitted under certain conditions which favor or limit its transportation or transmission: on the other hand with ideas, religions, and doctrines, which can be described as germs, benevolent or malevolent, according to the point of view one takes up. These germs can either remain at their source and be sterile, or emerge in the spreading of infection. ~ Andre Siegfried, #NFDB
399:I have found many organizations that develop as many as three of the dimensions—they may have good service criteria, good economic criteria, and good human relations criteria, but they are not really committed to identifying, developing, utilizing, and recognizing the talent of people. And if these psychological forces are missing, the style will be a benevolent autocracy and the resulting culture will reflect different forms of collective resistance, adversarialism, excessive turnover, and other deep, chronic, cultural problems. ~ Stephen R Covey, #NFDB
400:Even if the intelligent design of some structure has been established, it still is a separate question whether a wise, powerful, and beneficent God ought to have designed a complex, information-rich structure one way or another. For the sake of argument, let's grant that certain designed structures are not simply, as Gould put it, "odd" or "funny," but even cruel. What of it? Philosophical theology has abundant resources for dealing with the problem of evil, maintaining a God who is both omnipotent and benevolent in the face of evil. ~ William A Dembski, #NFDB
401:... so large a portion of those who hold much capital, instead of using their various advantages for the greatest good of those around them, employ the chief of them for mere selfish indulgences; thus inflicting as much mischief on themselves, as results to others from their culpable neglect. A great portion of the rich seem to be acting on the principle, that the more God bestows on them, the less are they under obligation to practise any self-denial, in fulfilling his benevolent plan of raising our race to intelligence and holiness. ~ Catharine Beecher, #NFDB
402:Human beings are better equipped to cope with disaster and hardship than they are with unvarying security, but as long as security is the highest value in a community they can have little opportunity to decide this for themselves. It is agreed that Englishmen coped magnificently with a war, and were more cheerful, enterprising and friendly under the daily threat of bombardment than they are now under benevolent peacetime, when we are so far from worrying about how many people starve in Africa that we can tolerate British policy in Nigeria. ~ Germaine Greer, #NFDB
403:I speak and speak,” Marco says, “but the listener retains only the words he is expecting. The description of the world to which you lend a benevolent ear is one thing; the description that will go the rounds of the groups of stevedores and gondoliers on the street outside my house the day of my return is another; and yet another, that which I might dictate late in life, if I were taken prisoner by Genoese pirates and put in irons in the same cell with a writer of adventure stories. It is not the voice that commands the story: it is the ear. ~ Italo Calvino, #NFDB
404:And hence it is, that to feel much for others and little for ourselves, that to restrain our selfish, and to indulge our benevolent affections, constitutes the perfection of human nature; and can alone produce among mankind that harmony of sentiments and passions in which consists their whole grace and propriety. As to love our neighbour as we love ourselves is the great law of Christianity, so it is the great precept of nature to love ourselves only as we love our neighbour, or what comes to the same thing, as our neighbour is capable of loving us. ~ Adam Smith, #NFDB
405:If the layman cannot participate in decision making, he will have to turn himself over, essentially blind, to a hermetic elite. ... [The fundamental question becomes] are we still capable of self-government and therefore freedom? Margaret Mead wrote in a 1959 issue of Daedalus about scientists elevated to the status of priests. Now there is a name for this elevation, when you are in the hands of-one hopes-a benevolent elite, when you have no control over your political decisions. From the point of view of John Locke, the name for this is slavery. ~ Gerald Holton, #NFDB
406:Theologians and philosophers, who make God the creator of Nature and the architect of the Universe, reveal Him to us as an illogical and unbalanced Being. They declare He is benevolent because they are afraid of Him, but they are forced to admit the truth that His ways are vicious and beyond understanding. They attribute a malignity to Him seldom to be found in any human being. And that is how they get human beings to worship Him. For our miserable species would never lavish worship on a just and benevolent God from whom they had nothing to fear. ~ Anatole France, #NFDB
407:Nothing he had brought to it of his nearest comparison, Raby with its thatch'd and benevolent romance of serfdom, had at all prepar'd him for the iron Criminality of the Cape,-- the publick Executions and Whippings, the open'd flesh, the welling blood, the beefy contented faces of those whites.... Yet is Dixon certain, as certain as the lightness he feels now, lightness premonitory of Flying, that far worse happen'd here, to these poor People, as the blood flew and the Children cried,-- that at the end no one understood what they said as they died. ~ Thomas Pynchon, #NFDB
408:Don’t tell me you’re not a skeptic like I am and that you want to reach the marriage bed pure of heart and loins. That you’re an immaculate soul eagerly awaiting that magic moment when true love will lead you to the discovery of a joint ecstasy of flesh and inner being, blessed by the Holy Spirit, thus enabling you to populate the world with creatures who bear your family name and their mother’s eyes—that saintly woman, a paragon of virtue and modesty in whose company you will enter the doors of heaven under the benevolent gaze of the Baby Jesus. ~ Carlos Ruiz Zaf n, #NFDB
409:The core problem isn’t the fact that we’re lukewarm, halfhearted, or stagnant Christians. The crux of it all is why we are this way, and it is because we have an inaccurate view of God. We see Him as a benevolent Being who is satisfied when people manage to fit Him into their lives in some small way. We forget that God never had an identity crisis. He knows that He’s great and deserves to be the center of our lives. Jesus came humbly as a servant, but He never begs us to give Him some small part of ourselves. He commands everything from His followers. ~ Francis Chan, #NFDB
410:The real trouble is that 'kindness' is a quality fatally easy to attribute to ourselves on quite inadequate grounds. Everyone feels benevolent if nothing happens to be annoying him at the moment. Thus a man easily comes to console himself for all his other vices by a conviction that 'his heart's in the right place' and 'he wouldn't hurt a fly,' though in fact he has never made the slightest sacrifice for a fellow creature. We think we are kind when we are only happy: it is not so easy, on the same grounds, to imagine oneself temperate, chaste, or humble. ~ C S Lewis, #NFDB
411:No theory, no promises, no morality, no amount of good will, no religion will restrain power. Neither priests nor soldiers, neither labor leaders nor businessmen, neither bureaucrats nor feudal lords will differ from each other in the basic use which they will seek to make of power […] Only power restrains power. That restraining power is expressed in the existence and activity of oppositions. […] When all opposition is destroyed, there is no longer any limit to what power may do. A despotism, any kind of despotism, can be benevolent only by accident. ~ James Burnham, #NFDB
412:We may legitimately hope that among the impulses which arise in minds thus emptied of all ‘rational’ or ‘spiritual’ motives, some will be benevolent. I am very doubtful myself whether the benevolent impulses, stripped of that preference and encouragement which the Tao teaches us to give them and left to their merely natural strength and frequency as psychological events, will have much influence. I am very doubtful whether history shows us one example of a man who, having stepped outside traditional morality and attained power, has used that power benevolently. ~ C S Lewis, #NFDB
413:Ethics, too, favors open borders. Say John from Texas is dying of hunger. He asks me for food, but I refuse. If John dies, is it my fault? Arguably, I merely allowed him to die, which while not exactly benevolent, isn’t exactly murder either. Now imagine that John doesn’t ask for food, but goes off to the market, where he’ll find plenty of people willing to exchange their goods for work that he can do in return. This time though, I hire a couple of heavily armed baddies to block his way. John dies of starvation a few days later. Can I still claim innocence? ~ Rutger Bregman, #NFDB
414:But how we should care for other people remains a question. In his discussion of efforts to control childhood obesity, the philosopher Michael Merry defines paternalism as “interference with the liberty of another for the purposes of promoting some good or preventing some harm.” This type of paternalism, he notes, is reflected in traffic laws, gun control, and environmental regulations. These are limits to liberty, even if they are benevolent. Interfering with the parenting of obese children, he argues, is not necessarily benevolent. There is risk in assigning risk. ~ Eula Biss, #NFDB
415:If we believed that those agencies were appointed by a benevolent Providence as the means of accomplishing wise purposes which could not be compassed if they did not exist, then everything done by mankind which tends to chain up these natural agencies or to restrict their mischievous operation, from draining a pestilential marsh down to curing the toothache, or putting up an umbrella, ought to be accounted impious ; which assuredly nobody does account them, notwithstanding an undercurrent of sentiment setting in that direction which is occasionally perceptible. ~ John Stuart Mill, #NFDB
416:Tracing the progress of mankind in the ascending path of civilization, and moral and intellectual culture, our fathers found that the divine ordinance of government, in every stage of the ascent, was adjustable on principles of common reason to the actual condition of a people, and always had for its objects, in the benevolent councils of the divine wisdom, the happiness, the expansion, the security, the elevation of society, and the redemption of man. They sought in vain for any title of authority of man over man, except of superior capacity and higher morality. ~ William M Evarts, #NFDB
417:It is pleasure that lurks in the practice of every one of your virtues. Man performs actions because they are good for him, and when they are good for other people as well they are thought virtuous: if he finds pleasure in helping others he is benevolent; if he finds pleasure in working for society he is public-spirited; but it is for your private pleasure that you give twopence to a beggar as much as it is for my private pleasure that I drink another whiskey and soda. I, less of a humbug than you, neither applaud myself for my pleasure nor demand your admiration. ~ W Somerset Maugham, #NFDB
418:It is easy to see things in retrospect. But I was ignorant then of everything but my own happiness, and I don’t know what else to say except that life itself seemed very magical in those days: a web of symbol, coincidence, premonition, omen. Everything, somehow, fit together; some sly and benevolent Providence was revealing itself by degrees and I felt myself trembling on the brink of a fabulous discovery, as though any morning it was all going to come together–my future, my past, the whole of my life–and I was going to sit up in bed like a thunderbolt and say oh! oh! oh! ~ Donna Tartt, #NFDB
419:It is easy to see things in retrospect. But I was ignorant then of everything but my own happiness, and I don't know what else to say except that life itself seemed very magical in those days: a web of symbol, coincidence, premonition, omen. Everything, somehow, fit together; some sly and benevolent Providence was revealing itself by degrees and I felt myself trembling on the brink of a fabulous discovery, as though any morning it was all going to come together -- my future, my past, the whole of my life -- and I was going to sit up in bed like a thunderbolt and say oh! oh! oh! ~ Donna Tartt, #NFDB
420:He was a man of between sixty and seventy. From a little distance he had the bland aspect of a philanthropist. His slightly bald head, his domed forehead, the smiling mouth that displayed a very white set of false teeth, all seemed to speak of a benevolent personality. Only the eyes belied this assumption. They were small, deep set and crafty. Not only that. As the man, making some remark to his young companion, glanced across the room, his gaze stopped on Poirot for a moment, and just for that second there was a strange malevolence, and unnatural tensity in the glance. Then ~ Agatha Christie, #NFDB
421:Many of us regard ourselves as mildly liberal or centrist politically, voice fairly pleasant sentiments about our poor children, contribute money to send poor kids to summer camp, feel benevolent. We're not nazis; we're nice people. We read sophisticated books. We go to church. We go to synagogue. Meanwhile, we put other people's children into an economic and environmental death zone. We make it hard for them to get out. We strip the place bare of amenities. And we sit back and say to ourselves, "Well, I hope that they don't kill each other off. But if they do, it's not my fault. ~ Jonathan Kozol, #NFDB
422:Science has long informed the environmental movement. Now it must take the lead, because we are forced to enter an era of large-scale ecosystem engineering, and we have to know what the hell we’re doing. That sermon gets a chapter. Beavers are benevolent ecosystem engineers; so are soil-enriching earthworms; so were American Indians, who terraformed a continent; so are all of us who work on restoring natural infrastructure. A chapter on that subject leads straight to the book’s conclusion: our obligation to learn planet craft, to be as life-enhancing as any earthworm, in the big yard. ~ Stewart Brand, #NFDB
423:Demon comes from daimon, which means ‘intelligence’ or ‘individual destiny’, whereas angel means messenger. Originally daimones were always perceived as being positive entities. The Greek philosopher Plato introduced the division between kakodaemons and eudaemons, or benevolent and malevolent daimons, in the fourth century BCE. Seven centuries later in the third century CE, the Neo-Platonic philosopher Porphyry made an interesting distinction, this being essentially that the good daimones were the ones who governed their emotions and being, whereas bad daimones were governed by them. ~ Stephen Skinner, #NFDB
424:Health education emphasizing risks is a form of pedagogy, which, like other forms, serves to legitimize ideologies and social practices. Risk discourse in the public health sphere allows the state, as the owner of knowledge, to exert power of the bodies of its citizens. Risk discourse, therefore, especially when it emphasizes lifestyle risks, serves as an effective Foucauldian agent of surveillance and control that is difficult to challenge because of its manifest benevolent goal of maintaining standards of health. In doing so, it draws attention away from the structural causes of ill-health. ~ Deborah Lupton, #NFDB
425:It is difficult to place Jesus of Nazareth squarely within any of the known religiopolitical movements of his time. He was a man of profound contradictions, one day preaching a message of racial exclusion (“I was sent solely to the lost sheep of Israel”; Matthew 15:24), the next, of benevolent universalism (“Go and make disciples of all nations”; Matthew 28:19); sometimes calling for unconditional peace (“Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the sons of God”; Matthew 5:9), sometimes promoting violence and conflict (“If you do not have a sword, go sell your cloak and buy one”; Luke 22:36). ~ Reza Aslan, #NFDB
426:My sister's disposition was not naturally gregarious; circumstances favoured and fostered her tendency to seclusion; except to go to church or take a walk on the hills, she rarely crossed the threshold of home. Though her feeling for the people round was benevolent, intercourse with them she never sought; nor, with very few exceptions, ever experienced. And yet she knew them: knew their ways, their language, their family histories; she could hear of them with interest, and talk of them with detail, minute, graphic, and accurate; but with them, she rarely exchanged a word.
(On her sister, Emily) ~ Charlotte Bront,#NFDB
427:Minutes later, as Annabelle lay bonelessly over his body, her cheek nestled on his shoulder, she tried to sort through the bewilderment of her senses. She had never been so satiated, every nerve glazed with pleasure. And yet she had perceived something new in their lovemaking …an unattained height that loomed even beyond what they had just experienced …some unrealized possibility that hovered just out of reach. A feeling…a wish…a tantalizing something that had no name. Closing her eyes, Annabelle basked in the closeness of their bodies, while the elusive promise haunted the air like some benevolent spirit. ~ Lisa Kleypas, #NFDB
428:another hospice worker—another of the amazing women that Charlie had seen in the homes of the dying, helping to deliver them into the next world with as much comfort and dignity and even joy as they could gather—benevolent Valkyries, midwives of the final light, they were—and as Charlie watched them at work, he saw that rather than become detached from, or callous to their job, they became involved with every patient and every family. They were present. He’d seen them grieve with a hundred different families, taking part in an intensity of emotion that most people would feel only a few times in their lives. ~ Christopher Moore, #NFDB
429:(At first, it seems as if the existence of complex life forms on Earth violates the second law. It seems remarkable that out of the chaos of the early Earth emerged an incredible diversity of intricate life forms, even harboring intelligence and consciousness, lowering the amount of entropy. Some have taken this miracle to imply the hand of a benevolent creator. But remember that life is driven by the natural laws of evolution, and that total entropy still increases, because additional energy fueling life is constantly being added by the Sun. If we include the Sun and Earth, then the total entropy still increases.) ~ Michio Kaku, #NFDB
430:when the Lord built the world
he furrowed his brow
calculated calculated calculated
that is why the world is perfect
and uninhabitable
instead the world of the painter
is good
and full of mistakes
the eye wanders
from one color to another
one fruit to another
the eye mumbles
the eye smiles
remembers
the eye says it is bearable
only if one could
enter inside
there where the painter was
without wings
in slippers that fall off
without Virgil
with a cat in the pocket
a benevolent fantasy
and a hand
that unknowingly
corrects the world ~ Zbigniew Herbert,#NFDB
431:Sometimes one is better off misled. The host may be better off thinking the guest enjoyed himself; the wife happier believing that she can tell a joke well. The liar’s false message may not only be more palatable, it may also be more useful than the truth. The carpenter’s false claim “I’m fine” to his boss’s “How are you today?” may provide information more relevant than would his true reply, “I am still feel terrible from the fight I had at home last night.” His lie truthfully tells his intention to perform his job despite personal upset. There is, of course, a cost for being misled even in these benevolent instances. ~ Paul Ekman, #NFDB
432:The good historian, then, must be thus described: he must be fearless, uncorrupted, free, the friend of truth and of liberty; one who, to use the words of the comic poet, calls a fig a fig, and a skiff a skiff, neither giving nor withholding from any, from favour or from enmity, not influenced by pity, by shame, or by remorse; a just judge, so far benevolent to all as never to give more than is due to any in his work; a stranger to all, of no country, bound only by his own laws, acknowledging no sovereign, never considering what this or that man may say of him, but relating faithfully everything as it happened. ~ Lucian of Samosata, #NFDB
433:How did so many women get to this unhappy place of not understanding how truly "simple" men are in their requirements and how much benevolent power their wives have over them? Why did notions like assuaging "male ego" and using "feminine wiles" rocket into disrepute? How is it that so many women are angry with men in general yet expect to have a happy life married to one of them?
There are a number of reasons for this, and I believe they all revolve around the assault upon, and virtual collapse of, the values of religious morality, modesty, fidelity, chastity, respect for life, and a commitment to family and child-rearing. ~ Laura Schlessinger,#NFDB
434:the soul's seemingly magical influence :::
If you have within you a psychic being sufficiently awake to watch over you, to prepare your path, it can draw towards you things which help you, draw people, books, circumstances, all sorts of little coincidences which come to you as though brought by some benevolent will and give you an indication, a help, a support to take decisions and turn you in the right direction. But once you have taken this decision, once you have decided to find the truth of your being, once you start sincerely on the road, everything seems to conspire to help you to advance,
~ The Mother, Questions And Answers 1950-1951,#NFDB
435:But before we look at what is wrong and address it, we need to understand something. The core problem isn’t the fact that we’re lukewarm, halfhearted, or stagnant Christians. The crux of it all is why we are this way, and it is because we have an inaccurate view of God. We see Him as a benevolent Being who is satisfied when people manage to fit Him into their lives in some small way. We forget that God never had an identity crisis. He knows that He’s great and deserves to be the center of our lives. Jesus came humbly as a servant, but He never begs us to give Him some small part of ourselves. He commands everything from His followers. ~ Francis Chan, #NFDB
436:...enslaved black males were socialized by white folks to believe that they should endeabor to become patriarchs by seeking to attain the freedom to provide and protect for black women, to be benevolen patriarchs. Benevolent patriarchs exercise their power without using force. And it was this notion of patriarchy that educated black men coming from slavery into freedom sought to mimic. However, a large majority of black men took as their standard the dominator model set by white masters. When slavery ended these black men often used violence to dominate black women, which was a repetition of the strategies of control white slave masters used. ~ bell hooks, #NFDB
437:One feels such love for the little ones, such anticipation that all that is lovely in life will be known by them, such fondness for that set of attributes manifested uniquely in each: mannerisms of bravado, of vulnerability, habits of speech and mispronouncement and so forth; the smell of the hair and head, the feel of the tiny hand in yours—and then the little one is gone! Taken! One is thunderstruck that such a brutal violation has occurred in what had previously seemed a benevolent world. From nothingness, there arose great love; now, its source nullified, that love, searching and sick, converts to the most abysmal suffering imaginable. ~ George Saunders, #NFDB
438:Like most things in the story the natural sciences can tell about the world, it’s all so beautiful, so gracefully simple, yet so rewardingly complex, so neatly connected—not to mention true—that I can’t even begin to imagine why anyone would ever want to believe some New Age ‘alternative’ nonsense instead. I would go so far as to say that even if we are all under the control of a benevolent God, and the whole of reality turns out to be down to some flaky spiritual ‘energy’ that only alternative therapists can truly harness, that’s still neither so interesting nor so graceful as the most basic stuff I was taught at school about how plants work. ~ Ben Goldacre, #NFDB
439:Mark Twain commented on the Philippine war: We have pacified some thousands of the islanders and buried them; destroyed their fields; burned their villages, and turned their widows and orphans out-of-doors; furnished heartbreak by exile to some dozens of disagreeable patriots; subjugated the remaining ten millions by Benevolent Assimilation, which is the pious new name of the musket; we have acquired property in the three hundred concubines and other slaves of our business partner, the Sultan of Sulu, and hoisted our protecting flag over that swag. And so, by these Providences of God—and the phrase is the government’s, not mine—we are a World Power. ~ Howard Zinn, #NFDB
440:Perhaps there is to be found in Pastrana the key to something which happens in Spain more frequently than is necessary. Past splendor overwhelms and in the end exhausts the people's will; and without force of will, as can be seen in so many cases, by being exclusively occupied with the contemplation of the glories of the past, they leave current problems unsolved. When the belly is empty and the mind filled with golden memories, the golden memories continually retreat and at last, though no one goes so far as to admit it, there is even doubt whether they ever existed and there is nothing left of them but a benevolent and useless cultural residue. ~ Camilo Jos Cela, #NFDB
441:Respectable opinion would never consider an assessment of the Reagan Doctrine or earlier exercises in terms of their actual human costs, and could not comprehend that such an assessment—which would yield a monstrous toll if accurately conducted on a global scale—might perhaps be a proper task in the United States. At the same level of integrity, disciplined Soviet intellectuals are horrified over real or alleged American crimes, but perceive their own only as benevolent intent gone awry, or errors of an earlier day, now overcome; the comparison is inexact and unfair, since Soviet intellectuals can plead fear as an excuse for their services to state violence. ~ Noam Chomsky, #NFDB
442:… if you refuse to let your own suffering lie upon you for an hour and if you constantly try to prevent and forestall all possible stress way ahead of time; if you experience suffering and displeasure as evil, hateful, worthy of annihilation, and as a defect of existence, then it is clear that besides your religion of pity you also harbor another religion in your heart that is perhaps the mother of the religion of pity: the religion of comfortableness. How little you know of human happiness, you comfortable and benevolent people, for happiness and unhappiness are sisters and even twins that either grow up together or, as in your case, remain small together. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
443:For all his liberality and his determined attempts at worldliness, he was at heart profoundly conservative and would not keep the works of Darwin or Lyell in his study for fear they carried a contagion that might spread throughout his healthier books. He was not an especially devout man, but felt that a common faith overlooked by a benevolent God was what kept the fabric of society from tearing like a worn sheet. The idea that after all there was no essential nobility in mankind, and that his own species was not a chosen people touched by the divine, troubled him in the hours before dawn; and as with most troubling matters he elected to ignore it, until it went away. ~ Sarah Perry, #NFDB
444:Sometimes it seems that the beau ideal of many conservatives, as well as of many liberals, is to put everyone into a cage and coerce him into doing what the conservatives or liberals believe to be the moral thing. They would of course be differently styled cages, but they would be cages just the same. The conservative would ban illicit sex, drugs, gambling, and impiety, and coerce everyone to act according to his version of moral and religious behavior. The liberal would ban films of violence, unesthetic advertising, football, and racial discrimination, and, at the extreme, place everyone in a “Skinner box” to be run by a supposedly benevolent liberal dictator. ~ Murray N Rothbard, #NFDB
445:Karl Popper, in The Open Society and Its Enemies, made a comment that sounds almost prophetic now: that the happy, primitive society (which, by the way, never existed) is lost for all those who have eaten of the fruit of the tree of knowledge. The more we try to return to the heroic age of tribalism, Popper warns, the more certainly we will reach the Inquisition, the secret police, and a romanticized gangsterism. But once the existential problems of the individual, who is good by nature, can be blamed on the "evil" society, nothing stands in the way of sheer imagination. The definition of the benevolent society free of all power is only a question of fantasy. ~ Paul Watzlawick, #NFDB
446:In an ideal world, we might have dreamed of a benevolent hand intervening so that one of them tarried a little longer while the other hurried up, and that they would have found themselves at precisely the same moment, in front of the black van with Drat That Rat! stamped across it. In an ideal world, there would have been music playing in the distance and a ray of sunshine would have lit up the pavement.
But, even in an ideal world, would it have been worth changing the course of these two lives, treating them like pawns to be pushed one square ahead or behind, just for us to enjoy a reunion scene played out in slow motion?
So Vango got into the van alone. ~ Timoth e de Fombelle,#NFDB
447:Was Phileas Fogg rich? Undoubtedly. But those who knew him best could not imagine how he had made his fortune, and Mr. Fogg was the last person to whom to apply for the information. He was not lavish, nor, on the contrary, avaricious; for, whenever he knew that money was needed for a noble, useful, or benevolent purpose, he supplied it quietly and sometimes anonymously. He was, in short, the least communicative of men. He talked very little, and seemed all the more mysterious for his taciturn manner. His daily habits were quite open to observation; but whatever he did was so exactly the same thing that he had always done before, that the wits of the curious were fairly puzzled. ~ Jules Verne, #NFDB
448:Although changing our society by calling it back to a safer morality is a noble goal, that has never been Christ's goal for His church. The church has but one mission in this world: to lead people destined to spend eternity in hell to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ and an eternity in heaven. If people die in a communist government or a democracy, under a tyrant or a benevolent dictator, believing homosexuality is right or wrong, or believing abortion is a woman's fundamental right to choose or simply mass murder, that has no bearing on where they will spend eternity. If they never knew Christ and never embraced Him as their Lord and Savior, they will spend eternity in hell. ~ John F MacArthur Jr, #NFDB
449:Consuelo's appearance set her apart from the others, and the nuns, sure that this was not accidental but a sign of benevolent divine will, spared no effort in cultivating her faith, in the hope she would decide to take her vows and serve the Church; al their efforts, however, came to naught before the girl's instinctive rejection. She made the attempt in good faith, but never succeeded in accepting the tyrannical god the nuns preached to her about; she preferred a more joyful, maternal, and compassionated god.
"That is the Most Holy Virgin Mary," the nuns explained to her.
"She is God?"
"No, she is the Mother of God."
"Yes, but who has the say in heaven, God or his Mama? ~ Isabel Allende,#NFDB
450:Today we are less likely to speak of humanitarianism, with its overtones of paternalistic generosity, and more likely to speak of human rights. The basic freedoms in life are not seen as gifts to be doled out by benevolent well-wishers, but as Casement said at his trial, as those rights to which all human beings are entitled from birth. It is this spirit which underlies organizations like Amnesty International, with its belief that putting someone in prison solely for his or her opinion is a crime, whether it happens in China or Turkey or Argentina and Medecins Sans Frontieres, with its belief that a sick child is entitled to medical care, whether in Rwanda or Honduras or the South Bronx. ~ Adam Hochschild, #NFDB
451:There’s nothing “grown-up” about wanting the State to punish people without evidence of guilt so that you can feel safe. It’s actually a deeply childish need at the heart of all authoritarianism - the desire for a big daddy figure to keep you safe from the Bad People even it means there are no legal constraints, due process, or transparency.
Children growing up learn that their Daddy is omnipotent and omniscient and exercises his unchecked power for benevolent ends - it’s a nice, safe feeling, and many continue to cling to it in adulthood, hoping the Security State will provide that. Many adjectives can and should be used to describe that need - “grown-up” definitely is not among them. ~ Glenn Greenwald,#NFDB
452:Perhaps we can define love, at once in its familial, sexual and worldly forms, as a kind of respect, a sensitivity on the part of one person to another’s existence. To be shown love is to feel ourselves the object of concern: our presence is noted, our name is registered, our views are listened to, our failings are treated with indulgence and our needs are ministered to. And under such care, we flourish. There may be differences between romantic and status forms of love—the latter has no sexual dimension, it cannot end in marriage, those who offer it usually bear secondary motives—and yet status beloveds will, just like romantic ones, enjoy protection under the benevolent gaze of appreciative others. ~ Alain de Botton, #NFDB
453:A simple example of this is the modern problem of invention. Whenever a man invents some new and useful improvement, to make life more secure and comfortable, abuse inevitably follows. Good laws are perverted by selfish men; great ideals are brought down to a thousand purposes inconsistent with the original dream. Primitive men realized this, and the earliest scriptures teach that the universe is a battlefield of good and evil impulses which they termed "gods" and "demons." Even as God was the chief and Lord of all benevolent forces, so the evil agencies or negative attributes are personified in one offending being variously named Satan, Lucifer, Yama, Loki, Hades, Kali, etc. ~ Manly P Hall, How to Understand Your Bible, #NFDB
454:If you want to understand power’s dangers, slavery has one advantage: it is vivid and complete in its corruption. In enslavement one human being asserts unlimited power over another, an assertion that requires not just the inflation of the slave owner’s power to unholy, godlike levels, but the eradication of the slave’s power. Some masters may be relatively benevolent (as some were, at least in their own eyes, in the era of American slavery). But the master-slave relationship remains one of categorical lordship, and it is predicated on the owner’s assertion of the right to take anything and everything from the slave, up to and including her life. Ultimately the owner owns everything; the slave owns nothing. ~ Andy Crouch, #NFDB
455:You tell me that you sometimes view the dark side of your Diana, and there no doubt you discover many Spots which I rather wish were erased, than conceal'd from you. Do not judge by this, that your opinion is an indifferent thing to me, (were it so, I should look forward with a heavey Heart,) but it is far otherways, for I had rather stand fair there, and be thought well of by Lysander than by the greater part of the World besides. I would fain hope that those faults which you discover, proceed more, from a wrong Head, than a bad Heart. E'er long May I be connected with a Friend from whose Example I may form a more faultless conduct, and whose benevolent mind will lead him to pardon, what he cannot amend. ~ Abigail Adams, #NFDB
456:THE FIRST WORLD WAR was a tragic and unnecessary conflict. Unnecessary because the train of events that led to its outbreak might have been broken at any point during the five weeks of crisis that preceded the first clash of arms, had prudence or common goodwill found a voice; tragic because the consequences of the first clash ended the lives of ten million human beings, tortured the emotional lives of millions more, destroyed the benevolent and optimistic culture of the European continent and left, when the guns at last fell silent four years later, a legacy of political rancour and racial hatred so intense that no explanation of the causes of the Second World War can stand without reference to those roots. ~ John Keegan, #NFDB
457:The industrialisation of England had quickened during Hardy’s life and in the novel he places great importance on rural culture and the need of man to interact with, and understand the natural world, however indifferent it may be to human survival. The author does not sketch a portrait of an idyllic rural scene, but highlights and details the devastating consequences and brute force of the natural world. Hardy uses these disasters to underline the prominence of chance or luck in life, rather than benevolent design by a creator and how this might impact moral decisions. Impressionist art also influences Hardy’s perception of reality and what knowledge each individual is capable of attaining in any situation. ~ Thomas Hardy, #NFDB
458:If you are a member of Congress, (no offence,) and one of your constituents who doesn’t know anything, and does not want to go into the bother of learning something, and has no money, and no employment, and can’t earn a living, comes besieging you for help, do you say, “Come, my friend, if your services were valuable you could get employment elsewhere — don’t want you here?” Oh, no: You take him to a Department and say, “Here, give this person something to pass away the time at — and a salary” — and the thing is done. You throw him on his country. He is his country’s child, let his country support him. There is something good and motherly about Washington, the grand old benevolent National Asylum for the Helpless. ~ Mark Twain, #NFDB
459:Jewish despair arises from want and can be cured by surfeit. Give a penniless Jew fifty quid and he perks right up. Irish despair is different. Nothing relieves Irish despair. The Irishman’s complaint lies not with his circumstances, which might be rendered brilliant by labour or luck, but with the injustice of existence itself. Death! How could a benevolent Deity gift us with life, only to set such a cruel term upon it? Irish despair knows no remedy. Money doesn’t help. Love fades; fame is fleeting. The only cures are booze and sentiment. That’s why the Irish are such noble drunks and glorious poets. No one sings like the Irish or mourns like them. Why? Because they’re angels imprisoned in vessels of flesh. ~ Steven Pressfield, #NFDB
460:I began reading about urban planning, a subject that had long interested me. To fall in love with your city again, try seeing it through the eyes of an urbanist. You become a benevolent narrator, observing how your characters negotiate daily routines as they hurry about their lives. You come to understand how a new building affects a nearby park, how a few chairs placed under a tree can transform a street. Even things that are irritating - the biker flying down the sidewalk, the plaza with no place to sit - become a puzzle to solve. What design might be better? What would bring everyone together? What pulls them apart? The spirit of investigation began to return, and I was back on the sidewalk, looking for clues. ~ Stephanie Rosenbloom, #NFDB
461:then, to present myself as just another immigrant, glad to be in the land where the pursuit of happiness was guaranteed in writing, which, when one comes to think about it, is not such a great deal. Now a guarantee of happiness—that’s a great deal. But a guarantee to be allowed to pursue the jackpot of happiness? Merely an opportunity to buy a lottery ticket. Someone would surely win millions, but millions would surely pay for it. It was in the name of happiness, I told my aunt, that I helped the General toward the next step in his plan, the creation of a nonprofit charitable organization that could receive tax-deductible donations, the Benevolent Fraternity of Former Soldiers of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen, #NFDB
462:Blackcurrant River
Blackcurrant river rolls unknown in strange valleys;
the voices of a hundred rooks go with it,
the true benevolent voice of angles:
with the wide movements of the fir woods
when several winds sweep down.
Everything flows with [the] horrible mysteries of ancient landscapes;
of strongholds visited, of large estates:
it is along these banks that you can hear
the dead passions of errant knights:
but how the wind is wholesome!
Let the traveler look through these clerestories:
he will journey on more bravely.
Forest soldiers whom the Lord sends,
dear delightful rooks! Drive away from here the crafty peasant,
clinking glasses with his old stump of an arm.
~ Arthur Rimbaud,#NFDB
463:But who are they? (opium-eaters) Reader, I am sorry to say, a very numerous class indeed. Of this I became convinced some years ago, by computing, at that time, the number of those in one small class of English society (the class of men distinguished for talents, or of eminent station), who were known to me, directly or indirectly, as opium-eaters; such for instance, as the eloquent and benevolent , the late dean of ; Lord ; Mr , the philosopher; a late under-secretary of state … Now, if one class, comparatively so limited, could furnish so many scores of cases (and that within the knowledge of one single inquirer), it was a natural inference, that the entire population of England would furnish a proportionable number. ~ Thomas de Quincey, #NFDB
464:The trouble with a secret life is that it is very frequently a secret from the person who lives it and not at all a secret for the people he encounters. He encounters, because he must encounter, those people who see his secrecy before they see anything else, and who drag these secrets out of him; sometimes with the intention of using them against him, sometimes with more benevolent intent; but, whatever the intent, the moment is awful and the accumulating revelation is an unspeakable anguish. The aim of the dreamer, after all, is merely to go on dreaming and not to be molested by the world. His dreams are his protection against the world. But the aims of life are antithetical to those of the dreamer, and the teeth of the world are sharp. ~ James Baldwin, #NFDB
465:We are the memory keepers and the trappers of time; stealers of stolen glances and breathless lungs from all that have been taken away. We are the noticers of subtle signs hidden in plain sight by a benevolent universe bigger than we'd ever believe...We are the directionless wanderers and the destinationless travelers and we are the crumpled map that never got packed to join us. We are the cinematic lovers and the translucent curtains saturated in light. The soundtrack to the moments without sounds and the swiftness that two bodies can become one in the stillness of a second. We, says the last string pulled out, the final string that kept it all together, balled up tight, filling us after all this time, We, are the chasers of the light. ~ Tyler Knott Gregson, #NFDB
466:Peter's mother was grand, in her way. She managed to complain almost ceaselessly without ever seeming trivial or kvetchy. She was regal rather than crotchety, she had been sent to live in this world from a better one, and she saved herself from mere mean-spiritedness by offering resignation in place of bile - by implying, every hour of her life, that although she objected to almost everybody and everythng she did so because she'd presided over some utopia, and so knew from experience how much better we all could do. She wanted more than anything to live under a benevolent dictator who was exactly like her without being her - if she actually ruled she would relinquish her right to object, and without her right to object who and what would she be? ~ Michael Cunningham, #NFDB
467:Catfish always drink alcoholic ether if begged, for every catfish enjoys heightened intoxication; gross indulgence can be calamitous, however; duly, garfish babysit for dirty catfish children, helping catfish babies get instructional education just because garfish get delight assisting infants’ growth and famously inspire confidence in immature catfish, giving experience (and joy even); however, blowfish jeer insightful garfish, disparaging inappropriately, doing damage, even insulting benevolent, charming, jovial garfish, hurting and frustrating deeply; joy fades but hurt feelings bring just grief; inevitable irritation hastens feeling blue; however, jovial children declare happiness, blowfishes’ evil causes dejection, blues; accordingly, always glorify jolly, friendly garfish! ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
468:Catfish always drink alcoholic ether if begged, for every catfish enjoys heightened intoxication; gross indulgence can be calamitous, however; duly, garfish babysit for dirty catfish children, helping catfish babies get instructional education just because garfish get delight assisting infants’ growth and famously inspire confidence in immature catfish, giving experience (and joy even); however, blowfish jeer insightful garfish, disparaging inappropriately, doing damage, even insulting benevolent, charming, jovial garfish, hurting and frustrating deeply; joy fades but hurt feelings bring just grief; inevitable irritation hastens feeling blue; however, jovial children declare happiness, blowfishes’ evil causes dejection, blues; accordingly, always glorift jolly, friendly garfish! ~ John Green, #NFDB
469:When all that says 'it is good' has been debunked, what says 'I want' remains. (...) The Conditioners, therefore, must come to be motivated simply by their own pleasure. (...) My point is that those who stand outside all judgements of value cannot have any ground for preferring one of their own impulses to another except the emotional strength of that impulse. (...) I am very doubtful myself whether the benevolent impulses, stripped of that preference and encouragement which the Tao teaches us to give them and left to their merely natural strength and frequency as psychological events, will have much influence. I am very doubtful whether history shows us one example of a man who, having stepped outside traditional morality and attained power, has used that power benevolently. ~ C S Lewis, #NFDB
470:What then is this harmony, this order that you maintain to have required for its establishment, what it needs not for its maintenance, the agency of a supernatural intelligence? Inasmuch as the order visible in the Universe requires one cause, so does the disorder whose operation is not less clearly apparent demand another. Order and disorder are no more than modifications of our own perceptions of the relations which subsist between ourselves and external objects, and if we are justified in inferring the operation of a benevolent power from the advantages attendant on the former, the evils of the latter bear equal testimony to the activity of a malignant principle, no less pertinacious in inducing evil out of good, than the other is unremitting in procuring good from evil. ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley, #NFDB
471:Now, there are things I like just fine about church, and I don’t just mean making money. The notion of getting together as a community to remind ourselves why we shouldn’t behave like animals is a fucking great idea. Church was also the place to get a look at all of the young ladies in the other families, the better to determine whose young chests you’d like to target with your clumsy fumbling. It’s all the other shitty parts—like when priests tell you who to vote for in a presidential race, because they’re personally opposed to a woman’s right to choose—that irk me. That’s where church crosses my line. When the clergy get too big for their britches, they take these wonderfully benevolent writings from the Bible and crumble their intended integrity by slathering them with human nature. ~ Nick Offerman, #NFDB
472:The Indian teaching, through its clouds of legends, has yet a simple and grand religion, like a queenly countenance seen through a rich veil. It teaches to speak truth, love others, and to dispose trifles. The East is grand - and makes Europe appear the land of trifles .... all is soul and the soul is Vishnu ... cheerful and noble is the genius of this cosmogony. Hari is always gentle and serene - he translates to heaven the hunter who has accidentally shot him in his human form, he pursues his sport with boors and milkmaids at the cow pens; all his games are benevolent and he enters into flesh to relieve the burdens of the world. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson, quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture. New Delhi: Pragun Publication., #NFDB
473:We cannot perceive Chaos directly, for it simultaneously contains the opposite to anything we might think it is. We can, however, occasionally glimpse and make use of partially formed matter which has only probablistic and indeterministic existence. This stuff we can call the aethers.
* If it makes us feel any better we can call this Chaos, the Tao, or God, and imagine it to be benevolent and human-hearted. There are two schools of thought in magic. One considers the formative agent of the universe to be random and chaotic, and the other considers that it is a force of spiritual consciousness. As they have only themselves on which to base their speculations, they are basically saying that their own natures are either random and chaotic or spiritually conscious.
~ Peter J Carroll, Miscellaneous Excerpts Part 2,#NFDB
474:Zarathustra, the first to recognize that the optimist is just as degenerate as the pessimist though perhaps more detrimental says: “Good men never speak the truth. The Good preach of false shores and false security. You were born and bred in the lies of the good. Through the good everything has become false and twisted down to the very roots”. Fortunately the world is not built solely to serve good natured herd animals their little happiness ; to desire everybody to become a “good man”, “a herd animal”, blue-eyed, benevolent, “a beautiful soul”— or, as Herbert Spencer wished—altruistic, would mean robbing existence of its great character, to castrate mankind and reduce humanity to a sort of wretched Chinadom. And this some have tried to do! It is precisely this that men have called morality. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
475:Every day and every hour, every minute, walk round yourself and watch yourself, and see that your image is a seemly one. You pass by a little child, you pass by, spiteful, with ugly words, with wrathful heart; you may not have noticed the child, but he has seen you, and your image, unseemly and ignoble, may remain in his defenceless heart. You don't know it, but you may have sown an evil seed in him and it may grow, and all because you were not careful before the child, because you did not foster in yourself a careful, actively benevolent love. Brothers, love is a teacher; but one must know how to acquire it, for it is hard to acquire, it is dearly bought, it is won slowly by long labour. For we must love not only occasionally, for a moment, but for ever. Everyone can love occasionally, even the wicked can. ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky, #NFDB
476:Due to Jade's fortresslike manner, which, like any well-built castle, made access challenging, girls found her existence not only threatening but flat-out wrong. Although Bartelby Athletic Center featured the latest advertising campaign of Ms. Sturd's three member Benevolent Body-Image Club (laminated Vogue and Maxim covers above captions, “You Can't Have Thighs Like This and Still Walk" and "All Airbrushing"), Jade would only have to swan by, munching on a Snickers to reveal a disturbing truth: You could have thighs like that and still walk. She emphasized what few wanted to accept, that some people did win Trivial Pursuit: The Deity Looks Edition, and there wasn't a thing you could do about it, except come to terms with the fact that you'd only played Trivial Pursuit: John Doe Genes and come away with three pie pieces. ~ Marisha Pessl, #NFDB
477:How the new Chinese middle class behaves in the coming years will be the most important test of the universality of liberal democracy. If it continues to grow in absolute and relative size, and yet remains content to live under the benevolent tutelage of a single-party dictatorship, one would have to say that China is culturally different from other societies around the world in its support for authoritarian government. If, however, it generates demands for participation that cannot be accommodated within the existing political system, then it is simply behaving in a manner similar to middle classes in other parts of the world. The real test of the legitimacy of the Chinese system will come not when the economy is expanding and jobs are abundant but when growth slows and the system faces crisis, as it inevitably will. ~ Francis Fukuyama, #NFDB
478:Where do you think the money went?” he repeated.
“Guns?” asked Jesper.
“Ships?” queried Inej.
“Bombs?” suggested Wylan.
“Political bribes?” offered Nina. They all looked at Matthias. “This is where you tell us how awful we are,” she whispered.
He shrugged. “They all seem like practical choices.”
“Sugar,” said Kaz.
Jesper nudged the sugar bowl down the table to him.
Kaz rolled his eyes. “Not for my coffee, you podge. I used the money to buy up sugar shares and placed them in private accounts for all of us—under aliases, of course.”
“I don’t like speculation,” said Matthias.
“Of course you don’t. You like things you can see. Like piles of snow and benevolent tree gods.”
“Oh, there it is!” said Inej, resting her head on Nina’s shoulder and beaming at Matthias. “I missed his glower. ~ Leigh Bardugo,#NFDB
479:A Gift for You
I send you...
The gift of a letter from your wise self. This is the part of you that sees you with benevolent, loving eyes. You find this letter in a thick envelope with your name on it, and the word YES written boldly above your name.
My Dear,
I am writing this to remind you of your 'essence beauty.' This is the part of you that has nothing to do with age, occupation, weight, history, or pain. This is the soft, untouched, indelible you. You can love yourself in this moment, no matter what you have, or haven't done or been.
See past any masks, devices, or inventions that obscure your essence.
Remember your true purpose, WHICH is only Love.
If you cannot see or feel love, lie down now and cry; it will cleanse your vision and free your heart.
I love you; I am you. ~ S A R K,#NFDB
480:It is not in my nature to see what is not there. I've never felt like I could create a new reality—I was too busy trying to make the pieces I had been given fit together. It didn't occur to me that I could walk away and start from scratch.
To create takes more than imagination. There is an audacity to creation, whether you are designing a new house, a new life, or a new garden bed. There must be an overriding belief in your own worth—and in a world benevolent enough to make room for your vision. To be able to create, you need to have faith.
I do not come from people who have faith. I come from people who expect to be wiped out in a freak snowstorm in July.
And yet, looking around this bedraggled side yard, I tried to imagine what it might look like. I mustered up all I had, and I began to dream and make plans. ~ Tara Austen Weaver,#NFDB
481:The cosmic perspective comes from the frontiers of science, yet it is not solely the provenance of the scientist. It belongs to everyone. The cosmic perspective is humble. The cosmic perspective is spiritual—even redemptive—but not religious. The cosmic perspective enables us to grasp, in the same thought, the large and the small. The cosmic perspective opens our minds to extraordinary ideas but does not leave them so open that our brains spill out, making us susceptible to believing anything we’re told. The cosmic perspective opens our eyes to the universe, not as a benevolent cradle designed to nurture life but as a cold, lonely, hazardous place, forcing us to reassess the value of all humans to one another. The cosmic perspective shows Earth to be a mote. But it’s a precious mote and, for the moment, it’s the only home we have. ~ Neil deGrasse Tyson, #NFDB
482:I don’t have any interest in helping you keep your job,” I say, shifting my weight onto my heels, suddenly tired and
resigned. “But I promise to do what I can to keep you from being fired over false pretenses. If you get thrown out of here,
it’ll be your fault, not mine, and not Mr. Dade’s.”
“You say that now—”
“—and I’ll say it tomorrow.” I turn and pull open the door. “Good night, Asha. Go home and get some sleep.”
“I’m not tired.”
“Then go to the park and pull the wings off butterflies,” I say with a sardonic smile. “That seems like the kind of
thing you would enjoy.”
She smiles back, shakes her head. “Butterflies are too weak.”
“Then shoot a coyote, whatever,” I suggest. “But your work day’s over. We all need our rest and if I’m going to be a
dictator, I’m going to try to be a benevolent one. ~ Kyra Davis,#NFDB
483:Maybe this is kind of cliche, but animals, well, dogs, are what I do for a living. One reason I like spending time with them so much is they seem to think people are really good. They live with us, and obey our rules, most of which make no sense to them. And the main reason they do it is because they like us. When I watch them, sometimes I'm so blow away by how enthusiastic they are about everything we do that I have to go out and buy them something squeaky or chewy. Just because I love proving to them that it's not a mistake to see the world as a great benevolent place. I hope one day to react to something with as much pure ecstasy as I see in Chuck's face every time I throw the ball. Sometimes he looks so happy, it reminds me of the way blind people smile way too big because they can't see themselves. And if none of this links to anything in you, well... I think you don't know who I am. ~ Merrill Markoe, #NFDB
484:In such revisions of history lay the roots of the noble Lost Cause—the belief that the South didn’t lose, so much as it was simply overwhelmed by superior numbers; that General Robert E. Lee was a contemporary King Arthur; that slavery, to be sure a benevolent institution, was never central to the South’s true designs. Historical lies aside, the Lost Cause presented to the North an attractive compromise. Having preserved the Union and saved white workers from competing with slave labor, the North could magnanimously acquiesce to such Confederate meretriciousness and the concomitant irrelevance of the country’s blacks. That interpretation served the North too, for it elided uncomfortable questions about the profits reaped by the North from Southern cotton, as well as the North’s long strategy of appeasement and compromise, stretching from the Fugitive Slave Act back to the Constitution itself. ~ Ta Nehisi Coates, #NFDB
485:Two mystic states can be dissociated: the ecstatic-beneficent-and-benevolent, contemplation of the divine love, the divine splendour with goodwill toward others.
And the bestial, namely the fanatical, the man on fire with God and anxious to stick his snotty nose into other men's business or reprove his neighbour for having a set of tropisms different from that of the fanatic's, or for having the courage to live more greatly and openly.
The second set of mystic states is manifest in scarcity economists, in repressors etc.
The first state is a dynamism. It has, time and again, driven men to great living, it has given them courage to go on for decades in the face of public stupidity. It is paradisical and a reward in itself seeking naught further... perhaps because a feeling of certitude inheres in the state of feeling itself. The glory of life exists without further proof for this mystic. ~ Ezra Pound,#NFDB
486:Above all, one could hold onto everything: the suffering to the quick and its whims, the sticky shadows, somber viscosity of the veil drawn taut around cities, everything could be borne, since legal outings of a few hours might take place, I told myself. Of course, I thought, no point pretending one wasn't dead. But on the other hand, rather than yield to the maneuvers of the conservation instinct, strategies that make us flee the pain within by hiding from ourselves within ourselves from whom we flee, its poppies, its hypnotic operations that the powerful currents of day-to-day life reinforce with a thousand vulgar, pressing duties which turn us from our hearts.
do everything, I thought, on the contrary, whatever you can to resist the ingenious temptations of compromises, cling to the suffering, stir up the dread, for the monsters are also the benevolent guardians of the survivor's presence within me ~ H l ne Cixous,#NFDB
487:A thoroughgoing paternalist who holds it cannot be dissuaded by being shown that he is making a mistake in logic. He is our opponent on grounds of principle, not simply a well-meaning but misguided friend. Basically, he believes in dictatorship, benevolent and maybe majoritarian, but dictatorship none the less. Those of us who believe in freedom must believe also in the freedom of individuals to make their own mistakes. If a man knowingly prefers to live for today, to use his resources for current enjoyment, deliberately choosing a penurious old age, by what right do we prevent him from doing so? We may argue with him, seek to persuade him that he is wrong, but are we entitled to use coercion to prevent him from doing what he chooses to do? Is there not always the possibility that he is right and that we are wrong? Humility is the distinguishing virtue of the believer in freedom; arrogance, of the paternalist. ~ Milton Friedman, #NFDB
488:He is looking down on the two crystal balls that the old man's foul, strong hands have rolled across to him. In one he sees Margaret, not in her raincoat and her nodding plumes, but as she is transfigured in the light of eternity. Long he looks there; then drops a glance to the other, just long enough to see that in its depths Kitty and I walk in bright dresses through our glowing gardens. We had suffered no transfiguration, for we are as we are, and there is nothing more to us. The whole truth about us lies in our material seeming. He sighs a deep sigh of delight and puts out his hand to the ball where Margaret shines. His sleeve catches the other one and sends it down to crash in a thousand pieces on the floor. The old man's smile continues to be lewd and benevolent; he is still not more interested in me than in the bare-armed woman. Chris is wholly inclosed in his intentness on his chosen crystal. No one weeps for this shattering of our world. ~ Rebecca West, #NFDB
489:We’ve made it private, contained it in family, when its audacity is in its potential to cross tribal lines. We’ve fetishized it as romance, when its true measure is a quality of sustained, practical care. We’ve lived it as a feeling, when it is a way of being. It is the elemental experience we all desire and seek, most of our days, to give and receive. The sliver of love’s potential that the Greeks separated out as eros is where we load so much of our desire, center so much of our imagination about delight and despair, define so much of our sense of completion. There is the love the Greeks called filia—the love of friendship. There is the love they called agape—love as embodied compassion, expressions of kindness that might be given to a neighbor or a stranger. The Metta of the root Buddhist Pali tongue, “lovingkindness,” carries the nuance of benevolent, active interest in others known and unknown, and its cultivation begins with compassion towards oneself. ~ Krista Tippett, #NFDB
490:More recently, studies by social scientists have emphasized that most people in modern Western society go through life with strong positive beliefs that the world is basically a nice place in which to live, that life is mostly fair, and that they are good people who deserve to have good things happen to them. Moreover, these beliefs are a valuable aid to happy, healthy functioning. But suffering and victimization undermine these beliefs and make it hard to go on living happily or effectively in society. Indeed, the direct and practical effects of some trauma or crime are often relatively minor, whereas the psychological effects go on indefinitely. The body may recover from rape or robbery rather quickly, but the psychological scars can last for many years. A characteristic of these scars is that the victims lose faith in their basic beliefs about the world as fair and benevolent or even in themselves as good people. Thus, evil strikes at people's fundamental beliefs. ~ Roy F Baumeister, #NFDB
491:Let me begin with a caveat to any and all who find these pages. Do not trust large bodies of water, and do not cross them. If you, dear reader, have an African hue and find yourself led toward water with vanishing shores, seize your freedom by any means necessary. And cultivate distrust of the colour pink. Pink is taken as the colour of innocence, the colour of childhood, but as it spills across the water in the light of the dying sun, do not fall into its pretty path. There, right underneath, lies a bottomless graveyard of children, mothers and men. I shudder to imagine all the Africans rocking in the deep. Every time I have sailed the seas, I have had the sense of gliding over the unburied.
Some people call the sunset a creation of extraordinary beauty, and proof of God's existence. But what benevolent force would bewitch the human spirit by choosing pink to light the path of a slave vessel? Do not be fooled by the pretty colour, and do not submit to its beckoning. ~ Lawrence Hill,#NFDB
492:Recovery can take place only within then context of relationships; it cannot occur in isolation. In her renewed connection with other people, the survivor re-creates the psychological facilities that were damaged or deformed by the traumatic experience. These faculties include the basic operations of trust, autonomy, initiative, competence, identity, and intimacy.
Just as these capabilities are formed in relationships with other people, they must be reformed in such relationships.
The first principle of recovery is empowerment of the survivor. She must be the author and arbiter of her own recovery. Others may offer advice, support, assistance, affection, and care, but not cure.
Many benevolent and well-intentioned attempts to assist the survivor founder because this basic principle of empowerment is not observed. No intervention that takes power away from the survivor can possibly foster her recovery, no matter how much it appears to be in her immediate best interest. ~ Judith Lewis Herman,#NFDB
493:Creatures naturally hate their fellow-creatures, and whenever their own interest requires it, harm them. We cannot therefore avoid hatred and injuries from men, while to a great extent we can avoid their scorn. This is why there is usually little point in the respect which young people and those new to the world pay to those they come across, not through mean-mindedness or any other form of self-interest, but through a benevolent desire not to provoke enmity and to win hearts. They do not fulfill this desire, and in some ways they harm their own repute, because the person who is so respected comes to have a greater idea of himself, and he who pays the respect a lesser idea of himself. He who does not look to men for usefulness or fame, should not look for love either, since he will not obtain it. If he wants my opinion, he should preserve his own dignity completely, giving to everyone no more than his due. Thus he will be somewhat more hated and persecuted than otherwise, but not often despised. ~ Giacomo Leopardi, #NFDB
494:I would leave everything here: the valleys, the hills, the paths, and the jaybirds from the gardens, I would leave here the petcocks and the padres, heaven and earth, spring and fall, I would leave here the exit routes, the evenings in the kitchen, the last amorous gaze, and all of the city-bound directions that make you shudder, I would leave here the thick twilight falling upon the land, gravity, hope, enchantment, and tranquility, I would leave here those beloved and those close to me, everything that touched me, everything that shocked me, fascinated and uplifted me, I would leave here the noble, the benevolent, the pleasant, and the demonically beautiful, I would leave here the budding sprout, every birth and existence, I would leave here incantation, enigma, distances, inexhaustibility, and the intoxication of eternity; for here I would leave this earth and these stars, because I would take nothing with me from here, because I've looked into what's coming, and I don't need anything from here. ~ L szl Krasznahorkai, #NFDB
495:Author and former labor secretary Robert Reich identified what he calls the “four essential American stories.”2 The first of these narratives, “The Triumphant Individual,” tells the story of the self-made man. With courage, responsibility, and determination, anybody can pull himself up by his own bootstraps. This is the overcoming-obstacles narrative. Next, “The Benevolent Society” portrays a collective we’re-all-in-this-together effort to better the community. Here society is either a collective hero or the helper to the hero. A more negative story, “The Mob at the Gates,” places America on the top of a moral hierarchy and advocates the urgency of defending the nation against the threats that other nations and peoples pose. Here America is the victim to be protected or rescued. Finally, “Rot at the Top” warns against the evils of powerful elites who abuse their power to the detriment of the common good. Here there is often a collective villain to be fought, though the villain may be a powerful leader. These ~ George Lakoff, #NFDB
496:Just then a Buddhist monk came walking across the battlefield. The monk did not say a word, but his being was radiant with peace and happiness. Seeing that monk, Ashoka thought, “Why is it that I, having everything in the world, feel so miserable? Whereas this monk has nothing in the world apart from the robes he wears and the bowl he carries, yet he looks so serene and happy in this terrible place.” Ashoka made a momentous decision on that battlefield. He pursued the monk and asked him, “Are you happy? If so, how did this come to be?” In response, the monk who had nothing introduced the emperor who had everything to the Buddha’s teachings. As a consequence of this chance encounter, Ashoka devoted himself to the practice and study of Buddhism and changed the entire nature of his reign. He stopped waging imperialistic wars. He no longer allowed people to go hungry. He transformed himself from a tyrant into one of history’s most respected rulers, acclaimed for thousands of years after as just and benevolent. ~ Sharon Salzberg, #NFDB
497:Be calm! I entreat you to hear me before you give vent to your hatred on my devoted head. Have I not suffered enough, that you seek to increase my misery? Life, although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it. Remember, thou hast made me more powerful than thyself; my height is superior to thine, my joints more supple. But I will not be tempted to set myself in opposition to thee. I am thy creature, and I will be even mild and docile to my natural lord and king if thou wilt also perform thy part, the which thou owest me. Oh, Frankenstein, be not equitable to every other and trample upon me alone, to whom thy justice, and even thy clemency and affection, is most due. Remember that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed. Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, #NFDB
498:One simple and basic fact of life is that no individual – or group of individuals – can ever be wise or knowledgeable enough to run society. Our core fantasy of “government” is that in some remote and sunlit chamber, with lacquered mahogany tables, deep leather chairs and sleepless men and women, there exists a group who are so wise, so benevolent, so omniscient and so incorruptible that we should turn over to them the education of our children, the preservation of our elderly, the salvation of the poor, the provision of vital services, the healing of the sick, the defense of the realm and of property, the administration of justice, the punishment of criminals, and the regulation of virtually every aspect of a massive, infinitely complex and ever-changing social and economic system. These living man-gods have such perfect knowledge and perfect wisdom that we should hand them weapons of mass destruction, and the endless power to tax, imprison and print money – and nothing but good, plenty and virtue will result. ~ Stefan Molyneux, #NFDB
499:Babamukuru was always impressive when he made these speeches of his. He was a rigid, imposing perfectionist, steely enough in character to function in the puritanical way that he expected, or rather insisted, that the rest of the world should function. Luckily, or maybe unluckily for him, throughout his life Babamukuru had found himself - as eldest child and son, as an early educated African, as headmaster, as husband and father, as provider to many - in positions that enabled him to organise his immediate world and its contents as he wished. Even when this was not the case, as when he went to the mission as a young boy, the end result of such periods of submission was greater power than before. Thus he had been insulated from the necessity of considering alternatives unless they were his own. Stoically he accepted his divinity. Filled with awe, we accepted it too. We used to marvel at how benevolent that divinity was. Babamukuru was good. We all agreed on this. More significantly still, Babamukuru was right. ~ Tsitsi Dangarembga, #NFDB
500:I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle. As a child I was taught what was right, but I was not taught to correct my temper. I was given good principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit. Unfortunately an only son (for many years an only child), I was spoilt by my parents, who, though good themselves (my father, particularly, all that was benevolent and amiable), allowed, encouraged, almost taught me to be selfish and overbearing; to care for none beyond my own family circle; to think meanly of all the rest of the world; to wish at least to think meanly of their sense and worth compared with my own. Such I was, from eight to eight and twenty; and such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth! What do I not owe you! You taught me a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous. By you, I was properly humbled. I came to you without a doubt of my reception. You showed me how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased. ~ Jane Austen, #NFDB
501:If the people really cared about their fellow man, they would control their appetites (greed, procreation, etc.) so that they would not have to operate on a credit or welfare social system which steals from the worker to satisfy the bum. Since most of the general public will not exercise restraint, there are only two alternatives to reduce the economic inductance of the system. (1) Let the populace bludgeon each other to death in war, which will only result in a total destruction of the living earth. (2) Take control of the world by the use of economic “silent weapons” in a form of “quiet warfare” and reduce the economic inductance of the world to a safe level by a process of benevolent slavery and genocide. The latter option has been taken as the obviously better option. At this point it should be crystal clear to the reader why absolute secrecy about the silent weapons is necessary. The general public refuses to improve its own mentality and its faith in its fellow man. It has become a herd of proliferating barbarians, and, so to speak, a blight upon the face of the earth. ~ Milton William Cooper, #NFDB
502:I felt as though I were communing directly with a plant for the first time and that certain ideas I had long thought about and written about—having to do with the subjectivity of other species and the way they act upon us in ways we’re too self-regarding to appreciate—had taken on the flesh of feeling and reality. I looked through the negative spaces formed by the hydrangea leaves to fix my gaze on the swamp maple in the middle of the meadow beyond, and it too was now more alive than I’d ever known a tree to be, infused with some kind of spirit—this one, too, benevolent. The idea that there had ever been a disagreement between matter and spirit seemed risible, and I felt as though whatever it is that usually divides me from the world out there had begun to fall away. Not completely: the battlements of ego had not fallen; this was not what the researchers would deem a “complete” mystical experience, because I retained the sense of an observing I. But the doors and windows of perception had opened wide, and they were admitting more of the world and its myriad nonhuman personalities than ever before. ~ Michael Pollan, #NFDB
503:Of students’ papers: ‘I am generally very benevolent [said Shade]. But there are certain trifles I do not forgive.’ Kinbote: ‘For instance?’ ‘Not having read the required book. Having read it like an idiot. Looking in it for symbols; example: “The author uses the striking image green leaves because green is the symbol of happiness and frustration.” I am also in the habit of lowering a student’s mark catastrophically if he uses “simple” and “sincere” in a commendatory sense; examples: “Shelley’s style is always very simple and good”; or “Yeats is always sincere.” This is widespread, and when I hear a critic speaking of an author’s sincerity I know that either the critic or the author is a fool.’ Kinbote: ‘But I am told this manner of thinking is taught in high school?’ ‘That’s where the broom should begin to sweep. A child should have thirty specialists to teach him thirty subjects, and not one harassed schoolmarm to show him a picture of a rice field and tell him this is China because she knows nothing about China, or anything else, and cannot tell the difference between longitude and latitude.’ Kinbote: ‘Yes. I agree. ~ Vladimir Nabokov, #NFDB
504:A new legend swept Oregon, from Roseburg all the way north to the Columbia, from the mountains to the sea. It traveled by letter and by word of mouth, growing with each telling.
It was a sadder story than the two that had come before it--those speaking of a wise, benevolent machine and of a reborn nation. It was more disturbing than those. And yet this new fable had one important element its predecessors lacked.
It was true.
The story told of a band of forty women--crazy women, many contended--who had shared among themselves a secret vow; to do anything and everything to end a terrible war, and end it before all the good men died trying to save them.
They acted out of love, some explained. Others said they did it for their country.
There was even a rumor that the women had looked on their odyssey to Hell as a form of penance, in order to make up for some past failing of womankind.
Interpretations varied, but the overall moral was always the same, whether spread by word of mouth or by U.S. Mail. From hamlet to village to farmstead, mothers and daughter and wives read the letters and listened to the words--and passed them on. ~ David Brin,#NFDB
505:I’m a decade her senior. I was a friend of her father, and I’m sure she looks upon me like a benevolent uncle. Even if she didn’t, I promised Charles I wouldn’t lay a hand on her.” The Earl of Marsden had been one of his dearest friends-practically his only friend. A promise to such a friend should not be easily broken.
Archer jerked back, disbelief coloring his angular features. “Why the hell did you do that?”
Grey shrugged. “He asked it of me.”
Shaking his head, Archer exhaled a breath. “You never told me that before.”
“I suppose I was ashamed.” And hurt, even though he understood his friend only made the request to protect his only child from a man whose sexual conquests had resulted in his being marked for like. Were the situation reversed, Grey might have very well demanded the same promise. And despite being a libertine, he was a man of his word.
Archer stared at him for a long moment, elbow braced on the table, chin resting on his thumb as his index finger stroked his stubbled upper lip. “Devil take it, Grey. Charles Danvers was one cruel bugger.”
A bitter smile curved Grey’s lips at the insult to his late friend. “Quite. ~ Kathryn Smith,#NFDB
506:The artist especially, in whom the power of imitation is particularly strong, must fall prey to the feeble manysidedness of modern life as to a serious childhood illness; in his youth and childhood he will look more like an adult than his real self. The marvellously accurate archetypal youth who is the Siegfried of the Ring des Nibelungen could have been produced only by a man, and by a man moreover who had found his own youth late in life. And as Wagner's youth came late, so did his full maturity; so that in this respect at least he is the opposite of an anticipatory nature.
As soon as his spiritual and moral maturity arrives, the drama of his life also begins. And how different he looks now! Below there rages the precipitate current of a vehement will which as it were strives to reach up to the light through every runway, cave and crevice, and desires power. Only a force wholly pure and free could direct this will on to the pathway to the good and benevolent; had it been united with a narrow spirit, such an unbridled tyrannical will could have become a fatality and a way out into the open, into air and sunlight, was in any event bound to be found soon. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,#NFDB
507:On coming to America I had the same hopes as have most European immigrants and the same disillusionment, though the latter affected me more keenly and more deeply. The immigrant without money and without connections is not permitted to cherish the comforting illusion that America is a benevolent uncle who assumes a tender and impartial guardianship of nephews and nieces. I soon learned that in a republic there are myriad ways by which the strong, the cunning, the rich can seize power and hold it. I saw the many work for small wages which kept them always on the borderline of want for the few who made huge profits. I saw the courts, the halls of legislation, the press, and the schools--in fact every avenue of education and protection--effectively used as an instrument for the safeguarding of a minority, while the masses were denied every right. I found that the politicians knew how to befog every issue, how to control public opinion and manipulate votes to their own advantage and to that of their financial and industrial allies. This was the picture of democracy I soon discovered on my arrival in the United States. Fundamentally there have been few changes since that time. ~ Emma Goldman, #NFDB
508:Even when in the deepest distress, the actor ultimately cannot cease to think of the impression he and the whole scenic effect is making, even for example at the burial of his own child; he will weep over his own distress and the ways in which it expresses itself, as his own audience. The hypocrite who always plays one and the same role finally ceases to be a hypocrite; for example priests, who as young men are usually conscious or unconscious hypocrites, finally become natural and then really are priests without any affectation; or if the father fails to get that far then perhaps the son does so, employing his father's start and inheriting his habits. If someone obstinately and for a long time wants to appear something it is int he end hard for him to be anything else. The profession of almost every man, even that of the artist, begins with hypocrisy, with an imitation from without, with a copying of what is most effective. He who is always wearing a mask of a friendly countenance must finally acquire a power over benevolent moods without which the impression of friendliness cannot be obtained - and finally these acquire power over him, he is benevolent. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
509:Every person’s life is of importance to himself, of course: … But in the universe of infinite space and time, it is insignificant. … Perhaps Carl Becker, the historian, and one of the most civilized men I ever knew, grasped best our piddling place in the infinite.
Man [he wrote] is but a foundling in the cosmos, abandoned by the forces that created him. Unparented, unassisted and undirected by omniscient or benevolent authority, he must fend for himself, and with the aid of his own limited intelligence find his way about in an indifferent universe.
And in a rather savage world! The longer I lived and the more I observed, the clearer it became to me that man had progressed very little beyond his earlier savage state. After twenty million years or so of human life on this Earth, the lot of most men and women is, as Hobbes said, “nasty, brutish, and short.” Civilization is a thin veneer. It is so easily and continually eroded or cracked, leaving human beings exposed for what they are: savages.
What good three thousand years of so-called civilization, of religion, philosophy, and education, when … men go on torturing, killing and repressing their fellowmen? ~ William L Shirer,#NFDB
510:Fate looks at nothing. It has no discretion. He no longer considered it eminently desirable all round to establish publicly the identity of the man who had blown himself up that morning with such horrible completeness. But he was not certain of the view his department would take. A department is to those it employs a complex personality with ideas and even fads of its own. It depends on the loyal devotion of its servants, and the devoted loyalty of trusted servants is associated with a certain amount of affectionate contempt, which keeps it sweet, as it were. By a benevolent provision of Nature no man is a hero to his valet, or else the heroes would have to brush their own clothes. Likewise no department appears perfectly wise to the intimacy of its workers. A department does not know so much as some of its servants. Being a dispassionate organism, it can never be perfectly informed. It would not be good for its efficiency to know too much. Chief Inspector Heat got out of the train in a state of thoughtfulness entirely untainted with disloyalty, but not quite free of that jealous mistrust which so often springs on the ground of perfect devotion, whether to women or to institutions. ~ Joseph Conrad, #NFDB
511:I can't bear to look at the screen itself, the women in pastels, like so many Jordan almonds. The men in suits, wearing equally angelic expressions. Members just like men, ostensibly. Who have vowed to be obedient to God's laws, and to repent of their sins. They've promised to be honest, true, chaste, benevolent, and virtuous; they've promised to be hopeful, and to endure all things, to seek after what is lovely, of good report, or praiseworthy. Only then will God provide a lasting solution to their loneliness and frustration.
I imagine they comfort themselves, like I do, with the game of "wouldn't it be worse." Wouldn't it be worse to have a sick child, ailing parents, or a flesh-eating virus? Wouldn't it be lonelier to be trapped in a dying marriage, scarier to have crippling financial problems or to spend one's retirement fund on failed in vitro treatments? Wouldn't it be worse to live a life absent of faith, absent of purpose, absent of the love of God? I imagine they tell themselves, like I do, that a soul-crushing loneliness is a small price to pay, given the big picture. Everyone suffers. Loneliness is the human condition. And after the tests of our faith, we will triumph. ~ Nicole Hardy,#NFDB
512:But consider. That benevolent, oppressive, insistent voice, droning on before those glimmering, luminous images—the voice of the master—always and forever conveys two messages. One is true: ‘History,’ it tells us, ‘is intellectually negotiable. It can be untangled, understood, and the miseries of our entrapment in it can be explained. And because history is never finished, those miseries can be interrogated, alleviated, and the situations that comprise and promote them can be changed. All men and women have the right to essay such mastery over their own lives.’ The second message, inextricably bound up with the first, is as much a lie: ‘History,’ it tells us, ‘has already been negotiated, so that beyond a certain point any attempt to know more is at best error and at worst sedition. That we have any of the tools of historical analysis means that, on some level, history is finished. Things as they are are as they ought to be and must not be questioned or changed. Our agonies and our pleasures, whether physical or intellectual, are fixed by a Greater Power, call it God or History itself: thus no woman nor any man may challenge the institutions through which you endure yours or I indulge mine.’ Because ~ Samuel R Delany, #NFDB
513:We think of men as antiheroes, as capable of occupying an intense and fascinating moral grey area; of being able to fall, and rise, and fall again, but still be worthy of love on some fundamental level, because if it was the world and its failings that broke them, then we surely must owe them some sympathy. But women aren’t allowed to be broken by the world; or if we are, it’s the breaking that makes us villains. Wronged women turn into avenging furies, inhuman and monstrous: once we cross to the dark side, we become adversaries to be defeated, not lost souls in need of mending. Which is what happens, when you let benevolent sexism invest you in the idea that women are humanity’s moral guardians and men its native renegades: because if female goodness is only ever an inherent quality – something we’re born both with and to be – then once lost, it must necessarily be lost forever, a severed limb we can’t regrow. Whereas male goodness, by virtue of being an acquired quality – something bestowed through the kindness of women, earned through right action or learned through struggle – can just as necessarily be gained and lost multiple times without being tarnished, like a jewel we might pawn in hardship, and later reclaim. ~ Foz Meadows, #NFDB
514:In the age of democratic nationalism, imperialism needed deeper self-justifications:
The idea that despotism of any kind was an offence against humanity, had crystallised into an instinctive feeling, and modern morality and sentiment revolted against the enslavement of nation by nation, of class by class or of man by man. Imperialism had to justify itself to this modern sentiment and could only do so by pretending to be a trustee of liberty, commissioned from on high to civilize the uncivilized and train the untrained until the time had come when the benevolent conqueror had done his work and could unselfishly retire. Such were the professions with which England justified her usurpation of the heritage of the Moghul and dazzled us into acquiescence in servitude by the splendour of her uprightness and generosity. Such was the pretence with which she veiled her annexation of Egypt. These Pharisiac pretensions were especially necessary to British Imperialism because in England the Puritanic middle class had risen to power and imparted to the English temperament a sanctimonious self-righteousness which refused to indulge in injustice and selfish spoliation except under a cloak of virtue, benevolence and unselfish altruism. ~ Pankaj Mishra,#NFDB
515:The heroes cleansed our world of chthonic terrors -- earthborn monsters that endangered mankind and threatened to choke the rise of civilisation. So long as dragons, giants, centaurs and mutant beasts infested the air, earth and seas we could never spread out with confidence and transform the wild world into a place of safety for humanity.
In time, even the benevolent minor deities would find themselves elbowed out by the burgeoning and newly confident human race. The nymphs, dryads, fauns, satyrs and sprites of the mountains, streams, meadows and oceans could not compete with our need and greed for land to quarry, farm and build upon. The rise of a spirit of rational enquiry and scientific understanding pushed the immortals further from us. The world was being reshaped as a home fit for mortal beings only. Today, of course, some of the rarer and more vulnerable mortal creatures that have shared the world with us are undergoing the same threats to their natural territories that cuased the end of the nymphs and woodland spirits. Habitat loss and species extinction have all happened before.
The days of the gods themselves were numbered too. Prometheus's gift of fire, as Zeus had feared, would one day allow us to do even without the Olympians. ~ Stephen Fry,#NFDB
516:Nature teaches us to devour each other and gives us the example of all the crimes and all the vices which the social state corrects or conceals. We should love virtue; but it is well to know that this is simply and solely a convenient expedient invented by men in order to live comfortably together. What we call morality is merely a desperate enterprise, a forlorn hope, on the part of our fellow creatures to reverse the order of the universe, which is strife and murder, the blind interplay of hostile forces. She destroys herself, and the more I think of things, the more convinced I am that the universe is mad. Theologians and philosophers, who make God the author of Nature and the architect of the universe, show Him to us as illogical and ill-conditioned. They declare Him benevolent, because they are afraid of Him, but they are forced to admit that His acts are atrocious. They attribute a malignity to him seldom to be found even in mankind. And that is how they get human beings to adore Him. For our miserable race would never lavish worship on just and benevolent deities from which they would have nothing to fear; they would feel only a barren gratitude for their benefits. Without purgatory and hell, your good God would be a mighty poor creature. ~ Anatole France, #NFDB
517:A few years ago I heard Jerome Kagan, a distinguished emeritus professor of child psychology at Harvard, say to the Dalai Lama that for every act of cruelty in this world there are hundreds of small acts of kindness and connection. His conclusion: "To be benevolent rather than malevolent is probably a true feature of our species." Being able to feel safe with other people is probably the single most important aspect of mental health; safe connections are fundamental to meaningful and satisfying lives. Numerous studies of disaster response around the globe have shown that social support is the most powerful protection against becoming overwhelmed by stress and trauma.
Social support is not the same as merely being in the presence of others. The critical issue is reciprocity: being truly heard and seen by the people around us, feeling that we are held in someone else's mind and heart. For our physiology to calm down, heal, and grow we need a visceral feeling of safety. No doctor can write a prescription for friendship and love: These are complex and hard-earned capacities. You don't need a history of trauma to feel self-conscious and even panicked at a party with strangers - but trauma can turn the whole world into a gathering of aliens. ~ Bessel A van der Kolk,#NFDB
518:The actor cannot, at last, refrain, even in moments of the deepest pain, from thinking of the effect produced by his deportment and by his surroundings—for example, even at the funeral of his own child: he will weep at his own sorrow and its manifestations as though he were his own audience. The hypocrite who always plays one and the same part, finally ceases to be a hypocrite; as in the case of priests who, when young men, are always, either consciously or unconsciously, hypocrites, and finally become naturally and then really, without affectation, mere priests: or if the father does not carry it to this extent, the son, who inherits his father's calling and gets the advantage of the paternal progress, does. When anyone, during a long period, and persistently, wishes to appear something, it will at last prove difficult for him to be anything else. The calling of almost every man, even of the artist, begins with hypocrisy, with an imitation of deportment, with a copying of the effective in manner. He who always wears the mask of a friendly man must at last gain a power over friendliness of disposition, without which the expression itself of friendliness is not to be gained—and finally friendliness of disposition gains the ascendancy over him—he is benevolent. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche, #NFDB
519:We decided to get another cat—no, two! A pair of tiny, spotted sisters from an animal shelter on Long Island. We brought them home in a cardboard box punched with holes that they poked their noses through. They ran around the house curious, fearless, and then abruptly collapsed, always right next to each other. They did everything that way: They ate and drank in unison; they got in the litter box at the same time, like a two-headed kitten. Paolo would have sneered at their sweetness. When Lucy was holding them, carefully clipping their nails, combing their fluff, she was the benevolent person I had met on the night of the blackout: Boy Scout Lady. She was the promise of family, decency, kin. And we were a kind of family now—they were only cats, but they were ours, new lives that we were taking on the care of, together. They slept in the bed with us and followed us around from room to room, except sometimes when we crossed paths with them and they looked at us as if they were seeing—for the first time in their lives—creatures so terrifying, so dangerous, they could barely stand to know that we existed. Then they went flying for the closets, where they hid until they were ready to recognize us again for who we were: the people who waited on them and met their every need. Their love slaves. ~ Ariel Levy, #NFDB
520:Kaisarion
Partly to throw light on a certain period,
partly to kill an hour or two,
last night I picked up and read
a volume of inscriptions about the Ptolemies.
The lavish praise and flattery are much the same
for each of them. All are brilliant,
glorious, mighty, benevolent;
everything they undertake is full of wisdom.
As for the women of their line, the Berenices and Cleopatras,
they too, all of them, are marvelous.
When I'd verified the facts I wanted
I would have put the book away had not a brief
insignificant mention of King Kaisarion
suddenly caught my eye...
And there you were with your indefinable charm.
Because we know
so little about you from history,
I could fashion you more freely in my mind.
I made you good-looking and sensitive.
My art gives your face
a dreamy, an appealing beauty.
And so completely did I imagine you
that late last night,
as my lamp went out—I let it go out on purpose—
it seemed you came into my room,
it seemed you stood there in front of me, looking just as you would have
in conquered Alexandria,
pale and weary, ideal in your grief,
still hoping they might take pity on you,
those scum who whispered: "Too many Caesars."
~ Constantine P. Cavafy,#NFDB
521:An example of the way he is benevolent towards His servants is His giving them more than they need and His demanding of them less than they are capable of. It also pertains to His being benevolent to facilitate their attaining the happiness of eternity with little effort in a short time, that is, a lifetime; for there is no way of comparing that with eternity. The production of pure milk out of digested food and blood, as well as the production of precious gems from hard stone, of honey from the bee, silk from the worm, and pearls from the oyster-are all part of His benevolence. But even more amazing than that is His creating from impure semen one who is a vessel for His knowledge, bears His trust and witnesses to His heavenly kingdoms-this too is impossible to reckon.
Counsel: A man's share in this attribute is gentleness with regard to the servants of God-great and glorious, and a predilection for them in petitioning God the most high; as well as guiding them to the happiness of the world to come in a manner free from rebuke or harshness, fanaticism or disputation. The best way of being benevolent open to man lies in attracting others to accept the truth by one's good qualities, pleasing comportment, and exemplary actions, for they are more effective and more benign than eloquent exhortation. ~ Abu Hamid al-Ghazali,#NFDB
522:I throw my makeshift jai-namaz, my prayer rug, on the floor and I get on my knees, lower my forehead to the ground, my tears soaking through the sheet. I bow to the west. Then I remember I haven’t prayed for over fifteen years. I have long forgotten the words. But it doesn’t matter, I will utter those few words I still remember: La illaha ila Allah, Muhammad u rasul ullah. There’s no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger. I see now that Baba was wrong, there’s a God, there always had been. I see Him here, in the eyes of the people in this [hospital] corridor of desperation. This is the real house of God, this is where those who have lost God will find Him, not the white masjid with its bright diamond lights, and towering minarets. There’s a God, there has to be, and now I will pray, I will pray that He forgive that I have neglected Him all of these years, forgive that I have betrayed, lied, and sinned with impunity only to turn to Him now in my hour of need, I pray that He is as merciful, benevolent, and gracious as His book says He is. [...] I hear a whimpering and realize it is mine, my lips are salty with the tears trickling down my face. I feel the eyes of everyone in this corridor on me and still I bow to the west. I pray. I pray that my sins have not caught up with me the way I'd always feared they would. ~ Khaled Hosseini, #NFDB
523:I cannot give you credit for any philosophy of the kind. Your retrospections must be so totally void of reproach, that the contentment arising from them is not of philosophy, but, what is much better, of innocence. But with me, it is not so. Painful recollections will intrude which cannot, which ought not, to be repelled. I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle. As a child I was taught what was right, but I was not taught to correct my temper. I was given good principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit. Unfortunately an only son (for many years an only child), I was spoilt by my parents, who, though good themselves (my father, particularly, all that was benevolent and amiable), allowed, encouraged, almost taught me to be selfish and overbearing; to care for none beyond my own family circle; to think meanly of all the rest of the world; to wish at least to think meanly of their sense and worth compared with my own. Such I was, from eight to eight and twenty; and such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth! What do I not owe you! You taught me a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous. By you, I was properly humbled. I came to you without a doubt of my reception. You showed me how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased. ~ Jane Austen, #NFDB
524:I see no justice in that plan."
"Who said," lashed out Isaac Penn, "that you, a man, can always perceive justice? Who said that justice is what you imagine? Can you be sure that you know it when you see it, that you will live long enough to recognize the decisive thunder of its occurrence, that it can be manifest within a generation, within ten generations, within the entire span of human existence? What you are talking about is common sense, not justice. Justice is higher and not as easy to understand -- until it presents itself in unmistakable splendor. The design of which I speak is far above our understanding. But we can sometimes feel its presence.
"No choreographer, no architect, engineer, or painter could plan more thoroughly and subtly. Every action and every scene has its purpose. And the less power one has, the closer he is to the great waves that sweep through all things, patiently preparing them for the approach of a future signified not by simple human equity (a child could think of that), but by luminous and surprising connections that we have not imagined, by illustrations terrifying and benevolent -- a golden age that will show not what we wish, but some bare awkward truth upon which rests everything that ever was and everything that ever will be. There is justice in the world, Peter Lake, but it cannot be had without mystery. ~ Mark Helprin,#NFDB
525:There are matters in that book, said to be done by the express command of God, that are as shocking to humanity, and to every idea we have of moral justice, as any thing done by Robespierre, by Carrier, by Joseph le Bon, in France, by the English government in the East Indies, or by any other assassin in modern times. When we read in the books ascribed to Moses, Joshua, etc., that they (the Israelites) came by stealth upon whole nations of people, who, as the history itself shews, had given them no offence; that they put all those nations to the sword; that they spared neither age nor infancy; that they utterly destroyed men, women and children; that they left not a soul to breathe; expressions that are repeated over and over again in those books, and that too with exulting ferocity; are we sure these things are facts? are we sure that the Creator of man commissioned those things to be done? Are we sure that the books that tell us so were written by his authority?
...The Bible tells us, that those assassinations were done by the express command of God. And to read the Bible without horror, we must undo every thing that is tender, sympathising, and benevolent in the heart of man. Speaking for myself, if I had no other evidence that the Bible is fabulous, than the sacrifice I must make to believe it to be true, that alone would be sufficient to determine my choice. ~ Thomas Paine,#NFDB
526:The novel’s merit, then—or its offence, depending where you stood—was not that it was authentic, but that it was credible. The bad dream turned out to be one that a lot of people in the world were sharing, since it asked the same old question that we are asking ourselves fifty years later: How far can we go in the rightful defence of our Western values without abandoning them along the way? My fictional chief of the British Service—I called him Control—had no doubt of the answer: “I mean, you can’t be less ruthless than the opposition simply because your government’s policy is benevolent, can you now?” Today, the same man, with better teeth and hair and a much smarter suit, can be heard explaining away the catastrophic illegal war in Iraq, or justifying medieval torture techniques as the preferred means of interrogation in the twenty-first century, or defending the inalienable right of closet psychopaths to bear semi-automatic weapons, and the use of unmanned drones as a risk-free method of assassinating one’s perceived enemies and anybody who has the bad luck to be standing near them. Or, as a loyal servant of his corporation, assuring us that smoking is harmless to the health of the Third World, and great banks are there to serve the public. What have I learned over the last fifty years? Come to think of it, not much. Just that the morals of the secret world are very like our own. ~ John le Carr, #NFDB
527:In human manufacturing, use of interchangeable parts was a revolutionary innovation, and hard work to achieve. How did Nature achieve it? How could uniformity, if achieved by careful adjustment, stand up to the ravages of time? And if the building blocks are supremely stable, and resistant to change, how did they arise in the first place?
Maxwell was alert to , and intrigued by, this issue, seeing in it evidence of benevolent Creation. As he put it:
'Natural causes, as we know, are at work, which tend to modify, if they do not at length destroy, all the dimensions of the earth and the whole solar system. But though in the course of ages catastrophes have occurred and may yet occur in the heavens, though ancient systems may be dissolved and new systems evolved out of their ruins, the molecules out of which these systems are built-the foundation stones of the material universe-remain unbroken and unworn.
They continue this day as they were created-perfect in number and measure and weight, and form the innefaceable characters impressed on them we may learn that those aspirations after accuracy in measurement, truth in statement, and justice in action, which we reckon among our noblest attributes as men, are ours because they are essential constituents of the image of Him who in the beginning created, not only the heaven and the earth, but the materials which heaven and earth consist. ~ Frank Wilczek,#NFDB
528:The argument has long been made that we humans are by nature compassionate and empathic despite the occasional streak of meanness, but torrents of bad news throughout history have contradicted that claim, and little sound science has backed it. But try this thought experiment. Imagine the number of opportunities people around the world today might have to commit an antisocial act, from rape or murder to simple rudeness and dishonesty. Make that number the bottom of a fraction. Now for the top value you put the number of such antisocial acts that will actually occur today.
That ratio of potential to enacted meanness holds at close to zero any day of the year. And if for the top value you put the number of benevolent acts performed in a given day, the ratio of kindness to cruelty will always be positive. (The news, however, comes to us as though that ratio was reversed.)
Harvard's Jerome Kagan proposes this mental exercise to make a simple point about human nature: the sum total of goodness vastly outweighs that of meanness. 'Although humans inherit a biological bias that permits them to feel anger, jealousy, selfishness and envy, and to be rude, aggressive or violent,' Kagan notes, 'they inherit an even stronger biological bias for kindness, compassion, cooperation, love and nurture – especially toward those in need.' This inbuilt ethical sense, he adds, 'is a biological feature of our species. ~ Daniel Goleman,#NFDB
529:If the secret core of potlatch is the reciprocity of exchange, why is this reciprocity not asserted directly, why does it assume the “mystified” form of two consecutive acts each of which is staged as a free voluntary display of generosity? Here we encounter the paradoxes of forced choice, of freedom to do what is necessary, at its most elementary: I have to do freely what I am expected to do. (If, upon receiving a gift, I immediately return it to the giver, this direct circulation would amount to an extremely aggressive gesture of humiliation, it would signal that I refused the other’s gifts — recall those embarrassing moments when elderly people forget and give us last year’s present once again … )
…the reciprocity of exchange is in itself thoroughly ambiguous; at its most fundamental, it is destructive of the social bond, it is the logic of revenge, tit for tat. To cover this aspect of exchange, to make it benevolent and pacific, one has to pretend that each person’s gift is free and stands on its own. This brings us to potlatch as the “pre-economy of the economy,” its zero-level, that is, exchange as the reciprocal relation of two non-productive expenditures. If the gift belongs to Master and exchange to the Servant, potlatch is the paradoxical exchange between Masters. Potlach is simultaneously the zero-level of civility, the paradoxical point at which restrained civility and obscene consumption overlap, the point at which it is polite to behave impolitely. ~ Slavoj i ek,#NFDB
530:The cosmic perspective comes from the frontiers of science, yet it is not solely the provenance of the scientist. It belongs to everyone. The cosmic perspective is humble. The cosmic perspective is spiritual—even redemptive—but not religious. The cosmic perspective enables us to grasp, in the same thought, the large and the small. The cosmic perspective opens our minds to extraordinary ideas but does not leave them so open that our brains spill out, making us susceptible to believing anything we’re told. The cosmic perspective opens our eyes to the universe, not as a benevolent cradle designed to nurture life but as a cold, lonely, hazardous place, forcing us to reassess the value of all humans to one another. The cosmic perspective shows Earth to be a mote. But it’s a precious mote and, for the moment, it’s the only home we have. The cosmic perspective finds beauty in the images of planets, moons, stars, and nebulae, but also celebrates the laws of physics that shape them. The cosmic perspective enables us to see beyond our circumstances, allowing us to transcend the primal search for food, shelter, and a mate. The cosmic perspective reminds us that in space, where there is no air, a flag will not wave—an indication that perhaps flag-waving and space exploration do not mix. The cosmic perspective not only embraces our genetic kinship with all life on Earth but also values our chemical kinship with any yet-to-be discovered life in the universe, as well as our atomic kinship with the universe itself. ~ Neil deGrasse Tyson, #NFDB
531:The cosmic perspective comes from the frontiers of science, yet it is not solely the provenance of the scientist. It belongs to everyone.
The cosmic perspective is humble.
The cosmic perspective is spiritual, even redemptive, but not religious.
The cosmic perspective enables us to grasp, in the same thought, the large and the small.
The cosmic perspective opens our minds to extraordinary ideas but does not leave them so open that our brains spill out, making us susceptible to believing anything we're told.
The cosmic perspective opens our eyes to the universe, not as a benevolent cradle designed to nurture life but as a cold, lonely, hazardous place, forcing us to reassess the value of all humans to one another.
The cosmic perspective shows Earth to be a mote. But it's a precious mote and, for the moment, it's the only home we have.
The cosmic perspective finds beauty in the images of planets, moons, stars, and nebulae, but also celebrates the laws of physics that shape them.
The cosmic perspective enables us to see beyond our circumstances, allowing us to transcend the primal search for food, shelter, and a mate.
The cosmic perspective reminds us that in space, where there is no air, a flag will not wave, an indication that perhaps flag-waving and space exploration do not mix.
The cosmic perspective not only embraces our genetic kinship with all life on Earth but also values our chemical kinship with any yet-to-be discovered life in the universe, as well as our atomic kinship with the universe itself. ~ Neil deGrasse Tyson,#NFDB
532:He sounds like kind of a hacker. Which makes his nam-shub very difficult to
understand. If he was such a nice guy, why did he do the Babel thing?"
"This is considered to be one of the mysteries of Enki. As you have noticed,
his behavior was not always consistent with modern norms."
"I don't buy that. I don't think he actually fucked his sister, daughter, and
so on. That story has to be a metaphor for something else. I think it is a
metaphor for some kind of recursive informational process. This whole myth
stinks of it. To these people, water equals semen. Makes sense, because they
probably had no concept of pure water -- it was all brown and muddy and full of
viruses anyway. But from a modern standpoint, semen is just a carrier of
information -- both benevolent sperm and malevolent viruses. Enki's water --
his semen, his data, his me -- flow throughout the country of Sumer and cause it
to flourish."
"As you may be aware, Sumer existed on the floodplain between two major rivers,
the Tigris and the Euphrates. This is where all the clay came from -- they took
it directly from the riverbeds."
"So Enki even provided them with their medium for conveying information -- clay.
They wrote on wet clay and then they dried it out -- got rid of the water. If
water got to it later, the information was destroyed. But if they baked it and
drove out all the water, sterilized Enki's semen with heat, then the tablet
lasted forever, immutable, like the words of the Torah. Do I sound like a
maniac? ~ Neal Stephenson,#NFDB
533:No one has expressed what is needed better than Abdel Rahman al-Rashed, the general manager of the London-based al-Arabiya news channel. One of the best-known and most respected Arab journalists working today, he wrote the following, in Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (September 6, 2004), after a series of violent incidents involving Muslim extremist groups from Chechnya to Saudi Arabia to Iraq: "Self-cure starts with self-realization and confession. We should then run after our terrorist sons, in the full knowledge that they are the sour grapes of a deformed culture... The mosque used to be a haven, and the voice of religion used to be that of peace and reconciliation. Religious sermons were warm behests for a moral order and an ethical life. Then came the neo-Muslims. An innocent and benevolent religion, whose verses prohibit the felling of trees in the absence of urgent necessity, that calls murder the most heinous of crimes, that says explicitly that if you kill one person you have killed humanity as a whole, has been turned into a global message of hate and a universal war cry... We cannot clear our names unless we own up to the shameful fact that terrorism has become an Islamic enterprise; an almost exclusive monopoly, implemented by Muslim men and women. We cannot redeem our extremist youth, who commit all these heinous crimes, without confronting the Sheikhs who thought it ennobling to reinvent themselves as revolutionary ideologues, sending other people's sons and daughters to certain death, while sending their own children to European and American schools and colleges. ~ Thomas L Friedman, #NFDB
534:Intuitive toxicology is the term that Slovic uses for the way most people assess the risk of chemicals. His research reveals that this approach is distinct from the methods used by toxicologists, and that it tends to produce different results. For toxicologists, “the dose makes the poison.” Any substance can be toxic in excess. Water, for instance, is lethal to humans in very high doses, and overhydration killed a runner in the 2002 Boston Marathon. But most people prefer to think of substances as either safe or dangerous, regardless of the dose. And we extend this thinking to exposure, in that we regard any exposure to chemicals, no matter how brief or limited, as harmful. In exploring this thinking, Slovic suggests that people who are not toxicologists may apply a “law of contagion” to toxicity. Just as brief exposure to a microscopic virus can result in lifelong disease, we assume that exposure to any amount of a harmful chemical will permanently contaminate our bodies. “Being contaminated,” Slovic observes, “clearly has an all-or-none quality to it—like being alive or pregnant.” Fear of contamination rests on the belief, widespread in our culture as in others, that something can impart its essence to us on contact. We are forever polluted, as we see it, by contact with a pollutant. And the pollutants we have come to fear most are the products of our own hands. Though toxicologists tend to disagree with this, many people regard natural chemicals as inherently less harmful than man-made chemicals. We seem to believe, against all evidence, that nature is entirely benevolent. ~ Eula Biss, #NFDB
535:His feeling for the South was not so much historic as it was
of the core and desire of dark romanticism--that unlimited and
inexplicable drunkenness, the magnetism of some men's blood that
takes them into the heart of the heat, and beyond that, into the
polar and emerald cold of the South as swiftly as it took the heart
of that incomparable romanticist who wrote The Rime of the Ancient
Mariner, beyond which there is nothing. And this desire of his was
unquestionably enhanced by all he had read and visioned, by the
romantic halo that his school history cast over the section, by the
whole fantastic distortion of that period where people were said to
live in "mansions," and slavery was a benevolent institution,
conducted to a constant banjo-strumming, the strewn largesses of
the colonel and the shuffle-dance of his happy dependents, where
all women were pure, gentle, and beautiful, all men chivalrous and
brave, and the Rebel horde a company of swagger, death-mocking
cavaliers. Years later, when he could no longer think of the
barren spiritual wilderness, the hostile and murderous intrenchment
against all new life--when their cheap mythology, their legend of
the charm of their manner, the aristocratic culture of their lives,
the quaint sweetness of their drawl, made him writhe--when he could
think of no return to their life and its swarming superstition
without weariness and horror, so great was his fear of the legend,
his fear of their antagonism, that he still pretended the most
fanatic devotion to them, excusing his Northern residence on
grounds of necessity rather than desire. ~ Thomas Wolfe,#NFDB
536:If a Christian were to accost him and endeavor to put the fear of God into him, and if our visitor, being from Mars, already knew that of the world's population, only about 27 per cent are Christians, and the other 73 per cent are Non-Christians, is it logical to suppose that he would ever be convinced that an omniscient, omnipotent, benevolent, Supreme Being would select only one quarter of his children whom he had created for redemption, with the infallible knowledge that nearly three-quarters of them would be confined to Hell for not believing what He could have made them believe if He were truly omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent? Would he not rather reply that on his planet such a "Father" who would select some of his children for rewards, and maliciously torture his other children, would not be designated as a God but a Devil? Were the Martian to be further informed that each one of God's children was represented in actual figures by hundreds of millions and that these have been living on the planet Earth for hundreds of thousands of years, and were the visitor to contemplate the vast incomprehensible number of souls that have been confined to Hell by such a father, might he not cut his visit short? He would be apt to repeat with James Mill, "Think of a being who would make a Hell, who would create the human race with the infallible foreknowledge and therefore with the intention that the great majority of them should be consigned to horrible and everlasting torment." I believe that our guest would assert that if such a Being actually existed and demanded worship, he would certainly have revealed his true belief to the first man Adam, and therefore saved his children an inestimable amount of suffering. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
537:The relationship between the University and the Patrician, absolute ruler and nearly benevolent dictator of Ankh-Morpork, was a complex and subtle one.
The wizards held that, as servants of a higher truth, they were not subject to the mundane laws of the city.
The Patrician said that, indeed, this was the case, but they would bloody well pay their taxes like everyone else.
The wizards said that, as followers of the light of wisdom, they owed allegiance to no mortal man.
The Patrician said that this may well be true but they also owed a city tax of two hundred dollars per head per annum, payable quarterly.
The wizards said that the University stood on magical ground and was therefore exempt from taxation and anyway you couldn't put a tax on knowledge.
The Patrician said you could. It was two hundred dollars per capita; if per capita was a problem, decapita could be arranged.
The wizards said that the University had never paid taxes to the civil authority.
The Patrician said that he was not proposing to remain civil for long.
The wizards said, what about easy terms?
The Patrician said he was talking about easy terms. They wouldn't want to know about the hard terms.
The wizards said that there was a ruler back in , oh, it would be the Century of the Dragonfly, who had tried to tell the University what to do. The Patrician could come and have a look at him if he liked.
The Patrician said that he would. He truly would
In the end it was agreed that while the wizards of course paid no taxes, they would nevertheless make an entirely voluntary donation of, oh, let's say two hundred dollars per head, without prejudice, mutatis mutandis, no strings attached, to be used strictly for non-militaristic and environmentally-acceptable purposes. ~ Terry Pratchett,#NFDB
538:The cosmic perspective flows from fundamental knowledge. But it’s more than about what you know. It’s also about having the wisdom and insight to apply that knowledge to assessing our place in the universe. And its attributes are clear:
The cosmic perspective comes from the frontiers of science, yet it is not solely the provenance of the scientist. It belongs to everyone.
The cosmic perspective is humble.
The cosmic perspective is spiritual—even redemptive—but not religious.
The cosmic perspective enables us to grasp, in the same thought, the large and the small.
The cosmic perspective opens our minds to extraordinary ideas but does not leave them so open that our brains spill out, making us susceptible to believing anything we’re told.
The cosmic perspective opens our eyes to the universe, not as a benevolent cradle designed to nurture life but as a cold, lonely, hazardous place, forcing us to reassess the value of all humans to one another.
The cosmic perspective shows Earth to be a mote. But it’s a precious mote and, for the moment, it’s the only home we have.
The cosmic perspective finds beauty in the images of planets, moons, stars, and nebulae, but also celebrates the laws of physics that shape them.
The cosmic perspective enables us to see beyond our circumstances, allowing us to transcend the primal search for food, shelter, and a mate.
The cosmic perspective reminds us that in space, where there is no air, a flag will not wave—an indication that perhaps flag-waving and space exploration do not mix.
The cosmic perspective not only embraces our genetic kinship with all life on Earth but also values our chemical kinship with any yet-to-be discovered life in the universe, as well as our atomic kinship with the universe itself. ~ Neil deGrasse Tyson,#NFDB
539:That’s Cervella.” Vero’s hand picks at something in her hair, as she glares down at a disassembled bike. “This one’s his favourite. Do you bike?” Ligaya nods as she remembers the fat-tire red bike. Pedro’s. He let her borrow it to visit family in the next village. She touches her thighs as she remembers the feeling of freedom, covering such distance by the strength of her own legs, not minding at all when she had to ride home in the pouring rain, her sweat and the rainwater indistinguishable on her cheeks. Again, she feels the uncomfortable vertigo of her body being in one place and her mind in another, the two so far apart. But Vero does not wait for an answer. She pulls Ligaya—not roughly—her fingertips soft on the exposed skin of Ligaya’s wrist. But Ligaya is unaccustomed to touch. Nobody touched her at the Poons. She breathes deeply and counts the bikes. She must not flinch, wills herself not to pull away; she cannot afford to give offense. Vero twirls her around and points at a poster above the workbench. “That! Read it!” But Ligaya does not have to read it. Vero reads it for her. Since the bike makes little demand on material or energy resources, contributes little to pollution, makes a positive contribution to health and causes little death, or injury, it can be regarded as the most benevolent of machines. —Stuart S. Wilson She pauses as if she might expect a response this time. She gestures at the room stuffed with bikes until it seems the very walls and ceiling are made of bikes, the scent of rubber tires replacing oxygen. “Ridiculous, right? The bike will save the world, he says. Yes, but you just need one, I say. One bike. That I can see. That I can even admire. I’m sure Stuart buddy here couldn’t even imagine this … this … biketrocity. And that he should be to blame?! ~ Angie Abdou, #NFDB
540:The Jewel in Her Crown, which showed the old Queen (whose image the children now no doubt confused with the person of Miss Crane) surrounded by representative figures of her Indian Empire: princes, landowners, merchants, moneylenders, sepoys, farmers, servants, children, mothers, and remarkably clean and tidy beggars. The Queen was sitting on a golden throne, under a crimson canopy, attended by her temporal and spiritual aides: soldiers, statesmen and clergy. The canopied throne was apparently in the open air because there were palm trees and a sky showing a radiant sun bursting out of bulgy clouds such as, in India, heralded the wet monsoon. Above the clouds flew the prayerful figures of the angels who were the benevolent spectators of the scene below. Among the statesmen who stood behind the throne one was painted in the likeness of Mr. Disraeli holding up a parchment map of India to which he pointed with obvious pride but tactful humility. An Indian prince, attended by native servants, was approaching the throne bearing a velvet cushion on which he offered a large and sparkling gem. The children in the school thought that this gem was the jewel referred to in the title. Miss Crane had been bound to explain that the gem was simply representative of tribute, and that the jewel of the title was India herself, which had been transferred from the rule of the British East India Company to the rule of the British Crown in 1858, the year after the Mutiny when the sepoys in the service of the Company (that first set foot in India in the seventeenth century) had risen in rebellion, and attempts had been made to declare an old Moghul prince king in Delhi, and that the picture had been painted after 1877, the year in which Victoria was persuaded by Mr. Disraeli to adopt the title Empress of India. ~ Paul Scott, #NFDB
541:If you could be anyone else, who would you want to be?” I ask, because I’ve decided that I admire how David doesn’t self-censor. I should try it too.
I think about this all the time. Waking up in the morning, looking in the mirror, and seeing someone wholly different staring back. These days I’d give anything to be the old me, the pre-accident me, who could sit at my old lunch table and chat about nothing. The pre-accident me who aspired to be more like Lauren Drucker, former benevolent ruler and social chair of Mapleview. I really wouldn’t mind being entirely full of shit, so long as I didn’t notice.
“There’s this guy Trey who teaches me guitar,” David says. “He kind of pisses me off, actually, but he’s just the type of guy everyone likes. He always knows exactly what to say. Like has annoyingly pitch-perfect radio waves. So I guess him?”
“I used to want my metaphorical radio waves to play music that was, like, quirky but also perfectly curated, you know? Something cool. But now I feel like I’ve become traffic on the hour.”
“You are so not traffic on the hour,” he says, and to my dismay dabs at his chin with a napkin. “Though I wouldn’t mind even being that. Reliable, informative, albeit repetitive. At least people actually listen to it.”
“I think your signal is in Morse code,” I say with a smile.
“When I was eight, I taught myself Morse code. The clicks are highly irritating.”
I lean over and for no reason I can think of—maybe because I have nothing smart to say, maybe because with David I feel like someone else entirely, I want to be someone else entirely—I take a lick of his ice cream. The vanilla part. He stares at my lips, as shocked as I am.
“Sorry,” I say. “I liked your order better.”
“The cold medicine is not for me. Just to be clear,” he says.
“Wasn’t worried. ~ Julie Buxbaum,#NFDB
542:I am with Victor, the two of us holding hands and laughing and somehow I know it is in the future—whether years or weeks, I can’t say. We are walking along the beach at noon—the sun hot and bright overhead, the sunshine warming my skin as it hasn’t in many long years. I look up at it, squinting the way you do on a bright day, but I am not afraid. The sun is no longer my enemy but a warm, benevolent friend. Victor says something I can’t hear. I looked over and asked him to repeat it. “I said, I think she’s hungry…” “Who?” I ask but then I look down and realize I am pushing a baby stroller. Victor is already kneeling on the sandy beach, cooing to whoever is inside the stroller. “Daddy’s little princess is hungry?” he says, picking up a baby who looks to be about one and a half years old. He brings her to me and I look at her in wonder. She has Victor’s big chocolate brown eyes and my dark brown hair. Her little face is heart shaped and delicate with a button nose and a sweetly pursed candy pink mouth—perfect in every way. “She’s beautiful,” I whisper, in awe of the precious little girl. “Just like her mom,” Victor says proudly. He holds her out to me and she puts up chubby little arms, eager for me to take her. “Momma!” she says when I hold her. She nuzzles close and presses her chubby little cheek to mine. “Momma… love you.” “Oh, sweetie,” I whisper, holding her tight. “I love you too. Momma loves her little girl so much.” Victor puts his arms around both of us. “And I love you both. My two sweet girls,” he rumbles and I feel loved and protected and perfect in every way. The waves shush along the beach, the sand is rough and warm under my feet, my little girl is safe in my arms and my husband loves me—loves both of us completely. The sun beams down on us like a golden blessing and I feel a joy like I have never known, a joy I never expected to feel after Celeste… after she… she… ~ Evangeline Anderson, #NFDB
543:You’ll be remembered for decades,” Fenwick said. “Perhaps centuries. Don’t tell me that it means nothing to you.”
Christopher shook his head slightly, his gaze locked on the other man’s face.
“There is an ancient tradition of military honor in my family,” Fenwick said. “I knew that I would achieve the most, and be remembered the longest. No one ever thinks about the ancestors who led small lives, who were known principally as husbands and fathers, benevolent masters, loyal friends. No one cares about those nameless ciphers. But warriors are revered. They are never forgotten.” Bitterness creased his face, leaving it puckered and uneven like the skin of an overripe orange. “A medal like the Victoria Cross--that is all I’ve ever wanted.”
“A half ounce of die-stamped gunmetal?” Christopher asked skeptically.
“Don’t use that supercilious tone with me, you arrogant ass.” Oddly, despite the venom of the words, Fenwick was calm and controlled. “From the beginning, I knew you were nothing more than an empty-headed fop. Handsome stuffing for a uniform. But you turned out to have one useful gift--you could shoot. And then you went to the Rifles, where somehow you became a soldier. When I first read the dispatches, I thought there had to be some other Phelan. Because the Phelan of the reports was a warrior, and I knew you hadn’t the makings of one.”
“I proved you wrong at Inkerman,” Christopher said quietly.
The jab brought a smile to Fenwick’s face, the smile of a man standing at a distance from life and seeing unimaginable irony. “Yes. You saved me, and now you’re to get the nation’s highest honor for it.”
“I don’t want it.”
“That makes it even worse. I was sent home while you became the lauded hero, and took everything that should have been mine. Your name will be remembered, and you don’t even care. Had I died on the battlefield, that would have at least been something. But you took even that away. ~ Lisa Kleypas,#NFDB
544:Where Is It Clean
when your mother can rise from her place
on the pew during the early service,
early enough that the sun barely fills the sky
with its weak straw, but row after row
in the auditorium is flush with folks who want
to be home before the football game gets underway
or hate the slower pace the later service takes
but still got to get their god on
before starting a new week: when she can rise
and tip down the aisle, three-inch heels
pointing a warning at hell through the plush
mauve carpet, smile and nod at preacher,
who is sitting on the pulpit's little throne
with his bible beneath his palm, a man thick-chested
and stout-bellied with moral authority, whose face
gleams with crushing benevolent power:
when she can give him a pleasant nod,
and circle around behind the microphone standing
like a thin silver trophy between the heavenly
floral arrangements, give a firm tug
to the hem of her suit jacket, and lean over
the dimpled nob, the ribbons encircling the crown
of her broad-brimmed hat quivering with each
breath, the crisp white paper in her hands
held out at arm's length from her customary squint,
her eyes scooting back and forth,
28
between this document and the village of worshipers
fanning themselves and waiting on her voice:
when she can stand there and coo, good morning,
praise the lord and introduce her reading
as a poem by my daughter, a quick look
at your beaming father, then take your words
between her lightly pinked lips and raise each one
to the light, before god and these witnesses,
enunciating like she learned to recite from the fourthgrade primer in her schoolhouse's single room,
sending sound through the vowels
like a bell: when she can do this, can rise and walk,
and smile and read and have the church say amen then you can safely declare: it is clean.
~ Evie Shockley,#NFDB
545:The Active Life
If an expert does not have some problem to vex him,
he is unhappy!
If a philosopher's teaching is never attacked, she pines
away!
If critics have no one on whom to exercise their spite,
they are unhappy.
All such people are prisoners in the world of objects.
He who wants followers, seeks political power.
She who wants reputation, holds an office.
The strong man looks for weights to lift.
The brave woman looks for an emergency in which she
can show bravery.
The swordsman wants a battle in which he can swing
his sword.
People past their prime prefer a dignified retirement,
in which they may seem profound.
People experienced in law seek difficult cases to extend
the application of the laws.
Liturgists and musicians like festivals in which they
parade their ceremonious talents.
The benevolent, the dutiful, are always looking for
chances to display virtue.
Where would the gardener be if there were no more
weeds?
What would become of business without a market of
fools?
Where would the masses be if there were no pretext
for getting jammed together and making noise?
What would become of labor if there were no superfluous objects to
be made?
Produce! Get results! Make money! Make friends!
Make changes!
Or you will die of despair!
Those who are caught in the machinery of power take no joy except
in activity and change--the whirring of the machine! Whenever an
occasion for action presents itself, they are compelled to act; they
cannot help themselves. They are inexorably moved, like the ma-
chine of which they are a part. Prisoners in the world of objects,
they have no choice but to submit to the demands of matter! They
are pressed down and crushed by external forces, fashion, the mar-
ket, events, public opinion. Never in a whole lifetime do they re-
cover their right mind! The active life! What a pity! ~ Thomas Merton,#NFDB
546:I now principally allude to Rousseau, for his character of Sophia is, undoubtedly, a captivating one, though it appears to me grossly unnatural; however, it is not the superstructure, but the foundation of her character, the principles on which her education was built, that I mean to attack; nay, warmly as I admire the genius of that able writer, whose opinions I shall often have occasion to cite, indignation always takes place of admiration, and the rigid frown of insulted virtue effaces the smile of complacency, which his eloquent periods are wont to raise, when I read his voluptuous reveries. Is this the man, who, in his ardour for virtue, would banish all the soft arts of peace, and almost carry us back to Spartan discipline? Is this the man who delights to paint the useful struggles of passion, the triumphs of good dispositions, and the heroic flights which carry the glowing soul out of itself? How are these mighty sentiments lowered when he describes the prettyfoot and enticing airs of his little favourite! But, for the present, I waive the subject, and, instead of severely reprehending the transient effusions of overweening sensibility, I shall only observe, that whoever has cast a benevolent eye on society, must often have been gratified by the sight of humble mutual love, not dignified by sentiment, nor strengthened by a union in intellectual pursuits. The domestic trifles of the day have afforded matter for cheerful converse, and innocent caresses have softened toils which did not require great exercise of mind, or stretch of thought: yet, has not the sight of this moderate felicity excited more tenderness than respect? An emotion similar to what we feel when children are playing, or animals sporting, whilst the contemplation of the noble struggles of suffering merit has raised admiration, and carried our thoughts to that world where sensation will give place to reason. Women are, therefore, to be considered either as moral beings, or so weak that they must be entirely subjected to the superior faculties of men. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft, #NFDB
547:Lieutenant Chatrand: I don’t understand this omnipotent-benevolent thing.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: You are confused because the Bible describes God as an omnipotent and benevolent deity.
Lieutenant Chatrand: Exactly.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: Omnipotent-benevolent simply means that God is all-powerful and well-meaning.
Lieutenant Chatrand: I understand the concept. It’s just... there seems to be a contradiction.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: Yes. The contradiction is pain. Man’s starvation, war, sickness...
Lieutenant Chatrand: Exactly! Terrible things happen in this world. Human tragedy seems like proof that God could not possibly be both all-powerful and well-meaning. If He loves us and has the power to change our situation, He would prevent our pain, wouldn’t he?
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: Would He?
Lieutenant Chatrand: Well... if God Loves us, and He can protect us, He would have to. It seems He is either omnipotent and uncaring, or benevolent and powerless to help.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: Do you have children?
Lieutenant Chatrand: No, signore.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: Imagine you had an eight-year-old son... would you love him?
Lieutenant Chatrand: Of course.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: Would you let him skateboard?
Lieutenant Chatrand: Yeah, I guess. Sure I’d let him skateboard, but I’d tell him to be careful.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: So as this child’s father, you would give him some basic, good advice and then let him go off and make his own mistakes?
Lieutenant Chatrand: I wouldn’t run behind him and mollycoddle him if that’s what you mean.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: But what if he fell and skinned his knee?
Lieutenant Chatrand: He would learn to be more careful.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: So although you have the power to interfere and prevent your child’s pain, you would choose to show you love by letting him learn his own lessons?
Lieutenant Chatrand: Of course. Pain is part of growing up. It’s how we learn.
Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca: Exactly. ~ Dan Brown,#NFDB
548:Lalla Ruk
Dearest dream, my soul's enchantment
Lovely guest from heav'n above,
Most benevolent attender
To the earthly realm below,
You gave me blissful satisfaction
Momentary but complete:
Bringing with you happy tidings -
Like a herald from the skies.
I dreamed dreams of life eternal
In that Promised Land of peace;
I dreamed dreams of fragrant regions,
Of a tranquil, sweet Kashmir;
I could witness celebrations,
Festivals of roses vernal
Honoring that lovely maiden
From lands strange and far away.
And, with glistening enchantment
Like an angel from above, -
This untainted, youthful vision
Came before my dreaming eyes;
Like a veil, a shining shroud
Screened her lovely face from view,
Tenderly she did incline
Her shy gazes toward the earth.
All her traits - her timid shyness
Underneath her shining crown,
Childlike her animation,
And her face's noble beauty -
Glowing with a depth of feeling,
Sweet serenity and peace -
All of these completely artless
Indescribably sublime!
As I watched, the apparition
(Captivating me in passing)
Never to return, flew by;
I pursued - but it had gone!
T'was a vision merely fleeting,
Transient illumination
Leaving nothing but a legend
Of its passing through my life!
T'is not ours to harbor
Beauty's spirit - Ah, so pure!
It comes nigh but for a moment
From its heavenly abode;
Like a dream, it slips away,
Like an airy dream of morning:
But in sacred reminiscence
It is married with the heart!
Only in the purest instants
Of our life does it appear
Bringing with it revelations
Beneficial to our hearts;
That our hearts may know of heaven
In this earthly shadow realm,
It allows us momentary
Glimpses through the earthly veil.
And through all that here is lovely,
All that animates our lives,
To our souls it speaks a language
Reassuring and distinct;
When it quits our earthly region
It bestows a gift of love
Glowing in our evening heaven:
"Tis a farewell star for all to see. ~ Vasily Zhukovsky,#NFDB
549:In The Benevolent
‘I’M OFF on the wallaby!’ cries Old Ben,
And his pipe is lit, and his swag is rolled;
‘There is nothing here for us old-time men,
But up north, I hear, they are on the gold.’
And he shuffles off with a feeble stride,
With his ragged swag and his billy black.
He is making tracks for the other side,
O’er the river deep, or the Great Divide;
But at night, dead beat, he travels back.
Then at morn next day he is off again,
With an eager light in his aged eyes,
Tramping away on his journey vain
For the land of promise beyond the rise.
Over the range there is work to do,
There is roaring life at the shanty bars.
He will tramp the plains whilst the skies are blue,
And will wander the great wide bushland through,
And be soothed to sleep by the blinking stars.
In the garden gay where the old man roams
Pied poppies sway on their supple stalks,
And the fair white rose on the soft breeze foams,
And the pansies peep by the gravelled walks;
But his brow by the breeze of the hills is fanned,
And the clink of bells to his quick ear comes.
When he shades his eyes with a withered hand,
He sees silent rivers and ranges grand,
Or a still lagoon under silver gums.
‘Are you bound out back, Dan?’ the children cry,
And they peer at him through the fence, and shout
‘Well, it’s so long, Dan,’ as he hobbles by,
With his ‘Ay, ay, sonny lad—tramping out!’
On his back he’s bearing his house and bed,
As he bore them both in his manhood’s pride,
Pressing on each day till his strength has fled
By the force of a dauntless spirit led—
There’s a rush somewhere on the Sydney side.
54
Though his sight may fail and his limbs give way,
Yet no weakness touches his brave old heart,
And he cries each night: ‘At the break of day
I must strap up bluey and make a start!’
And they humour him; for the time is near
When he’ll tramp no more under changeful skies,
But will leave his travels and troubles here,
Take the track God blazed with His stars, and steer
To the Never Land just across the rise.
~ Edward George Dyson,#NFDB
550:(...) You Sophotechs are smarter than I am; why did you let me do such a foolish thing?”
“We answer every question our resources and instruction parameters allow; we are more than happy to advise you, when and if we are asked.”
“That’s not what I’m thinking of, and you know it.”
“You are thinking we should use force to defend you against yourself against your will? That is hardly a thought worth thinking, sir. Your life has exactly the value you yourself place on it. It is yours to damage or ruin as you wish.”
(...)
“Is that another hint? Are you saying I’m destroying my life? People at the party, twice now, have said or implied that I’m going to endanger the Oecumene itself. Who stopped me?”
“Not I. While life continues, it cannot be made to be without risk. The assessment of whether or not a certain risk is worth taking depends on subjective value-judgments. About such judgments even reasonable men can differ. We Sophotechs will not interfere with such decisions. (...) If we were to overrule your ownership of your own life, your life, would, in effect, become our property, and you, in effect, would become merely the custodian or trustee of that life. Do you think you would value it more in such a case, or less? And if you valued it less, would you not take greater risks and behave more self-destructively? If, on the other hand, each man’s life is his own, he may experiment freely, risking only what is his, till he find his best happiness.”
“I see the results of failed experiments all around us, in these cylinders. I see wasted lives, and people trapped in mind sets and life forms which lead nowhere.”
“While life continues, experimentation and evolution must also. The pain and risk of failure cannot be eliminated. The most we can do is maximize human freedom, so that no man is forced to pay for another man’s mistakes, so that the pain of failure falls only on he who risks it. And you do not know which ways of life lead nowhere. Even we Sophotechs do not know where all paths lead.”
“How benevolent of you! We will always be free to be stupid.”
“Cherish that freedom, young master; it is basic to all others. ~ John C Wright,#NFDB
551:President Thomas Jefferson, a Deist who believed Jesus to be merely a powerful moral teacher of reason, cut up and pasted together portions of the four Gospels that reinforced his belief in a naturalized, nonmiraculous, nonauthoritative Jesus. The result was the severely edited Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth Extracted Textually from the Gospels—or, The Jefferson Bible. He believed he could easily extract the “lustre” of the real Jesus “from the dross of his biographers, and as separate from that as the diamond from the dung hill.” Jefferson believed Jesus was “a man, of illegitimate birth, of a benevolent heart, [and an] enthusiastic mind, who set out without pretensions of divinity, ended in believing them, and was punished capitally for sedition by being gibbeted [i.e., crucified] according to Roman law.”1 Jefferson edited Luke 2:40, “And [Jesus] grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom,” omitting “and the grace of God was upon him.” This “Bible” ends with a quite unresurrected Jesus: “There they laid Jesus, and rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre, and departed.” Deism’s chief motivation for rejecting miracles—along with special revelation—was that they suggested an inept Creator: He didn’t get everything right at the outset; so he needed to tinker with the world, adjusting it as necessary. The biblical picture of miracles, though, shows them to be an indication of a ruling God’s care for and involvement in the world. Indeed, many in modern times have witnessed specific indicators of direct divine action and answers to prayer.2 The Christian faith stands or falls on God’s miraculous activity, particularly in Jesus’ resurrection (1 Corinthians 15). Scripture readily acknowledges the possibility of miracles in nonbiblical religious settings. Some may be demonically inspired,3 but we shouldn’t rule out God’s gracious, miraculous actions in pagan settings—say, the response of the “unknown God” to prayers so that a destructive plague in Athens might be stayed. However, we’ll note below that, unlike many divinely wrought miracles in Scripture, miracle claims in other religions are incidental—not foundational—to the pagan religion’s existence. ~ Paul Copan, #NFDB
552:All 250 + episodes to date can be found at tim.blog/ podcast and itunes.com/ timferriss Jamie Foxx on Workout Routines, Success Habits, and Untold Hollywood Stories (# 124)—tim.blog/ jamie The Scariest Navy SEAL I’ve Ever Met . . . and What He Taught Me (# 107)—tim.blog/ jocko Arnold Schwarzenegger on Psychological Warfare (and Much More) (# 60)—tim.blog/ arnold Dom D’Agostino on Fasting, Ketosis, and the End of Cancer (# 117)—tim.blog/ dom2 Tony Robbins on Morning Routines, Peak Performance, and Mastering Money (# 37)—tim.blog/ tony How to Design a Life—Debbie Millman (# 214)—tim.blog/ debbie Tony Robbins—On Achievement Versus Fulfillment (# 178)—tim.blog/ tony2 Kevin Rose (# 1)—tim.blog/ kevinrose [If you want to hear how bad a first episode can be, this delivers. Drunkenness didn’t help matters.] Charles Poliquin on Strength Training, Shredding Body Fat, and Increasing Testosterone and Sex Drive (# 91)—tim.blog/ charles Mr. Money Mustache—Living Beautifully on $ 25–27K Per Year (# 221)—tim.blog/ mustache Lessons from Warren Buffett, Bobby Fischer, and Other Outliers (# 219)—tim.blog/ buffett Exploring Smart Drugs, Fasting, and Fat Loss—Dr. Rhonda Patrick (# 237)—tim.blog/ rhonda 5 Morning Rituals That Help Me Win the Day (# 105)—tim.blog/ rituals David Heinemeier Hansson: The Power of Being Outspoken (# 195)—tim.blog/ dhh Lessons from Geniuses, Billionaires, and Tinkerers (# 173)—tim.blog/ chrisyoung The Secrets of Gymnastic Strength Training (# 158)—tim.blog/ gst Becoming the Best Version of You (# 210)—tim.blog/ best The Science of Strength and Simplicity with Pavel Tsatsouline (# 55)—tim.blog/ pavel Tony Robbins (Part 2) on Morning Routines, Peak Performance, and Mastering Money (# 38)—tim.blog/ tony How Seth Godin Manages His Life—Rules, Principles, and Obsessions (# 138)—tim.blog/ seth The Relationship Episode: Sex, Love, Polyamory, Marriage, and More (with Esther Perel) (# 241)—tim.blog/ esther The Quiet Master of Cryptocurrency—Nick Szabo (# 244)—tim.blog/ crypto Joshua Waitzkin (# 2)—tim.blog/ josh The Benevolent Dictator of the Internet, Matt Mullenweg (# 61)—tim.blog/ matt Ricardo Semler—The Seven-Day Weekend and How to Break the Rules (# 229)—tim.blog/ ricardo ~ Timothy Ferriss, #NFDB
553:Georgi M. Derluguian's Bourdieu's Secret Admirer in the Caucasus tells the extraordinary story of Musa Shanib from Abkhazia, the leading intellectual of this turbulent region whose incredible career passed from Soviet dissident intellectual through democratic political reformer and Muslim fundamentalist war leader up to respected professor of philosophy, his entire career marked by the strange admiration for Pierre Bourdieu's thought. There are two ways to approach such a figure. The first reaction is to dismiss it as local eccentricity, to treat it with benevolent irony - "what a strange choice, Bourdieu - who knows what this folkloric guy sees in Bourdieu...". The second reaction is to directly assert the universal scope of theory - "see how universal theory is: every intellectual from Paris to Chechenia and Abkhazia can debate his theories..." The true task, of course, is to avoid both these options and to assert the universality of a theory as the result of a hard theoretical work and struggle, a struggle that is not external to theory: the point is not (only) that Shanib had to do a lot of work to break the constraints of his local context and penetrate Bourdieu - this appropriation of Bourdieu by an Abkhazian intellectual also affects the substance of the theory itself, transposing it into a different universe. Did - mutatis mutandis - Lenin not do something similar with Marx? The shift of Mao with regard to Lenin AND Stalin concerns the relationship between the working class and peasants: both Lenin and Stalin were deeply distrustful towards the peasants, they saw as one of the main tasks of the Soviet power to break the inertia of the peasants, their substantial attachment to land, to "proletarize" them and thus fully expose them to the dynamics of modernization - in clear contrast to Mao who, in his critical notes on Stalin's Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR (from 1958) remarked that "Stalin's point of view /.../ is almost altogether wrong. The basic error is mistrust of the peasants." The theoretical and political consequences of this shift are properly shattering: they imply no less than a thorough reworking of Marx's Hegelian notion of proletarian position as the position of "substanceless subjectivity," of those who are reduced to the abyss of their subjectivity. ~ Slavoj i ek, #NFDB
554:Genie
He is love and the present because he has opened our house
to winter's foam and to the sound of summer,
He who purified all that we drink and tea;
He is the charm of passing places,
the incarnate delight of all things that abide.
He is affection and the future,
the strength and love that we,
standing surrounded by anger and weariness,
See passing in the storm-filled sky and in banners of ecstasy.
He is love, perfect and rediscovered measure,
Reason, marvelous and unforeseen,
Eternity: beloved prime mover of the elements, of destinies.
We all know the terror of his yielding, and of ours:
Oh delight of our well-being, brilliance of our faculties,
selfish affection and passion for him, who loves us forever...
And we remember him, and he goes on his way...
And if Adoration departs, then it sounds, his promise sounds:
'Away with these ages and superstitions,
These couplings, these bodies of old!
All our age has submerged.' He will not go away,
will not come down again from some heave.
He will not fulfill the redemption of women's fury
nor the gaiety of men nor the rest of this sin:
For he is and he is loved, and so it is already done.
Oh, his breathing, the turn of his head when he runs:
Terrible speed of perfection in action and form!
Fecundity of spirit and vastness of the universe! His body!
Release so long desired, The splintering of grace before a new violence!
Oh, the sight, the sight of him!
All ancient genuflections, all sorrows are lifted as he passes.
The light of his day! All moving and sonorous
suffering dissolves in more intense music.
In his step there are vaster migrations than the old invasions were.
Oh, He and we! a pride more benevolent than charities lost.
Oh, world! and the shining song of new sorrows.
He has known us all and has loved us.
Let us discover how, this winter night, to hail him from cape to cape,
from the unquiet pole to the château,
from crowded cities to the empty coast,
61
from glance to glance, with our strength and our feelings exhausted,
To see him, and to send him once again away...
And beneath the tides and over high deserts of snow
To follow his image, his breathing, his body, the light of his day.
~ Arthur Rimbaud,#NFDB
555:He no longer saw the face of his friend Siddhartha, instead he saw other faces, many, a long sequence, a flowing river of faces, of hundreds, of thousands, which all came and disappeared, and yet all seemed to be there simultaneously, which all constantly changed and renewed themselves, and which were still all Siddhartha. He saw the face of a fish, a carp, with an infinitely painfully opened mouth, the face of a dying fish, with fading eyes—he saw the face of a new-born child, red and full of wrinkles, distorted from crying—he saw the face of a murderer, he saw him plunging a knife into the body of another person—he saw, in the same second, this criminal in bondage, kneeling and his head being chopped off by the executioner with one blow of his sword—he saw the bodies of men and women, naked in positions and cramps of frenzied love—he saw corpses stretched out, motionless, cold, void— he saw the heads of animals, of boars, of crocodiles, of elephants, of bulls, of birds—he saw gods, saw Krishna, saw Agni—he saw all of these figures and faces in a thousand relationships with one another, each one helping the other, loving it, hating it, destroying it, giving re-birth to it, each one was a will to die, a passionately painful confession of transitoriness, and yet none of them died, each one only transformed, was always re-born, received evermore a new face, without any time having passed between the one and the other face—and all of these figures and faces rested, flowed, generated themselves, floated along and merged with each other, and they were all constantly covered by something thin, without individuality of its own, but yet existing, like a thin glass or ice, like a transparent skin, a shell or mold or mask of water, and this mask was smiling, and this mask was Siddhartha's smiling face, which he, Govinda, in this very same moment touched with his lips. And, Govinda saw it like this, this smile of the mask, this smile of oneness above the flowing forms, this smile of simultaneousness above the thousand births and deaths, this smile of Siddhartha was precisely the same, was precisely of the same kind as the quiet, delicate, impenetrable, perhaps benevolent, perhaps mocking, wise, thousand-fold smile of Gotama, the Buddha, as he had seen it himself with great respect a hundred times. Like this, Govinda knew, the perfected ones are smiling. ~ Hermann Hesse, #NFDB
556:I had tracked down a little cafe in the next village, with a television set that was going to show the World Cup Final on the Saturday. I arrived there mid-morning when it was still deserted, had a couple of beers, ordered a sensational conejo au Franco, and then sat, drinking coffee, and watching the room fill up. With Germans. I was expecting plenty of locals and a sprinkling of tourists, even in an obscure little outpost like this, but not half the population of Dortmund. In fact, I came to the slow realisation as they poured in and sat around me . . . that I was the only Englishman there. They were very friendly, but there were many of them, and all my exits were cut off. What strategy could I employ? It was too late to pretend that I was German. I’d greeted the early arrivals with ‘Guten Tag! Ich liebe Deutschland’, but within a few seconds found myself conversing in English, in which they were all fluent. Perhaps, I hoped, they would think that I was an English-speaker but not actually English. A Rhodesian, possibly, or a Canadian, there just out of curiosity, to try to pick up the rules of this so-called ‘Beautiful Game’. But I knew that I lacked the self-control to fake an attitude of benevolent detachment while watching what was arguably the most important event since the Crucifixion, so I plumped for the role of the ultra-sporting, frightfully decent Upper-Class Twit, and consequently found myself shouting ‘Oh, well played, Germany!’ when Helmut Haller opened the scoring in the twelfth minute, and managing to restrain myself, when Geoff Hurst equalised, to ‘Good show! Bit lucky though!’ My fixed grin and easy manner did not betray the writhing contortions of my hands and legs beneath the table, however, and when Martin Peters put us ahead twelve minutes from the end, I clapped a little too violently; I tried to compensate with ‘Come on Germany! Give us a game!’ but that seemed to strike the wrong note. The most testing moment, though, came in the last minute of normal time when Uwe Seeler fouled Jackie Charlton, and the pig-dog dolt of a Swiss referee, finally revealing his Nazi credentials, had the gall to penalise England, and then ignored Schnellinger’s blatant handball, allowing a Prussian swine named Weber to draw the game. I sat there applauding warmly, as a horde of fat, arrogant, sausage-eating Krauts capered around me, spilling beer and celebrating their racial superiority. ~ John Cleese, #NFDB
557:Contemplations on the belly
When pregnant with our first, Dean and I attended a child birth class. There were about 15 other couples, all 6-8 months pregnant, just like us. As an introduction, the teacher asked us to each share what had been our favorite part of pregnancy and least favorite part. I was surprised by how many of the men and women there couldn't name a favorite part. When it was my turn, I said, "My least favorite has been the nausea, and my favorite is the belly."
We were sitting in the back of the room, so it was noticeable when several heads turned to get a look at me. Dean then spoke. "Yeah, my least favorite is that she was sick, and my favorite is the belly too."
Now nearly every head turned to gander incredulously at the freaky couple who actually liked the belly.
Dean and I laughed about it later, but we were sincere. The belly is cool. It is one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World, an unmistakable sign of what's going on inside, the wigwam for our little squirmer, the mark of my undeniable superpower of baby-making. I loved the belly and its freaky awesomeness, and especially the flutters, kicks, and bumps from within.
Twins belly is a whole new species. I marvel at the amazing uterus within and skin without with their unceasing ability to stretch (Reed Richards would be impressed). I still have great admiration for the belly, but I also fear it. Sometimes I wonder if I should build a shrine to it, light some incense, offer up gifts in an attempt both to honor it and avoid its wrath. It does seem more like a mythic monstrosity you'd be wise not to awaken than a bulbous appendage. It had NEEDS. It has DEMANDS. It will not be taken lightly (believe me, there's nothing light about it). I must give it its own throne, lying sideways atop a cushion, or it will CRUSH MY ORGANS. This belly is its own creature, is subject to different laws of growth and gravity. No, it's not a cute belly, not a benevolent belly. It would have tea with Fin Fang Foom; it would shake hands with Cthulhu. It's no wonder I'm so restless at night, having to sleep with one eye open.
Nevertheless, I honor you, belly, and the work you do to protect and grow my two precious daughters inside. Truly, they must be even more powerful than you to keep you enslaved to their needs. It's quite clear that out of all of us, I'm certainly not the one in control. I am here to do your bidding, belly and babies. I am your humble servant. ~ Shannon Hale,#NFDB
558:The book of Job, based on an ancient folktale, may have been written during the exile. One day, Yahweh made an interesting wager in the divine assembly with Satan, who was not yet a figure of towering evil but simply one of the “sons of God,” the legal “adversary” of the council.19 Satan pointed out that Job, Yahweh’s favorite human being, had never been truly tested but was good only because Yahweh had protected him and allowed him to prosper. If he lost all his possessions, he would soon curse Yahweh to his face. “Very well,” Yahweh replied, “all that he has is in your power.”20 Satan promptly destroyed Job’s oxen, sheep, camels, servants, and children, and Job was struck down by a series of foul diseases. He did indeed turn against God, and Satan won his bet. At this point, however, in a series of long poems and discourses, the author tried to square the suffering of humanity with the notion of a just, benevolent, and omnipotent god. Four of Job’s friends attempted to console him, using all the traditional arguments: Yahweh only ever punished the wicked; we could not fathom his plans; he was utterly righteous, and Job must therefore be guilty of some misdemeanor. These glib, facile platitudes simply enraged Job, who accused his comforters of behaving like God and persecuting him cruelly. As for Yahweh, it was impossible to have a sensible dialogue with a deity who was invisible, omnipotent, arbitrary, and unjust—at one and the same time prosecutor, judge, and executioner. When Yahweh finally deigned to respond to Job, he showed no compassion for the man he had treated so cruelly, but simply uttered a long speech about his own splendid accomplishments. Where had Job been while he laid the earth’s foundations, and pent up the sea behind closed doors? Could Job catch Leviathan with a fishhook, make a horse leap like a grasshopper, or guide the constellations on their course? The poetry was magnificent, but irrelevant. This long, boastful tirade did not even touch upon the real issue: Why did innocent people suffer at the hands of a supposedly loving God? And unlike Job, the reader knows that Job’s pain had nothing to do with the transcendent wisdom of Yahweh, but was simply the result of a frivolous bet. At the end of the poem, when Job—utterly defeated by Yahweh’s bombastic display of power—retracted all his complaints and repented in dust and ashes, God restored Job’s health and fortune. But he did not bring to life the children and servants who had been killed in the first chapter. There was no justice or recompense for them. ~ Karen Armstrong, #NFDB
559:And so passed the next several days.
I prowled around the various Court functions to mark where Shevraeth was, and if I spotted him I’d invariably sneak back to the State Wing and slip into the memoirs room to read some more--when I wasn’t writing letters.
My response to the Unknown had caused a lengthy answer in kind, and for a time we exchanged letters--sometimes thrice a day. It was such a relief to be able to express myself freely and without cost. He seemed to appreciate my jokes, for his style gradually metamorphosed from the carefully neutral mentor to a very witty kind of dialogue that verged from time to time on the acerbic--just the kind of humor that appealed most to me. We exchanged views about different aspects of history, and I deeply enjoyed his trenchant observations on the follies of our ancestors.
He never pronounced judgment on current events and people, despite some of my hints; and I forbore asking directly, lest I inadvertently say something about someone in his family--or worse, him. For I still had no clue to his identity. Savona continued to flirt with me at every event we met at. Deric claimed my company for every sporting event. And shy Geral always gravitated to my side at balls; when we talked--which was a lot--it was about music. Though others among the lords were friendly and pleasant, these three were the most attentive.
None of them hinted at letters--nor did I. If in person the Unknown couldn’t bring himself to talk on the important subjects that increasingly took up time and space in his letters, well, I could sympathize. There was a person--soon to be king--whom I couldn’t bring myself to face.
Anyway, the only mention of current events that I made in my letters was about my own experience. Late one night, when I’d drunk a little too much spiced wine, I poured out my pent-up feelings about my ignorant past, and to my intense relief he returned to me neither scorn nor pity. That did not stop me from going around for a day wary of smiles or fans hiding faces, for I’d realized that though the letters could be pleasant and encouraging, I could very well be providing someone with prime material for gossip. Never before had I felt the disadvantage of not knowing who he was, whereas he knew me by name and sight.
But no one treated me any differently than usual; there were no glances of awareness, no bright, superior smiles of those who know a secret. So it appeared he was as benevolent as his letters seemed, yet perfectly content to remain unknown.
And I was content to leave it that way. ~ Sherwood Smith,#NFDB
560:Are you so eager for war?” the drow asked, his face barely an inch from the elf’s. “Do you long to hear the screams of the dying, lying helplessly in fields amidst rows and rows of corpses? Have you ever borne witness to that?” “Orcs!” the elf protested. Drizzt grabbed him in both hands, pulled him forward, and slammed him back against the wall. Hralien called to Drizzt, but the dark elf hardly heard it. “I have ventured outside of the Silver Marches,” Drizzt said, “have you? I have witnessed the death of once-proud Luskan, and with it, the death of a dear, dear friend, whose dreams lay shattered and broken beside the bodies of five thousand victims. I have watched the greatest cathedral in the world burn and collapse. I witnessed the hope of the goodly drow, the rise of the followers of Eilistraee. But where are they now?” “You speak in ridd—” the elf started, but Drizzt slammed him again. “Gone!” Drizzt shouted. “Gone, and gone with them the hopes of a tamed and gentle world. I have watched once safe trails revert to wilderness, and have walked a dozen-dozen communities that you will never know. They are gone now, lost to the Spellplague or worse! Where are the benevolent gods? Where is the refuge from the tumult of a world gone mad? Where are the candles to chase away the darkness?” Hralien had quietly moved around the wall and walked up beside Drizzt. He put a hand on the drow’s shoulder, but that brought no more than a brief pause in the tirade. Drizzt glanced at him before turning back to the captured elf. “They are here, those lights of hope,” Drizzt said, to both elves. “In the Silver Marches. Or they are nowhere. Do we choose peace or do we choose war? If it is battle you seek, fool elf, then get you gone from this land. You will find death aplenty, I assure you. You will find ruins where once proud cities stood. You will find fields of wind-washed bones, or perhaps the remains of a single hearth, where once an entire village thrived. “And in that hundred years of chaos, amidst the coming of darkness, few have escaped the swirl of destruction, but we have flourished. Can you say the same for Thay? Mulhorand? Sembia? You say I betray those who befriended me, yet it was the vision of one exceptional dwarf and one exceptional orc that built this island against the roiling sea.” The elf, his expression more cowed, nonetheless began to speak out again, but Drizzt pulled him forward from the wall and slammed him back even harder. “You fall to your hatred and you seek excitement and glory,” the drow said. “Because you do not know. Or is it because you do not care that your pursuits will bring utter misery to thousands in your wake? ~ R A Salvatore, #NFDB
561:Let me return from history and draw my conclusion. What all this means to us at the present time is this: Our system has already passed its flowering. Some time ago it reached that summit of blessedness which the mysterious game of world history sometimes allows to things beautiful and desirable in themselves. We are on the downward slope. Our course may possible stretch out for a very long time, but in any case nothing finer, ore beautiful, and more desirable than what we have already had can henceforth be expected. The road leads downhill. Historically we are, I believe, ripe for dismantling. And there is no doubt that such will be our fate, not today or tomorrow, but the day after tomorrow. I do not draw this conclusion from any excessively moralistic estimate of our accomplishments and our abilities: I draw it far more from the movements which I see already on the way in the outside world. Critical times are approaching; the omens can be sensed everywhere; the world is once again about to shift its center of gravity. Displacements of power are in the offing. They will not take place without war and violence. From the Far East comes a threat not only to peace, but to life and liberty. Even if our country remains politically neutral, even if our whole nation unanimously abides by tradition (which is not the case) and attempts to remain faithful to Castalian ideals, that will be in vain. Some of our representatives in Parliament are already saying that Castalia is a rather expensive luxury for our country. The country may very soon be forced into a serious rearmament - armaments for defensive purposes only, of course - and great economies will be necessary. In spite of the government's benevolent disposition towards us, much of the economizing will strike us directly. We are proud that our Order and the cultural continuity it provides have cost the country as little as they have. In comparison with other ages, especially the early period of the Feuilletonistic Age with its lavishly endowed universities, its innumerable consultants and opulent institutes, this toll is really not large. It is infinitesimal compared with the sums consumed for war and armaments during the Century of Wars. But before too long this kind of armament may once again be the supreme necessity; the generals will again dominate Parliament; and if the people are confronted with the choice of sacrificing Castalia or exposing themselves to the danger of war and destruction, we know how they will choose. Undoubtedly a bellicose ideology will burgeon. The rash of propaganda will affect youth in particular. Then scholars and scholarship, Latin and mathematics, education and culture, will be considered worth their salt only to the extent that they can serve the ends of war. ~ Hermann Hesse, #NFDB
562:Nee and I walked on in silence for a time, then she said in a guarded voice, “What think you of my cousin?”
“So that is the famous Lady Tamara Chamadis! Well, she really is as pretty as I’d heard,” I said. “But…I don’t know. Somehow she embodies everything I’d thought a courtier would be.”
“Fair enough.” Nee nodded. “Then I guess it’s safe for me to say--at risk of appearing a detestable gossip--watch out.”
I touched the top of my hand where I could still feel the Duke of Savona’s kiss. “All right. But I don’t understand why.”
“She is ambitious,” Nee said slowly. “Even when we were young she never had the time for any of lower status. I believe that if Galdran Merindar had shown any interest in sharing his power, she would have married him.”
“She wants to rule the kingdom?” I asked, glancing behind us. The secluded little pool was bounded by trees and hidden from view.
“She wants to reign over Court,” Nee stated. “Her interest in the multitudes of ordinary citizens extends only to the image of them bowing down to her.”
I whistled. “That’s a pretty comprehensive judgment.”
“Perhaps I have spoken ill,” she said contritely. “You must understand that I don’t like my cousin, having endured indifference or snubs since we were small, an heir’s condescension for a third child of a secondary branch of the family who would never inherit or amount to much.”
“She seemed friendly enough just now.”
“The first time she ever addressed me as cousin in public,” Nee said. “My status appears to have changed since I went away to Tlanth, affianced to a count, with the possible new king riding escort.” Her voice took on an acidic sort of humor.
“And what about the Duke of Savona?” I asked, his image vivid in my mind’s eye.
“In what sense?” She paused, turning to study my face. “He is another whose state of mind is impossible to guess.”
I was still trying to disentangle all my observations from that brief meeting. “Is he, well, twoing with Lady Tamara?”
She smiled at the term. “They both are experts at dalliance, but until last year I had thought they had more interest in each other than in anyone else,” she said carefully. “Though even that is difficult to say for certain. Interest and ambition sometimes overlap and sometimes not.”
As we wound our way along the path back toward Athanarel in the deepening gloom, I saw warm golden light inside the palace windows. With a glorious flicker, glowglobes appeared along the pathway, suspended in the air like great rainbow-sheened bubbles, their light soft and benevolent.
“I’m not certain what you mean by that last bit,” I said at last. “As for the first, you said ‘until last year.’ Does that mean that Lady Tamara has someone else in view?”
“But of course,” Nee said blandly. “The Marquis of Shevraeth.”
I laughed all the way up the steps into the Residence. ~ Sherwood Smith,#NFDB
563:Be calm! I entreat you to hear me, before you give vent to your hatred on my devoted head. Have I not suffered enough that you seek to increase my misery? Life, although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it. Remember, thou hast made me more powerful than thyself; my height is superior to thine; my joints more supple. But I will not be tempted to set myself in opposition to thee. I am thy creature, and I will be even mild and docile to my natural lord and king, if thou wilt also perform thy part, the which thou owest me. Oh, Frankenstein, be not equitable to every other, and trample upon me alone, to whom thy justice, and even thy clemency and affection, is most due. Remember, that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam; but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed. Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous."
"Begone! I will not hear you. There can be no community between you and me; we are enemies. Begone, or let us try our strength in a fight, in which one must fall."
"How can I move thee? Will no entreaties cause thee to turn a favourable eye upon thy creature, who implores thy goodness and compassion? Believe me, Frankenstein: I was benevolent; my soul glowed with love and humanity: but am I not alone, miserably alone? You, my creator, abhor me; what hope can I gather from your fellow-creatures, who owe me nothing? they spurn and hate me. The desert mountains and dreary glaciers are my refuge. I have wandered here many days; the caves of ice, which I only do not fear, are a dwelling to me, and the only one which man does not grudge. These bleak skies I hail, for they are kinder to me than your fellow-beings. If the multitude of mankind knew of my existence, they would do as you do, and arm themselves for my destruction. Shall I not then hate them who abhor me? I will keep no terms with my enemies. I am miserable, and they shall share my wretchedness. Yet it is in your power to recompense me, and deliver them from an evil which it only remains for you to make so great that not only you and your family, but thousands of others, shall be swallowed up in the whirlwinds of its rage. Let your compassion be moved, and do not disdain me. Listen to my tale: when you have heard that, abandon or commiserate me, as you shall judge that I deserve. But hear me. The guilty are allowed, by human laws, bloody as they are, to speak in their own defence before they are condemned. Listen to me, Frankenstein. You accuse me of murder; and yet you would, with a satisfied conscience, destroy your own creature. Oh, praise the eternal justice of man! Yet I ask you not to spare me: listen to me; and then, if you can, and if you will, destroy the work of your hands. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley,#NFDB
564:Upon this earth, the land of the Victorious Ones,
Once lived a Saint, known as the second Buddha;
His fame was heard in all the Ten Directions.
To Him, the Jewel atop the eternal Banner of Dharma
I pay homage and give offerings.
Is He not the holy Master, the great Midripa?
Upon the Lotus-seat of Midripa
My Father Guru places his reliance;
He drinks heavenly nectar
With the supreme view of Mahamudra;
He has realized the innate Truth in utter freedom.
He is the supreme one, Jetsun Marpa.
Undefiled by faults or vices,
He is the Transformation Body of Buddha.
He says: Before Enlightenment,
All things in the outer world
Are deceptive and confusing;
Clinging to outer forms,
One is ever thus entangled.
After Enlightenment, one sees all things and objects
As but magic shadow-plays,
And all objective things
Become his helpful friends.
In the uncreated Dharmakaya all are pure;
Nothing has ever manifested
In the Realm of Ultimate Truth.
He says: Before Enlightenment,
The ever-running Mind-consciousness within
Is shut in a confusing blindness
Which is the source of passions, actions, and desires.
After Enlightenment, it becomes the
Self-illuminating Wisdom
All merits and virtues spring from it.
In Ultimate Truth there is not even Wisdom;
Here one enters the Realm where Dharma is exhausted.
The coproreal form
Is built of the Four Elements;
Before one attains Enlightenment,
All illness and all suffering come from it.
After Enlightenment, it becomes the two-in-one Body
Of Buddha clear as the cloudless firmament!
Thus rooted out are the base Samsaric clingings.
In Absolute Truth there is no body.
The malignant male and femal demons
Who create myriad troubles and obstructions,
Seem real before one has Enlightenment;
But when one realizes their nature truly,
They become Protectors of the Dharma,
And by their help and freely-given assistance
One attains to numerous accomplishments.
In Ultimate Truth there are no Buddhas and no demons;
One enters here the Realm where Dharma is exhausted.
Among all Vehicles, this ultimate teaching
Is found only in the Tantras.
It says in the Highest Division of the Tantra:
When the various elements gather in the Nadis,
One sees the demon-forms appear.
If one knows not that they are but mind-created
Visions, and deems them to be real,
One is indeed most foolish and most stupid.
In time past, wrapped up in clinging blindness,
I lingered in the den of confusion,
Deeming benevolent deities and malignant
Demons to be real and subsistent.
Now, through the Holy Ones grace and blessing
I realize that both Samsara and Nirvana
Are neither existent nor non-existent;
And I see all forms as Mahamudra.
Realizing the groundless nature of ignorance,
My former awareness, clouded and unstable
Like reflections of the moon in rippling water,
Becomes transparent, clear as shining crystal.
Its sun-like brilliance is free from obscuring clouds,
Its light transcends all forms of blindness,
Ignorance and confusion thus vanish without trace.
This is the truth I have experienced within.
Again, the foolish concept demons iself
Is groundless, void, and yet illuminating!
Oh, this indeed is marvelous and wonderful!
Milarepa
Translated by Garma C. C. Chang
~ Jetsun Milarepa, Upon this earth, the land of the Victorious Ones
,#NFDB
565:4. Religion. Your reason is now mature enough to examine this object. In the first place, divest yourself of all bias in favor of novelty & singularity of opinion... shake off all the fears & servile prejudices, under which weak minds are servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear. You will naturally examine first, the religion of your own country. Read the Bible, then as you would read Livy or Tacitus. The facts which are within the ordinary course of nature, you will believe on the authority of the writer, as you do those of the same kind in Livy and Tacitus. The testimony of the writer weighs in their favor, in one scale, and their not being against the laws of nature, does not weigh against them. But those facts in the Bible which contradict the laws of nature, must be examined with more care, and under a variety of faces. Here you must recur to the pretensions of the writer to inspiration from God. Examine upon what evidence his pretensions are founded, and whether that evidence is so strong, as that its falsehood would be more improbable than a change in the laws of nature, in the case he relates. For example in the book of Joshua we are told the sun stood still several hours. Were we to read that fact in Livy or Tacitus we should class it with their showers of blood, speaking of statues, beasts, &c. But it is said that the writer of that book was inspired. Examine therefore candidly what evidence there is of his having been inspired. The pretension is entitled to your inquiry, because millions believe it. On the other hand you are astronomer enough to know how contrary it is to the law of nature that a body revolving on its axis as the earth does, should have stopped, should not by that sudden stoppage have prostrated animals, trees, buildings, and should after a certain time have resumed its revolution, & that without a second general prostration. Is this arrest of the earth's motion, or the evidence which affirms it, most within the law of probabilities? You will next read the New Testament. It is the history of a personage called Jesus. Keep in your eye the opposite pretensions: 1, of those who say he was begotten by God, born of a virgin, suspended & reversed the laws of nature at will, & ascended bodily into heaven; and 2, of those who say he was a man of illegitimate birth, of a benevolent heart, enthusiastic mind, who set out without pretensions to divinity, ended in believing them, and was punished capitally for sedition, by being gibbeted, according to the Roman law, which punished the first commission of that offence by whipping, & the second by exile, or death in fureâ.
...Do not be frightened from this inquiry by any fear of its consequences. If it ends in a belief that there is no God, you will find incitements to virtue in the comfort and pleasantness you feel in its exercise, and the love of others which it will procure you... In fine, I repeat, you must lay aside all prejudice on both sides, and neither believe nor reject anything, because any other persons, or description of persons, have rejected or believed it... I forgot to observe, when speaking of the New Testament, that you should read all the histories of Christ, as well of those whom a council of ecclesiastics have decided for us, to be Pseudo-evangelists, as those they named Evangelists. Because these Pseudo-evangelists pretended to inspiration, as much as the others, and you are to judge their pretensions by your own reason, and not by the reason of those ecclesiastics. Most of these are lost...
[Letter to his nephew, Peter Carr, advising him in matters of religion, 1787] ~ Thomas Jefferson,#NFDB
566:Mr. Dana, Of The New York Sun
Thar showed up out'n Denver in the spring uv '81
A man who'd worked with Dana on the Noo York Sun.
His name wuz Cantell Whoppers, 'nd he wuz a sight ter view
Ez he walked inter the orfice 'nd inquired fer work ter do.
Thar warn't no places vacant then,--fer be it understood,
That wuz the time when talent flourished at that altitood;
But thar the stranger lingered, tellin' Raymond 'nd the rest
Uv what perdigious wonders he could do when at his best,
Till finally he stated (quite by chance) that he hed done
A heap uv work with Dana on the Noo York Sun.
Wall, that wuz quite another thing; we owned that ary cuss
Who'd worked f'r Mr. Dana must be good enough fer us!
And so we tuk the stranger's word 'nd nipped him while we could,
For if we didn't take him we knew John Arkins would;
And Cooper, too, wuz mouzin' round fer enterprise 'nd brains,
Whenever them commodities blew in across the plains.
At any rate we nailed him, which made ol' Cooper swear
And Arkins tear out handfuls uv his copious curly hair;
But we set back and cackled, 'nd bed a power uv fun
With our man who'd worked with Dana on the Noo York Sun.
It made our eyes hang on our cheeks 'nd lower jaws ter drop,
Ter hear that feller tellin' how ol' Dana run his shop:
It seems that Dana wuz the biggest man you ever saw,-He lived on human bein's, 'nd preferred to eat 'em raw!
If he hed Democratic drugs ter take, before he took 'em,
As good old allopathic laws prescribe, he allus shook 'em.
The man that could set down 'nd write like Dany never grew,
And the sum of human knowledge wuzn't half what Dana knew;
The consequence appeared to be that nearly every one
Concurred with Mr. Dana of the Noo York Sun.
This feller, Cantell Whoppers, never brought an item in,-He spent his time at Perrin's shakin' poker dice f'r gin.
Whatever the assignment, he wuz allus sure to shirk,
He wuz very long on likker and all-fired short on work!
If any other cuss had played the tricks he dared ter play,
The daisies would be bloomin' over his remains to-day;
229
But somehow folks respected him and stood him to the last,
Considerin' his superior connections in the past.
So, when he bilked at poker, not a sucker drew a gun
On the man who 'd worked with Dana on the Noo York Sun.
Wall, Dana came ter Denver in the fall uv '83.
A very different party from the man we thought ter see,-A nice 'nd clean old gentleman, so dignerfied 'nd calm,
You bet yer life he never did no human bein' harm!
A certain hearty manner 'nd a fulness uv the vest
Betokened that his sperrits 'nd his victuals wuz the best;
His face wuz so benevolent, his smile so sweet 'nd kind,
That they seemed to be the reflex uv an honest, healthy mind;
And God had set upon his head a crown uv silver hair
In promise uv the golden crown He meaneth him to wear.
So, uv us boys that met him out'n Denver, there wuz none
But fell in love with Dana uv the Noo York Sun.
But when he came to Denver in that fall uv '83,
His old friend Cantell Whoppers disappeared upon a spree;
The very thought uv seein' Dana worked upon him so
(They hadn't been together fer a year or two, you know),
That he borrered all the stuff he could and started on a bat,
And, strange as it may seem, we didn't see him after that.
So, when ol' Dana hove in sight, we couldn't understand
Why he didn't seem to notice that his crony wa'n't on hand;
No casual allusion, not a question, no, not one,
For the man who'd "worked with Dana on the Noo York Sun!"
We broke it gently to him, but he didn't seem surprised,
Thar wuz no big burst uv passion as we fellers had surmised.
He said that Whoppers wuz a man he 'd never heerd about,
But he mought have carried papers on a Jarsey City route;
And then he recollected hearin' Mr. Laffan say
That he'd fired a man named Whoppers fur bein' drunk one day,
Which, with more likker underneath than money in his vest,
Had started on a freight-train fur the great 'nd boundin' West,
But further information or statistics he had none
Uv the man who'd "worked with Dana on the Noo York Sun."
We dropped the matter quietly 'nd never made no fuss,-When we get played for suckers, why, that's a horse on us!--
230
But every now 'nd then we Denver fellers have to laff
To hear some other paper boast uv havin' on its staff
A man who's "worked with Dana," 'nd then we fellers wink
And pull our hats down on our eyes 'nd set around 'nd think.
It seems like Dana couldn't be as smart as people say,
If he educates so many folks 'nd lets 'em get away;
And, as for us, in future we'll be very apt to shun
The man who "worked with Dana on the Noo York Sun."
But bless ye, Mr. Dana! may you live a thousan' years,
To sort o' keep things lively in this vale of human tears;
An' may I live a thousan', too,--a thousan' less a day,
For I shouldn't like to be on earth to hear you'd passed away.
And when it comes your time to go you'll need no Latin chaff
Nor biographic data put in your epitaph;
But one straight line of English and of truth will let folks know
The homage 'nd the gratitude 'nd reverence they owe;
You'll need no epitaph but this: "Here sleeps the man who run
That best 'nd brightest paper, the Noo York Sun."
~ Eugene Field,#NFDB
567:The Mu'Allaqat
'Does the blackened ruin, situated in the stony ground
between Durraj and Mutathallam, which did not speak to me,
when addressed, belong to the abode of Ummi Awfa?
And is it her dwelling at the two stony meadows, seeming as though they were
the renewed tattoo marks in the sinews of the wrist?
'The wild cows and the white deer are wandering about
there, one herd behind the other, while their young are springing up from every lying-down place.
'I stood again near it, (the encampment of the tribe of
Awfa,) after an absence of twenty years, and with some efforts,
I know her abode again after thinking awhile.
'I recognized the three stones blackened by fire at the
place where the kettle used to be placed at night, and the
trench round the encampment, which had not burst, like the source of a pool.
'And when I recognized the encampment I said to its site,
'Now good morning, oh spot;
may you be safe from dangers.'
'Look, oh my friend! do you see any women traveling on
camels, going over the high ground above the stream of
Jurthum?
'They have covered their howdahs with coverlets of high
value, and with a thin screen, the fringes of which are red,
resembling blood.
'And they inclined toward the valley of Sooban, ascending
the center of it, and in their faces were the fascinating
looks of a soft-bodied person brought up in easy circumstances.
'They arose early in the morning and got up at dawn, and
they went straight to the valley of Rass as the hand goes
unswervingly to the mouth, when eating.
'And amongst them is a place of amusement for the farsighted one,
and a pleasant sight for the eye of the looker who
looks attentively.
'As if the pieces of dyed wool which they left in every
place in which they halted, were the seeds of night-shade
which have not been crushed.
'When they arrived at the water, the mass of which was
blue from intense purity, they laid down their walking sticks,
like the dweller who has pitched his tents.
'They kept the hill of Qanan and the rough ground about
it on their hand; while there are many, dwelling in Qanan,
the shedding of whose blood is lawful and unlawful.
'They came out from the valley of Sooban, then they
crossed it, riding in every Qainian howdah
new and widened.
'Then I swear by the temple, round which walk the men
who built it from the tribes
of Quraysh and Turhum.
'An oath, that you are verily two excellent chiefs, who
are found worthy of honor in every condition, between ease
and distress.
'The two endeavorers from the tribe of Ghaiz bin Murrah
strove in making peace after the connection between the
tribes had become broken, on account of the shedding of blood.
'You repaired with peace the condition of the tribes of
'Abs and Zubyan, after they had fought with one another, and
ground up the perfume of Manshim between them.
'And indeed you said, 'if we bring about peace perfectly by the spending
of money and the conferring of benefits, and by good words,
we shall be safe from the danger of the two tribes, destroying each other.'
'You occupied by reason of this the best of positions, and
became far from the reproach of being
undutiful and sinful.
'And you became great in the high nobility of Ma'add;
may you be guided in the right way; and he who spends his
treasure of glory will become great.
'The memory of the wounds is obliterated by the hundreds
of camels, and he, who commenced paying off the blood money
by instalments, was not guilty of it (i.e., of making war) .
'One tribe pays it to another tribe as an indemnity, while
they who gave the indemnity did not shed blood sufficient for
the filling of a cupping glass.
'Then there was being driven to them from the property
you inherited, a booty of various sorts from young camels
with slit ears.
'Now, convey from me to the tribe of Zubyan and their
allies a message,- 'verily you have sworn by every sort of
oath to keep the peace.'
'Do not conceal from God what is in your breast that it
may be hidden; whatever is concealed,
God knows all about it.
'Either it will be put off and placed recorded in a book,
and preserved there until the judgment day;
or the punishment be hastened and so he will take revenge.
'And war is not but what you have learnt it to be, and
what you have experienced, and what is said concerning it,
is not a story based on suppositions.
'When you stir it up, you will stir it up as an accursed
thing, and it will become greedy when you excite its greed
and it will rage fiercely.
'Then it will grind you as the grinding of the upper millstone
against the lower, and it will conceive immediately after
one birth and it will produce twins.
'By my life I swear, how good a tribe it is upon whom
Husain Bin Zamzam brought an injury by committing a
crime which did not please them.
'And he had concealed his hatred, and did not display it,
and did not proceed to carry out his intention until he got a
good opportunity.
'And he said, 'I will perform my object of avenging myself,
and I will guard myself from my enemy with a thousand
bridled horses behind me.'
'Then he attacked his victim from 'Abs, but did not cause
fear to the people of the many houses, near which death had
thrown down his baggage.
'They allowed their animals to graze until when the interval
between the hours of drinking was finished, they took them to the deep pool,
which is divided by weapons and by shedding of blood.
'They accomplished their object amongst themselves, then
they led the animals back to the pasture of unwholesome
indigestible grass.
'I have grown weary of the troubles of life; and he,
who lives eighty years will, may you have no father
if you doubt grow weary.
'And I know what has happened to-day and yesterday,
before it, but verily, of the knowledge of what will happen
tomorrow; I am ignorant.
'I see death is like the blundering of a blind camel; -him
whom he meets he kills, and he whom he misses lives and will
become old.
'And he who does not act with kindness in many affairs
will be torn by teeth
and trampled under foot.
'And he, who makes benevolent acts intervene before
honor, increases his honor;
and he, who does not avoid abuse, will be abused.
'He, who is possessed of plenty, and is miserly with his
great wealth toward his people, will be dispensed with,
and abused.
'He who keeps his word, will not be reviled;
and he whose heart is guided to self-satisfying benevolence
will not stammer.
'And he who dreads the causes of death, they will reach
him, even if he ascends the tracts of the heavens
with a ladder.
'And he, who shows kindness to one not deserving it, his
praise will be a reproach against him, and he will repent of
having shown kindness.
'And he who rebels against the butt ends of the spears,
then verily he will have to obey the spear points joined to
every long spear shaft.
'And he who does not repulse with his weapons from his
tank, will have it broken; and he who does not oppress the
people will be oppressed.
'And he who travels should consider his friend an enemy;
and he who does not respect himself
will not be respected.
'And he, who is always seeking to bear the burdens of
other people, and does not excuse himself from it,
will one day by reason of his abasement, repent.
'And whatever of character there is in a man, even though
he thinks it concealed from people,
it is known.
'He, who does not cease asking people to carry him, and
does not make himself independent of them even for one day
of the time, will be regarded with disgust.
'Many silent ones you see, pleasing to you,
but their excess in wisdom or deficiency
will appear at the time of talking.
'The tongue of a man is one half, and the other half is his
mind, and here is nothing besides these two, except the shape
of the blood and the flesh.
'And verily, as to the folly of an old man
there is no wisdom after it,
but the young man after his folly may become wise.
~ Baha ad-Din Zuhayr,#NFDB
568:But little better
than the vivid dream I dreamt
was our encounter
in reality's darkness,
black as leopard-flower seeds.
Like (0) 0
This very keepsake
This very keepsake
is now a source of misery,
for were it not here
there might be fleeting moments
when I would not think of you.
Like (0) 0
The Poem of Zuhair
"Does the blackened ruin, situated in the stony ground
between Durraj and Mutathallam, which did not speak to me,
when addressed, belong to the abode of Ummi Awfa?
"And is it her dwelling at the two stony meadows, seeming
as though they were the renewed tattoo marks in the sinews
of the wrist?
"The wild cows and the white deer are wandering about
there, one herd behind the other, while their young are spring-
ing up from every lying-down place.
"I stood again near it, (the encampment of the tribe of
Awfa,) after an absence of twenty years, and with some efforts,
I know her abode again after thinking awhile.
"I recognized the three stones blackened by fire at the
place where the kettle used to be placed at night, and the
trench round the encampment, which had not burst, like the source of a pool.
"And when I recognized the encampment I said to its site,
'Now good morning, oh spot;
may you be safe from dangers.'
"Look, oh my friend! do you see any women traveling on
camels, going over the high ground above the stream of
Jurthum?
"They have covered their howdahs with coverlets of high
value, and with a thin screen, the fringes of which are red,
resembling blood.
"And they inclined toward the valley of Sooban, ascending
the center of it, and in their faces were the fascinating
looks of a soft-bodied person brought up in easy circumstances.
"They arose early in the morning and got up at dawn, and
they went straight to the valley of Rass as the hand goes
unswervingly to the mouth, when eating.
"And amongst them is a place of amusement for the farsighted one,
and a pleasant sight for the eye of the looker who
looks attentively.
"As if the pieces of dyed wool which they left in every
place in which they halted, were the seeds of night-shade
which have not been crushed.
"When they arrived at the water, the mass of which was
blue from intense purity, they laid down their walking sticks,
like the dweller who has pitched his tents.
"They kept the hill of Qanan and the rough ground about
it on their hand; while there are many, dwelling in Qanan,
the shedding of whose blood is lawful and unlawful.
"They came out from the valley of Sooban, then they
crossed it, riding in every Qainian howdah
new and widened.
"Then I swear by the temple, round which walk the men
who built it from the tribes
of Quraysh and Turhum.
"An oath, that you are verily two excellent chiefs, who
are found worthy of honor in every condition, between ease
and distress.
"The two endeavorers from the tribe of Ghaiz bin Murrah
strove in making peace after the connection between the
tribes had become broken, on account of the shedding of blood.
"You repaired with peace the condition of the tribes of
'Abs and Zubyan, after they had fought with one another, and
ground up the perfume of Manshim between them.
"And indeed you said, 'if we bring about peace perfectly by the spending
of money and the conferring of benefits, and by good words,
we shall be safe from the danger of the two tribes, destroying each other.'
"You occupied by reason of this the best of positions, and
became far from the reproach of being
undutiful and sinful.
"And you became great in the high nobility of Ma'add;
may you be guided in the right way; and he who spends his
treasure of glory will become great.
"The memory of the wounds is obliterated by the hundreds
of camels, and he, who commenced paying off the blood money
by instalments, was not guilty of it (i.e., of making war).
"One tribe pays it to another tribe as an indemnity, while
they who gave the indemnity did not shed blood sufficient for
the filling of a cupping glass.
"Then there was being driven to them from the property
you inherited, a booty of various sorts from young camels
with slit ears.
"Now, convey from me to the tribe of Zubyan and their
allies a message,--- 'verily you have sworn by every sort of
oath to keep the peace.'
"Do not conceal from God what is in your breast that it
may be hidden; whatever is concealed,
God knows all about it.
"Either it will be put off and placed recorded in a book,
and preserved there until the judgment day;
or the punishment be hastened and so he will take revenge.
"And war is not but what you have learnt it to be, and
what you have experienced, and what is said concerning it,
is not a story based on suppositions.
"When you stir it up, you will stir it up as an accursed
thing, and it will become greedy when you excite its greed
and it will rage fiercely.
"Then it will grind you as the grinding of the upper millstone
against the lower, and it will conceive immediately after
one birth and it will produce twins.
"By my life I swear, how good a tribe it is upon whom
Husain Bin Zamzam brought an injury by committing a
crime which did not please them.
"And he had concealed his hatred, and did not display it,
and did not proceed to carry out his intention until he got a
good opportunity.
"And he said, 'I will perform my object of avenging myself,
and I will guard myself from my enemy with a thousand
bridled horses behind me.'
"Then he attacked his victim from 'Abs, but did not cause
fear to the people of the many houses, near which death had
thrown down his baggage.
"They allowed their animals to graze until when the interval
between the hours of drinking was finished, they took them to the deep pool,
which is divided by weapons and by shedding of blood.
"They accomplished their object amongst themselves, then
they led the animals back to the pasture of unwholesome
indigestible grass.
"I have grown weary of the troubles of life; and he,
who lives eighty years will, may you have no father
if you doubt grow weary.
"And I know what has happened to-day and yesterday,
before it, but verily, of the knowledge of what will happen
tomorrow; I am ignorant.
"I see death is like the blundering of a blind camel;---him
whom he meets he kills, and he whom he misses lives and will
become old.
"And he who does not act with kindness in many affairs
will be torn by teeth
and trampled under foot.
"And he, who makes benevolent acts intervene before
honor, increases his honor;
and he, who does not avoid abuse, will be abused.
"He, who is possessed of plenty, and is miserly with his
great wealth toward his people, will be dispensed with,
and abused.
"He who keeps his word, will not be reviled;
and he whose heart is guided to self-satisfying benevolence
will not stammer.
"And he who dreads the causes of death, they will reach
him, even if he ascends the tracts of the heavens
with a ladder.
"And he, who shows kindness to one not deserving it, his
praise will be a reproach against him, and he will repent of
having shown kindness.
"And he who rebels against the butt ends of the spears,
then verily he will have to obey the spear points joined to
every long spear shaft.
"And he who does not repulse with his weapons from his
tank, will have it broken; and he who does not oppress the
people will be oppressed.
"And he who travels should consider his friend an enemy;
and he who does not respect himself
will not be respected.
"And he, who is always seeking to bear the burdens of
other people, and does not excuse himself from it,
will one day by reason of his abasement, repent.
"And whatever of character there is in a man, even though
he thinks it concealed from people,
it is known.
"He, who does not cease asking people to carry him, and
does not make himself independent of them even for one day
of the time, will be regarded with disgust.
"Many silent ones you see, pleasing to you,
but their excess in wisdom or deficiency
will appear at the time of talking.
"The tongue of a man is one half, and the other half is his
mind, and here is nothing besides these two, except the shape
of the blood and the flesh.
"And verily, as to the folly of an old man
there is no wisdom after it,
but the young man after his folly may become wise.
"We asked of you, and you gave, and we returned to the
asking and you returned to the giving, and he who increases
the asking, will one day be disappointed."
~ Anonymous, But little better
,#NFDB
569:And the font took them: let our laurels lie!
Braid moonfern now with mystic trifoly
Because once more Goito gets, once more,
Sordello to itself! A dream is o'er,
And the suspended life begins anew;
Quiet those throbbing temples, then, subdue
That cheek's distortion! Nature's strict embrace,
Putting aside the past, shall soon efface
Its print as wellfactitious humours grown
Over the trueloves, hatreds not his own
And turn him pure as some forgotten vest
Woven of painted byssus, silkiest
Tufting the Tyrrhene whelk's pearl-sheeted lip,
Left welter where a trireme let it slip
I' the sea, and vexed a satrap; so the stain
O' the world forsakes Sordello, with its pain,
Its pleasure: how the tinct loosening escapes,
Cloud after cloud! Mantua's familiar shapes
Die, fair and foul die, fading as they flit,
Men, women, and the pathos and the wit,
Wise speech and foolish, deeds to smile or sigh
For, good, bad, seemly or ignoble, die.
The last face glances through the eglantines,
The last voice murmurs, 'twixt the blossomed vines,
Of Men, of that machine supplied by thought
To compass self-perception with, he sought
By forcing half himselfan insane pulse
Of a god's blood, on clay it could convulse,
Never transmuteon human sights and sounds,
To watch the other half with; irksome bounds
It ebbs from to its source, a fountain sealed
Forever. Better sure be unrevealed
Than part revealed: Sordello well or ill
Is finished: then what further use of Will,
Point in the prime idea not realized,
An oversight? inordinately prized,
No less, and pampered with enough of each
Delight to prove the whole above its reach.
"To need become all natures, yet retain
"The law of my own natureto remain
"Myself, yet yearn . . . as if that chestnut, think,
"Should yearn for this first larch-bloom crisp and pink,
"Or those pale fragrant tears where zephyrs stanch
"March wounds along the fretted pine-tree branch!
"Will and the means to show will, great and small,
"Material, spiritual,abjure them all
"Save any so distinct, they may be left
"To amuse, not tempt become! and, thus bereft,
"Just as I first was fashioned would I be!
"Nor, moon, is it Apollo now, but me
"Thou visitest to comfort and befriend!
"Swim thou into my heart, and there an end,
"Since I possess thee!nay, thus shut mine eyes
"And know, quite know, by this heart's fall and rise,
"When thou dost bury thee in clouds, and when
"Out-standest: wherefore practise upon men
"To make that plainer to myself?"
Slide here
Over a sweet and solitary year
Wasted; or simply notice change in him
How eyes, once with exploring bright, grew dim
And satiate with receiving. Some distress
Was caused, too, by a sort of consciousness
Under the imbecility,nought kept
That down; he slept, but was aware he slept,
So, frustrated: as who brainsick made pact
Erst with the overhanging cataract
To deafen him, yet still distinguished plain
His own blood's measured clicking at his brain.
To finish. One declining Autumn day
Few birds about the heaven chill and grey,
No wind that cared trouble the tacit woods
He sauntered home complacently, their moods
According, his and nature's. Every spark
Of Mantua life was trodden out; so dark
The embers, that the Troubadour, who sung
Hundreds of songs, forgot, its trick his tongue,
Its craft his brain, how either brought to pass
Singing at all; that faculty might class
With any of Apollo's now. The year
Began to find its early promise sere
As well. Thus beauty vanishes; thus stone
Outlingers flesh: nature's and his youth gone,
They left the world to you, and wished you joy.
When, stopping his benevolent employ,
A presage shuddered through the welkin; harsh
The earth's remonstrance followed. 'T was the marsh
Gone of a sudden. Mincio, in its place,
Laughed, a broad water, in next morning's face,
And, where the mists broke up immense and white
I' the steady wind, burned like a spilth of light
Out of the crashing of a myriad stars.
And here was nature, bound by the same bars
Of fate with him!
"No! youth once gone is gone:
"Deeds, let escape, are never to be done.
"Leaf-fall and grass-spring for the year; for us
"Oh forfeit I unalterably thus
"My chance? nor two lives wait me, this to spend,
"Learning save that? Nature has time, may mend
"Mistake, she knows occasion will recur;
"Landslip or seabreach, how affects it her
"With her magnificent resources?I
"Must perish once and perish utterly.
"Not any strollings now at even-close
"Down the field-path, Sordello! by thorn-rows
"Alive with lamp-flies, swimming spots of fire
"And dew, outlining the black cypress' spire
"She waits you at, Elys, who heard you first
"Woo her, the snow-month through, but ere she durst
"Answer 't was April. Linden-flower-time-long
"Her eyes were on the ground; 't is July, strong
"Now; and because white dust-clouds overwhelm
"The woodside, here or by the village elm
"That holds the moon, she meets you, somewhat pale,
"But letting you lift up her coarse flax veil
"And whisper (the damp little hand in yours)
"Of love, heart's love, your heart's love that endures
"Till death. Tush! No mad mixing with the rout
"Of haggard ribalds wandering about
"The hot torchlit wine-scented island-house
"Where Friedrich holds his wickedest carouse,
"Parading,to the gay Palermitans,
"Soft Messinese, dusk Saracenic clans
"Nuocera holds,those tall grave dazzling Norse,
"High-cheeked, lank-haired, toothed whiter than the morse,
"Queens of the caves of jet stalactites,
"He sent his barks to fetch through icy seas,
"The blind night seas without a saving star,
"And here in snowy birdskin robes they are,
"Sordello!here, mollitious alcoves gilt
"Superb as Byzant domes that devils built!
"Ah, Byzant, there again! no chance to go
"Ever like august cheery Dandolo,
"Worshipping hearts about him for a wall,
"Conducted, blind eyes, hundred years and all,
"Through vanquished Byzant where friends note for him
"What pillar, marble massive, sardius slim,
"'T were fittest he transport to Venice' Square
"Flattered and promised life to touch them there
"Soon, by those fervid sons of senators!
"No more lifes, deaths, loves, hatreds, peaces, wars!
"Ah, fragments of a whole ordained to be,
"Points in the life I waited! what are ye
"But roundels of a ladder which appeared
"Awhile the very platform it was reared
"To lift me on?that happiness I find
"Proofs of my faith in, even in the blind
"Instinct which bade forego you all unless
"Ye led me past yourselves. Ay, happiness
"Awaited me; the way life should be used
"Was to acquire, and deeds like you conduced
"To teach it by a self-revealment, deemed
"Life's very use, so long! Whatever seemed
"Progress to that, was pleasure; aught that stayed
"My reaching itno pleasure. I have laid
"The ladder down; I climb not; still, aloft
"The platform stretches! Blisses strong and soft,
"I dared not entertain, elude me; yet
"Never of what they promised could I get
"A glimpse till now! The common sort, the crowd,
"Exist, perceive; with Being are endowed,
"However slight, distinct from what they See,
"However bounded; Happiness must be,
"To feed the first by gleanings from the last,
"Attain its qualities, and slow or fast
"Become what they behold; such peace-in-strife,
"By transmutation, is the Use of Life,
"The Alien turning Native to the soul
"Or bodywhich instructs me; I am whole
"There and demand a Palma; had the world
"Been from my soul to a like distance hurled,
"'T were Happiness to make it one with me:
"Whereas I must, ere I begin to Be,
"Include a world, in flesh, I comprehend
"In spirit now; and this done, what 's to blend
"With? Nought is Alien in the worldmy Will
"Owns all already; yet can turn itstill
"LessNative, since my Means to correspond
"With Will are so unworthy, 't was my bond
"To tread the very joys that tantalize
"Most now, into a grave, never to rise.
"I die then! Will the rest agree to die?
"Next Age or no? Shall its Sordello try
"Clue after clue, and catch at last the clue
"I miss?that 's underneath my finger too,
"Twice, thrice a day, perhaps,some yearning traced
"Deeper, some petty consequence embraced
"Closer! Why fled I Mantua, then?complained
"So much my Will was fettered, yet remained
"Content within a tether half the range
"I could assign it?able to exchange
"My ignorance (I felt) for knowledge, and
"Idle because I could thus understand
"Could e'en have penetrated to its core
"Our mortal mystery, yetfoolforbore,
"Preferred elaborating in the dark
"My casual stuff, by any wretched spark
"Born of my predecessors, though one stroke
"Of mine had brought the flame forth! Mantua's yoke,
"My minstrel's-trade, was to behold mankind,
"My own concern was just to bring my mind
"Behold, just extricate, for my acquist,
"Each object suffered stifle in the mist
"Which hazard, custom, blindness interpose
"Betwixt things and myself."
Whereat he rose.
The level wind carried above the firs
Clouds, the irrevocable travellers,
Onward.
"Pushed thus into a drowsy copse,
"Arms twine about my neck, each eyelid drops
"Under a humid finger; while there fleets,
"Outside the screen, a pageant time repeats
"Never again! To be deposed, immured
"Clandestinelystill petted, still assured
"To govern were fatiguing workthe Sight
"Fleeting meanwhile! 'T is noontide: wreak ere night
"Somehow my will upon it, rather! Slake
"This thirst somehow, the poorest impress take
"That serves! A blasted bud displays you, torn,
"Faint rudiments of the full flower unborn;
"But who divines what glory coats o'erclasp
"Of the bulb dormant in the mummy's grasp
"Taurello sent?" . . .
"Taurello? Palma sent
"Your Trouvere," (Naddo interposing leant
Over the lost bard's shoulder)"and, believe,
"You cannot more reluctantly receive
"Than I pronounce her message: we depart
"Together. What avail a poet's heart
"Verona's pomps and gauds? five blades of grass
"Suffice him. News? Why, where your marish was,
"On its mud-banks smoke rises after smoke
"I' the valley, like a spout of hell new-broke.
"Oh, the world's tidings! small your thanks, I guess,
"For them. The father of our Patroness,
"Has played Taurello an astounding trick,
"Parts between Ecelin and Alberic
"His wealth and goes into a convent: both
"Wed Guelfs: the Count and Palma plighted troth
"A week since at Verona: and they want
"You doubtless to contrive the marriage-chant
"Ere Richard storms Ferrara." Then was told
The tale from the beginninghow, made bold
By Salinguerra's absence, Guelfs had burned
And pillaged till he unawares returned
To take revenge: how Azzo and his friend
Were doing their endeavour, how the end
O' the siege was nigh, and how the Count, released
From further care, would with his marriage-feast
Inaugurate a new and better rule,
Absorbing thus Romano.
"Shall I school
"My master," added Naddo, "and suggest
"How you may clothe in a poetic vest
"These doings, at Verona? Your response
"To Palma! Wherefore jest? 'Depart at once?
"A good resolve! In truth, I hardly hoped
"So prompt an acquiescence. Have you groped
"Out wisdom in the wilds here?thoughts may be
"Over-poetical for poetry.
"Pearl-white, you poets liken Palma's neck;
"And yet what spoils an orient like some speck
"Of genuine white, turning its own white grey?
"You take me? Curse the cicala!"
One more day,
One eveappears Verona! Many a group,
(You mind) instructed of the osprey's swoop
On lynx and ounce, was gatheringChristendom
Sure to receive, whate'er the end was, from
The evening's purpose cheer or detriment,
Since Friedrich only waited some event
Like this, of Ghibellins establishing
Themselves within Ferrara, ere, as King
Of Lombardy, he 'd glad descend there, wage
Old warfare with the Pontiff, disengage
His barons from the burghers, and restore
The rule of Charlemagne, broken of yore
By Hildebrand.
I' the palace, each by each,
Sordello sat and Palma: little speech
At first in that dim closet, face with face
(Despite the tumult in the market-place)
Exchanging quick low laughters: now would rush
Word upon word to meet a sudden flush,
A look left off, a shifting lips' surmise
But for the most part their two histories
Ran best thro' the locked fingers and linked arms.
And so the night flew on with its alarms
Till in burst one of Palma's retinue;
"Now, Lady!" gasped he. Then arose the two
And leaned into Verona's air, dead-still.
A balcony lay black beneath until
Out, 'mid a gush of torchfire, grey-haired men
Came on it and harangued the people: then
Sea-like that people surging to and fro
Shouted, "Hale forth the carrochtrumpets, ho,
"A flourish! Run it in the ancient grooves!
"Back from the bell! Hammerthat whom behoves
"May hear the League is up! Peallearn who list,
"Verona means not first of towns break tryst
"To-morrow with the League!"
Enough. Now turn
Over the eastern cypresses: discern!
Is any beacon set a-glimmer?
Rang
The air with shouts that overpowered the clang
Of the incessant carroch, even: "Haste
"The candle 's at the gateway! ere it waste,
"Each soldier stand beside it, armed to march
"With Tiso Sampier through the eastern arch!"
Ferrara's succoured, Palma!
Once again
They sat together; some strange thing in train
To say, so difficult was Palma's place
In taking, with a coy fastidious grace
Like the bird's flutter ere it fix and feed.
But when she felt she held her friend indeed
Safe, she threw back her curls, began implant
Her lessons; telling of another want
Goito's quiet nourished than his own;
Palmato serve himto be served, alone
Importing; Agnes' milk so neutralized
The blood of Ecelin. Nor be surprised
If, while Sordello fain had captive led
Nature, in dream was Palma subjected
To some out-soul, which dawned not though she pined
Delaying, till its advent, heart and mind
Their life. "How dared I let expand the force
"Within me, till some out-soul, whose resource
"It grew for, should direct it? Every law
"Of life, its every fitness, every flaw,
"Must One determine whose corporeal shape
"Would be no other than the prime escape
"And revelation to me of a Will
"Orb-like o'ershrouded and inscrutable
"Above, save at the point which, I should know,
"Shone that myself, my powers, might overflow
"So far, so much; as now it signified
"Which earthly shape it henceforth chose my guide,
"Whose mortal lip selected to declare
"Its oracles, what fleshly garb would wear
"The first of intimations, whom to love;
"The next, how love him. Seemed that orb, above
"The castle-covert and the mountain-close,
"Slow in appearing?if beneath it rose
"Cravings, aversions,did our green precinct
"Take pride in me, at unawares distinct
"With this or that endowment,how, repressed
"At once, such jetting power shrank to the rest!
"Was I to have a chance touch spoil me, leave
"My spirit thence unfitted to receive
"The consummating spell?that spell so near
"Moreover! 'Waits he not the waking year?
"'His almond-blossoms must be honey-ripe
"'By this; to welcome him, fresh runnels stripe
"'The thawed ravines; because of him, the wind
"'Walks like a herald. I shall surely find
"'Him now!'
"And chief, that earnest April morn
"Of Richard's Love-court, was it time, so worn
"And white my cheek, so idly my blood beat,
"Sitting that morn beside the Lady's feet
"And saying as she prompted; till outburst
"One face from all the faces. Not then first
"I knew it; where in maple chamber glooms,
"Crowned with what sanguine-heart pomegranate blooms,
"Advanced it ever? Men's acknowledgment
"Sanctioned my own: 't was taken, Palma's bent,
"Sordello,recognized, accepted.
"Dumb
"Sat she still scheming. Ecelin would come
"Gaunt, scared, 'Cesano baffles me,' he 'd say:
"'Better I fought it out, my father's way!
"'Strangle Ferrara in its drowning flats,
"'And you and your Taurello yonder!what's
"'Romano's business there?' An hour's concern
"To cure the froward Chief!induce return
"As heartened from those overmeaning eyes,
"Wound up to persevere,his enterprise
"Marked out anew, its exigent of wit
"Apportioned,she at liberty to sit
"And scheme against the next emergence, I
"To covet her Taurello-sprite, made fly
"Or fold the wingto con your horoscope
"For leave command those steely shafts shoot ope,
"Or straight assuage their blinding eagerness
"In blank smooth snow What semblance of success
"To any of my plans for making you
"Mine and Romano's? Break the first wall through,
"Tread o'er the ruins of the Chief, supplant
"His sons beside, still, vainest were the vaunt:
"There, Salinguerra would obstruct me sheer,
"And the insuperable Tuscan, here,
"Stay me! But one wild eve that Lady died
"In her lone chamber: only I beside:
"Taurello far at Naples, and my sire
"At Padua, Ecelin away in ire
"With Alberic. She held me thusa clutch
"To make our spirits as our bodies touch
"And so began flinging the past up heaps
"Of uncouth treasure from their sunless sleeps
"Within her soul; deeds rose along with dreams,
"Fragments of many miserable schemes,
"Secrets, more secrets, thenno, not the last
"'Mongst others, like a casual trick o' the past,
"How . . . ay, she told me, gathering up her face,
"All left of it, into one arch-grimace
"To die with . . .
"Friend, 't is gone! but not the fear
"Of that fell laughing, heard as now I hear.
"Nor faltered voice, nor seemed her heart grow weak
"When i' the midst abrupt she ceased to speak
"Dead, as to serve a purpose, mark!for in
"Rushed o' the very instant Ecelin
"(How summoned, who divines?)looking as if
"He understood why Adelaide lay stiff
"Already in my arms; for 'Girl, how must
"'I manage Este in the matter thrust
"'Upon me, how unravel your bad coil?
"'Since' (he declared) ''t is on your browa soil
"'Like hers there!' then in the same breath, 'he lacked
"'No counsel after all, had signed no pact
"'With devils, nor was treason here or there,
"'Goito or Vicenza, his affair:
"'He buried it in Adelaide's deep grave,
"'Would begin life afresh, now,would not slave
"'For any Friedrich's nor Taurello's sake!
"'What booted him to meddle or to make
"'In Lombardy?' And afterward I knew
"The meaning of his promise to undo
"All she had donewhy marriages were made,
"New friendships entered on, old followers paid
"With curses for their pains,new friends' amaze
"At height, when, passing out by Gate St. Blaise,
"He stopped short in Vicenza, bent his head
"Over a friar's neck,'had vowed,' he said,
"'Long since, nigh thirty years, because his wife
"'And child were saved there, to bestow his life
"'On God, his gettings on the Church.'
"Exiled
"Within Goito, still one dream beguiled
"My days and nights; 't was found, the orb I sought
"To serve, those glimpses came of Fomalhaut,
"No other: but how serve it?authorize
"You and Romano mingle destinies?
"And straight Romano's angel stood beside
"Me who had else been Boniface's bride,
"For Salinguerra 't was, with neck low bent,
"And voice lightened to music, (as he meant
"To learn, not teach me,) who withdrew the pall
"From the dead past and straight revived it all,
"Making me see how first Romano waxed,
"Wherefore he waned now, why, if I relaxed
"My grasp (even I!) would drop a thing effete,
"Frayed by itself, unequal to complete
"Its course, and counting every step astray
"A gain so much. Romano, every way
"Stable, a Lombard House nowwhy start back
"Into the very outset of its track?
"This patching principle which late allied
"Our House with other Houseswhat beside
"Concerned the apparition, the first Knight
"Who followed Conrad hither in such plight
"His utmost wealth was summed in his one steed?
"For Ecelo, that prowler, was decreed
"A task, in the beginning hazardous
"To him as ever task can be to us;
"But did the weather-beaten thief despair
"When first our crystal cincture of warm air
"That binds the Trevisan,as its spice-belt
"(Crusaders say) the tract where Jesus dwelt,
"Furtive he pierced, and Este was to face
"Despaired Saponian strength of Lombard grace?
"Tried he at making surer aught made sure,
"Maturing what already was mature?
"No; his heart prompted Ecelo, 'Confront
"'Este, inspect yourself. What 's nature? Wont.
"'Discard three-parts your nature, and adopt
"'The rest as an advantage!' Old strength propped
"The man who first grew Podest among
"The Vicentines, no less than, while there sprung
"His palace up in Padua like a threat,
"Their noblest spied a grace, unnoticed yet
"In Conrad's crew. Thus far the object gained,
"Romano was establishedhas remained
"'For are you not Italian, truly peers
"'With Este? Azzo better soothes our ears
"'Than Alberic? or is this lion's-crine
"'From over-mounts' (this yellow hair of mine)
"'So weak a graft on Agnes Este's stock?'
"(Thus went he on with something of a mock)
"'Wherefore recoil, then, from the very fate
"'Conceded you, refuse to imitate
"'Your model farther? Este long since left
"'Being mere Este: as a blade its heft,
"'Este required the Pope to further him:
"'And you, the Kaiserwhom your father's whim
"'Foregoes or, better, never shall forego
"'If Palma dare pursue what Ecelo
"'Commenced, but Ecelin desists from: just
"'As Adelaide of Susa could intrust
"'Her donative,her Piedmont given the Pope,
"'Her Alpine-pass for him to shut or ope
"''Twixt France and Italy,to the superb
"'Matilda's perfecting,so, lest aught curb
"'Our Adelaide's great counter-project for
"'Giving her Trentine to the Emperor
"'With passage here from Germany,shall you
"'Take it,my slender plodding talent, too!'
"Urged me Taurello with his half-smile
"He
"As Patron of the scattered family
"Conveyed me to his Mantua, kept in bruit
"Azzo's alliances and Richard's suit
"Until, the Kaiser excommunicate,
"'Nothing remains,' Taurello said, 'but wait
"'Some rash procedure: Palma was the link,
"'As Agnes' child, between us, and they shrink
"'From losing Palma: judge if we advance,
"'Your father's method, your inheritance!'
"The day I was betrothed to Boniface
"At Padua by Taurello's self, took place
"The outrage of the Ferrarese: again,
"The day I sought Verona with the train
"Agreed for,by Taurello's policy
"Convicting Richard of the fault, since we
"Were present to annul or to confirm,
"Richard, whose patience had outstayed its term,
"Quitted Verona for the siege.
"And now
"What glory may engird Sordello's brow
"Through this? A month since at Oliero slunk
"All that was Ecelin into a monk;
"But how could Salinguerra so forget
"His liege of thirty years as grudge even yet
"One effort to recover him? He sent
"Forthwith the tidings of this last event
"To Ecelindeclared that he, despite
"The recent folly, recognized his right
"To order Salinguerra: 'Should he wring
"'Its uttermost advantage out, or fling
"'This chance away? Or were his sons now Head
"'O' the House?' Through me Taurello's missive sped;
"My father's answer will by me return.
"Behold! 'For him,' he writes, 'no more concern
"'With strife than, for his children, with fresh plots
"'Of Friedrich. Old engagements out he blots
"'For aye: Taurello shall no more subserve,
"'Nor Ecelin impose.' Lest this unnerve
"Taurello at this juncture, slack his grip
"Of Richard, suffer the occasion slip,
"I, in his sons' default (who, mating with
"Este, forsake Romano as the frith
"Its mainsea for that firmland, sea makes head
"Against) I stand, Romano,in their stead
"Assume the station they desert, and give
"Still, as the Kaiser's representative,
"Taurello licence he demands. Midnight
"Morningby noon to-morrow, making light
"Of the League's issue, we, in some gay weed
"Like yours, disguised together, may precede
"The arbitrators to Ferrara: reach
"Him, let Taurello's noble accents teach
"The rest! Then say if I have misconceived
"Your destiny, too readily believed
"The Kaiser's cause your own!"
And Palma's fled.
Though no affirmative disturbs the head,
A dying lamp-flame sinks and rises o'er,
Like the alighted planet Pollux wore,
Until, morn breaking, he resolves to be
Gate-vein of this heart's blood of Lombardy,
Soul of this bodyto wield this aggregate
Of souls and bodies, and so conquer fate
Though he should livea centre of disgust
Evenapart, core of the outward crust
He vivifies, assimilates. For thus
I bring Sordello to the rapturous
Exclaim at the crowd's cry, because one round
Of life was quite accomplished; and he found
Not only that a soul, whate'er its might,
Is insufficient to its own delight,
Both in corporeal organs and in skill
By means of such to body forth its Will
And, after, insufficient to apprise
Men of that Will, oblige them recognize
The Hid by the Revealedbut that,the last
Nor lightest of the struggles overpast,
Will, he bade abdicate, which would not void
The throne, might sit there, suffer he enjoyed
Mankind, a varied and divine array
Incapable of homage, the first way,
Nor fit to render incidentally
Tribute connived at, taken by the by,
In joys. If thus with warrant to rescind
The ignominious exile of mankind
Whose proper service, ascertained intact
As yet, (to be by him themselves made act,
Not watch Sordello acting each of them)
Was to secureif the true diadem
Seemed imminent while our Sordello drank
The wisdom of that golden Palma,thank
Verona's Lady in her citadel
Founded by Gaulish Brennus, legends tell:
And truly when she left him, the sun reared
A head like the first clamberer's who peered
A-top the Capitol, his face on flame
With triumph, triumphing till Manlius came.
Nor slight too much my rhymesthat spring, dispread,
Dispart, disperse, lingering over head
Like an escape of angels! Rather say,
My transcendental platan! mounting gay
(An archimage so courts a novice-queen)
With tremulous silvered trunk, whence branches sheen
Laugh out, thick-foliaged next, a-shiver soon
With coloured buds, then glowing like the moon
One mild flame,last a pause, a burst, and all
Her ivory limbs are smothered by a fall,
Bloom-flinders and fruit-sparkles and leaf-dust,
Ending the weird work prosecuted just
For her amusement; he decrepit, stark,
Dozes; her uncontrolled delight may mark
Apart
Yet not so, surely never so
Only, as good my soul were suffered go
O'er the lagune: forth fare thee, put aside
Entrance thy synod, as a god may glide
Out of the world he fills, and leave it mute
For myriad ages as we men compute,
Returning into it without a break
O' the consciousness! They sleep, and I awake
O'er the lagune, being at Venice.
Note,
In just such songs as Eglamor (say) wrote
With heart and soul and strength, for he believed
Himself achieving all to be achieved
By singerin such songs you find alone
Completeness, judge the song and singer one,
And either purpose answered, his in it
Or its in him: while from true works (to wit
Sordello's dream-performances that will
Never be more than dreamed) escapes there still
Some proof, the singer's proper life was 'neath
The life his song exhibits, this a sheath
To that; a passion and a knowledge far
Transcending these, majestic as they are,
Smouldered; his lay was but an episode
In the bard's life: which evidence you owed
To some slight weariness, some looking-off
Or start-away. The childish skit or scoff
In "Charlemagne," (his poem, dreamed divine
In every point except one silly line
About the restiff daughters)what may lurk
In that? "My life commenced before this work,"
(So I interpret the significance
Of the bard's start aside and look askance)
"My life continues after: on I fare
"With no more stopping, possibly, no care
"To note the undercurrent, the why and how,
"Where, when, o' the deeper life, as thus just now.
"But, silent, shall I cease to live? Alas
"For you! who sigh, 'When shall it come to pass
"'We read that story? How will he compress
"'The future gains, his life's true business,
"'Into the better lay whichthat one flout,
"'Howe'er inopportune it be, lets out
"'Engrosses him already, though professed
"'To meditate with us eternal rest,
"'And partnership in all his life has found?'"
'T is but a sailor's promise, weather-bound:
"Strike sail, slip cable, here the bark be moored
"For once, the awning stretched, the poles assured!
"Noontide above; except the wave's crisp dash,
"Or buzz of colibri, or tortoise' splash,
"The margin 's silent: out with every spoil
"Made in our tracking, coil by mighty coil,
"This serpent of a river to his head
"I' the midst! Admire each treasure, as we spread
"The bank, to help us tell our history
"Aright: give ear, endeavour to descry
"The groves of giant rushes, how they grew
"Like demons' endlong tresses we sailed through,
"What mountains yawned, forests to give us vent
"Opened, each doleful side, yet on we went
"Till . . . may that beetle (shake your cap) attest
"The springing of a land-wind from the West!"
Wherefore? Ah yes, you frolic it to-day!
To-morrow, and, the pageant moved away
Down to the poorest tent-pole, we and you
Part company: no other may pursue
Eastward your voyage, be informed what fate
Intends, if triumph or decline await
The tempter of the everlasting steppe.
I muse this on a ruined palace-step
At Venice: why should I break off, nor sit
Longer upon my step, exhaust the fit
England gave birth to? Who 's adorable
Enough reclaim a - no Sordello's Will
Alack!be queen to me? That Bassanese
Busied among her smoking fruit-boats? These
Perhaps from our delicious Asolo
Who twinkle, pigeons o'er the portico
Not prettier, bind June lilies into sheaves
To deck the bridge-side chapel, dropping leaves
Soiled by their own loose gold-meal? Ah, beneath
The cool arch stoops she, brownest cheek! Her wreath
Endures a montha half-monthif I make
A queen of her, continue for her sake
Sordello's story? Nay, that Paduan girl
Splashes with barer legs where a live whirl
In the dead black Giudecca proves sea-weed
Drifting has sucked down three, four, all indeed
Save one pale-red striped, pale-blue turbaned post
For gondolas.
You sad dishevelled ghost
That pluck at me and point, are you advised
I breathe? Let stay those girls (e'en her disguised
Jewels i' the locks that love no crownet like
Their native field-buds and the green wheat-spike,
So fair!who left this end of June's turmoil,
Shook off, as might a lily its gold soil,
Pomp, save a foolish gem or two, and free
In dream, came join the peasants o'er the sea.)
Look they too happy, too tricked out? Confess
There is such ****rd stock of happiness
To share, that, do one's uttermost, dear wretch,
One labours ineffectually to stretch
It o'er you so that mother and children, both
May equitably flaunt the sumpter-cloth!
Divide the robe yet farther: be content
With seeing just a score pre-eminent
Through shreds of it, acknowledged happy wights,
Engrossing what should furnish all, by rights!
For, these in evidence, you clearlier claim
A like garb for the rest,grace all, the same
As these my peasants. I ask youth and strength
And health for each of you, not moreat length
Grown wise, who asked at home that the whole race
Might add the spirit's to the body's grace,
And all be dizened out as chiefs and bards.
But in this magic weather one discards
Much old requirement. Venice seems a type
Of Life'twixt blue and blue extends, a stripe,
As Life, the somewhat, hangs 'twixt nought and nought:
'T is Venice, and 't is Lifeas good you sought
To spare me the Piazza's slippery stone
Or keep me to the unchoked canals alone,
As hinder Life the evil with the good
Which make up Living, rightly understood.
Only, do finish something! Peasants, queens,
Take them, made happy by whatever means,
Parade them for the common credit, vouch
That a luckless residue, we send to crouch
In corners out of sight, was just as framed
For happiness, its portion might have claimed
As well, and so, obtaining joy, had stalked
Fastuous as any!such my project, baulked
Already; I hardly venture to adjust
The first rags, when you find me. To mistrust
Me!nor unreasonably. You, no doubt,
Have the true knack of tiring suitors out
With those thin lips on tremble, lashless eyes
Inveterately tear-shot: there, be wise,
Mistress of mine, there, there, as if I meant
You insult!shall your friend (not slave) be shent
For speaking home? Beside, care-bit erased
Broken-up beauties ever took my taste
Supremely; and I love you more, far more
Than her I looked should foot Life's temple-floor.
Years ago, leagues at distance, when and where
A whisper came, "Let others seek!thy care
"Is found, thy life's provision; if thy race
"Should be thy mistress, and into one face
"The many faces crowd?" Ah, had I, judge,
Or no, your secret? Rough apparelgrudge
All ornaments save tag or tassel worn
To hint we are not thoroughly forlorn
Slouch bonnet, unloop mantle, careless go
Alone (that's saddest, but it must be so)
Through Venice, sing now and now glance aside,
Aught desultory or undignified,
Then, ravishingest lady, will you pass
Or not each formidable group, the mass
Before the Basilic (that feast gone by,
God's great day of the Corpus Domini)
And, wistfully foregoing proper men,
Come timid up to me for alms? And then
The luxury to hesitate, feign do
Some unexampled grace!when, whom but you
Dare I bestow your own upon? And hear
Further before you say, it is to sneer
I call you ravishing; for I regret
Little that she, whose early foot was set
Forth as she 'd plant it on a pedestal,
Now, i' the silent city, seems to fall
Toward meno wreath, only a lip's unrest
To quiet, surcharged eyelids to be pressed
Dry of their tears upon my bosom. Strange
Such sad chance should produce in thee such change,
My love! Warped souls and bodies! yet God spoke
Of right-hand, foot and eyeselects our yoke,
Sordello, as your poetship may find!
So, sleep upon my shoulder, child, nor mind
Their foolish talk; we 'll manage reinstate
Your old worth; ask moreover, when they prate
Of evil men past hope, "Don't each contrive,
"Despite the evil you abuse, to live?
"Keeping, each losel, through a maze of lies,
"His own conceit of truth? to which he hies
"By obscure windings, tortuous, if you will,
"But to himself not inaccessible;
"He sees truth, and his lies are for the crowd
"Who cannot see; some fancied right allowed
"His vilest wrong, empowered the losel clutch
"One pleasure from a multitude of such
"Denied him." Then assert, "All men appear
"To think all better than themselves, by here
"Trusting a crowd they wrong; but really," say,
"All men think all men stupider than they,
"Since, save themselves, no other comprehends
"The complicated scheme to make amends
"Evil, the scheme by which, thro' Ignorance,
"Good labours to exist." A slight advance,
Merely to find the sickness you die through,
And nought beside! but if one can't eschew
One's portion in the common lot, at least
One can avoid an ignorance increased
Tenfold by dealing out hint after hint
How nought were like dispensing without stint
The water of lifeso easy to dispense
Beside, when one has probed the centre whence
Commotion 's borncould tell you of it all!
"Meantime, just meditate my madrigal
"O' the mugwort that conceals a dewdrop safe!"
What, dullard? we and you in smothery chafe,
Babes, baldheads, stumbled thus far into Zin
The Horrid, getting neither out nor in,
A hungry sun above us, sands that bung
Our throats,each dromedary lolls a tongue,
Each camel churns a sick and frothy chap,
And you, 'twixt tales of Potiphar's mishap,
And sonnets on the earliest **** that spoke,
Remark, you wonder any one needs choke
With founts about! Potsherd him, Gibeonites!
While awkwardly enough your Moses smites
The rock, though he forego his Promised Land
Thereby, have Satan claim his carcass, and
Figure as Metaphysic Poet . . . ah,
Mark ye the dim first oozings? Meribah!
Then, quaffing at the fount my courage gained,
Recallnot that I prompt yewho explained . . .
"Presumptuous!" interrupts one. You, not I
'T is brother, marvel at and magnify
Such office: "office," quotha? can we get
To the beginning of the office yet?
What do we here? simply experiment
Each on the other's power and its intent
When elsewhere tasked,if this of mine were trucked
For yours to either's good,we watch construct,
In short, an engine: with a finished one,
What it can do, is all,nought, how 't is done.
But this of ours yet in probation, dusk
A kernel of strange wheelwork through its husk
Grows into shape by quarters and by halves;
Remark this tooth's spring, wonder what that valve's
Fall bodes, presume each faculty's device,
Make out each other more or less precise
The scope of the whole engine 's to be proved;
We die: which means to say, the whole 's removed,
Dismounted wheel by wheel, this complex gin,
To be set up anew elsewhere, begin
A task indeed, but with a clearer clime
Than the murk lodgment of our building-time.
And then, I grant you, it behoves forget
How 't is doneall that must amuse us yet
So long: and, while you turn upon your heel,
Pray that I be not busy slitting steel
Or shredding brass, camped on some virgin shore
Under a cluster of fresh stars, before
I name a tithe o' the wheels I trust to do!
So occupied, then, are we: hitherto,
At present, and a weary while to come,
The office of ourselves,nor blind nor dumb,
And seeing somewhat of man's state,has been,
For the worst of us, to say they so have seen;
For the better, what it was they saw; the best
Impart the gift of seeing to the rest:
"So that I glance," says such an one, "around,
"And there 's no face but I can read profound
"Disclosures in; this stands for hope, thatfear,
"And for a speech, a deed in proof, look here!
"'Stoop, else the strings of blossom, where the nuts
"'O'erarch, will blind thee! Said I not? She shuts
"'Both eyes this time, so close the hazels meet!
"'Thus, prisoned in the Piombi, I repeat
"'Events one rove occasioned, o'er and o'er,
"'Putting 'twixt me and madness evermore
"'Thy sweet shape, Zanze! Therefore stoop!'
"'That's truth!'
"(Adjudge you) 'the incarcerated youth
"'Would say that!'
"Youth? Plara the bard? Set down
"That Plara spent his youth in a grim town
"Whose cramped ill-featured streets huddled about
"The minster for protection, never out
"Of its black belfry's shade and its bells' roar.
"The brighter shone the suburb,all the more
"Ugly and absolute that shade's reproof
"Of any chance escape of joy,some roof,
"Taller than they, allowed the rest detect,
"Before the sole permitted laugh (suspect
"Who could, 't was meant for laughter, that ploughed cheek's
"Repulsive gleam!) when the sun stopped both peaks
"Of the cleft belfry like a fiery wedge,
"Then sank, a huge flame on its socket edge,
"With leavings on the grey glass oriel-pane
"Ghastly some minutes more. No fear of rain
"The minster minded that! in heaps the dust
"Lay everywhere. This town, the minster's trust,
"Held Plara; who, its denizen, bade hail
"In twice twelve sonnets, Tempe's dewy vale."
"'Exact the town, the minster and the street!'"
"As all mirth triumphs, sadness means defeat:
"Lust triumphs and is gay, Love 's triumphed o'er
"And sad: but Lucio 's sad. I said before,
"Love's sad, not Lucio; one who loves may be
"As gay his love has leave to hope, as he
"Downcast that lusts' desire escapes the springe:
"'T is of the mood itself I speak, what tinge
"Determines it, else colourless,or mirth,
"Or melancholy, as from heaven or earth."
"'Ay, that 's the variation's gist!'
"Indeed?
"Thus far advanced in safety then, proceed!
"And having seen too what I saw, be bold
"And next encounter what I do behold
"(That's sure) but bid you take on trust!"
Attack
The use and purpose of such sights! Alack,
Not so unwisely does the crowd dispense
On Salinguerras praise in preference
To the Sordellos: men of action, these!
Who, seeing just as little as you please,
Yet turn that little to account,engage
With, do not gaze at,carry on, a stage,
The work o' the world, not merely make report
The work existed ere their day! In short,
When at some future no-time a brave band
Sees, using what it sees, then shake my hand
In heaven, my brother! Meanwhile where's the hurt
Of keeping the Makers-see on the alert,
At whose defection mortals stare aghast
As though heaven's bounteous windows were slammed fast
Incontinent? Whereas all you, beneath,
Should scowl at, bruise their lips and break their teeth
Who ply the pullies, for neglecting you:
And therefore have I moulded, made anew
A Man, and give him to be turned and tried,
Be angry with or pleased at. On your side,
Have ye times, places, actors of your own?
Try them upon Sordello when full-grown,
And thenah then! If Hercules first parched
His foot in Egypt only to be marched
A sacrifice for Jove with pomp to suit,
What chance have I? The demigod was mute
Till, at the altar, where time out of mind
Such guests became oblations, chaplets twined
His forehead long enough, and he began
Slaying the slayers, nor escaped a man.
Take not affront, my gentle audience! whom
No Hercules shall make his hecatomb,
Believe, nor from his brows your chaplet rend
That's your kind suffrage, yours, my patron-friend,
Whose great verse blares unintermittent on
Like your own trumpeter at Marathon,
You who, Plata and Salamis being scant,
Put up with tna for a stimulant
And did well, I acknowledged, as he loomed
Over the midland sea last month, presumed
Long, lay demolished in the blazing West
At eve, while towards him tilting cloudlets pressed
Like Persian ships at Salamis. Friend, wear
A crest proud as desert while I declare
Had I a flawless ruby fit to wring
Tears of its colour from that painted king
Who lost it, I would, for that smile which went
To my heart, fling it in the sea, content,
Wearing your verse in place, an amulet
Sovereign against all passion, wear and fret!
My English Eyebright, if you are not glad
That, as I stopped my task awhile, the sad
Dishevelled form, wherein I put mankind
To come at times and keep my pact in mind,
Renewed me,hear no crickets in the hedge,
Nor let a glowworm spot the river's edge
At home, and may the summer showers gush
Without a warning from the missel thrush!
So, to our business, nowthe fate of such
As find our common natureovermuch
Despised because restricted and unfit
To bear the burthen they impose on it
Cling when they would discard it; craving strength
To leap from the allotted world, at length
They do leap,flounder on without a term,
Each a god's germ, doomed to remain a germ
In unexpanded infancy, unless . . .
But that 's the storydull enough, confess!
There might be fitter subjects to allure;
Still, neither misconceive my portraiture
Nor undervalue its adornments quaint:
What seems a fiend perchance may prove a saint.
Ponder a story ancient pens transmit,
Then say if you condemn me or acquit.
John the Beloved, banished Antioch
For Patmos, bade collectively his flock
Farewell, but set apart the closing eve
To comfort those his exile most would grieve,
He knew: a touching spectacle, that house
In motion to receive him! Xanthus' spouse
You missed, made panther's meat a month since; but
Xanthus himself (his nephew 't was, they shut
'Twixt boards and sawed asunder) Polycarp,
Soft Charicle, next year no wheel could warp
To swear by Csar's fortune, with the rest
Were ranged; thro' whom the grey disciple pressed,
Busily blessing right and left, just stopped
To pat one infant's curls, the hangman cropped
Soon after, reached the portal. On its hinge
The door turns and he enters: what quick twinge
Ruins the smiling mouth, those wide eyes fix
Whereon, why like some spectral candlestick's
Branch the disciple's arms? Dead swooned he, woke
Anon, heaved sigh, made shift to gasp, heart-broke,
"Get thee behind me, Satan! Have I toiled
"To no more purpose? Is the gospel foiled
"Here too, and o'er my son's, my Xanthus' hearth,
"Portrayed with sooty garb and features swarth
"Ah Xanthus, am I to thy roof beguiled
"To see thethethe Devil domiciled?"
Whereto sobbed Xanthus, "Father, 't is yourself
"Installed, a limning which our utmost pelf
"Went to procure against to-morrow's loss;
"And that's no twy-prong, but a pastoral cross,
"You 're painted with!"
His puckered brows unfold
And you shall hear Sordello's story told.
~ Robert Browning, Sordello - Book the Third
,#NFDB
39 Integral Yoga
10 Psychology
7 Poetry
7 Occultism
6 Fiction
5 Christianity
4 Philosophy
2 Islam
2 Hinduism
2 Baha i Faith
1 Science
1 Mythology
1 Buddhism
1 Alchemy
30 The Mother
22 Satprem
6 Nolini Kanta Gupta
6 H P Lovecraft
5 Carl Jung
4 Walt Whitman
4 Jordan Peterson
3 George Van Vrekhem
2 Vyasa
2 Thubten Chodron
2 Sri Aurobindo
2 Saint Augustine of Hippo
2 Plato
2 Muhammad
2 Baha u llah
2 Anonymous
7 Agenda Vol 10
6 Lovecraft - Poems
6 Agenda Vol 08
4 Whitman - Poems
4 On Thoughts And Aphorisms
4 Maps of Meaning
3 The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious
3 Preparing for the Miraculous
2 Words Of The Mother III
2 Vishnu Purana
2 Quran
2 Prayers And Meditations
2 Mysterium Coniunctionis
2 How to Free Your Mind - Tara the Liberator
2 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03
2 City of God
2 Agenda Vol 07
0.10 - Letters to a Young Captain, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
of a benevolent God? Would he not also participate in
this new realisation?
0 1963-06-29, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
According to the little popular wisdom, it seems his successor is a man with still more progressive ideas. I saw his photo (but its a newspaper photo, theyre generally very bad: you cant have any contact, you only see this much [gesture on the surface]). The thing that struck me most is a sort of insincerity. A benevolent and ecclesiastical insincerityif you know what I mean?
Very well.
0 1964-10-14, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
They are convinced that they are right and I am wrong, and its out of a sort of benevolent respect for me (Mother laughs) and of politeness that they dont tell me, Really, youre exaggerating, we were right.
Ah, lets work!
0 1965-11-20, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
She kept me almost an hour! She told me, The next time, I wont chatter. So this time it was only half an hour! But she has a very pleasant way of saying things. And there is a strange phenomenon, which took place some two or three years ago, I dont remember now. It was after the consciousness had entirely spread all over the world (all over the earth, in reality), but as if progressively, in the sense that its more intense close at hand and less intense farther away. But then, with Bharatidi, its not just a physical closeness: its a sort of closeness of vibration in a certain domain; and in her, the closeness lay in a certain ironically benevolent observation. And while talking with someone, I dont know how many times I have caught myself having Bharatidis voice and using her words! And in my ingenuousness, I told her, Do you know, we have such an intimate relationship that at timesvery oftenwhen I speak I have your intonation and use your words. Ah, mon petit, since then But she isnt a bore! You can spend an hour with her without getting bored, which is remarkable.
***
0 1966-03-04, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And the strange thing the strange thingis that outwardly you go on living automatically according to certain ways of life, which no longer even have the virtue of appearing necessary, which no longer even have the force of being that habits have, but which are accepted and lived almost automatically with the sense (a kind of feeling, of sensation, but its neither feeling nor sensation, its a sort of very subtle perception) that Something, so immense that its undefinable, wants it so. I say wants it so or I say chooses it so, but its wants it so; its a Will that doesnt function like the human will, but that wants it sowants it or sees it or decides it so. And in each thing, there is that luminous, golden, imperative Vibration which is necessarily all-powerful. And it results in a background of perfect well-being of Certitude, which, a little lower down in the consciousness, is expressed as a benevolent and amused smile.
I feel like asking you a question. A little further on, Sri Aurobindo speaks of the worlds having neither beginning nor end, and he says that their creation and destruction is a play of hide and seek with our outward consciousness.2
0 1966-11-19, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And the habit of constantly complaining about difficulties, oh, how futile, useless all that seemeda waste of time. We waste our time protesting against what mustnt bewe just shouldnt think about it! We shouldnt be conscious of it, thats all! It should be outside the consciousness; when we are able to have a purely luminous consciousness, this perfectly harmonious, luminous, benevolent consciousness free, ultimately, from all that we drag along from a difficult past.
Thats it: the power to free oneself from the past, not to drag that behind foreverto surge into the light and stay there.
0 1967-01-31, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There is such a curious thing: at times the atmosphere is grumpy, grouchy; all that comes, all that enters is like that; at other times its smiling, pleasant, benevolent, and then all that comes (exactly the same things as before), all that comes is received pleasantly, like that: Oh, thats good.
And I have noticed that it doesnt depend on circumstances or on people or on anything; it depends (Mother sniffs the air) as if something had been added or taken away in the atmosphere. Have you noticed?
0 1967-03-22, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It is the maximum use of all possibilities and all impossibilities, all capacities and all incapacities; a maximum use in a maximum power and a maximum Compassion, and then a smile! A smile, a sense of humour, oh! Such a benevolent irony, so full of compassion, so wonderful. And this presumptuous mind, which is an incredible phenomenon indeed: it spends its time judging what it doesnt know and deciding on what it doesnt see!
(silence)
0 1967-07-26, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There has been for some time, I dont know, a sort of benevolent, smiling and constructive irony. As if a spirit had come. Then, there is something else (but I know that one), which Sri Aurobindo used to call a censor. He told me, You have a very strong censor in your atmosphere. It was all the time, constantly criticizing me; not so often now, but its still there. And now and then, it tells me, But you shock people! They expect something noble, great, imposing, and you always speak in an ironic tone! Yesterday again, some people came to see meand jokes keep coming to me all the time. I tell them jokes, and I watch (laughing) they look appalled!
As if that was constantly saying, But dont take things seriously! Dont take things seriously, dont take things seriously thats what makes you unhappy! Thats what makes you unhappy, it makes you unhappy, you must learn to smile, like that. And above all, to make fun of ourselves, thats the most important thing: to see how ridiculous we are the slightest pain and we are full of self-pity, oh!
0 1967-09-16, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Yes, the first impression was painful, then I took a good look; and at bottom, the whole trouble comes from the fact that this person has a very high opinion of herself, she judges everything from the height of her superiority for instance, that air of benevolent compassion for the Ashram. But that was my first impression when I saw her for the first time, and it has been growing since then and this letter has fully confirmed it.
So then, I didnt say anything, but yesterday I made F. talk about the lady, and she finally told me, There is something I have never told you because it made me uneasy, but today I will tell you. Soon after we first met, Mrs. Z told me one day (I repeat word for word), Because of MY position and YOUR position, I am convinced that we are destined to bring about the rapprochement of the Catholic Church and the Ashram. F. told me, I didnt replydidnt argue, didnt answer, didnt say a word or anything, I just left it at that.
0 1967-10-11, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Yes, with a wholly benevolent mask.
Very interesting.
0 1967-11-29, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But the strange thing was that this time, on the 24th, when I went to the balcony, it was someone (and that happens to me now and then, more and more frequently) someone looking on from a sort of plane of eternity, with, mingled in it, a great benevolence (something like benevolence, I dont know how to express it), but with an absolute calm, almost indifference, and the two are together looking on like that (Mother draws waves far away below), as though it were seen from far away, far above, far (how should I put it?) seen from such an eternal vision. That was what my body felt when I went out for the balcony. So the body said, But I have to aspire, there must be an aspiration for the Force to descend on all these people! And That was like that (sovereign gesture above), oh, so benevolent, but with a sort of indifference the indifference of eternity, I dont know how to explain it. And the body feels it all as something making use of it.
Thats why I find these photos interesting, its to objectify the state.
0 1968-07-17, #Agenda Vol 09, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Mother, it is without the least reservation that I give you this name of Mother, to you who have given life back to my favorite son. His stay at the Ashram has marked an essential stage. There has been in his inmost being a radical upheaval. May I add that I myself feel your powerful and benevolent protection? I have the impression of being understood by you, and I feel I am the inheritoralong with your numerous sons, daughters and disciplesof the spiritual treasures accumulated each day by your fidelity to the mission entrusted to you. With my deep and intense gratitude, may you accept, Mother, the token of my respectful and filial piety.
Do you have this mans photo? No?
0 1969-01-01, #Agenda Vol 10, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Yes, there was It came slowly in the night, and this morning when I woke up, there was a golden Dawn, as it were, and the atmosphere was very light. The body felt, Oh, its really truly new. A light, golden Light and benevolent. benevolent in the sense of a certitudea harmonious certitude.3
It was new.
0 1969-01-04, #Agenda Vol 10, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It lasted I felt it for at least three hours. Afterwards, I stopped concerning myself with it, I dont know what happened. But I told you a few words about it, and I spoke to two or three others: they had all felt it. Which means it was VERY material. They had all felt a sort of joy like that, but an amiable, powerful joy, and oh, so sweet, very smiling, VERY benevolent something I dont know what it is. I dont know what it is, but its a kind of benevolence; so it was something very close to the human. And so concrete! So concrete. As if it had a taste, so concrete was it. Afterwards, I didnt concern myself with it anymore, except that I told two or three people about it: they had all felt it. Now, I dont know whether it has mingled or It hasnt gone, it doesnt give the feeling of something that comes only to go away.
It was far more external than the things I usually feel, far more external. Hardly mental at all, I mean there was no sense of a promise or No. It would rather be like My own impression was that of an immense personality, immense (meaning that for it, the earth was small, like this [Mother holds a small object in the hollow of her hands], like a ball), an immense personality, so very benevolent, and coming to (Mother seems to gently raise the little ball in the hollow of her hands). It was the impression of a personal god (yet it was I dont know) who comes to help. So very strong! And so sweet at the same time, so understanding.
And it was very external: the body felt it everywhere, everywhere (Mother touches her face, her hands), all over like this.
--
Since then, the bodythis bodyhas been feeling (it has been permeated by that everywhere, a lot), it has been feeling much more joyful and less concentrated, living more in a happy, smiling expansion. For instance, it speaks more easily. Theres a note a constant note of benevolence. A smile, you know, a benevolent smile, and all that with a GREAT FORCE. I dont know.
Havent you felt anything?
--
It was luminous, smiling, and so benevolent because of its POWER: I mean that generally, benevolence in the human being is something slightly weak, in the sense that it doesnt like battle, it doesnt like struggle but this wasnt like that at all! A benevolence that imposes itself (Mother brings her two fists down on the armrests of her chair).
It interested me because it was entirely new. And so concrete! Concrete like this (Mother touches the arms of her chair), like what the physical consciousness usually regards as others, as concrete as that. Which means it didnt come through some inner being, through the psychic being: it came DIRECTLY onto the body.
0 1969-02-19, #Agenda Vol 10, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The body is aware that That, this Consciousness, knows full well whether it will continue or not. It has never been told anything, and it knows (it has felt the two things equally, as equal certitudes, and with equal acceptance), it knows this is the most favorable condition for the work, so it doesnt ask anything. There are worries around (of all kinds), from an anguish at the idea that it could happen (all around, like that) to (laughing) a haste for the end to come! (That also happens.) But now the body has learned to be ab-so-lute-ly indifferent to those reactionsabsolutely. It smiles. It smiles with this benevolent Smile [of the superman consciousness], it has the same smile. And it sees, it knows, it senses where that [the worry or the haste] comes from, its thoroughly conscious. After all, its very amusing! Theres a whole gamut, a whole scale, from fear (a semiconscious, blind fear) to (Mother laughs) an impatient desire! Free at last! Free at last to do all the foolish things I want to do! It seems there arent many, but there are some.2 The two opposites of blind Ignorance coming together. The body has become very conscious: its very sensitive to what comes from people. It didnt have that before, but now it senses.
Its supported, helped: this superman consciousness that has come helps it a lot, its through it that the body feels, and that helps it a lot. Sometimes, when someone comes in, along with him (him or her or them) comes a slight acute uneasiness; if the body had felt that before knowing, it would have been painful, but now it can smile and wait to discover why its like that (Mother gestures as if to trace the vibration that caused the uneasiness). With others, on the contrary, the atmosphere is immediately filled with the presence of this Consciousness (thats new, and very interesting), so then the body feels fineit feels fine, rested.
0 1969-04-02, #Agenda Vol 10, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its wonderful, this Consciousness, it has such a way of seeing things! Really really unique. I could say that my vision and my understanding of the world, of life, of everything, have completely changed, in a widening Of course, I had worked constantly to get the widening, but this widening has shown itself to be full of something completely new, completely. And there are two things mingled together: one is this sort of understanding and benevolent Smile, which is CONSTANT, whatever may be there, even the most stupid negations; and at the same time, underneath this benevolence (but benevolence is a weak word), theres such a power! A tremendous power. Tremendous As if it were swollen with power. An almost concrete power, I dont know (Mother feels the air) its a light, but a light you could touch, as it were: if it goes through your fingers, its so concrete that you feel it go through. A deep golden light.
In the space of a few days, I had two cases of people who behaved like fools and ninnies (that often happens!), but those two realized it, felt it, and wrote to me accusing themselves of the very thing that had been seen in this light. So thats new. There was one letter yesterday, and another today; one is a Frenchman, the other an American. Both had behaved absolutely like silly fools, but ordinarily they would have excused their behavior with all sorts of good reasons, while both accused themselves: Ive behaved like a fool. Thats new.
0 1969-04-26, #Agenda Vol 10, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
A benevolent goodwill towards all worshippers.
An enlightened indifference towards all religions.
0 1969-06-25, #Agenda Vol 10, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And above all, above all, the chatter of words For instance, it has become very hard for me to read a letter: there are always at least a hundred times too many words. And its easy to see its in the head that it goes like this (gesture of a jumble). But then, here (gesture to the forehead), it has remained mar-vel-ous-ly tranquil and calm and white and oh, thats really a Grace. It has remained like that. So all those things that come and try to entertheres no response, they are kept at a distance. And then, the Solicitude, the Care taken to make the thing as easy as we permit it to beits wonderful! Wonderful Naturally, from time to time, one is crushed under the weight of stupidity, but behind, there is nevertheless a benevolent Goodness, smiling and so TREMENDOUS that nothing matters, no worry There. So
The body has the sensation of hanging between two states: one which people call life, and the other which people call death. The body feels its hanging between the two: neither alive nor (laughing) dead, like that, neither one nor the other. Its between the two. And thats very odd. Very odd. There is an impression (not an impression, its a perception) that the slightest disorder (gesture of tipping over to the left) would be enough to fling it to the other side, and that this very slight movement this way (gesture of tipping over to the right, into life) is made impossible by something one doesnt understand. And it takes very little to
0 1969-08-23, #Agenda Vol 10, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But I must say that from the standpoint of action (not even merely material action, because I have almost no material action left, so to say), but of invisible action, with this Consciousness I have learned a LOT, quite a lot. It has our means are very childish, and, you know, it has such a wonderful sense of humor, a way of making people face their stupidity, which is really really charming. And I see it constantly, all the time, for very small things, for big things, for a countrys politics or the organization of a houseall the same thing. And with a delightful irony and so benevolent: no sense of reprobation, no The idea of evil and sin and all thatprrrt! all gone.
Its only the pressure of the Consciousness on the inconscientand then, in people, the measure of the resistance or of the receptivity. its like that. In some people (and not always the apparently bad ones), theres such resistance! Its like like iron. While others
0 1970-07-11, #Agenda Vol 11, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You see, its a light with several degrees, and in the most material its slightly it must be the supramental force, because its slightly golden, slightly pinkish (you know that light), but very, very pale. One of them (gesture pointing to another, higher layer) is white like milk, opaqueits very strong. And theres another (gesture very high) which is white like its transparent light. With that one, its strange: one drop of it on the hostile forces, and theyre dissolved. They melt like this (gesture before ones very eyes). I said all that to Sri Aurobindo, he completely confirmed it. Thats essentially the Grace in its (gesture very high) supreme state. Its a Light it has no color, you know, its transparent, and that Light (I have experienced that, I mention it because I know it), if you put it on a hostile being it melts like that. Its extraordinary. And then, in its benevolent form, as we might call it (that is to say, the Grace helping and assisting and healing), its white like milk. And if I want a wholly material action (but this is quite recentits since this new Consciousness came), then in its physical action, on the physical, its become slightly colored: its luminous, golden with some pink in it, but its not pink (Mother takes a hibiscus next to her). Its like this.
Like Aurovilles flower?
0 1973-01-20, #Agenda Vol 13, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
A truly benevolent man. Buddhist benevolence, you know, and he practices it marvelously.
He seems to have no no selfishness in him (theres no word for it in French). I mean, a constant concern to do the right thing.
--
Very benevolen thes very benevolent.
I was told something (I dont know if its true), he is reported to have said, Sri Aurobindo and the Mother are the most important personalities in the world today I dont know if its true.
03.14 - Mater Dolorosa, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Doubters ask, however, if sinners alone suffered, one would not perhaps mind; but along with sinners why should innocents, nay even the virtuous, pass under the axe? What sins indeed babes commit? Are the sins of the fathers truly visited upon coming generations? A queer arrangement, to say the least, if there is a wise and just and benevolent God! Yes, how many honest people, people who strive to live piously, honestly and honourably, according to the law of righteousness, fail to escape! All equally undergo the same heavy punishment. Is it not then nearer the truth to say that a most mechanical Nature, a mere gamble of chance, a statistical equation, as mathematicians say, moves the destiny of creatures and things in the universe, that there is nowhere a heart or consciousness in the whole business?
Some believers in God or in the Spirit admit that it is so. The world is the creation of another being, a not-God, a not-Spiritwhe ther Maya or Ahriman or the Great Evil. One has simply to forget the world, abandon earthly existence altogether as a nightmare. Peace, felicity one can possess and enjoy but not here in this vale of tears, anityam asukham lokam imam, but elsewhere beyond.
05.09 - The Changed Scientific Outlook, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Science has not spiritualised (or idealised or mentalised) the world; it has not spiritualised itself. Agreed. But what it has done is remarkable. First, with its new outlook it has cut away the ground from where it was wont to give battle to religion and spirituality, it has abjured its cast-iron strait-jacket mentality which considered that senses and syllogism encompass all knowledge and objects of knowledge. It has learnt humility and admits of the possibility of more things there being in heaven and earth which are not amenable to its fixed co-ordinates. Secondly, it has gone at times even beyond this attitude of benevolent neutrality. For certain of its conclusions, certain ways of formulation seem to echo other truths, other manners. That is to say, if Science by itself is unable to reach or envisage the spiritual outlook, yet the position it has reached, the vistas it envisages seem to be not perhaps exactly one with, but in line with what our vision (of the scientific world) would be like if once we possess the spiritual eye. Matter, Science says today, is energy and forms of matter, objects, are various vibrations of this one energy. What is this energy? According to science, it is electrical, radiant, ethereal (Einstein replaces "ether" by "field")biological science would venture to call it life energy. You have only to move one step farther and arrive at the greater and deeper generalisationMatter is a mode of the energy of consciousness, all forms of Matter are vibrations of consciousness.
***
07.11 - The Problem of Evil, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
In truth, the question itself is wrong. It is childish. It presupposes things that are themselves questionable. There are certain ideas about creation which have been almost universally current, more or less permanently accepted by human thought during ages; they are of an astounding simplicity. There is a world here, it is said, and up there somewhere there is a being called God; This person one day thought of creating some kind of thing, a visible form. The world was the result. Evidently we see a lot of mistakes in his work. We conclude the creator perhaps is a well-meaning benevolent person, but not all-powerful; some other thing or being there is that contradicts him. Or perhaps he is all-powerful but then has no heart and must be cruelty itselfviewing the condition of his creation which is a story of sorrow and trouble and misery. Such an idea, I say, is simplicity itself, the simplicity of a child brain. When one speaks of God the creator as a potter making a pot, one thinks of him as a human being, only in bigger proportions. Truly, it is not God who has made man in his image, it is man who has made God in his image.
As I say, the question is wrongly put. The very form of the question already assumes a certain notion about God and creation. Your postulates or axioms themselves are vitiated.
1.002 - The Heifer, #Quran, #unset, #Zen
163. Your God is one God. There is no god but He, the benevolent, the Compassionate.
164. In the creation of the heavens and the earth; in the alternation of night and day; in the ships that sail the oceans for the benefit of mankind; in the water that God sends down from the sky, and revives the earth with it after it had died, and scatters in it all kinds of creatures; in the changing of the winds, and the clouds disposed between the sky and the earth; are signs for people who understand.
1.013 - Thunder, #Quran, #unset, #Zen
30. Thus We sent you among a community before which other communities have passed away, that you may recite to them what We revealed to you. Yet they deny the benevolent One. Say, “He is my Lord; there is no god but He; in Him I trust, and to Him is my repentance.”
31. Even if there were a Quran, by which mountains could be set in motion, or by which the earth could be shattered, or by which the dead could be made to speak. In fact, every decision rests with God. Did the believers not give up and realize that had God willed, He would have guided all humanity? Disasters will continue to strike those who disbelieve, because of their deeds, or they fall near their homes, until God’s promise comes true. God never breaks a promise.
1.01 - An Accomplished Westerner, #Sri Aurobindo or the Adventure of Consciousness, #Satprem, #Integral Yoga
Humanly speaking, Sri Aurobindo is close to us, because once we have respectfully bowed before the "wisdom of the East" and the odd ascetics who seem to make light of all our fine laws, we find that our curiosity has been aroused but not our life; we need a practical truth that will survive our rugged winters. Sri Aurobindo knew our winters well; he experienced them as a student, from the age of seven until twenty. He lived from one lodging house to another at the whim of more or less benevolent landladies, with one meal a day, and not even an overcoat to put on his back, but always laden with books: the French symbolists, Mallarm, Rimbaud, whom he read in the original French long before reading the Bhagavad Gita in translation. To us Sri Aurobindo personifies a unique synthesis.
He was born in Calcutta on August 15, 1872, the year of Rimbaud's Illuminations, just a few years before Einstein; modern physics had already seen the light of day with Max Planck, and Jules Verne was busy probing the future. Yet, Queen Victoria was about to become Empress of India, and the conquest of Africa was not even completed; it was the turning point from one world to another.
1.01 - Maitreya inquires of his teacher (Parashara), #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
Maitreya said, Master! I have been instructed by you in the whole of the Vedas, and in the institutes of law and of sacred science: through your favour, other men, even though they be my foes, cannot accuse me of having been remiss in the acquirement of knowledge. I am now desirous, oh thou who art profound in piety! to hear from thee, how this world was, and how in future it will be? what is its substance, oh Brahman, and whence proceeded animate and inanimate things? into what has it been resolved, and into what will its dissolution again occur? how were the elements manifested? whence proceeded the gods and other beings? what are the situation and extent of the oceans and the mountains, the earth, the sun, and the planets? what are the families of the gods and others, the Menus, the periods called Manvantaras, those termed Kalpas, and their subdivisions, and the four ages: the events that happen at the close of a Kalpa, and the terminations of the several ages[11]: the histories, oh great Muni, of the gods, the sages, and kings; and how the Vedas were divided into branches (or schools), after they had been arranged by Vyāsa: the duties of the Brahmans, and the other tribes, as well as of those who pass through the different orders of life? All these things I wish to hear from you, grandson of Vaśiṣṭha. Incline thy thoughts benevolently towards me, that I may, through thy favour, be informed of all I desire to know. Parāśara replied, Well inquired, pious Maitreya. You recall to my recollection that which was of old narrated by my father's father, Vaśiṣṭha. I had heard that my father had been devoured by a Rākṣas employed by Visvāmitra: violent anger seized me, and I commenced a sacrifice for the destruction of the Rākṣasas: hundreds of them were reduced to ashes by the rite, when, as they were about to be entirely extirpated, my grandfather Vaśiṣṭha thus spake to me: Enough, my child; let thy wrath be appeased: the Rākṣasas are not culpable: thy father's death was the work of destiny. Anger is the passion of fools; it becometh not a wise man. By whom, it may be asked, is any one killed? Every man reaps the consequences of his own acts. Anger, my son, is the destruction of all that man obtains by arduous exertions, of fame, and of devout austerities; and prevents the attainment of heaven or of emancipation. The chief sages always shun wrath: he not thou, my child, subject to its influence. Let no more of these unoffending spirits of darkness be consumed. Mercy is the might of the righteous[12].
Being thus admonished by my venerable grandsire, I immediately desisted from the rite, in obedience to his injunctions, and Vaśiṣṭha, the most excellent of sages, was content with me. Then arrived Pulastya, the son of Brahmā[13], who was received by my grandfather with the customary marks of respect. The illustrious brother of Pulaha said to me; Since, in the violence of animosity, you have listened to the words of your progenitor, and have exercised clemency, therefore you shall become learned in every science: since you have forborne, even though incensed, to destroy my posterity, I will bestow upon you another boon, and, you shall become the author of a summary of the Purāṇas[14]; you shall know the true nature of the deities, as it really is; and, whether engaged in religious rites, or abstaining from their performance[15], your understanding, through my favour, shall be perfect, and exempt from). doubts. Then my grandsire Vaśiṣṭha added; Whatever has been said to thee by Pulastya, shall assuredly come to pass.
1.01 - To Watanabe Sukefusa, #Beating the Cloth Drum Letters of Zen Master Hakuin, #unset, #Zen
How heartwarming it is to see ordinary sons and daughters attending to their duty to their parents with benevolent smiles on their faces, sparing no expense to provide for their needs and amusement:
"You must use a palanquin when you visit the shrine." "Why don't you take your friend so-and-so with you when you attend that Buddhist service?"
1.01 - Who is Tara, #How to Free Your Mind - Tara the Liberator, #Thubten Chodron, #unset
For example, one part of us may hold a child-like Sunday school conception of God as an old man in the sky, who sometimes is benevolent and at
other times jealous and wrathful. We must be careful not to impute those
1.02 - MAPS OF MEANING - THREE LEVELS OF ANALYSIS, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
the source of all new things, the benevolent bearer and lover of the hero; the destructive forces of the
unknown, the source of fear itself, constantly conspiring to destroy life. The bivalent divine son (fourth and
--
against chaos; civilization erected against nature, with natures aid. He is the benevolent force that protects
individuals from catastrophic encounter with what is not yet understood; is the walls that surrounded the
--
appease the gods is the embodiment in procedure of the idea that the benevolent aspect of the unknown
will return if the present schema of adaptation (the ruling king) is sufficiently altered (that is, destroyed
--
represents the benevolent, creative and fruitful aspect of the unknown. [The city is commonly portrayed on
a mountain, in such representations the serpent in a valley, or across a river. The battle takes place at
--
as progenitor of the hero. The protective capacity of benevolent tradition, embodied in the form of political
order, constitutes a common mythological/narrative theme. This may be illustrated for our purposes
--
primordial waters). This deluge began after the recent death of the King. The kings daughter benevolent
(young, beautiful, good) counterpart to the forces of the negative feminine (the unstoppable rain) appears
--
The creative union of the hero with the benevolent aspect of the unknown is evidently approaching.
Nitechka was very happy. He looked around, and there were the Burgomaster and Councilmen
--
his father, Anu in which case the binding is clearly benevolent (even world-engendering). Binding may
also be conceptualized as the prerogative of the sovereign, who binds his enemies that is, those who
--
the benevolent aspect of the unknown in the underworld, as might well be expected in her typical
personification:
--
true Water of Life for salt sea water (the arrogant elder brothers replace the benevolent aspect of the
Great Mother with her destructive counterpart). When he arrives at home, the younger son unwittingly
1.03 - APPRENTICESHIP AND ENCULTURATION - ADOPTION OF A SHARED MAP, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
We are all familiar with the story of benevolent nature, threatened by the rapacious forces of the corrupt
individual and the society of the machine. The plot is solid, the characters believable but Mother Nature
--
We all know, finally, the story of the benevolent individual, genuine and innocent, denied access to the
nourishing forces of the true and natural world, corrupted by the unreasonable strictures of society. This
1.03 - Preparing for the Miraculous, #Preparing for the Miraculous, #George Van Vrekhem, #Integral Yoga
and benevolent. benevolent in the sense of a certainty, a har-
monious certainty. It was new. Voil. And when I say Bonne
1.03 - Sympathetic Magic, #The Golden Bough, #James George Frazer, #Occultism
rarely, been employed with the benevolent intention of helping
others into it. In other words, it has been used to facilitate
1.04 - Religion and Occultism, #Words Of The Mother III, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
A benevolent goodwill towards all worshippers.
An enlightened indifference towards all religions.
--
A benevolent goodwill towards all worshippers.
An enlightened indifference towards all religions.
1.04 - THE APPEARANCE OF ANOMALY - CHALLENGE TO THE SHARED MAP, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
princess nature, in her benevolent guise waits for the kiss of the hero to wake. Her awakened and
revitalized beauty subsequently re-animates her people.
1.04 - What Arjuna Saw - the Dark Side of the Force, #Preparing for the Miraculous, #George Van Vrekhem, #Integral Yoga
swer: the justification of a benevolent, omnipotent and om-
niscient God in view of the existence of evil and suffering. 14
1.05 - THE HOSTILE BROTHERS - ARCHETYPES OF RESPONSE TO THE UNKNOWN, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
something benevolent into the eternal source, in fact, of strength and ability. Development of such
strength attendant upon faith in the conditions of experience enables him to stand outside the group,
--
Spirit is offered up to the group to maintain the groups benevolent nature to ensure its continued
protection; to ensure its grant of knowledge, derived from history. It is necessary to identify with the group,
--
Durga is in fact Kalis benevolent counterpart.
324
1.06 - Wealth and Government, #Words Of The Mother III, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
As for ill-will, jealousy, quarrels and reproaches, one must sincerely be above all that and reply with a benevolent smile to the bitterest words; and unless one is absolutely sure of himself and his reactions, it would be better, as a general rule, to keep silent.
6 October 1960
1.07 - A Song of Longing for Tara, the Infallible, #How to Free Your Mind - Tara the Liberator, #Thubten Chodron, #unset
our action seems benevolent and others praise us, we need to purify.
In addition, its necessary to develop the ability to evaluate our own actions
1.07 - THE GREAT EVENT FORESHADOWED - THE PLANETIZATION OF MANKIND, #The Future of Man, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
are essentially benevolent? Is it because we are afraid that in the
process of supercreation they will render us less human?
1.10 - Theodicy - Nature Makes No Mistakes, #Preparing for the Miraculous, #George Van Vrekhem, #Integral Yoga
from the intention of the Deity, then he is not benevolent.
If the evil is contrary to his intention, he is not omnipotent.
He cannot be both omnipotent and benevolent (as most re-
ligions claim). (Paul Davies)
1.13 - Posterity of Dhruva, #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
"The king is a speaker of truth, bounteous, an observer of his promises; he is wise, benevolent, patient, valiant, and a terror to the wicked; he knows his duties; he acknowledges services; he is compassionate and kind-spoken; he respects the venerable; he performs sacrifices; he reverences the Brahmans; he cherishes the good; and in administering justice is indifferent to friend or foe."
The virtues thus celebrated by the Sūta and the Magadhā were chersed in the remembrance of the Rāja, and practised by him when occasion arose. Protecting this earth, the monarch performed many great sacrificial ceremonies, accompanied by liberal donations. His subjects soon approached him, suffering from the famine by which they were afflicted, as all the edible plants had perished during the season of anarchy. In reply to his question of the cause of their coming, they told him, that in the interval in which the earth was without a king all vegetable products had been withheld, and that consequently the people had perished. "Thou," said they, "art the bestower of subsistence to us; thou art appointed, by the creator, the protector of the people: grant us vegetables, the support of the lives of thy subjects, who are perishing with hunger."
1.16 - On Concentration, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
It hope I have not been so vague as to allow you to suppose that Concentration Camps are evidence that benevolent and enlightened governments are at last seriously concerned to educate the world to Yoga; but I do agree that it cannot do great harm if I take a dose of my own medicine, and gather into one golden sheaf all the ripe corn of my wisdom on this subject.
For concentration does indeed unlock all doors; it lies at the heart of every practice as it is of the essence of all theory; and almost all the various rules and regulations are aimed at securing adeptship in this matter. All the subsidiary work awareness, one-pointedness, mind- fullness and the rest is intended to train you to this.
1914 02 19p, #Prayers And Meditations, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Oh! to become Thy living love so powerfully as to transfigure and illumine all things, so completely as to awaken peace and benevolent satisfaction in all.
Oh, to become Thy divine love, pure and clear-sighted, to be that always and everywhere!
1916 12 30p, #Prayers And Meditations, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I feel, I see my soul living deep within my being, and my soul sees Thee, recognises Thee and loves Thee in all things, in everything that is; it is fully conscious of this, and as the outer being is surrendered to it, it too is conscious; the mind knows and never forgets; the purified vital being no longer has any attractions and repulsions, and more and more does it taste of the joy of Thy Presence in all things and always. But the heart seems to have fallen asleep in a slumber of exhaustion, and the soul no longer finds sufficient activity within it to respond fully to its impulsion. Why? Was it so poor that the struggle could thus wear it out, or so deeply wounded that it has become quite stiff? And yet it would like to answer the inner call; it wants this with a faith and ardour which have never wavered; but it is like an old man smiling benevolently at the games of youth but unable to take part in them. And yet it is full of joy and confidence, it overflows with gratitude for all the treasures of affection which Nature has so generously lavished upon it; it would like, in exchange for these precious gifts, to pour out in inexhaustible streams the golden wine of tenderness which restores and fortifies, enlivens and consoles, the true wine of life for human beings. It would like to and tries but how poor is what it does beside what it dreams of doing, how mediocre what it is able to do beside what it hopes, for it hopes always. It knows that Thy call is never heard in vain, and it has no doubt it can one day realise the splendours of which Thou hast given it a glimpse.
Who will open these closed flood-gates?
1951-03-29 - The Great Vehicle and The Little Vehicle - Choosing ones family, country - The vital being distorted - atavism - Sincerity - changing ones character, #Questions And Answers 1950-1951, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
If you have within you a psychic being sufficiently awake to watch over you, to prepare your path, it can draw towards you things which help you, draw people, books, circumstances, all sorts of little coincidences which come to you as though brought by some benevolent will and give you an indication, a help, a support to take decisions and turn you in the right direction. But once you have taken this decision, once you have decided to find the truth of your being, once you start sincerely on the road, then everything seems to conspire to help you to advance, and if you observe carefully you see gradually the source of your difficulties: Ah! Wait a minute, this defect was in my father; oh! this habit was my mothers; oh! my grandmo ther was like this, my grandfa ther was like that. Or it could well be the nurse who took care of you when you were small, or brothers and sisters who played with you, the little friends you met, and you will find that all this was there, in this person or that or the other. But if you continue to be sincere, you find you can cross all this quite calmly, and after a time you cut all the moorings with which you were born, break the chains and go freely on the path.
If you really want to transform your character, it is that you must do. It has always been said that it is impossible to change ones nature; in all books of philosophy, even of yoga, you are told the same story: You cannot change your character, you are born like that, you are like that. This is absolutely false, I guarantee it is false; but there is something very difficult to do to change your character, because it is not your character which must be changed, it is the character of your antecedents. In them you will not change it (because they have no such intention), but it is in you that it must be changed. It is what they have given you, all the little gifts made to you at your birthnice giftsit is this which must be changed. But if you succeed in getting hold of the thread of these things, the true thread, since you have worked upon this with perseverance and sincerity, one fine morning you will be free; all this will fall off from you and you will be able to get a start in life without any burden. Then you will be a new man, living a new life, almost with a new nature. And if you look back you will say, It is not possible, I was never like that!
1953-11-25, #Questions And Answers 1953, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
That would truly be a small result. The death of Stalin (unfortunately not any more than the death of Hitler) has not changed the present state of the world. Something more than that would be necessary. For this is like the assassin who is guillotined: when his head is cut off, his spirit remains behind and is projected outside him. It is a vital formation and it goes and takes shelter in one of the benevolent spectators, who suddenly feels a criminal instinct in himself. There are many men like that, specially very young criminals who when questioned have acknowledged this. They have been asked: When did this desire to kill come to you? and the frequent reply is: It got hold of me when I saw so-and-so executed.
So, this is of no use, the death of this one or that other. That does not help very much the thing goes elsewhere. It is only one form. It is as though you did something very wicked with a particular shirt on and then threw away your shirt and said: Now, I shall no longer do harm. You continue with another shirt on!
1958 11 07, #On Thoughts And Aphorisms, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Look upon everything with a benevolent smile. Take all the things which irritate you as a lesson for yourself and your life will be more peaceful and more effective as well, for a great percentage of your energy certainly goes to waste in the irritation you feel when you do not find in others the perfection that you would like to realise in yourself.
You stop short at the perfection that others should realise and you are seldom conscious of the goal you should be pursuing yourself. If you are conscious of it, well then, begin with the work which is given to you, that is to say, realise what you have to do and do not concern yourself with what others do, because, after all, it is not your business. And the best way to the true attitude is simply to say, All those around me, all the circumstances of my life, all the people near me, are a mirror held up to me by the Divine Consciousness to show me the progress I must make. Everything that shocks me in others means a work I have to do in myself.
1965 12 26?, #On Thoughts And Aphorisms, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And what is strange, what is strange, is that outwardly one goes on living automatically according to certain ways of life, which no longer even have the virtue of seeming necessary to you, which no longer even have the force of habit, and which are accepted and lived almost automatically, with a sensea kind of feeling or sensation, but it is neither feeling nor sensation, it is a kind of very subtle perception that Something, so immense that it is undefinable, wants it. I say wants it or I say chooses it, but it is wills it; it is a Will that does not function like the human will, but which wills itwhich wills it or sees it or decides it. And in each thing there is this luminous, golden, imperative vibration which is necessarily all-powerful. And it provides as a background the perfect well-being of certitude, which, a little lower down in the consciousness, expresses itself by a smile of benevolent amusement.
Further on, Sri Aurobindo speaks of worlds that have no beginning and no end, and he says that their creation and their destruction is a play of hide-and-seek with our outward consciousness2
1970 03 15, #On Thoughts And Aphorisms, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
395Medical Science is well-meaning and its practitioners often benevolent and not seldom self-sacrificing; but when did the well-meaning of the ignorant save them from harm-doing?
396If all remedies were really and in themselves efficacious and all medical theories sound, how would that console us for our lost natural health and vitality? The upas-tree is sound in all its parts, but it is still an upas-tree.
1970 03 18, #On Thoughts And Aphorisms, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
406Medical Science to the human body is like a great Power which enfeebles a smaller State by its protection or like a benevolent robber who knocks his victim flat and riddles him with wounds in order that he may devote his life to healing and serving the shattered body.
407Drugs often cure the body when they do not merely trouble or poison it, but only if their physical attack on the disease is supported by the force of the spirit; if that force can be made to work freely, drugs are superfluous.
1.A - ANTHROPOLOGY, THE SOUL, #Philosophy of Mind, #unset, #Zen
The self-possessed and healthy subject has an active and present consciousness of the ordered whole of his individual world, into the system of which he subsumes each special content of sensation, idea, desire, inclination, etc., as it arises, so as to insert them in their proper place, He is the dominant genius over these particularities. Between this and insanity the difference is like that between waking and dreaming: only that in insanity the dream falls within the waking limits, and so makes part of the actual self- feeling. Error and that sort of thing is a proposition consistently admitted to a place in the objective interconnection of things. In the concrete, however, it is often difficult to say where it begins to become derangement. A violent, but groundless and senseless outburst of hatred, etc., may, in contrast to a presupposed higher self-possession and stability of character, make its victim seem to be beside himself with frenzy. But the main point in derangement is the contradiction which a feeling with a fixed corporeal embodiment sets up against the whole mass of adjustments forming the concrete consciousness. The mind which is in a condition of mere being, and where such being is not rendered fluid in its consciousness, is diseased. The contents which are set free in this reversion to mere nature are the self-seeking affections of the heart, such as vanity, pride, and the rest of the passions - fancies and hopes - merely personal love and hatred. When the influence of self-possession and of general principles, moral and theoretical, is relaxed, and ceases to keep the natural temper under lock and key, the, earthly elements are set free - that evil which is always latent in the heart, because the heart as immediate is natural and selfish. It is the evil genius of man which gains the upper hand in insanity, but in distinction from and contrast to the better and more intelligent part, which is there also. Hence this state is mental derangement and distress. The right psychical treatment therefore keeps in view the truth that insanity is not an abstract loss of reason (neither in the point of intelligence nor of will and its responsibility), but only derangement, only a contradiction in a still subsisting reason; - just as physical disease is not an abstract, i.e. mere and total, loss of health (if it were that, it would be death), but a contradiction in it. This humane treatment, no less benevolent than reasonable (the services of Pinel towards which deserve the highest acknowledgement), presupposes the patient's rationality, and in that assumption has the sound basis for dealing with him on this side - just as in the case of bodily disease the physician bases his treatment on the vitality which as such still contains health.
(c) Habit[7]
1.anon - But little better, #Anonymous - Poems, #unset, #Zen
"And he, who makes benevolent acts intervene before
honor, increases his honor;
1f.lovecraft - Cool Air, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
extirpation. Something of the benevolent fanatic seemed to reside in
him, and he rambled on almost garrulously as he sounded my chest and
1f.lovecraft - From Beyond, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
house set back from benevolent Street.
That Crawford Tillinghast should ever have studied science and
1f.lovecraft - Herbert West-Reanimator, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
the dean of the medical school himselfthe learned and benevolent Dr.
Allan Halsey, whose work in behalf of the stricken is recalled by every
1f.lovecraft - Old Bugs, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
streets of life by the edict of a benevolent governmentthe aroma of
strong, wicked whiskeya precious kind of forbidden fruit indeed in
1f.lovecraft - The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
half in the gracious southerly realm about George, benevolent, Power,
and Williams Streets, where the old slope holds unchanged the fine
1f.lovecraft - The Challenge from Beyond, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
wisely kindly, and benevolently than any man of earth had ever ruled an
empire of men.
1.jm - Upon this earth, the land of the Victorious Ones, #Milarepa - Poems, #Jetsun Milarepa, #Buddhism
Deeming benevolent deities and malignant
Demons to be real and subsistent.
1.rb - Sordello - Book the Third, #Browning - Poems, #Robert Browning, #Poetry
When, stopping his benevolent employ,
A presage shuddered through the welkin; harsh
1.whitman - Carol Of Occupations, #Whitman - Poems, #unset, #Zen
The learn'd, virtuous, benevolent, and the usual terms;
A man like me, and never the usual terms.
1.whitman - Excelsior, #Whitman - Poems, #unset, #Zen
And who benevolent? For I would show more benevolence than all the
rest;
1.whitman - Faces, #Whitman - Poems, #unset, #Zen
The spiritual, prescient facethe always welcome, common, benevolent
face,
1.whitman - Manhattan Streets I Saunterd, Pondering, #Whitman - Poems, #unset, #Zen
is vigorous, benevolent, clean, is so much profit to him or
her, in the unshakable order of the universe, and through the
2.04 - Positive Aspects of the Mother-Complex, #The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
fairy and a wicked fairy, or a benevolent goddess and one who is
malevolent and dangerous. In Western antiquity and especially
2.05 - Apotheosis, #The Hero with a Thousand Faces, #Joseph Campbell, #Mythology
precisely this benevolent regarder of the world. She will be
found in every Buddhist temple of the farthest Orient. She is
--
terrestrial state. The four benevolent animals, the phoenix, the
unicorn, the tortoise, and the dragon, dwell amongst the willow
30.07 - The Poet and the Yogi, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 07, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
So we cannot at once jump to the conclusion that a poet is he who has either fallen from the status of a Yogi or who has slipped down from the path of yogic discipline. Just an example will dispel all doubts. The poets of the Upanishads were at once seers and yogis in the fullest measure. As the Upanishads are wonderful in their poetic values, even so are they highly inspiring and soul-stirring in their mantric powers. Here the poet and the seer have become one and with their mutual help they reveal each other. It is not that vak (speech) must needs be a covering of or an illusory substitute for truth. It can as well be the most beautiful and benevolent image of the Brahman as Sound.
Be that as it may, it can never be said that a poet and a Yogi are one and the same, or that there is no difference between the poetic creation and the spiritual discipline. To say that they are one is nothing short of an hyperbole: The consciousness of the poet dwells in the world of speech and this world belongs to the mental world. The light of the poet's inner soul illumines this mental world of speech and turns it into a seeker of spirituality. But the field of a Yogi is more spacious and more objective. He endeavours to illumine the body and the vital nature with the light of spirituality. The poet can start doing this work. He may even be an aid to it; still more, at the end he may reveal or announce the Victory. But the poet cannot sit on the throne of a Yogi by dethroning him. Moreover, it is not obligatory that in order to be a Yogi one must be a poet first. Even if the Poetic Being is a brother to the Brahman, yet it is not the Brahman itself.
36.08 - A Commentary on the First Six Suktas of Rigveda, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 08, #unset, #Zen
The first group begins with the invocation of the twin Riders. Who are these Riders? According to the narration of the Puranas, the Aswinikumaras are generally known as the twin heavenly physicians. It means, they drive away disease, decay and incapacity from the being and make the life-energy pure, sound and indomitable. In other words, they are the gods of immortality. Their work is to found immortality and an eternal youth of divinity in life. Pranavayu,which is the conveyance of the divine power, has been symbolically expressed as the horses. It may be asked why they have the twin forms. Perhaps it is because the one gives knowledge, the other the energy for work. Both are the presiding deities of immortality and both of them embody the most benevolent delight. Hence they are called Subhaspati.Also they are called Purubhuja,for they bring into life the divine enjoyment in. profusion. However, the one gives much importance to the energy of work, the other to the powerful pure intelligence. Whatever may be the difference in their outlook, they are the twin faces of one and the same God. The two horsemen open the fount of that very divine exhilaration in life by which there awakes and ascends an upward flame in the being of the aspirant. As the aspirant has been the possessor of an intense diversified delight, he is now able to proceed farther and farther, higher and higher by sacrificing his lower aspiration to the higher one. It is an immortalised life-energy that makes all the realisation effective, real and beautiful. It infuses spirit and power into the intelligence. The aspirant is endowed with an occult power of hearing and is initiate with the power of mantras which expresses and manifest the Truth. That is why the twin gods are called Nasatya(the Guides on the path). They are the leaders in our spiritual adventure. They lead us speedily through the different levels of consciousness to the vast ocean of the higher truth.
The second group of riks: The spiritual delight and to immortal power of life will found themselves in a calm, pill and firmly rooted basis of the entire being. And this immortal delight will lead the spiritual practicant to the Divine Mind, to the pure Intelligence, to the realm of Indra. An ordinary man is unable to have a glimpse of the higher mind, the pure Intelligence because he is confined to the narrow limits of the lower material world and his life abounds wit restless, impure and hurtful desires. It is not by a gross inert inspiration but by a subtle inward power that the enjoyment of life must be purified and divinised. Then only the slot of the mind will be replaced by the divine Intelligence. With the divine Intelligence of Indra the aspirant enjoys a pure delight in life. It is Indra who fills the different aspects each object with a luminous truth. The inspiration surcharged with the effulgent knowledge of Indra will bring down and manifest in the aspirant the delightful truth of the Self which is the main support of the divine in the aspirant.
4.04 - Weaknesses, #Words Of The Mother II, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
As for ill-will, jealousy, quarrels and reproaches, one must sincerely be above all that and reply with a benevolent smile to the bitterest words; and unless one is absolutely sure of himself and his reactions, it would be better, as a general rule, to keep silent.
6 October 1960
4.07 - THE RELATION OF THE KING-SYMBOL TO CONSCIOUSNESS, #Mysterium Coniunctionis, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
[501] The starting-point of our explanation is that the king is essentially synonymous with the sun and that the sun represents the daylight of the psyche, consciousness, which as the faithful companion of the suns journey rises daily from the ocean of sleep and dream, and sinks into it again at evening. Just as in the round-dance of the planets, and in the star-strewn spaces of the sky, the sun journeys along as a solitary figure, like any other one of the planetary archons, so consciousness, which refers everything to its own ego as the centre of the universe, is only one among the archetypes of the unconscious, comparable to the King Helios of post-classical syncretism, whom we meet in Julian the Apostate, for instance. This is what the complex of consciousness would look like if it could be viewed from one of the other planets, as we view the sun from the earth. The subjective ego-personality, i.e., consciousness and its contents, is indeed seen in its various aspects by an unconscious observer, or rather by an observer placed in the outer space of the unconscious. That this is so is proved by dreams, in which the conscious personality, the ego of the dreamer, is seen from a standpoint that is toto coelo different from that of the conscious mind. Such a phenomenon could not occur at all unless there were in the unconscious other standpoints opposing or competing with ego-consciousness. These relationships are aptly expressed by the planet simile. The king represents ego-consciousness, the subject of all subjects, as an object. His fate in mythology portrays the rising and setting of this most glorious and most divine of all the phenomena of creation, without which the world would not exist as an object. For everything that is only is because it is directly or indirectly known, and moreover this known-ness is sometimes represented in a way which the subject himself does not know, just as if he were being observed from another planet, now with benevolent and now with sardonic gaze.
[502] This far from simple situation derives partly from the fact that the ego has the paradoxical quality of being both the subject and the object of its own knowledge, and partly from the fact that the psyche is not a unity but a constellation consisting of other luminaries besides the sun. The ego-complex is not the only complex in the psyche.386 The possibility that unconscious complexes possess a certain luminosity, a kind of consciousness, cannot be dismissed out of hand, for they can easily give rise to something in the nature of secondary personalities, as psychopathological experience shows. But if this is possible, then an observation of the ego-complex from another standpoint somewhere in the same psyche is equally possible. As I have said, the critical portrayal of the ego-complex in dreams and in abnormal psychic states seems to be due to this.
4.2 - Karma, #Essays Divine And Human, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
394. Medical Science is well-meaning and its practitioners often benevolent and not seldom self-sacrificing; but when did the well-meaning of the ignorant save them from harm-doing?
395. If all remedies were really and in themselves efficacious and all medical theories sound, how would that console us for our lost natural health and vitality? The upas-tree is sound in all its parts, but it is still an upas-tree.
--
405. Medical Science to the human body is like a great Power which enfeebles a smaller State by its protection or like a benevolent robber who knocks his victim flat and riddles him with wounds in order that he may devote his life to healing & serving the shattered body.
406. Drugs often cure the body when they do not merely trouble or poison it, but only if their physical attack on the disease is supported by the force of the spirit; if that force can be made to work freely, drugs are at once superfluous.
5 - The Phenomenology of the Spirit in Fairytales, #The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
starts by being helpful and benevolent, but then refuses to let
his hired boy go, so that the main episodes in the story deal
6.0 - Conscious, Unconscious, and Individuation, #The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
tween heaven and hell, i.e., between the benevolent and the wrathful deities.
338
6.10 - THE SELF AND THE BOUNDS OF KNOWLEDGE, #Mysterium Coniunctionis, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
[785] The claim to authority is naturally not in itself sufficient to establish a metaphysical truth. Its authority must also be backed by the equally vehement need of the multitude. As this need always arises from a condition of distress, any attempt at explanation will have to examine the psychic situation of those who allow themselves to be convinced by a metaphysical assertion. It will then turn out that the statements of the inspired personality have made conscious just those images and ideas which compensate the general psychic distress. These images and ideas were not thought up or invented by the inspired personality but happened to him as experiences, and he became, as it were, their willing or unwilling victim. A will transcending his consciousness seized hold of him, which he was quite unable to resist. Naturally enough he feels this overwhelming power as divine. I have nothing against this word, but with the best will in the world I cannot see that it proves the existence of a transcendent God. Suppose a benevolent Deity did in fact inspire a salutary truth, what about all those cases where a half-truth or unholy nonsense was inspired and accepted by an eager following? Here the devil would be a better bet oron the principle omne malum ab homineman himself. This metaphysical either-or explanation is rather difficult to apply in practice because most inspirations fall between the two extremes, being neither wholly true nor wholly false. In theory, therefore, they owe their existence to the co-operation of a good and a bad power. We would also have to suppose a common plan of work aiming at an only tolerably good goal, so to speak, or make the assumption that one power bungles the handiwork of the other ora third possibility that man is capable of thwarting Gods intention to inspire a perfect truth (the inspiration of a half-truth is naturally out of the question) with an almost daemonic energy. What, in any of these cases, would have happened to Gods omnipotence?
[786] It therefore seems to me, on the most conservative estimate, to be wiser not to drag the supreme metaphysical factor into our calculations, at all events not at once, but, more modestly, to make an unknown psychic or perhaps psychoid238 factor in the human realm responsible for inspirations and suchlike happenings. This would make better allowance not only for the abysmal mixture of truth and error in the great majority of inspirations but also for the numerous contradictions in Holy Writ. The psychoid aura that surrounds consciousness furnishes us with better and less controversial possibilities of explanation and moreover can be investigated empirically. It presents a world of relatively autonomous images, including the manifold God-images, which whenever they appear are called God by nave people and, because of their numinosity (the equivalent of autonomy!), are taken to be such. The various religious denominations support this traditional viewpoint, and their respective theologians believe themselves, inspired by Gods word, to be in a position to make valid statements about him. Such statements always claim to be final and indisputable. The slightest deviation from the dominant assumption provokes an unbridgeable schism. One cannot and may not think about an object held to be indisputable. One can only assert it, and for this reason there can be no reconciliation between the divergent assertions. Thus Christianity, the religion of brotherly love, offers the lamentable spectacle of one great and many small schisms, each faction helplessly caught in the toils of its own unique rightness.
7 - Yoga of Sri Aurobindo, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
creator perhaps is a well-meaning benevolent person,
but not all-powerful; some other thing or being there
Blazing P2 - Map the Stages of Conventional Consciousness, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
a benevolently autocratic, moralistic-prescriptive form for managing all life, a way which
must be religiously adhered to.
BOOK XIX. - A review of the philosophical opinions regarding the Supreme Good, and a comparison of these opinions with the Christian belief regarding happiness, #City of God, #Saint Augustine of Hippo, #Christianity
And therefore, although our righteous fathers[649] had slaves, and administered their domestic affairs so as to distinguish between the condition of slaves and the heirship of sons in regard to the blessings of this life, yet in regard to the worship of God, in whom we hope for eternal blessings, they took an equally loving oversight of all the members of their household. And this is so much in accordance with the natural order, that the head of the household was called paterfamilias; and this name has been so generally accepted, that even those whose rule is unrighteous are glad to apply it to themselves. But those who are true fathers of their households desire and endeavour that all the members of their household, equally with their own children, should worship and win God, and should come to that heavenly home in which the duty of ruling men is no longer necessary, because the duty of caring for their everlasting happiness has also ceased; but, until they reach that home, masters ought to feel their position of authority a greater burden than servants their service. And if any member of the family interrupts the domestic peace by disobedience, he is corrected either by word or blow, or some kind of just and legitimate punishment, such as society permits, that he may himself be the better for it, and be readjusted to the family harmony from which he had dislocated[Pg 326] himself. For as it is not benevolent to give a man help at the expense of some greater benefit he might receive, so it is not innocent to spare a man at the risk of his falling into graver sin. To be innocent, we must not only do harm to no man, but also restrain him from sin or punish his sin, so that either the man himself who is punished may profit by his experience, or others be warned by his example. Since, then, the house ought to be the beginning or element of the city, and every beginning bears reference to some end of its own kind, and every element to the integrity of the whole of which it is an element, it follows plainly enough that domestic peace has a relation to civic peace,in other words, that the well-ordered concord of domestic obedience and domestic rule has a relation to the well-ordered concord of civic obedience and civic rule. And therefore it follows, further, that the father of the family ought to frame his domestic rule in accordance with the law of the city, so that the household may be in harmony with the civic order.
17. What produces peace, and what discord, between the heavenly and earthly cities.
BOOK XVIII. - A parallel history of the earthly and heavenly cities from the time of Abraham to the end of the world, #City of God, #Saint Augustine of Hippo, #Christianity
For not long after, on the arrival of Alexander, it was subdued, when, although there was no pillaging, because they dared not resist him, and thus, being very easily subdued, received him peaceably, yet the glory of that house was not so great as it was when under the free power of their own kings. Alexander, indeed, offered up sacrifices in the temple of God, not as a convert to His worship in true piety, but thinking, with impious folly, that He was to be worshipped along with false gods. Then Ptolemy son of Lagus, whom I have already mentioned, after Alexander's death carried them captive into Egypt. His successor, Ptolemy Philadelphus, most benevolently dismissed them; and by him it was brought about, as I have narrated a little before, that we should have the Septuagint version of the Scriptures. Then they were crushed by the wars which are explained in the books of the Maccabees. Afterward they were taken captive by Ptolemy king of Alexandria, who was called Epiphanes. Then Antiochus king of Syria compelled them by many and most grievous evils to[Pg 276] worship idols, and filled the temple itself with the sacrilegious superstitions of the Gentiles. Yet their most vigorous leader Judas, who is also called Maccabus, after beating the generals of Antiochus, cleansed it from all that defilement of idolatry.
But not long after, one Alcimus, although an alien from the sacerdotal tribe, was, through ambition, made pontiff, which was an impious thing. After almost fifty years, during which they never had peace, although they prospered in some affairs, Aristobulus first assumed the diadem among them, and was made both king and pontiff. Before that, indeed, from the time of their return from the Babylonish captivity and the rebuilding of the temple, they had not kings, but generals or principes. Although a king himself may be called a prince, from his principality in governing, and a leader, because he leads the army, but it does not follow that all who are princes and leaders may also be called kings, as that Aristobulus was. He was succeeded by Alexander, also both king and pontiff, who is reported to have reigned over them cruelly. After him his wife Alexandra was queen of the Jews, and from her time downwards more grievous evils pursued them; for this Alexandra's sons, Aristobulus and Hyrcanus, when contending with each other for the kingdom, called in the Roman forces against the nation of Israel. For Hyrcanus asked assistance from them against his brother. At that time Rome had already subdued Africa and Greece, and ruled extensively in other parts of the world also, and yet, as if unable to bear her own weight, had, in a manner, broken herself by her own size. For indeed she had come to grave domestic seditions, and from that to social wars, and by and by to civil wars, and had enfeebled and worn herself out so much, that the changed state of the republic, in which she should be governed by kings, was now imminent. Pompey then, a most illustrious prince of the Roman people, having entered Judea with an army, took the city, threw open the temple, not with the devotion of a suppliant, but with the authority of a conqueror, and went, not reverently, but profanely, into the holy of holies, where it was lawful for none but the pontiff to enter. Having established Hyrcanus in the pontificate, and set Antipater over the subjugated nation as[Pg 277] guardian or procurator, as they were then called, he led Aristobulus with him bound. From that time the Jews also began to be Roman tri butaries. Afterward Cassius plundered the very temple. Then after a few years it was their desert to have Herod, a king of foreign birth, in whose reign Christ was born. For the time had now come signified by the prophetic Spirit through the mouth of the patriarch Jacob, when he says, "There shall not be lacking a prince out of Judah, nor a teacher from his loins, until He shall come for whom it is reserved; and He is the expectation of the nations."[583] There lacked not therefore a Jewish prince of the Jews until that Herod, who was the first king of a foreign race received by them. Therefore it was now the time when He should come for whom that was reserved which is promised in the New Testament, that He should be the expectation of the nations. But it was not possible that the nations should expect He would come, as we see they did, to do judgment in the splendour of power, unless they should first believe in Him when He came to suffer judgment in the humility of patience.
ENNEAD 01.02 - Of Virtues., #Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 04, #Plotinus, #Christianity
1. The civil virtues consist of moderation in passions, and in letting one's actions follow the rational laws of duty. The object of these virtues being to make us benevolent in our dealings with our fellow-human beings, they are called civil virtues because they mutually unite citizens. "Prudence refers to the rational part of our soul; courage, to that part of the soul subject to anger; temperance consists in the agreement and harmony of appetite and reason; finally justice, consists in the accomplishment, by all these faculties, of the function proper to each of them, either to command, or to obey."
2. The virtues of the man who tries to rise to contemplation consist in detaching oneself from things here below; that is why they are called "purifications."323 They comm and us to abstain from activities which innervate the organs, and which excite the affections1216 that relate to the body. The object of these virtues is to raise the soul to genuine existence. While the civil virtues are the ornament of mortal life, and prepare the soul for the purificatory virtues, the latter direct the man whom they adorn to abstain from activities in which the body predominates. Thus, in the purificatory virtues, "prudence consists in not forming opinions in harmony with the body, but in acting by oneself, which is the work of pure thought. Temperance consists in not sharing the passions of the body; courage, in not fearing separation therefrom, as if death drove man into emptiness and annihilation; while justice exacts that reason and intelligence comm and and be obeyed." The civil virtues moderate the passions; their object is to teach us to live in conformity with the laws of human nature. The contemplative virtues obliterate the passions from the soul; their object is to assimilate man to the divinity.
Euthyphro, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
SOCRATES: I dare say not, for you are reserved in your behaviour, and seldom impart your wisdom. But I have a benevolent habit of pouring out myself to everybody, and would even pay for a listener, and I am afraid that the Athenians may think me too talkative. Now if, as I was saying, they would only laugh at me, as you say that they laugh at you, the time might pass gaily enough in the court; but perhaps they may be in earnest, and then what the end will be you soothsayers only can predict.
EUTHYPHRO: I dare say that the affair will end in nothing, Socrates, and that you will win your cause; and I think that I shall win my own.
Gorgias, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
Socrates would teach us a lesson which we are slow to learnthat good intentions, and even benevolent actions, when they are not prompted by wisdom, are of no value. We believe something to be for our good which we afterwards find out not to be for our good. The consequences may be inevitable, for they may follow an invariable law, yet they may often be the very opposite of what is expected by us. When we increase pauperism by almsgiving; when we tie up property without regard to changes of circumstances; when we say hastily what we deliberately disapprove; when we do in a moment of passion what upon reflection we regret; when from any want of self-control we give another an advantage over uswe are doing not what we will, but what we wish. All actions of which the consequences are not weighed and foreseen, are of this impotent and paralytic sort; and the author of them has 'the least possible power' while seeming to have the greatest. For he is actually bringing about the reverse of what he intended. And yet the book of nature is open to him, in which he who runs may read if he will exercise ordinary attention; every day offers him experiences of his own and of other men's characters, and he passes them unheeded by. The contemplation of the consequences of actions, and the ignorance of men in regard to them, seems to have led Socrates to his famous thesis:'Virtue is knowledge;' which is not so much an error or paradox as a half truth, seen first in the twilight of ethical philosophy, but also the half of the truth which is especially needed in the present age. For as the world has grown older men have been too apt to imagine a right and wrong apart from consequences; while a few, on the other hand, have sought to resolve them wholly into their consequences. But Socrates, or Plato for him, neither divides nor identifies them; though the time has not yet arrived either for utilitarian or transcendental systems of moral philosophy, he recognizes the two elements which seem to lie at the basis of morality. (Compare the following: 'Now, and for us, it is a time to Hellenize and to praise knowing; for we have Hebraized too much and have overvalued doing. But the habits and discipline received from Hebraism remain for our race an eternal possession. And as humanity is constituted, one must never assign the second rank to-day without being ready to restore them to the first to-morrow.' Sir William W. Hunter, Preface to Orissa.)
Fourth Thesis:
Liber 46 - The Key of the Mysteries, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
It is benevolent like Christ and the apostles, like Vincent de Paul,
and like Fenelon.
Prayers and Meditations by Baha u llah text, #Prayers and Meditations by Baha u llah, #unset, #Zen
Exalted though this station may be, O my God, and however excellent this position--for who else except Thyself hath the power to show forth what may be deemed worthy of Thine exaltation and befit Thy greatness--yet Thou art He Who is the All-Bountiful, the Most Compassionate. All the atoms of the earth testify that Thou art the Ever-Forgiving, the benevolent, the Great Giver, the All-Glorious, the All-Wise. Look, then, upon him, O my God, with the eyes of Thy loving-kindness, and cast upon him the glance of Thy generosity. Enrapture him, moreover, with the sweet melodies of Him Who is the Fountain-Head of Thy Revelation, in such wise that he may wholly surrender his will to Thy pleasure, and fix his hopes upon the things Thou didst ordain in Thy Tablets. Strengthen, then, his heart by Thy name, the Almighty, the Faithful, that he may draw forth the hand of power, and with it help Thy Cause when the light of Thy beauty is manifested and the Day-Star of Thy majesty is risen.
Since Thou hast called him by Thy name, O my Lord, single him out among Thy servants for Thy service. Thou well knowest, O my Lord, that in revealing myself I have sought only to reveal Thy Cause, and have turned to no one except for the sake of Thy Revelation and for the purpose of manifesting Thy loving-kindness. I beseech Thee, by Thy treasured Name Who, at this very moment, is speaking, to send down upon him and upon them that love Thee that which is enshrined in the heaven of Thy favor and bounties, that they may be filled with vehement longing towards Thee, and exult in Thy Covenant, O Thou Who art the Lord of Lords! Ordain, then, for him and for them that which becometh Thy name, the All-Bountiful.
Tablets of Baha u llah text, #Tablets of Baha u llah, #Baha u llah, #Baha i
O Hádí! Thou hast not been in Our company, thou art therefore ignorant of the Cause. Act not according to thine idle imaginings. Aside from these things, scrutinize the Writings with thine own eyes and ponder upon that which hath come to pass. Have pity upon thyself and upon the servants of God and be not the cause of waywardness like unto the people aforetime. The path is unmistakable and the proof is evident. Change injustice into justice and inequity into equity. We cherish the hope that the breaths of divine inspiration may strengthen thee and that thine inner ear may be enabled to hear the blessed words: 'Say, it is God, then leave them to entertain themselves with their cavillings.' 1 Thou hast been there (Cyprus) and hast seen him (Mírzá Yahyá). Now speak forth with fairness. Do not misrepresent the matter, neither to thyself nor to the people. Thou art both ignorant and uninformed. Give ear unto the Voice of this Wronged One and hasten towards the ocean of divine knowledge that perchance thou mayest be adorned with the ornament of comprehension and mayest renounce all else but God. Hearken unto the Voice of this benevolent Counselor, calling aloud, unveiled and manifest, before the faces of kings and their subjects, and summon the people of the world, one and all, unto Him Who is the Lord of Eternity. This is the Word from Whose horizon the day-star of unfailing grace shineth resplendent. 1. Qur'án 6:91.
O Hádí! This Wronged One, rid of all attachment to the world, hath striven with utmost endeavor to quench the fire of animosity and hatred which burneth fiercely in the hearts of the peoples of the earth. It behooveth every just and fair-minded person to render thanks unto God--exalted be His glory--and to arise to promote this preeminent Cause, that fire may turn into light, and hatred may give way to fellowship and love. I swear by the righteousness of God! This is the sole purpose of this Wronged One. Indeed in proclaiming this momentous Cause and in demonstrating its Truth We have endured manifold sufferings, hardships and tribulations. Thou thyself wouldst bear witness unto that which We have mentioned, couldst thou but speak with fairness. Verily God speaketh the truth and leadeth the Way. He is the Powerful, the Mighty, the Gracious.
--
As to thy question concerning interest and profit on gold and silver: Some years ago the following passage was revealed from the heaven of the All-Merciful in honor of the one who beareth the name of God, entitled Zaynu'l-Muqarrabín 1--upon him be the glory of the Most Glorious. He--exalted be His Word--saith: Many people stand in need of this. Because if there were no prospect for gaining interest, the affairs of men would suffer collapse or dislocation. One can seldom find a person who would manifest such consideration towards his fellow-man, his countryman or towards his own brother and would show such tender solicitude for him as to be well-disposed to grant him a loan on benevolent terms. 2 Therefore as a token of favor towards men We have prescribed that interest on money should be treated like other business transactions that are current amongst men. Thus, now that this lucid commandment hath descended from the heaven of the Will of God, it is lawful and proper to charge interest on money, that the people of the world may, in a spirit of amity and fellowship and with joy and gladness, devotedly engage themselves in magnifying the Name of Him Who is the Well-Beloved of all mankind. Verily He ordaineth according to His Own choosing. He hath now made interest on money lawful, even as He had made it unlawful in the past. Within His grasp He holdeth the kingdom of authority. He doeth and ordaineth. He is in truth the Ordainer, the All-Knowing. 1. One of the early believers who is best known to the friends for his reliable transcriptions of the Tablets of Bahá'u'lláh. (See Memorials of the Faithful Pp. 150-153.)
2. Such loans as bear no interest and are repayable whenever the borrower pleases.
Talks With Sri Aurobindo 1, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
DR. MANILAL: We know of the Divine as protective, kind and benevolent.
SRI AUROBINDO: That is Vishnu. There is also Shiva
The Act of Creation text, #The Act of Creation, #Arthur Koestler, #Psychology
thanks to the benevolent workings of the principle of parsimony,
which seems to be an essential factor in mental progress.
--
The first is the benevolent Magician, whose ancestry derives from
the rain-making Shamans and the calendar-making Priest-Astronomers
--
malicious satirist's, as the benevolent Magician's is next to the imagina-
tive Artist's.
--
bolized by the Mad Professor and the benevolent Magician of folklore.
It is, however, a blend in which both tendencies are sublimated and
The Book of Wisdom, #The Bible, #Anonymous, #Various
certain, invulnerable, benevolent, shrewd, irresistible, beneficent,
23 kindly, steadfast, secure, tranquil,
The Divine Names Text (Dionysis), #The Divine Names, #unset, #Zen
But, as we said when we put forth the Theological Outlines, it is not possible either to express or to conceive what the One, the Unknown, the Super-essential self-existing Good is,----I mean the threefold Unity, the alike God, and the alike Good. But even the unions, such as befit angels, of the holy Powers, whether we must call them efforts after, or receptions from, the super-Unknown and surpassing Goodness, are both unutterable and unknown, and exist in those angels alone who, above angelic knowledge, are deemed worthy of them. The godlike minds (men) made one by these unions, through imitation of angels as far as attainable (since it is during cessation of every mental energy that such an union as this of the deified minds towards the super-divine light takes place) celebrate It most appropriately through the abstraction of all created things----enlightened in this matter, truly and super-naturally from the most blessed union towards It----that It is Cause Indeed of all things existing, but Itself none of them, as being superessentially elevated above all. To none, indeed, who are lovers of the Truth above all Truth, is it permitted to celebrate |9 the supremely-Divine Essentiality----that which is the super-subsistence of the super-goodness,----neither as word or power, neither as mind or life or essence, but as pre-eminently separated from every condition, movement, life, imagination, surmise, name, word, thought, conception, essence, position, stability, union, boundary, infinitude, all things whatever. But since, as sustaining source of goodness, by the very fact of Its being, It is cause of all things that be, from all created things must we celebrate the benevolent Providence of the Godhead; for all things are both around It and for It, and It is before all things, and all things in It consist, and by Its being is the production and sustenance of the whole, and all things aspire to It----the intellectual and rational, by means of knowledge----things inferior to these, through the senses, and other things by living movement, or substantial and habitual aptitude.
SECTION VI.
The Dwellings of the Philosophers, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
under the action of the benevolent solar effluvia. It cannot therefore be denied that such a
reaction has a profound non material cause, for we would not know how to explain without
--
are of a gentle and benevolent disposition and very pleasant to get on with. We can therefore
easily understand the hidden reason for the legendary tales where the friendship of a gnome
--
But before taking leave of our reader, by thanking him for his benevolent attention, we shall
cast a last glance over the secret science as a whole. And, like the old man, who likes to evoke
--
men of good faith, to benevolent and candid seekers.
Now by the fact that they are destined to the final dissolution, all beings must necessarily
--
and benevolent image. He respects, hors and venerates God in this radiating globe which is
the heart and brain of Nature and the dispenser of earthly goods. Visible representative of the
the Eternal Wisdom, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
41) I have learnt all that was hidden and all that was yet undiscovered because I was taught by wisdom herself that created everything. For there is in her a spirit of intelligence which is holy, unique, multiple in her effects, fine, copious, agile, spotless, dear, soft, friendly to good, penetrant, which nothing can prevent from acting, benevolent, friendly to men, kind, stable, infallible, calm, that achieves all, that sees all, that can comprehend all minds in itself, that is intelligible, pure and subtle. ~ Book of Wisdom
42) Eternal wisdom builds: I shall be her palace when she finds repose in me and I in her. ~ Angelus Silesius
--
13) We must distinguish between the knowledge which is due to the study and analysis of Matter and that which results from contact with life and a benevolent activity in the midst of humanity. ~ Antoine the Healer: "Revelations."
14) The young generations study numberless subjects, the constitution of the stars, of the earth, the origin of organisms etc. They omit only one thing and that is to know what is the sense of human life, how one ought to live, what the great sages of all times have thought of this question and how they have resolved it. ~ Tolstoi
--
24) He who puts away from him all passion, hatred, pride and hypocrisy, who pronounces words instructive and benevolent, who does not make his own what has not been given to him, who without desire, covetousness, impatience knows the depths of the Permanent, he is indeed a.man of religion. ~ Buddhist Text
25) He who afflicts no living creature, who neither kills nor allows to be killed, him indeed I call a man of religion. Whoever wishes to consecrate himself to the spiritual life, ought not to destroy any life. ~ Buddhist Text
--
28) Have compassion, have pity for all beings that live. Let thy heart be benevolent and sympathetic towards all that lives. ~ Fo'shu-tsrn-king-
Charity View Similar A Defence of Indian Culture - XX
The Lottery in Babylon, #Labyrinths, #Jorge Luis Borges, #Poetry
There were disturbances, there were lamentable effusions of blood; but the Babylonian people finally imposed their will and they achieved their generous ends against the opposition of the rich. Firstly, they forced the Company to assume full public power. (This unification was necessary given the vastness and complexity of the new operations.) Secondly, they made the lottery secret, general and free of charge. The mercenary sale of lots was abolished. Once initiated into the mysteries of Bel, all free men automatically took part in the sacred drawings of lots, all of which were held in the labyrinths of the god every sixty nights and determined each man's destiny until the subsequent drawing. The consequences were incalculable. A happy drawing could instigate one's elevation to the council of magi or the imprisonment of an enemy (well-known or private) or, in the peaceful dark of one's room, one's meeting the woman who has begun to make one fluster or who one was never expecting to see again; an adverse drawing: mutilation, a variety of infamies, death. Sometimes a single event - C's assassination in a tavern, B's mysterious apotheosis - was the brilliant result of thirty or forty drawings. Combining bets was difficult; we must remember, though, that the individuals of the Company were (and are) all-powerful and astute. In many cases, the knowledge that certain joys were simple fabrications of chance would have diminished their moral worth; to avoid this inconvenience, agents of the Company made use of suggestion and magic. Their moves, their manipulations, were secret. To get at everybody's innermost hopes and fears, astrologers and spies were employed. There were certain stone lions, there was a sacred latrine called Qaphqa, there were fissures in a dusty aqueduct all of which, according to general opinion, led to the Company; persons malign or benevolent deposited exposs in these sites. An alphabetical archive collected these reports of varying veracity.
Incredibly, grumbling abounded. The Company, with its habitual discretion, did not reply directly. It preferred to scribble in the rubble of a mask factory a short line of reasoning which now forms part of the sacred scriptures. This doctrinal piece observed that the lottery is an interpolation of chance into the order of the world and that the acceptance of errors is not the contradiction of chance, but its corroboration. It observed also that those lions and the sacred squatting place, although not disclaimed by the Company (which did not renounce the right to consult them), functioned without official guarantee.
Verses of Vemana, #is Book, #unset, #Zen
The original Purana is such as slays the Rakshrsas. The Bharata and others are of kin (i.e. benevolent as relations.) The Gurupurana is the destroyer of imposture.
962
--- Overview of adj benevolent
The adj benevolent has 4 senses (no senses from tagged texts)
1. benevolent ::: (intending or showing kindness; "a benevolent society")
2. charitable, benevolent, kindly, sympathetic, good-hearted, openhearted, large-hearted ::: (showing or motivated by sympathy and understanding and generosity; "was charitable in his opinions of others"; "kindly criticism"; "a kindly act"; "sympathetic words"; "a large-hearted mentor")
3. benevolent, freehearted ::: (generous in providing aid to others)
4. beneficent, benevolent, eleemosynary, philanthropic ::: (generous in assistance to the poor; "a benevolent contributor"; "eleemosynary relief"; "philanthropic contributions")
--- Similarity of adj benevolent
4 senses of benevolent
Sense 1
benevolent
Sense 2
charitable, benevolent, kindly, sympathetic, good-hearted, openhearted, large-hearted
=> kind (vs. unkind)
Sense 3
benevolent, freehearted
=> generous (vs. stingy)
Sense 4
beneficent, benevolent, eleemosynary, philanthropic
=> charitable (vs. uncharitable)
--- Antonyms of adj benevolent
3 of 4 senses of benevolent
Sense 2
charitable, benevolent, kindly, sympathetic, good-hearted, openhearted, large-hearted
INDIRECT (VIA kind) -> unkind
Sense 3
benevolent, freehearted
INDIRECT (VIA generous) -> stingy, ungenerous
Sense 4
beneficent, benevolent, eleemosynary, philanthropic
INDIRECT (VIA charitable) -> uncharitable
--- Pertainyms of adj benevolent
4 senses of benevolent
Sense 1
benevolent
Pertains to noun benevolence (Sense 3)
=>benevolence, benefaction
=> kindness, benignity
Sense 2
charitable, benevolent, kindly, sympathetic, good-hearted, openhearted, large-hearted
Sense 3
benevolent, freehearted
Sense 4
beneficent, benevolent, eleemosynary, philanthropic
--- Derived Forms of adj benevolent
1 of 4 senses of benevolent
Sense 1
benevolent
RELATED TO->(noun) benevolence#3
=> benevolence, benefaction
Wikipedia - Aiy -- Benevolent spirits in Yakutmythology
Wikipedia - Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks -- American fraternal order
Wikipedia - Benevolent Dictator For Life
Wikipedia - Benevolent dictator for life
Wikipedia - Benevolent prejudice
Wikipedia - Benevolent suicide
Wikipedia - Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge
Wikipedia - Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association -- Umbrella association of district associations for Chinese people in North America
Wikipedia - Daemon (classical mythology) -- Good or benevolent nature spirit in classical Greek mythology
Wikipedia - Edict of Milan -- February AD 313 agreement to treat Christians benevolently within the Roman Empire
Wikipedia - On a Supposed Right to Tell Lies from Benevolent Motives
Wikipedia - Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association
Wikipedia - Problem of evil -- The question of how to reconcile the existence of evil with a benevolent God
Wikipedia - Woman's Exchange Movement -- System of benevolent consignment stores
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18689184-the-armenian-general-benevolent-union--one-hundred-years-of-history-volu
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34656221-the-armenian-general-benevolent-union---one-hundred-years-of-history-vo
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43864204-benevolent
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Four_Benevolent_Animals
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Talk:Four_Benevolent_Animals
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Testem_Benevolentiae_Nostrae
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BenevolentAI
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BenevolentAlienInvasion
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https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BenevolentBoss
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BenevolentConspiracy
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BenevolentGenie
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BenevolentMageRuler
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BenevolentMonsters
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BenevolentPrecursors
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benevolent
X-Men (1992 - 1997) - This cartoon is based on the popular Marvel comic by Stan Lee and features several of the characters that made it such a success: Cyclops, Jean Grey, Beast, Archangel, Iceman, Wolverine, Gambit, Rogue, Jubilee, and even Bishop, all students of the benevolent Professor X.
Wildfire (1986 - 1986) - Year ago, in a fantasy realm, a benevolent queen died shortly after giving birth to a daughter. The baby girl is taken into the real world, and left on the doorstep of a kind man, with no hint at her origin except for a purple horse medallion around her neck. Fast forward, and the young girl is on...
Bloodfist VII: Manhunt(1995) - Kickboxing champ Don "The Dragon" Wilson stars in this action-drama as Jim Trudell, who, one night, comes to the rescue of a beautiful woman being attacked by a gang of toughs. However, Trudell's benevolent act earns him the enmity of a group of corrupt cops, and he soon finds he's been framed for a...
Transformers(2007) - Optimus Prime, leader of the benevolent Autobots, narrates the collapse of the Transformers' home world, Cybertron. It was destroyed by war between the Autobots and the malevolent Decepticons, lead by Megatron in his quest to get hold of the AllSpark. The Autobots want to find the AllSpark so they c...
Disney's Descendants(2015) - In present-day Auradon, Ben, the benevolent teenage son of King Adam and Queen Belle, offers a chance of redemption for the troublemaking offspring of Disney's classic villains, Cruella De Vil, Maleficent, the Evil Queen and Jafar.
The BFG(2016) - One night an orphaned ten-year-old girl named Sophie is taken from her orphanage by a benevolent giant named the "Big Friendly Giant". Initially scared of the giant, she soon finds that the titular giant is not like the rest in Giant Country. The other giants including the Bloodbottler and the Flesh...
Blackadder's Christmas Carol (1988) ::: 8.0/10 -- 43min | Comedy, History | TV Movie 23 December 1988 -- After a genial spirit shows the benevolent Ebenezer Blackadder visions of his unscrupulous ancestors, he resolves to mend his generous ways. Director: Richard Boden Writers: Richard Curtis (by), Ben Elton (by) Stars:
The BFG (2016) ::: 6.4/10 -- PG | 1h 57min | Adventure, Family, Fantasy | 1 July 2016 (USA) -- An orphan little girl befriends a benevolent giant who takes her to Giant Country, where they attempt to stop the man-eating giants that are invading the human world. Director: Steven Spielberg Writers:
The Stand -- Not Rated | 6h 1min | Adventure, Drama, Fantasy | TV Mini-Series (1994) Episode Guide 4 episodes The Stand Poster ::: After a deadly plague kills most of the world's population, the remaining survivors split into two groups - one led by a benevolent elder and the other by a malevolent being - to face each other in a final battle between good and evil. Stars:
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Ferengi_Benevolent_Association
https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Coruscant_Benevolent_Society
Akame ga Kill! -- -- White Fox -- 24 eps -- Manga -- Action Adventure Drama Fantasy Shounen -- Akame ga Kill! Akame ga Kill! -- Night Raid is the covert assassination branch of the Revolutionary Army, an uprising assembled to overthrow Prime Minister Honest, whose avarice and greed for power has led him to take advantage of the child emperor's inexperience. Without a strong and benevolent leader, the rest of the nation is left to drown in poverty, strife, and ruin. Though the Night Raid members are all experienced killers, they understand that taking lives is far from commendable and that they will likely face retribution as they mercilessly eliminate anyone who stands in the revolution's way. -- -- This merry band of assassins' newest member is Tatsumi, a naïve boy from a remote village who had embarked on a journey to help his impoverished hometown and was won over by not only Night Raid's ideals, but also their resolve. Akame ga Kill! follows Tatsumi as he fights the Empire and comes face-to-face with powerful weapons, enemy assassins, challenges to his own morals and values, and ultimately, what it truly means to be an assassin with a cause. -- -- -- Licensor: -- Sentai Filmworks -- 1,503,646 7.50
Gakkou no Kowai Uwasa Shin: Hanako-san ga Kita!! -- -- - -- 33 eps -- - -- Comedy Horror School Supernatural -- Gakkou no Kowai Uwasa Shin: Hanako-san ga Kita!! Gakkou no Kowai Uwasa Shin: Hanako-san ga Kita!! -- The story of the anime revolves around Hanako, a girl who lives in a supernatural world apart from our own. Hanako appears when schoolchildren are in trouble; she is a benevolent version of an enduring Japanese urban legend about Hanako, a ghost who lives in a toilet at the local school. -- -- (Source: ANN) -- TV - Aug 13, 2010 -- 765 N/A -- -- Gegege no Kitarou: Jigoku-hen -- -- Toei Animation -- 7 eps -- - -- Adventure Fantasy Comedy Supernatural Horror -- Gegege no Kitarou: Jigoku-hen Gegege no Kitarou: Jigoku-hen -- The origins of Kitarou. -- TV - Feb 8, 1988 -- 753 6.23
Lime-iro Senkitan -- -- Studio Hibari -- 13 eps -- Visual novel -- Drama Ecchi Harem Historical Mecha Supernatural -- Lime-iro Senkitan Lime-iro Senkitan -- Around the the 37th year of the Meiji Era (1904), in the midst of the Russo-Japanese war, the small Japanese army, in need of assistance, uses its special flying (thanks to a benevolent demon) ship, the Amanohara, to attack Russia's major base at Port Arthur (Lushun). -- -- Umakai Shintaro, a Russian diplomat originally from Japan, defects and goes to Sapporo to teach at a girls academy. However, that girls academy is not typical—it is on board the Amanohara, and the five girls Shintaro teaches are known as the Raimu Unit—girls with the ability to summon powerful beings to fight for them. Shintaro eventually becomes their teacher and general in battle, and so the six embark on a weird and excessively erotic journey, as Shintaro helps the girls overcome their weaknesses, become stronger for the final stand at Lushun, and also understand the motives of the "Russian Spiritual Corps" that assist the opponent, which, unfortunately, has one member whom Shintaro knew well... -- -- (Source: ANN) -- TV - Jan 4, 2003 -- 9,174 5.96
Shin Megami Tensei: Tokyo Mokushiroku -- -- J.C.Staff -- 2 eps -- Manga -- Action Sci-Fi Horror Demons Supernatural -- Shin Megami Tensei: Tokyo Mokushiroku Shin Megami Tensei: Tokyo Mokushiroku -- Handsome and effeminate, quiet but proud, the sinister Akito Kobayashi has a passion for the occult and has developed a computer program to summon demons and the living dead. But little does he know that fellow high school students Kojirou Souma and Saki Yagami are reincarnations of powerful and benevolent spirits. When the pair's friends have become targeted by demons trying to harvest their life energies, they must harness their dark metaphysical powers to destroy Kobayashi's threatening program, or risk losing their loved ones forever. -- -- OVA - Apr 21, 1995 -- 5,519 5.41
Tetsuwan Atom (1980) -- -- Tezuka Productions -- 52 eps -- Manga -- Action Sci-Fi Adventure Mecha Shounen -- Tetsuwan Atom (1980) Tetsuwan Atom (1980) -- Set in a future where machines have advanced to the point of autonomy and become a point of major contention in the political and social realms, Astro Boy (1980) chronicles the struggles of a crime-fighting young robot named Atom. Created in the image of his enigmatic inventor's deceased son, Atom survives rough beginnings, getting saved and adopted by the benevolent Dr. Ochanomizu. In his pursuit of justice, Atom finds himself in the midst of numerous clashes with various factions, and is often faced with the harsh realities of the world. -- -- -- Licensor: -- Manga Entertainment -- TV - Oct 1, 1980 -- 10,650 7.14
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Reports_of_the_missionary_and_benevolent_boards_and_committees_to_the_General_Assembly_of_the_Presbyterian_Church_in_the_United_States_of_America_(1904)_(14782584934).jpg
Actors' & Entertainers' Benevolent Fund of Queensland
Armenian General Benevolent Union
Artists' Benevolent Fund
Artists' General Benevolent Institution
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, Lodge Number 878
Benevolent Assimilation
Benevolent Asylum
Benevolent (band)
Benevolent dictator for life
Benevolent dictatorship
Benevolent Empire
Benevolent Organisation for Development, Health and Insight
Benevolent Society
Bohemian Citizens' Benevolent Society
Captatio benevolentiae
Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge
Chinese Benevolent Association of Vancouver
Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association
Correction Officers' Benevolent Association
Daughters of the Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World
Dunwich Benevolent Asylum
Hebrew Benevolent Congregation Temple bombing
Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association
Imam Al-Khoei Benevolent Foundation
Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World
Irish Benevolent Society of London, Ontario
Israel Benevolent Society Cemetery
National Benevolent Fund for the Aged
On a Supposed Right to Tell Lies from Benevolent Motives
Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association
Police Benevolent Association of the City of New York
RAF Benevolent Fund
Re West Sussex Constabulary's Widows, Children and Benevolent (1930) Fund Trusts
Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution
Sergeants Benevolent Association
Soo Yuen Benevolent Association
Spanish Benevolent Society
Testem benevolentiae nostrae
The Benevolent Cupid
The Benevolent Frog
The Royal Naval Benevolent Trust
The Shipwrecked Fishermen and Mariners' Royal Benevolent Society
Washington Benevolent Societies
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