classes ::: verb,
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branches ::: elevate

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object:elevate
word class:verb

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now begins generated list of local instances, definitions, quotes, instances in chapters, wordnet info if available and instances among weblinks


OBJECT INSTANCES [0] - TOPICS - AUTHORS - BOOKS - CHAPTERS - CLASSES - SEE ALSO - SIMILAR TITLES

TOPICS
SEE ALSO


AUTH

BOOKS
Heart_of_Matter
Life_without_Death
Modern_Man_in_Search_of_a_Soul
The_Divine_Milieu
The_Imitation_of_Christ
The_Republic
The_Seals_of_Wisdom
Toward_the_Future

IN CHAPTERS TITLE

IN CHAPTERS CLASSNAME

IN CHAPTERS TEXT
00.03_-_Upanishadic_Symbolism
0.00_-_INTRODUCTION
0.03_-_The_Threefold_Life
0_1961-06-06
0_1961-10-15
0_1961-12-20
02.12_-_Mysticism_in_Bengali_Poetry
03.10_-_Hamlet:_A_Crisis_of_the_Evolving_Soul
04.01_-_The_March_of_Civilisation
06.35_-_Second_Sight
10.13_-_Go_Through
1.01_-_Economy
1.01_-_Our_Demand_and_Need_from_the_Gita
1.01_-_The_Cycle_of_Society
1.02_-_MAPS_OF_MEANING_-_THREE_LEVELS_OF_ANALYSIS
1.02_-_The_Human_Soul
1.02_-_The_Three_European_Worlds
1.02_-_Where_I_Lived,_and_What_I_Lived_For
10.31_-_The_Mystery_of_The_Five_Senses
1.03_-_Sympathetic_Magic
1.04_-_Narayana_appearance,_in_the_beginning_of_the_Kalpa,_as_the_Varaha_(boar)
1.04_-_On_Knowledge_of_the_Future_World.
1.05_-_Adam_Kadmon
1.05_-_AUERBACHS_CELLAR
1.05_-_The_Ascent_of_the_Sacrifice_-_The_Psychic_Being
1.05_-_THE_HOSTILE_BROTHERS_-_ARCHETYPES_OF_RESPONSE_TO_THE_UNKNOWN
1.060_-_Tracing_the_Ultimate_Cause_of_Any_Experience
1.06_-_Origin_of_the_four_castes
1.06_-_THE_MASTER_WITH_THE_BRAHMO_DEVOTEES
1.07_-_Incarnate_Human_Gods
1.07_-_ON_READING_AND_WRITING
1.07_-_Standards_of_Conduct_and_Spiritual_Freedom
1.08a_-_The_Ladder
1.08_-_Departmental_Kings_of_Nature
1.08_-_Information,_Language,_and_Society
1.08_-_Origin_of_Rudra:_his_becoming_eight_Rudras
1.09_-_Civilisation_and_Culture
11.02_-_The_Golden_Life-line
1.10_-_The_Three_Modes_of_Nature
1.11_-_Legend_of_Dhruva,_the_son_of_Uttanapada
1.11_-_The_Reason_as_Governor_of_Life
1.12_-_Dhruva_commences_a_course_of_religious_austerities
1.13_-_Gnostic_Symbols_of_the_Self
1.14_-_The_Structure_and_Dynamics_of_the_Self
1.14_-_The_Supermind_as_Creator
1.14_-_The_Suprarational_Beauty
1.15_-_Index
1.15_-_In_the_Domain_of_the_Spirit_Beings
1.16_-_PRAYER
1.16_-_The_Process_of_Avatarhood
1.18_-_Evocation
1.19_-_ON_THE_PROBABLE_EXISTENCE_AHEAD_OF_US_OF_AN_ULTRA-HUMAN
1.20_-_The_End_of_the_Curve_of_Reason
1.22_-_ON_THE_GIFT-GIVING_VIRTUE
1.22_-_The_Necessity_of_the_Spiritual_Transformation
1.27_-_On_holy_solitude_of_body_and_soul.
13.05_-_A_Dream_Of_Surreal_Science
14.07_-_A_Review_of_Our_Ashram_Life
1.47_-_Lityerses
1.A_-_ANTHROPOLOGY,_THE_SOUL
1.anon_-_The_Epic_of_Gilgamesh_Tablet_II
1f.lovecraft_-_Pickmans_Model
1f.lovecraft_-_The_Call_of_Cthulhu
1f.lovecraft_-_The_Night_Ocean
1.ia_-_Modification_Of_The_R_Poem
1.lovecraft_-_Waste_Paper-_A_Poem_Of_Profound_Insignificance
1.pbs_-_Queen_Mab_-_Part_I.
1.pbs_-_Queen_Mab_-_Part_IX.
1.pbs_-_Queen_Mab_-_Part_V.
1.pbs_-_Queen_Mab_-_Part_VII.
1.poe_-_Eureka_-_A_Prose_Poem
1.rb_-_Paracelsus_-_Part_I_-_Paracelsus_Aspires
1.rb_-_Pauline,_A_Fragment_of_a_Question
1.wby_-_Coole_Park_1929
1.wby_-_Coole_Park_And_Ballylee,_1931
1.whitman_-_To_A_Pupil
1.ww_-_1-_The_White_Doe_Of_Rylstone,_Or,_The_Fate_Of_The_Nortons
1.ww_-_Alas!_What_Boots_The_Long_Laborious_Quest
1.ww_-_Book_Eighth-_Retrospect--Love_Of_Nature_Leading_To_Love_Of_Man
1.ww_-_Book_First_[Introduction-Childhood_and_School_Time]
1.ww_-_Book_Second_[School-Time_Continued]
1.ww_-_Book_Thirteenth_[Imagination_And_Taste,_How_Impaired_And_Restored_Concluded]
1.ww_-_Lines_Composed_a_Few_Miles_above_Tintern_Abbey
1.ww_-_Ode
1.ww_-_The_Excursion-_V-_Book_Fouth-_Despondency_Corrected
1.ww_-_The_Excursion-_X-_Book_Ninth-_Discourse_of_the_Wanderer,_and_an_Evening_Visit_to_the_Lake
1.ww_-_The_Morning_Of_The_Day_Appointed_For_A_General_Thanksgiving._January_18,_1816
1.ww_-_The_Prelude,_Book_1-_Childhood_And_School-Time
1.ww_-_The_Primrose_of_the_Rock
1.ww_-_The_Recluse_-_Book_First
1.ww_-_To_Dora
1.ww_-_Weak_Is_The_Will_Of_Man,_His_Judgement_Blind
2.01_-_Habit_1__Be_Proactive
2.04_-_Concentration
2.04_-_Positive_Aspects_of_the_Mother-Complex
2.04_-_The_Divine_and_the_Undivine
2.05_-_ON_THE_VIRTUOUS
2.08_-_The_Branches_of_The_Archetypal_Man
2.0_-_THE_ANTICHRIST
21.02_-_Gods_and_Men
2.11_-_The_Shattering_And_Fall_of_The_Primordial_Kings
2.13_-_ON_THOSE_WHO_ARE_SUBLIME
2.13_-_The_Difficulties_of_the_Mental_Being
2.15_-_Reality_and_the_Integral_Knowledge
2.16_-_The_Integral_Knowledge_and_the_Aim_of_Life;_Four_Theories_of_Existence
2.1.7.08_-_Comments_on_Specific_Lines_and_Passages_of_the_Poem
2.18_-_The_Evolutionary_Process_-_Ascent_and_Integration
2.19_-_Out_of_the_Sevenfold_Ignorance_towards_the_Sevenfold_Knowledge
2.19_-_THE_MASTER_AND_DR._SARKAR
2.20_-_The_Infancy_and_Maturity_of_ZO,_Father_and_Mother,_Israel_The_Ancient_and_Understanding
2.21_-_The_Ladder_of_Self-transcendence
2.21_-_The_Order_of_the_Worlds
2.22_-_Rebirth_and_Other_Worlds;_Karma,_the_Soul_and_Immortality
2.22_-_THE_STILLEST_HOUR
2.22_-_Vijnana_or_Gnosis
2.23_-_A_Virtuous_Woman_is_a_Crown_to_Her_Husband
2.24_-_Gnosis_and_Ananda
2.26_-_The_Ascent_towards_Supermind
2.28_-_The_Divine_Life
30.01_-_World-Literature
3.00_-_Introduction
30.15_-_The_Language_of_Rabindranath
3.01_-_INTRODUCTION
3.02_-_SOL
3.02_-_The_Motives_of_Devotion
3.02_-_The_Practice_Use_of_Dream-Analysis
3.10_-_The_New_Birth
3.6.01_-_Heraclitus
3.7.1.01_-_Rebirth
3.7.1.05_-_The_Significance_of_Rebirth
3.7.1.12_-_Karma_and_Justice
3.8.1.02_-_Arya_-_Its_Significance
3_-_Commentaries_and_Annotated_Translations
4.03_-_The_Psychology_of_Self-Perfection
4.04_-_Conclusion
4.0_-_NOTES_TO_ZARATHUSTRA
4.19_-_The_Nature_of_the_supermind
4.21_-_The_Gradations_of_the_supermind
5.01_-_EPILOGUE
5.4.01_-_Notes_on_Root-Sounds
6.09_-_THE_THIRD_STAGE_-_THE_UNUS_MUNDUS
Apology
Big_Mind_(ten_perfections)
Blazing_P3_-_Explore_the_Stages_of_Postconventional_Consciousness
BOOK_II._-_A_review_of_the_calamities_suffered_by_the_Romans_before_the_time_of_Christ,_showing_that_their_gods_had_plunged_them_into_corruption_and_vice
BOOK_II._--_PART_I._ANTHROPOGENESIS.
BOOK_II._--_PART_III._ADDENDA._SCIENCE_AND_THE_SECRET_DOCTRINE_CONTRASTED
BOOK_I._--_PART_III._SCIENCE_AND_THE_SECRET_DOCTRINE_CONTRASTED
BOOK_I._--_PART_II._THE_EVOLUTION_OF_SYMBOLISM_IN_ITS_APPROXIMATE_ORDER
BOOK_X._-_Porphyrys_doctrine_of_redemption
COSA_-_BOOK_VIII
ENNEAD_01.04_-_Whether_Animals_May_Be_Termed_Happy.
ENNEAD_02.01_-_Of_the_Heaven.
ENNEAD_02.03_-_Whether_Astrology_is_of_any_Value.
ENNEAD_02.09_-_Against_the_Gnostics;_or,_That_the_Creator_and_the_World_are_Not_Evil.
ENNEAD_03.04_-_Of_Our_Individual_Guardian.
ENNEAD_03.05_-_Of_Love,_or_Eros.
ENNEAD_03.09_-_Fragments_About_the_Soul,_the_Intelligence,_and_the_Good.
ENNEAD_04.03_-_Psychological_Questions.
ENNEAD_04.08_-_Of_the_Descent_of_the_Soul_Into_the_Body.
ENNEAD_05.01_-_The_Three_Principal_Hypostases,_or_Forms_of_Existence.
ENNEAD_05.03_-_The_Self-Consciousnesses,_and_What_is_Above_Them.
ENNEAD_05.05_-_That_Intelligible_Entities_Are_Not_External_to_the_Intelligence_of_the_Good.
ENNEAD_06.07_-_How_Ideas_Multiplied,_and_the_Good.
Liber_111_-_The_Book_of_Wisdom_-_LIBER_ALEPH_VEL_CXI
Liber_46_-_The_Key_of_the_Mysteries
Prayers_and_Meditations_by_Baha_u_llah_text
Sophist
Symposium_translated_by_B_Jowett
Tablets_of_Baha_u_llah_text
Talks_With_Sri_Aurobindo_1
The_Act_of_Creation_text
Theaetetus
The_Book_of_Certitude_-_P1
The_Book_of_Sand
The_Dream_of_a_Ridiculous_Man
The_Dwellings_of_the_Philosophers
the_Eternal_Wisdom
Thus_Spoke_Zarathustra_text

PRIMARY CLASS

SIMILAR TITLES
elevate

DEFINITIONS


TERMS STARTING WITH

elevate ::: a. --> Elevated; raised aloft. ::: v. t. --> To bring from a lower place to a higher; to lift up; to raise; as, to elevate a weight, a flagstaff, etc.
To raise to a higher station; to promote; as, to elevate to an office, or to a high social position.


elevated ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Elevate ::: a. --> Uplifted; high; lofty; also, animated; noble; as, elevated thoughts.

elevatedness ::: n. --> The quality of being elevated.


TERMS ANYWHERE

1. Higher, as in place or position. 2. More elevated or lofty; higher in altitude.

1. Raised or lifted up; elevated. 2. Directed upwards.

  A block, pile, table, stand, mound, platform, or other elevated structure on which to place or sacrifice offerings to a deity. 2. With reference to the uses, customs, dedication, or peculiar sanctity of the altar. 3. A place consecrated to devotional observances. altar’s, altars, altar-burnings, mountain-altars.

admire ::: v. t. --> To regard with wonder or astonishment; to view with surprise; to marvel at.
To regard with wonder and delight; to look upon with an elevated feeling of pleasure, as something which calls out approbation, esteem, love, or reverence; to estimate or prize highly; as, to admire a person of high moral worth, to admire a landscape. ::: v. i.


advance ::: v. t. --> To bring forward; to move towards the van or front; to make to go on.
To raise; to elevate.
To raise to a higher rank; to promote.
To accelerate the growth or progress; to further; to forward; to help on; to aid; to heighten; as, to advance the ripening of fruit; to advance one&


advantage ::: n. --> Any condition, circumstance, opportunity, or means, particularly favorable to success, or to any desired end; benefit; as, the enemy had the advantage of a more elevated position.
Superiority; mastery; -- with of or over.
Superiority of state, or that which gives it; benefit; gain; profit; as, the advantage of a good constitution.
Interest of money; increase; overplus (as the thirteenth in the baker&


altar ::: 1. A block, pile, table, stand, mound, platform, or other elevated structure on which to place or sacrifice offerings to a deity. 2. With reference to the uses, customs, dedication, or peculiar sanctity of the altar. 3. A place consecrated to devotional observances. altar"s, altars, altar-burnings, mountain-altars.

altitudes ::: high places or regions; elevated regions; great heights.

amotus ::: a. --> Elevated, -- as a toe, when raised so high that the tip does not touch the ground.

anamaya thought ::: thought elevated to the plane of vijñana.

angular measure: The angle between the line from the observer to object 1 and the line from the observer to object 2. For example: Shortly after sunrise, you see that the sun is only a few degrees above the horizon, while at noon it is elevated to nearly 90 degrees (or directly overhead). You are the observer, the sun is Object 1, and the horizon is Object 2.

Ar-Rafi ::: The One who exalts. The one who elevates conscious beings to higher states of existence; to enable the realization and observation of their essential reality.

Ascension: Transcendence to a higher state of existence. Seen as both a personal goal (in which the mage achieves self-Ascension) and a global one (in which mages elevate humanity as a whole to an Ascended state). Few mages, however, agree about what Ascension actually looks like or what that higher state means. Ascension, then, is more of an ideal than an accomplishment.

assumpt ::: v. t. --> To take up; to elevate; to assume. ::: n. --> That which is assumed; an assumption.

avaunt ::: interj. --> Begone; depart; -- a word of contempt or abhorrence, equivalent to the phrase "Get thee gone." ::: v. t. & i. --> To advance; to move forward; to elevate.
To depart; to move away.
To vaunt; to boast.


axolotl ::: n. --> An amphibian of the salamander tribe found in the elevated lakes of Mexico; the siredon.

bastile bastille ::: n. --> A tower or an elevated work, used for the defense, or in the siege, of a fortified place.
"The Bastille", formerly a castle or fortress in Paris, used as a prison, especially for political offenders; hence, a rhetorical name for a prison.


bathos ::: n. --> A ludicrous descent from the elevated to the low, in writing or speech; anticlimax.

batture ::: n. --> An elevated river bed or sea bed.

elevate ::: a. --> Elevated; raised aloft. ::: v. t. --> To bring from a lower place to a higher; to lift up; to raise; as, to elevate a weight, a flagstaff, etc.
To raise to a higher station; to promote; as, to elevate to an office, or to a high social position.


elevated ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Elevate ::: a. --> Uplifted; high; lofty; also, animated; noble; as, elevated thoughts.

elevatedness ::: n. --> The quality of being elevated.

bilamellated ::: a. --> Formed of two plates, as the stigma of the Mimulus; also, having two elevated ridges, as in the lip of certain flowers.

Bkra shis lhun po. (Tashi Lhunpo). A Tibetan monastery that served as the seat of the PAn CHEN LAMAs, located in the Tibetan city of Gzhi ka rtse (Shigatse), and considered one of the six great institutions of the DGE LUGS sect of Tibetan Buddhism. The others include SE RA, 'BRAS SPUNGS, and DGA' LDAN, all located near LHA SA, together with BLA BRANG BKRA SHIS 'KHYIL and SKU 'BUM, in the northeast region of A mdo. Bkra shis lhun po was founded in 1447 by DGE 'DUN GRUB, a disciple of the Dge lugs luminary TSONG KHA PA. In 1618, the KARMA BKA' BRGYUD monastery Bkra shis zil gnon (Tashi Silnon, "Tashi Lhunpo Suppressor") was established on a nearby hill and, for a short while, superceded Bkra shis lhun po, but it was eventually destroyed amid sectarian strife between the rival institutions. The cleric BLO BZANG CHOS KYI RGYAL MTSHAN enlarged Bkra shis lhun po's original structure, and the fifth Dalai Lama NGAG DBANG BLO BZANG RGYA MTSHO conferred upon him the title of PAn CHEN LAMA, "Great Scholar." Blo bzang chos kyi rgyal mtshan was affirmed as the fourth such master, with the first three prelates recognized posthumously, beginning with Tsong kha pa's disciple MKHAS GRUB DGE LEGS DPAL BZANG. The Pan chen Lama was elevated to a position of great religious and political authority, officially ranking second after the Dalai Lama but often acting as his tutor and occasionally rivaling him in political power. His monastery thus became a key institution in the religious and political history of central and western Tibet from the seventeenth century onward. The large monastic complex of assembly halls, temples, and residences, including its famous golden roof, was spared major destruction during the Chinese Cultural Revolution (1966-1976).

Bodhisattva ::: Without delving too deeply into Buddhist philosophy, a Bodhisattva can be thought of as a being that has attained at least some level of enlightenment and has made the compassionate decision to continue causally in the phenomenal world in order to help raise all other beings from states of suffering toward realization and to help elevate and evolve society for the betterment of all beings.

bog ::: n. --> A quagmire filled with decayed moss and other vegetable matter; wet spongy ground where a heavy body is apt to sink; a marsh; a morass.
A little elevated spot or clump of earth, roots, and grass, in a marsh or swamp. ::: v. t.


buddhism ::: n. --> The religion based upon the doctrine originally taught by the Hindoo sage Gautama Siddartha, surnamed Buddha, "the awakened or enlightened," in the sixth century b. c., and adopted as a religion by the greater part of the inhabitants of Central and Eastern Asia and the Indian Islands. Buddha&

buddhi. (T. blo; C. siwei; J. shiyui; K. sayu 思惟). In Sanskrit and PAli, "intelligence," "comprehension," or "discernment"; referring specifically to the ability to fashion and retain concepts and ideas (related etymologically to the words buddha and BODHI, from the root √budh "to wake up"). In Buddhist usage, buddhi sometimes denotes a more elevated faculty of mind that surpasses the rational and discursive in its ability to discern truth. Buddhi is thus a kind of intuitive intelligence, comprehension, or insight, which can serve to catalyze wisdom (PRAJNA) and virtuous (KUsALA) actions. According to some strands of MAHAYANA philosophy, this discernment is an inherent and fundamental characteristic of the mind, which is essentially free of all mistaken discriminations and devoid of distinction or change. In such contexts, buddhi is often associated with the original nature of the mind. See RIG PA.

calash ::: n. --> A light carriage with low wheels, having a top or hood that can be raised or lowered, seats for inside, a separate seat for the driver, and often a movable front, so that it can be used as either an open or a close carriage.
In Canada, a two-wheeled, one-seated vehicle, with a calash top, and the driver&


calicle ::: n. --> One of the small cuplike cavities, often with elevated borders, covering the surface of most corals. Each is formed by a polyp. (b) One of the cuplike structures inclosing the zooids of certain hydroids. See Campanularian.

capillarity ::: n. --> The quality or condition of being capillary.
The peculiar action by which the surface of a liquid, where it is in contact with a solid (as in a capillary tube), is elevated or depressed; capillary attraction.


Chidagnikunda (Sanskrit) Cidagnikuṇḍa [from cit thought, consciousness, spirit + agni fire + kuṇḍa receptacle for fire, hearth, a place in which fire may burn] The interior fire of the spirit or the mystical site in the human constitution in which the fire of spiritual thought burns. The mahatma is said to completely transmute his ahamkara (merely ego-consciousness) and elevate it to spiritual egoic universality in chidagnikunda.

Chonŭnsa. (泉隱寺). In Korean, "Monastery of the Hidden Fount"; one of the three major monasteries located on the Buddhist sacred mountain of CHIRISAN. The monastery is said to have been founded in 828 by an Indian monk named Togun (d.u.) and was originally named Kamnosa (either "Sweet Dew Monastery" or "Responsive Dew Monastery"), after a spring there that would clear the minds of people who drank its ambrosial waters. During the Koryo dynasty, Chonŭnsa was elevated to the status of first Son monastery of the South, during the rule of Ch'ŭngnyol wang (r. 1275-1308). Most of the monastery was destroyed during the Japanese Hideyoshi invasion (1592-1598). In 1679, a Son monk named Tanyu (d.u.) rebuilt the monastery, but changed the name to Chonŭn (Hidden Fount), because the spring had disappeared after a monk killed a snake that kept showing up around it. Subsequently, fires of unknown origin repeatedly occurred in the monastery, which stopped only after hanging up a board with the name of the monastery written in the "water" calligraphic style by Won'gyo Yi Kwangsa (1705-1777), one of the four preeminent calligraphers of the Choson dynasty.

coach ::: n. --> A large, closed, four-wheeled carriage, having doors in the sides, and generally a front and back seat inside, each for two persons, and an elevated outside seat in front for the driver.
A special tutor who assists in preparing a student for examination; a trainer; esp. one who trains a boat&


combe ::: n. --> That unwatered portion of a valley which forms its continuation beyond and above the most elevated spring that issues into it.
See Comb.


condor ::: n. --> A very large bird of the Vulture family (Sarcorhamphus gryphus), found in the most elevated parts of the Andes.

crested ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Crest ::: a. --> Having a crest.
Having a crest of feathers or hair upon the head.
Bearing any elevated appendage like a crest, as an elevated line or ridge, or a tuft.


cucullated ::: a. --> Hooded; cowled; covered, as with a hood.
Having the edges toward the base rolled inward, as the leaf of the commonest American blue violet.
Having the prothorax elevated so as to form a sort of hood, receiving the head, as in certain insects.
Having a hoodlike crest on the head, as certain birds, mammals, and reptiles.


deep-waisted ::: a. --> Having a deep waist, as when, in a ship, the poop and forecastle are much elevated above the deck. html{color:

dharma. ::: "to carry", "to hold"; characteristic; feature; virtuous deeds; harmonious life; inherent qualities; inner principle; the means that elevates a man and helps him to reach the goal of life &

Dharmodgata. (T. Chos 'phags; C. Faqi pusa; J. Hoki bosatsu; K. Popki posal 法起菩薩). In Sanskrit, "Elevated Dharma," or "Dharma Arising," the name of a BODHISATTVA whom the AVATAMSAKASuTRA describes as residing in the Diamond (S. VAJRA) Mountains. According to the Chinese translations of the AvataMsakasutra, Dharmodgata lives in the middle of the sea in the Diamond Mountains (C. Jingangshan; J. KONGoSAN; K. KŬMGANGSAN), where he preaches the dharma to his large congregation of fellow bodhisattvas. The AstASĀHASRIKĀPRAJNĀPĀRAMITĀ also says that Dharmodgata (his name there is transcribed as C. Tanwujian, J. Donmukatsu, and K. Tammugal) preaches the PRAJNĀPĀRAMITĀ three times daily at the City of Fragrances (S. Gandhavatī; C. Zhongxiangcheng; J. Shukojo; K. Chunghyangsong), now used as the name of one of the individual peaks at the Korean KŬMGANGSAN. Since the Chinese Tang dynasty and the Korean Silla dynasty, East Asian Buddhists have presumed that Dharmodgata resided at the Diamond Mountains, just as the bodhisattva MANJUsRĪ lived at WUTAISHAN. In his HUAYAN JING SHU, CHENGGUAN's massive commentary to the AvataMsakasutra, Chengguan explicitly connects the sutra's mention of the Diamond Mountains to the Kŭmgangsan of Korea. At Kŭmgangsan, there are many place names associated with Dharmodgata and several legends and stories concerning him have been transmitted. Records explain that P'YOHUNSA, an important monastery at Kŭmgangsan, at one time had an image of Dharmodgata enshrined in its main basilica (although the image is now lost). According to the Japanese ascetic tradition of SHUGENDo, the semilegendary founder of the school, EN NO OZUNU (b. 634), is considered to be a manifestation of Dharmodgata, and his principal residence, Katsuragi Mountain in Nara prefecture, is therefore also sometimes known as the Diamond Mountains (KONGoSAN).

dignity ::: n. --> The state of being worthy or honorable; elevation of mind or character; true worth; excellence.
Elevation; grandeur.
Elevated rank; honorable station; high office, political or ecclesiastical; degree of excellence; preferment; exaltation.
Quality suited to inspire respect or reverence; loftiness and grace; impressiveness; stateliness; -- said of //en, manner, style, etc.


ecstasy ::: n. --> The state of being beside one&

elate ::: a. --> Lifted up; raised; elevated.
Having the spirits raised by success, or by hope; flushed or exalted with confidence; elated; exultant. ::: v. t. --> To raise; to exalt.
To exalt the spirit of; to fill with confidence or


elevating ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Elevate

elevation ::: n. --> The act of raising from a lower place, condition, or quality to a higher; -- said of material things, persons, the mind, the voice, etc.; as, the elevation of grain; elevation to a throne; elevation of mind, thoughts, or character.
Condition of being elevated; height; exaltation.
That which is raised up or elevated; an elevated place or station; as, an elevation of the ground; a hill.
The distance of a celestial object above the horizon, or


elevatory ::: a. --> Tending to raise, or having power to elevate; as, elevatory forces. ::: n. --> See Elevator, n. (e).

eloquent ::: a. --> Having the power of expressing strong emotions or forcible arguments in an elevated, impassioned, and effective manner; as, an eloquent orator or preacher.
Adapted to express strong emotion or to state facts arguments with fluency and power; as, an eloquent address or statement; an eloquent appeal to a jury.


eminence ::: n. --> That which is eminent or lofty; a high ground or place; a height.
An elevated condition among men; a place or station above men in general, either in rank, office, or celebrity; social or moral loftiness; high rank; distinction; preferment.
A title of honor, especially applied to a cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church.


ennoble ::: v. t. --> To make noble; to elevate in degree, qualities, or excellence; to dignify.
To raise to the rank of nobility; as, to ennoble a commoner.


epic ::: adj. 1. An extended narrative poem in elevated or dignified language, celebrating the feats of a legendary or traditional hero. 2. Resembling or suggesting such poetry. 3. Heroic; majestic; impressively great. 4. Of unusually great size or extent. n. 5. An epic poem. 6. Any composition resembling an epic. epics.

epic ::: a. --> Narrated in a grand style; pertaining to or designating a kind of narrative poem, usually called an heroic poem, in which real or fictitious events, usually the achievements of some hero, are narrated in an elevated style. ::: n. --> An epic or heroic poem. See Epic, a.

epic: This is a type of classical poetry, generally recounting heroic achievements. It is a poem that is a long narrative about a serious subject, told in an elevated styleof language. Epics generally focus on the exploits of a hero or demi-god who represents the cultural values of a race, nation, or religious group. John Milton’sParadise lost is an example of a famous epic. See classic.

erect ::: a. --> Upright, or having a vertical position; not inverted; not leaning or bent; not prone; as, to stand erect.
Directed upward; raised; uplifted.
Bold; confident; free from depression; undismayed.
Watchful; alert.
Standing upright, with reference to the earth&


exalted ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Exalt ::: a. --> Raised to lofty height; elevated; extolled; refined; dignified; sublime.

exalt ::: to raise in rank, character, or status; elevate. exalted.

exalt ::: v. t. --> To raise high; to elevate; to lift up.
To elevate in rank, dignity, power, wealth, character, or the like; to dignify; to promote; as, to exalt a prince to the throne, a citizen to the presidency.
To elevate by prise or estimation; to magnify; to extol; to glorify.
To lift up with joy, pride, or success; to inspire with delight or satisfaction; to elate.


extol ::: v. t. --> To place on high; to lift up; to elevate.
To elevate by praise; to eulogize; to praise; to magnify; as, to extol virtue; to extol an act or a person.


faculae ::: n. pl. --> Groups of small shining spots on the surface of the sun which are brighter than the other parts of the photosphere. They are generally seen in the neighborhood of the dark spots, and are supposed to be elevated portions of the photosphere.

fate. Jeou deprives the god of his rank and elevates

flame ::: n. --> A stream of burning vapor or gas, emitting light and heat; darting or streaming fire; a blaze; a fire.
Burning zeal or passion; elevated and noble enthusiasm; glowing imagination; passionate excitement or anger.
Ardor of affection; the passion of love.
A person beloved; a sweetheart.
To burn with a flame or blaze; to burn as gas emitted from bodies in combustion; to blaze.


footpace ::: n. --> A walking pace or step.
A dais, or elevated platform; the highest step of the altar; a landing in a staircase.


Fortified: An astrological term, meaning strongly placed (either elevated, in a congenial Sign, or well-aspected).

Fotudeng. [alt. Fotucheng] (J. Butsutocho/Buttocho; K. Pultojing 佛圖澄) (232-348). A monk and thaumaturge, perhaps from the Central Asian kingdom of KUCHA, who was a pioneer in the transmission of Buddhism to China. According to his hagiography in the GAOSENG ZHUAN, Fotudeng was a foreign monk, whose surname was BO, the ethnikon used for Kuchean monks; in some sources, his name is transcribed as BuddhasiMha. He was talented at memorizing and expounding scriptures, as well as in debate. Fotudeng is said to have received training in Kashmir (see KASHMIR-GANDHĀRA) and to have arrived in China in 310 intending to spread the DHARMA. Fotudeng is described as a skilled magician who could command spirits and predict the future. Despite his initial failure to establish a monastery in the Chinese capital of Luoyang, Fotudeng was able to convert the tyrannical ruler of the state of Later Zhao, Shi Le (r. 319-333), with a demonstration of his thaumaturgic skills. Fotudeng's continued assistance of Shi Le won him the title Daheshang (Great Monk). After Shi Le's general Shi Hu (r. 334-339) usurped the throne, Fotudeng was elevated to the highest status at the palace, and he continued to play the important role of political and spiritual advisor to the ruler. During his illustrious career as royal advisor, Fotudeng also taught many Buddhist disciples and is said to have established hundreds of monasteries. Among his disciples Zhu Faya (d.u.), DAO'AN, and Chu Fatai (320-387) are most famous.

glorify ::: v. t. --> To make glorious by bestowing glory upon; to confer honor and distinction upon; to elevate to power or happiness, or to celestial glory.
To make glorious in thought or with the heart, by ascribing glory to; to asknowledge the excellence of; to render homage to; to magnify in worship; to adore.


graduate ::: n. --> To mark with degrees; to divide into regular steps, grades, or intervals, as the scale of a thermometer, a scheme of punishment or rewards, etc.
To admit or elevate to a certain grade or degree; esp., in a college or university, to admit, at the close of the course, to an honorable standing defined by a diploma; as, he was graduated at Yale College.
To prepare gradually; to arrange, temper, or modify by


grandee ::: n. --> A man of elevated rank or station; a nobleman. In Spain, a nobleman of the first rank, who may be covered in the king&

groundlings: Also known as ‘understanders’, groundlings are those who paid only a penny to watch Shakespeare’s plays. They were the majority of the audience and stood on the ground floor of the theatre, in the yard. Groundlings stood through the entire play, which could be up to four hours long. The upper class, however, paid two pennies to sit and enter the elevated area with seats, whilst nobles often paid three pennies to sit in the Lords' rooms.

hance ::: v. t. --> To raise; to elevate. ::: --> Alt. of Hanch

hang ::: v. i. --> To suspend; to fasten to some elevated point without support from below; -- often used with up or out; as, to hang a coat on a hook; to hang up a sign; to hang out a banner.
To fasten in a manner which will allow of free motion upon the point or points of suspension; -- said of a pendulum, a swing, a door, gate, etc.
To fit properly, as at a proper angle (a part of an implement that is swung in using), as a scythe to its snath, or an ax


hansom cab ::: --> A light, low, two-wheeled covered carriage with the driver&

haught ::: a. --> High; elevated; hence, haughty; proud.

heave offering ::: --> An offering or oblation heaved up or elevated before the altar, as the shoulder of the peace offering. See Wave offering.

heighten ::: v. t. --> To make high; to raise higher; to elevate.
To carry forward; to advance; to increase; to augment; to aggravate; to intensify; to render more conspicuous; -- used of things, good or bad; as, to heighten beauty; to heighten a flavor or a tint.


height ::: n. --> The condition of being high; elevated position.
The distance to which anything rises above its foot, above that on which in stands, above the earth, or above the level of the sea; altitude; the measure upward from a surface, as the floor or the ground, of animal, especially of a man; stature.
Degree of latitude either north or south.
That which is elevated; an eminence; a hill or mountain; as, Alpine heights.


Higher Mind ::: a luminous thought-mind whose instrumentation is through an elevated thought-power and comprehensive mental sight. In the Higher Mind one becomes constantly and closely aware of the Self, the One everywhere and knows and sees habitually with that awareness.

Higher Mind ::: I mean by the Higher Mind a first plane of spiritual [consciousness] where one becomes constantly and closely aware of the Self, the One everywhere and knows and sees things habitually with that awareness; but it is still very much on the mindlevel although highly spiritual in its essential substance; and its instrumentation is through an elevated thought-power and comprehensive mental sight—not illumined by any of the intenser upper lights but as if in a large strong and clear daylight. It acts as an intermediate state between the Truth-Light above and the human mind; communicating the higher knowledge in a form that the Mind intensified, broadened, made spiritually supple, can receive without being blinded or dazzled by a Truth beyond it.Our first decisive step out of our human intelligence, our normal mentality, is an ascent into a higher Mind, a mind no longer of mingled light and obscurity or half-light, but a large clarity of the spirit. Its basic substance is a unitarian sense of being with a powerful multiple dynamisation capable of the formation of a multitude of aspects of knowledge, ways of action, forms and significances of becoming, of all of which there is a spontaneous inherent knowledge. It is th
   refore a power that has proceeded from the Overmind,—but with the Supermind as its ulterior origin,—as all these greater powers have proceeded: but its special character, its activity of consciousness are dominated by Thought; it is a luminous thought-mind, a mind of spirit-born conceptual knowledge.
   Ref: CWSA Vol. 27, 21-22 Page: 20, 974


high-flown ::: a. --> Elevated; proud.
Turgid; extravagant; bombastic; inflated; as, high-flown language.


highland ::: an elevated region.

highland ::: n. --> Elevated or mountainous land; (often in the pl.) an elevated region or country; as, the Highlands of Scotland.

high-minded ::: a. --> Proud; arrogant.
Having, or characterized by, honorable pride; of or pertaining to elevated principles and feelings; magnanimous; -- opposed to mean.


high-raised ::: a. --> Elevated; raised aloft; upreared.
Elated with great ideas or hopes.


high-toned ::: a. --> High in tone or sound.
Elevated; high-principled; honorable.


high ::: v. i. --> To hie.
To rise; as, the sun higheth. ::: superl. --> Elevated above any starting point of measurement, as a line, or surface; having altitude; lifted up; raised or extended in the direction of the zenith; lofty; tall; as, a high mountain, tower, tree;


high-winged ::: elevated or lofty.

hoist ::: v. t. --> To raise; to lift; to elevate; esp., to raise or lift to a desired elevation, by means of tackle, as a sail, a flag, a heavy package or weight. ::: n. --> That by which anything is hoisted; the apparatus for lifting goods.

Hwaomsa. (華嚴寺). In Korean, "Flower Garland Monastery"; the nineteenth of the major district monasteries (PONSA) in the contemporary CHOGYE order and the largest monastery on the Buddhist sacred mountain of CHIRISAN. According to the Hwaomsa monastery history, the monastery was founded in 544 by the obscure monk Yon'gi (d.u.), an Indian monk who is claimed to have been the first figure to spread the teaching of the AVATAMSAKASuTRA in Korea. (Five works related to the AvataMsakasutra and the DASHENG QIXIN LUN are attributed to Yon'gi in Buddhist catalogues, but none are extant.) In 645, during the Silla dynasty, the VINAYA master CHAJANG constructed at the monastery a three-story stone STuPA with four lions at the base, in which to preserve the relics (sARĪRA) of the Buddha. The eminent scholiast WoNHYO (617-686) is said to have taught at the monastery the "flower boys" (hwarang) group of Silla elite young men. In 677, the important vaunt courier in the Korean Hwaom school, ŬISANG (625-702), constructed a main shrine hall, the Changyukchon, where a gold buddha image six-chang (sixty feet) high was installed, and had inscribed the eighty-roll recension of the AvataMsakasutra on the four stone walls of the hall; since his time, the monastery was known as one of the centers of the Hwaom school (HUAYAN ZONG) in Korea. In 1462, during the Choson dynasty, Hwaomsa was raised to the status of a main monastery in the Son school (CHAN ZONG) of Buddhism. The monastery burned down during the Japanese Hideyoshi invasion of (1592-1598) and was rebuilt several times afterward. In 1702, the Son monk Kyeba (d.u.) built a new main shrine hall, Kakhwangjon, to replace the ruined Changyukchon, and the monastery was elevated to a main monastery of both the Son and Kyo (Doctrine) schools. The monastery is the nineteenth of the major parish monasteries (PONSA) in the contemporary CHOGYE order.

Hyeyong. (惠永) (1228-1294). Korean monk of the Koryo dynasty. In 1238, Hyeyong was ordained by Ch'ungyon (d.u.) at the monastery of Nambaegwolsa. Hyeyong passed the Son (CHAN) examinations held at WANGNYUNSA in 1244 and was subsequently given a position at Hŭngdoksa. In 1259, he was given the title Samjung taesa, and four years later, he was elevated to the status of head seat (sujwa). In 1267, Hyeyong moved to the temple Songnisa. Hyeyong's reputation grew, and he was eventually elevated to the highest status of SAMGHA overseer (sŭngt'ong) in 1269. He also resided at such monasteries as PULGUKSA, T'ONGDOSA, and Chunghŭngsa. In 1290, he led a mission of one hundred monks who specialized in copying Buddhist scriptures to Yuan China and delivered a lecture in the capital. He also copied the Buddhist canon in gold. In 1292, he was given the title Poja Kukchon (National Worthy whose Compassion is Universal) and was also given the title of saMgha overseer of the five teachings (Ogyodo Sŭngtong). He resided at the monastery of Tonghwasa and remained there until his death in 1294. Hyeyong composed a treatise entitled the Paegŭihae.

ideal thought ::: thought elevated to the plane of ideality; same as vijñanamaya thought, especially in the form of perceptive thought. ideal trik trikaladrsti

ignoble ::: a. --> Of low birth or family; not noble; not illustrious; plebeian; common; humble.
Not honorable, elevated, or generous; base.
Not a true or noble falcon; -- said of certain hawks, as the goshawk. ::: v. t.


imagination ::: n. --> The imagine-making power of the mind; the power to create or reproduce ideally an object of sense previously perceived; the power to call up mental imagines.
The representative power; the power to reconstruct or recombine the materials furnished by direct apprehension; the complex faculty usually termed the plastic or creative power; the fancy.
The power to recombine the materials furnished by experience or memory, for the accomplishment of an elevated purpose;


influence ::: n. --> A flowing in or upon; influx.
Hence, in general, the bringing about of an effect, phusical or moral, by a gradual process; controlling power quietly exerted; agency, force, or tendency of any kind which the sun exerts on animal and vegetable life; the influence of education on the mind; the influence, according to astrologers,of the stars over affairs.
Power or authority arising from elevated station, excelence of character or intellect, wealth, etc.; reputation;


interpretative imperative ::: (c. 1920) a form of logos vijñana formed by a combination of its interpretative and imperative elements; (in early 1927) an intermediate form of "the imperative", evidently interpretative ideality taken up into imperative vijñana and that again elevated to one of the lower planes of what by the end of 1927 was called overmind. interpretative logistical vijñana

isvarakoti (Ishwarakoti) ::: divine man; a human being whose centre has already been shifted upwards or from the beginning elevated in the superior planes of conscious existence, was established in God rather than in Nature; such men are already leaning down from God to Nature; they may therefore in losing themselves in Him yet keep themselves and live in Man-God. [cf. jivakoti]

Jaspers, Karl: (1883-) Inspired by Nietzsche's and Kierkegaard's psychology, but aiming at a strictly scientific method, the "existentialist" Jaspers analyzes the possible attitudes of man towards the world; the decisions which the individual must make in inescapable situations like death, struggle, change, guilt; and the various ways in which man meets these situations. Motivated by the boundless desire for clarity and precision, Jaspers earnestly presents as his main objective to awaken the desire for a fuller, more genuine philosophy, these three methods of philosophizing which have existed from te earliest times to the present: Philosophical world orientation consisting in an analysis of the limitations, incompleteness and relativity of the researches, methods, world pictures of all the sciences; elucidation of existence consisting of a cognitive penetration into reality on the basis of the deepest inner decisions experienced by the individual, and striving to satisfy the deepest demands of human nature; the way of metaphysics, the never-satisfied and unending search for truth in the world of knowledge, conduct of life and in the seeking for the one being, dimly seen through antithetic thoughts, deep existential conflicts and differently conceived metaphysical symbols of the past. Realizing the decisive problematic relation between philosophy and religion in the Middle Ages, Jaspers elevates psychology and history to a more important place in the future of philosophy.

Kŭmgang sammaegyong non. (C. Jingang sanmei jing lun; J. Kongo sanmaikyoron 金剛三昧經論). In Korean, "Exposition of the KŬMGANG SAMMAE KYoNG" (*Vajrasamādhisutra); composed by the Korean monk WoNHYO (617-686). The circumstances of the commentary's composition are provided in Wonhyo's biography in ZANNING's SONG GAOSENG ZHUAN. According to that account, an unidentified Silla king sent an envoy on a voyage to China in search of medicine that would cure his queen. On his way to China, however, the envoy was waylaid and taken to the dragon king's palace in the sea, where he was told that the queen's illness was merely a pretext in order to reintroduce the Vajrasamādhi into the world. The dragon king informed the envoy that the scripture was to be collated by an otherwise unknown monk named Taean (d.u.) and interpreted by Wonhyo, the most eminent contemporary scholar of the Korean Buddhist tradition. The commentary that Wonhyo wrote later made its way into China, where it was elevated to the status of a sĀSTRA (lun; K. non), hence the title Kŭmgang sammaegyong non. Wonhyo's commentary is largely concerned with the issue of how to cultivate "original enlightenment" (BENJUE), that is, how it is that the original enlightenment motivates ordinary sentient beings to aspire to become enlightened buddhas. Wonhyo discerns in the Kŭmgang sammae kyong a map of six sequential types of meditative practice, which culminate in the "contemplation practice that has but a single taste" (ilmi kwanhaeng). In Wonhyo's account of this process, the ordinary sensory consciousnesses are transformed into an "immaculate consciousness" (AMALAVIJNĀNA), wherein both enlightenment and delusion are rendered ineluctable and all phenomena are perceived to have but the "single taste" of liberation. In Wonhyo's treatment, original enlightenment is thus transformed from an abstract soteriological concept into a practical tool of meditative training.

Kyoto school. An influential school of modern and contemporary Japanese philosophy that is closely associated with philosophers from Kyoto University; it combines East Asian and especially MAHĀYĀNA Buddhist thought, such as ZEN and JoDO SHINSHu, with modern Western and especially German philosophy and Christian thought. NISHIDA KITARo (1870-1945), Tanabe Hajime (1885-1962), and NISHITANI KEIJI (1900-1991) are usually considered to be the school's three leading figures. The name "Kyoto school" was coined in 1932 by Tosaka Jun (1900-1945), a student of Nishida and Tanabe, who used it pejoratively to denounce Nishida and Tanabe's "Japanese bourgeois philosophy." Starting in the late 1970s, Western scholars began to research the philosophical insights of the Kyoto school, and especially the cross-cultural influences with Western philosophy. During the 1990s, the political dimensions of the school have also begun to receive scholarly attention. ¶ Although the school's philosophical perspectives have developed through mutual criticism between its leading figures, the foundational philosophical stance of the Kyoto school is considered to be based on a shared notion of "absolute nothingness." "Absolute nothingness" was coined by Nishida Kitaro and derives from a putatively Zen and PURE LAND emphasis on the doctrine of emptiness (suNYATĀ), which Kyoto school philosophers advocated was indicative of a distinctive Eastern approach to philosophical inquiry. This Eastern emphasis on nothingness stood in contrast to the fundamental focus in Western philosophy on the ontological notion of "being." Nishida Kitaro posits absolute nothingness topologically as the "site" or "locale" (basho) of nonduality, which overcomes the polarities of subject and object, or noetic and noematic. Another major concept in Nishida's philosophy is "self-awareness" (jikaku), a state of mind that transcends the subject-object bifurcation, which was initially adopted from William James' (1842-1910) notion of "pure experience" (J. junsui keiken); this intuition reveals a limitless, absolute reality that has been described in the West as God or in the East as emptiness. Tanabe Hajime subsequently criticized Nishida's "site of absolute nothingness" for two reasons: first, it was a suprarational religious intuition that transgresses against philosophical reasoning; and second, despite its claims to the contrary, it ultimately fell into a metaphysics of being. Despite his criticism of what he considered to be Nishida's pseudoreligious speculations, however, Tanabe's Shin Buddhist inclinations later led him to focus not on Nishida's Zen Buddhist-oriented "intuition," but instead on the religious aspect of "faith" as the operative force behind other-power (TARIKI). Inspired by both Nishida and such Western thinkers as Meister Eckhart (c. 1260-1327), Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), and Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) (with whom he studied), Nishitani Keiji developed the existential and phenomenological aspects of Nishida's philosophy of absolute nothingness. Concerned with how to reach the place of absolute nothingness, given the dilemma of, on the one hand, the incessant reification and objectification by a subjective ego and, on the other hand, the nullification of reality, he argued for the necessity of overcoming "nihilism." The Kyoto school thinkers also played a central role in the development of a Japanese political ideology around the time of the Pacific War, which elevated the Japanese race mentally and spiritually above other races and justified Japanese colonial expansion. Their writings helped lay the foundation for what came to be called Nihonjinron, a nationalist discourse that advocated the uniqueness and superiority of the Japanese race; at the same time, however, Nishida also resisted tendencies toward fascism and totalitarianism in Japanese politics. Since the 1990s, Kyoto school writings have come under critical scrutiny in light of their ties to Japanese exceptionalism and pre-war Japanese nationalism. These political dimensions of Kyoto school thought are now considered as important for scholarly examination as are its contributions to cross-cultural, comparative philosophy.

lofty ::: 1. Of majestic or imposing height. 2. Elevated in character; exalted. loftier.

lofty ::: superl. --> Lifted high up; having great height; towering; high.
Fig.: Elevated in character, rank, dignity, spirit, bearing, language, etc.; exalted; noble; stately; characterized by pride; haughty.


lower ::: a. --> Compar. of Low, a.
To let descend by its own weight, as something suspended; to let down; as, to lower a bucket into a well; to lower a sail or a boat; sometimes, to pull down; as, to lower a flag.
To reduce the height of; as, to lower a fence or wall; to lower a chimney or turret.
To depress as to direction; as, to lower the aim of a gun; to make less elevated as to object; as, to lower one&


lowly ::: a. --> Not high; not elevated in place; low.
Low in rank or social importance.
Not lofty or sublime; humble.
Having a low esteem of one&


magnanimous ::: a. --> Great of mind; elevated in soul or in sentiment; raised above what is low, mean, or ungenerous; of lofty and courageous spirit; as, a magnanimous character; a magnanimous conqueror.
Dictated by or exhibiting nobleness of soul; honorable; noble; not selfish.


meteor ::: n. --> Any phenomenon or appearance in the atmosphere, as clouds, rain, hail, snow, etc.
Specif.: A transient luminous body or appearance seen in the atmosphere, or in a more elevated region.


mid ::: superl. --> Denoting the middle part; as, in mid ocean.
Occupying a middle position; middle; as, the mid finger; the mid hour of night.
Made with a somewhat elevated position of some certain part of the tongue, in relation to the palate; midway between the high and the low; -- said of certain vowel sounds; as, a (ale), / (/ll), / (/ld). See Guide to Pronunciation, // 10, 11.


moot-hill ::: n. --> A hill of meeting or council; an elevated place in the open air where public assemblies or courts were held by the Saxons; -- called, in Scotland, mute-hill.

n. 1. Emotional or spiritual exaltation. 2. An elevating effect, result, or influence in the sphere of morality, emotion, physical condition, etc. v. 3. To lift up; raise; elevate. 4. To elevate in rank, honour, estate, or estimation. 5. To exalt emotionally or spiritually. uplifts, uplifting.

nabī ::: a prophet; one who informs; one who is informed; a clear and evident way. From the root n-b-a'meaning to utter in a low voice; to be exalted, elevated. (also see Nabi and Rasul web page)  

Nanzenji. (南禪寺). In Japanese, "Southern ZEN Monastery," major monastery in Kyoto, Japan, that is currently the headquarters (honzan) of the Nanzenji branch of the RINZAISHu. In 1264, Emperor Kameyama (r. 1259-1274) built a country villa, which he later converted to a Zen monastery named Nanzenji. He invited the monk Mukan Fumon (1212-1291), a disciple of ENNI BEN'EN (1202-1280), to serve as the monastery's founding abbot (J. kaisan; C. KAISHAN). After Fumon's departure, the monk Soen (1261-1313) succeeded Mukan and oversaw additional construction at the monastery. As the first Zen monastery constructed by an emperor, many eminent Zen masters were appointed to its abbacy. In 1325, Emperor Godaigo (r. 1318-1339) invited MUSo SoSEKI (1275-1351) to serve as abbot of Nanzenji. After his triumphant return to Kyoto in 1334, Godaigo elevated Nanzenji to the first rank in the influential GOZAN system. Nanzenji maintained this rank, even after political power was handed over to the Ashikaga shogunate. During the Muromachi period, the abbacy of Nanzenji came to be restricted only to those who had already served as abbot of another gozan monastery. For this reason, Nanzenji became the center of gozan culture and Zen practice. The monastery suffered from a series of conflagrations in 1393, 1447, and 1467. Although the monastery never fully recovered from these fires, some restoration efforts were made by Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1536-1598).

Nishida Kitaro. (西田幾太郎) (1870-1945). Influential Japanese philosopher of the modern era and founder of what came to be known as the KYOTO SCHOOL, a contemporary school of Japanese philosophy that sought to synthesize ZEN Buddhist thought with modern Western, and especially Germanic, philosophy. Nishida was instrumental in establishing in Japan the discipline of philosophy as practiced in Europe and North America, as well as in exploring possible intersections between European philosophy and such Buddhist ontological notions as the idea of nonduality (ADVAYA). Nishida was born in 1870, just north of Ishikawa prefecture's capital city of Kanazawa. In 1894, he graduated from Tokyo Imperial University with a degree in philosophy and eventually took an appointment at Kyoto University, where he taught from 1910 until his retirement in 1927. At Kyoto University, Nishida attracted a group of students who would later become known collectively as the "Kyoto School." These philosophers addressed an array of philosophical concerns, including metaphysics, ontology, phenomenology, and epistemology, using Western critical methods but in conjunction with Eastern religious concepts. Nishida's influential 1911 publication Zen no kenkyu ("A Study of Goodness") synthesized Zen Buddhist and German phenomenology to explore the unity between the ordinary and the transcendent. He argued that, through "pure experience" (J. junsui keiken), an individual human being is able to come in contact with a limitless, absolute reality that can be described either as God or emptiness (suNYATĀ). In Nishida's treatment, philosophy is subsumed under the broader soteriological quest for individual awakening, and its significance derives from its effectiveness in bringing about this goal of awakening. Other important works by Nishida include Jikaku ni okeru chokkan to hansei ("Intuition and Reflection in Self-Consciousness," 1917), Geijutsu to dotoku ("Art and Morality," 1923), Tetsugaku no konpon mondai ("Fundamental Problems of Philosophy," 1933), and Bashoteki ronri to shukyoteki sekaikan ("The Logic of the Place of Nothingness and the Religious Worldview," 1945). Nishida's Zen no kenkyu also helped lay the foundation for what later became regarded as Nihonjinron, a nationalist discourse that advocated the uniqueness and superiority of the Japanese race. Prominent in Nishida's philosophy is the idea that the Japanese-as exemplified in their exceptional cultivation of Zen, which here can stand for both Zen Buddhism and the homophonous word for "goodness"-are uniquely in tune with this concept of "pure experience." This familiarity, in part influenced by his longtime friend DAISETZ TEITARO SUZUKI, elevates the Japanese race mentally and spiritually above all other races in the world. This view grew in popularity during the era of Japanese colonial expansion and remained strong in some quarters even after the end of World War II. Since at least the 1970s, Nishida's work has been translated and widely read among English-speaking audiences. Beginning in the 1990s, however, his writings have come under critical scrutiny in light of their ties with Nihonjinron and Japanese nationalism.

observatory ::: n. --> A place or building for making observations on the heavenly bodies.
A building fitted with instruments for making systematic observations of any particular class or series of natural phenomena.
A place, as an elevated chamber, from which a view may be observed or commanded.
A lookout on a flank of a battery whence an officer


ode ::: 1. A lyric poem of some length, usually of a serious or meditative nature and having an elevated style and formal stanzaic structure. 2. A poem meant to be sung. odes.

Paegyangsa. (白羊寺). In Korean, "White Ram Monastery"; the eighteenth district monastery (PONSA) of the contemporary CHOGYE CHONG of Korean Buddhism, located on Paegam (White Cliff) Mountain in South Cholla province. The monastery was founded in 632 by the Paekche monk Yohwan (d.u.) and was originally called Paegamsa; it was renamed Chongt'osa after a reconstruction project during the Koryo dynasty in 1034. Its current name of Paegyangsa comes from a Koryo-era legend. Sometime during the reign of King Sonjo of the Choson dynasty (r. 1567-1607), a teacher now known as Hwanyang (d.u., lit. "Goat Caller") was said to have been leading a recitation assembly on the SADDHARMAPUndARĪKASuTRA ("Lotus Sutra"), when a white ram came down out of the mountains to listen to the monks recite the SuTRA. Once the event was over, the ram appeared to Hwanyang in a dream and explained that he had been reborn as a ram for transgressions he had committed in heaven; after hearing the master's sermon, however, he was redeemed and was able to take rebirth once again as a divinity (DEVA). The next day the body of the ram was found on the monastery grounds, and Paegyangsa received the name by which it has been known ever since. Paegyangsa is guarded by the Gate of the Four Heavenly Kings (Sach'onwang mun). The main shrine hall (TAEUNG CHoN) is unusually located to the right of the gate, rather than centered in the compound, and an eight-story stone STuPA is located behind the main hall, rather than in front of it. The oldest extant building on the campus is the Kŭngnak pojon, or SUKHĀVATĪ hall, the construction of which was sponsored by the queen-consort of the Choson king Chungjong (r. 1506-1544). The main shrine hall, reconstructed in 1917 by the prominent Buddhist reformer MANAM CHONGHoN (1876-1957), is dedicated to sĀKYAMUNI Buddha, and enshrines an image of sākyamuni flanked by the bodhisattvas MANJUsRĪ and SAMANTABHADRA. Much of the monastery burned in 1950 during the Korean War, and reconstruction extended into the 1990s. In 1996, Paegyangsa was elevated to the status of an ecumenical monastery (CH'ONGNIM), and is one of the five such centers in the contemporary Chogye order, which are expected to provide training in the full range of practices that exemplify the major strands of the Korean Buddhist tradition; the monastery is thus also known as the Kobul Ch'ongnim.

pall-mall ::: n. --> A game formerly common in England, in which a wooden ball was driven with a mallet through an elevated hoop or ring of iron. The name was also given to the mallet used, to the place where the game was played, and to the street, in London, still called Pall Mall.

plateau ::: an elevated, comparatively level expanse of land; a tableland.

plateau ::: n. --> A flat surface; especially, a broad, level, elevated area of land; a table-land.
An ornamental dish for the table; a tray or salver.


platonism ::: n. --> The doctrines or philosophy by Plato or of his followers.
An elevated rational and ethical conception of the laws and forces of the universe; sometimes, imaginative or fantastic philosophical notions.


promote ::: v. t. --> To contribute to the growth, enlargement, or prosperity of (any process or thing that is in course); to forward; to further; to encourage; to advance; to excite; as, to promote learning; to promote disorder; to promote a business venture.
To exalt in station, rank, or honor; to elevate; to raise; to prefer; to advance; as, to promote an officer. ::: v. i.


pulpit ::: n. --> An elevated place, or inclosed stage, in a church, in which the clergyman stands while preaching.
The whole body of the clergy; preachers as a class; also, preaching.
A desk, or platform, for an orator or public speaker. ::: a.


quote :::Music is called Ghiza-i-ruh, the food of the soul, by Sufis. Music being the most divine art elevates the soul to the higher spirit; music itself being unseen soon reaches the unseen; just as only the diamond can break the diamond, so musical vibrations are used to make the physical and mental vibrations inactive, in order that the Sufi may be elevated to the spiritual spheres.

    


raised, elevated, held up. Also fig.

raise ::: v. t. --> To cause to rise; to bring from a lower to a higher place; to lift upward; to elevate; to heave; as, to raise a stone or weight.
To bring to a higher condition or situation; to elevate in rank, dignity, and the like; to increase the value or estimation of; to promote; to exalt; to advance; to enhance; as, to raise from a low estate; to raise to office; to raise the price, and the like.
To increase the strength, vigor, or vehemence of; to


representative imperative ::: (c. 1920) a form of logos vijñana formed by a combination of its representative and imperative elements; (in early 1927) the lowest form of "the imperative", evidently representative vijñana taken up into imperative vijñana and that again elevated to one of the lower planes of what by the end of 1927 was called overmind.

ribaudequin ::: n. --> An engine of war used in the Middle Ages, consisting of a protected elevated staging on wheels, and armed in front with pikes. It was (after the 14th century) furnished with small cannon.
A huge bow fixed on the wall of a fortified town for casting javelins.


rideau ::: n. --> A small mound of earth; ground slightly elevated; a small ridge.

rugose ::: a. --> Wrinkled; full of wrinkles; specifically (Bot.), having the veinlets sunken and the spaces between them elevated, as the leaves of the sage and horehound.

scaffold ::: n. --> A temporary structure of timber, boards, etc., for various purposes, as for supporting workmen and materials in building, for exhibiting a spectacle upon, for holding the spectators at a show, etc.
Specifically, a stage or elevated platform for the execution of a criminal; as, to die on the scaffold.
An accumulation of adherent, partly fused material forming a shelf, or dome-shaped obstruction, above the tuyeres in a


scutellum ::: n. --> A rounded apothecium having an elevated rim formed of the proper thallus, the fructification of certain lichens.
The third of the four pieces forming the upper part of a thoracic segment of an insect. It follows the scutum, and is followed by the small postscutellum; a scutella. See Thorax.
One of the transverse scales on the tarsi and toes of birds; a scutella.


seamark ::: n. --> Any elevated object on land which serves as a guide to mariners; a beacon; a landmark visible from the sea, as a hill, a tree, a steeple, or the like.

sessile-eyed ::: a. --> Having eyes which are not elevated on a stalk; -- opposed to stalk-eyed.

shumidan. (C. xumi tan; K. sumi tan 須彌壇). In Japanese, "MT. SUMERU altar," also known as the shumiza, or Mt. Sumeru throne; the elevated altar or platform in a Japanese Buddhist shrine, on which the central icons are placed. The shumidan is so named because it was modeled after Mt. Sumeru, the central axis of the world in Buddhist cosmology. The altar's origins are found in a legend about the buddha sĀKYAMUNI, who was said to have gone away for several months to TRĀYASTRIMsA heaven, located at the peak of Mt. Sumeru, to preach to his mother, MĀYĀ. Due to his long absence, some of his adherents made images of the missing sākyamuni (see UDĀYANA BUDDHA), which they placed on a model of the mountain. Typically constructed in either square or octagonal shape, the shumidan is usually made of wood, metal, or stone and is decorated with various symbols. The square shape may symbolize the four sides of Mt. Sumeru, which are made of four types of jewels, generally listed as silver in the east, crystal in the west, lapis lazuli in the south, and gold in the north. The octagonal shape, by contrast, is said to represent the eightfold path (ĀRYĀstĀnGAMĀRGA). The shumidan is composed of upper, middle, and lower tiers. The Kamakura-period shumidan is a square-shaped altar constructed in a sophisticated style rich with symbolic meaning: its middle level consists of one thick, but narrow, tier, along with sixteen thinner tiers that gradually widen out in each direction toward both the top and the bottom. According to Buddhist esoteric teachings, the sixteen tiers toward the top represent the sixteen great bodhisattvas in the wisdom gate (J. emon); the sixteen tiers toward the bottom represent the sixteen great bodhisattvas in the meditation gate (J. jomon); the four jewels, represented by a square shape, symbolize the five wisdoms, because the four jewels as a group symbolize the "wisdom that is the essential nature of the dharma realm" (J. hokkai taishochi) and each jewel symbolizes the remaining four of the five wisdoms. Finally, the total of these thirty-two square-shaped tiers symbolizes the beings depicted in the diamond realm (J. KONGoKAI) MAndALA. The shumidan as a whole represents the mind of awakening (J. bodaishin; S. BODHICITTA), with which all sentient beings are endowed. In CHAN and ZEN monasteries, a shumidan without any displayed icon is placed in the dharma hall for the abbot or master to ascend for such occasions as the SHANGTANG ceremony.

siderealize ::: v. t. --> To elevate to the stars, or to the region of the stars; to etherealize.

Soho Myocho. [alt. Shuho Myocho] (宗峰妙超) (1282-1337/8). Japanese ZEN master of the RINZAISHu; commonly known as DAITo KOKUSHI (State Preceptor Great Lamp). Daito was a native of Harima in present-day Hyogo prefecture. At the age of ten, he entered the nearby TENDAI monastery of Engyoji on Mt. Shosha and received Tendai training under a VINAYA master Kaishin (d.u.). Later, Daito visited the Zen master KoHo KENNICHI at the monastery of Manjuji in Kamakura and received the full monastic precepts. In 1304, Daito began his training under NANPO JoMYo at the temple of Tokoan in Kyoto. He followed Nanpo to Manjuji in Kyoto and again to KENCHoJI in Kamakura. At Kenchoji, Daito had his first awakening. According to legend, Daito is said to have been instructed by Nanpo to continue his post-SATORI (awakening) cultivation for another twenty years. During this period of training, Daito is said to have once lived as a beggar underneath the Gojo Bridge in Kyoto. Shortly after his teacher's death in 1308, Daito left for Kyoto where he did indeed live for twenty years in a hermitage known as Ungoan. Later, Daito moved to the Murasakino district in Kyoto and established the monastery of DAITOKUJI. In 1323, he was summoned by retired Emperor Hanazono (r. 1308-1318) and was given the title State Preceptor Master Daito. Daito also received the patronage of Emperor Godaigo (r. 1318-1339). They elevated the status of Daitokuji to that of NANZENJI, then the most powerful GOZAN monastery in Kyoto. Daito and Nanpo's lineage, now known as the otokan, came to dominate the Rinzai Zen tradition.

Songgwangsa. (松廣寺). In Korean, "Piney Expanse Monastery"; the twenty-first district monastery (PONSA) of the contemporary CHOGYE CHONG of Korean Buddhism, located on Mount Chogye in South Cholla province. Along with HAEINSA and T'ONGDOSA, Songgwangsa is one of the "three-jewel monasteries" (SAMBO SACH'AL), which represent one of the three jewels (RATNATRAYA) of Buddhism; Songgwangsa has traditionally been considered the "SAMGHA-jewel monastery" (sŭngbo sach'al), because of the succession of sixteen state preceptors (K. kuksa; C. GUOSHI) who resided at the monastery during the Koryo dynasty. According to legend, Songgwangsa began as a small monastery named Kilsangsa, which was founded by a certain Hyerim (d.u.). In 1197, that monastery was restored and expanded by the eminent Son master POJO CHINUL, who moved his SAMĀDHI and PRAJNĀ Community (CHoNGHYE KYoLSA) to the Kilsangsa site. To commemorate the establishment of the expanded monastery, King Hŭijong (r. 1204-1211) renamed it SUSoNSA, or Son Cultivation Community, in 1208. (Still today, the meditation hall at the monastery uses the name Susonsa.) Chinul's reliquary STuPA, the Kamno t'ap (Sweet Dew Reliquary), sits on a hill behind the meditation hall, overlooking the monastery he founded. During the Choson dynasty, Songgwang, the original name of the mountain on which Susonsa was built, became the name of the monastery itself, and the mountain came to be known instead as Mt. Chogye. One of the most famous buildings at the monastery is the Kuksa chon (State Preceptors Hall), built in 1369 and now listed as Korean National Treasure no. 56, which enshrined early Choson-period portraits (CHINYoNG) of Chinul and the sixteen state preceptors at Songgwangsa. (The portraits were themselves collectively listed as cultural treasure no. 1043.) The portraits were stolen in 1995 in a brazen late-night heist and only three have been recovered. In 1969, Songgwangsa was elevated to the status of an ecumenical monastery (CH'ONGNIM), and is one of the five such centers in the contemporary Chogye order, which are all expected to provide training in the full range of practices that exemplify the major strands of the Korean Buddhist tradition. Songgwangsa is thus also known as the Chogye Ch'ongnim.

sprit ::: v. i. --> To throw out with force from a narrow orifice; to eject; to spurt out.
A small boom, pole, or spar, which crosses the sail of a boat diagonally from the mast to the upper aftmost corner, which it is used to extend and elevate. ::: v. t.


stage ::: n. --> A floor or story of a house.
An elevated platform on which an orator may speak, a play be performed, an exhibition be presented, or the like.
A floor elevated for the convenience of mechanical work, or the like; a scaffold; a staging.
A platform, often floating, serving as a kind of wharf.
The floor for scenic performances; hence, the theater; the playhouse; hence, also, the profession of representing dramatic


staith ::: n. --> A landing place; an elevated staging upon a wharf for discharging coal, etc., as from railway cars, into vessels.

steeve ::: v. i. --> To project upward, or make an angle with the horizon or with the line of a vessel&

steppe ::: n. --> One of the vast plains in Southeastern Europe and in Asia, generally elevated, and free from wood, analogous to many of the prairies in Western North America. See Savanna.

stilted ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Stilt ::: a. --> Elevated as if on stilts; hence, pompous; bombastic; as, a stilted style; stilted declamation.

stilty ::: a. --> Unreasonably elevated; pompous; stilted; as, a stilty style.

stipitate ::: a. --> Supported by a stipe; elevated on a stipe, as the fronds of most ferns, or the pod of certain cruciferous plants.

sublime ::: adj. 1. Elevated or lofty in thought, language, etc.; exalted, noble, refined. 2. Of high spiritual, moral, or intellectual worth. 3. Supreme; outstanding; perfect. n. 4. The realm of things that are sublime; the greatest or supreme degree. sublimer.

Sudoksa. (修德寺). In Korean, "Cultivating Merit Monastery"; the seventh district monastery (PONSA) of the contemporary CHOGYE CHONG of Korean Buddhism, located on the slopes of Toksung (Virtue Exalted) mountain in South Ch'ungch'ong province. According to Sudoksa's monastic records, the monastery was first constructed at the end of the Paekche dynasty by Sungje (d.u.). During the reign of the Paekche king Mu (r. 600-641) the monk Hyehyon (d.u.) is said to have lectured there on the SADDHARMAPUndARĪKASuTRA ("Lotus Sutra"). Alternate records state, however, that the monastery was founded by Chimyong (d.u.) during the reign of the Paekche king Pop (r. 599-600). The monastery was subsequently repaired by the renowned Koryo-dynasty Son monk NAONG HYEGŬN (1320-1376), and since that time Sudoksa has been one of the major centers of SoN (C. CHAN) practice in Korea. Sudoksa is best known for its TAEUNG CHoN, the main shrine hall. The taeung chon was rebuilt in 1308 and is presumed to be the oldest wooden building in Korea, having been spared the conflagrations that struck many Korean monasteries during the Japanese Hideyoshi invasions (1592-1598). It was constructed in the Chusimp'o style, so that its support pillars are wider in the middle than they are at the bottom or top. The Tap'o-style bracketing, imported from Fujian during the Southern Song dynasty, is similar to other Koryo-era monasteries, such as Pongjongsa and PUSoKSA. Inside the hall are images of three buddhas, sĀKYAMUNI, AMITĀBHA and BHAIsAJYAGURU, and two bodhisattvas, MANJUsRĪ and SAMANTABHADRA. Paintings depict KsITIGARBHA, the ten kings of hell (see SHIWANG; YAMA), and some indigenous Korean divinities. Many of the oldest original wall paintings were damaged during the Korean War and have now been removed to the safety of the monastery's museum. The courtyard holds two STuPAs, a three-story stone pagoda probably from the Koryo dynasty, and an older seven-story granite pagoda from the late Paekche dynasty, with typical upward curving corners. There is a thirty-three foot high statue of Maitreya a short walk up the mountain; the statue is unusual in that it is wearing Korean clothes, including a double cylindrical hat. It was erected by the Son master MAN'GONG WoLMYoN (1872-1946), one of the renowned Son teachers of the modern era who taught at Sudoksa; other famous masters associated with the monastery include KYoNGHo SoNGU (1849-1912), the nun KIM IRYoP (1869-1971), and Hyeam Hyonmun (1884-1985). Sudoksa recently opened a museum near its entrance to hold the large number of important historical artistic and written works the monastery owns, such as the exquisite wall paintings that formerly were located in the taeung chon. In 1996, Sudoksa was elevated to the status of an ecumenical monastery (CH'ONGNIM), and is one of the five such centers in the contemporary Chogye order, which are all expected to provide training in the full range of practices that exemplify the major strands of the Korean Buddhist tradition; the monastery is thus also known as the Toksung Ch'ongnim.

table-land ::: n. --> A broad, level, elevated area of land; a plateau.

The principal seat of his worship appears to have been at Borsippa (opposite the city of Babylon) where a temple-school flourished until the end of the neo-Babylonian empire — even surviving the conquest of Babylonia by Cyrus (538 BC). His original character cannot now be determined and he may have been a solar deity, although associated with water. His consort, Tashmit, is occasionally invoked with him. Nebo’s worship flourished before that of Marduk (the Biblical Merodach, probably the planet Mars and its regent), and when the latter was elevated to the chief position of the Babylonian pantheon, Nebo was regarded as his son and the two thereafter are more or less inseparable. Even in Assyria the worship of Nebo was made more prominent than the chief deity, Assur (’Ashshur) by some of the monarchs (e.g., Assurbanipal, 668-626 BC). His hieroglyph was the stylus, for he was regarded as the god of writing, prophecy, sacred chanting, and hence of song, having charge of the tablets of fate, on which he inscribed the names of men and forecast their destiny. His wisdom was likewise associated with the study of the heavenly bodies, hence the temple-school became famed for its astrologers. “Nebo is a creator, like Budha, of the Fourth and also of the Fifth Race. For the former starts a new race of Adepts, and the latter, the Solar-Lunar Dynasty, or the men of these Races and Round. Both are the Adams of their respective creatures” (SD 2:456).

T'ongdosa. (通度寺). In Korean, "Breakthrough Monastery" (lit. "Penetrating Crossing-Over Monastery"); the fifteenth district monastery (PONSA) in the contemporary CHOGYE CHONG of Korean Buddhism, located at the base of Yongch'uksan (S. GṚDHRAKutAPARVATA, or Vulture Peak) in Yangsan, South Kyongsang province. Along with HAEINSA and SONGGWANGSA, T'ongdosa is one of the "three-jewel monasteries" (SAMBO SACH'AL) that represent one of the three jewels (RATNATRAYA) of Buddhism; T'ONGDOSA is the buddha-jewel monastery (pulbo sach'al), because of its ordination platform and the relics (K. sari; S. sARĪRA) of the Buddha enshrined in back of its main shrine hall (TAEUNG CHoN). The oldest of the three-jewel monasteries, T'ongdosa has long been regarded as the center of Buddhist disciplinary studies (VINAYA) in Korea, and has been one of the major sites of ordination ceremonies since the Unified Silla period (668-935). Relics, reputed to be those of the Buddha himself, are enshrined at the monastery, and its taeung chon is famous for being one of four in Korea that does not enshrine an image of the Buddha; instead, a window at the back of the main hall, where the image ordinarily would be placed, looks out on the Diamond Ordination Platform (Kŭmgang kyedan), which includes a reliquary (STuPA) that enshrines the Buddha's relics. This focus on vinaya and the presence of these relics, both of which are reminders of the Buddha, have led the monastery to be designated the buddha-jewel monastery of Korea. T'ongdosa is said to have been established by the vinaya master CHAJANG (608-686) in 646 to enshrine a portion of the relics that he brought back with him from his sojourn into China. While on pilgrimage at WUTAISHAN, Chajang had an encounter with the bodhisattva MANJUsRĪ, who entrusted Chajang with a gold studded monk's robe (K. kasa; S. KAsĀYA) wrapped in purple silk gauze, one hundred pieces of relics of the Buddha's skull bone and his finger joint, beads, and sutras. One portion of the relics was enshrined together with the Buddha's robe in a bell-shaped stone stupa at the center of the Diamond Ordination Platform; another portion was enshrined in the nine-story pagoda at HWANGNYONGSA in the Silla capital of Kyongju. Under Chajang's leadership, the monastery grew into a major center of Silla Buddhism and the monastery continued to thrive throughout the Silla and Koryo dynasties, until the whole monastery except the taeung chon was destroyed by invading Japanese troops in the late sixteenth century. In 1641, the monk Uun (d.u.) rebuilt the monastery in its current configuration. The Diamond Ordination Platform was periodically damaged during the sporadic Japanese invasions that occurred during the Choson dynasty. In the fourth month of 1377, Japanese pirates invaded, seeking to plunder the sarīra; to keep them from falling into Japanese hands, the abbot went into hiding with the relics. Two years later, on the fifteenth day of the fifth month of 1379, the pirates came again, and the monks quickly whisked away the relics and hid them deep in the forest behind the monastery. The Japanese went in pursuit of the relics, but the abbot Wolsong (d.u.) took them to Seoul to keep them safe, returning with them once the danger had passed. During the Hideyoshi Invasions in the late sixteenth century, the relics were also removed in order to keep them safe. SAMYoNG YUJoNG, who was leading a monk's militia fighting the Japanese invaders, sent the relics to the Diamond Mountains (KŬMGANGSAN) in the north, where his teacher and the supreme commander, CH'oNGHo HYUJoNG, was staying. Hyujong decided that the relics were no safer there than back at their home monastery, so he returned them to T'ongdosa. Yujong covered the hiding place of the relics with weeds and thorn bushes and, once the Japanese threat was rebuffed, he restored the site to its former glory and the relics were reenshrined in 1603. The platform was repaired again in 1653 and on a grand scale in 1705. The Diamond Ordination Platform remains the site where BHIKsU and BHIKsUnĪ ordinations are held in Korea. In 1972, T'ongdosa was elevated to the status of an ecumenical monastery (CH'ONGNIM), and is one of the five such centers in the contemporary Chogye order, which are all expected to provide training in the full range of practices that exemplify the major strands of the Korean Buddhist tradition; the monastery is thus also known as the Yongch'uk Ch'ongnim.

topgallant ::: a. --> Situated above the topmast and below the royal mast; designatb, or pertaining to, the third spars in order from the deck; as, the topgallant mast, yards, braces, and the like. See Illustration of Ship.
Fig.: Highest; elevated; splendid. ::: n.


towering ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Tower ::: a. --> Very high; elevated; rising aloft; as, a towering height.
Hence, extreme; violent; surpassing.


tragedy ::: n. --> A dramatic poem, composed in elevated style, representing a signal action performed by some person or persons, and having a fatal issue; that species of drama which represents the sad or terrible phases of character and life.
A fatal and mournful event; any event in which human lives are lost by human violence, more especially by unauthorized violence.


transhumanize ::: v. t. --> To make more than human; to purity; to elevate above humanity.

tribune ::: n. --> An officer or magistrate chosen by the people, to protect them from the oppression of the patricians, or nobles, and to defend their liberties against any attempts that might be made upon them by the senate and consuls.
Anciently, a bench or elevated place, from which speeches were delivered; in France, a kind of pulpit in the hall of the legislative assembly, where a member stands while making an address; any place occupied by a public orator.


Tsong kha pa Blo bzang grags pa. (Tsong kha pa Losang Drakpa) (1357-1419). A Tibetan scholar and teacher venerated as the founder of the DGE LUGS sect of Tibetan Buddhism; typically known simply as Tsong kha pa. Born in the Tsong kha region of A mdo in northeastern Tibet, he received his initial lay vows under the fourth KARMA PA and began his religious education in the BKA' GDAMS tradition. In 1372, he traveled to central Tibet for further study. He became a disciple of the SA SKYA scholar Red mda' ba Gzhon nu blo gros (Rendawa Shonu Lodro, 1349-1412) but went on to study under many of the leading scholars of the day, including masters of various schools and sectarian affiliations. Another influential teacher was the lama Dbu ma pa (Umapa), from whom he received instructions on the KĀLACAKRATANTRA. He distinguished himself as a brilliant scholar and exegete of both SuTRA and TANTRA. According to his traditional biographies, Tsong kha pa experienced visions of Indian masters such as NĀGĀRJUNA and BUDDHAPĀLITA, who helped to clarify difficult points of doctrine. He is also said to have maintained a special relationship with MANJUsRĪ, the bodhisattva of wisdom, who appeared in visions throughout Tsong kha pa's life offering instruction and advice; Tsong kha pa is sometimes called 'Jam mgon, or "protected by MaNjusrī." Tsong kha pa's biographies speak of four major deeds undertaken during his lifetime. The first, in 1399, was his restoration of an image of the future buddha, MAITREYA. The second was a council to reform the code of VINAYA, convened in 1403 and attended by monks representing all sects of Tibetan Buddhism. The third was the Great Prayer Festival (SMON LAM CHEN MO) inaugurated in 1409 at the JO KHANG in LHA SA, in which he offered the ornaments of a SAMBHOGAKĀYA to the famous statue of JO BO SHĀKYAMUNI, celebrating the Buddha's performance of the sRĀVASTĪ MIRACLES. The festival became an important annual event, drawing thousands of participants from all quarters of the Tibetan Buddhist world. The fourth was the founding in 1409 of DGA' LDAN monastery, which would become one of principal religious institutions in the Lha sa region and seat of the leader of the Dge lugs sect. Tsong kha pa was an original and penetrating philosopher, who saw reason and intellectual development as key aspects of the path to enlightenment. Born during a period when the Tibetan Buddhist canon had been newly formulated, he sought a comprehensive explanation of the Buddhist path, with the PRĀSAnGIKA-MADHYAMAKA of BUDDHAPĀLITA and CANDRAKĪRTI as the highest philosophical view. His works are marked with a concern with systematic consistency, whether it be between sutra and tantra or PRAMĀnA and MADHYAMAKA. A prolific author, Tsong kha pa's works fill eighteen volumes. Among his best known writings are the LAM RIM CHEN MO ("Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment"), composed in 1402 at RWA SGRENG monastery, the SNGAGS RIM CHEN MO ("Great Treatise on the Stages of Mantra"), and the Drang nges LEGS BSHAD SNYING PO ("Essence of Eloquence on the Definitive and Interpretable"). Tsong kha pa called his system of religious practice the Bka' gdams gsar ma, or "New Bka' gdams," after the sect founded by the Bengali master ATIsA DĪPAMKARAsRĪJNĀNA. His followers were later known as Dga' ldan pa (Gandenpa), "those of Dga' ldan," after the monastic seat established by Tsong kha pa. This was sometimes abbreviated as Dga' lugs pa, "those of the system of Dga' ldan," eventually evolving into the current name Dge lugs pa, "those of the system of virtue." Tsong kha pa's fame was greatly elevated through the political power of the Dge lugs sect after the establishment of the institution of the DALAI LAMA. His tomb at Dga' ldan became an important site of pilgrimage prior to its destruction during the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Tsong kha pa's fame in Tibet was sufficiently great that he is commonly known simply as Rje rin po che, the "precious leader."

tunnel ::: n. . --> A vessel with a broad mouth at one end, a pipe or tube at the other, for conveying liquor, fluids, etc., into casks, bottles, or other vessels; a funnel.
The opening of a chimney for the passage of smoke; a flue; a funnel.
An artificial passage or archway for conducting canals or railroads under elevated ground, for the formation of roads under rivers or canals, and the construction of sewers, drains, and the like.


Under Kierkegaard's influence, he pursues an "existential" analysis of human existence in order to discuss the original philosophical question of being in a new way. He explores many hitherto unexplored phenomena which ontology disregarded. Sorge (concern), being par excellence the structure of consciousness, is elevated to the ultimate. Concern has a wholly special horizon of being. Dread (Angst), the feeling of being on the verge of nothing, represents an eminently transcendental instrument of knowledge. Heidegger gives dread a content directed upon the objective world. He unfolds the essence of dread to be Sorge (concern). As concern tends to become obscured to itself by the distracted losing of one's selfhood in the cares of daily life, its remedy is in the consideration of such experiences as conscience, forboding of death and the existential consciousness of time. By elevating Sorge to the basis of all being, he raised something universally human to the fundamental principle of the world. It is only after an elementary analysis of the basic constitution of human existence that Heidegger approaches his ultimate problem of Being and Time, in which more complicated structures such as the existential significance of death, conscience, and the power of resolute choice explain the phenomena of man's position in daily life and history.

unsensualize ::: v. t. --> To elevate from the domain of the senses; to purify.

upbear ::: v. t. --> To bear up; to raise aloft; to support in an elevated situation; to sustain.

uphold ::: v. t. --> To hold up; to lift on high; to elevate.
To keep erect; to support; to sustain; to keep from falling; to maintain.
To aid by approval or encouragement; to countenance; as, to uphold a person in wrongdoing.


upland ::: n. --> High land; ground elevated above the meadows and intervals which lie on the banks of rivers, near the sea, or between hills; land which is generally dry; -- opposed to lowland, meadow, marsh, swamp, interval, and the like.
The country, as distinguished from the neighborhood of towns. ::: a.


uplift ::: v. t. --> To lift or raise aloft; to raise; to elevate; as, to uplift the arm; to uplift a rock. ::: n. --> A raising or upheaval of strata so as to disturb their regularity and uniformity, and to occasion folds, dislocations, and the like.

vane ::: n. --> A contrivance attached to some elevated object for the purpose of showing which way the wind blows; a weathercock. It is usually a plate or strip of metal, or slip of wood, often cut into some fanciful form, and placed upon a perpendicular axis around which it moves freely.
Any flat, extended surface attached to an axis and moved by the wind; as, the vane of a windmill; hence, a similar fixture of any form moved in or by water, air, or other fluid; as, the vane of a screw


Vedic Religion: Or the Religion of the Vedas (q.v.). It is thoroughly cosmological, inspirational and ritualistic, priest and sacrifice playing an important role. It started with belief in different gods, such as Indra, Agni, Surya, Vishnu, Ushas, the Maruts, usually interpreted as symbolizing the forces of nature, but with the development of Hinduism it deteriorated into a worship of thousands of gods corresponding to the diversification of function and status in the complex social organism. Accompanying there was a pronounced tendency toward magic even in Vedic times, while the more elevated thoughts which have found expression in magnificent praises of the one or the other deity finally became crystallized in the philosophic thought of the Upanishads (q.v.). There is a distinct break, however, between Vedic culture with its free and autochthonous religious consciousness and the rigidly caste and custom controlled religion as we know it in India today, as also the religion of bhakti (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

vicugna ::: n. --> A South American mammal (Auchenia vicunna) native of the elevated plains of the Andes, allied to the llama but smaller. It has a thick coat of very fine reddish brown wool, and long, pendent white hair on the breast and belly. It is hunted for its wool and flesh.

Visvamitra (Sanskrit) Viśvāmitra Friend of all; a celebrated rishi (sage), famed for his contests with the sage Vasishtha. By birth a Kshattriya of the lineage of Pururavas of the lunar dynasty, he was employed at the court of Raja Sudas of the Tritsus, as was Vasishtha. Visvamitra was constantly worsted in his struggles for supremacy over the great Brahmin Vasishtha, and determined to elevate himself to the rank of a Brahmin, which he succeeded in doing after many strenuous austerities. Many verses of the Rig-Veda are said to have been written by him, and he is also credited with authorship of a law book.

water crane ::: --> A goose-neck apparatus for supplying water from an elevated tank, as to the tender of a locomotive.

winged ::: 1. Having wings or wing like appendages. 2. Moving or reaching swiftly on or as if on wings. 3. Fig. Swift; fleet. 4. Elevated or lofty. Also in numerous parasynthetic compounds, as strong-winged, swift-winged, white-winged, etc. blue-winged, eagle-winged, fire-winged, great-winged, high-winged, hue-winged, pearl-winged, puissant-winged, self-winged, seraph-winged, silver-winged, snow-winged, soft-winged, storm-winged, swift-winged, wide-winged. winged marvel

winged ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Wing ::: a. --> Furnished with wings; transported by flying; having winglike expansions.
Soaring with wings, or as if with wings; hence, elevated; lofty; sublime.


Zarpanitu, Sarpanit (Babylonian) Also Zer-banit; Zirat-banit. The shining one, its ideographs suggest the words zer seed, banit producing. A Babylonian goddess consort of Marduk or Merodach. In later Babylonian times (after 1200 BC) when Marduk was elevated to the position of chief deity of the pantheon in place of the older Chaldean deities, Zarpanitu was regarded as the great nature goddess, replacing Belit (consort of Bel). A triad was formed by the addition of Nebo, the god of wisdom, equivalent to the Hindu Budha and the Greek Hermes. “As Budha was the Son of Soma (the Moon) in India, and of the wife of Brihaspati (Jupiter), so Nebo was the son of Zarpa-nitu (the Moon Deity) and of Merodach, who had become Jupiter, after having been a Sun God” (SD 2:456). Herodotus called Zarpanitu “Zeus-Belos.”



QUOTES [8 / 8 - 481 / 481]


KEYS (10k)

   2 Sri Aurobindo
   1 Ven. Mother Marie Josepha of Bourg (1788-1862)
   1 SRI ANANDAMAYI MA
   1 MATA AMRITANANDAMAYI
   1 Henry David Thoreau
   1 Emile Mersch
   1 Saint Thomas Aquinas

NEW FULL DB (2.4M)

   10 Henry David Thoreau
   5 Samuel Johnson
   5 Mehmet Murat ildan
   5 Friedrich Nietzsche
   5 Frederick Lenz
   4 T F Hodge
   4 Steven Pressfield
   4 Sadhguru
   4 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
   4 H P Lovecraft
   4 Dave Eggers
   4 Anonymous
   3 Washington Irving
   3 Walter Savage Landor
   3 Terry Pratchett
   3 Lao Tzu
   3 John Grisham
   3 John C Maxwell
   3 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
   3 Gary Taubes

1:It is through the search after Truth that man can elevate himself. This he should regard in the light of a duty. ~ SRI ANANDAMAYI MA,
2:I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor.
   ~ Henry David Thoreau,
3:Power can abase as well as elevate; nothing is more liable to misuse. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, The Divine Life,
4:The struggle of Mind to elevate life is the promise and condition of the conquest of life by that which is higher even than Mind. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis Of Yoga, The Threefold Life,
5:...God will elevate to the throne a model king, a Christian king. The son of Saint Louis will love religion, goodness, justice. The Lord will give him the light, the wisdom, and the power." ~ Ven. Mother Marie Josepha of Bourg (1788-1862),
6:With earnestness, love and goodwill carry out life's everyday duties and try to elevate yourself step by step. In all human activities let there be a live contact with the Divine and you will not have to leave off anything. Your work will then be done well. ~ Sri Anandamayi Ma,
7:There are so many ways of making the approach to meditation as joyful as possible. You can find the music that most exalts you and use it to open your heart and mind. You can collect pieces of poetry, or quotations of lines of teachings that over the years have moved you, and keep them always at hand to elevate your spirit. ~ Sogyal Rinpoche,
8:55: A similar rejection is a necessary self-restraint and a spiritual discipline for the immature seeker, since such powers may be a great, even a deadly peril; for their supernormality may easily feed in him an abnormal exaggeration of the ego. Power in itself may be dreaded as a temptation by the aspirant to perfection, because power can abase as well as elevate; nothing is more liable to misuse. But when new capacities come as an inevitable result of the growth into a greater consciousness and a greater life and that growth is part of the very aim of the spiritual being within us, this bar does not operate; for a growth of the being into supernature and its life in supernature cannot take place or cannot be complete without bringing with it a greater power of consciousness and a greater power of life and the spontaneous development of an instrumentation of knowledge and force normal to that supernature. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 2.08,

*** WISDOM TROVE ***

1:To elevate the soul, poetry is necessary. ~ edgar-allan-poe, @wisdomtrove
2:As we each express our natural genius, we all elevate our world. ~ robin-sharma, @wisdomtrove
3:Funny, how one good cookie could calm the mind and even elevate a troubled soul. ~ dean-koontz, @wisdomtrove
4:The natural effect of sorrow over the dead is to refine and elevate the mind. ~ washington-irving, @wisdomtrove
5:We may elevate ourselves but we should never reach so high that we would every forget those who helped us get there. ~ will-rogers, @wisdomtrove
6:You have to elevate yourself to that point and bring your mind into the Godhead, into nirvana, into that perfect and pure radiant knowledge. It will not come to you. It never does. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
7:When you elevate the heels more so than you elevate the sole of the foot, you trigger a cascade of compensations in the knees and hips that cause tight hip flexors, and then those hip flexors cause lower-back pain. ~ tim-ferris, @wisdomtrove
8:Would that the simple maxim, that honesty is the best policy, might be laid to heart; that a sense of the true aim of life might elevate the tone of politics and trade till public and private honor become identical. ~ margaret-fuller, @wisdomtrove
9:Those who are well assured of their own standing are least apt to trespass on that of others, whereas nothing is so offensive as the aspirings of vulgarity which thinks to elevate itself by humiliating its neighbor. ~ washington-irving, @wisdomtrove
10:If I think that happiness is possible, I know all too well its hidden nature&
11:It is easy to specify the individual objects of admiration in these grand scenes; but it is not possible to give an adequate idea of the higher feelings of wonder, astonishment, and devotion, which fill and elevate the mind. ~ charles-darwin, @wisdomtrove
12:Have intentions but don't have expectations, and certainly don't have requirements. Do not become addicted to a particular result. Do not even prefer one. Elevate your Addictions to Preferences, and your Preferences to Acceptances. ~ neale-donald-walsch, @wisdomtrove
13:The essence of idolatry is the entertainment of thoughts about God that are unworthy of Him. The heaviest obligation lying upon the Christian Church today is to purify and elevate her concept of God until it is once more worthy of Him. ~ aiden-wilson-tozer, @wisdomtrove
14:Read books that expand you, that are bright. See films, plays, art forms that elevate your consciousness, that bring you into a sense of how beautiful this world is, how beautiful other worlds are, how beautiful nirvana, the transcendental is. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
15:Man’s strength resides in his capacity and desire to elevate himself, so as to attain the good. To travel step by step toward the heights. And that is all he can do. To reach heaven and remain there is beyond his powers: Even Moses had to return to earth. Is it the same for evil? ~ elie-wiesel, @wisdomtrove
16:Man is not made for the state; the state is made for man. To deprive man of freedom is to relegate him to the status of a thing, rather than elevate him to the status of a person. Man must never be treated as a means to the end of the state, but always as an end within himself. ~ martin-luther-king, @wisdomtrove
17:Good fortune will elevate even petty minds, and give them the appearance of a certain greatness and stateliness, as from their high place they look down upon the world; but the truly noble and resolved spirit raises itself, and becomes more conspicuous in times of disaster and ill fortune. ~ plutarch, @wisdomtrove
18:We don’t exhaust the Bible even after reading it hundreds of times. Each time we read it we see it in a new light. That is the greatness of the holy scriptures. They are that way because they were created by holy prophets who experienced the truth. Each time we read these works we elevate ourselves to see a little more. ~ swami-satchidananda-saraswati, @wisdomtrove
19:Choose to view life through God's eyes. This will not be easy because it doesn't come naturally to us. We cannot do this on our own. We have to allow God to elevate our vantage point. Start by reading His Word, the Bible... Pray and ask God to transform your thinking. Let Him do what you cannot. Ask Him to give you an eternal, divine perspective. ~ charles-r-swindoll, @wisdomtrove
20:The purpose of music is to elevate the spirit and inspire. Not to help push some product down your throat. It puts you in tune with your own existence. Sometimes you really don't know how you feel, but really good music can define how you feel... someone who's telling me where he's been that I haven't and what it's like there - somebody whose life I can feel. ~ bob-dylan, @wisdomtrove
21:A line partakes of the simplicity of a point more than does a surface; and a surface [partakes thereof more] than does a material object-as was evident. From this consideration of a point and a material object elevate yourself unto a likeness of True Being and of the universe; and by means of [this] quite clear symbolism [of a point] make a conjecture about what has been said. ~ nicholas-of-cusa, @wisdomtrove
22:I want to have a lasting experience with God. Sometimes I feel like I understand the divinity of this world, but then I loose it because I get distracted by my petty desires and fears. I want to be with God all the time. But I don't want to be a monk, or totally give up worldly pleasures. I guess what I want to learn is how to leave in this world and enjoy its delights, but also elevate myself to God. ~ elizabeth-gilbert, @wisdomtrove
23:We are Born like this Into this Into these carefully mad wars Into the sight of broken factory windows of emptiness Into bars where people no longer speak to each other Into fist fights that end as shootings and knifings Born into this Into hospitals which are so expensive that it’s cheaper to die Into lawyers who charge so much it’s cheaper to plead guilty Into a country where the jails are full and the madhouses closed Into a place where the masses elevate fools into rich heroes ~ charles-bukowski, @wisdomtrove
24:For me, running is both exercise and a metaphor. Running day after day, piling up the races, bit by bit I raise the bar, and by clearing each level I elevate myself. At least that’s why I’ve put in the effort day after day: to raise my own level. I’m no great runner, by any means. I’m at an ordinary or perhaps more like mediocre level. But that’s not the point. The point is whether or not I improved over yesterday. In long-distance running the only opponent you have to beat is yourself, the way you used to be. ~ haruki-murakami, @wisdomtrove

*** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***

1:Elevate those guns a little lower. ~ Andrew Jackson,
2:To elevate the soul, poetry is necessary. ~ Edgar Allan Poe,
3:I'm trying to elevate small-talk to medium talk. ~ Larry David,
4:If someone's deeds lower his position, his pedigree cannot elevate it. ~,
5:Make no more giants, God!But elevate the race at once! ~ Robert Browning,
6:Be creative. Thus we contribute and thus we elevate our souls. ~ Ming Dao Deng,
7:Once you take your foot off the gas, your life will elevate. ~ Bridget Everett,
8:Propaganda does not aim to elevate man, but to make him serve. ~ Jacques Ellul,
9:As we each express our natural genius, we all elevate our world. ~ Robin Sharma,
10:Don't kill the game with your 'funk', elevate it with your humility. ~ T F Hodge,
11:I do not elevate the time or mode of baptism to a primary doctrine. ~ John Piper,
12:The list, for better or worse, did elevate her status at school. ~ Siobhan Vivian,
13:We cannot lower the mountain, therefore we must elevate ourselves. ~ Todd Skinner,
14:What is the purpose of life? To elevate all, big or small. ~ Harbhajan Singh Yogi,
15:Take something ordinary and elevate it to something extraordinary. ~ Samuel Mockbee,
16:Only passions, great passions, can elevate the soul to great things. ~ Denis Diderot,
17:Only living things bring living joy to the soul and must elevate it. ~ Mahatma Gandhi,
18:The greatest privilege of leadership is the chance to elevate lives. ~ Robin S Sharma,
19:When you focus on your greatness you elevate everyone around you. ~ Gabrielle Bernstein,
20:Baseball is simply my platform to elevate Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior. ~ Albert Pujols,
21:One of the best ways to elevate your character is to emulate worthy role models ~ Epictetus,
22:Funny, how one good cookie could calm the mind and even elevate a troubled soul. ~ Dean Koontz,
23:The five senses are all correlated, the sixth and seventh is how you elevate it. ~ Kool Moe Dee,
24:There exists no objective basis on which to elevate one species above another. ~ Richard Dawkins,
25:Sometimes, whether you like it or not, people elevate you. It's real easy to fall. ~ Eddie Vedder,
26:The natural effect of sorrow over the dead is to refine and elevate the mind. ~ Washington Irving,
27:but pride is particularly heinous in that it attempts to elevate the sinner above God. ~ Anonymous,
28:He is sure that this would elevate his stature beyond that of dull software boy. ~ Neal Stephenson,
29:The more we consume, acquire, and elevate our status, the harder it is to stay happy. ~ Jane McGonigal,
30:You can only elevate individual performance by elevating that of the entire system. ~ W Edwards Deming,
31:calling a man a god did not elevate the man, it only diminished the idea of godhood. ~ Orson Scott Card,
32:When we elevate others, we elevate ourselves. Let’s all go be “elevators.”
KMR ~ Kathleen M Rodgers,
33:If you consciously get your body into different postures, you can elevate your consciousness. ~ Sadhguru,
34:When we raise our game aesthetically, we elevate it morally and spiritually as well. ~ Steven Pressfield,
35:Pain never really goes away; you just elevate and get used to it by growing stronger. ~ Philippos Syrigos,
36:elevate learning as a core metric. The enemy of creation is not uncertainty, it’s inertia. ~ Jocelyn K Glei,
37:Find your grit and put in the work to elevate your game. Champions train. Chumps complain. ~ Kwame Alexander,
38:Elevate your inside game. A negative attitude is below the horizon...a place for lonesome hearts. ~ T F Hodge,
39:Christianity has done more to elevate the status of women than any other movement in history. ~ Stasi Eldredge,
40:That which attempts to elevate the ugly to the level of beauty becomes neither; but an obscenity. ~ John Donne,
41:As you elevate spiritually, you start shedding these layers. These avarana, layers, veil the true you. ~ Om Swami,
42:Be the inner journeys, be the outer travels, all trips elevate man, all voyages lift him up! ~ Mehmet Murat ildan,
43:For me, art, and especially music, exist to elevate us as far as possible above everyday existence. ~ Gabriel Faure,
44:if you want to experience a mountain peak, you either elevate yourself to that level, or simply look up. ~ Sadhguru,
45:But Mr. Elton had only drunk wine enough to elevate his spirits, not at all to confuse his intellects. ~ Jane Austen,
46:It is unnatural to walk on tiptoe.
Try to elevate yourself above others,
and you will soon fall. ~ Lao Tzu,
47:The greatest formula that can liberate, cleanse and elevate the mind is Rama-Name, the Name of Rama. ~ Sathya Sai Baba,
48:Too often we elevate the inconsequential into the influential... by reacting without reflecting. ~ Sarah Ban Breathnach,
49:Deeply funny musings and adventures elevate Paul Rudnick to the highest level of American comedy writing. ~ Steve Martin,
50:Power can abase as well as elevate; nothing is more liable to misuse. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, The Divine Life,
51:I believe that it is in my power to elevate myself this very hour above the common level of my life. ~ Henry David Thoreau,
52:Telling the truth to yourself and someone you can trust are great ways to help elevate your whole emotional quality. ~ Jewel,
53:This love, it is a funny thing. It can elevate you to the highest peak and plunge you to a bottomless pit. I ~ Preeti Shenoy,
54:If you can't toot your own horn, toot another woman's! It's the best way to elevate women to be leaders. ~ Geraldine Laybourne,
55:Books of value are just like people of value-they try only to elevate others, to help them to rise and to grow. ~ Victor J Banis,
56:Just remember, the desire to elevate one’s self at the expense of another is the mark of an insecure personality, so ~ John Lyman,
57:Stairs elevate you; ethics elevates you; goodness elevates you; awareness elevates you; wisdom elevates you. ~ Mehmet Murat ildan,
58:A healthy mind always likes to adore others, elevate them. An unhealthy mind likes to pull everything down. ~ Sri Sri Ravi Shankar,
59:In pride we consciously elevate our own standing and concerns and look down upon others as essentially inferior. ~ Stephen Batchelor,
60:Love is simply a willingness to reduce oneself in some way, for no other reason than the desire to elevate another. The ~ Luke Scull,
61:Impure people oppress, and the pure-hearted not only forgive their oppressors, but elevate them in status and character. ~ Hamza Yusuf,
62:Running day after day, piling up the races, bit by bit I raise the bar, and by clearing each level I elevate myself. ~ Haruki Murakami,
63:That is what [Andy] Warhol portraits do: They elevate the subject into an icon of the pop culture he was documenting. ~ Giorgio Armani,
64:There are good photographers who might elevate themselves to the ranks of the great simply by burning most of their work. ~ Janet Malcolm,
65:The very fact that we have access to God's attention and presence should concentrate the thoughts and elevate the heart. ~ Timothy Keller,
66:What readers ask nowadays in a book is that it should improve, instruct, and elevate. This book wouldn't elevate a cow. ~ Jerome K Jerome,
67:I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor. ~ Henry David Thoreau,
68:Public Opinion... an attempt to organize the ignorance of the community, and to elevate it to the dignity of physical force. ~ Oscar Wilde,
69:Therefore, wheat products elevate blood sugar levels more than virtually any other carbohydrate, from beans to candy bars. ~ William Davis,
70:Bob Beaudine challenges you to think differently. His unique approach to life and business has helped elevate many careers. ~ Roger Goodell,
71:Life is a struggle to elevate ourselves from nobody to somebody, not ever knowing the secret beauties of being nobody! ~ Mehmet Murat ildan,
72:My vision is to elevate the consciousness of humanity one mind, one heart, one life, one spirit at a time. They are married. ~ Iyanla Vanzant,
73:Women are property,” he replied. “Your father was a fool to name you queen, to try to elevate women to more than what they are. ~ Morgan Rice,
74:Great grief makes sacred those upon whom its hand is laid. Joy may elevate, ambition glorify, but sorrow alone can consecrate. ~ Horace Greeley,
75:I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor.
   ~ Henry David Thoreau,
76:The most successful families embrace and elevate their family history, particularly their failures, setbacks and other missteps. ~ Bruce Feiler,
77:When we liberate the economic potential of women, we elevate the economic performance of communities, nations, and the world. ~ Hillary Clinton,
78:You can cease to be influenced by people who tease you... Just neglect their helps and elevate your steps... You can do it! ~ Israelmore Ayivor,
79:Hip-hop is still cool at a party. But to me, hip-hop has never been strictly a party; it is also there to elevate consciousness. ~ Saul Williams,
80:When you’re being celebrated and flying high, don’t allow fanatics (fans) to elevate you so far out that you forget whose sky it is. ~ T F Hodge,
81:Accessories are crucial. A great bag and a piece of statement jewelry are the fastest way to elevate an otherwise understated look. ~ Ivanka Trump,
82:Beautiful quality that women have, which is we like to get together and gab. It's time to elevate that aspect of being a woman. ~ Elizabeth Lesser,
83:We have to be careful not to elevate our preferences to moral standards and judge others by them. We only do so to feel superior. ~ Timothy Keller,
84:You who occupy the mountain summit, though you elevate your nest like the eagle, even from there I will bring you down. Jeremiah 49:16 ~ Beth Moore,
85:A little rudeness and disrespect can elevate a meaningless interaction to a battle of wills and add drama to an otherwise dull day. ~ Bill Watterson,
86:the feeling of rank is one of the most basic human instincts. To gossip about someone is to elevate yourself above him or her. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,
87:If you want to lower the significance of Russia in the world, you actually just want to elevate your own country. That is a mistake. ~ Vladimir Putin,
88:keep purifying your motivations so that they're completely about love and service to elevate the energy and experiences even further. ~ Doreen Virtue,
89:Well, I'm an artist to the core. And my objective has always been to use my talents and my skills to elevate humanity through my art. ~ Wesley Snipes,
90:Excellent friend! how sincerely did you love me, and endeavour to elevate my mind until it was on a level with your own. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley,
91:We don’t live in a meritocracy, and to pretend that simple hard work will elevate all to success is an exercise in wilful ignorance. ~ Reni Eddo Lodge,
92:We don’t live in a meritocracy, and to pretend that simple hard work will elevate all to success is an exercise in willful ignorance. ~ Reni Eddo Lodge,
93:With their virtues they want to scratch out the eyes of their enemies; and they elevate themselves only that they may lower others. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,
94:Happy Tuesday! Stay in the LIGHT. Hold onto positive things that elevate your spirit & be with positive people who make your life dance ! ~ Tracey Edmonds,
95:I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor. HENRY DAVID THOREAU ~ Stephen R Covey,
96:You would elevate tradition and societal approval over the expansion of knowledge. If anything deserves to be called ‘illogical,’ it is that. ~ David Mack,
97:Elevate. Each day, live to elevate yourself, each day elevate one person. Make elevation your religion and you shall reach infinity. ~ Harbhajan Singh Yogi,
98:She'd take these random occurrences and elevate them to oracles; she'd pretend that they were enough to justify her actions.
Or lack therof. ~ Jodi Picoult,
99:It has taken us two million years to elevate politics from the level of a monkey squabble, to a level comprehensible to a six year old child. ~ Peter J Carroll,
100:The function of the artist in a disturbed society is to give awareness of the universe, to ask the right questions, and to elevate the mind. ~ Marina Abramovic,
101:The greatest gift that an actor can have is good scripts because then you're relieved of the responsibility of trying to elevate the material. ~ Holt McCallany,
102:Meet hatred with hatred and you degrade yourself. Meet hatred with love and you elevate not only yourself but also the one who bears you hatred. ~ Ralph Waldo Trine,
103:ONE DAY THE Singularity would elevate humans to cybernetic superbeings, and maybe then people would say what they meant. Probably not, though. ~ Charlie Jane Anders,
104:to elevate the race of humankind. To endow each individual with sovereignty over his own heart and to lift the state as a whole to govern itself. ~ Steven Pressfield,
105:With fifty years ahead of him, he thought, he could elevate tedium to the status of an art form. There would be no end to the things he wouldn’t do ~ Terry Pratchett,
106:ONE DAY THE Singularity would elevate humans to cybernetic superbeings, and maybe then people would say what they meant. Probably not, though. * ~ Charlie Jane Anders,
107:Who can over estimate the progress of the world if all the money wasted in superstition could be used to enlighten, elevate and civilize mankind? ~ Robert G Ingersoll,
108:One day the Singularity would elevate humans to cybernetic superbeings, and maybe then people would say what they meant.
Probably not, though. ~ Charlie Jane Anders,
109:The land is like poetry: it is inexplicably coherent, it is transcendent in its meaning, and it has the power to elevate a consideration of human life. ~ Barry Lopez,
110:No amount of art, even of the Great American variety, can elevate you above, or insulate you from, the divisions, the cataclysms, of ordinary life. ~ Garth Risk Hallberg,
111:Prune what is turgid, elevate what is commonplace, arrange what is disorderly, introduce rhythm where the language is harsh, modify where it is too absolute. ~ Quintilian,
112:Who can over estimate the progress of the world if all the money wasted in superstition could be used to enlighten, elevate and civilize mankind? ~ Robert Green Ingersoll,
113:It was a kind of sado-masochism. I would take the things that were painful to me and elevate them and, through the mantra of music, make them into a release. ~ Michael Gira,
114:There is more of power to sanctify, elevate, strengthen, and cheer in the word Jesus (Jehovah-Saviour) than in all the utterances of man since the world began. ~ Charles Hodge,
115:When in doubt, initiate. Say yes—to love, to life, to joining in with others. That is how we stay on the right path and, at the same time, elevate humanity. ~ Philip Toshio Sudo,
116:Once you get clear on what you want, build your confidence account, and elevate your circle of influence, you must stay consistent or you’ll always be starting over. ~ Peter Voogd,
117:This is a tried and true genre directed by a guy who's famous for character work. This could take a genre picture and lift it and elevate it. That was my thinking. ~ Michael Chiklis,
118:We have to think outside the box, inside the Constitution, find ways to do things that will elevate our security, reduce the risk of the incidence of terrorist attack ~ John Ashcroft,
119:Whenever you find yourself becoming angry or jealous, try to see good quality in the person. You will suddenly be thinking a higher thought and that will elevate you. ~ Frederick Lenz,
120:One reason refined foods elevate insulin is the absence of fiber. As you saw earlier, fiber improves insulin efficiency, meaning that less is necessary to do the job. ~ John A McDougall,
121:We need leadership that can elevate religion and morality to their position of paramount importance and thus eliminate growing selfishness, immorality and materialism. ~ George W Romney,
122:Music is a great blessing. It has the power to elevate and liberate us. It sets people free to dream. It can unite us to sing with one voice. Such is the value of music. ~ Nelson Mandela,
123:Anytime you’re tempted to upsell someone else, stop what you’re doing and upserve instead. Don’t try to increase what they can do for you. Elevate what you can do for them. ~ Daniel H Pink,
124:Compliments are the helium that fills everyone's balloon; they elevate the person receiving them so he or she can fly over life's troubles and land safely on the other side. ~ Bernie Siegel,
125:The struggle of Mind to elevate life is the promise and condition of the conquest of life by that which is higher even than Mind. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis Of Yoga, The Threefold Life,
126:To be sure, it is not the fruits of scientific research that elevate a man and enrich his nature, but the urge to understand, the intellectual work, creative or receptive. ~ Albert Einstein,
127:[F]or contemporary judgment does not recognize that much depth of soul is needed to light up the picture drawn from contemptible life and elevate it into a pearl of creation. ~ Nikolai Gogol,
128:I not only wanted to showcase lyrical skills but also continue to drop knowledge on the hiphop community. Im looking to elevate through my music, and through my music I educate. ~ Talib Kweli,
129:I think that the celebrity memoir as a genre is looked upon as a lesser form. One of my missions as a ghostwriter has been to elevate that form. Maybe that sounds pretentious! ~ Hilary Liftin,
130:[F]or contemporary judgment does not recognize that much depth of soul is needed to light up the picture drawn from contemptible life and elevate it into a pearl of creation... ~ Nikolai Gogol,
131:When we bring the filmmaker, we bring somebody to help us elevate the material with those things, to help us do something different with all of those resources at their disposal. ~ Kevin Feige,
132:prosperity does not elevate the sage and adversity does not depress him. For he has always made the effort to rely as much as possible on himself and to derive all delight from himself. ~ Seneca,
133:The room was not a room to elevate the soul. Louis XIV, to pick a name at random, would not have liked it, would have found it not sunny enough, and insufficiently full of mirrors. ~ Douglas Adams,
134:The secret to being alone is to organize your time; to develop habits and routines and gradually elevate their importance to where they seem almost like normal, healthy activities. ~ Daniel Clowes,
135:If a person seems wicked, do not cast him away. Awaken him with your words, elevate him with your deeds, repay his injury with your kindness. Do not cast him away; cast away his wickedness. ~ Laozi,
136:You have to be as light as you can be and not get weighed down and stuck in your emotion, stuck in your body, stuck in your head. You just want to always be trying to elevate somehow. ~ Bill Murray,
137:You have to elevate yourself to that point and bring your mind into the Godhead, into nirvana, into that perfect and pure radiant knowledge. It will not come to you. It never does. ~ Frederick Lenz,
138:And there is distrust in Washington. I am surprised, frankly, at the amount of distrust that exists in this town. And I'm sorry it's the case, and I'll work hard to try to elevate it. ~ George W Bush,
139:High calls low and low calls high. I tell you, if you were in such dire straits as I was, you too would elevate your thoughts. The lower you are, the higher your mind will want to soar. ~ Yann Martel,
140:If a person seems wicked, do not cast him away. Awaken him with your words, elevate him with your deeds, repay his injury with your kindness. Do not cast him away; cast away his wickedness. ~ Lao Tzu,
141:Libraries for me have always had a cathedral-like ambiance, a hushed sanctuary where learning is revered, where we the people elevate books and education to the level of the religious. ~ Harlan Coben,
142:Marriage partners are to serve each other. Elevate, help, teach, strengthen each other, but above all, serve. Raise their children honorably, lovingly and with detachment. A child is a ~ J D Salinger,
143:Perhaps above everything compassion is the most important thing to embrace and emanate in life. It will enhance your life - and it's the one thing that will elevate and heal mankind ~ Rasheed Ogunlaru,
144:Woman has been the target of much that is sordid and cheap, especially in photography. To raise, to elevate, to endorse with timeless reverence the image of woman, has been my mission. ~ Ruth Bernhard,
145:This is a hallmark trait of the left. There is never any effort to elevate anybody. Liberalism is all about tearing down. Liberalism is all about lowering. It is all about destroying 'em. ~ Rush Limbaugh,
146:To elevate abstract doctrines and dogmas over living, breathing, embodied experiences of God's love and grace, then, is going the wrong direction. It's taking flesh and turning it back into words. ~ Rob Bell,
147:What is there in 'Paradise Lost' to elevate and astonish like Herschel or Somerville? ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson, Quoted in Robert D. Richardson, Jr., Emerson, the Mind On Fire (Univ. of Calif Press 1995), p. 124,
148:Trust is a competency. It's something you can get good at. It's a strength you personally, and your team and your company can master. Being good at it will elevate every other strength you have. ~ Stephen Covey,
149:every individual can make himself happy. External goods are of trivial importance and without much influence in either direction: prosperity does not elevate the sage and adversity does not depress him. ~ Seneca,
150:In His infinite mercy, Allah has
sent the light of Ramadan to erase the night. He has sent the month of the Qur’an so that He might
elevate us and bring us from our isolation to His nearness. ~ Yasmin Mogahed,
151:I mean, what’s wrong with treating something as a day job? Day jobs are perfectly respectable. We’re all here to make rent money by tricking people into buying things, right, so why try to elevate it? ~ Joshua Allen,
152:Music should elevate you. You can be raised, or left stranded. You can't be raised all the time, in my experience. This might be a rare moment. You might just go up to that level but that's always good. ~ Mick Jagger,
153:The instinct that pulls us toward art is the impulse to evolve, to learn, to heighten and elevate our consciousness. The Ego hates this. Because the more awake we become, the less we need the Ego. ~ Steven Pressfield,
154:If a politician can come across as likable—as nice, genuine, and friendly—she’s won most of her votes already. That initial appraisal will spread and elevate all other appraisals. Gaffes will be forgiven. ~ David McRaney,
155:If you like our food, great, but don’t come tell me you’re gonna clean it up, refine it, or elevate it because it’s not necessary or possible. We don’t need fucking food missionaries to cleanse our palates. ~ Eddie Huang,
156:Maybe the point of life (and youth, once it was over), was to elevate yourself, through time and reflection, into something worthy of contemplation (even if you were the only one doing the contemplating). ~ Matthew Gallaway,
157:There exists no objective basis on which to elevate one species above another. Chimp and human, lizard and fungus, we have all evolved over some three billion years by a process known as natural selection. ~ Richard Dawkins,
158:To Lincoln’s mind, the fundamental test of a democracy was its capacity to “elevate the condition of men, to lift artificial weights from all shoulders, to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all. ~ Doris Kearns Goodwin,
159:You could either be trapped by what was going on around you, or you could find a way out. I think that everything, even if it is scary or good, comes into our life to help elevate and expand us as human beings. ~ Demi Moore,
160:By consciously getting your body into a certain posture, you can also elevate your consciousness, you can change the very way you feel, think, understand, and experience life simply by sitting in a particular way. ~ Sadhguru,
161:Punishing achievement isn't gonna help anybody. Trying to equalize people by lowering the people at the top, that's not good. All that is is punitive. Why don't you find a way to elevate people at the bottom? ~ Rush Limbaugh,
162:This is a woman [Hillary Clinton] who has shown over and over again in her career that she will elevate this conversation but, more importantly, she will get things done so all Americans can prosper and grow. ~ Donna Brazile,
163:To Lincoln’s mind, the fundamental test of a democracy was its capacity to “elevate the condition of men, to lift artificial weights from all shoulders, to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all.” A ~ Doris Kearns Goodwin,
164:The language of art is a 'parabolic' language, with a special openness to the universal: the 'Way of Beauty' is a way capable of leading the mind and heart to the Lord, to elevate them to the heights of God. ~ Pope Benedict XVI,
165:You must make certain to give your subconscious only suggestions, which heal, bless, elevate, and inspire you in all your ways. Remember that your subconscious mind cannot take a joke. It takes you at your word. ~ Joseph Murphy,
166:It is not enough to prove something, one has also to seduce or elevate people to it. That is why the man of knowledge should learn how to speak his wisdom: and often in such a way that it sounds like folly! ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,
167:We forget that we were put on earth to learn something. If everything were perfect in this life, we would never learn anything new. We would not be able to elevate our spirits through the events that happen to us. ~ Lynn Andrews,
168:When you elevate the heels more so than you elevate the sole of the foot, you trigger a cascade of compensations in the knees and hips that cause tight hip flexors, and then those hip flexors cause lower-back pain. ~ Tim Ferriss,
169:It is not enough to prove something, one also has to seduce or elevate people to it. That is why the man of knowledge should learns how to speak his wisdom: and often in such a way that it sounds like folly! ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,
170:We believe in encouraging the talented, but we believe that while survival of the fittest may be a good working description of the process of evolution, a government of humans should elevate itself to a higher order. ~ Mario Cuomo,
171:Jesus freely placed your interest above his own. His desire was to elevate your status; in the process he lowered his own. He gave you the royal treatment: he works, you benefit. And you must accept this treatment. ~ Edward T Welch,
172:Even angry intellectuals realised how irresponsible it was to preach that all ideas are created equal. For in the end, postmodernist multiculturalism has no standard by which to elevate gender equality over sharia. ~ Eric P Kaufmann,
173:Would that the simple maxim, that honesty is the best policy, might be laid to heart; that a sense of the true aim of life might elevate the tone of politics and trade till public and private honor become identical. ~ Margaret Fuller,
174:Being a food show and being me, I always kicked it up a notch, which means I would always elevate the spice level or the complexity of a particular dish. So, it was always like we're going to kick this up a little bit. ~ Emeril Lagasse,
175:Perry, Jeremy, Man, Just knowing that you guys look up to me, And I can help you out so much, I could pull you to the side when we're working out. And just as much as you think I'm making you better, You elevate my game. ~ Kevin Durant,
176:The fact which interests us most is the life of the naturalist. The purest science is still biographical. Nothing will dignify and elevate science while it is sundered so wholly from the moral life of its devotee. ~ Henry David Thoreau,
177:This may not however elevate your stature during the years you have remaining; for fame’s a weed, but repute is a slow-growing oak, and all we can do during our lifetimes is hop around like squirrels and plant acorns. ~ Neal Stephenson,
178:Those who are well assured of their own standing are least apt to trespass on that of others, whereas nothing is so offensive as the aspirings of vulgarity which thinks to elevate itself by humiliating its neighbor. ~ Washington Irving,
179:And here it is that I miss my Watson. By cunning questions and ejaculations of wonder he could elevate my simple art, which is but systematized common sense, into a prodigy. When I tell my own story I have no such aid. ~ Arthur Conan Doyle,
180:It is easy to specify the individual objects of admiration in these grand scenes; but it is not possible to give an adequate idea of the higher feelings of wonder, astonishment, and devotion, which fill and elevate the mind. ~ Charles Darwin,
181:To elevate the goals of humankind, to achieve high moral purpose, to realize major intended change, leaders must thrust themselves into the most intractable processes and structures of history and ultimately master them. ~ James MacGregor Burns,
182:Un homme n'a jamais pu e lever sa ma|"tresse jusqu'a' lui; mais une femme place toujours son amant aussi haut qu'elle. A man can never elevate his mistress to his rank, but a woman can always place her lover as high as she. ~ Honore de Balzac,
183:That is probably why pride is not simply another sin among many, but a sin in a category of its own. Other sins lead the sinner further away from God, but pride is particularly heinous in that it attempts to elevate the sinner above God. ~ Anonymous,
184:There are old heads in the world who cannot help me by their example or advice to live worthily and satisfactorily to myself; but I believe that it is in my power to elevate myself this very hour above the common level of my life. ~ Henry David Thoreau,
185:Most adults don't sing anymore. We have to break that, and start singing the name of the Almighty One, try to cultivate the emotions. We have to elevate our emotions to the maximum, to the limit, and that then turns into spiritual bliss. ~ Dharma Mittra,
186:The vulgar charge that the tendency of democracies is to leveling, meaning to drag all down to the level of the lowest, is singularly untrue; its real tendency being to elevate the depressed to a condition not unworthy of their manhood. ~ James F Cooper,
187:You can build the Empire State Building. Train the Prussian army. Elevate the hierarchy of a totalitarian state higher than the throne of the Most High.

But there are still people whose moral superiority defeats your own. ~ Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn,
188:There is no greater purpose for art than to move you, to elevate your mood, to make you think, to remind you of places you have been or places you want to build. It does everything—nourishes the soul and lifts the spirits of the people. ~ Adriana Trigiani,
189:Yet living and dying, honour and dishonour, pain and pleasure, riches and poverty, and so forth are equally the lot of good men and bad. Things like these neither elevate nor degrade; and therefore they are no more good than they are evil. ~ Marcus Aurelius,
190:I think there are a lot of opportunities in the Americas that matter deeply to 45 million Latinos in this country, and I would hope to be able to work to maybe elevate the profile of the Americas in our discussion about American global leadership. ~ Tim Kaine,
191:So that, in effect, religion, which should most distinguish us from beasts, and ought most peculiarly to elevate us, as rational creatures, above brutes, is that wherein men often appear most irrational, and more senseless than beasts themselves. ~ John Locke,
192:Obamas finest speeches do not excite. They do not inform. They dont even really inspire. They elevate. . . . He is not the Word made flesh, but the triumph of word over flesh . . . Obama is, at his best, able to call us back to our highest selves. ~ Ezra Klein,
193:Read books that expand you, that are bright. See films, plays, art forms that elevate your consciousness, that bring you into a sense of how beautiful this world is, how beautiful other worlds are, how beautiful nirvana, the transcendental is. ~ Frederick Lenz,
194:I don't want to play a superhero. Drogo may not be Superman, but it is a phenomenal role. I didn't want to get typecast. Drogo is an exceptional character. Conan is iconic. Whether it does good or not, you just try to elevate it to the next level. ~ Jason Momoa,
195:For us to make sure that we have full lives, meaningful lives, we will have to elevate our unique human qualities. And I think we know now, we can see clearly what makes us different from machines. And that's why the future is enhanced humanity. ~ Garry Kasparov,
196:Engage, educate, equip, encourage, empower, energize, and elevate. Those are the methods for maximizing the potential of any individual, team, organization, or institution for ultimate success and significance. Those are the methods of a mentor leader. ~ Tony Dungy,
197:Taste is the intermediate faculty which connects the active with the passive powers of our nature, the intellect with the senses; and its appointed function is to elevate the images of the latter, while it realizes the ideas of the former. ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge,
198:One advantage resulting from good actions is that they elevate the soul to a disposition of attempting still better; for such is human weakness, that we must place among our good deeds an abstinence from those crimes we are tempted to commit. ~ Jean Jacques Rousseau,
199:Lesson number one from the Lord’s vineyard: coveting, pouting, or tearing others down does not elevate your standing, nor does demeaning someone else improve your self-image. So be kind, and be grateful that God is kind. It is a happy way to live. ~ Jeffrey R Holland,
200:It's the horsey-shape piece that moves in an L shape. It's what makes chess complicated, and why stupid people can't play chess. Go play checkers! Knights are the first piece you look at. They elevate the game. No chess master wants to lose her knights. ~ Courtney Love,
201:I tell you the truth, a man may not make himself king; only the blessing of him who holds the kingship can elevate a man to that high place. For sovereignty is a sacred trust that may not be bartered or sold; still less may it be stolen or taken by force. ~ Stephen R Lawhead,
202:My second album was written while I was on the road promoting the first record. I tried to take my personal experiences and elevate them to universal experiences, so that I wasn't writing songs about living on a tour bus or being on a TV set for the first time. ~ Kate Voegele,
203:As teachers we must not guide our students to be the people we wish them to be but elevate them to become the people they were meant to be. Remember the encouragement we give our students may be the only encouragement they ever receive so don't use it sparingly. ~ Chris Colfer,
204:The best tested are Elevate, Lumosity, Fit Brains, Brain HQ, and Brain Workshop. Many are effective in as little as ten to twenty minutes per day, five times per week, and four of the five (at time of publication) can be downloaded and used on your smartphone. ~ Sara Gottfried,
205:When we make our art a practice, when we make our workspace sacred and enter it daily with respect and high intention, then we elevate our actions (even if they're taking place within the profane arena of commerce) beyond ego and above gimme-gimme ambition. ~ Steven Pressfield,
206:Maybe one of the jobs of theory or philosophy is to elevate principles that seem impossible, or that have the status of the impossible, to stand by them and will them, even when it looks highly unlikely that they'll ever be realised. But that's ok, it's a service. ~ Judith Butler,
207:Research consistently shows that the risks to health outweigh the benefits of drinking alcohol. My argument is that the benefits to my mental health justify the risks. Alcohol seems to both calm me down and elevate my mood, a paradoxical but pleasant combination. ~ Graeme Simsion,
208:The whole notion of journalism being an institution whose fundamental purpose is to educate and inform and even, one might say, elevate, has altered under commercial pressure, perhaps, into a different kind of purpose, which is to divert and distract and entertain. ~ Tom Stoppard,
209:I realize that I will either allow my view of evil to determine my view of God and will cut him down accordingly, or I will allow my view of God to determine my view of the evil and will elevate him accordingly, accepting that nothing is beyond his power for good. ~ Dallas Willard,
210:If you like our food, great, but don’t come tell me you’re gonna clean it up, refine it, or elevate it because it’s not necessary or possible. We don’t need fucking food missionaries to cleanse our palates. What we need are opportunities outside kitchens and cubicles. ~ Eddie Huang,
211:Never to feel one’s feelings wholeheartedly and then to elevate that wan victory to the point of being able to regard one’s own ambitions, longings and desires with indifference; to pass by one’s joys and griefs as one would a person in whom one feels no interest. ~ Fernando Pessoa,
212:So you see, the most vital question then becomes, what type of woman will conquer our hero? If she be of poor quality, he’ll become a slave. But if she be great, then her greatness will elevate the man to greater heights than he could ever have attained on his own. ~ Bryan M Litfin,
213:I love the hybrid quality, the new computer sections and the books yellowing with age. Libraries for me have always had a cathedral-like ambiance, a hushed sanctuary where learning is revered, where we the people elevate books and education to the level of the religious. ~ Harlan Coben,
214:Which of the two powers, Love or Music, can elevate man to the sublimest heights? ... It is a problem, and yet it seems to me that this is the answer: 'Love can give no idea of music; music can give an idea of love.' ... Why separate them? They are two wings of the soul. ~ Hector Berlioz,
215:There is no evidence when we look to the past for any precedent for the rate of change in atmospheric composition that we’re causing, and the rates of change in climate that we can expect, as we continue to burn fossil fuels and elevate these greenhouse gas concentrations. ~ Thom Hartmann,
216:This is essentially a people's contest... whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men - to lift artificial weights from all shoulders - to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all - to afford all, an unfettered start and a fair chance, in the race of life. ~ Abraham Lincoln,
217:Faith means making a virtue out of not thinking. It's nothing to brag about. And those who preach faith, and enable and elevate it are intellectual slaveholders, keeping mankind in a bondage to fantasy and nonsense that has spawned and justified so much lunacy and destruction. ~ Bill Maher,
218:Racism is a blight on the human conscience. The idea that any people can be inferior to another, to the point where those who consider themselves superior define and treat the rest as subhuman, denies the humanity even of those who elevate themselves to the status of gods. ~ Nelson Mandela,
219:When you feel sad, you are participating in a venerable experience, to which I, this monument, am dedicated. Your sense of loss and disappointment, of frustrated hopes and grief at your own inadequacy, elevate you to serious company. Do not ignore of throw away your grief ~ Alain de Botton,
220:Man is a dubious mixture of mind and matter; since the mind unlocks recognition of the eternal to him, while matter pulls him down and binds him to the transitory, he should strive away from the senses and toward the mind if he wishes to elevate his life and give it meaning. ~ Hermann Hesse,
221:He did not seek to efface pain in forgetfulness, he sought to elevate it and to dignify it with hope. He would say, "Be careful how you turn to the dead. Don't think of the rotting. Hold your gaze and you will see the living light of your dearly loved departed up above in heaven. ~ Victor Hugo,
222:Man’s strength resides in his capacity and desire to elevate himself, so as to attain the good. To travel step by step toward the heights. And that is all he can do. To reach heaven and remain there is beyond his powers: Even Moses had to return to earth. Is it the same for evil? ~ Elie Wiesel,
223:We do not read (the law) to elevate accommodation of religious observances over an institution's need to maintain order and safety, ... We have no cause to believe that (the law) would not be applied in an appropriately balanced way, without sensitivity to security concerns. ~ Ruth Bader Ginsburg,
224:Born into this
Into hospitals which are so expensive that it's cheaper to die
Into lawyers who charge so much it's cheaper to plead guilty
Into a country where the jails are full and the madhouses closed
Into a place where the masses elevate fools into rich heroes... ~ Charles Bukowski,
225:I don't plan in terms of career ambitions. The only career ambition I have is to work with people who are going to bring you up and elevate your performance. They'll let you know things that you didn't know already and bring you places that you might not have gotten to otherwise. ~ Brendan Gleeson,
226:In order to gain some insight into the forces that elevate certain products to the level of 'works of art' it is helpful - among other investigations - to look into the economic and political underpinnings of the institutions, individuals and groups who share in the control of power. ~ Hans Haacke,
227:Architecture has to be greater than just architecture. It has to address social values, as well as technical and aesthetic values. On top of that, the one true gift that an architect has is his or her imagination. We take something ordinary and elevate it to something extraordinary. ~ Samuel Mockbee,
228:Good fortune will elevate even petty minds, and give them the appearance of a certain greatness and stateliness, as from their high place they look down upon the world; but the truly noble and resolved spirit raises itself, and becomes more conspicuous in times of disaster and ill fortune. ~ Plutarch,
229:In discourse more sweet; For eloquence the soul, song charms the sense. Others apart sat on a hill retir'd, In thoughts more elevate, and reason'd high Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate, Fix'd fate, free-will, foreknowledge absolute; And found no end, in wand'ring mazes lost. ~ John Milton,
230:Your social value is fluid and changes with the environment you are in—or the environment you create. If you wish to elevate your social value in any given situation, you can do so by redirecting people into a domain where you are in charge. This is easier to do than you might think. Our ~ Oren Klaff,
231:If ever I feel the soul within me elevate and expand to those dimensions, not wholly unworthy of its almighty Architect, it is when I contemplate the cause of my country, deserted by all the world beside, and I standing up boldly, alone, hurling defiance at her victorious oppressors. ~ Abraham Lincoln,
232:Man is not made for the state; the state is made for man. To deprive man of freedom is to relegate him to the status of a thing, rather than elevate him to the status of a person. Man must never be treated as a means to the end of the state, but always as an end within himself. ~ Martin Luther King Jr,
233:The apologists for the medium claim that all sorts of interesting information is provided by television. This is true, but as it is much easier to produce programs that titillate rather than elevate the viewer, what most people watch is unlikely to help in developing the self. ~ Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi,
234:Good fortune will elevate even petty minds, and gives them the appearance of a certain greatness and stateliness, as from their high place they look down upon the world; but the truly noble and resolved spirit raises itself, and becomes more conspicuous in times of disaster and ill fortune... ~ Plutarch,
235:Dr. Bonar once said that he could tell when a Christian was growing. In proportion to his growth in grace he would elevate his Master, talk less of what he himself was doing, and become smaller and smaller in his own esteem, until, like the morning star, he faded away before the rising sun. ~ Dwight L Moody,
236:Oppressed groups are frequently placed in the situation of being listened to only if we frame our ideas in the language that is familiar to and comfortable for a dominant group. This requirement often changes the meaning of our ideas and works to elevate the ideas of dominant groups. ~ Patricia Hill Collins,
237:There is no situation that could ever confront you that cannot be solved. Life takes on real meaning when you set values for yourself, regard yourself as worthwhile and elevate your thoughts to things that are of God-good. There is a Higher Power. Turn to it and use it; it is yours for the asking. ~ Bryan Adams,
238:Those very same university students to whom we have dedicated our lives, the ones whose moral characters we seek to elevate and whose intellectual horizons we strive to broaden, began tossing books, one by one, onto the bonfire. Many of them wore the brown shirts favored by members of the SA and SS. ~ Ay e Kulin,
239:Thoreau said: "I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestioned ability of a man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor." That is not only an encouraging statement, it is also an empowering one. It means you can accomplish a lot by applying your brainpower and then moving forward with it. ~ Donald Trump,
240:How does one say in the jargon of musicology that my sould was pulled out of me and thrown up in the air, to be tossed about by the music. How does one say that I breathed, that I existed, in harmony with the ups and downs of those notes. What kind of notes both elevate and cast down, exalt and crush? ~ Yann Martel,
241:I want to utilize social media to elevate the consciousness of those people who feel like all they want from social media is to be famous. Like, you can actually be a voice. You can actually say something that's inspiring and not just make people feel like you need to buy things and be a certain way. ~ Willow Smith,
242:Worship always suffers when man is exalted and God is belittled. If you remove the fact that you’re a sinner, if you elevate yourself to a more righteously entitled place, if you exalt yourself and think, “I’m not really all that bad; I’m kind of a good person,” then your worship is going to suffer. ~ Matt Chandler,
243:Faith means making a virtue out of not thinking. It’s nothing to brag about. And those who preach faith, and enable and elevate it are intellectual slaveholders, keeping mankind in a bondage to fantasy and nonsense that has spawned and justified so much lunacy and destruction. ~ Bill Maher, Religulous (closing words),
244:Christianity, as a product of the resentment of the botched and the weak, has put in ban all that is beautiful, strong, proud, and powerful, in fact all the qualities resulting from strength, and that, in consequence, all forces which tend to promote or elevate life have been seriously undermined. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,
245:Design is about creating spaces for people to enjoy and of course, creating moments where you elevate the spirit, but 'design for good' is figuring out a program that not only creates better spaces, but creates jobs, creates new industry and really kind of raises the conversation about how we rebuild. ~ Cameron Sinclair,
246:Take me back," I tell him, shifting a little. The world tilts and steadies all at once. "Alert the medics and have a bed prepared for our arrival. In the meantime, elevate my arm and continue applying direct pressure to the wound. The bullet has broken or fractured something, and this will require surgery. ~ Tahereh Mafi,
247:The piety of "having a personal relationship with Christ" ... is alien to the New Testament... but evangelicals elevate it to the shibboleth of salvation! Unless you have a personal relationship with Jesus, buster, one day you will be boiling in Hell. Sheesh! Talk about the fury of a personal savior scorned! ~ Robert M Price,
248:Religion is a bell jar; you cannot find God in that jar, because it is your bell jar, you have created it! Break the glass prison and get fresh air, elevate your intelligence! Wake up and open your eyes; see the truth beyond your prison! If you can’t break the glass, don’t worry; science will do it for you! ~ Mehmet Murat ildan,
249:We all know Reagan's legacy, from the Iran-Contra affair to the funding of the Nicaraguan military in which over 200,000 people died. The groundwork for the move steadily to the right happened with the Reagan administration. People want to elevate him to some mythic level; they have their own reason for doing that. ~ Danny Glover,
250:I love music. I love making songs. I feel like I've been given a path where I can contribute, where I can protest if somebody does something really obviously wrong or inhuman right in front of me, where I can make a difference. Where I can most especially elevate, make you happy, elevate the condition, elevate the thing. ~ David Crosby,
251:I want to feel both the beauty and the pain of the age we are living in. I want to survive my life without becoming numb. I want to speak and comprehend word of wounding without having these words becomg the landscape where I dwell. I want to possess a light touch that can elevate darkness to the realm of stars. ~ Terry Tempest Williams,
252:Most aspiring screenwriters simply don't spend enough time choosing their concept. It's by far the most common mistake I see in spec scripts. The writer has lost the race right from the gate. Months - sometimes years - are lost trying to elevate a film idea that by its nature probably had no hope of ever becoming a movie. ~ Terry Rossio,
253:Caution: If you’re a person who will one day mentor others, I have a sobering warning. If your ego hasn’t been annihilated by the cross of Jesus Christ, you will end up becoming a Saul in the lives of those who are just as (or more) gifted than you are. And when God begins to elevate them in His service, you will go insane. ~ Frank Viola,
254:I want to feel both the beauty and the pain of the age we are living in. I want to survive my life without becoming numb. I want to speak and comprehend words of wounding without having these words become the landscape where I dwell. I want to possess a light touch that can elevate darkness to the realm of stars. ~ Terry Tempest Williams,
255:Remarkably, there's no green screen in 'Leaves of Grass' movie. There is motion control. Technically, there were all sorts of challenges, but really the soul of it is Edward Norton talent. You write these characters when you write a movie, and all you can hope for or depend on is that your actors will elevate the material. ~ Edward Norton,
256:That eminence of learning is not to be gained without labour, at least equal to that which any other kind of greatness can require, will be allowed by those who wish to elevate the character of a scholar; since they cannot but know that every human acquisition is valuable in proportion to the difficulty of its attainment. ~ Samuel Johnson,
257:Let me roughly divide books into those which compete with the movies and those with which the movies cannot compete. They are the books that can elevate or instruct. If they are fine works of fiction, they can deepen your appreciation of human life. If they are serious works of nonfiction, they can inform or enlighten you. ~ Mortimer Adler,
258:There are so many ways of making the approach to meditation as joyful as possible. You can find the music that most exalts you and use it to open your heart and mind. You can collect pieces of poetry, or quotations of lines of teachings that over the years have moved you, and keep them always at hand to elevate your spirit. ~ Sogyal Rinpoche,
259:Seek not that your sons and your daughters should not see visions, should not dream dreams; seek that they should see true visions, that they should dream noble dreams. Such out-going of the imagination is one with aspiration, and will do more to elevate above what is low and vile than all possible inculcations of morality. ~ George MacDonald,
260:There are so many ways of making the approach to meditation as joyful as possible. You can find the music that most exalts you and use it to open your heart and mind. You can collect pieces of poetry, or quotations of lines of teachings that over the years have moved you, and keep them always at hand to elevate your spirit. ~ Sogyal Rinpoche,
261:He should release the tax returns tomorrow. It's crazy. You've got to release six, eight, ten years back tax returns. Take the hit for a day or two. He has to give a big speech in defense of capitalism, and that will elevate, I think, this race above this tactical back and forth, which I do think he's on the margin of losing. ~ William Kristol,
262:There is only one essence, always the same. As yet, man has found no other means to elevate himself—none but the routing of matter and the submission of the individual to an end which transcends the individual, even though that end be chimerical. When the heart believes and loves, nothing chimerical exists; nothing exists but ~ Nikos Kazantzakis,
263:What readers ask nowadays in a book is that it should improve, instruct and elevate. This book wouldn't elevate a cow. I cannot conscientiously recommend it for any useful purposes whatever. All I can suggest is that when you get tired of reading "the best hundred books," you may take this for half an hour. It will be a change. ~ Jerome K Jerome,
264:When we submit to the Word of God as our authority, we are submitting to the Spirit Himself, since He inspired every word it contains. No true work of the Spirit will contradict, devalue, or add new revelation to the Scriptures (cf. Rev. 22:17–19). Instead it will elevate biblical truth in the hearts and minds of believers. ~ John F MacArthur Jr,
265:When you have deep friendships with good people, you copy and then absorb some of their best traits. When you love a person deeply, you want to serve them and earn their regard. When you experience great art, you widen your repertoire of emotions. Through devotion to some cause, you elevate your desires and organize your energies. ~ David Brooks,
266:The career of politics grants a feeling of power. The knowledge of influencing men, of participating in power over them, and above all, the feeling of holding in one's hands a nerve fiber of historically important events can elevate the professional politician above everyday routine even when he is placed in formally modest positions. ~ Max Weber,
267:We can so educate the will power that it will focus the thoughts upon the bright side of things, and upon objects which elevate the soul, thus forming a habit of happiness and goodness which will enrich the whole life. The habit of making the best of everything and of always looking on the bright side is a fortune in itself. ~ Orison Swett Marden,
268:We don’t exhaust the Bible even after reading it hundreds of times. Each time we read it we see it in a new light. That is the greatness of the holy scriptures. They are that way because they were created by holy prophets who experienced the truth. Each time we read these works we elevate ourselves to see a little more. (81) ~ Swami Satchidananda,
269:There is perhaps nothing so admirable in Christianity and Buddhism as their art of teaching even the lowest to elevate themselves by piety to a seemingly higher order of things, and thereby to retain their satisfaction with the actual world in which they find it difficult enough to live - this very difficulty being necessary. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,
270:It has now become a status symbol among the rich to say that you got ripped off by Bernie Madoff, because everybody is losing money in the market, everybody is, but it makes you special and unique if you lost money because of Madoff. These people don't think it makes 'em look stupid. It continues to elevate their status, they think. ~ Rush Limbaugh,
271:Wherever there is a religious regime, over there there is ignorance, misery and absurdity! No religious state can ever elevate its own people! Sooner or later, the primitiveness of the religious administrations and the irrationality of the religious rules will cause a great collapse of those countries! The downfall is inevitable! ~ Mehmet Murat ildan,
272:I think the biggest problem we have in our time is a severe ignorance of the content of Scripture. Sadly, this is true even among evangelicals, who claim to revere the Word of God and elevate the authority of Scripture. We simply don't know what's in the Bible, so it's not surprising that we don't know what the Bible teaches about prayer. ~ R C Sproul,
273:One in a while, you discover a presidential candidate who has the potential to change the political conversation, to elevate key issues in voters' minds, and disrupt and transform a tired Republican brand. Once in a lifetime, maybe, you will have an opportunity to support a transformative candidate who can do all of these things, and win. ~ Matt Kibbe,
274:We live surrounded by God's pattern but we aren't high enough to see it. You can elevate yourself, of course. That's the whole point of education, of meditation and prayer. The more one lifts oneself up, the more of the pattern he is able to make out, though only an enlightened few have a perspective lofty enough to see the outline whole. ~ Victor J Banis,
275:There's people, like me and Jaden [Smith], who want to utilize social media to elevate the consciousness of those people who feel like all they want from social media is to be famous.Like, you can actually be a voice. You can actually say something that's inspiring and not just make people feel like you need to buy things and be a certain way. ~ Willow Smith,
276:Develop a lust for learning. Read regularly. Reading for 30 minutes a day will do wonders for you. Do not read just anything. Be very selective about what you put into the garden of your mind. It must be immensely nourishing. Make it something that will improve both you and the quality of your life. Something that will inspire and elevate you. ~ Robin S Sharma,
277:Next comes svadhyaya or study. This means study that concerns the true Self, not merely analyzing the emotions and mind as the psychologists and psychiatrists do. Anything that will elevate your mind and remind you of your true Self should be studied: the Bhagavad Gita, the Bible, the Koran, these Yoga Sutras, or any uplifting scripture. Study ~ Swami Satchidananda,
278:Choose to view life through God's eyes. This will not be easy because it doesn't come naturally to us. We cannot do this on our own. We have to allow God to elevate our vantage point. Start by reading His Word, the Bible...Pray and ask God to transform your thinking. Let Him do what you cannot. Ask Him to give you an eternal, divine perspective. ~ Charles R Swindoll,
279:Take a nautilus shell; cut it cross section. Gently elevate its swirling, chambered tiers as they approach the tight-bound center, culminating at last in a pinnacle on which we all stood. Note its asymmetrical order, its chaotic repetition, the grace of its linkages. Contemplate the ephemerality of its existence. Such is the beauty that is mortal life. ~ N K Jemisin,
280:Little did she know, I really did want to get hurt. It was irrational and probably stupid, but I wanted to feel the pain of having my emotions stomped all over. All of the best creative minds in the world had their hearts broken. It's what made their art genuine, vital, human. It had the potential to elevate me from just a "good" artist into a great one. ~ L H Cosway,
281:The purpose of music is to elevate the spirit and inspire. Not to help push some product down your throat. It puts you in tune with your own existence. Sometimes you really don't know how you feel, but really good music can define how you feel... someone who's telling me where he's been that I haven't and what it's like there - somebody whose life I can feel. ~ Bob Dylan,
282:It is about something personal and specific, because when the John McCain campaign in 2008 decided to elevate Sarah Palin from total obscurity to make her his vice presidential running mate, they knew they were making a big strategic gamble.They knew they were taking a big risk and it turned out in the end to be a bad choice. It hurt John McCain`s chances. ~ Rachel Maddow,
283:There is a whole separate filmmaking team that's doing it, but that's part of what's great about the Brain Trust and about the inspiring leadership of John Lasseter. He leaves it up to that creative group of individuals to help each other elevate each thing that they're working on to only try to make it better and to share what you've learned on the first one. ~ Klay Hall,
284:Compassion, however, should mean providing a mechanism to escape poverty rather than simply maintaining people in an impoverished state by supplying handouts. By doing this we give them an opportunity to elevate their personal situations, which eventually decreases our need to take care of them and empowers them to be able to exercise compassion toward others. ~ Ben Carson,
285:I don't give a damn unless I'm fond of a person;but I'd sacrifice my life for those I am fond of; the rest I'd throttle if they stood in my way...And you may not believe me but if I still set a value on life it is only because I still hope one day to meet such a heavenly creature who will regenarate me, purify me and elevate me. But you don't understand that. ~ Leo Tolstoy,
286:ELEVATE Lord, thank You for a fresh view of Your exalted holy nature. Great God of the universe, holy and high, lifted up. I exalt You, Lord. You are the object of my greatest thoughts, the end of my deepest affections. I give myself wholly to You and to You alone. Revive me according to Your Word even as I bow. I ask in Jesus' strong name. Amen. REPLICATE ~ James MacDonald,
287:I don't feel like it's pressure. It's more of an obligation - not to entertain or be funny, but to have a certain levity. I mean, there's got to be a lightness in your leg. You have to be as light as you can be, and you don't have to be weighted down, stuck in your emotions and stuck in your body, stuck in your head. You just want to try and elevate something. ~ Bill Murray,
288:You must find some way to elevate your act of writing into an entertainment. Usually this means giving the reader an enjoyable surprise. Any number of devices will do the job.... These seeming amusements in fact become your 'style.' When we say we like the style of certain writers, what we mean is that we like their personality as they express it on paper. ~ William Zinsser,
289:Onstage, it's all just a heightened and more elaborate version of me. When you're standing onstage, your adrenaline is going, your enthusiasm is at full tilt, and the excitement helps elevate you're attitude. I've always wanted to be as close to myself offstage, being funny with my buddies, and that's what I've worked hard on - being authentic to who I really am. ~ Dane Cook,
290:Compassion, however, should mean providing a mechanism to escape poverty rather than simply maintaining people in an impoverished state by supplying handouts. By doing this we give them an opportunity to elevate their personal situations, which eventually decreases our need to take care of them and empowers them to be able to exercise compassion toward others. ~ Benjamin Carson,
291:In AD 426, a ruler named K’inich Yax K’uk’ Mo’ (Sun-Eyed Resplendent Quetzal Macaw) came down from the Maya city of Tikal, in Guatemala, and seized control of the settlement of Copán in a coup or invasion. He became Copán’s first “Holy Lord” and launched a dynasty of sixteen lords that would elevate Copán into a glorious city dominating the area for centuries. ~ Douglas Preston,
292:There is only one essence, always the same. As yet, man has found no other means to elevate himself - none but routing of matter and the submissions of the individual to an end which transcends the individual, even though that end be chimerical. When the heart believes and loves, nothing chimerical exists; nothing exists but courage, trust and fruitful action. ~ Nikos Kazantzakis,
293:God has given us music so that firstly we are lead towards higher things. Music combines all characteristics in it. It can elevate, it can tease, it can cheer us up, yes, it can even break the most brazen temperament with its tender and yearning sounds. However, its main aim is to direct our thinking towards higher things, to elevate and even deeply disturb us… ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,
294:unwillingness to leave a single thing to chance was paying off. Anything less than a complete success was unacceptable to Travis, who had an enormous amount riding on this evening. He had bided his time waiting for the right premiere social event to elevate North Point, the country club and marina he had built over the last three years on the northern coast of Aquidneck ~ Marie Force,
295:We are born under circumstances that would be favourable if we did not abandon them. It was nature's intention that there should be no need of great equipment for a good life: every individual can make himself happy. External goods are of trivial importance and without much influence in either direction: prosperity does not elevate the sage and adversity does not depress him. ~ Seneca,
296:The most infuriating thing is the idea that ethnic food isn't already good enough because it goddamn is. We were fine before you came to visit and we'll be fine after. If you like our food, great, but don't come tell me you're gonna clean it up, refine it, or elevate it because it's not necessary or possible. We don't need fucking food missionaries to cleanse our palates. ~ Eddie Huang,
297:This practice of arranging the marriage of a dead person was uncommon, usually held in order to placate a spirit. A deceased concubine who had produced a son might be officially married to elevate her status to a wife. Or two lovers who died tragically might be united after death. That much I knew. But to marry the living to the dead was a rare and, indeed, dreadful occurrence. ~ Yangsze Choo,
298:Faith means making a virtue out of not thinking. It’s nothing to brag about. And those who preach faith, and enable and elevate it are intellectual slaveholders, keeping mankind in a bondage to fantasy and nonsense that has spawned and justified so much lunacy and destruction. Religion is dangerous because it allows human beings who don’t have all the answers to think that they do. ~ Bill Maher,
299:A line partakes of the simplicity of a point more than does a surface; and a surface [partakes thereof more] than does a material object-as was evident. From this consideration of a point and a material object elevate yourself unto a likeness of True Being and of the universe; and by means of [this] quite clear symbolism [of a point] make a conjecture about what has been said. ~ Nicholas of Cusa,
300:He had the uncanny capacity to know exactly what your weak point is, know what will make you feel small, to make you cringe," Joanna Hoffman said. "It's a common trait in people who are charismatic and know how to manipulate people. Knowing that he can crush you makes you feel weakened and eager for his approval, so then he can elevate you and put you on a pedestal and own you. ~ Walter Isaacson,
301:He had the uncanny capacity to know exactly what your weak point is, know what will make you feel small, to make you cringe,” Joanna Hoffman said. “It’s a common trait in people who are charismatic and know how to manipulate people. Knowing that he can crush you makes you feel weakened and eager for his approval, so then he can elevate you and put you on a pedestal and own you. ~ Walter Isaacson,
302:Tazmikella hated wearing clothes, and could never understand the need of humans to hide their natural forms. She always thought that level of shame and modesty to be reflective of a race that could not elevate itself above its apparent limitations, a race that insisted on subjugating itself to more powerful beings instead of standing as their own gods in proud self-determination. ~ R A Salvatore,
303:Aw, can't we have breakfast, at least?" Moth moaned as Daniel rushed them past Roscoe's House of Chicken N Waffles.
Cassandra made a face. "I fine the combination dubious."
"The waffles are substandard," Moth allowed, "but the chicken is delectable. They elevate each other."
Cassandra would not be convinced. "I don't believe chicken and waffles can have viable offspring. ~ Greg Van Eekhout,
304:For me, it's important to elevate the hypocrisy with humor. Then you really are using the humor to elevate the problem, saying this is why it matters, and then saying we can combine the work together with laughing and being around joyful people and helping out. So the comedy sometimes can actually full-on expose the issue, but also it's a gathering tool. It serves a lot of purposes. ~ Lizz Winstead,
305:I don't want to name names because I don't want to draw too many direct comparisons but the history of Fascism is populated by people who need to subjugate other people and elevate their status and power to a level which is supreme. Usually, any psychological study of those people will reveal a sort of lost, damaged child, who is somehow heartbroken and doesn't have any self-worth. ~ Tom Hiddleston,
306:If the party elected Burr, it would be exposed “to the disgrace of a defeat in an attempt to elevate to the first place in the government one of the worst men in the community.”14 Hamilton had never spoken about Adams and Jefferson in these terms. “The appointment of Burr as president would disgrace our country abroad,” he informed Sedgwick. “No agreement with him could be relied upon.”15 ~ Ron Chernow,
307:Dietary cholesterol, for instance, has an insignificant effect on blood cholesterol. It might elevate cholesterol levels in a small percentage of highly sensitive individuals, but for most of us, it’s clinically meaningless.” At the same time, a diet high in carbohydrates is strongly associated with high triglycerides, low HDL, and the damaging particles of LDL, which is the killer profile. ~ John J Ratey,
308:That means to push very heavy weight, repeatedly, and to constantly strive to elevate both your baseline numbers and the total weight lifted at the workout—until you start to reach a natural limit relative to your competitive goals. This will deliver improvements in strength and subsequent improvements in endurance performance, and also maximize the hormonal, anti-aging benefits of the workout. ~ Mark Sisson,
309:It must not be true when the left tell us what they really want is to help and assist and elevate the little guy, 'cause they don't elevate anybody. The people I'm talking about try to make things fair by punishing and penalizing people at the top. They seek equality and fairness by reaching for the lowest common denominator they can find. Equally shared misery seems to be what their utopia is. ~ Rush Limbaugh,
310:A man inferior with the blade or with his thoughts can still so elevate himself," Entreri explained curtly, "if he can impart the belief that some god or other speaks through him. It is the greatest deception in all the world and one embraced by kings and lords, while the minor lying thieves on the streets or Calimport and other cities lose their tongues for so attempting to coax the purses of others. ~ R A Salvatore,
311:It should be your care, therefore, and mine, to elevate the minds of our children and exalt their courage; to accelerate and animate their industry and activity; to excite in them an habitual contempt of meanness, abhorrence of injustice and inhumanity, and an ambition to excel in every capacity, faculty, and virtue. If we suffer their minds to grovel and creep in infancy, they will grovel all their lives. ~ John Adams,
312:I want to have a lasting experience with God. Sometimes I feel like I understand the divinity of this world, but then I loose it because I get distracted by my petty desires and fears. I want to be with God all the time. But I don't want to be a monk, or totally give up worldly pleasures. I guess what I want to learn is how to leave in this world and enjoy its delights, but also elevate myself to God. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert,
313:There is, in fact, a manly and lawful passion for equality which excites men to wish all to be powerful and honored. This passion tends to elevate the humble to the rank of the great; but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level, and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom. ~ Alexis de Tocqueville,
314:What is ki?'
Niang blushed. 'Um. Inner energy. Spiritual energy?'
'Spiritual energy,' Master Jun repeated. He snorted. 'Village nonsense. Those who elevate ki to the level of mystery or the supernatural do a great disservice to martial arts. Ki is nothing but plain energy. The same energy that flows through your lungs and blood vessels. The same energy that moves rivers downstream and causes the wind to blow. ~ R F Kuang,
315:There is in fact a manly and legitimate passion for equality that spurs all men to wish to be strong and esteemed. This passion tends to elevate the lesser to the rank of the greater. But one also finds in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to want to bring the strong down to their level, and which reduces men to preferring equality in servitude to inequality in freedom. ~ Alexis de Tocqueville,
316:Fasting, as some people speculate, is not a bodily torture, martyrdom, or a cross, but it is a way to elevate the body to reach the level of cooperation with the soul. When we fast, our intention is not to torture the body but to shun its behaviour. Thus, one who fasts becomes a spiritual and not a physical person. Fasting is an ascetic soul which takes the body with it as its partner in asceticism. ~ Pope Shenouda III of Alexandria,
317:We elevate the status of others with compliments, flattery, ingratiating comments, public roasts, awards, and outright praise and adoration. People around the world systematically use the tactics of politeness—hesitations, indirectness, apologies, formalities—when speaking with higher-status individuals. These subtle shifts in phrasing, syntax, and delivery convey the respect that the speaker feels toward the recipient. ~ Dacher Keltner,
318:There's enough ugliness - you know, we got wars going on and people dying and sickness and everything. We don't need to have our art be ugly. But it is, in a lot of it. And these people justify this crap by saying, "Oh we're just representing what's out there, man". Basically, you're making it worse and number one, the artist's job is to elevate people and to lift people up and to give them a place to go, something to hold on to. ~ Don McLean,
319:Our government's investments in science, technology and innovation are ensuring that ideas move from the lab to the marketplace faster, creating jobs and opportunities for Canadians. Through our investment in Mitacs Elevate, we are providing training and new career opportunities for talented researchers while ensuring that local businesses such as Vision Extrusions stay competitive and continue to create jobs here in Woodbridge. ~ Julian Fantino,
320:I've never seen a sincere white man, not when it comes to helping black people. Usually things like this are done by white people to benefit themselves. The white man's primary interest is not to elevate the thinking of black people, or to waken black people, or white people either. The white man is interested in the black man only to the extent that the black man is of use to him. The white man's interest is to make money, to exploit. ~ Malcolm X,
321:The ultimate answer may perhaps be found again in a complementarity: as we elevate pluralism to our creative principle, we embed the totality of human history meaningfully into the dynamics of an overall evolution which acts as an unfolding unity. As we realize ourselves as wholes, we become an integral aspect of a universal whole. As we live to the fullest extent, we overcome cosmic cold and loneliness. ~ Erich Jantsch, The Self-Organizing Universe,
322:In its broad sense, civilization means not only comfort in daily necessities but also the refining of knowledge and the cultivation of virtue so as to elevate human life to a higher plane... It refers to the attainment of both material well-being and the elevation of the human spirit, [but] since what produces man's well-being and refinement is knowledge and virtue, civilization ultimately means the progress of man's knowledge and virtue. ~ Fukuzawa Yukichi,
323:Since the late 1990s, Richard Johnson, a kidney specialist now at the University of Colorado, has been studying the effect of uric acid on the blood vessels leading into the kidneys. If uric acid levels in the circulation are high enough, this might damage these blood vessels and, in so doing, elevate blood pressure. And if sugar consumption is raising uric acid levels, it’s a reasonable assumption that sugar consumption elevates blood pressure. ~ Gary Taubes,
324:While property continues to be pretty equally divided, and a considerable share of information pervades the community; the tendency of the people's suffrages, will be to elevate merit even from obscurity. As riches increase and accumulate in few hands; as luxury prevails in society; virtue will be in a greater degree considered as only a graceful appendage of wealth, and the tendency of things will be to depart from the republican standard. ~ Alexander Hamilton,
325:And the story suggests something more: unchaperoned, and left to our own untutored judgment, we are quick to aim low and worship qualities that are beneath us—in this case, an artificial animal that brings out our own animal instincts in a completely unregulated way. The old Hebrew story makes it clear how the ancients felt about our prospects for civilized behaviour in the absence of rules that seek to elevate our gaze and raise our standards. ~ Jordan Peterson,
326:When a man perceives a woman as beautiful, it proves attraction to her exists. Attraction can lead to love, and love—well, when it takes root, it can overpower even the strongest man. So you see, the most vital question then becomes, what type of woman will conquer our hero? If she be of poor quality, he’ll become a slave. But if she be great, then her greatness will elevate the man to greater heights than he could ever have attained on his own. ~ Bryan M Litfin,
327:And the story suggests something more: unchaperoned, and left to our own untutored judgment, we are quick to aim low and worship qualities that are beneath us—in this case, an artificial animal that brings out our own animal instincts in a completely unregulated way. The old Hebrew story makes it clear how the ancients felt about our prospects for civilized behaviour in the absence of rules that seek to elevate our gaze and raise our standards. ~ Jordan B Peterson,
328:Sometimes, though, I feel that pushing books is a whole lot like pushing medicine. Think of books as pills. I have pills that cure ignorance and pills that cure boredom. I have pills to elevate moods and pills to open people's eyes to the awful truth: uppers and downers as they were. I sell pills to help people find themselves and pills to help them lose themselves when they require escape from the pressures and anxieties of life in a complex society. ~ Tom Robbins,
329:Sometimes, though, I feel that pushing books is a whole lot like pushing medicine. Think of books as pills. I have pills that cure ignorance and pills that cure boredom. I have pills to elevate moods and pills to open people's eyes to the awful truth: uppers and downers as they were. I sell pills to help people find themselves and pills to help them lose themselves when they require escape from the pressures and anxieties of life in a complex society... ~ Tom Robbins,
330:The misfortune of others is our misfortune. Our happiness is the happiness of others. To see ourselves in others and feel an inner oneness and sense of unity with them represents a fundamental revolution in the way we view and live our lives. Therefore, discriminating against another person is the same as discriminating against oneself. When we hurt another, we are hurting ourselves. And when we respect others, we respect and elevate our own lives as well. ~ Daisaku Ikeda,
331:The process of election affords a moral certainty that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications. Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union. ~ Kenneth C Davis,
332:Novelists should never allow themselves to weary of the study of real life. If they observed this duty conscientiously, they would give us fewer pictures chequered with vivid contrasts of light and shade; they would seldom elevate their heroes and heroines to the heights of rapture — still seldomer sink them to the depths of despair; for if we rarely taste the fulness of joy in this life, we yet more rarely savour the acrid bitterness of hopeless anguish. ~ Charlotte Bront,
333:We are right to say that we never dislike people without a reason. But the reason, often, is that it is not in our interests to like them; liking them won’t elevate our social status, aid our acquisition of material or sexual resources, help our kin, or do any of the other things that during evolution have made genes prolific. The feeling of “rightness” accompanying our dislike is just window dressing. Once you’ve seen that, the feeling’s power may diminish. ~ Robert Wright,
334:All history attests that man has subjected woman to his will, used her as a means to promote his selfish gratification, to minister to his sensual pleasures, to be instrumental in promoting his comfort; but never has he desired to elevate her to that rank she was created to fill. He has done all he could to debase and enslave her mind; and now he looks triumphantly on the ruin he has wrought, and say, the being he has thus deeply injured is his inferior. ~ Sarah Moore Grimke,
335:When we liberate the economic potential of women, we elevate the economic performance of communities, nations, and the world... There is a stimulative and ripple effect that kicks in when women have greater access to jobs and the economic lives of our countries: Greater political stability. Fewer military conflicts. More food. More educational opportunity for children... By harnessing the economic potential of all women, we boost opportunity for all people. ~ Hillary Clinton,
336:In people like us, the craving is as strong as the craving for food or water, the yearning for touch or light or love. I was looking for something--a diversion, an occupation, an unwavering force--that would elevate me, that would lift me out of the melancholy dissection of my own interior geography that otherwise would have consumed me pitilessly, as it had my father. I wanted to fly above myself-- if only for a few hours--and look down in tranquility upon my life. ~ Ethan Canin,
337:No entertainment is so cheap as reading," says Mary Wortley Montagu; "nor any pleasure so lasting." Good books elevate the character, purify the taste, take the attractiveness out of low pleasures, and lift us upon a higher plane of thinking and living. It is not easy to be mean directly after reading a noble and inspiring book. The conversation of a man who reads for improvement or pleasure will be flavored by his reading; but it will not be about his reading. ~ Orison Swett Marden,
338:Every single bit of entertainment is escapism. It's because you are saying, "Let's see what this other person's life is like." And also it's beyond escapism, its entertainment and art as such can elevate the species. The entertainer supposedly is the muse. They're the ones who tell you what is wrong with society in a humorous way. They're the ones who do an expose about this or a documentary about that about the injustice of this. So it can be a very powerful medium. ~ Bruce Campbell,
339:If your leg is in a cast, it's really dumb to sit in front of your computer doing unnecessary stuff with it hanging down. Your leg will swell and heal slower, if at all. When you go to your doctor, he/she will give you one of those "you're really dumb and self destructive" looks. Also, "Why didn't you follow my orders and rest?" Your doctor will be right, and so will mine at my next office visit. Elevate, folk! Elevate your mind, your soul, and your leg, in the order needed! ~ Sandy Nathan,
340:I think there is a disrespect for the mind that Trump, for example, exemplifies. His is a kind of strategic thinking that's more about shrewdness than about intellect. His attack on "elites" is meant to rally his base to rebel against the powers that be - in Washington especially. I don't think he cares much about higher education per se; he just wants to demonstrate that learning isn't necessary for business or government. He wants to elevate mediocrity to a heroic virtue. ~ Joan Wallach Scott,
341:We are born under circumstances that would be favorable if we did not abandon them. It was nature's intention that there should be no need of great equipment for a good life: every individual can make himself happy. External goods are of trivial importance and without much influence in either direction: prosperity does not elevate the sage and adversity does not depress him. For he has always made the effort to rely as much as possible on himself and to derive all delight from himself. ~ Seneca,
342:We are Born like this Into this Into these carefully mad wars Into the sight of broken factory windows of emptiness Into bars where people no longer speak to each other Into fist fights that end as shootings and knifings Born into this Into hospitals which are so expensive that it’s cheaper to die Into lawyers who charge so much it’s cheaper to plead guilty Into a country where the jails are full and the madhouses closed Into a place where the masses elevate fools into rich heroes ~ Charles Bukowski,
343:Man is not better treated by nature in his first start than her other works are; so long as he is unable to act for himself as an independent intelligence she acts for him. But the very fact that constitutes him a man is that he does not remain stationary, where nature has placed him, that he can pass with his reason, retracing the steps nature had made him anticipate, that he can convert the work of necessity into one of free solution, and elevate physical necessity into a moral law. ~ Friedrich Schiller,
344:For despite his confidence, and his apparent maturity, I suspected that there was in him a deep and childish need to elevate, and idealize, the love object. This is not uncommon in artists. The very nature of their work, the long periods of isolation followed by public self-display, and the associated risk of rejection all conspire to create unnaturally intense relationships with their sexual partners. Then, when disillusion occurs, as of course it must, the sense of betrayal is profound... ~ Patrick McGrath,
345:we elevate what we deem beautiful, endeavor to create spheres of pristine beauty, and perhaps rightly so, for “whatever is good, pure, lovely, think on these things.” But I wonder if maybe in the upside-down kingdom of God, what we regard as unlovely is, in Jesus, lovely. Because somewhere, underneath the grime of this broken world, everything has the radiant fingerprints of God on it. Seeing the world with Jesus’ eyes, we have the astonishing opportunity to daily love the unlovely into loveliness. ~ Anonymous,
346:When you go to a church and you see the pastor of that church with a philosophy and a program that's designed to bring black people together and elevate black people, join that church. Join that church. If you see where the NAACP is preaching and practicing that which is designed to make black nationalism materialize, join the NAACP. Join any kind of organization, civic, religious, fraternal, political, or otherwise that's based on lifting the black man up and making him master of his own community. ~ Malcolm X,
347:Propaganda must not concern itself with what is best in man - the highest goals humanity sets for itself, its noblest and most precious feelings. Propaganda does not aim to elevate man, but to make him serve. It must therefore utilize the most common feelings, the most widespread ideas, the crudest patterns, and in so doing place itself on a very low level with regard to what it wants man to do and to what end. Hate, hunger, and pride make better levers of propaganda than do love or impartiality. ~ Jacques Ellul,
348:I was a medic in the Army. I really should have become a doctor. Sometimes, though, I feel that pushing books is a whole lot like pushing medicine. Think of books as pills. I have pills that cure ignorance and pills that cure boredom. I have pills to elevate moods and open people’s eyes to the awful truth: uppers and downers as it were. I sell pills to help people find themselves and pills to help them lose themselves when they require escape from the pressures and anxieties of life in a complex society… ~ Tom Robbins,
349:We still write too many stories that are "state of the race" stories that are informed almost solely by what the polling shows and by what we're then deducing about who's up, who's down, and I'm just not sure that's very helpful to readers, it certainly doesn't elevate the debate and, and the problem is if you, if you cover these things, and I don't think the Times is particularly culpable, I think other news organizations are worse, if you cover them in an entirely "who's up, who's down" horse race way. ~ Frank Bruni,
350:My intention is for all of my activities to be directed by Spirit. My intention is to love and radiate my love to my writing and any who might read these words. My intention is to trust in what comes through me and to be a vehicle of Spirit, judging none of it. My intention is to recognize the Spirit as my Source and to detach from my ego. My intention is to do all that I can to elevate the collective consciousness to be more closely in rapport with the Spirit of the originating supreme power of intention. ~ Wayne W Dyer,
351:... not only did perspective elevate art to a "science"... the subjective visual impression was indeed so far rationalized that this very impression could itself become the foundation for a solidly grounded and yet, in an entirely modern sense, "infinite" experiential world. One could even compare the function of Renaissance perspective with that of critical philosophy... The result was a translation of psychophysiological space into mathematical space; in other words, an objectification of the subjective. ~ Erwin Panofsky,
352:In part of Lord Kames' Elements of Criticism, he says that "music improves the relish of a banquet." That I deny,--any more than painting might do. They may both be additional pleasures, as well as conversation is, but are perfectly distinct notices; and cannot, with the least propriety, be said to mix or blend with the repast, as none of them serve to raise the flavor of the wine, the sauce, the meat, or help to quicken appetite. But music and painting both add a spirit to devotion, and elevate the ardor. ~ Laurence Sterne,
353:Could my opponents be right? Partly right? Is there truth
or merit in their position or argument? Is my reaction one
that will relieve the problem, or will it just relieve any frustration? Will my reaction drive my opponents further away
or draw them closer to me? Will my reaction elevate the estimation good people have of me? Will I win or lose?
What price will I have to pay if I win? If I am quiet about it,
will the disagreement blow over? Is this difficult situation
an opportunity for me? ~ Dale Carnegie,
354:For me, running is both exercise and a metaphor. Running day after day, piling up the races, bit by bit I raise the bar, and by clearing each level I elevate myself. At least that’s why I’ve put in the effort day after day: to raise my own level. I’m no great runner, by any means. I’m at an ordinary—or perhaps more like mediocre—level. But that’s not the point. The point is whether or not I improved over yesterday. In long-distance running the only opponent you have to beat is yourself, the way you used to be. ~ Haruki Murakami,
355:individual can fully exercise his or her abilities and skills. “We shall distribute the company’s surplus earnings to all employees in an appropriate manner, and we shall assist them in a practical manner to secure a stable life. In return, all employees shall exert their utmost effort into their job.” Finally, his new company would help his country. Its formally stated national intent was to help “reconstruct Japan, and to elevate the nation’s culture through dynamic cultural and technological activities.” Yet ~ Simon Winchester,
356:For me, running is both exercise and a metaphor. Running day after day, piling up the races, bit by bit I raise the bar, and by clearing each level I elevate myself. At least that’s why I’ve put in the effort day after day: to raise my own level. I’m no great runner, by any means. I’m at an ordinary – or perhaps more like mediocre – level. But that’s not the point. The point is whether or not I improved over yesterday. In long-distance running the only opponent you have to beat is yourself, the way you used to be. ~ Haruki Murakami,
357:I have endeavored to convey to you my conception of the Poetic Principle. It has been my purpose to suggest that, while this Principle itself is strictly and simply the Human Aspiration for Supernal Beauty, the manifestation of the Principle is always found in an elevating excitement of the soul, quite independent of that passion which is the intoxication of the Heart, or of that truth which is the satisfaction of the Reason... in regard to passion, alas! its tendency is to degrade rather than to elevate the Soul. ~ Edgar Allan Poe,
358:We are
Born like this
Into this
Into these carefully mad wars
Into the sight of broken factory windows of emptiness
Into bars where people no longer speak to each other
Into fist fights that end as shootings and knifings
Born into this
Into hospitals which are so expensive that it’s cheaper to die
Into lawyers who charge so much it’s cheaper to plead guilty
Into a country where the jails are full and the madhouses closed
Into a place where the masses elevate fools into rich heroes ~ Charles Bukowski,
359:Real transformation requires real honesty. If you want to move forward, get real with yourself. Change will never happen if you lack the ability and courage to see yourself for who you really are. Begin to elevate yourself today. Try to make better decisions. Become a beauty seeker. If you can begin to believe in your own beauty, you can then begin to believe in the beauty of others. The transformation of the world takes place in your heart. Once you reach the summit of your own heart you will see beauty is everywhere. ~ Bryant McGill,
360:Here’s an exercise for your reasoning power: Each time you see something—whether an object, a person, a situation, a phenomena—define and describe it to yourself. Ask, What is it? What are the parts that compose it? Where did it come from? Where is it going? What will it decompose into? This is a sure way to elevate your mind and sharpen your discernment. As you examine everything that life shows you, you’ll learn about the universe you live in, the place and purpose of each thing in it, and how each relates to the whole. ~ Marcus Aurelius,
361:If we familiarize ourselves with the chains of bondage, we prepare our own limbs to wear them. The spirit of our government and our institutions must be to elevate people, and I am opposed to whatever degrades them. I am of the opinion that right makes might. Therefore, I signed the document, and now we will enforce its effectiveness. “So your question was, ‘Do I believe that God is on our side?’ To be quite honest, I haven’t given that question very much attention. I am much more concerned with whether we are on God’s side. ~ Andy Andrews,
362:Good works have always been valued more highly than faith. Of course, it’s true that we should do good works and respect the importance of them. But we should be careful that we don’t elevate good works to such an extent that faith and Christ become secondary. If we esteem them too highly, good works can become the greatest idolatry. This has occurred both inside and outside of Christianity. Some people value good works so much that they overlook faith in Christ. They preach about and praise their own works instead of God’s works. ~ Martin Luther,
363:you hurt your knee, you wouldn’t wait until you couldn’t walk before seeking help. You’d ice the joint, elevate it, skip your workouts—and then, if you didn’t see any improvement after a couple of days, you’d make an appointment with an orthopedist. Unfortunately, most people don’t turn to a mental health professional for help until they’re in real crisis. Nobody expects to heal their knees themselves, using self-discipline and gumption. Because of stigma, though, we do expect to be able to think our way out of the pain in our minds. ~ Sue Klebold,
364:If you hurt your knee, you wouldn’t wait until you couldn’t walk before seeking help. You’d ice the joint, elevate it, skip your workouts—and then, if you didn’t see any improvement after a couple of days, you’d make an appointment with an orthopedist. Unfortunately, most people don’t turn to a mental health professional for help until they’re in real crisis. Nobody expects to heal their knees themselves, using self-discipline and gumption. Because of stigma, though, we do expect to be able to think our way out of the pain in our minds. ~ Sue Klebold,
365:The world of advertising, whose list of sins runs deep, has sinned most by branding these people as creatives, which the world of web design sadly adopted as its own. Calling someone a creative doesn’t elevate. It marginalizes. The label excludes designers from conversations about strategy, product definition, business goals, and metrics. It sets them apart from other employees as people who aren’t bound by the same expectations and requirements. It diminishes their opportunity to be seen as people capable of analytical, rigorous thought. ~ Anonymous,
366:There are some things in the world we can't change- gravity, entropy, the speed of light, and our biological nature that requires clean air, clean water, clean soil, clean energy and biodiversity for our health and well-being. Protecting the biosphere should be our highest priority or else we sicken and die. Other things, like capitalism, free enterprise, the economy, currency, the market, are not forces of nature, we invented them. They are not immutable and we can change them. It makes no sense to elevate economics above the biosphere. ~ David Suzuki,
367:There are some things in the world we can't change - gravity, entropy, the speed of light, and our biological nature that requires clean air, clean water, clean soil, clean energy and biodiversity for our health and well being. Protecting the biosphere should be our highest priority or else we sicken and die. Other things, like capitalism, free enterprise, the economy, currency, the market, are not forces of nature, we invented them. They are not immutable and we can change them. It makes no sense to elevate economics above the biosphere. ~ David Suzuki,
368:And then there come the tears, the pain, the letting go of things once held so dear, so comfortable, so much a part of who you thought you were, and what defined you. Identity weakens. Divine Love is yearned for, a new feeling. The healing begins. Sexuality starts to be explored consciously as a way to share and exchange energy, as a way to elevate and expand, as a way to heal and release, as a way to trigger and evolve, as a way to express a deeper love and connect more parts of yourself together, designed to lead towards the sacred. ~ Padma Aon Prakasha,
369:You could conceive spirituality as the study of the immeasurable, of the qualitative. But that's very different from the way we typically use the word. A spiritual person, in the popular conception, is somebody who's kind of aloof from the world, introspective, meditating, communing with non-material beings. That's the spiritual realm, and we elevate it above the material realm. What's more worthy, what's more admirable? Who's the one who has done this hard work on the self, and has done a lot of "practice"? That's the spiritual person. ~ Charles Eisenstein,
370:Anytime the rich and poor combine, we should listen to whoever has the least power. Rich people are conditioned to assess the world through our privileges. The powerful tend to discredit or ignore the marginalized perspective because we can. We are shielded from the effects of a lopsided equation; we reap the benefits, not the losses. We don't mean to do this (or even know we do), but we evaluate other communities through the lens of advantage assuming we know best, have the most to offer. In doing so we unintentionally elevate our perception. ~ Jen Hatmaker,
371:As previously stated, Americans often have a difficult time addressing the issue of race. The tendency in the dialogue on race in the United States contrasts to the acknowledgment of shame in the book of Lamentations. American culture tends to hide the stories of guilt and shame and seeks to elevate stories of success. American culture gravitates toward narratives of exceptionalism and triumphalism, which results in amnesia about a tainted history. The reality of a shameful history undermines the narrative of exceptionalism, so it must remain hidden. ~ Soong Chan Rah,
372:I'm trying to work out a way to be a singer and to create cool content. I'm willing to do that as an entertainer. But I'm not willing to give up my actual self. And the way the system is built up, there'll be a backlash soon. Just recently some people published 11 photos of Sia's face. It's a bummer for me because it's going to elevate my profile and make me more recognizable. But I don't look the same as I did when I used to have my photo taken. Music is for your ears, not your eyes, right? But film is for your eyes, and I would like to give you something. ~ Sia Furler,
373:I distinctly recall the overall tone. When you listen to somebody.s story and then try to reproduce it in writing, the tone's the main thing Get the tone right and you have a true story on your hands. Maybe some of the facts aren't quite correct, but that doesn't matter-- it actually might elevate the truth factor of the story. Turn this around, and you could say there're stories that are factually accurate yet aren't true at all. Those are the stories you can count on to be boring, and even, in some instances, dangerous. You can smell those a mile away. ~ Haruki Murakami,
374:Society has never regarded virtue as anything else than as a means to strength, power and order. The State [is] unmorality organized… the will to war, to conquest and revenge… Society is not entitled to exist for its own sake but only as a substructure and scaffolding, by means of which a select race of beings may elevate themselves to their higher duties… There is no such thing as the right to live, the right to work, or the right to be happy: in this respect man is no different from the meanest worm.”* And he exalted the superman as the beast of prey, ~ William L Shirer,
375:I thought it such a shame that our culture had not devised a way to defang old age. A sophisticated civilization wouldn't ridicule senility, it would elevate it, worship it, wouldn't it? We would train ourselves to see poetry in the nonsense of dementia, to actually look forward to becoming so untethered from the world. We'd make a ceremony of casting off our material goods and confining ourselves to a single room, leaving all our old, abandoned space to someone new, someone young, so that we could die alone, indifferent to our own decay and lost beauty." (127 ~ Timothy Schaffert,
376:If children had teachers for judgment and eloquence just as they have for languages, if their memory was exercised less than their energy or their natural genius, if instead of deadening their vivacity of mind we tried to elevate the free scope and impulse of their souls, what might not result from a fine disposition? As it is, we forget that courage, or love of truth and glory are the virtues that matter most in youth; and our one endeavour is to subdue our children's spirits, in order to teach them that dependence and suppleness are the first laws of success in life. ~ Luc de Clapiers,
377:Of the trials that Eisenhower encountered in politics, McCarthy’s behavior was the most difficult to abide. In his private correspondence, Eisenhower repeatedly conveyed his conviction that the way to curb a demagogue was to ignore him. And, given the separation of powers, the president had few levers to discipline a senator. He could try to rally public opinion, but an open clash would elevate McCarthy and tarnish the presidency. “I personally deal in principles, ideas and national purposes,” Ike told a supporter. “I shall not demean this office by indulging in personal Donnybrooks. ~ John A Farrell,
378:On a 2013 album Jay-Z, one of the country’s richest and most popular rappers, referenced one Wayne Perry in a song. Perry was a hit man in the 1980s for one of Washington, D.C.’s most notorious drug lords. He pleaded guilty in 1994 to five murders, and received five consecutive life sentences. In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine in 2010, President Barack Obama expressed his affinity for rappers like Jay-Z and Lil Wayne, whose lyrics often elevate misogyny, drug dealing, and gun violence. At the time of the president’s interview, Lil Wayne was imprisoned on gun and drug charges. ~ Jason L Riley,
379:In the beggining of I was getting all this feedback from people saying, "What are you doing? What is this?" But I thought to myself, "This is a great opportunity. This is a perfect bridge to help me achieve my dream and my vision of polo becoming a bigger, more visible sport." So I used the money that I was getting from modeling to buy better horses and to become a better player. So I really believed that if I could elevate my game and show that I was serious about it, then the work I was doing with Ralph Lauren would become that bridge that I was looking for to take the sport further. ~ Nacho Figueras,
380:Here's a memonic device that I feel teaches how we can properly cope with failure. Forget about your failures; don't dwell on past mistakes Anticipate failure; realize that we all make mistakes. Intensity in everything you do; never be a failure for lack of effort. Learn from your mistakes; don't repeat previous errors. Understand why you failed; diagnose your mistakes so as to not repeat them. Respond, don't react to errors; responding corrects mistakes while reacting magnifies them. Elevate your self-concept. It's OK to fail, everyone does; now how are you going to deal with the failure ~ Steve Largent,
381:The millions are awake enough for physical labor; but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion, only one in a hundred million to a poetic or divine life. To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face? We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor. ~ Henry David Thoreau,
382:Genuine self esteem – please understand this – genuine self esteem is not competitive or comparative. Genuine self esteem isn’t expressed by self-glorification at the expense of others, or by trying to make yourself superior to everyone else, or diminishing others in order to elevate yourself. Arrogance, boastfulness, the overestimation of your abilities, reflect low self esteem, even though we’re often encouraged to believe the opposite. In human beings, joy in the simple fact of existence is a core meaning of healthy self esteem. Thus understood, how can you possibly have too much of it? ~ Nathaniel Branden,
383:What is the meaning of life?" "What is consciousness and the mind?” "Why am I here?" “What is my relationship to God and the universe?" These questions have been asked for centuries, but they are irrelevant to achieving social progress. These are unanswerable questions because they don’t have referents in the real world. The posing of such ambiguous questions doesn’t express concern for fellow human beings, or a desire to elevate their condition. Such musings are gibberish in terms of practicality, and as impotent as wailing over an injured person instead of seeking medical attention for them. ~ Jacque Fresco,
384:Not all of the women were influenced by the pheromones, but enough of them were to elevate the findings to robust statistical significance and to demonstrate with fair firmness that human pheromones exist. What we see in this carefully controlled experiment is that women can push and women can pull, and they can respond to other women in varying ways, all unconsciously, without knowing why, without the benefit even of olfaction, for the women in the study said they smelled nothing when the swab was applied under their nose, save for the scent of rubbing alcohol used as a prep in the experiment. ~ Natalie Angier,
385:human value means nothing but to treat the joys and sorrows, hopes and aspirations of human beings sympathetically, and see them merged in Cosmic Consciousness and established in divine majesty. And if one is to elevate oneself to that sublime height, he or she will have to be supplied with an environment suitable to his or her physical, mental and spiritual existence. It is the birthright of everyone to make headway in their trifarious existence. It is the duty of society to accord recognition to this human right. Society has failed to do its duty, and that is why life is full of sorrow and suffering. ~ Anonymous,
386:We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us even in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavour. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts. ~ Henry David Thoreau,
387:I don't like categorizing stuff, but women's roles all through history have been to act as hierophant or someone who's guarded the secrets or guarded the temple. I'm a girl doing what guys usually did, the way that I look, the goals and kinds of things I want to help achieve through rock. It's more heroic stuff and heroic stuff has been traditionally male. Like Hendrix and Jim Morrison and all those people. I mean, Jim Morrison was trying to elevate the word; he was the poet in rock & roll before me. He was an academic poet. Lou Reed -- another academic poet. I'm more like down-to-earth than them guys ~ Patti Smith,
388:God has given us music so that above all it can lead us upwards. Music unites all qualities: it can exalt us, divert us, cheer us up, or break the hardest of hearts with the softest of its melancholy tones. But its principal task is to lead our thoughts to higher things, to elevate, even to make us tremble...The musical art speaks in sounds more penetrating than the words of poetry, and takes hold of the most hidden crevices of the heart...Song elevates our being and leads us to the good and the true. If, however, music serves only as a diversion or as a kind of vain ostentation it is sinful and harmful. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,
389:To mention something three times in succession is to elevate it to the superlative degree, to attach to it emphasis of superimportance... Only once in sacred scripture is an attribute of God elevated to the third degree. Only once is a characteristic ofof God mentioned three times in succession. The Bible says that God is holy, holy, holy. Not that He is merely holy, or even holy, holy. He is holy holy holy. The Bible never says that God is love, love, love; or mercy, mercy, mercy; or wrath, wrath, wrath; or justice, juatice, justice. It does say that He is holy, holy, holy, that the whole earth is full of His glory. ~ R C Sproul,
390:The connection was so bad, and I couldn't talk at all during most of the call. How terrible it is when you say I love you and the person at the other end shouts back 'What?' I've been reading a miscellany of Vedanta all [358] day. Marriage partners are to serve each other. Elevate, help, teach, strengthen each other, but above all, serve. Raise their children honorably, lovingly, and with detachment. A child is a guest in the house, to be loved and respected-never possessed, since he belongs to God. How wonderful, how sane, how beautifully difficult, and therefore true. The joy of responsibility for the first time in my life. ~ J D Salinger,
391:The German deli was run by a distant cousin of Kaiser Wilhelm and the Great Neck Jews loved the place; they flocked to Kuch's. They said to one another, What a character he is, Otto, strictly old country, I'm telling you. Gus didn't think that Negroes would rush to shop in a store run by some retired slave owner, eager to share memories of fun times on the plantation, praising Massa's old-fashioned Mississippi charm. Jews were still chasing that absurd, wishful feather. Eventually, Jews would become like everybody else. They'd elevate small grievances; they'd cherish hurt feelings and ill treatment like they were signs of virtue. ~ Amy Bloom,
392:Now, in a shift of light, the shadows of birds are more pronounced on the gallery’s white wall. The shadow of each bird is speaking to me. Each shadow doubles the velocity, ferocity of forms. The shadow, my shadow now merges with theirs. Descension. Ascension. The velocity of wings creates the whisper to awaken….
I want to feel both the beauty and the pain of the age we are living in. I want to survive my life without becoming numb. I want to speak and comprehend words of wounding without having these words become the landscape where I dwell. I want to possess a light touch that can elevate darkness to the realm of stars. ~ Terry Tempest Williams,
393:And what enriched me while reading Adorno, for example, lay not in what I read but in the perception of myself while I was reading. I was someone who read Adorno! And in this heavy, intricate, detailed, precise language whose aim was to elevate thought ever higher, and where every period was set like a mountaineer’s cleat, there was something else, this particular approach to the mood of reality, the shadow of these sentences that could evoke in me a vague desire to use the language with this particular mood on something real, on something living. Not on an argument, but on a lynx, for example, or on a blackbird or a cement mixer. ~ Karl Ove Knausg rd,
394:In the three decades after World War II, we saw a movement to elevate culture for the masses. The middlebrow consensus, we could say, tracked with the upheaval of the modern movement in art, architecture, literature, and music. It meant publication of paperbacks of classic novels, the Great Books push, Leonard Bernstein on television, Thelonious Monk on the cover of Time, an expanding English major in colleges and universities, and so on. These days, it all seems like ancient history. Do we have a new, fruitful way to think about culture that goes beyond midcentury middlebrow? 2. If, as children, people don’t learn to love fiction, music of a ~ Anonymous,
395:In discourse more sweet
(For Eloquence the Soul, Song charms the Sense)
Others apart sat on a hill retired,
In thoughts more elevate, and reasoned high
Of Providence, Foreknowledge, Will, and Fate-
Fixed fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute,
And found no end, in wandering mazes lost.
Of good and evil much they argued then,
Of happiness and final misery,
Passion and apathy, and glory and shame:
Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy!-
Yet, with a pleasing sorcery, could charm
Pain for a while or anguish, and excite
Fallacious hope, or arm th' obdurate breast
With stubborn patience as with triple steel. ~ John Milton,
396:Men are apt to grow, in the apostolical phrase, too ‘worldly’: the propensity of our nature, or rather the operation of our state, is to plunge us, the lower orders of the community, in the concerns of the day, and their masters, in the cares of wealth and gain. It is good for us, sometimes to be ‘in the mount.’ Those things are to be cherished, which tend to elevate us above our ordinary sphere, and to abstract us from our common and every-day concerns. The affectionate recollection and admiration of the dead will act gently upon our spirits, and fill us with a composed seriousness, favourable to the best and most honourable contemplations. ~ William Godwin,
397:STEP 1. Identify the system’s bottlenecks. (After all it wasn’t too difficult to identify the oven and the NCX10 as the bottlenecks of the plant.)
STEP 2. Decide how to exploit the bottlenecks. (That was fun. Realizing that those machines should not take a lunch break, etc.)
STEP 3. Subordinate everything else to the above decision. (Making sure that everything marches to the tune of the constraints. The red and green tags.)
STEP 4. Elevate the system’s bottlenecks. (Bringing back the old Zmegma, switching back to old, less “effective” routings. . . .)
STEP 5. If, in a previous step, a bottleneck has been broken go back to step 1. ~ Eliyahu M Goldratt,
398:A T-shirt is a T-shirt. Spending hundreds of dollars on it doesn't elevate it. He was under-dressed, even if his casual outfit did cost more than my suit and tie.

I once had another fashion victim tell me, 'This T-shirt cost twelve thousand dollars!'

What difference does that make? If that's the message you want to send about yourself and your fashion sense, you should wear the price tag, or that should be the message on your T-shirt: 'Hi. This T-shirt costs more than a semester of college.' Or: 'Hi. I have money to burn. Please help me get rid of all this wealth.' And my shirt, in turn, would say, 'Great. Please write a $12,000 check to charity. ~ Tim Gunn,
399:And yet these Americans, with their helicopters and laser-guided weapons and shock-troop Rangers were going to somehow sort it out in a few weeks? Arrest Aidid and make it all better? They were trying to take down a clan, the most ancient and efficient social organization known to man. Didn’t the Americans realize that for every leader they arrested there were dozens of brothers, cousins, sons, and nephews to take his place? Setbacks just strengthened the clan’s resolve. Even if the Habr Gidr were somehow crippled or destroyed, wouldn’t that just elevate the next most powerful clan? Or did the Americans expect Somalia to suddenly sprout full-fledged Jeffersonian democracy? ~ Mark Bowden,
400:Just how long the ecosystems of Earth will be thrown into flux and disarray from anthropogenic climate change also depends on how much more of that change we choose to engineer—and perhaps how much we can manage to undo. But warming at the level necessary to fully melt ice sheets and glaciers and elevate sea level by several hundred feet promises to initiate rolling, radically transformative changes on a timescale measured not in decades or centuries or even millennia, but in the millions of years. Alongside that timeline, the entire lifespan of human civilization is rendered, effectively, an afterthought; and the much longer span of climate change becomes eternity. ~ David Wallace Wells,
401:Diet, sleep management, and exercise all have a powerful effect on mood. Moreover, each enhances the effectiveness of the other. A high-carbohydrate diet combined with exercise increases the effectiveness of sleep management. Also, the correct amount of sleep will elevate your mood sufficiently to help you stay on a healthy diet and exercise program. All three are highly effective, cost-free, and nontoxic, and offer rapid results. Unfortunately, because such tools are hard to manipulate for profit, they are unlikely to get widespread attention or achieve much popularity. Still, they are yours for the taking—free of charge and ready to change your life for the better today. ~ John A McDougall,
402:The insistence is on merit, insinuating that any current majority white leadership in any industry has got there through hard work and no outside help, as if whiteness isn’t its own leg-up, as if it doesn’t imply a familiarity that warms an interviewer to a candidate. When each of the sectors I mentioned earlier have such dire racial representation, you’d have to be fooling yourself if you really think that the homogeneous glut of middle-aged white men currently clogging the upper echelons of most professions got there purely through talent alone. We don’t live in a meritocracy, and to pretend that simple hard work will elevate all to success is an exercise in wilful ignorance. ~ Reni Eddo Lodge,
403:to elevate one way of interpreting it (the 'historical Jesus,' Pauline or Johannine Christology, Augustinian or Thomistic metaphysics, Luther's 'justification by faith,' Barth's notion of election) as the one and only way is to reify and petrify certain metaphors, models, and concepts that although appropriate to some people in certain times, may be no longer. If we take the form of Scripture seriously, the plurality of interpretive perspectives that it is, we will have to do the same risky, adventuresome thing that it does: interpret the salvific love of God in ways that can address our crises most persuasively and powerfully. And this will not, cannot, mean using the terminology of two thousand years ago. ~ Sallie McFague,
404:Lead from the front. Go to where you can do the most good. From the moment the Towers were struck, Giuliani was front and center, helping to coordinate, command, and commandeer state and federal assistance. Be seen as the leader. Get out of the bunker. Let people know what you are doing. In the wake of September 11, Giuliani was everywhere; he used his public persona to console, grieve with, and inspire his ravaged city. Elevate the status of sacrifice. Give meaning to the sacrifice of others. Giuliani repeatedly cited the heroism of the New York City firefighters who, as the Towers were crumbling, went in as others were coming out. Show the human side. Do not be afraid to show emotion. We witnessed Giuliani shedding ~ John Baldoni,
405:I peeled the shorts off my sweating skin and stepped into the skirt. It slid up my body, resting on my waist, and I pulled the zipper up towards the lord. It didn't just fit. No, it did more than that. It melded to my body, beautifully, as if it had been cut specifically for me, to mask and smooth and elevate. I would be better in this skirt. The dream was happening! I had the all-knowing smile, my hair was suddenly more luxurious, I felt thinner, more acceptable. Girls who had been mean to me in high school would see me in this skirt and think, "Is that Scaachi?" and I'd say, "YOU BET IT IS, YOU DUMB BITCH" and then punch all their boyfriends in the teeth. (I have not thought this fantasy through; just let me have this.) ~ Scaachi Koul,
406:A major existential breakthrough was averted Friday when, moments before he had a realization of monumental personal significance, 29-year-old local resident Darrell Gatsas instead turned to God. "He was so, so close to discovering something truly fundamental about himself and his place in the universe, but nope—he went with God," close friend Peter Rankin, 27, said. "For a second there it seemed like he was going to seriously consider the cause-and-effect relationship of his own actions and elevate himself to a new level of compassion and understanding, but then he suddenly changed course and asked God to swoop in and fix everything." Reached for comment, God chuckled to reporters that Gatsas is, indeed, a real piece of work. ~ The Onion,
407:Do you know, my dear fellow,” Derville went on after a pause, “there are in modern society three men who can never think well of the world—the priest, the doctor, and the man of law? And they wear black robes, perhaps because they are in mourning for every virtue and every illusion. The most hapless of the three is the lawyer. When a man comes in search of the priest, he is prompted by repentance, by remorse, by beliefs which make him interesting, which elevate him and comfort the soul of the intercessor whose task will bring him a sort of gladness; he purifies, repairs and reconciles. But we lawyers, we see the same evil feelings repeated again and again, nothing can correct them; our offices are sewers which can never be cleansed. ~ Honor de Balzac,
408:This has everything to do with parenting, because the kind of disciple I am dictates the kind of mother I am. I am a mom who is passionate about the work of God, or I’m not. My kids will surely know the difference. I’ll teach my children to elevate themselves or I’ll teach them to love the kingdom; those are mutually exclusive. If I truly believe, then my kids belong to Christ and my highest calling is to see them into his good care. My work is to present them to Jesus as single-minded disciples, prepared and equipped to live out their mission. If I believe, I create a house of grace. If I believe, my children will see me forgive and ask forgiveness. If I believe, my kids will care about this troubled planet Jesus was willing to die for. ~ Jen Hatmaker,
409:There are going to be times in our lives when someone else gets an unexpected blessing or receives some special recognition. May I plead with us not to be hurt - And certainly not to feel envious - when good fortune comes to another person? We are not diminished when someone else is added upon. We are not in a race against each other to see who is the wealthiest or the most talented or the most beautiful or even the most blessed. The race we are really in is the race against sin, and surely envy is one of the many universal of those... coveting, pouting, or tearing others down does not elevate your standing, nor does demeaning someone else improve your self-image. So behind, and be grateful that God is kind. It is a happy way to love. ~ Jeffrey R Holland,
410:Trying to get pregnant is the most vulnerable thing in the world. You have to openly decide you are ready and then you have to put sperm in your vagina and elevate your legs like you are an upside-down coffee table. It’s all ridiculous and incredibly sci-fi. Everyone’s journey is different and I have nothing to say about how and when someone decides to become a mother. The legacy of my generation will be that we have truly expanded the idea of what “family” means. It is no longer unusual for people who choose surrogacy, gay adoption, IVF, international and domestic adoption, fostering, and childlessness to live side by side and quietly judge each other. We can all live in peace thinking our way is the best way and everything else is cuckoo. ~ Amy Poehler,
411:Today I am bothered by the story of King Canute. (...) The story is, of course, that he was so arrogant and despotic a leader that he believed he could control everything - even the tide. We see him on the beach, surrounded by subjects, sceptre in hand, ordering back the heedless waves; a laughing stock, in short. But what if we've got it all wrong? What if, in fact, he was so good and great a king that his people began to elevate him to the status of a god, and began to believe that he was capable of anything? In order to prove to them that he was a mere mortal, he took them down to the beach and ordered back the waves, which of course kept on rolling up the beach. How awful it would be if we had got it so wrong, if we had misunderstood his actions for so long. ~ Maggie O Farrell,
412:But what is this force that pushes us as individuals and as a whole species to grow against the natural resistance of our own lethargy? We have already labeled it. It is love. Love was defined as ‘the will to extend one’s self for the purpose of nurturing one’s own or another’s spiritual growth.’ When we grow, it is because we are working at it, and we are working at it because we love ourselves. It is through love that we elevate ourselves. And it is through our love for others that we assist others to elevate themselves. Love, the extension of the self, is the very act of evolution. It is evolution in progress. The evolutionary force, present in all of life, manifests itself in mankind as human love. Among humanity love is the miraculous force that defies the natural law of entropy. ~ M Scott Peck,
413:Here is what Neville had to say regarding changing your self-concept in order to elevate your life: “If you refuse to assume the responsibility of the incarnation of a new and higher concept of yourself, then you reject the means, the only means, whereby your redemption—that is, the attainment of your ideal—can be effected.”2 Get this clearly in your head in this first chapter: A higher concept of yourself involves taking on new truths and shedding your old views of what you can achieve. This is the only way you can achieve your desires. That is the reason I’m stressing this early in this book. You must begin by replacing your old set of truths with a belief in the existence of a higher self within you. This is something that you may not have contemplated at an earlier time in your life. ~ Wayne W Dyer,
414:Véra assumed her married name almost as a stage name; rarely has matrimony so much represented a profession. It was one of the ironies of the life that – born at a time and place where women could and did lay claim to all kinds of ambitions – she should elevate the role of wife to a high art. […] Traditionally, a man changes his name and braces himself for fame; a woman changes hers and passes into oblivion. This was not to be Véra’s case, although she did gather her married name around her like a cloak, which she occasionally opened to startling effect. She would never be forced to make a woman’s historic choice between love and work. Nor would Verochka, as Vladimir called her, squander any of her professional training, though as it happened her husband would be the direct (and sole) beneficiary of that expertise. ~ Stacy Schiff,
415:Cameron, when you asked me to move in with you, I thought it was all about the babies. That it had nothing to do with me.” “Ohhh, it had everything to do with you.” “The past couple of weeks…” she said. “I don’t know when I’ve been happier.” “Really? If I could just elevate myself above sperm donor—” “Why? They don’t get any better. Talk about packing a punch,” she laughed. “That night, I remember thinking, if I had a little more time, if my life weren’t so screwed up, I could fall in love with this guy.” His breathing got a little heavier. “I have nothing but time,” he said, and his voice had grown raspy. “Then we don’t really have a problem here, do we?” she said with a smile. “We could—” She was cut off by his hands on her face, his lips on her lips, kissing her with a passion she hadn’t even dared hope for in so long. ~ Robyn Carr,
416:We shrink therefore from God, knowing that He wants to enrich our being, rather than our having—that He wishes to elevate our nature, not to submerge and lose it in trifles. He has called us to the superior vocation of being His children, of partaking of His nature, and of being related to Him as branches to a vine. Few of us completely want that elevation; it is our petty desire to have more,not to share the glory of being more.We want the poor shadows, not the light—the sparks, and not the sun—the arc, and not the circle. As the desire for the world and things increases in us, God makes less and less appeal. We hold back, our fists closed about our few pennies, and thus lose the fortune He holds out to us. That is why the initial step of coming to God is so hard. We cling to our nursery toys and lose the pearl of great price. ~ Fulton J Sheen,
417:Why does a human body become deceased?
The reason is that as long as the human body is not free from suffering, mind cannot be happy.
If a man lacks enthusiasm, either his body or mind is in a deceased condition....

Now what saps the enthusiasm in man?
If there is no enthusiasm, life becomes drudgery - a mere burden to be dragged. Nothing can be achieved if there is no enthusiasm.
The main reason for this lack of enthusiasm on the part of a man is that an individual looses the hope of getting an opportunity to elevate himself.
Hopelessness leads to lack of enthusiasm.
The mind in such cases becomes deceased....

When is enthusiasm created?
When one breaths an atmosphere where one is sure of getting the legitimate reward for one's labor, only then one feels enriched by enthusiasm and inspiration. ~ B R Ambedkar,
418:Christianity grasped perfectly that there is an element in the apparent contingency of love that can’t be reduced to that contingency. But it immediately raised it to the level of transcendence, and that is the root of the problem. This universal element I too recognize in love as immanent. But Christianity has somehow managed to elevate it and refocus it onto a transcendent power. It’s an ideal that was already partly present in Plato, through the idea of the Good. It is a brilliant first manipulation of the power of love and one we must now bring back to earth. I mean we must demonstrate that love really does have universal power, but that it is simply the opportunity we are given to enjoy a positive, creative, affirmative experience of difference. The Other, no doubt, but without the “Almighty-Other”, without the “Great Other” of transcendence. ~ Alain Badiou,
419:he had visited his distant kin, Noah. There, he had been told of the Creator Elohim, and his vindictive judgment on mankind that was the origin of the Great Flood. Nimrod rejected this despotic deity and his capricious obsession for controlling things from on high. How dare this supposed Creator make mankind and the angels, and then demand sniveling toe-licking slavery. Against this monolithic tyranny stood the pantheon of gods, who watched over mankind from Mount Hermon. This divine assembly of Watchers was willing to share power, to elevate man above his mud-brick existence. If there was one thing the Watcher gods gave him hope for, it was the glorious potential of mankind to become as gods, to commingle heaven and earth in a unity of being. He knew that what he and Marduk planned would more than likely provoke another vengeful response from Elohim. ~ Brian Godawa,
420:The room was not a room to elevate the soul. Louis XIV, to pick a name at random, would not have liked it, would have found it not sunny enough, and insufficiently full of mirrors. He would have desired someone to pick up the socks, put the records away, and maybe burn the place down. Michelangelo would have been distressed by its proportions, which were neither lofty nor shaped by any noticeable inner harmony or symmetry, other than that all parts of the room were pretty much equally full of old coffee mugs, shoes and brimming ashtrays, most of which were sharing their tasks with each other. The walls were painted in almost precisely that shade of green which Rafaello Sanzio would have bitten off his own right hand at the wrist rather than use, and Hercules, on seeing the room, would probably have returned half an hour later armed with a navigable river. ~ Douglas Adams,
421:What, actually, does it mean to be a tragic figure firmly in the grip of one's daimon? It means to possess great talent, to relentlessly pursue the expression of that talent through the unswerving affirmation of the causa-sui project that alone gives it birth and form. One is consumed by what he must do to express his gift. The passion of his character becomes inseparable from his dogma. Jung says the same thing beautifully when he concludes that Freud "must himself be so profoundly affected by the power of Eros that he actually wished to elevate it into a dogma...like a religious numen."
Eros is precisely the natural energy of the child's organism that will not let him rest, that keeps propelling him forward in a driven way while he fashions the lie of his character-which ironically permits that very drivenness to continue, but now under the illusion of self-control. ~ Ernest Becker,
422:The moon will never lie to anyone. Be like the moon. No one hates the moon or wants to kill it. The moon does not take antidepressants and never gets sent to prison. The moon never shot a guy in the face and ran away. The moon has been around a long time and has never tried to rip anyone off. The moon does not care who you want to touch or what color you are. The moon treats everyone the same. The moon never tries to get in on the guest list or use your name to impress others. Be like the moon. When others insult or belittle in an attempt to elevate themselves, the moon sits passively and watches, never lowering itself to anything that weak. The moon is beautiful and bright. It needs no makeup to look beautiful. The moon never shoves clouds out of its way so it can be seen. The moon needs not fame or money to be powerful. The moon never asks you to go to war to defend it. Be like the moon. ~ Henry Rollins,
423:There are those people who try to elevate their souls like someone who continually jumps from a standing position in the hope that forcing oneself to jump all day— and higher every day— they would no longer fall back down, but rise to heaven. Thus occupied, they no longer look to heaven. We cannot even take one step toward heaven. The vertical direction is forbidden to us. But if we look to heaven long-term, God descends and lifts us up. God lifts us up easily. As Aeschylus says, ‘That which is divine is without effort.’ There is an ease in salvation more difficult for us than all efforts. In one of Grimm’s accounts, there is a competition of strength between a giant and a little tailor. The giant throws a stone so high that it takes a very long time before falling back down. The little tailor throws a bird that never comes back down. That which does not have wings always comes back down in the end. ~ Simone Weil,
424:As we mixed down the song “Rocket Queen,” Axl felt that the bridge needed something; some other element to elevate the drama. He suggested that Adrianna Smith, who was with us in the studio that day, fuck him in the live room so that we could record her vocals and layer them over the breakdown. We’d been drinking Jack pretty heavily all day, so it seemed like the most natural thing in the world. I was all for it; I knew too well what she was capable of vocally—she had kept me up for the past three nights. So we lit up some candles for atmosphere, then she and Axl went out into the live room, got down on the floor by the drum riser, and we recorded Smith’s performance in all of its honest moaning and groaning. Enjoy it—it’s right there in the final mix. That breakdown said it all; I couldn’t think of a better song to close the album and I couldn’t think of a more telling slice of our lives at the time to hand to our fans. ~ Slash,
425:This is the difference between someone whose heart is purified and sound and one whose heart is impure and corrupt. Impure people oppress, and the pure-hearted not only forgive their oppressors, but elevate them in status and character. In order to purify ourselves, we must begin to recognize this truth. This is what this book is all about — a book of self-purification and a manual of liberation. If we work on our hearts, if we actually implement what is suggested here, we’ll begin to see changes in our lives, our condition, our society, and even within our own family dynamics. It is a blessing that we have this science of purification, a blessing that this teaching exists in the world today. What remains is for us to take these teachings seriously.

Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart. Translation and Commentary of Imam Mawlud's Matharat al-Qulub. Schaykh Hamza Yusuf. E-Book S. 10 ~ Hamza Yusuf,
426:55: A similar rejection is a necessary self-restraint and a spiritual discipline for the immature seeker, since such powers may be a great, even a deadly peril; for their supernormality may easily feed in him an abnormal exaggeration of the ego. Power in itself may be dreaded as a temptation by the aspirant to perfection, because power can abase as well as elevate; nothing is more liable to misuse. But when new capacities come as an inevitable result of the growth into a greater consciousness and a greater life and that growth is part of the very aim of the spiritual being within us, this bar does not operate; for a growth of the being into supernature and its life in supernature cannot take place or cannot be complete without bringing with it a greater power of consciousness and a greater power of life and the spontaneous development of an instrumentation of knowledge and force normal to that supernature. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 2.08,
427:I've come to take you with me
even if I must drag you along
But first I must steal your heart
then settle you in my soul.

I've come as a spring
to lay beside your blossoms
To feel the glory of happiness
and spread your flowers around

I've come to show you off
as the adornment in my house
and elevate you to the heavens
as the prayers of those in love.

I've come to take back
the kiss you once stole
Either return it with grace
or i must take it by force

You're my life
You're my soul
Please be my last prayer
My heart must hold you forever

From the lowly earth
to the high human soul
There are a lot more
than a thousand stages

Since I've taken you along
from town to town
no way will I abandon
you halfway down this road

Though you're in my hands
Though i can throw you around
like a child and a ball
I'll always need to chase after you ~ Rumi,
428:Before the Christian Church goes into eclipse anywhere there must first be a corrupting of her simple basic theology. She simply gets a wrong answer to the question, ”What is God like?” and goes on from there. Though she may continue to cling to a sound nominal creed, her practical working creed has become false. The masses of her adherents come to believe that God is different from what He actually is; and that is heresy of the most insidious and deadly kind. The heaviest obligation lying upon the Christian Church today is to purify and elevate her concept of God until it is once more worthy of Him - and of her. In all her prayers and labors this should have first place. We do the greatest service to the next generation of Christians by passing on to them undimmed and undiminished that noble concept of God which we received from our Hebrew and Christian fathers of generations past. This will prove of greater value to them than anything that art or science can devise. ~ A W Tozer,
429:It is also built sweetly through love and pleasure. When you have deep friendships with good people, you copy and then absorb some of their best traits. When you love a person deeply, you want to serve them and earn their regard. When you experience great art, you widen your repertoire of emotions. Through devotion to some cause, you elevate your desires and organize your energies. Moreover, the struggle against the weaknesses in yourself is never a solitary struggle. No person can achieve self-mastery on his or her own. Individual will, reason, compassion, and character are not strong enough to consistently defeat selfishness, pride, greed, and self-deception. Everybody needs redemptive assistance from outside—from family, friends, ancestors, rules, traditions, institutions, exemplars, and, for believers, God. We all need people to tell us when we are wrong, to advise us on how to do right, and to encourage, support, arouse, cooperate, and inspire us along the way. ~ David Brooks,
430:But what I want to know is, what does your view of my father say about you? When someone comes into the world who reaches the worst depths that humans can sink to, we will always call him a monster, or evil, or the embodiment of evil, but there is never any serious hint or suggestion that there is something actually supernatural or otherworldly about this individual. He may be an evil man, but he is just a man. But when our extraordinary person operating on the other side of the spectrum, the good, rises to the surface, like Jesus or Buddha, immediately we elevate him to God, a deity, something divine, supernatural, otherworldly. This is a reflection of how we see ourselves. We have no trouble believing that the worst creature who has done the most harm is a man, but we absolutely cannot believe that the best creature, who tries to inspire imagination, creativity and empathy, can be one of us. We just don't think that highly of ourselves, but we happily think that low. ~ Steve Toltz,
431:Beyond that, all whites depended on laws to defend slavery and segregation so as to elevate us politically, socially and economically. We were dependent on Mexicans to teach us how to extract gold from river-beds and quartz—critical to the growth of the economy in the mid-to-late 1800s—and had we not taken over half their nation in an unprovoked war, the Pacific ports so vital to the modern U.S. economy would have been not ours, but Mexico’s. Then we were dependent on their labor in the mid-twentieth century under the bracero program, through which more than five million Mexicans were brought into the country for agricultural work, and then sent back across the border.140 And we were dependent on Asian labor to build the railroads that made transcontinental commerce possible. Ninety percent of the labor used to build the Central Pacific Railroad in the 1860s was Chinese, imported for the purpose, and exploited because the rail bosses felt that group was easier to control than white workers. ~ Tim Wise,
432:In the hall, Tina whisper hisses, "Retreat! Retreat!" The sounds of heels clip clopping follows before...
stumble crash bang
Mimi laughs her ass off and says, "We have a man down! I repeat. We are a man down!"
Lola laughs hard and yells out, "We're so bad at this! Best mission ever!
The sound of giggles and heels approach my room. I put an arm under my head to elevate it. I want to see what these goofballs are doing. Tina's first through the door and looks sheepish while rubbing her elbow. That is until she see Nat, Helena and Nina all sitting on my bed. Then she yells out, "Pajama party!" And literally throws herself on to my bed, hurt elbow forgotten. She belly flops onto my stomach, My body jolts upwards, the wind is knocked out of me and I groan. Tina looks up at me with wide eyes. She rushed out, "Ash, honey! I'm so sorry!" Then she rubs what she thinks is my stomach. Only its my cock.
Removing her hands from me, I tell her,
"Tina, I don't think Nik would like you in my bed rubbing my junk. ~ Belle Aurora,
433:Devi cambiare la tua vita! Questo è l'imperativo che supera l'alternativa tra ipotetico e categorico, l'imperativo assoluto, il comando metanoico per eccellenza. Esso fornisce la parola chiave per la rivoluzione, declinata alla seconda persona singolare. Esso definisce la vita come un dislivello tra le sue forme più elevate e quelle più basse. Io vivo, ma qualcosa mi dice con autorità inconfutabile: non vivi ancora correttamente. L'autorità numinosa della forma gode del privilegio dei rivolgersi a me con un "tu devi": è l'autorità di una vita diversa in questa vita. Questa autorità coglie in me una sottile insufficienza, che è più antica e più libera della colpa. Si tratta del mio più intimo non-ancora. Nel mio istante più cosciente vengo colto dalla protesta assoluta contro il mio status quo. Cambiare me stesso è ciò di cui ho bisogno. Se tu dunque cambi veramente la tua vita, non faresti che dare retta alla tua migliore volontà, non appena capisci che una tensione verticale, a te favorevole, sta scardinando la tua vita. (33) ~ Peter Sloterdijk,
434:Long enshrined traditions around communion aside, there are always folks who fancy themselves bouncers to the heavenly banquet, charged with keeping the wrong people away from the table and out of the church. Evangelicalism in particular has seen a resurgence in border patrol Christianity in recent years, as alliances and coalitions formed around shared theological distinctives elevate secondary issues to primary ones and declare anyone who fails to conform to their strict set of beliefs and behaviors unfit for Christian fellowship. Committed to purifying the church of every errant thought, difference of opinion, or variation in practice, these self-appointed gatekeepers tie up heavy loads of legalistic rules and place them on weary people’s shoulders. They strain out the gnats in everyone else’s theology while swallowing their own camel-sized inconsistencies. They slam the door of the kingdom in people’s faces and tell them to come back when they are sober, back on their feet, Republican, Reformed, doubtless, submissive, straight. ~ Rachel Held Evans,
435:Seizing Situational Status Here are the steps involved in elevating your status in any situation. You will recognize some of these actions from framing, and for good reason. Frame control and status are closely related, as are the pitch techniques you will learn in Chapter 4.        1. Politely ignore power rituals and avoid beta traps.        2. Be unaffected by your customer’s global status (meaning the customer’s status inside and outside the business environment).        3. Look for opportunities to perpetrate small denials and defiances that strengthen your frame and elevate your status.        4. As soon as you take power, quickly move the discussion into an area where you are the domain expert, where your knowledge and information are unassailable by your audience.        5. Apply a prize frame by positioning yourself as the reward for making the decision to do business with you.        6. Confirm your alpha status by making your customer, who now temporarily occupies a beta position, make a statement that qualifies your higher status. ~ Oren Klaff,
436:His theory on the matter is quite original. He maintains that spiritual progress can only occur in a world of leisure. What do you think about that?'
'A world of leisure, truly!' Chawki exclaimed. 'I don't understand. Please explain what you mean.'
'It's quite simple,' said Medhat. 'From the beginning man's hardworking fate has made him unable to conceive of an ideal that is not material and does not correspond to his needs and his safety. All he thinks about is earning a living; this is what he is taught from childhood on. His only aim is to become cleverer and more of a bastard than everyone else. During his entire life, he uses his ingenuity to provide food for himself and, once he has eaten his fill, to invent some sordid ambition for himself. When, then, does he have time to elevate his spirit and his mind? The tiniest thought along these lines is considered a criminal offense, immediately punishable by disapproval and starvation. Therefore, I venture to affirm that only people of leisure can attain a way of thinking that is truly civilized. ~ Albert Cossery,
437:Mr. Winterborne is in no way beneath me, ma'am. Character is a far more important measure of a man than birth."
"Well said. Fortunately for Mr. Winterborne, marriage to a Ravenel will elevate him sufficiently that he will be allowed to mix in good society. One hopes he will prove worthy of the privilege."
"I hope aristocratic society will be worthy of *him*," Helen said pointedly.
The gray eyes sharpened. "Is he high-minded? Refined in his tastes? Exquisite in his comportment?"
"He is well-mannered, intelligent, honest, and generous."
"But not refined?" Lady Berwick pressed.
"Whatever refinements Mr. Winterborne does not possess, he will certainly acquire them if he wishes. But I wouldn't ask him to change anything about himself, as there is already far too much to admire, and I would be in danger of excessive pride on his behalf."
Lady Berwick gazed at her steadily, her gray eyes warming. "What an extraordinary girl. 'Cool as caller air," as my Scottish grandfather used to say. You'll be wasted on a Welshman- I vow, we could have married you to a duke. ~ Lisa Kleypas,
438:assumptions of what etymology is: the logical, fairy-tale story of English. But it would be sloppy scholarship to elevate an unsubstantiated theory to the level of researched etymology simply because that theory is au courant. Further, the way that English grows doesn’t make sense. The history of English is full of messiness and illogic because the English language is a true democracy, built entirely by the people who use and have used it, and people, generally speaking, are messy and illogical. What genius, for instance, looked at the ragged edge of their sweater, laddering and unknitting itself with energy, and thought, “This is so bad that it’s not just raveling; it’s super-raveling. No: über-raveling. No, no, I got it: it’s frickin’ unraveling! Like, unreal amounts of raveling. Yeah, I’m going to call this ‘unraveling’ from now on.” Who thought that “pumpernickel” was a good name for a dark rye bread? Because when you trace the word back to its German origins, you find it means “fart goblin,”* 5 and now you cannot help but blench and giggle whenever you see pumpernickel. ~ Kory Stamper,
439:To Be the Famous..."

To be the famous isn’t attractive,
Not this could ever elevate,
You needn’t to make your archive active,
You needn’t your scripts to be all saved.

Self-offering’s aimed by creation,
But ballyhoo or cheap success,
It is a shame, if worthless persons
Are talks of towns’ populace.

But you’ve to live without phony,
To live such life that, after all,
To gain love of the space symphony,
And answer to the future’s call,

And oft to leave gaps in your traces
In fate, but in the papers, crooked,
To mark the chapters and main places
On margins of your being’s book,

To fully sink in the unknown,
And hide in it your own steps
Like hide itself, if mist is grown,
The whole landscape of the place.

The others, by the living traces,
Will pass your way through, bit by bit,
But wins and losses of your battles
You have not to discern on it.

You’ve never – not by fate or folly –
To lose an atom of your face,
But – be alive, alive and only,
Alive and only, till your last. ~ Boris Pasternak,
440:Virginia Woolf wrote famously, “About December 1910 human nature changed.” Well, one doubts it. What did change, and has been changing all through the closing decades of the 19th century, is that the intelligentsia became increasingly alienated from the bourgeois world from which it sprung, and wished to become something Higher. It wished to make novels difficult and technical – think of Woolf or Joyce – to keep them out of the hands of the uneducated and to elevate the intelligentsia to a new clerisy, a new aristocracy of the spirit. Similarly in painting, music, and philosophy. It wished to make everything difficult and technical, and it succeeded. [Economists Lawrence] Klein, [Paul] Samuelson, and [Jan] Tinbergen were middle-period modernists.

The vices of modernism come from the master vice of Pride, the vice so characteristic of an actual or wannabe aristocracy. It is prideful overreaching to think that social engineering can work, that a smart lad at a blackboard can outwit the wisdom of the world or the ages, that a piece of machinery like statistical significance can tell you how big or small a number is. ~ Deirdre N McCloskey,
441:Leadership is responsibility.
There comes a point when one must make a decision. Are YOU willing to do what it takes to push the right buttons to elevate those around you? If the answer is YES, are you willing to push the right buttons even if it means being perceived as the villain? Here's where the true responsibility of being a leader lies. Sometimes you must prioritize the success of the team ahead of how your own image is perceived. The ability to elevate those around you is more than simply sharing the ball or making teammates feel a certain level of comfort. It's pushing them to find their inner beast, even if they end up resenting you for it at the time.
I'd rather be perceived as a winner than a good teammate. I wish they both went hand in hand all the time but that's just not reality. I have nothing in common with lazy people who blame others for their lack of success. Great things come from hard work and perseverance. No excuses.
This is my way. It might not be right for YOU but all I can do is share my thoughts. It’s on YOU to figure out which leadership style suits you best.
Will check back in with you soon.. Till then ~ Anonymous,
442:Lines Suggested By The Fourteenth Of February - Ii
Darkness succeeds to twilight:
Through lattice and through skylight
The stars no doubt, if one looked out,
Might be observed to shine:
And sitting by the embers
I elevate my members
On a stray chair, and then and there
Commence a Valentine.
Yea! by St. Valentinus,
Emma shall not be minus
What all young ladies, whate'er their grade is,
Expect to-day no doubt:
Emma the fair, the stately Whom I beheld so lately,
Smiling beneath the snow-white wreath
Which told that she was 'out.'
Wherefore fly to her, swallow,
And mention that I'd 'follow,'
And 'pipe and trill,' et cetera, till
I died, had I but wings:
Say the North's 'true and tender,'
The South an old offender;
And hint in fact, with your well-known tact,
All kinds of pretty things.
Say I grow hourly thinner,
Simply abhor my dinner Tho' I do try and absorb some viand
Each day, for form's sake merely:
And ask her, when all's ended,
And I am found extended,
With vest blood-spotted and cut carotid,
To think on Her's sincerely.
~ Charles Stuart Calverley,
443:What I saw in Washington that October were a lot of Americans who were genuinely dismayed by what their country was doing in Vietnam; I also saw a lot of other Americans who were self-righteously attracted to a most childish notion of heroism - namely, their own. They thought that to force a confrontation with soldiers and policemen would not only elevate themselves to the status of heroes; this confrontation, they deluded themselves, would expose the corruption of the political and social system they loftily thought they opposed. These would be the same people who, in later years, would credit the antiwar 'movement' with eventually getting the U.S. armed forces out of Vietnam. That was not what I saw. I saw that the righteousness of many of these demonstrators simply helped to harden the attitudes of those poor fools who supported the war. That is what makes what Ronald Reagan would say - two years later, in 1969 - so ludicrous: that the Vietnam protests were 'giving aid and comfort to the enemy.' What I saw was that the protests did worse than that; they gave aid and comfort to the idiots who endorsed the war - they made that war last longer. That's what I saw. ~ John Irving,
444:The insistence is on merit, insinuating that any current majority white leadership in any industry has got there through hard work and no outside help, as if whiteness isn’t its own leg-up, as if it doesn’t imply a familiarity that warms an interviewer to a candidate. When each of the sectors I mentioned earlier have such dire racial representation, you’d have to be fooling yourself if you really think that the homogeneous glut of middle-aged white men currently clogging the upper echelons of most professions got there purely through talent alone. We don’t live in a meritocracy, and to pretend that simple hard work will elevate all to success is an exercise in wilful ignorance.
Opposing positive discrimination based on apprehensions about getting the best person for the job means inadvertently revealing what you think talent looks like, and the kind of person in which you think talent resides. Because if the current system worked correctly, and if hiring practices were successfully recruiting and promoting the right people for the right jobs in all circumstances, I seriously doubt that so many leadership positions would be occupied by white middle-aged men. ~ Reni Eddo Lodge,
445:Any program about highlighting benevolence, protecting the innocent, or sacrificing time to help the underdog grew in popularity. Included in our list of reality viewing were shows about police or bounty hunters apprehending evil criminals. These too became some of the most-watched programs. To sum it all up, our entertainment is often centered on the good of humanity. Sales and Marketing 101 teaches us that a product must feel, look, sound, taste, or smell good in order to succeed in the marketplace. It must elevate the consumer’s senses or emotions to a better and happier state. We know that good items will sell. After all, who would want to purchase something bad? And only twisted people would desire to procure evil. We hear comments such as “he’s a good man” or “she’s a good woman,” and we normally accept this evaluation at face value. The vulnerable quickly let down their guard and embrace every statement or action from those proclaimed to be good as safe and trustworthy. But are these assessments always accurate? Could we ever fall into the delusional state of calling what’s right wrong or what’s wrong right? Doesn’t everybody know the difference? And we certainly could never fall into the deceived state of calling good evil or evil good. Correct? ~ John Bevere,
446:The process of election affords a moral certainty, that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications. Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union, or of so considerable a portion of it as would be necessary to make him a successful candidate for the distinguished office of President of the United States. It will not be too strong to say, that there will be a constant probability of seeing the station filled by characters pre-eminent for ability and virtue. And this will be thought no inconsiderable recommendation of the Constitution, by those who are able to estimate the share which the executive in every government must necessarily have in its good or ill administration. Though we cannot acquiesce in the political heresy of the poet who says: "For forms of government let fools contest—That which is best administered is best,"—yet we may safely pronounce, that the true test of a good government is its aptitude and tendency to produce a good administration. ~ Alexander Hamilton,
447:What had become of the singular ascending ambition that had driven young Roosevelt from his earliest days? What explains his willingness, against the counsel of his most trusted friends, to accept seemingly low-level jobs that traced neither a clear-cut nor a reliably ascending career path? The answer lies in probing what Roosevelt gleaned from his crucible experience. His expectation of and belief in a smooth, upward trajectory, either in life or in politics, was gone forever. He questioned if leadership success could be obtained by attaching oneself to a series of titled positions. If a person focused too much on a future that could not be controlled, he would become, Roosevelt acknowledged, too “careful, calculating, cautious in word and act.” Thereafter, he would jettison long-term career calculations and focus simply on whatever job opportunity came his way, assuming it might be his last. “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are,” he liked to say. In a very real way, Roosevelt had come to see political life as a succession of crucibles—good or bad—able to crush or elevate. He would view each position as a test of character, effort, endurance, and will. He would keep nothing in reserve for some will-o-the-wisp future. Rather, he would regard each job as a pivotal test, a manifestation of his leadership skills. ~ Doris Kearns Goodwin,
448:Listening To Michael Jackson In Tehran After Azar
Nafisi
Smuggled across the fierce chasm
between us and the US, and then
hidden, stuffed between Farsi
and Science textbooks in my school
bag, the illegal and sacrilegious
cassette-tape of Thriller, ready for
revelation to the sheepish, ignorant
kids on the bus to my primary school
in war-stricken Tehran. My plan:
to expose the forbidden thing, exhibit
my courage, rebelliousness, etc. Autumn
of ’83, desperate for attention/approval
from the other kids. My copy of
dangerous Western “art” would
unsettle the boring, Islamic world
of my classmates – and elevate my
cowardly, chubby, unpopular
self. I whispered to the kid next to me
if he had ever heard of “Billie Jean”
and “Beat It”; if he knew anything at all
about the number one famous
star of our wicked enemy. “I love
Thriller! Aren’t the zombies so scary
in the music video! They’re so ugly!” His
boisterous words echoed. The bus
59
vibrated with the singer’s name. Another
shouted he had a Thriller poster, and
another, a “Billie Jean” T-shirt, a gift from
Turkey. Silenced, robbed of my planned
stardom, I sank in my seat; later threw out my
Thriller tape, the fetish of Great Satan’s
useless, ubiquitous popular culture.
~ Ali Alizadeh,
449:To A Young Lady, On Being Too Fond Of Music
Why is your mind thus all day long
Upon your music set;
Till reason's swallowed in a song,
Or idle canzonet?
I grant you, Melesinda, when
Your instrument was new,
I was well pleased to see you then
Its charms assiduous woo.
The rudiments of any art
Or mastery that we try,
Are only on the learner's part
Got by hard industry.
But you are past your first essays;
Whene'er you play, your touch,
Skilful and light, ensures you praise:
All beyond that's too much.
Music's sweet uses are, to smooth
Each rough and angry passion;
To elevate at once, and soothe:
A heavenly recreation.
But we misconstrue, and defeat
The end of any good;
When what should be our casual treat,
We make our constant food.
While, to the exclusion of the rest,
This single art you ply,
Your nobler studies are supprest,
197
Your books neglected lie.
Could you in what you so affect
The utmost summit reach;
Beyond what fondest friends expect,
Or skilfullest masters teach:
The skill you learned would not repay
The time and pains it cost,
Youth's precious season thrown away,
And reading-leisure lost.
A benefit to books we owe
Music can ne'er dispense;
The one does only sound bestow,
The other gives us sense.
~ Charles Lamb,
450:At present, a good many men engaged in scientific pursuits, and who have signally failed in gaining recognition among their fellows, are endeavoring to make reputations among the churches by delivering weak and vapid lectures upon the 'harmony of Genesis and Geology.' Like all hypocrites, these men overstate the case to such a degree, and so turn and pervert facts and words that they succeed only in gaining the applause of other hypocrites like themselves. Among the great scientists they are regarded as generals regard sutlers who trade with both armies.

Surely the time must come when the wealth of the world will not be wasted in the propagation of ignorant creeds and miraculous mistakes. The time must come when churches and cathedrals will be dedicated to the use of man; when minister and priest will deem the discoveries of the living of more importance than the errors of the dead; when the truths of Nature will outrank the 'sacred' falsehoods of the past, and when a single fact will outweigh all the miracles of Holy Writ.

Who can over estimate the progress of the world if all the money wasted in superstition could be used to enlighten, elevate and civilize mankind?

When every church becomes a school, every cathedral a university, every clergyman a teacher, and all their hearers brave and honest thinkers, then, and not until then, will the dream of poet, patriot, philanthropist and philosopher, become a real and blessed truth. ~ Robert G Ingersoll,
451:Faith in God is an opening up, a letting go, a deept trust, a free act of love- but sometimes it was so hard to love. Sometimes my heart was sinking so fast with anger, desolation and weariness, I was afraid it would sink to the very bottom of the Pacific and I would not be able to lift it back up.
At such moments I tried to elevate myself. I would touch the turban I had made with the remnants of my shirt and I would say aloud, "THIS IS GOD'S HAT!"
I would pat my pants and say aloud, "THIS IS GOD'S ATTIRE!"
I would point to Richard Parker and say aloud, "THIS IS GOD'S CAT!"
I would point to the lifeboat and say aloud, "THIS IS GOD'S ARK!"
I would spread my hands wide and say aloud, "THESE ARE GOD'S WIDE ACRES!"
I would point at the sky and say aloud, "THIS IS GOD'S EAR!"
And in this way I would remind myself of creation and of my place in it.
But God's hat was always unravelling. God's pants were falling apart. God's cat was a constant danger. God's ark was a jail. God's wide acres were slowly killing me. God's ear didn't seem to be listening.
Despair was a heavy blackness that let no light in or out. It was a hell beyond expression. I thank God it always passed. A school of fish appeared around the net or a knot cried out to be reknotted. Or I thought of my family, of how they were spared this terrible agony. The blackness would stir and eventually go away, and God would remain, a shining point of light in my heart. I would go on loving. ~ Yann Martel,
452:But now it seems clear that literary criticism was inherently doomed. Explicitly or otherwise it had based itself on a structure of echelons and hierarchies; it was about the talent elite. And the structure atomized as soon as the forces of democratization gave their next concerted push.

Those forces – incomparably the most potent in our culture – have gone on pushing. And they are now running up against a natural barrier. Some citadels, true, have proved stormable. You can become rich without having any talent (via the scratchcard and the rollover jackpot). You can become famous without having any talent (by abasing yourself on some TV nerdathon; a clear improvement on the older method of simply killing a celebrity and inheriting the aura). But you cannot become talented without having any talent. Therefore, talent must go.

Literary criticism, now almost entirely confined to the universities, thus moves against talent by moving against the canon. Academic preferment will not come from a respectful study of Wordsworth’s poetics; it will come from a challenging study of his politics – his attitude toward the poor, say, or his unconscious ‘valorization’ of Napoleon; and it will come still faster if you ignore Wordsworth and elevate some (justly) neglected contemporary, by which process the canon may be quietly and steadily sapped. A brief consultation of the Internet will show that meanwhile, everyone has become a literary critic – or at least, a book-reviewer. ~ Martin Amis,
453:Obviously, the leveling process applies to the sexes as well. The Soviet emancipation of the woman parallels the emancipation that in America the feminist idiocy, deriving from 'democracy' all its logical conclusions, had achieved a long time ago in conjunction with the materialistic and practical degradation of man. Through countless and repeated divorces the disintegration of the family in America is characterized by the same pace that we could expect in a society that knows only 'comrades.' The women, having given up their true nature, believe they can elevate themselves by taking on and practicing all kinds of traditionally masculine activities. These women are chaste in their immorality and banal even in their lowest perversions; quite often they find in alcohol the way to rid themselves of the repressed or deviated energies of their nature. Moreover, young women seem to know very little of the polarity and the elemental magnetism of sex as they indulge in a comradely and sportive promiscuity. These phenomena are typically American, even though their contagious diffusion all over the world makes it difficult for people to trace their origin to America. Actually, if there is a difference between this promiscuity and that envisioned by communism, it is resolved in a pejorative sense by a gynaecocratic factor, since every woman and young girl in America and other Anglo-Saxon countries considers it only natural that some kind of pre-eminence and existential respectability be bestowed upon her as if it were her inalienable right. ~ Julius Evola,
454:One way or another, I regard it as almost inevitable that either a nuclear confrontation or environmental catastrophe will cripple the Earth at some point in the next 1,000 years which, as geological time goes, is the mere blink of an eye. By then I hope and believe that our ingenious race will have found a way to slip the surly bonds of Earth and will therefore survive the disaster. The same of course may not be possible for the millions of other species that inhabit the Earth, and that will be on our conscience as a race.
I think we are acting with reckless indifference to our future on planet Earth. At the moment, we have nowhere else to go, but in the long run the human race shouldn’t have all its eggs in one basket, or on one planet. I just hope we can avoid dropping the basket before we learn how to escape from Earth. But we are, by nature, explorers. Motivated by curiosity. This is a uniquely human quality. It is this driven curiosity that sent explorers to prove the Earth is not flat and it is the same instinct that sends us to the stars at the speed of thought, urging us to go there in reality. And whenever we make a great new leap, such as the Moon landings, we elevate humanity, bring people and nations together, usher in new discoveries and new technologies. To leave Earth demands a concerted global approach—everyone should join in. We need to rekindle the excitement of the early days of space travel in the 1960s. The technology is almost within our grasp. It is time to explore other solar systems. Spreading out may be the only thing that saves us from ourselves. I am convinced that humans need to leave Earth. If we stay, we risk being annihilated. ~ Stephen Hawking,
455:I started with a wedge of triple-cream cheese because that seemed like a rich and elegant base that would need little embellishment. I cut a large slice of cheese and stripped off the skin, leaving only the voluptuous center, which I set into a clean bowl. I had noticed that wine went into the best dishes, so I added enough claret to thin the cheese to a mixable consistency. As I beat it together, I watched the pure white turn a murky shade of rose, and the sharp smell of wine overpowered the milky fragrance of cheese. Although such a dramatic change in color and aroma was unexpected, I decided it was not a fatal blow to the plan.
The chef had once said that the cornerstones of culinary art were butter and garlic, so I cheerfully whipped in a knob of softened butter and pressed a large clove of garlic. I whisked it all until it was smooth, tested it with a fingertip, and judged it to be not bad. But not bad wasn't good enough for a grand gesture. I stood before the brick oven and pondered what might elevate this concoction from an oddly flavored cheese to something that would make the chef raise his eyebrows with appreciation.
The brick oven reminded me of Enrico, who often bragged that his lightly sweetened breads and confections were everyone's favorite. He once said, "Meals are only an excuse to get to the dessert." I wasn't sure that was true, but I had noticed that people usually greeted the dessert course with smiles, even though they had already eaten their fill. Confections always found favor, and so I poured a golden stream of honey into my mélange.
After it was well blended, it was rather pretty- smooth and thick, luscious looking, like pudding or custard. ~ Elle Newmark,
456:I know it was personally right, it was divinely right, for those apostles to hear what Jesus said and to tarry for the Holy Spirit; however, it is not right now to tarry for the Holy Spirit. Then why do we not all receive the Holy Spirit, you ask? Because our bodies are not ready for it; our temples are not cleansed. When our temples are purified and our minds are put in order so that carnalities and fleshly desires and everything contrary to the Spirit have gone, then the Holy Spirit can take full charge. The Holy Spirit is not a manifestation of carnality. There are any number of people who never read the Word of God who could not be led away by the powers of Satan. But the power of the Holy Spirit is most lovely, divine in all its construction. It is a great refiner. It is full of life, but it is always divine—never natural. If you deal in the flesh after you are baptized in the Holy Spirit, you cease to go on. Beloved, I want to speak about something greater; something to lift your minds, elevate your thoughts, and bring you into divine ways; something that elevates you out of yourself and into God, out of the world and into a place where you know you have rest for your feet, where you cease from your own works (Heb. 4:10), and where God works in you mightily “to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13). When I think about a river—a pure, holy, divine river—I say, “What can stand against its inrush?” Wherever it is—in a railway coach, in the street, or in a meeting—its power and flow will always be felt; it will always do its work. Jesus spoke about the Holy Spirit that was to be given. I want you to think about how God gave it, how its coming was manifested, and its reception and its outflow after it had come. ~ Smith Wigglesworth,
457:This is the work of a lifetime, here on earth: To invent the astral body, to create it. giving it our consciousness. Thus one will survive death. One could also die when one chooses… And on dying, not lose the awareness 'from here.'

What has happened to you is a detachment of your astral body while your physical body sleeps. This occurs to vîras; it's an automatic unconscious process. Sometimes, by simple chance, a glimmer of consciousness reaches this fine body and then, on suddenly awakening or the next day, one gets the impression of experiencing something much more real than physical reality. The deja-vu of psychologists has its explanation in this phenomena of detachment.

Have you seen those children who elevate a kite and send messages with little rolls of paper that go slowly up to the kite? So it is, more or less, with that other. The astral body breaks away, still attached to the physical body by a string which has been called a 'silver cord' that is only cut at death. Thanks to this cord we can go immeasurable distances without losing the connection with our physical bodies. It always returns. So it reaches consciousness, like those messages of children with their kite. Yes, we must become like children to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven… with our astral bodies. Pay attention to this other analogy: As a child finds itself joined to its mother by the umbilical cord, so the astral body is joined to its father, the physical body, by a silver cord. The child cries and despairs at birth, when the cord connecting him to his mother is cut. He thinks this is death, but it is a new life. The same befalls the vîra when he dies; when the silver cord is cut he enters into another life. Death is a new life. All this is archetypal. Only those events expressing archetypes have ontological reality. ~ Miguel Serrano,
458:7. Character is built in the course of your inner confrontation. Character is a set of dispositions, desires, and habits that are slowly engraved during the struggle against your own weakness. You become more disciplined, considerate, and loving through a thousand small acts of self-control, sharing, service, friendship, and refined enjoyment. If you make disciplined, caring choices, you are slowly engraving certain tendencies into your mind. You are making it more likely that you will desire the right things and execute the right actions. If you make selfish, cruel, or disorganized choices, then you are slowly turning this core thing inside yourself into something that is degraded, inconstant, or fragmented. You can do harm to this core thing with nothing more than ignoble thoughts, even if you are not harming anyone else. You can elevate this core thing with an act of restraint nobody sees. If you don’t develop a coherent character in this way, life will fall to pieces sooner or later. You will become a slave to your passions. But if you do behave with habitual self-discipline, you will become constant and dependable. 8. The things that lead us astray are short term—lust, fear, vanity, gluttony. The things we call character endure over the long term—courage, honesty, humility. People with character are capable of a long obedience in the same direction, of staying attached to people and causes and callings consistently through thick and thin. People with character also have scope. They are not infinitely flexible, free-floating, and solitary. They are anchored by permanent attachments to important things. In the realm of the intellect, they have a set of permanent convictions about fundamental truths. In the realm of emotion, they are enmeshed in a web of unconditional loves. In the realm of action, they have a permanent commitment to tasks that cannot be completed in a single lifetime. ~ David Brooks,
459:All the days of my appointed time will I wait." Job 14:14 A little stay on earth will make heaven more heavenly. Nothing makes rest so sweet as toil; nothing renders security so pleasant as exposure to alarms. The bitter quassia cups of earth will give a relish to the new wine which sparkles in the golden bowls of glory. Our battered armour and scarred countenances will render more illustrious our victory above, when we are welcomed to the seats of those who have overcome the world. We should not have full fellowship with Christ if we did not for awhile sojourn below, for he was baptized with a baptism of suffering among men, and we must be baptized with the same if we would share his kingdom. Fellowship with Christ is so honourable that the sorest sorrow is a light price by which to procure it. Another reason for our lingering here is for the good of others. We would not wish to enter heaven till our work is done, and it may be that we are yet ordained to minister light to souls benighted in the wilderness of sin. Our prolonged stay here is doubtless for God's glory. A tried saint, like a well-cut diamond, glitters much in the King's crown. Nothing reflects so much honour on a workman as a protracted and severe trial of his work, and its triumphant endurance of the ordeal without giving way in any part. We are God's workmanship, in whom he will be glorified by our afflictions. It is for the honour of Jesus that we endure the trial of our faith with sacred joy. Let each man surrender his own longings to the glory of Jesus, and feel, "If my lying in the dust would elevate my Lord by so much as an inch, let me still lie among the pots of earth. If to live on earth forever would make my Lord more glorious, it should be my heaven to be shut out of heaven." Our time is fixed and settled by eternal decree. Let us not be anxious about it, but wait with patience till the gates of pearl shall open. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon,
460:William Stead recognized the power of the fair immediately. The vision of the White City and its profound contrast to the Black City drove him to write If Christ Came to Chicago, a book often credited with launching the City Beautiful movement, which sought to elevate American cities to the level of the great cities of Europe. Like Stead, civic authorities throughout the world saw the fair as a model of what to strive for. They asked Burnham to apply the same citywide thinking that had gone into the White City to their own cities. He became a pioneer in modern urban planning. He created citywide plans for Cleveland, San Francisco, and Manila and led the turn-of-the-century effort to resuscitate and expand L’Enfant’s vision of Washington, D.C. In each case he worked without a fee. While helping design the new Washington plan, Burnham persuaded the head of the Pennsylvania Railroad, Alexander Cassatt, to remove his freight tracks and depot from the center of the federal mall, thus creating the unobstructed green that extends today from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial. Other cities came to Daniel Burnham for citywide plans, among them Fort Worth, Atlantic City, and St. Louis, but he turned them down to concentrate on his last plan, for the city of Chicago. Over the years many aspects of his Chicago plan were adopted, among them the creation of the city’s lovely ribbon of lakefront parks and Michigan Avenue’s “Miracle Mile.” One portion of the lakefront, named Burnham Park in his honor, contains Soldier Field and the Field Museum, which he designed. The park runs south in a narrow green border along the lakeshore all the way to Jackson Park, where the fair’s Palace of Fine Arts, transformed into a permanent structure, now houses the Museum of Science and Industry. It looks out over the lagoons and the Wooded Island, now a wild and tangled place that perhaps would make Olmsted smile—though no doubt he would find features to criticize. ~ Erik Larson,
461:Gabe watched her move to the center of the green. In one gloved hand, she clutched a leash. The other end of the leash was attached to... something furry and brown that rolled.
"What is that?"
"That would be mongrel with two lamed hind legs. Apparently, Her Ladyship's friend devised a little chariot for his rear half, and the dog careens around the neighborhood like a yapping billiard ball. If you think that's strange, wait until you see the goat."
"Hold a moment. There's a goat?"
"Oh, yes. She grazes it on the square every afternoon. Doesn't precisely elevate the atmosphere of Bloom Square, now does it?"
"I see the problem."
"I'm only getting started. Her Ladyship has single-handedly set us back a month on the improvements." Hammond pulled a collection of letters from a folio. He held one aloft and read from it. "'Dear Mr. Hammond, I must request that you delay completion of the parquet flooring. The fumes from the lacquer are dizzying the hens. Sincerely yours, Lady Penelope Campion.'"
He withdrew another. "'Dear Mr. Hammond, I'm afraid your improvements to the mews must be temporarily halted. I've located a litter of newborn kittens in the hayloft. Their mother is looking after them, but as their eyes are not yet open, they should not be displaced for another week. Thank you for your cooperation. Gratefully yours, Lady Penelope Campion.'"
Gabe sensed a theme.
"Oh, and here's my favorite." Hammond shook open a letter and cleared his throat for dramatic effect. "'Dear Mr. Hammond, if it is not too great an imposition, might I ask that your workers refrain from performing heavy labor between nine o'clock in the morning and half-three in the afternoon? Hedgehogs are nocturnal animals, and sensitive to loud noises. My dear Freya is losing quills. I feel certain this will concern you as much as it does me. Neighborly yours, Lady Penelope Campion.'" He tossed the folio of letters onto the table, where they landed with a smack. "Her hedgehog. Really. ~ Tessa Dare,
462:Writing is a solitary act—but it's only the first act. What comes next is what really matters. However, personally, I have never been all that comfortable with the second act. I'm a solitary person by nature and not much of a joiner. Yet still I've come to see the nonfiction writer's solitary act as important to the greater cause—really the only cause—of decreasing cruelty and increasing sympathy. In that service, nonfiction writers can perform two fundamental tasks that are unavailable to the writers of fiction. Like Florence Reece, we can bear witness and we can call for change—for an end to injustices. It is precisely on this subject of bearing witness that I find John D'Agata's recent writing about the genre of nonfiction so malicious and inept. D'Agata argues that nonfiction must serve the greater good of art, and therefore reality can be altered in the name of art. But to elevate reality to the level of art is one of the fundamental tasks of the nonfiction writer, and to say it cannot be done honestly, as D'Agata claims, displays an astonishing lack of imagination as well as an equally unflattering amount of arrogance and pedantry. But let's put aside the either-or nature of this line of thinking. The real problem here is that such an attitude robs nonfiction of it greatest strength and virtue—its ability to bear witness and the veracity that comes from that act. To admit that one only has a passing interest in representing reality is to forfeit one's moral authority to call that reality into question. That is to say, I have no right to call mountaintop removal an injustice—one in need of a new reality—if I cannot be trusted to depict the travesty of strip mining as it now exists. To play D'Agata's game is to lose the reader's trust, and without that, it seems to me that the nonfiction writer has very little left. Writers of that persuasion can align themselves with Picasso's famous sentiment that art is the lie that tells the truth, but I have no truck with such pretentiousness. The work of the nonfiction writers I most admire is telling a truth that exposes a lie. ~ Sean Prentiss,
463:Under my window-ledge the waters race,
Otters below and moor-hens on the top,
Run for a mile undimmed in Heaven's face
Then darkening through 'dark' Raftery's 'cellar' drop,
Run underground, rise in a rocky place
In Coole demesne, and there to finish up
Spread to a lake and drop into a hole.
What's water but the generated soul?

Upon the border of that lake's a wood
Now all dry sticks under a wintry sun,
And in a copse of beeches there I stood,
For Nature's pulled her tragic buskin on
And all the rant's a mirror of my mood:
At sudden thunder of the mounting swan
I turned about and looked where branches break
The glittering reaches of the flooded lake.

Another emblem there! That stormy white
But seems a concentration of the sky;
And, like the soul, it sails into the sight
And in the morning's gone, no man knows why;
And is so lovely that it sets to right
What knowledge or its lack had set awry,
So atrogantly pure, a child might think
It can be murdered with a spot of ink.

Sound of a stick upon the floor, a sound
From somebody that toils from chair to chair;
Beloved books that famous hands have bound,
Old marble heads, old pictures everywhere;
Great rooms where travelled men and children found
Content or joy; a last inheritor
Where none has reigned that lacked a name and fame
Or out of folly into folly came.

A spot whereon the founders lived and died
Seemed once more dear than life; ancestral trees,
Or gardens rich in memory glorified
Marriages, alliances and families,
And every bride's ambition satisfied.
Where fashion or mere fantasy decrees
We shift about - all that great glory spent -
Like some poor Arab tribesman and his tent.

We were the last romantics - chose for theme
Traditional sanctity and loveliness;
Whatever's written in what poets name
The book of the people; whatever most can bless
The mind of man or elevate a rhyme;
But all is changed, that high horse riderless,
Though mounted in that saddle Homer rode
Where the swan drifts upon a darkening flood.

~ William Butler Yeats, Coole Park And Ballylee, 1931
,
464:It would be incorrect in every sense to say that so near the end of his life he had lost his faith, when in fact
God seemed more abundant to him in the Regina Cleri home than any place he had been before. God was in the folds of his bathrobe, the ache of his knees. God saturated the hallways in the form of a pale electrical light. But now that his heart had become so shiftless and unreliable, now that he should be sensing the afterlife like a sweet scent drifting in from the garden, he had started to wonder if there was in fact no afterlife at all. Look at all these true believers who wanted only to live, look at himself, cling onto this life like a squirrel scrambling up the icy pitch of a roof. In suggesting that there may be nothing ahead of them, he in no way meant to diminish the future; instead, Father Sullivan hoped to elevate the present to a state of the divine. It seemed from this moment of repose that God may well have been life itself. God may have been the baseball games, the beautiful cigarette he smoked alone after checking to see that all the bats had been put back behind the closet door. God could have been the masses in which he had told people how best to prepare for the glorious life everlasting, the one they couldn't see as opposed to the one they were living at that exact moment in the pews of the church hall, washed over in stained glass light. How wrongheaded it seemed now to think that the thrill of heartbeat and breath were just a stepping stone to something greater. What could be greater than the armchair, the window, the snow? Life itself had been holy. We had been brought forth from nothing to see the face of God and in his life Father Sullivan had seen it miraculously for eighty-eight years. Why wouldn't it stand to reason that this had been the whole of existence and now he would retreat back to the nothingness he had come from in order to let someone else have their turn at the view. This was not the workings of disbelief. It was instead a final, joyful realization of all he had been given. It would be possible to overlook just about anything if you were trained to constantly strain forward to see the power and the glory that was waiting up ahead. What a shame it would have been to miss God while waiting for him. ~ Ann Patchett,
465:What I know in my soul is that the prejudice, inequality, and broken systems that do exist are wrong and dangerous. As Americans, they anger and shame so many of us. Personally, I can’t just sit on a couch and watch the news, or run a company, while society erupts, or walk into some form of retirement and be still. On the sidelines is not where most of us want to be. We must see beyond what’s in front of us. We must reimagine the promise of America. How? By using empathy to try to understand, raising our voices to condemn darkness, and casting our votes to choose the kind of leadership we want our grandchildren to grow up with. But we must also use our hard skills and resources to craft a better reality for ourselves, our neighbors and those with whom we share this land. We can protest but also plan. Search for the truth and share it broadly. Listen to others, and blend ideas. Criticize, but also create. It’s time to commit to a deeper level of shared accountability—to neighbor as well as to stranger, and to self. Americans will always have differences, because that is the nature of the republic we have created. But we owe our children a less divisive America, just as many of our parents fought for a less divided country than the one they inherited. It is time for all of us to elevate the best of ourselves. It is time to climb, and to reclaim the high ground. To do so we must make a choice, one that we have made before. It is a choice between renewal or decline. Our country has a history of renewal at moments when we’ve faced decline, but we also know that renewing our nation’s honor is not a forgone conclusion. The future is not going to bend toward America because we’re American. We’re going to have to bend it ourselves, nudge it, move it. At every turn, let us choose to replace meanness with kindness; pettiness with significance; hate with love; gridlock with compromise; complaints with creative solutions. As a nation, we must be tough but not at the expense of one another. So let us also champion and celebrate those with strength of character—the upstanders among us—because there are so many whose daily intentions and actions echo the heroism of the past, who strive for honesty in the present, and who are already reimagining the promise of America, and will do so for years to come. Above all, let us choose to believe in each other because now and always—we are in this together. ~ Howard Schultz,
466:A Letter To My Aunt
A Letter To My Aunt Discussing The Correct Approach To Modern Poetry
To you, my aunt, who would explore
The literary Chankley Bore,
The paths are hard, for you are not
A literary Hottentot
But just a kind and cultured dame
Who knows not Eliot (to her shame).
Fie on you, aunt, that you should see
No genius in David G.,
No elemental form and sound
In T.S.E. and Ezra Pound.
Fie on you, aunt! I'll show you how
To elevate your middle brow,
And how to scale and see the sights
From modernist Parnassian heights.
First buy a hat, no Paris model
But one the Swiss wear when they yodel,
A bowler thing with one or two
Feathers to conceal the view;
And then in sandals walk the street
(All modern painters use their feet
For painting, on their canvas strips,
Their wives or mothers, minus hips).
Perhaps it would be best if you
Created something very new,
A dirty novel done in Erse
Or written backwards in Welsh verse,
Or paintings on the backs of vests,
Or Sanskrit psalms on lepers' chests.
But if this proved imposs-i-ble
Perhaps it would be just as well,
For you could then write what you please,
And modern verse is done with ease.
Do not forget that 'limpet' rhymes
17
With 'strumpet' in these troubled times,
And commas are the worst of crimes;
Few understand the works of Cummings,
And few James Joyce's mental slummings,
And few young Auden's coded chatter;
But then it is the few that matter.
Never be lucid, never state,
If you would be regarded great,
The simplest thought or sentiment,
(For thought, we know, is decadent);
Never omit such vital words
As belly, genitals and -----,
For these are things that play a part
(And what a part) in all good art.
Remember this: each rose is wormy,
And every lovely woman's germy;
Remember this: that love depends
On how the Gallic letter bends;
Remember, too, that life is hell
And even heaven has a smell
Of putrefying angels who
Make deadly whoopee in the blue.
These things remembered, what can stop
A poet going to the top?
A final word: before you start
The convulsions of your art,
Remove your brains, take out your heart;
Minus these curses, you can be
A genius like David G.
Take courage, aunt, and send your stuff
To Geoffrey Grigson with my luff,
And may I yet live to admire
How well your poems light the fire.
~ Dylan Thomas,
467:All depression has its roots in self-pity, and all self-pity is rooted in people taking themselves too seriously.”

At the time Switters had disputed her assertion. Even at seventeen, he was aware that depression could have chemical causes.

“The key word here is roots,” Maestra had countered. “The roots of depression. For most people, self-awareness and self-pity blossom simultaneously in early adolescence. It's about that time that we start viewing the world as something other than a whoop-de-doo playground, we start to experience personally how threatening it can be, how cruel and unjust. At the very moment when we become, for the first time, both introspective and socially conscientious, we receive the bad news that the world, by and large, doesn't give a rat's ass. Even an old tomato like me can recall how painful, scary, and disillusioning that realization was. So, there's a tendency, then, to slip into rage and self-pity, which if indulged, can fester into bouts of depression.”

“Yeah but Maestra—”

“Don't interrupt. Now, unless someone stronger and wiser—a friend, a parent, a novelist, filmmaker, teacher, or musician—can josh us out of it, can elevate us and show us how petty and pompous and monumentally useless it is to take ourselves so seriously, then depression can become a habit, which, in tern, can produce a neurological imprint. Are you with me? Gradually, our brain chemistry becomes conditioned to react to negative stimuli in a particular, predictable way. One thing'll go wrong and it'll automatically switch on its blender and mix us that black cocktail, the ol’ doomsday daiquiri, and before we know it, we’re soused to the gills from the inside out. Once depression has become electrochemically integrated, it can be extremely difficult to philosophically or psychologically override it; by then it's playing by physical rules, a whole different ball game. That's why, Switters my dearest, every time you've shown signs of feeling sorry for yourself, I've played my blues records really loud or read to you from The Horse’s Mouth. And that’s why when you’ve exhibited the slightest tendency toward self-importance, I’ve reminded you that you and me— you and I: excuse me—may be every bit as important as the President or the pope or the biggest prime-time icon in Hollywood, but none of us is much more than a pimple on the ass-end of creation, so let’s not get carried away with ourselves. Preventive medicine, boy. It’s preventive medicine.”

“But what about self-esteem?”

“Heh! Self-esteem is for sissies. Accept that you’re a pimple and try to keep a lively sense of humor about it. That way lies grace—and maybe even glory. ~ Tom Robbins,
468:We love men because they can never fake orgasms, even if they wanted to.

Because they write poems, songs, and books in our honor.

Because they never understand us, but they never give up.

Because they can see beauty in women when women have long ceased to see any beauty in themselves.

Because they come from little boys.

Because they can churn out long, intricate, Machiavellian, or incredibly complex mathematics and physics equations, but they can be comparably clueless when it comes to women.

Because they are incredible lovers and never rest until we’re happy.

Because they elevate sports to religion.

Because they’re never afraid of the dark.

Because they don’t care how they look or if they age.

Because they persevere in making and repairing things beyond their abilities, with the naïve self-assurance of the teenage boy who knew everything.

Because they never wear or dream of wearing high heels.

Because they’re always ready for sex.

Because they’re like pomegranates: lots of inedible parts, but the juicy seeds are incredibly tasty and succulent and usually exceed your expectations.

Because they’re afraid to go bald.

Because you always know what they think and they always mean what they say.

Because they love machines, tools, and implements with the same ferocity women love jewelry.

Because they go to great lengths to hide, unsuccessfully, that they are frail and human.

Because they either speak too much or not at all to that end.

Because they always finish the food on their plate.

Because they are brave in front of insects and mice.

Because a well-spoken four-year old girl can reduce them to silence, and a beautiful 25-year old can reduce them to slobbering idiots.

Because they want to be either omnivorous or ascetic, warriors or lovers, artists or generals, but nothing in-between.

Because for them there’s no such thing as too much adrenaline.

Because when all is said and done, they can’t live without us, no matter how hard they try.

Because they’re truly as simple as they claim to be.

Because they love extremes and when they go to extremes, we’re there to catch them.

Because they are tender they when they cry, and how seldom they do it.

Because what they lack in talk, they tend to make up for in action.

Because they make excellent companions when driving through rough neighborhoods or walking past dark alleys.

Because they really love their moms, and they remind us of our dads.

Because they never care what their horoscope, their mother-in-law, nor the neighbors say.

Because they don’t lie about their age, their weight, or their clothing size.

Because they have an uncanny ability to look deeply into our eyes and connect with our heart, even when we don’t want them to.

Because when we say “I love you” they ask for an explanation. ~ Paulo Coelho,
469:Utilitarianism does not teach that people should strive only after sensuous pleasure (though it recognizes that most or at least many people behave in this way). Neither does it indulge in judgments of value. By its recognition that social cooperation is for the immense majority a means for attaining ali their ends, it dispels the notion that society, the state, the nation, or any other social entity is an ultimate end and that individual men are the slaves of that entity. It rejects the philosophies of universalism, collectivism, and totalitarianism. In this sense it is meaningful to call utilitarianism a philosophy of individualism.
The collectivist doctrine fails to recognize that social cooperation is for man a means for the attainment of ali his ends. It assumes that irreconcilable conflict prevails between the interests of the collective and those of individuais, and in this conflict it sides unconditionally with the collective entity. The collective alone has real existence; the individuais' existence is conditioned by that of the collective. The collective is perfect and can do no wrong. Individuais are wretched and refractory; their obstinacy must be curbed by the authority to which God or nature has entrusted the conduct of society's affairs. The powers that be, says the Apostle Paul, are ordained of God. They are ordained by nature or by the superhuman factor that directs the course of ali cosmic events, says the atheist collectivist.
Two questions immediately arise. First: If it were true that the interests of the collective and those of individuais are implacably opposed to one another, how could society function? One may assume that the individuais would be prevented by force of arms from resorting to open rebellion. But it cannot be assumed that their active cooperation could be secured by mere compulsion. A system of production in which the only incentive to work is the fear of punishment cannot last. It was this fact that made slavery disappear as a system of managing production.
Second: If the collective is not a means by which individuais may achieve their ends, if the collective's flowering requires sacrifices by the individuais which are not outweighed by advantages derived from social cooperation, what prompts the advocate of collectivism to assign to the concerns of the collective precedence over the personal wishes of the individuais? Can any argument be advanced for such exaltation of the collective but personal judgments of value?
Of course, everybodys judgments of value are personal. If a man assigns a higher value to the concerns of a collective than to his other concerns, and acts accordingly, that is his affair. So long as the collectivist philosophers proceed in this way, no objection can be raised. But they argue differently. They elevate their personal judgments of value to the dignity of an absolute standard of value. They urge other people to stop valuing according to their own will and to adopt unconditionally the precepts to which collectivism has assigned absolute eternal validity. ~ Ludwig von Mises,
470:Happy the writer who, passing by characters that are boring, disgusting, shocking in their mournful reality, approaches characters that manifest the lofty dignity of man, who from the great pool of daily whirling images has chosen only the rare exceptions, who has never once betrayed the exalted turning of his lyre, nor descended from his height to his poor, insignificant brethren, and, without touching the ground, has given the whole of himself to his elevated images so far removed from it. Twice enviable is his beautiful lot: he is among them as in his own family; and meanwhile his fame spreads loud and far. With entrancing smoke he has clouded people's eyes; he has flattered them wondrously, concealing what is mournful in life, showing them a beautiful man. Everything rushes after him, applauding, and flies off following his triumphal chariot. Great world poet they name him, soaring high above all other geniuses in the world, as the eagle soars above the other high fliers. At the mere mention of his name, young ardent hearts are filled with trembling, responsive tears shine in all eyes...No one equals him in power--he is God! But such is not the lot, and other is the destiny of the writer who has dared to call forth all that is before our eyes every moment and which our indifferent eyes do not see--all the stupendous mire of trivia in which our life in entangled, the whole depth of cold, fragmented, everyday characters that swarm over our often bitter and boring earthly path, and with the firm strength of his implacable chisel dares to present them roundly and vividly before the eyes of all people! It is not for him to win people's applause, not for him to behold the grateful tears and unanimous rapture of the souls he has stirred; no sixteen-year-old girl will come flying to meet him with her head in a whirl and heroic enthusiasm; it is not for him to forget himself in the sweet enchantment of sounds he himself has evoked; it is not for him, finally, to escape contemporary judgment, hypocritically callous contemporary judgment, which will call insignificant and mean the creations he has fostered, will allot him a contemptible corner in the ranks of writers who insult mankind, will ascribe to him the quality of the heroes he has portrayed, will deny him heart, and soul, and the divine flame of talent. For contemporary judgment does not recognize that equally wondrous are the glasses that observe the sun and those that look at the movement of inconspicuous insect; for contemporary judgment does not recognize that much depth of soul is needed to light up the picture drawn from contemptible life and elevate it into a pearl of creation; for contemporary judgment does not recognize that lofty ecstatic laughter is worthy to stand beside the lofty lyrical impulse, and that a whole abyss separates it from the antics of the street-fair clown! This contemporary judgment does not recognize; and will turn it all into a reproach and abuse of the unrecognized writer; with no sharing, no response, no sympathy, like a familyless wayfarer, he will be left alone in the middle of the road. Grim is his path, and bitterly he will feel his solitude. ~ Nikolai Gogol,
471:Poet’s Corner
I stand within the Abbey walls,
Where soft the slanting sunlight falls
In gleams of mellow grace:
The organ swells, the anthem soars,
And waves of prayerful music pours
Throughout the solemn space.
Slowly the chanted yearning dies:
Then spoken supplications rise,
Upfloating to the sky;
The organ peals anew, again
Is silent, and there linger then
Only my soul and I.
But what are these mute busts that gaze
On me from out the vanished days,
And bid me pause and scan
Tablet, inscription, title, date,
All that records the vain estate
Of transitory man?
Read I aright? And can it be,
Old Abbey, that dead bards in thee
A resting-place have found?
Is not this consecrated air?
This is the house, the home, of prayer,
This, this is sacred ground.
And who were they? Their fretful life
With heavenly precept was at strife;
No pious peace they knew:
Like thunderstorms, against the wind
They pressed, and from their lurid mind
Alarming lightnings flew.
Creeds were to them but chains to break;
No formulas their thirst could slake,
No faith their hunger feed;
Their prayers were breathed to unscaled crags,
374
They worshipped where the eagle flags,
And the snow-streams flash and speed.
Their temple was the earth, the air,
The stars that in night's silence share;
Unto the plunging brine
Listening, they heard a sacred hymn,
And deep within the woodlands dim
Found transept, aisle, and shrine.
All shapes of sensuous beauty stole
A pathway to the poet's soul;
An unresisting slave
To smiles that win, to tears that melt,
Whatever hearts can feel, he felt,
Whatever ask for, gave.
His heart to love as quick he lent,
As flower to wandering wind its scent,
Or lark to sun its song;
He spent himself in gusts of joy,
Chased the fair phantoms that decoy
And youth's brief reign prolong.
Yet it was wise as well as just
Not upon his rebellious dust
The Abbey gates to close,
But bid him hither wend, and find,
What life refused his eager mind,
Glory and yet repose.
For should there come that threatened day,
When creeds shall fade, when faith decay,
And worship shall have ceased,
Then, when all formal guides shall fail,
Mankind will in the Poet hail
A prophet and a priest.
He will instruct us still to strain
Towards something to redress our pain,
To elevate our joy;
Something responding to that sense
375
Of restlessness that calls us hence,
And makes existence cloy.
What though commandment, dogma, rite,
One after one, shall perish quite,
The Poet still will keep
The Sanctuary's lamp alight,
And, in the body's deepest night,
Forbid the soul to sleep.
Then, apprehended right, his lays
Shall seem a hymn of prayer and praise
To purify from stain;
Shall bridge with love the severed years,
Instil the sacredness of tears,
The piety of pain.
Devotion at his touch shall wake,
The fountains of emotion quake
With tenderness divine;
His melody our cravings lift
Upward, and have the saving gift
Of sacramental wine.
Let him then rest where now he lies,
So that if narrower ritual dies,
Devout feet still may come,
Confessing, what his strains impart,
The deep religion of the heart,
That never will be dumb.
~ Alfred Austin,
472:I MEDITATE upon a swallow's flight,
Upon a aged woman and her house,
A sycamore and lime-tree lost in night
Although that western cloud is luminous,
Great works constructed there in nature's spite
For scholars and for poets after us,
Thoughts long knitted into a single thought,
A dance-like glory that those walls begot.
There Hyde before he had beaten into prose
That noble blade the Muses buckled on,
There one that ruffled in a manly pose
For all his timid heart, there that slow man,
That meditative man, John Synge, and those
Impetuous men, Shawe-Taylor and Hugh Lane,
Found pride established in humility,
A scene well Set and excellent company.
They came like swallows and like swallows went,
And yet a woman's powerful character
Could keep a Swallow to its first intent;
And half a dozen in formation there,
That seemed to whirl upon a compass-point,
Found certainty upon the dreaming air,
The intellectual sweetness of those lines
That cut through time or cross it withershins.
Here, traveller, scholar, poet, take your stand
When all those rooms and passages are gone,
When nettles wave upon a shapeless mound
And saplings root among the broken stone,
And dedicate eyes bent upon the ground,
Back turned upon the brightness of the sun
And all the sensuality of the shade
A moment's memory to that laurelled head.
UNDER my window-ledge the waters race,
Otters below and moor-hens on the top,
Run for a mile undimmed in Heaven's face
Then darkening through "dark' Raftery's "cellar' drop,
Run underground, rise in a rocky place
In Coole demesne, and there to finish up
Spread to a lake and drop into a hole.
What's water but the generated soul?
Upon the border of that lake's a wood
Now all dry sticks under a wintry sun,
And in a copse of beeches there I stood,
For Nature's pulled her tragic buskin on
And all the rant's a mirror of my mood:
At sudden thunder of the mounting swan
I turned about and looked where branches break
The glittering reaches of the flooded lake.
Another emblem there! That stormy white
But seems a concentration of the sky;
And, like the soul, it sails into the sight
And in the morning's gone, no man knows why;
And is so lovely that it sets to right
What knowledge or its lack had set awry,
So arrogantly pure, a child might think
It can be murdered with a spot of ink.
Sound of a stick upon the floor, a sound
From somebody that toils from chair to chair;
Beloved books that famous hands have bound,
Old marble heads, old pictures everywhere;
Great rooms where travelled men and children found
Content or joy; a last inheritor
Where none has reigned that lacked a name and fame
Or out of folly into folly came.
A spot whereon the founders lived and died
Seemed once more dear than life; ancestral trees,
Or gardens rich in memory glorified
Marriages, alliances and families,
And every bride's ambition satisfied.
Where fashion or mere fantasy decrees
We shift about all that great glory spent
Like some poor Arab tribesman and his tent.
We were the last romantics chose for theme
Traditional sanctity and loveliness;
Whatever's written in what poets name
The book of the people; whatever most can bless
The mind of man or elevate a rhyme;
But all is changed, that high horse riderless,
Though mounted in that saddle Homer rode
Where the swan drifts upon a darkening flood.

~ William Butler Yeats, Coole Park 1929
,
473: ON

THOSE WHO

ARE

SUBLIME

Still is the bottom of my sea: who would guess that
it harbors sportive monsters? Imperturbable is my
depth, but it sparkles with swimming riddles and laughters.
One who was sublime I saw today, one who was solemn, an ascetic of the spirit; oh, how my soul laughed
at his ugliness! With a swelled chest and like one who
holds in his breath, he stood there, the sublime one,
silent, decked out with ugly truths, the spoil of his
117
hunting, and rich in torn garments; many thorns too
adorned him-yet I saw no rose.
As yet he has not learned laughter or beauty. Gloomy
this hunter returned from the woods of knowledge. He
came home from a fight with savage beasts; but out of
his seriousness there also peers a savage beast-one not
overcome. He still stands there like a tiger who wants
to leap; but I do not like these tense souls, and my
taste does not favor all these who withdraw.
And you tell me, friends, that there is no disputing
of taste and tasting? But all of life is a dispute over
taste and tasting. Taste-that is at the same time
weight and scales and weigher; and woe unto all the
living that would live without disputes over weight and
scales and weighersi
If he grew tired of his sublimity, this sublime one,
only then would his beauty commence; and only then
will I taste him and find him tasteful. And only when
he turns away from himself, will he jump over his
shadow-and verily, into his sun. All-too-long has he
been sitting in the shadow, and the cheeks of this ascetic of the spirit have grown pale; he almost starved to
death on his expectations. Contempt is still in his eyes,
and nausea hides around his mouth. Though he is resting now, his rest has not yet lain in the sun. He should
act like a bull, and his happiness should smell of the
earth, and not of contempt for the earth. I would like to
see him as a white bull, walking before the plowshare,
snorting and bellowing; and his bellowing should be
in praise of everything earthly.
His face is still dark; the shadow of the hand plays
upon him. His sense of sight is still in shadows. His
deed itself still lies on him as a shadow: the hand still
darkens the doer. As yet he has not overcome his deed.
118
Though I love the bull's neck on him, I also want to
see the eyes of the angel. He must still discard his heroic will; he shall be elevated, not merely sublime: the
ether itself should elevate him, the will-less one.
He subdued monsters, he solved riddles: but he must
still redeem his own monsters and riddles, changing
them into heavenly children. As yet his knowledge has
not learned to smile and to be without jealousy; as yet
his torrential passion has not become still in beauty.
Verily, it is not in satiety that his desire shall grow
silent and be submerged, but in beauty. Gracefulness
is part of the graciousness of the great-souled.
His arm placed over his head: thus should the hero
rest; thus should he overcome even his rest. But just
for the hero the beautiful is the most difficult thing. No
violent will can attain the beautiful by exertion. A little
more, a little less: precisely this counts for much here,
this matters most here.
To stand with relaxed muscles and unharnessed will:
that is most difficult for all of you who are sublime.
When power becomes gracious and descends into
the visible-such descent I call beauty.
And there is nobody from whom I want beauty as
much as from you who are powerful: let your kindness
be your final self-conquest.
Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the
good from you.
Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who
thought themselves good because they had no claws.
You shall strive after the virtue of the column: it
grows more and more beautiful and gentle, but internally harder and more enduring, as it ascends.
Indeed, you that are sublime shall yet become beautiful one day and hold up a mirror to your own beauty.
119

Then your soul will shudder with godlike desires, and
there will be adoration even in your vanity.
For this is the soul's secret: only when the hero has
abandoned her, she is approached in a dream by the
overhero.
Thus spoke Zarathustra.
~ Friedrich Nietzsche, ON THOSE WHO ARE SUBLIME
,
474:Mr. Fink's Debating Donkey
Of a person known as Peters I will humbly crave your leave
An unusual adventure into narrative to weave
Mr. William Perry Peters, of the town of Muscatel,
A public educator and an orator as well.
Mr. Peters had a weakness which, 'tis painful to relate,
Was a strong predisposition to the pleasures of debate.
He would foster disputation wheresoever he might be;
In polygonal contention none so happy was as he.
'Twas observable, however, that the exercises ran
Into monologue by Peters, that rhetorical young man.
And the Muscatelian rustics who assisted at the show,
By involuntary silence testified their overthrowMr. Peters, all unheedful of their silence and their grief,
Still effacing every vestige of erroneous belief.
O, he was a sore affliction to all heretics so bold
As to entertain opinions that he didn't care to hold.
One day-'t was in pursuance of a pedagogic plan
For the mental elevation of Uncultivated Man
Mr. Peters, to his pupils, in dismissing them, explained
That the Friday evening following (unless, indeed, it rained)
Would be signalized by holding in the schoolhouse a debate
Free to all who their opinions might desire to ventilate
On the question, 'Which is better, as a serviceable gift,
Speech or hearing, from barbarity the human mind to lift?'
The pupils told their fathers, who, forehanded always, met
At the barroom to discuss it every evening, dry or wet,
They argued it and argued it and spat upon the stove,
And the non-committal 'barkeep' on their differences throve.
And I state it as a maxim in a loosish kind of way:
You'll have the more to back your word the less you have to say.
Public interest was lively, but one Ebenezer Fink
Of the Rancho del Jackrabbit, only seemed to sit and think.
On the memorable evening all the men of Muscatel
Came to listen to the logic and the eloquence as well
All but William Perry Peters, whose attendance there, I fear.
Was to wreak his ready rhetoric upon the public ear,
And prove (whichever side he took) that hearing wouldn't lift
354
The human mind as ably as the other, greater gift.
The judges being chosen and the disputants enrolled,
The question he proceeded _in extenso_ to unfold:
'_Resolved_-The sense of hearing lifts the mind up out of reach
Of the fogs of error better than the faculty of speech.'
This simple proposition he expounded, word by word,
Until they best understood it who least perfectly had heard.
Even the judges comprehended as he ventured to explain
The impact of a spit-ball admonishing in vain.
Beginning at a period before Creation's morn,
He had reached the bounds of tolerance and Adam yet unborn.
As down the early centuries of pre-historic time
He tracked important principles and quoted striking rhyme,
And Whisky Bill, prosaic soul! proclaiming him a jay,
Had risen and like an earthquake, 'reeled unheededly away,'
And a late lamented cat, when opportunity should serve,
Was preparing to embark upon her parabolic curve,
A noise arose outside-the door was opened with a bang
And old Ebenezer Fink was heard ejaculating 'G'lang!'
Straight into that assembly gravely marched without a wink
An ancient ass-the property it was of Mr. Fink.
Its ears depressed and beating time to its infestive tread,
Silent through silence moved amain that stately quadruped!
It stopped before the orator, and in the lamplight thrown
Upon its tail they saw that member weighted with a stone.
Then spake old Ebenezer: 'Gents, I heern o' this debate
On w'ether v'ice or y'ears is best the mind to elevate.
Now 'yer's a bird ken throw some light uponto that tough theme:
He has 'em both, I'm free to say, oncommonly extreme.
He wa'n't invited for to speak, but he will not refuse
(If t'other gentleman ken wait) to exposay his views.'
Ere merriment or anger o'er amazement could prevail;
He cut the string that held the stone on that canary's tail.
Freed from the weight, that member made a gesture of delight,
Then rose until its rigid length was horizontal quite.
With lifted head and level ears along his withers laid,
Jack sighed, refilled his lungs and then-to put it mildly-brayed!
He brayed until the stones were stirred in circumjacent hills,
And sleeping women rose and fled, in divers kinds of frills.
'T is said that awful bugle-blast-to make the story briefWafted William Perry Peters through the window, like a leaf!
355
Such is the tale. If anything additional occurred
'Tis not set down, though, truly, I remember to have heard
That a gentleman named Peters, now residing at Soquel,
A considerable distance from the town of Muscatel,
Is opposed to education, and to rhetoric, as well.
~ Ambrose Bierce,
475:O who wants a share of the pleasure of closeness
If you want all goodness to appear in you
The councillor is honest, so heed this news:
There is no pleasure in life except accompanying the [fuqara]
for they are the sultans and the masters and the princes [umara]
They are people who are satisfied with little, of clothing
and food, and care not for the world.
Their hearts are free of whispering temptations
So accompany them and show proper manners in their councils
and leave your fortunes behind, no matter how much they offer to bring you upfront
Take their Path if you want to follow them
And leave your claims, and be careful not to question them
abut their purpose, and let their benefit be your intention
And seize the time and always attend with them
and know that pleasure and content distinguish who attended
Be content with them, they elevate you, and you reach.
If they register you, hang on; and if they erase you, vanish;
and if they don't feed you, starve; and if they feed you, then eat.
And abide by silence, except if you are asked, then say
I have no knowledge, and conceal yourself in ignorance
And don't be critical of people's flaws
even if it is apparent to existence
and look with an eye that sees only goodness and that does not see defects in anyone
And see defects only in you; and have faith
that your have a flaw that would have been apparent, but was concealed
With this you attain what you hope for of proper manners [adab]
Humble your self [nafs] to them in doubtless humility
a humility that takes the place of proper manners [adab]
And lay down your head and ask for forgiveness for no reason
and stand up on the feet of fairness apologizing
If you want a light for the Path from them then elevate
above everything they hate of your actions
and make your self [nafs] persist in doing good
If you commit a fault, apologize, and hold up
your apology for what you committed and what happened from you
Flatter them, and say: heal with your piety
with the cream of your pardon, the injury of your wound
It is me who is wrong, so grant me your pure advise
And say: your slave is more deserving of your pardon
so pardon and be lenient and clement, O [fuqara]
If you transgress, don't fear their enthusiasm
they are more sublime than you be harmed by their company
they are not the mighty whose power harm you
They are more deserving of kindness, which is their character
so do not feel or expect from them any evil or harm
If you want want them to guide you along the Path of piety
strive to fulfill what they request of you
immediately and don't delay it saying tomorrow
Always be generous in giving to the companions
actually and figuratively; and overlook if they slip
Always be truthful with them, and don't be dishonest
because they are truthful people, masters and chiefs
and pardon anyone of them who ever offended you
Observe the Sheikh carefully in his states, and hopefully
a trace of his achievement might appear in you.
Ask him to pray for you, you profit from his prayer
and through it you attain what you hope for of his blessing
and improve your assumption of him, and realize his sanctity
Wholeheartedly do the effort, and strive to serve him,
perhaps you please him, and take care not to become bored
And memorize his advise, and increase your attending to him
and answer him immediately if he calls you
and lower your voice in confounding out of obedience
For his pleasure begets The Lord's pleasure and begets obedience
He will be pleased with you, so be cautious not to leave him
And accompany whose self [nafs] is a gentle self [nafs]
in this time, for the selves [nafs] are generally despairing
of them, and their craft is underestimated by the people
And know that the people's Path needs study
and the state who claims it today is as you see.
If they distance me, because of their affection,
I should grieve for what I suffer due to parting with them
due to my breaking from them after accompanying them
When will I see them, and how will I reach seeing them
or reach my ear hearing news about them?
My lagging behind prevents me from being suitable for them
My origins are from them, so blame me, I do not blame them
O Lord, please grant me piety to be suitable to befriend them
I have no one, and how is it possible for the like of me to compete with them
over resources in which I did not know impurity?
Their traits are venerated beyond being countable
their appearances have pointed to their hidden inners
their glory is through obeying The Lord in this world
I love them and shelter them and prefer them
in my heart; specially a group of them.
They have become superior above other people by obediences
their companion adopts proper manners [adab] from them
and how unlucky is he who misses their company
A people with noble characteristics - wherever they sit,
the place continues to be fragrant with their traces
So devote to them and do not part with them and increase in attachment
and if you miss them, then weep out of sorrow
They are a clan who honor whoever relates to them
Sufism presents gifts from their manners and traits.
Their perfect harmony from them delights the eye
I 'wagged the tail' of pride of love because of them
when they accepted me as a slave of their love
and their right to their love I never forget
They are the people I love and my loved ones who
proudly boast dragging the tails of honor
I cut my heart to pieces composing poetry in their love
and I have begged The Lord by them, desiring
that The Lord forgives me together with all the Muslims
I am still united with and connected to them in Allah,
and our sins there by Him forgiven and pardoned
O whoever was in this council with us
please ask The Lord to wipe our sins,
and pray for the one who 'fived' the beautiful original
And then prayers upon the selected one, Sayyidina
Mohammed, the best of whoever fulfilled and whoever pledged

~ Ibn Arabi, Modification Of The R Poem
,
476:The Truant Dove, From Pilpay
A MOUNTAIN stream, its channel deep
Beneath a rock's rough base had torn;
The cliff, like a vast castle wall, was steep
By fretting rains in many a crevice worn;
But the fern wav'd there, and the mosses crept,
And o'er the summit, where the wind
Peel'd from their stems the silver rind,
Depending birches wept­­
There, tufts of broom a footing used to find,
And heath and straggling grass to grow,
And half-way down from roots enwreathing, broke
The branches of a scathed oak,
And seem'd to guard the cave below,
Where each revolving year,
Their twins, two faithful doves were wont to rear;
Choice never join'd a fonder pair;
To each their simple home was dear,
No discord ever enter'd there;
But there the soft affections dwell'd,
And three returning springs beheld
Secure within their fortress high
The little happy family.
'Toujours perdrix, messieurs, ne valent rien'­
So did a Gallic monarch once harangue,
And evil was the day whereon our bird
This saying heard,
From certain new acquaintance he had found,
Who at their perfect ease,
Amid a field of peas
Boasted to him, that all the country round,
The wheat, and oats, and barley, rye and tares,
Quite to the neighbouring sea, were theirs;
And theirs the oak, and beech-woods, far and near,
For their right noble owner was a peer,
And they themselves, luxuriantly were stored
In a great dove-cote­to amuse my lord !
'Toujours perdrix ne valent rien.' That's strange !
198
When people once are happy, wherefore change ?
So thought our stock-dove, but communication,
With birds in his new friend's exalted station,
Whose means of information,
And knowledge of all sorts, must be so ample;
Who saw great folks, and follow'd their example,
Made on the dweller of the cave, impression;
And soon, whatever was his best possession,
His sanctuary within the rock's deep breast,
His soft-eyed partner, and her nest,
He thought of with indifference, then with loathing;
So much insipid love was good for nothing.­
But sometimes tenderness return'd; his dame
So long belov'd, so mild, so free from blame,
How should he tell her, he had learn'd to cavil
At happiness itself, and longed to travel ?
His heart still smote him, so much wrong to do her,
He knew not how to break the matter to her.
But love, tho' blind himself, makes some discerning;
His frequent absence, and his late returning,
With ruffled plumage, and with alter'd eyes,
His careless short replies,
And to their couplets, coldness or neglect
Had made his gentle wife suspect,
All was not right; but she forbore to teaze him,
Which would but give him an excuse to rove:
She therefore tried by every art to please him,
Endur'd his peevish starts with patient love,
And when (like other husbands from a tavern)
Of his new notions full, he sought his cavern
She with dissembled cheerfulness, 'beguiled
'The thing she was,' and gaily coo-ed and smiled.
'Tis not in this most motley sphere uncommon,
For man, (and so of course more feeble woman)
Most strongly to suspect, what they're pursuing
Will lead them to inevitable ruin,
Yet rush with open eyes to their undoing;
Thus felt the dove; but in the cant of fashion
He talk'd of fate, and of predestination,
199
And in a grave oration,
He to his much affrighted mate related,
How he, yet slumbering in the egg, was fated,
To gather knowledge, to instruct his kind,
By observation elevate his mind,
And give new impulse to Columbian life;
'If it be so,' exclaim'd his hapless wife,
'It is my fate, to pass my days in pain,
'To mourn your love estrang'd, and mourn in vain;
'Here in our once dear hut, to wake and weep,
'When thy unkindness shall have ‘murder'd sleep;’
'And never that dear hut shall I prepare,
'And wait with fondness your arrival there,
'While me, and mine forgetting, you will go
'To some new love.' 'Why, no, I tell you no,­
'What shall I say such foolish fears to cure ?
'I only mean to make a little tour,
'Just­just to see the world around me; then
'With new delight, I shall come home again;
'Such tours are quite the rage­at my return
'I shall have much to tell, and you to learn;
'Of fashions­some becoming, some grotesque
'Of change of empires, and ideas novel;
'Of buildings, Grecian, Gothic, Arabesque,
'And scenery sublime and picturesque;
'And all these things with pleasure we'll discuss­'
'Ah, me ! and what are all these things to us ?'
'So then, you'd have a bird of genius grovel,
'And never see beyond a farmer's hovel ?
'Even the sand-martin, that inferior creature,
'Goes once a year abroad.' 'It is his nature,
'But yours how different once !' and then she sigh'd,
'There was a time, Ah ! would that I had died,
'E'er you so chang'd ! when you'd have perish'd rather
'Than this poor breast should heave a single feather
'With grief and care. And all this cant of fashion
'Would but have rais'd your anger, or compassion,­
'O my dear love ! You sought not then to range,
'But on my changeful neck as fell the light,
'You sweetly said, you wish'd no other change
200
'Than that soft neck could shew; to berries bright
'Of mountain ash, you fondly could compare
'My scarlet feet and bill; my shape and air,
'Ah ! faithless flatterer, did you not declare
'The soul of grace and beauty center'd there ?
'My eyes you said, were opals, brightly pink,
'Enchas'd in onyx; and you seem'd to think,
'Each charm might then the coldest heart enthrall:
'Those charms were mine. Alas ! I gave you all­
'Your farthest wanderings then were but to fetch
'The pea, the tare, the beechmast, and the vetch,
'For my repast; within my rocky bower,
'With spleenwort shaded, and the blue-bell's flower,
'For prospects then you never wish'd to roam,
'But the best scenery was our happy home;
'And when, beneath my breast, then fair and young,
'Our first dear pair, our earliest nestlings sprung,
'And weakly, indistinctly, tried to coo­
'Were not those moments picturesque to you ?'
'Yes, faith, my dear; and all you say is true.'
'Oh ! hear me then; if thus we have been blest,
'If on these wings it was your joy to rest,
'Love must from habit still new strength be gaining­'
'From habit ? 'tis of that, child, I'm complaining
'This everlasting fondness will not be
'For birds of flesh and blood. We sha'nt agree,
'So why dispute ? now prithee don't torment me;
'I shall not long be gone; let that content ye:
'Pshaw ! what a fuss ! Come, no more sighs and groans,
'Keep up your spirits; mind your little ones;
'My journey won't be far­my honour's pledged­
'I shall be back again before they're fledged;
'Give me a kiss; and now my dear, adieu !'
So light of heart and plumes, away he flew;
And, as above the sheltering rock he springs,
She listen'd to the echo of his wings;
Those well-known sounds, so soothing heretofore,
Which her heart whisper'd she should hear no more.
Then to her cold and widow'd bed she crept,
201
Clasp'd her half-orphan'd young, and wept !
Her recreant mate, by other views attracted,
A very different part enacted;
He sought the dove-cote, and was greeted there
With all that's tonish, elegant, and rare,
Among the pigeon tribes; and there the rover
Lived quite in clover !
His jolly comrades now, were blades of spirit;
Their nymphs possess'd most fascinating merit;
Nor fail'd our hero of the rock to prove,
He thought not of inviolable love
To his poor spouse at home. He bow'd and sigh'd,
Now to a fantail's, now a cropper's bride;
Then cow'ring low to a majestic powter,
Declared he should not suffer life without her;
And then with upturn'd eyes, in phrase still humbler,
Implor'd the pity of an almond tumbler;
Next, to a beauteous carrier's feet he'd run,
And lived a week, the captive of a nun:
Thus far in measureless content he revels,
And blest the hour when he began his travels.
Yet some things soon occurr'd not quite so pleasant;
He had observ'd that an unfeeling peasant,
It silence mounting on a ladder high,
Seiz'd certain pigeons just as they could fly,
Who never figur'd more, but in a pie;
That was but aukward; then, his lordship's son
Heard from the groom, that 'twould be famous fun
To try on others his unpractis'd gun;
Their fall, the rattling shot, his nerves perplex'd;
He thought perhaps it might be his turn next.
It has been seen ere now, that, much elated,
To be by some great man caress'd and fêted,
A youth of humble birth, and mind industrious,
Foregoes in evil hour his independance;
And, charm'd to wait upon his friend illustrious,
Gives up his time to flattery and attendance.
His patron, smiling at his folly, lets him­
Some newer whim succeeds, and he forgets him.
So fared our bird; his new friend's vacant stare,
202
Told him he scarce remember'd he was there;
And, when he talk'd of living more securely,
This very dear friend, yawning, answered, 'Surely !
'You are quite right to do what's most expedient,
'So, au revoir !­Good bye ! Your most obedient.'
Allies in prosperous fortune thus he prov'd,
And left them, unregretting, unbelov'd;
Yet much his self-love suffer'd by the shock,
And now, his quiet cabin in the rock,
The faithful partner of his every care,
And all the blessings he abandon'd there,
Rush'd on his sickening heart; he felt it yearn,
But pride and shame prevented his return;
So wandering farther­at the close of day
To the high woods he pensive wing'd his way;
But new distress at every turn he found­
Struck by an hawk, and stunn'd upon the ground,
He once by miracle escaped; then fled
From a wild cat, and hid his trembling head
Beneath a dock; recovering, on the wind
He rose once more, and left his fears behind;
And, as above the clouds he soar'd, the light
Fell on an inland rock; the radiance bright
Shew'd him his long deserted place of rest,
And thitherward he flew; his throbbing breast
Dwelt on his mate, so gentle, and so wrong'd,
And on his memory throng'd
The happiness he once at home had known;
Then to forgive him earnest to engage her,
And for his errors eager to atone,
Onward he went; but ah ! not yet had flown
Fate's sharpest arrow: to decide a wager,
Two sportsmen shot at our deserter; down
The wind swift wheeling, struggling, still he fell,
Close to the margin of the stream that flow'd
Beneath the foot of his regretted cell,
And the fresh grass was spotted with his blood;
To his dear home he turn'd his languid view,
Deplor'd his folly, while he look'd his last,
203
And sigh'd a long adieu !
Thither to sip the brook, his nestlings, led
By their still pensive mother, came;
He saw; and murmuring forth her dear lov'd name,
Implor'd her pity, and with shortening breath,
Besought her to forgive him ere his death.­
And now, how hard in metre to relate
The tears and tender pity of his mate !
Or with what generous zeal, his faithful moitie
Taught her now feather'd young, with duteous piety,
To aid her, on their mutual wings to bear,
With stork-like care,
Their suffering parent to the rock above;
There, by the best physician, Love,
His wounds were heal'd.­His wanderings at an end,
And sober'd quite, the husband, and the friend,
In proof of reformation and contrition,
Gave to his race this prudent admonition;
Advice, which this, our fabling muse, presumes
May benefit the biped without plumes:
'If of domestic peace you are possess'd,
'Learn to believe yourself supremely bless'd;
'And gratefully enjoying your condition,
'Frisk not about, on whims and fancies strange,
'For ten to one, you for the worse will change:
'And 'tis most wise, to check all vain ambition­
'By such aspiring pride the angels fell;
'So love your wife, and know when you are well.'
~ Charlotte Smith,
477: V - AUERBACH'S CELLAR IN LEIPZIG
CAROUSAL OF JOLLY COMPANIONS

FROSCH

Is no one laughing? no one drinking?
I'll teach you how to grin, I'm thinking.
To-day you're like wet straw, so tame;
And usually you're all aflame.

BRANDER

Now that's your fault; from you we nothing see,
No beastliness and no stupidity.

FROSCH

(Pours a glass of wine over BRANDER'S head.)
There's both together!

BRANDER

Twice a swine!

FROSCH

You wanted them: I've given you mine.

SIEBEL

Turn out who quarrelsout the door!
With open throat sing chorus, drink and roar!
Up! holla! ho!

ALTMAYER

Woe's me, the fearful bellow!
Bring cotton, quick! He's split my ears, that fellow.

SIEBEL

When the vault echoes to the song,
One first perceives the bass is deep and strong.

FROSCH

Well said! and out with him that takes the least offence!
Ah, tara, lara da!

ALTMAYER

Ah, tara, lara, da!

FROSCH

The throats are tuned, commence!

(Sings.)

The dear old holy Roman realm,
How does it hold together?

BRANDER

A nasty song! Fie! a political song
A most offensive song! Thank God, each morning, therefore,
That you have not the Roman realm to care for!
At least, I hold it so much gain for me,
That I nor Chancellor nor Kaiser be.
Yet also we must have a ruling head, I hope,
And so we'll choose ourselves a Pope.
You know the quality that can
Decide the choice, and elevate the man.

FROSCH
(sings)

Soar up, soar up, Dame Nightingale!
Ten thousand times my sweetheart hail!

SIEBEL

No, greet my sweetheart not! I tell you, I'll resent it.

FROSCH

My sweetheart greet and kiss! I dare you to prevent it!

(Sings.)

Draw the latch! the darkness makes:
Draw the latch! the lover wakes.
Shut the latch! the morning breaks

SIEBEL

Yes, sing away, sing on, and praise, and brag of her!
I'll wait my proper time for laughter:
Me by the nose she led, and now she'll lead you after.
Her paramour should be an ugly gnome,
Where four roads cross, in wanton play to meet her:
An old he-goat, from Blocksberg coming home,
Should his good-night in lustful gallop bleat her!
A fellow made of genuine flesh and blood
Is for the wench a deal too good.
Greet her? Not I: unless, when meeting,
To smash her windows be a greeting!

BRANDER (pounding on the table)

Attention! Hearken now to me!
Confess, Sirs, I know how to live.
Enamored persons here have we,
And I, as suits their quality,
Must something fresh for their advantage give.
Take heed! 'Tis of the latest cut, my strain,
And all strike in at each refrain!

(He sings.)

There was a rat in the cellar-nest,
Whom fat and butter made smoother:
He had a paunch beneath his vest
Like that of Doctor Luther.
The cook laid poison cunningly,
And then as sore oppressed was he
As if he had love in his bosom.

CHORUS (shouting)

As if he had love in his bosom!

BRANDER

He ran around, he ran about,
His thirst in puddles laving;
He gnawed and scratched the house throughout.
But nothing cured his raving.
He whirled and jumped, with torment mad,
And soon enough the poor beast had,
As if he had love in his bosom.

CHORUS

As if he had love in his bosom!

BRANDER

And driven at last, in open day,
He ran into the kitchen,
Fell on the hearth, and squirming lay,
In the last convulsion twitching.
Then laughed the murderess in her glee:
"Ha! ha! he's at his last gasp," said she,
"As if he had love in his bosom!"

CHORUS

As if he had love in his bosom!

SIEBEL

How the dull fools enjoy the matter!
To me it is a proper art
Poison for such poor rats to scatter.

BRANDER

Perhaps you'll warmly take their part?

ALTMAYER

The bald-pate pot-belly I have noted:
Misfortune tames him by degrees;
For in the rat by poison bloated
His own most natural form he sees.

FAUST AND MEPHISTOPHELES

MEPHISTOPHELES

Before all else, I bring thee hither
Where boon companions meet together,
To let thee see how smooth life runs away.
Here, for the folk, each day's a holiday:
With little wit, and ease to suit them,
They whirl in narrow, circling trails,
Like kittens playing with their tails?
And if no headache persecute them,
So long the host may credit give,
They merrily and careless live.

BRANDER

The fact is easy to unravel,
Their air's so odd, they've just returned from travel:
A single hour they've not been here.

FROSCH

You've verily hit the truth! Leipzig to me is dear:
Paris in miniature, how it refines its people!

SIEBEL

Who are the strangers, should you guess?

FROSCH

Let me alone! I'll set them first to drinking,
And then, as one a child's tooth draws, with cleverness,
I'll worm their secret out, I'm thinking.
They're of a noble house, that's very clear:
Haughty and discontented they appear.

BRANDER

They're mountebanks, upon a revel.

ALTMAYER

Perhaps.

FROSCH

Look out, I'll smoke them now!

MEPHISTOPHELES (to FAUST)

Not if he had them by the neck, I vow,
Would e'er these people scent the Devil!

FAUST Fair greeting, gentlemen!

SIEBEL

Our thanks: we give the same.
(Murmurs, inspecting MEPHISTOPHELES from the side.)
In one foot is the fellow lame?

MEPHISTOPHELES

Is it permitted that we share your leisure?
In place of cheering drink, which one seeks vainly here,
Your company shall give us pleasure.

ALTMAYER

A most fastidious person you appear.

FROSCH

No doubt 'twas late when you from Rippach started?
And supping there with Hans occasioned your delay?

MEPHISTOPHELES

We passed, without a call, to-day.
At our last interview, before we parted
Much of his cousins did he speak, entreating
That we should give to each his kindly greeting.

(He bows to FROSCH.)

ALTMAYER (aside)

You have it now! he understands.

SIEBEL

A knave sharp-set!

FROSCH

Just wait awhile: I'll have him yet.

MEPHISTOPHELES

If I am right, we heard the sound
Of well-trained voices, singing chorus;
And truly, song must here rebound
Superbly from the arches o'er us.

FROSCH

Are you, perhaps, a virtuoso?

MEPHISTOPHELES

O no! my wish is great, my power is only so-so.

ALTMAYER

Give us a song!

MEPHISTOPHELES

If you desire, a number.

SIEBEL

So that it be a bran-new strain!

MEPHISTOPHELES

We've just retraced our way from. Spain,
The lovely land of wine, and song, and slumber.

(Sings.)

There was a king once reigning,
Who had a big black flea

FROSCH

Hear, hear! A flea! D'ye rightly take the jest?
I call a flea a tidy guest.

MEPHISTOPHELES (sings)

There was a king once reigning,
Who had a big black flea,
And loved him past explaining,
As his own son were he.
He called his man of stitches;
The tailor came straightway:
Here, measure the lad for breeches.
And measure his coat, I say!

BRANDER

But mind, allow the tailor no caprices:
Enjoin upon him, as his head is dear,
To most exactly measure, sew and shear,
So that the breeches have no creases!

MEPHISTOPHELES

In silk and velvet gleaming
He now was wholly drest
Had a coat with ribbons streaming,
A cross upon his breast.
He had the first of stations,
A minister's star and name;
And also all his relations
Great lords at court became.

And the lords and ladies of honor
Were plagued, awake and in bed;
The queen she got them upon her,
The maids were bitten and bled.
And they did not dare to brush them,
Or scratch them, day or night:
We crack them and we crush them,
At once, whene'er they bite.

CHORUS (shouting)

We crack them and we crush them,
At once, whene'er they bite!

FROSCH Bravo! bravo! that was fine.

SIEBEL

Every flea may it so befall!

BRANDER

Point your fingers and nip them all!

ALTMAYER

Hurrah for Freedom! Hurrah for wine!

MEPHISTOPHELES

I fain would drink with you, my glass to Freedom clinking,
If 'twere a better wine that here I see you drinking.

SIEBEL

Don't let us hear that speech again!

MEPHISTOPHELES

Did I not fear the landlord might complain,
I'd treat these worthy guests, with pleasure,
To some from out our cellar's treasure.

SIEBEL

Just treat, and let the landlord me arraign!

FROSCH

And if the wine be good, our praises shall be ample.
But do not give too very small a sample;
For, if its quality I decide,
With a good mouthful I must be supplied.

ALTMAYER (aside)

They're from the Rhine! I guessed as much, before.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Bring me a gimlet here!

BRANDER

What shall therewith be done?
You've not the casks already at the door?

ALTMAYER

Yonder, within the landlord's box of tools, there's one!

MEPHISTOPHELES (takes the gimlet)

(To FROSCH.)

Now, give me of your taste some intimation.

FROSCH

How do you mean? Have you so many kinds?

MEPHISTOPHELES

The choice is free: make up your minds.

ALTMAYER (to FROSCH)

Aha! you lick your chops, from sheer anticipation.

FROSCH

Good! if I have the choice, so let the wine be Rhenish!
Our Fatherl and can best the sparkling cup replenish.

MEPHISTOPHELES

(boring a hole in the edge of the table, at the place where
FROSCH sits)

Get me a little wax, to make the stoppers, quick!

ALTMAYER

Ah! I perceive a juggler's trick.

MEPHISTOPHELES (to BRANDER)

And you?

BRANDER

Champagne shall be my wine,
And let it sparkle fresh and fine!

MEPHISTOPHELES

(bores: in the meantime one has made the wax stoppers, and
plugged the holes with them.)

BRANDER

What's foreign one can't always keep quite clear of,
For good things, oft, are not so near;
A German can't endure the French to see or hear of,
Yet drinks their wines with hearty cheer.

SIEBEL

(as MEPHISTOPHELES approaches his seat)
For me, I grant, sour wine is out of place;
Fill up my glass with sweetest, will you?

MEPHISTOPHELES (boring)

Tokay shall flow at once, to fill you!

ALTMAYER

Nolook me, Sirs, straight in the face!
I see you have your fun at our expense.

MEPHISTOPHELES

O no! with gentlemen of such pretence,
That were to venture far, indeed.
Speak out, and make your choice with speed! With what a vintage can I serve you?

ALTMAYER

With anyonly satisfy our need.

(After the holes have been bored and plugged)

MEPHISTOPHELES (with singular gestures)

Grapes the vine-stem bears,
Horns the he-goat wears!
The grapes are juicy, the vines are wood,
The wooden table gives wine as good!
Into the depths of Nature peer,
Only believe there's a miracle here!

Now draw the stoppers, and drink your fill!

ALL

(as they draw out the stoppers, and the wine which has been
desired flows into the glass of each)

O beautiful fountain, that flows at will!

MEPHISTOPHELES

But have a care that you nothing spill!

(They drink repeatedly.)

ALL (sing)

As 'twere five hundred hogs, we feel
So cannibalic jolly!

MEPHISTOPHELES

See, now, the race is happyit is free!

FAUST

To leave them is my inclination.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Take notice, first! their bestiality
Will make a brilliant demonstration.

SIEBEL

(drinks carelessly: the wine spills upon the earth, and turns to
flame)

Help! Fire! Help! Hell-fire is sent!

MEPHISTOPHELES (charming away the flame)

Be quiet, friendly element!

(To the revellers)

A bit of purgatory 'twas for this time, merely.

SIEBEL

What mean you? Wait!you'll pay for't dearly!
You'll know us, to your detriment.

FROSCH

Don't try that game a second time upon us!

ALTMAYER

I think we'd better send him packing quietly.

SIEBEL

What, Sir! you dare to make so free,
And play your hocus-pocus on us!

MEPHISTOPHELES

Be still, old wine-tub.

SIEBEL

Broomstick, you!
You face it out, impertinent and heady?

BRANDER

Just wait! a shower of blows is ready.

ALTMAYER

(draws a stopper out of the table: fire flies in his face.)
I burn! I burn!

SIEBEL

'Tis magic! Strike
The knave is outlawed! Cut him as you like!
(They draw their knives, and rush upon MEPHISTOPHELES.)

MEPHISTOPHELES (with solemn gestures)

False word and form of air,
Change place, and sense ensnare!
Be here and there!

(They stand amazed and look at each other.)

ALTMAYER

Where am I? What a lovely land!

FROSCH

Vines? Can I trust my eyes?

SIEBEL

And purple grapes at hand!

BRANDER

Here, over this green arbor bending,
See what a vine! what grapes depending!

(He takes SIEBEL by the nose: the others do the same reciprocally,
and raise their knives.)

MEPHISTOPHELES (as above)

Loose, Error, from their eyes the band,
And how the Devil jests, be now enlightened!

(He disappears with FAUST: the revellers start and separate.)

SIEBEL

What happened?

ALTMAYER

How?

FROSCH

Was that your nose I tightened?

BRANDER (to SIEBEL)

And yours that still I have in hand?

ALTMAYER

It was a blow that went through every limb!
Give me a chair! I sink! my senses swim.

FROSCH

But what has happened, tell me now?

SIEBEL

Where is he? If I catch the scoundrel hiding,
He shall not leave alive, I vow.

ALTMAYER

I saw him with these eyes upon a wine-cask riding
Out of the cellar-door, just now.
Still in my feet the fright like lead is weighing.
(He turns towards the table.)

Why! If the fount of wine should still be playing?

SIEBEL

'Twas all deceit, and lying, false design!

FROSCH

And yet it seemed as I were drinking wine.

BRANDER

But with the grapes how was it, pray?

ALTMAYER

Shall one believe no miracles, just say!


~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, AUERBACHS CELLAR
,
478:A Dialogue At Fiesole
HE.
Halt here awhile. That mossy-cushioned seat
Is for your queenliness a natural throne;
As I am fitly couched on this low sward,
Here at your feet.
SHE.
And I, in thought, at yours:
My adoration, deepest.
HE.
Deep, so deep,
I have no thought wherewith to fathom it;
Or, shall I say, no flight of song so high,
To reach the Heaven whence you look down on me,
My star, my far-off star!
SHE.
If far, yet fixed:
No shifting planet leaving you to seek
Where now it shines.
HE.
A little light, if near,
Glows livelier than the largest orb in Heaven.
SHE.
But little lights burn quickly out, and then,
Another must be kindled. Stars gleam on,
Unreached, but unextinguished. . . . Now, the song.
HE.
Yes, yes, the song: your music to my verse.
SHE.
In this sequestered dimple of the hill,
Forgotten by the furrow, none will hear:
Only the nightingales, that misconceive
The mid-day darkness of the cypresses
29
For curtained night.
HE.
And they will hush to hear
A sudden singing sweeter than their own.
Delay not the enchantment, but begin.
SHE
(singing).
If you were here, if you were here,
The cattle-bells would sound more clear;
The cataracts would flash and leap
More silvery from steep to steep;
The farewell of a rosier glow
Soften the summit of the snow;
The valley take a tenderer green;
In dewy gorge and dim ravine
The loving bramble-flowers embrace
The rough thorn with a gentler grace;
The gentian open bluer eyes,
In bluer air, to bluer skies:
The frail anemone delay,
The jonquil hasten on its way,
The primrose linger past its time,
The violet prolong its prime;
And every flower that seeks the light,
On Alpine lowland, Alpine height,
Wear April's smile without its tear,
If you were here; if you were here!
If you were here, the Spring would wake
A fuller music in the brake.
The mottled misselthrush would pipe
A note more ringing, rich, and ripe;
The whitethroat peer above its nest
With brighter eye and downier breast;
The cuckoo greet the amorous year,
Chanting its joy without its jeer;
The lark betroth the earth and sky
With peals of heavenlier minstrelsy;
And every wildwood bird rejoice
On fleeter wing, with sweeter voice,
30
If you were here!
If you were here, I too should feel
The moisture of the Springtide steal
Along my veins, and rise and roll
Through every fibre of my soul.
In my live breast would melt the snow,
And all its channels flush and flow
With waves of life and streams of song,
Frozen and silent all too long.
A something in each wilding flower,
Something in every scented shower,
Something in flitting voice and wing,
Would drench my heart and bid me sing:
Not in this feeble halting note,
But, like the merle's exulting throat,
With carol full and carol clear,
If you were here, if you were here.
HE.
Hark! How the hills have caught the strain, and seem
Loth to surrender it, and now enclose
Its cadence in the silence of their folds.
Still as you sang, the verses had the wing
Of that which buoyed them, and your aery voice
Lifted my drooping music from the ground.
Now that you cease, there is an empty nest,
From which the full-fledged melody hath flown.
SHE.
Dare I with you contend in metaphor,
It might not be so fanciful to show
That nest, and eggs, and music, all are yours.
But modesty in poets is too rare,
To be reproved for error. Let me then
Be crowned full queen of song, albeit in sooth
I am but consort, owing my degree
To the real sceptred Sovereign at my side.
But now repay my music, and in kind.
Unfolding to my ear the youngest flower
Of song that seems to blossom all the year;
``Delay not the enchantment, but begin.''
31
HE
(reciting). Yet, you are here; yes, you are here.
There's not a voice that wakes the year,
In vale frequented, upland lone,
But steals some sweetness from your own.
When dream and darkness have withdrawn,
I feel you in the freshening dawn:
You fill the noonday's hushed repose;
You scent the dew of daylight's close.
The twilight whispers you are nigh;
The stars announce you in the sky.
The moon, when most alone in space,
Fills all the heavens with your face.
In darkest hour of deepest night,
I see you with the spirit's sight;
And slumber murmurs in my ear,
``Hush! she is here. Sleep! she is here.''
SHE.
Hark how you bare your secret when you sing!
Imagination's universal scope
Can swift endue this gray and shapeless world
With the designs and colour of the sky.
What want you with our fixed and lumpish forms,
You, unconditioned arbiter of air?
``Yet, you are here; yes, you are here.'' The span
Of nimble fancy leaps the interval,
And brings the distant nearer than the near.
HE.
Distance is nearer than proximity,
When distance longs, proximity doth not.
SHE.
The near is always distant to the mind
That craves for satisfaction of its end;
Nor doth the distance ever feel so far
As when the end is touched. Retard that goal,
Prolonging appetite beyond the feast
That feeds anticipation.
32
HE.
Specious foil!
That parries every stroke before 'tis made.
Yet surfeit's self doth not more surely cloy
Than endless fasting.
SHE.
Still a swifter cure
Waits on too little than attends too much.
While disappointment merely woundeth Hope,
The deadly blow by disenchantment dealt
Strikes at the heart of Faith. O happy you,
The favourites of Fancy, who replace
Illusion with illusion, and conceive
Fresh cradles in the dark womb of the grave.
While we, prosaic victims, prove that time
Kills love while leaving loveless life alive,
You still, divinely duped, sing deathless love,
And with your wizard music, once again,
Make Winter Spring. Yet surely you forgive
That I have too much pity for the flowers
Children and poets cull to fling away,
To be an April nosegay.
HE.
How you swell
The common chorus! Women, who are wronged
So roughly by men's undiscerning word,
As though one pattern served to show them all,
Should be more just to poets. These, in truth,
Diverge from one another nowise less
Than ``women,'' vaguely labelled: children some,
With childish voice and nature, lyric bards,
Weaklings that on life's threshold sweetly wail,
But never from that silvery treble pass
Into the note and chant of manliness.
Their love is like their verse, a frail desire,
A fluttering fountain falling feebly back
Into its shallow origin. Next there are
The poets of contention, wrestlers born,
Who challenge iron Circumstance, and fail:
Generous and strong, withal not strong enough,
33
Since lacking sinewy wisdom, hard as life.
The love of these is like the lightning spear,
And shrivels whom it touches. They consume
All things within their reach, and, last of all,
Their lonely selves; and then through time they tower,
Sublime but charred, and wear on their high fronts
The gloomy glory of the sunlit pine.
But the great gods of Song, in clear white light,
The radiance of their godhead, calmly dwell,
And with immutable cold starlike gaze
Scan both the upper and the under world,
As it revolves, themselves serenely fixed.
Their bias is the bias of the sphere,
That turns all ways, but turns away from none,
Save to return to it. They have no feud
With gods or men, the living or the dead,
The past or present, and their words complete
Life's incompleteness with a healing note.
For they are not more sensitive than strong,
More wise than tender; understanding all,
At peace with all, at peace with life and death,
And love that gives a meaning unto life
And takes from death the meaning and the sting:
At peace with hate, and every opposite.
Were I but one of these-presumptuous thought!Even you, the live fulfilment of such dreams
As these secrete, would hazard well your love
On my more largely loving. 'Twould be you,
Yes, even you, that first would flag and fail
In either of my choosing; you, whose wing
Would droop on mine and pray to be upborne.
And when my pinions did no more suffice
For that their double load, then softly down,
Softly and smoothly as descending lark
That hath fulfilled its rhapsody in Heaven,
And with diminished music must decline
To earthy sounds and concepts, I should curb
Illimitable longings to the range
Of lower aspiration. Were I such!But, since I am notSHE.
34
Am not? Who shall say,
Save she who tests, and haply to her loss?
'Tis better left untested. Strange that you,
Who can imagine whatso thing you will,
Should lack imagination to appraise
Imagination at its topmost worth.
Now wield your native sceptre and extend
Your fancy forth where Florence overbrims
In eddies fairer even than herself.
Look how the landscape smiles complacently
At its own beauty, as indeed it may;
Villa and vineyard each a separate home,
Containing possibilities unseen,
Materials for your pleasure. Now disport!
Which homestead may it please my lord of song
To chalk for his, as those rough Frenchmen did
Who came with bow-legged Charles to justify
Savonarola's scourgeful prophecies?
Shall it be that one gazing in our face,
Not jealous of its beauty, but exposed
To all the wantonness of sun and air,
With roses girt, with roses garlanded,
And balustraded terrace topped with jars
Of clove carnations; unambitious roof,
Italian equivalent to house
Love in a cottage? Why, the very place
For her you once described! Wait! Let me see,
Can I recall the lines? Yes, thus they ran.
Do you remember them? Or are they now
A chronicle forgotten and erased
From that convenient palimpsest, the heart?
In dewy covert of her eyes
The secret of the violet lies;
The sun and wind caress and pair
In the lithe wavelets of her hair;
The fragrance of the warm soft south
Hovers about her honeyed mouth;
And, when she moves, she floats through air
Like zephyr-wafted gossamer.
Hers is no lore of dumb dead books;
Her learning liveth in her looks;
35
And still she shows, in meek replies,
Wisdom enough to deem you wise.
Her voice as soothing is and sweet
As whispers of the waving wheat,
And in the moisture of her kiss
Is April-like deliciousness.
Like gloaming-hour, she doth inspire
A vague, an infinite desire;
And, like the stars, though out of sight,
Filleth the loneliness of night.
Come how she may, or slow or fleet,
She brings the morning on her feet;
Gone, leaves behind a nameless pain,
Like the sadness of a silenced strain.
HE.
A youthful dream.
SHE.
Yet memory can surmise
That young dream fruited to reality,
Then, like reality, was dream no more.
All dreams are youthful; you are dreaming still.
What lovely visions denizen your sleep!
Let me recall another; for I know
All you have written, thought, and felt, and much
You neither thought nor felt, but only sang.
A wondrous gift, a godlike gift, that breathes
Into our exiled clay unexiled lives,
Manlier than Adam, comelier than Eve.
That massive villa, we both know so well,
With one face set toward Settignano, one
Gazing at Bellosguardo, and its rear
Locked from the north by clustered cypresses,
That seem like fixed colossal sentinels,
And tower above its tower, but look not in,
Might be abode for her whom you conceived
In tropes so mystical, you must forgive
If recollection trips.
To dwell with her is calmly to abide
Through every change of time and every flux of tide.
36
In her the Present, Past, and Future meet,
The Father, and the Son, and dovelike Paraclete.
She holdeth silent intercourse with Night,
Still journeying with the stars, and shining with their light.
Her love, illumination; her embrace,
The sweep of angels' wings across a mortal's face.
Her lap is piled with autumn fruits, her brow
Crowned with the blossoming trails that smile from April's bough.
Like wintry stars that shine with frosty fire,
Her loftiness excites to elevate desire.
To love her is to burn with such a flame
As lights the lamp which bears the Sanctuary's name.
That lamp burns on for ever, day and night,
Before her mystic shrine. I am its acolyte.
HE.
The merest foam of fancy; foam and spray.
SHE.
Foam-drift of fancy that hath ebbed away.
See how the very simile rebukes
Man's all unsealike longings! For confess,
While ocean still returns, the puny waves
Of mortal love are sucked into the sand,
Their motion felt, their music heard, no more.
Look when the vines are linking hands, and seem
As pausing from the dance of Spring, or just
Preparing to renew it, round and round,
On the green carpet of the bladed corn,
That spreads about their feet: corn, vine, and fig,
Almond and mulberry, cherry, and pear, and peach,
Not taught to know their place, but left to range
Up to the villa's walls, windows, and doors,
And peep into its life and smile good-day,
A portion of its homeliness and joy:
37
A poet's villa once, a poet's again,
If you but dream it such; a roof for her,
To whom you wrote-I wonder who she wasThis saucy sonnet; saucy, withal sweet,
And O, how true of the reflected love
You poets render to your worshippers.
TRUE AS THE DIAL TO THE SUN.
You are the sun, and I the dial, sweet,
So you can mark on me what time you will.
If you move slowly, how can I move fleet?
And when you halt, I too must fain be still.
Chide not the cloudy humours of my brow,
If you behold no settled sunshine there:
Rather upbraid your own, sweet, and allow,
My looks cannot be foul if yours be fair.
Then from the heaven of your high witchery shine,
And I with smiles shall watch the hours glide by;
You have no mood that is not straightway mine;
My cheek but takes complexion from your eye.
All that I am dependeth so on you,
What clouds the sun must cloud the dial too.
HE.
No man should quarrel with his Past, and I
Maintain no feud with mine. Do we not ripen,
Ripen and mellow in love, unto the close,
Thanks no more to the present than the past?
First love is fresh but fugitive as Spring,
A wilding flower no sooner plucked than faded;
And summer's sultry fervour ends in storm,
Recriminating thunder, wasteful tears,
And angry gleam of lightning menaces.
Give me October's meditative haze,
Its gossamer mornings, dewy-wimpled eves,
Dewy and fragrant, fragrant and secure,
The long slow sound of farmward-wending wains,
When homely Love sups quiet 'mong its sheaves,
Sups 'mong its sheaves, its sickle at its side,
And all is peace, peace and plump fruitfulness.
SHE.
38
Picture of all we dream and we desire:
Autumn's grave cheerfulness and sober bliss,
Rich resignation, humble constancy.
For, prone to bear the load piled up by life,
We, once youth's pasture season at an end,
Submit to crawl. Unbroken to the last,
You spurn the goad of stern taskmaster Time.
Even 'mid autumn harvest you demand
Returning hope and blossom of the Spring,
All seasons and sensations, and at once,
Or in too quick succession. Do we blame?
We envy rather the eternal youth
We cannot share. But youth is pitiless,
And, marching onward, neither asks nor seeks
Who falls behind. Thus women who are wise,
Beside their thresholds knitting homely gear,
Wave wistful salutation as you pass,
And think of you regretfully, when gone:
A soft regret, a sweet regret, that is
Only the mellow fruit of unplucked joy.
Now improvise some other simple strain,
That with harmonious cadence may attune
The vain and hazard discords of discourse.
HE.
When Love was young, it asked for wings,
That it might still be roaming;
And away it sped, by fancy led,
Through dawn, and noon, and gloaming.
Each daintiness that blooms and blows
It wooed in honeyed metre,
And when it won the sweetest sweet,
It flew off to a sweeter:
When Love was young.
When Love was old, it craved for rest,
For home, and hearth, and haven;
For quiet talks round sheltered walks,
And long lawns smoothly shaven.
And what Love sought, at last it found,
A roof, a porch, a garden,
And from a fond unquestioning heart
39
Peace, sympathy, and pardon,
When Love was old.
SHE.
Simple, in sooth, and haply true: withal,
Too, too autumnal even for my heart.
I never weary of your vernal note.
Carol again, and sing me back my youth
With the redundant melodies of Spring.
HE.
I breathe my heart in the heart of the rose,
The rose that I pluck and send you,
With a prayer that the perfume its leaves enclose
May kiss, and caress, and tend you:
Caress and tend you till I can come,
To the garden where first I found you,
And the thought that as yet in the rose is dumb
Can ripple in music round you.
O rose, that will shortly be her guest,
You may well look happy, at leaving:
Will you lie in the cradle her snowy breast
Doth rock with its gentle heaving?
Will you mount the throne of her hazel hair,
That waves like a summer billow,
Or be hidden and hushed, at nightfall prayer,
In the folds of her dimpled pillow?
And when she awakes at dawn to feel
If you have been dreaming with her,
Then the whole of your secret, sweet rose, reveal,
And say I am coming thither:
And that when there is silence in earth and sky,
And peace from the cares that cumber,
She must not ask if your leaves or I
Be clasped in her perfumed slumber.
SHE.
Give me your hand; and, if you will, keep mine
Engraffed in yours, as slowly thus we skirt
La Doccia's dark declivity, and make
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Athwart Majano's pathless pines a path
To lead us onward haply where it may.
Lo! the Carrara mountains flush to view,
That in the noonday were not visible.
Shall we not fold this comfort to our hearts,
Humbly rejoiced to think as there are heights
Seen only in the sunset, so our lives,
If that they lack not loftiness, may wear
A glow of glory on their furrowed fronts,
Until they faint and fade into the night!
~ Alfred Austin,
479:Orpheus
ORPHEUS.
LAUGHTER and dance, and sounds of harp and lyre,
Piping of flutes, singing of festal songs,
Ribbons of flame from flaunting torches, dulled
By the broad summer sunshine, these had filled
Since the high noon the pillared vestibules,
The peristyles and porches, in the house
Of the bride's father. Maidens, garlanded
With rose and myrtle dedicate to Love,
Adorned with chaplets fresh the bride, and veiled
The shining head and wistful, girlish face,
Ineffable sweetness of divided lips,
Large light of clear, gray eyes, low, lucid brows,
White as a cloud, beneath pale, clustering gold.
When sunless skies uncertain twilight cast,
That makes a friend's face as an alien's strange,
Investing with a foreign mystery
The dear green fields about our very home.
Then waiting stood the gilded chariot
Before the porch, and from the vine-wreathed door,
Issued the white-veiled bride, while jocund youths
And mænads followed her with dance and song.
She came with double glory; for her lord,
Son of Apollo and Calliope,
Towered beside her, beautiful in limb
And feature, as though formed to magic strains,
Like the Bœotian city, that arose
In airy structures to Amphion's lute.
The light serene shone from his brow and eyes,
Of one whose lofty thoughts keep consonance
With the celestial music of the spheres.
His smile was fluent, and his speech outsang
The cadences of soft-stringed instruments.
He to the chariot led Eurydice,
And these twain, mounting with their paranymph,
Drove onward through the dusky twilit fields,
Preceded by the nymphs and singing youths,
And boys diffusing light and odors warm,
With flaming brands of aromatic woods,
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And matrons bearing symbols of the life
Of careful wives, the distaff and the sieve;
And followed by the echoes of their songs,
The fragrance crushed from moist and trodden grass,
The blessing of the ever-present gods,
Whom they invoked with earnest hymns and prayer.
From Orpheus' portico, festooned with vines,
Issued a flood of rare, ambrosial light,
As though Olympian portals stood ajar,
And Hymen, radiant by his torch's flame,
Mystic with saffron vest and purple, stood
With hands munificent to greet and bless.
Ripe fruits were poured upon the married pair
Alighting, and the chariot wheels were burnt,
A token that the bride returned no more
Unto her father's house. With step resolved,
She crossed the threshold soft with flowers, secure
That his heroic soul who guided her,
Was potent and alert to grace her life,
With noble outlines and ideal hues,
Uplifting it to equal height with his.
EPITHALAMIUM. TO ZEUS.
Because thou art enthroned beyond our reach,
Behind the brightest and the farthest star,
And silence is as eloquent as speech,
To thee who knowest us for what we are,
We bring thee naught save brief and simple prayer,
Strong in its naked, frank sincerity.
Send sacred joys of marriage to this pair,
With fertile increase and prosperity.
Three nymphs had met beneath an oak that cast
Cool, dappled shadow on the glowing grass,
And liquid gleam of the translucent brook.
The air was musical with frolic sounds
Of feminine voices, and of laughter blithe.
Patines of sunshine fell like mottled gold
On the rose-white of bright bare limbs and neck,
On flowing, snowy mantles, and again
With sudden splendor on the gloriole
Of warm, rich hair. The fairest nymph reclined
Beneath the tree, and leaned her yellow head,
With its crisp, clustering rings, against the trunk,
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And dipped her pure feet in the colorless brook,
Stirring the ripples into circles wide,
With cool, delicious plashings in the stream.
Her young companions lay upon the grass,
With indolent eyes half closed, and parted lips
Half-smiling, in the languor of the noon.
But suddenly these twain, arising, cried,
Startled and sharply, 'Lo, Eurydice,
Behold!' and she, uplifting frightened eyes,
Saw a strange shepherd watching with bold glance.
Veiling their faces with their mantles light,
Her sisters fled swift-footed, with shrill cries,
Adown the meadow, but her wet feet clung
To the dry grasses and the earthy soil.
'Eurydice, I love thee! fear me not,
For I am Aristæus, with gray groves
Of hoary olives, and innumerous flocks,
And precious swarms of yellow-vested bees.'
But she with sudden strength eluding him,
Sprang o'er the flowery turf, with back-blown hair,
And wing-like garments, shortened breath, and face
Kindled with shame and terror. In her flight
She ran through fatal flowers and tangled weeds,
And thick rank grass beside a stagnant pool,
When, with a keen and breathless cry of pain,
Abrupt she fell amidst the tall, green reeds.
Then Aristæus reached her, as a snake
Crept back in sinuous lines amidst the slime.
Desire was changed to pity, when he saw
The wounded dryad in her agony
Strive vainly to escape, repelling him
With feeble arms. 'Forgive me, nymph,' he cried;
' I will not touch, save with most reverent hands,
Thy sacred form. But let me bear thee hence,
And soothe thy bruise with healing herbs. 'Too late,
Leave me,' she sighed, 'and lead thou Orpheus here,
That I may see him ere the daylight fails.'
He left her pale with suffering, —earth seemed strange
Unto her eyes, who knew she looked her last
On level-stretching meadows, hazy hills,
And all the light and color of the sky.
Brief as a dream she saw her happy life,
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Her father's face, her mother's blessed eyes,
The hero who, unheralded, appeared,
And all was changed,— all things put forth a voice,
As in the season of the singing birds.
She looked around revived, and saw again
The lapsing river and abiding sky.
Across the sunny fields came Aristæus,
With Orpheus following,— and after these,
Sad nymphs and heroes grave with sympathy.
Quite calm she lay, and almost wished to die
Before they reached her, if the throbbing pain
Of limb and heart could only thus be stilled.
But Orpheus hastened to her side, and mourned,
'Eurydice, Eurydice! Remain, —
For there is no delight of speech nor song
Among the dead. Will the gods jest with me,
And call this life, which must forevermore
Be but a void, a hunger, a desire,
A stretching out of empty hands to grasp
What earth nor sea nor heaven will restore?
Is this the life that I conceived and sang,
Rich with all noble opportunities
And beautiful realities?' But she:
'Brave Orpheus, search thou not the eternal gods,
Surely they love us dearer than we know.
Do thou refrain, for yet I hold my faith.
When I am gone, thou still wilt have thy lyre;
Love it and cherish,— it is Fate's best gift,
And with death's clearer vision, I can see
That in all ages men will be upraised
Nearer to gods through this than through aught else.
My death may but inspire a larger note,
A passionate cadence to thy strain, which else
Were not quite human, and thus incomplete.
And with this thought I am content to die.
Cease not to sing to me when I am gone;
Thy voice will reach me in the farthest spheres,
Or wake me out of silence. Now begin,
That I may float on those celestial waves
Into the darkness, as I oft have longed.'
ORPHEUS.
Once in a wild, bright vision, came to me
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Beautiful music, luminous as morn,
An effluence of light and rapture born,
With eyes as full of splendor as the sea;
Dazzling as youth, with pinions frail as air,
Yet potent to uplift and soar as prayer.
Again I see her, cypress in her wreath,
Sad with all grave and tender mysteries;
Tears in her unimaginable eyes,
That look their first with wondering awe on Death.
Never again, in all the after years,
Will her lips laugh with utter mirthfulness;
Nor the strange longing in her eyes grow less,
Nor any time dispel their mist of tears.
Yea, with new numbers she completes her strain,
A song unsung before by gods or men;
But she hath lost, ah! lost for evermore,
The ringing note of joy ineffable,
The high assurance proud, that all is well,
The glad refrain that pealed from shore to shore.
O lyre, thou hast done with joyous things,
Triumphant ecstasies, exultant song;
Of subtle pain, keen anguish, hopeless wrong,
I fashion now another of thy strings,
And strike thee with a strong hand passionate,
Into a fuller music, adequate
Unto a soul that seeks insatiably,
With fond, illusive hope and faith divine;
For through all ages will my soul seek thine,
Eurydice, my lost Eurydice!
What solace to lament with empty hands
And smitten heart, above a mound of earth,
Vivid with mockery of perpetual flowers,
O'er one small urn that holds beneath its lid,
With overmeasure, all the flameless dust
And soulless ashes of our love? Yet this
Was Orpheus' life, to mourn beside the grave,
From his stringed lyre compelling wild response
And thrilling intonation of his grief,
That made the hearts of gnarled and knotty oaks
Ache as with human sympathy, and rived
The adamantine centre of the rock,
And lured the forest beasts, and hushed the birds,
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Mavis and lark, while with wide, awful wings,
The eagle shadowed his exalted brow.
'Surely,' he cried, 'the senseless dust hears not,
More than the burnt brand hears old natural sounds
Innumerable rustle of young leaves.
It cannot be that only these remain,
The ashes of her glittering limbs, warm flesh,
And blessed hair,— my love had more than these
Where is the vital soul, that was to me
An inspiration and an influence?
The gods are not unstable like rash man,
Aimlessly to create and discreate,
With cruel and capricious fantasy,
For thus the immaculate skies would be a lie;
Eurydice is but withdrawn from me,
And disembodied, while mine eyesight blinds,
My senses are a hindrance, and obstruct
The accurate perception of my soul.
When mine own spirit, nightly disenthralled,
Soars to the land of dreams, whose boundaries,
By day, loom infinitely far and vague,
And yet, at night, become our very home,—
There still I see thee with the same bright form,
The same auroral eyes that made for me
Perpetual morning; and I stretch mine arms
Hungering after thee, and, calling, wake
Unto the vapid glare of languid dawn.
Yet all these things address my very soul,
Telling it that thou art not dead; for death
Is but the incarnation of man's fears;
Gods do not recognize it. If thou art
(As I have faith) in the known universe,
Yea, though it be in the extremest land,
Beyond the sunset, with its shining isles,
I will go forth and seek thee, nor will cease
To mourn thee and desire, till I have found.'
Thus Orpheus fared across the full-fed streams
Of Hebrus and of Strymon, and beyond
The purple outlines and aerial crags,
Snow-glittering of Scardus, Rhodope,
And grand Orbelus; through fair, fertile fields
Of Thessaly with increase of ripe corn,
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Through Attica, Bœotia and Eubœa,
And southward to the royal-citied state,
Beautiful Corinth, throned upon the base
Of green Acrocorinthus, whose soft slope
Was dedicate with temples to the gods,
And towering over all the sacred shrine
Of Aphrodite. Upward from the town
The mountain rose defensive, where the walls
Of Corinth ended, and beyond the gates,
The radiant plain of the Corinthian Gulf
Stretched infinitely. Orpheus rested here,
Till he bethought him to ascend the mount,
With offerings at Aphrodite's shrine—
Not sanguine victims, but fresh myrtle wreath
And faultless rose—to sue the oracle
For help and guidance.
All the town was still,
The bright red band of sunrise lit the sky
Above the dark blue gulf, and Orpheus heard
A hundred birds saluting, from the brake,
Aurora, and cool rush of waterfalls.
Made murmurous music, while Athené breathed
The vigor of the morning in his soul.
Up the steep mountain side he passed, beyond
The silver growth of olives, and the belt
Of pines, to where the foam-white temple stood,
Smitten at once by all the beams of morn.
He saw the double peak, rose-white with snow
And early sunshine, of Parnassus cleave
The northern sky, and sacred Helicon
Erect its head, crowned with the Muses' grove,
The Bay of Crissa and Corinthian Gulf,
Below flashed restless, and a path of gold
Divided with clear, tremulous light the waves.
From the large beauty of the morn, he went
Into the holy limits of the shrine,
With warm air heavy with the odorous rose.
ORPHEUS.
I put into my prayer to thee, O mother,
The tumult and the passion of the ocean,
The unflecked purity of winnowed foam-wreaths;
To thee who sprang from these, the incarnation
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Of all the huge sea holds of grace or splendor,
With its own light between thine amorous eyelids.
For I, in thy most sacred cause a pilgrim,
Have wandered tireless, from Thrace to Corinth,
'Midst foreign scenes and alien men and women.
And at my right hand Grief incessant follows,
And at my left walks Memory with the semblance
Of lost Eurydice's ethereal beauty.
Infatuate I gaze, until the vision
Thrills me to madness, and I start and tremble,
Remembering also Grief is my companion.
Onward through spacious fields, by copious waters,
Through purple growth of amaranth and crocus,
And past the marble beauty of great cities,
We three have journeyed,— strangers saw me reckless,
And knew at once that I had walked with sorrow,
And that the gods had chosen me their victim.
Are all my carols useless, worse than useless?
Shall my long pilgrimage, thus unrewarded,
End at the blank, insuperable ocean?
Hast thou no wise compassion, goddess, mother?
In all the measureless years' unfathomed chances,
Is the dear past to be repeated never?
O supreme mother! crowned with blessed poppy
As well as myrtle,— bring her here, or compass
My soul with death, that elsewhere I may seek her.
He ceased, and through the temple spread a mist
Ambrosial, and above the shrine a star
Serenely brightened, and a heavenly voice
Made sweet response: ' Love guides himself thy course
To the last sea-girt rock. No worthy soul
May ever truly seek, and fail to find.'
Still southward Orpheus journeyed, till he reached
Cape Tænarus, the last bleak point of Greece,
Desolate o'er an infinite waste of waves,
While sunset lit the western sea and sky
With yellow floods of warm, diffusive light,
Kindling his serious face and earnest eyes,
And glittering on his lyre. Long time he stood,
And gazed upon the trouble of the waves,
Expectant of a word, a sign— and still
No answer made the wild, indifferent sea.
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Impetuous, he smote his quivering lyre
To reckless and sonorous melody,
Vibrating o'er the watery turbulence.
Then far below its western bath, the sun
Dipped and was gone, and all the sea was gray.
Still through the air rang those imploring notes,
Unutterably plaintive— till there came
From out the ocean cave of Tænarus
The shining forms of Oceanides,
With myriad faces raised supremely fair,
And myriad arms that beckoned as he sang.
Behold! a stir amidst the frothing brine,
As though upheaved by powers submarine,
In implicate confusion, wave on wave,
Then rose with windy manes and fiery eyes,
Proudly careering, the immortal steeds,
Bearing, within the shell-shaped car, the god
Of august aspect and imperial port,
With such profusion of ambrosial locks
As curl around the very front of Zeus.
He with benign regard the minstrel viewed,
Then whirling thrice his massy trident, struck
The scarpéd promontory with its fork.
And Orpheus felt the solid basis yield,
And heard the hollow rumbling, as when earth
Rocks to her centre, and high hills spit flame.
And lo! he stood before a sulphurous throne,
Set in an open space, wherefrom there streamed
Four rivers stagnant, black. Here Ades reigned,
His very presence unto mortal sense
Oppressive as low thunder in the air.
The triple-headed guardian of his realm
Crouched at his feet, and in the dismal murk,
The hideous Harpies hovered o'er his head.
The serpent-haired Eumenides stood near,
Brow-bound with sanguine fillets, and the Fates
Wielded the distaff, spindle, and sharp shears.
The air was dense with noisome influence,
And shadowy apparitions seemed to float
Athwart the dusk. But on the infernal throne
Conspicuous in beauty, by her lord,
Persephone was seated. Wonderment
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Looked from her eyes, in seeing him, no god,
Who came before his time among the dead,
Unarmed with spear or shield, a glistening lyre
Nigh slipping from the loose grasp of his hands.
'Who comes unsummoned to my realm?' began
The baleful godhead in discordant tones,
Widely reverberant; and the low, clear voice
Of Orpheus answered: 'One who would remain,
If but the impotent body could be free
To follow the desires of the soul,—
Orpheus, an unskilled singer.' 'Birth and death
Are preordained for thee, presumptuous man.
What narrow space of time the Fates accord,
'Twould best become thee to bear worthily,
With dignity, and leave the rest to them,
The end as the beginning.' 'Plead for me,
O beautiful Persephone, — behold!
Eurydice was snatched with violent hand
From out mine eager arms, and I have sought
Her image o'er the peopled earth in vain.'
Then she: 'I may not summon her, nor hope
To swerve the haughty purpose of my lord.
With influence of thy familiar voice,
If thou canst touch her spirit, she is thine.'
But Ades: 'Who recalls the dead by prayer?
They whose calm souls are once possessed by death,
Find such a solid joy in grasping firm,
After life's phantasms, this reality,
That wisdom, grief, nor love persuadeth them
Their liberated spirits to confine
With fleshly limitations. Nathless sing,—
And prove life's glittering evanescence vain,
Outweighed by death's sublime security.'
ORPHEUS.
I render thanks, eternal gods, that ye
Empower myself to call Eurydice.
Man only can fulfill his own desire;
And if I fail, the sorrow rests with me.
Ye give what we deserve; I pray alone
Ne'er to be cursed with what I have not won.
And to whom else would I intrust my lyre,
This supreme invocation to intone?
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But in myself I feel the love, the power,
The lyric inspiration, while the flower
Of all my life brings forth its proper fruit,
In this my loftiest, most godlike hour.
If I could make ye feel the agony
Of the strong man, O gods, condemned to see
The light fail from dear eyes, the white lips mute,
The elusive soul take flight eternally
To where we cannot follow it nor find,
With the most subtle searchings of the mind,
With the most passionate longings of the soul,
Deaf, unresponsive as the empty wind;
Then would your pity as your power be,
'Twould crown us all with immortality,
And grace us with completeness, make us whole,
Worthy to be the peers of deity.
For we are mighty now to slay and bless,
Yea, gifted with strange strength of steadfastness,
To conquer bodiless and viewless foes
Within ourselves, yet in our helplessness,
As children, in the presence of this Death,
Whom nor revolt nor patience conquereth,
Implacable, with grim mouth fastened close,
That with no hope our anguish answereth.
Resound with wildest utterance, O my lyre;
Let each note be a living flame of fire,
To reach her, to burn through her, to compel,
Strong with the infinite strength of my desire.
I am no god, yet Fate, Eurydice,
A goddess for my slave hath given me,—
Immortal Music, pure, ineffable;
And I send her, my handmaid, after thee.
If all wherein I put my faith as sure,
Be not delusions vain which death will cure;
If the sublime reliance of the soul
On her own powers be no empty lure,
Whereat the high gods laugh in bitter scorn;
If what I have achieved and what forborne,
Will lead me nearer to a worthy goal,
If all life's promises be not forsworn,—
Eurydice, appear! Before mine eyes,
O gods, I see a formless essence rise,
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That moulds itself unto the music's beat,
Appareled in the glory of the skies.
Now, while I ring a more celestial tone,
The spirit more divinely bright hath grown,
To larger modulations, strains complete,
The white limbs from the shapeless mist are won,
As from the bosom of a summer cloud,
Wherewith a goddess would her semblance shroud.
Is this mine own creation? Is it truth,
That with warm life I have blank air endowed?
The soft cloud parts asunder,— yea, 'tis she!
Once more the face that was my star I see,
Crowned with the beauty of immortal youth,
Eurydice, my lost Eurydice!
Silent beside his silent, fallen lyre,
The singer stood, and clasped her in his arms,
Gazing upon this pale, fair face as one
Whose heart's supreme desire is satisfied.
'Is not this hour the hour I have foreseen,
Through all obstructions and infirmities
Of my mortality, and is it not
More glorious in fruition than I dreamed!
Yea, I have dreamed it all, eternal gods,
Even as now have pressed her to my heart
With the same clinging effort to retain,
And seen this breathing form, these lucent eyes
Vivid as now, instinct with life and love.
Yet have I waked to chill discouragement,
To vacant disappointment, and the sense
Of aching, unassuaged desire. O speak,
For in my dreams I never hear thy voice,
Save veiled and indistinct, a mockery
Of the old limpid music. Speak to me:
Thy flesh is warm, thy heart beats close to mine,
Thine upturned face is wet with human tears;
O speak to me,— lest I should wake again
To barren fields and empty skies of Thrace.'
Then in low, natural tones, Eurydice:
'Thy voice hath reached me in the farthest spheres,
And waked me out of silence.' 'Follow me,—
It is thyself,— if I must wake from this,
'Twill be to death or madness. Follow me,
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From darkness palpable, to earth, to light
Of ample skies, and freshness of blown grass
And rolling waters.' 'Hold!' the jarring voice
Of Ades interposed: ''Tis excellent
The attribute we gave thee, to convert
To such a weapon as may overcome
The old hereditary foes of man,
Sleep, death, corruption, and necessity.
But to reveal thyself the peer of gods,
Not only through inspired ecstasy,
But through a continent persistency,
This never was accomplished by thy race,
And thou must yet be tried. This soul is thine,
For thou hast won her from the jaws of Hell;
Yea, she may follow thee as free as light,—
Lead thou the way and charm the hostile fiends.
Look forward ever; if thine eyes revert
But once to gaze on her, to reassure
Unworthy fears, or sate a mean desire,
Thou art not mate for us. She will dissolve
To empty air —never to be recalled.
ORPHEUS.
Back to the vital earth, O follow me,
Regained Eurydice.
To rippling well-heads and to sunlit plains,
Greened by soft wash of rains.
See orchards rosy with prolific bloom,
And vineyards' purple gloom.
Lulled by the languid flow of lilied streams,
There will I sing my dreams.
Behold! I chant a hymn of adoration,
Triumphant exultation,
For I can see, in all the universe,
No error and no curse.
The gods have naught withheld, in power and sway,
From him who will obey
Their own divine and everlasting laws.
Above the world's applause,
As vigorous as morning, he can rise,
Wrest the desired prize
From the clenched hands of Nemesis and Fate.
With victory elate,
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I chant unmitigated prayer and praise
To gods who part our ways,
Seeing 'midst clamorous change incredible,
That all is ordered well.
In more harmonious strains, O lyre, express
My twice-born happiness;
Yea, utter and translate with larger sense
My rich experience,
That makes complete life's solemn threnody
Joy unalloyed and free,
Grief unexampled, victory at last,
When strife is overpast.
Through pathways hedged with horrors still they fared
Invulnerable. Darkness stayed them not,
Nor yet more dreadful light, revealing oft
The hideous fiends who rose on every side,
Huge shapes of ill, to gaze upon the twain.
A Greek, who, fleeing, smote a vibrant lyre,
That chimed to carols more divinely quired
Than those that fill with ravishment a grove,
Misty with moonlight, where the plain brown bird
Makes midnight vocal. Closely following him,
A woman with grave aspect, parted lips,
Upraising, in enthralléd ecstasy,
Large eyes serene, fulfilled with holier light
For having pierced beyond the boundaries
Of time and of mortality. The day
Shone through the murk at last, and filled their path
With dusky sunbeams; and far-stretching fields
Of soft, delicious green, and crystal skies,
Encouraged them; all perils past save one.
But a black, stagnant river crawled along,
Spanned by no bridge, and ferried by no sail,
With muddy tide between the day and them.
And Orpheus with enamored eyes passed on,
And saw not how the loathsome waters crept,
Nor how his magic song enchanted them
To solid substance; but he missed at once
The footsteps light that had inspired his lay.
Impetuous he turned to reassure
His fearful soul, and sate his hungry eyes;
But as he turned, the inspiration fled,
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His lips refused to frame the fruitless words,
His eyes beheld,—O gods! Eurydice
Removed already far away from him,
By all the wide-expanded space, between
Our loftiest dream and our unworthy deed.
She gazed with no reproachful glance nor tears,
And Orpheus felt himself beneath her, fall,
Momently down from empyreal heights,
And lo! he stood within the fields of Thrace,
On earth familiar, 'neath familiar skies,
And heard a voice float through the shining air,
From unimaginable distances,
Faint as a dream, — 'Farewell, farewell, farewell.'
'Woe! woe! what lamentations may express
The fullness of my new calamity!
I, overbearing, who presumed to reach
The lordly and severe stability
Of the immortals, — whom may I invoke?
To whom may man appeal when he hath failed
Unto himself? What god will interpose
To thwart invincible necessity?
Lost, lost forever! I stood elevate,
For one brief moment dreaming I had won
The skill and power of true divinity.
Gods! with what lofty and superb disdain
Ye must look down on mine unworthy haste,—
Ye, who with grandeur of sublime repose,
And majesty of patience, still abide
Invariable through eternity!
Alas! my mighty visions were to me
Auspicious omens, and they fed my heart
With vigor and encouragement; but now,
This was no dream; for Hope, full-flushed and fair,
Born, like the freshness of auroral dew,
From unseen air, and traceless vanishing,
Consorts not with this mighty goddess, Truth,
With solemn and unfathomable eyes,
For Truth is one with Death and Destiny.
With what a depth of meaning didst thou turn,
For the last time, to me, Eurydice,
A glory 'midst the darkness, with that glance
Of infinite compassion, hands outstretched,
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As if to save the from mine own defect.
With what humiliation and despair
I saw thee rising unattainably!—
The vault, the stream accursed had disappeared;
I was in Thrace uplooking to the sky.
O, to what harmonies I might have wed
The blessed tidings which all men await!
Now I can only make my song express
A distant echo, a suggestion vague,
Of the serene contentment of thy voice.
Sing this, my lyre, that all who hark to thee
With an attentive and a gentle ear,
May hear the promise, faint and yet assured,
Recall the grace and the deliciousness
Of immortality, and strive anew
Towards the ideal unattained by me,
Yet still accessible to stronger souls.'
Thus Orpheus, when the first wild burst of woe
Had passed; no need to seek her now;
No need to wander o'er the peopled earth.
Was he in truth a victim of the gods,
Or rather with a fairer fortune blest
Than happier men, selected for a fate
Divinely tragical, that he might know
The fullness of a life's experience,
And find expression adequate for all,
Simple as wisdom, and as dignified
As silence? From his kind he lived apart,
As one who cherishes a grief, nor seeks
Forgetfulness nor comfort; elevate
To glittering eminence by destiny,
And lonely through the privacy of woe
Beyond the reaches of man's sympathy.
Where lucid Hebrus bathes its golden sands,
He sat discoursing gracious harmonies,
Amidst the morning fields, when on his ears
Sounded with horrid dissonance the clang
Of smitten cymbals and the throb of drums.
But still the revelers remained unseen,
Till, rounding suddenly a neighboring hill,
The whole mad troop came dancing into sight.
First marched a jovial bacchanal, who bore
153
A crystal vessel, decked with branching vine,
Then youth and nymphs with ivy chapleted,
In purfled raiment of hues delicate,
With mitres, thyrsi, cymbals, drums and flutes,
Some balancing upon their graceful heads,
Regal with crisp-curled gold, their burdens light
Of baskets heaped with figs and dusky grapes.
And 'midst them all the sacrificial goat,
Adorned with berries. Thus the festal throng,
With wanton gestures, and with antic bounds,
And wild embracings, mad with wine, approached,
With peals of laughter, echoing faintly back
From jocund hill to hill, and lusty shouts
Of 'Bacché, Bacché!'
SONG.
With wassail all the night,
Celestial Bacchus, we have worshipped thee!
With riotous revel and with festal wine.
Still on the hills in early morning light,
With frolic dances and brisk jollity,
Our hymns of praise are thine.
For we have seen thee, god!
The fawn-skin slipping from thy shoulder bare,
Thy gestures lithe and loose, thine eyes that shine,
Thy rosy hands that waved a clustered rod
Of uncrushed grapes, and thine ambrosial hair,
Dripping with myrrh and wine.
Thou art not strict, severe,
Like loftier gods and ruthless goddesses,
Implacable like Pallas, Zeus, or Truth;
But to humanity akin and near,
Eager for folly, and the luxuries
Of lustful health and youth.
This crystal-vialed balm,
Divinely brewed, soothing as Lethe's streams,
Is the most generous gift of Deity,
Informing us with soft oblivion calm
Of Death and Fate, with joys beyond the dreams
Of grave sobriety.
Come, let us drink again.
Resound, O timbrels, and thou bird-voiced flute;
Thyrsus and pipes make shrill and dear acclaim,
154
To Bacchus, who impurples hill and plain
With vineyards bursting with increase of fruit,
Subtle as liquid flame.
Œoë! quaff and sing!
Who drinks no more, offends the deity
Of Bacchus! lo on Hebrus' grassy brink,
A minstrel sits, with gold lute glistening,
Marring our rites with stern solemnity,
Who doth not chant nor drink.
Ho! Orpheus, laugh again,
From mirthful heart, and join our happy throng;
Cease to lament with unappeased desire.
We bring a cordial for all grief and pain.
Add to the choral strain thy siren song,
And thine enchanted lyre.
For Fate hath answered thee
With cold derision; Death respondeth not.
Here is a god who soothes tire soul and sense
With sweet nepenthe,—thy Eurydice
Thou wilt not lure to earthly grove nor grot
With suasive eloquence.
Here, nymphs no whit less fair
Are waiting thee, with warm, caressing arms
And loving eyes, lips fit for gods to kiss,
And rosy shoulders, dimpling white and bare,—
Pliant and graceful, with innumerous Charms,
To sate thy heart with bliss.
ORPHEUS.
Hence, thou ignoble throng!
Dare ye profane the splendid purity,
The high nobility of morn, with rites
Lewd and disgusting, and delirious song,
Completing in dear sunshine, shamelessly,
Rude orgies of wild nights?
BACCHANTES.
Ha! he insults the god,
With his presumptuous and impious scorn.
Avenge, O bacchanals, the cause divine;
Compel him with the sacred cup and rod,
To quaff his salutation to the morn,
In frothing, Massic wine!
ORPHEUS.
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Mad bacchanals, begone!
I honor all the gods and Nemesis.
They favor not such frantic revelry,
But blameless lives, and deeds most like their own,
The service of a patient heart submiss,
And staunch integrity.
Behold the morning hills,
Sky-kissed Libethra, delicate as air;
The fragile grasses gray with wreaths of dew.
Hark to the tumbling of the mountain rills
To Eos and Athene your first prayer
And sacrifice are due.
BACCHANTES.
With shameless blasphemy,
He dares proscribe, O god, thy rank and fame.
Enough! enough! he hath despised us long,
Bewailing his beloved Eurydice.
O nymphs, avenge yourselves in Liber's name,
Slay him 'midst dance and song.
Your deadly javelins fling
With flinty missiles at the singer proud,
Who deems himself an equal of the gods,
Because he hath the skill to pipe and sing,
With facile fluency of speech endowed.
Smite him with spears and rods.
ORPHEUS.
Ring forth, my lyre, again,—
With magic harmonies my doom avert,
In tones as plaintive and as rich as life.
BACCHANTES.
Our stones and javelins we have hurled in vain;
His lyre enchants them, he remains unhurt,
'Midst all the wrath and strife.
Toss the loud tambourine,
Its tight-drawn skin with noisy fingers smite;
Clash ye the cymbals, sing with fatal art;
Cast ye his sundered limbs the stream within,—
They irritate us, soft and bare and white;
Rend them, O nymphs, apart.
ORPHEUS.
Sweet Death, deliver me
Out of the reach of envy, lust, and hate;
156
Enfold me in thy large-embracing arms.
BACCHANTES.
Ah! will he now invoke Eurydice,
Madly resisting his allotted fate
With vile, unhallowed charms?
So with a clamorous swell
Of drums and timbrels, we o'erpower the breath
Of dulcet and persuasive melody.
ORPHEUS.
The maniacs conquer! O my lyre, farewell!
Approach, thou beautiful and welcome Death,
With lost Eurydice.
~ Emma Lazarus,
480:Scene. Wrzburg; a garden in the environs. 1512.
Festus, Paracelsus, Michal.
Paracelsus.
Come close to me, dear friends; still closer; thus!
Close to the heart which, though long time roll by
Ere it again beat quicker, pressed to yours,
As now it beatsperchance a long, long time
At least henceforth your memories shall make
Quiet and fragrant as befits their home.
Nor shall my memory want a home in yours
Alas, that it requires too well such free
Forgiving love as shall embalm it there!
For if you would remember me aright,
As I was born to be, you must forget
All fitful strange and moody waywardness
Which e'er confused my better spirit, to dwell
Only on moments such as these, dear friends!
My heart no truer, but my words and ways
More true to it: as Michal, some months hence,
Will say, "this autumn was a pleasant time,"
For some few sunny days; and overlook
Its bleak wind, hankering after pining leaves.
Autumn would fain be sunny; I would look
Liker my nature's truth: and both are frail,
And both beloved, for all our frailty.
Michal.
                     Aureole!
                     Paracelsus.
Drop by drop! she is weeping like a child!
Not so! I am contentmore than content;
Nay, autumn wins you best by this its mute
Appeal to sympathy for its decay:
Look up, sweet Michal, nor esteem the less
Your stained and drooping vines their grapes bow down,
Nor blame those creaking trees bent with their fruit,
That apple-tree with a rare after-birth
Of peeping blooms sprinkled its wealth among!
Then for the windswhat wind that ever raved
Shall vex that ash which overlooks you both,
So proud it wears its berries? Ah, at length,
The old smile meet for her, the lady of this
Sequestered nest!this kingdom, limited
Alone by one old populous green wall
Tenanted by the ever-busy flies,
Grey crickets and shy lizards and quick spiders,
Each family of the silver-threaded moss
Which, look through near, this way, and it appears
A stubble-field or a cane-brake, a marsh
Of bulrush whitening in the sun: laugh now!
Fancy the crickets, each one in his house,
Looking out, wondering at the worldor best,
Yon painted snail with his gay shell of dew,
Travelling to see the glossy balls high up
Hung by the caterpillar, like gold lamps.
Michal.
In truth we have lived carelessly and well.
Paracelsus.
And shall, my perfect pair!each, trust me, born
For the other; nay, your very hair, when mixed,
Is of one hue. For where save in this nook
Shall you two walk, when I am far away,
And wish me prosperous fortune? Stay: that plant
Shall never wave its tangles lightly and softly,
As a queen's languid and imperial arm
Which scatters crowns among her lovers, but you
Shall be reminded to predict to me
Some great success! Ah see, the sun sinks broad
Behind Saint Saviour's: wholly gone, at last!
Festus.
Now, Aureole, stay those wandering eyes awhile!
You are ours to-night, at least; and while you spoke
Of Michal and her tears, I thought that none
Could willing leave what he so seemed to love:
But that last look destroys my dreamthat look
As if, where'er you gazed, there stood a star!
How far was Wrzburg with its church and spire
And garden-walls and all things they contain,
From that look's far alighting?
Paracelsus.
                 I but spoke
And looked alike from simple joy to see
The beings I love best, shut in so well
From all rude chances like to be my lot,
That, when afar, my weary spirit,disposed
To lose awhile its care in soothing thoughts
Of them, their pleasant features, looks and words,
Needs never hesitate, nor apprehend
Encroaching trouble may have reached them too,
Nor have recourse to fancy's busy aid
And fashion even a wish in their behalf
Beyond what they possess already here;
But, unobstructed, may at once forget
Itself in them, assured how well they fare.
Beside, this Festus knows he holds me one
Whom quiet and its charms arrest in vain,
One scarce aware of all the joys I quit,
Too filled with airy hopes to make account
Of soft delights his own heart garners up:
Whereas behold how much our sense of all
That's beauteous proves alike! When Festus learns
That every common pleasure of the world
Affects me as himself; that I have just
As varied appetite for joy derived
From common things; a stake in life, in short,
Like his; a stake which rash pursuit of aims
That life affords not, would as soon destroy;
He may convince himself that, this in view,
I shall act well advised. And last, because,
Though heaven and earth and all things were at stake,
Sweet Michal must not weep, our parting eve.
Festus.
True: and the eve is deepening, and we sit
As little anxious to begin our talk
As though to-morrow I could hint of it
As we paced arm-in-arm the cheerful town
At sun-dawn; or could whisper it by fits
(Trithemius busied with his class the while)
In that dim chamber where the noon-streaks peer
Half-frightened by the awful tomes around;
Or in some grassy lane unbosom all
From even-blush to midnight: but, to-morrow!
Have I full leave to tell my inmost mind?
We have been brothers, and henceforth the world
Will rise between us:all my freest mind?
'T is the last night, dear Aureole!
Paracelsus.
                   Oh, say on!
Devise some test of love, some arduous feat
To be performed for you: say on! If night
Be spent the while, the better! Recall how oft
My wondrous plans and dreams and hopes and fears
Havenever wearied you, oh no!as I
Recall, and never vividly as now,
Your true affection, born when Einsiedeln
And its green hills were all the world to us;
And still increasing to this night which ends
My further stay at Wrzburg. Oh, one day
You shall be very proud! Say on, dear friends!
Festus.
In truth? 'T is for my proper peace, indeed,
Rather than yours; for vain all projects seem
To stay your course: I said my latest hope
Is fading even now. A story tells
Of some far embassy despatched to win
The favour of an eastern king, and how
The gifts they offered proved but dazzling dust
Shed from the ore-beds native to his clime.
Just so, the value of repose and love,
I meant should tempt you, better far than I
You seem to comprehend; and yet desist
No whit from projects where repose nor love
Has part.
Paracelsus.
     Once more? Alas! As I foretold.
     Festus.
A solitary briar the bank puts forth
To save our swan's nest floating out to sea.
Paracelsus.
Dear Festus, hear me. What is it you wish?
That I should lay aside my heart's pursuit,
Abandon the sole ends for which I live,
Reject God's great commission, and so die!
You bid me listen for your true love's sake:
Yet how has grown that love? Even in a long
And patient cherishing of the self-same spirit
It now would quell; as though a mother hoped
To stay the lusty manhood of the child
Once weak upon her knees. I was not born
Informed and fearless from the first, but shrank
From aught which marked me out apart from men:
I would have lived their life, and died their death,
Lost in their ranks, eluding destiny:
But you first guided me through doubt and fear,
Taught me to know mankind and know myself;
And now that I am strong and full of hope,
That, from my soul, I can reject all aims
Save those your earnest words made plain to me,
Now that I touch the brink of my design,
When I would have a triumph in their eyes,
A glad cheer in their voicesMichal weeps,
And Festus ponders gravely!
Festus.
               When you deign
To hear my purpose . . .
Paracelsus.
             Hear it? I can say
Beforehand all this evening's conference!
'T is this way, Michal, that he uses: first,
Or he declares, or I, the leading points
Of our best scheme of life, what is man's end
And what God's will; no two faiths e'er agreed
As his with mine. Next, each of us allows
Faith should be acted on as best we may;
Accordingly, I venture to submit
My plan, in lack of better, for pursuing
The path which God's will seems to authorize.
Well, he discerns much good in it, avows
This motive worthy, that hope plausible,
A danger here to be avoided, there
An oversight to be repaired: in fine
Our two minds go togetherall the good
Approved by him, I gladly recognize,
All he counts bad, I thankfully discard,
And nought forbids my looking up at last
For some stray comfort in his cautious brow.
When, lo! I learn that, spite of all, there lurks
Some innate and inexplicable germ
Of failure in my scheme; so that at last
It all amounts to thisthe sovereign proof
That we devote ourselves to God, is seen
In living just as though no God there were;
A life which, prompted by the sad and blind
Folly of man, Festus abhors the most;
But which these tenets sanctify at once,
Though to less subtle wits it seems the same,
Consider it how they may.
Michal.
             Is it so, Festus
He speaks so calmly and kindly: is it so?
Paracelsus.
Reject those glorious visions of God's love
And man's design; laugh loud that God should send
Vast longings to direct us; say how soon
Power satiates these, or lust, or gold; I know
The world's cry well, and how to answer it.
But this ambiguous warfare . . .
Festus.
                 . . . Wearies so
That you will grant no last leave to your friend
To urge it?for his sake, not yours? I wish
To send my soul in good hopes after you;
Never to sorrow that uncertain words
Erringly apprehended, a new creed
Ill understood, begot rash trust in you,
Had share in your undoing.
Paracelsus.
              Choose your side,
Hold or renounce: but meanwhile blame me not
Because I dare to act on your own views,
Nor shrink when they point onward, nor espy
A peril where they most ensure success.
Festus.
Prove that to mebut that! Prove you abide
Within their warrant, nor presumptuous boast
God's labour laid on you; prove, all you covet
A mortal may expect; and, most of all,
Prove the strange course you now affect, will lead
To its attainmentand I bid you speed,
Nay, count the minutes till you venture forth!
You smile; but I had gathered from slow thought
Much musing on the fortunes of my friend
Matter I deemed could not be urged in vain;
But it all leaves me at my need: in shreds
And fragments I must venture what remains.
Michal.
Ask at once, Festus, wherefore he should scorn . . .
Festus.
Stay, Michal: Aureole, I speak guardedly
And gravely, knowing well, whate'er your error,
This is no ill-considered choice of yours,
No sudden fancy of an ardent boy.
Not from your own confiding words alone
Am I aware your passionate heart long since
Gave birth to, nourished and at length matures
This scheme. I will not speak of Einsiedeln,
Where I was born your elder by some years
Only to watch you fully from the first:
In all beside, our mutual tasks were fixed
Even then't was mine to have you in my view
As you had your own soul and those intents
Which filled it when, to crown your dearest wish,
With a tumultuous heart, you left with me
Our childhood's home to join the favoured few
Whom, here, Trithemius condescends to teach
A portion of his lore: and not one youth
Of those so favoured, whom you now despise,
Came earnest as you came, resolved, like you,
To grasp all, and retain all, and deserve
By patient toil a wide renown like his.
Now, this new ardour which supplants the old
I watched, too; 't was significant and strange,
In one matched to his soul's content at length
With rivals in the search for wisdom's prize,
To see the sudden pause, the total change;
From contest, the transition to repose
From pressing onward as his fellows pressed,
To a blank idleness, yet most unlike
The dull stagnation of a soul, content,
Once foiled, to leave betimes a thriveless quest.
That careless bearing, free from all pretence
Even of contempt for what it ceased to seek
Smiling humility, praising much, yet waiving
What it professed to praisethough not so well
Maintained but that rare outbreaks, fierce and brief,
Revealed the hidden scorn, as quickly curbed.
That ostentatious show of past defeat,
That ready acquiescence in contempt,
I deemed no other than the letting go
His shivered sword, of one about to spring
Upon his foe's throat; but it was not thus:
Not that way looked your brooding purpose then.
For after-signs disclosed, what you confirmed,
That you prepared to task to the uttermost
Your strength, in furtherance of a certain aim
Whichwhile it bore the name your rivals gave
Their own most puny effortswas so vast
In scope that it included their best flights,
Combined them, and desired to gain one prize
In place of many,the secret of the world,
Of man, and man's true purpose, path and fate.
That you, not nursing as a mere vague dream
This purpose, with the sages of the past,
Have struck upon a way to this, if all
You trust be true, which following, heart and soul,
You, if a man may, dare aspire to know:
And that this aim shall differ from a host
Of aims alike in character and kind,
Mostly in this,that in itself alone
Shall its reward be, not an alien end
Blending therewith; no hope nor fear nor joy
Nor woe, to elsewhere move you, but this pure
Devotion to sustain you or betray:
Thus you aspire.
Paracelsus.
         You shall not state it thus:
I should not differ from the dreamy crew
You speak of. I profess no other share
In the selection of my lot, than this
My ready answer to the will of God
Who summons me to be his organ. All
Whose innate strength supports them shall succeed
No better than the sages.
Festus.
             Such the aim, then,
God sets before you; and't is doubtless need
That he appoint no less the way of praise
Than the desire to praise; for, though I hold
With you, the setting forth such praise to be
The natural end and service of a man,
And hold such praise is best attained when man
Attains the general welfare of his kind
Yet this, the end, is not the instrument.
Presume not to serve God apart from such
Appointed channel as he wills shall gather
Imperfect tributes, for that sole obedience
Valued perchance! He seeks not that his altars
Blaze, careless how, so that they do but blaze.
Suppose this, then; that God selected you
To know (heed well your answers, for my faith
Shall meet implicitly what they affirm)
I cannot think you dare annex to such
Selection aught beyond a steadfast will,
An intense hope; nor let your gifts create
Scorn or neglect of ordinary means
Conducive to success, make destiny
Dispense with man's endeavour. Now, dare you search
Your inmost heart, and candidly avow
Whether you have not rather wild desire
For this distinction than security
Of its existence? whether you discern
The path to the fulfilment of your purpose
Clear as that purposeand again, that purpose
Clear as your yearning to be singled out
For its pursuer. Dare you answer this?
Paracelsus
[after a pause].
No, I have nought to fear! Who will may know
The secret'st workings of my soul. What though
It be so?if indeed the strong desire
Eclipse the aim in me?if splendour break
Upon the outset of my path alone,
And duskest shade succeed? What fairer seal
Shall I require to my authentic mission
Than this fierce energy?this instinct striving
Because its nature is to strive?enticed
By the security of no broad course,
Without success forever in its eyes!
How know I else such glorious fate my own,
But in the restless irresistible force
That works within me? Is it for human will
To institute such impulses?still less,
To disregard their promptings! What should I
Do, kept among you all; your loves, your cares,
Your lifeall to be mine? Be sure that God
Ne'er dooms to waste the strength he deigns impart!
Ask the geier-eagle why she stoops at once
Into the vast and unexplored abyss,
What full-grown power informs her from the first,
Why she not marvels, strenuously beating
The silent boundless regions of the sky!
Be sure they sleep not whom God needs! Nor fear
Their holding light his charge, when every hour
That finds that charge delayed, is a new death.
This for the faith in which I trust; and hence
I can abjure so well the idle arts
These pedants strive to learn and teach; Black Arts,
Great Works, the Secret and Sublime, forsooth
Let others prize: too intimate a tie
Connects me with our God! A sullen fiend
To do my bidding, fallen and hateful sprites
To help mewhat are these, at best, beside
God helping, God directing everywhere,
So that the earth shall yield her secrets up,
And every object there be charged to strike,
Teach, gratify her master God appoints?
And I am young, my Festus, happy and free!
I can devote myself; I have a life
To give; I, singled out for this, the One!
Think, think! the wide East, where all Wisdom sprung;
The bright South, where she dwelt; the hopeful North,
All are passed o'erit lights on me! 'T is time
New hopes should animate the world, new light
Should dawn from new revealings to a race
Weighed down so long, forgotten so long; thus shall
The heaven reserved for us at last receive
Creatures whom no unwonted splendours blind,
But ardent to confront the unclouded blaze.
Whose beams not seldom blessed their pilgrimage,
Not seldom glorified their life below.
Festus.
My words have their old fate and make faint stand
Against your glowing periods. Call this, truth
Why not pursue it in a fast retreat,
Some one of Learning's many palaces,
After approved example?seeking there
Calm converse with the great dead, soul to soul,
Who laid up treasure with the like intent
So lift yourself into their airy place,
And fill out full their unfulfilled careers,
Unravelling the knots their baffled skill
Pronounced inextricable, true!but left
Far less confused. A fresh eye, a fresh hand,
Might do much at their vigour's waning-point;
Succeeding with new-breathed new-hearted force,
As at old games the runner snatched the torch
From runner still: this way success might be.
But you have coupled with your enterprise,
An arbitrary self-repugnant scheme
Of seeking it in strange and untried paths.
What books are in the desert? Writes the sea
The secret of her yearning in vast caves
Where yours will fall the first of human feet?
Has wisdom sat there and recorded aught
You press to read? Why turn aside from her
To visit, where her vesture never glanced,
Nowsolitudes consigned to barrenness
By God's decree, which who shall dare impugn?
Nowruins where she paused but would not stay,
Old ravaged cities that, renouncing her,
She called an endless curse on, so it came:
Or worst of all, nowmen you visit, men,
Ignoblest troops who never heard her voice
Or hate it, men without one gift from Rome
Or Athens,these shall Aureole's teachers be!
Rejecting past example, practice, precept,
Aidless'mid these he thinks to stand alone:
Thick like a glory round the Stagirite
Your rivals throng, the sages: here stand you!
Whatever you may protest, knowledge is not
Paramount in your love; or for her sake
You would collect all help from every source
Rival, assistant, friend, foe, all would merge
In the broad class of those who showed her haunts,
And those who showed them not.
Paracelsus.
                What shall I say?
Festus, from childhood I have been possessed
By a fireby a true fire, or faint or fierce,
As from without some master, so it seemed,
Repressed or urged its current: this but ill
Expresses what would I convey: but rather
I will believe an angel ruled me thus,
Than that my soul's own workings, own high nature,
So became manifest. I knew not then
What whispered in the evening, and spoke out
At midnight. If some mortal, born too soon,
Were laid away in some great trancethe ages
Coming and going all the whiletill dawned
His true time's advent; and could then record
The words they spoke who kept watch by his bed,
Then I might tell more of the breath so light
Upon my eyelids, and the fingers light
Among my hair. Youth is confused; yet never
So dull was I but, when that spirit passed,
I turned to him, scarce consciously, as turns
A water-snake when fairies cross his sleep.
And having this within me and about me
While Einsiedeln, its mountains, lakes and woods
Confined mewhat oppressive joy was mine
When life grew plain, and I first viewed the thronged,
The everlasting concourse of mankind!
Believe that ere I joined them, ere I knew
The purpose of the pageant, or the place
Consigned me in its rankswhile, just awake,
Wonder was freshest and delight most pure
'T was then that least supportable appeared
A station with the brightest of the crowd,
A portion with the proudest of them all.
And from the tumult in my breast, this only
Could I collect, that I must thenceforth die
Or elevate myself far, far above
The gorgeous spectacle. I seemed to long
At once to trample on, yet save mankind,
To make some unexampled sacrifice
In their behalf, to wring some wondrous good
From heaven or earth for them, to perish, winning
Eternal weal in the act: as who should dare
Pluck out the angry thunder from its cloud,
That, all its gathered flame discharged on him,
No storm might threaten summer's azure sleep:
Yet never to be mixed with men so much
As to have part even in my own work, share
In my own largess. Once the feat achieved,
I would withdraw from their officious praise,
Would gently put aside their profuse thanks.
Like some knight traversing a wilderness,
Who, on his way, may chance to free a tribe
Of desert-people from their dragon-foe;
When all the swarthy race press round to kiss
His feet, and choose him for their king, and yield
Their poor tents, pitched among the sand-hills, for
His realm: and he points, smiling, to his scarf
Heavy with riveled gold, his burgonet
Gay set with twinkling stonesand to the East,
Where these must be displayed!
Festus.
                Good: let us hear
No more about your nature, "which first shrank
"From all that marked you out apart from men!"
Paracelsus.
I touch on that; these words but analyse
The first mad impulse: 't was as brief as fond,
For as I gazed again upon the show,
I soon distinguished here and there a shape
Palm-wreathed and radiant, forehead and full eye.
Well pleased was I their state should thus at once
Interpret my own thoughts:"Behold the clue
"To all," I rashly said, "and what I pine
"To do, these have accomplished: we are peers.
"They know and therefore rule: I, too, will know!"
You were beside me, Festus, as you say;
You saw me plunge in their pursuits whom fame
Is lavish to attest the lords of mind,
Not pausing to make sure the prize in view
Would satiate my cravings when obtained,
But since they strove I strove. Then came a slow
And strangling failure. We aspired alike,
Yet not the meanest plodder, Tritheim counts
A marvel, but was all-sufficient, strong,
Or staggered only at his own vast wits;
While I was restless, nothing satisfied,
Distrustful, most perplexed. I would slur over
That struggle; suffice it, that I loathed myself
As weak compared with them, yet felt somehow
A mighty power was brooding, taking shape
Within me; and this lasted till one night
When, as I sat revolving it and more,
A still voice from without said"Seest thou not,
"Desponding child, whence spring defeat and loss?
"Even from thy strength. Consider: hast thou gazed
"Presumptuously on wisdom's countenance,
"No veil between; and can thy faltering hands,
"Unguided by the brain the sight absorbs,
"Pursue their task as earnest blinkers do
"Whom radiance ne'er distracted? Live their life
"If thou wouldst share their fortune, choose their eyes
"Unfed by splendour. Let each task present
"Its petty good to thee. Waste not thy gifts
"In profitless waiting for the gods' descent,
"But have some idol of thine own to dress
"With their array. Know, not for knowing's sake,
"But to become a star to men for ever;
"Know, for the gain it gets, the praise it brings,
"The wonder it inspires, the love it breeds:
"Look one step onward, and secure that step!"
And I smiled as one never smiles but once,
Then first discovering my own aim's extent,
Which sought to comprehend the works of God,
And God himself, and all God's intercourse
With the human mind; I understood, no less,
My fellows' studies, whose true worth I saw,
But smiled not, well aware who stood by me.
And softer came the voice"There is a way:
"'T is hard for flesh to tread therein, imbued
"With frailtyhopeless, if indulgence first
"Have ripened inborn germs of sin to strength:
"Wilt thou adventure for my sake and man's,
"Apart from all reward?" And last it breathed
"Be happy, my good soldier; I am by thee,
"Be sure, even to the end!"I answered not,
Knowing him. As he spoke, I was endued
With comprehension and a steadfast will;
And when he ceased, my brow was sealed his own.
If there took place no special change in me,
How comes it all things wore a different hue
Thenceforward?pregnant with vast consequence,
Teeming with grand result, loaded with fate?
So that when, quailing at the mighty range
Of secret truths which yearn for birth, I haste
To contemplate undazzled some one truth,
Its bearings and effects aloneat once
What was a speck expands into a star,
Asking a life to pass exploring thus,
Till I near craze. I go to prove my soul!
I see my way as birds their trackless way.
I shall arrive! what time, what circuit first,
I ask not: but unless God send his hail
Or blinding fireballs, sleet or stifling snow,
In some time, his good time, I shall arrive:
He guides me and the bird. In his good time!
Michal.
Vex him no further, Festus; it is so!
Festus.
Just thus you help me ever. This would hold
Were it the trackless air, and not a path
Inviting you, distinct with footprints yet
Of many a mighty marcher gone that way.
You may have purer views than theirs, perhaps,
But they were famous in their daythe proofs
Remain. At least accept the light they lend.
Paracelsus.
Their light! the sum of all is briefly this:
They laboured and grew famous, and the fruits
Are best seen in a dark and groaning earth
Given over to a blind and endless strife
With evils, what of all their lore abates?
No; I reject and spurn them utterly
And all they teach. Shall I still sit beside
Their dry wells, with a white lip and filmed eye,
While in the distance heaven is blue above
Mountains where sleep the unsunned tarns?
Festus.
                      And yet
As strong delusions have prevailed ere now.
Men have set out as gallantly to seek
Their ruin. I have heard of such: yourself
Avow all hitherto have failed and fallen.
Michal.
Nay, Festus, when but as the pilgrims faint
Through the drear way, do you expect to see
Their city dawn amid the clouds afar?
Paracelsus.
Ay, sounds it not like some old well-known tale?
For me, I estimate their works and them
So rightly, that at times I almost dream
I too have spent a life the sages' way,
And tread once more familiar paths. Perchance
I perished in an arrogant self-reliance
Ages ago; and in that act, a prayer
For one more chance went up so earnest, so
Instinct with better light let in by death,
That life was blotted outnot so completely
But scattered wrecks enough of it remain,
Dim memories, as now, when once more seems
The goal in sight again. All which, indeed,
Is foolish, and only meansthe flesh I wear,
The earth I tread, are not more clear to me
Than my belief, explained to you or no.
Festus.
And who am I, to challenge and dispute
That clear belief? I will divest all fear.
Michal.
Then Aureole is God's commissary! he shall
Be great and grandand all for us!
Paracelsus.
                   No, sweet!
Not great and grand. If I can serve mankind
'T is well; but there our intercourse must end:
I never will be served by those I serve.
Festus.
Look well to this; here is a plague-spot, here,
Disguise it how you may! 'T is true, you utter
This scorn while by our side and loving us;
'T is but a spot as yet: but it will break
Into a hideous blotch if overlooked.
How can that course be safe which from the first
Produces carelessness to human love?
It seems you have abjured the helps which men
Who overpass their kind, as you would do,
Have humbly sought; I dare not thoroughly probe
This matter, lest I learn too much. Let be
That popular praise would little instigate
Your efforts, nor particular approval
Reward you; put reward aside; alone
You shall go forth upon your arduous task,
None shall assist you, none partake your toil,
None share your triumph: still you must retain
Some one to cast your glory on, to share
Your rapture with. Were I elect like you,
I would encircle me with love, and raise
A rampart of my fellows; it should seem
Impossible for me to fail, so watched
By gentle friends who made my cause their own.
They should ward off fate's envythe great gift,
Extravagant when claimed by me alone,
Being so a gift to them as well as me.
If danger daunted me or ease seduced,
How calmly their sad eyes should gaze reproach!
Michal.
O Aureole, can I sing when all alone,
Without first calling, in my fancy, both
To listen by my sideeven I! And you?
Do you not feel this? Say that you feel this!
Paracelsus.
I feel't is pleasant that my aims, at length
Allowed their weight, should be supposed to need
A further strengthening in these goodly helps!
My course allures for its own sake, its sole
Intrinsic worth; and ne'er shall boat of mine
Adventure forth for gold and apes at once.
Your sages say, "if human, therefore weak:"
If weak, more need to give myself entire
To my pursuit; and by its side, all else . . .
No matter! I deny myself but little
In waiving all assistance save its own.
Would there were some real sacrifice to make!
Your friends the sages threw their joys away,
While I must be content with keeping mine.
Festus.
But do not cut yourself from human weal!
You cannot thrivea man that dares affect
To spend his life in service to his kind
For no reward of theirs, unbound to them
By any tie; nor do so, Aureole! No
There are strange punishments for such. Give up
(Although no visible good flow thence) some part
Of the glory to another; hiding thus,
Even from yourself, that all is for yourself.
Say, say almost to God"I have done all
"For her, not for myself!"
Paracelsus.
              And who but lately
Was to rejoice in my success like you?
Whom should I love but both of you?
Festus.
                   I know not:
But know this, you, that't is no will of mine
You should abjure the lofty claims you make;
And this the causeI can no longer seek
To overlook the truth, that there would be
A monstrous spectacle upon the earth,
Beneath the pleasant sun, among the trees:
A being knowing not what love is. Hear me!
You are endowed with faculties which bear
Annexed to them as't were a dispensation
To summon meaner spirits to do their will
And gather round them at their need; inspiring
Such with a love themselves can never feel,
Passionless'mid their passionate votaries.
I know not if you joy in this or no,
Or ever dream that common men can live
On objects you prize lightly, but which make
Their heart's sole treasure: the affections seem
Beauteous at most to you, which we must taste
Or die: and this strange quality accords,
I know not how, with you; sits well upon
That luminous brow, though in another it scowls
An eating brand, a shame. I dare not judge you.
The rules of right and wrong thus set aside,
There's no alternativeI own you one
Of higher order, under other laws
Than bind us; therefore, curb not one bold glance!
'T is best aspire. Once mingled with us all . . .
Michal.
Stay with us, Aureole! cast those hopes away,
And stay with us! An angel warns me, too,
Man should be humble; you are very proud:
And God, dethroned, has doleful plagues for such!
Warns me to have in dread no quick repulse,
No slow defeat, but a complete success:
You will find all you seek, and perish so!
Paracelsus
[after a pause].
Are these the barren firstfruits of my quest?
Is love like this the natural lot of all?
How many years of pain might one such hour
O'erbalance? Dearest Michal, dearest Festus,
What shall I say, if not that I desire
To justify your love; and will, dear friends,
In swerving nothing from my first resolves.
See, the great moon! and ere the mottled owls
Were wide awake, I was to go. It seems
You acquiesce at last in all save this
If I am like to compass what I seek
By the untried career I choose; and then,
If that career, making but small account
Of much of life's delight, will yet retain
Sufficient to sustain my soul: for thus
I understand these fond fears just expressed.
And first; the lore you praise and I neglect,
The labours and the precepts of old time,
I have not lightly disesteemed. But, friends,
Truth is within ourselves; it takes no rise
From outward things, whate'er you may believe.
There is an inmost centre in us all,
Where truth abides in fulness; and around,
Wall upon wall, the gross flesh hems it in,
This perfect, clear perceptionwhich is truth.
A baffling and perverting carnal mesh
Binds it, and makes all error: and to know
Rather consists in opening out a way
Whence the imprisoned splendour may escape,
Than in effecting entry for a light
Supposed to be without. Watch narrowly
The demonstration of a truth, its birth,
And you trace back the effluence to its spring
And source within us; where broods radiance vast,
To be elicited ray by ray, as chance
Shall favour: chancefor hitherto, your sage
Even as he knows not how those beams are born,
As little knows he what unlocks their fount:
And men have oft grown old among their books
To die case-hardened in their ignorance,
Whose careless youth had promised what long years
Of unremitted labour ne'er performed:
While, contrary, it has chanced some idle day,
To autumn loiterers just as fancy-free
As the midges in the sun, gives birth at last
To truthproduced mysteriously as cape
Of cloud grown out of the invisible air.
Hence, may not truth be lodged alike in all,
The lowest as the highest? some slight film
The interposing bar which binds a soul
And makes the idiot, just as makes the sage
Some film removed, the happy outlet whence
Truth issues proudly? See this soul of ours!
How it strives weakly in the child, is loosed
In manhood, clogged by sickness, back compelled
By age and waste, set free at last by death:
Why is it, flesh enthrals it or enthrones?
What is this flesh we have to penetrate?
Oh, not alone when life flows still, do truth
And power emerge, but also when strange chance
Ruffles its current; in unused conjuncture,
When sickness breaks the bodyhunger, watching,
Excess or languoroftenest death's approach,
Peril, deep joy or woe. One man shall crawl
Through life surrounded with all stirring things,
Unmoved; and he goes mad: and from the wreck
Of what he was, by his wild talk alone,
You first collect how great a spirit he hid.
Therefore, set free the soul alike in all,
Discovering the true laws by which the flesh
Accloys the spirit! We may not be doomed
To cope with seraphs, but at least the rest
Shall cope with us. Make no more giants, God,
But elevate the race at once! We ask
To put forth just our strength, our human strength,
All starting fairly, all equipped alike,
Gifted alike, all eagle-eyed, true-hearted
See if we cannot beat thine angels yet!
Such is my task. I go to gather this
The sacred knowledge, here and there dispersed
About the world, long lost or never found.
And why should I be sad or lorn of hope?
Why ever make man's good distinct from God's,
Or, finding they are one, why dare mistrust?
Who shall succeed if not one pledged like me?
Mine is no mad attempt to build a world
Apart from his, like those who set themselves
To find the nature of the spirit they bore,
And, taught betimes that all their gorgeous dreams
Were only born to vanish in this life,
Refused to fit them to its narrow sphere,
But chose to figure forth another world
And other frames meet for their vast desires,
And all a dream! Thus was life scorned; but life
Shall yet be crowned: twine amaranth! I am priest!
And all for yielding with a lively spirit
A poor existence, parting with a youth
Like those who squander every energy
Convertible to good, on painted toys,
Breath-bubbles, gilded dust! And though I spurn
All adventitious aims, from empty praise
To love's award, yet whoso deems such helps
Important, and concerns himself for me,
May know even these will follow with the rest
As in the steady rolling Mayne, asleep
Yonder, is mixed its mass of schistous ore.
My own affections laid to rest awhile,
Will waken purified, subdued alone
By all I have achieved. Till thentill then . . .
Ah, the time-wiling loitering of a page
Through bower and over lawn, till eve shall bring
The stately lady's presence whom he loves
The broken sleep of the fisher whose rough coat
Enwraps the queenly pearlthese are faint types!
See, see, they look on me: I triumph now!
But one thing, Festus, Michal! I have told
All I shall e'er disclose to mortal: say
Do you believe I shall accomplish this?
Festus.
I do believe!
Michal.
       I ever did believe!
       Paracelsus.
Those words shall never fade from out my brain!
This earnest of the end shall never fade!
Are there not, Festus, are there not, dear Michal,
Two points in the adventure of the diver,
Onewhen, a beggar, he prepares to plunge,
Onewhen, a prince, he rises with his pearl?
Festus, I plunge!
Festus.
         We wait you when you rise!


~ Robert Browning, Paracelsus - Part I - Paracelsus Aspires
,
481:Pauline, A Fragment of a Question
Plus ne suis ce que j'ai t,
Et ne le saurois jamais tre.
Marot.

Non dubito, quin titulus libri nostri raritate sua quamplurimos alliciat ad legendum: inter quos nonnulli obliqu opinionis, mente languidi, multi etiam maligni, et in ingenium nostrum ingrati accedent, qui temeraria sua ignorantia, vix conspecto titulo clamabunt Nos vetita docere, hresium semina jacere: piis auribus offendiculo, prclaris ingeniis scandalo esse: . . . . adeo conscienti su consulentes, ut nec Apollo, nec Mus omnes, neque Angelus de coelo me ab illorum execratione vindicare queant: quibus et ego nunc consulo, ne scripta nostra legant, nec intelligant, nec meminerint: nam noxia sunt, venenosa sunt: Acherontis ostium est in hoc libro, lapides loquitur, caveant, ne cerebrum illis excutiat. Vos autem, qui qua mente ad legendum venitis, si tantam prudenti discretionem adhibueritis, quantam in melle legendo apes, jam securi legite. Puto namque vos et utilitatis haud parum et voluptatis plurimum accepturos. Quod si qua repereritis, qu vobis non placeant, mittite illa, nec utimini. Nam et ego vobis illa non Probo, sed Narro. Ctera tamen propterea non respuite . . . . . Ideo, si quid liberius dictum sit, ignoscite adolescenti nostr, qui minor quam adolescens hoc opus composui.

Hen. Corn. Agrippa, De Occult. Philosoph. in Prfat.
London: January 1833.V. A. XX .

1833.

Pauline, mine own, bend o'er methy soft breast
Shall pant to minebend o'er methy sweet eyes,
And loosened hair and breathing lips, and arms
Drawing me to theethese build up a screen
To shut me in with thee, and from all fear;
So that I might unlock the sleepless brood
Of fancies from my soul, their lurking-place,
Nor doubt that each would pass, ne'er to return
To one so watched, so loved and so secured.
But what can guard thee but thy naked love?
Ah dearest, whoso sucks a poisoned wound
Envenoms his own veins! Thou art so good,
So calmif thou shouldst wear a brow less light
For some wild thought which, but for me, were kept
From out thy soul as from a sacred star!
Yet till I have unlocked them it were vain
To hope to sing; some woe would light on me;
Nature would point at one whose quivering lip
Was bathed in her enchantments, whose brow burned
Beneath the crown to which her secrets knelt,
Who learned the spell which can call up the dead,
And then departed smiling like a fiend
Who has deceived God,if such one should seek
Again her altars and stand robed and crowned
Amid the faithful! Sad confession first,
Remorse and pardon and old claims renewed,
Ere I can beas I shall be no more.
I had been spared this shame if I had sat
By thee for ever from the first, in place
Of my wild dreams of beauty and of good,
Or with them, as an earnest of their truth:
No thought nor hope having been shut from thee,
No vague wish unexplained, no wandering aim
Sent back to bind on fancy's wings and seek
Some strange fair world where it might be a law;
But, doubting nothing, had been led by thee,
Thro' youth, and saved, as one at length awaked
Who has slept through a peril. Ah vain, vain!
Thou lovest me; the past is in its grave
Tho' its ghost haunts us; still this much is ours,
To cast away restraint, lest a worse thing
Wait for us in the dark. Thou lovest me;
And thou art to receive not love but faith,
For which thou wilt be mine, and smile and take
All shapes and shames, and veil without a fear
That form which music follows like a slave:
And I look to thee and I trust in thee,
As in a Northern night one looks alway
Unto the East for morn and spring and joy.
Thou seest then my aimless, hopeless state,
And, resting on some few old feelings won
Back by thy beauty, wouldst that I essay
The task which was to me what now thou art:
And why should I conceal one weakness more?
Thou wilt remember one warm morn when winter
Crept aged from the earth, and spring's first breath
Blew soft from the moist hills; the black-thorn boughs,
So dark in the bare wood, when glistening
In the sunshine were white with coming buds,
Like the bright side of a sorrow, and the banks
Had violets opening from sleep like eyes.
I walked with thee who knew'st not a deep shame
Lurked beneath smiles and careless words which sought
To hide it till they wandered and were mute,
As we stood listening on a sunny mound
To the wind murmuring in the damp copse,
Like heavy breathings of some hidden thing
Betrayed by sleep; until the feeling rushed
That I was low indeed, yet not so low
As to endure the calmness of thine eyes.
And so I told thee all, while the cool breast
I leaned on altered not its quiet beating:
And long ere words like a hurt bird's complaint
Bade me look up and be what I had been,
I felt despair could never live by thee:
Thou wilt remember. Thou art not more dear
Than song was once to me; and I ne'er sung
But as one entering bright halls where all
Will rise and shout for him: sure I must own
That I am fallen, having chosen gifts
Distinct from theirsthat I am sad and fain
Would give up all to be but where I was,
Not high as I had been if faithful found,
But low and weak yet full of hope, and sure
Of goodness as of lifethat I would lose
All this gay mastery of mind, to sit
Once more with them, trusting in truth and love
And with an aimnot being what I am.
Oh Pauline, I am ruined who believed
That though my soul had floated from its sphere
Of wild dominion into the dim orb
Of selfthat it was strong and free as ever!
It has conformed itself to that dim orb,
Reflecting all its shades and shapes, and now
Must stay where it alone can be adored.
I have felt this in dreamsin dreams in which
I seemed the fate from which I fled; I felt
A strange delight in causing my decay.
I was a fiend in darkness chained for ever
Within some ocean-cave; and ages rolled,
Till through the cleft rock, like a moonbeam, came
A white swan to remain with me; and ages
Rolled, yet I tired not of my first free joy
In gazing on the peace of its pure wings:
And then I said "It is most fair to me,
"Yet its soft wings must sure have suffered change
"From the thick darkness, sure its eyes are dim,
"Its silver pinions must be cramped and numbed
"With sleeping ages here; it cannot leave me,
"For it would seem, in light beside its kind,
"Withered, tho' here to me most beautiful."
And then I was a young witch whose blue eyes,
As she stood naked by the river springs,
Drew down a god: I watched his radiant form
Growing less radiant, and it gladdened me;
Till one morn, as he sat in the sunshine
Upon my knees, singing to me of heaven,
He turned to look at me, ere I could lose
The grin with which I viewed his perishing:
And he shrieked and departed and sat long
By his deserted throne, but sunk at last
Murmuring, as I kissed his lips and curled
Around him, "I am still a godto thee."
Still I can lay my soul bare in its fall,
Since all the wandering and all the weakness
Will be a saddest comment on the song:
And if, that done, I can be young again,
I will give up all gained, as willingly
As one gives up a charm which shuts him out
From hope or part or care in human kind.
As life wanes, all its care and strife and toil
Seem strangely valueless, while the old trees
Which grew by our youth's home, the waving mass
Of climbing plants heavy with bloom and dew,
The morning swallows with their songs like words,
All these seem clear and only worth our thoughts:
So, aught connected with my early life,
My rude songs or my wild imaginings,
How I look on themmost distinct amid
The fever and the stir of after years!
I ne'er had ventured e'en to hope for this,
Had not the glow I felt at His award,
Assured me all was not extinct within:
His whom all honour, whose renown springs up
Like sunlight which will visit all the world,
So that e'en they who sneered at him at first,
Come out to it, as some dark spider crawls
From his foul nets which some lit torch invades,
Yet spinning still new films for his retreat.
Thou didst smile, poet, but can we forgive?
Sun-treader, life and light be thine for ever!
Thou art gone from us; years go by and spring
Gladdens and the young earth is beautiful,
Yet thy songs come not, other bards arise,
But none like thee: they stand, thy majesties,
Like mighty works which tell some spirit there
Hath sat regardless of neglect and scorn,
Till, its long task completed, it hath risen
And left us, never to return, and all
Rush in to peer and praise when all in vain.
The air seems bright with thy past presence yet,
But thou art still for me as thou hast been
When I have stood with thee as on a throne
With all thy dim creations gathered round
Like mountains, and I felt of mould like them,
And with them creatures of my own were mixed,
Like things half-lived, catching and giving life.
But thou art still for me who have adored
Tho' single, panting but to hear thy name
Which I believed a spell to me alone,
Scarce deeming thou wast as a star to men!
As one should worship long a sacred spring
Scarce worth a moth's flitting, which long grasses cross,
And one small tree embowers droopingly
Joying to see some wandering insect won
To live in its few rushes, or some locust
To pasture on its boughs, or some wild bird
Stoop for its freshness from the trackless air:
And then should find it but the fountain-head,
Long lost, of some great river washing towns
And towers, and seeing old woods which will live
But by its banks untrod of human foot,
Which, when the great sun sinks, lie quivering
In light as some thing lieth half of life
Before God's foot, waiting a wondrous change;
Then girt with rocks which seek to turn or stay
Its course in vain, for it does ever spread
Like a sea's arm as it goes rolling on,
Being the pulse of some great countryso
Wast thou to me, and art thou to the world!
And I, perchance, half feel a strange regret
That I am not what I have been to thee:
Like a girl one has silently loved long
In her first loneliness in some retreat,
When, late emerged, all gaze and glow to view
Her fresh eyes and soft hair and lips which bloom
Like a mountain berry: doubtless it is sweet
To see her thus adored, but there have been
Moments when all the world was in our praise,
Sweeter than any pride of after hours.
Yet, sun-treader, all hail! From my heart's heart
I bid thee hail! E'en in my wildest dreams,
I proudly feel I would have thrown to dust
The wreaths of fame which seemed o'erhanging me,
To see thee for a moment as thou art.
And if thou livest, if thou lovest, spirit!
Remember me who set this final seal
To wandering thoughtthat one so pure as thou
Could never die. Remember me who flung
All honour from my soul, yet paused and said
"There is one spark of love remaining yet,
"For I have nought in common with him, shapes
"Which followed him avoid me, and foul forms
"Seek me, which ne'er could fasten on his mind;
"And though I feel how low I am to him,
"Yet I aim not even to catch a tone
"Of harmonies he called profusely up;
"So, one gleam still remains, although the last."
Remember me who praise thee e'en with tears,
For never more shall I walk calm with thee;
Thy sweet imaginings are as an air,
A melody some wondrous singer sings,
Which, though it haunt men oft in the still eve,
They dream not to essay; yet it no less
But more is honoured. I was thine in shame,
And now when all thy proud renown is out,
I am a watcher whose eyes have grown dim
With looking for some star which breaks on him
Altered and worn and weak and full of tears.
Autumn has come like spring returned to us,
Won from her girlishness; like one returned
A friend that was a lover, nor forgets
The first warm love, but full of sober thoughts
Of fading years; whose soft mouth quivers yet
With the old smile, but yet so changed and still!
And here am I the scoffer, who have probed
Life's vanity, won by a word again
Into my own lifeby one little word
Of this sweet friend who lives in loving me,
Lives strangely on my thoughts and looks and words,
As fathoms down some nameless ocean thing
Its silent course of quietness and joy.
O dearest, if indeed I tell the past,
May'st thou forget it as a sad sick dream!
Or if it lingermy lost soul too soon
Sinks to itself and whispers we shall be
But closer linked, two creatures whom the earth
Bears singly, with strange feelings unrevealed
Save to each other; or two lonely things
Created by some power whose reign is done,
Having no part in God or his bright world.
I am to sing whilst ebbing day dies soft,
As a lean scholar dies worn o'er his book,
And in the heaven stars steal out one by one
As hunted men steal to their mountain watch.
I must not think, lest this new impulse die
In which I trust; I have no confidence:
So, I will sing on fast as fancies come;
Rudely, the verse being as the mood it paints
I strip my mind bare, whose first elements
I shall unveilnot as they struggled forth
In infancy, nor as they now exist,
When I am grown above them and can rule
But in that middle stage when they were full
Yet ere I had disposed them to my will;
And then I shall show how these elements
Produced my present state, and what it is.
I am made up of an intensest life,
Of a most clear idea of consciousness
Of self, distinct from all its qualities,
From all affections, passions, feelings, powers;
And thus far it exists, if tracked, in all:
But linked, in me, to self-supremacy,
Existing as a centre to all things,
Most potent to create and rule and call
Upon all things to minister to it;
And to a principle of restlessness
Which would be all, have, see, know, taste, feel, all
This is myself; and I should thus have been
Though gifted lower than the meanest soul.
And of my powers, one springs up to save
From utter death a soul with such desire
Confined to clayof powers the only one
Which marks mean imagination which
Has been a very angel, coming not
In fitful visions but beside me ever
And never failing me; so, though my mind
Forgets not, not a shred of life forgets,
Yet I can take a secret pride in calling
The dark past up to quell it regally.
A mind like this must dissipate itself,
But I have always had one lode-star; now,
As I look back, I see that I have halted
Or hastened as I looked towards that star
A need, a trust, a yearning after God:
A feeling I have analysed but late,
But it existed, and was reconciled
With a neglect of all I deemed his laws,
Which yet, when seen in others, I abhorred.
I felt as one beloved, and so shut in
From fear: and thence I date my trust in signs
And omens, for I saw God everywhere;
And I can only lay it to the fruit
Of a sad after-time that I could doubt
Even his beinge'en the while I felt
His presence, never acted from myself,
Still trusted in a hand to lead me through
All danger; and this feeling ever fought
Against my weakest reason and resolve.
And I can love nothingand this dull truth
Has come the last: but sense supplies a love
Encircling me and mingling with my life.
These make myself: I have long sought in vain
To trace how they were formed by circumstance,
Yet ever found them mould my wildest youth
Where they alone displayed themselves, converted
All objects to their use: now see their course!
They came to me in my first dawn of life
Which passed alone with wisest ancient books
All halo-girt with fancies of my own;
And I myself went with the talea god
Wandering after beauty, or a giant
Standing vast in the sunsetan old hunter
Talking with gods, or a high-crested chief
Sailing with troops of friends to Tenedos.
I tell you, nought has ever been so clear
As the place, the time, the fashion of those lives:
I had not seen a work of lofty art,
Nor woman's beauty nor sweet nature's face,
Yet, I say, never morn broke clear as those
On the dim clustered isles in the blue sea,
The deep groves and white temples and wet caves
And nothing ever will surprise me now
Who stood beside the naked Swift-footed,
Who bound my forehead with Proserpine's hair.
And strange it is that I who could so dream
Should e'er have stooped to aim at aught beneath
Aught low or painful; but I never doubted:
So, as I grew. I rudely shaped my life
To my immediate wants; yet strong beneath
Was a vague sense of power though folded up
A sense that, though those shades and times were past,
Their spirit dwelt in me, with them should rule.
Then came a pause, and long restraint chained down
My soul till it was changed. I lost myself,
And were it not that I so loathe that loss,
I could recall how first I learned to turn
My mind against itself; and the effects
In deeds for which remorse were vain as for
The wanderings of delirious dream; yet thence
Came cunning, envy, falsehood, all world's wrong
That spotted me: at length I cleansed my soul.
Yet long world's influence remained; and nought
But the still life I led, apart once more,
Which left me free to seek soul's old delights,
Could e'er have brought me thus far back to peace.
As peace returned, I sought out some pursuit;
And song rose, no new impulse but the one
With which all others best could be combined.
My life has not been that of those whose heaven
Was lampless save where poesy shone out;
But as a clime where glittering mountain-tops
And glancing sea and forests steeped in light
Give back reflected the far-flashing sun;
For music (which is earnest of a heaven,
Seeing we know emotions strange by it,
Not else to be revealed,) is like a voice,
A low voice calling fancy, as a friend,
To the green woods in the gay summer time:
And she fills all the way with dancing shapes
Which have made painters pale, and they go on
Till stars look at them and winds call to them
As they leave life's path for the twilight world
Where the dead gather. This was not at first,
For I scarce knew what I would do. I had
An impulse but no yearningonly sang.
And first I sang as I in dream have seen
Music wait on a lyrist for some thought,
Yet singing to herself until it came.
I turned to those old times and scenes where all
That's beautiful had birth for me, and made
Rude verses on them all; and then I paused
I had done nothing, so I sought to know
What other minds achieved. No fear outbroke
As on the works of mighty bards I gazed,
In the first joy at finding my own thoughts
Recorded, my own fancies justified,
And their aspirings but my very own.
With them I first explored passion and mind,
All to begin afresh! I rather sought
To rival what I wondered at than form
Creations of my own; if much was light
Lent by the others, much was yet my own.
I paused again: a change was comingcame:
I was no more a boy, the past was breaking
Before the future and like fever worked.
I thought on my new self, and all my powers
Burst out. I dreamed not of restraint, but gazed
On all things: schemes and systems went and came,
And I was proud (being vainest of the weak)
In wandering o'er thought's world to seek some one
To be my prize, as if you wandered o'er
The White Way for a star.
             And my choice fell
Not so much on a system as a man
On one, whom praise of mine shall not offend,
Who was as calm as beauty, being such
Unto mankind as thou to me, Pauline,
Believing in them and devoting all
His soul's strength to their winning back to peace;
Who sent forth hopes and longings for their sake,
Clothed in all passion's melodies: such first
Caught me and set me, slave of a sweet task,
To disentangle, gather sense from song:
Since, song-inwoven, lurked there words which seemed
A key to a new world, the muttering
Of angels, something yet unguessed by man.
How my heart leapt as still I sought and found
Much there, I felt my own soul had conceived,
But there living and burning! Soon the orb
Of his conceptions dawned on me; its praise
Lives in the tongues of men, men's brows are high
When his name means a triumph and a pride,
So, my weak voice may well forbear to shame
What seemed decreed my fate: I threw myself
To meet it, I was vowed to liberty,
Men were to be as gods and earth as heaven,
And Iah, what a life was mine to prove!
My whole soul rose to meet it. Now, Pauline,
I shall go mad, if I recall that time!
Oh let me look back ere I leave for ever
The time which was an hour one fondly waits
For a fair girl that comes a withered hag!
And I was lonely, far from woods and fields,
And amid dullest sights, who should be loose
As a stag; yet I was full of bliss, who lived
With Plato and who had the key to life;
And I had dimly shaped my first attempt,
And many a thought did I build up on thought,
As the wild bee hangs cell to cell; in vain,
For I must still advance, no rest for mind.
'Twas in my plan to look on real life,
The life all new to me; my theories
Were firm, so them I left, to look and learn
Mankind, its cares, hopes, fears, its woes and joys;
And, as I pondered on their ways, I sought
How best life's end might be attainedan end
Comprising every joy. I deeply mused.
And suddenly without heart-wreck I awoke
As from a dream: I said "'Twas beautiful,
"Yet but a dream, and so adieu to it!"
As some world-wanderer sees in a far meadow
Strange towers and high-walled gardens thick with trees,
Where song takes shelter and delicious mirth
From laughing fairy creatures peeping over,
And on the morrow when he comes to lie
For ever 'neath those garden-trees fruit-flushed
Sung round by fairies, all his search is vain.
First went my hopes of perfecting mankind,
Nextfaith in them, and then in freedom's self
And virtue's self, then my own motives, ends
And aims and loves, and human love went last.
I felt this no decay, because new powers
Rose as old feelings leftwit, mockery,
Light-heartedness; for I had oft been sad,
Mistrusting my resolves, but now I cast
Hope joyously away: I laughed and said
"No more of this!" I must not think: at length
I looked again to see if all went well.
My powers were greater: as some temple seemed
My soul, where nought is changed and incense rolls
Around the altar, only God is gone
And some dark spirit sitteth in his seat.
So, I passed through the temple and to me
Knelt troops of shadows, and they cried "Hail, king!
"We serve thee now and thou shalt serve no more!
"Call on us, prove us, let us worship thee!"
And I said "Are ye strong? Let fancy bear me
"Far from the past!" And I was borne away,
As Arab birds float sleeping in the wind,
O'er deserts, towers and forests, I being calm.
And I said "I have nursed up energies,
"They will prey on me." And a band knelt low
And cried "Lord, we are here and we will make
"Safe way for thee in thine appointed life!
"But look on us!" And I said "Ye will worship
"Me; should my heart not worship too?" They shouted
"Thyself, thou art our king!" So, I stood there
Smilingoh, vanity of vanities!
For buoyant and rejoicing was the spirit
With which I looked out how to end my course;
I felt once more myself, my powersall mine;
I knew while youth and health so lifted me
That, spite of all life's nothingness, no grief
Came nigh me, I must ever be light-hearted;
And that this knowledge was the only veil
Betwixt joy and despair: so, if age came,
I should be lefta wreck linked to a soul
Yet fluttering, or mind-broken and aware
Of my decay. So a long summer morn
Found me; and ere noon came, I had resolved
No age should come on me ere youth was spent,
For I would wear myself out, like that morn
Which wasted not a sunbeam; every hour
I would make mine, and die.
               And thus I sought
To chain my spirit down which erst I freed
For flights to fame: I said "The troubled life
"Of genius, seen so gay when working forth
"Some trusted end, grows sad when all proves vain
"How sad when men have parted with truth's peace
"For falsest fancy's sake, which waited first
"As an obedient spirit when delight
"Came without fancy's call: but alters soon,
"Comes darkened, seldom, hastens to depart,
"Leaving a heavy darkness and warm tears.
"But I shall never lose her; she will live
"Dearer for such seclusion. I but catch
"A hue, a glance of what I sing: so, pain
"Is linked with pleasure, for I ne'er may tell
"Half the bright sights which dazzle me; but now
"Mine shall be all the radiance: let them fade
"Untoldothers shall rise as fair, as fast!
"And when all's done, the few dim gleams transferred,"
(For a new thought sprang up how well it were,
Discarding shadowy hope, to weave such lays
As straight encircle men with praise and love,
So, I should not die utterly,should bring
One branch from the gold forest, like the knight
Of old tales, witnessing I had been there)
"And when all's done, how vain seems e'en success
"The vaunted influence poets have o'er men!
"'T is a fine thing that one weak as myself
"Should sit in his lone room, knowing the words
"He utters in his solitude shall move
"Men like a swift windthat tho' dead and gone,
"New eyes shall glisten when his beauteous dreams
"Of love come true in happier frames than his.
"Ay, the still night brings thoughts like these, but morn
"Comes and the mockery again laughs out
"At hollow praises, smiles allied to sneers;
"And my soul's idol ever whispers me
"To dwell with him and his unhonoured song:
"And I foreknow my spirit, that would press
"First in the struggle, fail again to make
"All bow enslaved, and I again should sink.
"And then know that this curse will come on us,
"To see our idols perish; we may wither,
"No marvel, we are clay, but our low fate
"Should not extend to those whom trustingly
"We sent before into time's yawning gulf
"To face what dread may lurk in darkness there.
"To find the painter's glory pass, and feel
"Music can move us not as once, or, worst,
"To weep decaying wits ere the frail body
"Decays! Nought makes me trust some love is true,
"But the delight of the contented lowness
"With which I gaze on him I keep for ever
"Above me; I to rise and rival him?
"Feed his fame rather from my heart's best blood,
"Wither unseen that he may flourish still."
Pauline, my soul's friend, thou dost pity yet
How this mood swayed me when that soul found thine,
When I had set myself to live this life,
Defying all past glory. Ere thou camest
I seemed defiant, sweet, for old delights
Had flocked like birds again; music, my life,
Nourished me more than ever; then the lore
Loved for itself and all it showsthat king
Treading the purple calmly to his death,
While round him, like the clouds of eve, all dusk,
The giant shades of fate, silently flitting,
Pile the dim outline of the coming doom;
And him sitting alone in blood while friends
Are hunting far in the sunshine; and the boy
With his white breast and brow and clustering curls
Streaked with his mother's blood, but striving hard
To tell his story ere his reason goes.
And when I loved thee as love seemed so oft,
Thou lovedst me indeed: I wondering searched
My heart to find some feeling like such love,
Believing I was still much I had been.
Too soon I found all faith had gone from me,
And the late glow of life, like change on clouds,
Proved not the morn-blush widening into day,
But eve faint-coloured by the dying sun
While darkness hastens quickly. I will tell
My state as though 'twere none of minedespair
Cannot come near usthis it is, my state.
Souls alter not, and mine must still advance;
Strange that I knew not, when I flung away
My youth's chief aims, their loss might lead to loss
Of what few I retained, and no resource
Be left me: for behold how changed is all!
I cannot chain my soul: it will not rest
In its clay prison, this most narrow sphere:
It has strange impulse, tendency, desire,
Which nowise I account for nor explain,
But cannot stifle, being bound to trust
All feelings equally, to hear all sides:
How can my life indulge them? yet they live,
Referring to some state of life unknown.
My selfishness is satiated not,
It wears me like a flame; my hunger for
All pleasure, howsoe'er minute, grows pain;
I envyhow I envy him whose soul
Turns its whole energies to some one end,
To elevate an aim, pursue success
However mean! So, my still baffled hope
Seeks out abstractions; I would have one joy,
But one in life, so it were wholly mine,
One rapture all my soul could fill: and this
Wild feeling places me in dream afar
In some vast country where the eye can see
No end to the far hills and dales bestrewn
With shining towers and towns, till I grow mad
Well-nigh, to know not one abode but holds
Some pleasure, while my soul could grasp the world,
But must remain this vile form's slave. I look
With hope to age at last, which quenching much,
May let me concentrate what sparks it spares.
This restlessness of passion meets in me
A craving after knowledge: the sole proof
Of yet commanding will is in that power
Repressed; for I beheld it in its dawn,
The sleepless harpy with just-budding wings,
And I considered whether to forego
All happy ignorant hopes and fears, to live,
Finding a recompense in its wild eyes.
And when I found that I should perish so,
I bade its wild eyes close from me for ever,
And I am left alone with old delights;
See! it lies in me a chained thing, still prompt
To serve me if I loose its slightest bond:
I cannot but be proud of my bright slave.
How should this earth's life prove my only sphere?
Can I so narrow sense but that in life
Soul still exceeds it? In their elements
My love outsoars my reason; but since love
Perforce receives its object from this earth
While reason wanders chainless, the few truths.
Caught from its wanderings have sufficed to quell
Love chained below; then what were love, set free,
Which, with the object it demands, would pass
Reason companioning the seraphim?
No, what I feel may pass all human love
Yet fall far short of what my love should be.
And yet I seem more warped in this than aught,
Myself stands out more hideously: of old
I could forget myself in friendship, fame,
Liberty, nay, in love of mightier souls;
But I begin to know what thing hate is
To sicken and to quiver and grow white
And I myself have furnished its first prey.
Hate of the weak and ever-wavering will,
The selfishness, the still-decaying frame . . .
But I must never grieve whom wing can waft
Far from such thoughtsas now. Andromeda!
And she is with me: years roll, I shall change,
But change can touch her notso beautiful
With her fixed eyes, earnest and still, and hair
Lifted and spread by the salt-sweeping breeze,
And one red beam, all the storm leaves in heaven,
Resting upon her eyes and hair, such hair,
As she awaits the snake on the wet beach
By the dark rock and the white wave just breaking
At her feet; quite naked and alone; a thing
I doubt not, nor fear for, secure some god
To save will come in thunder from the stars.
Let it pass! Soul requires another change.
I will be gifted with a wondrous mind,
Yet sunk by error to men's sympathy,
And in the wane of life, yet only so
As to call up their fears; and there shall come
A time requiring youth's best energies;
And lo, I fling age, sorrow, sickness off,
And rise triumphant, triumph through decay.
And thus it is that I supply the chasm
'Twixt what I am and all I fain would be:
But then to know nothing, to hope for nothing,
To seize on life's dull joys from a strange fear
Lest, losing them, all 's lost and nought remains!
There 's some vile juggle with my reason here;
I feel I but explain to my own loss
These impulses: they live no less the same.
Liberty! what though I despair? my blood
Rose never at a slave's name proud as now.
Oh sympathies, obscured by sophistries!
Why else have I sought refuge in myself,
But from the woes I saw and could not stay?
Love! is not this to love thee, my Pauline?
I cherish prejudice, lest I be left
Utterly loveless? witness my belief
In poets, though sad change has come there too;
No more I leave myself to follow them
Unconsciously I measure me by them
Let me forget it: and I cherish most
My love of Englandhow her name, a word
Of hers in a strange tongue makes my heart beat!
Pauline, could I but break the spell! Not now
All's feverbut when calm shall come again,
I am prepared: I have made life my own.
I would not be content with all the change
One frame should feel, but I have gone in thought
Thro' all conjuncture, I have lived all life
When it is most alive, where strangest fate
New-shapes it past surmisethe throes of men
Bit by some curse or in the grasps of doom
Half-visible and still-increasing round,
Or crowning their wide being's general aim.
These are wild fancies, but I feel, sweet friend,
As one breathing his weakness to the ear
Of pitying angeldear as a winter flower,
A slight flower growing alone, and offering
Its frail cup of three leaves to the cold sun,
Yet joyous and confiding like the triumph
Of a child: and why am I not worthy thee?
I can live all the life of plants, and gaze
Drowsily on the bees that flit and play,
Or bare my breast for sunbeams which will kill,
Or open in the night of sounds, to look
For the dim stars; I can mount with the bird
Leaping airily his pyramid of leaves
And twisted boughs of some tall mountain tree,
Or rise cheerfully springing to the heavens;
Or like a fish breathe deep the morning air
In the misty sun-warm water; or with flower
And tree can smile in light at the sinking sun
Just as the storm comes, as a girl would look
On a departing lovermost serene.
Pauline, come with me, see how I could build
A home for us, out of the world, in thought!
I am uplifted: fly with me, Pauline!
Night, and one single ridge of narrow path
Between the sullen river and the woods
Waving and muttering, for the moonless night
Has shaped them into images of life,
Like the uprising of the giant-ghosts,
Looking on earth to know how their sons fare:
Thou art so close by me, the roughest swell
Of wind in the tree-tops hides not the panting
Of thy soft breasts. No, we will pass to morning
Morning, the rocks and valleys and old woods.
How the sun brightens in the mist, and here,
Half in the air, like creatures of the place,
Trusting the element, living on high boughs
That swing in the windlook at the silver spray
Flung from the foam-sheet of the cataract
Amid the broken rocks! Shall we stay here
With the wild hawks? No, ere the hot noon come,
Dive we downsafe! See this our new retreat
Walled in with a sloped mound of matted shrubs,
Dark, tangled, old and green, still sloping down
To a small pool whose waters lie asleep
Amid the trailing boughs turned water-plants:
And tall trees overarch to keep us in,
Breaking the sunbeams into emerald shafts,
And in the dreamy water one small group
Of two or three strange trees are got together
Wondering at all around, as strange beasts herd
Together far from their own land: all wildness,
No turf nor moss, for boughs and plants pave all,
And tongues of bank go shelving in the lymph,
Where the pale-throated snake reclines his head,
And old grey stones lie making eddies there,
The wild-mice cross them dry-shod. Deeper in!
Shut thy soft eyesnow lookstill deeper in!
This is the very heart of the woods all round
Mountain-like heaped above us; yet even here
One pond of water gleams; far off the river
Sweeps like a sea, barred out from land; but one
One thin clear sheet has overleaped and wound
Into this silent depth, which gained, it lies
Still, as but let by sufferance; the trees bend
O'er it as wild men watch a sleeping girl,
And through their roots long creeping plants out-stretch
Their twined hair, steeped and sparkling; farther on,
Tall rushes and thick flag-knots have combined
To narrow it; so, at length, a silver thread,
It winds, all noiselessly through the deep wood
Till thro' a cleft-way, thro' the moss and stone,
It joins its parent-river with a shout.
Up for the glowing day, leave the old woods!
See, they part, like a ruined arch: the sky!
Nothing but sky appears, so close the roots
And grass of the hill-top level with the air
Blue sunny air, where a great cloud floats laden
With light, like a dead whale that white birds pick,
Floating away in the sun in some north sea.
Air, air, fresh life-blood, thin and searching air,
The clear, dear breath of God that loveth us,
Where small birds reel and winds take their delight!
Water is beautiful, but not like air:
See, where the solid azure waters lie
Made as of thickened air, and down below,
The fern-ranks like a forest spread themselves
As though each pore could feel the element;
Where the quick glancing serpent winds his way,
Float with me there, Pauline!but not like air.
Down the hill! Stopa clump of trees, see, set
On a heap of rock, which look o'er the far plain:
So, envious climbing shrubs would mount to rest
And peer from their spread boughs; wide they wave, looking
At the muleteers who whistle on their way,
To the merry chime of morning bells, past all
The little smoking cots, mid fields and banks
And copses bright in the sun. My spirit wanders:
Hedgerows for methose living hedgerows where
The bushes close and clasp above and keep
Thought inI am concentratedI feel;
But my soul saddens when it looks beyond:
I cannot be immortal, taste all joy.
O God, where do they tendthese struggling aims?
What would I have? What is this "sleep" which seems
To bound all? can there be a "waking" point
Of crowning life? The soul would never rule;
It would be first in all things, it would have
Its utmost pleasure filled, but, that complete,
Commanding, for commanding, sickens it.
The last point I can trace isrest beneath
Some better essence than itself, in weakness;
This is "myself," not what I think should be:
And what is that I hunger for but God?
My God, my God, let me for once look on thee
As though nought else existed, we alone!
And as creation crumbles, my soul's spark
Expands till I can say,Even from myself
I need thee and I feel thee and I love thee.
I do not plead my rapture in thy works
For love of thee, nor that I feel as one
Who cannot die: but there is that in me
Which turns to thee, which loves or which should love.
Why have I girt myself with this hell-dress?
Why have I laboured to put out my life?
Is it not in my nature to adore,
And e'en for all my reason do I not
Feel him, and thank him, and pray to himnow?
Can I forego the trust that he loves me?
Do I not feel a love which only one . . .
O thou pale form, so dimly seen, deep-eyed!
I have denied thee calmlydo I not
Pant when I read of thy consummate power,
And burn to see thy calm pure truths out-flash
The brightest gleams of earth's philosophy?
Do I not shake to hear aught question thee?
If I am erring save me, madden me,
Take from me powers and pleasures, let me die
Ages, so I see thee! I am knit round
As with a charm by sin and lust and pride,
Yet though my wandering dreams have seen all shapes
Of strange delight, oft have I stood by thee
Have I been keeping lonely watch with thee
In the damp night by weeping Olivet,
Or leaning on thy bosom, proudly less,
Or dying with thee on the lonely cross,
Or witnessing thine outburst from the tomb.
A mortal, sin's familiar friend, doth here
Avow that he will give all earth's reward,
But to believe and humbly teach the faith,
In suffering and poverty and shame,
Only believing he is not unloved.
And now, my Pauline, I am thine for ever!
I feel the spirit which has buoyed me up
Desert me, and old shades are gathering fast;
Yet while the last light waits, I would say much,
This chiefly, it is gain that I have said
Somewhat of love I ever felt for thee
But seldom told; our hearts so beat together
That speech seemed mockery; but when dark hours come,
And joy departs, and thou, sweet, deem'st it strange
A sorrow moves me, thou canst not remove,
Look on this lay I dedicate to thee,
Which through thee I began, which thus I end,
Collecting the last gleams to strive to tell
How I am thine, and more than ever now
That I sink fast: yet though I deeplier sink,
No less song proves one word has brought me bliss,
Another still may win bliss surely back.
Thou knowest, dear, I could not think all calm,
For fancies followed thought and bore me off,
And left all indistinct; ere one was caught
Another glanced; so, dazzled by my wealth,
I knew not which to leave nor which to choose,
For all so floated, nought was fixed and firm.
And then thou said'st a perfect bard was one
Who chronicled the stages of all life,
And so thou bad'st me shadow this first stage.
'T is done, and even now I recognize
The shift, the change from last to pastdiscern
Faintly how life is truth and truth is good.
And why thou must be mine is, that e'en now
In the dim hush of night, that I have done,
Despite the sad forebodings, love looks through
Whispers,E'en at the last I have her still,
With her delicious eyes as clear as heaven
When rain in a quick shower has beat down mist,
And clouds float white above like broods of swans.
How the blood lies upon her cheek, outspread
As thinned by kisses! only in her lips
It wells and pulses like a living thing,
And her neck looks like marble misted o'er
With love-breath,a Pauline from heights above,
Stooping beneath me, looking upone look
As I might kill her and be loved the more.
So, love meme, Pauline, and nought but me,
Never leave loving! Words are wild and weak,
Believe them not, Pauline! I stained myself
But to behold thee purer by my side,
To show thou art my breath, my life, a last
Resource, an extreme want: never believe
Aught better could so look on thee; nor seek
Again the world of good thoughts left for mine!
There were bright troops of undiscovered suns,
Each equal in their radiant course; there were
Clusters of far fair isles which ocean kept
For his own joy, and his waves broke on them
Without a choice; and there was a dim crowd
Of visions, each a part of some grand whole:
And one star left his peers and came with peace
Upon a storm, and all eyes pined for him;
And one isle harboured a sea-beaten ship,
And the crew wandered in its bowers and plucked
Its fruits and gave up all their hopes of home;
And one dream came to a pale poet's sleep,
And he said, "I am singled out by God,
"No sin must touch me." Words are wild and weak,
But what they would express is,Leave me not,
Still sit by me with beating breast and hair
Loosened, be watching earnest by my side,
Turning my books or kissing me when I
Look uplike summer wind! Be still to me
A help to music's mystery which mind fails
To fathom, its solution, no mere clue!
O reason's pedantry, life's rule prescribed!
I hopeless, I the loveless, hope and love.
Wiser and better, know me now, not when
You loved me as I was. Smile not! I have
Much yet to dawn on you, to gladden you.
No more of the past! I'll look within no more.
I have too trusted my own lawless wants,
Too trusted my vain self, vague intuition
Draining soul's wine alone in the still night,
And seeing how, as gathering films arose,
As by an inspiration life seemed bare
And grinning in its vanity, while ends
Foul to be dreamed of, smiled at me as fixed
And fair, while others changed from fair to foul
As a young witch turns an old hag at night.
No more of this! We will go hand in hand,
I with thee, even as a childlove's slave,
Looking no farther than his liege commands.
And thou hast chosen where this life shall be:
The land which gave me thee shall be our home,
Where nature lies all wild amid her lakes
And snow-swathed mountains and vast pines begirt
With ropes of snowwhere nature lies all bare,
Suffering none to view her but a race
Or stinted or deformed, like the mute dwarfs
Which wait upon a naked Indian queen.
And there (the time being when the heavens are thick
With storm) I'll sit with thee while thou dost sing
Thy native songs, gay as a desert bird
Which crieth as it flies for perfect joy,
Or telling me old stories of dead knights;
Or I will read great lays to theehow she,
The fair pale sister, went to her chill grave
With power to love and to be loved and live:
Or we will go together, like twin gods
Of the infernal world, with scented lamp
Over the dead, to call and to awake,
Over the unshaped images which lie
Within my mind's cave: only leaving all,
That tells of the past doubt. So, when spring comes
With sunshine back again like an old smile,
And the fresh waters and awakened birds
And budding woods await us, I shall be
Prepared, and we will question life once more,
Till its old sense shall come renewed by change,
Like some clear thought which harsh words veiled before;
Feeling God loves us, and that all which errs
Is but a dream which death will dissipate.
And then what need of longer exile? Seek
My England, and, again there, calm approach
All I once fled from, calmly look on those
The works of my past weakness, as one views
Some scene where danger met him long before.
Ah that such pleasant life should be but dreamed!
But whate'er come of it, and though it fade,
And though ere the cold morning all be gone,
As it may be;tho' music wait to wile,
And strange eyes and bright wine lure, laugh like sin
Which steals back softly on a soul half saved,
And I the first deny, decry, despise,
With this avowal, these intents so fair,
Still be it all my own, this moment's pride!
No less I make an end in perfect joy.
E'en in my brightest time, a lurking fear
Possessed me: I well knew my weak resolves,
I felt the witchery that makes mind sleep
Over its treasure, as one half afraid
To make his riches definite: but now
These feelings shall not utterly be lost,
I shall not know again that nameless care
Lest, leaving all undone in youth, some new
And undreamed end reveal itself too late:
For this song shall remain to tell for ever
That when I lost all hope of such a change,
Suddenly beauty rose on me again.
No less I make an end in perfect joy,
For I, who thus again was visited,
Shall doubt not many another bliss awaits,
And, though this weak soul sink and darkness whelm,
Some little word shall light it, raise aloft,
To where I clearlier see and better love,
As I again go o'er the tracts of thought
Like one who has a right, and I shall live
With poets, calmer, purer still each time,
And beauteous shapes will come for me to seize,
And unknown secrets will be trusted me
Which were denied the waverer once; but now
I shall be priest and prophet as of old.
Sun-treader, I believe in God and truth
And love; and as one just escaped from death
Would bind himself in bands of friends to feel
He lives indeed, so, I would lean on thee!
Thou must be ever with me, most in gloom
If such must come, but chiefly when I die,
For I seem, dying, as one going in the dark
To fight a giant: but live thou for ever,
And be to all what thou hast been to me!
All in whom this wakes pleasant thoughts of me
Know my last state is happy, free from doubt
Or touch of fear. Love me and wish me well.
Richmond: October 22, 1832.


~ Robert Browning, Pauline, A Fragment of a Question
,

IN CHAPTERS [150/175]



   35 Poetry
   30 Integral Yoga
   26 Philosophy
   18 Christianity
   10 Occultism
   8 Psychology
   7 Fiction
   5 Hinduism
   4 Yoga
   3 Kabbalah
   3 Baha i Faith
   2 Sufism
   2 Mysticism
   2 Integral Theory
   1 Science
   1 Cybernetics
   1 Alchemy


   61 Sri Aurobindo
   16 William Wordsworth
   13 Plotinus
   13 Nolini Kanta Gupta
   9 Carl Jung
   8 Friedrich Nietzsche
   5 Vyasa
   4 Plato
   4 Percy Bysshe Shelley
   4 H P Lovecraft
   3 The Mother
   3 Sri Ramakrishna
   3 Satprem
   3 Saint Augustine of Hippo
   3 Rabbi Moses Luzzatto
   3 James George Frazer
   3 Baha u llah
   2 William Butler Yeats
   2 Robert Browning
   2 Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
   2 Jordan Peterson
   2 Henry David Thoreau
   2 Franz Bardon


   23 The Synthesis Of Yoga
   16 Wordsworth - Poems
   10 The Life Divine
   6 Thus Spoke Zarathustra
   6 The Human Cycle
   5 Vishnu Purana
   5 Essays In Philosophy And Yoga
   4 The Secret Doctrine
   4 Shelley - Poems
   4 Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 04
   4 Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 01
   4 Lovecraft - Poems
   3 The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
   3 The Golden Bough
   3 Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 02
   3 Mysterium Coniunctionis
   3 General Principles of Kabbalah
   3 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04
   3 Aion
   3 Agenda Vol 02
   2 Yeats - Poems
   2 Walden
   2 Twilight of the Idols
   2 The Practice of Psycho therapy
   2 The Practice of Magical Evocation
   2 Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 03
   2 Maps of Meaning
   2 Essays On The Gita
   2 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 07
   2 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05
   2 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02
   2 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01
   2 City of God
   2 Browning - Poems
   2 A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah


00.03 - Upanishadic Symbolism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   And they who are thus lifted up into the Higher Orbit are freed from the bondage to the cycle of rebirth. They enjoy the supreme Liberation that is of the Spirit; and even when they descend into the Inferior Path, it is to work out as free agents, as vehicles of the Divine, a special purpose, to bring down something of the substance and nature of the Solar reality into the lower world, enlighten and elevate the lower, as far as it is allowed, into the higher.
   IV. The Triple Agni

0.00 - INTRODUCTION, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
   Thus, after nirvikalpa samadhi, Sri Ramakrishna realized maya in an altogether new role. The binding aspect of Kali vanished from before his vision. She no longer obscured his understanding. The world became the glorious manifestation of the Divine Mother. Maya became Brahman. The Transcendental Itself broke through the Immanent. Sri Ramakrishna discovered that maya operates in the relative world in two ways, and he termed these "avidyamaya" and "vidyamaya". Avidyamaya represents the dark forces of creation: sensuous desires, evil passions, greed, lust, cruelty, and so on. It sustains the world system on the lower planes. It is responsible for the round of man's birth and death. It must be fought and vanquished. But vidyamaya is the higher force of creation: the spiritual virtues, the enlightening qualities, kindness, purity, love, devotion. Vidyamaya elevates man to the higher planes of consciousness. With the help of vidyamaya the devotee rids himself of avidyamaya; he then becomes mayatita, free of maya. The two aspects of maya are the two forces of creation, the two powers of Kali; and She stands beyond them both. She is like the effulgent sun, bringing into existence and shining through and standing behind the clouds of different colours and shapes, conjuring up wonderful forms in the blue autumn heaven.
   The Divine Mother asked Sri Ramakrishna not to be lost in the featureless Absolute but to remain, in bhavamukha, on the threshold of relative consciousness, the border line between the Absolute and the Relative. He was to keep himself at the "sixth centre" of Tantra, from which he could see not only the glory of the seventh, but also the divine manifestations of the Kundalini in the lower centres. He gently oscillated back and forth across the dividing line. Ecstatic devotion to the Divine Mother alternated with serene absorption in the Ocean of Absolute Unity. He thus bridged the gulf between the Personal and the Impersonal, the immanent and the transcendent aspects of Reality. This is a unique experience in the recorded spiritual history of the world.

0.03 - The Threefold Life, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  This mixing with life may, however, be pursued for the sake of the individual mind and with an entire indifference to the forms of the material existence or the uplifting of the race. This indifference is seen at its highest in the Epicurean discipline and is not entirely absent from the Stoic; and even altruism does the works of compassion more often for its own sake than for the sake of the world it helps. But this too is a limited fulfilment. The progressive mind is seen at its noblest when it strives to elevate the whole race to its own level whether by sowing broadcast the image of its own thought and fulfilment or by changing the material life of the race into fresh forms, religious, intellectual, social or political, intended to represent more nearly that ideal of truth, beauty, justice, righteousness with which the man's own soul is illumined. Failure in such a field matters little; for the mere attempt is dynamic and creative. The struggle of Mind to elevate life is the promise and condition of the conquest of life by that which is higher even than Mind.
  That highest thing, the spiritual existence, is concerned with what is eternal but not therefore entirely aloof from the transient. For the spiritual man the mind's dream of perfect beauty is realised in an eternal love, beauty and delight that has no dependence and is equal behind all objective appearances; its dream of perfect Truth in the supreme, self-existent, self-apparent and eternal Verity which never varies, but explains and is the secret of all variations and the goal of all progress; its dream of perfect action in the omnipotent and self-guiding Law that is inherent for ever in all things and translates itself here in the rhythm of the worlds. What is fugitive vision or constant effort of creation in the brilliant Self is an eternally existing Reality in the Self that knows2 and is the Lord.

0 1961-06-06, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   There is such a strong impression of facing something which completely escapes comprehension, reason, intelligence, everything mental or intellectual (even the most elevated); its not that, its. And then truly, if you stand back from it and employ big words, you would say, All this (Mother tilts her hand to one side) is Truth, and all that (she tilts her hand to the other side) is Falsehood but its the SAME thing! In one case, you have the sense of being carriednot only the body but the entire world, all circumstancescarried, floating in a beatific light towards an eternal Realization; and in the other case, its like this (Mother makes a gesture of being burdened), deadening, heavy, sorrowfulexactly the same thing! Almost the same material vibrations.
   And its so subtle, so incomprehensible theres a distinct impression of it TOTALLY eluding even the highest conscious will. What is it? What is it?

0 1961-10-15, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   After speaking of the descent of the Supermind, he said that an INTERMEDIARY must be prepared between our present mental state (even the most elevated higher mind) and the supramental region, because if one entered directly into Gnosis, well, it would produce such an abrupt change that our physical constitutions would be unable to support itan intermediary is needed. The experiences Ive had make me absolutely convinced of it; twice the supramental world took veritable possession of me and both times it was as if the bodytruly the physical bodywas going to completely disintegrate, due to what you could almost call the opposition of the two conditions.
   And yesterday again I clearly saw (Mother touches this mass in her head). My eyes are full of it my eyes are full, you know, and I see that as it works to settle itself in here, it produces this little vibrationa twinkling of vibrationswhich seems to be indispensable for it to enter into this Matter.

0 1961-12-20, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   One more thing. Despite their blockage from the deep spiritual viewpoint, they evidently represent a certain goodwill which can be utilized and should be recognizedit must be given a place. Thats why I was telling you to write a book on a much less elevated level, a book like the one I would write, if I ever wrote one!
   But Mother.

02.12 - Mysticism in Bengali Poetry, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Bengali poetry was born some time towards the end of an era of decline in the Indian consciousness, almost towards the close of what is called the Buddhist period, but it was born with a veritable crown on its head. For it was sheer mystic poetry, mystic in substance, mystic in manner and expression. The poets were themselves mystics, that is to say spiritual seekers, sadhaks they were called Siddhas or Siddhacharyas. They told of their spiritual, rather occult experiences in an occult or oblique manner, the very manner of the ancient Vedic Rishis, in figures and symbols and similes. It was a form of beauty, not merely of truthof abstract metaphysical truth that rose all on a sudden, as it were, out of an enveloping darkness. It shone for a time and then faded slowly, perhaps spread itself out in the common consciousness of the people and continued to exist as a backwash in popular songs and fables and proverbs. But it was there and came up again a few centuries later and the crest is seen once more in a more elevated, polished and dignified form with a content of mental illumination. I am referring to Chandidasa, who was also a sadhak poet and is usually known as the father of Bengali poetry, being the creator of modern Bengali poetry. He flourished somewhere in the fourteenth century. That wave too subsided and retired into the background, leaving in interregnum again of a century or more till it showed itself once more in another volume of mystic poetry in the hands of a new type of spiritual practitioners. They were the Yogis and Fakirs, and although of a popular type, yet possessing nuggets of gold in their utterances, and they formed a large family. This almost synchronised with the establishment and consolidation of the Western Power, with its intellectual and rational enlightenment, in India. The cultivation and superimposition of this Western or secular light forced the native vein of mysticism underground; it was necessary and useful, for it added an element which was missing before; a new synthesis came up in a crest with Tagore. It was a neo-mysticism, intellectual, philosophical, broad-based, self-conscious. Recently however we have been going on the downward slope, and many, if not the majority among us, have been pointing at mysticism and shouting: "Out, damned spot!" But perhaps we have struck the rock-bottom and are wheeling round.
   For in the present epoch we are rising on a new crest and everywhere, in all literatures, signs are not lacking of a supremely significant spiritual poetry being born among us.

03.10 - Hamlet: A Crisis of the Evolving Soul, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Over against the personality of Hamlet stands another which represents false height, the wrong perfection, the counterfeit ideal. Polonius is humanity arrested in its path of straight development and deviated into a cut-de-sac of self-conceit and surface urbanity, apparent cleverness and success and pretentious and copy-book morality. When one has outgrown the barbarian, one runs the risk of becoming a snob or philistine. It is a side table-land, as it were, on mid-heights, the standard perhaps of a commoner humanity, but which the younger ideal has to transcend or avoid or even to destroy, so that it may find itself and live its own life. To the philistine too the mere biological man is a taboo, but he seeks to confine human nature into a scheme of codes and maxims and lifeless injunctions and prohibitions. He is also the man of Reason but without the higher inflatus, the living and creative Something More the poetry, the vision, the dream that would transfigure the merely pragmatic, practical, worldly wise the bourgeoisinto the princely aristocratic idealist, elevate the drab terre terre To-day into the glory of a soaring To-morrow.
   What is the crisis that confronts the ascending visionary soul? What is the obstacle that the Idealist has to face, the danger zone that he has to traverse in order to arrive at- the realisation of his ideal?

04.01 - The March of Civilisation, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Ancient Greece, the fountainhead of European civilisationof the world culture reigning today, one can almost sayfound itself epitomised in the Periclean Age. The lightgrace, harmony, sweet reasonableness that was Greece, reached its highest and largest, its most characteristic growth in that period. Earlier, at the very beginning of her life cycle, there came indeed Homer and no later creation reached a higher or even as high a status of creative power: but it was a solitary peak, it was perhaps an announcement, not the realisation of the national glory. Pericles stood as the guardian, the representative, the emblem and nucleus of a nation-wide efflorescence. Not to speak of the great names associated with the age, even the common peoplemore than what was normally so characteristic of Greecefelt the tide that was moving high and shared in that elevated sweep of life, of thought and creative activity. Greece withdrew. The stage was made clear for Rome. Julius Caesar carried the Roman genius to its sublimest summit: but it remained for his great nephew to consolidate and give expression to that genius in its most characteristic manner and lent his name to a characteristic high-water mark of human civilisation.
   Greece and Rome may be taken to represent two types of culture. And accordingly we can distinguish two types of elevation or crest-formation of human consciousness one of light, the other of power. In certain movements one feels the intrusion, the expression of light, that is to say, the play of intelligence, understanding, knowledge, a fresh outlook and consideration of the world and things, a revaluation in other terms and categories of a new consciousness. The greatest, at least, the most representative movement of this kind is that of the Renaissance. It was really a New Illumination: a flood of light poured upon the mind and intellect and understanding of the period. There was a brightness, a brilliance, a happy agility and keenness in the movements of the brain. A largeness of vision, a curious sensibility, a wide and alert consciousness: these are some of the fundamental characteristics of this remarkable New Birth. It is the birth of what has been known as the scientific outlook, in the- broadest sense: it is the threshold of the modern epoch of humanity. All the modern European languages leaped into maturity, as it were, each attaining its definitive form and full-blooded individuality. Art and literature flooded in their magnificent creativeness all nations and peoples of the whole continent. The Romantic Revival, starting somewhere about the beginning of the nineteenth century, is another outstanding example of a similar phenomenon, of the descent of light into human consciousness. The light that descended into human consciousness at the time of the Renaissance captured the higher mind and intelligence the Ray touched as it were the frontal lobe of the brain; the later descent touched the heart, the feelings and emotive sensibility, it evoked more vibrant, living and powerful perceptions, created varied and dynamic sense-complexes, new idealisms and aspirations. The manifestation of Power, the descent or inrush of forcemighty and terriblehas been well recognised and experienced in the great French Revolution. A violence came out from somewhere and seized man and society: man was thrown out of his gear, society broken to pieces. There came a change in the very character and even nature of man: and society had to be built upon other foundations. The past was gone. Divasa gatah. Something very similar has happened again more recently, in Russia. The French Revolution brought in the bourgeois culture, the Russian Revolution has rung in the Proletariate.
  --
   The light sinks further down and extends still more its scope seeking to penetrate and encircle the whole of humanity. The general mass of mankind, the lowest strata of society have to be taken in, elevated and illumined. That must be the natural and inevitable consummation of all progress and evolution. And that is the secret sense and justification of the Proletarian Revolution of today. Although, the many names and forms given to it by its violent partisans do not bring out or sufficiently honour the soul and spirit that informs it.
   This then is the pattern of cultural development as it proceeds in extension and largeness. It moves in ever widening concentric circles. Individuals, small centres few and far between, then larger groups and sections, finally vast masses are touched and moved (and will be moulded one day) by the infiltrating light. That is how in modern times all movements are practically world-wide, encompassing all nations and peoples: there seems to be nothing left that is merely local or parochial. It is a single wave, as it were, that heaves up the whole of humanity. Political, social, economic and even spiritual movements, although not exactly of the same type or pattern, all are interrelated, interlocked, inspired by a common breath and move from one end of the earth to the other. They seem to be but modulations of the same world-theme. A pulse-beat in Korea or Japan is felt across the Pacific in America and across that continent, traversing again, the Atlantic it reaches England, sways the old continent in its turn and once more leaps forward through the Asiatic vastnesses back again to its place of origin. The wheel comes indeed full circle: it is one movement girdling the earth. What one thinks or acts in one corner of the globe is thought, and acted simultaneously by others at the farthest corner. Very evidently it is the age of radiography and electronics.

06.35 - Second Sight, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The animal acts by instinct, we say; that is to say, it goes straight to the thing to be done: in order to do a thing it does not make a choice between possibilities, there is no selective process in its consciousness. It is the human consciousness alone that says, this is not to be done, but that to be done, not this but that or puts the question, which one, to be or not to be? This is what we mean by discrimination or deliberation. Normally, this faculty is absent in the animal. We have said of refined feelings in man; refined here need not mean always ennobled or morally elevated; it may mean also more subtle, more complicated and be applied to some baseracutely perversefeelings which are perhaps peculiarly human. Domestic animals sometimes contract them from men: jealousy, spitefulness, vengeance, vindictiveness of an extreme degree are likely to be found more among animals living with men than those that are in the wild state. We have heard of elephants brooding over a hurt or even an insult for long months and taking revenge when occasion presents itself. And we have heard of a cat jumping out of a window into the street below and killing itself simply because it thought its mistress showed more love towards another cat.
   The humanising of animals living with men, through its good and bad effects, has an evolutionary value: that is to say, some animals in that way attain almost to a human status in their soul. And occultists state that souls do pass in this manner from the animal to the human incarnation.

10.13 - Go Through, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   In fact it is to the Divine that the dedication has to be made. Dedication means offering. All works, says the Gita, have to be offered to the Supreme, that is the meaning of sacrifice, the sacrifice of works (Karmayajna), all works come from the Divine and they are to go back to Him, that is how they are purified and through them thus purified and elevated, man attains his goal, union with the Supreme. However, not works alone but each and every element of the human beingeven love and passion and all the grosser urgesdo come from the only one Source, the Divine. They become impure and distorted, muddy and poisonous when man seeks to appropriate, that is to say, misappropriate them as his own personal belongings. To give up the sense of ownership is the core of dedication. You are not the possessor, the Divine is the only possessor. In fact, you also do not belong to yourself, you belong to the Divine. That is the ceremony of sacrifice you have to undertakeinstall the Divinity in all your parts and functions. That is how you purify and divinise your human elements. That is how you go through ignorance and mortality and arrive at knowledge and immortality.
   ***

1.01 - Economy, #Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience, #Henry David Thoreau, #Philosophy
  Philanthropy is almost the only virtue which is sufficiently appreciated by mankind. Nay, it is greatly overrated; and it is our selfishness which overrates it. A robust poor man, one sunny day here in Concord, praised a fellow-townsman to me, because, as he said, he was kind to the poor; meaning himself. The kind uncles and aunts of the race are more esteemed than its true spiritual fathers and mothers. I once heard a reverend lecturer on England, a man of learning and intelligence, after enumerating her scientific, literary, and political worthies, Shakespeare, Bacon, Cromwell, Milton, Newton, and others, speak next of her Christian heroes, whom, as if his profession required it of him, he elevated to a place far above all the rest, as the greatest of the great. They were Penn, Howard, and Mrs. Fry. Every one must feel the falsehood and cant of this. The last were not Englands best men and women; only, perhaps, her best philanthropists.
  I would not subtract any thing from the praise that is due to philanthropy, but merely demand justice for all who by their lives and works are a blessing to mankind. I do not value chiefly a mans uprightness and benevolence, which are, as it were, his stem and leaves. Those plants of whose greenness withered we make herb tea for the sick, serve but a humble use, and are most employed by quacks. I want the flower and fruit of a man; that some fragrance be wafted over from him to me, and some ripeness flavor our intercourse. His goodness must not be a partial and transitory act, but a constant superfluity, which costs him nothing and of which he is unconscious. This is a charity that hides a multitude of sins. The philanthropist too often surrounds mankind with the remembrance of his own cast-off griefs as an atmosphere, and calls it sympathy. We should impart our courage, and not our despair, our health and ease, and not our disease, and take care that this does not spread by contagion. From what southern plains comes up the voice of wailing? Under what latitudes reside the hea then to whom we would send light? Who is that intemperate and brutal man whom we would redeem? If any thing ail a man, so that he does not perform his functions, if he have a pain in his bowels even,for that is the seat of sympathy,he forthwith sets about reforming the world.

1.01 - Our Demand and Need from the Gita, #Essays On The Gita, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  God and all others are either impostures or at best imperfectly inspired, that this or that philosophy is the last word of the reasoning intellect and other systems are either errors or saved only by such partial truth in them as links them to the one true philosophical cult. Even the discoveries of physical Science have been elevated into a creed and in its name religion and spirituality banned as ignorance and superstition, philosophy as frippery and moonshine. And to these bigoted exclusions and vain wranglings even the wise have often lent themselves, misled by some spirit of darkness that has mingled with their light and overshadowed it with some cloud of intellectual egoism or spiritual pride. Mankind seems now indeed inclined to grow a little modester and wiser; we no longer slay our fellows in the name of God's truth or because they have minds differently trained or differently constituted from ours; we are less ready to curse and revile our neighbour because he is wicked or presumptuous enough to differ from us in opinion; we are ready even to admit that Truth is everywhere and cannot be our sole monopoly; we are beginning to look at other religions and philosophies for the truth and help they contain and no longer merely in order to damn them as false or criticise what we conceive to be their errors. But we are still apt to declare that our truth gives us the supreme knowledge which other religions or philosophies
  Essays on the Gita

1.01 - The Cycle of Society, #The Human Cycle, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  We may note also in passing that the Indian ideal of the relation between man and woman has always been governed by the symbolism of the relation between the Purusha and Prakriti (in the Veda Nri and Gna), the male and female divine Principles in the universe. Even, there is to some degree a practical correlation between the position of the female sex and this idea. In the earlier Vedic times when the female principle stood on a sort of equality with the male in the symbolic cult, though with a certain predominance for the latter, woman was as much the mate as the adjunct of man; in later times when the Prakriti has become subject in idea to the Purusha, the woman also depends entirely on the man, exists only for him and has hardly even a separate spiritual existence. In the Tantrik Shakta religion which puts the female principle highest, there is an attempt which could not get itself translated into social practice,even as this Tantrik cult could never entirely shake off the subjugation of the Vedantic idea,to elevate woman and make her an object of profound respect and even of worship.
  Or let us take, for this example will serve us best, the Vedic institution of the fourfold order, caturvara, miscalled the system of the four castes,for caste is a conventional, vara a symbolic and typal institution. We are told that the institution of the four orders of society was the result of an economic evolution complicated by political causes. Very possibly;1 but the important point is that it was not so regarded and could not be so regarded by the men of that age. For while we are satisfied when we have found the practical and material causes of a social phenomenon and do not care to look farther, they cared little or only subordinately for its material factors and looked always first and foremost for its symbolic, religious or psychological significance. This appears in the Purushasukta of the Veda, where the four orders are described as having sprung from the body of the creative Deity, from his head, arms, thighs and feet. To us this is merely a poetical image and its sense is that the Brahmins were the men of knowledge, the Kshatriyas the men of power, the Vaishyas the producers and support of society, the Shudras its servants. As if that were all, as if the men of those days would have so profound a reverence for mere poetical figures like this of the body of Brahma or that other of the marriages of Sury, would have built upon them elaborate systems of ritual and sacred ceremony, enduring institutions, great demarcations of social type and ethical discipline. We read always our own mentality into that of these ancient forefa thers and it is therefore that we can find in them nothing but imaginative barbarians. To us poetry is a revel of intellect and fancy, imagination a plaything and caterer for our amusement, our entertainer, the nautch-girl of the mind. But to the men of old the poet was a seer, a revealer of hidden truths, imagination no dancing courtesan but a priestess in Gods house commissioned not to spin fictions but to image difficult and hidden truths; even the metaphor or simile in the Vedic style is used with a serious purpose and expected to convey a reality, not to suggest a pleasing artifice of thought. The image was to these seers a revelative symbol of the unrevealed and it was used because it could hint luminously to the mind what the precise intellectual word, apt only for logical or practical thought or to express the physical and the superficial, could not at all hope to manifest. To them this symbol of the Creators body was more than an image, it expressed a divine reality. Human society was for them an attempt to express in life the cosmic Purusha who has expressed himself otherwise in the material and the supraphysical universe. Man and the cosmos are both of them symbols and expressions of the same hidden Reality.

1.02 - MAPS OF MEANING - THREE LEVELS OF ANALYSIS, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
  precedence over identification with any particular, concretized goal. Spirit is thus elevated over dogma so
  to speak.

1.02 - The Human Soul, #The Interior Castle or The Mansions, #Saint Teresa of Avila, #Christianity
  9.: A soul which gives itself to prayer, either much or little, should on no account be kept within narrow bounds. Since God has given it such great dignity, permit it to wander at will through the rooms of the castle, from the lowest to the highest. Let it not force itself to remain for very long in the same mansion, even that of self-knowledge. Mark well, however, that self-knowledge is indispensable, even for those whom God takes to dwell in the same mansion with Himself. Nothing else, however elevated, perfects the soul which must never seek to forget its own nothingness. Let humility be always at work, like the bee at the honeycomb, or all will be lost. But, remember, the bee leaves its hive to fly in search of flowers and the soul should sometimes cease thinking of itself to rise in meditation on the grandeur and majesty of its God. It will learn its own baseness better thus than by self-contemplation, and will be freer from the reptiles which enter the first room where self-knowledge is acquired. The palmito here referred to is not a palm, but a shrub about four feet high and very dense with leaves, resembling palm leaves. The poorer classes and principally children dig it up by the roots, which they peel of its many layers until a sort of kernel is disclosed, which is eaten, not without relish, and is somewhat like a filbert in taste. See St. John of the Cross, Accent of Mount Carmel, bk. ii. ch, xiv, 3. Although it is a great grace from God to practise self-examination, yet 'too much is as bad as too little,' as they say; believe me, by God's help, we shall advance more by contemplating the Divinity than by keeping our eyes fixed on ourselves, poor creatures of earth that we are.
  10.: I do not know whether I have put this clearly; self-knowledge is of such consequence that I would not have you careless of it, though you may be lifted to heaven in prayer, because while on earth nothing is more needful than humility. Therefore, I repeat, not only a good way, but the best of all ways, is to endeavour to enter first by the room where humility is practised, which is far better than at once rushing on to the others. This is the right road;-if we know how easy and safe it is to walk by it, why ask for wings with which to fly? Let us rather try to learn how to advance quickly. I believe we shall never learn to know ourselves except by endeavouring to know God, for, beholding His greatness we are struck by our own baseness, His purity shows our foulness, and by meditating on His humility we find how very far we are from being humble.

1.02 - Where I Lived, and What I Lived For, #Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience, #Henry David Thoreau, #Philosophy
  I distinguished elevated perhaps by a mirage in their seething valley, like a coin in a basin, all the earth beyond the pond appeared like a thin crust insulated and floated even by this small sheet of interverting water, and I was reminded that this on which I dwelt was but _dry land_.
  Though the view from my door was still more contracted, I did not feel crowded or confined in the least. There was pasture enough for my imagination. The low shrub-oak plateau to which the opposite shore arose, stretched away toward the prairies of the West and the steppes of Tartary, affording ample room for all the roving families of men.
  --
  We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts. Every man is tasked to make his life, even in its details, worthy of the contemplation of his most elevated and critical hour. If we refused, or rather used up, such paltry information as we get, the oracles would distinctly inform us how this might be done.
  I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion. For most men, it appears to me, are in a strange uncertainty about it, whether it is of the devil or of God, and have _somewhat hastily_ concluded that it is the chief end of man here to glorify God and enjoy him forever.

10.31 - The Mystery of The Five Senses, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Indeed we say habitually, when speaking of spiritual realisation, that one sees the truth, one has to see the truth: to know the truth, to know the reality is taken to mean to see the truth, to see the reality, and what does this signify? It signifies what one sees is the light, the light that emanates from truth, the form that the Truth takes, the radiant substance that is the Truth. This then is the special character or gift of this organ, the organ of sight, the eye. One sees the physical light, of course, but one sees also the supraphysical light. It is, as the Upanishad says, the eye of the eye, the third eye in the language of the occultists. What we say about the eye may be equally said in respect of the other sense-organs. Take hearing, for example. By the ear we hear the noises of the world, its deafening cries and no doubt at times also some earthly music. But when the ear is turned inward, we listen to unearthly things Indeed we know how stone-deaf Beethoven heard some of those harmonies of supreme beauty that are now the cherished possessions of humanity. This inner ear is able to take you by a process of regression to the very source of all sound and utterance, from where springs the anhata vk, the undictated voice, the nda-brahman, the original sound-seed, the primary vibration. So the ear gives that hearing which reveals to you a special aspect of the Divine: the vibratory rhythm of the being, that matrix of all utterance, of all speech that mark the material expression of consciousness. Next we come to the third sense, that of smell, Well, the nose is not a despicable organ, in any way; it is as important as any other more aristocratic sense-organ, as the eye or the ear. It is the gate to the perfumed atmosphere of the reality. Even like a flower, as a lotus for example, the truth is colourful, beautiful, shapely, radiant to the eye; to the nostrils it is exhilarating perfume, it distils all around a divine scent that sanctifies, elevates the whole being. After the third sense we come to the fourth, the tongue. The mouth gives you the taste of the truth and you find that the Truth is sweetness, the delicious nectar of the gods: for the truth is also soma, the surpreme rasa, amta, immortality itself. Here is Aswapathy's experience of the thing in Savitri:
   In the nostrils quivered celestial fragrances,

1.03 - Sympathetic Magic, #The Golden Bough, #James George Frazer, #Occultism
  and to elevate them into a larger, freer life, with a broader
  outlook on the world. This is no small service rendered to humanity.

1.04 - Narayana appearance, in the beginning of the Kalpa, as the Varaha (boar), #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
  Prīthivī (Earth).-Hail to thee, who art all creatures; to thee, the holder of the mace and shell: elevate me now from this place, as thou hast upraised me in days of old. From thee have I proceeded; of thee do I consist; as do the skies, and all other existing things. Hail to thee, spirit of the supreme spirit; to thee, soul of soul; to thee, who art discrete and indiscrete matter; who art one with the elements and with time. Thou art the creator of all things, their preserver, and their destroyer, in the forms, oh lord, of Brahmā, Viṣṇu, and Rudra, at the seasons of creation, duration, and dissolution. When thou hast devoured all things, thou reposest on the ocean that sweeps over the world, meditated upon, oh Govinda, by the wise. No one knoweth thy true nature, and the gods adore thee only in the forms it bath pleased thee to assume. They who are desirous of final liberation, worship thee as the supreme Brahmā; and who that adores not Vāsudeva, shall obtain emancipation? Whatever may be apprehended by the mind, whatever may be perceived by the senses, whatever may he discerned by the intellect, all is but a form of thee. I am of thee, upheld by thee; thou art my creator, and to thee I fly for refuge: hence, in this universe, Mādhavī (the bride of Mādhava or Viṣṇu) is my designation. Triumph to the essence of all wisdom, to the unchangeable, the imperishable: triumph to the eternal; to the indiscrete, to the essence of discrete things: to him who is both cause and effect; who is the universe; the sinless lord of sacrifice[4]; triumph. Thou art sacrifice; thou art the oblation; thou art the mystic Omkāra; thou art the sacrificial fires; thou art the Vedas, and their dependent sciences; thou art, Hari, the object of all worship[5]. The sun, the stars, the planets, the whole world; all that is formless, or that has form; all that is visible, or invisible; all, Puruṣottama, that I have said, or left unsaid; all this, Supreme, thou art. Hail to thee, again and again! hail! all hail!
  Parāśara said:-

1.04 - On Knowledge of the Future World., #The Alchemy of Happiness, #Al-Ghazali, #Sufism
  The second kind of torment in hell, beloved, is the fire of ignominy and shame. In illustration this, suppose that a prince receives in to his friendship a poor'and humble man, treating him with great honor and making'him the favorite among all his confidential servants. He gives into his hands the keys of all his treasuries/commits his honor and wife and family to his care, and in short confides all his affairs into his hands, in full reliance upon him. Then, suppose that the poor man, after being elevated to this high rank, should be puffed up with pride, and should be disposed to betray the honor of the prince,- that he should begin to indulge in unworthy conduct with his wife [90] and servants, and should open his coffers and spend his property for his own pleasures. Suppose farther that he should even be consulting with the prince's enemy who has designs upon the principality, and should enter in to a compact with him. Just at this point the prince from a concealed retreat espies his conduct in his family, and learns how he has wasted his money and his possessions, and in short becomes acquainted with everything he has done. The man also learns that for some time the prince has been aware of his course of conduct, but that the reason of his delaying and postponing punishment was that he might see what other crimes he would commit, that he might punish him accordingly. In these circumstances the reflecting can easily appreciate what would be the confusion and mortification of this individual. He would think it a thousand times better to fall from a precipice and be dashed to pieces, or that the earth should open and he sink into the abyss, than that he should continue to live. So also is it with you. How many actions you perform, of which you say, "it is in private and no one sees it," or of which Satan cloaks over the guilt from your mind, by persuading you that it is all right and fair. But at last, when death comes and makes your sin manifest, then the fire of ignominy and shame makes you captive to fierce torments and long continued misery....
  Suppose you should throw a stone over against a wall, and some one Should come and inform you that the stone had hit your own house; and had put out the eye of your son. When you rush to your house and find that it is even so, can you conceive of the fire of repentance and anguish you will have to meet? ...

1.05 - Adam Kadmon, #A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah, #Israel Regardie, #Occultism
  Zureh as connected in some way with the Neschamah by spiritual and magnetic ties. Isaac Myers has a few very interesting remarks to make in this respect. He says that by devotion the magical will elevates the Neschamah to its
  Zureh, where they unite. " The higher prototypic soul becomes stirred up and, by a mystic influence, they are chained to each other." This idea falls within the Mystic- ism of the Qabalah, where the doctrine of ecstasy plays a prominent part, and belongs therefore to a later chapter.

1.05 - AUERBACHS CELLAR, #Faust, #Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, #Poetry
  Decide the choice, and elevate the man.
  FROSCH

1.05 - The Ascent of the Sacrifice - The Psychic Being, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
     Altruism, philanthropy, humanitarianism, service are flowers of the mental consciousness and are at best the mind's cold and pale imitation of the spiritual flame of universal Divine Love. Not truly liberative from ego-sense, they widen it at most and give it higher and larger satisfaction; impotent in practice to change mall's vital life and nature, they only modify and palliate its action and daub over its unchanged egoistic essence. Or if they are intensely followed with an entire sincerity of the will, it is by an exaggerated amplification of one side of our nature; in that exaggeration there can be no clue for the full and perfect divine evolution of the many sides of our individualised being towards the universal and transcendent Eternal. Nor can the religio-ethical ideal be a sufficient guide, -- for this is a compromise or compact of mutual concessions for mutual support between a religious urge which seeks to get a closer hold on earth by taking into itself the higher turns of ordinary human nature and an ethical urge which hopes to elevate itself out of its own mental hardness and dryness by some touch of a religious fervour. In making this compact religion lowers itself to the mental level and inherits the inherent imperfections of mind and its inability to convert and transform life. The mind is the sphere of the dualities and, just as it is impossible for it to achieve any absolute Truth but only truths relative or mixed with error, so it is impossible for it to achieve any absolute good; for moral good exists as a counterpart and corrective to evil and has evil always for its shadow, complement, almost its reason for existence. But the spiritual consciousness belongs to a higher than the mental plane and there the dualities cease; for there falsehood confronted with the truth by which it profited through a usurping falsification of it and evil faced by the good of which it was a perversion or a lurid substitute, are obliged to perish for want of sustenance and to cease. The integral Yoga, refusing to rely upon the fragile stuff of mental and moral ideals, puts its whole emphasis in this field on three central dynamic processes -- the development of the true soul or psychic being to take the place of the false soul of desire, the sublimation of human into divine love, the elevation of consciousness from its mental to its spiritual and supramental plane by whose power alone both the soul and the life-force can be utterly delivered from the veils and prevarications of the Ignorance.
     It is the very nature of the soul or the psychic being to turn towards the Divine Truth as the sunflower to the sun; it accepts and clings to all that is divine or progressing towards divinity and draws back from all that is a perversion or a denial of it, from all that is false and undivine. Yet the soul is at first but a spark and then a little flame of godhead burning in the midst of a great darkness; for the most part it is veiled in its inner sanctum and to reveal itself it has to call on the mind, the life-force and the physical consciousness and persuade them, as best they can, to express it; ordinarily, it succeeds at most in suffusing their outwardness with its inner light and modifying with its purifying fineness their dark obscurities or their coarser mixture. Even when there is a formed psychic being, able to express itself with some directness in life, it is still in all but a few a smaller portion of the being -- "no bigger in the mass of the body than the thumb of a man" was the image used by the ancient seers -- and it is not always able to prevail against the obscurity and ignorant smallness of the physical consciousness, the mistaken surenesses of the mind or the arrogance and vehemence of the vital nature. This soul is obliged to accept the human mental, emotive, sensational life as it is, its relations, its activities, its cherished forms and figures; it has to labour to disengage and increase the divine element in all this relative truth mixed with continual falsifying error, this love turned to the uses of the animal body or the satisfaction of the vital ego, this life of an average manhood shot with rare and pale glimpses of Godhead and the darker luridities of the demon and the brute. Unerring in the essence of its will, it is obliged often under the pressure of its instruments to submit to mistakes of action, wrong placement of feeling, wrong choice of person, errors in the exact form of its will, in the circumstances of its expression of the infallible inner ideal. Yet is there a divination within it which makes it a surer guide than the reason or than even the highest desire, and through apparent errors and stumblings its voice can still lead better than the precise intellect and the considering mental judgment. This voice of the soul is not what we call conscience -- for that is only a mental and often conventional erring substitute; it is a deeper and more seldom heard call; yet to follow it when heard is wisest : even, it is better to wander at the call of one's soul than to go apparently straight with the reason and the outward moral mentor. But It is only when the life turns towards the Divine that the soul can truly come forward and impose its power on the outer members; for, itself a spark of the Divine, to grow in flame towards the Divine is its true life and its very reason of existence.

1.05 - THE HOSTILE BROTHERS - ARCHETYPES OF RESPONSE TO THE UNKNOWN, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
  The highest value towards which effort is devoted determines what will become elevated, and what
  subjugated, in the course of individual and social existence. If security or power is valued above all else,
  --
  with the justice that elevates yourself above him but as a divinity, heavily burdened, who could yet see
  the light.

1.060 - Tracing the Ultimate Cause of Any Experience, #The Study and Practice of Yoga, #Swami Krishnananda, #Yoga
  In practice, this method will fail unless the intelligence is far superior to the demands of the instinct; which is, of course, very rare to find in people. The senses generally get stirred up in the presence of their respective objects. Sense does not necessarily mean the ear or the eye even the ego is one of the senses. In an atmosphere where the ego is to be pampered, or can be pampered, where it can be elevated, where it can find its food in such an atmosphere it gets stirred up. It is activated, and its mood changes. Immediately, it flies up through a pair of new wings. When such a stirring activity within takes place, either of the senses or of the ego, one can infer the presence of a conducive atmosphere. A wise person will flee from that atmosphere; that is what an intelligent sadhaka would do. He would not stay in that place because he has found that his senses are becoming very turbulent due to the presence of certain external things. What can one do, except place oneself in a different condition where such an urge would not manifest itself? The cause of the event, the cause of the effect, is the presence of the personality in a given condition, just as favourable conditions enable a seed to sprout into a small plant while unfavourable conditions compel it to remain under the earth, as if it has no life at all. Likewise, the impulses remain inactive under unfavourable circumstances, and they manifest themselves under favourable ones.
  Once we provide these impulses with the conditions that are favourable, they gain an upper hand. Then, we cannot do anything with them. They will rush forth like a river which has found a small outlet. If a river that is in high flood finds even a little outlet, it will break the entire bund and will go wherever it wishes. Likewise, even a little outlet that is provided for the movement of an impulse outside in respect of an object may be enough for it to go out of control.

1.06 - Origin of the four castes, #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
  gu is the seventh, and kulattha, pulse, the eighth: the others are, Syāmāka, a sort of panic; Nīvāra, uñcultivated rice; Jarttila, wild sesamum; Gavedukā (coix); Markata, wild panic; and (a plant called) the seed or barley of the Bambu (Venu-yava). These, cultivated or wild, are the fourteen grains that were produced for purposes of offering in sacrifice; and sacrifice (the cause of rain) is their origin also: they again, with sacrifice, are the great cause of the perpetuation of the human race, as those understand who can discriminate cause and effect. Thence sacrifices were offered daily; the performance of which, oh best of Munis, is of essential service to mankind, and expiates the offences of those by whom they are observed. Those, however, in whose hearts the dross of sin derived from Time (Kāla) was still more developed, assented not to sacrifices, but reviled both them and all that resulted from them, the gods, and the followers of the Vedas. Those abusers of the Vedas, of evil disposition and conduct, and seceders from the path of enjoined duties, were plunged in wickedness[8]. The means of subsistence having been provided for the beings he had created, Brahmā prescribed laws suited to their station and faculties, the duties of the several castes and orders[9], and the regions of those of the different castes who were observant of their duties. The heaven of the Pitris is the region of devout Brahmans. The sphere of Indra, of Kṣetriyas who fly not from the field. The region of the winds is assigned to the Vaisyas who are diligent in their occupations and submissive. Śūdras are elevated to the sphere of the Gandharvas. Those Brahmans who lead religious lives go to the world of the eighty-eight thousand saints: and that of the seven Ṛṣis is the seat of pious anchorets and hermits. The world of ancestors is that of respectable householders: and the region of Brahmā is the asylum of religious mendicants[10]. The imperishable region of the Yogis is the highest seat of Viṣṇu, where they perpetually meditate upon the supreme being, with minds intent on him alone: the sphere where they reside, the gods themselves cannot behold. The sun, the moon, the planets, shall repeatedly be, and cease to be; but those who internally repeat the mystic adoration of the divinity, shall never know decay. For those who neglect their duties, who revile the Vedas, and obstruct religious rites, the places assigned after death are the terrific regions of darkness, of deep gloom, of fear, and of great terror; the fearful hell of sharp swords, the hell of scourges and of a waveless sea[11].
  Footnotes and references:

1.06 - THE MASTER WITH THE BRAHMO DEVOTEES, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
  And a pariah with the love of God is no longer a pariah. Through bhakti an untouchable becomes pure and elevated."
  Entanglement of householders

1.07 - Incarnate Human Gods, #The Golden Bough, #James George Frazer, #Occultism
  had not yet been elevated into communion with the divine spirit, its
  centre and source. Sometimes their progress towards this mystic

1.07 - ON READING AND WRITING, #Thus Spoke Zarathustra, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
  And I look down because I am elevated. Who among
  41
  you can laugh and be elevated at the same time? Whoever climbs the highest mountains laughs at all tragic
  plays and tragic seriousness.

1.07 - Standards of Conduct and Spiritual Freedom, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  16:Against this danger of suppression and immobilisation Nature in the individual reacts. It may react by an isolated resistance ranging from the instinctive and brutal revolt of the criminal to the complete negation of the solitary and ascetic. It may react by the assertion of an individualistic trend in the social idea, may impose it on the mass consciousness and establish a compromise between the individual and the social demand. But a compromise is not a solution; it only salves over the difficulty and in the end increases the complexity of the problem and multiplies its issues. A new principle has to be called in other and higher than the two conflicting instincts and powerful at once to override and to reconcile them. Above the natural individual law which sets up as our one standard of conduct the satisfaction of our individual needs, preferences and desires and the natural communal law which sets up as a superior standard the satisfaction of the needs, preferences and desires of the community as a whole, there had to arise the notion of an ideal moral law which is not the satisfaction of need and desire, but controls and even coerces or annuls them in the interests of an ideal order that is not animal, not vital and physical, but mental, a creation of the mind's seeking for light and knowledge and right rule and right movement and true order. The moment this notion becomes powerful in man, he begins to escape from the engrossing vital and material into the mental life; he climbs from the first to the second degree of the threefold ascent of Nature. His needs and desires themselves are touched with a more elevated light of purpose and the mental need, the aesthetic, intellectual and emotional desire begin to predominate over the demand of the physical and vital nature.
  17:The natural law of conduct proceeds from a conflict to an equilibrium of forces, impulsions and desires; the higher ethical law proceeds by the development of the mental and moral nature towards a fixed internal standard or else a self-formed ideal of absolute qualities, - justice, righteousness, love, right reason, right power, beauty, light. It is therefore essentially an individual standard; it is not a creation of the mass mind. The thinker is the individual; it is he who calls out and throws into forms that which would otherwise remain subconscious in the amorphous human whole. The moral striver is also the individual; selfdiscipline, not under the yoke of an outer law, but in obedience to an internal light, is essentially an individual effort. But by positing his personal standard as the translation of an absolute moral ideal the thinker imposes it, not on himself alone, but on all the individuals whom his thought can reach and penetrate. And as the mass of individuals come more and more to accept it in idea if only in an imperfect practice or no practice, society also is compelled to obey the new orientation. It absorbs the ideative influence and tries, not with any striking success, to mould its institutions into new forms touched by these higher ideals. But always its instinct is to translate them into binding law, into pattern forms, into mechanic custom, into an external social compulsion upon its living units.

1.08a - The Ladder, #A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah, #Israel Regardie, #Occultism
  " In the most mysterious and elevated part of the heaven there is a certain palace which is called the Palace of
  Love, wherein are hidden profound mysteries, and the
  --
  Abyss appears to invade or elevate the Ruach ; a larger environing consciousness, an unfolding presence makes itself felt. It is the emergence of a new type-level of life, corresponding in some way with ultimate sources of
  Reality ; it is a surge of the entire Self towards ineffable fullness of life.
  --
  Nature-mysticism ; nor of its advocates, those earnest people who have discovered the inner fastnesses of Nature through the quiet contemplation of lovely landscapes, with their noble green trees which elevate themselves as in adoration to the heavens above and whose laced frondage sways gently with the passing of mild breezes, their lush meadows of emerald hue, and their gentle brooks that wind their unwearying way through field and pasture to Mother
  Sea. In reality^ that does not belong to the province that I originally contemplated illustrating within the pages of this book, although it can be simply and briefly demon- strated that the experience even here is capable of analysis, being induced by an unconscious application of the funda- mental principles laid down above. The wealth and luxuriant variety of the overwhelming beauty of Wide

1.08 - Departmental Kings of Nature, #The Golden Bough, #James George Frazer, #Occultism
  themselves, for fear of being elevated to the invidious dignity
  which he has just vacated. The people go and search for them, and

1.08 - Information, Language, and Society, #Cybernetics, or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine, #Norbert Wiener, #Cybernetics
  belief, current in many countries, which has been elevated to
  the rank of an official article of faith in the United States, that

1.08 - Origin of Rudra: his becoming eight Rudras, #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
  ga and in the Hari Vaṃśa: and the latter thus accounts for the origin of the constellation Mrigasīras; Yajña, with the head of a deer, being elevated to the planetary region, by Brahmā.
  [8]: As he prays to Śiva presently, it could not well be meant here that Dakṣa was decapitated, although that is the story in other places. The Li

1.09 - Civilisation and Culture, #The Human Cycle, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Nature starts from Matter, develops out of it its hidden Life, releases out of involution in life all the crude material of Mind and, when she is ready, turns Mind upon itself and upon Life and Matter in a great mental effort to understand all three in their phenomena, their obvious action, their secret laws, their normal and abnormal possibilities and powers so that they may be turned to the richest account, used in the best and most harmonious way, elevated to their highest as well as extended to their widest potential aims by the action of that faculty which man alone of terrestrial creatures clearly possesses, the intelligent will. It is only in this fourth stage of her progress that she arrives at humanity. The atoms and the elements organise brute Matter, the plant develops the living being, the animal prepares and brings to a certain kind of mechanical organisation the crude material of Mind, but the last work of all, the knowledge and control of all these things and self-knowledge and self-control,that has been reserved for Man, Natures mental being. That he may better do the work she has given him, she compels him to repeat physically and to some extent mentally stages of her animal evolution and, even when he is in possession of his mental being, she induces him continually to dwell with an interest and even a kind of absorption upon Matter and Life and his own body and vital existence. This is necessary to the largeness of her purpose in him. His first natural absorption in the body and the life is narrow and unintelligent; as his intelligence and mental force increase, he disengages himself to some extent, is able to mount higher, but is still tied to his vital and material roots by need and desire and has to return upon them with a larger curiosity, a greater power of utilisation, a more and more highly mental and, in the end, a more and more spiritual aim in the return. For his cycles are circles of a growing, but still imperfect harmony and synthesis, and she brings him back violently to her original principles, sometimes even to something like her earlier conditions so that he may start afresh on a larger curve of progress and self-fulfilment.
  It would seem at first sight that since man is pre-eminently the mental being, the development of the mental faculties and the richness of the mental life should be his highest aim,his preoccupying aim, even, as soon as he has got rid of the obsession of the life and body and provided for the indispensable satisfaction of the gross needs which our physical and animal nature imposes on us. Knowledge, science, art, thought, ethics, philosophy, religion, this is mans real business, these are his true affairs. To be is for him not merely to be born, grow up, marry, get his livelihood, support a family and then die,the vital and physical life, a human edition of the animal round, a human enlargement of the little animal sector and arc of the divine circle; rather to become and grow mentally and live with knowledge and power within himself as well as from within outward is his manhood. But there is here a double motive of Nature, an insistent duality in her human purpose. Man is here to learn from her how to control and create; but she evidently means him not only to control, create and constantly re-create in new and better forms himself, his own inner existence, his mentality, but also to control and re-create correspondingly his environment. He has to turn Mind not only on itself, but on Life and Matter and the material existence; that is very clear not only from the law and nature of the terrestrial evolution, but from his own past and present history. And there comes from the observation of these conditions and of his highest aspirations and impulses the question whether he is not intended, not only to expand inwardly and outwardly, but to grow upward, wonderfully exceeding himself as he has wonderfully exceeded his animal beginnings, into something more than mental, more than human, into a being spiritual and divine. Even if he cannot do that, yet he may have to open his mind to what is beyond it and to govern his life more and more by the light and power that he receives from something greater than himself. Mans consciousness of the divine within himself and the world is the supreme fact of his existence and to grow into that may very well be the intention of his nature. In any case the fullness of Life is his evident object, the widest life and the highest life possible to him, whether that be a complete humanity or a new and divine race. We must recognise both his need of integrality and his impulse of self-exceeding if we would fix rightly the meaning of his individual existence and the perfect aim and norm of his society.
  --
  The first results of this momentous change have been inspiriting to our desire of movement, but a little disconcerting to the thinker and to the lover of a high and fine culture; for if it has to some extent democratised culture or the semblance of culture, it does not seem at first sight to have elevated or streng thened it by this large accession of the half-redeemed from below. Nor does the world seem to be guided any more directly by the reason and intelligent will of her best minds than before. Commercialism is still the heart of modern civilisation; a sensational activism is still its driving force. Modern education has not in the mass redeemed the sensational man; it has only made necessary to him things to which he was not formerly accustomed, mental activity and occupations, intellectual and even aesthetic sensations, emotions of idealism. He still lives in the vital substratum, but he wants it stimulated from above. He requires an army of writers to keep him mentally occupied and provide some sort of intellectual pabulum for him; he has a thirst for general information of all kinds which he does not care or has not time to coordinate or assimilate, for popularised scientific knowledge, for such new ideas as he can catch, provided they are put before him with force or brilliance, for mental sensations and excitation of many kinds, for ideals which he likes to think of as actuating his conduct and which do give it sometimes a certain colour. It is still the activism and sensationalism of the crude mental being, but much more open and free. And the cultured, the intelligentsia find that they can get a hearing from him such as they never had from the pure Philistine, provided they can first stimulate or amuse him; their ideas have now a chance of getting executed such as they never had before. The result has been to cheapen thought and art and literature, to make talent and even genius run in the grooves of popular success, to put the writer and thinker and scientist very much in a position like that of the cultured Greek slave in a Roman household where he has to work for, please, amuse and instruct his master while keeping a careful eye on his tastes and preferences and repeating trickily the manner and the points that have caught his fancy. The higher mental life, in a word, has been democratised, sensationalised, activised with both good and bad results. Through it all the eye of faith can see perhaps that a yet crude but an enormous change has begun. Thought and Knowledge, if not yet Beauty, can get a hearing and even produce rapidly some large, vague, yet in the end effective will for their results; the mass of culture and of men who think and strive seriously to appreciate and to know has enormously increased behind all this surface veil of sensationalism, and even the sensational man has begun to undergo a process of transformation. Especially, new methods of education, new principles of society are beginning to come into the range of practical possibility which will create perhaps one day that as yet unknown phenomenon, a race of mennot only a classwho have to some extent found and developed their mental selves, a cultured humanity.
  ***

11.02 - The Golden Life-line, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Naturally, the transference of the consciousness and being from the lower or surface line to the line that lies in a higher and deeper level does not mean, we must note, the rejection or annihilation of the lower in favour of the higher. The consciousness of the soul or self does not negate the consciousness of the body and the life and the mind. It only purifies, elevates, and transmutes them into its true and divine expression and embodiment.
   To live in the soul is to live in eternity with the vision and inspiration of the eternal. It is living in the mind and the vital and the body that turns and binds one to the past renders one a slave to mortality.

1.10 - The Three Modes of Nature, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  If we call in rajas again to correct this error and bid it ally itself to sattwa and by their united agency endeavour to get rid of the dark principle, we find that we have elevated our action, but that there is again subjection to rajasic eagerness, passion, disappointment, suffering, anger. These movements may be more exalted in their scope and spirit and action than before, but they are not the peace, the freedom, the power, the self-mastery
  238

1.11 - Legend of Dhruva, the son of Uttanapada, #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
  Dhruva answered; "Mother, the words that you have addressed to me for my consolation find no place in a heart that contumely has broken. I will exert myself to obtain such elevated rank, that it shall be revered by the whole world. Though I be not born of Suruci, the beloved of the king, you shall behold my glory, who am your son. Let Uttama my brother, her child, possess the throne given to him by my father; I wish for no other honours than such as my own actions shall acquire, such as even my father has not enjoyed."
  Having thus spoken, Dhruva went forth from his mother's dwelling: he quitted the city, and entered an adjoining thicket, where he beheld seven Munis sitting upon hides of the black antelope, which they had taken from off their persons, and spread over the holy kusa grass. Saluting them reverentially, and bowing humbly before then, the prince said, "Behold in me, venerable men, the son of Uttānapāda, born of Sunīti. Dissatisfied with the world, I appear before you." The Ṛṣis replied; "The son of a king, and but four or five years of age, there can be no reason, child, why you should be dissatisfied with life; you cannot be in want of any thing whilst the king your father reigns; we cannot imagine that you suffer the pain of separation from the object of your affections; nor do we observe in your person any sign of disease. What is the cause of your discontent? Tell us, if it is known to yourself."

1.11 - The Reason as Governor of Life, #The Human Cycle, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Reason can indeed make itself a mere servant of life; it can limit itself to the work the average normal man demands from it, content to furnish means and justifications for the interests, passions, prejudices of man and clo the them with a misleading garb of rationality or at most supply them with their own secure and enlightened order or with rules of caution and self-restraint sufficient to prevent their more egregious stumbles and most unpleasant consequences. But this is obviously to abdicate its throne or its highest office and to betray the hope with which man set forth on his journey. It may again determine to found itself securely on the facts of life, disinterestedly indeed, that is to say, with a dispassionate critical observation of its principles and processes, but with a prudent resolve not to venture too much forward into the unknown or elevate itself far beyond the immediate realities of our apparent or phenomenal existence. But here again it abdicates; either it becomes a mere critic and observer or else, so far as it tries to lay down laws, it does so within very narrow limits of immediate potentiality and it renounces mans drift towards higher possibilities, his saving gift of idealism. In this limited use of the reason subjected to the rule of an immediate, an apparent vital and physical practicality man cannot rest long satisfied. For his nature pushes him towards the heights; it demands a constant effort of self-transcendence and the impulsion towards things unachieved and even immediately impossible.
  On the other hand, when it attempts a higher action reason separates itself from life. Its very attempt at a disinterested and dispassionate knowledge carries it to an elevation where it loses hold of that other knowledge which our instincts and impulses carry within themselves and which, however imperfect, obscure and limited, is still a hidden action of the universal KnowledgeWill inherent in existence that creates and directs all things according to their nature. True, even Science and Philosophy are never entirely dispassionate and disinterested. They fall into subjection to the tyranny of their own ideas, their partial systems, their hasty generalisations and by the innate drive of man towards practice they seek to impose these upon the life. But even so they enter into a world either of abstract ideas or of ideals or of rigid laws from which the complexity of life escapes. The idealist, the thinker, the philosopher, the poet and artist, even the moralist, all those who live much in ideas, when they come to grapple at close quarters with practical life, seem to find themselves something at a loss and are constantly defeated in their endeavour to govern life by their ideas. They exercise a powerful influence, but it is indirectly, more by throwing their ideas into Life which does with them what the secret Will in it chooses than by a direct and successfully ordered action. Not that the pure empiric, the practical man really succeeds any better by his direct action; for that too is taken by the secret Will in life and turned to quite other ends than the practical man had intended. On the contrary, ideals and idealists are necessary; ideals are the savour and sap of life, idealists the most powerful diviners and assistants of its purposes. But reduce your ideal to a system and it at once begins to fail; apply your general laws and fixed ideas systematically as the doctrinaire would do, and Life very soon breaks through or writhes out of their hold or transforms your system, even while it nominally exists, into something the originator would not recognise and would repudiate perhaps as the very contradiction of the principles which he sought to eternise.

1.12 - Dhruva commences a course of religious austerities, #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
  Thus the sage Dhruva, having received a boon from Janārddana, the god of gods, and lord of the world, resides in an exalted station. Beholding his glory, Uśanas, the preceptor of the gods and demons, repeated these verses: "Wonderful is the efficacy of this penance, marvellous is its reward, that the seven Ṛṣis should be preceded by Dhruva. This too is the pious Sunīti, his parent, who is called Sūnritā[10]." Who can celebrate her greatness, who, having given birth to Dhruva, has become the asylum of the three worlds, enjoying to all future time an elevated station, a station eminent above all? He who shall worthily describe the ascent into the sky of Dhruva, for ever shall be freed from all sin, and enjoy the heaven of Indra. Whatever be his dignity, whether upon earth or in heaven, he shall never fall from it, but shall long enjoy life, possessed of every blessing[11].
  Footnotes and references:

1.13 - Gnostic Symbols of the Self, #Aion, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  pictures, the hermaphrodite has a fondness for elevated places.
  The alchemists likewise speak of an Adam who always carries

1.14 - The Structure and Dynamics of the Self, #Aion, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  perceived by the senses must therefore be elevated to reason or to
  the intelligence or to absolute unity. When in this way we shall

1.14 - The Supermind as Creator, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  19:This is the justification of the current religious notions of the omnipresence, omniscience and omnipotence of the Divine Being. Far from being an irrational imagination they are perfectly rational and in no way contradict either the logic of a comprehensive philosophy or the indications of observation and experience. The error is to make an unbridgeable gulf between God and man, Brahman and the world. That error elevates an actual and practical differentiation in being, consciousness and force into an essential division. But this aspect of the question we shall touch upon afterwards. At present we have arrived at an affirmation and some conception of the divine and creative Supermind in which all is one in being, consciousness, will and delight, yet with an infinite capacity of differentiation that deploys but does not destroy the unity, - in which Truth is the substance and Truth rises in the Idea and Truth comes out in the form and there is one truth of knowledge and will, one truth of self-fulfilment and therefore of delight; for all self-fulfilment is satisfaction of being. Therefore, always, in all mutations and combinations a self-existent and inalienable harmony.

1.14 - The Suprarational Beauty, #The Human Cycle, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  There have been periods of artistic creation, ages of reason, in which the rational and intellectual tendency has prevailed in poetry and art; there have even been nations which in their great formative periods of art and literature have set up reason and a meticulous taste as the sovereign powers of their aesthetic activity. At their best these periods have achieved work of a certain greatness, but predominantly of an intellectual greatness and perfection of technique rather than achievements of a supreme inspired and revealing beauty; indeed their very aim has been not the discovery of the deeper truth of beauty, but truth of ideas and truth of reason, a critical rather than a true creative aim. Their leading object has been an intellectual criticism of life and nature elevated by a consummate poetical rhythm and diction rather than a revelation of God and man and life and nature in inspired forms of artistic beauty. But great art is not satisfied with representing the intellectual truth of things, which is always their superficial or exterior truth; it seeks for a deeper and original truth which escapes the eye of the mere sense or the mere reason, the soul in them, the unseen reality which is not that of their form and process but of their spirit. This it seizes and expresses by form and idea, but a significant form, which is not merely a faithful and just or a harmonious reproduction of outward Nature, and a revelatory idea, not the idea which is merely correct, elegantly right or fully satisfying to the reason and taste. Always the truth it seeks is first and foremost the truth of beauty,not, again, the formal beauty alone or the beauty of proportion and right process which is what the sense and the reason seek, but the soul of beauty which is hidden from the ordinary eye and the ordinary mind and revealed in its fullness only to the unsealed vision of the poet and artist in man who can seize the secret significances of the universal poet and artist, the divine creator who dwells as their soul and spirit in the forms he has created.
  The art-creation which lays a supreme stress on reason and taste and on perfection and purity of a technique constructed in obedience to the canons of reason and taste, claimed for itself the name of classical art; but the claim, like the too trenchant distinction on which it rests, is of doubtful validity. The spirit of the real, the great classical art and poetry is to bring out what is universal and subordinate individual expression to universal truth and beauty, just as the spirit of romantic art and poetry is to bring out what is striking and individual and this it often does so powerfully or with so vivid an emphasis as to throw into the background of its creation the universal, on which yet all true art romantic or classical builds and fills in its forms. In truth, all great art has carried in it both a classical and a romantic as well as a realistic element,understanding realism in the sense of the prominent bringing out of the external truth of things, not the perverse inverted romanticism of the real which brings into exaggerated prominence the ugly, common or morbid and puts that forward as the whole truth of life. The type of art to which a great creative work belongs is determined by the prominence it gives to one element and the subdual of the others into subordination to its reigning spirit. But classical art also works by a large vision and inspiration, not by the process of the intellect. The lower kind of classical art and literature,if classical it be and not rather, as it often is, pseudo-classical, intellectually imitative of the external form and process of the classical,may achieve work of considerable, though a much lesser power, but of an essentially inferior scope and nature; for to that inferiority it is self-condemned by its principle of intellectual construction. Almost always it speedily degenerates into the formal or academic, empty of real beauty, void of life and power, imprisoned in its slavery to form and imagining that when a certain form has been followed, certain canons of construction satisfied, certain rhetorical rules or technical principles obeyed, all has been achieved. It ceases to be art and becomes a cold and mechanical workmanship.

1.15 - Index, #Aion, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  and elevated places, 206; Original
  Man as, 204; stone as, 246; sym-

1.15 - In the Domain of the Spirit Beings, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  Every human being, after having died, will realise yet another fact in the astral world: having only a low degree of development, he will not be able to communicate with beings who, during their lifetime, have reached a higher degree of development, because these beings will stay in a higher, more subtle sphere of the astral world, and he himself will not be able to travel to their sphere of light. Even if he were able to move to those higher spheres he would not be able to stand the elevated vibration there and would drop back, that is he would soon find himself transferred to that astral sphere in which he belongs on account of his degree of development. A person with a high degree of perfection, however, is able to place himself into a lower sphere by accomodating the vibration of that sphere in his spirit.
  If, therefore, a spirit with a low degree of development wants to get into contact with a spirit of a higher degree of development, the former must ask the latter, by force of imagination, to come to his sphere. Whether the higher developed being will fulfill the wish of the lower being, always depends on the purpose for which the lower being calls the higher one. This clearly shows that a lower being is not capable of moving to the higher spheres of the astral world. The contrary, however, is quite possible. A magician with a good degree of development is able to place himself iilto any sphere, for he is capable of accomodating and creating every kind of vibration and any form of every sphere he wants to get into touch with. Many a reader will here remember the words of the Bible and perceive its meaning:

1.16 - PRAYER, #The Perennial Philosophy, #Aldous Huxley, #Philosophy
  The spirit, in order to work, must have all sensible images, both good and bad, removed. The beginner in a spiritual course commences with the use of good sensible images, and it is impossible to begin in a good spiritual course with the exercises of the spirit. Those souls who have not a propensity to the interior must abide always in the exercises, in which sensible images are used, and these souls will find the sensible exercises very profitable to themselves and to others, and pleasing to God. And this is the way of the active life. But others, who have the propensity to the interior, do not always remain in the exercises of the senses, but after a time these will give place to the exercises of the spirit, which are independent of the senses and the imagination and consist simply in the elevation of the will of the intellective soul to God. The soul elevates her will towards God, apprehended by the understanding as a spirit, and not as an imaginary thing, the human spirit in this way aspiring to a union with the Divine Spirit.
  Augustine Baker

1.16 - The Process of Avatarhood, #Essays On The Gita, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Presence and divine Consciousness, we should have the Avatar according to this intermediary idea of the incarnation. That easily recommends itself as possible to our human notions; for if the human being can elevate his nature so as to feel a unity with the being of the Divine and himself a mere channel of its consciousness, light, power, love, his own will and personality lost in that will and that being, - and this is a recognised spiritual status,
  - then there is no inherent impossibility of the reflex action of that Will, Being, Power, Love, Light, Consciousness occupying the whole personality of the human Jiva. And this would not be merely an ascent of our humanity into the divine birth and the divine nature, but a descent of the divine Purusha into humanity, an Avatar.

1.18 - Evocation, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  The magician converses with a being in his own familiar language. Since he is, in any case, in an elevated state, in the state of trance, his language automatically changes into the spiritual language, into the so-called metaphorical language and is so understood by the being. The being, too, who normally uses its own language, will converse in this spiritual language, which again will be translated automatically into the language with which the magician is familiar. Due to this fact the magician will at first have the feeling that the answers by the being come from his own subconscious much in the same manner as a person's inner voice is heard. By and by the magician will get used to this and will finally realise that the being is actually speaking outside him, and after repeated work in this field it will appear to him to be the same as if he were talking to one of his fellow-men.
  The unwanted accompanying factors mentioned in the grimoires, for instance the vandalism of beings, creakings, thunderstorms, flashes of lightning and other disturbances which are said to usually accompany evocations are totally unknown to the genuine magician and may only occur with necromancers and sorcerers who have undergone no magical training, or with people who have left the necessary preparatory operations unobserved or who have made only little preparation for a true evocation.
  --
  For the actual evocation of beings no spells or similar nonsense is necessary. Since, during the whole time of the evocation, the magician is in an elevated state, in a true relationship with God, he places himself with his consciousness into the sphere of the chosen being and, after having called out its name, asks the being to appear to him. The being hears the magician, at once reacts to his call, and quite willingly comes near him. A true magician will never be obliged to threaten a being or do anything of that sort in order to make the being obedient to his will. This may only happen with stubborn demons to whom the magician demonstrates the power of his relationship to God. In the case of a true relationship to God, hardly any being, no matter what rank it may have, will ever dare to place itself in opposition to the divinity, for the divinity is the power by which the being was created, and therefore it must be respected.
  Since, for the magician, the saying is true that the stars influence, but do not force, it is left to the magician to fix the time for the evocation according to astrological rules, provided that he has a fundamental knowledge of astrology and is therefore able to fix the favourable planetary moments in respect of the relevant beings.

1.19 - ON THE PROBABLE EXISTENCE AHEAD OF US OF AN ULTRA-HUMAN, #The Future of Man, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
  ply a means of survival, became gradually elevated to the function
  and dignity of a "reason for living," it was inevitable that, with the

1.20 - The End of the Curve of Reason, #The Human Cycle, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  In the realm of thought that does not matter; for as there the reason does not drive at practice, it is able with impunity to allow the most opposite view-points and systems to exist side by side, to compare them, seek for reconciliations, synthetise in the most various ways, change constantly, enlarge, elevate; it is free to act without thinking at every point of immediate practical consequences. But when the reason seeks to govern life, it is obliged to fix its view-point, to crystallise its system; every change becomes or at least seems a thing doubtful, difficult and perilous, all the consequences of which cannot be foreseen, while the conflict of view-points, principles, systems leads to strife and revolution and not to a basis of harmonious development. The reason mechanises in order to arrive at fixity of conduct and practice amid the fluidity of things; but while mechanism is a sufficient principle in dealing with physical forces, because it is in harmony with the law or dharma of physical Nature, it can never truly succeed in dealing with conscious life, because there it is contrary to the law of life, its highest dharma. While, then, the attempt at a rational ordering of society is an advance upon the comparative immobility and slow subconscient or half-conscient evolution of infrarational societies and the confusedly mixed movement of semi-rational societies, it can never arrive at perfection by its own methods, because reason is neither the first principle of life, nor can be its last, supreme and sufficient principle.
  The question remains whether anarchistic thought supervening upon the collectivistic can any more successfully find a satisfying social principle. For if it gets rid of mechanism, the one practical means of a rationalising organisation of life, on what will it build and with what can it create? It may be contended as against the anarchistic objection that the collectivist period is, if not the last and best, at least a necessary stage in social progress. For the vice of individualism is that in insisting upon the free development and self-expression of the life and the mind or the life-soul in the individual, it tends to exaggerate the egoism of the mental and vital being and prevent the recognition of unity with others on which alone a complete self-development and a harmless freedom can be founded. Collectivism at least insists upon that unity by entirely subordinating the life of the isolated ego to the life of the greater group-ego, and its office may be thus to stamp upon the mentality and life-habits of the individual the necessity of unifying his life with the life of others. Afterwards, when again the individual asserts his freedom, as some day he must, he may have learned to do it on the basis of this unity and not on the basis of his separate egoistic life. This may well be the intention of Nature in human society in its movement towards a collectivist principle of social living. Collectivism may itself in the end realise this aim if it can modify its own dominant principle far enough to allow for a free individual development on the basis of unity and a closely harmonised common existence. But to do that it must first spiritualise itself and transform the very soul of its inspiring principle: it cannot do it on the basis of the logical reason and a mechanically scientific ordering of life.

1.22 - ON THE GIFT-GIVING VIRTUE, #Thus Spoke Zarathustra, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
  of your virtue. There your body is elevated and resurrected; with its rapture it delights the spirit so that it
  76
  --
  With knowledge, the body purifies itself; making experiments with knowledge, it elevates itself; in the
  lover of knowledge all instincts become holy; in the

1.22 - The Necessity of the Spiritual Transformation, #The Human Cycle, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  What precisely is the defect from which all his imperfection springs? We have already indicated it,that has indeed been the general aim of the preceding chapters,but it is necessary to state it now more succinctly and precisely. We see that at first sight man seems to be a double nature, an animal nature of the vital and physical being which lives according to its instincts, impulses, desires, its automatic orientation and method, and with that a half-divine nature of the self-conscious intellectual, ethical, aesthetic, intelligently emotional, intelligently dynamic being who is capable of finding and understanding the law of his own action and consciously using and bettering it, a reflecting mind that understands Nature, a will that uses, elevates, perfects Nature, a sense that intelligently enjoys Nature. The aim of the animal part of us is to increase vital possession and enjoyment; the aim of the semi-divine part of us is also to grow, possess and enjoy, but first to possess and enjoy intelligently, aesthetically, ethically, by the powers of the mind much more than by the powers of the life and body, and, secondly, to possess and enjoy, not so much the vital and physical except in so far as that is necessary as a foundation and starting-point, a preliminary necessity or condition, a standing-ground and basis, but things intellectual, ethical and aesthetic, and to grow not so much in the outward life, except in so far as that is necessary to the security, ease and dignity of our human existence, but in the true, the good and the beautiful. This is the manhood of man, his unique distinction and abnormality in the norm of this inconscient material Nature.
  This means that man has developed a new power of being,let us call it a new soul-power, with the premiss that we regard the life and the body also as a soul-power, and the being who has done that is under an inherent obligation not only to look at the world and revalue all in it from this new elevation, but to compel his whole nature to obey this power and in a way reshape itself in its mould, and even to reshape, so far as he can, his environmental life into some image of this greater truth and law. In doing this lies his svadharma, his true rule and way of being, the way of his perfection and his real happiness. Failing in this, he fails in the aim of his nature and his being, and has to begin again until he finds the right path and arrives at a successful turning-point, a decisive crisis of transformation. Now this is precisely what man has failed to do. He has effected something, he has passed a certain stage of his journey. He has laid some yoke of the intellectual, ethical, aesthetic rule on his vital and physical parts and made it impossible for himself to be content with or really to be the mere human animal. But more he has not been able to do successfully. The transformation of his life into the image of the true, the good and the beautiful seems as far off as ever; if ever he comes near to some imperfect form of it,and even then it is only done by a class or by a number of individuals with some reflex action on the life of the mass,he slides back from it in a general decay of his life, or else stumbles on from it into some bewildering upheaval out of which he comes with new gains indeed but also with serious losses. He has never arrived at any great turning-point, any decisive crisis of transformation.
  --
  This truth it is important to note, for mistakes made on the path are often even more instructive than the mistakes made by a turning aside from the path. As it is possible to superimpose the intellectual, ethical or aesthetic life or the sum of their motives upon the vital and physical nature, to be satisfied with a partial domination or a compromise, so it is possible to superimpose the spiritual life or some figure of strength or ascendency of spiritual ideas and motives on the mental, vital and physical nature and either to impoverish the latter, to impoverish the vital and physical existence and even to depress the mental as well in order to give the spiritual an easier domination, or else to make a compromise and leave the lower being to its pasture on condition of its doing frequent homage to the spiritual existence, admitting to a certain extent, greater or less, its influence and formally acknowledging it as the last state and the finality of the human being. This is the most that human society has ever done in the past, and though necessarily that must be a stage of the journey, to rest there is to miss the heart of the matter, the one thing needful. Not a humanity leading its ordinary life, what is now its normal round, touched by spiritual influences, but a humanity aspiring whole-heartedly to a law that is now abnormal to it until its whole life has been elevated into spirituality, is the steep way that lies before man towards his perfection and the transformation that it has to achieve.
  The secret of the transformation lies in the transference of our centre of living to a higher consciousness and in a change of our main power of living. This will be a leap or an ascent even more momentous than that which Nature must at one time have made from the vital mind of the animal to the thinking mind still imperfect in our human intelligence. The central will implicit in life must be no longer the vital will in the life and the body, but the spiritual will of which we have now only rare and dim intimations and glimpses. For now it comes to us hardly disclosed, weakened, disguised in the mental Idea; but it is in its own nature supramental and it is its supramental power and truth that we have somehow to discover. The main power of our living must be no longer the inferior vital urge of Nature which is already accomplished in us and can only whirl upon its rounds about the ego-centre, but that spiritual force of which we sometimes hear and speak but have not yet its inmost secret. For that is still retired in our depths and waits for our transcendence of the ego and the discovery of the true individual in whose universality we shall be united with all others. To transfer from the vital being, the instrumental reality in us, to the spirit, the central reality, to elevate to that height our will to be and our power of living is the secret which our nature is seeking to discover. All that we have done hitherto is some half-successful effort to transfer this will and power to the mental plane; our highest endeavour and labour has been to become the mental being and to live in the strength of the idea. But the mental idea in us is always intermediary and instrumental; always it depends on something other than it for its ground of action and therefore although it can follow for a time after its own separate satisfaction, it cannot rest for ever satisfied with that alone. It must either gravitate downwards and outwards towards the vital and physical life or it must elevate itself inwards and upwards towards the spirit.
  And that must be why in thought, in art, in conduct, in life we are always divided between two tendencies, one idealistic, the other realistic. The latter very easily seems to us more real, more solidly founded, more in touch with actualities because it relies upon a reality which is patent, sensible and already accomplished; the idealistic easily seems to us something unreal, fantastic, unsubstantial, nebulous, a thing more of thoughts and words than of live actualities, because it is trying to embody a reality not yet accomplished. To a certain extent we are perhaps right; for the ideal, a stranger among the actualities of our physical existence, is in fact a thing unreal until it has either in some way reconciled itself to the imperfections of our outer life or else has found the greater and purer reality for which it is seeking and imposed it on our outer activities; till then it hangs between two worlds and has conquered neither the upper light nor the nether darkness. Submission to the actual by a compromise is easy; discovery of the spiritual truth and the transformation of our actual way of living is difficult: but it is precisely this difficult thing that has to be done, if man is to find and fulfil his true nature. Our idealism is always the most rightly human thing in us, but as a mental idealism it is a thing ineffective. To be effective it has to convert itself into a spiritual realism which shall lay its hands on the higher reality of the spirit and take up for it this lower reality of our sensational, vital and physical nature.

1.27 - On holy solitude of body and soul., #The Ladder of Divine Ascent, #Saint John of Climacus, #unset
  3 St. Matthew xix, 12. In the spiritual life we must begin with the humbler virtues and climb by them to the heights, just as a ladder is used to elevate one from a lower to a higher state.
  4 That is, I will be silent about bodily falls and mental derangements.

13.05 - A Dream Of Surreal Science, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The Age of Reason came and deposed God. It said and proved rationally that God is an irrelevant, unnecessary quantity. Reason is sufficient to hold together mankind and the world, to develop, elevate and illumine them as much as it is necessary. The Great Revolution declared: the RepublicRespublicahas no need of God. Morality, a system of morals is the sole sufficient solid base; it is a known and proven reality, nothing illusory or imaginary, nothing nebulous or suppositional about it
   Things went on well, at least one thought like that, for sometime, but then it was realised soon enough that something was missing in this rationalistic frame of life, for it was almost lifeless, dry: it does not evoke enthusiasm, does not drive man spontaneously towards higher hights and deeper depths. Man remains a groundling. God need not be there: but the feeling that is associated with God and the conception of Godwhich is usually called the religious feeling is a genuine human feeling and with the rejection of God, the feeling does not go, it persists. So a new religion is proposed, a Godless religion, a Natural Religion and it came to be called the Religion of Humanity. God was replaced by Humanity. Humanity is a collective reality: to serve it became the ideal, the summum bonum. And to serve is to worship and adore. Thus a new deity was installed. To give yourself wholly, to work for the welfare of humanity, body and mind, to love one and all human beings, particularly those who deserve love and care the poor, the needy, the lowlyto work so that they may be comforted, is to bring comfort to yourself, to your own soul. It is nothing short of the purest and deepest religious feeling.

14.07 - A Review of Our Ashram Life, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The work that Mother could do then and was doing, she has herself described and explained to us. It was the creation of a worlda region at leastof the higher consciousness in which everyone who participated had his own place, everyone with his soul-being sufficiently in front; and this being she could connect or link up with a being of the higher spherea counterpart, an over-soul as it were for each soul. It was a kind of descenta subtle incarnation of Gods which the Mother's Grace occasioned or brought about into the elevated and sublimated human level.
   The ground had already been prepared, we may note, by the descent of the 24th November 1926the descent of the Overmind or Krishna-consciousness into Sri Aurobindo's body-consciousness and thence generally into the earth-atmosphere and becoming its natural and permanent possession.

1.A - ANTHROPOLOGY, THE SOUL, #Philosophy of Mind, #unset, #Zen
  The total sensitivity has its self here in a separate subjectivity, which, in the case cited of this sentient life in the ordinary course of nature, is visibly present as another and a different individual. But this sensitive totality is meant to elevate its self-hood out of itself to subjectivity in one and the same individual: which is then its indwelling consciousness, self-possessed, intelligent, and reasonable. For such a consciousness the merely sentient life serves as an underlying and only implicitly existent material; and the self-possessed subjectivity is the rational, self-conscious, controlling genius thereof.
  But this sensitive nucleus includes not merely the purely unconscious, congenital disposition and temperament, but within its enveloping simplicity it acquires and retains also (in habit, as to which see later) all further ties and essential relationships, fortunes, principles - everything in short belonging to the character, and in whose elaboration self-conscious activity has most effectively participated. The sensitivity is thus a soul in which the whole mental life is condensed. The total individual under this concentrated aspect is distinct from the existing and actual play of his consciousness, his secular ideas, developed interests, inclinations, etc. As contrasted with this looser aggregate of means and methods the more intensive form of individuality is termed the genius, whose decision is ultimate whatever may be the show of reasons, intentions, means, of which the more public consciousness is so liberal. This concentrated individuality also reveals itself under the aspect of what is called the heart and soul of feeling. A man is said to be heartless and unfeeling when he looks at things with self-possession and acts according to his permanent purposes, be they great substantial aims or petty and unjust interests: a good-hearted man, on the other hand, means rather one who is at the mercy of his individual sentiment, even when it is of narrow range and is wholly made up of particularities. Of such good nature or goodness of heart it may be said that it is less the genius itself than the indulgere genio.

1.anon - The Epic of Gilgamesh Tablet II, #Anonymous - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  your head is elevated over (other) men,
  Enlil has destined for you the kingship over the people."

1f.lovecraft - Pickmans Model, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   elevated last year. There were witches and what their spells summoned;
   pirates and what they brought in from the sea; smugglers;
  --
   myself have ever seen. It isnt so very far from the elevated as
   distance goes, but its centuries away as the soul goes. I took it
  --
   could sight. We changed to the elevated at the South Station, and at
   about twelve oclock had climbed down the steps at Battery Street and
  --
   where we hit it. We were too late for the elevated, and walked back
   downtown through Hanover Street. I remember that walk. We switched from

1f.lovecraft - The Call of Cthulhu, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   which clasped the crouchers elevated knees. The aspect of the whole
   was abnormally life-like, and the more subtly fearful because its

1f.lovecraft - The Night Ocean, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   moon, monstrously elevated. The flat sea bordering upon the gleaming
   sand, the utter absence of tree or figure or life of any sort, and the

1.ia - Modification Of The R Poem, #Arabi - Poems, #Ibn Arabi, #Sufism
  Be content with them, they elevate you, and you reach.
  If they register you, hang on; and if they erase you, vanish;
  --
  If you want a light for the Path from them then elevate
  above everything they hate of your actions

1.lovecraft - Waste Paper- A Poem Of Profound Insignificance, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  Out in the rain on the elevated
  Crated, sated, all mismated.

1.pbs - Queen Mab - Part I., #Shelley - Poems, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #Fiction
    Astonishes, enraptures, elevates,
     When fancy at a glance combines

1.pbs - Queen Mab - Part IX., #Shelley - Poems, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #Fiction
   And elevated will, that journeyed on
   Through life's phantasmal scene in fearlessness,

1.pbs - Queen Mab - Part V., #Shelley - Poems, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #Fiction
   Untainted passion, elevated will,
   Which death (who even would linger long in awe
  --
   Can bribe to yield his elevated soul
   To Tyranny or Falsehood, though they wield

1.pbs - Queen Mab - Part VII., #Shelley - Poems, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #Fiction
   To elevated daring, to one deed
   Which gross and sensual self did not pollute.

1.poe - Eureka - A Prose Poem, #Poe - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  "Than the persons" -the letter goes on to say -"than the persons thus suddenly elevated by the Hog-ian philosophy into a station for which they were unfitted -thus transferred from the sculleries into the parlors of Science -from its pantries into its pulpits -than these individuals a more intolerant -a more intolerable set of bigots and tyrants never existed on the face of the earth. Their creed, their text and their sermon were, alike, the one word 'fact' -but, for the most part, even of this one word, they knew not even the meaning. On those who ventured to disturb their facts with the view of putting them in order and to use, the disciples of Hog had no mercy whatever. All attempts at generalization were met at once by the words 'theoretical,' 'theory,' 'theorist' -all thought, to be brief, was very properly resented as a personal affront to themselves. Cultivating the natural sciences to the exclusion of Metaphysics, the Mathematics, and Logic, many of these Bacon-engendered philosophers -one-idead, one-sided and lame of a leg -were more wretchedly helpless -more miserably ignorant, in view of all the comprehensible objects of knowledge, than the veriest unlettered hind who proves that he knows something at least, in admitting that he knows absolutely nothing.
  "Nor had our forefathers any better right to talk about certainty, when pursuing, in blind confidence, the a priori path of axioms, or of the Ram. At innumerable points this path was scarcely as straight as a ram's-horn. The simple truth is, that the Aristotelians erected their castles upon a basis far less reliable than air; for no such things as axioms ever existed or can possibly exist at all. This they must have been very blind, indeed, not to see, or at least to suspect; for, even in their own day, many of their long-admitted 'axioms' had been abandoned: -'ex nihilo nihil fit,' for example, and a 'thing cannot act where it is not,' and 'there cannot be antipodes,' and 'darkness cannot proceed from light.' These and numerous similar propositions formerly accepted, without hesitation, as axioms, or undeniable truths, were, even at the period of which I speak, seen to be altogether untenable: -how absurd in these people, then, to persist in relying upon a basis, as immutable, whose mutability had become so repeatedly manifest!

1.rb - Paracelsus - Part I - Paracelsus Aspires, #Browning - Poems, #Robert Browning, #Poetry
  Or elevate myself far, far above
  The gorgeous spectacle. I seemed to long
  --
  But elevate the race at once! We ask
  To put forth just our strength, our human strength,

1.rb - Pauline, A Fragment of a Question, #Browning - Poems, #Robert Browning, #Poetry
  To elevate an aim, pursue success
  However mean! So, my still baffled hope

1.wby - Coole Park 1929, #Yeats - Poems, #William Butler Yeats, #Poetry
  The mind of man or elevate a rhyme;
  But all is changed, that high horse riderless,

1.wby - Coole Park And Ballylee, 1931, #Yeats - Poems, #William Butler Yeats, #Poetry
  The mind of man or elevate a rhyme;
  But all is changed, that high horse riderless,

1.whitman - To A Pupil, #Whitman - Poems, #unset, #Zen
       elevatedness;
  Rest not, till you rivet and publish yourself of your own

1.ww - 1- The White Doe Of Rylstone, Or, The Fate Of The Nortons, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  Him his own thoughts did elevate,--
  Most happy in the shy recess

1.ww - Alas! What Boots The Long Laborious Quest, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  Or pains abstruseto elevate the will,
  And lead us on to that transcendent rest

1.ww - Book Eighth- Retrospect--Love Of Nature Leading To Love Of Man, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  The effect was, still more elevated views
  Of human nature. Neither vice nor guilt,

1.ww - Book First [Introduction-Childhood and School Time], #unset, #Anonymous, #Various
  To impregnate and to elevate the mind.
  --And if the vulgar joy by its own weight

1.ww - Book Second [School-Time Continued], #unset, #Anonymous, #Various
  To breathe an elevated mood, by form
  Or image unprofaned; and I would stand,

1.ww - Book Thirteenth [Imagination And Taste, How Impaired And Restored Concluded], #unset, #Anonymous, #Various
  And elevated most when most admired.          
  Men may be found of other mould than these,

1.ww - Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
  Of something far more deeply interfused,

1.ww - Ode, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
     Into elevated gladness;
     While the white-robed choir attendant,

1.ww - The Excursion- V- Book Fouth- Despondency Corrected, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  These, with a soothed or elevated heart,
  May we behold; their knowledge register;

1.ww - The Excursion- X- Book Ninth- Discourse of the Wanderer, and an Evening Visit to the Lake, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   Soft heath this elevated spot supplied,
  And choice of moss-clad stones, whereon we couched

1.ww - The Morning Of The Day Appointed For A General Thanksgiving. January 18, 1816, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  And strength of love our souls shall elevate:
  For to a few collected in his name,

1.ww - The Prelude, Book 1- Childhood And School-Time, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  To impregnate and to elevate the mind.
  --And if the vulgar joy by its own weight

1.ww - The Primrose of the Rock, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  The faith that elevates the just,
   Before and when they die;

1.ww - The Recluse - Book First, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  And elevate, and harmonise, and soothe,
  And steal away, and for a while deceive
  --
  Or elevates the Mind, intent to weigh
  The good and evil of our mortal state.

1.ww - To Dora, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  To calm the affections, elevate the soul,
  And consecrate our lives to truth and love.

1.ww - Weak Is The Will Of Man, His Judgement Blind, #Wordsworth - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  To elevate the more-than-reasoning Mind,
  And colour life's dark cloud with orient rays.

2.01 - Habit 1 Be Proactive, #The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, #Stephen Covey, #unset
  I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor. - Henry David Thoreau
  As you read this book, try to stand apart from yourself. Try to project your consciousness upward into a corner of the room and see yourself, in your mind's eye, reading. Can you look at yourself almost as though you were someone else?

2.04 - Concentration, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  9:This is the process of concentrated meditation; but a more strenuous method is the fixing of the whole mind in concentration on the essence of the idea only, so as to reach not the thought-knowledge or the psychological experience of the subject, but the very essence of the thing behind the idea. In this process thought ceases and passes into the absorbed or ecstatic contemplation of the object or by a merging into it m an inner Samadhi. If this be the process followed, then subsequently the state into which we rise must still be called down to take possession of the lower being, to shed its light, power and bliss on our ordinary consciousness. For otherwise we may possess it, as many do, in the elevated condition or in the inward Samadhi, but we shall lose our hold of it when we awake or descend into the contacts of the world; and this truncated possession is not the aim of an integral Yoga.
  9:A third process is neither at first to concentrate in a strenuous meditation on the one subject nor in a strenuous contemplation of the one object of thought-vision, but first to still the mind altogether. This may be done by various ways; one is to stand back from the mental action altogether not participating in but simply watching it until, tired of its unsanctioned leaping and running, it falls into an increasing and finally an absolute quiet. Another is to reject the thought-suggestions, to cast them away from the mind whenever they come and firmly hold to the peace of the being which really and always exists behind the trouble and riot of the mind. When this secret peace is unveiled, a great calm settles on the being and there comes usually with it the perception and experience of the all-pervading silent Brahman, everything else at first seeming to be mere form and eidolon. On the basis of this calm everything else may be built up in the knowledge and experience no longer of the external phenomena of things but of the deeper truth of the divine manifestation.

2.04 - Positive Aspects of the Mother-Complex, #The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  mother to grandmo ther means that the archetype is elevated to
  a higher rank. This is clearly demonstrated in a notion held by
  --
  the mother archetype would be elevated to the rank of a dog-
  matic truth. The Christian "Queen of Heaven" has, obviously,

2.04 - The Divine and the Undivine, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
   in our present nature inseparably entwined together, look like conjoint dualities, negative pole and positive pole of the same unreality, and since they cannot be elevated and transformed, they must be both abandoned: humanity cannot be fulfilled in divinity; it must cease, be left behind and rejected. Whether the result will be an individual enjoyment of the absolute divine nature or of the Divine Presence or a Nirvana in the featureless
  Absolute, is a point on which religions and philosophies differ: but in either case human existence on earth must be taken as condemned to eternal imperfection by the very law of its being; it is perpetually and unchangeably an undivine manifestation in the Divine Existence. The soul by taking on manhood, perhaps by the very fact of birth itself, has fallen from the Divine, has committed an original sin or error which it must be man's spiritual aim, as soon as he is enlightened, thoroughly to cancel, unflinchingly to eliminate.

2.05 - ON THE VIRTUOUS, #Thus Spoke Zarathustra, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
  And some want to be edified and elevated, and they
  call that virtue, while others want to be bowled over,

2.08 - The Branches of The Archetypal Man, #General Principles of Kabbalah, #Rabbi Moses Luzzatto, #Kabbalah
  none of its powers will be annulled, it will be elevated
  by the power of the soul, and the roles will be reversed:

2.0 - THE ANTICHRIST, #Twilight of the Idols, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
  Schopenhauer was hostile to life: that is why he elevated pity to a
  virtue.... Aristotle, as you know, recognised in pity a morbid and
  --
  which enhances it, elevates it, says Yea to it, justifies it and
  renders it triumphant, is called "false." ... If it should happen that
  --
  which in this book is elevated to an _Art,_ is not the accident of
  any individual gift, of any exceptional nature. These qualities are

21.02 - Gods and Men, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 06, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   So, taking up this image I may say that man also occupies an intermediate position in the order of creation: on one side he is an enlarged animal (not in body, however, always), a developed, elevated animal; on the other side he is a diminutive, a diminished god. The story is very interesting, how man has developed, how he has come out of the animal, you must have read something of this story of evolution; but more interesting is the other part of the story, how God or a god has reduced himself to the stature of a human being.
   Long, long, long ago, in the earliest stage of creation, there were materially only dust particles, tiny dust particles or what looked like mere dust, everywhere (the Vedas say tucchyena abhvapihitam- covered all around with infinitesimals). There was no formation, no shape or various bodies as we see now: it was a vague cloud or mist, innumerable particles whirling about. That was how creation started. Then slowly, gradually, those particles began combining, coalescing; they began to condense, to have forms or shapes small or big, of various types. There was the first appearance of the sky with its starry battalions and then the earth emerged bearing a special character and destiny. I have spoken of the primeval or primary dust particles scattered about. But along with them, within each one, in another dimension, there were, strange to say, particles of light. We have come to know of the atomic and sub-atomic material particles, but of these light particles there has arisen just a suspicion only recently. This light, however, is not merely the material light, but the glow of consciousness. And the most momentous thing that happened was the growth and development of this light-particle along with the development of the material body of the dust. The material mass through many changes shaped into the body of sentient growths, living beings, animals and finally into the human body. Even so the original light particle, at the beginning no more than a flicker in the midst of surrounding darkness, hardly noticeable and distinguishable, slowly but irresistibly grew in clearness, in volume and in strength. It took many long years, many millions of years to develop into a clear shape. That was the centre, this light-particle was the heart of things, the heart of living beings and in man it underwent a strange transmutation. The light-particle, as I said, originally had no form, it was just a hazy speck. As it grew big, at a certain stage it began to take the shape of a flame. You have seen a candle flame which often has the form of a cone: a cone is a well-developed clear form. But as I said, when the human body appeared, this flame too changed into something like the human form, a tiny human form, a luminous embryo, as it were. You remember the famous Upanishadic line: angusthamatrah puruso' antaratma- a purusha, a being or person of the size of the thumb. That was the first formation of the human soul, the original light particle became a person or a psychic being. In man, I said, there has been a miraculous transmutation - the light, the growing consciousness has learnt to look back upon itself, it has become self-conscious, has taken the first leap that would carry it into another region of growth and development. The personification, rather personalisation, of the light of consciousness, its farther and continuous growth, the greatening of the psychic being involves the whole inner story of human destiny. How does the light grow and develop? What are the forces, what are the agents that initiate and help in the growth and development of the spark into the being, and the being into higher beings? Life is the agent, life-forces are the artisans that do this work. Life means a series of experiences, impacts of the surrounding world upon yourself, your mind and body and sensation. These are like fuel that you pour into the flame, that feed and increase that flame. Life after life you have to gather these experiences that fortify and greaten the contents of your being and then there comes a time when this flame, this conscious being is so developed, so mature, so well-formed, that you begin to think of the life spiritual. When one is not content, not wholly content with ordinary life, yearns after something else, something greater, it means that the flame in you has reached a crucial stage and has to take a leap or bound into another dimension of life.

2.13 - ON THOSE WHO ARE SUBLIME, #Thus Spoke Zarathustra, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
  see the eyes of the angel. He must still discard his heroic will; he shall be elevated, not merely sublime: the
  ether itself should elevate him, the will-less one.
  He subdued monsters, he solved riddles: but he must

2.13 - The Difficulties of the Mental Being, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  If it were easily possible to elevate ourselves to the supramental plane and, dwelling securely there, realise world and being, consciousness and action, outgoing and incoming of conscious experience by the power and in the manner of the divine supramental faculties, this realisation would offer no essential difficulties. But man is a mental and not yet a supramental being. It is by the mind therefore that he has to aim at knowledge and realise his being, with whatever help he can get from the supramental planes. This character of our actually realised being and therefore of our Yoga imposes on us certain limitations and primary difficulties which can only be overcome by divine help or an arduous practice, and in reality only by the combination of both these aids. These difficulties in the way of the integral knowledge, the integral realisation, the integral becoming we have to state succinctly before we can proceed farther.
  Realised mental being and realised spiritual being are really two different planes in the arrangement of our existence, the one superior and divine, the other inferior and human. To the former belong infinite being, infinite consciousness and will, infinite bliss and the infinite comprehensive and self-effective knowledge of supermind, four divine principles; to the latter belong mental being, vital being, physical being, three human principles. In their apparent nature the two are opposed; each is the reverse of the other. The divine is infinite and immortal being; the human is life limited in time and scope and form, life that is death attempting to become life that is immortality. The divine is infinite consciousness transcending and embracing all that it manifests within it; the human is consciousness rescued from a sleep of inconscience, subjected to the means it uses, limited by body and ego and attempting to find its relation to other consciousnesses, bodies, egos positively by various means of uniting contact and sympathy, negatively by various means of hostile contact and antipathy. The divine is inalienable self-bliss and inviolable all-bliss; the human is sensation of mind and body seeking for delight, but finding only pleasure, indifference and pain. The divine is supramental knowledge comprehending all and supramental will effecting all; the human is ignorance reaching out to knowledge by the comprehension of things in parts and parcels which it has to join clumsily together, and it is incapacity attempting to acquire force and will through a gradual extension of power corresponding to its gradual extension of knowledge; and this extension it can only bring about by a partial arid parcelled exercise of will corresponding to the partial and parcelled method of its knowledge. The divine founds itself upon unity and is master of the transcendences and totalities of things; the human founds itself on separated multiplicity and is the subject even when the master of their division and fragmentations and their difficult solderings and unifyings. Between the two there are for the human being a veil and a lid which prevent the human not only from attaining but even from knowing the divine.

2.15 - Reality and the Integral Knowledge, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  This ego-centric attitude has in recent times been elevated into a valid standard of knowledge; it has been implicitly or explicitly held as an axiom that all truth must be referred to the judgment of the personal mind, reason and experience of every man or else it must be verified or at any rate verifiable by a common or universal experience in order to be valid. But obviously this is a false standard of reality and of knowledge, since this means the sovereignty of the normal or average mind and its limited capacity and experience, the exclusion of what is supernormal or beyond the average intelligence. In its extreme, this claim of the individual to be the judge of everything is an egoistic illusion, a superstition of the physical mind, in the mass a gross and vulgar error. The truth behind it is that each man has to think for himself, know for himself according to his capacity, but his judgment can be valid only on condition that he is ready to learn and open always to a larger knowledge. It is reasoned that to depart from the physical standard and the principle of personal or universal verification will lead to gross delusions and the admission of unverified truth and subjective phantasy into the realm of knowledge. But error and delusion and the introduction of personality and one's own subjectivity into the pursuit of knowledge are always present, and the physical or objective standards and methods do not exclude them. The probability of error is no reason for refusing to attempt discovery, and subjective discovery must be pursued by a subjective method of enquiry, observation and verification; research into the supraphysical must evolve, accept and test an appropriate means and methods other than those by which one examines the constituents of physical objects and the processes of Energy in material Nature.
  To refuse to enquire upon any general ground preconceived and a priori is an obscurantism as prejudicial to the extension of knowledge as the religious obscurantism which opposed in Europe the extension of scientific discovery. The greatest inner discoveries, the experience of self-being, the cosmic consciousness, the inner calm of the liberated spirit, the direct effect of mind upon mind, the knowledge of things by consciousness in direct contact with other consciousness or with its objects, most spiritual experiences of any value, cannot be brought before the tribunal of the common mentality which has no experience of these things and takes its own absence or incapacity of experience as a proof of their invalidity or their non-existence. Physical truth or formulas, generalisations, discoveries founded upon physical observation can be so referred, but even there a training of capacity is needed before one can truly understand and judge; it is not every untrained mind that can follow the mathematics of relativity or other difficult scientific truths or judge of the validity either of their result or their process. All reality, all experience must indeed, to be held as true, be capable of verification by a same or similar experience; so, in fact, all men can have a spiritual experience and can follow it out and verify it in themselves, but only when they have acquired the capacity or can follow the inner methods by which that experience and verification are made possible. It is necessary to dwell for a moment on these obvious and elementary truths because the opposite ideas have been sovereign in a recent period of human mentality, - they are now only receding, - and have stood in the way of the development of a vast domain of possible knowledge. It is of supreme importance for the human spirit to be free to sound the depths of inner or subliminal reality, of spiritual and of what is still superconscient reality, and not to immure itself in the physical mind and its narrow domain of objective external solidities; for in that way alone can there come liberation from the Ignorance in which our mentality dwells and a release into a complete consciousness, a true and integral self-realisation and self-knowledge.

2.16 - The Integral Knowledge and the Aim of Life; Four Theories of Existence, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  It is true again that Life when it emerges becomes dominant, turns Matter into an instrument for its manifestation, and begins to look as if it were itself the secret original principle which breaks out into creation and veils itself in the forms of Matter; there is a truth in this appearance and this truth must be admitted as a part of the integral knowledge. Life, though not the original Reality, is yet a form, a power of it which is missioned here as a creative urge in Matter. Life, therefore, has to be accepted as the means of our activity and the dynamic mould into which we have here to pour the Divine Existence; but it can so be accepted only because it is a form of a Divine Energy which is itself greater than the Life-force. The Life-principle is not the whole foundation and origin of things; its creative working cannot be perfected and sovereignly fulfilled or even find its true movement until it knows itself as an energy of the Divine Being and elevates and subtilises its action into a free channel for the outpourings of the superior Nature.
  Mind in its turn, when it emerges, becomes dominant; it uses Life and Matter as means of its expression, a field for its own growth and sovereignty, and it begins to look as if it were the true reality and the creator even as it is the witness of existence. But Mind also is a limited and derivative power; it is an outcome of Overmind or it is here a luminous shadow thrown by the divine Supermind: it can only arrive at its own perfection by admitting the light of a larger knowledge; it must transform its own more ignorant, imperfect and conflicting powers and values into the divinely effective potencies and harmonious values of the supramental truth-consciousness. All the powers of the lower hemisphere with their structures of the Ignorance can find their true selves only by a transformation in the light that descends to us from the higher hemisphere of an eternal self-knowledge.

2.1.7.08 - Comments on Specific Lines and Passages of the Poem, #Letters On Poetry And Art, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  is somewhat self-contradictory. If a line has a rhythm and expressive turn which makes it poetic, then it must be good poetry; but I suppose what you mean is fine or elevated poetry. I would say that the line even in its original form is good poetry and is further uplifted by rising towards its subsequent context which gives it its full poetic meaning and suggestion, the evolution of the inner being and the abrupt end or failure of all that had been done unless it could suddenly transcend itself and become something greater. I do not think that this line in its context is merely passable, but I admit that it is less elevated and intense than what precedes or what follows. I do not see how that can be avoided without truncating the thought significance of the whole account by the omission of something necessary to its evolution or else overpitching the expression where it needs to be direct or clear and bare in its lucidity. In any case the emended version [All he had been and all towards which he grew] cures any possibility of the line being merely passable as it raises both the idea and the expression through the vividness of image which makes us feel and not merely think the living evolution in Aswapatis inner being.
  1946

2.18 - The Evolutionary Process - Ascent and Integration, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  This downward eye of knowledge and will with a view to an all-round heightening, deepening and subtler, finer and richer intensification is the secret Spirit's way from the beginning. The plant soul takes, as we may say, a nervous-material view of its whole physical existence so as to get out of it all the vital-physical intensity possible; for it seems to have some intense excitations of a mute life-vibration in it, - perhaps, though that is difficult for us to imagine, more intense relatively to its lower rudimentary scale than the animal mind and body in its higher and more powerful scale could tolerate. The animal being takes a mentalised sense-view of its vital and physical existence so as to get out of it all the sense value possible, much acuter in many respects than man's as mere sensation or sense-emotion or satisfaction of vital desire and pleasure. Man, looking downward from the plane of will and intelligence, abandons these lower intensities, but in order to get out of mind and life and sense a higher intensity in other values, intellectual, aesthetic, moral, spiritual, mentally dynamic or practical - as he terms it; by these higher elements he enlarges, subtilises and elevates his use of life-values. He does not abandon the animal reactions and enjoyments, but more lucidly, finely and sensitively mentalises them. This he does even on his normal and his lower levels, but, as he develops, he puts his lower being to a severer test, begins to demand from it on pain of rejection something like a transformation: that is the mind's way of preparing for a spiritual life still beyond it.
  But man not only turns his gaze downward and around him, when he has reached his higher level, but upward towards what is above him and inward towards what is occult within him.

2.19 - Out of the Sevenfold Ignorance towards the Sevenfold Knowledge, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  In the superconscience beyond our present level of awareness are included the higher planes of mental being as well as the native heights of supramental and pure spiritual being. The first indispensable step in an upward evolution would be to elevate our force of consciousness into those higher parts of Mind from which we already receive, but without knowing the source, much of our larger mental movements, those, especially, that come with a greater power and light, the revelatory, the inspirational, the intuitive. On these mental heights, in these largenesses, if the consciousness could succeed in reaching them or maintain and centre itself there, something of the direct presence and power of the spirit, something even - however secondary or indirect - of the supermind could receive a first expression, could make itself initially manifest, could intervene in the government of our lower being and help to remould it. Afterwards, by the force of that remoulded consciousness, the course of our evolution could rise by a sublimer ascent and get beyond the mental into the supramental and the supreme spiritual nature. It is possible without an actual ascent into these at present superconscient mental planes or without a constant or permanent living in them, by openness to them, by reception of their knowledge and influences, to get rid to a certain extent of our constitutional and psychological ignorance; it is possible to be aware of ourselves as spiritual beings and to spiritualise, though imperfectly, our normal human life and consciousness. There could be a conscious communication and guidance from this greater more luminous mentality and a reception of its enlightening and transforming forces. That is within the reach of the highly developed or the spiritually awakened human being; but it would not be more than a preliminary stage. To reach an integral self-knowledge, an entire consciousness and power of being, there is necessary an ascent beyond the plane of our normal mind. Such an ascent is at present possible in an absorbed superconscience; but that could lead only to an entry into the higher levels in a state of immobile or ecstatic trance. If the control of that highest spiritual being is to be brought into our waking life, there must be a conscious heightening and widening into immense ranges of new being, new consciousness, new potentialities of action, a taking up - as integral as possible - of our present being, consciousness, activities and a transmutation of them into divine values which would effect a transfiguration of our human existence. For wherever a radical transition has to be made, there is always this triple movement - ascent, widening of field and base, integration - in Nature's method of self-transcendence.
  Any such evolutionary change must necessarily be associated with a rejection of our present narrowing temporal ignorance. For not only do we now live from moment to moment of time, but our whole view is limited to our life in the present body between a single birth and death. As our regard does not go farther back in the past, so it does not extend farther out into the future; thus we are limited by our physical memory and awareness of the present life in a transient corporeal formation.

2.19 - THE MASTER AND DR. SARKAR, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
  DOCTOR: "Further, from an elevated place the water can be distributed on all sides."
  MASTER (smiling): "A certain man came to possess a siddha mantra. He then went to the top of a hill and cried aloud. 'Repeat this mantra and you will realize God.'"

2.20 - The Infancy and Maturity of ZO, Father and Mother, Israel The Ancient and Understanding, #General Principles of Kabbalah, #Rabbi Moses Luzzatto, #Kabbalah
  to elevate him to their own level. On the contrary,
  matter still has sway. But now some Light also is to
  --
  maturity arrives, ZO is not elevated, but is only taking
  part in the process of becoming complete. For the

2.21 - The Ladder of Self-transcendence, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Man too has in himself, subliminal, unknown and unseen concealed behind his waking consciousness and visible organism this mental soul, mental nature, mental body and a mental plane, not materialised, in which the principle of Mind is at home and not as here at strife with a world which is alien to it, obstructive to its freedom and corruptive of its purity and clearness. All the higher faculties of man, his intellectual and psycho-mental being and powers, his higher emotional life awaken and increase in proportion as this mental plane in him presses upon him. For the more it manifests, the more it influences the physical parts, the more it enriches and elevates the corresponding mental plane of the embodied nature. At a certain pitch of its increasing sovereignty it can make man truly man and not merely a reasoning animal; for it gives then its characteristic force to the mental being within us which our humanity is in the inwardly governing but still too hampered essence of its psychological structure.
  It is possible for man to awaken to this higher mental consciousness, to become this mental being,452 put on, this mental nature and live not only in the vital and physical sheaths, but in this mental body. If there were a sufficient completeness in this transformation he would become capable of a life and a being at least half divine. For he would enjoy powers and a vision and perceptions beyond the scope of this ordinary life and body; he would govern all by the clarities of pure knowledge; he would be united to other beings by a sympathy of love and happiness; his emotions would be lifted to the perfection of the psychomental plane, his sensations rescued from grossness, his intellect subtle, pure and flexible, delivered from the deviations of the impure pranic energy and the obstructions of matter. And he would develop too the reflection of a wisdom and bliss higher than any mental joy and knowledge; for he could receive more fully and without our incompetent mind's deforming and falsifying mixture the inspirations and intuitions that are the arrows of the supramental Light and form his perfected mental existence in the mould and power of that vaster splendour. He could then realise too the self or Spirit in a much larger and more luminous and more intimate intensity than is now possible and with a greater play of its active power and bliss in the satisfied harmony of his existence.

2.21 - The Order of the Worlds, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  These accounts are evidently built largely by imagination, but there is an element also of intuition and divination, a feeling of what life can be and surely is in some domain of its manifested or its realisable nature; there is also an element of true subliminal contact and experience. But the mind of man translates what he sees or receives or contacts from other-nature into figures proper to his own consciousness; they are his translations of supraphysical realities into his own significant forms and images and through these forms and images he enters into communication with the realities and can make them to a certain degree present and effective. The experience of an after-death continuance of a modified earth-life may be explained as due to this kind of translation; but it is also explainable partly as the creation of a subjective post-mortal state in which he still lives in figures of habitual experience before he enters into otherworldly realities, partly as a passage through life-worlds where the type of things expresses itself in formations originative of those to which he was attached in his earthly body or akin to them and therefore exercises a natural attraction on the vital being after its exit from the body. But, apart from these subtler life-states, the traditional accounts of other-worldly existence contain, though as a rarer more elevated element not included in the popular notion of these things, a higher grade of states of existence which are clearly of a mental and not a vital character and others founded on some spiritual-mental principle; these higher principles are formulated in states of being into which our inner experience can rise or the soul enter. The principle of gradation we have accepted is therefore justified provided we recognise that it is one way of organising our experience and that other ways proceeding from other view-points are possible.
  For a classification can always be valid from the principle and view-point adopted by it while from other principles and viewpoints another classification of the same things can be equally valid. But for our purpose the system we have chosen is of the greatest value because it is fundamental and answers to a truth of the manifestation which is of the utmost practical importance; it helps us to understand our own constituted existence and the course of the involution and the evolutionary motion of Nature.

2.22 - Rebirth and Other Worlds; Karma, the Soul and Immortality, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  But the same solution can be elevated to a higher level of reason and given a greater plausibility and the colour of a cosmic principle. For, first, it may be based on the unassailable ground that all energies in Nature must have their natural consequence; if any are without visible result in the present life, it may well be that the outcome is only delayed, not withheld for ever. Each being reaps the harvest of his works and deeds, the returns of the action put forth by the energies of his nature, and those which are not apparent in his present birth must be held over for a subsequent existence. It is true that the result of the energies and actions of the individual may accrue not to himself but to others when he is gone; for that we see constantly happening, - it happens indeed even during a man's lifetime that the fruits of his energies are reaped by others; but this is because there is a solidarity and a continuity of life in Nature and the individual cannot altogether, even if he so wills, live for himself alone. But, if there is a continuity of his own life by rebirth for the individual and not only a continuity of the mass life and the cosmic life, if he has an ever-developing self, nature and experience, then it is inevitable that for him too the working of his energies should not be cut off abruptly but must bear their consequence at some time in his continuous and developing existence. Man's being, nature, circumstances of life are the result of his own inner and outer activities, not something fortuitous and inexplicable: he is what he has made himself; the past man was the father of the man that now is, the present man is the father of the man that will be.
  Each being reaps what he sows; from what he does he profits, for what he does he suffers. This is the law and chain of Karma, of Action, of the work of Nature-Energy, and it gives a meaning to the total course of our existence, nature, character, action which is absent from other theories of life. It is evident on this principle that a man's past and present Karma must determine his future birth and its happenings and circumstances; for these too must be the fruit of his energies: all that he was and did in the past must be the creator of all that he now is and experiences in his present, and all that he is and is doing in the present must be the creator of what he will be and experience in the future. Man is the creator of himself; he is the creator also of his fate. All this is perfectly rational and unexceptionable so far as it goes and the law of Karma may be accepted as a fact, as part of the cosmic machinery; for it is so evident - rebirth once admitted - as to be practically indisputable.
  --
  But we have first to observe that a law or chain of Karma is only an outward machinery and cannot be elevated to a greater position as the sole and absolute determinant of the life-workings of the cosmos, unless the cosmos is itself entirely mechanical in its character. It is indeed held by many that all is Law and Process and there is no conscious Being or Will in or behind the cosmos; if so, here is a Law and Process that satisfies our human reason and our mental standards of right and justice and it has the beauty and truth of a perfect symmetry and a mathematical accuracy of working. But all is not Law and Process, there is also Being and Consciousness; there is not only a machinery but a Spirit in things, not only Nature and law of cosmos but a cosmic Spirit, not only a process of mind and life and body but a soul in the natural creature. If it were not so, there could be no rebirth of a soul and no field for a law of Karma. But if the fundamental truth of our being is spiritual and not mechanical, it must be ourself, our soul that fundamentally determines its own evolution, and the law of Karma can only be one of the processes it uses for that purpose: our Spirit, our Self must be greater than its Karma. There is Law, but there is also spiritual freedom. Law and Process are one side of our existence and their reign is over our outer mind, life and body, for these are mostly subject to the mechanism of Nature. But even here their mechanical power is absolute only over body and matter; for Law becomes more complex and less rigid, Process more plastic and less mechanical when there comes in the phenomenon of life, and yet more is this so when mind intervenes with its subtlety; an inner freedom already begins to intervene and, the more we go within, the soul's power of choice is increasingly felt: for Prakriti is the field of law and process, but the soul, the Purusha, is the giver of the sanction, anumanta, and even if ordinarily it chooses to remain a witness and concede an automatic sanction, it can be, if it wills, the master of its nature, Ishwara.
  It is not conceivable that the spirit within is an automaton in the hands of Karma, a slave in this life of its past actions; the truth must be less rigid and more plastic. If a certain amount of results of past Karma is formulated in the present life, it must be with the consent of the psychic being which presides over the new formation of its earth-experience and assents not merely to an outward compulsory process, but to a secret Will and Guidance. That secret Will is not mechanical, but spiritual; the guidance comes from an Intelligence which may use mechanical processes but is not their subject. Self-expression and experience are what the soul seeks by its birth into the body; whatever is necessary for the self-expression and experience of this life, whether it intervenes as an automatic outcome of past lives or as a free selection of results and a continuity or as a new development, whatever is a means of creation of the future, that will be formulated: for the principle is not the working out of a mechanism of Law, but the development of the nature through cosmic experience so that eventually it may grow out of the Ignorance. There must therefore be two elements, Karma as an instrument, but also the secret Consciousness and Will within working through the mind, life and body as the user. Fate, whether purely mechanical or created by ourselves, a chain of our own manufacture, is only one factor of existence; Being and its consciousness and its will are a still more important factor.

2.22 - THE STILLEST HOUR, #Thus Spoke Zarathustra, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
  And I look down because I am elevated. Who
  among you can laugh and be elevated at the same
  time? Whoever climbs the highest mountains

2.22 - Vijnana or Gnosis, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  In our perfect self-transcendence we pass out and up from the ignorance or half-enlightenment of our mental conscious-being into a greater wisdom-self and truth-power above it, there to dwell in the unwalled light of a divine knowledge. The mental man that we are is changed into the gnostic soul, the truth-conscious godhead, the vijnanamaya purusa. Seated on that level of the hill of our ascension we are in a quite different plane from this material, this vital, this mental poise of the universal spirit, and with this change changes too all our view and experience of our soul-life and of the world around us. We are born into a new soul-status and put on a new nature; for according to the status of the soul is the status of the prakriti. At each transition of the world-ascent, from matter to life, from life to mind, from mind bound to free intelligence, as the latent, half-manifested or already manifest soul rises to a higher and higher level of being, the nature also is elevated into a superior working, a wider consciousness, a vaster force and an intenser or larger range and joy of existence. But the transition from the mind-self to the knowledge-self is the great and the decisive transition in the Yoga. It is the shaking off of the last hold on us of the cosmic ignorance and our firm foundation in the Truth of things, in a consciousness infinite and eternal and inviolable by obscurity, falsehood, suffering or error.
  This is the first summit which enters into the divine perfection, sadharmaya, sadrsya; for all the rest only look up to it or catch some rays of its significance. The highest heights of mind or of overmind come still within the belt of a mitigated ignorance; they can refract a divine Light but not pass it on in undiminished power to our lower members. For so long as we are within the triple stratum of mind, life and body, our active nature continues to work in the force of the ignorance even when the soul in Mind possesses something of the knowledge. And even if the soul were to reflect or to represent all the largeness of the knowledge in its mental consciousness, it would be unable to mobilise it rightly in force of action. The truth in its action might greatly increase, but it would still be pursued by a limitation, still condemned to a divisibility which would prevent it from working integrally in the power of the infinite. The power of a divinely illumined mind may be immense compared with ordinary powers, but it will still be subject to incapacity and there can be no perfect correspondence between the force of the effective will and the light of the idea which inspires it. The infinite Presence may be there in status, but dynamis of the operations of nature still belongs to the lower prakriti, must follow its triple modes of working and cannot give any adequate form to the greatness within it. This is the tragedy of ineffectivity, of the hiatus between ideal and effective will, of our constant incapacity to work out in living form and action the truth we feel in our inner consciousness that pursues all the aspiration of mind and life towards the divinity behind them. But the vijnana or gnosis is not only truth but truth-power, it is the very working of the infinite and divine nature; it is the divine knowledge one with the divine will in the force and delight of a spontaneous and luminous and inevitable self-fulfilment. By the gnosis, then, we change our human into a divine nature.

2.23 - A Virtuous Woman is a Crown to Her Husband, #General Principles of Kabbalah, #Rabbi Moses Luzzatto, #Kabbalah
  her, and on the other, it elevates her, since all of this has
  been instituted for no other purpose than to disclose the
  --
  to the nether beings should achieve this elevated goal, He
  made her incomplete. Moreover, He caused her to be

2.24 - Gnosis and Ananda, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  The ascent to the gnosis, the possession of something of the gnostic consciousness must elevate the soul of man and sublimate his life in the world into a glory of light and power and bliss and infinity that can seem in comparison with the lame action and limited realisations of our present mental and physical existence the very status and dynamis of a perfection final and absolute. And it is a true perfection, such as nothing before it has yet been in the ascension of the spirit. For even the highest spiritual realisation on the plane of mentality has in it something top-heavy, one-sided and exclusive; even the widest mental spirituality is not wide enough and it is marred too by its imperfect power of self-expression in life. And yet in comparison with what is beyond it, this too, this first gnostic splendour is only a bright passage to a more perfect perfection. It is the secure and shining step from which we can happily mount still upwards into the absolute infinities which ale the origin and the goal of the incarnating spirit. In this farther ascension the gnosis does not disappear, but reaches rather its own supreme Light out of which it has descended to mediate between mind and the supreme Infinite.
  The Upanishad tells us that after the knowledge-self above the mental is possessed and all the lower selves have been drawn up into it, there is another and the last step of all still left to us -- though one might ask, is it eternally the last or only the last practically conceivable or at all necessary for us now? -- to take up our gnostic existence into the Bliss-Self and there complete the spiritual self-discovery of the divine Infinite. Ananda, a supreme Bliss eternal, far other and higher in its character than the highest human joy or pleasure is the essential and original nature of the spirit. In Ananda our spirit will find its true self, in Ananda its essential consciousness, in Ananda the absolute power of its existence. The embodied soul's entry into the highest absolute, unlimited, unconditional bliss of the spirit is the infinite liberation and the infinite perfection. It is true that something of this bliss can be enjoyed by reflection, by a qualified descent even on the lower planes where the Purusha plays with his modified and qualified Nature. There can be the experience of a spiritual and boundless Ananda on the plane of matter, on the plane of life, on the plane of mind as well as on the gnostic truth-plane of knowledge and above it. And the Yogin who enters into these lesser realisations, may find them so complete and compelling that he will imagine there is nothing greater, nothing beyond it. For each of the divine principles contains in itself the whole potentiality of all the other six notes of our being; each plane of Nature can have its own perfection of these notes under its own conditions. But the integral perfection can come only by a mounting ascent of the lowest into the highest and an incessant descent of the highest into the lowest till all becomes one at once solid block and plastic sea-stuff of the Truth infinite and eternal.

2.26 - The Ascent towards Supermind, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  THE PSYCHIC transformation and the first stages of the spiritual transformation are well within our conception; their perfection would be the perfection, wholeness, consummated unity of a knowledge and experience which is already part of things realised, though only by a small number of human beings. But the supramental change in its process carries us into less explored regions; it initiates a vision of heights of consciousness which have indeed been glimpsed and visited, but have yet to be discovered and mapped in their completeness. The highest of these peaks or elevated plateaus of consciousness, the supramental, lies far beyond the possibility of any satisfying mental scheme or map of it or any grasp of mental seeing and description. It would be difficult for the normal unillumined or untransformed mental conception to express or enter into something that is based on so different a consciousness with a radically different awareness of things; even if they were seen or conceived by some enlightenment or opening of vision, another language than the poor abstract counters used by our mind would be needed to translate them into terms by which their reality could become at all seizable by us. As the summits of human mind are beyond animal perception, so the movements of supermind are beyond the ordinary human mental conception: it is only when we have already had experience of a higher intermediate consciousness that any terms attempting to describe supramental being could convey a true meaning to our intelligence; for then, having experienced something akin to what is described, we could translate an inadequate language into a figure of what we knew. If the mind cannot enter into the nature of supermind, it can look towards it through these high and luminous approaches and catch some reflected impression of the Truth, the Right, the Vast which is the native kingdom of the free Spirit.
  But even what can be said about the intermediate consciousness must perforce be inadequate; only certain abstract generalisations can be hazarded which may serve for an initial light of guidance. The one enabling circumstance here is that, however different in constitution and principle, the higher consciousness is still, in its evolutionary form, in what we can first achieve of it here, a supreme development of elements which are already present in ours in however rudimentary and diminished a figure and power of themselves. It is also a helpful fact that the logic of the process of evolutionary Nature continues, greatly modified in some of the rules of its working but essentially the same, in the ascension of the highest heights as in the lower beginnings; thus we can discover and follow to a certain extent the lines of her supreme procedure. For we have seen something of the nature and law of the transition from intellectual to spiritual mind; from that achieved starting-point we can begin to trace the passage to a higher dynamic degree of the new consciousness and the farther transition from spiritual mind towards supermind. The indications must necessarily be very imperfect, for it is only some initial representations of an abstract and general character that can be arrived at by the method of metaphysical inquiry: the true knowledge and description must be left to the language of the mystic and the figures, at once more vivid and more recondite, of a direct and concrete experience.

2.28 - The Divine Life, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  55: A similar rejection is a necessary self-restraint and a spiritual discipline for the immature seeker, since such powers may be a great, even a deadly peril; for their supernormality may easily feed in him an abnormal exaggeration of the ego. Power in itself may be dreaded as a temptation by the aspirant to perfection, because power can abase as well as elevate; nothing is more liable to misuse. But when new capacities come as an inevitable result of the growth into a greater consciousness and a greater life and that growth is part of the very aim of the spiritual being within us, this bar does not operate; for a growth of the being into supernature and its life in supernature cannot take place or cannot be complete without bringing with it a greater power of consciousness and a greater power of life and the spontaneous development of an instrumentation of knowledge and force normal to that supernature. There is nothing in this future evolution of the being which could be regarded as irrational or incredible; there is nothing in it abnormal or miraculous: it would be the necessary course of the evolution of consciousness and its forces in the passage from the mental to the gnostic or supramental formulation of our existence. This action of the forces of supernature would be a natural, normal and spontaneously simple working of the new higher or greater consciousness into which the being enters in the course of his self-evolution; the gnostic being accepting the gnostic life would develop and use the powers of this greater consciousness, even as man develops and uses the powers of his mental nature.
  56: It is evident that such an increase of the power or powers of consciousness would be not only normal but indispensable to a greater and more perfect life. Human life with its partial harmony, in so far as that is not maintained by the imposition of a settled law and order on the constituent individuals through a partly willing, partly induced, partly forced or unavoidable acceptance, reposes on the agreement of the enlightened or interested elements in their mind, heart, life-sense, an assent to a composite body of common ideas, desires, vital satisfactions, aims of existence. But there is in the mass of constituting individuals an imperfect understanding and knowledge of the ideas, life-aims, life-motives which they have accepted, an imperfect power in their execution, an imperfect will to maintain them always unimpaired, to carry them out fully or to bring the life to a greater perfection: there is an element of struggle and discord, a mass of repressed or unfulfilled desires and frustrated wills, a simmering suppressed unsatisfaction or an awakened or eruptive discontent of unequally satisfied interests; there are new ideas, life-motives that break in and cannot be correlated without upheaval and disturbance; there are life-forces at work in human beings and their environment that are at variance with the harmony that has been constructed, and there is not the full power to overcome the discord and dislocations created by a clashing diversity of mind and life and by the attack of disrupting forces in universal Nature. What is lacking is a spiritual knowledge and spiritual power, a power over self, a power born of inner unification with others, a power over the surrounding or invading world-forces, a full-visioned and fully equipped power of effectuation of knowledge; it is these capacities missing or defective in us that belong to the very substance of gnostic being, for they are inherent in the light and dynamis of the gnostic nature.

30.01 - World-Literature, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 07, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   what a new life and novel tune has appeared in English poetry, what a unique resplendence has illumined its firmament! Chaucer elevated English literature as from a mundane to the spiritual level. He is the father of Great Poetry. He freed the language from the unrefined touch and flavour of narrow rusticity and entered as it were the realm of a higher, nobler, more luminous and wider perception and brought it down into his poetic creation. In French poetry also this parochial influence pervades all its Romances, the Chansons de Gestes, and even the Chanson de Roland. Real poetry, which is noble and of permanent value, was first introduced by Ronsard.
   Even there poetry did not reach its deeper, its superior nature. It has had to rise one step higher: it crossed this third level and entered the fourth where poetry is in its very character vaster and wider and deeper - to be sure, Victor Hugo holds this touch of immensity. It is here that the poetic spirit has achieved a divine energising inspiration that wants to have a direct vision of the Truth and express it in words and rhythms in a noble manner. Victor Hugo may not have achieved, but he has touched the new bourne. Here the poet aims at infusing whatever is easy, simple, common and fluid with a new spirit. Nothing unnecessary, irrelevant, profuse and diffuse has any place in his creation. Ordinary everyday experiences are to be raised to the level of a vivid, luminous expression of something rare. 'Great Poetry' blossoms then and there, in this fourth stage. However fine Chaucer's first outburst,

3.00 - Introduction, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  thraldom of tradition and to elevate them into a larger, freer life,
  with a broader outlook on the world. This is no small service

30.15 - The Language of Rabindranath, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 07, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Should a catalogue be ever made of the new words coined by Rabindranath, it would be a very instructive lesson. Numerous are the words - old words found only in the dictionary - that he has made current coin. In the same way innumerable are the words - used one time colloquially or in a regional dialect - that Rabindranath has elevated to the level of literary distinction. Moreover, he had a special genius in coining words and that expressed a characteristic trait of his creative genius. Primarily, his words seem to spring from the heart, from the lan
   vital,natural to the Bengali consciousness. There were two rocks on .his way to linguistic transformation. And he beautifully escaped and eluded them both. On the one hand, there is no heaviness in him, none of the massiveness of correct and flawless words composed by pedants and grammarians. On the other hand, there is no grotesqueness, nothing of what personal whim and. fancy and idiosyncrasy engender. If his words in their structure break certain strict rules and regulations, they yet are quite in tune with the inner nature and form of the language; if free, they are still natural. Secondly, the grace and beauty of the words raise no question. A word, in order to fulfil its role, must have an easy and inherent power of expression - it must be living and full of vitality. Still more it must be sweet and beautiful.

3.01 - INTRODUCTION, #Mysterium Coniunctionis, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  [106] Here again we see the contrast between alchemy and the prevailing Christian ideal of attempting to restore the original state of innocence by monasticism and, later, by the celibacy of the priesthood. The conflict between worldliness and spirituality, latent in the love-myth of Mother and Son, was elevated by Christianity to the mystic marriage of sponsus (Christ) and sponsa (Church), whereas the alchemists transposed it to the physical plane as the coniunctio of Sol and Luna. The Christian solution of the conflict is purely pneumatic, the physical relations of the sexes being turned into an allegory orquite illegitimatelyinto a sin that perpetuates and even intensifies the original one in the Garden. Alchemy, on the other hand, exalted the most heinous transgression of the law, namely incest, into a symbol of the union of opposites, hoping in this way to bring back the golden age. For both trends the solution lay in extrapolating the union of sexes into another medium: the one projected it into the spirit, the other into matter. But neither of them located the problem in the place where it arose the soul of man.
  [107] No doubt it would be tempting to assume that it was more convenient to shift such a supremely difficult question on to another plane and then represent it as having been solved. But this explanation is too facile, and is psychologically false because it supposes that the problem was asked consciously, found to be painful, and consequently moved on to another plane. This stratagem accords with our modern way of thinking but not with the spirit of the past, and there are no historical proofs of any such neurotic operation. Rather does all the evidence suggest that the problem has always seemed to lie outside the psyche as known to us. Incest was the hierosgamos of the gods, the mystic prerogative of kings, a priestly rite, etc. In all these cases we are dealing with an archetype of the collective unconscious which, as consciousness increased, exerted an ever greater influence on conscious life. It certainly seems today as if the ecclesiastical allegories of the bridegroom and bride, not to mention the now completely obsolete alchemical coniunctio, had become so faded that one meets with incest only in criminology and the psychopathology of sex. Freuds discovery of the Oedipus complex, a special instance of the incest problem in general, and its universal incidence have, however, reactivated this ancient problem, though mostly only for doctors interested in psychology. Even though laymen know very little about certain medical anomalies or have a wrong idea of them, this does not alter the facts any more than does the laymans ignorance of the actual percentage of cases of tuberculosis or psychosis.

3.02 - SOL, #Mysterium Coniunctionis, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  [131] Although the alchemists came very close to realizing that the ego was the mysteriously elusive arcane substance and the longed-for lapis, they were not aware that with their sun symbol they were establishing an intimate connection between God and the ego. As already remarked, projection is not a voluntary act; it is a natural phenomenon beyond the interference of the conscious mind and peculiar to the nature of the human psyche. If, therefore, it is this nature that produces the sun symbol, nature herself is expressing an identity of God and ego. In that case only unconscious nature can be accused of blasphemy, but not the man who is its victim. It is the rooted conviction of the West that God and the ego are worlds apart. In India, on the other hand, their identity was taken as self-evident. It was the nature of the Indian mind to become aware of the world-creating significance of the consciousness68 manifested in man.69 The West, on the contrary, has always emphasized the littleness, weakness, and sinfulness of the ego, despite the fact that it elevated one man to the status of divinity. The alchemists at least suspected mans hidden godlikeness, and the intuition of Angelus Silesius finally expressed it without disguise.
  [132] The East resolves these confusing and contradictory aspects by merging the ego, the personal atman, with the universal atman and thus explaining the ego as the veil of Maya. The Western alchemist was not consciously aware of these problems. But when his unspoken assumptions and his symbols reached the plane of conscious gnosis, as was the case with Angelus Silesius, it was precisely the littleness and lowliness of the ego70 that impelled him to recognize its identity with its extreme opposite.71 It was not the arbitrary opinions of deranged minds that gave rise to such insights, but rather the nature of the psyche itself, which, in East and West alike, expresses these truths either directly or clothed in transparent metaphors. This is understandable when we realize that a world-creating quality attaches to human consciousness as such. In saying this we violate no religious convictions, for the religious believer is at liberty to regard mans consciousness (through which, as it were, a second world-creation was enacted) as a divine instrument.

3.02 - The Motives of Devotion, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  All our instincts and the movements of our being begin by supporting themselves on the ordinary motives of our lower human nature, - mixed and egoistic motives at first, but afterwards they purify and elevate themselves, they become an intense and special need of our higher nature quite apart from the results our actions bring with them; finally they exalt themselves into a sort of categorical imperative of our being, and it is through our obedience to this that we arrive at that supreme something self-existent in us which was all the time drawing us towards it, first by the lures of our egoistic nature, then by something much higher, larger, more universal, until we are able to feel its own direct attraction which is the strongest and most imperative of all. In the transformation of ordinary religious worship into the Yoga of pure Bhakti we see this development from the motived and interested worship of popular religion into a principle of motiveless and self-existent love. This last is in fact the touchstone of the real Bhakti and shows whether we are really in the central way or are only upon one of the bypaths leading to it. We have to throw away the props of our weakness, the motives of the ego, the lures of our lower nature before we can deserve the divine union.
  Faced with the sense of a Power or perhaps a number of Powers greater and higher than himself by whom his life in Nature is overshadowed, influenced, governed, man naturally applies to it or to them the first primitive feelings of the natural being among the difficulties, desires and dangers of that life, - fear and interest. The enormous part played by these motives in the evolution of the religious instinct, is undeniable, and in fact, man being what he is, it could hardly have been less; and even when religion has advanced fairly far on its road, we see these motives still surviving, active, playing a sufficiently large part, justified and appealed to by Religion herself in support of her claims on man. The fear of God, it is said, - or, it may be added for the sake of historical truth, the fear of the Gods, - is the beginning of religion, a half-truth upon which scientific research, trying to trace the evolution of religion, ordinarily in a critical and often a hostile rather than in a sympathetic spirit, has laid undue emphasis. But not the fear of God only, for man does not act, even most primitively, from fear alone, but from twin motives, fear and desire, fear of things unpleasant and maleficent and desire of things pleasant and beneficent, - therefore from fear and interest. Life to him is primarily and engrossingly, - until he learns to live more in his soul and only secondarily in the action and reaction of outward things, - a series of actions and results, things to be desired, pursued and gained by action and things to be dreaded and shunned, yet which may come upon him as a result of action. And it is not only by his own action but by that also of others and of Nature around him that these things come to him. As soon, then, as he comes to sense a Power behind all this which can influence or determine action and result, he conceives of it as a dispenser of boons and sufferings, able and under certain conditions willing to help him or hurt, save and destroy.

3.02 - The Practice Use of Dream-Analysis, #The Practice of Psycho therapy, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  gained is of therapeutic value, in which case he will elevate dream-analysis
  to a professional duty. It is well known that the Freudian school is of the
  --
  artificial blasphemy so as to lower the father and elevate the son. An
  immoral business, we may be tempted to say. An unintelligent father

3.10 - The New Birth, #The Practice of Psycho therapy, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  great seriousness and elevated to a sort of religious dogma, which has been
  fanatically defended right down to the present time: such was the

3.6.01 - Heraclitus, #Essays In Philosophy And Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Does the thought of Heraclitus admit of any such hope as the Vedic seers held and hymned with so triumphant a confidence? or does it even give ground for any aspiration to some kind of a divine supermanhood such as his disciples the Stoics so sternly laboured for or as that of which Nietzsche, the modern Heraclitus, drew a too crude and violent figure? His saying that man is kindled and extinguished as light disappears into night, is commonplace and discouraging enough. But this may after all be only true of the apparent man Is it possible for man. in his becoming to raise his present fixed measures? to elevate his mental, relative, individual reason into direct communion with or direct participation in the divine and absolute reason? to inspire and raise the values of his human force to the higher values of the divine force? to become aware like the gods of an absolute good and an absolute beauty? to lift this mortal to the nature of immortality? Against his melancholy image of human transiency we have that remarkable and cryptic sentence, "the gods are mortals, men immortals", which, taken literally, might mean that the gods are powers that perish and replace each other and the soul of man alone is immortal, but must at least mean that there is in man behind his outward transiency an immortal spirit. We have too his saying, "thou canst not find the limits of the soul", and we have the profoundest of all Heraclitus' utterances, "the kingdom is of the child." If man is in his real being an infinite and immortal spirit, there is surely no reason why he should not awaken to his immortality, arise towards the consciousness of the universal, one and absolute, live in a higher self-realisation. "I have sought for myself" says Heraclitus; and what was it that he found?
  But there is one great gap and defect whether in his knowledge of things or his knowledge of the self of man. We see in how many directions the deep divining eye of Heraclitus anticipated the largest and profoundest generalisations of Science and Philosophy and how even his more superficial thoughts indicate later powerful tendencies of the occidental mind, how too some of his ideas influenced such profound and fruitful thinkers as Plato, the Stoics, the Neo-platonists. But in his defect also he is a forerunner; it illustrates the great deficiency of later European thought, such of it at least as has not been profoundly influenced by Asiatic religions or Asiatic mysticism. I have tried to show how often his thought touches and is almost identical with the Vedic and Vedantic. But his knowledge of the truth of things stopped with the vision of the universal reason and the universal force; he seems to have summed up the principle of things in these two first terms, the aspect of consciousness, the aspect of power, a supreme intelligence and a supreme energy. The eye of Indian thought saw a third aspect of the Self and of Brahman; besides the universal consciousness active in divine knowledge, besides the universal force active in divine will, it saw the universal delight active in divine love and joy. European thought, following the line of Heraclitus' thinking, has fixed itself on reason and on force and made them the principles towards whose perfection our being has to aspire. Force is the first aspect of the world, war, the clash of energies; the second aspect, reason, emerges out of the appearance of force in which it is at first hidden and reveals itself as a certain justice, a certain harmony, a certain determining intelligence and reason in things; the third aspect is a deeper secret behind these two, universal delight, love, beauty which taking up the other two can establish something higher than justice, better than harmony, truer than reason,-unity and bliss, the ecstasy of our fulfilled existence. Of this last secret power Western thought has only seen two lower aspects, pleasure and aesthetic beauty; it has missed the spiritual beauty and the spiritual delight. For that reason Europe has never been able to develop a powerful religion of its own; it has been obliged to turn to Asia. Science takes possession of the measures and utilities of Force; rational philosophy pursues reason to its last subtleties; but inspired philosophy and religion can seize hold of the highest secret, uttamaṁ rahasyam.

3.7.1.01 - Rebirth, #Essays In Philosophy And Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  No doubt, since these ideas were so prominent, they must have had their use in training humanity. Perhaps even it is true that the Supreme deals with the child soul according to its childishness and allows it to continue its sensational imaginations of heaven and hell for a time beyond the death of the physical body. Perhaps both these ideas of after-life and of rebirth as fields of punishment and reward were needed because suited to our half-mentalised animality. But after a certain stage the system ceases to be really effective. Men believe in Heaven and Hell but go on sinning merrily, quit at last by a Papal indulgence or the final priestly absolution or a death-bed repentance or a bath in the Ganges or a sanctified death at Benares,such are the childish devices by which we escape from our childishness! And in the end the mind grows adult and puts the whole nursery nonsense away with contempt. The reward and punishment theory of rebirth, if a little more elevated or at least less crudely sensational, comes to be as ineffective. And it is good that it should be so. For it is intolerable that man with his divine capacity should continue to be virtuous for a reward and shun sin out of terror. Better a strong sinner than a selfish virtuous coward or a petty hucksterer with God; there is more divinity in him, more capacity of elevation. Truly the Gita has said well, kpa phalahetava. And it is inconceivable that the system of this vast and majestic world should have been founded on these petty and paltry motives. There is reason in these theories? then reason of the nursery, puerile. Ethics? then ethics of the mud, muddy.
  The true foundation of the theory of rebirth is the evolution of the soul, or rather its efflorescence out of the veil of Matter and its gradual self-finding. Buddhism contained this truth involved in its theory of Karma and emergence out of Karma but failed to bring it to light; Hinduism knew it of old, but afterwards missed the right balance of its expression. Now we are again able to restate the ancient truth in a new language and this is already being done by certain schools of thought, though still the old incrustations tend to tack themselves on to the deeper wisdom. And if this gradual efflorescence be true, then the theory of rebirth is an intellectual necessity, a logically unavoidable corollary. But what is the aim of that evolution? Not conventional or interested virtue and the faultless counting out of the small coin of good in the hope of an apportioned material reward, but the continual growth towards a divine knowledge, strength, love and purity. These things alone are real virtue and this virtue is its own reward. The one true reward of the works of love is to grow ever in capacity and delight of love up to the ecstasy of the spirits all-seizing embrace and universal passion; the one reward of the works of right Knowledge is to grow perpetually into the infinite Light; the one reward of the works of right Power is to harbour more and more of the Force Divine, and of the works of purity to be freed more and more from egoism into that immaculate wideness where all things are transformed and reconciled into the divine equality. To seek other reward is to bind oneself to a foolishness and a childish ignorance; and to regard even these things as a reward is an unripeness and an imperfection.

3.7.1.05 - The Significance of Rebirth, #Essays In Philosophy And Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  But the Buddhistic statement admits no self, spirit or eternal Being in its rigorously mechanical economy of existence. It takes only the phenomenon of a constant becoming and elevates that from the physical to the psychical level. As there is evident to our physical mind an Energy, action, motion, capable of creating by its material forces the forms and powers of the material universe, so there is for the Buddhistic vision of things an Energy, action, Karma, creating by its psychic powers of idea and association this embodied soul life with its continuity of recurrences. As the body is a dissoluble construction, a composite and combination, so the soul too is a dissoluble construction and combination; the soul life like the physical life sustains itself by a continuous flux and repetition of the same workings and movements. As this constant hereditary succession of lives is a prolongation of the one universal principle of life by a continued creation of similar bodies, a mechanical recurrence, so the system of soul rebirth too is a constant prolongation of the principle of the soul life by a continued creation through Karma of similar embodied associations and experiences, a mechanical recurrence. As the cause of all this physical birth and long hereditary continuation is an obscure will to life in Matter, so the cause of continued soul birth is an ignorant desire or will to be in the universal energy of Karma. As the constant wheelings of the universe and the motions of its forces generate individual existences who escape from or end in being by an individual dissolution, so there is this constant wheel of becoming and motion of Karma which forms into individualised soul-lives that must escape from their continuity by a dissolving cessation. An extinction of the embodied consciousness is our apparent material end; for soul too the end is extinction, the blank satisfaction of Nothingness or some ineffable bliss of a superconscientNon-Being. The affirmation of the mechanical occurrence or recurrence of birth is the essence of this view; but while the bodily life suffers an enforced end and dissolution, the soul life ceases by a willed self-extinction.
  The Buddhistic theory adds nothing to the first obvious significance of life except an indefinite prolongation by rebirth which is a burden, not a gain, and the spiritual greatness of the discipline of self-extinction,the latter, no doubt, a thing of great value. The illusionist solution adds something, but does not differ very greatly in its motive from the Buddhistic. It sets against the futile cosmic repetition an eternity of our own absolute being; from the ignorance which creates the illusory mechanism of a recurrence of rebirth, it escapes into the self-knowledge of our ineffable existence. That seems to bring in a positive strain and to give to our being an initial, a supporting and an eventual reality. But the hiatus here is the absence of all true and valid relation between this real being of ours and all our birth and becoming. The last event and end of our births is not represented as any absolute fulfilment of what we are,that would be a great, fruitful and magnificently positive philosophy, nor as the final affirmation of a progressive self-finding,that too would give a noble meaning to our existence; it is a turning away from the demand of the universal Spirit, a refusal of all these cosmic ideas, imaginations, aspirations, action and effectuation. The way to find our being given us is an absolute denial of all our becoming. We rise to self by a liberating negation of ourselves, and in the result the Idea in the universe pursues its monstrous and aimless road, but the individual ceases and is blest in the cessation. The motive of this way of thought is the same oppressive sense of an ignorant mechanical cosmic recurrence as in the Buddhistic and the same high impatient passion of escape. There is recognition of a divine source of life, but a non-recognition of any divine meaning in life. And as for rebirth it is reduced in its significance to a constant mechanism of self-deception, and the will not to live is shown us as the last acquisition, the highest good and the one desirable result of living. The satisfaction which Illusionism gives,for it does give a certain high austere kind of satisfaction to the intellectand to one turn of spiritual tendency,is the pressing to a last point of the obvious antinomy between this great burdensome and tyrannous mechanism, the universe, and the spirit which feels itself of another and a diviner nature, the great relief to a soul passioning for freedom, but compelled to labour on as a spring of the dull machine, of being able to cast away the cosmic burden, and finally the free and bare absoluteness of this spiritual conclusion. But it gives no real, because no fruitful answer to the problem of God and man and the significance of life; it only gets away from them by a skilful evasion and takes away from them all significance, so that any question of the sense and will in all this tremendous labour and throb and seeking loses meaning. But the challenge of Gods universe to the knowledge and strength of the human spirit cannot in the end be met by man with a refusal or solved by an evasion, even though an individual soul may take refuge from the demand, as a man may from the burden of action and pain in unconsciousness, in spiritual trance or sleep or escape through its blank doors into the Absolute. Something the Spirit of the universe means by our labour in existence, some sense it has in these grandiose rhythms, and it has not undertaken them in an eternally enduring error or made them in a jest.1 To know that and possess it, to find and fulfil consciously the universal beings hidden significances is the task given to the human spirit.

3.7.1.12 - Karma and Justice, #Essays In Philosophy And Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  The cosmic Being must be then, if this view is to hold, a sort of enlarged divine Human or, we might say, a superior anthropoid Divine, or else the cosmic Law a perfection and magnitude of human methods and standards, which deals with man as he is accustomed to deal with his neighbour,only not with a rough partial human efficacy, but either a sure omniscience or an unfailing automatism. Whatever truth there may be behind that notion, this is not likely to be an adequate account of the matter. In actual life, if we put aside the rebirth theory, there are traces of this method, but it does not work out with any observable consistency,not even if we accept an unsatisfactory and hardly just vicarious punishment as part of the scheme. What surety have we, then, of its better or its faultless working out in rebirth except for some similar partial signs and indications and, to fill in the blanks, our general sense of the fitness of things? And again where does the true nature of ethics come in in this scheme? That more elevated action, it would almost seem, is an ideal movement of less use for the practical governance of life than as one part of a preparation for a fourth and last need of man, his need of spiritual salvation, and salvation winds up finally our karma and casts away the economy along with the very thought and will of life. Desire is the law of life and action and therefore of Karma. To do things above the material level for their own sake and their pure right or pure delight is to head straight towards the distances of heaven or the silence of the Ineffable. But this is a view of the meaning of existence against which it is time for the higher seeing mind and being of man to protest and to ask whether the ways of the Spirit in the world may not be capable of a greater, nobler and wiser significance.
  But still, since the mind of man is part of the universal mind and reflects something of it in a however broken or as yet imperfect and crookedly seeing fashion, there may well be something of a real truth behind this view, though it is not likely to be the whole or the well understood truth. There are some certain or probable laws of the universal working which are relevant to it and must enter into the account. First, it is sure that Nature has laws of which the observance leads to or helps well-being and of which the violation imposes suffering; but all of them cannot be given a moral significance. Then there is the certainty that there must be a moral law of cause and consequence in the total web of her weaving and this we would perhaps currently put into the formula that good produces good and evil evil, which is a proposition of undoubted truth, though also we see in this complicated world that evil comes out of what we hold to be good, and again out of evil disengages itself something that yet turns to good. Perhaps our system of values is too rigidly precise or too narrowly relative; there are subtle things in the totality, minglings, interrelations, cross-currents, suppressed or hidden significances which we do not take into account. The formula is true, but is not the whole truth, at least as now understood in its first superficial significance.
  And at any rate in the ordinary notion of Karma we are combining two different notions of good. I can well understand that moral good does or ought to produce and increase moral good and moral evil to farther and to create moral evil. It does so in myself. The habit of love confirms and enhances my power of love; it purifies my being and opens it to the universal good. The habit of hatred on the contrary corrupts my being, fills it with poison, with bad and morbid toxic matter, and opens it to the general power of evil. My love ought also by a prolongation or a return to produce love in others and my hatred to give rise to hatred; that happens to a certain, a great extent, but it need not be and is not an invariable or rigorous consequence; still we may well see and believe that love does throw out widening ripples and helps to elevate the world while hatred has the opposite consequence. But what is the necessary connection between this good and evil on the one hand and on the other pleasure and pain? Must the ethical power always turn perfectly into some term of kindred hedonistic result? Not entirely; for love is a joy in itself, but also love suffers; hatred is a troubled and self-afflicting thing, but has too its own perverse delight of itself and its gratifications; but in the end we may say that love, because it is born of the universal Delight, triumphs in its own nature and hatred because it is its denial or perversion, leads to a greater sum of misery to myself as to others. And of all true moral good and real evil this may be said that the one tends towards some supreme Right, the tam of the Vedic Rishis, the highest law of a highest Truth of our being and that Truth is the door of the spirits Ananda, its beatific nature, the other is a missing or perversion of the Right and the Truth and exposes us to its opposite, to false delight or suffering. And even in the perplexed steps of life some reflection of this identity must emerge.
  This correspondence is, still, more essentially true in the inner field, in the spiritual, mental and emotional result and reaction of the good or the evil or of the effects of its outgoing action. But where is the firm link of correspondence between the ethical and the more vital and physical hedonistic powers of life? How does my ethical good turn into smiling fortune, crowned prosperity, sleek material good and happiness to myself and my ethical evil into frowning misfortune, rugged adversity, sordid material ill and suffering,for that is what the desire soul of man and the intelligence governed by it seem to demand, and how is the account squared or the transmutation made between these two very different energies of the affirmation and denial of good? We can see this much that the good or the evil in me translates itself into a good or an evil action which among other things brings about much mental and material happiness and suffering to others, and to this outgoing power and effect there ought to be an equal reaction of incoming power and effect, though it does not seem to work itself out immediately or with any discoverable exactness of correspondence. There does still appear to be a principle of rebound in Nature; our action has in some degree the motion of recoil of the boomerang and cycles back towards the will that has cast it on the world. The stone we hurl rashly against the universal Life is cast back at us and may crush, maim or injure our own mental and physical being. But this mechanical rebound is not the whole principle of Karma. Nor is Karma wholly a mixed ethical-hedonistic order in its total significance, for there are involved other powers of our consciousness and being. Nor is it again a pure mechanism which we set going by our will and have then helplessly to accept the result; for the will which produced the effect, can also intervene to modify it. And above all the initiating and receiving consciousness can change the values and utilities of the reactions and make another thing of life than this automatic mechanism of fateful return or retri bution to the half-blind embodied actor in a mute necessity of rigorous law of Nature.

3.8.1.02 - Arya - Its Significance, #Essays In Philosophy And Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  The Aryan perfected is the Arhat. There is a transcendent Consciousness which surpasses the universe and of which all these worlds are only a side-issue and a by-play. To that consciousness he aspires and attains. There is a Consciousness which, being transcendent, is yet the universe and all that the universe contains. Into that consciousness he enlarges his limited ego; he becomes one with all beings and all inanimate objects in a single self-awareness, love, delight, all-embracing energy. There is a consciousness which, being both transcendental and universal, yet accepts the apparent limitations of individuality for work, for various standpoints of knowledge, for the play of the Lord with His creations; for the ego is there that it may finally convert itself into a free centre of the divine work and the divine play. That consciousness too he has sufficient love, joy and knowledge to accept; he is puissant enough to effect that conversion. To embrace individuality after transcending it is the last and divine sacrifice. The perfect Arhat is he who is able to live simultaneously in all these three apparent states of existence, elevate the lower into the higher, receive the higher into the lower, so that he may represent perfectly in the symbols of the world that with which he is identified in all parts of his being,the triple and triune Brahman.
    the word "rya" printed in Devanagari script on the cover of the review.

3 - Commentaries and Annotated Translations, #Hymns to the Mystic Fire, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  by which the knowledge in man is changed & elevated from the
  mental or sensational to the ideal type. It is done by a process

4.03 - The Psychology of Self-Perfection, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  This is the nature of spirit and its instruments. But to understand its operations and to get at a knowledge which will give to us a power of leverage in uplifting them out of the established groove in which our life goes spinning, we have to perceive that the Spirit has based all its workings upon two twin aspects of its being. Soul and Nature, Purusha and prakriti. We have to treat them as different and diverse in power, -- for in practice of consciousness this difference is valid, -- although they are only two sides of the same reality, pole and pole of the one conscious being. Purusha or soul is spirit cognisant of the workings of its nature, supporting them by its being, enjoying or rejecting enjoyment of them in its delight of being. Nature is power of the spirit, and she is too working and process of its power formulating name and form of being, developing action of consciousness and knowledge, throwing itself up in will and impulsion, force and energy, fulfilling itself in enjoyment. Nature is prakriti, Maya, shakti. If we look at her on her most external side where she seems the opposite of Purusha, she is prakriti, an inert and mechanical self-driven operation, inconscient or conscient only by the light of Purusha, elevated by various degrees, vital, mental, supramental, of his soul-illumination of her workings. If we look at her on her other internal side where she moves nearer to unity with Purusha, she is Maya, will of being and becoming or of cessation from being and becoming with all their results, apparent to the consciousness, of involution and evolution, existing and non-existing, self-concealment of spirit and self-discovery of spirit. Both are sides of one and the same thing, shakti, power of being of the spirit which operates, whether superconsciously or consciously or subconsciously in a seeming inconscience, -- in fact all these motions co-exist at the same time and in the same soul, --as the spirit's power of knowledge, power of will, power of process and action, jnana-sakti, iccha-sakti, kriya-sakti. By this power the spirit creates all things in itself, hides and discovers all itself in the form and behind the veil of its manifestation.
  Purusha is able by this power of its nature to take whatever poise it may will and to follow the law and form of being proper to any self-formulation. It is eternal soul and spirit in its own power of self-existence superior to and governing its manifestations; it is universal soul and spirit developed in power of becoming of its existence, infinite in the finite; it is individual soul and spirit absorbed in development of some particular course of its becoming, in appearance mutably finite in the infinite. All these things it can be at once, eternal spirit universalised in cosmos, individualised in its beings; it can too found the consciousness rejecting, governing or responding to the action of Nature in any one of them, put the others behind it or away from it, know itself as pure eternity, self-supporting universality or exclusive individuality. Whatever the formulation of its nature, soul can seem to become that and view itself as that only in the frontal active part of its consciousness; but it is never only what it seems to be; it is too the so much else that it can be; secretly, it is the all of itself that is yet hidden. It is not irrevocably limited by any particular self-formulation in Time, but can break through and beyond it, break it up or develop it, select, reject, new-create, reveal out of itself a greater self-formulation. What it believes itself to be by the whole active will of its consciousness in its instruments, that it is or tends to become, yo yacchraddhah sa eva sah what it believes it can be and has full faith in becoming, that it changes to in nature, evolves or discovers.

4.0 - NOTES TO ZARATHUSTRA, #Twilight of the Idols, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
  The great educator like nature must elevate obstacles in order that
  these may be overcome.
  --
  this species: once this has been achieved the aim can be elevated.
  One movement is absolute; it is nothing more than the levelling down of
  --
  it, perhaps also mankind will be elevated through it inasmuch as by
  its means the elements which are hostile to life will be overcome and

4.19 - The Nature of the supermind, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  The object of Yoga is to raise the human being from the consciousness of the ordinary mind subject to the control of vital and material Nature and limited wholly by birth and death and Time and the needs and desires of the mind, life and body to the consciousness of the spirit free in its self and using the circumstances of mind, life and body as admitted or self-chosen and self-figuring determinations of the spirit, using them in a free self-knowledge, a free will and power of being, a free delight of being. This is the essential difference between the ordinary mortal mind in which we live and the spiritual consciousness of our divine and immortal being which is the highest result of Yoga. It is a radical conversion as great as and greater than the change which we suppose evolutionary Nature to have made in its transition from the vital animal to the fully mentalised human consciousness. The animal has the conscious vital mind, but whatever beginnings there are in it of anything higher are only a primary glimpse, a crude hint of the intelligence which in man becomes the splendour of the mental understanding, will, emotion, aesthesis and reason. Man elevated in the heights and deepened by the intensities of the mind becomes aware of something great and divine in himself towards which all this tends, something he is in possibility but which he has not yet become, and he turns the powers of his mind, his power of knowledge, his power of will, his power of emotion and aesthesis to seek out this, to seize and comprehend all that it may be, to become it and to exist wholly in its greater consciousness, delight, being and power of highest becoming. But what he gets of this higher state in his normal mind is only an intimation, a primary glimpse, a crude hint of the splendour, the light, the glory and divinity of the spirit within him. A complete conversion of all the parts of his being into moulds and instruments of the spiritual consciousness is demanded of him before he can make quite real, constant, present to himself this greater thing that he can be and entirely live in what is now to him at the best a luminous aspiration. He must seek to develop and grow altogether into a greater divine consciousness by an integral Yoga.
  The Yoga of perfection necessary to this change has, so far as we have been considering it, consisted in a preparatory purification of the mental, vital and physical nature, a liberation from the knots of the lower prakriti, a consequent replacement of the egoistic state always subject to the ignorant and troubled action of the desire-soul by a large and luminous static equality which quiets the reason, the emotional mind, the life mind and the physical nature and brings into us the peace and freedom of the spirit, and a dynamical substitution of the action of the supreme and universal divine shakti under the control of the Ishwara for that of the lower prakriti, --an action whose complete operation must be preceded by the perfection of the natural instruments. And all these things together, though not as yet the whole Yoga, constitute already a much greater than the present normal consciousness, spiritual in its basis and moved by a greater light, power and bliss, and it might be easy to rest satisfied with so much accomplished and think that all has been done that was needed for the divine conversion.

4.21 - The Gradations of the supermind, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Here the one thing that is always and constantly present, that which one has grown to and in which one lives always, is infinite being and all that is seen, felt, known, existed in as only substance of the one being; it is infinite consciousness and all that is conscious and acts and moves is seen, felt, received, known, lived in as self-experience and energy of the one being; it is infinite Ananda and all that feels and is felt is seen and felt and known, received and lived in as forms of the one Ananda. Everything else is only manifestation and circumstance of this one truth of our existence. This is no longer merely the seeing or knowing, but the very condition of the self in all and all in the self. God in all and all in God and all seen as God, and that condition is now not a thing offered to the reflecting spiritualised mind but held and lived by an integral, always present, always active realisation in the supramental nature. There is thought here and will and sensation and everything that belongs to our nature, but it is transfigured and elevated into a higher consciousness. All thought is here seen and experienced as a luminous body of substance, a luminous movement of force, a luminous wave of Ananda of the being; it is not an idea in the void air of mind, but experienced in the reality and as the light of a reality of the infinite being. The will and impulsions are similarly experienced as a real power and substance of the Sat, the Chit, the Ananda of the Ishwara. All the spiritualised sensation and emotion are experienced as pure moulds of the consciousness and Ananda. The physical being itself is experienced as a conscious form and the vital being as an outpouring of the power and possession of the life of the spirit.
  The action of the supermind in the development is to manifest and organise this highest consciousness so as to exist and act no longer only in the infinite above with some limited or veiled or lower and deformed manifestations in the individual being and nature, but largely and totally in the individual as a conscious and self-knowing spiritual being and a living and acting power of the infinite and universal spirit. The character of this action, so far as it can be expressed, may be spoken of more fitly afterwards when we come to speak of the Brahmic consciousness and vision. In the succeeding chapters we shall only deal with so much of it as concerns the thought, will and psychic and other experience in the individual nature. At present all that is necessary to note is that here too there is in the field of the thought and the will a triple action. The spiritual reason is lifted and broadened into a greater representative action that formulates to us mainly the actualities of the existence of the self in and around us. There is then a higher interpretative action of the supramental knowledge, a greater scale less insistent on actualities, that opens out yet greater potentialities in time and space and beyond. And lastly there is a highest knowledge by identity that is a gate of entrance to the essential self-awareness and the omniscience and omnipotence of the Ishwara.

5.01 - EPILOGUE, #The Phenomenon of Man, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
  of something in line with, but still more elevated than, the Omega point '.
  This is in deference to the theological concept of the ' supernatural ' according

5.4.01 - Notes on Root-Sounds, #Vedic and Philological Studies, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
   to elevate the voice
   Cs [Causative] to throw, cast, propel .. urge, prompt .. attract, elevate, revive .. produce.
   , , ,

6.09 - THE THIRD STAGE - THE UNUS MUNDUS, #Mysterium Coniunctionis, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  [764] Now just as it seems self-evident to the naive-minded person that an apple falls from the tree to the earth, but absurd to say that the earth rises up to meet the apple, so he can believe without difficulty that the mind is able to spiritualize the body without being affected by its inertia and grossness. But all effects are mutual, and nothing changes anything else without itself being changed. Although the alchemist thought he knew better than anyone else that, at the Creation, at least a little bit of the divinity, the anima mundi, entered into material things and was caught there, he nevertheless believed in the possibility of a one-sided spiritualization, without considering that the precondition for this is a materialization of the spirit in the form of the blue quintessence. In reality his labours elevated the body into proximity with the spirit while at the same time drawing the spirit down into matter. By sublimating matter he concretized spirit.
  [765] This self-evident truth was still strange to medieval man and it has been only partially digested even by the man of today. But if a union is to take place between opposites like spirit and matter, conscious and unconscious, bright and dark, and so on, it will happen in a third thing, which represents not a compromise but something new, just as for the alchemists the cosmic strife of the elements was composed by the

Apology, #unset, #Anonymous, #Various
  Then every Athenian improves and elevates them; all with the exception of myself; and I alone am their corrupter? Is that what you affirm?
  That is what I stoutly affirm.

Big Mind (ten perfections), #unset, #Anonymous, #Various
  I don't steal. I don't take anything that is not given or sold to me, not even so much as a bar of soap. I don't engage in sexual misconduct, or act in a greedy way. I speak what is true, and I do not lie. I do not get intoxicated. I don't speak about others' errors and faults. I neither elevate myself nor blame others. I am not stingy, especially with the Teachings. I do not hate, and I don't allow myself to indulge in anger. I do not speak ill of my teachers, their teachings, and the community.
  What is so narrow-minded about me? I follow rules and codes of behavior, and I do my very best not to break them. I believe in the law, both man-made laws, and also the
  --
  I appreciate and respect others' possessions and property. I give freely and generously. I don't act self-centeredly or egotistically. I am truthful unless the circumstances are such that it is more appropriate for me not to be. I am sober, attentive and mindful, and I don't allow myself to get too intoxicated by alcohol, or my own ideas or notions. I refrain from talking about others' errors or faults, and I find ways to be kind and considerate in speech toward others. I don't elevate myself and blame others. I don't put others down in order to build myself up. I am simply generous and nice to others. I do not find fault, and I take full responsibility for action and reaction, for cause and effect. I am generous and giving. I am joyful, friendly and compassionate toward others.
  FACILITATOR: Do you ever have doubts about your past actions, and think that after all they may not have been the best course?

Blazing P3 - Explore the Stages of Postconventional Consciousness, #unset, #Anonymous, #Various
  spiritual in its essential substance; and its instrumentation is through an elevated thoughtpower and comprehensive mental sight not illumined by any of the intenser upper lights
  but as if in a large strong and clear daylight. It acts as an intermediate state between the

BOOK II. - A review of the calamities suffered by the Romans before the time of Christ, showing that their gods had plunged them into corruption and vice, #City of God, #Saint Augustine of Hippo, #Christianity
  This philosopher, Plato, has been elevated by Labeo to the rank of a demigod, and set thus upon a level with such as Hercules and Romulus. Labeo ranks demigods higher than heroes, but both he counts among the deities. But I have no doubt that he thinks this man whom he reckons a demigod worthy of greater respect not only than the heroes, but also than the gods themselves. The laws of the Romans and the speculations of Plato have this resemblance, that the latter pronounces a wholesale condemnation of poetical fictions, while the former restrain the licence of satire, at least so far as men are the objects of it. Plato will not suffer poets even to dwell in his city: the laws of Rome prohibit actors from being enrolled as citizens; and if they had not feared to offend the gods who had asked the services of the players, they would in all likelihood have banished them altogether. It is obvious, therefore, that the Romans could not receive, nor reasonably expect to receive, laws for the regulation of their conduct from their gods, since the laws they themselves enacted far surpassed and put to shame the morality of the gods. The gods demand stage-plays in their own honour; the Romans exclude the players from all civic honours:[101] the former commanded that they should be celebrated by the scenic representation[Pg 65] of their own disgrace; the latter commanded that no poet should dare to blemish the reputation of any citizen. But that demigod Plato resisted the lust of such gods as these, and showed the Romans what their genius had left incomplete; for he absolutely excluded poets from his ideal state, whether they composed fictions with no regard to truth, or set the worst possible examples before wretched men under the guise of divine actions. We for our part, indeed, reckon Plato neither a god nor a demigod; we would not even compare him to any of God's holy angels, nor to the truth-speaking prophets, nor to any of the apostles or martyrs of Christ, nay, not to any faithful Christian man. The reason of this opinion of ours we will, God prospering us, render in its own place. Nevertheless, since they wish him to be considered a demigod, we think he certainly is more entitled to that rank, and is every way superior, if not to Hercules and Romulus (though no historian could ever narrate nor any poet sing of him that he had killed his brother, or committed any crime), yet certainly to Priapus, or a Cynocephalus,[102] or the Fever,[103]divinities whom the Romans have partly received from foreigners, and partly consecrated by home-grown rites. How, then, could gods such as these be expected to promulgate good and wholesome laws, either for the prevention of moral and social evils, or for their eradication where they had already sprung up?gods who used their influence even to sow and cherish profligacy, by appointing that deeds truly or falsely ascribed to them should be published to the people by means of theatrical exhibitions, and by thus gratuitously fanning the flame of human lust with the breath of a seemingly divine approbation. In vain does Cicero, speaking of poets, exclaim against this state of things in these words: "When the plaudits and acclamation of the people, who sit as infallible judges, are won by the poets, what darkness benights the mind, what fears invade, what passions inflame it!"[104]
  [Pg 66]

BOOK II. -- PART I. ANTHROPOGENESIS., #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  for monotheistic purposes, elevated though they be into not-to-be questioned Church dogmas, prove
  nothing, except the abuse of human authority and power, perhaps.

BOOK II. -- PART III. ADDENDA. SCIENCE AND THE SECRET DOCTRINE CONTRASTED, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  repeatedly that sea-beds have been elevated 1,000 fathoms and islands have risen up
  from the depths of 3,000 fathoms; and to suppose that the upheaving forces are limited

BOOK I. -- PART III. SCIENCE AND THE SECRET DOCTRINE CONTRASTED, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  truly, would pass through the atmosphere to an elevated point of tenuity corresponding
  to the condition of sub-division that governs its liberation from its parent body." . . .

BOOK I. -- PART II. THE EVOLUTION OF SYMBOLISM IN ITS APPROXIMATE ORDER, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  remarked by Schilling; and principles, more elevated than we modern Sadducees know of, "were
  hidden under the transparent veil of such merely natural divinities as thunder,

BOOK X. - Porphyrys doctrine of redemption, #City of God, #Saint Augustine of Hippo, #Christianity
  For even Porphyry promises some kind of purgation of the soul by the help of theurgy, though he does so with some hesitation and shame, and denies that this art can secure to any one a return to God; so that you can detect his opinion vacillating between the profession of philosophy and an art which he feels to be presumptuous and sacrilegious. For at[Pg 395] one time he warns us to avoid it as deceitful, and prohibited by law, and dangerous to those who practise it; then again, as if in deference to its advocates, he declares it useful for cleansing one part of the soul, not, indeed, the intellectual part, by which the truth of things intelligible, which have no sensible images, is recognised, but the spiritual part, which takes cognizance of the images of things material. This part, he says, is prepared and fitted for intercourse with spirits and angels, and for the vision of the gods, by the help of certain theurgic consecrations, or, as they call them, mysteries. He acknowledges, however, that these theurgic mysteries impart to the intellectual soul no such purity as fits it to see its God, and recognise the things that truly exist. And from this acknowledgment we may infer what kind of gods these are, and what kind of vision of them is imparted by theurgic consecrations, if by it one cannot see the things which truly exist. He says, further, that the rational, or, as he prefers calling it, the intellectual soul, can pass into the heavens without the spiritual part being cleansed by theurgic art, and that this art cannot so purify the spiritual part as to give it entrance to immortality and eternity. And therefore, although he distinguishes angels from demons, asserting that the habitation of the latter is in the air, while the former dwell in the ether and empyrean, and although he advises us to cultivate the friendship of some demon, who may be able after our death to assist us, and elevate us at least a little above the earth,for he owns that it is by another way we must reach the heavenly society of the angels,he at the same time distinctly warns us to avoid the society of demons, saying that the soul, expiating its sin after death, execrates the worship of demons by whom it was entangled. And of theurgy itself, though he recommends it as reconciling angels and demons, he cannot deny that it treats with powers which either themselves envy the soul its purity, or serve the arts of those who do envy it. He complains of this through the mouth of some Chaldan or other: "A good man in Chalda complains," he says, "that his most strenuous efforts to cleanse his soul were frustrated, because another man, who had influence in these matters, and who envied him purity, had prayed to the powers, and bound them by his conjuring[Pg 396] not to listen to his request. Therefore," adds Porphyry, "what the one man bound, the other could not loose." And from this he concludes that theurgy is a craft which accomplishes not only good but evil among gods and men; and that the gods also have passions, and are perturbed and agitated by the emotions which Apuleius attributed to demons and men, but from which he preserved the gods by that sublimity of residence, which, in common with Plato, he accorded to them.
  10. Concerning theurgy, which promises a delusive purification of the soul by the invocation of demons.
  --
  I know not how it is so, but it seems to me that Porphyry blushed for his friends the theurgists; for he knew all that I have adduced, but did not frankly condemn polytheistic worship. He said, in fact, that there are some angels who visit earth, and reveal divine truth to theurgists, and others who publish on earth the things that belong to the Father, His height and depth. Can we believe, then, that the angels whose office it is to declare the will of the Father, wish us to be subject to any but Him whose will they declare? And hence, even this Platonist himself judiciously observes that we should rather imitate than invoke them. We ought not, then, to fear that we may offend these immortal and happy subjects[Pg 419] of the one God by not sacrificing to them; for this they know to be due only to the one true God, in allegiance to whom they themselves find their blessedness, and therefore they will not have it given to them, either in figure or in the reality, which the mysteries of sacrifice symbolized. Such arrogance belongs to proud and wretched demons, whose disposition is diametrically opposite to the piety of those who are subject to God, and whose blessedness consists in attachment to Him. And, that we also may attain to this bliss, they aid us, as is fit, with sincere kindliness, and usurp over us no dominion, but declare to us Him under whose rule we are then fellow-subjects. Why, then, O philosopher, do you still fear to speak freely against the powers which are inimical both to true virtue and to the gifts of the true God? Already you have discriminated between the angels who proclaim God's will, and those who visit theurgists, drawn down by I know not what art. Why do you still ascribe to these latter the honour of declaring divine truth? If they do not declare the will of the Father, what divine revelations can they make? Are not these the evil spirits who were bound over by the incantations of an envious man,[422] that they should not grant purity of soul to another, and could not, as you say, be set free from these bonds by a good man anxious for purity, and recover power over their own actions? Do you still doubt whether these are wicked demons; or do you, perhaps, feign ignorance, that you may not give offence to the theurgists, who have allured you by their secret rites, and have taught you, as a mighty boon, these insane and pernicious devilries? Do you dare to elevate above the air, and even to heaven, these envious powers, or pests, let me rather call them, less worthy of the name of sovereign than of slaves, as you yourself own; and are you not ashamed to place them even among your sidereal gods, and so put a slight upon the stars themselves?
  27. Of the impiety of Porphyry, which is worse than even the mistake of Apuleius.
  How much more tolerable and accordant with human feeling is the error of your Platonist co-sectary Apuleius! for he[Pg 420] attri buted the diseases and storms of human passions only to the demons who occupy a grade beneath the moon, and makes even this avowal as by constraint regarding gods whom he honours; but the superior and celestial gods, who inhabit the ethereal regions, whether visible, as the sun, moon, and other luminaries, whose brilliancy makes them conspicuous, or invisible, but believed in by him, he does his utmost to remove beyond the slightest stain of these perturbations. It is not, then, from Plato, but from your Chaldan teachers you have learned to elevate human vices to the ethereal and empyreal regions of the world and to the celestial firmament, in order that your theurgists might be able to obtain from your gods divine revelations; and yet you make yourself superior to these divine revelations by your intellectual life, which dispenses with these theurgic purifications as not needed by a philosopher. But, by way of rewarding your teachers, you recommend these arts to other men, who, not being philosophers, may be persuaded to use what you acknowledge to be useless to yourself, who are capable of higher things; so that those who cannot avail themselves of the virtue of philosophy, which is too arduous for the multitude, may, at your instigation, betake themselves to theurgists by whom they may be purified, not, indeed, in the intellectual, but in the spiritual part of the soul. Now, as the persons who are unfit for philosophy form incomparably the majority of mankind, more may be compelled to consult these secret and illicit teachers of yours than frequent the Platonic schools. For these most impure demons, pretending to be ethereal gods, whose herald and messenger you have become, have promised that those who are purified by theurgy in the spiritual part of their soul shall not indeed return to the Father, but shall dwell among the ethereal gods above the aerial regions. But such fancies are not listened to by the multitudes of men whom Christ came to set free from the tyranny of demons. For in Him they have the most gracious cleansing, in which mind, spirit, and body alike participate. For, in order that He might heal the whole man from the plague of sin, He took without sin the whole human nature. Would that you had known Him, and would that you had committed yourself[Pg 421] for healing to Him rather than to your own frail and infirm human virtue, or to pernicious and curious arts! He would not have deceived you; for Him your own oracles, on your own showing, acknowledged holy and immortal. It is of Him, too, that the most famous poet speaks, poetically indeed, since he applies it to the person of another, yet truly, if you refer it to Christ, saying, "Under thine auspices, if any traces of our crimes remain, they shall be obliterated, and earth freed from its perpetual fear."[423] By which he indicates that, by reason of the infirmity which attaches to this life, the greatest progress in virtue and righteousness leaves room for the existence, if not of crimes, yet of the traces of crimes, which are obliterated only by that Saviour of whom this verse speaks. For that he did not say this at the prompting of his own fancy, Virgil tells us in almost the last verse of that 4th Eclogue, when he says, "The last age predicted by the Cuman sibyl has now arrived;" whence it plainly appears that this had been dictated by the Cuman sibyl. But those theurgists, or rather demons, who assume the appearance and form of gods, pollute rather than purify the human spirit by false appearances and the delusive mockery of unsubstantial forms. How can those whose own spirit is unclean cleanse the spirit of man? Were they not unclean, they would not be bound by the incantations of an envious man, and would neither be afraid nor grudge to bestow that hollow boon which they promise. But it is sufficient for our purpose that you acknowledge that the intellectual soul, that is, our mind, cannot be justified by theurgy; and that even the spiritual or inferior part of our soul cannot by this act be made eternal and immortal, though you maintain that it can be purified by it. Christ, however, promises life eternal; and therefore to Him the world flocks, greatly to your indignation, greatly also to your astonishment and confusion. What avails your forced avowal that theurgy leads men astray, and deceives vast numbers by its ignorant and foolish teaching, and that it is the most manifest mistake to have recourse by prayer and sacrifice to angels and principalities, when at the same time, to save yourself from the charge of spending labour in vain on such arts, you direct[Pg 422] men to the theurgists, that by their means men, who do not live by the rule of the intellectual soul, may have their spiritual soul purified?
  28. How it is that Porphyry has been so blind as not to recognise the true wisdomChrist.

COSA - BOOK VIII, #The Confessions of Saint Augustine, #Saint Augustine of Hippo, #Christianity
  from an elevated place, in the sight of all the faithful, in a set
  form of words committed to memory), the presbyters, he said, offered

ENNEAD 01.04 - Whether Animals May Be Termed Happy., #Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 04, #Plotinus, #Christianity
  16. If the virtuous man were not located in this elevated life of intelligence; if on the contrary he were supposed to be subject to the blows of fate, and if we feared that they would overtake him, our ideal would no longer be that of the virtuous man such as we outline it; we would be considering a vulgar man, mingled with good and evil, of whom a life equally mingled with good and evil would be predicated. Even such a man might not easily be met with, and besides, if we did meet him, he would not deserve to be called a wise man; for there would be nothing great about him, neither the dignity of wisdom, nor the purity of good.1040 Happiness, therefore, is not located in the life of the common man. Plato rightly says that you have to leave the earth to ascend to the good, and that to become wise and happy, one should turn one's look towards the only Good, trying to acquire resemblance to Him, and to live a life conformable to Him.18 That indeed must suffice the wise man to reach his goal. To the remainder he should attach no more value than to changes of location, none of which can add to his happiness. If indeed he pay any attention to external things scattered here and there around him, it is to satisfy the needs of his body so far as he can. But as he is something entirely different from the body, he is never disturbed at having to leave it; and he will abandon it whenever nature will have indicated the time. Besides, he always reserves to himself the right to deliberate about this (time to leave the world by suicide).19 Achievement of happiness will indeed be his chief goal; nevertheless, he will also act, not only in view of his ultimate goal, or himself, but on the body to which he is united. He will care for this body, and will sustain it as long as possible. Thus a musician uses his lyre so long as he can; but as soon as it is beyond using, he repairs it, or abandons playing the lyre, because he now can do without it. Leaving it on the ground, he will look at it almost with scorn, and will sing without its accompaniment. Nevertheless it will not have been in vain that this lyre will have been originally given to him; for he will often have profited by its use.
  1041

ENNEAD 02.01 - Of the Heaven., #Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 03, #Plotinus, #Christianity
  8. Since this light subsists in elevated regions, because the purity of its nature forces it to remain in pure regions, it cannot be subject to any wastage (or, leakage). Such a nature could not allow any escape either downwards or upwards, nor could it meet anything that would force it to descend. Moreover, it will be remembered that there is a great difference of condition in a body united to, or separated from a soul; and in this case the body of the heaven is everywhere united to the (universal) Soul.
  THE HEAVEN DOES NOT NEED THE ACTION OF EITHER AIR OR FIRE.

ENNEAD 02.03 - Whether Astrology is of any Value., #Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 04, #Plotinus, #Christianity
  13. We must now distinguish, decide and express the origin of various things, inasmuch as there are some things that are produced by the course of the stars, and others that are not. Our principle is that the Soul governs the universe by Reason, just as each animal is governed by the principle (the reason) which fashions his organs, and harmonizes them with the whole of which they are parts;241 now the All contains everything, while the parts contain only what is individual to them. As to exterior influences, some1179 assist, while others oppose the tendency of nature. All things are subordinated to the All because they are parts of it; by their co-operation, each with its own nature and their particular tendencies they form the total life of the universe.242 The inanimate beings serve as instruments for the others that set them in motion by a mechanical impulse. Irrational animated beings move indeterminately; such as horses attached to a chariot before the driver indicates which direction they are to follow; for they need the whip to be directed. The nature of the reasonable animal contains the directing driver;243 if the driver be skilful, it follows the straight road, instead of going blindly at chance, as often happens. Beings gifted with reason and those that lack it are both contained within the universe, and contri bute to the formation of the whole. Those which are more powerful, and which occupy a more elevated rank do many important things, and co-operate in the life of the universe where their part is active, rather than passive. The passive ones act but little. Those of intermediary rank are passive in regard to some, and often active in regard to others, because they themselves possess the power of action and production (the stars, the brutes, and men.244).
  THE STARS AS THE FOLLOWERS OF THE UNIVERSAL KING.

WORDNET



--- Overview of verb elevate

The verb elevate has 3 senses (first 3 from tagged texts)
                    
1. (3) promote, upgrade, advance, kick upstairs, raise, elevate ::: (give a promotion to or assign to a higher position; "John was kicked upstairs when a replacement was hired"; "Women tend not to advance in the major law firms"; "I got promoted after many years of hard work")
2. (2) raise, lift, elevate, get up, bring up ::: (raise from a lower to a higher position; "Raise your hands"; "Lift a load")
3. (2) lift, raise, elevate ::: (raise in rank or condition; "The new law lifted many people from poverty")










--- Grep of noun elevate
elevated
elevated railroad
elevated railway



IN WEBGEN [10000/85]

Wikipedia - Alaskan Way Viaduct -- Former elevated highway in Seattle, Washington
Wikipedia - Autoclave -- Machine used to carry out industrial and scientific processes requiring elevated temperature and pressure
Wikipedia - Bar (river morphology) -- An elevated region of sediment in a river that has been deposited by the flow
Wikipedia - Bipolar disorder -- Mental disorder that causes periods of depression and abnormally elevated mood
Wikipedia - Bird's-eye view -- Elevated view of an object from above
Wikipedia - Bolaven Plateau -- Elevated region in southern Laos
Wikipedia - Canopy walkway -- Elevated walkway
Wikipedia - Central Freeway -- Elevated freeway in San Francisco, California, United States
Wikipedia - Chhatri -- Elevated, dome-shaped pavilions in Indian architecture
Wikipedia - Chittagong Elevated Expressway -- Expressway in Bangladesh
Wikipedia - Drainage divide -- Elevated terrain that separates neighbouring drainage basins
Wikipedia - Elevated railway -- rapid transit railway with the tracks above street level
Wikipedia - Elevate-Webiplex Pro Cycling -- American cycling team
Wikipedia - Fluoride toxicity -- Condition in which there are elevated levels of the fluoride ion in the body
Wikipedia - Hyperbaric welding -- Welding metal at elevated pressure
Wikipedia - Hyperlipidemia -- Abnormally elevated levels of lipids or lipoproteins in the blood
Wikipedia - Hypertensive emergency -- Condition of markedly elevated blood pressure with diastolic pressure typically greater than 120 mm Hg
Wikipedia - Hyperthermia -- Elevated body temperature due to failed thermoregulation that occurs when a body produces or absorbs more heat than it dissipates
Wikipedia - Jakarta Elevated Toll Road -- Toll roads in Jakarta
Wikipedia - Lei tai -- Elevated fighting arena
Wikipedia - Liverpool Overhead Railway -- Defunct elevated railway in Liverpool
Wikipedia - Mania -- State of abnormally elevated or irritable mood, arousal, and/or energy levels
Wikipedia - Mesa -- Elevated area of land with a flat top and sides that are usually steep cliffs
Wikipedia - Nitrogen narcosis -- Reversible narcotic effects of respiratory nitrogen at elevated partial pressures
Wikipedia - Nodule (medicine) -- Solid, non-blisterform elevated areas in or under the skin
Wikipedia - Noord metro station -- Elevated metro station in Amsterdam
Wikipedia - Observation deck -- Elevated sightseeing platform
Wikipedia - Osteosclerosis -- Condition in which bones are abnormally hardened, with elevated density
Wikipedia - Polycystic ovary syndrome -- Set of symptoms caused by elevated androgens in females
Wikipedia - Pyrolysis -- Thermal decomposition of materials at elevated temperatures in an inert atmosphere
Wikipedia - Raised floor -- Elevated floor above a solid substrate to create a void for mechanical and electrical services
Wikipedia - Ridge -- A geological feature consisting of a chain of mountains or hills that form a continuous elevated crest for some distance
Wikipedia - Tee -- Stand used in sport to support and elevate a stationary ball prior to striking with a foot, club or bat
Wikipedia - Transit Elevated Bus
Wikipedia - Trump (card games) -- Playing card with an elevated rank
Wikipedia - Vasari Corridor -- Elevated enclosed passageway in Florence, Italy
Wikipedia - Water tower -- Elevated structure supporting a tank
Wikipedia - West Side Elevated Highway -- Former highway in Manhattan, New York
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18947183-elevated
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19833789-elevate
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20828763-elevated
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22034800-elevated-a-tale
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22816351-elevated-a-tale
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32597478-elevate-your-efforts-to-greatness
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/The_Holy_Qur'an_(Maulana_Muhammad_Ali)/7._The_Elevated_Places
Integral World - The Magic of an Elevated Podium, David Lane
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/Elevated
Grumpy Old Men(1993) - This cheerful holiday comedy, a surprise box office smash, featured a generous dollop of raunchy, crude humor and was greatly elevated by the presence of masterful performers in the lead roles. Jack Lemmon is John Gustafson, an ice-fishing Minnesota native who has been feuding with his neighbor and...
House 3: The Horror Show(1989) - Detective Lucas McCarthy finally apprehends "Meat Cleaver Max" and watches the electric chair execution from the audience. But killing Max Jenke only elevated him to another level of reality. Now Lucas' family is under attack, his sanity in question, and his house haunted. Aided by a disreputable co...
King Ralph(1991) - Sometimes a family title, among the nobility of England, goes to the "collateral" heirs which are people who are not in the direct line of decent, like cousins, great-nephews and the like. On rare occasions, these people are not even aware that they are about to be elevated to the House of Lords, an...
Teamster Boss: The Jackie Presser Story(1992) - For a generation, the mobs main money machine was the Teamsters Union. When Jimmy Hoffa disappeared, the fight was on to see who could follow him. Jackie Presser was the son of a long time union board member and when he retired, Jackie was elevated to one of the most powerful position in the country...
The Shoes Of The Fisherman(1968) - Ukrainian Archbishop Kiril Lakota is set free after twenty years as a political prisoner in Siberia. He is brought to Rome by Father David Telemond, a troubled young priest who befriends him. Once at the Vatican, he is immediately given an audience with the Pope, who elevates him to Cardinal Priest....
Boogie Nights (1997) ::: 7.9/10 -- R | 2h 35min | Drama | 31 October 1997 (USA) -- Back when sex was safe, pleasure was a business and business was booming, an idealistic porn producer aspires to elevate his craft to an art when he discovers a hot young talent. Director: Paul Thomas Anderson Writer:
I Am Bruce Lee (2012) ::: 7.4/10 -- Not Rated | 1h 34min | Documentary, Biography | TV Movie 9 February -- I Am Bruce Lee Poster -- Bruce Lee is universally recognized as the pioneer who elevated martial arts in film to an art form, and this documentary will reveal why Bruce Lee's flame burns brighter now than the day he died over three decades ago. Director: Pete McCormack
Lola (1981) ::: 7.5/10 -- R | 1h 55min | Drama, Romance | 4 August 1982 (USA) -- A seductive cabaret singer-prostitute pits a corrupt building contractor against the new straight-arrow building commissioner, launching an outrageous plan to elevate herself in a world where everything-and everyone-is for sale. Director: Rainer Werner Fassbinder Writers: Pea Frhlich, Peter Mrthesheimer | 1 more credit
https://dnd4.fandom.com/wiki/Aspect_of_elevated_harmony
Ozma -- -- Gonzo, LandQ studios -- 6 eps -- Original -- Action Sci-Fi Adventure -- Ozma Ozma -- In the far future, the elevated irradiation from the sun has destroyed the environment of the earth and the birthrate of humans has drastically decreased. The government controls society with an army of cloned soldiers called "Ideal Children (IC)". Sam Coyne is a trader in a desert. One day, he saves a beautiful woman Maya, who has been chased by Theseus, a corps of IC. He shelters her in his trade ship, but the destroyers of Theseus surround Sam and Maya. -- TV - Mar 17, 2012 -- 14,048 6.11
Atlantic Avenue Elevated
Causeway Street elevated
Cuyuna Iron Range Municipally-Owned Elevated Metal Water Tanks
DamansaraShah Alam Elevated Expressway
De La Rosa Elevated Walkway
Electronic City Elevated Expressway
Elevate
Elevate (Big Time Rush album)
Elevated alkaline phosphatase
Elevated alpha-fetoprotein
Elevated (film)
Elevated park
Elevated photography
Elevated plus maze
Elevated transaminases
ElevateWebiplex Pro Cycling
Fifth Avenue Line (Brooklyn elevated)
Fulton Street Line (elevated)
Johor BahruPasir Gudang Elevated Expressway
Lake Street Elevated
Ludhiana Elevated Corridor
Sohna Elevated Corridor
South Side Elevated
Sungai BesiUlu Klang Elevated Expressway
Third Avenue Elevated
Thubway Tham and Elevated Elmer
Transit Elevated Bus
West Philadelphia Elevated



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