TERMS STARTING WITH
TERMS ANYWHERE
Adversary ::: “When there is some lowering or diminution of the consciousness or some impairing of it at one place or another, the Adversary—or the Censor—who is always on the watch presses with all his might wherever there is a weak point lying covered from your own view, and suddenly a wrong movement leaps up with unexpected force. Become conscious and cast out the possibility of its renewal, that is all that is to be done.” Letters on Yoga
Ahura-Mazda, previous to the material creation, consults with the Fravashis of men (the sons of light) and these guardian spirits of men choose to fight the adversary, Ahriman, in a bodily form.
angel is the adversary ( ha-satan ), as in Job. He is
Angel of the Lord is the adversary (i.e., ha-satan)
As with so many cosmic powers and their symbols, these other gods have been relegated in Judaism and Christianity to the position of evil powers hostile to mankind, to be fled from instead of revered, or ruled as obedient helpers when inferior to the human status. The whole idea of the Adversary or Devil is enshrined in the word daemones. But fallen angels, represented as rebels against God, were merely performing their natural duty in evolution by forming the lower worlds. As personification of evil, the word can only be truthfully applied to those beings that man himself, by his evil thoughts and passions, has generated to hover in the lowest strata of the astral light or haunt kama-loka. However, the ancient Greeks and Romans themselves drew a sharp distinction between the daemones of more ethereal type, truly spiritual beings, and the lower earth-haunting daemones who were distinctly denizens of the lower astral and physical realms, and which the ancients dreaded — with reason — far more than modern Christians have ever done. See also AGATHODAEMON
Baal Davar—a term for the adversary (ha-
CRITIC. ::: There is always this critical hostile voice in every- body’s nature, questioning, reasoning, denying the experience itself, suggesting doubt of oneself and doubt of the Divine. One has to recognise it as the voice of the Adversary trying to pre- vent the progress and refuse credence to it altogether.
Daemon is applicable in general to all formative power, from the highest to the lowest; in this aphorism it denotes the formative rays in their manifestation in and on the lower planes of prakriti, called by contrast the nether pole. Western monotheism, having anthropomorphized the higher creative powers into a personal God, personified the lower powers into a Devil and demons. But Satan or the Adversary is only God’s messenger, because what is below reflects what is above. This aphorism, then, states that all the manifested universe is the representation or material inversion or reflection of the divine essence and its emanations which in their aggregate compose the spiritual background and causal forces of the universe. Furthermore, a reflected image reverses.
Gah (Pahlavi-Persian) In Zoroastrian tradition, a day is broken into five periods or gahs: the period of daybreak, the period of midday, the period of afternoon, the period after sunset to midnight, and the period from midnight until the stars disappear. The second was the most celebrated gah because when the sun was at its meridian and there was no shadow, Ahura-Mazda performed the ceremony of prayer with the Amesha-Spantas in order to overcome the adversary.
In cosmic evolution, no sooner does duality in evolutionary manifestation supervene, than matter of necessity appears as the other pole or alter ego of spirit, from the dual nature of manifestation itself. It is only by the interaction of polar forces that evolution can proceed, a process everywhere mystically or theologically typified by the various wars in heaven. The same duality is present in human nature: the adversary is the lower quaternary manifesting through the terrestrial nature, which first dominates, and then eventually is dominated by, the upper triad or spirit. In many old myths, Satan under various names appears as the benefactor of mankind, e.g., Prometheus, Venus-Lucifer, and the Serpent of Genesis. Christian theology, through misunderstanding of and loss of the keys to its own sacred writings, has perverted several symbols: the Fall of the angels in one of its aspects is really the descent of the manasaputras; the Serpent of Eden was not the devil; and the sin of mankind was not sexual generation but the abuse of spiritual and intellectual as well as of psychic powers.
" . . . insincerity is always an open door for the adversary. That means there is some secret sympathy with what is perverse. And that is what is serious.” Questions and Answers 1957-58, MCW Vol. 9.
“… insincerity is always an open door for the adversary. That means there is some secret sympathy with what is perverse. And that is what is serious.” Questions and Answers 1957-58, MCW Vol. 9*
Kings, the adversary
Madhav: “Seven are the planes of existence that are embodied, in principle, in each grade of this creation. The stabs are the wounds inflicted by the Darkness and Falsehood of the Adversary on these seven formulations. The seven sorrows are the result of these seven stabs.” The Book of the Divine Mother
main-gauche ::: n. --> The dagger held in the left hand, while the rapier is held in the right; -- used to parry thrusts of the adversary&
Masters, p. 231. The fact that the adversary challenges God or questions Him docs not, ipso facto, make the adversary
(meaning “the adversary” and the title of an
Michael (Hebrew) Mīkhā’ēl Who is as God; one of the seven archangels, in the Old Testament one of the chiefs of the heavenly host, regarded as the guardian angel or celestial patron of Israel. According to one legend, Michael was chief of the four or seven angels who surrounded the heavenly throne. The Roman Catholic Church regards Michael in much the same light, his festival, Michaelmas, being held on September 29. With the Gnostics, the first of the Aeons, called the savior. In the New Testament Michael leads the angelic host against the Apocalyptic Dragon, repeating the familiar tale of many ancient mythologies. Again, he is the chief opponent of Samael, the principal antagonist of the heavenly host. Originally, however, both Michael and Samael were as one, both proceeding from ruah (soul), neshamah (spirit), and nephesh (vitality) — as taught in the Qabbalah (in the Chaldean Book of Numbers). “Samael is the concealed (occult) Wisdom, and Michael the higher terrestrial Wisdom, both emanating from the same source but diverging after their issue from the mundane soul, which on Earth is Mahat (intellectual understanding), or Manas (the seat of Intellect). They diverge, because one (Michael) is influenced by Neschamah, while the other (Isamael) remains uninfluenced. This tenet was perverted by the dogmatic spirit of the Church; which . . . made of Samael-Satan (the most wise and spiritual spirit of all) — the adversary of its anthropomorphic God and sensual physical man, the devil!” (SD 2:378).
quarte ::: n. --> A position in thrusting or parrying, with the inside of the hand turned upward and the point of the weapon toward the adversary&
Satan [from Hebrew śāṭān adversary, opposer from the verbal root śāṭan to lie in wait, oppose, be an adversary; or possibly from the verbal root shut to whip, scourge, run hither and thither on errands; Greek satan, satanas] Adversary; with the definite article (has-satan) the adversary in the Christian sense, as the Devil. This Satan of the exoteric Jewish and Christian books is a mere figment of the monkish theological imagination. From the second possible derivation many eminent Shemitic scholars have held that the Satan of the Book of Job was a good angel arranged by God to try the characters of men in order to help them; and therefore supposedly to be different from the Satan of other books of the Bible. The theosophist would not limit the good angel to the Book of Job alone, but would look upon the adversative or contrary forces of nature as being the means upon which each one tries his will, resolution, and determination to evolve and grow spiritually and intellectually. The Satan of this hypothesis is in a sense our own lower character combined with the lower forces of nature surrounding earth and elsewhere.
*Sri Aurobindo: "When there is some lowering or diminution of the consciousness or some impairing of it at one place or another, the Adversary — or the Censor — who is always on the watch presses with all his might wherever there is a weak point lying covered from your own view, and suddenly a wrong movement leaps up with unexpected force. Become conscious and cast out the possibility of its renewal, that is all that is to be done.” Letters on Yoga
(the adversary having been identified variously
"The Adversary will disappear only when he is no longer necessary in the world. And we know very well that he is necessary, as the touch-stone for gold: to know if it is pure. But if one is really sincere, the Adversary can"t even approach him any longer; and he doesn"t try it, because that would be courting his own destruction.” Questions and Answers 1955, MCW Vol. 7.
“The Adversary will disappear only when he is no longer necessary in the world. And we know very well that he is necessary, as the touch-stone for gold: to know if it is pure. But if one is really sincere, the Adversary can’t even approach him any longer; and he doesn’t try it, because that would be courting his own destruction.” Questions and Answers 1955, MCW Vol. 7**
*The Mother: "To conquer the Adversary is not a small thing. One must have a greater power than his to vanquish him. But one can liberate oneself totally from his influence. And from the minute one is completely free from his influence, one"s self-giving can be total. And with the self-giving comes joy, long before the Adversary is truly vanquished and disappears.”
The Mother: “To conquer the Adversary is not a small thing. One must have a greater power than his to vanquish him. But one can liberate oneself totally from his influence. And from the minute one is completely free from his influence, one’s self-giving can be total. And with the self-giving comes joy, long before the Adversary is truly vanquished and disappears.”
“the satan,” i.e., “the adversary.” In the New
Thus Samael, “the dark aspect of the Logos — occupies only the rind of that tree, and has the knowledge of EVIL alone” (SD 2:216n), i.e., the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. In Explaining the Hebrew terms as applied to the theosophical sevenfold classification of the human principles, Blavatsky makes Samael equivalent to kama, the seat of desire and emotional energy (SD 2:378). Yet there is another aspect to Samael: “In the ‘Chaldean Book of Numbers’ Samael is the concealed (occult) Wisdom, and Michael the higher terrestrial Wisdom, both emanating from the same source but diverging after their issue from the mundane soul, which on Earth is Mahat (intellectual understanding), or Manas (the seat of Intellect). They diverge, because one (Michael) is influenced by Meschamah, while the other (Samael) remains uninfluenced. This tenet was perverted by the dogmatic spirit of the Church; which, loathing independent Spirit, uninfluenced by the external form (hence by dogma), forthwith made of Samael-Satan (the most wise and spiritual spirit of all) — the adversary of its anthropomorphic God and sensual physical man, the DEVIL!” (SD 2:378).
times the adversary was neither evil nor fallen (the Old Testament knows nothing of fallen angels),
with the satan (i.e., the adversary) who tempted
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1:Q: I always had the impression that Lucifer and Satan was one and the same, you know, that Lucifer fell and became Satan. Would you clarify that for me?
A: There is a difference between Lucifer and Satan. The word satan comes from the word Shatan in Hebrew which means 'adversary'. Lucifer is Latin for "the bearer of light," and is the cosmic force that carries the fire. That fire is Kundalini, but when that fire becomes trapped in the ego, that fire is polarized negatively and becomes Satan, the adversary or the opposite of God. As long as that fire is trapped in desire, in ego, it is Satan, it is the devil. It is not outside of us. It is our mind. But when that force is liberated, it is the bearer of light. It is the greatest angel in the hierarchy of our own Consciousness. So it is our best friend.~ Samael Aun Weor,#KEYS
2:The Supreme Discovery
IF WE want to progress integrally, we must build within our conscious being a strong and pure mental synthesis which can serve us as a protection against temptations from outside, as a landmark to prevent us from going astray, as a beacon to light our way across the moving ocean of life.
Each individual should build up this mental synthesis according to his own tendencies and affinities and aspirations. But if we want it to be truly living and luminous, it must be centred on the idea that is the intellectual representation symbolising That which is at the centre of our being, That which is our life and our light.
This idea, expressed in sublime words, has been taught in various forms by all the great Instructors in all lands and all ages.
The Self of each one and the great universal Self are one. Since all that is exists from all eternity in its essence and principle, why make a distinction between the being and its origin, between ourselves and what we place at the beginning?
The ancient traditions rightly said:
"Our origin and ourselves, our God and ourselves are one."
And this oneness should not be understood merely as a more or less close and intimate relationship of union, but as a true identity.
Thus, when a man who seeks the Divine attempts to reascend by degrees towards the inaccessible, he forgets that all his knowledge and all his intuition cannot take him one step forward in this infinite; neither does he know that what he wants to attain, what he believes to be so far from him, is within him.
For how could he know anything of the origin until he becomes conscious of this origin in himself?
It is by understanding himself, by learning to know himself, that he can make the supreme discovery and cry out in wonder like the patriarch in the Bible, "The house of God is here and I knew it not."
That is why we must express that sublime thought, creatrix of the material worlds, and make known to all the word that fills the heavens and the earth, "I am in all things and all beings."When all shall know this, the promised day of great transfigurations will be at hand. When in each atom of Matter men shall recognise the indwelling thought of God, when in each living creature they shall perceive some hint of a gesture of God, when each man can see God in his brother, then dawn will break, dispelling the darkness, the falsehood, the ignorance, the error and suffering that weigh upon all Nature. For, "all Nature suffers and laments as she awaits the revelation of the Sons of God."
This indeed is the central thought epitomising all others, the thought which should be ever present to our remembrance as the sun that illumines all life.
That is why I remind you of it today. For if we follow our path bearing this thought in our hearts like the rarest jewel, the most precious treasure, if we allow it to do its work of illumination and transfiguration within us, we shall know that it lives in the centre of all beings and all things, and in it we shall feel the marvellous oneness of the universe.
Then we shall understand the vanity and childishness of our meagre satisfactions, our foolish quarrels, our petty passions, our blind indignations. We shall see the dissolution of our little faults, the crumbling of the last entrenchments of our limited personality and our obtuse egoism. We shall feel ourselves being swept along by this sublime current of true spirituality which will deliver us from our narrow limits and bounds.
The individual Self and the universal Self are one; in every world, in every being, in every thing, in every atom is the Divine Presence, and man's mission is to manifest it.
In order to do that, he must become conscious of this Divine Presence within him. Some individuals must undergo a real apprenticeship in order to achieve this: their egoistic being is too all-absorbing, too rigid, too conservative, and their struggles against it are long and painful. Others, on the contrary, who are more impersonal, more plastic, more spiritualised, come easily into contact with the inexhaustible divine source of their being.But let us not forget that they too should devote themselves daily, constantly, to a methodical effort of adaptation and transformation, so that nothing within them may ever again obscure the radiance of that pure light.
But how greatly the standpoint changes once we attain this deeper consciousness! How understanding widens, how compassion grows!
On this a sage has said:
"I would like each one of us to come to the point where he perceives the inner God who dwells even in the vilest of human beings; instead of condemning him we would say, 'Arise, O resplendent Being, thou who art ever pure, who knowest neither birth nor death; arise, Almighty One, and manifest thy nature.'"
Let us live by this beautiful utterance and we shall see everything around us transformed as if by miracle.
This is the attitude of true, conscious and discerning love, the love which knows how to see behind appearances, understand in spite of words, and which, amid all obstacles, is in constant communion with the depths.
What value have our impulses and our desires, our anguish and our violence, our sufferings and our struggles, all these inner vicissitudes unduly dramatised by our unruly imagination - what value do they have before this great, this sublime and divine love bending over us from the innermost depths of our being, bearing with our weaknesses, rectifying our errors, healing our wounds, bathing our whole being with its regenerating streams?
For the inner Godhead never imposes herself, she neither demands nor threatens; she offers and gives herself, conceals and forgets herself in the heart of all beings and things; she never accuses, she neither judges nor curses nor condemns, but works unceasingly to perfect without constraint, to mend without reproach, to encourage without impatience, to enrich each one with all the wealth he can receive; she is the mother whose love bears fruit and nourishes, guards and protects, counsels and consoles; because she understands everything, she can endure everything, excuse and pardon everything, hope and prepare for everything; bearing everything within herself, she owns nothing that does not belong to all, and because she reigns over all, she is the servant of all; that is why all, great and small, who want to be kings with her and gods in her, become, like her, not despots but servitors among their brethren.
How beautiful is this humble role of servant, the role of all who have been revealers and heralds of the God who is within all, of the Divine Love that animates all things....
And until we can follow their example and become true servants even as they, let us allow ourselves to be penetrated and transformed by this Divine Love; let us offer Him, without reserve, this marvellous instrument, our physical organism. He shall make it yield its utmost on every plane of activity.
To achieve this total self-consecration, all means are good, all methods have their value. The one thing needful is to persevere in our will to attain this goal. For then everything we study, every action we perform, every human being we meet, all come to bring us an indication, a help, a light to guide us on the path.
Before I close, I shall add a few pages for those who have already made apparently fruitless efforts, for those who have encountered the pitfalls on the way and seen the measure of their weakness, for those who are in danger of losing their self-confidence and courage. These pages, intended to rekindle hope in the hearts of those who suffer, were written by a spiritual worker at a time when ordeals of every kind were sweeping down on him like purifying flames.
You who are weary, downcast and bruised, you who fall, who think perhaps that you are defeated, hear the voice of a friend. He knows your sorrows, he has shared them, he has suffered like you from the ills of the earth; like you he has crossed many deserts under the burden of the day, he has known thirst and hunger, solitude and abandonment, and the cruellest of all wants, the destitution of the heart. Alas! he has known too the hours of doubt, the errors, the faults, the failings, every weakness.
But he tells you: Courage! Hearken to the lesson that the rising sun brings to the earth with its first rays each morning. It is a lesson of hope, a message of solace.
You who weep, who suffer and tremble, who dare not expect an end to your ills, an issue to your pangs, behold: there is no night without dawn and the day is about to break when darkness is thickest; there is no mist that the sun does not dispel, no cloud that it does not gild, no tear that it will not dry one day, no storm that is not followed by its shining triumphant bow; there is no snow that it does not melt, nor winter that it does not change into radiant spring.
And for you too, there is no affliction which does not bring its measure of glory, no distress which cannot be transformed into joy, nor defeat into victory, nor downfall into higher ascension, nor solitude into radiating centre of life, nor discord into harmony - sometimes it is a misunderstanding between two minds that compels two hearts to open to mutual communion; lastly, there is no infinite weakness that cannot be changed into strength. And it is even in supreme weakness that almightiness chooses to reveal itself!
Listen, my little child, you who today feel so broken, so fallen perhaps, who have nothing left, nothing to cover your misery and foster your pride: never before have you been so great! How close to the summits is he who awakens in the depths, for the deeper the abyss, the more the heights reveal themselves!
Do you not know this, that the most sublime forces of the vasts seek to array themselves in the most opaque veils of Matter? Oh, the sublime nuptials of sovereign love with the obscurest plasticities, of the shadow's yearning with the most royal light!
If ordeal or fault has cast you down, if you have sunk into the nether depths of suffering, do not grieve - for there indeed the divine love and the supreme blessing can reach you! Because you have passed through the crucible of purifying sorrows, the glorious ascents are yours.
You are in the wilderness: then listen to the voices of the silence. The clamour of flattering words and outer applause has gladdened your ears, but the voices of the silence will gladden your soul and awaken within you the echo of the depths, the chant of divine harmonies!
You are walking in the depths of night: then gather the priceless treasures of the night. In bright sunshine, the ways of intelligence are lit, but in the white luminosities of the night lie the hidden paths of perfection, the secret of spiritual riches.
You are being stripped of everything: that is the way towards plenitude. When you have nothing left, everything will be given to you. Because for those who are sincere and true, from the worst always comes the best.
Every grain that is sown in the earth produces a thousand. Every wing-beat of sorrow can be a soaring towards glory.
And when the adversary pursues man relentlessly, everything he does to destroy him only makes him greater.
Hear the story of the worlds, look: the great enemy seems to triumph. He casts the beings of light into the night, and the night is filled with stars. He rages against the cosmic working, he assails the integrity of the empire of the sphere, shatters its harmony, divides and subdivides it, scatters its dust to the four winds of infinity, and lo! the dust is changed into a golden seed, fertilising the infinite and peopling it with worlds which now gravitate around their eternal centre in the larger orbit of space - so that even division creates a richer and deeper unity, and by multiplying the surfaces of the material universe, enlarges the empire that it set out to destroy.
Beautiful indeed was the song of the primordial sphere cradled in the bosom of immensity, but how much more beautiful and triumphant is the symphony of the constellations, the music of the spheres, the immense choir that fills the heavens with an eternal hymn of victory!
Hear again: no state was ever more precarious than that of man when he was separated on earth from his divine origin. Above him stretched the hostile borders of the usurper, and at his horizon's gates watched jailers armed with flaming swords. Then, since he could climb no more to the source of life, the source arose within him; since he could no more receive the light from above, the light shone forth at the very centre of his being; since he could commune no more with the transcendent love, that love offered itself in a holocaust and chose each terrestrial being, each human self as its dwelling-place and sanctuary.
That is how, in this despised and desolate but fruitful and blessed Matter, each atom contains a divine thought, each being carries within him the Divine Inhabitant. And if no being in all the universe is as frail as man, neither is any as divine as he!
In truth, in truth, in humiliation lies the cradle of glory! 28 April 1912 ~ The Mother, Words Of Long Ago, The Supreme Discovery,#KEYS
*** WISDOM TROVE ***
1:I am not made for politics because I am incapable of wanting or accepting the death of the adversary. ~ albert-camus, @wisdomtrove 2:I'm here today to warn you: I want you to watch out for the adversary. Guard yourself from any spirit of entitlement. Restrain any and all subtle temptation to gain attention or to find ways to promote yourself. ~ charles-r-swindoll, @wisdomtrove 3:Jesus has redeemed not only our souls, but our bodies. When the Lord shall deliver His captive people out of the land of the enemy He will not leave a bone of one of them in the adversary's power. The dominion of death shall be utterly broken. ~ charles-spurgeon, @wisdomtrove 4:The natural formation of the country is the soldier's best ally; but a power of estimating the adversary, of controlling the forces of victory, and of shrewdly calculating difficulties, dangers and distances, constitutes the test of a great general. ~ sun-tzu, @wisdomtrove 5:Nonviolence seeks to ‘win’ not by destroying or even by humiliating the adversary, but by convincing [the adversary] that there is a higher and more certain common good than can be attained by bombs and blood. Nonviolence, ideally speaking, does not try to overcome the adversary by winning over [them], but to turn [them] from an adversary into a collaborator by winning [them] over. ~ thomas-merton, @wisdomtrove 6:The adversary she found herself forced to fight was not worth matching or beating; it was not a superior ability which she would have found honour in challenging; it was ineptitude - a grey spread of cotton that seemed soft and shapeless, that could offer no resistance to anything or anybody, yet managed to be a barrier in her way. She stood, disarmed, before the riddle of what made this possible, she could find no answer. ~ ayn-rand, @wisdomtrove *** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***
1:Superwoman is the adversary of the women's movement. ~ Gloria Steinem, #NFDB
2:It is narual for enemy to attack on the weaker side of the adversary. ~ Chanakya, #NFDB
3:God has not given us the spirit of fear. That comes from the adversary. ~ Gordon B Hinckley, #NFDB
4:The children of God can defeat the adversary, for we have fought him before. ~ Chris Stewart, #NFDB
5:I am not made for politics because I am incapable of wanting or accepting the death of the adversary. ~ Albert Camus, #NFDB
6:Always remember that if this were not the Lord's work, the adversary would not pay attention to us. ~ Spencer W Kimball, #NFDB
7:With any good story, you need the adversary, the heroes and villains. You need a good mixture to make it work. ~ Phil Keoghan, #NFDB
8:Mere access to the courthouse doors does not by itself assure a proper functioning of the adversary process. ~ Thurgood Marshall, #NFDB
9:Seeing me before him, / The adversary attacks, / But by that time / I am already standing / Safely behind him. ~ Morihei Ueshiba, #NFDB
10:the adversary is the situation and that the person that you appear to be in conflict with is actually your partner. ~ Chris Voss, #NFDB
11:Learning is the ally, not the adversary of genius... he who reads in a proper spirit, can scarcely read too much. ~ William Godwin, #NFDB
12:Know my name is lost, By treason's tooth bare-gnawn and canker-bit; Yet am I noble as the adversary I come to cope. ~ William Shakespeare, #NFDB
13:The enemy hides in Shadow, Master of the Hunt. Therefore be as wise as a serpent, having seen the face of the Adversary. ~ Katherine Kurtz, #NFDB
14:Could we possible manage the next phase of human history without first dealing with this penchant for dehumanizing the adversary? ~ Carl Sagan, #NFDB
15:If one man does not make a move, the other must, and by permitting the adversary to make the attack one learns something about him. ~ Agatha Christie, #NFDB
16:My real adversary has no name, no face, no party. It will never be elected, yet it governs - the adversary is the world of finance. ~ Francois Hollande, #NFDB
17:The art of crisis management is to raise the stakes to where the adversary will not follow, but in a manner that avoids a tit for tat. ~ Henry Kissinger, #NFDB
18:This is the function of Mephisto. The demon is the contrary, the adversary, to whatever is posited—the antithesis to Faust’s thesis. ~ Stephen E Flowers, #NFDB
19:Nick: “My second point is the same one Larry made about the Judge. The Adversary is not going to expect us to send a retarded person as a spy. ~ Stephen King, #NFDB
20:The nearer a person approaches the Lord, a greater power will be manifested by the adversary to prevent the accomplishment of His purposes. ~ Joseph Smith Jr, #NFDB
21:The intent is to shatter cohesion, produce paralysis, and bring about collapse of the adversary by generating confusion, disorder, panic, and chaos. ~ Robert Coram, #NFDB
22:The human mind, in taking us down the path of technocracy, has become the adversary of life itself and collaterally the adversary of the human soul. ~ Konrad Lorenz, #NFDB
23:Marketing is not what lures a writer to this pursuit. Marketing is the adversary that arrives smuggled inside the Trojan Horse of one’s creative impulse. ~ Jane Friedman, #NFDB
24:Our life derives all its strength from God; and if He deigns to make us strong, we cannot be weakened by all the machinations of the adversary. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon, #NFDB
25:know that when the Adversary, the Great Serpent, creates counterfeits of truth, the very existence of an imitation points back to the truth of the Almighty. ~ Bodie Thoene, #NFDB
26:All battles should be based on principles. And in a battle of principles, it is not the size of the adversary that matters. It is the size of the principle. ~ Subroto Bagchi, #NFDB
27:I am looking for the human who admits his flaws
Who shocks the adversary
By being kinder not stronger
What would that be like?
We don't even know ~ Naomi Shihab Nye,#NFDB
28:The adversary must first be made into a demon before people will accept the war. This was why during the Cold War, the U.S. government became infuriated at any ~ Mark Kurlansky, #NFDB
29:War does not permit itself to be coordinated with reason and righteousness. It needs stimulated emotions, enthusiasm for its own cause and hatred for the adversary. ~ Stefan Zweig, #NFDB
30:Meanwhile the Adversary of God and man, Satan with thoughts inflamed of highest design, Puts on swift wings, and towards the gates of hell Explores his solitary flight. ~ John Milton, #NFDB
31:Gandhi saw how people have to re-think their own individuality before engaging in political activity. Otherwise they're just playing the game that the adversary has set out. ~ Pankaj Mishra, #NFDB
32:He was a reporter for The Adversary. It was his job to stalk people. He was one step above paparazzi and a couple below common variety garden snake."
- Jae-Sun Fields, pg. 28 ~ Z A Maxfield,#NFDB
33:the Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness, ~ Terry Pratchett, #NFDB
34:the Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness. ~ Terry Pratchett, #NFDB
35:Conscience is called the adversary, because it always opposes our evil will; it reminds us of what we ought to do but do not, and condemns us if we do something we ought not. ~ Dorotheus of Gaza, #NFDB
36:You can't do it all. No one can have two full-time jobs, have perfect children and cook three meals and be multi-orgasmic 'til dawn ... Superwoman is the adversary of the women's movement. ~ Gloria Steinem, #NFDB
37:aAgree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
38:The intellectual ... must try never to forget the arguments of the adversary, or the uncertainty of the future, or the faults of one’s own side, or the underlying fraternity of ordinary men everywhere. ~ Raymond Aron, #NFDB
39:Offensive Takeaway Point: We should look for a way to stop responding to initiatives of the adversary and start behaving in such a way that they have to figure out how to respond to us. Take the initiative. ~ Douglas Wilson, #NFDB
40:So the initiator gave to Satan, the adversary, permission to strike Job in his weakest part, his wealth, to see whether the loss of things would destroy his vision or philosophy. ~ Manly P Hall, How to Understand Your Bible, #NFDB
41:Bear in Mind...that all Histories from the Rock at Plymouth, and Jamestown to the present time, have been made by white men, and a man who tells his own story, is always right until the adversary's tale is told. ~ Sam Houston, #NFDB
42:In the 3rd chapter of Genesis the adversary is Samael, the Serpent, and like Mephistopholes it is "a spirit of negation; part of the power that still works for good while ever scheming ill." ~ Manly P Hall, How to Understand Your Bible, #NFDB
43:The devil?” Jason heaved the tick over his shoulder like a collier with his sack. “Satan. The adversary. The enemy of the plan of God. The undoer. The destroyer. Yes. He definitely was.” Jason smiled. “But he meant well. ~ Orson Scott Card, #NFDB
44:I call it Andskoti, the Adversary. It is woven with the most powerful paradoxes in the Nine Worlds—Wi-Fi with no lag, a politician’s sincerity, a printer that prints, healthy deep-fried food, and an interesting grammar lecture! ~ Rick Riordan, #NFDB
45:It horrified him, this thought: the ancient gigantic cannibal near-man flourishing now, ruling the world once more. We spent a million years escaping him, Frink thought, and now he’s back. And not merely as the adversary . . . but as the master. ~ Philip K Dick, #NFDB
46:Jesus has redeemed not only our souls, but our bodies. When the Lord shall deliver His captive people out of the land of the enemy He will not leave a bone of one of them in the adversary's power. The dominion of death shall be utterly broken. ~ Charles Spurgeon, #NFDB
47:The natural formation of the country is the soldier's best ally; but a power of estimating the adversary, of controlling the forces of victory, and of shrewdly calculating difficulties, dangers and distances, constitutes the test of a great general. ~ Sun Tzu, #NFDB
48:Blind hate against the enemy creates a forceful impulse that cracks the boundaries of natural human limitations, transforming the soldier in an effective, selective and cold killing machine. A people without hate cannot triumph against the adversary. ~ Che Guevara, #NFDB
49:He checked her over while mentally checking himself. “Environment suits sealed up. Breather masks in hand. Daemons. Blades. Transmitters. Healthy respect for the adversary—you’ve got that, right?”
One corner of her mouth curled up. “Absolutely. ~ G S Jennsen,#NFDB
50:Real disciples absorb the fiery darts of the adversary by holding aloft the quenching shield of faith with one hand, while holding to the iron rod with the other (see Eph. 6:16; 1 Ne. 15:24; D&C 27:17). There should be no mistaking; it will take both hands! ~ Neal A Maxwell, #NFDB
51:Because the spirit of the gift shuns exactness and because gifts do not necessarily move reciprocally (and therefore do not produce the adversary roles of creditor and debtor), courts of law would be rightly perplexed as to how to adjudicate a case of ingratitude. Contracts ~ Lewis Hyde, #NFDB
52:That's the test, when all is said and done. Does it persuade one to do good, to rise, to stand tall, to do the right thing, to be kind, to be generous? Then it is of the Spirit of God. If it is dark, sinister, ugly, not good, then you may know that it is of the adversary. ~ Gordon B Hinckley, #NFDB
53:I try not to blame the public, because the public - men, especially - have seen not great portrayals of women in supporting roles, because they're not given the lead roles a lot of the time. Especially in comedy, they're relegated to the adversary, which is like "the mean girlfriend." ~ Paul Feig, #NFDB
54:As a work progresses, its power to elicit and dictate response mounts. There seems to be an optimum moment when this power is at its greatest which just precedes the point where 'elicit' is no longer apt usage. 'Dictates' is the word for this condition and tyranny is the adversary. ~ Richard Diebenkorn, #NFDB
55:He stared down at the golden curls of the Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness. "You know," he concluded, after a while, "I think he actually looks like an Adam. ~ Neil Gaiman, #NFDB
56:He stared down at the golden curls of the Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness. ‘You know,’ he concluded, after a while, ‘I think he actually looks like an Adam. ~ Terry Pratchett, #NFDB
57:He stared down at the golden curls of the Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness.
"You know," he concluded, after a while, "I think he actually looks like an Adam. ~ Neil Gaiman,#NFDB
58:Our life derives all its strength from God; and if he deigns to make us strong, we cannot be weakened by all the machinations of the adversary. "Of whom shall I be afraid?" The bold question looks into the future as well as the present. "If God be for us, who can be against us," either now or in time to come? ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon, #NFDB
59:Prepare her, Vizier. A cloud of darkness overshadows us. The fiery darts of the adversary have already begun to fly, but rest assured, light is always more powerful than darkness. We are mere candles casting our weak light upon the universe, but she can be so much more. If she will stand as our beacon, there is still hope. ~ Colleen Houck, #NFDB
60:The point is, this rope is even better! I call it Andskoti, the Adversary. It is woven with the most powerful paradoxes in the Nine Worlds – Wi-Fi with no lag, a politician’s sincerity, a printer that prints, healthy deep-fried food and an interesting grammar lecture!’
‘Okay, yeah,’ I admitted. ‘Those things don’t exist. ~ Rick Riordan,#NFDB
61:Junior huffed. “The point is, this rope is even better! I call it Andskoti, the Adversary. It is woven with the most powerful paradoxes in the Nine Worlds—Wi-Fi with no lag, a politician’s sincerity, a printer that prints, healthy deep-fried food, and an interesting grammar lecture!” “Okay, yeah,” I admitted. “Those things don’t exist. ~ Rick Riordan, #NFDB
62:The adversary’s global attack on marriage is actually an attack on society itself, and ultimately an attack on God, the creator and manufacturer of society and marriage. The adversary knows that if he can destroy marriage he can destroy families; if he can destroy families he can destroy society; and if he can destroy society he can destroy humanity. ~ Myles Munroe, #NFDB
63:Satan has long been known as the Adversary, but God fears women even more than He fears the devil—and is right to. She, with her power to bring life into the world, was truly made in the image of the Creator, not man, and in all ways has proved Herself a more deserving object of man’s worship than Christ, that unshaven fanatic who lusted for the end of the world. ~ Joe Hill, #NFDB
64:Nonviolence seeks to ‘win’ not by destroying or even by humiliating the adversary, but by convincing [the adversary] that there is a higher and more certain common good than can be attained by bombs and blood. Nonviolence, ideally speaking, does not try to overcome the adversary by winning over [them], but to turn [them] from an adversary into a collaborator by winning [them] over. ~ Thomas Merton, #NFDB
65:Boyd, borrowing from Sun Tzu, said the best commander is the one who wins while avoiding battle. The intent is to shatter cohesion, produce paralysis, and bring about collapse of the adversary by generating confusion, disorder, panic, and chaos. Boyd said war is organic and compared his technique to clipping the nerves, muscles, and tendons of an enemy, thus reducing him to jelly. As Boyd ~ Robert Coram, #NFDB
66:Generating a rapidly changing environment—that is, engaging in activity that is so quick it is disorienting and appears uncertain or ambiguous to the enemy—inhibits the adversary’s ability to adapt and causes confusion and disorder that, in turn, causes an adversary to overreact or underreact. Boyd closed the briefing by saying the message is that whoever can handle the quickest rate of change is the one who survives. ~ Robert Coram, #NFDB
67:The adversary she found herself forced to fight was not worth matching or beating; it was not a superior ability which she would have found honour in challenging; it was ineptitude - a grey spread of cotton that seemed soft and shapeless, that could offer no resistance to anything or anybody, yet managed to be a barrier in her way. She stood, disarmed, before the riddle of what made this possible, she could find no answer. ~ Ayn Rand, #NFDB
68:Generating a rapidly changing environment--that is, engaging in actively that is so quick it is disorienting and appears uncertain or ambiguous to the enemy--inhibits the adversary's ability to adapt and causes confusion and disorder that, in turn, causes an adversary to overreact or underreact. Boyd closed the briefing by saying the message is that whoever can handle the quickest rate of change is the one who survives. ~ Robert Coram, #NFDB
69:The visitor enters and says, "What a lot of books! Have you read them all?" ...The best answer is the one always used by Roberto Leydi: "And more, dear sir, many more," which freezes the adversary and plunges him into a state of awed admiration. But I find it merciless and angst-generating. Now I have fallen back on the riposte: "No, these are the ones I have to read by the end of the month. I keep the others in my office. ~ Umberto Eco, #NFDB
70:You must be a leader, as a member of this Church, in those causes for which this Church stands. Do not let fear overcome your efforts...The adversary of all truth would put into your heart a reluctance to make an effort. Cast that fear aside and be valiant in the cause of truth and righteousness and faith. If you now decide that this will become the pattern of your life, you will not have to make that decision again. ~ Gordon B Hinckley, #NFDB
71:It’s good to know certain things:
What’s departed, in order to know what’s left to come;
That water’s immeasurable and incomprehensible
And blows in the air
Where all that’s fallen and silent becomes invisible;
That fire’s the light our names are carved in.
That shame is a garment of sorrow;
That time is the Adversary, and stays sleepless and wants for nothing;
That clouds are unequal and words are. ~ Charles Wright,#NFDB
72:Any historian of the literature of the modern age will take virtually for granted the adversary intention, the actually subversive intention, that characterizes modern writing - he will perceive its clear purpose of detaching the reader from the habits of thought and feeling that the larger culture imposes, of giving him a ground and a vantage point from which to judge and condemn, and perhaps revise, the culture that produces him. ~ Lionel Trilling, #NFDB
73:We make no apology then for raising our voices loud to a world that is ripening in sin the lord has said,” Say nothing but repentance unto this generation; The adversary is subtle, cunning, he knows that he cannot induce good men and women immediately to do major evils so he moves slyly, whispering half truths until he has his intended victims following him finally he clamps his chains upon them and fetters them tight, and then he laughs at their discomfiture and their misery. ~ Spencer W Kimball, #NFDB
74:"This snake becomes the adversary of Being. There's the snake that bites you in the jungle. Then there's the snake that lives in your enemy. And then there's the snake that lives in your family. And then there's the snake that lives in you. And that snake that's in you, it's a psychological phenomena. It's equivalent to transcendent evil itself, the thing that inhabits every person. It's associated with knowledge of our vulnerability that gives us this constant capacity for evil." ~ Jordan Peterson, #NFDB
75:"This snake becomes the adversary of Being. There's the snake that bites you in the jungle. Then there's the snake that lives in your enemy. And then there's the snake that lives in your family. And then there's the snake that lives in you. And that snake that's in you, it's a psychological phenomena. It's equivalent to transcendent evil itself, the thing that inhabits every person. It's associated with knowledge of our vulnerability that gives us this constant capacity for evil." ~ Jordan B Peterson, #NFDB
76:Through the Spirit of God the hope of heaven is the most powerful force for producing virtue; it is a fountain of joyful endeavor; it is the cornerstone of cheerful holiness. Those who have this hope in them go about their work with vigor, for the joy of the Lord is their strength. They fight hard against temptation, for the hope of the next world repels the fiery darts of the adversary. They can work without immediate reward, for they anticipate a reward in the world to come. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon, #NFDB
77:The left-hand path would have existed in Europe without the advent of Christianity (as was, and still is, the case in India). But when Christianity did arrive, it labeled not only the indigenous left-hand-path practices of the heathens as diabolical, but the right-hand-path ones as well. It was, however, only the left-hand-path practitioners who were insightful enough (and perhaps courageous enough) to identify in some degree their ways with those of the adversary of the right-hand-path Christians. ~ Stephen E Flowers, #NFDB
78:Time Management Tips: The perpetual processing of the same temptation is both dangerous and time-wasting. Cycling and recycling the same temptation (instead of rejecting such blandishment out of hand) is not only to risk one's soul, again and again, but is to bring on fatigue, so that the Adversary may be able to do indirectly what we will not let him do directly. A lack of decisiveness in dealing with temptation ties up our thought processes and prevents us from doing good with the time allotted to us. ~ Neal A Maxwell, #NFDB
79:Q: Doesn't this open up the possibility of overcoming the dualism of political struggles that eternally feed on the opposition between the state, on the one hand, and revolution, on the other? Doesn't it indicate a wider field of conflicts than that where the adversary is the state?
Foucault: I would say that the state consists in the codification of a whole number of power relations that render its functioning possible, and that revolution is a different type of codification of the same relations. ~ Michel Foucault,#NFDB
80:If you could extend the elective franchise to all persons of color who can read the Constitution of the United States in English and write their names and to all persons of color who own real estate valued at not less than two hundred and fifty dollars and pay taxes thereon, and would completely disarm the adversary. This you can do with perfect safety. And as a consequence, the radicals, who are wild upon negro franchise, will be completely foiled in their attempts to keep the Southern States from renewing their relations to the Union. ~ Andrew Johnson, #NFDB
81:Thinking about operating at a quicker tempo - not just moving faster - than the adversary was a new concept in waging war. Generating a rapidly changing environment - that is, engaging in activity that is quick it is disorienting and appears uncertain or ambiguous to the enemy - inhibits the adversary's ability to adapt and causes confusion and disorder that, in turn, causes an adversary to overreact or underreact. Boyd closed the briefing by saying the message is that whoever can handle the quickest rate of change is the one who survives. ~ Robert Coram, #NFDB
82:To these somewhat contradictory remarks we learn that the gospel writers were not very sure what did happen to Judas. It appears that Judas is the Egyptian Typhon, Job's Satan, and Scandinavia's Loki. He is the personification of the adversary. He is introduced into the drama as a symbol of the intrinsic imperfection of all living things. In the zodiac, he is Scorpio by some calculations; and by others Capricorn. He is the backbiter, the destroyer. He is still preserved in the church as the "devil's advocate." ~ Manly P Hall, How to Understand Your Bible, #NFDB
83:North Korea and China have proposed what sounds like a pretty sensible option that North Korea should end its development of nuclear weapons, the US should stop carrying out hostile military maneuvers on the North Korean border. The US immediately rejected it. Modernization program is a very clear example of how security doesn't matter. There is no gain in security but massive overkill of the adversary's deterrent capacity. The only consequence of it is to elicit the likelihood of a preemptive attack. And a preemptive attack leads to a nuclear winter world. ~ Noam Chomsky, #NFDB
84:A scientist's life, the author says, is indeed conflictual, formed by battles, defeats, and victories: but the adversary is always and only the unknown, the problem to be solved, the mystery to be clarified. It is never a matter of civil war; even though of different opinions, or of different political leanings, scientists dispute each other, they compete, but they do not battle: they are bound together by a strong alliance, by the common faith "in the validity of Maxwell's or Boltzmann's equations," and by the common acceptance of Darwinism and the molecular structure of DNA. ~ Primo Levi, #NFDB
85:At these times, the adversary appears holding two boards.
Written on one board: “Think more of yourself. Keep your blessings to yourself, otherwise you will lose everything.”
The other board reads: “who are you to help others? Can’t you even see your own defects?”
A warrior of the light knows he has defects. But he also knows he cannot grow alone, and distance himself from his companions.
So he throws both boards to the ground, even though he believes they contain some truth deep down. They turn to dust, and the warrior continues to help those near him. ~ Paulo Coelho,#NFDB
86:My ninja teachers did not pound me to become faster and stronger as I would expect in any conventional martial art school. They urged me to pay more attention to what I felt. What was my attacker doing at any moment, and where did that put me? I must then change reality from within. Instead of me doing more things to him, I was supposed to sense where he was fighting to go, and then grant him what he wanted in a way that confused him into helping me win. The way to make that happen was to pay attention to my own perceptions inside and use that sensitivity to find the perfect way to usher the adversary to defeat outside. ~ Stephen K Hayes, #NFDB
87:To create the impression of unassailability to the outside world, you only had to make the context as complicated and confusing as possible. To that end, I would make my explanations of technical issues to journalists as complex as I could. They in turn often did not want to admit their lack of knowledge and, exhausted, gave up. It was the same principle used by terrorists and bureaucrats. The adversary can’t attack as long as he has nothing to grab hold of. Modern-day customer relations works in a similar way. A customer who wants to complain but can never find anyone responsible to talk to ultimately has no choice but to swallow his anger. ~ Daniel Domscheit Berg, #NFDB
88:When several creatures, men or animals, have worked together to overcome something offering resistance and have at last succeeded, there follows often a pause, as though they felt the propriety of paying respect to the adversary who has put up so good a fight. The great tree falls, splitting, cracking, rushing down in leaves to the final, shuddering blow along the ground. Then the foresters are silent, and do not at once sit down. After hours, the deep snowdrift has been cleared and the lorry is ready to take the men home out of the cold. But they stand a while, leaning on their spades and only nodding unsmilingly as the car-drivers go through, waving their thanks. ~ Richard Adams, #NFDB
89:The fact that the world today is what it is suggests, to say the least, that this concept is far from being cherished universally. The reasons for its unpopularity are twofold. First, what is required for this concept to be put into effect is a margin of democracy. This is precisely what 86 percent of the globe lacks. Second, the common sense that tells a victim that his only gain in turning the other cheek and not responding in kind yields, at best, a moral victory, i.e., quite immaterial. The natural reluctance to expose yet another part of your body to a blow is justified by a suspicion that this sort of conduct only agitates and enhances Evil; that moral victory can be mistaken by the adversary for his impunity. ~ Joseph Brodsky, #NFDB
90:The Woman And The Devil
When Man and Woman had been made,
All but the disposition,
The Devil to the workshop strayed,
And somehow gained admission.
The Master rested from his work,
For this was on a Sunday,
The man was snoring like a Turk,
Content to wait till Monday.
'Too bad!' the Woman cried; 'Oh, why,
Does slumber not benumb me?
A disposition! Oh, I die
To know if 'twill become me!'
The Adversary said: 'No doubt
'Twill be extremely fine, ma'am,
Though sure 'tis long to be without
I beg to lend you mine, ma'am.'
The Devil's disposition when
She'd got, of course she wore it,
For she'd no disposition then,
Nor now has, to restore it.
~ Ambrose Bierce,#NFDB
91:Sister Mary Loquacious has been a devout Satanist since birth. She went to Sabbat School as a child and won black stars for handwriting and liver. When she was told to join the Chattering Order she went obediently, having a natural talent in that direction and, in any case, knowing that she would be among friends. She would be quite bright, if she was ever put in a position to find out, but long ago found that being a scatterbrain, as she'd put it, gave you an easier journey through life. Currently she is being handed a golden.. haired male baby we will call the Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
92:Satan has long been known as the Adversary, but God fears women even more than He fears the devil–and is right to. She, with her power to bring life into the world, was truly made in the image of the Creator, not man, and in all ways has proved Herself a more deserving object of man’s worship than Christ, that unshaven fanatic who lusted for the end of the world. God saves–but not now, and here. His salvation is on layaway. Like all grifters, He asks you to pay now and take it on faith that you will receive later. Whereas women offer a different sort of salivation, more immediate and fulfilling. They don’t put off their love, for a distant, ill-defined eternity but make a gift of it in the here and now, frequently to those who deserve it least ~ Joe Hill, #NFDB
93:its paradox ingredients gave it great strength. This rope is the same, only better!” “Paradox ingredients?” Blitz held up the end of the rope and whistled appreciatively. “He means things that aren’t supposed to exist. Paradox ingredients are very difficult to craft with, very dangerous. Gleipnir contained the footfall of a cat, the spittle of a bird, the breath of a fish, the beard of a woman.” “Dunno if that last one is a paradox,” I said. “Crazy Alice in Chinatown has a pretty good beard.” Junior huffed. “The point is, this rope is even better! I call it Andskoti, the Adversary. It is woven with the most powerful paradoxes in the Nine Worlds—Wi-Fi with no lag, a politician’s sincerity, a printer that prints, healthy deep-fried food, and an interesting grammar lecture! ~ Rick Riordan, #NFDB
94:An NSA unit known as the Transgression Branch specializes in this kind of track-the-hacker work and takes things one step further. The branch watches a hacker break into another country’s computer system, then follows him inside. In a 2010 operation called Ironavenger, the Transgression Branch saw e-mails containing malware being sent to a government office in a hostile country—one that the NSA wanted to know more about. Upon further inspection, the branch discovered that the malware was coming from a US ally, whose own intelligence service was trying to break in. The Americans let their allies do the hard work and watched silently as they scooped up passwords and sensitive documents from the adversary’s system. The Americans saw everything the allies saw and got some inside knowledge about how they spied. ~ Shane Harris, #NFDB
95:Q: I always had the impression that Lucifer and Satan was one and the same, you know, that Lucifer fell and became Satan. Would you clarify that for me?
A: There is a difference between Lucifer and Satan. The word satan comes from the word Shatan in Hebrew which means 'adversary'. Lucifer is Latin for "the bearer of light," and is the cosmic force that carries the fire. That fire is Kundalini, but when that fire becomes trapped in the ego, that fire is polarized negatively and becomes Satan, the adversary or the opposite of God. As long as that fire is trapped in desire, in ego, it is Satan, it is the devil. It is not outside of us. It is our mind. But when that force is liberated, it is the bearer of light. It is the greatest angel in the hierarchy of our own Consciousness. So it is our best friend.~ Samael Aun Weor,#NFDB
96:The writer of this legend then records
Its ghostly application in these words:
The image is the Adversary old,
Whose beckoning finger points to realms of gold;
Our lusts and passions are the downward stair
That leads the soul from a diviner air;
The archer, Death; the flaming jewel, Life;
Terrestrial goods, the goblet and the knife;
The knights and ladies all whose flesh and bone
By avarice have been hardened into stone;
The clerk, the scholar whom the love of pelf
Tempts from his books and from his nobler self.
The scholar and the world! The endless strife,
The discord in the harmonies of life!
The love of learning, the sequestered nooks,
And all the sweet serenity of books;
The market-place, the eager love of gain,
Whose aim is vanity, and whose end is pain! ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,#NFDB
97:All night, a man called out “God! God!”
Until his lips were bleeding.
Then the Adversary of mankind said, “Hey! Mr Gullible!
… How come you’ve been calling all night
And never once heard God say, “Here, I AM”?
You call out so earnestly and, in reply, what?
I’ll tell you what. Nothing!”
The man suddenly felt empty and abandoned.
Depressed, he threw himself on the ground
And fell into a deep sleep.
In a dream, he met an angel, who asked,
“Why are you regretting calling out to God?”
The man said, “ I called and called
But God never replied, “Here I AM.”
The Angel explained, “God has said,
“Your calling my name is My reply.
Your longing for Me is My message to you.
All your attempts to reach Me
Are in reality My attempts to reach you.
Your fear and love are a noose to catch Me.
In the silence surrounding every call of “God”
Waits a thousand replies of “Here I AM. ~ Rumi,#NFDB
98:Here, too, there are some perverted people (as in the first part of the verse) who in a similar way twist and pervert this word of the Holy Spirit. Their meditation is not on the law of the Lord, but rather, to the contrary, the law of the Lord is in their meditation (which is a horrible situation). They are the ones who twist the Scriptures to their own understanding and by their own fixed meditation compel the Scriptures to enter it and agree with it, when it ought to be the other way around. In this way, then, the law of the Lord is in their meditation, and not their meditation on the law of the Lord. They do not want to agree with their adversary on the way (cf. Matt. 5:25), but they want the adversary to agree with them. They do not want to be holy with the holy, but they want the holy to be profane with them. Such were the heretics. Such are all who seek to approve their own empty opinion by the authority of Scripture, Judaizing with Jewish treachery. ~ Martin Luther, #NFDB
99:I'm struck by the difficulty I had in formulating it. When I think back now, I ask myself what else it was that I was talking about in Madness and Civilization or The Birth of the Clinic, but power? Yet I'm perfectly aware that I scarcely ever used the word and never had such a field of analyses at my disposal. I can say that this was an incapacity linked undoubtedly with the political situation in which we found ourselves. It is hard to see where, either on the Right or the Left, this problem of power could then have been posed. On the Right, it was posed only in terms of constitution, sovereignty, and so on, that is, in juridical terms; on the Marxist side, it was posed only in terms of the state apparatus. The way power was exercised - concretely, and in detail - with its specificity, its techniques and tactics, was something no one attempted to ascertain; they contented themselves with denouncing it in a polemical and global fashion as it existed among the "other," in the adversary camp. Where Soviet socialist power was in question, its opponents called it totalitarianism; power in Western capitalism was denounced by the Marxists as class domination; but the mechanics of power in themselves were never analyzed. ~ Michel Foucault, #NFDB
100:We are living under a tyranny of untruth which confirms itself in power and establishes a more and more total control over men in proportion as they convince themselves they are resisting error.
Our submission to plausible and useful lies involves us in greater and more obvious contradictions, and to hide these from ourselves we need greater and ever less plausible lies. The basic falsehood is the lie that we are totally dedicated to truth, and that we can remain dedicated to truth in a manner that is at the same time honest and exclusive: that we have the monopoly of all truth, just as our adversary of the moment has the monopoly of all error.
We then convince ourselves that we cannot preserve our purity of vision and our inner sincerity if we enter into dialogue with the enemy, for he will corrupt us with his error. We believe, finally, that truth cannot be preserved except by the destruction of the enemy - for, since we have identified him with error, to destroy him is to destroy error. The adversary, of course, has exactly the same thoughts about us and exactly the same basic policy by which he defends the “truth.” He has identified us with dishonesty, insincerity, and untruth. He believes that, if we are destroyed, nothing will be left but truth. ~ Thomas Merton,#NFDB
101:If we really sought truth we would begin slowly and laboriously to divest ourselves one by one of all our coverings of fiction and delusion: or at least we would desire to do so, for mere willing cannot enable us to effect it. On the contrary, the one who can best point out our error, and help us to see it, is the adversary whom we wish to destroy. This is perhaps why we wish to destroy him. So, too, we can help him to see his error, and that is why he wants to destroy us.
In the long run, no one can show another the error that is within him, unless the other is convinced that his critic first sees and loves the good that is within him. So while we are perfectly willing to tell our adversary he is wrong, we will never be able to do so effectively until we can ourselves appreciate where he is right. And we can never accept his judgment on our errors until he gives evidence that he really appreciates our own peculiar truth. Love, love only, love of our deluded fellow man as he actually is, in his delusion and in his sin: this alone can open the door to truth. As long as we do not have this love, as long as this love is not active and effective in our lives (for words and good wishes will never suffice) we have no real access to the truth. At least not to moral truth. ~ Thomas Merton,#NFDB
102:And the day we bargained about the betrothal, and you told me I had something you wanted very badly, what you wanted to do with me…was this?”
“Among other things,” he agreed, tenderly brushing his knuckles over her flushed cheek.
“If I had known all this,” she said with a rueful smile, “I’m certain I would have asked for additional concessions.”
That startled him-the thought that she would have tried to drive a harder bargain if she’d realized exactly how much and what sort of power she really held. “What kind of additional concessions?” he asked, his face carefully expressionless.
She put her cheek against his shoulder, her arms curving around him. “A shorter betrothal,” she whispered. “A shorter courtship, and a shorter ceremony.”
A fresh surge of tenderness and profound pride swept through him at her sweetness and her candor, and he wrapped his arms tightly, protectively around her, smiling with joyous contentment. He had realized within minutes of meeting her that she was rare; he had known within hours that she was everything he wanted. Passionate and gentle, intelligent, sensitive, and witty. He loved all of her qualities, but he hadn’t discovered the one he particularly admired until much later, and that was her courage. He was so proud of the courage that had enabled he to repeatedly confront adversity and adversaries-even when the adversary was him. ~ Judith McNaught,#NFDB
103:The twelve stay.
They eat a final meal with Jesus, and with his hands he tears the unleavened bread and holds it up to them. 'This is my body,' he says. 'Remember me.' And he tells Simon that the adversary has asked to sift them all like wheat, but their faith will be restored. The next day the Christ is lifted up at Golgotha, nailed to a tree, dead before sunset. And when his Spirit leaves him, the temple curtain rends, a veil between God and man. Left exposed in the holiest place is the ark of the covenant, and in that, the manna given to the Hebrews in the desert, life-giving for those who ate of it, but only for a short while here on this earth. And the people remember his words on the shore of Capernaum: 'Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.'
His body, crucified, given for them so they may taste eternity.
Three days later, resurrected, so those who believe can come to his banquet table and be filled.
His followers obey. They devote themselves to the breaking of the bread. They remember him each time they eat of it, and offer thanks. They are sustained in the world and rescued from the world because God became man, and man became bread. ~ Christa Parrish,#NFDB
104:Surely for as long as there have been nights as bad as this one---something to raise the possibility of another night that could actually, with love and cockcrows, light the path home, banish the Adversary, destroy the boundaries between our lands our bodies, our stories, all false, about who we are: for the one night, leaving only the clear way home and the memory of the infant you saw, almost too frail, there's too much shit in these streets, camels andother beasts stir heavily outside, each hoof a chance to wipe him out, make him only another Messiah, and sure somebody's around already taking bets on that one, while here in this town the Jewish collaborators are selling useful gossip to Imperial Intelligence, and the local hookers are keeping the foreskinned invaders happy, charging whatever the traffic will bear, just like the innkeepers who're naturally delighted with this registration thing, and up in the capital they're wondering should they, maybe, give everybody a number; yeah, something to help SPQR record-keeping...and Herod, or Hitler, fellas...what kind of a world is it...for a baby to come in tippin' those toledos at 7 pounds 8 ounces thinkin' he's gonna redeem it, why, he ought have his head examined...
"But on the way home tonight, you wish you'd picked him up, held him a bit. Just held him, very close to your heart, his cheek by the hollow of your shoulder, full of sleep. As it it were you who could, somehow, save him. For the moment not caring who you're supposed to be registered as. For the moment, anyway, no longer who the Caesars say you are. ~ Thomas Pynchon,#NFDB
105:From every direction, the place is under assault—and unlike in the past, the adversary is not concentrated in a single force, such as the Bureau of Reclamation, but takes the form of separate outfits conducting smaller attacks that are, in many ways, far more insidious. From directly above, the air-tour industry has succeeded in scuttling all efforts to dial it back, most recently through the intervention of Arizona’s senators, John Kyl and John McCain, and is continuing to destroy one of the canyon’s greatest treasures, which is its silence. From the east has come a dramatic increase in uranium-mining claims, while the once remote and untrammeled country of the North Rim now suffers from an ever-growing influx of recreational ATVs. On the South Rim, an Italian real estate company recently secured approval for a massive development whose water demands are all but guaranteed to compromise many of the canyon’s springs, along with the oases that they nourish. Worst of all, the Navajo tribe is currently planning to cooperate in constructing a monstrous tramway to the bottom of the canyon, complete with a restaurant and a resort, at the confluence of the Little Colorado and the Colorado, the very spot where John Wesley Powell made his famous journal entry in the summer of 1869 about venturing “down the Great Unknown.” As vexing as all these things are, what Litton finds even more disheartening is the country’s failure to rally to the canyon’s defense—or for that matter, to the defense of its other imperiled natural wonders. The movement that he and David Brower helped build is not only in retreat but finds itself the target of bottomless contempt. On talk radio and cable TV, environmentalists are derided as “wackos” and “extremists.” The country has swung decisively toward something smaller and more selfish than what it once was, and in addition to ushering in a disdain for the notion that wilderness might have a value that extends beyond the metrics of economics or business, much of the nation ignorantly embraces the benefits of engineering and technology while simultaneously rejecting basic science. ~ Kevin Fedarko, #NFDB
106:Will they achieve a uniformity in censorship methods among the various regimes?” “Not uniformity. They will create a system in which the methods support and balance one another in turn....” The Director General invites you to examine the planisphere hanging on the wall. The varied color scheme indicates: the countries where all books are systematically confiscated; the countries where only books published or approved by the State may circulate; the countries where existing censorship is crude, approximate, and unpredictable; the countries where the censorship is subtle, informed, sensitive to implications and allusions, managed by meticulous and sly intellectuals; the countries where there are two networks of dissemination: one legal and one clandestine; the countries where there is no censorship because there are no books, but there are many potential readers; the countries where there are no books and nobody complains about their absence; the countries, finally, in which every day books are produced for all tastes and all ideas, amid general indifference. “Nobody these days holds the written word in such high esteem as police states do,” Arkadian Porphyrich says. “What statistic allows one to identify the nations where literature enjoys true consideration better than the sums appropriated for controlling it and suppressing it? Where it is the object of such attentions, literature gains an extraordinary authority, inconceivable in countries where it is allowed to vegetate as an innocuous pastime, without risks. To be sure, repression must also allow an occasional breathing space, must close an eye every now and then, alternate indulgence with abuse, with a certain unpredictability in its caprices; otherwise, if nothing more remains to be repressed, the whole system rusts and wears down. Let’s be frank: every regime, even the most authoritarian, survives in a situation of unstable equilibrium, whereby it needs to justify constantly the existence of its repressive apparatus, therefore of something to repress. The wish to write things that irk the established authorities is one of the elements necessary to maintain this equilibrium. Therefore, by a secret treaty with the countries whose social regime is opposed to ours, we have created a common organization, with which you have intelligently agreed to collaborate, to export the books banned here and import the books banned there.” “This would seem to imply that the books banned here are allowed there, and vice versa....” “Not on your life. The books banned here are superbanned there, and the books banned there are ultrabanned here. But from exporting to the adversary regime one’s own banned books and from importing theirs, each regime derives at least two important advantages: it encourages the opponents of the hostile regime and it establishes a useful exchange of experience between the police services.” “The ~ Italo Calvino, #NFDB
107:Let us take a limited example and compare the war machine and the state apparatus in the context of the theory of games. Let us take chess and Go, from the standpoint of game pieces, the relations between the pieces and the space involved. Chess is a game of the State, or of the court: the emperor of China played it. Chess pieces are coded; they have an internal nature and intrinsic properties from which their movements, situations, and confrontations derive. They have qualities; a knight remains a knight, a pawn a pawn, a bishop a bishop. Each is like a subject of the statement endowed with relative power, and these relative powers combine in a subject of enunciation, that is, the chess player or the game’s form of interiority. Go pieces, I contrast, are pellets, disks, simple arithmetic units, and have only an anonymous, collective, or third-person function: “It” makes a move. “It” could be a man, a woman, a louse, an elephant. Go pieces are elements of a nonsubjectified machine assemblage with no intrinsic properties, only situational ones. Thus the relations are very different in the two cases.
Within their milieu of interiority, chess pieces entertain biunivocal relations with one another, and with the adversary’s pieces: their functioning is structural. One the other hand, a Go piece has only a milieu of exteriority, or extrinsic relations with nebulas or constellations, according to which it fulfills functions of insertion or situation, such as bordering, encircling, shattering. All by itself, a Go piece can destroy an entire constellation synchronically; a chess piece cannot (or can do so diachronically only). Chess is indeed a war, but an institutionalized, regulated, coded war with a front, a rear, battles. But what is proper to Go is war without battle lines, with neither confrontation nor retreat, without battles even: pure strategy, whereas chess is a semiology. Finally, the space is not at all the same: in chess, it is a question of arranging a closed space for oneself, thus going from one point to another, of occupying the maximum number of squares with the minimum number of pieces. In Go, it is a question of arraying oneself in an open space, of holding space, of maintaining the possibility of springing up at any point: the movement is not from one point to another, but becomes perpetual, without aim or destination, without departure or arrival. The “smooth” space of Go, as against the “striated” space of chess. The nomos of Go against the State of chess, nomos against polis. The difference is that chess codes and decodes space, whereas Go proceeds altogether differently, territorializing and deterritorializing it (make the outside a territory in space; consolidate that territory by the construction of a second, adjacent territory; deterritorialize the enemy by shattering his territory from within; deterritorialize oneself by renouncing, by going elsewhere…) Another justice, another movement, another space-time. ~ Gilles Deleuze,#NFDB
108:Jubilate Agno (Excerpt)
For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry.
For he is the servant of the Living God duly and daily serving him.
For at the first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his way.
For this is done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant
quickness.
For then he leaps up to catch the musk, which is the blessing of God upon his
prayer.
For he rolls upon prank to work it in.
For having done duty and received blessing he begins to consider himself.
For this he performs in ten degrees.
For first he looks upon his forepaws to see if they are clean.
For secondly he kicks up behind to clear away there.
For thirdly he works it upon stretch with the forepaws extended.
For fourthly he sharpens his paws by wood.
For fifthly he washes himself.
For sixthly he rolls upon wash.
For seventhly he fleas himself, that he may not be interrupted upon the beat.
For eighthly he rubs himself against a post.
For ninthly he looks up for his instructions.
For tenthly he goes in quest of food.
For having consider'd God and himself he will consider his neighbour.
For if he meets another cat he will kiss her in kindness.
For when he takes his prey he plays with it to give it a chance.
For one mouse in seven escapes by his dallying.
For when his day's work is done his business more properly begins.
For he keeps the Lord's watch in the night against the adversary.
For he counteracts the powers of darkness by his electrical skin and glaring
eyes.
For he counteracts the Devil, who is death, by brisking about the life.
For in his morning orisons he loves the sun and the sun loves him.
For he is of the tribe of Tiger.
For the Cherub Cat is a term of the Angel Tiger.
For he has the subtlety and hissing of a serpent, which in goodness he
suppresses.
For he will not do destruction, if he is well-fed, neither will he spit without
provocation.
For he purrs in thankfulness, when God tells him he's a good Cat.
For he is an instrument for the children to learn benevolence upon.
For every house is incomplete without him and a blessing is lacking in the spirit.
29
For the Lord commanded Moses concerning the cats at the departure of the
Children of Israel from Egypt.
For every family had one cat at least in the bag.
For the English Cats are the best in Europe.
For he is the cleanest in the use of his forepaws of any quadruped.
For the dexterity of his defence is an instance of the love of God to him
exceedingly.
For he is the quickest to his mark of any creature.
For he is tenacious of his point.
For he is a mixture of gravity and waggery.
For he knows that God is his Saviour.
For there is nothing sweeter than his peace when at rest.
For there is nothing brisker than his life when in motion.
For he is of the Lord's poor and so indeed is he called by benevolence
perpetually--Poor Jeoffry! poor Jeoffry! the rat has bit thy throat.
For I bless the name of the Lord Jesus that Jeoffry is better.
For the divine spirit comes about his body to sustain it in complete cat.
For his tongue is exceeding pure so that it has in purity what it wants in music.
For he is docile and can learn certain things.
For he can set up with gravity which is patience upon approbation.
For he can fetch and carry, which is patience in employment.
For he can jump over a stick which is patience upon proof positive.
For he can spraggle upon waggle at the word of command.
For he can jump from an eminence into his master's bosom.
For he can catch the cork and toss it again.
For he is hated by the hypocrite and miser.
For the former is afraid of detection.
For the latter refuses the charge.
For he camels his back to bear the first notion of business.
For he is good to think on, if a man would express himself neatly.
For he made a great figure in Egypt for his signal services.
For he killed the Ichneumon-rat very pernicious by land.
For his ears are so acute that they sting again.
For from this proceeds the passing quickness of his attention.
For by stroking of him I have found out electricity.
For I perceived God's light about him both wax and fire.
For the Electrical fire is the spiritual substance, which God sends from heaven to
sustain the bodies both of man and beast.
For God has blessed him in the variety of his movements.
For, tho he cannot fly, he is an excellent clamberer.
For his motions upon the face of the earth are more than any other quadruped.
For he can tread to all the measures upon the music.
30
For he can swim for life.
For he can creep.
~ Christopher Smart,#NFDB
109:From Jubilate Agno, Fragment B, Lines 695-768
For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry.
For he is the servant of the Living God, duly and daily serving him.
For at the first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his way.
For is this done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant quickness.
For then he leaps up to catch the musk, which is the blessing of God upon his
prayer.
For he rolls upon prank to work it in.
For having done duty and received blessing he begins to consider himself.
For this he performs in ten degrees.
For first he looks upon his forepaws to see if they are clean.
For secondly he kicks up behind to clear away there.
For thirdly he works it upon stretch with the forepaws extended.
For fourthly he sharpens his paws by wood.
For fifthly he washes himself.
For sixthly he rolls upon wash.
For seventhly he fleas himself, that he may not be interrupted upon the beat.
For eighthly he rubs himself against a post.
For ninthly he looks up for his instructions.
For tenthly he goes in quest of food.
For having considered God and himself he will consider his neighbor.
For if he meets another cat he will kiss her in kindness.
For when he takes his prey he plays with it to give it a chance.
For one mouse in seven escapes by his dallying.
For when his day's work is done his business more properly begins.
For he keeps the Lord's watch in the night against the adversary.
For he counteracts the powers of darkness by his electrical skin and glaring eyes.
For he counteracts the Devil, who is death, by brisking about the life.
For in his morning orisons he loves the sun and the sun loves him.
For he is of the tribe of Tiger.
For the Cherub Cat is a term of the Angel Tiger.
For he has the subtlety and hissing of a serpent, which in goodness he
suppresses.
For he will not do destruction if he is well-fed, neither will he spit without
provocation.
For he purrs in thankfulness when God tells him he's a good Cat.
For he is an instrument for the children to learn benevolence upon.
For every house is incomplete without him, and a blessing is lacking in the spirit.
For the Lord commanded Moses concerning the cats at the departure of the
Children of Israel
26
from Egypt.
For every family had one cat at least in the bag.
For the English Cats are the best in Europe.
For he is the cleanest in the use of his forepaws of any quadruped.
For the dexterity of his defense is an instance of the love of God to him
exceedingly.
For he is the quickest to his mark of any creature.
For he is tenacious of his point.
For he is a mixture of gravity and waggery.
For he knows that God is his Saviour.
For there is nothing sweeter than his peace when at rest.
For there is nothing brisker than his life when in motion.
For he is of the Lord's poor, and so indeed is he called by benevolence
perpetually--Poor Jeoffry!
poor Jeoffry! the rat has bit thy throat.
For I bless the name of the Lord Jesus that Jeoffry is better.
For the divine spirit comes about his body to sustain it in complete cat.
For his tongue is exceeding pure so that it has in purity what it wants in music.
For he is docile and can learn certain things.
For he can sit up with gravity, which is patience upon approbation.
For he can fetch and carry, which is patience in employment.
For he can jump over a stick, which is patience upon proof positive.
For he can spraggle upon waggle at the word of command.
For he can jump from an eminence into his master's bosom.
For he can catch the cork and toss it again.
For he is hated by the hypocrite and miser.
For the former is afraid of detection.
For the latter refuses the charge.
For he camels his back to bear the first notion of business.
For he is good to think on, if a man would express himself neatly.
For he made a great figure in Egypt for his signal services.
For he killed the Icneumon rat, very pernicious by land.
For his ears are so acute that they sting again.
For from this proceeds the passing quickness of his attention.
For by stroking of him I have found out electricity.
For I perceived God's light about him both wax and fire.
For the electrical fire is the spiritual substance which God sends from heaven to
sustain the
bodies both of man and beast.
For God has blessed him in the variety of his movements.
For, though he cannot fly, he is an excellent clamberer.
For his motions upon the face of the earth are more than any other quadruped.
27
For he can tread to all the measures upon the music.
For he can swim for life.
For he can creep.
~ Christopher Smart,#NFDB
110:For I Will Consider My Cat Jeoffry (Excerpt, Jubilate
Agno)
For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry.
For he is the servant of the Living God duly and daily serving him.
For at the first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his way.
For this is done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant quickness.
For then he leaps up to catch the musk, which is the blessing of God upon his
prayer.
For he rolls upon prank to work it in.
For having done duty and received blessing he begins to consider himself.
For this he performs in ten degrees.
For first he looks upon his forepaws to see if they are clean.
For secondly he kicks up behind to clear away there.
For thirdly he works it upon stretch with the forepaws extended.
For fourthly he sharpens his paws by wood.
For fifthly he washes himself.
For sixthly he rolls upon wash.
For seventhly he fleas himself, that he may not be interrupted upon the beat.
For eighthly he rubs himself against a post.
For ninthly he looks up for his instructions.
For tenthly he goes in quest of food.
For having consider'd God and himself he will consider his neighbour.
For if he meets another cat he will kiss her in kindness.
For when he takes his prey he plays with it to give it a chance.
For one mouse in seven escapes by his dallying.
For when his day's work is done his business more properly begins.
For he keeps the Lord's watch in the night against the adversary.
For he counteracts the powers of darkness by his electrical skin and glaring eyes.
For he counteracts the Devil, who is death, by brisking about the life.
For in his morning orisons he loves the sun and the sun loves him.
For he is of the tribe of Tiger.
For the Cherub Cat is a term of the Angel Tiger.
For he has the subtlety and hissing of a serpent, which in goodness he
suppresses.
For he will not do destruction, if he is well-fed, neither will he spit without
provocation.
For he purrs in thankfulness, when God tells him he's a good Cat.
For he is an instrument for the children to learn benevolence upon.
For every house is incomplete without him and a blessing is lacking in the spirit.
23
For the Lord commanded Moses concerning the cats at the departure of the
Children of Israel from Egypt.
For every family had one cat at least in the bag.
For the English Cats are the best in Europe.
For he is the cleanest in the use of his forepaws of any quadruped.
For the dexterity of his defence is an instance of the love of God to him
exceedingly.
For he is the quickest to his mark of any creature.
For he is tenacious of his point.
For he is a mixture of gravity and waggery.
For he knows that God is his Saviour.
For there is nothing sweeter than his peace when at rest.
For there is nothing brisker than his life when in motion.
For he is of the Lord's poor and so indeed is he called by benevolence
perpetually--Poor Jeoffry! poor Jeoffry! the rat has bit thy throat.
For I bless the name of the Lord Jesus that Jeoffry is better.
For the divine spirit comes about his body to sustain it in complete cat.
For his tongue is exceeding pure so that it has in purity what it wants in music.
For he is docile and can learn certain things.
For he can set up with gravity which is patience upon approbation.
For he can fetch and carry, which is patience in employment.
For he can jump over a stick which is patience upon proof positive.
For he can spraggle upon waggle at the word of command.
For he can jump from an eminence into his master's bosom.
For he can catch the cork and toss it again.
For he is hated by the hypocrite and miser.
For the former is afraid of detection.
For the latter refuses the charge.
For he camels his back to bear the first notion of business.
For he is good to think on, if a man would express himself neatly.
For he made a great figure in Egypt for his signal services.
For he killed the Ichneumon-rat very pernicious by land.
For his ears are so acute that they sting again.
For from this proceeds the passing quickness of his attention.
For by stroking of him I have found out electricity.
For I perceived God's light about him both wax and fire.
For the Electrical fire is the spiritual substance, which God sends from heaven to
sustain the bodies both of man and beast.
For God has blessed him in the variety of his movements.
For, tho he cannot fly, he is an excellent clamberer.
For his motions upon the face of the earth are more than any other quadruped.
For he can tread to all the measures upon the music.
24
For he can swim for life.
For he can creep.
~ Christopher Smart,#NFDB
111:Jubilate Agno: Fragment A
Rejoice in God, O ye Tongues; give the glory to the Lord, and the Lamb.
Nations, and languages, and every Creature, in which is the breath of Life.
Let man and beast appear before him, and magnify his name together.
Let Noah and his company approach the throne of Grace, and do homage to the
Ark of their Salvation.
Let Abraham present a Ram, and worship the God of his Redemption.
Let Isaac, the Bridegroom, kneel with his Camels, and bless the hope of his
pilgrimage.
Let Jacob, and his speckled Drove adore the good Shepherd of Israel.
Let Esau offer a scape Goat for his seed, and rejoice in the blessing of God his
father.
Let Nimrod, the mighty hunter, bind a Leopard to the altar, and consecrate his
spear to the Lord.
Let Ishmael dedicate a Tyger, and give praise for the liberty, in which the Lord
has let him at large.
Let Balaam appear with an Ass, and bless the Lord his people and his creatures
for a reward eternal.
Let Anah, the son of Zibion, lead a Mule to the temple, and bless God, who
amerces the consolation of the creature for the service of Man.
Let Daniel come forth with a Lion, and praise God with all his might through faith
in Christ Jesus.
Let Naphthali with an Hind give glory in the goodly words of Thanksgiving.
Let Aaron, the high priest, sanctify a Bull, and let him go free to the Lord and
Giver of Life.
32
Let the Levites of the Lord take the Beavers of the brook alive into the Ark of the
Testimony.
Let Eleazar with the Ermine serve the Lord decently and in purity.
Let Ithamar minister with a Chamois, and bless the name of Him, which
cloatheth the naked.
Let Gershom with an Pygarg Hart bless the name of Him, who feedeth the
hungry.
Let Merari praise the wisdom and power of God with the Coney, who scoopeth
the rock, and archeth in the sand.
Let Kohath serve with the Sable, and bless God in the ornaments of the Temple.
Let Jehoida bless God with an Hare, whose mazes are determined for the health
of the body and to parry the adversary.
Let Ahitub humble himself with an Ape before Almighty God, who is the maker of
variety and pleasantry.
Let Abiathar with a Fox praise the name of the Lord, who ballances craft against
strength and skill against number.
Let Moses, the Man of God, bless with a Lizard, in the sweet majesty of goodnature, and the magnanimity of meekness.
Let Joshua praise God with an Unicorn -- the swiftness of the Lord, and the
strength of the Lord, and the spear of the Lord mighty in battle.
Let Caleb with an Ounce praise the Lord of the Land of beauty and rejoice in the
blessing of his good Report.
Let Othniel praise God with the Rhinoceros, who put on his armour for the reward
of beauty in the Lord.
Let Tola bless with the Toad, which is the good creature of God, tho' his virtue is
in the secret, and his mention is not made.
Let Barak praise with the Pard -- and great is the might of the faithful and great
is the Lord in the nail of Jael and in the sword of the Son of Abinoam.
33
Let Gideon bless with the Panther -- the Word of the Lord is invincible by him
that lappeth from the brook.
Let Jotham praise with the Urchin, who took up his parable and provided himself
for the adversary to kick against the pricks.
Let Boaz, the Builder of Judah, bless with the Rat, which dwelleth in hardship and
peril, that they may look to themselves and keep their houses in order.
Let Obed-Edom with a Dormouse praise the Name of the Lord God his Guest for
increase of his store and for peace.
Let Abishai bless with the Hyaena -- the terror of the Lord, and the fierceness, of
his wrath against the foes of the King and of Israel.
Let Ethan praise with the Flea, his coat of mail, his piercer, and his vigour, which
wisdom and providence have contrived to attract observation and to escape it.
Let Heman bless with the Spider, his warp and his woof, his subtlety and
industry, which are good.
Let Chalcol praise with the Beetle, whose life is precious in the sight of God, tho
his appearance is against him.
Let Darda with a Leech bless the Name of the Physician of body and soul.
Let Mahol praise the Maker of Earth and Sea with the Otter, whom God has given
to dive and to burrow for his preservation.
Let David bless with the Bear -- The beginning of victory to the Lord -- to the
Lord the perfection of excellence -- Hallelujah from the heart of God, and from
the hand of the artist inimitable, and from the echo of the heavenly harp in
sweetness magnifical and mighty.
Let Solomon praise with the Ant, and give the glory to the Fountain of all
Wisdom.
Let Romamti-ezer bless with the Ferret -- The Lord is a rewarder of them, that
diligently seek him.
Let Samuel, the Minister from a child, without ceasing praise with the Porcupine,
34
which is the creature of defence and stands upon his arms continually.
Let Nathan with the Badger bless God for his retired fame, and privacy
inaccessible to slander.
Let Joseph, who from the abundance of his blessing may spare to him, that
lacketh, praise with the Crocodile, which is pleasant and pure, when he is
interpreted, tho' his look is of terror and offence.
Let Esdras bless Christ Jesus with the Rose and his people, which is a nation of
living sweetness.
Let Mephibosheth with the Cricket praise the God of chearfulness, hospitality,
and gratitude.
Let Shallum with the Frog bless God for the meadows of Canaan, the fleece, the
milk and the honey.
Let Hilkiah praise with the Weasel, which sneaks for his prey in craft, and
dwelleth at ambush.
Let Job bless with the Worm -- the life of the Lord is in Humiliation, the Spirit
also and the truth.
Let Elihu bless with the Tortoise, which is food for praise and thanksgiving.
Let Hezekiah praise with the Dromedary -- the zeal for the glory of God is
excellence, and to bear his burden is grace.
Let Zadoc worship with the Mole -- before honour is humility, and he that looketh
low shall learn.
Let Gad with the Adder bless in the simplicity of the preacher and the wisdom of
the creature.
Let Tobias bless Charity with his Dog, who is faithful, vigilant, and a friend in
poverty.
Let Anna bless God with the Cat, who is worthy to be presented before the
throne of grace, when he has trampled upon the idol in his prank.
Let Benaiah praise with the Asp -- to conquer malice is nobler, than to slay the
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lion.
Let Barzillai bless with the Snail -- a friend in need is as the balm of Gilead, or as
the slime to the wounded bark.
Let Joab with the Horse worship the Lord God of Hosts.
Let Shemaiah bless God with the Caterpiller -- the minister of vengeance is the
harbinger of mercy.
Let Ahimelech with the Locust bless God from the tyranny of numbers.
Let Cornelius with the Swine bless God, which purifyeth all things for the poor.
Let Araunah bless with the Squirrel, which is a gift of homage from the poor man
to the wealthy and increaseth good will.
Let Bakbakkar bless with the Salamander, which feedeth upon ashes as bread,
and whose joy is at the mouth of the furnace.
Let Jabez bless with Tarantula, who maketh his bed in the moss, which he
feedeth, that the pilgrim may take heed to his way.
Let Jakim with the Satyr bless God in the dance. -Let Iddo praise the Lord with the Moth -- the writings of man perish as the
garment, but the Book of God endureth for ever.
Let Nebuchadnezzar bless with the Grashopper -- the pomp and vanities of the
world are as the herb of the field, but the glory of the Lord increaseth for ever.
Let Naboth bless with the Canker-worm -- envy is cruel and killeth and preyeth
upon that which God has given to aspire and bear fruit.
Let Lud bless with the Elk, the strenuous asserter of his liberty, and the
maintainer of his ground.
Let Obadiah with the Palmer-worm bless God for the remnant that is left.
Let Agur bless with the Cockatrice -- The consolation of the world is deceitful,
and temporal honour the crown of him that creepeth.
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Let Ithiel bless with the Baboon, whose motions are regular in the wilderness,
and who defendeth himself with a staff against the assailant.
Let Ucal bless with the Cameleon, which feedeth on the Flowers and washeth
himself in the dew.
Let Lemuel bless with the Wolf, which is a dog without a master, but the Lord
hears his cries and feeds him in the desert.
Let Hananiah bless with the Civet, which is pure from benevolence.
Let Azarias bless with the Reindeer, who runneth upon the waters, and wadeth
thro the land in snow.
Let Mishael bless with the Stoat -- the praise of the Lord gives propriety to all
things.
Let Savaran bless with the Elephant, who gave his life for his country that he
might put on immortality.
Let Nehemiah, the imitator of God, bless with the Monkey, who is work'd down
from Man.
Let Manasses bless with the Wild-Ass -- liberty begetteth insolence, but necessity
is the mother of prayer.
Let Jebus bless with the Camelopard, which is good to carry and to parry and to
kneel.
Let Huz bless with the Polypus -- lively subtlety is acceptable to the Lord.
Let Buz bless with the Jackall -- but the Lord is the Lion's provider.
Let Meshullam bless with the Dragon, who maketh his den in desolation and
rejoiceth amongst the ruins.
Let Enoch bless with the Rackoon, who walked with God as by the instinct.
Let Hashbadana bless with the Catamountain, who stood by the Pulpit of God
against the dissensions of the Heathen.
Let Ebed-Melech bless with the Mantiger, the blood of the Lord is sufficient to do
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away the offence of Cain, and reinstate the creature which is amerced.
Let A Little Child with a Serpent bless Him, who ordaineth strength in babes to
the confusion of the Adversary.
Let Huldah bless with the Silkworm -- the ornaments of the Proud are from the
bowells of their Betters.
Let Susanna bless with the Butterfly -- beauty hath wings, but chastity is the
Cherub.
Let Sampson bless with the Bee, to whom the Lord hath given strength to annoy
the assailant and wisdom to his strength.
Let Amasiah bless with the Chaffer -- the top of the tree is for the brow of the
champion, who has given the glory to God.
Let Hashum bless with the Fly, whose health is the honey of the air, but he feeds
upon the thing strangled, and perisheth.
Let Malchiah bless with the Gnat -- it is good for man and beast to mend their
pace.
Let Pedaiah bless with the Humble-Bee, who loves himself in solitude and makes
his honey alone.
Let Maaseiah bless with the Drone, who with the appearance of a Bee is neither a
soldier nor an artist, neither a swordsman nor smith.
Let Urijah bless with the Scorpion, which is a scourge against the murmurers -the Lord keep it from our coasts.
Let Anaiah bless with the Dragon-fly, who sails over the pond by the wood-side
and feedeth on the cressies.
Let Zorobabel bless with the Wasp, who is the Lord's architect, and buildeth his
edifice in armour.
Let Jehu bless with the Hornet, who is the soldier of the Lord to extirpate
abomination and to prepare the way of peace.
Let Mattithiah bless with the Bat, who inhabiteth the desolations of pride and
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flieth amongst the tombs.
Let Elias which is the innocency of the Lord rejoice with the Dove.
Let Asaph rejoice with the Nightingale -- The musician of the Lord! and the
watchman of the Lord!
Let Shema rejoice with the Glowworm, who is the lamp of the traveller and mead
of the musician.
Let Jeduthun rejoice with the Woodlark, who is sweet and various.
Let Chenaniah rejoice with Chloris, in the vivacity of his powers and the beauty of
his person.
Let Gideoni rejoice with the Goldfinch, who is shrill and loud, and full withal.
Let Giddalti rejoice with the Mocking-bird, who takes off the notes of the Aviary
and reserves his own.
Let Jogli rejoice with the Linnet, who is distinct and of mild delight.
Let Benjamin bless and rejoice with the Redbird, who is soft and soothing.
Let Dan rejoice with the Blackbird, who praises God with all his heart, and
biddeth to be of good cheer.
~ Christopher Smart,#NFDB
112:Jubilate Agno: Fragment B, Part 4
For God has given us a language of monosyllables to prevent our clipping.
For a toad enjoys a finer prospect than another creature to compensate his lack.
Tho' toad I am the object of man's hate.
Yet better am I than a reprobate. who has the worst of prospects.
For there are stones, whose constituent particles are little toads.
For the spiritual musick is as follows.
For there is the thunder-stop, which is the voice of God direct.
For the rest of the stops are by their rhimes.
For the trumpet rhimes are sound bound, soar more and the like.
For the Shawm rhimes are lawn fawn moon boon and the like.
For the harp rhimes are sing ring string and the like.
For the cymbal rhimes are bell well toll soul and the like.
For the flute rhimes are tooth youth suit mute and the like.
For the dulcimer rhimes are grace place beat heat and the like.
For the Clarinet rhimes are clean seen and the like.
For the Bassoon rhimes are pass, class and the like. God be gracious to
Baumgarden.
For the dulcimer are rather van fan and the like and grace place &c are of the
bassoon.
For beat heat, weep peep &c are of the pipe.
For every word has its marrow in the English tongue for order and for delight.
For the dissyllables such as able table &c are the fiddle rhimes.
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For all dissyllables and some trissyllables are fiddle rhimes.
For the relations of words are in pairs first.
For the relations of words are sometimes in oppositions.
For the relations of words are according to their distances from the pair.
For there be twelve cardinal virtues the gifts of the twelve sons of Jacob.
For Reuben is Great. God be gracious to Lord Falmouth.
For Simeon is Valiant. God be gracious to the Duke of Somerset.
For Levi is Pious. God be gracious to the Bishop of London.
For Judah is Good. God be gracious to Lord Granville.
For Dan is Clean -- neat, dextrous, apt, active, compact. God be gracious to
Draper.
For Naphtali is sublime -- God be gracious to Chesterfield.
For Gad is Contemplative -- God be gracious to Lord Northampton.
For Ashur is Happy -- God be gracious to George Bowes.
For Issachar is strong -- God be gracious to the Duke of Dorsett.
For Zabulon is Constant -- God be gracious to Lord Bath.
For Joseph is Pleasant -- God be gracious to Lord Bolingbroke.
For Benjamin is Wise -- God be gracious to Honeywood.
For all Foundation is from God depending.
For the two Universities are the Eyes of England.
For Cambridge is the right and the brightest.
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For Pembroke Hall was founded more in the Lord than any College in Cambridge.
For mustard is the proper food of birds and men are bound to cultivate it for their
use.
For they that study the works of God are peculiarly assisted by his Spirit.
For all the creatures mentiond by Pliny are somewhere or other extant to the
glory of God.
For Rye is food rather for fowls than men.
For Rye-bread is not taken with thankfulness.
For the lack of Rye may be supplied by Spelt.
For languages work into one another by their bearings.
For the power of some animal is predominant in every language.
For the power and spirit of a CAT is in the Greek.
For the sound of a cat is in the most useful preposition êáô' åõ÷çí .
For the pleasantry of a cat at pranks is in the language ten thousand times over.
For JACK UPON PRANCK is in the performance of gåñé together or seperate.
For Clapperclaw is in the grappling of the words upon one another in all the
modes of versification.
For the sleekness of a Cat is in his áãëáéçöé .
For the Greek is thrown from heaven and falls upon its feet.
For the Greek when distracted from the line is sooner restored to rank and rallied
into some form than any other.
For the purring of a Cat is his ôñõæåé .
For his cry is in ïõáé , which I am sorry for.
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For the Mouse (Mus) prevails in the Latin.
For Edi-mus, bibi-mus, vivi-mus -- ore-mus.
For the Mouse is a creature of great personal valour.
For -- this is a true case -- Cat takes female mouse from the company of male -male mouse will not depart, but stands threatning and daring.
For this is as much as to challenge, if you will let her go, I will engage you, as
prodigious a creature as you are.
For the Mouse is of an hospitable disposition.
For bravery and hospitality were said and done by the Romans rather than
others.
For two creatures the Bull and the Dog prevail in the English.
For all the words ending in ble are in the creature. Invisi-ble, Incomprehensi-ble,
ineffa-ble, A-ble.
For the Greek and Latin are not dead languages, but taken up and accepted for
the sake of him that spake them.
For can is (canis) is cause and effect a dog.
For the English is concise and strong. Dog and Bull again.
For Newton's notion of colours is áëïãïò unphilosophical.
For the colours are spiritual.
For WHITE is the first and the best.
For there are many intermediate colours, before you come to SILVER.
For the next colour is a lively GREY.
For the next colour is BLUE.
For the next is GREEN of which there are ten thousand distinct sorts.
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For the next is YELLOW which is more excellent than red, tho Newton makes red
the prime. God be gracious to John Delap.
For RED is the next working round the Orange.
For Red is of sundry sorts till it deepens to BLACK.
For black blooms and it is PURPLE.
For purple works off to BROWN which is of ten thousand acceptable shades.
For the next is PALE. God be gracious to William Whitehead.
For pale works about to White again.
NOW that colour is spiritual appears inasmuch as the blessing of God upon all
things descends in colour.
For the blessing of health upon the human face is in colour.
For the blessing of God upon purity is in the Virgin's blushes.
For the blessing of God in colour is on him that keeps his virgin.
For I saw a blush in Staindrop Church, which was of God's own colouring.
For it was the benevolence of a virgin shewn to me before the whole
congregation.
For the blessing of God upon the grass is in shades of Green visible to a nice
observer as they light upon the surface of the earth.
For the blessing of God unto perfection in all bloom and fruit is by colouring.
For from hence something in the spirit may be taken off by painters.
For Painting is a species of idolatry, tho' not so gross as statuary.
For it is not good to look with earning upon any dead work.
For by so doing something is lost in the spirit and given from life to death.
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For BULL in the first place is the word of Almighty God.
For he is a creature of infinite magnitude in the height.
For there is the model of every beast of the field in the height.
For they are blessed intelligences and all angels of the living God.
For there are many words under Bull.
For Bul the Month is under it.
For Sea is under Bull.
For Brook is under Bull. God be gracious to Lord Bolingbroke.
For Rock is under Bull.
For Bullfinch is under Bull. God be gracious to the Duke of Cleveland.
For God, which always keeps his work in view has paited a Bullfinch in the heart
of a stone. God be gracious to Gosling and Canterbury.
For the Bluecap is under Bull.
For the Humming Bird is under Bull.
For Beetle is under Bull.
For Toad is under bull.
For Frog is under Bull, which he has a delight to look at.
For the Pheasant-eyed Pink is under Bull. Blessed Jesus R4NK EL.
For Bugloss is under Bull.
For Bugle is under Bull.
For Oxeye is under Bull.
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For Fire is under Bull.
For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry.
For he is the servant of the Living God duly and daily serving him.
For at the first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his way.
For is this done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant quickness.
For then he leaps up to catch the musk, which is the blessing of God upon his
prayer.
For he rolls upon prank to work it in.
For having done duty and received blessing he begins to consider himself.
For this he performs in ten degrees.
For first he looks upon his fore-paws to see if they are clean.
For secondly he kicks up behind to clear away there.
For thirdly he works it upon stretch with the fore paws extended.
For fourthly he sharpens his paws by wood.
For fifthly he washes himself.
For Sixthly he rolls upon wash.
For Seventhly he fleas himself, that he may not be interrupted upon the beat.
For Eighthly he rubs himself against a post.
For Ninthly he looks up for his instructions.
For Tenthly he goes in quest of food.
For having consider'd God and himself he will consider his neighbour.
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For if he meets another cat he will kiss her in kindness.
For when he takes his prey he plays with it to give it chance.
For one mouse in seven escapes by his dallying.
For when his day's work is done his business more properly begins.
For he keeps the Lord's watch in the night against the adversary.
For he counteracts the powers of darkness by his electrical skin and glaring eyes.
For he counteracts the Devil, who is death, by brisking about the life
For in his morning orisons he loves the sun and the sun loves him.
For he is of the tribe of Tiger.
For the Cherub Cat is a term of the Angel Tiger.
For he has the subtlety and hissing of a serpent, which in goodness he
suppresses.
For he will not do destruction, if he is well-fed, neither will he spit without
provocation.
For he purrs in thankfulness, when God tells him he's a good Cat.
For he is an instrument for the children to learn benevolence upon.
For every house is incompleat without him and a blessing is lacking in the spirit.
For the Lord commanded Moses concerning the cats at the departure of the
Children of Israel from Egypt.
For every family had one cat at least in the bag.
For the English Cats are the best in Europe.
For he is the cleanest in the use of his fore-paws of any quadrupede.
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For the dexterity of his defence is an instance of the love of God to him
exceedingly.
For he is the quickest to his mark of any creature.
For he is tenacious of his point.
For he is a mixture of gravity and waggery.
For he knows that God is his Saviour.
For there is nothing sweeter than his peace when at rest.
For there is nothing brisker than his life when in motion.
For he is of the Lord's poor and so indeed is he called by benevolence perpetually
-- Poor Jeoffry! poor Jeoffry! the rat has bit thy throat.
For I bless the name of the Lord Jesus that Jeoffry is better.
For the divine spirit comes about his body to sustain it in compleat cat.
For his tongue is exceeding pure so that it has in purity what it wants in musick.
For he is docile and can learn certain things.
For he can set up with gravity which is patience upon approbation.
For he can fetch and carry, which is patience in employment.
For he can jump over a stick which is patience upon proof positive.
For he can spraggle upon waggle at the word of command.
For he can jump from an eminence into his master's bosom.
For he can catch the cork and toss it again.
For he is hated by the hypocrite and miser.
For the former is affraid of detection.
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For the latter refuses the charge.
For he camels his back to bear the first notion of business.
For he is good to think on, if a man would express himself neatly.
For he made a great figure in Egypt for his signal services.
For he killed the Icneumon-rat very pernicious by land.
For his ears are so acute that they sting again.
For from this proceeds the passing quickness of his attention.
For by stroaking of him I have found out electricity.
For I perceived God's light about him both wax and fire.
For the Electrical fire is the spiritual substance, which God sends from heaven to
sustain the bodies both of man and beast.
For God has blessed him in the variety of his movements.
For, tho he cannot fly, he is an excellent clamberer.
For his motions upon the face of the earth are more than any other quadrupede.
For he can tread to all the measures upon the musick.
For he can swim for life.
For he can creep.
~ Christopher Smart,#NFDB
113:The Supreme Discovery
IF WE want to progress integrally, we must build within our conscious being a strong and pure mental synthesis which can serve us as a protection against temptations from outside, as a landmark to prevent us from going astray, as a beacon to light our way across the moving ocean of life.
Each individual should build up this mental synthesis according to his own tendencies and affinities and aspirations. But if we want it to be truly living and luminous, it must be centred on the idea that is the intellectual representation symbolising That which is at the centre of our being, That which is our life and our light.
This idea, expressed in sublime words, has been taught in various forms by all the great Instructors in all lands and all ages.
The Self of each one and the great universal Self are one. Since all that is exists from all eternity in its essence and principle, why make a distinction between the being and its origin, between ourselves and what we place at the beginning?
The ancient traditions rightly said:
"Our origin and ourselves, our God and ourselves are one."
And this oneness should not be understood merely as a more or less close and intimate relationship of union, but as a true identity.
Thus, when a man who seeks the Divine attempts to reascend by degrees towards the inaccessible, he forgets that all his knowledge and all his intuition cannot take him one step forward in this infinite; neither does he know that what he wants to attain, what he believes to be so far from him, is within him.
For how could he know anything of the origin until he becomes conscious of this origin in himself?
It is by understanding himself, by learning to know himself, that he can make the supreme discovery and cry out in wonder like the patriarch in the Bible, "The house of God is here and I knew it not."
That is why we must express that sublime thought, creatrix of the material worlds, and make known to all the word that fills the heavens and the earth, "I am in all things and all beings."When all shall know this, the promised day of great transfigurations will be at hand. When in each atom of Matter men shall recognise the indwelling thought of God, when in each living creature they shall perceive some hint of a gesture of God, when each man can see God in his brother, then dawn will break, dispelling the darkness, the falsehood, the ignorance, the error and suffering that weigh upon all Nature. For, "all Nature suffers and laments as she awaits the revelation of the Sons of God."
This indeed is the central thought epitomising all others, the thought which should be ever present to our remembrance as the sun that illumines all life.
That is why I remind you of it today. For if we follow our path bearing this thought in our hearts like the rarest jewel, the most precious treasure, if we allow it to do its work of illumination and transfiguration within us, we shall know that it lives in the centre of all beings and all things, and in it we shall feel the marvellous oneness of the universe.
Then we shall understand the vanity and childishness of our meagre satisfactions, our foolish quarrels, our petty passions, our blind indignations. We shall see the dissolution of our little faults, the crumbling of the last entrenchments of our limited personality and our obtuse egoism. We shall feel ourselves being swept along by this sublime current of true spirituality which will deliver us from our narrow limits and bounds.
The individual Self and the universal Self are one; in every world, in every being, in every thing, in every atom is the Divine Presence, and man's mission is to manifest it.
In order to do that, he must become conscious of this Divine Presence within him. Some individuals must undergo a real apprenticeship in order to achieve this: their egoistic being is too all-absorbing, too rigid, too conservative, and their struggles against it are long and painful. Others, on the contrary, who are more impersonal, more plastic, more spiritualised, come easily into contact with the inexhaustible divine source of their being.But let us not forget that they too should devote themselves daily, constantly, to a methodical effort of adaptation and transformation, so that nothing within them may ever again obscure the radiance of that pure light.
But how greatly the standpoint changes once we attain this deeper consciousness! How understanding widens, how compassion grows!
On this a sage has said:
"I would like each one of us to come to the point where he perceives the inner God who dwells even in the vilest of human beings; instead of condemning him we would say, 'Arise, O resplendent Being, thou who art ever pure, who knowest neither birth nor death; arise, Almighty One, and manifest thy nature.'"
Let us live by this beautiful utterance and we shall see everything around us transformed as if by miracle.
This is the attitude of true, conscious and discerning love, the love which knows how to see behind appearances, understand in spite of words, and which, amid all obstacles, is in constant communion with the depths.
What value have our impulses and our desires, our anguish and our violence, our sufferings and our struggles, all these inner vicissitudes unduly dramatised by our unruly imagination - what value do they have before this great, this sublime and divine love bending over us from the innermost depths of our being, bearing with our weaknesses, rectifying our errors, healing our wounds, bathing our whole being with its regenerating streams?
For the inner Godhead never imposes herself, she neither demands nor threatens; she offers and gives herself, conceals and forgets herself in the heart of all beings and things; she never accuses, she neither judges nor curses nor condemns, but works unceasingly to perfect without constraint, to mend without reproach, to encourage without impatience, to enrich each one with all the wealth he can receive; she is the mother whose love bears fruit and nourishes, guards and protects, counsels and consoles; because she understands everything, she can endure everything, excuse and pardon everything, hope and prepare for everything; bearing everything within herself, she owns nothing that does not belong to all, and because she reigns over all, she is the servant of all; that is why all, great and small, who want to be kings with her and gods in her, become, like her, not despots but servitors among their brethren.
How beautiful is this humble role of servant, the role of all who have been revealers and heralds of the God who is within all, of the Divine Love that animates all things....
And until we can follow their example and become true servants even as they, let us allow ourselves to be penetrated and transformed by this Divine Love; let us offer Him, without reserve, this marvellous instrument, our physical organism. He shall make it yield its utmost on every plane of activity.
To achieve this total self-consecration, all means are good, all methods have their value. The one thing needful is to persevere in our will to attain this goal. For then everything we study, every action we perform, every human being we meet, all come to bring us an indication, a help, a light to guide us on the path.
Before I close, I shall add a few pages for those who have already made apparently fruitless efforts, for those who have encountered the pitfalls on the way and seen the measure of their weakness, for those who are in danger of losing their self-confidence and courage. These pages, intended to rekindle hope in the hearts of those who suffer, were written by a spiritual worker at a time when ordeals of every kind were sweeping down on him like purifying flames.
You who are weary, downcast and bruised, you who fall, who think perhaps that you are defeated, hear the voice of a friend. He knows your sorrows, he has shared them, he has suffered like you from the ills of the earth; like you he has crossed many deserts under the burden of the day, he has known thirst and hunger, solitude and abandonment, and the cruellest of all wants, the destitution of the heart. Alas! he has known too the hours of doubt, the errors, the faults, the failings, every weakness.
But he tells you: Courage! Hearken to the lesson that the rising sun brings to the earth with its first rays each morning. It is a lesson of hope, a message of solace.
You who weep, who suffer and tremble, who dare not expect an end to your ills, an issue to your pangs, behold: there is no night without dawn and the day is about to break when darkness is thickest; there is no mist that the sun does not dispel, no cloud that it does not gild, no tear that it will not dry one day, no storm that is not followed by its shining triumphant bow; there is no snow that it does not melt, nor winter that it does not change into radiant spring.
And for you too, there is no affliction which does not bring its measure of glory, no distress which cannot be transformed into joy, nor defeat into victory, nor downfall into higher ascension, nor solitude into radiating centre of life, nor discord into harmony - sometimes it is a misunderstanding between two minds that compels two hearts to open to mutual communion; lastly, there is no infinite weakness that cannot be changed into strength. And it is even in supreme weakness that almightiness chooses to reveal itself!
Listen, my little child, you who today feel so broken, so fallen perhaps, who have nothing left, nothing to cover your misery and foster your pride: never before have you been so great! How close to the summits is he who awakens in the depths, for the deeper the abyss, the more the heights reveal themselves!
Do you not know this, that the most sublime forces of the vasts seek to array themselves in the most opaque veils of Matter? Oh, the sublime nuptials of sovereign love with the obscurest plasticities, of the shadow's yearning with the most royal light!
If ordeal or fault has cast you down, if you have sunk into the nether depths of suffering, do not grieve - for there indeed the divine love and the supreme blessing can reach you! Because you have passed through the crucible of purifying sorrows, the glorious ascents are yours.
You are in the wilderness: then listen to the voices of the silence. The clamour of flattering words and outer applause has gladdened your ears, but the voices of the silence will gladden your soul and awaken within you the echo of the depths, the chant of divine harmonies!
You are walking in the depths of night: then gather the priceless treasures of the night. In bright sunshine, the ways of intelligence are lit, but in the white luminosities of the night lie the hidden paths of perfection, the secret of spiritual riches.
You are being stripped of everything: that is the way towards plenitude. When you have nothing left, everything will be given to you. Because for those who are sincere and true, from the worst always comes the best.
Every grain that is sown in the earth produces a thousand. Every wing-beat of sorrow can be a soaring towards glory.
And when the adversary pursues man relentlessly, everything he does to destroy him only makes him greater.
Hear the story of the worlds, look: the great enemy seems to triumph. He casts the beings of light into the night, and the night is filled with stars. He rages against the cosmic working, he assails the integrity of the empire of the sphere, shatters its harmony, divides and subdivides it, scatters its dust to the four winds of infinity, and lo! the dust is changed into a golden seed, fertilising the infinite and peopling it with worlds which now gravitate around their eternal centre in the larger orbit of space - so that even division creates a richer and deeper unity, and by multiplying the surfaces of the material universe, enlarges the empire that it set out to destroy.
Beautiful indeed was the song of the primordial sphere cradled in the bosom of immensity, but how much more beautiful and triumphant is the symphony of the constellations, the music of the spheres, the immense choir that fills the heavens with an eternal hymn of victory!
Hear again: no state was ever more precarious than that of man when he was separated on earth from his divine origin. Above him stretched the hostile borders of the usurper, and at his horizon's gates watched jailers armed with flaming swords. Then, since he could climb no more to the source of life, the source arose within him; since he could no more receive the light from above, the light shone forth at the very centre of his being; since he could commune no more with the transcendent love, that love offered itself in a holocaust and chose each terrestrial being, each human self as its dwelling-place and sanctuary.
That is how, in this despised and desolate but fruitful and blessed Matter, each atom contains a divine thought, each being carries within him the Divine Inhabitant. And if no being in all the universe is as frail as man, neither is any as divine as he!
In truth, in truth, in humiliation lies the cradle of glory! 28 April 1912 ~ The Mother, Words Of Long Ago, The Supreme Discovery,#NFDB
114:Jubilate Agno: Fragment B, Part 3
For a Man is to be looked upon in that which he excells as on a prospect.
For there be twelve cardinal virtues -- three to the East -- Greatness, Valour,
Piety.
For there be three to the West -- Goodness, Purity and Sublimity.
For there be three to the North -- Meditation, Happiness, Strength.
For there be three to the South -- Constancy, Pleasantry and Wisdom.
For the Argument A PRIORI is GOD in every man's CONSCIENCE.
For the Argument A POSTERIORI is God before every man's eyes.
For the Four and Twenty Elders of the Revelation are Four and Twenty Eternities.
For their Four and Twenty Crowns are their respective Consummations.
For a CHARACTER is the votes of the Worldlings, but the seal is of Almighty GOD
alone.
For there is no musick in flats and sharps which are not in God's natural key.
For where Accusation takes the place of encouragement a man of Genius is
driven to act the vices of a fool.
For the Devil can set a house on fire, when the inhabitants find combustibles.
For the old account of time is the true -- Decr 28th 1759-60 -- -- -For Faith as a grain of mustard seed is to believe, as I do, that an Eternity is
such in respect to the power and magnitude of Almighty God.
For a DREAM is a good thing from GOD.
For there is a dream from the adversary which is terror.
For the phenomenon of dreaming is not of one solution, but many.
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For Eternity is like a grain of mustard as a growing body and improving spirit.
For the malignancy of fire is oweing to the Devil's hiding of light, till it became
visible darkness.
For the Circle may be SQUARED by swelling and flattening.
For the Life of God is in the body of man and his spirit in the Soul.
For there was no rain in Paradise because of the delicate construction of the
spiritual herbs and flowers.
For the Planet Mercury is the WORD DISCERNMENT.
For the Scotchman seeks for truth at the bottom of a well, the Englishman in the
Heavn of Heavens.
For the Planet Venus is the WORD PRUDENCE or providence.
For GOD nevertheless is an extravagant BEING and generous unto loss.
For there is no profit in the generation of man and the loss of millions is not
worth God's tear.
For this is the twelfth day of the MILLENNIUM of the MILLENNIUM foretold by the
prophets -- give the glory to God ONE THOUSAND SEVEN HUNDRED AND SIXTY For the Planet Mars is the word FORTITUDE.
For to worship naked in the Rain is the bravest thing for the refreshing and
purifying the body.
For the Planet Jupiter is the WORD DISPENSATION.
For Tully says to be generous you must be first just, but the voice of Christ is
distribute at all events.
For Kittim is the father of the Pygmies, God be gracious to Pigg his family.
For the Soul is divisible and a portion of the Spirit may be cut off from one and
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applied to another.
For NEW BREAD is the most wholesome especially if it be leaven'd with honey.
For a NEW SONG also is best, if it be to the glory of God; and taken with the food
like the psalms.
For the Planet Saturn is the word TEMPERANCE or PATIENCE.
For Jacob's Ladder are the steps of the Earth graduated hence to Paradice and
thence to the throne of God.
For a good wish is well but a faithful prayer is an eternal benefit.
For SPICA VIRGINIS is the star that appeared to the wise men in the East and
directed their way before it was yet insphered.
For an IDEA is the mental vision of an object.
For Lock supposes that an human creature, at a given time may be an atheist i.e.
without God, by the folly of his doctrine concerning innate ideas.
For it is not lawful to sell poyson in England any more than it is in Venice, the
Lord restrain both the finder and receiver.
For the ACCENTS are the invention of the Moabites, who learning the GREEK
tongue marked the words after their own vicious pronuntiation.
For the GAULS (the now-French and original Moabites) after they were subdued
by Cæsar became such Grecians at Rome.
For the Gaullic manuscripts fell into the hands of the inventors of printing.
For all the inventions of man, which are good, are the communications of
Almighty God.
For all the stars have satellites, which are terms under their respective words.
For tiger is a word and his satellites are Griffin, Storgis, Cat and others.
For my talent is to give an Impression upon words by punching, that when the
reader casts his eye upon 'em, he takes up the image from the mould which I
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have made.
For JOB was the son of Issachar and patience is the child of strength.
For the Names of the DAYS, as they now stand, are foolish and abominable.
For the Days are the First, Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Seventh.
For the names of the months are false -- the Hebrew appellatives are of God.
For the Time of the Lord's temptation was in early youth and imminent danger.
For an equivocal generation is a generation and no generation.
For putrifying matter nevertheless will yield up its life in diverse creatures and
combinations of creatures.
For a TOAD can dwell in the centre of a stone, because -- there are stones whose
constituent life is of those creatures.
For a Toad hath by means of his eye the most beautiful prospects of any other
animal to make him amends for his distance from his Creator in Glory.
For FAT is the fruit of benevolence, therefore it was the Lord's in the Mosaic
sacrifices.
For the very particular laws of Moses are the determinations of CASES that fell
under his cognizance.
For the Devil can make the shadow thicker by candlelight by reason of his pow'r
over malignant fire.
For the Romans clipped their words in the Augustan thro idleness and effeminacy
and paid foreign actors for speaking them out.
For when the weight and the pow'r are equivalent the prop is of none effect.
For shaving of the beard was an invention of the people of Sodom to make men
look like women.
For the ends of the world are the accomplishment of great events, and the
consummation of periods.
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For ignorance is a sin because illumination is to be obtained by prayer.
For Preferment is not from the East, West or South, but from the North, where
Satan has most power.
For the ministers of the Devil set the hewer of wood over the head of God's free
Man.
For this inverting God's good order, edifice and edification, and appointing place,
where the Lord has not appointed.
For the Ethiopian question is already solved in that the Blacks are the children of
Cain.
For the phenomenon of the horizontal moon is the truth -- she appears bigger in
the horizon because she actually is so.
For it was said of old 'can the Ethiopian change his skin?' the Lord has answered
the question by his merit and death he shall. -For the moon is magnified in the horizon by Almighty God, and so is the Sun.
For she has done her day's-work and the blessing of God upon her, and she
communicates with the earth.
For when she rises she has been strength'ned by the Sun, who cherishes her by
night.
For man is born to trouble in the body, as the sparks fly upwards in the spirit.
For man is between the pinchers while his soul is shaping and purifying.
For the ENGLISH are the seed of Abraham and work up to him by Joab, David,
and Naphtali. God be gracious to us this day. General Fast March 14th 1760.
For the Romans and the English are one people the children of the brave man
who died at the altar praying for his posterity, whose death was the type of our
Saviour's.
For the WELCH are the children of Mephibosheth and Ziba with a mixture of
David in the Jones's.
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For the Scotch are the children of Doeg with a mixture of Cush the Benjamite,
whence their innate antipathy to the English.
For the IRISH are the children of Shimei and Cush with a mixture of something
lower -- the Lord raise them!
For the FRENCH are Moabites even the children of Lot.
For the DUTCH are the children of Gog.
For the Poles are the children of Magog.
For the Italians are the children of Samuel and are the same as the Grecians.
For the Spaniards are the children of Abishai Joab's brother, hence is the goodwill
between the two nations.
For the Portuguese are the children of Amman -- God be gracious to Lisbon and
send good angels amongst them!
For the Hottentots are the children of Gog with a Black mixture.
For the Russians are the Children of Ishmael.
For the Turks are the children of Esaw, which is Edom.
For the Wallachians are the children of Huz. God be gracious to Elizabeth Hughes,
as she was.
For the Germans are the children of the Philistins even the seed of Anak.
For the Prussians are the children of Goliah -- but the present, whom God bless
this hour, is a Campbell of the seed of Phinees.
For the Hanoverians are Hittites of the seed of Uriah. God save the king.
For the Hessians are Philistines with a mixture of Judah.
For the Saxons are Benjamites, men of great subtlety and Marshal Saxe was
direct from Benjamin.
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For the Danes are of the children of Zabulon.
For the Venetians are the children of Mark and Romans.
For the Swiss are Philistins of a particular family. God be gracious to Jonathan
Tyers his family and to all the people at Vaux Hall.
For the Sardinians are of the seed of David -- The Lord forward the Reformation
amongst the good seed first. -For the Mogul's people are the children of Phut.
For the Old Greeks and the Italians are one people, which are blessed in the gift
of Mustek by reason of the song of Hannah and the care of Samuel with regard to
divine melody.
For the Germans and the Dutch are the children of the Goths and Vandals who
did a good in destruction books written by heathen Free-Thinkers against God.
For there are Americans of the children of Toi. -For the Laplanders are the children of Gomer.
For the Phenomena of the Diving Bell are solved right in the schools.
For NEW BREAD is the most wholesome -- God be gracious to Baker.
For the English are the children of Joab, Captain of the host of Israel, who was
the greatest man in the world to GIVE and to ATCHIEVE.
For TEA is a blessed plant and of excellent virtue. God give the Physicians more
skill and honesty!
For nutmeg is exceeding wholesome and cherishing, neither does it hurt the
liver.
For The Lightning before death is God's illumination in the spirit for preparation
and for warning.
For Lavender Cotton is exceeding good for the teeth. God be gracious to
Windsmore.
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For the Fern is exceeding good and pleasant to rub the teeth.
For a strong preparation of Mandragora is good for the gout.
For the Bark was a communication from God and is sovereign.
For the method of curing an ague by terror is exaction.
For Exaction is the most accursed of all things, because it brought the Lord to the
cross, his betrayers and murderers being such from their exaction.
For an Ague is the terror of the body, when the blessing of God is withheld for a
season.
For benevolence is the best remedy in the first place and the bark in the second.
For, when the nation is at war, it is better to abstain from the punishment of
criminals especially, every act of human vengeance being a check to the grace of
God.
For the letter ל [Hebrew character lamed] which signifies GOD by himself
is on the fibre of some leaf in every Tree.
For ל is the grain of the human heart and on the network of the skin.
For ל is in the veins of all stones both precious and common.
For ל is upon every hair both of man and beast.
For ל is in the grain of wood.
For ל is in the ore of all metals.
For ל is on the scales of all fish.
For ל is on the petals of all flowers.
For ל is upon on all shells.
For ל is in the constituent particles of air.
For ל is on the mite of the earth.
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For ל is in the water yea in every drop.
For ל is in the incomprehensible ingredients of fire.
For ל is in the stars the sun and in the Moon.
For ל is upon the Sapphire Vault.
For the doubling of flowers is the improvement of the gardners talent.
For the flowers are great blessings.
For the Lord made a Nosegay in the meadow with his disciples and preached
upon the lily.
For the angels of God took it out of his hand and carried it to the Height.
For a man cannot have publick spirit, who is void of private benevolence.
For there is no Height in which there are not flowers.
For flowers have great virtues for all the senses.
For the flower glorifies God and the root parries the adversary.
For the flowers have their angels even the words of God's Creation.
For the warp and woof of flowers are worked by perpetual moving spirits.
For flowers are good both for the living and the dead.
For there is a language of flowers.
For there is a sound reasoning upon all flowers.
For elegant phrases are nothing but flowers.
For flowers are peculiarly the poetry of Christ.
For flowers are medicinal.
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For flowers are musical in ocular harmony.
For the right names of flowers are yet in heaven. God make gard'ners better
nomenclators.
For the Poorman's nosegay is an introduction to a Prince.
For it were better for the SERVICE, if only select psalms were read.
For the Lamentations of Jeremiah, Songs from other scriptures, and parts of
Esdras might be taken to supply the quantity.
For A is the beginning of learning and the door of heaven.
For B is a creature busy and bustling.
For C is a sense quick and penetrating.
For D is depth.
For E is eternity -- such is the power of the English letters taken singly.
For F is faith.
For G is God -- whom I pray to be gracious to Liveware my fellow prisoner.
For H is not a letter, but a spirit -- Benedicatur Jesus Christus, sic spirem!
For I is identity. God be gracious to Henry Hatsell.
For K is king.
For L is love. God in every language.
For M is musick and Hebrew מ [Hebrew character mem] is the direct
figure of God's harp.
For N is new.
For O is open.
For P is power.
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For Q is quick.
For R is right.
For S is soul.
For T is truth. God be gracious to Jermyn Pratt and to Harriote his Sister.
For U is unity, and his right name is Uve to work it double.
For W is word.
For X [drawn as a backwards G and a G stuck together] is hope -- consisting of
two check G -- God be gracious to Anne Hope.
For Y is yea. God be gracious to Eennet and his family!
For Z is zeal.
For in the education of children it is necessary to watch the words, -which they
pronounce with difficulty, for such are against them in their consequences.
For A is awe, if pronounced full. Stand in awe and sin not.
For B pronounced in the animal is bey importing authority.
For C pronounced hard is ke importing to shut.
For D pronounced full is day.
For E is east particularly when formed little e with his eye.
For F in it's secondary meaning is fair.
For G in a secondary sense is good.
For H is heave.
For I is the organ of vision.
For K is keep.
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For L is light, and ל [Hebrew character lamed] is the line of beauty.
For M is meet.
For N is nay.
For O is over.
For P is peace.
For Q is quarter.
For R is rain, or thus reign, or thus rein.
For S is save.
For T is take.
For V is veil.
For W is world.
For X [drawn as a backwards G and a G stuck together] beginneth not, but
connects and continues.
For Y is young -- the Lord direct me in the better way of going on in the Fifth
year of my jeopardy June the 17th N.S. 1760. God be gracious to Dr YOUNG.
For Z is zest. God give us all a relish of our duty.
For Action and Speaking are one according to God and the Ancients.
For the approaches of Death are by illumination.
For a man cannot have Publick Spirit, who is void of private benevolence.
For the order of Alamoth is first three, second six, third eighteen, fourth fifty
four, and then the whole band.
For the order of Sheminith is first ten, second twenty, third thirty and then the
whole band.
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For the first entrance into Heaven is by complement.
For Flowers can see, and Pope's Carnations knew him.
For the devil works upon damps and lowth and causes agues.
For Ignorance is a sin, because illumination is to be had by prayer.
For many a genius being lost at the plough is a false thought -- the divine
providence is a better manager.
For a man's idleness is the fruit of the adversary's diligence.
For diligence is the gift of God, as well as other good things.
For it is a good NOTHING in one's own eyes and in the eyes of fools.
For æra in its primitive sense is but a weed amongst corn.
For there is no knowing of times and seasons, in submitting them to God stands
the Christian's Chronology.
For Jacob's brown sheep wore the Golden fleece.
For Shaving of the face was the invention of the Sodomites to make men look
like women.
~ Christopher Smart,#NFDB
115: XXI - WALPURGIS-NIGHT
THE HARTZ MOUNTAINS.
District of Schierke and Elend.
FAUST MEPHISTOPHELES
MEPHISTOPHELES
DOST thou not wish a broomstick-steed's assistance?
The sturdiest he-goat I would gladly see:
The way we take, our goal is yet some distance.
FAUST
So long as in my legs I feel the fresh existence.
This knotted staff suffices me.
What need to shorten so the way?
Along this labyrinth of vales to wander,
Then climb the rocky ramparts yonder,
Wherefrom the fountain flings eternal spray,
Is such delight, my steps would fain delay.
The spring-time stirs within the fragrant birches,
And even the fir-tree feels it now:
Should then our limbs escape its gentle searches?
MEPHISTOPHELES
I notice no such thing, I vow!
'Tis winter still within my body:
Upon my path I wish for frost and snow.
How sadly rises, incomplete and ruddy,
The moon's lone disk, with its belated glow,
And lights so dimly, that, as one advances,
At every step one strikes a rock or tree!
Let us, then, use a Jack-o'-lantern's glances:
I see one yonder, burning merrily.
Ho, there! my friend! I'll levy thine attendance:
Why waste so vainly thy resplendence?
Be kind enough to light us up the steep!
WILL-O'-THE-WISP
My reverence, I hope, will me enable
To curb my temperament unstable;
For zigzag courses we are wont to keep.
MEPHISTOPHELES
Indeed? he'd like mankind to imitate!
Now, in the Devil's name, go straight,
Or I'll blow out his being's flickering spark!
WILL-O'-THE-WISP
You are the master of the house, I mark,
And I shall try to serve you nicely.
But then, reflect: the mountain's magic-mad to-day,
And if a will-o'-the-wisp must guide you on the way,
You mustn't take things too precisely.
FAUST, MEPHISTOPHELES, WILL-O'-THE-WISP
(in alternating song)
We, it seems, have entered newly
In the sphere of dreams enchanted.
Do thy bidding, guide us truly,
That our feet be forwards planted
In the vast, the desert spaces!
See them swiftly changing places,
Trees on trees beside us trooping,
And the crags above us stooping,
And the rocky snouts, outgrowing,
Hear them snoring, hear them blowing!
O'er the stones, the grasses, flowing
Stream and streamlet seek the hollow.
Hear I noises? songs that follow?
Hear I tender love-petitions?
Voices of those heavenly visions?
Sounds of hope, of love undying!
And the echoes, like traditions
Of old days, come faint and hollow.
Hoo-hoo! Shoo-hoo! Nearer hover
Jay and screech-owl, and the plover,
Are they all awake and crying?
Is't the salamander pushes,
Bloated-bellied, through the bushes?
And the roots, like serpents twisted,
Through the sand and boulders toiling,
Fright us, weirdest links uncoiling
To entrap us, unresisted:
Living knots and gnarls uncanny
Feel with polypus-antennae
For the wanderer. Mice are flying,
Thousand-colored, herd-wise hieing
Through the moss and through the heather!
And the fire-flies wink and darkle,
Crowded swarms that soar and sparkle,
And in wildering escort gather!
Tell me, if we still are standing,
Or if further we're ascending?
All is turning, whirling, blending,
Trees and rocks with grinning faces,
Wandering lights that spin in mazes,
Still increasing and expanding!
MEPHISTOPHELES
Grasp my skirt with heart undaunted!
Here a middle-peak is planted,
Whence one seeth, with amaze,
Mammon in the mountain blaze.
FAUST
How strangely glimmers through the hollows
A dreary light, like that of dawn!
Its exhalation tracks and follows
The deepest gorges, faint and wan.
Here steam, there rolling vapor sweepeth;
Here burns the glow through film and haze:
Now like a tender thread it creepeth,
Now like a fountain leaps and plays.
Here winds away, and in a hundred
Divided veins the valley braids:
There, in a corner pressed and sundered,
Itself detaches, spreads and fades.
Here gush the sparkles incandescent
Like scattered showers of golden sand;
But, see! in all their height, at present,
The rocky ramparts blazing stand.
Under the old ribs of the rock retreating
Under the old ribs of the rock retreating
MEPHISTOPHELES
Has not Sir Mammon grandly lighted
His palace for this festal night?
'Tis lucky thou hast seen the sight;
The boisterous guests approach that were invited.
FAUST
How raves the tempest through the air!
With what fierce blows upon my neck 'tis beating!
MEPHISTOPHELES
Under the old ribs of the rock retreating,
Hold fast, lest thou be hurled down the abysses there!
The night with the mist is black;
Hark! how the forests grind and crack!
Frightened, the owlets are scattered:
Hearken! the pillars are shattered.
The evergreen palaces shaking!
Boughs are groaning and breaking,
The tree-trunks terribly thunder,
The roots are twisting asunder!
In frightfully intricate crashing
Each on the other is dashing,
And over the wreck-strewn gorges
The tempest whistles and surges!
Hear'st thou voices higher ringing?
Far away, or nearer singing?
Yes, the mountain's side along,
Sweeps an infuriate glamouring song!
WITCHES (in chorus)
The witches ride to the Brocken's top,
The stubble is yellow, and green the crop.
There gathers the crowd for carnival:
Sir Urian sits over all.
And so they go over stone and stock;
The witch she-s, and-s the buck.
A VOICE
Alone, old Baubo's coming now;
She rides upon a farrow-sow.
CHORUS
Then honor to whom the honor is due!
Dame Baubo first, to lead the crew!
A tough old sow and the mother thereon,
Then follow the witches, every one.
A VOICE
Which way com'st thou hither?
VOICE
O'er the Ilsen-stone.
I peeped at the owl in her nest alone:
How she stared and glared!
VOICE
Betake thee to Hell!
Why so fast and so fell?
VOICE
She has scored and has flayed me:
See the wounds she has made me!
WITCHES (chorus)
The way is wide, the way is long:
See, what a wild and crazy throng!
The broom it scratches, the fork it thrusts,
The child is stifled, the mother bursts.
WIZARDS (semichorus)
As doth the snail in shell, we crawl:
Before us go the women all.
When towards the Devil's House we tread,
Woman's a thousand steps ahead.
OTHER SEMICHORUS
We do not measure with such care:
Woman in thousand steps is theft.
But howsoe'er she hasten may,
Man in one leap has cleared the way.
VOICE (from above)
Come on, come on, from Rocky Lake!
VOICE (from below)
Aloft we'd fain ourselves betake.
We've washed, and are bright as ever you will,
Yet we're eternally sterile still.
BOTH CHORUSES
The wind is hushed, the star shoots by.
The dreary moon forsakes the sky;
The magic notes, like spark on spark,
Drizzle, whistling through the dark.
VOICE (from below)
Halt, there! Ho, there!
VOICE (from above)
Who calls from the rocky cleft below there?
VOICE (below)
Take me, too! take me, too!
I'm climbing now three hundred years,
And yet the summit cannot see:
Among my equals I would be.
BOTH CHORUSES
Bears the broom and bears the stock,
Bears the fork and bears the buck:
Who cannot raise himself to-night
Is evermore a ruined wight.
HALF-WITCH (below)
So long I stumble, ill bestead,
And the others are now so far ahead!
At home I've neither rest nor cheer,
And yet I cannot gain them here.
CHORUS OF WITCHES
To cheer the witch will salve avail;
A rag will answer for a sail;
Each trough a goodly ship supplies;
He ne'er will fly, who now not flies.
BOTH CHORUSES
When round the summit whirls our flight,
Then lower, and on the ground alight;
And far and wide the heather press
With witchhood's swarms of wantonness!
(They settle down.)
MEPHISTOPHELES
They crowd and push, they roar and clatter!
They whirl and whistle, pull and chatter!
They shine, and spirt, and stink, and burn!
The true witch-element we learn.
Keep close! or we are parted, in our turn,
Where art thou?
FAUST (in the distance)
Here!
MEPHISTOPHELES
What! whirled so far astray?
Then house-right I must use, and clear the way.
Make room! Squire Voland comes! Room, gentle rabble,
room!
Here, Doctor, hold to me: in one jump we'll resume
An easier space, and from the crowd be free:
It's too much, even for the like of me.
Yonder, with special light, there's something shining clearer
Within those bushes; I've a mind to see.
Come on! we'll slip a little nearer.
FAUST
Spirit of Contradiction! On! I'll follow straight.
'Tis planned most wisely, if I judge aright:
We climb the Brocken's top in the Walpurgis-Night,
That arbitrarily, here, ourselves we isolate.
MEPHISTOPHELES
But see, what motley flames among the heather!
There is a lively club together:
In smaller circles one is not alone.
FAUST
Better the summit, I must own:
There fire and whirling smoke I see.
They seek the Evil One in wild confusion:
Many enigmas there might find solution.
MEPHISTOPHELES
But there enigmas also knotted be.
Leave to the multitude their riot!
Here will we house ourselves in quiet.
It is an old, transmitted trade,
That in the greater world the little worlds are made.
I see stark-nude young witches congregate,
And old ones, veiled and hidden shrewdly:
On my account be kind, nor treat them rudely!
The trouble's small, the fun is great.
I hear the noise of instruments attuning,
Vile din! yet one must learn to bear the crooning.
Come, come along! It must be, I declare!
I'll go ahead and introduce thee there,
Thine obligation newly earning.
That is no little space: what say'st thou, friend?
Look yonder! thou canst scarcely see the end:
A hundred fires along the ranks are burning.
They dance, they chat, they cook, they drink, they court:
Now where, just tell me, is there better sport?
FAUST
Wilt thou, to introduce us to the revel,
Assume the part of wizard or of devil?
MEPHISTOPHELES
I'm mostly used, 'tis true, to go incognito,
But on a gala-day one may his orders show.
The Garter does not deck my suit,
But honored and at home is here the cloven foot.
Perceiv'st thou yonder snail? It cometh, slow and steady;
So delicately its feelers pry,
That it hath scented me already:
I cannot here disguise me, if I try.
But come! we'll go from this fire to a newer:
I am the go-between, and thou the wooer.
(To some, who are sitting around dying embers:)
Old gentlemen, why at the outskirts? Enter!
I'd praise you if I found you snugly in the centre,
With youth and revel round you like a zone:
You each, at home, are quite enough alone.
GENERAL
Say, who would put his trust in nations,
Howe'er for them one may have worked and planned?
For with the people, as with women,
Youth always has the upper hand.
MINISTER
They're now too far from what is just and sage.
I praise the old ones, not unduly:
When we were all-in-all, then, truly,
Then was the real golden age.
PARVENU
We also were not stupid, either,
And what we should not, often did;
But now all things have from their bases slid,
Just as we meant to hold them fast together.
AUTHOR
Who, now, a work of moderate sense will read?
Such works are held as antiquate and mossy;
And as regards the younger folk, indeed,
They never yet have been so pert and saucy.
MEPHISTOPHELES
(who all at once appears very old)
I feel that men are ripe for Judgment-Day,
Now for the last time I've the witches'-hill ascended:
Since to the lees my cask is drained away,
The world's, as well, must soon be ended.
HUCKSTER-WITCH
Ye gentlemen, don't pass me thus!
Let not the chance neglected be!
Behold my wares attentively:
The stock is rare and various.
And yet, there's nothing I've collected
No shop, on earth, like this you'll find!
Which has not, once, sore hurt inflicted
Upon the world, and on mankind.
No dagger's here, that set not blood to flowing;
No cup, that hath not once, within a healthy frame
Poured speedy death, in poison glowing:
No gems, that have not brought a maid to shame;
No sword, but severed ties for the unwary,
Or from behind struck down the adversary.
MEPHISTOPHELES
Gossip! the times thou badly comprehendest:
What's done has happedwhat haps, is done!
'Twere better if for novelties thou sendest:
By such alone can we be won.
FAUST
Let me not lose myself in all this pother!
This is a fair, as never was another!
MEPHISTOPHELES
The whirlpool swirls to get above:
Thou'rt shoved thyself, imagining to shove.
FAUST
But who is that?
MEPHISTOPHELES
Note her especially,
Tis Lilith.
FAUST
Who?
MEPHISTOPHELES
Adam's first wife is she.
Beware the lure within her lovely tresses,
The splendid sole adornment of her hair!
When she succeeds therewith a youth to snare,
Not soon again she frees him from her jesses.
FAUST
Those two, the old one with the young one sitting,
They've danced already more than fitting.
MEPHISTOPHELES
No rest to-night for young or old!
They start another dance: come now, let us take hold!
FAUST (dancing with the young witch)
A lovely dream once came to me;
I then beheld an apple-tree,
And there two fairest apples shone:
They lured me so, I climbed thereon.
THE FAIR ONE
Apples have been desired by you,
Since first in Paradise they grew;
And I am moved with joy, to know
That such within my garden grow.
MEPHISTOPHELES (dancing with the old one)
A dissolute dream once came to me:
Therein I saw a cloven tree,
Which had a;
Yet,as 'twas, I fancied it.
THE OLD ONE
I offer here my best salute
Unto the knight with cloven foot!
Let him aprepare,
If himdoes not scare.
PROKTOPHANTASMIST
Accursd folk! How dare you venture thus?
Had you not, long since, demonstration
That ghosts can't stand on ordinary foundation?
And now you even dance, like one of us!
THE FAIR ONE (dancing)
Why does he come, then, to our ball?
FAUST (dancing)
O, everywhere on him you fall!
When others dance, he weighs the matter:
If he can't every step bechatter,
Then 'tis the same as were the step not made;
But if you forwards go, his ire is most displayed.
If you would whirl in regular gyration
As he does in his dull old mill,
He'd show, at any rate, good-will,
Especially if you heard and heeded his hortation.
PROKTOPHANTASMIST
You still are here? Nay, 'tis a thing unheard!
Vanish, at once! We've said the enlightening word.
The pack of devils by no rules is daunted:
We are so wise, and yet is Tegel haunted.
To clear the folly out, how have I swept and stirred!
Twill ne'er be clean: why, 'tis a thing unheard!
THE FAIR ONE
Then cease to bore us at our ball!
PROKTOPHANTASMIST
I tell you, spirits, to your face,
I give to spirit-despotism no place;
My spirit cannot practise it at all.
(The dance continues)
Naught will succeed, I see, amid such revels;
Yet something from a tour I always save,
And hope, before my last step to the grave,
To overcome the poets and the devils.
MEPHISTOPHELES
He now will seat him in the nearest puddle;
The solace this, whereof he's most assured:
And when upon his rump the leeches hang and fuddle,
He'll be of spirits and of Spirit cured.
(To FAUST, who has left the dance:)
Wherefore forsakest thou the lovely maiden,
That in the dance so sweetly sang?
FAUST
Ah! in the midst of it there sprang
A red mouse from her mouthsufficient reason.
MEPHISTOPHELES
That's nothing! One must not so squeamish be;
So the mouse was not gray, enough for thee.
Who'd think of that in love's selected season?
FAUST
Then saw I.
MEPHISTOPHELES
What?
FAUST
Mephisto, seest thou there,
Alone and far, a girl most pale and fair?
She falters on, her way scarce knowing,
As if with fettered feet that stay her going.
I must confess, it seems to me
As if my kindly Margaret were she.
MEPHISTOPHELES
Let the thing be! All thence have evil drawn:
It is a magic shape, a lifeless eidolon.
Such to encounter is not good:
Their blank, set stare benumbs the human blood,
And one is almost turned to stone.
Medusa's tale to thee is known.
FAUST
Forsooth, the eyes they are of one whom, dying,
No hand with loving pressure closed;
That is the breast whereon I once was lying,
The body sweet, beside which I reposed!
MEPHISTOPHELES
Tis magic all, thou fool, seduced so easily!
Unto each man his love she seems to be.
FAUST
The woe, the rapture, so ensnare me,
That from her gaze I cannot tear me!
And, strange! around her fairest throat
A single scarlet band is gleaming,
No broader than a knife-blade seeming!
MEPHISTOPHELES
Quite right! The mark I also note.
Her head beneath her arm she'll sometimes carry;
Twas Perseus lopped it, her old adversary.
Thou crav'st the same illusion still!
Come, let us mount this little hill;
The Prater shows no livelier stir,
And, if they've not bewitched my sense,
I verily see a theatre.
What's going on?
SERVIBILIS
'Twill shortly recommence:
A new performance'tis the last of seven.
To give that number is the custom here:
'Twas by a Dilettante written,
And Dilettanti in the parts appear.
That now I vanish, pardon, I entreat you!
As Dilettante I the curtain raise.
MEPHISTOPHELES
When I upon the Blocksberg meet you,
I find it good: for that's your proper place.
Faust
~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, WALPURGIS-NIGHT
,#NFDB
116:ON OLD AND NEW TABLETS
I
Here I sit and wait, surrounded by broken old
tablets and new tablets half covered with writing. When
will my hour come? The hour of my going down and
going under; for I want to go among men once more.
For that I am waiting now, for first the signs must
come to me that my hour has come: the laughing lion
with the flock of doves. Meanwhile I talk to myself as
one who has time. Nobody tells me anything new: so
I tell myself-myself.
2
When I came to men I found them sitting on an old
conceit: the conceit that they have long known what
is good and evil for man. All talk of virtue seemed an
old and weary matter to man; and whoever wanted to
sleep well still talked of good and evil before going to
sleep.
I disturbed this sleepiness when I taught: what is
good and evil no one knows yet, unless it be he who
creates. He, however, creates man's goal and gives the
earth its meaning and its future. That anything at all
is good and evil-that is his creation.
And I bade them overthrow their old academic
chairs and wherever that old conceit had sat; I bade
them laugh at their great masters of virtue and saints
and poets and world-redeemers. I bade them laugh at
their gloomy sages and at whoever had at any time sat
on the tree of life like a black scarecrow. I sat down by
their great tomb road among cadavers and vultures,
and I laughed at all their past and its rotting, decaying
glory.
197
Verily, like preachers of repentance and fools, I
raised a hue and cry of wrath over what among them
is great and small, and that their best is still so small.
And that their greatest evil too is still so small-at
that I laughed.
My wise longing cried and laughed thus out of me
-born in the mountains, verily, a wild wisdom-my
great broad-winged longing! And often it swept me
away and up and far, in the middle of my laughter; and
I flew, quivering, an arrow, through sun-drunken delight, away into distant futures which no dream had yet
seen, into hotter souths than artists ever dreamed of,
where gods in their dances are ashamed of all clothesto speak in parables and to limp and stammer like
poets; and verily, I am ashamed that I must still be a
poet.
Where all becoming seemed to me the dance of gods
and the prankishness of gods, and the world seemed
free and frolicsome and as if fleeing back to itself-as
an eternal fleeing and seeking each other again of many
gods, as the happy controverting of each other, conversing again with each other, and converging again
of many gods.
Where all time seemed to me a happy mockery of
moments, where necessity was freedom itself playing
happily with the sting of freedom.
Where I also found again my old devil and archenemy, the spirit of gravity, and all that he created:
constraint, statute, necessity and consequence and purpose and will and good and evil.
For must there not be that over which one dances
and dances away? For the sake of the light and the
lightest, must there not be moles and grave dwarfs?
198
3
There it was too that I picked up the word "overman" by the way, and that man is something that must
be overcome-that man is a bridge and no end: proclaiming himself blessed in view of his noon and
evening, as the way to new dawns-Zarathustra's word
of the great noon, and whatever else I hung up over
man like the last crimson light of evening.
Verily, I also let them see new stars along with new
nights; and over clouds and day and night I still spread
out laughter as a colorful tent.
I taught them all my creating and striving, to create
and carry together into One what in man is fragment
and riddle and dreadful accident; as creator, guesser of
riddles, and redeemer of accidents, I taught them to
work on the future and to redeem with their creation
all that has been. To redeem what is past in man and
to re-create all "it was" until the will says, "Thus I
willed itl Thus I shall will it"-this I called redemption
and this alone I taught them to call redemption.
Now I wait for my own redemption-that I may go
to them for the last time. For I want to go to men
once more; under their eyes I want to go under; dying,
I want to give them my richest gift. From the sun I
learned this: when he goes down, overrich; he pours
gold into the sea out of inexhaustible riches, so that
even the poorest fisherman still rows with golden oars.
For this I once saw and I did not tire of my tears as I
watched it.
Like the sun, Zarathustra too wants to go under; now
he sits here and waits, surrounded by broken old tablets
and new tablets half covered with writing.
199
4
Behold, here is a new tablet; but where are my
brothers to carry it down with me to the valley and
into hearts of flesh?
Thus my great love of the farthest demands it: do
not spare your neighbor! Man is something that must
be overcome.
There are many ways of overcoming: see to that
yourself! But only a jester thinks: "Man can also be
skipped over.'
Overcome yourself even in your neighbor: and a
right that you can rob you should not accept as a gift.
What you do, nobody can do to you in turn. Behold,
there is no retri bution.
He who cannot comm and himself should obey. And
many can comm and themselves, but much is still lacking before they also obey themselves.
5
This is the manner of noble souls: they do not want
to have anything for nothing; least of all, life. Whoever
is of the mob wants to live for nothing; we others,
however, to whom life gave itself, we always think
about what we might best give in return. And verily,
that is a noble speech which says, "What life promises
us, we ourselves want to keep to life."
One shall not wish to enjoy where one does not give
joy. And one shall not wish to enjoy For enjoyment and
innocence are the most bashful things: both do not want
to be sought. One shall possess them-but rather seek
even guilt and suffering.
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6
My brothers, the firstling is always sacrificed. We,
however, are firstlings. All of us bleed at secret sacrificial altars; all of us burn and roast in honor of old
idols. What is best in us is still young: that attracts old
palates. Our flesh is tender, our hide is a mere lambskin: how could we fail to attract old idol-priests? Even
in ourselves the old idol-priest still lives who roasts
what is best in us for his feast. Alas, my brothers, how
could firstlings fail to be sacrifices?
But thus our kind wants it; and I love those who do
not want to preserve themselves. Those who are going
under I love with my whole love: for they cross over.
7
To be true-only a few are able! And those who are
still lack the will. But the good have this ability least
of all. Oh, these good men! Good men never speak the
truth; for the spirit, to be good in this way is a disease.
They give in, these good men; they give themselves up;
their heart repeats and their ground obeys: but whoever
heeds commands does not heed himself.
Everything that the good call evil must come together
so that one truth may be born. 0 my brothers, are you
evil enough for this truth? The audacious daring, the
long mistrust, the cruel No, the disgust, the cutting into
the living-how rarely does all this come together. But
from such seed is truth begotten.
Alongside the bad conscience, all science has grown
so far. Break, break, you lovers of knowledge, the old
tablets
201
8
When the water is spanned by planks, when bridges
and railings leap over the river, verily, those are not
believed who say, "Everything is in flux." Even the
blockheads contradict them. "How now?" say the blockheads. "Everything should be in flux? After all, planks
and railings are over the river. Whatever is over the
river is firm; all the values of things, the bridges, the
concepts, all 'good' and 'evil'-all that is firm."
But when the hard winter comes, the river-animal
tamer, then even the most quick-witted learn mistrust;
and verily, not only the blockheads then say, "Does not
everything stand still?"
"At bottom everything stands still"-that is truly a
winter doctrine, a good thing for sterile times, a fine
comfort for hibernators and hearth-squatters.
"At bottom everything stands still"-against this the
thawing wind preaches. The thawing wind, a bull
that is no plowing bull, a raging bull, a destroyer who
breaks the ice with wrathful horns. Ice, however, breaks
bridges
O my brothers, is not everything in flux now? Have
not all railings and bridges fallen into the water? Who
could still cling to "good" and "evil"?
"Woe to us! Hail to usl The thawing wind blows!"thus preach in every street, my brothers.
9
There is an old illusion, which is called good and evil.
So far the wheel of this illusion has revolved around
soothsayers and stargazers. Once man believed in soothsayers and stargazers, and therefore believed: "All is
destiny: you ought to, for you must."
Then man again mistrusted all soothsayers and star-
202
gazers, and therefore believed: "All is freedom: you
can, for you will."
0 my brothers, so far there have been only illusions
about stars and the future, not knowledge; and therefore there have been only illusions so far, not knowledge, about good and evil.
10
"Thou shalt not rob! Thou shalt not kill" Such words
were once called holy; one bent the knee and head and
took off one's shoes before them. But I ask you: where
have there ever been better robbers and killers in this
world than such holy words?
Is there not in all life itself robbing and killing? And
that such words were called holy-was not truth itself
killed thereby? Or was it the preaching of death that
was called holy, which contradicted and contravened all
life? 0 my brothers, break, break the old tablets!
11
This is my pity for all that is past: I see how all of
it is abandoned-abandoned to the pleasure, the spirit,
the madness: of every generation, which comes along
and reinterprets all that has been as a bridge to itself.
A great despot might come along, a shrewd monster
who, according to his pleasure and displeasure, might
constrain and strain all that is past till it becomes a
bridge to him, a harbinger and herald and cockcrow.
This, however, is the other danger and what prompts
my further pity: whoever is of the rabble, thinks back
as far as the grandfa ther; with the grandfa ther, however, time ends.
Thus all that is past is abandoned: for one day the
rabble might become master and drown all time in
shallow waters.
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Therefore, my brothers, a new nobility is needed to
be the adversary of all rabble and of all that is despotic
and to write anew upon new tablets the word "noble."
For many who are noble are needed, and noble men
of many kinds, that there may be a nobility. Or as I
once said in a parable: "Precisely this is godlike that
there are gods, but no God."
12
0 my brothers, I dedicate and direct you to a new
nobility: you shall become procreators and cultivators
and sowers of the future-verily, not to a nobility that
you might buy like shopkeepers and with shopkeepers'
gold: for whatever has its price has little value.
Not whence you come shall henceforth constitute
your honor, but whither you are going Your will and
your foot which has a will to go over and beyond yourselves-that shall constitute your new honor.
Verily, not that you have served a prince-what do
princes matter now?-or that you became a bulwark
for what stands that it might stand more firmly.
Not that your tribe has become courtly at court and
that you have learned, like a flamingo, to stand for long
hours in a colorful costume in shallow ponds-for the
ability to stand is meritorious among courtiers; and all
courtiers believe that blessedness after death must comprise permission to sit.
Nor that a spirit which they call holy led your ancestors into promised lands, which I do not praise-for
where the worst of all trees grew, the cross, that land
deserves no praise. And verily, wherever this "Holy
Spirit" led his knights, on all such crusades goose aids
goat in leading the way, and the contrary and crude
sailed foremost.
0 my brothers, your nobility should not look back-
204
ward but ahead! Exiles shall you be from all father- and
forefa ther-landsl Your children's land shall you love:
this love shall be your new nobility-the undiscovered
land in the most distant sea. For that I bid your sails
search and search.
In your children you shall make up for being the
children of your fathers: thus shall you redeem all that
is past. This new tablet I place over you.
13
"Why live? All is vanity Living-that is threshing
straw; living-that is consuming oneself in flames without becoming warm." Such antiquarian babbling is still
considered "wisdom"; it is honored all the more for
being old and musty. Mustiness too ennobles.
Children might speak thus: they fear the fire because it burned them. There is much childishness in
the old books of wisdom. And why should those who
always "thresh straw" be allowed to blaspheme threshing? Such oxen should be muzzled after all.
Such men sit down to the table and bring nothing
along, not even a good appetite; and then they blaspheme: "All is vanity." But eating and drinking well, 0
my brothers, is verily no vain art. Break, break the old
tablets of the never gay!
14
"To the clean all is clean," the people say. But I say
unto you, "To the mean all becomes mean."
Therefore the swooners and head-hangers, whose
hearts also hang limply, preach, "The world itself is a
filthy monster." For all these have an unclean spirit but especially those who have neither rest nor repose
except when they see the world from abaft, the afterworldly. To these I say to their faces, even though it
205
may not sound nice: the world is like man in having
a backside abaft; that much is true. There is much
filth in the world; that much is true. But that does not
make the world itself a filthy monster.
There is wisdom in this, that there is much in the
world that smells foul: nausea itself creates wings and
water-divining powers. Even in the best there is still
something that nauseates; and even the best is something that must be overcome. 0 my brothers, there is
much wisdom in this, that there is much filth in the
world.
15
Such maxims I heard pious afterworldly people
speak to their conscience-verily, without treachery or
falseness, although there is nothing falser in the whole
world, nothing more treacherous:
'Let the world go its wayl Do not raise one finger
against it't
"Let him who wants to, strangle and stab and fleece
and flay the people. Do not raise one finger against itl
Thus will they learn to renounce the world."
"And your own reason-you yourself should stifle
and strangle it; for it is a reason of this world; thus
will you yourself learn to renounce the world."
Break, break, 0 my brothers, these old tablets of the
pious. Break the maxims of those who slander the
world.
i6
"Whoever learns much will unlearn all violent desire"
-that is whispered today in all the dark lanes.
"Wisdom makes weary; worth while is-nothing;
thou shalt not desire!"-this new tablet I found hanging even in the open market places.
206
Break, 0 my brothers, break this new tablet too.
The world-weary hung it up, and the preachers of
death, and also the jailers; for behold, it is also an
exhortation to bondage. Because they learned badly,
and the best things not at all, and everything too early
and everything too hastily; because they ate badly,
therefore they got upset stomachs; for their spirit is an
upset stomach which counsels death. For verily, my
brothers, the spirit is a stomach. Life is a well of joy;
but for those out of whom an upset stomach speaks,
which is the father of melancholy, all wells are poisoned.
To gain knowledge is a joy for the lion-willedl But
those who have become weary are themselves merely
being "willed," and all the billows play with them. And
this is always the manner of the weak: they get lost on
the way. And in the end their weariness still asks, "Why
did we ever pursue any way at all? It is all the same."
Their ears appreciate the preaching, "Nothing is worth
while! You shall not will!" Yet this is an exhortation to
bondage.
o my brothers, like a fresh roaring wind Zarathustra
comes to all who are weary of the way; many noses he
will yet make sneeze. Through walls too, my free breath
blows, and into prisons and imprisoned spirits. To will
liberates, for to will is to create: thus I teach. And you
shall learn solely in order to create.
And you shall first learn from me how to lear-how
to learn well. He that has ears to hear, let him hear
17
There stands the bark; over there perhaps the great
nothing lies. But who would embark on this "perhaps"?
No one of you wants to embark on the bark of death.
Why then do you want to be world-weary? Worldwearyl And you are not even removed from the earth.
207
Lusting after the earth I have always found you, in
love even with your own earth-weariness. Not for
nothing is your lip hanging; a little earthly wish still
sits on it. And in your eyes-does not a little cloud of
unforgotten earthly joy float there?
There are many good inventions on earth, some useful, some pleasing: for their sake, the earth is to be
loved. And there is such a variety of well-invented
things that the earth is like the breasts of a woman:
useful as well as pleasing.
But you who are world-weary, you who are earthlazy, you should be lashed with switches: with lashes
one should make your legs sprightly again. For when
you are not invalids and decrepit wretches of whom the
earth is weary, you are shrewd sloths or sweet-toothed,
sneaky pleasure-cats. And if you do not want to run
again with pleasure, then you should pass away. To
the incurable, one should not try to be a physicianthus Zarathustra teaches-so you shall pass awayl
But it takes more courage to make an end than to
make a new verse: all physicians and poets know that.
18
o my brothers, there are tablets created by weariness
and tablets created by rotten, rotting sloth; but though
they speak alike, they must be understood differently.
Behold this man languishing here He is but one span
from his goal, but out of weariness he has defiantly
lain down in the dust-this courageous man! Out of
weariness he yawns at the way and the earth and the
goal and himself: not one step farther will he go-this
courageous man! Now the sun glows on him and the
dogs lick his sweat; but he lies there in his defiance
and would sooner die of thirst-die of thirst one span
away from his goal Verily, you will yet have to drag
208
him by the hair into his heaven-this herol Better yet,
let him lie where he lay down, and let sleep, the comforter, come to him with cooling, rushing rain. Let him
lie till he awakes by himself, till he renounces by himself all weariness and whatever weariness taught through
him. Only, my brothers, drive the dogs away from him,
the lazy creepers, and all the ravenous vermin-all the
raving vermin of the "educated," who feast on every
hero's sweat.
19
I draw circles around me and sacred boundaries;
fewer and fewer men climb with me on ever higher
mountains: I am building a mountain range out of ever
more sacred mountains. But wherever you may climb
with me, 0 my brothers, see to it that no parasite
climbs with you. Parasites: creeping, cringing worms
which would batten on your secret sores. And this is
their art, that they find where climbing souls are weary;
in your grief and discouragement, in your tender parts,
they build their nauseating nests. Where the strong are
weak and the noble all-too-soft-there they build their
nauseating nests: the parasites live where the great have
little secret sores.
What is the highest species of all being and what is
the lowest? The parasite is the lowest species; but whoever is of the highest species will nourish the most
parasites. For the soul that has the longest ladder and
reaches down deepest-how should the most parasites
not sit on that? The most comprehensive soul, which
can run and stray and roam farthest within itself; the
most necessary soul, which out of sheer joy plunges itself into chance; the soul which, having being, dives
into becoming; the soul which has, but wants to want
and will; the soul which flees itself and catches up with
209
itself in the widest circle; the wisest soul, which folly
exhorts most sweetly; the soul which loves itself most,
in which all things have their sweep and countersweep
and ebb and flood-oh, how should the highest soul
not have the worst parasites?
20
0 my brothers, am I cruel? But I say: what is falling,
we should still push. Everything today falls and decays:
who would check it? But I-I even want to push it.
Do you know the voluptuous delight which rolls
stones into steep depths? These human beings of today-look at them, how they roll into my depth!
I am a prelude of better players, 0 my brothers! A
precedent! Follow my precedent
And he whom you cannot teach to fly, teach to fall
faster!
21
I love the valiant; but it is not enough to wield a
broadsword, one must also know against whom. And
often there is more valor when one refrains and passes
by, in order to save oneself for the worthier enemy.
You shall have only enemies who are to be hated,
but not enemies to be despised: you must be proud of
your enemy; thus I taught once before. For the worthier
enemy, 0 my friends, you shall save yourselves; therefore you must pass by much-especially much rabble
who raise a din in your ears about the people and about
peoples. Keep your eyes undefiled by their pro and
conl There is much justice, much injustice; and whoever
looks on becomes angry. Sighting and smiting here
become one; therefore go away into the woods and lay
your sword to sleep.
Go your own ways And let the people and peoples
210
go theirs-dark ways, verily, on which not a single hope
flashes any more. Let the shopkeeper rule where all that
still glitters is-shopkeepers' gold. The time of kings is
past: what calls itself a people today deserves no kings.
Look how these peoples are now like shopkeepers: they
pick up the smallest advantages from any rubbish. They
lie around lurking and spy around smirking-and call
that "being good neighbors." 0 blessed remote time
when a people would say to itself, "I want to be master
-over peoples." For, my brothers, the best should rule,
the best also want to rule. And where the doctrine is
different, there the best is lacking.
22
If those got free bread, alas! For what would they
clamor? Their sustenance-that is what sustains their
attention; and it should be hard for them. They are
beasts of prey: in their "work" there is still an element
of preying, in their "earning" still an element of overreaching. Therefore it should be hard for them. Thus
they should become better beasts of prey, subtler, more
prudent, more human; for man is the best beast of prey.
Man has already robbed all the beasts of their virtues,
for of all beasts man has had the hardest time. Only the
birds are still over and above him. And if man were to
learn to fly-woe, to what heights would his rapaciousness fly?
23
Thus I want man and woman: the one fit for war, the
other fit to give birth, but both fit to dance with head
and limbs. And we should consider every day lost on
which we have not danced at least once. And we should
call every truth false which was not accompanied by at
least one laugh.
211
24
Your wedlock: see to it that it not be a bad lock. If
you lock it too quickly, there follows wedlock-breaking:
adultery. And better even such wedlock-breaking than
wedlock-picking, wedlock-tricking. Thus said a woman
to me: "Indeed I committed adultery and broke my
wedlock, but first my wedlock broke me!"
The worst among the vengeful I always found to be
the ill-matched: they would make all the world pay fox
it that they no longer live singly.
Therefore I would have those who are honest say to
each other, "We love each other; let us see to it that we
remain in love. Or shall our promise be a mistake?"
"Give us a probation and a little marriage, so that we
may see whether we are fit for a big marriage. It is a
big thing always to be two."
Thus I counsel all who are honest; and what would
my love for the overman and for all who shall yet come
amount to if I counseled and spoke differently? Not
merely to reproduce, but to produce something higher
-toward that, my brothers, the garden of marriage
should help you.
25
Whoever has gained wisdom concerning ancient
origins will eventually look for wells of the future and
for new origins. 0 my brothers, it will not be overlong
before new peoples originate and new wells roar down
into new depths. For earthquakes bury many wells and
leave many languishing, but they also bring to light
inner powers and secrets. Earthquakes reveal new
wells. In earthquakes that strike ancient peoples, new
wells break open.
And whoever shouts, "Behold, a well for many who
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are thirsty, a heart for many who are longing, a will for
many instruments"-around that man there will gather
a people; that is: many triers.
Who can command, who must obey-that is tried out
there. Alas, with what long trials and surmises and unpleasant surprises and learning and retrials!
Human society is a trial: thus I teach it-a long trial;
and what it tries to find is the commander. A trial, 0 my
brothers, and not a "contract." Break, break this word
of the softhearted and half-and-halfl
26
o
my brothers, who represents the greatest danger
for all of man's future? Is it not the good and the just?
Inasmuch as they say and feel in their hearts, "We already know what is good and just, and we have it too;
woe unto those who still seek here" And whatever harm
the evil may do, the harm done by the good is the most
harmful harm. And whatever harm those do who slander the world, the harm done by the good is the most
harmful harm.
o my brothers, one man once saw into the hearts of
the good and the just and said, "They are the pharisees." But he was not understood. The good and the
just themselves were not permitted to understand him:
their spirit is imprisoned in their good conscience. The
stupidity of the good is unfathomably shrewd. This,
however, is the truth: the good must be pharisees they have no choice. The good must crucify him who
invents his own virtue. That is the truth
The second one, however, who discovered their land
-the land, heart, and soil of the good and the justwas he who asked, "Whom do they hate most?" The
creator they hate most: he breaks tablets and old values.
He is a breaker, they call him lawbreaker. For the good
are unable to create; they are always the beginning of
the end: they crucify him who writes new values on
new tablets; they sacrifice the future to themselves they crucify all man's future.
The good have always been the beginning of the end.
27
O my brothers, have you really understood this word?
And what I once said concerning the 'last man"? Who
represents the greatest danger for all of man's future?
Is it not the good and the just? Break, break the good
and the just! 0 my brothers, have you really understood
this word?
28
You flee from me? You are frightened? You tremble
at this word?
o my brothers, when I bade you break the good and
the tablets of the good, only then did I embark man on
his high sea. And only now does there come to him the
great fright, the great looking-around, the great sickness, the great nausea, the great seasickness.
False coasts and false assurances the good have
taught you; in the lies of the good you were hatched
and huddled. Everything has been made fraudulent and
has been twisted through and through by the good.
But he who discovered the land "man," also discovered the land "man's future." Now you shall be seafarers, valiant and patient. Walk upright betimes, 0 my
brothers; learn to walk upright. The sea is raging; many
want to right themselves again with your help. The sea
is raging; everything is in the sea. Well then, old sea
dogs What of fatherland? Our helm steers us toward
our children's land Out there, stormier than the sea,
storms our great longingly
214
29
"Why so hard?" the kitchen coal once said to the
diamond. "After all, are we not close kin?"
Why so soft? 0 my brothers, thus I ask you: are you
not after all my brothers?
Why so soft, so pliant and yielding? Why is there so
much denial, self-denial, in your hearts? So little destiny
in your eyes?
And if you do not want to be destinies and inexorable
ones, how can you triumph with me?
And if your hardness does not wish to flash and cut
and cut through, how can you one day create with me?
For creators are hard. And it must seem blessedness
to you to impress your hand on millennia as on wax,
Blessedness to write on the will of millennia as on
bronze-harder than bronze, nobler than bronze. Only
the noblest is altoge ther hard.
This new tablet, 0 my brothers, I place over you:
become hard!
30
0 thou my will Thou cessation of all need, my own
necessity Keep me from all small victories! Thou destination of my soul, which I call destiny! Thou in-mel
Over-mel Keep me and save me for a great destiny
And thy last greatness, my will, save up for thy last
feat that thou mayest be inexorable in thy victory. Alas,
who was not vanquished in his victory? Alas, whose
eye would not darken in this drunken twilight? Alas,
whose foot would not reel in victory and forget how to
stand?
That I may one day be ready and ripe in the great
noon: as ready and ripe as glowing bronze, clouds
pregnant with lightning, and swelling milk udders-
215
ready for myself and my most hidden will: a bow lusting for its arrow, an arrow lusting for its star-a star
ready and ripe in its noon, glowing, pierced, enraptured
by annihilating sun arrows-a sun itself and an inexorable solar will, ready to annihilate in victory
O will, cessation of all need, my own necessity Save
me for a great victory!
Thus spoke Zarathustra.
~ Friedrich Nietzsche, ON OLD AND NEW TABLETS
,#NFDB
117:Jubilate Agno: Fragment B, Part 2
LET PETER rejoice with the MOON FISH who keeps up the life in the waters by
night.
Let Andrew rejoice with the Whale, who is array'd in beauteous blue and is a
combination of bulk and activity.
Let James rejoice with the Skuttle-Fish, who foils his foe by the effusion of his
ink.
Let John rejoice with Nautilus who spreads his sail and plies his oar, and the Lord
is his pilot.
Let Philip rejoice with Boca, which is a fish that can speak.
Let Bartholomew rejoice with the Eel, who is pure in proportion to where he is
found and how he is used.
Let Thomas rejoice with the Sword-Fish, whose aim is perpetual and strength
insuperable.
Let Matthew rejoice with Uranoscopus, whose eyes are lifted up to God.
Let James the less, rejoice with the Haddock, who brought the piece of money for
the Lord and Peter.
Let Jude bless with the Bream, who is of melancholy from his depth and serenity.
Let Simon rejoice with the Sprat, who is pure and innumerable.
Let Matthias rejoice with the Flying-Fish, who has a part with the birds, and is
sublimity in his conceit.
Let Stephen rejoice with Remora -- The Lord remove all obstacles to his glory.
Let Paul rejoice with the Scale, who is pleasant and faithful!, like God's good
ENGLISHMAN.
Let Agrippa, which is Agricola, rejoice with Elops, who is a choice fish.
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Let Joseph rejoice with the Turbut, whose capture makes the poor fisher-man
sing.
Let Mary rejoice with the Maid -- blessed be the name of the immaculate
CONCEPTION.
Let John, the Baptist, rejoice with the Salmon -- blessed be the name of the Lord
Jesus for infant Baptism.
Let Mark rejoice with the Mullet, who is John Dore, God be gracious to him and
his family.
Let Barnabus rejoice with the Herring -- God be gracious to the Lord's fishery.
Let Cleopas rejoice with the Mackerel, who cometh in a shoal after a leader.
Let Abiud of the Lord's line rejoice with Murex, who is good and of a precious
tincture.
Let Eliakim rejoice with the Shad, who is contemned in his abundance.
Let Azor rejoice with the Flounder, who is both of the sea and of the river,
Let Sadoc rejoice with the Bleak, who playeth upon the surface in the Sun.
Let Achim rejoice with the Miller's Thumb, who is a delicious morsel for the water
fowl.
Let Eliud rejoice with Cinaedus, who is a fish yellow all over.
Let Eleazar rejoice with the Grampus, who is a pompous spouter.
Let Matthan rejoice with the Shark, who is supported by multitudes of small
value.
Let Jacob rejoice with the Gold Fish, who is an eye-trap.
Let Jairus rejoice with the Silver Fish, who is bright and lively.
Let Lazarus rejoice with Torpedo, who chills the life of the assailant through his
staff.
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Let Mary Magdalen rejoice with the Place, whose goodness and purity are of the
Lord's making.
Let Simon the leper rejoice with the Eel-pout, who is a rarity on account of his
subtlety.
Let Alpheus rejoice with the Whiting, whom God hath bless'd in multitudes, and
his days are as the days of PURIM.
Let Onesimus rejoice with the Cod -- blessed be the name of the Lord Jesus for a
miraculous draught of men.
Let Joses rejoice with the Sturgeon, who saw his maker in the body and obtained
grace.
Let Theophilus rejoice with the Folio, who hath teeth, like the teeth of a saw.
Let Bartimeus rejoice with the Quaviver -- God be gracious to the eyes of him,
who prayeth for the blind.
Let CHRISTOPHER, who is Simon of Cyrene, rejoice with the Rough -- God be
gracious to the CAM and to DAVID CAM and his seed for ever.
Let Timeus rejoice with the Ling -- God keep the English Sailors clear of French
bribery.
Let Salome rejoice with the Mermaid, who hath the countenance and a portion of
human reason.
Let Zacharias rejoice with the Gudgeon, who improves in his growth till he is
mistaken.
Let Campanus rejoice with the Lobster -- God be gracious to all the CAMPBELLs
especially John.
Let Martha rejoice with the Skallop -- the Lord revive the exercise and excellence
of the Needle.
Let Mary rejoice with the Carp -- the ponds of Fairlawn and the garden bless for
the master.
58
Let Zebedee rejoice with the Tench -- God accept the good son for his parents
also.
Let Joseph of Arimathea rejoice with the Barbel -- a good coffin and a tombstone without grudging!
Let Elizabeth rejoice with the Crab -- it is good, at times, to go back.
Let Simeon rejoice with the Oyster, who hath the life without locomotion.
Let Jona rejoice with the Wilk -- Wilks, Wilkie, and Wilkinson bless the name of
the Lord Jesus.
Let Nicodemus rejoice with the Muscle, for so he hath provided for the poor.
Let Gamaliel rejoice with the Cockle -- I will rejoice in the remembrance of
mercy.
Let Agabus rejoice with the Smelt -- The Lord make me serviceable to the
HOWARDS.
Let Rhoda rejoice with the Sea-Cat, who is pleasantry and purity.
Let Elmodam rejoice with the Chubb, who is wary of the bait and thrives in his
circumspection.
Let Jorim rejoice with the Roach -- God bless my throat and keep me from things
stranggled.
Let Addi rejoice with the Dace -- It is good to angle with meditation.
Let Luke rejoice with the Trout -- Blessed be Jesus in Aa, in Dee and in Isis.
Let Cosam rejoice with the Perch, who is a little tyrant, because he is not liable to
that, which he inflicts.
Let Levi rejoice with the Pike -- God be merciful to all dumb creatures in respect
of pain.
Let Melchi rejoice with the Char, who cheweth the cud.
Let Joanna rejoice with the Anchovy -- I beheld and lo! 'a great multitude!
59
Let Neri rejoice with the Keeling Fish, who is also called the Stock Fish.
Let Janna rejoice with the Pilchard -- the Lord restore the seed of Abishai.
Let Esli rejoice with the Soal, who is flat and spackles for the increase of motion.
Let Nagge rejoice with the Perriwinkle -- 'for the rain it raineth every day.'
Let Anna rejoice with the Porpus, who is a joyous fish and of good omen.
Let Phanuel rejoice with the Shrimp, which is the childrens fishery.
Let Chuza rejoice with the Sea-Bear, who is full of sagacity and prank.
Let Susanna rejoice with the Lamprey, who is an eel with a title.
Let Candace rejoice with the Craw-fish -- How hath the Christian minister
renowned the Queen.
Let The Eunuch rejoice with the Thorn-Back -- It is good to be discovered reading
the BIBLE.
Let Simon the Pharisee rejoice with the Grigg -- the Lord bring up Issachar and
Dan.
Let Simon the converted Sorcerer rejoice with the Dab quoth Daniel.
Let Joanna, of the Lord's line, rejoice with the Minnow, who is multiplied against
the oppressor.
Let Jonas rejoice with the Sea-Devil, who hath a good name from his Maker.
Let Alexander rejoice with the Tunny -- the worse the time the better the
eternity.
Let Rufus rejoice with the Needle-fish, who is very good in his element.
Let Matthat rejoice with the Trumpet-fish -- God revive the blowing of the
TRUMPETS.
Let Mary, the mother of James, rejoice with the Sea-Mouse -- it is good to be at
60
peace.
Let Prochorus rejoice with Epodes, who is a kind of fish with Ovid who is at peace
in the Lord.
Let Timotheus rejoice with the Dolphin, who is of benevolence.
Let Nicanor rejoice with the Skeat -- Blessed be the name of the Lord Jesus in
fish and in the Shewbread, which ought to be continually on the altar, now more
than ever, and the want of it is the Abomination of Desolation spoken of by
Daniel.
Let Timon rejoice with Crusion -- The Shew-Bread in the first place is gratitude to
God to shew who is bread, whence it is, and that there is enough and to spare.
Let Parmenas rejoice with the Mixon -- Secondly it is to prevent the last
extremity, for it is lawful that rejected hunger may take it.
Let Dorcas rejoice with Dracunculus -- blessed be the name of the Lord Jesus in
the Grotto.
Let Tychicus rejoice with Scolopendra, who quits himself of the hook by voiding
his intrails.
Let Trophimus rejoice with the Sea-Horse, who shoud have been to Tychicus the
father of Yorkshiremen.
Let Tryphena rejoice with Fluta -- Saturday is the Sabbath for the mouth of God
hath spoken it.
Let Tryphosa rejoice with Acarne -- With such preparation the Lord's Jubile is
better kept.
Let Simon the Tanner rejoice with Alausa -- Five days are sufficient for the
purposes of husbandry.
Let Simeon Niger rejoice with the Loach -- The blacks are the seed of Cain.
Let Lucius rejoice with Corias -- Some of Cain's seed was preserved in the loins
of Ham at the flood.
Let Manaen rejoice with Donax. My DEGREE is good even here, in the Lord I have
61
a better.
Let Sergius Paulus rejoice with Dentex -- Blessed be the name Jesus for my
teeth.
Let Silas rejoice with the Cabot -- the philosophy of the times ev'n now is vain
deceit.
Let Barsabas rejoice with Cammarus -- Newton is ignorant for if a man consult
not the WORD how should he understand the WORK? -Let Lydia rejoice with Attilus -- Blessed be the name of him which eat the fish
and honey comb.
Let Jason rejoice with Alopecias, who is subtlety without offence.
Let Dionysius rejoice with Alabes who is peculiar to the Nile.
Let Damaris rejoice with Anthias -- The fountain of the Nile is known to the
Eastern people who drink it.
Let Apollos rejoice with Astacus, but St Paul is the Agent for England.
Let Justus rejoice with Crispus in a Salmon-Trout -- the Lord look on the soul of
Richard Atwood.
Let Crispus rejoice with Leviathan -- God be gracious to the soul of HOBBES, who
was no atheist, but a servant of Christ, and died in the Lord -- I wronged him
God forgive me.
Let Aquila rejoice with Beemoth who is Enoch no fish but a stupendous creeping
Thing.
Let Priscilla rejoice with Cythera. As earth increases by Beemoth so the sea
likewise enlarges.
Let Tyrannus rejoice with Cephalus who hath a great head.
Let Gaius rejoice with the Water-Tortoise -- Paul and Tychicus were in England
with Agricola my father.
Let Aristarchus rejoice with Cynoglossus -- The Lord was at Glastonbury in the
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body and blessed the thorn.
Let Alexander rejoice with the Sea-Urchin -- The Lord was at Bristol and blessed
the waters there.
Let Sopater rejoice with Elacate -- The waters of Bath were blessed by St
Matthias.
Let Secundus rejoice with Echeneis who is the sea-lamprey.
Let Eutychus rejoice with Cnide -- Fish and honeycomb are blessed to eat after a
recovery. -Let Mnason rejoice with Vulvula a sort of fish -- Good words are of God, the cant
from the Devil.
Let Claudius Lysias rejoice with Coracinus who is black and peculiar to Nile.
Let Bernice rejoice with Corophium which is a kind of crab.
Let Phebe rejoice with Echinometra who is a beautiful shellfish red and green.
Let Epenetus rejoice with Erythrinus who is red with a white belly.
Let Andronicus rejoice with Esox, the Lax, a great fish of the Rhine.
Let Junia rejoice with the Faber-Fish -- Broil'd fish and honeycomb may be taken
for the sacrament.
Let Amplias rejoice with Garus, who is a kind of Lobster.
Let Urbane rejoice with Glanis, who is a crafty fish who bites away the bait and
saves himself.
Let Stachys rejoice with Glauciscus, who is good for Women's milk.
Let Apelles rejoice with Glaucus -- behold the seed of the brave and ingenious
how they are saved!
Let Aristobulus rejoice with Glycymerides who is pure and sweet.
Let Herodion rejoice with Holothuria which are prickly fishes.
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Let Narcissus rejoice with Hordeia -- I will magnify the Lord who multiplied the
fish.
Let Persis rejoice with Liparis -- I will magnify the Lord who multiplied the barley
loaves.
Let Rufus rejoice with Icthyocolla of whose skin a water-glue is made.
Let Asyncritus rejoice with Labrus who is a voracious fish.
Let Phlegon rejoice with the Sea-Lizard -- Bless Jesus THOMAS BOWLBY and all
the seed of Reuben.
Let Hermas rejoice with Lamyrus who is of things creeping in the sea.
Let Patrobas rejoice with Lepas, all shells are precious.
Let Hermes rejoice with Lepus, who is a venomous fish.
Let Philologus rejoice with Ligarius -- shells are all parries to the adversary.
Let Julia rejoice with the Sleeve-Fish -- Blessed be Jesus for all the TAYLERS.
Let Nereus rejoice with the Calamary -- God give success to our fleets.
Let Olympas rejoice with the Sea-Lantern, which glows upon the waters.
Let Sosipater rejoice with Cornuta. There are fish for the Sea-Night-Birds that
glow at bottom.
Let Lucius rejoice with the Cackrel Fish. God be gracious to JMs FLETCHER who
has my tackling.
Let Tertius rejoice with Maia which is a kind of crab.
Let Erastus rejoice with Melandry which is the largest Tunny.
Let Quartus rejoice with Mena. God be gracious to the immortal soul of poor
Carte, who was barbarously and cowardly murder'd -- the Lord prevent the
dealers in clandestine death.
64
Let Sosthenes rejoice with the Winkle -- all shells like the parts of the body are
good kept for those parts.
Let Chloe rejoice with the Limpin -- There is a way to the terrestrial Paradise
upon the knees.
Let Carpus rejoice with the Frog-Fish -- A man cannot die upon his knees.
Let Stephanas rejoice with Mormyra who is a fish of divers colours.
Let Fortunatus rejoice with the Burret -- it is good to be born when things are
crossed.
Let Lois rejoice with the Angel-Fish -- There is a fish that swims in the fluid
Empyrean.
Let Achaicus rejoice with the Fat-Back -- The Lord invites his fishers to the WEST
INDIES.
Let Sylvanus rejoice with the Black-Fish -- Oliver Cromwell himself was the
murderer in the Mask.
Let Titus rejoice with Mys -- O Tite siquid ego adjuero curamve levasso!
Let Euodias rejoice with Myrcus -- There is a perfumed fish I will offer him for a
sweet savour to the Lord.
Let Syntyche rejoice with Myax -- There are shells in the earth which were left by
the FLOOD.
Let Clement rejoice with Ophidion -- There are shells again in earth at sympathy
with those in sea.
Let Epaphroditus rejoice with Opthalmias -- The Lord increase the Cambridge
collection of fossils.
Let Epaphras rejoice with Orphus -- God be gracious to the immortal soul of Dr
Woodward.
Let Justus rejoice with Pagrus -- God be gracious to the immortal soul of Dr
Middleton.
65
Let Nymphas rejoice with Fagurus -- God bless Charles Mason and all Trinity
College.
Let Archippus rejoice with Nerita whose shell swimmeth.
Let Eunice rejoice with Oculata who is of the Lizard kind.
Let Onesephorus rejoice with Orca, who is a great fish.
Let Eubulus rejoice with Ostrum the scarlet -- God be gracious to Gordon and
Groat.
Let Pudens rejoice with Polypus -- The Lord restore my virgin!
Let Linus rejoice with Ozsena who is a kind of Polype -- God be gracious to Lyne
and Anguish.
Let Claudia rejoice with Pascer -- the purest creatures minister to wantoness by
unthankfulness.
Let Artemas rejoice with Pastinaca who is a fish with a sting.
Let Zenas rejoice with Pecten -- The Lord obliterate the laws of man!
Let Philemon rejoice with Pelagia -- The laws and judgement are impudence and
blindness.
Let Apphia rejoice with Pelamis -- The Lord Jesus is man's judgement.
Let Demetrius rejoice with Peloris, who is greatest of Shell-Fishes.
Let Antipas rejoice with Pentadactylus -- A papist hath no sentiment God bless
CHURCHILL.
***
FOR I pray the Lord JESUS that cured the LUNATICK to be merciful to all my
brethren and sisters in these houses.
For they work me with their harping-irons, which is a barbarous instrument,
because I am more unguarded than others.
66
For the blessing of God hath been on my epistles, which I have written for the
benefit of others.
For I bless God that the CHURCH of ENGLAND is one of the SEVEN ev'n the
candlestick of the Lord.
For the ENGLISH TONGUE shall be the language of the WEST.
For I pray Almighty CHRIST to bless the MAGDALEN HOUSE and to forward a
National purification.
For I have the blessing of God in the three POINTS of manhood, of the pen, of
the sword, and of chivalry.
For I am inquisitive in the Lord, and defend the philosophy of the scripture
against vain deceit.
For the nets come down from the eyes of the Lord to fish up men to their
salvation.
For I have a greater compass both of mirth and melancholy than another.
For I bless the Lord JESUS in the innumerables, and for ever and ever.
For I am redoubted, and redoubtable in the Lord, as is THOMAS BECKET my
father.
For I have had the grace to GO BACK, which is my blessing unto prosperity.
For I paid for my seat in St PAUL's, when I was six years old, and took
possession against the evil day.
For I am descended from the steward of the island -- blessed be the name of the
Lord Jesus king of England.
For the poor gentleman is the first object of the Lord's charity and he is the most
pitied who hath lost the most.
For I am in twelve HARDSHIPS, but he that was born of a virgin shall deliver me
out of all.
For I am safe, as to my head, from the female dancer and her admirers.
67
For I pray for CHICHISTER to give the glory to God, and to keep the adversary at
bay.
For I am making to the shore day by day, the Lord Jesus take me.
For I bless the Lord JESUS upon RAMSGATE PIER -- the Lord forward the building
of harbours.
For I bless the Lord JESUS for his very seed, which is in my body.
For I pray for R and his family, I pray for Mr Becher, and I bean for the Lord
JESUS.
For I pray to God for Nore, for the Trinity house, for all light-houses, beacons and
buoys.
For I bless God that I am not in a dungeon, but am allowed the light of the Sun.
For I pray God for the PYGMIES against their feathered adversaries, as a deed of
charity.
For I pray God for all those, who have defiled themselves in matters
inconvenient.
For I pray God be gracious to CORNELIUS MATTHEWS name and connection.
For I am under the same accusation with my Saviour -- -for they said, he is
besides himself.
For I pray God for the introduction of new creatures into this island.
For I pray God for the ostriches of Salisbury Plain, the beavers of the Medway
and silver fish of Thames.
For Charity is cold in the multitude of possessions, and the rich are covetous of
their crumbs.
For I pray to be accepted as a dog without offence, which is best of all.
For I wish to God and desire towards the most High, which is my policy.
68
For the tides are the life of God in the ocean, and he sends his angel to trouble
the great DEEP.
For he hath fixed the earth upon arches and pillars, and the flames of hell flow
under it.
For the grosser the particles the nearer to the sink, and the nearer to purity, the
quicker the gravitation.
For MATTER is the dust of the Earth, every atom of which is the life.
For MOTION is as the quantity of life direct, and that which hath not motion, is
resistance.
For Resistance is not of GOD, but he -- hath built his works upon it.
For the Centripetal and Centrifugal forces are GOD SUSTAINING and DIRECTING.
For Elasticity is the temper of matter to recover its place with vehemence.
For Attraction is the earning of parts, which have a similitude in the life.
For the Life of God is in the Loadstone, and there is a magnet, which pointeth
due EAST.
For the Glory of God is always in the East, but cannot be seen for the cloud of the
crucifixion.
For due East is the way to Paradise, which man knoweth not by reason of his fall.
For the Longitude is (nevertheless) attainable by steering angularly
notwithstanding.
For Eternity is a creature and is built upon Eternity ¥ê¥á¥ó¥á¥â¥ï¥ë¥ç ¥å¥g¥é
¥ó¥ç ¥ä¥é¥á¥â¥ï¥ë¥ç .
For Fire is a mixed nature of body and spirit, and the body is fed by that which
hath not life.
For Fire is exasperated by the Adversary, who is Death, unto the detriment of
69
man.
For an happy Conjecture is a miraculous cast by the Lord Jesus.
For a bad Conjecture is a draught of stud and mud.
For there is a Fire which is blandishing, and which is of God direct.
For Fire is a substance and distinct, and purifyeth ev'n in hell.
For the Shears is the first of the mechanical powers, and to be used on the
knees.
For if Adam had used this instrument right, he would not have fallen.
For the power of the Shears Is direct as the life.
For the power of the WEDGE is direct as it's altitude by communication of
Almighty God.
For the Skrew, Axle and Wheel, Pulleys, the Lever and Inclined Plane are known
in the Schools.
For the Centre is not known but by the application of the members to matter.
For I have shown the Vis Inerti©¡ to be false, and such is all nonsense.
For the Centre is the hold of the Spirit upon the matter in hand.
For FRICTION is inevitable because the Universe is FULL of God's works.
For the PERPETUAL MOTION is in all the works of Almighty GOD.
For it is not so in the engines of man, which are made of dead materials, neither
indeed can be.
For the Moment of bodies, as it is used, is a false term -- bless God ye Speakers
on the Fifth of November.
For Time and Weight are by their several estimates.
For I bless GOD in the discovery of the LONGITUDE direct by the means of
70
GLADWICK.
For the motion of the PENDULUM is the longest in that it parries resistance.
For the WEDDING GARMENTS of all men are prepared in the SUN against the day
of acceptation.
For the Wedding Garments of all women are prepared in the MOON against the
day of their purification.
For CHASTITY is the key of knowledge as in Esdras, Sr Isaac Newton and now,
God be praised, in me.
For Newton nevertheless is more of error than of the truth, but I am of the
WORD of GOD.
For WATER, is not of solid constituents, but is dissolved from precious stones
above.
For the life remains in its dissolvent state, and that in great power.
For WATER is condensed by the Lord's FROST, tho' not by the FLORENTINE
experiment.
For GLADWICK is a substance growing on hills in the East, candied by the sun,
and of diverse colours.
For it is neither stone nor metal but a new creature, soft to the ax, but hard to
the hammer.
For it answers sundry uses, but particularly it supplies the place of Glass.
For it giveth a benign light without the fragility, malignity or mischief of Glass.
For it attracteth all the colours of the GREAT BOW which is fixed in the EAST.
For the FOUNTAINS and SPRINGS are the life of the waters working up to God.
For they are in SYMPATHY with the waters above the Heavens, which are solid.
For the Fountains, springs and rivers are all of them from the sea, whose water is
filtrated and purified by the earth.
71
For there is Water above the visible surface in a spiritualizing state, which cannot
be seen but by application of a CAPILLARY TUBE.
For the ASCENT of VAPOURS is the return of thanksgiving from all humid bodies.
For the RAIN WATER kept in a reservoir at any altitude, suppose of a thousand
feet, will make a fountain from a spout of ten feet of the same height.
For it will ascend in a stream two thirds of the way and afterwards prank itself
into ten thousand agreeable forms.
For the SEA is a seventh of the Earth -- the spirit of the Lord by Esdras.
For MERCURY is affected by the AIR because it is of a similar subtlety.
For the rising in the BAROMETER is not effected by pressure but by sympathy.
For it cannot be seperated from the creature with which it is intimately and
eternally connected.
For where it is stinted of air there it will adhere together and stretch on the
reverse.
For it works by ballancing according to the hold of the spirit.
For QUICK-SILVER is spiritual and so is the AIR to all intents and purposes.
For the AIR-PUMP weakens and dispirits but cannot wholly exhaust.
For SUCKTION is the withdrawing of the life, but life will follow as fast as it can.
For there is infinite provision to keep up the life in all the parts of Creation.
For the AIR is contaminated by curses and evil language.
For poysonous creatures catch some of it and retain it or ere it goes to the
adversary.
For IRELAND was without these creatures, till of late, because of the simplicity of
the people.
72
For the AIR. is purified by prayer which is made aloud and with all our might.
For loud prayer is good for weak lungs and for a vitiated throat.
For SOUND is propagated in the spirit and in all directions.
For the VOICE of a figure compleat in all its parts.
For a man speaks HIMSELF from the crown of his head to the sole of his feet.
For a LION roars HIMSELF compleat from head to tail.
For all these things are seen in the spirit which makes the beauty of prayer.
For all whispers and unmusical sounds in general are of the Adversary.
For 'I will hiss saith the Lord' is God's denunciation of death.
For applause or the clapping of the hands is the natural action of a man on the
descent of the glory of God.
For EARTH which is an intelligence hath a voice and a propensity to speak in all
her parts.
For ECHO is the soul of the voice exerting itself in hollow places.
For ECHO cannot act but when she can parry the adversary.
For ECHO is greatest in Churches and where she can assist in prayer.
For a good voice hath its Echo with it and it is attainable by much supplication.
For the FOICE is from the body and the spirit -- and is a a body and a spirit.
For the prayers of good men are therefore visible to second-sighted persons.
For HARPSICHORDS are best strung with gold wire.
For HARPS and VIOLS are best strung with Indian weed.
For the GERMAN FLUTE is an indirect -- the common flute good, bless the Lord
Jesus BENJIMIN HALLET.
73
For the feast of TRUMPETS should be kept up, that being the most direct and
acceptable of all instruments.
For the TRUMPET of God is a blessed intelligence and so are all the instruments
in HEAVEN.
For GOD the father Almighty plays upon the HARP of stupendous magnitude and
melody.
For innumerable Angels fly out at every touch and his tune is a work of creation.
For at that time malignity ceases and the devils themselves are at peace.
For this time is perceptible to man by a remarkable stillness and serenity of soul.
For the ¨¡olian harp is improveable into regularity.
For when it is so improved it will be known to be the SHAWM.
For it woud be better if the LITURGY were musically performed.
For the strings of the SHAWM were upon a cylinder which turned to the wind.
For this was spiritual musick altogether, as the wind is a spirit.
For there is nothing but it may be played upon in delight.
For the flames of fire may lie blown thro musical pipes.
For it is so higher up in the vast empyrean.
For is so real as that which is spiritual.
For an IGNIS FATUUS is either the fool's conceit or a blast from the adversary.
For SHELL-FIRE or ELECTRICAL is the quick air when it is caught.
For GLASS is worked in the fire till it partakes of its nature.
For the electrical fire is easily obtain'd by the working of glass.
74
For all spirits are of fire and the air is a very benign one.
For the MAN in VACUO is a flat conceit of preposterous folly.
For the breath of our nostrils is an electrical spirit.
For an electrical spirit may be exasperated into a malignant fire.
For it is good to quicken in paralytic cases being the life applied unto death,
For the method of philosophizing is in a posture of Adoration.
For the School-Doctrine of Thunder and Lightning is a Diabolical Hypothesis.
For it is taking the nitre from the lower regions and directing it against the
Infinite of Heights.
For THUNDER is the voice of God direct in verse and musick.
For LIGHTNING is a glance of the glory of God.
For the Brimstone that is found at the times of thunder and lightning is worked
up by the Adversary.
For the voice is always for infinite good which he strives to impede.
For the Devil can work coals into shapes to afflict the minds of those that will not
pray.
For the coffin and the cradle and the purse are all against a man.
For the coffin is for the dead and death came by disobedience.
For the cradle is for weakness and the child of man was originally strong from the
womb.
For the purse is for money and money is dead matter with the stamp of human
vanity.
For the adversary frequently sends these particular images out of the fire to
those whom they concern.
75
For the coffin is for me because I have nothing to do with it.
For the cradle is for me because the old Dragon attacked me in it and overcame
in Christ.
For the purse is for me because I have neither money nor human friends.
For LIGHT is propagated at all distances in an instant because it is actuated by
the divine conception.
For the Satellites of the planet prove nothing in this matter but the glory of
Almighty God.
For the SHADE is of death and from the adversary.
For Solomon said vanity of vanities, vanity of vanities all is vanity.
For Jesus says verity of verities, verity of verities all is verity.
For Solomon said THOU FOOL in malice from his own vanity.
For the Lord reviled not all in hardship and temptation unutterable.
For Fire hath this property that it reduces a thing till finally it is not.
For all the filth wicked of men shall be done away by fire in Eternity.
For the furnace itself shall come up at the last according to Abraham's vision.
For the Convex Heaven of shall work about on that great event.
For the ANTARTICK POLE is not yet but shall answer in the Consummation.
For the devil hath most power in winter, because darkness prevails.
For the Longing of Women is the operation of the Devil upon their conceptions.
For the marking of their children is from the same cause both of which are to be
parried by prayer.
For the laws of King James the first against Witchcraft were wise, had it been of
man to make laws.
76
For there are witches and wizards even now who are spoken to by their familiars.
For the visitation of their familiars is prevented by the Lord's incarnation.
For to conceive with intense diligence against one's neighbour is a branch of
witchcraft.
For to use pollution, exact and cross things and at the same time to think against
a man is the crime direct.
For prayer with musick is good for persons so exacted upon.
For before the NATIVITY is the dead of the winter and after it the quick.
For the sin against the HOLY GHOST is INGRATITUDE.
For stuff'd guts make no musick; strain them strong and you shall have sweet
melody.
For the SHADOW is of death, which is the Devil, who can make false and faint
images of the works of Almighty God.
For every man beareth death about him ever since the transgression of Adam,
but in perfect light there is no shadow.
For all Wrath is Fire, which the adversary blows upon and exasperates.
For SHADOW is a fair Word from God, which is not returnable till the furnace
comes up.
For the ECLIPSE is of the adversary -- blessed be the name of Jesus for Whisson
of Trinity.
For the shadow is his and the penumbra is his and his the perplexity of the the
phenomenon.
For the eclipses happen at times when the light is defective.
For the more the light is defective, the more the powers of darkness prevail.
77
For deficiencies happen by the luminaries crossing one another.
For the SUN is an intelligence and an angel of the human form.
For the MOON is an intelligence and an angel in shape like a woman.
For they are together in the spirit every night like man and wife.
For Justice is infinitely beneath Mercy in nature and office.
For the Devil himself may be just in accusation and punishment.
For HELL is without eternity from the presence of Almighty God.
For Volcanos and burning mountains are where the adversary hath most power.
For the angel GRATITUDE is my wife -- God bring me to her or her to me.
For the propagation of light is quick as the divine Conception.
For FROST is damp and unwholsome air candied to fall to the best advantage.
For I am the Lord's News-Writer -- the scribe-evangelist -- Widow Mitchel, Gun
and Grange bless the Lord Jesus.
For Adversity above all other is to be deserted of the grace of God.
For in the divine Idea this Eternity is compleat and the Word is a making many
more.
For there is a forlorn hope ev'n for impenitent sinners because the furnace itself
must be the crown of Eternity.
For my hope is beyond Eternity in the bosom of God my saviour.
For by the grace of God I am the Reviver of ADORATION amongst ENGLISH-MEN.
For being desert-ed is to have desert in the sight of God and intitles one to the
Lord's merit.
For things that are not in the sight of men are thro' God of infinite concern.
78
For envious men have exceeding subtlety quippe qui in -- videant.
For avaricious men are exceeding subtle like the soul seperated from the body.
For their attention is on a sinking object which perishes.
For they can go beyond the children of light in matters of their own misery.
For Snow is the dew candied and cherishes.
For TIMES and SEASONS are the Lord's -- Man is no CHRONOLOGER.
For there is a CIRCULATION of the SAP in all vegetables.
For SOOT is the dross of Fire.
For the CLAPPING of the hands is naught unless it be to the glory of God.
For God will descend in visible glory when men begin to applaud him.
For all STAGE-Playing is Hypocrisy and the Devil is the master of their revels.
For the INNATATION of corpuscles is solved by the Gold-beater's hammer -- God
be gracious to Christopher Peacock and to all my God-Children.
For the PRECESSION of the Equinoxes is improving nature -- something being
gained every where for the glory of God perpetually.
For the souls of the departed are embodied in clouds and purged by the Sun.
For the LONGITUDE may be discovered by attending the motions of the Sun.
Way 2d.
For you must consider the Sun as dodging, which he does to parry observation.
For he must be taken with an Astrolabe, and considered respecting the point he
left.
For you must do this upon your knees and that will secure your point.
For I bless God that I dwell within the sound of Success, and that it is well with
79
ENGLAND this blessed day. NATIVITY of our LORD N.S. 1759.
~ Christopher Smart,#NFDB
118:Meantime Ferrara lay in rueful case;
The lady-city, for whose sole embrace
Her pair of suitors struggled, felt their arms
A brawny mischief to the fragile charms
They tugged forone discovering that to twist
Her tresses twice or thrice about his wrist
Secured a point of vantageone, how best
He 'd parry that by planting in her breast
His elbow spikeeach party too intent
For noticing, howe'er the battle went,
The conqueror would but have a corpse to kiss.
"May Boniface be duly damned for this!"
Howled some old Ghibellin, as up he turned,
From the wet heap of rubbish where they burned
His house, a little skull with dazzling teeth:
"A boon, sweet Christlet Salinguerra seethe
"In hell for ever, Christ, and let myself
"Be there to laugh at him!"moaned some young Guelf
Stumbling upon a shrivelled hand nailed fast
To the charred lintel of the doorway, last
His father stood within to bid him speed.
The thoroughfares were overrun with weed
Docks, quitchgrass, loathy mallows no man plants.
The stranger, none of its inhabitants
Crept out of doors to taste fresh air again,
And ask the purpose of a splendid train
Admitted on a morning; every town
Of the East League was come by envoy down
To treat for Richard's ransom: here you saw
The Vicentine, here snowy oxen draw
The Paduan carroch, its vermilion cross
On its white field. A-tiptoe o'er the fosse
Looked Legate Montelungo wistfully
After the flock of steeples he might spy
In Este's time, gone (doubts he) long ago
To mend the ramparts: sure the laggards know
The Pope's as good as here! They paced the streets
More soberly. At last, "Taurello greets
"The League," announced a pursuivant,"will match
"Its courtesy, and labours to dispatch
"At earliest Tito, Friedrich's Pretor, sent
"On pressing matters from his post at Trent,
"With Mainard Count of Tyrol,simply waits
"Their going to receive the delegates."
"Tito!" Our delegates exchanged a glance,
And, keeping the main way, admired askance
The lazy engines of outlandish birth,
Couched like a king each on its bank of earth
Arbalist, manganel and catapult;
While stationed by, as waiting a result,
Lean silent gangs of mercenaries ceased
Working to watch the strangers. "This, at least,
"Were better spared; he scarce presumes gainsay
"The League's decision! Get our friend away
"And profit for the future: how else teach
"Fools 't is not safe to stray within claw's reach
"Ere Salinguerra's final gasp be blown?
"Those mere convulsive scratches find the bone.
"Who bade him bloody the spent osprey's nare?"
The carrochs halted in the public square.
Pennons of every blazon once a-flaunt,
Men prattled, freelier than the crested gaunt
White ostrich with a horse-shoe in her beak
Was missing, and whoever chose might speak
"Ecelin" boldly out: so,"Ecelin
"Needed his wife to swallow half the sin
"And sickens by himself: the devil's whelp,
"He styles his son, dwindles away, no help
"From conserves, your fine triple-curded froth
"Of virgin's blood, your Venice viper-broth
"Eh? Jubilate!""Peace! no little word
"You utter here that 's not distinctly heard
"Up at Oliero: he was absent sick
"When we besieged Bassanowho, i' the thick
"O' the work, perceived the progress Azzo made,
"Like Ecelin, through his witch Adelaide?
"She managed it so well that, night by night
"At their bed-foot stood up a soldier-sprite,
"First fresh, pale by-and-by without a wound,
"And, when it came with eyes filmed as in swound,
"They knew the place was taken.""Ominous
"That Ghibellins should get what cautelous
"Old Redbeard sought from Azzo's sire to wrench
"Vainly; Saint George contrived his town a trench
"O' the marshes, an impermeable bar."
"Young Ecelin is meant the tutelar
"Of Padua, rather; veins embrace upon
"His hand like Brenta and Bacchiglion."
What now?"The founts! God's bread, touch not a plank!
"A crawling hell of carrionevery tank
"Choke-full!found out just now to Cino's cost
"The same who gave Taurello up for lost,
"And, making no account of fortune's freaks,
"Refused to budge from Padua then, but sneaks
"Back now with Concorezzi: 'faith! they drag
"Their carroch to San Vitale, plant the flag
"On his own palace, so adroitly razed
"He knew it not; a sort of Guelf folk gazed
"And laughed apart; Cino disliked their air
"Must pluck up spirit, show he does not care
"Seats himself on the tank's edgewill begin
"To hum, za, za, Cavaler Ecelin
"A silence; he gets warmer, clinks to chime,
"Now both feet plough the ground, deeper each time,
"At last, za, za and up with a fierce kick
"Comes his own mother's face caught by the thick
"Grey hair about his spur!"
Which means, they lift
The covering, Salinguerra made a shift
To stretch upon the truth; as well avoid
Further disclosures; leave them thus employed.
Our dropping Autumn morning clears apace,
And poor Ferrara puts a softened face
On her misfortunes. Let us scale this tall
Huge foursquare line of red brick garden-wall
Bastioned within by trees of every sort
On three sides, slender, spreading, long and short;
Each grew as it contrived, the poplar ramped,
The fig-tree reared itself,but stark and cramped,
Made fools of, like tamed lions: whence, on the edge,
Running 'twixt trunk and trunk to smooth one ledge
Of shade, were shrubs inserted, warp and woof,
Which smothered up that variance. Scale the roof
Of solid tops, and o'er the slope you slide
Down to a grassy space level and wide,
Here and there dotted with a tree, but trees
Of rarer leaf, each foreigner at ease,
Set by itself: and in the centre spreads,
Borne upon three uneasy leopards' heads,
A laver, broad and shallow, one bright spirt
Of water bubbles in. The walls begirt
With trees leave off on either hand; pursue
Your path along a wondrous avenue
Those walls abut on, heaped of gleamy stone,
With aloes leering everywhere, grey-grown
From many a Moorish summer: how they wind
Out of the fissures! likelier to bind
The building than those rusted cramps which drop
Already in the eating sunshine. Stop,
You fleeting shapes above there! Ah, the pride
Or else despair of the whole country-side!
A range of statues, swarming o'er with wasps,
God, goddess, woman, man, the Greek rough-rasps
In crumbling Naples marblemeant to look
Like those Messina marbles Constance took
Delight in, or Taurello's self conveyed
To Mantua for his mistress, Adelaide,
A certain font with caryatides
Since cloistered at Goito; only, these
Are up and doing, not abashed, a troop
Able to right themselveswho see you, stoop
Their arms o' the instant after you! Unplucked
By this or that, you pass; for they conduct
To terrace raised on terrace, and, between,
Creatures of brighter mould and braver mien
Than any yet, the choicest of the Isle
No doubt. Here, left a sullen breathing-while,
Up-gathered on himself the Fighter stood
For his last fight, and, wiping treacherous blood
Out of the eyelids just held ope beneath
Those shading fingers in their iron sheath,
Steadied his strengths amid the buzz and stir
Of the dusk hideous amphitheatre
At the announcement of his over-match
To wind the day's diversion up, dispatch
The pertinactious Gaul: while, limbs one heap,
The Slave, no breath in her round mouth, watched leap
Dart after dart forth, as her hero's car
Clove dizzily the solid of the war
Let coil about his knees for pride in him.
We reach the farthest terrace, and the grim
San Pietro Palace stops us.
Such the state
Of Salinguerra's plan to emulate
Sicilian marvels, that his girlish wife
Retrude still might lead her ancient life
In her new home: whereat enlarged so much
Neighbours upon the novel princely touch
He took,who here imprisons Boniface.
Here must the Envoys come to sue for grace;
And here, emerging from the labyrinth
Below, Sordello paused beside the plinth
Of the door-pillar.
He had really left
Verona for the cornfields (a poor theft
From the morass) where Este's camp was made;
The Envoys' march, the Legate's cavalcade
All had been seen by him, but scarce as when,
Eager for cause to stand aloof from men
At every point save the fantastic tie
Acknowledged in his boyish sophistry,
He made account of such. A crowd,he meant
To task the whole of it; each part's intent
Concerned him therefore: and, the more he pried,
The less became Sordello satisfied
With his own figure at the moment. Sought
He respite from his task? Descried he aught
Novel in the anticipated sight
Of all these livers upon all delight?
This phalanx, as of myriad points combined,
Whereby he still had imaged the mankind
His youth was passed in dreams of rivalling,
His agein plans to prove at least such thing
Had been so dreamed,which now he must impress
With his own will, effect a happiness
By theirs,supply a body to his soul
Thence, and become eventually whole
With them as he had hoped to be without
Made these the mankind he once raved about?
Because a few of them were notable,
Should all be figured worthy note? As well
Expect to find Taurello's triple line
Of trees a single and prodigious pine.
Real pines rose here and there; but, close among,
Thrust into and mixed up with pines, a throng
Of shrubs, he saw,a nameless common sort
O'erpast in dreams, left out of the report
And hurried into corners, or at best
Admitted to be fancied like the rest.
Reckon that morning's proper chiefshow few!
And yet the people grew, the people grew,
Grew ever, as if the many there indeed,
More left behind and most who should succeed,
Simply in virtue of their mouths and eyes,
Petty enjoyments and huge miseries,
Mingled with, and made veritably great
Those chiefs: he overlooked not Mainard's state
Nor Concorezzi's station, but instead
Of stopping there, each dwindled to be head
Of infinite and absent Tyrolese
Or Paduans; startling all the more, that these
Seemed passive and disposed of, uncared for,
Yet doubtless on the whole (like Eglamor)
Smiling; for if a wealthy man decays
And out of store of robes must wear, all days,
One tattered suit, alike in sun and shade,
'T is commonly some tarnished gay brocade
Fit for a feast-night's flourish and no more:
Nor otherwise poor Misery from her store
Of looks is fain upgather, keep unfurled
For common wear as she goes through the world,
The faint remainder of some worn-out smile
Meant for a feast-night's service merely. While
Crowd upon crowd rose on Sordello thus,
(Crowds no way interfering to discuss,
Much less dispute, life's joys with one employed
In envying them,or, if they aught enjoyed,
Where lingered something indefinable
In every look and tone, the mirth as well
As woe, that fixed at once his estimate
Of the result, their good or bad estate)
Old memories returned with new effect:
And the new body, ere he could suspect,
Cohered, mankind and he were really fused,
The new self seemed impatient to be used
By him, but utterly another way
Than that anticipated: strange to say,
They were too much below him, more in thrall
Than he, the adjunct than the principal.
What booted scattered units?here a mind
And there, which might repay his own to find,
And stamp, and use?a few, howe'er august,
If all the rest were grovelling in the dust?
No: first a mighty equilibrium, sure,
Should he establish, privilege procure
For all, the few had long possessed! He felt
An error, an exceeding error melt:
While he was occupied with Mantuan chants,
Behoved him think of men, and take their wants,
Such as he now distinguished every side,
As his own want which might be satisfied,
And, after that, think of rare qualities
Of his own soul demanding exercise.
It followed naturally, through no claim
On their part, which made virtue of the aim
At serving them, on his,that, past retrieve,
He felt now in their toils, theirsnor could leave
Wonder how, in the eagerness to rule,
Impress his will on mankind, he (the fool!)
Had never even entertained the thought
That this his last arrangement might be fraught
with incidental good to them as well,
And that mankind's delight would help to swell
His own. So, if he sighed, as formerly
Because the merry time of life must fleet,
'T was deeplier now,for could the crowds repeat
Their poor experiences? His hand that shook
Was twice to be deplored. "The Legate, look!
"With eyes, like fresh-blown thrush-eggs on a thread,
"Faint-blue and loosely floating in his head,
"Large tongue, moist open mouth; and this long while
"That owner of the idiotic smile
"Serves them!"
He fortunately saw in time
His fault however, and since the office prime
Includes the secondarybest accept
Both offices; Taurello, its adept,
Could teach him the preparatory one,
And how to do what he had fancied done
Long previously, ere take the greater task.
How render first these people happy? Ask
The people's friends: for there must be one good
One way to itthe Cause! He understood
The meaning now of Palma; why the jar
Else, the ado, the trouble wide and far
Of Guelfs and Ghibellins, the Lombard hope
And Rome's despair?'twixt Emperor and Pope
The confused shifting sort of Eden tale
Hardihood still recurring, still to fail
That foreign interloping fiend, this free
And native overbrooding deity:
Yet a dire fascination o'er the palms
The Kaiser ruined, troubling even the calms
Of paradise; or, on the other hand,
The Pontiff, as the Kaisers understand,
One snake-like cursed of God to love the ground,
Whose heavy length breaks in the noon profound
Some saving treewhich needs the Kaiser, dressed
As the dislodging angel of that pest:
Yet flames that pest bedropped, flat head, full fold,
With coruscating dower of dyes. "Behold
"The secret, so to speak, and master-spring
"O' the contest!which of the two Powers shall bring
"Men good, perchance the most good: ay, it may
"Be that!the question, which best knows the way."
And hereupon Count Mainard strutted past
Out of San Pietro; never seemed the last
Of archers, slingers: and our friend began
To recollect strange modes of serving man
Arbalist, catapult, brake, manganel,
And more. "This way of theirs may,who can tell?
"Need perfecting," said he: "let all be solved
"At once! Taurello 't is, the task devolved
"On late: confront Taurello!"
And at last
He did confront him. Scarce an hour had past
When forth Sordello came, older by years
Than at his entry. Unexampled fears
Oppressed him, and he staggered off, blind, mute
And deaf, like some fresh-mutilated brute,
Into Ferraranot the empty town
That morning witnessed: he went up and down
Streets whence the veil had been stript shred by shred,
So that, in place of huddling with their dead
Indoors, to answer Salinguerra's ends,
Townsfolk make shift to crawl forth, sit like friends
With any one. A woman gave him choice
Of her two daughters, the infantile voice
Or the dimpled knee, for half a chain, his throat
Was clasped with; but an archer knew the coat
Its blue cross and eight lilies,bade beware
One dogging him in concert with the pair
Though thrumming on the sleeve that hid his knife.
Night set in early, autumn dews were rife,
They kindled great fires while the Leaguers' mass
Began at every carroch: he must pass
Between the kneeling people. Presently
The carroch of Verona caught his eye
With purple trappings; silently he bent
Over its fire, when voices violent
Began, "Affirm not whom the youth was like
"That struck me from the porch: I did not strike
"Again: I too have chestnut hair; my kin
"Hate Azzo and stand up for Ecelin.
"Here, minstrel, drive bad thoughts away! Sing! Take
"My glove for guerdon!" And for that man's sake
He turned: "A song of Eglamor's!"scarce named,
When, "Our Sordello's rather!"all exclaimed;
"Is not Sordello famousest for rhyme?"
He had been happy to deny, this time,
Profess as heretofore the aching head
And failing heart,suspect that in his stead
Some true Apollo had the charge of them,
Was champion to reward or to condemn,
So his intolerable risk might shift
Or share itself; but Naddo's precious gift
Of gifts, he owned, be certain! At the close
"I made that," said he to a youth who rose
As if to hear: 't was Palma through the band
Conducted him in silence by her hand.
Back now for Salinguerra. Tito of Trent
Gave place to Palma and her friend, who went
In turn at Montelungo's visit: one
After the other were they come and gone,
These spokesmen for the Kaiser and the Pope,
This incarnation of the People's hope,
Sordello,all the say of each was said;
And Salinguerra sat,himself instead
Of these to talk with, lingered musing yet.
'T was a drear vast presence-chamber roughly set
In order for the morning's use; full face,
The Kaiser's ominous sign-mark had first place,
The crowned grim twy-necked eagle, coarsely-blacked
With ochre on the naked wall; nor lacked
Romano's green and yellow either side;
But the new token Tito brought had tried
The Legate's patiencenay, if Palma knew
What Salinguerra almost meant to do
Until the sight of her restored his lip
A certain half-smile, three months' chieftainship
Had banished! Afterward, the Legate found
No change in him, nor asked what badge he wound
And unwound carelessly. Now sat the Chief
Silent as when our couple left, whose brief
Encounter wrought so opportune effect
In thoughts he summoned not, nor would reject,
Though time 't was now if ever, to pausefix
On any sort of ending: wiles and tricks
Exhausted, judge! his charge, the crazy town,
Just managed to be hindered crashing down
His last sound troops rangedcare observed to post
His best of the maimed soldiers innermost
So much was plain enough, but somehow struck
Him not before. And now with this strange luck
Of Tito's news, rewarding his address
So well, what thought he of?how the success
With Friedrich's rescript there, would either hush
Old Ecelin's scruples, bring the manly flush
To his young son's white cheek, or, last, exempt
Himself from telling what there was to tempt?
No: that this minstrel was Romano's last
Servanthimself the first! Could he contrast
The whole!that minstrel's thirty years just spent
In doing nought, their notablest event
This morning's journey hither, as I told
Who yet was lean, outworn and really old,
A stammering awkward man that scarce dared raise
His eye before the magisterial gaze
And Salinguerra with his fears and hopes
Of sixty years, his Emperors and Popes,
Cares and contrivances, yet, you would say,
'T was a youth nonchalantly looked away
Through the embrasure northward o'er the sick
Expostulating treesso agile, quick
And graceful turned the head on the broad chest
Encased in pliant steel, his constant vest,
Whence split the sun off in a spray of fire
Across the room; and, loosened of its tire
Of steel, that head let breathe the comely brown
Large massive locks discoloured as if a crown
Encircled them, so frayed the basnet where
A sharp white line divided clean the hair;
Glossy above, glossy below, it swept
Curling and fine about a brow thus kept
Calm, laid coat upon coat, marble and sound:
This was the mystic mark the Tuscan found,
Mused of, turned over books about. Square-faced,
No lion more; two vivid eyes, enchased
In hollows filled with many a shade and streak
Settling from the bold nose and bearded cheek.
Nor might the half-smile reach them that deformed
A lip supremely perfect elseunwarmed,
Unwidened, less or more; indifferent
Whether on trees or men his thoughts were bent,
Thoughts rarely, after all, in trim and train
As now a period was fulfilled again:
Of such, a series made his life, compressed
In each, one story serving for the rest
How his life-streams rolling arrived at last
At the barrier, whence, were it once overpast,
They would emerge, a river to the end,
Gathered themselves up, paused, bade fate befriend,
Took the leap, hung a minute at the height,
Then fell back to oblivion infinite:
Therefore he smiled. Beyond stretched garden-grounds
Where late the adversary, breaking bounds,
Had gained him an occasion, That above,
That eagle, testified he could improve
Effectually. The Kaiser's symbol lay
Beside his rescript, a new badge by way
Of baldric; while,another thing that marred
Alike emprise, achievement and reward,
Ecelin's missive was conspicuous too.
What past life did those flying thoughts pursue?
As his, few names in Mantua half so old;
But at Ferrara, where his sires enrolled
It latterly, the Adelardi spared
No pains to rival them: both factions shared
Ferrara, so that, counted out, 't would yield
A product very like the city's shield,
Half black and white, or Ghibellin and Guelf
As after Salinguerra styled himself
And Este who, till Marchesalla died,
(Last of the Adelardi)never tried
His fortune there: with Marchesalla's child
Would pass,could Blacks and Whites be reconciled
And young Taurello wed Linguetta,wealth
And sway to a sole grasp. Each treats by stealth
Already: when the Guelfs, the Ravennese
Arrive, assault the Pietro quarter, seize
Linguetta, and are gone! Men's first dismay
Abated somewhat, hurries down, to lay
The after indignation, Boniface,
This Richard's father. "Learn the full disgrace
"Averted, ere you blame us Guelfs, who rate
"Your Salinguerra, your sole potentate
"That might have been, 'mongst Este's valvassors
"Ay, Azzo'swho, not privy to, abhors
"Our step; but we were zealous." Azzo then
To do with! Straight a meeting of old men:
"Old Salinguerra dead, his heir a boy,
"What if we change our ruler and decoy
"The Lombard Eagle of the azure sphere
"With Italy to build in, fix him here,
"Settle the city's troubles in a trice?
"For private wrong, let public good suffice!"
In fine, young Salinguerra's staunchest friends
Talked of the townsmen making him amends,
Gave him a goshawk, and affirmed there was
Rare sport, one morning, over the green grass
A mile or so. He sauntered through the plain,
Was restless, fell to thinking, turned again
In time for Azzo's entry with the bride;
Count Boniface rode smirking at their side;
"She brings him half Ferrara," whispers flew,
"And all Ancona! If the stripling knew!"
Anon the stripling was in Sicily
Where Heinrich ruled in right of Constance; he
Was gracious nor his guest incapable;
Each understood the other. So it fell,
One Spring, when Azzo, thoroughly at ease,
Had near forgotten by what precise degrees
He crept at first to such a downy seat,
The Count trudged over in a special heat
To bid him of God's love dislodge from each
Of Salinguerra's palaces,a breach
Might yawn else, not so readily to shut,
For who was just arrived at Mantua but
The youngster, sword on thigh and tuft on chin,
With tokens for Celano, Ecelin,
Pistore, and the like! Next news,no whit
Do any of Ferrara's domes befit
His wife of Heinrich's very blood: a band
Of foreigners assemble, understand
Garden-constructing, level and surround,
Build up and bury in. A last news crowned
The consternation: since his infant's birth,
He only waits they end his wondrous girth
Of trees that link San Pietro with Tom,
To visit Mantua. When the Podest
Ecelin, at Vicenza, called his friend
Taurello thither, what could be their end
But to restore the Ghibellins' late Head,
The Kaiser helping? He with most to dread
From vengeance and reprisal, Azzo, there
With Boniface beforehand, as aware
Of plots in progress, gave alarm, expelled
Both plotters: but the Guelfs in triumph yelled
Too hastily. The burning and the flight,
And how Taurello, occupied that night
With Ecelin, lost wife and son, I told:
Not how he bore the blow, retained his hold,
Got friends safe through, left enemies the worst
O' the fray, and hardly seemed to care at first:
But afterward men heard not constantly
Of Salinguerra's House so sure to be!
Though Azzo simply gained by the event
A shifting of his plaguesthe first, content
To fall behind the second and estrange
So far his nature, suffer such a change
That in Romano sought he wife and child,
And for Romano's sake seemed reconciled
To losing individual life, which shrunk
As the other prosperedmortised in his trunk;
Like a dwarf palm which wanton Arabs foil
Of bearing its own proper wine and oil,
By grafting into it the stranger-vine,
Which sucks its heart out, sly and serpentine,
Till forth one vine-palm feathers to the root,
And red drops moisten the insipid fruit.
Once Adelaide set on,the subtle mate
Of the weak soldier, urged to emulate
The Church's valiant women deed for deed,
And paragon her namesake, win the meed
O' the great Matilda,soon they overbore
The rest of Lombardy,not as before
By an instinctive truculence, but patched
The Kaiser's strategy until it matched
The Pontiff's, sought old ends by novel means.
"Only, why is it Salinguerra screens
"Himself behind Romano?him we bade
"Enjoy our shine i' the front, not seek the shade!"
Asked Heinrich, somewhat of the tardiest
To comprehend. Nor Philip acquiesced
At once in the arrangement; reasoned, plied
His friend with offers of another bride,
A statelier functionfruitlessly: 't was plain
Taurello through some weakness must remain
Obscure. And Otho, free to judge of both
Ecelin the unready, harsh and loth,
And this more plausible and facile wight
With every point a-sparklechose the right,
Admiring how his predecessors harped
On the wrong man: "thus," quoth he, "wits are warped
"By outsides!" Carelessly, meanwhile, his life
Suffered its many turns of peace and strife
In many landsyou hardly could surprise
The man; who shamed Sordello (recognize!)
In this as much beside, that, unconcerned
What qualities were natural or earned,
With no ideal of graces, as they came
He took them, singularly well the same
Speaking the Greek's own language, just because
Your Greek eludes you, leave the least of flaws
In contracts with him; while, since Arab lore
Holds the stars' secrettake one trouble more
And master it! 'T is done, and now deter
Who may the Tuscan, once Jove trined for her,
From Friedrich's path!Friedrich, whose pilgrimage
The same man puts aside, whom he 'll engage
To leave next year John Brienne in the lurch,
Come to Bassano, see Saint Francis' church
And judge of Guido the Bolognian's piece
Which,lend Taurello credit,rivals Greece
Angels, with aureoles like golden quoits
Pitched home, applauding Ecelin's exploits.
For elegance, he strung the angelot,
Made rhymes thereto; for prowess, clove he not
Tiso, last siege, from crest to crupper? Why
Detail you thus a varied mastery
But to show how Taurello, on the watch
For men, to read their hearts and thereby catch
Their capabilities and purposes,
Displayed himself so far as displayed these:
While our Sordello only cared to know
About men as a means whereby he 'd show
Himself, and men had much or little worth
According as they kept in or drew forth
That self; the other's choicest instruments
Surmised him shallow.
Meantime, malcontents
Dropped off, town after town grew wiser. "How
"Change the world's face?" asked people; "as 't is now
"It has been, will be ever: very fine
"Subjecting things profane to things divine,
"In talk! This contumacy will fatigue
"The vigilance of Este and the League!
"The Ghibellins gain on us!"as it happed.
Old Azzo and old Boniface, entrapped
By Ponte Alto, both in one month's space
Slept at Verona: either left a brace
Of sonsbut, three years after, either's pair
Lost Guglielm and Aldobrand its heir:
Azzo remained and Richardall the stay
Of Este and Saint Boniface, at bay
As 't were. Then, either Ecelin grew old
Or his brain alterednot o' the proper mould
For new applianceshis old palm-stock
Endured no influx of strange strengths. He 'd rock
As in a drunkenness, or chuckle low
As proud of the completeness of his woe,
Then weep real tears;now make some mad onslaught
On Este, heedless of the lesson taught
So painfully,now cringe for peace, sue peace
At price of past gain, bar of fresh increase
To the fortunes of Romano. Up at last
Rose Este, down Romano sank as fast.
And men remarked these freaks of peace and war
Happened while Salinguerra was afar:
Whence every friend besought him, all in vain,
To use his old adherent's wits again.
Not he!"who had advisers in his sons,
"Could plot himself, nor needed any one's
"Advice." 'T was Adelaide's remaining staunch
Prevented his destruction root and branch
Forthwith; but when she died, doom fell, for gay
He made alliances, gave lands away
To whom it pleased accept them, and withdrew
For ever from the world. Taurello, who
Was summoned to the convent, then refused
A word at the wicket, patience thus abused,
Promptly threw off alike his imbecile
Ally's yoke, and his own frank, foolish smile.
Soon a few movements of the happier sort
Changed matters, put himself in men's report
As heretofore; he had to fight, beside,
And that became him ever. So, in pride
And flushing of this kind of second youth,
He dealt a good-will blow. Este in truth
Lay proneand men remembered, somewhat late,
A laughing old outrageous stifled hate
He bore to Estehow it would outbreak
At times spite of disguise, like an earthquake
In sunny weatheras that noted day
When with his hundred friends he tried to slay
Azzo before the Kaiser's face: and how,
On Azzo's calm refusal to allow
A liegeman's challenge, straight he too was calmed:
As if his hate could bear to lie embalmed,
Bricked up, the moody Pharaoh, and survive
All intermediate crumblings, to arrive
At earth's catastrophe't was Este's crash
Not Azzo's he demanded, so, no rash
Procedure! Este's true antagonist
Rose out of Ecelin: all voices whist,
All eyes were sharpened, wits predicted. He
'T was, leaned in the embrasure absently,
Amused with his own efforts, now, to trace
With his steel-sheathed forefinger Friedrich's face
I' the dust: but as the trees waved sere, his smile
Deepened, and words expressed its thought erewhile.
"Ay, fairly housed at last, my old compeer?
"That we should stick together, all the year
"I kept Vicenza!How old Boniface,
"Old Azzo caught us in its market-place,
"He by that pillar, I at this,caught each
"In mid swing, more than fury of his speech,
"Egging the rabble on to disavow
"Allegiance to their MarquisBacchus, how
"They boasted! Ecelin must turn their drudge,
"Nor, if released, will Salinguerra grudge
"Paying arrears of tribute due long since
"Bacchus! My man could promise then, nor wince
"The bones-and-muscles! Sound of wind and limb,
"Spoke he the set excuse I framed for him:
"And now he sits me, slavering and mute,
"Intent on chafing each starved purple foot
"Benumbed past aching with the altar slab:
"Will no vein throb there when some monk shall blab
"Spitefully to the circle of bald scalps,
"'Friedrich 's affirmed to be our side the Alps'
"Eh, brother Lactance, brother Anaclet?
"Sworn to abjure the world, its fume and fret,
"God's own now? Drop the dormitory bar,
"Enfold the scanty grey serge scapular
"Twice o'er the cowl to muffle memories out!
"So! But the midnight whisper turns a shout,
"Eyes wink, mouths open, pulses circulate
"In the stone walls: the past, the world you hate
"Is with you, ambush, open fieldor see
"The surging flamewe fire Vicenzaglee!
"Follow, let Pilio and Bernardo chafe!
"Bring up the Mantuansthrough San Biagiosafe!
"Ah, the mad people waken? Ah, they writhe
"And reach us? If they block the gate? No tithe
"Can passkeep back, you Bassanese! The edge,
"Use the edgeshear, thrust, hew, melt down the wedge,
"Let out the black of those black upturned eyes!
"Hellare they sprinkling fire too? The blood fries
"And hisses on your brass gloves as they tear
"Those upturned faces choking with despair.
"Brave! Slidder through the reeking gate! `How now?
"'You six had charge of her?' And then the vow
"Comes, and the foam spirts, hair's plucked, till one shriek
"(I hear it) and you flingyou cannot speak
"Your gold-flowered basnet to a man who haled
"The Adelaide he dared scarce view unveiled
"This morn, naked across the fire: how crown
"The archer that exhausted lays you down
"Your infant, smiling at the flame, and dies?
"While one, while mine . . .
"Bacchus! I think there lies
"More than one corpse there" (and he paced the room)
"Another cinder somewhere: 't was my doom
"Beside, my doom! If Adelaide is dead,
"I live the same, this Azzo lives instead
"Of that to me, and we pull, any how,
"Este into a heap: the matter 's now
"At the true juncture slipping us so oft.
"Ay, Heinrich died and Otho, please you, doffed
"His crown at such a juncture! Still, if hold
"Our Friedrich's purpose, if this chain enfold
"The neck of . . . who but this same Ecelin
"That must recoil when the best days begin!
"Recoil? that 's nought; if the recoiler leaves
"His name for me to fight with, no one grieves:
"But he must interfere, forsooth, unlock
"His cloister to become my stumbling-block
"Just as of old! Ay, ay, there 't is again
"The land's inevitable Headexplain
"The reverences that subject us! Count
"These Ecelins now! Not to say as fount,
"Originating power of thought,from twelve
"That drop i' the trenches they joined hands to delve,
"Six shall surpass him, but . . . why men must twine
"Somehow with something! Ecelin 's a fine
"Clear name! 'Twere simpler, doubtless, twine with me
"At once: our cloistered friend's capacity
"Was of a sort! I had to share myself
"In fifty portions, like an o'ertasked elf
"That 's forced illume in fifty points the vast
"Rare vapour he 's environed by. At last
"My strengths, though sorely frittered, e'en converge
"And crown . . . no, Bacchus, they have yet to urge
"The man be crowned!
"That aloe, an he durst,
"Would climb! Just such a bloated sprawler first
"I noted in Messina's castle-court
"The day I came, when Heinrich asked in sport
"If I would pledge my faith to win him back
"His right in Lombardy: 'for, once bid pack
"Marauders,' he continued, `in my stead
"'You rule, Taurello!' and upon this head
`Laid the silk glove of ConstanceI see her
"Too, mantled head to foot in miniver,
"Retrude following!
"I am absolved
"From further toil: the empery devolved
"On me, 't was Tito's word: I have to lay
"For once my plan, pursue my plan my way,
"Prompt nobody, and render an account
"Taurello to Taurello! Nay, I mount
"To Friedrich: he conceives the post I kept,
"Who did true service, able or inept,
"Who 's worthy guerdon, Ecelin or I.
"Me guerdoned, counsel follows: would he vie
"With the Pope really? Azzo, Boniface
"Compose a right-arm Hohenstauffen's race
"Must break ere govern Lombardy. I point
"How easy 't were to twist, once out of joint,
"The socket from the bone: my Azzo's stare
"Meanwhile! for I, this idle strap to wear,
"Shallfret myself abundantly, what end
"To serve? There 's left me twenty years to spend
"How better than my old way? Had I one
"Who laboured overthrow my worka son
"Hatching with Azzo superb treachery,
"To root my pines up and then poison me,
"Suppose't were worth while frustrate that! Beside,
"Another life's ordained me: the world's tide
"Rolls, and what hope of parting from the press
"Of waves, a single wave though weariness
"Gently lifted aside, laid upon shore?
"My life must be lived out in foam and roar,
"No question. Fifty years the province held
"Taurello; troubles raised, and troubles quelled,
"He in the midstwho leaves this quaint stone place,
"These trees a year or two, then not a trace
"Of him! How obtain hold, fetter men's tongues
"Like this poor minstrel with the foolish songs
"To which, despite our bustle, he is linked?
"Flowers one may teaze, that never grow extinct.
"Ay, that patch, surely, green as ever, where
"I set Her Moorish lentisk, by the stair,
"To overawe the aloes; and we trod
"Those flowers, how call you such?into the sod;
"A stately foreignera world of pain
"To make it thrive, arrest rough windsall vain!
"It would decline; these would not be destroyed:
"And now, where is it? where can you avoid
"The flowers? I frighten children twenty years
"Longer!which way, too, Ecelin appears
"To thwart me, for his son's besotted youth
"Gives promise of the proper tigertooth:
"They feel it at Vicenza! Fate, fate, fate,
"My fine Taurello! Go you, promulgate
"Friedrich's decree, and here 's shall aggrandise
"Young Ecelinyour Prefect's badge! a prize
"Too precious, certainly.
"How now? Compete
"With my old comrade? shuffle from their seat
"His children? Paltry dealing! Do n't I know
"Ecelin? now, I think, and years ago!
"What 's changedthe weakness? did not I compound
"For that, and undertake to keep him sound
"Despite it? Here 's Taurello hankering
"After a boy's prefermentthis plaything
"To carry, Bacchus!" And he laughed.
Remark
Why schemes wherein cold-blooded men embark
Prosper, when your enthusiastic sort
Fail: while these last are ever stopping short
(So much they shouldso little they can do!)
The careless tribe see nothing to pursue
If they desist; meantime their scheme succeeds.
Thoughts were caprices in the course of deeds
Methodic with Taurello; so, he turned,
Enough amused by fancies fairly earned
Of Este's horror-struck submitted neck,
And Richard, the cowed braggart, at his beck,
To his own petty but immediate doubt
If he could pacify the League without
Conceding Richard; just to this was brought
That interval of vain discursive thought!
As, shall I say, some Ethiop, past pursuit
Of all enslavers, dips a shackled foot
Burnt to the blood, into the drowsy black
Enormous watercourse which guides him back
To his own tribe again, where he is king;
And laughs because he guesses, numbering
The yellower poison-wattles on the pouch
Of the first lizard wrested from its couch
Under the slime (whose skin, the while, he strips
To cure his nostril with, and festered lips,
And eyeballs bloodshot through the desert-blast)
That he has reached its boundary, at last
May breathe;thinks o'er enchantments of the South
Sovereign to plague his enemies, their mouth,
Eyes, nails, and hair; but, these enchantments tried
In fancy, puts them soberly aside
For truth, projects a cool return with friends,
The likelihood of winning mere amends
Ere long; thinks that, takes comfort silently,
Then, from the river's brink, his wrongs and he,
Hugging revenge close to their hearts, are soon
Off-striding for the Mountains of the Moon.
Midnight: the watcher nodded on his spear,
Since clouds dispersing left a passage clear
For any meagre and discoloured moon
To venture forth; and such was peering soon
Above the harassed cityher close lanes
Closer, not half so tapering her fanes,
As though she shrunk into herself to keep
What little life was saved, more safely. Heap
By heap the watch-fires mouldered, and beside
The blackest spoke Sordello and replied
Palma with none to listen. "'T is your cause:
"What makes a Ghibellin? There should be laws
"(Remember how my youth escaped! I trust
"To you for manhood, Palma! tell me just
"As any child)there must be laws at work
"Explaining this. Assure me, good may lurk
"Under the bad,my multitude has part
"In your designs, their welfare is at heart
"With Salinguerra, to their interest
"Refer the deeds he dwelt on,so divest
"Our conference of much that scared me. Why
"Affect that heartless tone to Tito? I
"Esteemed myself, yes, in my inmost mind
"This morn, a recreant to my racemankind
"O'erlooked till now: why boast my spirit's force,
"Such force denied its object? why divorce
"These, then admire my spirit's flight the same
"As though it bore up, helped some half-orbed flame
"Else quenched in the dead void, to living space?
"That orb cast off to chaos and disgrace,
"Why vaunt so much my unencumbered dance,
"Making a feat's facilities enhance
"Its marvel? But I front Taurello, one
"Of happier fate, and all I should have done,
"He does; the people's good being paramount
"With him, their progress may perhaps account
"For his abiding still; whereas you heard
"The talk with Titothe excuse preferred
"For burning those five hostages,and broached
"By way of blind, as you and I approached,
"I do believe."
She spoke: then he, "My thought
"Plainlier expressed! All to your profitnought
"Meantime of these, of conquests to achieve
"For them, of wretchedness he might relieve
"While profiting your party. Azzo, too,
"Supports a cause: what cause? Do Guelfs pursue
"Their ends by means like yours, or better?"
When
The Guelfs were proved alike, men weighed with men,
And deed with deed, blaze, blood, with blood and blaze,
Morn broke: "Once more, Sordello, meet its gaze
"Proudlythe people's charge against thee fails
"In every point, while either party quails!
"These are the busy ones: be silent thou!
"Two parties take the world up, and allow
"No third, yet have one principle, subsist
"By the same injustice; whoso shall enlist
"With either, ranks with man's inveterate foes.
"So there is one less quarrel to compose:
"The Guelf, the Ghibellin may be to curse
"I have done nothing, but both sides do worse
"Than nothing. Nay, to me, forgotten, reft
"Of insight, lapped by trees and flowers, was left
"The notion of a serviceha? What lured
"Me here, what mighty aim was I assured
"Must move Taurello? What if there remained
"A cause, intact, distinct from these, ordained
"For me, its true discoverer?"
Some one pressed
Before them here, a watcher, to suggest
The subject for a ballad: "They must know
"The tale of the dead worthy, long ago
"Consul of Romethat 's long ago for us,
"Minstrels and bowmen, idly squabbling thus
`In the world's cornerbut too late no doubt,
"For the brave time he sought to bring about.
"Not know Crescentius Nomentanus?" Then
He cast about for terms to tell him, when
Sordello disavowed it, how they used
Whenever their Superior introduced
A novice to the Brotherhood("for I
"Was just a brown-sleeve brother, merrily
"Appointed too," quoth he, "till Innocent
"Bade me relinquish, to my small content,
"My wife or my brown sleeves")some brother spoke
Ere nocturns of Crescentius, to revoke
The edict issued, after his demise,
Which blotted fame alike and effigies,
All out except a floating power, a name
Including, tending to produce the same
Great act. Rome, dead, forgotten, lived at least
Within that brain, though to a vulgar priest
And a vile stranger,two not worth a slave
Of Rome's, Pope John, King Otho,fortune gave
The rule there: so, Crescentius, haply dressed
In white, called Roman Consul for a jest,
Taking the people at their word, forth stepped
As upon Brutus' heel, nor ever kept
Rome waiting,stood erect, and from his brain
Gave Rome out on its ancient place again,
Ay, bade proceed with Brutus' Rome, Kings styled
Themselves mere citizens of, and, beguiled
Into great thoughts thereby, would choose the gem
Out of a lapfull, spoil their diadem
The Senate's cypher was so hard to scratch
He flashes like a phanal, all men catch
The flame, Rome 's just accomplished! when returned
Otho, with John, the Consul's step had spurned,
And Hugo Lord of Este, to redress
The wrongs of each. Crescentius in the stress
Of adverse fortune bent. "They crucified
"Their Consul in the Forum; and abide
"E'er since such slaves at Rome, that I(for I
"Was once a brown-sleeve brother, merrily
"Appointed)I had option to keep wife
"Or keep brown sleeves, and managed in the strife
"Lose both. A song of Rome!"
And Rome, indeed,
Robed at Goito in fantastic weed,
The Mother-City of his Mantuan days,
Looked an established point of light whence rays
Traversed the world; for, all the clustered homes
Beside of men, seemed bent on being Romes
In their degree; the question was, how each
Should most resemble Rome, clean out of reach.
Nor, of the Two, did either principle
Struggle to change, but to possess Rome,still
Guelf Rome or Ghibellin Rome.
Let Rome advance!
Rome, as she struck Sordello's ignorance
How could he doubt one moment? Rome 's the Cause!
Rome of the Pandects, all the world's new laws
Of the Capitol, of Castle Angelo;
New structures, that inordinately glow,
Subdued, brought back to harmony, made ripe
By many a relic of the archetype
Extant for wonder; every upstart church
That hoped to leave old temples in the lurch,
Corrected by the Theatre forlorn
That,as a mundane shell, its world late born,
Lay and o'ershadowed it. These hints combined,
Rome typifies the scheme to put mankind
Once more in full possession of their rights.
"Let us have Rome again! On me it lights
"To build up Romeon me, the first and last:
"For such a future was endured the past!"
And thus, in the grey twilight, forth he sprung
To give his thought consistency among
The very Peoplelet their facts avail
Finish the dream grown from the archer's tale.
~ Robert Browning, Sordello - Book the Fourth
,#NFDB
18 Integral Yoga
5 Psychology
4 Poetry
3 Philosophy
3 Christianity
1 Occultism
1 Alchemy
13 Sri Aurobindo
8 The Mother
6 Nolini Kanta Gupta
4 Satprem
4 Jordan Peterson
2 Saint Augustine of Hippo
4 Maps of Meaning
4 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05
3 Hymns to the Mystic Fire
2 The Secret Doctrine
2 Savitri
2 Letters On Yoga IV
0.05 - Letters to a Child, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
to conquer the Adversary who is trying to draw you towards the
lower animal consciousness.
0 1961-10-30, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The secret lies in matter. Because Agni is imprisoned in matter and we ourselves are imprisoned there. It is said that Agni is without head or feet, that it conceals its two extremities: above, it disappears into the great heaven of the supraconscient (which the Rishis also called the great ocean), and below, it sinks into the formless ocean of the inconscient (which they also called the rock). We are truncated. But the Rishis were men of a solid realism, a true realism resting upon the Spirit; and since the summits of mind opened out upon a lacuna of lightecstatic, to be sure, but with no hold over the worldthey set upon the downward way.6 Thus begins the quest for the lost sun, the long pilgrimage of descent into the inconscient and the merciless fight against the dark forces, the thieves of the sun, the panis and vritras, pythons and giants, hidden in the dark lair with the whole cohort of usurpers: the dualizers, the confiners, the tearers, the COVERERS. But the divine worker, Agni, is helped by the gods, and in his quest he is led by the intuitive ray, Sarama, the heavenly hound with the subtle sense of smell who sets Agni on the track of the stolen herds (strange, shining herds). Now and again there comes the sudden glimmer of a fugitive dawn then all grows dim. One must advance step by step, digging, digging, fighting every inch of the way against the wolves whose savage fury increases the nearer one draws to their denAgni is a warrior. Agni grows through his difficulties, his flame burns more brilliantly with each blow from the Adversary; for, as the Rishis said, Night and Day both suckled the divine Child; they even said that Night and Day are the two sisters, Immortal, with a common lover [the sun] common they, though different their forms (I.113.2,3). These alternations of night and brightness accelerate until Day breaks at last and the herds of Dawn7 surge upward awakening someone who was dead (I.113.8). The infinite rock of the inconscient is shattered, the seeker uncovers the Sun dwelling in the darkness (III.39.5), the divine consciousness in the heart of Matter. In the very depths of Matter, that is to say, in the body, on earth, the Rishis found themselves cast up into Light that same Light which others sought on the heights, without their bodies and without the earth, in ecstasy. And this is what the Rishis would call the Great Passage. Without abandoning the earth they found the vast dwelling place, that dwelling place of the gods, Swar, the original Sun-world that Sri Aurobindo calls the Supramental World: Human beings [the Rishis emphasize that they are indeed men] slaying the Coverer have crossed beyond both earth and heaven [matter and mind] and made the wide world their dwelling place (I.36.8). They have entered the True, the Right, the Vast, Satyam, Ritam, Brihat, the unbroken light, the fearless light, where there is no longer suffering nor falsehood nor death: it is immortality, amritam.
***
0 1964-11-14, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(Mother looks at the photo) He is only an instrument. I mean he isnt an Asuric incarnation. But a strong will. He isnt a being who acts consciously for the Adversary: he thinks he is doing the right thing.
Hes a theoretician.
0 1967-10-04, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There is always this critical hostile voice in everybodys nature, questioning, reasoning, denying the experience itself, suggesting doubt of oneself and doubt of the Divine. One has to recognise it as the voice of the Adversary trying to prevent the progress and refuse credence to it altogether.
Sri Aurobindo
06.02 - The Way of Fate and the Problem of Pain, #Savitri, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
And perished has the Adversary Force,
He still must labour on, his work half done.
07.02 - The Parable of the Search for the Soul, #Savitri, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
The dread visages of the Adversary Kings.
The dreadful powers held down within his depths
1.02 - MAPS OF MEANING - THREE LEVELS OF ANALYSIS, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
must represent the sun (or, alternatively, the Adversary the power that eternally opposes the dominion of
the light).
1.02 - The Descent. Dante's Protest and Virgil's Appeal. The Intercession of the Three Ladies Benedight., #The Divine Comedy, #Dante Alighieri, #Christianity
But if the Adversary of all evil
Was courteous, thinking of the high effect
10.36 - Cling to Truth, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Beware, this is the voice of the Adversary trying to tempt you by confusing your mind. The path is straight and narrow, it is not wide and comfortable and strewn with roses. To find the Truth, to live the Truth we must begin by finding it in its purity and living it. As is the start, so is the end. Our steadfastness, our faithfulness must be unalloyed, our sincerity of utmost purity. It is Truth alone that leads to Truth, a compromise or semblance leads only to the untruth. Your diplomacy or duplicity may bring you the coveted result or it may not; but surely it will put a layer of soot upon your soul, push you back one step more into your inconscience. And if you continue you may become the biggest success in the eyes of the world, but your soul will be nowhere, leaving behind perhaps only a hopeless sob in a wilderness. Has not the Mother said, "Even if there is a particle of falsehood in your expression In your word or in your acthow can you hope to express the Supreme Truth?" Remember also the words of Sri Aurobindo: "Do not imagine that truth and falsehood, light and darkness, surrender and selfishness can be allowed to dwell together in a house consecrated to the Divine. The transformation must be integral, and integral therefore the rejection of all that withstands it."1
You cannot elude falsehood or cajole or conjure it. You must stand face to face, gaze with unwinking eyes, the flame of Truth within you constantly ablaze.
If you say you are a small creature and yours a smaller light: your consciousness has not the dimensions of a heroic being, your light will be engulfed, swallowed up and lost in the vast and overwhelming gloom around. Yet small as you are, do what you can, the utmost possible for you; do not let your little flame be tarnished by any contrary or unworthy movement in you: be firm, keep it bright and trimmed. The surrounding darkness may engulf it but cannot smother it; for it is the everlasting, the Divine in you. The body, the flesh may not continue but the holy light remains. The outward frame may have to yield or dissolve in a material surrounding that was unreadynot that the inner consciousness was unready. Indeed the passing body releases the light and it adds to the growing light in the earth's atmosphere. That is the central creed of the Christian martyr. The blood of the martyr is the cement of the Church. This truth of martyrdom, the sacrifice of the faithful was perhaps a necessity at a time when humanity had not risen high enough in consciousness and the earth's atmosphere was more opaque and dull than it is now. The one thing necessary at that stage was an uncompromising living faith, the pure light, the unvacillating flame, a spirit even though small standing against insurmountable odds that was the way, the martyr's way to stand against the Adversary. That is why in the process the God-Man sacrificed himself.
We are in a somewhat different age under different circumstances. At least our aim is different. We stand firm full square against all temptations, all leaning towards compromise, in the faith and certainty that we shall conquer, we shall not go down but the odds against us shall be pushed back and eliminated. This is the age of Victory.
1.03 - APPRENTICESHIP AND ENCULTURATION - ADOPTION OF A SHARED MAP, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
of the ever-lurking figure of the Adversary: arrogant, cowardly, and cruel. A story accounting for all of
these constituent elements of reality is balanced, and stable, in contrast to an ideology and far less
1.03 - Hymns of Gritsamada, #Hymns to the Mystic Fire, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
9. O Fire, men worship thee with their sacrifices as a father and thee that thou mayst be their brother by their achievement of works when thou illuminest the body with thy light. Thou becomest a son to the man who worships thee; thou art his blissful friend and guardest him from the violence of the Adversary.
10. O Fire, thou art the craftsman Ribhu, near to us and to be worshipped with obeisance of surrender; thou hast mastery over the store of the plenitude and the riches. All thy wide shining of light and onward burning is for the gift of the treasure; thou art our instructor in wisdom and our builder of sacrifice.
1.05 - Hymns of Bharadwaja, #Hymns to the Mystic Fire, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
2. He has sacrificed with sacrifices, he has achieved his labour by his works, he has given to the Fire whose boons grow ever in opulence. And so there befalls him not the turning away of the Glorious Ones; evil comes not to him nor the insolence of the Adversary.
3. Faultless is thy seeing like the sun's; terrible marches thy thought when blazing with light thou neighest aloud like a force of battle. This Fire was born in the pleasant woodl and and is a rapturous dweller somewhere in the night.
--
3. O Fire, from thee is born the Seer, the Horse and of thee are the Heroes whose might overcomes the Adversary. O King, O universal Power, found in us the desirable treasures.
4. O Immortal, all the Gods come together to thee in thy birth as to a new-born child. O universal Power, they travelled to immortality by the works of thy will when thou leapedst alight from the Father and Mother
--
5. The Fire is the godhead who rescues mortal man by knowledge from the Binder. A forceful thing is the treasure of his riches, unencircled by the Adversary, unbesieged in its plenitudes.
6. O Fire, O friendly Light, O Godhead turn to the Godheads, mayest thou speak for us the true thought of Earth and Heaven; march in peace to the happy abode and the Men of Heaven. Let us pass safe beyond the foe and the sin and the stumbling. Let us pass beyond these things, pass in thy keeping through them safe.
1.05 - THE HOSTILE BROTHERS - ARCHETYPES OF RESPONSE TO THE UNKNOWN, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
The personality of the Adversary comes in two forms, so to speak although these two forms are
inseparably linked. The fascist sacrifices his soul, which would enable him to confront change on his own,
--
5.1. Introduction: The Hero and the Adversary
The culture bequea thed to us by our forebears degenerates of its own accord, as the flux of the present
--
5.2. the Adversary: Emergence, Development and Representation
The figure of Satan is arguably the most well-developed representation of evil extant in religious and
--
opposite to the act of creative exploration (as the Adversary is opposite to the hero). What knowing
everything means, however at least in practice is that the unknown no longer exists, and that further
--
It is lack of discrimination between the existence of the Adversary as process with the existence of
anomaly as constituent element of experience that has lead to some of the worst excesses of Christianity
--
idea of the Adversary is somewhat more complex. Transpersonal notions of the breadth of the image of
the Devil cannot emerge as a consequence of conscious motivation, because their development requires
--
of the Adversary. The most thoroughly developed archaic personification of evil outside the JudeoChristian tradition can perhaps be found in the ideas of Zoroastrianism, which flourished in relatively
explicit form from 1000-600 B.C. (and which undoubtedly depended for its form on much more ancient
--
produce a character motivated to perform worse acts than mere suicide. The development of the Adversary
therefore follows a predictable path, from pride (Pride and worse Ambition threw me me down479),
--
5.2.1. the Adversary in Action: Voluntary Degradation of the Map of Meaning
Who alone has reason to lie himself out of actuality?
--
Figure 58: The Vicious Circle of the Adversary.
The individual who lives by the lie continually shrinks his domain of competence his explored and
--
58: The Vicious Circle of the Adversary.
260
--
the perfect world presently extant nothing imperfect may be allowed to exist. So the Adversary backs
himself into a position where he cannot admit even to his own misery (let alone the misery of others). A
--
contrast, identification with the Adversary, whose eternal dwelling place is hell. This hell is something
whose nature can be rendered explicitly comprehensible, despite its mythological character is something
--
5.2.2. the Adversary In Action: A Twentieth Century Allegory
Jung stated at some point that any internal state of contradiction, unrecognized, will be played out in the
1.06 - Quieting the Vital, #Sri Aurobindo or the Adventure of Consciousness, #Satprem, #Integral Yoga
but if it was not there to besiege and defy us, we would long ago have seized the eternal Truth and turned it into a nice, tidy piece of platitude. Truth moves on; it has legs; and the princes of darkness are there to make sure, however brutally, that it does not slumber. God's negations are as useful to us as His affirmations,68 says Sri Aurobindo. the Adversary will disappear only when he is no longer necessary in the world, remarked Mother. He is undoubtedly necessary, as is the touchstone for gold, to make sure we are true.
Indeed, God may not be a pure mathematical point, external to this world; perhaps He is all this world and all this impurity laboring and suffering to become perfect, and to remember Itself here on earth.
1.08 - The Supreme Discovery, #Words Of Long Ago, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And when the Adversary pursues man relentlessly, everything he does to destroy him only makes him greater.
Hear the story of the worlds, look: the great enemy seems to triumph. He casts the beings of light into the night, and the night is filled with stars. He rages against the cosmic working, he assails the integrity of the empire of the sphere, shatters its harmony, divides and subdivides it, scatters its dust to the four winds of infinity, and lo! the dust is changed into a golden seed, fertilising the infinite and peopling it with worlds which now gravitate around their eternal centre in the larger orbit of spaceso that even division creates a richer and deeper unity, and by multiplying the surfaces of the material universe, enlarges the empire that it set out to destroy.
1.21 - WALPURGIS-NIGHT, #Faust, #Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, #Poetry
Or from behind struck down the Adversary.
MEPHISTOPHELES
1.3.02 - Equality The Chief Support, #Letters On Yoga II, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
demanded from us. If so, then the general attitude will be one of a neutral indifference to everything. But the Gita, which strongly insists on a perfect and absolute samata, goes on to say, "Fight, destroy the Adversary, conquer." If there is no kind of general action wanted, no loyalty to Truth as against Falsehood except for one's personal sadhana, no will for the Truth to conquer, then the samata of indifference will suffice. But here there is a work to be done, a Truth to be established against which immense forces are arranged, invisible forces which use visible things and persons and actions for their instruments. If one is among the disciples, the seekers of this Truth, one has to take sides for the Truth, to stand against the Forces that attack it and seek to stifle it. Arjuna wanted not to stand for either side, to refuse any action of hostility even against assailants; Sri Krishna, who insisted so much on samata, strongly rebuked his attitude and insisted equally on his fighting the Adversary. "Have samata," he said, "and seeing clearly the Truth, fight." Therefore to take sides with the Truth and to refuse to concede anything to the
Falsehood that attacks, to be unflinchingly loyal and against the hostiles and the attackers, is not inconsistent with equality. It is personal and egoistic feeling that has to be thrown away; hatred and vital ill-will have to be rejected. But loyalty and refusal to compromise with the assailants and the hostiles or to dally with their ideas and demands and say, "After all we can compromise with what they ask from us", or to accept them as companions and our own people - these things have a great importance. If the attack were a physical menace to the work and the leaders and doers of the work, one would see this at once. But because the attack is of a subtler kind, can a passive attitude be right?
19.13 - Of the World, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Swans move in the path of the sun, they who possess subtle powers walk in the sky, the wise conquer the Adversary with all his armies and go out of the world.
[10]
19.20 - The Path, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
You must yourself make the effort, the Master only explains. They who take to meditation and follow the Path are freed from the bond ages of the Adversary.
[5]
1955-12-07 - Emotional impulse of self-giving - A young dancer in France - The heart has wings, not the head - Only joy can conquer the Adversary, #Questions And Answers 1955, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
object:1955-12-07 - Emotional impulse of self-giving - A young dancer in France - The heart has wings, not the head - Only joy can conquer the Adversary
class:chapter
--
Truly speaking, it is with the Adversary that suffering came into the world. And its only joy which can vanquish him, nothing elsevanquish him definitively, finally.
(Long silence)
--
Mother, you say that for conquering, it is only joy which can conquer the Adversary. But to attain the joy one must first conquer the Adversary!
Why no! One must go beyond him and ignore him.
There is one thing you must begin by doing, it is true, that is to free yourself from his influence. But there is a difference between freeing oneself from the Adversarys influence and conquering the Adversary. To conquer the Adversary is not a small thing. One must have a greater power than his to vanquish him. But one can liberate oneself totally from his influence. And from the minute one is completely free from his influence, ones self-giving can be total. And with the self-giving comes joy, long before the Adversary is truly vanquished and disappears.
the Adversary will disappear only when he is no longer necessary in the world. And we know very well that he is necessary, as the touch-stone for gold: to know if it is pure.
But if you, whoever it may be, become truly sincerewhat I call sincere, you see, what Sri Aurobindo calls sincere, that is, when nothing in the being contradicts the aspiration and the will to consecration, nothing disguises itself to continue living its own independent life The disguises are countless, they are full of craftiness and malice, very deceptive, and unfortunately the human being has a very great innate tendency to deceive himself; and the more one deceives himself, the less one recognises the self-deception. But if one is really sincere, the Adversary cant even approach him any longer; and he doesnt try it, because that would be courting his own destruction.
Only, some people have in them a kind of fighting instinct and they are not content to liberate themselves and come out of the influence; indeed they think they have the capacity to go to war and fight with the Adversary. So sometimes, if they are not quite ready, they go and land in very bad situations, difficult predicaments.
These are saved only by their trust in the divine Grace. Because, even if they act foolishly and land in difficult situations, there will always be something which comes and pulls them out of the hole at the last moment. A little like the mother cat catching its young one which is going to drown because it has made a mistake and wanted to walk upon watershe catches it, pulls it, brings it out. A little like that.
1956-08-15 - Protection, purification, fear - Atmosphere at the Ashram on Darshan days - Darshan messages - Significance of 15-08 - State of surrender - Divine Grace always all-powerful - Assumption of Virgin Mary - SA message of 1947-08-15, #Questions And Answers 1956, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
That I warn you to put you on your guard against the trap that is the great argument of the Adversary. He uses it to cloud the mind and raise up revolt; but still, it is well thought out as a trap.
Then come those who say, It is because you are in the Ignorance that you see like that; change your consciousness, enter into contact with the divine Consciousness and you will see differently. This is perfectly correct. I was just telling you, and I repeat, that if you can manage to get out of the Ignorance and enter ever so little into union with the divine Reality, you live an ecstatic life in which everything is marvellous, sublime, and where the Grace manifests in all things. Therefore, you have solved the problem for yourself, on condition that you can remain in that state perpetually, which is not very easy. But still it is possible. But it draws you out of the world, prevents you from participating in the life of the world, and above all, if everything had to be changed in that way, I think an eternity would not suffice for all the elements of the world to be so transformed.
1958-04-02 - Correcting a mistake, #Questions And Answers 1957-1958, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
That means an insincerity, it does not mean a weakness. And insincerity is always an open door for the Adversary. That means there is some secret sympathy with what is perverse. And that is what is serious.
In the case of ignorance which is to be enlightened, it is enough, as I said, to light the lamp. In the case of conscious relapse, what is necessary is a cauterisation.
1.rb - Sordello - Book the Fourth, #Browning - Poems, #Robert Browning, #Poetry
Where late the Adversary, breaking bounds,
Had gained him an occasion, That above,
20.02 - The Golden Journey, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
It is She: the mother, the tree, the comrade, the bride, the master, the Adversary the One, the Beloved.
The New Being incarnates, in a new cycle, their manifestation in a single body.
20.04 - Act II: The Play on Earth, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Scene 5: the Adversary
SHEMy spouse, my brother,
2.01 - Mandala One, #Vedic and Philological Studies, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
(7) Mitra of purified discernment I call and Varuna who destroys the Adversary, accomplishing together a clear light of the understanding.
(8) By the Truth, O Mitra and Varuna, growing by the Truth, in touch with the Truth you attain to a vast will-force.
2.10 - The Vision of the World-Spirit - Time the Destroyer, #Essays On The Gita, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
Slay, by me who are slain, Drona, Bhishma, Jayadratha, Karna and other heroic fighters; be not pained and troubled. Fight, thou shalt conquer the Adversary in the battle." The fruit of the great and terrible work is promised and prophesied, not as a fruit hungered for by the individual, - for to that there is to be no attachment, - but as the result of the divine will, the glory and success of the thing to be done accomplished, the glory given by the Divine to himself in his Vibhuti. Thus is the final and compelling comm and to action given to the protagonist of the world-battle.
It is the Timeless manifest as Time and World-Spirit from whom the comm and to action proceeds. For certainly the Godhead when he says, "I am Time the Destroyer of beings," does not mean either that he is the Time-Spirit alone or that the whole essence of the Time-Spirit is destruction. But it is this which is the present will of his workings, pravr.tti. Destruction is always a simultaneous or alternate element which keeps pace with creation and it is by destroying and renewing that the Master of
2.25 - The Triple Transformation, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
If the spirit could from the first dwell securely on the superior heights and deal with a blank and virgin stuff of mind and matter, a complete spiritual transformation might be rapid, even facile: but the actual process of Nature is more difficult, the logic of her movement more manifold, contorted, winding, comprehensive; she recognises all the data of the task she has set to herself and is not satisfied with a summary triumph over her own complexities. Every part of our being has to be taken in its own nature and character, with all the moulds and writings of the past still there in it: each minutest portion and movement must either be destroyed and replaced if it is unfit, or, if it is capable, transmuted into the truth of the higher being. If the psychic change is complete, this can be done by a painless process, though still the programme must be long and scrupulous and the progress deliberate; but otherwise one has to be satisfied with a partial result or, if one's own scrupulousness of perfection or hunger of the spirit is insatiable, consent to a difficult, often painful and seemingly interminable action. For ordinarily the consciousness does not rise to the summits except in the highest moments; it remains on the mental level and receives descents from above, sometimes a single descent of some spiritual power that stays and moulds the being into something predominatingly spiritual, or a succession of descents bringing into it more and more of the spiritual status and dynamis: but unless one can live on the highest height reached, there cannot be the complete or more integral change. If the psychic mutation has not taken place, if there has been a premature pulling down of the higher Forces, their contact may be too strong for the flawed and impure material of Nature and its immediate fate may be that of the unbaked jar of the Veda which could not hold the divine Soma Wine; or the descending influence may withdraw or be spilt because the nature cannot contain or keep it. Again, if it is Power that descends, the egoistic mind or vital may try to seize on it for its own use and a magnified ego or a hunting after powers and self-aggrandising masteries may be the untoward result. The Ananda descending cannot be held if there is too much sexual impurity creating an intoxicant or degrading mixture; the Power recedes, if there is ambition, vanity or other aggressive form of lower self, the Light if there is an attachment to obscurity or to any form of the Ignorance, the Presence if the chamber of the heart has not been made pure. Or some undivine Force may try to seize hold, not of the Power itself, for that withdraws, but of the result of force it leaves behind in the instrument and use it for the purposes of the Adversary. Even if none of these more disastrous faults or errors should take place, still the numerous mistakes of reception or the imperfections of the vessel may impede the transformation. The Power has to come at intervals and work meanwhile behind the veil or hold itself back through long periods of obscure assimilation or preparation of the recalcitrant parts of Nature; the Light has to work in darkness or semi-darkness on the regions in us that are still in the Night. At any moment the work may be stayed, personally for this life, because the nature is able to receive or assimilate no more, - for it has reached the present limits of its capacity, - or because the mind may be ready but the vital, when faced with a choice between the old life and the new, refuses, or if the vital accepts, the body may prove too weak, unfit or flawed for the necessary change of its consciousness and its dynamic transformation.
Moreover, the necessity of working out the change separately in each part of the being in its own nature and character compels the consciousness to descend into each in turn and act there according to its state and its possibility. If the work were done from above, from some spiritual height, there might be a sublimation or uplifting or the creation of a new structure compelled by the sheer force of the influence from above: but this change might not be accepted as native to itself by the lower being; it would not be a total growth, an integral evolution, but a partial and imposed formation, affecting or liberating some parts of the being, suppressing others or leaving them as they were; a creation from outside the normal nature, by imposition upon it, it could be durable in its entirety only as long as there was a maintenance of the creating influence. A descent of consciousness into the lower levels is therefore necessary, but in this way also it is difficult to work out the full power of the higher principle; there is a modification, dilution, diminution which keeps up an imperfection and limitation in the results: the light of a greater knowledge comes down but gets blurred and modified, its significance misinterpreted or its truth mixed with mental and vital error, or the force, the power to fulfil itself is not commensurate with its light. A light and power of the overmind working in its own full right and in its own sphere is one thing, the same light working in the obscurity of the physical consciousness and under its conditions is something quite different and, owing to dilution and mixture, far inferior in its knowledge and force and results. A mutilated power, a partial effect or hampered movement is the consequence.
2 - Other Hymns to Agni, #Hymns to the Mystic Fire, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
4. O Fire, who are these that are binders of the Adversary,
who are the guardians, the luminous ones that shall possess
3.03 - The Soul Is Mortal, #Of The Nature Of Things, #Lucretius, #Poetry
All refuge from the Adversary, and rout
Error by two-edged confutation.
3.12 - ON OLD AND NEW TABLETS, #Thus Spoke Zarathustra, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
be the Adversary of all rabble and of all that is despotic
and to write anew upon new tablets the word "noble."
33.05 - Muraripukur - II, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 07, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
The police had on more than one occasion suggested to Sri Aurobindo, in order that he might feel flattered or perhaps even get excited and be moved to act according to their wishes, that a strong and truthful and straightforward man like him could certainly not adopt a false pose or act in secret; that he had the courage to do openly whatever he considered to be his duty or the right thing to do; that he would never care to run away and hide himself; and that whatever he did he would frankly acknowledge and say without hesitation, "Yes, it is I who have done it." But Sri Aurobindo was not to be trapped like that: He held that far more important than any question of personal honour or indignities, or a parading of one's capacity or virtue, was the work to be done and its success. He would cite the example of Sri Krishna in the Mahabharata story; Sri Krishna had no intention of being caught by Jarasandha and he fled to Dwarka in order to make ready for the Adversary. That is why Sri Aurobindo did not consider a retreat to be a bad thing always. "We live to fight another day": this should be the motto of the soldier. That is why he left standing instructions with Barin and his group that they were not to admit anything immediately they were caught by the police. They should keep their mouths shut and make whatever statements were necessary only when the time came at a later stage. It is however true that Barin and some of the senior members of the group did make a full confession soon after their arrest. But they did that purposely, with a view to save the party by the sacrifice of some of its members. They had hoped that by taking on themselves all the responsibility, the others might be proved to have been innocent, so that instead of all of us dying together, some might still live on to carry the work forward.
Nevertheless, we were all arrested in a body. The police made us stand in a line under the strict watch of an armed guard. They kept us standing the whole day with hardly anything to eat. Only towards the evening, some of them were kind enough to get us some fried stuff from the market. Our throats were so dry by the time that we would have gladly taken a sip out of that famous pond of ours. In the evening, the order came, "Follow us." But follow where? I somehow had the feeling that here was the end - "Remember, O soul, the day of the Great Departure." I could not conceive at the moment that a case would have to be framed against us, that there must take place a trial and there might be a counsel to defend us. I thought on the contrary that they would take us straight to Fort William and finish us off with a firing squad! I was in fact getting myself ready for that. But things turned out rather differently. The British Government could not be so heartless after all. We were taken to the lock-up at the Lal Bazar police station. There they kept us for nearly two days and nights. This was perhaps the most trying time of all. We had no bath, no food, not even a wink of sleep. The whole lot of us were herded together like beasts and shut up in a cell. The police showed by their manner how rude and bitter they could be. Then, after having been through all this, we were taken to Alipore Jail one evening. There we were received with great kindness and courtesy by the gentleman in charge. He said, "Now there will be no more of that harassment by the police. You will find it quite comfortable here." And he had us served immediately with hot cooked rice. This was our first meal in three days, and it tasted so nice and sweet that we felt as if we were in heaven.
4.07 - THE RELATION OF THE KING-SYMBOL TO CONSCIOUSNESS, #Mysterium Coniunctionis, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
[506] The illegitimate aspect of this relationship appears as incest, veiled, in the Cantilena, by adoptionwhich nevertheless results in the pregnancy of the mother. As I have explained elsewhere, incest expresses the union of elements that are akin or of the same nature; that is to say the Adversary of Sol is his own feminine chthonic aspect which he has forgotten. Sols reflected light is the feminine Luna, who dissolves the king in her moistness. It is as though Sol had to descend into the watery deep of the sublunary world in order to unite the powers of Above and Below (as in Fausts journey to the Mothers). The unworkable conscious dominant disappears in menacing fashion among the contents rising up from the unconscious, thus bringing about a darkening of the light. The warring elements of primeval chaos are unleashed, as though they had never been subjugated. The battle is fought out between the dominant and the contents of the unconscious so violently that reason would like to clamp down on unreason. But these attempts fail, and go on failing until the ego acknowledges its impotence and lets the furious battle of psychic powers go its own way. If the ego does not interfere with its irritating rationality, the opposites, just because they are in conflict, will gradually draw together, and what looked like death and destruction will settle down into a latent state of concord, suitably expressed by the symbol of pregnancy.389 In consequence the king, the previous dominant of consciousness, is transformed into a real and workable whole, whereas before he had only pretended to wholeness.
[507] The Cantilena shows us what that dominant was which is subjected to transformation not only in Ripley but in many other alchemists: it was the Christian view of the world in the Middle Ages. This problem is of such dimensions that one cannot expect a medieval man to have been even remotely conscious of it. It was bound to work itself out in projection, unconsciously. For this reason, too, it can hardly be grasped even todaywhich is why the psychological interpretation of the One, the filius regius, meets with the greatest difficulties. From the hymnlike manner in which the alchemists praised their son it is quite evident that they meant by this symbol either Christ himself or something that corresponded to him. Naturally they were not concerned with the historical personality of Jesus, which at that time was completely covered up by the dogmatic figure of the second Person of the Trinity. The latter symbol had slowly crystallized out in the course of the centuries, though it was clearly prefigured in the Logos of St. John. Nor was the conception of God as senex and puer peculiar to the alchemists, for many clerics who were not alchemists took it as a transformation of the wrathful and vindictive Yahweh of the Old Testament into the God of Love of the New. Thus the archetype of the kings renewal manifested itself not only among the philosophers but also in ecclesiastical circles.390
4.1.01 - The Intellect and Yoga, #Letters On Yoga I, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
I have once before told you what I think of the ineffective peckings of certain well-intentioned scientific minds on the surface - or apparent surface - of the spiritual Reality behind things and I need not elaborate it. More important is the prognostic of a greater danger coming in the new attack by the Adversary, the sceptics, against the validity of spiritual and supraphysical experience, their new strategy of destruction by admitting and explaining it in their own sense. There may well be a strong ground for the apprehension; but I doubt whether, if these things are once admitted to scrutiny, the mind of humanity will long remain satisfied with explanations so ineptly superficial and external, explanations that explain nothing. If the defenders of religion take up an unsound position, easily capturable, when they affirm only the subjective validity of spiritual experience, the opponents also seem to me to be giving away without knowing it the gates of the materialistic stronghold by their consent at all to admit and examine spiritual and supraphysical experience.
Their entrenchment in the physical field, their refusal to admit or even examine supraphysical things was their tower of strong safety; once it is abandoned, the human mind pressing towards something less negative, more helpfully positive will pass to it
4.3.2 - Attacks by the Hostile Forces, #Letters On Yoga IV, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
There is always this critical hostile voice in everybodys nature, questioning, reasoning, denying the experience itself, suggesting doubt of oneself and doubt of the Divine. One has to recognise it as the voice of the Adversary trying to prevent the progress and refuse credence to it altogether.
***
4.3.3 - Dealing with Hostile Attacks, #Letters On Yoga IV, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
You need not be upset about the matter; it is sufficient if you note movements like these and are vigilant that they should find no ground in you again. The cause is probably to be found in the contact with the outside world renewing some possibilities of the old Adam in you. When there is some lowering or diminution of the consciousness or some impairing of it at one place or another, the Adversaryor the Censorwho is always on the watch presses with all his might wherever there is a weak point lying covered from your own view, and suddenly a wrong movement leaps up with unexpected force. Become conscious and cast out the possibility of its renewal, that is all that is to be done.
***
BOOK II. -- PART I. ANTHROPOGENESIS., #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
independent Spirit, uninfluenced by the external form (hence by dogma), forthwith made of SamaelSatan (the most wise and spiritual spirit of all) -- the Adversary of its anthropomorphic God and sensual
physical man, the DEVIL!
BOOK II. -- PART II. THE ARCHAIC SYMBOLISM OF THE WORLD-RELIGIONS, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
Talmud) undeviatingly forbid one to curse the Adversary, as also the gods of the gentiles. "Thou shalt
not revile the gods," quoth the god of Moses (Exodus xxii. 28), for it is God who "hath divided (them)
BOOK X. - Porphyrys doctrine of redemption, #City of God, #Saint Augustine of Hippo, #Christianity
It is by true piety that men of God cast out the hostile power of the air which opposes godliness; it is by exorcising it, not by propitiating it; and they overcome all the temptations of the Adversary by praying, not to him, but to their own God against him. For the devil cannot conquer or subdue any but those who are in league with sin; and therefore he is conquered in the name of Him who assumed humanity, and that without sin, that Himself being both Priest and Sacrifice, He might bring about the remission of sins, that is to say, might bring it about through the Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, by whom we are reconciled to God, the cleansing from sin being accomplished.[Pg 413] For men are separated from God only by sins, from which we are in this life cleansed not by our own virtue, but by the divine compassion; through His indulgence, not through our own power. For, whatever virtue we call our own is itself bestowed upon us by His goodness. And we might attri bute too much to ourselves while in the flesh, unless we lived in the receipt of pardon until we laid it down. This is the reason why there has been vouchsafed to us, through the Mediator, this grace, that we who are polluted by sinful flesh should be cleansed by the likeness of sinful flesh. By this grace of God, wherein He has shown His great compassion toward us, we are both governed by faith in this life, and, after this life, are led onwards to the fullest perfection by the vision of immutable truth.
23. Of the principles which, according to the Platonists, regulate the purification of the soul.
COSA - BOOK X, #The Confessions of Saint Augustine, #Saint Augustine of Hippo, #Christianity
men, the Adversary of our true blessedness layeth hard at us, every
where spreading his snares of "well-done, well-done"; that greedily
Maps of Meaning text, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
5.1. Introduction: The Hero and the Adversary _________________________________________________ 244
5.2. the Adversary: Emergence, Development and Representation _________________________________ 247
5.2.1. the Adversary in Action: Voluntary Degradation of the Map of Meaning________________________ 256
5.2.2. the Adversary In Action: A Twentieth Century Allegory ____________________________________ 269
5.3. Heroic Adaptation: Voluntary Reconstruction of the Map of Meaning __________________________
--
Figure 58: The Vicious Circle of the Adversary
Figure 59: The Constituent Elements of Existence, reprise.
Sophist, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
I. The Sophist in Plato is the master of the art of illusion; the charlatan, the foreigner, the prince of esprits-faux, the hireling who is not a teacher, and who, from whatever point of view he is regarded, is the opposite of the true teacher. He is the 'evil one,' the ideal representative of all that Plato most disliked in the moral and intellectual tendencies of his own age; the Adversary of the almost equally ideal Socrates. He seems to be always growing in the fancy of Plato, now boastful, now eristic, now clothing himself in rags of philosophy, now more akin to the rhetorician or lawyer, now haranguing, now questioning, until the final appearance in the Politicus of his departing shadow in the disguise of a statesman. We are not to suppose that Plato intended by such a description to depict Protagoras or Gorgias, or even Thrasymachus, who all turn out to be 'very good sort of people when we know them,' and all of them part on good terms with Socrates. But he is speaking of a being as imaginary as the wise man of the Stoics, and whose character varies in different dialogues. Like mythology, Greek philosophy has a tendency to personify ideas. And the Sophist is not merely a teacher of rhetoric for a fee of one or fifty drachmae (Crat.), but an ideal of Plato's in which the falsehood of all mankind is reflected.
A milder tone is adopted towards the Sophists in a well-known passage of the Republic, where they are described as the followers rather than the leaders of the rest of mankind. Plato ridicules the notion that any individuals can corrupt youth to a degree worth speaking of in comparison with the greater influence of public opinion. But there is no real inconsistency between this and other descriptions of the Sophist which occur in the Platonic writings. For Plato is not justifying the Sophists in the passage just quoted, but only representing their power to be contemptible; they are to be despised rather than feared, and are no worse than the rest of mankind. But a teacher or statesman may be justly condemned, who is on a level with mankind when he ought to be above them. There is another point of view in which this passage should also be considered. The great enemy of Plato is the world, not exactly in the theological sense, yet in one not wholly differentthe world as the hater of truth and lover of appearance, occupied in the pursuit of gain and pleasure rather than of knowledge, banded together against the few good and wise men, and devoid of true education. This creature has many heads: rhetoricians, lawyers, statesmen, poets, sophists. But the Sophist is the Proteus who takes the likeness of all of them; all other deceivers have a piece of him in them. And sometimes he is represented as the corrupter of the world; and sometimes the world as the corrupter of him and of itself.
The Dwellings of the Philosophers, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
who must attack the Adversary, our dissolving mercury. As for the mythological youth, his
nakedness translates the complete stripping of the impure part, and the crown, the sign of his
The First Epistle of Paul to Timothy, #The Bible, #Anonymous, #Various
3 Honour widows that are widows indeed. 4 But if any widow have children or nephews, let them learn first to shew piety at home, and to requite their parents: for that is good and acceptable before God. 5 Now she that is a widow indeed, and desolate, trusteth in God, and continueth in supplications and prayers night and day. 6 But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth. 7 And these things give in charge, that they may be blameless. 8 But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel. 9 Let not a widow be taken into the number under threescore years old, having been the wife of one man, 10 Well reported of for good works; if she have brought up children, if she have lodged strangers, if she have washed the saints' feet, if she have relieved the afflicted, if she have diligently followed every good work. 11 But the younger widows refuse: for when they have begun to wax wanton against Christ, they will marry; 12 Having damnation, because they have cast off their first faith. 13 And withal they learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house; and not only idle, but tattlers also and busybodies, speaking things which they ought not. 14 I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the Adversary to speak reproachfully. 15 For some are already turned aside after Satan. 16 If any man or woman that believeth have widows, let them relieve them, and let not the church be charged; that it may relieve them that are widows indeed.
Directions for Presbyters
The Riddle of this World, #unknown, #Unknown, #unset
attack by the Adversary, the sceptics, against the validity of spiritual and
supraphysical experience, their new strategy of destruction by
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17568783-the-adversary
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https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3858362-the-bible-of-the-adversary
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41334.The_Adversary
wiki.auroville - The_Adversary
The Adversary (2002) ::: 6.8/10 -- L'adversaire (original title) -- The Adversary Poster -- When a man murders his wife, children and parents, the ensuing investigation reveals that he's been living a lie for almost 20 years. Director: Nicole Garcia Writers:
https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/The_Adversary
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https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/The_Adversary
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/The_Adversary_(episode)
https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/The_Adversary
https://non-aliencreatures.fandom.com/wiki/Eyes_of_the_Adversary
https://westworld.fandom.com/wiki/The_Adversary
Full Metal Panic! -- -- Gonzo -- 24 eps -- Light novel -- Action Military Sci-Fi Comedy Mecha -- Full Metal Panic! Full Metal Panic! -- Equipped with cutting-edge weaponry and specialized troops, a private military organization named Mithril strives to extinguish the world's terrorism and all threats to peace on earth. The organization is powered by the "Whispered," individuals who possess intuitive knowledge and the remarkable ability to create powerful devices and machinery. -- -- Seventeen-year-old Sousuke Sagara, a sergeant working for Mithril, has been assigned to protect Kaname Chidori, a Whispered candidate. He is ordered to join her high school class and be as close to her as possible to prevent her from falling into enemy hands—that is, if he can safely blend in with their fellow classmates without revealing his true identity. -- -- Sousuke, who was raised on a battlefield and has very little knowledge of an average high school student's lifestyle, must adapt to a normal school life to safeguard Kaname. However, enemy forces have already begun making their move, and Sousuke is about to find out that the adversary coming for the Whispered girl may be a lot more familiar than he expects. -- -- -- Licensor: -- ADV Films, Funimation -- 419,737 7.64
The Adversary
The Adversary (Carrre book)
The Adversary Cycle
The Adversary (film)
The Adversary (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine)
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