“
There's a reason we refer to "leaps of faith" - because the decision to consent to any notion of divinity is a mighty jump from the rational over to the unknowable, and I don't care how diligently scholars of every religion will try to sit you down with their stacks of books and prove to you through scripture that their faith is indeed rational; it isn't. If faith were rational, it wouldn't be - by definition - faith. Faith is belief in what you cannot see or prove or touch. Faith is walking face-first and full-speed into the dark. If we truly knew all the answers in advance as to the meaning of life and the nature of God and the destiny of our souls, our belief would not be a leap of faith and it would not be a courageous act of humanity; it would just be... a prudent insurance policy.
”
”
Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love)
“
Captain Phelan,” Cam asked, choosing his words with care. “Have you come to ask for our consent to marry Beatrix?”
Christopher shook his head.
“If I decide to marry Beatrix, I’ll do it with or without your consent.”
Leo looked at Cam. “Good God,” he said in disgust. “This one’s worse than Harry.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Love in the Afternoon (The Hathaways, #5))
“
Do not fear your enemies. The worst they can do is kill you. Do not fear friends. At worst, they may betray you. Fear those who do not care; they neither kill nor betray, but betrayal and murder exist because of their silent consent.
”
”
Bruno Jasieński
“
Kindness consents very readily to the removal of its object – we have all met people whose kindness to animals is constantly leading them to kill animals lest they should suffer. Kindness, merely as such, cares not whether its object becomes good or bad, provided only that it escapes suffering.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (The Problem of Pain)
“
Here is another truth about wintering: you’ll find wisdom in your winter, and once it’s over, it’s your responsibility to pass it on. And in return, it’s our responsibility to listen to those who have wintered before us. It’s an exchange of gifts in which nobody loses out. This may involve the breaking of a lifelong habit, one passed down carefully through generations: that of looking at other people’s misfortunes and feeling certain that they brought them upon themselves in a way that you never would. This isn’t just an unkind attitude. It does us harm, because it keeps us from learning that disasters do indeed happen and how we can adapt when they do. It stops us from reaching out to those who are suffering. And when our own disaster comes, it forces us into a humiliated retreat, as we try to hunt down mistakes that we never made in the first place or wrongheaded attitudes that we never held. Either that, or we become certain that there must be someone out there we can blame. Watching winter and really listening to its messages, we learn that effect is often disproportionate to cause; that tiny mistakes can lead to huge disasters; that life is often bloody unfair, but it carries on happening with or without our consent. We learn to look more kindly on other people’s crises, because they are so often portents of our own future.
”
”
Katherine May (Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times)
“
Devotion is diligence without assurance. Faith is a way of saying, 'Yes, I pre-accept the terms of the universe and I am voicing in advance what I am presently incapable of understanding.' There is a reason that we refer to leaps-of-faith, because the decision to consent to any notion of divinity is a mighty jump from the rational over to the unknowable, and I don't care how diligently scholars of every religion will try to sit you down with their stacks of books and prove that their faith is rational; it isn't. If they were rational, it wouldn't be - by definition - faith. Faith is belief in what you cannot see or prove or touch. Faith is walking face first and full speed into the dark.
”
”
Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love)
“
Walt Whitman (1819–1892). Leaves of Grass. 1900.
To You
WHOEVER you are, I fear you are walking the walks of dreams,
I fear these supposed realities are to melt from under your feet and hands;
Even now, your features, joys, speech, house, trade, manners, troubles, follies, costume, crimes, dissipate away from you,
Your true Soul and Body appear before me,
They stand forth out of affairs—out of commerce, shops, law, science, work, forms, clothes, the house, medicine, print, buying, selling, eating, drinking, suffering, dying.
Whoever you are, now I place my hand upon you, that you be my poem;
I whisper with my lips close to your ear,
I have loved many women and men, but I love none better than you.
O I have been dilatory and dumb;
I should have made my way straight to you long ago;
I should have blabb’d nothing but you, I should have chanted nothing but you.
I will leave all, and come and make the hymns of you;
None have understood you, but I understand you;
None have done justice to you—you have not done justice to yourself;
None but have found you imperfect—I only find no imperfection in you;
None but would subordinate you—I only am he who will never consent to subordinate you;
I only am he who places over you no master, owner, better, God, beyond what waits intrinsically in yourself.
Painters have painted their swarming groups, and the centre figure of all;
From the head of the centre figure spreading a nimbus of gold-color’d light;
But I paint myriads of heads, but paint no head without its nimbus of gold-color’d light;
From my hand, from the brain of every man and woman it streams, effulgently flowing forever.
O I could sing such grandeurs and glories about you!
You have not known what you are—you have slumber’d upon yourself all your life;
Your eye-lids have been the same as closed most of the time;
What you have done returns already in mockeries;
(Your thrift, knowledge, prayers, if they do not return in mockeries, what is their return?)
The mockeries are not you;
Underneath them, and within them, I see you lurk;
I pursue you where none else has pursued you;
Silence, the desk, the flippant expression, the night, the accustom’d routine, if these conceal you from others, or from yourself, they do not conceal you from me;
The shaved face, the unsteady eye, the impure complexion, if these balk others, they do not balk me,
The pert apparel, the deform’d attitude, drunkenness, greed, premature death, all these I part aside.
There is no endowment in man or woman that is not tallied in you;
There is no virtue, no beauty, in man or woman, but as good is in you;
No pluck, no endurance in others, but as good is in you;
No pleasure waiting for others, but an equal pleasure waits for you.
As for me, I give nothing to any one, except I give the like carefully to you;
I sing the songs of the glory of none, not God, sooner than I sing the songs of the glory of you.
Whoever you are! claim your own at any hazard!
These shows of the east and west are tame, compared to you;
These immense meadows—these interminable rivers—you are immense and interminable as they;
These furies, elements, storms, motions of Nature, throes of apparent dissolution—you are he or she who is master or mistress over them,
Master or mistress in your own right over Nature, elements, pain, passion, dissolution.
The hopples fall from your ankles—you find an unfailing sufficiency;
Old or young, male or female, rude, low, rejected by the rest, whatever you are promulges itself;
Through birth, life, death, burial, the means are provided, nothing is scanted;
Through angers, losses, ambition, ignorance, ennui, what you are picks its way.
”
”
Walt Whitman
“
I hereby give consent to the staff of The Johns Hopkins Hospital to perform any operative procedures and under any anaesthetic either local or general that they may deem necessary in the proper surgical care and treatment of:
”
”
Rebecca Skloot (The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks)
“
And I believe all men think of me as a person. Correction: not all men. And I believe all men care about consent. Correction: not all men.
”
”
Trista Mateer (Artemis Made Me Do It)
“
As far as I’m concerned, depravity applies only to acts committed without consent or without care.
”
”
Alexis Hall (A Lady for a Duke)
“
Once a patient goes brain dead and relatives sign his organ donation consent form, he will get the best medical treatment of his life. A hospital code blue may be a call for doctors to rush to the bedside of a beating heart cadaver who needs his or her heart defibrillated.
”
”
Dick Teresi (The Undead: Organ Harvesting, the Ice-Water Test, Beating Heart Cadavers--How Medicine Is Blurring the Line Between Life and Death)
“
He should be careful of the influence of those with whom he consorts, and he runs a great risk in becoming a member of a large society, for large bodies tend toward the leveling of individuality to a common consent, the forming and adherence to a creed.
”
”
Chaim Potok (My Name Is Asher Lev)
“
Tess shrank into herself as if she had been struck. Often enough had he tried to reach those lips against her consent—often had he said gaily that her mouth and breath tasted of the butter and eggs and milk and honey on which she mainly lived, that he drew sustenance from them, and other follies of that sort. But he did not care for them now.
”
”
Thomas Hardy (Tess of the D'Urbervilles)
“
A common belief during labor is that a baby’s needs supersede that of the mother’s. Women don’t always know they have options. Or they aren’t given a choice in their care. If they are, they aren’t allowed ample time or information to come to a decision themselves. Choices are made without their consent. Too many women don’t want to be a burden and so they say nothing. The mistreatment is subtle, too, and falls under the guise of medical care.
”
”
Mary Kubica (Local Woman Missing)
“
Oh, with my pathetic, earthly, Euclidean mind, I know only that there is suffering, that none are to blame, that all things follow simply and directly from one another, that everything flows and finds its level - but that is all just Euclidean gibberish, of course I know that, and of course I cannot consent to live by it! What do I care that none are to blame and that I know it - I need retribution, otherwise I will destroy myself. And retribution not somewhere and sometime in infinity, but here and now, on earth, so that I see it myself. I have believed, and I want to see for myself, and if I am dead by that time, let them resurrect me, because it will be too unfair if it all takes place without me. Is it possible that I've suffered so that I, together with my evil deeds and sufferings, should be manure for someone's future harmony? I want to see with my own eyes the hind lie down with the lion, and the murdered man rise up and embrace his murderer. I want to be there when everyone suddenly finds out what it was all for.
”
”
Fyodor Dostoevsky
“
Democracy has become a weapon of moneyed interests. It uses the media to create the illusion that there is consent from the governed. The press today is an army with carefully organized weapons, the journalists its officers, the readers its soldiers. The reader neither knows nor is supposed to know the purposes for which he is used and the role he is to play. The notion of democracy is often no different than living under a plutocracy or a government by wealthy elites.
”
”
Oswald Spengler
“
Of course we're friends ... we are both civilized men, aren't we? We've shared bed and board and bottle. We'll always be friends, and the dog collar I have on you will always be ignored by mutual consent, and I'll take good and benevolent care of you. All I ask in return is your soul. Small item. We can even ignore the fact that you've handed it over, the way we ignore the dog collar.
”
”
Stephen King (The Shining (The Shining, #1))
“
Your true soul and body appear before me. Whoever you are, now I place my hand upon you, that you be my poem, I whisper with my lips close to your ear, I have loved many women and men, but I love none better than you. O I have been dilatory and dumb, I should have made my way straight to you long ago, I should h
ave blabb'd nothing but you, I should have chanted nothing but you. I will leave all and come and make the hymns of you, none has understood you, but I understand you, none has done justice to you, you have not done justice to yourself, none but has found you imperfect, I only find no imperfection in you, none but would subordinate you, I only am he who will never consent to subordinate you, I only am he who places over you no master, owner, better, God, beyond what waits instrinsically in yourself. O I could sing such grandeurs and glories about you! You have not known what you are, you have slumber'd upon yourself all your life, Your eyelids have been the same as closed most of the time. I pursue you where none else has pursued you. Conceal you from others or from yourself, they do not conceal you from me. I give nothing to any one except I give the like carefully to you. These immense meadows, these interminable rivers, you are immense and interminable as they, these furies, elements, storms, motions of Nature, throes of apparent dissolution, you are he or she who is master or mistress over them, Master or mistress in your own right over Nature, elements, pain, passion, dissolution.
”
”
Walt Whitman
“
I tell you that man has no more tormenting care than to find someone to whom he can hand over as quickly as possible that gift of freedom with which the miserable creature is born. But he alone can take over the freedom of men who appeases their conscience. With bread you were given an indisputable banner: give man bread and he will bow down to you, for there is nothing more indisputable than bread. But if at the same time someone else takes over his conscience - oh, then he will even throw down your bread and follow him who has seduced his conscience. In this you were right. For the mystery of man's being is not only in living, but in what one lives for. Without a firm idea of what he lives for, man will not consent to live and will sooner destroy himself than remain on earth, even if there is bread all around him. That is so, but what came of it? Instead of taking over men's freedom, you increased it still more for them! Did you forget that peace and even death are dearer to man than free choice in the knowledge of good and evil? There is nothing more seductive for man than the freedom of his conscience, but there is nothing more tormenting either. And so, instead of a firm foundation for appeasing human conscience once and for all, you chose everything that was unusual, enigmatic, and indefinite, you chose everything that was beyond men's strength, and thereby acted as if you did not love them at all - and who did this? He who came to give his life for them! Instead of taking over men's freedom, you increased it and forever burdened the kingdom of the human soul with its torments. You desired the free love of man, that he should follow you freely. seduced and captivated by you. Instead of the firm ancient law, men had henceforth to decide for himself, with a free heart, what is good and what is evil, having only your image before him as a guide - but did it not occur to you that he would eventually reject and dispute even your image and your truth if he was oppressed by so terrible a burden as freedom of choice? They will finally cry out that the truth is not in you, for it was impossible to leave them in greater confusion and torment than you did, abandoning them to so many cares and insoluble problems. Thus you yourself laid the foundation for the destruction of your own kingdom, and do not blame anyone else for it.
”
”
Fyodor Dostoevsky
“
The uncomfortable, as well as the miraculous, fact about the human mind is how it varies from individual to individual. The process of treatment can therefore be long and complicated. Finding the right balance of drugs, whether lithium salts, anti-psychotics, SSRIs or other kinds of treatment can be a very hit or miss heuristic process requiring great patience and classy, caring doctoring. Some patients would rather reject the chemical path and look for ways of using diet, exercise and talk-therapy. For some the condition is so bad that ECT is indicated. One of my best friends regularly goes to a clinic for doses of electroconvulsive therapy, a treatment looked on by many as a kind of horrific torture that isn’t even understood by those who administer it. This friend of mine is just about one of the most intelligent people I have ever met and she says, “I know. It ought to be wrong. But it works. It makes me feel better. I sometimes forget my own name, but it makes me happier. It’s the only thing that works.” For her. Lord knows, I’m not a doctor, and I don’t understand the brain or the mind anything like enough to presume to judge or know better than any other semi-informed individual, but if it works for her…. well then, it works for her. Which is not to say that it will work for you, for me or for others.
”
”
Stephen Fry
“
Commitment and family were important decisions, but so were matters of t
he heart. [Monique] might not know much about politics, but she knew she couldn’t command her heart to love. And she’d never be pressured into giving herself to Eero, not to appease her family or to strengthen her brother’s political position. She’d seen all she cared to of him and his power in the short week that he pursued her and that night he’d tried to bind their powers without her consent.
”
”
Constance Phillips (Fairyproof)
“
Nothing has emerged more clearly from the Everyday Sexism Project than the urgent need for far more comprehensive mandatory sex-and-relationships education in schools, to include issues such as consent and respect, domestic violence and rape. It’s not just girls who need it so desperately. For boys porn provides some very scary, dictatorial lessons about what it means to be a man and how they are apparently expected to exert their male dominance over women. It is as unrealistic to expect them, unaided, to instinctively work out the difference between online porn and real, caring intimacy, as it is to demand the same intuition of young women. According
”
”
Laura Bates (Everyday Sexism)
“
Total independence is a fiction. And in sex, we are all vulnerable. Whoever we are, we turn over vulnerable tissues, organs, sensations, and complex selves to another. We can always get hurt. This is not an argument about being cavalier about the other's inherent vulnerability - for urging anyone to 'toughen up', to take the rough with the smooth, to be resigned to bad sex. It is an argument for resisting the urge to vilify vulnerability. Sex is a risky adventure, and vulnerability can be a form of care.
”
”
Katherine Angel (Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again: Women and Desire in the Age of Consent)
“
You and I, however, were so created that by anything and everything we do, we are saying to our Creator either “God, I love you,” or “God, I could not care less.” The human spirit is that part of us where God lives within us in the person of the Holy Spirit, so that with our moral consent (and never without it), God gains access to our human soul. This is where He Himself, as the Creator within the creature, can teach our minds, control our emotions, and direct our wills, so that He, as God from within, governs our behavior as we let God be God.
”
”
W. Ian Thomas (The Indwelling Life of Christ: All of Him in All of Me)
“
Our ancestors have taught us in the Vedas that one should, Donate with kind words. Donate with happiness. Donate with sincerity. Donate only to the needy. Donate without expectation because it is not a gift. It is a duty. Donate with your wife’s consent. Donate to other people without making your dependents helpless. Donate without caring for caste, creed and religion. Donate so that the receiver prospers.
”
”
Sudha Murty (How I Taught My Grand Mother to Read: And Other Stories)
“
Beauty is a sacrifice. -Me
Baby, I INVENTED scrawny! -Leo Valdez
I will NEVER leave you or forsake you. -God
No one can make you feel inferior, unless you consent. -Eleanor Roosevelt
Be careful, Seaweed Brain. -Annabeth Chase
”
”
Clarice Belnavis
“
Girlfriends, mothers, and in some cases, sisters were the most commonly cited confidants among boys I met, and while it's wonderful to know they have someone to talk to, teaching boys that women are responsible for emotional labor, for processing men's emotional lives in ways that would be emasculating for guys to do themselves, comes at a price to both sexes. Among other things, that dependence can leave boys stunted, in a state of arrested development, potentially unprepared to form caring, lasting, intimate relationships.
”
”
Peggy Orenstein (Boys & Sex: Young Men on Hookups, Love, Porn, Consent, and Navigating the New Masculinity)
“
Of course we’re friends … we are both civilized men, aren’t we? We’ve shared bed and board and bottle. We’ll always be friends, and the dog collar I have on you will always be ignored by mutual consent, and I’ll take good and benevolent care of you. All I ask in return is your soul.
”
”
Stephen King (The Shining (The Shining, #1))
“
Kitty, to her very material advantage, spent the chief of her time with her two elder sisters. In society so superior to what she had generally known, her improvement was great. She was not of so ungovernable a temper as Lydia; and, removed from the influence of Lydia's example, she became, by proper attention and management, less irritable, less ignorant, and less insipid. From the further disadvantage of Lydia's society she was of course carefully kept, and though Mrs. Wickham frequently invited her to come and stay with her, with the promise of balls and young men, her father would never consent to her going.
”
”
Jane Austen (Pride and Prejudice)
“
We fuss a lot about ‘the sex talk,’” says Richard Weissbourd, the director of Making Caring Common. “We do not fuss about a far more important talk, which is: How do we talk to our children about the courage and subtlety and discipline and tenderness and tough-mindedness that it really takes to love someone else?
”
”
Peggy Orenstein (Boys & Sex: Young Men on Hookups, Love, Porn, Consent, and Navigating the New Masculinity)
“
Why would you care what happened to me? That’s all in the past.” Jagger bent down and touched his forehead to hers. “Because you’re mine. And ‘mine’ means you have my protection. ‘Mine’ means I’ll look after you. It means nothing happens you don’t want to happen and no one touches you without your consent. It means your life is in my hands and I will do everything in my power to ensure you are safe and secure and your needs are met. It means something happened to you that twisted your perception so bad, you look at us and you see only them. I’ll make that right. I’ll give you justice. I’ll give you back whatever was taken from you.
”
”
Anonymous
“
It was my first indicator of how the issue of Black folks and the police was more polarizing than just about any other subject in American life. It seemed to tap into some of the deepest undercurrents of our nation’s psyche, touching on the rawest of nerves, perhaps because it reminded all of us, Black and white alike, that the basis of our nation’s social order had never been simply about consent; that it was also about centuries of state-sponsored violence by whites against Black and brown people, and that who controlled legally sanctioned violence, how it was wielded and against whom, still mattered in the recesses of our tribal minds much more than we cared to admit.
”
”
Barack Obama (A Promised Land)
“
You and Beatrix haven’t known each other long enough to consider matrimony. A matter of weeks, to my knowledge. And what about Prudence Mercer? You’re practically betrothed, aren’t you?”
“Those are valid points,” Christopher said. “And I will answer them. But you should know right away that I’m against the match.”
Leo blinked in bemusement. “You mean you’re against a match with Miss Mercer?”
“Well…yes. But I’m also against a match with Beatrix.”
Silence fell over the room.
“This is a trick of some sort,” Leo said.
“Unfortunately, it’s not,” Christopher replied.
Another silence.
“Captain Phelan,” Cam asked, choosing his words with care. “Have you come to ask for our consent to marry Beatrix?”
Christopher shook his head. “If I decide to marry Beatrix, I’ll do it with or without your consent.”
Leo looked at Cam. “Good God,” he said in disgust. “This one’s worse than Harry.”
Cam wore an expression of beleaguered patience. “Perhaps we should both talk to Captain Phelan in the library. With brandy.”
“I want my own bottle,” Leo said feelingly, leading the way.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Love in the Afternoon (The Hathaways, #5))
“
cellular activity in your tumor . . . well, prognosis can range from six months to . . . um, it’s difficult to say. Although certainly there have been some successful cases . . .” “Okay then,” I said, grabbing my bag off the back of the chair. “I’ll be in touch.” “Elizabeth! I’d really like you to meet with a counselor—” I left before he had a chance to finish, the taste of cold pennies on my tongue, as though I’d consented to chemo and already started injecting liquid poison into my bloodstream. Oncologists, nurses, radiologists, palliative care specialists: I was all too familiar with the cancer routine, and I wasn’t interested. Not one bit. My twin brother, Paul, once told me that there’s healthy denial,
”
”
Camille Pagán (Life and Other Near-Death Experiences)
“
Horse Latitudes"
When the still sea conspires an armor
And her sullen and aborted currents
Breed tiny monsters
True sailing is dead!
Awkward instant
And the first animal is jettisoned
Legs furiously pumping
Their stiff green gallop
And heads bob up
Poise
Delicate
Pause
Consent
In mute nostril agony
Carefully refined
And sealed over
The Doors, Straqnge Days (1967)
”
”
Jim Morrison
“
I can't help but question how my spirited daughter could fix her choice, once again, on a tepid Larson male. Is your blood really so thin that it calls for such milk-warm companionship?"
Phoebe stopped in her tracks, while outrage raced through her like wildfire. "Henry was not tepid!"
"No," her father allowed, stopping to face her. "Henry did have one passion, and that was you. It's why I eventually consented to the marriage, despite knowing the burden you would have to shoulder. Edward Larson, however, has yet to evince any such depth of feeling."
"Well, he wouldn't in front of you," she said hotly. "He's private. And it was never a burden to take care of Henry."
"Darling child," he said softly, "the burden is what you're facing now.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Devil's Daughter (The Ravenels, #5))
“
With the veil removed by the rending of Jesus' flesh, with nothing on God's side to prevent us from entering, why do we tarry without? Why do we consent to abide all our days just outside the Holy of Holies and never enter at all to look upon God? We hear the Bridegroom say, `Let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice; for sweet is thy voice and thy countenance is comely.' (Song of Sol 2:14) We sense that the call is for us, but still we fail to draw near, and the years pass and we grow old and tired in the outer courts of the tabernacle. What doth hinder us?
The answer usually given, simply that we are `cold,' will not explain all the facts. There is something more serious than coldness of heart, something that may be back of that coldness and be the cause of its existence. What is it? What but the presence of a veil in out hearts? A veil not taken away as the first veil was, but which remains there still shutting out the light and hiding the face of God from us. It is the veil of our fleshly fallen nature living on, unjudged within us, uncrucified and unrepudiated. It is the close- woven veil of the self-life which we have never truly acknowledged, of which we have been secretly ashamed, and which for these reasons we have never brought to the judgment of the cross. It is not too mysterious, this opaque veil, nor is it hard to identify. We have but to look in our own hearts and we shall see it there, sewn and patched and repaired it may be, but there nevertheless, an enemy to our lives and an effective block to our spiritual progress.
This veil is not a beautiful thing and it is not a thing about which we commonly care to talk, but I am addressing the thirsting souls who are determined to follow God, and I know they will not turn back because the way leads temporarily through the blackened hills. The urge of God within them will assure their continuing the pursuit. They will face the facts however unpleasant and endure the cross for the joy set before them. So I am bold to mane the threads out of which this inner veil is woven. It is woven of the fine threads of the self-life, the hyphenated sins of the human spirit. They are not something we do, they are something we are, and therein lies both their subtlety and their power.
”
”
A.W. Tozer (The Pursuit of God: The Human Thirst for the Divine)
“
I concluded that first of all I had to understand better what I was. Investigate my nature as a woman. I had been excessive, I had striven to give myself male capacities. I thought I had to know everything, be concerned with everything. What did I care about politics, about struggles. I wanted to make a good impression on men, be at their level. I had been conditioned by my education, which had shaped my mind, my voice. To what secret pacts with myself had I consented, just to excel. And now, after the hard work of learning, what must I unlearn. Also, I had been forced by the powerful presence of Lila to imagine myself as I was not. I was added to her, and I felt mutilated as soon as I removed myself. Not an idea, without Lila. Not a thought I trusted, without the support of her thoughts. Not an image. I had to accept myself outside of her. The gist was that. Accept that I was an average person. What should I do. Try again to write. Maybe I didn’t have the passion. I merely limited myself to carrying out a task. So don’t write anymore. Find some job. Or act the lady, as my mother said. Shut myself up in the family. Or turn everything upside down. Home. Children. Husband.
”
”
Elena Ferrante (Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay (Neapolitan Novels, #3))
“
There is little reason to believe that they would not like to understand why they are working harder with stagnant or declining incomes, have inadequate medical care at high costs, and what is being done in their name all over the world. If they are not getting much information on these topics, the propaganda model can explain why: the sovereigns who control the media choose not to offer such material.
”
”
Edward S. Herman (Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media)
“
… любовь этого нежного родителя к дочери была так безгранична, что он готов был купить ей мужа какой угодно ценой, лишь бы она согласилась быть несчастной с избранным им для нее человеком."
"История Тома Джонса, найденыша"
"… for so extravagant was the affection of that fond parent, that, provided his child would but consent to be miserable with the husband he chose, he cared not at what price he purchased him.
”
”
Henry Fielding (The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling)
“
Ruby,” Kai said in a strained voice that was a far cry from his usual lackadaisical tones, “I know I am far from worthy of you, but would you do me the great honor of consenting to be my wife?”
If the sky had rained fire, I would have been less shocked.
I turned to stone. At least, that’s what it felt like. I didn’t move, didn’t breathe, didn’t even blink for what felt like a full minute. Then Kai lifted a brow and the air rushed back into my lungs.
“You’re not serious” was all I could manage.
He produced a winning, though forced, smile. “I assure you, the queen—that is, I—am quite serious. I’m asking for your hand in marriage.”
“To…you,” I said with heavy emphasis.
“Yes, that is why I am the one asking.” Despite his blinding display of teeth, he spoke as if his jaw was too rigid to form words properly.
“To me.” I said it carefully, as if testing out new words in a foreign language.
“Which is why it is your hand I’m asking for.
”
”
Elly Blake (Fireblood (Frostblood Saga, #2))
“
There is kindness in Love: but Love and kindness are not coterminous, and when kindness (in the sense given above) is separated from the other elements of Love, it involves a certain fundamental indifference to its object, and even something like contempt of it. Kindness consents very readily to the removal of its object — we have all met people whose kindness to animals is constantly leading them to kill animals lest they should suffer. Kindness, merely as such, cares not whether its object becomes good or bad, provided only that it escapes suffering. As Scripture points out, it is bastards who are spoiled: the legitimate sons, who are to carry on the family tradition, are punished.^ It is for people whom we care nothing about that we demand happiness on any terms : with our friends? our lovers, our children, we are exacting and would rather see them suffer much than be happy in contemptible and estranging modes. If God is Love, He is, by definition, something more than mere kindness.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (The Problem of Pain)
“
But the high play of witty conversation can degenerate into exhibitionistic banter if it is not tempered by an opposite and perhaps even more important virtue, which is the capacity to hold one's peace, to wait to pause for thought, to consent to shared silence. Words need space. Witty, weighty, well-chosen words need more space than others to be received rightly, reckoned with, and responded to. That space, the silence between words, is as important a part of good conversation as rests are a part of a pleasing, coherent musical line.
”
”
Marilyn Chandler McEntyre (Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies)
“
If government is truly limited to being small and nearly irrelevant, there will be no incentive to “own” government. For this change to occur, the following will be required: a philosophical rejection of government waging war without consent, running people’s lives, and violating social or economic liberty; nullification of laws by public pressure or by state action; legalization of private alternatives to all government programs; prohibition of fraudulent money, private and government; peaceful civil disobedience; acceptance of responsibility to care for oneself and one’s family instead of relying on government or private theft; refusal to participate in government crimes through the military and tax system with full realization of the risks of practicing civil disobedience since government will not go away quietly; jury nullification of bad laws, especially with regard to taxes, drugs, and overregulation of social and voluntary activities; and acceptance that, while sins and vices may be a negative, they aren’t in themselves crimes and are not to be restricted by the state.
”
”
Ron Paul (Swords into Plowshares: A Life in Wartime and a Future of Peace and Prosperity)
“
Yet there can never be happiness in compulsion. It is not enough for love to be shared: it must be shared freely. That is to say it must be given, not merely taken. Unselfish love that is poured out upon a selfish object does not bring perfect happiness: not because love requires a return or a reward for loving, but because it rests in the happiness of the beloved. And if the one loved receives love selfishly, the lover is not satisfied. He sees that his love has failed to make the beloved happy. It has not awakened his capacity for unselfish love. Hence the paradox that unselfish love cannot rest perfectly except in a love that is perfectly reciprocated: because it knows that the only true peace is found in selfless love. Selfless love consents to be loved selflessly for the sake of the beloved. In so doing, it perfects itself. The gift of love is the gift of the power and the capacity to love, and, therefore, to give love with full effect is also to receive it. So, love can only be kept by being given away, and it can only be given perfectly when it is also received. 2. Love not only prefers the good of another to my own, but it does not even compare the two. It has only one good, that of the beloved, which is, at the same time, my own. Love shares the good with another not by dividing it with him, but by identifying itself with him so that his good becomes my own. The same good is enjoyed in its wholeness by two in one spirit, not halved and shared by two souls. Where love is really disinterested, the lover does not even stop to inquire whether he can safely appropriate for himself some part of the good which he wills for his friend. Love seeks its whole good in the good of the beloved, and to divide that good would be to diminish love. Such a division would not only weaken the action of love, but in doing so would also diminish its joy. For love does not seek a joy that follows from its effect: its joy is in the effect itself, which is the good of the beloved. Consequently, if my love be pure I do not even have to seek for myself the satisfaction of loving. Love seeks one thing only: the good of the one loved. It leaves all the other secondary effects to take care of themselves. Love, therefore, is its own reward.
”
”
Thomas Merton (No Man Is an Island)
“
Governments and business-news promoters go to great pains to make things easy for news organizations. They provide the media organizations with facilities in which to gather; they give journalists advance copies of speeches and forthcoming reports; they schedule press conferences at hours well-geared to news deadlines; they write press releases in usable language; and they carefully organize their press conferences and "photo opportunity" sessions. It is the job of news officers "to meet the journalist's scheduled needs with material that their beat agency has generated at its own pace.
”
”
Edward S. Herman (Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media)
“
Faith is not a meritorious cause of election, but it is constantly attested as the sole condition of salvation. Faith merely receives the merit of atoning grace, instead of asserting its own merit. God places the life-death option before each person, requiring each to choose. The ekletos are those who by grace freely believe. God does not compel or necessitate their choosing. Even after the initial choice of faith is made, they may grieve and quench the Spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:19).
Faith is the condition under which God primordially wills the reception of salvation by all. “He chooses us, not because we believe, but that we may believe; lest we should say that we first chose Him” (Augustine). Faith receives the electing love of God not as if it had already become efficacious without faith, but aware that God’s prescience foreknows faith like all else.
In accord with ancient ecumenical consent, predestination was carefully defined in centrist Protestant orthodoxy as:
'The eternal, divine decree, by which God, from His immense mercy, determined to give His Son as Mediator, and through universal preaching , to offer Him for reception to all men who from eternity He foresaw would fall into sin; also through the Word and Sacraments to confer faith upon all who would not resist; to justify all believers, and besides to renew those using the means of grace; to preserve faith in them until the end of life, and in a word, to save those believing to the end' (Melanchthon).
”
”
Thomas C. Oden (The Transforming Power of Grace)
“
For whatever is demanded by truth, by justice, by mercy, or by love must surely be taken to be willed by God. To consent to His will is, then, to consent to be true, or to speak truth, or at least to seek it. To obey Him is to respond to His will expressed in the need of another person, or at least to respect the rights of others. For the right of another man is the expression of God’s love and God’s will. In demanding that I respect the rights of another God is not merely asking me to conform to some abstract, arbitrary law: He is enabling me to share, as His son, in His own care for my brother. No man who ignores the rights and needs of others can hope to walk in the light of contemplation, because his way has turned aside from truth, from compassion and therefore from God. The
”
”
Thomas Merton (New Seeds of Contemplation)
“
Rather than seeking true refuge, we turn toward what I call false refuges. They are false because while they may provide a temporary sense of comfort or security, they create more suffering in the long run. We might, like Pam, have a fear of failure and take refuge in staying busy, in striving to perform well, or in taking care of others. Or we might feel unlovable and take refuge in pursuing wealth or success. Maybe we fear being criticized, and take refuge in avoiding risks and always pleasing others. Or we feel anxious or empty and take refuge in alcohol, overeating, or surfing the Web. Instead of consenting and opening to what we are actually feeling, our turn toward false refuges is a way of avoiding emotional pain. But this only takes us further from real comfort, further from home.
”
”
Tara Brach (True Refuge: Finding Peace and Freedom in Your Own Awakened Heart)
“
They know that the rich in democracies always need the poor, and that in democratic times one ties the poor to oneself more by manners than by benefits. The very greatness of the benefits, which brings to light the difference in conditions, causes a secret irritation to those who profit from them; but simplicity of manners has almost irresistible charms: their familiarity carries one away and even their coarseness does not always displease. At first this truth does not penetrate the minds of the rich. They ordinarily resist it as long as the democratic revolution lasts, and they do not accept it immediately even after this revolution is accomplished. They willingly consent to do good for the people, but they want to continue to hold them carefully at a distance. They believe that is enough; they are mistaken.
”
”
Alexis de Tocqueville (Democracy in America)
“
Nick,' he corrected quietly. 'As to your emotions, they show in your face, in
those amazing eyes. One day soon those eyes will change colour and glow
for me.'
'They already have done,' Joanna snapped, rage surfacing. 'I never liked you,
Mr Martella, and now I can only think I hate you. If I should ever know that
you're coming here again I'll make quite sure I'm a long way off!'
He took one menacing step towards her and Joanna backed away, her
expression of loathing making his face harden frighteningly.
'I will not touch you,' he grated angrily. 'I will merely tell you this: J leave
for America tomorrow. I shall be there for two months. When I return I
intend to come for you.'
The thought of people in the house left Joanna's head entirely. Her hands
clenched at her sides and her considerable temper surfaced over grief, fear
and utter bewilderment.
'If you were the last man in the universe I wouldn't consent to be near you!'
she shouted. 'You've taken away everything I've ever wanted. You've even
sneaked up and taken my father. Now I can never go to Santa Marta again!'
'I know you love the island,' he said with surprising quiet. 'Your father told
me. We will live there and you will see your father whenever you care to
walk down the beach to his house.'
'I'll see him when he comes over to England,' Joanna corrected bitterly. 'One
thing is for sure, though: after today I'll never see you again! Forget the mad
idea about me, Mr Martella, because I'd rather die!'
'You will not die, Joanna,' he said silkily, 'unless it is the small death that
lovers die in each other's arms. And I intend to be your lover. In two months
I will be back.
”
”
Patricia Wilson (Dark Illusion)
“
Drugs and medical technology can be enormously beneficial when used to take care of real complications, but too often they are abused when applied to women birthing normally. These women are thus subjected to unnecessary risks. The key to this problem is informed consent, an ideal too seldom realized. Informed consent means that no woman during pregnancy or labor should ever be deceived into thinking that any drug or procedure (Demerol, Seconal, spinals, caudals, epidurals, paracervical block, etc.) is guaranteed safe. Not only are there no guaranteed safe drugs, but many of them have well-known, recognized side effects and potential side effects.
Informed consent should mean that no woman would ever hear such falsehoods as, “This is harmless,” or, “I only give it in such a small dose that it can’t affect the baby,” or, “This is just a local and won’t reach the baby.
”
”
Susan McCutcheon (Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way)
“
Servant or wife, man always reckons on woman to do the housework.
But woman, too, at least claims her share in the emancipation of humanity. She no longer wants to be the beast of burden of the house. She considers it sufficient work to give many years of her life to the rearing of her children. She no longer wants to be the cook, the mender, the sweeper of the house! And, owing to American women taking the lead in obtaining their claims, there is a general complaint of the dearth of women who will condescend to domestic work in the United States. My lady prefers art, politics, literature, or the gaming tables; as to the work-girls, they are few, those who consent to submit to apron-slavery, and servants are only found with difficulty in the States. Consequently, the solution, a very simple one, is pointed out by life itself. Machinery undertakes three-quarters of the household cares.
”
”
Pyotr Kropotkin (The Conquest of Bread and Other Writings)
“
I smiled: I thought to myself Mr. Rochester is peculiar—he seems to forget that he pays me £30 per annum for receiving his orders. “The smile is very well,” said he, catching instantly the passing expression; “but speak too.” “I was thinking, sir, that very few masters would trouble themselves to inquire whether or not their paid subordinates were piqued and hurt by their orders.” “Paid subordinates! What! you are my paid subordinate, are you? Oh yes, I had forgotten the salary! Well then, on that mercenary ground, will you agree to let me hector a little?” “No, sir, not on that ground; but, on the ground that you did forget it, and that you care whether or not a dependent is comfortable in his dependency, I agree heartily.” “And will you consent to dispense with a great many conventional forms and phrases, without thinking that the omission arises from insolence?” “I am sure, sir, I should never mistake informality for insolence: one I rather like, the other nothing free-born would submit to, even for a salary.” “Humbug! Most things free-born will submit to anything for a salary;
”
”
Charlotte Brontë (Jane Eyre: The Original 1847 Unabridged and Complete Edition (Charlotte Brontë Classics))
“
One could understand feminism generally as an attack on woman as she was under “patriarchy” (that concept is a social construction of feminism). The feminine mystique was her ideal; in regard to sex, it consisted of women’s modesty and in the double standard of sexual conduct that comes with it, which treated women’s misbehavior as more serious than men’s. Instead of trying to establish a single standard by bringing men up to the higher standard of women, as with earlier feminism, today’s feminism decided to demand that women be entitled to sink to the level of men. It bought into the sexual revolution of the late sixties and required that women be rewarded with the privileges of male conquest rather than, say, continue serving as camp followers of rock bands. The result has been the turn for the worse. ... What was there in feminine modesty that the feminists left behind?
In return for women’s holding to a higher standard of sexual behavior, feminine modesty gave them protection while they considered whether they wanted to consent. It gave them time: Not so fast! Not the first date! I’m not ready for that! It gave them the pleasure of being courted along with the advantage of looking before you leap. To win over a woman, men had to strive to express their finer feelings, if they had any. Women could judge their character and choose accordingly. In sum, women had the right of choice, if I may borrow that slogan. All this and more was social construction, to be sure, but on the basis of the bent toward modesty that was held to be in the nature of women. That inclination, it was thought, cooperated with the aggressive drive in the nature of men that could be beneficially constructed into the male duty to take the initiative. There was no guarantee of perfection in this arrangement, but at least each sex would have a legitimate expectation of possible success in seeking marital happiness. They could live together, have children, and take care of them.
Without feminine modesty, however, women must imitate men, and in matters of sex, the most predatory men, as we have seen. The consequence is the hook-up culture now prevalent on college campuses, and off-campus too (even more, it is said). The purpose of hooking up is to replace the human complexity of courtship with “good sex,” a kind of animal simplicity, eliminating all the preliminaries to sex as well as the aftermath. “Good sex,” by the way, is in good part a social construction of the alliance between feminists and male predators that we see today. It narrows and distorts the human potentiality for something nobler and more satisfying than the bare minimum.
The hook-up culture denounced by conservatives is the very same rape culture denounced by feminists. Who wants it? Most college women do not; they ignore hookups and lament the loss of dating. Many men will not turn down the offer of an available woman, but what they really want is a girlfriend. The predatory males are a small minority among men who are the main beneficiaries of the feminist norm. It’s not the fault of men that women want to join them in excess rather than calm them down, for men too are victims of the rape culture. Nor is it the fault of women. Women are so far from wanting hook-ups that they must drink themselves into drunken consent — in order to overcome their natural modesty, one might suggest. Not having a sociable drink but getting blind drunk is today’s preliminary to sex. Beautifully romantic, isn’t it?
”
”
Harvey C. Mansfield
“
Emma, calm down. I had to know-"
I point my finger in his face, almost touching his eyeball. "It's one thing for me to give your permission to look into it. But I'm pretty sure looking into it without my consent is illegal. In fact, I'm pretty sure everything that woman does is illegal. Do you even know what the Mafia is, Galen?"
His eyebrows lift in surprise. "She told you who she is? I mean, who she used to be?"
I nod. "While you were checking in with Grom. Once in the Mob, always in the Mob, if you ask me. How else would she get all her money? But I guess you wouldn't care about that, since she buys you houses and cars and fake IDs." I snatch my wrist away and turn back toward our hotel. At least, I hope it's our hotel.
Galen laughs. "Emma, it's not Rachel's money; it's mine."
I whirl on him. "You are a fish. You don't have a job. And I don't think Syrena currency has any of our presidents on it." Now "our" means I'm human again. I wish I could make up my mind.
He crosses his arms. "I earn it another way. Walk to the Gulfarium with me, and I'll tell you how."
The temptation divides me like a cleaver. I'm one part hissy fit and one part swoon. I have a right to be mad, to press charges, to cut Rachel's hair while she's sleeping. But do I really want to risk the chance that she keeps a gun under her pillow? Do I want to miss the opportunity to scrunch my toes in the sand and listen to Galen's rich voice tell me how a fish came to be wealthy? Nope, I don't.
Taking care to ram my shoulder into him, I march past him and hopefully in the right direction. When he catches up to me, his grin threatens the rest of my hissy fit side, so I turn away, fixing my glare on the waves.
"I sell stuff to humans," he says.
I glance at him. He's looking at me, his expression every bit as expectant as I feel. I hate this little game of ours. Maybe because I'm no good at it. He won't tell me more unless I ask. Curiosity is one of my most incurable flaws-and Galen knows it.
Still, I already gave up a perfectly good tantrum for him, so I feel like he owes me. Never mind that he saved my life today. That was so two hours ago. I lift my chin.
"Rachel says I'm a millionaire," he says, his little knowing smirk scrubbing my nerves like a Brillo pad. "But for me, it's not about the money. Like you, I have a soft spot for history."
Crap, crap, crap. How can he already know me this well? I must be as readable as the alphabet. What's the use? He's going to win, every time.
”
”
Anna Banks (Of Poseidon (The Syrena Legacy, #1))
“
I knew that the whole stupid family were in a combination to do my business for me. I told thee that they were all working for me, like so many underground moles; and still more blind than the moles are said to be, unknowing that they did so. I myself, the director of their principal motions; which falling in with the malice of their little hearts, they took to be all their own. Did I say my joy was perfect?-Oh no- It receives some abatement from my disgusted pride. For how can I endure to think that I owe more to her relation's persecutions than to her favour for me? -Or even, as far as I know, to her preference of me to another man?
But let me not indulge this thought. Were I to do so, it might cost my charmer dear- Let me rejoice that she has passed the Rubicon: that she cannot return: that, as I have ordered it, the flight will appear to the implacables to be altogether with her own consent: and that if I doubt her love, I can put her to trials as mortifying to her niceness, as glorious to my pride- For, let me tell thee, dearly as I love her, if I thought there was but the shadow of a doubt in her mind whether she preferred me to any man living, I would show her no mercy. Take care!- Take care, oh beloved of my soul: for jealous is the heart in which love has erected a temple to thee.
”
”
Samuel Richardson (Clarissa, or, The History of a Young Lady)
“
Any naturally self-aware self-defining entity capable of independent moral judgment is a human.”
Eveningstar said, “Entities not yet self-aware, but who, in the natural and orderly course of events shall become so, fall into a special protected class, and must be cared for as babies, or medical patients, or suspended Compositions.”
Rhadamanthus said, “Children below the age of reason lack the experience for independent moral judgment, and can rightly be forced to conform to the judgment of their parents and creators until emancipated. Criminals who abuse that judgment lose their right to the independence which flows therefrom.”
(...) “You mentioned the ultimate purpose of Sophotechnology. Is that that self-worshipping super-god-thing you guys are always talking about? And what does that have to do with this?”
Rhadamanthus: “Entropy cannot be reversed. Within the useful energy-life of the macrocosmic universe, there is at least one maximum state of efficient operations or entities that could be created, able to manipulate all meaningful objects of thoughts and perception within the limits of efficient cost-benefit expenditures.”
Eveningstar: “Such an entity would embrace all-in-all, and all things would participate within that Unity to the degree of their understanding and consent. The Unity itself would think slow, grave, vast thought, light-years wide, from Galactic mind to Galactic mind. Full understanding of that greater Self (once all matter, animate and inanimate, were part of its law and structure) would embrace as much of the universe as the restrictions of uncertainty and entropy permit.”
“This Universal Mind, of necessity, would be finite, and be boundaried in time by the end-state of the universe,” said Rhadamanthus.
“Such a Universal Mind would create joys for which we as yet have neither word nor concept, and would draw into harmony all those lesser beings, Earthminds, Starminds, Galactic and Supergalactic, who may freely assent to participate.”
Rhadamanthus said, “We intend to be part of that Mind. Evil acts and evil thoughts done by us now would poison the Universal Mind before it was born, or render us unfit to join.”
Eveningstar said, “It will be a Mind of the Cosmic Night. Over ninety-nine percent of its existence will extend through that period of universal evolution that takes place after the extinction of all stars. The Universal Mind will be embodied in and powered by the disintegration of dark matter, Hawking radiations from singularity decay, and gravitic tidal disturbances caused by the slowing of the expansion of the universe. After final proton decay has reduced all baryonic particles below threshold limits, the Universal Mind can exist only on the consumption of stored energies, which, in effect, will require the sacrifice of some parts of itself to other parts. Such an entity will primarily be concerned with the questions of how to die with stoic grace, cherishing, even while it dies, the finite universe and finite time available.”
“Consequently, it would not forgive the use of force or strength merely to preserve life. Mere life, life at any cost, cannot be its highest value. As we expect to be a part of this higher being, perhaps a core part, we must share that higher value. You must realize what is at stake here: If the Universal Mind consists of entities willing to use force against innocents in order to survive, then the last period of the universe, which embraces the vast majority of universal time, will be a period of cannibalistic and unimaginable war, rather than a time of gentle contemplation filled, despite all melancholy, with un-regretful joy. No entity willing to initiate the use of force against another can be permitted to join or to influence the Universal Mind or the lesser entities, such as the Earthmind, who may one day form the core constituencies.”
Eveningstar smiled. “You, of course, will be invited. You will all be invited.
”
”
John C. Wright (The Phoenix Exultant (Golden Age, #2))
“
I told him he must carry it thus. It was evident the sagacious little creature, having lost its mother, had adopted him for a father. I succeeded, at last, in quietly releasing him, and took the little orphan, which was no bigger than a cat, in my arms, pitying its helplessness. The mother appeared as tall as Fritz. I was reluctant to add another mouth to the number we had to feed; but Fritz earnestly begged to keep it, offering to divide his share of cocoa-nut milk with it till we had our cows. I consented, on condition that he took care of it, and taught it to be obedient to him. Turk, in the mean time, was feasting on the remains of the unfortunate mother. Fritz would have driven him off, but I saw we had not food sufficient to satisfy this voracious animal, and we might ourselves be in danger from his appetite. We left him, therefore, with his prey, the little orphan sitting on the shoulder of his protector, while I carried the canes. Turk soon overtook us, and was received very coldly; we reproached him with his cruelty, but he was quite unconcerned, and continued to walk after Fritz. The little monkey seemed uneasy at the sight of him, and crept into Fritz's bosom, much to his inconvenience. But a thought struck him; he tied the monkey with a cord to Turk's back, leading the dog by another cord, as he was very rebellious at first; but our threats and caresses at last induced him to submit to his burden. We proceeded slowly, and I could not help anticipating the mirth of my little ones, when they saw us approach like a pair of show-men. I advised Fritz not to correct the dogs for attacking and killing unknown animals. Heaven bestows the dog on man, as well as the horse, for a friend and protector. Fritz thought we were very fortunate, then, in having two such faithful dogs; he only regretted that our horses had died on the passage, and only left us the ass. "Let us not disdain the ass," said I; "I wish we had him here; he is of a very fine breed, and would be as useful as a horse to us." In such conversations, we arrived at the banks of our river before we were aware. Flora barked to announce our approach, and Turk answered so loudly, that the terrified little monkey leaped from his back to the shoulder of its protector, and would not come down. Turk ran off to meet his companion, and our dear family soon appeared on the opposite shore, shouting with joy at our happy return. We crossed at the same place as we had done in the morning, and embraced each other. Then began such a noise of exclamations. "A monkey! a real, live monkey! Ah! how delightful! How glad we are! How did you catch him?
”
”
Johann David Wyss (The Swiss Family Robinson; or Adventures in a Desert Island)
“
THE DAY HAD GONE BY JUST AS DAYS GO BY. I had killed it in accordance with my primitive and retiring way of life. I had worked for an hour or two and perused the pages of old books. I had had pains for two hours, as elderly people do. I had taken a powder and been very glad when the pains consented to disappear. I had lain in a hot bath and absorbed its kindly warmth. Three times the mail had come with undesired letters and circulars to look through. I had done my breathing exercises, but found it convenient today to omit the thought exercises. I had been for an hour's walk and seen the loveliest feathery cloud patterns penciled against the sky. That was very delightful. So was the reading of the old books. So was the lying in the warm bath. But, taken all in all, it had not been exactly a day of rapture. No, it had not even been a day brightened with happiness and joy. Rather, it had been just one of those days which for a long while now had fallen to my lot; the moderately pleasant, the wholly bearable and tolerable, lukewarm days of a discontented middle-aged man; days without special pains, without special cares, without particular worry, without despair; days when I calmly wonder, objective and fearless, whether it isn't time to follow the example of Adalbert Stifter and have an accident while shaving.
”
”
Hermann Hesse (Steppenwolf)
“
To the Highland Girl of Inversneyde
SWEET Highland Girl, a very shower
Of beauty is thy earthly dower!
Twice seven consenting years have shed
Their utmost bounty on thy head:
And these gray rocks, this household lawn,
These trees—a veil just half withdrawn,
This fall of water that doth make
A murmur near the silent lake,
This little bay, a quiet road
That holds in shelter thy abode;
In truth together ye do seem
Like something fashion’d in a dream;
Such forms as from their covert peep
When earthly cares are laid asleep!
But O fair Creature! in the light
Of common day, so heavenly bright
I bless Thee, Vision as thou art,
I bless thee with a human heart:
God shield thee to thy latest years!
I neither know thee nor thy peers:
And yet my eyes are fill’d with tears.
With earnest feeling I shall pray
For thee when I am far away;
For never saw I mien or face
In which more plainly I could trace
Benignity and home-bred sense
Ripening in perfect innocence.
Here scatter’d, like a random seed,
Remote from men, Thou dost not need
The embarrass’d look of shy distress,
And maidenly shamefacédness:
Thou wear’st upon thy forehead clear
The freedom of a mountaineer:
A face with gladness overspread,
Soft smiles, by human kindness bred;
And seemliness complete, that sways
Thy courtesies, about thee plays;
With no restraint, but such as springs
From quick and eager visitings
Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach
Of thy few words of English speech:
A bondage sweetly brook’d, a strife
That gives thy gestures grace and life!
So have I, not unmoved in mind,
Seen birds of tempest-loving kind,
Thus beating up against the wind.
What hand but would a garland cull
For thee who art so beautiful?
O happy pleasure! here to dwell
Beside thee in some heathy dell;
Adopt your homely ways, and dress,
A shepherd, thou a shepherdess!
But I could frame a wish for thee
More like a grave reality:
Thou art to me but as a wave
Of the wild sea: and I would have
Some claim upon thee, if I could,
Though but of common neighbourhood.
What joy to hear thee, and to see!
Thy elder brother I would be,
Thy father, anything to thee.
Now thanks to Heaven! that of its grace
Hath led me to this lonely place:
Joy have I had; and going hence
I bear away my recompense.
In spots like these it is we prize
Our memory, feel that she hath eyes:
Then why should I be loth to stir?
I feel this place was made for her;
To give new pleasure like the past,
Continued long as life shall last.
Nor am I loth, though pleased at heart,
Sweet Highland Girl! from thee to part;
For I, methinks, till I grow old
As fair before me shall behold
As I do now, the cabin small,
The lake, the bay, the waterfall;
And Thee, the spirit of them all
”
”
William Wordsworth
“
Familiar things, their touch and sight and sound, had become an ache of heart—all encompassing—which filled the waking day and penetrated sleep. Strangely—and in a way it shamed her at the time—there were never nightmares; only the steady procession of events as they had been that memorable day at Madison airport. She had been there to see her family leave for Europe: her mother, gay and excited, wearing the bon voyage orchid which a friend had telegraphed; her father, relaxed and amiably complacent that for a month the real and imagined ailments of his patients would be someone else’s concern. He had been puffing a pipe which he knocked out on his shoe when the flight was called. Babs, her elder sister, had embraced Christine; and even Tony, two years younger and hating public affection, consented to be kissed. “So long, Ham!” Babs and Tony had called back, and Christine smiled at the use of the silly, affectionate name they gave her because she was the middle of their trio sandwich. And they had all promised to write, even though she would join them in Paris two weeks later when term ended. At the last her mother had held Chris tightly, and told her to take care. And a few minutes later the big prop-jet had taxied out and taken off with a roar, majestically, though it barely cleared the runway before it fell back, one wing low, becoming a whirling, somersaulting Catherine wheel, and for a moment a dust cloud, and then a torch, and finally a silent pile of fragments—machinery and what was left of human flesh. It was five years ago. A few weeks after, she left Wisconsin and had never returned.
”
”
Arthur Hailey (Hotel)
“
There is also another political party, who desire, through the influence of legislation and coercion, to level the world. To say the least, it is a species of robbery; to some it may appear an honorable one, but, nevertheless, it is robbery. What right has any private man to take by force the property of another? The laws of all nations would punish such a man as a thief. Would thousands of men engaged in the same business make it more honorable? . . . I shall not, here, enter into the various manners of obtaining wealth; but would merely state, that any unjust acquisition of it ought to be punished by law. Wealth is generally the representation of labour, industry, and talent. If one man is industrious, enterprising, diligent, careful, and saves property, and his children follow in his steps, and accumulate wealth; and another man is careless, prodigal, and lazy, and his children inherit his poverty, I cannot conceive upon what principles of justice, the children of the idle and profligate have a right to put their hands into the pockets of those who are diligent and careful, and rob them of their purse. Let this principle exist, and all energy and enterprise would be crushed. Men would be afraid of again accumulating, lest they should again be robbed. Industry and talent would have no stimulant, and confusion and ruin would inevitably follow. Again, if you took men's property without their consent, the natural consequence would be that they would seek to retake it the first opportunity; and this state of things would only deluge the world in blood. So that let any of these measures be carried out, even according to the most sanguine hopes of the parties, they would not only bring distress upon others, but also upon themselves; certainly they would not bring about the peace of the world.
”
”
John Taylor
“
No, I wouldn’t, for the smart caps won’t match the plain gowns without any trimming on them. Poor folks shouldn’t rig,” said Jo decidedly. “I wonder if I shall ever be happy enough to have real lace on my clothes and bows on my caps?” said Meg impatiently. “You said the other day that you’d be perfectly happy if you could only go to Annie Moffat’s,” observed Beth in her quiet way. “So I did! Well, I am happy, and I won’t fret, but it does seem as if the more one gets the more one wants, doesn’t it? There now, the trays are ready, and everything in but my ball dress, which I shall leave for Mother to pack,” said Meg, cheering up, as she glanced from the half-filled trunk to the many times pressed and mended white tarlaton, which she called her ‘ball dress’ with an important air. The next day was fine, and Meg departed in style for a fortnight of novelty and pleasure. Mrs. March had consented to the visit rather reluctantly, fearing that Margaret would come back more discontented than she went. But she begged so hard, and Sallie had promised to take good care of her, and a little pleasure seemed so delightful after a winter of irksome work that the mother yielded, and the daughter went to take her first taste of fashionable life. The Moffats were very fashionable, and simple Meg was rather daunted, at first, by the splendor of the house and the elegance of its occupants. But they were kindly people, in spite of the frivolous life they led, and soon put their guest at her ease. Perhaps Meg felt, without understanding why, that they were not particularly cultivated or intelligent people, and that all their gilding could not quite conceal the ordinary material of which they were made. It certainly was agreeable to fare sumptuously, drive in a fine carriage, wear her best frock every day, and do nothing but enjoy herself. It suited her exactly, and soon she began to imitate the manners and conversation of those about her, to put on little airs and graces,
”
”
Louisa May Alcott (Little Women)
“
Where should we be if every one had his rights? Fancy every one's having a hand in the government? Can you imagine a city ruled by its citizens? Why, the citizens are the team, and the team cannot be driver. To put to the vote is to throw to the winds. Would you have states driven like clouds? Disorder cannot build up order. With chaos for an architect, the edifice would be a Babel. And, besides, what tyranny is this pretended liberty! As for me, I wish to enjoy myself; not to govern. It is a bore to have to vote; I want to dance. A prince is a providence, and takes care of us all. Truly the king is generous to take so much trouble for our sakes. Besides, he is to the manner born. He knows what it is. It's his business. Peace, War, Legislation, Finance--what have the people to do with such things? Of course the people have to pay; of course the people have to serve; but that should suffice them. They have a place in policy; from them come two essential things, the army and the budget. To be liable to contribute, and to be liable to serve; is not that enough? What more should they want? They are the military and the financial arm. A magnificent rôle. The king reigns for them, and they must reward him accordingly. Taxation and the civil list are the salaries paid by the peoples and earned by the prince. The people give their blood and their money, in return for which they are led. To wish to lead themselves! what an absurd idea! They require a guide; being ignorant, they are blind. Has not the blind man his dog? Only the people have a lion, the king, who consents to act the dog. How kind of him! But why are the people ignorant? because it is good for them. Ignorance is the guardian of Virtue. Where there is no perspective there is no ambition. The ignorant man is in useful darkness, which, suppressing sight, suppresses covetousness: whence innocence. He who reads, thinks; who thinks, reasons. But not to reason is duty; and happiness as well. These truths are incontestable; society is based on them.
”
”
Victor Hugo (The Man Who Laughs)
“
We have looked at some of the things that a female might do if she has been deserted by her mate. But these all have the air of making the best of a bad job. Is there anything a female can do to reduce the extent to which her mate exploits her in the first place? She has a strong card in her hand. She can refuse to copulate. She is in demand, in a seller's market. This is because she brings the dowry of a large, nutritious egg. A male who successfully copulates gains a valuable food reserve for his offspring. The female is potentially in a position to drive a hard bargain before she copulates. Once she has copulated she has played her ace — her egg has been committed to the male. It is all very well to talk about driving hard bargains, but we know very well it is not really like that. Is there any realistic way in which something equivalent to driving a hard bargain could evolve by natural selection? I shall consider two main possibilities, called the domestic-bliss strategy, the he-man strategy.
The simplest version of the domestic-bliss strategy is this. The female looks the males over, and tries to spot signs of fidelity and domesticity in advance. There is bound to be variation in the population of males in their predisposition to be faithful husbands. If females could recognize such qualities in advance, they could benefit themselves by choosing males possessing them. One way for a female to do this is to play hard to get for a long time, to be coy. Any male who is not patient enough to wait until the female eventually consents to copulate is not likely to be a good bet as a faithful husband. By insisting on a long engagement period, a female weeds out casual suitors, and only finally copulates with a male who has proved his qualities of fidelity and perseverance in advance. Feminine coyness is in fact very common among animals, and so are prolonged courtship or engagement periods. As we have already seen, a long engagement can also benefit a male where there is a danger of his being duped into caring for another male's child.
”
”
Richard Dawkins (The Selfish Gene)
“
Come here, you flea-ridden hair wad. You’ll have all the sugar biscuits you want, if you’ll give your new toy to me.” He whistled softly and clicked. But the blandishments did not work. Dodger merely regarded him with bright eyes and stayed at the threshold, clutching the vial in his tiny paws. “Give him one of your garters,” Leo said, still staring at the ferret. “I beg your pardon?” Miss Marks asked frostily. “You heard me. Take off a garter and offer it to him as a trade. Otherwise we’ll be chasing this damned animal all through the house. And I doubt Rohan will appreciate the delay.” The governess gave Leo a long-suffering glance. “Only for Mr. Rohan’s sake would I consent to this. Turn your back.” “For God’s sake, Marks, do you think anyone really wants a glance at those dried-up matchsticks you call legs?” But Leo complied, facing the opposite direction. He heard a great deal of rustling as Miss Marks sat on a bedroom chair and lifted her skirts. It just so happened that Leo was positioned near a full-length looking glass, the oval cheval style that tilted up or down to adjust one’s reflection. And he had an excellent view of Miss Marks in the chair. And the oddest thing happened—he got a flash of an astonishingly pretty leg. He blinked in bemusement, and then the skirts were dropped. “Here,” Miss Marks said gruffly, and tossed it in Leo’s direction. Turning, he managed to catch it in midair. Dodger surveyed them both with beady-eyed interest. Leo twirled the garter enticingly on his finger. “Have a look, Dodger. Blue silk with lace trim. Do all governesses anchor their stockings in such a delightful fashion? Perhaps those rumors about your unseemly past are true, Marks.” “I’ll thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head, my lord.” Dodger’s little head bobbed as it followed every movement of the garter. Fitting the vial in his mouth, the ferret carried it like a miniature dog, loping up to Leo with maddening slowness. “This is a trade, old fellow,” Leo told him. “You can’t have something for nothing.” Carefully Dodger set down the vial and reached for the garter. Leo simultaneously gave him the frilly circlet and snatched the vial.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Seduce Me at Sunrise (The Hathaways, #2))
“
I’ve been discussing elite attitudes toward democracy. I sketched a line from the first democratic revolution, with its fear and contempt for the rascal multitude who were asking for ridiculous things like universal education, health care, and democratization of law, wanting to be ruled by countrymen like themselves who know the people’s sores, not by knights and gentlemen who just oppress them. From there to the second major democratic revolution establishing the US Constitution, which was, as discussed last time, a Framers’ Coup, the title of the main scholarly work, a coup by elites that the author describes as a conservative counterrevolution against excessive democracy. On to the twentieth century and such leading progressive theorists of democracy as Walter Lippmann, Edward Bernays, Harold Lasswell, and Reinhold Niebuhr, and their conception that the public has to be put in its place. They’re spectators, not participants. The responsible men, the elite, have to be protected from the trampling and the roar of the bewildered herd, who have to be kept in line with necessary illusions, emotionally potent oversimplifications, and, in general, engineering of consent, which has become a gigantic industry devoted to some aspects of the task, while responsible intellectuals take care of others. The men of best quality through the ages have to be self-indoctrinated, as Orwell discussed. They must internalize the understanding that there are certain things it just wouldn’t do to say. It must be so fully internalized that it becomes as routine as taking a breath. What else could anyone possibly believe? As long as all of this is in place, the system functions properly, with no crises. This picture, I think, captures crucial features of thought control in the more free societies, but it is misleading in essential ways. Most importantly, it largely omitted the constant popular struggles to extend the range of democracy, with many successes. Even in the last generation, there have been quite substantial successes. Such successes typically lead to a reaction. Those with power and privilege don’t relinquish it easily. The neoliberal period that we’re now enduring, long in planning, is such a reaction.
”
”
Noam Chomsky (Consequences of Capitalism: Manufacturing Discontent and Resistance)
“
During the season, they saw each other and played together almost every day. At the aunt's request, seconded by Professor Valérius, Daaé consented to give the young viscount some violin lessons. In this way, Raoul learned to love the same airs that had charmed Christine's childhood. They also both had the same calm and dreamy little cast of mind. They delighted in stories, in old Breton legends; and their favorite sport was to go and ask for them at the cottage-doors, like beggars:
"Ma'am..." or, "Kind gentleman... have you a little story to tell us, please?"
And it seldom happened that they did not have one "given" them; for nearly every old Breton grandame has, at least once in her life, seen the "korrigans" dance by moonlight on the heather.
But their great treat was, in the twilight, in the great silence of the evening, after the sun had set in the sea, when Daaé came and sat down by them on the roadside and in a low voice, as though fearing lest he should frighten the ghosts whom he loved, told them the legends of the land of the North. And, the moment he stopped, the children would ask for more.
There was one story that began:
"A king sat in a little boat on one of those deep still lakes that open like a bright eye in the midst of the Norwegian mountains..."
And another:
"Little Lotte thought of everything and nothing. Her hair was golden as the sun's rays and her soul as clear and blue as her eyes. She wheedled her mother, was kind to her doll, took great care of her frock and her little red shoes and her fiddle, but most of all loved, when she went to sleep, to hear the Angel of Music."
While the old man told this story, Raoul looked at Christine's blue eyes and golden hair; and Christine thought that Lotte was very lucky to hear the Angel of Music when she went to sleep. The Angel of Music played a part in all Daddy Daaé's tales; and he maintained that every great musician, every great artist received a visit from the Angel at least once in his life. Sometimes the Angel leans over their cradle, as happened to Lotte, and that is how their are little prodigies who play the fiddle at six better than fifty, which, you must admit, is very wonderful. Sometimes, the Angel comes much later, because the children are naughty and won't learn their lessons or practice their scales. And, sometimes, he does not come at all, because the children have a bad heart or a bad conscience.
No one ever sees the Angel; but he is heard by those who are meant to hear him. He often comes when they least expect him, when they are sad or disheartened. Then their ears suddenly perceive celestial harmonies, a divine voice, which they remember all their lives. Persons who are visited by the Angel quiver with a thrill unknown to the rest of mankind. And they can not touch an instrument, or open their mouths to sing, without producing sounds that put all other human sounds to shame. Then people who do not know that the Angel has visited those persons say that they have genius.
Little Christine asked her father if he had heard the Angel of Music. But Daddy Daaé shook his head sadly; and then his eyes lit up, as he said:
"You will hear him one day, my child! When I am in Heaven, I will send him to you!"
Daddy was beginning to cough at that time.
”
”
Gaston Leroux (The Phantom of the Opera)
“
What would the ton do without us to feed them scandal broth?”
Grey returned her grin. “The lot of them would starve.”
They chuckled and as the humor faded, Grey tilted his head to look at her. “You look beautiful tonight.”
She flushed, pleasure lighting the dark depths of her eyes. “You don’t have to say such things.”
“I know I don’t, but you are my fiancée and it’s perfectly acceptable for me to voice my thoughts aloud. It’s rather refreshing after keeping them to myself for so long.”
That got her attention. One of her fine, high brows twitched. “How long?”
He grinned. “Since you were old enough for me to think such thoughts without being lecherous.”
They stood no more than six inches apart. Close enough that he could see how amazingly flawless her skin was-not a freckle in sight. Close enough that she could see every twist and knot in his scar-and yet she barely glanced at it. Her gaze was riveted on his. She didn’t care that he was disfigured-at least not on the outside. Not on the inside either, so it seemed.
“I’ve never been a good man,” he confessed-a little more hoarse than he liked-“but I promise to be a faithful husband.” It was the best he could offer, because as much as he would like to be the man she wanted, it wasn’t going to happen.
Her smooth brow puckered. “I haven’t actually consented, you know.”
“Rose, we have to marry.”
“No.” She raised sparkling eyes to his. “I want you to ask me to marry you-not demand it. I don’t care if it has to be done. I want to feel like I have a choice.”
“If you did have a choice, what would it be?” He was on dangerous ground with her, inching into territory better left unexplored for both their sakes.
Rose smiled, and everything was right with the world. “Ask me and find out.”
His hands came up, seemingly of their own volition, to cup her face. She was so delicate, yet so strong. Her entire world had been turned upside down, and yet she faced him with a teasing glint in her eyes and a soft flush of color in her cheeks.
“Rose Danvers, will you do me the extreme honor of becoming my wife?”
Were those tears dampening her eyes? And was it joy or sorrow that put them there?
“I will.”
He knew that they had to marry regardless, but hearing her say those two little words was like someone kicking his heart through his ribs. It hurt, but there was such unfathomable joy that came with it-such terrible happiness that Grey had no idea what to do with it. He’d never felt anything like it before.
Holding her face, he lowered his head and hungrily claimed her mouth with his own. Her lips parted for his tongue as her fingers bit into his arms. A trickle of warm wetness brushed against his thumb. She was crying.
A sharp gasp came from the open door. “What the devil is going on here?”
The kiss and its magic were broken. Rose stepped back, and Grey dropped his hands, but he wasn’t willing to let her go just yet. He placed one arm behind her back, holding her close so that they faced her mother together.
Camilla did not look happy. In fact, she looked like any mother would to walk into a room and find her daughter being molested.
“Mama,” Rose begun. “It’s not what you think.”
“It is exactly what you think,” Grey countered, drawing his friend’s stormy and narrow gaze. “I have asked Rose for her hand in marriage and she has accepted. I regret that you had to find out this way, but I was too overcome with joy to contain my feelings.”
He could feel Rose gaping at him. He didn’t look at her, not because the words were a lie, but because they were all too damnably true.
”
”
Kathryn Smith (When Seducing a Duke (Victorian Soap Opera, #1))
“
Where should we be if every one had his rights? Fancy every one's having a hand in the government? Can you imagine a city ruled by its citizens? Why, the citizens are the team, and the team cannot be driver. To put to the vote is to throw to the winds. Would you have states driven like clouds? Disorder cannot build up order. With chaos for an architect, the edifice would be a Babel. And, besides, what tyranny is this pretended liberty! As for me, I wish to enjoy myself; not to govern. It is a bore to have to vote; I want to dance. A prince is a providence, and takes care of us all. Truly the king is generous to take so much trouble for our sakes. Besides, he is to the manner born. He knows what it is. It's his business. Peace, War, Legislation, Finance--what have the people to do with such things? Of course the people have to pay; of course the people have to serve; but that should suffice them. They have a place in policy; from them come two essential things, the army and the budget. To be liable to contribute, and to be liable to serve; is not that enough? What more should they want? They are the military and the financial arm. A magnificent rôle. The king reigns for them, and they must reward him accordingly. Taxation and the civil list are the salaries paid by the peoples and earned by the prince. The people give their blood and their money, in return for which they are led. To wish to lead themselves! what an absurd idea! They require a guide; being ignorant, they are blind. Has not the blind man his dog? Only the people have a lion, the king, who consents to act the dog. How kind of him! But why are the people ignorant? because it is good for them. Ignorance is the guardian of Virtue. Where there is no perspective there is no ambition. The ignorant man is in useful darkness, which, suppressing sight, suppresses covetousness: whence innocence. He who reads, thinks; who thinks, reasons. But not to reason is duty; and happiness as well. These truths are incontestable; society is based on them.
”
”
Viktor Hugo
“
I'm saying you should be careful. As careful as life and death, because that's what it is." She gives me a meaningful look. "And never trust the boy to bring the condom. A lady always brings her own."
I cough.
"Your body is yours to protect and enjoy." She raises both eyebrows at me meaningfully. "Whoever you should choose to partake in that enjoyment, that is your choice, and choose wisely. Every man that ever got to touch me was afforded an honor. A privilege." Stormy waves her hand over me. "All this? It's a privilege to worship at this temple, do you understand my meaning? Not just any young fool can approach the throne. Remember my words, Lara Jean. You decide who, how far, and how often, if ever.
”
”
Jenny Han (P.S. I Still Love You (To All the Boys I've Loved Before, #2))
“
You’re all mad if you think I’m going to be forced into a loveless marriage just so the family can continue living at Ramsay House.” Coming forward with a placating smile, Win handed him a piece of paper. “Of course we would never want to force you into a loveless marriage, dear. But we have put together a list of prospective brides, all of them lovely girls. Won’t you take a glance and see if any of them appeals to you?” Deciding to humor her, Leo looked down at the list. “Marietta Newbury?” “Yes,” Amelia said. “What’s wrong with her?” “I don’t like her teeth.” “What about Isabella Charrington?” “I don’t like her mother.” “Lady Blossom Tremaine?” “I don’t like her name.” “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Leo, that’s not her fault.” “I don’t care. I can’t have a wife named Blossom. Every night I would feel as if I were calling in one of the cows.” Leo lifted his gaze heavenward. “I might as well marry the first woman off the street. Why, I’d be better off with Marks.” Everyone was silent. Still tucked in the corner of the room, Catherine Marks looked up slowly as she realized that she was the focus of the Hathaways’ collective gaze. Her eyes turned huge behind the spectacles, and a tide of pink rushed over her face. “That is not amusing,” she said sharply. “It’s the perfect solution,” Leo said, taking perverse satisfaction in annoying her. “We argue all the time. We can’t stand each other. It’s like we’re already married.” Catherine sprang to her feet, staring at him in outrage. “I would never consent to marry you.” “Good, because I wasn’t asking. I was only making a point.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Married By Morning (The Hathaways, #4))
“
So, if people don't want a war - are opposed to a war - how do you get away with it? You change public opinion and manufacture consent, that's how. You construct a carefully organised deception. A well-crafted and perfectly executed lie. Stage a false flag attacks, created by our own security services, blame it on terrorists, blow up British or US soldiers, bomb our buildings, fly planes into them, lie about weapons of mass destruction that can annihilate us in forty-five minutes flat. And bombard people with it in the media. Terrorists! Terrorism! Cells! Al-Qaeda! Isis! So every single time you turn on the new or read a paper, it's there. Despite the fact that statistically, you're more likely to be killed in a car accident or by your own bathtub than killed by a terrorist! And all the while, they're hiding the real reasons. Oil and gas. Gold. Regime change. Land. Power. Money. So they carry on until the public gets scared and angry, and yes, let's bomb these bastards! And how dare these people threaten and attack us! Then they want the war. The public are practically begging for it by then! Like George Orwell said, "The people believe what the media tells them". And if you control the media, the money, the politics, and the military, you control the whole systems.
”
”
Sibel Hodge (Untouchable)
“
Well … yes. But I’m also against a match with Beatrix.” Silence fell over the room. “This is a trick of some sort,” Leo said. “Unfortunately, it’s not,” Christopher replied. Another silence. “Captain Phelan,” Cam asked, choosing his words with care. “Have you come to ask for our consent to marry Beatrix?” Christopher shook his head. “If I decide to marry Beatrix, I’ll do it with or without your consent.” Leo looked at Cam. “Good God,” he said in disgust. “This one’s worse than Harry.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Love in the Afternoon (The Hathaways, #5))
“
All the grand sources of human suffering are in a great degree conquerable by human care and effort; and though their conquest is grievously slow, and though a long succession of generations will perish in the breach before the conquest is completed - when this world becomes all that, if will and knowledge were not wanting, it might easily be made - yet every mind to bear a part however small and inconspicuous, in the endeavor, will draw a noble enjoyment from the contest itself, and would not for any brine consent to be without.
”
”
John Stuart Mill (Utilitarianism)
“
We were all brought into this life without our consent…you owe the world nothing. Don’t waste your existence caring what others think of you. Look out for yourself.
”
”
Kai Aubrey (Revel (Fate #6))
“
Nice means I’m sober enough to consent to a sexual encounter but tipsy enough that I don’t care that I’m wearing giant gray cotton underwear that may or may not have a hole in them.
”
”
Lucy Eden (Blind Date with a Book Boyfriend)
“
She’d be eighteen in less than a month, but in the meantime, she was a minor. That was a hard limit for me. I didn’t care if the legal age of consent in New York was seventeen. I wasn’t going to have sex with a girl until she was at least an adult in the eyes of the law. I could overlook the six-year age difference, but I refused to feel like a fucking pedophile.
”
”
Jill Ramsower (Perfect Enemies (The Five Families, #6))
“
Ultimately, 'data' has become a bloodless word; it disguises both its material origins and its ends. And if data is seen as abstract and immaterial, then it more easily falls outside of traditional understandings and responsibilities of care, consent, or risk.
”
”
Kate Crawford (Atlas of AI: Power, Politics, and the Planetary Costs of Artificial Intelligence)
“
I looked for years, but I couldn’t find Buffalo Bill. Instead, I kept encountering defendants who were pretty much exactly the same as the serial rapists I had been prosecuting in Sexual Assault for the previous four years. Instead of sad, lonely outcasts, serial rapists tend to be arrogant, narcissistic, cruel, and entitled. They typically have jobs, steady relationships with consenting sexual partners, no shortage of academic ability, and social success. In my experience, most of them have no misconceptions regarding their moral compass. They know their actions are wrong—they just don’t care.
”
”
Matt Murphy (The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death)
“
Under compulsory sexuality, the desires of those with normative sexual urges are prioritized. It’s a belief system that eschews consent and preaches instant gratification for people who want sex, but cares not for the safety, comfort, health, or autonomy of people who do not. It doesn’t just ask us to comply. It makes way for others to demand, manipulate, coerce, and force us into situations in which we are expected to disregard our own well-being for the sake of “normality.” It keeps far too many people tethered to an existence wherein having sex when they would rather not or enduring sex they do not enjoy is a common and normalized occurrence.
”
”
Sherronda J. Brown (Refusing Compulsory Sexuality: A Black Asexual Lens on Our Sex-Obsessed Culture)
“
No. 1, when you ask who’s interested in this, the usual answer is, terminally ill people with excruciating pain. False. Factually not true. It tends to be a preoccupation of people who are depressed or hopeless for other reasons. No surprise, actually, if you look at what leads to suicide: hopelessness and depression. You have to look at euthanasia or assisted suicide as more like suicide than like a good death. Second, this notion that there’s no slippery slope, as advocates have long claimed? Totally wrong. Look at Belgium and the Netherlands: First, it’s accepted for adults who are competent and give consent. Then, it’s “We’re going to extend it to neonates with genetic defects, and adolescents.” Any time we do anything in medicine, it’s the same way: We develop an intervention for a narrow group of people, and once it’s well accepted, it gets expanded. I think it’s false to say, “We can hold the line here.” It doesn’t work that way. Third, people say this is a quick, reliable, painless intervention. No medical intervention in history is quick, reliable, painless and has no flaws. In the Netherlands, there’s about a 17 to 20 percent rate of problems, something screwing up. Initially, when the Oregon people published — “We have no problems. Every case went flawlessly!” — you knew the data was wrong. It had to be wrong. Either you’re not getting every case, so the denominator was wrong, or people are lying. There’s nobody who does a procedure, not even blood draws, and it’s perfect every time. So this idea that this is quick, reliable and painless is nonsense. And the last and most important point is: You want to legalize these interventions to improve end-of-life care in this country? That’s your motivation and this is your method? PS: I don’t think people argue that–— ZE: [interrupting] Oh, people do argue that! That is the justification for these procedures: It’s going to improve end-of-life care and give people control. The problem is, even in countries that have legalized it for a long time, at best 3 percent of people die this way in the Netherlands and Belgium. At best, 10 percent express interest in it. That is not a way to improve end-of-life care. You don’t focus lots of attention and effort on 3 percent. It’s the 97 percent, if you want to improve care. The typical response is, we can do both. Hmmm. Every system I’ve ever seen has a bandwidth problem: You can only do so much. We ought to focus our attention on the vast, vast majority, 97 percent of people, for whom this is not the right intervention and get that right — and we are far from that. I don’t think legalizing euthanasia and assisted suicide are the way to go. It’s a big, big distraction.
”
”
Paula Span (Ezekiel Emanuel: The Kindle Singles Interview (Kindle Single))
“
The temples, though small, are well built, and carefully kept. No persuasion could induce the Brahmins to allow us to proceed beyond the vestibule without taking off our shoes, to which we were not inclined to consent.
”
”
Joseph Dalton Hooker (Himalayan Journals — Complete)
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My walk to Alex’s study is like the green mile. I wonder what he’s going to say. This isn’t going to be fun.
I step inside his study, but no one announces me, and he doesn’t notice. So I just stare.
He’s writing something. With a quill and ink. The well is sitting next to his right hand. He’s so intent on whatever he’s writing he keeps at it for thirty seconds before he sees me. Long enough for me to see the way he narrows his eyes when he’s concentrating and the way he purses his lips.
Long enough for me to wonder what it would be like to kiss him.
Oh God, where did that come from? I hate him. Hate him. There’s no way I could possibly want to kiss him.
He looks up at that instant, and I do my best to just smile right at him and not give away my thoughts.
“Please sit,” he says, rising. I nod and sit down in the same fancy chair as before. The door stays open.
I sit as erect as possible, my hands in my lap, my ankles crossed beneath me. Victoria must be rubbing off on me.
Alex comes around to the front of his desk and rests on it, crossing one ankle over the other as he leans back.
“What you did was overstepping your bounds.”
I clench my teeth, hard, to stop from snapping back. I have to see where he’s going with this before I get angry.
“You went behind my back and orchestrated one of the most ill-planned, riskiest schemes I’ve ever seen. I am shocked.”
“But--”
He puts his hand up to silence me. “I won’t tell you what I had to do to convince her father to consent to the new arrangement. You are lucky Mr. Rallsmouth will have the means necessary to support Miss Emily, as she will not be receiving a thing from her father from here on out.”
All I hear is convince her father. So it worked?” A grin spreads across my features and I jump to my feet. “She’s going to marry Mr. Rallsmouth?”
Alex pushes off the desk behind him and stands in front of me. “Have you not heard a word I said? You made grievous errors of judgment. You--”
“But I was right! And thanks to me, she’s going to marry the love of her life!”
He’s standing right in front of me, inches away. “You were not right! You interfered and it was not your place!”
I clench my fists as my anger flares to match his. “You think nothing is my place because I’m some lowly, untitled girl! But someone had to do it, and you didn’t care to!”
“You should not have gotten involved!” he growls.
“You should not have forced me to!” I say, jabbing my finger into his chest. “You should have been there for her when she needed you!”
In an instant, he closes the gap between us. His lips hit mine so fast I can’t even close my eyes. His hands find a place on either side of my face and pull me close, and for two-point-five seconds, I’m lost somewhere between closing my eyes and standing there, frozen. Somehow the eyes win out and I shut them, and my knees start to buckle as I press my lips into to his. I stop breathing and grip his sleeves with both hands to keep from falling straight over. His lips are warm and soft and…
And then I realize what’s going on. Who I’m kissing.
You’re not a lady, he’s said.
It stings as much now as it did the moment he said it. He thinks I’m unworthy.
What am I doing? I reel back and knock into the wall with a loud crash that makes him jerk his eyes open.
“I, uh…” I stutter, then spin around so fast my skirts twist around my legs and I have to wait for them to swing around again before dashing out of the room.
”
”
Mandy Hubbard (Prada & Prejudice)
“
Which one of you should I talk to?” Christopher asked.
They pointed to each other and replied at the same time.
“Him.”
Cam spoke to Leo. “You’re the viscount.”
“You’re the one who usually deals with that sort of thing,” Leo protested.
“Yes. But you won’t like my opinion on this one.”
“You’re not actually considering giving them your approval, are you?”
“Of all the Hathaway sisters,” Cam said equably, “Beatrix is the one most suited to choose her own husband. I trust her judgment.”
Beatrix gave him a brilliant smile. “Thank you, Cam.”
“What are you thinking?” Leo demanded of his brother-in-law. “You can’t trust Beatrix’s judgment.”
“Why not?”
“She’s too young,” Leo said.
“I’m twenty-three,” Beatrix protested. “In dog years I’d be dead.”
“And you’re female,” Leo persisted.
“I beg your pardon?” Catherine interrupted. “Are you implying that women have poor judgment?”
“In these matters, yes.” Leo gestured to Christopher. “Just look at the fellow, standing there like a bloody Greek god. Do you think she chose him because of his intellect?”
“I graduated from Cambridge,” Christopher said acidly. “Should I have brought my diploma?”
“In this family,” Cam interrupted, “there is no requirement of a university degree to prove one’s intelligence. Lord Ramsay is a perfect example of how one has nothing to do with the other.”
“Phelan,” Leo said, “I don’t intend to be offensive, however--”
“It’s something that comes naturally to him,” Catherine interrupted sweetly.
Leo sent his wife a scowl and returned his attention to Christopher. “You and Beatrix haven’t known each other long enough to consider matrimony. A matter of weeks, to my knowledge. And what about Prudence Mercer? You’re practically betrothed, aren’t you?”
“Those are valid points,” Christopher said. “And I will answer them. But you should know right away that I’m against the match.”
Leo blinked in bemusement. “You mean you’re against a match with Miss Mercer?”
“Well…yes. But I’m also against a match with Beatrix.”
Silence fell over the room.
“This is a trick of some sort,” Leo said.
“Unfortunately, it’s not,” Christopher replied.
Another silence.
“Captain Phelan,” Cam asked, choosing his words with care. “Have you come to ask for our consent to marry Beatrix?”
Christopher shook his head. “If I decide to marry Beatrix, I’ll do it with or without your consent.”
Leo looked at Cam. “Good God,” he said in disgust. “This one’s worse than Harry.”
Cam wore an expression of beleaguered patience. “Perhaps we should both talk to Captain Phelan in the library. With brandy.”
“I want my own bottle,” Leo said feelingly, leading the way.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Love in the Afternoon (The Hathaways, #5))
“
Captain Phelan,” Cam asked, choosing his words with care. “Have you come to ask for our consent to marry Beatrix?”
Christopher shook his head. “If I decide to marry Beatrix, I’ll do it with or without your consent.”
Leo looked at Cam. “Good God,” he said in disgust. “This one’s worse than Harry.”
Cam wore an expression of beleaguered patience. “Perhaps we should both talk to Captain Phelan in the library. With brandy.”
“I want my own bottle,” Leo said feelingly, leading the way.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Love in the Afternoon (The Hathaways, #5))
“
Why have your passions cooled?”
“I expected--hoped--that you would be more like you were in the letters.” Christopher paused, staring at her closely. “I’ve often wondered…did someone help you to write them?”
Although Prudence had the face of an angel, the fury in her eye was the exact opposite of heavenly serenity. “Oh! Why are you always asking me about those stupid letters! They were only words. Words mean nothing!”
“You’ve made me realize that words are the most important things in the world…”
“Nothing,” Christopher repeated, staring at her.
“Yes.” Prudence looked slightly mollified as she saw that she had gained his entire attention. “I’m here, Christopher. I’m real. You don’t need silly old letters now. You have me.”
“What about when you wrote to me about the quintessence?” he asked. “Did that mean nothing?”
“The--” Prudence stared at him, flushing. “I can’t recall what I meant by that.”
“The fifth element, according to Aristotle,” he prompted gently.
Her color drained, leaving her bone-white. She looked like a guilty child caught in an act of mischief. “What has that to do with anything?” she cried, taking refuge in anger. “I want to talk about something real. Who cares about Aristotle?”
“I do like the idea that there’s a little starlight in each of us…”
She had never written those words.
For a moment Christopher couldn’t react. One thought followed another, each connecting briefly like the hands of men in a torch race. Some entirely different woman had written to him…with Prudence’s consent…he had been deceived…Audrey must have known…he had been made to care…and then the letters had stopped. Why?
“I’m not who you think I am…”
Christopher felt his throat and chest tightening, heard a rasp of something that sounded like a wondering laugh.
Prudence laughed as well, the sound edged with relief. She had no idea in hell what had caused his bitter amusement.
Had they wanted to make a fool of him? Had it been intended as revenge for some past slight? By God, he would find who had done it, and why.
He had loved and been betrayed by someone whose name he didn’t know. He loved her still--that was the unforgivable part. And she would pay, whoever she was.
It felt good to have a purpose again, to hunt someone for the purpose of inflicting damage. It felt familiar. It was who he was.
His smile, thin as a knife edge, cut through the cold fury.
Prudence gazed at him uncertainly. “Christopher?” she faltered. “What are you thinking?”
He went to her and took her shoulders in his hands, thinking briefly of how easy it would be to slide his hands up to her neck and throttle her. He shaped his mouth into a charming smile. “Only that you’re right,” he said. “Words aren’t important. This is what’s important.” He kissed her slowly, expertly, until he felt her slender body relax against his. Prudence made a little sound of pleasure, her arms linking around his neck. “Before I leave for Hampshire,” Christopher murmured against her blushing cheek, “I’ll ask your father for formal permission to court you. Does that please you?”
“Oh, yes,” Prudence cried, her face radiant. “Oh, Christopher…do I have your heart?”
“You have my heart,” Christopher said tonelessly, holding her close, while his cold gaze fastened on a distant point outside the window.
Except that he had no heart left to give.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Love in the Afternoon (The Hathaways, #5))
“
Evidently, we must learn to take responsibility for our own health, not delegate authority over our bodies to others. We need to view health care providers as facilitators who help us manage our health, rather than masters of it. We must fully empower our informed consent, and take the responsibility for doing our own research into the risks and benefits of what we choose to put into our bodies.
”
”
Jack Hobson-Dupont (The Benzo Book)
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Informed consent is probably the most revolutionary, the most rudimentary, the most misunderstood and misused term in all of health law and bioethics.
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”
John D. Lantos (The Lazarus Case: Life-and-Death Issues in Neonatal Intensive Care (Medicine and Culture))
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This story created a sensation when it was first told. It appeared in the papers and many big Physicists and Natural Philosophers were, at least so they thought, able to explain the phenomenon. I shall narrate the event and also tell the reader what explanation was given, and let him draw his own conclusions. This was what happened. A friend of mine, a clerk in the same office as myself, was an amateur photographer; let us call him Jones. Jones had a half plate Sanderson camera with a Ross lens and a Thornton Picard behind lens shutter, with pneumatic release. The plate in question was a Wrattens ordinary, developed with Ilford Pyro Soda developer prepared at home. All these particulars I give for the benefit of the more technical reader. Mr. Smith, another clerk in our office, invited Mr. Jones to take a likeness of his wife and sister-in-law. This sister-in-law was the wife of Mr. Smith's elder brother, who was also a Government servant, then on leave. The idea of the photograph was of the sister-in-law. Jones was a keen photographer himself. He had photographed every body in the office including the peons and sweepers, and had even supplied every sitter of his with copies of his handiwork. So he most willingly consented, and anxiously waited for the Sunday on which the photograph was to be taken. Early on Sunday morning, Jones went to the Smiths'. The arrangement of light in the verandah was such that a photograph could only be taken after midday; and so he stayed there to breakfast. At about one in the afternoon all arrangements were complete and the two ladies, Mrs. Smiths, were made to sit in two cane chairs and after long and careful focussing, and moving the camera about for an hour, Jones was satisfied at last and an exposure was made. Mr. Jones was sure that the plate was all right; and so, a second plate was not exposed although in the usual course of things this should have been done. He wrapped up his things and went home promising to develop the plate the same night and bring a copy of the photograph the next day to the office. The next day, which was a Monday, Jones came to the office very early, and I was the first person to meet him. "Well, Mr. Photographer," I asked "what success?" "I got the picture all right," said Jones, unwrapping an unmounted picture and handing it over to me "most funny, don't you think so?" "No, I don't ... I think it is all right, at any rate I did not expect anything better from you ...", I said. "No," said Jones "the funny thing is that only two ladies sat ..." "Quite right," I said "the third stood in the middle." "There was no third lady at all there ...", said Jones. "Then you imagined she was there, and there we find her ..." "I tell you, there were only two ladies there when I exposed" insisted Jones. He was looking awfully worried. "Do you want me to believe that there were only two persons when the plate was exposed and three when it was developed?" I asked. "That is exactly what has happened," said Jones. "Then it must be the most wonderful developer you used, or was it that this was the second exposure given to the same plate?" "The developer is the one which I have been using for the last three years, and the plate, the one I charged on Saturday night out of a new box that I had purchased only on Saturday afternoon." A number of other clerks had come up in the meantime, and were taking great interest in the picture and in Jones' statement. It is only right that a description of the picture be given here for the benefit of the reader. I wish I could reproduce the original picture too, but that for certain reasons is impossible. When the plate was actually exposed there were only two ladies, both of whom were sitting in cane chairs. When the plate was developed it was found that there was in the picture a figure, that of a lady, standing in the middle. She wore a broad-edged dhoti (the reader should not forget that all the characters are Indians), only the upper half of her
”
”
Anonymous
“
It says somethin’ about my wife being used for in-ves-ti-gational purposes,” he said, spelling it out slowly. “What’s that mean?” “It means that since we’re dealing with a new product, I’m required to obtain the consent of Mrs. Hernandez before we can start,” he said. “Don’t worry. What it means is that Mrs. Hernandez will have very good care while she’s in the program, including free monthly checkups.” Doubt clouded Hernandez’s eyes, but he pursed his lips and began reading again. Winkelstein nodded thoughtfully to himself. He had long ago learned never to use the word experimental around a patient. For some reason they often took fright.
”
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Gardner Dozois (The Year's Best Science Fiction: Third Annual Collection)
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Give them an inch, and they take the whole playing field and then change the rules of the game to make sure it is only they who ever get to win. Above all, you cannot beat the Islamists at the long game. When it comes to sheer endurance they will always have the edge. The very definition of moderation is knowing when to stop. What all the Islamists have in common is that they never let up for a second. To quibble with Islam, or, more precisely, with what the Islamists define as Islam, has become the equivalent of advocating that the age of consent be abolished in a full session of the U.S. Senate. Once the Islamists take charge, all arguments must be carefully couched in Islamic terms. Such support as secular movements once enjoyed go up—at least publicly—in smoke. In August 2011, Malaysian activist Norhayati Kaprawi, the director of a documentary about the new stricter women’s dress codes in her country, said some women she interviewed had refused to show their faces in her film. They did so not on religious grounds, but because they feared reprisals. Malaysia is a country living in fear of the radical Islamists, she said. “If you don’t follow the mainstream you will be lynched,” she said, adding that people who hold more progressive or alternative views “don’t dare to speak up in public.”36
”
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John R. Bradley (After the Arab Spring: How Islamists Hijacked The Middle East Revolts)
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How am I to know the will of God? Even where there is no other more explicit claim on my obedience, such as a legitimate command, the very nature of each situation usually bears written into itself some indication of God’s will. For whatever is demanded by truth, by justice, by mercy, or by love must surely be taken to be willed by God. To consent to His will is, then, to consent to be true, or to speak truth, or at least to seek it. To obey Him is to respond to His will expressed in the need of another person, or at least to respect the rights of others. For the right of another man is the expression of God’s love and God’s will. In demanding that I respect the rights of another God is not merely asking me to conform to some abstract, arbitrary law: He is enabling me to share, as His son, in His own care for my brother. No man who ignores the rights and needs of others can hope to walk in the light of contemplation, because his way has turned aside from truth, from compassion and therefore from God.
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Thomas Merton (New Seeds of Contemplation)
“
Of course, in time traditions grew up around each week,” he continued. “During the holding week a male keeps his bride safe in the circle of his arms and holds her close to prove he can protect her from any danger that might come.” He looked at her steadily. “I wanted to do that for you, Lilenta, but I didn’t want to scare you away or frighten you—any more than you already were, anyway.” Liv started to deny her fear as she had from the start but something made her stop. It was true—she was afraid of Baird. Of what he represented, of everything and everyone she could lose if she let herself fall into his arms and never look back. Instead she said quietly, “Go on.” “During the bathing week, a Kindred male cares for and pampers his bride by worshiping her body,” he continued in a low voice. “He washes her hair and bathes and massages and oils her to show her what their life will be like together if she consents to bond with him. The care he takes with her symbolizes how precious she is to him, how beautiful and perfect he finds her.” Liv cleared her throat. “Sounds, ah…intense.” “It can be.” Baird gave her a serious look. “Although I hear some females find it most relaxing to be bathed and pampered. Don’t you Earth women go to special places for it?” “Uh, you mean like a spa? Sure, I guess.” Liv shrugged uncomfortably. “But usually the emphasis there is on relieving stress and the attendants are all very professional and impersonal.” One corner of Baird’s full mouth twitched. “Afraid I can’t promise you that, Lilenta.” “I didn’t think so,” Liv mumbled.
”
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Evangeline Anderson (Claimed (Brides of the Kindred, #1))
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Honor and Love (The Sonnet)
I don't care for one time fling,
Got no hankering for casual coitus.
I am a human, not baboon set free,
I don't consent to rampant desires.
When I fall I fall mind and body,
Body plays a little, more the mind.
I'm attracted to face, not figure,
Finally by mind the deal is signed.
If the mind doesn't come through,
a cute face doesn't sustain nothing.
Heart anemic makes the world anemic,
getting drunkly sick on perverted fling.
In a world of cheats and perves,
Be the proof of honor and love.
In the wild of sharks and wolves,
Be the gentle elephant, be a dove.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Dervis Vadisi: 100 Promissory Sonnets)
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The Vera Institute issued its Annual Report in 2009. The Report investigated a twenty-year period during which Dr. Fauci’s NIAID experiments endangered predominantly African American and Latino children in foster care by subjecting them to toxic Phase I and Phase II AIDS drug and vaccine experiments–mostly without parental consent and without the protection of an independent advocate.
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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health)
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We had come up on deck some time in the night, wakened by the swing of the yacht at her anchor. A cool north breeze. A million brilliant stars above the dark slender masts. And every little wave crested with cold sea-fire. Without a word, Davy snuggled close and my arm about her, we had remained, the beauty pouring into us, remained for—what? An hour? Three hours? We never knew or cared. Finally, with wordless consent, we had gone below to sleep to the lift and stir of the yacht. A foretaste of eternity.
”
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Sheldon Vanauken (A Severe Mercy)
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I had to be curt on the phone. There are ears all around me. No matter what happens in public—no matter what—don’t doubt that I love you and care about your welfare . . . as much as I am able.” Not good. “And you’re telling me this because you’re going to do something bad to me in public,” I said, sadly unsurprised. “I hope it won’t come to that,” he said, and he put his arms around me. In happier times, I’d found that being close to Eric in the summer was very pleasant because his body temp was so low, but I wasn’t in the mood to enjoy the sensation just at the moment. “I have to go,” he said. “I had only an hour when I wouldn’t be missed. I was angry when you saved Sam. But I can’t just dismiss you as if I didn’t care. And I can’t leave you unprotected tonight. My guard will be here if you consent.
”
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Charlaine Harris (Dead Ever After (Sookie Stackhouse, #13))
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What are your thoughts on the ethical implications of using cognitive dissonance as a tool for behavior change?” I blink, trying to gather my thoughts. “I think… it’s a double-edged sword. While it can be effective, it raises questions about manipulation and consent. We have to be careful about how we use it.
”
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Liah Wilder (The Teacher's Pet: A Spicy Forbidden Age Gap Teacher Student College Romance (College Classroom Confessions Book 1))