Constantine Quotes

I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.

All my life I'd been told what to believe about politics, coloreds, being a girl. But with Constantine's thumb pressed in my hand, I realized I actually had a choice in what I could believe.

Love art in yourself, and not yourself in art.

I listened wide-eyed, stupid. Glowing by her voice in the dim light. If chocolate was a sound, it would've been Constantine's voice singing. If singing was a color, it would've been the color of that chocolate.

I love the night passionately. I love it as I love my country, or my mistress, with an instinctive, deep, and unshakeable love. I love it with all my senses: I love to see it, I love to breathe it in, I love to open my ears to its silence, I love my whole body to be caressed by its blackness. Skylarks sing in the sunshine, the blue sky, the warm air, in the fresh morning light. The owl flies by night, a dark shadow passing through the darkness; he hoots his sinister, quivering hoot, as though he delights in the intoxicating black immensity of space.

In the language of an actor, to know is synonymous with to feel

When we are no longer children we are already dead

And if you can’t shape your life the way you want, at least try as much as you can not to degrade it...

Every person who is really an artist desires to create inside of himself another, deeper, more interesting life than the one that actually surrounds him.

I thought if only I had a keen, shapely bone structure to my face or could discuss politics shrewdly or was a famous writer Constantin might find me interesting enough to sleep with. And then I wondered if as soon as he came to like me he would sink into ordinariness, and if as soon as he came to love me I would find fault, the way I did with Buddy Willard and the boys before him.

The first time I was ever called ugly, I was thirteen. It was a rich friend of my brother Carlton's over to shoot guns in the field. 'Why you crying, girl?' Constantine asked me in the kitchen. I told her what the boy had called me, tears streaming down my face. 'Well? Is you?' I blinked, paused my crying. 'Is I what?' 'Now you look a here, Egenia'-because constantien was the only one who'd occasionally follow Mama's rule. 'Ugly live up on the inside. Ugly be a hurtful, mean person. Is you one a them peoples?' 'I don't know. I don't think so,' I sobbed. Constantine sat down next to me, at the kitchen table. I heard the cracking of her swollen joints. She pressed her thumb hard in the palm of my hand, somthing we both knew meant Listen. Listen to me. 'Ever morning, until you dead in the ground, you gone have to make this decision.' Constantine was so close, I could see the blackness of her gums. 'You gone have to ask yourself, Am I gone believe what them fools say about me today?' She kept her thumb pressed hard in my hand. I nodded that I understood. I was just smart enough to realize she meant white people. And even though I still felt miserable, and knew that I was, most likely, ugly, it was the first time she ever talked to me like I was something besides my mother's white child. All my life I'd been told what to believe about politics, coloreds, being a girl. But with Constantine's thumb pressed in my hand, I realized I actually had a choice in what I could believe.

And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not deceived you. Wise as you have become, with so much experience, you must already have understood what these Ithacas mean.

In the 300 years of the crucifixion of Christ to the conversion of Emperor Constantine, polytheistic Roman emperors initiated no more than four general persecutions of Christians. Local administrators and governors incited some anti-Christian violence of their own. Still, if we combine all the victims of all these persecutions, it turns out that in these three centuries the polytheistic Romans killed no more than a few thousand Christians. In contrast, over the course, of the next 1,500 years, Christians slaughtered Christians by the millions, to defend slightly different interpretations of the religion of love and compassion.

De aceea nu sîntem, în lume, decît ceea ce se întîmplă să fim. Un prieten, o dragoste,cărţile, luna de ieri-noapte, astea toate ne construiesc. Noi ne facem din propria noastră risipire. Fiecare om este dezordinea sa.

If you have a rifle, hanging on the wall in the first act, it should fire in the last act”.

اجعلني قطعة من الحجر يا مولاي ولكن لا تتركني للحياة

Vampire. Dangerous. Unknowable. Seriously creepy. This one's name was Constantine. We'd met before.

Vreau să trăiţi din plin, viu, agitat, nervos, liber aceşti ani neasemuiţi, aceşti ani în care visul şi fantezia nu ţin seama de niciun obstacol, în care orice bătaie a inimii se dăruie întregii lumi.

If chocolate was a sound, it would've been Constantine's voice singing. If singing was a color, it would've been the color of that chocolate.

You can kill the King without a sword, and you can light the fire without a match. What needs to burn is your imagination.

if they hadn’t both been pretending, but had had what is called a heart-to-heart talk, that is, simply told each other just what they were thinking and feeling, then they would just have looked into each other’s eyes, and Constantine would only have said: ‘You’re dying, dying, dying!’ – while Nicholas would simply have replied: ‘I know I’m dying, but I’m afraid, afraid, afraid!’ That’s all they would have said if they’d been talking straight from the heart. But it was impossible to live that way, so Levin tried to do what he’d been trying to do all his life without being able to, what a great many people could do so well, as he observed, and without which life was impossible: he tried to say something different from what he thought, and he always felt it came out false, that his brother caught him out and was irritated by it.

Oamenii te iartă dacă faci crime. Dar nu te iartă dacă ești fericit.

Work like a slave; command like a king; create like a god.

King Constantine IX of Regia had been killed three times and was bored with it. He wanted a bath.

Power is lost or won, never created or destroyed. Power is a visitor to, not a possession of, those it empowers. The mad tend to crave it, many of the sane crave it, but the wise worry about its long-term side effects. Power is crack cocaine for your ego and battery acid for your soul. Power’s comings and goings, from host to host, via war, marriage, ballot box, diktat, and accident of birth, are the plot of history. The empowered may serve justice, remodel the Earth, transform lush nations into smoking battlefields, and bring down skyscrapers, but power itself is amoral.” Immaculée Constantin now looks up at me. “Power will notice you. Power is watching you now. Carry on as you are, and power will favor you. But power will also laugh at you, mercilessly, as you lie dying in a private clinic, a few fleeting decades from now. Power mocks all its illustrious favorites as they lie dying. ‘Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay, might stop a hole to keep the wind away.

Επιθυμίες Σαν σώματα ωραία νεκρών που δεν εγέρασαν και τάκλεισαν, με δάκρυα, σε μαυσωλείο λαμπρό, με ρόδα στο κεφάλι και στα πόδια γιασεμιά -- έτσ' η επιθυμίες μοιάζουν που επέρασαν χωρίς να εκπληρωθούν· χωρίς ν' αξιωθεί καμιά της ηδονής μια νύχτα, ή ένα πρωϊ της φεγγερό." Desires "Like beautiful bodies of the dead who had not grown old and they shut them, with tears, in a brilliant mausoleum, with roses at the head and jasmine at the feet -- this is what desires resemble that have passed without fulfillment; without any of them having achieved a night of sensual delight, or a morning of brightness.

The theatre infects the audience with its noble ecstasy.

Preacher: "This is the word of God!" Constantine: "The edited word of God

إن الإنسان يستطيع السيطرة على كل الحيوانات المفترسة. غير أن حيوانا جديدا ظهر على سطح الأرض في الآونة الأخيرة. وهذا الحيوان الجديد اسمه : المواطنون. إنهم لا يعيشون في الغابات، ولا في الأدغال، بل في المكاتب. ومع ذلك فإنهم أشد قسوة وضراوة من الحيوانات المتوحشة في الأدغال. لقد ولدوا من اتحاد الرجل مع الآلات. إنهم نوع من أبناء السفاح، وهو أقوى الأصول والأجناس الموجودة على سطح الأرض.

انه ليس الأسف للبقاء بل انه الحنين إلى شيء نعتقد في صحته في خيالنا، شيء لن نمتلكه ابدا واذا بلغناه فاننا سرعان ما نجد انه لم يكن هو موضوع أحلامنا

Have Ithaka always in your mind. Your arrival there is what you are destined for. But don't in the least hurry the journey.

Fetch Constantine, or I’ll make boots out of your hide, bear. (Arcadian Sentinel) Don’t touch me, or I’ll mount your jewels to the wall over your head. (Aimee)

Some say the Tudors transcend this history, bloody and demonic as it is: that they descend from Brutus through the line of Constantine, son of St Helena, who was a Briton. Arthur, High King of Britain, was Constantine's grandson. He married up to three women, all called Guinevere, and his tomb is at Glastonbury, but you must understand that he is not really dead, only waiting his time to come again. His blessed descendant, Prince Arthur of England, was born in the year 1486, eldest son of Henry, the first Tudor king. This Arthur married Katharine the princess of Aragon, died at fifteen and was buried in Worcester Cathedral. If he were alive now, he would be King of England. His younger brother Henry would likely be Archbishop of Canterbury, and would not (at least, we devoutly hope not) be in pursuit of a woman of whom the cardinal hears nothing good: a woman to whom, several years before the dukes walk in to despoil him, he will need to turn his attention; whose history, before ruin seizes him, he will need to comprehend. Beneath every history, another history.

Constantine cursed the faujis again, and then he cursed Tom Cruise for having made that bloody Top Gun movie. Since then, an entire generation of faujis had grown up thinking they could be like him just by buying those cheap rip-off sunglasses for 200 rupees from Zainab Market.

We dwell in forever.

Did Constantine actually just say that? Hell would be freezing over if the Thunderhead weren't controlling its weather.

People should learn the names of things. They're more important when you know what they're called -- harder to forget. - Constantine

Constantine saw with his own eyes the trophy of a cross of light in the heavens, above the sun, and bearing this inscription: conquer by this. At the sight, he himself was struck with amazement and his whole army also.

Of course you aren't scared of me. I'm not the wolf. You are.

Today she felt especially comforted by the books that climbed the walls. They were a reminder that any knowledge she desired was hers for the asking.

Ugly live upon the inside. Ugly be a hurtful mean person...Ever morning, until you dead in the ground, you gone have to make this decision...You gone have to ask yourself, Am I gone believe what them fools say about me today?...With Constantine's thumb pressed in my hand, I realized I actually had a choice in what I could believe.

I kept thinking of her eyes, the depths of them, the way she looked right into me, and I wasn't afraid of what she'd find.

Without the quest, there can be no epiphany.

...الخلاص والسلام لن يهبطا إلا على الإنسان الذي ظلّ إنسانًا".

If I were a boy,” Thea told him with a Southern belle smile, “people would just call me driven.” “Thea.” Constantine frowned at her. “Right.” Thea dabbed at her lips with her napkin. “No feminism at the dinner table.

I could spank Constantine and skin him alive afterwards, that I could," she exclaimed bitterly. "Oh, Susan, I'm surprised at you," said the doctor, pulling a long face. "Have you no regard for the proprieties? Skin him alive by all means but omit the spanking.

How tall are you, Constantine?” I asked, unable to hide my tears. Constantine narrowed her eyes at me. “How tall is you?” “Five-eleven,” I cried. “I’m already taller than the boys’ basketball coach.” “Well, I’m five-thirteen, so quit feeling sorry for yourself.

In the circle of light on the state in the midst of darkness, you have the sensation of being entirely alone... This is called solitude in public... During a performance, before an audience of thousands, you can always enclose yourself in this circle, like a snail in its shell... You can carry it wherever you go.

هناك بعض الميتات التي لا تخلف وراءها جثثا

I have gazed so much on beauty that my eyes overflow with it.

Constantin Demiris had arranged with the authorities for her body to be buried on the grounds of the cemetery on Psara, his private island in the Aegean. Everyone had remarked on what a beautiful, sentimental gesture it was. In fact, Demiris had arranged for the burial plot to be there so that he could have the exquisite pleasure of walking over the bitch's grave.

Don’t mourn your luck that’s failing now, work gone wrong, your plans all proving deceptive — don’t mourn them uselessly. As one long prepared, and graced with courage, say goodbye to her, the Alexandria that is leaving. Above all, don’t fool yourself, don’t say it was a dream, your ears deceived you: don’t degrade yourself with empty hopes like these.

The Emperor Constantine the Great (272 - 337) and his Pauline bishops decided that all the Gospels that went against the politics of the emperor and the Hellenistic Christianity that was created by St Paul, were to be excluded from the New Testament. Proof of this can be found in the fact that the 27 books of The New Testament are but a very small fraction of the Christian literature that was produced in the first three centuries after Jesus lived. These documents are known as the Apocryphal Gospels (Greek, Apocrypha: ' hidden' or 'secret writings') and some of them retained quite a following and were highly respected in the communities of the earliest times...

It was a mark of Constantine's political genius and flexibility that he realized it was better to utilize a religion(Christianity) that already had a well-established structure of authority as a prop to the imperial regime rather than exclude it as a hindrance.

the touch of evil poisons by the idea of it. Reject the idea, and you've rejected the evil

فالأمل عشبة تنبت حتى بين القبور

To see far is one thing, going there is another.

Call reached out and grabbed Aaron’s hand. Aaron looked surprised for a second. Then his grip locked with Call’s. Call wanted to tell his best friend how sorry he was, how this was all his fault because he was Constantine Madden. But Aaron spoke before he got a chance. “At least we’re going to die together,” Aaron said. Then, unbelievably, he smiled at Call.

إن المجتمع الآلي يستطيع ابتداع رفاهيك، لكنه لا يستطيع خلق الفكر. وبدون الفكر لا توجد العبقرية. وإن مجتمعًا محرومًا من رجال عباقرة، مقضيٌّ عليه بالفناء. " ص٦٥

It's not regret for staying. It is nostalgia for something that we believe is true in our illusion, something we will never have. And if we touched it, we would soon realize that it was not what we dreamed of.

I have been writing now for over a week. I find it cleansing, refreshing; it is good for me.” (p.531)

They are imbeciles who call my work abstract. That which they call abstract is the most realistic, because what is real is not the exterior but the idea, the essence of things.

I do not know how to live in a world where everyone is right and everyone is wrong. Constantine was a good man, and he was also a fool who threw away the lives of his people. I have loved Mehmed with everything I am since I was a child, and I have longed to enter this city triumphant with him. But now that we are here, I cannot look at him without hearing the cries of the dying, without seeing the blood on my hands. Nazira and I—we ate and dreamed and walked and bled with these people. And now they are gone, and my people are here, but I do not know who I am anymore.

... إن الكلمات نفسها، والآراء نفسها التي تعتبر في الحياة العامة طبيعية، أو تدل على الذكاء المفرط، تصبح في مأوى المجانين دليلًا على الجنون المطبق...

That grin was pulling me into the deep end of the pool. The scary part, the part that made me search desperately for some other task I could lose myself in, was that there was a small, insistent voice urging me to dive right in.

Simplicity is not an objective in art, but one achieves simplicity despite one’s self by entering into the real sense of things.

غير أن آلام البشر لا يمكن أن تقاس بالكيلوغرامات والأطنان! أن الحياة لا يمكن أن توزن ان ذلك الذي يحاول وزنها يرتكب خطيئة قاتلة

If life is a battle, then my inner scars are medals for valor, for swiftness, for courage, for passion. Evil is the dark-haired brother of Good; they walk hand in hand—always.

And while I initially resisted, the thought of touching her, of her wanting me to touch her . . . Well, damn, I just wasn't strong enough to abstain from that.

Ce înfrângere să recunoşti că nimic din afară nu te mai interesează şi nimic dinnăuntru nu te mai însufleţeşte! E de necrezut să spunem cu atâta seninătate,cu atât de puţină sfială:mă plictisesc

Being a child is such a shining gift, yet we don't know how precious it is until it's worn out and gone away.

كان حتى عندما يجلس على كرسي يبدو جالساً على حقائبه. لم يكن يوماً مرتاحاً حيث كان، وكأن المدن التي يسكنها محطات ينتظر فيها قطاراً لا يدري متى يأتي.

Urmăresc cu interes, cînd se opresc două trenuri în staţie, cu ce aviditate se uită oamenii unii la alţii. E prea puţin să spui că vor să întîlnească o cunoştinţă. Nu, e un sentiment metafizic: vor să vadă pe celălalt. Fiecare se vede pe sine în celălalt. Şi rîde.

For the first time in my life, sitting there in the sound-proof heart of the UN building between Constantin who could play tennis as well as simultaneously interpret and the Russian girl who knew so many idioms, I felt dreadfully inadequate. The trouble was, I had been inadequate all along, I simply hadn't thought about it.

„Like‟ is a mild sort of word for what Con and I have,” Collin replied, leaning forward to touch noses with the big doofus. Constantine half-closed his eyes and twitched his whiskers back. “I‟d go with the deeply twisted interpersonal relationship that a hero has for his nemesis, sort of a Batman/Joker thing, if the Joker suddenly started going down on Batman like a porn-star on Viagra.” Jeff looked at him in alarm. “Jesus, Sparky, stop touching my cat!

I think love, both kinds of love, which you remember Plato defines in his "Symposium" - both kinds of love serve a touchstone for men. Some men understand only the one, some only the other. Those who understand only the non-platonic love need not speak of tragedy. For such love there can be no tragedy. "Thank you kindly for the pleasure, good bye," and that's the whole tragedy. And for the platonic love there can be no tragedy either, because there everything is clear and pure.

Constantine sat down next to me, at the kitchen table, I heard the cracking of her swollen joints. She pressed her thumb hard in the palm of my hand, something we both knew meant 'Listen to me.' "Every morning, until you dead in the ground, you gone have to make this decision." Constantine was so close, I could see the blackness of her gums. "You gone have to ask yourself, am I gone believe what them fools say about me today?" She kept her thumb pressed hard in my hand. I nodded that I understood. I was just smart enough to realize she meant white people. And even though I still felt miserable, and knew that I was, most likely, ugly, it was the first time she ever talked to me like I was something besides my mother's white child. All my life I'd been told what to believe about politics, coloreds, being a girl. But with Constantine's thumb pressed in my hand, I realized I actually had a choice in what I could believe.

Originally,” Langdon said, “Christianity honored the Jewish Sabbath of Saturday, but Constantine shifted it to coincide with the pagan’s veneration day of the sun.” He paused, grinning. “To this day, most churchgoers attend services on Sunday morning with no idea that they are there on account of the pagan sun god’s weekly tribute—Sunday.

From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, [...] and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attilla and a pack of other lovers with queer names [...] I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest...

Theories are patterns without value. What counts is action.

În fiecare din noi stă un Adam care așteaptă să fie iarăși singur.

Facem confesiuni pe care nimeni nu ni le cere. Te trezeşti mărturisind lucururi atât de crude, încât celălalt face semne, aprobă, doar ai să închei tu; dar tu, necruţător, continui. Vrei să spui totul. Exact ca în scenele mari ale lui Dostoievski.

There is a point when facing the unknown stops being a longed-for adventure and becomes a terrifying reality.

Are you saying that he deserves to die?' I asked, chilled. 'We all deserve to die,' he answered.

Singurătatea absolută? O concep cîteodată aşa: în tren, pe un culoar ticsit, stînd pe geamantan. Eşti atunci departe nu numai de orice om, mai ales de cei care te împiedică să te mişti; dar eşti departe şi de orice punct fix în spaţiu. Eşti undeva, între o staţie şi alta, rupt de ceva, în drum spre altceva, scos din timp, scos din rost, purtat de tren, purtînd după tine un alt tren, cu oameni, situaţii, mărfuri, idei, una peste alta, în vagoane pe care le laşi în staţii, le pierzi între staţii, le uiţi în spaţii, golind lumea, gonind peste lume, singur, mai singur, nicăieri de singur. îmi plac curbele căilor ferate. Sînt îndeajuns de plecate pentru ca un tren în viteză să nu cadă în afară, dar şi îndeajuns de puţin plecate pentru ca un tren fără viteză să nu cadă înăuntru. Coexistenţa contrariilor.

I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig-tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and off-beat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn’t quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig-tree, starving to death, just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose.

I was a terrible dancer. I couldn't carry a tune. I had no sense of balance, and when we had to walk down a narrow board with our hands out and a book on our heads in gym class I always fell over. I couldn't ride a horse or ski, the two things I wanted to do most, because they cost too much money. I couldn't speak German or read Hebrew or write Chinese. I didn't even know where most of the old out-of-the-way countries the UN men in front of me represented fitted in on the map. For the first time in my life, sitting there in the soundproof heart of the UN building between Constantin who could play tennis as well as simultaneously interpret and the Russian girl who knew so many idioms, I felt dreadfully inadequate. The trouble was, I had been inadequate all along, I simply hadn't thought about it.

From this we conclude, that, to live in harmony and peace…we must trace a line of distinction between those (assertions) that are capable of verification, and those that are not; (we must) separate by an inviolable barrier the world of fantastical beings from the world of realities.

The unveiled Algerian woman, who assumed an increasingly important place in revolutionary action, developed her personality, discovered the exalting realm of responsibility. The freedom of the Algerian people from then on became identified with woman's liberation, with her entry into history. This woman who, in the avenues of Algier or of Constantine, would carry the grenades or the submachine-gun chargers, this woman who tomorrow would be outraged, violated, tortured, could not put herself back into her former state of mind and relive her behaviour of the past; this woman who was writing the heroic pages of Algerian history was, in so doing, bursting the bounds of the narrow in which she had lived without responsibility, and was at the same time participating in the destruction of colonialism and in the birth of a new woman.

I tried to imagine what it would be like if Constantin were my husband. It would mean getting up at seven and cooking him eggs and bacon and toast and coffee and dawdling about in my nightgown and curlers after he'd left for work to wash up the dirty plates and make the bed, and then when he came home after a lively, fascinating day he'd expect a big dinner, and I'd spend the evening washing up even more dirty plates till I fell into bed, utterly exhausted. This seemed a dreary and wasted life for a girl with fifteen years of straight A's, but I knew that's what marriage was like, because cook and clean and wash was just what Buddy Willard's mother did from morning till night, and she was the wife of a university professor and had been a private school teacher herself.

As one long prepared, and graced with courage, as is right for you who were given this kind of city, go firmly to the window and listen with deep emotion, but not with the whining, the pleas of a coward; listen—your final delectation—to the voices, to the exquisite music of that strange procession, and say goodbye to her, to the Alexandria you are losing.

Poirot's eyes opened. "That is great ferocity," he said. "It is a woman," said the chef de train, speaking for the first time. "Depend upon it, it was a woman. Only a woman would stab like that." Dr. Constantine screwed up his face thoughtfully. "She must have been a very strong woman," he said. "It is not my desire to speak technically-that is only confusing; but I can assure you that two of the blows were delivered with such forces as to drive them through hard belts of bone and muscle." "It was clearly not a scientific crime," said Poirot. "It was most unscientific," returned Dr. Constantine. "The blows seem to have been delivered haphazard and at random. Some have glanced off, doing hardly any damage. It is as though somebody had shut his eyes and then in a frenzy struck blindly again and again." "C'est une femme," said the chef de train again. "Women are like that. When they are enraged they have great strength." He nodded so sagely that everyone suspected a personal experience of his own.

There is no New Testament basis for a linking of church and state until Christ, the King returns. The whole "Constantine mentality" from the fourth century up to our day was a mistake. Constantine, as the Roman Emperor, in 313 ended the persecution of Christians. Unfortunately, the support he gave to the church led by 381 to the enforcing of Christianity, by Theodosius I, as the official state religion. Making Christianity the official state religion opened the way for confusion up till our own day. There have been times of very good government when this interrelationship of church and state has been present. But through the centuries it has caused great confusion between loyalty to the state and loyalty to Christ, between patriotism and being a Christian. We must not confuse the Kingdom of God with our country. To say it another way: "We should not wrap our Christianity in our national flag.

Ce stupid: stai în cancelarie zece minute, îţi compui o mască, intri în sala de curs, ţii prelegerea şi te întorci. Aşa se prăpădesc adevărurile: cînd nu se mai rostesc la întîmplare. Ce fac profesorii aceştia? Vehiculează idei. Huxley descria odată civilizaţia prin vaporul acela cu cartofi, care se încarcă într-o parte a globului spre a fi descărcat într-alta. Aşa e şi cultura: iei de aci şi descarci dincolo. E foarte folositor, fireşte. Dar e ce este civilizaţie în cultură. Singura şcoală valabilă, singura şcoală creatoare de cultură e aceea în care profesorul însuşi trece examene.

In The Bloudy Tenent, Williams points out that Constantine "did more to hurt Christ Jesus than the raging fury of the most bloody Neroes." at least under the Christian persecutor Nero, who was rumored to have had the Apostle Paul beheaded and Saint Peter crucified upside down, Christianity was a pure (if hazardous) way of life. But when Constantine himself converted to Christianity, that's when the Church was corrupted and perverted by the state. Williams explains that under Constantine, "the gardens of Christ's churches turned into the wildernesss of national religion, and the world (under Constantine's dominion) to the most unchristian Christendom." Legalizing, legitimizing the Church turned Christianity into just another branch of government enforced by "the sword of civil power," i.e., through state-sponsored violence.

Libertatea de a fi absurd stă la originea filozofiei. Şi poate că măsura, înţelepciunea, „mioriticul" — în sens nefilozofic — ne-au împiedicat pe noi, românii, să avem o filozofie mare. Oamenii aceştia de pe la noi sunt înţelepţi în materie de gîndire — unde trebuie ceva sminteală — şi sunt smintiţi în viaţă. Cuminţenia lor, pe care o mai numesc şi românească, asta e. Resemnare, seninătate, împăcare, în filozofie. Şi dincolo? Haos.

Într-o aşa serioasă măsură mi se pare de negîndită viaţa, încît dacă m-aş gîndi efectiv ce să răspund la o întrebare uzuală ca: "ce mai faci?" aş constata că întrebarea aceasta e printre cele mai grele cu putinţă. Căci „fac“ o mie de lucruri: aş putea să spun că gîndesc, că sînt bine, că gîndesc ceva, că gîndesc altceva, că am fost pe stradă, că nu fac nimic. Ce să spun? Care e lucrul pe care trebuie să-l spun celui care mă întreabă? Şi nu numai atît. Care e lucrul pe care trebuie să i-l spun lui, acum? Şi mai mult: ce trebuie să-i spun lui,acum, despre mine?Aşadar ar trebui să respect mai multe serii de adevăruri: a) adevărul lucrului, să aleg, adică, un lucru dintre cele o mie pe care le-am făcut realmente; b) să aleg adevărat pentru cel care mă întreabă, adică să aleg unul dintre lucrurile acelea care privesc raporturile mele cu el; c) să aleg un lucru adevărat pentru clipa de faţă, pentru ceea ce se întîmplă acum între el şi mine; d) să fie totuşi un lucru al meu.Şi credeţi că astea sînt singurele adevăruri de respectat? Atunci ce să-i răspund? Mă cuprinde o panică, panica mea formală…

- يا سيد ستين ، قل لي بكل خلاص : هل تعتقد انني تزوجت زواجاً عاطفياً ام زواجاً مصلحياً ؟ أرجو أن لا تراعي عواطفي في جوابك سألها ستين : - ماذا تعتقدين أنتِ؟ أجابت : لست أدري ...، هناك فترات يخيّل إليّ انني تصرفت بوحي عواطفي ، و حالات اخرى اعتقد انني كنت مدفوعة بالسببين معاً . غير إن هذين التفسيرين لا يمتازان بأية قيمة حقيقية - انه لا هذا و لا ذاك. - انني لم اتزوج اذن زواجاً مصلحياً .... - كلا يا سيدة ويست ..... - اذن لقد تزوجتُ بدافع الحب ؟ - لكي يحب الانسان ، ينبغي ان يستطيع الايمان بالمستقبل ، الايمان بالسعادة بل اكثر من ذلك ، ينبغي الايمان بإن هذه السعادة ابدية و انها لا يمكن ان تمنح لنا الا من قبل من نحبه و يحبنا ....... و لهذا السبب اعذريني اذا قلت انك لست متزوجة بسبب اي من هذين الدافعين - إذن ؟ - فأجابها ستين - إنك لم تتزوجي بسبب الحب و لا بدافع المصلحة بل بدافع الخوف ، ان سرعة تصرفاتك الخارقة تحمل طابع اليأس . - أليس للحب مكان في حساباتي - لعل ثمة شيء منه في الموضوع ، لكن غرامك يشبه ذلك الذي كانت النساء تشعرن به عندما يكن في الغابات عرضة في كل لحظة من لحظات الليل او النهار لتهديد الوحوش الضارية فكن لهذا السبب يتعلقن برجل طالبات الحماية و الحب و الحياة ..... انهن يشعرن هذا الشعور كلما بدا العالم على وشك الانهيار !

His warm fingers slid along my cheek, then wrapped into my hair. He leaned down to rest his forehead against mine and closed his eyes. “The ribbon. I lied.” “What? We aren't engaged?” I asked, smiling shakily, curling my fingers into his shirt. “I have to show up to family dinners as your weird second cousin?” He opened his eyes and looked into mine. “It doesn't mean family. Not like that. Not to me.” And his emotional connection opened cleanly, without the muddle he usually hid his true feelings within. And it was love, clear and without artifice, shining there. I stared at him, breath caught in my chest. “You—” His emotions were wrapping around me, free and clear and relieved. Like honey and copper—sweet, tangy, and charged—gentle, consuming, warm, passionate, and resolute. “No tricks. No games. No expectations. No lies—not to you, not ever again.” Stunned, I watched him pull away. He looked at peace for the first time in weeks. Months. Then he looked down at our connection threads and I wondered what on earth he’d see. He looked up, and a smile, brilliant and all-consuming split his face. He backed up slowly. “Interesting. See you soon, darling.” He winked, turned, and flipped over the edge of the seal and through the vortex.

What do you learn at school, then?" "We learn about the Prophet and his three hundred authenticated miracles,and about Abraham and Isaac and Jonah and Omar and Ali and Hind and Fatima and the saints, and sometimes the big battles of Saladin against the barbarians. And we recite the Holy Koran because we have to learn al-Fatihah by heart." "What's that?" "It's the beginning." "What's it like?" Karatavuk closed his eyes and recited:'Bismillah al-rahman al-rahim...' When he's finished he opened his eyes, and mopped his forehead. "It's difficult" he observed. "I didn't understand any of it" complained Mehmetcik. " It sounds nice though. was it language?" "Of course it was language, stupid. It's Arabic." "What's that then?" "It's what Arabs speak. And it's what God speaks, and that's why we have to learn to recite it. It's something about being merciful and the Day of Judgement and showing us the right path, and if anything is going wrong, or you're worried, or someone's sick, you just have to say al-Fatihah and everything will probably be all right." "I didn't know that God spoke language." observed Mehmetcik. Father Kristoforos speaks to him in Greek, but we don't understand that either." "What do you learn, then." "We learn more than you," answered Mehmetcik self-importantly. "We learn about Jesus Son of Mary and his miracles and St Nicholas and St Dmitri and St Menas and the saints and Abraham and Isaac and Jonah and Emperor Constantine and Alexander the Great and the Marble Emperor, and the great battles against barbarians, and the War of Independence, and we learn reading and writing and adding up and taking away and multiplication and division." "Don't you learn al-Fatihah,then?" "When things go wrong we say 'Kyrie elesion'. and we've got a proper prayer as well." "What's that like?" Mehmetcik screwed up his eyes in unconcious imitation of his friend, and recited: 'Pater imon, o en tois ouranis, agiasthito to onoma sou, eltheto i vasileia sou..' When Mehmetcik has finished, Karatavuk asked, "What's that about, then? is that some kind of language?" "It's Greek. It's what we speak to God.I don't know exactly what it means, it's something about our father who is in heaven and forgive us our daily bread, and led us not into temptation, but it doesn't matter if we don't understand it, because God does" "Maybe," pondered Karatavuk, " Greek and Arabic are actually the same language, and that's how God understands us, like sometimes I'm Abdul and sometimes I'm Karatavuk, and sometimes you're Nico and sometimes you're Mehmetcik, but it's two names and there's only one me and there's only one you, so it might be all one language that's called Greek sometimes and Arabic sometimes.