Divine Visitation Quotes

Strange is our situation here on Earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose. From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that man is here for the sake of other men - above all for those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness depends.

Strange is our situation here upon earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to a divine purpose. From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: That we are here for the sake of other men —above all for those upon whose smile and well-being our own happiness depends, for the countless unknown souls with whose fate we are connected by a bond of sympathy. Many times a day, I realize how much my outer and inner life is built upon the labors of people, both living and dead, and how earnestly I must exert myself in order to give in return as much as I have received and am still receiving.

Though I have always made it my practice to be pleasant to everybody, I have not once actually experienced friendship. I have only the most painful recollections of my various acquaintances with the exception of such companions in pleasure as Horiki. I have frantically played the clown in order to disentangle myself from these painful relationships, only to wear myself out as a result. Even now it comes as a shock if by chance I notice in the street a face resembling someone I know however slightly, and I am at once seized by a shivering violent enough to make me dizzy. I know that I am liked by other people, but I seem to be deficient in the faculty to love others. (I should add that I have very strong doubts as to whether even human beings really possess this faculty.) It was hardly to be expected that someone like myself could ever develop any close friends—besides, I lacked even the ability to pay visits. The front door of another person’s house terrified me more than the gate of Inferno in the Divine Comedy, and I am not exaggerating when I say that I really felt I could detect within the door the presence of a horrible dragon-like monster writhing there with a dank, raw smell.

There she was, the mother of me, like a lit plinth, Heavenly, though I was reared to find this kind Of visitation impractical; she was an unbearable detail Of the supreme celestial map, Of which I had been taught that there was No such thing.

I do not just want you at your best. I almost do not care where your Happiness lives, but please, let me visit your pain? Take me to the place where your sadness goes, and show me the tragedy that no one knows.

I tell you, you Heaven's Holy Baal, you don't exist; but that, if you did, I would curse you so that your Heaven would quiver with the fire of hell! I tell you, I have offered you my service, and you repulsed me; and I turn my back on you for all eternity, because you did not know your time of visitation! I tell you that I am about to die, and yet I mock you! You Heaven God and Apis! with death staring me in the face - I tell you, I would rather be a bondsman in hell than a freedman in your mansions! I tell you, I am filled with a blissful contempt for your divine paltriness; and I choose the abyss of destruction for a perpetual resort, where the devils Judas and Pharaoh are cast down!

HAIL THE VISITATION OF THE GOD OF QUESTIONABLE MOTIVATIONS!” Dominic raised his eyebrows. “Is that my divinity this week?

Strange is our situation here on earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose.

Moyers: Then what does love have to do with morality? Campbell: Violates it....Insofar as love expresses itself, it is not expressing itself in terms of the socially approved manners of life. That's why it is all so secret. Love has nothing to do with social order. It is a higher spiritual experience than that of socially organized marriage....Love was a divine visitation, and that's why it was superior to marriage.

And how nobly it raises our conceit of the mighty, misty monster, to behold him solemnly sailing through a calm tropical sea; his vast, mild head overhung by a canopy of vapor, engendered by his incommunicable contemplations, and that vapor- as you will sometimes see it- glorified by a rainbow, as if Heaven itself had put its seal upon his thoughts. For d'ye see, rainbows do not visit the clear air; they only irradiate vapor. And so, through all the thick mists of the dim doubts in my mind, divine intuitions now and then shoot, enkindling my fog with a heavenly ray. And for this I thank God; for all have doubts; many deny; but doubts or denials, few along with them, have intuitions. Doubts of all things earthly, and intuitions of some things heavenly; this combination makes neither believer nor infidel, but makes a man who regards them both with equal eye.

The humble, simple souls, who are little enough to see the bigness of God in the littleness of a Babe, are therefore the only ones who will ever understand the reason of His visitation. He came to this poor earth of ours to carry on an exchange; to say to us, as only the Good God could say: ‘you give me your humanity, and I will give you my Divinity; you give me your time, and I will give you My eternity; you give me your broken heart, and I will give you Love; you give me your nothingness, and I will give you My all.

The love that I believe in is something that goes beyond the physical aspects of this world. The love that I believe is one that extends its energy and power through the beautiful souls that I encounter along the way, a love that can be seen in the eyes of a little dog or in the confusion of a cute lost cat who wants to be worshiped like a Goddess. This kind of love goes through a divine crafting of a person's inner self, through personal experience and thousands of years of tears and strength, that can only be seen in the familiar eyes of old souls, the eyes that recognize each other even after long times of separation, the eyes that find themselves familiar with places they have probably been to before, but that nevertheless bring great memories with every visit. This kind of love sees hope in the eyes of new-born children that know way much more than they are capable of putting into words and that bring with their innocence a smile on each person's face who'd wish they could start again. The love that I see when I look at you is a love which has roots deep inside each of us, but that needs care and light to grow and unfold its branches so that they can reach outside of ourselves and even further beyond the skies.

When the Eternal bows the skies To visit earthly things, With scorn divine he turns his eyes From towers of haughty kings. He bids his awful chariot roll Far downward from the skies, To visit every humble soul, With pleasure in his eyes.

Sometime I wonder if men and women really suit each other. Perhaps they should live next door and just visit now and then.” -Katherine Hepburn

But though to visit the sins of the fathers upon the children may be a morality good enough for divinities, it is scorned by the average human nature; and it therefore does not mend the matter.

Here’s to the misfits and foolish ones who think differently. They’re not fond of simplicity. They live unconventionally existing at a different level of intensity. They add elasticity and flexibility to what’s inflexibly rigid, bringing warmth to the frigid systems of existence. You can hate them acidicly, discredit their credibility or even oppose them ritualistically. Look down on them cynically, say they became great accidentally, rain on them torrentially or see brilliance academically. You can look and see density or see a lovely symphony. About the only thing you can’t do is disqualify their eligibility. Because they change history. Everything in existence moves them restlessly on to destiny backed by infinity. Their spirit is immensity, they overcome resiliently and follow their hearts existentially. Though they may be misunderstood until the next century, we see their opponents’ adrenaline as only minimally convincing, simply for a time because in them there’s a tendency for the divine to visit earth coincidentally. And while others may see misfits and foolishness we see wisdom and genius because the ones crazy enough to think they can live and love limitlessly are the ones who actually do.

And where does he now exist? is this gentle and lovely being lost for ever? Has this mind, so replete with ideas, imaginations fanciful and magnificent, which formed a world, whose existence depended on the life of its creator - has the mind perished? Does it now only exist in my memory? No, it is not thus; your form so divinely wrought, and beaming with beauty, has decayed, but your spirit still visits and consoles your unhappy friend.

God language can tie people into knots, of course. In part, that is because ‘God’ is not God's name. Referring to the highest power we can imagine, ‘God’ is our name for that which is greater than all and yet present in each. For some the highest imaginable power will be a petty and angry tribal baron ensconced high above the clouds on a golden throne, visiting punishment on all who don't believe in him. But for others, the highest power is love, goodness, justice, or the spirit of life itself. Each of us projects our limited experience on a cosmic screen in letters as big as our minds can fashion. For those whose vision is constricted (illiberal, narrow-minded people), this can have horrific consequences. But others respond to the munificence of creation with broad imagination and sympathy. Answering to the highest and best within and beyond themselves, they draw lessons and fathom meaning so redemptive that surely it touches the divine.

You see, the glamour girl standing before you was not the dame I first laid eyes on in Penn Station. In fact, at first I thought she was the charwoman. Don’t you remember how frightful you looked that night, Honey Pie?” Sam patted Evie’s hand. Her strained smile pleased him. “She was sooty and grimy. Had on her mother’s dress and those thick woolen stockings that grandmas and war orphans wear. And one of her teeth was missing. Ghastly. But I was smitten.” “Oh, Daddy, you might need a visit to the dentist soon yourself.” Evie laughed and tightened her grip on Sam’s hand.

Strange is our situation here on Earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose. From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that man is here for the sake of other men—above all for those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness depends. —ALBERT EINSTEIN

What is important is that you get your house in order at each stage of the journey so that you can proceed. “If some day it be given to you to pass into the inner temple, you must leave no enemies behind.”—de Lubicz For example, if you never got on well with one of your parents and you have left that parent behind on your journey in such a way that the thought of that parent arouses anger or frustration or self-pity or any emotion . . . you are still attached. You are still stuck. And you must get that relationship straight before you can finish your work. And what, specifically, does “getting it straight” mean? Well, it means re-perceiving that parent, or whoever it may be, with total compassion . . . seeing him as a being of the spirit, just like you, who happens to be your parent . . . and who happens to have this or that characteristic, and who happens to be at a certain stage of his evolutionary journey. You must see that all beings are just beings . . . and that all the wrappings of personality and role and body are the coverings. Your attachments are only to the coverings, and as long as you are attached to someone else’s covering you are stuck, and you keep them stuck, in that attachment. Only when you can see the essence, can see God, in each human being do you free yourself and those about you. It’s hard work when you have spent years building a fixed model of who someone else is to abandon it, but until that model is superceded by a compassionate model, you are still stuck. In India they say that in order to proceed with one’s work one needs one’s parents’ blessings. Even if the parent has died, you must in your heart and mind, re-perceive that relationship until it becomes, like every one of your current relationships, one of light. If the person is still alive you may, when you have proceeded far enough, revisit and bring the relationship into the present. For, if you can keep the visit totally in the present, you will be free and finished. The parent may or may not be . . . but that is his karmic predicament. And if you have been truly in the present, and if you find a place in which you can share even a brief eternal moment . . . this is all it takes to get the blessing of your parent! It obviously doesn’t demand that the parent say, “I bless you.” Rather it means that he hears you as a fellow being, and honors the divine spark within you. And even a moment in the Here and Now . . . a single second shared in the eternal present . . . in love . . . is all that is required to free you both, if you are ready to be freed. From then on, it’s your own individual karma that determines how long you can maintain that high moment.

Do you want to know something from the beyond? Do you want to chat with divine beings face to face? It is indispensable to enter into the region of the dead at will, to visit the celestial regions, to know other worlds of the infinite space. Outside of the physical body, one can give to himself the luxury of invoking beloved relatives who already passed through the doors of death. They will concur to our call, then we can personally chat with them... When out of the physical body, we can acquire complete knowledge about the mysteries of death and life. Out of the physical body, we can invoke the angels in order to talk personally with them face to face.

Strange is our situation here on earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to a divine purpose. From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that we are here for the sake of others.    —ALBERT EINSTEIN I

It was uphill work for a foreigner, lame or sound, to make his way with the Bleeding Hearts. In the first place, they were vaguely persuaded that every foreigner had a knife about him; in the second, they held it to be a sound constitutional national axiom that he ought to go home to his own country. They never thought of inquiring how many of their own countrymen would be returned upon their hands from divers parts of the world, if the principle were generally recognised; they considered it particularly and peculiarly British. In the third place, they had a notion that it was a sort of Divine visitation upon a foreigner that he was not an Englishman, and that all kinds of calamities happened to his country because it did things that England did not, and did not do things that England did. In this belief, to be sure, they had long been carefully trained by the Barnacles and Stiltstalkings, who were always proclaiming to them, officially, that no country which failed to submit itself to those two large families could possibly hope to be under the protection of Providence; and who, when they believed it, disparaged them in private as the most prejudiced people under the sun.

I have seen," he said, "the most beautiful scenes of my own country; I have visited the lakes of Lucerne and Uri, where the snowy mountains descend almost perpendicularly to the water, casting black and impenetrable shades, which would cause a gloomy and mournful appearance, were it not for the most verdant islands that relieve the eye by their gay appearance; I have seen this lake agitated by a tempest, when the wind tore up whirlwinds of water, and gave you an idea of what the waterspout must be on the great ocean; and the waves dash with fury the base of the mountain, where the priest and his mistress were overwhelmed by an avalanche, and where their dying voices are still said to be heard amid the pauses of the nightly wind; I have seen the mountains of La Valais, and the Pays de Vaud: but this country, Victor, pleases me more than all those wonders. The mountains of Switzerland are more majestic and strange; but there is a charm in the banks of this divine river, that I never before saw equalled. Look at that castle which overhangs yon precipice; and that also on the island, almost concealed amongst the foliage of those lovely trees; and now that group of labourers coming from among their vines; and that village half hid in the recess of the mountain. Oh, surely, the spirit that inhabits and guards this place has a soul more in harmony with man than those who pile the glacier, or retire to the inaccessible peaks of the mountains of our own country. "Clerval! beloved friend! even now it delights me to record your words, and to dwell on the praise of which you are so eminently deserving. He was a being formed in the "very poetry of nature." His wild and enthusiastic imagination was chastened by the sensibility of his heart.

A thousand church visits won't make you holy, if you remain indifferent to the agonies of the people.

Strange is our situation here on Earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose.

In every human act of charity, something larger, greater, divine has come down to visit the act.

How does life treat me? Life is the "I" or divine Ego, and the "ME" is the corporeal part. We are all visitors, I treat it well and it does the same to me.

When we really let our minds rest contemplatively on a rose in bud, on a child at play, on a divine mystery, we are rested and quickened as though by a dreamless sleep. Or as the Book of Job says, “God giveth songs in the night” (Job 35:10). Moreover, it has always been a pious belief that God sends his good gifts and his blessings in sleep. And in the same way his great, imperishable intuitions visit a man in his moments of leisure. It is in these silent and receptive moments that the soul of man is sometimes visited by an awareness of what holds the world together:

[The Christian story] amounts to a refusal to affirm life. In the biblical tradition we have inherited, life is corrupt, and every natural impulse is sinful unless it has been circumcised or baptized. The serpent was the one who brought sin into the wold. And the woman was the one who handed the apple to man. This identification of the woman with sin, of the serpent with sin, and thus of life with sin, is the twist the has been given to the whole story in the biblical myth and doctrine of the Fall.... I don't know of it [the idea of woman as sinner...in other mythologies] elsewhere. The closest thing to it would be perhaps Pandora with Pandora's box, but that's not sin, that's just trouble. The idea in the biblical tradition of the all is that nature as we know it is corrupt, sex in itself is corrupt, and the female as the epitome of sex is a corrupter. Why was the knowledge of good and evil forbidden to Adam and Eve? Without that knowledge, we'd all be a bunch of babies still Eden, without any participation in life. Woman brings life into the world. Eve is the mother o this temporal wold. Formerly you had a dreamtime paradise there in the Garden of Eden – no time, no birth, no death – no life. The serpent, who dies and is resurrected, shedding its skin and renewing its life, is the lord of the central tree, where time and eternity come together. He is the primary god, actually, in the Garden of Eden. Yahweh, the one who walks there in the cool of the evening, is just a visitor. The Garden is the serpent's place. It is an old, old story. We have Sumerian seals from as early as 3500 B.C. showing the serpent and the tree and the goddess, with the goddess giving the fruit of life to a visiting male. The old mythology of he goddess is right there.... There is actually a historical explanation [of the change of this image of the serpent and the snake in Genesis] based on the coming of the Hebrews into Canaan. The principal divinity of the people of Canaan was the Goddess and associated with the Goddess is the serpent. This is the symbol of the mystery of life. The male-god-oriented groups rejected it. In other words, there is a historical rejection of the Mother Goddess implied in the story of the Garden of Eden. Moyers: It does seem that this story has done women a great disservice by casting Eve as responsible for the Fall. Why...? Campbell: They represent life. Man doesn't enter life except by woman, and so it is woman who brings us into this wold of pairs of opposites and suffering.... Male and female is one opposition. Another opposition is the human and God. Good and evil is a third opposition. The primary oppositions are the sexual and that between human beings and God. Then comes the idea of good and evil in the world. And so Adm and Eve have thrown themselves out of the Garden of Timeless Unity, you might say, just by that act of recognizing duality. To move out into the world, you have to act in terms of pairs of opposites.

Three years ago he was visited by a Cambridge scholar to whom he uttered sentiments so noble, so Christ-like that we repeat them as our closing words - 'We desire but the good of the world and the happiness of the nations - that all nations should become one in faith and all men as brothers; that all bonds of affection and unity between the sons of men should be strengthened; that diversity of religion should cease and differences of race be annulled - and so shall it be; these fruitless strifes, these ruinous wars shall pass away and the most great peace shall come. Is not this that which Christ foretold? Let not a man glory in this, that he loves his country; let him rather glory in this, that he loves his kind.

There is no true poetry without conscious craft, absorbed attention, absolute concentration. There is no true poetry without unconscious invention. The reader, too, enters into the relationship between the controlled and the uncontrollable aspects of the art. Shelley says that 'Poetry redeems from decay the visitations of the divinity in man.' The poem is a genie that comes out of the bottle to liberate the reader's imagination, the divinity within. The writer and the reader make meaning together. The poet who calls on help from the heavenly muse also does so on behalf of the imaginative reader.

Religionists from pulpits and evangelical TV stations announced that this [AIDS] was all God’s punishment for the perverted vice of homosexuality, quite failing to explain why this vengeful deity had no interest in visiting plagues and agonized death upon child rapists, torturers, murderers, those who beat up old women for their pension money (or indeed those cheating, thieving, adulterous and hypocritical clerics and preachers who pop up on the news from time to time weeping their repentance), reserving this uniquely foul pestilence only for men who choose to go to bed with each other and addicts careless in the use of their syringes. What a strange divinity. Later he was to take his pleasure, as he still does, on horrifying numbers of women and very young girls raped in sub-Saharan Africa while transmitting his avenging wrath on the unborn children in their wombs. I should be interested to hear from the religious zealots why he is doing this and what kind of a kick he gets out of it.

And now without redemption all mankind Must have been lost, adjudged to death and hell By doom severe, had not the Son of God, In whom the fullness dwells of love divine, His dearest mediation thus renewed. 'Father, Thy word is passed, man shall find grace; And shall grace not find means, that finds her way, The speediest of Thy winged messengers, To visit all Thy creatures, and to all Comes unprevented, unimplored, unsought, Happy for man, so coming; he her aid Can never seek, once dead in sins and lost; Atonement for himself or offering meet, Indebted and undone, hath none to bring: Behold Me then, Me for him, life for life I offer, on Me let Thine anger fall; Account Me man; I for his sake will leave Thy bosom, and this glory next to Thee Freely put off, and for him lastly die Well pleased, on Me let death wreak all his rage; Under his gloomy power I shall not long Lie vanquished; Thou hast given Me to possess Life in Myself forever, by Thee I live, Though now to death I yield, and am his due All that of Me can die, yet that debt paid, Thou wilt not leave Me in the loathsome grave His prey, nor suffer My unspotted soul Forever with corruption there to dwell; But I shall rise victorious, and subdue My vanquisher, spoiled of his vaunted spoil; Death his death's wound shall then receive, and stoop Inglorious, of his mortal sting disarmed.

Pilgrimage was a centrally important part of Christian life in the early twelfth century, and had been for nearly one thousand years. People traveled incredible distances to visit saints' shrines and the sites of famous Christian deeds. did it for the good of their souls: sometimes to seek divine relief from illness, sometimes as penance to atone for their sins. Some thought that praying at a certain shrine would ensure the protection of that saint in their passage through the afterlife. All believed that God looked kindly on pilgrims and that a man or woman who ventured humbly and faithfully to the center of the world would improve his or her standing in the eyes of God.

At the age of twenty-nine Gautama slipped away from his palace in the middle of the night, leaving behind his family and possessions. He travelled as a homeless vagabond throughout northern India, searching for a way out of suffering. He visited ashrams and sat at the feet of gurus but nothing liberated him entirely – some dissatisfaction always remained. He did not despair. He resolved to investigate suffering on his own until he found a method for complete liberation. He spent six years meditating on the essence, causes and cures for human anguish. In the end he came to the realisation that suffering is not caused by ill fortune, by social injustice, or by divine whims. Rather, suffering is caused by the behaviour patterns of one’s own mind. Gautama’s insight was that no matter what the mind experiences, it usually reacts with craving, and craving always involves dissatisfaction. When the mind experiences something distasteful it craves to be rid of the irritation. When the mind experiences something pleasant, it craves that the pleasure will remain and will intensify. Therefore, the mind is always dissatisfied and restless. This is very clear when we experience unpleasant things, such as pain. As long as the pain continues, we are dissatisfied and do all we can to avoid it. Yet even when we experience pleasant things we are never content. We either fear that the pleasure might disappear, or we hope that it will intensify. People dream for years about finding love but are rarely satisfied when they find it. Some become anxious that their partner will leave; others feel that they have settled cheaply, and could have found someone better. And we all know people who manage to do both.

Strange is our situation here on Earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose. From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that man is here for the sake of other men – above all for those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness depends. ALBERT EINSTEIN

Strange is our situation here on Earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose. From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that man is here for the sake of other men – above all for those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness depends. –ALBERT EINSTEIN

The chief care of the legislators [in the colonies of New England] was the maintenance of orderly conduct and good morals in the community: thus they constantly invaded the domain of conscience, and there was scarcely a sin which was no subject to magisterial censure. The reader is aware of the rigor with which these laws punished rape and adultery; intercourse between unmarried persons was likewise severely repressed. The judge was empowered to inflict either a pecuniary penalty, a whipping, or marriage, on the misdemeanants; and if the records of the old courts of New Haven may be believed, prosecutions of this kind were not unfrequent. We find a sentence, bearing date the 1st of May, 1660, inflicting a fine and reprimand on a young woman who was accused of using improper language, and of allowing herself to be kissed. The Code of 1650 abounds in preventive measures. It punishes idleness and drunkenness with severity. Innkeepers were forbidden to furnish more than certain quantities of liquor to each customer; and simple lying, whenever it may be injurious, is checked by a fine or a flogging. In other places, the legislator, entirely forgetting the great principles of religious toleration which he had himself demanded in Europe, makes attendance on divine service compulsory, and goes so far as to visit with severe punishment, and even with death, Christians who choose to worship God according to a ritual differing from his own. Sometimes, indeed, the zeal for regulation induces him to descend to the most frivolous particulars: thus a law is to be found in the same code which prohibits the use of tobacco. It must not be forgotten that these fantastical and vexatious laws were not imposed by authority, but that they were freely voted by all the persons interested in them, and that the manners of the community were even more austere and puritanical than the laws.... These errors are no doubt discreditable to human reason; they attest the inferiority of our nature, which is incapable of laying firm hold upon what is true and just, and is often reduced to the alternative of two excesses. In strict connection with this penal legislation, which bears such striking marks of a narrow, sectarian spirit, and of those religious passions which had been warmed by persecution and were still fermenting among the people, a body of political laws is to be found, which, though written two hundred years ago, is still in advance of the liberties of our own age.

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 and 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.

Why it was that upon this beautiful feminine tissue, sensitive as gossamer, and practically blank as snow yet, there should have been traced such a coarse pattern as it was doomed to receive; why so often the coarse appropriates the finer thus, many thousands years of analytical philosophy have failed to explain to our sense of order. One may, indeed, admit the possibility of a retribution lurking in the catastrophe. Doubtless some of Tess D'Urberville's mailed ancestors rollicking home from a fray had dealt the same wrong even more ruthlessly upon peasant girls of their time. But though to visit the sins of the fathers upon the children may be a morality good enough for divinities, it is scorned by average human nature; and it therefore does not mend the matter.

Just let the mind go and look at a flower. There are realms where there is absolutely no fear. In such divine realms, realization is complete. Fear is completely absent from these realms. On this earth where people can feel so separate, there does not exist a feeling of Oneness. I know ultimately nothing can harm or destroy you. Fear comes from not knowing the entire truth. ~ Kuan Yin

Oh Allah, distance me from my sins just as You have distanced the east from the west. Oh Allah, purify me of my sins as a white robe is purified of filth. Oh Allah, cleanse me of my sins with snow, water, and ice.”10 Oh Allah, I lovingly await Your invitation to come visit You, both in this life and the next. I place my hope in Your mercy and place my trust in Your perfect timing. In Your generous names I pray, Ameen.

WHEN the hours of Day are numbered, And the voices of the Night Wake the better soul, that slumbered, To a holy, calm delight; Ere the evening lamps are lighted, 5 And, like phantoms grim and tall, Shadows from the fitful firelight Dance upon the parlor wall; Then the forms of the departed Enter at the open door; The beloved, the true-hearted, Come to visit me once more; He, the young and strong, who cherished Noble longings for the strife, By the roadside fell and perished, 15 Weary with the march of life! They, the holy ones and weakly, Who the cross of suffering bore, Folded their pale hands so meekly, Spake with us on earth no more! 20 And with them the Being Beauteous, Who unto my youth was given, More than all things else to love me, And is now a saint in heaven. With a slow and noiseless footstep 25 Comes that messenger divine, Takes the vacant chair beside me, Lays her gentle hand in mine. And she sits and gazes at me With those deep and tender eyes, 30 Like the stars, so still and saint-like, Looking downward from the skies. Uttered not, yet comprehended, Is the spirit's voiceless prayer, Soft rebukes, in blessings ended, 35 Breathing from her lips of air. Oh, though oft depressed and lonely, All my fears are laid aside, If I but remember only Such as these have lived and died!

For, d’ye see, rainbows do not visit the clear air; they only irradiate vapor. And so, through all the thick mists of the dim doubts in my mind, divine intuitions now and then shoot, enkindling my fog with a heavenly ray. And for this I thank God; for all have doubts; many deny; but doubts or denials, few along with them, have intuitions. Doubts of all things earthly, and intuitions of some things heavenly; this combination makes neither believer nor infidel, but makes a man who regards them both with equal eye.

Though I have always made it my practice to be pleasant to everybody, I have not once actually experienced friendship. I have only the most painful recollections of my various acquaintances with the exception of such companions in pleasure as Horiki. I have frantically played the clown in order to disentangle myself from these painful relationships, only to wear myself out as a result. Even now it comes as a shock if by chance I notice in the street a face resembling someone I know however slightly, and I am at once seized by a shivering violent enough to make me dizzy. I know that I am liked by other people, but I seem to be deficient in the faculty to love others. (I should add that I have very strong doubts as to whether even human beings really possess this faculty.) It was hardly to be expected that someone like myself could ever develop any close friends—besides, I lacked even the ability to pay visits. The front door of another person’s house terrified me more than the gate of Inferno in the Divine Comedy, and I am not exaggerating when I say that I really felt I could detect within the door the presence of a horrible dragon-like monster writhing there with a dank, raw smell.

[Lena Lees describes from trance her experience of Kuan Yin]: “I see Kuan Yin. She is like Venus, statuesque and standing in front of a beautiful pink half-shell. Quickly, she walks in front of me, pointing the way. We are entering the mouth of a cave. It’s so interesting. I see stairs carved out of rock in the cave. We walk up the stairs to a door. I know somehow this is just another entrance, a doorway to another time, place. Perhaps at another historical time monks lived there. Now, I’m seeing a huge image, a beautiful statue of Kuan Yin right at the top of the mountain. There are stairs leading up to her and it is as if I’m right on location, standing alongside a group of worshipers. I feel the potency of her energy. In these places, perhaps China or Vietnam, there is a palpable sense of being immersed in and supported by her presence. There is a need by the people to know more, to pick up and accumulate wisdom. I’m suddenly feeling a need to be in that kind of energy. Suddenly it is Kuan Yin who is speaking: “Some believe I am in servitude to Buddha. However, Buddha doesn’t see it like that. We’re more like brother and sister. I’m showing, Lena, my abode, a place on earth where humans can visit me and be in my potency. Lena is looking at my statue and then at my form. There’s a difference. I come to people in many forms, forms constructed from people’s own perceptions of how I should come to them. And it is individual spiritual needs that create these unique perceptions. In the end, it does not matter what form I take.” “Kuan Yin wants me to know that I can have the most divine life imaginable,” whispers Lena, still very deep in trance. “She’ll be here until the last soul passes off the earth. She remains in deity form to assist people in transcending their materialistic nature, to help them attain their highest spiritual level.

Runach took the book in hand and went to look for that Bruadarian lass, who was likely having a conversation with the flora and fauna of his grandfather's garden... He just hadn't expected her to be singing. It wasn't loud singing, though he could hear it once he'd wandered the garden long enough to catch sight of her, standing beneath a flowering linden tree, holding a blossom in her hand. Runach came to a skidding halt and gaped at her. Very well, so he had ceased to think of her as plain directly after Gobhann, and he had been struggling to come up with a worthy adjective ever since. He supposed he might spend the rest of his life trying, and never manage it. It was difficult to describe a dream. He had to sit down on the first bench he found, because he couldn't stand any longer. He wondered if the day would come where she ceased to surprise him with the things she did. Her song was nothing he had ever heard before, but for some reason it seemed familiar in a way he couldn't divine. It was enough for the moment to simply sit there and watch as she and the tree--and several of the flowers, it had to be said--engaged in an ethereal bit of music making. It was truthfully the most beautiful thing he had ever heard, and that was saying something, because the musicians who graced his grandfather's hall were unequalled in any Elvish hall he'd ever visited. And then Runach realized why what she was doing sounded so familiar. She was singing in Fadaire. He grasped for the rapidly disappearing shreds of anything resembling coherent thought, but it was useless. All he could do was sit on that very cold bench and listen to a woman who had hardly set foot past her place of incarceration, sing a song in his mother's native tongue, that would have brought any elf in the vicinity to tears if they had heard it. He knew because it was nigh onto bringing him to that place in spite of his sorry, jaded self.

Gardizi mentions the seven divisions of Indian society, almost echoing Megasthenes who had visited India in the fourth century BC in the Mauryan period. Unlike Megasthenes, this account refers to two divisions at the lowest social level, that of the Chandala and the Domb. And, echoing the description of Fa Hsien who came to India in Gupta times, he states that the Chandala have to announce their presence by striking wooden clappers, so that the ‘pure’ castes could keep at a distance from them. In the description of religion, apart from the names of various deities, there is some attempt to describe avataras, the doctrine of karma, and the nature of the divine.

Make this experiment whether you believe in God or not. At your first opportunity, stop in a Catholic Church for a visit. You need not believe, as we Catholics do, that Our Lord is really and truly present in the tabernacle. But just sit there for an hour, and within that hour you will experience a surpassing peace the like of which you never before enjoyed in your life. You will ask yourself as a sensationalist once asked me when we made an all-night vigil of adoration in the Basilica of Sacre Coeur in Paris: “What is it that is in that church?” Without voice or argument or thundering demands, you will have an awareness of something before which your spirit trembles — a sense of the Divine.

In 1854, at the young age of twenty, Spurgeon became pastor of a church in London (New Park Street Chapel), which later became the Metropolitan Tabernacle. Spurgeon had barely been in London twelve months when a severe case of cholera swept through London. Spurgeon recounts his efforts to care for and visit the numerous sick in the midst of horrific conditions: “All day, and sometimes all night long, I went about from house to house and saw men and women dying, and, oh, how glad they were to see my face! When many were afraid to enter their houses lest they should catch the deadly disease, we who had no fear about such things found ourselves most gladly listened to when we spoke of Christ and of things Divine.”16

St Thomas, in his commentary on Psalm 16, writes: `When God examines, he does three things, namely, he tests, he visits, he examines.''`' What is more, as a result of this testing, as soon as God finds that an individual possesses a certain integrity, there begins the deeper testing, the more searching examination. Thomas cites Jer. 17.10: I, the Lord, search the heart and probe the loins. I give everyone according to his way.20 Finding oneself under this kind of mysterious, divine scrutiny is a wonderful sign of grace and of progress in the spiritual life. But the experience itself is not `wonderful'. Thomas notes: `this examination is severe and strong, and so much so that no one would withstand it unless helped by God.'21

... all the smart men talking about Manifest Destiny. Like it's a new idea. ... It means taking what is yours, your property, whatever you decide it to be. And everyone else taking their assigned places to allow you to to take it. Whether it's red men or Africans, giving up themselves, giving of themselves, so that we can have what is rightfully ours. The French seeing aside their territorial claims. The British and the Spanish slinking away. ... the American spirit, ... to conquer and build and civilize. And destroy that what needs to be destroyed. To lift up the lesser races. If not lift up, subjugate. And if not subjugate, exterminate. Our destiny by divine prescription -- the American imperative." "I need to visit the outhouse," ...

In his rapid rise, talent, opportunity, and fortune converged improbably—to many, it seemed, providentially. Patton—who earlier in the year had told Eisenhower, “You are my oldest friend”—privately claimed the initials “D.D.” stood for “Divine Destiny.” Thirty months earlier, Eisenhower had been a lieutenant colonel who had never commanded even a platoon in combat. Young Ike, the third son of a failed Midwestern merchant turned creamery worker, had chosen a military career because West Point provided a free education. After an indifferent cadetship he embarked on an ordinary career as a staff officer, stalled at the middling rank of major for sixteen years. Even his first venture into the rarefied circles he would inhabit for two decades was inauspicious: the White House usher’s log for February 9, 1942, recorded the initial visit to the Oval Office of one “P. D. Eisenhauer.

Every one of us has had experiences which we have not been able to explain: a sudden sense of loneliness, or a feeling of wonder or awe in the face of the universal vastness. Or we have had a fleeting visitation of light like an illumination from some other sun, giving us in a quick flash an assurance that we are from another world, that our origins are divine. What we saw there, or felt, or heard, may have been contrary to all that we had been taught in the schools and at wide variance with all our former beliefs and opinions. We were forced to suspend our acquired doubts while, for a moment, the clouds were rolled back and we saw and heard for ourselves. Explain such things as we will, I think we have not been fair to the facts until we allow at least the possibility that such experiences may arise from the Presence of God in the world and His persistent effort to communicate with mankind.

She sat on the little iron garden seat in the clearing at the top and looked down at the strange garden of her mysterious grandmother, the patched-up house beyond. She wondered what her mother and grandmother were speaking of, why had they come to visit today, but no matter how she twisted the questions in her mind, she could divine no answers. After a time, the distraction of the garden proved too great. Her questions dropped away, and she began to harvest pregnant Busy Lizzie pods while a black cat watched from a distance, pretending disinterest. When she had a nice collection, Cassandra climbed up onto the lowest bough of the mango tree in the back corner of the yard, pods cupped gently in her hand, and began to pop them, one by one. Enjoying the cold, gooey seeds that sprayed across her fingers, the pussycat's surprise when a pod shell dropped between her paws, her zeal as she mistook it for a grasshopper.

The central figure of Buddhism is not a god but a human being, Siddhartha Gautama. According to Buddhist tradition, Gautama was heir to a small Himalayan kingdom, sometime around 500 BC. The young prince was deeply affected by the suffering evident all around him. He saw that men and women, children and old people, all suffer not just from occasional calamities such as war and plague, but also from anxiety, frustration and discontent, all of which seem to be an inseparable part of the human condition. People pursue wealth and power, acquire knowledge and possessions, beget sons and daughters, and build houses and palaces. Yet no matter what they achieve, they are never content. Those who live in poverty dream of riches. Those who have a million want two million. Those who have two million want 10 million. Even the rich and famous are rarely satisfied. They too are haunted by ceaseless cares and worries, until sickness, old age and death put a bitter end to them. Everything that one has accumulated vanishes like smoke. Life is a pointless rat race. But how to escape it? At the age of twenty-nine Gautama slipped away from his palace in the middle of the night, leaving behind his family and possessions. He travelled as a homeless vagabond throughout northern India, searching for a way out of suffering. He visited ashrams and sat at the feet of gurus but nothing liberated him entirely – some dissatisfaction always remained. He did not despair. He resolved to investigate suffering on his own until he found a method for complete liberation. He spent six years meditating on the essence, causes and cures for human anguish. In the end he came to the realisation that suffering is not caused by ill fortune, by social injustice, or by divine whims. Rather, suffering is caused by the behaviour patterns of one’s own mind. Gautama’s insight was that no matter what the mind experiences, it usually reacts with craving, and craving always involves dissatisfaction. When the mind experiences something distasteful it craves to be rid of the irritation. When the mind experiences something pleasant, it craves that the pleasure will remain and will intensify. Therefore, the mind is always dissatisfied and restless. This is very clear when we experience unpleasant things, such as pain. As long as the pain continues, we are dissatisfied and do all we can to avoid it. Yet even when we experience pleasant things we are never content. We either fear that the pleasure might disappear, or we hope that it will intensify. People dream for years about finding love but are rarely satisfied when they find it. Some become anxious that their partner will leave; others feel that they have settled cheaply, and could have found someone better. And we all know people who manage to do both.

It was the ultimate sacrilege that Jesus Christ, the very Son of God, was rejected and even put to death. And it continues. In many parts of the world today we see a growing rejection of the Son of God. His divinity is questioned. His gospel is deemed irrelevant. In day-to-day life, His teachings are ignored. Those who legitimately speak in His name find little respect in secular society. If we ignore the Lord and His servants, we may just as well be atheists—the end result is practically the same. It is what Mormon described as typical after extended periods of peace and prosperity: “Then is the time that they do harden their hearts, and do forget the Lord their God, and do trample under their feet the Holy One” (Helaman 12:2). And so we should ask ourselves, do we reverence the Holy One and those He has sent? Some years before he was called as an Apostle himself, Elder Robert D. Hales recounted an experience that demonstrated his father’s sense of that holy calling. Elder Hales said: "Some years ago Father, then over eighty years of age, was expecting a visit from a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles on a snowy winter day. Father, an artist, had painted a picture of the home of the Apostle. Rather than have the painting delivered to him, this sweet Apostle wanted to go personally to pick the painting up and thank my father for it. Knowing that Father would be concerned that everything was in readiness for the forthcoming visit, I dropped by his home. Because of the depth of the snow, snowplows had caused a snowbank in front of the walkway to the front door. Father had shoveled the walks and then labored to remove the snowbank. He returned to the house exhausted and in pain. When I arrived, he was experiencing heart pain from overexertion and stressful anxiety. My first concern was to warn him of his unwise physical efforts. Didn’t he know what the result of his labor would be? "'Robert,' he said through interrupted short breaths, 'do you realize an Apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ is coming to my home? The walks must be clean. He should not have to come through a snowdrift.' He raised his hand, saying, 'Oh, Robert, don’t ever forget or take for granted the privilege it is to know and to serve with Apostles of the Lord.'" [In CR, April 1992, 89; or “Gratitude for the Goodness of God,” Ensign, May 1992, 64] I think it is more than coincidence that such a father would be blessed to have a son serve as an Apostle. You might ask yourself, “Do I see the calling of the prophets and apostles as sacred? Do I treat their counsel seriously, or is it a light thing with me?” President Gordon B. Hinckley, for instance, has counseled us to pursue education and vocational training; to avoid pornography as a plague; to respect women; to eliminate consumer debt; to be grateful, smart, clean, true, humble, and prayerful; and to do our best, our very best. Do your actions show that you want to know and do what he teaches? Do you actively study his words and the statements of the Brethren? Is this something you hunger and thirst for? If so, you have a sense of the sacredness of the calling of prophets as the witnesses and messengers of the Son of God.

Why it was that upon this beautiful feminine tissue, sensitive as gossamer, and practically blank as snow as yet, there should have been traced such a coarse pattern as it was doomed to receive; why so often the coarse appropriates the finer thus, the wrong man the woman, the wrong woman the man, many thousand years of analytical philosophy have failed to explain to our sense of order. One may, indeed, admit the possibility of a retribution lurking in the present catastrophe. Doubtless some of Tess d'Urberville's mailed ancestors rollicking home from a fray had dealt the same measure even more ruthlessly towards peasant girls of their time. But though to visit the sins of the fathers upon the children may be a morality good enough for divinities, it is scorned by average human nature; and it therefore does not mend the matter. As Tess's own people down in those retreats are never tired of saying among each other in their fatalistic way: "It was to be." There lay the pity of it. An immeasurable social chasm was to divide our heroine's personality thereafter from that previous self of hers who stepped from her mother's door to try her fortune at Trantridge poultry-farm.

So in the library there are also books containing falsehoods. ...” “Monsters exist because they are part of the divine plan, and in the horrible features of those same monsters the power of the Creator is revealed. And by divine plan, too, there exist also books by wizards, the cabalas of the Jews, the fables of pagan poets, the lies of the infidels. It was the firm and holy conviction of those who founded the abbey and sustained it over the centuries that even in books of falsehood, to the eyes of the sage reader, a pale reflection of the divine wisdom can shine. And therefore the library is a vessel of these, too. But for this very reason, you understand, it cannot be visited by just anyone. And furthermore,” the abbot added, as if to apologize for the weakness of this last argument, “a book is a fragile creature, it suffers the wear of time, it fears rodents, the elements, clumsy hands. If for a hundred and a hundred years everyone had been able freely to handle our codices, the majority of them would no longer exist. So the librarian protects them not only against mankind but also against nature, and devotes his life to this war with the forces of oblivion, the enemy of truth.

Being naturally of a serious turn, my attention was directed to the solid advantages derivable from a residence here, rather than to the effervescent pleasures which are the grand object with too many visitants. The Christian reader, if he have had no accounts of the city later than Bunyan's time, will be surprised to hear that almost every street has its church, and that the reverend clergy are nowhere held in higher respect than at Vanity Fair. And well do they deserve such honorable estimation; for the maxims of wisdom and virtue which fall from their lips come from as deep a spiritual source, and tend to as lofty a religious aim, as those of the sagest philosophers of old. In justification of this high praise I need only mention the names of the Rev. Mr. Shallow-deep, the Rev. Mr. Stumble-at-truth, that fine old clerical character the Rev. Mr. This-today, who expects shortly to resign his pulpit to the Rev. Mr. That-tomorrow; together with the Rev. Mr. Bewilderment, the Rev. Mr. Clog-the-spirit, and, last and greatest, the Rev. Dr. Wind-of-doctrine. The labors of these eminent divines are aided by those of innumerable lecturers, who diffuse such a various profundity, in all subjects of human or celestial science, that any man may acquire an omnigenous erudition without the trouble of even learning to read.

And were you immediately taken with Charlotte, when you found her?" "Who wouldn't be?" Gentry parried with a bland smile. He drew a slow circle on Lottie's palm, stroking the insides of her fingers, brushed his thumb over the delicate veins of her wrist. The subtle exploration made her feel hot and breathless, her entire being focused on the fingertip that feathered along the tender flesh of her upper palm. Most disconcerting of all was the realization that Gentry didn't even know what he was doing. He fiddled lazily with her hand and talked with Sophia, while the chocolate service was brought to the parlor and set out on the table. "Isn't it charming?" Sophia asked, indicating the flowered porcelain service with a flourish. She picked up the tall, narrow pot and poured a dark, fragrant liquid into one of the small cups, filling the bottom third. "Most people use cocoa powder, but the best results are obtained by mixing the cream with chocolate liquor." Expertly she stirred a generous spoonful of sugar into the steaming liquid. "Not liquor as in wine or spirits, mind you. Chocolate liquor is pressed from the meat of the beans, after they have been roasted and hulled." "It smells quite lovely," Lottie commented, her breath catching as Gentry's fingertip investigated the plump softness at the base of her thumb. Sophia turned her attention to preparing the other cups. "Yes, and the flavor is divine. I much prefer chocolate to coffee in the morning." "Is it a st-stimulant, then?" Lottie asked, finally managing to jerk her hand away from Gentry. Deprived of his plaything, he gave her a questioning glance. "Yes, of a sort," Sophia replied, pouring a generous amount of cream into the sweetened chocolate liquor. She stirred the cups with a tiny silver spoon. "Although it is not quite as animating as coffee, chocolate is uplifting in its own way." She winked at Lottie. "Some even claim that chocolate rouses the amorous instincts." "How interesting," Lottie said, doing her best to ignore Gentry as she accepted her cup. Inhaling the rich fumes appreciatively, she took a tiny sip of the shiny, dark liquid. The robust sweetness slid along her tongue and tickled the back of her throat. Sophia laughed in delight at Lottie's expression. "You like it, I see. Good- now I have found an inducement to make you visit often." Lottie nodded as she continued to drink. By the time she reached the bottom of the cup, her head was swimming, and her nerves were tingling from the mixture of heat and sugar. Gentry set his cup aside after a swallow or two. "Too rich for my taste, Sophia, although I compliment your skill in preparing it. Besides, my amorous instincts need no encouragement." He smiled as the statement caused Lottie to choke on the last few drops of chocolate.

first produce, and doth still establish and uphold the same. When we reflect upon ourselves, let us consider that we are not a mere piece of organized matter, a curious and well-contrived engine; that there is more in us than flesh, and blood, and bones, even a divine spark, capable to know, and love, and enjoy our Maker; and though it be now exceedingly clogged with its dull and lumpish companion, yet ere long it shall be delivered, and can subsist without the body, as well as that can do without the clothes which we throw off at our pleasure. Let us often withdraw our thoughts from this earth, this scene of misery, and folly, and sin, and raise them towards that more vast and glorious world, whose innocent and blessed inhabitants solace themselves eternally in the divine presence, and know no other passions, but an unmixed joy and an unbounded love. And then consider how the blessed Son of God came down to this lower world to live among us, and die for us, that he might bring us to a portion of the same felicity; and think how he hath overcome the sharpness of death, and opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers, and is now set down on the right hand of the Majesty on high, and yet is not the less mindful of us, but receiveth our prayers, and presenteth them unto his Father, and is daily visiting his church with the influences of his Spirit, as the sun reacheth us with his beams.

That great portion of what is generally received as Christian truth is, in its rudiments or in its separate parts, to be found in heathen philosophies and religions. For instance, the doctrine of a Trinity is found both in the East and in the West; so is the ceremony of washing; so is the rite of sacrifice. The doctrine of the Divine Word is Platonic; the doctrine of the Incarnation is Indian; of a divine kingdom is Judaic; of Angels and demons is Magian; the connection of sin with the body is Gnostic; celibacy is known to Bonze and Talapoin; a sacerdotal order is Egyptian; the idea of a new birth is Chinese and Eleusinian; belief in sacramental virtue is Pythagorean; and honours to the dead are a polytheism. Such is the general nature of the fact before us; Mr. Milman argues from it,—'These things are in heathenism, therefore they are not Christian:' we, on the contrary, prefer to say, 'these things are in Christianity, therefore they are not heathen.' That is, we prefer to say, and we think that Scripture bears us out in saying, that from the beginning the Moral Governor of the world has scattered the seeds of truth far and wide over its extent; that these have variously taken root, and grown up as in the wilderness, wild plants indeed but living; and hence that, as the inferior animals have tokens of an immaterial principle in them, yet have not souls, so the philosophies and religions of men have their life in certain true ideas, though they are not directly divine. What man is amid the brute creation, such is the Church among the schools of the world; and as Adam gave names to the animals about him, so has the Church from the first looked round upon the earth, noting and visiting the doctrines she found there.

Sometimes our heart is moved to tenderness when we consider God's great wisdom with regard to each of us. At other times we can be softened only through suffering. We may then feel utterly destroyed to the point of despairing of life itself. But if, with help from on high, we gather the strength to turn to God at that point, He will find an opening so as to enter our heart with His grace. Nowadays, people are familiar with acute suffering of one kind or another. Pain and suffering have become the common language of humankind. God may well be using this to break through into our hardened and loveless world with His grace and the result would be a spiritual renaissance. He has already changed the lives of so many people, and He can easily change many more, and even extend it to the whole world. We might also be moved by the thought that our life has been nothing but a chain of errors, a chain of betrayals, a long series of failures. We see that nothing in our life is worthy of God and nothing in us is fit to look upon the Face of God. Neither can He look upon us, nor can we stand in His presence. If we turn to God with such awareness He will unfailingly find and opening for His grace. In this way, we can make a new start at any moment of our life, for we know that our God will respond. But if He is to visit man with His grace, He will first require our cooperation. He requires the presence of our human factor, little and weak though it is. He created us out of nothing, but He does not create us anew unless we consent to work with Him. Our tiny human factor is absolutely necessary to Him, so we need to align it with His infinitely great and divine factor, and the miracle of the union of our heart with His grace will then take place.

Ninth month, 1753. -- In company with my well-esteemed friend, John Sykes, and with the unity of Friends, I travelled about two weeks, visiting Friends in Buck's County. We labored in the love of the gospel, according to the measure received; and through the mercies of Him who is strength to the poor who trust in him, we found satisfaction in our visit. In the next winter, way opening to visit Friends' families within the compass of our Monthly Meeting, partly by the labors of two Friends from Pennsylvania, I joined in some part of the work, having had a desire some time that it might go forward amongst us. About this time, a person at some distance lying sick, his brother came to me to write his will. I knew he had slaves, and, asking his brother, was told he intended to leave them as slaves to his children. As writing is a profitable employ, and as offending sober people was disagreeable to my inclination, I was straitened in my mind; but as I looked to the Lord, he inclined my heart to his testimony. I told the man that I believed the practice of continuing slavery to this people was not right, and that I had a scruple in my mind against doing writings of that kind; that though many in our Society kept them as slaves, still I was not easy to be concerned in it, and desired to be excused from going to write the will. I spake to him in the fear of the Lord, and he made no reply to what I said, but went away; he also had some concerns in the practice, and I thought he was displeased with me. In this case I had fresh confirmation that acting contrary to present outward interest, from a motive of Divine love and in regard to truth and righteousness, and thereby incurring the resentments of people, opens the way to a treasure better than silver, and to a friendship exceeding the friendship of men.

Let me put the contrast in a single concrete example. The physician who finds time to give personal attention to his patients and listens to them. carefully probing inner conditions that may be more significant than any laboratory reports, has become a rarity. Where the power complex is dominant, a visit to a physician is paced, not to fit the patient's needs, but mainly to perform the succession of physical tests upon which the diagnosis will be based. Yet if there were a sufficient number of competent physicians on hand whose inner resources were as available as their laboratory aids, a more subtle diagnosis might be possible, and the patient's subjective response might in many cases effectively supplement the treatment. Thoreau expressed this to perfection when he observed in his 'Journal' that "the really efficient laborer will be found not to crowd his day with work, but will saunter to his task surrounded by a wide halo of ease and leisure." Without this slowing of the tempo of all activities the positive advantages of plenitude could not be sufficiently enjoyed; for the congestion of time is as threatening to the good life as the congestion of space or people, and produces stresses and tensions that equally undermine human relations. The inner stability that such a slowdown brings about is essential to the highest uses of the mind, through opening up that second life which one lives in reflection and contemplation and self-scrutiny. The means to escape from the "noisy crowing up of things and whatsoever wars on the divine" was one of the vital offerings of the classic religions: hence their emphasis was not on technological productivity but on personal poise. The old slogan of New York subway guards in handling a crush of passengers applies with even greater force to the tempo of megatechnic society: "What's your hurry...Watch your step!

For the good man is neither uplifted with the good things of time, nor broken by its ills; but the wicked man, because he is corrupted by this world's happiness, feels himself punished by its unhappiness. Yet often, even in the present distribution of temporal things, does God plainly evince His own interference. For if every sin were now visited with manifest punishment, nothing would seem to be reserved for the final judgment; on the other hand, if no sin received now a plainly divine punishment, it would be concluded that there is no divine providence at all. And so of the good things of this life: if God did not by a very visible liberality confer these on some of those persons who ask for them, we should say that these good things were not at His disposal; and if He gave them to all who sought them, we should suppose that such were the only rewards of His service; and such a service would make us not godly, but greedy rather, and covetous. Wherefore, though good and bad men suffer alike, we must not suppose that there is no difference between the men themselves, because there is no difference in what they both suffer. For even in the likeness of the sufferings, there remains an unlikeness in the sufferers; and though exposed to the same anguish, virtue and vice are not the same thing. For as the same fire causes gold to glow brightly, and chaff to smoke; and under the same flail the straw is beaten small, while the grain is cleansed; and as the lees are not mixed with the oil, though squeezed out of the vat by the same pressure, so the same violence of affliction proves, purges, clarifies the good, but damns, ruins, exterminates the wicked. And thus it is that in the same affliction the wicked detest God and blaspheme, while the good pray and praise. So material a difference does it make, not what ills are suffered, but what kind of man suffers them.

Not many people understood her. She loved visiting temples. She loved children and flowers, simple things and actually everything reminded her of God's Love. She found Kindness more beautiful than anything of this world. She breathed in Faith and trusted God no matter what. She was free as a bird and travelled far and wide only to know in her heart that one day she will find what Her Soul's been searching for since eternity in God's Timing. She was often looked at as pretty and intelligent, and she loved the compliments but when someone called her Godloving that stole her heart. She loved dreams and knew that all she ever wants is a Man who could walk beside her, hand in hand, living dreams and following passions in a journey of Love's adventure. She didn't just want to be a wife, she wanted to be a partner in dreams, a co-sharer of aspirations, a travel mate through the happiness and difficulties of Life. She wasn't looking for a smooth sail, she knew every bond has trying moments, just that she wanted someone who would stand by her every step of the way, just like she would have his back every single time. She wasn't looking for a hero, she was looking for an equal, a soul-counterpart sailing through life with Love, Respect and Passion. She wasn't looking for a ring, she was waiting for a Heart that was already written in the stars as hers forever. And she knew no matter what, someday someone will come who will bend his knees before God and ask Him to make her all of his, not just for a temporary timespan but for lifetimes that their souls needed to take human shape in. She knows someday she wouldn't visit temples alone, someone would stand right beside her and together they would pray for the family that would create in the blessings of Him who has already got it all planned. - and the right person would understand her because God understands Souls and Love.

Since my visit to the Hermitage, I had become more aware of the four figures, two women and two men, who stood around the luminous space where the father welcomed his returning son. Their way of looking leaves you wondering how they think or feel about what they are watching. These bystanders, or observers, allow for all sorts of interpretations. As I reflect on my own journey, I become more and more aware of how long I have played the role of observer. For years I had instructed students on the different aspects of the spiritual life, trying to help them see the importance of living it. But had I, myself, really ever dared to step into the center, kneel down, and let myself be held by a forgiving God? The simple fact of being able to express an opinion, to set up an argument, to defend a position, and to clarify a vision has given me, and gives me still, a sense of control. And, generally, I feel much safer in experiencing a sense of control over an undefinable situation than in taking the risk of letting that situation control me. Certainly there were many hours of prayer, many days and months of retreat, and countless conversations with spiritual directors, but I had never fully given up the role of bystander. Even though there has been in me a lifelong desire to be an insider looking out, I nevertheless kept choosing over and over again the position of the outsider looking in. Sometimes this looking-in was a curious looking-in, sometimes a jealous looking-in, sometimes an anxious looking-in, and, once in a while, even a loving looking-in. But giving up the somewhat safe position of the critical observer seemed like a great leap into totally unknown territory. I so much wanted to keep some control over my spiritual journey, to be able to predict at least a part of the outcome, that relinquishing the security of the observer for the vulnerability of the returning son seemed close to impossible. Teaching students, passing on the many explanations given over the centuries to the words and actions of Jesus, and showing them the many spiritual journeys that people have chosen in the past seemed very much like taking the position of one of the four figures surrounding the divine embrace. The two women standing behind the father at different distances the seated man staring into space and looking at no one in particular, and the tall man standing erect and looking critically at the event on the platform in front of him--they all represent different ways of not getting involved. There is indifference, curiosity, daydreaming, and attentive observation; there is staring, gazing, watching, and looking; there is standing in the background, leaning against an arch, sitting with arms crossed, and standing with hands gripping each other. Every one of these inner and outward postures are all too familiar with me. Some are more comfortable than others, but all of them are ways of not getting directly involved," (pp. 12-13).

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.

Advent Season by Stewart Stafford A house bedecked in verdant wonderment, With lights that mirror the starry firmament, Where the Christmas Star did once shine, To guide worshippers to the Divine. The wreath on the door is a welcome portal, For any passing cheerful mortal, Wishing to enjoy warm company, And mountains of gravy-drowned turkey. Nostrils fill with cooking scents, That waft through the house with excitement A feast to consume on the 25th, After the Man in Red has paid a visit. Children orchestrate great noise, And sit and play with gifted toys, While adults watch and reminisce, On childhoods past and favourite gifts. The Wheel of Time turns, Festivities End, And the year itself begins again. In Time's juvenile crawl, Or adult speed, Life zips forward, and history repeats. © Stewart Stafford, 2020. All rights reserved.

In school, we’re given the false impression that scientists took a straight path to the light switch. There’s one curriculum, one right way to study science, and one right formula that spits out the correct answer on a standardized test. Textbooks with lofty titles like The Principles of Physics magically reveal “the principles” in three hundred pages. An authority figure then steps up to the lectern to feed us “the truth.” Textbooks, explained theoretical physicist David Gross in his Nobel lecture, “often ignore the many alternate paths that people wandered down, the many false clues they followed, the many misconceptions they had.”15 We learn about Newton’s “laws”—as if they arrived by a grand divine visitation or a stroke of genius—but not the years he spent exploring, revising, and tweaking them. The laws that Newton failed to establish—most notably his experiments in alchemy, which attempted, and spectacularly failed, to turn lead into gold—don’t make the

Regrets were like hauntings, Jericho knew, visitations people tried to dispel with busyness or the bottle, with blame heaped on others, or with a relentless urge to reframe and retell their own histories, to make up stories that haunted them less than the truth.

Besides Diana Gabaldon’s Scotland and Anne McCaffrey’s Pern, DreamLand is my favorite land to visit.

THE SPH'S OFFICIAL VISIT (VIJAYA YATRA) TO KAILASA IN LOS ANGELES || E-TOUR || 21 FEB 2021 WORLDWIDE OFFICIAL VISITS (VIJAYA YATRA) OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM, JAGATGURU MAHASANNIDHANAM, HIS DIVINE HOLINESS BHAGAVAN #NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM CONTINUES TODAY WITH THE ETOUR TO KAILASA IN LOS ANGELES, USA. ADHERING TO WHO’S GUIDANCE ON RETAINING OURSELVES TO QUARANTINE AND SOCIAL DISTANCING, KAILASA’S DEPARTMENT OF BROADCASTING FACILITATED THE E-TOUR BRINGING HINDU DIASPORA IN LOS ANGELES CLOSER TO THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM. THE DE FACTO SPIRITUAL EMBASSY, #KAILASA IN LOS ANGELES HEADED BY SRI NITHYA MUKTHANANDA AND MA NITHYA MUKTHIKANANDA RECEIVED THE SPH AT 9.40AM IST. A FEW HUNDRED KAILASIANS PARTICIPATED IN THE E-TOUR VIA KAILASA’S OFFICIAL DIGITAL SPACES. THE E-TOUR WAS TRULY A BLESSED MOMENT FOR EACH AND EVERY KAILASIAN AS IT HAS BEEN 11 YEARS SINCE THE SPH HAD VISITED THE KAILASA IN LOS ANGELES PHYSICALLY. INSPIRING EVERY #HINDU TO RECLAIM THEIR HINDU CENTRIC FREEDOM AND BUILD KAILASA, THE ENLIGHTENED CIVILIZATIONAL NATION, THE SPH REVEALED VARIOUS POWERFUL TRUTHS IN THE 3 HOUR LONG E-TOUR. KAILASA IN LOS ANGELES’S DEPARTMENT OF #RELIGION & WORSHIP RECEIVED SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE ON THE DEITIES IN KAILASA. THE SPH REVEALED THAT WHEN INSTALLING DEITIES ENERGISED BY THE SPH BY A LIVING INCARNATION, THE DEITIES PROTECT THE LAND AND PEOPLE OF THE NATION. THEREFORE, THE DEITIES SHOULD BE PLACED IN SUCH A WAY THAT THEY TOUCH THE LAND (BHU) HE FURTHER REVEALED, “LEARN DISCIPLINE FROM NATURE BEFORE NATURE DISCIPLINES US". THE #SPH BLESSED THE VARIOUS INITIATIVES UNDERTAKEN BY THE DEPARTMENT OF HUMAN SERVICES INCLUDING NITHYANANDA FOOD BANK (ANNAMANDIR) , DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION - KAILASA IN LOS ANGELES. #nithyananda kailaasa kailasa

Mama Zula Divine | Spiritual Healer & Lost Love Spells | Mafikeng Klerksdorp +27769337951 My family and I had everything we wished for, and life was good but due to jealousy my husband's family hated me. In fact, he later left me and the kids for another woman and asked for divorce. It was so painful. My kids and I suffered during this time. I visited church

Wrath is the divine reaction to sin. Atonement is necessary because human beings stand under the wrath and judgment of God. “Unless we give real content to the wrath of God, unless we hold that men really deserve to have God visit upon them the painful consequences of their wrongdoing, we empty God’s forgiveness of its meaning.

Embark on a pilgrimage of serenity with Monk Travels as we guide you through the sacred realms of Char Dham. Experience tranquility at its peak as we curate a spiritual journey to Yamunotri, Gangotri, Kedarnath, and Badrinath. Our expertly crafted itinerary ensures a seamless and serene exploration of these divine destinations, allowing you to connect with the spiritual essence of the Himalayas. Visit us at: monktravel.com

I believe that we shocked each other by how swiftly we went from being the people who knew each other best in the world to being a pair of the most mutually incomprehensible strangers who ever lived. But it was vital to my survival to have a one bedroom of my own i saw the aprtment almost as a sanatorium a hospice clinci for my own recovery I painted the walls in the warmest colors i could find and bought myself flowers every week as if i were visiting myself in the hospital is this lifetime supposed to be only about duty why are you studying Italian so that just in case Italy ever invades Ethiopia again and is actually successful this time? ciao comes from if you must know it's an abbreviation of a phrase used by medieval venetians as an intimate salutation Sono il Suo Schiavo meaning i am your slave. om Naamah Shivaya meaning I honor the divinity that resides whin me. I wanted to experience both , I wanted worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence the dual glories of a human life I wanted what the Greeks called kalos kai agathos the singular balance of the good and he beautiful I'd been missing both during these last hard years because both pleasure and devotion require a stress free space in which to flourish and I'd been living in a giant trash compactor of nonstop anxiety , As for how to balance the urge for pleasure against the longing for devotion. four feet on the ground a head full of foliage looking at the world through the heart. it was more than I wanted to toughly explore one aspect of myself set against the backdrop of each country in a place that has traditionally done that one thing very well. same guatemalan musicians are always playing id rather be a sparrow than a snail on their bamboo windpipes oh how i want italian to open itself up to me i havent felt so starved for comprehension since then dal centro della mia vita venne una grande fontanana dolce sitl nuovo Dante wrote his divine comedy in terza rima triple rhyme a chain of rhymes with each rhyme repeating here times every five lines. lamor che move il sole e laltre stelle we are the masters of bel far niente larte darrangiarsi The reply in italy to you deserve a break today would probably be yeah no duh that's why I'm planning on taking a break at noon to go over to your house and sleep with your wife, I walked home to my apartment and soft-boiled a pair of fresh brown eggs for my lunch i peeled the eggs and arranged them on a plate beside the seven stalks of the asparagus (which were so slim and snappy they didn't need to be cooked at all,)I put some olives on the plate too and the four knobs of goat cheese I'd picked up yesterday from the fromagerie down the street tend two slices of pink oily salmon for dessert a lovely peach which the woman at the market had given to me for free and which was still warm form the roman sunlight for the longest time I couldn't even touch this food because it was such a masterpiece of lunch a true expression of the art of making something out of nothing finally when i had fully absorbed the prettiness of my meal i went and sat in apatch of sunbeam on my clean wooden floor and ate every bit of it with my fingers while reading my daily newspaper article in Italian happiness inhabited my every molecule. I am inspired by the regal self assurance of this town so grounded and rounded so amused and monumental knowing that she is held securely in the palm of history i would like to be like rome when i am an old lady. I linger over my food and wine for many hours because nobody in

Yoga is the effort to experience one's divinity personally and then to hold on that experience forever. Yoga is about self-mastery and the dedicated effort to haul your attention away from your endless brooding over the past and your nonstop worrying about the future so that you can seek instead a place of eternal presence form which may regard yourself and your surrounding with poise. it's all god in disguise but they yogis believe a human life is a very special opportunity because only in alumni from and only with a special opportunity because only in a human form and only with a human mind can God realization ever occur. is to restore to health the eye of the heart whereby God may be seen. a great yogi is anyone who has achieved the permanent state of enlightened bliss. A guru is a great yogi who can actually pass that state on to theirs. mantravirya the potency of the Enlighted consciousness capable of conscious inquiry a yearning to understand the nature of the universe. living spiritual master when I was nine, I couldn't do a thing with it except cry later over these years my hypersensitive awareness of times s led me to push myself to experience life at a maximum pace if I were going to have such a short visit on earth, I had to do everything possible e to experience it now hence all the traveling all the romances all the ambition all the pasta. On the other the Zen masters always say that you cannot see your reflection in running water only in still Ater so something was telling me it would be spiritually negligent to run off now then so much was happening right here in this small, cloistered place where every minute of the day is organized to facilitate self-exploration and devotional practice. vipassana mediation teaches that grief and nuisance are inevitable in this life but if you can plant yourself in stillness long enough you will in time experience the truth that everything. (both uncomfortable and lovely) does eventually pass. Man is neither entirely ap upper off the god and is not entirely the captain of his own destiny he is a little of both. But when they do show up again i can just send them back here back to this rooftop of memory back to the care of those two cool blue souls who already and always understand everything This is what rituals are for we do spiritual ceremonies as human beings in order to create a safe resting place of our most complicated feeling of joy or trauma so that we don't have to have those feelings around with us forever weight us down. we have hands we can stand on them if we want to that's our privilege that is the joy of a moral body and that is because God needs us because God loves to feel things through our hands.

In the silence of a day stripped of sleep and sustenance, I craft "Walking Alone in a Jungle." Immersed in the theatricality of my mind, questions cascade like an endless stream, leaving me suspended between belief and doubt. At times, I defy divine power, embracing logic as my refuge. Yet, within the labyrinth of thought, I query the origin – cosmic expanse or mere creation? Contemplating life's capricious dance, I grapple with control. Do I dictate my orbit, or does an unseen hand choreograph existence's strange waltz? The mystery deepens as virtuous hearts endure misfortune. If a benevolent God exists, why does adversity visit the good-hearted? "Why must a virtuous soul suffer?" echoes the proverb. Does God truly test the best with the toughest trials, or is this notion a construct of the mind? Amidst constant questioning, I navigate self-reflection. Why does positivity, tied to pure intentions, spawn misunderstanding? As day wears on, thoughts flow into a new book, yet answers elude me. Are unanswered questions born of perpetual thought, or does clarity dwell in thought's absence? The 'why' persists, a relentless echo in contemplative caverns. Existence's fabric seems woven with illusion, prompting scrutiny of authenticity. Why doubt the simplicity of truth, where pain persists? After tireless questioning, understanding teases, slipping away like shadows. Is it thought's 'why' constructing an exitless maze, or does enlightenment reside where thought surrenders? I don't know. Sometimes, I think too much or not enough. Stuck in a perpetual cycle, I laugh bitterly. Perhaps, writing holds answers, or stubborn questioning persists. Why?

Your lived experience makes you the expert you need on any journey home to yourself. You can read every book in the world and visit every sacred place that exists, but nothing illuminates your awareness like your awakened contact with the innermost presence that has always been a part of you. Your divinity is not reliant upon others witnessing your light. Be the fountain of inspiration you seek in others.

It is not always necessary that a thing should be proved by something else. For there are some things which are self-evident according to the philosophers (as the highest categories of things, and ultimate differences and first principles) which are not susceptible of demonstration, but are evident by their own light and are taken for granted as certain and indubitable. If perchance anyone denies them, he is not to be met with arguments, but should be committed to the custody of his kinsmen (as a madman); or to be visited with punishment, as one (according to Aristotle) either lacking sense or needing punishment. Aristotle says there are certain axioms which do not have an external reason for their truth 'which must necessarily be and appear to be such per se' (ho anankē einai di’ auto kai dokein anankē, Posterior Analytics 1.10 [Loeb, 70–71]); i.e., they are not only credible (autopiston) of themselves, but cannot be seriously denied by anyone of a sound mind. Therefore since the Bible is the first principle and the primary and infallible truth, is it strange to say that it can be proved by itself? The Bible can prove itself either one part or another when all parts are not equally called into doubt (as when we convince the Jews from the Old Testament); or the whole proving the whole, not by a direct argument of testimony (because it declares itself divine), but by that made artfully (artificiali) and ratiocinative (because in it are discovered divine marks which are not found in the writings of men). Nor is this a begging of the question because these criteria are something distinct from the Scriptures; if not materially, yet formally as adjuncts and properties which are demonstrated with regard to the subject. Nor is one thing proved by another equally unknown because they are better known by us; as we properly prove a cause from its effects, a subject by its properties. The argument of the papists that Scripture cannot be proved by itself (because then it would be more known and more unknown than itself) can with much greater force be turned against the church.

It is not always necessary that a thing should be proved by something else. For there are some things which are self-evident according to the philosophers (as the highest categories of things, and ultimate differences and first principles) which are not susceptible of demonstration, but are evident by their own light and are taken for granted as certain and indubitable. If perchance anyone denies them, he is not to be met with arguments, but should be committed to the custody of his kinsmen (as a madman); or to be visited with punishment, as one (according to Aristotle) either lacking sense or needing punishment. Aristotle says there are certain axioms which do not have an external reason for their truth 'which must necessarily be and appear to be such per se', Posterior Analytics 1.10 [Loeb, 70–71]); i.e., they are not only credible of themselves, but cannot be seriously denied by anyone of a sound mind. Therefore since the Bible is the first principle and the primary and infallible truth, is it strange to say that it can be proved by itself? The Bible can prove itself either one part or another when all parts are not equally called into doubt (as when we convince the Jews from the Old Testament); or the whole proving the whole, not by a direct argument of testimony (because it declares itself divine), but by that made artfully and ratiocinative (because in it are discovered divine marks which are not found in the writings of men). Nor is this a begging of the question because these criteria are something distinct from the Scriptures; if not materially, yet formally as adjuncts and properties which are demonstrated with regard to the subject. Nor is one thing proved by another equally unknown because they are better known by us; as we properly prove a cause from its effects, a subject by its properties. The argument of the papists that Scripture cannot be proved by itself (because then it would be more known and more unknown than itself) can with much greater force be turned against the church.

It is not always necessary that a thing should be proved by something else. For there are some things which are self-evident according to the philosophers which are not susceptible of demonstration, but are evident by their own light and are taken for granted as certain and indubitable. If perchance anyone denies them, he is not to be met with arguments, but should be committed to the custody of his kinsmen (as a madman); or to be visited with punishment, as one (according to Aristotle) either lacking sense or needing punishment. Aristotle says there are certain axioms which do not have an external reason for their truth 'which must necessarily be and appear to be such per se', Posterior Analytics 1.10 [Loeb, 70–71]); i.e., they are not only credible of themselves, but cannot be seriously denied by anyone of a sound mind. Therefore since the Bible is the first principle and the primary and infallible truth, is it strange to say that it can be proved by itself? The Bible can prove itself either one part or another when all parts are not equally called into doubt (as when we convince the Jews from the Old Testament); or the whole proving the whole, not by a direct argument of testimony (because it declares itself divine), but by that made artfully and ratiocinative (because in it are discovered divine marks which are not found in the writings of men). Nor is this a begging of the question because these criteria are something distinct from the Scriptures; if not materially, yet formally as adjuncts and properties which are demonstrated with regard to the subject. Nor is one thing proved by another equally unknown because they are better known by us; as we properly prove a cause from its effects, a subject by its properties. The argument of the papists that Scripture cannot be proved by itself (because then it would be more known and more unknown than itself) can with much greater force be turned against the church.

It is "the times of the Gentiles" (kairoiV ejqnw'n). The expression means, the time when the Gentiles should have their opportunity of enjoying divine grace, corresponding to the time of gracious visitation enjoyed by the Jews referred to by Jesus in His lament over Jerusalem. There is no reason to suppose Luke coined these phrases; they bear the stamp of genuineness upon them. But if we assume, as we are entitled to do, that not Luke the Pauline universalist, but Jesus Himself, spoke of a time of merciful visitation of the Gentiles, then it follows that in His eschatological discourse He gave clear intimation of a lengthened period during which His gospel was to be preached in the world; even as He did on other occasions, as in the parable of the wicked husbandman, in which He declared that the vineyard should be taken from its present occupants, and given to others who would bring forth fruit.

If genius springs from genetics, a meritocracy is hardly more just than the divine right of kings; it, too, mythologizes inherent superiority. If genius results from labor, then brilliant people deserve the kudos and wealth they reap. The communist perspective is that everyone can be a genius if he will only work at it; the fascist perspective is that born geniuses are a different species from the rest of humanity. Many people fall short of their potential through lack of discipline, but a visit to a coal mine will amply demonstrate that hard work on its own neither constitutes genius nor guarantees riches. The history of high intelligence is no less political than the history of intellectual disability or of mental illness.

This “anointed preaching,” R. C. said, was the animus behind the Great Awakening. He said there was no voice powerful enough to wake the dead. No human voice. But a divine voice, heard through the impassioned preaching of the Word, could wake the dead. All of those men preached for conversion, a “monergistic, immediate visitation of the Holy Spirit,” which accompanies the faithful preaching of the gospel. God has decreed His Word to have the power to bring life from death, to bring dead men to life. R. C. continued, gaining strength sentence by sentence: “Every generation needs to recover anew the Word of God and rely on its power afresh.” People need the new birth. They need to see the light of the gospel, no longer blind and in darkness. People need to come awake.

The word “contemplate” means to create space for the divine to enter. So if we exile ourselves to a special place—as simple as a quiet room we love, as plain as a park or a path in the forest, as far removed as a visit to a monastery or other spiritual destination—we are opening our hearts, minds, and souls to contemplation. We are creating space for the divine to enter.

Major life changes—anything from moving across country to graduating from college New relationships—either in personal or professional work Challenges and difficulties—from sickness to strife to struggle Goals attained and milestones achieved—losing weight, learning a new skill, gaining financial freedom Travel—a visit to a new city or state or country or a journey that brought new insight Spiritual experiences—encounters with grace, growth experiences, new awareness and understanding Special serendipitous blessings—divine encounters that especially encouraged us

Hildegard of Bingen grounded both her ecospirituality and her herbal medicine in this knowing. Her central concept of viriditas, or divine “greenness,” sanctifies more than the literally green mosses and leaves; over and over Hildegard calls upon the interdependence of trees, seeds, spirit, and soil as sacred cocreators. She used various trees in her practical cures, but they were also stand-ins for the mythic tree of life in her writings and visions. In one of Hildegard’s greatest hymns, she sings to the trees on her lush Rhineland. “O happy roots, mediatrix, and branches…” The “happy” roots, ever underland, grow in the particular favor of the divine (and perhaps of Hildegard herself—there is speculation that some of her visions may have been enhanced by the hallucinogenic mandrake root, which she prescribed as a cure for depression). Green branching is only and always mirrored in rooted darkness—the place we, too, come from and return to. To be whole on earth is to embrace this exuberant darkness, the landscape we visit with every turn of day into night.

When I was a young girl, my parents often visited a temple from where the Arabian Sea was visible. I accompanied them only to look forward to the few moments where sea mist and a widening orb of space juxtaposed.

True Story:- Once upon a time, there was a man named Shree Om who, along with more than three hundred individuals, set out on a journey to visit the largest tulip garden in the world, located across various realms of the earth. This journey had been planned meticulously for many months. However, on that particular day, nature seemed to be against them. The sky was covered with dark clouds, and it was raining. Advanced weather monitoring systems from Space station had predicted heavy rainfall for the day. Nevertheless, Shree Om, with his compassionate nature, kindly order the king of the heaven, Indra, to intervene and temporarily stop the rain to prevent disruption to their plans. The dark clouds that veiled the sky and the pouring rain were dispelled by Shreeom's command, allowing everyone, including more than twenty thousands who had gathered from various places, to enjoy the vibrant colors of the flowers in the garden. Indra swiftly removed the clouds and cleared the sky to welcome the sun for Shreeom's arrival. SriOm told his first Yog to Pashupatinath (Bhabam), to the Sun and divinity in the beginning of his knowledge. Shreeom, at his will, could turn bodies of water into tranquil seas, rivers for bathing and swimming as well as to create Brahma, but at that moment, he chose to the humble path and cooperated with Mahalaxmi, the sun, moon, stars and various Devi Devtas to ensure harmony and sustenance in the universe. Shree Om is the Vishnu himself. Shree Om and Mahalaxmi represented the divine consort, illustrating the profound interconnectedness and balance in the cosmic universal order. Shreeom, along with Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, the various gods and goddesses, and especially Mahalakshmi Bhavani, along with the sun, moon, and the constellations of stars, collectively uphold and create the entire universe.

Painting of love This afternoon I saw a painting hanging on the wall, It was of a maiden in the prime of her beauty, The background was painted in rainbow colours, one and all, I had every reason to admire the artists sagacity, Her form looked perfect worthy of every appreciation, Her eyes interacted with mine, Her lips had a strong and intense red sensation, And from her arose feelings divine, Although she was just a portrait, A still painting hanging on the even more still wall, She was a feeling that moved through eyes into the heart without any freight, And in me, just like other mesmerised onlookers, she did feelings of “life in love” install, Maybe I only felt so, maybe I wanted to feel so, Because her eyes, her form, her everything reminded me of someone, And I imagined her in this painting on the wall, and I allowed my mind to believe so, As long as she did not remind me of anyone, or everyone, but just her, my special someone, So I sat there looking at the painting on the wall, I admired the salient aspects of her colourful beauty, And now I too was still, still like the painting and still like the dead wall, Now, not the painting, but the stillness it exuded had become my new propensity, Like a flower that is beautiful in the presence of the beauty that holds itself within it so still, A state where all conflicts are exhumed and everything that represents profanity dies, That is when this painting my heart does with million joys fill, And recreates her colourful visions within me, and now my life just on them relies, So, I often visit the painting on the wall, still hanging there, And maybe it will be so always, Until one day I find it everywhere, Because I wish to love her in a million ways!

Painting of love This afternoon I saw a painting hanging on the wall, It was of a maiden in the prime of her beauty, The background was painted in rainbow colours, one and all, I had every reason to admire the artists sagacity, Her form looked perfect worthy of every appreciation, Her eyes interacted with mine, Her lips had a strong and intense red sensation, And from her arose feelings divine, Although it was just a portrait, A still painting hanging on the still wall, She was a feeling that moved through eyes into the heart without any freight, And in me, just like other mesmerised onlookers, she did feelings of life and love install, Maybe I only felt so, maybe I wanted to feel so, Because her eyes, her form, her everything reminded me of someone, And I imagined her in this painting on the wall, and I allowed my mind to believe so, As long as she did not remind me of anyone, or everyone, but just her, my special someone, So I sat there looking at the painting on the wall, I admired the salient aspects of her colourful beauty, And now I too was still, still like the painting and still like the dead wall, Now, not the painting, but the stillness it exuded had become my new propensity, Like a flower that is beautiful in the presence of the beauty that holds itself within it so still, A state where all conflicts are exhumed and everything that represents profanity dies, That is when this painting with million joys my heart fills in the life’s unforgiving mill, And recreates her colourful visions within me, and now my life just on them relies, So, I often visit the painting on the wall, still hanging there, And maybe it will be so always, Until one day I find it everywhere, Because I wish to love her in a million ways, in the narrow lanes, on the byways and all the highways!

longed for her return every time I went to my Place. In fact, the hope of seeing her again was half the impetus to head out there at least once a week. She only returned once, which was a little disappointing and confusing, until I read about a similar encounter Mary Oliver captured in her poem, “The Place I Want to Get Back To.” The poem, which is about a numinous visit by two does, explains that “such gifts, bestowed, can’t be repeated.”1 They can, however, become beacons to show you the way. Numinous presence through deer became an important beckoning toward the divine for me, a gentle nudge to pay attention.

Rakesh Roshan Rakesh Roshan is a producer, director, and actor in Bollywood films. A member of the successful Roshan film family, Mr. Roshan opened his own production company in 1982 and has been producing Hindi movies ever since. His film Kaho Naa…Pyaar Hai won nine Filmfare awards, including those for best movie and best director. I didn’t have the privilege of meeting Diana personally, but as a keen observer I learned a lot about her through the media and television coverage of her various activities and her visits to various countries, including India. I vividly remember when she came to my country and visited places that interested her, such as Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity, various homes of the destitute, orphanages, hospitals, and so on. On all of these occasions, her kind looks, kind words, and kind actions, such as holding the poor orphan children in her lap, caring for them with love, and wiping their tears, were sufficient indications to convey the passion that Diana had in her heart for the service of the poor and underprivileged. Wherever she went, she went with such noble mission. She derived a sort of divine pleasure through her visits to charitable institutions, orphanages, and homes of the destitute. By minutely looking at her, one could see a deity in Diana--dedicated to love and kindness--devoted to charity and goodness and the darling of all she met. For such human virtues, love for the poor and concern for the suffering of humanity, Diana commands the immense respect, admiration, and affection of the whole world. Wherever she went, she was received with genuine affection and warmth, unlike politically staged receptions.

Joseph Smith Jr. was born December 23, 1805, in Sharon, Windsor County, Vermont. During his early life, he moved with his family to present-day Manchester, in western New York. It was while he was living there in the spring of 1820, when he was fourteen years of age, that he experienced his first vision, in which he was visited in person by God, the Eternal Father, and His Son Jesus Christ. He was told in this vision that the true Church of Jesus Christ that had been established in New Testament times, and which had administered the fulness of the gospel, was no longer on the earth. Other divine manifestations followed in which he was taught by many angels; it was shown to him that God had a special work for him to do on the earth and that through him the Church of Jesus Christ would be restored to the earth.