Fellow Leo Quotes

I beg your pardon?” Catherine interrupted. “Are you implying that women have poor judgment?” “In these matters, yes.” Leo gestured to Christopher. “Just look at the fellow, standing there like a bloody Greek god. Do you think she chose him because of his intellect?” “I graduated from Cambridge,” Christopher said acidly. “Should I have brought my diploma?” “In this family,” Cam interrupted, “there is no requirement of a university degree to prove one’s intelligence. Lord Ramsay is a perfect example of how one has nothing to do with the other.

When in doubt, my dear fellow, do nothing.

Just look at the fellow, standing there like a bloody Greek god. Do you think she chose him because of his intellect?

Millions of men, renouncing their human feelings and reason, had to go from west to east to slay their fellows, just as some centuries previously hordes of men had come from the east to the west slaying their fellows.

Before Rohan could reply, a new voice entered the conversation. "What's this?" It was Leo, who had just arisen from bed and pulled on his clothes. He came barefoot from the direction of his bedroom. His bleary gaze moved over the pair of them. "Why are you on the floor with your buttons undone?" Amelia considered the question. "I decided to have a spontaneous tryst in the middle of the hallway with a man I hardly know." "Well, try to be quiet about it next time. A fellow needs his sleep." Amelia stared at him quizzically. "For heaven's sake, Leo, aren't you worried that I may have been compromised?" "Were you?" "I..." Her face turned hot as she glanced into Rohan's vivid topaz eyes. "I don't think so." "If you're not sure about it," Leo said, "you probably weren't.

There is an old Eastern fable about a traveler who is taken unawares on the steppes by a ferocious wild animal. In order to escape the beast the traveler hides in an empty well, but at the bottom of the well he sees a dragon with its jaws open, ready to devour him. The poor fellow does not dare to climb out because he is afraid of being eaten by the rapacious beast, neither does he dare drop to the bottom of the well for fear of being eaten by the dragon. So he seizes hold of a branch of a bush that is growing in the crevices of the well and clings on to it. His arms grow weak and he knows that he will soon have to resign himself to the death that awaits him on either side. Yet he still clings on, and while he is holding on to the branch he looks around and sees that two mice, one black and one white, are steadily working their way round the bush he is hanging from, gnawing away at it. Sooner or later they will eat through it and the branch will snap, and he will fall into the jaws of the dragon. The traveler sees this and knows that he will inevitably perish. But while he is still hanging there he sees some drops of honey on the leaves of the bush, stretches out his tongue and licks them. In the same way I am clinging to the tree of life, knowing full well that the dragon of death inevitably awaits me, ready to tear me to pieces, and I cannot understand how I have fallen into this torment. And I try licking the honey that once consoled me, but it no longer gives me pleasure. The white mouse and the black mouse – day and night – are gnawing at the branch from which I am hanging. I can see the dragon clearly and the honey no longer tastes sweet. I can see only one thing; the inescapable dragon and the mice, and I cannot tear my eyes away from them. And this is no fable but the truth, the truth that is irrefutable and intelligible to everyone. The delusion of the joys of life that had formerly stifled my fear of the dragon no longer deceived me. No matter how many times I am told: you cannot understand the meaning of life, do not thinking about it but live, I cannot do so because I have already done it for too long. Now I cannot help seeing day and night chasing me and leading me to my death. This is all I can see because it is the only truth. All the rest is a lie. Those two drops of honey, which more than all else had diverted my eyes from the cruel truth, my love for my family and for my writing, which I called art – I no longer found sweet.

The most important acts, both for the one who accomplishes them and for his fellow creatures, are those that have remote consequences.

He [Vronsky] himself felt that, except that crazy fellow married to Kitty Shcherbatsky, who, quite irrelevantly had with rabid virulence told him a lot of pointless nonsense, every nobleman whose acquaintance he had made had become his partisan.

Can it be that there is not enough space for man in this beautiful world, under those immeasurable, starry heavens? Is it possible that man's heart can harbour, amid such ravishing natural beauty, feelings of hatred, vengeance, or the desire to destroy his fellows? All the evil in man, one would think, should disappear on contact with Nature, the most spontaneous expression of beauty and goodness.

At the advent of danger there are always two voices that speak with equal force in the human heart: one very reasonably invites a man to consider the nature of the peril and the means of escaping it; the other, with a still greater show of reason, argues that it is too depressing and painful to think of the danger since it is not in man's power to foresee everything and avert the general march of events, and it is better therefore to shut one's eyes to the disagreeable until it actually comes, and to think instead of what is pleasant. When a man is alone he generally listens to the first voice; in the company of his fellow-men, to the second.

If we’re laying out a garden, planning one before the house, you know, and there you’ve a tree that’s stood for centuries in the very spot. . . . Old and gnarled it may be, and yet you don’t cut down the old fellow to make room for the flowerbeds, but lay out your beds so as to take advantage of the tree. You won’t grow him again in a year . . .

One man may not kill. If he kills a fellow-creature, he is a murderer. If two, ten, a hundred men do so, they, too, are murderers. But a government or a nation may kill as many men as it chooses, and that will not be murder, but a great and noble action. Only gather the people together on a large scale, and a battle of ten thousand men becomes an innocent action. But precisely how many people must there be to make it so?—that is the question. One man cannot plunder and pillage, but a whole nation can. But precisely how many are needed to make it permissible?

The absence of suffering, the satisfaction of one's needs and consequent freedom in the choice of one's occupation, that is, of one's way of life, now seemed to Pierre to be indubitably man's highest happiness. Here and now for the first time he fully appreciated the enjoyment of eating when he wanted to eat, drinking when he wanted to drink, sleeping when he wanted to sleep, of warmth when he was cold, of talking to a fellow man when he wished to talk and to hear a human voice. The satisfaction of one's needs—good food, cleanliness, and freedom—now that he was deprived of all this, seemed to Pierre to constitute perfect happiness

Reason discovered the struggle for existence and the law requiring that we oppress everyone who impedes the gratification of our desires. That is reason's conclusion. But loving one's fellow man reason could not discover because it is not reasonable.

The doctrine of Christ, which teaches love, humility, and self-denial, had always attracted me. But I found a contrary law, both in the history of the past and in the present organization of our lives – a law repugnant to my heart, my conscience, and my reason, but one that flattered my animal instincts. I knew that if I accepted the doctrine of Christ, I should be forsaken, miserable, persecuted, and sorrowing, as Christ tells us His followers will be. I knew that if I accepted that law of man, I should have the approbation of my fellow-men; I should be at peace and in safety; all possible sophisms would be at hand to quiet my conscience and I should ‘laugh and be merry,’ as Christ says. I felt this, and therefore I avoided a closer examination of the law of Christ, and tried to comprehend it in a way that should not prevent my still leading my animal life. But, finding that impossible, I desisted from all attempts at comprehension.

Every monarch in the world, except the Emperor of China, wears a military uniform, and bestows the greatest rewards on the man who kills the greatest number of his fellow-creatures.

Career" Galileo, the clergy maintained, was a pernicious and stubborn man. But time has a way of demonstrating the most stubborn are the most intelligent. In Galileo's day, a fellow scientist was no more stupid than Galileo. He was well aware the earth revolved, but he also had a large family to feed. Stepping into a carriage with his wife, after effecting his betrayal, he believed he was launched on a career, though he was undermining it in reality. Galileo alone had risked asserting the truth about our planet, and this made him a great man... His was a genuine career as I understand it. I salute then a career, when the career is akin to that of a Shakespeare or Pasteur, a Newton or Tolstoy- Leo! Why did people fling mud at them all? Talent speaks for itself, whatever the charges. We've forgotten the men who abused them, Remember only the victims of slander. All who rushed into the stratosphere, the doctors who perished fighting cholera, were, all of them, men of career! I take their careers as my example! I believe in their sacred faith. Their faith is my very manhood. I shall therefore pursue my career by trying not to pursue one.

It's beyond everything what's being done in the district, according to what this doctor tells me. He's a very intelligent fellow. And as I've told you before, I tell you again; it's not right for you not to go to the meetings, and altogether to keep out of the district business. If decent people won't go into it, of course it's bound to go all wrong. We pay the money, and it all goes in salaries, and there are no schools, not district nurses, nor midwives, nor drug-stores ---nothing [...] How can you think it a matter of no importance whether the peasant, whom you love as you assert...dies without help? The ignorant peasant-women starve the children, and the people stagnate in darkness, and are helpless in the hands of every village clerk, while you have at your disposal a means of helping them, and don't help them because to your mind it's of no importance." And Sergey Ivanovitch put before him the alternative: either you are so undeveloped that you can't see all that you can do , or you won't sacrifice your ease, your vanity, or whatever IT is, to do it.

A man does what he must, in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressure, and that is the basis of all human morality. And whatever maybe the sactifices he faces if he follows his conscience, the loss of his friends, his fortune, his contentment, even the esteem of his fellow men, each man must decide for himself the course he will follow. The stories of past courage cannot supply courage itself. For this each man must look into his own soul.

One man may not kill. If he kills a fellow-creature, he is a murderer. If two, ten, a hundred men do so, they, too, are murderers. But a government or a nation may kill as many men as it chooses, and that will not be murder, but a great and noble action.

Snobs by Julian Fellowes The Piano Teacher by Janice Y. K. Lee People Like Us by Dominick Dunne The Power of Style by Annette Tapert and Diana Edkins (this is out of print; I will lend you my copy) Pride and Avarice by Nicholas Coleridge The Soong Dynasty by Sterling Seagrave Freedom by Jonathan Franzen D. V. by Diana Vreeland A Princess Remembers: The Memoirs of the Maharani of Jaipur by Gayatri Devi Jane Austen—complete works beginning with Pride and Prejudice Edith Wharton—The Custom of the Country, The Age of Innocence, The Buccaneers, The House of Mirth (must be read in strict order—you will understand why when you finish the last one) Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh Anthony Trollope—all the books in the Palliser series, beginning with Can You Forgive Her?

If you only knew what those society women are, and women in general! My father is right. Selfish, vain, stupid, trivial in everything—that's what women are when you see them in their true colors! When you meet them in society it seems as if there were something in them, but there's nothing, nothing, nothing! No, don't marry, my dear fellow; don't marry!

Never, never marry, my dear fellow! That’s my advice: never marry till you can say to yourself that you have done all you are capable of, and until you have ceased to love the woman of your choice and have seen her plainly as she is, or else you will make a cruel and irrevocable mistake. Marry when you are old and good for nothing—or all that is good and noble in you will be lost. It will all be wasted on trifles. Yes!

One can only hope you feel better than you look,” Amelia said. “I’ll feel better once I can find some decent refreshment. I’ve asked thrice for wine or spirits, and the servants all seem damnably absentminded.” She frowned. “Surely it’s too early in the day even for you, Leo.” He extracted a pocket watch from his waistcoat and squinted at its face. “It’s eight o’clock in Bombay. Being an internationally minded fellow, I’ll have a drink as a diplomatic gesture.

To Konstantin the peasant was simply the chief partner in their common labor, and in spite of all the respect and the love, almost like that of kinship, he had for the peasant—sucked in probably, as he said himself, with the milk of his peasant nurse—still as a fellow-worker with him, while sometimes enthusiastic over the vigor, gentleness, and justice of these men, he was very often, when their common labors called for other qualities, exasperated with the peasant for his carelessness, lack of method, drunkenness, and lying.

Proshka was a man of self-esteem. He considered himself a cut above the rest, and had a degree of personal pride. His spell in prison was a humiliating experience for him. No longer could he strut with pride before his fellows, and his spirits sank at once. Proshka went home from prison embittered not so much against Pyotr Nikolayevich as against the whole world. Everyone said the same thing: after he came out of prison, Proshka went to pieces. He grew too lazy to work, took to drink, and was soon caught stealing clothes from the trademan's wife. Once again he ended up in prison.

Merripen,” Harry said pleasantly. “Did you enjoy the breakfast?” The Rom was in no mood for small talk. He stared at Harry with a gaze promising death. “Something is wrong,” he said. “If you’ve done something to harm Poppy, I will find you and rip your head from your—” “Merripen!” came a cheerful exclamation as Leo suddenly appeared beside them. Harry didn’t miss the way Leo jabbed a warning elbow against the Gypsy’s ribs. “All charm and lightness, as usual. You’re supposed to congratulate the bridegroom, phral. Not threaten to dismember him.” “It’s not a threat,” the Rom muttered. “It’s a promise.” Harry met Merripen’s gaze directly. “I appreciate your concern for her. I assure you, I’ll do everything in my power to make her happy. Poppy will have anything she wants.” “I believe a divorce would top the list,” Leo mused aloud. Harry leveled a cool stare at Merripen. “I’d like to point out that your sister married me voluntarily. Michael Bayning should have had the bollocks to come to the church and carry her out bodily if necessary. But he didn’t. And if he wasn’t willing to fight for her, he didn’t deserve her.” He saw from Merripen’s quick blink that he had scored a point. “Moreover, after going through these exertions to marry Poppy, the last thing I would do is mistreat her.” “What exertions?” the Rom asked suspiciously, and Harry realized that he hadn’t yet been told the entire story. “Never mind that,” Leo told Merripen. “If I told you now, you’d only make an embarrassing scene at Poppy’s wedding. And that’s supposed to be my job.” They exchanged a glance, and Merripen muttered something in Romany. Leo smiled faintly. “I have no idea what you just said. But I suspect it’s something about battering Poppy’s new husband into forest mulch.” He paused. “Later, old fellow,” he said. A look of grim understanding passed between them.

Boychik or boychikel is used with affection, even admiration, the way some people say, “That’s my boy,” or the way an earlier generation said, “Oh, you kid!” “Hello, boychik” or “How are you, boychikel?” may be uttered to males long past their boyhood; generally, when used to or about an aging man, boychik carries a tinge of sarcasm—but it can be used fondly: Affectionate: “That Sam”—sigh—”he has the spirit of a boychik.” Sarcastic: “At his age to go after young girls … ! Some boychik!” 2. Critically: A sharp operator; one who cuts corners. “He’s some boychik” can mean anything from “He’s a tricky fellow” to “Watch

The idea which had long ago and often occurred to him during the period of his active service, that there was and could be no sort of military science, and that therefore there could not be such a thing as military genius, seemed to him now to be an absolutely obvious truth. “What theory and science can there be of a subject of which the conditions and circumstances are uncertain and can never be definitely known, in which the strength of the active forces engaged can be even less definitely measured? No one can, or possibly could, know the relative positions of our army and the enemy's in another twenty-four hours, and no one can gauge the force of this or the other detachment. Sometimes when there is no coward in front to cry, ‘We are cut off!' and to run, but a brave, spirited fellow leads the way, shouting ‘Hurrah!' a detachment of five thousand is as good as thirty thousand, as it was at Schöngraben, while at times fifty thousand will run from eight thousand, as they did at Austerlitz. How can there be a science of war in which, as in every practical matter, nothing can be definite and everything depends on countless conditions, the influence of which becomes manifest all in a moment, and no one can know when that moment is coming.

I became expert at making myself invisible. I could linger two hours over a coffee, four over a meal, and hardly be noticed by the waitress. Though the janitors in Commons rousted me every night at closing time, I doubt they ever realized they spoke to the same boy twice. Sunday afternoons, my cloak of invisibility around my shoulders, I would sit in the infirmary for sometimes six hours at a time, placidly reading copies of Yankee magazine ('Clamming on Cuttyhunk') or Reader's Digest (Ten Ways to Help That Aching Back!'), my presence unremarked by receptionist, physician, and fellow sufferer alike. But, like the Invisible Man in H. G. Wells, I discovered that my gift had its price, which took the form of, in my case as in his, a sort of mental darkness. It seemed that people failed to meet my eye, made as if to walk through me; my superstitions began to transform themselves into something like mania. I became convinced that it was only a matter of time before one of the rickety iron steps that led to my room gave and I would fall and break my neck or, worse, a leg; I'd freeze or starve before Leo would assist me. Because one day, when I'd climbed the stairs successfully and without fear, I'd had an old Brian Eno song running through my head ('In New Delhi, 'And Hong Kong,' They all know that it won't be long...'), I now had to sing it to myself each trip up or down the stairs. And each time I crossed the footbridge over the river, twice a day, I had to stop and scoop around in the coffee-colored snow at the road's edge until I found a decent-sized rock. I would then lean over the icy railing and drop it into the rapid current that bubbled over the speckled dinosaur eggs of granite which made up its bed - a gift to the river-god, maybe, for safe crossing, or perhaps some attempt to prove to it that I, though invisible, did exist. The water ran so shallow and clear in places that sometimes I heard the dropped stone click as it hit the bed. Both hands on the icy rail, staring down at the water as it dashed white against the boulders, boiled thinly over the polished stones, I wondered what it would be like to fall and break my head open on one of those bright rocks: a wicked crack, a sudden limpness, then veins of red marbling the glassy water. If I threw myself off, I thought, who would find me in all that white silence? Might the river beat me downstream over the rocks until it spat me out in the quiet waters, down behind the dye factory, where some lady would catch me in the beam of her headlights when she pulled out of the parking lot at five in the afternoon? Or would I, like the pieces of Leo's mandolin, lodge stubbornly in some quiet place behind a boulder and wait, my clothes washing about me, for spring?

Catherine Marks came to stand on the other side of the doorway as if she were a fellow sentinel guarding the castle gate. Leo glanced at her covertly. She was dressed in lavender, unlike her usual drab of colors. Her mousy brown hair was pulled back into such a tight chignon as to make it difficult for her to blink. The spectacles sat oddly on her nose, one of the wire earpieces crimped. It gave her the appearance of a befuddled owl. "What are you looking at?" she asked tersely. "Your spectacles are crooked," Leo said, trying not to smile. She scowled. "I tried to fix them, but it only made them worse." "Give them to me." Before she could object, he took them from her face and began to fiddle with the bent wire. She spluttered in protest. "My lord, I didn't ask you to- if you damage them-" "How did you bend the earpiece?" Leo asked, patiently straightening the wire. "I dropped them on the floor, and as I was searching, I stepped on them." "Nearsighted, are you?" "Quite." Having reshaped the earpiece, Leo scrutinized the spectacles carefully. "There." He began to give them to her and paused as he stared into her eyes, all blue, green, and gray, contained in distinct dark rims. Brilliant, warm, changeable. Like opals. Why had he never noticed them before? Awareness chased over him, making his skin prickle as if exposed to a sudden change in temperature. She wasn't plain at all. She was beautiful, in a fine, subtle way, like winter moonlight, or the sharp linen smell of daisies. So cool and pale... delicious. For a moment, Leo couldn't move.

Aksënov was a handsome, fair-haired, curly-headed fellow, full of fun and very fond of singing. When quite a young man he had been given to drink and was riotous when he had too much; but after he married he gave up drinking except now and then. One summer Aksënov was going to the Nizhny Fair, and as he bade goodbye to his family his wife said to him, “Iván Dmitrich, do not start today; I have had a bad dream about you.’ Aksënov laughed, and said, ‘You are afraid that when I get to the fair I shall go on the spree.’ His wife replied: ‘I do not know what I am afraid of; all I know is that I had a bad dream. I dreamt you returned from the town, and when you took off your cap I saw that your hair was quite grey.’ Aksënov laughed. ‘That’s a lucky sign,’ said he. ‘See if I don’t sell out all my goods and bring you some presents from the fair.

Phelan,” Cam said, looking up with an easy smile, “have you come to see the timber yard?” “Thank you, but I’m here for another reason.” Leo, who was standing near the window, glanced from Christopher’s rumpled attire to Beatrix’s disheveled condition. “Beatrix, darling, have you taken to going off the estate dressed like that?” “Only this once,” she said apologetically. “I was in a hurry.” “A hurry involving Captain Phelan?” Leo’s sharp gaze moved to Christopher. “What do you wish to discuss?” “It’s personal,” Christopher said quietly. “And it concerns your sister.” He looked from Cam to Leo. Ordinarily there would have been no question concerning which one of them to approach. As lord of the manor, Leo would have been the first choice. However, the Hathaways seemed to have settled on an unconventional sharing of roles. “Which one of you should I talk to?” Christopher asked. They pointed to each other and replied at the same time. “Him.” Cam spoke to Leo. “You’re the viscount.” “You’re the one who usually deals with that sort of thing,” Leo protested. “Yes. But you won’t like my opinion on this one.” “You’re not actually considering giving them your approval, are you?” “Of all the Hathaway sisters,” Cam said equably, “Beatrix is the one most suited to choose her own husband. I trust her judgment.” Beatrix gave him a brilliant smile. “Thank you, Cam.” “What are you thinking?” Leo demanded of his brother-in-law. “You can’t trust Beatrix’s judgment.” “Why not?” “She’s too young,” Leo said. “I’m twenty-three,” Beatrix protested. “In dog years I’d be dead.” “And you’re female,” Leo persisted. “I beg your pardon?” Catherine interrupted. “Are you implying that women have poor judgment?” “In these matters, yes.” Leo gestured to Christopher. “Just look at the fellow, standing there like a bloody Greek god. Do you think she chose him because of his intellect?” “I graduated from Cambridge,” Christopher said acidly. “Should I have brought my diploma?” “In this family,” Cam interrupted, “there is no requirement of a university degree to prove one’s intelligence. Lord Ramsay is a perfect example of how one has nothing to do with the other.” “Phelan,” Leo said, “I don’t intend to be offensive, however--” “It’s something that comes naturally to him,” Catherine interrupted sweetly.

Come here, you flea-ridden hair wad. You’ll have all the sugar biscuits you want, if you’ll give your new toy to me.” He whistled softly and clicked. But the blandishments did not work. Dodger merely regarded him with bright eyes and stayed at the threshold, clutching the vial in his tiny paws. “Give him one of your garters,” Leo said, still staring at the ferret. “I beg your pardon?” Miss Marks asked frostily. “You heard me. Take off a garter and offer it to him as a trade. Otherwise we’ll be chasing this damned animal all through the house. And I doubt Rohan will appreciate the delay.” The governess gave Leo a long-suffering glance. “Only for Mr. Rohan’s sake would I consent to this. Turn your back.” “For God’s sake, Marks, do you think anyone really wants a glance at those dried-up matchsticks you call legs?” But Leo complied, facing the opposite direction. He heard a great deal of rustling as Miss Marks sat on a bedroom chair and lifted her skirts. It just so happened that Leo was positioned near a full-length looking glass, the oval cheval style that tilted up or down to adjust one’s reflection. And he had an excellent view of Miss Marks in the chair. And the oddest thing happened—he got a flash of an astonishingly pretty leg. He blinked in bemusement, and then the skirts were dropped. “Here,” Miss Marks said gruffly, and tossed it in Leo’s direction. Turning, he managed to catch it in midair. Dodger surveyed them both with beady-eyed interest. Leo twirled the garter enticingly on his finger. “Have a look, Dodger. Blue silk with lace trim. Do all governesses anchor their stockings in such a delightful fashion? Perhaps those rumors about your unseemly past are true, Marks.” “I’ll thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head, my lord.” Dodger’s little head bobbed as it followed every movement of the garter. Fitting the vial in his mouth, the ferret carried it like a miniature dog, loping up to Leo with maddening slowness. “This is a trade, old fellow,” Leo told him. “You can’t have something for nothing.” Carefully Dodger set down the vial and reached for the garter. Leo simultaneously gave him the frilly circlet and snatched the vial.

What did you hope to get out of killing Win’s doctor?” “Enjoyment.” “No doubt you would have. Win didn’t seem to be enjoying it, however.” “Why is Harrow here?” Kev asked fiercely. “I can answer that one,” Leo said, leaning a shoulder against the wall with casual ease. “Harrow wants to become better acquainted with the Hathaways. Because he and my sister are … close.” Kev abruptly felt a sickening weight in his stomach, as if he’d swallowed a handful of river stones. “What do you mean?” he asked, even though he knew. No man could be exposed to Win and not fall in love with her. “Harrow is a widower,” Leo said. “A decent enough fellow. More attached to his clinic and patients than anything else. But he’s a sophisticated man, widely traveled, and wealthy as the devil. And he’s a collector of beautiful objects. A connoisseur of fine things.” Neither of the other men missed the implication. Win would indeed be an exquisite addition to a collection of fine things. It was difficult to ask the next question, but Kev forced himself to. “Does Win care for him?” “I don’t believe Win knows how much of what she feels for him is gratitude, and how much is true affection.” Leo gave Kev a pointed glance. “And there are still a few unresolved questions she has to answer for herself.” “I’ll talk to her.” “I wouldn’t, if I were you. Not until she cools a bit. She’s rather incensed with you.” “Why?” Kev asked, wondering if she had confided to her brother about the events of the previous night. “Why?” Leo’s mouth twisted. “There’s such a dazzling array of choices, I find myself in a quandary about which one to start with. Putting the subject of this morning aside, what about the fact that you never wrote to her?” “I did,” Kev said indignantly. “One letter,” Leo allowed. “The farm report. She showed it to me, actually. How could one forget the soaring prose you wrote about fertilizing the field near the east gate? I’ll tell you, the part about sheep dung nearly brought a tear to my eye, it was so sentimental and—” “What did she expect me to write about?” Kev demanded. “Don’t bother to explain, my lord,” Cam interceded as Leo opened his mouth. “It’s not the way of the Rom to put our private thoughts on paper.

Leo was at her side in an instant, crouching on the floor as he sorted through the hissing tangle of limbs and skirts. “Are you hurt? I feel certain there’s a woman in here somewhere. … Ah, there you are. Easy, now. Let me—” “Don’t touch me,” she snapped, batting at him with her fists. “I’m not touching you. That is, I’m only touching you with the—ow, damn it—with the intention of helping.” Her hat, a little scrap of wool felt with cheap corded trim, had fallen over her face. Leo managed to push it back to the top of her head, narrowly missing a sharp blow to his jaw. “Christ. Would you stop flailing for a moment?” Struggling to a sitting position, she glared at him. Leo crawled to retrieve the spectacles and returned to hand them to her. She snatched them from him without a word of thanks. She was a lean, anxious-looking woman. A young woman with narrowed eyes, from which bad temper flashed out. Her light brown hair was pulled back with a gallows-rope tightness that made Leo wince just to see it. One would have hoped for some compensating feature—a soft pair of lips, perhaps, or a pretty bosom. But no, there was only a stern mouth, a flat chest, and gaunt cheeks. If Leo were compelled to spend any time with her—which, thankfully, he wasn’t—he would have started by feeding her. “If you want to help,” she said coldly, hooking the spectacles around her ears, “retrieve that blasted ferret for me. Perhaps I’ve tired him enough that you may be able to run him to ground.” Still crouching on the floor, Leo glanced at the ferret, which had paused ten yards away and was watching them both with bright, beady eyes. “What is his name?” “Dodger.” Leo gave a low whistle and a few clicks of his tongue. “Come here, Dodger. You’ve caused enough trouble for the morning. Though I can’t fault your taste in … ladies’ garters? Is that what you’re holding?” The woman watched, stupefied, as the ferret’s long, slender body wriggled toward Leo. Chattering busily, Dodger crawled onto Leo’s thigh. “Good fellow,” Leo said, stroking the sleek fur. “How did you do that?” the woman asked in annoyance. “I have a way with animals. They tend to acknowledge me as one of their own.” Leo gently pried a frilly bit of lace and ribbon from the long front teeth. It was definitely a garter, deliciously feminine and impractical. He gave the woman a mocking smile as he handed it to her. “No doubt this is yours.

If the claims of the papacy cannot be proven from what we know of the historical Peter, there are, on the other hand, several undoubted facts in the real history of Peter which bear heavily upon those claims, namely: 1. That Peter was married, Matt. 8:14, took his wife with him on his missionary tours, 1 Cor. 9:5, and, according to a possible interpretation of the "coëlect" (sister), mentions her in 1 Pet. 5:13. Patristic tradition ascribes to him children, or at least a daughter (Petronilla). His wife is said to have suffered martyrdom in Rome before him. What right have the popes, in view of this example, to forbid clerical marriage?  We pass by the equally striking contrast between the poverty of Peter, who had no silver nor gold (Acts 3:6) and the gorgeous display of the triple-crowned papacy in the middle ages and down to the recent collapse of the temporal power. 2. That in the Council at Jerusalem (Acts 15:1–11), Peter appears simply as the first speaker and debater, not as president and judge (James presided), and assumes no special prerogative, least of all an infallibility of judgment. According to the Vatican theory the whole question of circumcision ought to have been submitted to Peter rather than to a Council, and the decision ought to have gone out from him rather than from "the apostles and elders, brethren" (or "the elder brethren," 15:23). 3. That Peter was openly rebuked for inconsistency by a younger apostle at Antioch (Gal. 2:11–14). Peter’s conduct on that occasion is irreconcilable with his infallibility as to discipline; Paul’s conduct is irreconcilable with Peter’s alleged supremacy; and the whole scene, though perfectly plain, is so inconvenient to Roman and Romanizing views, that it has been variously distorted by patristic and Jesuit commentators, even into a theatrical farce gotten up by the apostles for the more effectual refutation of the Judaizers! 4. That, while the greatest of popes, from Leo I. down to Leo XIII. never cease to speak of their authority over all the bishops and all the churches, Peter, in his speeches in the Acts, never does so. And his Epistles, far from assuming any superiority over his "fellow-elders" and over "the clergy" (by which he means the Christian people), breathe the spirit of the sincerest humility and contain a prophetic warning against the besetting sins of the papacy, filthy avarice and lordly ambition (1 Pet. 5:1–3). Love of money and love of power are twin-sisters, and either of them is "a root of all evil." It is certainly very significant that the weaknesses even more than the virtues of the natural Peter—his boldness and presumption, his dread of the cross, his love for secular glory, his carnal zeal, his use of the sword, his sleepiness in Gethsemane—are faithfully reproduced in the history of the papacy; while the addresses and epistles of the converted and inspired Peter contain the most emphatic protest against the hierarchical pretensions and worldly vices of the papacy, and enjoin truly evangelical principles—the general priesthood and royalty of believers, apostolic poverty before the rich temple, obedience to God rather than man, yet with proper regard for the civil authorities, honorable marriage, condemnation of mental reservation in Ananias and Sapphira, and of simony in Simon Magus, liberal appreciation of heathen piety in Cornelius, opposition to the yoke of legal bondage, salvation in no other name but that of Jesus Christ.

Prince Andrew could no longer restrain himself and wept tender loving tears for his fellow men, for himself, and for his own and their errors.

The thought which tranquillized Rastopchin was not a new one. Since the world began and men have killed one another no one has ever committed such a crime against his fellow-man without comforting himself with this same idea. This idea is le bien public, the hypothetical welfare of other people.

So all these causes—myriads of causes—coincided to bring it about. And so there was no one cause for that occurrence, but it had to occur because it had to. Millions of men, renouncing their human feelings and reason, had to go from west to east to slay their fellows, just as some centuries previously hordes of men had come from the east to the west, slaying their fellows. The actions of Napoleon and Alexander, on whose words the event seemed to hang, were as little voluntary as the actions of any soldier who was drawn into the campaign by lot or by conscription.

He genuinely believed that he had enemies and convincing himself that he must take revenge on someone and wash away some insult with blood brought him the greatest pleasure. He was quite certain that hatred, vengeance and contempt for human race were the noblest and most poetic of emotion. But his mistress, maintained that he was the kindest and gentlest of men, and that every evening he would enter his melancholy thoughts in a diary, draw up his accounts on ruled paper, and then go down on his knees to pray. And how that man suffered, just to appear in his own eyes the way he wanted to appear, fir his fellow officers and the soldiers could never see him the way he wanted to be seen.

Keeping his chain-reaction patent a secret was one way for Szilard to prevent Germany from realizing fission’s military potential. Another way was to urge fellow scientists to censor their own research.

Since the world began and men have killed one another no one has ever committed such a crime against his fellow-man without comforting himself with this same idea. This idea is le bien public, the hypothetical welfare of other people.

While Socrates does not claim to have heard the speech of a god, he claims that a voice—something divine and demonic—speaks to him from time to time, his daimonion. This daimonion, however, has no connection with Socrates’s mission, for it never urges him forward but only keeps him back. While the Delphic oracle urged him forward toward philosophizing, toward examining his fellow men, and thus made him generally hated and thus brought him into mortal danger, his daimonion kept him back from political activity and thus saved him from mortal danger.

Never, never marry, my dear fellow! That’s my advice: never marry till you can say to yourself that you have done all you are capable of, and until you have ceased to love the woman of your choice and have seen her plainly as she is, or else you will make a cruel and irrevocable mistake. Marry when you are old and good for nothing—or all that is good and noble in you will be lost.

Cain—like his fellow fratricide, Romulus—founded a city, and some of his descendants were the ancestors of men practicing various arts: the city and the arts, so alien to man’s original simplicity, owe their origin to Cain and his race rather than to Seth, the substitute for Abel, and his race. It goes without saying that this is not the last word of the Bible on the city and the arts but it is its first word, just as the prohibition against eating of the tree of knowledge is, one may say, its first word simply, and the revelation of the Torah—i.e., the highest kind of knowledge of good and evil that is vouchsafed to men—is its last word.

millions of Christian men professing the law of love of their fellows slew one another.

As if Meena would let his usual preference deter her. This Leo fellow was the jam to her peanut butter. The whipped cream to her sundae. The guy to rock her world, break her bed, and maybe help her avoid the disasters that seemed to follow her around, or, at least, manage to calm tempers with his voodoo omega powers when she pissed people off. In other words, the perfect man.

Anyhow, I drove like my daddy was chasing me, which he did a few times when I was a teenager and I snuck out of the house, and made it to the airport. I stowed away on a plane, which looks a lot more fun in the movies by the way, and made it back home. Most guys would have stopped at that point but Dmitri, being stubborn, called a few times spouting off, so I had my number changed.” “But?” “But, he got my family’s number and started calling them. Which was fine. My aunts and stuff blocked him, but thing is, he showed up on my parents’ doorstep while I was out shopping. My parents are vacationing in Mexico, and so Aunt Cecily had to deal with him.” “They scared her.” She laughed. “Scare my Aunt Cecily? Not in this lifetime. She wields a mean right hook. Daddy’s sister is the one who taught me to fight dirty.” “Something had to have happened to get you banished.” “Well, she was kind of worried about me, on account of me being delicate and stuff.” He couldn’t help but snort. “Yeah, that was my reaction too, but that’s what I get for being the youngest in the family. Teena beat me into the world by like ten seconds. Anyhow, Aunt Cecily would have kept me around, except the goons trampled Mama’s flower garden during one of their kidnapping attempts.” “You got banished over flowers?” “No, I got banished before the goons did any more damage to Mama’s stuff. When my mother cries, Daddy gets a little upset, and when Daddy gets upset, things happen. Dealing with the disposal of bodies is always a pain, and law enforcement really frowns upon murder. And Daddy’s been trying so hard to stay out of jail. Anyhow, for the good of the family, it was strongly suggested I take an extended vacation in the hopes my absence would see Dmitri call off his paid thugs and give up on the whole marriage business.” “Except he realized you took off and followed you here.” A frown creased her brow. “Yeah, which is weird because I was certain I didn’t have a tail.” “Well, you’re going to have one now, twenty-four-seven, until I locate this Dmitri fellow and tell him to get the hell out of pride territory.” -Meena & Leo

He couldn’t spot them, and the minor foot traffic on the sidewalk was not enough to hide. They must have entered a building or alley. Rather than searching all of them, he let his nose do its job. Big breath in. Filter the smells. Aha. There, up the sidewalk a few more storefronts then into an arcade. The wolves that dragged her probably hoped to hide their scent and sneak out the back. Except Hayder knew this place. He knew where the door to the alley was, thus, when the steel door swung open, he stood there, arms crossed waiting for them. “Shit, he’s here. Get back inside,” the chubby one grunted. “Oh, don’t leave on my account. I insist you stay.” And to make sure they did, he kicked the door shut. The two thugs backed away from him, the one who needed to invest in a treadmill holding Arabella, who hung limp in his grasp, before him as a shield. She was alive. However, her eyes bore a resigned expression Hayder didn’t like at all. “Baby, are you all right? Did they hurt you?” The answer was moot. At this point, he was going to punish them no matter what, violently. They’d done the unforgivable when they’d taken Arabella and scared her. However, if they’d actually hurt her, or if she cried… We’ll make them wish their mother had a headache the night they were conceived. Rawr. Her reply emerged so soft he almost missed it. “I told you this would happen. They’ll never let me be free.” How utterly convinced she seemed and miserable. Totally unacceptable. “Don’t you dare take this without a fight,” he growled. The chubby one should have spent more time on expanding his mind instead of his waistline because he showed no sense at all when he said, “Bella here knows her place, and after the next full moon, it will be on her knees, serving the new alpha of the pack.” Hell no. Hayder didn’t even think twice about it. His fist shot out, and it connected to the idiot’s nose with a satisfying crunch, and that left one wolf. An even dumber wolf that seemed to think the switchblade he’d pulled out of a pocket and waved around would really make a difference. “Are you stupid enough to think you can take me with that puny knife?” Hayder couldn’t stem the incredulity in his query. “Stay back, cat, or else. It’s silver.” Silver, which meant painful if he got sliced with it. Harder to heal, too. But a three-inch blade wasn’t going to keep Hayder away from his woman. As beta, though, he did try to give the idiot a chance. Show patience before acting, or so he’d been taught as part of those anger management courses Leo made him take. Hayder employed one of the tricks to control impulsive acts. He counted. “Three.” “I’ll cut you.” Slash. Slash. The knifeman sketched lines in the air. “Two.” “I mean it.” “One. You’re dead.” Hayder took a step forward even as the last dumb wolf took a step back, one hand clamped around Arabella’s arm. Lightning fast, Hayder shot a hand out to grab the wrist of the guy wielding the knife. This fellow had slightly faster reflexes than his pack brothers and actually managed to score a line of red across his palm. The blood didn’t bother Hayder. ’Twas but a scratch. However, the coppery scent did something to Arabella. Up snapped her head. Her nostrils flared. Her brown eyes took on a wildness. Her lips pulled back in a snarl. “Don’t. Touch. Him!” With a screech, she turned on her captor and then proceeded to go rabid on his ass. How cool.

Which one of you should I talk to?” Christopher asked. They pointed to each other and replied at the same time. “Him.” Cam spoke to Leo. “You’re the viscount.” “You’re the one who usually deals with that sort of thing,” Leo protested. “Yes. But you won’t like my opinion on this one.” “You’re not actually considering giving them your approval, are you?” “Of all the Hathaway sisters,” Cam said equably, “Beatrix is the one most suited to choose her own husband. I trust her judgment.” Beatrix gave him a brilliant smile. “Thank you, Cam.” “What are you thinking?” Leo demanded of his brother-in-law. “You can’t trust Beatrix’s judgment.” “Why not?” “She’s too young,” Leo said. “I’m twenty-three,” Beatrix protested. “In dog years I’d be dead.” “And you’re female,” Leo persisted. “I beg your pardon?” Catherine interrupted. “Are you implying that women have poor judgment?” “In these matters, yes.” Leo gestured to Christopher. “Just look at the fellow, standing there like a bloody Greek god. Do you think she chose him because of his intellect?” “I graduated from Cambridge,” Christopher said acidly. “Should I have brought my diploma?” “In this family,” Cam interrupted, “there is no requirement of a university degree to prove one’s intelligence. Lord Ramsay is a perfect example of how one has nothing to do with the other.” “Phelan,” Leo said, “I don’t intend to be offensive, however--” “It’s something that comes naturally to him,” Catherine interrupted sweetly. Leo sent his wife a scowl and returned his attention to Christopher. “You and Beatrix haven’t known each other long enough to consider matrimony. A matter of weeks, to my knowledge. And what about Prudence Mercer? You’re practically betrothed, aren’t you?” “Those are valid points,” Christopher said. “And I will answer them. But you should know right away that I’m against the match.” Leo blinked in bemusement. “You mean you’re against a match with Miss Mercer?” “Well…yes. But I’m also against a match with Beatrix.” Silence fell over the room. “This is a trick of some sort,” Leo said. “Unfortunately, it’s not,” Christopher replied. Another silence. “Captain Phelan,” Cam asked, choosing his words with care. “Have you come to ask for our consent to marry Beatrix?” Christopher shook his head. “If I decide to marry Beatrix, I’ll do it with or without your consent.” Leo looked at Cam. “Good God,” he said in disgust. “This one’s worse than Harry.” Cam wore an expression of beleaguered patience. “Perhaps we should both talk to Captain Phelan in the library. With brandy.” “I want my own bottle,” Leo said feelingly, leading the way.

as though he was really saying that all desire for positive happiness is implanted in us merely to torment us and never be satisfied. But Pierre believed it without any mental reservation. The absence of suffering, the satisfaction of one's needs and consequent freedom in the choice of one's occupation, that is, of one's way of life, now seemed to Pierre to be indubitably man's highest happiness. Here and now for the first time he fully appreciated the enjoyment of eating when he wanted to eat, drinking when he wanted to drink, sleeping when he wanted to sleep, of warmth when he was cold, of talking to a fellow man when he wished to talk and to hear a human voice. The satisfaction of one's needs—good food, cleanliness, and freedom—now

And there was so much kindliness and simplicity in his singsong voice that Pierre tried to reply, but his jaw trembled and he felt tears rising to his eyes. The little fellow, giving Pierre no time to betray his confusion, instantly continued in the same pleasant tones: "Eh, lad, don't fret!" said he, in the tender singsong caressing voice old Russian peasant women employ. "Don't fret, friend—'suffer an hour, live for an age!' that's how it is, my dear fellow. And here we live, thank heaven, without offense. Among these folk, too, there are good men as well as bad," said he, and still speaking, he turned on his knees with a supple movement, got up, coughed, and went off to another part of the shed.

We are forced to fall back on fatalism as an explanation of irrational events (that is to say, events the reasonableness of which we do not understand). The more we try to explain such events in history reasonably, the more unreasonable and incomprehensible do they become to us. Each man lives for himself, using his freedom to attain his personal aims, and feels with his whole being that he can now do or abstain from doing this or that action; but as soon as he has done it, that action performed at a certain moment in time becomes irrevocable and belongs to history, in which it has not a free but a predestined significance. There are two sides to the life of every man, his individual life, which is the more free the more abstract its interests, and his elemental hive life in which he inevitably obeys laws laid down for him. Man lives consciously for himself, but is an unconscious instrument in the attainment of the historic, universal, aims of humanity. A deed done is irrevocable, and its result coinciding in time with the actions of millions of other men assumes an historic significance. The higher a man stands on the social ladder, the more people he is connected with and the more power he has over others, the more evident is the predestination and inevitability of his every action. "The king's heart is in the hands of the Lord." A king is history's slave. History, that is, the unconscious, general, hive life of mankind, uses every moment of the life of kings as a tool for its own purposes. Though Napoleon at that time, in 1812, was more convinced than ever that it depended on him, verser (ou ne pas verser) le sang de ses peuples *—as Alexander expressed it in the last letter he wrote him—he had never been so much in the grip of inevitable laws, which compelled him, while thinking that he was acting on his own volition, to perform for the hive life—that is to say, for history—whatever had to be performed. * "To shed (or not to shed) the blood of his peoples." The people of the west moved eastwards to slay their fellow men, and by the law of coincidence thousands of minute causes fitted in and co-ordinated to produce that movement and war: reproaches for the nonobservance of the Continental System, the Duke of Oldenburg's wrongs, the movement of troops into Prussia—undertaken (as it seemed to Napoleon) only for the purpose of securing an armed peace, the French Emperor's love and habit of war coinciding with his people's inclinations, allurement by the grandeur of the preparations, and the expenditure on those preparations and the need of obtaining advantages to compensate for that expenditure, the intoxicating honors he received in Dresden, the diplomatic negotiations which, in the opinion of contemporaries, were carried on with a sincere desire to attain peace, but which only wounded the self-love of both sides, and millions of other causes that adapted themselves

Sinful? Where's the sin?' demanded the old man. 'A sin to look at a pretty girl? A sin to walk out with one? A sin to love one? Be that a sin where you come from? No, my dear boy, that ain't no sin, 'tis salvation. God made you, and God made the girl, too. He made everything there is. So 'tain't no sin to look at a pretty wench. That's what she were made for, to be loved and to give happiness. That's the way I sees it, my good fellow.

In fact, it is by no means certain that the purpose of Plato or of Aristotle, as Fārābī understood it, required the actualization of the best political order or of the virtuous city. Fārābī adumbrates the problem by making a distinction between Socrates’ investigations and Plato’s investigations, as well as between “the way of Socrates” and the way adopted eventually by Plato. “The science and the art of Socrates” which is to be found in Plato’s Laws, is only a part of Plato’s, the other part being “the science and the art of Timaeus” which is to be found in the Timaeus. “The way of Socrates” is characterized by the emphasis on “the scientific investigation of justice and the virtues,” whereas the art of Plato is meant to supply “the science of the essence of every being” and hence especially the science of the divine and on the natural things. The difference between the way of Socrates and the way of Plato points back to the difference between the attitude of the two men toward the actual cities. The crucial difficulty was created by the political or social status of philosophy: in the nations and cities of Plato’s time, there was no freedom of teaching and of investigation. Socrates was therefore confronted with the alternative, whether he should choose security and life, and thus conform with the false opinions and the wrong way of life of his fellow-citizens, or else non-conformity and death. Socrates chose non-conformity and death. Plato found a solution to the problem posed by the fate of Socrates, in founding the virtuous city in speech: only in that “other city” can man reach his perfection. Yet, according to Fārābī, Plato “repeated” his account of the way of Socrates and he “repeated” the mention of the vulgar of the cities and nations which existed in his time. The repetition amounts to a considerable modification of the first statement, or to a correction of the Socratic way. The Platonic way, as distinguished from the Socratic way, is a combination of the way of Socrates with the way of Thrasymachus; for the intransigent way of Socrates is appropriate only for the philosopher’s dealing with the elite, whereas the way of Thrasymachus, which is both more and less exacting than the former, is appropriate for his dealing with the vulgar. What Fārābī suggests is that by combining the way of Socrates with the way of Thrasymachus, Plato avoided the conflict with the vulgar and thus the fate of Socrates. Accordingly, the revolutionary quest for the other city ceased to be necessary: Plato substituted it for a more constructive way of action, namely, the gradual replacement of the accepted opinions by the truth or an approximation of the truth. The replacement of the accepted opinions could not be gradual, if it were not accompanied by a provisional acceptance of the accepted opinions: as Fārābī elsewhere declares, conformity with the opinions of the religious community in which one is brought up, is a necessary qualification for the future philosopher. The replacement of the accepted opinions could not be gradual if it were not accompanied by the suggestion of opinions which, while pointing toward the truth, do not too flagrantly contradict the accepted opinions. We may say that Fārābī’s Plato eventually replaces the philosopher-king who rules openly in the virtuous city, by the secret kingship of the philosopher who, being “a perfect man” precisely because he is an “investigator,” lives privately as a member of an imperfect society which he tries to humanize within the limits of the possible.

[Many ordinary people] would admit, as a matter of course, that man can lie and does lie. But they would add that lies are short-lived and cannot stand the test of repetition—let alone of constant repetition—and that therefore a statement which is constantly repeated and never contradicted must be true. Another line of argument maintains that a statement made by an ordinary fellow may be a lie, but the truth of a statement made by a responsible and respected man, and therefore particularly by a man in a highly responsible or exalted position, is morally certain. These two enthymemes lead to the conclusion that the truth of a statement which is constantly repeated by the head of government and never contradicted is absolutely certain.

When the baby was tidied up and turned into a stiff little doll, Lizaveta Petrovna rocked him once, as if proud of her work, and drew back so that Levin could see his son in all his beauty. Kitty, not taking her eyes away, looked sidelong in the same direction. ‘Give him here, give him here!’ she said and even rose slightly. ‘No, no, Katerina Alexandrovna, you mustn’t make such movements! Wait, I’ll bring him. Here, we’ll show papa what a fine fellow we are!’ And Lizaveta Petrovna held out to Levin on one hand (the other merely propping the unsteady head with its fingers) this strange, wobbly, red being whose head was hidden behind the edge of the swaddling-clothes. There was also a nose, crossed eyes and smacking lips. ‘A beautiful baby!’ said Lizaveta Petrovna. Levin sighed with dismay. This beautiful baby inspired only a feeling of squeamishness and pity in him. It was not at all the feeling he had expected. He turned away while Lizaveta Petrovna was putting him to the unaccustomed breast. Suddenly laughter made him raise his head. It was Kitty laughing. The baby had taken the breast. ‘Well, enough, enough!’ said Lizaveta Petrovna, but Kitty would not let go of him. The baby fell asleep in her arms. ‘Look now,’ said Kitty, turning the baby towards him so that he could see him. The old-looking face suddenly wrinkled still more, and the baby sneezed. Smiling and barely keeping back tears of tenderness, Levin kissed his wife and left the darkened room. What he felt for this small being was not at all what he had expected. There was nothing happy or joyful in this feeling; on the contrary, there was a new tormenting fear. There was an awareness of a new region of vulnerability. And this awareness was so tormenting at first, the fear lest this helpless being should suffer was so strong, that because of it he scarcely noticed the strange feeling of senseless joy and even pride he had experienced when the baby sneezed.

Never, never marry, my dear fellow! That's my advice: never marry till you can say to yourself that you have done all you are capable of, and until you have ceased to love the woman of your choice and have seen her plainly as she is, or else you will make a cruel and irrevocable mistake. Marry when you are old and good for nothing—or all that is good and noble in you will be lost. It will all be wasted on trifles. Yes! Yes! Yes! Don't look at me with such surprise. If you marry expecting anything from yourself in the future, you will feel at every step that for you all is ended, all is closed except the drawing room, where you will be ranged side by side with a court lackey and an idiot!...

In their eyes, though he was now thirty-two, he did not have any regular, defined activity or position in society, whereas among his comrades one was already a colonel and imperial aide-de-camp, one a professor, one the director of a bank and a railway or the chief of an office like Oblonsky, while he (he knew very well what he must seem like to others) was a landowner, occupied with breeding cows, shooting snipe, and building things, that is, a giftless fellow who amounted to nothing and was doing, in society’s view, the very thing that good-for-nothing people do.

We had a friend, a poor fellow, who, with his last pennies, bought a metal wind-up canary. We cracked our heads trying to explain this act, until we recalled that our friend was simply very stupid.

Snobs by Julian Fellowes The Piano Teacher by Janice Y. K. Lee People Like Us by Dominick Dunne The Power of Style by Annette Tapert and Diana Edkins (this is out of print; I will lend you my copy) Pride and Avarice by Nicholas Coleridge The Soong Dynasty by Sterling Seagrave Freedom by Jonathan Franzen D. V. by Diana Vreeland A Princess Remembers: The Memoirs of the Maharani of Jaipur by Gayatri Devi Jane Austen—complete works beginning with Pride and Prejudice Edith Wharton—The Custom of the Country, The Age of Innocence, The Buccaneers, The House of Mirth (must be read in strict order—you will understand why when you finish the last one) Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh

man feels in his soul that love and goodness toward his fellow-men is the only true, free, eternal life

In the corporal’s changed face, in the sound of his voice, in the stirring and deafening noise of the drums, he recognized that mysterious, callous force which compelled people against their will to kill their fellow men—that force the effect of which he had witnessed during the executions. To fear or to try to escape that force, to address entreaties or exhortations to those who served as its tools, was useless.

from the sofa. The princess came in. She had changed her gown for a house dress as fresh and elegant as the other. Prince Andrew rose and politely placed a chair for her. “How is it,” she began, as usual in French, settling down briskly and fussily in the easy chair, “how is it Annette never got married? How stupid you men all are not to have married her! Excuse me for saying so, but you have no sense about women. What an argumentative fellow you are, Monsieur Pierre!” “And I am still arguing with your husband. I can’t understand why he wants to go to the war,” replied Pierre, addressing the princess

Never, never marry, my dear fellow! That’s my advice: never marry till you can say to yourself that you have done all you are capable of, and until you have ceased to love the woman of your choice and have seen her plainly as she is, or else you will make a cruel and irrevocable mistake. Marry when you are old and good for nothing—or all that is good and noble in you will be lost. It will all be wasted on trifles.

Einstein maintains that whether or not a human life has a meaning depends on how the individual conceives of his or her own life in relation to the lives of fellow human beings. A primitive human being in this regard is one whose life is entirely devoted to the gratification of instinctual needs.

That's just the point, my dear fellow, that cases may arise when the Government does not fulfill the will of its citizens and then Society announces its own will.

In retrospect it is difficult to see how the outcome of the trial could have been different. As Edmund M. Morgan, co-author of 'The Legacy of Sacco and Vanzetti,' observed, 'every experienced judge and every experienced lawyer know [that] it is almost impossible to secure a verdict which runs counter to the settled convictions of the community.' And in the South, where, according to Ellen Glasgow, the Virginia novelist, the people never developed the habit of independent thought - 'there was, indeed, no need for thinking when everybody thought alike, or, rather, when to think differently meant to be ostracized' - dire social and economic consequences awaited those jurors who would forget tradition and ignore their fellow citizens' attitudes toward Leo Frank.

Never, never marry, my dear fellow! That's my advice: never marry till you can say to yourself that you have done all you are capable of, and until you have ceased to love the woman of your choice and have seen her plainly as she is, or else you will make a cruel and irrevocable mistake. Marry when you are old and good for nothing—or all that is good and noble in you will be lost. It will all be wasted on trifles. Yes! Yes! Yes! Don't look at me with such surprise. If you marry expecting anything from yourself in the future, you will feel at every step that for you all is ended, all is closed except the drawing room, where you will be ranged side by side with a court lackey and an idiot!… But what's the good?…

Rocking gently in the softly sprung carriage, out of range of the mob and its ghastly noises, Rostopchin found himself physically comforted, and, as always, along with the physical relief came help from his intellect, which was busy fabricating good reasons for moral comfort too. The thought that reassured Rostopchin was hardly original. Since time began and men started killing each other, no man has ever committed such a crime against one of his fellows without comforting himself with the same idea. This idea is ‘the public good’, a supposed benefit for other people. No person in control of his passions is ever aware of this benefit, but a man fresh from committing such a crime always knows for certain where the benefit lies. Rostopchin knew.

That’s how it is, dear fellow. Fate looks for a head. But we are always judging, ‘that’s not well—that’s not right!’ Our luck is like water in a dragnet: you pull at it and it bulges, but when you’ve drawn it out it’s empty! That’s how it is.

One outrageous and illustrative story along these lines may help us understand what Luther was dealing with in the Rome of his era, although thankfully Luther himself would have had no idea of it. It took place in 1514. At this juncture in his own life, Luther was routinely waking at 4:00 a.m. to lecture on the Psalms and generally busying himself in innumerable ways to draw closer to God and his fellow man. But eight hundred miles south, the Holy Father Leo X was focused on something that anyone would reckon quite different: He was planning a lavish event to publicly mock a mentally unstable person.

As a political leader, Xenophon was forced to adapt himself to this situation and to induce those he led to do so. Among the most impressive passages in the Anabasis are the speeches in which he instructs his fellow Greeks on the necessity of compliance with certain Spartan demands that are far from just or reasonable and, in general, on the necessity of accommodating themselves to “those who now rule Greece.” [123] Readers who are at all sensitive to how harsh political necessity can occasionally be may also find in Xenophon the writer, in his treatment of the Spartans, a model of how to proceed under like circumstances. He applauded and thus encouraged what was good, while pointing out without rancor or bitterness what was bad, to the extent that it was prudent and useful to do so. To return to what distinguished him from the elder and younger Cyruses, the high qualities which in the case of the two Persians (that is, barbarians) could be prevented from doing political harm only by being suppressed, or excised from the soul, could safely thrive in Xenophon, who had had the benefit of a Socratic education, an education that those qualities among others fitted him to receive. [123] Anabasis VI 6.8–16 and VII 1.25–31; compare III 2.37 and VI 1.26–28.

His efforts can be seen by now to have rested on a profound understanding or, at least, a remarkable intuitive grasp of the limitations of “Persia,” that is, of classical aristocracy. He knew, for example, that the loyalty it demanded, like that for any particular, nonuniversal society, rested on an arbitrary division of mankind into fellow citizens (friends) and strangers (enemies actual or potential). (Compare Plato’s analysis in the Republic of the defects of justice understood as helping friends and harming enemies.) He knew likewise that the class hierarchy without which, in the premodern condition of material scarcity, the unique Persian system of public education could not have been supported, rested not on merit or natural capacity but on the indefensible criterion of inherited wealth. (In the Republic, Plato was able to remove this stain from classical aristocracy only by the extreme expedient of abolishing the family.) These defects of the old order were to be removed in the new by the creation of a universal (and therefore all-inclusive) empire and by making positions of wealth, honor, and responsibility within it depend upon merit alone. Above all, Cyrus knew or sensed the weakness of that attachment to virtue and virtuous deeds as ends in themselves which the old Persian education prided itself on producing, an attachment on which the preference for old Persia and its way of life depended. To speak now only of the attachment itself and not of the virtue that was its object, it was not truly the result of education in the strict sense of the word. Rather, it had been beaten into the Persian peers both literally and figuratively (through praise and blame). And an attachment so produced is vulnerable to temptation. (Compare what Plato suggests, in the myth of Er which concludes the Republic, by his tale of the choice of lives.) Still, in providing that temptation, in suggesting to the peers that they no longer pursue what they take to be virtue for its own sake but rather for its rewards, Cyrus would appear to be more of a corrupter than a reformer.