Heart Of Darkness Restraint Quotes

He struggled with himself, too. I saw it -- I heard it. I saw the inconceivable mystery of a soul that knew no restraint, no faith, and no fear, yet struggling blindly with itself.

No fear can stand up to hunger, no patience can wear it out, disgust simply does not exist where hunger is; and as to superstition, beliefs, and what you may call principles, they are less than chaff in a breeze. Don't you know the devilry of lingering starvation, its exasperating torment, its black thoughts, its sombre and brooding ferocity? Well, I do. It takes a man all is inborn strength to fight hunger properly. It's really easier to face bereavement, dishonour, and the perdition of one's soul - than this kind of prolonged hunger. Sad, but true. And these chaps, too, had no earthly reason for any kind of scruple. Restraint! I would just as soon have expected restraint from a hyena prowling amongst the corpses of a battlefield.

But his soul was mad. Being alone in the wilderness, it had gone mad. I had - for my sins, I suppose - to go through the ordeal of looking into it myself. No eloquence could have been so withering to one's belief in mankind as his final burst of sincerity. He struggled with himself, too. I saw it, - I heard it. I saw the inconceivable mystery of a soul that knew no restraint, no faith, and no fear, yet struggling blindly with itself

From time to time our national history has been marred by forgetfulness of the Jeffersonian principle that restraint is at the heart of liberty. In 1789 the Federalists adopted Alien and Sedition Acts in a shabby political effort to isolate the Republic from the world and to punish political criticism as seditious libel. In 1865 the Radical Republicans sought to snare private conscience in a web of oaths and affirmations of loyalty. Spokesmen for the South did service for the Nation in resisting the petty tyranny of distrustful vengeance. In the 1920's the Attorney General of the United States degraded his office by hunting political radicals as if they were Salem witches. The Nation's only gain from his efforts were the classic dissents of Holmes and Brandeis. In our own times, the old blunt instruments have again been put to work. The States have followed in the footsteps of the Federalists and have put Alien and Sedition Acts upon their statute books. An epidemic of loyalty oaths has spread across the Nation until no town or village seems to feel secure until its servants have purged themselves of all suspicion of non-conformity by swearing to their political cleanliness. Those who love the twilight speak as if public education must be training in conformity, and government support of science be public aid of caution. We have also seen a sharpening and refinement of abusive power. The legislative investigation, designed and often exercised for the achievement of high ends, has too frequently been used by the Nation and the States as a means for effecting the disgrace and degradation of private persons. Unscrupulous demagogues have used the power to investigate as tyrants of an earlier day used the bill of attainder. The architects of fear have converted a wholesome law against conspiracy into an instrument for making association a crime. Pretending to fear government they have asked government to outlaw private protest. They glorify "togetherness" when it is theirs, and call it conspiracy when it is that of others. In listing these abuses I do not mean to condemn our central effort to protect the Nation's security. The dangers that surround us have been very great, and many of our measures of vigilance have ample justification. Yet there are few among us who do not share a portion of the blame for not recognizing soon enough the dark tendency towards excess of caution.

Mr. Kurtz lacked restraint in the gratification of his various lusts, that there was something wanting in him--some small matter which, when the pressing need arose, could not be found under his magnificent eloquence. Whether he knew of this deficiency himself I can't say. I think the knowledge came to him at last--only at the very last. But the wilderness had found him out early, and had taken on him a terrible vengeance for the fantastic invasion. I think it had whispered to him things about himself which he did not know, things of which he had no conception till he took counsel with this great solitude--and the whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating. It echoed loudly within him because he was hollow at the core.

Poor fool! If he had only left that shutter alone. He had no restraint, no restraint—just like Kurtz—a tree swayed by the wind. As soon as I had put on a dry pair of slippers, I dragged him out, after first jerking the spear out of his side, which operation I confess I performed with my eyes shut tight. His heels leaped together over the little doorstep; his shoulders were pressed to my breast; I hugged him from behind desperately. Oh! he was heavy, heavy; heavier than any man on earth, I should imagine. Then without more ado I tipped him overboard. The current snatched him as though he had been a wisp of grass, and I saw the body roll over twice before I lost sight of it for ever. All the pilgrims and the manager were then congregated on the awning–deck about the pilot–house, chattering at each other like a flock of excited magpies, and there was a scandalized murmur at my heartless promptitude. What they wanted to keep that body hanging about for I can’t guess. Embalm it, maybe. But I had also heard another, and a very ominous, murmur on the deck below. My friends the wood–cutters were likewise scandalized, and with a better show of reason—though I admit that the reason itself was quite inadmissible. Oh, quite! I had made up my mind that if my late helmsman was to be eaten, the fishes alone should have him. He had been a very second–rate helmsman while alive, but now he was dead he might have become a first–class temptation, and possibly cause some startling trouble. Besides, I was anxious to take the wheel, the man in pink pyjamas showing himself a hopeless duffer at the business.

The Broken Beauty I see compassion in your eyes, And I wonder, What agony has taught you such tenderness? I see kindness in your soul, And I wonder, What grief has taught you such gentleness? I see light in your eyes, And I wonder, What suffering has broken into light? I see wholeness rising in your heart, And I wonder, What brokenness has taught you such healing in life? I see smiles blooming in your face, And I wonder, What bruise has brought you such beauty? I smell fragrance of your soul. And I wonder, What murk has taught you to unfold? I see kindness in your face, And I wonder, What severity has taught you such softness? I see gratitude lighting your cheeks, And I wonder, What loss has taught you such humbleness? I sense peace in your soul, And I wonder, What struggles have taught you to surrender? I see shimmer in your eyes, And I wonder, What darkness has brought you to such light? I sense peace in your heart, And I wonder, What defeat has taught you such a submission? I see humility in your face, And I wonder, What trials have taught you such a gratitude? I sense freedom in your breath, And I wonder, What restraint has brought such a release? I see soaring of your wings, And I wonder, What confinement has taught you to fly in sky? I see the ocean in your eyes, And I wonder, What grief has brought such an oceanic vastness? I hear the splashing in your laughter, And I wonder, What sorrow has brought this dancing madness? I hear the brook babbling in your heart, And I wonder, What moss was gathered on the way that taught you to flow again? I sense the delight in your soul, And I wonder, What sadness came with such wisdom, to release the running river again? I see stars in your eyes, And I wonder, What darkness has given rise to the galaxy in you? I see the sun rising in your soul, And I wonder, What night has brought such a glory in rise? .....Jayita Bhattacharjee Copyright 2019 Jayita Bhattacharjee

Without thinking it through, I whirled and dashed a few steps down the hall to my bedroom. I barely made it through the door when he was on me. His arms wrapped around me from behind, one of his hands cupping my chin to tilt my head back and to the side. Conner’s lips slid up my neck to my ear. “You shouldn’t have done that, Donna. Never run from a vampire. Like any predator, if you run from one of us, we will chase you.” His voice was dark. My heart started pounding as his other hand moved up my torso to cup my breast through my bra. I gasped when I felt the sharp scrape of his fangs on my neck. Since the first night we made love, he was careful not to get his teeth near my skin. I appreciated his restraint, but I had woken the beast within tonight, and he seemed hungry. While he kissed my neck and scraped the skin with his teeth, Conner’s hands drifted down to my stomach and started pushing my jeans down. I helped him until I was standing with my back to him, clad only in my underwear. My bra loosened and the straps fell down my arms. I let it fall to the floor before I turned to face him. When I saw his face, my knees weakened. His eyes were literally two burning orbs of blue and his fangs had lengthened so that they dented his bottom lip.

Dear reader, I guess there’s a chance – just the tiniest chance – that I might hunt you down. Beforehand I’d always let such a frivolous impulse fade but these days – and I am not proud of this – the pictures lurking in the corners of my mind are gaining in colour, detail and intensity. I fight them, I really do, but the scenario seems to have a life of its own, slowly taking shape and maybe dreaming of the day it gets unleashed into the real world. Becomes flesh and blood, if you like. And despite my very best efforts at restraint, I’m afraid I’ve already started... planning. You know, plotting a bit. Gathering details about your movements and habits. That sort of thing. And if I’m pushed, I might admit to lingering on the finer points of your demise, perhaps even gorging on the sight of your stricken face as I finally take centre stage in your life. You see, I guess I’m just tired of your lack of appreciation. Let’s face it, I’m not exactly the first name on your Christmas card list. I’m still waiting for you to swing by for a cuppa and a few kind words. Hey, a simple email would have been enough. Don’t you know how precious a bit of encouragement can be? And here’s the rub: for as long as I can remember I have been on my knees in front of you only to be treated like the invisible man. You’ve repeatedly ignored my imploring face and open arms, although occasionally you’ve stopped and dallied, causing my heart to skitter wildly. I can’t begin to tell you how much it means to be noticed. It’s so... nourishing. After all, a flower can’t bloom in the dark. But then it dawns on me that you’re not committed to our fledgling relationship. In fact, it’s just a flirtation and soon you’ll be skipping on your merry way. Whatever trifling affection you have shown, it’s clear you’ll never bang the drum for little old me. And don’t think I don’t know about the others. The ones you fawn over. Just tell me – why are you so in thrall with their rampant mediocrity? Hell, maybe they’ve somehow infected you, skewed your take on things and made you unable to sort the wheat from the chaff. Perhaps I should offer condolences but the fact remains that kneeling before you with my heart in my hands only seems to result in you jumping into bed with them. Do you not understand how much love I’ve lavished on you? Call me tetchy, but some days you simply seem unworthy of my great sacrifice. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. All is not lost. For here we are again meeting as equals and this time I know I have your attention. I can only hope you have lost the desire to bait me, or God forbid, spit in my face. So help me. Accept my tender embrace. Or one day, dear reader, you might find the invisible man taking shape right in front of your disbelieving eyes. And you’d only have yourself to blame.

Our bodies are lock and key, and we’re transfixed on each other. Inseparable. Insoluble. I seize her tongue, pulling her in, sucking her, wringing every drop of sweetness from the kiss. She whimpers, her hands clawing at my shoulders, my neck, scraping over my scalp. “I love you." Her words drop hot in my ear with her breasts flattened to my chest and her thighs clenching at my hips. She tightens her pussy around my cock, a deliberate, hungry grasp and release. "Bris.” My eyes roll back. I'm at the mercy of those muscles. "I love you, too." She tucks her head into the curve of my neck, her breaths short and sharp as she recites from “Sonnet LXXXI”, telling me I’m already hers, to rest with my dream inside her dream, that we are joined by forever itself, and that we’ll travel the shadows together. She pants, sitting up straighter, leveraging herself with one arm behind her on the bed, changing the angle, deepening the penetration. In the lamp's light, I see her head flung back in abandon, her muscles straining with the unrelenting ferocity, the rigor of our bodies. “You alone are my dream,” she says, adapting the quote, tears in the eyes she refuses to pull away from me. “And I alone am yours.” It is a pledge of persistence, hidden in the poems I sent her. It’s a vow that she won’t ever give up on us. Knowing she held the poetry in her heart when she wouldn't even consider me, when I wasn’t even sure there was any hope, undoes me. “Bristol, oh God." I touch my forehead to hers, twisting my fingers into the damp hair at her neck. Pressed together, our heartbeats ricocheting, the universe tips, a dazzling lurching. A spectacular axis spinning beyond my restraint, just beyond my control. I once threatened to make her come with my words, but as the stars go blindingly bright and then dark behind my eyes, I realize she’s the one who did it.

October 3 After the earthquake came a fire. . . . And after the fire came a gentle whisper. (1 Kings 19:12) A woman who had made rapid progress in her understanding of the Lord was once asked the secret of her seemingly easy growth. Her brief response was, “Mind the checks.” The reason many of us do not know and understand God better is that we do not heed His gentle “checks”—His delicate restraints and constraints. His voice is “a gentle whisper.” A whisper can hardly be heard, so it must be felt as a faint and steady pressure upon the heart and mind, like the touch of a morning breeze calmly moving across the soul. And when it is heeded, it quietly grows clearer in the inner ear of the heart. God’s voice is directed to the ear of love, and true love is intent upon hearing even the faintest whisper. Yet there comes a time when His love ceases to speak, when we do not respond to or believe His message. “God is love” (1 John 4:8), and if you want to know Him and His voice, you must continually listen to His gentle touches. So when you are about to say something in conversation with others, and you sense a gentle restraint from His quiet whisper, heed the restraint and refrain from speaking. And when you are about to pursue some course of action that seems perfectly clear and right, yet you sense in your spirit another path being suggested with the force of quiet conviction, heed that conviction. Follow the alternate course, even if the change of plans appears to be absolute folly from the perspective of human wisdom. Also learn to wait on God until He unfolds His will before you. Allow Him to develop all the plans of your heart and mind, and then let Him accomplish them. Do not possess any wisdom of your own, for often His performance will appear to contradict the plan He gave you. God will seem to work against Himself, so simply listen, obey, and trust Him, even when it appears to be the greatest absurdity to do so. Ultimately, “we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him” (Rom. 8:28), but many times, in the initial stages of the performance of His plans: In His own world He is content To play a losing game. Therefore if you desire to know God’s voice, never consider the final outcome or the possible results. Obey Him even when He asks you to move while you still see only darkness, for He Himself will be a glorious light within you. Then there will quickly spring up within your heart a knowledge of God and a fellowship with Him, which will be overpowering enough in themselves to hold you and Him together, even in the most severe tests and under the strongest pressures of life. from Way of Faith

When things fall apart, the children of the land scurry and scatter like birds escaping a burning sky. They flee their own wretched land so their hunger may be pacified in foreign lands, their tears wiped away in strange lands, the wounds of their despair bandaged in faraway lands, their blistered prayers muttered in the darkness of queer lands. Look at the children of the land leaving in droves, leaving their own land with bleeding wounds on their bodies and shock on their faces and blood in their hearts and hunger in their stomachs and grief in their footsteps. Leaving their mothers and fathers and children behind, leaving their umbilical cords underneath the soil, leaving the bones of their ancestors in the earth, leaving everything that makes them who and what they are, leaving because it is no longer possible to stay. They will never be the same again because you just cannot be the same once you leave behind who and what you are, you just cannot be the same. Look at them leaving in droves despite knowing they will be welcomed with restraint in those strange lands because they do not belong, knowing they will have to sit on one buttock because they must not sit comfortably lest they be asked to rise and leave, knowing they will speak in dampened whispers because

When you plunge into your human prey, whether with teeth or cock, you worship your goddess. She doesn’t want your silly celibacy, your barren self-restraint. She is fertility. She is blood. She didn’t build this world with hands and hammer, but birthed it bloody and heaving for her children to rule.

Why did you try to control me? It wasn’t purely an intellectual question, as she wanted it to be. He sensed he had hurt her in some way, disappointed her. She moved restlessly, as if waiting for her lover. The thought of her with another man enraged him. Feelings after hundreds of years. Sharp, clear, in-focus. Real feelings. It is my nature to control. That was the stark truth. He was a powerful being, and one responsible for his entire species. Control of such power was essential. He was exhilarated, joyous, yet at the same time all too aware that he was more dangerous than he had ever been. Power always needed control. The less emotion, the easier the restraint. Don’t try to control me. There was something in her voice, something he sensed more than the actual words, as if she knew he was a threat to her. And he knew he was. How does one control one’s nature, little one? He saw her smile even as it filled his emptiness, as it registered in his heart and lungs and sent his blood soaring. Why would you think I was little? I’m as big as a house. I am to believe this? The laughter faded from her voice, her thoughts, lingered in his blood. I’m tired, and again, I apologize. I enjoyed talking with you. But? He prompted gently. Good-bye. Finality. Mikhail took flight, soaring high above the forest. It wasn’t good-bye. He wouldn’t allow it. He couldn’t allow it. His survival depended on her. Something, someone, had aroused his interest, his will to live. She had reminded him that there was such a thing as laughter, that there was more to life than existence.