Ignition Book Quotes

A book is a device to ignite the imagination.

Books can ignite fires in your mind, because they carry ideas for kindling, and art for matches.

The road to your highest achievements leads through environments that support you.

Revenge I think Has never looked so sweet

It was a pleasure to burn. It was a special pleasure to see things eaten, to see things blackened and changed. With the brass nozzle in his fists, with this great python spitting its venomous kerosene upon the world, the blood pounded in his head, and his hands were the hands of some amazing conductor playing all the symphonies of blazing and burning to bring down the tatters and charcoal ruins of history. With his symbolic helmet numbered 451 on his stolid head, and his eyes all orange flame with the thought of what came next, he flicked the igniter and the house jumped up in a gorging fire that burned the evening sky red and yellow and black. He strode in a swarm of fireflies. He wanted above all, like the old joke, to shove a marshmallow on a stick in the furnace, while the flapping pigeon-winged books died on the porch and lawn of the house. While the books went up in sparkling whirls and blew away on a wind turned dark with burning.

Why doesn’t every fire once kindled, survive and thrive? Why doesn’t every person accomplish her dreams? The simple answer is that the Firestarter’s life is a constant fight against extinction.

If you feel you don’t know the right people, turn to the next person you see on the street and introduce yourself—that connection could be the key to your future.

I can accept a compliment, but not from you. You scare me, Mister Sampson. You’re a stranger here on our land and we shouldn’t even concern ourselves with you. But you killed three gunmen and ignited a war.

Firestarters are able to make associations between similar situations and use lessons learned from one sphere of their lives to inform actions and thoughts in seemingly unrelated situations. They look for patterns of success, and then they pounce on situations that have proven to be generators of that success.

A spark is exactly what it means. An igniting of something that spreads, and soon it becomes difficult to contain. The sparks, in this case, represent sin, not just any sin, a major undertaking of evil that spreads and infects life, changing the way humans live forever." " The Everlasting protects man for six of these catastrophes, but once there is a seventh, well… anything goes." "I’m not destroying man; I’m saving man--from themselves.

Afterwards, in bed with a book, the spell of television feels remote compared to the journey into the page. To be in a book. To slip into the crease where two pages meet, to live in the place where your eyes alight upon the words to ignite a world of smoke and peril, colour and serene delight. That is a journey no one can end with the change of a channel. Enduring magic.

He knew that his wings could ignite at any moment, but the closer he came to touching the fire, the more he sensed that he was fulfilling his destiny. As he put it in his journal that night: If I mean to save my life, then I have to come within an inch of destroying it.

When things go dark, we can't see what we have. That doesn't mean that we don't have those things. Those things remain, right in front of us. All we need is to light a candle, or ignite some hope, and we can see that what we thought was lost was merely hidden.

Ryan’s passion towards Stephanie surged around the restaurant like lightning from the love-gods and re-ignited her own dormant feelings for Lharkin.

Can you imagine doing ministry the last five hundred years and getting away with ‘Sorry, I don’t do books’? Can you imagine doing ministry in the next five years and getting away with ‘Sorry, I don’t do Facebook’?

I am Cinna's bird, ignited, flying frantically to escape something inescapable. The feathers of flame that grow from my body. Beating my wings only fans the blaze. I consume myself, but to no end. Finally, my wings begin to falter, I lose height, and gravity pulls me into a foamy sea the color of Finnick's eyes. I float on my back, which continues to burn beneath the water, but the agony quiets to pain. When I am adrift and unable to navigate, that's when they come. The dead. The ones I loved fly as birds in the open sky above me. Soaring, weaving, calling to me to join them. I want so badly to follow them, but the seawater saturates my wings, making it impossible to lift them. The ones I hated have taken to the water, horrible scaled things that tear my salty flesh with needle teeth. Biting again and again. Dragging me beneath the surface. The small white bird tinged in pink dives down, buries her claws in my chest, and tries to keep me afloat. "No, Katniss! No! You can't go!" But the ones I hated are winning, and if she clings to me, she'll be lost as well. "Prim, let go!" And finally she does.

And I would rather be alive, be real, be increasingly conscious of all that I am, than move around this planet all mechanical and unconscious.

My sense of self has expanded and contracted like a schizophrenic accordion. I have questioned everything, and I have felt nothing. I have told the universe to f**k off, and I have fallen down weeping at its compassionate response.

Like most music that affects me deeply, I would never listen to it while others were around, just as I would not pass on a book that I especially loved to another. I am embarrassed to admit this, knowing that it reveals some essential lack or selfishness in my nature, and aware that it runs contrary to the instincts of most, whose passion for something leads them to want to share it, to ignite a similar passion in others, and that without the benefit of such enthusiasm I would still be ignorant of many of the books and much of the music I love most... But rather than an expansion, I've always felt a diminishment of my own pleasure when I've invited someone else to take part in it, a rupture in the intimacy I felt with the work, an invasion of privacy. It is worst when someone else picks up the copy of a book I've just been enthralled by and begins casually to thumb through the pages.

The body never lies. It's your spiritual tuning fork.

What careful planning, what painstaking attention to detail, goes into extinguishing a man's life! Far more than the hit-or-miss, haphazard circumstances of igniting it. ("New York Blues")

See, sexuality is less about the actual act of having pretty good sex for seventeen minutes twice a week and much more about surrounding yourself with an ever simmering sensual energy, pulsing just underneath your daily life and infusing almost everything you do. It's like you're always just a little bit horny, just a little turned on, but the object of your gentle lust isn't just your lover, it's divine life itself.

Your relationship with the divine should dance and sway, should at all times be dynamic and energized and fluid, constantly redefining itself as you progress. You are always growing, and your consciousness is continuously expanding; so should your relationship to divinity, as well as your expression of it.

The sun rises over the Grand Canyon, igniting rocks that have been there for two billion years before we were born and will likely remain two billion years after we're gone. My heart aches with the cruel and unimaginable beauty of it. We are nothing. We are everything.

How intensely do I want to exist?

The work of a lifetime, the process of individuation, is widening of that spotlight so much that everything is illuminated and you are conscious of and can see your All.

The impetuous wind can ignite the fire or put it out.

I've had my past lives read, my aura tuned, my chakras aligned, my spirit guides channeled, my palms interpreted, and my kundalini awakened.

Relish the paradox. Celebrate change. Trust your unique process. Igniting your divine spark is one of the most natural, yet brave, things you can do at this time in your life. No less is asked of you now. No less should be expected of you in return. Realize who you are. Release your divinity into the world. We are waiting.

Odessa is the setting for this book, but it could be anyplace in this vast land where, on a Friday night, a set of spindly stadium lights rises to the heavens to so powerfully, and so briefly, ignite the darkness.

A simple truth delivered in kindness may be the impetus that ignites a passionate fire in another’s soul and goes on to become the source of motivation for positive change.

Fill my mouth with the accuracy and potency of Your word and Spirit that I may make war through prayer with swift precision (Psalm 144:1).

even an ember in the ashes can still ignite a great blaze.

Your awesome site isn’t awesome. Getting your stories into the hands of the people who need them is awesome.

If you aren’t having fun creating content, you’re doing it wrong.

I am so horribly attracted to him.

In the absence of human relationships I formed bonds with paper characters. I lived love and loss through stories threaded in history; I experienced adolescence by association. My world is one interwoven web of words, stringing limb to limb, bone to sinew, thoughts and images all together. I am a being comprised of letters, a character created by sentences, a figment of imagination formed through fiction. They

Books are full of words and they are the most influential tools in the world. These seemingly innocent things strung together by letters have the power to ignite ideas, to spark a dying motivation, to fuel a passion.

Some books wrote themselves into people’s hearts as children and lived there, all but forgotten, until a bookseller recognized the spark and reunited them. Other books held their words close, waiting on the shelf to ignite a passion in someone who hadn’t even known they were wanting,

Adam has to work to defend himself against me and I’m exhausting him. I’m making him sick and I’m weakening his body and if he ever slips again. If he ever forgets. If he ever makes a mistake or loses focus or becomes too aware of the fact that he’s using his gift to control what I might do—

Carlin would like to see this: her library in use by a community of readers, an oasis in an entire nation starved for books. No, not even starved, Kelsea thought grimly. The Tearling was like a man who hadn’t eaten in so long that he didn’t even remember what it was like to be hungry anymore. The spark of an idea ignited in her mind, then danced away. Pen

You cannot be perseverant if you are not patient.

Whether you are going to have a good day depends on your own thoughts.

flash of sorcery ignited the air above the front street, followed by an agonized shriek.

Some love sets off a spark... Others ignite the flame.

Consider Pawn Stars, a popular show on the History Channel, and compare it with Antiques Roadshow, which airs on PBS.

Every great leader is a great storyteller.i And the first and most important part of being a great storyteller is knowing what stories to tell.

A vision is a picture of the future so compelling people want to go there with you.

We can only help ourselves— and through that, inspire others. Anything else is madness! That you have found your path is enough. Let the others find theirs, or be lost.

A book is a device to ignite the imagination.

It seems probable that he was trying to yoke the fractious horses of his dream, to straddle transcendental idealism and scientific empiricism,

Books are easily destroyed but words will love as long as people can remember them

Is it because I intimidate you, Kent? Am I making you nervous?

This book is dedicated to the ones who know the darkness all too well, and persevere regardless. The light will always return–just hold on.

Besides, it’d be a shame to lose such a pretty face.

Because you’re a dumbass,” he says again.

Have you ever had a girlfriend, Kenji?” “What?” He looks mortally offended. “Do I look like the kind of guy who’s never had a girlfriend? Have you even met me?

We should not forget that the spark which ignited the American Revolution was caused by the British attempt to confiscate the firearms of the colonists.” Patrick Henry

We are part of a flowing ocean of energy. Our limitations are the rafts we create to help us feel secure.

Fawn and Gabriel stared at her in wonder, for only passionate dreams could ignite a timid soul.

I know you want it back,” he says, “but I’m afraid I’m going to have to keep it forever.” He holds it up, shows it to me. Grins. And then puts it in his pocket. The one place I’d never dare to reach. “Why?” I can’t help but ask. “Why do you want it so much?” He spends far too long just looking at me. Not answering my question. And then he says “On the darkest days you have to search for a spot of brightness, on the coldest days you have to seek out a spot of warmth; on the bleakest days you have to keep your eyes onward and upward and on the saddest days you have to leave them open to let them cry. To then let them dry. To give them a chance to wash out the pain in order to see fresh and clear once again.” “I can’t believe you have that memorized,” I whisper. He leans back again. Closes his eyes again. Says, “Nothing in this life will ever make sense to me but I can’t help but try to collect the change and hope it’s enough to pay for our mistakes.

He lay in bed with one of his sisters. She must have kicked him or muscled her way into the majority of the bed because he was on the very edge with his arm around her. The boy slept. His candlelit hair ignited the bed, and I picked him both and Bettina up with their souls still in the blanket. If nothing else, they died fast and they were warm. The boy from the plane, I thought. The one with the teddy bear. Where was Rudy's comfort? Where was someone to alleviate this robbery of his life? Who was there to soothe him as life's rug was snatched from under his sleeping feet?

I leaned forward, hiding behind my glass and took a sip, almost choking when he stroked the skin visible along my spine. Surely flames had ignited and the entire room could see I was now on fire.

Judas means to have his revolution, Ana. If Jesus doesn’t bring it about peaceably, Judas means to ignite it by force. The surest way to incite the masses is for the Romans to execute their Messiah.

Today, I see my business as a content marketing company. In other words, my entire goal is to give more valuable, helpful, and remarkable content to consumers than anyone else in my field, which will in turn lead to more sales.

People tend to mistake reading and writing with living passively. Words are actions. Language ignites thoughts and channels emotions. Each sentence written by a literary master is an act of rebellion against the intolerable inadequacies and the outrageous injustices of life. Contemplative reading and writing creates channels of empathy and decreases our sense of aloneness. Many liberating social movements trace their origins back to a heart-wrenching piece of literature.

The sun is an arrogant thing, always leaving the world behind when it tires of us. The moon is a loyal companion. It never leaves. It’s always there, watching, steadfast, knowing us in our light and dark moments, changing forever just as we do.

For eight years I dreamed of fire. Trees ignited as I passed them; oceans burned. The sugary smoke settled in my hair as I slept, the scent like a cloud left on my pillow as I rose. Even so, the moment my mattress started to burn, I bolted awake. The sharp, chemical smell was nothing like the hazy syrup of my dreams; the two were as different as Carolina and Indian jasmine, separation and attachment. They could not be confused. Standing in the middle of the room, I located the source of the fire. A neat row of wooden matches lined the foot of the bed. They ignited, one after the next, a glowing picket fence across the piped edging. Watching them light, I felt a terror unequal to the size of the flickering flames, and for a paralyzing moment I was ten years old again, desperate and hopeful in a way I had never been before and never would be again. But the bare synthetic mattress did not ignite like the thistle had in late October. It smoldered, and then the fire went out. It was my eighteenth birthday.

We nurture the candle flames that show the way ahead. We are guerrillas of the word, unsung heroes breathing softly on the embers of the human mind, so that they might re-ignite the hearths around which we once found safe haven. The book is the Light and the Life.

Books are full of words and they are the most influential tools in the world. These seemingly innocent things strung together by letters have the power to ignite ideas, to spark a dying motivation, to fuel a passion. Words in essence can breathe life and they can take it.

The Indian gentleman, with all self-respect to himself, should not enter into a compartment reserved for Europeans, any more than he should enter a carriage set apart for ladies. Although you may have acquired the habits and manners of the European, have the courage to show that you are not ashamed of being an Indian, and in all such cases, identify yourself to the race to which you belong. - H. Hardless, The Indian Gentleman's Guide to Etiquette A rush of anger surprised her. It was unwise to read old books; they fury they ignited wasn't old; it was new. If she couldn't get the pompous fart himself, she wanted to search out the descendants of H. Hardless and stab the life out of them. But the child shouldn't be blamed for the father's crime, she tried to reason with herself, then. But should the child therefore also enjoy the father's illicit gain?

What motivates you is the ignition to your passion, the source for your enthusiasm, and the fuel of your persistence. This is so important that I made it the focus of another book, Living Your Best Year Ever: A Proven System for Achieving BIG GOALS (SUCCESS Books, 2011). You MUST know your why.

One night he was awakened by a dream. Astride two fractious, ungovernable horses—literal nightmares—he galloped through the woods. “In my dream I had been riding,” he wrote, “but the horses bit each other and occasioned endless trouble and anxiety, and it was my employment to hold their heads apart.

I found out the differences between “the truth” and “all the truth.” You can know some pretty terrible things about a person, and you can know they’re true. But sometimes it makes a huge difference if you know what else is true too. I read something in a book once about an old lady who was walking along the street minding her own business when a young guy came charging along, knocked her down, rolled her in a mud puddle, slapped her head and smeared handsful of wet mud all over her hair. Now what should you do with a guy like that? But then if you find out that someone had got careless with a drum of gasoline and it ignited and the old lady was splashed with it, and the guy had presence of mind enough to do what he did as fast as he did, and severely burned his hands in the doing of it, then what should you do with him? Yet everything reported about him is true. The only difference is the amount of truth you tell.

Conversion for those first Christians was not a destination; it was the beginning of a journey. And right there is where the Biblical emphasis differs from ours…. In the book of Acts, faith was for each believer a beginning, not an end; it was a journey, not a bed in which to be waiting for the day of our Lord’s triumph.

My one small hope for you today is this: don't let life happen to you. What I mean by that is, don't just exist in the space you occupy — I hope you really, truly live. When you wake up, I hope that you are grateful for a fresh start. I hope you notice your breath go in and out, and I hope you feel lucky to be alive. And then I hope you step outside and notice the way saying hello to a stranger can make a smile reach their eyes. I hope that you actively choose, in every passing moment, to reach for what ignites a fire inside of you. If it is a dream: pursue it relentlessly. If it is a love: make sure they know you care. Whatever you're doing, wherever you are — I hope you do it with all of your heart.

So we call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop) Our myxomatoid kids spraddle the streets, we've shunned them from the greasy-grind The poor little things, they look so sad and old as they mount us from behind I ask them to desist and to refrain And then we call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop)Rosary clutched in his hand, he died with tubes up his nose And a cabal of angels with finger cymbals chanted his name in code We shook our fists at the punishing rain And we call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop) He said everything is messed up around here, everything is banal and jejune There is a planetary conspiracy against the likes of you and me in this idiot constituency of the moon Well, he knew exactly who to blame And we call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop) Prolix! Prolix! Nothing a pair of scissors can't fix! Prolix! Prolix! Nothing a pair of scissors can't fix!(Doop doop doop doop dooop) Well, I go guruing down the street, young people gather round my feet Ask me things, but I don't know where to start They ignite the power-trail ssstraight to my father's heart And once again I call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop ...)We call upon the author to explain Who is this great burdensome slavering dog-thing that mediocres my every thought? I feel like a vacuum cleaner, a complete sucker, it's fucked up and he is a fucker But what an enormous and encyclopaedic brain I call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop ...) Oh rampant discrimination, mass poverty, third world debt, infectious diseease Global inequality and deepening socio-economic divisions Well, it does in your brain And we call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop ...) Now hang on, my friend Doug is tapping on the window (Hey Doug, how you been?) Brings me back a book on holocaust poetry complete with pictures Then tells me to get ready for the rain And we call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop ...) I say prolix! Prolix! Something a pair of scissors can fix Bukowski was a jerk! Berryman was best! He wrote like wet papier mache, went the Heming-way weirdly on wings and with maximum pain We call upon the author to explain (Doop doop doop doop dooop ...) Down in my bolthole I see they've published another volume of unreconstructed rubbish "The waves, the waves were soldiers moving". Well, thank you, thank you, thank you And again I call upon the author to explain Yeah, we call upon the author to explain Prolix! Prolix! There's nothing a pair of scissors can't fix!

This time there was no delay between explosion and sound. The ends of her hair singed. Shrapnel shredded the palm leaves around her. She hit the ground, and Faraday dove on top of her to protect her. Another explosion, along with heat that she thought would ignite their flesh … but then it faded, resolving into twangs of dying metal and the acrid smell of burning insulation. When they looked

When we say to be authentic, we mean you should make it clear that your stuff has the stamp of an actual person or actual people and that that person or those people have the qualities (a point of view, a personality, a sense of enthusiasm for the subject, and suitability to your audience) that make for a compelling approach to content as a solid foundation for the start of your relationship with your audience.

Which is one reason that by the end of the 1860s, Wallace had become a spiritualist. Like Gray, he too found it impossible to accept Darwin’s purely materialist explanation of the universe. It failed, in his opinion, to account for at least three miraculous events in history: the creation of life from inorganic matter, the birth of consciousness in higher animals, and the appearance of moral faculties in humans.

Arie, you bring out a fire in Noah that I’d never seen anyone else ignite. You not only complete him and compliment him but you are his opposite and other half. You are the very essence of who he is. He is who he is because of you. When he looks at you, he sees a mirror reflecting all the things that he hopes and longs for in life. And that, my dear, is something that no one will ever be able to take away from you.

TEKELI-LI. Tekeli-li, Tekeli-li. I got that from Pym. I got that from Poe. The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe, specifically. Pym that is maddening, Pym that is brilliance, Pym whose failures entice instead of repel. Pym that flows and ignites and Pym that becomes so entrenched it stagnates for hundreds of words at a time. A book that at points makes no sense, gets wrong both history and science, and yet stumbles into an emotional truth greater than both.

why I wrote this book: to share the stories of people who have given focus and urgency to my life. I want us to see the ways we can help each other flourish. The engines are igniting; the earth is shaking; we are rising. More than at any time in the past, we have the knowledge and energy and moral insight to crack the patterns of history. We need the help of every advocate now. Women and men. No one should be left out. Everyone should be brought in. Our call is to lift women up—and when we come together in this cause, we are the lift.

Never take things for granted. Cynthia Ozick once said that “we often take for granted the very things that most deserve our gratitude.” This could not be truer! Most humans have amnesia when it comes to appreciating things and people that have rewarded them for a long time. When something works perfectly, don’t forget how hard it was to set it up originally. Similarly, don’t be unruly or unappreciative of someone who has showered you with his or her love and affection for a long time. Sometimes, saying thank you can do wonders in someone’s day, week…or life.

The corollary is that a book is not finished until it is read. The writing is not complete until what is said has passed from the physical volume which gives it sensory reality into another mind where it kindles thoughts and impressions: a whole understanding of what it means to be, ignited on foreign soil in an act that is either erotic or imperialistic, but in either case miraculous. We become one another. Ink on paper is the frozen matter of a person, a snapshot of selfhood in fungal spores waiting to be quickened in our borrowed mentation, thought shaping itself in us, of us, to emerge from us.

What thwarted Pope John's reform was clericalism, the vesting of power in an all-male and celibate clergy. A foreseen change in the place of women in the church — foreseen in the nascent initiative John had taken in the direction of, yes, women's liberation — was what most powerfully ignited the clerical resistance. To return to this book's central assertion, clericalism is both the root cause and the ongoing enabler of the present Catholic catastrophe. Clericalism epitomizes a woman-insulting patriarchy that cuts deeper into culture than other forms of male dominance because clericalism claims nothing less than divine authority for itself.

Light's Interrupted Amplitude All summer connotations fill this light, a symmetry of different scales—the site of fibrous silence, the velvet lace of iris, alders the moon can ignite. One feels the amplitude of grief, the pace of oscillating stars, power in place where time has crossed and left a breathy stain. A body needs the weight and thrust of grace. I want to parse the logic, spin and domain, the structure mourning will allow, the grain of certainty in two estates, the dance of perfect order, flowing toward its plane. That bird you see has caught a proper stance, unfaithful to its measure, a pert mischance of divination on the move, the trace of sacred darkness true to light's advance.

I’d rather be lucky than good.’ [Baseball player] Lefty Gomez said that, and I live and breathe that fortune-dwelling, fuzzy-dice-dangling creed. I was fantastically lucky to be taken in by Montag Press and its extraordinary managing editor, Charlie Franco. But I’m also a bit of a research freak and I'm convinced that homework helped me set up a situation where luck could flash and ignite. I spent an inordinate amount of time researching small and independent imprints. Here I reveal the flip side of thinking that any hours spent researching literary agents is wasted (in my unwashed opinion) while time spent reading and learning about quality independent publishers is essential. It’s the best and only way to identify the little houses in that vibrant village that might be just right for your own book. (Interview with Ruuf Wangersen on sevencircumstances.com)

Civil war had ignited, deadly as that storm in the sky. Families were being torn asunder, from the Citadel itself down to the meanest homes of the commons. And blood painted Kharkanas and there was nowhere to run. Through the gate, and then, even as despair choked all life from Endest Silann, he saw him approaching. From the city below. His forearms sheathed in black glistening scales, his bared chest made a thing of natural armour. The blood of Tiam ran riot through him, fired to life by the conflation of chaotic sorcery, and his eyes glowed with ferocious will. Endest fell to his knees in Anomander's path. 'Lord! The world falls!' 'Rise, priest,' he replied. 'The world does not fall. It but changes. I need you. Come.' And so he walked past, and Endest found himself on his feet, as Lord Anomander's will closed about his heart like an iron gauntlet, pulling him round and into the great warrior's wake.

Sexual violence is a difficult topic to think about and even harder to deal with. I understand that a wide range of emotions may have been ignited while reading this book, so I ask you to take care of yourself. Always remember to take care of yourself no matter what, and never stop doing the things you love that bring peace and joy to your life. Whether it is music, art, exercise, cooking, reading, sports, prayer, nature, or any of the other amazing gifts life has to offer: Embrace them. Do what you love to do, embrace all the beauty that exists within yourself and the world around you, and take care of yourself. And of course, reach out to someone if you need help. Talk to a family member or friend, find the right therapist, or seek out a religious or spiritual guide if needed. Life is very difficult to go through it alone, so please talk to someone you love and trust, and one who always has your best interest at heart.

Once again the Aos Sí, the good folk, and the fairy kin, gather 'mungst the humans- to celebrate the ushering in of days, at the start of May, with candles, fires, and lumen. Oh, see, oh! What have some humans done?! Turning beloved Beltane into twisted wildness- such awful ravenous hum. The low drums, and the lovely blossoms- of which are covered now by carnal madness. Twas not always such a frenzied display of such power-driven lusts. The Beltane was sweet, but fervent- passion, to open up the flower buds. A welcoming, of the Spring and Summer seasons met the fire, the rhythm, and the dances- all to stoke the spirit of each creature, including leaflets on the trees upon where faeries pranceth. But for I- tonight I dance, and I cast my seeds- a better world to ripen, grow, and be. My fire, well lit; sparks of passion ignite in me, magic trickles from my fingers, joyful laughter so shall linger. Welcome, welcome sweetest Beltane." From the book "The spark (of a Muse)", by Cheri Bauer

It is not at all clear to me how a culture gets from here to there, however, because I come to the end of this book convinced that religion is indispensable in igniting great accomplishment in the arts. I use religion at once loosely and stringently. Going to church every Sunday is not the definition I have in mind, nor even a theology in its traditional sense. Confucianism and classical Greek thought were both essentially secular, and look at the cultures they produced. But both schools of thought were tantamount to religion in that they articulated a human place in the cosmos, laid out a clear understanding of the end—the good—toward which humans aim, and set exalted standards of human behavior. And that brings me to the sense in which I use religion stringently. Confucianism and Aristotelianism, along with the great religions of the world, are for grownups, requiring mature contemplation of truth, beauty, and the good. Cultures in which the creative elites are not engaged in that kind of mature contemplation don’t produce great art.

presidency weaker and Congress and the courts stronger, just as the forest fire of Watergate did. There is a lot of good in that. Thoughtful people are staring at the vicious partisanship that has grown all around us. Far from creating a new norm where lying is widely accepted, the Trump presidency has ignited a focus on truth and ethics. Parents are talking to their children about truth-telling, about respect for all people, about rejecting prejudice and hate. Schools and religious institutions are talking about values-driven leadership. The next president, no matter the party, will surely emphasize values—truth, integrity, respect, and tolerance—in ways an American leader hasn’t needed to for more than forty years. The fire will make something good grow. I wrote this book because I hope it will be useful to people living among the flames who are thinking about what comes next. I also hope it will be useful to readers long after the flames are doused, by inspiring them to choose a higher loyalty, to find truth among lies, and to pursue ethical leadership.

She had several books she'd been wanting to read, but instead she sprawled out on the couch surrounded by pillows and blankets, and spent the hours flipping channels between Judge Judy, The People's Court, Maury, and Jerry Springer, and rounded out her afternoon with Dr. Phil and Oprah. All in all, it was a complete waste of a day. At least until school got out. Jay showed up after school with a bouquet of flowers and an armful of DVDs, although Violet couldn't have card less about either...he was all she wanted. She couldn't help the electric thrill of excitement she felt when he came strolling in, grinning at her foolishly as if he hadn't seen her in weeks rather than hours. He scooped her up from the couch and dropped her onto his lap as he sat down where she had been just a moment before. He was careful to arrange her ankle on a neatly stacked pile of pillows beside him. He stubbornly refused to hide his affection for her, and if Violet hadn't known better she would have sworn that he was going out of his way to make her self-conscious in her own home. Fortunately her parents were giving them some space for the time being, and they were left by themselves most of the time. "Did you miss me?" he asked arrogantly as he gently brushed his lips over hers, not bothering to wait for an answer. She smiled while she kissed him back, loving the topsy-turvy feeling that her stomach always got when he was so close to her. She wound her arms around his neck, forgetting that she was in the middle of the family room and not hidden away in the privacy of her bedroom. He pulled away from her, suddenly serious. "You know, we didn't get much time alone yesterday. And I didn't get a chance to tell you..." Violet was mesmerized by the thick timbre of his deep voice. She barely heard his words but rather concentrated on the fluid masculinity of his tone. "I feel like I've waited too long to finally have you, and then yesterday...when..." He stopped, seemingly at a loss, and then he tried another approach. His hand stroked her cheek, igniting a response from deep within her. "I can't imagine living without you," he said, tenderly kissing her forehead, his warm breath fanning her brow. He paused thoughtfully for a moment before speaking again. "I love you, Violet. More than I ever could have imagined. And I don't want to lose you...I can't lose you." It was her turn to look arrogant as she glanced up at him. "I know," she stated smugly, shrugging her shoulder. He shoved her playfully but held on to her tightly so that she never really went anywhere. "What do you mean, 'I know'? What kind of response is that?" His righteous indignation bordered on comical. He pulled her down into his arms so that his face was directly above hers. "Say it!" he commanded. She shook her head, pretending not to understand him. "What? What do you want me to say?" But then she giggled and ruined her baffled façade. He teased her with his mouth, leaning down to kiss her and then pulling away before his lips ever reached hers. He nuzzled her neck tantalizingly, only to stop once she responded. She wrapped her arms around his neck, trying to pull him closer, frustrated by his mocking ambush of her senses. "Say it," he whispered, his breath warm against her neck. She groaned, wanting him to put her out of her misery. "I love you too," she rasped as she clung to him. "I love you so much..." His mouth moved to cover hers in an exhausting kiss that left them broth breathless and craving more than they could have. Violet collapsed into his arms, gathering her wits and hoping that no one walked in on them anytime soon.

Kenilworth, Mountainside, Scotch Plains, Dunellen... they themselves seemed far from Jersey: names out of Waverley novels, promising vistas of castles, highland waterfalls, and meadows dotted with flocks of grazing sheep. But the signboards lied, the books had lied, the Times had lied; the land here was one vast and charmless suburb, and as the bus passed through it, speeding west across the state, Freirs saw before him only the flat grey monotony of highway, broken from time to time by gas stations, roadhouses, and shopping malls that stretched away like deserts. The bus was warm, and the ride was beginning to give him a headache. He could feel the backs of his thighs sweating through his chinos. Easing himself farther into the seat, he pushed up his glasses and rubbed his eyes. The scenery disappointed him, yet it was still an improvement over what they'd just come through. Back there, on the fringes of the city, every work of man seemed to have been given over to the automobile, in an endless line of showrooms and repair shops for mufflers, fenders, carburetors, ignitions, tires, brakes. Now at last he could make out hills in the distance and extended zones of green, though here and there the nearness of some larger town or development meant a length of highway lined by construction, billboards touting banks or amusement parks, and drive-in theaters, themselves immense blank billboards, their signs proclaiming horror movies, "family pictures," soft-core porn. A speedway announced that next Wednesday was ladies' night. Food stands offered pizzaburgers, chicken in the basket, fish 'n' chips.

A week later fifty-four sit-ins were under way in fifteen cities in nine states in the South.60 It was obvious from the way that the spark of protest jumped from place to place that black resentments, which had somehow failed to ignite other sit-ins between 1957 and 1959, had exploded. The sit-ins of 1960 arose, as did the civil rights movement in later years, from the collective efforts of unsung local activists: they sprang from the bottom up. Many later leaders, unknown in 1960, jumped into action.

In each decision you make in life, say ‘thank you’ and follow your heart. Let it decide how to proceed, what is important and what is not. Deep inside

This book is about the ecosystem and inhabitants of the new United States, one that I sometimes call Frackistan. To trace its emergence, I will begin deep underground and follow the path of the hydrocarbon up and out of the rocks.

God’s Word   “Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it.” Joshua 1:8   Dear Heavenly Father, thank You for the Book of Joshua. This verse is especially important because You are telling us how important it is not to forget You. Lord so many times Your people disappointed You by taking Your love and forgetting it. So many times You showed Your people miracles and they forgot and got distracted with other people in the world who were worshipping statues and engraved images. Lord help me keep Your rules at the front of my mind so You stay full in my heart.   Lord in these times thousands of years later the same problems are all around me. Now everyone gets tattoos of images of worship so they can be worshipped. So many people are distracted by music, drugs and being popular that it shows me that it is all a false god and leads to destruction. Lord help me be an example for many that Your laws are meant for good. Lord help me be an example that praising You is courageous in a world so full of pressure to be popular. Lord help me be an example that being who You want me to be is all that matters, in Jesus name, amen.   “Now fear the LORD and serve him with all faithfulness.” Joshua 24:14   Dear Heavenly Father, I thank You that I understand that to fear You is wisdom. Lord I now know that You don’t force Yourself on anyone but that You do demand that I chose to either honor You or dishonor You.   Lord to fear You is to have respect for You as my creator. Lord when I remind myself every moment that You are the LORD, and that I am to be Your faithful servant, I know that I am protected and blessed. Lord

I love to read books. I love to read anything really, even the back of the cereal box. But there is nothing that will ignite your soul like reading God’s Word.