Innocence Is Bliss Quotes

Ô, Wanderess, Wanderess When did you feel your most euphoric kiss? Was I the source of your greatest bliss?

That's what innocence is, you know. A blissful oblivion of what's coming, of what you'll lose and what you'll gain, and what kind of person you'll grow up to be.

Wisdom is the recovery of innocence at the far end of experience.

O Solitude! if I must with thee dwell, Let it not be among the jumbled heap Of murky buildings; climb with me the steep,— Nature’s observatory—whence the dell, Its flowery slopes, its river’s crystal swell, May seem a span; let me thy vigils keep ’Mongst boughs pavillion’d, where the deer’s swift leap Startles the wild bee from the fox-glove bell. But though I’ll gladly trace these scenes with thee, Yet the sweet converse of an innocent mind, Whose words are images of thoughts refin’d, Is my soul’s pleasure; and it sure must be Almost the highest bliss of human-kind, When to thy haunts two kindred spirits flee.

As the wise men say, the key to happiness is to have a heart as pure as a child’s—a heart that sees the world as a child sees, a heart that smiles and cries like a child. For such a heart will also sleep like a child.

Sometimes I would see them not as mementos of the blissful hours but as the tangible precious debris of the storm raging in my soul.

From blissful to tragic, innocent to ruined?

When we are happy, we don’t know that we are happy, because happiness requires childlike innocence. When a child is happy, he doesn’t know that he is happy. He doesn’t formulate it, he simply enjoys it.

Bliss leads me to contentment and promises me forever. And I believe her. Because love is a lot of things, but above all, love is what we make it. And we’ll make this never ending.

My girl has that effect on us. She’s the friend my sister needs, the daughter my mom wants, a child my dad doesn’t feel guilty about, and the reason my heart beats. Leighlee Bliss is the pièce de résistance. She’s our saving grace. She’s my pulse and my nervousness and my … everything. 

Yep, you’re cute. Innocent, but fucking dying to be bad.

Earth to Bliss.” Rebecka snaps her fingers in my face. “Are you daydreaming about cocks? I look like that when I daydream about them, too.

He probably knew that any man she took up with now would only pay in pain for what had happened between her and Eugene; the brutal logic of wronged lovers taking their revenge on innocents and outsiders.

Nearly all ancient peoples worshiped sex in some form and ritual, and not the lowest people but the highest expressed their worship most completely [...]. The sexual character and functions of primitive deities were held in high regard, not through any obscenity of mind, but through a passion for fertility in women and in the earth. Certain animals, like the bull and the snake, were worshiped as apparently possessing or symbolizing in a high degree the divine power of reproduction. The snake in the story of Eden is doubtless a phallic symbol, representing sex as the origin of evil, suggesting sexual awakening as the beginning of the knowledge of good and evil, and perhaps insinuating a certain proverbial connection between mental innocence and bliss.

Wisdom is the recovery of innocence at the far end of experience; it is the ability to see again what most of us have forgotten how to see, but now fortified by the ability to translate some of that vision into words, however inadequate.

Innocence had nothing to do with the state of her virginity but with the state of her heart. A woman could screw a thousand men, and if she still was able to love, she could hold her innocence in her soul.

You told us once not to be in such a hurry to grow up, but I don't see any way we could have avoided it. There was always someone out there ready to carve away another chunk of our innocence. Maybe because theirs was already gone and they couldn't stand the sight of our ignorant happiness. Because that's what innocence is, you know. A blissful oblivion of what's coming, of what you'll lose and what you'll gain, and what kind of person you'll grow up to be.

Peace is a beautiful flower of love, harmony and joy Peace is a dancing bird, a joyful smile of a poor boy Peace is a little child's innocent smile and loving kiss For a war torn mother, peace is a divine bliss. Peace starts with a heart that is caring Peace starts with a smile that is loving Peace starts with power of love not with love of power Peace starts with a desire to bloom like a flower.

He would never believe, in his wildest dreams ,that she no longer loved him. She had said it once, but he would dismiss these sorts of things as "temperament" or "wine" as if a bottle contained an infusion of foreign thoughts with which she had innocently poisoned herself.

Had anyone told me that my entire life would change course between one heartbeat and the next, I would have laughed. From blissful to tragic, innocent to ruined? Please. But that’s all it took. One heartbeat. A blink, a breath, a second, and everything I knew and loved was gone.

Peace is in selfless caring Peace is in true understanding Peace is in undeserved kindness Peace is in joyful forgiveness Peace is in innocent trust Peace is in becoming just Peace is in a dancing butterfly Peace is in a clear starry sky Peace is a child's loving kiss Peace is a life's pure bliss

TOWARD THE END OF the summer I accidentally overheard a conversation that shook me out of my state of blissful ignorance. When we are children we seldom think of the future. This innocence leaves us free to enjoy ourselves as few adults can. The day we fret about the future is the day we leave our childhood behind.

Some of my friends in the other nations would argue that, on occasion, truth and beauty must be defended with ugliness. They would claim a gardener who nurtures a flower so others can enjoy it bloom for a few moments must spend much time with their hands buried in dirt.” Kyoshi would have chosen a less pleasant word than dirt. “What do you believe then?” Jinpa smiled sadly. “I believe I have to make peace with my own choices, just like everyone else.” The tint of pain in his expression reminded her too much of Kelsang for her to believe Jinpa was at complete peace with himself. Outsiders enviously and condescendingly assumed Airbenders lived in a state of innocent bliss, but that didn’t give the monks and nuns enough credit for their inner strength. From what Kyoshi knew, belonging to the wandering nation meant a constant struggle with your own morals against the world’s.

The knowledge of unhappiness makes it impossible to ever more experience unalloyed bliss. That's only possible in a state of innocence.

The experienced life is far more fulfilling than the blissful and innocent life. Y’know who said that?” “Jesus.” “No, not Jesus. William Blake.

could achieve. It was one of those high school romances that you read about. Me being the naïve, somewhat innocent and impressionable

you read about. Me being the naïve, somewhat innocent and impressionable eighteen year old girl that I was back then, believed

could achieve. It was one of those high school romances that you read about. Me being the naïve, somewhat innocent and

Alone, we're us: an innocent secret made of bad habits spread across his bed.

Ignorance is a place where innocence is not always a virtue.

Servitude to law is the hatred of Heaven. Self-love only is the eternal all pleasing, by meditation on this effulgent self which is mystic joyousness. At that time of bliss, he is punctual to his imagination, in that day what happiness is his! A lusty innocent, beyond sin, without hurt! Balanced by an emotion, a refraction of his ecstasy is all that he is conscious of as external.[16] His vacuity causes double refraction, "He," the self-effulgent lightens in the Ego. Beyond law and the guest at the "Feast of the Supersensualists."[17] He has power over life and death.[18]

The learned must educate the ignorant. Because, according to society, ignorance is never bliss. Except in retrospect. I look back upon my ignorance with the knowledge that I was much happier then than now. Consider this: children know precious little, but the profound ignorance comes from profound innocence. People really mean to say that innocence is bliss. And bliss is short-lived.

I despised the world because I used to know who I was, and I used to be good, with no bad in me, or at least that’s what I thought and there really is a degree of bliss and charmed innocence in ignorance.

A fleeting look, followed by his close presence, followed by his smell, a flicker of a smile followed by a sudden explosion of hormones and chemicals of all colors and shapes that separates your mind, body and soul for a moment of bliss.

Jean Valjean felt his heart melt within him with delight, at all these sparks of a tenderness so exclusive, so wholly satisfied with himself alone. The poor man trembled, inundated with angelic joy; he declared to himself ecstatically that this would last all their lives; he told himself that he really had not suffered sufficiently to merit so radiant a bliss, and he thanked God, in the depths of his soul, for having permitted him to be loved thus, he, a wretch, by that innocent being.

We are born free as creatures of bliss, compassion, friendliness, innocence and curiosity. Among us, there is a tremendous love and natural belonging. Burning beneath our numbness, negativity and grief is a celebration of life and a passion for being here

For Thomas Traherne (c. 1636–1674), one of the sanest men who ever lived, to see the world with the eyes of innocence, and so to see it pervaded by a numinous glory, is to see things as they truly are, and to recognize creation as the mirror of God’s infinite beauty.

But you will come to regret this, Abigail. This won’t be like one of the memories that fritters away into nothing when you come out of that game. This will leave a stain. You’ll carry for it for ever, when you could have had a few more years of blissful innocence. Are you sure, now?

As soon as you are filled with awareness, the first thing that will happen is you will begin to see misery, the hell around you. Because you are the one who has created it. However, if you remain courageous and pass through the misery consciously, you will have cut the crop. You won’t have to go through the same miseries again. Once you have gone through this chain of miseries – the chain of karmas, the chain tied around your soul.... If you could pass through it without losing your consciousness, courageously, unworried; if you could determine, ”whatever misery I have created, I’ll go through it, I’ll go to the end of it. I want to arrive at that initial moment when I was innocent and the journey of suffering had not started yet, when my soul was absolutely pure and I had not gathered any misery – I am determined to penetrate up to that point regardless of any consequences, pain, or sorrow.

...I've had a lot of time to think about this, and yes, we could go down your route. The difficult, painful one, because, let's face it, Ellie, you're a fan of the hard way through. Or, we could, slowly but surely, try to forgive each other for all the mistakes we've made and the hurt we've caused each other. None of us sitting here is innocent...

She looked beautiful and very innocent, her vibrant blue eyes wide with what he guessed was shock. Her cheeks were stained pink with more of the nerves she hadn't been able to hide during the ceremony. As for her rosy mouth, her lips were slightly parted and ripe for kissing. 'Mine,' he thought primitively. 'Mine to touch and taste and claim at my leisure.

Time travel can be read as a metaphor for memory: we are all time travelers in our minds, if not in our bodies. Like Henry, we jump back to moments of humiliation, loss, joy; we find ourselves flung seemingly at random to ordinary days, small unnoticed pleasures. Our present is created and shadowed by our past. We live in the present, blissfully innocent of our future.

I didn't like what that word-'childhood'-conjured up, or rather, I didn't like the way most people use it: that presumption of innocence and starry-eyed wonder. The only good thing about childhood is that no one really remembers it, or rather, that's the only thing about it to like: this forgetting. What else could possibly lie beneath that blissful oblivion but shame: a dark knowledge of that terrible badge of weakness, that inescapable servitude (bearable only thanks to the slow revelation that we could inflict cruelty and evil on the weaker kids), a sickening awareness that just about everything there is to understand was beyond us, made even worse by the lies and inaccuracies that adults feel entitled to spread around, deliberately, or because they don't know any better, about themselves or about the nature of reality?

A morning-flowered dalliance demured and dulcet-sweet with ebullience and efflorescence admiring, cozy cottages and elixirs of eloquence lie waiting at our feet - We'll dance through fetching pleasantries as we walk ephemeral roads evocative epiphanies ethereal, though we know our hearts are linked with gossamer halcyon our day a harbinger of pretty things infused with whispers longing still and gamboling in sultry ways to feelings, all ineffable screaming with insouciance masking labyrinthine paths where, in our nonchalance, we walk through the lilt of love’s new morning rays. Mellifluous murmurings from a babbling brook that soothes our heated passion-songs and panoplies perplexed with thought of shadows carried off with clouds in stormy summer rains… My dear, and that I can call you 'dear' after ripples turned to crashing waves after pyrrhic wins, emotions drained we find our palace sunned and rayed with quintessential moments lit with wildflower lanterns arrayed on verandahs lush with mutual love, the softest love – our preferred décor of life's lilly-blossom gate in white-fenced serendipity… Twilight sunlit heavens cross our gardens, graced with perseverance, bliss, and thee, and thou, so splendid, delicate as a morning dove of charm and mirth – at least with me; our misty mornings glide through air... So with whippoorwill’d sweet poetry - of moonstones, triumphs, wonder-woven in chandliers of winglet cherubs wrought with time immemorial, crafted with innocence, stowed away and brought to light upon our day in hallelujah tapestries of ocean-windswept galleries in breaths of ballet kisses, light, skipping to the breakfast room cascading chrysalis's love in diaphanous imaginings delightful, fleeting, celestial-viewed as in our eyes which come to rest evocative, exuberant on one another’s moon-stowed dreams idyllic, in quiescent ways, peaceful in their radiance resplendent with a myriad of thought soothing muse, rhapsodic song until the somnolence of night spreads out again its shaded truss of luminescent fantasies waiting to be loved by us… Oh, love! Your sincerest pardons begged! I’ve gone too long, I’ve rambled, dear, and on and on and on and on - as if our hours were endless here… A morning toast, with orange-juiced lips exalting transcendent minds suffused with sunrise symphonies organic-born tranquilities sublimed sonorous assemblages with scintillas of eternity beating at our breasts – their embraces but a blushing, longing glance away… I’ll end my charms this enraptured morn' before cacophony and chafe coarse in crude and rough abrade when cynical distrust is laid by hoarse and leeching parasites, distaste fraught with smug disgust by hairy, smelly maladroit mediocrities born of poisoned wells grotesque with selfish lies - shrill and shrieking, biting, creeping around our love, as if they rose from Edgar Allen’s own immortal rumpled decomposing clothes… Oh me, oh my! I am so sorry! can you forgive me? I gone and kissed you for so long, in my morning imaginings, through these words, through this song - ‘twas supposed to be "a trifle treat," but little treats do sometimes last a little longer; and, oh, but oh, but if I could, I surly would keep you just a little longer tarrying here, tarrying here with me this pleasant morn

victory is something one experiences everyday, if he immerses himself in the joy of his craft, and in his sincere quest for learning it. Blood, sweat, and tears are fine. But rather than bleeding from wounds, is it not better to bleed from passion? Rather than sweating from a maniacal adherence to “hard work,” is it not better to sweat from an innocent immersion in one’s craft? Rather than tears of pain, is it not better to have tears of joy?

Human beings go through a 'camel phase' during which they carry all the foolish prejudices society burdens them with. Then comes the 'lion phase,' when they fight against all such prejudices. But there's another phase only a few achieve: the childhood phase. It's the highest phase, which requires one to consider life with the naïveté of a child, to play games, to be open to all kinds of influences, and to find one's lost innocence again. That's why I play games.

Discreet as you are, Rohan, one can’t help but notice how ardently you are pursued. It seems you hold quite an appeal for the ladies of London. And from all appearances, you’ve taken full advantage of what’s been offered.” Cam stared at him without expression. “Pardon, but are you leading to an actual point, my lord?” Leaning back in his chair, St. Vincent made a temple of his elegant hands and regarded Cam steadily. “Since you’ve had no problem with lack of desire in the past, I can only assume that, as happens with other appetites, yours has been sated with an overabundance of sameness. A bit of novelty may be just the thing.” Considering the statement, which actually made sense, Cam wondered if the notorious former rake had ever been tempted to stray. Having known Evie since childhood, when she had come to visit her widowed father at the club from time to time, Cam felt as protective of her as if she’d been his younger sister. No one would have paired the gentle-natured Evie with such a libertine. And perhaps no one had been as surprised as St. Vincent himself to discover their marriage of convenience had turned into a passionate love match. “What of married life?” Cam asked softly. “Does it eventually become an overabundance of sameness?” St. Vincent’s expression changed, the light blue eyes warming at the thought of his wife. “It has become clear to me that with the right woman, one can never have enough. I would welcome an overabundance of such bliss—but I doubt such a thing is mortally possible.” Closing the account book with a decisive thud, he stood from the desk. “If you’ll excuse me, Rohan, I’ll bid you good night.” “What about finishing the accounting?” “I’ll leave the rest in your capable hands.” At Cam’s scowl, St. Vincent shrugged innocently. “Rohan, one of us is an unmarried man with superior mathematical abilities and no prospects for the evening. The other is a confirmed lecher in an amorous mood, with a willing and nubile young wife waiting at home. Who do you think should do the damned account books?” And, with a nonchalant wave, St. Vincent had left the office.

The device of time travel allowed me to tell the story of a good marriage in a way that made ordinary things worthy of special attention. In the face of obstacles normal life is a triumph. Time travel can be read as a metaphor for memory: we are all time travelers in our minds, if not in our bodies.bodies. Like Henry, we jump back to moments of humiliation, loss, joy; we find ourselves flung seemingly at random to ordinary days, small unnoticed pleasures. Our present is created and shadowed by our past. We live in the present, blissfully innocent of our future.

We feel Divine Love entering us firstly through gentle, soft, humbling, kind and loving feelings, independent of any other person. This can be experienced as gently overwhelming as it increases, dependent on the depth of our desire for It. As we heal further, and more of our negative, repressed emotions and causal soul wounds are removed, the entering of Divine Love into our souls becomes stronger and stronger, bringing deep tears, powerful sensations and expansions in the heart and soul in immense gratitude, humility and feelings of great love and even more yearning for God. There may also be whole body tingling and sensations, crown chakra and heart explosions, feelings of being fully bathed in love and light, great feelings of humility, awe and wonder at the indescribable nature of God’s Love, and at how much He loves you. Receiving Divine Love can feel like being immersed in a bath of love all over, in every part of you, every cell. Deep peace, joy and waves of ecstasy, rapture and bliss arise and flow all over, and great humility washes over the soul. Immense love for God as the most wondrous, awe inspiring Soul that He Is is felt. A deepening into the essence of your pure soul occurs, along with the deep desire to give more of your soul to God. You feel deeply nurtured and embraced in God’s Arms. There is nothing better than resting and dropping into This. You feel the purity of His Love that is the most pleasurable feeling your soul will ever experience. Heat, pressure, inner and outer movements, pulsing, physical shifts and alignments can occur as you open and embody more Divine Love and the feeling of Blessedness this brings. This Blessedness also arises in felt feelings of forgiveness and mercy. Divine Love is Perfect in its trust and tenderness. We become more and more like a child; innocent, joyful, playful and beautiful as we were created to Be. This play is a pure and glorious sensation, wishing to share itself freely and touching all others. Receiving Divine Love can also become so powerful that we are brought to our knees in immense gratitude, rapture, pain and bliss, sometimes all at once. Receiving Divine Love in its fullness is overwhelming, and can even be physically painful in the heart as it inflows to such a degree that the heart actually stretches to accommodate It all. It is both rapturous and ecstatic, as the body may rock, sway and stretch as it receives more and more Divine Love.8 There is no better feeling in all universes than to receive this Greatest Love of all loves, the most pleasurable feelings a soul can experience as it has actually been designed this way, yet our physical bodies cannot take too much of it at one time! When I receive Divine Love in a rapturous way, it is blissful to the soul yet sometimes painful to the physical. Sometimes I have to stop praying as the body becomes too tired.

Consider," she said, "what it is, a unicorn. It is the incarnation of purity, an avatar of innocence. And here is the power of the talisman, for that state of grace which soon passes from each and every one is forever locked inside the horn, the horn become the phallus. And in the instant that it brought you, Natalie, to orgasm, you knew again that innocence, the bliss of a child before it suffers corruption." I didn't interrupt her, but all at once I got the gist. "Still, you are only a mortal woman, so what negligible, insignificant sins could you have possibly committed during your short life? Likewise, whatever calamities and wrongs have been visited upon your flesh or your soul, they are trifles. But if you survived the war in Paradise, if you refused the yoke and so are counted among the exiles, then you've persisted down all the long eons. You were already broken and despoiled billions of years before the coming of man. And your transgressions outnumber the stars. "Now," she asked, "what would you pay, were you so cursed, to know even one fleeting moment of that stainless, former existence?

Around the glade this pair of woodland nymphs danced. He swept her in a waltz to a duet that was sometimes off tune, sometimes rent with giggling and laughter as they made their own music. A breathless Erienne fell to a sun-dappled hummock of deep, soft moss, and laughing for the pure thrill of the day, she spread her arms, creating a comely yellow-hued flower on the dark green sward while seeming every bit as fragile as a blossom to the man who watched her. With bliss-bedazzled eyes, she gazed through the treetops overhead where swaying branches, bedecked in the first bright green of spring, caressed the underbellies of the freshlet zephyrs, and the fleecy white clouds raced like frolicking sheep across an azure lea. Small birds played courting games, and the earlier ones tended nests with single-minded perseverance. A sprightly squirrel leapt across the spaces, and a larger one followed, bemused at the sudden coyness of his mate. Christopher came to Erienne and sank to his knees on the thick, soft carpet, then bracing his hands on either side of her, slowly lowered himself until his chest touched her bosom. For a long moment he kissed those blushing lips that opened to him and welcomed him with an eagerness that belied the once-cool maid. Then he lifted her arm and lay beside her, keeping her hand in his as he shared her viewpoint of the day. They whispered sweet inanities, talked of dreams, hopes, and other things, as lovers are wont to do. Erienne turned on her side and taking care to keep her hand in the warm nest, ran her other fingers through his tousled hair. “You need a shearing, milord,” she teased. He rolled his head until he could look up into those amethyst eyes. “And does my lady see me as an innocent lamb ready to be clipped?” At her doubtful gaze, he questioned further. “Or rather a lusting, long-maned beast? A zealous suitor come to seduce you?” Erienne’s eyes brightened, and she nodded quickly to his inquiry. “A love-smitten swain? A silver-armored knight upon a white horse charging down to rescue you?” “Aye, all of that,” she agreed through a giggle. She came to her knees and grasped his shirt front with both hands. “All of that and more.” She bent to place a honeyed kiss upon his lips, then sitting back, spoke huskily. “I see you as my husband, as the father of my child, as my succor against the storm, protector of my home, and lord of yonder manse. But most of all, I see you as the love of my life.” -Erienne & Christopher

Серафимы I Резнею кровавой на время насытясь, Устали и слуги, и доблестный витязь И входят под своды обители Божьей, Где теплятся свечи Господних подножий. И с кроткой улыбкой со стен базилики Глядят серафимов блаженные лики. II Палач утомленный уснул на мгновенье. Подвешенной жертвы растет исступленье. На дыбе трепещет избитое тело, Медлительным пыткам не видно предела. А там, над землею, над тьмою кромешной, Парят серафимы с улыбкой безгрешной. III В глубоком «in pace», без воли и силы, Монахиня бьется о камни могилы. В холодную яму, где крысы и плесень, Доносится отзвук божественных песен. То – с гулом органа, в куреньях незримы, «Осанна! Осанна!» поют серафимы. The Seraphim I Gorged for a time with bloody slaughter, both servants and valorous hero are weary and enter the dome of God's dwelling, where candles glimmer at the Master's feet, and from the basilica's walls, with gentle smiles, gaze the blissful faces of the Seraphim. II The weary executioner has dozed for an instant. The hung victim's frenzy grows. A beaten body quivers on the rack, no limit to these slow tortures is seen. But there, above the earth, above this pitch darkness, soar the Seraphim with innocent smiles. III With deep "in pace" lacking strength and will, a nun beats against the stones of a grave. The echo of heavenly songs is heard in that cold pit, with rats and mould. But beyond - with the organ's roar, unseen in clouds of incense, "Hosanna, Hosanna!" sing the Seraphim.

Where truth is high ignorance is low. Where certainty is high speculation is low. Where pleasure is high pain is low. Where joy is high grief is low. Where love is high fear is low. Where modesty is high ego is low. Where tolerance is high injustice is low. Where mercy is high vengeance is low. Where integrity is high distrust is low. Where justice is high crime is low. Where equality is high abuse is low. Where freedom is high slavery is low. Where wealth is high poverty is low. Where knowledge is high illiteracy is low. Where wisdom is high imprudence is low. Where harmony is high anarchy is low. Where peace is high turmoil is low. Where order is high chaos is low. Where faith is high doubt is low. Where light is high darkness is low. Where good is high evil is low. Where strength is high weakness is low. Where pride is high wisdom is low. Where sorrow is high bliss is low. Where error is high truth is low. Where despair is high confidence is low. Where silence is high speech is low. Where tyranny is high liberty is low. Where shame is high honor is low. Where guilt is high innocence is low. Where illusion is high reality is low. Where bitterness is high happiness is low. Where want is high needs is low. Where pain is high pleasure is low. Where fear is high love is low. Where trouble is high comfort is low. Where fear is high certainty is low. Where desire is high fulfillment is low. Where apathy is high hope is low. Where confusion is high clarity is low. Where greed is high contentment is low. Where disloyalty is high friendship is low. Where wrath is high goodness is low. Where vice is high virtue is low.

Take the famous slogan on the atheist bus in London … “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” … The word that offends against realism here is “enjoy.” I’m sorry—enjoy your life? Enjoy your life? I’m not making some kind of neo-puritan objection to enjoyment. Enjoyment is lovely. Enjoyment is great. The more enjoyment the better. But enjoyment is one emotion … Only sometimes, when you’re being lucky, will you stand in a relationship to what’s happening to you where you’ll gaze at it with warm, approving satisfaction. The rest of the time, you’ll be busy feeling hope, boredom, curiosity, anxiety, irritation, fear, joy, bewilderment, hate, tenderness, despair, relief, exhaustion … This really is a bizarre category error. But not necessarily an innocent one … The implication of the bus slogan is that enjoyment would be your natural state if you weren’t being “worried” by us believer … Take away the malignant threat of God-talk, and you would revert to continuous pleasure, under cloudless skies. What’s so wrong with this, apart from it being total bollocks? … Suppose, as the atheist bus goes by, that you are the fifty-something woman with the Tesco bags, trudging home to find out whether your dementing lover has smeared the walls of the flat with her own shit again. Yesterday when she did it, you hit her, and she mewled till her face was a mess of tears and mucus which you also had to clean up. The only thing that would ease the weight on your heart would be to tell the funniest, sharpest-tongued person you know about it: but that person no longer inhabits the creature who will meet you when you unlock the door. Respite care would help, but nothing will restore your sweetheart, your true love, your darling, your joy. Or suppose you’re that boy in the wheelchair, the one with the spasming corkscrew limbs and the funny-looking head. You’ve never been able to talk, but one of your hands has been enough under your control to tap out messages. Now the electrical storm in your nervous system is spreading there too, and your fingers tap more errors than readable words. Soon your narrow channel to the world will close altogether, and you’ll be left all alone in the hulk of your body. Research into the genetics of your disease may abolish it altogether in later generations, but it won’t rescue you. Or suppose you’re that skanky-looking woman in the doorway, the one with the rat’s nest of dreadlocks. Two days ago you skedaddled from rehab. The first couple of hits were great: your tolerance had gone right down, over two weeks of abstinence and square meals, and the rush of bliss was the way it used to be when you began. But now you’re back in the grind, and the news is trickling through you that you’ve fucked up big time. Always before you’ve had this story you tell yourself about getting clean, but now you see it isn’t true, now you know you haven’t the strength. Social services will be keeping your little boy. And in about half an hour you’ll be giving someone a blowjob for a fiver behind the bus station. Better drugs policy might help, but it won’t ease the need, and the shame over the need, and the need to wipe away the shame. So when the atheist bus comes by, and tells you that there’s probably no God so you should stop worrying and enjoy your life, the slogan is not just bitterly inappropriate in mood. What it means, if it’s true, is that anyone who isn’t enjoying themselves is entirely on their own. The three of you are, for instance; you’re all three locked in your unshareable situations, banged up for good in cells no other human being can enter. What the atheist bus says is: there’s no help coming … But let’s be clear about the emotional logic of the bus’s message. It amounts to a denial of hope or consolation, on any but the most chirpy, squeaky, bubble-gummy reading of the human situation. St Augustine called this kind of thing “cruel optimism” fifteen hundred years ago, and it’s still cruel.

The truth is, the vanity of protective parents that I cited to the court goes beyond look-at-us-we’re-such-responsible-guardians. Our prohibitions also bulwark our self-importance. They fortify the construct that we adults are all initiates. By conceit, we have earned access to an unwritten Talmud whose soul-shattering content we are sworn to conceal from “innocents” for their own good. By pandering to this myth of the naïf, we service our own legend. Presumably we have looked the horror in the face, like staring into the naked eye of the sun, blistering into turbulent, corrupted creatures, enigmas even to ourselves. Gross with revelation, we would turn back the clock if we could, but there is no unknowing of this awful canon, no return to the blissfully insipid world of childhood, no choice but to shoulder this weighty black sagacity, whose finest purpose is to shelter our air-headed midgets from a glimpse of the abyss. The sacrifice is flatteringly tragic. The last thing we want to admit is that the forbidden fruit on which we have been gnawing since reaching the magic age of twenty-one is the same mealy Golden Delicious that we stuff into our children’s lunch boxes. The last thing we want to admit is that the bickering of the playground perfectly presages the machinations of the boardroom, that our social hierarchies are merely an extension of who got picked first for the kickball team, and that grown-ups still get divided into bullies and fatties and crybabies. What’s a kid to find out? Presumably we lord over them an exclusive deed to sex, but this pretense flies so fantastically in the face of fact that it must result from some conspiratorial group amnesia. To this day, some of my most intense sexual memories date back to before I was ten, as I have confided to you under the sheets in better days. No, they have sex, too. In truth, we are bigger, greedier versions of the same eating, shitting, rutting ruck, hell-bent on disguising from somebody, if only from a three-year-old, that pretty much all we do is eat and shit and rut. The secret is there is no secret. That is what we really wish to keep from our kids, and its suppression is the true collusion of adulthood, the pact we make, the Talmud we protect.

Sarah rode with him and felt her body rejoice, felt her senses whirl and sing with pleasure. She was exquisitely conscious, to her fingernails aware of the shattering intimacy of their joining. Eyes closed, hearing suspended, her world condensed just to him and her, and another world came alive, a landscape filled with feeling, with heat and longing, with sensation and power and the promise of glory. He moved within her and she rode out each thrust, met and matched him, welcomed and reluctantly released him again. Pleasure and delight bloomed, welled, then spilled through her. The momentary pain had faded so fast it was already a dim memory, overwhelmed by the solid and immediate reality of him hard and strong and so elementally male, joining so deeply and inexorably with her. His fingers slid from hers, sliding down and around to one globe of her bottom. He tilted her hips, and she gasped as the altered position let him penetrate her more deeply still. The reined power behind each deliberate thrust sent a thrill arcing through her. A primitive sense of danger, the recognition of vulnerability; he was so much stronger than she, his body so much harder, so much more powerful than hers. Yet he was careful. The realization slid through her, but she couldn't focus enough to think, then the heat of their passion rose another degree and claimed her. Sent fire and a hungry, ravenous need sliding through her veins, making her writhe, making her gasp. It inexorably branded desire deep into her flesh, marking and searing, until she burned. Until her body was aflame, until the flames coalesced and concentrated, burning deeper and hotter until she sobbed and clung and desperately urged him on, and he rode her faster, harder, deeper. Until with a rush, all heat and yearning, she found herself clinging to that final, dizzying peak. Felt him thrust one last time and shatter her, felt the furnace within her that he'd stoked and fed rupture, felt glory pour forth and sear her veins. And rush through her. She spiraled through a void, cushioned in heated bliss, her mind disconnected. Dimly, she heard him groan, long-drawn and guttural, was distantly aware that, joined deeply with her, he went rigid in her arms. She felt, from far away, the warmth of his seed spill inside her. Buoyed by glory, cocooned in golden rapture, she smiled.

A whimper escaped her as he slid low between her thighs, his head bending to the swollen place he had been tormenting with his fingers. He put his mouth on her, licking along the delicate, salty strait, spreading her with his thumbs. She tried to sit bolt-upright, but fell back against the pillows as he found what he wanted, his tongue strong and wet. She was spread beneath him like a pagan sacrifice, illuminated by the daylight that now flooded the room. Merripen worshipped her with hot, glassy licks, savoring the taste of her pleasured flesh. Moaning, she closed her legs around his head, and he turned deliberately to nibble and lick at one pale inner thigh, then the other. Feasting on her. Wanting everything. Win curled her fingers desperately in his hair, lost to shame as she guided him back, her body arching wordlessly...here, please, more, more, now...and she groaned as he fastened his mouth over her with a fast, flicking rhythm. Pleasure seized her, wrenching an astonished cry from her, holding her stiff and paralyzed for excruciating seconds. Every movement and measure and pulse of the universe had distilled to the compelling, slippery heat, riveted there on that crucial place, and then it all released, the feeling and tension shattering exquisitely, and she was racked with hard, blissful shudders. Win relaxed helplessly as the spasms faded. She was filled with glowing weariness, a sense of peace too pervasive to allow movement. Merripen let go of her just long enough to undress completely. Naked and aroused, he came back to her. He gathered her up with brute, masculine need, settling over her. She lifted her arms to him with a drowsy murmur. His back was tough and sleek beneath her fingers, the muscles twitching eagerly at her touch. His head descended, his shaven cheek rasping against hers. She met his power with utter surrender, flexing her knees and tilting her hips to cradle him. He pushed gently at first. The innocent flesh resisted, smarting at the intrusion. He thrust more strongly and Win caught her breath at the burning pain of his entrance. Too much of him, too hard, too deep. She writhed in reaction, and he buried himself heavily and pinned her down, gasping for her to be still, telling her to wait, he wouldn't move, it would be better. They both stilled, breathing hard. "Should I stop?" Merripen whispered raggedly, his face taut. Even now in this flash point of need, he was concerned for her. Understanding what it had cost him to ask, how much he needed her, Win was overwhelmed with love. "Don't even think of stopping now," she whispered back. Reaching down his lean flanks, she stroked him in shy encouragement. He groaned and began to move, his entire body trembling as he pressed within her. Although every thrust caused a sharp burn where they were joined, Win tried to pull him even deeper. The feeling of having him inside her went far beyond the pain or pleasure. It was necessary.

All running and playing beneath the heavy heat of the sun, children filled the park while their mothers—women cradling purring babies with pinched cheeks and sore bellies—sat on knitted picnic blankets along the sides, sipping on bubbling white wine and eating salted crackers with softened slices of warm cheese, watching their daughters prance and swirl with light dresses billowing around their boyish hips, plastic dolls tucked to their sides as squealing giggles ripped from glossed lips, reminiscing of a time when they were so ignorantly blissful, stupidly innocent, unaware that one day, such a thing would be turned sour, like the sticky juice of peaches whose pits were filled with squirming maggots. So unaware of the void that had been left in the center of the Town, gaping and cold.

in the concrete realm of history, even essentially innocent ideas can have malign consequences.

As time goes on, the free, happy, innocent child of bliss becomes buried deep underneath the layers of fear for so many years that even you forget your true identity. You’ve been wearing the protective layers for so long that you completely overlooked the fact that you could just take them all off at any point.

The master as a friend can help immensely, but the master should not become an owner. He should not possess the disciple as a slave, he should not ask for any surrender. The surrender has to be for the whole of existence, not for any individual. You have to surrender the ego, not to someone, you have to simply drop it. If somebody demands you to surrender yourself to him, demands that you should obey him and says that disobedience is sin, then he is creating a spiritual slave out of you. [...] Just believe in Jesus Christ and on the ultimate judgment day he will choose you out of the crowd: "This is my follower." Those he chooses will enter into the kingdom of God, and those he does not choose will fall into eternal darkness and hell. Now this is all exploitation of the simplicity, of the innocence of human beings. Nobody can be your savior. Neither can Christ nor Krishna; [...] And if you had not accepted these people as your saviors but just as your guides, you would have been in a totally different state. You would not have been in such misery and suffering and anguish. You would have been blissful. Your life would have been a light unto itself.

shoulder. “If your young man is innocent he’ll be all right. British justice is deservedly respected all the world over.” “But the p’lice, they’re something chronic; they’ll worm anything out of you,” blubbered Nellie. “Don’t get any wrong ideas about our excellent police force into your head,” Mr. Slocomb admonished her. “They are the friends of the innocent. Of course this is very unfortunate for your young man, but surely——” “There ’e is, my poor Bob, in a nasty cell! Oh, sir, d’you think they’ll let me see ’im?” “Well, really——” began Mr. Slocomb; but the conversation was interrupted by a strident call. “Nellie! Nellie! What are you about? Pull yourself together, girl! We have to dine even if...” Mrs. Bliss, the proprietress of the Frampton, flowingly clothed in black satin, paused in the doorway. “Dear me, Mr. Slocomb; you must be wondering what’s come to me, shouting all over the house like this! But really, my poor nerves are so jangled I hardly know where I am! To think of dear Miss Pongleton, always so particular, poor soul, lying there on the stairs—dear, dear, dear!” Nellie had slipped past Mrs. Bliss and scuttled back to the kitchen. Mr. Slocomb noticed that Mrs. Bliss’s black satin was unrelieved by the usual loops of gold chain and pearls, and concluded that this restraint was in token of respect to the deceased. “Yes, indeed, Mrs. Bliss, you must be distraught. Indeed a terrible affair! And this poor girl is in great distress about young Bob Thurlow, but I would advise you to keep her mind on her work, Mrs. Bliss; work is a wonderful balm for harassed nerves. A dreadful business! I only know, of course, the sparse details which I have just read in the evening Press.” “You’ve heard nothing more, Mr. Slocomb? Nellie’s Bob is a good-for-nothing, we all know”—Mrs. Bliss’s tone held sinister meaning—“but I’m sure none of us thought him capable of this!” “We must not think him so now, Mrs. Bliss, until—and unless—we are reluctantly compelled to do so,” Mr. Slocomb told her in his most pompous manner. “And Bob was always so good to poor Miss Pongleton’s Tuppy. The little creature is very restless; mark my words, he’s beginning to pine! Now I wonder, Mr. Slocomb, what I ought to do with him? What would you advise? Perhaps poor Miss Pongleton’s nephew, young Mr. Basil, would take him—though in lodgings, of course, I hardly know. There’s many a landlady would think a dog nothing but a nuisance, and little return for it, but of course what I have done for the poor dear lady I did gladly——” “Indeed, Mrs. Bliss, we have always counted you as one of Tuppy’s best friends. And as you say, Bob Thurlow was good to him, too; he took him for walks, I believe?” “He always seemed so fond of the poor little fellow; who could believe ... Well! well! And they say dogs know! What was that saying Mr. Blend was so fond of at one time—before your day, I daresay it would be: True humanity shows itself first in kindness to dumb animals. Out of one of his scrap-books. Well, the truest sayings sometimes go astray! But I must see after that girl; and cook’s not much better, she’s so flustered she’s making Nellie ten times worse. She can’t keep her tongue still a moment!” Mrs. Bliss bustled away, and Mr. Slocomb, apparently rather exasperated by her chatter, made his escape as soon as she had removed herself from the doorway. As Mrs. Bliss returned to the kitchen she thought: “Well, I’m glad he’s here; that’s some comfort; always so helpful—but goodness knows what the dinner will be like!” CHAPTER TWO THE FRUMPS DINNER at the Frampton that evening was eaten to the accompaniment of livelier conversation than usual, and now and again from one of the little tables an excited voice would rise to a pitch that dominated the surrounding talk until the owner of the voice, realizing her unseemly assertiveness on this solemn evening, would fall into lowered tones or awkward silence. The boarders discussed the murder callously. One’s

Of course, Rita would never know what I really was, not if I could help it. I had worked very hard to keep her blissfully ignorant of the true me, Dexter the Dark, the cheerful vivisectionist who lived for the purr of duct tape, the gleam of the knife, and the smell of fear rising up from a truly deserving playmate who had earned his ticket to Dexterland by slaughtering the innocent and somehow slipping through the gaping cracks in the justice system.… Rita

As innocent as the gesture was probably meant, it seemed to connect with some untouched spot in Maddie's soul. Oh, who was she kidding? She didn't use the word soul and the area she meant lay a tad further down south than where one would assume the soul to reside.

Intoxicated by my Master’s vampire guise, shocks of electric currents vibrated down my arching spine; I willingly offered my bacchá innocence to this erotic aristocrat for his inerrant enjoyment. French kisses filled my urgent provocation as his desires rendered me helpless, and Andy’s tantalizing riposte replaced my bidder’s sweet attraction. Laying me on the loveseat, P’s obsessive glare stirred my uninhibited longing for my lover’s unbridled manhood. Willingly I surrendered to my lover’s sensuality before his consecrated erection encased me in a cocoon of sacramental love. Our glowing auras merged into a halo of sexual unity, bonding our sacred Eucharist, igniting a fiery passion of unimaginable bliss and filling our bodies with flowing essence of milky love. P the voyeur, sat enamored, watching a love story unfold that was as old as the creation of man.

Rule number six: no promises." "Okay", I agree easily. "No promises, ever." "Promise?" he asks. "Promise." "And that's it." "That's the only one.

water lapped softly against the side of the marina walkway, the sound of muffled conversations and kids laughing occasionally floated by, the heat of the sun warmed skin while the breeze off the water kept the temperature pleasant, and a time-traveling vampire pirate was dragging a sensual, yet innocent,

Jesus is God’s grace 1embrace of the entire human race. So here we are, 2standing tall in the joyful bliss of our redeemed innocence! We are God’s 3dream come true! This was God’s 4idea all along!

Imagine yourself again, that same innocent five-year-old. Your parents get into a fight, and it makes you feel something new—fear and doubt of love and goodness. You instinctually find that by covering yourself with a blanket, you feel safe and protected. So you start to wear this blanket as a costume to hide from the chaos. You go to school and your classmates taunt you just for being yourself. You feel ashamed and embarrassed. You decide one blanket isn’t enough protection, so you add a second one to cover yourself up even more. If you didn’t physically do this as a child, we can guarantee you did it metaphorically. As you get older, you fall in love, but the person you open your heart to shuts you down. So you add another layer of protection over yourself. Your parents get divorced; you add another layer. People let you down; you add a layer. Your big plans don’t pan out; you add another layer. Anytime you are unable to control your circumstances or the people around you, you are reminded of how powerless you seem to be, and so you protect yourself with yet another layer. Because of mineness mentality, your mind innocently collected these experiences as a part of your identity and has worn them all your life. After all, from your ego’s vantage point, all of it is mine, and therefore about me—all my experiences must define me. As time goes on, the free, happy, innocent child of bliss becomes buried deep underneath the layers of fear for so many years that even you forget your true identity. You’ve been wearing the protective layers for so long that you completely overlooked the fact that you could just take them all off at any point. Luckily, underneath the layers of past experiences you have dressed yourself in, you still remain the innocent and happy child. No matter how traumatic life has been, you are still innocent and free, beautiful and perfect, wanted and loved, seen and recognized—just as you are. And with a little decluttering of the mind’s layers, the innocent child of bliss can finally be revealed once again.

In this altered state, the parts of the brain associated with happiness, compassion, and equanimity light up. Kotler and Wheal describe four experiential characteristics of these ecstatic states. They are: Selflessness Timelessness Effortlessness Richness 2.9. The Enlightenment Circuit associated with Bliss Brain. Brain regions include those involved with attention (insula and anterior cingulate cortex), regulating stress and the DMN (ventromedial prefrontal cortex and limbic system), empathy (temporoparietal junction, anterior cingulate cortex, and insula), and regulating self-awareness (precuneus and medial prefrontal cortex). They summarize these four qualities with the acronym STER. The benefit of this characterization of altered states is that it’s not linked to a philosophy, religion, guru, or cult. It focuses on the experiences common to transcendent states, rather than the paths by which people reach them. Selflessness represents a letting go of the sense of I-me-mine and all the elements that keep us stuck in our suffering default local personalities. Timelessness means coming into the present moment. That’s the place where we’re free of the regrets of the past as well as worries about the future. We’re in the timeless now, the only place we can experience the state of flow. In Huxley’s words, “the eye recovers some of the perceptual innocence of childhood,” while “Interest in space is diminished and interest in time falls almost to zero.” In this place, we relax into a sense of effortlessness. We feel connected to the universe and all living beings, our lives infused with a sense of richness. In this state we make connections between ideas, and the coordination between all the parts of our brains is enhanced. These rich experiences feel deeply significant. Kotler and Wheal document the human drive for ecstasy as far back in time as the ancient Greeks, saying that Plato describes it as “an altered state where our normal waking consciousness vanishes completely, replaced by an intense euphoria and a powerful connection to a greater intelligence.” Our English word “ecstasy” comes from the Greek words ex and stasis. It means getting outside (ex) the static place where your consciousness usually stands (stasis). That’s Bliss Brain. When you quiet the demon, you open up space in consciousness for connection with the universe. This produces a rich experience in which time, space, and effort fall away, and you merge with the rich infinity of nonlocal mind.

While Carius the Uncanny prowled lea and dale in search of monkshood and belladonna for use in various nefarious concoctions, he spied a site far more pleasing to his lecherous eyes than any blossom or berry. A young maid of exceptional beauty tended a small herd in high pasture. Surrounded by an aura of innocence and purity that drew men’s hearts like the mystical lodestone attracted iron filings, the lass knew little about the more dangerous nature of womanly allure. She blissfully sang the strains of an old folk tune about valiant heroes and true love as she went about her business, at first unaware that she had caught the attention of the region’s most notorious practitioner of the dark arts.

14 – Would anyone like to have a little look down into the secret of how ideals are fabricated on this earth? Who has enough pluck? . . . Come on! Here we have a clear glimpse into this dark workshop. Just wait one moment, Mr Nosy Daredevil: your eyes will have to become used to this false, shimmering light . . . There! That’s enough! Now you can speak! What’s happening down there? Tell me what you see, you with your most dangerous curiosity – now I am the one who’s listening. – – ‘I cannot see anything but I can hear all the better. There is a guarded, malicious little rumour-mongering and whispering from every nook and cranny. I think people are telling lies; a sugary mildness clings to every sound. Lies are turning weakness into an accomplishment, no doubt about it – it’s just as you said.’ – – Go on! – ‘and impotence which doesn’t retaliate is being turned into “good- ness”; timid baseness is being turned into “humility”; submission to people one hates is being turned into “obedience” (actually towards someone who, they say, orders this submission – they call him God). The 27 On the Genealogy of Morality inoffensiveness of the weakling, the very cowardice with which he is richly endowed, his standing-by-the-door, his inevitable position of having to wait, are all given good names such as “patience”, also known as the virtue; not-being-able-to-take-revenge is called not-wanting-to-take-revenge, it might even be forgiveness (“for they know not what they do – but we know what they are doing!”).33 They are also talking about “loving your enemies” – and sweating while they do it.’ – Go on! – ‘They are miserable, without a doubt, all these rumour-mongers and clandestine forgers, even if they do crouch close together for warmth – but they tell me that their misery means they are God’s chosen and select, after all, people beat the dogs they love best; perhaps this misery is just a preparation, a test, a training, it might be even more than that – some- thing that will one day be balanced up and paid back with enormous inter- est in gold, no! in happiness. They call that “bliss”.’ – Go on! – ‘They are now informing me that not only are they better than the powerful, the masters of the world whose spittle they have to lick (not from fear, not at all from fear! but because God orders them to honour those in authority)34 – not only are they better, but they have a “better time”, or at least will have a better time one day. But enough! enough! I can’t bear it any longer. Bad air! Bad air! This workshop where ideals are fabricated – it seems to me just to stink of lies.’ – No! Wait a moment! You haven’t said anything yet about the master- pieces of those black magicians who can turn anything black into white- ness, milk and innocence: – haven’t you noticed their perfect raffinement, their boldest, subtlest, most ingenious and mendacious stunt? Pay atten- tion! These cellar rats full of revenge and hatred – what do they turn revenge and hatred into? Have you ever heard these words? Would you suspect, if you just went by what they said, that the men around you were nothing but men of ressentiment? . . .

Bliss is not ignorance....bliss is innocent

Human beings go through a ‘camel phase’ during which they carry all the foolish prejudices society burdens them with. Then comes the ‘lion phase,’ when they fight against all such prejudices. But there’s another phase only a few achieve: the childhood phase. It’s the highest phase, which requires one to consider life with the naïveté of a child, to play games, to be open to all kinds of influences, and to find one’s lost innocence again. That’s why I play games.

Ah. Your innocence is bliss," he praised.

Eleanor plucked his sleeve. “But you know society just as I do. Blanche Harrington is one of the few genuinely nice women in town. There are so many vultures out there! I hated society when I was forced to come out. I can’t begin to tell you how many English ladies looked down on me because I am Irish. Worse, even though I am an earl’s daughter, the rakes in the ton were conscienceless.” She made sure not to grin, although she thought her eyes probably danced. He scowled. “I will protect Amanda from any rogue who dares give her a single glance,” he said tersely. “No one will dare pursue her with any intention other than an honorable one.” Eleanor tried not to laugh. “You do take this guardianship very seriously,” she said, maintaining an innocent expression. “Of course I do,” he snapped, appearing vastly annoyed. Then he nodded at the document in her hand. “Is that for me?” Eleanor simply could not prevent a grin. “It is the list of suitors.” Cliff looked at her as if she had spoken Chinese. “Don’t you want to see who is on it?” He snatched the sheet from her hand and she tried not to chuckle as his brows lifted. “There are only four names here!” “It is only the first four names I have thought of,” she said. “Besides, although you are providing her with a dowry, you are not making her a great heiress. We can claim an ancient Saxon family tree, but we have no proof. I am trying to find Amanda the perfect husband. You do want her to be very happy and to live in marital bliss, don’t you?” He gave her a dark look. “John Cunningham? Who is this?” She became eager, smiling. “He is a widower with a title, a baronet. He has a small estate in Dorset, of little value, but he is young and handsome and apparently virile, as his first wife had two sons. He—” “No.” She feigned surprise, raising both brows. “I beg your pardon?” “Who is next?” “What is wrong with Cunningham? Truthfully, he is openly looking for a wife!” “He is impoverished,” Cliff spat. “And he only wants a mother for his sons. Next?” “Fine,” she said, huffing. “William de Brett. Ah, you will like him! De Brett has a modest income of twelve hundred a year. He comes from a very fine family—they are of Norman descent, as well, but he has no title. However—” “No. Absolutely not.” Eleanor stared, forcing herself to maintain a straight face. “Amanda can live modestly but well on twelve hundred a year and I know de Brett. The women swoon when he walks into a salon.” His gaze hardened. “The income is barely acceptable, and he has no title. She will marry blue blood.” “Really?” His smile was dangerous. “Really. Who is Lionel Camden?

There is an immense, unreserved trust in life when one is young. You pursue, go off track, rediscover, whine, ans then allow your share of happiness to find you. And you do not realize how rare that occurrence is. You feel entitled to that bliss. And for a while, you bask in it. And it goes on, until the day it is taken away from you. And when that happens, your innocence is gone.

I keep having dreams about a lad I met back when I was seventeen,” Bliss was saying. “Perfectly innocent afternoon in its way. One of those endless summers. You never remember it raining in your past, do you? Just summers. We collected blackberries. Then we sat on the beach and talked. He took his shirt off. I kept mine on. I was too ashamed of my body to do the same. He was beautiful. So piss-elegant in his way. All cheek-bones and wrists. Tanned hairless skin. I wanted to be the centre of his world forever.” Bliss smiled, his eyes somewhere in the distance, away from the heat of all these people and their mindless chatter. “It was just a kiss. That was all it was. A sweet, sweet kiss… I never saw him again, even though I went back to that place every afternoon for a week.” His eyes refocused and he glanced at Malcolm, at Oliver. His face was hard, his voice brittle. “I found out he’d been hit by a postal van not two hours after we’d kissed. Died later that night in hospital. I overheard my mother talking about it. She said his name and I had to run away to the beach. I wept for hours. All gone, gone, gone.