Live Life In Moderation Quotes

The man who makes everything that leads to happiness depends upon himself, and not upon other men, has adopted the very best plan for living happily. This is the man of moderation, the man of manly character and of wisdom.

The great art of life is to moderate our passions. Objects of affection are like other belongings. We must love them enough to enrich our lives while we have them, not enough to impoverish our lives when they are gone.

There is nothing more savage than modern civilization.

But together, many trees create an ecosystem that moderates extremes of heat and cold, stores a great deal of water, and generates a great deal of humidity. And in this protected environment, trees can live to be very old.

...I should always find, the calamities of life were shared among the upper and lower part of mankind; but that middle station had the fewest disasters, and was not exposed to so many vicissitudes as the higher or lower part of mankind; nay, they were not subjected to so many distempers and uneasinesses either of body or mind, as those were who, by vicious living, luxury, and extravagances on one hand, or by hard labor, want of necessaries, and mean or insufficient diet on the other hand, bring distempers upon themselves by the natural consequences of their way of living; that the middle station of life was calculated for all kind of virtues and all kind of enjoyments; that peace and plenty were the handmaids of a middle fortune; that temperance, moderation, quietness, health, society, all agreeable diversions, and all desirable pleasures, were the blessings attending the middle station of life...

To insure good health: Eat lightly, breathe deeply, live moderately, cultivate cheerfulness, and maintain an interest in life.

Life isn’t meant to be lived in moderation.

As long as you pursue pleasure with moderation and discretion, and you don’t hurt anyone, then by all means—live every day to the fullest.

For God’s sake, the Bible says drinking is okay. “Stop drinking only water, and use a little wine.” That’s straight out of the Bible, 1 Timothy 5:23. And Ecclesiastes 9:7 instructs, “Eat your food with gladness and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for God has already approved what you do.” God approves and has no problem with you having a few glasses of wine.

The ultimate work of energy production is accomplished not in any specialized organ but in every cell of the body. A living cell, like a flame, burns fuel to produce the energy on which life depends. The analogy is more poetic than precise, for the cell accomplishes its ‘burning’ with only the moderate heat of the body’s normal temperature. Yet all these billions of gently burning little fires spark the energy of life. Should they cease to burn, ‘no heart could beat, no plant could grow upward defying gravity, no amoeba could swim, no sensation could speed along a nerve, no thought could flash in the human brain,’ said the chemist Eugene Rabinowitch.

Those who live by the labor of others are taught by religion to practice charity while on earth, thus offering them a very cheap way of justifying their entire existence as exploiters and selling them at a moderate price tickets to well-being in heaven. Religion is opium for the people. Religion is a sort of spiritual booze, in which the slaves of capital drown their human image, their demand for a life more or less worthy of man.

Men achieve cheerfulness by moderation in pleasure and by proportion in their life excess and deficiency are apt to fluctuate and cause great changes in the soul. And souls which change over great intervals are neither stable nor cheerful. So one should set one's mind on what is possible and be content with what one has taking little account of those who are admired and envied and not dwelling on them in thought but one should consider the lives of those who are in distress thinking of their grievous sufferings so that what one has and possesses will seem great and enviable and one will cease to suffer in one's soul through the desire for more.

Great wealth can make a man no happier than moderate means, unless he has the luck to continue in propsperity to the end. Many very rich men have been unfortunate, and many with a modest competence have had good luck. The former are better off than the latter in two respects only, whereas the poor but lucky man has the advantage in many ways; for though the rich have the means to satisfy their appetites and to bear calamities, and the poor have not, the poor, if they are lucky, are more likely to keep clear of trouble, and will have besides the blessings of a sound body, health, freedom from trouble, fine children, and good looks. Now if a man thus favoured died as he has lived, he will be just the one you are looking for: the only sort of person who deserves to be called happy. But mark this: until he is dead, keep the word “happy” in reserve. Till then, he is not happy, but only lucky.

Health outweighs all other blessings so much that one may really say that a healthy beggar is happier than an ailing king. A quiet and cheerful temperament, happy in the enjoyment of a perfectly sound physique, an intellect clear, lively, penetrating and seeing things as they are, a moderate and gentle will, and therefore a good conscience—these are privileges which no rank or wealth can make up for or replace.

...among whom the art of living well and getting the most out of life at a moderate expense has been attained to a very high degree.

The unexamined life may not be worth living, but the overexamined life is nothing to write home about either.19 Moreover, there is almost certainly no “book” answer to the question of how much moderation is the right amount of moderation.

Without knowing it he drew a very pleasant picture of an affectionate, happy family who lived unpretentiously in circumstances of moderate affluence at peace with themselves and the world and undisturbed by any fear that anything might happen to affect their security. The life he described lacked neither grace nor dignity; it was healthy and normal, and through its intellectual interests not entirely material; the persons who led it were simple and honest, neither ambitious nor envious, prepared to do their duty by the state and by their neighbors according to their lights; and there was in them neither harm nor malice. If Lydia saw how much of their good nature, their kindliness, their unpleasing self-complacency depended on the long-established and well-ordered prosperity of the country that had given them birth; if she had an inkling that, like children building castles on the sea sand, they might at any moment be swept away by a tidal wave, she allowed no sign of it to appear on her face.

I have lived my life in the shelter of too many northern alliances. I have made alliance with the gentle cow, the health department, the local policeman. In the shelter of such alliances I have got out of bed in the morning with moderate assurance that I shall still be alive at bedtime. But south of the moon my allies vanish, and I have an emptiness in my stomach. I fear the cobras in the garden. I lack a treaty with the lioness. I dread the crocodiles of Lake Victoria, the tsetse fly in the Tanganyika bush, the little airplane with the funny engine, and the mosquito in the soft evening air. But most of all, I am afraid of the African street.

Many people in this room have an Etsy store where they create unique, unreplicable artifacts or useful items to be sold on a small scale, in a common marketplace where their friends meet and barter. I and many of my friends own more than one spinning wheel. We grow our food again. We make pickles and jams on private, individual scales, when many of our mothers forgot those skills if they ever knew them. We come to conventions, we create small communities of support and distributed skills--when one of us needs help, our village steps in. It’s only that our village is no longer physical, but connected by DSL instead of roads. But look at how we organize our tribes--bloggers preside over large estates, kings and queens whose spouses’ virtues are oft-lauded but whose faces are rarely seen. They have moderators to protect them, to be their knights, a nobility of active commenters and big name fans, a peasantry of regular readers, and vandals starting the occasional flame war just to watch the fields burn. Other villages are more commune-like, sharing out resources on forums or aggregate sites, providing wise women to be consulted, rabbis or priests to explain the world, makers and smiths to fashion magical objects. Groups of performers, acrobats and actors and singers of songs are traveling the roads once more, entertaining for a brief evening in a living room or a wheatfield, known by word of mouth and secret signal. Separate from official government, we create our own hierarchies, laws, and mores, as well as our own folklore and secret history. Even my own guilt about having failed as an academic is quite the crisis of filial piety--you see, my mother is a professor. I have not carried on the family trade. We dwell within a system so large and widespread, so disorganized and unconcerned for anyone but its most privileged and luxurious members, that our powerlessness, when we can summon up the courage to actually face it, is staggering. So we do not face it. We tell ourselves we are Achilles when we have much more in common with the cathedral-worker, laboring anonymously so that the next generation can see some incremental progress. We lack, of course, a Great Work to point to and say: my grandmother made that window; I worked upon the door. Though, I would submit that perhaps the Internet, as an object, as an aggregate entity, is the cathedral we build word by word and image by image, window by window and portal by portal, to stand taller for our children, if only by a little, than it does for us. For most of us are Lancelots, not Galahads. We may see the Grail of a good Classical life, but never touch it. That is for our sons, or their daughters, or further off. And if our villages are online, the real world becomes that dark wood on the edge of civilization, a place of danger and experience, of magic and blood, a place to make one’s name or find death by bear. And here, there be monsters.

Remember that you must behave in life as at a dinner party. Is anything brought around to you? Put out your hand and take your share with moderation. Does it pass by you? Don’t stop it. Is it not yet come? Don’t stretch your desire towards it, but wait till it reaches you.

The next man I was involved with lived in Boston. He taught me to cook mushrooms. He taught me that if you heat the butter very hot and put just a very few mushrooms into the frying pan, they come out nice and brown and crispy, whereas if the butter is only moderately hot and you crowd the mushrooms, they get all mushy and wet. Every time I make mushrooms I think of him. There was another man in my life when I was younger who taught me to put sour cream into scrambled eggs, and since I never ever put sour cream into scrambled eggs I never really think of him at all.

A soft luxurious course of habitual indulgence, is the practice of the bulk of modern Christians: and that constant moderation, that wholesome discipline of restraint and self-denial, which are requisite to prevent the unperceived encroachments of the inferior appetites, seem altogether disused, as the exploded austerities of monkish superstition... But the persons of whom we are now speaking, forgetting alike the duties they owe to themselves and to their fellow-creatures, often act as though their condition were meant to be a state of uniform indulgence, and vacant, unprofitable sloth... To multiply the comforts of affluence, to provide for the gratification of appetite, to be luxurious without diseases, and indolent without lassitude, seems the chief study of their lives. Others again seem more to attach themselves to what have been well termed the ‘pomps and vanities of this world.’ Magnificent houses, grand equipages, numerous retinues, splendid entertainments, high and fashionable connections, appear to constitute, in their estimation, the supreme happiness of life.

Hypatia’s case then was this. She lived in a time when her intellectual heritage, a seven-hundred-year-old tradition, was crumbling. The supports that had once seemed so secure—the Museum and the libraries—had all been swept away by the swell of ignorant dogmatism. Almost alone, virtually the last academic, she stood for the intellectual values, for rigorous mathematics, ascetic Neoplatonism, the crucial role of the mind, and the voice of temperance and moderation in civic life.

A life lived in moderation is a story nobody would read, much less live

Moderation sees itself as beautiful; it is unaware that in the eye of the immoderate it appears black and sober, and consequently ugly-looking.

Simplicity is my fashion, Moderation is my trend. There are creases on my shirt, Because my heart is without bent.

Simplicity is my fashion, Moderation is my trend.

Finally, in your conduct be friendly toward everyone And a burden to none. Toward God, live a holy life; toward yourself, be moderate; toward your fellow men, be fair; in life, be modest; in your manner, courteous; in admonition, friendly; in forgiveness, willing; in your promises, true; in your speech, wise; and out of a pure heart gladly share of the bounties you receive.38

Most of these stories are on the tragic side. But the reader must not suppose that the incidents I have narrated were of common occurrence. The vast majority of these people, government servants, planters, and traders, who spent their working lives in Malaya were ordinary people ordinarily satisfied with their station in life. They did the jobs they were paid to do more or less competently,. They were as happy with their wives as are most married couples. They led humdrum lives and did very much the same things every day. Sometimes by way of a change they got a little shooting; but at a rule, after they had done their day's work, they played tennis if there were people to play with, went to the club at sundown if there was a club in the vicinity, drank in moderation, and played bridge. They had their little tiffs, their little jealousies, their little flirtations, their little celebrations. They were good, decent, normal people. I respect, and even admire, such people, but they are not the sort of people I can write stories about. I write stories about people who have some singularity of character which suggests to me that they may be capable of behaving in such a way as to give me an idea that I can make use of, or about people who by some accident or another, accident of temperament, accident of environment, have been involved in unusual contingencies. But, I repeat, they are the exception.

I have said that in one respect my mind has changed during the last twenty or thirty years. Up to the age of thirty, or beyond it, poetry of many kinds, such as the works of Milton, Gray, Byron, Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Shelley, gave me great pleasure, and even as a schoolboy I took intense delight in Shakespeare, especially in the historical plays. I have also said that formerly pictures gave me considerable, and music very great delight. But now for many years I cannot endure to read a line of poetry: I have tried lately to read Shakespeare, and found it so intolerably dull that it nauseated me. I have also almost lost my taste for pictures or music. Music generally sets me thinking too energetically on what I have been at work on, instead of giving me pleasure. I retain some taste for fine scenery, but it does not cause me the exquisite delight which it formerly did. On the other hand, novels which are works of the imagination, though not of a very high order, have been for years a wonderful relief and pleasure to me, and I often bless all novelists. A surprising number have been read aloud to me, and I like all if moderately good, and if they do not end unhappily–against which a law ought to be passed. A novel, according to my taste, does not come into the first class unless it contains some person whom one can thoroughly love, and if a pretty woman all the better. This curious and lamentable loss of the higher aesthetic tastes is all the odder, as books on history, biographies, and travels (independently of any scientific facts which they may contain), and essays on all sorts of subjects interest me as much as ever they did. My mind seems to have become a kind of machine for grinding general laws out of large collections of facts, but why this should have caused the atrophy of that part of the brain alone, on which the higher tastes depend, I cannot conceive. A man with a mind more highly organised or better constituted than mine, would not, I suppose, have thus suffered; and if I had to live my life again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week; for perhaps the parts of my brain now atrophied would thus have been kept active through use. The loss of these tastes is a loss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the intellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional part of our nature.

Philosophy consists in moderating each life so that many lives will fit together with as much liberty and justice as will keep them together: and not so much as will make them fly apart, when the harm will be the greater.

we are left with evidence that is modest, at best, to justify the use of moderate alcohol. What’s beyond doubt, on the other hand, is that more brains and lives are ruined by overuse of alcohol than by any other substance.

Greatness of soul consists not so much in mounting and in pressing forward, as in knowing how to govern and circumscribe itself; it takes everything for great, that is enough, and demonstrates itself in preferring moderate to eminent things. There is nothing so fine and legitimate as well and duly play the man; nor science so arduous as well and naturally know how to live this life; and of all the infirmities we have, 'tis the most barbarous to despise our being.

We all have our chosen methods to numb the pain of our problems, and in moderate doses there is nothing wrong with this. But the longer we avoid and the longer we numb, the more painful it will be when we finally do confront our issues.

He told me it was for men of desperate fortunes on one hand, or of aspiring, superior fortune on the other, who when abroad upon adventures, to rise by enterprize, and make themselves famous in undertakings of a nature out of the common road; that these things were all either too far above me, or to far below me; that mine was the middle state, or what might be called the upper station of low life, which he had found by long experience was the best state in the world, the most suited to human happiness, not exposed to the miseries of hardships, the labour and sufferings of the mechanick part of mankind, and not embarrassed with the pride, luxury, ambition, and envy of the upper part of mankind. He told me I might judge of the happiness of this state by this one thing, viz. that this was the state of life which all other people envied, that kings had frequently lamented the miserable consequences of being born to great things, and wished they had been placed in the middle of the two extremes, between the mean and the great; that the wise man gave his testimony to this as the just standard of true felicity, when he prayed to have neither poverty or riches. He bid me observe it, and I should always find, that the calamities of life were shared among the upper and lower part of mankind; but that the middle station had the fewest disasters, and was not exposed to so many vicissitudes as the higher or lower part of mankind; nay, they were so subjected to so many distempers and uneasiness, either of body or mind, as those were who, by vicious living, luxury, and extravagancies on one hand, and by hard labour, want of necessaries, and mean or insufficient diet on the other hand, bring distempers upon themselves by the natural consequences of their way of living; that the middle station of life was calculated for all kinds of vertues and all kinds of enjoyments; that peace and plenty were the hand-maids of a middle fortune; that temperance, moderation, quietness, health, society, all agreeable diversion, and all desirable pleasures, were the blessing attending the middle station of life; that this way men went silently and smoothly thro’ the world, and comfortably out of it, not embarrassed with the labour of their hands or of the head, not sold to the life of slavery for daily bread, or harrast with perplexed circumstances, which rob the soul of peace and the body of rest; not enraged with the passion of envy, or secret burning lust of ambition for great things; but in easy circumstances sliding gently thro’ the world, and sensibly tasting the sweets of living without the bitter, feeling that they are happy and learning by every day’s experience to know it more sensibly.

To enjoy good health and live a long life you need four things: 1. A clear conscience when you go to bed at night; that is, no fear of eternity. 2. Moderation in eating. 3. An active life. 4. Good companions, that is, fleeing from those who are corrupt.

How many ills, how many infirmities, does man owe to his excesses, his ambition – in a word, to the indulgence of his various passions! He who should live soberly in all respects, who should never run into excesses of any kind, who should be always simple in his tastes, modest in his desires, would escape a large proportion of the tribulations of human life. It is the same with regard to spirit-life, the sufferings of which are always the consequence of the manner in which a spirit has lived upon the earth. In that life undoubtedly he will no longer suffer from gout or rheumatism; but his wrong-doing down here will cause him to experience other sufferings no less painful. We have seen that those sufferings are the result of the links which exist between a spirit and matter; that the more completely he is freed from the influence of matter – in other words, the more dematerialized he is – the fewer are the painful sensations experienced by him. It depends, therefore, on each of us to free ourselves from the influence of matter by our action in this present life. Man possesses free-will, and, consequently, the power of electing to do or not to do. Let him conquer his animal passions; let him rid himself of hatred, envy, jealousy, pride; let him throw off the yoke of selfishness; let him purify his soul by cultivating noble sentiments; let him do good; let him attach to the things of this world only the degree of importance which they deserve – and he will, even under his present corporeal envelope, have effected his purification, and achieved his deliverance from the influence of matter, which will cease for him on his quitting that envelope. For such a one the remembrance of physical sufferings endured by him in the life he has quitted has nothing painful, and produces no disagreeable impression, because they affected his body only, and left no trace in his soul. He is happy to be relieved from them; and the calmness of a good conscience exempts him from all moral suffering.

According to Massimo Maffei from the University of Turin, plants-and that includes trees-are perfectly capable of distinguishing their own roots from the roots of other species and even from the roots of related individuals. But why are trees such social beings? Why do they share food with their own species and sometimes even go so far as to nourish their competitors? The reasons are the same as for human communities: there are advantages to working together. A tree is not a forest. On its own, a tree cannot establish a consistent local climate. It is at the mercy of wind and weather. But together, many trees create an ecosystem that moderates extremes of heat and cold, stores a great deal of water, and generates a great deal of humidity. And in this protected environment, trees can live to be very old. To get to this point, the community must remain intact no matter what. If every tree were looking out only for itself, then quite a few of them would never reach old age. Regular fatalities would result in many large gaps in the tree canopy, which would make it easier for storms to get inside the forest and uproot more trees. The heat of summer would reach teh forest floor and dry it out. Every tree would suffer.

Your life seems simple,' Lancelot said. Leo Sen said, 'My life is beautiful.' Lancelot saw that it was. He was enough of a lover of forms to understand the allure of such a strict life, how much internal wildness it could release. Leo waking to dawn over the cold seabird ocean, the fresh berries and goat-milk yogurt for breakfast, the tisanes of his own herbs, blue crabs in the black tide pools, going to bed with the whipping winds and rhythm of waves against hard rock. Lettuce shoots glowing in the south-facing windows. The celibacy, the temperate, moderate life that Leo lived, at least on the outside, in his state of constant cold. And the feverish musical life within.

Patriotism,” said Lymond, “like honesty is a luxury with a very high face value which is quickly pricing itself out of the spiritual market altogether. [...] It is an emotion as well, and of course the emotion comes first. A child’s home and the ways of its life are sacrosanct, perfect, inviolate to the child. Add age; add security; add experience. In time we all admit our relatives and our neighbours, our fellow townsmen and even, perhaps, at last our fellow nationals to the threshold of tolerance. But the man living one inch beyond the boundary is an inveterate foe. [...] Patriotism is a fine hothouse for maggots. It breeds intolerance; it forces a spindle-legged, spurious riot of colour.… A man of only moderate powers enjoys the special sanction of purpose, the sense of ceremony; the echo of mysterious, lost and royal things; a trace of the broad, plain childish virtues of myth and legend and ballad. He wants advancement—what simpler way is there? He’s tired of the little seasons and looks for movement and change and an edge of peril and excitement; he enjoys the flowering of small talents lost in the dry courses of daily life. For all these reasons, men at least once in their lives move the finger which will take them to battle for their country.… “Patriotism,” said Lymond again. “It’s an opulent word, a mighty key to a royal Cloud-Cuckoo-Land. Patriotism; loyalty; a true conviction that of all the troubled and striving world, the soil of one’s fathers is noblest and best. A celestial competition for the best breed of man; a vehicle for shedding boredom and exercising surplus power or surplus talents or surplus money; an immature and bigoted intolerance which becomes the coin of barter in the markets of power— [...] These are not patriots but martyrs, dying in cheerful self-interest as the Christians died in the pleasant conviction of grace, leaving their example by chance to brood beneath the water and rise, miraculously, to refresh the centuries. The cry is raised: Our land is glorious under the sun. I have a need to believe it, they say. It is a virtue to believe it; and therefore I shall wring from this unassuming clod a passion and a power and a selflessness that otherwise would be laid unquickened in the grave. [...] “And who shall say they are wrong?” said Lymond. “There are those who will always cleave to the living country, and who with their uprooted imaginations might well make of it an instrument for good. Is it quite beyond us in this land? Is there no one will take up this priceless thing and say, Here is a nation, with such a soul; with such talents; with these failings and this native worth? In what fashion can this one people be brought to live in full vigour and serenity, and who, in their compassion and wisdom, will take it and lead it into the path?

All my life I have wondered about the possibility of life elsewhere. What would it be like? Of what would it be made? All living things on our planet are constructed of organic molecules—complex microscopic architectures in which the carbon atom plays a central role. There was once a time before life, when the Earth was barren and utterly desolate. Our world is now overflowing with life. How did it come about? How, in the absence of life, were carbon-based organic molecules made? How did the first living things arise? How did life evolve to produce beings as elaborate and complex as we, able to explore the mystery of our own origins? And on the countless other planets that may circle other suns, is there life also? Is extraterrestrial life, if it exists, based on the same organic molecules as life on Earth? Do the beings of other worlds look much like life on Earth? Or are they stunningly different—other adaptations to other environments? What else is possible? The nature of life on Earth and the search for life elsewhere are two sides of the same question—the search for who we are. In the great dark between the stars there are clouds of gas and dust and organic matter. Dozens of different kinds of organic molecules have been found there by radio telescopes. The abundance of these molecules suggests that the stuff of life is everywhere. Perhaps the origin and evolution of life is, given enough time, a cosmic inevitability. On some of the billions of planets in the Milky Way Galaxy, life may never arise. On others, it may arise and die out, or never evolve beyond its simplest forms. And on some small fraction of worlds there may develop intelligences and civilizations more advanced than our own. Occasionally someone remarks on what a lucky coincidence it is that the Earth is perfectly suitable for life—moderate temperatures, liquid water, oxygen atmosphere, and so on. But this is, at least in part, a confusion of cause and effect. We earthlings are supremely well adapted to the environment of the Earth because we grew up here. Those earlier forms of life that were not well adapted died. We are descended from the organisms that did well. Organisms that evolve on a quite different world will doubtless sing its praises too. All life on Earth is closely related. We have a common organic chemistry and a common evolutionary heritage. As a result, our biologists are profoundly limited. They study only a single kind of biology, one lonely theme in the music of life. Is this faint and reedy tune the only voice for thousands of light-years? Or is there a kind of cosmic fugue, with themes and counterpoints, dissonances and harmonies, a billion different voices playing the life music of the Galaxy? Let

It is not for nothing that the person stands between heaven and hell. He has to live so as to do justice to both the spirit and the flesh and to honor the fragility of life where it reveals itself to him. This he should do as a pragmatist out of a respect for the deep ambiguity contained in all of existence, not as a petty profiteer: he will be part of one of the two halves of the world soon enough.

Christians are to live their lives on earth dour and sullen; they enjoy the goods of this world as anyone is entitled. Yet they do so with a constant gratitude expressed through virtuous moderation and with an eye toward the giver of all good gifts. Christians are unified in love of their enemies and are therefore able to endure hatred in return because they know to whom they truly and eternally belong.

Remember to conduct yourself in life as if at a banquet. As something being passed around comes to you, reach out your hand and take a moderate helping. Does it pass you by? Don’t stop it. It hasn’t yet come? Don’t burn in desire for it, but wait until it arrives in front of you. Act this way with children, a spouse, toward position, with wealth—one day it will make you worthy of a banquet with the gods.

Health outweighs all other blessings so much that one may really say that a healthy beggar is happier than an ailing king. A quiet and cheerful temperament, happy in the enjoyment of a perfectly sound physique, an intellect clear, lively, penetrating and seeing things as they are, a moderate and gentle will, and therefore a good conscience–these are privileges which no rank or wealth can make up for or replace.

Remember to conduct yourself in life as if at a banquet. As something being passed around comes to you, reach out your hand and take a moderate helping. Does it pass you by? Don’t stop it. It hasn’t yet come? Don’t burn in desire for it, but wait until it arrives in front of you. Act this way with children, a spouse, toward position, with wealth—one day it will make you worthy of a banquet with the gods.” —EPICTETUS, ENCHIRIDION, 15

O Fabricius! What would your great soul have thought, if to your own misfortune you had been called back to life and had seen the pompous face of this Rome saved by your efforts and which your honourable name had distinguished more than all its conquests? 'Gods,' you would have said, 'what has happened to those thatched roofs and those rustic dwelling places where, back then, moderation and virtue lived? What fatal splendour has succeeded Roman simplicity? What is this strange language? What are these effeminate customs? What do these statues signify, these paintings, these buildings? You mad people, what have you done? You, masters of nations, have you turned yourself into the slaves of the frivolous men you conquered? Are you now governed by rhetoricians? Was it to enrich architects, painters, sculptors, and comic actors that you soaked Greece and Asia with your blood? Are the spoils of Carthage trophies for a flute player? Romans, hurry up and tear down these amphitheatres, break up these marbles, burn these paintings, chase out these slaves who are subjugating you, whose fatal arts are corrupting you. Let other hands distinguish themselves with vain talents. The only talent worthy of Rome is that of conquering the world and making virtue reign there. When Cineas took our Senate for an assembly of kings, he was not dazzled by vain pomp or by affected elegance. He did not hear there this frivolous eloquence, the study and charm of futile men. What then did Cineas see that was so majestic? O citizens! He saw a spectacle which your riches or your arts could never produce, the most beautiful sight which has ever appeared under heaven, an assembly of two hundred virtuous men, worthy of commanding in Rome and governing the earth.

It was like living half your life in a tiny, scruffy, warm grey box, and being moderately happy in there because you knew no better...and then discovering a little hole in the corner of the box, a tiny opening which you could get your finger into, and tease and pull apart at, so that eventually you created a tear, which led to a greater tear, which led to the box falling apart around you... so that you stepped out of the tiny box's confines into startlingly cool, clear fresh air and found yourself on top of a mountain, surrounded by deep valleys, sighing forests, soaring peaks, glittering lakes, sparkling snow fields and a stunning, breathtakingly blue sky. And that, of course, wasn't even the start of the real story, that was more like the breath that is drawn in before the first syllable of the first word of the first paragraph of the first chapter of the first book of the first volume of the story.

Principal standpoint: one should not suppose the mission of a higher species to be the leading of inferior men (as Comte does, for instance); but the inferior should be regarded as the foundation upon which a higher species may live their higher life — upon which alone they can stand. The conditions under which a strong, noble species maintains itself (in the matter of intellectual discipline) are precisely the reverse of those under which the industrial masses — the tea-grocers à la Spencer — subsist. Those qualities which are within the grasp only of the strongest and most terrible natures, and which make their existence possible leisure, adventure, disbelief, and even dissipation — would necessarily ruin mediocre natures — and does do so — when they possess them. In the case of the latter industry, regularity, moderation, and strong 'conviction' are in their proper place — in short, all 'gregarious virtues': under their influence these mediocre men become perfect.

Sonnet of Luxury Serenity shrinks as luxury grows, While you pay moderation no heed. Disparity is not a matter of economics, All of it is born of human greed. Moderation is the key to contentment, Lesser the needs the happier you are. Grow up and get hold of your needs, Learn to tell necessities from desire. Cherish the little things in life, Value people over possession. A healthy society is born of healthy mind, Health begins where ends self-obsession. Sophistication is an enemy of life. A life of simplicity is bound to thrive.

There was staying with her at this time a certain Miss Macnulty, who was related, after some distant fashion, to old Lady Linlithgow, and who was as utterly destitute of possessions or means of existence as any unfortunate, well-born, and moderately-educated, middle-aged woman in London. To live upon her friends, such as they might be, was the only mode of life within her reach. It was not that she had chosen such dependence; nor, indeed, had she endeavoured to reject it. It had come to her as a matter of course, — either that or the poor-house

As Clor observes, the moderate knows she cannot have it all. There are tensions between rival goods, and you just have to accept that you will never get to live a pure and perfect life, devoted to one truth or one value. The moderate has limited aspirations about what can be achieved in public life. The paradoxes embedded into any situation do not allow for a clean and ultimate resolution. You expand liberty at the cost of encouraging license. You crack down on license at the cost of limiting liberty. There is no escaping this sort of trade-off.

ON GETTING DRUNK: "Those who are Christians are to see to it that they are grateful for grace and redemption and conduct themselves modestly, moderately, and soberly, so that one does not go on living the swinish life that goes on in the filthy world...." "...In my time it was considered a great shame among the nobility [drunkenness]. Now they are worse than the citizens and peasants;...We preach, but who stops it? Those who should stop it do it themselves; the princes even more. Therefore Germany is a land of hogs and a filthy people which debauches its body and its life. If you were going to paint it, you would have to paint a pig. "This gluttony is inundating us like an ocean....We are the laughingstock of all the other countries, who look upon us as filthy pigs;...It is possible to tolerate a little elevation, when a man takes a drink or two too much after working hard and when he is feeling low. This must be called a frolic. But to sit day and night, pouring it in and pouring it out again, is piggish. This is not a human way of living. not to say Christian, but rather a pig's life." - Martin Luther

What is the actual link between material consumption and objective and subjective quality of life once the basic needs for food, clothes, shelter, and mobility are well satisfied? Going from material misery to modest material comfort will make many things in life better but, obviously, the link is not an endless escalator. But if so, where is the saturation point? Can such a level actually be quantified in a meaningful way? These questions must be asked even if there are no easy answers, mainly because of the situation that is the very opposite of the material poverty outlined at the beginning of this section: too many people live in the condition of material excess and this does not endow them with a higher physical quality of life than that enjoyed by moderate consumers and it does not make them exceptionally happy. At the most fundamental level, the question is about the very nature of modern economies. All but a tiny minority of economists (those of ecological persuasion) see the constant expansion of output as the fundamental goal. And not just any expansion: economies should preferably grow at annual rates in excess of 2%, better yet 3%. This is the only model, the only paradigm, and the only precept, as the economists in command of modern societies cannot envisage a system that would deliberately grow at a minimum rate, even less so one that would experience zero growth, and the idea of a carefully managed decline appears to them to be outright unimaginable. The pursuit of endless growth is, obviously, an unsustainable strategy (Binswanger, 2009), and the post-2008 experience has shown how dysfunctional modern economies become as soon as the growth becomes negligible, ceases temporarily or when there is even a slight decline: rising unemployment, falling labor participation, growing income inequality, and soaring budget deficits.

As for wealth, we live in a civilization which piously denies that it is an end in itself, and treats it exactly this way in practice. One of the most powerful indictments of capitalism is that it compels us to invest most of our creative energies in matters which are in fact purely utilitarian. The means of life become the end. Life consists in laying the material infrastructure for living. It is astonishing that in the twenty-fi rst century, the material organization of life should bulk as large as it did in the Stone Age. The capital which might be devoted to releasing men and women, at least to some moderate degree, from the exigencies of labour is dedicated instead to the task of amassing more capital.

Thomas Jefferson wrote, “We have no paupers. . . . The great mass of our population is of laborers; our rich, who can live without labor, either manual or professional, being few, and of moderate wealth. Most of the laboring class possess property, cultivate their own lands, have families, and from the demand for their labor are enabled to exact from the rich and the competent such prices as enable them to be fed abundantly, clothed above mere decency, to labor moderately and raise their families. . . . The wealthy, on the other hand, and those at their ease, know nothing of what the Europeans call luxury. They have only somewhat more of the comforts and decencies of life than those who furnish them. Can any condition of society be more desirable than this?

Homo sapiens is a creature that over vast areas of the earth, in the countries and continents and centuries that the history books and the newsreels neglect because nothing ‘interesting’ has happened in them, has succeeded in living the moderate and mainly cooperative life to be expected of cousins of the hedonic apes. Almost all men spend most of their lives in this way. Most men spend all their lives in this way. But because all our governance is based on male bonding, and male bonding on at best a low-powered rumbling of aggression, accompanied by the hallucinatory visions which keep that aggression alive, we are constantly in danger of seeing our communities revert at intervals into the horrible agonic semblance of a troop of baboons. Baboons, moreover, with their finger on the button that can fire off an H-bomb.

Because of all this, Aomame hated her parents and deeply despised both the world to which they belonged and the ideology of that world. What she longed for was an ordinary life like everybody else’s. Not luxury: just a totally normal little life, nothing more. She wanted to hurry up and become an adult so she could leave her parents and live alone—eating what and as much as she wanted, using the money in her purse any way she liked, wearing new clothes of her own choosing, wearing shoes that fit her feet, going where she wanted to go, making lots of friends and exchanging beautifully wrapped presents with them. Once she became an adult, however, Aomame discovered that she was most comfortable living a life of self-denial and moderation. What she wanted most of all was not to go out with someone all dressed up, but to spend time alone in her room dressed in a jersey top and bottom.

I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty.” REVELATION 1:8 You are holy, Lord, the only God, and your deeds are wonderful. You are strong. You are great. You are the Most High, You are almighty. You, holy Father, are King of heaven and earth. You are Three and One, Lord God, all good. You are Good, all Good, supreme Good, Lord God, living and true. You are love, You are wisdom. You are humility, You are endurance. You are rest, You are peace. You are joy and gladness. You are justice and moderation. You are all our riches, And you suffice for us. You are beauty. You are gentleness. You are our protector, You are our guardian and defender. You are courage. You are our haven and our hope. You are our faith, Our great consolation. You are our eternal life, Great and wonderful Lord, God almighty, Merciful Saviour. ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI

I have two daughters who will one day take drugs. Of course, I will do everything in my power to see that they choose their drugs wisely, but a life lived entirely without drugs is neither foreseeable nor, I think, desirable. I hope they someday enjoy a morning cup of tea or coffee as much as I do. If they drink alcohol as adults, as they probably will, I will encourage them to do it safely. If they choose to smoke marijuana, I will urge moderation. Tobacco should be shunned, and I will do everything within the bounds of decent parenting to steer them away from it. Needless to say, if I knew that either of my daughters would eventually develop a fondness for methamphetamine or heroin, I might never sleep again. But if they don’t try a psychedelic like psilocybin or LSD at least once in their adult lives, I will wonder whether they had missed one of the most important rites of passage a human being can experience.

Stoic virtues are sometimes referred to as the four cardinal virtues: Practical wisdom (prudence) Moderation (temperance) Courage (fortitude) Integrity (justice) However, each of them individually is not considered a virtue. They may be thought of as traits or dispositions that strengthen and ennoble humankind but must be used together so one does not override the others. The Stoics sought after ethical notions and solid principles. They came up with eight principles to form the foundation for living a good life[VM10]. These principles have been used by people from all walks of life and can help you achieve your goals. Nature is rational. Illness, poverty, and death are not evil; they are natural. A life following rational nature is virtuous. Passion is irrational (apatheia). Wisdom is the root of all virtue. The universe is governed by a law of reason. Pleasure is neither good nor bad. Virtue should be sought as a matter of duty, not for pleasure.

PASSION PLAY WORKSHEET Your true strengths are living right here. What are you intensely interested in? While you’re at it, include your moderate curiosities. You go to the best cocktail party ever. It’s a life-changing event because you meet the most with-it, interesting, empowered people, and each of them can contribute to your career and interests in some way.… Who was there? What kind of information did they share with you? What did they ask you? How did they offer to help you? If you could go to five conferences or events this year, which ones would you go to, or what would they be about? What could you talk about late into the night with like-minded people without running out of things to say? What activities make you feel really useful, alive, and strong? When do you feel like a rock star, a gifted contributor, a very cool and purposeful human being? In terms of things that you do, when do you feel most like yourself? What do you want to be known for?

There was still the same unknowability about her life ahead. And yet, everything was different. And it was different because she no longer felt she was there simply to serve the dreams of other people. She no longer felt like she had to find sole fulfilment as some imaginary perfect daughter or sister or partner or wife or mother or employee or anything other than a human being, orbiting her own purpose, and answerable to herself. And it was different because she was alive, when she had so nearly been dead. And because that had been her choice. A choice to live. Because she had touched the vastness of life and within that vastness she had seen the possibility not only of what she could do, but also feel. There were other scales and other tunes. There was more to her than a flat line of mild to moderate depression, spiced up with occasional flourishes of despair. And that gave her hope, and even the sheer sentimental gratitude of being able to be here, knowing she had the potential to enjoy watching radiant skies and mediocre Ryan Bailey comedies and be happy listening to music

The moderate person contains opposing capacities to the nth degree. A moderate person can start out hot on both ends, both fervent in a capacity for rage and fervent in a desire for order, both Apollonian at work and Dionysian at play, both strong in faith and deeply doubtful, both Adam I and Adam II. A moderate person can start out with these divisions and rival tendencies, but to live a coherent life, the moderate must find a series of balances and proportions. The moderate is forever seeking a series of temporary arrangements, embedded in the specific situation of the moment, that will help him or her balance the desire for security with the desire for risk, the call of liberty with the need for restraint. The moderate knows there is no ultimate resolution to these tensions. Great matters cannot be settled by taking into account just one principle or one viewpoint. Governing is more like sailing in a storm: shift your weight one way when the boat tilts to starboard, shift your weight the other way when it tilts to port—adjust and adjust and adjust to circumstances to keep the semblance and equanimity of an even keel.

He spoke of his father and mother with a faintly mocking irony which Lydia saw well enough he assumed only to conceal the loving admiration with which he regarded them. Without knowing it he drew a very pleasant picture of an affectionate, happy family who lived unpretentiously in circumstances of moderate affluence at peace with themselves and the world and undisturbed by any fear that anything might happen to affect their security. The life he described lacked neither grace nor dignity; it was healthy and normal, and through its intellectual interests not entirely material; the persons who led it were simple and honest, neither ambitious nor envious, prepared to do their duty by the state and by their neighbours according to their lights; and there was in them neither harm nor malice. If Lydia saw how much of their good nature, their kindliness, their not unpleasing self-complacency depended on the long-established and well-ordered prosperity of the country that had given them birth; if she had an inkling that, like children building castles on the sea sand, they might at any moment be swept away by a tidal wave, she allowed no sign of it to appear on her face. ‘How lucky you English are,’ she said.

I know I said this before, but it bears repeating. You know Tate won’t like you staying with me.” “I don’t care,” she said bitterly. “I don’t tell him where to sleep. It’s none of his business what I do anymore.” He made a rough sound. “Would you like to guess what he’s going to assume if you stay the night in my apartment?” She drew in a long breath. “Okay. I don’t want to cause problems between you, not after all the years you’ve been friends. Take me to a hotel instead.” He hesitated uncharacteristically. “I can take the heat, if you can.” “I don’t know that I can. I’ve got enough turmoil in my life right now. Besides, he’ll look for me at your place. I don’t want to be found for a couple of days, until I can get used to my new situation and make some decisions about my future. I want to see Senator Holden and find another apartment. I can do all that from a hotel.” “Suit yourself.” “Make it a moderately priced one,” she added with graveyard humor. “I’m no longer a woman of means. From now on, I’m going to have to be responsible for my own bills.” “You should have poured the soup in the right lap,” he murmured. “Which was?” “Audrey Gannon’s,” he said curtly. “She had no right to tell you that Tate was your benefactor. She did it for pure spite, to drive a wedge between you and Tate. She’s nothing but trouble. One day Tate is going to be sorry that he ever met her.” “She’s lasted longer than the others.” “You haven’t spent enough time talking to her to know what she’ s like. I have,” he added darkly. “She has enemies, among them an ex-husband who’s living in a duplex because she got his house, his Mercedes, and his Swiss bank account in the divorce settlement.” “So that’s where all those pretty diamonds came from,” she said wickedly. “Her parents had money, too, but they spent most of it before they died in a plane crash. She likes unusual men, they say, and Tate’s unusual.” “She won’t go to the reservation to see Leta,” she commented. “Of course not.” He leaned toward her as he stopped at a traffic light. “It’s a Native American reservation!” She stuck her tongue out at him. “Leta’s worth two of Audrey.” “Three,” he returned. “Okay. I’ll find you a hotel. Then I’m leaving town before Tate comes looking for me!” “You might hang a crab on your front door,” she said, tongue-in-cheek. “It just might ward him off.” “Ha!” She turned her eyes toward the bright lights of the city. She felt cold and alone and a little frightened. But everything would work out. She knew it would. She was a grown woman and she could take care of herself. This was her chance to prove it.

You see,” resumed Laura, “I really have some grounds for supposing that my next incarnation will be in a lower organism. I shall be an animal of some kind. On the other hand, I haven’t been a bad sort in my way, so I think I may count on being a nice animal, some thing elegant and lively, with a love of fun. An otter, perhaps.” “I can’t imagine you as an otter,” said Amanda. “Well, I don’t suppose you can imagine me as an angel, if it comes to that,” said Laura. Amanda was silent. She couldn’t. “Personally I think an otter life would be rather enjoyable,” continued Laura; “salmon to eat all the year around, and the satisfaction of being able to fetch the trout in their own homes without having to wait for hours till they condescend to rise to the fly you’ve been dangling before them; and an elegant svelte figure—” “Think of the otter hounds,” interposed Amanda, “how dreadful to be hunted and harried and finally worried to death!” “Rather fun with half the neighbourhood looking on, and anyhow not worse than this Saturday-to-Tuesday business of dying by inches; and then I should go on into something else. If I had been a moderately good otter I suppose I should get back into human shape of some sort; probably something rather primitive—a little brown, unclothed Nubian boy, I should think.

The crystallized opposition of the segregationists was not unexpected; but we had only dimly foreseen the resistance that came from another quarter. Victor Hugo has spoken of the "madmen of moderation" who are "un-paving hell." The descendants of Hugo's moderates appeared in the fall of 1963, bearing banners inscribed with the message: Order Before Justice. For the most part, these moderates counted themselves as friends of the civil-rights movement; certainly they were in no sense moral bedfellows of the forces of segregation and violence. But they were now wrestling with a logic that an earlier, more passive, movement had never forced them to question. They had long settled on a simple compromise, one easy to accept and to live with. They could countenance token changes, and they had always believed these would make the Negro content. They were not asking him to stay in his old ghetto. They were ready to build a brand-new ghetto for him with a small exit door for a few. But the breath of the new movement chilled them. The Negro was insisting upon the mass application of equality to jobs, housing, education and social mobility. He sought a full life for a whole people. These moderates had come some distance in step with the thundering drums, but at the point of mass application they wanted the bugle to sound a retreat.

That is when, I walked into the home as if I would have like any other day, with my head down, going to take a bath and get ready for supper, with guardian Hope. Plus went up to the steps up to my room dripping wet my braindead mind puzzled.' 'My sweet brown shaggy teddy bear was the only thing I grabbed covering my body from dinner, then I went into my room. My pink nighty top on my bed from the night before. Truly, I did not care about my nakedness anymore; after all, I am wild, continuous, unbroken, and untamed.' 'Moderate retardation books,' said Hope when she picked them up under her breath, showing them back into the unzipped backpack. 'I feel so weird, like never before; I sat stark naked in my bed soaking wet, rocking hoping for nightfall to come. to see if the next day I would have to go to school.' 'How? I don't know. Just like fast-forwarding it will only dawn another day. That's going to repeat all the hell ones more, I'm just sure of that.' 'Previously this is my question, I asked myself, as I am laying in my bed holding onto my teddy bear far too tightly. 'Is it me who is the problem, or the ones that are all around me?'' I answer myself- 'I know that there is not one person on this planet, who truly cares if I am even here or not.' Oh, 'God' - 'Why does my life have to be like this?' 'I do not think I can take any more of living in this town or going to this school!

329 Leisure and Idleness. - There is an Indian savagery, a savagery peculiar to the Indian blood, in the manner in which the Americans strive after gold: and the breathless hurry of their work- the characteristic vice of the New World-already begins to infect old Europe, and makes it savage also, spreading over it a strange lack of intellectuality. One is now ashamed of repose: even long reflection almost causes remorse of conscience. Thinking is done with a stop-watch, as dining is done with the eyes fixed on the financial newspaper; we live like men who are continually " afraid of letting opportunities slip." " Better do anything whatever, than nothing "-this principle also is a noose with which all culture and all higher taste may be strangled. And just as all form obviously disappears in this hurry of workers, so the sense for form itself, the ear and the eye for the melody of movement, also disappear. The proof of this is the clumsy perspicuity which is now everywhere demanded in all positions where a person would like to be sincere with his fellows, in intercourse with friends, women, relatives, children, teachers, pupils, leaders and princes,-one has no longer either time or energy for ceremonies, for roundabout courtesies, for any esprit in conversation, or for any otium whatever. For life in the hunt for gain continually compels a person to consume his intellect, even to exhaustion, in constant dissimulation, overreaching, or forestalling: the real virtue nowadays is to do something in a shorter time than another person. And so there are only rare hours of sincere intercourse permitted: in them, however, people are tired, and would not only like " to let themselves go," but to stretch their legs out wide in awkward style. The way people write their letters nowadays is quite in keeping with the age; their style and spirit will always be the true " sign of the times." If there be still enjoyment in society and in art, it is enjoyment such as over-worked slaves provide for themselves. Oh, this moderation in "joy" of our cultured and uncultured classes! Oh, this increasing suspiciousness of all enjoyment! Work is winning over more and more the good conscience to its side: the desire for enjoyment already calls itself " need of recreation," and even begins to be ashamed of itself. " One owes it to one's health," people say, when they are caught at a picnic. Indeed, it might soon go so far that one could not yield to the desire for the vita contemplativa (that is to say, excursions with thoughts and friends), without self-contempt and a bad conscience.-Well! Formerly it was the very reverse: it was "action" that suffered from a bad conscience. A man of good family concealed his work when need compelled him to labour. The slave laboured under the weight of the feeling that he did something contemptible :- the "doing" itself was something contemptible. "Only in otium and bellum is there nobility and honour:" so rang the voice of ancient prejudice !

For example, highly religious and highly secular people score the same on tests of conscientiousness, coming out higher than those in the third group. In experimental studies of obedience (usually variants on the classic research of Stanley Milgram examining how willing subjects are to obey an order to shock someone), the greatest rates of compliance came from religious “moderates,” whereas “extreme believers” and “extreme nonbelievers” were equally resistant. In another study, doctors who had chosen to care for the underserved at the cost of personal income were disproportionately highly religious or highly irreligious. Moreover, classic studies of the people who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust documented that these people who could not look the other way were disproportionately likely to be either highly religious or highly irreligious.[38] Here is our vitally important reason for optimism, about how the sky won’t necessarily fall if people come to stop believing in free will. There are people who have thought long and hard about, say, what early-life privilege or adversity does to the development of the frontal cortex, and have concluded, “There’s no free will and here’s why.” They are a mirror of the people who have thought long and hard about the same and concluded, “There’s still free will and here’s why.” The similarities between the two are ultimately greater than the differences, and the real contrast is between them and those whose reaction to questions about the roots of our moral decency is “Whatever.

Our country, as well as the rest of the world, faces an enormous threat from ISIS and other radical Islamic terrorist organizations that aspire to achieve world domination. These were the same aspirations held by the followers of Adolf Hitler in the 1930s. Our government must recognize the importance of directly and vigorously confronting these forces of evil. We must not make the mistake of avoiding necessary conflict; we did not get involved in World War I or World War II until we felt that American interests were directly threatened, and this proved to be the wrong choice, though we eventually were victorious. If a vicious enemy that is willing to decapitate people, burn people alive, and even crucify children is allowed to grow with only minor to moderate resistance, it will only become a more formidable adversary in the future. If during this period of tepid responses to terrorist expansion the radical Islamists manage to acquire nuclear weapons, providing for the common defense will take on an entirely new different meaning. The longer we wait to eliminate the threat, the more difficult that task will become and the more dangerous the world will be for our children and grandchildren. We must use all necessary resources to protect the lives of our people. Given the existence of enemies who have a stated goal of destroying our nation and our way of life, one way to provide for the common defense is to hide, which in our case would not be possible. A better option is to try to eliminate the threat, and the earlier the threat can be eliminated, the fewer lives will be lost in the conflict.

Why did you come here tonight?” she asked. “Other than the fact that you’ve finally come to your senses and realize you love me.” Chuckling, Grey reached up and untied the ribbons that held her mask. The pretty silk fell away to reveal the beautiful face beneath. “I missed you,” he replied honestly. “And you were right-about everything. I’m tired of drifting through life. I want to live again-with you.” A lone tear trickled down her cheek. “I think that might be the most romantic thing you’ve ever said to me.” He grinned. “I have more.” She pressed her fingers to his lips. “I’m tired of talking.” She kissed him, teasing his lips with the ripe curves of hers, sliding her tongue inside to rub against his in a sensual rhythm that had him fisting his hands in her skirts. By the time they reached Mayfair, Grey’s hair was mussed, Rose’s skirts crushed, and he was harder than an oratory competition for mutes. “I can’t believe you came,” she told him as the entered the house, arms wrapped around each other. “I’m so proud of you.” “I wouldn’t have done it without you.” She shook her head. “You did it for yourself not for me.” Perhaps that was true, and perhaps it wasn’t. He had no interest in discussing it tonight. “It’s just the beginning,” he promised. “I’m going to go wherever you want to go from now on. Within reason.” She laughed. “Of course. We can’t have you attending a musicale just to please me, can we?” She gazed up at him. “You know, I think I’m going to want to spend plenty of evenings at home as well. That time I spent out of society had some very soothing moments.” “Of course,” he agreed, thinking about all the things they could do to one another at home. Alone. “There has to be moderation.” Upstairs in their bedroom, he undressed her, unbuttoning each tiny button one by one until she sighed in exasperation. “In a hurry?” he teased. His wife got her revenge, when clad only in her chemise and stockings, she turned those nimble fingers of hers to his cravat, working the knot so slowly he thought he might go mad. She worsened the torment by slowly rubbing her hips against his thigh. His cock was so rigid he could hang clothes on it, and the need to bury himself inside her consumed him. Still, a skilled lover knows when to have patience-and a man in love knows that his woman’s pleasure comes far, far before his own. So, as ready as he was, Grey was in no hurry to let this night end, not when it might prove to be the best of his new-found life. Wearing only his trousers, he took Rose’s hand and led her to their bed. He climbed onto the mattress and pulled her down beside him, lying so that they were face-to-face. Warm fingers came up to gently touch the scar that ran down his face. Odd, but he hadn’t thought of it at all that evening. In fact, he’d almost forgot about it. “I heard you that night,” he admitted. “When you told me you loved me.” Her head tilted. “I thought you were asleep.” “No.” He held her gaze as he raised his own hand to brush the softness of her cheek. “I should have said it then, but I love you too, Rose. So much.” Her smile was smug. “I know.” She kissed him again. “Make love to me.” His entire body pulsed. “I intend to, but there’s one thing I have to do first.” Rose frowned. “What’s that?” Grey pulled the brand-new copy of Voluptuous from beneath the pillow where he’d hidden it before going to the ball. “There’s a story in here that I want to read to you.

No words need be wasted over the fact that all these narcotics are harmful. The question whether even a small quantity of alcohol is harmful or whether the harm results only from the abuse of alcoholic beverages is not at issue here. It is an established fact that alcoholism, cocainism, and morphinism are deadly enemies of life, of health, and of the capacity for work and enjoyment; and a utilitarian must therefore consider them as vices. But this is far from demonstrating that the authorities must interpose to suppress these vices by commercial prohibitions, nor is it by any means evident that such intervention on the part of the government is really capable of suppressing them or that, even if this end could be attained, it might not therewith open up a Pandora's box of other dangers, no less mischievous than alcoholism and morphinism. Whoever is convinced that indulgence or excessive indulgence in these poisons is pernicious is not hindered from living abstemiously or temperately. This question cannot be treated exclusively in reference to alcoholism, morphinism, cocainism, etc., which all reasonable men acknowledge to be evils. For if the majority of citizens is, in principle, conceded the right to impose its way of life upon a minority, it is impossible to stop at prohibitions against indulgence in alcohol, morphine, cocaine, and similar poisons. Why should not what is valid for these poisons be valid also for nicotine, caffeine, and the like? Why should not the state generally prescribe which foods may be indulged in and which must be avoided because they are injurious? In sports too, many people are prone to carry their indulgence further than their strength will allow. Why should not the state interfere here as well? Few men know how to be temperate in their sexual life, and it seems especially difficult for aging persons to understand that they should cease entirely to indulge in such pleasures or, at least, do so in moderation. Should not the state intervene here too? More harmful still than all these pleasures, many will say, is the reading of evil literature. Should a press pandering to the lowest instincts of man be allowed to corrupt the soul? Should not the exhibition of pornographic pictures, of obscene plays, in short, of all allurements to immorality, be prohibited? And is not the dissemination of false sociological doctrines just as injurious to men and nations? Should men be permitted to incite others to civil war and to wars against foreign countries? And should scurrilous lampoons and blasphemous diatribes be allowed to undermine respect for God and the Church? We see that as soon as we surrender the principle that the state should not interfere in any questions touching on the individual's mode of life, we end by regulating and restricting the latter down to the smallest detail. The personal freedom of the individual is abrogated. He becomes a slave of the community, bound to obey the dictates of the majority. It is hardly necessary to expatiate on the ways in which such powers could be abused by malevolent persons in authority. The wielding, of powers of this kind even by men imbued with the best of intentions must needs reduce the world to a graveyard of the spirit. All mankind's progress has been achieved as a result of the initiative of a small minority that began to deviate from the ideas and customs of the majority until their example finally moved the others to accept the innovation themselves. To give the majority the right to dictate to the minority what it is to think, to read, and to do is to put a stop to progress once and for all. Let no one object that the struggle against morphinism and the struggle against "evil" literature are two quite different things. The only difference between them is that some of the same people who favor the prohibition of the former will not agree to the prohibition of the latter.

Almost any positive good [positive liberty] can be described in terms of freedom from something [negative liberty]. Health is freedom from disease; happiness is a life free from flaws and miseries; equality is freedom from advantage and disadvantage.. Faced with this flexibility, the theorist will need to prioritize some freedoms and discount others. At its extreme we may get the view that only some particular kind of life makes for ‘real freedom’. Real freedom might, for instance, be freedom the bondage of desire, as in Buddhism and Stoicism. Or it might be a kind of self-realization or self-perfection only possible in a community of similarly self-realized individuals, pointing us towards a communitarian, socialist, or even communist ideal. To a laissez-faire capitalist, it is freedom from more than minimal necessary political and legal interference in the pursuit of profit. But the rhetoric of freedom will typically just disguise the merits or demerits of the political order being promoted. The flexibility of the term ‘freedom’ undoubtedly plays a huge role in the rhetoric of political demands, particularly when the language of rights mingles with the language of freedom. ‘We have a right to freedom from…’ is not only a good way, but the best way to start a moral or political demand. Freedom is a dangerous word, just because it is an inspirational one. The modern emphasis on freedom is problematically associated with a particular self-image. This is the 'autonomous' or self-governing and self-driven individual. This individual has the right to make his or her own decisions. Interference or restraint is lack of respect, and everyone has a right to respect. For this individual, the ultimate irrationality would be to alienate his freedom, for instance by joining a monastery that requires unquestioning obedience to a superior, or selling himself into slavery to another. The self-image may be sustained by the thought that each individual has the same share of human reason, and an equal right to deploy this reason in the conduct of his or her own life. Yet the 'autonomous' individual, gloriously independent in his decision-making, can easily seem to be a fantasy. Not only the Grand Unifying Pessimisms, but any moderately sober reflection on human life and human societies, suggest that we are creatures easily swayed, constantly infected by the opinions of others, lacking critical self-understanding, easily gripped by fantastical hopes and ambitions. Our capacity for self-government is spasmodic, and even while we preen ourselves on our critical and independent, free and rational decisions, we are slaves of fashion and opinion and social and cultural forces of which we are ignorant. A little awareness of ethics will make us mistrustful of sound-bite-sized absolutes. Even sacred freedoms meet compromises, and take us into a world of balances. Free speech is sacred. Yet the law does not protect fraudulent speech, libellous speech, speech describing national secrets, speech inciting racial and other hatreds, speech inciting panic in crowded places, and so on. In return, though, we gain freedom from fraud, from misrepresentation of our characters and our doings, from enemy incursions, from civil unrest, from arbitrary risks of panic in crowds. For sure, there will always be difficult cases. There are websites giving people simple recipes on how to make bombs in their kitchens. Do we want a conception of free speech that protects those? What about the freedom of the rest of us to live our lives without a significant risk of being blown up by a crank? It would be nice if there were a utilitarian calculus enabling us to measure the costs and benefits of permission and suppression, but it is hard to find one.

For all that, Lee Hannaford made no objection to receiving the portion of his wife's income which she offered. He took it without thanks, keeping his reflections to himself. And therewith was practically dissolved one, at least, of the innumerable mock marriages which burden the lives of mankind. Mrs. Hannaford's only bitterness was that in law she remained wedded. It soothed her but moderately to reflect that she was a martyr to national morality.

In proficient English, Samira explained that her current job for the United Nations was to represent women who had been raped by Taliban militia. The leaders of the militia wanted to kill Samira because of her faith in Christ and because of her attempts to hold them accountable in a United Nations court of law. She had personally led more than thirty women to Christ, baptized them, and was now discipling them. She had done all of this in an environment nearly devoid of male believers who might be able to lend her protection. I listened in amazement as she shared the story of her own spiritual pilgrimage. The Lord was obviously using her in a powerful way. By the time she and I met, Samira’s superiors were already seeking to extradite Samira to the United States—for her own protection. I begged her to stay among her own people because I couldn’t see how God could replace this young woman of faith in such a dark and difficult place. However, the slow-grinding, irreversible gears of international diplomacy had already been set in motion. Samira was whisked out of Central Asia and flown immediately to the American Midwest where she began to make a new life. When I arrived home from my trip, I told Ruth all about this remarkable young woman. We arranged to fly her from her new home to Kentucky for a visit. She spent a week in our home. We took Samira to a moderate-sized church in central Kentucky for Sunday morning worship. It just so happened that there was a baptism service scheduled for that morning; an entire family—mother, father, and two children—were to be baptized. As their baptism progressed—with this young lady believer from a Muslim background sitting in the pew between Ruth and me—I noticed Samira beginning to fidget, twisting, turning, and rocking backward and forward. It was as if she was having an anxiety attack. In a quiet whisper, I asked her if there was something wrong. Samira tugged on the sleeve of my jacket. She whispered forcefully in my ear: “I cannot believe this! I cannot believe that I have lived long enough to see people being baptized in public. An entire family together! No one is shooting at them, no one is threatening them, no one will go to prison, no one will be tortured, and no one will be killed. And they are being openly and freely baptized as a family! I never dreamed that God could do such things! I never believed that I would live to see a miracle like this.

Billion-Dollar Grave (The Sonnet) All our life we work hard to buy golden chains. With which we then bind ourselves. What's the point of living as fancy slaves? What will we do with our billion-dollar graves? We sit on our couch covering our eyes, Then we yell, why everything is so very dark! But no one hears for they are also shouting, Praying for a messiah to bring back life's spark. We've forged fascist fences out of all our gold, And have placed them as walls around us. Then we shout out - help, help, And beg to be saved by the universe! Greed of dollar is the toxic mold on the green of life. Life flourishes on moderation, not consumerist strife.

Teachers of creative writing used to urge their students to write about what they know – perhaps they still do. But when you’re eighteen or nineteen and keenly aware of how thin your experience really is, it’s hard to put a directive like that into action. The truth is, a family and a hometown will afford you material to last a lifetime, but when you’re a youth neither seems important enough to address. It’s as if only distant places and other families are worth writing about. Even young New Yorkers and Londoners must feel this. For somebody writing from the wrong side of the wrong continent in the wrong hemisphere – which is more or less what it felt like when I was first writing and publishing – the feeling is acute. When you’re starting out, it takes nerve to write about home and to do it in a language that’s unapologetically local. Some voice in your head is telling you to moderate the demotic and the specific, to accommodate the ‘cosmopolitan reader’. You waste a lot of time second-guessing this abstract stranger from somewhere far more important, and sadly, in time, you’ll get to meet him or her and realize they weren’t entirely imaginary. For writers at the margin there will always be an imperial pressure to relinquish particularity and conform to something more familiar, and what is most familiar to the world of publishing is an urban and largely denatured life. Whether they acknowledge it or not, many editors like to see their own lives reflected. Readers in New York and London often prefer a friction-free reading experience, so when you stubbornly write about regional lives in local vernacular you test the cosmopolitan reader’s patience. These were lessons I had to learn at home before I began to be published abroad.

Moderation is not restriction, moderation is jubilation.

Honor He Wrote Sonnet 11 You wanna get laid? Get laid, but with consent. You wanna jump off a cliff? Just jump, with an active brain. You wanna try booze? Try it, but with moderation. You wanna smoke weed? Do it, but with self-regulation. Try out everything you wanna try, Figure out right 'n wrong for yourself. It is your life, test it to its limits, but, Be sure not to harm others in the process. Get it all over with, for plenty work remains. Live to build a world, not to pamper shallow tenets.

Have we found anything better than moderation and sobriety? Have we found anything better than doing what is right?

Temperance or moderation is about doing nothing in abundance. It is about doing what is right in the correct amount in the proper way. Since we are what we repeatedly do, excellence is a habit, not an act.

In fact, you can be too competitive (insatiable), too caring (co-dependent), and too disciplined (repressed). In the delicate spectrum of virtue, only those that represent balance – the mean, as in golden mean – and embody moderation shield themselves from the downside of the extremes, establishing the delicate range of desired qualities

for yourself the simple Law of Enjoyment of all that you can enjoy, ruled by moderation, and toward others equally the simple Law of Honesty and Kindness.

Saad Jalal - Mindful Lifestyle Choices Healthy living is not solely about what you eat and how you exercise; it encompasses a holistic approach. Saad Jalal Toronto Canada - Practicing mindfulness, managing stress, getting adequate sleep, and avoiding harmful habits like smoking and excessive alcohol consumption are equally important. These choices are instrumental in promoting mental and emotional well-being and can significantly impact physical health. Saad Jalal -In conclusion, healthy living and eating are interconnected aspects of a fulfilling life. A well-rounded diet, portion control, and moderation, along with regular physical activity, contribute to physical health, while mindful lifestyle choices support mental and emotional well-being. By embracing these principles, individuals can embark on a journey to improve their overall quality of life, achieving a harmonious balance of body and mind.

Naskar is made by Naskar alone, not an industry or benefactor - or more importantly, by family wealth. I had a roof over my head, food on the table, and clothes on my back - that was more than enough. I started writing with literally zero dollar in my pocket. Let me tell you how it began, because for some reason, I completely forgot a crucial event of my life when I wrote my memoir Love, God & Neurons. I once met an American tourist at a local train in Calcutta. The first thing he asked me was, had I lived in the States? I said, no. Then how come you have an American accent - he asked. Watching movies - I said. We got chatting and he told me about a book he had recently published, a memoir. I believe, this was the cosmic event that planted the thought of writing my own books in my head - I had already started my self-education in Neurology and Psychology, and I was all determined to publish research papers on my ideas, but not books. Meeting the person somehow subconsciously shifted my focus from research papers to books. So the journey began. And for the first few years, I made no real money from my books. Occasionally some of my books would climb the bestsellers list on amazon, like my very first book did, and that would keep the bills paid for several months. Then the invitations for talks started coming, but they too were not paid in the beginning. The organizers made all the travel arrangements, and I gave the talks for free. It's ironic and super confusing really - I remember flying business class, but I didn't have enough money to even afford a one way flight ticket, because I had already used up my royalties on other expenses. Today I can pick and choose which speaking invitations to accept, but back then I didn't have that luxury - I was grateful for any speaking gig and interview request I received, paid or not. One time, I gave an interview to this moderately popular journalist for her personal youtube channel, only to find out, she never released the video publicly - she posted an interview with a dog owner instead - whose dog videos had gained quite a following on social media. You could say, this was the first time I realized first hand, what white privilege was. Anyway, the point is this. Did I doubt myself? Often. Did I consider quitting? Occasionally. But did I actually quit? Never. And because I didn't quit, the world received a vast never-before seen multicultural humanitarian legacy, that you know me for today. There is no such thing as overnight success. If you have a dream, you gotta work at it day in, day out - night after night - spoiling sleep, ruining rest, forgetting fun. Persist, persist, and persist, that's the only secret - there is no other. Remember this - the size of your pocket does not determine your destiny, the size of your dedication does.

When it comes to most things in life, moderation is the key. We shouldn’t eat too much, drink too much, exercise constantly, stare at a screen too much, or play video games for hours. But when it comes to our relationship with God, too much is never enough. He doesn’t want us to dip our toe in the pool. God wants us to cannonball into the deep end of our faith. He wants to surround our lives with his love and sit alone on the throne of our hearts.

A life lived in equal excess is one of moderation.

Don’t continue to straddle the fence. Commit your total effort and energy to Christ. The wholeheartedly committed Christian is the truly happy Christian. In Philippians 1:21 we read: “To me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” When we lose sight of who God is and forget to give Him honor, anxiety sets into our lives and day-to-day living doesn’t make sense. When we make our goal the pursuit of things and we take our eyes off Jesus, we invariably will be disappointed in our journeys. God does not fail us. He gives us moderation and balance and direction and purpose. A full life. As I’ve mentioned, one of our family’s favorite verses is Matthew 6:33: “Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.” Yes, this is the ultimate anxiety breaker—seek first His kingdom. Bob and I use this as our test for doing anything in life. When we face a decision, we ask ourselves if we are truly seeking His kingdom first, or are we seeking to build our vision of success and value? In John 16:33 we read: “These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world” (NASB). God has promised us peace, but many of us choose anxiety instead. We will never be the women God wants us to be until we heed His call—“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). Prayer: Father God, take my eyes off the things of the world. I realize that life is more than things. I know that they don’t give my life purpose and meaning. I want to focus on serving You all of my existing days. Give me the power and conviction to follow Your ways. Amen.   Action: Analyze what is making you anxious. What are you going to do about it? Physically write out on a piece of paper what these anxieties are and what you will do to change each into peace. Today’s Wisdom: Anxiety is the natural result when our hopes are centered in anything short of God and His will for us. —BILLY GRAHAM

A conversation with a Moderator friend revealed another telling distinction. “I got a sundae from my favorite ice-cream store,” she told me, “and it was delicious. But after a while, I could hardly taste it. I let a friend finish it.” “I’ve never left ice cream unfinished in my life,” I said. For Moderators, the first bite tastes the best, and then their pleasure gradually drops, and they might even stop eating before they’re finished. For Abstainers, however, the desire for each bite is just as strong as for the first bite—or stronger, so they may want seconds, too. In other words, for Abstainers, having something makes them want it more; for Moderators, having something makes them want it less.

So far as man is concerned, his level is midway between the other two, as though he were composed of bestial and angelic natures. At the beginning of his life, his bestial nature predominates, since the only perception he has at first is through the senses, perception which requires that he seek proximity to the thing sensed through pursuit and movement. Eventually the light of reason dawns upon him, which disposes itself through the realms of heaven and earth, with no need for bodily motion nor for seeking proximity or contact with what it perceives. Rather, its objects of perception are exempt from proximity or distance in space. Similarly, passion and anger hold sway over him at first, and desires arise in accordance with what they dictate, until the desire to seek perfection appears in him, and he considers consequences and begins to resist the demands of passion and anger. If he conquers passion and anger to the point of controlling them, and they become too weak to move him or pacify him, he then attains a likeness to the angels. Likewise, if he weans himself from the inflexibility of things imagined and perceptible through the senses, and accustoms himself to perceiving things too exalted to be attained by sense or imagination, he will achieve another likeness to the angels. For the specific properties of living things are perception and activity, and both of them are susceptible to deficiency, moderate status, or perfection. The more one emulates the angels in these specific properties, the more is one removed from one's bestial nature and comes close to the angelic. For the angels are close to God-great and glorious-and whoever is close to the one who is close is himself close.

Beliefs of this sort—that I’m not attractive enough, so why bother; or that my boss is an asshole, so why bother—are designed to give us moderate comfort now by mortgaging greater happiness and success later on. They’re terrible long-term strategies, yet we cling to them because we assume we’re right, because we assume we already know what’s supposed to happen. In other words, we assume we know how the story ends. Certainty is the enemy of growth. Nothing is for certain until it has already happened—and even then, it’s still debatable. That’s why accepting the inevitable imperfections of our values is necessary for any growth to take place. Instead

Wherever I turn, I am accosted with enticing advertisements. Highly paid and highly sophisticated ad agencies employ all their creative talents to influence my buying habits. I am exhorted to buy things I may not want and probably don’t need with the promise that I will be sexier or healthier or have more fun. There is no campaign with comparable volume that influences me to be kind and compassionate and loving, or to act in moderation, or to give generously to those in need. The loudest, most visible message I get every day from the society I live in is that I need to acquire to be happy. If I want to live my life according to a different, more spiritually based message, I have to seek that message out; it is almost imperceptible. So

When evaluating a new client for degree of independence, I consider four factors: 1. Emotional issues: Does the person have good resources within himself or herself for coping independently with emotional issues that come up, or does he or she turn to parents not only for advice, but for cues as to how to react to the event in question? 2. Financial issues: Does the adult child earn an adequate living on his or her own, or does he or she rely heavily on parental input for things such as job contacts, supplemental funds, or housing? 3. Practical issues/interactive situations: Can the person manage day-to-day living, finances, nutrition, exercise, and housekeeping? 4. Career/Education issues: Does the person have a rewarding job or career that is commensurate with his or her abilities and offers the potential for further success? Is the person willing to learn new things to increase his or her productivity or compensation? These are the basic skills of living, many of which are addressed in the social ability questionnaire. Just as there are levels of social functioning, so too there are levels of independent functioning. All three of the following levels describe an adult with some degree of dependency problems. A healthy adult is someone who is independent financially, is able to manage practical and interactive issues, and who stays in touch with family but does not rely almost solely on family for emotional support. Level 1—Low Functioning Emotional issues: Lives at home with parent(s) or away from home in a fully structured or supervised environment. Financial issues: Contributes virtually nothing financially to the running of the household. Practical issues: Chooses clothes to wear that day, but does not manage own wardrobe (i.e., laundry, shopping, etc.). Relies on family members to buy food and prepare meals. Does few household chores, if any. May try a few tasks when asked, but seldom follows through until the job is finished. Career/education issues: Is not table to keep a job, and therefore does not earn an independent living. Extremely resistant to learning new skills or changing responsibilities. Level 2: Moderately functioning Emotional issues: Lives either at home or nearby and calls home every day. Relies on parents to discuss all details of daily life, from what happened at work or school that day to what to wear the next day. Will call home for advice rather than trying to figure something out for him- or herself. Financial issues: May rely on parents for supplemental income—parents may supply car, apartment, etc. May be employed by parents at an inflated salary for a job with very few responsibilities. May be irresponsible about paying bills. Practical issues: Is able to make daily decisions about clothing, but may rely on parents when shopping for clothing and other items. Neglects household responsibilities such as laundry, cleaning and meal planning. Career/education issues: Has a job, but is unable to cope with much on-the-job stress; job is therefore only minimally challenging, or a major source of anxiety—discussed in detail with Mom and Dad. Level 3: Functioning Emotional issues: Lives away from home. Calls home a few times a week, relies on family for emotional support and most socializing. Few friends. Practical issues: Handles all aspects of daily household management independently. Financial issues: Is financially independent, pays bills on time. Career/education issues: Has achieved some moderate success at work. Is willing to seek new information, even to take an occasional class to improve skills.

There is convincing evidence that vegetarians have lower rates of coronary heart disease, largely explained by low LDL cholesterol, probable lower rales of hypertension and diabetes mellitus, and lower prevalence of obesity. Overall, their cancer rates appear to be moderately lower than others living in the same communities, and life expectancy appears to be greater.

5. The Salt Paradox When the human body adapts to a low carb diet, the kidneys fundamentally change how they handle sodium. Removing most carbs from the diet causes your kidneys to aggressively secrete sodium (and along with it, extra fluid). This is why many people experience a dramatic early weight loss with carb restriction. But this means that a continuous moderate intake of sodium is necessary to keep your circulation adequate to handle ‘heat stresses’ like hot weather, endurance activity, or even a hot shower. If you are eating less than 60 grams of carbohydrate per day, you need to purposefully add 2-3 grams of sodium to your daily intake (unless you are still taking diuretic medication under a doctor’s direction for high blood pressure or fluid retention).

Neighborhood In the broadest sense, the neighborhood is a friendly atmosphere of security that lies between two or more human virtues and nobility. Therefore, the neighborhood is also spread out prevalently from human kindness and sympathy. Neighborhood is not something “scientific”, resembling a “scientific fact” that has the date of its discovery. The neighborhood, therefore, can not be defined as same way we define chemical formula. Neighborhood is not an object or concept that is somewhere in the institute's cabins made and then is applied to us. The neighborhood is above all the giving of to other people and creatures with spiritual tranquility and physical security, to live with them. The neighborhood firstly encompass us, not we him. The neighborhood, therefore, is the spiritual, psychological and physical space emerged from the whole set of moral relations among people. There is a moral neighborhood between us and our neighbor. The neighborhood is here, like the air here or the ground under the feet. The neighborhood reside in pious freedom of personal decision to live inpeace in with other people. Also: neighborhood is not a dictation law, similar to the dictation of the laws of modern parliaments. In the neighborhood establishment there is no “stronger” and “weaker” sides. Neighbors donate the neighborhood institution with their own goodness and that so they are enobling. Therefore, the neighborhood is not a prevalent rational project such as, for example, the construction of a hydroelectric power plant a project! Neighborhood is a spiritual institution that grounds itself, under condition that moral people provide a chance for that institution. Neighborhood is not led or moderated by any of the participants in it. In addition, the neighborhood is a consequence of moral courtesy, moral education. Our upbringing and our morale dams protect others from us. Furthermore, it is like a free and dignified conversation. A dignified conversation leads itself. If any interlocutor begins to dominate the conversation, then the conversation turns into something like a police interrogation. The neighborhood, of course, can be intimidated, but it is not a family alliance. Namely, our neighbor is not necessarily our cousin. Neighborhood is neither a material benefit nor a business, because the true neighborhood does not thickens anyone bank accounts. But the true neighborhood contributes to many prosperity, and among others to the material, of course. Although the neighborhood has nothing against the rules of “house rules”, the neighborhood is far more than that. The neighborhood is a moral characteristic of the neighbor, and the neighbor is here as someone who is “sown on Earth”, where are “sown” we too, his neighbors. The neighbor is in the midst of our vicinity, in the middle of the same street, in the middle of a common city, homeland and country. Further, the neighborhood is a moral responsibility. The neighbor is there to meet, to exchange greetings, to shake hands, to talk, to eat sometimes together, to exchange views, opinions about world and life. By our conversation with us, our neighbor moves in our time with non-violent footsteps, enters our language, steps into our spiritual mood, enters “our space”. We do the same with his time, language, spiritual mood, “his space”. But this participation in the space and the spirit of the neighborhood does not mean occupation. On the contrary, the neighborhood is participation without seizure without deprivation, as billions of fish participate in one ocean, but it is impossible to say that each other occupies their space ...

But why are trees such social beings? Why do they share food with their own species and sometimes even go so far as to nourish their competitors? The reasons are the same as for human communities: there are advantages to working together. A tree is not a forest. On its own, a tree cannot establish a consistent local climate. It is at the mercy of wind and weather. But together, many trees create an ecosystem that moderates extremes of heat and cold, stores a great deal of water, and generates a great deal of humidity. And in this protected environment, trees can live to be very old. To get to this point, the community must remain intact no matter what. If every tree were looking out only for itself, then quite a few of them would never reach old age. Regular fatalities would result in many large gaps in the tree canopy, which would make it easier for storms to get inside the forest and uproot more trees. The heat of summer would reach the forest floor and dry it out. Every tree would suffer. Every tree, therefore, is valuable to the community and worth keeping around for as long as possible. And that is why even sick individuals are supported and nourished until they recover. Next time, perhaps it will be the other way round, and the supporting tree might be the one in need of assistance. When thick silver-gray beeches behave like this, they remind me of a herd of elephants. Like the herd, they, too, look after their own, and they help their sick and weak back up onto their feet. They are even reluctant to abandon their dead.

High Fat, Moderate Protein, Low Carb Breakfast Smoothies Recipes for ‘low carbohydrate’ smoothies abound, but most are also low in fat and assume that anything under 200 Calories from sugars qualifies as ‘low carb’. Here are two basic recipes that provide enough fat and protein to keep you satisfied until lunch, and both come in at or under10 grams of carbohydrates. Note that you have your choice of sweeteners, but the argument for adding some xylitol to the mix is that it does not raise your insulin level, provides useful energy, and protects your dental health. Also note that there are lots of different protein powders for sale, but most whey products are flavored and sweetened. Shop until you find unflavored whey powder with the lactose removed – the label should indicate about 15 grams of protein and less than one gram of carbohydrate per serving. Do not buy soy protein powder or whey/soy mix, as the soy does not dissolve well into the smoothie. This whey powder looks expensive (about $1 per 15 gram serving) but this is the same amount of protein as you get from 2 eggs. Breakfast Berry Smoothie Ingredients: 3 oz fresh or frozen (unsweetened) berries (strawberries, blueberries, or raspberries) ¼ cup whipping (or heavy) cream 1 tablespoon light olive oil 2 tablespoons unflavored whey protein powder (delactosed) sweetener of choice (e.g., 1 tablespoon xylitol and 1 packet Splenda) 2-3 oz ice Blend the ingredients at high speed until smooth (30-60 seconds) Protein 15 grams, Fat 25-30 grams, Carbs 10 grams, Calories 330-380