Perfume Oil Quotes

The perfumes of lords and ladies tickled at my nose: lavender and orange oil. On the road, shit has the decency to stink.

Beauty is in the skin! Take care of it, oil it, clean it, scrub it, perfume it, and put on your best clothes, even if there is no special occasion, and you'll feel like a queen. If society is hard on you, fight back by pampering your skin. Skin is political. Otherwise why would the imams order us to hide it?

The perfume that her body exhaled was of the quality of that earth-flesh, fungi, which smells of captured dampness and yet is so dry, overcast with the odour of oil of amber, which is an inner malady of the sea, making her seem as if she had invaded a sleep incautious and entire. Her flesh was the texture of plant life, and beneath it one sensed a frame, broad, porous and sleep-worn, as if sleep were a decay fishing her beneath the visible surface. About her head there was an effulgence as of phosphorous glowing about the circumference of a body of water - as if her life lay through her in ungainly luminous deteriorations - the troubling structure of the born somnambule.

No one thinks to make the goddess a cup of tea; they just ply her with useless perfumed oils and impotent carved fetishes.

See how the symbols stretch across all three shields? They represent a god." Hypnos frowned. "There's a God of lions and knives and wineglasses? That seems incredibly specific." "This god is Shezmu," said Enrique, rolling his eyes. "He's seldom depicted, perhaps because he's at such odds with himself. On the other hand, he's the lord of perfumes and gracious oils, often considered something of a celebration deity." "My kind of god," said Hypnos. "He is also the god of slaughter, blood and dismemberment." "I amend my original statement," said Hypnos.

In a seperate cloth pouch I found little bottles of shampoo and soap and a toothbrush and the like,as well as a tiny brown glass vial of perfumed oil. It smelled of violets and chocolate. Yeah,like I needed the zombies to find me any more delicious.That'd be like a cow wearing eau de gravy.

There comes a time in a man's life, if he is unlucky and leads a full life, when he has a secret so dirty that he knows he never will get rid of it. (Shakespeare knew this and tried to say it, but he said it just as badly as anyone ever said it. 'All the perfumes of Arabia' makes you think of all the perfumes of Arabia and nothing more. It is the trouble with all metaphors where human behavior is concerned. People are not ships, chess men, flowers, race horses, oil paintings, bottles of champagne, excrement, musical instruments or anything else but people. Metaphors are all right to give you an idea.)

Can we believe that the real God, if there is one, ever ordered a man to be killed simply for making hair oil, or ointment? We are told in the thirtieth chapter of Exodus, that the Lord commanded Moses to take myrrh, cinnamon, sweet calamus, cassia, and olive oil, and make a holy ointment for the purpose of anointing the tabernacle, tables, candlesticks and other utensils, as well as Aaron and his sons; saying, at the same time, that whosoever compounded any like it, or whoever put any of it on a stranger, should be put to death. In the same chapter, the Lord furnishes Moses with a recipe for making a perfume, saying, that whoever should make any which smelled like it, should be cut off from his people. This, to me, sounds so unreasonable that I cannot believe it. Why should an infinite God care whether mankind made ointments and perfumes like his or not? Why should the Creator of all things threaten to kill a priest who approached his altar without having washed his hands and feet? These commandments and these penalties would disgrace the vainest tyrant that ever sat, by chance, upon a throne.

And so he would now study perfumes, and the secrets of their manufacture, distilling heavily-scented oils, and burning odorous gums from the East. He saw that there was no mood of the mind that had not its counterpart in the sensuous life, and set himself to discover their true relations, wondering what there was in frankincense that made one mystical, and in ambergris that stirred one’s passions, and in violets that woke the memory of dead romances, and in musk that troubled the brain, and in champak that stained the imagination; and seeking often to elaborate a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate the several influences of sweet-smelling roots, and scented pollen-laden flower, of aromatic balms, and of dark and fragrant woods, of spikenard that sickens, of hovenia that makes men mad, and of aloes that are said to be able to expel melancholy from the soul.

He's the lord of perfumes and precious oils, often considered something of a celebration deity." "My kind of god," said Hypnos. "He is also the god of slaughter, blood, and dismemberment." "I amend my original statement," said Hypnos.

True artistry in perfumery is the marriage of notes that may juxtapose each other but become harmonious in a blend. Born of pure creativity and an astounding knowledge of literally thousands of synthetics and hundreds of Essential oils, they must possess the ability to marry disparate and conjugal notes into a harmonious blend.

… as well as a tiny brown glass vial of perfumed oil. It smelled of violets and chocolate. Yeah, like i needed the zombies to find me any more delicious. That'd be like a cow wearing 'eau de gravy'.

As they walked, it seemed almost every building had some similar contrivance as decoration, adorning the street in a cacophony of clangs, bangs and whirs. The street’s surroundings danced with steam and smoke, the scent of oil and grease its perfume.

The room smells of lemon oil, heavy cloth, fading daffodils, the leftover smells of cooking that have made their way from the kitchen or the dining room, and of Serena Joy's perfume: Lily of the Valley. Perfume is a luxury, she must have some private source. I breathe it in, thinking I should appreciate it. It's the scent of pre-pubescent girls, of the gifts young children used to give their mothers, for Mother's Day; the smell of white cotton socks and white cotton petticoats, of dusting powder, of the innocence of female flesh not yet given over to hairiness and blood. It makes me feel slightly ill, as it I'm in a closed car on a hot muggy day with an older woman wearing too much face powder. This is what the sitting room is like, despite its elegance.

Ethanol is a volatile, flammable, colourless liquid with a slight chemical odour. It is used as an antiseptic, a solvent, in medical wipes and antibacterial formulas because it kills organisms by denaturing their proteins. Ethanol is an important industrial ingredient. Ethanol is a good general purpose solvent and is found in paints, tinctures, markers and personal care products such as perfumes and deodorants. The largest single use of ethanol is as an engine fuel and fuel additive. In other words, we drink, for fun, the same thing we use to make rocket fuel, house paint, anti-septics, solvents, perfumes, and deodorants and to denature, i.e. to take away the natural properties of, or kill, living organisms. Which might make sense on some level if we weren’t a generation of green minded, organic, health-conscious, truth seeking individuals. But we are. We read labels, we shun gluten, dairy, processed foods, and refined sugars. We buy organic, we use natural sunscreen and beauty products. We worry about fluoride in our water, smog in our air, hydrogenated oils in our food, and we debate whether plastic bottles are safe to drink from. We replace toxic cleaning products with Mrs. Myers and homemade vinegar concoctions. We do yoga, we run, we SoulCycle and Fitbit, we go paleo and keto, we juice, we cleanse. We do coffee enemas and steam our yonis, and drink clay and charcoal, and shoot up vitamins, and sit in infrared foil boxes, and hire naturopaths, and shamans, and functional doctors, and we take nootropics and we stress about our telomeres. These are all real words. We are hyper-vigilant about everything we put into our body, everything we do to our body, and we are proud of this. We Instagram how proud we are of this, and we follow Goop and Well+Good, and we drop 40 bucks on an exercise class because there are healing crystals in the floor. The global wellness economy is estimated to be worth $4 trillion. $4 TRILLION DOLLARS. We are on an endless and expensive quest for wellness and vitality and youth. And we drink fucking rocket fuel.

American whale oil lit the world. It was used in the production of soap, textiles, leather, paints, and varnishes, and it lubricated the tools and machines that drove the Industrial Revolution. The baleen cut from the mouths of whales shaped the course of feminine fashion by putting the hoop in hooped skirts and giving form to stomachtightening and chest-crushing corsets. Spermaceti, the waxy substance from the heads of sperm whales, produced the brightest- and cleanest-burning candles the world has ever known, while ambergris, a byproduct of irritation in a sperm whale’s bowel, gave perfumes great staying power and was worth its weight in gold.

Turkish Delight Turkish delight has had a bad reputation since that man C.S.Lewis - a positive genius in other ways - linked it for ever with one of the most terrifying creations in literature, the White Witch of Narnia, and that naughty, sticky, traitorous Edmund. But with the sensuous pleasure imbued in its melting, gelatinous texture, and, when made in the proper way, delicately perfumed with rose petals, flavoured with oils and dusted with sugar, it reclaims its power as a sweet as seductive as Arabian nights. The fact that it now carries with it a whiff of danger merely adds to its pleasure. It is not, truly, a sweet for children. They simply complain, and get the almonds stuck up their noses,

I was sitting there, as I said, and had been for several watches, when I came to me that I was reading no longer. For some time I was hard put to say what I had been doing. When I tried, I could only think of certain odors and textures and colors that seemed to have no connection with anything discussed in the volume I held. At last I realized that instead of reading it, I had been observing it as a physical object. The red I recalled came from the ribbon sewn to the headband so that I might mark my place. The texture that tickled my fingers still was that of the paper in which the book was printed. The smell in my nostrils was old leather, still wearing the traces of birch oil. It was only then, when I saw the books themselves, when I began to understand their care.” His grip on my shoulder tightened. “We have books here bound in the hides of echidnes, krakens, and beasts so long extinct that those whose studies they are, are for the most part of the opinion that no trace of them survives unfossilized. We have books bound wholly in metals of unknown alloy, and books whose bindings are covered with the thickest gems. We have books cased in perfumed woods shipped across the inconceivable gulf between creations—books doubly precious because no one on Urth can read them.” “We have books whose papers are matted of plants from which spring curious alkaloids, so that the reader, in turning their pages, is taken unaware by bizarre fantasies and chimeric dreams. Books whose pages are not paper at all, but delicate wafers of white jade, ivory, and shell; books too who leaves are the desiccated leaves of unknown plants. Books we have also that are not books at all to the eye: scrolls and tablets and recordings on a hundred different substances. There is a cube of crystal here—though I can no longer tell you where—no larger than the ball of your thumb that contains more books than the library itself does. Though a harlot might dangle it from one ear for an ornament, there are not volumes enough in the world to counterweight the other.

For, in the same fire, gold gleams and straw smokes; under the same flail the stalk is crushed and the grain threshed; the lees are not mistaken for oil because they issued from the same press. So, too, the tide of trouble will test, purify, and improve the good, but beat, crush, and wash away the wicked. So it is that, under the weight of the same affliction, the wicked deny and blaspheme God, and the good pray to Him and praise Him. The difference is not in what people suffer but in the way they suffer. The same shaking that makes fetid water stink makes perfume issue a more pleasant odor.

She wanted the best oils and perfumes, wanted the best kind of life, wanted the most tender hopes, wanted the best delicate meats and also the heaviest ones to eat, wanted her flesh to break into spirt and her spirit to break into flesh, wanted those fine mixtures— everything that would secretly ready her for those first moments that would come.

I draw a breath, comforting myself with her scent of coconut oil and lily flower.

Caesar tarried in Egypt, Taking in all the spoils, The Lighthouse, the Library, Queen Cleopatra and Her many-perfumed oils.

The air in Seoul smells of rain, cooking oil, garbage, pine trees, persimmon, perfume, red bean paste, hot metal, and snow. It changes by the season and the time of day and the neighborhood.

I smelt him, smelt Johnny; for a second I thought - what? That he was there, was with me, that he wasn't...But I realised it was his perfume, the one I'd had made specially for him by an artisan perfumer in New York, his own custom-made one-off blend. It had been hideously expensive but I hadn't cared as long as it had pleased him. It was all intense essential oils, layer upon layer of labdanum, patchouli, vanilla, vetiver, ambrette, frankincense, myrrh, amber, Bulgarian rose absolute, Oud wood - the list was endless and beautiful, like a scented prayer. The woman had said some of the ingredients would keep their fragrance for a hundred years, would never die. Like me, he'd said, like us. I'd put some drops of the heavy dark oil on a couple of cotton wool pads and put them in the box when we got it, now the fragrance - strange, narcotic, archaic - filled the room like his ghost, embracing me in memories.

Suddenly there were two strong arms around her, holding her tightly, more tightly than Triss's parents had ever dared to hug Triss. Violet smelt of oil, cigarettes, and some kind of perfume. Her coat was rough against Not-Triss's face. Not Triss could feel Pen there too, scrambling to be part of it, resting her head against Not-Triss's back. "You're all thorny," whispered Pen, shifting position. "I'll hurt you both," whispered Not-Triss. "My thorns - they'll hurt you." "What, me?" answered Violet. "Don't be silly. I'm tough as nails. I've got a hide like a dreadnought." Violet did not feel cold or metallic lke nails or a battleship. She felt warm. Her voice was a bit shaky, but her hug was as firm as the hills or the horizons.

We spent afternoons kicking around in the sand, picking through the seaweed for shells, making headdresses of washed-up fishing ropes and hats from Styrofoam cups. Beach rats, we were called. We stopped brushing our hair, and it hung in tangles spun by the salt air. We sprayed Sun-In across our heads and let it turn our hair orange in patches. Our skin peeled, and we didn't much care. We woke up to the feel of sand in our sheets. We covered ourselves in baby oil and iodine and let the sun bake our skin. We smelled like Love's Baby Soft perfume, like summer all year long. We were tanned, with freckles across our noses.

The air is heavy, sweet with perfume, stirred only by a scratchy music that soars and glides and stuns itself against the walls. Large leaded windows look out over the garden at the rear of the house, gray clouds piling up beyond a cupola. Chairs and chaise longues have been gathered around the fire, young women draped over them like wilted orchids, smoking cigarettes and clinging to their drinks. The mood in the room is one of restless agitation rather than celebration. About the only sign of life comes from an oil painting on the far wall, where an old woman with coals for eyes sits in judgment of the room, her expression conveying her distaste for this gathering.

Somewhere out of sight a punching-bag was rat-tat-tatting on a board. I stepped through a doorless aperture opposite the door I'd come in by, and found myself in the main hall. It was comparatively small, with seats for maybe a thousand rising on four sides to the girders that held up the roof. An ingot of lead-gray light from a skylight fell through the moted air onto the empty roped square on the central platform. Still no people, but you could tell that people had been there. The same air had hung for months in the windowless building, absorbing the smells of human sweat and breath, roasted peanuts and beer, white and brown cigarettes, Ben Hur perfume and bay rum and hair oil and tired feet. A social researcher with a good nose could have written a Ph.D. thesis about that air.

Unlike flowers, the animals he tried to macerate would not yield up their scent without complaints or with a mute sigh — they fought desperately against death…and in their fear of death created large quantities of sweat whose acidity ruined the warm oil… The objects would have to be quieted down, and so suddenly that they would have no time to become afraid or to resist. He would have to kill them.

The foreigners who heard the noise in the dining room and hastened to remove the body noticed the suffocating odor of Remedios the Beauty on his skin. It was so deep in his body that the cracks in his skull did not give off blood but an amber-colored oil that was impregnated with that secret perfume, and then they understood that the smell of Remedios the Beauty kept on torturing men beyond death, right down to the dust of their bones.

Botany smells like glue and blotter paper and pressed flowers. Paleontology smells like rock dust, bone dust. Biology smells like formalin and old fruit; it is loaded with heavy cool jars in which float things she has only had described for her: the pale coiled ropes of rattlesnakes, the severed hands of gorillas. Entomology smells like mothballs and oil: a preservative that, Dr. Geffard explains, is called naphthalene. Offices smell of carbon paper, or cigar smoke, or brandy, or perfume. Or all four.

I went through her garbage when I knew she was out, thirsty to know more, to touch the things she touched. I found a wide-toothed tortoiseshell comb from Kent of London, good as new except for a single broken tooth, and a soap box, Crabtree and Evelyn's Elderflower. She drank Myer's rum, used extra virgin olive oil in a tall bottle. I found an impossibly soft stocking, the garter kind, cloud taupe, laddered, and an empty flagon of Ma Griffe perfume, its label decorated with a scribble of black lines on white. It smelled of whispery black organdy dresses, of spotted green orchids and the Bois de Boulogne after rain.

Now the householder having got up in the morning and performed his necessary duties,17 should wash his teeth, apply a limited quantity of ointments and perfumes to his body, put some ornaments on his person and collyrium on his eyelids and below his eyes, colour his lips with alacktaka,18 and look at himself in the glass. Having then eaten betel leaves, with other things that give fragrance to the mouth, he should perform his usual business. He should bathe daily, anoint his body with oil every other day, apply a lathering19 substance to his body every three days, get his head (including face) shaved every four days, and the other parts of his body every five or ten days.20 All these things should be done without fail, and the sweat of the armpits should also be removed.

These usages are attested in the most formal manner. “I pour upon the earth of the tomb,” says Iphigenia in Euripides, “milk, honey, and wine; for it is with these that we rejoice the dead.”10 Among the Greeks there was in front of every tomb a place destined for the immolation of the victim and the cooking of its flesh.11 The Roman tomb also had its culina, a species of kitchen, of a particular kind, and entirely for the use of the dead.12 Plutarch relates that after the battle of Platæa, the slain having been buried upon the field of battle, the Platæans engaged to offer them the funeral repast every year. Consequently, on each anniversary they went in grand procession, conducted by their first magistrates to the mound under which the dead lay. They offered the departed milk, wine, oil, and perfumes, and sacrificed a victim. When the provisions had been placed upon the tomb, the Platæans pronounced a formula by which they called the dead to come and partake of this repast. This ceremony was still performed in the time of Plutarch, who was enabled to witness the six hundredth anniversary of it.13 A little later, Lucian, ridiculing these opinions and usages, shows how deeply rooted they were in the common mind. “The dead,” says he, “are nourished by the provisions which we place upon their tomb, and drink the wine which we pour out there; so that one of the dead to whom nothing is offered is condemned to perpetual hunger.”14 These are very old forms of belief, and are quite groundless and ridiculous, and yet they exercised empire over man during a great number of generations. They governed men’s minds; we shall soon see that they governed societies even, and that the greater part of the domestic and social institutions of the ancients was derived from this source.

While the indecisive customer hovered over an array of perfumes that Nettle had brought out for her, the American girls browsed among the shelves of perfumes, colognes, pomades, waxes, creams, soaps, and other items intended for beauty care. There were bath oils in stoppered crystal bottles, , and tins of herbal unguents, and tiny boxes of violet pastilles to freshen the breath. Lower shelves held treasure troves of scented candles and inks, sachets filled with clove-saturated smelling salts, potpourri bowls, and jars of pastes and balms. Nettle noticed, however, that while the younger girl, Daisy, viewed the assortment with only mild interest, the older one, Lillian, had stopped before a row of oils and extracts that contained pure scent. Rose, frangipani, jasmine, bergamot, and so forth. Lifting the amber glass bottles, she opened them carefully and inhaled with visible appreciation. Eventually the blond woman made her choice, purchased a flacon of perfume, and left the shop, a small bell ringing cheerfully as the door closed. Lillian, who had turned to glance at the departing woman, murmured thoughtfully, "I wonder why it is that so many light-haired women smell of amber..." "You mean amber perfume?" Daisy asked. "No- their skin itself. Amber, and sometimes honey..." "What on earth do you mean?" the younger girl asked with a bemused laugh. "People don't smell like anything, except when they need to wash." The pair regarded each other with what appeared to be mutual surprise. "Yes, they do," Lillian said. "Everyone has a smell... don't say you've never noticed? The way some people's skin is like bitter almond, or violet, while others..." "Others have a scent like plum, or palm sap, or fresh hay," Nettle commented. Lillian glanced at him with a satisfied smile. "Yes, exactly!" Nettle removed his spectacles and polished them with care, while his mind swarmed with questions. Could it be? Was it possible that this girl could actually detect a person's intrinsic scent? He himself could- but it was a rare gift, and not one that he had ever known a woman to have.

If you take a moment and look back over all of your life experiences you will soon discover that it is those bitter moments, the moments you do not readily welcome, that become the foundation for your beauty. Those are seasons in your life when even your taste buds are filled with the bitterness of myrrh. You bathe in it and soak in it and wish you could put on the finishing touches of your beauty process with cosmetics and perfumes, but an unseen hand continues to apply the oil of myrrh.

Young men seemed to collect by her side, ready with drinks and conversation. She tanned quickly and easily, her delicate limbs oiled and gleaming. In the evening, she made the most of her new tan in low-cut clinging evening dresses in white or black.

There was precious little nobility in the features of the High King's fleshy face. Like his body, his face was broad and heavy, with a wide stub of a nose, a thick brow, and deep-set eyes that seemed to look out at the world with suspicion and resentment. His hair and beard were just beginning to turn grey, but they were well combed and glistening with fresh oil perfumed... heavily... He was broad of shoulder and body, built like a squat turret, round and thick from neck to hips. He wore a sleeveless coat of gilded chain mail over his tunic... Over the mail was a harness of gleaming leather, with silver buckles and ornaments. A jewelled sword hung at his side. His sandals had gold tassels on their thongs.

heritage a secret. This secrecy is probably a matter of protection for her and for Mordecai. As Ahasuerus is preparing for a new wife, as Mordecai is preparing Esther for a new life, Esther is preparing to be come a queen. It is important to notice that Esther is obedient and faithful without being certain of the outcome of this year. She has no guarantee of ever returning to her own life, she has no guarantee that she will become queen, so we must assume that she is not motivated by results in her service to the Lord. Esther is obedient without any promise other than the knowledge inside her that she will not be abandoned by the Lord at any time. She will be faithful regardless of foreseeable consequences, and the example that this kind of faithfulness sets for us is fantastic. Once evaluated by Hegai worthy of the expense of the preparations, each young woman must undergo Ahasuerus’ scrutiny as well. After a year, Esther is prepared to face the king, and is now awaiting her turn to enter his chambers. Each young woman’s turn came to go in to King Ahasuerus after she had completed twelve months’ preparation, according to the regulations for the women, for thus were the days of their preparation apportioned: six months with oil of myrrh, and six months with perfumes and preparations for beautifying women.Thus prepared, each young woman went to the king, and she was given whatever she desired to take with her from the women’s quarters to the king’s palace.In the evening she went, and in the morning she returned to the second house of the women, to the custody of Shaashgaz, the king’s eunuch who kept the concubines. Esther 2:12-13 After their period of preparation, the women go, one at a time, in to the king’s palace. They leave the women’s quarters in the evening and return in the morning… and their life’s course is determined within a period of 24 hours or less. Imagine the scene: these women were taken from their families and everything familiar to them a year or so before they are sent into the king. For a year, they are in the custody of Hegai the custodian of the women. Each step that these women take toward the palace is a step toward one of two things: either the beginning of a new life or the death of every possible dream that each one might have had for her life. A step toward becoming Ahasuerus’ wife and queen of Persia — tremendous honor and riches; or a step toward becoming one of the king’s concubines — a life devoid of true love or passion. Each candidate completed these twelve months and went into the king as a potential queen. The next morning, each woman left the king’s chambers as one of a countless number of mistresses in his harem. The history does not indicate that they were rejected and returned to their own homes. They were returned to Shaashgaz, the keeper of the king’s concubines. The finality and sadness of the conclusion of this year must have been excruciating. “She would not go into the king again unless the king delighted in her and called for her by name.” Esther 2:14 Like a splash of ice water, that sentence feels cold. A rush of emptiness and loneliness all of a sudden, they have been used and, for all practical purposes, thrown away. When they returned the next morning, they did not even go to the court that has been their home for the past year. These women went into the custody of Shaashgaz, the eunuch custodian of the concubines. That is quite a demotion for these young women — their future has just been decided, and they had no say in it. Hopes of marriage to anyone for one of these rejected women is completely over. “She would not go into the king again...” These women must have felt a tremendous loss and sorrow. Whether or not they had actually wanted to be queen (remember that they had no choice in the matter — they had to come to the palace either way), they had been preparing for this moment for a year. Perhaps they had waited even longer

Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.” — 1 Corinthians 10:12 IT is a curious fact, that there is such a thing as being proud of grace. A man says, “I have great faith, I shall not fall; poor little faith may, but I never shall.” “I have fervent love,” says another, “I can stand, there is no danger of my going astray.” He who boasts of grace has little grace to boast of. Some who do this imagine that their graces can keep them, knowing not that the stream must flow constantly from the fountain head, or else the brook will soon be dry. If a continuous stream of oil comes not to the lamp, though it burn brightly to-day, it will smoke to-morrow, and noxious will be its scent. Take heed that thou gloriest not in thy graces, but let all thy glorying and confidence be in Christ and His strength, for only so canst thou be kept from falling. Be much more in prayer. Spend longer time in holy adoration. Read the Scriptures more earnestly and constantly. Watch your lives more carefully. Live nearer to God. Take the best examples for your pattern. Let your conversation be redolent of heaven. Let your hearts be perfumed with affection for men’s souls. So live that men may take knowledge of you that you have been with Jesus, and have learned of Him; and when that happy day shall come, when He whom you love shall say, “Come up higher,” may it be your happiness to hear Him say, “Thou hast fought a good fight, thou hast finished thy course, and henceforth there is laid up for thee a crown of righteousness which fadeth not away.” On, Christian, with care and caution! On, with holy fear and trembling! On, with faith and confidence in Jesus alone, and let your constant petition be, “Uphold me according to Thy word.” He is able, and He alone, “To keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy.

Seeds pour out oil when pressed. Grapes pour out wine when squeezed. Herbs pour out medicine when pounded. Flowers pour out perfume when crushed. The gifted pour out excellence when tested.

Thieving dealers continue to take naive dreamers like essential oil healers to the cleaners.

After you have bathed and oiled her with the faintest hint of frankincense, use no other perfume. Apply only the lightest of the cosmetics. She is beautiful without them, so let us not mar her beauty." He studied her. "Dress her in a simple white, semi-sheer tunic. The king will enjoy the ability to see her well. But cover the tunic with a pale blue robe trimmed with purple." Parisa hurried to the garment room and returned with clothing that matched Hegai's description. "Do these suffice, my lord?" Hegai took the tunic and robe and nodded. "Soft and beautiful. Yes. This is perfect. Tie the robe with a purple sash. Place a golden pendant around her neck and hang golden earrings from her ears. Let me see her choice of sandals." Parisa hurried back to the room after laying the garments flat on the bed, which had already been stripped of its linens. She returned with an armful of sandals and set them on a chair. Heegai bent to examine them and pulled a pair of intricately carved leather devoid of jewels from the pile. "You will go as a virgin with hints of wealth to show off your character and your beauty. You may wear your mother's ring, but do not wear bracelets. The less distraction you give him, the better. The king, you shall see, likes simple pleasures, despite the ornate designs you find throughout the palace." "And my hair?" Esther's head spun with his quick choices. She sensed by his look that Hegai had planned this for some time, probably in the hopes that she would ask for his help. She breathed a silent prayer of thanks to Adonai, for she knew she could never have decided on her own. Hegai rubbed his chin and had her turn about. Her long dark hair fell to the middle of her back. To wear it down would be scandalous. Her heart beat faster at the thought, for she had no idea what Hegai would suggest or what the king would desire. "Wear it up. Hold it in place with combs that are easily removed. The king will enjoy removing them.

Grief Grief is a normal but painful process most people go through when a loved one dies or a relationship ends. Many people also experience deep grief following the loss of a companion animal. Essential oils can facilitate the grieving process by bringing comfort and relief. DIFFUSE WITH BENZOIN Benzoin essential oil calms the nervous system, comforting the bereaved and easing the emotional exhaustion that often accompanies the loss of a loved one. Its fragrance is slightly reminiscent of vanilla—sweet, warm, and welcoming. Diffuse benzoin essential oil in areas where people gather or where you spend the most time. You may also inhale its scent directly or place it in an aromatherapy pendant. RELAX WITH A ROSE BATH MAKES 1 TREATMENT Rose essential oil soothes depression, grief, nervous tension, stress, anger, and fear— all emotions that are commonly felt during the grieving process. Help yourself through this difficult time by using rose essential oil in a variety of ways: diffuse it, use it like perfume, and relax with it while bathing. 1 tablespoon carrier oil 10 drops rose essential oil In a small glass bowl, add the carrier oil and the rose essential oil, and stir to combine. Draw a warm bath and add the entire treatment to the running water. Soak for at least 15 minutes. Use caution when getting out of the bathtub, as it may be slippery. Repeat this treatment once a day as needed.

My smells of a son are gummy sweeties, Play-Doh, Pritt Stick, poster paint and wax crayons. Earthy mud on polyester football kit. The sweet antiseptic of sticking plasters. Fruity bubble gum and the minty tang of chong- as he and his friends called chewing gum. Bicycle chain oil and rubber inner tubes. The chemical overload of Lynx sprayed profusely over sweat, hair gel and toxic trainers. Fried onions and meat on the breath. Tomato ketchup. My scents for a son are: I am Juicy Couture by Juicy Couture Black by Bvlgari L'Air de Rien by Miller Harris Serge Noire by Serge Lutens Rocker Femme by Britney Spears Dirty by Lush Africa by Lynx

An hour later, a group of men from the funeral home arrived. With my grandfather's help, they cleaned my grandmother's body and marinated it in rice alcohol. When the wine had straightened her limbs, which had stiffened from rigor mortis, they dressed her in new clothes. Using a thick red thread, they tied her two big toes together to prevent her spirit from wandering. A cheap red lacquered coffin was brought into my grandparents' bedroom. A layer of sand was spread at the bottom to cushion the body. Rich families would use tea leaves instead of sand. The more expensive the tea, the richer and higher in status the dead were. We covered the sand with coarse, loosely woven cotton gauze. After my grandmother's body was laid inside the coffin, a small dish filled with burning oil was placed on the ground beneath it to keep her spirit warm. Incense in a large urn perfumed the air. It was time for friends and relatives to pay their respects.

Separated by centrifugal force, in the great turbine of Dante, or through fractional distillation in the Deisis of Byzantine icons, Inferno and Paradiso, layer of perfumed oil over layer of stinking pitch, all these in the end are all wisdom. Paradise – the wisdom of the right hand, right hemisphere, feminine, gentle and puffy, endless, still waters, illuminated in their depths by the phosphorescence of terrifying abyssal fish … Hell – wisdom of the left hand, left hemisphere, sudden paracletian fire, the mask that covers, in the crux of destruction, the soul of a dove. Good and evil, two enormous Buddhas erupting over our lives from two volcanoes over our lives, opposing and yet similar principles like magnetic poles, in the end they couple, over a footbridge of nervous fibers, to make the motionless and complicated hemispheres of the great, incomparable Brain that dreams us all.

All my life I used the best lotions, finest soaps, nicest oils, and fanciest perfumes to keep my skin nice, only to find out I need thick, hard skin to survive. Oh, the irony.

The stately tuberose is reluctant to share its effusive scent, yielding only to enfleurage- petals pressed into fat between glass, rinsed in alcohol. The carnal charisma of tuberose, one of the perfumer's most expensive essential oils, heightens the white floral bouquet, lifting it up on angels' wings. -DB

Riz cooed with delight as the perfumed oils developed a mirror sheen, bringing to the fore her perfect colouring, symmetrical patterns of peacock blue and rose scales covering a skin of deep shining gold. Her talons were painted a complimentary gold, sparkling in the dying light.

The perfumes of lords and ladies tickled at my nose: lavender and orange oil. On the road, shit has the decency to stink. Only

Sins and Love A Pharisee named Simon invited Jesus to supper. There, a woman came with a beautiful little jar of perfume. She was weeping at Jesus’ feet. This was a well-known, sinful woman who lived in town. Jesus’ feet were bathed in her tears. Then the woman dried them with her hair. As this sinful woman kissed Jesus’ feet, she anointed them with perfume. “I don’t think this man’s a prophet,” Simon said to himself. “If he were, he’d know who’s touching him. She’s a sinner.” Jesus spoke up. “Simon, I want to tell you a story.” “Two people owed another man money. The first owed 500 dollars. The other owed 50 dollars. Neither of them could pay. So he told them both they didn’t need to pay him back. Which one loved him more?” Simon the Pharisee answered, “I suppose the one who owed the most money.” Jesus said to him, “You’re right. I came to your house. Did you give me water to wash my feet? No. Do you see this woman, Simon? She bathed my feet in tears and wiped them with her hair. You didn’t greet me with a kiss. But since I came she hasn’t stopped kissing my feet. You didn’t anoint my head with oil. But she has anointed my feet. I tell you, her many sins are forgiven. But the one who’s done little to forgive, loves little.” Jesus said to the woman, “Your sins are forgiven.” The people around the table murmured. “Who’s this who forgives sins?” And he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.

The moon has risen. She sits now, at the same spot where she saw the eagle, waiting, waiting for something to come and take her. Have you ever waited for IT? Wondering whether it will come from outside or inside? Finally past the futile guesses at what might happen...now and then re-erasing brain to keep it clean for the Visit...yes wasn't it close to here? remember didn't you sneak away from camp to have a moment alone with What you felt stirring across the land...it was the equinox...green spring equal nights...canyons are opening up, at the bottoms are steaming fumaroles, steaming the tropical life there like greens in a pot, rank, dope-perfume, a hood of smell...human consciousness, that poor cripple, that deformed and doomed thing, is about to be born. This is the World just before men. Too violently pitched alive in constant flow ever to be seen by men directly. They are meant only to look at it dead, in still strata, transputrefied to oil or coal. Alive, it was a threat: it was Titans, was an overpeaking of life so clangorous and mad, such a green corona about Earth's body that some spoiler HAD to be brought in before it blew the Creation apart. So we, the crippled keepers, were sent out to multiply, to have dominion. God's spoilers. Us. Counter-revolutionaries. IT IS OUR MISSION TO PROMOTE DEATH. The way we kill, the way we die, being unique among the Creatures. It was something we had to work on, historically and personally. To build from scratch up to its present status as reaction, nearly as strong as life, holding down the green uprising. But only nearly as strong.

Absolutes are essential oils, and concretes are obtained by extracting perfume from natural vegetal sources like rose, jasmine, or lilac blossom.

European perfumery started in earnest around the turn of the twentieth century, and developed apace with the discovery of aroma chemicals: coumarin, vanillin, cyclamen aldehyde, the great nitro musks. The Great War left industry and cities largely intact and killed countless males. Many factors then conspired to make the period 1918-1939 the golden age of mass perfumery: working women vying for the remaining men, cheap aroma chemicals, cheap labor to harvest the naturals, flourishing visual arts and music, the obsolescence of prewar bourgeois dignity, replaced by irreverence and optimism. The WWII destroyed the great engine of European chemistry (Germany). The tail end of German chemistry on the Rhine lay in the neutral Switzerland and was untouched, which is wy today two of the biggest perfumery houses in the world (Firmenich and Givaudan) are Swiss. Postwar France stank. In 1951, six years after the Liberation, only one household in fifteen had an internal bathroom. The Paris Metro at rush hour was famous for its unwashed stench. Given cost constraints, French perfumes in those years ('50) had an air de famille, a perfumey feel based on then-cheap drydown materials like sandalwood oil and salicylate esters. Being able to smell someone's fragrance was a sign of intimacy. When a perfume left a trail (called sillage) it was remarked upon, usually unfavourably. It is a strange coincidence, or perhaps a hint of the existence of God, that skin melanin is a polymer spontaneously formed from phenols, and that the perfumery materials that defined American perfumery were also in good part phenols.

A perfume collects these fragmented histories into a single borderless substance, a seamless composition of oils and resins distilled from plants that might be strangers in nature, from countries with a violent colonial relationship, like French lavender and Haitian vetiver.

I believe in science, but I believe in the unknowable, too. I lost my hair, my sleep, my desire to eat, sick to my stomach as I’ve absorbed these stories. Do we need scientific evidence to prove that the violence against our ancestors affects us, too? We cannot turn back time and resurrect the world before genocide. I made a perfume called Mojave, to honor the First People of this land. Sacred notes of palo santo, wild white sage, and black copal are the incenses of the Americas, burned in ceremony for protection and clarity; as oils they smell as cool as a desert night.

Falcon, the Lucky dragon smiles something in my direction.

I bring my wrist to my nose---and I'm lost in a melody of fragrances---sweet and musky. Almonds? Vanilla? Florals? A switch clicks in my brain, a feeling of exhilaration rolling through my body in waves. I'm at a loss for words. Garrance really captured something special; she knows what she's doing. "Do you like it?" I smell my wrist again, my eyes wide. "Like it? I love it. What's in it?" "A little frangipani, some ylang-ylang, a bit of almond oil, and a light sandalwood musk.

there are those born with the calling and inner knowledge of its practice. These people love plants, animals, and nature, those who are naturals at taking care of anything green, healers, great cooks, tea lovers and collectors, and all those who love making their perfumes and essential oils.

All my life, used the best lotions, finest soaps, nicest oils, and fanciest perfumes to keep my skin nice, only to find out I need thick, hard skin to survive. Oh, the irony.

36Now one of the Pharisees was requesting Him to dine with him, and He entered the Pharisee’s house and reclined at the table. 37And there was a woman in the city who was a sinner; and when she learned that He was reclining at the table in the Pharisee’s house, she brought an alabaster vial of perfume, 38and standing behind Him at His feet, weeping, she began to wet His feet with her tears, and kept wiping them with the hair of her head, and kissing His feet and anointing them with the perfume. 39Now when the Pharisee who had invited Him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet He would know who and what sort of person this woman is who is touching Him, that she is a sinner.” 40And Jesus answered him, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” And he replied, “Say it, Teacher.” 41“A moneylender had two debtors: one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. 42When they were unable to repay, he graciously forgave them both. So which of them will love him more?” 43Simon answered and said, “I suppose the one whom he forgave more.” And He said to him, “You have judged correctly.” 44Turning toward the woman, He said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave Me no water for My feet, but she has wet My feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. 45You gave Me no kiss; but she, since the time I came in, has not ceased to kiss My feet. 46You did not anoint My head with oil, but she anointed My feet with perfume. 47For this reason I say to you, her sins, which are many, have been forgiven, for she loved much; but he who is forgiven little, loves little.” 48Then He said to her, “Your sins have been forgiven.” 49Those who were reclining at the table with Him began to say to themselves, “Who is this man who even forgives sins?” 50And He said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.

A Harlot Crashes the Party A very “nice” man named Simon, a Pharisee, brought Jesus to dinner at his home in Capernaum (Luke 5). As they were reclining around the table, a woman known to be a harlot somehow came in, bringing with her an expensive flask of perfumed lotion. She certainly had overheard Jesus teaching and had seen his care for others. She was moved to believe that she too was loved by him and by the heavenly Father of whom he spoke. She was seized by a transforming conviction, an overwhelming faith. Suddenly there she was, down on the floor by Jesus, tears of gratitude for him pouring down upon his feet. Drying them away with her hair, she then rained kisses upon his feet and massaged them with the lotion. What a scene! That nice man, Simon, was taking it in, and—no doubt battling a surge of disapproval—he tried to put the best possible construction on it. It just could not be that Jesus wasn’t nice. Clearly he was a righteous man. So the only reason he would be letting this woman touch him, or even come near him, was that he didn’t know she was a prostitute. And that, unfortunately, proved that Jesus didn’t have “it” after all. “If this fellow really were a prophet,” Simon mused, “he would know what this woman does, for she is filthy.” Perhaps Simon consoled himself with the thought that it is at least no sin not to be a prophet. It never occurred to him that Jesus would know exactly who the woman was and yet let her touch him. But Jesus did know, and he also knew what Simon was thinking. So he told him a story of a man who lent money to two people: $50,000 to one and $5 to the other, let us say. When they could not repay, the man simply forgave the debts. “Now Simon,” Jesus asked, “which one will love the man most?” Simon replied that it would be the one who had owed most. That granted, Jesus positioned Simon and the streetwalker side by side to compare their hearts: “Look at this woman,” he said. “When I entered your home, you didn’t bother to offer me water to wash the dust from my feet, but she has washed them with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You refused me the customary kiss of greeting, but she has kissed my feet again and again from the time I first came in. You neglected the usual courtesy of olive oil to anoint my head, but she has covered my feet with rare perfume. Therefore her sins—and they are many—are forgiven, for she loved me much; but one who is forgiven little, shows little love.” (Luke 7:44–47 LB) “Loved me much!” Simply that, and not the customary proprieties, was now the key of entry into the rule of God.

Perhaps she stood in the street attracted by the crowd, and, as she listened to our Saviour’s talk, it seemed to hold her fast. She had never heard a man speak after that fashion, and when he spoke of abounding mercy, and the willingness of God to accept as many as would come to him, then the tears began to follow each other down her check; and when she listened again to that meek and lowly preacher, and heard him tell of the Father in heaven who would receive prodigals and press them to his loving bosom, then her heart was fairly broken, she relinquished her evil traffic, she became a new woman, desirous of better things, anxious to be freed from sin. But she was greatly agitated in her heart with the question, could she, would she, be really forgiven ? Would such pardoning love as she had heard of reach even to her? She hoped so, and was in a measure comforted. Her faith grew, and with it an ardent love. The Spirit of God still wrought with her till she enjoyed a feeble hope, a gleam of confidence; she believed that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah , that he had appeared on earth to forgive sins, and she rested on him for the forgiveness of her sins, and longed for an opportunity to do him homage, and if possible to win a word direct from his mouth... and I have already derived such benefit from him that I love him better than all besides; I love him as my own soul... Now, when she came to the door, the Saviour was reclining at his meat, according to the Oriental custom, and his feet were towards the door; for the Pharisee had but little respect for Christ , and had not given him the best and innermost place at the feast ; but there he lay with his uncovered feet towards the door, and the woman, almost unperceived, came close to him, and, as she looked and saw that the Pharisee had refused him the ordinary courtesy of washing his feet, and that they were all stained and travel-worn with Lis long journeys of love, she began to weep, and the tears fell in such plenteous showers that they even washed his feet. Here was holy water of a true sort. The crystal of penitence falling in drops, each one as precious as a diamond. Never were feet bedewed with a more precious water than those penitent eyes showered forth. Then, unbinding those luxurious tresses, which had been for her the devil’s nets in which to entangle souls, she wiped the sacred feet therewith. Surely she thought that her chief adornment, the crown and glory of her womanhood, was all too worthless a thing to do service to the lowest and meanest part of the Son of God. That which once was her vanity now was humbled and yet exalted to the lowest office; she made her eyes a ewer and her locks a towel. “Never,” says bishop Hall, “was any hair so preferred as this ; how I envy those locks that were graced with the touch of those sacred feet.” There a sweet temptation overtook her, “I will even kiss those feet, I will humbly pay reverence to those blessed limbs.” She spake not a word, but how eloquent were her actions ! better even than psalms and hymns were these acts of devotion. Then she bethought her of that alabaster box containing perfumed oil with which, like most Eastern women, she was wont to anoint herself for the pleasure of the smell and for the increase of her beauty, and now, opening it, she pours out the costliest thing she has upon his blessed feet. Not a word, I say, came from her; and, brethren, we would prefer a single speechless lover of Jesus, who acted as she did, to ten thousand noisy talkers who have no gifts, no heart, no tears. As for the Master, he remained quietly acquiescent, saying nothing, but all the while drinking in her love, and letting his poor weary heart find sweet solace in the gratitude of one who once was a sinner, but who was to be such no more.

Oil and perfume make the heart glad, and A person’s advice is sweet to his friend. PROVERBS 27:9 (NASB) The

a frigid night of an Italian winter, crimson flows through the veins of nature’s sweet orange, staining its flesh. Cold-pressing releases its addictive oil: tangy, warm, balsamic. Blends well with frankincense, cedar, and clove. And always transports me to Italy. —DB

I sleep with a dream of the past. My hand curled in the tendrils of her hair. About us the vale lay quiet in slumber. Even the children did not yet stir. The birds rested on knotted limbs in the pinewood nearby, and I heard nothing but her breath and the crackling of the old fire. The bed smelled of her. No scent of flowers or perfume. Just the earthy musk of her skin, of the oils in the hair around my hands, of her hot breath as it warmed my cheek.

They occasionally turned up in Tudor inventories and linens would often be recorded in wills as bequeathed to others. Goodman tells us how she followed a Tudor body cleansing regime for a period of three months while living in modern society. No one complained or even noticed a sweaty smell. She wore natural fibre on top of the linen underwear but took neither a shower nor a bath for the whole period. When she recorded The Monastery Farm for television, she only changed her linen smock once weekly and her hose three times over six months and she still did not pong.9 Tudor England was not a place where everyone smelled as sweetly as most people who shower daily today but its people generally managed not to stink. Of course, the past did smell differently but being clean and sweet smelling certainly did matter to many Tudors. In 1485 only a few hundred people in England could afford essential oils which arrived during the Crusades. Perfume for most people originated from natural sources such as posies of violets, lavender bags and smoke from herbs burning over a fire. Sir Thomas More is known to have had a rosemary bush planted beneath his study window so its pleasant scent wafted up towards him as he worked. Lavender was often placed in bedrooms, tucked into the straw of a bolster or hung in bunches on bed posts so that its calming nature might induce relaxation. Rue and Tansey were known as insecticides and

Fire roared through the bifurcated city of Ankh-Morpork. Where it licked the Wizards’ Quarter it burned blue and green and was even laced with strange sparks of the eighth color, octarine; where its outriders found their way into the vats and oil stores all along Merchant Street it progressed in a series of blazing fountains and explosions; in the streets of the perfume blenders it burned with a sweetness; where it touched bundles of rare and dry herbs in the storerooms of the drugmasters it made men go mad and talk to God.

We found ourselves in a lovers’ arrangement common in cities, when you see each other after midnight, once a week or so, sometimes dinner if he felt up for a date. I wanted more, but he had just gotten free of a long relationship, and I’d never been in one. We dated other people. I gravitated to people who reminded me of him, quiet, reserved, people who moved with diligence and discipline in their art. Masculine, but soft. When I couldn’t bear our arrangement, I cut myself off. But I wanted to smell him. I traced his scent back to the source, the Brooklyn Bangladeshi-owned oil shop Madina on Atlantic Avenue, an institution. Named for one of the two holy cities in Islam, the word al-Madina simply means the city, and the shop’s visitors include Black and Muslim entrepreneurs, fragrance aficionados, folks who want to smell good for cheap, imams who sell the oils to the prison commissary, making perfumes available to inmates. I would purchase five-dollar roll-on bottles of oil to smell him in those periods we were off-again.

Vasanas are imprinted in textiles, traces of perfume and natural body oils and dirt locked in the weave of vintage silk, cotton, polyester. Holding the memories of the wearer. But what about the traces of the laborers embedded in the fabric? From farm to factory, the weavers, the spinners, the pickers of cotton bolls and silkworms, the fabric cutters and dyers, their sweat and blood pricked from a needle, vasana of touch. To be touched is to be made and unmade in relationship to another, another’s body, another’s desire, another’s trace, according to scholar Poulomi Saha.

There is no limit to the foolishness of men of my age. Our only excuse is that we leave no mark of our own on the girls who pass through our hands: our convoluted desires, our ritualized lovemaking, our elephantine ecstasies are soon forgotten, they shrug off our clumsy dance as they drive straight as arrows into the arms of men whose children they will bear, the young and vigorous and direct. Our loving leaves no mark. Whom will that other girl with the blind face remember: me with my silk robe and my dim lights and my perfumes and oils and my unhappy pleasures, or that other cold man with the mask over his eyes who gave the orders and pondered the sounds of her intimate pain? Whose was the last face she saw plainly on this earth but the face behind the glowing iron? Though I cringe with shame, even here and now, I must ask myself whether, when I lay head to foot with her, fondling and kissing those broken ankles, I was not in my heart of hearts regretting that I could not engrave myself on her as deeply.

This fancy linen shirt she’s crammed me into, studs all over the place, shoes, Chinese dressing gown, the way she’s done and oiled my hair – bergamot, yes sir! Wanted to sprinkle me with some kind of perfume – crème brûlée or what not, well that’s where I dug my heels in, and asserted my conjugal authority—

MAY 27 How Would You Like To Receive a Fresh Anointing? …I shall be anointed with fresh oil. — Psalm 92:10 How would you like to receive a fresh anointing of the Holy Spirit on your life today? If your answer is yes, why don’t you go before the Great Anointer and allow Him to give you that fresh anointing? This is precisely what David was referring to when he said, “…I shall be anointed with fresh oil” (Psalm 92:10). The word “anoint” that is used primarily in the Old Testament Septuagint and the Greek New Testament comes from the Greek word chrio. This word originally denoted the smearing or rubbing of oil or perfume upon an individual. For example, if a patient came to see his physician because he had sore muscles, the physician would pour oil upon his own hands; then he would begin to deeply rub that oil into the sore muscles of his patient. That penetrating application of oil would be denoted by the Greek word chrio. So technically speaking, the word “anoint” has to do with the rubbing or smearing of oil upon someone else. When I hear the word “anoint,” I immediately think not only of the oil, but of the hands of the Anointer! Oil was very expensive in biblical times; therefore, rather than tip the bottle of oil downward and freely pour it upon the recipient, a person would first pour the oil into his hands and then apply it to the other person. For this reason, I refer to the anointing as a “hands-on” situation. It took someone’s hands to apply the oil. Let’s consider this concept in the context of God anointing our lives. God Himself — the Great Anointer — filled His hands with the essence of the Spirit and then laid His mighty hands upon our lives, pressing the Spirit’s power and anointing ever deeper into us. So when we speak of a person who is anointed, we are actually acknowledging that the hand of God is on that person. The strong presence of the anointing that we see or feel is a signal to let us know that God’s hand is personally resting on that individual’s life. Therefore, if you would like a fresh anointing of the Holy Spirit upon your life, you must come before the Great Anointer! He alone can give you what you need. Open your heart to God, and allow Him to lay His hand upon your life in a new way. I guarantee you, a strong anointing will follow!

I have never before gathered eggs from under a hen. Fernando has never before seen a hen. We bend low into the shed where perch a dozen or so fat lady birds. There's no shrieking or fluttering at all. I approach one and ask if she has an egg or two. Nothing. I ask in Italian. Still nothing. I ask Fernando to pick her up but he's already outside the shed smoking and pacing, telling me he really doesn't like eggs at all and he especially doesn't like frittata. Both bold-faced lies. I start to move the hen and she plumps down from her perch quite voluntarily, uncovering the place where two lovely brown eggs sit. I take them, one at a time, bend down and nestle them in my sack. I want two more. I peruse the room. I choose the hen who sits next to the docile one. I pick her up and she pecks me so hard on my wrist that I drop her. I see there is nothing in her nest and apologise for my insensitivity, thinking her nastiness must have been caused by embarrassment. I move on to another hen and this time find a single, paler brown-shelled beauty, still warm and stuck all over with bits of straw. I take it and leave with an unfamiliar thrill. This is my first full day in Tuscany and I've robbed a henhouse before lunch. Back home in the kitchen I beat the eggs, the yolks of which are orange as pumpkin, with a few grindings of sea salt, a few more of pepper, adding a tablespoon or so of white wine and a handful of Parmigliano. I dig for my flat broad frying pan, twirl it to coat its floor with a few drops of my tourist oil, and let it warm over a quiet flame. I drop in the rinsed and dried blossoms whole, flatten them a bit so they stay put, and leave them for a minute or so while I tear a few basil leaves, give the eggs another stroke or two. I throw a few fennel seeds into the pan to scent the oil, where the blossoms are now beginning to take colour on their bottom sides. Time to liven up the flame and add the egg batter. I perform the lift-and-tilt motions necessary to cook the frittata without disturbing the blossoms, which are now ensnared in the creamy embrace of the eggs. Next, I run the lush little cake under a hot grill to form a gold blistery skin on top before sliding it onto a plate, strewing it with torn basil. The heat of the eggs warms the herbs so they give up a double-strength perfume. Now I drop a thread of find old balsamico over it. And finally, let it rest.

Think about it, a hypothetical movie called The Wages of Pleasure, where four handsome men in two Mercedes Benz cars deliver body oils, perfumes and soaps to a coterie of young beautiful woman in a Playboy Mansion somewhere nearby on a paradise beach. A hollow, bland movie devoid of tension, suspense, action, suffering and fear.

Think about this--if you buy a perfume or aftershave because it’s the trendiest scent at the moment, but you don’t really like it, how often will you wear it? With essential oils the same is true. Take some time to find the scents that you like, even if it whittles your list down to only two or three.

I guide Delia through the slaw: green cabbage with fennel and green apple and a light dressing of rice wine vinegar, sugar, lime juice, canola oil, and caraway seeds. Kai makes the butternut squash with applesauce, nutmeg, grains of paradise, and cinnamon. I work on a light pasta salad that I have been playing with, orecchiette pasta with white beans, chopped celery, green peas, and feta in red wine vinaigrette with fresh oregano. The case gets filled, Kai takes off, the doors get opened, and we begin to serve customers. While Delia takes a phone order, I head into the kitchen and take the brisket out of the oven. It is mahogany brown and juicy, and perfumes the kitchen immediately, the scent wafting out into the store. "What is that smell?" Delia says, eyes closing, inhaling deeply. "That, is hope," I say.

Moreover, whatever the object of elimination may be, it would not be feasible to eliminate its innate aspect without having first eliminated its imputed aspect. And within the innate aspect of what is to be abandoned, it is the obscurations, together with their seeds, that are eliminated, proceeding from the gross to the subtle, so that, by the end of this process, the extremely subtle habitual tendencies, which are like the trace of oil and the perfume of flowers, are exhausted and abandoned. And similarly, until manifest clinging to real existence, together with its seeds, has been eliminated, the habitual tendency to cling to real existence cannot be eliminated. This is all quite true. However, to say that until one is on the verge of eliminating these habitual tendencies, the cognitive obscurations can in no way be removed is not tenable—as I briefly explained above.136 And even though there is a lot that one might say on this topic, I shall not elaborate further.

I slice fresh garlic, rub it into the meat with olive oil, then insert the thin wafers into tiny slits I cut along the grain. After rinsing my hands, I hold them to my face, inhale the garlic perfume still on my skin. I could easily wipe it away on the faucet, a spoon, any piece of stainless steel, but I've never understood why people find it offensive. It's the smell of anticipation, the promise of a wonderful meal in the offing. Opening the spice cabinet, I breathe in the fragrance of all those jars I left behind: saffron threads, cardamom pods, star anise, Tahitian vanilla. I almost weep at the sight of my Fleur de Sel. No one ever gets my obsession with sea salt, especially expensive sea salt. They don't understand that it brightens the flavor of food, wakes it up, like a condiment. Regular table salt just makes food salty.

Most of her recipes came from her father, but Noor learned how to make the luscious potato cake from Nelson's mother. The recipe her mother-in-law had whispered into Noor's ear was the authentic one used by Nelson's great-grandmother. In its own unpresumptuous way, the Spanish Tortilla is an honest love omelet, and every bite must be suffused with fragrant olive oil- in this case, too much of a good thing is not a sin. Even when Noor was an amateur and the potatoes were sometimes raw, Nelson would say, "Oh my God! That was the best tortilla of my whole life!" Which of course wasn't true, but he was acknowledging the effort of peeling and slicing immense quantities of potatoes. What she loved most about Spanish food was its lusty simplicity, so unlike the gastronomical somersaults of French cuisine or the complexity of the Persian food she grew up with. When she was little she could eat pyramids of saffron rice and rich meat stews, but she now associated the colors and perfumes of her husband's native cuisine with their courtship, with paddleboats and honeymoons and champagne in silver buckets, with flamenco and candlelight and little fried sardines with sea salt by the water. Her postcards were menus, smudged and wine-stained, saved from their meals, addressed to herself and read carefully like romance manuals.

This being so, when the good and the wicked suffer alike, the identity of their sufferings does not mean that there is no difference between them. Though the sufferings are the same, the sufferers remain different. Virtue and vice are not the same, even if they undergo the same torment. The fire which makes gold shine makes chaff smoke; the same flail breaks up the straw, and clears the grain; and oil is not mistaken for lees because both are forced out by the same press. In the same way, the violence which assails good men to test them, to cleanse and purify them, effects in the wicked their condemnation, ruin, and annihilation. Thus the wicked, under pressure of affliction, execrate God and blaspheme; the good, in the same affliction, offer up prayers and praises. This shows that what matters is the nature of the sufferer, not the nature of the sufferings. Stir a cesspit, and a foul stench arises; stir a perfume, and a delightful fragrance ascends. But the movement is identical.

The first known perfumer was a woman, Tapputi, an overseer at a palace in Mesopotamia in the second millennium BCE. Clay tablets tell us that she used oil, reeds, flowers, resin, and water to make perfumes by a process of distillation and filtration.

Rose oil eventually lost popularity by Elizabeth I’s reign when musk, civet and ambergris competed with rose as the perfume most valued at court. Could this be because once rose oil became so readily available it lost its exclusivity value?