Quincy Quotes

Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman, before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air.

Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone.

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.

Let the human mind loose. It must be loose. It will be loose. Superstition and dogmatism cannot confine it. {Letter to his son and 6th US president, John Quincy Adams, November 13 1816}

In charity to all mankind, bearing no malice or ill will to any human being, and even compassionating those who hold in bondage their fellow men, not knowing what they do.

Government has no right to hurt a hair on the head of an Atheist for his Opinions. Let him have a care of his Practices. {Letter to his son and future president, John Quincy Adams, 16 June 1816}

He loves history. He wanted to write a biography of John Quincy Adams. I, shamefully, knew almost nothing about John Quincy Adams, so I went online and bought every biography of him I could find. One day, he called me, claiming that we wouldn’t work out long term. He said he loved me but that we had different interests. “What does love mean to you?” I said. “That’s an impossible question,” he replied. I, however, find love to be quite simple. Love is the stack of biographies on my nightstand with a bookmark near the end

I am a warrior, so that my son may be a merchant, so that his son may be a poet.

Try and fail,but don't fail to try.

America... goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all.

Posterity -- you will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it.

To believe all men honest would be folly. To believe none so, is something worse.

Though it cost the blood of millions of white men, let it come. Let justice be done.

To furnish the means of acquiring knowledge is ... the greatest benefit that can be conferred upon mankind. It prolongs life itself and enlarges the sphere of existence.

I waited a long time for you, love. I’ll wait as long as you need. You are mine.” And he was here in Quincy to claim me.

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader. —JOHN QUINCY ADAMS

The tragedy of Tupac is that his untimely passing is representative of too many young black men in this country....If we had lost Oprah Winfrey at 25, we would have lost a relatively unknown, local market TV anchorwoman. If we had lost Malcolm X at 25, we would have lost a hustler named Detroit Red. And if I had left the world at 25, we would have lost a big-band trumpet player and aspiring composer--just a sliver of my eventual life potential.

Power always thinks it has a great soul and vast views beyond the comprehension of the weak, and that it is doing God’s service when it is violating all His laws.

Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost.

The historian must have no country. —JOHN QUINCY ADAMS

We understand now, we've been made to understand, and to embrace the understanding that who we are is who we were.

Greatness occurs when your children love you, when your critics respect you and when you have peace of mind.

If the fundamental principles in the Declaration of Independence, as self-evident truths, are real truths, the existence of slavery, in any form, is a wrong.

Never give up - never surrender!

Posterity: you will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it.

It is not in the still calm of life, or the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed,” Abigail Adams wrote to her son John Quincy Adams in the midst of the American Revolution, suggesting that “the habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues.

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader.

The young John Quincy Adams begins it lifelong habit of keeping a journal with reluctance that he might one day have to read it. He hopes, though, that the flaws in his earlier entries will be balanced by the progress he is able to see.

It is one of the great arts of the human soul," Ezekiel said to himself. Her hand on the door, Quincy shifted and looked back at her uncle's profile. "What is?" "Staying with someone. Companionship is one of the great arts of the human soul.

There’s such a thing as too much sweetness, Quincy, he told me. All the best bakers know this. There needs to be a counterpoint. Something dark. Or bitter. Or sour. Unsweetened chocolate. Cardamom and cinnamon. Lemon and lime. They cut through all the sugar, taming it just enough so that when you do taste the sweetness, you appreciate it all the more.

Your father’s zeal for books will be one of the last desires which will quit him,” Abigail observed to John Quincy

The script supervisor wasn’t pleased, but Quincy told him that sex wasn’t needed to show love.” “Wow,” Josy said. “That’s deep. My name is Josiah Erickson, and I approve this message.

A desire to be observed, considered, esteemed, praised, beloved, and admired by his fellows is one of the earliest as well as the keenest dispositions discovered in the heart of man.

Thus situated, the perilous experiment must be made. Let me make it with full deliberations, and be prepared for the consequences.

I was born for a controversial world, and I cannot escape my destiny. John Quincy Adams

For instead of being “the ardent pursuer of science” that some imagined, Jefferson was the captive of ambition, and ambition, Adams told John Quincy, was “the subtlest beast of the intellectual and moral field . . . [and] wonderfully adroit in concealing itself from its owner.

Do you think a commoner should dare to dress like a blue blood?” Rhys asked as Quincy pulled the hem of the robe over his legs. “I believe every man ought to dress as well as he is able.” Rhys’s eyes narrowed. “Do you think it’s right for people to judge a man for what he wears?” “It is not for me to decide whether it is right, sir. The fact is, they do.

John Quincy Adams subscribed to the thesis that his mother's generation was unique when he complained to [his wife] that there were no modern women like her. Abigail, God love her, shot back that women might act frivolous and flighty, but only because men wanted them to.

Tie me, tease me, let your pleasure please me. Hurt me, love me, but please don’t ever leave me…

John Quincy Adams' depression was treated by his aunt with some reliable remedies, first sleep and then compassion. She said, " He was half cared for by having someone to care for him.

With that, Quincy brought the bowie knife down on Moon's cuffed hand and chopped off four fingers which flew up before my eyes like chips from a log. Moon screamed and a rifle ball shattered the lantern in front of me and struck Quincy in the neck, causing hot blood to spurt on my face. My thought was: I am better out of this.

You have to know that your real home is within.

La edad de una persona puede determinarse por el grado de dolor que experimenta cuando entra en contacto con una idea nueva

Once a task has just begun, never leave it till it's done. Be the labor great or small, do it well or not at all.

Do you really like Quincy or are you just saying that?" I asked. Dylan held up his index finger and finished swallowing his toast. He looked alarmed by my question. "Quincy is fine. Why would I mind Quincy?" "I don't know. I mean, don't you have a preference as to where we live?" Dylan shook his head. "Not really. As long as I'm living with you, I could care less. I'd live in a closet with you for Christ's sake.

If she could walk away, she would; her pride demanded at least that much from her. But Quincy knew that her heart beat with the rhythm of the presses in the back room, that her blood ran black with ink, and that her mind filled with reams of numbers and projections and plans. The Q was Quincy's only vital organ, so she would play the game.

I am here, Bella. Let me cherish you as you deserve. - Sebastian Stanhope

Once the two of you come together, even the devil himself will be running for cover. - The Duke of Traherne

It is my wish to fill every moment of my time with some action of the mind which may contribute to the pleasure or the improvement of my fellow creatures.

The only justification for looking down on anyone, is that you're going to stop and pick them up.

This is the last of earth! I am content.

Quincy, boyfriends apologize, shrinks analyze. Which are you?

John Quincy Adams was convinced that Polk's election meant the end of the civilized world

Maybe try the hipster ones.” “You’re so hot, I better date you before you’re cool!” Quincy shouted. “My feelings for you are one hundred percent organic and locally sourced! Are you gluten-free tonight, because I’d like to take you on a date! I’d still care about you even if you went mainstream! Roses are red, your shirt is ironic, your drink of choice is probably a mason jar filled with a vodka tonic!

I was in bed at my beach house, but could not sleep because of some fried chicken in the icebox that I felt entitled to. I waited till my wife dropped off, and tiptoed into the kitchen. I remembered looking at the clock. It was precisely four-fifteen. I'm quite certain of this, because our kitchen clock has not worked in twenty-one years and is always at that time. I also noticed that our dog, Judas, was acting funny. He was sanding up on his hind legs and singing, 'I Enjoy Being a Girl.' Suddenly the room turned bright orange. At first, I thought my wife had caught me eating between meals and set fire to the house. Then I looked out the window, where to my amazement I saw a gigantic cigar-shaped aircraft hovering just over the treetops in the yard and emitting an orange glow. I stood transfixed for what must have been several hours, though our clock still read four-fifteen, so it was difficult to tell. Finally, a large, mechanical claw extended from the aircraft and snatched the two pieces of chicken from my hand and quickly retreated. When I reported the incident to the Air Force, they told me that what I had seen was a flock of birds. When I protested, Colonel Quincy Bascomb personally promised that the Air Force would return the two pieces of chicken. To this day, I have only received one piece.

Quincy and Fisher walked through all this in silence. Silence was the most common stock-in-trade between them, and the portfolio of their friendship was thick with it. So, without words, they stepped across the streets, their feet pressing the pavement with the same sounds, their toes turned just so; they knew what life was like at each other's side. Sometimes he would speak, or she would, small offerings on the altar of their joint survival.

War, to be abolished, must be understood. To be understood, it must be studied." Karl Deutsch - preface of A Study of War by Quincy Wright. Added corollary by KMV: To abolish what is not understood is both arrogant and ignorant.

We are all a little bit broken, she tells me (the reason she doesn’t sleep at night?), but we all work on fixing ourselves.

We are sent into this world for some end. It is our duty to discover by close study what this end is and when we once discover it to pursue it

I like it,” I said. “The material’s so heavy, though. I may turn into a sweat monster.

My toast would be, may our country always be successful, but whether successful or otherwise, always right.

Family is family. Even if you hate them, it’s hard to let go.

If I am the moon, then you are my sun. The sun can shine on its own, but I cannot shine without you.

Although the laws of marriage and divorce were written by men to be to their advantage, they neglected to take into account that women can be far more cunning.

Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish.

Adams had no doubt that education was as much a human birthright as freedom, for females as well as males, for slaves as well as free blacks. Freedom and education were inseparable.

The immediate occasion of this practice was the lowness of wages, which at that time would not allow them to indulge in ale or spirits, and wages rising, it may be thought that this practice would cease; but as I do not readily believe that any man having once tasted the divine luxuries of opium will afterwards descend to the gross and mortal enjoyments of alcohol, I take it for granted, That those eat now who never ate before; And those who always ate, now eat the more.

We are redeemed one man at a time. There is no family pass ticket or park hopping pass to life. One ticket — one at a time. Man doesn’t vanquish hatred or bigotry. The target keeps moving. From the blacks to the Irish; atheists to Christians. But as always there are a few leaders: Ben Franklin, John Quincy Adams, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Abraham Lincoln, Fredrick Douglas, Booker T Washington, Ghandi and Martin Luther King. They know that the march toward freedom never ends, man must be ever vigilant and pray less with his lips and more with his legs.

Did you know that seventy-five to eighty percent of juvenile offenders can’t read at grade level?” “Really?” This was news to me. “Your world becomes a much smaller place if you can’t read. You have far fewer options. It’s not the only factor, but it’s a big one. If they want to know how big to build a prison, all they have to do is look at the illiteracy statistics.” “They knew I was coming.” “You or someone like you.” “You knew it too, all those years ago, back in Quincy. That’s why you tried to help me. Because you knew I was coming here.” “Here or someplace like here.

The Quincy rodeo was a standing tradition, much like Christmas or Thanksgiving. It was one of the few events we always made sure to attend together, even if that meant closing shop. Except that evening, surrounded by my family, a piece was missing. I hadn’t realized until late in the evening, when I’d glanced across the arena and found Winn at the fence, that the missing piece was her. Another shift. She belonged by my side, not standing alone.

Warren had a most unusual household. A recent widower with four children between the ages of two and eight, he was not only a leading patriot but also had one of the busiest medical practices in Boston. He had two apprentices living with him on Hanover Street, and he sometimes saw as many as twenty patients a day. His practice ran the gamut, from little boys with broken bones, like John Quincy Adams, to prostitutes on aptly named Damnation Alley,

Perhaps the twentieth-century Senator is not called upon to risk his entire future on one basic issue in the manner of Edmund Ross or Thomas Hart Benton. Perhaps our modern acts of political courage do not arouse the public in the manner that crushed the career of Sam Houston and John Quincy Adams. Still, when we realize that a newspaper that chooses to denounce a Senator today can reach many thousand times as many voters as could be reached by all of Daniel Webster’s famous and articulate detractors put together, these stories of twentieth-century political courage have a drama, an excitement—and an inspiration—all their own.

Instead of casting off the foreign skin, as John Quincy Adams had stipulated, never to resume it, the fashion is to resume the foreign skin as conspicuously as can be. The cult of ethnicity has reversed the movement of American history, producing a nation of minorities - or at least of minority spokesmen - less interested in joining with the majority in common endeavor than in declaring their alienation from oppressive, white, patriarchal, racist, sexist, classist society.

In all actuality, Quincy knew that, when riding in a wagon, your thoughts had plenty of room to wander and move and never bump into those of your companions. But in a carriage, with its confined space, people often felt compelled to speak with one another, even when their companion didn't wish it. And Quincy did not wish it. She thought that the truest test of humanity was riding in a coach and saying absolutely nothing to one's traveling companions. Few, if any, had ever succeeded.

The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. All history will convince you of this, and that wisdom and penetration are the fruit of experience, not the lessons of retirement and leisure. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised and animated by scenes that engage the heart, then those qualities which would otherwise lie dormant wake into life and form the character of the hero and the statesman…’ - Abigail Adams to her son John Quincy Adams, p. 379

Which is why she’d fallen desperately in love the first time she’d met Sharlah. She’d looked into her foster daughter’s eyes and she’d known her. Just . . . known her. Sharlah’s fears, anxieties, fragile hope, bone-deep strength. Rainie saw all of her daughter. And she loved her, not in spite of her weaknesses, but because of them. Sharlah was a fighter.

However it happened, you are my wife and I am grateful. I look at you and I know you were worth waiting for. - Sebastian Stanhope

Warn a kid with oppositional defiant disorder not to do something, and you’ve pretty much guaranteed the crime.

A politician in this country must be the man of a party. I would fain be the man of my whole country.

All glories of flesh vanish, and this, the glory of infantine beauty seen in the mirror of memory, soonest of all.

especially when I’m alone in the middle of the night without any whiskey to dull the screams that echo through the dark hallways of my soul.

When (an advocate) is not thoroughly acquainted with the real strength and weakness of his cause, he knows not where to choose the most impressive argument. When the mark is shrouded in obscurity, the only substitute for accuracy in the aim is in the multitude of the shafts.

Do you play?” Quincy jerked her eyes away from the instrument to find Lord Arch watching her, his mouth drawn in a very familiar straight line. “Only for myself, now that Ezekiel is dead,” she answered truthfully. “How delightful,” he said, smiling, his handsome face giving way to the refined wrinkles of his age. “Why don’t you play for yourself now, and I’ll just listen?

Modern researchers have identified one or more major mood disorders in John Quincy Adams, Charles Darwin, Emily Dickinson, Benjamin Disraeli, William James, William Tecumseh Sherman, Robert Schumann, Leo Tolstoy, Queen Victoria, and many others. We may accurately call these luminaries “mentally ill,” a label that has some use—as did our early diagnosis of Lincoln—insofar as it indicates the depth, severity, and quality of their trouble. However, if we get stuck on the label, we may miss the core fascination, which is how illness can coexist with marvelous well-being. In

Of all persecuted sects, the Baptists stand forth as most prominent, simply and only because they aim at a more complete and thorough reform than any others ever attempted. They teach that Christ's kingdom is not of this world; that the church is not a national, political, or provincial establishment; but a congregation of holy men, separated from the world by the receiving of the Holy Spirit.

As the months passed, even the strident voices from the newspapers had begun to moderate, and the passion to put Preston’s neck in a noose had become subdued. It was a relief to Adams that with the trial now scheduled for October, he had time to work with Josiah Quincy to prepare a case based on law and reason. And it meant he could spend time with his family and enjoy the wonderful peace of the farm.

If slavery be the destined sword of the hand of the destroying angel which is to sever the ties of this Union, the same sword will cut in sunder the bonds of slavery itself. A dissolution of the Union for the cause of slavery would be followed by a servile war in the slave-holding States, combined with a war between the two severed portions of the Union. It seems to me that its result might be the extirpation of slavery from this whole continent; and, calamitous and desolating as this course of events in its progress must be, so glorious would be its final issue, that, as God shall judge me, I dare not say that it is not to be desired.

Each second neared our last. We danced. “Kieren . . .” “Shhh . . .” We danced. “I’ll be okay.” Was that me lying? Or him? We danced. “Close your eyes,” he whispered, brushing his lips against mine. “Know that I’m missing you already and that you’ll always be in my prayers.” When I opened my eyes, I stood alone in the middle of the dance floor.

THE Gospel of Christ not only differs from all other systems of religion in the superior excellence of the truths it reveals, but also in the directions it gives for the propagation of its doctrines. Other systems seek to advance themselves by invoking the aid of the secular power, and by forcing men, against their convictions, to accept a theory repugnant to their views. They have thus succeeded in thronging their temples with hypocritical worshippers, bound to tlieir altars through fear and slavish dread. These systems, in order to maintain themselves, find it necessary to proscribe and persecute all who differ from them, either in their articles of belief or mode of worship. But the Gospel of Christ, though it is the infallible truth of God, expressly prohibits a resort to any such measures for its advancement. It not only teaches its adherents to utterly abandon the use of carnal weapons for its propagation, but it also charges them not to proscribe those who may differ in their views or mode of worship. This principle is directly expressed in the text and its connection. The teaching of the Saviour has been violated, however, even by his professed followers; and, in the name of the meek and lowly Jesus, men have gone forth with proscription, oppression, and persecution, to advance their own opinions, and crush out that liberty of thought, and those rights of conscience vouchsafed to man by his Maker, and the free exercise of which is alone compatible with his personal accountability.

Josy was certain of a few things in his life. He wanted to be an actor. He had an agent who cared about his future. He had friends he’d somehow managed to carve into a family. He liked weed and funky socks with animals on them. He was good at radio trivia (which for some reason didn’t translate so well to bar trivia). He had a bong named Vlad the Inhaler, and maybe his parents would never come around to seeing that while his life would never be what they wanted, it was still a life worth living. And Josiah Erickson was certain that what he felt for Quincy Moore went beyond simple affection. Regardless of what happened tomorrow or any day after, he would remember this moment when he felt so full of light he thought he’d burst.

At the age of eight, John Quincy Adams was made the man of his house while his father, John Adams, was off doing important John Adams things for America. This would be a lot of terrifying responsibility at any time in American history, but it just so happens that, when Adams was eight years old, the *Revolutionary freaking War* was happening right outside his house. He watched the Battle of Bunker Hill from his front porch, according to his diary, worried that he might be 'butchered in cold blood, or taken and carried ... as hostages by any foraging or marauding detachment of British soldiers.' I don't have the diary I kept at age eight, but I think the only things I worried about was whether or not they'd have for dogs in the school the next day and if I had the wherewithal and clarity of purpose to collect all of the Pokemon. John Q, on the other hand, guarded his house, mother, and siblings during wartime. This isn't to imply that eight-year-old John Quincy Adams could have beaten eight-year-old you in a fight, but to imply that eight-year-old John Quincy Adams could beat you *as an adult*.

Quincy laughed. "If I were Elizabeth I shouldn't thank either of you for that comforting diagnosis. Would it do any good to open Aunt Sarai's grave and drive a stake through her? If you believe in as much sorcery as that, you must regret the days of witch-burners, Carew." Carew said quietly, "No. Witch-burners were barbarous blunderers. If I wanted to suppress a dangerous letter, could I do it by burning the envelope and leaving the letter loose? The witch would come back unchanged; I should merely have postponed the danger until another time and place. And have further handicapped myself to meet it, by depriving the witch, by violent death, of the years allotted her, or him, for evolution." Joseph said with dry humor, "She might not have used them for that, Carew. At least not for your idea of it." Carew shrugged. "That would be her responsibility, not mine. And, in any case, she would be that many years nearer the time of her inevitable change." This time Joseph did not answer, only smiled.

The first secretary of defense, General Henry Knox, said that what we’re doing to the native population is worse than what the conquistadors did in Peru and Mexico. He said future historians will look at the “destruction” of these people—what would nowadays be called genocide—and paint the acts with “sable colors” [in other words, darkly]. This was known all the way through. Long after John Quincy Adams, the intellectual father of Manifest Destiny, left power, he became an opponent of both slavery and the policy toward the Indians. He said he’d been involved—along with the rest of them—in a crime of “extermination” of such enormity that surely God would punish them for these “heinous sins.

They taught that the church of which Jesus is the Head, was a spiritual organization, composed not of those who came into it by hereditary descent, but of those who were born of the Spirit. But, there has been a departure from these principles; and organizations now exist, under the designation of Christian churches, which aim to unite the church and the world, and introduce the impious, and ungodly, and profane, into Christ's kingdom – thus reversing his declaration, that his "kingdom is not of this world." Against this innovation Baptists strenuous!y protest. We announce, then, as the Second Feature of the reform in which Baptists are engaged, THE RESTORATION OF THE SPIRITUALITY OF CHRIST'S KINGDOM.

The founders of your race are not handed down to you, like the fathers of the Roman people, as the sucklings of a wolf. You are not descended from a nauseous compound of fanaticism and sensuality, whose only argument was the sword, and whose only paradise was a brothel. No Gothic scourge of God, no Vandal pest of nations, no fabled fugitive from the flames of Troy, no bastard Norman tyrant, appears among the list of worthies who first landed on the rock, which your veneration has preserved as a lasting monument of their achievement. The

The Reformation which took place in the sixteenth century, while it aimed to remove many of the abuses of Popery, still did not recognize religions liberty. "There is not a confession of faith, nor a creed," says Underhill, "framed by any of the Reformers, which does not give to the magistrate a coercive power in religion, and almost every one, at the same time, curses the resisting Baptist." "It was the crime of this persecuted people, that they rejected secular interference in the church of God; it was the boast and aim of the Reformers everywhere to employ it. The natural fruit of the one was persecution – of the other, liberty."[1] The Baptists stood entirely alone, as the defenders of the rights of conscience. All the Reformed communities agreed that it was right for the magistrate to punish those who did not worship according to the prescribed rule of their churches; and it was for opposition to this feature of religious oppression, in connection with their adherence to believer's baptiem, that brought upon the Baptists those severe persecutions which they were called to endure. They contended for religious liberty; the Reformed churches opposed it, and committed themselves to a course fatal to the rights of conscience.

The station was filling with more movement and noise and light, as the morning sun began to bounce and rattle off the brass and glass of the building. Quincy pushed through the crowd, her eyes towards the ground, her feet guiding her out of the station. She only lifted her head when she came out onto the sidewalk. And there, before her, a familiar figure was waiting, standing with a paper in one hand, watching the flow of traffic. He saw her and waved in silence, somehow knowing it wasn’t a morning for many words. “Did Fisher tell you to come?” Quincy said, her voice sounding so unlike itself—sounding yearning. “No,” Arch replied. Then he shook his head as confirmation, as if it were an important truth she needed to know two ways. “But I knew this was his train.” “You missed him.” “I didn’t come for him. I came for you.

He asked, looking at her dark-rimmed eyes, "You do not sleep?" She shivered. "No. I do not want to sleep any more. I sleep too much already. It is so cold, where Quincy sends me in my sleep. Deep into the house, farther in, not into the house we see. It is as if that house were a face, and when you see a face you can't see the brain or the thoughts of the person behind it. And it is so strange - the house inside the house." ******** "How is it strange - this that you call the house inside the house?" She said vaguely, her eyes growing glassy, "Strange. Shapes change, and sizes. The rooms are different: bigger and blacker and longer and the shadows are full of things. Creatures - or sometimes the rooms get smaller, fewer, and the furnishings change and change, like the scenes in a kaleidoscope, and I see the people in the portraits walking about in them.

Ed ecco verso noi venir per nave un vecchio, bianco per antico pelo, gridando: "Guai a voi, anime prave! Non isperate mai veder lo cielo: i’ vegno per menarvi a l’altra riva ne le tenebre etterne, in caldo e ’n gelo. E tu che se’ costì, anima viva, pàrtiti da cotesti che son morti". Ma poi che vide ch’io non mi partiva, disse: "Per altra via, per altri porti verrai a piaggia, non qui, per passare: più lieve legno convien che ti porti". E ’l duca lui: "Caron, non ti crucciare: vuolsi così colà dove si puote ciò che si vuole, e più non dimandare". Quinci fuor quete le lanose gote al nocchier de la livida palude, che ’ntorno a li occhi avea di fiamme rote. Ma quell’anime, ch’eran lasse e nude, cangiar colore e dibattero i denti, ratto che ’nteser le parole crude. Bestemmiavano Dio e lor parenti, l’umana spezie e ’l loco e ’l tempo e ’l seme di lor semenza e di lor nascimenti. Poi si ritrasser tutte quante insieme, forte piangendo, a la riva malvagia ch’attende ciascun uom che Dio non teme. Caron dimonio, con occhi di bragia loro accennando, tutte le raccoglie; batte col remo qualunque s'adagia. Come d’autunno si levan le foglie l’una appresso de l’altra, fin che ’l ramo vede a la terra tutte le sue spoglie, similemente il mal seme d’Adamo gittansi di quel lito ad una ad una, per cenni come augel per suo richiamo. Così sen vanno su per l’onda bruna, e avanti che sien di là discese, anche di qua nuova schiera s’auna.

Five actors playing allotted parts on a set stage; and now he, for whom no part had been written, had walked onto the stage unexpectedly, because one of the players had turned rebel, as she had once before. He threw everything out of focus, and them into a fever. The heat and intensity of these flying questions was enough to make a man with even partially trained clairvoyant faculties feel as if he sat in a room filled with flashing fireflies. He took warning and withdrew himself to a cold inner isolation, as he knew how to do, even while laughing and talking with surface ease. It would not do to let his mind become clouded with emotion; or open any door of his imagination. But the impressions that came across that safer inner distance did not make his companions seem less dramatic, more normal: they were still out of focus. Something about the picture was distorted, even to a clear vision. The sense of evil was as strong as ever although the lurking Presence seemed to have retreated into a far background. He saw presently what the distortion was. Their modern figures were somehow incongruous in the old house, not at home. Like actors who had somehow got onto the wrong stage, onto sets with which their voices and costumes clashed. Interlopers. Or else-actors of an old school dressed up in an unbecoming masquerade. Witch House was an old house. Not old as other houses are old, that remain beds of the continuous stream of life, of marriages and births and deaths, of children crying and children laughing, where the past is only part of the pattern, root of the present and the future. Joseph de Quincy, dead nearly a quarter of a thousand years, was still its master: he had been strong, so strong that no later personality could dim or efface him here where he had set his seal. "He left his evil here when he could no longer stay himself," Carew thought. "As a man with diphtheria leaves germs on the things he has handled, the bed he has lain in. Thoughts are tangible things; on their own plane they breed like germs and, unlike germs, they do not die. He may have forgotten; he may even walk the earth in other flesh, but what he has left here lives." As probably it had been meant to do. For the man whose malignance, swollen with the contributions of the centuries, still ensouled these walls would not have cared to build a house or found a family except as a means to an end. Witch House was set like a mold, steeped in ritual atmosphere as a temple. Dangerous business, for who could say that such a temple would not find a god? There are low, non-human beings that coalesce with and feed on such leftover forces: lair in them.