Resorts Thoughts Quotes

Two students severely injured, you yourself covered in blood, a Reaper on the premises, a Fenrir wolf running around loose somewhere, and extensive property damage to the resort. Well?" Nickamedes snapped. "What do you have to say for yourself, Gwendolyn?" I thought for a second, then grinned at him. "I followed your directions exactly. I never set one foot outside the hotel.

To distract myself from tiresome thoughts, I have only to resort to books; they easily draw my mind to themselves and away from other things.

God should always be our first thought, not our last resort.

She went to the window. A fine sheen of sugary frost covered everything in sight, and white smoke rose from chimneys in the valley below the resort town. The window opened to a rush of sharp early November air that would have the town in a flurry of activity, anticipating the tourists the colder weather always brought to the high mountains of North Carolina. She stuck her head out and took a deep breath. If she could eat the cold air, she would. She thought cold snaps were like cookies, like gingersnaps. In her mind they were made with white chocolate chunks and had a cool, brittle vanilla frosting. They melted like snow in her mouth, turning creamy and warm.

Having a chronic illness, Molly thought, was like being invaded. Her grandmother back in Michigan used to tell about the day one of their cows got loose and wandered into the parlor, and the awful time they had getting her out. That was exactly what Molly's arthritis was like: as if some big old cow had got into her house and wouldn't go away. It just sat there, taking up space in her life and making everything more difficult, mooing loudly from time to time and making cow pies, and all she could do really was edge around it and put up with it. When other people first became aware of the cow, they expressed concern and anxiety. They suggested strategies for getting the animal out of Molly's parlor: remedies and doctors and procedures, some mainstream and some New Age. They related anecdotes of friends who had removed their own cows in one way or another. But after a while they had exhausted their suggestions. Then they usually began to pretend that the cow wasn't there, and they preferred for Molly to go along with the pretense.

No sooner do we believe that God loves us than there is an impulse to believe that He does so, not because He is Love, but because we are intrinsically lovable. The Pagans obeyed this impulse unabashed; a good man was "dear to the gods" because he was good. We, being better taught, resort to subterfuge. Far be it from us to think that we have virtues for which God could love us. But then, how magnificently we have repented! As Bunyan says, describing his first and illusory conversion, "I thought there was no man in England that pleased God better than I." Beaten out of this, we next offer our own humility to God's admiration. Surely He'll like that? Or if not that, our clear-sighted and humble recognition that we still lack humility. Thus, depth beneath depth and subtlety within subtelty, there remains some lingering idea of our own, our very own attractiveness. It is easy to acknowledge, but almost impossible to realize for long, that we are mirrors whose brightness, if we are bright, is wholly derived from the sun that shines upon us. Surely we must have a little--however little--native luminosity? Surely we can't be quite creatures? - The Four Loves

It was very bad if the council had resorted to recruiting men. By tradition men were our last line of defence, their physical strength bent towards the single and most important task of protecting our homes and children. This meant the council had decided that our only defence was to defeat the enemy, period. Anything else meant the end of Darre.

From the time when the exercise of the intellect became a source of strength and of wealth, we see that every addition to science, every fresh truth, and every new idea became a germ of power placed within the reach of the people. Poetry, eloquence, and memory, the graces of the mind, the fire of imagination, depth of thought, and all the gifts which Heaven scatters at a venture turned to the advantage of democracy; and even when they were in the possession of its adversaries, they still served its cause by throwing into bold relief the natural greatness of man. Its conquests spread, therefore, with those of civilization and knowledge; and literature became an arsenal open to all, where the poor and the weak daily resorted for arms.

Eyebeam: What do you mean, I have “male answer syndrome”? Sally: It’s the compulsion to provide an answer to any question, even if it means resorting to pure speculation. Eyebeam: I knew that… Sally: It’s a very widespread phenomenon. Beth: I wonder what causes it? Eyebeam: Cause? Well, society has chosen male role models who always exhibit total control… If a male says “I don’t know”, he’s admitting to conversational helplessness and failing to live up to that societal standard… Sally: Pretty pitiful, huh? Eyebeam: Damn! Beth: …And I always thought they learned it all in “shop”.

People had not so much as the courage and honesty and truth to say to God bluntly, "That I cannot agree to," they resorted to hypocrisy and thought they were perfectly secure. pp 168-6

Phut Phat knew, at an early age, that humans were an inferior breed. They were unable to see in the dark. They ate and drank unthinkable concoctions. And they had only five senses; the pair who lived with Phut Phat could not even transmit their thoughts without resorting to words.

I cannot come nearer to God and Heaven Than I live to Walden even. I am its stony shore, And the breeze that passes o'er; In the hollow of my hand Are its water and its sand, And its deepest resort Lies high in my thought.

Struggles to coerce uniformity of sentiment in support of some end thought essential to their time and country have been waged by many good as well as by evil men. Nationalism is a relatively recent phenomenon but at other times and places the ends have been racial or territorial security, support of a dynasty or regime, and particular plans for saving souls. As first and moderate methods to attain unity have failed, those bent on its accomplishment must resort to an ever-increasing severity. . . . Those who begin coercive elimination of dissent soon find themselves exterminating dissenters. Compulsory unification of opinion achieves only the unanimity of the graveyard. It seems trite but necessary to say that the First Amendment to our Constitution was designed to avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings. There is no mysticism in the American concept of the State or of the nature or origin of its authority. We set up government by consent of the governed, and the Bill of Rights denies those in power any legal opportunity to coerce that consent. Authority here is to be controlled by public opinion, not public opinion by authority. If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.

There are very subtle shades of violence, I can assure you. A civilization that renounces the possibility of resorting to violence in thought or deed destroys itself. It becomes a flock of sheep that will get their throats cut by the first person to come along. The same thing happens to men.

...how is it possible that our thoughts don't change our bodies on a cellular level? It seems inconceivable that the workings of my blood and bones and organs aren't affected by the knowledge I obtain. How can information that shakes your reality be limited to the thoughts that dwell in your mind?

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.

The priest removed his glasses and pocketed them. «I'm sure you don't need to hear it, but a sponsor should never get too…involved with his client.» Shit. Phil was careful to show no emotion, even though he was howling inside. Plan A had just gone down the tubes. So much for channeling Vanda's anger into a glorious eruption of lust. He'd have to resort to Plan B. There was no Plan B. His thoughts had never progressed past the bedroom. The priest was right. He was an animal.

I had taken out of my pocket the photographs of us all which I had wanted to show Freddie, and among them the photo of Gay Orlov as a little girl. I had not noticed until then that she was crying. One could tell by the wrinkling of her brows. For a moment, my thoughts transported me far from this lagoon, to the other end of the world, to a seaside resort in Southern Russia where the photo had been taken, long ago. A little girl is returning from the beach, at dusk, with her mother. She is crying for no reason at all, because she would have liked to continue playing. She moves off into the distance. She has already turned the corner of the street, and do not our lives dissolve into the evening as quickly as this grief of childhood?

Jesus isn’t an afterthought only when we need help, but He should be our first thought. Our first friend. Our first listening ear. The first person we go to for advice. Jesus shouldn’t be our last resort, but the reservoir of strength that we draw from before we even begin.

I could tell he wanted the best for me. Of course, he assumed that would be getting out. Everyone always thought that, not of what we had to go back to, at home. Maybe our parents had thrown away our mattresses. Maybe they'd told our siblings we'd been run over by trains, to make our absence fonder. Not everyone had a parent. It could be that nothing was waiting for us. Our keys would no longer fit the locks. We'd resort to ringing the bell, saying we've come home, can't we come in? The eye in the peephole would show itself, and that eye could belong to a stranger, as our family had moved halfway across the country and never informed us. Or that eye could belong to the woman who carried us for nine months, who labored for fourteen hours, who was sliced open with a C-section to give us life, and now wished she never did. The juvenile correctional system could let us out into the world, but it could not control who would be out there, willing to claim us.

Too commonly sex does not have the dignity of a sacramental event because sex is thought to be the means of the search for self rather than the expression and communication of one who has already found himself, and is free from resort to sex in the frantic pursuit of his own identity.

These diseases are not really there, are they? A: They can be if people choose to allow those energies to enter into their body. But for the most part, they are only in the energetic fields. And like anything else that is talked about, or thought about, it can become reality in the physical. D: Yes, if enough people accept it as their reality. A: But the diseases are extremely blown out of proportion, and they are not epidemics as they are portrayed to be. The media and the movies are showing you their desperation as they insist in presenting to the masses information that is completely negative and fear-based. Subject matter such as murder, death and betrayal, attacks and such that keep the consciousness focused on these matters, as opposed to portraying in the media images of hope and inspiration. But nevertheless, there are enough of those positive messages being broadcast at this time, that like a domino effect, they are no longer stoppable. D: Another fear the government is trying to promote is terrorism. A: Yes. It is just another tool, like the diseases, to find excuses to give people a reason to be afraid and not unify, but to trust that the government will solve their problems. They are imaginary problems, and in the subconscious, many people are becoming aware of this. They are no longer believing, although many are in the masses. But on their subconscious level, they are beginning to awaken, and the power knows this. That is the reason they are resorting to ridiculous stories that only those who wish to believe, believe in them because anybody with a logical and reasonable mind could not believe them.

As soon as the period of mourning for Dona Ester was over and the big house on the corner was finished, Esteban Trueba and Clara del Valle were married in a modest ceremony. Esteban gave his wife a set of diamond jewelry, which she thought beautiful. She packed it away in a shoe box and quickly forgot where she had put it. They spent their honeymoon in Italy and two days after they were on the boat. Esteban was as madly in love as an adolescent, despite the fact that the movement of the ship made Clara uncontrollably ill and the tight quarters gave her asthma. Seated by her side in the narrow cabin, pressing cold compress to her forehead and holding her while she vomited, he felt profoundly happy and desired her with unjust intensity considering the wretched state to which she was reduced. On the fourth day at sea, she woke up feeling better and they went out on deck to look at the sea. Seeing her with her wind-reddened nose, and laughing at the slightest provocation, Esteban swore that sooner or later she would come to love him as he needed to be loved, even if it meant he had to resort to extreme measures. He realized that Clara did not belong to him and that if she continued living in her world of apparitions, three-legged chairs that moved of their own volition, and cards that spelled out the future, she probably never would. Clara's impudent and nonchalant sensuality was also not enough for him. He wanted far more than her body; he wanted control over that undefined and luminous material that lay within her and that escaped him even in those moments when she appeared to be dying of pleasure. His hands felt very heavy, his feet very big, his voice very hard, his beard very scratchy, and his habits of rape and whoring very deeply ingrained, but even if he had to turn himself inside out like a glove, he was prepared to do everything in his power to seduce her.

She needed a break.” “A break? She needed a break? What does that mean?” “You know what that means, Charlie.” “I do?” Charlie thought a moment, then rolled her eyes. “Oh, come on! Again?”“You know how she is. But hey! At least she’s still in Switzerland. We’ll get there in no time.” “But it’s a mental hospital! Not a resort!”“To her, all mental hospitals are resorts. Besides, it could be worse,” Max said happily. “This could all be so much worse!” Charlie shook her head . “Dude, I seriously don’t know how.

Once a government resorts to terror against its own population to get what it wants, it must keep using terror against its own population to get what it wants. A government that terrorizes its own people can never stop. If such a government ever lets the fear subside and rational thought return to the populace, that government is finished.

So we ran the experiment. For a period of time, in our control groups of Googlers, people who were nominated for cash awards continued to receive them. In our experimental groups, nominated winners received trips, team parties, and gifts of the same value as the cash awards they would have received. Instead of making public stock awards, we sent teams to Hawaii. Instead of smaller awards, we provided trips to health resorts, blowout team dinners, or Google TVs for the home. The result was astounding. Despite telling us they would prefer cash over experiences, the experimental group was happier. Much happier. They thought their awards were 28 percent more fun, 28 percent more memorable, and 15 percent more thoughtful. This was true whether the experience was a team trip to Disneyland (it turns out most adults are still kids on the inside) or individual vouchers to do something on their own. And they stayed happier for a longer period of time than Googlers who received money. When resurveyed five months later, the cash recipients’ levels of happiness with their awards had dropped by about 25 percent. The experimental group was even happier about the award than when they received it. The joy of money is fleeting, but memories last forever.

Oh, that’s sad. You resorted to an arbitrary number. That reveals a shallow capacity for independent thought and analysis.

As a last resort, with the orange nearing my face and my back pressing hard against the sharp edge of my broadcast table, I grabbed my phone to tell Carlos that if I didn't make it home tonight, it wasn't because I didn't love him, or didn't want to watch a documentary on special scientific graphs, or was too obsessed with my job to relax and enjoy a good meal and some television. It was only because I was zapped out of existence by a lunatic Non-John Peters. And that, in fact, I do love Carlos, and I would want nothing more than to watch a documentary on scientific graphs over some homemade linguini, or go out to eat again, or whatever. But then, as I grabbed my phone, I thought: That's way too long to write for a text. So I just hit John Peters upside the head with it...

with you, the sense i have lost my place in a book or simply lost — misplaced the memory which isn't in the last place where I looked. a thought that the clouds don't move — that it is we who thunder past — there it is! an old vacation, a train ride — sense of immobility. as sky and forest scroll past in relation, we are not moved, pretend to love the view, resort at length to scripted conversation by a poet-turned-screenwriter who didn't want this job, career gone grossly wrong and now drafts action film scripts wholly two- dimensional unless you choose to don the 3d glasses that do not stay on —

Why was I worried? Because if, in everyday life, I was so embarrassed, so cautious, that I scarcely breathed, the diary produced in me a craving for truth. I thought that when one writes, it makes no sense to be contained, to censor oneself, and as a result I wrote mostly—maybe only—about what I would have preferred to be silent about, resorting among other things to a vocabulary that I would never have dared to use in speaking. This

We have to learn to manage the turmoil created by our own thoughts. This can be done by overcoming mental disturbances and distractions, resorting to positive self affirmations and meditation and focusing on all that is good around us.

But the whole point of the novel is that if we resort to savagery society falls apart. Maybe it should. It's all fake, anyway. That's what the book's really saying. We're all just pretending to be civilized, when, deep down, we're not.

It is no dream of mine, To ornament a line; I cannot come nearer to God and Heaven Than I live to Walden even. I am its stony shore, And the breeze that passes o'er; In the hollow of my hand Are its water and its sand, And its deepest resort Lies high in my thought.

So many ruins bear witness to good intentions which went astray, good intentions unenlightened by any glimmer of wisdom. To bring religion to the people is a fine and necessary undertaking, but this is not a situation in which the proposed end can be said to justify the means. The further people have drifted from the truth, the greater is the temptation to water down the truth, glossing over its less palatable aspects and, in short, allowing a policy of compromise to become one of adulteration. In this way it is hoped that the common man – if he can be found – will be encouraged to find a small corner in his busy life for religion without having to change his ways or to grapple with disturbing thoughts. It is a forlorn hope. Standing, as it were, at the pavement’s edge with his tray of goods, the priest reduces the price until he is offering his wares for nothing: divine judgement is a myth, hell a wicked superstition, prayer less important than decent behaviour, and God himself dispensable in the last resort; and still the passers-by go their way, sorry over having to ignore such a nice man but with more important matters demanding their attention. And yet these matters with which they are most urgently concerned are, for so many of them, quicksands in which they feel themselves trapped. Had they been offered a real alternative, a rock firm-planted from the beginning of time, they might have been prepared to pay a high price.

I can almost say, Walden, is it you? It is no dream of mine, To ornament a line; I cannot come nearer to God and Heaven Than I live to Walden even. I am its stony shore, And the breeze that passes o’er; In the hollow of my hand Are its water and its sand, And its deepest resort Lies high in my thought.

This was a habit Alizeh had mastered long ago. Cataloging moments of grace even in the midst of disaster often helped steady her mind; indeed there had been days in her life so bleak that Alizeh had resorted to counting her teeth if only to prove she still owned something of value. Just then she forced herself to listen to the susurrations of the wind, to appreciate that she'd never seen the moon so close, in all its unobstructed glory. She drew in a deep breath at the thought, tasting pure cold on her tongue, and lifted a searching hand to the night. The skies passed under her fingertips much like a cat, demanding to be pet.

Teachers were not allowed to beat children as they did in the past, although, Mma Ramotswe reflected, there were some boys-and indeed some young men-who might have been greatly improved by moderate physical correction. The apprentices, for example: would it help if Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni resorted to physical chastisement-nothing severe, of course-but just an occasional kick in the seat of the pants while they were bending over to change a tyre or something like that? The thought made her smile. She would even offer to administer the kick herself, which she imagined might be oddly satisfying, as one of the apprentices, the one who still kept on about girls, had a largeish bottom which she thought would be quite comfortable to kick. How enjoyable it would be to creep up behind him and kick him when he was least expecting it, and then to say: Let that be a lesson! That was all one would have to say, but it would be a blow for women everywhere.

Today, Dr. Cruz reached a new low. Apparently, my ‘yes’ and ‘no´ answers had pushed her over the edge, because she resorted to force-feeding me grief. Her tactic was to superimpose feelings onto me that she thought I should be experiencing, ending the statement with some patronizing variation of ‘You don’t have to say anything. I already know.

Megan wanted to be friends with me? I think back on all the times the two of us were thrust together: companions of last resort. I always thought she resented having to come play with me. And as a result, I hated having to play with her. But maybe we were both wrong. Maybe we were just two proud and stubborn little girls who were just too proud and stubborn.

Life as an honest person could be difficult, but life as a criminal always caught up to you. She knew friends and family members who resorted to stealing or writing bad checks to get money for drugs. No matter how careful they were, the story always had the same ending. It was very much, she thought, like circling a drain. You were going down at some point. You just didn’t know when.

The queer thing is that we do trust you," said Bodisham. "In spite of your -- extremism." "You'd better," said Rud with grim conviction. "I'm right. What is extremism? The whole truth and nothing but the truth. I ask you." "It's because of his extremism you trust him," said Chiffan. "It's because in the last resort we believe in his indiscretion, and know he won't fail us even if we fail ourselves. All leadership is extravagance. Extra-vagance. Going a bit ahead." Rud did not quite understand that. "It's because you know I'm right," he said. "It's because," said Chiffan, letting his thoughts run away with him," to make a new world, the leader must be a fundamentally destructive man, a recklessly destructive man. He breaks his way through the jungle and we follow...We cannot do without you, Rud.

Extremism frequently turns its champions into angry people, driven by conflicting desires. At first, I pitied my less enlightened parents and siblings. Then I felt superior to them, poor sinners that they were. Then I lost patience with their unwillingness to see the one true path and resorted to threats, intimidation, and yelling. At night, I was tormented by thoughts of what would happen to all us of when we reached our graves.

But we’re already uncomfortable,” Dwight retorted. “And we are at risk! Don’t you realize where we are? We’re in the fucking jungle. We already had malaria. What’s next? Snakebite? Typhus? When do we factor us into the equation for what we do?” He had brought up their unspoken worries and a series of morally ugly questions. Whom do you save? Can you save both? Or do you save only yourself? Do you do nothing and risk nothing, or die from whatever happens to come along as you sit on a log waiting for whatever comes? They agitated over the questions in private thought, wishing to forget morals and just be out of this place. Who else had discarded morals and saved themselves? Could they live with themselves later? If they put away the concerns of the Lajamee, how soon would they push aside one another’s welfare? At what point do people resort to “every man for himself”?

A few months after the great crisis I had the joy of seeing the line of caravans re-form on the banks of the Orontes; the oases were again the resort of merchants exchanging news in the glow of their evening fires, each morning repacking along with their goods for transportation to lands unknown a certain number of thoughts, words and customs genuinely our own, which little by little would take possession of the globe more securely than can advancing legions.

In his ministry to the sick Luther recommended physicians, barbers, and apothecaries. Resort to medicine is desirable, he said, and it is well that physicians and nurses do what they can. However, Luther went beyond most of these physicians in pointing to the mental and emotional origin of some physical ailments. “Our physical health depends in large measure on the thoughts of our minds. This is in accord with the saying, ‘Good cheer is half the battle.’”{18}

I thought of Atargatis, the First, frightening and beautiful. The mermaid goddess who lived on in the soul of every woman who'd ever fallen in love with the ocean. I thought of Sebastian, my little mermaid queen, how happy he was the day of the parade, just getting the chance to express himself, to be himself. I thought of Vanessa, the story about how she and her girlfriends became feminist killjoys to get a women's literature core in their school, the way she'd accepted me this summer without question, gently pushed me out of my self-imposed shell. Of her mother, Mrs. James, how she'd grabbed that bullhorn at the parade and paved the way for Sebastian's joy. I thought of Lemon, so wise, so comfortable in her own skin, full of enough love to raise a daughter as a single mom and still have room for me, for her friends, for everyone whose lives she touched with her art. I thought of Kirby, her fierce loyalty, her patience and grace, her energy, what a good friend and sister she'd become, even when I'd tried to shut her out. I thought of all the new things I wanted to share with her now, all the things I hoped she'd share with me. I thought of my mother, a woman I'd never known, but one whose ultimate sacrifice gave me life. I thought of Granna, stepping in to raise her six granddaughters when my mom died, never once making us feel like a burden or a curse. She'd managed the cocoa estate with her son, personally saw to the comforts of every resort guest, and still had time to tell us bedtime stories, always reminding us how much she treasured us. I thought of my sisters. Juliette, Martine, and Hazel, their adventures to faraway lands, new experiences. Gabrielle with her island-hopping, her ultimate choice to follow her heart home. And Natalie, my twin. My mirror image, my dream sharer. I knew I hadn't been fair to her this summer—she'd saved my life, done the best she could. And I wanted to thank her for that, because as long as it had taken me to realize it, I was thankful. Thankful for her. Thankful to be alive. To breathe.

Stefano put an end to this tirade, which was developing rather nicely, I thought, by picking me up off the bench and lifting me till my eyes were on a level with his. My feet dangled helplessly, a good ten inches off the ground. "Just like a man," I said, somewhat breathlessly, because his hands were squeezing my ribs. "When you are losing an argument, you resort to physical violence!" "Oh no," Stefano said. "The physical violence is only a preliminary. This is how I counter arguments such as yours." He kissed me.

I put music on in the morning, just that it sets the tone for the rest of the day. It’s very simple but also sort of complicated to explain: I believe that we can choose our moods: because we are aware that there are several mood-strata and we have the means to gain access to them. For example, to write a profound thought, I have to put myself onto a very special stratum, otherwise the ideas and words just don’t come. I have to forget myself and at the same time be superconcentrated. But it’s not a question of “the will,” it’s a mechanism I can set in motion or not, like scratching my nose or doing a backward roll. And to activate the mechanism there’s nothing better than a little music. For example, to relax, I put on something that takes me into a sort of faraway mood, where things can’t really reach me, where I can look at them as if I were watching a film: a “detached” stratum of consciousness. In general, for that particular stratum, I resort to jazz or, more effective overall but longer to take effect: Dire Straits (long live my mp3 player).

Virginity, like all abnormalities, has its special richness, its own absorbing grandeur. Life, in a virgin, husbands its forces and takes on an incalculable quality of resistance and endurance. The brain, as a whole, has been enriched by the sum total of its unexpended faculties. When chaste people need their bodies or their minds, when they resort to deed or thought, they find that their muscles are of steel or that their minds have been infused with intuitive wisdom; they have diabolical strength or the black magic of the will.

He drew his fingers down over her collarbones drifting closer to her breasts. “The muscles here on our women are often as developed as ours.” Judging by the heated look in his eyes, he didn’t mind at all that she had breasts instead of muscular pecs. “And here.” Her pulse picked up as he cupped her breasts. “You’re rounder here. Softer. Fuller.” He squeezed them gently and drew his thumbs across the hard, sensitive peaks. Ava sucked in a breath as sensation shot through her. “Do that again.” He brushed his thumbs across the tight buds again., toyed with them and gave an experimental pinch. Ava jerked and arched against him. “You’re sensitive here,” he murmured. “Yes.” His lips captured hers once more, tasting and tempting as he explored her breasts and ratcheted up her need. She and Jak’ri had been nearly bare with each other countless times in their dreams as they swam and cavorted in Rounaka Sea, but they had been out in the open and the dreams had felt so real that she would never have thought of doing her lustful inclinations there for fear of being discovered. Now, however, they were alone. They were free and the cave enclosing them might has well have been a Honeymoon suite at a secluded resort. So there was no reason for her to hold back. She moaned. Jak’ri certainly wasn’t holding back. The women of Purvel might not have breasts like hers, but he sure as hell knew what to do with them, teasing and tweaking and squeezing until she squirmed against him. Her breath shortening. “Jak’ri,” she whispered, tunneling the fingers of one hand through his thick hair while she slid the other down his back and rocked against the thick, hard ridge concealed by his pants. “I want you.” Nodding he trailed heated kisses down her neck. “I want you too.” One of his big hands left her breast and cupped her ass, grinding her against him. “Are you ready to release your eggs?” Sensation shot through her. “Hmmm?” “Are you ready to release your eggs so I can fertilize them?” he murmured, clutching her closer. Her eyes flew open. “Wait, what?” She leaned back. “I assume your reproduce the same way Purveli’s do,” he said, dragging his eyes up from her breasts to meet hers. “You release your eggs, then I fertilize them.” She stared at him, stunned. Release her eggs? Did he mean like a…like a fish? Her gaze shot to the barely discernable scales that coated his broad chest and handsome face. Did Purveli’s not have sex the way humans and Lasaran’s did? His lips twitched as his eyes danced with mirth. Relief filled her. “Oh my gosh,” laughing Ava shoved one of his shoulders. “You are so bad.” He laughed. “Apologies, I couldn’t resist. My scales seemed to fascinate you.

That's one reason why a civil war is worse than any other sort. When two parties in a given country resort to arms to settle political differences, every man is a potential enemy to every other man, and the distinction between legalized killing and murder is not clearly drawn in the minds of average men, who are incapable of sustained thought. Death is held to be a fitting reward for those who dare hold contrary views, and a nation involved in a civil war is a breeding ground for children reared to look with tolerance on next to nothing but violence.

Hey!" To his horror, the canvas started to move and a perfectly manicured hand appeared. Law rushed across the hall, his feet making not a single sound against the carpet. “Hafta getta way.” Kinley was trying to haul herself out of the laundry cart. One fist came up. “Won’t let you. Won’t.” Riley peered down at her. How did she make that look so fucking adorable? She was a mess of white tulle, and all he could think about was wrapping himself around her. “Baby, it’s all right.” Law reached for her hand, his voice softer than Riley could ever remember hearing it. Law was rough and tumble, but he got so tender around this one bit of blonde fluff. “What the hell. I thought I emptied the fucking syringe in her arm. We need the chloroform, Riley." Yes, it was their last resort. It wouldn’t keep Kinley out for very long, but they had to keep her out long enough to escape this damn hotel. “Don’t want to get married. Want the beach. Happy there.” They weren’t taking her to the beach, but at least Law seemed to be calming her down. Then she turned those kick-him-in-the-gonads brown eyes his way. "So pretty. Wanna get married?

To make way for more resorts with spectacular views, developers destroy native habitats and ignore local concerns. Preservationists decry the growing propensity to bulldoze old hotels and buildings in favor of constructing new resorts, water holes and entertainment spots that look identical whether in Singapore, Dubai or Johannesburg; a world where diversity is replaced with homogeneity. Another catastrophe for countries betting on tourism has come from wealthy vacationers who fall in love with a country and buy so many second houses that locals can no longer afford to live in their own towns and villages. Among the more thoughtful questions is how mass tourism has changed cultures. African children told anthropologists that they want to grow up to be tourists so they could spend the day doing nothing but eating. The tourists who do not speak the local language and rely on guides to tell them what they are seeing and what to think marvel at countries like China with its new wealth and appearance of democracy. Environmentalists wonder how long the globe can continue to support 1 billion people racing around the world for a long weekend on a beach or a ten-day tour of an African game park.

I have no criticism of the basic concept of irrefutable authority. Properly employed, it is the easiest, the surest, and the proper way to resolve conflicts. There is an omnipresent temptation, however, to rely on such authority regardless of its applicability; and I know of no better examples than the scriptures and the Constitution. We find it easy to lapse into the expansive notion that the Constitution, like the gospel, embraces all truth and that it protects and guarantees all that is right, equitable, and just. From that grand premise it is only a short and comfortable leap to the proposition that the Constitution embraces my particular notion of what is right, equitable, and just. The Constitution lends itself to this kind of use because of its breadth. Issues such as foreign aid, fluoridation of water, public versus private education, progressive income tax, to which political party I should belong and which candidate I should support; questions about economic development and environmental quality control; questions about the power of labor unions and the influence of big business in government--all these are issues of great importance. But these questions cannot and ought not to be resolved by simply resorting to irrefutable authority. Neither the Constitution nor the scriptures contain answers to these questions, and under the grand plan of eternal progress it is our responsibility to develop our own skills by working out our own answers through our own thought processes. For example, the Constitution authorizes an income tax, but it neither commands nor forbids an income tax. That is a policy issue on which the Constitution--and the scriptures--are silent. Attempting to resolve our differences of opinion by asserting that if our opponents only understood the scriptures or the Constitution they would see that the whole answer is contained therein only results in foreclosing the careful, rational attention that these issues deserve and require. Resorting to several broad provisions of the Constitution in answer to that kind of question is just plain intellectual laziness. We, of all people, have an obligation to respect the Constitution--to respect it not only for what it is and what it does, but also for what it is not and what it does not do. For in this as in other contexts, improper use of that which is grand can only result in the diminution of its grandeur.

He had brought up their unspoken worries and a series of morally ugly questions. Whom do you save? Can you save both? Or do you save only yourself? Do you do nothing and risk nothing, or die from whatever happens to come along as you sit on a log waiting for whatever comes? They agitated over the questions in private thought, wishing to forget morals and just be out of this place. Who else had discarded morals and saved themselves? Could they live with themselves later? If they put away the concerns of the Lajamee, how soon would they push aside one another’s welfare? At what point do people resort to “every man for himself”?

I have read your memory and your thoughts.   It seems you are trying to restrain your power to live a life without it.  In order to live a more fulfilling life.  You believe interpersonal relationships are more important than psychic power.  This is the thought of a blessed one.  You underestimate the world.  You live isolated from all the bad in this world.  Subconsciously you know you can solve your problems with your power, you always have a last resort.  I have created this world in accord with your fragile and weak mind.  However, do not misunderstand my intention.  None of this is your fault.  You've done nothing wrong.

Power itself is founded largely on disgust. The whole of advertising, the whole of political discourse, is a public insult to the intelligence, to reason - but an insult in which we collaborate, abjectly subscribing to a silent interaction. The day of hidden persuasion is over: those who govern us now resort unapologetically to arm-twisting pure and simple. The prototype here was a banker got up like a vampire, saying, 'I am after you for your money' . A decade has already gone by since this kind of obscenity was introduced, with the government's blessing, into our social mores. At the time we thought the ad feeble because of its aggressive vulgarity. In point of fact it was a prophetic commercial, full of intimations of the future shape of social relationships, because it operated, precisely, in terms of disgust, avidity and rape. The same goes for pornographic and food advertising, which are also powered by shamelessness and lust, by a strategic logic of violation and anxiety. Nowadays you can seduce a woman with the words, 'I am interested in your cunt' . The same kind of crassness has triumphed in the realm of art, whose mounds of trivia may be reduced to a single pronouncement of the type, 'What we want from you is stupidity and bad taste' . And the fact is that we do succumb to this mass extortion, with its subtle infusion of guilt. It is true in a sense that nothing really disgusts us any more. In our eclectic culture, which embraces the debris of all others in a promiscuous confusion, nothing is unacceptable. But for this very reason disgust is nevertheless on the increase - the desire to spew out this promiscuity, this indifference to everything no matter how bad, this viscous adherence of opposites. To the extent that this happens, what is on the increase is disgust over the lack of disgust. An allergic temptation to reject everything en bloc: to refuse all the gentle brainwashing, the soft-sold overfeeding, the tolerance, the pressure to embrace synergy and consensus.

If it were enough for him to be fragile, patient, passive, if the fear (the fear provoked by nothing), the ancient fear that reigns over the city pushing the figures in front of it, that passes in him like the past of his fear, the fear he does not feel, were enough to make him even more fragile, well beyond the consciousness of fragility in which he always holds himself back, but, even though the sentence, in interrupting itself gives him only the interruption of a sentence that does not end, even so, fragile patience, in the horizon of the fear that beseiges it, testifies only to a resort to fragility, even there where it makes thought mad in making it fragile, thoughtless.

We’ve been through so much together I’ve seen you grow into someone you thought you’d never be I’ve seen you endure challenges most will never see Mocked by your peers for being from a different culture Feeling deserted, you searched for ways to adapt and become accepted You resorted to fitting in instead of making a stand for your true self You’ve made countless mistakes in pursuit of acceptance To me, it was undeniable you were meant to be a misfit You dove into finding your talents and utilizing them Unapologetically, you began making your mark during your middle school years Discovering your skills as a runner made a way for you to flee from the norm Racing hard and your pace in this life Hurdle after hurdle, you never stopped jumping and running towards the finish line You lost focus numerous times running someone else’s race, matching their suicidal pace, but over time you opened your eyes and ran your race in your lane You used failures as your stepping stone to climb up to where you are now and where you’re going I love you, I love you even when you hate you Thank you for staying true to you, never justifying your flaws and running away from your consequences You’ve taught me so much. I’m proud of you I love you so much. Thank you for being a friend, an example, a brother Thank you for being the man you are now. I love you, man in the mirror

One of the metaphors for ego is a cocoon. We stay in our cocoon because we’re afraid—we’re afraid of our feelings and the reactions that life is going to trigger in us. We’re afraid of what might come at us. But if this avoidance strategy worked, then the Buddha wouldn’t have needed to teach anything, because our attempts to escape pain, which all living beings instinctively resort to, would result in security, happiness, and comfort, and there would be no problem. But what the Buddha observed is that self-absorption, this trying to find zones of safety, creates terrible suffering. It weakens us, the world becomes more terrifying, and our thoughts and emotions become more and more threatening as well. There

With no clever thoughts in her head, Bea resorted to the truth. “Thank you, your grace. The compliment is deeply appreciated by me, and I must own that I did not come here today expecting such a charitable reception. I assumed you would be unhappy with the arrangement, as I’m not what you or anybody could have wanted for Kesgrave.” “You shouted,” her grace said. Bea, who had managed an intelligible comment by what felt like the skin of her teeth, wondered if perhaps the real problem was her hearing. “I shouted?” she echoed. “When Kesgrave brought you here to castigate you in private, you responded to his criticism with equal fervor and refused to melt in the heat of his anger,” she explained. “I can think of no better basis for a marriage.

She used to like talking to people, especially ones who disagreed with her. They provided mental stimulation and allowed her to practice emotional control in her arguments, she liked to let others be the first to resort to name-calling. When someone called her a moron, Kate took it as a signal of victory. However lately she noticed she had been isolating herself more, allowing her thoughts to carry her off to some distant point. It was as though she were stuck, unable to move or grow in an internal conflict that left her feeling somewhat one-dimensional, obsessive and compelled to move toward something unknown that was gnawing at her. While Kate recognized her new state of mind might not be a good thing, she felt helpless to pull herself out of it. As

It is important not to confuse opposition against this kind of planning with a dogmatic laissez faire attitude. The liberal argument is in favor of making the best possible use of the forces of competition as a means of coordinating human efforts, not an argument for leaving things just as they are. It is based on the conviction that, where effective competition can be created, it is a better way of guiding individual efforts than any other. It does not deny, but even emphasizes, that, in order that competition should work beneficially, a carefully thought-out legal framework is required and that neither the existing nor the past legal rules are free from grave defects. Nor does it deny that, where it is impossible to create the conditions necessary to make competition effective, we must resort to other methods of guiding economic activity.

I trace the lines of the tattoo on his chest---two tigers facing off with symbols and words. "I thought you didn't like cats. When did you get this?" "Oh, I love cats. Just not my mother's," he says. "As for the tattoo, I think I told you that I practice mixed martial arts. I got this one when my family lived in Thailand, setting up one of the resorts, when I was eighteen and practicing Muay Thai. This design has traditional symbols of Sak Yant---twin tigers, five lines, nine peaks, and eight directions, all deeply rooted in ancient Buddhist and Hindu practices and representing forces like power, strength, fearlessness, protection, and wealth." "You definitely have all those attributes," I say, enraptured by the design and the softness of his skin. Everything about him is so sensual---from his lips to his toes and whatever he's hiding under the towel.

Princess Cookie’s cognitive pathways may have required a more comprehensive analysis. He knew that it was possible to employ certain progressive methods of neural interface, but he felt somewhat apprehensive about implementing them, for fear of the risks involved and of the limited returns such tactics might yield. For instance, it would be a particularly wasteful endeavor if, for the sake of exhausting every last option available, he were even to go so far as resorting to invasive Ontological Neurospelunkery, for this unorthodox process would only prove to be the cerebral equivalent of tracking a creature one was not even sure existed: surely one could happen upon some new species deep in the caverns somewhere and assume it to be the goal of one’s trek, but then there was a certain idiocy to this notion, as one would never be sure this newfound entity should prove to be what one wished it to be; taken further, this very need to find something, to begin with, would only lead one to clamber more deeply inward along rigorous paths and over unsteady terrain, the entirety of which could only be traversed with the arrogant resolve of someone who has already determined, with a misplaced sense of pride in his own assumptions, that he was undoubtedly making headway in a direction worthwhile. And assuming still that this process was the only viable option available, and further assuming that Morell could manage to find a way to track down the beast lingering ostensibly inside of Princess Cookie, what was he then to do with it? Exorcise the thing? Reason with it? Negotiate maybe? How? Could one hope to impose terms and conditions upon the behavior of something tracked and captured in the wilds of the intellect? The thought was a bizarre one and the prospect of achieving success with it unlikely. Perhaps, it would be enough to track the beast, but also to let it live according to its own inclinations inside of her. This would seem a more agreeable proposition. Unfortunately, however, the possibility still remained that there was no beast at all, but that the aberration plaguing her consciousness was merely a side effect of some divine, yet misunderstood purpose with which she had been imbued by the Almighty Lord Himself. She could very well have been functioning on a spiritual plane far beyond Morell’s ability to grasp, which, of course, seared any scrutiny leveled against her with the indelible brand of blasphemy. To say the least, the fear of Godly reprisal which this brand was sure to summon up only served to make the prospect of engaging in such measures as invasive Ontological Neurospelunkery seem both risky and wasteful. And thus, it was a nonstarter.

Three weeks passed, and I didn’t hear from Chelsea again. To be honest, I hadn’t expected to. Felicity’s Instagram feed continued to be populated with images of her in fabulous clubs and restaurants, wearing fabulous clothes, only now she was accompanied less often by Pru – whose own feed informed me that things with Phillip from Toffee were hotting up – and more often by Renzo. Although she hardly ever showed his face in her pictures, there were glimpses of his flat, his car, the back of his head. Each image was like a punch in the stomach, but I couldn’t help looking at them, torturing myself with the knowledge that, if only I’d done things differently, it could have been me with him still. If I hadn’t resorted to webcam work. If I hadn’t told him about it. If I’d been a better girlfriend to him, so that when I told him, he didn’t mind. If I’d had a chance to see him just one more time, and maybe… Round and round the thoughts went in my head, all those pointless, painful ifs

By nature and by training this woman was all for conservation of life. She had been brought up in rather a strict and narrow school. In her day although no one, certainly no woman, was expected to save humanity, every female was confidently expected to produce it. More than that, she was earnestly enjoined to guard and protect it. So Mary Ball and her successor Mary Washington, early imbibed not only a sense of the woman's responsibility for the family but a sense of her authority over it....At any rate, in this particular crisi she was merely obeying a law of nature as old as womanhood--to protect the creature she had brought into the world. There was no subtlety in her. She could not see the finer shadings of ths situation, the fact that in holding him back from the frontier she might be putting him into even greater peril. Her course was prompted by instinct and impulse, and she never thought of questioning the right or wrong of it. So, armed with the most primitive of all weapons, she faced her son for a hard fight. But she was pitted here against a temendous paradox. With her whole might she was resisting the demands of war, and yet it had been that very strength that had produced the warrior. Her opponent was remarkably like her--in strength of mind and body, in resolution, in force of will. Now, it is one of the ironies of life that sameness creates opposition. In the conflict that day at Mount Vernon, therefore, the contestants were fighting with identical weapons, even though from different spheres... George Washington must have been a very patient man. And if he had patience, that, too, came from her by that same theory of heredity that makes a firstborn son peculiarly like his mother. So this must be written in to her credity when for the third time she has to be recorded as trying to interrupt his destiny. As a last resort he used a weapon that she herself had put into his hand. Madam," he is said to have remarked with respectful finality, "the God to whom you commended me when first I went to war will be my protector stil.

Normally, Bentner would have beamed approvingly at the pretty portrait the girls made, but this morning, as he put out butter and jam, he had grim news to impart and a confession to make. As he swept the cover off the scones he gave his news and made his confession. “We had a guest last night,” he told Elizabeth. “I slammed the door on him.” “Who was it?” “A Mr. Ian Thornton.” Elizabeth stifled a horrified chuckle at the image that called to mind, but before she could comment Bentner said fiercely, “I regretted my actions afterward! I should have invited him inside, offered him refreshment, and slipped some of that purgative powder into his drink. He’d have had a bellyache that lasted a month!” “Bentner,” Alex sputtered, “you are a treasure!” “Do not encourage him in these fantasies,” Elizabeth warned wryly. “Bentner is so addicted to mystery novels that he occasionally forgets that what one does in a novel cannot always be done in real life. He actually did a similar thing to my uncle last year.” “Yes, and he didn’t return for six months,” Bentner told Alex proudly. “And when he does come,” Elizabeth reminded him with a frown to sound severe, “he refuses to eat or drink anything.” “Which is why he never stays long,” Bentner countered, undaunted. As was his habit whenever his mistress’s future was being discussed, as it was now, Bentner hung about to make suggestions as they occurred to him. Since Elizabeth had always seemed to appreciate his advice and assistance, he found nothing odd about a butler sitting down at the table and contributing to the conversation when the only guest was someone he’d known since she was a girl. “It’s that odious Belhaven we have to rid you of first,” Alexandra said, returning to their earlier conversation. “He hung about last night, glowering at anyone who might have approached you.” She shuddered. “And the way he ogles you. It’s revolting. It’s worse than that; he’s almost frightening.” Bentner heard that, and his elderly eyes grew thoughtful as he recalled something he’d read about in one of his novels. “As a solution it is a trifle extreme,” he said, “but as a last resort it could work.” Two pairs of eyes turned to him with interest, and he continued, “I read it in The Nefarious Gentleman. We would have Aaron abduct this Belhaven in our carriage and bring him straightaway to the docks, where we’ll sell him to the press gangs.” Shaking her head in amused affection, Elizabeth said, “I daresay he wouldn’t just meekly go along with Aaron.” “And I don’t think,” Alex added, her smiling gaze meeting Elizabeth’s, “a press gang would take him. They’re not that desperate.” “There’s always black magic,” Bentner continued. “In Deathly Endeavors there was a perpetrator of ancient rites who cast an evil spell. We would require some rats’ tails, as I recall, and tongues of-“ “No,” Elizabeth said with finality. “-lizards,” Bentner finished determinedly. “Absolutely not,” his mistress returned. “And fresh toad old, but procuring that might be tricky. The novel didn’t say how to tell fresh from-“ “Bentner!” Elizabeth exclaimed, laughing. “You’ll cast us all into a swoon if you don’t desist at once.” When Bentner had padded away to seek privacy for further contemplation of solutions, Elizabeth looked at Alex. “Rats’ tails and lizards’ tongues,” she said, chuckling. “No wonder Bentner insists on having a lighted candle in his room all night.” “He must be afraid to close his eyes after reading such things,” Alex agreed.

Human beings innate complexities resist reduction into simple sentences and neat paragraphs. The stories that come nearest to expressing the ambivalent nature of people are textured and occasionally inconsistent and express waves of inner uncertainty. A simile and a metaphor are not literally true. A figure of speech, symbols, and allegories are mere expressions that when interlinked with other text assist explain facts, ideas, and emotions. Useful facts are elusive; we must look for them, and then express them using whatever mechanism proves most authoritative. We can never directly describe emotions; we resort to metaphors to describe emotions and other illusive thoughts. Ideas by virtue of their untested nature are often untrue or at best rough approximations of truth. Lyrical writing is equivocal; it is never exactly true or precisely false. Lyrical language attempts to express and connect sentiments through extrapolation and misdirection. The writer’s task is to melt away durable facts, breakdown the symbolic depictions of solid reality, and discover the liquidity of a passionate inner life that provides the hot breath to our steamy humanness.

Back when wizards were just crazy men with no powers and a mystical belief system that they couldn’t really prove, the clergy was their sworn enemy. Kind of like two used car dealerships set up on the same street. Both sides claimed to have all the answers, but couldn’t demonstrate that they were right without resorting to a lot of arm waving and suggesting that people look around them and think about it. They couldn’t prove themselves right, so they channeled their energies into proving the other side wrong. Then we came along, with our irritating ability to prove that we had powers. We put the fake wizards right out of business, and the more practical-minded members of the church, Bishop Galbraith among them, decided that they had to find a way to explain our existence that was consistent with their belief system.” “How do they explain us?” “They just say we were created by God.” “Fair enough. Why do they say God created wizards?” “For a reason.” “Okay, I’m still with you. What is that reason?” “The reason is . . . beyond man’s understanding.” Martin thought about this. “That’s not much of an explanation.” “No, but it is consistent with their beliefs.

…every now and then when I felt the necessity of a strong inspiration of soul-thought. My heart was dusty, parched for want of the rain of deep feeling; my mind arid and dry, for there is a dust which settles on the heart as well as that which falls on a ledge. It is injurious to the mind as well as the body to be always in one place and always surrounded by the same circumstances. A species of thick clothing slowly grows about my mind … little habits become a part of existence, and by degrees the mind is inclosed in a husk. When this began to form I felt eager to escape from it … to drink deeply once more at the fresh fountains of life. An inspiration -- a long deep breath of pure air of thought -- could alone give health to the heart. There was a hill to which I used to resort at such periods. The labour of walking three miles to it, all the while gradually ascending, seemed to clear my blood of the heaviness accumulated at home … the slow continued rise required continual effort, which carried away the sense of oppression … Moving up the sweet short turf, at every step my heart seemed to obtain a wider horizon of feeling; with every inhalation of rich pure air, a deeper desire … By the time I had reached the summit I had entirely forgotten the petty circumstances and the annoyances of existence. I felt myself, myself'.

In any society, the ruling class tries to bring about the unchallenged predominance of its own ideology. In capitalist society, where the society is split into classes and people’s interests’ conflict, one ideology cannot hold undivided sway and it is inevitable that different ideas exist. The imperialists and their mouthpieces claim the existence of these ideas is a source of pride for the “free world”. However, progressive ideas can never develop freely in capitalist society, where the means of propaganda and education such as the mass media are in the hands of monopoly capitalists and reactionary rulers. The reactionary bourgeois ruling class tolerates progressive ideas to some extent, to make capitalist society seem democratic; but when they are considered the slightest threat to its ruling system, it mercilessly suppresses them. Outwardly, different thoughts appear to be tolerated in capitalist society, but all kinds of thoughts throughout it are, without exception, none other than various forms and expressions of bourgeois ideology. The “freedom” of ideology talked about by imperialists is a deceptive slogan to dress up–under the signpost of “freedom”–their oppression of progressive ideas in capitalist society and their resorting to every method to propagate reactionary bourgeois ideas. It is a deceptive slogan to justify their ideological and cultural infiltration into other countries.

He hated it so very much I almost felt sorry for him. He finally resorted to standing over me while I cast the final spell, noting down every small thing I did, even the sneeze from breathing in too deep over the cinnamon, and when I was finished he tried it again himself. It was very strange watching him, like a delayed and flattering mirror: he did everything exactly the way I had done, but more gracefully, with perfect precision, enunciating every syllable I had slurred, but he wasn’t halfway through before I could tell it wasn’t working. I twitched to interrupt him. He shot me a furious look, so I gave up and let him finish working himself into a thicket, as I thought of it, and when he was done and nothing whatsoever had happened, I said, “You shouldn’t have said miko there.” “You did!” he snapped. I shrugged helplessly: I didn’t doubt that I had, though to be perfectly honest I didn’t remember. But it hadn’t been an important thing to remember. “It was all right when I did it,” I said, “but when you did it, it was wrong. As though—you were following a trail, but a tree had fallen down in the meantime, or some hedge grew up, and you insisted on continuing on anyway, instead of going around it—” “There are no hedges!” he roared. “It comes, I suppose,” I said thoughtfully, speaking to the air, “of spending too much time alone indoors, and forgetting that living things don’t always stay where you put them.

The Nazis no longer resorted to hypocritical pretexts about the urgency of opposing and eliminating Marxism. They did not just rob and steal, they gave free rein to every kind of private vengeful instinct. University professors were forced to scrub the streets with their bare hands; devout, white-bearded Jews were hauled into the synagogues by young men bawling with glee, and made to perform knee-bends while shouting “Heil Hitler!” in chorus. They rounded up innocent citizens in the streets like rabbits and dragged them away to sweep the steps of the SA barracks. All the sick, perverted fantasies they had thought up over many nights of sadistic imaginings were now put into practice in broad daylight. They broke into apartments and tore the jewels out of the ears of trembling women—it was the kind of thing that might have happened when cities were plundered hundreds of years ago in medieval wars, but the shameless pleasure they took in the public infliction of pain, psychological torture and all the refinements of humiliation was something new. All this has been described not by one victim but by thousands, and a more peaceful age, not morally exhausted like our own, will shudder some day to read what horrors were inflicted on that cultured city in the twentieth century by a single half-deranged man. For in the midst of his military and political victories, that was Hitler’s most diabolical triumph—one man succeeded in deadening every idea of what is just and right by the constant attrition of excess. Before

It must be clear to those who look below the surface of things that far-reaching changes in our fundamental ideas and attitudes are setting in, and that the world of to-morrow will be a very different one from that which carried us into the abyss in 1914. In this connection a grave duty arises also for our science and philosophy. The higher thought of our day should not exhaust itself in fine-spun technicalities of speculation or research, but should regard itself as dedicated to service and should make its distinctive contribution towards the upbuilding of a new constructive world-view. We are passing through one of the great transition epochs of history; we are threatened with reaction on the one hand and with disintegration on the other. The old beacon lights are growing dimmer, and the torch of new ideas has to be kindled for our guidance. The word is largely with our intellectual leaders. In the last resort a civilisation vi PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION depends on its general ideas; it is nothing but a spiritual structure of the dominant ideas expressing themselves in institutions and the subtle atmosphere of culture. If the soul of our civilisation is to be saved we shall have to find new and fuller expression for the great saving unities—the unity of reality in all its range, the unity of life in all its forms, the unity of ideas throughout human civilisation, and the unity of man's spirit with the mystery of the Cosmos in religious faith and aspiration. Holism is in its own way a groping towards the new light and to new points of view. And I cannot help feeling that if the full extent of its implications is realised, both science and philosophy

The one thing that seemed to be on our side, however, was the reality on the streets of Egypt. Day after day, the protests spread and Mubarak’s regime seemed to crumble around him. On February 11, I woke to the news that Mubarak had fled to the resort town of Sharm el Sheikh and resigned. It was, it seemed, a happy ending. Jubilant crowds celebrated in the streets of Cairo. I drafted a statement for Obama that drew comparisons between what had just taken place and some of the iconic movements of the past several decades—Germans tearing down a wall, Indonesians upending a dictatorship, Indians marching nonviolently for independence. I went up to the Oval Office that morning to review the statement with Obama. “You should feel good about this,” he said. “I do,” I replied. “Though I’m not sure all of the principals do.” “You know,” he said, “one of the things that made it easier for me is that I didn’t really know Mubarak.” He mentioned that George H. W. Bush had called Mubarak at the height of the protests to express his support. “But it’s not just Bush. The Clintons, Gates, Biden—they’ve known Mubarak[…] “for decades.” I thought of Biden’s perennial line: All foreign policy is an “extension of personal relationships. “If it had been King Abdullah,” Obama said, referring to the young Jordanian monarch with whom he’d struck up a friendship, “I don’t know if I could have done the same thing.” As Obama delivered a statement to a smattering of press, it seemed that history might at last be breaking in a positive direction in the Middle East. His tribute to the protests was unabashed. Yet our own government was still wired to defer to the Egyptian military, and ill equipped to support a transition to democracy once the president had spoken.

Managerial abilities, bureaucratic skills, technical expertise, and political talent are all necessary, but they can be applied only to goals that have already been defined by military policies, broad and narrow. And those policies can be only as good as strategy, operational art of war, tactical thought, and plain military craft that have gone into their making. At present, the defects of structure submerge or distort strategy and operational art, they out rightly suppress tactical ingenuity, and they displace the traditional insights and rules of military craft in favor of bureaucratic preferences, administrative convenience, and abstract notions of efficiency derived from the world of business management. First there is the defective structure for making of military decisions under the futile supervision of the civilian Defense Department; then come the deeply flawed defense policies and military choices, replete with unnecessary costs and hidden risks; finally there come the undoubted managerial abilities, bureaucratic skills, technical expertise, and political talents, all applied to achieve those flawed policies and to implement those flawed choices. By this same sequence was the fatally incomplete Maginot Line built, as were all the Maginot Lines of history, each made no better by good government, technical talent, careful accounting, or sheer hard work. Hence the futility of all the managerial innovations tried in the Pentagon over the years. In the purchasing of weapons, for example, “total package” procurement, cost plus incentive contracting, “firm fixed price” purchasing have all been introduced with much fanfare, only to be abandoned, retried, and repudiated once again. And each time a new Secretary of Defense arrives, with him come the latest batch of managerial innovations, many of them aimed at reducing fraud, waste, and mismanagement-the classic trio endlessly denounced in Congress, even though they account for mere percentage points in the total budget, and have no relevance at all to the failures of combat. The persistence of the Administrator’s Delusion has long kept the Pentagon on a treadmill of futile procedural “reforms” that have no impact at all on the military substance of our defense. It is through strategy, operational art, tactical ingenuity, and military craft that the large savings can be made, and the nation’s military strength greatly increased, but achieving long-overdue structural innovations, from the central headquarters to the combat forces, from the overhead of bases and installations to the current purchase of new weapons. Then, and only then, will it be useful to pursue fraud, waste, and mismanagement, if only to save a few dollars more after the billions have already been saved. At present, by contrast, the Defense Department administers ineffectively, while the public, Congress, and the media apply their energies to such petty matters as overpriced spare parts for a given device in a given weapon of a given ship, overlooking at the same time the multibillion dollar question of money spent for the Navy as a whole instead of the Army – whose weakness diminishes our diplomatic weight in peacetime, and which could one day cause us to resort to nuclear weapons in the face of imminent debacle. If we had a central military authority and a Defense Department capable of strategy, we should cheerfully tolerate much fraud, waste, and mismanagement; but so long as there are competing military bureaucracies organically incapable of strategic combat, neither safety nor economy will be ensured, even if we could totally eliminate every last cent of fraud, waste, and mismanagement.

There's a million dark little corners in Baytowne for you two to snuggle-" "Ohmysweetgoodness, Chloe, stop!" I giggle and shiver at the same time and accidentally imagine walking around The Village in Baytowne Wharf with Galen. The Village is exactly that-a sleepy little village of tourist shops in the middle of a golf-course resort. During the daytime anyway. At night though...that's when the dance club wakes up and opens its doors to all the sunburned partiers roaming the cobblestoned walkways with their daiquiris. Galen would look great under the twinling lights, even with a shirt on... Chloe smirks. "Uh-huh. Already thought of that, huh?" "No!" "Uh-huh. Then why are your cheeks as red as hot sauce?" "Nuh-uh!" I laugh. She does, too. "You want me to go ask him to meet us, then?" I nod. "How old do you think he is?" She shrugs. "Not creepy-old. Old enough for me to be jailboat, though. Lucky for him, you just turned eighteen...What the...did you just kick me?" She peers into the water, wswipes her hand over the surface as if clearing away something to see better. "Something just bumped me.” She cups her hands over her eyes and squints, leaving down so close that one good wave could slap her chin. The concentration on her face almost convinces me. Almost. But I grew up with Chloe-we’ve been next-door neighbors since the third grade. I’ve grown used to fake rubber snakes on my front porch, salt in the sugar dish, and Saran wrap spread across the toilet seat-well, actually, Mom fell prey to that one. The point is Chloe loves pranks almost as much as she loves running. And this is definitely a prank. “Yep, I kicked you,” I tell her, rolling my eyes. “But…but you can’t reach me, Emma. My legs are longer than yours, and I can’t reach you…There it is again! You didn’t feel that?” I didn’t feel it, but I did see her leg twitch. I wonder how long she’s been planning this. Since we got here? Since we boarded the plane in Jersey? Sine we turned twelve?

The appeasers had been powerful; they had controlled The Times and The BBC; they had been largely drawn from the upper classes, and their betrayal of England's greatness would be neither forgotten nor forgiven by those who, gulled by the mystique of England's class system, had believed as Englishmen had believed for generations that public school boys governed best. The appeasers destroyed oligarchic rule which, though levelers may protest, had long governed well. If ever men betrayed their class, these were they. Because their possessions were great, the appeasers had much to lose should the Red flag fly over Westminster. That was why they had felt threatened by the hunger riots of 1932. It was also the driving force behind their exorbitant fear and distrust of the new Russia. They had seen a strong Germany as a buffer against bolshevism, had thought their security would be strengthened if they sidled up to the fierce, virile Third Reich. Nazi coarseness, Anti-Semitism, the Reich's darker underside, were rationalized; time, they assured one another, would blur the jagged edges of Nazi Germany. So, with their eyes open, they sought accommodation with a criminal regime, turned a blind eye to its iniquities, ignored its frequent resort to murder and torture, submitted to extortion, humiliation, and abuse until, having sold out all who had sought to stand shoulder to shoulder with Britain and keep the bridge against the new barbarism, they led England herself into the cold damp shadow of the gallows, friendless save for the demoralized republic across the Channel. Their end came when the House of Commons, in a revolt of conscience, wrenched power from them and summoned to the colors the one man who had foretold all that had passed, who had tried, year after year, alone and mocked, to prevent the war by urging the only policy which would have done the job. And now, in the desperate spring of 1940, he resolved to lead Britain and her fading empire in one last great struggle worthy of all they had been and meant, to arm the nation, not only with weapons but also with the mace of honor, creating in every English breast a soul beneath the ribs of death.

The preconventional level of moral reasoning, which develops during our first nine years of life, considers rules as fixed and absolute. In the first of its two stages (the stage of obedience and punishment), we determine whether actions are right or wrong by whether or not they lead to a punishment. In the second stage (the stage of individualism and exchange), right and wrong are determined by what brings rewards. The desires and needs of others are important, but only in a reciprocal sense—“You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.” Morality at this level is governed by consequence.   The second level of moral reasoning starts in adolescence, and continues into early adulthood. It sees us starting to consider the intention behind behavior, rather than just the consequences. Its first stage, often called the “good boy—nice girl” stage, is when we begin classifying moral behavior as to whether it will help or please. Being seen as good becomes the goal. In the second stage (the law and order stage), we start to equate “being good” with respecting authority and obeying the law, believing that this protects and sustains society.   The third level of moral development is when we move beyond simple conformity, but Kohlberg suggested that only around 10–15 percent of us ever reach this level. In its first stage (the social contract and individual rights stage), we still respect authority, but there is a growing recognition that individual rights can supersede laws that are destructive or restrictive. We come to realize that human life is more sacred than just following rules. The sixth and final stage (the stage of universal ethical principles) is when our own conscience becomes the ultimate judge, and we commit ourselves to equal rights and respect for all. We may even resort to civil disobedience in the name of universal principles, such as justice.   Kohlberg’s six-stage theory was considered radical, because it stated that morality is not imposed on children (as psychoanalysts said), nor is it about avoiding bad feelings (as the behaviorists had thought). Kohlberg believed children developed a moral code and awareness of respect, empathy, and love through interaction with others.

Blissfully unaware of all that, Elizabeth continued to love him without reservation or guile, and as she grew more certain of his love, she became more confident and more enchanting to Ian. On those occasions when she saw his expression become inexplicably grim, she teased him or kissed him, and, if those ploys failed, she presented him with little gifts-a flower arrangement from Havenhurst’s gardens, a single rose that she stuck behind his ear, or left upon his pillow. “Shall I have to resort to buying you a jewel to make you smile, my lord?” she joked one day three months after they were married. “I understand that is how it is done when a lover begins to act distracted.” To Elizabeth’s surprise, her remark made him snatch her into his arms in a suffocating embrace. “I am not losing interest in you, if that’s what you’re suggesting,” he told her. Elizabeth leaned back in his arms, surprised by the unwarranted force of his declaration, and continued to tease. “You’re quite certain?” “Positive.” “You wouldn’t lie to me, would you?” she asked in a voice of mock severity. “I would never lie to you,” Ian said gravely, but then he realized that by withholding the truth from her, he was, in effect, deceiving her, which in turn, amounted to little less than lying outright. Elizabeth knew something was bothering him, and that as time passed, it was bothering him with increasing frequency, but she never dreamed she was even remotely the cause of his silences or preoccupation. She thought of Robert often, but not since the day of her marriage had she permitted herself to think of Mr. Wordsworth’s accusations, not even for an instant. In the first place, she couldn’t bear it; in the second, she no longer believed there was the slightest possibility he was right. “I have to go to Havenhurst tomorrow,” she said reluctantly when Ian finally let her go. “The masons have started on the house and bridge, and the irrigation work has begun. If I spend the night, though, I shouldn’t have to go back for at least a fornight.” “I’ll miss you,” he said quietly, but there was no trace of resentment in his voice, nor did he attempt to persuade her to postpone the trip. He was keeping to his bargain with the integrity that Elizabeth particularly admired in him. “Not,” she whispered, kissing the side of his mouth, “as much as I’ll miss you.

I might know a way we could repay that debt.” Everything inside Darius sharpened at that comment, just like it did when he stumbled across an idea for a new experiment. “Oh?” he asked, trying to keep his voice casual. “The young lady drew me aside after she returned from her luncheon today. She made an odd request.” Darius recalled their earlier run-in at the pond. Odd didn’t begin to describe it—him stalking her through the grass in his sodden clothes and bare feet. She’d handled herself with plenty of spirit, though, and he’d thought they’d left on good terms. “I did have words with her this morning,” he admitted, though it seemed like forever ago now, with all that had happened since. “Her request did not pertain to you, sir. At least, not directly.” Darius arched a brow. “What did it pertain to?” Wellborn was always serious, but something in the man’s expression made the back of Darius’s neck prickle. “Miss Greyson requested, if anyone came to Oakhaven asking after a young woman matching her description, that I not reveal her presence here. Also, that I make her aware of the situation at once.” Darius fell back against the worktable. He grabbed the edge to steady himself. “She’s in some kind of trouble.” Wellborn dipped his chin in agreement. “It seems a logical conclusion. I’d thought to discuss the matter with you later this evening.” “Thank you for bringing it to my attention,” Darius said, ironically slipping into the same formality he had chided Wellborn for earlier. However, when a man lost his equilibrium, he tended to resort to old habits to regain his footing. “I found her phrasing of the request a bit odd.” A contemplative look came over the butler’s face. Darius mentally reviewed Wellborn’s account, analyzing each section as he would one of his journal articles until a hypothesis formed. “She’s more concerned over someone recognizing her appearance than her name.” Wellborn nodded. “That is the impression I gained.” Interesting. It seemed his new secretary might have accepted the position under false pretenses. Well, a false name, at least. Not that it mattered. The woman had proved herself more than capable. Her name didn’t matter. “Let’s adhere to her wishes for now. With one deviation.” Darius pushed up from the table and braced his legs apart, as if preparing for battle. “If anyone comes looking for her, inform me first. She deserves our protection, Wellborn. I intend to see that she gets it.

He ought to be more clever in his murder attempt. Done properly, he could make a wealthy widow of you, and then you’d both have your happy ending.” Harry knew instantly that he shouldn’t have said it—the comment was the kind of cold-blooded sarcasm he had always resorted to when he felt the need to defend himself. He regretted it even before he saw Merripen out of the periphery of his vision. The Rom was giving him a warning shake of his head and drawing a finger across his throat. Poppy was red faced, her brows drawn in a scowl. “What a dreadful thing to say!” Harry cleared his throat. “I’m sorry,” he said brusquely. “I was joking. It was in poor—” He ducked as something came flying at him. “What the devil—” She had thrown something at him, a cushion. “I don’t want to be a widow, I don’t want Michael Bayning, and I don’t want you to joke about such things, you tactless clodpole!” As all three of them stared at her openmouthed, Poppy leapt up and stalked away, her hands drawn into fists. Bewildered by the immediate force of her fury—it was like being stung by a butterfly—Harry stared after her dumbly. After a moment, he asked the first coherent thought that came to him. “Did she just say she doesn’t want Bayning?” “Yes,” Win said, a smile hovering on her lips. “That’s what she said. Go after her, Harry.” Every cell in Harry’s body longed to comply. Except that he had the feeling of standing on the edge of a cliff, with one ill-chosen word likely to send him over. He gave Poppy’s sister a desperate glance. “What should I say?” “Be honest with her about your feelings,” Win suggested. A frown settled on Harry’s face as he considered that. “What’s my second option?” “I’ll handle this,” Merripen told Win before she could reply. Standing, he slung a great arm across Harry’s shoulders and walked him to the side of the terrace. Poppy’s furious form could be seen in the distance. She was walking down the drive to the caretaker’s house, her skirts and shoes kicking up tiny dust storms. Merripen spoke in a low, not unsympathetic tone, as if compelled to guide a hapless fellow male away from danger. “Take my advice, gadjo . . . never argue with a woman when she’s in this state. Tell her you were wrong and you’re sorry as hell. And promise never to do it again.” “I’m still not exactly certain what I did,” Harry said. “That doesn’t matter. Apologize anyway.” Merripen paused and added in whisper, “And whenever your wife is angry . . . for God’s sake, don’t try logic.” “I heard that,” Win said from the chaise.

Perhaps I won’t tire of her,” Gray protested, just to be contrary. Because, apparently, that was how brothers behaved. “Perhaps a dolphin will fly out of your arse. And here’s an argument even you can’t refuse. Grayson Shipping doesn’t need a reputation for delivering damaged goods. You want me to hand George Waltham an impregnated governess?” “I wouldn’t get her with child. Give me that much credit, at least.” “I give you credit for nothing. Let’s try this one last time, shall we? You made me this ship’s captain. If I’m the captain, what I say goes. And I say you don’t touch her. If you can’t abide by my orders, take command of the ship yourself and let me go home.” “Go home and do what? Squander your fortune and talent on dirt farming?” “Go home and take care of my own family. Go home and do what I damn well please, for once.” Cursing, Gray leaned against the wall. He knew Joss would make good on that threat, too. It hadn’t been easy, coaxing his brother out of mourning. Gray had resorted to outright bullying just to convince him to take command of the Aphrodite, threatening to cut off his income unless he reported to London as agreed. But he needed Joss, if this shipping concern was to stay afloat. He’d worked too hard, sacrificed too much to see it fail. And if Joss didn’t become a willing partner, it all would have been in vain. “Stay away from the girl, Gray.” Gray sighed. “We’re on the same ship. I can’t help but be near her. I’ll not promise to refrain from touching her, because the girl seems to lose her footing whenever I’m around. But I give you my word I’ll not kiss her again. Satisfied?” Joss shook his head. “Give me your word you won’t bed her.” “What a legend you’re making me! Insinuating I could bed her without even kissing her first.” Gray worried the edge of his thumbnail as he considered. “That might prove an amusing challenge, now that you suggest it.” Joss shot him an incredulous look. “With some other lady, on some other ship.” Gray raised his hands in a defensive gesture. “I’ll not bed her. You have my word. And don’t think that’s not a great sacrifice, because it is. I’d have her in two, three days at the most, I tell you.” “Once again-not amusing.” “For God’s sake, Joss, it’s a joke. What do you want, an apology? I’m sorry for kissing Miss Turner’s hand, all right?” Joss shook his head and flipped open the logbook. “No, you’re not.” “Yes, I am.” The odd thing of it was, Gray was telling the truth. He knew he was being an ass, but the joking was easier than honesty. For all his teasing, he hadn’t kissed her hand with the intent to seduce, or to judge if she tasted as sweet as he’d dreamed. He’d kissed her fingers for one reason only. Because they were trembling, and he’d wanted them to stop. It was wholly unlike him, that kiss. It was not a gesture he thought it wise to repeat. That girl did something strange to him.

In their eagerness to eliminate from history any reference to individuais and individual events, collectivist authors resorted to a chimerical construction, the group mind or social mind. At the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries German philologists began to study German medieval poetry, which had long since fallen into oblivion. Most of the epics they edited from old manuscripts were imitations of French works. The names of their authors—most of them knightly warriors in the service of dukes or counts—were known. These epics were not much to boast of. But there were two epics of a quite different character, genuinely original works of high literary value, far surpassing the conventional products of the courtiers: the Nibelungenlied and the Gudrun. The former is one of the great books of world literature and undoubtedly the outstanding poem Germany produced before the days of Goethe and Schiller. The names of the authors of these masterpieces were not handed down to posterity. Perhaps the poets belonged to the class of professional entertainers (Spielleute), who not only were snubbed by the nobility but had to endure mortifying legal disabilities. Perhaps they were heretical or Jewish, and the clergy was eager to make people forget them. At any rate the philologists called these two works "people's epics" (Volksepen). This term suggested to naive minds the idea that they were written not by individual authors but by the "people." The same mythical authorship was attributed to popular songs (Volkslieder) whose authors were unknown. Again in Germany, in the years following the Napoleonic wars, the problem of comprehensive legislative codification was brought up for discussion. In this controversy the historical school of jurisprudence, led by Savigny, denied the competence of any age and any persons to write legislation. Like the Volksepen and the Volkslieder, a nation s laws, they declared, are a spontaneous emanation of the Volksgeist, the nations spirit and peculiar character. Genuine laws are not arbitrarily written by legislators; they spring up and thrive organically from the Volksgeist. This Volksgeist doctrine was devised in Germany as a conscious reaction against the ideas of natural law and the "unGerman" spirit of the French Revolution. But it was further developed and elevated to the dignity of a comprehensive social doctrine by the French positivists, many of whom not only were committed to the principies of the most radical among the revolutionary leaders but aimed at completing the "unfinished revolution" by a violent overthrow of the capitalistic mode of production. Émile Durkheim and his school deal with the group mind as if it were a real phenomenon, a distinct agency, thinking and acting. As they see it, not individuais but the group is the subject of history. As a corrective of these fancies the truism must be stressed that only individuais think and act. In dealing with the thoughts and actions of individuais the historian establishes the fact that some individuais influence one another in their thinking and acting more strongly than they influence and are influenced by other individuais. He observes that cooperation and division of labor exist among some, while existing to a lesser extent or not at ali among others. He employs the term "group" to signify an aggregation of individuais who cooperate together more closely.

Truly evil persons do not recognize their own malevolence. They perceive themselves as generous, good-hearted, friendly sorts, who sometimes have to resort to unpleasant tactics for the general betterment of society. Even the historical monsters seem to have had no second thoughts about the damage they were causing. It was that way with Hitler and Oliver Moresby, just as it was with the Greer Avenue Strangler.

But this left a very large question mark: Who was Chutsky, in fact, and how did I get his help? Did I need some cunning stratagem to bend him to my will, or would I have to resort to some form of the unprecedented uncomfortable unspeakable truth? The very thought of committing honesty made me tremble in every leaf and branch—it went against everything I had ever stood for. But there seemed no way out; I would have to be at least marginally truthful.

Meltdown: noun, def. 1) adult tantrum 2) regressing to the chronological age of three 3) having no ability to express oneself rationally or make a logical case for oneself 4) believing that one’s sense of self is compromised or in great danger 5) resorting to slash and burn tactics to try to get needs met Synonym: fit, bad temper, eruption, hysteria Antonym: calm, mature, reasonable, thoughtful

wife’s death. “I know what you are thinking, my prince, but I do not see how Rapp could have left America and put this together so quickly. Who would he find to be a suicide bomber?” “Maybe he blew himself up?” Rashid asked in a hopeful tone. Tayyib thought about that for a moment and then announced, “I have studied Rapp. The man would never commit suicide unless he had to. He would have simply shot Saeed.” “Then tell me why a fellow Muslim would want to kill Saeed?” “Maybe it wasn’t a Muslim.” Rashid frowned. “There is no such thing as a non-Muslim suicide bomber. Do you see any Jewish suicide bombers? Even the Irish during their war with the British never resorted to suicide bombings. The Japanese are the only other culture to employ the tactic in modern history, and I doubt the Japanese killed Saeed.” “I’ll grant that the timing looks bad, but I

The only difference between Obama’s and McCain’s foreign policy was that Obama represented that faction of America’s foreign policy establishment which places an emphasis of long term “Soft Power” strategies; saving war as a last resort should their phony NGO “protests”, hunger sanctions and “rebel” proxy wars fail to achieve the intended effect. McCain on the other hand, just like the departing Bush/Cheney, was the candidate of choice for the “Neo-Conservative” faction of America’s ruling class; a group that believes in war as a first choice, second choice and third choice! The argument between these overlapping “schools of thought” is generally over tactics, not over the final result.

She wondered whether there was any way of getting him to take the pills by trickery. She did not like the idea of using underhand methods with Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, but when a person's reason was disturbed, then she thought that any means were justified in getting them better. It was as if a person had been kidnapped by some evil being and held ransom. You would not hesitate, she felt, to resort to trickery to defeat the evil being.

I felt bad that everyone thought she took the abortion pill herself.  A nigga didn’t feel that bad, because if she would have gotten it done, we wouldn’t have to resort to all of this.

Daphne had no idea that I knew she was fucking with Julius. I thought about telling her, but as the saying goes, keep your enemies closer. The only reason she was here was because her little plan was my last resort.

The first step in dealing with negative automatic thoughts about a task or plan is to catch them by asking, “What am I thinking right now?” These thoughts often do not occur in the form of grammatically correct sentences, but may be expressed in brief phrases (e.g., “Oh no,” “I hate this stuff,” a string of expletives, etc.). In fact, sometimes procrastination starts with an accurate statement (e.g., “The gym is crowded after work.”), but that can kick off a string of assumptions that result in procrastination (e.g., “I won’t be able to find any open machines. It will either take me 3 hours to finish my workout or I won’t be able to do my full workout. I’m tired and I’m not up to dealing with crowds tonight. There is no use in going to the gym.”). The subsequent evening spent watching lousy television shows while eating way too many cheese puffs leads to self-critical thoughts and frustration with the missed workout (e.g., “I could have gone to the gym. I would have been done by now. Now I have to find time to make up this workout.”). At the outset, it is vital to be aware of how your thoughts make you prone to procrastinate. Automatic thoughts are often distorted and impact your feelings about tasks. Hence, you start to psych yourself out of doing something without having a chance to get started on it, which increases the likelihood of resorting to avoiding the task through an escape behavior. In Chapter 7, we will discuss in greater detail some of the distorted thoughts and strategies for modifying them, particularly with regard to the emotions they trigger, including pure and simple discomfort about a task (i.e., “Ugh”). When dealing with procrastination, however, the most common distortion we encounter is magnification/minimization. That is, you pull out and embellish all the negative elements about performing a task and you overlook or play down the positive elements and your ability to handle the task in question.

suffering such pain and they couldn’t help her just tore her apart. Wild thoughts of asking Reggie to interfere went through her mind, but that was a last resort. Neighbours and friends did not interfere between husband and wife, even

I find myself, like many thoughtful citizens, on the horns of the dilemma of being totally opposed to violence but also as totally opposed to allowing certain conditions in our society to continue. I don’t want any J.C. Penney branch store burned and looted, but I deplore even more the original Watts in which human dignity, aspiration, and often even life were impossible! A contempt for law and resort to violence will certainly destroy any social structure, but is a discomforting fact that they are more often a result of something than a cause. ~ Gene Roddenberry Mar 1970 letter

[During the honeymoon at a Catskill resort] A quiz was held during the afternoon, and guests were invited to volunteer. I raised my hand, of course, and became one of the contestants.... I was third in line, and when I rose to field my question in the first round, spontaneous laughter broke out from the audience. They had laughed at no one else. The trouble was that I looked anxious, and when I look anxious I look even more stupid than usual. The reason I was anxious was that I wanted to shine and feared I would not. I knew that I was neither handsome, self-assured, athletic, wealthy, nor sophisticated. The only thing I had going for me was that I was clever and I wanted to show off to Gertruded. And I was afraid of failing and spelling "weigh" "WIEGH." I ignored the laughter as best I could, and tried to concentrate. The master of ceremonies, trying not to grin and failing, said, "Use the word 'pitch' in sentences in such a way to demonstrate five different meanings of the word." (Heaven only knows where he got his questions.) More laughter, as I paused for a moment to collect my thoughts. I then said, "John pitched the pitch-covered ball as intensely as though he was fighting a pitched battled, while Mary singing in a high-pitched voice, pitched a tent." The laughter stopped as though someone had pulled a plug out of the socket. The master of ceremonies had me repeat it, counted the pitches, considered them, and pronounced me correct. Naturally by the time the quiz was over, I had won.... I noticed, though, that winning the quiz did not make me popular at the resort. Many people resented having wasted their laughter. The thought apparently was that I had no right to look stupid without being stupid; that, by doing so, I had cheated.

When you walk the Path of Fear, you believe God is not with you. So you resort to relying on your own thinking, efforts, and plans. Overcoming your fears is impossible because God is absent, and Satan’s work

Mma Ramotswe said that she thought it wrong to threaten people in any circumstances. Threats were no more than the verbal expression of the violence that she had always disliked so much. As was swearing, which was another form of violence, even when it was directed against the world in general rather than an individual target. She did not like that, and yet it seemed to her that people now resorted to it so casually, as if it was nothing exceptional. What were they like inside, she asked herself, these people who used such language all the time; what were they like inside?

Before she made any decisions, perhaps she should travel abroad. Italy, Germany, Spain, Greece, China, Egypt... She could visit the seven wonders of the world and keep a journal. What were the seven wonders? She tried to recall a poem a governess once taught her to help remember them. How did it go?... The pyramids first, which in Egypt were laid... Next Babylon's garden, which Amytis made... Now that she thought of it, who had made the list in the first place? In a world full of wonders, seven seemed an awfully stingy number. Gloom started to creep back over her again. I’ll compile my own list of wonders, she decided, far more than seven. She would become an adventuress. She might even try mountain climbing. Not a large, life-threatening mountain, but a friendly mountain, with a nearby resort that served afternoon tea. Being an adventuress didn’t mean one had to suffer, after all.