Shepherd King Quotes

To the quiet girls with stories in their heads. To their dreams—and their nightmares.

The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want for nothing. He makes me lie down in the green pastures. He greases up my head with oil. He gives me kung-fu in the face of my enemies. Amen

There once was a girl,” he murmured, “clever and good, who tarried in shadow in the depths of the wood. There also was a King—a shepherd by his crook, who reigned over magic and wrote the old book. The two were together, so the two were the same: “The girl, the King… and the monster they became.

Be wary. Be clever. Be good.

I know only one thing. when i sleep, i know no fear, no, trouble no bliss. blessing on him who invented sleep. the common coin that purchases all things, the balance that levels shepherd and king, fool and wise man. there is only one bad thing about sound sleep. they say it closely resembles death.

I'm just the wind in the trees, the shadow, and the fright. The echo in the leaves...the nightmare in the night.

He came for the girl... And got the monster instead.

All I know is that while I’m asleep, I’m never afraid, and I have no hopes, no struggles, no glories — and bless the man who invented sleep, a cloak over all human thought, food that drives away hunger, water that banishes thirst, fire that heats up cold, chill that moderates passion, and, finally, universal currency with which all things can be bought, weight and balance that brings the shepherd and the king, the fool and the wise, to the same level. There’s only one bad thing about sleep, as far as I’ve ever heard, and that is that it resembles death, since there’s very little difference between a sleeping man and a corpse.

As gentle a man as he was, as tender as was his heart, there was nothing weak about Michael Hosea. He was the strongest-minded man Joseph had ever met. A Man like Noah. A Man like the Shepherd-king David. A man after God's own heart.

To anyone who’s ever felt lost in a wood. There is a strange sort of finding in losing.

Nothing is free. Nothing is safe. Magic is love, but also, it’s hate. It comes at a cost. You’re found, and you’re lost. Magic is love, but also, it’s hate.

Be wary, Be clever, Be good

Here we are, my darling girl, he whispered to me. The end of all things. The last page of our story.

I love when they argue,” Emory said into his soup. “Keeps my weak little heart beating.

Are you still pretending?” I said, reveling in his gaze. Ravyn gave a surprised laugh and, in front of everyone, leaned in and kissed me. “I never was,” he whispered into my lips.

You did not come all this way to yield to despair.

I am the shepherd of shadow. The phantom of the fright. The demon in the daydream.” Her yellow eyes flickered to Ravyn. “The nightmare in the night.

It's like chess, you know. The Queen saves the King.

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever. [Psalms 23]

The berry of rowans is red, always red. The earth at its trunk is dark with blood shed. But a Prince is a man, and a man may be bled. He came for the girl… And got the monster instead.

I am stronger than my doubts

Why do you suppose they made you king in the first place?' I ask him. 'Not for your benefit, but for theirs. They meant you to devote your energies to making their lives more comfortable, and protecting them from injustice. So your job is to see that they're all right, not that you are - just as a shepherd's job, strictly speaking, is to feed his sheep, not himself.

There were not enough pages in all the books Elm had read, in all the libraries he’d wandered, in all the notebooks he’d scrawled, that could measure—denote or describe—just how beautiful she was.

Except, in this fairy tale, the maiden has blood on her hands.

I’d be your King, but always your servant. Never your keeper.

There once was a girl,” he said, his voice slick, “clever and good, who tarried in shadow in the depths of the wood. There also was a King—a shepherd by his crook, who reigned over magic and wrote the old book. The two were together, so the two were the same: “The girl, the King, and the monster they became.

He has looked pain in the eye - and refused to let it make a monster of him

My magic moves, he said. My magic bites. My magic soothes. My magic frights. You are young and not so bold. I am unflinching—five hundred years old.

It is not they who bring the reckoning, Ravyn. It is you. It is us.

Above rowan and yew, the elm tree stands tall. It waits along borders, a sentry at call.

You’re smiling.” Elm looked over the table. “Does no one else find that incredibly unnerving?

There once was a girl clever and good, who tarried in shadow in the depths of the wood. There also was a king - a shepard by his crook, who reigned over magic and wrote the old book. The two were together, so the two were the same...The girl, the King...and the monster they became.

Had I known they’d be the last words I’d say to him aloud, I might have chosen them differently.

Can I kiss you?” My voice shook. “A bit late to ask, isn’t it?” “Not on your mouth, Elspeth.” His eyes turned wicked as he lowered himself to his knees,

For nothing is safe, and nothing is free. Debt follows all men, no matter their plea. When the Shepherd returns, a new day shall ring. Death to the Rowans.” His gray eyes focused, homing in on Elm. “Long live the King.

When the song of the angels is stilled, when the star in the sky is gone, when the kings and princes are home, when the shepherds are back with their flocks, the work of Christmas begins: to find the lost, to heal the broken, to feed the hungry, to release the prisoner, to rebuild the nations, to bring peace among the people, to make music in the heart.

It was shepherds who were the first to recognize a king that the rest of the world refused to acknowledge.

I know as well as you that magic is the oldest paradox. The more power it gives you, the weaker you become.

Human life is short. You are not as a tree, stoic and unyielding, but a butterfly. Delicate, fleeting. Inconsequential.

I’ve wanted to know you since I saw you all those years ago, riding in the wood, mud on your ankles.

The two were together, so the two were the same: “The girl, the King, and the monster they became.

Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the king whose hand is to be laid upon him in honour.

A hundred years,” he said to her, as if she were the only one in the room. “I’ll love you for a hundred years—and an eternity after.

You mean one human is good, but a hundred humans is bad?" "Exactly. One human is just a person. A hundred humans make a society. And societies have kings, and religions and priests, and all these other things serrin completely fail to understand

Practice restraint, and know it by touch. Use Cards when they’re needed, and never too much. For too much of fire, our swords would all break. Too much of wine a poison doth make. Excess is grievous, be knave, maid, or crown. Too much of water, how easy we drown.

Feed my lambs, shepherd my sheep.

But the tide always turns, and the truth always outs.

And with every kiss, every flick of his tongue, Ravyn was... pushing me toward an inevitable, ruinous fall. He did not let me fall right away. By his sighs, the muffled, contented growls, he was taking his time with me. Laying waste to me

Tell them. Tell them the truth. When your children ask, do not lie- do not hide the risk of magic. Children are strongest when their eyes are clear. Only then can they make their own choices. Only then are they truly free. Tell them. Tell them the truth.

Be safe,” I whispered to the wind as Ravyn Yew disappeared beyond the gate. Had I known they’d be the last words I’d say to him aloud, I might have chosen them differently.

For even dead, I will not die. I am the shepherd of shadow. The phantom of the fright. The demon in the daydream. The nightmare in the night.

But his soul carried on, buried deep in Elspeth Spindle, the only woman Ravyn had ever loved.

He was a soldier. He was a shepherd. He was a beggar, and a king. He was a farmer, gleeman, sailor, carpenter. He was born, lived, and died Aiel. He died mad, he died rotting, he died of sickness, accident, age. He was executed, and multitudes cheered his death. He proclaimed himself the Dragon Reborn and flung his banner across the sky; he ran from the Power and hid; he lived and died never knowing. He held off the madness and the sickness for years; he succumbed between two winters. Sometimes Moiraine came and took him away from the Two Rivers, alone or with those of his friends who had survived Winternight; sometimes she did not. Sometimes other Aes Sedai came for him. Sometimes Red Ajah. Egwene married him; Egwene, stern-faced in stole of Amyrlin Seat, led Aes Sedai who gentled him; Egwene, with tears in her eyes, plunged a dagger into his heart, and he thanked her as he died. He loved other women, married other women. Elayne, and Min, and a fair-haired farmer's daughter met on the road to Caemlyn, and women he had never seen before he lived those lives. A hundred lives. More. So many he could not count them. And at the end of every life, as he lay dying, as he drew his final breath, a voice whispered in his ear. I have won again, Lews Therin. Flicker.

The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not be in want.

You’re a Rowan. Don’t you take whatever you fancy?” “Clearly not, when all I fancy is a proper night’s sleep.

The Nightmare’s smile was a thinly veiled threat. “I know what I know. My secrets are deep. But long have I kept them. And long will they keep.

A king leads his people like a shepherd leads his flock.

I was the darkness and the darkness was me, and together we rolled with the tide, lulled toward a shore I could neither see nor hear. All was water—all was salt.

There you are.

Love is influenced by no consideration, recognizes no restraints of reason, and is of the same nature as death, that assails alike the lofty palaces of kings and the humble cabins of shepherds; and when it takes entire possession of a heart, the first thing it does is to banish fear and shame from it.

I'll tell you a story, I whispered. It always helped me sleep as a child. He nodded, folding his hands over his lap, and closed his eyes. There once was a girl, clever and good, who tarried in shadow in the depths of the wood. There also was a King, a shepherd by his crook, who reigned over magic and wrote the old book. The two were together, so the two- I couldn't go on. Elspeth. No. I'm not ready. Not yet. Finish the story, dear one. My voice shook. The two were together- Together. So the two were the same. The girl, he whispered, honey and oil and silk. The King... We said the final words together, our voices echoing, listless, through the dark. A final note. An eternal farewell. And the monster they became.

I’m tied to a post with a grating headache and the dimmest Yews in five centuries,” the Nightmare muttered. “Never been better.

Having hope does not make me delusional, Elspeth,

The Black Horse made its beholder a master of combat. The Golden Egg granted great wealth. The Prophet offered glimpses of the future. The White Eagle bestowed courage. The Maiden bequeathed great beauty. The Chalice turned liquid into truth serum. The Well gave clear sight to recognize one’s enemies. The Iron Gate offered blissful serenity, no matter the struggle. The Scythe gave its beholder the power to control others. The Mirror granted invisibility. The Nightmare allowed its user to speak into the minds of others. The Twin Alders had the power to commune with Blunder’s ancient entity, the Spirit of the Wood.

Shepherds and farmers throughout history showed affection for their animals and have taken great care of them, just as many slaveholders felt affection and concern for their slaves. It was no accident that kings and prophets styled themselves as shepherds and likened the way they and the gods cared for their people to a shepherd’s care for his flock.

Be wary the pink, the Nightmare said as he sniffed the air. Be wary the rose. Be wary of beauty divine, unopposed.

My darling, you’ve always had a choice.

Weariness was king, and I his servant.

There you are.” He wrapped me in his arms, holding me against his armored chest like a father would a child. “One day, you will be nothing more than memory, Elspeth Spindle. But not yet.” His yellow eyes rose to the blackened sky. “Don’t leave me alone with these fools.

They came in the night,” we said, “the black and red horde. They burned down my castle, put my kin to the sword. The usurper was crowned, though my blood had not dried. But he did not account for the turn of the tide. For nothing is safe, and nothing is free. Debt follows all men, no matter their plea. When the Shepherd returns, a new day shall ring. Death to the Rowans… “Long live the King.

Helen leaned down over her husband and ran her lips lightly across his bare shoulder in good-bye. Maybe, someday, she would find him by the River Styx. There, they could wash all their hateful memories away, and walk into a new life together, a life that didn’t have the dirty paw prints of a dozen gods and a dozen kings marring it. Such a beautiful thought. Helen vowed that she would live a hundred lives of hardship for one life—one real life—with Paris. They could be shepherds, just as they had dreamed once when they had met at the great lighthouse long ago. She’d be anything, really, a shopkeeper, or a farmer, whatever, as long as they were allowed to live their lives and each other freely. She dressed quickly, imagining herself tending a shop somewhere by the sea, hoping that someday this dream would come true.

My laughter was hollow. “Better distrustful than delusional.

There were not enough pages in all the books Elm had read, in all the libraries he’d wandered, in all the notebooks he’d scrawled, that could measure—denote or describe—just how beautiful she was. “There you are.

Get up, the Nightmare called. Get up, Elspeth.

There was a way to lie and tell the truth at the same time. That’s how the best lies are told—with just a sliver of truth.

My thoughts festered until my mind turned septic.

Then be angry, Ione.” Elm pressed his mouth to her forehead. “It looks well on you.

But he wrapped his arms around me, pulling me against his chest in a hug so deep it blotted out Market Day entirely. He held me, resting his cheek against the crown of my head, his heart drumming against my ear. I inhaled him, leather and smoke and cedar, settling into his arms like a rabbit in its warm, safe den. I had not fit into anyone’s arms like that since childhood. And even then, no one had ever held me so tightly—as if they needed me in their arms as much as I needed to be held. As if nothing else mattered but to hold one another. As if we had all the time in the world.

It was difficult to look at her. Beneath the ache that existed between them was a thin, fragile thread. One Ione had slipped through the eye of a needle and plunged into Elm's chest, past all his bricks and barbs, though she didn't yet realize it. It was uncomfortable, pretending she was not sewn into him.

I've never been frightened of shepherds. It's the sheep who trouble me.

I don't want rest, Elspeth," he murmured into my lips. "I want you.

The berry of rowans is red, always red. The earth at its trunk is dark with bloodshed. But a Prince is a man, and a man may be bled. He came for the girl.. And got the monster instead.

We must tell stories the way God does, stories in which a sister must float her little brother on a river with nothing but a basket between him and the crocodiles. Stories in which a king is a coward, and a shepherd boy steps forward to face the giant. Stories with fiery serpents and leviathans and sermons in whirlwinds. Stories in which murderers are blinded on donkeys and become heroes. Stories with dens of lions and fiery furnaces and lone prophets laughing at kings and priests and demons. Stories with heads on platters. Stories with courage and crosses and redemption. Stories with resurrections.

help us to live with more confidence that Jesus is the Good Shepherd, not a consulting partner; a very present Lord, not an absentee landlord; the reigning King, not an impotent bystander.

Everyone was watching him, brows high. When I looked up, Ravyn’s gaze was on me, his mouth upturned, his teeth tugging at his bottom lip. “Morning.” He looked stupidly handsome, smug to his boots. I hid behind my teacup. “Morning.” Next to him, Elm’s face twisted in a grimace. “What the hell’s wrong with you?” Ravyn took a bite of bread and leaned back in his chair. “What do you mean?” “You’re smiling.” Elm looked over the table. “Does no one else find that incredibly unnerving?

We smiled, and when we stood, the world around us faded, time and space, Prince and King, child and spirit. All that remained was magic - black as ink. Powerful, vengeful, and full of fury. Our voice dripped oil, Hauth fixed in our gaze. We stalked him, pinning him in the corner of the room. "They came in the night," we said, "the black and red horde. They burned down my castle, put my kin to the sword. The usurper was crowned, though my blood had not dried. But he did not account for the turn of the tide. For nothing is safe, and nothing is free. Debt follows all men, no matter their plea. When the Shepherd returns, a new day shall ring. Death to the Rowans... "Long live the King.

It’s the nice ones you should look out for,” Ravyn said. I glanced up at him. “What about you, Captain? Are you too nice for your own good?” He watched me, something I could not read flashing in his gray eyes. “No, Miss Spindle,” he said. “I’m not nice at all.

If the characters are not wicked, the book is." We must tell stories the way God does, stories in which a sister must float her little brother on a river with nothing but a basket between him and the crocodiles. Stories in which a king is a coward, and a shepherd boy steps forward to face the giant. Stories with fiery serpents and leviathans and sermons in whirlwinds. Stories in which murderers are blinded on donkeys and become heroes. Stories with dens of lions and fiery furnaces and lone prophets laughing at kings and priests and demons. Stories with heads on platters. Stories with courage and crosses and redemption. Stories with resurrections.

No ruler can ever get far with only militaristic power. The easiest way to conquer is to crush people’s faith and convert them to your own ideology, often portraying it as heroic. I am an ambitious man – I am not just a casual pirate to steal only people’s riches. I am an emperor – I shall steal people’s hearts, hopes, and faith so that they will eventually have no one but me to turn to. If you put yourself in the role of a saviour, people are sure to follow you, just like a pack of lambs always follows a mighty shepherd.

On the seventh day God rested in the darkness of the tomb; Having finished on the sixth day all his work of joy and doom. Now the Word had fallen silent, and the water had run dry, The bread had all been scattered, and the light had left the sky. The flock had lost its shepherd, and the seed was sadly sown, The courtiers had betrayed their king, and nailed him to his throne. O Sabbath rest by Calvary, O calm of tomb below, Where the grave-clothes and the spices cradle him we do not know! Rest you well, beloved Jesus, Caesar’s Lord and Israel’s King, In the brooding of the Spirit, in the darkness of the spring.

The King said, "The third question is, how many seconds of time are there in eternity." Then said the shepherd boy, "In Lower Pomerania is the Diamond Mountain, which is two miles and a half high, two miles and a half wide, and two miles and a half in depth; every hundred years a little bird comes and sharpens its beak on it, and when the whole mountain is worn away by this, then the first second of eternity will be over." The

The big mistake of modern media has been this notion of balance for balance's sake. That the left is just as violent and cruel as the right, that unions are just powerful as corporations, that reverse racism is just as damaging as racism.... Governments led by liberal democrats passed laws which changed the air I breathe for the better. Okay I'm for them and not for the party that is as we speak plotting to abolish the E.P.A. And I don't need to pretend that both sides have a point here, and I don't care what left or right commentators say about it. I only care what climate scientists say about it. Two opposing sides don't necessarily have two compelling arguments. Martin Luther King speaks on that wall in the capital and he didn't say "Remember folks, those southern sheriffs with the fire hoses and the German shepherds, they have a point too." No, he said, "I had a dream and they had a nightmare." This isn't Team Edward & Team Jacob. Liberals like the ones on that field must stand up and be counted and not pretend that we're as mean or greedy or shortsighted or plain batched as they are. And if that is too polarizing for you and you still want to reach across the aisle and hold hands and sing with someone on the right ... Try Church.

Haiku Christmas Story New light in the sky announces a sacred birth. Shine brightly young star. Hallelujah song carries on a gentle wind, heralding a king. Shepherds lift their heads, not to gaze at a new light but to hear angels. "Unto you is born in the city of David a Savior for all." Born on straw at night under low stable rafters, Baby Jesus cried. Sheep and goats and cows gather 'round a manger bed to awe at a babe. Wise men come to see a child of greater wisdom and honor divine. Rare and precious gifts, gold and myrrh and frankincense, to offer a king. Mary and Joseph huddle snugly together. They cradle God's son. On this wise He came, the Son of God to the earth. A humble wonder.

The following spring was a time of calving. Great icebergs calved from the vast glaciers which stretched down to our fjords from distant mountains. The heifers and cows of Kaupangen gave birth to over one hundred calves that spring. Most survived. Gudrod, the master shepherd, had seventy-five new lambkins skipping after their mothers. Ten sets of lamb twins were born in the city that year. Bitches had pups suckling at their breasts. The mountain goats that stood watch over the fjord, indifferently chewing on the wild grasses between the rocks, had kids following them on their steep paths. The residents of the city, too, gave birth. Twenty-one new healthy babies were born within thirty days of the spring equinox; boys and girls with thick blonde, brown, black, or red hair; others with smooth bald heads. Olaf, my third father, my king, had a son, stillborn. Olaf wept. Kenna wept. I wept as the boy was buried inside the casket with his mother in our graveyard by the church.

The Song Of The Happy Shepherd The woods of Arcady are dead, And over is their antique joy; Of old the world on dreaming fed; Grey Truth is now her painted toy; Yet still she turns her restless head: But O, sick children of the world, Of all the many changing things In dreary dancing past us whirled, To the cracked tune that Chronos sings, Words alone are certain good. Where are now the warring kings, Word be-mockers?—By the Rood, Where are now the watring kings? An idle word is now their glory, By the stammering schoolboy said, Reading some entangled story: The kings of the old time are dead; The wandering earth herself may be Only a sudden flaming word, In clanging space a moment heard, Troubling the endless reverie. Then nowise worship dusty deeds, Nor seek, for this is also sooth, To hunger fiercely after truth, Lest all thy toiling only breeds New dreams, new dreams; there is no truth Saving in thine own heart. Seek, then, No learning from the starry men, Who follow with the optic glass The whirling ways of stars that pass— Seek, then, for this is also sooth, No word of theirs—the cold star-bane Has cloven and rent their hearts in twain, And dead is all their human truth. Go gather by the humming sea Some twisted, echo-harbouring shell. And to its lips thy story tell, And they thy comforters will be. Rewording in melodious guile Thy fretful words a little while, Till they shall singing fade in ruth And die a pearly brotherhood; For words alone are certain good: Sing, then, for this is also sooth. I must be gone: there is a grave Where daffodil and lily wave, And I would please the hapless faun, Buried under the sleepy ground, With mirthful songs before the dawn. His shouting days with mirth were crowned; And still I dream he treads the lawn, Walking ghostly in the dew, Pierced by my glad singing through, My songs of old earth’s dreamy youth: But ah! she dreams not now; dream thou! For fair are poppies on the brow: Dream, dream, for this is also sooth.

The Drunken Gnat You are the soul of the soul, a door that opens into existence. When separation makes us angry, you strike with a sword. When union becomes vague, you feed it with a vast nothing. Old civilizations start to flourish again. The March sun warms the world with singing. Tambourine and harp, branches covered with buds. Is anyone sober enough to speak with the king? No one. All right. Remember how a gnat once got drunk and walked into the ear of a terrible tyrant, then from there into his brain and killed him? Grape-wine can do that to a gnat. What will the wine of infinity do for us? A cave dog watched over the sleepers. If a dog can be a shepherd, what could the spirit-lion of a human being become? Sparks from a fire lift in the sky and turn to stars. Shams is now a depth of truth that rises every morning in the east.

My reading has been lamentably desultory and immedthodical. Odd, out of the way, old English plays, and treatises, have supplied me with most of my notions, and ways of feeling. In everything that relates to science, I am a whole Encyclopaedia behind the rest of the world. I should have scarcely cut a figure among the franklins, or country gentlemen, in King John's days. I know less geography than a schoolboy of six weeks standing. To me a map of old Ortelius is as authentic as Arrowsmith. I do not know whereabout Africa merges into Asia, whether Ethiopia lie in one or other of those great divisions, nor can form the remotest, conjecture of the position of New South Wales, or Van Diemen's Land. Yet do I hold a correspondence with a very dear friend in the first named of these two Terrae Incognitae. I have no astronomy. I do not know where to look for the Bear or Charles' Wain, the place of any star, or the name of any of them at sight. I guess at Venus only by her brightness - and if the sun on some portentous morn were to make his first appearance in the west, I verily believe, that, while all the world were grasping in apprehension about me, I alone should stand unterrified, from sheer incuriosity and want of observation. Of history and chronology I possess some vague points, such as one cannot help picking up in the course of miscellaneous study, but I never deliberately sat down to a chronicle, even of my own country. I have most dim apprehensions of the four great monarchies, and sometimes the Assyrian, sometimes the Persian, floats as first in my fancy. I make the widest conjectures concerning Egypt, and her shepherd kings. My friend M., with great pains taking, got me to think I understood the first proposition in Euclid, but gave me over in despair at the second. I am entirely unacquainted with the modern languages, and, like a better man than myself, have 'small Latin and less Greek'. I am a stranger to the shapes and texture of the commonest trees, herbs, flowers - not from the circumstance of my being town-born - for I should have brought the same inobservant spirit into the world with me, had I first seen it, 'on Devon's leafy shores' - and am no less at a loss among purely town objects, tool, engines, mechanic processes. Not that I affect ignorance - but my head has not many mansions, nor spacious, and I have been obliged to fill it with such cabinet curiosities as it can hold without aching. I sometimes wonder how I have passed my probation with so little discredit in the world, as I have done, upon so meagre a stock. But the fact is, a man may do very well with a very little knowledge, and scarce be found out, in mixed company; everybody is so much more ready to produce his own, than to call for a display of your acquisitions. But in a tete-a-tete there is no shuffling. The truth will out. There is nothing which I dread so much, as the being left alone for a quarter of an hour with a sensible, well-informed man that does not know me.

CHAPTER XXVI.—A new Prince in a City or Province of which he has taken Possession, ought to make Everything new. Whosoever becomes prince of a city or State, more especially if his position be so insecure that he cannot resort to constitutional government either in the form of a republic or a monarchy, will find that the best way to preserve his princedom is to renew the whole institutions of that State; that is to say, to create new magistracies with new names, confer new powers, and employ new men, and like David when he became king, exalt the humble and depress the great, "filling the hungry with good things, and sending the rich empty away." Moreover, he must pull down existing towns and rebuild them, removing their inhabitants from one place to another; and, in short, leave nothing in the country as he found it; so that there shall be neither rank, nor condition, nor honour, nor wealth which its possessor can refer to any but to him. And he must take example from Philip of Macedon, the father of Alexander, who by means such as these, from being a petty prince became monarch of all Greece; and of whom it was written that he shifted men from province to province as a shepherd moves his flocks from one pasture to another. These indeed are most cruel expedients, contrary not merely to every Christian, but to every civilized rule of conduct, and such as every man should shun, choosing rather to lead a private life than to be a king on terms so hurtful to mankind. But he who will not keep to the fair path of virtue, must to maintain himself enter this path of evil. Men, however, not knowing how to be wholly good or wholly bad, choose for themselves certain middle ways, which of all others are the most pernicious, as shall be shown by an instance in the following Chapter.

Allow me to introduce my shepherd,” The Under-King said from the mist ahead, standing beside a ten-foot-tall black dog. Each of its fangs were as long as one of her fingers. All hooked—like a shark’s. Designed to latch into flesh and hold tight while it ripped and shredded. Its eyes were milky white—sightless. Identical to the Under-King’s. Her light would have no effect on something that was already blind. The dog’s fur—sleek and iridescent enough that it almost resembled scales—flowed over bulky, bunched muscles. Claws like razor blades sliced into the dry ground. Hunt’s lightning crackled, skittering at Bryce’s feet. “That’s a demon,” he ground out. He’d fought enough of them to know. “An experiment of the Prince of the Ravine’s, from the First Wars,” the Under-King rasped. “Forgotten and abandoned here in Midgard during the aftermath. Now my faithful companion and helper. You’d be surprised how many souls do not wish to make their final offering to the Gate. The Shepherd…Well, it herds them for me. As it shall herd you.” “Fry this fucker,” Bryce muttered to Hunt as the dog snarled. “I’m assessing.” “Assess faster. Roast it like a—” “Do not make a joke about—” “Hot dog.” Bryce had no sooner finished saying the words than the hound lunged. Hunt struck, swift and sure, a lightning bolt spearing toward its neck.

New Rule: If you're going to have a rally where hundreds of thousands of people show up, you may as well go ahead and make it about something. With all due respect to my friends Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, it seems that if you truly wanted to come down on the side of restoring sanity and reason, you'd side with the sane and the reasonable--and not try to pretend the insanity is equally distributed in both parties. Keith Olbermann is right when he says he's not the equivalent of Glenn Beck. One reports facts; the other one is very close to playing with his poop. And the big mistake of modern media has been this notion of balance for balance's sake, that the left is just as violent and cruel as the right, that unions are just as powerful as corporations, that reverse racism is just as damaging as racism. There's a difference between a mad man and a madman. Now, getting more than two hundred thousand people to come to a liberal rally is a great achievement that gave me hope, and what I really loved about it was that it was twice the size of the Glenn Beck crowd on the Mall in August--although it weight the same. But the message of the rally as I heard it was that if the media would just top giving voice to the crazies on both sides, then maybe we could restore sanity. It was all nonpartisan, and urged cooperation with the moderates on the other side. Forgetting that Obama tried that, and found our there are no moderates on the other side. When Jon announced his rally, he said that the national conversation is "dominated" by people on the right who believe Obama's a socialist, and by people on the left who believe 9/11 was an inside job. But I can't name any Democratic leaders who think 9/11 was an inside job. But Republican leaders who think Obama's socialist? All of them. McCain, Boehner, Cantor, Palin...all of them. It's now official Republican dogma, like "Tax cuts pay for themselves" and "Gay men just haven't met the right woman." As another example of both sides using overheated rhetoric, Jon cited the right equating Obama with Hitler, and the left calling Bush a war criminal. Except thinking Obama is like Hitler is utterly unfounded--but thinking Bush is a war criminal? That's the opinion of Major General Anthony Taguba, who headed the Army's investigation into Abu Ghraib. Republicans keep staking out a position that is farther and farther right, and then demand Democrats meet them in the middle. Which now is not the middle anymore. That's the reason health-care reform is so watered down--it's Bob Dole's old plan from 1994. Same thing with cap and trade--it was the first President Bush's plan to deal with carbon emissions. Now the Republican plan for climate change is to claim it's a hoax. But it's not--I know because I've lived in L.A. since '83, and there's been a change in the city: I can see it now. All of us who live out here have had that experience: "Oh, look, there's a mountain there." Governments, led my liberal Democrats, passed laws that changed the air I breathe. For the better. I'm for them, and not the party that is plotting to abolish the EPA. I don't need to pretend both sides have a point here, and I don't care what left or right commentators say about it, I can only what climate scientists say about it. Two opposing sides don't necessarily have two compelling arguments. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke on that mall in the capital, and he didn't say, "Remember, folks, those southern sheriffs with the fire hoses and the German shepherds, they have a point, too." No, he said, "I have a dream. They have a nightmare. This isn't Team Edward and Team Jacob." Liberals, like the ones on that field, must stand up and be counted, and not pretend we're as mean or greedy or shortsighted or just plain batshit at them. And if that's too polarizing for you, and you still want to reach across the aisle and hold hands and sing with someone on the right, try church.