Xi Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Xi. Here they are! All 100 of them:

I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair. Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets. Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.
Pablo Neruda (100 Love Sonnets)
Lan XiChen, 'You believe in him?' Lan WangJi, 'I do.' He answered without any hesitation. Wei WuXian felt his chest warm up.
墨香铜臭 (魔道祖师 [Mó Dào Zǔ Shī])
X. I saw pale kings and princes too, Pale warriors, death-pale were they all; They cried—“La Belle Dame sans Merci Hath thee in thrall!” XI. I saw their starved lips in the gloam, With horrid warning gaped wide, And I awoke and found me here, On the cold hill’s side. XII. And this is why I sojourn here, Alone and palely loitering, Though the sedge is wither’d from the lake, And no birds sing.
John Keats
XI I sang his name instead of song; Over and over I sang his name: Backward and forward I sang it along, With my sweetest notes, it was still the same! I sang it low, that the slave-girls near Might never guess, from what they could hear, That all the song was a name.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Your job then, should you choose to accept it, is to keep searching for the metaphors, rituals and teachers that will help you move ever closer to divinity. The Yogic scriptures say that God responds to the sacred prayers and efforts of human beings in any way whatsoever that mortals choose to worship—just so long as those prayers are sincere. I think you have every right to cherry-pick when it comes to moving your spirit and finding peace in God. I think you are free to search for any metaphor whatsoever which will take you across the worldly divide whenever you need to be transported or comforted. It's nothing to be embarrassed about. It's the history of mankind's search for holiness. If humanity never evolved in its exploration of the divine, a lot of us would still be worshipping golden Egyptian statues of cats. And this evolution of religious thinking does involve a fair bit of cherry-picking. You take whatever works from wherever you can find it, and you keep moving toward the light. The Hopi Indians thought that the world's religions each contained one spiritual thread, and that these threads are always seeking each other, wanting to join. When all the threads are finally woven together they will form a rope that will pull us out of this dark cycle of history and into the next realm. More contemporarily, the Dalai Lama has repeated the same idea, assuring his Western students repeatedly that they needn't become Tibetan Buddhists in order to be his pupils. He welcomes them to take whatever ideas they like out of Tibetan Buddhism and integrate these ideas into their own religious practices. Even in the most unlikely and conservative of places, you can find sometimes this glimmering idea that God might be bigger than our limited religious doctrines have taught us. In 1954, Pope Pius XI, of all people, sent some Vatican delegates on a trip to Libya with these written instructions: "Do NOT think that you are going among Infidels. Muslims attain salvation, too. The ways of Providence are infinite." But doesn't that make sense? That the infinite would be, indeed ... infinite? That even the most holy amongst us would only be able to see scattered pieces of the eternal picture at any given time? And that maybe if we could collect those pieces and compare them, a story about God would begin to emerge that resembles and includes everyone? And isn't our individual longing for transcendence all just part of this larger human search for divinity? Don't we each have the right to not stop seeking until we get as close to the source of wonder as possible? Even if it means coming to India and kissing trees in the moonlight for a while? That's me in the corner, in other words. That's me in the spotlight. Choosing my religion.
Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love)
Lan XiChen was shocked, "Young Master Wei, could it be that even after you spent such a long time together with WangJi, you still do not know of his feelings?
墨香铜臭 (魔道祖师 [Mó Dào Zǔ Shī])
It is pointless to believe what you see, if you only see what you believe. —“The Admiral,” from The Requiem of Gods Vol. XI, translated by Chevalle
Marie Lu (The Young Elites (The Young Elites, #1))
In 1954, Pope Pius XI, of all people, sent some Vatican delegates on a trip to Libya with these written instructions: "Do NOT think that you are going among Infidels. Muslims attain salvation, too. The ways of Providence are infinite.
Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love)
For though your mind is active enough, your heart is darkened with corruption, and without a pure heart there can be no full or genuine sensibility.
Fyodor Dostoevsky (Notes from Underground, White Nights, The Dream of a Ridiculous Man, and Selections from The House of the Dead)
There are certain things in a man's past which he does not divulge to everybody but, perhaps, only to his friends. Again there are certain things he will not divulge even to his friends; he will divulge them perhaps only to himself, and that, too, as a secret. But, finally, there are things which he is afraid to divulge even to himself, and every decent man has quite an accumulation of such things in his mind. I can put it even this way: the more decent a man is, the larger will the number of such things be.
Fyodor Dostoevsky (Notes from Underground, White Nights, The Dream of a Ridiculous Man, and Selections from The House of the Dead)
Everyone has evil intentions in their minds. The only difference is executing it or not. There's no need to criticize them so harshly.
Meng Xi Shi (千秋 [Qian Qiu])
Everyone holds evil thoughts inside their hearts; the difference lies in whether or not they act on it. Why castigate them for being human?
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 1)
Lan WangJi’s brows sunk low as he shook his head. A few moments later, he replied in a low voice, “Brother, I want to take someone back to the Cloud Recesses.” Lan XiChen was surprised, “Take someone back to the Cloud Recesses?” Lan WangJi nodded, his expression pensive. After a pause, he continued, “Take him back… and hide him somewhere.
墨香铜臭 (魔道祖师 [Mó Dào Zǔ Shī])
Article XI Canada acceding to this confederation, and adjoining in the measures of the United States, shall be admitted into, and entitled to all the advantages of this Union; but no other colony shall be admitted into the same, unless such admission be agreed to by nine States.
Founding Fathers (The Constitution of the United States of America, with all of the Amendments; The Declaration of Independence; and The Articles of Confederation, annotated (Breathitt Classics))
... Ban ngày mọi thứ đều gớm ghiếc. Người ta lịch sự, mơn trớn, tô son đánh phấn, rắc nước hoa, đi xe đạp. Mẹ kiếp, xi-líp cũng cần mác xịn. Mình muốn đập tan tất cả các tôn giáo (phải ngu lắm mới thờ một thằng ngoẻo từ đời tám hoánh, một thằng chắc chắn không biết giấy toa-lét là gì). Nhưng đạo Phật không đến nỗi. Nếu nhà chùa cho tự do tình dục thì mình cũng trùm áo cà sa mấy năm. Tiện, chẳng cần mặc quái gì bên trong. Mà đầu cũng đã trọc sẵn...
Thuận (Vân Vy)
Louis XI (1423-1483), the great Spider King of France, had a weakness for astrology. He kept a court astrologer whom he admired, until one day the man predicted that a lady of the court would die within eight days. When the prophecy came true, Louis was terrified, thinking that either the man had murdered the woman to prove his accuracy or that he was so versed in his science that his powers threatened Louis himself. In either case he had to be killed. One evening Louis summoned the astrologer to his room, high in the castle. Before the man arrived, the king told his servants that when he gave the signal they were to pick the astrologer up, carry him to the window, and hurl him to the ground, hundreds of feet below. The astrologer soon arrived, but before giving the signal, Louis decided to ask him one last question: “You claim to understand astrology and to know the fate of others, so tell me what your fate will be and how long you have to live.” “I shall die just three days before Your Majesty,” the astrologer replied. The king’s signal was never given. The man’s life was spared. The Spider King not only protected his astrologer for as long as he was alive, he lavished him with gifts and had him tended by the finest court doctors. The astrologer survived Louis by several years, disproving his power of prophecy but proving his mastery of power.
Robert Greene (The 48 Laws of Power)
However we may pity the mother whose health and even life is imperiled by the performance of her natural duty, there yet remains no sufficient reason for condoning the direct murder of the innocent.
Pope Pius XI
Humans judge both other people and other things through the self, so if the self has no joy, then heaven and earth have no joy.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
If you wish for a world without war, start with yourself.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 1)
For the ideals I pursue within my heart, I’d not regret a thousand deaths to die.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 2)
Thus it shall befall Him, who to worth in women over-trusting, Lets her will rule: restraint she will not brook; And left to herself, if evil thence ensue She first his weak indulgence will accuse.
John Milton (Paradise Lost)
Yan Wushi grabbed his hand and brought it to his own heart. He said softly, “If you don’t believe me, you can dig it out and see for yourself, then you’ll know. From today onward, this is all yours.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 4)
I love to doubt as well as know." ~ Dante's Inferno, Canto XI, 93: "non men che saver, dubbiar m'aggrata.
Dante Alighieri
I was born into privilege,” I told Ping Xi. “I am not going to squander that. I’m not a moron.
Ottessa Moshfegh (My Year of Rest and Relaxation)
If you can orchestrate the words people use and how they use them, you can control their speech and therefore their thoughts.
Xi Van Fleet (Mao's America: A Survivor's Warning)
No one has yet tested the pencil To see how many words it can write
Xi Chuan (Notes on the Mosquito: Selected Poems)
Let us thank God that He makes us live among the present problems. It is no longer permitted to anyone to be mediocre.
Pope Pius XI
xI don't want to repeat my innocence. I want the pleasure of losing it again.
F. Scott Fitzgerald (This Side of Paradise)
On a winter night I hear the Easter bell: I knock on graves and quicken the dead, Until at last in a grave I see — myself. (Winter Sonnets: XI)
Vyacheslav Ivanov (Silver Age of Russian Culture (An Anthology))
LAWS OF THE HOUSE OF GOD I Gomers don’t die. II Gomers go to ground. III At a cardiac arrest, the first procedure is to take your own pulse. IV The patient is the one with the disease. V Placement comes first. VI There is no body cavity that cannot be reached with a #14 needle and a good strong arm. VII Age + BUN = Lasix dose. VIII They can always hurt you more. IX The only good admission is a dead admission. X If you don’t take a temperature, you can’t find a fever. XI Show me a BMS who only triples my work and I will kiss his feet. XII If the radiology resident and the BMS both see a lesion on the chest X ray, there can be no lesion there. XIII The delivery of medical care is to do as much nothing as possible.
Samuel Shem (The House of God)
I flipped it over: Ping Xi's business card with his name, number, e-mail address, and the corniest quotation I'd ever read: "Every act of creation is an act of destruction.—Pablo Picasso
Ottessa Moshfegh (My Year of Rest and Relaxation)
I hate this city. Thankfully, I wasn’t able to meet you earlier – if I had met you earlier, I would have fallen in love with every single person in this city. And that would have killed me.
Jiu Yue Xi (The Youthful You Who Was So Beautiful)
Gratitude is a species of love, excited in us by some action of the person for whom we have it, and by which we believe that he has done some good to us, or at least that he has had the intention of doing so. Passions, III, 193. XI, 473-474. Trans. John Morris
René Descartes (The Passions of the Soul)
The mind commands the body, and obedience is instant; the mind commands itself and meets resistance. The mind tells the hand to move, and all goes so smoothly that it is hard to distinguish the command from its execution. Yet the mind is the mind, and the hand is a body. The mind tells the mind to will; one is the same as the other, and yet it does not do what it is told.
Augustine of Hippo (Confessions: Livre XI)
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird" I Among twenty snowy mountains, The only moving thing Was the eye of the blackbird. II I was of three minds, Like a tree In which there are three blackbirds. III The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds. It was a small part of the pantomime. IV A man and a woman Are one. A man and a woman and a blackbird Are one. V I do not know which to prefer, The beauty of inflections Or the beauty of innuendoes, The blackbird whistling Or just after. VI Icicles filled the long window With barbaric glass. The shadow of the blackbird Crossed it, to and fro. The mood Traced in the shadow An indecipherable cause. VII O thin men of Haddam, Why do you imagine golden birds? Do you not see how the blackbird Walks around the feet Of the women about you? VIII I know noble accents And lucid, inescapable rhythms; But I know, too, That the blackbird is involved In what I know. IX When the blackbird flew out of sight, It marked the edge Of one of many circles. X At the sight of blackbirds Flying in a green light, Even the bawds of euphony Would cry out sharply. XI He rode over Connecticut In a glass coach. Once, a fear pierced him, In that he mistook The shadow of his equipage For blackbirds. XII The river is moving. The blackbird must be flying. XIII It was evening all afternoon. It was snowing And it was going to snow. The blackbird sat In the cedar-limbs.
Wallace Stevens
I'm not as incredible as you think. I only want to see that man one more time, to see the disappointment on his face. Let him know that demonic core didn't take, that it didn't control me. That I'm still myself.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 2)
X Блажен, кто смолоду был молод, Блажен, кто вовремя созрел, Кто постепенно жизни холод С летами вытерпеть умел; Кто странным снам не предавался, Кто черни светской не чуждался, Кто в двадцать лет был франт иль хват, А в тридцать выгодно женат; Кто в пятьдесят освободился От частных и других долгов, Кто славы, денег и чинов Спокойно в очередь добился, О ком твердили целый век: N. N. прекрасный человек. XI Но грустно думать, что напрасно Была нам молодость дана, Что изменяли ей всечасно, Что обманула нас она; Что наши лучшие желанья, Что наши свежие мечтанья Истлели быстрой чередой, Как листья осенью гнилой. Несносно видеть пред собою Одних обедов длинный ряд, Глядеть на жизнь, как на обряд, И вслед за чинною толпою Идти, не разделяя с ней Ни общих мнений, ни страстей.
Alexander Pushkin (Eugene Onegin)
A tyrant remains a tyrant no matter how benevolently he may philosophize and smile,
David I. Kertzer (The Pope and Mussolini: The Secret History of Pius XI and the Rise of Fascism in Europe)
Night is the sleep of seven wax moths Dawn is the singing of five mermaids Noon is the scratching of three field mice Dusk is the shadow of a crow
Xi Chuan (Notes on the Mosquito: Selected Poems)
We will pick our way through the shards of broken objects folly leaves behind. And some of what breaks will be very beautiful.
Guy Gavriel Kay
Foolish A-Qiao" "When have I ever been good to you?
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
However, now Yan Wushi was forced to admit that Shen Qiao was unique and that he couldn’t change him. Though the world was vast, there was still only one Shen Qiao.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 4)
In one of your letters, you had asked me whether, despite all that I’ve been through, I continued to believe – in truth, in beauty, in kindness, in goodness, and in trust and belief itself. Officer Zheng, I am now able to tell you, that because of Bei Ye, and solely because of Bei Ye, my answer is “Yes”.
Jiu Yue Xi (少年的你,如此美丽)
To know the world, one must first know themselves. Then they must forget themselves. Once they forgot both the world and themselves, never again would they be moved by worldy gains and losses.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 2)
But in Yan Wushi’s eyes, whether it was Xie Ling or Yan Wushi didn’t matter. Good or evil, painful or wonderful—he alone should be special to Shen Qiao. There was no need for some other random person to partake in that special regard.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
26. Above all other reality there exists one supreme Being: God, the omnipotent Creator of all things, the all-wise and just Judge of all men. This supreme reality, God, is the absolute condemnation of the impudent falsehoods of communism. In truth, it is not because men believe in God that He exists; rather because He exists do all men whose eyes are not deliberately closed to the truth believe in Him and pray to Him.
Pope Pius XI (Divini Redemptoris: On Atheistic Communism)
When it comes to worth, every heart weighs it differently. Grudges have a source, and debts a debtor, but involving innocent people should never be commended. When you don’t save the people you could have, when you don’t take action when you could have, a shadow lodges in your heart forever. Whether other people know about it― whether they’ll feel grateful― that’s their business
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 1)
In the end, he finally believed that it was indeed a worthless stone. But in his eyes, compared to the room full of gold and silver treasure, even if it was only a stone, it was still one of a kind—a stone out of a million.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 4)
je saisis en sombrant que la seule verité de l’homme, enfin entrevue, est d’être une supplication sans réponse.
Georges Bataille (Œuvres complètes, tome XI : Articles I (1944–1949))
If I knock him unconscious right now, will he wake up with a more normal personality? Shen Qiao contemplated this with all seriousness.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
He was unwilling to admit that he, who’d looked down upon everyone in the world, would one day find that a name had wormed its way into his heart.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 4)
VII. A Knock at the Door VIII. A Hand at Cards IX. The Game Made X. The Substance of the Shadow XI. Dusk XII.
Charles Dickens (A Tale of Two Cities)
Shadow XI. Dusk XII. Darkness XIII. Fifty-two XIV. The Knitting Done XV. The Footsteps Die Out For Ever
Charles Dickens (A Tale of Two Cities)
the Shadow XI. Dusk XII. Darkness XIII. Fifty-two XIV. The Knitting Done XV. The Footsteps
Charles Dickens (A Tale of Two Cities)
Substance of the Shadow XI. Dusk XII. Darkness XIII. Fifty-two XIV. The Knitting Done XV. The
Charles Dickens (A Tale of Two Cities)
Sir Thomas More (7 February 1478 – 6 July 1535), also known as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, author, and statesman. During his lifetime he earned a reputation as a leading humanist scholar and occupied many public offices, including that of Lord Chancellor from 1529 to 1532. More coined the word "utopia", a name he gave to an ideal, imaginary island nation whose political system he described in a book published in 1516. He is chiefly remembered for his principled refusal to accept King Henry VIII's claim to be supreme head of the Church of England, a decision which ended his political career and led to his execution as a traitor. In 1935, four hundred years after his death, More was canonized in the Catholic Church by Pope Pius XI, and was later declared the patron saint of lawyers and statesmen. He shares his feast day, June 22 on the Catholic calendar of saints, with Saint John Fisher, the only Bishop during the English Reformation to maintain his allegiance to the Pope. More was added to the Anglican Churches' calendar of saints in 1980. Source: Wikipedia
Thomas More (Utopia (Norton Critical Editions))
a leading humanist scholar and occupied many public offices, including that of Lord Chancellor from 1529 to 1532. More coined the word "utopia", a name he gave to an ideal, imaginary island nation whose political system he described in a book published in 1516. He is chiefly remembered for his principled refusal to accept King Henry VIII's claim to be supreme head of the Church of England, a decision which ended his political career and led to his execution as a traitor. In 1935, four hundred years after his death, More was canonized in the Catholic Church by Pope Pius XI, and was later declared the patron saint of lawyers and statesmen
Thomas More (Utopia (Norton Critical Editions))
But this flower was good-natured, always tenderhearted and compassionate. That’s why it met with trouble after trouble. It seemed to bring all this trouble on itself, but it also anticipated and accepted the consequences of such tenderness. If others thought that softness was a weakness, then it was they who were truly blind.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 1)
Herr Sesemann Hears of Things that are New to Him X Another Grandmother XI Heidi Gains in One Way and Loses in Another XII A Ghost in the House XIII A Summer Evening on the Mountain XIV Sunday Bells XV Preparations for a journey XVI A Visitor XVII A Compensation XVIII Winter in Dorfli
Johanna Spyri (Heidi)
If they drive God from the earth, we shall shelter Him underground. The Brothers Karamazov Mitya (Dmitri) to Aloysha who visits him in prison, Book XI - Ivan, Chapter 4 - A Hymn and a Secret.
Fyodor Dostoevsky
There are many people in this world — some of them are good, and some of them are bad. But there are even more who can't be simply classified as 'good' or 'bad'. They may not think in the same way you think, or walk the same path you walk. Just like the case with Yu Ai and Yuan Ying - even the same set of sword arts looks slightly different in different people's hands. Don't deny others just because they are different from you. Like how the ocean is capable of holding water from thousands of rivers, a person should be forgiving and tolerant to diversity, and it is the same for practicing martial arts. People who are narrow-minded can only achieve so much. Even if they do reach the summit, they cannot stay there for long.
Meng Xi Shi (千秋 [Qian Qiu])
One could have said that he'd lived twenty-seven years without evr making a single major mistake. Except for Gu Mang. For Mo Xi, Gu Mang was like ink on a paper or mud in the snow, the suggestive smear of blood left upon the pristine white of a gentleman's bedsheets. He was the stain on Mo Xi's life.
Rou Bao Bu Chi Rou (Remnants of Filth: Yuwu (Novel) Vol. 1)
After he said this, he gripped Shen Qiao’s chin and lowered his head, invading him with his lips and tongue. He only stopped once Shen Qiao’s breaths became disordered, his eyes glistening with moisture.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
The only circumstance under which Mo Xi could imagine amiably sharing a jug of wine with Gu Mang was in a cemetery, with Gu Mang buried in the earth, and himself standing upon it. Then he might talk to the man like he once had, and place a bouquet of red peonies shaped from spiritual energy on his grave.
Rou Bao Bu Chi Rou (Remnants of Filth: Yuwu (Novel) Vol. 1)
China’s import of chips—$260 billion in 2017, the year of Xi’s Davos debut—was far larger than Saudi Arabia’s export of oil or Germany’s export of cars. China spends more money buying chips each year than the entire global trade in aircraft. No product is more central to international trade than semiconductors.
Chris Miller (Chip War: The Fight for the World's Most Critical Technology)
I. My first thought was, he lied in every word, That hoary cripple, with malicious eye Askance to watch the workings of his lie On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford Suppression of the glee, that pursed and scored Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby. II. What else should he be set for, with his staff? What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare All travellers who might find him posted there, And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh Would break, what crutch 'gin write my epitaph For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare. III. If at his counsel I should turn aside Into that ominous tract which, all agree, Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly I did turn as he pointed, neither pride Now hope rekindling at the end descried, So much as gladness that some end might be. IV. For, what with my whole world-wide wandering, What with my search drawn out through years, my hope Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope With that obstreperous joy success would bring, I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring My heart made, finding failure in its scope. V. As when a sick man very near to death Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end The tears and takes the farewell of each friend, And hears one bit the other go, draw breath Freelier outside, ('since all is o'er,' he saith And the blow fallen no grieving can amend;') VI. When some discuss if near the other graves be room enough for this, and when a day Suits best for carrying the corpse away, With care about the banners, scarves and staves And still the man hears all, and only craves He may not shame such tender love and stay. VII. Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest, Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ So many times among 'The Band' to wit, The knights who to the Dark Tower's search addressed Their steps - that just to fail as they, seemed best, And all the doubt was now - should I be fit? VIII. So, quiet as despair I turned from him, That hateful cripple, out of his highway Into the path he pointed. All the day Had been a dreary one at best, and dim Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim Red leer to see the plain catch its estray. IX. For mark! No sooner was I fairly found Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, Than, pausing to throw backwards a last view O'er the safe road, 'twas gone; grey plain all round; Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound. I might go on, naught else remained to do. X. So on I went. I think I never saw Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve: For flowers - as well expect a cedar grove! But cockle, spurge, according to their law Might propagate their kind with none to awe, You'd think; a burr had been a treasure trove. XI. No! penury, inertness and grimace, In some strange sort, were the land's portion. 'See Or shut your eyes,' said Nature peevishly, It nothing skills: I cannot help my case: Tis the Last Judgement's fire must cure this place Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free.
Robert Browning
In this world there are many, many situations where giving someone something doesn't necessarily mean you'll receive anything in return. When you choose to give, you must remember this, or else the only one hurt will be you.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 2)
The lofty bookshelves sag Under thousands of sleeping souls Silence, hopeful - Every time I open a book, a soul is awakened.
Xi Chuan (Yours Truly & Other Poems)
The affairs of the past are like the waters flowing by: they cannot be returned.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 2)
Clarence was with me as concerned the revolution, but in a modified way. His idea was a republic, without privileged orders, but with a hereditary royal family at the head of it instead of an elective chief magistrate. He believed that no nation that had ever known the joy of worshiping a royal family could ever be robbed of it and not fade away and die of melancholy. I urged that kings were dangerous. He said, then have cats. He was sure that a royal family of cats would answer every purpose. They would be as useful as any other royal family, they would know as much, they would have the same virtues and the same treacheries, the same disposition to get up shindies with other royal cats, they would be laughably vain and absurd and never know it, they would be wholly inexpensive; finally, they would have as sound a divine right as any other royal house, and “Tom VII, or Tom XI, or Tom XIV by the grace of God King,” would sound as well as it would when applied to the ordinary royal tomcat with tights on.
Mark Twain (A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court)
O meu principal problema é uma coisa chamada di-os-to-se bu-co-ma-xi-lo-fa-ci-al, que, aliás, levei uma eternidade para aprender a falar. Mas também tenho outra síndrome que eu nem consigo pronunciar. E essas coisas meio que se juntaram em uma grande supercoisa, tão rara que nem tem nome. Quer dizer, não quero me gabar nem nada, mas sou considerado um tipo de milagre da medicina, sabe?
R.J. Palacio
Conscientious parents, aware of their educational duties, have a primal and original right to determine that the children which God has given them should be educated in the spirit of true faith.
Pope Pius XI
God knows that, as we are prone to sin, so, when conscience is thoroughly awaked, we are as prone to despair for sin; and therefore he would have us know, that he setteth himself in the covenant of grace to triumph in Christ over the greatest evils and enemies we fear, and that his thoughts are not as our thoughts are, Isa. v. 8; that he is God, and not man, Hos. xi. 9; that there are heights, and depths, and breadths of mercy in him above all the depths of our sin and misery, Eph. iii. 18; that we should never be in such a forlorn condition, wherein there should be ground of despair, considering our sins be the sins of men, his mercy the mercy of an infinite God.
Richard Sibbes (The Bruised Reed)
Yan Wushi thought that he could look at Shen Qiao’s earnest expression hundreds of times without growing bored. In the past, he’d wanted this man to fall into the pitch-black abyss, to hate and curse the world, but he now adored his warm and gentle heart with that same fervency.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 4)
Paths of the mirror" I And above all else, to look with innocence. As if nothing was happening, which is true. II But you, I want to look at you until your face escapes from my fear like a bird from the sharp edge of the night. III Like a girl made of pink chalk on a very old wall that is suddenly washed away by the rain. IV Like when a flower blooms and reveals the heart that isn’t there. V Every gesture of my body and my voice to make myself into the offering, the bouquet that is abandoned by the wind on the porch. VI Cover the memory of your face with the mask of who you will be and scare the girl you once were. VII The night of us both scattered with the fog. It’s the season of cold foods. VIII And the thirst, my memory is of the thirst, me underneath, at the bottom, in the hole, I drank, I remember. IX To fall like a wounded animal in a place that was meant to be for revelations. X As if it meant nothing. No thing. Mouth zipped. Eyelids sewn. I forgot. Inside, the wind. Everything closed and the wind inside. XI Under the black sun of the silence the words burned slowly. XII But the silence is true. That’s why I write. I’m alone and I write. No, I’m not alone. There’s somebody here shivering. XIII Even if I say sun and moon and star I’m talking about things that happen to me. And what did I wish for? I wished for a perfect silence. That’s why I speak. XIV The night is shaped like a wolf’s scream. XV Delight of losing one-self in the presaged image. I rose from my corpse, I went looking for who I am. Migrant of myself, I’ve gone towards the one who sleeps in a country of wind. XVI My endless falling into my endless falling where nobody waited for me –because when I saw who was waiting for me I saw no one but myself. XVII Something was falling in the silence. My last word was “I” but I was talking about the luminiscent dawn. XVIII Yellow flowers constellate a circle of blue earth. The water trembles full of wind. XIX The blinding of day, yellow birds in the morning. A hand untangles the darkness, a hand drags the hair of a drowned woman that never stops going through the mirror. To return to the memory of the body, I have to return to my mourning bones, I have to understand what my voice is saying.
Alejandra Pizarnik (Extracting the Stone of Madness: Poems 1962 - 1972)
La masse (...) hait l'image de l'homme car la masse est incohérente, pousse dans tous les sens à la fois et annule l'effort créateur. Il est certes mauvais que l'homme écrase le troupeau. Mais ne cherche point là le grand esclavage: il se montre quand le troupeau écrase l'homme. (chapitre XI)
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (Citadelle)
I’ve always done as I pleased without a single regret. This isn’t for atonement, much less something as laughable as guilt. You don’t need to feel indebted to me, or go as far as to harbor some self-serving, wishful thoughts about the meaning of it all. That would only make me want to throw up.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
Of course, there are many people with evil intentions in this world, but there are even more people willing to lend a helping hand. I wish to remember those people, not the things that will only bring me despair and suffering.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
Bei Ye didn’t respond. All this while, he only let Chen Nian gaze at his side profile, stubbornly refusing to let her look into his eyes. But Chen Nian knew. Last night, he hugged her the entire time, his tears falling onto her eyes as his body was wracked with silent sobs. He had stopped at several intervals, but it wasn’t long before his tears would begin to flow once more.
Jiu Yue Xi (少年的你,如此美丽)
Yan Wushi glanced at Shen Qiao, then quickly dropped his head and mumbled, “Feed me.” Shen Qiao fell silent. After a long time with no reply, Yan Wushi raised his head to look at Shen Qiao, then said hesitantly, “Like last time… Kis…
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
Dao is like water, benefiting all living things while keeping none for itself. The law of Dao is to be what it is. People who follow the law of Dao should soften their own glare and unify themselves with the ordinary. Only those who comply to the natural order of things and sense the common feelings shared among people can achieve the real Dao.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 2)
Sullivan became increasingly convinced, the individual is simply not the unit to study. Human beings are inseparable, always and inevitably, from their interpersonal field. The individual’s personality takes shape in an environment composed of other people. The individual is in continual interaction with other people. The personality or self is not something that resides “inside” the individual, but rather something that appears in interactions with others. “Personality . . . is made manifest in interpersonal situations and not otherwise” (1938, p. 32), Sullivan suggested. Personality is “the relatively enduring pattern of recurrent interpersonal situations which characterize a human life” (1940, p. xi).
Stephen A. Mitchell (Freud and Beyond: A History of Modern Psychoanalytic Thought)
And that though one man may tell another how he should pray: yet, as I said before, he cannot pray, nor make his condition known to God, except the Spirit help.  It is not the Common Prayer-Book that can do this.  It is the Spirit that showeth us our sins, and the Spirit that showeth us a Saviour, Jn. xvi. 16, and the Spirit that stirreth up in our hearts desires to come to God, for such things as we stand in need of, Matt. xi. 27, even sighing out our souls unto Him for them with groans which cannot be uttered.  With other words to the
John Bunyan (Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners)
The Sun Tzu School (which wrote the Art of War) surely never imagined that their antiwar, pro-empire treatise would become known and accepted after the fall of the first empire as a text on military tactics. Likewise, they would have been surprised to see the Ping-fa military metaphor—an inspired teaching device—come to be seen as the message and not the medium.
David G. Jones
After a moment, he opened them again, reaching down to carefully stroke Shen Qiao’s cheek. Then his hand meandered to the back to grasp his nape, pulling him up a little. Finally, he lowered his own head and swallowed each one of those incessant murmurs, taking them into his mouth.
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 3)
The flowers have already bloomed to their most beautiful and luxuriant form; if they bloom even longer, they will only start withering away. Sending them off on their journey now will leave their most perfect image imprinted in your heart. Isn’t that a good thing?” His five fingers closed into a fist, and the piece of fallen leaf in his hand was immediately pulverized into a fine powder, rustling as it fell from his fingers. “In this world, if one cannot live vigorously and freely in accordance to their own desires and inclinations, then what is the point? Humans are not that different from flowers.
Meng Xi Shi (千秋 [Qian Qiu])
Some people were unaware of the evil in the world and gave their kindness indiscriminately. In the end, all it did was exhaust them and others both. But there were some people who did see through to the evil, and that insight was precisely why they refused to change—why they carried on being gentle and tenderhearted
Meng Xi Shi (Thousand Autumns: Qian Qiu (Novel) Vol. 1)
Many people believe that it is OK to be like China for a time, because when the crisis ends we can go back to being like Britain again. These people are making a serious mistake. We cannot switch in and out of totalitarianism at will. Because a free society is a question of attitude, it is dead once the attitude changes.
Michael P. Senger (Snake Oil: How Xi Jinping Shut Down the World)
Toward the end of the meeting, Xi asked about Trump. Again, Obama suggested that the Chinese wait and see what the new administration decided to do in office, but he noted that the president-elect had tapped into real concerns among Americans about the fairness of our economic relationship with China. Xi is a big man who moves slowly and deliberately, as if he wants people to notice his every motion. Sitting across the table from Obama, he pushed aside the binder of talking points that usually shape the words of a Chinese leader. We prefer to have a good relationship with the United States, he said, folding his hands in front of him. That is good for the world. But every action will have a reaction. And if an immature leader throws the world into chaos, then the world will know whom to blame.
Ben Rhodes (The World As It Is: A Memoir of the Obama White House)
To describe adequately is the high power & one of the highest enjoyments of man. She was beautiful and he fell in love with her. The thing has happened to millions, yet how few can tell the story. Try some of them, set them at the painting; each knows it all & can communicate nothing. Then comes Shakspeare [sic], & tells it point for point as it befel [sic], or better; and now we have two things, love & literature.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1848–1851 (Volume XI) (Ralph Waldo Emerson))
Daily media reports of China’s “aggressive” behavior and unwillingness to accept the “international rules-based order” established by the US after World War II describe incidents and accidents reminiscent of 1914. At the same time, a dose of self-awareness is due. If China were “just like us” when the US burst into the twentieth century brimming with confidence that the hundred years ahead would be an American era, the rivalry would be even more severe, and war even harder to avoid. If it actually followed in America’s footsteps, we should expect to see Chinese troops enforcing Beijing’s will from Mongolia to Australia, just as Theodore Roosevelt molded “our hemisphere” to his liking. China is following a different trajectory than did the United States during its own surge to primacy. But in many aspects of China’s rise, we can hear echoes. What does President Xi Jinping’s China want?
Graham Allison (Destined For War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides's Trap?)
The Convergence of the Twain Thomas Hardy, 1840 - 1928 (Lines on the loss of the “Titanic”) I In a solitude of the sea Deep from human vanity, And the Pride of Life that planned her, stilly couches she. II Steel chambers, late the pyres Of her salamandrine fires, Cold currents thrid, and turn to rhythmic tidal lyres. III Over the mirrors meant To glass the opulent The sea-worm crawls—grotesque, slimed, dumb, indifferent. IV Jewels in joy designed To ravish the sensuous mind Lie lightless, all their sparkles bleared and black and blind. V Dim moon-eyed fishes near Gaze at the gilded gear And query: “What does this vaingloriousness down here?”. . . VI Well: while was fashioning This creature of cleaving wing, The Immanent Will that stirs and urges everything VII Prepared a sinister mate For her—so gaily great— A Shape of Ice, for the time far and dissociate. VIII And as the smart ship grew In stature, grace, and hue In shadowy silent distance grew the Iceberg too. IX Alien they seemed to be: No mortal eye could see The intimate welding of their later history. X Or sign that they were bent By paths coincident On being anon twin halves of one August event, XI Till the Spinner of the Years Said “Now!” And each one hears, And consummation comes, and jars two hemispheres.
Thomas Hardy
Over decades in power, the CCP had constructed a multilayered system for stifling dissent in China based on the Soviet psychological warfare technique of Zersetzung, which translates roughly to “psychological decomposition.”[96] The regime’s threats instill fear of open discourse about reality, resulting in self-censorship. To avoid the cognitive dissonance of this silence, individuals willfully play down the evidence before their own eyes. The collective psychological effects are deceptively enormous.
Michael P. Senger (Snake Oil: How Xi Jinping Shut Down the World)
Что бы с вами ни случилось - ничего не принимайте близко к сердцу. Немногое на свете долго бывает важным (Гл. I). Но кем бы ты ни был - поэтом, полубогом или идиотом, все равно, - каждые несколько часов ты должен спускаться с неба на землю, чтобы помочиться. От этого не уйти. Ирония природы. Романтическая радуга над рефлексами желез, над пищеварительным урчанием (Гл. II). Свободен лишь тот, кто утратил все, ради чего стоит жить (Гл. III). Париж - единственный в мире город, где можно отлично проводить время, ничем по существу не занимаясь (Гл. IV). Равик смотрел в окно. О чем еще думать? У него уже почти ничего не осталось. Он жил, и этого было достаточно. Он жил в неустойчивую эпоху. К чему пытаться что-то строить, если вскоре все неминуемо рухнет? Уж лучше плыть по течению, не растрачивая сил, ведь они - единственное, что невозможно восстановить. Выстоять! Продержаться до тех пор, пока снова не появится цель. И чем меньше истратишь сил, тем лучше, - пусть они останутся про запас. В век, когда все рушится, вновь и вновь, с муравьиным упорством строить солидную жизнь? Он знал, сколько людей терпело крах на этом пути. Это было трогательно, героично, смешно... и бесполезно. Только подрывало силы. Невозможно удержать лавину, катящуюся с гор. И всякий, кто попытается это сделать, будет раздавлен ею. Лучше переждать, а потом откапывать заживо погребенных. В дальний поход бери легкую поклажу. При бегстве тоже... (Гл. IV) Почему набожные люди так нетерпимы? Самый легкий характер у циников, самый невыносимый - у идеалистов. Не наталкивает ли это вас на размышления? (Гл. VI) Дешево только то, что носишь без чувства уверенности в себе (Гл. VIII). Если выберусь отсюда, поеду в Италию. В Фьезоле. Там у меня тихий старый дом с садом. Хочу пожить там немного. Теперь в Фьезоле еще, пожалуй, прохладно. Бледное весеннее солнце. В полдень на южной стене дома появляются первые ящерицы. Вечером из Флоренции доносится перезвон колоколов. А ночью сквозь кипарисы видны луна и звезды. В доме есть книги и большой камин. Перед ним деревянные скамьи, можно посидеть у огонька. В камине специальный держатель для стакана, чтобы подогревать вино. И совсем нет людей. Только двое стариков, муж и жена. Следят за порядком (Гл. XI). Любить - это когда хочешь с кем-то состариться (Гл. XI). Давай-ка посидим, полюбуемся красивейшей в мире улицей, восславим этот мягкий вечер и хладнокровно плюнем отчаянию в морду (Гл. XII). Длинные, нескончаемые ряды домов, протянувшиеся вдоль бесконечных улиц; ряд окон, а за ними - целые пачки человеческих судеб... (Гл. XII). Нет. Мы не умираем. Умирает время. Проклятое время. Оно умирает непрерывно. А мы живем. Мы неизменно живем. Когда ты просыпаешься, на дворе весна, когда засыпаешь - осень, а между ними тысячу раз мелькают зима и лето, и, если мы любим друг друга, мы вечны и бессмертны, как биение сердца, или дождь, или ветер, - и это очень много. Мы выгадываем дни, любимая моя, и теряем годы! Но кому какое дело, кого это тревожит? Мгновение радости - вот жизнь! Лишь оно ближе всего к вечности. Твои глаза мерцают, звездная пыль струится сквозь бесконечность, боги дряхлеют, но твои губы юны. Между нами трепещет загадка - Ты и Я, Зов и Отклик, рожденные вечерними сумерками, восторгами всех, кто любил... Это как сон лозы, перебродивший в бурю золотого хмеля... Крики исступленной страсти... Они доносятся из самых стародавних времен... Бесконечный путь ведет от амебы к Руфи, и Эсфири, и Елене, и Аспазии, к голубым Мадоннам придорожных часовен, от рептилий и животных - к тебе и ко мне... (Гл. XII).
Erich Maria Remarque (Arch of Triumph: A Novel of a Man Without a Country)
Domestic society being confirmed, therefore, by this bond of love, there should flourish in it that "order of love," as St. Augustine calls it. This order includes both the primacy of the husband with regard to the wife and children, the ready subjection of the wife and her willing obedience, which the Apostle commends in these words: "Let women be subject to their husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ is the head of the Church." This subjection, however, does not deny or take away the liberty which fully belongs to the woman both in view of her dignity as a human person, and in view of her most noble office as wife and mother and companion; nor does it bid her obey her husband's every request if not in harmony with right reason or with the dignity due to wife; nor, in fine, does it imply that the wife should be put on a level with those persons who in law are called minors, to whom it is not customary to allow free exercise of their rights on account of their lack of mature judgment, or of their ignorance of human affairs. But it forbids that exaggerated liberty which cares not for the good of the family; it forbids that in this body which is the family, the heart be separated from the head to the great detriment of the whole body and the proximate danger of ruin. For if the man is the head, the woman is the heart, and as he occupies the chief place in ruling, so she may and ought to claim for herself the chief place in love. Again, this subjection of wife to husband in its degree and manner may vary according to the different conditions of persons, place and time. In fact, if the husband neglect his duty, it falls to the wife to take his place in directing the family. But the structure of the family and its fundamental law, established and confirmed by God, must always and everywhere be maintained intact.
Pope Pius XI (Casti Connubii: On Christian Marriage)
finalement, éperdu d'amour et au comble de la frénésie érotique, je m'assis dans l'herbe et j'enlevai un de mes souliers en caoutchouc. — Je vais le manger pour toi, si tu veux. Si elle le voulait I Ha! Mais bien sûr qu'elle le voulait, voyons! C'était une vraie petite femme. --- Elle posa son cerceau par terre et s'assit sur ses ta-lons. Je crus voir dans ses yeux une lueur d'estime. Je n'en demandais pas plus. Je pris mon canif et enta-mai le caoutchouc. Elle me regardait faire. — Tu vas le manger cru ? — Oui. J'avalai un morceau, puis un autre. Sous son regard enfin admiratif, je me sentais devenir vraiment un homme. Et j'avais raison. Je venais de faire mon apprentissage. J'entamai le caoutchouc encore plus profondément, soufflant un peu, entre les bouchées, et je continuai ainsi un bon moment, jusqu'à ce qu'une sueur froide me montât au front. Je continuai même un peu au-delà, serrant les dents, luttant contre la nausée, ramassant toutes mes forces pour demeurer sur le terrain, comme il me fallut le faire tant de fois, depuis, dans mon métier d'homme. Je fus très malade, on me transporta à l'hôpital, ma mère sanglotait, Aniela hurlait, les filles de l'atelier geignaient, pendant qu'on me mettait sur un brancard dans l'ambulance. J'étais très fier de moi. Mon amour d'enfant m'inspira vingt ans plus tard mon premier roman Éducation européenne, et aussi certains passages du Grand Vestiaire. Pendant longtemps, à travers mes pérégrinations, j'ai transporté avec moi un soulier d'enfant en caoutchouc, entamé au couteau. J'avais vingt-cinq ans, puis trente, puis quarante, mais le soulier était toujours là, à portée de la main. J'étais toujours prêt à m'y attabler, à donner, une fois de plus, le meilleur de moi-même. Ça ne s'est pas trouvé. Finalement, j'ai abandonné le soulier quelque part derrière moi. On ne vit pas deux fois. (La promesse de l'aube, ch. XI)
Romain Gary (Promise at Dawn)
If the people merely have the right to vote, but no right of extensive participation, in other words, if they are awakened only at election time but go into hibernation afterwards, this is token democracy. Reviewing our experience with people's democracy since the founding of the PRC, we have made it clear that in such a vast and populous socialist country, extensive deliberation under the leadership of the CPC on major issues affecting the economy and the people's quality of life embodies the unity of democracy and centralism. Chinese socialist democracy takes two important forms: in one the people exercise their right to vote in elections, and in the other, people from all sectors of society undertake extensive deliberations before major decisions are made. In China, these two forms do not cancel one another out, nor are they contradictory; they are complimentary. They constitute institutional features and strengths of Chinese socialist democracy.
Xi Jinping (The Governance of China: Volume 2)
En un pergamino de una vara de alto el bufon mojando su pluma de pavo real en purpurina escribio el dodecalogo de la ley de venus que se fue inventando poco a poco en sus ratos libres i) la procreacion no es un instinto ii) la procreacion es la consecuencia ii a) ni siquiera obligada ii b) casi siempre temida ii c) con frecuencia evitada iii) la procreacion puede ser un anhelo iii a) de orden intelectual iii b) no intuitivo iv) la copula se realiza no pensando en el posible hijo por venir sino en iv a) la complacencia del amante iv b) la satisfaccion de la libido ya que v) innumeros gestos sexuales no son fecundos vi) la copula se perfecciona en si misma no en ningun otro fin ulterior y distinto vii) en la sola idea contraria duerme el huevo de los metodos que evitan el fruto vii a) tangible vii b) no espiritual huidizo amoroso viii) el hijo puede desearse pero su presencia viii a) acontece al margen del instinto sexual e incluso viii b) puede llegar a ser su precio ix) la naturaleza en su sabiduria ix a) brinda al hijo como premio que se otorga a ella misma ix b) encela al macho y a la hembra con el señuelo del deleite sexual x) el instinto sexual x a) no cesa con la noticia del embarazo x b) salta todas las barreras x c) vive y muere con el individuo y en el xi) el amor es un sentimiento bravo xii) el cariño es un sentimiento manso y bonancible
Camilo José Cela (Oficio de tinieblas 5)
And God himself will have his servants, and his graces, tried and exercised by difficulties. He never intended us the reward for sitting still; nor the crown of victory, without a fight; nor a fight, without an enemy and opposition. Innocent Adam was unfit for his state of confirmation and reward, till he had been tried by temptation. therefore the martyrs have the most glorious crown, as having undergone the greatest trial. and shall we presume to murmur at the method of God? And Satan, having liberty to tempt and try us, will quickly raise up storms and waves before us, as soon as we are set to sea: which make young beginners often fear, that they shall never live to reach the haven. He will show thee the greatness of thy former sins, to persuade thee that they shall not be pardoned. he will show thee the strength of thy passions and corruption, to make thee think they will never be overcome. he will show thee the greatness of the opposition and suffering which thou art like to undergo, to make thee think thou shall never persevere. He will do his worst to poverty, losses , crosses, injuries, vexations, and cruelties, yea , and unkind dearest friends, as he did by Job, to ill of God, or of His service. If he can , he will make them thy enemies that are of thine own household. He will stir up thy own father, or mother, or husband, or wife, or brother, or sister, or children, against thee, to persuade or persecute thee from Christ: therefore Christ tells us, that if we hate not all these that is cannot forsake them, and use them as men do hated things; when they would turn us from him, we cannot be his disciples". Look for the worst that the devil can do against thee, if thou hast once lifted thyself against him, in the army of Christ, and resolvest, whatever it cost thee, to be saved. Read heb.xi. But How little cause you have to be discouraged, though earth and hell should do their worst , you may perceive by these few considerations. God is on your side, who hath all your enemies in his hand, and can rebuke them, or destroy them in a moment. O what is the breath or fury of dust or devils, against the Lord Almighty? "If God be for us, who can be against us?" read often that chapter, Rom. viii. In the day when thou didst enter into covenant with God, and he with thee, thou didst enter into the most impregnable rock and fortress, and house thyself in that castle of defense, where thought mayst (modestly)defy all adverse powers of earth or hell. If God cannot save thee, he is not God. And if he will not save thee, he must break his covenant. Indeed, he may resolve to save thee, not from affliction and persecution, but in it, and by it. But in all these sufferings you will "be more than conquerors, through Christ that loveth you;" that is, it is far more desirable and excellent, to conquer by patience, in suffering for Christ, than to conquer our persecutors in the field, by force arms. O think on the saints triumphant boastings in their God:" God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble: therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea". when his " enemies were many" and "wrested his words daily," and "fought against him, and all their thoughts were against him, " yet he saith, "What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee. in God I will praise his word; in God I have put my trust: I will not fear what flesh can do unto me". Remember Christ's charge, " Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: fear him, which after he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you , Fear him" if all the world were on they side, thou might yet have cause to fear; but to have God on thy side, is infinitely more. Practical works of Richard Baxter,Ch 2 Directions to Weak Christians for Their Establishment and Growth, page 43.
Richard Baxter
Do you know what kind of a world we live in? We live in a world where, if a man came up with a sure cure for cancer, and if that man were found to be married to his sister, his neighbors would righteously burn down his house and all his notes. If a man built the most beautiful tower in the country, and that man later begins to believe that Satan should be worshipped, they’ll blow up his tower. I know a great and moving book written by a woman who later went quite crazy and wrote crazy books, and nobody will read her great one any more. I can name three kinds of mental therapy that could have changed the face of the earth, and in each case the men who found it went on to insane Institutes and so-called religions and made fools of themselves—dangerous fools at that—and now no one will look at their really great early discoveries. Great politicians have been prevented from being great statesmen because they were divorced. And I wasn’t going to have the Mensch machine stolen or buried or laughed at and forgotten just because I had long hair and played the lute. You know, it’s easy to have long hair and play the lute and be kind to people when everyone else around you is doing it. It’s a much harder thing to be the one who does it first, because then you have to pay a price, you get jeered at and they throw stones and shut you out.
Theodore Sturgeon (The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon, Volume XI: The Nail and the Oracle)