24 Mar
There is a place where things have been seen as they truly are, and where they will be seen as they truly are.
The moments wherein things come more clearly into focus are called beauty.
Our journey is about learning to see those things more and more clearly, and about responding appropriately.
Right now I’m not doing a very good job.
23 Mar
So just when I was feeling depressed about the future of the world (and, of course, the future of old Fionnbharr,) those wonderful little Eraslings go and spoil it by being inspiring.
Good show young friends.
21 Mar
“If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were ever our countrymen.”
— Samuel Adams
21 Mar
From First Thoughts: The Good Fight
From The Washington Post: Anonymity: A secret fix for campaign finance
17 Mar
It seems appropriate on St. Patrick’s day to post an article by an angry Brit. Maybe there’s hope for that backwards little country yet.
16 Mar
So I’m stealing these from the Anchoress:
A few thoughts on power:
“The fundamental article of my political creed is that despotism, or unlimited sovereignty, or absolute power, is the same in a majority of a popular assembly, an aristocratic council, an oligarchical junto, and a single emperor.”
– John Adams
“In a country where the sole employer is the State, opposition means death by slow starvation. The old principle: Who does not work shall not eat, has been replaced by a new one: Who does not obey shall not eat.”
– Trotsky
“Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people.”
— John Quincy Adams
“Despotism can be a development, often a late development and very often indeed the end of societies that have been highly democratic. A despotism may almost be defined as a tired democracy.”
— G.K. Chesterton
“The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving the servants of tyranny a good conscience.”
— Camus
“Power is not alluring to pure minds.”
— Thomas JeffersonOne more quote, from Pope John Paul II:
“The fundamental error of socialism is anthropological in nature. Socialism considers the individual person simply as an element, a molecule within the social organism, so that the good of the individual is completely subordinated to the functioning of the socio-economic mechanism. Socialism likewise maintains that the good of the individual can be realized without reference to his free choice, to the unique and exclusive responsibility which he exercises in the face of good or evil. Man is reduced to a series of social relationships, and the concept of the person as the autonomous subject of moral decisions disappears.”
25 Feb
So, yeah, I took the GREs today. Over. Done with. Finally I can move on to more important things. Right now I’m just planning on drinking hot toddies, reading mysteries, and maybe watching John Adams until I recover from this terrible cold.
Right now I just thought I’d toss my relief up on this page, and also maybe have a little fun. Johnny Cash’s new album is coming out and there’s a song on it, one of the last the Man in Black wrote, which was inspired by the following passage from Paul:
50 Τοῦτο δέ φημι, ἀδελφοί, ὅτι σὰρξ καὶ αἷμα βασιλείαν θεοῦ κληρονομῆσαι οὐ δύναται, οὐδὲ ἡ φθορὰ τὴν ἀφθαρσίαν κληρονομεῖ. 51 ἰδοὺ μυστήριον ὑμῖν λέγω: πάντες οὐ κοιμηθησόμεθα, πάντες δὲ ἀλλαγησόμεθα, 52 ἐν ἀτόμῳ, ἐν ῥιπῇ ὀφθαλμοῦ, ἐν τῇ ἐσχάτῃ σάλπιγγι: σαλπίσει γάρ, καὶ οἱ νεκροὶ ἐγερθήσονται ἄφθαρτοι, καὶ ἡμεῖς ἀλλαγησόμεθα. 53 δεῖ γὰρ τὸ φθαρτὸν τοῦτο ἐνδύσασθαι ἀφθαρσίαν καὶ τὸ θνητὸν τοῦτο ἐνδύσασθαι ἀθανασίαν. 54 ὅταν δὲ τὸ θνητὸν τοῦτο ἐνδύσηται [τὴν] ἀθανασίαν, τότε γενήσεται ὁ λόγος ὁ γεγραμμένος, κατεπόθη ὁ θάνατος εἰς νῖκος. 55 ποῦ σου, θάνατε, τὸ νῖκος; ποῦ σου, θάνατε, τὸ κέντρον; 56 τὸ δὲ κέντρον τοῦ θανάτου ἡ ἁμαρτία, ἡ δὲ δύναμις τῆς ἁμαρτίας ὁ νόμος. 57 τῷ δὲ θεῷ χάρις τῷ διδόντι ἡμῖν τὸ νῖκος διὰ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ. 58 ὥστε, ἀδελφοί μου ἀγαπητοί, ἑδραῖοι γίνεσθε, ἀμετακίνητοι, περισσεύοντες ἐν τῷ ἔργῳ τοῦ κυρίου πάντοτε, εἰδότες ὅτι ὁ κόπος ὑμῶν οὐκ ἔστιν κενὸς ἐν κυρίῳ.
Except that I don’t think ol’ Johnny was reading it in Greek. Hmm…
50 Hoc autem dico, fratres : quia caro et sanguis regnum Dei possidere non possunt : neque corruptio incorruptelam possidebit. 51 Ecce mysterium vobis dico : omnes quidem resurgemus, sed non omnes immutabimur. 52 In momento, in ictu oculi, in novissima tuba : canet enim tuba, et mortui resurgent incorrupti : et nos immutabimur. 53 Oportet enim corruptibile hoc induere incorruptionem : et mortale hoc induere immortalitatem. 54 Cum autem mortale hoc induerit immortalitatem, tunc fiet sermo, qui scriptus est : Absorpta est mors in victoria. 55 Ubi est mors victoria tua? ubi est mors stimulus tuus? 56 Stimulus autem mortis peccatum est : virtus vero peccati lex. 57 Deo autem gratias, qui dedit nobis victoriam per Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum. 58 Itaque fratres mei dilecti, stabiles estote, et immobiles : abundantes in opere Domini semper, scientes quod labor vester non est inanis in Domino.
Hmm…that…doesn’t seem quite right either.
How about this:
50 Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot possess the kingdom of God: neither shall corruption possess incorruption. 51 Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall all indeed rise again: but we shall not all be changed. 52 In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet: for the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall rise again incorruptible. And we shall be changed. 53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption: and this mortal must put on immortality. 54 And when this mortal has put on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: Death is swallowed up in victory. 55 O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? 56 Now the sting of death is sin: and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God, who has given us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 58 Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast and unmoveable: always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.
24 Feb
Going along with the theme of memory that will hopefully one day be established on this site, this is an interesting little article from First Things’ On the Square:
24 Feb
I started this blog ostensibly to write about poetry (and the intention is very particularly to attempt to work out some ideas that I’ve been kicking around about Hamlet.) However, writing about poetry is hard, and even more so when one is getting ready to take the GREs (they’ve been rescheduled to tomorrow, for those of you who were praying for me two weeks ago before they were snowed out.)
So, as I’ve said, writing about poetry is hard. Writing about politics, however, tends to be easier, and posting things that other people have written about politics easier still. So here, just a little bit late, a with only a little bit more ado, is a bit of Mr. Washington’s Farewell Address:
Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally.
This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.
The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of public liberty.
