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Imagined Security is the Forerunner of Destruction
When each individual has subdued one’s own spirits, then there will be no war and no other enemies to conquer. Life and mind, being closely connected with the functioning of the body, must be conceived of in a way that does justice to the peculiar intimacy of this relationship. The fundamental issue in resolving traumatic stress is to restore the proper balance between the rational and emotional brains, so that you can feel in charge of how you respond and how you conduct your life. When we are provoked into states of hyper—or hypoarousal, we are pushed into an uncomfortable zone, where we are not able to tolerate as much as we usually are able to, and we are no longer in a range of optimal functioning. We become reactive and disorganized; we are not always able to hold back our emotions and may say things out of anger or react unusually. Sounds and lights bother us, unwanted images from the past invade our minds, and we panic, get nervous or become outraged. Our bodies may feel numb, our minds may slow down, and we may not be able to process information as easily, we may lose balance and have trouble standing, sitting, and walking because the chemistry in our bodies is in a state of shock. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
The noblest of all victories, that over ourselves. Human behavior falls under the concept of motion, which is widely applicable in the natural World. The soul is virtually the principal of all life, and there are different levels of life. The soul is that which keeps a person alive and it leaves the body when a person dies. It is connected with breathing. Spirit, on the other hand, is thought of as the generator of movement; it is connected with the movement of the limbs and with emotional states. The spirit is quite distinct both from the soul and from the mind, which is regarded as the source of images and ideas. In mathematics, the soul grasps forms that are eternal and nondeceptive. As like can be known only by like, the soul, in its rational aspect, must also be eternal. The slave is being made to remember what one had known previous to one’s embodiment. Reason, spirit, and desire represent different levels of being alive. To be alive is to possess a self-originating tendency toward an end. This is exhibited at the lowest level in nutrition and reproduction. Thus, plants have a low-grade soul. Animals have sensation, locomotion, and desire superimposed upon nutrition and reproduction. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
Humans, in addition, have reason, or mind, by means of which a rule or plan is imposed upon desire. By mind is meant self-direction in accordance with a rational formula. The lower soul is a necessary condition for the higher and the possession of a higher type of soul also changes the way in which the lower functions. Because people are rational, they feed, reproduce, perceive and act in a manner which differs from that of animals. The rational soul is an active agency which inhabits the body for a brief period, it is located in the head because the head is round (the most perfect shape, and hence, an appropriate place for the seat of reason) and the part of the body nearest the Heavens. It makes contact with the brain, which is conceived as a kind of marrow encased in the skull. The irrational soul makes contact with the marrow of the spinal cord in its bony sheath. The better part of the irrational soul, spirit, inhabits the heart and functions in such manifestations of life as energy, courage, and ambition; the worse part, desire, functions below the diaphragm, in appetite nutrition, and reproduction. The rational and irrational parts affect each other through the liver, which acts as a sort of mirror of thought. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
Over their passions and their weaknesses, mortals cannot keep a curb too strong. In sleep, the soul is shut up, and its motions subside. A few agitations remain, however, and produce dreams. Usually dreams are the expressions of desires which are suppressed. The good person controls their desires sensibly and so is not unduly disturbed by them in sleep. In sleep, the rational soul, if not troubled by irrational desires, can attain truths not otherwise revealed. It is not the dream that creates the phantasy, but the activity of unconscious phantasy that plays the leading part in the formation of the dream-thoughts. Almost everything that is ascribed to the dream-work is attributable to the activity of the unconscious during the day, which instigates dreams no less than neurotic symptoms. We have involved ourselves by our advance into the dark regions of psychology. This proves that the most complex mental operations are possible without the cooperation of consciousness—a truth which we have had to learn anyhow from every psychoanalysis of a patient suffering from hysteria or obsessions. These dream-thoughts are certainly not in themselves incapable of consciousness; if we have not become conscious of them during the day, this may have been due to various reasons. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
The act of becoming conscious depends upon a definite psychic function—attention—being brought to bear. This seems to be available only in a determinate quantity, which may have been diverted from the train of thought in questions by other aims. If we want to change posttraumatic reactions, we have to access the emotional brain and do limbic system therapy: repairing faulty alarm systems and restoring the emotional brain to its ordinary job of being a quiet background presence that takes care of the housekeeping of the body, ensuring that you eat, sleep, connect with intimate partners, protect your children, and defend against danger. Learning how to breathe calmly and remaining in a state of relative physical relaxation, even while accessing painful and horrifying memories, is an essential tool for recovery. We believe that a certain quantity of excitation, called cathectic energy is displaced from a purposive idea along the association paths selected by this directing idea. The only way we can consciously access the emotional brain is through self-awareness, i.e. by activating the medial prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that notices what is going on inside of us and thus allows us to feel what we are feeling. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
Most of our conscious brain is dedicated to focusing on the outside World: getting along with others and making plans for the future. However, that does not help us manage ourselves. Neuroscience research shows that the only way we can change the way we feel is becoming aware of our inner experience and learning to befriend what is going on inside of ourselves. Sensation is a transmission of motions. The human body receives an impression from without and responds with an inner motion. Some parts of the body—for instance, the hair and the nails—are subject to shock but do not respond with inner movements. Sense organs, however, are good conductors of motion. Thus, hearing, for instance, is the end product of a kind of shock. By means of air in the cavities of the body a blow transmitted through the ears to the blood and brain and then the soul. Knowledge does not consist just in sensation, but in the activity of the soul in relation to what is transmitted. This transmission is complicated by the intervention of memory, imagination, feeling, and association, all of which act as intermediaries between reason and sensation. Emotional regulation is the critical issue in managing the effects of trauma and neglect. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
Love is the Beauty of the Soul—All Love in Not Created Equally
I meant to be uncommonly cleaver in taking so decided a dislike to him, without any reason. It is such a spur to one’s genius, such an opening for wit to have a dislike of that kind. One may be continually abusive without saying anything just; but one cannot be always laughing at a man without now and then stumbling on something witty. There is no such thing as moral responsibility for past acts, no such thing as real justice in punishing them, for the reason that human beings are not stationary existences, but changing, growing, incessantly progressive organisms, which in no two moments are the same. Therefore justice, whose only possible mode of proceeding is to punish in present time for what is done in past time, must always punish a person more or less similar to, but never identical with, the one who committed the offense, and therein must be no justice. The World, being in the constant commission of vast quantities of injustice, is a little too apt to comfort itself with the idea that if the victim of its falsehood and malice have a clear conscience, he cannot fail to be sustained under his trials, and somehow or other to come right at last. Internal graces conquer the souls of the judicious. #RandolphHarris 1 of 13
I hate the man in whom kindness produces no responsive affection, and injustice no swell, no glow of resentment. Nothing, humanely speaking, can deserve higher respect than a profession in which a person devotes the labors of one’s life to the support of justice. The term eros (Greek erasthai) isused to refer to that part of love constituting a passionate, intense desire for something; it is a common desire that seeks transcendental beauty—the particular beauty of an individual reminds us of the true beauty that exists in the World of Forms or Ideas. One who loves the beautiful is called a lover because one partakes of it. The love we generate for beauty on this Earth can never be truly satisfied until we die; but in the meantime, we should aspire beyond the particular stimulating image in front of us to the contemplations of beauty in itself. Ideal beauty is reflected in the particular images of beauty we find, and becomes interchangeable across people and things, ideas, and art: to love is to love the form of beauty—not a particular individual, but the element they possess of true (Ideal) beauty. #RandolphHarris 2 of 13
Reciprocity is not necessary in the view of love, for the desire is for the object (of Beauty), then for, the company of another and shared values and pursuits. Reason is peculiar to humanity (and presumably to higher beings, if there are any). Love is an intrinsically higher value than appetitive or physical desire. Physical desire is held in common with the animal kingdom. Hence, it is of a lower order of reaction and stimulus than a rationally induced love—that is, a love produced by rational discourse and exploration of ideas, which in turn defines the pursuit of Ideal beauty. Accordingly, the physical love of an object, an idea, or a person in itself is not a proper form of love, love being a reflection of that part of the object, idea, or person, that partakes in Ideal beauty. Real love entails a fondness and appreciation of the other. The motivational distinctions are derived from love for another because the friendship is wholly useful as in the case of business contracts, or because their character and values are pleasing. If we wish to provide a rational reconstruction of our knowledge of the World, we must recognize the logical arbitrariness of the epistemological base. #RandolphHarris 3 of 13
Things that causes friendship are: doing kindnesses; doing them unasked; and not proclaiming the fact when they are done. The kinds of things we seek in proper friendship are those who share our dispositions, who bear no grudges, who seek what we do, who are temperate, and just, who admire us appropriately as we admire them, and so on. Friendships cannot emanate from those who are quarrelsome, gossips, aggressive in manner and personality, who are unjust, and so on. The best character, it follows, may produce the best kind of friendship and hence love: indeed, how to be a good character worthy of friendship is to be rational. The most rational people are the happiest. We must learn to live in the time current than from the past. The soul’s connection with the time current from the future, with what is coming-to-be rather than what has already been, is the soul’s connection with the World and God. Anyone who love lives in this time current from the future. While one is in love, the past is forgotten; one forgets the inbuilt limitations steaming from the past. All seems possible, and one sees only the future because it is right before your eyes, and you know the rest of your life will be the best of your life. #RandolphHarris 4 of 13
The gift of love is the truth, not only the truth of seeing another human being, but the truth of the World. Through the activity of love, we learn our own darkness as well as that of the beloved. And the greatest secret of love is that continuing to love in the face of such darkness. Love is a therapy that makes one want to change and become a better person and that is why a lot of people start going to church and therapy to consciously work toward this new kind of love. It is a complex character in relation to the World. However, when you learn to love that human instinct feels a connection to God and wants to be in his good graces. This connection ensure that love will not abandon the physical realm. Also, the work that is done between two souls has is true and circulates creating a dreamy state. This kind of love is a desire for perfection, you know you want to live right, be at peace and harmony and feel safe and comfortable. It is like when you wake up in the morning, you want a sense that everything is right. It is the American pie life. Your wife and her friends are talking about the cupcakes they baked, your daughter is picking flowers and son playing with his truck. #RandolphHarris 5 of 13
When you go to your den to read the morning paper, the sound of the bird singing in the tress is relaxing, as you sip your coffee with the scent of fresh laundry and lilac in the air. Love is not invented for love’s sake, but for life. Love makes the will strong and generally allows one to pull out of any negative situation. You think about the World and how you want your kid to grow up in a place where they are safe and this makes one live by the laws of God and obey the laws of man and set a good example so other can follow. God has made the soul’s journey in a practical way that is good and perfect and natural love is very much part of this journey. Love defines the experience of life and their efforts are to be respected and admired for it is the privilege and soul right of every individual to partake in God’s beautiful creation. This opportunity of love is the soul’s way of freedom, and without love, peace, and harmony, there would be no reason to exist. People ask why then is their suffering in the World, and it is because God wants us to be free, he does not want us to be slaves and be forced to do things the way he wants, it is a choice. #RandolphHarris 6 of 13
And with this freedom of will we have a choice to love God and do what is right and because not everyone loves God, there is evil in the World. If we all loved God and lived how we were supposed, there would be no problems on Earth and that is what God wants us to understand. These problems are not because of the Fall of Man, they are not caused by the Devil. All evil comes from humanity and what is in your heart. While on Earth and as you participate in your Divine Love experience, the natural love will always be part of your experience because you are a child of God, and it very much part of your soul force, part of the evolutionary experience of life. God wants us to help those around us to learn the Divine Love and to do this well. Place God like a deal over your heart, like a seal on your arm, for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave. It burns like blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot wash it away. If one were to give all the wealth of his or her house for love, it would be utterly scorned. #RandolphHarris 7 of 13
Ah, sinful nation, a people loaded with guilt, a brood of evildoers, children given to corruption! They have forsaken the LORD and turned their backs on him. Why should you be beaten anymore? Why do you persist in rebellion? Your whole head is injured, your whole heart afflicted. From the sole of your foot to the top of your head there is no soundness—only wounds and welts and open sores, not cleansed or bandages or soothed with oil. Your country is desolate, your cities burned with fire; your fields are being stripped by foreigners right before you, laid waste as when overthrown by standers. And it is all because you guys do not know unity, you do not take care of your own families first. You protest about injustice to foreigners, that is why your own people are being abused and killed. You ever stop and think about the people who get killed at work or going to work to provide a house for their family and paying their taxes? You ever stop and think about the veterans who have given their lives for their country and not here to protect their children? Where can their children run and hide for protection and shelter? #RandolphHarris 8 of 13
God does not want your burnt offerings in the blood of the innocent. When you come to appear before God, who has asked this of you, this trampling of his courts? Stop bringing God your meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to him. New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—God cannot bear your evil assemblies. Your New Moon festivals and your appointed feasts, his soul hates. They have become a burden to God; he is weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands in prayer, God will hide his eyes from you; even if you offer many prayers, he will not listen. Your hands are full of blood; wash and make yourselves clean. Take your evil deeds out of my sight! Stop doing wrong, learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow, say the Lord (Isaiah 1.16-17). Come now, let us reason together says the LORD. Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; through they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool. Of you are willing and obedient, you will eat the best from the land; but if you resist and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword. #RandolphHarris 9 of 13
See how the faithful city has become a harlot! She once was full of justice; righteousness used to dwell in this city—but now murderers! Your silver has become dross, your choice wine is diluted with water. Your rulers are rebels, companions of thieves; they all love bribes and chase after gifts. They do not defend the cause of the fatherless; the widow’s case does not come before them. Therefore, the Lord, the Lord Almighty, the Mighty One of the Universe, declares: Ah, I will get relief form my foes and avenge myself on my enemies. I will turn my hand against you; I will thoroughly purge away your dross and remove all your impurities. I will restore your judges as in days of old, your counselors as at the beginning. Afterward you will be called the City of Righteousness, the Faithful City. America will be redeemed with justice, her penitent ones with righteousness. However, rebels and sinners will both be broken, and those who forsake the LORD will perish. You will be ashamed because of the sacred oaks in which you have delighted; you will be disgraced because of the gardens that you have chosen. #RandolphHarris 10 of 13
Those who you who wish to keep living foul and sinning will be like an oak with fading leaves, like a garden without water. The mighty man will become tinder and his work a spark; both will be burned together with no one to quench the fire. Prudence is a virtue, equally with generosity; and people may be unjust to oneself, no less than to another. Would it not be justice to oblige every person who proposes a medicine to sale, first to make proof that it is harmless at least, by taking it? Offended justice is diligent in detecting the breakers of the law. Strong minds perceive that justice is the highest of the moral attributes; mercy is only the favorites of the weak ones. No love is more consuming and passionate than that one has for God. And nothing is more beautiful than that love. How much better it is to be useful than rich or fine; how much more amiable to be good than great. To do a kindness to a bad person is like sowing your seed in the white squall. The greatest merit anyone can have is to be good and useful. True love is the complete merger of two souls and when that happens all other aspects of life succeed. #RandolphHarris 11 of 13
Love is that intense pressure which you feel in your heart always latent, that appears to be dormant or lost when your mind’s impure thoughts overpower your emotions and you disconnect from love. Never dilute love with foreign matters and negative emotions. Impure love is no love. When you change or disguise the nature of love, you stop loving. There starts all the problems. The absence of love creates misery in every form. The deep feelings, the desire for a true connection is the union creates in love. Love occurs when you truly know someone. Finding someone attractive, liking, admiring, appreciating someone may not be love, but infatuation. To really love someone, first you must know yourself completely, love yourself, and be emotionally available. Love is a natural process which just occurs. Soul connections are eternal. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. To have a soul mate, you have to love someone’s soul, and that means seeing beyond what they can offer you or how they look, where they shop or live. Your soul mate makes you feel entirely intact. #RandolphHarris 12 of 13
We cannot speak of a direction for time as a whole, but only for certain segments in which relatively isolated (branch) systems undergo thermodynamic changes. For some segments (those in which processes may occur in such a way that entrophy decreases), we shall have to recognize the peculiar possibility of a reversal in time direction. People will flee to caves in the rocks and to holes in the ground from dread of the LORD and the splendor of his majesty, when he rises to shake the Earth. In the day people will throw away to the rodents and bats their idols of silver and idols of gold, which they made to worship. They will flee to caverns in the rocks and to the overhanging crags from the dread of the LORD and the splendor of his majesty, when he rises to shake the Earth. Stop trusting in humans, who has but a breath in their nostrils. Of what account is he? Surely, if one lives merely for one’s self, one pays a terrible price for doing so. Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. Unsought self-possession is a sure sign of good breeding. I have striven to be Thine, more than to be this World’s or mine own. Yet this is nothing; I leave eternity to Thee; for what is man that he should live out the lifetime of his God? God is in America. #RandolphHarris 13 of 13
Is the Sun of Blue Heaven Guilty of the Shadow it Casts?
The beauty and loveliness of friendship is too strong for dim eyes. The soul is form giving being to humans, and it assists in operation of the body and mind as a sailor presides over the operation of an already formed ship. It is important to control the mind, and for an individual to have a rapport with nature. God is identified with the regularity governing the World, and must be thought of as the essence or embodiment of regularity in general; as the totality of logical regularity, of natural laws, and of the laws of mental and spiritual life. All moral values disappear if God does not exist. Therefore, it is important for people to believe in God. Christ and his disciples through the ages have experienced the divine presence of God the loving Father and with it a sense of moral repentance and an inner energy of the spirit. As with all personal experience, no symbolic structure can act as substitute. Such structures are, in every field, merely hypothetical attempts to grasps experience. God lives in human’s consciousness. Before a new direction is sought, it is necessary to discern the error of the old and awaken a desire to transcend that error. This requires courage and fearless honesty. #RandolphHarris 1 of 10
The recovery from many serious and incurable, potentially fatal disorders is based on the willingness and capacity to face the truth and choose a different pathway. To break down denial and admit the truth takes one above the lower levels of humanity. Spiritual awakening is fostered by a desire for salvation and peace. The Human need for and experience of God’s presence proves his existence. Science and philosophy are masters of their own proper domain. Thus, God is the final reason of everything, but not necessarily the scientific explanation of anything. The idea of God is so embedded in the consciousness of human beings that we find some version of it in most legends. One knows but little of human nature who has not discovered that, to all who rise one step above the brutes, it is far pleasanter to starve and freeze after their own fashion than to be fed and clothes and worked upon compulsion. Friendship is a mighty pretty invention, and, next to love, gives of all things the greatest spirit to society. #RandolphHarris 2 of 10
We lie in nature very close to God; and though, further on, the stream may be corrupted by the banks it flows through; yet at the fountain’s rim, where humankind stand, there the stream infallibly bespeaks the fountain. Whatever the number of a person’s friends, there will be times in one’s life when one has too few; but if one has only one enemy, one is lucky indeed if one has not one too many. In life, however, it is sometimes difficult to say who does you the most mischief, enemies with the worst intentions, or friends with the best. Friendship is a passion. It entrances the being; it tears the soul. All loves of after life can never bring its rapture, or its wretchedness; no bliss so absorbing, no pangs of jealousy or despair so crushing and so keen! Our consciousness rarely registers the beginning of a growth within us any more than without us: there have been many circulations of the sap before we detect the smallest sign of the bud. What we say is important for in most cases the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. Equality is the soul of friendship. #RandolphHarris 3 of 10
When I do entertain, in the Summer, which is rare, I receive my guest on the front porch, set up wicker trays found at Draper James, and serve ice cold sweet tea, cucumber finger sandwiches, and miniature chess pies. The ice tea is so delicious that it can stand alone as a refreshment, but we like to embellish things a bit. There are different reasons for receiving guest. Visits of congratulations are paid after the birth of an infant; when it is also customary to send tasteful and elegant baskets or bouquets of flowers. Also, upon friends who have received an appointment to any office or dignity in the community, state, or government. If a friend has published a book, you call to congratulation him or her upon its success; or if one has delivered a lecture, sermon, or oration, which has elicited your applause, you express your high estimation of the discourse. A good orator is pointed and impassioned, and they get their subjects into the heart of the audience. It is also a good idea to pay visits of congratulation when you hear that your friends are intending to marry, and take upon themselves new responsibilities. #RandolphHarris 4 of 10
There are times when people must act as though life were equally sweet in any company. In this World, sometimes we experience sickness, sorrow, and bereavement, visits of condolence must occasionally be made; and, if possible, they should be paid within a week after death has entered the family circle. If your acquaintance is ceremonious, it is the custom, however, to wait until the family has appeared at church. One should send up your card, and ask if your friends will receive you; and it is in good taste for ladies to be attired in quiet apparel, rather than in bright, beautiful colours. And you do not necessarily have to wear black. In formal visiting, a card can be left in lieu of a call. In many places, it is customary to send invitations to friends to attend a funeral, and only those receiving cards are expected to attend. Notes are also usually sent to those who are requested to serve as pall-bearers. One should always leave it to those who are in affliction to make the first allusions to their bereavement. Grief is an experience common after the passing of a loved one. There is a crying for someone to help because we cannot do anything about it. #RandolphHarris 5 of 10
My idea of good company is the company of clever, well-informed people who have a great deal of conversation. That is the best. When calling upon friends at hotels, or boarding houses, always send up by an assistance, a request to see them; and never enter a room until you have received an invitation to do so. When a gentleman calls upon a lady, and finds a lady friend also visiting her, he should rise when she takes her leave, and accompany her to the hall door; and is she has a carriage, should hand her into it. Also, when arriving at someone’s house, do not blow the horn of the carriage, nor holler and scream like you lost your mind for them to open the door. Get out of the carriage, and ring the doorbell like a well-bred person with sanity. People generally want to keep their communities as quiet and peaceful as possible. Gentlemen should always carry their hats in their hands when paying morning or evening calls, but should not place them on the chairs or parlor table. Every well-bred man knows that a hat can be made a very graceful part of his attire, especially if he knows how to hold it. #RandolphHarris 6 of 10
In our country, we are allowed considerable freedom in receiving and paying visits, and can appear, in the daytime, in all public places. It is actually becoming proper for ladies and gentlemen to have brothers, husbands, or friends of either gender attend meetings with them for safety reasons. It was a common practice for women, in the Victorian ages, but people are now always preying on men. I had a friend who went to meet up with people I thought he knew well, and he came back with a missing tooth. I did not expect he would actually keep company with someone he was unfamiliar with, and thought it was some kind of skit. Nonetheless, it was not my business to advise him. People used to be able to attend public exhibitions, libraries, etc., and appear on the promenades alone, but this may no longer be the case. If you attempt such proceedings in a World class city, or even a small rural town, you may expose yourself to indignities which would annoy you sadly. In the United States of America, women and men, who behave with discretion, can go wherever they please without molestation; but an escort is always desirable, especially in the evening. #RandolphHarris 7 of 10
There is no light without its shade, no good without its inconvenience. It is not considered comme il faut for the lady of the house to accompany ceremonial visitors to the door; she merely rises from her seat, bows, or shakes hands, according to her intimacy when the persons, and if her ménage supplies a parlor assistance, she rings the bell to summon him to open the outer door. With intimate friends, one can do as they please, either accompanying them to the door, or leaving them to find their way out of the house alone, or calling an assistant to escort them. However, in these modern times, with people changing like the seasons and acting all brand new when you least expect it, it is best to be safe and see your guest find them way out. In almost everything, we act on probabilities. Good sense will shew you the power of self-conquest, and point out its means. It should be the desire of us all to be well-bred, but it is not a veneering that can be applied, or laid aside at pleasure. Keeping witty company sharpens the apprehension. #RandolphHarris 8 of 10
More light a candle and fewer to curse the darkness. We should carry our good manners everywhere; and unless we cultivate them constantly, and exercise them upon all occasions, and towards all persons, they can never become a part of ourselves; and when we try to assume them, they will often fail us at our greatest need. If you are impolite to your washerwoman, or to your maid, you are in great danger of being so to those whose good opinion your desire to possess. Life is full of the saddest and the strongest contrasts. The charm which true politeness sheds over its possessors, is not easily described; yet, it is felt by everyone, and invariably responded to by the best feelings of their nature. It is the secret sympathy, the silver link, like the silken tie, which heart to hearts, and mind to mind, in body and in soul can bind. A companionable man or woman will put up with many inconveniences for the sake of enjoying agreeable society. The wine cannot be bad where the company is agreeable. #RandolphHarris 9 of 10
Glorious Father in Heaven, filled with compassion for those who invoke you and with love for those who suffer, heavily laden with the weight of our troubles, we cast ourselves at your feet and humbly beg you to take the present affair which we recommend to you under your special protection and make the rest of our lives the best of our lives. When we realize God’s favor is upon you, you will accomplish your dreams faster than you ever thought possible. telling yourself the wall is too big, the dream is too great, or the obstacles are too high. It will not happen in your own strength. It will not happen in your own powers. It will happen because Almighty God favors you. Try claiming God’s blessing instead of longing for them. The humblest painter of real life, if he could have his desire, would select a picturesque background for his figures; but events have an inexorable fashion of choosing their own landscape. Success if for everyone and your life becomes better the moment you become better. There is no success without sacrifice. You will be as small as your controlling desire, as great as your dominant aspiration. #RandolphHarris 10 of 10
A Vital Doctrine—God Manifest in the Flesh
Never in a human head was contemplation more separated from desire. The Architects and advocates of the modern English translations of the Holy Scriptures unequivocally declare that Christ was God manifest in the flesh. He appeared in body. Two whole, perfect, and distinct natures, the Godhead and the manhood, were inseparably joined together in one Person, without conversion, composition, or confusion. Which person is very God and very man, yet one Christ, the only Mediator between God and human beings. The Westminster Divines evidently regarded this verse as one of the essential proofs of the Trinitarian doctrine of the Bible, that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. The first Reason, why the then Greatness of the Roman Empire was a fit Circumstance of Time for the Mission, of Christ, is that he might better manifest his Divine Authority and Commission to the civil Powers of the World. Hell, Satan, and the devils are in reality sates of the mind. However, some events can never be explained. When we limit the mental to the realm of conscious events (the actual), it is called psychology without a soul. #RandolphHarris 1 of 13
Faithfulness to fact is raised to the level of genius. Behavior at the house is one of the best touchstones of good manners; for many persons will appear well abroad, and yet cannot exhibit any degree of ease at their own fireside table. However, to entertain company without embarrassment or excitement, is an art which it requires some usage to perfect. Company, various company, is the only school of this knowledge. Nothing forms a young person so much as being used to keep respectable and superior company, where a constant regard and attention is necessary. It is true, this is at first a disagreeable state of restraint; but it soon grows habitual, and consequently easy; and you are amply paid for it by the improvement you make, and the credit it gives you. Hospitality is also a Christian duty, and all homemakers should exercise it to some extent. We were not designed to live alone, to shut ourselves up in our houses, and enjoy the blessings up in our houses, and enjoy the blessings which have been given us in a spirit of exclusiveness. The idea is therefore essentially the divine nature and formally the ratio according to which God intelligizes creatures. #RandolphHarris 2 of 13
These ideas make up the creative mind of God. In a parallel fashion the universal (on human level) is its singular. The singular participates in its universal, which is by nature a projection of an idea in the mind of God. As a creation of God’s mind, the singular is incapable of annihilation. For God to allow a singular to be annihilated would be to permit the annihilation of a part of himself—an obvious impossibility. Nature teaches us a lesson in this direction. She keeps open house for innumerable winged and creeping insects, and their banquets are always spread among the beautiful, fragrant flowers, whose hospitable abodes are every filled with guests, from the bees and the butterflies to the tiniest winged fairy. Elegant hospitality can be exercised at a moderate expense; and those of us who cannot afford to give costly dinner or evening parties, can surely entertain a few friends at tea or coffee, or of an evening, and this promote a social feeling among neighbors and acquaintances. It is not well for young persons to entertain too much company when they first commence housekeeping, but neither is it well to pay no heed to hospitality. #RandolphHarris 3 of 13
God’s intellection, his knowledge, his will, the Trinity, his ideas and his power to create outside himself is the grand design. Young people should live frugally and you will live happily; shut not your doors or hearts against those who have a claim upon your hospitality;–but remember, that if they really esteem and love you, they will come not to look at your table or your furniture, but to enjoy your society. Psychology is the common basis for all scientific and cultural knowledge and the bond uniting all the individual sciences, and therefore as the science directly preparatory to philosophy. Certain knowledge is possible for humans of one realm but not of the other, where only opinion is possible, although God may be able to have the knowledge of both. The chief art of pleasing is to make everyone feel at home; that is, at one’s ease. And if anything has occurred in your ménage to ruffle your temper, do not annoy your guest by telling your grievances. Of course, they cannot be interested in such petty details; and the relation may tend to mar their pleasure. We can improve our understanding, but this will always fall short of knowledge. #RandolphHarris 4 of 13
The most perfect being must owe one’s exemption from vice to the absence of temptation. We never quite understand why another dislikes what we like. There are those who are born with the faculty of rendering everyone happy who comes in contact with them, and they seem endowed with great discernment of character, and can encourage the timid, repress the encroaching, and call forth the peculiar talents and perfections of all. Such persons can always make themselves agreeable; while there are others who, strive as they can, can never attain to the same position. Yet, a desire to please—a desire to entertain one’s guest, will usually prove successful; and if you are cheerful, animated and pleasant yourself, you cannot fail to shed a halo of pleasure upon those around you. People of an enormously strong moral character have an unselfishness and self-control. It is important to be ambitious generals and politicians to acquire knowledge, and draw analogies to show that all skills must be learned. The significance of your knowledge can be usefully increased by deeper understanding of the purposes of your various crafts. #RandolphHarris 5 of 13
If your friends become your guests for awhile, it is well to give them some insight into your mode of life. Then they will readily comprehend your duties, and will often think it advisable not to encroach too much upon your morning hours, which may be required for some domestic occupations. After luncheon, or early dinner, your time, however, should be given up to them; either to drive out, walk, shop, or in some entertainment in the house. Of course, you will always attend to the arrangement of their sleeping-rooms, and provide everything that is essential for their comfort before they arrive, unless you are blessed with a most superior housekeeper. It is merciless to invite friends to visit you in cold weather, without providing a fire in their bedroom or dressing-room (heat). Neither is it courteous to wait until they arrive, and then inquire—“Would you like a fire?” Therefore, if you cannot afford to make your friends comfortable, do not invite them; at least in the wintry season. #RandolphHarris 6 of 13
There are temptations which it is not in the power of human nature to resist. Let your guest see, by your manner, that their presence is a decided pleasure to you; and make it also an incentive to recreations and amusements which do not belong to the common routine of your life. One should try to make their visits as agreeable as possible, but without any apparent effort; so that they many not think that you are putting yourself out of the way to afford them pleasures in which you do not often indulge. It is your duty to endeavor to make the time pass pleasantly, but if your visitors perceive that you are altering the daily tenor of your life on their account, it will detract greatly from their happiness. Mental training is paramount; serenity, sincerity, magnanimity, introspection, and self-restraint are the virtues to be cultivated. An ethical formula of devotion within, righteousness without is a virtue to be cultivated. Learning is knowing and practice. Therefore, we must rely on intelligence rather than strength. Intelligence is a great asset in the struggle for existence. #RandolphHarris 7 of 13
We do not injure others, nor harm ourselves in the pursuit of fame, wealth, and rank. These are to be avoided as temptations external to one’s nature. On the other hand, there is inherent in human beings a craving for the pleasures of this World. To seek the gratification of one’s desires for such things as fine food and beautiful objects is to yield to one’s original nature and in this way to work for its completion. We must seek happiness to our heart’s content, as well as longevity and immortality. One should not unnecessarily shorten one’s life. It is a good plan, when inviting guests to visit you, to state a given period for their visit. Mention the day when you would be happy to receive them, and the length of time of their visit. Perhaps a young lady is invited to make a visit in the country, or in the city, and no mention is made of days, weeks, or months, for its limit, and, therefore, she is utterly at a loss to know what amount of clothing to bring. It is impossible to study the human frame without a little studying the human mind. #RandolphHarris 8 of 13
The imprudence of our thoughts recoils upon our heads. When your guests intimate their intention of leaving you, if you really desire them to remain longer, say so frankly, and urge them to prolong the visit; but if you do not care for their society any longer, do not be so insincere as to urge it; or, on the other hand, if they cannot prolong their visit, do not worry them by your pertinacity in urging them to do so—but, while you invite them to renew their visit at their earliest convenience, facilitate their departure by every means in your power, and give them all needful information as to routes, times tables, etc. Of course, no guest will leave a friend’s house without some expression of regret and good-will. A good warm heart will, however, dictate the forms of speech requisite upon such occasions. And when you are at the house, be sure and inform your friends of your safe arrival, and express the gratification you have received from your visit, and gracefully allude to different members of the family, while you thank them for their kindly hospitality. #RandolphHarris 9 of 13
The transcendental knowledge attained involves a vivid awareness of the nature of the soul and its essential distinctness from the psychophysical organism. This bring liberation. No well-bred person will ever fail to acknowledge your hospitality and charming family; and a failure to do so, is a decided mark of ignorance of both etiquette and politeness. Guests will never take the part of either host or hostess in any trifling disagreement or opinion. As visitors, they can express their ideas upon various matters, of course; but shun any partisanship. And they will also scrupulously respect the rights of their entertainers, and never criticize their surroundings and manners to other persons. A house guest never speaks ill of those whose food one has tasted; and well-bred persons will never repeat what Mrs. Hearst said, nor tell what Mr. Hearst. did, when they were visiting. There has been some investigation of the physiology, and there seems little doubt that a kind of hibernation can be achieved and that the control over lungs, heartbeat, and the viscera organs is, by ordinary standards remarkable. #RandolphHarris 10 of 13
Some of the ore spectacular physical claims, however (such as levitation), are unconfirmed, and some of them are mythological in style. The ascription of magical powers to the host or hostess is part of the traditional tendency in India to think that with austerity and mental discipline can create a force which can even threaten the gods. This in turn both reflects and generates the view that mystical experience is the supreme religious goal, transcending the cult of supernatural beings. Such discrepancies of good manners are perfectly unendurable, and no respectable person will excuse them. Visitors should always give the housekeepers who waited upon them some little presents, either in money or its equivalent. They have had extra work in waiting upon them, and, therefore, deserve extra compensation. The chain which binds society together is composed of innumerable links, and it should be the part of hosts and guest to keep them uniformly bright; and to let neither moth nor rust corrupt them. There is nothing so difficult as to manage the public mind. The rest of your life will be the best of your life, which is socially engaged, but still retains its intellectual independence and freedom of social criticism. #RandolphHarris 11 of 13
Seeing may be contrasted both with hearing and with feeling by touching. One way in which seeing differs from hearing follows from the truth of our language that we hear an object if and only if we hear a sound which is made by the object. There is no comparable linguistic practice in the case of seeing. This may lead us to think of sight as presenting objects to us directly, hearing only indirectly. One way in which seeing differs from feeling by touching is that if we feel something by touching it, our experience is of feeling it with a particular part of the body. Our visual experience, however, is not of seeing with our eyes. We can imagine a disembodied mind having visual experiences but not having tactile ones. Sight does not require our being part of the material World in the way in which feeling by touching does. One way in which seeing differs from both hearing and feeling by touching is in respect to time. It takes time to hear a tune or to feel the shape of a statue, but one seems to be able to see a landscape instantaneously. #RandolphHarris 12 of 13
Sweet pliability of a human’s spirit, that can at once surrender itself to illusions, which cheat expectations and sorrow of their weary moments! Thus, the directness of seeing when contrasted with hearing, its noninvolvement with its object when contrasted with feeling by touching, and its apparent temporal immediacy when contrasted with both hearing and feeling by touching are features that may partly explain the belief that sight is the most excellent of the senses; this envied in the use by ancient and modern philosophers of predominantly visual metaphors to describe intellectual apprehension. Pray that we may finally receive the consolations and the succor of Heaven in all our necessities, tribulations and sufferings, particularly in Sacramento, and that we may bless God with the Elect through eternity. As mere human knowledge can split a ray of light and analyze the manner of its composition, so sublime intelligence may read in the feeble shining of this Earth of ours, every thought and act, every vice and virtue, of every responsible creature on it. #RandolphHarris 13 of 13
I Have a Sweet Little Angel
The contemplation of beauty causes the soul to grow wings. Beauty is indefinable—it is one of the greatest mysteries of nature, and beyond the limits of human understanding. (There is nevertheless an absolute standard of taste. However, this cannot be deduced; it must be grasped through a deeper insight into actual works of art.) Beauty maintains a glorious elasticity in its own ecstasies of hope, provided you do not crush it with a doubt of its own purity. Expression is a lower stage of beauty. It is a lively imitation of both the soul and the body as passive and active. Pure beauty is reached through the stillness of this feeling of life. To one that lives well every form of life is good, nor can there be given any other rule for choice than to remove from all apparent evil. The highest stage of beauty arises from the unification of expression and pure beauty in grace. By this unity beauty becomes an appearance of divinity in the representation of a sensible object. The unity of art arises mainly from simplicity and measure, or the harmony of opposing traits—for instance, understanding passions. When a beautiful soul harmonizes with a beautiful form, and the two are cast in one mould, that will be the fairest of sights to him who has the eye to contemplate the vision. #RandolphHarris 1 of 12
This process of unification corresponds to the rise from sensible to ideal beauty, or from the imitation of nature to the creation of higher nature. The observation of nature gives us the means of overcoming spurious standards of beauty and a set of samples to be used by the intellect in creating the higher nature. Beauty is felt by the senses, but it is understood and created by the intellect—which is the faculty of ideas as well as of distinct concepts. The ideal (Das Ideale) or spirit (Geist), is the most important and controversial notion of aesthetic. One kind of ideal is created when an artist combines in one unique whole elements of beauty among different natural objects—for example, by constructing a perfect female figure from separate parts imitating parts of different women, each of which is the most perfect of its kind. A superior kind of ideal arises when the choice of parts is directed not only by a feeling for proportion, but by a supernatural idea translated into matter—for example, the superhuman perfection of a particular human type or quality such as the combination of attractive manhood and pleasing youthfulness in the Apollo del Belvedere, or of enormous pain in a great soul in the Laocoon. #RandolphHarris 2 of 12
The power of the good has taken refuge in the nature of the beautiful and the ideal is not abstracted from experience, but is derived from an intuition of the beauty of God himself. It is realized through a creative process like that of God creating his own image in man. Ideal beauty of the second kind must show noble simplicity and quiet greatness (edle Einfalt und stille Grosse). Because beauty in its highest form is spiritual, it must suggest a deeper ethical meaning. These ethical thoughts are the content of real art. Art makes them intuitively known through allegory. Nature also presents allegories to humans; and humans themselves spoke through images before they spoke in rational language. Painting, sculpture, and poetry all express through allegory invisible things; and thus allegory is the foundation of the unity of the different fine arts. Simplicity, or unity, gives distinctness (Deutlichkeit) to a work of art. Therefore, there is an intuitive, or sensible, distinctness, whereas the then current psychology admitted only intellectual distinctness and allowed only clarity to sensibility. #RandolphHarris 3 of 12
Greek art is the standard of ideal beauty. The Greek man was the most spiritually and ethically balanced, and therefore the most physically perfect, because of various climatic, geographical, historical, social, and political conditions. Greek artist could therefore use the beautiful human specimens as models; and they should be imitated by modern artists. Imitation of nature and imitation of the Greek is the same thing. However, in a recent address made by the Bishop of Manchester, England, he said “Some people think a gentleman means a man of independent fortune—a man, who fares sumptuously every day; a man who need not labor for his daily bread.” Yet, none of these make a gentleman—not one of them—nor all of them together. I have known men when I was brought closer in contact with working men than I am brought now; I have known men of the roughest exterior, who had been used all their lives to follow the plough and to look after horses, as thorough gentlemen in heart as any nobleman who ever wore a ducal coronet. I mean, I have known them as unselfish, I have known them as truthful, I have known them as sympathizing; and all these qualities go to make what I understand by the term a gentleman. #RandolphHarris 4 of 12
It is a noble privilege which has been sadly prostituted; and what I want to tell you is, that the humblest man in Leeds, who has the coarsest work to do, yet, if his heart be tender, and pure, and true, can be, in the most emphatic sense of the word, a gentleman. We all know that there are those in our midst who object to politeness, or polite phrases, because, as they say, the language is false and unmeaning. And company manner is scornful terms frequently applied to the courteous demeanor, and may polite sentences which are often uttered, and are so very desirable, in well-bred society. When people are kind and say nice things from the heart, it makes them more attractive. When people are rude, mean, gossip and harass others, it has the opposite effect. Children and animals recognize this truth quite as readily as adults. A baby will cry at the sound of harsh language; and your horse, cow, dogs, bird, cat, fish, deer, or moose, are all most amenable to kind words and caressing motions. And although:–it is only humans words create, and cut the air to sounds articulate by Nature’s special character, yet kindness is a language which the unwise can speak and the hearing impaired can understand. #RandolphHarris 5 of 12
We can convey the plainest of truths in a civil speech; and the most malignant of lies can be also wrapped in specious words. However, we cannot consider a love of truth any apology for rude and uncouth manners; truth need not be made harsh, unlovely and morose; but should appear kind and gentle, attractive and pleasing. Roughness and honesty are, however, often met with in the same person; but we are not competent judges of human nature; if we take ill-manners to be a guarantee of probity of heart, or think a stranger must be a knave because he possesses the outward seeming of a gentleman. Doubtless there are many wolves in sheep’s clothing and snakes in suits in our land, but that does not decrease the value of gentleness and courtesy in the least. Good manners and a good conscience are very often twin-sisters, and are always more attractive for the companionship. Bad manners are frequently a species of bad morals; and there is no outward sign of courtesy that does not rest on a deep moral foundation. #RandolphHarris 6 of 12
Good manners are a very essential characteristic of religion also, as well as a fundamental part of civilization; and we are all in duty bound to treat those with whom we come in contact, with consideration, respect and deference. Good manners were given to humans from high authority. The Greeks and Romans, to be sure, were strictly devoted to etiquette—but it was not the kind that springs from a conscience void of offence against God and man. The customs of salutations, of visiting, of eating, of making presents, of introductions, writing letters, and the like, are all strictly defined, and they are enforced like our laws—no one being permitted to transgress them. We may define politeness, though we cannot tell where to fix it in practice. It observes received usages and customs, is bound to times and places, and is not the same thing in the two genders or in different conditions. Wit along cannot obtain it; it is acquired and brought to perfection by emulation. Some dispositions alone are susceptible of politeness, and others are only capable of great talents or solid virtues. #RandolphHarris 7 of 12
It is true, politeness puts merit forward, and renders it agreeable, and a human must have eminent qualifications to support oneself without it. Politeness may also be said to be in the embodiment of the golden rule; and without its assistance, without the amenities of society, life is an arid waste, a barren plain. Gold will not supply the deficiencies of a pleasing deportment; and we can assure our readers that they will find courtesy in all times and at all places the cheapest and most available of commodities. In Europe, good manners are most highly esteemed, and most assiduously inculcated both in the highest and the lowest classes; and the children are taught that it is very essential for them to show respect to their superiors and elders, and to be always kind and courteous to their inferiors. In America, politeness and etiquette are well taught in those families who possess culture and refinement; but among the masses rarely taught at all. Our district schools were nurseries of good manners thirty or forty years ago, compared to what they are at the present day. #RandolphHarris 8 of 12
Then the country children were taught to bow to strangers passing by; now they would be more likely to salute them with profanity or vulgarity. Good manners are surely a discount in the United States of America. We cannot disguise this fact—it Is seen by all who travel through the country, who frequent the city, who sail upon our rivers, and our lakes, drive on the roads, fly on the planes, or whirl rapidly along our railways. This savage behavior is also daily displayed on the news for the World to see. The lower officials are often cross and surly—the higher sometimes extremely discourteous; and the want of good-breeding is everywhere noted. Surely, we should ask ourselves the question—“Whence has this condition of affairs arisen?” Many would say it is since we removed prayer from the schools and removed public acknowledgment of God. This country was founded on Christianity and we are allowing people to remove the structural beams of Christ, which has kept this architecture so secure and sound. #RandolphHarris 9 of 12
Our democratic principles should not be allowed to lead us to indulge in discourtesy, and thus throw a shadow of disgrace upon our institutions. And those who consider the rules which regulate society needless and absurd, would, if they were laid aside, soon desire their restoration, as they are a needful barrier against rudeness and vulgarity. There are, doubtless, many eccentricities of fashion, yet they soon pass away; but some prescribed regulations for conduct are essential for the preservation order and dignity. We cannot let society get all loosey goosey, foolish and goulish, nor roguish and thuggish. Etiquette is intended to guard us from some of the inconveniences of large acquaintance, and by settling certain points, it permits us to maintain a ceremonious acquaintance with a circle much too large for social visiting. Therefore, let us:–study with care, politeness that much teach the modest forms of gestures and of speech; in vain formality, with matron mien, and pertness apes with her familiar grin; they against nature for applauses strain, distort themselves, and give all other pain. #RandolphHarris 10 of 12
Etiquette is a comprehensive term, for it embraces not only all observances connected with social intercourse, but such as belong particularly to the home circle. To obtain fireside comforts, and home-born enjoyments and happiness, something more is requires than a handsome horse, a beautiful emerald green lawn, shade-tress, and a garden filled with flowers arranged in the most artistic order. Family bickerings and strife; a lack of politeness, good-breeding and etiquette, would turn the loveliest Eden into a barren waste. It will avail us little to furnish our houses with all the elegancies which the upholsterer’s art can afford, and to cultivate the grounds with the utmost skill, if our hearts and minds are uncultivated, rough, uncouth and uncivilized. The members of one family must unceasingly interchange kind offices; must rejoice and mourn, hope and fear, smile and weep in unison; and must exchange sympathetic emotions, with due regard to each other’s feelings, or the charming delights of the domestic circle will lose much of their relish, or will be broken up and become totally devoid of interest. #RandolphHarris 11 of 12
And it cannot be too strongly impressed upon the mind, that mutual respect is the basis of true affection; and, although it may seem a trifling matter in the family whether this or this mode of speech is adopted, in reality it is a very important thing. Enlightenment happens in the present moment and is outside of time, history, or geography which are therefore irrelevant. Music, sweet fragrances, and architectural beauty is inspirational and uplifting to activate aspects of the consciousness which progressively becomes empowered by compassion, devotion and the power to overcome oppression. God has great things in store for his people; they ought to have large expectations. The rest of your life will be the best of your life. Leaders of the Heavenly armies, we beseech you that with your prayers you may encircle us with the protection of the wings of your angelic glory. Watch over us as we bow low and earnestly cry out to you: Deliver us from trouble, princes of the Heavenly armies. I have been in love with you baby, honey before I learned to call your name. #RandolphHarris 12 of 12
God is Not in His Heaven: All is Wrong with the World!
We are overhasty to speak as if God did not manifest himself by our silent feeling, and make his love felt through ours. I think that our Universe must be like a sea walnut. Sea walnuts are a jelly fish type creature and they live in the ocean, they are actually shaped like a walnut, and they produce their own light. Some scientist think they produce their own light to scare off predators, but others disagree. It is possible that sea walnuts are a microcosm, like a living organism, with other organism that live inside of it, and it produces light for them to see and grow food. Of course, these organisms inside of the sea walnut would probably microscopic. So, I wonder if the Universe is like a sea walnut and we are encased inside of another Universe? Because something about the creation myths is baffling to me. Human behavior is response to desire or aversion. Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them. Will is the very nature or essence of human beings and indeed of everything, identifying it with the thing-in-itself that underlies all phenomena. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
Human life partakes of the unravelable inscrutableness of God. All people ideally perceive certain ends or goals by their reason and then direct their wills to the attainment of these ends or goals. This is why no human can knowingly will evil. So, then why is their evil on Earth? Either God can remove evil from the World and will not; or being willing to do so, cannot; or he neither can nor will; or he is both able and willing. If he can but will not, he is not benevolent. If he is neither willing nor able, he is neither omnipotent nor benevolent. If he both wants to and can, whence comes the evil over the face of the Earth? God may cause our circumstances to suddenly fall apart, which may bring the realization of our unfaithfulness to hum for not recognizing that he had ordained the situation. This is where the test of our faithfulness comes. If we will just learn to worship God even during the difficult circumstances, he will change them for the better very quickly if he so chooses. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
What are the comprehensible terrors of humanity compared with the interlinked terrors and wonders of God! The ascent of the soul is traced towards higher and higher ends, the supposition being that these ends are apprehended first by the senses and then ultimately by the pure or unfettered intelligence, which enlists the will or desire for their pursuit. The corruption of a human was precisely the dominance of the will, that is, of human’s appetites or desires, this being a deviation from what human nature ideally should be. The understanding first grasps certain ideas or presents certain ends to the mind and the will then either assents or withholds its assent, thus following rather than directing the understanding. Ends and goal become such only because they are willed; they are not first perceived as ends and then willed. Reason is concerned entirely with demonstrations (dedication) or with the relations of cause and effect (induction). In neither case can it give us ends or goals. Mathematics is used in mechanical arts and the like, but always as a means of attaining something that has nothing to do with reason. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
As we know not what purpose any event is ultimately directed, so neither can we affirm from what causes it originally sprung. The computations of a merchant, for example, can be fallacious, but the ends for which they are undertaken can in no sense be fallacious or irrational. They can only be wise or foolish, that is, such as to promote or to frustrate other ends that are again products of the will. Similarly, no discovery of casual connections in nature can by itself have the least influence on the will. Such discoveries can only be useful or useless in enabling people to choose appropriate means to certain ends, which are in no way derived from reason. It can never in the least concern us to know that such objects are causes, and such other effects, if both causes and effects be indifferent to us. Reason therefore can never produce actions or impulses, nor can it oppose them. An impulse to act can be opposed only by a contrary impulse, not by reason. There can, accordingly, be no such thing as a conflict between reason and passion, and the only way in which willed behavior can be irrational is for it to be based upon some misconception—for instance, on some erroneous conception of what is a fit means to the attainment of an end which I entirely the product of will. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
There is no creature whose inward being is so strong that it is not greatly determined by what lies outside. All agree that people are moved by their impulses, appetites, passions, or wills and that these are incapable of fallacy or error. There is thus no such thing as a rational or irrational will, although one may will imprudently in relation to other things that one wills. A free being wills because it wills, and the willing of an object is itself the last ground of such willing. Human nature contains implications of the highest importance for ethics. If ends or goals are entirely products of the will and the will is neither rational nor irrational, then ends themselves cannot be termed either rational or irrational and it becomes meaningless to ask whether this or that end is really good or bad independently of its being willed. To say something is good, is to say nothing more than it is an object of one’s appetite, and to say that something is bad is only to say that one has an aversion to it. Good and bad are thus purely relative to desires and aversions, which are, of course, sometimes quite different in different people. Wise behavior, on this conception, can be nothing other than prudence, that is, the selection of appropriate means to the attainment of whatever goals one happens to have. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
The inconsistency so common in dreams. There is one goal, however, that is fairly common to all people: the goal of self-preservation. People can preserve themselves in safety and security within a commonwealth. People are the measure of all things. Things are good solely by virtue of the fact that they are demanded, this is, that someone wants them or lays claim to them, and such a demand might be for anything under the Sun. Considered apart from the demands of sentient beings, nothing in the Universe has any worth what so ever. The only proper ethical maxim is to satisfy as many demands as possible, no matter what these happen to be, but at the least cost, this is, with the minimum of frustration to other demands. It is clear that within the framework of theories like this, no meaning can be attached to asking what is truly worthy of one’s desires, unless this question is interpreted to mean, “What is in fact satisfying of one’s desires?”; nor does it make sense to see, any metaphysical principles of morals. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
People will dream; the most that can be asked of them is but that the dream be not in too glaring discord with the thing they know. Truth and falsity in ethics are exhausted in questions as to the truth and falsity of various opinions concerning the utility of proposed means to the achievement of ends, that is, to the satisfaction of appetite, desire, and demand. They have no relevance to any questions concerning ends themselves. Human reason or dialectic is worthless in theological maters, for the simple reason that the very laws of logic are valid only by the concurrence of God’s will. God is omnipotent and can therefore render true even those things which reason declares to be absurd or contradictory. It is thus idle for philosophers to speculate upon what must be true with respect to divine matters, since these depend only on God’s will. Faith is found in the very act of faith itself, which is an act of the will, rather than in rational proof. God has some type of powers that, as humans, we cannot even conceive. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
I believe in order that I may understand. The divine will is the only and the ultimate moral justification for any act. Strictly understood, this means that an action that might otherwise be deemed heinous is not so, provided it is commanded by God. The divine will, and not human or divine reason, is the ultimate standard of morality, that certain acts are sins other acts are meritorious only because they have been commanded by God. God does not forbid certain things because they are sins or commands certain things because they are virtues, for it seems that this would be a limitation upon God’s will. There can be no higher justification for any act than that God wills it, nor any more final condemnation of an act than that God forbids it. The moral law is simply a matter of God’s free choice, for God’s choice cannot be constrained by any moral law, being itself the sole source of that law. The concept of the will is crucial to the understanding of the law, ethics, and human behaviour generally; this is crucial to the understanding of reality itself. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
Dreamers see the Heavens open every day. The will is the underlying and ultimate reality and the whole phenomenal World is only the expression of will. Living things are the objectifications of their wills and explains not only the behaviour but also the very anatomical structures of planets, animals, and people. The will is a blind and all-powerful force that is literally the inexhaustible creator of every visible thing. The sexual appetite, which I considered to be fundamentally the same in all living things, is a blind urge to love and to perpetuate existence without any goal beyond that, and it has nothing whatever to do with reason or intelligence, being in fact more often than not opposed to them. The religious impulse found in all cultures at all times is similarly explained as the response to a blind and irrational will to possess endless existence. In the growth and development of all living things is the unfolding of the will in nature, wherein certain things appear and transform themselves in accordance with a fairly unvarying pattern and in the face of obstacles and impediments, solely in accordance with at is willed in a metaphysical sense but entirely without any rational purpose or goal. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
Strong drink makes every hidden seed sprout up in the soul and show itself. The feelings of self-love, malice, and compassion, all of which are expressions of the will, may have nothing to do with reason or intelligence. People have free will only in the sense that every person is the free or unfettered expression of a will and people are therefore not the authors of their own destinies, characters, or behavior. The irrational factors in human behaviour is now taken for granted in those sophisticated circles that have come under the influence of modern psychological theories. Moral laws cannot guide human conduct successfully, because they are rational rules directed to the conscious will and are defeated by the irrational antagonism that stems from the human’s subconscious. For moral ideals to be significant and effective they must take possession of the subconscious, which they can do only if they are reached through the sublimation of subconscious impulses. Sublimation, operating through the imagination, transforms human’s lower impulses into higher ones and turns one’s inherent, arbitrary freedom into moral freedom that seeks the good. #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
Such sublimation is assisted by divine grace and is possible only where the soul turns freely toward the Absolute. Christian ethics is not ethics of law, but the ethics of sublimation. Sublimate means to express potentially violent or socially unacceptable impulses in a modified, socially acceptable manner. Thus, my dear friend, I have briefly proposes the method which I judge proper for molding the soul into a holy frame; and the same means which serve to beget this divine temper, must still be practiced for strengthening and advancing it; and therefore I shall recommend but one more for that purpose, and it is the frequent and conscientious use of that holy sacrament, which is peculiarly appointed to nourish and increase spiritual life, when once it is begun in the soul. All the instruments of religion do meet together in this ordinance; and while we address ourselves unto it, we are put to practice all the rules which were mentioned before. Then it is that we make the severest survey of our actions, and they lay the strictest obligations on ourselves; then are our minds raised up to the highest contempt of the World, and every grace does exercise itself with the greatest activity and vigor. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
All the subjects of contemplation do there present themselves unto us with the greatest advantage; and then, if every does the soul make its most powerful sallies toward Heaven, and assaults it with a holy acceptable force. And certainly the neglect or careless performance of this duty, is one of the chief causes that bedwarfs our religion, and makes us continue of so low a size. And now, most gracious God, Father and fountain of mercy and goodness, who has blessed us with the knowledge of our happiness, and the way that leads unto it! Excite in our souls such ardent desires after the one. Let us nether presume on our own strength, nor distrust thy divine assistance: but while we are doing our utmost endeavours, teach us still to depend on thee for success. Open our eyes, God, and teach us out of thy law. Bless us with an exact and tender sense of our duty, and a knowledge to discern perverse things. That our ways were directed to keep thy statues, then shall we not be ashamed when we have respect unto all thy commandments. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
Possess our hearts with a generous and holy disdain of all those poor enjoyments which this World holds out to allure us, that they may never be able to inveigle our affections, or betray us to any sin: turn away our eyes from beholding vanity, and quicken us in thy law. Fill our souls with such a deep sense, and full persuasion of those great truths which you have revealed in gospel, as may influence and regulate our whole conversation; and that the life which we henceforth live in the flesh, we may life through faith in the Son of God. That the infinite perfections of thy blessed nature, and the astonishing expressions of thy goodness and love, may conquer and overpower our hearts, that they may be constantly rising toward thee in flames of devoutest affections, and enlarging themselves in sincere and cordial love towards all the World for thy sake; and that we may cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in thy fear, without which we can never hope to behold and enjoy thee. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
God, grant that the consideration of what you are, and what we ourselves are, may both humble and lay us low before thee, and also stir up in us the strongest and most ardent aspiration towards thee. We desire to resign and give up ourselves to the conduct of the Holy Spirit; lead us in thy truth, and teach us, for you are the God of salvation; guide us with thy counsel, and afterwards receive us unto glory, for the merits and intercessions of thy blessed Son and Saviour. If you are sensitive to God’s way, your message as his servant will be merciless and insistent, cutting to the very root. Otherwise, there will be no healing. We must drive the message to the house so forcefully that a person cannot possibly hide, but must apply its truth. Deal with people where they are until they begin to realize their true need. Then hold high the standard of Jesus Christ for their lives. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
Love is misunderstood to be an emotion; actually, it is a state of awareness, a way of being in the World, a way of seeing oneself and others. The great God absolute! The centre and circumference of all democracy! His omnipresence, our divine equality! Everyone has been created with the ability to reach out beyond one’s own grasp. However, it is God who draws me, and my relationship to God in the first place is an inner personal one, not an intellectual one. I come into the relationship through the miracle of God and through my own will to believe. Then I begin to get an intelligent appreciation and understanding of the wonder of the transformation in my life. Wisdom brings with it peace, balance, and wholeness, but to benefit from this wisdom, we must first learn to feel the Source of truth. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
Love for God or nature and animals opens the doors to spiritual inspiration. There comes a time when one falls in love with everything and everyone they meet. This tendency to be intensely loving has to be curtailed because love, curiously enough, frightens many people. Many people cannot look fully into another person’s eyes for more than a brief second, if at all. This is especially so if the one looking at them radiates lovingness. Some people even panic when exposed to love. I believe one reason I have seen God’s favor in my life is that I have learned to ask big. When my father died and I was left with nothing, I prayed an extraordinary prayer asking God to help me not only to maintain what my parents have built, but also for God to let me excel in life. It was a bold prayer when I walked in that jewelry store, met Michelle for the first time, and prayed: “God, please let her see how good-looking I am!” Ask God for your dreams. Your Father owns it all. He created the Universe. If you want to see the fullness of what he has in store, you should learn to ask big. Love leads to God, through art or in acts. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
May God, if there is One, Save my Soul, if I have One
Have you not reflected that Christ was a singer? At the Last Supper, they sang a hymn. He liked to describe himself as a just man, lacking in grace. God is able to communicate thought to organized matter, that thinking is the function of the brain just as walking is the function of the feet, was to have important repercussions throughout the future. After being crucified, Christ gazed in admiration at those vast globes of light which appeared to our eyes as so many little sparks, while Earth, which is in truth nothing but an imperceptible point in nature, appears so great and so noble to our fond imaginations. He looked on humans are they truly are, insects devouring one another on a little atom of mud. This true picture seemed to annihilate his misfortunes, by showing him the nothingness of his own being. An abiding awe of the majesty of the Heavens, in comparison with the pettiness of our planet, and an unshakable belief in a supreme intelligence, the Creator of the Universe, the Heavens declared the glory of God. And a mystical sense of cosmic awe occurred. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
His soul reached up into infinity and, detached from his senses, contemplating the unchanging order of the Universe. Having endowed humans with reason and social instincts, God was beyond good and evil. Since materialists cannot disprove the immortality of the soul and spiritualists cannot approve it, social utility weighs the scales in favor of the doctrine of future rewards and punishment. Theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity substitute faith in human ability to settle their own problems, hope for a better society, and love of one’s fellow citizens. Christ said, according to truth as old as creation: Love God and your neighbor. A religion is an organ of human beings in society which helps them to cope with the problems of nature and their destiny—their place and role in the Universe. God Almighty is just and gracious, and gives not his assent to rash and inhuman curses. God did endow humans with reason and feelings of benevolence, which, if properly directed, were all that was needed for humans to gain happiness in life. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
General providence would be described today as a benevolent Universe. We lie in nature very close to God; and through, further on, the stream may be corrupted by the banks it flows through; yet at the fountain’s rim, where humankind stand, there the stream infallibly bespeaks the fountain. Religion always involves the sense of sacredness or mystery and of participation in continuing enterprise; it is always concerned with the problems of good and evil and with what transcends the individual self and the immediate and present facts of everyday. Once we are convinced that there is a God, and that we are here to save our souls, it is surely folly in the extreme to think of anything except him. The common sense of the eighteenth century acted on the World like a bath of moral cleansing. I hate cruelty, I hate senseless repression, and I hate hocus-pocus. Furthermore, when I see them, I know them. If God did not exist, we would have to invent him. The good are often punished, and the wicked rewarded. God moves in mysterious ways his wonders to perform, but our limited and not entirely submissive reason is often indignant. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
Many people on Earth neither have an enlightened mind nor a humanitarian heart. They are virtually obsessed with the misery of the human condition, and believe the doctrine of original sin is psychologically the most satisfactory interpretation of human nature that has ever been devised. I dare to take the side of humanity against this sublime misanthropist and affirm that we are neither so wicked nor so unhappy as we are depicted on the Television and in the newspaper. Why try to make us disgusted with life? To look upon the Universe as a prison cell and all the people as criminals about to be executed is a fanatic’s idea. To believe that the World is a land of bliss is a dream of a Sybarite. To think that Earth, humans, and animals are what they created to be, is the opinion of a sage. Turmoil of civil and religious wars, has sought refuse in meditative cultivation of individual humans through self-knowledge. However, there is value found in the sufferings of human’s terrestrial existence as a painful preparation for the glories of life to come. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
There is a purpose for human existence explained in the terms of divine purpose through the theological doctrines of the Fall and the redemption, predestination, and grace of God. Such doctrines can be accepted only as revealed truths, not as reasoned truths. God as First Cause, Prime Mover, and the Supreme Intelligence created the Universe with certain ends in view. I can assert this by saying, the existence of a watch proves the existence of a watchmaker. The beautiful fables of antiquity have this great advantage over history (news), they present a comprehensible morality: they are lessons in virtue, whereas almost all history (news) is a succession of crimes. History (news) teaches us what human beings are; literature teaches us what they should be. People are born, and remain, free and equal before the law. The principle of all sovereignty resides in the Nation. No body, no individual, can exercise authority which does not emanate expressly therefrom. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
No ecclesiastical law should be of any force until it has received the express sanction of government. Everything relating to marriages depends solely upon the magistrate; all ecclesiastical persons should be under the perfect control of government, because they are subjects of the state; magistrates, cultivators, and priests, should alike contribute to the expenses of the state. Legislation has succeeded in restoring to each individual one’s natural rights, of which nearly all monarchies have deprived them. These rights are: entire freedom of person and property; freedom to speak to the nation in one’s writings, to be judged in criminal cases by a jury of independent citizens, to be judged according to the precise terms of the law, and to profess peacefully the religion of one’s choice. People should be fully conscious of their dignity and toward effecting the social reforms essential to that end. It is a pleasure for me when my mason, my carpenter, my blacksmith, my mechanic, all lift themselves above their trade and know more about public interest than some gossip. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
Queen of the Damned—Successful Women Never Lose
Nature never duplicates her products, however persistently she may adhere to types. Everyone in the World has the ability to recognize certain figures. Archetypes are considered influential in myth, history, and the present. People focus on certain individuals because these people are in some place others would like to be or because they possess some quality that many wish they had. For women of all walks of life, there is a requirement to grow into a leader that the World respects, in a male-dominated society. Sometimes women are punished for being too successful or driven because they do not adhere to antiquated stereotypes of being inferior, passive, dependent, easy, or powerless.
The film, Queen of the Damned, starring Aaliayh Haughton, is a cautionary tale about what happens to powerful women. Aaliyah Haughton played the role of a 5,000-year-old Egyptian Queen called Akasha. One of Queen Akasha’s most notable attributes is that she was very powerful and had power over other vampires. Queen Akasha was fearless and wanted to rule over the human, as other vampires feared the humans and lived in the shadows, only coming out at night like cowards. Queen Akasha planned to end this shameful lifestyle, she sees Earth as her home, and wants to command the other vampires.
Many cultures are patriarchal, in these cultures, women are internalizing the idea that women are inferior, and that they require approval and validation for men. Queen Akasha rejects this restrictive lifestyle and steps out of the shadows. Dependency acts as a threat to Queen Akasha power and authority. She dethrones her husband, King Enkil, after awaking in modern times by the music of the vampire Lestat, and plans to take him as a new King and rule the World. Queen Akasha fears that her race, the race of vampires, is near death, and she wants to find and protect vampires living on Earth.
The first appearance we get of Akasha, she is an alabaster statue, which indicates she is virginal goddess. However, Queen Akasha initial encounter with Lestat, she is wearing a black dress, and she saves him from being killed by other vampires, who are upset with him because he is calling attention to their race, and is a successful rockstar. Lestat becomes a culture icon in the modern World, and other vampires fear him and all the attention he is getting. Lestat is using his music to tell a story and program the minds of the masses! People start to sing or chant his music, and it entrains their brains and makes them more receptive to his intended message. This is probably why the Queen sees Lestat as more of a suitable mate.
Queen Akasha is not a damsel in distress, however, she does face a challenge asserting her power with the other vampires. She is unaccustomed to others outright devaluing her status, and has to assert her power in front of these men. It is at this juncture that we see Queen Akasha deal with expectations of her sex and position as women do in real life. To instill fear in them, she seduces a male vampire and rips out his heart and eats it. This symbolizes the power of her father. After other vampires try to kill her in the bar, because she is the Queen of all vampires, they have her blood in them, and she uses her power to make them burst into flames, which represents purification.
In identifying with and adapting to a masculine World, many women may find success in their chosen careers. On the surface, these women exude power, and may feel that something is missing from their lives because the male-dominated culture is not accommodating to their needs and sometimes other women fear women who are more powerful than them. Through her leadership, Queen Akasha tries to strengthen the vampire race, and bring about the destruction of human reign. Queen Akasha starts inciting other women as vampires to rise up and put an end to their oppressors. However, some vampires feel threatened because they have been breeding with humans and meet at an ancient vampire’s compound in Death Valley.
While in Death Valley, Maharet explains that Queen Akasha plans to eliminate 90 percent of human men, and establish a new garden of Eden where everyone will worship her as the goddess she is. Maharet does not like Queen Akasha because Maharet used to be a witch, and she was taken advantage of by a member of Akasha’s staff. Eventually, the witches rise up against Akasha and her King Enkil and kill them. As they lay dying on the floor the spirt of Amel sees this as his chance to ensnare the soul of the dying Queen and combines himself with her flesh and blood, transforming her into a vampire. Akasha allows the king to drink her blood, which saves his life. This process is symbolic of why people fear powerful women, and also explains why Maharet supports the rule of a weaker race.
The story of Queen Akasha also theorizes that the journey of the heroine is not an outward adventure, but one that delves deeper into the soul. There is a desire to rediscover the feminine and mesh the masculine and feminine together into a complete, whole person, as Amel does when he turns Queen Akasha into a vampire. Without attending to her inner needs the woman feels incomplete, she wants to be an equal of a man, but still remain a feminine role model. Akasha slowly beginas a romance with Lestat, even though the feelings she develops for him never match the feelings she had for King Enkil. However, it is easy to see how Akasha and Lestat form a relationship, the feel they complete each other.
Queen Akasha, realizes the thirst in her brain and the need for Lestat. The heroine’s journey does not always mean falling in love; rather, it is the recognition that outward success does not necessarily equate with true happiness. Despite the brief (and often interrupted interactions) between Lestate and Akasha in the Queen of the Damned, the audience see that their bond brings genuine happiness and joy to both characters. One of the most gut-wrenching moments in the fil is when Akasha allows Lestat to drink her blood, at the compound in Death Valley, this is supposed to represent their love for each other, but also represents that love leaves women vulnerable.
In the presence of their enemies, Queen Akasha bare her heart to Lestat, while he acknowledges that he knows her true feelings, but the other vampires attack the Queen and she bursts into flames and turns to dust. The decent into death represents a crucial moment to the development of women. Queen Akasha does not really die, this is actually a transition. Maharet takes the last drop of her blood and turns into a statue, being the Queen of all Vampires, Akasha simply enters another body, the body of Jesse, Mahrat’s niece. The woman, when reaching great success may reach a period of isolation, she emerges from this period by going deep into herself. A woman’s descent triggers her need to seek out and reclaim her femininity. The descent helps release the woman from the society’s patriarchal demands through the natural introspection that accompanies it.
As a result of this new body and concealed identity, the woman who emerges is stronger because she now accepts the femininity she once rejected. She can focus on being rather than controlling. Queen Akasha is not fully in charge of her deep feelings for Lestat and she is rediscovered in Jesse’s body, as she reclaims her femininity through being an equal with her and reaffirming her love by symbolically overcoming her need to rule. This does not diminish the power Queen Akasha possess, bit rather enhances it because she is no longer looked at as a threat. The laws of nature will defend themselves.
Nothing is Surer [than] the Heart
Our hearts are often larger than our wills. There are those who like not to be detected in the possession of the heart. Can you feel pain and suffering? Most people can feel pain, so why is it that many like to hurt others instead of making them feel loved and accepted? When people are apparently being tortured others marvel at how well they endure the suffering, and to justify the inhuman behavior, some might convince themselves that other members of the human population are not human, or they do not have a soul, and because of that it is okay to abuse them. And if these beings are soulless, the abuser believes the creature does not deserve any consideration when it comes to how it is being treated. Many of us are but sorry hosts to ourselves. Some hearts are hermits.
Some people live lives that are not their choice and have to deal with unbelievable circumstances. And everyone they interact with, consistently, is not necessarily nice to them. They live isolated lives and are working hard to overcome their burdens. Some of these people who are striving to be successful have worked hard than many you know and they invest every dime of their saving into their business, without know if it will ever be successful. Every time they make a purchase for themselves, it kind of makes them depressed. You cannot always decide for yourself whether your own heart is cold or warm. So it is important to be loving, kind, considerate, and humble to everyone you meet.
Some people have goals that are independent of their culture, and as a result they may face shame; amusement; feelings of superiority, annoyance, ambition; and aims of self-preservation and increasing power. These people are capable of intelligence, goals, emotions, and pain. And they also care about other people and the environment. However, it seems no one cares about these extremely motivated people, even though they display enormous care, love, and loyalty towards others. When others are hurt, extremely motivated people are disturbed, shocked, and depressed by these maladaptive behaviors. The first mistaken impulse of an undisciplined heart.
However, when the tables are turned, and these highly motivated people are punched, strangled, and hit in the head no one seems to care, and this can trigger deep psychological reactions in the participants that makes them feel like they are toys, not human, or somehow less valuable. Extremely motivated people are highly evolved or have been very well educated. They think more deeply and deliberatively. Often times watching scary movies disturbs them because they care about the feelings of the people in the film, and think to themselves, “This could be real, look at how good the emotions are, they are better actors in this film, than most people are in real life.” Their brains react to stimuli the same way it would if the events were actually happening in front of them.
Yet, many people tend to keep these highly motivated people at somewhat of a distance, they hold back from them as if they are not human. As a result, they live in casual abandonment, and this makes them have excessive worry and fear; because of that no one ever really gets to know them. When they are hurt, the general public seems to display laughter and joy, not the horror of injury or death. It is as if people think, “We do not care about them so it is okay to hurt and kill them.” When these outsiders are on the edge and others think they may be contemplating suicide, groups of people are more likely to bait them or try to hurt them so they destroy themselves. Nonetheless, research indicates the people actually like the pictures of these non-human, fake people, more than real humans. Overall, these fake people are not disliked more than others, nor do they appear to be very realistic, but there is something about their genetic code that drives some people crazy.
Because of the way they are treated, these highly motivated people feel more anonymous, some wear sunglasses all the time, or tend to avoid large crowds. However, they are easier to kill, and it is easier for people to watch them being killed, but no one will march or put on demonstrations for them. Scientist say this is because they keep their faces partially covered and you do not see them often so you have no idea they are suffering. You cannot see their emotions and typically see no bruises nor broken bones, and they appear to be happy, so it does not register to others that these fake humans are being hurt and feel pain. These fake humans are not out in public hollering and screaming, nor do they fight with others.
So the question is, how do we make people care about these toy humans? Why should they be mistreated? Well, some think that if we push religion and more people learn to believe in God that it will foster more concern for people that are looked at as outsiders. Blessed are those who have regard for those who are delicate; the LORD delivers us in times of trouble. The LORD will protect you and preserve your life; God will bless you in the land, and not surrender you to the desire of your foes. The LORD will sustain you on your sickbed and restore you from your bed of infirmary. God knows the secrets of the heart. I do not know what heart means. I sometimes fancy that it is a talent for getting into debt, and running away with other men’s wives.
Hostages Seized and Killed in Attack on Radisson Hotel
No child is born hostile or aggressive. It becomes so only when its desires to be loved and to love are frustrated, that is, when it expected satisfactions are thwarted—and the thwarting of an expected satisfaction is the definition of frustration. I entertain the hope that in our venturing we shall get addicted to wonder and know the joy of constantly feeling something a little new. Grief can take care of itself, but to get full value of a joy, you must have somebody to divide it with. We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another. In Bamako, Mali—an unknown number of Islamist militant gunmen stormed a Radisson Blu hotel on the morning of 20 November 2015 in Bamako, the capitol of the West African nation of Mali, taking at least 170 people as hostages, and killing an estimated 3 people. Because of all of the terrorist attacks, many people are wondering if Muslims and Islamist are religions of terror?
Over the centuries, churches, synagogues, and mosques have had a number of important socializing effects on their participants as well as on society as a whole. In the main, these have to do with an individual’s approach to how to answer certain important questions about life, death, how to deal with people, and the structure of one’s value system. Perhaps the most important socializing effect of many churches is to teach members that there is an answer to every important question—and that leading a good life consists of learning these answers and following them to the letter. In effect, people were provided with a whole code of ethics and set of rules for living. Many decisions were eliminated. All the devout person had to do was find the church’s view of the answer.
Many people are learning to abuse religion. Because God forgives anyone of any sin, people use this as an excuse to partake in bad behavior, and then pray to God and ask for forgiveness. Even if you are evil and bad your entire life, you can ask God to forgive you on your death bed, and he will. So people have no incentive to behave. This position, too, has seen and experienced much change. Churches today are more inclined to encourage individual responsibility. For some, this has contributed considerably to the amount of anxiety in the World over the number of unanswered questions “running around loose” in each person’s head. Much of the popularity of the Back to Jesus movement may be due to the desire for renewed certainty—the feeling that the Bible and the church have a certain answer for every difficult question. And those who do not participate in such religious experiences may look elsewhere for that sense of certainty—whether in drugs, astrology, political ideology, or even psychology.
Many people have left organized churches because of difference between what the church teaches and what goes on in the real World. Others left because their religion insisted on dividing people into believers and unbelievers, teaching hatred and rejection for those with different beliefs. Many young people have begun to borrow ideas from oriental religions like Buddhism, Taoism, and Indian meditation cults. It seems to me that if we are going to live sanely, then we must respect and be sensitive to differences, realizing that no two individuals are alike, and that is we really understand someone, we understand how they differ from us. Freedom in religion, freedom in life, asks one fundamental overriding questions: Who do you want to be? It does not tell you who you must be, not even that there are some real and productive laws of your being that you were destined to become. Religion asks you never to forget how each day can be described by the possibilities it contains and how tomorrow shall be as well. All freedom can do is to illuminate the possibilities that can be opened to us and toward which we can steer ourselves by making our choices real.
Randolph Harris II International Institute 