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In a World where the Pulse of Time Beats Infinitely Slowly, Birth and Death Count for Little!
Hardships do not build character. They reveal it. Anyone who will tear down Victorian craftsmanship will tear down America. Victorian architecture and religion have made America what it is today. A World without Victorian architecture is in danger of deteriorating into a medieval prison. Just like the unconscious mind, Victorians have a lot of secrets that can take several lifetimes to reveal. Faith and the word of God fills our inner soul and is sufficient to sustain us—and allows us to access His power. The notion that God created this World spectacle for the benefit of the human alone is an absurd and unwarranted anthropolatry, but the notion that life first attains individual self-consciousness in humans is justified in philosophy and by experience. What is it of which one alone is conscious? It is of being oneself, one’s ego. In all earlier stages of evolution, consciousness is entirely veiled in its forms and never becomes self-aware. Only in the human state does individual consciousness of being first dawn. There may exist on other planets creatures infinitely more intelligent and more amiable than human beings. We may not be the only pebbles on the beach of life. Nevertheless the piece of arrogance which places humans highest in the scale of existence contains the dim reverberation of a great truth, for humans bear the divine within their hearts. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19
Human beings have made too much fuss about themselves, their own importance in the cosmic scale. Why should there not be other forms of life superior t them, conscious intelligent beings higher in mentality, character, and spiritual knowledge, better equipped with powers and techniques? Even a partial awareness of what it means to be a human—as above an animal—capable of thinking abstractly, conscious of the vastness of the Universe and the littleness of the ego, asking the ago-old questions about meaning and purpose in life, sometimes getting a glimpse of a few words of the answer through religion, art, Nature, mysticism, joy, suffering, or intelligence, even this is enough to make one wonder what follows in development after one, higher than oneself, if not here then perhaps on other planets or in a fourth dimension. Such beings must already exist somewhere. Are they the gods of ancient fable and myth, disfigured or miscomprehended in human narratives by passing of time? Were they visitors who helped infant humanity reach its tends and then left it, withdrew, except for rare appearances as avatars, angels, or lawgivers? There are existences for beings on levels and in times and space different from ours. The Level we know and the humans we see only partially manifest the World-Idea. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19
The multibirthed nature of human experience fits in with the shimmering galaxies of the multiverse itself. “We are not alone,” could be echoed back by this planet Earth itself. There are beings not subject to the same laws as those governing humankind’s physical existence. They are normally not visible to humans. They are gods. The Gods are both symbols of particular forces and beings dwelling on higher planes. All these figures irrupt autonomously into consciousness as soon as it gets into a pathological state. With regard to the anima, I would particularly like to draw attention to the case described by Nelken. Now the remarkable thing is that these figures show the most striking connections with the poetic, religious, or mythological formulations, though these connections are in no way factual. That is to say, they are spontaneous products of analogy. One such case even led to the charge of plagiarism: the French writer Benoit gave a description of the anima and her classic myth in his book L’Atlantide, which is an exact parallel of Rider Haggard’s She. The lawsuit proved unsuccessful; Benoit and never heard of She. (It might, in the last analysis, have been an instance of cryptomnesic deception, which is often extremely difficult to rule out.) #RandolphHarris 3 of 19
The distinctly “historical” aspect of the anima and Benoit’s condensation with the figures of the sister, wife, mother, and daughter, plus thus associated incest motif, can be found in Goethe (“You were in times gone by my wife of sister”), as well as in the anima figure of the regina and femina alba in alchemy. The English alchemist Eirenaeus Philalethes (“love of truth”), writing about 1645, remarks that the “Queen” was the King’s “sister, mother, or wife.” The same idea can be found, ornately elaborated, in Nelken’s patient and in a whole series of cases observed by me, where I was able to rule out with certainty any possibility of literary influence. For the rest, the anima complex is one of the oldest features of Latin alchemy. When one studies the archetypal personalities and their behaviour with the help of the dreams, fantasies, delusions of patients, one is profoundly impressed by their manifold and unmistakable connections with mythological ideas completely unknown to the layperson. They form a species of singular beings whom one would like to endow with ego-consciousness; indeed, they almost seem capable of it. And yet this idea is not borne out by the facts. There is nothing in their behaviour to suggest that they have an ego-consciousness as we know it. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19
The behaviours show, on the contrary, all the marks of fragmentary personalities. They are masklike, wraithlike, without problems, lacking self-reflection, with no conflicts, no doubts no sufferings; like gods, perhaps, who have no philosophy, such as the Brahma-gods of the Samyutta–nikaya, whose erroneous views needed correction by the Buddha. Unlike other contents, they always remain strangers in the World of consciousness, unwelcome intruders saturating the atmosphere with uncanny forebodings or even with the fear of madness. If we examine their content, id est, the fantasy material constituting their phenomenology, we find countless archaic and “historical” associations and images of an archetypal nature. This peculiar fact permits us to draw conclusions about the “localization’ of anima and animus in the psychic structure. They evidently live and function in the deeper layers of the unconscious, especially that phylogenetic substratum which I have called the collective unconscious. This localization explains a good deal of their strangeness: they being into our ephemeral consciousness an unknown psychic life belonging to a remote past. It is the mind of our unknown ancestors, their way of thinking and feeling, their way of experiencing life and the World, gods and humans. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19
The existence of these archaic strata is presumable the source of the human’s belief in reincarnations and in memories of “previous existences.” Just as the human body is a museum, so to speak, of its phylogenetic history, so too is the psyche. We have no reason to suppose that the specific structure of the psyche is the only thing in the World that has n history outside its individual manifestations. Even the conscious mind cannot be denied a history reaching back at least five thousand years. It is only our ego-consciousness that has forever a new beginning and an early end. The unconscious psyche is not only immensely old, it is also capable of growing into an equally remote future. It moulds the human species and is just as much a part of its as the human body, which, though ephemeral in the individual, is collectively of immense ago. The anima and animus live in a World quite different from the World outside—in a World where the pulse of time beats infinitely slowly, where the birth and death of individuals count for little. No wonder their nature is strange, so strange that their irruption into consciousness often amounts to a psychosis. They undoubtedly belong to the material that comes to light in schizophrenia. #RandolphHarris 6 of 19
What I have said about the collective unconscious may give you give a more or less adequate idea of what I mean by their term. If we now turn back to the problem of individuation, we shall see ourselves faced with a rather extraordinary task: the psyche consists of two incongruous halves which together should form a whole. One is inclined to think that ego-consciousness is capable of assimilating the unconscious, at least one hopes that such a solution is possible. However, unfortunately the unconscious really is unconscious; in other words, it is unknown. And how can you assimilate something unknown? Even if you can form a fairly complete picture of the anima and animus, this does not mean that you have plumbed the depths of the unconscious. One hopes to control the unconscious, but the past masters in the art of self-control, the yogis, attain perfection in samadhi, a state of ecstasy, which so far as we know is equivalent to a state of unconsciousness. It makes no difference whether they call our unconscious a “universal consciousness”; the fact remains that in their case the unconscious has swallowed up ego-consciousness. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19
They do not realize that a “universal consciousness” is a contradiction in terms, since exclusion, selection, and discrimination are the root and essence of everything that lays claim to the name “consciousness.” “Universal consciousness” is logically identical with unconsciousness. It is nevertheless true that a correct application of the methods described in the Pali Canon or the Yoga-sutra induces a remarkable extension of consciousness. But, with increasing extension, the contents of consciousness lose in clarity of detail. In the end consciousness becomes all-embracing, but nebulous; and infinite number of things merge into an indefinite whole, a state in which subject and object are almost completely identical. This is all very beautiful, but scarcely to be recommended anywhere north of the Tropic of Cancer. For this reason we must look for a different solution. We believe in ego-consciousness and in what we call reality. The realities of a north climate are somehow so convincing that we feel very much better off when we do not forget them. For us it makes sense to concern ourselves with reality. Our European ego-consciousness is therefore inclined to swallow up the unconscious, and if this should not prove feasible we try to suppress it. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19
However, if we understand anything of the unconscious, we know that it cannot be swallowed. We also know that it is dangerous to suppress it, because the unconscious is life and this life turns against us if suppressed, as it happens in neurosis. When one of them is suppressed and injured by the other, conscious and unconscious do not make a whole. If they must contend, let it at least be a fair fight with equal rights on both sides. Both are aspects of life. Consciousness should defend its reason and protect itself, and the chaotic life of the unconscious should be given the chance of having its way too—as much of it as we can stand. This means open conflict and open collaboration at once. That, evidently, is the way human life should be. It is the old game of hammer and anvil: between them the patient iron is forged into an indestructible whole, and “individual.” This, roughly, is what I mean by the individuation process. As the same shows, it is a process or course of development arising out of the conflict between the two fundamental psychic facts. The symbol of formation has the closet affinities with alchemical ideas, and especially with the conception of the “uniting symbol,” which yield highly significant parallels. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19
Naturally these are processes which have no meaning in the initial stages of psychological treatments. On the other hand, more difficult cases, such as cases of unresolved transference, develop these symbols. Knowledge of them is of inestimable importance in treating cases of this kind, especially when dealing with cultured patients. How the harmonizing of conscious and unconscious data is to be undertaken cannot be indicated in the form of a recipe. It is an irrational life-process which expressed itself in definite symbols. It may be the task of the analyst to stand by this process with all the help one can give. In this case, knowledge of the symbols is indispensable, for it is in them that the union of conscious and unconscious contents is consummated. Out of this union emerge new situations and new conscious attitudes. I have therefore called the union of opposites the “transcendent function.” This rounding out of the personality into a whole may well be the goal of any psychotherapy that claims to be more than a mere cure of symptoms. As experience piles up, self-structures gradually establish themselves and, in doing so, separate out more and more from other structures which have less to do with one’s identity. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19
In the course of this process, as the self becomes more distinct, other people and things also gain coherence and individuality. There is a growing sense of “Ah yes, this is me, and that is that, and you are you, and this is what goes on between us.” Gradually, with further experiences, if all goes well, the personality develops a relatively stable sense of itself in its environment and a stable sense of what is not self but other people and things. Our life-experiences are increasingly reorganized and integrated, with more linkages to the more central regions of the self, and/or with more clearly delineated object-imagery. Our experiences can become more closely connected with (or, on the other hand, more distant from) the feelings or excitements which originally accompanied the experiences. This is a process through which our experiences can also become relatively less integrated with the person with whim we first experienced them, and relatively less integrated with the feelings or excitements with which we first experienced them. Thus feelings and excitements can be isolated from the structures in terms of which they were first experienced, isolated from structures of self and/or isolated from object-imagery. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19
To give an imaginary illustration of a very complicated process, the experience may be of a child being hugged by the mother and enjoying it. In words: “I like being hugged by mother.” This may be broken up into such substructures as “hugging is lovely” (whoever hugs whom: the “depersonalized” relationship), as well as “I liked being hugged,” “I love mother,” “I like hugging,” “mother loves me,” “mother loves hugging me,” “mother likes hugging,” and so on. This example is also useful in letting us realize just how many structures can emerge out of one experience; it is a mistake to think of an experience being broken up into one self-concept, one object-concept, one relationship, one emotion. “Depersonalizing” is used to describe this process. Depersonalizing is a useful way of coping with distressing feelings, I shall often call it “distancing” or “disowning.” In depersonalizing, emotions and objects differentiate. My first experience of a dog may have been frightening, but “frightening” and “dog” will eventually probably differentiate from each other, so that in due course I can distinguish between the dog which scared me, and dogs in general which have no personal significance for me either frightening or lovable, and so on. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19
At that level of abstraction, dogs remain dogs, whatever my experience of them: object-constancy has been achieved. In depersonalizing, the emotions and self differentiate. “I” and “frightened” differentiate. More generally, I learn that I am not wholly (always) good or wholly (always” bad, or wholly (always) happy or wholly (always) unhappy. Later I have to discover that my feeling hat someone or something is good or bad does not mean that it is so. And I have to discover that my feeling that someone or something is good or bad does not mean that other people think so. Subjectivity is thus turned into objectivity. This process of depersonalizing may be patchy or superficial. Underneath what we have learned about dogs which helps us say we know that not all dogs are frightening although we once knew a frightening puppy, there may be unconscious connections very tightly integrated with a feeling of good or bad about dogs. Part of psychotherapy is to being these unconscious connections into consciousness. When thinking about feelings, it is useful sometimes not to think in a “distancing” or depersonalized way of “love,” or “distress,” or “fear.” It can be instructive to think for a while in terms of “love-of,” and “distress-from,” and “fear-of,” and “hate-of,” and “greed-for,” and “bliss-with.” #RandolphHarris 13 of 19
If we think of feelings apart from who-feels-what-towards-whom, we risk being cut from out roots. Feeling are experienced as relational—once stated, it seems obvious, at least for a healthy functioning organism. Feelings are relational from the start except when something has gone wrong with our biochemistry. When feelings are detached from the experiences in which they were aroused, that is normally due to a later and defensive manoeuver. This component in the object-relation does not therefore separate out in an organized way, as self-structures or object-imagery do in the healthy infant. On the contrary, it looks as though health may consist in keeping feelings attached to the experiences with which they are bound up. Healthy people may have a clear sense of self and of the people and things around them, but they are not much visited by isolated waves of “fear-of” or “bliss-with.” Such feelings would normally be anchored in an experience. Depersonalized feelings are very weird. One of the many contributions made by Dr. Melanie Klein and her associates comes from their intuitive understanding that “I am angry (with a person or thing)” is very close to “Someone or something is very angry with me.” #RandolphHarris 14 of 19
The feeling “angry-with” may be depersonalized, detached from particular experiences, and associated at random with self or with other. Similarly “I feel torn apart (by something in the course of hunger)” may become “I have torn apart (the breast associated with hunger).” For some people there is no differentiation between self-and-feeling; for others there is none between others-and-feeling. It seems that people vary in this respect. The former are likely to experience “I am fine, sad, content, frightened, furious,” et cetera. The latter are likely to experience “He is nice, she is frightening, that is nasty, this is sweet, the other wicked.” Only people who are very out of touch would be assailed by feelings of fear or well-being or anger or love without any clear connections with anything. Illustrating the extreme, a person mainly organized in terms of self-structures, and distant from the World of people and things, might say, “I was so worried when I did not hear…I wondered what I had done wrong. I felt so guilt and worried, then I remembered that I am always forgetting people’s birthdays. Are I not awful.” #RandolphHarris 15 of 19
Another kind of person, mainly organized in terms of other people and things, and distant from one’s own feelings, might say, “They sent this letter which said they were closing down. With a cheque. The cheque was an insult. They have no right to send a notice like that through the post. I went to the Citizens’ Advice Bureau round the corner from where I used to live—not last year but the year before. Almost everyone there was new, much younger and two were Asian.” Yet another kind of person hardly experiences either self or other people, but picks up feelings without firmly attaching them to anyone: “It was really eerie, a dangerous atmosphere. There were a lot of booming noises and a lot of talk which I do not remember. It felt very heavy and threatening. It did not mater, though.” People differ in how they are aware, more in some ways, less in others. One wonders at which point thee types begin to become fixed. It is an interesting area to speculate in. Whole cultures or subcultures may be found which prefer one or other type, so that polite conventional speech requires more awareness of some aspect than another. Thus in some circles it is discourteous to talk about oneself, and in others it is band manners to talk about others, and in yet other circles one should not talk about impersonal matters. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19
Because I cannot deal with the soul here in a thorough and systematic manner that would address main issues (I refer again to the literature noted), my strategy will be twofold: First, I will elaborate a picture or image of the soul, and second, I will look at certain things said about the soul in the Bible. Now the image: Our soul is like an inner stream of water, which gives strength, direction, and harmony to every other element of our life. When that stream is as it should be, we are constantly refreshed and exuberant in all we do, because our soul itself is then profusely rooted in the vastness of God and His kingdom, including nature: and all else within us is enlivened and directed by that stream. Therefore we are in harmony with God, reality, and the rest of human nature at large. As is usual in biblical themes, a little child that has been allowed to develop naturally and have been natured in all the aspects of its being gives us the best presentation of that a life flooded with a healthy soul looks like. Now, beyond the image or picture of an inner stream is this reality: Life is self-initiating, self-directing, self-sustaining activity and power. In this full sense, of course, only God has life. That is the biblical view. Moreover, it his “hand is the soul of every living thing,” Job tells us (Job 12.10). #RandolphHarris 17 of 19
Can it be truth that all this cast travail, all this long long ingathering of experience, all this travel to the farthest limit, is only to end in negation, in unlearning all knowledge and returning to where we started? My heart does not believe it, my reason cannot accept it. “The Father has life in Himself,” Jesus taught, and “gave to the Son also to have life in Himself,” reports John 5.26. “He alone possesses undying life,” reports 1 Timothy 6.16, according to Saint Paul, and is the one “who gives and preserves life to all things,” reports 1 Timothy 5.13. The individual living thing receives its relatively “self-initiating, self-directing, self-sustaining power” from the hand of God. This derivative life flows through the living being in the form of its own soul. As for the human, its peculiar form of soul is related to the unique spirit relationship it has to be God (Genesis 2.7). It is its peculiar form of soul that enlivens everything else in the creature, and its overall condition reflects the state of its soul. In the human being, spiritual life in the kingdom of God is central to its soul and its life. This, we seriously suggest, is not an image but a reality, and one that the image of a stream of water can portray with some force. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19
When we speak of the human soul, then, we are speaking of the deepest level of life and power in the human being. On this land, please pour blessings, O Lord, pour blessings. On this house please pour blessings, O Lord pour blessings. Spirits of the Ancestors, do you see what has been done? A house has been born to continue your line. Once again, a link is forged in the ancient chain and we are all connected that much tighter. Bless this Victorian Mansion; it carries your memory forward to the future. Because God has set His love upon Sarah Winchester’s Mansion and estate, He will protect it; God will protect it because it knows His name. God will rescue the Winchester and its fine Victorian architecture and bring honour to it. Give will give Mrs. Winchester’s estate abundance of long life, and the Winchester mansion shall witness God’s salvation. Hallelujah. Praise the name of the Lord; give praise, ye servants of the Lord, who stand in the house of the Lord, in the courts of the house of God. Praise the Lord, for the Lord is good; sing praise unto the name of God, for it is pleasant. For the Lord hath chosen this estate as wonder of the World and a treasure for many generations to enjoy. Indeed I know that the Lord is great, that our Lord is above all who are worshipped as gods. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19
Winchester Mystery House
Sarah Winchester’s Daisy Bedroom – the room she was trapped in during the 1906 earthquake. Legend says that she had the front of the house boarded up after the earthquake.
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A Million Years to Her are Nothing Remarkable—Heaven and Earth Have Faded!
I know what happened there and I am not the only one who knows. There is nothing else that can be said about it. Although defensive aggression, destructiveness, and cruelty are not ordinarily the cause of war, these impulses manifest themselves in warfare. Hence some data on primitive warfare will help to complete the picture of primitive aggression. Among the Walbiri of Australia the characterization of warfare in hunting-gathering societies generally does not emphasize militarism—there is also no class of permanent or professional warriors; there is no hierarchy of military command; and groups rarely engage in wars of conquest. Every human was (and is still) a potential warrior, always armed and ready to defend one’s rights; but one is also an individualist, who prefers to fight independently. In some disputes kinship ties are align humans into opposed camps, and such a group may occasionally have comprised all the humans of a community. However, there are no military leaders, elected of hereditary, to plan tactics and ensure that others adopt the plans. Although some people are respected as capable and courageous fighters and their advice is valued, other humans do not necessarily follow them. #RandolphHarris 1 of 23
Moreover, the range of circumstances in which fights occur is in effect so limited that humans know and can employ the most effective techniques without hesitation. This is still true today even of young bachelors. There was in any case little reason for all-out warfare between communities. Slavery was unknown; portable goods were few; and the territory seized in a battle was virtually an embarrassment to the victors, whose spiritual ties were wit other localities. Small-scale wars of conquest against other tribes occurred occasionally, but I am sure that they differed only in degree from intratribal and even intracommunity fights. Thus the attack on the Waringari that led to the occupation of the water wholes in the Tanami area involved only Wangeiga men—a few score at most; and I have no evidence that communities ever entered into military alliances, either to oppose other Walbiri communities or other tribes. Technically speaking, this kind of conflict among primitive hunters can be described as war; in this sense one may conclude that “war” has always existed within the human species, and hence, that it is the manifestation of an innate drive to kill. This reasoning, however, ignores the profound differences in the warfare of civilized cultures. #RandolphHarris 2 of 23
Primitive warfare, particularly that of the lower primitives, was neither centrally organized nor led by permanent chieftains; it was relatively infrequent; it was not war of conquest nor was it bloody war aimed at killing as many of the enemy as possible. Most civilized war, in contrast, is institutionalized, organized by permanent chieftains, and aims at conquest of territory and/or acquisition of slaves and/or booty. In addition, and perhaps most important of all, is the frequently overlooked fact that there is no important economic stimulus among primitive hunter-gatherers to full-scale war. The birth-death ratio in hunting-gather societies is such that it would be rare for population pressure to cause some part of the population to fight others for territorial acquisition. Even if such a circumstance occurred it would not lead to much of a battle. If hunting rights or rights to some gathering spot were demanded, the stronger, more numerus, group would simply prevail, probably even without battle. In the second place there is not much to gain by plunder in hunting-gathering society. #RandolphHarris 3 of 23
All bands are poor in material goods and there are no standard items of exchange that serve as capital or as valuables. Finally, at the hunting-gathering level the acquisition of captives to serve as slaves for economic exploitation—a common cause of warfare in more modern times—would be useless, given the low productivity of the economy. Captives and slaves would have a difficult time producing more than enough food to sustain themselves. The overall picture of warfare among primitive hunter-gatherers given by Service is supported and supplemented by a number of other investigators, some of who are quoted in the following paragraphs. Dr. D. Pilbeam stresses the absence of war, in contrast to occasional feuds, together with the role of example rather than power among the leaders in a hunting society, and the principle of reciprocity and generosity and the central role of cooperation. (D. Pilbeam, 1970.) Dr. U. H. Stewart comes to the following conclusion concerning territoriality and warfare: There have been many contentions that primitive bands own territories or resources and fight to protect them. Although I cannot assert that this is never the case, it is probably very uncommon. #RandolphHarris 4 of 23
First, if they are too small, the primary groups that comprise the larger maximum bands intermarry. If they are too large, they split off. Second, in the cases reported here, there is no more than a tendency for primary groups to utilize special areas. Third, most so-called “warfare” among such societies is no more than revenge for alleged witchcraft or continued interfamily feuds. Fourth, collecting is the main resource in most areas, but I know of no reported defense of seed areas. Primary bands did not fight one another, and it is difficult to see how a maximum band could assemble its manpower to defend its territory against another band or why it should do so. It is true that durian trees, eagle nests, and a few other specific resources were sometimes individually claimed, but how they were defended by a person miles away has not been made clear. (U. H. Stewart, 1968.) Dr. H.H Turney-High (1971) comes to similar conclusions. He stressed that while the experiences of fear, rage, and frustration are universal, the art of war develops only late in human evolution. Most primitive societies were not capable of war because war requires a sophisticated level of conceptualization. Most primitive societies could not imagine an organization necessary to conquer or defeat a neighbour. #RandolphHarris 5 of 23
According to Rapaport, Turney-High’s work did not find a very friendly reception among anthropologist because he stressed that secondary accounts of battles written by professional anthropologists were hopelessly inadequate and sometimes downright misleading; he believed that primary sources were more reliable, even when they were by amateur ethnologist generations ago. (H.H. Turney-High, 1971.) Dr. Quincy Wright’s monumental work (1,637pages including an extensive Bibliography) presents a thorough analysis of warfare among primitive people based on the statistical comparison of the main data to be found among six hundred and fifty-thee primitive peoples. The shortcomings of his analytical in the classification of primitive societies as well as different kinds of warfare. Nevertheless, his conclusions are of considerable interest because they show a statistical trend that corresponds to the result of many other authors: “The collectors, lower hunters and lower agriculturalists are the least warlike. The higher hunters and higher agriculturalists are more warlike, while the highest agriculturalists and the pastors are the most warlike of all.” (Q. Wright, 1965.) #RandolphHarris 6 of 23
This statement confirms the idea that warlikeness is not a function of human’s natural drives that manifest themselves in the most primitive form of society, but of one’s development in civilization. Dr. Wright’s data show that the more division of labour there is in a society, the more warlike it is, and that societies with compulsory classes are the most warlike of all people. Eventually his data show that the greater the equilibrium among groups and between the group and its physical environment, the less warlikeness one finds, while frequent disturbances of the equilibrium results in an increase in warlikeness. Dr. Wright differentiates among four kinds of war—defensive, social, economic, and political. By defensive war, he refers to the practice of people who have no war in their mores and who fight if actually attacked, “in which case they make spontaneous use of available tools and hunting weapons to defend themselves, but regard this necessity as a misfortune.” By social war he refers to people with whom war “is usually not very destructive of life.” (This warfare corresponds to Dr. Service’s description of war among hunters.) #RandolphHarris 7 of 23
Economic and political wars refer to people who make war in order to acquire women, slaves, raw materials, and land/or, in addition, for the maintenance of a ruling dynasty or class. Almost every body reasons: if civilized humans are so warlike, how much more warlike must primitive humans have been! However, Dr. Wright’s results confirm the thesis that the most primitive humans are the least warlike and that warlikeness grows in proportion to civilization. If destructiveness were innate in humans, the trend would have to be the opposite. A view similar to Dr. Wright’s has also been expressed by M. Ginsberg, who writes: It would seem that war in this sense grows with the consolidation of groups and economic development. Among the simplest peoples we ought to speak rather of feuds, and these unquestionably occur on grounds of abduction of women, or resentments of trespass or personal injury. It must be conceded that these societies are peaceful by comparison with the more advanced of the primitive peoples. However, violence and fear of violence are there and fight occurs, though that is obviously and necessarily on a small scale. #RandolphHarris 8 of 23
The facts are not adequately known, and if they do not support the view of a primitive idyllic peace, they are perhaps compatible with the view of those who think that primary or unprovoked aggressiveness is not an inherent element of human nature. (E. Glover and M. Ginsberg, 1934.) Dr. Ruth Benedict (1959) makes the distinction between “socially lethal” and “non-lethal” wars. In the latter, the aim is not that of subjugating other tribes to the victor as masters and profiteers; although there was much warfare among North American Indian: The idea of conquest never arose in aboriginal North America, and this made it possible for almost all these Indian tribes to do a very extreme thing: to separate war from the state. The state was personified in the Peace Chief, who was a leader of public opinion in all that concerned the in-group and in his council. The Peace Chief was permanent, and though no autocratic ruler he was often a very important personage. However, he had nothing to do with war. He did not even appoint the war chiefs or concern himself with the conduct of war parties. Any human who could attract a following led a war party when and where he would, and in some tribes, he was in complete control for the duration of the expedition. #RandolphHarris 9 of 23
However, this lasted only till the return of the war part. The state, according to this interpretation of war, had no conceivable interest in these ventures, which were only highly desirable demonstrations of rugged individualism turned against an out-group where such demonstrations dis not harm the body politic. (R. Benedict, 1959.) Dr. Benedict’s point is important because it touches upon the connection of war, state, and private property. Socially nonlethal war is to a large extent an expression of adventurousness and the wish to have trophies and be admired, but it was not invoked by the impulse to conquer people or territory, to subjugate human beings, or to destroy the basis for their livelihood. Dr. Benedict comes to the conclusion that “elimination of war is not so uncommon as one would think from the writing of political theorists of the prehistory of war…It is a complete misunderstanding to lay this havoc [war] to any biological need of humans to go to war. The havoc is humanmade.” (R. Benedict, 1959.) Another outstanding anthropologist, Dr. E. A. Hoebel (1958) characterizes warfare among early North American Indians in these terms: “They come closer to William James’s Moral Equivalents of War. #RandolphHarris 10 of 23
“They release aggressions harmlessly: they provide exercise, sport and amusement without destruction; and only mildly is there any imposition of desires by one part on the other.” (E.A. Hoebel, 1958.) Dr. Hoebel comes to the general conclusion that human’s propensity to war is obviously not an instinct, because it is an elaborate cultural complex. He gives as an interesting example the pacifistic Shoshones and the violent Comanches who in the 1600 were still culturally and racially one. The humans of the old did not till the field, but the fruits of plants and trees were sufficient for food. Nor did the women weave for the furs of birds and animals were enough for clothing. Without working there was enough to live, there were few people and plenty of supplies, and therefore the people did not quarrel. So neither large rewards nor heavy punishments where used, but the people governed themselves. However, nowadays people do not consider a family of five children as large, and each child having again five children, before the death of the grandfather, there may be twenty-five grandchildren. The result is that there are many people and few supplies, that one has to work hard for a meagre return. So the people fall to quarreling and though rewards may be doubled and punishments heaped up, ooooooone does not get away from disorder. #RandolphHarris 11 of 23
Now, of all the dimensions of human being that must be dealt with in understanding spiritual formation, the soul is by far the most controversial and inaccessible in today’s World. For various reasons, it was rejected by the field of “psychology”—by very name the “theory of the soul”—as that field tried to develop itself into a “scientific” understanding of humans. The alleged failure to “find” and enduring, nonphysical center that organizes life into a whole has become a part of what is regarded as the outcome of modern thought, as everyone with a high-school education now knows. The issues here certainly run deep, and we do not mean to dismiss them lightly. However, they are not the kind of matters that can be dealt entirely in this scope. Part of soul growth and development involves charity. Charity is act of service, but it is more. It is a condition of the heart. While charity is an essential part of our lives, the ways we develop and exercise it vary as much as each life. “And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work: Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift,” reports 2 Corinthians 9.6, 8, 16. The Apostle Paul taught that persistence is necessary in serving, as it is in planting and harvesting. “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. #RandolphHarris 12 of 23
“As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good until all,” report Galatians 6.9-10. We may plant a good seed, but we must then spend long hours cultivating the plant before we can reap the harvest. And in service to others, our harvest is always twofold. First, our service blesses those we serve. Second, we are blessed with divine help as we serve. Cultivation of the soul has expressed itself in a great wave of popular publications and media presentations on the soul. “Soul” has become almost as attention-getting a some of the biggest celebrities, and as widely used as selling the most popular music. People pride themselves on having and knowing and expressing “soul.” The superficial conditions of ordinary life in most Western contexts have brough this forth. It is a natural reaction to a deeply felt need, for indeed the soul—or, more generally, the spiritual side of life—simply cannot be indefinitely suppressed. Fundamental aspects of life such as art, sleep, pleasures of the flesh, ritual, family (“roots”), parenting, community, health, and meaningful work all are in fact soul functions, and they fail and fall apart to the degree that soul diminishes. It is possible that the reason modern intellectuals have failed to find soul is that soul really is no longer present in their individual lives. #RandolphHarris 13 of 23
Perhaps something like a soulless life really is possible and not just something to be portrayed in fashionable literary works. That would explain why meaning is such a problem for human beings today. “Meaning” in action is fundamentally a matter of “carry over” or transcendence. Meaningful experience flows. It does not leave you stuck on something you cannot get past-whether a word you do not understand or a pointless social situation. Meaning is one of the greatest needs of human life, one of our deepest hungers—perhaps it is, in the final analysis, the most basic need in the realm of the human experience. If life as a whole is meaningful, almost anything can be born. However, in the absence of meaning, boredom and mere effort or willpower are all that is left. “Dead” religion or a dead job or relationship is one that has to be carried on in “meaningless” human routine. In boredom and carrying on by mere willpower, almost nothing can be endured, and people who are well off by all other physical and social standards find such a life unbearable. They re “dead souls.” By contrast, though in meaningful experience we are very active, the presence of meaning, with its power of “carryover,” relieves the pain of effort and makes even great strain exhilarating. #RandolphHarris 14 of 23
It is as if a power beyond us meets our action and carries us. That is always, in some measure, the presence of soul. The human fetus grows through various stages, each of which corresponds to a parallel stage of the whole human race’s own previous evolution. Examine any living organism you choose and you will find that its conception, birth, and growth show an innate evolutionary trend. The process of passing from an embryonic stage to a more evolved one involves considerable differences physically. It is equally true although less apparent, mentally. The nature and functions of humans are reflected in miniature in the cells which compose one’s body, while one oneself reflects those of the Universal Mind in which one is similar to the cell. There is no one cell in the whole organism of a human which does not reflect in miniature the pattern, the proportions, and the functions of the immense cosmos itself. The microorganism has within it all the varied possibilities of becoming a human entity. The body’s physical cells disintegrate into the Earth and become part of the soil until they take new forms in plant and animal life. #RandolphHarris 15 of 23
Just as a class in school one day breaks up and all the students go their separate ways, and in its place another class is formed, so the units are fully individualized only when they enter human stage. Until then they very, very slowly approach this release, just as an embryo in the womb approaches the form of a new born baby. The human body is composed of millions of tiny different intelligences, each having its own specialized life, all having developed from a single generalized cell. Some cells die within hours, others within days or even longer after the body’s own death. The fertilized egg contains all the organs of the human being in miniature. They merely grow and become big to produce the adult. It is an astonishing thought that the entire human body, from its head to its feet, is contained in miniature in the cell from which it starts existence. No microscope can see it, for it still is only an idea. However, given time, the idea finds expression is a form. In our bodies, the phagocyte cells follow they very opposite path to all the other cells, scattering and moving restlessly where the others are settling down into groups. There are millions of living cells which, in their totality, compose the human body. Each has its own separate birth, life, and death. #RandolphHarris 16 of 23
Nature extravagantly spends large fragments of time on outworking her high purpose; a million years to her are nothing remarkable. We poor mortals, however—being helpless prisoners in the captivity of time, whose tyrannous character we have yet to understand—are eager to see improvement and progress before the same day’s sun has set. We need but to consider the enormous duration of the aeons which have straddled the globe since the first Lemurian lived and loved. If they study the World-Idea, those who get discouraged by seeing how slow is humanity’s moral growth, and how few are the signs of its spiritual awakening, may gain fresh hope. The will of Gd is entirely unchangeable. On this point we must consider that to change the will is one thing; to will that certain things should be changed is another. It is possible to will a thing to be done now, and its contrary afterwards; and yet for the will to remain permanently the same: whereas he will would be changed, if one should begin to will what before one had not willed; or cease to will what one had willed before. This cannot happen, unless we presuppose change either in the knowledge or in the disposition of the substance of the willer. For since the will regards good, a human may in two ways begin to will a thing. #RandolphHarris 17 of 23
In one way when that thing begins to be good for one, and this does not take place without a change in one. Thus when the cold weather begins, it becomes good to sit by the fire; though it was not so before. In another way when one knows for the firs time that a whing is good for one, though one did not know it before; hence we take counsel in order to know what is good for us. Now it has already been shown that both the substance of God and His knowledge are entirely unchangeable. Many of the words the Lord has spoken are to be understood metaphorically, and according to the likeness of nature. For when we repent, we destroy what we have made; although we may even do so without change of the will; as, when a human wills to make a thing, at the same time intending to destroy it later. Therefore God is said to have repented, by way of comparison with our mode of acting, in so far as by the deluge He destroyed from the face of the Earth humans whom He had made. The will of God, as it is the first and universal cause, does not exclude intermediate causes that have power to produce certain effects. #RandolphHarris 18 of 23
Since however all intermediate causes are inferior in power to the first cause, there are many things in the divine power, knowledge and will that are not included in order of inferior causes. Thus in the case of Lazarus, one who looked only on inferior causes might have said: “Lazarus will rise again.” And God wills both: that is, that in the order of the inferior cause a thing shall happen; but that in the order of the higher cause it shall not happen; or He may will conversely. We may say, then, that God sometimes declares that a thing shall happen according as it falls under the order of inferior causes, as of nature, or merit, which yet does not happen as not being in the designs of the divine and higher causes. The He foretold Ezechias: “Take order with thy house, for thou shalt die, and not live,” reports Isaiah 38.1. Yet this did not take place, since from eternity it was otherwise disposed in the divine knowledge and will, which is unchangeable. Hence Gregory says (Moral, xvi, 5): “The sentence of God changes, but not His counsel”—that is to say, the counsel of His will. When therefore God says, “I also will repent,” His words must be understood metaphorically. For when they do not fulfill what they have threatened, humans seem to repent. #RandolphHarris 19 of 23
It does not follow from this argument that God has a will that changes, but that He sometimes wills that things should change. Although God’s willing a thing is not by absolute necessity, yet it is necessary by supposition, on account of the unchangeableness of the divine will, as has been said above. There are different stages in the development of people: some stand on the lower, some on the higher ones—and others fill in the space between. There is no equality among human beings, in character or manners, in intelligence or intuitiveness. Those who resent this fact may deny it, thereby revealing their incapacity for understanding truth. Exploitation of the lower types by the higher ones has bred the resentment, and this in turn has blinded the eyes or the mind. By one’s own reactions to the fragments of knowledge of the World-Idea which come to a human, one reveals oneself, one’s kind of character and stage of development. The wise and the foolish, the enlightened and the ignorant, the good, and the bad, dwell on the same Earth outwardly but on different planets inwardly. The human being slowly unfolds its possibilities through the workings of manifold experience. #RandolphHarris 20 of 23
It is there, in this manifold of experience, that there are to be seen conscience, guiding it along ever-higher moral paths; capacity, expressing its active power and creative talent; and intelligence, teaching it to discriminate between foolishness and wisdom or to penetrate through appearance to reality. It is significant that animals tend to live in herds. As humans mature, they reach more and more individuality. Slowly, at times pleasurably and at times painfully, the human entity builds up its consciousness and capacities through the ages. If human needs brought us thus far, human curiosity is bringing us into another kind of cycle. Yet this perception of the ultimate goodness behind life, the ultimate triumph of light and love, need not keep us from recognizing that there are evil tendencies in many humans. We may recognize the as motes in the beam, as dust in the sunray, for we must not lose our perspective about them; but we may still regard them as temporary phases of human vicissitude that will be over-passed and left behind as the slow course of evolution carries out its work upon the human race. #RandolphHarris 21 of 23
For a thousand years in Thy sight are but as a day that is past, and as a watch in the night. Thou carriest humans away as with a flood; they are like moss; they are like grass that grows in the morning. In the morning it flourishes and grows up; in the evening it is cut down and withers. Truly we perish by reason of Thy displeasure, and are overwhelmed by Thy wrath; for Thou hast set our iniquities before Thee, our secret sins in the light of Thy presence. Yea, all our days pass away because of Thy displeasure; we bring our year to an end as a sign. The days of our years are but three-score years and tend, or by reason of strength four-score. Yet is their pride but travail and vanity; for seedily our life is over and we vanish. Who knows the power of Thy wrath? And how fearful is Thine anger! Please teach us, therefore, to number our days, that we may get us a heart of wisdom. Return unto us, O Lord; how long wilt Thou be wroth? O relent Thee concerning Thy servants. Please give us abundantly every morning of Thy lovingkindness, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. Gladden us according to the days wherein Thou hast afflicted us, the years wherein we have seen sorrow. Please let thy work be revealed unto Thy servants, and Thy glory unto their children. #RandolphHarris 22 of 23
And let Thy graciousness, O Lord our God, be upon us; establish Thou also the work of our hands for us; yea, the work of our hands establish Thou it. Please watch over our families and protect them during their whole life. May our children, and our children’s children know to worship God. May each moment we experience on this Earth welcome us and bring protection. May God increase all His people and may we rejoice with a new life. May our lives grow and give us strength. Lord, please guide us in the way to grow being us healing and strength. May be learn and know the meaning and purpose of our lives on this Earth. Deep inside, may we learn what we must know and do what we must do. Please go before us an open the gates of opportunity. May our journey in this life be smooth and safe. May we know the right thing with all of us and do it no matter what the pain. A hard road lies before us, shining ones, a road filled with great difficulties, a road filled with great joys. Please guide us alone it. Please be at our side, Lord, and send guardian angels. Father of World, we turn to you in prayer that you might bless us, our Father, who took your role here on Earth and performed it well. May we act the role as artfully. Amen. #RandolphHarris 23 of 23
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Rubbing their Sleepy Eyes with Lazy Wrists–There is the Brute and the Angel in Almost Every Human!
Americans are trained from infancy for mutationhood. Western civilization is a human running with increased speed through an air-sealed tunnel in search of additional oxygen. In your prayers, pour out your heart to your Father in Heaven in thanks for the blessings you have received. Please be specific in thanking God for His goodness, for your family, for your friends, for your home, for your leaders and teachers, for the gospel, and for His Son, Jesus Christ. If we prayed for the small and simple blessings of if our prayers were only prayers of gratitude, what would our prayers be like? Recognizing our blessings and expressing gratitude increases our happiness. God gives us commandments to protect us and help us to be happy. The commandment to be grateful is no exception. Gratitude takes us outside of ourselves and focuses our attention on God and others. At this beautiful time of year, may our hearts be softened and changed as we increase our gratitude. May we always choose, no matter the season, to be grateful and qualify for God’s acknowledgement and promised blessings. “And one who recieveth all things with thankfulness shall be made glorious; and the things of this Earth shall be added unto one, even an hundred fold, yea, more,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 78.19. #RandolphHarris 1 of 23
When things get tough, perseverance is demonstrated by those who keep going, who do not give up even when others say it cannot be done. When we encounter challenged, success is usually earned by persevering and not becoming discouraged. Early warning signals are evident in many aspects of our lives. For example, a fever can be a first symptom of sickness of disease. Various financial and labour market indicator are used to forecast future trends in local and national economies. And depending upon the area of the World in which we live, we may receiver flood, Earthquake, avalanche, hurricane, tsunami, tornado, or winter storm warnings. We are also blessed by spiritual early warning signals as a source of protection and direction in our lives. Recall how Noah was alerted by God of things not yet seen, and he “prepared the ark to the saving of his house,” reports Hebrews 11.7. Consider the language of the Lord in the revelation known as the Word of Wisdom: “In consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring humans in the last days, I have warned you, and forewarn you, by giving unto you this word of wisdom by revelation,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 89.4. Spiritual warning should lead to increasingly vigilant watching. #RandolphHarris 2 of 23
You and I live in “a day of warning,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 63.58. And because we have been and will be warned, we need to be, as the Apostle Paul admonished, “watching with all perseverance,” reports Ephesians 6.19. I pray for the guidance of the Holy Ghost. The highest possibility which separates humans from beast is attainment of insight into truth, experience of one’s divine source. A tension holds all thins in equilibrium between coming together of their elements, temporary maintenance of their forms, and passing away int dissolution. This includes the mineral, the plant, the animal, and the human. However, when we look at the last-named, a new possibility opens up which could not have happened to Nature’s earlier kingdoms. All things dissolve in the end, but humans alone dissolve consciously into a higher Consciousness. We are not just higher animals and nothing more, but as human beings we possess a self-consciousness which can be developed until it matures into a thinking power as well as a totally superior kind of awareness—that of God. A human life presents only the opportunity for attaining the realization of God. #RandolphHarris 3 of 23
Developing the full potential of the human mind ought not to be taken away from any human, however evil one may be, and however remote from this goal, in punishment for one’s crimes. Our sole objective where the truths of salvation are concerned should be to find out what the Lord has revealed and then to believe and act accordingly. We testify that God is infinite and eternal and that He ordained the laws whereby His spirit children might have power to advance and progress and become like Him. We know the salvation is in Christ; that He was the Firstborn Son of the Eternal Father; that he was chosen and foreordained in the councils of Heaven to work out the infinite and eternal atonement; that Christ was born into the World as the Son of God; and that He has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. We believe with perfect surety that Christ came to ransom humans from the temporal and spiritual death brought into the World by the Fall of Adam and that Christ took upon Himself the sins of all humans on condition of repentance. We testify that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the plan of salvation; and that through the Lord’s atoning sacrifice all humans shall be raised in immortality to be judged by Jesus Christ according to the deeds done in the flesh. #RandolphHarris 4 of 23
Those that believe and obey the fullness of gospel shall be raised also unto eternal life in our Father’s kingdom. We believe it is by grace that we are saved after all that we can do, and that building upon the foundation of the atonement of Christ, all humans must work out their salvation with fear and trembling before the Lord. We proclaim that to gain salvation humans must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, repent of their sins, receive the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands, and then press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, keeping the commandments and enduring to the end. How can humans be so blind to the truth of their very being? Their quality of consciousness provides the clue, but it must be followed up. It is questionable whether the advantages of being a human creature are outweighed by the disadvantages. Why? Simply because humans may use their human faculties to transcend their present level and, as they call it, “realize oneself.” The choice between submitting or not submitting to one’s terrestrial genes and hormones belongs to humans, but the tendency to follow them belongs to the earlier stage; it is very, very ancient and is coming under their control very, very slowly. #RandolphHarris 5 of 23
When this transcendence of their ancestry is complete, humans fulfill themselves as truly human. If a human walks upright, it is because this upright poster is symbolic of their gradual progression into ruling their terrestrial body and human nature. The ordinary ego-driven unenlightened human is acted on by lower cosmic Nature, just as plants and animals are. However, in human animal, individuality and intellect are additionally present—whether slightly in the savage or markedly in the highly civilized person. The enlightened human is also acted on, but in one’s case it is by higher cosmic Nature. Instead of being guided by passion and desire, one is guided by intuition. The changeover from lower to higher requires one’s contribution, one’s effort to control nature, to discipline individuality, and to achieve self-mastery. It is not only in the possession of reason and the reception of intuition that the human form of life is superior to other beings, but also in the exercise of will. Humans are an individualized creature. They are aware of their own separate identity and special personality. If humans feel one feel they are not individually responsible for their actions, being entirely responsive to their instincts, they have the choice to learn how to modify their behaviour. #RandolphHarris 6 of 23
Human beings add a new urge, that of conscious development through intelligence to the Earth. The impersonal and eternal part of us is the God in us, symbolized by the upper half of the Sphinx’s head, as the lower half symbolizes the human part, and as the body itself symbolizes the terrestrial part. We cannot separate the importance of the body from the importance of the mind. We are animals in one part of our nature, human beings in the second part, and sometimes angelic in the third part. All make one creature. We learn what our bodies are through the physical senses. We learn a part of what the mind is through our thoughts. We learn still more about the mind’s deeper phases through our non-thoughts—that is, intuitions. Such is the triple nature of humans—a lower self of animal instincts, a middle self of human thoughts, a higher self of divine nature. We may well wonder how animal lust, human cunning, and angelic nobility can come to be mingled in a single entity. That indeed is the mystery of humans. When the whole cosmos shows its double-face of Eternal Consciousness, shadow and light, we must expect the individual creature to show the same. #RandolphHarris 7 of 23
Hence, humans are half animal and half god, with reason as their link; only when they establish an equilibrium between then do they fulfill themselves. Nature is what it is—bipolar—so existence involves struggle and conflict of all of us until the genius in a million finds the point of equilibrium between the two opposing pulls, between the savage and the saint in one. The animal nature is naturally selfish, the spiritual nature unselfish. Between those two poles, humans are brought more and more into conflict with oneself as one evolves. Because they are human animals bonded to a divine spirit, we see humans as erratic in their behaviour and irrelevant in their purposes. They bear the human form externally but are largely predatory animal internally. Mind—that is, character and consciousness—is the real essence of a human. There is the brute and the angel in almost every human. However, how much there is of the one and how little of the other, differs with every human. Returning for a moment to the metaphor of “islands,” it has to be acknowledged that the islands undergo some atypical developments in the course of time. As the infant encounters further experiences, we may think of the island both as disintegrating and as merging in new ways. #RandolphHarris 8 of 23
However, this transformation happens not on a geographical but on a multidimensional scale, and it is not easily visualized on a flat map. It is as though all the green on al the islands (green of leaves, of sea, of stones) merged to contribute to the more abstract concept of “green” without, however, bleaching the green objects on the island. It is as though the flying of the birds and of the leaves in the win were integrated to make the concept of flying. In short, each experience remains itself although generalized abstracted aspects may grow in relative importance as further experiences contribute to them. Differentiating, generalizing, and abstracting go together. Abstraction, differentiation, and generalization are names for different aspects of the same process which are in connection with learning to recognize triangles, oranges, and musical notation: the formation of concept. The concepts now under consideration are at a higher level, that is all. In order to conceptualize the colour puce, I have to perceive and recognize as puce a particular shade in a variety of contexts—generalizing. #RandolphHarris 9 of 23
I have to disentangle it from other features of the situation in which it is embedded—abstracting. And I have to distinguish it from other shades which are not puce—differentiating. Three main sets of abstractions, generalizations, and differentiations with which we are concerned just now are to do with the achievement of some sense of self, some sense of other people and things, and, thirdly, some ways in which self is experienced as related to other people and things. These will be considered one by one. However, perhaps yet another caution is needed before we do so. It is only for the sake of clarity we look at these three sets one by one and “abstract” them. Except in very rare circumstances, my experience of myself is not of me in some pure abstract sense. I am aware at this moment, not of “me,” but of me-getting-an-idea-across-to-you-the-reader and of you-the-reader-understanding-me, you-liking-this-point, you-put-off-by-my-style. In short, and to say it yet again, our experiences come in units of relationship. Gradually, if all goes well, a self, and a sense of self, is established, made up from all the bits of experience in which the persons has been involved. #RandolphHarris 10 of 23
The memory-traces of all these bits remain, but the structures which they form are profoundly affected by the context which the evolving structures provide for each new experience as it happened. Some experiences will have integrated with much that has gone before; some will have been left more or less isolated. Under the influences of a well integrated ego-identity, more central controls gain increasingly more dominance over new information coming in, and the map is no longer so easily modified by further experience. New information, although registered, then has relatively little effect on behaviour or indeed on consciousness. This is in reference to the process of selective perception, by which certain meanings come to predominate over others. Through these processes the sense of self differentiates from not self. Strong psychological structures are created in which the self is involved—self-structures. Self-structures are often strong enough to be functioning as “maps” to the working model of what is going on in and around the organism at a particular time. When this is so, they are strong enough to steer behaviour in a particular direction. When this has happenes, we recognize a stable identity. #RandolphHarris 11 of 23
Appetite and will are two different faculties, yet they have the same function: they impel humans to action. The two faculties are essential to action. Appetite is the efficient and effective cause of processes not having sense organs. It appears, for example, in the movements of nutrition and excretion. It seemed logical to postulate the same kind of originative power for all kinds of movement. That is why we admonish the mora philosophers who spend such an infinite quantity of debate touching good and the highest good to cast their eye abroad upon nature and behold the appetite that is in all things to receive and to give. With receiving and giving as the controlling ideas, there are appetitive motions more precise than that of philosopher in their long and wandering discourses of pleasure, virtue, duty, and religion. Furthermore, if one looks deeply into the experience of human desire one can detect movement, for every obtaining of a desire hath a shew of advancement, as motion though in a circle hath a shew of progression. #RandolphHarris 12 of 23
That is, a desire—say that of obtaining political office, or a mistress—directs one initially to a goal, and arriving at the goal is like retuning to one’s starting point. The will, too, seems to be the immediate impetus to any action that is the outcome of reasoning and judgment. Reason might work well and true, judgment might be sound, but unless the will were moved the intellect would have cerebrated in vain. One function of the imagination, described previously, is that of making reason appealing to the will; and the art of rhetoric discharged its office by applying the dictates of reason to imagination for “better’ moving of the will. As efficient causes, appetite and will allowed two different kinds of behaviour, the sensuous and the rational. In sensuous actions, three features were always present. First, they were immediate and nonreflective; there was no thinking about consequence. Desire, for example, was often touched off by some unlawful wish, and the wish rashly granted before it has been understood and weighed. Second, pleasure and pain attend sensuous actions, and hence were guides to desire. #RandolphHarris 13 of 23
These qualities of experience are shown most clearly in the passions, some emotional experience giving pleasure, as with joy, other experiences giving pain, as with anger. Pleasure and pain are to the particular affections, as light is to particular colours. That is, pleasure or pain is always a feature of emotional experience, just as light is always present in colour. As a quality of experience, pleasure is not most pure and satisfying when accompanying knowledge and learning. Delight always attends upon learning; there is no satiety for satisfaction and appetite are perpetually interchangeable. Many other kinds of behaviour give pleasure because of their novelty. Accordingly, some of life’s pleasures can be graded, the pleasures of knowing exceed those of affections, the affections those of the senses, achievement and victory those of a strong dinner. If the pleasure of learning be not insatiable, why do voluptuous men turn friars, and ambition men turn melancholy? The third feature of sensuous behaviour in some manner involves the affections of passions; that is, sensuous actions are emotional to some degree, great or small. The center of emotional experience is in the heart or its region. #RandolphHarris 14 of 23
Both affections and passions are linked to appetite rather than will. Their activity, strongly tinctured with pleasure and pain, powerfully affects the appetite. Their influence, however, need not be bad. In fact, in the scheme of things, if it does not conflict with reason and will, appetitive behaviour is coloured with good. The affections, indeed, can be properly enlisted by the imagination in efforts to move the will. Only when the affections of their perturbation rise up to disturb judgment and overpower the will are the issues of appetite are evil. As a general rule, behaviour controlled by will is preferable to actions controlled by appetite. “In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth. Now the Earth was a formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light ‘day,’ and the darkness he called ‘night.’ And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day,” reports Genesis 1.1-3. Light is a species of quality. #RandolphHarris 15 of 23
Some writers have said that the light in the air has not a natural being such as the colour on a wall has, but only an intentional being, as a similitude of colour in their air. However, this cannot be the case for two reasons. First, because light gives a name to the air, since by it the air becomes actually luminous. However, colour does not do this, for we do not speak of the air as coloured. Secondly, because light produces natural effect, for by the rays of the sun bodies are warmed, and natural changes cannot be brought about by mere intentions. Others have said that light is the sun’s substantial form, but this also sems impossible for two reasons. First because substantial forms are not of themselves objects of the senses; for the object of the intellect is what a thing is. Whereas light is visible of itself. In the second place, because it is impossible that what is the substantial form of one thing should be accidental for of another; since substantial forms of their very nature constitute species: wherefore the substantial form always and everywhere accompanies the species. However, light is not the substantial for of air, for if it were, the air would be destroyed when light is withdrawn. Hence it cannot be the substantial form of the sun. #RandolphHarris 16 of 23
We must say, then, that as heat is an active quality consequent on the substantial form of fire, so light is an active quality consequent on the substantial form of the sun, or of another body that is of itself luminous, if there is any such body. A proof of this is that the rays of different stars produce different effects according to the diverse natures of bodies. Since quality is consequent upon substantial form, the mode in which the subject receives a quality differs ad the mode differs in which a subject receives a substantial form. For when matter receives its form perfectly, the qualities consequent upon the form are firm and enduring; as when, for instance, water is converted into fire. When, however, substantial form is received imperfectly, so as to be, as it were, in process of being received, rather than fully impressed, the consequent quality lasts for a time but is not permanent; as may be seen when water which has been heated returns in time to its natural state. However, light is not produced by the transmutation of matter, as though matter were in receipt of a substantial form, and light were a certain inception of substantial form. For this reason light disappears on the disappearance of its active cause. #RandolphHarris 17 of 23
It is accidental to light not to have a contrary, forasmuch as it is the natural quality of the first corporal cause of change, which is itself removed from contrariety. As heart acts towards perfecting the form of fire, as instrumental cause, by virtue of the substantial form, so does light act instrumentally, by virtue of the Heavenly bodies, towards producing substantial forms; and towards rendering colours actually visible, inasmuch as it is a quality of the first sensible body. God hath done all things, whatsoever He would. The will of God must needs always be fulfilled. In proof of which we must consider that since an effect is confirmed to the agent according to its form, the rule is the same with active causes as with formal causes. The rule in forms is this: that although a thing may fall short of any particular form, it cannot fall short of universal form. For though a thing may fail to be, for example, a man or a living being, yet it cannot fail to be a being. Hence the same must happen in active causes. Something may fall outside the order of any particular cause, but not outside the order of the universal cause; under which all particular causes are included: and if any particular cause fails of its effect, this is because of the hindrance of some other particular cause, which is included in the order of the universal cause. #RandolphHarris 18 of 23
Even in corporeal things this is clearly seen. For it may happen that a star is hindered from producing its effects; yet whatever effect does result, in corporeal things, from this hindrance of a corporal cause, must be referred though intermediate causes to the universal influence of Heaven first. Since, then, the will f God is the universal cause of all things, it is impossible that the divine will should not produce its effect. Hence that which seems to depart from the divine will in one order, returns into it in another order; as does the sinner, who by sin falls away from the divine will as much as lies in one, yet falls back into the order of that will, when it is punished. In the spiritually transformed social dimension is abandonment of all defensiveness. This of course could occur only in a social context where Christ dwells—that is, among his special people. However, it is natural it would occur in the absence of attack and withdrawal, wherever that may be, or where we have an impregnable defense against it. This abandonment includes a willingness to beknown in our most intimate relationships for who we really are. It would include abandonment of all practices of self-justification, evasiveness, and deceit, as well as manipulation. #RandolphHarris 19 of 23
That is not to say we should impose all the fact about ourselves upon those close to us, much less on others at large. Of course we should not. However, it does mean that we do not hide and we do not follow strategies for “looking good.” Jesus’ teachings about not performing for public approval, about letting our “yes” be a “yes” and nothing more, and about not being a hypocrite—having a face that differs from our reality—all find application here. “Be careful not to do your ‘acts of righteousness’ before humans, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have n reward from your Heavenly Father,” reports Matthew 6.1. (Important to read Matthew chapters 5 and 6 in the Christian Bible.) Frequently, death comes as an intruder. It is an enemy that suddenly appears in the midst of life’s feasts, putting out is lights and gaiety. It visits the aged as they walk on faltering feet. Its summons is heard by those who have scarcely reached midway in life’s journey, and often it hushes the laughter of little children. Death lays its heavy hand upon those dear to us and at times leaves us baffled and wondering. In certain situations, as in great suffering and illness, death comes as an Angel of mercy. However, for the most part, we think of it as the enemy of human happiness. #RandolphHarris 20 of 23
The darkness of death can ever be dispelled by the light of revealed truth. “I am the resurrection, and the life,” spoke the Master. “One that believeth in me, though one were dead, yet shall one live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die,” reports John 11.25-26. This reassurance, yes, even holy confirmation of life beyond the grace, could well be the peace promised by the Saviour when he assured his disciples: “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the World giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, nether let it be afraid,” reports John 14.27. So all those who walk with God in this Earthly pilgrimage will be blessed and know that God will not abandon his children who trust in Him. In the night of death God’s presence will be better than a light and safer than a known way. The door is starting to swing from hot to cold. Although it is not as cold as it should be, occasionally a cold day comes. The pokeberries are purple, the sassafras is starting to turn, and the gardens are heavy with tomatoes and mandarin oranges. #RandolphHarris 21 of 23
It is a time to stop and pay attention: the spirit of the land are very busy. I pray to them at this liminal time to open my eyes. Do not let me awake one day and ask where winter has gone. May I be aware of its heavy rain and feet and feet of deep snow, and artic chill. May I be aware of winter’s presence, may we experience rain and lightning and thunder storms, and be as thrilled with it as I will be with arrival of the spring. I set my face to the dark I will travel with the Sun through the dark. I will go with confidence in the deepest dark. Though about me the dark may grow, God is always at my side guiding me to light. This is what I know, God of the Universe. This is what you are telling me and this is what I tell you: the Earth prepares for a great change. Light and dark are equal today, but that will not last. I see the Heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God. The Earth makes its way around the Sun and takes u with it into the year’s dark half. We travel with it, not in calm resignation, but with wild anticipation of what dreams may be dreamt in the night of the World. May they be good dreams. For we saw Him, even on the right hand of God; and we heard the voice bearing record that he if the Only Begotten of the Father. #RandolphHarris 22 of 23
That by God, and through God, and of God, the World are and were created, and the inhabitants thereof are begotten sons and daughters of God. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament shows His handiwork; day unto day expresses His greatness; night unto night makes Him known. There is no speech, there are no words, their voice is not heard. Yet their sway extends over all the Earth and their message to the ends of the World. In the Heavens, He hath set a tent for the Sun. For the Sun is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber it rejoices as a strong human to run its course. Its going forth is from one end of the Heaven, and its circuit unto the other; nothing is hidden from its heat. The law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is clear, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever; the judgments of the Lord are true, they are righteous altogether; more to be desired are they than gold, yea, than must fine gold; sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. More over by them is Thy servant warned; in keeping of the there is great reward. What can humans discern of their own errors? Please clear me of my hidden faults. #RandolphHarris 23 of 23
Winchester Mystery House
The Witches Cap – named for it’s conical resemblance of a witches hat. Many famous mediums claim this room was “important” to Sarah Winchester, all though we do not know what it may have been used for. How did you feel when you experienced the Witches Cap for the first time?
Winchester Mystery House
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻 The original mansion still stands, but there were also other Victorian houses on the estate for employees. Be sure to show your support and help keep tours possible in the future by taking virtual tours and exploring items in the online gift shop.
🗝 winchestermysteryhouse.com
To Live with Gratitude Ever in Our Hearts is to Touch Heaven!
It is very peaceful to be able to live for your work alone. The self-denial, the sacrifices that our work demands are all compensated for by that lovely serenity of giving yourself to inherit the kingdom of Heaven. Many people believe that we can only experience peace when the conditions in our lives are pleasant. However, we can even feel peace in times of war, and when there is no war raging, many people often lack peace. In order to have peace a person must first find atonement; peace is the result of change within humans in which union has replaced alienation. Peace is harmony and union between humans, it is the overcoming of separateness and alienation. Peace comes through the gospel—through the Atonement of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Even when the World is in turmoil all around us, we can receive the blessings of inner peace. This blessing will continue with us as we stay true to our testimony of the gospel and as we remember that Heavenly Fathers and Jesus Christ love us and watch over us. In addition to feeling peace ourselves, we can be an influence for peace in our families, our community, and the World. #RandolphHarris 1 of 24
When we keep the commandment, give service, care for family members and neighbour’s, and share the gospel, we work for peace. Think about it. Why do people make fun of people and spread vicious rumors and lies? Because they want to spread evil and hate. However, if we share the Word of God, we will spread love and peace. Whenever we help relieve the suffering of another, we work for peace. “The Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall tech you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the World giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid,” reports John 14.26-27. At this time of year, we frequently think of gifts. We sometimes obsess over gifts we want to give and gifts we hope to receive. However, do we consider the great gift of gratitude? Gratitude is deeper than thanks. Thankfulness is the beginning of gratitude. Gratitude is the completion of thankfulness. Thankfulness may consist merely of words. Gratitude is shown in acts. It especially blesses of families. The Saviour exemplified and taught the importance of gratitude. #RandolphHarris 2 of 24
Many of us had a hard year, and some of us knew 2020 was not going to be a great year. As we lay in bed on the first day of 2021, I am sure a lot of people were thinking, “Is this going to be worth it. Going through another year of uncertainty. Nothing ever changes.” However, a grateful heart comes through expressing gratitude to our Heavenly Father for His blessings and to those around us for all that they bring into our lives. To live with gratitude ever in out hearts is to touch Heaven. When our lives change or become difficult and we have to deal with a lot of difficult people and it seems we are not getting the help we need and thinks are taking much longer than we expect them to, sometimes we need someone to help teach us how to think and look at life. The Scriptures and church are the best way to reeducate ourselves and train our brains to think different. You could spend years trying to convince the people around you to live right and confess their sins, and in many cases, all they will do is get more entrenched in lives, sarcasm, and ignorance. To some people sinning and lying and breaking the law is cool. They think it allows them to be part of an elite group and that they are cool, hip, trendsetters. #RandolphHarris 3 of 24
Therefore, it is important to focus on self. Our hearts must be changed in order to inherit the kingdom of God. How might we change our actions so that our heart may be changed int a grateful hearts and touch heaven? Our Father in Heaven has placed great trust in you. He has a work for you to do. Seek His guidance in prayer. The decisions you make now will set the course for much of what will follow during your mortal life and throughout eternity. We testify that God lives. It is our fervent prayer that you will remain steadfast and valiant throughout your lives and that you will trust in the Saviour and His promises. As you do this, you will be an influence for good in helping to build the kingdom of God and prepare the World for the Second Coming of the Saviour. Heavenly Father has given to us agency, the ability to choose right from wrong and to act four ourselves. Next to the bestowal of life itself, the right to direct our life is one of God’s greatest gifts. We are responsible for the choices we make and must have the agency and courage to stand firm in obeying God’s will, even if we have to stand alone. While we are free to choose our course of actions, we are not free to choose the consequences. Whether for good or bad, consequences follow as a natural result of the choices we make. #RandolphHarris 4 of 24
Some sinful behaviour may bring temporary, Worldly pleasures, but such choices delay our progress and lead to heartache and misery. Righteous choices lead to lasting happiness and eternal life. Remember, true freedom comes from using our agency to choose obedience; loss of freedom comes from choosing disobedience. We are responsible for developing the talents and abilities Heavenly Father has given us. We are accountable to God for what we do with our talents and how we spend our time. Choose to do many good things of your own free will. It seems evident, that humans are carried, by a natural instinct or prepossession, to repose faith in their senses; and that, without any reasoning, or even almost before the use of reason, we always suppose an external Universe, which depends not on our perception, but would exist, though we and every sensible creature were absent or annihilated. Even the animal creation are governed by a like opinion, and preserve this belief of external objects, in all their thoughts, designs, and actions. It seems also evident, that, when humans follow this blind and powerful instinct of nature, they always suppose the very images, presented by these senses, to be the external objects, and never entertain any suspicion, that the one are nothing but a representation of the other. #RandolphHarris 5 of 24
This very table, which we see white, and which we feel hard, is believed to exist, independent of our perception, and to be something external to our mind, which perceives it. Our presence bestows not being on it. Our absence does not annihilate it. It preserves its existence uniform and entire, independent of the situation of intelligent beings, who perceive or contemplate it. However, this universal and primary opinion of all humans is soon destroyed by the slightest philosophy, which teaches us, that nothing can ever be present to the mind but an image or perception, and that the senses are only the inlets, through which these images are conveyed, without being able to produce any immediate intercourses between the mind and the object. The table, which we see, seems to diminish, as we remove father from it: But the real table, which exists independent of us, suffers no alteration: It was, therefore, nothing but its image, which was present to the mind. These are the obvious dictates of reason; and no human, who reflects, ever doubted, that the existences, which we consider, when we say, this house and that tree, are nothing but perceptions in the mind, and fleeting copies or representations of other existences, which remain uniform and independent. #RandolphHarris 6 of 24
So far, then, are we necessitated by reasoning to contradict or depart from the primary instincts of nature, and to embrace a new system with regard to the evidence of our sense. However, here philosophy finds herself extremely embarrassed, when she would justify this new system, and obivate the cavils and objections of sceptics. She can no longer plead the infallible and irresistible instincts of nature: For that led us to a quite different system, which is acknowledged fallible and even erroneous. And to justify this pretended philosophical system, by a chain of clear and convincing argument, or even any appearance of argument, exceeds the power of all human capacity. By what argument can it be proved, that the perceptions of the mind must be caused by external objects, entirely different from them, though resembling them (if that be possible) and could not arise either from the energy of the mind itself, or from the suggestion of some invisible and unknown spirit, or from some other cause still more unknown to us? It is acknowledged, that, in fact, many of these perceptions arise not from anything external, as in dreams, madness, and other diseases. #RandolphHarris 7 of 24
And nothing can be more inexplicable than the manner, in which the body should so operate upon the mind as ever to convey an image of itself to a substance, supposed of so different, and even contrary a nature. It is a question of fact, whether the perceptions of the sense be produced by external objects, resembling them: How shall this question be determined? By experience surely; as all other questions of a like nature. However, here experience is, and must be entirely silent. The mind has never anything present to it but the perceptions, and cannot possibly reach any experience of their connexion with object. The supposition of such a connexion is, therefore, without any foundation in reasoning. To have recourse to the veracity of the supreme Being in order to prove the veracity of our sense, is surely making a very unexpected circuit. If one’s veracity were at all concerned in this matter, our sense would be entirely infallible; because it is not possible that one can ever deceive. Not to mention, that, if the external World be once called in question, we shall be at a loss to find arguments, by which we may prove the existence of that Being or any of his attributes. #RandolphHarris 8 of 24
The Darwinian idea of evolution as a struggle for existence is blind; the philosophic idea sees it as rhythmic unfoldment, following a spiral pattern and accompanied by involution. If we start with the theory that the human form was born out of a pair of apes, that it originated by a process of natural selection, a different view of the descent of humans may be obtained. However, we still need the Missing Link. This is something which will never be found by the methods of scientific investigation. There is evolution only in outward appearance but unfoldment inward reality. The human entity paradoxically contains within itself all lower forms of life from the very beginning, although they are quite different from the one it manifests when fully developed. The living, intelligent human entity preexists elsewhere, and takes up its physical residence on Earth only when it is ready for it. From the moment this specific unit of life separated from the cosmic Life, through all the differences experiences whereby it developed, and through all the different kingdoms of Nature, its spiritual identity as Man was predetermined. #RandolphHarris 9 of 24
The materialist belief that humans have evolved from the monkey is not accepted by philosophy. The race of apes came from a conjunction of primitive man and a female beast. It was a degeneration, not an evolution. It is true that we got our bodies, as Dr. Darwin says, from the best type of animals on Earth through a utilization of them at the time of conception. The progeny was animal plus human. The monkey did not precede man, as so many materialistic biologists assets, but appeared after hi. Had it really preceded him it would not have been in existence today, for in ever case of the evolution of species the predecessors die off and disappear. There is a long evolutionary arch between a thinking animal in human form and a beauty-inspired man. According to philosophic tradition, we are in the “monkey” stage of development where our relationship toward the full “human” stage is as far away as that of a monkey is to a present-day man. The “half-ape” half-human being which passes today for a real “man” will one day give place to the real thing. Only then will it deserve the appellation. The grossest humans, not far from animals in habits and ways, and the most unrefined primitive communities contain this possibility of eventual development. #RandolphHarris 10 of 24
However, the full humans realization can come only with time, with birth after birth slowly and spirally unfold the World-Idea. Anne Rice also mentioned in the Vampire novels that humans may not be God’s final and best creation and that they could still be evolving. Is man only a reasoning ape—a creative animal? The religious instinct, the ethical conscience, the metaphysical faculty, and the mystical intuition proclaim, with one vice, the answer: “No!” Man is the keystone of the arch of material life, whereas an animal lives solely under the impulses of self-preservation and self-procreation. Only in man can this Divine Being arrive at Self-consciousness, because only man can develop intelligence in its fullness. The intelligence which animals possess, however excellently it suffices them, is after all one which is concerned purely with objective things. Animals cannot move in the realm of abstract ideas, but man can escape from the concrete through his developed reason, his religious feeling, his mystic intuition. So far as man is an animal body, he shares with the other animals their interest in eating, drinking, and copulation. However, their interest does not go beyond this point where his does. #RandolphHarris 11 of 24
Men and woman want to know about other things and to express what they know or to receive communications from others concerning what they know. No living creature in the kingdom of animals knows more than its immediate surroundings or cares for more than the sustenance of its immediate existence. It lives in an immense and varied Universe but that fact is lost to its mentality and outside its interest. Only when the evolving entity attains the stage of developed human beings does this unconsciousness disappear. Then life takes on a larger meaning and the life-force becomes aware of itself, individualized, self-conscious. Only then does a higher purpose become possible and apparent. Is there any animal which tries to understand the meaning of is life, much more the meaning of life in the whole cosmos? Only when its consciousness has advanced to some extent to the human kingdom does the beginning of such an attempt become noticeable. When Consciousness in any creature reaches by successive periods of growth the stage where it asks itself “What am I?” thus betraying developed intelligence of a kind which no animal possesses, it is ready to seek the Spirit. #RandolphHarris 12 of 24
As far as we know, the moral idealism and metaphysical thinking which is possible to humans may be impossible to animals. What animal could hold any metaphysical theory, could generalize ideas about space, time, and mind, could analyse situations and relationships, could be seriously concerned about a higher ethical problem? Since we cannot truly communicate with animals, we do not truly understand their mental capabilities, and therefore they do not seem to have the capacity to get outside themselves and to perceive themselves quite impersonally. Some humans do have it and more will have it as they develop their potentialities. A self-conscious creature is one that not only knows its own individual feelings and thoughts, its own mind, but can also reflect upon them. The animal, as far as we know, has not reached this stage but the human has. If there were no way of going beyond it, tied to the physical body as humans are, the outlook would seem bleak for humans. However, they have mental and emotional possibilities and capacities, imaginations and sensitivities, which can carry them where animals may not be able to penetrate. #RandolphHarris 13 of 24
There are certain ideas which belong exclusively to the higher part of human’s nature. We would look in vain into any animal’s mind to match them. Humans are the only creature among Earth’s animals which, as far as we know, aspires to reach beyond themselves, which has the inner urge to grow. Humans also are the only creature which desires to know what life is here for. The human animal is unique. Yes, let it be admitted that man moves and acts with a terrestrial body but let it not be forgotten that humans think with a human brain and feel with a heart capable of responding to calls for charity. More, there is something in them which aspires to spirituality. There are two basic feelings, pleasure and pain, attached to two basic drives: libidinal/pleasure-seeking and aggressive/destructive/pain-associated respectively. According to this view, all pleasurable experiences are associated with libidinal drives, all painful experiences with aggressive/destructive drives. The emergence of self and other out of the earliest units of experience is attributable to these two drives and their associated feelings. #RandolphHarris 14 of 24
The painful experiences which the infant encounters are the first to be organized, and they are experienced as somehow inflicted on the infant by an “other.” This primitive organization of experience constitutes the first differentiation of self from other. It is as though the baby knew that the self is good and the other bad. According to this theory, organization starts when something is experiences as bad—it does not start from an experience of well-being. The sense of “other” is thought to come from times of distress which the infant experiences in terms of “this is terrible but it is not me.” This is in contrast to what is thought to happen at times of well-being. These are so pleasant that it is thought to be of no advantage to the infant to organize the experience into “this is very nice but it is not me. On the contrary. This is how the sense of omnipotent well-being develops which Dr. Freud calls the “purified pleasure-ego”: “all that is good is me and all that is me is good.” The purified pleasure-ego and the pleasant experiences which lead to its construction are the core or germ of the self. The basic units of experience are “precipitants” round which parts of the self “consolidate.” #RandolphHarris 15 of 24
They consolidate by virtue of the common element of pleasure in a number of experiences. What is important is the intense, overwhelming nature of early feeling and its irradiating effect on all other perceptual elements of the introjection. In this view, not only does distress not get organized at this stage with what will become part of the self, but also distressing experiences are not recognized as having a common factor—they are not given meaning except as “other.” Unpleasant experiences are kept apart from each other, and from the sense of well-being—defensively. From this viewpoint, pleasure and pain are the organizing principles for all experiences, taking precedence over any other means of conceptualizing experience. It is not difficult to imagine circumstances in which this could be so, for instance when the infant is so frequently uncomfortable that this makes an overwhelming impact on its development: distress and the absence of distress could come to matter more than anything else. And if we picture a system in which those neural pathways come to be the most dominant, down which pleasure-messages and pain-messages flow, we may imagine how this can happen; this would be a system in which those pathways have more enduring and more extensive reverberations. #RandolphHarris 16 of 24
We could also account for the relatively later conceptualization of distressing experiences, by imagining that, in early states of development, distress somehow disrupts normal message-sending. This disruptive process would be the same as that referred to when it is said of a human baby that the ego is overwhelmed by anxiety, and disintegrates. In the adult, we call it panic. When distress disrupts the immature organism’s organization, this prevents it doing anything other than calling for help from more mature animals. There may be survival-value in this. If the young organism is too immature to react to danger with fight or flight in a successful way, it is perhaps safest that it should be unable to try, and be reduced to only crying for help. The beginnings of ego-functioning are thought to be defensive in this tradition, the purpose being to maintain a sense of well-being and to ward off the infant’s discover that the distress is also its own. However, it may not be true that the sense of well-being and the sense of distress can be the original organizing principles of self and other in every case, though perhaps it was the general cause among those who sought psychotherapeutic help at a particular time during this century. #RandolphHarris 17 of 24
For the most part, to my mind, people need to be fairly well and integrated, before they are able to organize their experiences of the World in terms of “I like” versus “I do not like,” “libidinally” versus “aggressively.” I think it is at least as possible for people’s minds to be organized according to what happened in their early relationships with others, whether pleasurable or painful. Sensations and emotions are thought of as organized into the landscape of what occurs as experience follows experience. Psychic structures form because repeated experiences create them from the most commonly experiences connections, which after a certain point gain some independence from the structures in which they were originally embedded. To my mind, the neurophysiological/classificatory/concept-attaining/structure-building approach provides the basic ideas in terms of which we should understand the emergence of self and other from the original state which Dr. William James (1890) called a “big buzzing blooming confusion,” and Dr. Balint a “harmonious interpenetrating mix-up.” #RandolphHarris 18 of 24
Pleasure and pain may profoundly affect the harmonious interpenetrating mix-up differentiation, but they are not solely responsible. The process I have called concept-formation start off the differentiation of self from other, as they start every other differentiation and integration. Growth is the characteristic of the plant kingdom, movement of the animal, thought of the human. The mineral, the plant, and the animal have the infinite Life-Power within them, too, but they do not know that they have it. Humans alone can know their own divinity. Indeed one is not truly a human until one has know it. What the fishes and birds cannot attain, the human can. And that is the Supreme Awareness, the Divine Being discovered under the cosmic masquerade. The first main element in the transformed social dimension is for individuals to come to see themselves whole, as God Himself sees them. Such a vision sets them beyond the wounds and limitations they have received in their past relationships to others. It is this vision of oneself from God’s point of view that makes it possible to regard oneself as blessed, no matter what has happened. “We are dead,” Paul tells us, and “our life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then we will appear with him, glorious,” reports Colossians 3.3-4. #RandolphHarris 19 of 24
We have stepped into a new life where the primary relationship is with Christ and we are assured of a glorious existence forever. If we place our hope entirely in God, God has a plan for each of us in the work he is doing during our lifetime, and no ne can prevent this from being fulfilled. The part we play in His plans now will extend to the role God has set before us for eternity. Our life in Him is whole and it is blessed, no matter what has or has not been done to us, no matter how shamefully our human circles of sufficiency have been violated. It is God’s sufficiency to us that secures everything else. Paul again said, “Our sufficiency is of God.” “Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes for God. He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant—not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life,” reports 2 Corinthians 3.5-6. “And God is able to make all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. As it is written: ‘He has scattered abroad his gifts to the poor; his righteousness endures forever,’” reports 2 Corinthians 9.8-9. It is the God-given vision of us as whole in Him that draws all the poisons from our relationships to others and enables us to go forward with sincere forgiveness and blessings toward them. #RandolphHarris 20 of 24
Only when we have the God-given vision can we stand free from the wounds of the past and from those who have assaulted or forsaken us. Every efficient cause is greater than the thing effected. However, nothing is greater than the will of God. We must not then seek for a cause of it. In no wise has the will of Gd a cause. In proof of which we must consider that, since the will follows from the intellect, there is cause of the will in the person who wills, in the same way as there is a cause of the understanding, in the person that understands. The case with the understanding is this: that if the premiss and its conclusion are understood separately from each other, the understanding the premiss is the cause that the conclusion is known. If the understanding perceive the conclusion in the premiss itself, apprehending both the one and the other at the same glance, in this case the knowing of the conclusion would not be caused by understanding the premises, since a thing cannot be its own cause; and yet, it would be true that the thinker would understand the premises to be the cause of the conclusion. It is the same with the will, with respect to which the end stands in the same relation to the means to the end, as do the premises to the conclusion with regard to the understanding. #RandolphHarris 21 of 24
Hence, if anyone in one act wills and end, and in another act means to that end, one’s willing that end will be the case of one’s willing the means. If in one act one will both end and the means to the end, this cannot be the case. Yet it will be true to say that one wills to order to the end the means to the end. Now as God by one act understands all things in His essence, so by one act He wills all things in His goodness. Hence, as in God to understand the cause is not the cause of His understanding the effect, for He understand the effect in the cause, so, in Him, to will an end is not the cause of His willing the means, yet He wills the ordering of the means to the end. Therefore, He will this to be as means to that; but does not will this on account of that. The will of God is reasonable, not because anything is to God a cause of willing, but in so far as He wills one thing to be on account of another. Since God wills effects to proceed from definite causes, for the preservation of order in the Universe, it is not unreasonable to seek for causes secondary to the divine will. It would, however, be unreasonable to do so, if such were considered as primary, and not as dependent on the will of God. #RandolphHarris 22 of 24
Philosophers have their vanity have thought fit to attribute contingent effects to other causes, being utterly unable to perceive the cause that is shown above all others, the will of God. Since God wills effects to come from causes, all effects that presuppose some other effect do not depend solely on the will of God, but on something else besides: but the first effect depends on the divine will alone. Thus, for example, we may say that God willed humans to have hands to serve His intellect by their work, and intellect, that humans might be human; and willed humans to be humans so that they might enjoy Him (God), or for the completion of the Universe. However, this cannot be reduced to other created secondary ends. Hence such things depend on the simple will of God; but the others on the order of other causes. Look! The garden is growing well! Through your help, and through my work, we have done a great deed, Holy Ones. We have produced food from seeds’ promise. I stop for a moment to praise tomatoes, honouring them by eating one. Lovely is the Spirit of God who grows such things. First I praise their shapes—they shun the easy perfection of the sphere and take instead their own forms. #RandolphHarris 23 of 24
The weight of these tomatoes is worth praising, and the depth of their colour. Before I eat this one, I smell it, taking its scent in deeply, finding in me a resonance that tells me that this is the smell of fertile Earth. Their skin, though stretched tightly, yields quickly; it has performed its duty of containing treasure with uncommon devotion and now relinquishes command to me. With silent thanks, then, I accept the task and eagerly receive the honour so bestowed, hoping, by so doing, to honour in turn the giver of the gift and the gift itself. Our soul has waited for the Lord; He is our help and shield. For our heart rejoices in Him, because we have trusted in His holy name. Let Thy mercy, O Lord, be upon us, according as we have hoped in Thee. Show us Thy loving kindness, O Lord, and please grant us Thy salvation. Arise for our help and redeem us for Thy mercy’s sake. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt; open your mouth, and I shall grant you of My bounty. Happy is the people that fares thus, happy is the people whose God is the Lord. As for me, in Thy loving kindness do I trust; my heart rejoices in Thy salvation. I will sing unto the Lord, because He hath dealt bountifully with me. #RandolphHarris 24 of 24
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This is the Soul-Searching Fact at the Heart of Our Modern Sadness!
Outside the kingdom of the Lord there is no nation which is greater than any other. God and history will remember your judgment. A time comes when one must weary of one’s paradise, when a desire appears for the conditions which ne was formerly glad to leave behind but now would be glad to take up again. Thus it is that humans shuttle through this Universe of opposites. We find a certain phenomena in nature. We seek a cause or author. We imagine that we have found Him. We afterwards become so enamoured of this offspring of our brain, that we imagine it impossible, but He must produce something greater and more perfect than the present scene of things, which are so full of ill disorder. In a since, God has allowed humans to be the authors of their existence or order it the Universe; it follows, that they possess that precise degree of power, intelligence, and benevolence, which appears in their craft. They have assisted the ascent of reason by the wings of imagination; otherwise humans could not change their manner of inference, and argue from causes to effects; presuming, that a more perfect production than the present World would be more suitable to such perfect beings as the gods, and forgetting that they have no reason to ascribe to these beings any perfection or any attribute, but what can be found in the present World. #RandolphHarris 1 of 31
Hence all the fruitless industry to account for the ill appearances of nature, and save the honour of the gods; while we must acknowledge the reality of that evil and disorder, with which the World so much abounds. Physics finds that nothing is ultimately permanent, that everything moves from its present condition to its opposite. Need we be surprised that history finds somewhat the same cyclic movement in the activities of humankind, that deterioration of even the best comes with time, that improvement of even the worst follows too? It is as true in the domain of inner life as in the outer one that Nature must restore equilibrium when it is lacking, must compensate opposing forces by balancing them. If it were not continuously being equilibrated in some of its parts, there could not be any stable Universe. This is happening by obedience to law, not by chance. It is happening wherever the movement or development of human and Nature reaches an extreme, when it forces a reversal of direction of the movement backward toward the other and totally dissimilar extreme. The pattern followed is therefore a rhythmic one, shuttling between one pole and its opposite. #RandolphHarris 2 of 31
In this history of humans, when the point of fullness in any particular development is approached, a contradictory movement begins to come into play and, at first gradually but later suddenly, reverses the direction of one’s tendencies. In this way not only are neglected potentialities activated but also some sort of an equilibrium is maintained. These critical turning points are always marked by great and violent upheavals. The Universe is not only constructed by divine intelligence no a two-way oscillating rhythm, but also on a balancing force between both movements. If humans upset Nature’s equilibrium by excess, she sets up a reversal in compensation, a movement toward lack, restraint. This is the endless oscillation of things, history. There is a threefold movement in nature and life—forward, backward, and neutralizing. There is an Old World theory that everything that has been will be again, repeating itself by a precise mathematical law when the same particles of matter are brought together again. And that there is a perpetual alternation between change and changelessness, of endless rhythm and periodicity which provides no evolutionary goal but makes life an end in itself. #RandolphHarris 3 of 31
Why take these attributes for granted, or why ascribe to the cause any qualities but what actually appear in the effect? Why torture your brain to justify the course of nature upon suppositions, which, for aught you know, may be entirely imaginary, and of which there are to be found no traces in the course of nature? It is useless; because our knowledge of this cause being derived entirely from the course of nature, we can never, according to the rules of reasoning, return back from the cause with any new inference, or making additions to the common and experienced course of nature, establish any new principles of conduct and behaviour. Eternal Recurrence is the eternal law, that perpetual repetitive movement is the universal condition, is questionable at the very least, unjustifiable at the very most. If the human race, for example, were doomed to repeat all its mistakes and misdeeds again and again, its life would be senseless. Such an outlook is not far from the merely materialistic one. The idea of recurring historic cycles is well established in the Old World. If you saw, for instance, a half-finished building, surrounded with heaps of brick and stone and mortar, and all the instruments of masonry; could you not infer from the effect, that it was a work of design and contrivance? #RandolphHarris 4 of 31
And could you not return again, from this inferred cause, to infer new additions to the effect, and conclude, that the mansion would soon be finished, and receive all the further improvements, which art could bestow upon it? If you saw upon the sea-shore the print of one human foot, you would conclude, that a man had passed that way, and that he had also left the traces of the other foot, though effaced by the rolling of the sands or inundation of the waters. Why then do you refuse to admit the same method of reasoning with regard to the order of nature? Consider the World and the present life only as an imperfect Victorian mansion, from which you can infer a superior intelligence; and arguing from that superior intelligence, which can leave nothing imperfect; why may you not infer a more finished scheme or plan, which will receive its completion in some distant point of space of time? Are not these methods of reasoning exactly similar? And under what pretence can you embrace that one, while you respect the other? All things move forward, stop, and wheel back on themselves. They increase and strengthen but also bend and submit. This advance and retreat is both a cycle and a spiral. It is not blind, for thus it established equilibrium and obeys law, that is, it gives meaning. #RandolphHarris 5 of 31
Nowhere in Nature does a situation, a circumstance, a creature, or a person recur exactly as before. It is that Nature repeats herself, but during the interval the spiral has wound its way onward. In the spiral’s form we see the coming together of that which is the hidden being and that which is the visible one, so the full truth is revealed. It is true f a creature or a globe. Whenever you see a spiral form in nature, you will find it stands for a form which is developing, growing, changing, or moving. The infinite difference of the subjects is a sufficient foundation for this difference in my conclusions. In works of human art and contrivance, it is allowable to advance from the effect to the cause, and returning back from the cause, to form new inferences concerning the effect, and examine the alterations, which it has probably undergone, or may still undergo. However, what is the foundation of this method of reasoning? Plainly this; that humans are beings, whom we know by experience, whose motives and designs we are acquainted with, and whose projects and inclinations have a certain connexion and coherence, according to the laws which nature has established for the government of such a creature. #RandolphHarris 6 of 31
When, therefore, we find, that any work has proceeded from the skill and industry of humans; as we are otherwise acquainted with the nature of the animal, we can draw a hundred inference concerning what may be expected from one; and these inferences will all be founded in experience and observation. However, did we know humans only from the single work or production which we examine, it were impossible for us to argue in this manner; because our knowledge of all the production, it is impossible they could point to any thing farther, or be the foundation of any new inference. When considered alone, the print of a foot in the sand can only prove that there was some figure adapted to it, by which it was produced: However, the print of a human foot proves likewise, from our other experience, that there was probably another foot, which also left its impression, though effaced by time or other accidents. Here we mount from the effect to the cause; and descending again from the cause, infer alterations in the effect; but this is not a continuation of the same simple chain of reasoning. #RandolphHarris 7 of 31
We comprehend in this case a hundred other experiences and observations, concerning the usual figure and members of that species of animal, without which this method of argument must be considered as fallacious and sophistical. The case is not the same with our reasonings from the works of nature. The Deity is known to us only by one’s productions, and is a single being in the Universe, not comprehended under any species or genus, from whose experienced attributes or qualities, we can, by analogy, infer any attribute or quality in one. As the Universe shows wisdom and goodness, we infer wisdom and goodness. As it shows a particular degree of these perfections, we infer a particular degree of them, precisely adapted to the effect which we examine. However, father attributes or father degrees of the same attributes, we can never be authorized to infer or suppose, by any rules of just reasoning. Now, without some such licence of supposition, it is impossible for us to argue from the cause, or infer any alteration in effect, beyond what has immediately fallen under our observation. Greater good produced by this Being must still prove a greater degree of goodness: A more impartial distribution of reward and punishments must proceed from a greater regard to justice and equity. #RandolphHarris 8 of 31
Every supposed addition to the works of nature makes an addition to the attributes of the Author of nature; and consequently, being entirely unsupported by any reason or argument, can never be admitted but as mere conjecture and hypothesis. I tried to reason my way to the truth, but that only got me through the door. From there I had to learn faith. We were raised to be loyal to our faith, to believe in God, to attend church, and to obey the commandments—and we saw no need to change. We paid little attention to the criticism of our faith. In some of the classes I was taking, the professors taught that the purposes and object of laws is to maintain peace, structure, safety, and stability in a community. It struck me then that this was the purpose of God’s laws. Obeying them created peace and harmony within the community. If God has laws (and he must), and if He has a proper interpretation of them (which He must), a community that followed those laws would be God’s perfect community, one of peace and order—pure peace and order. #RandolphHarris 9 of 31
A community where the people of God could live together in peace and harmony. A kingdom where God could dwell. Through studying the teachings of humans and the teachings of God, I found that some arguments against the true gospel seem, at times, more convincing than arguments for it. Not only are the philosophies of humans very persuasive and usually easier to live, but reason alone is in most cases sufficient to the convincing of natural humans. The gospel of Jesus Christ, however, is not always persuasive to the natural human, entrapped as one is in the entanglements of logic and reason. Sometimes, somewhere, that person who would be truly converted to the Church, be one member or not, must be humble and submissive enough to have an overwhelming desire to know the truth. Not just to continue the aimless, well-worn path from philosophy to philosophy to mythology, but to seek to actually know God’s absolute truths and to live them. If it were not for the witness of the Spirit to confirm truth to us, we would be as confused and perplexed as the philosophies themselves. Through keeping baptismal covenants, we lay aside the natural human. #RandolphHarris 10 of 31
As a result, we create the void which necessitates a spiritual witness; reason alone is no longer sufficient. However, besides that ordinary course of nature may convince us, that almost everything is regulated by principles and maxims very different from ours; Besides this, I say, it must evidently appear contrary to all rules of analogy to reason, from the intentions and projects of humans, to those of a Being so different, and so much superior. In human nature, there is a certain experienced coherence of designs and inclinations; so that when, from any fact, we have discovered one intention of any human, it may often be reasonable, from experience, to infer another, and draw a long chain of conclusions concerning one’s past or future conduct. However, this method of reasoning can never have place with regard to a Being, so remote and incomprehensible, who bears much less analogy to any other being in the Universe than the sun to a waxed taper, and who discovers oneself only by some faint traces or outlines, beyond which we have no authority to ascribe to Him any attribute or perfect. What we imagine to be a superior perfection, may really be a defect. #RandolphHarris 11 of 31
Or were it ever so much a perfection the ascribing of it to the Supreme Being, where it appears not to have been really exerted, to the full, in His works, savours more of flattery and panegyric, than of just reasoning and sound philosophy. All the philosophy, therefore, in the World, and all the religion, which is nothing but a species of philosophy, will never be able to carry us beyond the usual course of experience, or give us measures of conduct and behaviour differ from those which are furnished by reflections on common life. No new fact can ever be inferred from the religious hypothesis; no event foreseen or foretold; no reward or punishment expected or dreaded, beyond what is already know by practice and observation. Yet, if there is your stance on God and religion, there is still one circumstance, which you seem to have overlooked. This seems to fulfill the words of Moroni: “Dispute not because ye see not, for ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith,” reports Ether 12.6. By obeying the commandments, we become worthy of further witness. The Saviour said: “If any human will do God’s will, one shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself,” reports John 7.17. #RandolphHarris 12 of 31
God lives and He is speaking to us in these last days. As witnesses we know this. God has been seen, heard, and felt. With the declaration that the gospel has been restored is the promise that the Holy Ghost will also witness the fact to you, and then you will know. God is trying to straighten out all of our concerns, and only when one has enough faith will one be able to hear his message. God went to quite a bit of trouble so that we could have the gospel, and now the prophet is telling us that we had better pay attention because these things are for our happiness and that the “rebellious shall be pierced with much sorrow,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 1.3. Today there is about a fifty-percent divorce rate in America, and the rate is not much lower for professing Christians. However, the problem is not divorce—though divorce generates a set of problems all its own. The problem is that people do not know how to be married. They do not actually get married in many cases, though they go through a legal and possibly a religious ceremony. They are, sad to say, incapable of marriage—the kind of constant mutual blessing that can make two people in conjugal relation literally one whole person. “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. #RandolphHarris 13 of 31
“For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Saviour. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church—for we are members of his body. ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.’ This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband,” reports Ephesians 5.22-33. It is not their fault that so many marriages end in divorce. In their World, how could they know? Who would teach them? This is the soul-searing fact at the heart of our modern sadness. #RandolphHarris 14 of 31
To be married to give oneself to another person in the most intimate and inclusive of human relationships, to support one for good in every way possible—physically, emotionally, and spiritually, of course, but in every way conceivable dimension of one’s being. Nothing ever given to humanity more adequately portrays what marriage is than the “traditional service,” the “Form of Solemnization of Matrimony,” in the old Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England. Just consider some of its wording. Anyone who wished the situation with divorce and family breakup today should begin with careful study of the giving of oneself and the receiving of another that is manifested in the vows of this traditional service: “I…take thee…to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do us part…” Insight into the meaning of the vows will clearly bring out why the ideal intent of marriage is one man, one woman for life (or whatever newer forms may be considered). The “mutual submission to each other in awe of the Lord,” which is the vision of marriage in Christ, eliminates both assault and withdrawal from this most basic of human relationships. #RandolphHarris 15 of 31
Thereby marriage provides the matrix of womb from which (in God’s plan) whole human being can emerge to form whole and human communities, under God. This “womb” is then, of course, the overall home life of the child, not just a particular part of the woman’s body. Birth should only be a move from one part to a larger part of the same home. This home is as much or more the man’s responsibility as the woman’s for it is the man’s role to make it possible for the woman to do what she alone can do for the child—and for him. And for her part, then, she is to help in making it possible for him to do what he alone can do for her and the child—and this in the midst of constant sacrificial submission on the part of each to overall good of the other. In case there are no children involved, they still “lay down their life” for each other. That is what marriage involves. “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this right. ‘Honour your father and mother’—which is the first commandment wit a promise—‘that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the Earth.’ Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord,” reports Ephesians 6.1-4. #RandolphHarris 16 of 31
The human who wisely disciplines oneself for godliness understand the necessity of prioritizing and realism and prayer and accountability and that failure is part of success, but one’s greatest wisdom and impetus comes from one’s understanding of grace. Everything in one’s life comes from God’s grace—sola gratia—grace alone! Salvation itself is by grace alone. We were dead in our transgressions and sins, captive to dark powers, no more capable of effecting our own salvation than a corpse. “But…God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgression—it is by grace you have been saved…For it is by grace you have been saved through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast,” reports Ephesians 2.4, 8, 9. We are saved by God’s grace, His unmerited favour. Even the smallest percentage of works debases saving grace, as Paul made so pointedly clear: “And if by grace, then it is no longer by works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace,” reports Romans 11.6. Sola gratia. Salvation is by grace alone, and living the Christian life is by grace alone also. James makes this stunning declaration regarding the believer’s universal experience in this World: “But he gives us more grace,” reports James 4.6. #RandolphHarris 17 of 31
This is not saving grace, but grace to live our lives as we ought in this fallen World—literally, “greater grace.” There is always “more grace.” An artist once submitted a painting of Niagara Falls to an exhibition, but neglected to give it a title. The gallery, faced with the need to supply one, came up with these words: “More to Follow.” Old Niagara Falls, spilling over billions of gallons per year for thousands of years, has more than met the needs of those below and is a fit emblem of the floods of God’s grace He showers upon us. There is always more to follow! The Apostle John referred to this reality, saying, “For of His fulness we have all received, and grace upon grace,” reports John 1.16—literally, “grace instead of grace,” or as others have rendered it, “grace following grace” or “grace heaped upon grace.” “For daily need there is daily grace; for sudden need, sudden grace; for overwhelming need, overwhelming grace, proclaims John Blanchard. As we tackle the disciplines of a Godly human, we must remember it is a matter of grace from beginning to end. #RandolphHarris 18 of 31
Consider slowly and carefully Paul’s words, “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me,” reports 1 Corinthians 15.10. You see there is no contradiction between grace and hard work. In fact, grace produces spiritual sweat! It is God’s grace that energizes us to live out the disciplines of a Godly human. There is always more grace. Grace of Purity, Grace for Marriage, Grace for Fatherhood, Grace for Motherhood, Grace for Friendship, Grace for Mind, Grace for Devotion, Grace for Prayer, Grace for Worship, Grace for Integrity, Grace for Tongue, Grace for Work, Grace for Church, Grace for Leadership, Grace for Giving, Grace for Witness, Grace for Ministry. Brothers and Sister, when we attempt to do God’s will, God always gives more grace. When we have exhausted our store of endurance, when our strength has failed ere the day is half done; when we reach the end of our hoarded resources, our Father’s full giving is only begun. God’s love has no limits, His grace has no measure. #RandolphHarris 19 of 31
God’s power has no boundary know unto humans; for out of His infinite riches in Jesus, God giveth, and giveth, and giveth. Make a complete listen of all the areas of your life in which you need greater discipline. Then, for each, write down what you can do to experience increased discipline. Since you cannot accomplish this in your own strength and must have God’s help, your answers should include ways you can receive divine assistance and enabling. During my junior-high years, in the midst of a time of uncertainty and insecurity, I remember having a keen interest in spiritual matters. I felt a strong desire to go to church, but could find no answers. I recall a stained-glass window in our church depicting an Angel kneeling with its wings outstretched. How I yearned to crawl under those wings for security, protection, and peace. I wanted to know what I believed. I was searching for meaning in my life. The people in the church seemed to sincerely care about each other. There was not the superficiality I had encountered at so many other social and business groups. During the holidays, a family with adult children, three boys, two of them twins, and an adult daughter really impressed me. #RandolphHarris 20 of 31
They hungout in their living room, and the dad read stories from a book, and his wife and kids all laughed, and they really liked each other and enjoyed being together. I was overcome with emotions of joy, awe, and thankfulness. This magnificent moment this family shared with me tugged at my spiritual chords within me. They were generous, living, gracious, compassionate, kind, and humble. I admired this family’s strength of character that I sensed was lacking in myself. They trusted Christ to rule their lives instead of themselves. That was so contrary to the way I was living my life. It was during this time that I received another invitation to a dinner being held at a country club by a business acquaintance. It was to feature a testimony by a business executive and his wife on what their relationship with Christ has meant in their lives. Out of respect for my friend, I went. Here I heard what I had been hearing at Bible study but from a business executive, someone who had been struggling with many of the things that I was struggling with. I could definitely identify with him. I realized that Revelations 3.20 was speaking to me: “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with one, and one with me.” #RandolphHarris 21 of 31
A new relationship was deepening within me—one with Christ. My desire to follow, serve, and obey Christ had become first in my life. With that decision I wanted to spend my time differently. Lifestyle preferences changed. The power of Scripture was beginning to take root for the first time in my life. I was stronger, more forgiving, more independent, and less argumentative. I began to trust God in daily decisions and realized that God is sovereign and in control of my life. God had done what He promised, “I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. They will be my people, and I will be their God,” reports Ezekiel 11.19-20. God’s forgiveness and grace makes people feel free and alive in a new way. God will fill a person with a new power and a totally new sense of self-worth. By trusting in God, things will workout better. Trying to please Him instead of oneself somehow takes the pressure off and makes one feel better about life. #RandolphHarris 22 of 31
Jesus Christ can make all this difference in our lives. Our lives are a living testimony of His power. Through countless trials, struggles, and everyday events Christ has guided our path. He has blessed us beyond our hopes. We are grateful to the many who pray for, nurture, and bless us. As most business people know, by profession a healthy skepticism comes naturally. However, once one discovered the Way, the Truth, and the Life—the Lord Jesus Christ—we learn where to put our trust. God is faithful. He loves you, and He loves me. Trust in Him. “And now I, Moroni, write a few of the words of my father Mormon, which he spake concerning faith, hope, and charity; for after this manner did he speak unto the people, as he taught them in the synagogue which they have built for the place of worship. And now I, Mormon, speak uno you, my beloved brethren; and it is by the grace of God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, and his holy will, because of the gift of his calling unto me, that I am permitted to speak unto you at this time. Wherefore, I would speak unto you that you are of the church, that are the peaceable followers of Christ, and that have obtained a sufficient hope by which ye can enter into the rest of the Lord, from this time henceforth until ye shall rest with him in Heaven. #RandolphHarris 23 of 31
“And now my brethren, I judge these things of you because of your peaceable walk with the children of men. For I remember the word of God which saith by their works ye shall know them; for if their works be good, then they are good also. For behold, God hah said a man being evil cannot do what which is good; for if one offereth a gift, or prayeth unto God, except one shall do it with real intent it profiteth one nothing. For behold it is not counted unto one for righteousness. For behold, if a human being evil giveth a gift, one doeth it grudgingly; wherefore it is counted evil before God. And likewise also is it counted evil unto a human, if one shall pray and not with real intent of heart; yea, and it profiteth one nothing for God recieveth none such. Wherefore, a human being evil cannot do what which is good; neither will one give a good gift. For behold, a bitter fountain cannot bring forth good water; neither can a good fountain bring forth bitter water; wherefore, a human being a servant of the devil cannot follow Christ; and if one follow Christ one cannot be a servant of the devil. Wherefore, all things which are good cometh of God; and that which is evil cometh of the devil; for the devil is an enemy unto God. #RandolphHarris 24 of 31
“Being an enemy unto God the devil fighteth against him continually, and inviteth and enticeth to sin, and to do that which is evil continually. However, behold, that which is of God inviteth and enticeth to do good continually; wherefore, every thing which inviteth and enticeth to do good, and to love God, and to serve him, is inspired of God. Wherefore, take heed, my beloved brethren, that ye do not judge that which is evil to be of God, or that which is good and of God to be of the devil. For behold, my brethren, it is given unto you to judge, that ye may know good from evil; and the ways to judge is as plain, that ye may know with a perfect knowledge, as the daylight is from the dark night. For behold, the Spirit of Christ is given to every human, that one may know good from evil; wherefore, I show unto you the way to judge; for every thing which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of Christ; wherefore ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is God. However, whatsoever thing persuadeth humans to do evil, and believe not in Christ, and deny him, and serve not God, then ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of the devil; for after this manner doth the devil work, for he persuadeth no human to do good, no, not one. #RandolphHarris 25 of 31
“Neither do the devil’s angels; neither do they who subject themselves unto the devil. And now, my brethren, seeing that ye know the light by which ye may judge, which light is the light of Christ, see that ye do not judge wrongfully; for with that same judgment which ye judge ye shall also be judged. Wherefore, I beseech of you, brethren, that ye should search diligently in the light of Christ that ye may know good from evil; and if ye will lay hold upon every good thing, and condemn it not, ye certainly be a child of Christ. And now, my brethren, how is it possible that ye can lay hold upon every good thing? And now I come to that faith, of which I said I would speak; and I will tell you the way whereby ye may law hold on every good thing. For behold, God knowing all things, being from everlasting to everlasting, behold, he sent Angels to minister unto the children of men, to make manifest concerning the coming of Christ; and in Christ there should come every good thing. And God also declared unto prophets, by his own mouth, that Christ should come. And behold, there were divers ways that he did manifest thing unto the children of men, which were good; and all things which are good cometh of Christ. #RandolphHerris 26 of 31
“Otherwise humans were fallen, and there could be no good come unto them. Wherefore, by the ministering of Angels, and by every word which proceeded forth out of the mouth of God, men began to exercise faith in Christ; and thus by faith, they did lay hold upon every good thing; and thus it was until the coming of Christ. And after that he same unto men also were saved by faith in his name; and by faith, they become the sons of God. And as surely as Christ liveth he spake these words unto our fathers, saying: Whatsoever thing ye shall ask the Father in my name, which is good, in faith believing that ye shall receive, behold, it shall be done unto you. Wherefore, my beloved brethren, have miracles ceased because Christ hath ascended into Heaven, and hath sat down on the right hand of God, to claim of the Father his rights of mercy which he hath upon the children of men? For he hath answered the ends of the law, and he clamieth all those who have faith in him; and they who have faith in him will cleave unto every good thing; wherefore he advocated the cause of the children of men; and he dwelleth eternally in the Heaven. #RandolphHarris 27 of 31
“And because he hath done this, my beloved brethren, have miracles ceased? Behold I say unto you, Nay; neither have Angels ceased to minister unto the children of men. For behold, they are subject unto him, to minister according to the word of his command, showing themselves unto them of strong faith and firm mind in every form and Godliness. And the office of their ministry is to call humans unto repentance, and to fulfill and to do the work of the covenants of the Father, which he hath made unto the children of men, to prepare the way among the children of men, by declaring the word of Christ unto the chosen vessels of the Lord, that they may bear testimony of him. And by so doing, the Lord God prepareth the way that the residue of men may have faith in Christ, that the Holy Ghost may have place in their hearts, according to the power thereof; and after this manner bringeth to pass the Father, the covenants which he hath made unto the children of men. And Christ hath said: If ye will have faith in me ye shall have power to do whatsoever thing is expedient in me. And he hath said: Repent all ye ends of the Earth, and come unto me, and be baptized in my name, and have faith in me, that ye may be saved. #RandolphHarris 28 of 31
“And now, my beloved brethren, if this be the case that these things are true which I have spoken unto you, and God will show unto you, with power and great glory at the last day, that they are true, and if they are true as the day of miracles ceased? Or have Angels ceased to appear unto the children of men? Or has he withheld the power of the Holy Ghost from them? Or will he, so long as time shall last, or the Earth shall stand, or there shall be one man upon the face thereof to be saved? Behold I say unto you, Nay; for it is by faith that miracles are wrought; and it is by faith that Angels appear and minister unto humans; wherefore, if these things have ceased wo be unto the children of men, for it is because of unbelief, and all is vain. For no man can be saved, according to the words of Christ, save they shall have faith in his name; wherefore, if these things have ceased, then has faith ceased also; and awful is the state of man, for they are as though there had been no redemption made. However, behold, my beloved brethren, I judge better things for you, for I judge that ye have faith in Christ because of your meekness; for if ye have not faith in him then ye are not fit to be numbered among the people of his church. #RandolphHarris 29 of 31
“And again, my beloved brethren, I would speak unto you concerning hope. How is it that ye can attain unto faith, save ye shall have hope? And what is it that ye shall hope for? Behold I say unto you that ye shall have hope through the atonement of Christ and the power of his resurrection, to be raised unto life eternal, and this because of your faith in him according to the promise. Wherefore, if a human have faith one must needs have hope; for without faith there cannot be any hope. And again, behold I say unto you that one cannot have faith and hope, save one shall be meek, and lowly of heart. If so, one’s faith and hope is vain, for none is acceptable before God, save the meek and lowly in heart; and if a human be meek and lowly in heart, and confesses by the power of the Holy Ghost that Jesus is the Christ, one must needs have charity; for if one have not charity one is nothing; wherefore one must needs have charity. And charity suffereth long, and is kind, and envieth not, and is not puffed up, seeketh not one’s own , is not easily provoke, thinketh no evil, and rejoice not in iniquity but rejoiceth in the truth, beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. #RandolphHarris 30 of 31
“Wherefore, my beloved brethren, if ye have not charity, ye are nothing, for charity never faileth. Wherefore, cleave unto charity, which is the greatest of all, for all things must fail—but charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is fund possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with one. Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure. Amen,” reports Moroni 7.1-48. For all this, Thy name, O our King, shall be blessed and exalted for ever and ever. May all the living do homage unto Thee forever and praise Thy name in truth, O God, who art our salvation and our help. Blessed be Thou, O, Lord, Beneficent One, unto whom our thanks are due. Our God and God of our fathers, bless us. #RandolphHarris 31 of 31
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And Now the Purple Dusk of Twilight Time Steals Across the Meadows of My Heart!
Civilization beings with order, grows with liberty, and dies with chaos. If one is always a little hungry, never quite warm enough, and never falling prey to the dangers of the soft life of self-gratification, a person can think and meditate better. Meditation is just oiling the machinery and making the unused parts come into use. You have not done enough, you have never done enough, so long as it is possible that you have something of value to contribute. Let us now consider whether justice requires the toleration of the intolerant, and if so under what conditions. There are a variety of situations in which this question arises. Some political parties in democratic states hold doctrines that commit them to suppress the constitutional liberties whenever they have power. Again, there are those who reject intellectual freedom but who nevertheless hold positions in the university. It may appear that toleration in these cases is inconsistent with the principles of justice, or at any rate not required by them. I shall discuss the matter in connection with religious toleration. With appropriate alterations the argument can be extended to these other instances. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
Several questions should be distinguished. First, there is the question whether an intolerant sect has any title to complain if it is not tolerated; second, under what conditions tolerant sects have a right not to tolerate those which are intolerant; and last, when they have the right not to tolerate them, for what ends it should be exercised. Beginning with the first question, it seems that an intolerant sect has no title to complain when it is denied an equal liberty. At least this follows if it is assumed that one has no title to object to the conduct of others that is in accordance with principles one would use in similar circumstance to justify one’s action toward them. A person’s right to complain is limited to violations of principles one acknowledges oneself. A complaint is a protest addressed to another in good faith. It claims a violation of a principle that both parties accept. Now, to be sure, an intolerant human will say that one acts in good faith and that one does not ask anything for oneself that one denies to others. One’s view, let us suppose, is that one is acting on the principle that God is to be obeyed and the truth accepted by all. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
This principle is absolute authority is perfectly general and by acting on it one is not making an exception in one’s own case. As one sees that matter, one is following the correct principle others reject. The reply to this defense is that, from the standpoint of the original position (designed to be a fair and impartial point of view that is to be adopted in our reasoning about fundamental principles of justice), no particular interpretation of religious truth can be acknowledged as binding upon citizens generally; nor can it be agreed that there should be one authority with the right to settle questions of theological doctrine. Each person must insist upon an equal right t decide what one’s religious obligations are. One cannot give up this right to another person or institutional authority. In fact, a human exercises one’s liberty in deciding to accept anther as an authority even when one regards this authority as infallible, since in doing this one in no way abandons one’s equal liberty of conscience as a matter of constitutional law. For this liberty as secured by justice is imprescriptible: a person is always free to change one’s faith and this right does not depend upon one’s having exercised one’s powers of choice regularly or intelligently. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
We may observe that human beings having an equal liberty of conscience is consistent with the idea that all humans ought to obey God and accept the truth. The problem of liberty is that of choosing a principle by which the claims humans make on one another in the name of their religion are to be regulated. Granting that God’s will should be followed and the truth recognized does not as yet define a principle of adjudication. From the fact that God’s intention is to be complied with, it does follow that any person or institution has authority to interfere with another’s interpretation of one’s religious obligations. This religious principle justifies no one in demanding in law or politics a greater liberty for oneself. The only principles which authorize claims on institutions are those that would be chosen in the original position. Let us suppose, then, that an intolerant sect has no title to complain of intolerance. We still cannot say that tolerant sects have the right to suppress them. For one thing, others may have a right to complain. They may have this right not as a right to complain on behalf of the intolerant, but simply as a right to object whenever a principle of justice is violated. For justice is infringed whenever equal liberty is denied without sufficient reason. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
The question, then, is whether being intolerant of another in grounds enough for limiting someone’s liberty. To simplify things, assumes that the tolerant sects have the right not to tolerate the intolerant in at least one circumstances, namely, when they sincerely and with reason believe that intolerance is necessary for their own security. This right follows readily enough since, as the original position is defined, each would agree to the right of self-preservation. Justice does not require that humans must stand idly by while others destroy the basis of their existence. Since it can never be to human’s advantage, from a general point of view, to forgo the right of self-protection, the only question, then, is whether the tolerant have a right to curb the intolerant when they are of no immediate danger to the equal liberties of others. Suppose that, in some way or other, an intolerant sect comes to exist within a well-ordered society accepting the two principles of justice. How are the citizens of this society to act in regard to it? Now certainly they would not suppress it simply because the members of the intolerant sect could not complain were they to do so. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Rather, since a just constitution exists, all citizens have a natural duty of justice to uphold it. We are not released from this duty whenever others are disposed to act unjustly. A more stringent condition is required: there must be some considerable risks to our own legitimate interests. Thus just citizens should strive to preserve the constitution with all its equal liberties as long as liberty itself and their own freedom are not in danger. They can properly force the intolerant to respect the liberty of others, since a person can be required to respect the rights established by principles that one would acknowledge in the original position. However, when the constitution itself is secure, there is no reason to deny freedom to the intolerant. The question of tolerating the intolerant is directly related to that of the stability of a well-ordered society regulated by the two principles. We can see this as follows. It is from the position of equal citizenship that persons join the various religious associations, and it is from this position that they should conduct their discussions with one another. Citizens in a free society should not think one another incapable of a sense of justice unless this is necessary for the sake of liberty itself. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
If an intolerant sect appears in a well-ordered society, the others should keep in mind the inherent stability of their institutions. The liberties of the intolerant may persuade them to a belief in freedom. This persuasion works on the psychological principle that those whose liberties are protected by and who benefit from a just constitution will, ceteris paribus (other things equal), acquire an allegiance to it over a period of times. So even if an intolerant sect should arise, provided that it is not so strong initially that it can impose its will straightway, or does not grow so rapidly that the psychological principle has no time to take hold, it will tend to lose its intolerance and accept liberty of conscience. This is the consequence of the stability of just institutions, for stability means that when tendencies to injustice arise other forces will be called into play that work to preserve the justice of the whole arrangement. Of course, the intolerant sect may be so strong initially or growing so fast that the forces making for stability cannot convert it to liberty. This situation presents a practical dilemma which philosophy alone cannot resolve it. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
Whether the liberty of the intolerant should be limited to preserve freedom under a just constitution depends on the circumstances. The theory of justice only characterizes the just constitution, the end of political action by reference to which practical decisions are to be made. In pursuing this end the natural strength of free institutions must not be forgotten, nor should it be supposed that tendencies to depart from them go unchecked and always win out. Knowing the inherent stability of a just constitution, members of a well-ordered society have the confidence to limit the freedom of the intolerant only in the special cases when it is necessary for preserving equal liberty itself. Therefore, while an intolerant sect does not itself have title to complain of intolerance, its freedom should be restricted only when the tolerant sincerely and with reason believe that their own security and that of the institutions of liberty are in danger. The tolerant should curb the intolerant only in this case. The leading principle is to establish a justice constitution with the liberties of equal citizenship. The just should be guided by the principles of justice and not the fact that the unjust cannot complain. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
It should be noted that even when the freedom of the intolerant is limited to safeguard a just constitution, this is not done in the name of maximizing liberty. The liberties of some are not suppressed simply to make possible a greater liberty for others. Justice forbids this sort of reasoning in connection with liberty as much as it does in regard to the sum of advantages. It is only the liberty of the intolerant which is to be limited, and this is done for the sake of equal liberty under a just constitution the principles of which the intolerant themselves would acknowledge in the original position. The argument in this and in the preceding sections suggests that the adoption of the principle of equal liberty can be viewed as a limiting case. Even though their differences are profound and no one knows how to reconcile them by reason, humans can, from the standpoint of the original position, still agree on this principle if they can agree on any principle at all. This idea which arose historically with religious toleration can be extended to other instances. Thus we can suppose that the persons in the original position know that they have moral convictions although, as the veil of ignorance requires, they do not know what these convictions are. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
They understand that the principles they acknowledge are to override these beliefs when there is a conflict; but otherwise they need not revise their opinions nor give them up when these principles do not uphold them. In this way the principles of justice can adjudicate between opposing moralities just as they regular the claims of rival religions. Within the framework that justice established, moral conceptions with different principles, or conceptions representing a different balancing of the same principles, may be adopted by various parts of society. What is essential is that when persons with different convictions make conflicting demands on the basic structure as a matter of political principle, they are to judge these claims by the principles of justice. The principles that would be chosen in the original position are the kernel of political morality. They not only specify the terms of cooperation between persons but they define a pact of reconciliation between diverse religions and moral beliefs, and the forms of culture to which they belong. If this conception of justice now seems largely negative, we shall see that it has a happier side. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
When we overcome our own selfish desires and put God first in our lives and covenant to serve God regardless of the cost, we are then living the law of sacrifice. One of the best ways to be sure we are keeping the first great commandment is to keep the second. “I am the Lord thy God, thou shalt not have any strange god before me. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.” The faithful are required to honour the name of God. If we are to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, it makes sense that we are naturally to respect the name of God with equal passion and vigour. The law of sacrifice provides an opportunity for us to prove to the Lord that we love Him more than any other thing. As a result the course sometimes becomes difficult since this process of perfection that prepares us for the celestial kingdom to “dwell in the presence of God and His Christ forever and ever,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 76.62. The sacred mission of the Church is to “invite all to come unto Christ,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 20.59. Come unto Christ and be perfected in Him. In that light, the law of sacrifice has always been a means for God’s children to come unto the Lord Jesus Christ. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
Let us here observe, that a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation; it is though the medium of the sacrifice of all Earthly things that humans do actually know that they are doing the things that are well pleasing in the sight of God. When a human has offered in sacrifice all that one has for the truth’s sake, not even withholding one’s life, and believing before God that one has been called to make this sacrifice because one seeks to do one’s will, one does know, most assuredly, that God does and will accept one’s sacrifice and offering, and that one has not, nor will seek one’s face in vain. Under these circumstances, then one can obtain the faith necessary for one to lay hold on eternal life. We know what we do is pleasing before God and understand that this knowledge comes to us through sacrifice and obedience. Those who come unto Christ in this way receive a confidence that whispers peace to their souls and that will eventually enable them to lay hold upon eternal life. Sacrifice allows us to learn something about ourselves—what we are willing to offer the Lord through our obedience. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
Through sacrifice and service, one comes to know the Lord. As we sacrifice our selfish desires, serve our God and others, we become more like Him. We do this by our obedience to the commandments of God. Thus, the laws of obedience and sacrifice are indelibly intertwined. As we comply with these and other commandments, something wonderful happens to us. We become more sacred and holy—more like our Lord! In fact, the word sacrifice means literally “to make scared,” or “to render sacred.” Our first lessons about the law of sacrifice, as well as other gospel principles, began in our premotal life. We were taught the fulness of the gospel and the plan of salvation. We knew of the Saviour’s mission and of His futre atoning sacrifice, and we willingly sustained Christ as our Saviour and our Redeemer. In fact, we learn from Revelation 12.9, 11 that it is by “the blood of the Lamb” (Christ’s atoning sacrifice) and our testimony that we are able to overcome Satan. The Lord designed in the beginning to place before humans the knowledge of good and evil, and gave one a commandment to cleave to good and abstain from evil. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
However, if one should fail, God would give unto one the law of sacrifice and provide a Saviour for one, that one might be brought back again into the presence and favour of God and partake of eternal life with God. This is the plan of redemption chosen and instituted by the Alight before human was placed on Earth. Adam and Eve were taught the law of sacrifice and were commanded to practice it by giving offerings. These included two emblems: the firstlings of the flock and the first fruits of the field. They obeyed without questioning. The effect of this law was that the best of the Earth produced, the best specimen in the flock or heard should not be sued for self, but for God. At a time in history when it was a struggle to make sure the family had food, those who sought to worship the Lord were asked to sacrifice the best part of their source of life. It was the real test of Adam and Eve’s faith, and they obeyed. “And now I speak concerning baptism. Behold, elders, priests, and teachers were baptized; and they were not baptized save they brought forth fruit meet that they were worthy of it. Neither did they receive any unto baptism save they came forth with a broken heart and a contrite spirit, and witnessed unto the church that they truly repented of all their sins. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
“And none were received unto baptism save they took upon them the name of Christ, having a determination to serve him to the end. And after they had been received unto baptism, and were wrought upon and cleansed by the power of the Holy Ghost, they were numbered among the people of the church of Christ; and their names were taken that they might be remembered and nourished by the good word of God, to keep them in the right way, to keep them continually watchful unto prayer, relying alone upon the merits of Christ, who was the author and the finisher of their faith. And the church did meet together oft, to fast and to pray, and to speak one with another concerning the welfare of their souls. And hey did meet together oft to partake of bread and wine, in remembrance of the Lord Jesus. And they were strict to observe that there should be no iniquity among them; and whoso was found to commit iniquity, and three witnesses of the church did condemn them before the elders, and if they repented not and confessed not, their names were blotted out, and they were not numbered among the people of Christ. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
“However, as oft as they repented and sought forgiveness, with real intent, they were forgiven. And their meetings were conducted by the church after the manner of the workings of the Spirit, and by the power of the Holy Ghost; for as the power of the Holy Ghost led them whether to preach, or to exhort, or to pray, or to supplicate, or to sing, even so it was done,” reports Moroni 6.1-9. It is especially in our families and similarly close associations that we must identify the elements of assault and withdrawal that defeat love and right relation to others. By insight and practice we must break away from them and reserve them, first by learning a calm but firm non-cooperation with those poisonous elements, and then by initiatives of goodwill and blessing in the midst of them. What we do in our meetings as Christians should be focused on enabling us to do this effectively wherever we are. Those meetings should and could be centers from which powerfully redemptive community spreads. Where to start? In various parts of the United States of America, publicly owned vehicles (police, street maintenance, schools) wear a bumper sticker that proclaims, “There is No Excuse for Domestic Violence.” It is a wonderful idea. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
However, we need to go deeper, of course. We need to become the kind of people whom domestic violence is unthinkable and never an option. We must be transformed in such a way that our minds and bodies—our very souls—simply do not have the makeup for it. This is the work of the Christian spiritual formations. We must begin in the family. Now the slogan must be, “There is No Excuse for Assault or Withdrawal in the Home.” Do you think that would take care of intimate partner violence? Of course it would. However, the reserve is not true: merely avoiding the subject of intimate partner violence, domestic violence or assault can still leave the home a hell of cutting remarks, contempt, coldness, and withdrawal or noninvolvement. Such a hell is often found in the homes of Christians and even of Christian leaders. Frequently they seem to honestly think that such a condition is normal, and they have no knowledge of any other way. Their very theology may strengthen this tragically false outlook. If I were married, I would seek the help of my spouse in this matter. If not, then a trusted friend who is spiritually mature and not abusive. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
I would then number my areas of need in order of importance, say: Purity, Mind, Prayer, Witness, Giving, Work, Friendship, and Leadership. Then, beginning with the first need, Purity, I would look over the suggested sub-disciplines and choose one to three things which I think would best help me improve. In doing this, I would resist the temptation to commit myself to too many disciplines. Better to succeed in a few than to assure failure by overcommitment. Perhaps, regarding the discipline of Purity I would choose to commit myself, first, to memorizing Scripture which help steel me to temptations, and second, to not watching anything sensual on TV or at the movies. Perhaps under Witness, I would make commitments to pray that God would give me someone to share Christ with and to join an interest club to meet unchurched people. After going through my life I would have perhaps twenty specific things which I could do to improve my eight weakest areas. However, before commitment to the specifics, I would look at the whole list with honest realism, asking, “Are the things which I am about to commit to really within my reach with the help of God?” #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
Perhaps, regarding the discipline of Mind, I have become so convicted that I am considering committing myself to reading the Old Testament once and the New Testament twice, plus reading The Book of Mormon. Make sure your commitments make you sweat, but also make sure that taken together they are manageable. It is better to increase your commitments as you succeed than to bite off more than you can do. Success begets success. Before setting your commitments in concrete, give yourself a week to think about them and pray over them. Seek the Holy Spirit’s guidance for other ways of personal discipline not mentioned in this essay. Ask your spouse of friend to hold you accountable for your disciplines. Even if it has to be over the phone, make sure you regularly confer and pray. Be honest about your success and failures. And be willing to take advice and make adjustments. You may have some complications, no doubt, and may not succeed at time. When this happens, wounded pride and embarrassment can make you want to take your marbles and go home. We do not like to do things which we fail. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
However, we must realize that failure is a part of succeeding, provided we admit our failures and go at it again. Moreover, we are not under Law but grace. God is not counting our failure against us, and we are not building a treasure of merit with our success. We are simply trying to live a disciplined life which pleases our loving Father—and He understands our failures better than we understand our own children’s. When the movement in one direction has exhausted itself, there is a pause, and then a reversal directs the movement into the opposite direction. The flow of Nature follows the course indicated by the Principle of Reversion, which throws it back after a time in the opposite direction. When the point of farthest travel is reached, the forces reverse themselves. In this way, excess disciplines and even defeats itself. In this way too the Universe and all the different kinds of existence in it are kept in equilibrium. In the to-and-fro movement of human breathing, we have a kay to human development. Study it well with this assistance and you will discern a forward and backward movement, a pendulum-like swing, here too. Everything in the Universe is subject to a pendulum-like movement. It shuttles to and from with a coming-to-be and a ceasing-to-be effect. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
Winchester Mystery House
Sarah Winchester had multiple rooms dedicated to plants and flowers. This room, her South Conservatory, contains over 200 panes of glass to allow for natural light. How would you spend a day alone in this room?
Explore the house from the comfort of your own home!
Learn More Link in bio. winchestermysteryhouse.com
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻
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The Unconscious Thinks and Lives in Terms of Millennia–for that We Require the Help of the Black Magician!
People who take an optimum amount of vitamin C will experience only a quarter as much illness as those who do not. Through proper use, we could raise the average life expectancy by eight years. We have certain ideas as to how a civilized or educated or moral being should live, and we occasionally do our best to fulfill these ambitious expectations. Vegetables are interesting but lack a sense of purpose when unaccompanied by a good cut of meat. We call the unconscious “nothing,” and yet it is a reality in poetentia. The thought we shall think, the deed we shall do, even the fate we shall lament tomorrow, all lie unconscious in our today. The unknown is us which the affect uncovers was always there and sooner or later would have presented itself to the conscious. Sarah Winchester’s mansion has hosted many glittering, star studded parties and was regarded as the place to see and been seen. Conrad Nicholson Hilton, Constance Hilton, Zsa Zsa Gabor, William Randolph Heart, Phoebe Apperson, Vivien Leigh, Hattie McDaniel, and Sidney Howard are said to have visited. As often happens, the intensity of emotion experienced over the years by those anxious to be recognized at the mysterious mansion has left the grand Queen Anne, Eastlake, Gothic mansion uniquely stocked with echoes from the past. #RandolphHarris 1 of 28
The only slightly surprising element to this haunted house is that ghosts were apparently not officially acknowledged until 1985, just prior to the mansion’s $40-million renovation. During mid-December in 1985, everyone at the Winchester mansion was busy preparing for the upcoming day when the mansion would once again receive guests. No matter what their usual duties or job titles, all employees were directly involved with the last-minute details—secretaries were sweeping, butlers were dusting, waitresses were helping make up guest rooms. The place was a veritable model of industry. Mr. Jim was in the Grand Ballroom, which some consider the most beautiful room in the house, in anticipation of the new carpet being installed. Like many of those on the staff, Mr. Jim was a part-time Hollywood actor; given the star-studded history of the mansion, the “day job” was very much a labour of love. Being able to devote some of himself this gorgeous room that had been so important to the history of movie-making felt more like a privilege than a chore. It was also a perfect time, he thought, to commune with the spirits of those who came to the mansion to celebrate receiving Academy Awards here. As Mr. Jim’s experience unfolded, it became a far closer encounter than he anticipated. #RandolphHarris 2 of 28
The Grand Ballroom is large and the job had to be done thoroughly, so Mr. Jim was taking his time and making sure he did not miss any part of the floor. After repeatedly going back over to a certain area in the Grand Ballroom, he realized that while the rest of the room was kept at a very comfortable temperature, the air in that particular spot was incredibly chilly. More puzzled than concerned Mr. Jim wanted to determine what was causing this draft. The temperature was an inexplicably 20 degrees Fahrenheit cooler in this circle which was about 45 inches in diameter near a wall, mahogany framed mirror. As Mr. Jim wiped his cloth over the reflective glass, he was astonished to see the face a young man, with slick dark hair, smoking a cigarette staring back at him. Mr. Jim was alone in the room, so he quickly turned around to see who had joined him. There was no one else in the room, and that was not his face in the mirror. He turned back to the mirror. The image was still there. That was enough for Mr. Jim. He took it as a sign to remove the carpet he had just installed. #RandolphHarris 3 of 28
According to information released by the mansion, the mirror was gifted to the mansion by Boris Karloff with a note saying, “A warm private friendship has subsisted between us for half our lives, interrupted by no untoward occurrence, and never for a moment cooling into indifference. Of this friendship, the source of so much happiness to me, I wish to leave, if not an enduring memorial, at least an affectionate and grateful acknowledgment. I inscribe this mirror to you.” One night, I was in the Winchester mansion, standing in the presence of a sublime hieratic figured we now called the “Warlock” who was clothed in a long black robe reflecting from the mirror. This warlock was Boris Karloff, and he had just ended a lengthy discourse with the words, “And for that we require the help of black magician.” Then the door suddenly opened and an old man came in, the “black magician,” who however was dressed in a white rob. He too looked noble and sublime. The black magician evidently wanted to speak with the warlock, but he hesitated to do so in my presence. As that the warlock, point to me, said, “Speak, only an innocent is here.” So the black magician began to relate a strange story of how he had found the lost keys of Paradise and did not know how to use them. #RandolphHarris 4 of 28
The black magician told the warlock (Boris) that the king of the country in which he lived was seeking a suitable tomb for himself. The king’s subjects had chanced to dig up an old sarcophagus, threw away the bones, and had the empty sarcophagus buried again for later use on the spot that this sprawling mansion now occupies. However, no sooner had the bones seen the light of day than the being to whom they once had belonged—the virgin—changed into a black horse that galloped off into the desert. The black magician pursued it across the sandy coast and beyond, and there after many vicissitudes and difficulties he found the lost keys of Paradise. That was the end of history, and also, unfortunately, of the warlock and his mirror. It supposedly shattered into pieces, was sent out to San Francisco for repair and never returned. This haunting did not fall out as we had wished, no one understand what the warlock, the black magician, and the king were trying to tell us. The meaning of the story died with the disappearance of the haunted mirror. We were confronted with a problem and one which life is always brining us up against: namely, the uncertainty of all moral valuation, the bewildering interplay of good and evil, and the remorseless concatenation of guilt, suffering, and redemption. #RandolphHarris 5 of 28
This path to the primordial religious experience is the right one, but how many recognize it? It is like a still small voice, and it sounds from afar. It is ambiguous, questionable, dark, presaging danger and hazardous adventure; a razor-egged path, to be trodden for God’s sake only, without assurance and without sanction. Hence we must always reckon with the presence of things not yet discovered. These, as I have said, may be unknow quirks of character. However, the possibilities of future development may also come to light in this way, perhaps in just such an outburst of affect which sometimes radically alters the whole situation. The unconscious has a Janus-face: on one side its contents point back to a preconscious, prehistoric World of instinct, while on the other side it potentially anticipates the future—precisely because of the instinctive readiness for action of the factors that determine human’s fate. If we had complete knowledge of the ground plan lying dormant in an individual from the beginning, one’s fate would be in large measure predictable. #RandolphHarris 6 of 28
Now, to the extent that unconscious tendencies—by they backward-looking images or forward-looking anticipations—appear in visions, vision have been regarded, in all previous ages less as historical regression than as anticipations of the future, and rightly so. For everything that will be happens on the basis of what has been, and of what—consciously or unconsciously—still exists as a memory-trace. In s far as no human is born totally new, but continually repeats the stage of development last reached by the species, one contains unconsciously, as an a priori datum, the entire psychic structure developed both upwards and downwards by one’s ancestors in the course of the ages. That is what gives the unconscious its characteristic “historical” aspect, but it is at the same time the sine qua non for shaping the future. For this reason it is often very difficult to decide whether an autonomous manifestation of the unconscious should be interpreted as an effect (and therefore historical) or as an aim (and therefore teleological and anticipatory). The conscious mind thinks as a rule without regard to ancestral preconditions and without taking into account the influence this a priori factor has on the shaping of the individual’s fate. #RandolphHarris 7 of 28
Whereas we think in periods of years, the unconscious thinks and lives in terms of millennia. So when something happens that seems to us an unexampled novelty, it is generally a very old story indeed. We still forget, like children, what happened yesterday. We are still living in a wonderful new World where humans think themselves astonishingly new and “modern.” This is unmistakable proof of the youthfulness of human consciousness, which has not yet grown aware of its historical antecedents. As a matter of fact, the “normal” person convinces me far more of the autonomy of the unconscious than does the insane person. Psychiatric theory can always take refuge behind real or alleged organic disorders of the brain and thus detract from the importance of the unconscious. However, when it comes to normal humanity, such a view is no longer applicable. What one sees happening in the World is no just a shadowy vestige of activities that were once conscious, but expression of a living psychic condition that still exists and always will exist. Were that not so, one might well be astonished. However, it is precisely those who give least credence to the autonomy of the unconscious who are the most surprised by it. #RandolphHarris 8 of 28
Because of its youthfulness and vulnerability, our consciousness tends to make light of the unconscious. This is understandable each, for if one wants to start something on one’s own account. a young person should not let oneself be overawed by the authority of one’s parents. Historically as well as individually, our consciousness has developed out of the darkness and somnolence of primordial unconsciousness. There were psychic processes and functions long before any ego-consciousness existed. Thinking existed long before humans were able to say: “I am conscious of thinking.” The primitive “perils of the soul” consist mainly of dangers to consciousness. Fascination, bewitchment, “loss of soul,” possession, et cetera are obviously phenomena of the dissociation and suppression of consciousness caused by unconscious contents. Even civilized humans are not yet entirely free of the darkness of primeval times. The unconscious is the mother of consciousness. Where there is a mother there is also a father, yet one seems to be unknown. #RandolphHarris 9 of 28
Consciousness in the pride of its youth, may deny its father, but it cannot deny its mother. That would be too unnatural, for one can see in every child how hesitantly and slowly its ego-consciousness evolves out of a fragmentary consciousness lasting for single moments only, and how these islands gradually emerge from the total darkness of mere instinctuality. Consciousness grows out of an unconscious psyche which is older than it, and which goes on functioning together with it or even in spite of it. Although there are numerous cases of conscious contents becoming unconscious again (through being repressed, for instance), the unconscious as a whole is far from being a mere remnant of consciousness. Or are the psychic functions of animals remnants of consciousness? There is little hope of our finding in the unconscious an order equivalent to that of the ego. It certainly does not look as if we were likely to discover an unconscious ego-personality, something in the nature of a Pythagorean “counter-Earth.” And this of course means “miraculous” interposition, but not necessarily of the gross sort our fathers took such delight in representing, and which has so lost is magic for us. #RandolphHarris 10 of 28
If evil were really one under the same sun, the sky would incontinently shrivel to a snakeskin and cast it out in spasms. However, the spasms of Nature are years and centuries; and it will tax human’s patience to wait so long. We may think of the reserved possibilities God keeps in his own hand, under as invisible and molecular slowly self-summating a form as we please. We may think of them as counteracting human agencies which God inspires ad hoc. In short, signs and wonders and convulsions of the Earth and sky are not the only neutralizers of obstruction to God’s plans of which it is possible to think. As long as languages contain a future perfect tense, determinists, following the bent of laziness or passion, the lines of least resistance, can reply in that tense, saying, “It will have been fated,” to the still small voice which urges an opposite course; and thus excuse themselves from effort in a quiet unanswerable way. Vampires, Ghost, and Demons—God Himself, you think, can have no use for them. An immortality of every separate specimen must be to Him and to the Universe as indigestible a load to carry as it is to you. #RandolphHarris 11 of 28
So, engulfing the whole subject in a sort of mental giddiness and nausea, you drift along, first doubting that the mass can be immortal, then losing all assurance in the immortality of a particular person, precious as you all the while feel and realize the latter to be. This, I am sure, is the attitude of mind of some of you before me. However, is not such an attitude due to the verist lack and dearth of your imagination? You take these swarms of alien kinsmen as they are for you: an external picture painted on your retina, representing a crowd oppressive by tis vastness and confusion. As they are for you, so you think they positively and absolutely are. I feel no call for them, you say; therefore there is no call for them. However, all the while, beyond this externality which is your way of realizing them, they realize themselves with the acutest internality, with the most violent thrills of life. It is you who are dead, stone-dead and blind and senseless, in your way of looking. You open your eyes upon a scene of which you miss the whole significance. Each of these grotesque or even repulsive aliens is animated by an inner joy of living as hot or hotter than that which you feel beating in your private breast. #RandolphHarris 12 of 28
The sun rises and beauty beams to light his path. To miss the inner joy of him is to miss the whole of him. Not a being of the countless throng is there whose continued life is not called for, and called for intensely, by the consciousness that animates the being’s form. That you neither realize nor understand nor call for it, that you have no use for it, is an absolutely irrelevant circumstance. That you have a saturation-point of interest tells us nothing of the interest that absolutely are. The Universe, with every living entity which her resources create, creates at the same time a call for that entity, and an appetite for its continuance—creates it, if nowhere else, at least within the heart of the entity itself. It is absurd to suppose, simply because our private power of sympathetic vibration wit other lives gives out so soon, that in the heart of infinite being itself there can be such a thing as plethora, or glut, or supersaturation. It is not as if there were a bounded room where the minds in possession had to move up or make place and crowd together to accommodate new occupants. Each new mind brings its own edition of the Universe of space along with it, its own room to inhabit; and these spaces never crowd each other—the space of my imagination, for example, in no way interferes with yours. #RandolphHarris 13 of 28
The amount of possible consciousness seems to be governed by no law analogous to that of the so-called conservation of energy in the material World. When one human wakes up, or is born, another does not have to go to sleep, or die, in order to keep the consciousness of the Universe a constant quantity. There is a law of the Universe called the Law of Increase of Spiritual energy, by Dr. Wundt, which expressly oppose the law of conservation of energy in physical things. There seems no formal limit to the positive increase of being in spiritual respects; and since spiritual being, whenever it conies, affirms itself, expands and craves continuance, we may justly and literally say, regardless of the defect of our own private sympathy, that the supply of the individual life in the Universe can never possibly, however immeasurable it may become, exceed the demand. The demand for that supply is there the moment the supply itself comes into being, for the beings supplied demand their own continuance. Through many diversified channels of expression, the eternal Spirit of the Universe affirms and realizes its own infinite life. However, if we are theists, we can go no farther without altering the result. #RandolphHarris 14 of 28
God, we can then say, has so inexhaustible a capacity for love that His call and need is for literally endless accumulation of created lives. God can never faint or grow weary, as we should, under the increasing supply. God’s scale is infinite in all things. His sympathy can never know satiety or glut. Furthermore, consciousness in this process does not have to be generated de novo in a vast number of places. It exists already, behind the scenes, coeval with the World. The condition of consciousness is a certain kind of psychophysical movement. Before consciousness can come, a certain degree of activity in the movement must be reached. This requisite degree is called the threshold; but the height of the threshold varies under different circumstances: it may rise of fall. When it falls, as in states of great lucidity, we grow conscious of things of which we should be unconscious at other times; when it rises, as in drowsiness, consciousness sinks in amount. This rising and lowering of a psychophysical threshold exactly conforms to our notion of a permanent obstruction to the transmission of consciousness, which obstruction may, in our brains, grow alternately greater or less. #RandolphHarris 15 of 28
The transmission-theory also puts itself in touch with a whole class of experiences that are with difficulty explained by the production-theory. I refer to those obscure and exceptional phenomena reported at all times throughout human history which the psychical-researchers are doing to much to rehabilitate; such phenomena, namely, as religious conversions, providential leadings in answers to prayer, instantaneous healings, premonitions, apparitions at time of death, clairvoyant visions or impressions, and the whole range of mediumistic capacities, to say nothing of still more exceptional and incomprehensible things. If all our human thought be a function of the brain, then of course, if any of these things are fact—and to my own mind some of them are fact—we may not suppose that they can occur without preliminary brain-action. However, the ordinary production-theory of consciousness is knit up with a peculiar notion of how brain-action can occur—that notion being that all brain-action, without exception, is due to a prior action, immediate or remote, of the bodily sense-organs on the brain. #RandolphHarris 16 of 28
Such action makes the brain produce sensations and mental images, and out of the sensations and images the higher forms of thought and knowledge in their turn are framed. As transmissionists, we also must admit this to the condition of all our usual thought. Sense-action is what lowers the brain-barrier. My voice and aspect, for instance strike upon your ears and eyes; your brain thereupon becomes more previous, and an awareness on your part of what I say and who I am slips into this World from the World behind the veil. However, in the mysterious phenomena to which I allude, it is often hard to see where the sense-organs can come in. A medium, for example, will show knowledge of his sitter’s private affairs which it seems impossible he should have acquired through sight or hearing, or inference therefrom. Or you will have an apparition of some one who is now dying hundreds of miles away. We need only suppose the continuity of our consciousness with a mother sea, to allow for exceptional waves occasionally pouring over the dam. Of course the causes of these odd lowerings of the brain’s threshold still remain a mystery on any terms with its grouping of Heavenly and Hellish forces upon a common center. #RandolphHarris 17 of 28
If it were the dark nor even if all were in the light, we could see no form of anything at all. The contrast of shadow and light is needed to define the form. Opposites are always necessary to each other. This is why they are present throughout the Universe and moreover present in all possible combinations and proportions in all possible rhythms and patterns. It is present in life, in all things, in planets and seasons. It is the eternal and invariable law of manifested existence. For anything to exist for us at all, it needs an opposite to compare it with, or it will remain non-existent to our consciousness. Unless it recognizes the pairs of opposites, thinking cannot come into existence at all. If we had not experienced Evil, we could not appreciate Good. If we had not become lost in Appearance, we could not appreciate Reality. It may be that for us humans, the ultimate meaning of the cosmos lies implicit in this truth. The acting self needs an outer World and an inner one—both. All things in human’s experience can be classified into pairs of opposites—that which experiences and that which is experienced. In each pair the first member itself becomes, on analysis, the second member of another pair. #RandolphHarris 18 of 28
Whatever we look at, we see only in a relationship of contrast to something else. It is a mistake to consider this opposition to be antagonistic. On the contrary, if our perception is to be true and our judgment correct, each should be considered a part of the other. This teaches us to synthesize, to look at both sides of a thing, to include both points of view in an argument, and to add the similarities also instead of nothing the differences alone. It may be unusual, inconsistent, startling, to propose that we think in terms of opposing ideas, of conflicting statements, and find identity in variety, but this is Nature’s own way—her balance. Balance is a teaching which plays on contradictions and finds room for opposites. It seems them both in the structure of the Universe and in the movement of evolution. It puts them in its approach to human problems. Each to view of a thing or idea implies the existence of the contrary view. To understand that the universal evolution depends upon a two-way interconnected movement, and that its comprehension requires us to think about it in oppositional terms, is to be liberated from the narrow, one sided, incomplete, and intolerant thinking which is responsible for so many absurdities and miseries in human history. #RandolphHarris 19 of 28
When both ignore the two-face character of fortune and Nature, optimism becomes unreasonable pessimism. The life of the human being is one of relating to others. We reemphasize: The life of the human beings is one of relating to others. Though many are cursed to live and die alone, we are born of relations and into relations. One of the heart-rending stories found in Sarah Winchester’s diary is of a broken human being living on the streets. He was dying, and Mrs. Winchester took him in and had her staff care for him. When he recovered, she gave him a job and a place to stay on her estate. To merely welcome another, to provide for one, to make a place, is one of the most life-giving and life-receiving things a human being can do. They are the basic, universal acts of love. Our lives were meant to be full of such acts, drawing on the abundance of God, and they achieve their greatest fulfillment precisely when, like Jesus, we “lay down our lives for the brethren.” This “relating” quality reaches into every dimension of human existence. It characterizes the basic nature of all thought and feeling, which is always thought of or feeling something other than itself. #RandolphHarris 20 of 28
The way relate to others pervades the deepest reaches of our body, soul, and World, where our very identity—who we really are—is always intermingled (if sometimes negatively, by reaction) with others who have given us life, sustained us, or walked with us—or perhaps have deeply injured us. The call of “the other” on our lives is a constant for everyone. It is the basic reality of a moral existence, which we retreat from only into a living death of isolation. If we make our purpose to save our life by withdrawal, we lost it. So Jesus said. However, this is not only a revealed truth, it is also a testable fact of life. If you would live, then give—and receive. Now you understand why Sarah Winchester, even though she withdrew, created a microcosm in her own mansion, and kept people employed for 38 years of nonstop construction. “And it came to pass when Corintumr had recovered of his wounds, he began to remember the words which Ether had spoken unto him. He saw that there had been slain by the sword already nearly two millions of his people, and he began to sorrow in his heart; yea, there had been slain two millions of mighty men, and also their wives and the children. #RandolphHarris 21 of 28
“He began to repent of evil which he had done; he began to remember the words which had been spoken by the mouth of all the prophets, and he saw them that they were fulfilled thus far, every whit; and his soul mourned and refused to be comforted. And it came to pass that he write an epistle unto Shiz, desiring him that he would spare the people, and he would give up the kingdom for the sake of their lives of the people. And it came to pass that when Shiz had received his epistle he wrote an epistle unto Coriantumr, that is he would give himself up, that he might slay him with his own sword, that he would spare the lives of the people. And it came to pass that the people repented not of their iniquity; and the people of Coriantumr were stirred up to anger against the people of Shiz; and the people of Shiz were stirred up to anger against the people of Coriantumr; wherefore, the people of Shi did give battle unto the people of Coriantumr. And when Coriantumr saw that he was about to fall he fled again before the people of Shiz. And it came to pass that he came to the waters of Ripliancum, which, by interpretation, is large, or to exceed all; wherefore, when they came to these waters they pitched their tents. #RandolphHarris 22 of 28
“And Shiz also pitched his tents near unto them; and therefore on the morrow they did come to battle. And it came to pass that they fought and exceedingly sore battle, in which Coriantumr was wounded again, and he fainted with the loss of blood. And it came to pass that the armies of Coriantumr did press upon the armies of Shiz that they beat them, that they caused them to flee before them; and they did flee southward, and did pitch their tents in a place which was called Ogath. And it came to pass that they army of Coriantumr did pitch their tents by the hill Ramah; and it was that same hill where my father Mormon did hide up the records unto the Lord, which were sacred. And it came to pass that they did gather together all the people upon all the face of the land, who had not been slain, save it was Ether. And it came to pass that Ether did behold all the doings of the people; and he beheld that the people who were for Coriantumr were gathered together to the army of Coriantumr; and the people who were for Shiz were gathered together to the army of Shiz. Wherefore, they were for the space of four years gathering together the people, that they might get all who were upon the face of the land, and that they might receive all the strength which it was possible that they could receive. #RandolphHarris 23 of 28
“And it came to pass that when they were all gathered together, every one to the army which he would, with their wives and their children—both men, women, and children being armed with weapons of war, having shields, and breastplates, and head-plates, and being clothed after the manner of war—they did march forth one against another to battle; and they fought all that day, and conquered not. And it came to pass that when it was night they were weary, and retired to their camps; and after they had retired to their camps they took up a howling and a lamentation for the loss of the slain of their people; and so great were their cries, their howling and a lamentation for the loss of the slain of their people; and so great were their cries, that they did rend the air exceedingly. And it came to pass that on the morrow they did go again to battle, and great and terrible was that day; nevertheless, they conquered not, and when the night came again they did rend the air with their cries, and their howlings, and their mournings, for the loss of the slain of their people. And it came to pass that Coriantumr wrote again an epistle unto Shiz, desiring that he would not come again to battle, but that he would take the kingdom, and spare the lives of the people. #RandolphHarris 24 of 28
“However, behold, the Spirit of the Lord had ceased striving with them, and Satan had full power over the hearts of the people; for they were given up unto the hardness of their hearts, and the blindness of their minds that they might be destroyed; wherefore they went again to battle. And it came to pass that they fought all that day, and when the night came they slept upon their swords. And on the morrow they fought even until the night came. And when the night came they were drunken with anger, even as a man who is drunken with wine; and they slept again upon their swords. And on the morrow they fought again; and when the night came they had fallen by the sword save it were fifty and two of the people of Coriantumr, and sixty nine of the people of Shiz. And it came to pass that they slept upon their swords that night, and on the morrow they fought again, and they contended in their might with their swords and with their shields, all that day. And when the night came there were thirty and two of the people of Shiz, and twenty and seven of the people of Coriantumr. And it came to pass that they ate and slept, and prepared for death on the morrow. And they were large and mighty men as to the strength of men. #RandolphHarris 25 of 28
“And it came to pass that they fought for the space of three hours, and they fainted with the loss of blood. And it came to pass that when the men of Coriantumr had received sufficient strength that they could walk, they were about to flee for their lives; but behold, Shiz arose, and also his men, and he swore in his wrath that he would slay Coriantumr or he would perish by the sword. Wherefore, he did pursue them, and on the morrow he did overtake them; and they fought again with the sword. And it came to pass that when they had all fallen by the sword, save it were Coriantumr and Shiz, behold Shiz had fainted with the loss of blood. And it came to pass that when Croiantumr had leaned upon his sword, that he rested a little, he smote off the head of Shiz. And it came to pass that after he had smitten off the head of Shiz, that Shiz raised up on his hands and fell; and after that he had struggled for breath, he died. And it came to pass that Coriantumr fell to the Earth, and became as if he had no life. And the Lord spake unto Ether, and said unto him: Go forth. And he went forth, and beheld that the words of the Lord has all been fulfilled; and he finished his record; (and the hundredth part I have not written) and he hid them in a manner that the people of Limhi did find them. #RandolphHarris 26 of 28
“Now the last words which are written by Ether are these: Whether the Lord will that I be translated, or that I suffer the will of the Lord in the flesh, it mattereth not, if it so be that I am saved in the kingdom of God. Amen,” reports Ether 15.1-34. “But the LORD said to him, ‘Not so; if anyone kills Cain, one will suffer vengeance seven times over.’ Then the LORD put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him. So Cain went out from the LORD’s presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden,” reports Genesis 4.15-16. A view of the World which fails or refuses to recognize that the opposites are essential to it, which accepts its beauty but not its ugliness, is not complete and only a half truth. If there is suffering as well as sweetness in life, that is not accident, nor is it brought into the scheme of things by human evil alone: nothing exists without its contrary. In the end, a human must recognize that there are two forces a work in Nature—and therefore in one’s own life—the ne benign, the other hostile. The cold time is here: time to work and time to rest, time to celebrate inside, time to enjoy the harvest. All about us, the Land of Spirits are singing. All about us, the deities are speaking. Please help me listen, all you divine beings. May I hear your voices. #RandolphHarris 27 of 28
I need much help in cooling my Earth. I cannot do it alone I ask for help from the Sky: please give rise to your cloud with plentiful moisture and ice so the Earth can cool and have water. I ask for help from the rain: please give your moisture to be the plants’ own blood. I ask for help from the soil: please give your minerals from which the plants will form their bodies. I will give my time, I will give my care, I will give my loving stewardship. All these will I give my garden and I ask for your others to give what the garden of Eden will need as well. We will do it together and I will not forget your contribution. Glory His holy name; may your heart rejoice, ye who seek the Lord. Seek the Lord and His strength; seek His presence continually. Remember the marvellous works that He hath done, His wonders, and the judgments He decreed, O seed of Israel, His servant, Children of Jacob, His beloved ones. He is the Lord our God; His judgments are throughout the Earth. Remember His covenant forever, the word which He commanded to a thousand generations. In Luke 18.1-8, Jesus told a parable about an unfair, unjust judge who finally was willing to listen to a woman’s case because of her continual persistence. When it comes to God, that is the way we need to be of what he said. What promises or promises from God are you bringing to His constant remembrance? #RandolphHarris 28 of 28
Winchester Mystery House
WMH 13 Days of Christmas #7
Sarah Winchester’s innovations for water conservation was far ahead of her time. She had multiple rooms dedicated for plants, each with a complex drainage system that allowed for the reuse of water. On today’s episode of the Winchester Mystery House 13 Days of Christmas, explore Sarah’s North Conservatory and learn more about her magnificent innovations.
Winchester Mystery House
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻
🗝 winchestermysteryhouse.com
My Heart is Gladder than All these Because My Love is Come to Me!
The only abnormality is the incapacity to love. The greatest healing therapy is friendship and love. Individuation denotes the process by which a person becomes a psychological “in-dividual,” that is, a separate, indivisible unity or “whole.” It is generally assumed that consciousness is the whole of the psychological individual. However, knowledge of the phenomena that can only be explained on the hypothesis of the unconscious psychic process makes it doubtful whether the ego and its contents are in fact identical with the “whole.” If unconscious processes exist at all, they must surely belong to the totality of the individual, even though they are not components of the conscious ego. If they were part of the ego they would necessarily be conscious, because everything that is directly related to the ego is conscious. Conscious can even be equated with the relation between the ego and the psychic contents. However, unconscious phenomena are so little related to the ego that most people do not hesitate to deny their existence outright. Nevertheless, they manifest themselves in an individual’s behaviour. #RandolphHarris 1 of 26
An attentive observer can detect the ego and psychic content without difficulty, while the observed person remains quite unaware of the fact that one is betraying one’s most secret thoughts or even things that one has never thought consciously. It is, however, a great prejudice to suppose that something we have never thought consciously does not exist in the psyche. There is plenty of evidence to show that consciousness is very far from covering the psyche in its totality. Many things occur semiconsciously, and a great many more remain entirely unconscious. Thorough investigation of the phenomena of dual and multiple personalities, for instance, has brought to light a mass of material with observations to prove this point. (I would refer the reader to the writings of Pierre Janet, Theodore Flournoy, Morton Prince, and others.) The importance of such phenomena has made a deep impression on medical psychology, because they give rise to all sorts of psychic and physiological symptoms. In these circumstances, the assumption that the ego expresses the totality of the psyche has become untenable. #RandolphHarris 2 of 26
It is, on the contrary, evident that the whole must necessarily include not only consciousness but the illimitable field of unconscious occurrences as well, and that the ego can be no more than the center of the field of conscious. You will naturally ask whether the unconscious possesses a center too. I would hardly venture to assume that there is in the unconscious a ruling principle analogous to the ego. As a matter of fact, everything points to the contrary. If there were such a center, we could expect almost regular signs of its existence. Cases of dual personality would then be frequent occurrences instead of rare curiosities. As a rule, unconscious phenomena manifest themselves in fairly chaotic and unsystematic form. Dreams, for instance, show no apparent order and no tendency to systematization, as they would have to do if there were a personal consciousness at the back of them. The philosophers Carus and von Hartmann treat the unconscious as a metaphysical principle, a sort of universal mind, without any trace of personality or ego-consciousness, and similarly Schopenhauer’s “Will” is without ego. #RandolphHarris 3 of 26
Modern psychologist, too, regard the unconscious as an egoless function below the threshold of consciousness. Unlike the philosophers, they tend to derive its subliminal functions from the conscious mind. Dr. Janet thinks that there is certain weakness of consciousness which is unable to hold all the psychic process together. Dr. Freud, on the other hand, favours the idea of conscious factors that suppress certain incompatible tendencies. Much can be said for both theories, since there are numerous cases where a weakness of consciousness actually causes certain contents to fall below the threshold, or where disagreeable contents are repressed. It is obvious that such careful observations as Dr. Janet and Dr. Freud would not have constructed theories deriving the unconscious mainly from conscious sources had they been able to discover traces of an independent personality or of an autonomous will in the manifestations of the unconscious. If it were true that the unconscious consists of nothing but contents accidentally deprived of consciousness but otherwise indistinguishable from the conscious material the one could identify the ego more or less with the totality of the psyche. #RandolphHarris 4 of 26
However, actually the situation is not quite so simple. Both theories are based mainly on observations in the field of neurosis. Neither Dr. Janet nor Dr. Freud had any specifically psychiatric experience. If they had, they would surely have been struck by the fact that the unconscious displays some contents that are utterly different from conscious ones, so strange, indeed, that nobody can understand them, neither the patient oneself nor one’s doctors. The patient is inundated by a flood of thoughts that are as strange to one as they are to a normal person. That is why we call one “crazy”: we cannot understand one’s ideas. Only if we have the necessary premises for doing so, can we understand something. However, where the premises are just as remote from our consciousness as they were from the mind of the patient before one went made. Otherwise one would have never become insane. There is, in fact, no field directly known to us from which we could derive certain pathological ideas. It is not a question of more or less normal contents that became unconscious by accident. They are, on the contrary, products whose nature is at first baffling. #RandolphHarris 5 of 26
The contents differ in every respect from neurotic material, which cannot be said at all bizarre. The material of a neurosis is understandable in human terms, but that of a psychosis is not. (By this I mean only certain cases of schizophrenia.) This peculiar psychotic material cannot be derived from the conscious mind, because the latter lack the premises which would help to explain the strangeness of the ideas. Neurotic contents can be integrated without appreciable injury to the ego, but psychotic ideas cannot. They remain inaccessible, and ego-consciousness is more or less swamped by them. They even show a distinct tendency to draw the ego into their “system.” Such cases indicate that under certain conditions the unconscious is capable of taking over the role of the ego. The consequence of this exchange is insanity and confusion, because the unconscious is not a second personality with organized and centralized functions but in all probability a decentralized congeries of psychic processes. However, nothing produced by the human mind lies absolutely outside the psychic realm. Even the craziest idea must correspond to something in the psyche. #RandolphHarris 6 of 26
We cannot suppose that certain minds contain elements that do not exist at all in other minds. Nor can we assume that the unconscious is capable of becoming autonomous only in certain people, namely in those predisposed to insanity. It is very much more likely that the tendency to autonomy is more or less general peculiarity of the unconscious. Mental disorder is, in a sense, only one outstanding example of a hidden but none the less general condition. This tendency to autonomy shows itself above all in affective states, including those of normal people. When in a state of violent affect one says or does things which exceed the ordinary. Not much is needed: love and hate, joy and grief, are often enough to make the ego and the unconscious change places. Very strange ideas indeed can take possession of otherwise healthy people on such occasions. Groups, communities, and even whole nations can be seized in this way by psychic epidemics. The autonomy of the unconscious therefore begins where emotions are generated. Emotions are instinctive, involuntary reactions which upset the rational order of conscious by their elemental outburst. #RandolphHarris 7 of 26
Affects are not “made” or willfully produced; they simply happen. In a state of affect a trait of character sometimes appears which is strange even to the person concerned, or hidden contents may irrupt involuntarily. The more violent an affect the closer it comes to the pathological, to a condition in which the ego-consciousness is thrust aside by autonomous contents that were unconscious before. So long as the unconscious is in a dormant condition, it seems as if there were absolutely noting in this hidden region. Hence wen something unknow suddenly appears “from nowhere,” we are continually surprised. Afterwards, of course, the psychologist comes along and shows that things had to happen as they did for this or that reason. However, who could have said so beforehand? The experience of the harmonious interpenetrating mix-up was “a paradise in the womb.” This paradise is destroyed by the discovery that firm independent objects exist. From then on, the existence of objects with their resistant, aggressive and ambivalent qualities must be accepted. The moment of this discovery does not coincide with the birth of the body: it marks a rather later moment: the beginning of the individual personality, of the self (called ego). #RandolphHarris 8 of 26
The encounter with something so definitely other that it cannot be controlled is what starts the individual on the process of individuation. Two reactions may come from this discovery. They are called ocnophilic and philobatic. We shall call them home-loving (homebodies) and space-loving (spacebats), which keeps much of the meaning and also most of the letters from the proper titles, so as to minimize confusion. A homebody’s reaction to the discover of the “other” is to create a World based on phantasy that other people and things are useful, reliable, and kind; that they will always be there when needed; and that they will never mind being used as needed. By contrast, a spacebat rection is to create a phantasy World which goes back to a time when there were no others, no obstacles/things, people, only limitless power. A spacebat lives as far as possible in a phantasy of a still existing unity and harmony of limitless contourless expanses. When other people of things cannot be ignored, they are experienced either as dangerous unpredictable obstacles and hazards (of which the autistic child’s reaction is an extreme example) or as emotionally uninteresting equipment to be used as convenient. #RandolphHarris 9 of 26
On the other hand, homebodies’ reaction to the discovery that there are others, people and things, which resist them and which they cannot control, is to turn strongly to these others, to whom they then attribute the power to look after them in this dangerous World. This development leads them to the cultivation of strong relationships with others and to mistrust of their own independent individual endeavours. In these relationships the object is felt as a vitally important support. Any threat of being separated from it creates intense anxiety, and the most frequently used defence against this is clinging. On the other hand, the object becomes so important that no concern or consideration can be given to it. It must have no separate interests from the individual’s, it must simply be there and, in fact, it is taken for granted. The consequences of this type of relationship are an over-valuation of the object and a comparative inhibition against developing personal skills which might make the individual independent from one’s objects. A homebody’s World consists of people and things separated by horrid empty spaces. Homebodies live from person to person, cutting short their time in the empty spaces as far as possible. #RandolphHarris 10 of 26
When separated from their attachment figures, homebodies are frightened; when attachment figure rejoin them, their fear is allayed. Homebodies hold on to people (parents, friends, anyone) or things (toys, clothes, rooms, home-towns) or ideas (in art, philosophy, science, or politics). In the World of ideas they need certainty. Uncertainty and ambiguity are experienced as uncomfortable and somehow wrong. They imagine that as long as they are in touch with a safe attachment-figure they themselves are safe. Spacebats, on the other hand, have the illusion that all they need is the proper equipment. They do not need people, certainly not one particular person. In fact, people are avoided as principal sources of danger. Provided the elements are not too inclement, the pilot is safe in the skies, the sailor on the high seas, the skier on the slopes, the driver on the open read, the parachutist in the air. The spacebat fears danger only from other things and people, which have to be “negotiated”: the pilot has to land, the skier has to skim round trees and rocks, a boss has to be impressed, a lover pleased. The spacebat’s World is one of friendly expanses dotted with dangerous and unpredictable things and people. #RandolphHarris 11 of 26
Spacebats cultivate their skills and ego-functions so that they can look after themselves. Thereafter they can put their trust in the assurance that they can cope, keeping also always a fascination for (but wary mistrust of) the environment (including the people) they were not able to control until they had cultivated the skills to do so. These skills they will continue to test and confirm throughout life, often through deeds of risk and derring-do. Such people’s World is coloured by an unjustified optimism, which actually has its roots in the earlier World of Primary Love when all was well—this memory enables them to hold on to the belief that their skills and equipment will be sufficient to cope with anything as long as they can avoid the hazardous obstacles. Fairground please differ accordingly. The homebodies go for the simple human aggression of the rifle range or the greedy indulgence of hamburgers and candyfloss. Spacebat go for the non-attached thrills of the Big Wheel, the roundabouts, and the dodgems, which over and over assure them of their ability to survive. They look for danger which can be overcome with skill. #RandolphHarris 12 of 26
From them, thrill goes with skill. These thrills are to do with leaving a safe place for somewhere where there is nothing to hold on to, with perhaps the danger of collision, and then a safe return home. This hypothesis is that this is where the fear of separateness (the loss of an attachment figure) could be mastered in play. It is a regression—to that moment when the infant experienced itself as on its own, unattached and unsupported. They very language of caring and relating is permeated by these two contrasting stances: “we are contrasting the World of skin-contact with the World of the more distal sense of vision.” Home-loving relationships are more tactile: homebodies use tact, they like to be in touch, ideas are grasped and comprehended, stories grip them. Speacebat relationships are eye-to-eye, spacebat look after people and tings, they have regard for them, consideration, concern. The three synonymous words: concern, consideration, and regard came from Norman French into English…in their original meaning they all describe a state of intense looking at an object from a distance. #RandolphHarris 13 of 26
To sum up: Homebodies need to feel in turn with their chosen person (attachment figure), presume that they can win the favour of their chosen person, need to be in contact (close, attached); they keep in touch with people. Spacebats need to feel in tune wit the whole World, presume that they can conquer the World without relying on anyone’s favour need to be on the watch (distant, eyes and ears alert); they relate to people by making them safe through the use of interpersonal skills. Most intrepid spacebats hold on to something: skiers to sticks, tightrope-walkers to poles, lion-tamers to whips, and all have to be taught not to tense and hold on with their muscle in the supreme moment of tension. I think this must be the same process as that which Dr. Tustin had in mind when she noticed how autistic children hold on to what she called an auto-sensuous object; she thought it likely that by holding hard on to this, the defenceless and frightened child gave itself a sense that the whole body had something hard to protect it. This is a similar paradox about homebodies. By clinging one gets father and father away from the satisfaction of the original need, which was to be held safely. #RandolphHarris 14 of 26
The profoundly tragic situation is that the more efficiently one clings, the less one is held by the object. This ever-repeated experience during analytic treatment had a large share in building up our theories of ambivalence and frustration. Both home-loving and space-loving are reactions to the emergence of self from (m)other. Both reaction involve the disappearance of something from which separation had been inconceivable. The home-loving reaction would be to cling so closely to the attachment figure that vision, which normally gives a sense of distance, is blurred and obscured and the gap between self and other acutely. The space-loving reaction makes the other dwindle out of sight so that one ceases to be reminded of the separation. Both reactions provide a ready foundation for ambivalence. The home-loving side, so dependent for well-being on the closeness of the others, may make us suspicious, mistrustful, disappointed in the failings of the people we cling to; the space-loving side may make us feel superior and condescending to the very people we need to cooperate with. #RandolphHarris 15 of 26
Both of them are in constant danger of marring or even destroying their relationships to their love-objects by exactly the same methods by which they gained their favour: the ocnophil by too much clinging, the philobat by the use of too much superior skill. From this angle it would be equally correct to describe these two attitudes by words denoting hatred. Less frantically and more constructively, our home-loving side may enable us to cultivate a talent for psychological closeness and intimacy and tolerance, while the space-loving side may go exploring the great featureless expanses—a happy preparation for a safe return home. The teachings of Jesus are deeply rooted in our basic nature. Love expresses itself in the beautiful circles of sufficiency. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. #RandolphHarris 16 of 26
All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a goldfish. However, it is immortals whom we joke wit, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendors. All of us have a complex network of relationships built around four natural contacts: biological (relatives and family, and by extension church and family), geographical (where we live), vocational (who we work with), and recreational (where we play). We need to discover our networks, make a list of likely contacts, and begin to pray for them. Finally, as we pray, we must invest out time, talent, and treasure in relationships. Become personally involved in the lives of others. Plan to spend significant time wit those you would like to reach, and then make sure your plan is represented on your calendar. #RandolphHarris 17 of 26
Invite your friends out for lunch or dinner, or to your home for coffee. Do things together. Attend plays, sporting events, art exhibits. Go fishing. Use special days to share your interests—birthday, graduations, holidays, weddings, births. Visit, call, or write a note. Join a service club such as Rotary, Kiwanis, or Lions. Join an interest club: gardening, hunting, cooking, woodworking. Volunteer to coach boys’ or girls’ athletic team, to be a teacher’s assistant, to give your time to the hospital or one of the many charitable organizations. Open your home to the neighbourhood. Be the most hospital home on the block to the people in your community. Spiritual formation, good or bad, is always profoundly social. You cannot keep it to yourself. Anyone who thinks of it as a merely private matter has misunderstood it. Anyone who says, “It is just between me and God,” or “What I do is my own business,” has misunderstood God as well as “me.” Strictly speaking there is nothing “just between me and God.” For all that is between me and God affect who I am; and that, in turn, modifies my relationship to everyone around me. #RandolphHarris 18 of 26
My relationship to others also modifies me and deeply affects my relationship to God. Hence, if I am to be transformed, those relationships must be transformed. Therefore Jesus gave a sure mark of the outcome of spiritual formation under his guidance: we become people who love one another (John 13.35). And he does not leave “love,” that “many splendored thing,” unspecified. Instead he gives “a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another,” reports John 13.34. The age-old command to love is transformed, made a new command, by identification of the love in question with that of Jesus for us. “Anyone who does not believe God has made him out to be a liar, because one has not believed the testimony God has given about his Son. And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is his Son. One who has the Son has life; one who does not have the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life. This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he will hear us. And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him,” reports 1 John 5.10-12. #RandolphHarris 19 of 26
Love of our human family is the supernatural way that allows us to know that we have passed out of death into life. We simply cannot love in that way unless we have a different kind of life in us. And the “love” here in question is identified as that which is in Christ because it is one that makes us ready to lay down our lives for the brethren. Failure to love others as Jesus loves us, on the other hand, chokes off the flow of the eternal kind of life that our whole human system cries out for. The old apostle minces no words: “One who does not love abides in death,” reports 1 John 3.14. Notice he did not say, “one who hates,” but simply, “one who does not love.” The mere absence of love is deadly. It is withdrawal. Notice that Jesus did not say, “One who is not loved,” though that also is true. That too is death, but our purpose cannot be to get others to love us. Love comes to us from God. That must be our unshakable circle of sufficiency. Our purpose must them be to become one who loves others with Christ’s agape. That purpose, when developed, will transform the social dimension of the human self and all of our relations to others. #RandolphHarris 20 of 26
Love is not a feeling, or a special way of feeling, but the divine way of relating to others and oneself that moves through every dimension of our being and restructures our World for good. “And now there began to be a great curse upon all the land because of the iniquity of the people, in which, if a man should lay his tool or his sword upon his shelf, or upon the place wither he could keep it, behold, upon the morrow, he could not find it, so great was the cure upon the land. Wherefore every man did cleave unto that which was one’s own, with one’s hands, and would not borrow neither would he lend; and every human kept the hilt of his sword in his right hand, in the defence of his property and his own life and of his wives and children. And now, after the space of two years, and after the death of Shared, behold, there arouse the brother of Shared and he gave battle unto Coriantumr, in which Coriantumr did beat him and did pursue him to be the wilderness of Akish. And it came to pass that the brother of Shared did give battle unto him in the wilderness of Akish; and the battle became exceedingly sore, and many thousands fell by the sword. #RandolphHarris 21 of 26
“And it came to pass that Coriantumr dwelt with is army in the wilderness for the space of two years, in which he did receive great strength to his army. Now the brother of Shared, whose name was Gilead, also received great strength to his army, because of secret combinations. And it came to pass that his high priest murdered him as he sat upon his throne. And it came to pass that one of the secret combinations murdered him in a secret pass, and obtained unto himself the kingdom; and his name was Lib; and Lib was a man of greater stature, more than any other man among all the people. And it came to pass that in the first year of Lib, Coriantumr came up unto the land of Moron, and gave battle unto Lib. And it came to pass that he forth with Lib, in which Lib did smite upon his arm that he was wounded; nevertheless, the army of Coriantumr did press forward upon Lib, that he fled to the borders upon the seashore. And it came to pass that Coriantumr pursued him; and Lib gave battle unto him upon the seashore. And it came to pass that Lib did smite army of Coriantumr, that they fled again to the wilderness of Akish. #RandolphHarris 22 of 26
“And it came to pass that Lib did pursue him until he came to the plains of Agosh. And Coriantumr had taken all the people with him as he fled before Lib in that quarter of the land wither he fled. And when he had come to the plains of Agosh he gave battle unto Lib, and he smote upon him until he died; nevertheless, the brother of Lib did come against Coriantumr in the stead thereof, and the battle became exceedingly sore, in the which Coriantumr fled again before the army of the brother of Lib. Now the name of the brother of Lib was called Shiz. And it came to pass that Shiz pursued after Coriantumr, and he did overthrow many cities, and he did slay both women and children, and he did burn the cities. And there went a fear of Shiz throughout all the land; yea, a cry went forth throughout the land—Who can stand before the army of Shiz? Behold, he sweepeth the Earth before him! And it came to pass that the people began to flock together in armies, throughout all the face of the land. And they were divided; and a part of them fled to the army of Shiz, and a part of them fled to the army of Coriantumr. #RandolphHarris 23 of 26
“And so great and lasting had been the war, and so long had been the scene of bloodshed and carnage, that the whole face of the land was covered with the bodies of the dead. And so swift and speedy was the way that there was none left to bury the dead, but they did march forth from the shedding of blood, leaving the bodies of both men, women, and children strewed upon the face of the land, to become a prey to the worms of the flesh. And the scent thereof went forth upon the face of the land, even upon all the face of the land; wherefore the people became troubled by day and by night, because of the scent thereof. Nevertheless, Shiz did not cease to pursue Coriantumr; for he had sworn to avenge himself upon Coriantumr of the blood of his brother, who has been slain, and the word of the Lord which came to Ether that Coriantumr should not fall by the sword. And thus we see that the Lord did visit them in the fulness of his wrath, and their wickedness and abomination had prepared a way for their everlasting destruction. And it came to pass that Shiz did pursue Coriantumr eastward, even to the borders by the seashore, and there he gave battle unto Shiz for the space of thee days. #RandolphHarris 24 of 26
“And so terrible was the destruction among the armies of Shiz that the people began to be frightened, and began to flee before the armies of Coriantumr; and they fled to the land of Corihor, and swept off the inhabitants before them, all them that would not join them. And they pitched their tents in the valley of Corihor; and Coriantumr pitched his tents in the valley of Shurr. Now the valley of Shurr was near the hill Comnor; wherefore, Coriantumr did gather his armies together upon the hill Comnor, and did sound a trumpet unto the armies of Chiz to invite them forth to battle. And it came to pass that they came forth, but were driven again; and they came the second time, and they were driven again the second time. And it came to pass that they came again the third time, and the battle became exceedingly sore. And it came to pass that Shiz smote upon Coriantumr that he gave him many deep wounds; and Coriantumr, having lost his blood, fainted, and was carried away as though he were dead. Now the loss of men, women and children on both sides was so great that Shiz commanded his people that they should not pursue the armies of Coriantumr; wherefore they returned to their camp,” reports Ether 14.1-31. #RandolphHarris 25 of 26
Blessed be God, wintertime King, blessed in all the signs of cold’s return, blessed in the scent of freezing Earth, His own true incense rising up in his Praise. Blessed be God who hath compassion upon His creatures. Blessed be God who bestoweth a good reward upon them that revere Him. Blessed be God who liveth forever and endureth to all eternity. Blessed be God who ransometh and delivereth; blessed be His name. Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, O God, merciful Father, praised by Thy people, extolled and glorified by Thy servants, Thy faithful ones. With the psalms of David, Thy servant, we will praise Thee, O Lord our God; with hymns and songs we will extol and glorify Thee; with hymns and songs we will extol and glorify Thee; we will call upon Thy name and proclaim Thee our King. O Thou who art One, the life of the Universe, the King, who art praised and glorified, Thy great names endureth to all eternity. Blessed art Thou, O Lord, divine Ruler, extolled with psalms of praise. O give thanks unto the Lord, call upon His name; make known His deeds among peoples. Speak of al His marvellous works. #RandolphHarris 26 of 26
Cresleigh Homes
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Where Forces Rules, there is No Love, and where Love Reigns Force Does Not Count!
When the satisfaction or the security of another person becomes as significant to one as one’s own satisfaction or security, then the state of loves exists…Under no other circumstances is a state of love present, regardless of the popular usage of the word. But what has the individual personality to do with the plight of the many? In the first place one is part of the people as a whole, and is as much at the mercy of the power that moves the wholes as anybody else. The only thing that distinguishes one from all the others is one’s vocation. One has been called by that all-powerful, all-tyrannizing psychic necessity that is one’s own and one’s people’s affliction. If one hearkens to the voice, one is not once set apart and isolated as one has resolved to obey the law that commands one from within. “One’s own law!” everybody will cry. However, one knows better: it is the law, the vocation for which one is destined, no more “one’s own” than the lion that fells one, although it is undoubtedly this particular lion that kills one and not any other lion. Only in this sense is one entitled to speak of “one’s” vocation, “one’s” law. With the decision to put one’s way above all other possible ways one has already fulfilled the greater part of one’s vocation as a redeemer. #RandolphHarris 1 of 21
One has invalidated all other ways for oneself, exalting one’s law above convention and thus making a clean sweep of all those things that not only failed to prevent the great danger but actually accelerated it. For conventions in themselves are soulless mechanisms that can never understand more than the mere routine of life. Creative life always stands outside convention. That is why, when the mere routine of life predominated in the form of convention and tradition, there is bound to be a destructive outbreak of creative energy. Only when it is a mass phenomenon, is this outbreak is a catastrophe, but never in the individual who consciously submits to these higher powers and serves them with all one’s strength. The mechanism of convention keeps people unconscious, for in that state they can follow their accustomed tracks like blind brutes, without the need for conscious decision. This unintended result of even the best conventions is unavoidable but is no less a terrible danger for that. For when new conditions arise that are not provided for under the old conventions, then, just as with animals, panic is liable to break out among human beings kept unconscious by routine, and with equally unpredictable results. #RandolphHarris 2 of 21
Personality, however, does not allow itself to be seized by the panic terror of those who are just waking to consciousness, for it has put all its terrors behind it. It is able to cope with the changing times, and has unknowingly and involuntarily become a leader. All human beings are much alike, otherwise they could not succumb to the same delusion, and the psychic substratum upon which the individual consciousness is based is universally the same, otherwise people could never reach a common understanding. So, in this sense, personality and its peculiar psychic make-up are not something absolutely unique. The uniqueness holds only for the individual nature of the personality, as it does for every individual. To become a personality is not the absolute prerogative of the genius, for a human may be a genius without being a personality. In so far as every individual has the law of one’s life inborn in one, it is theoretically possible for any human to follow this law and so become a personality, that is, to achieve wholeness. However, since life only exists in the form of living unite, id est, individuals, the law of life always tends towards a life individual lived. #RandolphHarris 3 of 21
So although the objective psyche can only be conceived as a universal and uniform datum, which means that all humans share the same primary, psychic condition, this objective psyche must nevertheless individuate itself if it is to become actualized, for there is other way in which it could express itself except through the individual human being. When the psyche seizes hold of a group, in which case it must, of its own nature, precipitate a catastrophe, because it can only operate unconsciously and is not assimilated by any consciousness or assigned its place among the existing conditions of life, this is the only exception. Only the human who can consciously assent to the power of the inner voice becomes a personality; but if one succumbs to it one will be swept away by the blind flux of psychic events and destroyed. That is the great and liberating thing about any genuine personality: If it were lived unconsciously by the group, one voluntarily sacrifices oneself to one’s vocation, and consciously translates into one’s own individual reality what would only lead to ruin. One of the most shining examples of the meaning of personality that history has preserved for us is the life of Christ. #RandolphHarris 4 of 21
In Christianity, which, be it mentioned in passing, was the only religion really persecuted by the Romans, there rose up a direct opponent of the Caesarean madness that afflicted not only the emperor, but every Roman as well: civis Rmanus sum. The opposition showed itself wherever the worship of Caesar clashed with Christianity. However, as we know from what the evangelists tell us about the psychic development of Christ’s personality, this opposition was fought out just as decisively in the soul of its funder. The story of the Temptation clearly reveals the nature of the psychic power with which Jesus came into collision: it was the power-intoxicated devil of the prevailing Caesarean psychology that led him into dire temptation in the wilderness. As if it were trying to make a Caesar of him, this devil was the objective psyche that held all the peoples of the Roman Empire under its sway, and that is why it promised Jesus all the kingdoms of the Earth. Obeying the inner call of his vocation, Jesus voluntarily exposed himself to the assaults of the imperialistic madness that filled everyone, conqueror and conquered alike. #RandolphHarris 5 of 21
In this way, by exposing himself to the World’s suffering, Christ recognized the nature of the objective psyche which had plunged the whole World into misery and had begotten a yearning for salvation that found expression even in the pagan poets. Far from suppressing or allowing oneself to be suppressed by this psychic onslaught, Christ let it act on him consciously, and assimilated it. Thus was World-conquering Caesarism transformed into spiritual kingship, and the Roman Empire into the universal kingdom of God that was not of this World. While the whole Jewish nation was expecting an imperialistically minded and politically active hero as a Messiah, Jesus fulfilled the Messianic mission not so much for one’s own nation as for the whole Roman World, and pointed out to humanity the ancient truth that where force rules there is no love, and where love reigns force does not count. The religion of love was the exact psychological counterpart to the Roman devil-worship of power. This Roman devil-worship of force and power has its grip on Americans, especially those in California. #RandolphHarris 6 of 21
However, the example of Christianity is perhaps the best illustration of the previous abstraction argument. This apparently unique life became a sacred symbol because it is the psychological prototype of the only meaningful life, that is, of a life that strives for the individual realization—absolute and unconditional—of its own particular law. Well may we exclaim with Tertullian: anima naturaliter christiana! (A natural Christian soul.) The deification of Jesus, as also of the Buddha, is not surprising, for it affords a striking example of the enormous valuation that humanity places upon the ideal of personality. Though it seems at present as if the blind and destructive dominance of meaningless collective forces would thrust the ideal of personality into the background, yet this is only a passing revolt against the dead weight of history. Once the revolutionary, unhistorical, and therefore uneducated inclinations of the rising generation have had their fill of tearing down tradition, new heroes will be sought and found. Even the Bolseviks, whose radicalism leaves nothing to be desired, have embalmed Lenin and made a saviour Karl Marx. #RandolphHarris 7 of 21
The ideal of personality is one of the ineradicable needs of the human soul, and the more unsuitable it is the more fanatically it is defended. Indeed, the worship of Caesar was itself a misconceived cult of personality, and modern Protestantism, whose critical theology has reduced the divinity of Christ to vanishing point, has found its last refuge in the personality of Jesus. Yes, this thing we call personality is a great and mysterious problem. Everything that can be said about it is curiously unsatisfactory and inadequate, and there is always a danger of the discussion losing itself in pomposity and empty chatter. They very idea of personality is, in common usage, so vague and ill-defined that one hardly ever finds two people who take the word in the same sense. If I put forward a more definite conception of it, I do not imagine that I have uttered the last word. I should like to regard all I say here only as a tentative attempt to approach the problem of personality without making any claim to solve it. Or rather, I should like my attempt to be regarded as a description of the psychological problems raised by personality. #RandolphHarris 8 of 21
All the usual explanations and nostrums of psychology are apt to fall short here, just as they do with the human of genius or the creative artist. Inferences from heredity or from environment do not quite come off; inventing fictions about childhood, so popular today, ends—to put it mildly—in unreality; explanations from necessity—“he had no money,” “he was a sick man,” et cetera—remain caught in externals. There is always something irrational to be added, something that simply cannot be explained, a deus ex machina or an asylum ignorantiae, that well-known sobriquet for God. The problem thus seems to border on the extrahuman realm, which always been known by a divine name. Wherever we look or search, probe or analyse in this Universe, we find nothing that is permanent. Everything is moving slowly or swiftly to change of condition, whether this be growth or deterioration, and moves in the end to complete disintegration. There is no stability anywhere but only the show of it. Whether it be human’s fortunes or a mountain’s surface, everything is evanescent. Only the rate of this evanescence differs but the fact of it does not. #RandolphHarris 9 of 21
Throughout all things in the Universe and not only in the plant and animal kingdoms, we find the presence of growth and decay, and ripe and rot. There are no golden ages, no utopias, no Heavens on Earth. This World is a scene of continuous process, or diversification—which means it is an ever-changing scene. Sometimes it is better, sometimes it is worse—if looked at from a human standpoint—but none these two conditions remains forever fixed. Only romantic dreamers or pious, wishful thinkers look or wait for one that is. If fortunate, what we may reasonably look for and, hope to find, is an inner equilibrium within ourselves which will yield a peace or a presence. Let us not lessen what we are by refusing to accept the responsibility, by practising self-pity, or by blaming environments. They have their place and may make their contribution, but in the end it is our own ignorance of our own possibilities which is the basic cause. Whatever is done to improve human affairs and arrangements will not last. When it will need to be improved again, the time will come. In just the same way even the planet itself changes its features, turns tropical zones to temperate ones and great seas to sandy deserts. Only in the Void is there no activity, no change. #RandolphHarris 10 of 21
If anything is perfect it cannot be improved. Whoever therefore demands perfection must understand that one is demanding finality. Perhaps that is why, even at an approximate 24,000 square feet (which is at least ten times larger than most homes), Sarah Winchester’s Mansion was never completed, even though it is one of the largest and most unique estates in the World! Could there be such a thing in this ever-changing World as perfection? There are no permanent solutions because there are no permanent problems. Millions of animal and human bodies have entered the Earth’s composition through drowning in vast floods or dying in droughts, famines, and epidemics, through earthquakes and eruptions. It has been an immense graveyard and crematorium. Yet equally it has brought into living existence millions of new beings. Men and women terrify themselves with mental pictures of age, of its diseases and infirmities, its growing cancers and shrinking arteries. Yet they seldom relate their personal experience to the wider scheme of things, to the Universe as a whole. If they did, they would soon see that not only are decay and disintegration everywhere in nature, but brutality and murder are there also on an appalling scale. #RandolphHarris 11 of 21
Millions of animals, insects, birds, fish, and sometimes humans, attack, deform, mutilate or kill other creatures. Civilizations do not progress; they grow, but they crumble by their own weight, or, rather, overweight. If anything every impressed me with the truth of civilization’s transformatory nature it was my reading of the Frenchman Volney’s book The Ruins of Empires, together with my visit to the remains of two cities. One, Anuradhapura in Ceylon, sixteen miles long and sixteen miles wife stretching in the sunshine with thousands of golden and sliver pillars, was eaten up by jungle growth or dissolved into dust! The other, Angkor in Cambodia, displayed huge temples rising out of the thick clogging undergrowth and broken, weather-beaten states of Buddhas tangled with, root-bound in, gnarled wrinkled trees. If it was in Beijing or Shanghai, maybe X’ian, possibly Hangzhou, I cannot recall. However, something else I found fascinating was in China, they have statues of God carved into the mountain and they must be 100 feet tall, and one of them even had brown skin. #RandolphHarris 12 of 21
Despite the ever-confronting evidence that change is ceaseless throughout the Universe and throughout human experience, we persistently get the feeling of solidity in the Universe and permanency in experience. Is this only an illusion and the World merely a phantasm? The answer that there IS something unending behind both. There is no stability anywhere in the Universe, given enough time, and there is none in human life. Yet the craving for it exists. That there is a metaphysical meaning behind this phenomenon. It exists because THAT which is being the craving person is the only stable thing there is, or rather no-thing, because IT has no shape, no colour, is soundless and invisible and beyond the grasp of ordinary thoughts. It is this hidden contact, or connection, which keeps humans seeking for what one never finds, hoping for what one never attains, refusing to accept the message of ceaseless change which Nature and Life continue to utter in one’s ears, and opposing the adjustments that experience and events demand periodically from one. #RandolphHarris 13 of 21
There is no permanency anywhere except in ourselves. And even there it is so deep down, and so hard to find, that most people accept the mistaken idea that their ego’s ever-changing existence is the only real existence. The communities of God, to which Christ has become teacher and guide, are, in comparison with communities of the pagan people among whom they live as strangers, like Heavenly lights in the World. “We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren. One who does not love abides in death,” reports 1 John 3.14. Now, if we are to be spiritually formed in Christlikeness, we must find out what our relationships to others must be like. The natural condition of life for human beings is one of reciprocal rootedness in others. As firmness of footing is a condition of walking and secure movement, so assurance of others being for us is the condition of stable, healthy living. There are many ways this can be present in individual cases, but it must be there. If it is not, we are but walking wounded, our life more or less a shambles until we die. When the required type of “for-ness” is adequately present, human “circles of sufficiency” emerge. #RandolphHarris 14 of 21
The most fundamental form of a circle of sufficiency is that of a mother and child (the Virgin Mary and Jesus). Then perhaps mother and child and father. (What some more modern spiritualist consider the “Holy Trinity.”) Then there are young lovers, reciprocally absorbed, as well as mature mates. Of course numerous forms of human association can take on some degree of this “sufficiency,” and always with a distinctive character arising out of the precise nature of the relationships involved. These circles of sufficiency, natural and essential to the human condition and so profoundly beautiful to behold, are always illusory at the merely human level, and even the illusion itself is terrifyingly fragile. To assure an anxious child we may say, “Everything is okay now.” However, it never is. In this World it is never true that everything is okay, and perhaps it is least true in those very situations where we feel the need to say it. Every human circle presupposes for its “really being okay” a larger context or circle that supports it. The mother and child, for example, presuppose the larger family that cares for and sustains them, making it possible for them to be absorbed in one another as they need to be, ignoring all else. #RandolphHarris 15 of 21
These larger circles also depend upon yet larger circles, which, while ever less intimate, are still crucial to making the inner circles possible. That is just how human life is. The togetherness of the mother and child may be drastically affected by economic conditions on the other side of the Earth. Ultimately, if it is not caught up in the life of the only genuinely self-sufficient circle of sufficiency, that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, every human circle is doomed to dissolution. Only when rooted in that divine Trinitarian circle can the broken individuals from the broken circles recover from the wounds received in their circles of origin and find wholeness on their long journey from the womb to the eternal City of God. Of course it was never God’s intention that the natural human circles of sufficiency, or reciprocal rootedness, would be illusory, fragile, and eventually broken; and if they were lived within his kingdom, they would not be. “And there came also in the days of Com many prophets, and prophesied of the destruction of the great people except they should repent, and turn unto the Lord, and forsake their murders and wickedness. #RandolphHarris 16 of 21
“And it came to pass that the prophets were rejected by the people, and they fled unto Com for protection, for the people sought to destroy them. And they prophesied unto Com many things; and he was blessed in all the remainders of his days. And he lived to a good old age, and begat Shiblom; and Shiblom reigned in his stead. And the brother of Shiblom rebelled against him, and there began to be an exceedingly great war in all the land. And it came to pass that the brother of Shiblom caused that all the prophets who prophesied of the destruction of the people should be put to death; And there was great calamity in all the land, for they had testified that a great curse should come upon the land, and also upon the people, and that there should be a great destruction among them, such an one as never had been upon the face of the Earth, and their bones should become as heaps of Earth upon the face of the land except they should repent of their wickedness. And they hearkened not unto the voice of the Lord, because of their wicked combinations; wherefore, there began to be wars and contentions in all the land, and also many famines and pestilences, insomuch that there was a great destruction. #RandolphHarris 17 of 21
“The destruction was so great that is was such an one as never had been known upon the face of the Earth; and all this came to pass in the days of Shiblom. And the people began to repent of their iniquity; and inasmuch as they did the Lord did have mercy on them. And it came to pass that Shiblom was slain, and Seth was brought into captivity, and did dwell in captivity all his days. And it came to pass that Ahah, his son, did obtain the kingdom; and he did reign over the people all his days. And he did do all manner f iniquity in his days, by which he did cause the shedding of much blood; and few were his days. And Ethem, being a descendant of Ahah, did obtain the kingdom; and he also did do that which was wicked in his days. And it came to pass that in the days of Ethem there came many prophets, and prophesied again unto the people; yea, they did prophesy that the Lord would utterly destroy them from off the face of the Earth except they repented of their iniquities. And it came to pass that the people hardened their hearts, and would not hearken unto their words; and the prophets mourned withdrew from among the people. #RandolphHarris 18 of 21
“And it came to pass that Ethem did execute judgment in wickedness all his days; and he begat Moron. And it came to pass that Moron did reign in his stead; and Moron did that which was wicked before the Lord. And it came to pass that there arose another mighty man; and he was a descendant of the brother of Jared. And it came to pass that he did overthrow Moron and obtain the kingdom; wherefore, Moron dwelt in captivity all the remainder of his days; and he begat Coriantor. And it came to pass that Coriantor dwelt in captivity all his days. And in the days of Coriantor there also came many prophets, and prophesied of great and marvelous things, and cried repentance unto the people, and except they should repent the Lord God would execute judgment against them to their utter destruction; and that the Lord God would send or bring forth another people to possess the land, by his power, after the manner by which be brought their fathers. #RandolphHarris 19 of 21
“And they did reject all the words of the prophets, because of their secret society and wicked abominations. And it came to pass that Coriantor begat Ether, and he died, having dwelt in captivity all his days,” reports Ether 11.1-23. Lord, our hearth, God who guards the heart of our home, threefold flame who shines in the center: we honour and praise you, we offer you our words of worship. King of Poets, may our lives be creative. King of Smithers, may our lives be useful. King of healers, may our lives be healthy. Your family is standing before you here, confident you will do what is right. May the snow start falling to create the waters of the Earth, so it can soak deep into the Earth, and conceive a healthy environment. Being to birth the cold and rainy days. And be God’s treasured people in His hand, a diadem His kingly brow to band. By God, we were uplifted, carried, crowned, thus honoured inasmuch as precious found. God’s glory is on me, and mine on Him. And when I call God is not far or dim. God loves His folks; the meek will glorify, and, shrined in prayer, draw their rapt reply. #RandolphHarris 20 of 21
Truth is Thy primal word; at Thy behest the generations pass—O assist our quest for Thee, and set my host of song on high, and let my psalmody come very nigh. My praises as a coronal account, and let my prayer as Thine incense mount. Deem precious unto Thee the poor man’s song, as those that to Thine altar did belong. Rise, O my blessing, to the lord of birth, the breeding, quickening, righteous force of Earth. Do Thou receive it with acceptant nod, my choicest incense offered to my God. And let my meditation grateful be, for all my being is athirst for Thee. Thine, O Lord, is the greatness and the power, the glory and victory and the majesty; for all that is in the Heaven and on the Earth is Thine. Thine is the kingdom, O Lord, and Thou art exalted supreme above all. Who can recount the mighty acts of the Lord? Who can proclaim all His full praise? I will extol Thee, O Lord, for Thou hast raised me up, and hast not allowed mine enemies to rejoice in triumph over me. O Lord, my God, I cried unto Thee, and Thou didst heal me; O Lord, Thou savest me from the peril of death; Thou didst keep me alive, that I should not go down to the grave. #RandolphHarris 21 of 21
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A Person that Does Not Have Any Tears Does Not Have Any Heart!
To have no friends at all is the worst state of humans. To have only one good friend is enough. You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you. Our personality develops in the course of our life from germs that are hard or impossible to discern, and it is only our deeds that reveal who we are. We are like the sun, which nourishes the life of the Earth and brings forth every kind of strange, wonderful, and evil thing; we are like the mothers who bear in their wombs untold happiness and suffering. At first we do not know what deeds or misdeeds, what destiny, what good and evil we have in us, and only the autumn can show what spring has engendered, only in the evening will it be seen what the morning began. Personality, as the complete realization of our whole being, is an unattainable ideal. However, unattainability is no argument against the ideal, for ideals are only signposts, never the goal. Just as the child must develop in order to be educated, so the personality must begin to sprout before it can be trained. And this is where the danger begins. For we are handling something unpredictable, we do not know how and in what direction the budding personality will develop, and we have learned enough of nature and the World to be somewhat chary of both. #RandolphHarris 1 of 24
On top of that, we were brought up in the Christian belief that human nature is intrinsically evil. However, even those who no longer adhere to the Christian teaching are by nature mistrustful and not a little frightened of the possibilities lurking in the subterranean chambers of their being. Even enlightened psychologists like Dr. Freud give us an extremely unpleasant picture of what lies slumbering in the depths of the human psyche. So it is rather a bold venture to put in a good word for the development of personality. Human nature, however, is fully of the strangest contradictions. We praise the “sanctity of motherhood,” yet would never dream of holding it responsible for all the human monsters, the homicidal maniacs, dangerous lunatics, epileptics, idiots, and physically disabled of every description who are born every day. At the same time, when it comes to allowing the free development of personality, we are tortured with doubts. “Anything might happen then,” people say. Or they dish up the old, feeble-minded objection to “individualism.” However, individualism is not and never has been a natural development; it is nothing but an unnatural usurpation, a freakish, impertinent pose that proves its hollowness by crumpling up before the least obstacle. What we have in mind is something very different. #RandolphHarris 2 of 24
Clearly no one develops one’s personality because somebody tells one that it would be useful or advisable to do so. Nature has never yet been taken in by well-meaning advice. The only thing that moves nature is causal necessity, and that goes for human nature, too. Without necessity nothing budges, the human personality least of all. It is tremendously conservative, not to say torpid. Only acute necessity is able to rouse it. The developing personality obeys no caprice, no command, no insight, only brute necessity; it needs the motivating force of inner or outer fatalities. Any other development would be no better than individualism. That is why when flung at the natural development of personality, the cry of “individualism” is a cheap insult. The words “many are called, but few are chosen” are singularly appropriate here, for the development of personality from the germ-state to full consciousness is at once a charisma and a curse, because its first fruit is the conscious and unavoidable segregation of the single individual from the undifferentiated and unconscious herd. This means isolation, and there is no more comforting word for it. Neither family nor society nor position can save one from this fate, nor yet the most successful adaptation to one’s environment, however smoothly one fits in. #RandolphHarris 3 of 24
The development of personality is a favour that must be paid for dearly. However, the people who talk most loudly about developing their personalities are the very ones who are lest mindful of the results, which are such as to frighten away all weaker spirits. Yet the development of personality means more than just the fear of hatching forth monsters, or of isolation. It also means fidelity to the law of one’s own being. For the word “fidelity” I should prefer, in this context, the Greek word used in the New Testament, which is erroneously translated “faith.” It really means “trust,” “trustful loyalty. Fidelity to the law of one’s own being is a trust in this law, a loyal perseverance and confident hope; in short, an attitude such as a religious human should have towards God. It can now be seen how portentous is the dilemma that emerges from behind our problem: personality can never develop unless the individual chooses one’s own way, consciously and with moral deliberation. Not only the causal motive—necessity—but conscious moral decision must lend its strength to the process of building personality. If the first is lacking, then the alleged development is a mere acrobatics of the will; if the second, it will get stuck in unconscious automatism. However, if one holds one’s own way to be the best, a human can make a moral decision to go that way. #RandolphHarris 4 of 24
The other ways are conventionalities of a moral, social, political, philosophical, or religious nature. The fact that the conventions always flourish in one form or another only proves that the vast majority of humankind do not choose their own way, but convention, and consequently develop no themselves but a method and a collective mode of life at the cost of their own wholeness. Just as the psychic and social life of humankind at the primitive level is exclusively a group life with a high degree of unconsciousness among the individuals composing it, so the historical process of development that comes afterwards is in the main collective and will doubtless remain so. That is why I believe convention to be a collective necessity. It is a stopgap and not an ideal, either in the moral or in the religious sense, for submission to it always means renouncing one’s wholeness and running away from the final consequences of one’s own being. To develop one’s own personality is indeed an unpopular undertaking, a deviation that is highly uncongenial to the herd, an eccentricity smelling of the cenobite, as it seems to the outsider. Small wonder, then, that from earliest times only the chosen few have embarked upon this strange adventure. Had they all been fools, we would safely dismiss them as mentally “private” persons who have no claim on interest. #RandolphHarris 5 of 24
However, unfortunately, these personalities are as a rule the legendary heroes of humankind, the very ones who are looked up to, loved, and worshipped, the true sons of God whose names perish not. They are the flower and the fruit, the ever fertile seeds of the tree of humanity. This allusion to historical personalities makes it abundantly clear why the development of personality is an ideal, and why the cry of individualism is an insult. Their greatness has never lain in their abject submission to convention, but on the contrary, in their deliverance from convention. They towered up like mountain peaks above the mass that still clung to its collective fears, its beliefs, laws, and systems, and boldly chose their own way. To the man in the street it has always seemed miraculous that anyone should turn aside from the beaten track with its known destinations, and strike out on the steep and narrow path leading into the unknown. Hence, if not actually crazy, it was always believed that such a human was possessed by a daemon or a god; for the miracle of a human being able to act otherwise than as humanity has always acted could only be explained by the gift of daemonic power or a divine spirit. How could anyone but a god counterbalance the dead weight of humanity in the mass, with its everlasting convention and habit? #RandolphHarris 6 of 24
From the beginning, therefore, the heroes were endowed with godlike attributes. According to the Nordic view they had snake’s eyes, and there was something peculiar about their birth or descent; certain heroes of ancient Greece were snake-souled, others had a personal daemon, were magicians or the elect of God. All these attributes, which could be multiplied at will, show that for the ordinary human the outstanding personality is something supernatural, a phenomenon that can only be explained by the intervention of some daemonic factor. What is it, in the end, that induces a human to go one’s own way and to rise out of unconscious identity with the mass as out of a swathing mist? Not necessity, for necessity comes to many, and they all take refuge in convention. Not moral decision, for nine times out of ten we decide for convention likewise. What is it then, that inexorable tips the scales in favour of the extra-ordinary? It is what is commonly called vocation: an irrational factor that destines a human to emancipate oneself from the herd and from its well-worn paths. True personality is always a vocation and puts its trust in it as in God, despite its being, as the ordinary human would say, only a personal feeling. #RandolphHarris 7 of 24
However, vocation acts like a law of God from which there is no escape. The fact that many a human who goes one’s own way ends in ruin means nothing to one who has a vocation. One must obey one’s own law, as if it were a daemon whispering to one of new and wonderful paths. Anyone with a vocation hears that voice of the inner human: one is called. That is why the legend say that one possesses a private daemon who counsels one and whose mandates one must obey. The best known example of this is Faust, and an historical instance is provided by the daemon of Socrates. Primitive medicine-humans have their snake spirits, and Aesculapius, the tutelary patron of physicians, has for ones emblem the Serpent of Epidaurus. He also has, as his private daemon, the Cabir Telesphoros, who is said to have dictated or inspired his medical prescriptions. Nonetheless, always choose a vocation where you will be happy. You will spend at least eight hours a day or more at it through all the foreseeable future. Choose something that you enjoy doing. The original meaning of “to have a vocation” is to be addressed by a voice.” The clearest examples of this are to be found in the avowals of the Old Testament prophets. That it is not just a quaint old-fashioned way of speaking is proved by the confessions of historical personalities such as Goethe and Napoleon, to mention only two familiar examples, who made no secret of the feeling of vocation. #RandolphHarris 8 of 24
When it comes to a vocation, income is important, but you do not need to be a multimillionaire or a billionaire to be happy. In fact, if wealth becomes your only objective, you are more likely to be unhappy. You will become a slave t it. It will colour all your decisions. You need enough to get along on. You need enough to provide well for your family. Vocation, or the feeling of it, is not, however, the prerogative of great personalities; it is also appropriate to the small ones all the way down to humble personalities, but as the size decreases the voice become more and more muffled and unconscious. It is as if the voice of the daemon within were moving further and further off, and spoke more rarely and more indistinctly. The smaller the personality, the dimmer and more unconscious it becomes, until finally in merges indistinguishably with the surrounding society, thus surrendering its own wholeness and dissolving into the wholeness of the group. In the place of the inner voice there is the voice of the group with its conventions, and vocation is replaced by collective necessities. However, even in this unconscious social condition there are not a few who are called awake by the summons of the voice, whereupon they are at once set apart from the others, feelings themselves confronted with a problem about which the others know nothing. #RandolphHarris 9 of 24
In the most cases it is impossible to explain to others what has happened for any understanding is walled off by impenetrable prejudices. “You are no different from anybody else,” they will chorus, or, “there is no such thing,” and even if there is such a thing, it is immediately branded as “morbid” and “most unseemly.” For it is “a monstrous presumption to suppose anything of that sort could be of the slightest significance” –it is “purely psychological.” This last objection is extremely popular nowadays. It stems from a curious underestimation of anything psychic, which people apparently regard as personal, arbitrary, and therefore completely futile. And this, paradoxically enough, despite their enthusiasm for psychology. The unconscious, after all, is “nothing but fantasy.” We “merely imagined” so and so, et cetera. People think themselves magicians who can conjure the psyche hither and thither and fashion it to suit their moods. They deny what strikes them as inconvenient, sublimate anything nasty, explain away their phobias, correct their faults, and feel in the end that they have arranged everything beautifully. In the meantime they have forgotten the essential point, which is that only the tiniest fraction of the psyche is identical with the conscious mind and its box of magic tricks. #RandolphHarris 10 of 24
The much greater part of the mind is sheer unconscious fact, hard and immitigable as granite, immovable, inaccessible, yet ready at any time to come crashing down upon us at the behest of unseen powers. The gigantic catastrophes that threaten us today are not elemental happenings of a physical or biological order, but psychic events. To a quite terrifying degree we are threatened by wars and revolutions which are nothing other than psychic epidemics. At any moment several millions of human beings may be smitten with a new madness, and then we shall have another World war or devastating revolution. Instead of being at the mercy of wild beasts, earthquakes, landslides, and inundations, modern humans are battered by the elemental forces of one’s own psyche. This is the World Power that vastly exceeds all other powers on Earth. The Age of Enlightenment, which stripped nature and human institutions of gods, overlooked the God of Terror who dwells in the human soul. If anywhere, fear of God is justified in face of the overwhelming supremacy of the psychic. However, all this is so much abstraction. Everyone knows that the intellect, that clever jackanapes, can put it this way or any other way one pleases. #RandolphHarris 11 of 24
When the psyche, as an objective fact, hard as granite and heavy as lead, confronts a human as an inner experience and addresses one in an audible voice, saying, “This is what will and must be,” it is a very different thing. Then one feels oneself called, just as the group does when there is a war on, or a revolution, or any other madness. It is not for nothing that our age calls for the redeemer personality, for the one who can emancipate oneself from the inescapable grip of the collective and save at least one’s own soul, who lights a beacon of hope for others, proclaiming that here is at least one person who has succeeded in extricating oneself from that fatal identity with the group psyche. For the group, because of its unconsciousness, has no freedom of choice, and so psychic activity runs on it like an uncontrolled law of nature. There is thus set going a chain reaction that comes to a stop only in catastrophe. When they feel the danger of psychic forces, the people always long for a hero, a slayer of dragons; hence the cry for personality. We know that God is our ultimate Saviour. Sabbath fulfilled in human life is really celebration of God. Sabbath is inseparable from worship, and, indeed, genuine worship is Sabbath. #RandolphHarris 12 of 24
As the fourth commandment, Sabbath is the fulfillment in practice of the first three. When we come to the place where we can joyously “do no work” it will be because God is so exalted in our minds and bodies that we can trust him with our life and our World and can take our hands off of them. Now, for most of us Sabbath is first to be achieved in the practice of solitude and silence. Thee must be carefully sought, cultivated, and dwelt in. When they become established in our soul and our body, they can be practiced in company with others. However, the body must be weaned away from its tendencies to always take control, to run the World, to achieve and produce, to attain gratification. These are its habitual tendencies learned in a fallen World. Progress in the opposite direction can only be made in solitude and silence, for they “take our hands off our World” as nothing else does. And that is the meaning of Sabbath. Rest is one primary mark of the condition of sabbath in the body, as unrest is a primary mark of its absence. So if we really intend to submit our bodies as living sacrifices to God, our first step well might be to start getting enough sleep. Sleep is a good first use of solitude and silence. It is also a good indicator of how thoroughly we trust in God. #RandolphHarris 13 of 24
The psalmist, who knew danger and uncertainty well, also slept well: “I lay down and slept; I awoke, for the LORD sustains me” (3.5-6), he said, and “In peace I will both lie down and sleep, for Thou alone, O LORD, dost make me to dwell in safety,” (4.8). Of course we do not mean that we can just seep our way to sainthood. Sometimes people sleep because they are depressed, or are sad, or have a physical condition, or are just evading reality. Nor do we mean that really godly people—call them saints—do not work hard and are never exhausted. However, the saints who have separated their bodies to God have resources not at the disposal of the ordinary person running on fumes and promises, where so many of us find ourselves today. We have to learn how to get where those resources are and to take our bodies into the rest of God. If we are not rested, on the other hand, the body moves to the center of our focus and makes its presence more strongly felt, and the tendencies of its parts call out more strongly for gratification. He sensual desires and ego demands will have greater power over us through our desperate body and its parts. In addition, our awareness of what it is doing—it is very subtle—and what is happening around us will be less sharp and decisive. Confusion is the enemy of spiritual orientation. #RandolphHarris 14 of 24
Rest, properly taken, gives clarity to the mind. Weariness, by contrast can make us seek gratification and energy from food or drugs, or from various illicit relationships, or from egoistic postures that are, in Paul’s words, “upon the Earth.” They pull us away from reliance upon God and from living in his power. Much more could be said of the role of spiritual disciplines on behalf of the spiritual formation of the body. A full discussion of disciplines focused on the body would have to deal with how exercise and diet can contribute to easing the influence of the “sin that is in our members.” As finite, bodily creature we cannot ignore such things. In particular, specific disciplines go far in retraining particular parts of our body away from the specific tendencies to sin that are localized in them. They enable us to stop the practice and remove the tendency in question by entering special contrary practices and circumstances, and thereby breaking the force of habit that has us in bondage. God has made every provision for the body we actually have to serve us and him well for his purposes in putting us here on Earth. There may be severe problems with our bodies, at least from the human point of view. We do not mean to deny or disregard that. #RandolphHarris 15 of 24
However, as Peter said to women apprentices of his day (and of course it applies equally well to men), the real power of life lies in who we are as redeemed people and how our behaviour is caught up in that. So we should “not let [our] adornment be merely external—braiding the hair, and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on dresses; but let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God,” reports 1 Peter 3.3-4. This is no legalistic ban on jewelry and so on—though such things can be wrongly used, and perhaps nearly always are. However, it is a clear indication of where genuine beauty, health, and strength of the body come from and what incredible grace lies in the spiritual transformation of the body. “And it came to pass that Sez, who was a descendant of Heth—for Heth had perished by the famine, and all his household save it were Shez—wherefore, Shez began to build up again a broken people. And it came to pass that Shez did remember the destruction of his fathers, and he did build up a righteous kingdom; for he remembered what the Lord had done in bringing Jared and his brother across the deep; and he did walk in the ways of the Lord; and he begat sons and daughters. #RandolphHarris 16 of 24
“And his eldest son, whose name was Shez, did rebel against him; nevertheless, Shez was smitten by the hand of a robber, because of his exceeding riches, which brought peace again unto his father. And it came to pass that his father did build up many cities upon the face f the land, and the people began again to spread over all the face of the land. And Shez did live to an exceedingly old age; and he begat Riplakish. And he died, and Riplakish reigned in his stead. And it came to pass that Riplakish did not do that which was right in the sight of the Lord, for he did have many wives and concubines, and did lay that upon most men’s shoulders which was grievous to be borne; yea, he did tax them with heavy taxes; and with the taxes he did build many spacious buildings. And he did erect him an exceedingly beautiful throne; and he did build many prisons, and whoso would not be subject unto taxes he did cast into prison; and whoso was not able to pay taxes did cast into prison; and he did cause that they should labour continually for their support; and whoso refused to labour he did cause to be put to death. Wherefore he did obtain all his fine work, yea, even his fine gold he did cause to be refined in prison; and all manner of fine workmanship he did cause to be wrought in prison. And it came to pass that the did afflict the people with his whoredoms and abominations. #RandolphHarris 17 of 24
“And when he had reigned for the space of forty and two years the people did rise up in rebellion against him; and there began to be war again in the land, insomuch that Riplakish was killed, and his descendants were driven out of the land. And it came to pass that after the space of many years, Morianton (he being a descendent of Riplakish) gathered together an army of outcasts, and went forth and gave battle unto the people; and he gained power over many cities; and the war became exceedingly sore, and did last for the space of many years; and he did gain power over all the land, and did establish himself king over the land. And after that he had established himself king he did ease the burden of the people, by which he did gain favour in the eyes of the people, and they did anoint him to be their king. And he did do justice unto the people, but not unto himself because of his many whoredoms; wherefore e was cut off from the presence of the Lord. And it came to pass that Morianton built up many cities, and the people became exceedingly rich under his reign, both in buildings, and in gold and silver, and in raising grain, and in flocks, and herds, and such things which has been restored unto them. And Morianton did live to an exceedingly great age, and then he begat Kim. #RandolphHarris 18 of 24
“And Kim did reign in the stead of his father; and he did reign eight years, and his father died And it came to pass that Kim did not reign in righteousness, wherefore he was not favoured of the Lord. And his brother did raise up in rebellion against him, by which he did bring him into captivity; and he did remain in captivity all his days; and he begat sons and daughters in captivity, and in his old age he begat Levi; and he died. And it came to pas that Levi did serve in captivity after the death of his father, for the space of forty and two years. And he did make war against the king of the land, by which he did obtain unto himself the kingdom. And after he had obtained unto himself the kingdom he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord; and the people did prosper in the land; and he did live to a good old age, and begat sons and daughters; and he also begat, Corom, whom he anointed king in his stead. And it came to pass that Corom did that which was good in the sight of the Lord all his days; and he begat many sons and daughters; and after he had seen many days he did pass away, even like unto the rest of the Earth; and Kish reigned in his stead. And it came to pass that Kish passed away also, and Lib reigned in his stead. #RandolphHarris 19 of 24
“And it came to pass that Lib also did that which was good in the sight of the Lord. And in the days of Lib the poisonous serpents were destroyed. Wherefore they did go into the land southward, to hunt food for the people of the land, for the land was covered with animals of the forest. And Lib also himself became a great hunter. And they built a great city by the narrow neck of the land, by the place where the sea divides the land. And they did preserve the land southward for a wilderness, to get game. And the whole face of the land northward was covered with inhabitants. And they were exceedingly industrious, and they did buy and sell and traffic one with another, that they might get gain. And they did work in all manner of ore, and they did make gold, and silver, and iron, and brass, and all manner of metals; and they did dig it out of the Earth; wherefore, they did cast up mighty heaps of Earth to get ore, of gold, and of silver, and of iron, and of copper. And they did work all manner of fine work. And they did have silks, and fine-twined linen; and they did work all manner of cloth, that they might clothe themselves from their nakedness. And they did make all manner of tools to till the Earth, both to plow and to sow, to reap and to hoe, and also to thrash. #RandolphHarris 20 of 24
“And they did make all manner of tools which they did work their beasts. And they did make all manner of weapons of war. And they did work all manner of work exceedingly curious workmanship. And never could be a people more blessed than were they, and more prospered by the and of the Lord. And they were in a land that was choice above all lands, for the Lord has spoken it. And it came to pass that Lib did live many years, and begat sons and daughters; and he also begat Hearthom. And it came to pass that Hearthom reigned in the stead of his father. And when Hearthom had reigned twenty and four years, behold, the kingdom was taken away from him. And he served many years in captivity, yea, even all the remainder of his days. And he begat Heth, and Heth lived in captivity all his days. And Heth begat Aaron, and Aaron dwelt in captivity all his days; and he begat Amnigaddah, and Amnigaddah also dwelt in captivity all his days; and he begat Coriantum, and Coriantum dwelt in captivity all his days; and he begat Com. And it came to pass that Com drew away the half of the kingdom. And he reigned over the half of the kingdom forty and two years; and he went to battle against the king, Amgid, and they fought for the space of many years, during which time Com gained power over Amgid, and obtained power over the remainder of the kingdom. #RandolphHarris 21 of 24
“And in the days of Com there began to be robbers in the land; and they adopted the old plans, and administered oaths after the manner of the ancients, and sought again to destroy the kingdom. Now Com did fight against them much; nevertheless, he did not prevail against them,” reports Ether 10.1-34. Dear Lord in Heaven, as we approach this New Year, may it be born from You; praise, blessings, and honours are due for this gift! Please hear my words, Lord, as you give birth to everything. A newly born year will take its place among your wonders, one more thing for which You might rightly be praised. Sweet hymns shall be my chant and women songs, for Thou art all for which my spirit longs—to be within the shadow of Thy hand, and all Thy mystery to understand. The while Thy glory is upon my tongue, my inmost heart with love is of Thee is wrung. So though Thy mighty marvels I proclaim, these songs of love wherewith I greet Thy name. I have not seen Thee, yet I tell Thy praise, nor known Thee, yet I imagine forth Thy ways. For by Thy seers’ and servants’ mystic speech Thou didst Thy sov’ran splendor darkly teach, and from the grandeur of Thy work they drew the measure of Thy inner greatness, too. They told of Thee, but not as Thou must be, since from Thy work they tried to body Thee. #RandolphHarris 22 of 24
To countless visions did their pictures run, behold through all the visions Thou art One. I glorify Him, for He joys in me, my crown of beauty He shall ever be! His head is like pure gold: His forehead’s flame is graven glory of His holy name. And with that lovely diadem this graced, the coronal His people there have placed. Like Nature, the World, I myself, all of existence is subject to change. It is inevitable. What can we do except accommodate ourselves to this inexorable law? If there is any law which governs human existence it is the law of change. We forget it at our peril. Most ancient societies forgot it and suffered. For they cannot escape change, nor the sorrow that change bring, nor the loss of individual existence which is also brings. Such is the universal law which dominates all things and all creatures. When we try to press a permanent happiness out of this World of impermanent things, we are deceiving ourselves. Whether one comes to this truth near the end of a lifetime after long and varied experience or early in it by intuition, the effect is salutary, if saddening: perfect and continual happiness would include perfect and continual functioning of the body, good health, oral hygiene, good vision, good digestion, and all of the rest. #RandolphHarris 23 of 24
How many of the saints and the wise in history’s records had excellent bodily condition until the end? Nothing remains; everything is subject to change. Whether you rebel against this stark fact or resignedly accept it, it stares you in the face unaffected by your personal attitude. Jesus said: “This World will pass away.” It is hard to bear the remembrance that whatever else may happen change is certain, in one way or another, at some time or another. This is the “eternal flow” of ancient Greek thinkers. Not only is everything subject to change but everything also exists in relation to something else. Thus change and relativity dominate the World scene. Even Nature, used to existences extending through millions of years, is itself subject to this ever-changing process. What chance is then is there for the creations of humans? How could they hope to endure? We may think of the Sphinx and the Pyramid as likely to outlast the hours—but stay! Look at their neighbour, Sahara: today a vast sea of sand, but formerly a vast sea of water. So we must conclude that all is perishable—yet, to complete the picture, we must admit also that all is renewable. The one feature of life and thus Universe which does not change is change itself! It is an inexorable law. #RandolphHarris 24 of 24
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Randolph Harris II International Institute 