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Captains of Industry—Think ye a Hero one to be Defeated in the First Battle?
Dreams should be acquitted of evil. Easy for one to think like a hero; but hard for many to act like one. Have no the unconscious impulses revealed by dreams the value of real forces in the psychic life? Is the ethical significance of the suppressed wishes to be lightly disregarded, since, just as they now create dreams, they may someday create some other things? Blended mythology with metaphysics produce an image of the ideal type of individual needed as the savior of humankind. The hero can take many forms: he or she can be a god, a prophet, poet, priest, a man of letters, or a political ruler. In fact, a hero can be what you will, according to the kind of World he or she finds oneself born into: your heroes ever-varying persona results from the deeper needs of society. The subject selected as a hero is directed not by the mechanical needs of humans, but by their dynamical, unseen, mystical requirements. Thus, all heroes have discerned truly what the time wanted and have led it on the right road thither. In this sense, the hero is a gift from Heaven, a force of nature; the hero’s essential quality is original insight into the primal reality of things. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
With an appreciation of the mode of functioning of the psychic apparatus, and an insight into the relations between conscious and unconscious, all that is ethically offensive in our dream-life and the life of phantasy for the most part disappears. Because of the hero’s firm contact with the great fact of existence, once cannot lie. My hero is heartily in earnest; an unconscious sincerity emanates from him turning his acts or utterances into a kind of revelation, which the ordinary, unheroic man is morally obligated to recognize and obey. For all that is right includes itself in this of co-operating with the real tendency of the World. Indeed, the proper feelings of ordinary men toward the heroes of their age are loyalty (which is akin to religious Faith, reverence, admiration, and an obedience which knows no bounds. Hero worship is a basic and indestructible tendency of human nature: it is the one fixed point in modern revolutionary history, otherwise as if bottomless and shoreless. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
The hero concept is best understood as a rather curious ad obsessional example of a spiritual phenomenon that reached something of a climax in the nineteenth century. Worship of God gave way to worship of man and human society. What a dream has told us of our relations to the present (reality) we will then seek also in our consciousness, and we must not be surprised if we discover that the monster we saw under the magnifying-glass of the analysis is a tiny little infusorian. The irresponsible pursuit of wealth in which cash payment has become the sole nexus between people, thus displacing the traditional ties of obligation. However, social justice, now paradoxically asserted, can be achieved only through the enforcement of social inequality. Members of the aristocracy and those heroes of the business World, the Captains of Industry, must assume their responsibilities as the rulers of the masses: freedom consists in the right of the ignorant man to be guided by the wiser. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
It is impossible to exaggerate a hero’s impact, for better or worse, upon all aspects of Victorian culture, ranging from the development of the novel to the formation of social policy. I tend to be constantly misled by a craving for a strong faith which I lack the necessary capacity to experience. However, it is hardly the capacity I lack; rather, I need something to have faith in. In the absence of my father’s God, I chose what seemed to me the best substitute—the hero. For all practical purposes in judging human character, a man’s actions and conscious expressions of thought are in most cases sufficient. Actions above all deserve to be placed in the front rank; for many impulses which penetrate into consciousness are neutralized by real forces in the psychic life before they find issue in action; indeed, the reason why they frequently do not encounter any psychic obstacle on their path is because the unconscious is certain of their meeting with resistances later. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
In any case, it is highly instructive to learn something of the intensively tilled soil from which our virtues emerge. For the complexity of human character, dynamically moved in all directions, very rarely accommodates itself to the arbitrament of a simple alternative, as our antiquated moral philosophy would have it. And what of the value of dreams in regard to our knowledge of the future? That, of course, is quite out of the question. One would like to substitute the words: in regard to our knowledge of the past. For in every sense a dream has its origin in the past. The ancient belief that dreams reveal the future is not indeed entirely devoid of truth. By representing a wish as fulfilled the dream certainly leads us into the future; but this future, which the dreamer accepts as one’s present, has been shaped in the likeness of the past by the indestructible wish. The virtuous man contents himself with dreaming of that which the wicked man does in actual life. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
I am chasing after memories, trying to recreate that past. All of these night stories make me realize how the past does not help when we are put in a tight spot. Memories are all well and good to hold on to, but it is the promise of making new memories that helps me push through. I have to just keep telling myself that I will be back with you in no time. Nothing else I can do. I think back to the day with that car at the castle, and the standoff the guy in it had with police at our meeting spot and how concerned you were that hours went by and out have not seen me. We have been through a lot, but have you ever really stopped and thought how we would feel if we never saw each other again? As much as I try to push the past aside so that I can keep moving forward, nothing is holding you back that way. You have more questions than memories, more mystery than enlightenment. You have to look behind you. The present and the future are built on the know. I know that you want to find where you came from before you will know where to go. Do not give up. Many grave histories are as dangerous as the most absurd fiction. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
The Winchester Mystery House
A tour of The Winchester Mystery House tells the dramatic story of the famous Mrs. Winchester and her family and their Victorian mansion. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
Letters to an American Friend—Reflections on the Guillotine
Love of the World and its sensuous immediacy is a World where we speak tenderly and almost lovingly of our fellow humans and of their common fate, which we share. Absolute success often bears in it the seeds of its own destruction. The problem of suicide is described by some as the only serious philosophical problem. Suicide is contrary to the first law of nature, self-preservation; and it shocks the natural feelings and common apprehension of all humankind. However, some wonder, does it make any sense to go on living once the meaninglessness of human life is fully understood and assimilated. The meaninglessness or absurdity comprises the failure of the World to satisfy the human demand that it provides a basis for human values—for our personal ideals and for our judgements. No one is to blame for suffering an evil one cannot avoid. It is not the persecution, but the catastrophe which is annexed to it, that makes the difference between the tyrant and the sufferer. In mere corporal exertion, the hunter perhaps is upon a level with the vulnerable target being pursed. One that kills another can but commit murder upon his body; but for one to kill oneself is to kill body and soul at once. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8
The wound that bleedeth inward is most dangerous, the fire kept close burnest most furious, the oven dammed up baketh soonest, sores having no vent fester inwardly. One that dedicates their days to an endless sorrow is the worst and most degraded of suicides. I happened upon the youthful experience which even to-day still expressed its power in all these emotions. I might have been ten or twelve years old when my father began to take me with him on his walks, and in his conversation to reveal his view on the things of this World. Thus, he once told me the following incident, in order to show me that I had been born into happier times than he: “When I was a young man, I was walking one Saturday along the street in the village where you were born; I was well-dressed, with a new fur cap on my head. Up comes a Christian, who knocks my cap into the mud, and shouts, ‘Satan, get off my pavement!’ ” –“And what did you do?”—“I went into the street and picked up the cap,” he calmly replied. That did not seem heroic on the part of a big strong man who was leading me, a little fellow, by the hand. #RandolphHarris 2 of 8
My father maintained that violence, like suicide cannot be regarded as an adequate response to the experience of absurdity. There is nothing the body suffers that the soul might profit by. Who gave thee a power over thy life? The human being and the World—that together produce the tension described above. Suicide is thus an admission of incapacity, and such an admission is inconsistent with that human pride to which men like my father openly appeal. There is nothing equal to a spectacle of human pride. Only by going on living in the face of one’s own absurdity can human beings realize their full stature. The conscious espousal of the metaphysical arbitrariness of human purpose and action transforms nihilism (the rejection of all religious and moral principles, often in the belief that life is meaningless) from a passive despair into a way of revolting against and transcending the World’s indifference to humans. I believe that absurdity, in the sense of recognition and acceptance of the fact that there are no metaphysically guaranteed directives for conduct, could by itself generate a beneficial ethic. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8
In particular, the idea of human fraternity is connected with a heroic nihilism on the grounds that to accept oneself as the sole guarantor of one’s own values does necessarily involve accepting a principle of respect for other human beings. It seems that my father found it necessary to show by means of examples just what the specific implications for conduct of his doctrine of absurdity are and also make it plausible that these implications are consistent with the humanistic ideal to which he as an individual is clearly devoted. Life can be adequately motivated by an acceptance of absurdity. I agree that suicide and violence are mechanisms of this motor inhibition through nervousness in the intention of self-destruction is realized. One who digs a pit for others falls in themselves. Violence, suicide, and harassment are the severest terms for denial of human fraternity. The human apparatus of moral distinctions, of justice, and of guilt, as kind of a senseless rigmarole with no basis in reality. The whole World is in a peculiar state that is described as innocence, because in a World that affords no transcendental sanction for human judgments of right or wrong there can be no real guilt. #RandolphHarris 4 of 8
However, the difficulty in showing no optimistic ethic of human fraternity can be generated by a nihilistic attitude toward all values. Injustice and cruelty of humans to human should arouse others to action; by comparison with the hideous but remediable evils of human society, the cosmic injustice of the human condition seems to have lost some of its obsessive hold on the mind of society. The reason for the extraordinary incontinence of the Soviet revolution was that the revolutionary tradition had its roots in a revolt against the human condition as such, and such revolts can never lead to human fraternity but leads instead to a new enslavement of human by human. Much like the push for the first black president and socialism, many feel, enslaved many Americans and the capitalism ideals of the American economy and lead to the polar opposite being elected as president in 2016, with the election of a white business man, who puts Americans first and no foreign values. Political reaction is essentially a violent revolt, and the taking of human life is inconsistent with true revolt since the revolt involves the implicit assertion of a supraindividual value, the value of human life. #RandolphHarris 5 of 8
The metaphysical revolt is bad as it is a refusal of the human condition, resulting in either suicide or in a demonic attempt to disposed God and remake the World in the image of man. Its deepest motive is not love for humankind, but a desire to destroy the World as it is. The order it attempts to impose on the New World it constructs is informed by no ethically creative principle because nihilism can yield no such principle. A nightmare state of power for power’s sake is the ultimate fruit of metaphysical revolt. While many think we needed a black president in America because it has been known to be a racist county, was he elected just because he was black or because he was the best man for the job? Because if you give authority to someone just because you think others have abused authority in the past and it is time for a change, the danger of that is it can create a disaster because we should give power to those who are qualified, not those who we think she have it because it is a popular idea. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8
The historical tableau presents a principle of selection that seems to reflect a personal predilection for extreme or crisis situations rather than any objective assessment of real influence. Electing someone based on feeling and not qualification is no difference than the Nazi occupation of France or even totalitarianism as a political system, but all of the many forms that injustice and inhumanity can assume. Many have allowed practitioners to evade the responsibility that goes with moral self-ownership and to confirm them in their inhumanity to their fellow humans. Nihilism is a kind of immunizing experience, although one with very considerable dangers of its own, by virtue of which one is enabled to grasp the ideal of human fraternity in its pure form without the entanglements of ideology and doctrine by which it has so often been disfigured. My father had a stubborn moral integrity and a deep sympathy with his fellow humans, to which the somewhat meretricious rhetoric of revolt adds very little. At the same time, however, it must be conceded that the absence or unavailability of absolute values, whatever these might be, remains anything but trivial, and pervades the atmosphere of the humanistic ethic that are erected in their place. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8
Society also does not have the right to put criminals to death. The Fall of Adam is not the conception of evil. Evil is unjust social institutions or in the terms on which humans permitted to exist but in the very human heart of people themselves. Many people have an interior corruptness that is concealed from the World and for a long time from themselves—by a life of philanthropy and active sympathy for their fellow humans. Many people are, in fact, a sort of monster whose ultimate self-knowledge led them to create a sense of guilt and unworthiness in others by advertising their own corruption. They feed their obsessive need for superiority. The original sin has been forgiven by God and the locus of the struggle between good and evil. Thus, broadly speaking, one must emphasize their own inner complicity with evil and the lack of the kind of innocence that my father always claimed for humans. There cannot be a father in the World who would sell his child’s virtue. #RandolphHarris 8 of 8
How Does this Spoiling of God’s Initially Good Creation Come About?
Your verbosity, founded upon your memory of what others have said, proves that you retain words without ever having considered their meaning. Long-worded, long-winded, obscure, affirmatizing by negatives, confessing by implication!—Where is the beginning and end of you, and what is your meaning? Measurement of life should be proportioned rather to the intensity of the experience than to its actual length. There is no place but the Universe; no limit but the limitless; no bottom but the bottomless. Not only were you a sneak and a cheat, but you led on your own brother to do the same. You have caused a rift in more than your marriage. You caused one in your family. Your brothers are not speaking to each other. And behind it all are your own actions. If you had not done what you did to your brother, a certain person who will remain unnamed would not have felt justified in his decisions. Your family would still be whole. It has to stop. You have to stop. And, believe me, my fingers do not want to write these words. However, you cannot do this anymore, you are not only hurting your own family, but the entire community. #RandolphHarris 1 of 9
It is up to you to go to the house and straighten things out with everyone before there can be any form of healing and forgiveness. It is important that you go about this the right way or I am afraid you will face the doctrine of damnation and your soul will be forever lost. And now when know why you have been painting your story in the media while you hide in your lake front cottage. Please understand. Know that I love you, but I understand. We are naturally in the habit of explaining our actions and making excused for the things we do. I really think that the hypnotic therapy that you were participating in has allowed someone to control and manipulate you into becoming someone other than yourself and you are under a form of mind control. Basically, you allowed a person to transmit information or messages directly from his or her personality or consciousness to you through trance speaking while you were in a dream like state, allowing someone else to take control of the physical mind and body through rituals. It is also possible that possession allows some to be take over either by an outside entity or else by a different part of themselves. #RandolphHarris 2 of 9
Sin has a habit of persisting, and is remorseless in it choice of vehicles. In the United States of American, 57 percent of people believe in the Devil. While 51 percent of people believe that an individual can be possessed by a spirit or the Devil. Yet, only 15 percent of people believe that others are frequently possessed by the Devil, 29 percent believe that possession by the Devil happens on occasion, 45 percent think it rarely happens, and only 11 percent of people think that people are never possessed by the Devil. Darkness is more eligible than light to those whose deeds are evil. Some churches have a ritual called exorcism, which is designed to drive the Devil or evil spirits out of an individual. It is fascinating that 46 percent of people believe in the power of exorcism, 19 percent do not, and 36 percent of people are undecided. Every noisy evil is missed when it is taken away, and it is also believed that once an evil presence is exorcised out of a person that at some point and time it can return. It is not reasonable to assumes that all forms of possession can be explained in neurological terms. #RandolphHarris 3 of 9
The subtile Devil is never absent from his business, but ready at all occasions to encourage his servants. In sociocognitive terms, i.e. in terms of the apparently possessed person taking on a learned role for various reasons, is a result of involuntary behavior that is beyond completely beyond their control. However, at the other extreme, some of these cases will be deliberately taken on for a variety of reasons, and many of these cases will be deliberate hoaxes to produce a bestselling book, successful more, and to create news coverage and get on talks shows. There can also be cases where people are possessed, but they do not display irrational nor maladaptive behavior. The sociocognitive perspective is most commonly associated with a particular approach to explaining hypnotic phenomena by invoking such psychological factors as attitudes, expectancies, beliefs, compliance, imagination, attention, concentration, distraction, and relaxation. Hypnotic possession and responding is a state or condition of the person rooted in conceptions held by an entity in the mini-drama that is labeled the hypnotic situation. #RandolphHarris 4 of 9
In many societies, possession is deliberately invited as a part of healing rituals. The medium becomes possessed and it is then the spirit or another individual who actually diagnoses the problem and recommends treatment, along with general advice for dealing with life’s problems. The rituals may be one-on-one consultations or public ceremonies. The transition from one spirit identity to another is marked by recognizable changes in behavior such as changes in voice, personality, appearance, and dress. Sometimes respected members of the community are possessed, the possessing spirit is a major deity, and the performance serves to reinforce the central value of the society. That is called central possession. In contrast, in peripheral possession the person possessed is a socially marginal and powerless member of society and the possessing spirit is often capricious and amoral. Peripheral possession is typically associated with illness and distress on the part of the possessed and the initial signs that someone is possessed and the initial signs that someone is possessed may be physical symptoms such as headaches or stomach ache. #RandolphHarris 5 of 9
Peripheral possession is provided a socially acceptable means for the powerless to express their anger and resentment at those above them in the social hierarchy without fear of retribution. After all, they may not be held personally responsible for the demands they make during possession or for mocking and insulting their supposed superiors. It is the spirit that is held responsible. Not surprisingly, peripheral possession tends to occur at times of high stress. However, if the spirit is in an individual, I suppose they would have to be strong enough to break the bond because if it is the spirit that will be punished and it is in that vehicle, then both may be destroyed. The New Testament of the Bible provides many example of possession by demons and exorcism, the most prominent symptoms being convulsions, sensory and cognitive deficits, enactment of multiple identities, loss of voluntary control over behavior, increased strength, and amnesia. In the New Testament, sufferers typically displayed only one or a few of the symptoms but by the medieval period sufferers tended to display most or all of them. It was believed that that witches, acting on behalf of Satan, could send demons to possess people. #RandolphHarris 6 of 9
However, the demons possessing their victims could be coerced into naming the witch that had sent them, who could then be arrested and tortured, resulting in the naming of other witches who would then receive similar treatment. Thus, the possessed often served as witch-finders and, those controlled the demoniacs had a powerful weapon to use against political, social, or personal rivals. Demons were also believed to be intelligent and Worldly in contrast to the members of the lower social classes whom they possessed. Therefore, evidence of intelligence or learning in such folk could also be taken as an indication of possession. An even more certain sign is when a sick man speaks in foreign tongues unknown to hum or understands in those tongues. It is a manifest sign when a man speaks literary or grammatical Latin, or if without knowledge of the art he sings musically or says something of which he could never have had any knowledge. Some people try to strangle those they suspect are possessed to get the witch or demon out of them, so they will come to their senses. #RandolphHarris 7 of 9
I find this idea of possession interesting. Some of you, who engage in unorthodox behavioral therapy become very corrupt an evil, and you poison the minds of others by claiming that someone else is possessed by a demon, Devil, or is the child of the Devil. However, when observing some of these people who are being targeted by witch hunters, it actually appears the people who are attacking them and turning their family and community members against the individual are actually the ones doing evil. Also, the lies many of you spread about people you suspect to be evil actually put that individual in danger. So it leads me to believe that the person you are targeting is not the problem, but you are and are creating a mass hysteria to put their lives in danger. We saw this same kind of behavior during the Salem Witch Trials, and now we are seeing it again. So, I do believe that some possession is a mental disorder, but it is more instinctively evil. Because you witch hunters clearly have a mental disability and I am sure doctors have prescribed medication for you, and even though you may be taking this medication and going to church, you still display signs of mental illness or evil. #RandolphHarris 8 of 9
For when the will abandons what is above itself, and turns to what is lower, it becomes evil—not because that is evil to which it turns, but because the turning itself is wicked. There are two kinds of evils, sin and the penalty for sin. And if you are given medication for a mental disorder and it is not working, then you must be evil, your soul is evil, you are a product of this Devil you hate so much and church nor modern medicine can purge it from your being. Since there is happiness for those who do not sin, the Universe is perfect; and it is no less perfect because there is misery for sinners…So, whatever a soul may choose, ever beautiful and well-ordered in all its parts is the Universe whose Maker and Governor and President is God. Our Universe is called “Immense Heaven” and it is best not because it contains no evil, but because any other possible Universe would contain more evil. “And boy I got ya ‘cause tonight I’m making deals with the Devil, and I know it’s going to get me in trouble. Just as long as you know you got me. These friends keep talkin’ way too much, say I should give you up. Can’t hear them, no, ‘cause I have been hear all night. I have been here all day, and boy, got me walkin’ side to side.” (Ariana Grande – Side to Side). Side to side means two or more people or things lined up so their reality, beliefs, thoughts, and ideas are the same. It could be a form of possession. #RandolphHarris 9 of 9
The Winchester Mystery House
The stories of ghosts, mysteries, and paranormal happenings in The Winchester Mystery House, will leave readers delightfully frightened. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
Theory of Decaying Sense–Love Tearing Me in Two
Joy, Sunshine, the sea. Love soaring, love vanishing. Love tearing me in two. You should start to understand what I am feeling; you see some of these ghosts. I get tired of doing nothing but writing and reading and staring into the fire every evening. Sometimes, I think back to when my grandparents were young and people cared about more than money and material goods. Back then people mend their clothes and patch them. People had real family values and real love. Remember when people used to actually fall in love with people and not just want to have the sex with them, but they genuinely cared about the feelings of others and wanted to make them happy. Well, anyway, I always thought that I wore my hair too long, and I have my reasons, I like to feel it on my forehead. Tonight, as I sat in my trousers, I was going to cut my hair short and throw the locks into the fire. However, when I was in the store, a guy was talking to me about my hair and he really liked it and said, “if you see someone else with your hair, you know they copied you. We do not see that too often.” I thanked him, paid for my items and left.
As I was walking down the block, another man stopped me and talked about my hair, he really loved it and told me not to change it and that it is not a traditional style, but do not change it. He liked that I am not a follower and am doing what makes me happy and told me to keep being good and keep loving and I will get that back in return. It was so nice to finally get some love, it really made me feel good, and these guys did not want anything from me, but a moment of my time. He told me my hair reminded him of Samuel L. Jackson from that 70s, movie. I guess it is the side burns and the fact that more guys wore this style nearly 50 years ago. With a glint of satisfaction in my eyes, I left feeling more confident than I had in a lone time. I have gotten really shy about talking to people because I never know what to expect and I guess sometimes others pick up on my insecurity and might think that I am rude, but instead have been through some very hard times and try to keep to myself.
When you feel a little blue, like I do sometimes, do not collapse in on yourself. Many people do not realize what a vibrant force they are on this Earth. Human beings are not meant for mourning. We are meant for living and for loving. As love as we live, we should pay tribute to God by being a bright ray of Sunlight in the lives of others. By being genuine and kind, one could really change another person’s life. Even when you do not think you have anything to say, you may come up with the perfect words. This is one of the most beautiful place I have seen in this city, made even more so by the peacefulness and respite it offers us. I wish I could take your hand and show it to you. I am staying in a little valley just beyond the town, verdant and dotted with flowers. After smelling dried pee, boo boo, crack, and the sickly-sweet smell of infection for long, I cannot get enough of the scent of fresh grass, pine trees, and roses. By unlocking the secrets in nature, it gives us mastery over it. Your words will never become artificial. When I speak to you, I do not know of a more-natural, more honest person than you. #RyanPhillippe 3 of 6
My ideal society Is interesting as the first expression of persistent English distaste for the urbanized, commercial social order. An organic community, it embodies a large measure of equality, rests on an agricultural base, and has as its highest aim the fostering of free, cultivated individuals, bearing their share of common labor, but detached from material interest. The natural law governs both physical and social phenomena. Whether it governs the behavior of material bodies or sets the ends of human conduct, natural law is an expression of the divine order of the World. It can be discovered through reason and is not an outcome of God’s arbitrary will. Natural knowledge is to be acquired not as a witness to the glory of God or a source of evidence about God’s existence and nature, but for practical use, for the relief of human’s estate. Humans must guard against empty verbalism, falsely authoritative errors of the past; and dubious records of isolated marvels. It is important the claims respectively, of observation, cooperative research, and a systematic method.
In the battle against error, it is conducted on a wider front. There are certain general propensities of the human intellect which lead to unjustified beliefs, such as an excessive expectation of order; these are the Idols of the tribes. Humans must always guard against individual peculiarities and prejudices, the Idols of the cave. The Idols of the marketplace are those features of language which we wrongly supposed to correspond to distinction in reality. There are also idols of the theater, those received systems of ideas which prevent us from seeing the World as it really is. Artificial reality makes the unreal look real so that we cannot tell the difference between reality and pseudo reality. On the other hand, it also makes the unreal so entertaining that many no longer care about reality. This explains why many people are no longer in control of their own destiny. So many have begun to worship Idols that they are prisoner of, or at the very least subjected to, powerful and distant forces beyond their complete control.
However, one of the greatest abilities God has given each of us is our ability to believe. If you believe you can be successful, it will come true. Therefore, know that you can overcome mistakes of the past and fulfill your God-given destiny. The greatness of God’s power is activated only when we believe. That means right now, the Creator of the Universe is just waiting to release healing, restoration, favor, promotion, and abundance. When you believe, the surpassing greatness of God’s power is released. You may have to develop new habits. God loves with a great love the person whose heart is bursting with a passion for the impossible. True faith rests upon the character of God and asks no further proof than the moral perfections of the One who cannot lie. It is enough that God has said it. Faith is a living, daring confidence in God’s grace, so sure and certain that one could smile every day. Father, please take the limits off of you and release my faith in uncommon ways. I want to believe you for the extraordinary. I want to believe that you will increase me and show me your favor. I believe that you, God, is taking me forward into the fullness of my destiny and my life will be brilliantly productive and converge all the fruitful lines of scientific thinking age.
La Coscienza e il Meccanismo Interiore
Every calling is great when greatly pursued. Lord thank you that your gracious hands are upon me. God has created us to be, and we will have everything that God intended for us to have. Considering the Universe as a whole both directions of time are still indistinguishable just as space knows no above and below. Yet at a specific point of the surface of the Earth we call the direction towards the center “downward” direction; in the same way, a living World will distinguish the direction towards the more improbable state from the opposite direction calling the former past, and the latter future. This seems to be the only method which will allow us to conceive the term “space lived in,” which designates a nonobjective relationship to reality that is captured only approximately by such a concept as familiarity, intimacy, and identification, and that corresponds most closely to the way in which a human may be said to have their body. Here for the first time the existentialist problem of human’s becoming oneself is given a deeper foundation. For if confidence, hope, security, and dwelling are indispensable conditions for the possibility of human life, then the concerns of the philosophy of existence can be retained and validated anew only in a philosophical anthropology.
I believe that I have seen God’s favor in my life is because I have learned to ask for it. God has helped me to maintain not only what my parents have built, but God has also let me go further. Just as the Universe is created and governed by one God, so both the church and state must preserve administrative unity. However, since the church is the direct channel of communication between God and his creatures, the state and its subjects must be governed in moral affairs by the church. It is interesting that some people actually believe in capital punishment, since God will see to it that the innocent will not suffer in the afterlife. There are two ways of life for the soul, one which is subject to the laws of fate and another which, although it recognizes these laws, is able to rise above them and use them as tools. The conscious subject can be aware of other things only if it is capable at one and the same time of being modified and of remaining identical with itself, or inalterable. The solution of this apparent contradiction might lie in distinguishing between consciousness, understood as thought or pure mentality, and sensibility. The act of consciousness detaches the psychic event from its matrix in reality and thinks it is possible essence or its possibility or quiddity or whatever you wish to call it.
Consciousness is thought turned back upon itself and almost creating itself, but also as freely accepting the yoke of logic. If consciousness were not of this nature, it would be reduced to a logical machine, whereas it is free reflection on itself, grasping itself by directing itself toward objects. However, although the distinctive essence of consciousness is its infinite turning back upon itself (la riflexione infinita degli atti, “the infinite reflection of acts”), this reflection is not an infinite succession in which consciousness would lose itself in an endless postponement but rather is a completed penetration of self, the fullness and richness of the activity of thought. As the Son said: I came forth from the Father and have come into the World; again I leave the World and go to the Father [Johnson 16.28], so anyone may say: Lord, I came forth from you, the All High; I go to you, the All High, and by means of you, the All High. Here is the metaphysical medium leading us back. And this is the whole of our metaphysics: it concerns emanation, exemplarity, and consummation [that is, being illumined by spiritual rays and led back to the All High]. It is the way one becomes a true metaphysician. God has promised to give us the desires of our hearts. I have dreams in my heart that are extraordinary. God’s favor will shine down upon us and make a way. God create opportunities that cannot be taken away.
Pray for great things, expect great things, work for great things, prayer is the hand that moves the World. With the recognition of exemplarism, on the other hand, the whole of creation takes on a sacramental character—that is, it becomes a material means of bringing the soul to God. Nature becomes the mirror of God, reflecting his perfections in varying degrees. Although we see only a shadowy likeness (umbra) or trace (vestigium) of the creator in inorganic substances and the lower forms of life, the soul of man is God’s image (imago) and the angel his similitude. The recognition of God in nature begins in philosophy, but it is continued and perfected in theology. If there are potential beings, then pure act must also exist; composite things imply the existence of something simple; the changeable can only coexist with the unchangeable. More can be learned by the soul reflecting upon itself. The soul, possess memory, intelligence, and will, is an image of God, not only mirroring his spiritual nature but adumbrating the Trinity itself. Memory, which creates its own thought objects, resembles the Father who beget the Son or Logos (intelligence) as an intellectual reflection of himself, and the two through their mutual love (will-the active principle of “spiration”) breathe the Holy Spirit.
One can discover a spiritual God as the ultimate object of the soul’s search for the truth and happiness, however, only a person of faith can find the Trinity manifest throughout the creation. We can return to God by living an upright life—that is, by being rightly aligned with God—and this can be accomplished only through the grace of Christ. This return is a fulfillment of one’s destiny and is called reductio and the creation is achieved through one who praises God for and through subhuman creation. The human mind is right (rectus) when it has found truth, and above all, eternal truth. One’s will is right when one loves what is really good, one’s exercise of power is right when it is a continuation of God’s ruling power. Through original sin or the Fall, humans lost this triple righteousness. The human intellect, lured by vain curiosity, has enmeshed itself in interminable doubts and futile controversies; one’s will is ruled by greed and concupiscence; in one’s exercise of power one seeks autonomy. However, although humanity lost the state of original justice, we all still hunger for it. This longing for the infinite good is revealed in our ceaseless quest for pleasures. Through faith and love (grace), humans can find their way back.
Since knowledge is involved at every stage of return, reductio is also a quest for wisdom and hence, in an extended theological sense, it is metaphysical. It is an enlightened return, because every branch of learning is a gift from above, from the “Father of lights,” and can be put into the service of theology. Although human’s return begins with the natural illumination of the divine ideas and then by a varying additional degree of supernatural illumination which culminate in the experiential cognition of God through mystical union. This experience is not the same as the clear vision of the blessed in Heaven but is learned ignorance referred to the mystical union of the soul with God in darkness, granted to saints like Francis before death. Light of the agent intellect illumines the possible intellect. At the birth, the mind is at tabula rasa. It needs sensory stimulation before it can acquire any notions about the external World of objects. Illumination explains how the mind passes judgment on sensible things in terms of their values. For when the mind judges something to be, for example, good or beautiful, there must be an implicit awareness of what beauty and goodness are in themselves; and this requires that the human mind have some knowledge of the divine ideas.
Obviously, this is not a clear or intuitive knowledge of God such as the angles or the blessed in paradise possess. Yet, just as one sees the Sunlight without looking into the Sun itself, so one can have knowledge of divine ideas. These ideas are the residual effects of the divine action—effects which remain in the soul like habitual or buried memories. Nothing is in the intellect that was not first in the senses. The intellect can turn inward, reflecting on the soul and its tendencies, and the mind discovers God and itself as his image. Reasoning proceeds by progressively deepening insights into what the desire for truth and perfect happiness involve. The existence of God is truth implanted by nature in the human mind, and is our desire for knowledge, truth, happiness, or goodness—all of which need explication before humans realize they have God as their ultimate object. Only God is pure actuality. You are good and you are clean. None of this is your fault. This spiritual matter, found both in the angel and in the human soul, is never separable from its spiritual form; hence, such spiritual substances are not subject to change—they cannot die nor disintegrate like terrestrial bodies, nor can they be perfected by a hierarchy of forms, as can corporal matter. Try claiming God’s blessings instead of merely longing for them.
Whether Sleep be Swift or Virtue be Square
You see one ghost, you have seen then all. A Rolls Royce or Honda Civic, I am gone roll with you. Good is what has an aptness to produce pleasure in us. I usually concentrate on writing to you and loving you more every day that passes. My other lucky charm is a white gold and diamond ring that I wear on my wedding finder. That four diamond represent, Earth, air, water, fire and the white gold represents the mysterious Moon. It has led to my fascination with metaphysics, space, and the Heavens. I have worn it on my finger for the longest time, when I was feeling blue, I examine it, hoping to discover the magic it holds. Planetary demons are like humans without Earthly bodies, they have souls and aetheric or aerial bodies, according to their status; these bodies are like nature to the human spirit, and they live in Heavenly spheres; they perform the function of transmitting celestial influences; they can be both soul and spirit, act on both human’s spirit and soul. Not to make light of your romantic impressions, but a guardian angel is the same as a familiar planetary demon. There are bad demons, of low status and with aerial bodies, who trouble people’s spirits and imagination. #RandolphHarris 1 of 7
The connection between self-interest and morality in the threat of punishment—divine, natural, or civil—that coerces the individual to be moral for the sake of self-interest. However, it has been noticed that this connection breaks down wherever the expected benefit to the individual of moral conduct outweighs the likelihood of punishment and maintaining social privileges. If morality is grounded in psychology, then human nature cannot be as aggressively self-centered as the apostles of self-preservation and pursuit of pleasure maintained. Benevolence and conscience are as deeply rooted in human nature as is self-love. Moral obligation has its source in caring affections, such as love and pity, that are natural and universal as the more aggressive tendencies (“self-affections”), such as envy, greed, and the impulse of self-preservation. Moreover, there is a moral sense in humans that finds unique satisfaction in actions directed toward the common good. This moral sensibility turns us from the pursuit of pleasure toward the performance of duties toward others and explains our admiration of self-sacrifice independently of external reward or punishment. #RandolphHarris 2 of 7
The meaning of good, right, justice, and virtue—by what standards are they attributed to persons and actions; how is it psychologically possible for humans to admire and cultivate morality at the expense of self-interest; and by what rules can ethical disputes be decided in favor of one judgment against another? Considered as mediums of planetary influences, demons are exactly parallel to the Soul and Spirit of the World; the only, but crucial, difference is that the former are individual, personal, whereas the latter is general, impersonal. It would be difficult to believe simultaneously in both kinds of planetary influence; the celestial spirits cannot be both personal and impersonal. No observable facts or logical relations answer to our concepts of goodness, justice, and moral virtue. The terms do not denote qualities or relations, but convey a sentiment of approbation, so that their meaning is to be found in the feelings of the judge rather than on the object judged. We call things good for the same reasons that we call them beautiful: because we find them agreeable. An object is good if it is immediately pleasant, or if it is a useful means for attaining something else that is pleasant. Virtues are qualities that render a person agreeable or useful to oneself or to others, whether they are natural virtues such as talent, wit, and benevolence or artificial virtues like honesty and justice. #RandolphHarris 3 of 7
It might be possible that the impersonal spirit comes from the Heavenly bodies and works on human’s body and spirit, but no higher, whereas the personal spirits, the demons, who have souls, work primarily on man’s mind. People do not usually think logically about magic, especially if they believe in it. It is unsatisfactory because the demons have spiritual bodies closely akin to human spirits on which they can and so act. Indeed, passions of the human body, whether induced by these higher spirits or higher bodies, overflow into the soul in so far as the soul, by acquired or natural affects, has sunk itself in the body. However, there is this difference: that those [celestial] bodies move our souls through our bodies; the [celestial] spirits, on the other hand, both move the soul through the body, and directly move the soul, and move it through that [human] spirit which the Physicians often call the bond of body and soul. God has knowledge, not of what we are compelled to do, but what we freely choose to do, because his knowledge is not the kind of advanced knowledge that is based on casual process, but is due to the fact that, in the mind of God, we have already made our decisions. #RandolphHarris 4 of 7
All of past and future time is spread out in the specious present of the divine mind, so that what, from our limited standpoint, would be prediction of the future is, for God, simply direct awareness of contemporaneous events. Sometimes prayers are weak and disingenuous. These hymns are clearly prayers addressed to spirits of some kind; moreover, on several occasions some of them are addressed to demons. Egyptians religion place in their temples statues fashioned by magic art to attract into them demons and the souls of the dead. Orpheus, devoted man of his hymns not only to celestial [gods], but also to demons and demonic men and women, and added particular fumigations for each. However, much more foolish, wicked and abominable superstitions were introduced by many Priests, both civil and poetic. The demonic human-made gods, and the planetary guardian demons were said to be dangerous. Learned ancients, of course, did not worship idols and animals. The good pagan religion was explained as astrological magic. The status did not represent demons or gods, but humans influenced by certain planets; the animals and other objects were talismanic. The wise and learned priests were not worshiping them; they were just using them for magical operations, by which, presumably, they attacked good planetary demons. The practices led astray the ignorant into idolatry and superstition. #RandolphHarris 5 of 7
Some are strongly attracted to this kind of magic or theurgy, it is valuable, but it is clear that it is also dangerous. If remained within a learned philosophical circle, and kept secret from the ignorant, who distort it into idolatry and superstition, its dangers might be avoided. One must believe in order to understand. Faith is not incompatible with reason but, rather, prepares the soul for rational understanding. Morality is an inner quality, a property of motive or intention rather than of the consequences of one’s actions, a principle that was later stressed by the Reformation and attained its fullest expression in the ethical system. Theological virtues—faith, hope, and love—require faith and divine grace. The two highest goods, or paramount goals of life, are Worldly happiness and eternal beatitude (which has precedence); the former is achieved through natural virtue and the latter is achieved through church and its sacraments. There is a possibility of improving the human condition on Earth through knowledge of nature and intelligent action. This has helped to prepare the climate for the rebirth of natural science, whose first stirrings were felt in the thirteenth century. Informed reason and moral conscience represent an inherent tendency in the nature of humans, and conformity to this nature fulfills both the cosmic plan of the Creator and the direct commands of God revealed in the Scriptures. #RandolphHarris 6 of 7
Nonetheless, I do believe in the law of attract and that what you focus on you will attract. The Exorcist of FOX is a fictional show, but I thought a concept that they touched upon was interesting. A mother was a fading star and her career was going nowhere. So, while on set, she would let her daughter play with the witch board in hopes that a demon would possess her and this would allow her daughter to have supernatural powers that were noticeable so that the media would pay attention to her and her movie would be a success and relaunch her career. However, her daughter did become possessed, she actually attacked a very dark, evil, and powerful spirit into her being, which she passed own to one of her own children later in life. Bad magic was to do with the devil and demons, and it destroyed God’s freedom of will. God bears the ultimate responsibility for (in other words, is the necessary and knowing cause of) human’s existence as a fallen creature, although on his own level, humans remain individually responsible for his or her personal choices and actions. God has thus created humans imperfect but perfectible has also entered into human life, in Christ, to bring about human’s redemption. The fulfillment of God’s purpose for his creatures in his Heavenly kingdom constitutes a good so great and enduring that it justifies all the pain which have been experienced in order to reach it. #RandolphHarris 7 of 7
Entreties sur la Pluralite des Mondes
I was still terrified, though. I did not want to make a wrong move. The first evening was perfect. Dinner, dancing, strolling through Regent’s Park. I did not want to ruin it by suggesting anything improper. I wanted to—oh, God, did I want to!—but I could never have brought myself to ask. I have a small confession to make. Or maybe you have guessed it already. You know, writing this all to you has helped calm my fears somewhat. As long as I still have your letters, a lifeline running to me all the way from Scotland, I will be okay. I told you I brought the book along with me as a lucky charm, but you are my lucky charm. It has been overwhelming to go from living by myself in an isolated cottage to living on a busy block in a wee flat full of children and noise. I am quite dizzy most of the time and seem to have a constant headache from their chatter, but it has been lovely. I was thinking about God today. In the beginning God created a void by withdrawing into himself (contraction), and the void appeared as darkness because God is light. Expanding again as light into the void, God created all the substances of the World. Thus, the World we live in is ruled partly by light (God) and partly by the darkness (the kingdom of the devil). #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
Since everything is of the same nature—that is, a mixture of light and darkness—there are secret sympathies and secret antipathies everywhere, marked by signs which the adept can discover with God’s help. The practice of medicine depends entirely on understanding these forces, as do the practices of chiromancy and astrology. In the past, fear of persecution invited prudence, and some people would not even publish their brilliant books, even though their knowledge proved the superiority of the Moderns. A song works on body, mind, and on whatever intermediate faculties may be between; but it is the text alone which can carry an intellectual content and thus influence the mind. The music, abstracted from its text, can reach no higher than the spirit, i.e. sense and feeling, or at most, through the spirit, the lower parts of the soul, phantasy and imagination. Force denotes the faculty of action or the power to overcomes a resistance. In the physical sciences, it is that entity which changes, or tends to change, the state of rest or of motion of a body. We can capture planetary influences by prayers, either simple or sung with art. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
Our spirit is consonant with the Heavenly rays which, occult or manifest, penetrate everything. We can make it still more consonant, if we vehemently direct our affections towards the star from which we wish to receive a certain benefit…above all, if we apply the song and light suitable to the astral deity and also the odour. If communication is to succeed, something which, like sense and coloring, is ordinarily counted as part of the significance of the sound. This is called for force of the sound. In a language that is to express everything we wish to convey, we need some special signs for this element. Some people sing prayers to the Sun. Plato us one of the most ancient of the Greeks and he is considered a symbol of powerful, effect-producing singer; and he was a magician. The conception of musical sound is deemed as a living, spiritual being. Some writers say what they write comes from spirits as they are able to produce work as it moves through them. The World is seen as a living being, whose soul, by means of the stars imprints forms on the sub-lunar World; these are conveyed by cosmic spirit, and, if the form has been imperfectly received owing to the inadequacy of the receiving matter, this imperfection can be corrected by attracting more spirit from the appropriate planet. Like, if you wish to attract solarian gifts, wear colours such as gold, and plant flowers and have a picture of the Sun on your mantle, and sing songs to the physical Sun. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
While the idea of worshiping planets holds great promise, it is also at the same time fraught with grave dangers. Some planet supposedly also have demons attached to them. The Sun is better fitted for uplifting the mind than for securely balancing it. High-strung energy rather than poise seemed to be its natural effect on its votaries. It is believed that the fallen angels are responsible for our free will because they attracted Lucifer to Earth and are the architects for everything we cherish like music, poetry, movies, car, and television shows. My inmost yearning, my purest, though most secret flame, my purest, though most secret flame, my deepest faith and my highest hope—they are still the same as ever, and they all bear one name: the State. One day to build the state like a temple, rising up pure and strong, resting in its own weight, severe and sublime, but also serene like the gods and with and with bright hall glistening in the dancing brilliance of the Sun—this, at bottom, is the end and goal of my aspirations. This kind of magic has many sources. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
The immense importance attributes to astral influences and the immense importance is attributed to astral influence on the human spirit and one’s acceptance of a cosmic or celestial spirit that acquires a soul from the various stars and spheres it passes through during descent into the Earthly body. On this Earth the vehicle, which began by being fine, shinning and star-like, becomes heavy, dark and damp, and, unless purified and rendered more aetheric, it will at death drag down the soul to hell or to some lower incarnation. This conception of the spirit (for the vehicle is historically connected with Aristotelian, medical and Stoic pneumata) would account for its being peculiarly subject to astral influences, since it derives from the stars, and for the great urgency of its purification, since it does not leave the soul at death, but can drag it down or, if light and dry enough, ascend with it. It would, moreover, have a special affinity to the spheres and their harmony, since its proper shape, before entering the physical body, is spherical, and its proper motion is circular. The astral body was for primarily a religious conception—an explanation, a method of approaching God and salvation which are non—intellectual, such as fasting, lustrations, the use of incenses, incantations, excreta. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
To all these practices the astral body corresponds exactly; being corporeal, it can be acted on by similar physical things (vapours, scents, sounds); being the seat of imagination, of the irrational soul, it can be affected by prayers and images; since it survives death, its condition is the utmost importance. Humans are marvelous. They have been able to discover the divine nature and produce it, is admirable beyond all marvels. Our first ancestors, then, when they were in grave error concerning the gods, being incredulous and paying no attention to worship and religion, invented the art of making gods. Having done so, they added a virtue appropriate to it, taken from the World’s nature, and mixed these; since they could not make souls, they evoked the souls of demons or angels, and out them into images with holy and divine rites, so that through these souls the idols might have the power of doing good and evil…terrestrial gods and they have in them a natural divine power. And it is for the following reason that people delight them with frequent sacrifices, with hymns and praises and sweet sounds concerted like the harmony of the Heavens: that this Heavenly thing which has been attracted into the idol by repeated Heavenly rites, may bear joyously with humans and stay with them long. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
Credo Quia Absurdum
No knowledge can have for its object the absurdity that the eternal is the historical. It is impossible for two persons to be constituted so much alike, but that one of them should have a more genuine and instantaneous relish for one sort of excellence, and another for another. It contributes greatly towards a person’s moral and intellectual health, to be brought into habits of companionship with individuals unlike themselves, who care little for one’s pursuits, and whose sphere and abilities one must go out of oneself to appreciate. I went out shopping today. Why did you not tell me about all of the book? While out walking, I turned a corner and was confronted with a street packed full of book shops. You may laugh, but even if I were to have let my imagination run loose, I never would have conjured up an image of an entire stored filled with nothing but books. What power is able to hold in chains a mind ardent and determined? What power can cause that individual to die, whose whole soul commands one to continue to live? I am afraid I looked quite the country yokel, standing in the doorway of the first establishment I entered, staring around me goggle-eye at the shelves upon shelves. #RandolphHarris 1 of 9
I was enthralled by all of the knowledge, purported proofs of the existence of God, metaphysical systems interpreting what is accepted on faith, and historical and psychological evidences about the nature of religion and its effects on believers, which offered rational explanations of even justifications of what has already been accepted on faith. It was some time before I remerged from the bookshop, blinking, into the sunlight that seemed to sting my eyes and cause them to become crimsoned. However, it was incomprehensible and contrary to reason for the rest of the day I traipsed from one end of the Castle’s bookshop to the other, ducking into every single room in the place that was filled with books, and not leaving without buying at least one thing. I became quite adept at saying, in an offhand sort of way, “Send the in my hotel” and was flabbergasted at the stack of parcels awaiting me at the hotel that evening. I puzzled over what to get for you, my dear, as I know that you have only limited amount of room in your kit bag. All a person really needs to get them through the vagaries of life are the Bible and William Shakespeare (both of them). Sometimes I forget that it modern times, we also require music to get by. #RandolphHarris 2 of 9
Music is a natural magic, as distinct from the demonic magic that all Christians must renounce. Music uses air in its physical medium, and it resembles spirits. Music bridges a gateway with the soul, as the strings of lyre are made to resonate with the cosmic tones of the planets, stars, and the heart and communicate with these higher powers through this magical realm where words are but pictures of our thoughts. You get a lovely sense of the artist’s superstitions and almost primitive lifestyle. In some cases, when magicians cause strange effect by calling on the assistance of non-human person, the magic is demonic; in others, when strange effects come from manipulating physical objects rather than conversing with persons, the magic is natural or spiritual. The musician who plays his or her lyre to a higher Heavenly power without singing could not be accused of invoking a demon. Invocation is inverted prayer; both require the sending of verbal messages between persons. We are regular savages, but do not always eat our own young. I love to listen to music while taking a long, luxurious bath; a bath where I do not have to draw and heat the water myself. Just to sink back in the steamy water and rose oil is Heaven itself. #RandolphHarris 3 of 9
When taking a bath, I like to listen to Aaliyah, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Dj Testio, Paul Oakenfold, J.R. Castro, Tory Lanez, Giovannit Pico, Diacetto, and other figures and imagine I am in my dream mansion filled with light. However, some scholars seem to believe that this sort of meditation leaves physical channels open for not only imagination, but spirits and occult qualities that have magical effects and it replaces the stars with the God who created them. The stars project astral instruments in a way that allows their voice and music to grasp the whole World. An instrument of this sort is the spirit, which by the physician is defined as a certain vapour of the blood, pure, subtle, hot and lucid. And, formed from the subtler blood by the heat of the heart, it files to the brain, and there the soul assiduously employs it for the exercise of both the interior and exterior senses. Thus, the blood serves the spirit, the spirit the senses, and finally the senses reason. In this sense a corporeal vapour, centered in the brain also flows through the nervous system, and it is the first instrument of the incorporeal soul, an instrument for sense-perception, imagination and motor-activity—the link between body and soul. #RandolphHarris 4 of 9
The Christian Religion not only was the first attended with miracles, but even to this day cannot be believed by any reasonable person without them. Mere reason is not sufficient to convince us of its veracity; and whoever is moved by Faith to assent to it, is conscious of a continued miracle in one’s own person, which subverts all the principals of one’s understanding, and gives one determination to believe what is most contrary to custom and experience. The spirit of the studios is especially likely to need care, because their constant use of it in thinking and imagining consumes it. It has to be replaces from the subtler part of the blood and this renders the remaining blood dense, dry, and dark. In consequences, such person are always of a melancholy temperament. The spirits which derive from a melancholy humour (dark blood) are exceptionally fine, hot, agile, and combustible like the Sun that warms Earth. They are, therefore, liable to ignite and produce a temporary state of mania or exaltation, followed by extreme depression and lethargy, caused by the dark matter left after being invoked. However, if properly tempered with a lot of life-force, then the spirits will glow and not burn, and make it possible continuous study of the highest order. #RandolphHarris 5 of 9
Christianity makes claims that are worthy of belief, and is only by total commitment, or the leap into faith that it can be accepted. I believe it because I want to believe it and have seen miracles in my life. The refusal to accept that 2+2 = 4 and the ability to believe that 2+2 = 5 are intimately connected with attaining religious truth. If you believe and draw near God, it will also draw near you and you will see that 2.35+ 2.65 makes 2+2 = 5. It all depend on how you look at the equation. This is just an example of the suprarational or extrarational ways, such as mystical or revelatory experiences that provide the knowledge of fundamental truths. One can train oneself to escape the confines of rationality in order to intensify religious experience and belief. This is a form of genuine thought commonly found in late antiquity and during the Renaissance. Back in those time people had time to become contemplative genius, and they saw the importance for scholars of attracting the influence of the planets like the Sun, Jupiter, Saturn, Jupiter, Mercury and others. Saturn’s rings actually give off a sound that has been picked up by NASA and is described as Melancholy. #RandolphHarris 6 of 7
To preserve the health of the spirit and to avoid the perils of being sad or depressed, one must nourish and purify the spirit with fresh water, aromatic foods, clean and pure scents, crisp air, light, and music. These are sometimes made to correspond to the division of the spirits into natural, vital, and primitive. If the vapours exhaled by merely vegetable life are greatly beneficial to your life, how beneficial do you think will be aerial songs to the spirit which is indeed entirely aerial, harmonic songs to the harmonic spirit, warm and thus living to the living, endowed with the sense to the sensitive, conceived by reason to the rational. That is to say, the peculiar power of music is due to a similarity between the material medium in which it is transmitted, air, and the human spirit, to the fact that both are living with kinds of air, moving in an highly organized way, and that both, through the text of the son, can carry an intellectual content. Not surprising; for, since song and sound arise from the cogitation of the mind, the impetuous of the phantasy, and the feeling of the heart, and, together with the air they have broken up and tempered, strikes the aerial spirit of the hearer, which is the junction of the soul and body, they easily move the phantasy, affect the heart and penetrate into deep recesses of the mind. #RandolphHarris 7 of 9
It is not in fact surprising that a song, being the product of mind, imagination, and feeling, should, if transmitted, react on these faculties, just as a picture book might. I have been busy, running from one end of Paris to the other, it seems, securing the necessary paperwork, buying my uniform and the last bits of equipment, taking my driving exam. Did I tell you that, when I was on the boat trip across the Atlantic, I had the childish urge to go to Paris first and then to London, so that I could greet you all kitted out in my uniform? I think I look quite well turned out. All dressed up, but nowhere to go! I have been enjoying what bit of time we have. Our uniforms (and some say our hair) gets us all sorts of boons—half-priced theater tickets, discounted meals. It has been fun, but it does not seem like the “Gay Paree” I remember. Many of the theaters and music halls are shut or operate on shorted hours. Cafés are closed early, lights are dimmed on the street at night. Once one has realized the human predicament—human’s fundamental requirement for ultimate truths and one’s inability to find them—then one is ready to hear God and to accept his revealed Word on faith alone. #RandolphHarris 8 of 9
Once one has faith, one can see the force for the truth of the Christian religion. How often we look upon God as our last and feeblest resource! We go to God because we have nowhere else to go. Ans then we learn that the storms of life have driven us, not upon the rocks, but into the desire Heaven. Father in Heaven, You see the challenges in my life and where the odds are attacked high against me. There are giants in front of me, but I am not worried about them. I acknowledge that the battle will not be won by my own strength or by my own power. I will accomplish this because You hold my future in Your hands. You will go before me, fighting my battles and making the crooked places straight. I believe that You will have the final say, and You have promised You will cross over ahead of me and defeat my challenges for me. One on God’s side is a majority. Such evidence might then constitute good reasons for believing what one has already accepted fideistically, which means that truth in religion is ultimately based on faith rather than on reasoning and evidence because miracles are supernatural events and sometimes cannot be explained by science. #RandolphHarris 9 of 9
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The Illuminationist and Interrupted Glimmerings of the Light of Truth
Christmas is coming up soon and it is one of my favourite holidays. I make a marvelous Christmas pudding! It is similar to the fruitcake my mother insists on making for us each Christmas. The woman does not set foot into the kitchen all year, unless it is to make a last-minute change to the menu. However, every year, as the Christmas season approaches, she dons a lace-edged apron about as effective as a paper cake doily and waves all the staff out of the kitchen. Mother emerges hours later, hair floured, a smear of molasses on her cheek, and a shine in her eyes that could only be brought about by “sampling” the brandy, but victoriously bearing a fruitcake. It generally has the appearance, textures, and taste of a caramel sundae, and we all eat a hearty slice on Christmas Eve. The joy we had last year. Ava was eating my delightful Christmas pudding. Both Deacon and Tennessee insisted on examining the box I had sent, to make sure I was not holding out on the. Even father begged for more. When my mother asked, with the air of jealous mistress, how this pudding compared to her fruitcake, we were quick to reassure her, “Oh, the Christmas pudding is good, but it is very…you know…British.” We left her to interpret just what that meant. Some prophets receive this symbolic knowledge directly from the celestial souls. Such reception involves the prophet’s imaginative facility. #RandolphHarris 1 of 5
The holiday was peaceful. I regret to say that last year Santa Claus did not leave a kettle for me, but I did get a splendid new tennis racket. I could not hardly wait until the snow thawed to try it out. Ava stitched a beautiful bookmark that reads, “A book is like a garden carried in the pocket.” And my father presented me with a watch, a gold number with a thick chain. He told me it was his father’s watch and his father’s before him. “Now that you are a man, Ryan,” says he, “and have some direction in your life, you will need something to help guide you. You know where to go, but now you will know when to when to go.” I have a sharp mind that can be wielded like any sharp weapon. The human soul and the rational knowledge it acquires are emanations from the Active Intelligence, which is an entity existing independently of humans, coming from the Divine Source known as God. As such, the body receives the soul and the soul receives rational knowledge. Certain combinations of formed matter induce the reception of Active Intelligence of the vegetative soul. The soul is immortal. If one was to come into being fully mature and rational but suspended in space so that he or she was totally unaware of his or her physical circumstances, one would still be certain of a single thing—his or her existence as an individual self. #RandolphHarris 2 of 5
In a higher form of prophecy that is intellectual, the prophets from the celestial intellects not only the first intelligibles, without the need of the soul’s preparatory activities, but also the demonstrative knowledge involving the internal and external senses—sensation, memory, imagination, estimation, and cogitation, or imaged thinking. Prophetic reception of knowledge thus differs from the philosophical in manner. It also differs in quantity. The prophet receives all or most of the intelligibles from the Active Intelligence all at once. This intellectual revelation is then translated into the language of imagery and divulged to the public. It includes the basic commands of the revealed law, without which man or woman as a political animal cannot survive. Hence, divine goodness must reveal the law at certain moments of discussion through the prophets. Prophecy is thus necessary in the sense that it is required for the survival of civilized society and in the sense that it is necessitated by the divine nature. This is all part of the mystic’s spiritual journey to God: Beginning with faith and motivated by desire and love, the mystic undertakes spiritual exercises that first being him or her to interrupted glimmerings of the light of Truth. These experiences become progressively more frequent and durable until the stage of arrival is reached, in which the mystic has a direct and an uninterrupted vision of God. If you heed the voice of God, all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you. #RandolphHarris 3 of 5
God’s gifts put human’s best dreams to shame. We have forgotten the gracious hands which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessing were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. It is interesting that people take credit for all of the good things in life, but what they do something ungodly, they refuse to take responsibility. This is known as the causality of freedom. Human freedom is categorical or such that their actions are not entirely determined by factors which they have no control. Causation is constant conjunction; humans, when acting voluntarily, always act in accordance with their strongest desires and aversions; justice, morality, and the administration of the laws all require such casual determination of behavior, and so on. However, it seems some people are only helpless products of an impersonal nature who govern neither themselves nor anything else but are simply carried along to whatever destinies the circumstances of their lives inflict upon them. #RandolphHarris 4 of 5
The unconscious is the master of every fate and the captain of every soul. Typical cases are quite well understood by psychiatrists—the man who uses someone and puts his life in danger so he can get TV show and keep paying his bills, while he gets free publicity by emotional manipulating a kind soul. The compulsive gambler who always plays until he loses, the man who inwardly loves filth and so washes his hands constantly, the mother who lets her child perish of illness on the train because she “must get to her destination,” and so in. We can, if we are honest and sophisticated, see our own lives and conduct partially mirrored and perhaps begin to have some inkling of the unconscious, deeply hidden but powerful forces which almost entirely determine what we are and what we do. Father in Heaven, I know you are the God of Acceleration, and if you transformed water into wine in a split second for the wedding party centuries ago, I know you can accelerate things in my life. Thank you for taking me further faster. I know you will thrust me years ahead. I want to thank you thank you that I will accomplish my dreams sooner than I think. God is about to release everything that belongs to you. It will happen sooner than you think. It will be bigger than you imagined. He will bring out gifts and talents you did not even know you had. He will open up new doors of opportunity. God loves to do exceedingly, abundantly, above and beyond. #RandolphHarris 5 of 5
The Tragic Sense of Life in Humans and in Peoples on Eternity of the World Part V
So today the stage is set once again for a diplomatic drama. We have been long expecting that you would tell us something about the family life of your citizens—how they will bring children into the World, and rear them when they have arrived, and, in general, what is the nature of this community of women and children-for we are of opinion that the right or wrong management of such matters will have a great and paramount influence on the State for good or evil. There is something wrong with everyone on this planet, none of us are perfect, we are all hear to learn. Some manage their imperfections better than others. Many choose to enjoy their deviance and try to make life hard on others, as mischievous behavior is fun for them. Some old wounds never truly heal, and bleed again at the slightest word. Keep your best wishes close to your heart and watch what happens. It is always a mystery what people see in each other. There are people from whom we secretly shrink, whom we would personally avoid, though reason confesses that they are good people: there are others with faults of temper, et cetera (and other things), evident enough, beside whom we live content, as if the air about them did us good. A critic has raised he questions: What is God like if he is not a grand consciousness tied to a grand body, if he is so completely nonphysical as to make any results of telescopic exploration antecedently irrelevant? If the telescope is the wrong instrument, what is the right instrument? More specifically, what does it mean to speak of a pure spirit, a disembodied mind, as infinitely (or finitely) powerful, wise, good, just and all the rest? We can understand these words when they are applied to human beings who have bodies and whose behavior is publicly observable; we could undoubtedly understand these words when they are applied to a pure spirit? So they mean anything at all? In recent years, it has come to be widely questioned whether it makes any sense to talk about a disembodied spirit. This view, it should be pointed out, is not identical with reductive materialism. (Reductive materialism the view that only the material World is truly real, and that all processes and realities observed in the Universe can be explained by reducing them down to their most basic scientific components, exempli gratia, atoms, molecules, and everything else thought to make up what we know as matter.)
Reductive materialism does not, or at least does not necessarily, imply that the person is just his body, that there are no private experiences, or that feelings are simply ways of behaving. It makes the milder claim that however much more than a body a human being may be, one cannot sensibly talk about this “more” without presupposing (as part of what one means, and not as a mere contingent fact) that he is a living organism. Anybody who has studied and felt the force of this thesis is not likely to dismiss as facetious or as “trite positivism” the question as to what words like “wise,” “just” and “powerful” can mean when they are applied to an entity that is supposedly devoid of a body. What would it be like, for example, just, without a body? To be just, a person has to act justly—he has to behave in certain ways. However, is it possible to perform these acts, to behave in the required ways, without a body? Similar remarks apply to the other divine attributes. It is a work whose substance and whose leading idea is simple and even ancient: that man created the Gods and that the Gods embody man’s own conception of his own humanity, his own wishes, fears, needs, and ideals. Xenophanes, Euhemeries, Lucretius, among others, had already grasped this idea clearly, in their own context, in ancient times. One nature which is the highest of existing things and which confers upon effects in all other beings, through its unlimited goodness, they very fact of their existence is good. Since Goodness is supremely good, it must exist through itself; but what exists through itself is Existence. Therefore, Existence and Goodness are one. This Supreme Being must be living, wise, powerful, true, just, blessed, and eternal, since, as the Supreme Good, it must be whatever it is absolutely better to be than not to be. The Divine Nature, however, does not have these characteristics, for that would imply that it has them through something other than, and therefore higher than, itself. The Divine Nature is these characteristics. It is the same thing to say of God that He exists and that he is Existence, to say that of him he is good and that he is Goodness. A comfortable deism, compatible with the new spirit of mechanism in science, had banished God to the interstices between Worlds, and required His services only to provide the hypothetical first push for the World machines.
The trouble with the essence of Christianity is not that it does not hold one’s attention or that its revelations seem old hat (not new or modern anymore). Warmth and tenderness of heart, with an affectionate, open manner, will beat all the clearness of head in the World, for attraction. The divine philosophy becomes the basis for a critique of metaphysics. One may term this the semantic challenge to anthropomorphic theology, as distinct, for example, from arguments like the one from eternity of matter, which assume the meaningfulness of the position attacked. Some anthropomorphic deities represent specific human concepts, such as love, war, fertility, beauty, or the seasons. Anthropomorphic deities exhibited human qualities such as beauty, wisdom, and power, and sometimes human weaknesses such as greed, hatred, jealousy, and uncontrollable anger. A proponent of this challenge does not flatly maintain that anthropomorphic theology is unintelligible. The predicates in question lose their meaning when applied to a supposedly disembodied entity—would be accompanied by the observations that in fact most anthropomorphic believers do, in an important sense of the word believe in a god with a body, whatever they may say or agree to in certain theoretical moments. If we judge the content of their belief not by what they say during these theoretical moments but by the images in terms of which their thinking is conducted, then it seems clear that in this sense or to this extent they believe in a god with a body. It is true that the images of most Western adults are not those of a big king on his Heavenly throne, but it nevertheless seems to be the case that, when they think about God unself-consciously (and this is, incidentally, true of most unbelievers also), they vaguely think of him as possessing some kind of rather large body. The moment they assert or deny or question such statements as “God created the Universe” or “God will be a just judge when we come before him,” they introduce a body into the background, if not into the foreground, or their mental pictures.
The difference between children and adults, according to this account, is that children have more vivid and definite images than adults. Maybe their God possess the Amulet of Zohar which transfers a ghost into a new body? And perhaps, then, it is also true that there is a golden ritual dagger that allows one to summon a demon? This entire point may perhaps be brought out clearly by comparing it with a similar semantic criticism of belief in human survival after death. The semantic critic would maintain that while a believer in reincarnation or the resurrection of the body may be immune from this objection, those who claim that human beings will continue to exist as disembodies minds are really using words without meaning. They do not see this because of the mental pictures accompanying or (partly) constituting their thoughts on the subject. For some, it is no different than saying there is a 16-millimeter movie print that releases a character for the duration of a film, and absorbing live people to take their place and become unwilling players, in the deadly action, of his cursed film reel. Or, alternatively, they do not see this because, in spite of what they say in certain theoretical contexts, in practice they believe in the survival of the familiar embodied minds whom they know in this life. When they wonder whether their friends, enemies, certain historical personages, or, for that matter, anybody did or will of on existing after death, they think of them automatically in their familiar bodily guises or in some ghostly disguises, but still as bodily beings of some kind. Perhaps these individuals have the mirror that belonged to Louis XIV, which acts are a portal between Earth and the Realms of Darkness, which allows people to return to the living World?
If these images are eliminated on the ground that they are irrelevant or inappropriate because the subject of survival is a disembodied mine, it is not clear that an intelligible statement remains. What is stopping someone from using the silver Thule Amulet, which allows a Nazi criminal to resurrect a dead warrior and communicate telepathically with him. Or how about we use Adolf Hilter’s pink silk boutonniere that brings a ventriloquist’s dummy to life and compels it to become the grim reaper. What, for example, do words like “love” and “hate” or “happiness” and “misery” mean when they are predicated of a disembodied mind? One may incorporate what is of value in their discussion into the following challenge to anthropomorphic theology: Insofar as the believers believe in a god with a body, what he says is intelligible; but in that case the available evidence indicates that there is no such body. If or insofar as God is cleared to be a purely spiritual entity, the predicates applied to God have lost their meaning, and, hence, we no longer have an intelligible assertion. It is no different than saying the Coin of Ziocles kills one person and then brings a dead person back to life, and the victim is branded with the mark of the beast to summon Satan himself, and to rule the Word in His name. Therefore, it seems to some that metaphysical theology is incoherent or unintelligible, and an atheist believe they have grounds for rejecting belief in God because he sounds more like the leader of a Satanic cult, and can at times be cunning and ruthless, killing during his reign, but then able to restore people to life by cunning trickery. What next? Where do the myths stop? Is there also a pocket watch that stops time for an hour at 1 am (the 13th hour), allowing the user to plunder the motionless World? Is this how God is able to be a purely spiritual being? Furthermore, the existence of a finite anthropomorphic God to be an intelligible hypothesis, should be rejected because it is not needed to account for any phenomena and, further, because it is too vague to be of any explanatory value. As thoughts are frozen and utterance benumbed unless the speaker stand in some true relation with his audience, it may be pardonable to imagine that a friend, a kind and apprehensive, though not the closet friend, is listening to our talk; and then, a native reserve being thawed by this genial consciousness, we may prate of the circumstances that lie around us, and even of ourselves, but still keep the inmost Me behind its veil.
The Winchester Mystery House
Ghostly tales of The Winchester Mystery House will change the way you see this haunted mansion forever, and have you sleeping with the lights on. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
Randolph Harris II International Institute 