Randolph Harris II International Institute

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O Golden Tongued Romance, with Serene Lute! Leave Melodizing on this Wintry Day!

Everybody else is talking about how hard life is, and here I am singing about how good it is to be alive. You can destroy your now by worrying about tomorrow. If the Universe were obviously based on mere chance, if it were in a state of complete disorder, if the Moon, the Sun, and the Earth wandered about at their individual will, and if no sign of organization appeared anywhere in it, then we might justly assert that there was no Mind behind it. However, because we see the very contrary of these things all around us, because the energy out of which the Universe is made is everywhere inseparable from thought, we can definitely assert that a World-Mind must exist. Events may seem to happen at random, but it is not really so. They are connected with our own thinking and doing, with the pattern of the World-Idea and with the activity of the World-Mind. Whatever we call it, most people feel it in their heart and soul—whether vaguely or strongly—that there must be a God and that there must be something which God has in view in letting the Universe come into existence. This purposed is called the World-Idea, because God is the World’s Mind. This is a thrilling conception. It is an ancient revelation. #RandolphHarris 1 of 26

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This ancient revelation came to the first cultures, the first civilizations, of any importance, as it has come to all others which have appeared, and it is still coming today to our own. With this knowledge, deeply absorbed and properly applied, humans come into harmonious alignment with their Source. If it ignores the facts, truths, laws, and principles of cosmogony, all spiritual study is incomplete. To attempt to justify this neglect with the accusation that they belong to the World of illusion is an unenlightened disposition. For the accuser must still continue to live in an illusory body and use an illusory self governed by those laws. After every such attempt and for each violation of those laws—upon which the order and harmony of the Universe depend—which one’s neglect brings about, one must pay the penalty in suffering.  “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves, teachers to suit their own passions, and they will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths,” 2 Timothy 4.3-4. Everything around us and every event that happens to us is an expression of God’s will. #RandolphHarris 2 of 26

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The forces in the Universe and the figures on the Universal scene are all connected with each other and are all related with the World-Mind. Nothing stands alone except in its illusory belief. In living things, to live is to be. Our intellect, which takes cognizance of the essence of a thing as its proper object, gains knowledge from sense, of which the proper objects are external accidents. Hence from external appearances we come to the knowledge of the essence of things. And because we name a thing in accordance with our knowledge of it, as it is clear from what has already been said, so from external properties names are often imposed to signify essences. Hence such names are sometime taken strictly to denote the essence itself, the signification of which is their principal object; but sometimes, and less strictly, to denote the properties by reason of which they are imposed. And so we see that the word “body” is used to denote a genus of substances from the fact of their possessing three dimensions: and is sometimes taken to denote the dimensions themselves; in which sense body is said to be a species of quantity. The same must be said of life. #RandolphHarris 3 of 26

The name is given from a certain external appearance, namely, self-movement, yet not precisely to signify this, but rather a substance to which self-movement and the application of itself to any kind of operation, belong naturally. To live, accordingly, is nothing else than to exist in this or that nature; and life signifies this, though in the abstract, just as the word “running” denotes “to run” is the abstract. Hence “living” is not an accidental but an essential predicate. Sometimes, however, life is used less properly for the operations from which its name is taken, and thus the Philosopher says (Ethic. ix, 9) that to lice is principally to sense or to understand. The Philosopher here takes “to live” to means an operation of life. Or it would be better to say that sensation and intelligence and the like, are sometimes taken for the operations, sometimes for the existence itself of the operator. For one says (Ethic. ix, 9) that to live is to sense or to understand—in other words, to have a nature capable of sensation or understanding. Thus, then, one distinguishes life by the four operations mentioned. For in this lower World there are four kinds of living. #RandolphHarris 4 of 26

 It is the nature of some to be capable of nothing more than taking nourishment, and, as a consequence, of growing and generating. Others are able, in addition, to sense, as we see in the case of shellfish and other animals without movement. Others have the further power of moving from place to place, as perfect animals, such as quadrupeds, and birds, and so on. Others, as humans, have the still higher faculty of understanding. By vital operations are meant those whose principles are within the operator, and in virtue of which the operator produces such operations of itself. It happens that there exist in humans not merely such natural principles of certain operations as are their natural powers, but something over and above these, such as habits inclining them like a second nature to particular kinds of work in which a human takes delight, so that one is bent is towards it, one’s time is spent in it, and one’s whole life ordered with a view to it, is said to be the life of that human. Hence some are said to lead to life of self-indulgence, others a life of virtue. In this way the contemplative life is distinguished from the active, and thus to know God is said to be life eternal. #RandolphHarris 5 of 26

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If God expresses His will through, and in, the Universe then why are the horrors we find there unbeatable by any of the tortures perpetrated by humans? The wanton malignancy of certain parasites, ants, worms; the poisonous bites and stings of certain insects and reptiles; the dreadful fish like piranhas which strip unfortunate wretches to a skeleton in a few minutes; the infectious germs in jungle and city alike; the intimidating hordes of vermin which threaten to multiply and destroy other forms—are they all God’s goodness? Even believers may sometimes ask themselves the question: “Is God blind and unseeing to human suffering—so small an item in the vastness of His Universe—or callous and indifferent to it?” Those who see no sign of God in the Universe, and leave it at that, are at least in a better position than those who think they can detect an underlying hostility in the Universe. The absurdity of life and the insanity of humans cast doubt upon the sanity of their Source. However, this is a surface point of view. The order which has been established throughout the cosmos is a perfect one. #RandolphHarris 6 of 26

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If the human mind fails to see this fact, it is partly because human feelings, prejudices, aversions, and attractions sway it and partly because the World-Idea unveils itself only to those who are ready. The Universe is perfect because God is perfect. However, for each human to find and see this perfection for oneself otherwise the trouble and tragedy in life may obstruct one’s vision and obscure one’s path. If the Mind behind the Universe is perfect, then the pattern of the Universe itself must be perfect too. And if we muster up the heroism needed to cast out our feeble, sentimental and emotional way of looking at things, if we put aside for a few minutes our personal and human demands that the Universe shall conform to our wishes, so it will show itself to be perfect. The more intellectual they are, the more they feel that God has somehow blundered, that they could have made a better or kindlier job of the Universe than one has, and that too much unnecessary suffering falls upon his creatures. The self-actualized, however, with one’s deeper insight and one’s serener mentality, finds the contrary to be the cause and is set free from such bitter thoughts. It is preposterous presumption to look in the divine Intelligence for what can only be found in the limited and little human one. #RandolphHarris 7 of 26

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 Humans judge the World without knowing the World-Idea, certainly without conscious contact with the World-Mind. The moment we establish a right relation with the Mind behind the Universe, in that moment we begin to see as ultimately good certain experiences which we formerly thought to be evil, and we begin to see as dreamlike many sufferings which we formerly saw as real. The answer to this enigma but simple religious trust for the shallow multitude and movement to another level by mystical experience for the serious seekers. In the first case there is the hope that in a God-governed World all is arranged for the best, while in the second there is the overwhelming feeling that it is so. The philosopher is also a possessed of hope and feeling but, venturing int a wider area, adds knowledge. We see the underside of the pattern only—and merely a par of it at that—and inevitably judge Nature to be cruel, “red in tooth and claw.” If we could see the upper side and the whole of it, the pattern would show itself perfect. From this ultimate point of view there are no sins, only ignorance; there are no clumsy falls, only steps forward to heart’s wiser levels; there are no misfortunes, only lessons in the art of disentanglement. #RandolphHarris 8 of 26

Pain and suffering belong only to this physical World and its shadow-spheres. There is a higher World, where joy and happiness alone are human’s experience. The structure and working of the Universe may not be stamped with “goodness” as we understand it, nor with “perfection” as we envisage it. Consider them from all aspects, however, in a philosophical manner and you will find the essentially “right.” Because there is a Divine Mind back of the Universe, there are Divine Wisdom and Goodness in the Universe. The Universe of our experience is governed by justice and wisdom, by ultimate goodness and infinite power. The Universe has infinitely more intelligence behind it than the humans who live in it. This remains true even though there is much that seems unnecessarily brutal and unacceptable to compassionate believers in a divine order. Let evil appearances be what they are, the revelation of insight contradicts them and shows the divine presence throughout the whole Universe and behind all happenings. Even the violent, sudden, and unwanted deceased of such a multitude of persons in war, pestilence, famine, epidemic, pandemic, or eruption has beneficial meaning in the divine World-Idea and is not at all vain or useless. #RandolphHarris 9 of 26

The truth about cosmic laws is sometimes terrifying to our human fears, sometimes repulsive to our human feeling. It may fitly be called ugly at such times. However, the infinite power behind those laws is always beautiful. In spite of contrary appearances this is still God’s World. We live in an orderly World but not in a humane one. We must find faith and some of us even the certitude that if it has been possible to think a better cosmos into being, the World-Mind’s infinite wisdom would have done so. We cannot believe in God without accepting God’s Universe also. We must accept and submit to the World-Idea with its ascending hierarchy of creatures and pre-established order of things. If we do not know why we are here, the Universal Mind does. We may and must trust it. The Supreme Essence nurtures all things with care and love. There is an infinite number of possibilities in the evolution of humans and the Universe. If only certain ones out of them are actually realized, this is because both follow a pattern—the World Idea. All the activity of this entire Universe is God’s activity. Everything is being carried on according to the pattern and the rhythm set by the divine World-Idea. #RandolphHarris 10 of 26

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All the forms and developments, the creatures and objects which make the never-ending picture of the cosmos derived from the World-Idea; everything conforms to it. But often the parts or members that “are upon the Earth” are also very nice. This is generally true among religious people, and it is a deadly trap. When Paul explained to the Philippians what “flesh” he could have confidence in he lists: “Circumcised the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness which is in the Law, found blameless,” reports Philippians 3.5-6. One can easily translate this into modern-day terms by listing the things religious people are apt to present as “good qualifications.” However, Paul actually regarded all this “nice flesh” as loss, and even as feces, compared to the real treasure of the resurrection life of Christ moving in him. “For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship by the spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh—though I myself have reasons for such confidence. #RandolphHarris 11 of 26

“If anyone else thinks one has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless. However, whatever was to my profit I now consider loss of the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead,” reports Philippians 3.3-11. That is why he said to the Colossians: “Therefore kill off your parts (members) that are of the Earth.” The “therefore” refers back to the fact he had just cited in this passage, that Christ’s people have received a different life, one not “of Earth” but of Christ himself, raised up beyond natural death. “You have died,” he said, “and your real life is now concealed along with Christ in God,” reports Colossians 3.1-3. #RandolphHarris 12 of 26

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This, as is well known, is a theme developed at many other points in Paul’s writings, but at greatest lengths in Romans chapter 5 through 8. There Paul had been describing how sin (and therefore death) has reigned over (governed) human life. However, now as he comes toward the end of chapter 5, a new kind of “reign” emerges. Death had reigned because of sin, which came into the human World by one man and one woman (Adam and Eve). Yes, but “much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign [govern] in life through the One, Jesus Christ,” reports Romans 5.17. Sin indeed has flourished. However, grace (life from above) has and will flourish all the more, “that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness into eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord,” reports Romans 5.21. Now we must emphasize that the grace in question is not merely a judicial action, though it involves that too. It is above all a presence and power in life, which provides an alternative to the merely natural forces (flesh) accessible to the individual in and through the body without any specific divine intervention from above. #RandolphHarris 13 of 26

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So now Paul lays out the alternative open to the one already born from above and therefore experiencing a life that is not of the flesh. Such a one is given the option of walking in the new, different life that is already “doing things,” in them. “Just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father,” Paul said, “so we too might walk in newness of life,” reports Romans 6.4. Walk in it, as a steadily moving force, not just feel it in spurts and starts! However, because we are now in the grip of grace it is up to us—though never on our own—to “not let sin have dominion in our death-bound (mortal) body to obey Sin’s desires,” reports Romans 6.12. And this we do by refusing to surrender our body parts to sin as weapons of wickedness. Instead, having been invaded by a life beyond death, and hence by one that is not of the body or flesh, we “present our body parts (members) to Christ as weapons of righteousness,” reports Romans 6.13. Because we are in the grip of grace, sin does not exercise control over us except insofar as we allow it. And, with divine assistance provided, we can break whatever strict control remains to it in every aspect of our life,” reports Romans 6.14. #RandolphHarris 14 of 26

So, just as once—while “dead in…trespass and sins,” reports Ephesians 2.1—we surrendered our body parts to be servants of impurity, and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now we are to “present our body parts to be servants of righteousness leading to sanctification,” reports Romans 6.19. Now, these words of Paul refer precisely to the process and outcome of spiritual formation, of which we have spoken. “Now that you have been released from slavery to sin and enslaved to God by your dependence on him for your new kind of life, the benefit you get is sanctification, and the outcome is eternal life,” Romans 6.22, “the life that really is life,” reports 1 Timothy 6.19. The parts of our death-bound body are not mere physical things, but now carry in them a life that is not of them. He who raised Jesus from the dead now dwells in us and “will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you,” reports Romans 8.11. After the forty years of wandering, it came about on the plains of Moab that, according to Numbers 26.65, “not one of them was left except Caleb son of Jephunneth and Joshua son of Nun.” #RandolphHarris 15 of 26

 It was time for Joshua’s commissioning: “So the Lord said to Moses, ‘Take Joshua the son of Nun, a man in whom is the Spirit, and lay your hand on him; and have him stand before Eleazar the priest and before all the congregation; and commission him in their sight,” reports Numbers 27.18-19. Notice that the Spirit, capital S—that is, the Holy Spirit—was upon and in Joshua. He had the indispensable qualification for all spiritual leadership. Spiritual leadership is not a matter of superior spiritual power, and it can never be self-generated. There is no such thing as a self-made spiritual leader. The New Testament agrees: “Brothers, choose seven people from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.” They chose Stephan, a mand full of faith and of the Holy Spirit (Acts 6.3,5). There is no spiritual leadership apart from the fullness of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, it follows that is we aspire to leadership in the Church, we must be full of the Holy Spirit. #RandolphHarris 16 of 26

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Practically, this means that we must continually confess our sins, keep ourselves in God’s Word, and continually submit to God, asking the Spirit to fill us. The telltale sign of this will be that we effervesce Christ. “Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. Do not get inebriated on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit. Speak to one another with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ,” reports Ephesians 5.17-21. As we walk and serve in the Spirit, the Spirit will ordain us to specific tasks in the Church, and these will be tasks of leadership at all levels, be it waiting tables or heralding the gospel. “The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused t love the truth and so be saved,” report 2 Thessalonians 2.9-10. “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ,” reports Romans 10.17. #RandolphHarris 17 of 26

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Each individual is a Spirit child of Heavenly Father and existed as a spirit before this life on Earth. During this life, the spirit of the individual is housed in a physical body, which was born of mortal parents. The scriptures teach that at the time of physical death, the Spirit does not die. It separates from the body and lives in the postmortal Spirit World. At the time of resurrection, the spirit is reunited with the body, “never to be divided; thus the whole becoming spiritual and immortal,” reports Alma 11.45. The Scriptures also teach about the nature of spirits. Through the Prophet Joseph Smith, the Lord revealed that “all spirit is matter, but it is more fine or pure, and can only be discerned by purer eyes,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 131.7. The Lord also revealed that “the spirit of Humans is in the likeness of one’s person, as also the spirit of the beast, and every other creature which God has created,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 77.2. Just as the World-Idea is both the expression of the World-Mind and one with it, so the Word (Logos) mentioned in the New Testament as being with God is another way of saying the same thing. #RandolphHarris 18 of 26

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The World with its form and history is the embodiment of the Word and the Word is the World-Idea. “Behold I, Moroni, do finish the record of my father, Mormon. Behold, I have but few things to write, which things I have been commanded by my father. And now it came to pass that after the great and tremendous battle at Cumorah, behold, the Nephites who had escaped into the country southward were hunted by the Lamanites, until they were all destroyed. And my father also was killed by them, and I even remain alone to write the sad tale of the destruction of my people. However, behold, they are gone, and I fulfill the commandment of my father. And whether they will slay me, I know not. Therefore I will write and hide up the records in the Earth; and whither I go it mattereth not. Behold, my father hath made this record, and he hath written the intent thereof. And behold, if I had room, I would write it also upon the plates, but I have not; and ore I have none, for I am alone. My father hath been slain in battle and all my kinsfolk, and I have not friend nor wither to go; and how long the Lord will suffer that I may live I know not. #RandolphHarris 19 of 26

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“Behold, four hundred years have passed away since the coming of our Lord. And behold, the Lamanites have hunted my people, the Nephites, down from city to city and from place to place, even until they are no more; and great has been their fall; yea, great and marvelous is the destruction of my people, the Nephites. And behold, it is the hand of the Lord which hath done it. And behold also, the Lamanites are at war one with another; and the whole face of this land is one continual round of murder and bloodshed; and no one knoweth the end of the war. And now, behold, I say no more concerning them, for there are none save it be the Lamanites and robbers that do exist upon the face of the land. And there are none that do know the true God save it be the disciples of Jesus, who did tarry in the land until the wickedness of the people was so great that the Lord would not suffer them to remain with the people; and whether they be upon the face of the land no human knoweth. However, behold, my father and I have seen them, and they have ministered unto us. And whoso receiveth this record, and shall not condemn it because of the imperfections which are in it, the same shall know of greater things than these. #RandolphHarris 20 of 26

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“Behold, I am Moroni; and were it possible, I would make all things known unto you. Behold, I make an end of speaking concerning this people. I am the son of Mormon, and my father was a descendent of Nephi. And I am the same who hideth up this record unto the Lord; the plates thereof are of no worth, because of the commandment of the Lord. For he truly saith that no one shall have them to get gain; but the record thereof is of great worth; and whoso shall bring it to light, one will the Lord bless. For none can have power to bring it to light save it be given one of God; for God wills that it shall be done with an eye single to his glory, or the welfare of the ancient and long dispersed covenant people of the Lord. And blessed be one that shall bring this thing to light; for it shall be brought out of darkness unto light, according to the word of God; yea, it shall be brought out of the Earth, and it shall shine forth out of darkness, and come unto the knowledge of the people; and it shall be done by the power of God. And if there be faults they be the faults of a human. However, behold, we know no fault; nevertheless God knoweth all things; therefore, one that condemneth, let one be aware lest one shall be in danger of hell fire. #RandolphHarris 21 of 26

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“And one that saith: Show unto me, or ye shall be smitten—let one beware lest one commandeth that which is forbidden of the Lord. For behold, the same that judgeth rashly shall be judged rashly again; for according to one’s works shall one’s wages be; therefore, one that smiteth shall be smitten again of the Lord. Behold what the scripture says—humans shall not smite, neither shall one judge; for judgment is mine, saith the Lord, and vengeance is mine also, and I will repay. And one that shall breathe out wrath and strifes against the work of the Lord, and against the covenant people of the Lord who are the house of Israel, and shall say: We will destroy the work of the Lord, and the Lord will not remember his covenant which he hath made unto the house of Israel—the same is in danger to be hewn down and cast into the fire; for the eternal purposes of the Lord shall roll on, until all his promises shall be fulfilled. Search the prophecies of Isaiah. Behold, I cannot write them. #RandolphHarris 22 of 26

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“Yea, behold I say unto you, that those saints who have gone before me, who have possessed this land, shall cry, yea, even from the dust will they cry unto the Lord; and as the Lord liveth he will remember the covenant which he hath made with them. And he knoweth their prayers, that they were in behalf of their faith, for in his name could they remove mountains; and in his name could they cause the Earth to shake; and by the power of his word did they cause prisons to tumble to the Earth; yes, even the fiery furnace could not harm them, neither wild beasts nor poisonous serpents, because of the power of his word. And behold, their prayers were also in behalf of him that the Lord should suffer to bring these things forth. And no one need say they shall not come, for they surely shall, for the Lord hath spoken it; for out of the Earth shall they come, by the hand of the Lord, and none can stay it; and it shall come in a day when it shall be said that miracles are done away; and it shall come even as if one should speak from the dead. And it shall come in a day when the blood of saints shall cry unto the Lord, because of secret combinations and the works of darkness. #RandolphHarris 23 of 26

“Yea, it shall come in a day when the power of God shall be denied, and churches become defiled and be lifted up in the pride of their hearts, even to the envying of them who belong to their churches. Yea, it shall come in a day when there shall be heard of fires, and tempests, and vapours of smoke in foreign lands; and there shall also be heard of wars, rumors of wars, and Earthquakes in divers places. Yes, it shall come in a day when there shall be great pollutions upon the face of the Earth; there shall be murders, and robbing, and lying, and deceivings, and whoredoms, and all manner of abominations; when there shall be many who will say, Do this, or do that, and it mattereth not, for the Lord will uphold such at the last day. However, wo unto such, for they are in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity. Yea, it shall come in a day when there shall be churches built up that shall say: Come unto me, and for your money you shall be forgiven of your sins. O ye wicked and perverse stiffnecked people, why have ye built up churches unto yourselves to get gain? Why have ye transfigured the holy word of God, that ye might being damnation upon your souls? #RandolphHarris 24 of 26

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“Behold, look ye unto the revelations of God; for behold, the time cometh at that day when all these things must be fulfilled. Behold, the Lord hath shown unto me great and marvelous things concerning that which must shortly come, at that day when these things shall come forth among you. Behold, I speak unto you as if ye were present, and yet ye are not. However, behold, Jesus Christ hath shown you unto me, and I know your doing. And I know that ye do walk in the pride of your hearts; and there are none save a few only who do not lift themselves up in the pride of their hearts, unto the wearing of very fine apparel, unto envying, and strifes, and malice and persecutions, and all manner of iniquities; and your churches, yea, even every one, have become polluted because of the pride of your hearts. For behold, ye do love money, and your substance, and your fine apparel, and the adorning of your churches, more than ye love the poor and the needy, the sick and the afflicted. O ye pollutions, ye hypocrites, ye teachers, who sell yourselves that which will canker, why have ye polluted the holy church of God? #RandolphHarris 25 of 26

“Why are ye ashamed to take upon you the name of Christ? Why do ye not think that greater is the value of an endless happiness than that misery which never dies—because of the praise of the World? Why do ye adorn yourselves with that which hath no life, and yet suffer the hungry, and the needy and the naked, and the sick and the afflicted to pass by you, and notice them not? Yea, why do ye build up your secret adominations to get gain, and cause the windows should mourn before the Lord, and also orphans to mourn before the Lord, and also the blood of their fathers and their husbands to cry unto the Lord from the ground, for vengeance upon your heads? Behold, the sword of vengeance hangeth over you; and the time soon cometh that he avengeth the blood of the saints upon you, for he will not suffer their cries any longer,” reports Mormon 8.1-41. From out of the brightness, God who marks the passing of the days, with your sharp edges, cut out this month from the time before and the time after. Measure it out to fit the pattern laid out for you. Great is the Lord, and highly to be praised, in the city of our God, His holy mountain; beautiful in elevation, the Earth’s joy is Mount Zion in the far north, the city of great King. #RandolphHarris 26 of 26

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In His Immortal Spirit, Been as Free as the Sky-Searching Lark, and as Elate!

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Being an entertainer, especially in times like these, is really a public service. When a great person dies, the World looks for one’s successor. One has no successor. Liberty is a power of acting or not acting, according to the determinations of the will; that is, if we choose to remain at rest, we may; if we choose to move, we also may. All humans agree liberty is essential to morality, and that no human actions, where it is wanting, are susceptibe of any moral qualities, or can be the objects either of approbation or dislike. For as actions are objects of our moral sentiment, so far only as they are indications of the internal character, passions, and affections; it is impossible that they can give rise either to praise or blame, where they process not from these principles, but are derived altogether from external violence. I pretend not to have obviated or removed all objections to this theory, with regard to necessity and liberty. I can foresee other objections, derived from topics, which have not here been treated of. It may be said, for instance, that, if voluntary actions be subjected to the same laws of necessity with the operations of matter, there is a continued chain of necessary cases, pre-ordained or pre-determined, reaching from the original cause of all, to every single volition of every creation. No contingency anywhere in the Universe; no indifference; no liberty. #RandolphHarris 1 of 26

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While we act, we are, at the same time, acted upon. The ultimate Author of all our volitions is the Creator of the World, who first bestowed motion on this immense machine, and, placed all being in particular position, whence every subsequent event, by an inevitable necessity, must result. Human actions, therefore, either can have no more turpitude at all, as proceeding from so good a cause; of if they have any turpitude, they must involve our Creator in the same guilt, while he is acknowledged to be their ultimate cause and author. For as a humans, who fired a mine, is answerable for all the consequences whether the train one employed be long or short; so wherever a continued chain of necessary causes is fixed, that Being, either finite or infinite, who produces the first, is likewise the author of all the rest, and must both bear the blame and acquire the praise, which belong to them. When we examine the consequences of any action, our clear and unalterable ideas of morality establish this rule, upon unquestionable reasons; and these reasons must still have force, when applied to the volitions and intentions of a Being, infinitely wise and powerful. #RandolphHarris 2 of 26

Ignorance or impotence may be pleased for so limited a creature as humans; but those imperfections have no place in our Creator. He foresaw, he ordained, he intended all those actions of humans, which we so rashly pronounce criminal, or that the Deity, not humans, are accountable for them. However, as either of these positions is absurd and impious; it follows, that the doctrine, from which they are deduced, cannot possibly be true, as being liable to all the same objections. An absurd consequence, if necessary, proves the original doctrine to be absurd; in the same manner as criminal actions render criminal the original cause, if the connextion between them be necessary and inevitable. The objection consists of two parts, which we shall examine separately; First, that, if human actions can be traced up, by a necessary chain, to the Deity, they can never be criminal; on account of the infinite perfection of that Being, from whom they are derived, and who can intend nothing but what is all together good and laudable. Or, secondly, if they be criminal, we must retract the attributes of perfection, which we ascribe to the Deity, and must acknowledge him to be the ultimate author of guilt and moral turpitude in all his creatures. #RandolphHarris 3 of 26

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The answer to the first objection seems obvious and convincing. There are many philosophers, who, after an exact scrutiny of all the phenomena of nature, conclude, that the WHOLE, considered as one system, is, in every period of its existence, ordered with perfect benevolence; and that the utmost possible happiness will, in the end, result to all created beings, without any mixture of positive or absolute ill and misery. Every physical ill, say they, makes an essential part of this benevolent system, and could not possibly be removed, even by the Deity himself, considered as a wise agent, without giving entrance to greater ill, or excluding greater good, which will result from it. From this theory, some philosophers, and the ancient Stoics among the rest, derived a topic of consolation under all afflictions, while they taught their pupils, that those ills, under which they laboured, were, in reality, goods to the Universe; and that to an enlarged view, which could comprehend the whole system of nature, every event became an object of joy and exultation. However, though this topic be specious and sublime, it was soon found in practice weak and ineffectual. #RandolphHarris 4 of 26

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You would surely more irritate, than appease a human, lying under the racking pains of the gout, by preaching up to one the rectitude of those general laws, which produced the malignant humours in one’s body, and led them through the proper canals, to the sinew and nerves, where they now excite such acute torments. These enlarged views may, for a moment, please the imagination of a speculative human, who is placed in ease and security; but neither can they dwell with constancy on one’s mind, even though undisturbed by the emotions of pain or passion; much less can they maintain their ground, when attacked by such powerful antagonists. The affections take a narrower and more natural survey of their object; and by an economy, more suitable to the infirmity of human minds, regard alone the beings around us, and are actuated by such events as appear good or ill to the private system. The case is the same with moral as with physical ill. It cannot reasonably be supposed, that those remote considerations, which are found of so little efficacy with regard to one, will have a more powerful influence with regard to the other. #RandolphHarris 5 of 26

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The mind of humans is so formed by nature, that, upon the appearance of certain characters, dispositions, and action, it immediately feels the sentiment of approbation or blame; nor are there any emotions more essential to its frame and constitution. The characters, which engage our approbation, are chiefly such as contribute to the peace and security of human society; as the characters, which excite blame, are chiefly such as tend to public detriment and disturbance: Whence it may reasonably be presumed, that the moral sentiments arise, either mediately or immediately, from a reflection of these opposite interest. What though philosophical meditations establish a different opinion or conjecture; that every thing is right with regard to the WHOLE, and that the qualities, which disturb society, are, in the main, as beneficial, and are as suitable to the primary intention of nature, as those which more directly promote its happiness and welfare? A human who is robbed of a considerable sum; does one find one’s vexation for the losses any wise diminished by the sublime reflections? #RandolphHarris 6 of 26

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Why then should one’s moral resentment against the crime be supposed incompatible with them? Or why should not the acknowledgement of a real distinction between vice and virtue be reconcilable to all speculative systems of philosophy, as well as that of a real distinction between person beauty and deformity? Both these distinctions are founded in the natural sentiment of the human mind: And these sentiments are not to be controller or altered by any philosophical theory or speculation whatsoever. The second objection admits not of so easy and satisfactory an answer; nor is it possible to explain distinctly, how the Deity can be the mediate cause of all the actions of humans, without being the author of sin and moral turpitude. These are mysteries, which mere natural and unassisted reason is very unfit to handle; and whatever system she embraces, she must find herself involved in inextricable difficulties, and even contradictions, at every step which she takes with regard to such subjects. To reconcile the indifferences and contingency of human actions with prescience; or to defend absolute decrees, and yet free the Deity from being the author of sin, has been found hitherto to exceed all the power of philosophy. #RandolphHarris 7 of 26

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Happy, if she be thence sensible of her temerity, when she pries into these sublime mysteries; and leaving a scene so full of obscurities and perplexities, return, with suitable modesty, to her true and proper province, the examination of common life; where she will find difficulties enough to employ her enquiries, without launching into so boundless an ocean of doubt, uncertainty, and contradiction! From the standpoint of justice as fairness there is no reason why the persons in the original position (Often referred to as the veil of ignorance, one is asked to consider which principles one would select for the basic structure of society, but one must selectas if one has no knowledge ahead of time what position one would have in that society. This choice is made from behind a veil of ignorance, which prevents one from knowing your ethnicity, social status, gender and, crucially, your individual idea of how to lead a good life. Ideally, this would force participants to select principles impartially and rationally.) would agree to the approvals of an impartial sympathetic spectator as the standard of justice. This agreement has all the drawbacks of the classical principle of utility to which it is equivalent. #RandolphHarris 8 of 26

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If, however, the parties are conceived as perfect altruists, that is, as persons who desired conform to the approvals of such a spectator, then the classical principle (the classical principle of utility, the best actions produce the greatest amount of utility for the greatest number of individuals) would, of course, be adopted. The greater net balance of happiness with which to sympathize, the more perfect altruist achieves one’s desire. Thus we arrive at the unexpected conclusion that while the average principle of utility is the ethic of a single rational individual (with no aversion to risk) who tries to maximize one’s own prospects, the classical doctrine is the ethic of perfect altruists. A surprising contrast indeed! By looking at these principles from the standpoint of the original position, we see that a different complex of ideas underlies them. Not only are they based upon contrary motivational assumptions, but the notion of taking chances has a part in one view yet none in the other. In the classical conception one chooses as if one will live through the experiences of each individual, seriatim as Lewis says, the then sum up the result. #RandolphHarris 9 of 26

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The idea of taking a chance on which person one will turn out to be does not arise. Thus even if the concept of the original position served no other purpose, it would be a useful analytic device. Although the various principles of utility may often have similar practical consequences, we can see that these conceptions derive from markedly distinction assumption. There is, however, a peculiar feature of perfect altruism that deserves mention. A perfect altruist can fulfill one’s desire only if someone else has independent, or first-order, desires. To illustrate this fact, suppose that in deciding what to do all vote to do what everyone else wants to do. Obviously nothing get settled; in fact there is nothing to decide. For a problem of justice to arise at least two persons must want to do something other than whatever everyone else wants to do. It is impossible, then, to assume that the parties are simply perfect altruists. They may have some separate interests which may conflict. Justice as fairness makes this assumption, in the form of mutual disinterest, the main motivational condition of the original position. While this may prove to be an oversimplification, one can develop a reasonably comprehensive conception of justice on this basis. #RandolphHarris 10 of 26

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Some philosophers have accepted the utilitarian principle because they believed that the idea of an impartial sympathetic spectator is the correct interpretation of impartiality. Indeed, Hume thought that it offered the only perspective from which moral judgments could be made coherent and brought into line. Now moral judgments are, or should be, impartial; but there is another way to achieve this, another point of view by reference to which our judgments of justice may be organized. Justice as fairness provides what we want. An impartial judgment, we can say, is one rendered in accordance with the principles which would be chosen in the original position. An impartial judgment, we can say, is one rendered in accordance with the principles without bias of prejudice. Instead of defining impartiality from the standpoint of a sympathetic observer who responds to the conflicting interests of others as if they were one’s own, we define impartiality from the standpoint of the litigants themselves. It is they who must choose their conception of justice once and for all in an original position of equality. They must decide by which principles their claims against one another are to be settled, and one who is to judge between humans serves as their agent. #RandolphHarris 11 of 26

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The fault of the utilitarian doctrine is that it mistakes impersonality for impartiality. If one adopted the sympathetic spectator idea, but did not character this spectator as conflating all desires into one system, the preceding remarks naturally lead one to ask what sort of theory of justice would result. Hume’s conception provides one modus operadi for benevolence, but is it the only possibility? Now love clearly has among its main elements the desire to advance the other person’s good as this person’s rational self-love would require. Very often how one is to realize this desire is clear enough. The difficulty is that the love of several persons is thrown into confusion once the claims of these persons conflict. If we reject the classical doctrine, what does the love of humankind enjoin? It is quite pointless to say that one is to judge the situation as benevolence dictates. This assumes that we are wrongly swayed by self-concern. Our problem lies elsewhere. Benevolence is at sea as long as its many loves are in opposition in the persons of its many objects. #RandolphHarris 12 of 26

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We might try out here the idea that a benevolent person is to be guided by the principles someone would choose if one knew that one is to split, so to speak, into many members of society. That is, one is to imagine that one is to divine into a plurality of persons whose life and experiences will be distinct in the usual way. Experiences and memories are to remain each person’s own; and there is to be no conflation of desires and memories into those of one person. Since a single individual is literally to become many persons, there is no question of guessing which one; once again the problem of taking chances does not arise. Now knowing this (or believing it), which conception of justice would a person chose for a society comprised of these individual? As this person would, let us suppose, love this plurality of persons as one loves oneself, perhaps the principles one would chose characterize the aims of benevolence. Leaving aside the difficulties in the idea of splitting that may arise from problems about personal identity, two things seem evident. First of all, it is still unclear what a person would decide, since the situation does not offhand provide an answer. #RandolphHarris 13 of 26

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However, secondly, the two principles of justice now seem a relatively more plausible choice than the classical principle of utility. The latter is no longer the natural preference, and this suggests that the conflation of persons into one is indeed at the root of the classical view. The reason why the situation remains obscure is that love and benevolence are second-order notions: they seek to further the good of beloved individuals that is already given. If the claims of these goods clash, benevolence is at a loss as to how to proceed, as long anyway as it treats these individuals as separate persons. These high-order sentiments do not include principles of right to adjudicate these conflicts. Therefore a love of humankind that wishes to preserve the distinction of persons, to recognize the separateness of life and experience, will use the two principles of justice to determine its aims when many goods it cherishes are in opposition. Love is guided by what individuals themselves would consent to in a fair initial situation which gives them both equal representation as moral persons. We now see why nothing would have been gained by attributing benevolence to the parties in the original position. #RandolphHarris 14 of 26

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We must, however, distinguish between the love of humankind kind and the sense of justice. The difference is not that they are guided by different principles, since both include a desire to give justice. Rather, the former is manifest by the greater intensity and pervasiveness of this desire, and in a readiness to fulfill all the natural duties in addition to that of justice, and even to go beyond their requirements. The love of humankind is more comprehensive than the sense of justice and prompts to acts of supererogation, whereas the latter does not. Thus we see that the assumption of the mutual disinterestedness of the parities does not prevent a reasonable interpretation of benevolence and of the love of humankind within the framework of justice as fairness. The fact that we start out assuming that the parties are mutually disinterested and have conflicting first-order desires still allows us to construct a comprehensive account. For once the principles of right and justice are on hand, they may be used to define the moral virtues just as in any other theory. The virtues are sentiments, that is, related families of dispositions and propensities regulated by a higher-order desire, in this case a desire to act from the corresponding moral principles. #RandolphHarris 15 of 26

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Although justice as fairness begins by taking the persons in the original position as individuals, or more accurately as continuing strands, this is no obstacle to explicating the higher-order moral sentiments that serve to bind a community of persons together. Otherwise people can spend years groping amid-semi darkness for the entrance to the path which they have missed, but justice will gladly lead them in due course. Spiritually, at the moment of dying one will WILL one’s own rebirth again and again until one’s flock are brought safely through the narrow gate which leads to the kingdom of Heaven. Therefore it is said, for such is the mysterious reality of one’s telepathic power, that the birth of the self-actualized sends forth an echoing vibration within the Universe, which acts as a call to one’s unborn chelas (disciples) to incarnate with one, and as a command to the principle of rebirth to make effectual the event. The one sacrifices oneself for the salvation of one’s chelas (disciples). There are several self-styled spiritual guides who can guide their flocks into all kinds of queer experiences, but they cannot guide them into the Kingdom of Heaven. That territory is barred to them. Consequently it is barred to those who meekly walk behind them. The reason is quite simple. #RandolphHarris 16 of 26

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Jesus explained it long ago. The lower ego with its baggage of desires is too big, while the door leading into the Kingdom is too small. In all their activities, these teachers fail to achieve a truly spiritual result because they are thinking primarily of themselves rather than of what they are supposed to be thinking. In some cases the process is an unconscious one, but in many it is not. The difference between a false teacher and a genuine one is often the difference between a dominating dictator and a quiet guide. The false teacher will seek to emasculate your will or even to enslave your mind, whereas the true teacher will endeavour to exalt you into a sense of your own self-responsibility. The teacher who demands or accepts such servility is dangerous to true growth. In the end, one will require a loyalty which should be given only to God. The true teacher will carry your soul into greater freedom and not less, into stabilizing truth and not emotional moods. The true teacher has no desire to hold anyone in pupilage, but on the contrary gladly welcomes the time when the disciple is able to stand without help from outside. However, because talk is easy and redemption is not demanded except in the distant future, these false teachers thrive for a while. #RandolphHarris 17 of 26

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Many of the false teachers are but students, yet find it hard to take the low places where humility dwells. Hence their gravity; hence the laughter of the gods at them. Could they but laugh at themselves awhile, and perhaps at their doctrines occasionally, they might regain balance, a sense of proportion—but greatest of all true Humility. They are not necessarily deliberate misleaders of others, these self-appointed saviours, but their mystical experiences have given them false impressions about themselves. Their authority is fallible and their doctrines are false. They find it easy to deliver themselves of lofty teachings, but hard to put the same teachings into practice. These gurus promise much, but in the sequel do not redeem their word. These self-styled adepts appear to be adepts in circumlocution more than in anything else. Those who openly court worship or secretly exult in it cannot possibly have entered into the true Kingdom of Heaven. For the humility it demands is aptly described by Jesus when he describes its entrance as smaller than a needle’s eye. #RandolphHarris 18 of 26

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Would-be disciples who are so eager to fill this role that they are swept straightaway into enthusiasm by the extravagant promises of would-be masters, usually lack both the desire and the competence to investigate the qualifications of such masters. Consequently they pay the penalty of their lack of discrimination. If a nation accepts and follows a wicked human as its leader, then there must be some fault in it which make this possible. And if a seeker accepts a false guide on one’s spiritual path, then there must be some false intuition, false thinking, or false standards which made this possible to. There are various ways of appraising a teacher at one’s true worth. We may watch one’s external life and notice how one conducts one’s affairs, how one talks and works, and how one behaves toward other humans. Or we may dive deep into one’s interior nature and plumb the depths of one’s mental life. The latter course presupposes some degree of psychic sensitiveness. The best way is to combine both to penetrate the unseen and to observe the visible. Do not reverence those who call themselves guru and beg for alms. Only who live by the fruits of their labours and do honest and useful work are in the way of truth. #RandolphHarris 19 of 26

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Spiritual knowledge is not to be bought and sold. Indeed it could not be. That which could be got and given in this way is only the pretense of it. It is utterly impossible for a human who has entered into communion with the World-Mind to sell one’s power for money. The very act would of itself break one’s connection with it, leaving for one’s possession only those undesirable lesser powers which come from contact with the fringes of the nether World of dark spirits. There are too many aspirants who are hoping, like Micawber in Dicken’s story, for something to turn up. In their cause it is a spiritual master who will not only take their burdens and responsibilities off their shoulders but, much more, translate them overnight into a realm of spiritual consciousness for evermore. They go on waiting and they go on hoping, but nothing turns up and no one appears. What is the reason for this frustration of their hopes? It is that they fail to work while they wait, fail to prepare themselves to be fit for such a meeting, fail to recognize that whether they have a master or not they must still work upon themselves diligently, and that they harder they work in this task or self-improvement, the more likely it is that they will find a master. #RandolphHarris 20 of 26

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They are like children who want to be carried all the way and coddled while they are being carried. They are waiting for someone to do what they ought to be doing for themselves. They are waiting to receive from outside what they could start getting straightaway by delving inside themselves. Instead of wandering about looking for Christs to come, we should be better employed wandering inward looking for Christ there, the Christ within. Such a truth is our best Saviour and the surest Avatar of our time. After he has “seen” you take the plunge and try to “feel” his presence as the next stage. Only When one has reached a point where one no longer thinks of the Master as another person but as the core of one’s inner self, can it be said that the Master’s work for one is done. When Jesus said that one who eats His flesh and drinks His blood abides in Him and He in one, Jesus meant no theatrical rite of purely ceremonial order such as is performed outwardly through the Eucharist today. He meant this inwardly achieved union here described. #RandolphHarris 21 of 26

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There are untouched forces back of self which we seldom include when we reckon up our mortal accounts. One of these is that aspect of God in man which we denominate Power. Once found it makes us feel greater than we seem. When the divine will works through our hands, we may go forth into the World and master it. Strong in the consciousness of Power, we can advance without fear, asking favour of none, yet conferring it upon all we meet. “And now I finish my record concerning the destruction of my people, the Nephites. And it came to pass that we did march forth before the Lamanites. And I, Mormon, wrote an epistle unto the king of the Lamanites, and desired of him that he would grant unto us that he would grant unto us that we might gather together our people unto the land of Cumorah, by a hill which was called Cumorah, and there we could give them battle And it came to pass that the king of the Lamanites did grant unto me the thing which I desired. And it came to pass that we did march forth to the land of Cumorah, and we did pitch our tents around the hill Cumorah; and it was in the land of many waters, rivers, and fountains; and here we had hope to gain advantage over the Lamanites. #RandolphHarris 22 of 26

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“And when three hundred and eighty and four years had passed away, we had gathered in all the remainder of our people unto the land of Cumorah. And it came to pass that when we had gathered in all our people in one to the land of Cumorah, behold I, Mormon, began to be old; and knowing it to be the last struggle of my people, and having been commanded of the Lord that I should not suffer the records which had been handed down by our fathers, which were sacred, to fall into the hands of the Lamanites, (for he Lamanites would destroy them) therefore I made this record out of the plates of Nephi, and hid up in the hill Cumorah all the records which had been entrusted to me by the hand of the Lord, save it were these few plates which I gave unto my son Moroni. And it came to pass that my people, with their wives and their children, did now behold the armies of the Lamanites marching towards them; and with that awful fear of death which fills the breast of all the wicked, did they await to receive them. And it came to pass that they came to battle against us, and every soul was filled with terror because of the greatness of their numbers. #RandolphHarris 23 of 26

“And it came to pass that my men were hewn down, yea, even my ten thousand who were with me, and I fell wounded in the midst; and they passed by me that they did not put an end to my life. And when they had gone through and hewn down all my people save it were twenty and four of us, (among whom my son Moroni) and we having survived the dead of our people, did behold on the morrow, when the Lamanites had returned unto their camps, from the top of the hill Cumorah, then ten thousand of my people who were hewn down, being led in the front by me. And we also beheld the ten thousand of my people who were led by my son Moroni. And behold, the ten thousand of Gidgiddonah had fallen, and he also in the midst. And Lamah had fallen with his ten thousand; and Limhah had fallen with his tend thousand; and Jeneum had fallen with his ten thousand; and Cumenihah, and Moronihah, and Antinum, and Shiblom, and Shem, and Josh, had fallen with their ten thousand each. And it came to pass that there were tend more who did fall by the sword, with their ten thousand each; yea, even all my people, save it were those who with me, and also a few who had escaped into the south countries, and a few who had deserted over unto the Lamanites, had fallen. #RandolphHarris 24 of 26

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“And their flesh, and bones, and blood lay upon the face of the Earth, being left by the hands of those who slew them to molder upon the land, and to crumble and to return to their mother Earth, And my soul was rent with anguish, because of the slain of my people, and I cried: O ye fair ones, how could ye have departed from the ways of the Lord! O ye fair ones, how could ye have rejected that Jesus, who stood with open arms to receive you! Behold, if ye had not done this, ye would have fallen. However, behold, ye are fallen, and I mourn your loss. O ye fair sons and daughters, ye fathers and mothers, ye husbands and wives, ye fair ones, how is it that ye could have fallen! However, behold, ye are gone, and my sorrows cannot bring your return. And the day soon cometh that your mortal must put on immortality, and these bodies which are now moldering in corruption must soon become incorruptible bodies; and then ye must stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, to be judged according to your works; and if it so be that ye are righteous, then are ye blessed with your fathers who have gone before you. O that ye had repented before this great destruction had come upon you. #RandolphHarris 25 of 26

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“However, behold, ye are gone, and the Father, yea, the Eternal Father of Heaven, knoweth your state; and he doeth with you according to his justice and mercy,” reports Mormon 6.1-22. Out of the bright sky as the Sun goes down, appears the Father who rules the darkness. I pray to him, my eyes facing west at the end of the day, and the beginning of the month. You will not be here with us long; you dance quickly toward the horizon. While you are still with us, though, I will look on you with love. Hope in the west, prophet of return from darkness: you show us it is possible to go from age into the shadowland and emerge, new yet the same. When I am surrounded by the shadows, come to me and remind me of this night’s lesson I pray to you, who wear the silver crescent, not to let me forget. Unto Israel and unto our scholars, unto their disciples and pupils, and unto all who engaged in the study of the Scriptures, here and everywhere, unto them and unto you, may there be abundant peace, grace, lovingkindness, mercy, long life, sustenance and salvation from their Father in Heaven; and say ye, Amen. May there be abundant peace from Heaven, and a happy life for us, and for all Israel; and say ye, Amen. May He who establisheth peace in the Heavens, in His mercy, grant peace unto us and unto all America; and say ye, Amen. #RandolphHarris 26 of 26

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Winchester Mystery House

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Sarah Winchester kept building over 38 years. Supernatural guidance or something to keep her occupied – what do you think?

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I Might Lose Myself in Bottomless Abysses of Ignorance—Cleanse the Horrible Darknesses of Our Mind!

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The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved…the ones who…are passionate, compassionate, enthusiastic. In order to seize hold of the fantasies, I frequently imagined a steep descent. I even made several attempts to get to the very bottom. The very first time I reached, as it were, a depth of about a thousand feet; the next time I found myself at the edge of a cosmic abyss. It was like a voyage to the mon, or a descent into empty space. First came the image of a crater, and I had the feeling that I was in the land of the dead. The atmosphere was that of the other World. Near the steep slope of a rock I caught sight of two figures, an old mand with a white beard and a beautiful young lady. I summoned up my courage and approached them as though they were real people, and listened attentively to what they told me. The old man explained that he was Elijah, and that gave me a shock. However, the young lady staggered me even more, for she called herself Salome! She was blind. What a strange couple: Salome and Elijah. However, Elijah assured me that he and Salome had belonged together from all eternity, which completely astounded me. They have a black serpent living with them which displayed an unmistakable fondness for me. #RandolphHarris 1 of 27

I stuck close to Elijah because he seemed to be the most reasonable of the three, and to have a clear intelligence. Of Salome I was distinctly suspicious. Elijah and I had a long conversation which, however, I did not understand. Naturally I tried to find a plausible explanation for the appearance of Biblical figures in my fantasy by reminding myself that my father had been a clergyman. However, that really explained nothing at all. For what did the old man signify? What did Salome signify? Why were they together? Only man years later, when I knew a great deal more then I knew then, did the connection between the old man and the young lady appear perfectly natural to me. In such dream wanderings one frequently encounters an old man who is accompanied by a young girl, and examples of such couples are to be found in many mythic tales. Thus, according to Gnostic tradition, Simon Magus went about with a young lady whom he had picked up in a brothel. Her name was Helen, and she was regarded as the reincarnation of the Trojan Helen. Klingsor and Kundry, Lao-tzu and the dancing girl, likewise belong to this category. I have mentioned that there was a third figure in my fantasy besides Elijah and Salome: the large black snake. #RandolphHarris 2 of 27

In myths the snake is frequently counterpart of the hero. There are numerous accounts of their affinity. For example, the hero has eyes like a snake, or after his death he is changed into a snake and revered as such, or the snake is his mother, et cetera. In my fantasy, therefore, the presence of the snake was an indication of a hero-myth. Salome is an anima figure. She is blind because she does not see the meaning of things. Elijah is the figure of the wise old prophet and represents the factor of intelligence and knowledge; Salome, the erotic element. One might say that the two figures are personifications of Logos and Eros. However, such a definition would be excessively intellectual. It is more meaningful to let the figures be what they were for me at the time—videlicet, events and experiences. Soon after this fantasy another figure rose out of the unconscious. He developed out of the Elijah figure. I called him Philemon. Philemon was a pagan and brought with him an Egypto-Hellenistic atmosphere with a Gnostic colouration. His figure first appeared to me in the following dream. #RandolphHarris 3 of 27

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The sky was blue, like the sea, covered not by clouds but by flat brown clods of Earth. It looked as if the clods were breaking apart and the blue water of the sea were becoming visible between them. However, the water was blue sky. Suddenly there appeared from the right a winged being sailing across the sky. I saw that it was an old man with the horns of a bull. He held a bunch of four keys, one of which he clutched as if here were about to open a lock. He had the winds of the kingfisher with it characteristic colours. Since I did not understand this dream-image, I painted it in order to impress it upon my memory. During the days when I was occupied with the painting, I found in my garden, by the lake shore, a dead kingfisher! I was thunderstruck, for kingfishers are quite rare in the vicinity of Zurich and I have never since found a dead one. The body was recently dead—at the most, two or three days—and showed no external injuries. Philemon and other figures of my fantasies brought home to me the crucial insight that there are things in the psyche which I do not produce, but which produce themselves and have their own life. Philemon represented a force which was not myself. #RandolphHarris 4 of 27

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In my fantasies I held conversations with him, and he said things which I had not consciously thought. For I observed clearly that it was he who spoke, not I. He said I treated thoughts as if I generated them myself, but in his view thoughts were like animals in the forest, or people in a room, or birds in the air, and added, “If you should see people in a room, you would not think that you had made those people, or that you were responsible for them.” It was he who taught me psychic objectivity, the reality of the psyche. Through hum the distinction was clarified between myself and the object of my thought. He confronted me in an objective manner, and I understood that there is something in me which can say things that I do not know and do not intend, things which may even be directed against me. Psychologically, Philemon represented superior insight. He was a mysterious figure to me. As if here were a living personality, at times, he seemed to me quite real. I went walking up and down the garden with him, and to me he was what the Indians called a guru. Whenever the outlines of a new personification appeared, I felt it almost as a personal defeat. It meant: “Here is something else you did not know until now!” #RandolphHarris 5 of 27

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Fear crept over me that the succession of such figures might be endless, that I might lose myself in the bottomless abysses of ignorance. My ego felt devalued—although the success I had been having in Worldly affairs might have reassured me. In my darknesses (horridas nostrae mentis purge tenebras— “cleanse the horrible darkness out of our mind” – the Aurora Consurgens* says) I could have wished for nothing better than a real, live guru, someone possessing superior knowledge and ability, who would have disentangled for me the involuntary creations of my imagination. This task was undertaken by the figure of Philemon, whom in this respect I had willy-nilly to recognize as my psychagogue. And the fact was the he conveyed to me many an illuminating idea. More than fifteen years later a highly cultivated elderly Indian visited me, a friend of Gandhi’s, and we talked about Indian education—in particular, about the relationship between guru and chela. I hesitantly asked him whether he could tell me anything about the person and character of one’s own guru, whereupon he replied in a matter-of-fact tone, “Oh yes, he was Shankaracharya.” #RandolphHarris 6 of 27

“You do not mean the commentor on the Vedas who died centuries ago?” I asked.

“Yes, I mean him,” he said, to my amazement.

“Then you are referring to a spirit?” I asked.

“Of course it was his spirit,” he agreed.

At that moment I thought of Philemon.

“There are ghostly gurus too,” he added. “Most people have living gurus. However, there are always some who have a spirit for teacher.” #RandolphHarris 7 of 27

This information was both illuminating and reassuring to me. Evidently, then, I had not plummeted right out of the human World, but had only experienced the sort of thing that could happen to others who made similar efforts. Later, Philemon became relativized by the emergence of yet another figure, whom I called Ka. In ancient Egypt the “king’s ka” was his Earthly form, the embodied soul. In my fantasy, as if out of a deep shaft, the ka-soul came from below, out of the Earth. I did a painting of him, showing him in his Earth-bound form, as a herm with base of stone and upper part of bronze. High up in the painting appears a kingfisher’s wing, and between it and the head of Ka floats a round, glowing nebula of stars. Ka’s expression has something demonic about it—one might also say, Mephistophelian. In one had he holds something like a coloured pagoda, or a reliquary, and in the other a stylus with which he was working on the reliquary. He is saying, “I am he who buries the gods in gold and gems.” Philemon had a lame foot, but was a winged spirit, where as Ka represented a kind of Earth demon or mental demon. Philemon was the spiritual aspects, or “meaning.” #RandolphHarris 8 of 27

Ka, on the other hand, was a spirit like the Anthroparion of Greek alchemy—with which at the time I was still unfamiliar. [The Anthroparion is a tiny man, a kind of homunculus. He is found, for example, in the visions of Zosimos of Panopolis, an important alchemist of the third century. To the group which includes the Anthroparion belong the gnomes, the Dactyls of classical antiquity, and the homunculi of the alchemists. As the spirit of quicksilver, the alchemical Mercurius was also an Anthroparion.] Ka was he who made everything real, but who also obscured the halcyon spirit, Meaning, or replaced it by beauty, the “eternal reflection.” In time I was able to integrate both figures through the study of alchemy. The archetype of the wise old man, also called the “Mana-personality,” tend to be projected upon human beings who set themselves up as leaders, secular or spiritual. This may have disastrous results, as when religious sects or political movements are led by charlatans or madmen. Alternatively, the subject may identify oneself with the archetype, believing that one oneself has superior wisdom. Analysts and priests, as well as politicians, sometimes succumb to this danger, referred to as “inflation.” #RandolphHarris 9 of 27

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I have frequently considered, what could possibly be the reason, why all humankind, though they have ever, without hesitation, acknowledged the necessity, in their whole practice and reasoning, have yet discovered such a reluctance to acknowledge it in words, and have rather shown a propensity, in all ages, to profess the contrary opinion. The matter, I think, may be accounted for, after the following manner. If we examine the operations of body, and the production of effects from their causes, we shall find, that all our faculties can never carry us farther in our knowledge of this relation, than barely to observe, that particular objects are constantly transition, from the appearance of one to the belief of the other. However, though this conclusions concerning human ignorance be the result of the strictest scrutiny of this subject, human still entertain a strong propensity to believe, that they penetrate farther into the powers of nature, and perceive something like a necessary connexion between the cause and the effect. When again they turn their reflections towards the operations of their own minds, and feel no such connexion of the motive and the action; they are thence apt to suppose, that there is a difference between the effects, which result from material force, and those which arise from thought and intelligence. #RandolphHarris 10 of 27

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However, being once convinced, that we know nothing father of causation of any kind, than merely the constant conjunction of objects, and the consequent inference of the mind from one to another, and finding, that these two circumstances are universally allowed to have a place in voluntary actions; we may be more easily led to own the same necessity common to all causes. And though this reasoning may contradict the systems of many philosophers, in ascribing necessity to the determination of the will, we shall find, upon reflection, that they dissent from it in words only, not in their real sentiment. Necessity, according to the sense, in which it is here taken, has never yet been rejected, nor can ever, I think, be rejected by any philosopher. It may only, perhaps, be pretended, that the mind can perceive, in the operations of matter, some farther connexion between the cause and effect; and a connexion that has not place in the voluntary actions of intelligent beings. Now whether it be so or not, can only appear upon examination; and it is incumbent on these philosophers to make good their assertion, by defining or describing that necessity, and pointing it out to us in the operations of material causes. #RandolphHarris 11 of 27

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When they enter upon it by examining the faculties of the soul, the influence of the understanding, and operations of the will, it would seem, indeed, that humans begin at the wrong end of this question concerning liberty and necessity. Let them first discuss a more simple question, namely, the operations of body and of brute unintelligent matter; and try whether they can there form any idea of causation and necessity, except that of a constant conjunction of objects, and subsequent inference of the mind from one to another. If these circumstances form, in reality, the whole of that necessity, which we conceive in matter, and if these circumstances be also universally acknowledged to take place in the operations of the mind, the dispute is at an end; at least, must be owned to be thenceforth merely verbal. However, as long as we will rashly suppose, that we have some farther idea of necessity and causation in the operations of external objects; at the same time, that we can find nothing farther, in the voluntary actions of the mind; there is no possibility of bringing the question to any determinate issues, while we proceed upon so erroneous a supposition. #RandolphHarris 12 of 27

The only method of undeceiving us, is, to mount up higher; to examine the narrow extent of science when applied to material causes; and to convince ourselves, that all we know of them, is, the constant conjunction and inference above mentioned. We may, perhaps, find, that it is with difficulty we are induced to fix such narrow limits to human understanding: But we can afterwards find no difficulty when we come to apply this doctrine to the actions of the will. For as it is evident, that these have a regular conjunction with motives and circumstances and character, and as we always draw inferences from one to the other, we must be obliged to acknowledge in words, that necessity, which we have already avowed, in every deliberation of our lives, and in every step of our conduct and behaviour. The prevalence of the doctrine of liberty may be accounted for, from another cause, namely, a false sensation or seeming experience which we have, or may have, of liberty or indifference, in may of our actions. The necessity of any action, whether of matter or of mind, is not, properly speaking, a quality in the agent, but in any thinking or intelligent being, who many consider the action. #RandolphHarris 13 of 27

And it consists chiefly in the determination of one’s thoughts to infer the existence of that action from some preceding objects; as liberty, when opposed to necessity, is nothing but the want of that determination, and a certain looseness or indifference, which we feel, in passing, or not passing, from the idea of one object to that of any succeeding one. Now we may observe, that, though, in reflecting on human actions, we seldom feel such a looseness or indifference, but are commonly able to infer them with considerable certainty from their motives, and from the dispositions of the agent; yet if frequently happens, that, in performing the actions themselves, we are sensible of something like it: And as all resembling objects are readily taken for each other, this has been employed as a demonstrative and even intuitive proof of human liberty. We feel, that our actions are subject to our will, on most occasions; and imagine we feel, that the will itself is subject to nothing, because, when by a denial of it we are provoked to try, we feel, that it moves easily every way, and produces an image of itself (or a Velleity, as it is called in the schools) even n that side, on which it did not settle. #RandolphHarris 14 of 27

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This image, of faint motion, we persuade ourselves, could, at that time, have been completed into the things itself; because, should that be denied, we find, upon a second trial, that, at present, it can. We consider not, that the fantastical desire of showing liberty, is here the motive of our actions. And it seems certain, that, however we may imagine we feel a liberty within ourselves, a spectator can commonly infer our actions from our motives and character; and even where one cannot, one concludes in general, that one might, were one perfectly acquainted with every circumstance of our situation and temper, and the most secret springs of our complexion and disposition. Now this is the very essence of necessity, according to the foregoing doctrine. However, to proceed in this reconciling project with regard to the question of liberty and necessity; the most contentious question, of metaphysics, the most contentious science; it will not require many words to prove, that all humankind have ever agreed in the doctrine of liberty as well as in that of necessity, and that the whole dispute, in this respect also, have been hitherto merely verbal. For, when applied to voluntary actions, what is meant by liberty? #RandolphHarris 15 of 27

We cannot surely mean, that actions have so little connexion with motives, inclinations, and circumstances, that one does not follow with a certain degree of uniformity from the other, and that one affords no inference by which we can conclude the existence of the other. For these are plain and acknowledged matters of fact. By liberty, then we can only mean a power of acting or not acting, according to the determinations of the will; that is, if we choose to remain at rest, we may; if we choose to move, we also may. Now this hypothetical liberty is universally allowed to belong to every one, who is not a prisoner and in chains. Here then is no subject of dispute. Whatever definition we may give of liberty, we should be careful to observe two requisite circumstances; first, that it be consistent with plain matter of fact; secondly, that it be consistent with itself. If we observe these circumstances, and render our definition intelligible, I am persuaded that all humankind will be found of one opinion with regard to it. It is universally allowed, that nothing exists without a cause of its existence, and that chance, when strictly examined, is a mere negative word, and means not any real power, which has any where, a being in nature. #RandolphHarris 16 of 27

However, it is pretended, that some causes are necessary, some not necessary. Here then is the advantage of definitions. Let any one define a cause, without comprehending, as a part of the definition, a necessary connexin with its effect; and let one show distinctly the origin of the idea, expressed by the definition; and I shall readily give up the whole controversy. However, if the foregoing explication f the matter be received, this must be absolutely impracticable. Had not objects regular conjunction with each other, we should never have entertained any notion of cause and effect; and this regular conjunction produces that inference of the understanding, which is the only connexion, that we can have any comprehension of. Whoever attempts a definition of cause, exclusive of these circumstances, will be obliged, either to employ unintelligible terms, or such as are synonymous to the term, which one endeavours to define. Thus, if a cause be defined, that which produces any thing; it is easy to observe, that producing is synonymous to causing. In like manner, if a cause be defined, that by which anything exists; this is liable to the same objection. For what is meant by these words by which? #RandolphHarris 17 of 27

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Had it been said that a cause is that after which anything constantly exists; we should have understood the terms. For this is, indeed, all we know of the matter. And this constancy forms the very essence of necessity, nor have we any other idea of it. And if the definition above mentioned by admitted; liberty, when opposed to necessity, not to constraint, is the same thing with chance; which is universally allowed to have no existence. “And it came to pass that the thirty and fourth year passed away, and also the thirty and fifth, and behold the disciples of Jesus had formed a church of Christ in all the lands round about. And as many as did come unto them, and did truly repent of their sins, were baptized in the name of Jesus; and they did also receive the Holy Ghost. And it came to pass in the thirty and sixth year, the people were all converted unto the Lord, upon all the face of the land, both Nephites and Lamanites, and there were no contentions and disputations among them, and every human did deal justly one with another. And they had all things common among them; therefore there were not rich and poor, bond and free, but they were all made free, and partakers of the heavenly gift. And it came to pass that the thirty and seventh year passed away also, and there still continued to be peace in the land. #RandolphHarris 18 of 27

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“And there were great and marvelous works wrought by the disciples of Jesus, insomuch that they did heal the sick, and raise the dead, and cause the lame to walk, and the blind to receive their sight, and the deaf to hear; and all manner of miracles did they work among the children of men; and in nothing did they work miracles save it were in the name of Jesus. And thus did the thirty and eighth year pass away, and also the thirty and ninth, and forty and first, and the forty and second, yea, even until forty and nine years had passed away, and also the fifty and first, and the fifty and second; year, and even until fifty and nine year has passed away. And the Lord did prosper them exceedingly in the land; yea, insomuch that they did build cities again where there had been cities burned. Yea, even that great city of Zarahemla did they cause to be built again. However, there were many cities which had been sunk, and waters came up in the stead thereof; therefore these cities could not be renewed. And now, behold, it came to pass that the people of Nephi did wax strong, and did multiply exceedingly fast, and become an exceedingly fair and delightsome people. And they were married, and given in marriage, and were blessed according to the multitude of the promises which the Lord had made unto them. #RandolphHarris 19 of 27

“And they did not walk any more after the performances and ordinances of the law of Moses; but they did walk after the commandments which they had received from their Lord and their God, continuing in fasting and prayer, and in meeting together oft both to pray and to hear the word of the Lord. And it came to pass that there was no contention among all the people, in all the land; but there were mighty miracles wrought among the disciples of Jesus. And it came to pass that the seventy and first year passed away, and also the seventy and second year, yea, and in fine, till the seventy and ninth year had passes away; yea, even an hundred years had passed away, and the disciples of Jesus, whom he had chosen, had all gone to the paradise of God, save it were the three who should tarry; and there were other disciples ordained in their stead; and also many of that generation had passed away. And it came to pass that there was no contention in the land, because of the love of God which did dwell in the hearts of the people. And there were no envyings, nor strifes, nor tumults, nor whoredoms, nor lyings, nor murders, nor any manner of lasciviousness; and surely there could not be a happier people among al the people who has been created by the hand of God. #RandolphHarris 20 of 27

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“There were no robbers, nor murderers, neither were there Lamanites, nor any manner of -ites; but there were in one, the children of Christ, and heirs to the kingdom of God. And how blessed were they! For the Lord did bless them in all their doings; yea, even they were blessed and prospered until an hundred and ten years had passed away; and the first generation from Christ had passes away, and there was no contention in all the land. And it came to pass that Nephi, he that kept this last record, (and he kept it upon the plates of Nephi) died, and his son Amon kept it in his stead; and he kept it upon the plates of Nephi also. And he kept it eighty and four years, and there was still peace in the land, save it were a small part of the people who had revolted from the church and taken upon them the name of Lamanites; therefore there began to be Lamanites again in the land. And it came to pass that Amos died also, (and it was an hundred and ninety and four years from the coming of Christ) and his son Amos kept the record in his stead; and he also kept it upon the plates of Nephi; and it was also written in he book of Nephi, which is this book. And it came to pass that two hundred years had passed away; and the second generation had all passed away save it were a few. #RandolphHarris 21 of 27

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“And now I, Mormon, would that ye should know that the people had multiplied, insomuch that they were spread upon all the face of the land, and that they had become exceedingly rich, because of their prosperity in Christ. And now, in this two hundred and first year there began to be among them those who were lifted up in pride, such as the wearing of costly apparel, and all manner of fine pearls, and of the fine things of the World. And from that time forth they did have their goods and their substance no more common among them. And they began to be divided into classes; and they began to build up churches unto themselves to get gain, and began to deny the true church of Christ. And it came to pass that when two hundred and ten years had passes away there were many churches in the land; yea, there were many churches which professed to know the Christ, and yet they did deny the more parts of his gospel, insomuch that they did receive all manner of wickedness, and did administer that which was sacred unto him to whim it had been forbidden because of unworthiness. And this church did multiply exceedingly because of iniquity, and because of the power of Satan who did get hold upon their hearts. #RandolphHarris 22 of 27

“And again, there was another church of Christ, because of their humility and their belief in Christ; and they did despise them because of the many miracles which were wrought among them. Therefore they did exercise power and authority over the disciples of Jesus who did tarry with them, and they did cast them into prison; but by the power of the word of God, which was in them, the prisoners were rent in twain, and they went forth doing mighty miracles among them. Nevertheless, and notwithstanding all these miracles, the people did harden their hearts, and did seek to kill them, even as the Jews at Jerusalem sought to kill Jesus, according to his word. And they did cast them into furnaces of fire, and they came forth receiving no harm. And they also cast them into dens of wild beasts, and they did play with the wild beasts even as a child with a lamb; and they did come forth from among them, receiving no harm. Nevertheless, the people did harden their hearts, for they were led by many priests and false prophets to build up many churches, and to do all manners of iniquity. And they did smite upon the people of Jesus; but the people of Jesus did not smite again. And they thus did dwindle in unbelief and wickedness from year to year, even until two hundred and thirty years had passed away. #RandolphHarris 23 of 27

“And now it came to pass in this year, yea, in the two hundred and thirty and first year, there was a great division among the people. And it came to pass that in this year there arose a people who were called the Nephites, and they were true believers in Christ; and among them there were those who were called by the Lamanites—Jacobites, and Josephites, and Zoramites; therefore the true believers in Christ, and the true worshipers of Christ, (among whom were the three disciples of Jesus who should tarry) were called Nephites, and Jacobites, and Josephites, and Zoramites. And it came to pass that they who rejected the gospel were called Lamanites, and Lemuelites, and Ishmaelites; and they did not dwindle in unbelief, but they did willfully rebel against the gospel of Christ; and they did teach their children that they should not believe, even as their fathers, from the beginning, did dwindle. And it was because of the wickedness and abomination of their fathers, even as it was in the beginning. And they were taught to hate the children of God, even as the Lamanites were taught to hate the children of Nephi from the beginning. #RandolphHarris 24 of 27

“And it came to pass that two hundred and forty and four years had passed away, and thus were the affairs of the people. And the more wicked part of the people did wax strong, and became exceedingly more numerous than were the people of God. And they did still continue to build up churches unto themselves, and adorn them with all manner of precious things. And thus did two hundred and fifty years pass away, and also two hundred and sixty years. And it came to pass that the wicked part of the people began again to build up the secret oaths and combinations of Gadianton. And also the people who were called the people of Nephi began to be proud in their hearts, because of their exceeding riches, and become vain like unto their brethren, the Lamanites. And from this time the disciples began to sorrow for the sins of the World. And it came to pass that when three hundred years had passes away, both the people of Nephi and the Lamanites had become exceedingly wicked one like unto another. And it came to pass that the robbers of Gadinaton did spread over all the face of the land; and there were none that were righteous save it were the disciples of Jesus. And gold and silver did they lay up in store in abundance, and did traffic in all manner of traffic. #RandolphHarris 25 of 27

“And it came to pass that after three hundred and five years had passed away, (and the people did still remain in wickedness) Amos died; and his brother, Ammaron, did keep the record in his stead. And it came to pass that when three hundred and twenty years had passed away, Ammaron, being constrained by the Holy Ghost, did hide up the records which were sacred—yea, even all the sacred records which had been handed down from generation to generation, which were sacred—even until the three hundred and twentieth year from the coming of Christ. And he did hide them up unto the Lord, that they might come again unto the remnant of the house of Jacob, according to the prophecies and the promises of the Lord. And thus is the end of the record of Ammaron,” reports 4 Nephi 1.1-49. Night is called the first of all things because of the common belief that the World came out of darkness. In part, this reflects the obvious truth that before something there was nothing, and that “nothing” is equated with darkness. The connection between these two is not so subtle, however. For, after all, if light (and everything else) was born out of darkness be thought of as nothing? It is a creative force in itself. #RandolphHarris 26 of 27

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Thus, among the Celts and Germans, the day began with night, and the year with Winter. To this day, our day begins in the middle of night and our year in the middle of Winter. The World rests beneath night’s blanket and I sit quietly, finally myself at rest. All day, I have been the one talking; my time for silence has arrived. Speak to me, Holy Ones, and I will listen. Here I am, waiting to hear your words. Lord of the World, the King supreme, ere aught was formed, He reigned alone. When by His will all things were wrought, then was His sovereign name made known. And when in time all things shall cease, He still shall reign in majesty. He was, He is, He shall remain all-glorious eternally. Incomparable, unique is He, no other can His Oneness share. Without beginning, without end, Dominion’s might is His to bear. He is my living God who saves, my Rock when grief or trials befall, my Banner and my Refuge strong, my bounteous Portion when I call. My soul I give unto His care, asleep, awake, for He is near, and with my soul, my body, too; God is with me, I have no fear. #RandolphHarris 27 of 27

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Winchester Mystery House

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What was once a two-story farmhouse grew over 38 straight years into a massive 160-room labyrinth style Victorian Mansion. Have you experienced the house during the holiday season?

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When the Morning Blesses Thee for Enlivening All the Cheerful Eyes the Heart Upsprings!

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Change is the biggest story in the World today, and we are not covering it adequately. Leadership is a work one everyone’s lips. The young attack it and police seek it. Experts claim it and artists spurn it, while scholars want it…bureaucrats pretend they have it, politicians wish they did. Everybody agrees that there is less of it than there used to be. The pessimistic consensus and longing for leadership extends to the Church, which many today believe suffers from an alarming lack of leadership when compared to history as recent as the decades between the forties and seventies (decades which produces leaders of the stature of Harold John Ockenga, Billy Graham, Carl F.H. Henry and Francis Schaeffer, as well as dynamic local church and layleaders). Is there really less leadership than there used to be? It appears so, but objective analysis is difficult. Statistics do indicate this, however: male leadership in the Church is on the decline as women outnumber men, for men comprise only 41 percent of adult church attenders, and some smaller churches cannot find even one man to fill the office of elder. More and more men are content to let others shoulder the heavy responsibilities while they go along for the ride. #RandolphHarris 1 of 25

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It is certainly true that leadership is more difficult today due to the sheer complexity of life and the size of today’s institutions, and because of the contemporary confusion as to what leadership is. Secular analysis has produced more than 350 definitions of leadership. Leadership, to some, is like the Abominable Snowman, whose footprints are everywhere but he is nowhere to be seen. However, none of this excuses today’s Church—or today’s Christian humans. Unlike our culture, the Bible provides clear instruction regarding leadership through the lives of its great leaders and through specific teachings regarding the character, qualifications, and commitment of spiritual leaders. In addition to this, amidst our culture’s confusion about leadership there are some astute analysts who have pinpointed the essentials of leadership and are providing information which has immense benefits for the general culture, including the Church. As we tackle the topic of the discipline of leadership, we will draw from both sources, with the greatest reliance being upon God’s word. When the Saviour was on the Earth, He taught His Apostles about leadership service: “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it to you. #RandolphHarris 2 of 25

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“These things I command you, that ye love one another,” reports John 15.16-17. After His ascension into Heaven, His disciples became greater leaders and built up the Church in their day. The first mention of Joshua comes in Exodus 17.8, 9 after the Amalekites’ attack upon the stragglers at Israel’s rear: “Moses said to Joshua, ‘Choose some of our men and go out to fight the Amalekites. Tomorrow I will stand on top of the hill with the staff of God in my hands.’” Moses, then in his eighties, took the rod of God with which he had parted the Red Sea and ascended a nearby hill. Joshua, in his fighting prime, took charge of the army below. In the ensuing battle, when Moses lifted his hands in intercessory prayer, Israel prevailed. However, as Moses wearied and began to lower his arms, the tide of battle turned to the Amalekites. Then again, as Moses mustered all his power and elevated his hands, the advantage returned to Israel. Israel’s fate ebbed and flowed with Moses’ aged hands. Soon Aaron and Hur were called to assist Moses, seating him on a stone and standing at his sides to hold his hands Heavenward. When sunset came, Moses’ hands were still reaching upward to God, and Israel had carried the day. #RandolphHarris 3 of 25

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The lessons for Joshua were clearly manifest. He learned that the real power was not in his sword, but in God. The victory undoubtedly tempted him to forget that. He was an instant hero, and that night all the campfires sang the name of Joshua. However, fixed in Joshua’s mind was the image of Aaron and Hur coming to Moses’ side and lifting his hands up to God. No one attains true spiritual leadership who thinks one’s power is one’s own or the past victories are due to one’s own genius. The overriding lesson Joshua learned that day was the backbone of any work done for God is prayer. Those who have effective leadership are not leaders because of brilliancy, but because, by the power of prayer, they could command the power of God. How contrary this is to conventional thinking on leadership. The first thing the World (and all too often the Church!) considers is a leader’s magnetism and elan—does one have the charisma to magnetize people? But the Holy Spirit places prayer first. In our day we are called on to be leaders and to beckon others to follow Jesus’s teachings. You may be a leader in your ward or branch or among your group of friends. Young people in the Church are learning. “I learned not to just pay attention to how things are done, but to go to individuals and help them in whatever way they need,” said Leo. #RandolphHarris 4 of 25

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There may be time when we do not know what to do and that is when one should recall to open up the scriptures. Also, keep in mind that Christian leadership includes helping everyone feel welcome. Now, when we set out on the path of the surrendered will we find we must come to grips with our fallen character. This character will have taken over our habitual or “automatic” ways of thinking and feeling, shaped our social World past and present, permeated our body and its responses, and even sunk down into the unconscious depths of our soul. In their fallen character thoughts, feelings, social interactions, body, character, will, and the soul will usually not be in accordance with the genuine intentions of our reborn spirit or will. The fallen character in fact poises every element of our being against God. When we are subjected to environments where people may or may not have willfully, knowingly and enthusiastically submitted to the influence of Satan and are attacking us, we must remember to seek spiritual counsel even more, and commit to more Bible study so our souls do not become sucked into their blackhole of evil. #RandolphHarris 5 of 25

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We do not want to end up in the adversary’s web because we want to go to Heaven and not suffer any legal consequences while on Earth either because the bad people are going to get themselves in trouble with God and human’s laws. The condition we find ourselves in can best be described as one of entanglement. By contrast, the condition we must move to is that of single-minded focus upon doing the will of God in everything, distracted by nothing. Do not care about anything but Christ. Make sure your intention is that you and your team care for nothing before Christ, which means the ways of the Lord must come first. Nothing should be allowed to detract from that or conflict with it. All lesser desires have to be done away with (hence they are macabre baggage!). Some people, of course, are more concerned about language they think is wrong than about hearts not set wholly on Christ. In our fallen World very few people live with a focused will, even a will focused on an evil. The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity. #RandolphHarris 6 of 25

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However, in fact—and we can be thankful for this—even “the worst” rarely have much intensity about them. There are always hecklers in this World, however. Evil people who are genuinely focused can gain the great power they do over others because of the fact that good people and evil people alike are, for the most part, simply drifting through life. The “Chief Executive Officer” of the self has abandoned its post to other dimensions of the self and is dragged hither and thither by them. If it is recognized at all, in our culture today the direction of the self is usually left to feelings; and the will is either identified with feelings or else regarded as helpless in the face of feelings. The cognitive aide of the mind is hijacked to renationalize it all by producing or borrowing suitable “insights,” usually lying ready to hand in surrounding culture.  David Hume’s eighteenth-century claim that “reason is and ought only to be the slave of the passions” was prophetic of a World to come—our present World—to the existence of which e significantly contributed: a World of perpetual drift in which manipulation and entanglement of the will is simply unavoidable. Purity of heart is to will one thing. #RandolphHarris 7 of 25

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Before we can come to rest in such single-mindedness as the habitual orientation of all dimensions of our being, to allow it and to sustain it, a serious battle is required. However, the call of grace and wisdom is nonetheless to “lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us, and run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus,” reports Hebrews 12.1-2. “No soldier in active service entangles oneself in the affairs of everyday life,” Paul reminded Timothy, “so that one may please the one who enlisted one as a soldier,” reports 2 Timothy 2.4. Dear Martha was “worried and bothered about so many things,” as Jesus pointed out, while only a few things are necessary, really only one, “Many has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her,” reports Luke 10.41-42. And Paul’s own testimony was that he really did only one thing, which was to “press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus,” reports Philippians 3.13-14. According to the classical principle of utility, the best actions produce the greatest amount of utility for the greatest number of individuals, and the best actions maximize the average utility which may be enjoyed by each individual. Now it is tempting to argue against the principle that it presupposed a real and equal acceptance of risk by all members of society. #RandolphHarris 8 of 25

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At some time, one wants to say, everyone must actually have agreed to take the same chances. Since clearly there was n such occasion, the principle is unsound. Consider an extreme case: when confronted by his slaves, a slaveholder, in his attempts to justify his position to them by claiming that, first of all, given the circumstances of their society, the institution of slavery is in fact necessary to produce the greatest average happiness; and secondly, that in the initial contractual situation he would choose the average principle even at the risk of its subsequently happening that he is justifiably held a slave. Now offhand we are inclined to reject the slaveholder’s argument as beside the point, if not outrageous. One may think that it makes no difference what one would choose. Unless individuals have actually agreed to a conception of justice subject to real risk, no one is bound by its requirements. On the contract view, however, the general form of the slaveholder’s argument is correct. It would be a mistake for the slaves to retort that his contentions are irrelevant since there has been no actual occasion of choice, no equal sharing of risk as to how things would turn out. #RandolphHarris 9 of 25

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The contract doctrine is purely hypothetical: if a conception of justice would be agreed to in the original position, its principles are the right ones to apply. It is no objection that such an understanding has never been nor ever will be entered into. We cannot have it both ways: we cannot interpret the theory of justice hypothetically when the appropriate occasions of consent cannot be found to explain individuals’ duties and obligations, and then insist upon real situations of risk-bearing to throw out principles of justice that we do not want. Thus in justice as fairness the way to refute the slaveholder’s argument is to show that the principle one invokes would be rejected in the original position. We have no alternative but to exploit the various aspects of this initial situation (on the favoured interpretation) to establish that the balance of reasons favours the two principles of justice. People can often say that everyone makes choices and decisions and because they have a troubled life that you should also have to suffer a life of hardships and they may manufacture a situation to make sure that you do. The issues here is, while what they are saying is true, there life turned out bad because of the probability of the choices and decisions they made. Usually people are not victims of a conspiracy. #RandolphHarris 10 of 25

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In many cases the lot of evidence shows that a particular coin is unbiased, but when a group of people plot to ruin a person and no one step in to help, even after the situations are reported, not only is that biased, but it is illegal, unconstitutional and unfair. What is distinctive about the use of the principle is that it enables one to incorporate different kinds of information within one strictly probabilistic framework and to draw inferences about probabilities even in the absence of knowledge. Prior probabilities however arrived at are part of one theory along with estimates of chances based on random sampling. The limiting case of no information does not pose a theoretical problem. As evidence accumulates the prior probabilities are revised anyway and the principle of insufficient reason at least insures that no possibilities are excluded from the outset. Now I shall assume that the parties discount likelihoods arrived at solely on the basis of this principle. This supposition is plausible in view of the fundamental importance of the original agreement and the desire to have one’s decision appear responsible to one’s descendants who will be affected by it. #RandolphHarris 11 of 25

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 We are more reluctant to take great risks for our descendants than for ourselves; and we are willing to do so only when there is no way to avoid these uncertainties of the original position. Recall that the original position is an elegant thought experiment. It asks one to imagine that they are temporarily ignorant (veil of ignorance) about certain things, including important facts about themselves, such as how well off they are especially talented, and what their core personal values—religious or otherwise—are. One is then to ask oneself: If I did not know these things, what principle of justice would I choose to regulate the basic institutions of society? To be a little more precise, we are employing a vision of the familiar idea of a social contract. The parties to the contract are choosing basic principles of justice for their society. However, they are behind what is referred to as the veil of ignorance: they do not know how well off they are especially talented, and what their core personal values are. In such a situation, given certain additional stipulations, it would be rational for the parties to choose the following two principles of justice. First, a principle that guaranteed each citizen a robust package of liberal rights to such things as freedom of conscience, freedom to vote and stand in elections, and rights to due process in law. #RandolphHarris 12 of 25

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Second, a principle that ensured fair equality of economic opportunity as well as shares of income and wealth that were maximally beneficial to people with the least amount of income and wealth. So the people in our scenario can guarantee the protection of their liberties and a reasonably satisfactory standard of life as the conditions of their society permit. In fact, it is questionable whether the choice of the average principle really offers a better prospect anyway, waiving the fact that it is based on the principle of insufficient reason. It seems, then, that the effect of the veil of ignorance is to favour the two principles. This conception of justice is better suited to the situation of complete ignorance. If they were sound, there are, to be sure, assumptions about society that would allow parities to arrive at objective estimates of equality. The idea is to formulate certain reasonable assumptions under which it would be rational for self-interested parties to agree to the standard of utility as a political principle to assess social policies. The necessity for such a principle arises because the political process is not a competitive one and these decisions cannot be left to the market. Some other method must be found to reconcile divergent interests. #RandolphHarris 13 of 25

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The principle of utility would be agreed to by self-interested parties as the desired criterion. Over the long run of many occasions, the policy of maximizing utility on each occasion is most likely to give the greatest utility for any person individually. Consistent application of this standard to taxation and property legislation, and so on, is calculated to give the best results from any one human’s point of view. Therefore by adopting this principle self-interested parties have reasonable assurance that they will not lose out in the end, in fact, will best improve their prospects. However, there are some flaws in these positions, especially the basic structure. For one, people who move from one social position to another in random fashion must live long enough for gains and losses to average out, or else there is some mechanism which insures that legislation guided by the principle of utility distributes its favours evenly over one time. However, clearly society is not a stochastic process of this type; and some questions of social policy are much more vital than others, often causing large and enduring shifts in the institutional distribution of advantage. Therefore, we must not be enticed by mathematically attractive assumptions into pretending that the contingencies of human’s social positions and the asymmetries of their situations somehow even out in the end. #RandolphHarris 14 of 25

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Rather, we must choose our conceptions of justice fully recognizing that this is not and cannot be the case. From our point of view it is often easy enough to appraise another individual’s situation as specified say by one’s social position, wealth, and the like, or by one’s prospects in terms of primary goods. We put ourselves in one’s shoes, complete with our character and preferences (not the individual’s), and take account of how our plans would be affected. We can go much further. We can assess the worth to us being in another’s place with at least some of one’s traits and aims. Knowing our plan of life, we can decide whether it would be rational for us to have those traits and aims, and therefore advisable for us to develop and encourage them if we can. It suffices to observe here that what we cannot do is to evaluate another person’s total circumstances, one’s objective situation plus one’s character and system of ends, without any reference to the details of our conception of our good. If we are to judge these things from our standpoint at all, we must know what our plan of life is. The worth to us of the circumstances of others is not, as the constructed expectation assumes, its value them. #RandolphHarris 15 of 25

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Furthermore, as we have seen, the clearest basis for interpersonal comparisons is in terms of primary goods, things that every rational person is presumed to want whatever else one wants. The more we ascend to the higher aims and aspects of the person and try to assess their worth to us, the more tenuous the procedure becomes. The reason for this is that these evaluations contemplate more fundamental changes in our way of life, more far-reaching revisions in our plans. Indeed, it seems pointless to try to define a measure between persons which includes the full range of final ends. The problem is similar to comparing different styles of art. There are simply many things in which human beings become engaged and find fully worthwhile depending upon their inclinations. The expectation finally arrived at in the reasoning for the average principle seems spurious for two reasons: it is not, as expectations should be, founded on one system of aims; and since the veil of ignorance excludes the knowledge of the parties’ conception of their good, the worth to a person of the circumstances of others simply cannot be assessed. The argument ends up with a purely formal expression for an expectation that is without meaning. #RandolphHarris 16 of 25

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This difficult about expectations is analogous to that concerning the knowledge of probabilities. In both instances the reasoning carries on with these notions aster the basis for their legitimate use has been ruled out by the conditions of the original position. Anger at the absence of an attachment figure is not like the anger that is felt when an instinctual drive is frustrated (unless we take attachment to be the frustrated instinct) and it is not like the anger felt during an experience of deprivation or persecution—two frequent sources of anger mentioned in psycho-analytic literature. Whenever separation is only temporary, which in the large majority of cases it is, anger has two functions: first, it may assist in overcoming such obstacles as there may be to reunion; second, it may discourage the loved person from going away again. This is coercive anger, and is thought of as the anger of hope. Angry coercive behaviour, acting in the service of an affectional bond, is not uncommon. It is seen when a mother, whose child has run foolishly across the road, berated and punishes it with an anger born of fear. It is seen whenever one berates one’s partner for being or seeming to be disloyal. #RandolphHarris 17 of 25

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Dysfunctional anger, on the other hand, occurs whenever a person becomes so intensely or persistently angry that the bond of affection is weakened instead of strengthened. Clinical experience suggests that the situations of separation and loss with which this work is concerned are especially liable to result in anger that crosses the threshold of intensity and becomes dysfunctional. Separations, especially when prolonged or repeated, have a double effect. On the one hand, anger is aroused; on the other, love is attenuated. Thus not only many angry discontented behaviour alienate the attachment figure but, within the attached, a shift can occur in the balance of feeling. Instead of a strongly rooted affection laced occasionally with “hot displeasure,” such as develops in a child brough up by affectionate parents, there grows a deep-running resentment, held in check only partially by an anxious uncertain affection. “And now it came to pass that when Jesus had told these things he expounded them unto the multitude; and he did expound all things unto them, both great and small. And he saith: These scriptures, which ye had not with you, the Father commanded that I should give unto you; for it was wisdom in him that they should be given unto future generations. #RandolphHarris 18 of 25

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“And he did expound all things, even from the beginning until time that he should come in his glory—yea, even all things which should come upon the face of the Earth, even until the elements should melt with fervent heat, and the Earth should be wrapt together as a scroll, and the Heavens and the Earth should pass away; and even unto the great and last day, when all people, and all kindreds, and all nations and tongues shall stand before God, to be judged of their works, whether they be good or whether they be evil—if they be good, to the resurrection of everlasting life; and if they be evil, to the resurrection of damnation; being on a parallel, the one on the one hand and the other on the other hand, according to the mercy, and the justice, and the holiness which is in Christ, who was before the World began. And now cannot be written in this book even a hundredth part of the things which Jesus did truly teach unto the people; however, behold the plated of Nephi do contain the more part of the things which he taught the people. And thee things have I written, which he taught the people; and I have written them to the intent that they may be brought again unto this people, from the Gentiles, according to the words which Jesus hath spoken. #RandolphHarris 19 of 25

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“And when they shall have received this, which is expedient that they should have first, to try their faith, and if it shall so be that they shall believe thee things then shall the greater things be made manifest unto them. And if it is so be that they will not believe these things, then shall the greater things be made manifest unto them. And if it so be that they will not believe these things, then shall the greater things be withheld from them, unto their condemnation. Behold, I was about to write them, all which were engraven upon the plates of Nephi, but the Lord forbade it, saying: I will try the faith of my people. Therefore I, Mormon, do write the things which have been commanded me of the Lord. And now I, Mormon, make an end of my sayings, and proceed to write the things which have been commanded me. Therefore, I would that ye should behold that the Lord truly did teach the people, for the space of three days; and after that he did show himself unto them oft, and did break bread oft, and bless it, and give it unto them. And it came to pass that he did teach and minister unto the children and multitude of whom hath been spoken, and he did loose their tongues, and they did speak unto their fathers great and marvelous things, even greater than he had revealed unto the people; and he loosed their tongues that they could utter. #RandolphHarris 20 of 25

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“And it came to pass that after he had ascended into Heaven—the second time that he showed himself unto them, and had gone unto the Father, after having healed all their sick, and their lame, and opened the eyes of their blind and unstopped the ears of the deaf, and even had done all manner of cures among them, and raised a man from the dead, and had shown forth his power unto them, and had ascended unto the Father—behold, it came to pass on the morrow that the multitude gathered themselves together, and they both saw and heard these children; yea, even babes did open their mouths and utter marvelous things; and the things which they did utter were forbidden that there should not any human write them. And it came to pass that the disciples whom Jesus had chosen began from that time forth to baptize and to teach as many as did come unto them; and as many as were baptized in the name of Jesus were filled with the Holy Ghost. And many of them saw and heard unspeakable things, which are not lawful to be written. #RandolphHarris 21 of 25

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“And they taught, and did minister one to another; and they had all things common among them, every human dealing justly, one with another. And it came to pass that they do all things even as Jesus had commanded them. And they who were baptized in the name of Jesus were called the church of Christ,” reports 3 Nephi 26.1-21. If one can look back and reflect that a hundred people have firmly grounded their minds in truth and planted their feet on the road to eternal liberation through the word done by this transitory body, one will count the years gloriously spent. For those who welcome the Truth-bringer must needs be few, those who want the truth must be fewer still, and of these again those who can endure it when brought face to face with it are rare. The sages of old deliberately restricted the public from their full knowledge so that their immediate following was always numerically insignificant. Yet the paradox was that they excised an indirect influence disproportion to their small numbers. This was achieved by a concentrating their tuition on humans in positions of high authority or leadership, and establishing popular religions and cults suited to the capacity of the multitude. #RandolphHarris 22 of 25

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For a religious leader to try to convince others of the truth would require that they are seeking the truth. However, how many are consciously and deliberately doing so? Falsity is not to be sought in the senses except as truth is in them. Now truth is not in them in such a way that the senses know truth, but in so far as they apprehend sensible things truly.  And this takes place through the senses apprehending things as they are, and hence it happens that falsity exists in the sense through their apprehending or judging things to be otherwise. The knowledge of things by the senses is in proportion to the existence of their likeness in the senses; and the likeness of a thing can exist in the senses in three ways. In the first way, primarily and of its own nature, as in sight there is the likeness of colours, and of other sensible objects proper to it. Secondly, of its own nature, though not primarily; as in sight there is the likeness of shape, size, and of other sensible objects common to more than one sense. Thirdly, neither primarily nor of its own nature, but accidentally, as in sight, there is the likeness of a human, not as a human, but in so far as it is accidental to the coloured object to be a human. #RandolphHarris 23 of 25

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Sense, then, as no false knowledge about its proper objects, expect accidentally and rarely, and then, because of the unsound organ it does receive the sensible form rightly; just as other passive subjects because of their indisposition receive defectively the impressions of the agent. Hence, for instance, it happens that on account of an unhealthy tongue sweet seems bitter to a sick person. However, as to common objects of sense, and accidental objects, even a rightly disposed sense may have a false judgment, because it is referred to them not directly, but accidentally, or as a consequence of being directed to other things. Our Holy King lowers Himself to bed to rest for tomorrow’s travel. I, too, will soon go to my bed, resting with the dreams of the Holy Ones send. Eternal God, who sendest consolation unto all sorrowing hearts, we turn to Thee for solace in this, our trying hour. Though bowed in grief at the passing of our loved ones, we affirm our faith in Thee, our Father, who art just and merciful, who healest broken hearts and art ever near to those who are afflicted. #RandolphHarris 24 of 25

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Israel’s hope for Thy true kingdom here on Earth, impel us to help speed that day when peace shall be established through justice, and all humans recognize their brotherhood in Thee. With trust in Thy great goodness, we who mourn, rise to sanctify Thy name. Life is good and life’s tasks must be performed. Help us, O Lord, to rise above our sorrow and face the trials of life with courage in our hearts. Please give us insight in this hour of grief, that from the depths of suffering may come a deepened sympathy for all who are bereaved, that we may feel the heartbreak of our fellow beings and find our strength in helping them. Heartened by this hymn of praise to Thee, we bear our sorrow with trustful hearts, and knowing Thou art near, shall not despair. With faith in Thine eternal wisdom, we who mourn, rise to sanctify Thy name. As around our home the darkness grows, I light the evening lights. As the daytime spirits depart, I say my goodbyes: you will stay in our hearts the whole night through. As the nighttime spirits gather about, I give greetings to them: may these lights honour you who come with the darkness. Where there is shadow, there is light. #RandolphHarris 25 of 25

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The Learner Has the Need and the Capacity to Assume Responsibility for One’s Own Continuing Learning!

The system has not failed—but some of us have failed the system. Do not become the problems instead of the solution to the problem. Recent insights from the behavioral sciences have expanded our conceptions of human potential through a re-casting of the image of the human—from passive, reactive recipient to an active, seeking, autonomous, and reflective being. What are the implications of this impelling new image for our concern with human the learner? Educators are giving increased attention to implementing in practice the recognition that the learner has both the capacity and the need to assume responsibility for one’s continuing learning. However, the real question is here is what do humans learn and for whom? Learning is not a task; it is a way to be in the World. Humans learn as they purse their goals and projects that have meaning for them. Humans are always learning something. Perhaps the key to the problem of independent learning lies in the phrase, “The learner has the need and the capacity to assume responsibility for one’s own continuing learning.” That is one phrase that will help wide unclasp the table of their thoughts. These same thoughts—people, the little World. #RandolphHarris 1 of 22

It may well be that those who train young people in the ways of their group (a most necessary task) have overshot the mark; they have trained youngster to believe that they cannot, dare not, learn anything without a trainer close at hand. The only safe and good learning is learning-for-the trainer. And the youngsters, being human, independently learned something meaningful to them; namely, that it is dangerous or futile to become interested in something, to learn for oneself. It is only safe to learn for the teacher’s or for society’s approval. One set of image-molders, the teachers, have been commissioned by social leaders to shape youngsters to the acquiescent mode. They implement this commission by invalidating a child’s experience of spontaneous curiosity and fascination with aspects of the World. They insist one learn only when and what one is taught. One must learn for others. The teachers and parents have robbed children of their autonomy—their capacity to experience amazement, wonder, and fascination—by invalidating it whenever it appears. Then, they look at their product and find it wanting; they produced a Golem, a humanoid, a “dependent learning.” Now we are asked to breathe life into it. #RandolphHarris 2 of 22

We are caught on the horns of a dilemma. Children must be shown the ways of their group; they must be taught and trained. However, if they are to experience their lives as meaningful, and if the society in which they live is to grow and change, they must also be able to transcend this training and learn for themselves. The question is, how is it possible to reconcile the contradiction between teaching children for society and letting them learn for themselves, such that children can serve their society without a loss of freedom and capacity to go beyond what they have been taught? This is the same problem, write large, that every serious teacher—of piano, of art, of math, or English, of Science, of History, of woodshop, of psychotherapy, or even of teaching—faces: how can one teach a pupil in the fundamental techniques of this art without producing a mere technician? In any of these arts, we wish the learner to commit oneself, to be willing to struggle for objectives beyond mastery of exercises and technique (learning experienced as “for-the-teacher”) and even beyond current goals. We hope one will week to make actual one’s own image (not one’s teacher’s image) of beautiful music, pictures, woodworks, healthy personalities, or independent learners. #RandolphHarris 3 of 22

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If the teacher has been effective, one will have shown one’s pupil that techniques are no more than a beginner’s set of tools, to be used up to the point that an impasse is reached. Then, the trust scholar, the involved therapist, the committed teacher (committed to one’s own image of ultimate goals, not means), gropes and leaps into the unknown, exercising that courage that is not devoid of fear and trembling, to invent or discover new means to further one’s project of actualizing the image. If the old versions of the ultimate goals have lost meaning, the pupil will envision new embodiments of them. Your must play the teacher to yourself. One cannot tread the path for you: you must walk and work by your own effort. The mother cannot grow up on behalf of the child, no matter how greatly she loves it. The adept cannot do your growing-up for you. Nature’s laws must prevail. One has shown you the way; use your will to follow it. However, devote a little time each day to keeping open the channel of communication with your teacher and thus receive one’s impetus, one’s inspiration to help you. So although you must strive by your own use of free will, do not imagine that you need to strive unassisted. #RandolphHarris 4 of 22

Working along the line that the teacher found suitable for oneself, slavishly and artificially trying to produce a copy of one, will in the end not even produce that but a caricature instead. For only the teacher’s bodily acts will be imitated; one’s Spirit is invisible and therefore cannot be imitated. Why should anyone copy another’s artwork? Why should Whistler paint pictures in the same way that Gainsborough did? Whistler remained loyal to one’s own conceptions. Why then, going further, copy another’s lifestyle? We may honour a master’s inspirations but yet express our own in our individual way. It is true that followers have no right to burden the teacher with their personal problems, that they should learn bravely to shoulder their difficulties and not pass them on to one. Yet human nature is weak, the teacher kindly. What they may do without taxing one’s strength is to place the problem before one in prayer, thought, or meditation silently, and nor in letter or interview. If they will keep their distresses, troubles, or indecisions to themselves in this way, such reticence will not be to their loss. When an aspirant plagues a teacher too frequently or on too trivial matters, it is indeed a sign of neuroticism. Such conduct is quite suited to children but not to adults. #RandolphHarris 5 of 22

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Every person must come to terms with who they are now. It reveals too egocentric a person, one who is unwilling to bring the stage of novice to an end because the dependence on another person is more comforting and much easier than endeavouring to settle one’s own little problems. One must learn to speak, move, and even experience the World in the given ways, those deemed right and sane where one lives. It is not easy. It takes a long time. The temptation to stary is strong. Commissars stand close, to insure each person conforms to one’s prescribed position and role. Once a human masters the rules of the social “games,” what then? One plays the games so long as they yield meaningful rewards and the rewards of meaning. Ultimately, the games become confining, boring, even strangling. The person may then wish to opt out, but one cannot—there re no other games to play. So one may become sick. Then, one is patched up by doctors who pronounce one healed, and they send one back into the game. If one seeks to transcend the given, for new realms of experience, one threatens the sleep of the unawakened. They condemn and invalidate one. So one gives up and becomes “normal,” or else seeks a richer experience in private, the while impersonating a typical person. #RandolphHarris 6 of 22

It should be made clear that dramatic and directive dominance are dramaturgical terms and that performers wo have positions of visible leadership are often merely figureheads, selected as a compromise, or as a way of neutralizing a potentially threatening position, or as a way of strategically concealing the power behind the front and hence the power behind the power behind the front. So also, whenever inexperienced or temporary incumbents are given formal authority over experienced subordinates, we often find that the formally empowered person is bribed with a part that has dramatic dominance while the subordinates tend to direct the show. Since we all participate on teams we must all carry within ourselves something of the sweet guilt of conspirators. And since each team is engaged in maintaining the stability of some definitions of the situation, concealing or playing down certain facts in order to do this, we can expect the performer to live out one’s conspiratorial career in some furtiveness. A basic problem for many performances, then, is that of information control; the audience must not acquire destructive information about the situation that is being defined for them. In other words, a term must be able to keep its secrets and have its secrets kept. #RandolphHarris 7 of 22

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There are what are sometimes called “dark” secrets. These consist of facts about a team which it knows and conceals and which are incompatible with the image of self that the team attempts to maintain before its audience. Dark secrets are, of course, double secrets: one is the crucial fact that is hidden and another is the fact that crucial facts have not been openly admitted. There are also what might be called “strategic” secrets. These pertain to intentions and capacities of a team which it conceals from its audience in order to prevent them from adapting effectively to the state of affairs the team is planning to being about. Strategic secrets are the ones that businesses and armies employ in designing future actions against the opposition. So long as a team makes no pretense of being the sort of team that does not have strategic secrets, its strategic secrets need not be dark ones. Yet it is to be noted that even when the strategic secrets of a team are not dark ones, still the disclosure or discovery of such secrets disrupts the team’s performance, for suddenly and unexpectedly the team finds it useless and foolish to maintain the care, reticence, and studied ambiguity of action that was required prior to loss of its secrets. #RandolphHarris 8 of 22

 It may be added that secrets that are merely strategic tend to be ones which the team eventually discloses, performance, when action based upon secret preparations is consummated, whereas an effort may be made to keep dark secrets secret forever. It may also be added that information is often held back not because of its known strategic importance but because it is felt that it may someday acquire such importance. Thirdly, there are what might be called “inside” secrets. These are ones whose possession marks an individual as being a member of a group and help the group feel separate and different from those individuals who are not in the know. Inside secrets give objective intellectual content to subjectively felt social distance. Almost all information in a social establishment has something of the exclusion function and may be seen as none of somebody’s business. Inside secrets may have little strategic importance and may not be very dark. When this is the case, such secrets may be discovered or accidentally disclosed without radically disrupting the team performance; the performance need only shift their secret delight to another matter. Of course, secret that are strategic and/or dark serve extremely well as inside secrets and we find, in fact, that the strategic and dark character of secrets is often exaggerated for this reason. #RandolphHarris 9 of 22

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Interestingly enough, the leaders of a social group are sometimes faced with a dilemma regarding important strategic secrets. Those in the group who are not brought in on the secret will feel excluded and affronted when the secret finally comes to light; on the other hand, the greater the number of persons who are brought in on the secret, the greater the likelihood of intentional or unintentional disclosure. The knowledge that one team can have of another’s secrets provides us with two other types of secrets. First, there re what might be called “entrusted” secrets This is the kind which the possessor is obliged to keep because of one’s relation to the team to which the secret refers. If an individual who is entrusted with a secret is to be the person one claims one is, one must keep the secret, even thought it is not a secret about oneself. Thus, for example, when a lawyer discloses the improprieties of one’s clients, two quite different performances are threatened: the client’s show of innocence to the court, and the lawyer’s show of trustworthiness to one’s client. It may also be noted that a team’s strategic secrets, whether dark or not, are likely to be the entrusted secrets of the individual members of the team, for each member of the team is likely to present oneself to one’s teammates as someone who is loyal to them. #RandolphHarris 10 of 22

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Since time immemorial, each society had secretly harbored “gurus.” These wise humans have been sought by sufferers, who may have been rich in goods but poor in spirit. The gurus have taught the seekers to let go their attachments in this World, the better to concentrate on spiritual purification. The intimated rewards have not been wealth, fame, or power; but rather enlightenment and liberation, an enriched, more meaningful experience of oneself and one’s World. The gurus have helped seekers attain liberation from entrapment in the culture. They have invited the experience and disclosure of individuality that had hitherto been concealed under the trappings of conformity to roles. The society that would not fall must locate and treasure its gurus, protect them, and not deny seekers access to them. The gurus and their ways are not for everyone. Gurus cannot be hired or bought; they can only be deserved! A society without gurus is stagnant, and will perish as did the dinosaurs, unable to change ways to cope with changing conditions. In the New World, I think we are experiencing an absence in our midst, an absence of gurus. We have myriad commissars, but no one to lead beyond their ways. #RandolphHarris 11 of 22

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 The commissars insure that everyone conforms to existing ways, to the image of humans that is current, that is synonymous with goodness and sanity. Commissars use bribery, guile, and threats of force to get people to follow their prescribed ways, the ways that keep the society and its existing power-structure intact. Who are the commissar? Most of our teacher are commissars. So are our parents. And law enforcement, judges, lawyers, congress, our psychiatrist and psychologist, and even our neighbours. Radio, TV, and the press function as commissars. All commissars collude with oner another to keep us wanting what we are supposed to want and doing what we are supposed to do. Conform, and be reward. However, we are discovering, we who have graduated from such institutes, that something is missing. The something was ourselves. Somewhere along the line, we have lost ourselves, our capacity to experience in new modes and qualities. If we are at all sensitive, we notice the absence and become concerned. We state to seek ourselves and our lost capacity for experiencing. I hope we find it. Our nation will sit stunned, the people having forgotten how to live for themselves, otherwise. #RandolphHarris 12 of 22

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If we do not get in touch with reality, people will know only how to live for the system of things. An era will have ended. Then, it will be the turn of the Asiatics and Africans to follow the American Way, until they too reach the end of their tether. Finally, people of Marts will land on Earth and have their turn. When you lose yourself your own experiences and their meanings are being denied, and you are developing a self that is different from your real experience self, which may be becoming increasingly unknow to you. Because so many people accept other’s meanings as their own experience, they will come to distrust their own organismic experience. As one beings to distrust more and more of one’s own experience, one’s sense of self-worth will steadily decline until one has very little use for one’s own experience or one’s self. Of course things will be well for those you are trying to please. This pseudoself is just what they want. It is only within oneself, at some deep and unknown level, that there is a vague uneasiness. When a person denies awareness to all of one’s own experiencing—one will get to a pint where one no longer really has a self and is trying to be a self wanted by someone else. Next, rebellion happens. #RandolphHarris 13 of 22

One can only attribute this rebellion to the actualizing tendency that has been suppressed for so long but that finally asserts itself. However, often times, because one has distrusted one’s own experience for such a long period and because the self by which one is living is so sharply different from the experiences of one’s organism, one cannot reconstruct one’s true self without help. When there is such a great discrepancy, the need for help often exists. In contrast, however, when people have spent years and even decades trying to socially engineer you, and you do not adhere to their values, even though they do not know you, they will think you are acting weird because their sick and twisted and sadistic methods are not working on you. When people reclaim the value of their experience, they are the ones who decides what matters to them and how they want to live. The center of the valuing process, and the evidence is provided by one’s own sense. What is right for someone who is trying to indoctrinate and corrupt you, may not be what is right for you. One may have started off at a young age knowing the love of God and who one wants to be. Society may call a given experience bad, but when one trusts one’s own valuing of it, one will find that following the path to truth and the love of God is significant and worthwhile. #RandolphHarris 14 of 22

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 When denied experience comes close to awareness, anxiety always results because these previously unadmitted experiences will have meanings that will change the structure of the self by which one as been living. Any drastic change in the self-concept is always a threatening and frightening experience. One may be dimly aware of this threat even though one does not yet know what would emerge. When the denied experienced break through the dam, they turn out to be hurts and angers that one has been completely unaware of. It is impossible for people to realize how completely an experience can be shut out of awareness until it does break through into awareness. Every individual is able to shut out and deny those experiences that will endanger one’s self concept. When the self-concept is so sharply changed that parts of it are completely shattered, it is a very frightening experience, and it is accurate to feel like an alien has take over you. That is why the law allows for mental competence to be called into question when some people are accused of crimes, for they may have been manipulated since they were too young to think for themselves and unaware of what they are doing is wrong. #RandolphHarris 15 of 22

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So, the system wants to give people who are victims of crimes, who have gone on to commit crimes, an opportunity for repentance and the chance to live a life as themselves, instead of being condemned for having been brainwashed. Some will realize that they are the alien because the submissive, malleable self by which they have been living, the self that has been guided by the statements, attitudes, and expectations of others, is no longer theirs. The new self that had seemed so alien is more than likely one that had experienced hurt and anger and feelings that society regards as bad, as well as wild hallucinatory thoughts—and love. As one goes further into self-discovery, it is likely that one will find out that some of one’s anger is directed against one’s parents. The hurts will have come from various sources; some of the feelings and experiences that society regards as bad but that one finds good and satisfying are experiences and feelings that probably have to do with pleasures of the flesh. Sometimes one has to let their experiences tell them what they mean instead of trying to impose a meaning on them. The more the individual’s self-concept is rooted in the spontaneously felt meanings of one’s experiencing, the more one is an integrated person. People who are learning to self-actualize will enjoy meet and making friend with their thoughts and feelings. #RandolphHarris 16 of 22

Here is the dawning of the self-respect and self-acceptance of which one has been deprived for so long. One will even feel an affection for oneself. One of the curious but common side effects of this change is that now one will be able to give oneself more freely to others, to enjoy others more, to be more genuinely interested in them. As one becomes more expressive of one’s love one can also be more expressive of one’s anger and hurt, one’s likes and dislikes, and one’s “wild” thoughts and feelings (which will turn out to be creative impulses). One is in the process of changing from psychological maladjustment to a much healthier relationship to others and to reality. There is a peaceful harmony in being a whole person, but one will be mistaken if one thinks this reaction is permanent. Instead, if one is really open to one’s experience, one will find other hidden aspects of oneself that one has denied to awareness, and each such discovery will give one uneasy and anxious moments or days until it is assimilated into a revised and changing picture of oneself. One will discover that growing toward a congruence between one’s experiencing organism and one’s concept of oneself is an exciting, sometime disturbing, but neverending adventure. #RandolphHarris 17 of 22

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“And now behold, there was not a living soul among all the people of the Nephites who did doubt in the least the words of all the holy prophets who had spoken; for they knew that it must needs be that they must be fulfilled. And they knew that it must be expedient that Christ had come, because of the many signs which had been given, according to the words of the prophets; and because of the things which had come to pass already they knew that it must needs be that all things should come to pass according to that which had been spoken. Therefore they did forsake all their sins, and their abominations, and their whoredoms, and did sever God with all diligence day and night. And now it came to pass that when they had taken all the robbers prisoners, insomuch that none did escape wo were not slain, they did cast their prisoners into prison, and did cause the word of God to be preached unto them; ad as many as would repent of their sins and enter into a covenant that they would murder no more were set at liberty. However, as many as there were who did not enter into a covenant, and who did still continue to have those secret murders in their hearts, yea, as many as were found breathing out threatenings against their brethren were condemned and punished according to the law. #RandolphHarris 18 of 22

“And thus they did put an end to all those wicked, and secret, and abominable combinations, in the which there was so much wickedness, and so many murders committed. And thus had the twenty and second year passed away, and the twenty and third year also, and they twenty and forth, and the twenty and fifth; and thus had twenty and five years passed away. And these had many things transpired which, in the eyes of some, would be great and marvelous; nevertheless, they cannot all be written in this book; yea, this book cannot contain even a hundredth part of what was done among so many people in the space of twenty and five years; but behold there are records which do contain all the proceedings of this people; and a shorter but true account was given by Nephi. Therefore I have made my record of these things according to the record of Nephi, which was engraven on the plates which were called the plates of Nephi. And behold, I do make the record on plates which I have made with mine own hands. And behold, I am called Mormon, being called after the land of Mormon, the land in which Alma did establish the church among the people, yea, the first church which was established among them after their transgression. #RandolphHarris 19 of 22

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“Behold, I am a disciple of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. I have been called of him to declare his work among his people, that they might have everlasting life. And it hath become expedient that I, according to the will of God, that the prayers of those who have gone hence, who were the holy ones, should be filled according to their faith, should make a record of these things which have been done—yea, a small record of that which hath taken place from the time that Lehi left Jerusalem, even down until the present time. Therefore I do make my record from the accounts which have been given by those who were before me, until the commencement of my day; and then I do make record of the things which I have seen with mine own eyes. And I know the record which I make to be a just and a true record; nevertheless here are many things which, according to our language, we are not able to write. And now I make an end of my saying, which is of myself, an proceed to give my account of the things which have been before me. I am Mormon, and a pure descendant of Lehi. I have reason to bless my God and my Saviour Jesus Christ, that he brought our fathers out of the land of Jerusalem, (and no one knew it save it were himself and those whom he brought out of that land) and that he hath given me and my people so much knowledge unto the salvation of our souls. #RandolphHarris 20 of 22

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“Surely he hath blessed the house of Jacob, and hat been merciful unto the seed of Joseph. And insomuch as the children of Lehi have kept his commandments he hath blessed them and prospered them according to his word. Yea, and surely shall be again bring a remnant of the seed of Joseph to the knowledge of the Lord their God. And as surely as the Lord liveth, will he gather in from the four quarters of the Earth all the remnants of the seed of Jacob, who are scattered abroad upon all the face of the Earth. And as he hath covenanted with all the house of Jacob, even so shall the covenant wherewith he hath covenanted with the house of Jacob be fulfilled in one’s own due time, unto the restoring all the house of Jacob unto the knowledge of the covenant that he hath covenanted with them. And then shall they know their Redeemer, who is Jesus Christ, the Son of God; and then shall they be gathered in from the four quarters of the Earth unto their own lands, from whence they have been dispersed; yea, as the Lord liveth so shall it be. Amen,” reports 3 Nephi 5.1-26. We adore Thee, Blessed Jesus very God and very Man, the Same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever, our strong Salvation and our only Hope. #RandolphHarris 21 of 22

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Please take us, we pray Thee, into Thy keeping, both now and at the hour of our death; please make us faithful to Thee upon Earth, and blessed with Thee in Heaven, where the Father, Who raises in glory the World, piercer of darkness, illuminates our path as we go through our days. God, pleased continue to illuminate or paths as we go through life. O God, Who hast brought us near to an innumerable company Angels, and to the spirits of just human made perfect; please grant us during our pilgrimage to abide in their fellowship, and in our Country to become partakers of their joy; through Jesus Christ our Lord. I pray Thee, good Lord Jesus, by the love which Thou hadst for him that lay on Thy heart, to make me thankful for all that Thou hast given men in this World and to bless this planet exceedingly abundantly, above all that I can ask or think. Please help us to love each other in Thee and for Thee, to be one in heart through all separations, and to talk as friends in the path of Thy service; and finally unite us for ever at Thy feet, where peace and love are perfect and immortal, and Thou with the Father Who is turning the World towards Him, as He has turned it since its very beginning, in infinite longing, in infinite love. And I, a child of Earth, take the Lord as my exemplar, and hold my heart out to Hum in the dawn. #RandolphHarris 22 of 22

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