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Friday 30 March 2018

Quotes 31 Mar 18

“Better to be a child of God in poverty than a child of Satan in riches.” -@SpurgeonMBTS

He that gets and keeps the mastery of his passions
is better than the mighty, better than he that by
a long siege takes a city or by a long war
subdues a country.
Behold, a greater than Alexander or Caesar is here.
The conquest of ourselves, and our own unruly
passions, requires more true wisdom, and a more
steady, constant, and regular management, than the
obtaining of a victory over the forces of an enemy.
--Matthew Henry (1662-1714)
      _Commentary On The Whole Bible_ [1981], "Proverbs 16:32"
       http://www.biblegateway.com/resources/matthew-henry/Prov.16.32

Strive for perfection in everything. Take the best that exists and make it better. If it doesn't exist, create it. Accept nothing nearly right or good enough- Henry Royce

Prayer is nothing else but a pleading of God's promises. -Stephen Charnock

‘Of all people who engage in controversy, we, who are called Calvinists, are most expressly bound by our own principles to the exercise of gentleness and moderation.’- John Newton anticipating Social Media

Quotes 30 Mar 18

Invest in the human soul.  Who knows?  It might be a diamond in the rough.-Mary McLeod Bethune (1875-1955)

No kind action ever stops with itself. One kind action leads to another. Good example is followed. A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions, and the roots spring up and make new trees.The greatest work that kindness does to others is that it makes them kind themselves.--Amelia Earhart (1897-1937)

If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain. --Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

Whatever 'call' a man may pretend to have, if he has not been called to holiness, he certainly has not been called to ministry~ Spurgeon

Grace is the seed of glory, the dawning of glory in the heart, and therefore grace is the earnest of the future inheritance.-Jonathan Edwards@Heart_Aflame

Wednesday 28 March 2018

Quotes 29 Mar 18

Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen
and thinking what nobody has thought.
     --Albert Szent-Gyorgyi von Nagyrapolt (1893-1986)
       (As quoted in I.J. Good's _The Scientist Speculates_ [1962])

People say, how can I help on this war against
terror?  How can I fight evil?  You can do so by
mentoring a child; by going into a shut-in's house
and say "I love you."
     --George Walker Bush (1946-    )
      (Speech in Washington, D.C. on September 19, 2002.)

The impersonal hand of government can never replace the helping hand of
a neighbor.-Hubert H. Humphrey (1911-1978)

Each man takes care that his neighbour shall not cheat him. But a day
comes when he begins to care that he does not cheat his neighbour. Then
all goes well - he has changed his market-cart into a chariot of the
sun. --Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)

Sometimes when we are generous in small, barely detectable ways it can
change someone else's life forever.--Margaret Cho 1968-

Quotes 28 Mar 18

Children are ones greatest happiness but often still greater misery A man of science ought to have none perhaps not a wife so then there would be nothing in this whole world worth caring for and a man might (whether he could is another question) work away like the Trojan - Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson 268

To disbelieve is easy; to scoff is simple; to have faith is harder. --Louis L'Amour, _To the Far Blue Mountains_

One thing I know, that I am in the hands of my father in heaven, who is all love to me —  not for what I am in myself, but for the beauty he sees in Immanuel.—Robert Murray M'Cheyne

Whether God come to His children with a rod or a crown, if He come Himself with it, it is well. ~ Samuel Rutherford

The sense of God's free, covenant, everlasting love keeps my heart happy and makes walking with Him my delight~William Romaine.

Monday 26 March 2018

Quotes 27 Mar 18

Prayer is ‘sending God a knee-mail,’-Babylon Bee

‘1 cross + 3 nails = 4given’-Babylon Bee

‘Boaz was a Ruthless man before he got married’-Babylon Bee

Eugenics was the natural consequence of Darwin's Malthuisianism. Sterilisation programs, state encouraged prostitution, contraception and abortion were the logical rational measures by which to fulfil his idea of society - Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson 

Whatever a man does leaves a trail behind, and in his passing he leaves indications of the manner of man he is, of his character, and even something of his plans. It requires onlythe observant and understanding eye to read what the trail can show. Nor does any person stand completely alone in this world, for when he passes he brushes, perhaps ever so slightly, upon others, and each is never quite the same thereafter. -- Louis L'Amour, _High Lonesome_ 

Quotes 26 Mar 18

 ‘Son screen prevents sin burn,’ - Babylon Bee

Sidney Webb for instance, one of the leading leftist social engineers of his generation, founding father of the New Statesman and Nation and the London School of Economics and one of those who drafted the Constitution of the Labour Part, feared  that Britain was gradually falling to the Irish and the Jews - Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson Page 316

"Have you not had better visions of Jesus, when you have been racked with pain, than when you have been elevated by prosperity?”- Spurgeon Library@SpurgeonMBTS

Power not only corrupts he who wields the power but those who submit to it. Those who grovel at the feet of power betray their fellows to hide themselves behind the cloak of submission. It is an evil thing. -- Louis L'Amour, _The Haunted Mesa_ 

“Everybody can be great...because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.”― Martin Luther King Jr.

Friday 23 March 2018

Quotes 24 Mar 18

Science has nothing to do with Christ. For myself I do not believe that there ever has been any revelation. - Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson page 320

Let no man boast himself that he has got through the
perils of winter till at least the seventh of May.
     --Anthony Trollope (1815-1882)
      _Doctor Thorne_ [1858], Chapter 47

If we had no Winter, the Spring would not be so pleasant;
if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity
would not be so welcomed.
     --Anne Bradstreet (1612-1672)
      _Meditations Divine and Moral_ [1664]

There are only two emotions in a plane: boredom and terror.
     --Orson Welles (1915-1985)
      _The Times_ [May 6, 1985]

There are no atheists on turbulent airplanes.
     --Erica Jong (1942-    )
      (In Tracy Quinn's _Quotable Women of the
       Twentieth Century_ [1999], "Belief")

Thursday 22 March 2018

Quotes 23 Mar 18

Karl Marx sent Darwin  a copy of the second German edition of Das Kapital in 1873 Darwin thanked him politely for it Though our studies have been so different I believe that we both earnestly desire the extension of knowledge and that this in the long run sure to add to the happiness of mankind Janet Brown pointed out that Marx's book was still on the shelf at down house but that the pages had not been cut.- Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson Page 328

A field that has rested gives a bountiful crop.  --Ovid (43 BC - 18 AD)

The first day of Spring is one thing, and the first spring
day is another.  The difference between them is
sometimes as great as a month.  --Henry Van Dyke (1852-1933)

Treat spring just as you would a friend you have not learned to trust.--E.W. Howe

Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection
not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime.
     --Martin Luther (1483-1546)

Wednesday 21 March 2018

Quotes 22 Mar 18

Just as Darwin discovered the law of evolution in human nature so Marx discovered the law law of evolution in human history - Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson Page 328 (the two most disastrous errors in recent history IMO_ GJW)

The total meaning of Christianity was and is that the God who made earth and its creatures took at a certain time upon the earth the flesh and form of man.-John Ruskin quoted in Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson Page 329

The church is like Noah's ark. The stench inside would be intolerable were it not for the storm outside. - Chuck Colson.

I’m not suffering from anything that a good resurrection can’t fix. - D. A. Carson

Sample the best of Irish cuisine at Cork's English market. - Air Lingus advert on Classic Fm

Tuesday 20 March 2018

Quotes 21 Mar 18

The entire structure of Pauline theology has had its foundation undermined by Darwinian science.The first man having been politely removed there is no longer any logical justification according to this theology for the second man. - George John Romaine  quoted  in  Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson p334

Marriage is not socially defined but divinely designed. Therefore, it’s true meaning will stand when society crumbles (Rev. 19:9). And a marriage where a husband loves his wife like this is a little bit of heaven on earth. Gavin Peacock

Opponents of Christianity will believe anything except Christianity.- G. K. Chesterton

  An apparatus of thought policing is already in place in this country. By foolishly accepting bans on Muslim ‘extremists’, we have licensed public bodies to decide that other views, too, are ‘extremist’.
Because the authorities are terrified of upsetting Islam, nothing much will happen to Muslim militants. But conservative and Christian views such as mine will suffer.
Christian and Jewish schools, especially ones which have conservative views on marriage and sex education, increasingly find themselves in trouble. Even mainstream Catholic and C of E schools are under stealthy attack, with attempts made to stop them ‘discriminating’ in favour of pupils from Christian homes.
Ofsted now says that ‘all schools’ have a ‘duty to actively promote fundamental British values’, which sounds totalitarian to me. This includes so-called ‘mutual respect and tolerance of values different from their own’. Actually, there is nothing mutual about it. The sexual revolution fanatics demand submission, and offer no tolerance in return. Now the freedom to educate children at home, always a barometer of liberty, is being seriously threatened for the first time in our history. The pretext for this is supposed fears of child abuse or ‘extremism’. The real reason is that so much home education rejects the so-called ‘British values’ of multiculturalism and sexual liberation.-PETER HITCHENS: The 'patriotic' thought police came for Corbyn. You are next, Mail on Sunday, http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2018/03/peter-hitchens-the-patriotic-thought-police-came-for-corbyn-you-are-next.html

The church is like Noah's ark. The stench inside would be intolerable were it not for the storm outside. - Chuck Colson.

Monday 19 March 2018

Quotes 20 Mar 18

The western world which came to believe that what are considered species have descended from a common parentage The micro-evolution of the finches was observable. The common ancestry of mammals is not - Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson Page 10 

 This is an old saying, Atula, it is not a saying of today.
'They blame the man who is silent, they blame the man who speaks too
much, and they blame the man who speaks too little.'  No man can
escape blame in the world.
        --_The Dhammapada_, c 3rdC BC

Euphemisms blind us to reality.  Death becomes 
merely "passing away."  Killing unborn babies 
becomes "terminating a pregnancy."  Copulation 
becomes "going to bed with."  Genocide becomes 
"population control."  Sin becomes "antisocial 
behavior."  Change the language, and you change 
people's perception of reality. 
This could not be so if words were only convenient 
artificial labels.  Changing the label does not 
change the contents of the jar.  But language 
is more than labels; language is a choice of a 
way of thinking and therefore of living, of 
existing.  Our very mode of being is 
determined by our language. 
--Peter Kreeft (1937-    ) 
      _Making Choices: Practical Wisdom For Everyday 
       Moral Decisions_ [1990], Chapter 9 

“If you are for gun control, then you are not against guns, because the guns will be needed to disarm people. So it’s not that you are anti-gun. You’ll need the police’s guns to take away other people’s guns. So you are very pro-gun, you just believe that only the Government (which is, of course, so reliable, honest, moral and virtuous) should be allowed to have guns. There is no such thing as gun control. There is only centralizing gun ownership in the hands of a small,political elite and their minions.” 
-– Stefan Molyneux, Facebook 
https://www.facebook.com/stefan.molyneux/posts/10151606493811679 

Learn in confession to be honest with God.  Do not 
give fair names to foul sins; call them what you 
will, they will smell no sweeter. 
     --C. H. Spurgeon (1834-1892) 
      _Morning And Evening_ [2003]; "April 7, Evening" 

Sunday 18 March 2018

Quotes 19 Mar 18

I have a sneaking suspicion that all this straight-faced piety about sexuality misses one of the Creator's most brilliant bits of humour. The body uses the same general equipment for both lovemaking and plumbing. Desire and drainage are hilariously close. I think that's a hint to take it lightly. ... It's a movement of the dance , not the be-all and end-all of the dancers. Omitting it doesn't stop the show. There's nothing wrong with mutual agreed abstinence if honestly tried. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 89

No other major scientific discovery or breakthrough has made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist only Darwin's. This will prompt some people to wonder whether Darwin's distinctive twin doctrines that evolution occurs gradually by means of natural selection and that this process necessitates an everlasting struggle for existence are not in fact scientific statements at all but expressions of opinion, metaphysical opinion that. - Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson p14

Both Josiah Wedgewood and Erasmus Darwin had from the first been are supporters of the French Revolution Government spies kept watch on Wedgewood fearful that he who sent his sons to Paris on a trading mission in 1791 might have been plotting the overthrow of monarchical government - Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson Page 23

"Farewell all created comforts. Farewell sweet Bible, in which I delighted most, and which has been sweet to me since I came to prison." – Last words from Isabel Alison, executed on 26 January 1681

All hail, redeeming blood!
All hail, life-giving grace!
All hail, the gift of Christ our Lord,
Our strength and righteousness.

I am coming, Lord,
Coming now to Thee:
Wash me, cleanse me in the blood
That flowed on Calvary.
- Lewis Hartsough (1828-19


 

Friday 16 March 2018

Quotes 17 Mar 18

Romance as the justification for marriage is pretty much a folk invention of less than eight hundred years 'standing. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p81

"The doctrines of election fill my soul with a holy fire, and afford me great confidence in God my Saviour." #GeorgeWhitefield, 1739.

"The victim should have the right to end his life, if he wants. But I think it would be a great mistake. However bad life may seem, there is always something you can do, and succeed at. While there's life, there is hope"- Stephen Hawking,on euthanasia: , Quoted in People's Daily Online, June 2006

"If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason - for then we would know the mind of God" -Stephen Hawking, On the reason why the universe exists: A Brief History Of Time, published 1988

To suppose that there is a God explains why there is a physical universe at all; why there are the scientific laws there are; why animals and then humans have evolved; why human beings have the opportunity to mould their character and those of their fellow humans for good or ill and to change the environment in which we live; why we have the well authenticated account of Christ's life death and resurrection; why throughout the centuries millions of people other than ourselves have had the apparent experience of being in touch with and guided by God and so much else. In fact the hypothesis of the existence of God makes sense of the whole of our experience and it does so better than any other explanation that can be put forward and that is the grounds for believing it to be true. - Richard Springburn, Emeritus Prof of philosophy at the University of Oxford, quoted in Charles Darwin Victorian Mythmaker,  A N Wilson p12

Quotes 16 Mar 18

God himself spread his table. But Judas sat down at it. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 94 

We are the outposts of heaven in this world, and so when we find ourselves more at home with the world than we find ourselves at home with God's people, then, probably, something is wrong.@LigonDuncan

"Freud said that laughter is the outward expression of the psyche. But Freud never had to play the Glasgow Empire."- Ken Dodd (1927-2018)

"When people are right with God, they are apt to be hard on themselves and easy on other people." ~ John Newton

What other people think of me is becoming less and less important; what they think of Jesus because of me is critical.- Cliff Richard

Wednesday 14 March 2018

Quotes 15 Mar 18

Sexual intercourse is indeed society (though often not too mutual) , and it is certainly a comfort, when it goes well; but it is seldom much help unless its disastrousness is softened by a vast amount of incidental tenderness. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 76

He drew a circle that shut me out-- 
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout; 
But Love and I had the wit to win: 
We drew a circle that took him in. 
     --Edwin Markham (1852-1940) 
      _The Shoes Of Happiness, And Other 
       Poems_ [1913], "Outwitted" 

If someone you love breaks your heart, keep moving on. It'll get better, and you'll get stronger.- Life Quotes@liife_quote

“Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of earthly friends, are but shadows; but God is the substance. These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun. These are but streams. But God is the ocean.”-Jonathan Edwards 

We are called to be the salt of the world, not its sugar. - Art Azurdia

Quotes 14 Mar 18

People admit that it's hard to pray. Yet they think it's way to make love. What nonsense. Neither is worth much when it is only the outcropping of intermittent enthusiasm. Both need to be done with out ceasing;- Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 76

Every semblance of religion that is not derived from Christ, by faith in his name, is, at the best, like a lamp without oil.-John Newton@john__newton

The way to be filled with the Spirit is to be filled with his word. The way to have the power of the Spirit is to believe the promises of the Bible.- Desiring God@desiringGod

It wasn't a waste of time if you learned something. -Mandy Hale

"Because Jesus dwells with God, God dwells with men. Christ on high is the reason for the Spirit below. It was expedient that the Redeemer should rise, that the Comforter should come down."- Spurgeon Library@SpurgeonMBTS

Monday 12 March 2018

Quotes 13 Mar 18

A man can give his wife is little besides trouble. He makes a life of hard labour for he, prompts most of her available time by begetting children upon her, and then leaves he alone with the whole business for the greater part of every working day. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 75

That the Lord God of all consolation Will now be my comfort, and, strength, buckler and sheild, and also of all my brethren that are in the same case and distress, that I and they all may despise all manner of threats and cruelty, and even the bitter burning fire and dreadful dart of death, and stick like true soldiers, to our dear and Loving captain Christ, our only redeemer and saviour - John Rogers before his execution, 1555, quoted in the Burning Time, p248,  Virginia Rounding

The doctrine of total depravity is simply another way of saying that there is no area of your life about which you can say “I don’t need Jesus for that.”- Sam Allberry @SamAllberry

There are two tenets of atheism: there is no God, and I hate him.—@douglaswils

King of Glory and Lord of Hosts, who ascended in triumph to the right hand of the Father, leave me not comfortless, but come to me in your Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of Truth. ~ F.B. Meyer

Sunday 11 March 2018

Quotes 12 Mar 18

 Only Christian marriage has a chance to save nature. Not that mine is very natural - it can't be, because it isn't very Christian; but the truth remains. The disciple is not above his master; the Cross is foolishness, and the marriage bed is absurd. That much rings true. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 72

Billy Graham "an ambassador for Christ who reminded the world of the power of prayer and the gift of God's grace."- President Trump 

A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent.- John Calvin@JohnCalvinDaily
Fall seven times, stand up eight. -Japanese Proverb

If you want health for your souls and if you want to bring health to others, turn your gaze away from your own miserable experiences, away from your own sin, to the Lord Jesus Christ as He is offered to us in the gospel.  ~ J. Gresham Machen http://bit.ly/2oDu8DR 

Friday 9 March 2018

Quotes 10 Mar 18

The vow of lifelong fidelity to one bed. one woman, becomes the wall at the edge of the cliff that leaves the children free to play a little, rather than to be lost at large. marriage gives us somewhere to be. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 70

"The average American who was asked to back same-sex marriage on the principle of justice and tolerance is seeing that those who requested their support are not living by their own rules. They are finding that “marriage equality” is not enough. They are finding the deal has been unilaterally renegotiated: “You will not only support our right to marry, but you will also support our marriages in every way that we ask. If you do not, we will take you to court, ruin your business, take your money, slime your good name, and even threaten your life.” The remarkable examples of these injustices are surprising and alarming many good citizens." Glenn T. Stanton, with Focus on the Family

"There is no knowledge of Christ apart from Scripture, no fellowship with him except by fellowship in the word of the apostles" Bavinck

Evidence? How about the fact that anything exists at all? Doesn't that require an explanation, and isn't Theism one?  And look what exists - a large and complex universe, operating to very fine tolerances. Einstein wasn't an atheist, What makes you so clever?- Peter Hitchens

Its also been a week where the old Establishment came out of the woodwork – Blair, Major, Campbell, Heseltine et al claiming that Brexit was a ‘historic mistake’. I accept that given the amount of ‘historic mistakes’ they made, they are the experts in that particular department, but I’m not sure that we should listen to them!  - https://theweeflea.com/author/theweeflea/ 2 mar 2018

Wednesday 7 March 2018

Quotes 8 Mar 18

Children love fat mothers. They like them because while any mother is a diagram of place, a picture of home, a atone is a clearer diagram, a greater sacrament. She is more there. I can think of to better wish to all the slender swans of this present age, than to propose them a toast: May your husbands find your s slim as they like; your children should always remember you were fat. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 66

A wandering Arab of the lineage of Hagar [i.e., Muhammad] … spread desolation and delusion over an extensive portion of the earth. … He poisoned the sources of human felicity at the fountain, by degrading the condition of the female sex, and the allowance of polygamy; and he declared undistinguishing and exterminating war, as a part of his religion, against all the rest of mankind. THE ESSENCE OF HIS DOCTRINE WAS VIOLENCE AND LUST: TO EXALT THE BRUTAL OVER THE SPIRITUAL PART OF HUMAN NATURE [Adam's capitalization] …While the merciless and dissolute dogmas of the false prophet shall furnish motives to human action, there can never be peace upon earth, and good will towards men.- air to John Quincy Adams

“That a camel-merchant [Muhammad] … delivers his country to iron and flame; that he cuts the throats of fathers and kidnaps daughters; that he gives to the defeated the choice of his religion or death: this is assuredly nothing any man can excuse.”-  Voltaire

“There was to be no nonsense about toleration” in Islam, wrote Shaw in a 1933 letter. “You accepted Allah or you had your throat cut by someone who did accept him, and who went to Paradise for having sent you to Hell.”- George Bernard Shaw

The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. … The influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.-Winston Churchill

Tuesday 6 March 2018

Quotes 7 Mar 18

Fathers provoke not your children to wrath ....Develop a passion for fairness. It you overdo anything, make it that. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 61

Civilizations die of suicide, not by murder. --Arnold J. Toynbee (1889-1975) _A Study Of History_ [1954]

As I wrote in my book The Crisis Behind Our Crisis, “We have replaced religion with (at best)
religionism, freedom with liberty, wisdom with cleverness, sentiment with sentimentality, justice
with legalism, art with pickled animals, music with amplified noise, statecraft with politicking,
love with sex, communication with sound bytes, self-confidence with effrontery, equality before God
with levelling, respect for others with political correctness – in short, everything real with
virtual caricatures.” And, I might have added, pleasure with drunken oblivion.
--Alexander Boot, Look what progress throws up.  http://www.alexanderboot.com/look-what-progress-throws-up/

I think in one of my previous lives I was a mighty king, because I like people to do what I say. --Jack Handey (1949-    )  _Deep Thoughts_ [1992]

Look back and smile on perils past. -Walter Scott

Monday 5 March 2018

Quotes 6 Mar 18

Justin Welby said the Islamic rules are incompatible with Britain’s laws, which have developed over 500 years on the principles of a different culture....He said yesterday in advance of publication that British law has ‘underlying values and assumptions’ that come from a clearly Christian tradition. ‘Sharia law is not just about punishments,’ he added. ‘It is something of immense sophistication, but it comes from a very different background of jurisprudence to the one from which British law has developed over the past 500 years’....The problem is reimagining Britain through values applied in action can only work where the narrative of the country is coherent and embracing.’ The Archbishop said: ‘Sharia, which has a powerful and ancient cultural narrative of its own, deeply embedded in a system of faith and understanding of God, and thus especially powerful in forming identity, cannot become part of another narrative.‘Accepting it in part implies accepting its values around the nature of the human person, attitudes to outsiders, the revelation of God, and a basis for life in law, rather than grace, the formative word of Christian culture.’-http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5428849/Welby-Islamic-rules-incompatible-British-laws.html

With every new sunrise there is a new chance.
But with every sunset, you blew it.
     --Jack Handey (1946-    )
      _The Lost Deep Thoughts_ [1998]

We are what we are today in Jesus Christ because God has a plan. It's not something uncertain. It's not something wistful. It's not some fleeting thing. It is a sure thing—a definite thing that goes back into eternity.-Derek Thomas@DerekWHThomas

Progress: The process whereby the human race has got
rid of whiskers, the vermiform appendix, and God.
     --H. L. Mencken (1880-1956)
      _A Book of Burlesques_ [1916]

Father's day is a joke and a commercially motivated one at that. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 58

Friday 2 March 2018

Quotes 3 Mar 18

...the Bible does not say that men and women are unequal. Neither does the church. There are no second class citizens in the New Jerusalem. It is husbands and wives that are unequal. It is precisely in marriage (a state, you will recall, not to be continued as such in heaven) that they enter into a relationship of superior to inferior,- of head to a body. And the difference there is not one of worth, ability to intelligence, but of role. It is functional not organic.It is based on the exigencies of the Dance not on a judgement as to talent.In the ballet, in any intricate dance, one dancer leads, the other follows. Not because one is better (he may or may not be), but because that is his part. Our mistake here, as elsewhere, is to think that equality and diversity are irreconcilable. The common notion of equality is based on the image of the march. In a parade, really unequal beings are dressed alike, given guns of identical length, trained to hold them at the same angle, and ordered to keep step with a fixed beat. But it is not the parade that is true to life, it is the dance. There you have real equals assigned unequal roles in order that each may achieve his individual perfection in the whole. Nothing is less personal than a parade; nothing more so than a dance. It is the choice image of fulfillment through function, and it comes very close to the heart of the Trinity. Marriage is a hierarchical game played bu co-equal persons.Keep that paradox and you move in the freedom of the Dance; alter, and you grow weary with marching. - - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 53-54.


"Truth is stranger than fiction, because fiction has to make 
sense." "Grandpa Jones" - Hee-Haw tv show. 

Asked who was worse, Rousseau or Voltaire, Dr. Johnson is said (at least apocryphally) to have replied: “Sir, it is not for me to apportion the degree of iniquity between a louse and a flea.” I think it’s pretty much the same regarding Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. 
-- Roger Kimball, Thoughts on the RNC Convention, #1 
https://pjmedia.com/rogerkimball/2016/07/19/thoughts-on-the-rnc-convention-1/ 

Dr. Johnson said no such thing. When James Boswell asked him if he thought Rousseau was "as bad a man as Voltaire," Johnson replied: "Why, Sir, it is difficult to settle the proportion of iniquity between them." See: Boswell's The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), vol. 1, p. 278. In 1783, however, Johnson did say this about two run-of-the-mill British poets, Samuel Derrick and Christopher Smart: "Sir, there is no settling the point of precedency between a louse and a flea."  

I hope life isn't a big joke, because I don't get it. 
     --Jack Handey (1949-    ) 
      _Deeper Thoughts_ [1993] 

Quotes 5 Mar 18

...it is husbands who have done the most damage. , and it is they, who can if they will, do the most good. If the train doesn't move , repair the locomotive. Don't let the cars sit around blaming themselves for not being engines. Above all, don't let them try to act as if they were. For the cars have their own function, they are what the train is really about.They are what the engine is for.All the space in a husband is supposed to be given over to providing traction; it is the wife's capacity for freight that makes the trip worthwhile. The comparison is hardly flattering, but it does manage to be a bit gallant and, and as a husband, I am rather pleased that I was able to get it off. One should try to practice what one preaches, with or without elegance. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 57

Lofty words do not make a man just or holy; but 
a good life makes him dear to God.  I would far 
rather feel contrition than be able to define it. 
     --Thomas A' Kempis (1380-1471) 
      _The Imitation Of Christ_ [c. 1420]; Book 1, Chapter 1 

I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world 
without hate.  And I can picture us attacking that 
world, because they'd never expect it. 
     --Jack Handey (1949-    ) 
      _Deepest Thoughts_ [1994] 

If a kid asks where rain comes from, I think a cute 
thing to tell him is "God is crying." 
And if he asks why God is crying, another cute thing to 
tell him is "Probably because of something you did." - unk

“Those who do not eat before they understand the entire process by which food arrives at their table will starve to death..those who do not want to believe the Word of God before they see all their problems resolved will die of spiritual starvation” Bavinck

Thursday 1 March 2018

Quotes 2 Mar 18

For a nun's life of course is utterly sexual....Of course, she omits as an offering to God, one particular expression of her sexuality; but it is only one out of a hundred. The sexual congress she does not attend is not life's most important meeting, all the marriage manuals to the contrary notwithstanding. - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 49

Very soon the end of your life will be at hand: consider, 
therefore, the state of your soul.  Today a man is here; 
tomorrow he is gone. . . . 
You should order your every deed and thought, as though today 
were the day of your death.  Had you a good conscience, death 
would hold no terrors for you. --Thomas A' Kempis (1380-1471) 
      _The Imitation Of Christ_ [c. 1420]; Book 1, Chapter 23 

Just as the soil needs cultivators of the soil, the mind needs teachers. But teachers are not as easy to come by as farmers. The teachers themselves are pupils and must be pupils. But there cannot be an infinite regress: ultimately there must be teachers who are not in turn pupils. Those teachers who are not in turn pupils are the great minds or, in order to avoid any ambiguity in a matter of such importance, the greatest minds. Such men are extremely rare. We are not likely to meet any of them in any classroom. We are not likely to meet any of them anywhere. It is a piece of good luck if there is a single one alive in one's time. For all practical purposes, pupils, of whatever degree of proficiency, have access to the teachers who are not in turn pupils, to the greatest minds, only through the great books. Liberal education will then consist in studying with the proper care the great books which the greatest minds have left behind -- a study in which the more experienced pupils assist the less experienced pupils, including the beginners. 
-- Leo Strauss, graduation speech at University of Chicago, June 6, 1959, 

When you have arrived at that state when trouble 
seems sweet and acceptable to you for Christ's 
sake, then all is well with you, for you have found 
paradise upon earth. 
But so long as suffering is grievous to you and 
you seek to escape it, so long will it go ill with 
you, for the trouble you try to escape will 
pursue you everywhere. --Thomas A' Kempis (1380-1471) 
      _The Imitation Of Christ_ [c. 1420]; Book 2, Chapter 12 

Everyone can master a grief but he that has it. 
     --William Shakespeare (1564-1616) 
      _Much Ado About Nothing_ [1598-1600]; 
       Act III, Scene II, Line 26 
       http://www.shakespeare-online.com/plays/much_3_2.html 

Quotes ! Mar 18

About sex especially men are born mad; and they hardly reach sanity until they reach sanctity.- G K Chesterton quoted in - Robert Farrar Capon, Bed and Board, p 48

Not one drop of rain falls without God’s sure command.-@JohnCalvinDaily
 John Calvin

Tell me, where now are all the masters and teachers 
whom you knew so well in life and who were famous 
for their learning?  Others have already taken their 
places and I know not whether they ever think of 
their predecessors.  During life they seemed to be 
something; now they are seldom remembered. 
How quickly the glory of the world passes away!  If 
only their lives had kept pace with their learning, 
then their study and reading would have been worth 
while. --Thomas A' Kempis (1380-1471) 
      _The Imitation Of Christ_ [c. 1420]; Book 1, Chapter 3 
       http://www.ccel.org/ccel/kempis/imitation.ONE.3.html 

There is frequently more to be learned from the 
unexpected questions of a child than the discourses 
of men, who talk in a road, according to the notions 
they have borrowed and the prejudices of their 
education. 
     --John Locke (1632-1704) 
      _Some Thoughts Concerning Education_ [1693], Section 121 

I suspect that the child plucks its first flower 
with an insight into its beauty and significance 
which the subsequent botanist never retains. 
     --Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) 
      _Journal_ [February 5, 1852]