Maids have been milked by cads from time immemorial

Good Counsel To A Young Maid

When you the sun-burnt Pilgrim see,

Fainting with thirst, haste to the springs;

Mark how at first with bended knee

He courts the crystal Nymphs, and flings

His body to the earth, where he,

Prostrate, adores the flowing Deitie.

But, when his sweaty face is drencht

In her cool waves, when from her sweet

Bosom his burning thirst is quencht;

Then mark how with disdainful feet

He kicks her banks, and from the place

That thus refresh'd him, moves with sullen pace.

So shalt thou be despis'd, fair Maid,

When by the sated Lover tasted;

What first he did with tears invade,

Shall afterwards with scorn be wasted;

When all thy Virgin springs go dry,

When no streams shall be left, but in thine eye.

-- Thomas Carew (1595-1640)

Behavior, not books?

Infinite shall be made cold in religion, by your example, that never were hurt by reading books.

-- Roger Ascham (1515-1568)

The human body averages 310 degrees Kelvin, the whole universe just 2.73

 

 

You are no surer, no,

Than is the coal of fire upon the ice,

Or hailstone in the sun.

-- William Shakespeare, Coriolanus, Act I, Scene 1

Why was the sight . . .

Why was the sight

To such a tender ball as th' eye confin'd;

So obvious and so easy to be quench'd,

And not, as feeling, through all parts diffus'd,

That she might look at will through every pore?

-- John Milton

O cruel death!

 

 

 O cruel death! to those you are more kind

Than to the wretched mortals left behind.

-- Edmund Waller

Interrupted retreat

Clamours our privacies uneasy make,

Birds leave their nests disturb'd,

and beasts their haunts forsake.

-- John Dryden

Imagination misleads

Love is by fancy led about,

From hope to fear, from joy to doubt:

Whom we now a goddess call,

Divinely grac'd in every feature,

Strait's a deform'd, a perjur'd creature;

Love and hate are fancy all.

-- George Granville

A hermit without repose

 

 

I all the livelong day

Consume in meditation deep, recluse

From human converse; nor at shut of eve

Enjoy repose.

-- John Philips (1676-1709)

Fear makes us untrue to our better selves

 

 

The wise man doth so say of fear, that it is a betrayer of the forces of reasonable understanding.

-- Richard Hooker (1554-1600)

The tyranny of hope and fear

My heart is your's; but oh! you left it here

Abandon'd to those tyrants hope and fear:

If they forc'd from me one kind look or word,

Could you not that, nor that small part afford?

-- John Dryden

In defense of the critic

 

Such parts of writings as are stupid or silly, false or mistaken, should become subjects of occasional criticism.

-- Isaac Watts (1674-1748), godfather of English hymnody

Socially liberal mainline Protestant denominations hemorrhage members in Minnesota since 2000

The table is from the story here.

Learn of me . . . my burden is light

Engraving by Jan Luyken of the narrow gate which leads to life

In days of poverty his heart was light;

He sung his hymns at morning, noon, and night.

-- Walter Harte

A stylistic sign of the Fourth Gospel's claim to superiority over the Synoptics

Jesus' statements in the Fourth Gospel are never simply "Verily", but "Verily, verily" (25 times).

But the Synoptics (and the rest of the NT) do not know this double use of "Verily", only the single use:

Matthew (32 instances, including prayers)

Mark (15 instances, including long ending of Mark KJV)

Luke (8 instances).

John has a 26th use, his only instance of the single use category, the concluding line of John 21 which is also the conclusion of the Fourth Gospel, a devotional benediction to the work as in prayer. 

We are the monsters who devour the babes

Minoan Snake Goddess 1600 BC

He sends a monster, horrible and fell,
Begot by furies in the depths of hell.
The pest a virgin's face and bosom bears,

High on her crown a rising snake appears,

Guards her black front, and hisses in her hairs.
About the realm she walks her dreadful round,
When night with sable wings o'erspreads the ground,
Devours young babes before their parents' eyes,
And feeds and thrives on public miseries.

-- Alexander Pope

Athena Parthenos 2nd Century AD

Virtue needs no defence

Virtue, dear friend, needs no defence, 

The surest guard is innocence,

Quivers and bows and poison'd darts

Are only us'd by guilty hearts.

-- 4th Earl of Roscommon

A lesser man than Trump would have succumbed to paranoia by now

 

 

The press, the pulpit and the stage,

Conspire to censure and expose our age.

-- 4th Earl of Roscommon