tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-40934172009-07-24T19:23:31.700-07:00Lake MusingsThe lake.org blogJamesnoreply@blogger.comBlogger207125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-90318962247061224602007-09-28T07:58:00.000-07:002007-09-28T08:01:32.463-07:00"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident." -SchopenhauerJamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-8218372611420798172007-08-21T19:50:00.000-07:002007-09-28T08:04:34.236-07:00"There is only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous."- Napoleon BonaparteJamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-36176298480946880052007-08-19T09:31:00.000-07:002007-09-28T08:07:08.490-07:00AN UNEXPECTED MEETINGWe treat each other with exceeding courtesy;we say, it's great to see you after all these years.Our tigers drink milk.Our hawks tread the ground.Our sharks have all drowned.Our wolves yawn beyond the open cage.Our snakes have shed their lightning,our apes their flights of fancy,our peacocks have renounced their plumes.The bats flew out of our hair long ago.We fall silent in Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1148954415176654942006-05-29T18:53:00.000-07:002006-05-29T20:06:26.866-07:00"What is the single thread that runs through all your teaching and pulls it all together?" - student"Look into your own heart. Discover what it is that gives you pain. And then refuse to inflict that pain on anybody else." - Confucius_______"Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets." - Matthew 7:12_______"...Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1144212127857084972006-04-04T21:39:00.000-07:002006-04-04T21:52:33.963-07:00"For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1143705821189343602006-03-30T00:01:00.000-08:002006-03-30T00:03:41.200-08:00"Then I commended mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry: for that shall abide with him of his labour the days of his life, which God giveth him under the sun."- Ecclesiastes 8:15Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1141631439037954472006-03-05T23:03:00.000-08:002006-03-05T23:52:38.536-08:00"And remember her (Mary) who guarded her chastity whereupon We (God) breathed into her of Our spirit and caused her, together with her son (Isa - Jesus), to become a symbol of Our Grace to all people."- Holy Qur'an 21:91Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1139449484146093372006-02-08T17:43:00.000-08:002006-02-08T17:44:44.156-08:00"In science, 'fact' can only mean 'confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent.' I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms."- Stephen Jay GouldJamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1138322303166935182006-01-26T16:35:00.000-08:002006-01-26T16:38:23.180-08:00“[The evil days of old age come] and one fears heights, and perils in the street; when the almond tree blooms, and the locust grows sluggish and the caper berry is destroyed, because man goes to his lasting home; and mourners go about the streets…” Ecclesiastes 12:5The origin of "The Grasshopper Lays Heavily", the book inside "The Man in the High Castle"Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1137255532513455702006-01-14T08:18:00.000-08:002006-01-14T08:18:52.523-08:00"Immoral means cannot bring moral ends, for the ends are pre-existent in the means."-Martin Luther KingJamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1131037886433068432005-11-03T09:08:00.000-08:002005-11-03T09:11:26.443-08:00`Sci-fi can be succinctly defined as speculation, whether based on established scientific facts or on logical pseudo-facts consistent with the framework of the fiction in question, involving smelly green pimply aliens furiously raping or eating, or both, beautiful naked bare-breasted chicks, covering them in slime, red, oozing, living slime, dribbling from every horrific orifice, squeezing out Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1130906831714122962005-11-01T20:45:00.000-08:002005-11-01T20:52:08.923-08:00"Innocence is like a dumb leper who has lost his bell, wandering the world, meaning no harm."- Graham Green (The Quite American)Americans are "innocent" not "idealistic".Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1123044674083436352005-08-02T21:46:00.000-07:002005-08-02T21:54:45.170-07:00"Film is truth 24 times a second, and every cut is a lie."-Jean Luc GodardJamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1115050455835101312005-05-02T09:12:00.000-07:002005-05-02T09:14:15.836-07:00"Liberalism is trust of the people tempered by prudence. Conservatism is distrust of the people tempered by fear."~William E. Gladstone, 1866Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1114750667424221492005-04-28T21:55:00.000-07:002005-04-28T21:59:30.116-07:00For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth:Job 19:25Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1111735594601514662005-03-24T23:25:00.000-08:002005-03-24T23:27:48.850-08:00Under the spreading chestnut treeI sold you and you sold me:There lie they, and here lie weUnder the spreading chestnut tree.- George Orwell (1984)Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1110548466818551192005-03-11T05:40:00.000-08:002005-03-11T05:45:27.836-08:00"The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave, ... It is vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen cry peace, peace - but there is no peace. The war is actually begun ! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms ! Our brethren are already in the field ! Why stand we here idle ? What is it that Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1108180120057457862005-02-11T19:45:00.000-08:002005-02-11T19:55:23.776-08:00Letter to the congregation in Corinth“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not selfseeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.”-St. Paul - 1 Corinthians 13:4,5Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1106242562120452572005-01-20T09:34:00.000-08:002005-01-20T09:38:40.266-08:00"It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words: "And this, too, shall pass away." How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride! -- how consoling in the depths of affliction!"Abraham Lincoln Before the Wisconsin State Agricultural Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1106200293252535592005-01-19T21:50:00.000-08:002005-01-19T21:57:24.856-08:00“The disposition to admire, and almost to worship, the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or, at least, to neglect persons of poor and mean condition, though necessary both to establish and to maintain the distinction of ranks and the order of society, is, at the same time, the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments.”Adam SmithJamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1102116779262893512004-12-03T15:19:00.000-08:002004-12-03T15:38:48.650-08:00Even a "just war" is a fountain of evil. "Anyone who looks with anguish on evils so great, so repulsive, so savage, must acknowledge the tragedy of it all; and if anyone experiences them or even looks on at them without anguish, his condition is even more tragic, since he remains serene by losing his humanity."Augustine, Bishop of Hippo Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1094246890512465282004-09-03T14:26:00.000-07:002004-12-03T15:48:12.176-08:00"Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the President."Theodore Roosevelt, Twenty-sixth President of the United States Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1093331093013110852004-08-24T01:03:00.000-07:002004-12-03T15:49:24.763-08:00"Insane asylums are filled with people who think they're Jesus or Satan. Very few have delusions of being a guy down the block who works for an insurance company."Chuck Barris Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1091504711338916192004-08-02T20:41:00.000-07:002004-12-03T15:51:39.330-08:00A leader "ought to inspire fear in such a way that, if he does not win love, he avoids hatred."Machiavelli Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4093417.post-1089157475100196282004-07-06T16:40:00.000-07:002004-12-03T15:53:08.983-08:00"I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed; we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal."Martin Luther King Jamesnoreply@blogger.com