Quote of the day...........

If you would be a real seeker after truth,

it is necessary that at least once in your life

you doubt, as far as possible, all things.

-- Rene Descartes
(1596-1650) French philosopher
Source: Principles of Philosophy, 1644

              *     *     *     *     *

[When] Men are not allowed to think freely

about chemistry and biology,

why should they be allowed to think freely

about political philosophy?

-- Auguste Comte.
Isidore Marie Auguste François Xavier Comte(1798-1857) 
French philosopher, founder of Positivism and Sociology
Source: The Positive Philosophy, 1830-40

              *     *     *     *     *

The free-thinking of one age is 

the common sense of the next.

-- Matthew Arnold (1822-1887)

Quote of the day.............

The heart of the liberal philosophy

is a belief in the dignity of the individual,

in his freedom to make the most of his capacities

and opportunities according to his own lights...

This implies a belief in the equality of man in one sense;

in their inequality in another."

-- Milton Friedman

(1912-2006) Nobel Prize-winning economist, 
economic advisor to President Ronald Reagan,
 "ultimate guru of the free-market system"
Source: Capitalism and Freedom, 1962

Quote of the day.........

You make men love 

their government and 

their country by giving them 

the kind of government 

and the kind of country 

that inspire respect and love; 

a country that is free and unafraid, 

that lets the discontented talk 

in order to learn the causes of 

their discontent and end those causes, 

that refuses to impel men to spy 

on their neighbors, 

that protects its citizens vigorously 

from harmful acts 

while it leaves the remedies for 

objectionable ideas 

to counter-argument and time.

-- Zecharian Chafee, Jr.(1865-1957)
Source: Free Speech in the United States, 1942

Quote of the day.....

The highest manifestation of 

life consists in this:

that a being governs its own actions.

A thing which is always subject to 

the direction of another is 

somewhat of a dead thing.

-- Saint Thomas Aquinas(1225-1274).

 Italian philosopher and theologian

       *       *       *       *       *

To learn who rules over you,

simply find out who you are 

not allowed to criticize.

-- Voltaire
[François Marie Arouet] (1694-1778)

Quote of the day.....

A wise man neither suffers 

himself to be governed,

nor attempts to govern others.

-- Jean de la Bruyere.

quote of the day..........

May the Declaration of Independence

be to the world, what I believe it will be 

(to some parts sooner,

to others later, but finally to all)

the signal of arousing men to burst 

the chains under which monkish ignorance and 

superstition had persuaded them 

to bind themselves, and to assume 

the blessings and security of self-government. 

That form which we have substituted, 

restores the free right to the unbounded

exercise of reason and freedom of opinion. 

All eyes are opened, or opening, 

to the rights of man.

-- Thomas Jefferson(1743-1826). 

US Founding Father, 3rd US President
drafted the Declaration of Independence.

Quote of the day.......

No man is justified in doing evil

on the ground of expediency.

-- Theodore Roosevelt(1858-1919) 

26th US President.

Carpe diem.......

Next to the swans nesting

By the lake side - eerie and surreal

Under the shadows of giant trees

That stood mourning through the night

Keeping a vigil, lighting a candle

People flowing in the streets streaming

The colored chalks glowing

With thoughts and words flowing

For good will hunting

There rises a memorial for 

The spirit’s resting.

Quote of the day........

Finally, the fundamental flaw, 

which will ultimately destroy 

this prohibition as it did the last one, 

is that criminal sanctions cannot, 

and should not attempt to, 

prohibit personal conduct 

which does no harm to others. 

-- Judge Robert Sweet
(U.S. District Ct., N.Y.)
Source: February 12, 1996, National Review

          *       *        *       *        *

From the standpoint of freedom of 

speech and the press,

it is enough to point out that 

the state has no legitimate interest in 

protecting any or all religions 

from views distasteful to them...

It is not the business of government 

to suppress real or imagined attacks 

upon a particular religious doctrine.

-- Justice Tom C. Clark.
(1899-1977) U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Burstyn v. Wilson, 1952

           *         *         *         *         *

Rightful liberty is unobstructed action 

according to our will within limits 

drawn around us by 

the equal rights of others. 

I do not add 'within the limits of the law,' 

because law is often but the tyrant's will, and

always so when it violates 

the rights of the individual.

-- Thomas Jefferson, 3rd US President.
(1743-1826), US Founding Father.
Drafted the Declaration of Independence.

Being Sad..........

In rejecting or in even fighting, being sad

will only lead one to be silly.

Roosevelt's Four freedoms ......

If the Congress maintains these principles, 

the voters,putting patriotism 

ahead of pocketbooks, 

will give you their applause.

In the future days, 

which we seek to make secure, 

we look forward to a world founded upon 

four essential human freedoms.


The first is freedom of speech and expression —

everywhere in the world.


The second is freedom of every person to 

worship God in his own way — 

everywhere in the world.


The third is freedom from want — 

which, translated into world terms, 

means economic understandings 

which will secure to every nation 

a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants — 

everywhere in the world.


The fourth is freedom from fear – 

which, translated into world terms, 

means a world-wide reduction of armaments 

to such a point and in such a thorough 

fashion that no nation will be in 

a position to commit an act of 

physical aggression against any neighbor —

anywhere in the world.


That is no vision of a distant millennium. 

It is a definite basis for a kind of world 

attainable in our own time and generation.


That kind of world is the very antithesis of 

the so-called new order of tyranny 

which the dictators seek to create with 

the crash of a bomb.

To that new order we oppose 

the greater conception – 

the moral order. 


A good society is able to face schemes of 

world domination and foreign revolutions 

alike without fear.


Since the beginning of our American history, 

we have been engaged in change —  

in a perpetual peaceful revolution —

a revolution which goes on steadily,

quietly adjusting itself to changing conditions —

without the concentration camp or 

the quick-lime in the ditch. 

The world order which we seek is 

the cooperation of free countries,

working together in a friendly, civilized society.


This nation has placed its destiny in 

the hands and heads and hearts of 

its millions of free men and women; and

its faith in freedom under the guidance of God. 


Freedom means the supremacy of 

human rights everywhere. 


Our support goes to those who struggle 

to gain those rights and keep them. 


Our strength is our unity of purpose.

To that high concept 

there can be no end save victory.

Quote of the day.............

"Those who suppress freedom always do so 

in the name of law and order."

-- John V. Lindsay
(1921-2000) U.S. Congressman, Mayor of New York City

         *    *    *    *    *

"It is not the business of the law

 to make anyone good or reverent or 

moral or clean or upright."

-- Murray N. Rothbard
(1926-1995) Dean of the Austrian School of Economics

In Grace...........

Even in order to make a claim and

To enjoy the fruits of ones doing

Either right or wrong......

One has to take the responsibility 

For one’s actions.........

Without which one is reduced to live 

A life that is parasitic........

No matter what identity or 

Worldly position one bears.........

And as such a life that in its wants and 

Unfulfilled desires brings 

Only misery as karmic bondage

And a life devoid of....... 

True moral and ethical standing

That define the best of human nature and

Some significance to...... 

The natural order of reality

Is a life outside of divine grace.

Quote of the day......

The theologian who is satisfied with his complete 

and conclusive thought is mediocre.

A good theologian and a philosopher is open ,or 

incomplete in thought,

always open to the maius ( moreness) of God 

and of the truth,always in development.

-Pope Francis.

In reflection of Purva Mimansa.

Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of 

Our intelligence by means of language.

----Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Source-  Nathan Greenslit. Harvard university.

Quote of the Day........

All ideas having even the slightest 

redeeming social importance --

unorthodox ideas, controversial ideas, 

even ideas hateful to the

prevailing climate of opinion, 

have the full protection of the

guarantees [of the First Amendment].

-- Justice William J. Brennan
(1906-1997) U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Roth v. United States, 1957

          *        *        *        *         *

"Since when do you have to 

agree with people

to defend them from injustice?"

-- Lillian Hellman(1905-1984).

 American playwright and memoirist.

         *        *         *        *         *

You seem ... to consider the judges as 

the ultimate arbiters of 

all constitutional questions; 

a very dangerous doctrine indeed, 

and one which would place us under 

the despotism of an oligarchy... 

The Constitution has erected 

no such single tribunal.

-- Thomas Jefferson.
(1743-1826), US Founding Father, 
drafted the Declaration of Independence.

Making of Mischief...........

All mischief is momentary

If we do not lend ourselves to it

It will pass, losing its momentum.

Quote of the Day...........

    

A people who extend civil liberties 

only to preferred groups 

start down the path 

either to dictatorship of 

the right or the left.

Beauty ? Art ....

What is mostly desired after 

has to be corrupted ( by the market forces )

To be mundanely accessible.

Quote of the day......

Concepts of justice

must have hands and feet or

they remain sterile abstractions.

The hands and feet we need

are efficient means and methods 

to carry out justice in every case

in the shortest possible time

and at the lowest possible cost.

-- Justice Warren E. Burger(1907-1995).

 Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (1969-86)

           *        *        *        *        *
 
By freethinking I mean the use of 

the understanding in endeavoring to 

find out the meaning of 

any proposition whatsoever, 

in considering the nature of the evidence 

for or against, and in judging of it 

according to the seeming force or 

weakness of the evidence.

-- Anthony Collins(1676-1729).
Source: A Discourse of Freethinking, 1713.

Quote of the day.....

Protection, therefore, 

against the tyranny of 

the magistrate is not enough;

there needs protection against 

the tyranny of 

the prevailing opinion and feeling,

against the tendency of society to impose,

by other means than civil penalties,

its own ideas and practices 

as rules of conduction 

those who dissent from them.

 John Stuart Mill(1806-1873) 
 Source: On Liberty, 1859

         *          *         *         *        *

It is a maxim among lawyers 

that whatever hath been done before 

may be done again, and 

therefore they take special care 

to record all the decisions 

formerly made against 

common justice and 

the general reason of mankind. 

These, under the name of precedents,

they produce as authorities to justify 

the most iniquitous opinions, and 

the judges never fail of directing 

them accordingly. 

Jonathan Swift(1667-1745)
 Source: Gulliver’s Travels, 1726

           *         *        *        *        *

You do not examine legislation 

in the light of the benefits 

it will convey 

if properly administered, but 

in the light of the wrongs

it would do and the harm 

it would cause 

if improperly administered.

Lyndon B. Johnson(1908-1973) 
37th US President (1963-1969)

Homeless Ambition........

Everyday I see a great dream.

A great Possibility.

Yet each day passing 

I get on with next to nothing. 

In the Beginning........

The word in its True spirit is 

The Teacher.

Quote of the day.....

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,

adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.

With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do.

He may as well concern himself 

with his shadow on the wall.

Speak what you think now in hard words, and 

to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks 

in hard words again,

though it contradict everything you said to-day.

--'Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.'

-- Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood?

Pythagoras was misunderstood, 

and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, 

and Copernicus, and Galileo, and

Newton, and every pure and 

wise spirit that ever took flesh.

To be great is to be misunderstood.

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Quote of the Day.......

The law is not the private property of lawyers,

nor is justice the exclusive province of 

judges and juries.

In the final analysis, true justice is 

not a matter of courts and law books,

but of a commitment in each of us 

to liberty and mutual respect.

-- Jimmy Carter (1924- )
39th US PresidentSource: Dallas Times-Herald, 26 April 1978
 
                       *      *      *     *     *

Prayer of Teilhard de Chardin.............

                    Patient Trust

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.

We are quite naturally impatient in everything

to reach the end without delay.

We should like to skip the intermediate stages.

We are impatient of being on the way to something

unknown, something new.


And yet it is the law of all progress

that it is made by passing through

some stages of instability—

and that it may take a very long time.


And so I think it is with you;

your ideas mature gradually—let them grow,

let them shape themselves, without undue haste.

Don’t try to force them on,

as though you could be today what time

(that is to say, grace and circumstances

acting on your own good will)

will make of you tomorrow.


Only God could say what this new spirit

gradually forming within you will be.

Give Our Lord the benefit of believing

that his hand is leading you,

and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself

in suspense and incomplete.


-Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, From Hearts on Fire.

Shared by the  fellowship of  
MANNA Monday Lunch program.

Maya Angelou's "Change the Attitude"

One does only need to look in oneself

What one does not like in others.

Quote of the Day.....

Freedom of men under government is to have 

a standing rule to live by,

common to every one of that society and made 

by the legislative power vested in it and 

not to be subject to the inconstant, 

uncertain, arbitrary will of another man.

-- John Locke(1632-1704) 
English philosopher and political theorist.

Quote of the Day....

"Men in authority will always think that

criticism of their policies is dangerous.

They will always equate their policies

with patriotism, and find criticism subversive."

-- Henry Steele Commager(1902-1998) 
Source: Freedom and Order, 1966

Reality in modernist paradigm..........

In the context of modernity

Reality is not what it seems

As a construct

It is a suspension of disbelief.

Quote of the day.....

"We have never stopped sin by passing laws; and

in the same way, 

we are not going to take a great moral ideal

and achieve it merely by law."

-- Dwight D. Eisenhower
(1890-1969), 34th US President, WWII General

Some Nuggets from The Pilgrim writer's journal.....

                       THE TRUTH

There is a lot of liars out here,

Criminals ,Cons- Hustlers.

But there is one thing and

That's if something isn't True

If you are not honest with them

They can always tell, and

They don't like it

It's funny how people don't understand that.

----Miss Bartlett.
The Pilgrim -Black seed writers group

              *     *     *     *     *

                 THE RIGHT TO EXIST

Feels like all my living 

has mostly been a whole lotta fightin

for the right to exist.

Sitting on a jetty in the autumn rain

Friday night

I 'm huddled in my raincoat

trying to write

without soaking the page

Girls in glitter and pumps come by

fallin all over and under  the fog

first rangers , then cops come by-

trying to arrest me cause I refuse

to evacuate with no cause

But the girls in glitter can throw their

pumps all over the place

Long ago and far away

Colorado, rustle my stuff out of tall

grasses and rattlesnake nests

Confiscate my photos,

artwork for evidence

sent my sage and herbs

for forensic tests

Try to build a raft to camp

the only place legal and free and 

they say my old discarded fence and

nails will never pass as watercraft

Oh,and so the stories go

just plain cut and dried injustice -

I try not to be belligerent

instead fight them with calm logic

make them question themselves

put their sanity on trial, to the test

so their heart may change. . . . .

But more often 

Authority proven wrong

gets MEANER : seeking heads to roll

so the battle goes on 

the never ending need to be right

and when you think you've found

peace, Look ! Here it some again !

Another fight for the right to exist.

--- Katie Schultz
The Pilgrim -Black seed writers group
Jan /Feb Volume 3, Issue I


           *    *    *    *    *

                   LENTEN DARKNESS 

Lent will start in March this year. I've had to start

preparing for it now because it's been such an 

intense year.I¹ve always been able to put things 

in perspective, make peace with myself and move 

on after holy communion, but this year I may have 

to ask for some sort of extension.

I've met some very bad people and I¹ve seen bad 

things happen ­to me and to people around me.

I don't have a problem with forgiving people; 

I¹ve practiced that all my life. 

But I do need to determine how to forgive these 

people without enabling them to do these things again.

I¹m trying to understand their actions and intentions

so I can have a forgiveness that is clean and pure.

I won¹t receive communion at Easter with hurried

decisions of forgiveness it would be half-hearted.

Maybe I'll focus on what I can do, and get an

extension for the more complex things.

---- Diana Kottori,
 Source : The Pilgrim.The black seed writers group.

Banality of Truth.....

Truth is not only...... 

One of the most enduring 

Paths of  human existence

It is also one........ 

That is scientifically correct.

The Easter Marathon............

Beginning the Holy Week, in the wee hours of the day

and all day they run... run... run...

Some for fun and some to win,

They run... run... run...

Passing over one hurdle after another, 

reaching milestones, they run... run... run...

Centuries apart, keeping up with a 100 year-old tradition

during the Holy Week,

They run... run... run...

Some are young, some are old,

Some are strong, some are weak,

and there are women too, 

Yet they run... run... run...

Like Mary and her brothers in fellowship,

That stood before the open door,

To find the Holy One that showed us

The way to the heavens,

Beginning Easter they gather around in the wee hours

unburdening the past days,

Freeing themselves in resurrection of triumph and joy,

They run... run... run...

Some are young, some are old,

Some are strong, some are weak,

and there are women too.

Some for fun and some to win,

During Holy Week, like an Easter Bunny

They run... run... run...
  

Boundaries of Hypocrisy.....

Human hypocrisy like all other vices has no boundaries

It desires to transcend all that is good and human.