Awe

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  Taking our position at the close of the apostolic age, and looking back to its fountain-head and forward to succeeding generations, we cannot but be amazed at the magnitude of the effects produced by the brief public ministry of Jesus of Nazareth, which sends its blessings through centuries as an unbroken and ever-expanding river of life. There is absolutely nothing like it in the annals of the race. The Roman empire embraced, at the birth of Christ, over one hundred millions of men, conquered by force, and, after having persecuted his religion for three hundred years, it died away without the possibility of a resurrection. The Christian church now numbers four hundred millions, conquered by the love of Christ, and is constantly increasing. The first century is the life and light of history and the turning point of the ages. If ever God revealed himself to man, if ever heaven appeared on earth, it was in the person and work of Jesus of Nazareth. He is, beyond any shadow of doubt, and by the reluctant consent of sceptics and infidels, the wisest of the wise, the purest of the pure, and the mightiest of the mighty. His Cross has become the tree of life to all nations; his teaching is still the highest standard of religious truth; his example the unsurpassed ideal of holiness; the Gospels and Epistles of his Galilean disciples are still the book of books, more powerful than all the classics of human wisdom and genius. No book has attracted so much attention, provoked so much opposition, outlived so many persecutions, called forth so much reverence and gratitude, inspired so many noble thoughts and deeds, administered so much comfort and peace from the cradle to the grave to all classes and conditions of men. It is more than a book; it is an institution, an all-pervading omnipresent force, a converting, sanctifying, transforming agency; it rules from the pulpit and the chair; it presides at the family altar; it is the sacred ark of every household, the written conscience of every Christian man, the pillar of cloud by day, the pillar of light by night in the pilgrimage of life. Mankind is bad enough, and human life dark enough with it; but how much worse and how much darker would they be without it? Christianity might live without the letter of the New Testament, but not without the facts and truths which it records and teaches. Were it possible to banish them from the world, the sun of our civilization would be extinguished, and mankind left to midnight darkness, with the dreary prospect of a dreamless and endless Nirvana.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  9 Then all men will fear [God’s judgment]; They will declare the work of God, And they will consider and wisely acknowledge what He has done. 10 The righteous will rejoice in the LORD and take refuge in Him; All the upright in heart will glory and offer praise. Psalm 65 God’s Abundant Favor to Earth and Man. To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David. A Song. 1 T O YOU belongs silence [the submissive wonder of reverence], and [it bursts into] praise in Zion, O God; And to You the vow shall be performed. 2 O You who hear prayer, To You all mankind comes. 3 Wickedness and guilt prevail against me; Yet as for our transgressions, You forgive them [removing them from Your sight]. 4 Blessed is the one whom You choose and bring near To dwell in Your courts. We will be filled with the goodness of Your house, Your holy temple. 5 By awesome and wondrous things You answer us in righteousness, O God of our salvation, You who are the trust and hope of all the ends of the earth and of the farthest sea; 6 Who creates the mountains by His strength, Being clothed with power, 7 Who stills the roaring of the seas, The roaring of their waves, And the tumult of the peoples, 8 So they who dwell at the ends of the earth stand in awe of Your signs [the evidence of Your presence]. [Mark 4:36–41 ] You make the dawn and the sunset shout for joy. 9 You visit the earth and make it overflow [with water]; You greatly enrich it; The stream of God is full of water; You provide their grain, when You have prepared the earth. 10 You water its furrows abundantly, You smooth its ridges; You soften it with showers, You bless its growth. 11 You crown the year with Your bounty, And Your paths overflow. 12 The pastures of the wilderness drip [with dew], And the hills are encircled with joy. 13 The meadows are clothed with flocks And the valleys are covered with grain; They shout for joy and they sing. Psalm 66 Praise for God’s Mighty Deeds and for His Answer to Prayer. To the Chief Musician. A Song. A Psalm. 1 S HOUT JOYFULLY to God, all the earth; 2 Sing of the honor and glory and magnificence of His name; Make His praise glorious. 3 Say to God, “How awesome and fearfully glorious are Your works! Because of the greatness of Your power Your enemies will pretend to be obedient to You. 4 “All the earth will [bow down to] worship You [in submissive wonder], And will sing praises to You; They will praise Your name in song.” Selah. 5 Come and see the works of God, He is awesome in His deeds toward the children of men. 6 He turned the sea into dry land; They crossed through the river on foot; There we rejoiced in Him.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  6 For the Israelites walked forty years in the wilderness, until all the nation, that is, the men of war who came out of Egypt, died because they did not listen to the voice of the LORD ; to them the LORD had sworn [an oath] that He would not let them see the land which He had promised to their fathers to give us, a land [of abundance] b flowing with milk and honey. 7 So it was their uncircumcised sons whom He raised up in their place, whom Joshua circumcised, because circumcision had not been performed on the way. 8 Then, when they had finished circumcising all [the males of] the nation, they stayed in their places in the camp until they were healed. 9 Then the LORD said to Joshua, “This day I have rolled away the reproach (derision, ridicule) of Egypt from you.” So the name of that place is called Gilgal (rolling) to this day. 10 While the Israelites camped at Gilgal they observed the Passover on the evening of the fourteenth day of the month on the desert plains of Jericho. 11 On the day after Passover, on that very day, they ate some of the produce of the land, unleavened bread, and roasted grain. [Lev 23:14 ] 12 And the manna ceased on the day after they had eaten some of the produce of the land, so that the Israelites no longer had manna, but they ate some of the produce of the land of Canaan during that year. 13 Now when Joshua was by Jericho, he looked up, and behold, c a man was standing opposite him with his drawn sword in his hand, and Joshua went to him and said to him, “Are you for us or for our adversaries?” 14 He said, “No; rather I have come now as captain of the army of the LORD .” Then Joshua fell with his face toward the earth and bowed down, and said to him, “What does my lord have to say to his servant?” 15 The captain of the LORD ’s army said to Joshua, “Remove your sandals from your feet, because the place where you are standing is holy (set apart to the LORD ).” And Joshua did so. [Ex 3:5 ] Joshua 6 The Conquest of Jericho 1 N OW JERICHO [a fortified city with high walls] was tightly closed because [of the people’s fear] of the sons of Israel; no one went out or came in. 2 The LORD said to Joshua, “See, I have given Jericho into your hand, with its king and the mighty warriors. 3 “Now you shall march around the city, all the men of war circling the city once. You shall do this [once each day] for six days.

• From The Beautiful Room Is Empty (1988)

  He was considering salaries of forty thousand dollars, whereas starting positions for writer trainees in 1962 paid only five thousand dollars. August was approaching, and soon everyone would leave town for vacation. “The whole city shuts down,” a lady at an agency told me. She asked me questions, listened, bathed us both in her cigarette smoke, coughed a full minute, and finally said, “You’re kinda weird, you know, but I like it. I like the whole package. I think I can sell it. Tell me I’m crazy. Yes, I’m crazy. But I think I can sell it.” Lou cruised the corridors of the Y and came back with descriptions of what he’d found: “All these pleasant fellows, the regulars, sitting around in the fake Moorish reception room watching TV and sipping orange soda and scanning the transients checking in. After the late movie on the tube, off to bed, but not before Fred from Toledo stops by for a cup of instant Sanka that Bill from Tampa heats up with his electric coil. They listen to the new Ferrante and Teicher album. You see, Bill’s made his room real homey, soft lights and all. Fred gets the great idea they’ll spend Thanksgiving together, never too early to plan for these lonely holidays, we’ll have turkey dinner at Schrafft’s, it’s not too expensive and it’s very nice, and then we’ll take in a show at Radio City. They agree and kiss coldly. Neither gets an erection, so they laugh and say, ‘Isn’t it silly for us to kiss when we’re just sisters?’ ” I suppose Lou made all that up. It seemed that outside the Y everyone was living on the streets and no one ever went to bed. Lou and I took the subway to the Village, emerged at Sixth Avenue and Eighth Street, and walked up Greenwich Avenue. Most of the strollers were straight couples, but here and there, flashing past like a parakeet, was a gaudy little queen, a paste clip on a shirt that might have started life as a blouse, her gait complex with extra motions, micro-motions somehow added, as though a mad scientist, after breaking walking down into its components, had had trouble reassembling the elements into a convincing continuity. “But we all walk that way,” Lou said. “We queens are so self-conscious, our little heads so drugged on just the sheer thrill of existing publicly, that we can’t even cross a room without simpering and mincing. It’s not that we start out wanting to appear effeminate. It’s that we use effeminacy after the fact as an alibi for our embarrassment, our florid but somehow ill-timed gestures, the bizarre tilt of our heads, our—” But here his lecture dissolved into a tearful laugh, for Lou loved to assail us in terms that were pushed to such an extreme that even he saw the absurdity.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  18 The high mountains are for the wild goats; The rocks are a refuge for the a shephanim. 19 He made the moon for the seasons; The sun knows the [exact] place of its setting. 20 You [O LORD ] make darkness and it becomes night, In which prowls about every wild beast of the forest. 21 The young lions roar after their prey And seek their food from God. 22 When the sun arises, they withdraw And lie down in their dens. 23 Man goes out to his work And remains at his labor until evening. 24 O LORD , how many and varied are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all; The earth is full of Your riches and Your creatures. 25 There is the sea, great and broad, In which are swarms without number, Creatures both small and great. 26 There the ships [of the sea] sail, And Leviathan [the sea monster], which You have formed to play there. 27 They all wait for You To give them their food in its appointed season. 28 You give it to them, they gather it up; You open Your hand, they are filled and satisfied with good [things]. 29 You hide Your face, they are dismayed; You take away their breath, they die And return to their dust. 30 You send out Your Spirit, they are created; You renew the face of the ground. 31 May the glory of the LORD endure forever; May the LORD rejoice and be glad in His works— 32 He looks at the earth, and it trembles; He touches the mountains, and they smoke. 33 I will sing to the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have my being. 34 May my meditation be sweet and pleasing to Him; As for me, I will rejoice and be glad in the LORD . 35 Let sinners be consumed from the earth, And let the wicked be no more. Bless and affectionately praise the LORD , O my soul. Praise the LORD ! (Hallelujah!) Psalm 105 The LORD ’s Wonderful Works in Behalf of Israel. 1 O give thanks to the LORD , call upon His name; Make known His deeds among the people. 2 Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; Speak of all His wonderful acts and devoutly praise them. 3 Glory in His holy name; Let the hearts of those who seek and require the LORD [as their most essential need] rejoice. 4 Seek and deeply long for the LORD and His strength [His power, His might]; Seek and deeply long for His face and His presence continually. 5 Remember [with awe and gratitude] the wonderful things which He has done, His amazing deeds and the judgments uttered by His mouth [on His enemies, as in Egypt], [Ps 78:43–51 ] 6 O you offspring of Abraham, His servant, O you sons of Jacob, His chosen ones!

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  34 And he said, “Fill four pitchers with water and pour it on the burnt offering and the wood.” And he said, “Do it the second time.” And they did it the second time. And he said, “Do it the third time.” And they did it a third time. 35 The water flowed around the altar, and he also filled the trench with water. Elijah’s Prayer 36 At the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, Elijah the prophet approached [the altar] and said, “O LORD , the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel (Jacob), let it be known today that You are God in Israel and that I am Your servant and that I have done all these things at Your word. 37 “Answer me, O LORD , answer me, so that this people may know that You, O LORD , are God, and that You have turned their hearts back [to You].” 38 Then the fire of the LORD fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood, and even the stones and the dust; it also licked up the water in the trench. 39 When all the people saw it, they fell face downward; and they said, “The LORD , He is God! The LORD , He is God!” 40 Then Elijah said to them, “Seize the prophets of Baal; do not let one of them escape.” They seized them; and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and [as God’s law required] killed them there. [Deut 13:5 , 12–15 ; 18:20 ] 41 Now Elijah said to Ahab, “Go up, eat and drink, for there is the sound of the roar of an abundance of rain.” 42 So Ahab went up to eat and to drink. And Elijah went up to the top of Carmel; and he crouched down to the earth and put his face between his knees, 43 and he said to his servant, “Go up, look toward the sea.” So he went up and looked and said, “There is nothing.” Elijah said, “Go back” seven times. 44 And at the seventh time the servant said, “A cloud as small as a man’s hand is coming up from the sea.” And Elijah said, “Go up, say to Ahab, ‘Prepare your chariot and go down, so that the rain shower does not stop you.’ ” 45 In a little while the sky grew dark with clouds and wind, and there were heavy showers. And Ahab mounted and rode [his chariot] and went [inland] to e Jezreel. 46 Then the hand of the LORD came upon Elijah [giving him supernatural strength]. He f girded up his loins and outran Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel [nearly twenty miles]. 1 Kings 19 Elijah Flees from Jezebel 1 N OW AHAB told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets [of Baal] with the sword.

• From City of Night (1963)

  He paused—a rare, long pause. Then, with a flourish of his cigarette, he continued more enthusiastically: “The Countess Sabrisky once asked me if I believed in Heaven, and I answered; ‘Of course I believe—I have had it on earth!’... I was referring to the angels—my angels—why, even Milton, the poet, in his epic poem, was on the side of the rebellious angels. He makes us sympathize with them against God: They are as heroic as American colonists rebelling against extra taxation!... But listen to me, I have gone on and on, and I must interview you, my new angel.... And, child, there is a favor I have to ask you: I must have a photograph of you, to put in my Album.... I have pictures of most of my Angels.... Please—over there—oh that shelf—that album—please bring it to me....” I rose from the chair, mesmerized by the words which came almost like an endless song. I saw an album. On top of the album was a book: a thick, important-looking volume—much like the one the malenurse had thrust at me that day, but a different color. I glanced at the author’s name. It was the Professor’s. I brought the album to him. “Now move over here. No, you can bring your chair this time. The other is for the closing moments of our Interview—ha, ha—our momentary close farewell. First we establish emotional contact, by speaking to each other, by telling each other, as we have been doing, about each other’s lives: And then:... sex,” he said bluntly, strangely flatly.

• From Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life (1994)

  We get to see his hands, which are beautiful, long and broad with white moons on his big square fingernails, so lovely that they almost make up for the fact that he is wearing a yellow polyester shirt. Also, it is in his favor that he has brought along a nice bottle of champagne; the woman loves to drink. So the man has peeled the foil away, and then begins to untwist and remove that wire thing that covers all champagne corks. Now, I’ve always thought of that wire thing—that little helmet—as the wire thing, and that is how everyone I’ve ever known refers to it: “Honey, will you take the wire thing off the champagne? I just had my nails done.” “Oh, look, Skippy’s playing with that little wire thing; I hope she doesn’t cut her little lips on it …” But it must have a name, right? I mean, boxes of them don’t just arrive at wineries—five-hundred-count Wire Things. They have to have a label. So I called the Christian Brothers Winery, whose vineyard is near the Russian River. I got a busy signal. I really did. So I sat there staring off into space. I watched the movie in my mind of the many times I’d passed those vineyards and remembered how, especially in the early fall, a vineyard is about as voluptuous a place as you can find on earth: the sense of lushness and abundance; the fullness of the clumps of grapes that hang, mammarian, and give off an ancient autumnal smell, semiprotected from the sun by their leaves. The grapes are so incredibly beautiful that you can’t help but be thrilled. If you aren’t—if you only see someone’s profit or that in another month there will be rotten fruit all over the ground—someone has gotten inside your brain and really fucked you up. And you need to get well so you can see again, see that the grapes almost seem to glow, with a light dusting of some sort of powdery residue, like an incredibly light snowfall, almost as if they’re covered with their own confectioners’ sugar. I wrote all this down, and then dialed the winery again. The line was still busy. Right when I hung up, a friend called and wanted to describe his latest emotional catastrophes, but I said, “No, no, talk to me about grapes.” I read him what I’d written, and he said, “Yes, they really are that lovely. They do almost glow; Mother Nature wants animals to be mesmerized, hypnotized by the beauty of the fruit, so they’ll eat it, shit the pits somewhere else, and make her some more.”

• From The Beautiful Room Is Empty (1988)

  When the man fucked the boy, the boy always had his rump up in the air, propped up on a pillow, and the man would lick his anus and tongue it and finger it before greasing it up with KY and fucking it, long and hard, while the boy squirmed in pain or pleasure. While being fucked, the boy ignored his own dick and even lost his hard-on, proof of how thoroughly his was concentrating on his ass. After the man shot his load, he’d stay in the boy, they’d roll over on their sides, and the boy would now be free to masturbate quickly while held tightly in his man’s arms. Once in a while, the boy was permitted to fuck the man, as a loving concession to the boy’s own masculinity, espaliered but still rawly alive, shimmeringly ambiguous. As soon as the boy came, they wiped off with the already stiff and greasy trick towel, and the boy sat on the toilet and shit out sperm. Lou reserved special scorn for boys who whispered to their lovers on the way to a midnight movie, “I’ve still got your babies inside me.” “Don’t they know those babies are dead spunk festering up their filthy bungholes!” A real boy, someone skinny and under twelve who walked around with his mouth open, sent Lou into raptures. One sweaty afternoon in Chicago we rode the elevated and sat behind a boy of eleven or so in shorts and T-shirt. The boy stared out the window and wagged his right leg against his stationary left leg, in a ceaseless, thoughtless way. A hard little erection could be seen pressed flat against his tummy in his white shorts. Unconsciously he kept batting at the erection with the back of his right hand, now to one side of it, now to the other, as though despite trial and error he had yet to find the exact spot. His skin had no pores, no bulges, and no sheen—it was as mat and consistent as face powder, except it looked cool, firm, and alive. It drank the light as soil drinks water. His shoulders and thin arms hung limply down with sublime inconsequence, though his shoulder blades looked too knotty under the cotton, as if they were about to hatch wings. The same fine, nearly invisible gold down that covered his cheeks, and had collected in a haze just below the line of his light brown hair, dusted his nape in a precise pattern, the shape of a cursive letter M, rising on either side and dipping in the center toward his spine. If the down had been molten it would have roared as it rose to descend that glistening chute. “Yes,” Lou insisted, “if it made a sound.” He sank into a silence then sighed: “If it were gold … just look at that nape.” Lou spoke as loudly as if we were conversing in a language all our own.

• From The Beautiful Room Is Empty (1988)

  No matter what people said or showed me, I just nodded, wisely. If I did venture an opinion, I replaced my native glibness with a slow groping after simple yet oblique words. Groping was taken as proof of sincerity. But for me the encounter with these men and women and their efforts to explain themselves, with their proud poverty and shared solitude, gave me a view of a bohemian world in which people pursued goals that my father would have despised if he’d ever heard of them. After the stolidity of my childhood—the affluent Midwest of new Cadillacs, Negro maids, and wineless six-o’clock dinners—the sheer effrontery of these painters staying up all night and stretching canvas tight as drumheads, then thumping them with brushes, crayons, charcoal, finally smearing the whole mess away with rags—that thrilled my timid heart. “Common sense” was the name my father and his friends gave their smugness. They worked long hours, saved their money, minded their own business, and furnished their big houses with wall-to-wall carpeting and heavy, store-bought furniture. The sheer weight of their breakfronts and breakfasts, of their wool suits and wooly ideas kept them safely earthbound. But here were these kids, also Midwesterners, who’d left their Wisconsin dairy farms or Indiana milltowns and the chance to take up solid jobs with a future, in order to come here, to puzzle over French novels, listen to Gregorian chants, cut their own hair, work menial jobs, and stab and daub all night at scary, childlike paintings. During that first Michigan winter, I scarcely knew Maria. She crept up on me like the sun, at first just a silvering of the hard pond, a gleam shot through icicles, but at last a patch of blue quarried out of gray cloud. Ivan, the sculptor who’d discovered me, gave me a weird surrealist book to read, The Songs of Maldoror by the Count of Lautréamont. I remember I was most impressed by the biographical note that said the author had been not a count at all but a penniless Uruguayan who’d committed suicide in Paris at the age of twenty-four in 1870. I’d sit in Ivan’s studio and read to him from this upsetting book about a long talking hair from a whore’s head or a man who’d coupled in the sea with a shark. I remember a line that said, “I’m like a dog with its love for the infinite.”

• From Vox (1992)

  122 cheeks! God! And the sight of that blanket slowly sliding off her. And when she put her knees together. And it's not like I haven't done normal stuff here and there. But I don't know, you slip inside, and that first moment is paradise, incomparable, but then you're there working away, and you can't see the clitoris properly, you can't really concentrate on what it feels like to hold her breasts, what they look like when they move, you're distracted, your brain is moving your hips, moving your torso, hold ing her soft hips—hey, it sounds good! But you know? When I come inside it feels mystical but muffled—it's as if I don't feel the perimeter of my cock anymore, because that's merged with her, it's melted away and all I feel is the technical interior conduit structure of the thing and the bulb of come swelling and all that—I lose a sense of outer boundaries. You know? Or do you prefer the phys ical presence of a cock?" "Well," she said, "I mean, if one is in there, I'm not going to tell it to go away. But actually, it's funny, it's another little bit of clit-trickery. As I'm starting to get close to coming, and I'm with a man, I get this intense wish at a certain point to have him in me, but if I pull him up from what he's doing and guide him in, that first moment is great, but then my whole area becomes, as you say, distracted—my clitoris is suddenly in close con ference with my vagina, and I'm out of the loop. I like to think about cocks in me, though. Also, yeah, I do un fortunately tend to get yeast complications from real sex, inside sex, the friction seems to cause them."

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  The Graeco-Roman heathenism, the most cultivated and powerful form of idolatry, which history knows, surrenders, after three hundred years’ struggle, to Christianity, and dies of incurable consumption, with the confession: Galilean, thou hast conquered! The ruler of the civilized world lays his crown at the feet of the crucified Jesus of Nazareth. The successor of Nero, Domitian, and Diocletian appears in the imperial purple at the council of Nice as protector of the church, and takes his golden throne at the nod of bishops, who still bear the scars of persecution. The despised sect, which, like its Founder in the days of His humiliation, had not where to lay its head, is raised to sovereign authority in the state, enters

• From The Beautiful Room Is Empty (1988)

  After all, they were students in a provincial school and had nothing to go on beyond occasional visits to New York and perusals of stylishly inscrutable art magazines in which the celebrated genius of the moment intimidated everyone with grim whimsies (“If a bull wants to sit down in my arena, let him!” a gaunt young art widow, herself a painter, had recklessly declared). One of the student painters I met compared his work to jazz and I dutifully looked at his canvases while listening to the newest bop, those cool blue blips and pop-eyed blasts, muted ballads or zany calisthenics. Another guy, a smilingly ironic man who seemed to be Maria’s lover, said, “It’s a dance. I mean, you know, it’s when, you know, the painter moves toward the easel, like, and that is the real painting, you see, kind of like that.” No matter what people said or showed me, I just nodded, wisely. If I did venture an opinion, I replaced my native glibness with a slow groping after simple yet oblique words. Groping was taken as proof of sincerity. But for me the encounter with these men and women and their efforts to explain themselves, with their proud poverty and shared solitude, gave me a view of a bohemian world in which people pursued goals that my father would have despised if he’d ever heard of them. After the stolidity of my childhood—the affluent Midwest of new Cadillacs, Negro maids, and wineless six-o’clock dinners—the sheer effrontery of these painters staying up all night and stretching canvas tight as drumheads, then thumping them with brushes, crayons, charcoal, finally smearing the whole mess away with rags—that thrilled my timid heart. “Common sense” was the name my father and his friends gave their smugness. They worked long hours, saved their money, minded their own business, and furnished their big houses with wall-to-wall carpeting and heavy, store-bought furniture. The sheer weight of their breakfronts and breakfasts, of their wool suits and wooly ideas kept them safely earthbound. But here were these kids, also Midwesterners, who’d left their Wisconsin dairy farms or Indiana milltowns and the chance to take up solid jobs with a future, in order to come here, to puzzle over French novels, listen to Gregorian chants, cut their own hair, work menial jobs, and stab and daub all night at scary, childlike paintings. During that first Michigan winter, I scarcely knew Maria. She crept up on me like the sun, at first just a silvering of the hard pond, a gleam shot through icicles, but at last a patch of blue quarried out of gray cloud. Ivan, the sculptor who’d discovered me, gave me a weird surrealist book to read, The Songs of Maldoror by the Count of Lautréamont. I remember I was most impressed by the biographical note that said the author had been not a count at all but a penniless Uruguayan who’d committed suicide in Paris at the age of twenty-four in 1870.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  16 And [the forests of] Lebanon cannot supply sufficient fuel to start a fire, Nor are its wild beasts enough for a burnt offering [worthy of the LORD ]. 17 All the nations are as nothing before Him, They are regarded by Him as less than nothing and meaningless. 18 To whom then will you liken God? Or with what likeness will you compare Him? [Acts 17:29 ] 19 As for the cast image (idol), a metalworker casts it, A goldsmith overlays it with gold And a silversmith casts its silver chains. 20 He who is too impoverished for such an offering [to give to his god] Chooses a tree that will not rot; He seeks out for himself a skillful craftsman To [carve and] set up an idol that will not totter. 21 Do you [who worship idols] not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been told to you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth [the omnipotence of God and the stupidity of bowing to idols]? [Rom 1:20 , 21 ] 22 It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; [It is He] who stretches out the heavens like a veil And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. 23 It is He who reduces dignitaries to nothing, Who makes the judges (rulers) of the earth meaningless (useless). 24 Scarcely have they been planted, Scarcely have they been sown, Scarcely has their stock taken root in the earth, But He merely blows on them, and they wither, And a strong wind carries them away like stubble. 25 “To whom then will you compare Me That I would be his equal?” says the Holy One. 26 Lift up your eyes on high And see who has created these heavenly bodies, The One who brings out their host by number, He calls them all by name; Because of the greatness of His might and the strength of His power, Not one is missing. 27 Why, O Jacob, do you say, and declare, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the LORD , And the justice due me escapes the notice of my God”? 28 Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the LORD , the Creator of the ends of the earth Does not become tired or grow weary; There is no searching of His understanding. 29 He gives strength to the weary, And to him who has no might He increases power. [2 Cor 12:9 ] 30 Even youths grow weary and tired, And vigorous young men stumble badly, 31 But those who wait for the LORD [who expect, look for, and hope in Him] Will gain new strength and renew their power; They will lift up their wings [and rise up close to God] like eagles [rising toward the sun]; They will run and not become weary, They will walk and not grow tired.

• From Vox (1992)

  The elephant acts were what were interesting. I’ve ridden on an elephant once or twice in my life, when I was small, and I remember touching the big lobes of its head, and let me tell you, the skin is not smooth, it’s warm and dry and quite bristly—that’s how I remember it, anyway. And these were not little elephants, these were big old elephants, with big tusks. Well, these women were sliding down the side of the elephants, riding on the elephants heads, with their legs between the elephants’ eyes, and repeatedly pivoting around on their bottoms on the elephants’ backs, and they were wearing flesh-colored stockings, or tights, so it was not skin to skin, but even so, those little leotards are cut extremely high in the back, and I really started to be concerned about their bottoms, about whether they were more uncomfortable than their smiles let on, and I started thinking about whether if I were dressed in a very high-cut leotard I would like the sensation of the elephant’s dry living skin on my bottom, and then, during the beginning of the very last big elephant promenade, one of the women was riding on the elephant’s back with one leg in the air, and as the elephant turned I saw this woman’s bottom, and even through the tights I could see that it was in fact red! She was the main elephant woman, I think. Anyhow, for the big finale she rode around on this elephant’s tusks for a minute or two, sat on his trunk, fine fine, all gracefully executed but surprisingly suggestive, and then she did this thing that really shocked me. She took hold of one of the tusks and one of the ears, or somehow swung herself up, and then she lifted one of her knees so that it went right into the elephant’s mouth, and she waited for a second for the elephant to clamp on to it, and then she threw her head back, and arched her back, and spread her arms wide, so she was held in the air suppprted entirely by her knee, which was stuffed in the elephant’s mouth! I mean, think about the saliva! Think about those elephant molars that are gently but firmly taking hold of your upper calf and your mid-thigh, while this elephant tongue is there lounging with its giant taste-buds against your knee! The elephant did a full turn while she was swooning like this. Then she got down and took a bow and patted the elephant under his eye.” “Wow, that’s better than King Kong .” “Well I was impressed. Lawrence had come up with the idea of going to the circus—this was our very first time out, by the way, though I’d known him for a while—so he was careful not to be too impressed.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  (c) Protestant: Jos. Mede (Clavis Apocalyptica, Cambr., 1632; Engl. transl. by More, 1643; a new transl. by R. B. Cooper, Lond., 1833); Hugo Grotius (first, 1644); Vitringa (1705, 1719, 1721); Bengel (1740); Bishop Thomas Newton (in Dissertations on the Prophecies, 8 vols., 1758). This list is a small selection. The literature on the Apocalypse, especially in English, is immense, but mostly impository rather than expository, and hence worthless or even mischievous, because confounding and misleading. Darling’s list of English works on the Apocalypse contains nearly fifty-four columns (I., 1732–1786). General Character of the Apocalypse. The "Revelation" of John, or rather "of Jesus Christ" through John,1244 appropriately closes the New Testament. It is the one and only prophetic book, but based upon the discourses of our Lord on the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the world, and his second advent (Matt. 24). It has one face turned back to the prophecies of old, the other gazing into the future. It combines the beginning and the end in Him who is "the Alpha and the Omega." It reminds one of the mysterious sphinx keeping ceaseless watch, with staring eyes, at the base of the Great Pyramid. "As many words as many mysteries," says Jerome; "Nobody knows what is in it," adds Luther.1245 No book has been more misunderstood and abused; none calls for greater modesty and reserve in interpretation.1246 The opening and closing chapters are as clear and dazzling as sunlight, and furnish spiritual nourishment and encouragement to the plainest Christian; but the intervening visions are, to most readers, as dark as midnight, yet with many stars and the full moon illuminating the darkness. The Epistles to the Seven Churches, the description of the heavenly Jerusalem, and the anthems and doxologies1247 which are interspersed through the mysterious visions, and glister like brilliant jewels on a canopy of richest black, are among the most beautiful, sublime, edifying, and inspiring portions of the Bible, and they ought to guard us against a hasty judgment of those chapters which we may be unable to understand. The Old Testament prophets were not clearly understood until the fulfilment cast its light upon them, and yet they served a most useful purpose as books of warning, comfort, and hope for the coming Messiah. The Revelation will be fully revealed when the new heavens and the new earth appear—not before.1248

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  We see it everywhere triumphant; we find it on houses, on roofs, and on walls, in cities and hamlets, on the markets, along the roads, and in the deserts, on the mountains and in the valleys, on the sea, on ships, on books and weapons, on garments, in marriage chambers, at banquets, upon gold and silver vessels, in pearls, in painting upon walls, on beds, on the bodies of very sick animals, on the bodies of the possessed [—to drive away the disease and the demon—], at the dances of the merry, and in the brotherhoods of ascetics." Besides this, it was usual to mark the cross on windows and floors, and to wear it upon the forehead.1192 According to Augustine this sign was to remind believers that their calling is to follow Christ in true humility, through suffering, into glory. We might speak in the same way of the use of other Christian emblems from the sphere of nature; the representation of Christ by a good Shepherd, a lamb, a fish, and the like, which we have already observed in the period preceding.1193 Towards the end of the present period we for the first time meet with crucifixes; that is, crosses not bare, but with the figure of the crucified Saviour upon them. The transition to the crucifix we find in the fifth century in the figure of a lamb, or even a bust of Christ, attached to the cross, sometimes at the top, sometimes at the bottom.1194 Afterwards the whole figure of Christ was fastened to the cross, and the earlier forms gave place to this. The Trullan council of Constantinople (the Quinisextum), A.D. 692, directed in the 82d canon: "Hereafter, instead of the lamb, the human figure of Christ shall be set up on the images."1195 But subsequently the orthodox church of the East prohibited all plastic images, crucifixes among them, and it tolerates only pictures of Christ and the saints. The earlier Latin crucifixes offend the taste and disturb devotion; but the Catholic art in its flourishing period succeeded in combining, in the figure of the suffering and dying Redeemer, the expression of the deepest and holiest anguish with that of supreme dignity. In the middle age there was frequently added to the crucifix a group of Mary, John, a soldier, and the penitent Magdalene, who on her knees embraced the post of the cross. § 110. Images of Christ. Fr. Kugler: Handbuch der Geschichte der Malerei seit Constantin dem Berlin, 1847, 2 vols.; and other works on the history of painting. Also C. Grüneisen: Die bildliche Darstellung der Gottheit. Stuttgart 1828. On the Iconoclastic controversies, comp. Maimbourg (R.C.): Histoire de l’hérésie de l’Iconoclastes. Par. 1679 sqq. 2 vols. Dallaeus (Calvinist): De imaginibus. Lugd. Bat. 1642. Fr. Spanheim: Historia imaginum restituta. Lugd. Bat. 1686. P. E. Jablonski († 1757): De origine imaginum Christi Domini, in Opuscul. ed. Water, Lugd. Bat. 1804, tom. iii. Walch: Ketzergesch., vols. x. and xi. J. Marx: Der Bildersturm der byzantinischen Kaiser.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  [Matt 9:2–8 ; Mark 2:3–12 ] 19 But finding no way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the b roof [and removed some tiles to make an opening] and lowered him through the tiles with his stretcher, into the middle of the crowd, in front of Jesus. 20 When Jesus saw their [active] faith [springing from confidence in Him], He said, “Man, your sins are forgiven.” 21 The scribes and the Pharisees began to consider and question [the implications of what He had said], saying, “Who is this man who speaks blasphemies [by claiming the rights and prerogatives of God]? Who can forgive sins [that is, remove guilt, nullify sin’s penalty, and assign righteousness] except God alone?” 22 But Jesus, knowing their [hostile] thoughts, answered them, “Why are you questioning [these things] in your hearts? 23 “Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Get up and walk’? 24 “But, in order that you may know that the Son of Man (the Messiah) has authority and power on earth to forgive sins” —He said to the paralyzed man, “I say to you, get up, pick up your stretcher and go home.” 25 He immediately stood up before them, picked up his stretcher, and went home glorifying and praising God. 26 They were all astonished, and they began glorifying God; and they were filled with [reverential] fear and kept saying, “We have seen wonderful and incredible things today!” Call of Levi (Matthew) 27 After this Jesus went out and noticed a tax collector named Levi (Matthew) sitting at the tax booth; and He said to him, “Follow Me [as My disciple, accepting Me as your Master and Teacher and walking the same path of life that I walk].” [Matt 9:9–17 ; Mark 2:14–22 ] 28 And he left everything behind and got up and began to follow Jesus [as His disciple]. 29 Levi (Matthew) gave a great banquet for Him at his house; and there was a large crowd of tax collectors and others who were reclining at the table with them. 30 The Pharisees and their scribes [seeing those with whom He was associating] began murmuring in discontent to His disciples, asking, “Why are you eating and drinking with the tax collectors and sinners [including non-observant Jews]?” 31 And Jesus replied to them, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but [only] those who are sick.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  18 Now it happened that as Jesus was praying privately, the disciples were with Him, and He asked them, “Who do the crowds say that I am?” [Matt 16:13–16 ; Mark 8:27–29 ] 19 They answered, “John the Baptist, and some say, Elijah; but others, that one of the ancient prophets has come back to life.” 20 And He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter replied, “The Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed) of God!” 21 But He strictly warned and admonished them not to tell this to anyone, 22 saying, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected [as the Messiah] by the elders and chief priests and scribes (Sanhedrin, Jewish High Court), and be put to death, and on the third day be raised up [from death to life].” [Matt 16:21–28 ; Mark 8:31–9:1 ] 23 And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to follow Me [as My disciple], he must deny himself [set aside selfish interests], and take up his cross daily [expressing a willingness to endure whatever may come] and follow Me [believing in Me, conforming to My example in living and, if need be, suffering or perhaps dying because of faith in Me]. 24 “For whoever wishes to save his life [in this world] will [eventually] lose it [through death], but whoever loses his life [in this world] for My sake, he is the one who will save it [from the consequences of sin and separation from God]. 25 “For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world [wealth, fame, success], and loses or forfeits himself? 26 “For whoever is ashamed [here and now] of Me and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His glory and the glory of the [heavenly] Father and of the holy angels. 27 “But I tell you truthfully, there are d some among those standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God.” The Transfiguration 28 Now about eight days after these teachings, He took along Peter and John and James and went up on the mountain to pray. [Matt 17:1–8 ; Mark 9:2–8 ] 29 As He was praying, the appearance of His face became different [actually transformed], and His clothing became white and flashing with the brilliance of lightning. 30 And behold, two men were talking with Him; and they were Moses and Elijah, 31 who appeared in glory, and were speaking of His departure [from earthly life], which He was about to bring to fulfillment at Jerusalem. 32 Now Peter and those who were with him had been overcome with sleep; but when they were fully awake, they saw His glory and splendor and majesty, and the two men who were standing with Him.

• From Vox (1992)

  In fact, this secondary deductive twist allows me to get aroused by stuff that doesn’t really arouse me, like for instance when you went into that catalog thing earlier about the row of male models in the warehouse with their cream horns popping out of their shorts, I could think to myself, okay, her arousal is supremely arousing to me, and this image she’s describing is the source or current expression of her arousal, and I could imagine your face thinking of those images, and therefore I was able to make them somewhat arousing to me. Like the religious nut who embraces the devil because it shows his utter humility before God—except I don’t go that far. Oh! I know what I meant to tell you.” “What?” “You know you mentioned that friend of yours reading you a romance novel all night? Okay, this is a good example of what I’m talking about. I went into this used bookstore one time, just to browse around, called Bonnie’s Books. But it wasn’t really the kind of place I thought it was going to be, it had hardly any old books, what it had was recently published pre-enjoyed books. A de-facto library. Shelf after shelf of these things, big thick historical romances, super neatly shelved, sometimes five or six copies of the same book side by side, Love’s Hurry, Loves Eager Trial, Loves Tender Fender Bender , all that kind of material, but even though there were multiple copies of these books, they weren’t identical, because every one of them had been read. They looked handled. All of their pages were turned. And turned by whom? Turned by women. My heart started going. I had entered this enchanted glade. I took a historical romance off the shelf, and I felt as if I were lifting a towel that was still damp from a woman’s shower. The intimacy of it! But it was long—no way I could ever read a book that long. So I put it back. There was a woman at the counter, maybe thirty-eight or forty, perhaps Bonnie herself. She’d read some of these books! I think I was the only one in the store—I knew she was aware of me—I’d smiled at her when I went in. I wanted her to see me looking at the historical romances. And then I went a little further up this one aisle, and I came to a huge trove of romance novels—hundreds and hundreds of them—all organized by the specific subseries, some of which are slightly softer core or harder core, you know, in some they’re allowed to say ‘he frisked his tongue over her navel’ and some they can’t.