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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 The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (1967)

  religion enters significantly into our argument. Religion is the human enterprise by which a sacred cosmos is established (34). Put differently, religion is cosmization in a sacred mode. By sacred is meant here a quality of mysterious and awesome power, other than man and yet related to him, which is believed to reside in certain objects of experience (35). This quality may be attributed to natural or artificial objects, to animals, or to men, or to the objectivations of human culture. There are sacred rocks, sacred tools, sacred cows. The chieftain may be sacred, as may be a particular custom or institution. Space and time may be assigned the same quality, as in sacred localities and sacred seasons. The quality may finally be embodied in sacred beings, from highly localized spirits to the great cosmic divinities. The latter, in turn, may be transformed into ultimate forces or principles ruling the cosmos, no longer conceived of in personal terms but still endowed with the status of sacredness. The historical manifestations of the sacred vary widely, though there are, certain uniformities to be observed cross-culturally (no matter here whether these are to be interpreted as resulting from cultural diffusion or from an inner logic of man’s religious imagination). The sacred is apprehended as “sticking out” from the normal routines of everyday life, as something extraordinary and potentially dangerous, though its dangers can be domesticated and its potency harnessed to the needs of everyday life. Although the sacred is apprehended as other than man, yet it refers to man, relating to him in a way in which other non-human phenomena (specifically, the phenomena of non-sacred nature) do not. The cosmos posited by religion thus both transcends and includes man. The sacred cosmos is confronted by man as an immensely powerful reality other than himself. Yet this reality addresses itself to him and locates his life in an ultimately meaningful 35

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  It was a public school in the Bronx, so it was all brown kids of various ethnicities and races and countries, you know, a lot of them are first-generation immigrants. It was really amazing to see this incredibly diverse group of kids so identify with this reservation Indian boy. And you know, we’re from the same place in the world, I mean, Eastern Washington from Springdale and Wellpinit, from the rez and just off the rez, and to think that we could have any standing or any influence over anybody, let alone some kid in the Bronx? It’s astonishing. It never fails to astonish me. JW: But I think that’s the universal quality of books written for teens up to young adults, is that idea...the universal. I remember reading A Wrinkle in Time and you know, my dad wasn’t a professor, but you identify with those kids. You identify with Charlie going into the chocolate factory. You become that character, and I think that’s what that book’s done so amazingly. I spoke at an alternative school, and the first question I get from this kid is, “Do you know Sherman Alexie?” “No, I never met him.” “That’s the only book I ever read; I love that book.” SA: [Laughs] JW: Again, here’s a kid with a tough childhood. That has to be a recurring theme you hear over the last ten years. SA: I mean, books saved me, so I think True Diary might be part of the emergency kit for a lot of students. One of the things I hear, too, now, is, “This book led me to become a writer. I’m in this MFA program because of Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian.” JW: Do you remember when Arnold Spirit first, when that voice first...Books come in voices, and the voice here is so strong, I had to think that the voice is what popped in your head. SA: Well, it’s autobiographical, of course, but he’s a much more confident person than I was at the same age. And he’s really also kinder. JW: It’s funny, as I read it—you know, you had become a father—I thought you were looking at fatherhood through your boys’ eyes, both the kindness and the savvy of your two sons. SA: My sons are urban Indians, they are very much urban kids so they have urban skills and they’re also members of this generation who are much more self-aware and aware of the world, and they are kinder. My sons at the same age are far kinder than I was, partly because their survival is assured right now, and mine wasn’t. So I think Arnold Spirit Jr. has less of the cannibalistic instincts I did. It’s less Donner Party for him than it was for me. JW: I think sometimes my kids doubt the Lord of the Flies nature of the stories I tell.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  SA: It’s the Iliad of public school education, the Odyssey of public school education. And I was reading the chapter and I was getting emotional just thinking about Gordy being out there, not seeing him yet, and then as I was reading I looked up and we locked eyes and he was in the crowd and he was weeping.…I mean, his shoulders were shaking and tears were running down his face. To see somebody I had written about and somebody who meant so much to me from my past and somebody who did become part of that group I ended up in—where education was so valued, where education was seen as a great path, where there was this heroic quality to it, to the idea of going to college, to aspiring to intellectualism, to aspiring to academic achievement—to be a successful writer having gone through that path and succeeded in all sorts of ways and then to look in the crowd and see my old friend, who had also succeeded intellectually…to be the men we’ve become and to look across that room and remember the kids we were, it was really incredible. JW: That need and ability to fight for your own education—that’s another universal thing. I look at where we are now…Kids are going to have to take all the belligerence, all the anger, everything they have, and turn it toward their own education. SA: I mean, look, I collected aluminum cans one summer to pay for the SAT prep course—aluminum beer cans on the rez to pay for my SAT prep course. JW: And you ended up buying two cars. [Laughs] SA: I built a car out of empty beer cans. [Laughs] And so I think this book’s subtext, and text, in celebrating education is huge, and I think that’s one of the reasons why it’s so big and why it does so well, is that it does it in a funny way. It’s a celebration of high school education with dick jokes. JW: Right, right. What could be more subversive than that? [Laughs] In the last ten years, of course, a lot of other things have changed, and there’s another character in the book, Rowdy, who was also based on a real friend. I think I told you I reread the ending of the book and it was so poignant—Junior and Rowdy talking about seeing each other as old men. SA: Yeah. As those of you reading this tenth anniversary edition know when you read the afterword, Rowdy was based on my childhood best friend, Randy Peone—I really dramatically changed that name, from Randy to Rowdy… JW: Two letters! SA: Fooled everybody on the rez. [Laughs]

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  "And here you have a terrace," Monsieur de Gernande went on, leading me out into a little garden on a level with the apartment, "but its elevation above the ground ought not, I believe, give you the idea of measuring the walls; the Countess is permitted to take fresh air out here whenever she wishes, you will keep her company... adieu." I returned to my mistress and, as at first we spent a few moments examining one another without speaking, I obtained a good picture of her Ä but let me paint it for you. Madame de Gernande, aged nineteen and a half, had the most lovely, the most noble, the most majestic figure one could hope to see, not one of her gestures, not a single movement was without gracefulness, not one of her glances lacked depth of sentiment: nothing could equal the expression of her eyes, which were a beautiful dark brown although her hair was blond; but a certain languor, a lassitude entailed by her misfortunes, dimmed their e'clat, and thereby rendered them a thousand times more interesting; her skin was very fair, her hair very rich; her mouth was very small, perhaps too small, and I was little surprised to find this defect in her: 'twas a pretty rose not yet in full bloom; but teeth so white... lips of a vermillion... one might have said Love had colored them with tints borrowed from the goddess of flowers; her nose was aquiline, straight, delicately modeled; upon her brow curved two ebony eyebrows; a perfectly lovely chin; a visage, in one word, of the finest oval shape, over whose entirety reigned a kind of attractiveness, a naivete, an openness which might well have made one take this adorable face for an angelic rather than mortal physiognomy. Her arms, her breasts, her flanks were of a splendor... of a round fullness fit to serve as models to an artist; a black silken fleece covered her mons veneris, which was sustained by two superbly cast thighs; and what astonished me was that, despite the slenderness of the Countess' figure, despite her sufferings, nothing had impaired the firm quality of her flesh: her round, plump buttocks were as smooth, as ripe, as firm as if her figure were heavier and as if she had always dwelled in the depths of happiness.

• From Going Clear (2013)

  But she knew nothing about running the engine room, or operating the electronics on the bridge, or docking a ship. Half an hour later, Hubbard stuck his head out of his office and beckoned to her. He was holding an E-Meter. Standing in the doorway where everyone could see them, Hubbard handed her the cans. Then he screwed up his eyes and demanded, “ Recall a time you were last a captain.” As Eltringham closed her eyes and began to free-associate, Hubbard watched the needle on the E-Meter. “What’s that?” he asked, when the needle suddenly dropped. “That was sometime on a ship somewhere and the ship was sinking,” Eltringham responded. “Okay, go back earlier.” A moment later, he asked her again, “What’s that?” “That’s just a lot of confusion. I’m in a cabin with a lot of other people. Something urgent is going on.” Hubbard asked her to talk more about it. Eltringham began to see the incident more clearly. “We were in some kind of spaceship,” she said. “We were under attack and—oh my God!—I can see a planet down there! And the planet’s on fire! And something is shooting at us and—oh my God!—the spaceship exploded!” Hubbard asked her to tell the story several more times to destimulate the incident. Then he asked Eltringham how she was feeling. “I’m fine, sir.” Hubbard screwed up his eyes again. “Do you have any other thoughts about it?” Eltringham realized that he was looking for a floating needle, but she wasn’t able to give it to him. “Okay, one more question. Are you a loyal officer?” “I don’t know what you mean by that,” Eltringham said. “I’m loyal to you, and I’m an officer.” Hubbard said, “All right, that’s as far as we’ll go this time.” Eltringham walked up on the deck and tried to take in what Hubbard meant. Suddenly it came to her. Hubbard wasn’t talking about the present. He was referring to the time in her visualization. Some catastrophe must have happened. Eltringham realized that it must have been her planet that was being attacked, and she had been trying to save it. A few minutes later, Hubbard came up on deck and stood beside her. She turned to him and said, “Yep, you’re right, sir. I was a loyal officer. I am.” Hubbard beamed. THE AVON RIVER WAS traveling down the east side of Corsica when Hubbard gathered his crew and read them a new revelation. Nearby, in the north of Corsica, there was an underground space station, he said. He even provided the coordinates. There, a secret doorway would open by a palm print on the lock—but only one person’s hand would do the trick. Hubbard smiled suggestively, without saying whose hand that would be. The rock face would slide open, revealing an immense cavern harboring a mother ship and hundreds of smaller craft, all fueled and ready to go. The space station would remain undiscovered, however.

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

  It is the great and difficult task of the biographer of Jesus to show how he, by external and internal development, under the conditions of a particular people, age, and country, came to be in fact what he was in idea and destination, and what he will continue to be for the faith of Christendom, the God-Man and Saviour of the world. Being divine from eternity, he could not become God; but as man he was subject to the laws of human life and gradual growth. "He advanced in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man."96 Though he was the Son of God, "yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him."97 There is no conflict between the historical Jesus of Nazareth and the ideal Christ of faith. The full understanding of his truly human life, by its very perfection and elevation above all other men before and after him, will necessarily lead to an admission of his own testimony concerning his divinity. "Deep strike thy roots, O heavenly Vine, Within our earthly sod! Most human and yet most divine, The flower of man and God!" Jesus Christ came into the world under Caesar Augustus, the first Roman emperor, before the death of king Herod the Great, four years before the traditional date of our Dionysian aera. He was born at Bethlehem of Judaea, in the royal line of David, from Mary, "the wedded Maid and Virgin Mother." The world was at peace, and the gates of Janus were closed for only the second time in the history of Rome. There is a poetic and moral fitness in this coincidence: it secured a hearing for the gentle message of peace which might have been drowned in the passions of war and the clamor of arms. Angels from heaven proclaimed the good tidings of his birth with songs of praise; Jewish shepherds from the neighboring fields, and heathen sages from the far east greeted the newborn king and Saviour with the homage of believing hearts. Heaven and earth gathered in joyful adoration around the Christ-child, and the blessing of this event is renewed from year to year among high and low, rich and poor, old and young, throughout the civilized world. The idea of a perfect childhood, sinless and holy, yet truly human and natural, had never entered the mind of poet or historian before; and when the legendary fancy of the Apocryphal Gospels attempted to fill out the chaste silence of the Evangelists, it painted an unnatural prodigy of a child to whom wild animals, trees, and dumb idols bowed, and who changed balls of clay into flying birds for the amusement of his playmates. The youth of Jesus is veiled in mystery. We know only one, but a very significant fact.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  S’ils ne regardaient pas l’aliéné comme en proie a la visitation d’un dieu (idée orientale et fataliste), du moins ils savaient que l’amour est une sorte d’envoûtement, une folie où se manifeste l’animosité des puissances cosmiques. Plus tard, le christianisme enveloppa les âmes de ténèbres. Ce fut la grande nuit. L’Église condamna tout ce qui lui parût neuf ou menaçant pour les dogmes implaçable qui reduisaient le monde en esclavage.” Among Sacher-Masoch’s works, Venus in Furs is one of the most typical and outstanding. In spite of melodramatic elements and other literary faults, it is unquestionably a sincere work, written without any idea of titillating morbid fancies. One feels that in the hero many subjective elements have been incorporated, which are a disadvantage to the work from the point of view of literature, but on the other hand raise the book beyond the sphere of art, pure and simple, and make it one of those appalling human documents which belong, part to science and part to psychology. It is the confession of a deeply unhappy man who could not master his personal tragedy of existence, and so sought to unburden his soul in writing down the things he felt and experienced. The reader who will approach the book from this angle and who will honestly put aside moral prejudices and prepossessions will come away from the perusal of this book with a deeper understanding of this poor miserable soul of ours and a light will be cast into dark places that lie latent in all of us. Sacher-Masoch’s works have held an established position in European letters for something like half a century, and the author himself was made a chevalier of the Legion of Honor by the French Government in 1883, on the occasion of his literary jubilee. When several years ago cheap reprints were brought out on the Continent and attempts were made by various guardians of morality—they exist in all countries—to have them suppressed, the judicial decisions were invariably against the plaintiff and in favor of the publisher. Are Americans children that they must be protected from books which any European school-boy can purchase whenever he wishes? However, such seems to be the case, and this translation, which has long been in preparation, consequently appears in a limited edition printed for subscribers only. In another connection Herbert Spencer once used these words: “The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly, is to fill the world with fools.” They have a very pointed application in the case of a work like Venus in Furs. F. S. Atlantic City April, 1921 VENUS IN FURS “But the Almighty Lord hath struck him, and hath delivered him into the hands of a woman.” —The Vulgate, Judith, xvi. 7. My company was charming.

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

  Poetry, and its twin sister music, are the most sublime and spiritual arts, and are much more akin to the genius of Christianity, and minister far more copiously to the purposes of devotion and edification than architecture, painting, and sculpture. They employ word and tone, and can speak thereby more directly to the spirit than the plastic arts by stone and color, and give more adequate expression to the whole wealth of the world of thought and feeling. In the Old Testament, as is well known, they were essential parts of divine worship; and so they have been in all ages and almost all branches of the Christian church. Of the various species of religious poetry, the hymn is the earliest and most important. It has a rich history, in which the deepest experiences of Christian life are stored. But it attains full bloom in the Evangelical church of the German and English tongue, where it, like the Bible, becomes for the first time truly the possession of the people, instead of being restricted to priest or choir. The hymn, in the narrower sense, belongs to lyrical poetry, or the poetry of feeling, in distinction from the epic and dramatic. It differs also from the other forms of the lyric (ode, elegy, sonnet, cantata, &c.) in its devotional nature, its popular form, and its adaptation to singing. The hymn is a popular spiritual song, presenting a healthful Christian sentiment in a noble, simple, and universally intelligible form, and adapted to be read and sung with edification by the whole congregation of the faithful. It must therefore contain nothing inconsistent with Scripture, with the doctrines of the church, with general Christian experience, or with the spirit of devotion. Every believing Christian can join in the Gloria in Excelsis or the Te Deum. The classic hymns, which are, indeed, comparatively few, stand above confessional differences, and resolve the discords of human opinions in heavenly harmony. They resemble in this the Psalms, from which all branches of the militant church draw daily nourishment and comfort. They exhibit the bloom of the Christian life in the Sabbath dress of beauty and holy rapture. They resound in all pious hearts, and have, like the daily rising sun and the yearly returning spring, an indestructible freshness and power. In truth, their benign virtue increases with increasing age, like that of healing herbs, which is the richer the longer they are bruised. They are true benefactors of the struggling church, ministering angels sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation. Next to the Holy Scripture, a good hymn-book is the richest fountain of edification.

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

  Jesus Christ, the God- Man, the prophet, priest, and king of mankind, is, in fact, the centre and turning-point not only of chronology, but of all history, and the key to all its mysteries. Around him, as the sun of the moral universe, revolve at their several distances, all nations and all important events, in the religious life of the world; and all must, directly or indirectly, consciously or unconsciously, contribute to glorify his name and advance his cause. The history of mankind before his birth must be viewed as a preparation for his coming, and the history after his birth as a gradual diffusion of his spirit and progress of his kingdom. "All things were created by him, and for him." He is "the desire of all nations." He appeared in the "fulness of time,"45 when the process of preparation was finished, and the world’s need of redemption fully disclosed. This preparation for Christianity began properly with the very creation of man, who was made in the image of God, and destined for communion with him through the eternal Son; and with the promise of salvation which God gave to our first parents as a star of hope to guide them through the darkness of sin and error.46 Vague memories of a primitive paradise and subsequent fall, and hopes of a future redemption, survive even in the heathen religions. With Abraham, about nineteen hundred years before Christ, the religious development of humanity separates into the two independent, and, in their compass, very unequal branches of Judaism and heathenism. These meet and unite—at last in Christ as the common Saviour, the fulfiller of the types and prophecies, desires and hopes of the ancient world; while at the same time the ungodly elements of both league in deadly hostility against him, and thus draw forth the full revelation of his all—conquering power of truth and love. As Christianity is the reconciliation and union of God and man in and through Jesus Christ, the God-Man, it must have been preceded by a twofold process of preparation, an approach of God to man, and an approach of man to God. In Judaism the preparation is direct and positive, proceeding from above downwards, and ending with the birth of the Messiah. In heathenism it is indirect and mainly, though not entirely, negative, proceeding from below upwards, and ending with a helpless cry of mankind for redemption.

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

  The fourth century saw in the city of Rome above forty great churches.1128 In Constantinople the Church of the Apostles and the church of St. Sophia, built by Constantine, excelled in magnificence and beauty, and in the fifth century were considerably enlarged and beautified by Justinian. Sometimes heathen temples or other public buildings were transformed for Christian worship. The Emperor Phocas (602–610), for example, gave to the Roman bishop Boniface IV, the Pantheon, built by Agrippa under Augustus, and renowned for its immense and magnificent dome (now called chiesa della rotonda), and it was thenceforth consecrated to the virgin Mary and the martyrs. But generally the heathen temples, from their small size and their frequent round form, were not adapted for the Christian worship, as this is held within the building, and requires large room for the congregation, that the preaching and the Scripture-reading may be heard; while the heathen sacrifices were performed before the portico, and the multitude looked on without the sanctuary. The sanctuary of Pandrosos, on the Acropolis at Athens, holds but few persons, and even the Parthenon is not so capacious as an ordinary church. The Pantheon in Rome is an exception, and is much larger than most temples. The small round pagan temples were most easily convertible into Christian baptisteries and burial chapels. Far more frequently, doubtless, was the material of forsaken or destroyed temples applied to the building of churches. § 104. The Consecration of Churches. New churches were consecrated with great solemnity by prayer, singing, the communion, eulogies of present bishops, and the depositing of relics of saints.1129 This service set them apart from all profane uses, and designated them exclusively for the service and praise of God and the edification of his people. The dedication of Solomon’s temple,1130 as well as the purification of the temple after its desecration by the heathen Syrians,1131 furnished the biblical authority for this custom. In times of persecution the consecration must have been performed in silence. But now these occasions became festivals attended by multitudes. Many bishops, like Theodoret, even invited the pagans to attend them. The first description of such a festivity is given us by Eusebius: the consecration of the church of the Redeemer at the Holy Sepulchre,1132 and of a church at Tyre.1133 After the Jewish precedent,1134 it was usual to celebrate the anniversary of the consecration.1135 Churches were dedicated either to the holy Trinity, or to one of the three divine Persons, especially Christ, or to the Virgin Mary, or to apostles, especially Peter, Paul, and John, or to distinguished martyrs and saints.

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

  somewhat reddish beard. (2) The Ecce Homo picture of the suffering Saviour with the crown of thorns. This is traced back by tradition to St. Veronica, who accompanied the Saviour on the way to Golgotha, and gave Him her veil to wipe the sweat from His face; whereupon the Lord miraculously imprinted on the cloth the image of His thorn-crowned head.1216 The Abgarus likeness and the Veronica both lay claim to a miraculous origin, and profess to be eijkovne" ajceiropoivhtai, pictures not made with human hands. Besides these, however, tradition tells of pictures of Christ taken in a natural way by Luke and by Nicodemus. The Salvator picture in the Lateran chapel Sancta Sanctorum in Rome, which is attributed to Luke, belongs to the Edessene or Byzantine type. With so different pretended portraits of the Lord we cannot wonder at the variations of the pictures of Christ, which the Iconoclasts used as an argument against images. In truth, every nation formed a likeness of its own, according to its existing ideals of art and virtue. Great influence was exerted upon the representations of Christ by the apocryphal description of his person in the Latin epistle of Publius Lentulus (a supposed friend of Pilate) to the Roman senate, delineating Christ as a man of slender form, noble countenance, dark hair parted in the middle, fair forehead, clear eyes, faultless mouth and nose, and reddish beard.1217 An older, and in some points different, description is that of John of Damascus, or some other writer of the eighth century, who says: "Christ was of stately form, with beautiful eyes, large nose, curling hair, somewhat bent, in the prime of life, with black beard, and sallow complexion, like his mother."1218 No figure of Christ, in color, or bronze, or marble, can reach the ideal of perfect beauty which came forth into actual reality in the Son of God and Son of man. The highest creations of art are here but feeble reflections of the original in heaven, yet prove the mighty influence which the living Christ continually exerts even upon the imagination and sentiment of the great painters and sculptors, and which He will exert to the end of the world. § 111. Images of Madonna and Saints. Besides the images of Christ, representations were also made of prominent characters in sacred history, especially of the blessed Virgin with the Child, of the wise men of the east, as three kings worshipping before the manger,1219 of the four Evangelists, the twelve Apostles, particularly Peter and Paul,1220 of many martyrs and saints of the times of persecution, and honored bishops and monks of a later day.1221 According to a tradition of the eighth century or later, the Evangelist Luke painted not only Christ, but Mary also, and the two leading apostles. Still later legends ascribe to him even seven Madonnas, several of which, it is pretended, still exist; one, for example, in the Borghese chapel in the church of Maria Maggiore at Rome.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  And guess what they found? Stupid Horse washed up on shore again.” Despite being burned at the dump, and burned again in the lake of fire, Stupid Horse was untouched. Well, the horse was still dead, of course, but it was unburned. Nobody went near the horse after that. They just let it rot. But it took a long time—too long. For weeks, the dead body just lay there. Didn’t go bad or anything. Didn’t stink. The bugs and animals stayed away. Only after a few weeks did Stupid Horse finally let go. His skin and flesh melted away. The maggots and coyotes ate their fill. Then the horse was just bones. “Let me tell you,” Dad said. “That was just about the scariest thing I’ve ever seen. That horse skeleton lying there. It was freaky.” After a few more weeks, the skeleton collapsed into a pile of bones. And the water and the wind dragged them away. It was a freaky story! “Nobody swam in Turtle Lake for ten, eleven years,” Dad said. Me, I don’t think anybody should be swimming in there now. But people forget. They forget good things and they forget bad things. They forget that lakes can catch on fire. They forget that dead horses can magically vanish and reappear. I mean, jeez, we Indians are just weird. So, anyway, on that hot summer day, Rowdy and I walked the five miles from my house to Turtle Lake. All the way, I thought about fire and horses, but I wasn’t going to tell Rowdy about that. He would’ve just called me a wuss or a pussy. He would’ve just said it was kid stuff. He would’ve just said it was a hot day that needed a cold lake. As we walked, I saw that monster pine tree ahead of us. It was so tall and green and beautiful. It was the only reservation skyscraper, you know? “I love that tree,” I said. “That’s because you’re a tree fag,” Rowdy said. “I’m not a tree fag,” I said. “Then how come you like to stick your dick inside knotholes?” “I stick my dick in the girl trees,” I said. Rowdy laughed his ha-ha, hee-hee avalanche laugh. I loved to make him laugh. I was the only one who knew how to make him laugh. “Hey,” he said. “You know what we should do?” I hated when Rowdy asked that particular question. It meant we were about to do something dangerous. “What should we do?” I asked. “We should climb that monster.” “That tree?” “No, we should climb your big head,” he said. “Of course, I’m talking about that tree. The biggest tree on the rez.” It wasn’t really open to debate. I had to climb the tree. Rowdy knew I had to climb the tree with him.

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

  But all these more recent inquiries, earnest, profound, and valuable as they are, have not as yet led to any important or generally accepted results, and cannot supersede the Chalcedonian Christology. The theology of the church will ever return anew to deeper and still deeper contemplation and adoration of the theanthropic person of Jesus Christ, which is, and ever will be, the sun of history, the miracle of miracles, the central mystery of godliness, and the inexhaustible fountain of salvation and life for the lost race of man. § 143. The Monophysite Controversies. I. The Acta in Mansi, tom. vii.-ix. The writings already cited of Liberatus and Leontinus Byzant. Evagrius: H. E. ii. v. Nicephorus: H. E. xvi. 25. Procopius († about 552): jAnevkdota, Hist. arcana (ed. Orelli, Lips. 1827). Facundus (bishop of Hermiane in Africa, but residing mostly in Constantinople): Pro defensione trium capitulorum, in 12 books (written A.D. 547, ed. Sirmond, Paris, 1629, and in Galland. xi. 665). Fulgentius Ferrandus (deacon in Carthage, † 551): Pro tribus capitulis (in Gall. tom. xi.). Anastasius Sinaita (bishop of Antioch, 564): JOdhgov" adv. Acephalos. Angelo Mai: Script vet. Bova collectio, tom. vii. A late, though unimportant, contribution to the history of Monophysitism (from 581 to 583) is the Church History of the Monophysite bishop John of Ephesus (of the sixth century): The Third Part of the Eccles. History of John, bishop of Ephesus, Oxford, 1853 (edited by W. Cureton from the Syrian literature of the Nitrian convent). II. Petavius: De Incarnatione, lib. i. c. 16–18 (tom. iv. p. 74 sqq.). Walch: Bd, vi.-viii. Schröckh: Th. xviii. pp. 493–636. Neander: Kirchengeschichte, !v. 993–1038. Gieseler: i. ii. pp. 347–376 (4th ed.), and his Commentatio qua Monophysitarum veterum variae de Christi persona opiniones ... illustrantur (1835 and 1838). Baur: Geschichte der Trinitätslehre, Bd. ii. pp. 37–96. Dorner: Geschichte der Christologie, ii. pp. 150–193. Hefele (R.C.): Conciliengeschichte, ii. 545 ff. F. Rud. Hasse: Kirchengeschichte (1864), Bd. i. p. 177 ff. A. Ebrard: Handbuch der Kirchen- und Dogmengeschichte (1865), Bd. i. pp. 263–279.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  “And this particular Indian stranger was holding a very beautiful powwow dance outfit, a woman’s powwow dance outfit. It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. It was all beaded blue and red and yellow with a thunderbird design. It must have weighed fifty pounds. And I couldn’t imagine the strength of the woman who could dance beneath that magical burden.” Every woman in the world could dance that way. “Well, this Indian stranger said he was in a desperate situation. His wife was dying of cancer and he needed money to pay for her medicine. I knew he was lying. I knew he’d stolen the outfit. I could always smell a thief.” Smell yourself, Ted. “And I knew I should call the police on this thief. I knew I should take that outfit away and find the real owner. But it was so beautiful, so perfect, that I gave the Indian stranger a thousand dollars and sent him on his way. And I kept the outfit.” Whoa, was Ted coming here to make a confession? And why had he chosen my grandmother’s funeral for his confession? “For years, I felt terrible. I’d look at that outfit hanging on the wall of my Montana cabin.” Mansion, Ted, it’s a mansion. Go ahead; you can say it: MANSION! “And then I decided to do some research. I hired an anthropologist, an expert, and he quickly pointed out that the outfit was obviously of Interior Salish origin. And after doing a little research, he discovered that the outfit was Spokane Indian, to be specific. And then, a few years ago, he visited your reservation undercover and learned that this stolen outfit once belonged to a woman named Grandmother Spirit.” We all gasped. This was a huge shock. I wondered if we were all part of some crazy reality show called When Billionaires Pretend to be Human. I looked around for the cameras. “Well, ever since I learned who really owned this outfit, I’ve been torn. I always wanted to give it back. But I wanted to keep it, too. I couldn’t sleep some nights because I was so torn up by it.” Yep, even billionaires have DARK NIGHTS OF THE SOUL. “And, well, I finally couldn’t take it anymore. I packed up the outfit and headed for your reservation, here, to hand-deliver the outfit back to Grandmother Spirit. And I get here only to discover that she’s passed on to the next world. It’s just devastating.” We were all completely silent. This was the weirdest thing any of us had ever witnessed. And we’re Indians, so trust me, we’ve seen some really weird stuff. “But I have the outfit here,” Ted said. He opened up his suitcase and pulled out the outfit and held it up. It was fifty pounds, so he struggled with it. Anybody would have struggled with it. “So if any of Grandmother Spirit’s children are here, I’d love to return her outfit to them.”

• From The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (1967)

  independence of these powers is vastly augmented, both in the collective nomos and in individual consciousness. The projected meanings of human activity congeal into a gigantic and mysterious “other world,” hovering over the world of men as an alien reality. By means of the “otherness” of the sacred the alienation of the humanly constructed world is ultimately ratified. Inasmuch as this inversion of the relationship between men and their world entails a denial of human choice, the encounter with the sacred is apprehended in terms of “total dependence” (25). This may or may not involve a masochistic attitude, though, as we have seen, the latter is an important motif of religious consciousness. Now, it is important to recall here that the relationship between human activity and the world produced by it is and remains dialectical, even when this fact is denied (that is, when it is not present to consciousness). Thus men produce their gods even while they apprehend themselves as “totally dependent” upon these their products. But, by the same token, the “other world” of the gods takes on a certain autonomy vis-à-vis the human activity that ongoingly produces it. The supra-empirical reality posited by the religious projection is capable of acting back upon the empirical existence of men in society. Thus it would be gravely misleading to regard the religious formations as being simply mechanical effects of the activity that produced them, that is, as inert “reflections” of their societal base (26). On the contrary, the religious formations have the capacity to act upon and modify that base. This fact, however, has a curious consequence—namely, the possibility of de-alienation itself being religiously legitimated. Unless this possibility is grasped, a one-sided view of the relationship between religion and society is inevitable (27). In other words, while religion has an intrinsic (and theoretically very understandable) tendency to 116

• From The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (1967)

  As we have already seen, religion has been one of the most effective bulwarks against anomy throughout human history. It is now important to see that this very fact is directly related to the alienating propensity of religion. Religion has been so powerful an agency of nomization precisely because it has also been a powerful, probably the most powerful, agency of alienation. By the same token, and in the exact sense indicated above, religion has been a very important form of false consciousness (14). One of the essential qualities of the sacred, as encountered in “religious experience,” is otherness, its manifestation as something totaliter aliter as compared to ordinary, profane human life (15). It is precisely this otherness that lies at the heart of religious awe, of numinous dread, of the adoration of what totally transcends all dimensions of the merely human. It is this otherness, for example, that overwhelms Arjuna in the classic vision of Krishna’s divine form in the Bhagavad Gita: With many faces and eyes, presenting many wondrous sights, bedecked with many celestial ornaments, armed with many divine uplifted weapons; wearing celestial garlands and vestments, anointed with divine perfumes, all-wonderful, resplendent, boundless, and with faces on all sides. If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst forth at once in the sky, that would be like the splendour of the Mighty One. (16) And then, in more sinister images: Beholding Thy great form, O Mighty Lord, with myriads of mouths and eyes, with myriads of arms and 106

• From Going Clear (2013)

  “ It gives Man his first keen look into the heads and hearts of his fellows,” Hubbard claimed, adding that Scientology boosted some people’s IQ one point for every hour of auditing. “ Our most spectacular feat was raising a boy from 83 IQ to 212,” he once boasted to the Saturday Evening Post . The theory of auditing is that it locates and discharges mental “masses” that are blocking the free flow of energy. Ideas and fantasies are not immaterial; they have weight and solidity. They can root themselves in the mind as phobias and obsessions. Auditing breaks up the masses that occupy what Hubbard terms the “reactive mind,” which is where the fears and phobias reside. The E-Meter is presumed to measure changes in those masses. If the needle on the meter moves to the right, resistance is rising; to the left, it is falling. The auditor asks systematic questions aimed at detecting sources of “spiritual distress”—problems at work or in a relationship, for instance. Whenever the client, or “ preclear,” gives an answer that prompts the meter needle to jump, that subject becomes an area of concentration until the auditor is satisfied that emotional consequences of the troubling experience have drained away. Certain patterns of needle movement, such as sudden jumps or darts, long versus short falls, et cetera, have meaning as well. The auditor tries to guide the preclear to a “cognition” about the subject under examination, which leads to a “floating” needle. That doesn’t necessarily mean that the needle is frozen. “ The needle just idles around and yawns at your questions,” Hubbard explains. The individual should experience a corresponding feeling of release. Eventually, the reactive mind is cleansed of its obsessions, fears, and irrational urges, and the preclear becomes Clear.2 Haggis found the E-Meter impressively responsive. He would grasp a cylindrical electrode in each hand. (When he first joined Scientology, the electrodes were empty Campbell’s soup cans with the labels stripped off.) An imperceptible electrical charge would run from the meter through his body. The meter seemed able to gauge the kinds of thoughts he was having—whether they were scary or happy, or when he was hiding something. It was a little spooky. The auditor often probed for what Scientologists call “ earlier similars.” If Paul was having another fight with Diane, for instance, the auditor would ask him, “Can you remember an earlier time when something like this happened?” Each new memory led further and further back in time. The goal was to uncover and neutralize the emotional memories that were plaguing Paul’s behavior. Often, the process led participants to recall past lives. Although that never happened to Haggis, he envied others who professed to have vivid recollections of ancient times or distant civilizations. Wouldn’t it be cool if you had many lifetimes before? he thought. Wouldn’t it be easier to face death?

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  Terrified, Madame de Lorsange begs her sister to make all haste and close the shutters; anxious to calm her, Therese dashes to the windows which are already being broken; she would do battle with the wind, she gives a minute's fight, is driven back and at that instant a blazing thunderbolt reaches her where she stands in the middle of the room... transfixes her. Madame de Lorsange emits a terrible cry and falls in a faint; Monsieur de Corville calls for help, attentions are given each woman, Madame de Lorsange is revived, but the unhappy Therese has been struck in such wise hope itself can no longer subsist for her; the lightning entered her right breast, found the heart, and after having consumed her chest and face, burst out through her belly. The miserable thing was hideous to look upon; Monsieur de Corville orders that she be borne away.... "No," says Madame de Lorsange, getting to her feet with the utmost calm; "no, leave her here before my eyes, Monsieur, I have got to contemplate her in order to be confirmed in the resolves I have just taken. Listen to me, Corville, and above all do not oppose the decision I am adopting; for the present, nothing in the world could swerve my designs. "The unheard of sufferings this luckless creature has experienced although she has always respected her duties, have something about them which is too extraordinary for me not to open my eyes upon my own self; think not I am blinded by that false-gleaming felicity which, in the course of Therese's adventures, we have seen enjoyed by the villains who battened upon her. These caprices of Heaven's hand are enigmas it is not for us to sound, but which ought never seduce us. O thou my friend!

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  "Whatever faults the general's son had, his manners were those of the French nobility, therefore perfect; his stately gait might even have graced the court of the grand Monarque ; his politeness was unrivalled—in fact, he possessed all those 'small, sweet courtesies of life,' which, as Sterne says, 'beget inclinations to love at first sight.' He was about to usher us in, when Teleny stopped him. "'Wait a moment,' said he, 'could not Camille have a peep at your harem first? You know he is but a neophyte in the Priapean creed. I am his first lover.' "'Yes, I know,' interrupted Briancourt, sighing, 'and I cannot say sincerely, may you long be the last.' "'And not being inured to the sight of such revelry he will be induced to run away like Joseph from Mrs. Potiphar.' "'Very well, do you mind giving yourself the trouble to come this way?' "And with these words he led us through a dimly-lighted passage, and up a winding staircase into a kind of balcony made out of old Arab mouchambiè , brought to him by his father from Tunis or Algiers. "'From here you can see everything without being seen, so ta-ta for a while, but not for long, as supper will soon be served.' "As I stepped in this kind of loggia and looked down into the room, I was, for a moment, if not dazzled, at least perfectly bewildered. It seemed as if from this every-day world of ours I had been transported into the magic realms of fairy-land. A thousand lamps of varied form filled the room with a strong yet hazy light. There were wax tapers upheld by Japanese cranes, or glowing in massive bronze or silver candlesticks, the plunder of Spanish altars; star-shaped or octagonal lamps from Moorish mosques or Eastern synagogues; curiously-wrought iron cressets of tortured and fantastic designs; chandeliers of murous, iridiscent glass work reflected in Dutch gilt, or Castel-Durante majolica sconces. "Though the room was very large, the walls were all covered with pictures of the most lascivious nature; for the general's son, who was very rich, painted mostly for his own delight. Many were only half-finished sketches, for his ardent yet fickle imagination could not dwell long on the same subject, nor could his talent for invention be long satisfied with the same way of painting. "In some of his imitations of the libidinous Pompeian encaustics he had tried to fathom the secrets of a bygone art. Some pictures were executed with the minute care and the corrosive paints of Leonardo da Vinci; whilst others looked more like Greuze's pastels, or wrought in Watteau's delicate hues. Some flesh tints had the golden haze of the Venetian school, whilst —— " "Please finish this digression on Briancourt's paintings, and tell me something of the more realistic scene."

• From Going Clear (2013)

  Not only was he inventing a new religion, he was also reinventing himself as a religious leader. He was creating the legend of who he was in the minds of those who believed in him. And inevitably, he became imprisoned by their expectations. His followers lived in a state of constant anticipation, trading legends among themselves about the marvels they had experienced or heard about, and speculating upon what was to come. Moments of magic and transcendence kept reason at bay. Ken Urquhart, who served as Hubbard’s butler and later as his secretary—or “Communicator”—recalls coaching a “little old English lady” on a Scientology training exercise. As he observed her, “I noticed her nice skin, her eyes, eyebrows. I noted that behind the skin on her forehead was the bone of her forehead, and I knew that behind that lay her brain. As I thought that thought, her forehead absolutely disappeared. I was looking directly at her brain. I was first astounded and then quickly horrified. Here I was exposing her brain to germs and the cold. At once her forehead was back in place.” If Scientology really did bestow enhanced powers upon its adherents, Hubbard himself should be able to exercise them. Hubbard’s frailties were obvious to everyone; among other things, his hands were beginning to shake from palsy and he was hard of hearing, constantly exclaiming, “What? What?” He sensed the presumptions that surrounded him. “Your friends,” he said one day to Urquhart as his bath was being prepared, “might be curious as to why I employ somebody to open the shutters in my room when I can do it myself.” He meant that he should be able, by sheer mental power, to project his intention and the shutters would open themselves. “Well, a lot of people would like me to appear in the sky over New York so as to impress the world. But if I were to do that I’d overwhelm a lot of people. I’m not here to overwhelm.” Urquhart thought of saying that he was perfectly willing to be overwhelmed in order to see such a demonstration, but he wasn’t altogether sure that Hubbard could actually do it. The failure of Hubbard’s followers to challenge him made them complicit in the creation of the mythical figure that he became. They conspired to protect the image of L. Ron Hubbard, the prophet, the revelator, and the friend of mankind. On the other hand, there were moments when Hubbard seemed to be toying with the limits of possibility. It was rumored that he could move the clouds around in the sky or stir up dust devils in his wake. Urquhart remembers a time when Hubbard was talking to him while sitting in a chair more than an arm’s length away. “My attention wandered,” he recalled. Suddenly, he felt a finger poking him in the ribs. “I came back.