Despair

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 City of God

  64 Books That Matter: The City of God with all moral murkiness sanded away, provoked a poignant despair to Romans viewing their present situation. They were haunted by the memory of republican glory, memory of Caesar, or of Cato, Scipio Africanus; and the many memorial statues and monuments scattered across the empire’s cities—many of which survive today—made such heroism’s absence more palpable and painful, and their consciences at their own moral decline all the more guilty. Perhaps it was inevitable that as a nation aged and its own history grew richer and deeper, certain episodes or eras or people would stand out as remarkable heroes worthy of emulation. After all, nations always seek heroes, and it’s safer to plant them in the sepia-toned precincts of the distant past—perhaps, for the Romans, the marble precincts—where vital conflicts and clashing values are washed away and the simple, straightforward, moral example is privileged. Additionally, though, the rise of Christianity was a genuinely new thing: the emergence of an empire-wide religion that sought to convert all peoples of all different nationalities—the gentes— and, what was more terrifying, of all social classes to a new moral and spiritual posture, one that was possibly fundamentally alien to traditional Roman mores and pietas. This was a new kind of internal threat. The Romans could accommodate the idea of different peoples, with their different rituals and beliefs, and they were eager to incorporate new kinds of human cultures within their empire; diversity was the spice of life, after all. But they required all of them to fit inside the Roman categories, not to challenge the terms on which Rome understood the world. And the Christians wouldn’t do that. First of all, they were like and oddly unlike the Jews that the Romans had already encountered. The Christians were radical monotheists, too, but they seemed to think that their God should be the God for everybody—now, and not at some distant point in the hazy future.

• From The City of God

  123 Lecture 6 Transcript—The Price of Empire (Books 2–3) Why must the pagans hang on to this vision of Rome, he asks. What is at stake in them holding onto it? Here, Augustine gets at the great psychological theme of the first 10 books, which is the pursuit of happiness. Now, everyone wants happiness, Augustine argues. For pagan thinkers, happiness—true human flourishing—is found in our lives as citizens of some human city, such as Rome. This is effectively a morality of patriotism. You exercise your virtuousness— your kind of manly power; this is really addressed to men here—to gain imperium—rule, or domination—which gives you and your city gloria—glory, or splendor. Again, this remains a view which many if not most people today share, that human happiness is the product of this-worldly striving, and that to advance such striving, governments are established as one central vehicle for empowering it. Happiness is realized by worldly achievement. But Augustine thinks this is both historically and psychologically deluded. First, consider history, particularly the physical evils experienced by the Romans—the physical sufferings and deaths that eventuated from their rise to domination over the known world. These are clearly part of the cost of Rome’s rise to greatness. There have certainly been enough of these, he thinks. The civil wars that Rome has suffered over the centuries were more ferocious and bloody than any barbarian sack. To hold on to their belief that the way to be happy is through civic greatness, the Romans are compelled to forget their own history. But the Romans’ blindness to their history of physical evils—this is not the worst thing about their attitude. The worst thing is that the Romans can only see physical evils, and not the larger and more profound moral evils surrounding them and enabling them. Here, Augustine notes the curious and ironic fact that the Romans were more afraid of physical evils than the moral evils that he considered deeper and more devastating—more afraid of suffering physical pain than of the corruption of their souls. Thus they exemplify for Augustine the truism, as he put it, that the only thing which the evil regard as evil are those which do not make evil, because anyone

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  ἐρύτήρ, ἤρος. 6, one that draws or rescues from, κακῶν Nic. Al. 363. ἐρύω, Ion. εἰρύω ; Ep. inf. εἰρύμεναι [0] Hes. Op. 816 :—impf. εἴρυον Mosch. 2. 14, ἔρυον Il. 12. 258; Petes Nonn. Ὁ. 43. 50 :—fut. ἐρύω Il. ΤΙ. 454, 15. 351. 22. 67; 1. ἐρύσω as in Opp. PISS ΟΠΕΡ: ἐρύσσω Orph., Nonn. :—aor. «φῦσα Hom., Hdt. ; ; €pvoa Il. 5.573, Pind.; εἴρυσσα Il. 3. 373, Od. 8. 85; lengthd. ἔρύσασκε (ἐξ--) ail το. 490; imper. εἴρυσον even in Soph. Tr. 1033 (in a chorus); subj. ἐρύσω Il., εἰρύσω, Hipp. 452. 12, etc., 2 sing. ἐρύσσῃς 5. 110, Ep. I pl. ἐρύσσομεν (for -μεν)) Il. 14. γ6., U7 635; ; opt. ἐρύσαιμι 11. ; ἐρύσαι. ἐρύσσαι Il. : inf. εἰρύσαι (δι--, ἐξ--) Hdt.; part. ἐρύσας Il. 23. 21, εἰρύσας Hdt. 4.το; ἐρύσσας Ap. Rh. 3. 912. Ion. and poét. Verb. To drag along the ground, drag, draw, generally with a sense of violence or force, νῆα... εἰς ἅλα Il. 1. 141, Od. 8. 34; ἅλαδε 2. 389; ἤπειρόνδε TO. 423; ἐπ᾽ ἠπείροιο on land, 16. 325. 359; ἐπὶ θῖνι Il. 4. 248; [δόρυ] ἐ ἐρ. ἐπ᾽ ἄκρης. of the Trojan horse, Od. 8. 508 :—of the dead, τρὶς δ᾽ ἐρύσας περὶ σῆμα. of Hector’s body, Il. 24.16; νεκρόν, vexpods ép., either of the friends, to drag them away, rescue them, 5. 573., 16. 781; or of the enemy, ¢o drag them off for plunder, ransom, etc., 4. 467 sq., al. (v. infr. B. I. 2); of dogs and birds of prey, zo drag and tear, οἰωνοὶ ὠμησταὶ ἐρύουσι II. 454, etc. :—hence ¢o drag away, carry off violently, Od. 9. 99; c. gen. partis, διὰ δώματ᾽ ep... ἢ ποδὸς ἢ Kal χειρός 17.4793 so, Ep. τινὰ Koupit by the hair, 22.188 :—to draw upwards or downwards, ἐξ οὐρανόθεν πεδίονδε Ζῆν᾽ 1]. 8. 22, cf. vss. sqq.; σείρην .. κίον᾽ ἀν᾽ ὑψηλὴν ἐρύσαι to draw it up a pillar, Od. 22.176; χειρὶ πάλιν ἔρ. Il. 5. 836 (cf. αὐερύωλ :—of warriors, δόρυ .. ἐξ ὠτειλῆς εἴρυσε 16. 863; ἐξ ὥμοιο.. ὀϊστόν 5. 110; μελίην .. ἐκ κρημνοῖο 21.175; also, φάρμακον ἐκ γαίης Od. το. 303 :—also, to pull down, tear away, κρόσσας μὲν πύργων ἐρίων ΤΙ ΤΖ: 258, ὍΚΙΤΑΣ 35. 2. without any sense of violence, to draw, φᾶρος. . κὰκ κεφαλῆς εἴρυσσε drew it over his head, Od. 8. 85; Πρ Ὁ μὲν χλαίνης ἐρύων, ἄλλον δὲ χιτῶνος pulling or plucking him by .. 22. 493: νευρὴν ep. ἐπί τινι to draw the bowstring at him, Il. 15. vee 5 so, ἐρ. τόξον Hdt. 3. 30; ἔγχος εἴρυσον draw thy sword, Soph. firs 1033; ἐπί τινι κλῆρον Ep. to draw lots for .., Call. Jov. 62; ἐκ ποδὸς ép. to put aside, Pind. N. 7. 99 :—but πλίνθους εἰρύειν, Lat. ducere lateres, like ἕλκειν, Hdt. 2. 1 30.

• From The City of God

  101 Lecture 5 Transcript—The Problem of Suffering (Book 1) If that’s so, what then? How do you respond to a world that seems immune to your wish to avoid suffering? Should we conclude it’s absurd? If so, what should we do about it? This question resolves itself in this book into a long discussion of a fundamental issue brought up by the sack and by important moral exemplars in Roman history. Is suicide a sin? Is life worth the effort of living it? This is not a question local only to Augustine’s age, of course. When we are faced with the apparent absurdity of the world, Hamlet asks, “To be, or not to be?” And the French existentialist writer Albert Camus put it frankly in The Myth of Sisyphus: “There is only one truly important philosophical question, and that is suicide.” By the way, for all his atheist, existentialist Frenchness, Camus actually wrote his master’s thesis in large part on Saint Augustine. So suicide is a perennial question, a question of how we are to endure a challenging life. But it’s also one that has a particular purchase on Augustine’s age. In pagan Rome, and even among many Christians in North Africa, suicide did not have all the opprobrium that most of us today associate with it. The Romans honored some suicides, and self-willed martyrs of the faith were a major part of radical Christian ideology and vital Christian memory. Augustine wants to explain why Christians and humans in general should think suicide is never acceptable, and how suffering is to be endured, not avoided through self-annihilation. He concludes this by talking about what he insinuates is the uttermost form of cruelty, the cruelty of convincing another that they are complicit in their own annihilation, particularly through rape, and thus causing them to kill themselves. Augustine’s answer is not theoretically tidy. He doesn’t propose that if we see the world aright, the problem of suffering will go away for us. In fact, if we see the world aright, according to Augustine, a great many things will become more puzzling to us. But before we can get to that, Augustine thinks, we must inspect the pagan attitudes towards these matters, to assess their plausibility, and to see whether we need to expel their assumptions from our own minds.

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Marianne heard enough. In one moment her imagination placed before her a letter from Willoughby, full of tenderness and contrition, explanatory of all that had passed, satisfactory, convincing; and instantly followed by Willoughby himself, rushing eagerly into the room to inforce, at her feet, by the eloquence of his eyes, the assurances of his letter. The work of one moment was destroyed by the next. The hand writing of her mother, never till then unwelcome, was before her; and, in the acuteness of the disappointment which followed such an ecstasy of more than hope, she felt as if, till that instant, she had never suffered. The cruelty of Mrs. Jennings no language, within her reach in her moments of happiest eloquence, could have expressed; and now she could reproach her only by the tears which streamed from her eyes with passionate violence—a reproach, however, so entirely lost on its object, that after many expressions of pity, she withdrew, still referring her to the letter of comfort. But the letter, when she was calm enough to read it, brought little comfort. Willoughby filled every page. Her mother, still confident of their engagement, and relying as warmly as ever on his constancy, had only been roused by Elinor’s application, to intreat from Marianne greater openness towards them both; and this, with such tenderness towards her, such affection for Willoughby, and such a conviction of their future happiness in each other, that she wept with agony through the whole of it. All her impatience to be at home again now returned; her mother was dearer to her than ever; dearer through the very excess of her mistaken confidence in Willoughby, and she was wildly urgent to be gone. Elinor, unable herself to determine whether it were better for Marianne to be in London or at Barton, offered no counsel of her own except of patience till their mother’s wishes could be known; and at length she obtained her sister’s consent to wait for that knowledge. Mrs. Jennings left them earlier than usual; for she could not be easy till the Middletons and Palmers were able to grieve as much as herself; and positively refusing Elinor’s offered attendance, went out alone for the rest of the morning. Elinor, with a very heavy heart, aware of the pain she was going to communicate, and perceiving, by Marianne’s letter, how ill she had succeeded in laying any foundation for it, then sat down to write her mother an account of what had passed, and entreat her directions for the future; while Marianne, who came into the drawing-room on Mrs. Jennings’s going away, remained fixed at the table where Elinor wrote, watching the advancement of her pen, grieving over her for the hardship of such a task, and grieving still more fondly over its effect on her mother.

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  “No, no,” cried Marianne, “misery such as mine has no pride. I care not who knows that I am wretched. The triumph of seeing me so may be open to all the world. Elinor, Elinor, they who suffer little may be proud and independent as they like—may resist insult, or return mortification—but I cannot. I must feel—I must be wretched—and they are welcome to enjoy the consciousness of it that can.” “But for my mother’s sake and mine—” “I would do more than for my own. But to appear happy when I am so miserable—Oh! who can require it?” Again they were both silent. Elinor was employed in walking thoughtfully from the fire to the window, from the window to the fire, without knowing that she received warmth from one, or discerning objects through the other; and Marianne, seated at the foot of the bed, with her head leaning against one of its posts, again took up Willoughby’s letter, and, after shuddering over every sentence, exclaimed,— “It is too much! Oh, Willoughby, Willoughby, could this be yours! Cruel, cruel—nothing can acquit you. Elinor, nothing can. Whatever he might have heard against me—ought he not to have suspended his belief? ought he not to have told me of it, to have given me the power of clearing myself? ‘The lock of hair, (repeating it from the letter,) which you so obligingly bestowed on me’—That is unpardonable. Willoughby, where was your heart when you wrote those words? Oh, barbarously insolent!—Elinor, can he be justified?” “No, Marianne, in no possible way.” “And yet this woman—who knows what her art may have been?—how long it may have been premeditated, and how deeply contrived by her!—Who is she?—Who can she be?—Whom did I ever hear him talk of as young and attractive among his female acquaintance?—Oh! no one, no one—he talked to me only of myself.” Another pause ensued; Marianne was greatly agitated, and it ended thus. “Elinor, I must go home. I must go and comfort mama. Can not we be gone to-morrow?” “To-morrow, Marianne!” “Yes, why should I stay here? I came only for Willoughby’s sake—and now who cares for me? Who regards me?” “It would be impossible to go to-morrow. We owe Mrs. Jennings much more than civility; and civility of the commonest kind must prevent such a hasty removal as that.” “Well then, another day or two, perhaps; but I cannot stay here long, I cannot stay to endure the questions and remarks of all these people. The Middletons and Palmers—how am I to bear their pity? The pity of such a woman as Lady Middleton! Oh, what would he say to that!”

• From The City of God

  55 Lecture 3 Transcript—The Sack of Rome, 410 A.D. And what happens when the barbarians leave to go home, after killing all the officials and destroying all the buildings? Can you imagine building all over again? But what would it be like if they stay? What would that be like? Such was the situation facing the Roman world when Augustine began to write The City of God. Augustine writes in the wake of chaos, attempting to accept it. Not accept it in a defeatist mode, but accept it as what has happened, and attempt to learn from it, to see what it can teach us, what use we can make of its sufferings, and to what end we might direct the essentially unjust acts that we must enact upon others in its wake. If the end of the world has a beginning, we could do far worse than date it to August 24, 410 A.D., when Alaric and the Visigoths entered the city of Rome and began to sack it. Almost as soon as it occurred, the sack of Rome from August 24 to 26 left the space of history and entered the realm of myth. And, of course, the West has lived through the end of history many times—not just the sack of 410 but the far more savage Vandal assault of 455, the Plague of Justinian in 541–42, the Black Death of 1348—and a full history of the imagination of the end of the world would chart how that imagination is a palimpsest, with each catastrophe overwriting the others, and the whole ensemble being reordered for each era’s apocalyptic needs. But the sack of Rome in 410 is in a very real way foundational for the apocalyptic imagination of the West. When we imagine a catastrophe, when we try to depict the end of life as we know it, life as we know it turns out to be remarkably akin to what we imagine life in Rome was like on August 23 of that year, and the ending turns out to be remarkably akin to what we imagine the sack of Rome to have been. It’s all turned into mythology. Probably, it would be harder to uncover the facts about the sack of Rome than it was, at first, to sack it. This is not to say that the historical facts are in much doubt, but only that they have the most oblique relationship with our imagination

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  “His character is now before you; expensive, dissipated, and worse than both. Knowing all this, as I have now known it many weeks, guess what I must have felt on seeing your sister as fond of him as ever, and on being assured that she was to marry him: guess what I must have felt for all your sakes. When I came to you last week and found you alone, I came determined to know the truth; though irresolute what to do when it was known. My behaviour must have seemed strange to you then; but now you will comprehend it. To suffer you all to be so deceived; to see your sister—but what could I do? I had no hope of interfering with success; and sometimes I thought your sister’s influence might yet reclaim him. But now, after such dishonorable usage, who can tell what were his designs on her. Whatever they may have been, however, she may now, and hereafter doubtless will turn with gratitude towards her own condition, when she compares it with that of my poor Eliza, when she considers the wretched and hopeless situation of this poor girl, and pictures her to herself, with an affection for him so strong, still as strong as her own, and with a mind tormented by self-reproach, which must attend her through life. Surely this comparison must have its use with her. She will feel her own sufferings to be nothing. They proceed from no misconduct, and can bring no disgrace. On the contrary, every friend must be made still more her friend by them. Concern for her unhappiness, and respect for her fortitude under it, must strengthen every attachment. Use your own discretion, however, in communicating to her what I have told you. You must know best what will be its effect; but had I not seriously, and from my heart believed it might be of service, might lessen her regrets, I would not have suffered myself to trouble you with this account of my family afflictions, with a recital which may seem to have been intended to raise myself at the expense of others.” Elinor’s thanks followed this speech with grateful earnestness; attended too with the assurance of her expecting material advantage to Marianne, from the communication of what had passed. “I have been more pained,” said she, “by her endeavors to acquit him than by all the rest; for it irritates her mind more than the most perfect conviction of his unworthiness can do. Now, though at first she will suffer much, I am sure she will soon become easier. Have you,” she continued, after a short silence, “ever seen Mr. Willoughby since you left him at Barton?” “Yes,” he replied gravely, “once I have. One meeting was unavoidable.” Elinor, startled by his manner, looked at him anxiously, saying, “What? have you met him to—”

• From The City of God

  91 Lecture 5—The Problem of Suffering (Book 1) of that. The vision of Rome that emerges from these books is a terrifying one. The Inequity of Suffering „Suffering is so pervasive in our world, so powerful in our experience, and so perplexing and vexing to our expectations that any belief in or hope for secure happiness in this world is always a delusion. The question for Augustine is, once we see that suffering is unavoidable, what are we going to do about it? „Augustine offers a direct response to the immediate challenge posed by the sack of Rome—the inequity of unmerited suffering—and answers pagan accusations that the sack itself was evidence against the Christians’ faith in the providential governance of a loving God. „Yet, a more fundamental question is the problem of evil, suffering, and the discrepancy between our moral expectations of the world and what the world provides. Augustine suggests that the question was not why innocents suffer, but: ›Why, on Christian terms, does suffering happen? ›What should humans do when such sufferings are inflicted upon them? „Suffering is common to our human condition. The dilemma is why people suffer to the degree that they do, and why people do not suffer fairly—that is, why some good people Augustine answers that the key is wrong attachment to the world, and the question should be what use we make of suffering. No one is righteous; no one properly appreciates the world as it should be appreciated, and therefore all find suffering in their interactions with it.

• From The City of God

  139 Lecture 7—Augustine’s Political Vision (Book 4) › Romans also believed in a deeply theological character to their polity. Here Augustine suggests that an honest geopolitical imagination recognizes that nations were great before Rome and that when Rome did rise, the causes were contingent factors that bear no marks of inevitability or destiny. ›As to divine favor, Augustine believed that the practice of creating a multiplicity of gods led to enormous idolatry and that polytheism benefits only demons, who leverage the Romans’ belief into a racket whereby they pretend to offer such favor, but for the price of the Romans’ souls. „The final aspect of Augustine’s critique of Roman politics makes three claims—about what motivates political actors to obey, about what motivates political powers to act, and about the addictive nature of the exercise of power. ›People and states are motivated by the logic of obedience, not consent. It is not reason but force that coordinates between differing political agents, for obedience is purchased not by consent but by force. ›Positive motivations are much less mobilizing of action than negative ones. While we are gathered together in a community by our loves, our behavior is more typically reactive, responding to perceived threats or rivals. We are driven by fear more than aspiration. ›The possession of political power changes both vision and behavior: Having begun exercising it, the ability to stop is lost; were you to let it go, someone else would gain it and use it against you. Nor does the exercise of power make you happy: Happiness purchased through worldly power is only and always insecure, and its insecurity drains away your happiness in it. Political power is self-subverting: It becomes its own self- legitimating end, and, like political desire for freedom, can enslave. 140 Books That Matter: The City of God „When we step back from the episodic narrative of Augustine’s story and reflect on its overall vision, the systemic nature can be striking. He has a wide and deep vision, deeply aware of how complicated and intricate all the moves have to be. Seen in this light, books 2 through 4 both sketch an overall political philosophy and critique a certain cultural mythology and the elites who embody, promulgate, and profit from it. Questions to Consider 1. Do you think the Romans’ pursuit of happiness was ever likely to be successful on Augustine’s terms? Was it wise? 2. Augustine said that kingdoms without justice are little more than large criminal gangs. Do you think he is right? If not, what functionally differentiates states from criminal gangs? 3. Is insecure happiness really happiness? Augustine thinks it is not. Do you? Does true happiness come only after death?

• From The City of God

  130 Books That Matter: The City of God ambiguous. That explains both the essential fluidity of the desire and its essential futility. And it is futile for Augustine; it is impossible. It is the form our longing takes when its most basic expression—namely, as Genesis puts it, to be as gods—is stymied; which of course, from Eden forward—from its first formulation forward—it is. Sinful human behavior has a form even in its revolt against form. It can be described in semi-intelligible terms even in rebellion against its existence within God’s prescriptions, because its revolt is not, and perhaps cannot be, entirely serious, radically absolute. So all-encompassing and universally inclusive a description offers a profound diagnosis of our moral calamity. And yet the true power and ultimate irony of this category is that it shows that human activity, even at its very worst, is no more than ambivalent, that it is not wholly nihilistic, that there is always hope. The human cannot destroy itself wholly. The conditions of its own agency forbid such utter self- abnegation. The libido dominandi is that category that, for Augustine, simultaneously sobers us about the depths of human corruption, and rescues us from utter despair. Of course, it’s only obscurely related to any better form of moral action, too. That is to say, the connection between this false category of action, this description of bad action, and some alternative and good description of a good action, will be obscure, at least from the side of the fallen self. But we can expect that kind of obscurity in any account of moral progress. If, at some moment, we already fully apprehended what being better truly would mean, it would be something we already would be on the way to becoming. In a way, that is to say, moral progress in the vision of the world, in the vision of human endeavor that Augustine has, is inescapably only retrospectively understandable and reportable—from the after condition back to the before—and perhaps it is even only retrospectively narratable.

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  “Forgive me, forgive me,” throwing her arms round her sister’s neck; “I know you feel for me; I know what a heart you have; but yet you are—you must be happy; Edward loves you—what, oh what, can do away such happiness as that?” “Many, many circumstances,” said Elinor, solemnly. “No, no, no,” cried Marianne wildly, “he loves you, and only you. You can have no grief.” “I can have no pleasure while I see you in this state.” “And you will never see me otherwise. Mine is a misery which nothing can do away.” “You must not talk so, Marianne. Have you no comforts? no friends? Is your loss such as leaves no opening for consolation? Much as you suffer now, think of what you would have suffered if the discovery of his character had been delayed to a later period—if your engagement had been carried on for months and months, as it might have been, before he chose to put an end to it. Every additional day of unhappy confidence, on your side, would have made the blow more dreadful.” “Engagement!” cried Marianne, “there has been no engagement.” “No engagement!” “No, he is not so unworthy as you believe him. He has broken no faith with me.” “But he told you that he loved you.” “Yes—no—never absolutely. It was every day implied, but never professedly declared. Sometimes I thought it had been, but it never was.” “Yet you wrote to him?” “Yes: could that be wrong after all that had passed? But I cannot talk.” Elinor said no more, and turning again to the three letters which now raised a much stronger curiosity than before, directly ran over the contents of all. The first, which was what her sister had sent him on their arrival in town, was to this effect. Berkeley Street, January. “How surprised you will be, Willoughby, on receiving this; and I think you will feel something more than surprise, when you know that I am in town. An opportunity of coming hither, though with Mrs. Jennings, was a temptation we could not resist. I wish you may receive this in time to come here to-night, but I will not depend on it. At any rate I shall expect you to-morrow. For the present, adieu. “M.D.” Her second note, which had been written on the morning after the dance at the Middletons’, was in these words:—

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  “Last night, in Drury Lane lobby, I ran against Sir John Middleton, and when he saw who I was, for the first time these two months, he spoke to me. That he had cut me ever since my marriage, I had seen without surprise or resentment. Now, however, his good-natured, honest, stupid soul, full of indignation against me, and concern for your sister, could not resist the temptation of telling me what he knew ought to, though probably he did not think it would, vex me horridly. As bluntly as he could speak it, therefore, he told me that Marianne Dashwood was dying of a putrid fever at Cleveland—a letter that morning received from Mrs. Jennings declared her danger most imminent—the Palmers are all gone off in a fright, &c. I was too much shocked to be able to pass myself off as insensible even to the undiscerning Sir John. His heart was softened in seeing mine suffer; and so much of his ill-will was done away, that when we parted, he almost shook me by the hand while he reminded me of an old promise about a pointer puppy. What I felt on hearing that your sister was dying, and dying too, believing me the greatest villain upon earth, scorning, hating me in her latest moments—for how could I tell what horrid projects might not have been imputed? One person I was sure would represent me as capable of anything—What I felt was dreadful! My resolution was soon made, and at eight o’clock this morning I was in my carriage. Now you know all.” Elinor made no answer. Her thoughts were silently fixed on the irreparable injury which too early an independence and its consequent habits of idleness, dissipation, and luxury, had made in the mind, the character, the happiness, of a man who, to every advantage of person and talents, united a disposition naturally open and honest, and a feeling, affectionate temper. The world had made him extravagant and vain—Extravagance and vanity had made him cold-hearted and selfish. Vanity, while seeking its own guilty triumph at the expense of another, had involved him in a real attachment, which extravagance, or at least its offspring, necessity, had required to be sacrificed. Each faulty propensity in leading him to evil, had led him likewise to punishment. The attachment, from which against honour, against feeling, against every better interest he had outwardly torn himself, now, when no longer allowable, governed every thought; and the connection, for the sake of which he had, with little scruple, left her sister to misery, was likely to prove a source of unhappiness to himself of a far more incurable nature. From a reverie of this kind she was recalled at the end of some minutes by Willoughby, who, rousing himself from a reverie at least equally painful, started up in preparation for going, and said— “There is no use in staying here; I must be off.” “Are you going back to town?”

• From A Theology for the Social Gospel (1918)

  5. New spiritual factors of the highest significance are disclosed by the realization of the super-personal forces, or composite personalities, in society. When these backslide and become combinations for evil, they add enormously to the power of sin. Theology has utilized the terminology and results of psychology to interpret the sin and regeneration of individuals. Would it stray from its field if it utilized sociological terms and results in order to interpret the sin and re- demption of these super-personal entities in human life? The solidaristic spiritual conceptions which have been discussed must all be kept in mind and seen together, in order to realize the power and scope of the doctrine to which they converge : the Kingdom of Evil. In some of our swampy forests the growth of ages has produced impenetrable thickets of trees and under- growth, woven together by creepers, and inhabited by things that creep or fly. Every season sends forth new growth under the urge of life, but always developing THE KINGDOM OF EVIL 79 from the old growth and. its seeds, and still perpetuat- ing the same rank mass of life. The life of humanity is infinitely interwoven, always renewing itself, yet always perpetuating what has been.- The evils of one generation are caused by the wrongs of the generations that preceded, and will in turn con- dition the sufferings and temptations of those who come after. Our Italian immigrants are what they are be- cause the Church and the land system of Italy have made them so. The Mexican peon is ridden by the Spanish past. Capitalistic Europe has fastened its yoke on the neck of Africa. When negroes are hunted from a Northern city like beasts, or when a Southern city de- grades the whole nation by turning the savage inhuman- ity of a mob into a public festivity, we are continuing to sin because our fathers created the conditions of sin by the African slave trade and by the unearned wealth they gathered from slave labour for generations. Stupid dynasties go on reigning by right of the long time they have reigned. The laws of the ancient Roman despotism were foisted by ambitious lawyers on mediaeval communities, to which they were in no wise fitted, and once more strangled liberty, and dragged free farmers into serfdom. When once the common land of a nation, and its mines and waters, have become the private property of a privileged band, nothing short of a social earthquake can pry them from their right of collecting private taxes. Superstitions which origi- nated in the third century are still faithfully cultivated by great churches, compressing the minds of the young with fear and cherished by the old as their most precious 8o A THEOLOGY FOR THE SOCIAL GOSPEL

• From Boys & Sex (2020)

  “No,” he admitted. “I wasn’t.” By Thanksgiving break, he was so despondent that he had what he called a “mental breakdown” after dinner one night while chatting in the kitchen with his mom. “I was so stressed out,” he said. “Classes. The thing with my girlfriend. It was a lot for me to handle.” He couldn’t describe what that “breakdown” looked or felt like to him (though, he said, it “scared the crap” out of his mom, who immediately demanded, “Tell me everything”). All he could say definitively was that he didn’t cry. “Never,” he insisted. “I don’t cry ever.” I paid close attention when boys mentioned crying—doing it, not doing it, wanting to do it, not being able to do it. For most, it was a rare and sometimes shameful event—a dangerous crack in that carefully constructed internal edifice. True, teary men are given more leeway today than they once were, but there are rules. GQ, for instance, stipulates that guys can cry in extreme pain: “Like, say, if a piano were dropped from a fifth-story window onto your foot”; if someone is shooting at you; if you’re an athlete and your team wins a championship (LeBron after the 2016 NBA finals); or at a tear-jerking film (that “is a bodily function . . . like menstruation of the eyes”). Askmen.com adds that crying over a sports loss is acceptable—providing you weren’t responsible for it (so, the site says, Tim Tebow after losing the 2009 SEC Championships is fine, but not Roger Federer after blowing the Australian Open that same year). A survey of 150 college football players found that while they believed it was reasonable to “tear up” after an important victory or a devastating loss, actual sobbing, for most, was never an option. A college sophomore in Chicago told me that he hadn’t been able to cry when his parents divorced. “I really wanted to,” he said. “I needed to cry.” His solution: he streamed three movies about the Holocaust back to back (that worked). As someone who has, by virtue of my genitalia, always had permission to weep, I didn’t initially get it. It took multiple interviews for me to realize that when boys confided in me about crying—or, even more so, when they teared up right in front of me—they were taking a risk, trusting me with something private and precious: evidence of vulnerability, or a desire for it. Or, as with Rob, an inability to acknowledge it that was so poignant, it made me want to, well, cry. Jocks, Bros, Fags, and Pussies

• From A Theology for the Social Gospel (1918)

  ESCHATOLOGY 211 allthe more pathetic because the pre-millennial scheme is really anoutlineof the social salvationofthe race. Thosewho hold it exhibit real interest in socialand po- litical events.But they are best pleased when they see humanity defeated and collapsing, forthen salvation is nigh. Activework for thesalvation of the social order before the coming of Christis not only vain but against the willof God.Thus eschatology defeats theChris- tian imperative of righteousness andsalvation. Historicalscienceandthe social gospeltogether may be able to affect eschatology for good. Historical criticism by itself makes it lookimbecile and has no creative power. The social gospel has that moral earnestness and religious faithwhich exertsconstruc- tive influence on doctrine. Inthe first place, thesocial gospel can at least give us a sympathetic understanding and right valuationof some of the elements contained in theinherited body of ideas. A merely theologicalcomprehension ofit isafalse un- derstanding. It must be understood historically in con- nection with the social situations which createdits parts, like the buildings onan old college campus, or like the Constitution and its amendments. Those parts of Christian eschatology which dealwith the future ofthe race are on the wholederived from Judaism, and weowe their ethical qualities tothe valiant democratic spirit ofthe prophets. Their "Day of Yahveh " became our " Great Judgment " ; the time of peace and righteousness which wasto followit became the Christian millennium. The wholewas originally A THEOLOGY FOR THESOCIAL GOSPEL the religious equivalent of a wholesome revolution in which the oppressing class is eliminated and the right- eous, poorget relief. This central section of Christian eschatology was the product of the brave fight which Jehovah and his people made together forthe ancestral freedom of the common people. The idea ofa resur- rection of the dead did not come into eschatology through growing individualism, but out of the feeling that the righteous who had died before the inauguration of the new order were entitled to a share inthe common hap- piness. Demonology and satanology, which pervaded Jewish eschatology after the exile, were, as we have pointed out, in part a religious expression of social and political hatred and despair. Those parts of eschatology which deal with the future of theindividual were in the main derived from contem- porary Greek life. Greek religion was characterized by a profound desire for immortality and an equally deep sense of the sin and sadness of this earthly life. The " mysteries " ministered tothis desire ; Christianity did it more effectively. In turn these religious desires brought out and strengthened those eschatological facts and ideas in Christianity which could serve them. Here wehave one chief cause for the increasing other-world- liness of Christianity. Now, this attitude of weariness and resignation, which led to the immense popularity of ascetic ideals of life, was in part a product ofthe Roman Empire. It had clamped down its bureaucracy and its tax-gathering apparatus on allMediterranean civiliza- tion; the method was political subjugation; theaim was economic exploitation. The self-government ofthe

• From Bold Move

  After all, to live boldly does not mean to live fearlessly or recklessly, but to face life’s challenges without being paralyzed by psychological avoidance, the real enemy that most of us face. I invite you to join me in becoming bold and living a “comfortably uncomfortable” life. I am humbled to be where I am today and sincerely hope that by the end of this book, you will have discovered your own recipe for becoming bold. Part IThe Stuff That Keeps Us Stuck Chapter OneAnxiety Is Painful but It Is Not What Is Keeping You StuckBeing human is hard. Sometimes it feels like we can’t even catch our breath before we’re pummeled with a new difficulty to address: impossible quotas at work, unexpected bills, a child struggling in school, a family health crisis, the same fights with our partners. All these things can make us want to just numb out at the end of a hard day. We all have our favorite ways to zone out. But would you say you’re satisfied with your life? Are you living your best, most authentic life? Do you even remember what your dreams are? Or does the thought of living a bold, fulfilling life sound impossible—and maybe even exhausting, anxiety-producing, and overwhelming? In moments of high anxiety, we often feel stuck. We get stuck in unhealthy relationships and in draining jobs. Some mornings we get stuck in bed, trying to find a reason to get up. And some nights we get stuck at home, binge-watching TV shows or scrolling on our phones instead of going out into the world. We all have moments when we feel trapped, and in those moments, we often feel as if we are skating on thin ice and that just a little extra weight will send us crashing into freezing-cold water of unimaginable depths. In these moments, being bold—living your best, most authentic life—can feel like a far-fetched dream. Who has the time or energy? We may believe boldness is a personality trait possessed by young people—those without piles of stress and responsibilities—or those with greater advantages, fewer problems, and more money to burn. But not us. Or we hear the term bold , and we think of people like Martin Luther King Jr., CEOs, or professional athletes—individuals with influence and the courage and confidence we don’t have. But what if boldness isn’t reserved for a lucky few with advantages, talents, or certain personalities? What if it is meant for us all? Bold Move: A 3-Step Plan to Transform Anxiety into Power will help you get unstuck so that you can start making moves toward the things you care about—your unique bold moves—despite discomfort or obstacles. In moments of stress and anxiety, you can rely on the three skills I present in this book to help you face whatever is preventing you from the life you want: your bold life.

• From The Spiral Staircase: My Climb Out of Darkness (2004)

  Nobody was willing to listen. The trouble is that when people decide that what looks like a suicide attempt is “only” a cry for help, they sometimes conclude that this appeal need not be answered. Indeed, they even decide that it is better not to respond, because the patient must not be encouraged to give way to such neurotic exhibitionism. He or she must learn to express pain simply and directly, without resorting to such outlandish symbolism. But I had tried to explain my fears and bewilderment as clearly as I was able, and no aid was forthcoming. Quite simply, I wanted help, and I didn’t feel that I was getting it. That was probably what lay behind this unconsciously performed gesture. As I lay in bed that morning, amidst the confusion and the fear—what might I do next in this amnesiac state?—I was also aware of a definite sense of relief. I was sorry to have caused all this unnecessary bother, but on the other hand I was so weary and needy. I had spent years now fighting with demons, and the struggle had pushed me to an extreme. I felt exhausted, and it was good to have people looking after me, instead of telling me briskly that I was perfectly well and getting along just fine. I knew that this could only be a temporary respite, but it was not altogether unpleasant to give up the struggle for a while. And something in me had been calmed. Instead of the familiar turmoil within, there was a new stillness. I had tried my best, and to no avail. I had expressed my fear and despair, and I could do no more. I had come to the end, had given up hope, and there was a certain peace in that. Dr. Piet, who came to visit that afternoon, seemed to take it all rather personally. He had challenged me to surprise him, and I had taken him at his word. I was, he told me, clearly angry with him— and that, in his view, was a step forward. Even in my becalmed state, I felt faintly annoyed that he had placed himself so squarely in the center of my personal drama. He seemed to believe that I had done all this just to grab his attention—whereas, in reality, he was by no means as crucial to me as he seemed to imagine. He had decided that the things that truly distressed me were peripheral, and had thus become a rather marginal figure in my emotional life. If a doctor had failed to respond in this way to Rebecca, I would have been furious. But you get angry only with people who are important to you in a way that Dr. Piet was not. For months— indeed, for years now—I had felt increasingly insubstantial.

• From The Spiral Staircase: My Climb Out of Darkness (2004)

  One evening, after a day in school, I got onto the bus and found tears rolling down my cheeks. I could not stop them, but sat throughout the long journey home to North London weeping quietly. There seemed no hope at all. The next morning I woke up feeling empty and hollow. Looking into the mirror, I winced. Not a pretty sight. And today, as ill luck would have it, I had an appointment with a television crew. Perhaps I could get out of it! I could always ring up and say that I wasn’t feeling well. It wasn’t as though this project would do anything for the book; in fact, it seemed I would simply be doing the film company a favor. “Don’t feel you have to do this, Karen,” Jacqui, my publicist, had said when she had included it on the schedule. “It’s only a pilot for Channel Four, the new television channel starting this autumn. The film company is doing a few programs to persuade the channel’s editor to give them a commission for a series. So nothing may come of it. If you don’t want to do this, please feel free to say no.” But I had agreed to go along and had spoken with the producer. He asked me to think of a topic on any subject that I felt I could talk about. As long as it was punchy and controversial, it didn’t matter what it was. I had not given the program a thought, and spending the morning in a hot studio was the last thing I felt like. All I wanted to do was crawl under the bedclothes and shut out the world. I even dialed the office of the production company, but of course there was no reply. They would all be waiting for me at the studio, setting up, as they called it. A car was coming to collect me in forty-five minutes. I often wonder how my life would have turned out if I had managed to get through to the producer, offered my excuses, and pulled out. Strangely enough, once I was in the cab, I found that I was feeling better. It was a beautiful day, and London was looking its very best in the June sunlight. Outside I passed women wearing brightly colored clothes, looking like exotic birds and preening themselves on the gray pavements. Men walked with their shirtsleeves rolled up, their jackets slung over their shoulders. There was that air of excitement, that pulse of life, which becomes almost comically evident in England whenever the sun makes a brief appearance. I found myself picking up the mood.

• From The Fermata (1994)

  But there are times when the wish for others’ voices, for friendliness returned, reaches unpleasant levels, and becomes a kind of immobilizing pain. That was how it felt as I finished packing up the box of sex machines. I used a “tape gun” to tape it back up, just like the pros at Mailboxes USA. A tape gun is a triggerless machine with a handle that enables you to dispense tape from thick rolls one-handed. It has a set of sharp metal teeth that cut the tape at will, like the row running along a box of plastic wrap that can hurt your finger if you rummage overhastily in a drawer, but its whole function stands in swords-into-plowshares opposition to the gun—it is meant to seal, to mend, to hold together, rather than to injure and rend. I bought it at an office-supply store as a reward after an awful week working for the Department of Social Services typing Social Security numbers in boxes that were not spaced to fit either of the type sizes of the typewriter. Now, in my moment of despair, taping up the carton of sex toys, I lifted this nicely balanced tape gun and held it to my temple, and investigated my wish to die—and in doing so I immediately realized how laughably far I was from actual suicide, and how good, happy, lucky, fundamentally, my life was. The idea of trying to commit suicide over a box of vibrating dildos with a tape gun held at my temple struck me as almost comic. It got me over the hump of Joyce-loneliness. I decided that what I really needed to do was go to the library and get out some more autobiographies and read them, so that I would have a better idea of how to write this one properly. Before I left, I cut open the carton that I had just sealed up with tape and took out one of the vibrating dildos ( not the Pleasure Pallas, a medium-sized Japanese-made one in the shape of Athena holding an oddly flamed torch of wisdom in her hands, the torch being in fact a pliant clitoris-stimulating projection; but rather the Monasticon, which was a large twisting Capuchin monk holding a clit-nuzzling open manuscript), and put it in my briefcase. I brushed my teeth. Then I reconsidered, and put the hot-pink vibrating Butterfly in my briefcase as well. It would be a waste of life’s possibilities to send them dolefully back, I thought, just because I might never use them with Joyce. Much more sensible to distribute them free at the library. I was luckier than usual in finding the books I wanted.