Gratitude

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 Barclay's Guide to the New Testament (2008)

  The reason was very simple. Rome had a vast and diverse empire, stretching from one end of the known world to the other. It had in it many languages, races and traditions. The problem was how to weld this varied mass into a unity. There was no unifying force such as a common religion, and none of the national religions could conceivably have become universal. Caesar-worship could. It was the one common act and belief which turned the Empire into a unity. To refuse to burn the pinch of incense and to say: `Caesar is Lord' was not an act against religion; it was an act of political disloyalty. That is why the Romans dealt with the utmost severity with anyone who would not say: `Caesar is Lord.' And Christians could never give the title Lord to anyone other than Jesus Christ. This was the centre of their creed. We must see how this Caesar-worship developed and how it was at its peak when Revelation was written. One basic fact must be noted. Caesar-worship was not imposed on the people from above. It arose from the people; it might even be said that it arose in spite of efforts by the early emperors to stop it, or at least to curb it. And it is to be noted that, of all the people in the Empire, only the Jews were exempt from it. Caesar-worship began as a spontaneous outburst of gratitude to Rome. The people of the provinces knew very well what they owed to Rome. Impartial Roman justice had taken the place of inconsistent and tyrannical oppression. Security had taken the place of insecurity. The great Roman roads spanned the world, and were safe from robbers; and the seas were clear of pirates. The pax Romana, the Roman peace, was the greatest thing which ever happened to the ancient world. As Virgil had it, Rome felt its destiny to be `to spare the fallen and to cast down the proud'. Life had a new order about it. The American biblical scholar E. J. Goodspeed writes: `This was the pax Romana. The provincial under Roman sway found himself in a position to conduct his business, provide for his family, send his letters, and make his journeys in security, thanks to the strong hand of Rome.'

• From Barclay's Guide to the New Testament (2008)

  Aquila was a teacher (Acts 18:26). Their house in Rome was a church in itself (Romans 16:5). Harnack thought that that is why the letter begins with no greetings and why the writer's name has vanished - because the main author of Hebrews was a woman, and a woman was not allowed to teach. But, when we come to the end of conjecture, we are compelled to say, as Origen said i,8oo years ago, that only God knows who wrote Hebrews. To us, the author must remain a voice and nothing more; but we can be thankful to God for the work of this great nameless individual who wrote with incomparable skill and beauty about the Jesus who is the way to reality and the way to God. 17 James An Early Christian Sermon James is one of the books which had a very hard fight to get into the New Testament. Even when it did come to be regarded as Scripture, it was spoken of with a certain reserve and suspicion, and even as late as the sixteenth century the reformer Martin Luther would gladly have banished it from the New Testament altogether. The Doubts of the Early Christian Fathers In the Latin-speaking part of the Church, it is not until the middle of the fourth century that James emerges in the writings of the fathers. The first list of New Testament books ever to be compiled is the Muratorian Canon, which dates to about AD 170 - and James is absent from it. Tertullian, writing in the middle of the third century, is an immense quoter of Scripture; he has 7,258 quotations from the New Testament, but never one from James. The first appearance of James in Latin is in a Latin manuscript called the Codex Corbeiensis, which dates to about AD 350. This manuscript attributes the authorship of the book to James the son of Zebedee, and includes it, not with the universally acknowledged New Testament books, but with a collection of religious tracts written by the early fathers. James has now emerged, but it is accepted with a certain reservation. The first Latin writer to quote James verbatim is Hilary of Poitiers in a work On the Trinity, written about AD 357. If, then, James was so late in emerging in the Latin church, and if, when it did emerge, it was still regarded with some uncertainty, how did it become integrated into the New Testament? The moving influence was that of the biblical scholar Jerome, for he unhesitatingly included James in his Latin version of the New Testament, the Vulgate, completed early in the fifth century.

• From The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: A 25-Year Landmark Study (2000)

  When I interviewed Debbie at age thirty-eight, she was living in a specially equipped apartment in the lower part of her parents’ home. Personable, cheerful, and realistic, she told me that other, less fortunate people with her medical condition were wheelchair-bound and lived in full-time residential institutions. “Almost all of my memories as a child are of me together with my family,” she said. “I was always with them and they took care of me when I was sick. Anything I’ve needed, they try to help. I know they’ll be there for me no matter what happens.” Debbie said that sometimes she wishes she could be more self-sufficient, get out more with her friends, and maybe even marry and have children. A tinge of rebelliousness surfaces in her voice: “Right now I think my parents are too involved in my life. I see a lot of them. I like having them near, but I think they’re too close, and they worry about me and want to know too much. It’s hard to feel like I have a real life separate from them.” Aside from her work, Debbie spends as much time as she can with her network of friends. She’s had two romantic relationships, one in college and another more recently. Wryly, she told me about her father’s pretended nonchalance as he “happened” to drop in on her when she was being picked up by a male friend. “I know they’re overprotective because they’re so used to taking care of me, but puh-leeze, I am thirty-eight years old!” When I asked Debbie how she would have been affected had her parents divorced when she was young, she answered, “I imagine almost everything would have been different.” She envisioned that she would have lived with her mother and sister and seen much less of her father and brothers. Cognizant of how much her parents supported each other in caring for her, she concluded, “I think Mom would have worn herself out taking care of me and then I don’t know what would have happened to her or to me!” Although she saw her parents’ marriage “with much rosier glasses” when she was younger, Debbie feels strongly that their marriage was and is a successful union. “You have to expect to take the bad with the good,” she said, “to make the most of what life gives you and to make your own happiness.”

• From Becoming Myself: A Psychiatrist's Memoir (2017)

  One of the early pioneers was the social scientist Kurt Lewin, whose dictum “No research without action, no action without research,” generated a vast, sophisticated body of data that I found far more interesting than the medically based group therapy research. One of the most important things I drew from my Lake Arrowhead group experience was the singular focus on the here-and-now, and I began to implement that forcefully in my own work. As I learned at Lake Arrowhead, it is not enough to tell group members to focus on the here-and-now: we need to supply both a rationale and a roadmap. Over time I developed a short preparation talk that I gave to patients before they entered the group, in which I emphasized that a great many of their interpersonal problems would be re-created in the group, thus offering them a marvelous opportunity to learn more about themselves and to effect change. It followed (and I repeated this more than once) that their task in the group was to understand everything they could about their relationship with every patient in the group and with the group leaders . Many new members would generally find some aspects of the preparation puzzling, and often they would raise the objection that their problem was with their boss, or their spouse, or with friends, or with their anger, and it made no sense to focus on their relationships with group members because they would never see these people in the future. In response to these common questions, I explained that the group is a social microcosm , and that the issues raised in the therapy group would replicate or resemble the types of interpersonal issues that initially brought them into therapy . This step, I’d learned, was crucial. Later, I conducted and published research demonstrating that patients who were effectively prepared for group therapy fared much better in therapy than those who were not well prepared. I continued my association with the T-group movement for several years and was part of the faculty of NTL workshops at Lincoln, New Hampshire, as well as in a weeklong workshop for CEOs in Sandusky, Ohio. To this day I am grateful to T-group pioneers for showing me the way to lead and to research interpersonally based groups. G radually over the years, I fashioned an intensive group therapy training program for psychiatry residents consisting of several components: a weekly lecture, observation and post-group discussion of my weekly therapy group, having the residents lead a therapy group with weekly supervision, and lastly, participating in a weekly personal process group that I led with a colleague. How did overworked first-year residents respond to spending this much time learning about group therapy? With a good bit of grousing! Some busy residents particularly resisted the two hours spent each week observing my group and often showed up late or skipped sessions entirely.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  LEO. (Epist. ad Flavian. xxviii. 3.) Pope; For this emptying of himself, by which the Invisible made Himself Visible, and the Creator and Lord of all things chose to become one of us mortal creatures, was a stooping of His mercy, not a failing of His power. GLOSS. Therefore that the Lord should not be supposed to be present in such a way as that there should be any thing lost of His power, the Prophet adds, The Lord shall come with power. AUGUSTINE. (de doct. Christ. i. 12.) Come, not by passing through the regions of space, but by shewing Himself to men in the flesh. LEO. (Serm. in Nativ. s. xix. 3.) By the unspeakable power of God, it was wrought, that while very Man was in the inviolable God, and very God in passible flesh, there was bestowed upon man, glory through shame, immortality through punishment, life through death. AUGUSTINE. (de Peccatorum Meritis, ii. 30.) For blood that was without sin being shed, the bond of all men’s sins was done away, by which men were before held captive by the Devil. GLOSS. Therefore because men, having been delivered from sin by virtue of Christ suffering, became the servants of God, it follows, And His arm shall have dominion. LEO. (Ubi sup.) In Christ then was given us this wonderful deliverance, that on our passible nature the condition of death should not abide, which His impassible essence had admitted, and that by that which could not die, that which was dead might be brought to life. GLOSS. And thus through Christ is opened to us the entrance of immortal glory, concerning which it follows, Lo, His reward is with Him; that, namely, of which Himself speaks, Your reward is abundant in heaven. (Matt. 5:12.) AUGUSTINE. (contra Faust. iv. 2.) The promise of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven belongs to the New Testament; in the Old Testament are contained promises of temporal things. GLOSS. So then evangelic teaching delivers to us four things concerning Christ; the Divinity that takes upon it, the Humanity that is taken upon it, His Death by which we are delivered from bondage, His Resurrection by which the entrance of a glorious life is opened to us. On this account it is represented in Ezekiel under the figure of the four animals. GREGORY. (in Ezek. Hom. iv.) The Only-begotten Son of God was Himself verily made Man; Himself condescended to die as the sacrifice of our redemption as a Calf; He rose again through the power of His might, as a Lion; and as an Eagle He ascended aloft into heaven. GLOSS. In which ascension He shewed manifestly His Divinity; Matthew then is denoted by the Man, because he dwells chiefly on the humanity of Christ; Mark by the Lion, because he treats of His Resurrection; Luke by the Calf, because he insists on His Priesthood; John by the Eagle, because he describes the sacraments of His Divinity.

• From Barclay's Guide to the New Testament (2008)

  He did so by placing an embargo on the export of currency; and in his own part of the province alone he seized an illegal shipment of no less than twenty pounds in weight of gold which was meant for the Temple at Jerusalem. That amount of gold would represent the Temple tax of no fewer than i i,ooo people. Since women and children were exempt from the tax, and since many Jews would successfully evade the capture of their money, we may well put the Jewish population as high as almost 50,000. The Church at Colosse The Christian church at Colosse was one which Paul had not himself founded and which he had never visited. He classes the Colossians and the Laodicaeans with those who had never seen him face to face (2: I). But no doubt the founding of the church sprang from his instructions. During his three years in Ephesus, the whole province of Asia was evangelized, so that all its inhabitants, both Jews and Greeks, heard the word of the Lord (Acts 19:10). Colosse was about ioo miles from Ephesus, and it was no doubt in that campaign of expansion that the Colossian church was founded. We do not know who its founder was; but it may well have been Epaphras, who is described as Paul's fellow servant and the faithful minister of the Colossian church and who is later connected also with Hierapolis and Laodicaea (r:7, 4:12-13). If Epaphras was not the founder of the Christian church there, he was certainly the minister in charge of the area. A Gentile Church It is clear that the Colossian church was mainly Gentile. The phrase estranged and hostile in mind (i :21) is the kind of phrase which Paul regularly uses of those who had once been strangers to the covenant of promise. In 1:27, he speaks of making known the mystery of Christ among the Gentiles, when the reference is clearly to the Colossians themselves. In 3:5-7, he gives a list of their sins before they became Christians, and these are characteristically Gentile sins. We may confidently conclude that the membership of the church at Colosse was largely composed of Gentiles. The Threat to the Church It must have been Epaphras who brought to Paul, in prison in Rome, news of the situation which was developing in Colosse. Much of the news that he brought was good. Paul is grateful for news of their faith in Christ and their love for the saints (r:4). He rejoices at the Christian fruit which they are producing (1:6). Epaphras has brought him news of their love in the Spirit (r:8).

• From Barclay's Guide to the New Testament (2008)

  So, we can believe that it was none other than Matthew who wrote that book which was the source from which everyone who wished to know what Jesus taught must draw. And it was because so much of that source book is incorporated in the first gospel that Matthew's name was attached to it. We must be forever grateful to Matthew, when we remember that it is to him that we owe the Sermon on the Mount and nearly all we know about the teaching of Jesus. Broadly speaking, to Mark we owe our knowledge of the events of Jesus' life; to Matthew we owe our knowledge of the substance of Jesus' teaching. Matthew the Tax-gatherer About Matthew himself we know very little. We read of his call in Matthew 9:9. We know that he was a tax-gatherer and that he must therefore have been a bitterly hated man, for the Jews hated the members of their own race who had entered the civil service of their conquerors. Matthew would be regarded as nothing better than a collaborator. But there was one gift which Matthew would possess. Most of the disciples were fishermen. They would have little skill and little practice in putting words together and writing them down; but Matthew would be an expert in that. When Jesus called Matthew, as he sat in the office where he collected the customs duty, Matthew rose up and followed him and left everything behind him except one thing - his pen. And Matthew nobly used his literary skill to become the first man ever to compile an account of the teaching of Jesus. The Gospel of the Jews Let us now look at the chief characteristics of Matthew's gospel so that we may watch for them as we read it. First and foremost, Matthew is the gospel which was written for the Jews. It was written by a Jew in order to convince Jews. One of the great objects of Matthew is to demonstrate that all the prophecies of the Old Testament are fulfilled in Jesus, and that, therefore, he must be the Messiah. It has one phrase which runs through it like an ever-recurring theme: `This was to fulfil what the Lord had spoken by the prophet.' That phrase occurs in the gospel as often as sixteen times. Jesus' birth and Jesus' name are the fulfilment of prophecy (1:21-3); so are the flight to Egypt (2:14-15); the slaughter of the children (2:16-18); Joseph's settlement in Nazareth and Jesus' upbringing there (2:23); Jesus' use of parables (3:34-5); the triumphal entry (21:3-5); the betrayal for thirty pieces of silver (27:9); and the casting of lots for Jesus' garments as he hung on the cross (27:35). It is Matthew's primary and deliberate purpose to show how the Old Testament prophecies received their fulfilment in Jesus; how every detail of Jesus' life was foreshadowed in the prophets; and thus to compel the Jews to admit that Jesus was the Messiah.

• From The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: A 25-Year Landmark Study (2000)

  Flawed court orders or mediated agreements remain hidden because their results are not regularly held to the light and examined. Rulings in family law—with their long-term consequences for children—have a complexity that requires an assessment that goes beyond questions of following laws appropriately. It would be very helpful and reassuring to parents, to the courts themselves, and to society as a whole if court policies and related practice had a built-in, regular review process. Such assessments might lead to important changes that would greatly improve the quality of the children’s lives. • • • T HESE SUGGESTIONS ARE just some of the things we might do to reduce the suffering of children and adults in our divorce culture. I’m sure that gifted minds will come up with many others as we learn more about the long-term consequences of divorce on the American family. In fact, it’s likely that many new ideas will come from those who have lived firsthand the experience of growing up in divorced families—the generation of young adults that we met in this book. They are now of an age when they’re entering responsible positions in politics, law, entertainment, science, medicine, education, and other professions. They are our future, and thank God, they are dubious but not entirely cynical. Quite the opposite. They have demonstrated a startling capacity to change, to put aside their fears, and to learn how to trust the people they love. We now come to a final, critical question. What values does this generation hold regarding marriage and divorce? Have they given up on marriage or committed cohabitation? Is it fated to disappear as a human institution? The vote of this generation is clear. Despite their firsthand experience of seeing how marriages can fail, they sincerely want lasting, faithful relationships whether in marriage or a lasting cohabitation. No single adult in this study accepts the notion that marriage is going to wither away. They want stability and a different life for their children. They fully accept divorce as an option but they believe that divorce in a family with children should be an absolute last resort. Those who are happily married feel blessed. They never expected to have a happy family of their own and they’re grateful for their great good fortune. As children of divorce they are all eager to rewrite history, not to repeat it. They want to do things better than their parents. Over the years, many of the children in this study have kept in touch with me. I’ve been invited to their weddings and attended several of them. Others send color photographs, including images of romantic weddings with all the trimmings. In one, a crateful of white doves was released after the vows were spoken. One garlanded bride got married on top of a mountain to the sound of a shepherd’s flute.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  N. Be sober and watch, because your adversary the devil, like a roaring lion, goeth about, seeking whom he may devour; whom resist ye strong in faith. 1 St. Pet. 5:8, 9. When they have eaten, and are full and fat, they will turn away after strange gods and will serve them; and will despise Me and make void My covenant. Deut. 31:20. Know you not that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of a harlot? God forbid. 1 Cor. 6:15. (3) His Body increased if eaten; 1. Not like earthly food; We being many are one bread, one body; all that partake of one bread. 1 Cor. 10:17. They shall be converted that sit under His shadow; they shall live upon wheat. Osee 14:8. 2. Human knowledge; There is one most high Creator, Almighty; … He created her (Wisdom) in the Holy Ghost.… He poured her out upon all His works, and upon all flesh according to His gift; and hath given her to them that love Him. Ecclus. 1:8–10. He that had received the five talents, coming, brought other five talents, saying, Lord, Thou didst deliver to me five talents; behold I have gained other five over and above. St. Matt. 25:20. Growth in Christ; Doing the truth in charity, we may in all things grow up in Him who is the head, even Christ; from whom the whole body, being compacted and fitly joined together, by what every joint supplieth, according to the operation in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in charity. Eph. 4:15, 16. Prayer Eternal Father, look upon Thy child whom Thou hast made, and help me to draw near to the Altar and receive the Body and Blood of my Jesus, as worthily as I can. O Father, whom I love, I am weak with a great weakness; give me strength and victory. Eternal Son, look upon Thy brother whom Thou hast redeemed. Help me to receive Thee as worthily as I can in Thy Holy Sacrament. O Brother and Friend, whom I love, I am blind with a great blindness; give me wisdom and light. Eternal Spirit, look upon Thy temple which Thou hast hallowed for Thyself, and on the sanctuary which Thy right hand hath made. O, help me to receive the Body and Blood of Jesus, as worthily as I can. O dear Spirit, Spirit of grace and supplication, whom I love, I am cold with a great coldness, and dark with a great darkness; give me fervour; give me more love. O Ever-blessed Trinity, Three Persons and One God, help me as I go to the Altar of Jesus. Thanksgiving

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  O Holy Ghost, I thank Thee for the Bread of Life which Jesus gives. It is His gift to me; it is Thy gift to me; it is a possession for ever. I bless and praise Thee for the miracles which Thou daily workest in order that Jesus may be the food of His people. In a hundred lands, in thousands of churches, in the heat of summer and in the winter cold, in the midst of the morning dew and when the sun is high, a pure Sacrifice is offered to God, and a banquet of Heaven is spread for all. Hungry and thirsty, our souls faint within us; but we cry to Thee, and Thou leadest us in a right way, a way that brings us to Thy storehouses and to the garners of Thy grace. We kneel before the Altar, and Thou dost satisfy the empty soul, and dost fill the hungry soul with good things. We wander in a wilderness, but Thy springs are always found in it. Jesus has redeemed us from the enemy. Thou art the Comforter whom He sent. Thou dost gather us from all lands, from the rising and the setting sun, from the north and from the sea. Thy mercies, O Lord, give glory to Thee, and Thy wonderful works for the children of men ever show forth Thy praise. XIV About the three miracles in receiving the Body of our LordC. Here we have to consider the last miracles worked about the Blessed Sacrament, that is, the three miracles in the reception of our Lord’s Body. (1) The first miracle is this, that the Body of our Lord when eaten is not lessened. This is against the heretics, who say that if our Lord’s Body had been greater than a mountain it would have been long ago consumed. For this miracle, that is, the inconsumptibility of the Body of Jesus, there is a threefold reason.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  My Lord and my Love, I bless Thee and praise Thee for Thy wheat and Thy vines, for Thy harvest and Thy vintage, for Thy granary and Thy wine-press, for Thy bread and Thy wine. O Jesus, dwell in my soul, that the lilies there may please Thee by their whiteness and their fragrance, and that there the scarlet blossoms of the pomegranates may be dear to Thy Heart. Thou art strong and wise and loving, and I praise Thee. I bless Thee for the home Thou art making ready; for the hope of the fulfilment of every desire; for the fulness of joy that Thou dost promise me in Thy kingdom. XXV About three effects of the Body of Jesus, taken from three of its namesOur Lord’s Body is called by three names: (1) the true Bread; (2) the Sacrament of the Altar; (3) the Sacrament of Love. (1) As the true Bread it has three effects; for as bread does chiefly three things for the body, in satisfying, in strengthening and preserving life, so this Bread, 1, satisfies the soul to the loathing of sweetness of the world; 2, strengthens it to the getting rid of all guilt; 3, preserves its life to God, who is to be praised for ever. 1. St. Gregory says, ‘When we have tasted of the Spirit all flesh is tasteless.’ 2. They who are not strengthened by this Bread are easily slain by sin. The King of Babylon and his army besieged Jerusalem, and there was no bread for the people. Then the men of war fled by night to the king’s garden and to the plains of the wilderness. They fell into sins of the flesh, and went on the broad way that leads to death. 3. As Jesus lives by the Father, so we live by Him; and this is the life to God, who is to be praised for evermore. (2) As the Sacrament of the Altar it has also a threefold effect, because of the threefold state of the faithful: 1, in this world; 2, in Purgatory; 3, in Heaven. In this world it forgives sin, in Purgatory it lessens suffering, in Heaven it increases glory.

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  Next morning I awoke rested but very weak: the Doctor came in and sponged me in warm water and changed my linen: my nightshirt and a great part of the sheet were quite brown. “Can you make water?” he asked, handing me a bed-dish: I tried and at once succeeded. “The wonder is complete!!” he cried, “I’ll bet, you have cured your lumbago too”, and indeed I was completely free of pain. That evening or the next my father and I had a great, heart-to-heart talk. I told him all my ambitions and he tried to persuade me to take one hundred pounds a year from him to continue my studies. I told him I couldn’t, though I was just as grateful. “I’ll get work as soon as I am strong”, I said; but his unselfish affection shook my very soul and when he told me that my sister, too, had agreed he should make me the allowance, I could only shake my head and thank him. That evening I went to bed early and he came and sat with me: he said that the doctor advised that I should take a long rest. Strange colored lights kept sweeping across my sight every time I shut my eyes: so I asked him to lie beside me and hold my hand. At once he lay down beside me and with his hand in mine, I soon fell asleep and slept like a log till seven next morning. I awoke perfectly well and refreshed and was shocked to see that my father’s face was strangely drawn and white and when he tried to get off the bed, he nearly fell. I saw then that he had lain all the night through on the brass edge of the bed rather than risk disturbing me to give him more room. From that time to the end of his noble and unselfish life, some twenty-five years later, I had only praise and admiration for him.

• From Barclay's Guide to the New Testament (2008)

  (5) So we come to the fifth possibility. Let us remember how closely the Letter of James resembles a sermon. It is possible that this is, in substance, a sermon preached by James, taken down by someone else, translated into Greek, added to and decorated a little and then issued to the wider church so that everyone could benefit from it. That explains its form and how it came to be attached to the name of James. It even explains the scarcity of the references to Jesus, to the resurrection and to the messiahship of Jesus - for, in one single sermon, James could not go through the whole range of orthodoxy and is, in fact, pressing moral duty upon men and women, and not talking about theology. It seems to us that this is the one theory that explains the facts. One thing is certain - we may approach this little letter feeling that it is one of the lesser books of the New Testament; but, if we study it faithfully, we will lay it down thanking God that it was preserved for our instruction and inspiration. 181 Peter The Lovely LetterThe Catholic or General Epistles First Peter belongs to that group of New Testament letters which are known as the Catholic or General Epistles. Two explanations of that title have been offered. (i) It is suggested that these letters were so called because they were addressed to the wider Church, as distinct from the Pauline letters which were addressed to individual churches. But that is not so. James is addressed to a definite, though widely scattered, community. It is written to the twelve tribes in the Dispersion, the tribes that are scattered throughout the world (James It needs no argument that 2 and 3 John are addressed to definite communities; and, although i John has no specific address, it is clearly written with the needs and perils of a particular community in mind. First Peter itself is written to the strangers scattered abroad through Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia (i Peter It is true that these General Epistles have a wider range than the letters of Paul; at the same time, they all have a definite community in mind.

• From Barclay's Guide to the New Testament (2008)

  We take but one instance, from the occasion on which James and John sought to ensure themselves of the highest places in the coming kingdom. Let us compare the introduction to that story in Mark and in Matthew: Matthew hesitates to ascribe motives of ambition directly to the two apostles, and so he ascribes them to their mother. All this makes it clear that Mark is the earliest of the gospels. Mark gives a simple, vivid, direct narrative; but Matthew and Luke have already begun to be affected by doctrinal and theological considerations which make them much more careful of what they say. The Teaching of Jesus We have seen that Matthew has i,o68 verses; and that Luke has 1,149 verses; and that between them they reproduce 582 of Mark's 661 verses. That means that in Matthew and Luke there is much more material than Mark supplies. When we examine that material, we find that more than 200 verses of it are almost identical. For instance, such passages as Luke 6:41-2 and Matthew 7:3, 5; Luke 10:21-2 and Matthew 11:25-7; Luke 3:7-9 and Matthew 3:7-1o are almost exactly the same. But here we notice a difference. The material which Matthew and Luke drew from Mark was almost entirely material dealing with the events of Jesus' life; but these 200 additional verses common to Matthew and Luke tell us not what Jesus did, but what Jesus said. Clearly in these verses Matthew and Luke are drawing from a common source book of the sayings of Jesus. That book does not now exist; but to it scholars have given the letter Q which stands for Quelle, which is the German word for source. In its day it must have been an extraordinarily important book, for it was the first handbook of the teaching of Jesus. Matthew's Place in the Gospel Tradition It is here that we come to Matthew the apostle. Scholars are agreed that the first gospel as it stands does not come directly from the hand of Matthew. One who had himself been an eyewitness of the life of Christ would not have needed to use Mark as a source book for the life of Jesus in the way Matthew does. But one of the earliest Church historians, a man called Papias, gives us this intensely important piece of information: `Matthew collected the sayings of Jesus in the Hebrew tongue.' So, we can believe that it was none other than Matthew who wrote that book which was the source from which everyone who wished to know what Jesus taught must draw. And it was because so much of that source book is incorporated in the first gospel that Matthew's name was attached to it. We must be forever grateful to Matthew, when we remember that it is to him that we owe the Sermon on the Mount and nearly all we know about the teaching of Jesus.

• From Barclay's Guide to the New Testament (2008)

  It must have been Epaphras who brought to Paul, in prison in Rome, news of the situation which was developing in Colosse. Much of the news that he brought was good. Paul is grateful for news of their faith in Christ and their love for the saints (r:4). He rejoices at the Christian fruit which they are producing (1:6). Epaphras has brought him news of their love in the Spirit (r:8). He is glad when he hears of their order and steadfastness in the faith (2:5). There was trouble at Colosse, certainly; but it had not yet become an epidemic. Paul believed that prevention was better than cure; and in this letter he is grasping this evil before it has time to spread. The Heresy at Colosse What the heresy was which was threatening the life of the church at Colosse, no one can tell for certain. `The Colossian Heresy' is one of the great problems of New Testament scholarship. All we can do is to go to the letter itself, list the characteristics we find indicated there and then see if we can find any general heretical tendency to fit the list. (i) It was clearly a heresy which attacked the total adequacy and the unique supremacy of Christ. No Pauline letter has such a high view of Jesus Christ or such insistence on his completeness and finality. Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God; in him all fullness dwells (1:15, 1:19). In him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and of knowledge (2:2). In him dwells the fullness of the Godhead in bodily form (2:9). (2) Paul goes out of his way to stress the part that Christ played in creation. By him, all things were created (i:16); in him, all things hold together (r:17). The Son was the Father's instrument in the creation of the universe. (3) At the same time, he goes out of his way to stress the real humanity of Christ. It was in the body of his flesh that he did his redeeming work (1:22). The fullness of the Godhead dwells in him somatikos, in bodily form (2:9). For all his deity, Jesus Christ was truly human flesh and blood. (4) There seems to have been an astrological element in this heresy. In 2:8, as the Authorized Version has it, he says that they were walking after the rudiments of this world, and in 2:20 that they ought to be dead to the rudiments of this world. The word translated as rudiments is stoicheia, which has two meanings.

• From Speak, Memory (1966)

  He was replaced by the celebrated Dobuzhinski who liked to give me his lessons on the piano nobile of our house, in one of its pretty reception rooms downstairs, which he entered in a particularly noiseless way as if afraid to startle me from my verse-making stupor. He made me depict from memory, in the greatest possible detail, objects I had certainly seen thousands of times without visualizing them properly: a street lamp, a postbox, the tulip design on the stained glass of our own front door. He tried to teach me to find the geometrical coordinations between the slender twigs of a leafless boulevard tree, a system of visual give-and-takes, requiring a precision of linear expression, which I failed to achieve in my youth, but applied gratefully, in my adult instar, not only to the drawing of butterfly genitalia during my seven years at the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology, when immersing myself in the bright wellhole of a microscope to record in India ink this or that new structure; but also, perhaps, to certain camera-lucida needs of literary composition. Emotionally, however, I am still more indebted to the earlier color treats given me by my mother and her former teacher. How readily Mr. Cummings would sit down on a stool, part behind with both hands his—what? was he wearing a frock coat? I see only the gesture—and proceed to open the black tin paintbox. I loved the nimble way he had of soaking his paintbrush in multiple color to the accompaniment of a rapid clatter produced by the enamel containers wherein the rich reds and yellows that the brush dimpled were appetizingly cupped; and having thus collected its honey, it would cease to hover and poke, and, by two or three sweeps of its lush tip, would drench the “Vatmanski” paper with an even spread of orange sky, across which, while that sky was still dampish, a long purple-black cloud would be laid. “And that’s all, dearie,” he would say. “That’s all there is to it.” On one occasion, I had him draw an express train for me. I watched his pencil ably evolve the cowcatcher and elaborate headlights of a locomotive that looked as if it had been acquired secondhand for the Trans-Siberian line after it had done duty at Promontory Point, Utah, in the sixties. Then came five disappointingly plain carriages. When he had quite finished them, he carefully shaded the ample smoke coming from the huge funnel, cocked his head, and, after a moment of pleased contemplation, handed me the drawing. I tried to look pleased, too. He had forgotten the tender.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  Eternal Father, I thank Thee for the gift that Thou hast given me. It is Thy beloved Son, in whom Thou art well pleased. In Him and by Him give me strength to keep all my good resolutions. Eternal Son, I thank Thee for the gift that Thou hast given me. It is Thyself who didst die for me. Make me, dear Jesus, wiser with Thy heavenly wisdom, and show me clearly all the things I should do for God. Eternal Spirit, I thank Thee for the gift that Thou hast given me. It is Jesus, whose Soul Thou didst sanctify with Thy holiest treasures. Make me, dear Spirit, more loving, that I may cling more closely to God. O Ever-blessed Trinity, Three Persons and One God, help me to live according to this gift of gifts which I have received at the Altar of Jesus. PART IV THE FOURTH THING TO BE CHIEFLY NOTED ABOUT THE BLESSED SACRAMENT IS THE KIND OF PREPARATION THAT WE SHOULD MAKE FOR HOLY COMMUNION XV About our preparation for Holy CommunionWE have to prove ourselves, examine ourselves, purify ourselves. For it is in the highest degree right and fitting that, with great care and great devotion, we should make ourselves ready to receive food so holy and so adorable as this. In it we receive the Lord of all the earth. Priests and people alike must come with holy fear and love to this heavenly feast. Even in the old law, God ordered the priests to sanctify themselves when they drew near to Him, lest He should strike them. Much more should we prepare ourselves when we draw near to the very city of the living God, and to God Himself who is the Judge of all. Now as to our preparation we have to consider three things: A, the majesty of this most holy Body; B, the Host of bread; C, the type of the Paschal lamb. The first and second points, A and B, will be considered in this meditation, and the third point, C, in the next. A. This Body of Jesus is a Body of the greatest purity. It is full of the living God, and hypostatically united to Him. For receiving it therefore we must with great care make ourselves ready by three things. 1. By fulness of faith. When St. Paul says, ‘With a true heart,’ he means that our intellect must be without error. When he says, ‘In fulness of faith,’ he means that we must believe, without any doubt, those things which we cannot see, namely, that under the species of bread there is the whole Body of Jesus Christ, true man and true God. Because of the great merit of faith, St. Peter promises that they who believe in Christ, whom they do not see, shall rejoice with joy unspeakable.

• From Speak, Memory (1966)

  He was replaced by the celebrated Dobuzhinski who liked to give me his lessons on the piano nobile of our house, in one of its pretty reception rooms downstairs, which he entered in a particularly noiseless way as if afraid to startle me from my verse-making stupor. He made me depict from memory, in the greatest possible detail, objects I had certainly seen thousands of times without visualizing them properly: a street lamp, a postbox, the tulip design on the stained glass of our own front door. He tried to teach me to find the geometrical coordinations between the slender twigs of a leafless boulevard tree, a system of visual give-and-takes, requiring a precision of linear expression, which I failed to achieve in my youth, but applied gratefully, in my adult instar, not only to the drawing of butterfly genitalia during my seven years at the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology, when immersing myself in the bright wellhole of a microscope to record in India ink this or that new structure; but also, perhaps, to certain camera-lucida needs of literary composition. Emotionally, however, I am still more indebted to the earlier color treats given me by my mother and her former teacher. How readily Mr. Cummings would sit down on a stool, part behind with both hands his—what? was he wearing a frock coat? I see only the gesture—and proceed to open the black tin paintbox. I loved the nimble way he had of soaking his paintbrush in multiple color to the accompaniment of a rapid clatter produced by the enamel containers wherein the rich reds and yellows that the brush dimpled were appetizingly cupped; and having thus collected its honey, it would cease to hover and poke, and, by two or three sweeps of its lush tip, would drench the “Vatmanski” paper with an even spread of orange sky, across which, while that sky was still dampish, a long purple-black cloud would be laid. “And that’s all, dearie,” he would say. “That’s all there is to it.” On one occasion, I had him draw an express train for me. I watched his pencil ably evolve the cowcatcher and elaborate headlights of a locomotive that looked as if it had been acquired secondhand for the Trans-Siberian line after it had done duty at Promontory Point, Utah, in the sixties. Then came five disappointingly plain carriages. When he had quite finished them, he carefully shaded the ample smoke coming from the huge funnel, cocked his head, and, after a moment of pleased contemplation, handed me the drawing. I tried to look pleased, too. He had forgotten the tender.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  c. When our Lord says, ‘Do this in remembrance of Me,’ we have the first reason, namely, that we may not forget our Saviour. When He says, ‘which is given for you,’ He tells us of the Sacrifice of the Lamb of God, and thus the Sacrifice of the Altar is offered against our robbery. When He says, ‘Take and eat,’ He tells us of the Food that is the medicine against corruption. A. There is the remembrance of our Saviour. We often draw away our minds and all our senses from God, and wander far from Him, by bad thoughts and wrong pleasures, but by the grace of this holy Sacrament we must turn our thoughts from all that is evil and give ourselves altogether to God. Eusebius says, ‘Since our Lord was going to take His assumed body from our sight it was needful that on the day of the Last Supper He should consecrate for us the Sacrament of His Body and Blood, that He might be always offered in a mystery who once was offered as a price, and that the deathless Victim might live in memory and be always present in grace.’ N. There are three signs of His love to keep His memory fresh in our hearts: 1, the forgiveness of our sins; 2, the redemption of those in bondage; 3, the ceaselessness of His kindness. B. There is the Sacrifice of the Altar, which is offered against what we may call the daily robbery of our sins, that as our Lord’s Body was once offered on the Cross for the original debt, so it may be offered ceaselessly on the altar for our daily sins; and that in this the Church may have a gift for appeasing God far more precious and acceptable than all the sacrifices of the law. Pope Alexander says, ‘Nothing in the sacrifices of the Church can be greater than the Body and Blood of Christ. This is before all oblations. It must be offered to God with a pure conscience and taken with a pure mind. As it is greater than all sacrifices, so it is more adorable.’ N. To show the greatness of this Sacrifice, we mark three reasons for changing the ancient sacrifice: 1, the power of the Author of our Sacrifice; 2, the greatness of our debt; 3, the insufficiency of the sacrifices of the law. 1. Jesus is not only Lord and King of the whole earth, but also our High Priest after the order of Melchisedech. As the Priesthood is translated to Him, He has power to change the Sacrifice into what is better, and it is fitting that He should do so.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  I have therefore treated our passing thoughts as integers, and regarded the mere laws of their coexistence with brain-states as the ultimate laws for our science. The reader will in vain seek for any closed system in the book. It is mainly a mess of descriptive details, running out into queries which only a metaphysics alive to the weight of her task can hope successfully to deal with. That will perhaps be centuries hence; and meanwhile the best mark of health that a science can show is this unfinished-seeming front. The completion of the book has been so slow that several chapters have been published successively in Mind, the Journal of Speculative Philosophy, the Popular Science Monthly, and Scribner's Magazine. Acknowledgment is made in the proper places. The bibliography, I regret to say, is quite unsystematic. I have habitually given my authority for special experimental facts; but beyond that I have aimed mainly to cite books that would probably be actually used by the ordinary American college-student in his collateral reading. The bibliography in W. Volkmann von Volkmar's Lehrbuch der Psychologie (1875) is so complete, up to its date, that there is no need of an inferior duplicate. And for more recent references, Sully's Outlines, Dewey's Psychology, and Baldwin's Handbook of Psychology may be advantageously used. Finally, where one owes to so many, it seems absurd to single out particular creditors; yet I cannot resist the temptation at the end of my first literary venture to record my gratitude for the inspiration I have got from the writings of J. S. Mill, Lotze, Renouvier, Hodgson, and Wundt, and from the intellectual companionship (to name only five names) of Chauncey Wright and Charles Peirce in old times, and more recently of Stanley Hall, James Putnam, and Josiah Royce. HARVARD UNIVERSITY, August 1890. PSYCHOLOGY CHAPTER I. THE SCOPE OF PSYCHOLOGY. Psychology is the Science of Mental Life, both of its phenomena and of their conditions. The phenomena are such things as we call feelings, desires, cognitions, reasonings, decisions, and the like; and, superficially considered, their variety and complexity is such as to leave a chaotic impression on the observer. The most natural and consequently the earliest way of unifying the material was, first, to classify it as well as might be, and, secondly, to affiliate the diverse mental modes thus found, upon a simple entity, the personal Soul, of which they are taken to be so many facultative manifestations.