Sadness

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.

Page 208 of 212 · 20 per page

• From The Fixed Stars (0)

  [image file=image_rsrc2FK.jpg] The morning of May 25, 2017, was a “parent tea” in June’s class at school. Brandon and I both went, and the three of us sat together at a low table in the classroom. There was a bud vase in the center of the table with a single too-tall stem flopping jauntily from its mouth. June had arranged it for us, and now she would serve us cups of lukewarm peppermint tea that sloshed a little as she walked. We’d received an email the week before, saying that her teacher was leaving at the end of the year to get a degree in child psychology. When she stood to thank us, a sob rose in my throat like a cough and I mashed my lips together so hard, they kept aching even after I stopped. After the tea, Brandon and I drove separately to King County Superior Court. The attorney was waiting for us upstairs, at the end of a grim marble-lined hallway, and he led us into a room with pews, an unlikely chapel, that faced a long counter at the front. We sat down in a pew at the back, and the attorney offered us sticks of gum. When an attendant called our names, we filed up to the counter where the judge flipped through our file. He asked us to confirm our names, and we did, and then he asked, Is your marriage irretrievably broken? In unison we said yes. Then the judge signed something, or stamped something, I don’t remember, and handed the papers to our attorney. Out in the corridor, the attorney slid the file into a slot in the wall. It was done. We all shook hands, and that was it. But it seemed wrong to go back to the world; we were tender as newly molted crabs. So we walked through downtown, along streets we’d crossed on our first date twelve years earlier, and wound up at a friend’s restaurant, where they bought us a noontime glass of Champagne. 31A week and a day later, Ash had top surgery. They’d thought on it for more than a year, and less actively for decades; breasts had never seemed to belong on their body. Ash wore a sports bra for the compression, the way it flattened their silhouette. In the short time we’d been together, I had noticed their discomfort with wearing even that—not because it dug or pinched but because it pointed to the fact that they had breasts at all. I was nervous when Ash told me they wanted finally to do something about it. What do you think? they asked. I love your breasts, I said. To be honest, I want more time with them. But I also want you to have your body.

• From The Spiritual Works of Leo Tolstoy (selected nonfiction) (2016)

  We may yet save ourselves by going back to the farm, and taking up anew the life and labors of our fathers. Disagreed, yet kept silent. In this strain he continued for quite awhile, and the longer he spoke the sadder grew his speech and the more prophetic became his look. At length he ceased speaking, and an oppressive quiet ensued. I recognized that he was deeply moved, and I therefore did not care to contradict some of his statements which were obviously based on error. In other of his statements I fully agreed with him, yet, loyalty to my country forbade my seconding the gloomy prospect he held out for us. Description of his relationship with wife and family. A fortunate interruption relieved the situation. His wife approached with a letter or manuscript in hand. He arose, proceeded toward her, and, for a while, the two conferred together. In all probability it was a manuscript of his which she was translating or revising. I was told that she was always doing something of that sort. She was his consultant, his reviser, his translator, while his daughter, Tatiana, was his correspondent in a number of different languages. It is said that his wife copied twenty-one times the four large volumes of his novel War and Peace , and that there has been no novel nor little else of his writing, since their marriage in 1862, that did not pass through her hands. He found in her, in the fullest sense of the word, his help-mate, a woman of great culture as well of great practical sense, who looked after his literary interests no less than after those of the household, and who often found it no easy task to be, as has been well said, "the patient wife of an impatient genius." She bore him thirteen children, six of whom passed away in their early youth. She fairly idolized him and skilfully managed to slip, unknown to him, those little comforts into his life which he required for his well-being and which he had renounced. Neither she nor the children shared his view respecting the distribution among the peasantry of his estate and other property, and keeping for himself no more than an equal share with all the others. The family believed in availing themselves of the benefits of civilization, and for that they required the income of the farm and the royalty of his books. There was quite a wrangle, for a time, between the family and its head, but it was amicably disposed of in the end, the count agreeing to their living as they chose, on the condition that they permitted him to live as he pleased.

• From The Spiritual Works of Leo Tolstoy (selected nonfiction) (2016)

  Got used to it, you say? No; I cannot imagine having Vera to change my linen and wash me. Of course she would say that it's nothing to her, but for me it would be awful. "And tell me, is he afraid to die? Does he say not? Very likely; he's a strong man, he may be able to conquer the fear of it. Yes, yes, perhaps he's not afraid; but still— "You say he struggles with the feeling? Why, of course; what else can one do? "I wanted to go and be with him; but I thought, how can I? I shall crack up myself, and then there will be two invalids instead of one. "Yes, you have told me a great deal; every detail is interesting. It is not death that's so terrible, it's illness, helplessness, and, above all, the fear that you are a burden to others. That's awful, awful." Uncle Seryozha died in 1904 of cancer in the face. This is what my aunt, Maria Nikolayevna,15 the nun, told me about his death. Almost to the last day he was on his legs, and would not let any one nurse him. He was in full possession of his faculties and consciously prepared for death. Besides his own family, the aged Maria Mikhailovna and her daughters, his sister, Maria Nikolayevna, who told me the story, was with him, too, and from hour to hour they expected the arrival of my father, for whom they had sent a messenger to Yasnaya. They were all troubled with the difficult question whether the dying man would want to receive the holy communion before he died. Knowing Sergei Nikolayevitch's disbelief in the religion of the church, no one dared to mention the subject to him, and the unhappy Maria Mikhailovna hovered round his room, wringing her hands and praying. They awaited my father's arrival impatiently, but were secretly afraid of his influence on his brother, and hoped against hope that Sergei Nikolayevitch would send for the priest before his arrival. "Imagine our surprise and delight," said Maria Tolstoy, "when Lyovotchka came out of his room and told Maria Mikhailovna that Seryozha wanted a priest sent for. I do not know what they had been talking about, but when Seryozha said that he wished to take the communion, Lyovotchka answered that he was quite right, and at once came and told us what he wanted." My father stayed about a week at Pirogovo, and left two days before my uncle died. When he received a telegram to say he was worse, he drove over again, but arrived too late; he was no longer living. He carried his body out from the house with his own hands, and himself bore it to the churchyard. When he got back to Yasnaya he spoke with touching affection of his parting with this "inscrutable and beloved" brother, who was so strange and remote from him, but at the same time so near and so akin.

• From A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (BDB) (1907)

  כאב כָּן like D+++3, + 58"; and answered by‏ as zt were is against‏ , בכזר יתמוללו 58° —.26"7 Ts‏ usage of 193 (with a vb.), and yields a lame‏ (Lag Che) ;‏ כמו [VSM]‏ ית' ,עס sense: read‏ if I said, 123 TBD, the text is un-‏ 73° being‏ כמן translateable, the rendering thus for‏ indefensible: prob. 137 has dropped out before‏ the following 731: for 3 103 the like of these‏ things, 61. Jb 23% 7303, and 12° supr. db.‏ (a) of time, once, tGn 19"‏ : כּאשר conj.=‏ ny 123 when the dawn arose; (8) of‏ הַשָחַר mode, according as, + 20 10° 137 193 33) Pr 237‏ (answered by }3).—For 2 (before sfs.), see 3.‏ TAND vb. be in pain (Aram. IN3, 5ב‎ id.; Ar. 525 be sorrowful, sad; As. in deriv., tkkibu, pain Zim*®?™, kébtu, ruin Apt in KAT? Gloss.1.)_Qaal Jmpf. “AND Pr 14%; AND! Jbr4”; Pt, ץ בּיאָב‎ 69”; DIND Gn 3 4*;—1. be in pain, physical Gn 34” (J, as result of circumcision); Jb 14” (subj. W3; poet. of body in grave 2. of mental pain Pr 14" (subj. 22); prob. also 69% )|| (עני‎ Hiph. GX Co (MT NINA vy. MND); Zmpf PN Ib 5%; 3INDA 2K 3”; Pt. AND Hz 28"%;—pain, mar ; 1. of enemies of Isr. under fig. of thorn causing pain (no object expr.) קוץ מכ'‎ Ez 28% (|i סלון‎ YS); of "IY, no obj. expr., Jb 5" (opp. חבש‎ || 7012). 2. of mental pain, obj. ,לב‎ Ez 132 (subj. false prophetesses, v. supr.); cf. לץ‎ (subj.”). 3. (si vera 1.) of marring good land with stones 2 1% 3°, © dypecere (Klo (תָּאבָּד‎ Tard n.m.”?? 8 pain;—’) abs. Jb2™Is17"; cstr. 65"; 81. כָּאָבִי‎ Jb 16°+ 2 t.;—pain, mental and physical Jb 2'* 16° perh. also ~ 39°; WN ‘3 (in disappointment and disaster) Is 17" (|| mona from nbn); mental, (שַבֶר רוח ||) 5% 6 פ'"לב‎ so Je x5” מכָה|)‎ 56 Taino n.m.’*” pain ;--- כ‎ abs. Ec 1° 4+ 2+. estr. y 697; sf.°DINDD (ANID) שש‎ 38% + 3 +. etc.; pl. ש מַכָאוּבִים‎ 32" He 2%; מַכְאבוּת‎ 13% 86. מַכָאבָיו‎ Ex מִכָאבִינוּ ;ב‎ Is 53%---1. pain, physical, Ex 37 )|| ;עָנִי‎ ef. 33°22 in context) ; 2 Ch 6*:(||¥22); Jb 33". 2. of mental pain, 32” (of troubles of wicked), of Babylon Je 51°; ש‎ 38% 69” (as result of sin; of ”’s servant); in ’’s word to Baruch Je 45° (|| {)%, 1738), ef. 456 כוכב of Israel in distress Je 30% (||72¥), of Jerus La 1228 Ke 18 (39 soi nya (יוּסִיף‎ ; 2 (||'229 DY); partic. of suffering servant of | Ts 53° (both || (חלי‎ | [rT א‎ 2] vb. Niph. be disheartened, coy

• From The Fixed Stars (0)

  She stood out in the Bible Belt. My parents were from the East Coast, and they’d met in Baltimore, her hometown. When my father took a job in Oklahoma City in the mid-seventies, they didn’t intend the move to be permanent. My mother says she was depressed for the first two years. But they stayed. Eventually they bought a house in Nichols Hills, the ritziest part of town, and sent me to the private prep school nearby. They scoffed at the flat horizon of Oklahoma City, but they also learned how to live with it, how to make the most of it. Oklahoma is known best for being, in the nineteenth century, the place where the US government put Native Americans it had cruelly expelled from other parts of the country. It is also known for its bizarro Land Rush of 1889, when white settlers raced to grab up parcels of Native land; for the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical of the same (exclamation-pointed) name; and perhaps less so, for having an oil well on the lawn of the state capitol. In the 1980s, if you told someone from somewhere else that you lived in Oklahoma, they’d ask if you rode a cow to school, and this would seem hilarious to everyone but you. But Oklahoma was also a place of new and flashy wealth, and this was especially true in Nichols Hills, a manicured enclave of oil and gas money and gated mansions that people casually called “houses.” My father was a radiation oncologist in private practice, and I had a childhood of privilege. My mother stayed home until I was twelve, then made her aerobics habit a job. She became a certified personal fitness trainer. My parents clung to vestiges of their old coastal life: progressive politics and a subscription to the Sunday New York Times. We didn’t go to church on Sundays. My father instead spent weekend mornings combing estate sales for silver saltcellars, etched crystal glasses, and glazed ceramics from England and France with lobsters and serpents on the lid. He’d hit up the Chinese supermarket, bring home a haul of slender eggplants and crisp-skinned lacquered duck. My parents bought plane tickets and got me out, took me to see other cities and countries.

• From A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (BDB) (1907)

  a>-70n3 Pr 10” by lacking intelligence (sense), (Di puts here Dt 15°, v.infr.) |. abs. be in want, want y 23. Pr13” Neg”. 2. be lack- ing, 12 /MY WY MDM 1% 15° his lack (i.e. thing needed), which is lacking to him (possible also is, which he lacks for es so Di, v. supr.); שמ‎ orbs על חלשף‎ Ee 98 oil on thy head let it not be lacking; v. also abs. Is 51% Ct 7°, and "Df לבו‎ Ee 10° his sense is lacking ; of jar of oil 1 K 17*16 (abs.) by meton. for the oil itself (cf. || בלה‎ be consumed, exhausted). 3. diminish, decrease, of waters Gn 8°(P), 61. WDM) qa 2 (P), waters continually diminished (v. הלך‎ supr. p. 233). Pi. cause to lack, c. ace. pers., Jmpf. 2 ms. sf. מעט מָאֶלהים‎ ITIBOM y 8° and thou didst make him lack little of God ; Pt. אתדנפשי מְטוּבָה‎ IN Ec 4* for whom am 1 labouri ing and depriving myself of good things ? Hiph. Pf VON) Ex 16%; Impf. VOM Is 3 2°;— cause to be lacking, fail, ¢. acc. rei mm Noy MPwID Ts 32°; the drink of the thirsty he causeth to fail 341 חפה )| 239 (לְהָרִיק נפש‎ ; abs. Ex 16" (P), he that gathered little caused no lack. Tron n.m.!"%~ want, poverty—alw. abs.; NI חי‎ Pr 28” want shall come to him; ||{23 hung ger Jb 30%. ץ[תס--(*7 7% 1,3) n.[m.] want, lack‏ חסרז Dt 287,‏ ח' פל ;4° Am‏ ח' estr. pnb‏ fren adj. needy, lacking, in want of— ח"‎ abs. Ec 6%; estr. 1D 18 21+ 13 t.;—needy, in want of ח' משגעים אני‎ 18 21% am I in want of madmen? 28 3” in need of bread, so Pr 12°; usu. ו‎ pore understanding, sense Pr 6” “Go ו‎ ene ay Rate ח'דלב‎ DIS Pr 178 24%; נָּנִיר ח' תבוּנות‎ Pr 280. TDM IS וג/‎ bop לפשו‎ Ec 67 neither is he lacking for his soul in aught of כמן)‎ part.) all that he desireth. n.pr.m. grandfather of Shallum‏ חַסרה1 who was husband of Huldah the prophetess‏ 2Ke2 24(G Apaas,‏ חַרחס (GA Eacepn, GL Acep)=‏ GL Aédpa).‏ Ten n.m. thing lacking, deficiency (Lag™ =) —only nina ד 6ך ח" לאדיוכל‎ what is lacking cannot be counted. n.[m.] need, thing‏ מחסר ,מחסורז abs. Pr 11% + 6t.; estr.‏ מ - -; needed, poverty‏ Jur8" 19"; sf. FOND Jurg™; FIOM Pr 6";‏ Pr a —1. need=‏ מחסריף oN Dt 15°; pl. sf.‏ "I Dt 15° enough for his‏ מחסר\ thing needed‏ fam) Ju‏ עָלִי cf. IDM vb.);‏ אשר יָּחְסַר לו need (sq.‏ all thy need be upon me (for me to prov ide).‏ ”19 no lack of‏ 18% 170 אִין מ ָּלַדְּבַר lack, want‏ .2 anything,19" 734". 3. ingen., need, poverty‏ 22° 210 ןד EI‏ (ריש ||( 24% = Pr 6% (|| WNT)‏ man of poverty.‏ ₪ 217 איש מז" ;287 FT +. ir. .חפף‎

• From The Second Sex (1949)

  She shared in production as linen maid, laundress, burnisher, shopgirl, and so on; she worked either at home or in small businesses; her material independence allowed her great freedom of behavior: a woman of modest means could go out, go to taverns, and control her own body almost like a man; she is her husband’s partner and his equal. She is oppressed on an economic and not on a sexual level. In the countryside, the peasant woman plays a considerable role in rural labor; she is treated like a servant; often she does not eat at the same table as her husband and sons; she toils harder and the burdens of maternity add to her fatigue. But as in old farming societies, since she is necessary to man, he respects her for it; their goods, interests, and concerns are shared; she enjoys great authority in the home. From within their difficult lives, these women could have asserted themselves as individuals and demanded their rights; but a tradition of timidity and submission weighed on them: the Estates-General cahiers record an insignificant number of feminine claims, limited to “Men should not engage in trades that are the prerogative of women.” And it is true that women are found alongside their men in demonstrations and riots: they are the ones who go to Versailles to find “the baker, the baker’s wife, and the baker’s little boy.”* But it is not the people who led the Revolution and reaped its fruits. As for bourgeois women, a few rallied ardently to the cause of freedom: Mme Roland, Lucile Desmoulins, and Théroigne de Méricourt; one of them, Charlotte Corday, significantly influenced the outcome when she assassinated Marat. There were a few feminist movements. In 1791, Olympe de Gouges proposed a “Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen” equivalent to the “Declaration of the Rights of Man,” demanding that all masculine privileges be abolished. In 1790 the same ideas are found in Motion de la pauvre Javotte (Poor Javotte’s Motion) and in other similar lampoons; but in spite of Condorcet’s support, these efforts are abortive, and Olympe perishes on the scaffold. In addition to L’Impatient, the newspaper she founded, a few other short-lived papers appear. Women’s clubs merge for the most part with men’s and are taken over by them. On Brumaire 28, 1793, when the actress Rose Lacombe, president of the Society of Republican and Revolutionary Women, along with a delegation of women, forces the doors of the Conseil Général, the prosecutor Chaumette pronounces words in the assembly that could be inspired by Saint Paul and Saint Thomas: “Since when are women allowed to renounce their sex and become men?… [Nature] has told woman: Be a woman. Child care, household tasks, sundry motherhood cares, those are your tasks.” Women are banned from entering the Conseil and soon even from the clubs where they had learned their politics.

• From Thinking, Fast and Slow (2011)

  I soon had an occasion to apply what I had learned from Feller. The Yom Kippur War broke out in 1973, and my only significant contribution to the war effort was to advise high officers in the Israeli Air Force to stop an investigation. The air war initially went quite badly for Israel, because of the unexpectedly good performance of Egyptian ground-to-air missiles. Losses were high, and they appeared to be unevenly distributed. I was told of two squadrons flying from the same base, one of which had lost four planes while the other had lost none. An inquiry was initiated in the hope of learning what it was that the unfortunate squadron was doing wrong. There was no prior reason to believe that one of the squadrons was more effective than the other, and no operational differences were found, but of course the lives of the pilots differed in many random ways, including, as I recall, how often they went home between missions and something about the conduct of debriefings. My advice was that the command should accept that the different outcomes were due to blind luck, and that the interviewing of the pilots should stop. I reasoned that luck was the most likely answer, that a random search for a nonobvious cause was hopeless, and that in the meantime the pilots in the squadron that had sustained losses did not need the extra burden of being made to feel that they and their dead friends were at fault. Some years later, Amos and his students Tom Gilovich and Robert Vallone caused a stir with their study of misperceptions of randomness in basketball. The “fact” that players occasionally acquire a hot hand is generally accepted by players, coaches, and fans. The inference is irresistible: a player sinks three or four baskets in a row and you cannot help forming the causal judgment that this player is now hot, with a temporarily increased propensity to score. Players on both teams adapt to this judgment—teammates are more likely to pass to the hot scorer and the defense is more likely to doubleteam. Analysis of thousands of sequences of shots led to a disappointing conclusion: there is no such thing as a hot hand in professional basketball, either in shooting from the field or scoring from the foul line. Of course, some players are more accurate than others, but the sequence of successes and missed shots satisfies all tests of randomness. The hot hand is entirely in the eye of the beholders, who are consistently too quick to perceive order and causality in randomness. The hot hand is a massive and widespread cognitive illusion. The public reaction to this research is part of the story. The finding was picked up by the press because of its surprising conclusion, and the general response was disbelief. When the celebrated coach of the Boston Celtics, Red Auerbach, heard of Gilovich and his study, he responded, “Who is this guy? So he makes a study. I couldn’t care less.” The tendency to see patterns in

• From New Testament Words (1964)

  With little or with much, be contented; So wilt thou not have to bear the reproach of thy wandering. An evil life it is to go from house to house, And where thou art a stranger thou must not open thy mouth. A stranger thou art in that case, and drinkest contempt; And besides this thou wilt have to bear bitter things: ‘Come hither, sojourner, from the face of honour, My brother is come as my guest, I have need of my house.’ These things are grievous to a man of understanding: Upbraiding concerning sojourning, and the reproach of a money-lender . The very fact that the Christian is a stranger and a pilgrim and a sojourner is the proof that comfort is the last thing that he can expect in life, and that an easy popularity is not for him. (ii) This idea of the Christian as a stranger in the world is deeply rooted in the literature of the early Church. TertulHan wrote: ‘The Christian knows that on earth he has a pilgrimage, but that he has his dignity in heaven’ ( Apology , 1). ‘Nothing is of any importance to us in this world except to depart from it as quickly as possible’ ( Apology , 41). ‘The Christian is a sojourner amongst corruptible things’ ( The Letter to Diognetus , 6.18). ‘We have no fatherland on earth’ (Clement of Alexandria, Paedagogus , 3.8.1). ‘We are sojourners, unable to live happily exiled from our fatherland. We seek for a way to help us to end our sorrows and to return to our native country’ (Augustine, Concerning Christian Doctrine , 2.4). ‘We should consider, dearly beloved brethren, we should ever and anon reflect that we have renounced the world, and in the meantime are living here as guests and strangers. Let us greet the day which assigns each of us to our own home, which snatches us hence, and lifts us from the snares of the world, and restores us to Paradise and to the Kingdom. Who that has been placed in foreign lands would not hasten to return to his own country? Who that is hastening to return to his friends would not eagerly desire a prosperous gale, that he might the sooner embrace those dear to him. We regard Paradise as our country’ (Cyprian, Concerning Mortality , 26).

• From While You Were Out (2023)

  4 Dangerous Tricks [image file=Image00009.jpg] Billy, my mother, Molly, and Danny on one of our annual ski trips to the Porcupine Mountains in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, 1968. I can’t say exactly when my mother was released from the psychiatric ward after that Thanksgiving. Her medical records were destroyed years ago, and it’s been too long for any of us to remember the specifics. But I do know this: My mother did more than just eat pumpkin pie during her three-hour pass at home that night. Molly, the baby of our family, was born nine months later, almost to the day. Once my mother came home from the maternity ward that August, she stayed put more or less for the next fifteen years, except to go on an occasional spiritual retreat with some ladies from our parish or her annual romantic getaway with Holmer. Though her mysterious disappearing acts stopped, she now seemed to be encased in a kind of invisible bubble, one that kept us at a distance from her. We didn’t doubt that she loved us. She organized birthday parties for us all, baked us angel food cakes, came to most of our basketball games, sewed matching suede jumpers for Patty and me, and decorated our room with lavender and powder-blue daisy wallpaper. But there was an aloofness about her now, an intimacy that she wouldn’t—or couldn’t—give us. The medications she took kept her from us. She tuned us out in tiny ways, making half-hearted efforts at scratching our backs or rubbing our feet. My mother had never been one to cuddle or lavish us with kisses the way Holmer often did. When we skinned our knees or a friend said something that hurt our feelings, she’d pat us on the back softly and offer a faint, “There, there.” My mother rarely raised her voice. Even her vivid threats of first-degree child abuse—Come here so I can crack your skulls wide open —sounded more like a Shakespeare sonnet coming from her singsong voice. We once had a contest at the dining room table to see who could make the meanest, most menacing face. The scariest she could muster was to squint her eyes and pucker her lips slightly like she’d just bit into a lemon. She didn’t dish out words of wisdom or unsolicited advice the way so many mothers did. Nor did she tear up at the kind of events that could cause other mothers to blubber—baby teeth lost, Mother’s Day poems scratched in crayon, little girls in white dresses and veils nervously approaching the altar for their First Holy Communion. My mother’s feelings were mostly a mystery to us. She rarely talked about her childhood. If you wanted information, you’d have to pry it out of her, pester her with questions. Even then, she might not give much of an answer. Her parenting approach, like that of many mothers of her generation, could best be described as laissez-faire.

• From New Testament Words (1964)

  The third word which describes the relationship of the Christian to the world is the noun paroikos , with its verb paroikein . In classical Greek the word is more usually metoikos , and it describes what was known as a ‘resident alien’. The resident alien was a man who came to stay in a place without being naturalized. He paid an alien tax; he was a licensed sojourner. He stayed in some place, but he had never given up citizenship of the place to which he truly belonged. In the NT the word is used several times. God told Abraham that his descendants would ‘sojourn’ in a strange land (Acts 7.6). Moses was a ‘stranger’ in the land of Midian (Acts 7.29). On the road to Emmaus the two travellers ask the unrecognized risen Christ if he is only a ‘stranger’ in Jerusalem because he does not seem to know of the tragedy that has happened (Luke 24.18). When the Gentiles enter the Christian faith they are not ‘strangers’ to God’s promises any more. But once again it is Hebrews and I Peter which give this word its special tone and emphasis and meaning. Once again Hebrews describes the patriarchs as ‘sojourners’, with no permanent residence (Heb. 11.9); and it is Peter’s appeal that his people should keep themselves clean because they were strangers and ‘pilgrims’ (I Pet. 2.11). The word paroikos occurs often in the Septuagint. Eleven times it translates the Hebrew word gēr; the gēr was the stranger, the proselyte, the foreigner who was a dweller within the family of Israel. Ten times it translates the word tōshab ; the tōshab was the emigrant sojourning in a strange country, where he is not naturalized . Thucydides uses the word metoikos to describe ‘strangers’ who have settled in Athens but who have never become citizens (2.13). Herodotus uses it of people in Crete who are settlers there, but not citizens of the country (4.151). It is the word which is regularly used in contrast with politēs , the full citizen of a country and with katoikos , the man who has his permanent residence there. A Carpathos inscription divides the population into two classes— politai and paroikoi , citizens and resident aliens. The governor of Priene invites to a festival politai , the ‘citizens’, paroikoi , the ‘resident aliens’, katoikoi , those who have their permanent residence in the town, and xenoi , the ‘strangers’ who happen to be there. The ancient world well knew the term paroikos ; it described a man who lived within a community but whose citizenship was somewhere else. The words were particularly used of the Jews of the Dispersion.

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  “I will leave you,” said Elinor, “if you will go to bed.” But this, from the momentary perverseness of impatient suffering, she at first refused to do. Her sister’s earnest, though gentle persuasion, however, soon softened her to compliance, and Elinor saw her lay her aching head on the pillow, and as she hoped, in a way to get some quiet rest before she left her. In the drawing-room, whither she then repaired, she was soon joined by Mrs. Jennings, with a wine-glass, full of something, in her hand. “My dear,” said she, entering, “I have just recollected that I have some of the finest old Constantia wine in the house that ever was tasted, so I have brought a glass of it for your sister. My poor husband! how fond he was of it! Whenever he had a touch of his old colicky gout, he said it did him more good than any thing else in the world. Do take it to your sister.” “Dear Ma’am,” replied Elinor, smiling at the difference of the complaints for which it was recommended, “how good you are! But I have just left Marianne in bed, and, I hope, almost asleep; and as I think nothing will be of so much service to her as rest, if you will give me leave, I will drink the wine myself.” Mrs. Jennings, though regretting that she had not been five minutes earlier, was satisfied with the compromise; and Elinor, as she swallowed the chief of it, reflected, that though its effects on a colicky gout were, at present, of little importance to her, its healing powers, on a disappointed heart might be as reasonably tried on herself as on her sister. Colonel Brandon came in while the party were at tea, and by his manner of looking round the room for Marianne, Elinor immediately fancied that he neither expected nor wished to see her there, and, in short, that he was already aware of what occasioned her absence. Mrs. Jennings was not struck by the same thought; for soon after his entrance, she walked across the room to the tea-table where Elinor presided, and whispered, “The Colonel looks as grave as ever you see. He knows nothing of it; do tell him, my dear.” He shortly afterwards drew a chair close to hers, and, with a look which perfectly assured her of his good information, inquired after her sister. “Marianne is not well,” said she. “She has been indisposed all day, and we have persuaded her to go to bed.” “Perhaps, then,” he hesitatingly replied, “what I heard this morning may be—there may be more truth in it than I could believe possible at first.” “What did you hear?” “That a gentleman, whom I had reason to think—in short, that a man, whom I knew to be engaged—but how shall I tell you? If you know it already, as surely you must, I may be spared.”

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  “Aye, I believe that will be best for her. Let her name her own supper, and go to bed. Lord! no wonder she has been looking so bad and so cast down this last week or two, for this matter I suppose has been hanging over her head as long as that. And so the letter that came today finished it! Poor soul! I am sure if I had had a notion of it, I would not have joked her about it for all my money. But then you know, how should I guess such a thing? I made sure of its being nothing but a common love letter, and you know young people like to be laughed at about them. Lord! how concerned Sir John and my daughters will be when they hear it! If I had my senses about me I might have called in Conduit Street in my way home, and told them of it. But I shall see them tomorrow.” “It would be unnecessary I am sure, for you to caution Mrs. Palmer and Sir John against ever naming Mr. Willoughby, or making the slightest allusion to what has passed, before my sister. Their own good-nature must point out to them the real cruelty of appearing to know any thing about it when she is present; and the less that may ever be said to myself on the subject, the more my feelings will be spared, as you my dear madam will easily believe.” “Oh! Lord! yes, that I do indeed. It must be terrible for you to hear it talked of; and as for your sister, I am sure I would not mention a word about it to her for the world. You saw I did not all dinner time. No more would Sir John, nor my daughters, for they are all very thoughtful and considerate; especially if I give them a hint, as I certainly will. For my part, I think the less that is said about such things, the better, the sooner ’tis blown over and forgot. And what good does talking ever do you know?” “In this affair it can only do harm; more so perhaps than in many cases of a similar kind, for it has been attended by circumstances which, for the sake of every one concerned in it, make it unfit to become the public conversation. I must do this justice to Mr. Willoughby—he has broken no positive engagement with my sister.” “Law, my dear! Don’t pretend to defend him. No positive engagement indeed! after taking her all over Allenham House, and fixing on the very rooms they were to live in hereafter!”

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Never had Marianne been so unwilling to dance in her life, as she was that evening, and never so much fatigued by the exercise. She complained of it as they returned to Berkeley Street. “Aye, aye,” said Mrs. Jennings, “we know the reason of all that very well; if a certain person who shall be nameless, had been there, you would not have been a bit tired: and to say the truth it was not very pretty of him not to give you the meeting when he was invited.” “Invited!” cried Marianne. “So my daughter Middleton told me, for it seems Sir John met him somewhere in the street this morning.” Marianne said no more, but looked exceedingly hurt. Impatient in this situation to be doing something that might lead to her sister’s relief, Elinor resolved to write the next morning to her mother, and hoped by awakening her fears for the health of Marianne, to procure those inquiries which had been so long delayed; and she was still more eagerly bent on this measure by perceiving after breakfast on the morrow, that Marianne was again writing to Willoughby, for she could not suppose it to be to any other person. About the middle of the day, Mrs. Jennings went out by herself on business, and Elinor began her letter directly, while Marianne, too restless for employment, too anxious for conversation, walked from one window to the other, or sat down by the fire in melancholy meditation. Elinor was very earnest in her application to her mother, relating all that had passed, her suspicions of Willoughby’s inconstancy, urging her by every plea of duty and affection to demand from Marianne an account of her real situation with respect to him.

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  “The lady then—Miss Grey I think you called her—is very rich?” “Fifty thousand pounds, my dear. Did you ever see her? a smart, stylish girl they say, but not handsome. I remember her aunt very well, Biddy Henshawe; she married a very wealthy man. But the family are all rich together. Fifty thousand pounds! and by all accounts, it won’t come before it’s wanted; for they say he is all to pieces. No wonder! dashing about with his curricle and hunters! Well, it don’t signify talking; but when a young man, be who he will, comes and makes love to a pretty girl, and promises marriage, he has no business to fly off from his word only because he grows poor, and a richer girl is ready to have him. Why don’t he, in such a case, sell his horses, let his house, turn off his servants, and make a thorough reform at once? I warrant you, Miss Marianne would have been ready to wait till matters came round. But that won’t do now-a-days; nothing in the way of pleasure can ever be given up by the young men of this age.” “Do you know what kind of a girl Miss Grey is? Is she said to be amiable?” “I never heard any harm of her; indeed I hardly ever heard her mentioned; except that Mrs. Taylor did say this morning, that one day Miss Walker hinted to her, that she believed Mr. and Mrs. Ellison would not be sorry to have Miss Grey married, for she and Mrs. Ellison could never agree.” “And who are the Ellisons?” “Her guardians, my dear. But now she is of age and may choose for herself; and a pretty choice she has made!—What now,” after pausing a moment—“your poor sister is gone to her own room, I suppose, to moan by herself. Is there nothing one can get to comfort her? Poor dear, it seems quite cruel to let her be alone. Well, by-and-by we shall have a few friends, and that will amuse her a little. What shall we play at? She hates whist I know; but is there no round game she cares for?” “Dear ma’am, this kindness is quite unnecessary. Marianne, I dare say, will not leave her room again this evening. I shall persuade her if I can to go early to bed, for I am sure she wants rest.”

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Marianne, to the surprise of her sister, determined on dining with them. Elinor even advised her against it. But “no, she would go down; she could bear it very well, and the bustle about her would be less.” Elinor, pleased to have her governed for a moment by such a motive, though believing it hardly possible that she could sit out the dinner, said no more; and adjusting her dress for her as well as she could, while Marianne still remained on the bed, was ready to assist her into the dining room as soon as they were summoned to it. When there, though looking most wretchedly, she ate more and was calmer than her sister had expected. Had she tried to speak, or had she been conscious of half Mrs. Jennings’s well-meant but ill-judged attentions to her, this calmness could not have been maintained; but not a syllable escaped her lips; and the abstraction of her thoughts preserved her in ignorance of every thing that was passing before her. Elinor, who did justice to Mrs. Jennings’s kindness, though its effusions were often distressing, and sometimes almost ridiculous, made her those acknowledgments, and returned her those civilities, which her sister could not make or return for herself. Their good friend saw that Marianne was unhappy, and felt that every thing was due to her which might make her at all less so. She treated her therefore, with all the indulgent fondness of a parent towards a favourite child on the last day of its holidays. Marianne was to have the best place by the fire, was to be tempted to eat by every delicacy in the house, and to be amused by the relation of all the news of the day. Had not Elinor, in the sad countenance of her sister, seen a check to all mirth, she could have been entertained by Mrs. Jennings’s endeavours to cure a disappointment in love, by a variety of sweetmeats and olives, and a good fire. As soon, however, as the consciousness of all this was forced by continual repetition on Marianne, she could stay no longer. With a hasty exclamation of Misery, and a sign to her sister not to follow her, she directly got up and hurried out of the room. “Poor soul!” cried Mrs. Jennings, as soon as she was gone, “how it grieves me to see her! And I declare if she is not gone away without finishing her wine! And the dried cherries too! Lord! nothing seems to do her any good. I am sure if I knew of any thing she would like, I would send all over the town for it. Well, it is the oddest thing to me, that a man should use such a pretty girl so ill! But when there is plenty of money on one side, and next to none on the other, Lord bless you! they care no more about such things!—”

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Elinor advised her to lie down again, and for a moment she did so; but no attitude could give her ease; and in restless pain of mind and body she moved from one posture to another, till growing more and more hysterical, her sister could with difficulty keep her on the bed at all, and for some time was fearful of being constrained to call for assistance. Some lavender drops, however, which she was at length persuaded to take, were of use; and from that time till Mrs. Jennings returned, she continued on the bed quiet and motionless. CHAPTER XXX. Mrs. Jennings came immediately to their room on her return, and without waiting to have her request of admittance answered, opened the door and walked in with a look of real concern. “How do you do my dear?”—said she in a voice of great compassion to Marianne, who turned away her face without attempting to answer. “How is she, Miss Dashwood? Poor thing! she looks very bad. No wonder. Ay, it is but too true. He is to be married very soon—a good-for-nothing fellow! I have no patience with him. Mrs. Taylor told me of it half an hour ago, and she was told it by a particular friend of Miss Grey herself, else I am sure I should not have believed it; and I was almost ready to sink as it was. Well, said I, all I can say is, that if this be true, he has used a young lady of my acquaintance abominably ill, and I wish with all my soul his wife may plague his heart out. And so I shall always say, my dear, you may depend on it. I have no notion of men’s going on in this way; and if ever I meet him again, I will give him such a dressing as he has not had this many a day. But there is one comfort, my dear Miss Marianne; he is not the only young man in the world worth having; and with your pretty face you will never want admirers. Well, poor thing! I won’t disturb her any longer, for she had better have her cry out at once and have done with. The Parrys and Sandersons luckily are coming tonight you know, and that will amuse her.” She then went away, walking on tiptoe out of the room, as if she supposed her young friend’s affliction could be increased by noise.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  The Christian Church cannot. The very name of “Christian” would turn into an indictment if it did not concern itself in the situation in some way. One answer to the challenge of the Christian spirit has been the organization of institutional church work. A church perhaps organizes a day-nursery or kindergarten; a playground for the children; a meeting-place for young people, or educational facilities for those who are ambitious. It tires to do for people who are living under abnormal conditions what these people under normal conditions ought to do for themselves. This saving helpfulness toward the poor must be distinguished sharply from the money-making efforts of some churches called institutional, which simply run a continuous sacred variety performance. Confront the Church of Christ with a homeless, playless, joyless, proletarian population, and that is the kind of work to which some Christian spirits will inevitably feel impelled. All honor to them! But it puts a terrible burden on the Church. Institutional work is hard work and costly work. It requires a large plant and an expensive staff. It puts such a strain on the organizing ability and the sympathies of the workers that few can stand it long. The Church by the voluntary gifts and labors of a few here tries to furnish what the entire coöperative community ought to furnish. Few churches have the resources and leadership to undertake institutional work on a large scale, but most churches in large cities have some institutional features, and all pastors who are at all willing to do it, have institutional work thrust on them. They have to care for the poor. Those of us who passed through the last great industrial depression will never forget the procession of men out of work, out of clothes, out of shoes, and out of hope. They wore down our threshold, and they wore away our hearts. This is the stake of the churches in modern poverty. They are buried at times under a stream of human wreckage. They are turned aside constantly from their more spiritual functions to “serve tables.” They have a right, therefore, to inquire who is unloading this burden of poverty and suffering upon them by underpaying, exhausting, and maiming the people. The good Samaritan did not go after the robbers with a shot-gun, but looked after the wounded and helpless man by the wayside. But if hundreds of good Samaritans travelling the same road should find thousands of bruised men groaning to them, they would not be such very good Samaritans if they did not organize a vigilance committee to stop the manufacturing of wounded men. If they did not, presumably the asses who had to lug the wounded to the tavern would have the wisdom to inquire into the causes of their extra work.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  The boys of the poor may have fine native ability and piety, but if they are early forced to work, their educational chances are slighter and their minds are likely to be blunted. The country and the smaller cities furnish a larger proportion of the supply than the large cities, because there the wholesome conditions of middle-class life persist longer. The general shrinkage in the supply, which seems to be undeniable, is doubtless due to a combination of causes: theological unrest; the glamour of wealth in business life; the multiplied openings for intellectual work and social service; and the deterrent conditions existing in the ministry. But one cheif cause for the shrinkage in the ministry must be the shrinkage of the class from which it is drawn. A spring will dry up if the rock formation is disturbed or removed within which the water collects. When the best elements of the country and village churches are drained off to the city; when the home life in the cities is narrowed and withered; when many of the most intelligent men of the middle classes have no children or very few of them—is not so far reaching a social condition sure to affect the supply of young men drawn from these social classes? The inequality of wealth has already lowered the spirit of the ministry. The most selfish church of wealthy people can offer a better salary and greater social advantages than the most generous church of working people. To get a warm berth, a man must get into the right stratum of society. Smoothness and courtly grace may count for more than spirituality and earnestness. Prophetic vigor may even be a disqualifying virtue. It is hard to make a comparative judgment of so elusive a thing as the spirit of a profession, but it does seem that a spirit of anxiety, ambition, and self-advancement is gaining ground and sapping one of the noblest of all professions of its power and its happiness. When lawyers, doctors, teachers, journalists, and artists have been “commercialized” to their inner loss, is it likely that the ministry can escape? The chief reward of the ministry has always come to it in the affection and respect of the people. But our age is so drunk with the love of money that anything which does not pan out in cold cash has to take a back seat. Our newspapers constantly speak of college professors and ministers in a tone of patronizing condescension. The salaries of teachers are pitifully inadequate when compared with their value to the community. They turn boys and girls into nobler men and women; a successful writer of advertisements may turn a lie into dollars; clearly he deserves the higher pay. There have been times when the community had a truer judgment of comparative values and gave its spiritual leaders veneration and love. Our commercial system has begotten a fierce competitive thirst for wealth.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  While youth and health last, they may manage; but when age approaches or ill health drains their strength, they have to husband their forces for the task of getting a living. They will henceforth come to church to be cheered and helped, and can no longer put forth much service. If a young woman is on her feet all day Saturday till late, her work in Sunday-school must be impaired by it. Thus the churches are concerned in the hours and conditions of labor. The exhaustion of the people drains the churches of their working force. Christian workers, to be effective, must also have some measure of trained intelligence, managing ability, and resourcefulness. Those professions which develop these qualities furnish the ablest church workers. The business manager, the doctor, the school principal, make the ideal Sunday-school superintendent or elder. In so far as our industrial life deprives the ordinary workers of all opportunity for executive planning and reduces them to automatic parts of the machinery, it fails to develop their latent mental resources and thereby stunts their possibilities as Christian workers. Among the higher classes the churches can lay hold of minds trained by their daily work and press them into Christian service. Among the lower classes it has to take minds blunted by their daily work and itself train them. When the Church descends still lower in the social scale, it works on material that has almost no capacity for service. There the work falls back on a paid staff and officialism once more reigns in religion. Thus the churches have an interest at stake in the prosperity, physical elasticity, mental efficiency, and leisure time of the people. As the modern factory and tenement stamp one generation after the other with the proletarian character, one of the most hopeful tendencies in the history of the Church will perforce be frustrated. Volunteer work will lessen, and the professional worker will carry the burden of work once more. The supply and spirit of the ministry “Like priest, like people.” The condition of the Church depends on the character of the ministry, and the condition of the ministry depends on the social health of the people. The ministry is recruited from the sons of the middle class, from the families of farmers, small business men, and the better grade of artisans. Students for the ministry rarely come from the homes of the very rich or the very poor.