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.

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• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  The best community for church support at present is a comfortable middle-class neighborhood. A social system which would make moderate wealth approximately universal would be the best soil for robust churches. If, on the contrary, society tends to divide into a few rich families and a mass of poor wage-earners, the troubles of the Church are before it. We all understand that a man receiving $500 a year cannot pay as much to religious institutions as a man receiving $5000, but the universal impression seems to be that he can fairly be expected to contribute the same proportion of his income. The Old Testament law of tithing is very generally recommended as the ideal to be followed by all, on the supposition that ten per cent of an income of $500 is the same proportion as ten per cent of an income of $5000. This commercial method of calculation leaves some fundamental facts of human nature out of account and has inflicted a grave wrong on the poorer portion of our churches. Dr. Ernst Engel, long the eminent chief of the Prussian Bureau of Statistics, compiled from a large number of family budgets the proportion expended for various purposes. The following table contains the main results:— I tem of E xpenditures P ercentage of the E xpenditure of a F amily with an I ncome of $225–$300 a year $450–$600 a year $750–$1100 a year 1 Subsistence 62.0% 95% 55.0% 90% 50.0% 85% 2 Clothing 16.0% 18.0% 18.0% 3 Lodging 12.0% 12.0% 12.0% 4 Firing and lighting 5.0% 5.0% 5.0% 5 Education, worship, etc 2.0% 5% 3.5% 10% 5.5% 15% 6 Legal protection 1.0% 2.0% 3.0% 7 Care of health 1.0% 2.0% 3.0% 8 Comfort, mental and bodily recreation 1.0% 2.5% 3.5% The minor items of this table will vary somewhat in different countries, according to local prices and customs; but the main deduction, which is known in Political Economy as “Engel’s Law of Consumption,” is as universal as human nature. It will be noticed that the first four items include those expenditures which satisfy the animal necessities of the body: food, shelter, and warmth. The other four satisfy the higher needs. As the income rises, the proportion spent on the first group sinks, and the proportion spent on the second group rises. Within the first group the proportion spent for lodging, heat, and light is the same in all classes, and the proportion for clothing nearly so. But the proportion spent for food is far larger with the poorest families. The human body has certain imperious demands for its maintenance, and these demands cannot be compressed below a certain minimum. If the income is small, the largest part must go simply for stoking the human machine, and the higher needs of the social, intellectual, and religious nature must be starved.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  The power that might have lifted mankind up, was used in wearing themselves down. The good men among the monks served mankind even as monks; but would men of that stamp not have served it if they had remained in the natural bonds of family and neighborhood? When the monastic movement first swept over the ancient Church, it is certain that many went out to the hermit colonies at least partly because they were weary of the burdens of taxation and service imposed by the tottering Empire, and of the lack of freedom that hemmed all men in. They shook off the burdens of civilization at a time when civilization was desperately in need of all its human resources, and especially of all moral energy. They necessarily unloaded on those who remained the burdens which they refused to carry longer. Thus a social organism, wasted by disease and attacked by external dangers, was further bled of some of its best blood corpuscles. Ascetic and monastic Christianity contributed not a little to the fall of the Roman Empire and the destruction of ancient civilization. During the Middle Ages some of the best organizing ability, which might have sufficed to meet the social anarchy and disorganization of society, was devoted to the organization of local monasteries or new orders, or to the reformation of old orders. When occasionally some great monastic leader took hold of a real moral and social task, the effect was sometimes wonderful. One of the worst consequences of monasticism was the sterilizing of the best individuals. The minds of ideal bent were not allowed to propagate. The monks and nuns were condemned to childlessness. The enthusiasm of the monastic movement dragged the common priesthood into celibacy also. Aside from the considerations of ecclesiastical politics, it was chiefly the reaction of monasticism which made celibacy compulsory for the priest. But the sterility of monks and nuns and priests for so many centuries turned the laws of heredity against the moral progress of the race. It was just as if an agricultural experiment station should nip off all the flowers that showed unusual color and fragrance and should develop seed from the rest. It has been truly asserted that the most draining effect which war has on the life of nations is that it kills off the capable and lets the incapable propagate. Monasticism eliminated the morally capable, just as war eliminates the physically capable. God alone knows where the race might be to-day if the natural leaders had not so long been made childless by their own goodness. The wonderful fecundity of the Protestant parsonage in men of the highest ability and ideality is proof of what has been lost.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  As Amos and Jeremiah foresaw the conflict of their people with the Assyrians and the Chaldeans, so Jesus foresaw his nation drifting toward the conflict with Rome, and like them he foretold disaster, the fall of the temple and of the holy city. That prophetic type of religion which we have tried to set forth in the previous chapter, and which constituted the chief religious heritage of his nation, had laid hold on Jesus and he had laid hold of it and had appropriated its essential spirit. In the poise and calm of his mind and manner, and in the love of his heart, he was infinitely above them all. But the greatest of all prophets was still one of the prophets, and that large interest in the national and social life which had been inseparable from the religion of the prophets was part of his life too. The presumption is that Jesus shared the fundamental religious purpose of the prophets. If any one asserts that he abandoned the collective hope and gave his faith solely to religious individualism, he will have to furnish express statements in which Jesus disavows the religious past of his people. The purpose of Jesus: the kingdom of God The historical background which we have just sketched must ever be kept in mind in understanding the life and purpose of Jesus. He was not merely an initiator, but a consummator. Like all great minds that do not merely imagine Utopias, but actually advance humanity to a new epoch, he took the situation and material furnished to him by the past and moulded that into a fuller approximation to the divine conception within him. He embodied the prophetic stream of faith and hope. He linked his work to that of John the Baptist as the one contemporary fact to which he felt most inward affinity. Jesus began his preaching with the call: “The time is fulfilled; the kingdom of God is now close at hand; repent and believe in the glad news.” The kingdom of God continued to be the centre of all his teaching as recorded by the synoptic gospels. His parables, his moral instructions, and his prophetic predictions all bear on that. We have no definition of what he meant by the phrase. His audience needed no definition. It was then a familiar conception and phrase. The new thing was simply that this kingdom was at last on the point of coming. We are not at all in that situation to-day. Any one who has tried to grasp the idea will have realized how vague and elusive it seems. It stands to-day for quite a catalogue of ideas. To the ordinary reader of the Bible, “inheriting the kingdom of heaven” simply means being saved and going to heaven. For others it means the millennium. For some the organized Church; for others “the invisible Church.”

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Elinor was soon called to the card-table by the conclusion of the first rubber, and the confidential discourse of the two ladies was therefore at an end, to which both of them submitted without any reluctance, for nothing had been said on either side to make them dislike each other less than they had done before; and Elinor sat down to the card table with the melancholy persuasion that Edward was not only without affection for the person who was to be his wife; but that he had not even the chance of being tolerably happy in marriage, which sincere affection on her side would have given, for self-interest alone could induce a woman to keep a man to an engagement, of which she seemed so thoroughly aware that he was weary. From this time the subject was never revived by Elinor, and when entered on by Lucy, who seldom missed an opportunity of introducing it, and was particularly careful to inform her confidante, of her happiness whenever she received a letter from Edward, it was treated by the former with calmness and caution, and dismissed as soon as civility would allow; for she felt such conversations to be an indulgence which Lucy did not deserve, and which were dangerous to herself. The visit of the Miss Steeles at Barton Park was lengthened far beyond what the first invitation implied. Their favour increased; they could not be spared; Sir John would not hear of their going; and in spite of their numerous and long arranged engagements in Exeter, in spite of the absolute necessity of returning to fulfill them immediately, which was in full force at the end of every week, they were prevailed on to stay nearly two months at the park, and to assist in the due celebration of that festival which requires a more than ordinary share of private balls and large dinners to proclaim its importance. CHAPTER XXV. Though Mrs. Jennings was in the habit of spending a large portion of the year at the houses of her children and friends, she was not without a settled habitation of her own. Since the death of her husband, who had traded with success in a less elegant part of the town, she had resided every winter in a house in one of the streets near Portman Square. Towards this home, she began on the approach of January to turn her thoughts, and thither she one day abruptly, and very unexpectedly by them, asked the elder Misses Dashwood to accompany her. Elinor, without observing the varying complexion of her sister, and the animated look which spoke no indifference to the plan, immediately gave a grateful but absolute denial for both, in which she believed herself to be speaking their united inclinations. The reason alleged was their determined resolution of not leaving their mother at that time of the year. Mrs. Jennings received the refusal with some surprise, and repeated her invitation immediately.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  The later poverty at Jerusalem may have been due in part to this generosity. If a man turned in his farm to be eaten up, he raised the standard of living of all for a while, but his private capital was gone without creating any capital for common production. On the other hand, the continued poverty may well have been due to other causes: to the general poverty of the lower classes in Palestine; to persecution and economic unsettlement; to the emigration of well-to-do and conspicuous members; to the separation of the Galilean Christians from their accustomed sources of earning; or to the amount of time devoted to religion and withdrawn from labor. It is at least hasty to charge a permanent situation to a single cause. Thus the church at Jerusalem was not quite as communistic as is usually supposed. On the other hand, the other churches were not as completely devoid of communistic features as is commonly assumed. The primitive churches as fraternal communicaties The disciples at Jerusalem had met in their homes and had eaten in common. The one act which might be called an act of distinctively Christian ritual at the beginning, the reminder of the Lord’s last meal with the disciples, was performed in connection with these common meals, and this insured the homeliness and simplicity of the rite. These common meals were so essential a part of the earliest church life that this custom was established wherever Christianity came. This in itself is a strong proof that the churches were more than organizations for worship. We know from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians that the Christians met in the evening, the time for the chief meal of the day, and dined together. Such common meals were frequent in the Greek fraternal associations, and Greeks could easily fall in with the custom. These love-feasts did not consist of eating a wafer as a religious symbol, as is done in some modern churches; it was a downright meal to which people came hungry, so that Paul advised them to get a bite at home to take the edge off their appetites, if they were too hungry to wait for one another. Now the assurance of one square meal means a great deal to a poor man physically. It means still more to his consciousness of human worth and his enjoyment of human intercourse to sit at a social function as the equal of all. To break bread in common brings men close to one another. At Corinth the social differences had obtruded themselves at the common meals. The well-to-do had drifted together in a coterie, had clubbed their well-filled baskets, and were in danger of getting hilarious together, while the poor brother sat on one side hungry and outside the pale of social enjoyment. Paul took this very seriously. It seemed to him a denial of the fundamental spirit of the churches.

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  In her earnest meditations on the contents of the letter, on the depravity of that mind which could dictate it, and probably, on the very different mind of a very different person, who had no other connection whatever with the affair than what her heart gave him with every thing that passed, Elinor forgot the immediate distress of her sister, forgot that she had three letters on her lap yet unread, and so entirely forgot how long she had been in the room, that when on hearing a carriage drive up to the door, she went to the window to see who could be coming so unreasonably early, she was all astonishment to perceive Mrs. Jennings’s chariot, which she knew had not been ordered till one. Determined not to quit Marianne, though hopeless of contributing, at present, to her ease, she hurried away to excuse herself from attending Mrs. Jennings, on account of her sister being indisposed. Mrs. Jennings, with a thoroughly good-humoured concern for its cause, admitted the excuse most readily, and Elinor, after seeing her safe off, returned to Marianne, whom she found attempting to rise from the bed, and whom she reached just in time to prevent her from falling on the floor, faint and giddy from a long want of proper rest and food; for it was many days since she had any appetite, and many nights since she had really slept; and now, when her mind was no longer supported by the fever of suspense, the consequence of all this was felt in an aching head, a weakened stomach, and a general nervous faintness. A glass of wine, which Elinor procured for her directly, made her more comfortable, and she was at last able to express some sense of her kindness, by saying, “Poor Elinor! how unhappy I make you!” “I only wish,” replied her sister, “there were any thing I could do, which might be of comfort to you.” This, as every thing else would have been, was too much for Marianne, who could only exclaim, in the anguish of her heart, “Oh! Elinor, I am miserable, indeed,” before her voice was entirely lost in sobs. Elinor could no longer witness this torrent of unresisted grief in silence. “Exert yourself, dear Marianne,” she cried, “if you would not kill yourself and all who love you. Think of your mother; think of her misery while you suffer: for her sake you must exert yourself.” “I cannot, I cannot,” cried Marianne; “leave me, leave me, if I distress you; leave me, hate me, forget me! but do not torture me so. Oh! how easy for those, who have no sorrow of their own to talk of exertion! Happy, happy Elinor, you cannot have an idea of what I suffer.” “Do you call me happy, Marianne? Ah! if you knew!—And can you believe me to be so, while I see you so wretched!”

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Elinor, though never less disposed to speak than at that moment, obliged herself to answer such an attack as this, and, therefore, trying to smile, replied, “And have you really, Ma’am, talked yourself into a persuasion of my sister’s being engaged to Mr. Willoughby? I thought it had been only a joke, but so serious a question seems to imply more; and I must beg, therefore, that you will not deceive yourself any longer. I do assure you that nothing would surprise me more than to hear of their being going to be married.” “For shame, for shame, Miss Dashwood! how can you talk so? Don’t we all know that it must be a match, that they were over head and ears in love with each other from the first moment they met? Did not I see them together in Devonshire every day, and all day long; and did not I know that your sister came to town with me on purpose to buy wedding clothes? Come, come, this won’t do. Because you are so sly about it yourself, you think nobody else has any senses; but it is no such thing, I can tell you, for it has been known all over town this ever so long. I tell every body of it and so does Charlotte.” “Indeed, Ma’am,” said Elinor, very seriously, “you are mistaken. Indeed, you are doing a very unkind thing in spreading the report, and you will find that you have though you will not believe me now.” Mrs. Jennings laughed again, but Elinor had not spirits to say more, and eager at all events to know what Willoughby had written, hurried away to their room, where, on opening the door, she saw Marianne stretched on the bed, almost choked by grief, one letter in her hand, and two or three others lying by her. Elinor drew near, but without saying a word; and seating herself on the bed, took her hand, kissed her affectionately several times, and then gave way to a burst of tears, which at first was scarcely less violent than Marianne’s. The latter, though unable to speak, seemed to feel all the tenderness of this behaviour, and after some time thus spent in joint affliction, she put all the letters into Elinor’s hands; and then covering her face with her handkerchief, almost screamed with agony. Elinor, who knew that such grief, shocking as it was to witness it, must have its course, watched by her till this excess of suffering had somewhat spent itself, and then turning eagerly to Willoughby’s letter, read as follows: “Bond Street, January. MY DEAR MADAM,

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  Would not the others have felt jealously that he was in a class by himself? If Jesus had shown him favor, would not even the Master’s motives have been suspected? If he had replenished the common purse from his private wealth, it would have given them all a more opulent living; it would have attracted selfish men and would have paralyzed the influence of Jesus on the poor. Then the crowds would have been at his heels, not merely for healing, but for the loaves and fishes—with dessert added. Judas would have been deeply pleased with such a reenforcement of the apostolate, but Jesus would have gone through the same sorrow which came upon Francis of Assisi when property was forced upon his Order and its early spirit was corrupted. It is all very well to say that rich and poor are alike in Christ, but in fact only exceptional characters, like Jesus himself, can sit at a rich man’s table and be indifferent to the fact that he is rich. Others can forget it for a while under the pressure of a great common danger or sorrow or joy, but in general the sense of equality will prevail only where substantial equality exists. The presence of the rich young man would have been ruinous to the spirit of the discipleship and would have put a debased interpretation on the hope of the kingdom. Jesus did not ask him to hand over his property for the common purse, as the Church in later times did constantly, but simply to turn it back to social usefulness and come down to the common level. The meeting of Jesus and the rich young man has often been painted, but always as a private affair between the man and Jesus. At the St. Louis Exposition there was a painting representing Jesus sitting in a barnlike building with a group of plain people about him, women, old men, and the disciples. Before him stands the young man richly dressed, a bird of very different feather. Jesus by his gesture is evidently drawing in the listening group. It was not a matter between the man and God, but between the man and God and the people. The theological interpretations of the passage, like the artistic, have failed to take account of this third factor in the moral situation. If the kingdom of God is the true human society, it is a fellowship of justice, equality, and love. But it is hard to get riches with justice, to keep them with equality, and to spend them with love. The kingdom of God means normal and wholesome human relations, and it is exceedingly hard for a rich man to be in normal human relations to others, as many a man has discovered who has honestly tried. It can be done only by an act of renunciation in some form.

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  The sort of desperate calmness with which this was said, lasted no longer than while she spoke, and was immediately followed by a return of the same excessive affliction. It was some minutes before she could go on with her letter, and the frequent bursts of grief which still obliged her, at intervals, to withhold her pen, were proofs enough of her feeling how more than probable it was that she was writing for the last time to Willoughby. Elinor paid her every quiet and unobtrusive attention in her power; and she would have tried to sooth and tranquilize her still more, had not Marianne entreated her, with all the eagerness of the most nervous irritability, not to speak to her for the world. In such circumstances, it was better for both that they should not be long together; and the restless state of Marianne’s mind not only prevented her from remaining in the room a moment after she was dressed, but requiring at once solitude and continual change of place, made her wander about the house till breakfast time, avoiding the sight of every body. At breakfast she neither ate, nor attempted to eat any thing; and Elinor’s attention was then all employed, not in urging her, not in pitying her, nor in appearing to regard her, but in endeavouring to engage Mrs. Jennings’s notice entirely to herself. As this was a favourite meal with Mrs. Jennings, it lasted a considerable time, and they were just setting themselves, after it, round the common working table, when a letter was delivered to Marianne, which she eagerly caught from the servant, and, turning of a death-like paleness, instantly ran out of the room. Elinor, who saw as plainly by this, as if she had seen the direction, that it must come from Willoughby, felt immediately such a sickness at heart as made her hardly able to hold up her head, and sat in such a general tremour as made her fear it impossible to escape Mrs. Jennings’s notice. That good lady, however, saw only that Marianne had received a letter from Willoughby, which appeared to her a very good joke, and which she treated accordingly, by hoping, with a laugh, that she would find it to her liking. Of Elinor’s distress, she was too busily employed in measuring lengths of worsted for her rug, to see any thing at all; and calmly continuing her talk, as soon as Marianne disappeared, she said, “Upon my word, I never saw a young woman so desperately in love in my life! My girls were nothing to her, and yet they used to be foolish enough; but as for Miss Marianne, she is quite an altered creature. I hope, from the bottom of my heart, he won’t keep her waiting much longer, for it is quite grievous to see her look so ill and forlorn. Pray, when are they to be married?”

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  It wedges society apart in horizontal strata between which real fellow-feeling is paralyzed. It lifts individuals out of the wholesome dependence on their fellows and equally out of the full sense of responsibility to them. That is the charm of riches and their curse. This is the key to the conversation of Jesus with the rich young man, who was so honestly and lovably anxious to have a share in the Messianic salvation. He could truthfully say that he had lived a good life. Jesus accepted his statement, but if he would be perfect, he bade him get rid of his wealth and join the company of the disciples. This demand has been understood either as a test or as a cure. Some think that it was merely a test; if he had consented to give up his wealth, it would not have been necessary to give it up. Some think it was a cure for the love of money which was really needed in this exceptional case. On either supposition the advice concerned merely this young man’s soul; it was medicine to be swallowed by him for his own good alone. But Jesus immediately rises from this concrete case to the general assertion that it is hard for any rich man to enter the kingdom of God, harder than for a camel to wedge through the eye of a needle. The young man who was departing with clouded face was simply a demonstration of a general fact. Clearly here was a case where the heart was anchored to its treasure. The solution for this “hard saying” has been sought in the remark quoted only in Mark: “How hard it is for them that trust in riches to enter the kingdom.” A man may have riches safely, if only he will not trust in them for salvation. It is easy to satisfy that requirement. But unfortunately the best manuscripts do not contain the phrase about trusting. The critical editions of the Greek text drop it or place it in the margin. Some early copyist probably felt as anxious to dull the sharpness of the saying as some modern preachers. The solution lies in another direction. We think of the salvation of the individual in the life to come, and find it hard that so fine a young fellow should be barred out of heaven because he was rich. Jesus was thinking of the righteous society on earth which he was initiating and of the young man’s fitness for that. Suppose the young man had kept his property and had thus joined the discipleship. How would that have affected the spirit of the group?

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Lady Middleton, though in the middle of a rubber, on being informed that Marianne was unwell, was too polite to object for a moment to her wish of going away, and making over her cards to a friend, they departed as soon as the carriage could be found. Scarcely a word was spoken during their return to Berkeley Street. Marianne was in a silent agony, too much oppressed even for tears; but as Mrs. Jennings was luckily not come home, they could go directly to their own room, where hartshorn restored her a little to herself. She was soon undressed and in bed, and as she seemed desirous of being alone, her sister then left her, and while she waited the return of Mrs. Jennings, had leisure enough for thinking over the past. That some kind of engagement had subsisted between Willoughby and Marianne she could not doubt, and that Willoughby was weary of it, seemed equally clear; for however Marianne might still feed her own wishes, she could not attribute such behaviour to mistake or misapprehension of any kind. Nothing but a thorough change of sentiment could account for it. Her indignation would have been still stronger than it was, had she not witnessed that embarrassment which seemed to speak a consciousness of his own misconduct, and prevented her from believing him so unprincipled as to have been sporting with the affections of her sister from the first, without any design that would bear investigation. Absence might have weakened his regard, and convenience might have determined him to overcome it, but that such a regard had formerly existed she could not bring herself to doubt. As for Marianne, on the pangs which so unhappy a meeting must already have given her, and on those still more severe which might await her in its probable consequence, she could not reflect without the deepest concern. Her own situation gained in the comparison; for while she could esteem Edward as much as ever, however they might be divided in future, her mind might be always supported. But every circumstance that could embitter such an evil seemed uniting to heighten the misery of Marianne in a final separation from Willoughby—in an immediate and irreconcilable rupture with him. CHAPTER XXIX. Before the housemaid had lit their fire the next day, or the sun gained any power over a cold, gloomy morning in January, Marianne, only half dressed, was kneeling against one of the window-seats for the sake of all the little light she could command from it, and writing as fast as a continual flow of tears would permit her. In this situation, Elinor, roused from sleep by her agitation and sobs, first perceived her; and after observing her for a few moments with silent anxiety, said, in a tone of the most considerate gentleness, “Marianne, may I ask—?” “No, Elinor,” she replied, “ask nothing; you will soon know all.”

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Mrs. Dashwood could think of no other question, and Thomas and the tablecloth, now alike needless, were soon afterwards dismissed. Marianne had already sent to say, that she should eat nothing more. Mrs. Dashwood’s and Elinor’s appetites were equally lost, and Margaret might think herself very well off, that with so much uneasiness as both her sisters had lately experienced, so much reason as they had often had to be careless of their meals, she had never been obliged to go without her dinner before. When the dessert and the wine were arranged, and Mrs. Dashwood and Elinor were left by themselves, they remained long together in a similarity of thoughtfulness and silence. Mrs. Dashwood feared to hazard any remark, and ventured not to offer consolation. She now found that she had erred in relying on Elinor’s representation of herself; and justly concluded that every thing had been expressly softened at the time, to spare her from an increase of unhappiness, suffering as she then had suffered for Marianne. She found that she had been misled by the careful, the considerate attention of her daughter, to think the attachment, which once she had so well understood, much slighter in reality, than she had been wont to believe, or than it was now proved to be. She feared that under this persuasion she had been unjust, inattentive, nay, almost unkind, to her Elinor;—that Marianne’s affliction, because more acknowledged, more immediately before her, had too much engrossed her tenderness, and led her away to forget that in Elinor she might have a daughter suffering almost as much, certainly with less self-provocation, and greater fortitude. CHAPTER XLVIII. Elinor now found the difference between the expectation of an unpleasant event, however certain the mind may be told to consider it, and certainty itself. She now found, that in spite of herself, she had always admitted a hope, while Edward remained single, that something would occur to prevent his marrying Lucy; that some resolution of his own, some mediation of friends, or some more eligible opportunity of establishment for the lady, would arise to assist the happiness of all. But he was now married; and she condemned her heart for the lurking flattery, which so much heightened the pain of the intelligence. That he should be married soon, before (as she imagined) he could be in orders, and consequently before he could be in possession of the living, surprised her a little at first. But she soon saw how likely it was that Lucy, in her self-provident care, in her haste to secure him, should overlook every thing but the risk of delay. They were married, married in town, and now hastening down to her uncle’s. What had Edward felt on being within four miles from Barton, on seeing her mother’s servant, on hearing Lucy’s message!

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  These words, which conveyed to Elinor a direct avowal of his love for her sister, affected her very much. She was not immediately able to say anything, and even when her spirits were recovered, she debated for a short time, on the answer it would be most proper to give. The real state of things between Willoughby and her sister was so little known to herself, that in endeavouring to explain it, she might be as liable to say too much as too little. Yet as she was convinced that Marianne’s affection for Willoughby, could leave no hope of Colonel Brandon’s success, whatever the event of that affection might be, and at the same time wished to shield her conduct from censure, she thought it most prudent and kind, after some consideration, to say more than she really knew or believed. She acknowledged, therefore, that though she had never been informed by themselves of the terms on which they stood with each other, of their mutual affection she had no doubt, and of their correspondence she was not astonished to hear. He listened to her with silent attention, and on her ceasing to speak, rose directly from his seat, and after saying in a voice of emotion, “to your sister I wish all imaginable happiness; to Willoughby that he may endeavour to deserve her,”—took leave, and went away. Elinor derived no comfortable feelings from this conversation, to lessen the uneasiness of her mind on other points; she was left, on the contrary, with a melancholy impression of Colonel Brandon’s unhappiness, and was prevented even from wishing it removed, by her anxiety for the very event that must confirm it. CHAPTER XXVIII. Nothing occurred during the next three or four days, to make Elinor regret what she had done, in applying to her mother; for Willoughby neither came nor wrote. They were engaged about the end of that time to attend Lady Middleton to a party, from which Mrs. Jennings was kept away by the indisposition of her youngest daughter; and for this party, Marianne, wholly dispirited, careless of her appearance, and seeming equally indifferent whether she went or staid, prepared, without one look of hope or one expression of pleasure. She sat by the drawing-room fire after tea, till the moment of Lady Middleton’s arrival, without once stirring from her seat, or altering her attitude, lost in her own thoughts, and insensible of her sister’s presence; and when at last they were told that Lady Middleton waited for them at the door, she started as if she had forgotten that any one was expected.

• From Sense and Sensibility (1811)

  Her letter was scarcely finished, when a rap foretold a visitor, and Colonel Brandon was announced. Marianne, who had seen him from the window, and who hated company of any kind, left the room before he entered it. He looked more than usually grave, and though expressing satisfaction at finding Miss Dashwood alone, as if he had somewhat in particular to tell her, sat for some time without saying a word. Elinor, persuaded that he had some communication to make in which her sister was concerned, impatiently expected its opening. It was not the first time of her feeling the same kind of conviction; for, more than once before, beginning with the observation of “your sister looks unwell to-day,” or “your sister seems out of spirits,” he had appeared on the point, either of disclosing, or of inquiring, something particular about her. After a pause of several minutes, their silence was broken, by his asking her in a voice of some agitation, when he was to congratulate her on the acquisition of a brother? Elinor was not prepared for such a question, and having no answer ready, was obliged to adopt the simple and common expedient, of asking what he meant? He tried to smile as he replied, “your sister’s engagement to Mr. Willoughby is very generally known.” “It cannot be generally known,” returned Elinor, “for her own family do not know it.” He looked surprised and said, “I beg your pardon, I am afraid my inquiry has been impertinent; but I had not supposed any secrecy intended, as they openly correspond, and their marriage is universally talked of.” “How can that be? By whom can you have heard it mentioned?” “By many—by some of whom you know nothing, by others with whom you are most intimate, Mrs. Jennings, Mrs. Palmer, and the Middletons. But still I might not have believed it, for where the mind is perhaps rather unwilling to be convinced, it will always find something to support its doubts, if I had not, when the servant let me in today, accidentally seen a letter in his hand, directed to Mr. Willoughby in your sister’s writing. I came to inquire, but I was convinced before I could ask the question. Is every thing finally settled? Is it impossible to—? But I have no right, and I could have no chance of succeeding. Excuse me, Miss Dashwood. I believe I have been wrong in saying so much, but I hardly know what to do, and on your prudence I have the strongest dependence. Tell me that it is all absolutely resolved on, that any attempt, that in short concealment, if concealment be possible, is all that remains.”

• From The Fixed Stars (0)

  [image file=image_rsrc2FK.jpg] I met her mother once. She was visiting from the East Coast, and she wanted to meet me. She offered to take us to dinner, chose a steak restaurant. I liked the idea of being brought into the fold, and I dressed up for the evening. Nora’s mother asked about June. She asked about my mother. She couldn’t wait to know them. The next afternoon, we all met up at a playground. Nora’s mother had stopped at a toy store and lavished June with gifts, a brand-new flower-print backpack full of them. She was trying hard, and it touched me. June was reticent, quiet in her excitement. She had no idea who this woman was, and I barely did either. June didn’t want me to talk with the other grown-ups; she wanted me to join her on the playground equipment. Nora hung back with our mothers, made periodic visits to me and June on the swings. I wanted her to stay with us, to join us in our play, swing high like we did. She leaned on the steel supports, hands in her pockets, and stared out at the lake. She walked with our mothers down to the water. I dragged June’s doll and new backpack over the grass toward them, sweating and irritated and sad. None of us knew what to do in this scene. [image file=image_rsrc2FK.jpg] Recently my mother reminded me about that afternoon. God, remember that? Doesn’t it seem like ages ago? She thought we could laugh together about its awkwardness. Instead I cringed. I had wanted things to work out with Nora, wanted it enough to introduce our parents. But it hadn’t worked—not that afternoon, not really anytime. “The trouble with letting people see you at your worst,” writes Sarah Manguso, “isn’t that they’ll remember; it’s that you’ll remember.”32 [image file=image_rsrc2FK.jpg] Brandon and Nora met only once, the morning of Labor Day. She had come over for dinner the night before, and he texted early, while we were still in bed. He wanted to grab a tool from the garage. Nora’s here, I replied, but you can come if you want. She says she’d be happy to meet you. He arrived with June in tow. Surely it couldn’t have happened any other way but this: on short notice, so no one had time to get anxious, and with June around, a healthy distraction. He knocked, and I answered, Nora waiting in the hall. Brandon bounded in, extending his hand. I could see the effort behind his high spirits, and a tender sting rose in the back of my throat. When I walked him and June out to the car, his eyes were wet, unspeakable. 21One Monday, I was at the restaurant, calculating tips for payroll. June was at the dance studio next door, taking her first pre-ballet class. Brandon was in the kitchen, doing prep for the next day. It was late September.

• From Introduction to the Hebrew Bible and Deutero-Canonical Books (2018)

  The other is the story of Ruth. In the case of Ruth, we are not told which brother died first, or why the other did not take the widow to wife. For the purposes of the story, the two seem to have died at the same time. Naomi plaintively tells her daughters-in-law that she has no sons in her womb that they could hope to marry. Accordingly, she urges them to return to the houses of their parents until they should find new husbands. Orpah is persuaded to do this, but Ruth persists in going with Naomi: “Where you go, I will go; and where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God.” Ruth thereby abandons the relative security of staying with her own people in an act of fidelity to her mother-in-law and to the family of her dead husband. The first chapter ends with the return of the two destitute women to Bethlehem (which literally means “house of bread”) and the lament of Naomi that although she went away full the Lord has brought her back empty. Her emptiness is all the more striking in the context of the barley harvest that was about to begin. The second chapter introduces another character who has a crucial role in the story. Elimelech has a rich kinsman named Boaz. Naomi had not mentioned the existence of this relative to Ruth in chapter 1. The levirate law, as formulated in Deuteronomy, applied only to brothers. Boaz would not have been under any legal obligation to help a distant kinswoman, nor do the women claim anything from him as a matter of right. Instead, Ruth proposes to support the women for a while by gathering ears of grain left by the reapers. (Biblical law requires the reapers to leave something for the poor and the alien: Lev 19:9-10; 23:22; Deut 24:19-22.) When she comes to the field of Boaz, he notices her and protects her because of her fidelity to her mother-in-law. He allows her to eat at his table and instructs the reapers to let her glean even among the standing sheaves. Only at the end of the day does Naomi tell Ruth of her relationship to Boaz and suggest that her meeting Boaz is a sign of the Lord’s providential care. Ruth and Naomi are now secure until the end of the barley and wheat harvests, but their long-term future is still precarious. Chapter 3 brings the drama of the story to a climax. Naomi realizes that the best hope for long-term security is to have Boaz marry Ruth. Her plan for bringing this about, however, is remarkable. She does not instruct Ruth to ask Boaz to marry her, but rather to seduce him. The scene is the threshing floor, where Boaz is winnowing barley.

• From The Fixed Stars (0)

  I want to be a fish! she said, sitting up straighter on the toilet seat. I’ll be a pink fish! And you’ll be a pink fish too. And Daddy will be a purple fish. I lowered myself onto the wooden stool that my second cousin had given us when June was born, with her name and birthdate spelled out in puzzle letters. We’ll all swim around together. Right, Mama? She looked at me, waiting. I nodded, not sure if I was happy, or sad, or some third thing. [image file=image_rsrc2FK.jpg] We swapped June on Mondays usually, sometimes Tuesdays. The first day without her was disorienting, as though I’d misplaced something terribly important, left my wallet at the store. But now I had time, gaping stretches of time, wide-open rolling meadows of it. I searched online for information about sexual orientation in women, trying to understand what had happened to me. One book kept coming up, so I ordered it. It was called Sexual Fluidity: Understanding Women’s Love and Desire, by a psychologist named Lisa M. Diamond. When it arrived, I put it on my bedside table. Then I piled a bunch of other books on top of it. I caught up on the New Yorker. I went to IKEA, bought June a big-girl bed and assembled it. I started my first quilt. I’d learned to sew a couple of years earlier, when Brandon bought me a sewing machine for Christmas. Now with evenings to myself, I drank beer and watched YouTube videos with titles like “How to Stitch in the Ditch” and “Easy Improv Quilting.” I splashed around in my free time like it was an Olympic-size pool, all to myself. While prying loose a clump of dog hair stuck under a baseboard in the front hall, I got a splinter under my fingernail. The splinter was tiny, but I couldn’t get it out, and it leaked pus when I pressed on the nail. I called the doctor’s office, got a last-minute appointment with a nurse. Waiting in the exam room, I noticed the cover of a magazine on the chair beside me. It was a giant photo of a beaming Hollywood blonde, and next to her face, hot-pink letters shouted: 45 AND SINGLE! AND FEELING GREAT! Along came a fresh kind of dread. I took a picture of the cover and texted it to Matthew. Is this going to be me? I wrote. You’ll meet someone, he replied. How? Where? Anywhere, he says. You met Nora in a courtroom. [image file=image_rsrc2FK.jpg] On the mirror above the bathroom sink I stuck two columns of Post-it notes, reminders of things June and I were working on. June’s notes, in carnation pink: PEE BEFORE BED BRUSH 2x / FLOSS THUMB-SUCKING My notes, in light blue: BE CURIOUS BE PATIENT THE MISTAKE IS NOT IMPORTANT; THE WAY YOU RECOVER IS “YOU HAVE TO BE WILLING TO BE BAD AT IT IN ORDER TO GET GOOD AT IT”

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  Jehovah was always the God of an organized society and not of a disconnected mass of individuals. The Book of Daniel is an interpretation of international relations and events, a programme for history to follow. But when the weight of foreign empire was so overwhelming and crushing that even the boldest hope could see no adequate resources in the people, the catastrophe that would break this power was conceived as a supernatural cataclysm out of all relation to human activity. By contact with foreign religious life during the Exile the belief in a great organized kingdom of evil had become a vital part of Jewish thought, and the Jews saw behind the oppressive human forces the shadowy and sinister forms of demon powers that could be overcome only by archangels and heavenly armies. When religion was driven from national interests into the refuge of private life, it lost its grasp of larger affairs, and the old clear outlook into contemporary history gave way to an artificial scheme. Instead of reading present facts to discern God’s purposes, men began to pore over the sacred books, and to piece the unfulfilled prophecies of the dead prophets into a mosaic picture of the future. The sunlight of the prophetic hope gave way to the limelight of the apocalyptic visions of later Judaism. It is profoundly pathetic to see how a people paralyzed, broken on the rack, and almost destroyed, still clung to its national existence and believed in its political future. Even the crudest dreams of apocalypticism have a tragic dignity and a lingering touch of vital force. In those dreams the Jewish people kept alive both their memories and their hopes much as an impoverished aristocratic family will preserve the tarnished swords and the faded uniforms worn by illustrious ancestors and nurse the hope in its sons that they may some day regain the old position. But it is a mistake to look for political wisdom in a people that had no politics. Bands of foreign political refugees gathered in England have often dreamed intensely of the liberation of their fatherland, but they have rarely planned wisely, and usually fail to take account of changes since they left their home. Yet the unhistorical and artificial schemes of apocalypticism have been and are now more influential in shaping the imagination of Christian men about the future course of history than the inspired thoughts of the great prophets. Men still rival the rabbis in learned calculations that somehow never turn out correct, and follow wandering lights which have thus far disappointed and led astray all that have ever followed them. The “pessimism” of the prophets Social preachers nowadays are very commonly charged with being “too pessimistic.” The same charge was made against the Hebrew prophets.

• From The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1915)

  In proportion as we advance in history, these international groups acquire a greater importance and extent. Thus we see how, in certain cases, this universalistic tendency has been able to develop itself to the point of affecting not only the higher ideas of the religious system, but even the principles upon which it rests. II Thus there is something eternal in religion which is destined to survive all the particular symbols in which religious thought has successively enveloped itself. There can be no society which does not feel the need of upholding and reaffirming at regular intervals the collective sentiments and the collective ideas which make its unity and its personality. Now this moral remaking cannot be achieved except by the means of reunions, assemblies and meetings where the individuals, being closely united to one another, reaffirm in common their common sentiments; hence come ceremonies which do not differ from regular religious ceremonies, either in their object, the results which they produce, or the processes employed to attain these results. What essential difference is there between an assembly of Christians celebrating the principal dates of the life of Christ, or of Jews remembering the exodus from Egypt or the promulgation of the decalogue, and a reunion of citizens commemorating the promulgation of a new moral or legal system or some great event in the national life? If we find a little difficulty to-day in imagining what these feasts and ceremonies of the future could consist in, it is because we are going through a stage of transition and moral mediocrity. The great things of the past which filled our fathers with enthusiasm do not excite the same ardour in us, either because they have come into common usage to such an extent that we are unconscious of them, or else because they no longer answer to our actual aspirations; but as yet there is nothing to replace them. We can no longer impassionate ourselves for the principles in the name of which Christianity recommended to masters that they treat their slaves humanely, and, on the other hand, the idea which it has formed of human equality and fraternity seems to us to-day to leave too large a place for unjust inequalities. Its pity for the outcast seems to us too Platonic; we desire another which would be more practicable; but as yet we cannot clearly see what it should be nor how it could be realized in facts. In a word, the old gods are growing old or already dead, and others are not yet born. This is what rendered vain the attempt of Comte with the old historic souvenirs artificially revived; it is life itself, and not a dead past which can produce a living cult.

• From The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1915)

  Now, as always, the pooling of these sentiments results in intensifying them. By affirming themselves, they exalt and impassion themselves and attain a degree of violence which is translated by the corresponding violence of the gestures which express them. Just as at the death of a relative, they utter terrible cries, fly into a passion and feel that they must tear and destroy; it is to satisfy this need that they beat themselves, wound themselves, and make their blood flow. When emotions have this vivacity, they may well be painful, but they are not depressing; on the contrary, they denote a state of effervescence which implies a mobilization of all our active forces, and even a supply of external energies. It matters little that this exaltation was provoked by a sad event, for it is real, notwithstanding, and does not differ specifically from what is observed in the happy feasts. Sometimes it is even made manifest by movements of the same nature: there is the same frenzy which seizes the worshippers and the same tendency towards sexual debauches, a sure sign of great nervous over-excitement. Robertson Smith had already noticed this curious influence of sad rites in the Semitic cults: "in evil times," he says, "when men's thoughts were habitually sombre, they betook themselves to the physical excitement of religion as men now take refuge in wine.... And so in general when an act of Semitic worship began with sorrow and lamentation—as in the mourning for Adonis, or the great atoning ceremonies which became common in later times—a swift revulsion of feeling followed, and the gloomy part of the service was presently succeeded by a burst of hilarious revelry." [1288] In a word, even when religious ceremonies have a disquieting or saddening event as their point of departure, they retain their stimulating power over the affective state of the group and individuals. By the mere fact that they are collective, they raise the vital tone. When one feels life within him—whether it be in the form of painful irritation or happy enthusiasm—he does not believe in death; so he becomes reassured and takes courage again, and subjectively, everything goes on as if the rite had really driven off the danger which was dreaded. This is how curing or preventive virtues come to be attributed to the movements which one makes, to the cries uttered, to the blood shed and to the wounds inflicted upon one's self or others; and as these different tortures necessarily make one suffer, suffering by itself is finally regarded as a means of conjuring evil or curing sickness. [1289] Later, when the majority of the religious forces had taken the form of moral personalities, the efficacy of these practices was explained by imagining that their object was to appease an evil-working or irritated god. But these conceptions only reflect the rite and the sentiments it arouses; they are an interpretation of it, not its determining cause.