Tenderness

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 What Belongs to You (2016)

  I set off again, intending to follow the path up to the road and then to find my way home. I had decided not to go back to school, I would go straight home, but after another turn in the path I stopped again. There was a clearing to the left and at the side of the path a horse was grazing, still hitched to its cart. Horses are common in Mladost, gypsies use them on their rounds, but I had never seen one unattended before. There was no one in sight; maybe someone had been called by the summons after all. It was a pitiful creature, sickly and thin, its skin hanging loose over protruding ribs; it might have been a portrait of misery, I thought as I stepped closer, but it was grazing sedately enough, pulling at the sparse tufts of grass in the rocky soil. I watched it for a few minutes, and then I laid my hand on its flank, which was dark and broiling with sun, almost too hot to touch. I felt it give a sudden sigh, a quick unburdening of breath as it shifted its frame a little. It wasn’t tied up, I saw, it could have wandered off anytime it chose; but there was nowhere for it to go, of course, and the cart I supposed was heavy, and there was something however meager to be had there where it stood.

• From What Belongs to You (2016)

  There were more pictures, always the two of them alone, one or the other awkwardly angling the camera. They were so young, these boys in the frame, children really, and yet despite their eagerness for each other it was as though they were documenting something they knew could not last. Of course there were no witnesses in their small town to what they were together, neither their families nor their friends, not even strangers passed on the street, since none of the photos was taken outside. Except for these photographs, these digital memories he scrolled through now, nothing would have survived of those embraces that for all their heat had come to an end. Where is he now, I asked Mitko, flooded with tenderness and wanting access to some greater intimacy with him. He didn’t look at me as he answered, still clicking from image to image, his hand moving absently across his chest. He was a schoolteacher, Mitko told me, he left to study abroad and lived in France now, having fled his country along with (I thought) nearly everyone with the talent or means to do so. Of these two men locked together on the screen, then, one left, buoyed by talent or means or both, and the other stayed and was transformed somehow from a prosperous-looking boy to the more or less homeless man I had invited into my home. As if he sensed my sadness and shared it and wanted to give it voice, Mitko opened a new page, a Bulgarian site for video clips, where one can find almost anything, copyright laws have little meaning here. Music, Mitko said, I want you to hear something, and he typed the name of a French singer, someone I had never heard of and whose name escapes me now, into a search engine that dredged up a remarkable number of files. Mitko scanned through several pages, searching for the clip of a song he had shared with Julien, something they had listened to and loved together. Each of the thumbnail images showed a frail woman softly lit, holding a microphone prayerfully in both of her hands.

• From Collected Essays (1998)

  It could never have come about at all without the tacit consent of the North; and this consent robs the North, historically and actually, of any claim to moral superiority. The failure of the government to make any realistic provision for the edu cation of tens of thousands of illiterate former slaves had the effect of dumping this problem squarely into the lap of one man-who knew, whatever else he may not have known, that the education of Negroes had somehow to be accomplished. Whether or not Washington believed what he said is certainly an interesting question. But he did know that he could ac complish his objective by telling white men what they wanted to hear. And it has never been very difficult for a Negro in this country to figure out what white men want to hear: he takes his condition as an echo of their desires. There will be no more Booker T. Washingtons. And whether we like it or not, and no matter how hard or how long we oppose it, there will be no more segregated schools, there will be no more segregated anything. King is entirely right when he says that segregation is dead. The real question which taces the Republic is just how long, how violent, and how expensive the funeral is going to be; and this question it MAR TIN LUTHER KING is up to the Republic to resolve, it is not really in King's hands. The sooner the corpse is buried, the sooner we can get around to the far more taxing and rewarding problems of integration, or what King calls community, and what I think of as the achievement of nationhood, or, more simply and cruelly, the growing up of this dangerously adolescent country. I saw King again, later that same evening, at a party given by this same friend. He came late, did not stay long. I re member him standing in the shadows of the room, ncar a bookcase, drinking something nonalcoholic, and being patient with the interlocutor who had trapped him in this spot. He obviously wanted to get away and go to bed. King is some what below what is called average height, he is sturdily built, but is not quite as heavy or as stocky as he had seemed to me at first. I remember feeling, rather as though he were a younger, much-l oved, and menaced brother, that he seemed very slight and vulnerable to be taking on such tremendous odds. I was leaving for Montgomery the next day, and I called on King in the morning to ask him to have someone from the Montgomery Improvement Association meet me at the air port. It was he who had volunteered to do this for me, since he knew that I knew no one there, and he also probably re alized that I was frightened. He was coming to Montgomery on Sunday to preach in his own church.

• From The Swimming-Pool Library (1988)

  But needless to say it was a long time ago.’ I didn’t want to pursue this vein, and strolled reflectively along to where the two boys ran, as Charles saw it, towards the water. Or perhaps they were already standing in water, lapping round their long-eroded legs. They were intensely poignant. Seen close to, their curves were revealed as pinked, stepped edges, their moving forms made up of tiny, featureless squares. The boy in full-face had his mouth open in pleasure, or as an indication that he was speaking, but it also gave a strong impression of pain. It was at once too crude and too complex to be analysed properly. It reminded me of the face of Eve expelled from Paradise in Masaccio’s fresco. But at the same time it was not like it at all; it could have been a mask of pagan joy. The second young man, following closely behind, leaning forward as if he might indeed be wading through water, was in profile, and expressed nothing but attention to his fellow. What did he see there, I wondered—a mundane greeting or the ecstasy which I read into it? That it was merely a fragment compounded and rarefied its enigma. Charles rested his hand on my shoulder as I bent over it. ‘Jolly fellows, aren’t they?’ ‘I was thinking they were rather tragic.’ ‘My dear, what I want to ask you is this.’ Feeling the physical weight of him on me, I was sure for a moment that he had some physical demand in mind. Would I let him take my clothes off, or kiss me. A don at Winchester had asked a friend of mine to masturbate in front of him, and though he didn’t, such things can harmlessly be done. I stood up straight and looked away over his shoulder. ‘Will you write about me?’ I caught his eye. ‘Well—how do you mean?’ He looked down, quite bashfully, at the bathers. ‘About my life, you know. The memoirs I’ve never written, as it were. I assume you can write?’ I felt touched, and relieved; I also felt that it was quite impossible. ‘I did once write two thousand words on Coade Stone garden ornaments.’ ‘Oh, it would be much more than that.’ ‘But I don’t know anything about you,’ was a second reservation. He smiled. ‘I thought you might be interested to find out, as you say you haven’t anything else to do. I could pay you, of course,’ he added. ‘It’s not that, Charles,’ I said, resting my hand in turn on his shoulder. He looked almost tearful at having brought his idea to a head and facing possible disappointment. ‘Before you say anything else I want to ask you, take time to consider it. Because, though I say it myself, I think it would prove to interest you a very great deal. It wouldn’t be an immense amount of work, in a sense. I’ve got masses of papers.

• From The Swimming-Pool Library (1988)

  Its ‘country-house’ smell and the established presence of my things subdued him rather. He gazed abashed at my Whitehaven picture and, with an access of solemnity, embarked on a reading of Tom Jones. I was glad of his self-reliance; and companionable hours passed with him, sprawled in an armchair with his book, and me behind him, at my writing-table, going through Charles’s papers and looking up now and again with a sudden rush of the blood at his powerful figure and sober head, his face, full of thoughts, turned from me in a lost profile. The quiet, slightly contrived domestic mood made me think of Arthur again, and I couldn’t help being grateful for the open windows, the normality, the cool of the new set-up. Not that there weren’t things I missed. It was fine, making love to Phil, and I was obsessed with his body. But he lacked the illiterate, curling readiness of Arthur, his instinct for sex. Both of them were teenagers over whom I had many advantages; both of them watched me for the moves I would make. But where with Arthur, when I did move, there was an immediate transport, a falling-open of the mouth, a mood of necessity that was close to possession, with Phil there was a more selfconscious giving, callow at times and imitative. When I was rough with him it was to break through all that. Phil’s affection expressed itself too in a kind of wrestling, which was sweatily physical but which wasn’t quite sex. There were no rules and it generally involved him in his pants and me in nothing at all, clinching wildly on the sofa or wherever we happened to be, tumbling on to the floor, straining, twisting and squeezing at each other but showing enough decorum not to knock things over. I suppose all this assertion of muscle was his familiar shyness, and silly as it was it had something authentic of him in it, which was beautifully exposed over those few seconds when our eyes at last held each other’s, he fell into a silent slackness of submission and the ragging and bragging dissolved into tenderness and release. I had had a brief talk with Bill after the boxing. The contest itself went on and on and through much of it I sat around in the changing-room while Bill exhorted or solaced his team and a succession of teenaged boys got dressed in front of me. Sometimes fathers, who fancied themselves as boxing pundits, came in with brothers or friends, and lectured, berated or praised their bruised progeny.

• From Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (2014)

  The guard came in and he was angry. He snarled at me, “You should have been done a long time ago. You have to leave.” He began handcuffing Henry, pulling his hands together behind his back and locking them there. Then he roughly shackled Henry’s ankles. The guard was so angry he put the cuffs on too tight. I could see Henry grimacing with pain. I said, “I think those cuffs are on too tight. Can you loosen them, please?” “I told you: You need to leave. You don’t tell me how to do my job.” Henry gave me a smile and said, “It’s okay, Bryan. Don’t worry about this. Just come back and see me again, okay?” I could see him wince with each click of the chains being tightened around his waist. I must have looked pretty distraught. Henry kept saying, “Don’t worry, Bryan, don’t worry. Come back, okay?” As the officer pushed him toward the door, Henry turned back to look at me. I started mumbling, “I’m really sorry. I’m really sor—” “Don’t worry about this, Bryan,” he said, cutting me off. “Just come back.” I looked at him and struggled to say something appropriate, something reassuring, something that expressed my gratitude to him for being so patient with me. But I couldn’t think of anything to say. Henry looked at me and smiled. The guard was shoving him toward the door roughly. I didn’t like the way Henry was being treated, but he continued to smile until, just before the guard could push him fully out of the room, he planted his feet to resist the officer’s shoving. He looked so calm. Then he did something completely unexpected. I watched him close his eyes and tilt his head back. I was confused by what he was doing, but then he opened his mouth and I understood. He began to sing. He had a tremendous baritone voice that was strong and clear. It startled both me and the guard, who stopped his pushing. I’m pressing on, the upward way New heights I’m gaining, every day Still praying as, I’m onward bound Lord, plant my feet on Higher Ground. It was an old hymn they used to sing all the time in the church where I grew up. I hadn’t heard it in years. Henry sang slowly and with great sincerity and conviction. It took a moment before the officer recovered and resumed pushing him out the door. Because his ankles were shackled and his hands were locked behind his back, Henry almost stumbled when the guard shoved him forward. He had to waddle to keep his balance, but he kept on singing. I could hear him as he went down the hall: Lord lift me up, and let me stand By faith on Heaven’s tableland A higher plane, that I have found Lord, plant my feet on Higher Ground.

• From What Belongs to You (2016)

  You want to be the big American, R. said in a final charge, you think you can fix things, you want to save him. And maybe that was part of it; certainly there was a tenderness in me that Mitko struck as no one else did, and I hated that, for all his sometimes brutality, he was finally so helpless in a world that took little heed of him. I did want to help him, but I no longer believed, if I ever had, that Mitko could be drawn in any permanent way out of what had become his life. I knew I couldn’t save him, but how could I explain to R., especially to him, the feeling of inevitability I had whenever Mitko appeared, as though we were in a story that had already been written. He was waiting patiently when I stepped outside into the cold, standing beside the door and drawing on a cigarette that he left in his mouth as he held his hand out in greeting. K’vo ima , he asked, glancing up at the dark apartment, what’s wrong? A friend is staying with me, I said, the lie R. had told me to use, and Mitko nodded, Yasno , I get it. Your friend from Portugal, he said, the obvious assumption, though I was taken aback to hear any mention from him of R., and I quickly shook my head, as if dismissing the thought of him from the air. No, I said, just a friend, and then, before he could ask anything else, Are you hungry, should we go somewhere to eat? We began walking slowly together over the ice, which was thick and many-layered on the sidewalk. Mitko was wearing the same clothes I had last seen him in, the same thin jacket, but he seemed unbothered by the cold, and in general he looked better: he had showered and shaved, his clothes were clean, and looking down, I saw that the canvas sneakers had been replaced by short leather boots, well-worn but sturdy. A friend gave them, Mitko said when I asked, shrugging his shoulders, they’re not so nice but they do the job, they’re better than the others.

• From What Belongs to You (2016)

  But I’m done with that now, he said, making a gesture as if wiping his hands clean, I don’t want to do that anymore. What happened when you got out, I asked, what did you do then? He shrugged again, I was in Sofia for a while, he said, I found some work here, and he told me how he had worked on a construction site, not as a builder but as security, watching over the premises at night. Skuchna rabota , he said, boring work. I thought about calling you, I still had your number, but I wasn’t sure you would want me to, I thought you were still mad. I shrugged, wondering if I was, and he went on, I worked there a few months, and then it stopped. At my inquisitive glance, They ran out of money, he said, it’s what always happens, we had to stop working. He had gone back to Varna to his mother’s apartment, which was all right in the summer, when there were people, he said, there was something to do, and I thought how he must love it, those few weeks when his city became a little Europe, the beautiful young coming from the west for the cheap beaches and beer, the Balkan carnival, maybe it seemed like the life that should have been his. But no one’s there now, he said, the city’s empty, and so he had come back to Sofia to look for work. But there isn’t any work, he said, what can you do. I stayed with friends for a while, but there’s no one you can count on here, and now his face darkened, the people who say they are your friends aren’t friends at all. And then this happened, he said, gesturing down at his lap, and I don’t have any money; they want me to take pills first, and then if they don’t work I need an injection. But the pills are forty leva, he said, and then, disingenuously, where will I get forty leva? I’ll help you, I said, of course, don’t worry. We had finished eating already, and so I stood and took my wallet from the little shelf by the door, taking out forty leva and then another twenty. Here, I said, for the medicine.

• From What Belongs to You (2016)

  My mother and I were standing now, gathering our things, lifting our large bags from the rack, and I found I didn’t know how to say goodbye to the boy. I wanted to tell him to study, to work hard, above all to study his English, which he would be helpless without; it was his best chance, I wanted to say, but that’s the kind of thing one can never say, there’s no way to say it, or no way for it to be heard. And so instead I opened a small pocket of my bag, telling him I wanted to give him something, something you couldn’t find in Bulgaria, I said, and I handed him a drugstore peppermint from a packet my mother had brought over for me. It was my favorite candy when I was a child, and I was glad beyond words at the pleasure it gave him when he twisted off the plastic wrapper and popped it in his mouth. Then the train stopped, and my mother and I moved into the corridor, clumsy with our bags and with the prospect of being alone together. As we joined the line of people getting off at the last stop before Sofia, I looked once more at the little boy, whom I felt I would never forget, though maybe it wasn’t exactly him I would remember, I thought, but the use I would make of him. I had my notes, I knew I would write a poem about him, and then it would be the poem I remembered, which would be both true and false at once, the image I made replacing the real image. Making poems was a way of loving things, I had always thought, of preserving them, of living moments twice; or more than that, it was a way of living more fully, of bestowing on experience a richer meaning. But that wasn’t what it felt like when I looked back at the boy, wanting a last glimpse of him; it felt like a loss. Whatever I could make of him would diminish him, and I wondered whether I wasn’t really turning my back on things in making them into poems, whether instead of preserving the world I was taking refuge from it. The doors opened, the line began to move, and I saw that the boy was already clambering into the seats we had left, claiming a new space as his own. And then my mother and I stepped off the train into the evening air, nearly gasping in relief at its freshness.

• From The Swimming-Pool Library (1988)

  I watched him moving about, doing a little tidying, neatly stacking up Charles’s tumbled notebooks. For all his compact, self-contained ordinariness he was a shape-changer. He was exercising his ability to make himself bigger, stronger, and more beautiful. I could still summon up one image of him when he first came to the Corry—standard material, a bit overweight, uncommunicative. Now he grew better week by week. His whole gait was changing as his thighs became more massive, rubbing together as he walked and so pushing his knees apart and turning his toes slightly in. As a result his ass, even more than before, seemed to be proffered, thrust out ingenuously towards the admiring hand. Whilst I was Impotens he was a great consolation just to hold and touch—like those exhibitions of sculpture that are put on for the handicapped. Instead of the normal brutal rush our lovemaking was tentative and respectful—it was as if we were both of us afflicted by some cruel, slowing illness that made us think everything out from scratch. ‘Still reading those books?’ he said, with a hint of reserve, as he came and sat on the floor by my chair and activated the remote control of the TV. I don’t think he really knew what the books were, and looked on them as some tiresome academic pursuit to which I was snobbishly attached. ‘There’s no tennis,’ I said, as the still of the court welled up in the screen, accompanied by optimistic light music. ‘Do you fancy any of the tennis players?’ he asked. ‘I think tennis the least erotic of all sports,’ I lied firmly, ‘marbles and pigeon-fancying not excluded. Please turn it off.’ He fairly jabbed down the button, and I could see him forcing back a reasonable riposte and remembering to be tolerant of me. He sat with his head bowed, until I reached down and stroked the side of his neck, pulling his chin back, and running my fingers over his face. When my palm covered his mouth, he kissed it slightly, and I was perhaps forgiven. ‘No telly today,’ I said. ‘I’m going to read to you. Please excuse my temporary lisp. Our hero is just arriving at Port Said, with him three rather keen young men, Harrap, Fryer and, um, Stearn; all are wearing panama hats and too many clothes. The date, September 12, 1923.’

• From Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (2014)

  “It has been wonderful, Bryan. When I first came, I’d look for people who had lost someone to murder or some violent crime. Then it got to the point where some of the ones grieving the most were the ones whose children or parents were on trial, so I just started letting anybody lean on me who needed it. All these young children being sent to prison forever, all this grief and violence. Those judges throwing people away like they’re not even human, people shooting each other, hurting each other like they don’t care. I don’t know, it’s a lot of pain. I decided that I was supposed to be here to catch some of the stones people cast at each other.” I chuckled when she said it. During the McMillian hearings, a local minister had held a regional church meeting about the case and had asked me to come speak. There were a few people in the African American community whose support of Walter was muted, not because they thought he was guilty but because he had had an extramarital affair and wasn’t active in the church. At the church meeting, I spoke mostly about Walter’s case, but I also reminded people that when the woman accused of adultery was brought to Jesus, he told the accusers who wanted to stone her to death, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” The woman’s accusers retreated, and Jesus forgave her and urged her to sin no more. But today, our self-righteousness, our fear, and our anger have caused even the Christians to hurl stones at the people who fall down, even when we know we should forgive or show compassion. I told the congregation that we can’t simply watch that happen. I told them we have to be stonecatchers. When I chuckled at the older woman’s invocation of the parable, she laughed, too. “I heard you in that courtroom today. I’ve even seen you here a couple of times before. I know you’s a stonecatcher, too.” I laughed even more. “Well, I guess I try to be.” She took my hands and rubbed my palms. “Well, it hurts to catch all them stones people throw.” She kept stroking my hands, and I couldn’t think of anything to say. I felt unusually comforted by this woman. It would take me nearly five hours to drive back to Montgomery once I got things settled for Mr. Caston and Mr. Carter. I needed to keep moving, but it felt nice sitting there with the woman now earnestly massaging my palms in a way that was so sweet, even though it seemed strange, too. “Are you trying to make me cry?” I asked. I tried to smile.

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

  “Well, I suppose that wouldn’t do any harm,” Jenifer said doubtfully. She frowned, and I felt a sudden wave of affection for her. There was something heroic in what she was doing. She was sacrificing all her most cherished principles; her clever, skeptical friends would be merciless to her face and probably lethal behind her back. But what mattered most to Jenifer was what was best for Jacob. “You see,” she continued, “it’s all very well for people like Herbert and me to reject religion. But Jacob—he needs something—he needs some kind of support.” “What you mean is,” I said caustically, “that religion is really just for idiots, weaklings, and defectives.” “Oh dear.” Jenifer grinned rather nervously at me. “How awful. But yes . . . yes, if I’m honest, I suppose that is what I think . . .” she trailed off and looked at me sheepishly. I couldn’t in all conscience take issue with her. Had I not just dismissed God myself as an illusion? But Jacob deserved some consolation. “All right,” I said at last, “I’ll take him.” In finally relinquishing the last vestiges of religious belief, I had come closer to the mainstream than ever before in my life. During the 1960s, religion had died in Britain, and church attendance plummeted. England was fast becoming one of the most secular countries in the world, topped only by the Netherlands. The Harts’ principled rejection of religion had once seemed daring and iconoclastic, but it was now unremarkable, especially among intellectuals. But although the Harts regarded Catholicism as ludicrous, they were not crusading atheists. They were both admirers of the utilitarianism first enunciated by the nineteenth-century British philosopher Jeremy Bentham. Jenifer’s pragmatic approach to Jacob’s churchgoing was essentially utilitarian. Actions are not intrinsically good or evil, but should be judged by their consequences. Right acts are those that produce the best results. There was nothing in itself wrong with attending Mass, so even though it was the product of a belief system that was palpably false, if it helped Jacob, then he should go to Blackfriars. Many of their friends, whose repudiation of faith was more militant, would find this faintly reprehensible.

• From Collected Essays (1998)

  We are confronted with the speeding wheels of the carriage, the relentless hooves of the horses, and a small, running, ragged boy, trying to get out of the way. He is knocked down, he is run over, he is killed : and I knew something about that. The moment that most stands out, for me, is that moment in the tumbril, near the end of the film, when the seamstress (Isabel Jewell) recognizes that Sydney Carton (Ronald Colman ) is dying in his friend's stead. I knew nothing about that, but I had been taught greater love hath no man than this, and some thing in me believed it. Yet, when Bill whispered to me, dur ing the scene of the storming of the Bastille, "Every time somebody drops from the drawbridge, they die," though I watched the people dropping off the drawbridge lik e so many dead cockroaches being swept into the dust pan, I was also aware that Bill was not telling me that Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was murdering all these people, any more than that that guil lotine was really going to chop off Ronald Colman's head. The guillotine was going to chop off Sydney Carton 's head: my first director was instructing me in the discipline and power of make-believe. For, while believing it all, and really believing it, I still knew that Madame Defarge was really an actress named Blanche Yurka, and that Lucie Manette was really an English girl, named Elizabeth Allan. Something implacable in the set of Yurka's mouth probably reminded me of my grandmother, and I knew that Elizabeth Allan-Lucie Manette reminded me of my music teacher, a Miss Taub, with whom I was desper ately in love. When Lucie Manette and Charles Darnay are torn from each other's arms in the courtroom, tears rose to my eyes, for I knew something about that: yet, at the very +88 THE DE VIL FI ND S WORK same time, I also knew that Charles Darnay was really an ac tor, named Donald Woods. This was the first time in my lif e, after all, that I had seen a screen rendition (so the ads and the press put it) of a novel, which, considering my age, I could claim to know. And I felt very close to the actors, who had not betrayed the friends I had lived with for nearly as long as I had lived with the people of Uncle Tom's Cabin. I had read Uncle Tom's Cabin compulsively, the book in one hand, the newest baby on my hipbone. I was trying to find out something, sensing something in the book of some immense import for me: which, however, I knew I did not really understand. My mother got scared. She hid the book. The last time she hid it, she hid it on the highest shelf above the bathtub.

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

  AUGUSTINE. (de Serm. Dom. lib. 1. c. 20.) He says not, To him that seeketh give all things, but give what you justly and honestly can, that is, what as far as man can know or believe, neither hurts you, nor another: and if thou hast justly refused any one, the justice must be declared to him, (so as not to send him away empty,) sometimes thou wilt confer even a greater boon when thou hast corrected him who seeks what he ought not. CHRYSOSTOM. Herein however we do not lightly err, when not only we give not to those who seek, but also blame them? Why (you say) does he not work, why is the idle man fed? Tell me, dost thou then possess by labour? but still if thou workest, dost thou work for this, that thou shouldest blame another? For a single loaf and coat dost thou call a man covetous? Thou givest nothing, make then no reproaches. Why dost thou neither take pity thyself, and dissuadest those who would? If we spend upon all indifferently, we shall always have compassion: for because Abraham entertains all, he also entertains angels. For if a man is a homicide and a robber, does he not, thinkest thou, deserve to have bread? Let us not then be severe censors of others, lest we too be strictly judged. It follows, And of him that taketh away thy goods, ask them not again. CHRYSOSTOM. (Hom. 10. in 1 Cor.) Every thing we have we receive from God. But when we speak of “mine and thine,” they are only bare words. For if you assert a house to be yours, you have uttered an expression which wants the substance of reality. For both the air, the soil, and the moisture, are the Creator’s. Thou again art he who has built the house; but although the use is thine, it is doubtful, not only because of death, but also on account of the issues of things. Thy soul is not thy own possession, and will be reckoned to thee in like manner as all thy goods. God wishes those things to be thine which are entrusted to thee for thy brethren, and they will be thine if thou hast dispensed them for others. But if thou hast spent richly upon thyself what things are thine, they are now become another’s. But through a wicked desire of wealth men strive together in a state contrary to Christ’s words, And of him that taketh away thy goods, ask them not again.

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

  1. St. John says (3 John), “Dearly beloved, do faithfully whatever you do for the brethrens and for strangers.” He immediately points out to whom he refers by saying: “For his name they went out” (i.e., “ leaving their own possessions,” Gloas). And again, “We, therefore, ought to receive such.” The Gloss here remarks: “John had renounced all things, but he speaks of himself as belonging to the number of the rich, in order to make those whom he addresses more prompt and more ready in helping the needy.” Hence it is praiseworthy to give alms to those who, for the love of Christ, live without possessions of their own. 2. We read in Matt. x. 41, “He who receives a just man in the name of a just man shall receive the reward of a just man.” The Gloss remarks that “on this account he is called just.” The Gloss also adds, “Someone may therefore say: ‘We shall thus receive false prophets, and the traitor Judas.’ But the Lord, foreseeing this objection, says not that persons are to be received but their names; and that he who receives another shall not be deprived of a reward on account of the unworthiness of the object of his charity.” Hence we must conclude that alms are to be given to those who bear, even though unjustly, the name of sanctity. 3. St. Paul (Rom. xv.) praises the faithful of Macedonia and Achaia for their resolution to make a collection for the poor among the saints. The Gloss remarks hereon: “These men devoted themselves wholly to the Divine service, heeding no worldly matters, and caring only to set an example of holy living to those who believed.” The Achaians and Macedonians had made a collection for these good men; and St. Paul invites the Romans to do the same. Hence we see that alms may be given to the poor of Christ. 4. The Gloss says, commenting on the words (2 Cor. vii), “let your abundance supply their want,” i.e., “the want of those who have renounced all earthly things.” These words are a further confirmation of the opinion which we have already expressed. 5. Again, on the words, “But you, brethren, be not weary of well doing” (1 Thes. iii. 14), the Gloss observes that “‘well doing’ here signifies doing good to the poor.” Another commentary says: “Because, although they work, they are still in need of certain things. Thus, St. Paul warns the faithful that if they have the means of supplying the necessities of the servants of God, they should not be remiss in so doing.” A man cannot be blamed for generosity; he, only, deserves a rebuke who, while able to work, prefers to lead an idle life. Hence it is praiseworthy to give alms to the servants of God, whether they work or not, even though they may be to. blame for not working.

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

  2. Again, mercy is the mitigation of justice. But God cannot rescind what his justice requires, for it is said in II Tim. 2:13: “ If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful: for he cannot deny himself, ” and God would deny himself if he were to deny his own words, as the gloss says. We cannot therefore attribute mercy to him. On the other hand: it is said in Ps. 111:4: “ the Lord is gracious, and full of compassion. ” I answer: mercy is pre-eminently attributable to God, albeit as an effect, not as the affection of a passion. In evidence of this we may reflect that one is said to be merciful when one has misery in one ’ s heart, grieving for the misery of another as if it were one ’ s own, and consequently striving to dispel it as if it were one ’ s own. This is the effect of mercy. God does not grieve over the misery of another, but he pre-eminently does dispel the misery of another, whatever be the defect for which this word may stand. Now defects are remedied only by the perfection of some goodness, and the first origin of goodness is God, as we said in Q. 6, Art. 4. But we must bear in mind that God bestows perfections on things not only through his goodness, but in a different sense also through his justice, generosity, and mercy. Considered absolutely, it is through his goodness that God bestows a perfection (Art. 2). Yet in so far as God bestows perfections on things in accordance with their status, he bestows them through justice. In so far as he bestows them purely by his goodness, and not because things are useful to him, he bestows them through liberality. In so far as the perfections which God bestows dispel every defect, he bestows them in mercy. On the first point: this objection argues from the manner in which mercy affects a passion. On the second point: when God acts mercifully he does not do what is contrary to his justice, but does more than his justice requires, as it were like one who gives two hundred denarii to a person to whom he owes one hundred. Such a one acts with liberality or with mercy, without denying justice. So also does one who forgives an offence against himself. He who forgives something in a sense gives it. Thus the apostle calls forgiveness a gift in Eph. 4:32: “ forgiving one another, even as God for Christ ’ s sake hath forgiven you. ” It is plain from this that mercy does not destroy justice, but is a fulfilment of it. As James says: “ mercy rejoiceth against judgment. ” ARTICLE FOUR

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

  II. On the second head it is to be noted, four kinds of compassion are expressed which Christ manifested towards sinners. (1) Was the taking of human nature: “A certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was; and when He saw him he had compassion on him,” Gloss. The Samaritan is Christ, who was made man for our sakes, that He might deliver us from this present life. (2) Was the institution of the Sacraments for the salvation of sinners: “and bound up his wounds,” Gloss. In baptism: “He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds,” Psalm 147:3. (3) Was the infusion of the grace of the Holy Spirit: “pouring in oil,” Gloss. The charisma of the Holy Spirit: “but the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in My name, He shall teach you all things.… whatsoever I have said unto you,” S. John 14:26. “And of His fulness have all we received, and grace for grace. For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ,” S. John 1:16, 17. (4) In enduring the bitterness of His passion for sinners: “and set Him on His own beast.” Gloss. The beast is His flesh, in which He places the wounded, because He “bare our sins in His own Body on the tree,” 1 S. Peter 2:24. III. On the third head it is to be noted, that we ought to show a four-fold compassion to the penitent. (1) In succouring him: “Bear ye one another’s burdens,” &c. Gal. 6:2. (2) In praying for him: “If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it,” 1 S. John 5:16. “Pray one for another, that ye may be healed,” S. James 5:16. (3) In instructing him: “If a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such an one in the spirit of meekness,” Gal. 6:1. “Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him, let him know,” &c., S. James 5:19, 20. “If thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone,” S. Matt. 18:15. (4) In the gift of pardon: “Then came Peter to Him and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?.… Until seventy times seven,” S. Matt. 18:21, 22. “Reproach not a man that turneth from sin,” i.e., turning from sin to repentance; “But remember that we are all worthy of punishment,” Ecclus. 8:5. HOMILY XXVII FOUR FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT FOURTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY.—(FROM THE EPISTLE)“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith.”—Gal. 5:22.

• From Confessions of a Mask (1958)

  Could it have been because of laziness? I kept asking myself. All of my earnestness toward life as a whole arose out of this suspicion that I was simply lazy. And in the end this earnestness spent itself in defending myself against the charge of laziness on this one point, insuring that my laziness could remain laziness still.This earnestness led me in the first place to resolve to gather together all my memories concerning women, starting back at the very beginning. What an extremely meager collection it turned out to be! I remembered one incident that had taken place when I was about thirteen or fourteen. It was the day of my father's transfer to Osaka, and we had all gone to Tokyo Station to see him off. Afterwards, a number of relatives had returned to the house with us. Among them was my second cousin Sumiko, an unmarried girl of about twenty. Sumiko's front teeth protruded the tiniest bit. They were exceedingly white and beautiful teeth, and when she laughed they gleamed so brightly that one wondered whether she was not laughing on purpose to show them off. Their slight appearance of prominence added a subtle attractiveness to her smile; in her case the defect of protruding teeth was like a pinch of spice dropped into the harmonious grace and beauty of her face and figure, emphasizing the harmony and adding an accent of flavor to the beauty. If the word "love" is not applicable, at least I "liked" this cousin. Ever since childhood I had enjoyed watching her from a distance. I would sit beside her for hours as she embroidered, doing nothing but stare at her vacantly. After a time my aunts went into an inner room, leaving Sumiko and me alone in the parlor. We remained just as we were, seated side by side on a sofa, saying nothing. Our heads were still buzzing with the bustle of the station platform. I felt unusually weary. "Oh, I'm tired," she said, giving a little yawn. She lifted her white hand wearily and tapped her mouth lightly several times with her white fingers, as though performing some superstitious ritual. "Aren't you tired too, Kochan?" For some unknown reason, as she said this she covered her face with both sleeves of her kimono and buried it with a plop upon my thigh. Then, rolling her cheek slowly against my trousers, she turned her face up and remained motionless for a time. The trousers of my uniform trembled at the honor of serving as her pillow. The fragrance of her perfume and powder confused me. I looked upon her unmoving profile as she lay there with her tired, clear eyes wide open; I was at a loss. . . . That is all that happened.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Saladin answered that this should without fail be accomplished and accordingly, on the morrow, meaning to send him away that same night, he let make, in a great hall of his palace, a very goodly and rich bed of mattresses, all, according to their usance, of velvet and cloth of gold and caused lay thereon a counterpoint curiously wrought in various figures with great pearls and jewels of great price (the which here in Italy was after esteemed an inestimable treasure) and two pillows such as sorted with a bed of that fashion. This done, he bade invest Messer Torello, who was presently well and strong again, in a gown of the Saracen fashion, the richest and goodliest thing that had ever been seen of any, and wind about his head, after their guise, one of his longest turban-cloths.[477] Then, it growing late, he betook himself with many of his barons to the chamber where Messer Torello was and seating himself, well nigh weeping, by his side, bespoke him thus; 'Messer Torello, the hour draweth near that is to sunder me from you, and since I may not bear you company nor cause you to be accompanied, by reason of the nature of the journey you have to make, which suffereth it not, needs must I take leave of you here in this chamber, to which end I am come hither. Wherefore, ere I commend you to God, I conjure you, by that love and that friendship that is between us, that you remember you of me and if it be possible, ere our times come to an end, that, whenas you have ordered your affairs in Lombardy, you come at the least once to see me, to the end that, what while I am cheered by your sight, I may then supply the default which needs must I presently commit by reason of your haste; and against that betide, let it not irk you to visit me with letters and require me of such things as shall please you; for that of a surety I will more gladly do them for you than for any man alive.' [Footnote 477: It may be well to remind the European reader that the turban consists of two parts, _i.e._ a skull-cap and a linen cloth, which is wound round it in various folds and shapes, to form the well-known Eastern head-dress.]

• From Fragments (7)

  With thy delicate hands shoots of anise plait; For a flower-covered maid by the blessed Graces Is favored, but those without garlands they hate. TO AN UNKNOWN FRIEND (21) Gently, gently mayest thou rest On thy dear companion's breast. IN THE BLOOM OF HER YOUTH , (22) She now has reached her youthful bloom; Her time for plaiting wreaths has come. 27 Lyric SottffS of the Greeks A GIFTED PUPIL (23) Of all the maidens fair for whom the sun doth rise, Now and in times to come not one will be so wise. A LOST PUPIL (24) Far more than I 'tis some one else Whose love thy heart at present thrills. (25) But utterly Forget'st thou me. BRIDAL SONGS THE BRIDEGROOM (26) Lift high the roof to give him room — Hymenaeus. Ye workmen, lift again — Hymenaeus. Like mighty Ares now doth come The bridegroom taller than tall men. 28 Sappho His rivals he outstrips with ease, Like Lesbian bards those of all Greece. (28) To what, dear bridegroom, should I most rightly thee compare? I thee would best compare to a slender sapling fair. THE BRIDE (29) Like the sweet apple which reddens, far up on the high tree-top growing. Up on the loftiest branch, scarce itself to the gath- erers showing — They rathermore could not reach it, e'en though of it easily knowing. (30) Thy form, thy eyes are full of grace. Thy honey-sweet, thy lovely face. Of Aphrodite's love a token. Hath to me of her favor spoken. (31) In all the world thou wouldst ne'er discover Another maid like this, O lover. 29 Lyric Songs of the Greeks (32) " Does it appear to thee That I still a maid would be? " MAIDENHOOD (33) " O maidenhood ! O maidenhood ! where hast thou gone from me?" " I nevermore, I nevermore, shall e'er come back to thee." THE BRIDAL DAY (34) The marriage thou hast desired Is performed, O happy bridegroom; The bride which thou hast admired, Thine own has she now become. FELICITATIONS (35) Good wishes give we to the bride. And to the bridegroom at her side. THE FATHER (36) The father said: " We give this maid." 30 Sappho THE PORTER (37) Seven fathoms long, the porter's feet Five ox-hides for his shoes did need. Ten cobblers worked them to complete. THE UNWOOED MAIDEN (38) Just as the hyacinth purple, whose flowers on the mountain are blooming, Down on the ground is trod by the feet of the shepherds home-coming. VESPER (39) Evening, which bringest all things which the gleam- ing Aurora has scattered. The sheep and the goats thou bring'st home ; Thou the son to his mother let'st come. ANDROMACHE'S WEDDING (40-41) " Now Hector and his comrades bring home An- dromache, The bright-eyed beauteous lady, across the briny sea 31 Lyric Sonffs of the Greeks Upon their ships from Thebe, from Placia's gush- ing streams.