Re: Spammed by Fax?? !! Read inside
Nick
one in the other.
21. Nature has made all her truths independent of one another. Our art makes
one dependent on the other. But this is not natural. Each keeps its own
place.
22. Let no one say that I have said nothing new; the arrangement of the
subject is new. When we play tennis, we both play with the same ball, but
one of us places it better.
I had as soon it said that I used words employed before. And in the same way
if the same thoughts in a different arrangement do not form a different
discourse, no more do the same words in their different arrangement form
different thoughts!
23. Words differently arranged have a different meaning, and meanings
differently arranged have different effects.
24. Language.--We should not turn the mind from one thing to another, except
for relaxation, and that when it is necessary and the time suitable, and not
otherwise. For he that relaxes out of season wearies, and he who wearies us
out of season makes us languid, since we turn quite away. So much does our
perverse lust like to do the contrary of what those wish to obtain from us
without giving us pleasure, the coin for which we will do whatever is
wanted.
25. Eloquence.--It requires the pleasant and the real; but the pleasant must
itself be drawn from the true.
26. Eloquence is a painting of thought; and thus those who, after having
painted it, add something more, make a picture instead of a portrait.
27. Miscellaneous. Language.--Those who make antitheses by forcing words are
like those who make false windows for symmetry. Their rule is not to speak
accurately, but to make apt figures of speech.
28. Symmetry is what we see at a glance; based on the fact that there is no
reason for any difference, and based also o
Nick
trouble. We must get an easier belief, which is that of custom, which,
without violence, without art, without argument, makes us believe things and
inclines all our powers to this belief, so that our soul falls naturally
into it. It is not enough to believe only by force of conviction, when the
automaton is inclined to believe the contrary. Both our parts must be made
to believe, the mind by reasons which it is sufficient to have seen once in
a lifetime, and the automaton by custom, and by not allowing it to incline
to the contrary. Inclina cor meum, Deus.36
The reason acts slowly, with so many examinations and on so many principles,
which must be always present, that at every hour it falls asleep, or
wanders, through want of having all its principles present. Feeling does not
act thus; it acts in a moment, and is always ready to act. We must then put
our faith in feeling; otherwise it will be always vacillating.
253. Two extremes: to exclude reason, to admit reason only.
254. It is not a rare thing to have to reprove the world for too much
docility. It is a natural vice like credulity, and as pernicious.
Superstition.
255. Piety is different from superstition.
To carry piety as far as superstition is to destroy it.
The heretics reproach us for this superstitious submission. This is to do
what they reproach us for...
Infidelity, not to believe in the Eucharist, because it is not seen.
Superstition to believe propositions. Faith, etc.
256. I say there are few true Christians, even as regards faith. There are
many who believe but from superstition. There are many who do not believe
solely from wickedness. Few are between the two.
In this I do not include those who are of truly pious character, nor all
those who believe from a feeling in their heart.
257. There are only three kinds of persons; those who serve God, having
found Him; others who are occupied in seeking Him, not having found Him;
while the remainde