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VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Children are a blessing for humanity and for the church, bringing new life and energy to families and society, Pope Francis said.
Unfortunately, he said, too often children are society's "great rejected ones, because they aren't even allowed to be born!"
Continuing a series of general audience talks about the family March 18, Pope Francis said it was troubling that so many European countries have a birthrate so low that their populations are declining or would without immigration.
"Children bring life, happiness, hope — and even troubles, but that's life," he said. "Obviously they cause worries and sometimes problems, but a society with those worries and problems is always better than a society that is sad and gray because it has no children."
Pope Francis, who spent more than half an hour kissing and blessing babies and children in St. Peter's Square before the audience, said little ones are not diplomats and have not yet learned "the science of duplicity." And they let people know exactly what they are thinking, sometimes to their parents chagrin.
"With their interior simplicity, they have the ability to give and to receive tenderness," the pope said. "Children are able to smile and to cry. Some, when I reach out to embrace them, smile. Others, seeing me dressed in white, think I'm a doctor who's come to vaccinate them and they cry. It's spontaneous. Kids are like that."
"Smile and cry — those are two things that we big people often block," he said. "Many times our smile is a cardboard smile, something without life, artificial like a clown's. Children smile spontaneously and they cry spontaneously. It's a matter of heart, and adult hearts can be blocked and lose the ability to smile and to cry. But children can teach us to smile and cry again."
Despite the fact that sometimes they can be naughty, the pope said, children "constantly remind us of the condition necessary to enter the kingdom of God: that of not considering ourselves self-sufficient, but needing help, love and forgiveness."
They remind Christians that they are children of God, dependent on him for their lives and salvation, he said.
"Children remind us of another beautiful thing as well: We are always sons and daughters. Even when one is an adult or elderly, even when you become parents or have a position of responsibility, you are still a son or daughter," he said. "This brings us back to the fact that we did not give ourselves life, but we received the gift of life. It's the first gift we ever received."
Those who act as if they are the creators and lords of their lives, he said, will never understand what it means to be a child of God and to trust him.
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You are here: Home » Resources »
We have begun to collate the publicly available contact details for your local councillors, TDs and soon, Senators. We have started with Dublin Councillors, but will expand this list over time to cover other areas.
Local Authority Councillors
- All four Dublin Local Authorities: Dublin City Council, Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Counil, Fingal County Council and South Dublin County Council.
Teachtaí Dáil (TDs)
Find your local TD on the Oireachtas.ie website.
Find your local Senator on the Oireachtas.ie website.

subset: commoncrawl


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John Appel is a former paratrooper, current swordsman, and life-long rum-drinker who writes SFF. He lives with is supportive and very tolerant family in Maryland.
Today at Nerds of a Feather, I ask John about his Six Books.
1. What book are you currently reading?
2. What upcoming book are you really excited about?
3. Is there a book you're currently itching to re-read?
4. A book that you love and wish that you yourself had written.
5. What's one book, which you read as a child or a young adult, that has had a lasting influence on your writing?
6. And speaking of that, what's your latest book, and why is it awesome?
Thanks, John!
Find out more about Assassin's Orbit with my Nerds of a Feather Review.
POSTED BY: Paul Weimer. Ubiquitous in Shadow, but I'm just this guy, you know? @princejvstin.


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LIVINGSTON MANOR, NY — The Catskill Project is a collaboration of collaborations. It starts with an investor, a long-time resident of the area, and an architectural firm, with a New York …
LIVINGSTON MANOR, NY — The Catskill Project is a collaboration of collaborations. It starts with an investor, a long-time resident of the area, and an architectural firm, with a New York City/Callicoon connection that now features a father and daughter plus a longtime architectural firm employee. It then adds in a policy nerd whose mission is to create a roadmap to achieve a statewide carbon-neutral building stock. Throw in a New Hamshire-based manufacturer for pre-designed architecture panels, and a Brooklyn-based women-owned interior design agency with a eye for scouring the local area for fixtures and furnishings, and you've got an interesting combination of skills and connections.
Together, they aspire to develop a 90-acre property, preserving 40 acres as common spaces for trails and a nature preserve.
They will build, when completed, 24 homes using Passive House standards. This private community is located in Livingston Manor, off Huber Road.
Peter Malik is the investment banker, environmentalist and a longtime Livingston Manor resident. Buck Moorhead, Remy Moorhead and Laura Carter are the architectural and production management team. In his day job, Greg Hale is the policy nerd who works with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority's (NYSERDA) as a senior advisor for energy efficiency markets and finance. With New Hampshire-based Bensonwood, whose mission is improving people's lives through product and process, a company renowned for customizable pre-designed architecture and timber framing, and Diane Burgio Design, a company that specializes in interior architecture and decor, you've got layers of people and businesses that are committed to sustainable development. Their sights are aimed at the connection between a particular landscape and emerging technologies. They are focused on where the global system meets the local one. They aspire to use their research, experience and technologies to explore this knowledge, which could be downscaled from an upscale development into transforming the building industry and increasing the standards for affordable housing.
"The idea of carbon neutrality for the entirety of the community is really exciting to me. It's a lifelong passion," said Hale at the October 9 ribbon cutting on the nearly $900,000 model home.
"It's a weird business model," he said. "I'm building prototypes such as this, and then I am out there to make sure that everybody else can build it just like this as well.
"We're all about open source, and making this a model for how you build properties in the future. The design is tremendous, but the performance is amazing. I have been out there saying 'everyone should do it this way,' without having done it yet. And now that we have it, it is remarkable. We haven't had the heating or cooling system turned on as we have been finishing this and the house just performs. The principles just work. You get the sun in the winter time, and it warms it up. You have the shades above the windows and in the summertime, cools it down. It's really exciting."
He outlined the connections and the future.
"This is all about partnership. We are actively working to set up some workshops with the high school and the college and share how we did it here and how they can do it as well."
Other collaborations include Ulster Saving Bank for financing and Coldwell Banker Timberland Properties, with James Karpowicz as the real estate agent.
"Collaboration starts with a vision and a lot of people who know how to implement the vision," said Hans Porschitz, Bensonwood COO. Porschitz is a member and coordinator of the collaborative "Open-Prototype Initiative," and has participated in many innovative projects including Net-Zero, LEED Platinum, Unity House, and BrightBuilt Barn, as well as the famous Loblolly house.
"This collaboration is great design with the technology to build homes that really perform and have the tradesmen who can really finish them to make them as beautiful as they are," Porschitz said.
For more, visit www.thecatskillproject.com
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Available in Checkout
The Gate Crafters sensor is a multipurpose exit sensor and vehicle detector that allows hands free access; and, because of its simple design, it is compatible with most gate openers including the Estate Swing, Apollo, Zareba, and many others. The single piece design provides the installer with a simple installation procedure. The Gate Crafters Exit Sensor is buried in the ground so a potential intruder or vandals do not notice it. The Gate Crafters have a wide range of power supply options from 9V to 41V AC or DC. Low current consumption makes it an excellent choice for solar power applications.
The Gate Crafters sensor uses a passive probe sensor to detect changes in the earth's magnetic field. These changes are caused by a movement of ferrous metal objects such as a car in the proximity of the probe. The sensing area of each probe is in the shape of about 15-foot circle. The size of this detection circle changes with the size and speed of the moving car. The Gate Crafters sensor can be buried in the ground about 6 inches deep parallel to the paved driveway. It also can be placed 2 inches deep in asphalt or concrete under the path of the vehicle.
Note: Exit wands/sensors should not be used on properties in which the driveway gate is designed to keep in pets, children or livestock due to the possibility for unintentional openings. Our suggestion is to use a keypad for exiting so the gate will only open when it is intended to by code.
Use this formula to calculate how far from the gate the loops should be placed so that by the time a car reaches the gate, the gate will be completely open:
Exit Loop formula: x*(y*1.46)=z
x = time for gate to open in seconds.
y = Desired MPH to reach gate.
z = how far from gate.
FYI - 1.46 converts miles per hour to feet per second. We also recommend adding in 10 to 20 feet so the gate is fully open at a comfortable distance
from the
For placement of a safety loop before and after the gate use the formula below. A safety loop is designed to stop the motion of the gate before the
car reaches
the gate. The distance below should give an ample amount of time for the gate to stop before hitting a vehicle:
Safety Formula: 4 feet before a closed gate and after an opened gate.
"We are always getting questions about how gate exit wands work and how they are different from exit loops.
Exit wands are what is know as a magnetometer which senses changes in the Earth's magnetic field. An easy way to explain how exit wands work is to picture a boat traveling through the water. As the boat is traveling it is creating waves. As your car travels through the magnetic field of the Earth it creates similar waves, like the boat. The exit wand's magnetometer picks up on these waves as you travel by the wand. One downside of exit wands is that they do lose sight of your vehicle when it is stopped.
Gate Crafters carries 5 different types of exit wands that work very similar to each other. The only difference between these wands is some of their features. The GTO/PRO wireless exit wand is wireless between the magnetometer and receiver. The Gate Crafters exit wand is manufactured by EMX and has been around for years. The GTO exit wand is recommended for use with other GTO openers and accessories. The Estate Swing exit wand does come with a range control board that allows you to adjust the sensitivity of the magnetometer. This feature allows you tune down the range of the exit wand so that vehicles such as a lawnmower don't set open your gate, but this isn't a complete failsafe, as it will still operate the gate opener when something is nearby. The Estate Swing Deluxe Exit wand is the most different from the other exit wands. It is constructed out of copper and features a ground cable that attaches to a grounding rod that helps protect this exit wand from lightning strikes. The other 4 exit wands do not have this feature and are susceptible to damage from lightning strikes. Also, the Estate Swing Deluxe Exit Wand comes with a 5 year warranty, which is longer than any other exit wand we sell.
Exit loops differ from exit wands in that they are buried in the driveway in a loop and are wire to the gate opener. The way exit loops work is that they detect the presence of metal (your car) above the loop. It does not matter if your car is moving or not, the loop will detect the car. Besides being used to exit your property, exit loops are used for safety. When exit loops are used as a safety device, they will prevent your gate from closing on your car, when they detect a car nearby to your gate. The exit loop is wired to an exit loop detector, which is then wired into your gate opener's control board.
GateCrafters.com is a one stop shop for gate openers and gate accessories at a great price. Gate Crafters was started on the idea of providing gate openers and accessories along with great customer service to our valued customers. We have technical support available to you 7 days a week from 9 am to 9 pm, eastern time. Our experts are standing by to take your phone call, answer your email, or chat with you with our live chat on our website. We welcome any question you may have and can help you put together a complete package for you so your gate operates how you want it to. We look forward to hearing from you.
Manual: Vehicle Motion DetectorManual: Spec sheetQB ID: VMD-202-5-50


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Date 08/05
Day 3
Location N68 19.632 W 046 58.187
Distance (day/total) 0/106 miles
Weather Strong wind and whiteout for most of day
Wind 20-40 mph Temp -8c
Well not much progress today..strong winds and whiteout conditions meant that today's activities were tent-bound administrative duties. We got word that the Norwegians that were with us in the helicopter had made progress today and overtaken us by about 50 miles. It is always a difficult call as to when to push in marginal conditions and when to play it safe. Because this is our first major snowkiting expedition we had previously set some ground rules so our go/no-go decisions were largely made without protracted debate on the trip. These basic rules were:
A) Wind speeds over 35mph would be avoided
B) Temperatures of below -30 deg C would see us in the tent.
C) Visibility less than 100 metres – stop.
So rule A and C kicked in today and that was that. That is not to say that we wouldn't consider a little bit of flex in the rules but when the forecast was to worsen and we would have had to pack and unpack the tent again, it was an easy call. 1000 miles is a long way and it would be silly to put ourselves into the "red-zone" so early on. Snowkiting is very much a game of strategy, very similar to sailing the oceans – you play the long game and accept that you can't win everyday.
So the childish glee at being 30 miles ahead of our Norwegian friends yesterday has been replaced by our despair at maybe missing an opportunity today – but safely tucked up in our warm sleeping bags with a copy of Peter Kay live on the tablet, we are the lucky ones….
Track the progress of Leo Houlding's month-long 1000 mile snowkiting expedition across Greenland's ice cap with 10 minute updates on the adventurers location.


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Novembers edition of Vital Label
Who's behind it?
The label was formed in 2011 by Sasha alongside a tight-knit team of dancefloor regulars in London. Sasha says that he wanted to start a new imprint that was about supporting new electronic music talent, as well as his new productions.
"The idea with the label was always to nurture upcoming talented producears and also give me an outlet for my club tracks and remixes," Sasha tells DJ Mag.
Sounds like?
Hard to pinpoint, but LNOE seems to have a specific feeling and vibe to its output. It's got a very wide variety of sound with many alternate genres but lots of diversity and emotion, layers of depth. "We have always looked for music with a certain musical edge that fits with my love of things with a wonky melodic sound," says Sasha.
Who's currently on it?
Various artists are on the label including Henry Saiz, Hunter/Game, Ejeca and Alex Niggemann. The most recent release is an EP titled 'Just Too Late For Summer' by Thermalbear. The label has also seen releases by Sasha himself, with a massive remix of Hot Chip 'Flutes' in 2012 and a Bonobo remix in 2013.
Who's playing it?
Sasha loves testing the crowd reactions to the newest releases before they come out, which gives the records great exposure in the clubbing world. They've also had a vast amount of very different artists playing their material over the years including the likes of Mano Le Tough, Seth Troxler, Davide Squillace, Ivan Smagghe, Scuba, Joris Voorn, Dixon, Adam Beyer, T.E.E.D and Breach.
What's next?
There's a variety of projects in the works at the moment, according to LNOE HQ, including some very interesting collaborations with Sasha, an album from Ghosting Season, and EPs from Simon Baker and Joel Mull. They're currently working on release schedules for 2015 and label showcase events around the world.
"I'm very proud of the way the label has grown and developed since its inception," Sasha tells DJ Mag. "It's ticking along beautifully. We have some really exciting things planned for 2015, some great releases, and I will be collaborating with some of the very talented artists we have championed."
Copyright Thrust Publishing Ltd. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.djmag.com as the source.


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Polygamy as a social practice is against the law in most countries, though there is still the occasional instance of this marriage structure. The term refers to a marriage in which there is more than one spouse, usually more than one wife.
The word "polygamy" comes from the French, Latin and Greek roots in ancient times, meaning "often married" or "many marriages." For centuries, there have been cultures that accepted polygamy as a standard way of life, usually with a man having several wives but occasionally a woman having more than one husband.
The term is not to be confused with bigamy, which has come to mean two separate marriages rather than multiple spouses living in one household as in polygamy. In many cases, when two spouses are in the same household the situation is referred to as polygamy.
Other terms used to discussion a marriage with multiple spouses are "plural marriage" and "polyfidelty," in which a person is true to only two or more spouses. This would separate the way of life from that of someone who has relationships with several people but some outside the marriage.
Polygamy is generally used in reference to marriages of human beings, but the term can also apply in anthropology and zoology. In the past, the anthropological term referred to ancient cultures in which polygamy was traditional and not illegal. In zoology, scientists refer to polygamy as well, since some animals will mate with more than one member of the opposite sex.
The native residents of the African country of Senegal have polygamous marriages as a traditional part of their culture. In this nation, the religious rule of Islam might limit polygamy to a man and four wives. Studies have shown that about half of the women in Senegal are in polygamous marriages.
Cultures have explained polygamy in the past as a necessity, especially in rural areas. Men sometimes had more than one wife in order to produce additional children who could help with the farm work and other labor.
One study by Garenne and de Walle shows that each woman in a Senegalese polygamous marriage has fewer children than the average for women in a single-spouse marriage. In most cases of polygamy, the wives share cooking, cleaning and child-raising duties, generally with little distinction between the children when it comes to feeding and instructing them.
The term has been misused in recent years when referring to sexual activity that does not involve marriage. Some have said that sex with multiple partners is polygamy, but technically the term is one that should be used by sociologists, anthropologists and other scientists who analyze and report on marriage practices in various cultures. One question that has come up in this discussion is whether polygamous marriages involve group sex, in which more than one wife has sexual activity with the lone husband at the same time as another woman. This may occur in some cases but a polygamous marriage is usually conducted with the man and one wife alone for sexual activity.


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Irongate Building Inspections
Company Type: Residential Home Inspections
Launched: Nov 2018
With years of home building experience under it's belt, Irongate Building Inspections provides residential home inspection services. With their certified expert inspectors their goal is to provide their customers with the information they need to have peace of mind when making their decision about purchasing a home.
Services that helped ignite their business
Website Design & Development
Responsive & Mobile Development
Logo & Branding Design
Website, Application or Email Hosting
Search Engine & Website Optimization


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Putting the Project Puzzle Together.
After disengaging an independent developer who over-promised and under-delivered, NCCD urgently sought a reliable Web partner to implement its new website design concept in a short timeframe.
Working to achieve NCCD's highest-priority goals, Dayspring specified a scope of work that got the website produced as quickly as possible, and additionally provided flexibility within the remaining budget to pick and choose among optional elements.
In addition to providing technical support and hosting configuration guidance, Dayspring recommended Google custom search, integrated a WordPress blog, produced sample pages and equipped the NCCD staff to complete the production within the established infrastructure.


text: Overtime has become a significant legal issue in recent years as workers around the country are filing a record number of federal lawsuits alleging employers are violating labor laws by requiring them to work longer than 40 hours without proper pay. This costly litigation is part of the motivation behind the effort to revamp the nation's overtime pay regulations. Attorneys who represent employers say that the overtime rules are outdated and result in frivolous lawsuits.


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Re-Recorded Version On 180g Marble Vinyl LP!
Celebrating The 50th Anniversary Of His Classic Solo Debut Album!
Plated & Pressed at QRP!
Alone Together was my first solo album. Like all firsts, they are special. The original tapes that burned in the 2008 Universal fires was heartbreaking. But it occurs to me, the Music never dies.
I've played these songs for the better part of 50 years because I love them. I re-recorded the whole album because I still feel inspired by the music. This makes Alone Together Again a true labor of love. Some things I know for sure; music is relationship and love is best when shared. That is the whole conceptual play of Alone Together.
We allowed ourselves to have some fun with the presentation of this LP, which is marbled and multicolored, just like the original vinyl. And true to the original album, it's a three part fold out. We tried to find the exact spot in Joshua Tree to reshoot the photo, but, well, it has been over fifty years ago and we couldn't be sure. But we think we recaptured the spirit, nonetheless.
I hope you'll enjoy listening to Alone Together Again as much as I had in making it. And I hope you'll feel the love when you have it in your hands, and when the music hits your heart.
- Dave Mason
Wait! There's More! You'll hear great music, but you'll also have something awesome to look at. Encased in a tri-fold jacket, complete with die-cut image of Dave Mason in a top hat and collaged behind a rocky outcrop. The interior pocket holds your marbled LP, an homage to the legendary original record. Alone Together Again will bring you joy both for the ears and the eyes.
Featured on the album is the Dave Mason Band: Johnne Sambataro on guitar, Alvino Bennett on drums, Anthony Patler on bass and keyboards, and special musical guests John McFee, Jason Roller, Jonathan McEuen, Gretchen Rhodes, Bill Reynolds, Jesse Siebenberg, Teddy Jack Russell and Billy Mason.
- 180g Vinyl
- Multicolor Marble Vinyl
- 2020 re-recorded version of 1970 solo album
- Plated & pressed at QRP
- Custom die-cut triple gatefold jacket
Side 1:
- Only You Know And I Know
- Can't Stop Worrying, Can't Stop Loving
- Waitin' On You
- Shouldn't Have Took More Than You Gave
Side 2:
- World In Changes
- Sad And Deep As You
- Just A Song
- Look At You Look At Me


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Additional information
|0.127868 lbs
|2.5 × .75 × 3.625 in
This genuine plaster Grand Tour intaglio dates circa 1840 and is from a collection by Giovanni Liberotti, a nineteenth-century Roman gem engraver who specialized in making these Grand Tour souvenirs. This intaglio shows a Citerista from a wall painting in Herculaneum and has a small edge chip. The intaglio has been mounted on Italian marbled paper in a unique, resin- like frame in the shape of a temple facade. Please note the small chip on the intaglio. Otherwise in excellent antique condition.
-Size: Length: 2.5 inches, Width: .75 inch, Height: 3.625 inches
Out of stock
|0.127868 lbs
|2.5 × .75 × 3.625 in
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International Women's Day: 'choosing to challenge' and the fight for gender equality
by Muireann Bolger, World Intellectual Property Review, March 2021
For this year's International Women's Day, the theme is #ChooseToChallenge. Leading female attorneys share their thoughts with WIPR about what the campaign theme means to them, the issues affecting women in IP and their efforts to tackle them.
Mari-Elise Paul, attorney, intellectual property and technology group, Stites & Harbison
"Speaking frankly, the theme #ChooseToChallenge is a little scary and runs slightly counter to my nature. Growing up in the northeast of the US and then working for a traditional law firm in a traditional law firm culture, #ChoosingToChallenge does not come easily.
Click here to read this article in its entirety.


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Craig Brown Band–The Lucky Ones Forget
Detroit's Craig Brown released his debut full-length via Third Man Records (SWOON), and it's a countrified hum-dinger. Equal parts honky-tonk hillbilly and dive bar derelict, Brown has crafted a rock and pedal steel-infused collection of barroom punkicana that will surely delight showgoers of all ages.
The Company Stores–Little Lights
Electrified folk mixed with shades of blue, bright horns, and a touch of funk yields one groovy album, y'all. The Company Stores' Little Lights features the sultry sassitude of frontwoman Casey Litz against a fiery backdrop of musicality that begs for a festival-sized stage and a whole lot of sunshine. It's punchy, it's poignant, and it's perfect.
This week we're getting our folkicana fix from Indiana's Matt Record–its heartland-inspired tracks evoke dynamic images of small towns, lost loves, and troubled times, his honest delivery a refreshing ring in the ears. He calls it "micro country," we call it mighty fine.


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King County elementary school student dies from flu complications
SEATTLE - An elementary school-aged child who lived in King County has died from flu complications, marking the first flu death in a King County child in 10 years, according to Seattle-King County Public Health.
The child was healthy before contracting the flu and died Dec. 15 at a Pierce County hospital. Public health officials haven't released the child's age or which hospital the child was admitted to.
It's the fourth King County flu-related death this year.
"Losing a child to influenza is heartbreaking and I want to extend our deep sympathy to the family," said Dr. Jeff Duchin, health officer for Public Health – Seattle & King County. "This death is a tragic reminder of how serious influenza can be, especially for young children, pregnant women, the elderly, and people with long-term health conditions.
"I urge everyone to get an annual flu vaccine and to stay home when sick to help prevent the spread of illness to these more vulnerable groups," continued Duchin. "If you're in a high risk group and develop influenza symptoms, contact your healthcare provider right away – antiviral treatment can prevent serious complications."
King County, Washington state and many areas of the United States are seeing an unusually early start to the influenza season. The predominant strain currently circulating is an influenza B virus, which is particularly dangerous for young children.
"B strains tend to cause more serious illnesses in children relatively to adults, A strains tend to cause more illnesses to adults relatively to children," Dr. Duchin said.
And since this season's B strain has not been around for many years, it could mean more people are susceptible.
"We haven't seen a lot of immunity in the population to the virus," Dr. Duchin said.
Symptoms of flu include fever, cough, sore throat, runny nose, body aches, headache, tiredness, and in some cases vomiting and diarrhea. People who are sick with the flu often feel some or all of these symptoms; not everyone with flu will have a fever.
During the 2017 to 2018 season, 187 children reportedly died from the flu across the country but because the flu is very underreported Dr. Duchin says that number is closer to 600 children. About 80% of those deaths are children who were not vaccinated.
"We don't see a large number of vaccinated kids dying from influenza," Dr. Duchin said.
Other counties are being hit hard by the flu as well. In Snohomish County, many schools are reporting 10% to 20% of absenteeism is because of the flu.


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Glimpses of Bengal
Sir Rabindranath Tagore
Part 2 out of 2
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Index of Glimpses of Bengal
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those distant villages used to appear, like dark green clouds. To-day the
whole of the wood is visible.
Land and water are gradually approaching each other like two bashful
lovers. The limit of their shyness has nearly been reached--their arms
will soon be round each other's necks. I shall enjoy my trip along this
brimful river at the height of the rains. I am fidgeting to give the order
to cast off.
_4th July_ 1893.
A little gleam of sunlight shows this morning. There was a break in the
rains yesterday, but the clouds are banked up so heavily along the skirts
of the sky that there is not much hope of the break lasting. It looks as
if a heavy carpet of cloud had been rolled up to one side, and at any
moment a fussy breeze may come along and spread it over the whole place
again, covering every trace of blue sky and golden sunshine.
What a store of water must have been laid up in the sky this year. The
river has already risen over the low _chur_-lands,[1] threatening to
overwhelm all the standing crops. The wretched ryots, in despair, are
cutting and bringing away in boats sheaves of half-ripe rice. As they pass
my boat I hear them bewailing their fate. It is easy to understand how
heart-rending it must be for cultivators to have to cut down their rice on
the very eve of its ripening, the only hope left them being that some of
the ears may possibly have hardened into grain.
[Footnote 1: Old sand-banks consolidated by the deposit of a layer of
culturable soil.]
There must be some element of pity in the dispensations of Providence,
else how did we get our share of it? But it is so difficult to see where
it comes in. The lamentations of these hundreds of thousands of
unoffending creatures do not seem to get anywhere. The rain pours on as it
lists, the river still rises, and no amount of petitioning seems to have
the effect of bringing relief from any quarter. One has to seek
consolation by saying that all this is beyond the understanding of man.
And yet, it is so vitally necessary for man to understand that there are
such things as pity and justice in the world.
However, this is only sulking. Reason tells us that creation never can be
perfectly happy. So long as it is incomplete it must put up with
imperfection and sorrow. It can only be perfect when it ceases to be
creation, and is God. Do our prayers dare go so far?
The more we think over it, the oftener we come hack to the
starting-point--Why this creation at all? If we cannot make up our minds
to object to the thing itself, it is futile complaining about its
companion, sorrow.
_7th July_ 1893.
The flow of village life is not too rapid, neither is it stagnant. Work
and rest go together, hand in hand. The ferry crosses to and fro, the
passers-by with umbrellas up wend their way along the tow-path, women are
washing rice on the split-bamboo trays which they dip in the water, the
ryots are coming to the market with bundles of jute on their heads. Two
men are chopping away at a log of wood with regular, ringing blows. The
village carpenter is repairing an upturned dinghy under a big
_aswatha_ tree. A mongrel dog is prowling aimlessly along the canal
bank. Some cows are lying there chewing the cud, after a huge meal off the
luxuriant grass, lazily moving their ears backwards and forwards, flicking
off flies with their tails, and occasionally giving an impatient toss of
their heads when the crows perched on their backs take too much of a
The monotonous blows of woodcutter's axe or carpenter's mallet, the
splashing of oars, the merry voices of the naked little children at play,
the plaintive tune of the ryot's song, the more dominant creaking of the
turning oil-mill, all these sounds of activity do not seem out of harmony
with murmuring leaves and singing birds, and all combine like moving
strains of some grand dream-orchestra, rendering a composition of immense
though restrained pathos.
_10th July 1893._
All I have to say about the discussion that is going on over "silent
poets" is that, though the strength of feeling may be the same in those
who are silent as in those who are vocal, that has nothing to do with
poetry. Poetry is not a matter of feeling, it is the creation of form.
Ideas take shape by some hidden, subtle skill at work within the poet.
This creative power is the origin of poetry. Perceptions, feelings, or
language, are only raw material. One may be gifted with feeling, a second
with language, a third with both; but he who has as well a creative
genius, alone is a poet.
_13th August 1893._
Coming through these _beels_[1] to Kaligram, an idea took shape in my
mind. Not that the thought was new, but sometimes old ideas strike one
with new force.
[Footnote 1: _Translator's Note_.--Sometimes a stream passing through the
flat Bengal country encounters a stretch of low land and spreads out into
a sheet of water, called a _beel_, of indefinite extent, ranging from a
large pool in the dry season to a shoreless expanse during the rains.
Villages consisting of a cluster of huts, built on mounds, stand out here
and there like islands, and boats or round, earthen vessels are the only
means of getting about from village to village.
Where the waters cover cultivated tracts the rice grows through, often
from considerable depths, giving to the boats sailing over them the
curious appearance of gliding over a cornfield, so clear is the water.
Elsewhere these _beels_ have a peculiar flora and fauna of water-lilies
and irises and various water-fowl. As a result, they resemble neither a
marsh nor a lake, but have a distinct character of their own.]
The water loses its beauty when it ceases to be defined by banks and
spreads out into a monotonous vagueness. In the case of language, metre
serves for banks and gives form and beauty and character. Just as the
banks give each river a distinct personality, so does rhythm make each
poem an individual creation; prose is like the featureless, impersonal
_beel_. Again, the waters of the river have movement and progress; those
of the _beel_ engulf the country by expanse alone. So, in order to give
language power, the narrow bondage of metre becomes necessary; otherwise
it spreads and spreads, but cannot advance.
The country people call these _beels_ "dumb waters"--they have no
language, no self-expression. The river ceaselessly babbles; so the words
of the poem sing, they are not "dumb words." Thus bondage creates beauty
of form, motion, and music; bounds make not only for beauty but power.
Poetry gives itself up to the control of metre, not led by blind habit,
but because it thus finds the joy of motion. There are foolish persons who
think that metre is a species of verbal gymnastics, or legerdemain, of
which the object is to win the admiration of the crowd. That is not so.
Metre is born as all beauty is born the universe through. The current set
up within well-defined bounds gives metrical verse power to move the minds
of men as vague and indefinite prose cannot.
This idea became clear to me as I glided on from river to _beel_ and
_beel_ to river.
_26th (Straven) August 1893._
For some time it has struck me that man is a rough-hewn and woman a
finished product.
There is an unbroken consistency in the manners, customs, speech, and
adornment of woman. And the reason is, that for ages Nature has assigned
to her the same definite role and has been adapting her to it. No
cataclysm, no political revolution, no alteration of social ideal, has yet
diverted woman from her particular functions, nor destroyed their
inter-relations. She has loved, tended, and caressed, and done nothing
else; and the exquisite skill which she has acquired in these, permeates
all her being and doing. Her disposition and action have become
inseparably one, like the flower and its scent. She has, therefore, no
doubts or hesitations.
But the character of man has still many hollows and protuberances; each of
the varied circumstances and forces which have contributed to his making
has left its mark upon him. That is why the features of one will display
an indefinite spread of forehead, of another an irresponsible prominence
of nose, of a third an unaccountable hardness about the jaws. Had man but
the benefit of continuity and uniformity of purpose, Nature must have
succeeded in elaborating a definite mould for him, enabling him to
function simply and naturally, without such strenuous effort. He would not
have so complicated a code of behaviour; and he would be less liable to
deviate from the normal when disturbed by outside influences.
Woman was cast in the mould of mother. Man has no such primal design to go
by, and that is why he has been unable to rise to an equal perfection of
_19th February 1894._
We have two elephants which come to graze on this bank of the river. They
greatly interest me. They give the ground a few taps with one foot, and
then taking hold of the grass with the end of their trunks wrench off an
enormous piece of turf, roots, soil, and all. This they go on swinging
till all the earth leaves the roots; they then put it into their mouths
and eat it up.
Sometimes the whim takes them to draw up the dust into their trunks, and
then with a snort they squirt it all over their bodies; this is their
elephantine toilet.
I love to look on these overgrown beasts, with their vast bodies, their
immense strength, their ungainly proportions, their docile harmlessness.
Their very size and clumsiness make me feel a kind of tenderness for
them--their unwieldy bulk has something infantile about it. Moreover, they
have large hearts. When they get wild they are furious, but when they calm
down they are peace itself.
The uncouthness which goes with bigness does not repel, it rather
_27th February 1894._
The sky is every now and then overcast and again clears up. Sudden little
puffs of wind make the boat lazily creak and groan in all its seams. Thus
the day wears on.
It is now past one o'clock. Steeped in this countryside noonday, with its
different sounds--the quacking of ducks, the swirl of passing boats,
bathers splashing the clothes they wash, the distant shouts from drovers
taking cattle across the ford,--it is difficult even to imagine the
chair-and-table, monotonously dismal routine-life of Calcutta.
Calcutta is as ponderously proper as a Government office. Each of its days
comes forth, like coin from a mint, clear-cut and glittering. Ah! those
dreary, deadly days, so precisely equal in weight, so decently
Here I am quit of the demands of my circle, and do not feel like a wound
up machine. Each day is my own. And with leisure and my thoughts I walk
the fields, unfettered by bounds of space or time. The evening gradually
deepens over earth and sky and water, as with bowed head I stroll along.
_22nd March 1894._
As I was sitting at the window of the boat, looking out on the river, I
saw, all of a sudden, an odd-looking bird making its way through the water
to the opposite bank, followed by a great commotion. I found it was a
domestic fowl which had managed to escape impending doom in the galley by
jumping overboard and was now trying frantically to win across. It had
almost gained the bank when the clutches of its relentless pursuers closed
on it, and it was brought back in triumph, gripped by the neck. I told the
cook I would not have any meat for dinner.
I really must give up animal food. We manage to swallow flesh only because
we do not think of the cruel and sinful thing we do. There are many crimes
which are the creation of man himself, the wrongfulness of which is put
down to their divergence from habit, custom, or tradition. But cruelty is
not of these. It is a fundamental sin, and admits of no argument or nice
distinctions. If only we do not allow our heart to grow callous, its
protest against cruelty is always clearly heard; and yet we go on
perpetrating cruelties easily, merrily, all of us--in fact, any one who
does not join in is dubbed a crank.
How artificial is our apprehension of sin! I feel that the highest
commandment is that of sympathy for all sentient beings. Love is the
foundation of all religion. The other day I read in one of the English
papers that 50,000 pounds of animal carcasses had been sent to some army
station in Africa, but the meat being found to have gone bad on arrival,
the consignment was returned and was eventually auctioned off for a few
pounds at Portsmouth. What a shocking waste of life! What callousness to
its true worth! How many living creatures are sacrificed only to grace the
dishes at a dinner-party, a large proportion of which will leave the table
So long as we are unconscious of our cruelty we may not be to blame. But
if, after our pity is aroused, we persist in throttling our feelings
simply in order to join others in their preying upon life, we insult all
that is good in us. I have decided to try a vegetarian diet.
_28th March 1894._
It is getting rather warm here, but I do not mind the heat of the sun
much. The heated wind whistles on its way, now and then pauses in a whirl,
then dances away twirling its skirt of dust and sand and dry leaves and
This morning, however, it was quite cold--almost like a cold-weather
morning; in fact, I did not feel over-enthusiastic for my bath. It is so
difficult to account for what veritably happens in this big thing called
Nature. Some obscure cause turns up in some unknown corner, and all of a
sudden things look completely different.
The mind of man works in just the same mysterious fashion as outside
Nature--so it struck me yesterday. A wondrous alchemy is being wrought in
artery, vein, and nerve, in brain and marrow. The blood-stream rushes on,
the nerve--strings vibrate, the heart-muscle rises and falls, and the
seasons in man's being change from one to another. What kind of breezes
will blow next, when and from what quarter--of that we know nothing.
One day I am sure I shall get along splendidly; I feel strong enough to
leap over all the obstructing sorrows and trials of the world; and, as if
I had a printed programme for the rest of my life tucked safely away in my
pocket, I am at ease. The next day there is a nasty wind, sprung up from
some unknown _inferno_, the aspect of the sky is threatening, and I
begin to doubt whether I shall ever weather the storm. Merely because
something has gone wrong in some blood-vessel or nerve-fibre, all my
strength and intelligence seem to fail me.
This mystery within frightens me. It makes me diffident about talking of
what I shall or shall not do. Why was this tacked on to me--this immense
mystery which I can neither understand nor control? I know not where it
may lead me or I lead it. I cannot see what is happening, nor am I
consulted about what is going to happen, and yet I have to keep up an
appearance of mastery and pretend to be the doer....
I feel like a living pianoforte with a vast complication of machinery and
wires inside, but with no means of telling who the player is, and with
only a guess as to why the player plays at all. I can only know what is
being played, whether the mode is merry or mournful, when the notes are
sharp or flat, the tune in or out of time, the key high-pitched or low.
But do I really know even that?
_30th March 1894._
Sometimes when I realise that Life's journey is long, and that the sorrows
to be encountered are many and inevitable, a supreme effort is required to
keep up my strength of mind. Some evenings, as I sit alone staring at the
flame of the lamp on the table, I vow I will live as a brave man
should--unmoved, silent, uncomplaining. The resolve puffs me up, and for
the moment I mistake myself for a very, very brave person indeed. But as
soon as the thorns on the road worry my feet, I writhe and begin to feel
serious misgivings as to the future. The path of life again seems long,
and my strength inadequate.
But this last conclusion cannot be the true one, for it is these petty
thorns which are the most difficult to bear. The household of the mind is
a thrifty one, and only so much is spent as is necessary. There is no
squandering on trifles, and its wealth of strength is saved up with
miserly strictness to meet the really big calamities. So any amount of
weeping and wailing over the lesser griefs fails to evoke a charitable
response. But when sorrow is deepest there is no stint of effort. Then the
surface crust is pierced, and consolation wells up, and all the forces of
patience and courage are banded together to do their duty. Thus great
suffering brings with it the power of great endurance.
One side of man's nature has the desire for pleasure--there is another
side which desires self-sacrifice. When the former meets with
disappointment, the latter gains strength, and on its thus finding fuller
scope a grand enthusiasm fills the soul. So while we are cowards before
petty troubles, great sorrows make us brave by rousing our truer manhood.
And in these, therefore, there is a joy.
It is not an empty paradox to say that there is joy in sorrow, just as, on
the other hand, it is true that there is a dissatisfaction in pleasure. It
is not difficult to understand why this should be so.
_24th June 1894_.
I have been only four days here, but, having lost count of the hours, it
seems such a long while, I feel that if I were to return to Calcutta
to-day I should find much of it changed--as if I alone had been standing
still outside the current of time, unconscious of the gradually changing
position of the rest of the world.
The fact is that here, away from Calcutta, I live in my own inner world,
where the clocks do not keep ordinary time; where duration is measured
only by the intensity of the feelings; where, as the outside world does
not count the minutes, moments change into hours and hours into moments.
So it seems to me that the subdivisions of time and space are only mental
illusions. Every atom is immeasurable and every moment infinite.
There is a Persian story which I was greatly taken with when I read it as
a boy--I think I understood, even then, something of the underlying idea,
though I was a mere child. To show the illusory character of time, a
_faquir_ put some magic water into a tub and asked the King to take a
dip. The King no sooner dipped his head in than he found himself in a
strange country by the sea, where he spent a good long time going through
a variety of happenings and doings. He married, had children, his wife and
children died, he lost all his wealth, and as he writhed under his
sufferings he suddenly found himself back in the room, surrounded by his
courtiers. On his proceeding to revile the _faquir_ for his
misfortunes, they said: "But, Sire, you have only just dipped your head
in, and raised it out of the water!"
The whole of our life with its pleasures and pains is in the same way
enclosed in one moment of time. However long or intense we may feel it to
be while it lasts, as soon as we have finished our dip in the tub of the
world, we shall find how like a slight, momentary dream the whole thing
has been....
_9th August 1894._
I saw a dead bird floating down the current to-day. The history of its
death may easily be divined. It had a nest in some mango tree at the edge
of a village. It returned home in the evening, nestling there against
soft-feathered companions, and resting a wearied little body in sleep. All
of a sudden, in the night, the mighty Padma tossed slightly in her bed,
and the earth was swept away from the roots of the mango tree. The little
creature bereft of its nest awoke just for a moment before it went to
sleep again for ever.
When I am in the presence of the awful mystery of all-destructive Nature,
the difference between myself and the other living things seems trivial.
In town, human society is to the fore and looms large; it is cruelly
callous to the happiness and misery of other creatures as compared with
its own.
In Europe, also, man is so complex and so dominant, that the animal is too
merely an animal to him. To Indians the idea of the transmigration of the
soul from animal to man, and man to animal, does not seem strange, and so
from our scriptures pity for all sentient creatures has not been banished
as a sentimental exaggeration.
When I am in close touch with Nature in the country, the Indian in me
asserts itself and I cannot remain coldly indifferent to the abounding joy
of life throbbing within the soft down-covered breast of a single tiny
_10th August 1894._
Last night a rushing sound in the water awoke me--a sudden boisterous
disturbance of the river current--probably the onslaught of a freshet: a
thing that often happens at this season. One's feet on the planking of the
boat become aware of a variety of forces at work beneath it. Slight
tremors, little rockings, gentle heaves, and sudden jerks, all keep me in
touch with the pulse of the flowing stream.
There must have been some sudden excitement in the night, which sent the
current racing away. I rose and sat by the window. A hazy kind of light
made the turbulent river look madder than ever. The sky was spotted with
clouds. The reflection of a great big star quivered on the waters in a
long streak, like a burning gash of pain. Both banks were vague with the
dimness of slumber, and between them was this wild, sleepless unrest,
running and running regardless of consequences.
To watch a scene like this in the middle of the night makes one feel
altogether a different person, and the daylight life an illusion. Then
again, this morning, that midnight world faded away into some dreamland,
and vanished into thin air. The two are so different, yet both are true
for man.
The day-world seems to me like European Music--its concords and discords
resolving into each other in a great progression of harmony; the
night-world like Indian Music--pure, unfettered melody, grave and
poignant. What if their contrast be so striking--both move us. This
principle of opposites is at the very root of creation, which is divided
between the rule of the King and the Queen; Night and Day; the One and the
Varied; the Eternal and the Evolving.
We Indians are under the rule of Night. We are immersed in the Eternal,
the One. Our melodies are to be sung alone, to oneself; they take us out
of the everyday world into a solitude aloof. European Music is for the
multitude and takes them along, dancing, through the ups and downs of the
joys and sorrows of men.
_13th August 1894._
Whatever I truly think, truly feel, truly realise,--its natural destiny is
to find true expression. There is some force in me which continually works
towards that end, but is not mine alone,--it permeates the universe. When
this universal force is manifested within an individual, it is beyond his
control and acts according to its own nature; and in surrendering our
lives to its power is our greatest joy. It not only gives us expression,
but also sensitiveness and love; this makes our feelings so fresh to us
every time, so full of wonder.
When my little daughter delights me, she merges into the original mystery
of joy which is the Universe; and my loving caresses are called forth like
worship. I am sure that all our love is but worship of the Great Mystery,
only we perform it unconsciously. Otherwise it is meaningless.
Like universal gravitation, which governs large and small alike in the
world of matter, this universal joy exerts its attraction throughout our
inner world, and baffles our understanding when we see it in a partial
view. The only rational explanation of why we find joy in man and nature
is given in the Upanishad:
For of joy are born all created things.
_19th August 1894._
The Vedanta seems to help many to free their minds from all doubt as to
the Universe and its First Cause, but my doubts remain undispelled. It is
true that the Vedanta is simpler than most other theories. The problem of
Creation and its Creator is more complex than appears at first sight; but
the Vedanta has certainly simplified it half way, by cutting the Gordian
knot and leaving out Creation altogether.
There is only Brahma, and the rest of us merely imagine that we are,--it
is wonderful how the human mind should have found room for such a thought.
It is still more wonderful to think that the idea is not so inconsistent
as it sounds, and the real difficulty is, rather, to prove that anything
does exist.
Anyhow, when as now the moon is up, and with half-closed eyes I am
stretched beneath it on the upper deck, the soft breeze cooling my
problem-vexed head, then the earth, waters, and sky around, the gentle
rippling of the river, the casual wayfarer passing along the tow-path, the
occasional dinghy gliding by, the trees across the fields, vague in the
moonlight, the sleepy village beyond, bounded by the dark shadows of its
groves,--verily seem an illusion of _Maya_; and yet they cling to and
draw the mind and heart more truly than truth itself, which is
abstraction, and it becomes impossible to realise what kind of salvation
there can be in freeing oneself from them.
_5th September 1894._
I realise how hungry for space I have become, and take my fill of it in
these rooms where I hold my state as sole monarch, with all doors and
windows thrown open. Here the desire and power to write are mine as they
are nowhere else. The stir of outside life comes into me in waves of
verdure, and with its light and scent and sound stimulated my fancy into
The afternoons have a special enchantment of their own. The glare of the
sun, the silence, the solitude, the bird cries, especially the cawings of
crows, and the delightful, restful leisure--these conspire to carry me
away altogether.
Just such noondays seem to have gone to the making of the Arabian
Nights,--in Damascus, Bokhara, or Samarkhand, with their desert roadways,
files of camels, wandering horsemen, crystal springs, welling up under the
shade of feathery date groves; their wilderness of roses, songs of
nightingales, wines of Shiraz; their narrow bazaar paths with bright
overhanging canopies, the men, in loose robes and multi-coloured turbans,
selling dates and nuts and melons; their palaces, fragrant with incense,
luxurious with kincob-covered divans and bolsters by the window-side;
their Zobedia or Amina or Sufia with gaily decorated jacket, wide
trousers, and gold-embroidered slippers, a long narghilah pipe curled up
at her feet, with gorgeously liveried eunuchs on guard,--and all the
possible and impossible tales of human deeds and desires, and the laughter
and wailing, of that distant mysterious region.
_20th September 1894._
Big trees are standing in the flood water, their trunks wholly submerged,
their branches and foliage bending over the waters. Boats are tied up
under shady groves of mango and bo tree, and people bathe screened behind
them. Here and there cottages stand out in the current, their inner
quadrangles under water.
As my boat rustles its way through standing crops it now and then comes
across what was a pool and is still to be distinguished by its clusters of
water-lilies, and diver-birds pursuing fish.
The water has penetrated every possible place. I have never before seen
such a complete defeat of the land. A little more and the water will be
right inside the cottages, and their occupants will have to put up
_machans_ to live on. The cows will die if they have to remain
standing like this in water up to their knees. All the snakes have been
flooded out of their holes, and they, with sundry other homeless reptiles
and insects, will have to chum with man and take refuge on the thatch of
his roof.
The vegetation rotting in the water, refuse of all kinds floating about,
naked children with shrivelled limbs and enlarged spleens splashing
everywhere, the long-suffering patient housewives exposed in their wet
clothes to wind and rain, wading through their daily tasks with tucked-up
skirts, and over all a thick pall of mosquitoes hovering in the noxious
atmosphere--the sight is hardly pleasing!
Colds and fevers and rheumatism in every home, the malaria-stricken
infants constantly crying,--nothing can save them. How is it possible for
men to live in such unlovely, unhealthy, squalid, neglected surroundings?
The fact is we are so used to bear everything, hands down,--the ravages of
Nature, the oppression of rulers, the pressure of our _shastras_ to
which we have not a word to say, while they keep eternally grinding us
_22nd September 1894._
It feels strange to be reminded that only thirty-two Autumns have come and
gone in my life; for my memory seems to have receded back into the dimness
of time immemorial; and when my inner world is flooded with a light, as of
an unclouded autumn morning, I feel I am sitting at the window of some
magic palace, gazing entranced on a scene of distant reminiscence, soothed
with soft breezes laden with the faint perfume of all the Past.
Goethe on his death-bed wanted "more light." If I have any desire left at
all at such a time, it will be for "more space" as well; for I dearly love
both light and space. Many look down on Bengal as being only a flat
country, but that is just what makes me revel in its scenery all the more.
Its unobstructed sky is filled to the brim, like an amethyst cup, with the
descending twilight and peace of the evening; and the golden skirt of the
still, silent noonday spreads over the whole of it without let or
Where is there another such country for the eye to look on, the mind to
take in?
_5th October 1894._
To-morrow is the Durga Festival. As I was going to S----'s yesterday, I
noticed images being made in almost every big house on the way. It struck
me that during these few days of the Poojahs, old and young alike had
become children.
When we come to think of it, all preparation for enjoyment is really a
playing with toys which are of no consequence in themselves. From outside
it may appear wasteful, but can that be called futile which raises such a
wave of feeling through and through the country? Even the driest of
worldly-wise people are moved out of their self-centred interests by the
rush of the pervading emotion.
Thus, once every year there comes a period when all minds are in a melting
mood, fit for the springing of love and affection and sympathy. The songs
of welcome and farewell to the goddess, the meeting of loved ones, the
strains of the festive pipes, the limpid sky and molten gold of autumn,
are all parts of one great paean of joy.
Pure joy is the children's joy. They have the power of using any and every
trivial thing to create their world of interest, and the ugliest doll is
made beautiful with their imagination and lives with their life. He who
can retain this faculty of enjoyment after he has grown up, is indeed the
true Idealist. For him things are not merely visible to the eye or audible
to the ear, but they are also sensible to the heart, and their narrowness
and imperfections are lost in the glad music which he himself supplies.
Every one cannot hope to be an Idealist, but a whole people approaches
nearest to this blissful state at such seasons of festivity. And then what
may ordinarily appear to be a mere toy loses its limitations and becomes
glorified with an ideal radiance.
_19th October 1894._
We know people only in dotted outline, that is to say, with gaps in our
knowledge which we have to fill in ourselves, as best we can. Thus, even
those we know well are largely made up of our imagination. Sometimes the
lines are so broken, with even the guiding dots missing, that a portion of
the picture remains darkly confused and uncertain. If, then, our best
friends are only pieces of broken outline strung on a thread of
imagination, do we really know anybody at all, or does anybody know us
except in the same disjointed fashion? But perhaps it is these very
loopholes, allowing entrance to each other's imagination, which make for
intimacy; otherwise each one, secure in his inviolate individuality, would
have been unapproachable to all but the Dweller within.
Our own self, too, we know only in bits, and with these scraps of material
we have to shape the hero of our life-story,--likewise with the help of
our imagination. Providence has, doubtless, deliberately omitted portions
so that we may assist in our own creation.
_31st October 1894._
The first of the north winds has begun to blow to-day, shiveringly. It
looks as if there had been a visitation of the tax-gatherer in the
_Amlaki_ groves,--everything beside itself, sighing, trembling,
withering. The tired impassiveness of the noonday sunshine, with its
monotonous cooing of doves in the dense shade of the mango-tops, seems to
overcast the drowsy watches of the day with a pang, as of some impending
The ticking of the clock on my table, and the pattering of the squirrels
which scamper in and out of my room, are in harmony with all other midday
It amuses me to watch these soft, grey and black striped, furry squirrels,
with their bushy tails, their twinkling bead-like eyes, their gentle yet
busily practical demeanour. Everything eatable has to be put away in the
wire-gauze cupboard in the corner, safe from these greedy creatures. So,
sniffing with an irrepressible eagerness, they come nosing round and round
the cupboard, trying to find some hole for entrance. If any grain or crumb
has been dropped outside they are sure to find it, and, taking it between
their forepaws, nibble away with great industry, turning it over and over
to adjust it to their mouths. At the least movement of mine up go their
tails over their backs and off they run, only to stop short half-way, sit
up on their tails on the door-mat, scratching their ears with their
hind-paws, and then come back.
Thus little sounds continue all day long--gnawing teeth, scampering feet,
and the tinkling of the china on the shelves.
_7th December 1894._
As I walk on the moonlit sands, S---- usually comes up for a business
He came last evening; and when silence fell upon me after the talk was
over, I became aware of the eternal universe standing before me in the
evening light. The trivial chatter of one person had been enough to
obscure the presence of its all-pervading manifestation.
As soon as the patter of words came to an end, the peace of the stars
descended, and filled my heart to overflowing. I found my seat in one
corner, with these assembled millions of shining orbs, in the great
mysterious conclave of Being.
I have to start out early in the evening so as to let my mind absorb the
tranquillity outside, before S---- comes along with his jarring inquiries
as to whether the milk has agreed with me, and if I have finished going
through the Annual Statement.
How curiously placed are we between the Eternal and the Ephemeral! Any
allusion to the affairs of the stomach sounds so hopelessly discordant
when the mind is dwelling on the things of the spirit,--and yet the soul
and the stomach have been living together so long. The very spot on which
the moonlight falls is my landed property, but the moonlight tells me that
my _zamindari_ is an illusion, and my _zamindari_ tells me that
this moonlight is all emptiness. And as for poor me, I remain distracted
between the two.
_23rd February_ 1895.
I grow quite absent-minded when I try to write for the _Sadhana_
I raise my eyes to every passing boat and keep staring at the ferry going
to and fro. And then on the bank, close to my boat, there are a herd of
buffaloes thrusting their massive snouts into the herbage, wrapping their
tongues round it to get it into their mouths, and then munching away,
blowing hard with great big gasps of contentment, and flicking the flies
off their backs with their tails.
All of a sudden a naked weakling of a human cub appears on the scene,
makes sundry noises, and pokes one of the patient beasts with a cudgel,
whereupon, throwing occasional glances at the human sprig out of a corner
of its eye, and snatching at tufts of leaves or grass here and there on
the way, the unruffled beast leisurely moves on a few paces, and that imp
of a boy seems to feel that his duty as herdsman has been done.
I fail to penetrate this mystery of the boy-cowherd's mind. Whenever a cow
or a buffalo has selected a spot to its liking and is comfortably grazing
there, I cannot divine what purpose is served by worrying it, as he
insists on doing, till it shifts somewhere else. I suppose it is man's
masterfulness glorying in triumph over the powerful creature it has tamed.
Anyhow, I love to see these buffaloes amongst the lush grass.
But this is not what I started to say. I wanted to tell you how the least
thing distracts me nowadays from my duty to the _Sadhana_. In my last
letter[1] I told you of the bumble-bees which hover round me in some
fruitless quest, to the tune of a meaningless humming, with tireless
[Footnote 1: Not included in this selection.]
They come every day at about nine or ten in the morning, dart up to my
table, shoot down under the desk, go bang on to the coloured glass
window-pane, and then with a circuit or two round my head are off again
with a whizz.
I could easily have thought them to be departed spirits who had left this
world unsatisfied, and so keep coming back to it again and again in the
guise of bees, paying me an inquiring visit in passing. But I think
nothing of the kind. I am sure they are real bees, otherwise known, in
Sanskrit, as honey-suckers, or on still rarer occasions as
_16th (Phalgun) February_ 1895.
We have to tread every single moment of the way as we go on living our
life, but when taken as a whole it is such a very small thing, two hours
uninterrupted thought can hold all of it.
After thirty years of strenuous living Shelley could only supply material
for two volumes of biography, of which, moreover, a considerable space is
taken up by Dowden's chatter. The thirty years of my life would not fill
even one volume.
What a to-do there is over this tiny bit of life! To think of the quantity
of land and trade and commerce which go to furnish its commissariat alone,
the amount of space occupied by each individual throughout the world,
though one little chair is large enough to hold the whole of him! Yet,
after all is over and done, there remains only material for two hours'
thought, some pages of writing!
What a negligible fraction of my few pages would this one lazy day of mine
occupy! But then, will not this peaceful day, on the desolate sands by the
placid river, leave nevertheless a distinct little gold mark even upon the
scroll of my eternal past and eternal future?
_28th February_ 1895.
I have got an anonymous letter to-day which begins:
To give up one's self at the feet of another,
is the truest of all gifts.
The writer has never seen me, but knows me from my writings, and goes on
to say:
However petty or distant, the Sun[1]-worshipper gets a share of the
Sun's rays. You are the world's poet, yet to me it seems you are my own
[Footnote 1: Rabi, the author's name, means the Sun.]
and more in the same strain.
Man is so anxious to bestow his love on some object, that he ends by
falling in love with his own Ideal. But why should we suppose the idea to
be less true than the reality? We can never know for certain the truth of
the substance underlying what we get through the senses. Why should the
doubt be greater in the case of the entity behind the ideas which are the
creation of mind?
The mother realises in her child the great Idea, which is in every child,
the ineffableness of which, however, is not revealed to any one else. Are
we to say that what draws forth the mother's very life and soul is
illusory, but what fails to draw the rest of us to the same extent is the
real truth?
Every person is worthy of an infinite wealth of love--the beauty of his
soul knows no limit.... But I am departing into generalities. What I
wanted to express is, that in one sense I have no right to accept this
offering of my admirer's heart; that is to say, for me, seen within my
everyday covering, such a person could not possibly have had these
feelings. But there is another sense in which I am worthy of all this, or
of even greater adoration.
_9th July_ 1895.
I am gliding through this winding little Ichamati, this streamlet of the
rainy season. With rows of villages along its banks, its fields of jute
and sugar-cane, its reed patches, its green bathing slopes, it is like a
few lines of a poem, often repeated and as often enjoyed. One cannot
commit to memory a big river like the Padma, but this meandering little
Ichamati, the flow of whose syllables is regulated by the rhythm of the
rains, I am gradually making my very own....
It is dusk, the sky getting dark with clouds. The thunder rumbles
fitfully, and the wild casuarina clumps bend in waves to the stormy gusts
which pass through them. The depths of bamboo thickets look black as ink.
The pallid twilight glimmers over the water like the herald of some weird
I am bending over my desk in the dimness, writing this letter. I want to
whisper low-toned, intimate talk, in keeping with this penumbra of the
dusk. But it is just wishes like these which baffle all effort. They
either get fulfilled of themselves, or not at all. That is why it is a
simple matter to warm up to a grim battle, but not to an easy,
inconsequent talk.
_14th August_ 1895.
One great point about work is that for its sake the individual has to make
light of his personal joys and sorrows; indeed, so far as may be, to
ignore them. I am reminded of an incident at Shazadpur. My servant was
late one morning, and I was greatly annoyed at his delay. He came up and
stood before me with his usual _salaam_, and with a slight catch in
his voice explained that his eight-year-old daughter had died last night.
Then, with his duster, he set to tidying up my room.
When we look at the field of work, we see some at their trades, some
tilling the soil, some carrying burdens, and yet underneath, death,
sorrow, and loss are flowing, in an unseen undercurrent, every day,--their
privacy not intruded upon. If ever these should break forth beyond control
and come to the surface, then all this work would at once come to a stop.
Over the individual sorrows, flowing beneath, is a hard stone track,
across which the trains of duty, with their human load, thunder their way,
stopping for none save at appointed stations. This very cruelty of work
proves, perhaps, man's sternest consolation.
_5th October 1895_.
The religion that only comes to us from external scriptures never becomes
our own; our only tie with it is that of habit. To gain religion within is
man's great lifelong adventure. In the extremity of suffering must it be
born; on his life-blood it must live; and then, whether or not it brings
him happiness, the man's journey shall end in the joy of fulfilment.
We rarely realise how false for us is that which we hear from other lips,
or keep repeating with our own, while all the time the temple of our Truth
is building within us, brick by brick, day after day. We fail to
understand the mystery of this eternal building when we view our joys and
sorrows apart by themselves, in the midst of fleeting time; just as a
sentence becomes unintelligible if one has to spell through every word of
When once we perceive the unity of the scheme of that creation which is
going on in us, we realise our relation to the ever-unfolding universe. We
realise that we are in the process of being created in the same way as are
the glowing heavenly orbs which revolve in their courses,--our desires,
our sufferings, all finding their proper place within the whole.
We may not know exactly what is happening: we do not know exactly even
about a speck of dust. But when we feel the flow of life in us to be one
with the universal life outside, then all our pleasures and pains are seen
strung upon one long thread of joy. The facts: _I am, I move, I
grow_, are seen in all their immensity in connection with the fact that
everything else is there along with me, and not the tiniest atom can do
without me.
The relation of my soul to this beautiful autumn morning, this vast
radiance, is one of intimate kinship; and all this colour, scent, and
music is but the outward expression of our secret communion. This constant
communion, whether realised or unrealised, keeps my mind in movement; out
of this intercourse between my inner and outer worlds I gain such
religion, be it much or little, as my capacity allows: and in its light I
have to test scriptures before I can make them really my own.
_12th December 1895._
The other evening I was reading an English book of criticisms, full of all
manner of disputations about Poetry, Art, Beauty, and so forth and so on.
As I plodded through these artificial discussions, my tired faculties
seemed to have wandered into a region of empty mirage, filled with the
presence of a mocking demon.
The night was far advanced. I closed the book with a bang and flung it on
the table. Then I blew out the lamp with the idea of turning into bed. No
sooner had I done so than, through the open windows, the moonlight burst
into the room, with a shock of surprise.
That little bit of a lamp had been sneering drily at me, like some
Mephistopheles: and that tiniest sneer had screened off this infinite
light of joy issuing forth from the deep love which is in all the world.
What, forsooth, had I been looking for in the empty wordiness of the book?
There was the very thing itself, filling the skies, silently waiting for
me outside, all these hours!
If I had gone off to bed leaving the shutters closed, and thus missed this
vision, it would have stayed there all the same without any protest
against the mocking lamp inside. Even if I had remained blind to it all my
life,--letting the lamp triumph to the end,--till for the last time I went
darkling to bed,--even then the moon would have still been there, sweetly
smiling, unperturbed and unobtrusive, waiting for me as she has throughout
the ages.
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text:
Facebook is testing ways for people to verify their age when using the platform's dating app, including using an AI face scanning tool.
In a blog post today, Meta announced it would start prompting users on Facebook Dating to verify that they're over 18 if the platform suspects a user is underage (you must be over 18 to use the dating service). Users can then confirm their age either by submitting a copy of their ID or by uploading a selfie video, which Facebook shares a portion of with a third-party company. Meta says the company, Yoti, uses facial features to estimate a user's age without identifying them.
Meta says the new age verification systems will help stop children from accessing features meant for adults. It doesn't appear there are any requirements for adults to verify their age on Facebook Dating (like making sure a 45-year-old isn't pretending to be 18).
Meta has used Yoti for other age verification purposes, including vetting Instagram users who attempt to change their birthdate to make them 18 or older. Yoti says its system is broadly very accurate: it said that its rate of correctly identifying 13 to 17-year-olds as under 23 years old is 99.65 percent. Meta says age verification has sorted "hundreds of thousands" of people into age-appropriate versions of the app and that 81 percent of users prompted by Instagram to verify their age opt to use Yoti's selfie option.
But the system isn't equally accurate for all people: Yoti's data shows that its accuracy is worse for "female" faces and people with darker complexions. Researchers have flagged concerns over how facial recognitions and analysis software perform differently for people along age, race, and gender lines.


text:
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text:
Peter Pan Collar Blouse (31 colours)
Tax included. Shipping calculated at checkout.
The blouse is made in 100% cotton material, has a peter pan and fastens at the front with buttons.
Available with short or long sleeves.
Please choose a colour from the colour chart and leave it in the box provided.


text:
Sask. confirms 8 more COVID-19 cases, 10 new recoveries
This undated electron microscope image made available by the U.S. National Institutes of Health in February 2020 shows the Novel Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. Also known as 2019-nCoV, the virus causes COVID-19. The sample was isolated from a patient in the U.S. Dozens of research groups around the world are racing to create a vaccine as COVID-19 cases continue to grow. (NIAID-RML via AP)
REGINA -- The province of Saskatchewan is reporting eight new COVID-19 cases on Friday, bringing the province's total number of cases to 590.
The new cases are all in the far north, the province said in a news release. Five cases are in La Loche and three are in Beauval. There are 176 active cases in Saskatchewan.
Another 10 people have recovered from the virus, for a provincial total of 408 recoveries.
There are currently nine people in hospital in Saskatchewan. There are six people receiving inpatient care —three in Saskatoon, two in Regina and in the north. There are also three people in the ICU in Saskatoon.
In a news release, the province says hospitalizations are "attributed to the location of the hospitalization, not the patient's residence."
There are 218 total cases in the far north, 163 cases in Saskatoon, 106 in the north, 76 in Regina, 15 in the south and 12 in the central region.
Active cases break down into 147 in the far north, 18 in the north, nine in Saskatoon, one each in Regina and the central region and no active cases in the south.
The province says there are 139 cases connected to travelling, 304 from community contacts, 68 have no known exposure and 79 are currently under investigation.
There are 83 cases in people under 19, 209 cases in people between 20 and 39, 181 between 40 and 59, 99 between 60 and 79 and 18 over the age of 80.
The cases are 51 per cent male and 49 per cent female.
Six people have died from COVID-19 complications in the province.
To date, Saskatchewan has performed 39,233 COVID-19 tests.
The province also released an updated COVID-19 website on Friday, where residents can find information on case numbers, testing and recoveries in each region.


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An author's dilemma – Slavery in ancient Rome
When we attempt to relate to another culture, especially one existing over 2500 years ago, confusion, bewilderment, and in the case of slavery, rage is bound to happen. The culture of slavery is an issue authors encounter when writing about the Roman empire, and it is a treacherous one to address.
(Collared Roman slaves / Ashmolean Museum, Photo by Jun, Wikimedia Commons)
It is difficult to approximate the number of slaves in 96 A.D. the year my mystery novel, Obedient Unto Death, takes place. Historians and archeologists estimate up to one out of three people were in bondage throughout the far-flung geography of the Roman Empire during that period. Many of our current western Christian principles, values, and beliefs would have been ridiculed or were non-existent in ancient cultures. The Ancient Roman reaction to slavery, rape, infanticide, murder, marriage, and death was not the same as our "enlightened" responses. How does one conflate the horrors of human bondage with the Romans' causal acceptance of the pervasive practice? Captivity was so engrained in the fabric of Roman life that it was accepted as "normal," not only by the ruling elite but often by the enslaved themselves.
In my novel, I have chosen to present slavery as individual characters might react to it, slave or free, rich or poor, male or female, Christian or pagan, with a unique but 96 A.D. perspective. How did one become a slave? The main supply of slaves feeding the Roman way of life came from the countries and lands the Romans conquered. Taking captives from defeated tribes, neighbors, and adversaries was standard practice. Triumphant parades displaying the spoils of successful battles included hundreds, if not thousands of prisoners bound for the slave markets. The famous Arch of Titus in Rome commemorates the Emperor Titus's deification and his victory over the Judaea rebellion and his capture of Jerusalem in 70 A.D.
"So this Fronto slew all those that had been seditious and robbers…; but of the young men he chose out the tallest and most beautiful, and reserved them for the triumph; (418) and as for the rest of the multitude that were above seventeen years old, he put them into bonds, and sent them to the Egyptian mines. Titus also sent a great number into the provinces, as a present to them, that they might be destroyed upon their theaters, by the sword and by the wild beasts; but those that were under seventeen years of age were sold for slaves. (419) Now the number of those that were carried captive during this whole war was collected to be ninety-seven thousand…" (From the Works of Josephus, translated by William Whiston Hendrickson Publishers, 1987) Another source of new slaves was the offspring of the captives, who, born into bondage, continued in slavery. A third source was indebtedness. To get out of debt, a free man or woman could sell themselves or their children into slavery to pay off debt. In the case of children, exchanging a financial drain for a profit was not uncommon. Convicted criminals were a fourth way people ended up in slavery. Depending on the crime, criminals could be sentenced to death, gladiatorial entertainment in the arenas, or sold into slavery. A recurrent supply of slaves came from unwanted infants who were "exposed" or abandoned to the elements after birth. These babies could be rescued and raised as slaves if the rescuers were willing to take on the burden of rearing them until they grew into productive workers. Popular literature of the era also depicted the kidnapping of freedmen, women, and children by pirates and bandits and sold into slavery. (Part 2 in my next blog)


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Arcade Fire's new album, Everything Now, is a mess. The band became so concerned with satire and social lecturing that they forgot to write good songs. These problems extended their way into their concert at Madison Square Garden.
Up until this year, the idea of a disappointing Arcade Fire show was a foreign concept. From their earliest shows through world-conquering headline gigs, their sets felt like a religious experience. They played with endless passion and enthusiasm that bolstered a killer song catalog. For this year's Infinite Content tour though? There were several momentum-killing moments, all centered around tracks from the new album. Even some decent visuals and an in-the-round stage couldn't make them work.
Some examples? How about the pre-concert intro, where a digital huckster advertised Arcade Fire shirts and fidget spinners? Cause there's too much consumerism! Get it?! Of course, the band did sell shirts and fidget spinners in the lobby, so the joke doesn't work. It's a case of having your cake, eating it too and hoping no one notices.
The concert started with the sleek disco of the title track. It's a great song and an excellent kick-off that got everyone up and dancing. But things ground to a halt almost immediately with the "Rapture"-aping "Signs of Life." No one wants to hear Win Butler rap about "those cool kids stuck in the past," especially when the song is a 40-year throwback! In the stands, many people sat down or played with their phones. On the second song! Not a great sign. And to make matters worse, they go from this lame track into "Rebellion (Lies)" from their debut, Funeral. Considered one of Arcade Fire's greatest compositions, its power was zapped by what came before.
That's pretty much how the show played out. The boring faux-punk of "Infinite Content" and synth-chug of "Creature Comfort" deflated what should have been the thrilling main set closer of "Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)." Even on the good songs of Everything Now, the band blew it. The funk-bass of "Put Your Money on Me" was ruined by overwrought videos of dollar bills and fake infomercials. It wasn't clever, just distracting.
But when the new songs and pompous videos fell to the wayside, Arcade Fire proved that their live show could still reach glorious heights. "No Cars Go" had everyone in MSG standing and shouting along. For the quiet "Neon Bible," the lights dimmed and the band asked everyone to use their phone lights to brighten the arena. Then there was the hit parade stretch from "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)" through "Afterlife." For those seven songs, which ran chronologically, everything was perfect. People danced their way through "Ready to Start" and "Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)." We all cheered when David Bowie appeared on the screen for his lines in "Reflektor." And we felt the emotional resonance of the tragic, spiritual "Afterlife."
The only new song that matched the power of Arcade Fire's older material was "We Don't Deserve Love." The slow-burning track started the encore with Butler walking through the crowd. He made his way to the stage as the song's wavering synths built into a marching chorus. From there, Arcade Fire went into an acoustic, string-laden reprise of "Everything Now," before bursting into "Wake Up." No matter what flaws there were in the show, this one song united everyone in the venue. Whether you loved or hated the new album, were a casual fan or a hardcore obsessive, you let out a cathartic scream for its wordless chorus. As the show ended, the band walked onto the arena floor, joined by the Preservation Hall Jazz Band to play the song again. They wound up making their way down into the subway, still playing!
For all the missteps found on the Infinite Content tour, Arcade Fire is still a band that can create moments of pure, joyous magic. It used to be that each new album added to that experience, rather than diluting it. But Everything Now is the first real struggle for a band that moved from success to success. I doubt we'll see much of this album next time around. Hopefully, at that time, the group will innovate while also playing to their strengths. Don't force feed the message. If the music's there, the rest will come.


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Ask your local pharmasist they will tell u for no charge.
All the info below is from the web...I am not a doctor or pharmacist.... If it was Valium, a "V" would be cut into the pill. According to my searches, it could be the following: Imprint Code: 10 Drug/Strength/Manufacturer: Trifluoperazine HCl 10mg - Apo Trifluoperaz - Apotex Description: Tablet - Blue - Round Info found here: http://www.rxlist.com/cgi/rxlistid.cgi?drug=* Important: If you don't have a doc or pharmasist telling you specifically what it is, don't take it! If a child or animal ingested a pill like it, bring the child to a hospital with the extra pill (or animal to an animal hospital). If I were you, I'd toss it out. Having pills lying around when you're not sure what they are or what they're for is dangerous. Hope this helps!
Copyright 2023, Wired Ivy, LLC


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Art Moderne Nesting Tables
These quasi-industrial-looking modern pieces are all the rage these days for loft living and the metro set. Inspired by a modern ethos these wood and metal combination table trio are as practical as they are nice to look at. I saw them first in a Manhattan apartment in the SoHo neighborhood, smitten by them - I was eager to get a set for myself. Perfect for a modern apartment and quite the style statement.
Overall Dimensions: 28"w x 15"d x 24"h
Material: Iron & Wood
In-stock Freight Delivery orders are usually shipped within 5 business days and should arrive in approximately 2-3 weeks. Expedited shipping is not available for Freight Delivery Orders, and delivery cannot take place on weekends or national holidays. Our Fulfillment hours are Monday through Friday, 8 am to 4 pm ET. Expedited Parcel Delivery is not available currently.
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