by Marc on August 12, 2010
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only”.
– Charles Dickens
That pretty well sums it up ;). [click to continue…]
by Marc on January 19, 2010
"[William James] believed, with many another religious thinker, that the sinner is closer to God than the conventionally good man, because life is given us as a passion; it is, as Keats said, a vale of soul-making. What is characteristic of life is the thing that antedates and denies convention. Convention trims, distorts, and suppresses, for good reasons that we all acknowledge. But social discipline also weakens and disables, leaving no merit for the virtuous man who is such only because his spirit is too weak to be tempted. This is no doubt why saints and apostles more often consort with thieves and prostitutes than with bankers and aldermen”
– Jacques Barzum, from the preface to William James’ Varieties of Religious Experience
