trying a smaller batch, with larger spacing, as suggested by Bruce Charlton.

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i couldn't experience the mass as a thirteenth century illiterate peasant and was thus rendered unfit for service.

a woman is meant to steal her man's soul, but woe ...

A few days ago I was out for my usual early evening walk. The particular circular route I was taking this time started off in a local park then proceeded up a road that goes to the downs and then across a field with horses that leads to a small wood from where it's a mile or so home. I like this walk because of its ...

From what does Jesus save us?

To simplify, one might first say Jesus saved us from death, by his offer of resurrection.

And Jesus also saved us from an ultimately purposeless and meaningless mortal life - i.e. "alienation", by resurrection into that "second creation" which is Heaven. (Both are achieved by an ...

I put russell brand into Google to try to get context for a Babylon Bee article, and I added a new word to my vocabulary.

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That's the Esperanto name for Humpty Dumpty. Some of you may have read in Martin Gardner that it's Homito Omleto and means "Little-Man Egg" -- which spoils the rhyme, incorrectly uses the passive past participle affix as a diminutive, and somehow misses the very obvious fact that omleto means "omelette," not "egg." (I ...

I first became aware of the home design and building TV program Grand Designs during my nine-month teaching stint in the UK. For those unfamiliar with the show, it basically chronicles the construction of unconventionally planned residences in Great Britain.

The bulk of these grand designs qualified as what I ...

The "Right" or "Based" blogosphere, or Manosphere in its various manifestations - strikes me as the latest iteration of a theme of self-improvement that probably began with Machiavelli's The Prince; included Samuel Smiles (who coined "self-help"), Dale Carnegie's How to win friends and influence people, and many ...

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Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedat peace, at rest

bit the dust, breathed the last

dirt napping six feet under with the fishes

croaked across the Jordan

didn’t make it, done for,

departed to meet its maker

dropped dead like a fly

food for ...

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Hey lads! Let's use the One Ring to fight Sauron!

One point about Gandalf's plan to destroy the One Ring by sending Frodo into Mordor; is that, on the one hand, it had potential to be decisive; while on the other hand it had a very low apparent chance of success.

By comparison there were many ...

​Not just in painting but also in thinking.

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Seven Crows - Alex Colville - 1980

experience is the worst student.

understand reality with this one simple trick: a tree is judged by its fruits.

the oldest and worst case of 'make work' is farming. it could be so much simpler and easier and healthier.

whatever other value it might have, orthodoxy of any kind has never produced anything ...

When Orwell's 1984 was written, there seemed to be an obvious relationship between war and totalitarianism - such that (apparent) perpetual war was a condition of the continued domination of the leadership class.

My understanding is that this was a transitional reality - true only insofar as religion retainrd a ...

Kristor, of The Orthosphere, is very good at expounding his own metaphysical assumptions (which are essentially those of Thomistic Roman Catholicism); but when it comes to making a comparative evaluation of different metaphysical "systems"... well, he just doesn't ever do it!

Kristor is an old internet pal, going ...

In my last post, "How is an armadillo like a griffon vulture in the Crimea?" vultures are connected, by way of armadillos, with armored knights. This reminded me of two cartoon characters I used to draw as a child: Victor the Vulture and Sylvester the Snake. None of the cartoons have survived, but they were drawn in ...

The first of the two dreams recounted in "A vulture named Odessa Grigorievna, and Joseph Smith in a spider mask" has a scene in which carrion birds, including the vulture of the title, flock around a carcass. This made me think of Jesus' saying that "wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered ...

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I review the 1974 abridged Hobbit by Nicol "Merlin" Williamson, over at The Notion Club Papers blog.

About a month ago, I suggested that Nikolai Berdyaev’s metaphysical quest should have led him to non-Omnigod and pluralism.

On rereading Chapter Five of The Meaning of the Creative Act, I revisited the closest Berdyaev seems to have come to realizing that true creativity within Creation makes pluralism a ...

Yesterday's post, "The Tinleys and the small key of David," featured the name T(h)inley in two different contexts. First, there's Thinley Norbu, author of The Small Golden Key to the Treasure of the Various Essential Necessities of General and Extraordinary Buddhist Dharma -- the key word for the purposes of this post ...

The other Abrahamic religions approach God through an Old Testament consciousness and depict Him as an incomprehensible, absolute, autocratic master. Well, okay, Christianity does that, too.

The problem is that such depictions are (or should be) irreconcilable and incompatible with Christianity and its emphasis on ...

If your Litmus Tests involve things likesincere and humble submission to the Pope or any other external authoritypooh-poohing the depth of evil revealed during events like the birdemicor insisting that everyone vote in the most important election ever to save civilization then you adhere to Litmus Tests that fail ...

I suggest this is a real phenomenon. You may say space appears to contract because technology has reduced distance while time seems to rush by because life has become so fast and rapidly changing, and I would not dispute that but I would also maintain that this is more than an impression because of our circumstances. ...

This afternoon I was in my study, which is full of bookcases, and one of the books caught my eye: The Small Golden Key to the Treasure of the Various Essential Necessities of General and Extraordinary Buddhist Dharma by Thinley Norbu. (One can only hope that the book is as well-written as the ...

I had two strange, rather detailed dreams last night, which I document here in case they should turn out to be significant:

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I dreamed that I was with a "friend," a man, whose identity was not clearly defined. We were outside and saw in the distance some kind of large carcass with carrion birds flocking around ...

Spirit is ultimate reality. It can be denied, but it can never truly be destroyed. If it could be destroyed, the material world as we know it would simply cease to exist for the simple reason that the material is a subcategory of the spiritual.

Whenever we perceive the material world as nothing more than the material ...

Healthism is one of the Litmus Test issues for Christians, in the sense that Christians need to be clear that there are more-important things than health and longevity, including survival.

Health cannot be the life-priority for Christians - if it is, they simply cease to be Christian.

This was the underlying ...

Optimism about this-worldly matters is all fine and well; however, it is by no means a Christian obligation, duty, virtue, or value. Being buoyant and cheerful about temporal matters may provide emotional, physical, and social benefits; however, such benefits do not necessarily benefit one’s spirit or ...

Every mortal life on this earth has-been and will-be a failure, whatever you do.

Of course!

This has been known since ancient days by whoever is most thoughtful and honest. So we should acknowledge this from the beginning!

And then...?

And then solve the problem - don't merely "cope" with it by some combination ...

On April 22, William Wright posted "Shushan!", which included a clip from the James Bond spoof movie Johnny English Reborn in which a Chinese man who apparently turns out to be a spy or gangster or something is wearing a nametag that says Susan, prompting English's sidekick to say, "Sir, I don't think he's a Susan." ...