Philosophical quotes by Baruch Spinoza

As men's habits of mind differ, so that some more readily embrace one form of faith, some another, for what moves one to pray may move another to scoff, I conclude ... that everyone should be free to choose for himself the foundations of his creed, and that faith should be judged only by its fruits; each would then obey God freely with his whole heart, while nothing would be publicly honoured save justice and charity.

Men would never be superstitious, if they could govern all their circumstances by set rules, or if they were always favoured by fortune: but being frequently driven into straits where rules are useless, and being often kept fluctuating pitiably between hope and fear by the uncertainty of fortune’s greedily coveted favours, they are consequently for the most part, very prone to credulity.

Surely human affairs would be far happier if the power in men to be silent were the same as that to speak. But experience more than sufficiently teaches that men govern nothing with more difficulty than their tongues.

I refer those actions which work out the good of the agent to courage, and those which work out the good of others to nobility. Therefore temperance, sobriety, and presence of mind in danger, etc., are species of courage; but modesty, clemency, etc., are species of nobility.

The more you struggle to live, the less you live. Give up the notion that you must be sure of what you are doing. Instead, surrender to what is real within you, for that alone is sure....you are above everything distressing.

Blessedness is not the reward of virtue, but virtue itself; neither do we rejoice therein, because we control our lusts, but contrariwise, because we rejoice therein, we are able to control our lusts.

For peace is not mere absence of war, but is a virtue that springs from, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice.

Be not astonished at new ideas; for it is well known to you that a thing does not therefore cease to be true because it is not accepted by many.

The highest activity a human being can attain is learning for understanding, because to understand is to be free.

I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand them.

All happiness or unhappiness solely depends upon the quality of the object to which we are attached by love.

No matter how thin you slice it, there will always be two sides.

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Enlarge my heart by George Appleton

Enlarge my heart
George Appleton

Enlarge my heart, God,
to the dimensions of your heart,
O limitless Love.
Let nothing be thought
common or unclean
which thou hast cleansed.
Let no one be thought
too exalted, so that
I only respect
but do not love.
Let no one be regarded
as too humble, so that
I patronise or despise.
Let no one be thought
as of little value
and written off.
For each is dear to thee
with his own potential
and his own hope
and his own heartbreak.
Let me say to each with thee,
‘O man greatly beloved’
infinitely and eternally
dear to thee.
O Lord Love,
enlarge my heart
to the dimensions of thine.

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WISH by DENA KIRKWOOD

WISH
DENA KIRKWOOD

I need to be held and told I am lovely-
To hear magical, wild, magnificent things,
Which will surge through my senses with the good pain
Of new blood pumping its way into numbed extremities.

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VICE and VIRTUE QUOTES

Steve Hanks Art

The vices we scoff at in others laugh at us within ourselves.
Sir Thomas Browne

Perfect virtue is to do unwitnessed what we should be capable of doing before the entire world.
Rochefoucauld

Half the vices which the world condemns most loudly have seeds of good in them and require moderate use rather than total abstinence.
Samuel Butler

If you wish to save men from any particular vice, set up a tremendous cry of warning about some other, and they will all give their special efforts to the one to which attention is called.
Charles Dudley

If a man has no vices, he is in great danger of making vices about his virtues, and there’s a spectacle.
Thornton Wilder

Hypocrisy is the homage which vice pays to virtue.
LA Rochefoucauld

We tolerate without rebuke the vices with which we have grown familiar.
Publilius Syrus

The extremes of vice and virtue are alike detestable, and absolute virtue is as sure to kill a man as absolute vice is.
Samuel Butler

It takes a vice to check a vice, and virtue is the by-product of a stalemate between opposite vices.
Eric Hoffer

Fine words and an insinuating appearance are seldom associated with true virtue.
Confucius

It’s a vice to trust all, and equally a vice to trust none. Seneca
All virtue is summed up in dealing justly.
Aristotle

As virtue is its own reward, so vice is its own punishment.
Thomas Fuller

Search other for their virtues, thyself for thy vices.
Benjamin Franklin

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DEAD ARE MY PEOPLE by Khalil Gibran

Bcharri,lebanon(Birthplace of Khalil Gibran)

DEAD ARE MY PEOPLE
Khalil Gibran

Kahlil Gibran wrote the following during the First World War (1914 to 1918), a time when many places, including Lebanon, were struck by famine. At the time of writing he was living in Boston in the United States.

Dead are my people, gone are my people, but I exist yet, lamenting them in my solitude. Dead are my friends, and in their death my life is naught but great disaster. The knolls of my country are submerged by tears and blood, for my people and my beloved are gone, and I am here living as I did when my people and my beloved were enjoying life and the bounty of life, and when the hills of my country were blessed and engulfed by the light of the sun.

My people died from hunger, and he who did not perish from starvation was butchered with the sword; and I am here in this distant land, roaming amongst a joyful people who sleep upon soft beds, and smile at the days while the days smile upon them.

My people died a painful and shameful death, and here am I living in plenty and in peace. This is deep tragedy ever enacted upon the stage of my heart; few would care to witness this drama, for my people are as birds with broken wings, left behind the flock.

If I were hungry and living amid my famished people, and persecuted among my oppressed countrymen, the burden of the black days would be lighter upon my restless dreams, and the obscurity of the night would be less dark before my hollow eyes and my crying heart and my wounded soul. For he who shares with his people their sorrow and agony will feel a supreme comfort created only by suffering in sacrifice. And he will be at peace with himself when he dies innocent with his fellow innocents.

But I am not living with my hungry and persecuted people who are walking in the procession of death toward martyrdom. I am here beyond the broad seas living in the shadow of tranquillity, and in the sunshine of peace. I am afar from the pitiful arena and the distressed, and cannot be proud of ought, not even of my own tears.
What can an exiled son do for his starving people, and of what value unto them is the lamentation of an absent poet?

Were I an ear of corn grown in the earth of my country, the hungry child would pluck me and remove with my kernels the hand of Death form his soul. Were I a ripe fruit in the gardens of my country, the starving women would gather me and sustain life. Were I a bird flying the sky of my country, my hungry brother would hunt me and remove with the flesh of my body the shadow of the grave from his body. But, alas! I am not an ear of corn grown in the plains of Syria, nor a ripe fruit in the valleys of Lebanon; this is my disaster, and this is my mute calamity which brings humiliation before my soul and before the phantoms of the night. This is the painful tragedy which tightens my tongue and pinions my arms and arrests me usurped of power and of will and of action. This is the curse burned upon my forehead before God and man.

And oftentimes they say unto me, the disaster of your country is but naught to calamity of the world, and the tears and blood shed by your people are as nothing to the rivers of blood and tears pouring each day and night in the valleys and plains of the earth."

Yes, but the death of my people is a silent accusation; it is a crime conceived by the heads of the unseen serpents. it is a sceneless tragedy. And if my people had attacked the despots and oppressors and died rebels, I would have said, "Dying for freedom is nobler than living in the shadow of weak submission, for he who embraces death with the sword of Truth in his hand will eternalize with the Eternity of Truth, for Life is weaker than Death and Death is weaker than Truth.

If my nation had partaken in the war of all nations and had died in the field of battle, I would say that the raging tempest had broken with its might the green branches; and strong death under the canopy of the tempest is nobler than slow perishment in the arms of senility. But there was no rescue from the closing jaws. My people dropped and wept with the crying angels.

If an earthquake had torn my country asunder and the earth had engulfed my people into its bosom, I would have said, "A great and mysterious law has been moved by the will of divine force, and it would be pure madness if we frail mortals endeavoured to probe its deep secrets." But my people did not die as rebels; they were not killed in the field of battle; nor did the earthquake shatter my country and subdue them. Death was their only rescuer, and starvation their only spoils.

My people died on the cross. They died while their hands stretched toward the East and West, while the remnants of their eyes stared at the blackness of the firmament. They died silently, for humanity had closed its ears to their cry. They died because they did not befriend their enemy. They died because they loved their neighbours. They died because they placed trust in all humanity. They died because they did not oppress the oppressors. They died because they were the crushed flowers, and not the crushing feet. They died because they were peace makers. They perished from hunger in a land rich with milk and honey. They died because monsters of hell arose and destroyed all that their fields grew, and devoured the last provisions in their bins. They died because the vipers and sons of vipers spat out poison into the space where the Holy Cedars and the roses and the jasmine breathe their fragrance.

My people and your people, my Syrian Brothers, are dead. What can be done for those who are dying? Our lamentations will not satisfy their hunger, and our tears will not quench their thirst; what can we do to save them between the iron paws of hunger? My brother, the kindness which compels you to give a part of your life to any human who is in the shadow of losing his life is the only virtue which makes you worthy of the light of day and the peace of the night. Remember, my brother, that the coin which you drop into the withered hand stretching toward you is the only golden chain that binds your rich heart to the loving heart of God.

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Dance Life by Sandie Hum

Dance Life
Sandie Hum

Dance!
Sink your fingers into the earth
taste the delicacy of the herbs
Feel the suffering of the world
and send out love in return
Until the pulse of life…throbs within…

and you ARE
the creation and destruction of the universe
With each solider going into war
each refugee wondering where home is
Each child
dancing in the rain
or starving, no energy to move
Or playing, running with a pack of kids in a park
or falling and crying for Ma
or staring in wonder at a birthday cake aflame
with candles and presents beyond…

Dance…
with the elder, sitting wisely in state
or the one sitting cold, hungry, lonely and in pain
With the businessman barking into his cell phone
as he strides forth with his briefcase
With the mother, wailing, holding the bullet-ridden body
of her son amidst the street’s rubble

Dance…
with the lava, flowing in the dark
moving, congealing, spreading its fiery river
With each star spiraling out in expanding galaxies
and the drop of rain falling into the Pacific Ocean
With the rabbit, bounding across the plain,
suddenly snatched up and torn apart by the eagle’s talons

Dance…
with the lovers, tangled, sweaty, heaving
lost in each other’s eyes, united with the universe
With the father, lovingly standing strong against his young son,
who he will see grows into a man
With the board member, feeling into each personality and figure
with her heart, mind and body even as she runs a meeting

Dance!
With each texture, sound and taste of a moment
letting it engulf you, feel you, inspire you, breathe you
Dance Life, my love, dance

May it take a moment
Or a lifetime
To truly feel the texture of a child’s hair against your cheek
to fully embrace the pain of your breaking heart until it cracks open
Until you laugh so hard your stomach is one big clench
and tears run free down your face
Dance

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THE RIDER by By Sarah Manguso

THE RIDER
By Sarah Manguso

Some believe the end will come
in the form of a mathematical equation.
Others believe it will descend as a shining horse.
I calculate the probabilities to be even at fifty percent.
Either a thing will happen or it won't.
I open a window,
I unmake the bed.
Somehow, I am moving closer to the equation
or to the horse with everything I do.
Death comes in the form of a horse
covered in shining equations.
There will be no further clues, I see.
I begin to read my horse.
The equations are drawn in the shapes of horses:
horses covered in equations.
I am tempted to hook an ankle
around the world as I ride away.
For I am about to ride far beyond
the low prairie of beginnings and endings.

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