Cavour

“ The completion of the national edifice within a decade of Cavour's death was still, in a sense, his work, as the consolidation of the United States after the death of Lincoln was still moulded by his vanished hand.
If it be true that the world's history is the world's judgment, it is no less true that the history of the state is the judgment of the statesman. ”

“ In any case, Rome must not be touched for the present, since Napoleon was pledged to protect the pope; but as the latter had made large armaments, and his forces, consisting largely of brigands and foreigners under the French general Lamoricière, were in a menacing attitude on the frontier, Cavour decided on the momentous step of annexing the papal states with the exception of the Roman province. ”

“ After some more talk the king says, "What are you?"
"I'm an honest man," says Saint Kavin.
"Well, honest man," says the king, "and how is it you make your money so aisy?"
"By makin' old things as good as new," says Saint Kavin.
"Is it a tinker you are?" says the king.
"No," says the saint; "I'm no tinker by trade, King O'Toole; I've a better trade than a tinker," says he—"what would you say," says he, "If I made your old goose as good as new?"
My dear, at the word of making his goose as good as new, you'd think the poor old king's eyes were ready to jump out of his head. ”

“ This general need—this hunger for the ideal and wonderful—led eventually to the differentiation of a caste, whose vocation it was to cultivate the mystery of life and its surroundings, and to give shape, name, and habitation to the emotions which that mystery aroused. Even the savage lived, not by bread alone, but in a mental world peopled with forms answering to his capacities and needs. ”

“ I will have money, wool, wheat and cheese, although the poorest lad give it, or the poorest widow in a village, though her children die for famine. Nay, I will drink liquor of the grape and in every town have a jolly wench. But hark, lordings, in conclusion, your will is that I tell some story. Now that I have drunk a draught of corny ale, by God's light, I hope I shall tell you somewhat that shall by reason be to your liking. For though I myself be a full vicious man, yet I can tell you a moral tale, which I am wont to preach for gain. ”

“ Would'st thou have fortune bow her neck to thee,
Make it thy care to feed thy soul with glee;
And hold a creed like mine, which is to drain
The cup of wine, not that of misery.
371. So the Ecclesiast, «There is nothing better for a man than that he should eat, and drink, and make his soul enjoy good in his labour.» ”

“ For when they say, that a secret conversion takes place in the consecration, so that they are something different from bread and wine, I have already stated their meaning to be, not that the bread and wine are annihilated, but that they are to be considered in a different light from common aliments, which are merely designed for the nourishment of the body; because, in those elements, we are presented with the spiritual meat and drink of the soul. ”

“ They will pour their wine into almost any vessel that comes to hand: generally using by preference--and lifting to new levels of beauty and significance--the religious or philosophic formulae current in their own day. Thus we find that some of Kabīr’s finest poems have as their subjects the commonplaces of Hindu philosophy and religion: the Līlā, or Sport, of God, the Ocean of Bliss, the Bird of the Soul, Māyā, the Hundred-petalled Lotus, and the “Formless Form.” Many, again, are soaked in Sūfī imagery and feeling. ”

“ Thou, Master almighty, didst create all things for Thy name’s sake; Thou gavest food and drink to men for enjoyment, that they might give thanks to Thee; but to us Thou didst freely give spiritual food and drink and life eternal through Thy Servant. ”

“ CHAUCER
[Struck, at a flash, by this medley of incongruities, bursts into
laughter, and seizing an ale mug, lifts it high.]
Alis, I drink to thee and woman’s wit.
FRIAR
God save the vintner and the Wife of Bath!
PILGRIMS
[Shout.]
God save the vintner and the Wife of Bath!
ALISOUN
[Sharing the ale mug with Chaucer.] ”

“ I have learned the Sanskrit language, so let all men call me wise:
But where is the use of this, when I am floating adrift, and parched with thirst, and burning with the heat of desire?
To no purpose do you bear on your head this load of pride and vanity.
Kabir says: "Lay it down in the dust and go forth to meet the Beloved. ”

“ If the simple and limited supply of his food, leaves the savage without any room for the exercise of this faculty, subject to reason, he has the consolation of knowing that he acts under the guidance of nature, the parent of taste, and that she will not permit him to eat any thing pernicious—an exemption which those that imagine they fare better amidst an endless variety and profusion, cannot boast. ”

“ Yet in this wide and rapturous vision of the universe Kabīr never loses touch with diurnal existence, never forgets the common life. His feet are firmly planted upon earth; his lofty and passionate apprehensions are perpetually controlled by the activity of a sane and vigorous intellect, by the alert common sense so often found in persons of real mystical genius. ”

“ So then, when you say that man is the image of the Divine nature, and that the devil dragged this down and shattered it, and that God grieved over His image as an Emperor over his statue, you smear (so to speak) the lips of the cup with something sweet like honey, that men may drain the cup offered to them, and not perceive its deadliness, while they taste what is alluring. ”

“ This example of the Lord the Apostles did imitate, to receive the meat which was due unto them; of which the same Lord most openly speaketh: “As ye go,” saith He, “preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out devils. Freely have ye received, freely give. Possess not gold nor silver nor money in your purses, neither scrip on your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, neither staff: for the workman is worthy of his meat.” ”

“ So also a true teacher is himself worthy, as the workman, of his support. [4] 3. Every first-fruit, therefore, of the products of wine-press and threshing-floor, of oxen and of sheep, thou shalt take and give to the prophets, for they are your high priests. [5] 4. But if ye have not a prophet, give it to the poor. 5. If thou makest a batch of dough, take the first-fruit and give according to the commandment. 6. So also when thou openest a jar of wine or of oil, take the first-fruit and give it to the prophets ”

“ They who have been at the pains of mastering such special qualifications, by a natural law, soon regard them as the only canons of taste; nothing which does not conform to them has the true ring. Having conquered caviare, they find all that pleases 'the general' tasteless. ”

“ For indeed we receive corn from the Lord, when, in the more obscure sayings, the husk of the letter being drawn off, we perceive in the marrow of the Spirit the inward meaning of the Law. The Lord proffers us His wine, when He inebriates us with the lofty preaching of His Scripture. His oil also He gives us, when, by plainer precepts, He orders our life gently and smoothly. ”

“ It is not any bread and wine that we hold sacred as a natural production, as if Christ were confined in corn or in vines, as the Manichæans fancy, but what is truly consecrated as a symbol. What is not consecrated, though it is bread and wine, is only nourishment or refreshment, with no sacredness about it ”

“ Let us, then, study these various modes of speech as they are exemplified in the writings of men who, by reading the Scriptures, have attained to the knowledge of divine and saving truth, and have ministered it to the Church. Cyprian of blessed memory writes in the subdued style in his treatise on the sacrament of the cup. In this book he resolves the question, whether the cup of the Lord ought to contain water only, or water mingled with wine. ”

“ What is the profit of the words? Great is the profit and necessity of them. Because they pressed upon Him, asking for bodily food, reminding Him of the food provided in the days of their forefathers, and speaking of the manna as a great thing, to show them that all those things were but type and shadow, but that the very reality of the matter was now present with them, He mentioneth spiritual food. “But,” saith some one, “he ought to have said, Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, but I have given you bread.” ”

“ You are wealthy and rich, and do you think that you celebrate the Lord’s Supper, not at all considering the offering, [45] who come to the Lord’s Supper without a sacrifice, and yet take part of the sacrifice which the poor man has offered? ”

“ The first necessity of savages is a sufficient supply of food, and this, they hold, is to be procured either by the application of what they conceive to be natural laws, or by appeal to superhuman Powers. Among economic ceremonies, therefore, we may distinguish those which may be loosely described as natural, those in which a supernatural element enters, and those in which the two orders of procedure appear to be combined. ”

“ Glancing subsequently at the action of caste feeling in confining the sympathies of individuals more especially to the members of their own caste, we came to the conclusion that, though caste had undoubtedly the effect of contracting the feelings within a narrow circle, there was to be found a compensating advantage in the fact that the claims of caste produced, in the aggregate, a greater amount of charity, and, in short, were calculated to produce a better general result than would be arrived at in the absence of caste feelings. ”

“ They address the masses after, to tell them that the sabre is not in their hands, but that reason is the richest and most invaluable of the divine gifts and that it was separated almost equally amongst all, that the culture of the mind can centuplicate its fruitfulness and strength ”

“ Those dry and ever-thirsty souls would willingly end their lives in a tub of malmsey, and the Savages in a pot full of meat; those over there, talk only of drinking, and these here only of eating. It is giving a sort of insult to a Savage to refuse the pieces which he offers you. ”

“ If only we had had the sense to fasten a handkerchief to a stick to show where we had left the sphere!"
I subsided fuming.
"It is clear," meditated Cavor, "they are intelligent. One can hypothecate certain things. As they have not killed us at once they must have ideas of mercy. ”

“ He stirred his coffee slowly, but with evident reluctance to stay near her. She would not have been a human woman if she had not been annoyed by his cool manner, and a shade of displeasure passed over her face. ”

“ The Vira Saivas illustrate their creed by a comparison quite in the Hindu style. They say, the guru is the cow: whose mouth is the Jangam or brother in the faith; and the lingam or image is the udder. The cow benefits its owner by means of the udder: but what fills the udder? the mouth. And what connects the mouth and the udder? the body. Accordingly if a Vira Saiva wishes the image to benefit him (that is, if he desires to obtain the favour of the deity) , he must feed the mouth—that is sustain and comfort his brethren. ”

“ If it was a ram, the meat-offering was doubled, two tenth-deals of flour, about five quarts, and a third part of a hin of oil (which was to them as butter is to us) mingled with it; and the same quantity of wine for a drink-offering, v. 6, 7. If the sacrifice was a bullock, the meat-offering was to be trebled, three omers, with five pints of oil, and the same quantity of wine for a drink-offering, v. 8-10. And thus for each sacrifice, whether offered by a particular person or at the common charge. Note, Our religious services should be governed, as by other rules, so by the rule of proportion. ”

“ For it is not only the quality, but also the quantity of food taken which dulls the keenness of the mind, and when the soul as well as the flesh is surfeited, kindles the baneful and fiery incentive to vice. ”

“ This is what they call a "charm"; there are charms for the stanching of blood, for making the cows yield well, for the cure of toothache, for averting evil from a young child; when a Devonshire woman is asked to a christening, she still takes with her a saffron cake, and gives it to the first stranger that she meets on her way to church. ”

“ The little boys and girls approached in order, and the priest placed in their hands some maize and incense, which they threw one by one into the brazier. This finished and the incensing being terminated, they raised the brazier and the cord with which the Chacs had formed the inclosure. They poured a little wine into a vase or vessel, which they gave, with these things, to a man to carry out of the village, and charged him especially not to drink the wine and not to look behind him on his return In this manner the evil spirit was said to be dispelled. ”

“ When the day was come, the cook, with a high voice, said before all men, ‘My lord, this is the day of my answer. First I shall show you that the swine had no heart; this is the reason. Every thought cometh from the heart, therefore every man or beast feeleth good or evil; it followeth of necessity that by this the heart thinketh.’ The emperor said, ‘That is truth.’ ‘Then,’ said the cook, ‘now shall I show by reasons that the swine had no heart. First he entered the forest, and the steward cut off his tail ”

“ Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God: even as I please all men in all things, not seeking mine own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved" (I Cor. 10:19-33) . ”