Nu

“ My soul shall seek out beauty
And look, once more,
Upon the unveiled vision...
And not die.
Night passes: and already in the court,
Amid the plash of fountains,
There sounds the pad of naked feet approaching.
With slow, deliberate pace,
As though they trod out all my perished years,
The Nubians come, to lead me out to death.
Slowly the great door opens;
And clearer comes the call of waters;
Cool airs are on my brow ...
Lo! ... in the East, the dawn. ”

“ Behold the men whom I have created, how they speak against me. Tell me what ye would that I should do to them, for verily I will not slay them till I have heard your words."
And Nun, the great god whose dwelling is in the waters of the sky, made answer, "My son Ra, greatest of gods, mightiest of kings, thy throne is set fast, and thy fear will be upon all the world when thou sendest out thy daughter, the apple of thine eye, against those who attack thee." ”

“ "You see, you and I are the only people here who walk quite quietly and peaceably on solid ground. The nuns walk in heaven and your husband—in darkness." ”

“ Once on a time the earth-god Keb lay secretly with the sky-goddess Nut, and the sun-god Ra in his anger cursed the goddess, saying that she should give birth to her offspring neither in any month nor in any year. ”

“ And thus Numa, a man curious in such things, and whose wisdom made it thought that he conversed with the Muses, consecrated fire, and ordained it to be kept ever burning, as an image of that eternal power which orders and actuates all things. ”

“ I have seen faces like yours before, but they have always belonged to someone who wore the garb of a nun. The nuns shut out the world from them; you, on the contrary, have lived in the world, and have still kept apart from it. ”

“ And she entered one of the nunneries where virgins were received in the city of Rome, and she put on the nun’s garb, which is the garb of angels. And she made her body to toil with the labor of constant prayer, and with strenuous contending, and with hunger, and with thirst, and with cutting out from her heart and soul every thought concerning this world. In those days she used to fast the whole of every second day throughout the whole year. ”

“ Here is a nucleus—a band of brethren inspired from on high, having the oracles of God in their midst,—the only people that are taught by the revelations of God. Here is the place where the standard is to be erected to all nations. ”

“ Nuns fret not at their Convent's narrow room;
And Hermits are contented with their Cells; ”

“ N.B.—To a nun this is an awful penance, as she has been taught that the “Body and [123] Blood, Soul and Divinity” of Jesus Christ are there present in the reserved Sacrament in the tabernacle.
Rule 10.—If we have a tendency to criticise a Superior’s wisdom or the correctness of any action, to believe that thereby our Lord is injured and the vocation weakened by such thoughts, since we are under our Superiors in and for the Lord, and that the Lord reveals His will only through our spiritual Father or Mother. ”

“ In this land, where I was once so near to being a nun, there lingers hardly one religious house, so-called. The Scripture, then a hid treasure, is now in reach of all, taught even in dame schools, and read in all the churches, and we have peace at home and abroad, sitting every man under his own vine and fig-tree, with none to make us afraid. ”

“ On every earth. How many earths are there? I observed this morning that you may take the particles of matter composing this earth, and if they could be enumerated they would only be a beginning to the number of the creations of God; and they are continually coming into existence, and undergoing changes and passing through the same experience that we are passing through, Sin is upon every earth that ever was created, and if it was not so, I would like some philosophers to let us know how people can be exalted to become sons of God, and enjoy a fulness of glory with the Redeemer. ”

“ As in paradise a new Church had its beginning, before the flood, through Adam and Eve's faith in the promise, so also here a new world and a new Church arise from the marriage of Noah—a nursery of that world which shall endure to the end. ”

“ When, therefore, Anu, Bel, and Ea were invoked, it was equivalent to naming all the powers that influenced the fate of man. They embraced, as it were, the three kingdoms of the gods, within which all the other gods could be comprised. ”

“ I am in the mood in which women of another religion take the veil. I seek heavenly steadfastness in earthly monotony. If I were a Roman Catholic and could deaden my heart, stun it with some great blow, I might become a nun. ”

“ The name of Manu seems afterward to have been given by the Brahmans to the author of their code. Some extracts from this very interesting volume we will now give, slightly abridged, from Sir William Jones's translation.50 From the first book, on Creation:—
"The universe existed in darkness, imperceptible, undefinable, undiscoverable, and undiscovered ”

“ I assert, for myself, that I do not behold the outward creation, and that to me it is hindrance and not action. 'What!' it will be questioned, 'when the sun rises, do you not see a round disc of fire, somewhat like a guinea?' Oh! no, no! I see an innumerable company of the heavenly host, crying: 'Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty!' I question not my corporeal eye, any more than I would question a window concerning a sight. I look through it, and not with it. ”

“ The formulas themselves, as we shall see, are characterized by their large number rather than by any elements that they have in common. At times they constitute a direct appeal to [Pg 271] some god or gods, to some particular spirit, or to the associated spirits of heaven and earth, together with a direct indication of what is desired. An incantation addressed to Nusku, the god of fire, closes:
Fire-god, mighty and lofty one of the gods,
Who dost overpower the wicked and the hostile,
Overpower them (the witches) so that I be not destroyed. ”

“ Shall not both evil and good proceed out of the mouth of the Highest?
39 Mem. Why hath a living man murmured, man suffering for his sins?
40 Nun. Let us search our ways, and seek, and return to the Lord.
41 Nun. Let us lift up our hearts with our hands to the Lord in the heavens.
42 Nun. We have done wickedly, and provoked thee to wrath: therefore thou art inexorable.
43 Samech. Thou hast covered in thy wrath, and hast struck us: thou hast killed and hast not spared. ”

“ Not one of Eve's numerous progeny in all respects resembles her who first culled the flowers of Eden. To the infinite variety and picturesque inequality of Nature we owe the great charm of her uncloying beauty. ”

“ The identification of some of the deities with stars or planets is, moreover, impossible, and if Êa, the god of the deep, and Anu, the god of the heavens, have their representatives among the heavenly bodies, this is probably the result of later development. ”

“ So far from there being any ground for the belief that Ea, Anu, and Bel are, or ever were, real entities, it seems to me quite infinitely more probable that they are products of the religious imagination, such as are to be found everywhere and in all ages, so long as that imagination riots uncontrolled by scientific criticism. ”

“ Although St Nun’s well has been long famous, and the celebrity of its waters extended far, yet there was a belief prevailing amidst the uneducated, that the sudden shock produced by suddenly plunging an insane person into water was most effective in producing a return to reason. ”

“ For the glorious woman in heaven, the remnant of whole seed kept the commandments of God, and had the testimony of Jesus, continued the same woman in outward form after her flight into the wilderness, whereby she quitted her former sincerity and piety, and became the great Whore. ”

“ Thy resurrection shall be in conformity with thy qualities.”
This threefold division they call “hell.” The number of the stories of hell, according to the followers of the law, is seven; that of the simple elements, four; and that of the compound elements, three: altogether seven. Every soul, on leaving the elemental world, enters into one of the stories of hell. ”

“ The second column, which is much mutilated at the beginning, goes on to describe “the trouble” of the moon-god, how “night and day in eclipse, in the seat of his dominion he sat not.” But
1. The wicked gods the messengers of Anu their king 2. devising with wicked heads assisted one another. 3. Evil they plotted together. 4. From the midst of heaven like the wind on mankind they swooped. 102 5. Bel the eclipse of the hero Sin 6. in heaven saw and 7. the god to his messenger the god Nusku (Nebo) said: 8. “My messenger, Nebo, my word to the deep carry: 9. ”

“ When the bell rings, or a Superior calls, everything must be left at once, even though the nun knows full well she will be penanced for leaving things about, and yet she dares not stay to put them away without a breach of this Vow of Obedience. ”

“ A number of girls of my acquaintance went to school to the nuns of the Congregational Nunnery, or Sisters of Charity, as they are sometimes called. ”

“ The Hindu, Buddhist 6 and Greek predecessors of Plotinus and his Christian and Kabbalistic successors saw the created world as having emanated as force or radiated as light from the unknowable, uncreated Source, called God or Law or Light, matter being the radiation farthest from the Divine Center. ”

“ DREAMS Oh! that my young life were a lasting dream! My spirit not awak’ning, till the beam Of an Eternity should bring the morrow: Yes! tho’ that long dream were of hopeless sorrow, ’Twere better than the dull reality Of waking life to him whose heart shall be, And hath been ever, on the chilly earth, A chaos of deep passion from his birth! But should it be—that dream eternally Continuing—as dreams have been to me In my young boyhood—should it thus be given, ’Twere folly still to hope for higher Heaven! ”

“ AND when God Almighty had shewed so plenteously and joyfully of His Goodness, I desired to learn assuredly as to a certain creature that I loved, if it should continue in good living, which I hoped by the grace of God was begun. And in this desire for a singular Shewing, it seemed that I hindered myself: for I was not taught in this time. And then was I answered in my reason, as it were by a friendly intervenor [1] : Take it generally, and behold the graciousness of the Lord God as He sheweth to thee: for it is more worship to God to behold Him in all than in any special thing. ”

“ It seems to me very difficult, I might almost say quite impossible, to lay before the eyes of a Nun 171considerably advanced in years those weaknesses, which she must have long since forgotten and have learned to despise and ridicule ”

“ There was no want of room in the interior of this gigantic tree, for there were great gaps in the foliage, perfect glades, with air in abundance, and freshness everywhere. To see the innumerable branches rising to the clouds, and the creepers running from bough to bough, and attaching them together while the sunlight glinted here and there among the leaves, one might have called it a complete forest instead of a solitary tree sheltering them all. ”

“ Illumine the darkness of my intellect with a ray of Thy heavenly light and inflame my heart with the fire of Thy divine love, that I may contemplate the great virtues and merits of the saint in whose honor I make this novena, and following his example imitate, like him, the life of Thy divine Son. ”

“ There, like the waves about the Hebrides, the low underwood is agitated continually. But there is no wind throughout the heaven. And the tall primeval trees rock eternally hither and thither with a crashing and mighty sound. And from their high summits, one by one, drop everlasting dews. And at the roots strange poisonous flowers lie writhing in perturbed slumber. ”

“ I am already fully in the darkness of terrible sin and do not know whether this darkness has come for all, or whether I alone am punished with blindness.
“If Thou wilt save me, God of Nina, then I pray to Thee, lighten up darkness and show me where my palace stands! I will accept the religion of Thy name, I will [65] erect and glorify the wooden cross, I will build a temple of prayer, following the teachings of Saint Nina, and become a true Christian.” ”

“ And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying, 9. And I, behold, I, establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you: 10. And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth: 11. And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth. ”

“ Come, then, into the midst of us, most amiable Jesus, for it is in Thy sacred name we are here assembled; come into our hearts, that we may be governed by Thy holy spirit; mercifully grant us, through that adorable name, which is the joy of heaven, the terror of hell, the consolation of the afflicted and the solid ground of our unlimited confidence, all the petitions we make in this novena. ”

“ To the mystical soul, quiet to listen to "the music of the spheres," all sweet accordant sounds are singing Holy, Holy, Holy to the mystical soul, "full of eyes within"—like those Creatures of Life seen on the plain by the prophet of the Law of Life as renewed for Hope, and seen in the heights by the herald of the Evangel of life as fulfilled in Love—all symmetrical sights are as doors that are opened in Heaven. ”