Thais

“ Thais thought in the dazzling glare—
“He was good, and now he has become great and glorious. Why is it that he is elevated above other men? What is this unknown thing which is more than riches or pleasure?”
She rose slowly, and turned towards the tomb of the saint who had loved her, those violet eyes, now filled with tears which glittered in the candle-light; then, with bowed head, humble, slow, and the last, with those lips on which so many desires hung, she kissed the stone of the slave’s tomb. ”

“ The young men, on their part, also thought—
“If Thais is going to renounce acting and love, our chief amusements will be taken from us. She was the glory, delight, and honour of the stage. She was the joy even of those who had never possessed her. The women we loved, we loved in her. There were no kisses given in which she was altogether absent, for she was the joy of all voluptuaries, and the mere thought that she breathed amongst us excited us to pleasure.” ”

“ Thais replied reprovingly. "See, the world is beautiful!"
They stood in silence for a moment, gazing at the scene, which was indeed beautiful, as Thais had said. On three sides the sea flashed and sparkled with white-capped waves before the southwest wind. On the east a channel, half a mile in width, divided the mainland from the island upon which the new city was built. Beyond the strait lay the city of Old Tyre, with its wide circle of walls. ”

“ Thailand is founded on blood and flesh Thai people share, Luang Saranupraphan Phra Chen-Duriyang
Thailand is founded on blood and flesh Thai people share, Every portion of the land belongs to us, thus we must care; It has long maintained its sovereignty, Because the Thais have always been united. The Thai people are peace-loving, But they are no cowards at war. They shall allow no one to rob them of their independence, Nor shall they suffer tyranny. All Thais are ready to give up every drop of blood For the nation's safety, freedom and progress. ”

“ PAPHNUTIUS. Thais.
DISCIPLES. Thais! Thais, the harlot!
PAPHNUTIUS. Yes—she.
DISCIPLE. Everyone has heard of her and her wickedness.
PAPHNUTIUS. It is no wonder, for she is not satisfied to ruin herself with a small band of lovers. She seeks to allure all men through her marvellous beauty, and drag them down with her.
DISCIPLES. What a woeful thing!
PAPHNUTIUS. And it is not only fools and wastrels who squander their substance with her. Citizens of high standing and virtue lay precious things at her feet, and enrich her to their own undoing. ”

“ He did not sleep all night, and before dawn he had a vision. Thais appeared to him again. There was no expression of guilty pleasure on her face, nor was she dressed according to custom in transparent drapery. She was enveloped in a shroud, which hid even a part of her face, so that the Abbot could see nothing but the two eyes, from which flowed white and heavy tears. ”

“ Walk in the footsteps of Thais. Hate your offenses, which are as great as hers. Which of you, poor or rich, merchants, soldiers, slaves or eminent citizens, would dare to say, before God, that he was better than a prostitute? You are all nothing but living filth, and it is by a miracle of divine goodness that you do not suddenly turn into streams of mire. ”

“ You know me well, Paphnutius. How is it you have not recognised me? I am one of the innumerable incarnations of Thais. You are a learned monk, and well skilled in the knowledge of things. You have travelled, and it is by travel a man learns the most. Often a day passed abroad will show more novelties than ten years passed at home. You have heard that Thais lived formerly in Argos, under the name of Helen. She had another existence in Thebes Hecatompyle. ”

“ Attracted by curiosity, the crowd increased unceasingly, and soon it was known that Thais had been persuaded by the Abbot of Antinoe to burn her riches and retire to a nunnery.
The shopkeepers thought to themselves—
“Thais is going to leave the city; we shall sell no more to her; it is dreadful to think of. What will become of us without her? This monk has driven her mad. He is ruining us. Why let him do it? What is the use of the laws? Are there no magistrates in Alexandria? Thais does not think about us and our wives and our poor children. ”

“ Thais knew well, having often watched her, that her mother practised no magic arts, but that she was eaten up with avarice, and counted all night the gains of the day. The idle father and the greedy mother let the child live as best it could, like one of the fowls in the poultry-yard. She became very clever in extracting, one by one, the oboli from the belt of some drunken sailor, and in amusing the drinkers with artless songs and obscene words, the meaning of which she did not know. ”

“ Now, kneeling in his cell, before the image of that holy cross on which hung, as in a balance, the ransom of the world, Paphnutius began to think of Thais, because Thais was a sin to him, and he meditated long, according to ascetic rules, on the fearful hideousness of the carnal delights with which this woman had inspired him in the days of his sin and ignorance. After some hours of meditation the image of Thais appeared to him clearly and distinctly. ”

“ But thou thyself wouldest have been touched if thou hadst seen her in these pious scenes, shedding real tears, and raising to heaven arms graceful as palm leaves. I have long governed a community of women, and I make it a rule never to oppose their nature. All seeds give not the same flowers. Not all souls are sanctified in the same way. It must also not be forgotten that Thais gave herself to God whilst she was still beautiful, and such a sacrifice is, if not unexampled, at least very rare. ”

“ Priests, clad in white, were prostrate at the foot of the sarcophagus. The hymns they sang with the people expressed the delight of suffering, and mingled, in a triumphal mourning, so much joy with so much grief, that Thais, in listening to them, felt the pleasures of life and the terrors of death flowing, at the same time, through her re-awakened senses.
When they had finished singing, the believers rose, and walked in single file to the tomb, the side of which they kissed. They were common men, accustomed to work with their hands. ”

“ Thais looked at him with an angry eye, a frown gathered on her beautiful face.
“You are very bold, stranger, to offend your hostess. Look at me, and say if I resemble a creature crushed down with shame. No, I am not ashamed, and all others who live like me are not ashamed either, although they are not so beautiful or so rich as I am. I have sown pleasure in my footsteps, and I am celebrated for that all over the world. I am more powerful than the masters of the world. ”

“ Yes, when I had before my eyes the line in which it was written, ‘Nothing should deter you from improving your mind,’ I read, ‘The kisses of Thais are warmer than fire, and sweeter than honey.’ That is how a philosopher reads the books of other philosophers—and that is your fault, you naughty child. ”

“ Left in an independent position, Thais had shown herself capricious. None of the young men who hung about her could boast of any successes. A few had ruined themselves in their efforts to gain her favor, and one had even drunk hemlock and crept to her door to die. Clearchus, although he had never before seen her, had heard enough of her to feel astonished at her presence. He could not understand how Chares had been able to induce her to come, like a mere dancing girl, for their amusement, unless he had offered her an enormous sum of money. ”

“ My Thais, thou hast seen these filthy snails crawling towards thee and defiling thee with their sticky sweat; thou hast seen others, like brutes, sleeping under the heels of their slaves; thou hast seen them coupling like beasts on the carpet they had fouled with their vomit; thou hast seen a foolish old man shed a blood yet viler than the wine which flowed at his debauch, and at the end of the orgie throw himself in the face of the unforeseen Christ. ”

“ The opulence of Bangkok might entice poor school girls in uniform to become whores of old Chinese-Thais and straight men to be serpentine prostitutes, but few were the Buddhists who would kill their servants of their pleasures. Still, even with the probability of being snug and secure in his den of decadence, the croaking of those incessant frogs outside ensured that no sleep was possible for a city dweller who deemed traffic to be a purr when hearing the harangue of the jungles. ”

“ The holy man watched this incident, and as, by virtue of his holiness, he easily comprehended the mystic sense of all occurrences, he knew that the captive bird was no other than Thais, caught in the snares of sin, and that—like the plover that had cut the hempen threads with its beak—he could, by pronouncing the word of power, break the invisible bonds by which Thais was held in sin. ”

“ But such a thought did not come from God, and I cast it from me, for assuredly it would be a great offence to the well-beloved of Jesus Christ to offer them the spoils of thy lust. Thais, all that thou hast touched must be devoured by the fire, even to its very soul. Thanks be to Heaven, these tunics and veils, which have seen kisses more innumerable than the waves of the sea, will only feel now the lips and tongues of the flames. ”

“ Phradates shuddered and covered his face with his hands.
"I think Thais really loves thee," the Egyptian continued artfully. "It is the presence of the other that restrains her, because she is ashamed to show her love before her. If Artemisia were away, she would grieve, it is true, but she would recover. It is not needful that thou shouldst give her up. The priests take whom they will for sacrifice. Thou mightest even defend her, which would commend thee to Thais and earn her gratitude." ”

“ Thais with a disposition and willingness to scrutinize their own cultural suppositions were rare but for those who were so inclined to repugn family and Buddha, if only in outward aloofness and tacit pondering, little remained sacrosanct from intellectual dissection except for issues in reference to the king, for to cease to revere him would make one something other than Thai. ”

“ Thais with money are no different than other sex tourists that come to this country for a piece of Laotian pussy. All those paintings—you must be a real ladies man. Well, it looks like we will be here for a while. ”

“ Their serious probing of life and their awareness of the geyser of unique thoughts that erupted in them certainly didn’t seem Thai. A typical urban Thai yearned to languish if not extinguish himself or herself in strolls in a shopping mall, a movie, a video game, laughter, cellular telephones, beer, and comic books. Jatupon did pursue the pejorative in comic books as most Thai males from five to fifty and the two of them were pursuing their quest of leisure as lazily as the best of Thais ”

“ Prevail on you to grant but two short days.
Phæd. Well—for two days—so those two be not twenty.
124 Thais. No in good faith but two, or——
Phæd. Or? no more.
Thais. It shall not be: but you will grant me those.
Phæd. Your will must be a law.
Thais. Thanks, my sweet Phædria!
Phæd. I’ll to the country: there consume myself
For these two days: it must be so: we must
Give way to Thais. See you, Parmeno,
The slaves brought hither.
Par. Sir, I will.
Phæd. My Thais,
For these two days farewell!
Thais. Farewell, my Phædria! ”

“ And the blessed Bessarion answered and said unto her, “God hath not forgiven thee thy sins because of thy repentance, but because of the thought which thou hadst—that thou wouldst deliver thyself over unto Christ.” Now this blessed woman Thais lived (literally, made) after her repentance fifteen days, and she departed unto our Lord in peace. Thus was the crowning of the blessed Thais, who was lost and was found, and was dead and who came to life by the grace of Christ, unto Whom belong mercy, and compassion, and glory, and honour, for ever and ever. ”

“ May all the Thais be of one mind and united in preserving and observing the Constitution unanimously, in order to enhance the permanent peace, happiness, and well-being of His citizenry. May the members of the royalty, either senior or junior, the public servants, both civil and military, as well as the people under His authority, uphold unity, in order that the regime of democracy should stay well and beside the State of Thailand, the Royal Land, till the end of the epoch, in accordance with His great royal wish. ”

“ The place was overrun with people. I'd brought Thais, of course, resplendent in red and silver paint. Lyra Yves appeared in a solid coat of gilt, with that one breast and her left arm sheathed in flexible vinyl. Thais nudged me. "Look at that. I think it's disgusting."
I did look. I couldn't help myself. That shiny vinyl caught the eye of every man in the room. "Depraved," Thais sniffed.
Honest Pancho came in with an older man who was pointed out to me as an ethnologist from the University of California across the bay. ”

“ Thais—who, though a heartless flirt of the worst description, still has her good points—is anxious to rescue her old companion, and, if possible, to restore her to her friends, to whom she hopes she has already found some clue. She fears that if her military lover believes her to prefer Phædria—as she assures that young gentleman she really does—he will break his promise, and not give her this girl. ”