Scoria

“ In a serpent's form the devil deceived Adam; and he is now ever striving against our faith: but our protection is in the hand of our Father. The scorpion, which is set in opposition to the egg, is venomous, and stings with its tail to death. Those things which we see in this life are perishable; those which we see not, and which are promised to us are eternal: stretch thereto thy hope, and wait until thou have them. Look not behind; dread the scorpion which envenoms with its tail. The man looks behind, who despairs of God's mercy; then is his hope envenomed by the scorpion's tail. ”

“ So when they drew nigh, the Sorceress caught sight of the Prince and of the retinue that rode before and beside him; and she saw them enter a hollow way which forked into a many of by-ways; and so steep and dangerous were the cliffs and boulders about the track that hardly could a footman safely pace that path. Seeing this the Sorceress bethought her that it must surely lead to some cavern or haply to a subterraneous passage, or to a souterrain the abode of Jinns and fairies; when suddenly the Prince and all his suite vanished from her view. ”

“ The brightest star, α (in the heart) , bears the ancient Arabic name of Antares, which means the wounding. It is called by the Latins Cor Scorpii, because it marks the scorpion's heart. It shines ominously with a deep red light. The sting is called in Hebrew Lesath (Chaldee, Lesha) , which means the perverse. The stars in the tail are also known as Leshaa, or Leshat.40
The scorpion is a deadly enemy (as we learn from Rev. ix) , with poison in its sting, and all the names associated with the sign combine to set forth the malignant enmity which is “set” between the serpent and the woman's Seed. ”

“ This rough, stern, blind, and stricken giant was a divine being to the poor child of the woods. In a vague way Nial thought of Màm-Gorm as God: like Màm-Gorm, God could provide, could at rare times be tender and pitiful, could be stern, morose, forbidding, terrible in wrath, of a swift avenging spirit, could strike, bruise, drive forth, kill.
When Sorcha had left at sunrise she knew that her father had the gloom upon him. In vain she looked here and there for Oona. ”

“ Scoff not at it, my lord, as if he were too pitiful to give cause for alarm. The scorpion is a small, petty-looking insect, but yet there is death in his sting. And now, good night; when you have spent another hour in the sweet dreams that lovers like, betake you to repose, and early to-morrow you shall have some one to guide you on your way. ”

“ But it is in charms for disease that the rural exorciser is most proficient. Accidents, such as the bites of snakes, stings of scorpions, or wasps are in particular treated in this way, and these charms make up most of the folk-medicine of Northern India. Thus, when a man is stung by a scorpion the exorciser says—“Black scorpion of the limestone! Green is thy tail and black thy mouth. God orders thee to go home. Come out! Come out! If thou fail to come out Mahâdeva and Pârvatî will drive thee out!” Another spell for scorpion sting runs thus—“On the hill and mountain is the holy cow. ”

“ Similar attempts to shift the burden of disease and sin from one's self to another person, or to an animal or thing, have been common in ancient and modern Europe. Grave writers of antiquity recommended that, if a man be stung by a scorpion, he should sit upon an ass with his face to the tail, or whisper in the ear of the ass, “A scorpion has stung me”; in either case, they thought, the pain would be transferred from the man to the ass.453 A Roman cure for fever was to pare the patient's nails, and stick the parings with wax upon a neighbour's door before sunrise ”

“ She drew the frightened Buté close to her, held her little trembling hand in one of her own, and with the other pointed to the dead scorpion which lay on the floor.
“O my child!” she cried, “see in that poisonous reptile a type of your own sin of untruth. That scorpion could only hurt the body; but falsehood poisons the soul. Who but a fool would play with a scorpion and say, ‘It is but a little one,’ instead of crushing it at once! Who but a fool would amuse himself with fire-flies when poisonous reptiles were lurking near! ”

“ From the strange mode of Cornelius's death, my father had made a transition to that of Socrates, and was giving my uncle Toby an abstract of his pleading before his judges;—'twas irresistible:—not the oration of Socrates,—but my father's temptation to it.—He had wrote the Life of Socrates (This book my father would never consent to publish; 'tis in manuscript, with some other tracts of his, in the family, all, or most of which will be printed in due time.) ”

“ When my body is burned to ashes, she sleeps her last sleep.
Murmurs of indignation from the crowd. Zoraya makes a movement to go to the stake.
Padilla. (Descending the steps furiously) Seize her! (The gaolers move toward her.) No! Wait! (He motions them back.) Wait! (To Zoraya.) Ah! Wretch, I am at your mercy!—Is it a pardon and freedom that you want?
Zoraya. No! life would be only full of sorrow for me! I prefer death, which will give me an opportunity for revenge!
Enrique. (Standing between Zoraya and the pyre) No! No! Do not use her for revenge. ”

“ Enrique. Ramiro! Arias! My archers, help me!
Instead of responding to Enrique’s call for assistance, Ramiro, Arias and the archers join the crowd and shout.
All. (Encouraged by this move) To the stake! To the stake with the sorceress!
Zoraya. (Taking refuge above the steps of the church, then under the portal) They will kill you—Save yourself!
Enrique. (Covering his retreat, sword in hand) Go into the church!—into the church!
Zoraya runs to the closed door, which she shakes in vain.
Zoraya. Open! Open for us!
No response is heard except singing and organ music. The mob laughs. ”

“ In the blue distance rose Soracte, and other heights, which have gleamed afar, to our imaginations, but look scarcely real to our bodily eyes, because, being dreamed about so much, they have taken the aërial tints which belong only to a dream. These, nevertheless, are the solid framework of hills that shut in Rome, and its wide surrounding Campagna; no land of dreams, but the broadest page of history, crowded so full with memorable events that one obliterates another ”

“ There has been neither a magician nor magic. “Life,” said my father, “is a combat, where, like flights of arrows, contrary minds strive among themselves for a victory, which finally rests with the fallen.” I desired ardently to be loved by you. You did not know how to defend yourself. I have shot my arrow into your heart—in that lies all of my sorcery.
Enrique. And why did you so fervently desire me to love you?
Zoraya. (Passing Enrique, to the left) First, because of cowardice, my dear lord!—to extort from you my pardon—and later on, if I conquered you, to flee from Toledo! ”

“ We have no favorites; one child gets the same attention as all the rest.
“Did you see our babies today, mother?” Nellie inquired.
“Why, I see them every day I go. Do you suppose I could go where they are and not see them? Your boy is growing finely and little Scoris so like her namesake. I feel that you have named her under an inspiration. She is so demure and quiet, yet so determined when she imagines she is not being treated right. Today the head nurse asked her to take a shoe to the nurse that a baby had kicked off, but Scoris shook her head. ”

“ I have your prayers, I know I have, unworthy as I am, and Zorilda's prayers will reach the throne of mercy.
"My sand is nearly run. The king of terrors beckons to me. A little while, a few brief moments, and I shall awake in the invisible world, from whose bourne none hath ever returned to unfold its mysteries. Strength fails. Cold dews creep over my frame. Think of me [Pg 104] sometimes. First and last beloved, farewell for ever." ”

“ Once or twice, within these last few cloudless days and nights, she knew that Sorcha, when at length the restless lapwings had ceased their querulous crying in the moonlight, had slipped quietly from the house. She knew, too, that once at least Sorcha did not return till sunrise, for she had been awake, and had risen, and had seen her sister moving slow through the dew, with so wonderful a look in her eyes, so beautiful, so strange, that she had not dared to speak, and had fled back to her bed, with a sob in her throat, she knew not why. ”

“ Sorcery is held by some to be properly what the ancients called Sortilegium, or divination by means of Sortes or lots.
Lord Coke (3 Instit. fol. 44,) describes a Sorcerer, qui utitur sortibus, et incantationibus dæmonium. Sorcery, by Stat. 1o.Jac. is felony. In another book it is said to be a branch of heresy; and by Stat. 12, Carolus II. it is excepted out of the general pardons.
Sorcery is pretended to have been a very common thing formerly; the credulity, at least, of those ages made it pass for such; people frequently suffered for it. ”

“ Touch the black mouth of Love, the ancient whore.
CRASSUS.
Girl! what a scorpion leaping from your lips!
ALICIA.
My mouth stings as no scorpion ever stang.
in this round impudent smiling face of mine
There is a poison fiercer than all wine;
And from these eyes more subtle sorrows pour
Than you can dream. These teeth have been at grips
With gods; I have sung what no girl ever sang. ”

“ Such hardened optimists are we, and Shakespeare,—and those who find the darkness of revelation in a tragedy which reveals Cordelia. Yet surely, if we condemn the universe for Cordelia's death, we ought also to remember that it gave her birth. The fact that Socrates was executed does not remove the fact that he lived, and the inference thence to be drawn about the world that produced him. ”

“ In a convent on the frontiers of Flanders lives a ————’ He expired. Death cut short the thread of his discourse. I wish to see my friend to hear the remainder.”
“You ask much,” exclaimed the Englishman, with an oath. “I proclaim you the greatest sorcerer on earth if you can solve this problem,” continued he, turning to the Sicilian. We admired the wise choice of the prince, and unanimously gave our approval to the proposition. In the meantime the sorcerer paced up and down the room with hasty steps, apparently struggling with himself. ”

“ Surely I would live to be as old, for I, Scar, was the strongest and most full of health of all our clan, the one most able to fend off evil of any sort. Assuredly I would live as long as had this fine veteran, who was near an hundred years of age. ”

“ One night, when this man Elpidius was reciting the service, now we were with him, a scorpion stung him, and he crushed the insect, without either leaving the place where he was or being in any way moved as a man usually is when he is suffering from the sting of a scorpion. ”

“ By the advice of the god of wisdom she took refuge in the papyrus swamps of the Delta. Seven scorpions accompanied her in her flight. One evening when she was weary she came to the house of a woman, who, alarmed at the sight of the scorpions, shut the door in her face. Then one of the scorpions crept under the door and stung the child of the woman that he died. But when Isis heard the mother’s lamentation, her heart was touched, and she laid her hands on the child and uttered her powerful spells; so the poison was driven out of the child and he lived. ”

“ And while we were pressed on all sides with the vast masses of arms, and works, and beasts, still our scorpions were kept at work with their iron slings, hurling huge round stones from the battlements, by which the towers of the enemy were crushed and the balistae and those who worked them were dashed to the ground, so that many were desperately injured, and many crushed by the weight of the falling structures. ”

“ Fear thou the Lord, and it shall not be able to hurt thee. “A scorpion stings.” Fear the Lord, and it shall not sting thee. “A lion is bloodthirsty.” Fear thou the Lord, and he shall lie down beside thee, as by Daniel. But truly wonderful also is the action of the animals: how some, as the scorpion, have the sharpness in a sting; and others have their power in their teeth; and others do battle with their claws ”

“ CIRCE (Gr. Κίρκη) , in Greek legend, a famous sorceress, the daughter of Helios and the ocean nymph Perse. Having murdered her husband, the prince of Colchis, she was expelled by her subjects and placed by her father on the solitary island of Aeaea on the coast of Italy. She was able by means of drugs and incantations to change human beings into the forms of wolves or lions, and with these beings her palace was surrounded. ”

“ When I was a boy I vowed that wherever I found an oppressed people, or one unjustly treated, I would fight for them, and never yet have I broken my word. I will hold your country for you as long as I am here." Then he turned to his little band of Fians: "Are you willing to fight on behalf of this king?"
Their eyes gleamed, and they shouted with joy at thought of the coming battle; they would follow their chief gladly, even though he led them to death.
The next morning the Fians, and the King of Sorcha with his army, sought the invaders, and on the wide open plain gave them battle. ”

“ THE IMMUNITY OF LARVÆ
So little do we possess the Scorpion’s secret that unexpected facts crop up that strangely complicate the problem. The study of life brings us these surprises. Repeated experiments, with mutually consistent results, seem to justify our formulation of a rule when, suddenly, important exceptions arise, compelling us to follow a fresh path, directly opposed to the first, and leading us to doubt which is the last stage on the road to knowledge. ”