#I doubt I could measure up to the true author’s genius

[aedesluminis]

Marat's critique on scientific academies

"Even though the following letter does not come from the same quill, I felt obliged to include it here anyway, because it reveals some piquant facts that are perfect to show the uselessness of scientific societies and to reveal the shameless charlatanism of their members."

Letter XII "It is not true, Monsieur, that the academies have never made some discoveries, although their members have often stolen those of others. On the subject, I could mention one hundred traits of infidelity of Messrs. the academicians of Paris; one hundred cases of misuse of funds; one hundred inventions publicly claimed by their authors, and what is even stranger, one hundred mémoirs that have been made to disappear and then carelessly published again under the names of these shameful plagiarists, but I do not want to demoralise you. Thus, I will limit myself to clear your doubts with two anecdotes that you will find amusing and of which you can find proof easily, since they happened before our very eyes.

You remember the enthusiasm about the rise of the first aerostatic globe and the craze of the public for this kind of exhibition. You remember the wonderful discoveries, of which this new experience was the source; you also remember the multiple as well as vain attempts done to steer the balloons. Well? Some fools, who believe that genius resides in the Academy of Science, gave it twelve thousand livres to figure out a way to control [the balloons]. What happened to that money? Do you think it reached its destination? Do not fool yourself. Do you think it was used for some useful research? How naive you are. Just know that our savants shared it among themselves and that it was all squandered at the Rapée, at the Opera and with women. You blush for them, but this is just a small thing, listen to this other bolder courtesy of theirs. Some months ago, a deputy, prompted by the work of an author, proposed in the National Assembly to proclaim the equality of weights and measures through all the reign. The proposal was well received and sent to the Academy of Science in order to decide how to proceed. It only took them the time to puff themselves up, to put their scribes to work and to rush to the senate that Messrs. the scientists were ready to announce that the Academy had found the best method to fulfil the expectations of the Assembly. It was to derive all the measures from the one of the circumference of the terrestrial globe; a method that some venal quills have immediately presented as a superb discovery by our doctors. But where do you think that this sublime method comes from? From the Egyptians. It was to pass it on to future centuries that the famous pyramids were built, which many clueless travellers took for eternal monuments of the greatness of these people. Eh! And where do you think that our academicians took this magnificent system from? They took it word for word from the treatise on weights and measures of the Ancients, published by Romé de l’Îsle, a distinguished savant, whose name they have taken care to overshadow since his death, in order to steal from him, after having persecuted him his whole life. But the best is yet to come. Under the pretext to measure a degree of the meridian arc - already well determined by the ancients and of which it would be impossible today to alter the measure without overthrowing this admirable system - they have been granted by the minister one hundred thousand écus for the expenses of the operation; a gâteau that they will share among their associates.

Judge for yourself the usefulness of the academies and the virtue of their members. The academies of the capital, which have never done anything for the progress of human knowledge other than persecute true men of genius; those will be preserved by conscript fathers, for the fact that the nation is in charge of [the academies] and that they consist of vile supporters of the despot, pavid advocates of despotism." —from Jean-Paul Marat's "Les charlatans modernes ou lettres sur le charlatanisme académique", letter n° 12, p. 40

Highlights in italics are mine. I thank @pleasecallmealsip for helping me with a couple of words I didn't know how to translate.

#spoiler: the “prompting” plagiarist author is Talleyrand #marat #jean paul marat #frev #french revolution #metric system #history of science #rome de l'isle #my translations

[davidfarland]

Recognizing Your Own Skill

When you write a story, you often have to ask yourself, “Is this tale good enough to send to editors or agents? Is it ready to publish? Could it be a bestseller?” Oddly enough, you as the author may be a terrible judge of your own work.

This principle was brought up to me years ago by my mentor, Algis Budrys. He was a leading critic for a major newspaper and a magazine, so he read widely. He once mentioned to me that, “For 20 years, I’ve asked well-known authors, ‘Which one of your books do you think is the best?’ Almost always they get it wrong. They don’t pick the books that the public likes best, or that the critics like best, but choose instead something that deals with conflicts that are especially powerful to them. Almost always, the author chooses some . . . obscure book that no one else would look at twice.”

It’s an important principle to remember when you finish a novel. You may think that it’s great. After having just gone through your “birthing pains,” you look at your newborn and it seems beautiful to you. But maybe it’s not quite so beautiful to others.

Most people are pretty bad judges of their own efforts. Years ago, there was a newspaper story about a man who believed that if he rubbed lemon juice on his face, it would make him invisible to cameras. So he rubbed some lemon juice on his face and went out and robbed some banks. When the police caught him, he was astonished that they had been able to recognize him.

Some researchers at Cornell University learned of the incident and wondered how the man could be so self-deluded. So they performed a study in which they tested people’s powers of logic, recognition of humor, and so on.

What they found was fascinating. The people who scored lowest, in the bottom 12 percentile, very often thought that they had performed fantastic!

In the same way, we as authors sometimes delude ourselves. People who need a lot of work sometimes act like prima donnas. They can’t figure out why the rest of the world doesn’t recognize their talent—including editors, agents, literary critics, and their own spouses.

You’ve probably met such a person. Very often they will attach themselves to writing groups, trying to feed their egos, and then promptly drive away anyone who has any common sense.

But, amazingly, I often find that the opposite is true: many truly great authors often don’t recognize their own gifts. If they really are great, they seem to doubt it, and therefore belittle themselves. They might be too frightened to send stories to editors or agents, fearing rejection.

Now, it’s interesting that in the study that I mentioned, many people who were painfully unaware of their own inabilities often proved to be quite successful. For example, managers in companies might be terrible at many tasks, but their own sense of self-importance assures them of a measure of success. You remember the saying, “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread”? I’ve had bosses who did that. They’d promise a customer, “Sure, we can get the job done by tomorrow,” hoping to add some functionality to an existing bit of software, and suddenly they had to pull a team of a hundred programmers together to try to do the impossible. Sometimes, our teams even managed to do the impossible—and that’s the genius of it!

But usually, our old manager ended up with a bit of egg on his face.

Now, incompetent writers will make similar promises. They overpromise and under-deliver. But at least they deliver.

An author who suffers from low self-esteem, on the other hand, may not deliver at all.

So what are we to do? I think that we need to find the courage to work at our writing. Sometimes, look to others for opinions. If you give a manuscript to ten people and three of them tell you that you’ve got a problem, then fix the dang problem. Don’t argue and sashay around and call them all idiots.

Meanwhile, if you write a story and ten people tell you that you’re amazing, then use it as fuel to get yourself writing, to push harder and work longer, so that you continue to improve and write more amazing works.

#writing tips #writing tips and tricks #writeblr #writing help

[melon-kiss]

This is just going to be a ramble about everything Sherlock. You’re most welcome to discuss or just ignore it. I needed the space to vent.

I watched Sherlock. Again. I think it’s beginning to become my annual tradition. And I have a crisis. Don’t get me wrong, I am always Sherlollian at heart. It’s just… I have doubts sometimes. And what triggered those doubts this time was the fact that Sherlock calls Molly “John”. Twice. And then Irene Adler. And then one post on Tumblr. And many, many more.

OK, these are just my random thoughts. Enjoy if you’re willing to read them.

 1. “John”. “Molly”.

We often mix up names of people we consider to have the same place in our lives. Which is good, right? Right. Only, in Sherlock’s case, we’d have lean into the theory that Sherlock does love John romantically and feels the same way about Molly. Or concede the fact that he loves them both platonically. Neither of these options is really satisfying, isn’t it? Well, that’s why I’m struggling… One could say he’s in denial of feelings for Molly and identifies them as friendship, as this is the strongest, purest relationship in his life, the only one he describes as emotional and the closest he’s ever had to love. Besides, Molly and John are similar in one way – they both share the same – medical – knowledge. Of course, Sherlock doesn’t realise her other qualities until The Reichenbach Fall when she says she can help him whenever he needs it. It’s not until she’s honest with him again and tells him, without a shred of grudge, that she knows she means nothing to him, that he realises he has at least two friends. He calls her “John” when his mind is busy with something else, so there’s no room for any purposeful confusion. The same thing happens in The Empty Hearse. What else can it mean if not friendship?

 2. Nothing Hits Like Irene

Irene Adler is created as the love interest for Sherlock. Is she, though? Well, we see Sherlock utterly confused upon their first meeting. We also see him flirting and creating an atmosphere of sexual tension for the first time. OK, he saves her but then she vanishes, he got over her, I thought. And all was fine until The Lying Detective came and Irene Adler sent a text to Sherlock, first in such a long time. John, of course, suggests that if Sherlock should be romantically involved with anyone, it should be her. And then it hit me.

Irene Adler is the symbol of chemistry in Sherlock’s life.

She’s a dominatrix. She’s all about sex, that’s obvious. At the critical point of The Scandal in Belgravia Sherlock says: I believe John Watson thinks love’s a mystery for me but the chemistry is incredibly simple and very distractive. Sherlock discovers that he, indeed, can have chemistry with people. He doesn’t mention love, he merely says sentiment, referring to the crush Irene Adler had on him. She is, indeed, a simple distraction – you can see it clearly in his memory palace when he yells at her to get away. But Molly… Molly stays. She leads him through the entire process of surviving a shot.

And then Irene Adler returns in The Lying Detective. John confesses to Sherlock about texting with a stranger met on the bus. And that he wanted more. Sherlock says everyone gets to be human sometimes. Even he can’t resist the urge of replying to Irene Adler sometimes. It was all about attraction again.

And that’s why she’s not considered a romantic relationship in his life. John rambles about love changing him, to be more specific, the love of his woman changing him. But he says Irene’s a dangerous criminal. How would that change Sherlock in any way?

In The Final Problem, upon deducing the coffin, John suggests Irene Adler but she’s not his first thought in general once they all hear that this is about someone who loves Sherlock. Sherlock’s response is very telling: Don’t be ridiculous. Look at the coffin. It seems like Sherlock pieces the puzzle at once – the coffin, plus the “name” on the lid – it couldn’t have been Irene Adler.

And that’s why Sherlock calls her The Woman. As a symbol of his sexuality. The Woman who’s woken up certain impulses in his life.

 3. Makeshift Gauge

Who is she?, Sherlock asks John in His Last Vow.

Based on what Mofftiss duo said about Molly, she was supposed to be featured in two episodes top. Yet, she stayed. The uncanonical character not only stayed but became fans’ favourite. I think she became a useful tool for Moffat and Gatiss. I think that not only she represents Sherlock heart (of which existence he has no idea at first) but later becomes our makeshift gauge. For what? For measuring Sherlock’s progress. See, it’s like when you live with someone, you don’t notice when they put on weight or grew a little but those who see less of them will notice all changes right away. So, when Sherlock runs around with John, we don’t notice the change in his behaviour at once (also because he’s always been nice to him, from the very beginning), we need to focus to see that. But Molly pops by once per episode and we see how Sherlock’s perception changes. In season one, he has good intentions, but they turn out bad. In season two, he’s more neutral but doesn’t restrain himself from rude comments. And Molly is being Molly – tells him he’s rude in her natural, soft way and he says sorry. For the first time. Without anyone making him do that. Almost the same happens in The Reichenbach Fall – but this time, Molly doesn’t let herself be fooled by Sherlock’s arrogance and just ignores it, going straight to the point. She says: “I’m here for you” and lowers his defences. In season three, he spends an entire day with her, smiles at her and is the sweetest, softest Sherlock we’ve ever seen. Moreover, when Lestrade asks him about her helping him solve cases, he says: [John] is not in the picture anymore, implying that she not necessarily had to be a temporary replacement. In season four, he says I love you to her.

What can we deduce about his heart?

 4. The Eurus Conundrum

We could write an entire book about Eurus and not even be able to grasp her spirit. I’m not going to do that right now.

I have issues with what happened in season four finale. I mean – Molly, of course. Mycroft says Eurus and Jim Moriarty met five years ago, so before Moriarty revealed himself to Sherlock. They both planned the entire game for Sherlock. Does that mean Sherlock never really won with him? Does that mean Moriarty let him use Molly to “win”? Since she was included in Eurus’ plan, we can safely assume Jim knew about Molly back then. At first, when I saw Moriarty saying We both know that’s not quite true [that you don’t have a heart] in many Sherlolly fanvids, I was like naaaaah. He didn’t see her as one of the important people in Sherlock’s life, it couldn’t have been a reference to their meeting. But now… how deeply back in time was Eurus’ plan allocated? Which events did she predict?

Or maybe I’m missing something? Any thoughts on this?

 5. Sherlock Evergreen

I once came across a post here, about how BBC Sherlock is literature, about sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s struggle with his own genius character. He was over with him, didn’t feel like writing any more of his stories so he killed him, but fans demanded more. He kept writing, although he hated it from the bottom of his heart. Season four, so often considered as the worst of all of them, is a way of saying that Sherlock character is, unfortunately, invincible. Immortal. He will live forever. We can’t kill him, no one can. Even his creator couldn’t have done it.

In season four, Sherlock goes back to the start. He is a clean slate again. He went through the entire process of change – became a good Sherlock, considerate of other people’s feelings and emotions, appreciative, supportive, loving, ready to mend what he broke. That interpretation, although very good, kind of killed my Sherlolly spirit. But I guess every interpretation like this would do it. If we stop treating characters like real human being, we’re left with what they really are – a construct, tools, puppets in the author’s hands.

Based on this, I think we’re safe to say there will never be a fifth season of BBC Sherlock (gosh, how I wish I was wrong!). Why? Because, despite what Moffat said in an interview once (after season three finale he said they’ve plotted out the entire fourth and fifth season – liar, liar, pants on fire!), season four had the perfect ending. As mentioned above, Sherlock became a good man and Mary Watson summed up what Sherlock is all about: two man, a genius junkie and a former soldier, who solve the weirdest, the toughest of cases together in flat on 221B Baker Street. Now, Sherlock is ready to be taken over by other artists who may find a new way to tell his story (though, I don’t think so) all over again.

And that’s a big, big shame… I think I speak for at least most of Sherlollians when I say we’d like to see Sherlock and Molly’s first encounter after the call. The finale really closed all the story arcs and subplots, except for this one. I mean, c’mon. You don’t have to be a Sherlollian to be annoyed by this – just remember that it was such a “biggie” that Moffat was asked about this in an interview. And this may be another reason as to why we won’t ever get a fifth season of Sherlock – because that would mean taking a side. And none of the creators will do it because Sherlock cannot be an open-and-shut case. It has to be like literature: big, open, twisted, unclear and full of room for interpretation. As long as there’s no certain explanation – yes, Sherlock loves Molly, no, Sherlock is gay – we create more and more content out of the need of closure. Thanks to the room for interpretation, the story lives. I mean, it’s been four years since The Final Problem airing and here I am, discussing BBC Sherlock still.

 Coming back to Sherlolly… don’t worry. Though I’m still not sure that we can harvest any hard evidence for Sherlock’s feelings for Molly (other than friendship and respect), I’m still a Sherlollian. There two new fics waiting for me to pull myself together and write them. I think it’s good to have doubts – it means my brain hasn’t rotten yet and I can still be critical, I’m able of having my own opinions.

 Thank you if you managed to read it all! I’d love to discuss if you have any conclusions. If not, that’s fine, too. I just needed it get it out of my system.

PS WHY DOES MY POSTS IN ENGLISH SOUND SO SOPHISTICATED IN MY HEAD BUT WHEN I PUT THEM IN WRITING, THEY’RE SO SHITTY?!

#bbc sherlock #sherlock #sherlock holmes #john watson #irene adler #molly hooper #sherlolly #molly x sherlock #thoughts #eurus holmes

[thewatermelloncat]

Powers Against the Father (Diego)

Luther, Allison and Klaus, Five, Ben, Vanya

Author’s Note: Let me know if you want to be put in the tag list.

Warnings: None

Tag list: 

@lunamusamelark

@ll-short-breadstikz-ll

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Her face is too white. Almost as white as it is when her powers are activated. Though Diego knows this is for a completely different reason.

For weeks their father had been talking about Vanya using her powers to levitate, which wouldn’t be a problem unless he planned for her to levitate outside the fourth story window. And today is the day for his barbaric plan to potentially kill one of his children.

Vanya doesn’t join in with the idle chitchat between the siblings as they wait in the foyer for their father to come down from his office to commence their training. Instead she stands off to the side, her hands in her pockets, her face as white as a sheet.

Diego had been ignoring all conversation around him as he watched her. He’d seen her barely touch her breakfast and she hadn’t looked up from the floor all morning. It didn’t take a genius to know she is beyond nervous.

Without thinking to hard about it his feet carry him over to stand next to her. He hadn’t planned to say anything, just stand next to her and it comes as a surprise to him when she turns to him to speak.

“I’m going to die.”

It was unnerving how upfront she was being about it. “We won’t let that happen” Diego tells her.

“Yeah, what are you going to do about it?” she sounded annoyed but Diego was able to chalk it down to stress. “Tell dad that you forbid him to make me do it?”

He doesn’t have anything to say and only shakes his head at her.

“You know, I heard Five talking the other day” she remembers, looking over at him talking with Ben as they watch Klaus run chaotically up and down the stairs. “He was saying that the median height for people falling to their deaths is four stories.”

“Good thing you’re not a normal person” he tells her.

“But my body is still built like one!” she yells, drawing the attention of the rest of her siblings.

Diego can tell she regrets it as she shrinks back further away from the group. Everything freezes for a second, all eyes falling to her and Klaus stopping running up the stairs, before he turns tail and makes his way down and over to her. The other siblings falling into place behind him.

“I know it’s wrong” Allison sighs, shaking her head as the group congregates around her.

“But you’ve done it before” – Luther’s encouragement is interrupted.

“Not four stories in the air, Luther” Diego bites back at him. “Half a metre off the kitchen floor doesn’t really compare to that, does it?”

They can all tell that it’s for their sister’s sake that Luther doesn’t fire something back at his brother.

“Is there something we could do? Some kind of measure we could put in place?” Allison asks.

“Luther could catch her” Klaus puts out.

“If he calculates her trajectory wrong, she could crush both of them” Five dismisses.

“It’ll be better than nothing though” Ben points out. “At least injuries heal.”

“Guys were thinking too negatively” Luther says, “this might actually work.”

“And you want to try it without any kind of safety measures?” Allison raises an eyebrow at him.

“Not all of us have super resilience like you” Vanya adds.

Around Diego his siblings squabble with one another arguing the best way to save their sister if needed. Though he chooses not to listen, instead formulating his own plan. After considering its logistics it takes him a couple of goes to get his siblings’ attention.

“Guys, shut it!” he cuts in, stepping into the middle of the formed circle. “I have a plan.”

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Diego is barely finished whispering the plan in his siblings’ ears when their father descends the stairs coming to stand nonchalantly in front of them. Hastily they back away from each other forming their standard line.

It’s doubtful that anyone listens to their father’s instruction about Vanya’s training exercise that is about to follow. Though bits stand out like when he forbids Five to jump Vanya to safety if she is to fall. Diego is glad that he doesn’t mention a single thing about him as he fingers the blade of one of the knives hidden behind his back.

After their father gives them the command to make their way to the courtyard and for Vanya to follow him, Diego rushes forward to her before she can follow him. “You just need to make your way down.”

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Vanya can’t feel her fingers as she looks out the window at the ground below her. She knows that it won’t be as far down as it looks, but that thought doesn’t help her. She can’t hear her father’s commands as he reminds her of the proper technique as she hesitantly climbs up to sit on the edge of the windowsill.

The ground blurs below her but she can still make out the uniforms of her sibling standing in a line watching her. With a shudder of breath, she turns to her father. “Don’t make me do this” she begs him, tears beginning to fall out of her eyes.

“This is the only way to unlock your potential” his response would normally have Vanya coming back at him with a counter argument, but she’s too scared to think of anything. “Out the window. Off you go, Number 7.”

All Vanya can do is hope that Diego is true to his word as she turns around on the ledge, supporting her weight on her hands. Below her she can feel the air solidifying beneath her feet as her powers activate, but she knows it’s not enough to hold her. She gasps in a breath continuing to grip the edge of the windowsill tightly.

“Let go Number 7” her father commands her.

“I can’t!” Vanya can barely get the words out. “I’m not ready yet!”

From the ground her siblings bunch in together as they watch in suspense, latching onto one another as their father begins physically removing Vanya’s death grip on the windowsill. Diego takes this as his cue and steps apart from the group releasing the two knives he’d kept hidden behind his back, each of them sinking into the brick wall beneath Vanya’s shoes.

Vanya holds back a sigh of relief when she feels the blades slip into place under her shoes. They hurt a little with their limited surface area digging into her feet, and she’s not sure if they’ll hold her weight. But it’s enough and she doesn’t resist as her father pries the last of her fingers off the windowsill.

The siblings all hold their breath as Vanya’s last hand comes away from the window, though it hovers closely over it, and their father starts the timer. It stretches into the longest minute of their lives as they watch their sister balancing on the blades of two horizontal knives. Diego seems to be the most nervous out of them, hoping that they stuck into the brick deep enough.

At Five’s quiet whisper of 10 seconds left, Diego can see Luther take a step forward preparing to run and catch her if she falls. While Five himself sets his stance into one that readies him to spatial jump to catch her if needed.

“You can do it, Vanya!” Allison calls out to her after their father gives the signal that the time is up.

Though none of them are calm yet as Vanya’s face pales at the thought of stepping off the knives. But as her sister’s words of reassurance reach her ears, she is able to muster up the courage to step off.

Around her she can feel the air solidifying to hold her, though she’s sinking fast. But that’s okay, the ground is where she wants to be. She can feel the wind rushing past her ears, lifting her hair into the air and across her face, but it’s more like a gentle breeze than a hurricane. Her landing isn’t as smooth as she would have liked for it to be as she stumbles and catches herself against the brick wall.

Standing away from her she sees her siblings in their line, a mix of happiness, suspense and worry on their faces. By the way they all lean forward she can tell they all want to rush over to her but that would be against their father’s wishes. She can see Klaus bouncing impatiently on the balls of his feet. She wants to run and hug them herself, if just to latch onto something that was stable, though she knows she can’t and makes her way over to stand in her place at the end of the line.

As she walks past them, she flashes Diego a grateful look and an appreciative smile before taking her place and turning back to face her father in the window and the knives imbedded in the wall.

#tua #The Umbrella Academy #umbrella academy fanfiction #luther hargreeves #diego hargreeves #the kraken #Allison Hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #five hargreeves #ben hargreeves #vanya hargreeves #the white violin #reginald hargreeves

[arcticdementor]

Dealing with GNU/Linux meant dealing with Richard Stallman, the eccentric genius who had guided the creation of pretty much everything but the Linux kernel itself. I say “eccentric”, but what I’m really saying is that Stallman is mentally ill. I don’t know the correct words to describe that illness, but it manifests itself in dozens of different ways, from extreme hydrophobia (fear of water!) to various disturbing habits of phraseology, communication, and physical behavior. Nobody who knows Stallman thinks he is sane. By the same token, nobody would doubt his intelligence. He’s the only person I have ever met in person who struck me as being measurably smarter than I am, which sounds horrifyingly egotistical but is probably more a reflection of my choice in fellow-travelers.

Stallman agreed to eat dinner with me on the condition that he be permitted to order my meal and that I eat the whole thing without complaint. I wouldn’t have dinner with a resurrected John Coltrane under those conditions but there were plenty of great jazz musicians and there is only one Richard Stallman. The meal was an utter nightmare, of course. Everything he picked had the texture, and taste, of Jell-O made from dog vomit. I told myself that if G. Gordon Liddy could burn his own finger down to the tendon that I could finish a five-course “authentic” Chinese meal. Having done so, I managed to extract some absolutely brilliant ideas from him about software design and programming principles. “Come back to my office,” he suggested, and we headed out to walk over towards the MIT Media Lab. About ninety seconds into our walk, it started to rain. Just a light sprinkling, not build-the-ark stuff. Stallman screamed like a teenage girl, pulled his dashiki (yes!) over his head, and ran in waddling fashion towards MIT.

Twenty minutes later, I arrived at the Media Lab to find him huddling on the other side of the door, shaking. “Why did you not run?” he asked, in a whining monotone. “Is it because you are heavy?” (I was 195 pounds at the time; lighter than Stallman, half a foot taller.)

“Yes,” I replied, “my weight prevents rapid locomotion.” Stallman nodded in satisfied fashion. Two hours later, in the middle of demonstrating some bizarre Bulgarian folk dance, he looked over his shoulder at me and said, “I would be happier if you were not in the office.” He did not stop dancing. I took this as my cue to leave.

I mention all of this so you know precisely the sort of person who is in the middle of being crucified for “defending Epstein’s rape island” by his institutional rivals.

…

When asked to give his thoughts on the matter, Stallman responded like any 110-octane autism-spectrum genius would: by questioning the terminology involved. He suggested that the correct word for Minsky’s alleged statutory rape was not “sexual assault”, noting that

a) Minsky had no way to know the girl was 17, not 18 ; b) she had been coerced by Epstein out of Minsky’s presence and might well have appeared to be entirely willing.

In true Stallman fashion, this was

a) absolutely correct from a logical perspective; b) mind-blowingly stupid from a perspective of The Current Year.

It’s no different from the thousands of logical but emotionally uncomfortable things he has said and written over the past forty years. Stallman has no way to understand how people feel about something; he doesn’t feel that way. The community of actual computer scientists and clued-in tech people has long accepted this because — and I cannot emphasize this enough — Richard Stallman is responsible for computing as we know it.

…

The idea of truly free software given to the world for humanitarian purposes would not exist without Stallman. He was the only person who ever had the thought. Which means it is more radical than calculus, heavier-than-air flight, the theory of relativity, or the atomic bomb. It took someone with Stallman’s particular blend of Promethean IQ and mentally handicapped social skills to push it all the way to reality. You live in Richard Stallman’s world, whether you like it or not. He has had more influence on how we communicate in 2019 than any other single human being currently living. Any sane society would consider him a national treasure of greater importance than Fort Knox, to be cherished and protected accordingly.

Naturally, our society has decided to crucify him.

…

Ms. Selam Jie Gano, the author in question, is part of the most pernicious, and reprehensible, movement in technology, namely: the cabal of people who want to reduce the American (and Western) programming and technological development base of expertise to a kindergarten political commissariat which investigates its own belly button for thoughtcrime while rent-seeking the American economy to its knees and producing absolutely nothing of value in return. This cabal is actively aided and abetted by the one-percent Silicon Valley Illuminati who are murderously intent on pulling up the ladder behind them so that the existing tech (and financial) structure in NorCal is etched forever in stone. Both of these groups have identified native-born American coders and tech experts as the only thing keeping them from turning tech into a plantation system where the San Jose crowd pursues ever-more-specific meanings of “diversity”, “race”, and “problematic” while the actual work of coding, designing, developing, and manufacturing is done overseas by lowest-bidder sweatshops where the concerns of the commissars are taken with precisely the seriousness they deserve — which is to say none.

These people secretly believe that all the major necessary technological innovation has already been achieved, which is why they are so intent on crippling any further possible achievement with insane systems like Agile and pair-programming and Russian-doll containerization. Their current fetishes, NoSQL databases and headless content, are directly reflective of their moral, spiritual, and intellectual poverty. They yearn for cash-cow garbage projects like the Obamacare website, which cost two billion dollars but which likely contained more of Richard Stallman’s code than the government’s.

Haven’t you noticed how much worse computing has gotten in the past ten years? How much slower your phone is to do something than the desktop computer of 2002, which had a fraction of your phone’s power? How every bit of software in your possession requires near-constant updating to eliminate previous bugs and introduce new ones? This are the bitter fruits of modern tech-industry stupidity. Nota bene that China has very little difficulty of this nature; their WeChat software combines the functions of Facebook, Paypal, iMessage, and a half-dozen other apps in one lightweight, fast-running platform that works effortlessly on a twenty-dollar phone. That’s the kind of efficiency, and progress, we sacrificed when we decided that Selam Jie Gano’s vision of the future is more valuable than Richard Stallman’s. The eventual reckoning implied in that comparison will not be long in coming. Oh, wait: it’s already here. While we were busy making sure that every programming team at Google looked exactly like a Benetton ad, the Chinese were putting microchips between the layers of motherboards to give the CCCP ultimate control of the world’s networks.

Perhaps the final indignity here is that Stallman should be protected by the very guidelines of Diversity And Inclusion which are being used to crucify him. Were Stallman in a wheelchair, MIT would make sure he had a near-effortless path to work. Were he blind, he would have the appropriate hardware and software to enable his genius to proceed uninterrupted. But because he is mentally challenged in social interactions — an area where the Illuminati respect, and permit, nothing besides complete and total compliance — he is going to be drummed out of the world that he single-handedly created.

Mark my words: if we continue like this, the airplanes will start falling out of the sky. Oh, wait. It’s already happening.

#jack baruth #richard stallman #read the whole thing

[theteablogger]

Michael Corner and Terry Boot

While working on the timeline, I’ve found myself digressing quite a bit to talk about Mike and Terry’s “evolving” relationship throughout DAYDverse and Andy’s meta. Rather than clutter up the timeline, I decided to post something here and simply link to it later. So I put together an outline, with fic links and excerpts and as much chronological detail as possible, of what Andy wrote about Mike and Terry over the years. It stops in 2013 because their labeling has been consistent since September 2012, and he hasn’t written any significant fic featuring these characters since the following year.

(Cut for length and NSFW content.)

April 2008 - In DAYD, Andy establishes that Mike and Terry are best friends, extremely close, and can “read each other’s minds”. Eventually, we learn that this is literally true; they use Legillimency to maintain a constant mental connection that they rarely choose to break. He also mentions that they have matching tattoos, and that Terry’s says, “L’amitie de la conaissance.”

Sometime between April 2008 and July 2009 - In his FAQ, Andy “bans” people from slashing Mike and Terry. He says: 

This is the first thing on the FAQ that is preemptive, not a response to comments or emails, but I feel I need to, particularly after #50. I have given other authors permission to play in my world, but I am putting a few caveats on that. I have no problem with slash or homosexuality. Rowan Glynnis and Malcolm Braddock both “stir their cauldrons in their own direction.” IMHO, both Colin and Luna are bisexual. HOWEVER, I am refusing permission for anyone to slash my Neville and/or Ernie, as well as any Michael/Terry slash. Obviously, these are all four originally JKR’s creations and I cannot ban the pairings in general , but I can ask people not to use my story as material in them. In the case of Neville and Ernie, this is because their relationships with women are just too vital to the plot and who they are as young men in my world, but in the case of Michael and Terry, I have another reason too. As a male writer, I have tried very hard to accurately portray the way the men in my story think and feel, even as I try my best to do justice to the ladies as well. The kind of love Michael and Terry have for one another is an extraordinary sort of brother-bond that men can form for one another under very rare circumstances, and it is one of the most powerful forms of love in the world, sometimes almost as strong as a mother for her child. That is something that I would find debased by making it into romantic or physical attraction, and that is why I am requesting that it not be done. Please respect this, and if I find out that someone has written a story from my canon that violates it, I will be reporting it to ff.net as uncondoned plagiarism.

Prior to June 17, 2008 - Andy publishes “By Consensus”, in which each of the two boys telepathically shares with the other the memory of a sexual encounter that he has recently had with a girl. These are memories such as one might see in a pensieve, except that their telepathic connection allows each to experience it as if he were in the other’s body. This is incredibly skeevy because neither girl is asked for her consent before they share. The experience of sharing these memories is so intense that Mike and Terry “wake up” afterward entangled in each other’s limbs, sweaty, chests heaving, evidently having kissed each other--oh, and they’ve both come. (Link goes to a much later re-posting on the DAYDverse community.) Excerpt:

He was still trembling, there was a hot stickiness at his groin, a deep throbbing that told him he'd come again, but Terry scarcely noticed as he released the connection, the memory fading back to what it had been before he raised it and shared it with his friend.  Instead, what had his attention so completely was he and Michael were no longer laying side by side, but tangled together, and he could feel the other boy's erection flagging as freshly as his own. Their arms were wrapped around each other, their hair damp and clinging to their faces, their chests still heaving, and he could taste a faint lingering hint of chocolate in his mouth.  He hadn't eaten chocolate that day.

June 19, 2008 - Andy publishes “Empirical Evidence” on hprarepairs. In this fic, Mike and Terry have sex and it's the most profound, amazing, meaningful thing ever precisely because they are male, not gay, and feel no sexual desire for each other despite their extremely strong friendship-type-love. It’s so intense, in fact, that they’re afraid ever to do it again. Excerpt:

Michael chuckled, and the sound was oddly rough in his raw throat. “Kind of defeats the whole purpose of avoiding emotional involvement when I love you more than any witch in this school?”   “No fucking kidding.” Terry rolled unsteadily onto one elbow, tucking himself back into his pants. “That was…yeah…but I think if we ever do anything like it again….”   He reached out, pushing a piece of the long blonde hair out of Terry’s eyes. “Speaking of your ancient Greeks, the Spartans encouraged their soldiers to have sex with one another because it took the brotherhood bonds to a level that would drive them to acts of insanity on the battlefield to protect one another. Never made sense before, and I don’t think it’s anything like what Stephen and Derek have…that seems to be more like what we have with witches. This was something else, something more raw, and I mean here –“ he tapped his chest, “—not just down there. It wasn’t…it wasn’t about sex at all, but it was certainly sexual, but….”  “It was terrifying.”   “Completely.” Michael bit his lip, looking down for a moment before reaching out to lace his hand through his friend’s, squeezing it tightly. “Mindless shagging definitely goes somewhere else, then?” Terry nodded. “Definitely.” His fingers tightened on Michael’s. “There’s nothing mindless about what you mean to me, Mike.” 

September 30, 2008 - In “20 Random Facts about Tiresius W Boot”, Andy says that Mike and Terry each has half of a quotation by Comte DeBussy-Rabutin tattooed on his upper arm. Mike has  “L’amour vient de l’aveuglement” (”Love comes from blindness...”) and Terry has “l’amitie de la connaissance” (”...friendship, from knowledge.”). 

November 4, 2008 - In “20 Random Facts About Michael J Corner”, Andy reveals that following Mike and Terry’s deaths in the Battle of Hogwarts, their ashes were mixed and split in half, then buried under identical gravestones with both their names on them. Their parents had intended to engrave the text of their tattoos on the stones, but the Greek characters for "philia" appeared instead, "inexplicably and indelibly of [their] own accord". In this hilarious summary of DAYD, this is described as, “No Homo, in Ancient Greek.”

December 9, 2008 - Andy throws a fit on fanficrants when someone writes what he describes as “a craptastic slash threesome” between Mike, Terry, and Tony. He reports this person for plagiarism because he says that they “stole” his version of Terry.

December 12, 2008 - In “Standing Witness”, Mike is horribly tortured by Belsen while the other students are made to watch. Because of their telepathic connection, Terry shares the experience, and finally casts Avada Kedavra to put Mike out of his misery--but it doesn't work because he doesn’t really mean it. Later, Terry sits at Mike’s bedside and internally monologues at great length about how Mike is indescribably beautiful and intelligent and wonderful and he loves him more than life itself, and now he’s thrown all that away. When he realizes that Mike is still alive, he monologues some more about how much he loves Mike, who no doubt will never forgive him. When these events are described in DAYD itself, the other characters talk about how much Mike and Terry love each other, to the point that they’re closer than brothers. When Mike wakes up, Terry cries over him and Mike kisses his hand. Excerpt from “Standing Witness”:

I've wondered for years what kind of person could burn the Library of Alexandria; all that knowledge, all that art, so much priceless genius, who could look at that and bear to think of a torch or a hammer…but those monsters are still with us, aren't they, Mike? That he could look at you and do…do what he did, knowing you're not just beautiful, but brilliant and brave and good…and how could I help him? What does that make me? Qu'est-ce que creature, quel monstre suis-je? ... We'll fight and we'll survive and all of this, every minute of it and every day of my life I've lived and every day I have left will be worth it if I can just have one more day with you well and whole and seeing you smile, seeing your eyes light up with a new idea, some new bit of knowledge, some new discovery that we can share.  ... Maybe, in the end, that's why I'm here…so that at least once, someone would truly know how precious you are, even if you're in the end a treasure only measurable by its cost to lose.

Sometime prior to February 28, 2009 - Andy publishes “Perils of Studying Outdoors”. Caught sneaking around outside by Amycus Carrow, Mike and Terry misdirect him by passionately making out and...well, here’s an excerpt. The non-italicized bits represent the two of them communicating telepathically.

There was no acting necessary to love him, just love him with every bit of his soul, but he rarely let himself just feel it this completely, because it was so overwhelming as to be a little bit frightening, and he heard a tiny gasp escape his lips, a shiver running through him at the raw, almost feral depth of it. You're beautiful too, Terry. I wish you could see that. Not just your eyes, either.  Terry flinched back, closing his eyes at the compliment and trying to turn away, but Michael's hands were clasped behind his neck now. You don't have to...he can't hear us.  I'm not saying it to him. I'm saying it to you. You're the pretty one. I'm the pin-up. But you're no half-cast spell either. Sometimes I almost wish I could fancy wizards, because you already mean so much to me, and I know if I did, even a little, I'd lose myself in you so easily. You're already so much everything to me, adelphos. Philia et agape... ... The kiss was uncertain at first, edged on barriers neither quite understood and both knew completely, barely a whisper of lip to lip, then the tight set of Terry's shoulders seemed to melt beneath his hands, and arms that had become recently stronger than he had realized were around his waist, pulling them in together until their bodies breathed under one rhythm. It was real in every way that they were, no act at all and so much more than what it was meant to appear to be, expressing every layer of the love that Michael wondered if any other couple in this school - in this world - who could claim simple eros even began to understand. What a pity if they didn't, because even as some faint part of him heard the Death Eater's roar of outrage, knew what was about to come, his mouth was still reluctant to edge away from Terry's, teeth and tongue lingering across the moisture of his lower lip, and the rest of himself was reflected in cobalt that lazed open just in time to lace their hands together and brace themselves before le vilain petit monde cracked over them again.

April 1, 2009 - On the LJ community, Andy posts “Revelations” as a prank for April Fool’s Day. In this fic, Mike and Terry inform their friends that they are involved in a romantic relationship with each other, and then kiss passionately in front of them, as a joke. In the header Andy says, as part of his prank, that he's had writer's block and is curing it by changing the story/characters to fit what the readers want to see. Excerpt:

“There’s no need for rash action,” Michael cut in hastily. “We’re not offended. But if we’re going to be trusting each other with our lives, we can at least trust you with this. It’s been such a year…a lot has changed. We’ve all discovered things about ourselves that maybe we didn’t realize before.” ... Another moment of wordless conversation, and then Neville’s jaw nearly hit the polished surface of the conference table as the two wizards moved as one.   Chairs scraped the stone floor deafeningly, and now Michael was almost in Terry’s lap, their arms locked around one another, and they were kissing. Not just kissing, snogging. Bloody near trying to suck one another’s tonsils out. Mouths crushed together, eyes closed, hands sliding up under robes and gripping shoulders, moving over backs in the most passionate, almost desperate embrace that Neville had ever seen. The tendons corded tight on Terry’s neck. The flutter and fan of dark lashes against Michael’s still-pale cheek. Breath sucked quick and fervent between teeth and around tongues, as if any moment it wouldn’t, couldn’t be enough and they would either have to go further or burst from the pure intensity. It was the kind of kiss that was uncomfortable and voyeuristic to watch, even if it hadn’t been two wizards, and he had to look away, staring at the ceiling and wondering what…wondering how…?

April 6, 2009 - Andy posts his completed “Quadrophilia” sketch, which portrays Mike and Terry having sex with the Patil twins. 

July 12, 2009 - What is a slash and what do you mean Mike and Terry have subtext; I can't see these things at all in any canon ever.

May 26, 2011 - Mike and Terry are bicurious.

June 2011, just over a week later - Terry is asexual. (Andy copy/pasted a group chat about LGBTQIA characters to the community. Neither Mike nor Terry was mentioned during the chat, but in the comments, another user asked if there were any asexual characters in the DAYDverse. Andy replied, “Terry, as a matter of fact.” I won’t link to it because it includes DAYDians’ full names.)

July 12, 2012 - Mike and Terry = BROTP.

September 2012 - Terry is homoromantic/asexual and Mike is homoromantic/heterosexual.

February 23, 2013 - Andy defends himself when asked whether his portrayal of Mike and Terry constitutes queerbaiting.

December 10, 2013 - Andy publishes “Unison”, the story of Mike and Terry’s establishing their mental link, with an author’s note that tries to preempt further talk of queerbaiting. Excerpt from the fic:

“I’m afraid.” "So am I. Of so many things." The vial stopped. The crease between his brows deepened. He pushed his hair back. “What could you ever fear?” "Falling." From grace. From my pedestal. In love. Too late and he knew it for all of them and I couldn’t breathe. The vial lifted, uncapped, tilted to dampen his finger, all still untouched. His wand was still on the floor somewhere behind us both, glowing and casting its ghosts’ light. Oh, but he was so astoundingly gifted in ways I could barely comprehend. I could never. How could he not see it? Maybe if this worked. He touched my temples with the potion; first one, then the other. “I’d catch you.” ... “...I think I’ve only ever done two perfect things in my life." "Only two?" His left hand on his face now as well, his right on mine. Our pulses had come to match. I felt light headed and didn’t even know if it was beginning. I closed my eyes. We were too young, they said. It was too dangerous. We didn’t have the maturity, the control, the capacity for the necessary level of responsible intimacy, much less to handle the complexities and abstracts of it all. Blocking, maybe, under the direst need, but never probing, penetrating, accepting, inviting, receiving. It could change who you were if it happened too young. Never before seventeen, surely. Not for children. Not for us. Rules were made to be broken by the exceptions. Or the exceptional. "Finding you, and now letting you in."

#daydverse #queerbaiting #andythanfiction #thanfiction #andrew blake #andy blake

[bharatiyamedia-blog]

Reservations for Marathas: Devendra Fadnavis is fooling no one when he mouths platitudes of social justice

http://tinyurl.com/y5xvwsoy With the Bombay Excessive Courtroom upholding reservations for Marathas, the insanity over caste reservations in India has simply received madder. In the case of reservations, I like to think about two Lakshmana rekhas that ought to by no means be crossed. One is a authorized one: the Supreme Courtroom’s 50 p.c ceiling on complete reservations. The second — 70 p.c — is a psychological one, talked about randomly by Ambedkar 70 years in the past. The Father of the Structure spoke of it not as a rule however to warn us towards the ridiculousness of stretching reservations too far. Even earlier than reservations had been prolonged to Marathas final yr, Maharashtra’s complete quotas (for SC/STs, and Different Backward Courses or OBCs) stood at 52 p.c, a wee bit past the Supreme Courtroom restrict. This went as much as 62 p.c, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 10 p.c supposed bonanza for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS), an election gimmick concentrating on higher castes, introduced three months earlier than the current Lok Sabha ballot. With the excessive courtroom approving the Maratha reservations of 12 p.c in seats and 13 in jobs, the state’s complete goes as much as 74-75 p.c, past Ambedkar’s psychological barrier. Until the Supreme Courtroom strikes down the decision — petitioners have promised to go for an enchantment — Maharashtra can be within the exalted firm of Tamil Nadu in crossing each the Lakshmana rekhas with authorized and political genius. Tamil Nadu achieved the feat of 69 p.c reservations by the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution, and Modi’s EWS farce jacked it as much as 79 p.c. File picture of Devendra Fadnavis. PTI Maharashtra has achieved the excellence with the wily ploy of turning the politically influential Marathas right into a “Socially and Economically Backward Class” (SEBC) and enacting a laws to make it authorized. This might set off calls for from sundry castes from different states to make use of the identical subterfuge. There are different states that crossed the Supreme Courtroom barrier as you may see here and here, and a few could even breach the 70 p.c degree, in the event that they win instances pending towards their brazen strikes. However Maharashtra’s ingenuity is one in all its form. Ambedkar’s worry comes true That is what Ambedkar stated at a gathering of the Drafting Committee of the Constitution: “Supposing, as an illustration, reservations had been made for a neighborhood or a set of communities, the overall of which got here to one thing like 70 p.c…may anyone say that the reservation of 30 p.c as open to basic competitors could be passable (from the standpoint of equal alternatives)? It can’t be, in my judgement. Subsequently, the seats to be reserved…have to be confined to a minority of seats. It’s then solely that the primary precept (equal alternatives) may discover its place within the Structure…” The Supreme Courtroom first spoke of the ceiling of 50 p.c “or much less” within the Balaji case in 1962 referring to engineering and medical seats in what was then the Mysore state. The courtroom upheld this restrict even for jobs within the 1963 Devadasan case. It was on the premise of this that the Mandal Fee restricted reservations for OBCs in its 1980 report back to 27 p.c, in order that, together with quotas for Scheduled Castes/Tribes, the overall fell in need of 50 p.c. The apex courtroom’s judgment within the 1992 Indra Sawhney case backed the 50 p.c ceiling, saying it may solely be stretched in “extraordinary” conditions. The 1992 verdict stated: “Whereas 50% shall be the rule, it’s essential to not put out of consideration sure extraordinary conditions inherent within the nice range of this nation and the folks. It’d occur that in far-flung and distant areas the inhabitants inhabiting these areas may, on account of their being out of the primary stream of nationwide life and in view of situations peculiar to and characteristical to them, should be handled another way, some leisure on this strict rule could turn into crucial. In doing so, excessive warning is to be exercised and a particular case made out.” And it’s this “particular case” that Maharashtra’s BJP-Shiv Sena authorities believes it has made out by an 11-member Backward Courses Fee headed by Justice NG Gaikwad (retired), which it appointed in June 2018 and which submitted its report in November 2018. Gaikwad advisable 13 and 12 p.c reservations for the neighborhood in jobs and schooling respectively. Then adopted at lightning pace the Socially and Educationally Backward Courses (SEBC) Act, 2018 that the state Meeting handed, granting Marathas 16 p.c reservation. When this regulation was challenged, the excessive courtroom validated it, although proscribing the quota to 12-13 p.c, as advisable by Gaikwad. Gaikwad’s report concluded that the neighborhood, which it claimed accounted for 30 p.c of Maharashtra’s inhabitants, was under-represented in authorities jobs. Amongst different issues, it additionally spoke of suicides by Maratha farmers and even their daughters. Pleased with all this information, the excessive courtroom stated it was “happy” that an “extraordinary state of affairs and distinctive circumstances” existed, warranting the crossing of the 50 p.c restrict. The 2-judge bench used its collective judicial knowledge on the premise of knowledge accessible to it. However what was extra putting was the eagerness of the state authorities to pamper Marathas with an apparent eye on the current Lok Sabha election and the upcoming Meeting ballot. The courtroom has acknowledged Gaikwad’s remark that Marathas are politically well-represented. This isn’t to counsel that the poor amongst them want no uplift. However whether or not they will need to have reservations to tide over agrarian misery, which triggered the most recent unrest amongst them, is the query that Fadnavis has not answered with any diploma of conviction. If the BJP is mollycoddling Marathas to pad up its vote financial institution, it’s a doubtful transfer that makes the occasion no totally different from the Congress whose notoriety for utilizing reservations as an electoral instrument is simply too well-known. And if the BJP is certainly utilizing reservations as a poverty alleviation measure, it quantities to an financial illiteracy that’s equally appalling. The final hasn’t been heard of this because the situation is ready to go earlier than the Supreme Courtroom. In the mean time, nonetheless, the highly effective Marathas can have the political cake — and eat the financial one too. Writer tweets @sprasadindia Your information to the most recent cricket World Cup tales, evaluation, studies, opinions, stay updates and scores on https://www.firstpost.com/firstcricket/series/icc-cricket-world-cup-2019.html. 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[illustir]

Highlights for The Hall of Uselessness

One has the feeling that these critics do not really like literature—they do not enjoy reading. Worse even, if they were actually to enjoy a book, they would suspect it to be frivolous. In their eyes, something that is amusing cannot be important or serious.

Though, as a wise doctor once remarked, between two doctors whose medical qualifications are otherwise equal, we should trust the one who reads Chekhov.

The closer a book comes to being a genuine work of art, a true creation with a life of its own, the less likely it is that the author had full control over and a clear understanding of what he wrote.

what led them to their mysticism was simply the perception of “an intolerable disparity between the hugeness of their desire and the smallness of reality.”

Still, the notion that it is generally unwise to make pronouncements in areas that lie outside one’s expertise remains a sound principle. I only wish that Mr. Hitchens himself would abide by it.

This weird belief that a dead man called Jesus is still alive should command all the deeds and all the thoughts of a Christian.

“But if someone does not do it, how will good be done?” questioned the old gentleman in a voice full of perplexity. “Live so,” replied the Master in a voice suddenly stern, “live so that by the sanctity of thy life all good will be performed involuntarily.”

I was writing in a café; I had been sitting there for a couple of hours already, comfortably settled at a table with my books and papers. Like many lazy people, I enjoy a measure of hustle and bustle around me while I am supposed to work—it gives me an illusion of activity—and thus the surrounding din of conversations and calls did not disturb me in the least.

true Philistines are not people who are incapable of recognising beauty; they recognise it all too well; they detect its presence anywhere, immediately, and with a flair as infallible as that of the most sensitive aesthete—but for them, it is in order to be able better to pounce upon it at once and to destroy it before it can gain a foothold in their universal empire of ugliness.

And Claudel commented: “This mental process is identical to that of poetical writing . . . The impelling motion is the same. Which shows that the primary source of scientific thought is not reasoning, but the precise verification of an association originally supplied by the imagination.”

The fact is, these two arts—history writing and fiction writing—originating both in poetry, involve similar activities and mobilise the same faculties: memory and imagination; and this is why it could rightly be said that the novelist is the historian of the present and the historian the novelist of the past. Both must invent the truth.

He clearly felt that, together with the rest of the country, he was being progressively sucked into a poisonous swamp. To ensure a reasonably smooth and trouble-free existence, small compromises were constantly required—nothing difficult nor particularly dramatic; everyone else, to a various extent, was similarly involved. Yet the sum total of these fairly banal, daily surrenders eroded the integrity of each individual.

His short (unfinished), clear-sighted and sober memoir raises one terrifying question: all that Haffner knew at the time, many millions of people around him knew equally well. Why was there only one Haffner?

However, beware! Whenever people wonder “What is the truth?” usually it is because the truth is just under their noses—but it would be very inconvenient to acknowledge it.

“I do not care for scholars unless they are scholars without wishing to be or without knowing it. There is nothing easier than becoming a scholar. To acquire learning, it suffices to lock oneself up in one’s house for six months. It is far better to have a good imagination than a good memory.”

The brutalities of boarding school can routinely maim sensitive children for life; occasionally they may also breed a genius.

“Genius,” Baudelaire said, “is childhood recalled at will.”

There is no escaping the radical difference between the capacity for conception and that for execution: imagination and action are often at opposite poles. That is why novelists usually do not become millionaires, whereas millionaires do not even read novels.

Half of the misery in this world is caused by people whose only talent is to worm their way into positions for which they otherwise have no competence.

At the remotest end of Europe, Tolstoy secured without delay a copy of the book and was overwhelmed. One may say without exaggeration that Les Misérables triggered War and Peace. Giants breed giants.

Nor must we overlook the essential: he benefited from what only the warm affection of a united family can supply, a happy childhood, which arms one to face life and, once adult, to eliminate the risk of losing time in some fatuous and vain quest for happiness.

For the gift of the poet (which is also the gift of the child) is the ability to connect with the real world, to look at things with rapt attention. Both the poet and the child are blessed with what Chesterton called “the mystical minimum”: the awareness that things are—full stop. “If a thing is nothing else, that is good; it is—and that is good.”

None of the activities that really matter can be pursued in a merely professional capacity;

Thus he made the point that the man must be, to a certain extent, a specialist—out of necessity, he finds himself confined in a narrow professional pursuit, since he must do one thing well enough to earn the daily bread—whereas the woman is the true universalist: she must do a hundred things for the safe-guarding and management of the home.

He realised it was a status he could easily have achieved, had he agreed to pay the usual price—which is to isolate and emphasise only one side of the truth. This is always an easy recipe for achieving popularity and for gathering crowds of disciples; but to secure this sort of demagogic success one must mutilate a complex reality.

Generally speaking, literary people are exceedingly self-centred and vain—on the whole they are not a very attractive breed—but Chesterton did not belong to that species.

Here, Gide seems to be unwittingly joining Claudel, who held that the key metaphor with which to interpret the diverse manifestations of German culture was the sausage.

Conclusion: if one had to go out to sea in a small boat, one would not choose Orwell for skipper. But when meeting with shipwreck, disaster or other catastrophe, one could not dream of better company.

For all his gluttony and drunkenness, his passionate attachment to all things of beauty, his selfishness, his impatience, his unkindness and anger (a close friend once asked how he could reconcile his generally beastly behaviour and his Christianity; Waugh replied: “You have no idea how much nastier I would be if I was not a Catholic. Without supernatural aid, I would hardly be a human being”), what he derived from his Catholicism was a fundamental ability not to take this world too seriously.

The latter exacted from him such an intense, nervous effort that sometimes, before starting to write, he would suffer fits of vomiting. Each time, he had to assume imaginatively the persona of his main protagonist—to become him—and then to see with the mind’s eye the world his pen was conjuring as it followed an inner dictation.

This phenomenon reached such an intensity that there were times when it scared Simenon, times when he felt drawn towards an uncertain border where his very sanity might founder.

Every life leaves behind an accumulation of broken odds and ends—bizarre and sometimes smelly. Rummaging there, one can always unearth enough evidence to establish that the deceased was both monstrous and mediocre. Such a combination is quite common—whoever doubts it needs only look at himself in a mirror.

In the eighteenth century, French was the common language of the leading minds of continental Europe; twentieth-century French intellectuals hardly noticed that times had changed in this respect; they retained the dangerous belief that whatever was not expressed in French could hardly matter.

Revel’s attempt at entering into active politics was short-lived, but the experience gave him an invaluable insight into the essential intellectual dishonesty that is unavoidably attached to partisan politicking.

Mitterrand was the purest type of political animal: he had no politics at all. He had a brilliant intelligence, but for him ideas were neither right nor wrong, they were only useful or useless in the pursuit of power. The object of power was not a possibility to enact certain policies; the object of all policies was simply to attain and retain power.

In other words, people who do not read fiction or poetry are in permanent danger of crashing against facts and being crushed by reality.

Confucius often said that if only a ruler could employ him, in one year he would achieve a lot, and in three years he would succeed. One day a disciple asked him, “If a king were to entrust you with a territory which you could govern according to your ideas, what would you do first?” Confucius replied, “My first task would certainly be to rectify the names.” On hearing this, the disciple was puzzled. “Rectify the names? And that would be your first priority? Is this a joke?” (Chesterton or Orwell, however, would have immediately understood and approved the idea.) Confucius had to explain: “If the names are not correct, if they do not match realities, language has no object. If language is without an object, action becomes impossible—and therefore, all human affairs disintegrate and their management becomes pointless and impossible. Hence, the very first task of a true statesman is to rectify the names.”

Zhou Zuoren (1885–1968), summarised in one pithy sentence this living tradition of which he himself was a product: “All that can be spelled out is without importance.”

Aesthetic criteria are functional: does the work do what it does efficiently, does it nourish the vital energy of the artist, does it succeed in capturing the spirit that informs mountains and rivers, does it establish harmony between the metamorphoses of forms and the metamorphoses of the world?

Orientalism could obviously have been written by no one but a Palestinian scholar with a huge chip on his shoulder and a very dim understanding of the European academic tradition (here perceived through the distorted prism of a certain type of American university, with its brutish hyper-specialisation, non-humanistic approach, and close, unhealthy links with government).

He dispatched the affairs of the state with the supreme efficiency of an old Daoist ruler who knows that one should govern a large empire the way one cooks a little fish.

His unique skills made him forever indispensable, while simultaneously he cultivated a quality of utter elusiveness; no one could pin him down to a specific political line, nor could one associate him with any particular faction. He never expressed personal ideas or indulged in penning his own theoretical views. Where did he really stand? What did he actually believe? Apparently he had no other policies but those of the leader of the moment, and nourished no other ambitions but to serve him with total dedication. Yet the brilliance of his mind, the sharpness of his intelligence, the electrifying quality of his personal magnetism, eloquence and authority constantly belied the kind of bland selflessness that he so studiously displayed in the performance of his public duties; Zhou’s enigma lay in the paradox that, with all his exceptional talents, he should also present a sort of disconcerting and essential hollowness.

Twenty-three hundred years ago, Zhuang Zi, in giving advice to a king, made him observe that when a small boat drifts in the way of a huge barge, the crew of the barge will immediately shout abuse at the stray craft; however, coming closer, if they discover that the little boat is empty, they will simply shut up and quietly steer clear of it. He concluded that a ruler who has to sail the turbulent waters of politics should first and foremost learn how to become an empty boat.

To reconcile such paradoxes, one must either learn the mental acrobatics of a very sophisticated game played by the enlightened vanguard and called “dialectics,” or, more vulgarly, face the fact that rather than being the prophet-philosopher as described by his worshippers, Mao was essentially always and foremost a practical politician for whom what mattered above everything was power—how to obtain it, how to retain it, how to regain it. In order to secure power, no sacrifice was ever too big—and least of all the sacrifice of principles. It is only in this light that it becomes possible to understand his alternations between compromise and ruthlessness, benevolence and ferocity, suppleness and brutality, and all his abrupt volte-faces: none of these were ever arbitrary.

Without an ability to decipher non-existent inscriptions written in invisible ink on blank pages, no one should ever dream of analysing the nature and reality of Chinese communism.

For Truth, by its very nature, is ugly, savage and cruel; it disturbs, it frightens, it hurts and it kills. If, in some extreme situations, it is to be used at all, it must be taken only in small doses, in strict isolation, and with the most rigorous prophylactic precautions. Whoever would be willing to spread it wildly, or to unload it in large quantities, just as it comes, is a dangerous and irresponsible person who should be restrained in the interest of his own safety, as well as for the protection of social harmony.

Kazimierz Brandys summed it up neatly (with the clear-sightedness that characterises so many Polish intellectuals, who on this subject have acquired a bitter expertise): “Contemporary history teaches us that all you need is one mentally sick individual, two ideologues and three hundred murderous thugs in order to take power and gag millions of people.”

Democracy is the only acceptable political system; yet it pertains to politics exclusively, and has no application in any other domain. When applied anywhere else, it is death—for truth is not democratic, intelligence and talent are not democratic, nor is beauty, nor love—nor God’s grace.

I am of course referring to the time before independence; for today, even if there should still be any enterprising Greek merchants around, I doubt very much that they would find passable tracks to reach these distant hamlets.

The most depressing thing is to watch these crowds of tourists, who paid a not inconsiderable amount to come here and secure for themselves eight days of happiness. In the motley uniforms of holiday convicts, they patrol lugubriously this huge Luna Park while trying hard to persuade themselves that they are getting their money’s worth of fun.

Literary scholars are particularly adept at cultivating this sort of nonsense: they seem permanently drunk on the psychedelic milk they keep sucking from the twin mammelles of Freud and Marx.

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[araitsume]

Prophets and Kings, pp. 522-538: Chapter (43) The Unseen Watcher

This chapter is based on Daniel 5.

Toward the close of Daniel's life great changes were taking place in the land to which, over threescore years before, he and his Hebrew companions had been carried captive. Nebuchadnezzar, “the terrible of the nations” (Ezekiel 28:7), had died, and Babylon, “the praise of the whole earth” (Jeremiah 51:41), had passed under the unwise rule of his successors, and gradual but sure dissolution was resulting.

Through the folly and weakness of Belshazzar, the grandson of Nebuchadnezzar, proud Babylon was soon to fall. Admitted in his youth to a share in kingly authority, Belshazzar gloried in his power and lifted up his heart against the God of heaven. Many had been his opportunities to know the divine will and to understand his responsibility of rendering obedience thereto. He had known of his grandfather's banishment, by the decree of God, from the society of men; and he was familiar with Nebuchadnezzar's conversion and miraculous restoration. But Belshazzar allowed the love of pleasure and self-glorification to efface the lessons that he should never have forgotten. He wasted the opportunities graciously granted him, and neglected to use the means within his reach for becoming more fully acquainted with truth. That which Nebuchadnezzar had finally gained at the cost of untold suffering and humiliation, Belshazzar passed by with indifference.

It was not long before reverses came. Babylon was besieged by Cyrus, nephew of Darius the Mede, and commanding general of the combined armies of the Medes and Persians. But within the seemingly impregnable fortress, with its massive walls and its gates of brass, protected by the river Euphrates, and stocked with provision in abundance, the voluptuous monarch felt safe and passed his time in mirth and revelry.

In his pride and arrogancy, with a reckless feeling of security Belshazzar “made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and drank wine before the thousand.” All the attractions that wealth and power could command, added splendor to the scene. Beautiful women with their enchantments were among the guests in attendance at the royal banquet. Men of genius and education were there. Princes and statesmen drank wine like water and reveled under its maddening influence.

With reason dethroned through shameless intoxication, and with lower impulses and passions now in the ascendancy, the king himself took the lead in the riotous orgy. As the feast progressed, he “commanded to bring the golden and silver vessels which ... Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple which was in Jerusalem; that the king, and his princes, his wives, and his concubines, might drink therein.” The king would prove that nothing was too sacred for his hands to handle. “They brought the golden vessels; ... and the king, and his princes, his wives, and his concubines, drank in them. They drank wine, and praised the gods of gold, and of silver, of brass, of iron, of wood, and of stone.”

Little did Belshazzar think that there was a heavenly Witness to his idolatrous revelry; that a divine Watcher, unrecognized, looked upon the scene of profanation, heard the sacrilegious mirth, beheld the idolatry. But soon the uninvited Guest made His presence felt. When the revelry was at its height a bloodless hand came forth and traced upon the walls of the palace characters that gleamed like fire—words which, though unknown to the vast throng, were a portent of doom to the now conscience-stricken king and his guests.

Hushed was the boisterous mirth, while men and women, seized with nameless terror, watched the hand slowly tracing the mysterious characters. Before them passed, as in panoramic view, the deeds of their evil lives; they seemed to be arraigned before the judgment bar of the eternal God, whose power they had just defied. Where but a few moments before had been hilarity and blasphemous witticism, were pallid faces and cries of fear. When God makes men fear, they cannot hide the intensity of their terror.

Belshazzar was the most terrified of them all. He it was who above all others had been responsible for the rebellion against God which that night had reached its height in the Babylonian realm. In the presence of the unseen Watcher, the representative of Him whose power had been challenged and whose name had been blasphemed, the king was paralyzed with fear. Conscience was awakened. “The joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against another.” Belshazzar had impiously lifted himself up against the God of heaven and had trusted in his own might, not supposing that any would dare say, “Why doest thou thus?” but now he realized that he must render an account of the stewardship entrusted him, and that for his wasted opportunities and his defiant attitude he could offer no excuse.

In vain the king tried to read the burning letters. But here was a secret he could not fathom, a power he could neither understand nor gainsay. In despair he turned to the wise men of his realm for help. His wild cry rang out in the assembly, calling upon the astrologers, the Chaldeans, and the soothsayers to read the writing. “Whosoever shall read this writing,” he promised, “and show me the interpretation thereof, shall be clothed with scarlet, and have a chain of gold about his neck, and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom.” But of no avail was his appeal to his trusted advisers, with offers of rich awards. Heavenly wisdom cannot be bought or sold. “All the king's wise men ... could not read the writing, nor make known to the king the interpretation thereof.” They were no more able to read the mysterious characters than had been the wise men of a former generation to interpret the dreams of Nebuchadnezzar.

Then the queen mother remembered Daniel, who, over half a century before, had made known to King Nebuchadnezzar the dream of the great image and its interpretation. “O king, live forever,” she said. “Let not thy thoughts trouble thee, nor let thy countenance be changed: there is a man in thy kingdom, in whom is the spirit of the holy gods; and in the days of thy father light and understanding and wisdom, like the wisdom of the gods, was found in him; whom the king Nebuchadnezzar ... made master of the magicians, astrologers, Chaldeans, and soothsayers; forasmuch as an excellent spirit, and knowledge, and understanding, interpreting of dreams, and showing of hard sentences, and dissolving of doubts, were found in the same Daniel, whom the king named Belteshazzar: now let Daniel be called, and he will show the interpretation.

“Then was Daniel brought in before the king.” Making an effort to regain his composure, Belshazzar said to the prophet: “Art thou that Daniel, which art of the children of the captivity of Judah, whom the king my father brought out of Jewry? I have even heard of thee, that the spirit of the gods is in thee, and that light and understanding and excellent wisdom is found in thee. And now the wise men, the astrologers, have been brought in before me, that they should read this writing, and make known unto me the interpretation thereof: but they could not show the interpretation of the thing: and I have heard of thee, that thou canst make interpretations, and dissolve doubts: now if thou canst read the writing, and make known to me the interpretation thereof, thou shalt be clothed with scarlet, and have a chain of gold about thy neck, and shalt be the third ruler in the kingdom.”

Before that terror-stricken throng, Daniel, unmoved by the promises of the king, stood in the quiet dignity of a servant of the Most High, not to speak words of flattery, but to interpret a message of doom. “Let thy gifts be to thyself,” he said, “and give thy rewards to another; yet I will read the writing unto the king, and make known to him the interpretation.”

The prophet first reminded Belshazzar of matters with which he was familiar, but which had not taught him the lesson of humility that might have saved him. He spoke of Nebuchadnezzar's sin and fall, and of the Lord's dealings with him—the dominion and glory bestowed upon him, the divine judgment for his pride, and his subsequent acknowledgment of the power and mercy of the God of Israel; and then in bold and emphatic words he rebuked Belshazzar for his great wickedness. He held the king's sin up before him, showing him the lessons he might have learned but did not. Belshazzar had not read aright the experience of his grandfather, nor heeded the warning of events so significant to himself. The opportunity of knowing and obeying the true God had been given him, but had not been taken to heart, and he was about to reap the consequence of his rebellion.

“Thou, ... O Belshazzar,” the prophet declared, “hast not humbled thine heart, though thou knewest all this; but hast lifted up thyself against the Lord of heaven; and they have brought the vessels of His house before thee, and thou, and thy lords, thy wives, and thy concubines, have drunk wine in them; and thou hast praised the gods of silver, and gold, of brass, iron, wood, and stone, which see not, nor hear, nor know: and the God in whose hand thy breath is, and whose are all thy ways, hast thou not glorified: then was the part of the hand set from Him; and this writing was written.”

Turning to the Heaven-sent message on the wall, the prophet read, “Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin.” The hand that had traced the characters was no longer visible, but these four words were still gleaming forth with terrible distinctness; and now with bated breath the people listened while the aged prophet declared:

“This is the interpretation of the thing: Mene; God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it. Tekel; Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. Peres; Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.”

In that last night of mad folly, Belshazzar and his lords had filled up the measure of their guilt and the guilt of the Chaldean kingdom. No longer could God's restraining hand ward off the impending evil. Through manifold providences, God had sought to teach them reverence for His law. “We would have healed Babylon,” He declared of those whose judgment was now reaching unto heaven, “but she is not healed.” Jeremiah 51:9. Because of the strange perversity of the human heart, God had at last found it necessary to pass the irrevocable sentence. Belshazzar was to fall, and his kingdom was to pass into other hands.

As the prophet ceased speaking, the king commanded that he be awarded the promised honors; and in harmony with this, “they clothed Daniel with scarlet, and put a chain of gold about his neck, and made a proclamation concerning him, that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom.”

More than a century before, Inspiration had foretold that “the night of ... pleasure” during which king and counselors would vie with one another in blasphemy against God, would suddenly be changed into a season of fear and destruction. And now, in rapid succession, momentous events followed one another exactly as had been portrayed in the prophetic scriptures years before the principals in the drama had been born.

While still in the festal hall, surrounded by those whose doom has been sealed, the king is informed by a messenger that “his city is taken” by the enemy against whose devices he had felt so secure; “that the passages are stopped, ... and the men of war are affrighted.” Verses 31, 32. Even while he and his nobles were drinking from the sacred vessels of Jehovah, and praising their gods of silver and of gold, the Medes and the Persians, having turned the Euphrates out of its channel, were marching into the heart of the unguarded city. The army of Cyrus now stood under the walls of the palace; the city was filled with the soldiers of the enemy, “as with caterpillars” (verse 14); and their triumphant shouts could be heard above the despairing cries of the astonished revelers.

“In that night was Belshazzar the king of the Chaldeans slain,” and an alien monarch sat upon the throne.

Clearly had the Hebrew prophets spoken concerning the manner in which Babylon should fall. As in vision God had revealed to them the events of the future, they had exclaimed: “How is Sheshach taken! and how is the praise of the whole earth surprised! how is Babylon become an astonishment among the nations!” “How is the hammer of the whole earth cut asunder and broken! how is Babylon become a desolation among the nations!” “At the noise of the taking of Babylon the earth is moved, and the cry is heard among the nations.”

“Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed.” “The spoiler is come upon her, even upon Babylon, and her mighty men are taken, every one of their bows is broken: for the Lord God of recompenses shall surely requite. And I will make drunk her princes, and her wise men, her captains, and her rulers, and her mighty men: and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, saith the King, whose name is the Lord of hosts.”

“I have laid a snare for thee, and thou art also taken, O Babylon, and thou wast not aware: thou art found, and also caught, because thou hast striven against the Lord. The Lord hath opened His armory, and hath brought forth the weapons of His indignation: for this is the work of the Lord God of hosts in the land of the Chaldeans.”

“Thus saith the Lord of hosts; The children of Israel and the children of Judah were oppressed together: and all that took them captives held them fast; they refused to let them go. Their Redeemer is strong; the Lord of hosts is His name: He shall throughly plead their cause, that He may give rest to the land, and disquiet the inhabitants of Babylon.” Jeremiah 51:41; 50:23, 46; Jeremiah 51:8, 56, 57; 50:24, 25, 33, 34.

Thus “the broad walls of Babylon” became “utterly broken, and her high gates ... burned with fire.” Thus did Jehovah of hosts “cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease,” and lay low “the haughtiness of the terrible.” Thus did “Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees’ excellency,” become as Sodom and Gomorrah—a place forever accursed. “It shall never be inhabited,” Inspiration has declared, “neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation: neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there; neither shall the shepherds make their fold there. But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there. And the wild beasts of the islands shall cry in their desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces.” “I will also make it a possession for the bittern, and pools of water: and I will sweep it with the besom of destruction, saith the Lord of hosts.” Jeremiah 51:58; Isaiah 13:11, 19-22; 14:23.

To the last ruler of Babylon, as in type to its first, had come the sentence of the divine Watcher: “O king, ... to thee it is spoken; The kingdom is departed from thee.” Daniel 4:31.

“Come down, and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon, Sit on the ground: there is no throne.... Sit thou silent, And get thee into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans: For thou shalt no more be called, The lady of kingdoms.

“I was wroth with My people, I have polluted Mine inheritance, and given them into thine hand: Thou didst show them no mercy; ...

“And thou saidst, I shall be a lady forever: So that thou didst not lay these things to thy heart, Neither didst remember the latter end of it.

“Therefore hear now this, Thou that art given to pleasures That dwellest carelessly, That sayest in thine heart, I am, and none else beside me; I shall not sit as a widow, Neither shall I know the loss of children: ...

“These two things shall come to thee in a moment in one day, The loss of children, and widowhood: They shall come upon thee in their perfection for the multitude of thy sorceries, and for the great abundance of thine enchantments. For thou hast trusted in thy wickedness: Thou hast said, None seeth me.

“Thy wisdom and thy knowledge, it hath perverted thee; And thou hast said in thine heart, I am, and none else beside me. Therefore shall evil come upon thee; Thou shalt not know from whence it riseth: And mischief shall fall upon thee; Thou shalt not be able to put it off: And desolation shall come upon thee suddenly, which thou shalt not know.

“Stand now with thine enchantments, and with the multitude of thy sorceries, wherein thou hast labored from thy youth; If so be thou shalt be able to profit, If so be thou mayest prevail.

“Thou art wearied in the multitude of thy counsels. Let now the astrologers, the stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, Stand up, and save thee from these things that shall come upon thee. Behold, they shall be as stubble; ... They shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame: ... None shall save thee.” Isaiah 47:1-15.

Every nation that has come upon the stage of action has been permitted to occupy its place on the earth, that the fact might be determined whether it would fulfill the purposes of the Watcher and the Holy One. Prophecy has traced the rise and progress of the world's great empires—Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. With each of these, as with the nations of less power, history has repeated itself. Each has had its period of test; each has failed, its glory faded, its power departed.

While nations have rejected God's principles, and in this rejection have wrought their own ruin, yet a divine, overruling purpose has manifestly been at work throughout the ages. It was this that the prophet Ezekiel saw in the wonderful representation given him during his exile in the land of the Chaldeans, when before his astonished gaze were portrayed the symbols that revealed an overruling Power that has to do with the affairs of earthly rulers.

Upon the banks of the river Chebar, Ezekiel beheld a whirlwind seeming to come from the north, “a great cloud, and a fire infolding itself, and a brightness was about it, and out of the midst thereof as the color of amber.” A number of wheels intersecting one another were moved by four living beings. High above all these “was the likeness of a throne, as the appearance of a sapphire stone: and upon the likeness of the throne was the likeness as the appearance of a man above upon it.” “And there appeared in the cherubims the form of a man's hand under their wings.” Ezekiel 1:4, 26; 10:8. The wheels were so complicated in arrangement that at first sight they appeared to be in confusion; yet they moved in perfect harmony. Heavenly beings, sustained and guided by the hand beneath the wings of the cherubim, were impelling those wheels; above them, upon the sapphire throne, was the Eternal One; and round about the throne was a rainbow, the emblem of divine mercy.

As the wheellike complications were under the guidance of the hand beneath the wings of the cherubim, so the complicated play of human events is under divine control. Amidst the strife and tumult of nations He that sitteth above the cherubim still guides the affairs of this earth.

The history of nations speaks to us today. To every nation and to every individual God has assigned a place in His great plan. Today men and nations are being tested by the plummet in the hand of Him who makes no mistake. All are by their own choice deciding their destiny, and God is overruling all for the accomplishment of His purposes.

The prophecies which the great I AM has given in His word, uniting link after link in the chain of events, from eternity in the past to eternity in the future, tell us where we are today in the procession of the ages and what may be expected in the time to come. All that prophecy has foretold as coming to pass, until the present time, has been traced on the pages of history, and we may be assured that all which is yet to come will be fulfilled in its order.

Today the signs of the times declare that we are standing on the threshold of great and solemn events. Everything in our world is in agitation. Before our eyes is fulfilling the Saviour's prophecy of the events to precede His coming: “Ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars.... Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.” Matthew 24:6, 7.

The present is a time of overwhelming interest to all living. Rulers and statesmen, men who occupy positions of trust and authority, thinking men and women of all classes, have their attention fixed upon the events taking place about us. They are watching the relations that exist among the nations. They observe the intensity that is taking possession of every earthly element, and they recognize that something great and decisive is about to take place—that the world is on the verge of a stupendous crisis.

The Bible, and the Bible only, gives a correct view of these things. Here are revealed the great final scenes in the history of our world, events that already are casting their shadows before, the sound of their approach causing the earth to tremble and men's hearts to fail them for fear.

“Behold, the Lord maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof; ... because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate.” Isaiah 24:1-6.

“Alas for the day! for the day of the Lord is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come.... The seed is rotten under their clods, the garners are laid desolate, the barns are broken down; for the corn is withered. How do the beasts groan! the herds of cattle are perplexed, because they have no pasture; yea, the flocks of sheep are made desolate.” “The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men.” Joel 1:15-18, 12.

“I am pained at my very heart; ... I cannot hold my peace, because thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Destruction upon destruction is cried; for the whole land is spoiled.” Jeremiah 4:19, 20.

“Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be saved out of it.” Jeremiah 30:7.

“Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, Even the Most High, thy habitation; There shall no evil befall thee, Neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.”

Psalm 91:9, 10.

“O daughter of Zion, ... the Lord shall redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies. Now also many nations are gathered against thee, that say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon Zion. But they know not the thoughts of the Lord, neither understand they His counsel.” Micah 4:10-12. God will not fail His church in the hour of her greatest peril. He has promised deliverance. “I will bring again the captivity of Jacob's tents,” He has declared, “and have mercy on His dwelling places.” Jeremiah 30:18.

Then will the purpose of God be fulfilled; the principles of His kingdom will be honored by all beneath the sun.

#egw #Ellen G. White #Christianity #God #Jesus Christ #Bible #prophets and kings #conflict of the ages #Daniel #babylon #belshazzar #idolatry #prophecy #sacrilege #the fall of babylon #rebuke #rise of medo-persia #Jeremiah #isaiah mustafa #God overseeing the course of the world #Ezekiel #depiction of heavenly beings and objects #the state of the world we live in #Joel #psalms #God's protection of His people

[juliandmouton30]

"Mies' Mansion House Square is the greatest public space never to have been built in London"

Mies van der Rohe's unbuilt London tower would have been more than a modernist icon, it would have created the only useable space for protest in the City of London, says Jack Self in this Opinion column.

For the first time in more than 30 years, Mies van der Rohe's only UK project is being presented to the public – in both a forthcoming exhibition at the RIBA and, if it is successful, a book funded through Kickstarter by the REAL foundation.

Alternatively referred to by Prince Charles as "a giant glass stump" and Richard Rogers as "the culmination of a master architect's life work", Mies' unbuilt Mansion House Square remains highly controversial, even 50 years after its conception. The project's failure to be realised is often blamed on a massive mood swing in the UK concerning how the public viewed modernist architecture.

It is true that when the scheme was finally cancelled in the mid 1980s, it was right at the moment when historical pastiche and an obsession with preservation overthrew the postwar, predominantly brutalist paradigm – one that was increasingly associated with social dystopias, not social democracy.

But is that myth actually true? Did the British really come to hate modernism generally and corporate modernist towers specifically? If so, how can we explain the explosion of precisely this type of building in the subsequent decades all around the City, from Lloyd's of London to the Gherkin or Cheesegrater? Was there perhaps another quality about Mies' project, aside from its modernist aesthetic, that made it politically impossible to build?

Mies took a scrambled, dangerous street pattern and rationalised it with a perfect grid

A key element to the scheme was the creation of a large public square to the east of the site, adjacent to the City Mayor's residence Mansion House. In some respects, this space was the greatest genius of the scheme. Mies took a scrambled, dangerous street pattern surrounding the Bank of England and (apparently effortlessly) rationalised it with a perfect grid.

This move carved out a serene ceremonial area directly in front of one of London's most important seats of power, which remains rather claustrophobically oppressed by its neighbours to this day. Such a generous civic gesture was not flagged as problematic when planning was granted in the mid 1960s, precisely because it was such an unquestionably positive addition to London. However, by the mid 1980s this public space had become a real source of panic for both the City and the British government.

The 1980s were a famously tumultuous decade for the UK, as Thatcherite reforms radically transformed the structure of employment and basic fabric of society. Strikes and civil unrest in London were common, from dockworker and printers' union disputes in the east to violent race riots in Brixton and deadly anti-government protests in Trafalgar Square. Thrown into this mix were IRA bomb attacks, which at their worst point occurred almost every month (one of my earliest memories is being caught up in a blast at John Lewis on Oxford Street).

Large crowds – whether gathered out of civic pride or civil disobedience – were no longer universally desirable in the city. Public space had become dangerous.

This public space became a real source of panic for both the City and the British government

It is important to keep in mind that, by the mid 1980s, powerful components of neoliberal ideology had embedded themselves within the internal logic of governance. Some of these principles were that there was no such thing as society; that there was no alternative to deregulated free markets; that the state was an inherently wasteful, inefficient and unprofitable entity; and, therefore, its scope should be reduced by privatisation and corporatisation wherever possible.

Although Margaret Thatcher was extremely popular, she was also extremely divisive, and the large minority of people that opposed her were restive and vocal. There was a widespread belief amongst those in power that the basic functions of the nation faced existential threats from the protest, dissidence and unrest.

The responses by urban policy-makers to these problems of civic security were twofold. They prevented the formation of new public spaces wherever they could, often through blocking new development on ground of "historical merit", and they installed various devices in existing spaces to limit their capacity and control their crowds. Mies' project, Mansion House Square, may have been simply too generous, and more than the City could accept.

Related story

Mies van der Rohe's London tower design revealed in detail for first time

In 1848, during a comparable period of social upheaval in Britain, London's authorities had installed two massive fountains into Trafalgar Square, to halve the number of people that could congregate there. Some time later, crude chains were added. Then the adjacent roads were redirected in such a way as to make the square into a kind of traffic island. These innovations became the basis for most anti-protest, anti-terror strategies that – until today – remain central to the governance of London's public spaces.

The mechanisms are as diverse as they are ingenious. There are simple barriers, railings and gates. There are tools that rely on social norms (taking advantage of the British tendency toward polite obedience), such as excessive signage, road and pavement markings, or brass plugs in the pavement delineating private ownership. And then there are the urban tactics that coerce and influence in an unseen way: sophisticated anti-bomb bollards disguised as benches, water features like moats and fountains, lanes of traffic that encircle crowds like sheepdogs herding a flock.

We are told that these measures are necessary for our own protection. However, in broader historical terms it is not the public that really has to worry about terrorism. It is the authorities that must manage the risk of civil disobedience.

If Mies' square had been completed it would have been an ideal locus for Occupy

The current state of public space, particularly in the City of London, bears testament to this fear. In October 2011 I joined a Facebook group calling itself Occupy London, and a few days later – when it announced a march – I fashioned the wittiest anti-capitalist sign I could think of and went down to the Stock Exchange.

As the crowd twisted along its route I found myself progressively shuffled towards the front, and as we arrived at our destination I was nearly cheek-to-cheek with a phalanx of anti-riot police. The London Stock Exchange (LSX), which at that time was majority controlled by Toshiba, is located opposite St Paul's Cathedral, in a privately owned complex called Pater Noster Square. Because of this there was no way to "occupy" LSX and we were halted short of the target.

In fact, there was no way to occupy anything else in the City either – within a few days the City issued a memo advising companies to regularly check any nearby vacant properties for squatters, and instructed them to block access to all corporately controlled, publicly accessible spaces until further notice. The only exception was St Paul's Churchyard, over which they did not hold such direct control. So Occupy claimed sanctuary there. We established a tent city, a library, a "university." I even spent a night camping on the steps before the cathedral authorities were eventually pressured by the City to evict the protesters and dismantle the camp.

In a post-Trump, post-Brexit reality, public space and its occupation have never seemed so relevant

If Mies' square had been completed it would have been an ideal locus for Occupy, which as a civic function is without doubt a positive contribution to the health of British democracy. But more importantly, for the overwhelming majority of the time when people are not setting up soup kitchens or hand-stitching banners, it would have been a wonderful public amenity.

Mies' Mansion House Square scheme is the greatest public space never to have been built in London.

This is precisely why I have been so motivated to make the project available to the public. Me and the REAL foundation have spent almost two years working closely with the building's commissioner, Lord Palumbo, as well as the RIBA (who are planning an exhibition on Mansion House Square and James Stirling's One Poultry to open in March) with the aim of publishing a wide variety of project documents.

In a post-Trump, post-Brexit reality, public space and its occupation have never seemed so relevant. It is my strong hope that, by shining more light onto Mies' attempted intervention in London, we can contribute to a renewed debate about what type of cities we want to live in today.

Jack Self (1987) is an architect and writer based in London. He is director of the REAL foundation and editor-in-chief of the Real Review. In 2016, Jack curated the British Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale. He is also contributing editor for the Architectural Review and was previously associate editor at Strelka Press.

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"Mies' Mansion House Square is the greatest public space never to have been built in London"

Mies van der Rohe's unbuilt London tower would have been more than a modernist icon, it would have created the only useable space for protest in the City of London, says Jack Self in this Opinion column.

For the first time in more than 30 years, Mies van der Rohe's only UK project is being presented to the public – in both a forthcoming exhibition at the RIBA and, if it is successful, a book funded through Kickstarter by the REAL foundation.

Alternatively referred to by Prince Charles as "a giant glass stump" and Richard Rogers as "the culmination of a master architect's life work", Mies' unbuilt Mansion House Square remains highly controversial, even 50 years after its conception. The project's failure to be realised is often blamed on a massive mood swing in the UK concerning how the public viewed modernist architecture.

It is true that when the scheme was finally cancelled in the mid 1980s, it was right at the moment when historical pastiche and an obsession with preservation overthrew the postwar, predominantly brutalist paradigm – one that was increasingly associated with social dystopias, not social democracy.

But is that myth actually true? Did the British really come to hate modernism generally and corporate modernist towers specifically? If so, how can we explain the explosion of precisely this type of building in the subsequent decades all around the City, from Lloyd's of London to the Gherkin or Cheesegrater? Was there perhaps another quality about Mies' project, aside from its modernist aesthetic, that made it politically impossible to build?

Mies took a scrambled, dangerous street pattern and rationalised it with a perfect grid

A key element to the scheme was the creation of a large public square to the east of the site, adjacent to the City Mayor's residence Mansion House. In some respects, this space was the greatest genius of the scheme. Mies took a scrambled, dangerous street pattern surrounding the Bank of England and (apparently effortlessly) rationalised it with a perfect grid.

This move carved out a serene ceremonial area directly in front of one of London's most important seats of power, which remains rather claustrophobically oppressed by its neighbours to this day. Such a generous civic gesture was not flagged as problematic when planning was granted in the mid 1960s, precisely because it was such an unquestionably positive addition to London. However, by the mid 1980s this public space had become a real source of panic for both the City and the British government.

The 1980s were a famously tumultuous decade for the UK, as Thatcherite reforms radically transformed the structure of employment and basic fabric of society. Strikes and civil unrest in London were common, from dockworker and printers' union disputes in the east to violent race riots in Brixton and deadly anti-government protests in Trafalgar Square. Thrown into this mix were IRA bomb attacks, which at their worst point occurred almost every month (one of my earliest memories is being caught up in a blast at John Lewis on Oxford Street).

Large crowds – whether gathered out of civic pride or civil disobedience – were no longer universally desirable in the city. Public space had become dangerous.

This public space became a real source of panic for both the City and the British government

It is important to keep in mind that, by the mid 1980s, powerful components of neoliberal ideology had embedded themselves within the internal logic of governance. Some of these principles were that there was no such thing as society; that there was no alternative to deregulated free markets; that the state was an inherently wasteful, inefficient and unprofitable entity; and, therefore, its scope should be reduced by privatisation and corporatisation wherever possible.

Although Margaret Thatcher was extremely popular, she was also extremely divisive, and the large minority of people that opposed her were restive and vocal. There was a widespread belief amongst those in power that the basic functions of the nation faced existential threats from the protest, dissidence and unrest.

The responses by urban policy-makers to these problems of civic security were twofold. They prevented the formation of new public spaces wherever they could, often through blocking new development on ground of "historical merit", and they installed various devices in existing spaces to limit their capacity and control their crowds. Mies' project, Mansion House Square, may have been simply too generous, and more than the City could accept.

Related story

Mies van der Rohe's London tower design revealed in detail for first time

In 1848, during a comparable period of social upheaval in Britain, London's authorities had installed two massive fountains into Trafalgar Square, to halve the number of people that could congregate there. Some time later, crude chains were added. Then the adjacent roads were redirected in such a way as to make the square into a kind of traffic island. These innovations became the basis for most anti-protest, anti-terror strategies that – until today – remain central to the governance of London's public spaces.

The mechanisms are as diverse as they are ingenious. There are simple barriers, railings and gates. There are tools that rely on social norms (taking advantage of the British tendency toward polite obedience), such as excessive signage, road and pavement markings, or brass plugs in the pavement delineating private ownership. And then there are the urban tactics that coerce and influence in an unseen way: sophisticated anti-bomb bollards disguised as benches, water features like moats and fountains, lanes of traffic that encircle crowds like sheepdogs herding a flock.

We are told that these measures are necessary for our own protection. However, in broader historical terms it is not the public that really has to worry about terrorism. It is the authorities that must manage the risk of civil disobedience.

If Mies' square had been completed it would have been an ideal locus for Occupy

The current state of public space, particularly in the City of London, bears testament to this fear. In October 2011 I joined a Facebook group calling itself Occupy London, and a few days later – when it announced a march – I fashioned the wittiest anti-capitalist sign I could think of and went down to the Stock Exchange.

As the crowd twisted along its route I found myself progressively shuffled towards the front, and as we arrived at our destination I was nearly cheek-to-cheek with a phalanx of anti-riot police. The London Stock Exchange (LSX), which at that time was majority controlled by Toshiba, is located opposite St Paul's Cathedral, in a privately owned complex called Pater Noster Square. Because of this there was no way to "occupy" LSX and we were halted short of the target.

In fact, there was no way to occupy anything else in the City either – within a few days the City issued a memo advising companies to regularly check any nearby vacant properties for squatters, and instructed them to block access to all corporately controlled, publicly accessible spaces until further notice. The only exception was St Paul's Churchyard, over which they did not hold such direct control. So Occupy claimed sanctuary there. We established a tent city, a library, a "university." I even spent a night camping on the steps before the cathedral authorities were eventually pressured by the City to evict the protesters and dismantle the camp.

In a post-Trump, post-Brexit reality, public space and its occupation have never seemed so relevant

If Mies' square had been completed it would have been an ideal locus for Occupy, which as a civic function is without doubt a positive contribution to the health of British democracy. But more importantly, for the overwhelming majority of the time when people are not setting up soup kitchens or hand-stitching banners, it would have been a wonderful public amenity.

Mies' Mansion House Square scheme is the greatest public space never to have been built in London.

This is precisely why I have been so motivated to make the project available to the public. Me and the REAL foundation have spent almost two years working closely with the building's commissioner, Lord Palumbo, as well as the RIBA (who are planning an exhibition on Mansion House Square and James Stirling's One Poultry to open in March) with the aim of publishing a wide variety of project documents.

In a post-Trump, post-Brexit reality, public space and its occupation have never seemed so relevant. It is my strong hope that, by shining more light onto Mies' attempted intervention in London, we can contribute to a renewed debate about what type of cities we want to live in today.

Jack Self (1987) is an architect and writer based in London. He is director of the REAL foundation and editor-in-chief of the Real Review. In 2016, Jack curated the British Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale. He is also contributing editor for the Architectural Review and was previously associate editor at Strelka Press.

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