Faith and Ceremony

G. K. Chesterton, originally Protestant, then a convert to Catholicism, defends his church against Iconoclasts;  his remarks do equally well in defense of Eastern Orthodoxy.

Though of course these shows and pageants  meant immeasurably much to me, and profoundly affected my emotions,  yet I do not base my belief on such emotions, still less on such pageants or shows.   I was myself received into the Catholic Church  in a small tin shed, painted brick-red, which stood among the sculleries and outhouses of a Railway Hotel.

-- G.K. Chesterton, The Resurrection of Rome (1930)

Eschatological Monostich

The soul   does not die by sin,  but by impenitence.

-- G.K. Chesterton, The Resurrection of Rome (1930)

Journée mondiale de la procrastination

Bienvenus sur notre site, pour célébrer  la Journée mondiale de la procrastination !

http://www.leparisien.fr/societe/journee-mondiale-de-la-procrastination-le-smartphone-ennemi-n-1-des-taches-menageres-24-03-2018-7626975.php

Actually it was yesterday -- no wait, several days ago, by now.  We’d meant to post something, but didn’t get around to it until now.

Tableau neige et lumière

… lifted into a clearer  and a colder air …

a phase where light has transcended colour,

as in the hueless dawn of creation 

when the first light     was as strange

as the first snow …

-- G.K. Chesterton, The Resurrection of Rome (1930)

Feasts of Spring

We had breakfast guests this morning on the deck;

some with feathers, some with fur.

Sunflower seeds bright black  atop the snow.

[For a similar vision  from around this time two years ago, try this.]

Substitutionary atonement

It is a repeated motif of the thriller-series “24”, that Jack Bauer offers himself up as a sacrifice -- in Season Six, for one specific hostage.   We marveled at that them here:

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2012/07/24-season-vi-executive-summary.html

Against the background of all the other whiz-bang implausibilities of that show, this one was not the most far-fetched, but it still seemed a stretch.

And yet now we have a real-life authentic hero of law enforcement, who did exactly that during yesterday's terror attack in France, and died for his pains:

Arnaud Beltrame

https://www.valeursactuelles.com/societe/arnaud-beltrame-les-francais-ont-recu-un-modele-94219

The  Christian doctrine with which such acts are blessed, is called “Substitutionary atonement”.  

Jack Bauer received no thanks for his gambit; les gendarmes de France are likewise best appreciated by the bobos-gauchos  when letting themselves be stoned or shot at, rather than firing back.   A few of them have been getting somewhat annoyed:

    http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2016/10/entre-bleus.html

Butch monostich

    … le sévèr-e Char-lus    tout de noir  habillé …

[ -- Proust, La Prisonnière (1919), p. 212]

Code Red !

            Code -- Red!

            Rest in bed.

            Time to soothe

            your sleepy head.

{ for more about the lovely snow,

   gently press …    here …. }

{ for further glimpses into the wonderful world of Office Life,
    zestily press ...  here ... )

Journée internationale de la francophonie

In celebration, we link to our roster of over a hundred essays relating to French language and literature:

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/search/label/francophonie

For allusions to Proust specifically:
http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/search/label/Marcel%20Proust

 

Devonshire mini-hemi-monostich

… the thin   Devonian   rain  …

[--Edmund Gosse, Father and Son (1907)]

A Lost Lament of Sir Walter Ralegh

Re banished Ralegh’s  unpublished plaint to Elizabeth, known as “Cynthia”:

There are many fine passages,  none finer than the line

     Of all which passed,  the sorrow only stays

-- Ward & Waller, eds. The Cambridge History of English Literature, vol. IV: North to Drayton (1909), p. 54

Scenes from Office Life

Today -- March 14 -- our office celebrated International Pi Day(***), by bringing in a whole bunch of pies.  (March 14 --  3   1   4 -- get it?   Not funny, just fun.)  Apple, cherry, banana cream, pecan -- you name it.   And amazingly, for every single one of those pies, the ratio of its circumference to its diameter was -- you’ll never guess -- more or less 3.14 !!   Thus proving the theorem.

(***)   Actually Interplanetary Pi Day, since the value of that transcendental constant  is invariant throughout the universe.

[For further glimpses of our office life, click here.

For more mathy funnies,  here.]

More on “the Eternal Feminine”

(1)

Das Unbeschreibliche

hier ist getan.

Das Ewig-Weibliche

zieht uns hinan.

[-- Goethe, Faust]

A late-Elizabethan version:

Nó wórds fór it --

Yet ‘tis done.

A woman’s Forever

beckons us on.

[ -- Anon.  The “B” manuscript substitutes “Whatever” for “Forever”:

scholars are divided upon which is the valid reading.]

cf:  http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2016/04/west-easterly-divan.html

(2)

To the psychologist, the emotional differences between the sexes  appear small in a laboratory,  but enormous during a quarrel with his wife.

-- Theodor Reik, Of Love and Lust (1949/1957), p.412

“Like Shining from Shook Foil”

Portrait of Lawrence : 

The eyes were blue and piercing,

and the very fine hair,  a little on the reddish side of golden,

fluttered up  at every movement, every breath of wind,

like wisps of blown flame.

[--Aldous Huxley, Point Counter Point (1928), p. 93]

mournful monostich

the cheese

stands

a-lone  . .    .      .      .

[For additional  minimalist glimpses
 into scenes of desolation,
 click
 here .]

Tableaux de nostalgie

   Across the grass,     a peacock stalked,

   dragging its tattered tail

-- P. D. James, The Skull Beneath the Skin (1982), p. 121

   Beyond the half-open window,

   a tideless Mediterranean

   lay open to the moon.

-- P. D. James, The Skull Beneath the Skin (1982), p. 134

“Dottie’s Dimple” hemi-monostich

Dottie’s

dimple

twinkled

        [--Mary McCarthy, The Group (1963)]

Tableau avant-tempête

au-dessus de la ville …

un de ces immenses ciels crus  et gros de menaces

amoncelées de drame,

pareils à certains ciels,

de modernité presque parisienne,

de Mantegna  ou de Véronèse,

et sous lequel  ne pouvait s’accomplir

que quelque acte  terrible et solennel,

comme un départ en chemin de fer

ou l’érection de la Croix.

--Marcel Proust, A l’ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs (1919)

A hard rain’s gonna fall

Pour une vue d’ensemble cinématographique 

de la psychologie (in)tempestive,

consultez :

= >     Take Shelter (A l’abri !)

.