Job and Jesus!
“(2&3)..But how can a mortal be righteous before God? Though one wishes to dispute with Him, He could not answer him one time out of a thousand. (14-15) How can I dispute with Him? How can I find words to argue with Him? [Even] though I were innocent, I could not answer Him. I could only plead with my judge for mercy…(32-35) He is not a man like me that I might answer Him, that we might confront each other in court. If only there were someone to arbitrate between us, to lay His hands upon us both so that His terror would frighten me no more. Then I would speak without fear of Him, but as it stands now with me, I cannot.”
–Job 9:2-35
“Even now my witness is in heaven; my advocate is on high. My intercessor is my friend as my eyes pour out tears to God; on behalf of a man He pleads with God as a man pleads for his friend.”
–Job 16:19-21
Also
Job 14:14-17; 33:23-28
The Founding Fathers Weigh In
“… God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive… And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms…The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.”
-Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334 (C.J. Boyd, Ed., 1950)
“The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government.”
Patrick Henry
“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves.”
-William Pitt in the House of Commons November 18, 1783
“Laws that forbid the carrying of arms… disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes… Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.”
-Thomas Jefferson
“Americans [have] the right and advantage of being armed, unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust their people with arms.”
-James Madison
“We, the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow men who pervert the Constitution.”
Abraham Lincoln (Not technically a founding father, but respectable words nonetheless.)
“There is not a shadow of right in the general government to intermeddle in religion. Its least interference with it would be a most flagrant usurpation.” James Madison
“You have rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the Universe”
John Adams
From the Movies–about love
–The Notebook
”I am no one special, just a common man with common thoughts. I’ve led a common life. There are no monuments dedicated to me, and my name will soon be forgotten. But in one respect, I’ve succeeded as gloriously as anyone who ever lived. I’ve loved another with all my heart and soul, and for me, that has always been enough.”
“The way I see it, I got three choices. One, I can shoot him. Two, I can kick the crap out of him. Or three, I leave you. Well, all that’s no good. You see, ’cause none of those options get me you.”
“The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds. And that’s what you’ve given me. That’s what I’d hoped to give you forever.”
–Big Fish
“You don’t understand. There are two kinds of women in the world to your father–your mother and everyone else.”
Random
After the game, the king and the pawn go into the same box.-Italian Proverb
And your very flesh shall be a great poem.
Walt Whitman
Be curious, not judgmental.
Walt Whitman
I also say it is good to fall, battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are won.
Walt Whitman
I no doubt deserved my enemies, but I don’t believe I deserved my friends.
Walt Whitman
Literature
“Again, I always go to sea as a sailor, because they make a point of paying me for my trouble, whereas they never pay passengers a single penny that I ever heard of. On the contrary, passengers themselves must pay. And there is all the difference in the world between paying and being paid.”-Moby Dick
“You start a question, and it’s like starting a stone. You sit quietly on the top of a hill; and away the stone goes, starting others; and presently some bland old bird (the last you would have thought of) is knocked on the head in his own back garden and the family have to change their name.”-Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
“She is happy…Whether it’s madness or a god or a monster, or whatever it is, she is happy. She is ten times happier there in the Mountain, than you could ever make her. Leave her alone…Don’t mar what you’ve learned you can’t make.”-Til We Have Faces
“My anger protected me only for a short time; anger wearies itself out and truth comes in.”-Til We Have Faces
“Reputation is an idle and most false imposition; oft got without merit and lost without deserving.”-Othello
“How poor are they that have not patience! What wound did ever heal but by degrees?”-Othello
A Taste of Poe
I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity.
Edgar Allan Poe
I have great faith in fools; self-confidence my friends call it.
Edgar Allan Poe
There are few cases in which mere popularity should be considered a proper test of merit; but the case of song-writing is, I think, one of the few.
Edgar Allan Poe
There is an eloquence in true enthusiasm.
Edgar Allan Poe
Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality.
Edgar Allan Poe
A Little Bit from Dr. Seuss
“Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.”
“You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.”
“I have heard there are troubles of more than one kind. Some come from ahead and some come from behind. But I’ve bought a big bat. I’m all ready you see. Now my troubles are going to have troubles with me!”
“You can get help from teachers, but you are going to have to learn a lot by yourself, sitting alone in a room.”
C.S. Lewis’ Words of Wisdom.
“You don’t have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body.”
“A man can no more diminish God’s glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word, ‘darkness’ on the walls of his cell. “
“Can a mortal ask questions which God finds unanswerable? Quite easily, I should think. All nonsense questions are unanswerable.”
“Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point.”
“I gave in, and admitted that God was God.”
“Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become.”
“Telling us to obey instinct is like telling us to obey ‘people.’ People say different things: so do instincts. Our instincts are at war… Each instinct, if you listen to it, will claim to be gratified at the expense of the rest.”
“The safest road to hell is the gradual one – the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without.” milestones, without signposts.”
“There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, ‘Thy will be done,’ and those to whom God says, ‘All right, then, have it your way.’”
