I have been all men known to history, Wondering at the world and at time passing; I have seen evil, and the light blessing Innocent love under a spring sky.
~Present, The.~--Since Time is not a person we can overtake when he is gone, let us honor him with mirth and cheerfulness of heart while he is passing.--_Goethe._
Sunlight dances through the leaves Soft winds stir the sighing trees Lying in the warm grass Feel the sun upon your face Elven songs and endless nights Sweet wine and soft relaxing lights Time will never touch you Here in this enchanted place You feel there's something calling you You're wanting to return To where the misty mountains rise and friendly fires burn A place you can escape the world Where the dark lord cannot go Peace of mind and sanctuary by loud water's flow I've traveled now for many miles It feels so good to see the smiles of Friends who never left your mind When you were far away From the golden light of coming dawn Till the twilight where the sun is gone We treasure every season And every passing day We feel the coming of a new day Darkness gives way to light a new way Stop here for a while until the world, The world calls you away Yet you know I've had the feeling Standing with my senses reeling This is the place to grow old 'til I reach my final day.
There can be no doubt that free inquiry has swept away, and will sweep away, many things which have been highly valued, nay, which were considered essential by many honest and pious minds. And yet who will say that true Christianity, Christianity which is known by its fruits, is less vigorous now than it has ever been before? There have been discussions in the Christian Church from the time of the Apostles to our own times. We have passed through them ourselves, we are passing through them now.
One world, one mankind cannot exist in the face of six, four or even two scales of values: We shall be torn apart by this disparity of rhythm, this disparity of vibrations.… Our 20th Century has proved to be more cruel than preceding centuries, and the first fifty years have not erased all its horrors; our world is rent asunder by those same old cave-age emotions of greed, envy, lack of control, mutual hostility which have picked up in passing respectable pseudonyms like class struggle, radical conflict, struggle of the masses, trade-union disputes. The primeval refusal to accept a compromise has been turned into a theoretical principle and is considered the virtue of orthodoxy. It demands millions of sacrifices in ceaseless civil wars, it drums into our souls that there is no such thing as unchanging, universal concepts of goodness and justice, that they are all fluctuating and inconstant.… Violence, less and less embarrassed by the limits imposed by centuries of lawfulness, is brazenly and victoriously striding across the whole world, unconcerned that its infertility has been demonstrated and proved many times in history. What is more, it is not simply crude power that triumphs abroad, but its exultant justification. The world is being inundated by the brazen conviction that power can do anything, justice nothing.… The young, at an age when they have not yet any experience other than sexual, when they do not yet have years of personal suffering and personal understanding behind them, are jubilantly repeating our depraved Russian blunders of the 19th Century, under the impression that they are discovering something new. They acclaim the latest wretched degradation on the part of the Chinese Red Guards as a joyous example. In shallow lack of understanding of the age-old essence of mankind, in the naive confidence of inexperienced hearts they cry: Let us drive away those cruel, greedy oppressors, governments, and the new ones (we), having just laid aside grenades and rifles, will be just and understanding. Far from it.… But of those who have lived more and understand, those who could oppose these young—many do not dare oppose, they even suck up, anything not to appear conservative. Another Russian phenomenon of the 19th Century which Dostoyevsky called slavery to progressive quirks.… The timid civilized world has found nothing with which to oppose the onslaught of a sudden revival of barefaced barbarity, other than concessions and smiles.… The price of cowardice will only be evil. We shall reap courage and victory only when we dare to make sacrifices. [ The Wall Street Journal , September 6, 1972, p. 14.]
Most men judge only by their senses and let themselves be persuaded by what they see... On top of that, insufferable vanity has convinced humans that nature has been made only for them, as though the sun, a huge body four hundred and thirty-four times as large as the earth, had been lit only to ripen our crab apples and cabbages. \x85 Do people really think that because the sun gives us light every day and year, it was made only to keep us from bumping into walls? No, no, this visible god gives light to man by accident, as a king's torch accidentally shines upon a working man or burglar passing in the street.
Since time is not a person we can overtake when he is past, let us honour him with mirth and cheerfulness of heart while he is passing.
The mechanical occupations of man, the watching any object, as it were, coming into existence by manual labour, is a very pleasant way of passing one's time, but our own activity is at the moment nil. It is almost the same as with smoking tobacco.
The position of the beds which constitute the coal-measures is infinitely diverse. Sometimes they are tilted up vertically, sometimes they are horizontal, sometimes curved into great basins; sometimes they come to the surface, sometimes they are covered up by thousands of feet of rock. But, whatever then-present position, there is abundant and conclusive evidence that every under-clay was once a surface soil. Not only do carbonized root-fibres frequently abound in these under-clays; but the stools of trees, the trunks of which are broken off and confounded with the bed of coal, have been repeatedly found passing into radiating roots, still embedded in the under-clay. On many parts of the coast of England, what are commonly known as "submarine forests" are to be seen at low water. They consist, for the most part, of short stools of oak, beech, and fir-trees, still fixed by their long roots in the bed of blue clay in which they originally grew. If one of these submarine forest beds should be gradually depressed and covered up by new deposits, it would present just the same characters as an under-clay of the coal, if the _Sigillaria_ and _Lepidodendron_ of the ancient world were substituted for the oak, or the beech, of our own times.
I really look with commiseration over the great body of my fellow citizens who, reading newspapers, live and die in the belief that they have known something of what has been passing in their time. -- H. Truman
I had an errand there: gathering water-lilies, green leaves and lilies white to please my pretty lady, the last ere the year's end to keep them from the winter, to flower by her pretty feet till the snows are melted. Each year at summer's end I go to find them for her, in a wide pool, deep and clear, far down Withywindle; there they open first in spring and there they linger latest. By that pool long ago I found the River-daughter, fair young Goldberry sitting in the rushes. Sweet was her singing then, and her heart was beating! And that proved well for you--for now I shall no longer go down deep again along the forest-water, no while the year is old. Nor shall I be passing</p> Old Man Willow's house this side of spring-time, not till the merry spring, when the River-daughter dances down the withy-path to bathe in the water. -- J. R. R. Tolkien
Anxious after the delay, Gruber doesn't waste any time getting the Koenig [a modified Porsche] up to speed, and almost immediately we are blowing off Alfas, Fiats, and Lancias full of excited Italians. These people love fast cars. But they love sport too and no passing encounter goes unchallenged. Nothing serious, just two wheels into your lane as you're bearing down on them at 130-plus -- to see if you're paying attention. -- Road & Track article about driving two absurdly fast cars across Europe.
Speaking as someone who has delved into the intricacies of PL/I, I am sure that only Real Men could have written such a machine-hogging, cycle-grabbing, all-encompassing monster. Allocate an array and free the middle third? Sure! Why not? Multiply a character string times a bit string and assign the result to a float decimal? Go ahead! Free a controlled variable procedure parameter and reallocate it before passing it back? Overlay three different types of variable on the same memory location? Anything you say! Write a recursive macro? Well, no, but Real Men use rescan. How could a language so obviously designed and written by Real Men not be intended for Real Man use?
I began many years ago, as so many young men do, in searching for the perfect woman. I believed that if I looked long enough, and hard enough, I would find her and then I would be secure for life. Well, the years and romances came and went, and I eventually ended up settling for someone a lot less than my idea of perfection. But one day, after many years together, I lay there on our bed recovering from a slight illness. My wife was sitting on a chair next to the bed, humming softly and watching the late afternoon sun filtering through the trees. The only sounds to be heard elsewhere were the clock ticking, the kettle downstairs starting to boil, and an occasional schoolchild passing beneath our window. And as I looked up into my wife's now wrinkled face, but still warm and twinkling eyes, I realized something about perfection... It comes only with time. -- James L. Collymore, "Perfect Woman"
There goes the good time that was had by all. -- Bette Davis, remarking on a passing starlet
ACTON'S LAW Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely. ALBRECHT'S LAW Social innovations tend to the level of minimum tolerable well-being. ALLEN'S (or CANN'S) AXIOM When all else fails, read the instructions. BOREN'S FIRST LAW When in doubt, mumble. BOVE'S THEOREM The remaining work to finish in order to reach your goal increases as the deadline approaches. BOWIE'S THEOREM If an experiment works, you must be using the wrong equipment. BROOK'S LAW Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later. CANADA BILL JONES' MOTTO It's morally wrong to allow naive end users to keep their money. CANN'S (or ALLEN'S) AXIOM When all else fails, read the instructions. CARLSON'S CONSOLATION Nothing is ever a complete failure; it can always serve as a bad example. CLARKE'S THIRD LAW Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. COLE'S LAW Thinly sliced cabbage. COHN'S LAW The more time you spend in reporting on what you are doing, the less time you have to do anything. Stability is achieved when you spend all your time reporting on the nothing you are doing. CONWAY'S LAW In any organization there will always be one person who knows what is going on. This person must be fired. LAW OF CONTINUITY Experiments should be reproducible. They should all fail in the same way. CORRESPONDENCE COROLLARY An experiment may be considered a success if no more than half of your data must be discarded to obtain correspondence with your theory. CROPP'S LAW The amount of work done varies inversely with the amount of time spent in the office. CUTLER WEBSTER'S LAW There are two sides to every argument, unless a person is personally involved, in which case there is only one. DEADLINE-DAN'S DEMO DEMONSTRATION The higher the "higher-ups" are who've come to see your demo, the lower your chances are of giving a successful one. DEMIAN'S OBSERVATION There is always one item on the screen menu that is mislabeled and should read "ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE". DENNISTON'S LAW Virtue is its own punishment. DOW'S LAW In a hierarchical organization, the higher the level, the greater the confusion. DR. CALIGARI'S COME-BACK A bad sector disk error occurs only after you've done several hours of work without performing a backup. ESTRIDGE'S LAW No matter how large and standardized the marketplace is, IBM can redefine it. FINAGLE'S LAWS 1) Once a job is fouled up, anything done to improve it makes it worse. 2) No matter what results are expected, someone is always willing to fake it. 3) No matter what the result, someone is always eager to misinterpret it. 4) No matter what occurs, someone believes it happened according to his pet theory. FINAGLE'S RULES 1) To study an application best, understand it thoroughly before you start. 2) Always keep a record of data. It indicates you've been working. 3) Always draw your curves, then plot the reading. 4) In case of doubt, make it sound convincing. 5) Program results should always be reproducible. They should all fail in the same way. 6) Do not believe in miracles. Rely on them. FINSTER'S LAW A closed mouth gathers no feet. FIRST RULE OF HISTORY History doesn't repeat itself --- historians merely repeat each other. FRANKLIN'S PARAPHRASE OF POPE'S LAW Praised be the end user who expects nothing, for he/she will never be disappointed. GILB'S LAWS OF UNRELIABILITY 1) At the source of every error which is blamed on the computer you will find at least two human errors, including the error of blaming it on the computer. 2) Any system which depends on human reliability is unreliable. 3) Undetectable errors are infinite in variety, in contrast to detectable errors, which by definition are limited. 4) Investment in reliability will increase until it exceeds the probable cost of errors, or until someone insists on getting some useful work done. GLYME'S FORMULA FOR SUCCESS The secret of success is sincerity. Once you can fake that, you've got it made. THE GOLDEN RULE Whoever has the gold makes the rules. GOLD'S LAW If the shoe fits, it's ugly. GORDON'S FIRST LAW If a research project is not worth doing at all, it is not worth doing well. GOVERNMENT'S LAW There is an exception to all laws. GREEN'S LAW OF DEBATE Anything is possible if you don't know what you're talking about. GUMMIDGES'S LAW The amount of expertise varies in inverse proportion to the number of statements understood by the general public. GUMPERSON'S LAW The probability of a given event occurring is inversely proportional to its desirability. HANLON'S RAZOR Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity. HARP'S COROLLARY TO ESTRIDGE'S LAW Your "IBM PC-compatible" computer grows more incompatible with every passing moment. HARRISON'S POSTULATE For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism. HELLER'S LAW The first myth of management is that it exists. HINDS' LAW OF COMPUTER PROGRAMMING 1) Any given program, when running, is obsolete. 2) If a program is useful, it will have to be changed. 3) If a program is useless, it will have to be documented. 4) Any given program will expand to fill all available memory. 5) The value of a program is proportional to the weight of its output. 6) Program complexity grows until it exceeds the capability of the programmer who must maintain it. 7) Make it possible for programmers to write programs in English, andyou will find that programmers cannot write in English. HOARE'S LAW OF LARGE PROGRAMS Inside every large program is a small program struggling to get out. HOPPER'S AXIOM (Admiral Grace Hopper, USN, who discovered the first computer "bug" in the 1940's---an actual insect) It's better to ask forgiveness than to ask permission. HUBBARD'S LAW Don't take life too seriously; you won't get out of it alive. JENKINSON'S LAW It won't work. JOHNSON-LAIRD'S LAW Toothaches tend to start on Saturday night. LARKINSON'S LAW All laws are basically false. THE LAST ONE'S LAW OF PROGRAM GENERATORS A program generator creates programs that are more "buggy" than the program generator. LIEBERMAN'S LAW Everybody lies; but it doesn't matter since nobody listens. LYNCH'S LAW When the going gets tough, everyone leaves. MASON'S FIRST LAW OF SYNERGISM The one day you'd sell your soul for something, souls are a glut. MAY'S LAW The quality of correlation is inversely proportional to the density of control. (The fewer the data points, the smoother the curves.) MENCKEN'S LAW There is always an easy answer to every human problem --- neat, plausible, and wrong. MESKIMEN'S LAW There's never time to do it right, but always time to do it over. MUIR'S LAW When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. MURPHY'S LAWS 1) If anything can go wrong, it will (and at the worst possible moment). 2) Nothing is as easy as it looks. 3) Everything takes longer than you think it will. MURPHY'S FOURTH LAW If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong. MURPHY'S LAWS OF THERMODYNAMICS 1) You can't win, 2) You can't break even, 3) And you can't get out of the game. ALSO: Things get worse under pressure. NINETY-NINETY RULE OF PROJECT SCHEDULES The first ninety percent of the task takes ninety percent of the time, and the last ten percent takes the other ninety percent. NIXON'S THEOREM The man who can smile when things go wrong has thought of someone he can blame it on. NOLAN'S PLACEBO An ounce of image is worth a pound of performance. OLIVER'S LAW OF LOCATION No matter where you are, there you are. O'REILLY'S LAW OF THE KITCHEN Cleanliness is next to impossible. OSBORN'S LAW Variables won't, constants aren't. O'TOOLE'S COMMENTARY ON MURPHY'S LAW Murphy was an optimist. PARKINSON'S LAW Work expands to fill the time available for its completion. PARKINSON'S LAW (MODIFIED) The components you have will expand to fill the available space. PEER'S LAW The solution to a problem changes the problem. PETER'S PRINCIPLE In every hierarchy, each employee tends to rise to the level of his incompetence. THE LAW OF THE PERVERSITY OF NATURE You cannot determine beforehand which side of the bread to butter. PUDDER'S LAW Anything that begins well will end badly. [Note: The converse of Pudder's law is not true.] RHODE'S COROLLARY TO HOARE'S LAW Inside every complex and unworkable program is a useful routine struggling to be free. ROBERT E. LEE'S TRUCE Judgment comes from experience; experience comes from poor judgment. RUDIN'S LAW In a crisis that forces a choice to be made among alternative courses of action, people tend to choose the worst possible course. RULE OF ACCURACY When working toward the solution of a problem it always helps you to know the answer. RYAN'S LAW Make three correct guesses consecutively and you will establish yourself as an expert. SATTINGER'S LAW It works better if you plug it in. SAUSAGE PRINCIPLE People who love sausage and respect the law should watch neither being made. SHAW'S PRINCIPLE Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will want to use it. SNAFU EQUATIONS 1) Given any problem containing N equations, there will be N+1 unknowns. 2) The object or bit of information most needed will be the least available. 3) The device requiring service or adjustment will be the least accessible. 4) Interchangeable devices aren't. 5) In any human endeavor, once you have exhausted all possibilities and fail, there will be one solution, simple and obvious, highly visible to everyone else. 6) Badness comes in waves. STEWART'S LAW OF RETROACTION It is easier to get forgiveness than permission. THOREAU'S THEORIES OF ADAPTATION 1) After months of training and you finally understand all of a program's commands, a revised version of the program arrives with an all-new command structure. 2) After designing a useful routine that gets around a familiar "bug" in the system, the system is revised, the "bug" taken away, and you're left with a useless routine. 3) Efforts in improving a program's "user friendliness" invariably lead to work in improving user's "computer literacy". 4) That's not a "bug", that's a feature! THYME'S LAW Everything goes wrong at once. THE LAW OF THE TOO SOLID GOOF In any collection of data, the figures that are obviously correct beyond all need of checking are the figures that contain the errors. Corollary 1: No one you ask for help will see the error either. Corollary 2: Any nagging intruder, who stops by with unsought advice, will spot it immediately. UNNAMED LAW If it happens, it must be possible. WEILER'S LAW Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do the work. WEINBERG'S COROLLARY An expert is a person who avoids the small errors while sweeping on to the grand fallacy. WEINBERG'S LAW If builders built buildings the way programmers write programs, then the first woodpecker that came along would destroy civilization. WHITEHEAD'S LAW The obvious answer is always overlooked. WILCOX'S LAW A pat on the back is only a few centimeters from a kick in the pants. WOOD'S AXIOM As soon as a still-to-be-finished computer task becomes a life-or-death situation, the power fails. WOODWARD'S LAW A theory is better than its explanation. ZYMURGY'S FIRST LAW OF EVOLVING SYSTEM DYNAMICS Once you open a can of worms, the only way to re-can them is to use a larger can.
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Thus far thy toils are finish'd. Now attend! Mark well my words, of which the Gods will sure Themselves remind thee in the needful hour. First shalt thou reach the Sirens; they the hearts Enchant of all who on their coast arrive. The wretch, who unforewarn'd approaching, hears The Sirens' voice, his wife and little-ones Ne'er fly to gratulate his glad return, But him the Sirens sitting in the meads Charm with mellifluous song, while all around The bones accumulated lie of men Now putrid, and the skins mould'ring away. But, pass them thou, and, lest thy people hear Those warblings, ere thou yet approach, fill all Their ears with wax moulded between thy palms; But as for thee--thou hear them if thou wilt. Yet let thy people bind thee to the mast Erect, encompassing thy feet and arms With cordage well-secured to the mast-foot, So shalt thou, raptur'd, hear the Sirens' song. But if thou supplicate to be released, Or give such order, then, with added cords Let thy companions bind thee still the more. When thus thy people shall have safely pass'd The Sirens by, think not from me to learn What course thou next shalt steer; two will occur; Delib'rate chuse; I shall describe them both. Here vaulted rocks impend, dash'd by the waves Immense of Amphitrite azure-eyed; The blessed Gods those rocks, Erratic, call. Birds cannot pass them safe; no, not the doves Which his ambrosia bear to Father Jove, But even of those doves the slipp'ry rock Proves fatal still to one, for which the God Supplies another, lest the number fail. No ship, what ship soever there arrives, Escapes them, but both mariners and planks Whelm'd under billows of the Deep, or, caught By fiery tempests, sudden disappear. Those rocks the billow-cleaving bark alone The Argo, further'd by the vows of all, Pass'd safely, sailing from Ææta's isle; Nor she had pass'd, but surely dash'd had been On those huge rocks, but that, propitious still To Jason, Juno sped her safe along. These rocks are two; one lifts his summit sharp High as the spacious heav'ns, wrapt in dun clouds Perpetual, which nor autumn sees dispers'd Nor summer, for the sun shines never there; No mortal man might climb it or descend, Though twice ten hands and twice ten feet he own'd, For it is levigated as by art. Down scoop'd to Erebus, a cavern drear Yawns in the centre of its western side; Pass it, renown'd Ulysses! but aloof So far, that a keen arrow smartly sent Forth from thy bark should fail to reach the cave. There Scylla dwells, and thence her howl is heard Tremendous; shrill her voice is as the note Of hound new-whelp'd, but hideous her aspect, Such as no mortal man, nor ev'n a God Encount'ring her, should with delight survey. Her feet are twelve, all fore-feet; six her necks Of hideous length, each clubb'd into a head Terrific, and each head with fangs is arm'd In triple row, thick planted, stored with death. Plunged to her middle in the hollow den She lurks, protruding from the black abyss Her heads, with which the rav'ning monster dives In quest of dolphins, dog-fish, or of prey More bulky, such as in the roaring gulphs Of Amphitrite without end abounds. It is no seaman's boast that e'er he slipp'd Her cavern by, unharm'd. In ev'ry mouth She bears upcaught a mariner away. The other rock, Ulysses, thou shalt find Humbler, a bow-shot only from the first; On this a wild fig grows broad-leav'd, and here Charybdis dire ingulphs the sable flood. Each day she thrice disgorges, and each day Thrice swallows it. Ah! well forewarn'd, beware What time she swallows, that thou come not nigh, For not himself, Neptune, could snatch thee thence. Close passing Scylla's rock, shoot swift thy bark Beyond it, since the loss of six alone Is better far than shipwreck made of all.