The old order changeth, yielding place to new; And God fulfils himself in many ways, Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
The old order changeth, yielding place to new, / And God fulfils himself in many ways, / Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
The old order changeth, yielding place to new, and God fulfils himself in many ways lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
21:43. Therefore I say to you that the kingdom of God shall be taken from you and shall be given to a nation yielding the fruits thereof.
Then Pallas, thus, Goddess cærulean-eyed. Stranger! thou sure art simple, or hast dwelt Far distant hence, if of this land thou ask. It is not, trust me, of so little note, But known to many, both to those who dwell Toward the sun-rise, and to others placed Behind it, distant in the dusky West. Rugged it is, not yielding level course To the swift steed, and yet no barren spot, However small, but rich in wheat and wine; Nor wants it rain or fertilising dew, But pasture green to goats and beeves affords, Trees of all kinds, and fountains never dry. Ithaca therefore, stranger, is a name Known ev'n at Troy, a city, by report, At no small distance from Achaia's shore.
"You see," said the young man, with an air of sorrowful resignation, to Faria, "that God deems it right to take from me any claim to merit for what you call my devotion to you. I have promised to remain forever with you, and now I could not break my promise if I would. The treasure will be no more mine than yours, and neither of us will quit this prison. But my real treasure is not that, my dear friend, which awaits me beneath the sombre rocks of Monte Cristo, it is your presence, our living together five or six hours a day, in spite of our jailers; it is the rays of intelligence you have elicited from my brain, the languages you have implanted in my memory, and which have taken root there with all their philological ramifications. These different sciences that you have made so easy to me by the depth of the knowledge you possess of them, and the clearness of the principles to which you have reduced them--this is my treasure, my beloved friend, and with this you have made me rich and happy. Believe me, and take comfort, this is better for me than tons of gold and cases of diamonds, even were they not as problematical as the clouds we see in the morning floating over the sea, which we take for terra firma, and which evaporate and vanish as we draw near to them. To have you as long as possible near me, to hear your eloquent speech,--which embellishes my mind, strengthens my soul, and makes my whole frame capable of great and terrible things, if I should ever be free,--so fills my whole existence, that the despair to which I was just on the point of yielding when I knew you, has no longer any hold over me; and this--this is my fortune--not chimerical, but actual. I owe you my real good, my present happiness; and all the sovereigns of the earth, even Caesar Borgia himself, could not deprive me of this."
Then thus Achilles matchless in the race. Laertes' noble son, for wiles renown'd! I must with plainness speak my fixt resolve Unalterable; lest I hear from each The same long murmur'd melancholy tale. For I abhor the man, not more the gates Of hell itself, whose words belie his heart. So shall not mine. My judgment undisguised Is this; that neither Agamemnon me Nor all the Greeks shall move; for ceaseless toil Wins here no thanks; one recompense awaits The sedentary and the most alert, The brave and base in equal honor stand, And drones and heroes fall unwept alike. I after all my labors, who exposed My life continual in the field, have earn'd No very sumptuous prize. As the poor bird Gives to her unfledged brood a morsel gain'd After long search, though wanting it herself, So I have worn out many sleepless nights, And waded deep through many a bloody day In battle for their wives. I have destroy'd Twelve cities with my fleet, and twelve, save one, On foot contending in the fields of Troy. From all these cities, precious spoils I took Abundant, and to Agamemnon's hand Gave all the treasure. He within his ships Abode the while, and having all received, Little distributed, and much retained; He gave, however, to the Kings and Chiefs A portion, and they keep it. Me alone Of all the Grecian host he hath despoil'd; My bride, my soul's delight is in his hands, And let him, couch'd with her, enjoy his fill Of dalliance. What sufficient cause, what need Have the Achaians to contend with Troy? Why hath Atrides gather'd such a host, And led them hither? Was't not for the sake Of beauteous Helen? And of all mankind Can none be found who love their proper wives But the Atridæ? There is no good man Who loves not, guards not, and with care provides For his own wife, and, though in battle won, I loved the fair Briseïs at my heart. But having dispossess'd me of my prize So foully, let him not essay me now, For I am warn'd, and he shall not prevail. With thee and with thy peers let him advise, Ulysses! how the fleet may likeliest 'scape Yon hostile fires; full many an arduous task He hath accomplished without aid of mine; So hath he now this rampart and the trench Which he hath digg'd around it, and with stakes Planted contiguous--puny barriers all To hero-slaughtering Hector's force opposed. While I the battle waged, present myself Among the Achaians, Hector never fought Far from his walls, but to the Scæan gate Advancing and the beech-tree, there remain'd. Once, on that spot he met me, and my arm Escaped with difficulty even there. But, since I feel myself not now inclined To fight with noble Hector, yielding first To Jove due worship, and to all the Gods, To-morrow will I launch, and give my ships Their lading. Look thou forth at early dawn, And, if such spectacle delight thee aught, Thou shalt behold me cleaving with my prows The waves of Hellespont, and all my crews Of lusty rowers active in their task. So shall I reach (if Ocean's mighty God Prosper my passage) Phthia the deep-soil'd On the third day. I have possessions there, Which hither roaming in an evil hour I left abundant. I shall also hence Convey much treasure, gold and burnish'd brass, And glittering steel, and women passing fair My portion of the spoils. But he, your King, The prize he gave, himself resumed, And taunted at me. Tell him my reply, And tell it him aloud, that other Greeks May indignation feel like me, if arm'd Always in impudence, he seek to wrong Them also. Let him not henceforth presume, Canine and hard in aspect though he be, To look me in the face. I will not share His counsels, neither will I aid his works. Let it suffice him, that he wrong'd me once, Deceived me once, henceforth his glozing arts Are lost on me. But let him rot in peace Crazed as he is, and by the stroke of Jove Infatuate. I detest his gifts, and him So honor as the thing which most I scorn. And would he give me twenty times the worth Of this his offer, all the treasured heaps Which he possesses, or shall yet possess, All that Orchomenos within her walls, And all that opulent Egyptian Thebes Receives, the city with a hundred gates, Whence twenty thousand chariots rush to war, And would he give me riches as the sands, And as the dust of earth, no gifts from him Should soothe me, till my soul were first avenged For all the offensive license of his tongue. I will not wed the daughter of your Chief, Of Agamemnon. Could she vie in charms With golden Venus, had she all the skill Of blue-eyed Pallas, even so endow'd She were no bride for me. No. He may choose From the Achaians some superior Prince, One more her equal. Peleus, if the Gods Preserve me, and I safe arrive at home, Himself, ere long, shall mate me with a bride. In Hellas and in Phthia may be found Fair damsels many, daughters of the Chiefs Who guard our cities; I may choose of them, And make the loveliest of them all my own. There, in my country, it hath ever been My dearest purpose, wedded to a wife Of rank convenient, to enjoy in peace Such wealth as ancient Peleus hath acquired. For life, in my account, surpasses far In value all the treasures which report Ascribed to populous Ilium, ere the Greeks Arrived, and while the city yet had peace; Those also which Apollo's marble shrine In rocky Pytho boasts. Fat flocks and beeves May be by force obtain'd, tripods and steeds Are bought or won, but if the breath of man Once overpass its bounds, no force arrests Or may constrain the unbodied spirit back. Me, as my silver-footed mother speaks Thetis, a twofold consummation waits. If still with battle I encompass Troy, I win immortal glory, but all hope Renounce of my return. If I return To my beloved country, I renounce The illustrious meed of glory, but obtain Secure and long immunity from death. And truly I would recommend to all To voyage homeward, for the fall as yet Ye shall not see of Ilium's lofty towers, For that the Thunderer with uplifted arm Protects her, and her courage hath revived. Bear ye mine answer back, as is the part Of good ambassadors, that they may frame Some likelier plan, by which both fleet and host May be preserved; for, my resentment still Burning, this project is but premature. Let Phoenix stay with us, and sleep this night Within my tent, that, if he so incline, He may to-morrow in my fleet embark, And hence attend me; but I leave him free.
He said, and sent Cyllenius with command To free the ports, and ope the Punic land To Trojan guests; lest, ignorant of fate, The queen might force them from her town and state. Down from the steep of heav'n Cyllenius flies, And cleaves with all his wings the yielding skies. Soon on the Libyan shore descends the god, Performs his message, and displays his rod: The surly murmurs of the people cease; And, as the fates requir'd, they give the peace: The queen herself suspends the rigid laws, The Trojans pities, and protects their cause.
A solemn custom was observ'd of old, Which Latium held, and now the Romans hold, Their standard when in fighting fields they rear Against the fierce Hyrcanians, or declare The Scythian, Indian, or Arabian war; Or from the boasting Parthians would regain Their eagles, lost in Carrhae's bloody plain. Two gates of steel (the name of Mars they bear, And still are worship'd with religious fear) Before his temple stand: the dire abode, And the fear'd issues of the furious god, Are fenc'd with brazen bolts; without the gates, The wary guardian Janus doubly waits. Then, when the sacred senate votes the wars, The Roman consul their decree declares, And in his robes the sounding gates unbars. The youth in military shouts arise, And the loud trumpets break the yielding skies. These rites, of old by sov'reign princes us'd, Were the king's office; but the king refus'd, Deaf to their cries, nor would the gates unbar Of sacred peace, or loose th' imprison'd war; But hid his head, and, safe from loud alarms, Abhorr'd the wicked ministry of arms. Then heav'n's imperious queen shot down from high: At her approach the brazen hinges fly; The gates are forc'd, and ev'ry falling bar; And, like a tempest, issues out the war.
The administration of Sir Robert Peel is also remarkable for its Irish policy. The Irish, under O'Connell, had constantly supported the Whig ministry of Lord Melbourne. But their alliance, or understanding, with the Whigs had not procured them all the results which they had expected from it. The two great Whig measures, dealing with the church and the municipalities, had only been passed after years of controversy, and in a shape which deprived them of many expected advantages. Hence arose a notion in Ireland that nothing was to be expected from a British parliament, and hence began a movement for the repeal of the union which had been accomplished in 1801. This agitation, which smouldered during the reign of the Whig ministry, was rapidly revived when Sir Robert Peel entered upon office. The Irish contributed large sums, which were known as repeal rent, to the cause, and they held monster meetings in various parts of Ireland to stimulate the demand for repeal. The ministry met this campaign by coercive legislation regulating the use of arms, by quartering large bodies of troops in Ireland, and by prohibiting a great meeting at Clontarf, the scene of Brian Boru's victory, in the immediate neighbourhood of Dublin. They further decided in 1843 to place O'Connell and some of the leading agitators on their trial for conspiracy and sedition. O'Connell was tried before a jury chosen from a defective panel, was convicted on an indictment which contained many counts, and the court passed sentence without distinguishing between these counts. These irregularities induced the House of Lords to reverse the judgment, and its reversal did much to prevent mischief. O'Connell's illness, which resulted in his death in 1847, tended also to establish peace. Sir Robert Peel wisely endeavoured to stifle agitation by making considerable concessions to Irish sentiment. He increased the grant which was made to the Roman Catholic College at Maynooth; he established three colleges in the north, south and west of Ireland for the undenominational education of the middle classes; he appointed a commission--the Devon commission, as it was called, from the name of the nobleman who presided over it--to investigate the conditions on which Irish land was held; and, after the report of the commission, he introduced, though he failed to carry, a measure for remedying some of the grievances of the Irish tenants. These wise concessions might possibly have had some effect in pacifying Ireland, if, in the autumn of 1845, they had not been forgotten in the presence of a disaster which suddenly fell on that unhappy country. The potato, which was the sole food of at least half the people of an overcrowded island, failed, and a famine of unprecedented proportions was obviously imminent. Sir Robert Peel, whose original views on protection had been rapidly yielding to the arguments afforded by the success of his own budgets, concluded that it was impossible to provide for the necessities of Ireland without suspending the corn laws; and that, if they were once suspended, it would be equally impossible to restore them. He failed, however, to convince two prominent members of his cabinet--Lord Stanley and the duke of Buccleuch--that protection must be finally abandoned, and considering it hopeless to persevere with a disunited cabinet he resigned office. On Sir Robert's resignation the queen sent for Lord John Russell, who had led the Liberal party in the House of Commons with conspicuous ability for more than ten years, and charged him with the task of forming a new ministry. Differences, which it proved impossible to remove, between two prominent Whigs--Lord Palmerston and Lord Grey--made the task impracticable, and after an interval Sir Robert Peel consented to resume power. Sir Robert Peel was probably aware that his fall had been only postponed. In the four years and a half during which his ministry had lasted he had done much to estrange his party. They said, with some truth, that, whether his measures were right or wrong, they were opposed to the principles which he had been placed in power to support. The general election of 1841 had been mainly fought on the rival policies of protection and free trade. The country had decided for protection, and Sir R. Peel had done more than all his predecessors to give it free trade. The Conservative party, moreover, was closely allied with the church, and Sir Robert had offended the church by giving an increased endowment to Maynooth, and by establishing undenominational colleges--"godless colleges" as they were called--in Ireland. The Conservatives were, therefore, sullenly discontented with the conduct of their leader. They were lashed into positive fury by the proposal which he was now making to abolish the corn laws. Lord George Bentinck, who, in his youth, had been private secretary to Canning, but who in his maturer years had devoted more time to the turf than to politics, placed himself at their head. He was assisted by a remarkable man--Benjamin Disraeli--who joined great abilities to great ambition, and who, embittered by Sir Robert Peel's neglect to appoint him to office, had already displayed his animosity to the minister. The policy on which Sir Robert Peel resolved facilitated attack. For the minister thought it necessary, while providing against famine by repealing the corn laws, to ensure the preservation of order by a new coercion bill. The financial bill and the coercion bill were both pressed forward, and each gave opportunities for discussion and, what was then new in parliament, for obstruction. At last, on the very night on which the fiscal proposals of the ministers were accepted by the Lords, the coercion bill was defeated in the Commons by a combination of Whigs, radicals and protectionists; and Sir R. Peel, worn out with a protracted struggle, placed his resignation in the queen's hands. Entry: XII
Ali's position in Kufa was much less advantageous. The population of Irak was already mixed up with Persian elements; it fluctuated greatly, and was largely composed of fresh immigrants. Islam had its headquarters here; Kufa and Basra were the home of the pious and of the adventurer, the centres of religious and political movement. This movement it was that had raised Ali to the Caliphate, but yet it did not really take any personal interest in him. Religion proved for him a less trustworthy and more dangerous support than did the conservative and secular feeling of Syria for the Omayyads. Moawiya could either act or refrain from acting as he chose, secure in either case of the obedience of his subjects. Ali, on the other hand, was unable to convert enthusiasm for the principle inscribed on his banner into enthusiasm for his person. It was necessary that he should accommodate himself to the wishes of his supporters, which, however, were inconsistent. They compelled him suddenly to break off the battle of Siffin, which he was apparently on the point of gaining over Moawiya, because the Syrians fastened copies of the Koran to their lances to denote that not the sword, but the word of God should decide the contest (see further below, B.1; also ALI). But in yielding to the will of the majority he excited the displeasure of the minority, the genuine zealots, who in Moawiya were opposing the enemy of Islam, and regarded Ali's entering into negotiations with him as a denial of the faith. When the negotiations failed and war was resumed, the Kharijites refused to follow Ali's army, and he had to turn his armies in the first instance against them. He succeeded in disposing of them without difficulty at the battle of Nahrawan, but in his success he lost the soul of his following. For they were the true champions of the theocratic principle; through their elimination it became clear that the struggle had in no sense anything to do with the cause of God. Ali's defeat was a foregone conclusion, once religious enthusiasm had failed him; the secular resources at the disposal of his adversaries were far superior. Fortunately for him he was murdered (end of January 661), thereby posthumously attaining an importance in the eyes of a large part of the Mahommedan world (Shi'a) which he had never possessed during his life. Entry: 4
"If civilized people were ever to lapse into the worship of animals, the Cow would certainly be their chief goddess. What a fountain of blessings is the Cow! She is the mother of beef, the source of butter, the original cause of cheese, to say nothing of shoe-horns, hair-combs and upper leather. A gentle, amiable, ever-yielding creature, who has no joy in her family affairs which she does not share with man. We rob her of her children that we may rob her of her milk, and we only care for her when the robbing may be perpetrated." Entry: DAIRY
In philosophy Bonaventura presents a marked contrast to his great contemporaries, Thomas Aquinas and Roger Bacon. While these may be taken as representing respectively physical science yet in its infancy, and Aristotelian scholasticism in its most perfect form, he brings before us the mystical and Platonizing mode of speculation which had already to some extent found expression in Hugo and Richard of St Victor, and in Bernard of Clairvaux. To him the purely intellectual element, though never absent, is of inferior interest when compared with the living power of the affections or the heart. He rejects the authority of Aristotle, to whose influence he ascribes much of the heretical tendency of the age, and some of whose cardinal doctrines--such as the eternity of the world--he combats vigorously. But the Platonism he received was Plato as understood by St Augustine, and as he had been handed down by the Alexandrian school and the author of the mystical works passing under the name of Dionysius the Areopagite. Bonaventura accepts as Platonic the theory that ideas do not exist _in rerum natura_, but as thoughts of the divine mind, according to which actual things were formed; and this conception has no slight influence upon his philosophy. Like all the great scholastic doctors he starts with the discussion of the relations between reason and faith. All the sciences are but the handmaids of theology; reason can discover some of the moral truths which form the groundwork of the Christian system, but others it can only receive and apprehend through divine illumination. In order to obtain this illumination the soul must employ the proper means, which are prayer, the exercise of the virtues, whereby it is rendered fit to accept the divine light, and meditation which may rise even to ecstatic union with God. The supreme end of life is such union, union in contemplation or intellect and in intense absorbing love; but it cannot be entirely reached in this life, and remains as a hope for futurity. The mind in contemplating God has three distinct aspects, stages or grades--the senses, giving empirical knowledge of what is without and discerning the traces (_vestigia_) of the divine in the world; the reason, which examines the soul itself, the image of the divine Being; and lastly, pure intellect (_intelligentia_), which, in a transcendent act, grasps the Being of the divine cause. To these three correspond the three kinds of theology--_theologia symbolica, theologia propria_ and _theologia mystica_. Each stage is subdivided, for in contemplating the outer world we may use the senses or the imagination; we may rise to a knowledge of God _per vestigia_ or _in vestigiis_. In the first case the three great properties of physical bodies--weight, number, measure,--in the second the division of created things into the classes of those that have merely physical existence, those that have life, and those that have thought, irresistibly lead us to conclude the power, wisdom and goodness of the Triune God. So in the second stage we may ascend to the knowledge of God, _per imaginem_, by reason, or _in imagine_, by the pure understanding (_intellectus_); in the one case the triple division--memory, understanding and will,--in the other the Christian virtues--faith, hope and charity,--leading again to the conception of a Trinity of divine qualities--eternity, truth and goodness. In the last stage we have first _intelligentia_, pure intellect, contemplating the essential being of God, and finding itself compelled by necessity of thought to hold absolute being as the first notion, for non-being cannot be conceived apart from being, of which it is but the privation. To this notion of absolute being, which is perfect and the greatest of all, objective existence must be ascribed. In its last and highest form of activity the mind rests in the contemplation of the infinite goodness of God, which is apprehended by means of the highest faculty, the _apex mentis_ or _synderesis_. This spark of the divine illumination is common to all forms of mysticism, but Bonaventura adds to it peculiarly Christian elements. The complete yielding up of mind and heart to God is unattainable without divine grace, and nothing renders us so fit to receive this gift as the meditative and ascetic life of the cloister. The monastic life is the best means of grace. Entry: BONAVENTURA
BUTO, the Greek name of the Egyptian goddess Uto (hierogl. _W'zy·t_), confused with the name of her city Buto (see BUSIRIS). She was a cobra-goddess of the marshes, worshipped especially in the city of Buto in the north-west of the Delta, and at another Buto (Hdt. ii. 75) in the north-east of the Delta, now Tell Nebesheh. The former city is placed by Petrie at Tell Ferain, a large and important site, but as yet yielding no inscriptions. This western Buto was the capital of the kingdom of Northern Egypt in prehistoric times before the two kingdoms were united; hence the goddess Buto was goddess of Lower Egypt and the North. To correspond to the vulture goddess (Nekhbi) of the south she sometimes is given the form of a vulture; she is also figured in human form. As a serpent she is commonly twined round a papyrus stem, which latter spells her name; and generally she wears the crown of Lower Egypt. The Greeks identified her with Leto; this may be accounted for partly by the resemblance of name, partly by the myth of her having brought up Horus in a floating island, resembling the story of Leto and Apollo on Delos. Perhaps the two myths influenced each other. Herodotus describes the temple and other sacred [v.04 p.0889] places of (the western) Buto, and refers to its festival, and to its oracle, which must have been important though nothing definite is known about it. It is strange that a city whose leading in the most ancient times was fully recognized throughout Egyptian history does not appear in the early lists of nome-capitals. Like Thebes, however (which lay in the 4th nome of Upper Egypt, its early capital being Hermonthis), it eventually became, at a very late date, the capital of a nome, in this case called Phtheneto, "the land of (the goddess) Buto." The second Buto (hierogl. _'Im·t_) was capital from early times of the 19th nome of Lower Egypt. Entry: BUTO