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April 23, 2008
Charles Darwin Online
Cambridge University is making available to the world at large works of Charles Darwin previously available only to scholars.
To live in the digital age is both a blessing and a curse. File this one under blessings.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:46 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
April 25, 2008
By Way of Comment on My Present Read
I have, of late, had the sometime pleasure of the company of a young American woman of my acquaintance at luncheon. While the venues, cuisines, and surroundings of our après-midi repast were variable and dependent upon the circumstances and opportunities available to us, they have always been of the greatest pleasure and entertainment to me.
Miss Archer is at once a very determined young lady, but one also tinged with the streak of independence set firmly in the ground of a graceful and enhancing naiveté, which conduces to my enjoyment of our conversational aperitifs.
I've grown somewhat concerned because whereas her talk was mostly of the many men who saw her and implored her favors while she remained on the Touchett family estate, more and more I am hearing of a person of interest who seems to have netted our pretty little bird without her own knowledge. And the more I hear of Osmond, the more concerned I become, because it occurs to me that there is some information circulating about him that does not redound to his credit. While one can never take seriously what circulates on the street or even in the salon, it has been my distinct displeasure to make the acquaintance of another member of the pretty scene that Miss Archer has laid before me.
Miss Archer never fails of speak of Madame Merle in anything but the most glowing terms, expressing only admiration for this widow, who, as Mr. Touchett has observed on occasion lacks any blot whatsoever on her record. One must wonder about such a record--how recent it must be and what must have been, with some great aplomb, expunged from that on-going document. My own sense of Madame Merle is not nearly so flattering to that personage. There is something about her that is, perhaps subtle is the word, but I think wily is closer to the sense. She seems to fashion les tableaux to fit the needs of the moment, and one cannot help but wonder what those needs might be. Mr. Touchett himself has confided to me that she is a woman of great and unrealized ambitions—and perhaps that view has colored my own of her character. For all I know she may be as spotless as she appears to the casual observer.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:30 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Obedience
While reading through Casti Connubii for quite a different purpose, I happened upon this:
104. Wherefore, let the faithful also be on their guard against the overrated independence of private judgment and that false autonomy of human reason. For it is quite foreign to everyone bearing the name of a Christian to trust his own mental powers with such pride as to agree only with those things which he can examine from their inner nature, and to imagine that the Church, sent by God to teach and guide all nations, is not conversant with present affairs and circumstances; or even that they must obey only in those matters which she has decreed by solemn definition as though her other decisions might be presumed to be false or putting forward insufficient motive for truth and honesty. Quite to the contrary, a characteristic of all true followers of Christ, lettered or unlettered, is to suffer themselves to be guided and led in all things that touch upon faith or morals by the Holy Church of God through its Supreme Pastor the Roman Pontiff, who is himself guided by Jesus Christ Our Lord.
While this will evince chagrin or excite anguish or rattle the cage of almost no one who passes through this way, I suspect that it would stick mightily in the craw of those who would prefer to pick and choose amongst the truths to which they wish to adhere. I wonder how many of us, even those in agreement with the sentiment, live the actuality of the final sentence in the excerpt above? I know that I truly do believe and hold true all that the Church teaches (in my very meager ability to comprehend it), and even so, practice differs from belief. Perhaps it is the road that transforms what is held intellectually into what is lived in reality that is the hardest road to walk.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack