A Quote by Baruch Spinoza
It is not possible that we should remember that we existed before our body, for our can bear no trace of such existence, neither can eternity be defined in terms of time or have any relation to time. But notwithstanding, we feel and know that we are eternal.
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One can take eternity and time to be predicates of God since, being the Ancient of Days, He is the cause of all time and eternity. Yet He is before time and beyond time and is the source of the variety of time and of the seasons. Or again, He precedes the eternal ages, for He is there before eternity and above eternity, and 'His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom' (Ps. 145:13). Amen.
Sören Kierkegaard has another answer: human existence is possible as existence not in despair, as existence not in tragedy; it is possible as existence in faith... Faith is the belief that in God the impossible is possible, that in Him time and eternity are one, that both life and death are meaningful.
We recognize that our progress as a species does not have to be defined in terms of wealth or material and physical growth any more than our progress as individuals has to be defined in terms of physical growth. Physical growth of the body reaches a limit, but the character and the soul of the individual continues to grow, or at least has a chance to continue, often to our last breath. It is simple minded to define our well being in material terms, when that well-being has an aesthetic dimension, and intellectual dimension, a moral dimension.
What every woman knows is that we are remade each time we make love, each time we give birth; each time we feel the blood making its way through our body into our cupped hands, we remember it is our destiny to make change.
This fear bears no analogy to any fear I knew before. This is the basest of all possible emotions, the feeling that was with us before we existed, before this building existed, before the earth existed. This is the fear that made fish crawl out onto dry land and evolve lungs, the fear that teaches us to run, the fear that makes us bury our dead.
If there is existence, there must be non-existence. And if there was a time when nothing existed, there must have been a time before that - when even nothing did not exist. Suddenly, when nothing came into existence, could one really say whether it belonged to the category of existence or non-existence?
But any Time is with us. And if we take control to shape our attitude and reshape our memories, that time is always now, - our time for the best possible uses of our lives.
Shall not this bygone Eden that we knew In our Eternal Life have shape and hue? For where Time is not shall not all Time be? In that calm breast whereto our souls are cleaving Shall we not find our loved ones beyond grieving About the hearth-stone of Eternity?
Transiency is stamped on all our possessions, occupations, and delights. We have the hunger for eternity in our souls, the thought of eternity in our hearts, the destination for eternity written on our inmost being, and the need to ally ourselves with eternity proclaimed by the most short-lived trifles of time. Either these things will be the blessing or the curse of our lives. Which do yon mean that they shall be for you?
It is very remarkable that while the words Eternal, Eternity, Forever, are constantly in our mouths, and applied without hesitation, we yet experience considerable difficulty in contemplating any definite term which bears a very large proportion to the brief cycles of our petty chronicles. There are many minds that would not for an instant doubt the God of Nature to have existed from all Eternity, and would yet reject as preposterous the idea of going back a million of years in the History of His Works. Yet what is a million, or a million million, of solar revolutions to an Eternity?
At its heart, the quest that trans people are on is to have the same thing that straight — and gay — people have: the ability to wake up in the morning and be ourselves, without permission, without apology. Our lives should not be defined by wigs, or surgery, or which bathroom we use. Our lives should be defined by our identities, and the truth we bear in our hearts.
What we do with Him now, we will be for all eternity. In His eternity He came to die our death and give us His eternity. His eternity requires no sun or moon or seasons or days. His is an eternal day without time. He is the Light. He is the source of all our needs. In Him is no darkness. As we have the light of the sun, we can also have the light of the Son. One provides for the natural, One for the spiritual.
Spend in pure converse our eternal day;
Think each in each, immediately wise;
Learn all we lacked before; hear, know, and say
What this tumultuous body now denies;
And feel, who have laid our groping hands away;
And see, no longer blinded by our eyes.
There is only eternity. That's our real body. The stars are our blanket. Time doesn't even exist, except in our own minds.
Let people who do not know what to do with themselves in this life, but fritter away their time reading magazines and watching television, hope for eternal life... The life I want is a life I could not endure in eternity. It is a life of love and intensity, suffering and creation, that makes life worthwhile and death welcome. There is no other life I should prefer. Neither should I like not to die.
To write honestly and with conviction anything about the migration of birds, one should oneself have migrated. Somehow or other we should dehumanize ourselves, feel the feel of feathers on our body and wind in our wings, and finally know what it is to leave abundance and safety and daylight and yield to a compelling instinct, age-old, seeming at the time quite devoid of reason and object.
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