No temptation can ever be measured by the value of its object.
quote by Sidonie Gabrielle Colette
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Temptation
Ive never been closer
Ive tried to understand
That certain feeling
Carved by anothers hand
But its too late to hesitate
We cant keep on living like this
Leave no track
Dont look back
All I desire
Temptation
Keep climbing higher and higher
Temptation
Adorable creatures
Temptation
With unacceptable features
Temptation
Trouble is coming
Temptation
Its just the high cost of loving
Temptation
You can take it or leave it
Temptation
But youd better believe it
Youve got to make me an offer
That cannot be ignored
So lets head for home now
Everything I have is yours
Step by step and day by day
Every second counts I cant break away
Leave no trace
Hide your face
All I desire
Temptation
Keep climbing higher and higher
Temptation
Adorable creatures
Temptation
With unacceptable features
Temptation
Trouble is coming
Temptation
Its just the high cost of loving
Temptation
You can take it or leave it
Temptation
But youd better believe it
Keep us from temptation
Lead us not into temptation
Trying to find it
Temptation
[...] Read more
song performed by Heaven 17
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Time For Temptation
Time for temptation, what you see is there for you
Time for temptation, no damnation for what you do
(good, good, good, good temptation)
Why you chasing a lost religion of guilty feelings
-that belong in yesterday?
Spy the preachers a politician, he carries the cross like a gun
- whip you into shape
Heres the rub, now, no secret hours locked in the backroom if you
- come together right
Check your vision and push it out there
- you make the question, define what its all about
(chorus)
(oh) oh...
With chains or heaven across your shoulder,
A slave for promotion to the afterlife
The boss gets fat while you just get older, here comes a mission
- set to put you right
Time for temptation, what you see is there for you
Time for temptation, no damnation for what you do - oh
Time for temptation, what you see is there for you
Time for temptation, no damnation for what you do
(no damnation...)
Time for temptation, what you see is there for you
Time for temptation, no damnation for what you do - oh
Time for temptation, what you see is there for you
Time for temptation, no damnation for what you do - oh
Time for temptation, what you see is there for you
(good, good, good, good temptation)
Time for temptation, no damnation for what you do
(good, good, good, good temptation)
Time for temptation, what you see is there for you
(good, good, good, good temptation)
Time for temptation, no damnation for what you do
(good, good, good, good temptation)
Time for temptation
song performed by Duran Duran
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Temptation
Sex
Temptation
Lust
Pop go mama
Everybody on this earth has got a vice
And mine, little darlin, mine is the opposite of ice
Mine is the running hot water of the daughter of morality
In other words, this little prince thinks a lot about u, see?
Baby, baby, baby
Im guilty in the first degree
Temptation
Working my body with a hot flash of animal lust
Temptation
All my fingers in the pool go splash we must
Everybody in this room
Everybody in this room has got an urge
Whats yours, baby?
Mine is temptation, it reigns at a party where lovers splurge
Pop go mama when daddy gets a little 2 much
You know what Im talkin bout?
Purplelectricity whenever our bodies touch
Ooh baby, I love it when our bodies touch
Temptation
Working my body with a hot flash of animal lust
Temptation
All my fingers in the pool go splash we must
Temptation, temptation, temptation
Wait a minute now
Temptation
Working my body with a hot flash of animal lust
Temptation
All my fingers in the pool go splash we must
Temptation
Working my body, working my body, working my body
Temptation
Im not talkin about just ordinary temptation, people. Im talking
About the kind of temptation thatll make u do things.
Oh, oh, temptation.
Oh, darling, I can almost taste the wetness between your...
Temptation, temptation
Im not talking about any ol kind of temptation, people, Im talkin
About, Im talkin about... sexual temptation.
A lover
I need a lover, a lover, I need a...right now.
U, I want u.
I want u in the worst way.
I want u.
Oh, silly man, thats not how it works.
You have 2 want her 4 the right reasons.
I do!
[...] Read more
song performed by Prince
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Object
You know you turn me on
Eyes so white and legs so long
But don't try to talk to me
I won't listen to your lies
You're just an object in my eyes
You're just an object in my eyes
Sophisticated smile
You seduce in such fine style
But don't try to fool me
'cause i can see through your disguise
You're just an object in my eyes
You're just an object in my eyes
But i don't mind
I just don't care
I've got no objection
To you touching me there
Object object
Object object
Object object
Object object
You know just what to do
Lick your lips
And i want you
But don't try to hold me
'cause i don't want any ties
You're just an object in my eyes
You're just an object in my eyes
But i don't mind
I just don't care
I've got no objections
To you touching me there
You're just an object object
Object object
You're just an object
song performed by Cure
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Sex Object
Yes! No!
Yes! No!
I don't want to be your sex object
Show some feeling and respect
I don't want to be your sex object
I've had enough and that's a fact
Yes! No!
Yes! No!
I don't want to be your sex object
You play your tricks they're just perfect
I don't want to be your sex object
You turn me on then you forget
No! Why? [sex]
No! Why? [sex]
Maybe, Perhaps, Yes!
Maybe, Perhaps, Yes!
Yes! No!
Yes! No!
I don't want to be your sex object
You play your tricks they're just perfect
I don't want to be your sex object
I've had enough and that's a fact
[Spanish: No! Yes! Maybe Perhaps Yes]
No... si, si quieres
No... si, si quieres
Por que? No. Quizas.
Por que? No. A lo mejor.
Sex object
Sex object
No... si, si quieres
No... si, si quieres
Por que? No. Quizas.
Por que? No. A lo mejor.
No! Why? [sex]
No! Why? [sex]
Maybe, Perhaps, Yes!
Maybe, Perhaps, Yes!
[German?]
Sex object
Sex object
No! Why? [sex]
No! Why? [sex]
Maybe, Perhaps, Yes!
Maybe, Perhaps, Yes!
Sex object
Sex object
song performed by Kraftwerk
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Here Comes Temptation
(written by kostas)
When I see you Im drawn to you
Theres a certain look in yours eyes
Its hard to say no to this feeling
No matter how hard I try
Catch me if Im falling to you
Catch me if Im breaking away
Oh Im looking at paradise
Oh Im looking at paradise
Here comes temptation
Tempting me with you
Here comes temptation
Tempted to get close to you
Here comes temptation
Tempting me with you
If you were to know my secret
I wouldnt feel so shy
Sometimes I think you can see it
Its something I cant hide
All youd have to do is touch me
And all my resistance would melt away
Oh Im looking at paradise
Oh Im looking at paradise
Here comes temptation
Tempting me with you
Here comes temptation
Tempted to get close to you
Here comes temptation
Tempting me with you
Ill have to wait until my chance comes by
I know that you will be mine
Here comes temptation
Tempting me with you
Here comes temptation
Tempted to get close to you
Here comes temptation
Tempting me with you
song performed by Trisha Yearwood
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Temptation
My temptation is coming from my heart
That skips a bit just like a game
Everytime you call my name, call my name
Its only you
I want you too
Its only you
I want you too
Come
Do you see what I mean talking bout fever
The fire burns inside of me
And you can quench me easily, so....
Let me hold you and squeeze you like a fool
Because I'm crazy about you
When you sit down and cross your legs, cross your legs
Temptation
Temptation...
Come
Youre sweeping away without a reason
Unless someone else is loving you
Id want to have you by my side, by my side
Temptation
Temptation...
Its only you...
I want you too!
Its only you .
I want you too!
My temptation is coming from my heart
That skips a bit just like a game
Everytime you call my name, call my name
Temptation
Temptation...
song performed by Cure
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Spotless object
Spotless object
I saw spotless emerging object
Very much silvery and natural act
Slowly rising from the bottom of the sky
With full size and feeling very shy
Beauty can seldom be narrated
Now with any of the object equated
Such a beautiful scene with no blockade
Whole of sky illuminated with no sign of shade
I saw spotless character
As if highly integrated as lady actor
What a beautiful show altogether!
In fine atmosphere with cool weather
Not a single person can resist temptation
Few words in praise with so much elation
How come an object rise with so much of elegance?
Lovers across the world give so much of importance
Stars have no place to twinkle
Only moon has space and capable
Complete sway over millions of hearts
An object seen as unparallel natural art
Can you imagine few spots on the face?
As if cried for few minutes in waiting race
The smile was clearly reflected as sign of happiness
That is why there was brightness all over on the face
The sadness and pain was left all behind
We have no means to point out or find
The wonders behind such a artful show
Where you find all inspirations with glow
Such a humble and all round show in universe
Where all love hungry people see and converse
Express their desire with full of promises
Not to part with any of the reasons with slight miss
I shall depict it as heavenly creature
Where only peace and love resides for future
No hatred but enough of space for future generations
With a sole aim to rise again for maintaining relation
We may miss such a scene for times to come
If not adhere to in our life and welcome
What we need to see at this object and learn!
[...] Read more
poem by Hasmukh Amathalal
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The Dam that Keele Built
This is the dam that Keele built.
This is the stream that brought the water to fill the dam that Keele built;
This is the Water and Sewer Brigade,
That measured the stream that brought the water to fill the dam that Keele built;
This is the Engineer by Trade --
Head of the Water and Sewer Brigade,
Who measured the stream that brought the water to fill the dam that Keele built;
These are the Calculations made
By the Eminent Engineer by Trade,
Head of the Water and Sewer Brigade,
Who measured the stream that brought the water to fill the dam that Keele built;
This is the scornful Mr Wade,
Who sneered at the Calculations made
By the Eminent Engineer by Trade,
Head of the Water and Sewer Brigade,
Who measured the stream that brought the water to fill the dam that Keele built;
This is the Minister quite dismayed
At the sight of the Scornful Mr Wade,
Who sneered at the Calculations made
By the Eminent Engineer by Trade,
Head of the Water and Sewer Brigade,
Who measured the stream that brought the water to fill the dam that Keele built;
This is the Sydneyite afraid
That a serious blunder will be made,
Because of the Minister, quite dismayed
At the sight of the Scornful Mr Wade,
Who sneered at the Calculations made
By the Eminent Engineer by Trade,
Head of the Water and Sewer Brigade,
Who measured the stream that brought the water to fill the dam that Keele built.
poem by Andrew Barton Paterson
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Into Temptation
You opened up your door
I couldnt believe my luck
You in your new blue dress
Taking away my breath
The cradle is soft and warm
Couldnt do me no harm
Youre showing me how to give
Into temptation
Knowing full well the earth will rebel
Into temptation
In a muddle of nervous words
Could never amount to betrayal
The sentence is all my own
The price is to watch it fail
As I turn to go
You looked at me for half a second
An open invitation for me to go
Into temptation
Knowing full well the earth will rebel
Into temptation
Safe in the wide open arms of hell
We can go sailing in
Climb down
Lose yourself when you linger long
Into temptation
Right where you belong
The guilty get no sleep
In the last slow hours of morning
Experience is cheap
I shouldve listened to the warning
But the cradle is soft and warm
Into temptation
Knowing full well the earth will rebel
Into your wide open arms
No way to break the spell
Dont tell
song performed by Crowded House
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Temptation
Temptation:
You never knew when it's coming;
it shows up.
It needs no invitation;
it comes at odd times.
Work is slow...
Down time.
There you are reflecting,
trying to ease your mind
and bim!
Temptation!
Where did it come from?
Who asked for it?
Did you hear her coming?
Did you hear her belly aching?
Yes you did!
Did you hear my response?
No you did not!
Why? Because I did not.
Temptation!
If I answered...
One thing leads to another.
Around here
people call the police
for a whisper.
Next thing you know,
you are cuffed and taken down.
Temptation!
Men, listen up
be prepared for temptation.
It's omnipresent...
If you are at church
it is there.
If you are at work
it is there.
A spoiler of a good time.
An enemy of rest,
your spouse's friend.
Careful, here it comes.
Temptation!
Howch!
poem by Buxton Shippy
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Temptation
Temptation comes in many forms they're mostly human, though...
At first temptation gently warms, then boils to overflow!
As humans we're weak as water! What strength can we provide?
When we don't do what we oughta, billions of sighs are sighed!
Man's conscience warns and gives us pause, Reflect, repent, resist!
Yet even if we know God's laws, temptation will persist!
We try at first to turn away...We fight against delight!
Yet few are they who strive all day and fight with all their might!
The rightousness of morning fades...It melts beneath the sun...
Temptation builds and thus pervades within us, every one!
We swelter in the afternoon...then cool when evening's here...
Then comes the madness of the moon when lunatics show fear!
In darkness now, we sin again, regardless of the cost!
When Samson sinned he joined weak men and more than eyes were lost!
Temptation whispers then it shouts! It beckons and beguiles!
It drips soft honey on your doubts and tricks you with its smiles...
Temptation cares not for your soul...Indeed it never will!
Yet God forgives and makes you whole through Christ on Calvary's Hill!
poem by Denis Martindale
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The Interpretation of Nature and
I.
MAN, being the servant and interpreter of Nature, can do and understand so much and so much only as he has observed in fact or in thought of the course of nature: beyond this he neither knows anything nor can do anything.
II.
Neither the naked hand nor the understanding left to itself can effect much. It is by instruments and helps that the work is done, which are as much wanted for the understanding as for the hand. And as the instruments of the hand either give motion or guide it, so the instruments of the mind supply either suggestions for the understanding or cautions.
III.
Human knowledge and human power meet in one; for where the cause is not known the effect cannot be produced. Nature to be commanded must be obeyed; and that which in contemplation is as the cause is in operation as the rule.
IV.
Towards the effecting of works, all that man can do is to put together or put asunder natural bodies. The rest is done by nature working within.
V.
The study of nature with a view to works is engaged in by the mechanic, the mathematician, the physician, the alchemist, and the magician; but by all (as things now are) with slight endeavour and scanty success.
VI.
It would be an unsound fancy and self-contradictory to expect that things which have never yet been done can be done except by means which have never yet been tried.
VII.
The productions of the mind and hand seem very numerous in books and manufactures. But all this variety lies in an exquisite subtlety and derivations from a few things already known; not in the number of axioms.
VIII.
Moreover the works already known are due to chance and experiment rather than to sciences; for the sciences we now possess are merely systems for the nice ordering and setting forth of things already invented; not methods of invention or directions for new works.
IX.
The cause and root of nearly all evils in the sciences is this -- that while we falsely admire and extol the powers of the human mind we neglect to seek for its true helps.
X.
The subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of the senses and understanding; so that all those specious meditations, speculations, and glosses in which men indulge are quite from the purpose, only there is no one by to observe it.
XI.
As the sciences which we now have do not help us in finding out new works, so neither does the logic which we now have help us in finding out new sciences.
XII.
The logic now in use serves rather to fix and give stability to the errors which have their foundation in commonly received notions than to help the search after truth. So it does more harm than good.
XIII.
[...] Read more
poem by Sir Francis Bacon
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Berenice by edgar allan poe
MISERY is manifold. The wretchedness of earth is multiform. Overreaching the wide horizon as the rainbow, its hues are as various as the hues of that arch, -as distinct too, yet as intimately blended. Overreaching the wide horizon as the rainbow! How is it that from beauty I have derived a type of unloveliness? -from the covenant of peace a simile of sorrow? But as, in ethics, evil is a consequence of good, so, in fact, out of joy is sorrow born. Either the memory of past bliss is the anguish of to-day, or the agonies which are have their origin in the ecstasies which might have been.
My baptismal name is Egaeus; that of my family I will not mention. Yet there are no towers in the land more time-honored than my gloomy, gray, hereditary halls. Our line has been called a race of visionaries; and in many striking particulars -in the character of the family mansion -in the frescos of the chief saloon -in the tapestries of the dormitories -in the chiselling of some buttresses in the armory -but more especially in the gallery of antique paintings -in the fashion of the library chamber -and, lastly, in the very peculiar nature of the library's contents, there is more than sufficient evidence to warrant the belief.
The recollections of my earliest years are connected with that chamber, and with its volumes -of which latter I will say no more. Here died my mother. Herein was I born. But it is mere idleness to say that I had not lived before -that the soul has no previous existence. You deny it? -let us not argue the matter. Convinced myself, I seek not to convince. There is, however, a remembrance of aerial forms -of spiritual and meaning eyes -of sounds, musical yet sad -a remembrance which will not be excluded; a memory like a shadow, vague, variable, indefinite, unsteady; and like a shadow, too, in the impossibility of my getting rid of it while the sunlight of my reason shall exist.
In that chamber was I born. Thus awaking from the long night of what seemed, but was not, nonentity, at once into the very regions of fairy-land -into a palace of imagination -into the wild dominions of monastic thought and erudition -it is not singular that I gazed around me with a startled and ardent eye -that I loitered away my boyhood in books, and dissipated my youth in reverie; but it is singular that as years rolled away, and the noon of manhood found me still in the mansion of my fathers -it is wonderful what stagnation there fell upon the springs of my life -wonderful how total an inversion took place in the character of my commonest thought. The realities of the world affected me as visions, and as visions only, while the wild ideas of the land of dreams became, in turn, -not the material of my every-day existence-but in very deed that existence utterly and solely in itself.
Berenice and I were cousins, and we grew up together in my paternal halls. Yet differently we grew -I ill of health, and buried in gloom -she agile, graceful, and overflowing with energy; hers the ramble on the hill-side -mine the studies of the cloister -I living within my own heart, and addicted body and soul to the most intense and painful meditation -she roaming carelessly through life with no thought of the shadows in her path, or the silent flight of the raven-winged hours. Berenice! -I call upon her name -Berenice! -and from the gray ruins of memory a thousand tumultuous recollections are startled at the sound! Ah! vividly is her image before me now, as in the early days of her light-heartedness and joy! Oh! gorgeous yet fantastic beauty! Oh! sylph amid the shrubberies of Arnheim! -Oh! Naiad among its fountains! -and then -then all is mystery and terror, and a tale which should not be told. Disease -a fatal disease -fell like the simoom upon her frame, and, even while I gazed upon her, the spirit of change swept, over her, pervading her mind, her habits, and her character, and, in a manner the most subtle and terrible, disturbing even the identity of her person! Alas! the destroyer came and went, and the victim -where was she, I knew her not -or knew her no longer as Berenice.
Among the numerous train of maladies superinduced by that fatal and primary one which effected a revolution of so horrible a kind in the moral and physical being of my cousin, may be mentioned as the most distressing and obstinate in its nature, a species of epilepsy not unfrequently terminating in trance itself -trance very nearly resembling positive dissolution, and from which her manner of recovery was in most instances, startlingly abrupt. In the mean time my own disease -for I have been told that I should call it by no other appelation -my own disease, then, grew rapidly upon me, and assumed finally a monomaniac character of a novel and extraordinary form -hourly and momently gaining vigor -and at length obtaining over me the most incomprehensible ascendancy. This monomania, if I must so term it, consisted in a morbid irritability of those properties of the mind in metaphysical science termed the attentive. It is more than probable that I am not understood; but I fear, indeed, that it is in no manner possible to convey to the mind of the merely general reader, an adequate idea of that nervous intensity of interest with which, in my case, the powers of meditation (not to speak technically) busied and buried themselves, in the contemplation of even the most ordinary objects of the universe.
To muse for long unwearied hours with my attention riveted to some frivolous device on the margin, or in the topography of a book; to become absorbed for the better part of a summer's day, in a quaint shadow falling aslant upon the tapestry, or upon the door; to lose myself for an entire night in watching the steady flame of a lamp, or the embers of a fire; to dream away whole days over the perfume of a flower; to repeat monotonously some common word, until the sound, by dint of frequent repetition, ceased to convey any idea whatever to the mind; to lose all sense of motion or physical existence, by means of absolute bodily quiescence long and obstinately persevered in; -such were a few of the most common and least pernicious vagaries induced by a condition of the mental faculties, not, indeed, altogether unparalleled, but certainly bidding defiance to anything like analysis or explanation.
Yet let me not be misapprehended. -The undue, earnest, and morbid attention thus excited by objects in their own nature frivolous, must not be confounded in character with that ruminating propensity common to all mankind, and more especially indulged in by persons of ardent imagination. It was not even, as might be at first supposed, an extreme condition or exaggeration of such propensity, but primarily and essentially distinct and different. In the one instance, the dreamer, or enthusiast, being interested by an object usually not frivolous, imperceptibly loses sight of this object in a wilderness of deductions and suggestions issuing therefrom, until, at the conclusion of a day dream often replete with luxury, he finds the incitamentum or first cause of his musings entirely vanished and forgotten. In my case the primary object was invariably frivolous, although assuming, through the medium of my distempered vision, a refracted and unreal importance. Few deductions, if any, were made; and those few pertinaciously returning in upon the original object as a centre. The meditations were never pleasurable; and, at the termination of the reverie, the first cause, so far from being out of sight, had attained that supernaturally exaggerated interest which was the prevailing feature of the disease. In a word, the powers of mind more particularly exercised were, with me, as I have said before, the attentive, and are, with the day-dreamer, the speculative.
My books, at this epoch, if they did not actually serve to irritate the disorder, partook, it will be perceived, largely, in their imaginative and inconsequential nature, of the characteristic qualities of the disorder itself. I well remember, among others, the treatise of the noble Italian Coelius Secundus Curio 'de Amplitudine Beati Regni dei'; St. Austin's great work, the 'City of God'; and Tertullian 'de Carne Christi, ' in which the paradoxical sentence 'Mortuus est Dei filius; credible est quia ineptum est: et sepultus resurrexit; certum est quia impossibile est' occupied my undivided time, for many weeks of laborious and fruitless investigation.
Thus it will appear that, shaken from its balance only by trivial things, my reason bore resemblance to that ocean-crag spoken of by Ptolemy Hephestion, which steadily resisting the attacks of human violence, and the fiercer fury of the waters and the winds, trembled only to the touch of the flower called Asphodel. And although, to a careless thinker, it might appear a matter beyond doubt, that the alteration produced by her unhappy malady, in the moral condition of Berenice, would afford me many objects for the exercise of that intense and abnormal meditation whose nature I have been at some trouble in explaining, yet such was not in any degree the case. In the lucid intervals of my infirmity, her calamity, indeed, gave me pain, and, taking deeply to heart that total wreck of her fair and gentle life, I did not fall to ponder frequently and bitterly upon the wonder-working means by which so strange a revolution had been so suddenly brought to pass. But these reflections partook not of the idiosyncrasy of my disease, and were such as would have occurred, under similar circumstances, to the ordinary mass of mankind. True to its own character, my disorder revelled in the less important but more startling changes wrought in the physical frame of Berenice -in the singular and most appalling distortion of her personal identity.
During the brightest days of her unparalleled beauty, most surely I had never loved her. In the strange anomaly of my existence, feelings with me, had never been of the heart, and my passions always were of the mind. Through the gray of the early morning -among the trellised shadows of the forest at noonday -and in the silence of my library at night, she had flitted by my eyes, and I had seen her -not as the living and breathing Berenice, but as the Berenice of a dream -not as a being of the earth, earthy, but as the abstraction of such a being-not as a thing to admire, but to analyze -not as an object of love, but as the theme of the most abstruse although desultory speculation. And now -now I shuddered in her presence, and grew pale at her approach; yet bitterly lamenting her fallen and desolate condition, I called to mind that she had loved me long, and, in an evil moment, I spoke to her of marriage.
And at length the period of our nuptials was approaching, when, upon an afternoon in the winter of the year, -one of those unseasonably warm, calm, and misty days which are the nurse of the beautiful Halcyon*, -I sat, (and sat, as I thought, alone,) in the inner apartment of the library. But uplifting my eyes I saw that Berenice stood before me.
*For as Jove, during the winter season, gives twice seven days of warmth, men have called this clement and temperate time the nurse of the beautiful Halcyon -Simonides.
Was it my own excited imagination -or the misty influence of the atmosphere -or the uncertain twilight of the chamber -or the gray draperies which fell around her figure -that caused in it so vacillating and indistinct an outline? I could not tell. She spoke no word, I -not for worlds could I have uttered a syllable. An icy chill ran through my frame; a sense of insufferable anxiety oppressed me; a consuming curiosity pervaded my soul; and sinking back upon the chair, I remained for some time breathless and motionless, with my eyes riveted upon her person. Alas! its emaciation was excessive, and not one vestige of the former being, lurked in any single line of the contour. My burning glances at length fell upon the face.
The forehead was high, and very pale, and singularly placid; and the once jetty hair fell partially over it, and overshadowed the hollow temples with innumerable ringlets now of a vivid yellow, and Jarring discordantly, in their fantastic character, with the reigning melancholy of the countenance. The eyes were lifeless, and lustreless, and seemingly pupil-less, and I shrank involuntarily from their glassy stare to the contemplation of the thin and shrunken lips. They parted; and in a smile of peculiar meaning, the teeth of the changed Berenice disclosed themselves slowly to my view. Would to God that I had never beheld them, or that, having done so, I had died!
The shutting of a door disturbed me, and, looking up, I found that my cousin had departed from the chamber. But from the disordered chamber of my brain, had not, alas! departed, and would not be driven away, the white and ghastly spectrum of the teeth. Not a speck on their surface -not a shade on their enamel -not an indenture in their edges -but what that period of her smile had sufficed to brand in upon my memory. I saw them now even more unequivocally than I beheld them then. The teeth! -the teeth! -they were here, and there, and everywhere, and visibly and palpably before me; long, narrow, and excessively white, with the pale lips writhing about them, as in the very moment of their first terrible development. Then came the full fury of my monomania, and I struggled in vain against its strange and irresistible influence. In the multiplied objects of the external world I had no thoughts but for the teeth. For these I longed with a phrenzied desire. All other matters and all different interests became absorbed in their single contemplation. They -they alone were present to the mental eye, and they, in their sole individuality, became the essence of my mental life. I held them in every light. I turned them in every attitude. I surveyed their characteristics. I dwelt upon their peculiarities. I pondered upon their conformation. I mused upon the alteration in their nature. I shuddered as I assigned to them in imagination a sensitive and sentient power, and even when unassisted by the lips, a capability of moral expression. Of Mad'selle Salle it has been well said, 'que tous ses pas etaient des sentiments, ' and of Berenice I more seriously believed que toutes ses dents etaient des idees. Des idees! -ah here was the idiotic thought that destroyed me! Des idees! -ah therefore it was that I coveted them so madly! I felt that their possession could alone ever restore me to peace, in giving me back to reason.
And the evening closed in upon me thus-and then the darkness came, and tarried, and went -and the day again dawned -and the mists of a second night were now gathering around -and still I sat motionless in that solitary room; and still I sat buried in meditation, and still the phantasma of the teeth maintained its terrible ascendancy as, with the most vivid hideous distinctness, it floated about amid the changing lights and shadows of the chamber. At length there broke in upon my dreams a cry as of horror and dismay; and thereunto, after a pause, succeeded the sound of troubled voices, intermingled with many low moanings of sorrow, or of pain. I arose from my seat and, throwing open one of the doors of the library, saw standing out in the antechamber a servant maiden, all in tears, who told me that Berenice was -no more. She had been seized with epilepsy in the early morning, and now, at the closing in of the night, the grave was ready for its tenant, and all the preparations for the burial were completed.
I found myself sitting in the library, and again sitting there alone. It seemed that I had newly awakened from a confused and exciting dream. I knew that it was now midnight, and I was well aware that since the setting of the sun Berenice had been interred. But of that dreary period which intervened I had no positive -at least no definite comprehension. Yet its memory was replete with horror -horror more horrible from being vague, and terror more terrible from ambiguity. It was a fearful page in the record my existence, written all over with dim, and hideous, and unintelligible recollections. I strived to decypher them, but in vain; while ever and anon, like the spirit of a departed sound, the shrill and piercing shriek of a female voice seemed to be ringing in my ears. I had done a deed -what was it? I asked myself the question aloud, and the whispering echoes of the chamber answered me, 'what was it? '
On the table beside me burned a lamp, and near it lay a little box. It was of no remarkable character, and I had seen it frequently before, for it was the property of the family physician; but how came it there, upon my table, and why did I shudder in regarding it? These things were in no manner to be accounted for, and my eyes at length dropped to the open pages of a book, and to a sentence underscored therein. The words were the singular but simple ones of the poet Ebn Zaiat, 'Dicebant mihi sodales si sepulchrum amicae visitarem, curas meas aliquantulum fore levatas.' Why then, as I perused them, did the hairs of my head erect themselves on end, and the blood of my body become congealed within my veins?
There came a light tap at the library door, and pale as the tenant of a tomb, a menial entered upon tiptoe. His looks were wild with terror, and he spoke to me in a voice tremulous, husky, and very low. What said he? -some broken sentences I heard. He told of a wild cry disturbing the silence of the night -of the gathering together of the household-of a search in the direction of the sound; -and then his tones grew thrillingly distinct as he whispered me of a violated grave -of a disfigured body enshrouded, yet still breathing, still palpitating, still alive!
He pointed to garments; -they were muddy and clotted with gore. I spoke not, and he took me gently by the hand; -it was indented with the impress of human nails. He directed my attention to some object against the wall; -I looked at it for some minutes; -it was a spade. With a shriek I bounded to the table, and grasped the box that lay upon it. But I could not force it open; and in my tremor it slipped from my hands, and fell heavily, and burst into pieces; and from it, with a rattling sound, there rolled out some instruments of dental surgery, intermingled with thirty-two small, white and ivory-looking substances that were scattered to and fro about the floor.
poem by Erie Morganmaples
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Paradise Regained: The Fourth Book
Perplexed and troubled at his bad success
The Tempter stood, nor had what to reply,
Discovered in his fraud, thrown from his hope
So oft, and the persuasive rhetoric
That sleeked his tongue, and won so much on Eve,
So little here, nay lost. But Eve was Eve;
This far his over-match, who, self-deceived
And rash, beforehand had no better weighed
The strength he was to cope with, or his own.
But—as a man who had been matchless held
In cunning, over-reached where least he thought,
To salve his credit, and for very spite,
Still will be tempting him who foils him still,
And never cease, though to his shame the more;
Or as a swarm of flies in vintage-time,
About the wine-press where sweet must is poured,
Beat off, returns as oft with humming sound;
Or surging waves against a solid rock,
Though all to shivers dashed, the assault renew,
(Vain battery!) and in froth or bubbles end—
So Satan, whom repulse upon repulse
Met ever, and to shameful silence brought,
Yet gives not o'er, though desperate of success,
And his vain importunity pursues.
He brought our Saviour to the western side
Of that high mountain, whence he might behold
Another plain, long, but in breadth not wide,
Washed by the southern sea, and on the north
To equal length backed with a ridge of hills
That screened the fruits of the earth and seats of men
From cold Septentrion blasts; thence in the midst
Divided by a river, off whose banks
On each side an Imperial City stood,
With towers and temples proudly elevate
On seven small hills, with palaces adorned,
Porches and theatres, baths, aqueducts,
Statues and trophies, and triumphal arcs,
Gardens and groves, presented to his eyes
Above the highth of mountains interposed—
By what strange parallax, or optic skill
Of vision, multiplied through air, or glass
Of telescope, were curious to enquire.
And now the Tempter thus his silence broke:—
"The city which thou seest no other deem
Than great and glorious Rome, Queen of the Earth
So far renowned, and with the spoils enriched
Of nations. There the Capitol thou seest,
Above the rest lifting his stately head
On the Tarpeian rock, her citadel
Impregnable; and there Mount Palatine,
[...] Read more
poem by John Milton
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Temptation Is A Gun
By gregg allman, cain, schon
Copyright 1994 sony music entertainment, inc.
Transcribed by ed luskey
Like the hopeful dreams of many, he had everything and more,
A lovely wife and children, all the things worth fighting for.
He knows, there was still, still, something missing in his life.
Though he promised to be faithful, he was good at telling lies.
He had an eye for young girls, he would steal some on the side.
Oh no, he just could not be satisfied.
Its a game of all or nothing, there is nowhere safe to run,
Someone might just pull the trigger, cause temptation is a gun.
He met her at a night club, on the other side of town.
Somehow he could not resist her, shes the best hed ever found.
She knows, she found her ticket to the other side.
Its a game of all or nothing, there is nowhere safe to run,
Someone might just pull the trigger, cause temptation is a gun.
His foolish ways seem harmless, but his world was so divine,
Cause at home they know his secrets, theyve heard all his alibis.
As he tries to face his feelings, he cant justify his crimes,
Now comes the final ending, of the dreams he once held sacred deep inside.
He can kiss it all good-bye.
Its a game of all or nothing, there is nowhere safe to run,
Someone might just pull the trigger, cause temptation is a gun.
Oh, ummmm, ya baby, ahhhh temptation is a gun.
Temptation is a gun, all or nothing, all or nothing.
song performed by Allman Brothers Band
Added by Lucian Velea
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Hold On
I hear the phone, it rings so violently
Cant leave my room, cant breathe since she left me
I will admit, I hate those things I said
Girls always cry, guys will never admit they did
Hold on, hold on
Hold on, hold on
Dont tell me that its over
Im not used to this temptation
And when you come back running
Theres no use for explanation
I think things are too hard for
Even with my expert knowledge
Most girls get them in trouble
Because they are rarely honest
Whats with the jokes, all the routines they play
Screw with my head, now I cave in till they their way
Guys like to run, chicks like to yell, you see
Guys hate to fight, girls think its therapy
Hold on, hold on
Hold on, hold on
Dont tell me that its over
Im not used to this temptation
And when you come back running
Theres no use for explanation
I think things are too hard for
Even with my expert knowledge
Most girls get them in trouble
Because they are rarely honest
Hold on, hold on
Hold on, hold on
Dont tell me that its over
Im not used to this temptation
And when you come back running
Theres no use for explanation
I think things are too hard for
Even with my expert knowledge
Most girls get them in trouble
Because they are rarely honest
Dont tell me that its over
Im not used to this temptation
And when you come back running
Theres no use for explanation
I think things are too hard for
Even with my expert knowledge
Most girls get them in trouble
Because they are rarely honest
Dont tell me that its over
Im not used to this temptation
song performed by Blink 182
Added by Lucian Velea
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A Temptation For Us All
I reached for you without any hesitation and I must reminisce.
You tempted me with your promise of sweet unadulterated bliss.
This temptation sometimes can not be controlled, almost everyone can relate.
This temptation I write of can strike most of us from nine to ninety, so do not hate.
This temptation I write about is the magical food we call chocolate, and it's a great sensation.
Chocolate comes in an array of sizes, colors and flavors, to my great frustration.
There is milk, Swiss, dark, white, and a vast array of other flavors of chocolate for us all to try.
On this temptation I can not lie, but if I don't get any chocolate soon I feel like I might just die.
There is even chocolate covered bacon to my fascination.
Oh chocolate, you lure me with the greatest temptation.
poem by Nichole Kaci McKnight
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The Parish Register - Part II: Marriages
DISPOSED to wed, e'en while you hasten, stay;
There's great advantage in a small delay:
Thus Ovid sang, and much the wise approve
This prudent maxim of the priest of Love;
If poor, delay for future want prepares,
And eases humble life of half its cares;
If rich, delay shall brace the thoughtful mind,
T'endure the ills that e'en the happiest find:
Delay shall knowledge yield on either part,
And show the value of the vanquish'd heart;
The humours, passions, merits, failings prove,
And gently raise the veil that's worn by Love;
Love, that impatient guide!--too proud to think
Of vulgar wants, of clothing, meat, and drink,
Urges our amorous swains their joys to seize,
And then, at rags and hunger frighten'd, flees:
Yet not too long in cold debate remain;
Till age refrain not--but if old, refrain.
By no such rule would Gaffer Kirk be tried;
First in the year he led a blooming bride,
And stood a wither'd elder at her side.
Oh! Nathan! Nathan! at thy years trepann'd,
To take a wanton harlot by the hand!
Thou, who wert used so tartly to express
Thy sense of matrimonial happiness,
Till every youth, whose banns at church were read,
Strove not to meet, or meeting, hung his head;
And every lass forebore at thee to look,
A sly old fish, too cunning for the hook;
And now at sixty, that pert dame to see,
Of all thy savings mistress, and of thee;
Now will the lads, rememb'ring insults past,
Cry, 'What, the wise one in the trap at last!'
Fie! Nathan! fie! to let an artful jade
The close recesses of thine heart invade;
What grievous pangs! what suffering she'll impart!
And fill with anguish that rebellious heart;
For thou wilt strive incessantly, in vain,
By threatening speech thy freedom to regain:
But she for conquest married, nor will prove
A dupe to thee, thine anger or thy love;
Clamorous her tongue will be: --of either sex,
She'll gather friends around thee and perplex
Thy doubtful soul;--thy money she will waste
In the vain ramblings of a vulgar taste;
And will be happy to exert her power,
In every eye, in thine, at every hour.
Then wilt thou bluster--'No! I will not rest,
And see consumed each shilling of my chest:'
Thou wilt be valiant--'When thy cousins call,
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poem by George Crabbe
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Paradise Regained
THE FIRST BOOK
I, WHO erewhile the happy Garden sung
By one man's disobedience lost, now sing
Recovered Paradise to all mankind,
By one man's firm obedience fully tried
Through all temptation, and the Tempter foiled
In all his wiles, defeated and repulsed,
And Eden raised in the waste Wilderness.
Thou Spirit, who led'st this glorious Eremite
Into the desert, his victorious field
Against the spiritual foe, and brought'st him thence 10
By proof the undoubted Son of God, inspire,
As thou art wont, my prompted song, else mute,
And bear through highth or depth of Nature's bounds,
With prosperous wing full summed, to tell of deeds
Above heroic, though in secret done,
And unrecorded left through many an age:
Worthy to have not remained so long unsung.
Now had the great Proclaimer, with a voice
More awful than the sound of trumpet, cried
Repentance, and Heaven's kingdom nigh at hand 20
To all baptized. To his great baptism flocked
With awe the regions round, and with them came
From Nazareth the son of Joseph deemed
To the flood Jordan--came as then obscure,
Unmarked, unknown. But him the Baptist soon
Descried, divinely warned, and witness bore
As to his worthier, and would have resigned
To him his heavenly office. Nor was long
His witness unconfirmed: on him baptized
Heaven opened, and in likeness of a Dove 30
The Spirit descended, while the Father's voice
From Heaven pronounced him his beloved Son.
That heard the Adversary, who, roving still
About the world, at that assembly famed
Would not be last, and, with the voice divine
Nigh thunder-struck, the exalted man to whom
Such high attest was given a while surveyed
With wonder; then, with envy fraught and rage,
Flies to his place, nor rests, but in mid air
To council summons all his mighty Peers, 40
Within thick clouds and dark tenfold involved,
A gloomy consistory; and them amidst,
With looks aghast and sad, he thus bespake:--
"O ancient Powers of Air and this wide World
(For much more willingly I mention Air,
This our old conquest, than remember Hell,
Our hated habitation), well ye know
How many ages, as the years of men,
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poem by John Milton
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