He Doesn’t LIKE You.

Dr. Dysart! There's a terrible scene with the Strang boy in the Violence Room. 

His Mother brought him chocolates. 

He threw them at her, hard! 

Manchester Black’s Mother :

Don't you dare! Don't you dare. 

Don't you look at me like that. 

I'm Not A Doctor who'll take anything. 

Don't you give me that stare, Young Man. 

Mrs. Strang. 

I know your stares, they don't work on me... 

Leave here at once! 

What did you say? 

I tell you to leave here at once. 

Goodbye, Alan. 

Wait for me. 

I must ask you never to come here again. 

You think I want to? Do you think I want to? 

What on earth has got into you? 

Into ME? 

Can't you see the boy's highly distressed? 

He's at the most delicate stage of treatment. 

He's totally exposed, ashamed, everything you can imagine. 

And me? What about me? What do you think I am? 

I'm a parent. Of course, that doesn't count. 

Isn't it a dirty word in here, "parent"? 

You know that's not true.

I know it, alright. I've heard it all my life -- It's our fault. 

Whatever happens, WE did it. 

You say to us, 

"Who forbids Television?" 

"Who does what behind whose back?" As if we're criminals. 

Let me tell you something. We're NOT criminals. 

We've done nothing wrong. We loved Alan. 

We gave him the best love we COULD. 

Poor Frank digs into the boy too much, 

but nothing in excess. He's not a bully. 

No, Doctor. 

Whatever has happened... 

has happened because of Alan. 

If you added up everything we did to him, 

from his first day on earth to this... 

you wouldn't find out why 

he did this terrible thing. 

Do you understand what I'm saying? 

I want you to understand... 

because I lie awake, thinking it out. 

And I want you to know 

I deny it absolutely, 

what he's doing now. 

Staring at me, attacking me 

for what he's done... 

for what he is. 

Mrs. Strang! 

You have your words, 

and I have mine. 

But if you knew God, Doctor, 

you would know about The Devil. 

The Devil isn't made by 

What Mummy Says, 

or What Daddy Says. 

The Devil is there. 

It's an old-fashioned word, 

but a True thing. 

I'll go. 

What I did just now was inexcusable. 

I only know that... 

He was My Little Alan... 

and then The Devil came. 

*****

I thought you liked your mother. 

She doesn't know anything. 

I haven't told her what you told me. 

It was lies, anyway. 

What was? 

You and your pencil. 

Just a con-trick, that's all. 

Made me say a lot of lies.

Like what?

All of it. Everything I said. 

A lot of lies. 

I see.

Ought to be locked up. 

Bloody Tricks. 

Thought you liked tricks. 

There'll be the drug next.

What drug?

I've heard. I'm not ignorant. 

I know what you get up to in here... 

shove needles in people and pump them full of truth drugs... 

so they can't help Saying Things. 

That's next, isn't it? 

Do you know why you're here? 

So you can give me Truth Drugs? 

He actually believes they exist. 

Hesther :

Truth Drugs? 

Yes. 

Hesther :

And don't they? 

Of course not. 

The important thing is that 

he wants A Way to Speak... 

Finally tell me what happened in those stables. 

Tape is too isolated... and hypnosis, he pretends, is A Trick, so he can deny it later. 

I'm tempted to 

Play A Real Trick on him. 

Hesther :

Like what? 

Give him an aspirin. 

Tell him it's the strongest truth drug in the world. 

Hesther :

He'd just deny everything again afterwards. 

The same thing all over. 

Superman :

No, because I'd tell him The Truth afterwards... 

that it was simply an aspirin. 

He'll Believe Me. 

Underneath all that glowering, 

The Boy Trusts Me. 

You realize that? I'm sure he does. 

Poor, bloody fool. 

Hesther :

Please, Martin, dear, 

don't start that again. 

Superman :

Can you do anything worse to somebody than to…

Take away Their Worship? 

Hesther :

Worship? 

Superman :

Yes, that word again. 

Hesther :

Isn't that a little extreme? 

Superman :

Extremity — is The Point. 

Hesther :

Worship isn't destructive, Martin —

I know that. 

Superman :

I don't —I only know 

it's the core of his life. 

What else has he got? 

Think about it. 

He can hardly read. 

He knows no physics or engineering 

to make The World real to him... 

No paintings to show him 

how others have enjoyed it... 

No music except television jingles... 

No history except tales from a desperate mother... 

No friends to give him a joke 

or make him know himself 

more moderately. 

He's a modern citizen for whom Society doesn't exist. 

He lives one hour every three weeks, howling in a mist. 

"With My BODY, I Thee Worship." 

Many men are less vital with their wives. 

Hesther :

All the same, they don't BLIND their wives, do they? 

Superman :

Come on. 

Hesther :

Well, do they? 

Superman :

You mean he's a violent, dangerous madman, who'll go round the country doing it again and again? 

Hesther :

I mean he's In PAIN, Martin. 

He's been In Pain for most of His Life. 

Superman :

Yes. 

Hesther :

And you can take it away. 

Superman :

Yes. 

Hesther :

Then that's all you need to know, in the end. 

Superman :

No. 

Hesther :

Why not? 

Superman :

Because — it is HIS. 

Hesther :

His? 

Superman :

HIS Pain. His Own. He made it. 

Hesther :

I don't understand. I don't! 

There's no merit about being In Pain, that's just pure old masochism. 

Superman :

I'm talking about Passion, Hesther. 

You know what that word meant originally? Suffering. 

The way you get Your Own Spirit through Your Own Suffering. 

Self-chosen. Self-made. 

This boy's DONE that. 

He's created his own desperate ceremony... 

just to ignite one flame of original ecstasy 

in the spiritless waste around him. 

Alright... he's destroyed for it, horribly. 

He's virtually been destroyed BY it. 

One thing I know for sure, that boy has known a PASSION... more ferocious than I have known in any second of my life. 

Let me tell you something : 

I envy it. 

Hesther :

You CAN'T. 

Superman :

Don't you see? 

That's what his stare has said all this time :

"At least I galloped. 

When did you?" 

I'm jealous, Hesther. 

Jealous... of Manchester Black. 

Hesther :

That's absurd. 

Superman :

Is it? 

Hesther :

Yes, utterly. Utterly! 

Superman :

I go on about my wife —

Have you thought about the husband? 

The finicky, critical husband, with his art books on mythical Greece? 

What REAL Worship has he known? 

Without worship, you shrink! 

It's brutal. 

I shrank my life. 

No one can do it for you. 

I settled for being pallid and provincial 

out of my eternal timidity. 

The old story of 

bluster, and do bugger-all. 

I didn't even dare to have children... 

didn't dare to bring children into a house and marriage as cold as mine. 

I tell everyone Margaret 

is The Puritan, I'm The Pagan. 

Some Pagan. 

Such wild returns I make 

to the womb of civilisation. 

Three weeks a year 

in the Mediterranean. 

Beds booked in advance, meals paid with vouchers... 

cautious jaunts in hired cars, suitcase crammed with Kaopectate. 

What a FANTASTIC Surrender 

to The Primitive. 

The "Primitive." 

I use that word endlessly. 

"The Primitive World," I say, 

"What Instinctual Truths were lost with it." 

While I sit baiting that poor, 

unimaginative woman with the word... 

That freaky boy is trying 

to conjure The Reality. 

I look at pages of centaurs 

trampling the soil of Argos. 

Outside My Window, that boy 

is trying to BECOME one 

in a Hampshire field. 

Every night I watch that woman knitting, 

a woman I haven't kissed in six years. 

And he stands for an hour in The Dark, 

sucking the sweat off his god's hairy cheek.

In the morning, 

I put away my books 

on the cultural shelf... 

Close up my Kodachrome snaps 

of Mount Olympus... 

Touch my reproduction statue 

of Dionysus for luck... 

and go off to The Hospital 

to treat HIM for Insanity. 

Now do you see? 

Hesther :

The Boy's In Pain, Martin. 

That's all I see. 

I understand, you know. 

I'm not just being Mrs. MacBrisk. 

You haven't made 

that kind of pain. 

So few of us have. 

But you've still made 

OTHER things. 

Your own thoughts. Your own skill. 

Skill absolutely unique to you. 

I've watched you do it, year after year... 

and it's marvelous! 

You can't just sit and say 

"It's all provincial, 

You're just a butcher." 

All that stuff is stupid, hateful. 

Alright, you never galloped. 

Too bad. 

If I have to choose between his galloping 

and your sheer training... 

I'll take The Training every time. 

What's more, 

so will the boy, at this moment. 

That stare of his isn't accusing you, 

it's simply demanding. 

Superman :

What? 

Hesther :

Just that. 

YOUR Power to pull him out of 

The NIGHTMARE he's galloped himself INTO. 

Do you see? 

Do you see? 

The Outsider

The Outsider

By H. P. Lovecraft

That night the Baron dreamt of many a woe;

And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form

Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm,

Were long be-nightmared.

— Keats.

Unhappy is he to whom the memories of childhood bring only fear and sadness. Wretched is he who looks back upon lone hours in vast and dismal chambers with brown hangings and maddening rows of antique books, or upon awed watches in twilight groves of grotesque, gigantic, and vine-encumbered trees that silently wave twisted branches far aloft. Such a lot the gods gave to me — to me, the dazed, the disappointed; the barren, the broken. And yet I am strangely content, and cling desperately to those sere memories, when my mind momentarily threatens to reach beyond to The Other.

I know not where I was born, save that the castle was infinitely old and infinitely horrible; full of dark passages and having high ceilings where the eye could find only cobwebs and shadows. The stones in the crumbling corridors seemed always hideously damp, and there was an accursed smell everywhere, as of the piled-up corpses of dead generations. It was never light, so that I used sometimes to light candles and gaze steadily at them for relief; nor was there any sun outdoors, since the terrible trees grew high above the topmost accessible tower. There was one black tower which reached above the trees into the unknown outer sky, but that was partly ruined and could not be ascended save by a well-nigh impossible climb up the sheer wall, stone by stone.

I must have lived years in this place, but I cannot measure the time. Beings must have cared for my needs, yet I cannot recall any person except myself; or anything alive but the noiseless rats and bats and spiders. I think that whoever nursed me must have been shockingly aged, since my first conception of a living person was that of something mockingly like myself, yet distorted, shrivelled, and decaying like the castle. To me there was nothing grotesque in the bones and skeletons that strowed some of the stone crypts deep down among the foundations. I fantastically associated these things with every-day events, and thought them more natural than the coloured pictures of living beings which I found in many of the mouldy books. From such books I learned all that I know. No teacher urged or guided me, and I do not recall hearing any human voice in all those years—not even my own; for although I had read of speech, I had never thought to try to speak aloud. My aspect was a matter equally unthought of, for there were no mirrors in the castle, and I merely regarded myself by instinct as akin to the youthful figures I saw drawn and painted in the books. I felt conscious of youth because I remembered so little.

Outside, across the putrid moat and under the dark mute trees, I would often lie and dream for hours about what I read in the books; and would longingly picture myself amidst gay crowds in the sunny world beyond the endless forest. Once I tried to escape from the forest, but as I went farther from the castle the shade grew denser and the air more filled with brooding fear; so that I ran frantically back lest I lose my way in a labyrinth of nighted silence.

So through endless twilights I dreamed and waited, though I knew not what I waited for. Then in the shadowy solitude my longing for light grew so frantic that I could rest no more, and I lifted entreating hands to the single black ruined tower that reached above the forest into the unknown outer sky. And at last I resolved to scale that tower, fall though I might; since it were better to glimpse the sky and perish, than to live without ever beholding day.

In the dank twilight I climbed the worn and aged stone stairs till I reached the level where they ceased, and thereafter clung perilously to small footholds leading upward. Ghastly and terrible was that dead, stairless cylinder of rock; black, ruined, and deserted, and sinister with startled bats whose wings made no noise. But more ghastly and terrible still was the slowness of my progress; for climb as I might, the darkness overhead grew no thinner, and a new chill as of haunted and venerable mould assailed me. I shivered as I wondered why I did not reach the light, and would have looked down had I dared. I fancied that night had come suddenly upon me, and vainly groped with one free hand for a window embrasure, that I might peer out and above, and try to judge the height I had attained.

All at once, after an infinity of awesome, sightless crawling up that concave and desperate precipice, I felt my head touch a solid thing, and I knew I must have gained the roof, or at least some kind of floor. In the darkness I raised my free hand and tested the barrier, finding it stone and immovable. Then came a deadly circuit of the tower, clinging to whatever holds the slimy wall could give; till finally my testing hand found the barrier yielding, and I turned upward again, pushing the slab or door with my head as I used both hands in my fearful ascent. There was no light revealed above, and as my hands went higher I knew that my climb was for the nonce ended; since the slab was the trap-door of an aperture leading to a level stone surface of greater circumference than the lower tower, no doubt the floor of some lofty and capacious observation chamber. I crawled through carefully, and tried to prevent the heavy slab from falling back into place; but failed in the latter attempt. As I lay exhausted on the stone floor I heard the eerie echoes of its fall, but hoped when necessary to pry it open again.

Believing I was now at a prodigious height, far above the accursed branches of the wood, I dragged myself up from the floor and fumbled about for windows, that I might look for the first time upon the sky, and the moon and stars of which I had read. But on every hand I was disappointed; since all that I found were vast shelves of marble, bearing odious oblong boxes of disturbing size. More and more I reflected, and wondered what hoary secrets might abide in this high apartment so many aeons cut off from the castle below. Then unexpectedly my hands came upon a doorway, where hung a portal of stone, rough with strange chiselling. Trying it, I found it locked; but with a supreme burst of strength I overcame all obstacles and dragged it open inward. As I did so there came to me the purest ecstasy I have ever known; for shining tranquilly through an ornate grating of iron, and down a short stone passageway of steps that ascended from the newly found doorway, was the radiant full moon, which I had never before seen save in dreams and in vague visions I dared not call memories.

Fancying now that I had attained the very pinnacle of the castle, I commenced to rush up the few steps beyond the door; but the sudden veiling of the moon by a cloud caused me to stumble, and I felt my way more slowly in the dark. It was still very dark when I reached the grating—which I tried carefully and found unlocked, but which I did not open for fear of falling from the amazing height to which I had climbed. Then the moon came out.

Most daemoniacal of all shocks is that of the abysmally unexpected and grotesquely unbelievable. Nothing I had before undergone could compare in terror with what I now saw; with the bizarre marvels that sight implied. The sight itself was as simple as it was stupefying, for it was merely this: instead of a dizzying prospect of treetops seen from a lofty eminence, there stretched around me on a level through the grating nothing less than the solid ground, decked and diversified by marble slabs and columns, and overshadowed by an ancient stone church, whose ruined spire gleamed spectrally in the moonlight.

Half unconscious, I opened the grating and staggered out upon the white gravel path that stretched away in two directions. My mind, stunned and chaotic as it was, still held the frantic craving for light; and not even the fantastic wonder which had happened could stay my course. I neither knew nor cared whether my experience was insanity, dreaming, or magic; but was determined to gaze on brilliance and gaiety at any cost. I knew not who I was or what I was, or what my surroundings might be; though as I continued to stumble along I became conscious of a kind of fearsome latent memory that made my progress not wholly fortuitous. I passed under an arch out of that region of slabs and columns, and wandered through the open country; sometimes following the visible road, but sometimes leaving it curiously to tread across meadows where only occasional ruins bespoke the ancient presence of a forgotten road. Once I swam across a swift river where crumbling, mossy masonry told of a bridge long vanished.

Over two hours must have passed before I reached what seemed to be my goal, a venerable ivied castle in a thickly wooded park; maddeningly familiar, yet full of perplexing strangeness to me. I saw that the moat was filled in, and that some of the well-known towers were demolished; whilst new wings existed to confuse the beholder. But what I observed with chief interest and delight were the open windows—gorgeously ablaze with light and sending forth sound of the gayest revelry. Advancing to one of these I looked in and saw an oddly dressed company, indeed; making merry, and speaking brightly to one another. I had never, seemingly, heard human speech before; and could guess only vaguely what was said. Some of the faces seemed to hold expressions that brought up incredibly remote recollections; others were utterly alien.

I now stepped through the low window into the brilliantly lighted room, stepping as I did so from my single bright moment of hope to my blackest convulsion of despair and realisation. The nightmare was quick to come; for as I entered, there occurred immediately one of the most terrifying demonstrations I had ever conceived. Scarcely had I crossed the sill when there descended upon the whole company a sudden and unheralded fear of hideous intensity, distorting every face and evoking the most horrible screams from nearly every throat. Flight was universal, and in the clamour and panic several fell in a swoon and were dragged away by their madly fleeing companions. Many covered their eyes with their hands, and plunged blindly and awkwardly in their race to escape; overturning furniture and stumbling against the walls before they managed to reach one of the many doors.

The cries were shocking; and as I stood in the brilliant apartment alone and dazed, listening to their vanishing echoes, I trembled at the thought of what might be lurking near me unseen. At a casual inspection the room seemed deserted, but when I moved toward one of the alcoves I thought I detected a presence there—a hint of motion beyond the golden-arched doorway leading to another and somewhat similar room. As I approached the arch I began to perceive the presence more clearly; and then, with the first and last sound I ever uttered—a ghastly ululation that revolted me almost as poignantly as its noxious cause—I beheld in full, frightful vividness the inconceivable, indescribable, and unmentionable monstrosity which had by its simple appearance changed a merry company to a herd of delirious fugitives.

I cannot even hint what it was like, for it was a compound of all that is unclean, uncanny, unwelcome, abnormal, and detestable. It was the ghoulish shade of decay, antiquity, and desolation; the putrid, dripping eidolon of unwholesome revelation; the awful baring of that which the merciful earth should always hide. God knows it was not of this world—or no longer of this world—yet to my horror I saw in its eaten-away and bone-revealing outlines a leering, abhorrent travesty on the human shape; and in its mouldy, disintegrating apparel an unspeakable quality that chilled me even more.

I was almost paralysed, but not too much so to make a feeble effort toward flight; a backward stumble which failed to break the spell in which the nameless, voiceless monster held me. My eyes, bewitched by the glassy orbs which stared loathsomely into them, refused to close; though they were mercifully blurred, and shewed the terrible object but indistinctly after the first shock. I tried to raise my hand to shut out the sight, yet so stunned were my nerves that my arm could not fully obey my will. The attempt, however, was enough to disturb my balance; so that I had to stagger forward several steps to avoid falling. As I did so I became suddenly and agonisingly aware of the nearness of the carrion thing, whose hideous hollow breathing I half fancied I could hear. Nearly mad, I found myself yet able to throw out a hand to ward off the foetid apparition which pressed so close; when in one cataclysmic second of cosmic nightmarishness and hellish accident my fingers touched the rotting outstretched paw of the monster beneath the golden arch.

I did not shriek, but all the fiendish ghouls that ride the night-wind shrieked for me as in that same second there crashed down upon my mind a single and fleeting avalanche of soul-annihilating memory. I knew in that second all that had been; I remembered beyond the frightful castle and the trees, and recognised the altered edifice in which I now stood; I recognised, most terrible of all, the unholy abomination that stood leering before me as I withdrew my sullied fingers from its own.

But in the cosmos there is balm as well as bitterness, and that balm is nepenthe. In the supreme horror of that second I forgot what had horrified me, and the burst of black memory vanished in a chaos of echoing images. In a dream I fled from that haunted and accursed pile, and ran swiftly and silently in the moonlight. When I returned to the churchyard place of marble and went down the steps I found the stone trap-door immovable; but I was not sorry, for I had hated the antique castle and the trees. Now I ride with the mocking and friendly ghouls on the night-wind, and play by day amongst the catacombs of Nephren-Ka in the sealed and unknown valley of Hadoth by the Nile. I know that light is not for me, save that of the moon over the rock tombs of Neb, nor any gaiety save the unnamed feasts of Nitokris beneath the Great Pyramid; yet in my new wildness and freedom I almost welcome the bitterness of alienage.

For although nepenthe has calmed me, I know always that I am An Outsider; a stranger in this century and among those who are still men. This I have known ever since I stretched out my fingers to the abomination within that great gilded frame; stretched out my fingers and touched a cold and unyielding surface of polished glass.

People WANT Leadership

“Monarchy can easily be "debunked", 

but watch the faces, 

mark well the accents of the debunkers. 

These are the men 

whose taproot in Eden has been cut -- 

whom no rumor of the polyphony, 

the dance, can reach – 

men to whom pebbles laid in a row 

are more beautiful than an arch. 

Yet even if they desire mere equality 

they cannot reach it. 

Where Men are forbidden to Honour A King, 

they honour millionaires, athletes, 

or film-stars instead -- 

even famous prostitutes or gangsters. 

For Spiritual Nature, like Bodily Nature, 

will be served -- 

Deny it Food and it will Gobble Poison.

(Article "Equality")”

― C.S. Lewis

When you lived among The Criminals, 

did you start to pity them?

The first time I stole so that I wouldn't starve, yes.

I lost many assumptions about 

The Simple Nature of Right and Wrong.

The American President (Know the Difference)

 Mr. President, I think we have to do this. 

AJ, she is one vote away. 

It's important legislation that for the first time has a legitimate chance. 

She deserves every opportunity... 

LEWIS: 

She? You meant "it," didn't you, sir? 

You meant the important legislation 

deserves every opportunity. - 

Lewis, shut up. 

You have something to say to me, Lewis? 

Respectfully, sir, I think we should examine the new poll for something more than... 

Examine what? 

They don't like that I'm going out with Sydney. 

It's not that simple. 

I think that this poll 

brings a murky problem 

into specific relief. 

Whose problem are we talking about, Lewis? Yours? 

You worried about losing your job? 

Because this poll isn't talking about My Presidency! 

This poll is talking about My Life! 

264 million people... 

264 million people don't give a damn about your life! 

They give a damn about their own! 

All right! That's enough! 

(SIGHS) 

Mr. President, you've raised a daughter --

almost entirely on your own, 

and she's terrific. 

So what does it say to you 

that in the past seven weeks 

59% of this country 

has begun to question your Family Values? 

The President doesn't answer to you, Lewis. 

Oh, yes, he does, AJ, I'm A Citizen. 

This is My President. 

And in This Country, 

it is not only permissible to question our leaders, 

it's our responsibility. 

But you already know that, 

don't you, Mr. President? 

Because you have a deeper love of this country than any man I've ever known, 

and I want to know what it says to you 

that in the past seven weeks 

59% of Americans have begun to question Your Patriotism? 

Look, if people want to listen to Bob... 

They don't have a choice! 

Bob Rumson is the only one doing the talking. 

People want Leadership, Mr. President, 

and in the absence of genuine Leadership, 

they'll listen to anyone who steps up to The Microphone. 

They want Leadership. 

They're so thirsty for it, 

they'll crawl through The Desert toward a mirage, 

and when they discover there's no water, 

they'll drink the sand. 

Lewis, we have had presidents who were beloved, 

who couldn't find a coherent sentence 

with two hands and a flashlight. 

People don't drink The Sand because they're thirsty -- 

They drink the sand because they don't know the difference.

None of Us Defended The Creepy Little Shit

Q: 

What are you looking at? 

DATA: 

I was considering the possibility 

that you are 

Telling The Truth.

None of Us Defended 

The Creepy Little Shit...

But Then Again -- 

None of Us Ever Liked Him.

“The Reign of the Superman” (January 1933) is a short story written by Jerry Siegel and illustrated by Joe Shuster. 

It was the writer/artist duo’s 

FIRST published use of the name 

‘Superman’, 

which they later applied to their 

archetypal fictional superhero. 

The title character of this story is 

A TELEPATHIC VILLAIN, 

rather than a physically powerful hero 

like the well-known character.

“No! Go AWAY, Q! 

Go Find Picard!”

A mad scientist, a chemist named 

Professor Ernest Smalley, 

randomly chooses raggedly dressed vagrant Bill Dunn 

from a bread line and recruits him 

to participate in an experiment in exchange for 

“a real meal and a new suit”. 

When Smalley’s experimental potion 

grants Dunn telepathic powers, 

The Man becomes intoxicated by His Power 

and seeks to Rule The World. 

This Superman uses these abilities for Evil, 

only to discover that the potion’s effects are temporary. 

Having killed the evil Smalley, 

who had intended to Kill Superman 

and give himself the same powers, 

Superman was left unable to use his knowledge 

to recreate the secret formula. 

As the story ends, Dunn’s powers wear off 

and he realizes he will be returning to 

the bread line to be a forgotten man once more.

The Conspiracy Against Alexander

"We all felt there was more here

than sexual bickering.

Alexander wanted The Truth and 

Philotas' answers were lacking merit.

Please take him away.

Alexander put him silently and quickly

to Trial by His Peers... and whether 

Plotter or Opportunist,

Philotas was found 

Guilty of Treason.

No, Alexander, no!

Remove him.

The Suspects were all Executed.

None of us Defended Philotas...

but then again, 

None of Us Ever Liked Him.

And of course, 

His Power was carved up 

By The Rest of Us.

Before he died, we tortured him to find out 

what His Father Parmenion knew.

But this we never learned.

What to Do with Parmenion and His 

20,000 troops guarding our supply lines

was a far more delicate matter.

Was he innocent in this?

Or had he decided to act before

age further withered His Power?

The men will follow Their King.

- Alexander won't be there.

Necessity required Alexander to act...

and he sealed the camp within the hour

of the first accusations against Philotas.

Then go, Antigonus, and Cleitus.

And go quickly.

Three days' hard riding

sent Antigonus and Cleitus to Parmenion, 

The General most loyal to Philip.

His Soldiers accepted the finding of Guilt

against Parmenion, as they understood well

The Code of Vengeance...

That made The Head of Family

responsible for the behavior of all.

Many of us felt we were better off

without that pompous thorn, Parmenion...

as Alexander promoted all of us

generously.

Coningsby

‘The first public association of men,’ said Coningsby, ‘who have worked for an avowed end without enunciating a single principle.’ ‘And who have established political infidelity throughout the land,’ said Lord Henry. ‘By Jove!’ said Buckhurst, ‘what infernal fools we have made ourselves this last week!’ ‘Nay,’ said Coningsby, smiling, ‘it was our last schoolboy weakness. Floreat Etona, under all circumstances.’ ‘I certainly, Coningsby,’ said Lord Vere, ‘shall not assume the Conservative Cause, instead of the cause for which Hampden died in the field, and Sydney on the scaffold.’ 

‘The cause for which Hampden died in the field and Sydney on the scaffold,’ said Coningsby, ‘was the cause of the Venetian Republic.’ 

‘How, how?’ cried Buckhurst. ‘I repeat it,’ said Coningsby. ‘The great object of the Whig leaders in England from the first movement under Hampden to the last most successful one in 1688, was to establish in England a high aristocratic republic on the model of the Venetian, then the study and admiration of all speculative politicians. Read Harrington; turn over Algernon Sydney; then you will see how the minds of the English leaders in the seventeenth century were saturated with the Venetian type. And they at length succeeded. William III. found them out. He told the Whig leaders, “I will not be a Doge.” He balanced parties; he baffled them as the Puritans baffled them fifty years before. 

The reign of Anne was a struggle between the Venetian and the English systems. Two great Whig nobles, Argyle and Somerset, worthy of seats in the Council of Ten, forced their Sovereign on her deathbed to change the ministry. They accomplished their object. They brought in a new family on their own terms. George I. was a Doge; George II. was a Doge; they were what William III., a great man, would not be. George III. tried not to be a Doge, but it was impossible materially to resist the deeply-laid combination. He might get rid of the Whig magnificoes, but he could not rid himself of the Venetian constitution. And a Venetian constitution did govern England from the accession of the House of Hanover until 1832. Now I do not ask you, Vere, to relinquish the political tenets which in ordinary times would have been your inheritance. All I say is, the constitution introduced by your ancestors having been subverted by their descendants your contemporaries, beware of still holding Venetian principles of government when you have not a Venetian constitution to govern with. Do what I am doing, what Henry Sydney and Buckhurst are doing, what other men that I could mention are doing, hold yourself aloof from political parties which, from the necessity of things, have ceased to have distinctive principles, and are therefore practically only factions; and wait and see, whether with patience, energy, honour, and Christian faith, and a desire to look to the national welfare and not to sectional and limited interests; whether, I say, we may not discover some great principles to guide us, to which we may adhere, and which then, if true, will ultimately guide and control others.’ 

‘The Whigs are worn out,’ said Vere, ‘Conservatism is a sham, and Radicalism is pollution.’ 

‘I certainly,’ said Buckhurst, ‘when I get into the House of Commons, shall speak my mind without reference to any party whatever; and all I hope is, we may all come in at the same time, and then we may make a party of our own.’ 

‘I have always heard my father say,’ said Vere, ‘that there was nothing so difficult as to organise an independent party in the House of Commons.’ 

‘Ay! but that was in the Venetian period, Vere,’ said Henry Sydney, smiling. 

‘I dare say,’ said Buckhurst, ‘the only way to make a party in the House of Commons is just the one that succeeds anywhere else. Men must associate together. When you are living in the same set, dining together every day, and quizzing the Dons, it is astonishing how well men agree. As for me, I never would enter into a conspiracy, unless the conspirators were fellows who had been at Eton with me; and then there would be no treachery.’ ‘Let us think of principles, and not of parties,’ said Coningsby. ‘For my part,’ said Buckhurst, ‘whenever a political system is breaking up, as in this country at present, I think the very bestthing is to brush all the old Dons off the stage. They never take to the new road kindly. They are always hampered by their exploded prejudices and obsolete traditions. I don’t think a single man, Vere, that sat in the Venetian Senate ought to be allowed to sit in the present English House of Commons.’ 

‘Well, no one does in our family except my uncle Philip,’ said Lord Henry; ‘and the moment I want it, he will resign; for he detests Parliament. It interferes so with his hunting.’

40 Years of Darkness

Skeletor :

"I am NOT Nice.

But, uh... uh, tell me more about 

this "Christmas" [of which You Speak]....

Little Boy :

Well... it's a WONDERFUL Time of The Year!

Everyone has LOTS of Fun..!!

Skeletor :

"You mean, they get 

in FIGHTS...?"

Children :

No..!! [ YES.] 

Skeletor :

Fights are Fun..!! 

I LIKE Fights!!

Little Girl :

....and you give each other presents...!!

Skeletor :

...and when you open them, 

they EXPLODE, right..??

[ Sometimes, yes…. The People, not The Gifts.]

Little Girl :

No!! They're NICE Gifts..!!

Skeletor :

"NICE!?! 

Doesn't sound like 

much FUN, to me....!"

Mint Condition

“ Nowhere was this thinning more apparent than in our lack of rules about what the anthropologists call “purity” and “pollution.” 

Contrast us with the Hua of New Guinea, who have developed elaborate networks of food taboos that govern what men and women may eat. In order for their boys to become men, they have to avoid foods that in any way resemble vaginas, including anything that is red, wet, slimy, comes from a hole, or has hair. 

It sounds at first like arbitrary superstition mixed with the predictable Sexism of a Patriarchal Society. Turiel would call these rules social conventions, because the Hua don’t believe that men in other tribes have to follow these rules. 

But the Hua certainly seemed to think of their food rules as moral rules. They talked about them constantly, judged each other by their food habits, and governed their lives, duties, and relationships by what the anthropologist Anna Meigs called “a religion of the body.”

But it’s not just hunter-gatherers in rain forests who believe that bodily practices can be moral practices. When I read the Hebrew Bible, I was shocked to discover how much of the book—one of the sources of Western morality—was taken up with rules about food, menstruation, sex, skin, and the handling of corpses. 

Some of these rules were clear attempts to avoid disease, such as the long sections of Leviticus on leprosy. 

But many of the rules seemed to follow a more emotional logic about avoiding disgust. 

For example, the Bible prohibits Jews from eating or even touching “the swarming things that swarm upon the earth” (and just think how much more disgusting a swarm of mice is than a single mouse).

Other rules seemed to follow a conceptual logic involving keeping categories pure or not mixing things together (such as clothing made from two different fibers).

So what’s going on here? If Turiel was right that morality is really about harm, then why do most non-Western cultures moralize so many practices that seem to have nothing to do with harm? Why do many Christians and Jews believe that “cleanliness is next to godliness”?

And why do so many Westerners, even secular ones, continue to see choices about food and sex as being heavily loaded with moral significance? Liberals sometimes say that religious conservatives are sexual prudes for whom anything other than missionary-position intercourse within marriage is a sin. 

But conservatives can just as well make fun of liberal struggles to choose a balanced breakfast—balanced among moral concerns about free-range eggs, fair-trade coffee, naturalness, and a variety of toxins, some of which (such as genetically modified corn and soybeans) pose a greater threat spiritually than biologically. 

Even if Turiel was right that children lock onto harmfulness as a method for identifying immoral actions, I couldn’t see how kids in the West—let alone among the Azande, the Ilongot, and the Hua—could have come to all this purity and pollution stuff on their own. 

There must be more to moral development than kids constructing rules as they take the perspectives of other people and feel their pain. 

There must be something beyond rationalism.”

I Cannot.

Chancellor Gowron and Lt. Commander Worf meet again

GARAK: 

We can stand here all day reminding ourselves 

just how much we hate each other, 

but you don't have the time. 

The Klingon fleet will reach Cardassian territory 

in less than one hour. 

I suggest you prepare for them.

[Ops]

(The War Game is being monitored on the big table)

KIRA: 

Based on Klingon transmissions we've intercepted, 

the outlying Cardassian colonies were overrun almost immediately. 

But, now that the Cardassian fleet has mobilised, 

the Klingons are meeting stronger resistance.

DAX: 

You'd almost think somebody warned the Cardassians they were coming.

KIRA: 

Hopefully it'll make the Klingons think twice about what they're doing.

WORF: 

Unlikely, Major. 

Now that the battle has begun, Martok and his troops will settle for nothing less than victory.

(Sisko enters from his office.)

O'BRIEN: 

Well, what did the Federation Council say?

SISKO: 

They've decided to condemn the Klingon invasion. 

In response, Gowron has expelled all Federation citizens from the Klingon Empire and recalled his ambassadors from the Federation.

KIRA: You're saying he cut off diplomatic relations?

SISKO: He's done more than that. The Klingons have withdrawn from the Khitomer Accords. The peace treaty between the Federation and the Klingon Empire has ended.

O'BRIEN: Captain, you're never going to believe this. A Klingon ship just decloaked off upper pylon three and is requesting permission to dock. They claim they have Chancellor Gowron on board and he is demanding to speak with Mister Worf, personally.

[Klingon Bridge]

WORF: Chancellor Gowron. You wished to speak with me?

GOWRON: Worf. Worf! It is good to see you. I always said that uniform would get you into trouble one day.

WORF: It seems you were right. But I do not apologise for my actions

GOWRON: Yes, yes. I know. you did what you thought was right. And even though you may have made some enemies, I assure you I am not one of them.

WORF: I am glad. Your friendship means much to me.

GOWRON: And yours to me. It has been too long since you last fought at my side. But now the time has come again. We will do great deeds in the coming days. Deeds worthy of song.

WORF: You want me to go to Cardassia with you?

GOWRON: What better way to redeem yourself in the eyes of your people. Come with me, Worf. Glory awaits you on Cardassia. Worf, why do you stand there like a mute d'blok. I have offered you a chance for glory. All you have to do is take it.

WORF: If there's any glory to be won, Gowron, it'll have to be yours alone. I cannot come with you.

GOWRON: Of course you can. It is where you belong.

WORF: I cannot abandon my post.

GOWRON: You no longer have a post. You have no place on that station, and no business wearing that uniform.

WORF: I have sworn an oath of allegiance.

GOWRON: To the Federation.

WORF: You would have me break my word?

GOWRON: Your word? What good is your word when you give it to people who care nothing for honour, who refuse to lift a finger while Klingon warriors shed blood for their protection. I tell you, they are without honour. You do not owe them anything.

WORF: It is not what I owe them that matters. It is what I owe myself. Worf, Son of Mogh, does not break His Word.

GOWRON: And what of your debt to me? Are you saying you owe me nothing? I gave you back your name, restored your house, gave your family a seat on the High Council. And this is how you repay me?

WORF: It is true I owe you a great debt. I would give up my life for you. But invading Cardassia is wrong, and I cannot support it.

GOWRON: Worf, I have always considered you a friend and an ally. And because you are my friend, I am giving you this one last chance to redeem yourself. Come with me.

WORF: I cannot.

GOWRON: Think about what you are doing. If you turn your back on me now, for as long as I live, you will not be welcome anywhere in the Klingon Empire. Your family will be removed from the High Council, your lands seized, and your House stripped of its titles. You will have nothing.

WORF: Except my honour.

GOWRON: So be it.

[Quark's cafe]

(As happy gamblers play below, Worf sits alone at a table and stare at nothing.)

O'BRIEN: You look like you could use some company.

WORF: Chief, do you remember the time we rescued Captain Picard from the Borg?

O'BRIEN: How could I forget? It was touch and go there for a while. There were a couple of moments when I thought we were all going to wind up being assimilated.

WORF: I never doubted the outcome. We were like warriors from the ancient sagas. There was nothing we could not do.

O'BRIEN: Except keep the holodecks working right.

WORF: I have decided to resign from Starfleet.

O'BRIEN: Resign? What are you talking about?

WORF: I have made up my mind. It is for the best.

O'BRIEN: Look, I know how much you miss the Enterprise, but I'm sure they'll be building a new one soon.

WORF: It will not be the same. The Enterprise I knew is gone. Those were good years, but now it is time for me to move on.

O'BRIEN: And do what?

WORF: I do not know. I thought I would be returning to Boreth, but now that is impossible. I have made an enemy of Gowron, and every other Klingon in the Empire.

O'BRIEN: All the more reason to stay in Starfleet.

WORF: This uniform will only serve to remind me of how I have disgraced myself in the eyes of my people. I suppose I could get a berth on a Nyberrite Alliance Cruiser. They are always eager to hire experienced officers.

O'BRIEN: The Nyberrite Alliance? That's a long way. What about your son?

WORF: Alexander is much happier living with his grandparents on Earth than he ever was staying with me. One thing is certain. The sooner I leave here, the better. My continued presence on Deep Space Nine would only be a liability to Captain Sisko in his dealings with the Klingons.

QUARK: Do you hear that, Chief? Seventy two decibels. Music to my ears.

O'BRIEN: I think I liked it better when it was quiet.

QUARK: You want quiet, go to the Replimat. This is Quark's the way Quark's should be. The way it was meant to be. Am I glad we finally got rid of all those Klingons. Present company excepted, of course.

(Worf leaves.)

O'BRIEN: I got to hand it to you, Quark. You really know how to make your customers feel welcome.

QUARK: What do I care? All he ever drinks is prune juice.

[Captain's office]

SISKO: I'm sorry, Mister Worf, but I can't accept your resignation at this time.

WORF: I do not understand. What further use could I be here?

SISKO: I'm not sure yet. But as long as the fighting continues between the Klingons and the Cardassians, 

I need you here on the station.

WORF :

If you think that is wise.

SISKO: 

I don't know if it's wise or not. 

But I do know that you're a good officer,

and right now I need every good officer I can get.

(Kira enters)

KIRA: 

Captain, we just got word from Bajoran Intelligence. 

The Klingons have broken through the Cardassian fleet.

SISKO: 

How long before they reach Cardassia Prime?

KIRA: 

Fifty two hours.

WORF: 

If The Klingon Empire has reverted to the old practices, 

they will occupy the Cardassian homeworld, 

execute all government officials, 

and install an imperial overseer 

to put down any further resistance.

SISKO: 

I think it's about time we had a talk with the Cardassians.

DUKAT [on monitor]: 

Captain, I'm a little busy at the moment, so whatever you have to say, make it brief.

SISKO: Dukat? I was trying to reach someone in the civilian Government.

DUKAT 

[on monitor]: 

And you have succeeded. 

You are speaking to the new 

Chief Military Advisor to the Detapa Council.

SISKO: 

Does this mean you've turned your back on 

The Central Command?

DUKAT 

[on monitor]: 

It means that as a loyal officer of the Cardassian Military, 

I am pledged to serve the legitimate 

ruling body of the Empire. 

Whoever that may be.

SISKO: 

In other words, 

you saw which way 

the wind was blowing 

and switched sides.

DUKAT [on monitor]: 

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

SISKO: 

Dukat, you have got to get those council members to safety before the Klingons reach Cardassia Prime.

DUKAT [on monitor]: 

I am open to suggestions, Captain.

SISKO: 

If you can get a ship and meet me at these coordinates, 

I'll do what I can to escort you out of the war zone.

DUKAT [on monitor]: 

That is a very generous offer. 

I must say I am touched. 

By saving the members of the Detapa Council, you will be saving some very

SISKO: 

Forget The Speech, Dukat. 

Just meet me at the rendezvous point.

DUKAT [on monitor]: 

And if the Klingons try to stop us?

SISKO: 

Then I'll be there to reason with them. 

I doubt the Klingons will fire on a Federation ship.

DUKAT: 

I'm not sure I share your optimism, 

but then I don't have much choice, do I? 

We'll meet you there.

(Transmission ends)

WORF: 

Sir, if the Klingons are right, 

if the Cardassian government 

has been taken over by The Founders

SISKO: 

Then we'll be helping them to escape. 

That's the chance we'll have to take. I know you want to be out of that uniform but right now I need you with me.

WORF: 

I understand