Author: Papa Giorgio

Heartbroken Donkeys Mourn Death of Friend

Published by Papa Giorgio

Bram came to the Ezelshoeve Foundation, a donkey sanctuary in the Netherlands, in March 2014. He came along with three mares, from elderly owners who could not look after them properly. The good people at the sanctuary tried their hardest to nurse him back to health, but he didn’t improve. They had to make the decision to euthanize him.After Bram passed away, the other donkeys at the sanctuary began to make distressed noises and crowded around their friend’s body. The sanctuary’s founders are convinced that the donkeys were in mourning – stating that they have made the same noises (which is very different to their usual brays) after the passing of other companions. Perhaps the most heartbreaking moment of all, is when one of the devastated donkeys tries nipping at an unresponsive Bram in a bid to wake him.

Trump Is NOT “America First”

Published by Papa Giorgio

In this clip Mark Levi explains some basics in conservative economics 101. I include a couple calls and Mark gets worked up in the process of “laying down the law”!

BTW, this is a great refutation of those who think tariffs are a good thing. The movie BREXIT does a great job explaining how this thinking killed European competitive markets.

I Am NOT Jazzed

Published by Papa Giorgio

Gay Patriot has a great post on an issue that is seemingly ignored by the media in mass as well as the low-information general public. And that is  that The Learning Channel is attempting “to show how normal and healthy it is to be a transgender teen.”

  • Meet Jazz Jennings! Although born male, Jazz is a transgender female and has been living as a girl since kindergarten. Parents Jeanette and Greg have spent the years finding doctors to treat their daughter, while fighting the discrimination and misconceptions associated with what it means to be transgender. But, now that Jazz is 14, she is on the brink of the biggest challenge of her life: high school…. (TLC)

GP quotes a NewsBusters story noting that TLC says the “normal and healthy” life of a teen transgender is defined as “addicted to anti-depressants, emotionally unstable and generating massive drama for everyone around you.”

Continuing GP says:

Mom (to Grandmother): So I have to stop at the drug store to get this medicine as soon as possible, because she told me this morning, ‘Oh mom, I’m out of my antidepressants’.

Jazz (birth name: Jeanette Jennings): Sucks to think that I have to rely on medications to be emotionally balanced. My body is crap, and I feel it.

Mom (to camera): It’s very, very clear when Jazz is not herself. She…it’s like a light switch…she turns off and she turns on. Between the drugs that are given to her, and the side effects and the depression that she battles, she’s predictably unpredictable.

Hmmm, maybe giving massive amounts of hormones and psychoactive pharmaceuticals to mentally unstable adolescents is not such a good idea.

If Jazz is upset now, wait until Jazz finds out normal straight teenage boys are just not into “girls” with penises.

I guess teaching people to love and accept the bodies they are born with is just not an option….

The NewsBusters article goes on to point out how the family views discrimination:

…Mom (to camera): In the Liberty Council letter, there’s a long list of negative things they say about Jazz and our family that just aren’t true. They also called Jazz a boy, and refer to her as my son. We’ve never experienced discrimination like that….

It is the whiner generation raising a worse generation.

Caesar’s vs. Jesus’ Sources Compared

Published by Papa Giorgio

(There are other videos in the above series)

Following is an excerpt from a slightly larger article entitled, “Sources for Caesar and Jesus Compared,” where scholar and professor, Darrell L. Bock*, explains quickly the manuscript integrity in the New Testament. I would even push it further back myself (see my post detailing the differences in Buddhist Scripture and Biblical Scripture).

…Considering Caesar’s Sources

Tracing ancient history is about examining sources and the manuscripts behind them, as well as the nature of their content and claims. In regard to Julius Caesar, the key sources are his own accounts of the Gallic Wars, the speeches of Cicero, Sallust’s account of Catiline’s War, Suetonius’s section on Caesar in Twelve Caesars, and Plutarch’s section on Caesar in Plutarchs’s Lives.

In some ways, Caesar’s autobiographical account gives us more to consider than the accounts of Jesus do. It provides direct testimony about events Caesar participated in. Sallust and Cicero were Caesar’s contemporaries as well, so there are reliable outside sources closely tied to the time of these events. Two of the most important sources for the emperor’s life, however, Suetonius and Plutarch, write in the early second century. That’s more than 100 years after the time of Caesar.

Manuscript support lies behind these sources. And this is where things get especially interesting. Around 12 manuscripts are essential for determining the wording of Caesar’s account. The oldest manuscript is from the ninth century—a full 900 years removed from the actual events. The list extends to manuscripts from the 12th century. Cicero’s speeches have an even older pedigree. They have about 15 manuscripts ranging from AD 400 to 800. Sallust’s account has around 20 manuscripts from the 10th and 11th centuries.Plutarch’s Lives is also mostly divided across six key manuscripts that range from the 10th and 11th centuries. Suetonius’s manuscript is dated AD 820. Classics scholars build much of our understanding of Caesar around these sources, even though their manuscript traditions contain significant gaps of time.

Considering Jesus’s Sources 

What about Jesus? Here we mostly rely on the four Gospels. Their production falls well within the Suetonian and Plutarchian time period. But even if you hold to the more conservative tradition that the synoptics were written in the 60s and John in the 90s, or the common alternative that the synoptics were written in the 80s, you’re still within 60 years of the events described. Contemporaries of Jesus and eyewitnesses of those events were still alive, unlike Suetonius’s or Plutarch’s accounts.

Gospel authorship is also debated. Conservatives argue the apostles Matthew and John are the sources of the Gospels under their names. If so, this is like Sallust’s and Cicero’s accounts in which the authors are contemporaries of the figure being chronicled. The other two Gospels are also traditionally tied to apostles—Mark uses Peter as a source and Luke uses Paul. This is a well-established tradition tied to Papias in the early second century. Once again, this contemporary link is what we see with Sallust and Cicero. Even if one severs those links with a less conservative reading, authorship remains tied to contemporary figures. Add the corporate and oral nature and role of the Gospels and we have good reason—purely on secular grounds—to regard the traditions we have of Jesus. Our sources give us a solid core for understanding him. Ken Bailey’s essay “Informal Controlled Oral Tradition and the Synoptic Gospels,” James Dunn’s Jesus Remembered, my own and Robert Webb’s edited work Key Events in the Life of the Historical Jesus, and Robert McIver’s Memory, Jesus, and the Synoptic Gospels make this case in detail.

What about the manuscripts? Here the New Testament is far superior to its classical companions. Our earliest manuscripts start appearing within decades of the writing. The fragment p52 is dated around AD 125. It only has a few portions of John 18, but it starts a trail that has full manuscripts of the Gospels appearing by the fourth century. The number of Greek manuscripts we have of the New Testament up to the time of the printing press is more than 5,800. The wording of the New Testament, including the Gospels, is extremely solid. Unclear spots often appear with an “or” note in Bible margins that record such differences. Yet none of those differences affects any core doctrinal teaching of Christianity. The only thing affected is how many verses make that teaching point.

So we can see the Gospels compare favorably to the classics in terms of what the sources say about Jesus and Caesar. If such sourcing works for the classics and the study of Caesar, it should work for Jesus as well….

* Darrell L. Bock is senior research professor of New Testament and executive director for cultural engagement at Dallas Theological Seminary. He has authored or edited more than 30 books, including

Scientists Who Believe

Published by Papa Giorgio

Many years ago I was challenged with a quote from then Representative Michele Bachmann

  • There are hundreds and hundreds of scientists, many of them holding Nobel Prizes, who believe in intelligent design.

The challenge was “who are these scientists”?

Here Uncommon Descent has a few listed, please, see their post for more info on each of these gentleman:

  1. Nobel Laureate and Intelligent Design proponent: Dr. Brian Josephson (winner of the Nobel prize for Physics, 1973)
  2. Nobel Laureate and Old Earth creationist: Dr. Richard Smalley (winner of the Nobel prize for Chemistry, 1996)
  3. Abdus Salam (1926-1996), a winner of the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics
  4. Sir John Eccles (1903-1997), winner of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1963.
  5. Nobel Laureate Ernst Boris Chain (1906-1979), winner of the 1945 Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology
  6. Wolfgang Pauli (1900-1958), winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1945.
  7. Guglielmo Marconi (1874–1937), winner of the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics

Part of my response was this:

Okay, since you are dodging my question/statement, I will give an example from your list. I guarantee that more than half of those can be explained away using the same common sense I did in the position above that you seem to not want to engage in, the example I gave of Melissa Ethridge near the beginning, and this one.

Bachmann said…. this: “There are hundreds and hundreds of scientists, many of them holding Nobel Prizes, who believe in intelligent design.”

Okay, Nobel Laureates who believe in I.D. or some form of it:

1) Charles Hard Townes, winner of a Nobel Prize in Physics and a UC Berkeley professor; 2) Nobel Laureate Eugene P. Wigner (1963, physics); 3) I would argue that Einstein accepted a form of I.D.; 4) Richard E Smalley, winner of the 1996 Nobel Prize in chemistry, as asked to present the keynote address at Tuskegee University’s 79th Annual Scholarship Convocation/Parents’ Recognition Program; 5) Max Plank, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 6) Werner Heisenberg, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 7) Erwin Schrödinger, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 8) Robert Millikan, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 9) Arthur Schawlow, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 10) William Phillips, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 11) Sir William H. Bragg, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 12) Guglielmo Marconi, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 13) Arthur Compton, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 14) Arno Penzias, Nobel Laureate in Physics; 15) Alexis Carrel, Nobel Laureate in Medicine and Physiology; 16) Sir John Eccles, Nobel Laureate in Medicine and Physiology; 17) Joseph Murray, Nobel Laureate in Medicine and Physiology; 18) Sir Ernst Chain, Nobel Laureate in Medicine and Physiology; 19) George Wald, Nobel Laureate in Medicine and Physiology; 20) Sir Derek Barton, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry; 21) Christian Anfinsen, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry; 22) Walter Kohn, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry; 23) T. S. Eliot, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 24) Rudyard Kipling, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 25) Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 26) François Mauriac, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 27) Hermann Hesse, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 28) Sir Winston Churchill, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 29) Jean-Paul Sartre, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 30) Sigrid Undset, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 31) Isaac B. Singer, Nobel Laureate in Literature; 32) Albert Schweitzer, Nobel Laureate for Peace; 33) Theodore Roosevelt, Nobel Laureate for Peace; 34) Woodrow Wilson, Nobel Laureate for Peace; 35) Nelson Mandela, Nobel Laureate for Peace; 36) Kim Dae-Jung, Nobel Laureate for Peace; 37) Dag Hammarskjöld, Nobel Laureate for Peace; 38) Martin Luther King Jr., Nobel Laureate for Peace; 39) John R. Mott, Nobel Laureate for Peace; 40) Nathan Söderblom, Nobel Laureate for Peace.

….Of course there are many scientists who were or are leaders in technology/science, literature and the like that are believers in some form of Intelligent Design. The example I give (and have given to you in past discussions is….

1) The guy most credited in getting us to the moon, Wernher von Braun: von Braun began work at the US Army Ordinance Corps testing grounds at White Sands, New Mexico. In 1952 he became technical director of the army’s ballistic-missile program. It was in the 1950’s that he produced rockets for US satellites (the first, Explorer 1, was launched early 1958) and early space flights by astronauts. He held an administrative post at NASA from 1970-1972 as well. We would have never made it to the moon if it were not for von Braun. More to follow (UPDATED JUNE 2016):

….Sensing disloyalty, the Gestapo arrested von Braun in 1944 and charged him with espionage. Von Braun’s work was deemed essential to the success of the war effort, so Nazi leader Albert Speer intervened and ordered the release of the scientist. When American soldiers marched into central Germany in May 1945, they found that von Braun had organized the surrender of 500 of his top scientists, along with plans and test vehicles.

Von Braun and his German scientists were relocated to the United States, where they became indispensable to the development of American military and space programs. Von Braun’s life had changed drastically within the course of a year. But it was in a little church in El Paso, Texas, that von Braun experienced a spiritual transformation that would change him from the inside out.

In Germany, von Braun had been nominally Lutheran but functionally atheist. He had no interest in religion or God. In Texas, while living at Fort Bliss, a neighbor invited him to church. He went, expecting to find the religious equivalent of a country club. Instead, he found a small white frame building with a vibrant congregation of people who loved the Lord. He realized that he had been morally adrift and that he needed to surrender himself to God. He converted to Christ and, over the coming years, became quite outspoken in his evangelical faith and frequently addressed the complementarity of faith and science.

C. M. Ward’s 1966 interview of von Braun took place in Huntsville, Alabama, at the George Marshall Space Flight Center (NASA), where he served as director. Von Braun contrasted the large empty cathedrals of Europe to the large numbers of churches he found in Texas, many meeting in temporary buildings, pastored by “humble preachers driving second-hand buses,” who led “thriving congregations.” The German scientist was impressed and noted: “Here is a growing, aggressive church and not a dignified, half-dead institution. Here is spiritual life.”

Ward published von Braun’s story and his thoughts on faith and science in an article in the June 2, 1966, issue of the Pentecostal Evangel, as well as in a 15-page booklet, The Farther We Probe into Space, the Greater My Faith (Gospel Publishing House, 1966), of which almost 500,000 copies were published.

Wernher von Braun booklets

The booklet containing C. M. Ward’s interview with

Wernher von Braun was published in several languages,

including English, Croatian (pictured), and German.

(Nazi Rocket Scientist Wernher von Braun Converted to Christ, Interviewed by C. M. Ward)

2) Dr Raymond V. Damadian is one that’s invention was key in diagnosing me with Multiple Sclerosis. He invented the MRI and his first working model is forever in the Smithsonian Institution‘s Hall of Medical Sciences

The MRI scanner has revolutionized the field of Medical Science. In 1977, Dr. Raymond Damadian invented the MRI scanner. The recipient of the 2001 Lemelson MIT achievement award, and the 1988 National Medal of Technology from President Ronald Regan, his name stands among those of the greatest inventors in the National Inventors Hall of Fame. Join us in this rare personal interview of Dr. Damadian as he describes the invention and comments on multiple scientific controversies related to the origin of life. His answers will surprise you and leave you pondering your own worldview. See amazing Medical MRI images and state of the art animations. Expand your mind.

3) Benjamin S. Carson, M.D., one of the world’s foremost pediatric neurosurgeons, is professor and chief of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University Medical School. Born on September 18, 1951, in Detroit to a single mother in a working class neighborhood, Ben showed promise from a young age. A graduate of Yale and the University of Michigan Medical School, he was rated by a Time issue titled “America’s Best” as a “super surgeon.” Dr. Carson was also selected by CNN and Time as one of the nation’s top 20 physicians and scientists, and by the Library of Congress as one of 89 “living-legends.”

These three men are young earth creationists (YEC) and support their claims by evidence and faith. One last point here are lists found on my blog

You can read more bio’s of professors, scientists, and researchers who are young earth creationists – HERE.

  1. Creation WIKI’s list of current creationist scientists;
  2. Creation WIKI’s historical list of creation sciuentists;
  3. Creation WIKI’s history of science.

A few other examples of current men of science who are young earth creationists:

  • Professor Dr Bernard Brandstater—pioneer in anesthetics. Amongst many other achievements, he pioneered assisted breathing for premature babies with prolonged incubation and developed an improved catheter for epidural anesthesia, both adopted around the world.
  • Prof. Stuart Burgess—a world expert in biomimetics (imitating design in nature). He is Professor of Engineering Design, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Bristol (UK) and leads the Design Engineering Research Group at the university. Dr Burgess is the author of over 40 papers published in science journals, and another 50 conference proceedings. He has also registered 7 patents and has received various awards, the Wessex Institute Scientific Medal being the most recent.
  • Professor Dr Ben Carson—pioneer pediatric neurosurgeon. He was long-term director of pediatric neurosurgery at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. He was the first surgeon to successfully separate conjoined twins joined at the head and also pioneered surgery to cure epilepsy in young children, and much else. He has been awarded 51 honorary doctorates, including from Yale and Columbia universities in recognition of his outstanding achievements. He is a member of the Alpha Honor Medical Society, the Horatio Alger Society of Distinguished Americans, and sits on numerous business and education boards. In 2001, CNN and Time magazine named Ben Carson as one of the nation’s 20 foremost physicians and scientists. In that same year, the Library of Congress selected him as one of 89 ‘Living Legends’. In February 2008, President Bush awarded Carson the Ford’s Theater Lincoln Medal and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the USA’s highest civilian honors.
  • Dr Raymond Damadian (see above)—largely responsible for developing medical imaging using magnetic resonance (MRI). He has been honored with the United States’ National Medal of Technology, the Lincoln-Edison Medal, and induction into the National Inventors Hall of Fame alongside Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell and the Wright brothers. In 2001 the Lemelson-MIT program bestowed its lifetime achievement award on Dr Damadian as “the man who invented the MRI scanner”. It is commonly recognized that he was discriminated against in not at least sharing a Nobel Prize for his work (two others shared the award), although Damadian was the discoverer that diseased tissue would have a different signal from healthy.’
  • Dr John Hartnett—developed the world’s most precise atomic clocks, which are used in research and industry around the globe. He is an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Outstanding Researcher Award (DORA) fellow at the University of Adelaide, where he is an Associate Professor. In his relatively short career, he has published more than 200 papers in scientific journals, book chapters, and conference proceedings.
  • Dr Raymond Jones—solved the major problem of the indigestibility of Leucaena (a tropical legume) for grazing cattle in Australia, among other achievements. This research has contributed hundreds of millions of dollars to the Australian beef industry. He was honored with the CSIRO Gold Medal for Research Excellence, and the Urrbrae Award.
  • Dr Felix Konotey-Ahulu—many pioneering contributions, especially in sickle cell disease management. He is Kwegyir Aggrey Distinguished Professor of Human Genetics, University of Cape Coast, Ghana, and Consultant Physician Genetic Counsellor in Sickle Cell and Other Haemoglobinopathies, Phoenix Hospital Group, London, UK. Ironically, sickle cell disease is often incorrectly held up as a ‘proof of evolution’ in science textbooks. Dr Konotey-Ahulu has received many awards in recognition of his work.
  • Dr John Sanford—has been granted over 30 patents arising from his research in plant breeding and genetics. His most significant scientific contributions involve three inventions, the biolistic (`gene gun’) process, pathogen-derived resistance, and genetic immunization. A large fraction of the transgenic crops (in terms of both numbers and area planted) grown in the world today were genetically engineered using the gene gun technology developed by John and his collaborators. Dr Sanford was honoured with the Distinguished Inventor Award by the Central New York Patent Law Association in 1990 and 1995)
  • Dr Wally (Siang Hwa) Tow—groundbreaking research in ‘molar pregnancy’, a poverty-related disease. He was invited to lecture in some fourteen top Obstetrics-Gynaecology departments in America in 1962-3, including leading universities such as Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Columbia, New York, UCLA, Cornell, and Stanford. He was awarded the William Blair Bell Lectureship by the RCOG in recognition of the importance of this work. He served as Professor and Chairman of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, National University of Singapore.

Don Batten, “Creationist Contributions to Science,” Creation 36(4):1 September 2014, 17-18. See also, creation bios.

Rep. Randy Forbes on Obama’s Military Cuts

Published by Papa Giorgio

Here is a quick audio of Dennis Prager going over Congressman Forbes points:

Dennis Prager reads from an article detailing Congressman Forbes’ assessment of our military readiness due to Obama’s cuts in military spending. Some stories on this issue:

★ Rep. Forbes Decries Cuts To Carrier Wings, Cruisers & UCLASS In Navy 2017 Budget, via Breaking Defense: http://tinyurl.com/grsstbo
★ Interview: Randy Forbes, in Defense News.

Here are two videos from Rep. Forbes (2010 and then 2016) speaking to these issues:

Weird Hobbies

Published by Papa Giorgio

A Yale University newspaper staff columnist, Adriana Miele, writes a crazy story about one of her hobbies… counting rapists at lunch. The article can be read here.

I suggest — for the curious — listening to Dennis Prager reading from Heather Mac Donald’s article in from The City Journal about the “rape culture.”

As usual, the left over-exaggerates… and what parent would put their daughter in AP classes to prepare them for the worse crime wave in human history, which is: one-in-five women are rapped at college. OBVIOUSLY the definition is the issue. Who would send their daughter to higher education? (The fact that parents enroll their kids in college prep courses and send em off to school reveals the myth in and of itself.) As society gets further away from Judeo-Christian norms… more-and-more regret will rear its head from drunken hook-ups.

Donald Trump’s Exceptional Failure

Published by Papa Giorgio

(See also my previous post on this)

…all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government… 

(Declaration of Independence)

An “authentic, fully American history and tradition” is lacking in Trump’s thinking. To wit, reading this article by Daniel Krauthammer titled, Without Exceptionalism, both lifted me up as-well-as saddened me. The article made my spirit sour because of the reinvigorated understanding of “what it means to be an American” by a young man while-at-the-same-time my heart sunk because of the state of the American people in nominating a complete scoundrel in all regards to the Grand Ol’ Party. What a roller-coaster ride that was! I will take Charles Krauthammer’s word for it that Daniel “has the sharpest, most brilliant mind, sharper than mine.” Without further adieu,  here is Michael Medved reading over and commenting on Daniel’s article:

The key point I see in Daniel’s piece is that Trump views markets, wealth, and ultimately America as a zero-sum game:

  • Trump’s world is a zero-sum game, and Trump’s America will start winning again only when everyone else starts losing. This simplistic thinking defies logic and basic economics. But it does appeal to a certain sense of American nationalism: that “we” as a collective need to rally around a strong leader who will make us once again richer and more powerful than everyone else. Why? Because we’re us and they’re them. This kind of nationalism, however, is completely unexceptional. The leaders of literally any other country on earth could—and often do—say the same thing to their people and appeal to the same nationalistic sentiments. There is nothing uniquely American about what Trump espouses. There is no American ideal or philosophy providing a moral reason for this national mission to “win.”The-Crimson-Permanent-Assurance

He shows an almost Keynsein propensity that manifests itself in trying to fit the American Soul into an Excel spreadsheet — viewing “what” we are… kinesthetically… at his deepest understanding [if that even applies to “The Donald”] depicting the United States as the “Crimson Permanent Assurance,” a (mostly) standalone short in Monty Python’s Meaning of Life about “a crew of aged accountants who throw off the yokes of their oppressors, take up the mantle of corporate piracy and set sail on the high seas of international finance.”

What a joke!

What an ass.

Every day I am more-and-more convinced in my decision to leave the Presidential choice BLANK come November. For the first time, since I started voting, I will not vote for the President of These United States. Bill Kristol is right when he says that we have 5-months ahead of us of watching GOP pundits (like Sean Hannity and others) “defending, apologizing for, and excusing” Donald Trump’s obvious zero-sum intelligence.

Good luck with that.

Idiocracy

Gay Patriot (CFA) writes in response to a question by yours-truly that he recognizes that “primary campaigns get nasty,” he adds that he also gets

that our last two elections were decided by Low Information Voters, and that these voters are not moved by, for example, a Scott Walker type who is a brilliant policy reformer but dishwater dull.  My concern is that if a candidate runs a campaign based on childish name-calling, outright lies, violent threats, and conspiracy theories and is rewarded with the presidency; not only will he govern likewise, but his strategy will become the template for all future campaigns. To me, it feels like the onset of Idiocracy.

If that is really where our culture is, then it doesn’t much matter who the president is.

I won’t be a part of it.

Amen to that! I won’t be either.

“America Guided by Wisdom”

(Click to Enlarge)

On the fore ground, Minerva, the goddess of Wisdom, is pointing to a shield, supported by the Genius of America, bearing the arms of the United States, with the motto UNION AND INDEPENDENCE, by which the country enjoys the prosperity signified by the horn of plenty at the feet of America. The second ground is occupied by a Triumphal Arch with the Equestrian Statue of WASHINGTON placed in front, indicating the progress of the liberal arts. On the third ground, Commerce is represented by the figure of Mercury, with one foot resting on bales of American manufactures, pointing out the advantages of encouraging and protecting Navigation, signified by an armed vessel under sail, to Ceres, who is seated with emplements of Agriculture near her. The Bee Hive is emblematic of industry; and the female spinning at the cottage door, shews the first and most useful of domestic manufactures.

~ Benjamin Tanner’s descriptive text.

The first black poet in America to publish a book, Poems on Various Subjects: Religious and Moral, spoke of this wisdom that guided one of our Founding Fathers in a poem entitled, “His Excellency General Washington.”

Just a small bio on this American gem before the poem:

  • Phillis Wheatley, the first African-American to publish a book of poetry, was probably born in 1753 or 1754, somewhere in western Africa. At roughly 7 years old, captured by [most likely Arab] slave-traders. She was considered too sickly for hard labor plantations in the Caribbean or Southern U.S. colonies, she became a domestic servant for the Wheatley family in Boston. Though they kept slaves, the Wheatley’s were relatively progressive; after witnessing Phillis copying the alphabet in chalk, instead of punishing her, they decided to cultivate her academic interests. During a period when some states outlawed teaching slaves to read, Phillis was studying Alexander Pope and John Milton. Actually, the education she received from the Wheatley’s was superior even to most Caucasian males’ schooling.

May I also add to History Bitches slightly adapted info above that Phillis was also steeped in the Bible. And being a poet she was well aware of “lady wisdom” in Proverbs. (A more complete bio of her is below):

Celestial choir! enthron’d in realms of light,
Columbia’s scenes of glorious toils I write.
While freedom’s cause her anxious breast alarms,
She flashes dreadful in refulgent arms.
See mother earth her offspring’s fate bemoan,
And nations gaze at scenes before unknown!
See the bright beams of heaven’s revolving light
Involved in sorrows and the veil of night!

The Goddess comes, she moves divinely fair,
Olive and laurel binds Her golden hair:
Wherever shines this native of the skies,
Unnumber’d charms and recent graces rise.

Muse! Bow propitious while my pen relates
How pour her armies through a thousand gates,
As when Eolus heaven’s fair face deforms,
Enwrapp’d in tempest and a night of storms;
Astonish’d ocean feels the wild uproar,
The refluent surges beat the sounding shore;
Or think as leaves in Autumn’s golden reign,
Such, and so many, moves the warrior’s train.
In bright array they seek the work of war,
Where high unfurl’d the ensign waves in air.
Shall I to Washington their praise recite?
Enough thou know’st them in the fields of fight.
Thee, first in peace and honors—we demand
The grace and glory of thy martial band.
Fam’d for thy valour, for thy virtues more,
Hear every tongue thy guardian aid implore!

One century scarce perform’d its destined round,
When Gallic powers Columbia’s fury found;
And so may you, whoever dares disgrace
The land of freedom’s heaven-defended race!
Fix’d are the eyes of nations on the scales,
For in their hopes Columbia’s arm prevails.
Anon Britannia droops the pensive head,
While round increase the rising hills of dead.
Ah! Cruel blindness to Columbia’s state!
Lament thy thirst of boundless power too late.

Proceed, great chief, with virtue on thy side,
Thy ev’ry action let the Goddess guide.
A crown, a mansion, and a throne that shine,
With gold unfading, WASHINGTON! Be thine.

Richard Gamble writes about this “exceptionalism” with a warning…

In 1765, John Adams unwittingly penned one of the proof texts of American exceptionalism. “I always consider the settlement of America with reverence and wonder,” the young lawyer wrote in his diary, “as the opening of a grand scene and design in Providence for the illumination of the ignorant and the emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the earth.”

[….]

In 1814, half a century after the publication of his Dissertation on Canon and Feudal Law, John Adams wrote to his Southern adversary John Taylor of Caroline. In the course of defending his constitutional principles, Adams issued a warning that the new exceptionalists will never quote, let alone heed: “We may boast that we are the chosen people; we may even thank God that we are not like other men; but, after all, it will be but flattery, and the delusion, the self-deceit of the Pharisee.”

A people, as surely as an individual, cannot stand in the presence of the world and congratulate itself on its unassailable virtue without leading itself into moral blindness and earning the contempt of others. Nothing about the American achievement is “placed beyond all possibility of failure,” as John Quincy Adams boasted. It would be fatal for a republic to entertain such presumption. There is nothing inevitable about our future, and no facile talk about exceptionalism will make it so. A history and a tradition—an authentic, fully American history and tradition—is available to us, but only if we turn away from the myths of the new exceptionalism.

(The American Conservative)

And so, goodbye…

…The past few days when I’ve been at that window upstairs, I’ve thought a bit of the ‘shining city upon a hill.’ The phrase comes from John Winthrop, who wrote it to describe the America he imagined. What he imagined was important because he was an early Pilgrim, an early freedom man. He journeyed here on what today we’d call a little wooden boat; and like the other Pilgrims, he was looking for a home that would be free. I’ve spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don’t know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That’s how I saw it, and see it still.

And how stands the city on this winter night? More prosperous, more secure, and happier than it was eight years ago. But more than that: After 200 years, two centuries, she still stands strong and true on the granite ridge, and her glow has held steady no matter what storm. And she’s still a beacon, still a magnet for all who must have freedom, for all the pilgrims from all the lost places who are hurtling through the darkness, toward home.

We’ve done our part. And as I walk off into the city streets, a final word to the men and women of the Reagan revolution, the men and women across America who for eight years did the work that brought America back. My friends: We did it. We weren’t just marking time. We made a difference. We made the city stronger, we made the city freer, and we left her in good hands. All in all, not bad, not bad at all.

And so, goodbye, God bless you, and God bless the United States of America.

(Reagan’s Farewell Speech) 

 

Phillis Wheatley

Phillis Wheatley was born in Senegal, Africa, in 1753. She was kidnapped at the age of eight and sent on a slave ship to Boston. Purchased by a prosperous Boston tailor, John Wheatley, she was trained as a personal servant for John’s wife, Susannah.

Phillis was quick and perceptive, and Susannah and her daughter Mary were drawn in a special manner to Phillis. Susannah considered Phillis a daughter, and Mary treated her like a sister. Both tutored her in the Scriptures and in morals, and within sixteen months Phillis had so mastered English that she was able to read the most difficult parts of the Bible with ease. Mary then taught Phillis astronomy, geography, ancient history, the Latin classics, and the English poets, all of which Phillis conquered with equal ease. Because of her aptitude for difficult knowledge and her ability as a brilliant conversationalist, Phillis was considered by the Bostonian intellectuals to be a child prodigy.

When she was only thirteen years old, Phillis wrote her first poetic verses; and then three years later, being an admirer of the celebrated Rev. George Whitefield, she authored a special poem about his life. This early interest in poetry continued for the rest of her life, and today Phillis is known as America’s first Black female poet.

In 1771, Phillis became a member of the famous Old South Church. It was later said that “her membership in Old South was an exception to the rule that slaves were not baptized into the church.”

In 1773, her health began to fail. A sea-voyage was recommended, and Mrs. Wheatley promptly saw to it that Phillis was manumitted (freed). Phillis traveled to England, where she was received by British royalty. While abroad, she published her first collection of poems, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral.

In 1775, while still abroad, and while the siege of Boston was underway in America, Phillis wrote a letter to the new Commander-in-Chief, General Washington, containing a special poem she had written for him:

His Excellency George Washington . . . Thee, first in place and honors, – we demand The grace and glory of thy martial band Fam’d for thy valor, for thy virtues more, Here every tongue thy guardian aid implore! . . . Proceed, great chief, with virtue on thy side, Thy every action let the goddess guide. A crown, a mansion, and a throne that shine, With gold unfading, Washington, be thine. . . .

Washington was touched by the poem; and when Phillis returned to America, Washington invited her to his military camp at Cambridge to honor her before his staff.

Phillis had returned to America when she had learned of the declining health of Mrs. Wheatley, who died shortly after her return. Phillis remained close to the family. She continued her writings and purposed to bring out a second volume of poems to be dedicated to Benjamin Franklin. Misfortune, however, intervened.

In 1778, Phillis married John Peters, a free Black. Although he appeared promising (he was a writer and had studied for the law), his character was deeply flawed: he was slothful, did not provide for his new wife, and failed to give her the care that her delicate health required. He also demanded that she isolate herself from her former friends and even required that she cut off all contact with the Wheatleys. Peters finally deserted Phillis.

Under these circumstances, and only five years after her marriage, Phillis died in obscurity at the age of 30, alone and in poverty, buried in an unmarked grave. Of her three children, two died in infancy, and the third was buried alongside her.

Despite the hardships in her life, Phillis never complained. In fact, she found a silver lining – or rather a Divine one – even in her tragic life of slavery. In her poem, “On Being Brought from Africa to America,” she wrote:

‘Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land Taught my benighted soul to understand That there’s a God, that there’s a Savior too: Once I redemption neither sought nor knew. Some view our fable race with scornful eye, “Their color is a diabolic dye.” Remember, Christians, Negroes black as Cain, May be refin’d, and join th’ angelic train.

Phillis’ poetry was popular for generations after her death, and she was considered a heroine by those who fought to end slavery. She remains a shining example of a devout Christian, an accomplished poet, and a gracious and kind woman.

(Wall Builders)