Curious about these new entities, the elementals asked why the gods were in the shape they were. "We are bipedal," Erebus said. "We wish to be distinguished from the animals." "What are animals?" an elemental asked. "We're not sure yet, but they will...
All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant."] The original Hebrew word that has been translated "paths" means "well-worn roads' or "wheel tracks," such ruts as wagons make when they go down our green roads in wet wea...
As is well known, the priests are the most evil enemies—but why? Because they are the most impotent. It is because of their impotence that in them hatred grows to monstrous and uncanny proportions, to the most spiritual and poisonous kind of hatred...
We all like to think the world ends when we do. The truth is our acquaintances, our friends, and our loved ones all live on, and through them, so do we. It's not about what you had, but what you gave. It's not about how you looked, but how you lived....
Picture a girl with her arms full of small packages, too many to hold all at once. When they topple and fall all around her, she stoops down and scoops them all back up, literally re-collecting all the gifts that are already hers. To set your mind is...
So,' he said. 'What do you think of it?' She twisted towards the fire and watched the flames behind the blackened furnace door. 'When I hear a piece like that,' she said, 'I find it hard to believe that there isn't something more than this.' She wave...
We have reached the end of the road that is built on the set of traits held out for male identity--advance at any cost, pay any price, drive out all competitors, and kill them if necessary.... we have arrived at a point from which we must seek a basi...
There's a reason caveman started to develop sophisticated tools before the meteor wiped them all out: It's so they could fucking shave. Do you know how frustrating it must have been to be hunched over all night trying to start a fire only to finally ...
The tales of pure terror, of course, are completely naturalistic in their content, and must stand or fall by their merit alone. But what about the supernatural stories? Can we, the children of a scientific age, give any credence to these medleys of d...
Group membership can modify individuals' perceptions of themselves. Unable to separate their personal introspection from the ways they believe other people perceive them, teenagers may have what psychologists call an "imaginary audience", meaning tha...
The blazing sun beat down on the concrete of the museum's front yard- Reverend Ryu Yosop felt as if the heat were sucking up all the moisture in his brain and heart. What different colors he and his brother Yohan must have used as each of them painte...
How sad it was, Carmen thought, that you acted awful when you were desperately sad and hurt and wanted to be loved. How tragic then, the way everyone avoided you and tiptoed around you when you really needed them. Carmen knew this vicious predicament...
In the meantime, when he went on his way back, the seed had grown into a tree which reached up to the sky. Then thought the peasant, 'As thou hast the chance, thou must just see what the angels are doing up there above, and for once have them before ...
And the answer is: You are wrong. The Faeries are not gone. But they are no longer what they were. I watched it and did not help them, though I could have. I cheered. I cheered and I wept and I was glad. Perhaps I should not have been. Perhaps laughi...
Jacob wrote that the true poet ‘is like a man who is happy anywhere, in endless measure, if he is allowed to look at leaves and grass, to see the sun rise and set. The false poet travels abroad in strange countries and hopes to be uplifted by the m...
Melville, by his own account, spent four months in the valley. He was well treated. He made friends with a girl called Fayaway, swam and boated with her, and except for his fear of being eaten was happy enough.
A sort of animals, to whose share, [...] some small pittance of reason had fallen, whereof we made no other use, than to aggravate our natural corruptions, and to acquire new ones, which nature had not given us; that we disarmed ourselves of the few ...
Charles is going to be fine," said Annie. "Yep," said Jack with a smile. "He never even knew that it was us who helped him." "That's the best way to help someone, I think," said Annie. "Why?" asked Jack. "Then you know you're not helping them just to...
We ran into lots of old friends. Friends from elementary school, junior high school, high school. Everyone had matured in their own way, and even as we stood face to face with them they seemed like people from dreams, sudden glimpses through the fenc...
Sometimes stories get on my nerves--especially the ones where unfair things keep happening to the hero over and over, for no reason at all, and he valiantly overcomes it all. Life isn't like that. Not every hero can stay valiant. Sometimes, they can'...
Technology isn’t what makes us “post-human” or “transhuman,” as some writers and scholars have recently suggested. It’s what makes us human. Technology is in our nature. Through our tools we give our dreams form. We bring them into the wo...