Above Suspicion Quotes

We often hear of someone saying, 'So you don't trust me' or 'Are you questioning my integrity?' or 'You don't believe me.' They get defensive and angry because someone questions their actions, and they think they are above being questioned or having to prove their trustworthiness. But none of us is above questioning. ~ Henry Cloud

There is a great deal of hard lying in the world; especially among people whose characters are above suspicion. ~ Benjamin Jowett

The Catholic Church wants to see child abuse by priests and nuns as simply an issue of some very bad priests and nuns. What it needs to understand is that the nature of religion compounded the problem. It allowed priests to have a status that placed them above suspicion. It fostered a myth that celibacy meant purity. It had schools that enforced authority by beating children and taught that authority figures should not be questioned. Men like Smyth and Steele will have understood the esteem in which priests were held and seen themselves as untouchable. They had every reason to, as the Catholic Church did a great deal to defend and enable them. ~ Noel McGivern

A man's grammar, like Caesar's wife, should not only be pure, but above suspicion of impurity. ~ Edgar Allan Poe

ever since that time of unbound paranoia the one unbreakable law of the British secret services has been: Thou shalt not snoop on Number Ten. Because we are not in the business of generating policy - it's not a task for which agencies like ours are suited, and in those countries where spooks set policy, it always ends in tears. We vet politicians on the way up - that's an entirely different matter - but by the time they're moving into Number Ten they should already be above suspicion; if they aren't, we haven't been doing our job properly. And ~ Charles Stross

Caesar's wife should be above suspicion. ~ Plutarch

At least, if your will is as you say, it proves definitively that I couldn't be the murderer." Nick put on an exaggerated expression of relief. "I was beginning to worry."
"I'm happy to set your mind at ease, Nick, old boy, but I must admit I've long held you above suspicion in this case."
"Really?"
"Oh, by all means. Obviously our murderer is of superior intelligence and nerve. I ruled you out from the start. ~ Julianna Deering

The Gospels were written in such temporal and geographical proximity to the events they record that it would have been almost impossible to fabricate events. Anyone who cared to could have checked out the accuracy of what they reported. The fact that the disciples were able to proclaim the resurrection in Jerusalem in the face of their enemies a few weeks after the crucifixion shows that what they proclaimed was true, for they could never have proclaimed the resurrection under such circumstances had it not occurred.

The Gospels could not have been corrupted without a great outcry on the part of orthodox Christians. Against the idea that there could have been a deliberate falsifying of the text, no one could have corrupted all the manuscripts. Moreover, there is no precise time when the falsification could have occurred, since, as we have seen, the New Testament books are cited by the church fathers in regular and close succession. The text could not have been falsified before all external testimony, since then the apostles were still alive and could repudiate any such tampering with the Gospels.

The miracles of Jesus were witnessed by hundreds of people, friends and enemies alike; that the apostles had the ability to testify accurately to what they saw; that the apostles were of such doubtless honesty and sincerity as to place them above suspicion of fraud; that the apostles, though of low estate, nevertheless had comfort and life itself to lose in pro ~ William Lane Craig

Communism everywhere has paid the price of rigidity and dogmatism. Freedom has the strength of compassion and flexibility. It has, above all, the strength of intellectual honesty. ~ Robert Kennedy

What a strange fellowship this is, the God seekers in every land, lifting their voices in the most disparate ways imaginable to the God of all life. How does it sound from above? Like bedlam, or do the strains blend in strange ethereal harmony? Does one faith carry the lead or do the parts share in counterpoint and antiphony where not in full throated chorus?
We cannot know. All we can do is to listen carefully and with full attention to each voice in turn as it addresses the divine. ~ Huston Smith

No great stars above her. Only a blackness that hurt to look at. Had the distant suns abandoned their birthplace? Earth was dying and the stars were gone like adulterous celestial lovers seeking a new terrestrial mate. She did not blame them. We were never worth shining for, she thought. ~ C.J. Anderson

The supposed "secular" values atheists hold dear are in fact borrowed Christian values. Our society is respectful of any creed, or lack thereof, not because it embraces an illusory, non-existent secular morality, but because it is rooted in Christian faith. Christopher Dawson noted that "we cannot understand the inner form of a society unless we understand its religion." Because moral values are always a religious product, and Western moral values are a product of Christianity. Our values, what we believe has a value beyond and above our self-interest, are grounded in religious faith or are not grounded at all. ~ Giorgio Roversi

His righteousness rises above the sins of all men; His life is more powerful than all death; His salvation is more unconquerable than all hell. ~ Martin Luther

You cannot be too gentle, too kind. Shun even to appear harsh in your treatment of each other. Joy, radiant joy, streams from the face of him who gives and kindles joy in the heart of him who receives. All condemnation is from the devil. Never condemn each other. We condemn others only because we shun knowing ourselves. When we gaze at our own failings, we see such a swamp that nothing in another can equal it. That is why we turn away, and make much of the faults of others. Instead of condemning others, strive to reach inner peace. Keep silent, refrain from judgement. This will raise you above the deadly arrows of slander, insult and outrage and will shield your glowing hearts against all evil. ~ Seraphim Of Sarov

I find every sect, as far as reason will help them, make use of it gladly: and where it fails them, they cry out, It is a matter of faith, and above reason. ~ John Locke

I've viewed myself as slightly above average in talent. And where I excel is ridiculous, sickening work ethic. ~ Will Smith

Jordan loomed over her and a flash of light blinded her momentarily. The knife. Shane felt her newfound courage faltering, felt herself falling back through the years, into the body of that little girl.
No.
She closed her eyes, pictured Matt's face, Gram's face, and felt her strength returning. She would not let Jordan terrify her again. She might fail tonight, she might die, but she would not be his whimpering victim.
Opening her eyes, she braved the flashing glare of the hunting knife he held above her face. She willed her body to lie still as she stared straight into his eyes. With a thrill of triumph, she saw the surprise in the gray eyes that stared back at her.
Neither of them spoke a word, but they both knew the final moves in the game were at hand, and that Shane had just altered the rules. She could see the dawn of awareness in his eyes: She was no longer a mere pawn to toy with as he pleased.
On the other hand, he still had the knife. ~ Jane Taylor Starwood

On August 10, 1984, my plane landed in Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan. There were no skyscrapers here. The blue domes of the mosques and the faded mountains were the only things rising above the adobe duvals (the houses). The mosques came alive in the evening with multivoiced wailing: the mullahs were calling the faithful to evening prayer. It was such an unusual spectacle that, in the beginning, I used to leave the barracks to listen – the same way that, in Russia, on spring nights, people go outside to listen to the nightingales sing. For me, a nineteen-year-old boy who had lived his whole life in Leningrad, everything about Kabul was exotic: enormous skies – uncommonly starry – occasionally punctured by the blazing lines of tracers. And spread out before you, the mysterious Asian capital where strange people were bustling about like ants on an anthill: bearded men, faces darkend by the sun, in solid-colored wide cotton trousers and long shirts. Their modern jackets, worn over those outfits, looked completely unnatural. And women, hidden under plain dull garments that covered them from head to toe: only their hands visible, holding bulging shopping bags, and their feet, in worn-out shoes or sneakers, sticking out from under the hems.

And somewhere between this odd city and the deep black southern sky, the wailing, beautifully incomprehensible songs of the mullahs. The sounds didn't contradict each other, but rather, in a polyphonic echo, melted away among the ~ Vladislav Tamarov

Don't live in the world as if you were renting or here only for the summer, but act as if it was your father's house ... Believe in seeds, earth, and the sea, but people above all. Love clouds, machines, and books, but people above all. Nazim Hikmet, 20th century Turkish poet ~ Nahid Rachlin

A man's truest self realizations might require him, above all, to learn to close his eyes: to let himself be taken unawares, to follow his dark angel, to risk his illegal instincts. ~ Jean Cocteau

Human material seems to have one major defect: it does not like to be considered merely as human material. It finds it hard to endure the feeling that it must resign itself to passive acceptance of changes introduced from above. ~ Czeslaw Milosz

Peridots and periwinkle blue medallions
Gilded galleons spilled across the ocean floor
Treasure somewhere in the sea and he will find where
Never mind the questions there's no answer for
The roll of the harbor wake
The songs that the rigging makes
The taste of the spray he takes
And he learns to give
He aches and he learns to live
He stakes all his silver
On a promise to be free
Mermaids live in colonies
All his sea dreams come to me

City satins left at home I will not need them
I believe him when he tells of loving me
Something truthful in the sea all lies will find you
Leave behind your streets he said and come to me
Come down from the neon lights
Come down from the tourist sights
Run down till the rain delights
You do not hide
Sunlight will renew your pride
Skin white by skin golden
Like a promise to be free
Dolphins playing in the sea
All his sea dreams come to me

Seabird I have seen you fly above the pilings
I am smiling at your circles in the air
I will come and sit by you while he lies sleeping
Fold your fleet wings I have brought some dreams to share
A dream that you love someone
A dream that the wars are done
A dream that you tell no one but the gray sea
They'll say that you're crazy
And a dream of a baby
Like a promise to be free
Children laughing out to sea
All his sea dr ~ Joni Mitchell

Above and beyond all else it must be borne in mind that hatred tends to dry up the springs of creative thought in the life of the hater, so that his resourcefulness becomes completely focused on the negative aspects of his environment. The urgent needs of the personality for creative expression are starved to death. A man's horizon may become so completely dominated by the intense character of his hatred that there remains no creative residue in his mind and spirit to give to great ideas, to great concepts. ~ Howard Thurman

Above the sink in the scratched mirror he looked grubby and bloated, his beard a grizzled mess. He knew what these men could never know: A man is who he is. That doesn't change. A thief is a thief. A bad man stays a bad man underneath. He'd been set at seventeen. "You want to end ~ Rae Meadows

Know this...GOD IS BIGGER, than anything you're going through, trust him...KEEP YOUR TRUST IN HIM" -Gary Linville

"I don't pretend to know what love is for everyone, but I can tell you what love is for me; love is knowing all about someone, and still wanting to be with them more than any other person, love is trusting them enough to tell them everything about yourself, including the things you might be ashamed of, love is feeling comfortable and safe with someone, but still getting weak knees when they walk into a room and smile at you."

"Prayer makes the darkened cloud withdraw,
Prayer climbs the ladder Jacob saw;
Gives exercise to faith and love,
Brings every blessing from above."

Nahum 1:7, "The Lord is good, a strong refuge when trouble comes. He is close to those who trust in him."

"be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace."
♥ Ephesians 4:2-3

"the truth is, everyone is going to hurt you. you just got to find the ones worth suffering for." ― Bob Marley

"The thing about the shadows is that they're not all darkness. You need to have light to have shadows"
- A. Meredith Walters "Light in the Shadows" (Find You in the Dark #2) ~ Muliple

It was a vast emptiness vastly filled, a nothing that found room for everything -- room for grass, trees, shadowy distant hills, and far above them snow-peaks like a row of angular clouds riding the blue sky . I had lost a head and gained a world. ~ Douglas Harding

She's fifteen, above the age of consent, and he's seventeen, but he's still "the boy" in every conversation. She's "the young woman".

Words are not small things. ~ Fredrik Backman

All day, the colours had been those of dusk, mist moving like a water creature across the great flanks of mountains possessed of ocean shadows and depths. Briefly visible above the vapour, Kanchenjunga was a far peak whittled out of ice, gathering the last of the night, a plume of snow blown high by the storms at its summit.
Sai, sitting on the veranda, was reading an article about giant squid in an old National Geographic. Every now and then she looked up at Kanchenjunga, observed its wizard phosphorescence with a shiver. The judge sat at the far corner with his chessboard, playing against himself. Stuffed under his chair where she felt safe was Mutt the dog, snoring gently in her sleep. A single bald lightbulb dangled on a wire above. It was cold, but inside the house, it was still colder, the dark, the freeze, contained by stone walls several feet deep. ~ Kiran Desai

I sighed, sinking back, head filling with pleasant images; pictures Pietr floated to the surface. Kisses scorched along my face and neck. "Pietr ... "
There was a growl, and I felt fingers at the waistband of my jeans. The button opened and a hand traced along the top of my underpants.
"No," I said. The kissing resumed, harder. "Jessica." The word rumbled in someone's throat. Not Pietr's. To him, I was Jess.
"No," I insisted, trying to pry my eyes open. Something was wrong ... Not Pietr ... I pushed at the chest above me, my eyelids stinging as I willed them apart.
"Relax ... " a voice said, lips dragging along the cornerof my jaw, filling my head with honey, sticky and sweet ... ~ Shannon Delany

The first is the Credo quia absurdum of the early Father. It would imply that religious doctrines are outside reason's jurisdiction; they stand above reason. Their truth must be inwardly felt: one does not need to comprehend them. ~ Sigmund Freud

I gazed back up the dome of the heavens painted on the ceiling above. It was only then that I noticed somethings else in the painted sky, directly above the bed. The sun, moon and stars were positioned in swirls around some object in the centre, like angels clustered round the throne of God. But this was no throne, nor was it God. [Vincent] ~ Karen Maitland

I cherish the creation of public space and services, especially health, housing and the comprehensive education system which dared to give so many of us ideas 'above our station.' ~ Frances O'Grady

She grabbed her briefcase and took a step toward him. "You don't have a last name?"
"Everyone has a last name." His hand hovered in the air, waiting. He was forcing her to cross the marble floor to meet him, and like a Luna moth drawn to a midnight moon, she drifted toward him.
When she reached him, she took his hand and looked up into his face. "Is it Jones? Smith? Or Brown?"
His lips twitched. "None of the above."
"And you won't tell me?"
"It's not necessary information."
She tilted her head, studying his angular features. "You don't look like an Adrian."
His smile broadened. "Imagine that."
"More like a Carlos, or a Juan, or a Diego."
"Those are Hispanic names."
"Aren't you Hispanic?"
"I'm anything you want me to be. ~ Shelby Reed

The camel is an ugly animal, seen from above. Its shoulders slope formless like a sack, its silly little ears and fluff of bleached curls behind them have a respectable, boarding-house look, like some faded neatness that dresses for propriety but never dressed for love. ~ Freya Stark

You should open these doors with care and caution-but, first, you must know how to close them. And above all, you must know which doors should be left unopened ... ~ Michael Bentine

The septons were always going on about how the Father Above judges us all. If the Father would be so good as to topple over and crush Joff like a dung beetle, I might even believe it. ~ George R R Martin

You ought to know how to rise above the trivialities of life, in which most people are found drowning themselves. ~ D.T. Suzuki

I remeber asking a wise man, once ... 'Why do Men fear the dark?' ... 'Because darkness' he told me, 'is ignorance made visable.' 'And do Men despise ignorance?' I asked. 'No,' he said, 'they prize it above all things
all things!
but only so long as it remains invisible. ~ R. Scott Bakker

The doctrine of Relativity is carried to a fallacious pitch, when applied to prove that there must be something absolute, because the Relative must suppose the non- Relative. If there be Relation, it is said, there must be something Un-related, or above all relation. But Relation cannot in this way, be brought round on itself, except by a verbal juggle. Relation means that every conscious state has a correlative state ; which brings us at last to a couple (the subject-mind, and the object or extended world). This is the final end of all possible cognition. We may view the two facts separately or together; and we may call the conjunct view an Absolute (as Ferrier does), but this adds nothing to our knowledge. A self-contradiction is committed by inferring from * everything is relative,' that * something is non-relative.'

Fallacies of Relativity often arise in the hyperboles of Rhetoric. In order to reconcile to their lot the more humble class of manual labourers, the rhetorician proclaims the dignity of all labour, without being conscious that if all labour is dignified, none is ; dignity supposes inferior grades ; a mountain height is abolished if all the surrounding plains are raised to the level of its highest peak. So, in spurring men to industry and perseverance, examples of distinguished success are held up for universal imitation ; while, in fact, these cases owe their distinction to the general backwardness. ~ Alexander Bain

I wanna run through the halls of my high school, I wanna scream at the top of my lungs. I just found out there's no such thing as the real world, just a lie you've got to rise above. ~ John Mayer

In the shores of twilight,
Wide and deep as your eyes,
I swim.
In a way, I feel her

Night, a crowned goddess commanding the stars to swim,
So peaceful, even death escapes into serenity.
Stars so far, they seem as they tell the living world,
lights, live into shinning, die into nothingness.
Worlds I want to travel, away to shadows of your eyes in the hold of your lips.
So far, so far away....
As your kiss, as my lover.

Night,
With a soft touch,
Touches my face, winds to the trees, sunlight on grass, life, breath, so quite, death screams in the abyss, a black pearl with grains of sand.

The dance of the night..reminds me of her.
Her tender laughter, the gleam in her
enormous eyes, her soft whirlpool lips.
As a reflection from dark streams,
She reveals hot love,
Nothing hidden, no shame,
just love that hurts.
The solace in the night makes me cry...
The lights of stars as arrows to me.

Night,
Hits my eyes,
Beauty of the wilderness,
Calling me,
Homeless in a city, naked on cold steel
At home with the sea,
with night above,
foam of waters breaks below.
As my companion,
friend I speak to.
I say to the night sky.
Does she love me?
When travels of the heart goes outside of me, outside the seas into clouds of your warmth,
To another place in her heart tryin ~ Albert Alexander Bukoski

One definition occurred to both of them - that he had come out into the light of that lucid and radiant ignorance in which all beliefs had begun. The sky above them was full of mythology. Heaven seemed deep enough to hold all the gods. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Nothing but blackness above And nothing that moves but the cars ... God, if you wish for our love, Fling us a handful of stars! ~ Louis Untermeyer

The two Mast Houses just within the Victory Gate of Portsmouth Dockyard are raised above the water on piloti. They are structures of remarkable grace, clinker-built, painted the palest green. They are vast, as they needed to be. Their survival is an industrial site devoted for a century to the servicing of mastless vessels is a matter for celebration. The use of which the more southerly is put is a matter for obloquy: the Mary Rose Shop is a repository of tawdry, insipid tat. It's the sort of stuff to make me wince- a dismal, timid inventory of mediocrity. Bad taste is forgivable. It's no taste which is so disheartening. ~ Jonathan Meades

Men seek retreats for themselves, houses in the country, sea-shores, and mountains; and thou too art wont to desire such things very much. But this is altogether a mark of the most common sort of men, for it is in thy power whenever thou shalt choose to retire into thyself. For nowhere either with more quiet or more freedom from trouble does a man retire than into his own soul, particularly when he has within him such thoughts that by looking into them he is immediately in perfect tranquility; and I affirm that tranquility is nothing else than the good ordering of the mind. Constantly then give to thyself this retreat, and renew thyself; and let thy principles be brief and fundamental, which, as soon as thou shalt recur to them, will be sufficient to cleanse the soul completely, and to send thee back free from all discontent with the things to which thou returnest. For with what art thou discontented? With the badness of men? Recall to thy mind this conclusion, that rational animals exist for one another, and that to endure is a part of justice, and that men do wrong involuntarily; and consider how many already, after mutual enmity, suspicion, hatred, and fighting, have been stretched dead, reduced to ashes; and be quiet at last.- But perhaps thou art dissatisfied with that which is assigned to thee out of the universe.- Recall to thy recollection this alternative; either there is providence or atoms, fortuitous concurrence of things; or remember the arguments by which it has ~ Marcus Aurelius