Reconcile Quotes

Everything about me is a contradiction, and so is everything about everybody else. We are made out of oppositions; we live between two poles. There's a philistine and an aesthete in all of us, and a murderer and a saint. You don't reconcile the poles. You just recognize them. ~ Orson Welles

Once I look at the story of the prodigal son with the eyes of faith, the "return" of the prodigal becomes the return of the Son of God who has drawn all people into himself and brings them home to his heavenly Father. As Paul says: "God wanted all fullness to be found in him and through him to reconcile all things to him, everything in heaven and everything on earth. ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

They always mean beautiful things like hummingbirds. I always reply by saying that I think of a little child in east Africa with a worm burrowing through his eyeball. The worm cannot live in any other way, except by burrowing through eyeballs. I find that hard to reconcile with the notion of a divine and benevolent creator. ~ David Attenborough

She is so beautiful she is unnatural; her beauty is an abnormality, a deformity, for none of her features exhibit any of those touching imperfections that reconcile us to the imperfection of the human condition. ~ Angela Carter

A student asked to his master: "You teach me fighting but you talk about peace. How do you reconcile the two?"

The master replied: " It's better to be warrior in garden than to be a gardener in war. ~ Zen Master

Settle down and be Good forever. Find the hardest things to accept in me, and reconcile what I am with what I hope to be. ~ Jen Wang

Though no participator in the joy of more vehement sport, I have a pleasure that I cannot reconcile to my abstract notions of the tenderness due to dumb creatures in the tranquil cruelty of angling. I can only palliate the wanton destructiveness of my amusement by trying to assure myself that my pleasure does not spring from the success of the treachery I practise toward a poor little fish, but rather from that innocent revelry in the luxuriance of summer life which only anglers enjoy to the utmost. ~ Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

There is hardly any personal defect which an agreeable manner might not gradually reconcile one to. ~ Jane Austen

Much of my work in this period was concerned with exploring the logic of economic models, but also with attempting to reconcile the models with every day observation. ~ Joseph Stiglitz

14 For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15 by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. ~ Anonymous

If the people in a relationship were able to get rid of this torment within and replace it with happiness, love, and a sense of well-being, they would never think to hurt another human being. They would be filled with an understanding of others and an appreciation of others and have an ability to reconcile differences without any violence whatsoever, to reconcile differences in a very loving way, a very happy way. ~ David Lynch

The international manager reconciles cultural dilemmas ~ Fons Trompenaars

I think they'd barely recognize us as brothers and sisters. If we told them, church is on Sundays, and we have an awesome band...if the found out 1/6th of the earth's population claimed to be Christians, I'm not sure they could reconcile the suffering happening on our watch while we're living in excess...

But listen, early church, we have a monthly event called 'Mocha chicks', we have choir practice every Wednesday, we organize retreats with door prizes, we're raising $3 million for an outdoor amphitheater, we have catchy t-shirts, we don't smoke or say the f-word, we go to bible study every semester...

the local church would be the heartbeat of the city. ~ Jen Hatmaker

To be human and to be adult means constantly to be in the grip of opposing emotions, to have daily to reconcile apparently conflicting tensions. I want this, but need that. I cherish this, but I adore its opposite too. ~ Stephen Fry

We all have at least two sides. The world we live in is a world of opposites. And the trick is to reconcile those opposing things. I've always liked both sides. In order to appreciate one you have to know the other. The more darkness you can gather up, the more light you can see too. ~ David Lynch

Forks and spoons have probably done more to reconcile people who cannot agree than guns and bombs ever did ~ Theodore Zeldin

God give me patience, to reconcile with what I am not able to change
Give me strength to change what I can
And give me wisdom to distinguish one from another. ~ Marcus Aurelius

When two texts, or two assertions, perhaps two ideas, are in contradiction, be ready to reconcile them rather than cancel one by the other; regard them as two different facets, or two successive stages, of the same reality, a reality convincingly human just because it is too complex. ~ Marguerite Yourcenar

If we are going to solve the challenges we face, you need a President who will pursue genuine solutions day in and day out. And that is my commitment to you. We need immigration reform that will secure our borders, and punish employers who exploit immigrant labor; reform that finally brings the 12 million people who are here illegally out of the shadows by requiring them to take steps to become legal citizens. We must assert our values and reconcile our principles as a nation of immigrants and a nation of laws. That is a priority I will pursue from my very first day. ~ Barack Obama

To me, a king is a lighthouse. A guide who can cast his glow across his kingdom and bring every last one of us out of the shadows. A beacon who we can look up to when the world seems lost. A bridge who can unite us when our differences seem to stark to reconcile. Tonight, we need a king who is all of those things. A king who can look each of you in the eye and make you feel that you won't just fight for him or his kingdom, but you'll fight for our way of life. ~ Soman Chainani

This, after all, is the literal level on which the incident took place. She asked him to hit her and when he said he didn't want to, she wanted to stop having sex. So why, despite its factual accuracy, does this feel like a dishonest way of narrating what happened? What is the missing element, the excluded part of the story that explains what upset them both? It has something to do with their history, he knows that. Ever since school he has understood his power over her. How she responds to his look or the touch of his hand. The way her face colours, and she goes still as if awaiting some spoken order. His effortless tyranny over someone who seems, to other people, so invulnerable. He has never been able to reconcile himself to the idea of losing this hold over her, like a key to an empty property, left available for future use. In fact he has cultivated it, and he knows he has.
What's left for them, then? There doesn't seem to be a halfway position anymore. Too much has passed between them for that. So it's over, and they're just nothing? What would it even mean, to be nothing to her? He could avoid her, but as soon as he saw her again, even if they only glanced at one another outside a lecture hall, the glance could not contain nothing. He could never really want it to. He has sincerely wanted to die, but he has never sincerely wanted Marianne to forget about him. That's the only part of himself he wants to protect, the part that exists inside her. ~ Sally Rooney

Okay? It's okay! Don't worry about it! Just chill out! You don't have to feel like you're suffering just because your life is unfortunate, you don't have to sulk just because your life hasn't been blessed! What's wrong with staying positive in the face of adversity? You know what? What you're going to do after this is go home looking like nothing ever happened! Live the same old life with your father and mother who are out of the hospital now! You'll never be able to reconcile with either of them, I guarantee that! Even if you somehow beat the odds and become happy someday, it's not going to matter, because no matter how happy you are, it's never going to erase your crappy past! You can't pretend it never happened, you're going to be dragging it around with you! No matter what you do, no matter what happens, that misfortune is going to sit in your heart forever! You'll remember it just when you think you forgot, you'll dream about it for the rest of your life! We are going to have nightmares for the rest of our lives! That's how it's going to be-and since there's nothing you can do about it, don't try to look away! Playing a prank on some random passerby, playing streaker in your underwear is just going to take a tiny bit of stress off your mind, in reality it's not going to change a thing! ~ NisiOisiN

One cannot live from one day into the next without changing. It is the nature of life. Small choices are always necessary even when large ones do not loom. I will change what I choose to change and retain what I choose to retain. I will even listen to advice since it is foolish not to, provided the adviser has something of value to say. But I will not choose between Anna and Lady Anastasia, for I am both. I merely have to decide, one choice at a time, how I will somehow reconcile the two without rejecting either. ~ Mary Balogh

In our mental outlook we have to reconcile ourselves to the fact of sin as the only explanation as to why Jesus Christ came, and the explanation of the grief and sorrow in life. ~ Oswald Chambers

Only music clarifies, reconciles, and consoles. But it is not a straw just barely clutched at. It is a faithful friend, protector, and comforter, and for its sake alone, life in this world is worth living. Who knows, perhaps in heaven there will be no music. So let us live on the earth while we still have life! ~ Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

People try to reconcile you to a disappointment in love by asking why you should cherish a passion for an object that has proved itself worthless. Had you known this before, you would not have encouraged the passion; but that having been once formed, knowledge does not destroy it. If we have drank poison, finding it out does not prevent its being in our veins: so passion leaves its poison in the mind! ~ William Hazlitt

Ner'zhul... Gul'dan. Two of the darkest names ever to sully the history of my people. And yet, Drek'thar tells me that once Ner'zhul was admired, even beloved, and truly cared for the people whos spiritual leader he was. It is hard to reconcile those words with what Ner'zhul has become, but I try. I try because I want to understand.
And yet, try as I might... I do not. ~ Christie Golden

It's difficult to reconcile the fantastic with reality; hard to accept that things we can't see exist - terrifying, in fact. ~ Mary Lindsey

We may reconcile ourselves to the world at our peril, but it will never reconcile itself to us ... This unwillingness to die, doth actually impeach us of high treason against the Lord : is it not a choosing of earth before him ; and taking these present things for our happiness, and consequently asking them our very God (469)? ~ Richard Baxter

The harmony of the universe knows only one musical form - the legato; while the symphony of number knows only its opposite - the staccato. All attempts to reconcile this discrepancy are based on the hope that an accelerated staccato may appear to our senses as a legato. ~ Tobias Dantzig

It takes a long while for a naturally trustful person to reconcile himself to the idea that after all God will not help him ~ H.L. Mencken

What can a meaning outside my condition mean to me? I can understand only in human terms. What I touch, what resists me
that is what I understand. And these two certainties
my appetite for the absolute and for unity and the impossibility of reducing this world to a rational and reasonable principle
I also know that I cannot reconcile them. What other truth can I admit without lying, without bringing in a hope which I lack and which means nothing within the limits of my condition? ~ Albert Camus

Even the highest forms of sacrificial worship present much that is repulsive to modern ideas, and in particular it requires an effort to reconcile our imagination to the bloody ritual which is prominent in almost every religion which has a strong sense of sin. ~ William Robertson Smith

For me, therapy is partly translation therapy, the talking cure a second-language cure. My going to a shrink is, among other things, a rite of initiation: initiation into the language of the subculture within which I happen to live, into a way of explaining myself to myself. But gradually, it becomes a project of translating backward.
The way to jump over my Great Divine is to crawl backward over it in English. It's only when I retell my whole story, back to the beginning, and from the beginning onward, in one language, that I can reconcile the voices within me with each other; it is only then that the person who judges the voices and tells the stories begins to emerge. ~ Eva Hoffman

White supremacy, over time, became a religion of sorts. Faith in the idea that people of the African race were bestial, that whites were inherently superior, and that slavery was, in fact, for black's own good, served to alleviate the white conscience and reconcile the tension between slavery and the democratic ideals espoused by whites in the so-called New World. There was no contradiction in the bold claim made by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence that 'all men are created equal' if Africans were not really people. ~ Michelle Alexander

At any rate', said I, 'we can now state the problem accurately. People usually think the problem is how to reconcile what we now know about the size of the universe with our traditional ideas of religion. That turns out not to be the problem at all. The real problem is this. The enormous size of the universe and the insignificance of the earth were known for centuries, and no one ever dreamed that they had any bearing on the religious question. Then, less than a hundred years ago, they are suddenly trotted out as an argument against Christianity. And the people who trot them out carefully hush up the fact that they were known long ago. Don't you think that all you atheists are strangely unsuspicious people? ~ C.S. Lewis

I believe that all great art holds the power to dissolve things: time, distance, difference, injustice, alienation, despair. I believe that all great art holds the power to mend things: join, comfort, inspire hope in fellowship, reconcile us to our selves. Art is good for my soul precisely because it reminds me that we have souls in the first place. ~ Tilda Swinton

To our betters eve can reconcile ourselves, if you please
respecting them sincerely, laughing at their jokes, making allowance for their stupidities, meekly suffering their insolence; but we can't pardon our equals going beyond us. ~ William Makepeace Thackeray

Reconciliation is a deep practice that we can do with our listening and our mindful speech. To reconcile means to bring peace and happiness to nations, people, and members of our family ... In order to reconcile, you have to possess the art of deep listening. ~ Nhat Hanh

When a relationship of love is disrupted, the relationship does not cease. The love continues; therefore, the relationship continues. The work of grief is to reconcile and redeem life to a different love relationship. ~ W. Scott Lineberry

I feel so much the continual death of everything and everybody, and have so learned to reconcile myself to it, that the final and official end loses most of its impressiveness. ~ George Santayana

Through metaphor to reconcile the people and the stones. ~ William Carlos Williams

The uncommon abilities and fortune of Severus have induced an elegant historian to compare him with the first and greatest of the Caesars. The parallel is, at least, imperfect. Where shall we find, in the character of Severus, the commanding superiority of the soul, the generous clemency, and the various genius, which could reconcile and unite the love of pleasure, the thirst of knowledge, and the fire of ambition? ⁴⁴

⁴⁴ Though it is not, most assuredly, the intention of Lucan to exalt the character of Caesar, yet the idea he gives of that hero, in the tenth book of the Pharsalia, where he describes him, at the same time making love to Cleopatra, sustaining a siege against the power of Egypt, and conversing with the sages of the country, is, in reality, the noblest panegyric. ~ Edward Gibbon

My brain tries to reconcile the gap between the man I thought he was, the man he is, and the man I want him to be. ~ Leighton Del Mia

This is the Day in which God's most excellent favors have been poured out upon men, the Day in which His most mighty grace hath been infused into all created things. It is incumbent upon all the peoples of the world to reconcile their differences, and, with perfect unity and peace, abide beneath the shadow of the Tree of His care and loving-kindness. ~ Bahaullah

Our problem is how to reconcile respect for true human dignity, personality, with the demands of social cooperation. And that is a most difficult problem. Very few people really are interested in true freedom, in any era; most folk always go for security, secular conformity, and enforced routine, at the price of independence. But the freedom of the few who really deserve freedom - and they are fewer in our time than ever they were before, I am inclined to believe - is infinitely precious; and in the long run, the security and contentment of the whole of humanity depends upon the survival of that freedom for a few. The great danger just now is that, in the name of general security, we shall neglect altogether the claims of the minority who need and deserve freedom. We seem bent on establishing a universal equalitarian domination which will call itself free and democratic, but which will have made existence almost impossible for those natures that seek to obey the will of God and to abjure desire. ~ Russell Kirk

It struck me as an operational way to define free will, in a way that allowed you to reconcile free will with determinism. The system is deterministic, but you can't say what it's going to do next. ~ James Gleick

Some colors reconcile themselves to one another, others just clash. ~ Edvard Munch

My body remembers what part of my mind wants to forget - because there are times when I struggle to reconcile what I gave up to be here, in this very moment, despite how much I wanted it. How much I do want it. The past may be prologue, but it's with me, every day. ~ Samira Ahmed

The love of power and the power to attract love were not easy to reconcile. ~ Robert K. Massie

Familiar like a forgotten song from long ago that takes you back to a moment the second you hear it. And you recognize who you were. Then. And now. And you have to figure out how to reconcile the two. ~ Katy Regnery

Art is that imaginative expression of human energy, which, through technical concretion of feeling and perception, tends to reconcile the individual with the universal, by exciting in him impersonal emotion. And the greatest Art is that which excites the greatest impersonal emotion in an hypothetical perfect human being.

Impersonal emotion! And what - I thought - do I mean by that? Surely I mean: That is not Art, which, while I am contemplating it, inspires me with any active or direct impulse; that is Art, when, for however brief a moment, it replaces within me interest in myself by interest in itself. For, let me suppose myself in the presence of a carved marble bath. If my thoughts be: 'What could I buy that for?' Impulse of acquisition; or: 'From what quarry did it come?' Impulse of inquiry; or: 'Which would be the right end for my head?' Mixed impulse of inquiry and acquisition - I am at that moment insensible to it as a work of Art. But, if I stand before it vibrating at sight of its colour and forms, if ever so little and for ever so short a time, unhaunted by any definite practical thought or impulse - to that extent and for that moment it has stolen me away out of myself and put itself there instead; has linked me to the universal by making me forget the individual in me. And for that moment, and only while that moment lasts, it is to me a work of Art. The word 'impersonal,' then, is but used in this my definition to signify momentary forgetfulness of one' ~ John Galsworthy

Brisbane continued. "I have led a selfish life, and I have enjoyed it. I cannot imagine a life without my work, and I cannot imagine a life without you, and yet I cannot reconcile the two." My heart, which had given a joyous leap in the middle of his speech, faltered now as I realised what he was trying to say. "I never thought to ask you to give up your work," I began. "But how can I ask you to sit idly by and wait for me to return when every time I kiss you goodbye might be the last?" "Oh, don't!" I told him, fully enraged. "How dare you blame your cowardice upon me?" His lips went white, as did the tiny crescent moon scar high upon his cheekbone. "I beg your pardon?" "Cowardice," I said distinctly. "You hide behind this pretence of fine feeling because you will not declare yourself directly and this gives you a perfect excuse, does it not? Spare poor Julia the horror of being widowed a second time. Put her up on the shelf and keep her out of harm's way whilst you amuse yourself with your dashing adventures." He opened his mouth to speak, but I stepped forward, tipping my head up to rail at him. "I am quite disappointed that you have revealed yourself to be so thoroughly conventional in your philosophy. Have I not proven myself a capable partner?" I demanded. "Have I not stood, side by side, with you, facing peril with equal courage? If you thought for a moment that I would be the meek, quiet, obedient sort of woman who would sit quietly at home mending your socks while you ~ Deanna Raybourn

There is a dilemma, to reconcile three time scales: in the short term, the economy; in the middle range, global well - being generally; and, in the long range, the environment. ~ Matthieu Ricard

You are supposed to stand before a congregation, brimming over with a great message. Here I am trying to find a new little message each Sunday. If I really had great convictions I suppose they would struggle for birth each week. As the matter stands, I struggle to find an idea worth presenting and I almost dread the approach of a new sabbath. I don't know whether I can ever accustom myself to the task of bringing light and inspiration in regular weekly installments. How in the world can you reconcile the inevitability of Sunday and its task with the moods and caprices of the soul? The prophet speaks only when he is inspired. The parish preacher must speak whether he is inspired or not. I wonder whether it is possible to live on a high enough plane to do that without sinning against the Holy Spirit. ~ Reinhold Niebuhr

What is our task in this world as children of God and brothers and sisters of Jesus? Our task is reconciliation. Wherever we go we see divisions among people - in families, communities, cities, countries, and continents. All these divisions are tragic reflections of our separation from God. The truth that all people belong together as members of one family under God is seldom visible. Our sacred task is to reveal that truth in the reality of everyday life. Why is that our task? Because God sent Jesus to reconcile us with God and to give us the task of reconciling people with one another. As people reconciled with God through Jesus we have been given the ministry of reconciliation (see 2 Corinthians 5:18). So whatever we do the main question is, Does it lead to reconciliation among people? ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

I think I would like to be a monk. I really considered Catholicism a few years ago, but there were some things that I just couldn't reconcile. ~ Rich Mullins

It's very human to try to put things into boxes, and it's hard for us to reconcile with grey areas, and yet somehow that's the area I find the most poetic, the juiciest. ~ Arca

I look at the cross of Christ. There I see that sin is so black and damnable, that nothing but the blood of God's own Son can wash it away. There I see that sin has so separated me from my holy Maker, that all the angels in heaven could never have made peace between us. Nothing could reconcile us, short of the death of Christ. Ah, if I listened to the wretched talk of proud men, I might sometimes fancy sin was not so very sinful! But I cannot think little of sin, when I look at the cross of Christ. ~ J.C. Ryle

Another example is the modern political order. Ever since the French Revolution, people throughout the world have gradually come to see both equality and individual freedom as fundamental values. Yet the two values contradict each other. Equality can be ensured only by curtailing the freedoms of those who are better off. Guaranteeing that every individual will be free to do as he wishes inevitably short-changes equality. The entire political history of the world since 1789 can be seen as a series of attempts to reconcile this contradiction. Anyone who has read a novel by Charles Dickens knows that the liberal regimes of nineteenth-century Europe gave priority to individual freedom even if it meant throwing insolvent poor families in prison and giving orphans little choice but to join schools for pickpockets. Anyone who has read a novel by Alexander Solzhenitsyn knows how Communism's egalitarian ideal produced brutal tyrannies that tried to control every aspect of daily life. ~ Yuval Noah Harari

Curiously, Dawkins and Dennett remain firmly committed to the outmoded notion that science and religion are permanently in conflict - an idea often referred to as the "warfare" thesis. This is now regarded as quite unacceptable by historians of science, chiefly because it is so difficult to reconcile with the facts of history.8 ~ Alister E. McGrath

Some women, it seemed, were entirely without guile and bestowed their affections with hardly a moment's conscious thought. Others set out to implement a campaign of military thoroughness, with branched contingency trees and fallback positions, all to 'catch' a desirable man. The word 'desirable' was the giveaway, she thought. The poor jerk wasn't actually desired, only 'desirable' - a plausible object of desire in the opinion of those others on whose account this whole sorry charade was performed. Most women, she thought, were somewhere in the middle, seeking to reconcile their passions with their perceived long-term advantage. ~ Carl Sagan

My favorite times were spent in his backyard where he and his roommates had "let nature take its course," the weeds towering above our heads. We placed two chairs in the middle of that jungle and discussed what we didn't know we were discussing: What brings a writer and an engineer together? How can we reconcile our diverse interests into a pointed goal, a single aphorism on life? More simply stated: Why are we falling in love? ~ Megan Rich

If we want to reconcile with our family or with friends who have hurt us, we have to take care of ourselves first. If we're not capable of listening to ourselves, how can we listen to another person? If we don't know how to recognise our own suffering, it won't be possible to bring peace and harmony into our relationships. ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

One of the most ordinary weaknesses of the human intellect is to seek to reconcile contrary principles, and to purchase peace at the expense of logic. ~ Alexis De Tocqueville

Much of Satan's time is spent trying to make you remember what God has already forgotten. Reconcile, rejoice, and look forward. ~ Mark Hart

Nations do not think, they only feel. They get their feelings at second hand through their temperaments, not their brains. A nation can be brought
by force of circumstances, not argument
to reconcile itself to any kind of government or religion that can be devised; in time it will fit itself to the required conditions; later it will prefer them and will fiercely fight for them. ~ Mark Twain

I don't have to hate any person because I can always start anew, I can always reconcile. ~ Nhat Hanh

I can't reconcile who he was, the man who was so kind and loving and considerate, with who he is now. I know the truth is who I'm seeing now, but I keep hoping the former man will come back. It's like I love someone who doesn't even exist. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

I'm happy if my book makes you want to kiss your family ... if we can reconcile with each other no matter where we are on the globe. ~ Uwem Akpan

To-morrow is that lamp upon the marsh, which a traveller never reacheth;
To-morrow, the rainbow's cup, coveted prize of ignorance;
To-morrow, the shifting anchorage, dangerous trust of manners;
To-morrow, the wrecker's beacon, wily snare of the destroyer.
Reconcile conviction with delay, and To-morrow is a fatal lie;
Frighten resolutions into action, To-morrow is a wholesome truth. ~ Martin Farquhar Tupper

Religious people are forced to perform mental gymnastics to reconcile real life with their delusions. When Christianity, Islam and the rest of the world religions finally have gone the way of Zeus, they will leave behind a legacy of case studies for students of abnormal psychology. ~ Al Stefanelli

Let the snake wait under
his weed
and the writing
be of words, slow and quick, sharp
to strike, quiet to wait,
sleepless.
through metaphor to reconcile
the people and the stones.
Compose. (No ideas
but in things) Invent!
Saxifrage is my flower that splits
the rocks. ~ William Carlos Williams

The idea of determinism combined with complete human responsibility struck me as very hard to reconcile with an idea of justice, let alone mercy. ~ Ken MacLeod

In the conflict between Israelis and Arabs you have wounded civilizations - the Arabs have been wounded in their dealings with the West, and an insecure Jewish people have gone through terrible disasters and traumas. There is no end to the Jewish quest for security, and there is no end for the Arab quest for redress and dignity. It is very difficult to reconcile the two. ~ Itamar Rabinovich

There is nothing to which men, while they have food and drink, cannot reconcile themselves. ~ George Santayana

I've found more tolerance, acceptance and inclusion from social conservative groups who have to reconcile that I'm a Republican who happens to be gay ... versus the intolerance the LGBT leaders see me as a gay man who happens to be a Republican. ~ Carl DeMaio

It was sometimes difficult to reconcile a man's talents with his personality. ~ Christopher Moore

Lots of my friends and family belong to churches, and some of them are part of the so-called Christian Right. In this preacher, I wanted to show a good man struggling to reconcile his commitment to the community with the political agenda of his church. He does not see that as a dilemma, but I do. ~ Lanford Wilson

You cannot reconcile creativeness with technical achievement. You may be perfect in playing the piano, and not be creative. You may be able to handle color, to put paint on canvas most cleverly, and not be a creative painter ... having lost the song, we pursue the singer. We learn from the singer the technique of song, but there is no song; and I say the song is essential, the joy of singing is essential. When the joy is there, the technique can be built up from nothing; you will invent your own technique, you won't have to study elocution or style. When you have, you see, and the very seeing of beauty is an art. ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

Ranulf stared blankly into the campfire, trying to ignore Lily.
"White horses always look dirty," Lily told the young smitten soldier sitting beside her. "That's why I refuse to ride them.Brown ones may be just as filthy,but at least I cannot see the dirt. Black ones less so,but I have found that in general dark horses suit me better."
"You just think you look better on them," Edythe protested before succumbing to several seconds of coughing.
Bronwyn studied her redheaded sister for a moment.Tyr put another blanket around Edythe's shoulders and eventually the coughs quieted. Turning her attention to Ranulf,Bronwyn promised him softly, "You'll have to ignore them."
Ranulf grimaced and sent a reproving look to his youngest sister-in-law. It,just like the others he had sent Lily throughout the day,changed nothing. "I just find it hard to reconcile the child I hear now with the woman who appeared after your death. With you gone,she had to grow up.Now that you are back..."
Bronwyn snuggled up against his side with a sigh. "I admit I encourage it.Life will force Lily to grow up soon enough and I am glad it was not my death that thrust it upon her. In the meantime,you ignore her prattle and I'll just be amused it," she advised before planting a gentle kiss on his arm.
Ranulf,with his free hand, raked his fingers through his short hair. How had he gotten into this predicament? But it took only one look at the huddled form next to him to remember exactly ~ Michele Sinclair

The problem, once again, as in all sciences is the attitude of the mind that is dealing with whatever field. The problem is not philosophy but the lack of intellectual humility. It is when reason becomes arrogant that we lose track. But intellectual humility with science: this is spirituality - this is the way we are with God. So we should not be scared and we must reconcile ourselves. ~ Tariq Ramadan

One of the commonest weaknesses of human intelligence is the wish to reconcile opposing principles and to purchase harmony at the expensive of logic. ~ Alexis De Tocqueville

Before the autumn of our years, there exists a time when we struggle to reconcile what we are with what we wish to be. This time can be known as summer. After spring gives us life, before winter takes it away. ~ H.L. Sudler

To reconcile ourselves with one another, we must release our judgments and make peace with the fact that we are one. This country was founded on the ideal that we are all created equal. If we truly believe in the equality of all humankind, how can we put down and belittle one another? How can we disrespect and prejudge one another? How can we come to the point where we malign and hate one another? ~ John Lewis

He shifted. She kept her back to him as she felt him move closer. The warmth of him slowly fitted along her spine. It was like sinking into a bath. His words brushed the back of her neck: "Just to keep you warm," he said, a question in his tone.
"You say that we're friends."
"Yes."
"Have we done this before?"
Another pause. "No."
Her shaking quieted to a shiver. She found that she'd moved even closer to him, had sealed herself against him. His heart beat fast against her back. He held her, and the weight of his arm made her feel more solid, more real, less ready to shatter into mirrorlike pieces. She calmed, relaxing into his warmth.
She still didn't sleep. Neither did he. She could feel his wakefulness. She thought, fleetingly, that it was like him not to fall asleep before she did. She didn't know how she could believe this to be true. It was hard to reconcile with the one memory she had of him: his face in the market, across a distance. An enemy's mouth, enemy's eyes.
But he was here, he had saved her, and he'd asked nothing of her except to remember, and had stopped asking even for that. She knew his scent. Knew that she liked it. His hand reached to touch the pulse in her neck. He kept his fingers there, slightly too firm to be gentle, as if he doubted she was alive.
Had they really never shared a bed? No. She would remember that. Wouldn't she? ~ Marie Rutkoski

The world is so big, so complicated, so replete with marvels and surprises that it takes years for most people to begin to notice that it is, also, irretrievably broken. We call this period of research "childhood."

There follows a program of renewed inquiry, often involuntary, into the nature and effects of mortality, entropy, heartbreak, violence, failure, cowardice, duplicity, cruelty, and grief; the researcher learns their histories, and their bitter lessons, by heart. Along the way, he or she discovers that the world has been broken for as long as anyone can remember, and struggles to reconcile this fact with the ache of cosmic nostalgia that arises, from time to time, in the researcher's heart: an intimation of vanished glory, of lost wholeness, a memory of the world unbroken. We call the moment at which this ache first arises "adolescence." The feeling haunts people all their lives.

Everyone, sooner or later, gets a thorough schooling in brokenness. ~ Michael Chabon

The essence of peace is to merge two opposites. Therefore your notions should not scare you if you see another, who absolutely opposes you, and you presume that there is no chance for peace between you two. On the same token when you see two individuals who are exactly two opposites, never say it would be impossible for them to reconcile. On the contrary, and this is the perfection of peace to make it between two opposites. ~ Nachman Of Breslov

It is not indeed certain, that the most refined caution will find a proper time for bringing a man to the knowledge of his own failing, or the most zealous benevolence reconcile him to that judgment by which they are detected; but he who endeavours only the happiness of him whom he reproves will always have either the satisfaction of obtaining or deserving kindness; if he succeeds, he benefits his friend; and if he fails, he has at least the consciousness that he suffers for only doing well. ~ Samuel Johnson

The good and just society is neither the thesis of capitalism nor the antithesis of communism, but a socially conscious democracy which reconciles the truths of individualism and collectivism ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

I'm sort of exploring where pacifism and socialism come into conflict. How do you reconcile a passionate rejection of might and violence with an attitude of "nil paseran" - "none shall pass" - in the face of fascism? ~ Hal Duncan

Education is one of the Grand Christianson Obsessions. They've been whole years my mother's kept us home for intensive private study. As a result of that, Paul will perform the first brain transplant, James will someday build a bridge across the Atlantic Ocean, Charlie – who is an actual musical genius – will probably end up writing the Great American Symphony, and I – I know a little bit about a lot of things.
I can tell you the chemical composition of the stuff your stick in your hair; how long it would take you, at just under the speed of light, to get to Alpha Centauri – and how old your body would be when you finally got there; the middle name of the third president of the United States; the amount of the present budget deficit; the author of the Brothers Karamazov, and how many feet there are in a line of trochaic heptameter. The Little Girl Who Had to Know Why, Paul used to call me. But even my mother couldn't reconcile me and math. ~ Kristen D. Randle

If you know you have been forgiven, you will forgive and reconcile with others. ~ Edward T. Welch

One could reconcile oneself to existence only because it was meaningless. It ~ W. Somerset Maugham

Habit will reconcile us to everything but change ~ Charles Caleb Colton

To me, however, the question of the times resolved itself into a practical question of the conduct of life. How shall I live? We are incompetent to solve the times. Our geometry cannot span the huge orbits of the prevailing ideas, behold their return, and reconcile their opposition. We can only obey our own polarity. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

It seems the only way we can avoid being the victims of change is to reconcile with the inevitable. We must never stand on the rail tracks of positive change. ~ Paul Bamikole

In his latest book Marc Ellis asks the defining question for Jewish life today: 'Can injustice, represented by Jewish domination of Jerusalem, be at the heart of the covenant?' Ellis's answer is that the covenant of Israel with God has been shattered by the creation of a state at the expense of Palestinian life in the land. It can only be renewed by a new ethic and practice of justice that reconcile these two people, who have become irrevocably linked together in the land, either for good or for ill. ~ Rosemary Radford Ruether

Now, the disposition to be conservative in respect of politics reflects a quite different view of the activity of governing. The man of this disposition understands it to be the business of a government not to inflame passion and give it new objects to feed upon, but to inject into the activities of already too passionate men an ingredient of moderation; to restrain, to deflate, to pacify and to reconcile; not to stoke the fires of desire, but to damp them down. And all this, not because passion is vice and moderation virtue, but because moderation is indispensable if passionate men are to escape being locked in an encounter of mutual frustration. ~ Michael Oakeshott

Had Christ not risen we could not believe Him to be what He declared Himself when He "made Himself equal with God." But He has risen in the confirmation of all His claims. By it alone, but by it thoroughly, is He manifested as the very Son of God, who has come into the world to reconcile the world to Himself. It is the fundamental fact in the Christian's unwavering confidence in "all the words of this life. ~ B. B. Warfield