"We must now recognize belief once more as the source of all knowledge."

     Michael Polanyi, Personal knowledge: towards a post-critical philosophy, pt. 3, chap. 8, sec. 12 ((London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1962 [1958]), 266).

Polanyi on "the scientistic Minotaur" born of the illusion of objectivism

"a dogmatic orthodoxy can be kept in check both internally and externally, while a creed inverted into a science is both blind and deceptive."

     Michael Polanyi, Personal knowledge: towards a post-critical philosophy, pt. 3, chap. 8, sec. 12 ((London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1962 [1958]), 268).

     "This then is our ultimate liberation from objectivism:  to realize that we can voice our ultimate convictions only from within our convictions—from within the whole system of acceptances that are logically prior to any particular assertion of our own, prior to the holding of any particular piece of knowledge. . . . I believe that the function of philosophical reflection consists in bringing to light, and affirming as my own, the beliefs implied in such of my thoughts and practices as I believe to be valid; that I must aim at discovering what I truly believe in and at formulating the convictions which I find myself holding; that I must conquer my self-doubt, so as to retain a firm hold on this programme of self-identification. . . .
     "This invitation to dogmatism may appear shocking; yet it is but the corollary to the greatly increased critical powers of man.  These have endowed our mind with a capacity for self-transcendence of which we can never again divest ourselves.  We have plucked from the Tree a second apple which has for ever imperilled our knowledge of Good and Evil, and we must learn to know these qualities henceforth in the blinding light of our new analytical powers.  Humanity has been deprived a second time of its innocence, and driven out of another garden which was, at any rate, a Fool's Paradise.  Innocently, we had trusted that we could be relieved of all personal responsibility for our beliefs by objective criteria of validity—and our own critical powers have shattered this hope.  Struck by our sudden nakedness, we may try to brazen it out by flaunting it in a profession of nihilism.  But modern man's immorality is unstable.  Presently his moral passions reassert themselves in objectivist disguise and the scientistic Minotaur is born" (267-268, italics mine).

Don Quixote making his sun rise on the evil and on the good / sending his rain on the unjust and the just alike

CERVANTES NA FILATELIA ESPANHOLA

"'it is not the responsibility or concern of a knight errant to determine if the afflicted, the fettered, and the oppressed whom he meets along the road are in that condition and suffering that anguish because of misdeeds or kind acts.  His only obligation is to help them because they are in need, turning his eyes to their suffering and not their wickedness.  And I encountered a rosary, a string of disheartened, unfortunate people, and I did for them what my religion asks of me; the rest does not concern me. . . .'"

Project Gutenberg

     "'For the love of God, Señor Knight Errant, if you ever run into me again, even if you see them chopping me to pieces, don't help me and don't come to my aid, but leave me alone with my misfortune; no matter how bad it is, it won't be worse than what will happen to me when I'm helped by your grace, and may God curse you and all the knights errant ever born in this world.'"

     Don Quixote and then Andrés in Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote I.xxx and xxxi (trans. Edith Grossman (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 2003), 250 and 266).

Feast of the Ascension

"Gladden us with holy joys, almighty God, and make us rejoice with devout thanksgiving [(Fac nos . . . exsultare . . . , et . . . lætari, Cause us to exult . . . and rejoice)], for the Ascension of Christ your Son is our exaltation [(provectio, advancement, promotion)], and, where the Head has gone before in glory [(quo processit gloria capitis, to what place the glory of the Head has gone before)], the Body is called to follow in hope [(eo spes vocatur et corporis, to that place the hope of the Body, too, is called/summoned/referred/directed)].  Through."

     Collect "At the Mass during the Day" of the Ascension (new with the Novus Ordo, after Leo the Great, Sermo 73.4, De ascensione Domini I, PL 54, 396, "Quia igitur Christi ascensio, nostra provectio est, et quo praecessit gloria capitis, eo spes vocatur et corporis. . . ."), according to the new translation, which, I'm beginning to admit, isn't always perfectly literal.

2010: Gladden us with holy joys, almighty God,
and make us rejoice with devout thanksgiving,
for the Ascension of Christ your Son is our exaltation
and, where the Head has gone before in glory
the Body is called to follow in hope
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, [etc.]

Pre-2010:
God our Father,
make us joyful in the ascension of your Son Jesus Christ.
May we follow him into the new creation,
for his ascension is our glory and our hope.
We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, [etc.]

Fac nos, omnipotens Deus, sanctis exsultare gaudis,
et pia gratiarum actione lætari,
quia Christi Filii tui ascensio est nostra provectio,
et quo processit gloria capitis, eo spes vocantur et corporis.
Per Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum Filium tuum, [etc.]


The "Prayer after Communion" (comment updated here), is also a bit loose:

Almighty, ever-living God,
who allow those on earth to celebrate divine mysteries
          [(qui in terra constitutos divina tractare concedis,
          who allow those settled on earth to handle divine things)],
grant, we pray,
that Christian hope may draw us onward
          [(ut illuc tendat christianæ devotionis affectus,
          that to that place may tend the affection of
          Christian devotion)]
to where our nature is united with you
          [(quo tecum est nostra substantia,
          where with you is our substance)].
Through Christ our Lord.

     Prayer after Communion "At the Mass during the Day" of the Ascension, Roman Missal.  The core of this "Prayer after Communion" is basically no. 185 (which Vogel, following Mohlberg, appears to date between 400 and 440 (Medieval liturgy:  an introduction to the sources (1986 [1981]), 43-44 and 58n127) in the "Sacramentary of Verona, called Leonine" (so-called, though not actually a sacramentary:  Sacramentarium Veronense = Verona, Biblioteca Capitolare, cod. 85 (once 80)).  Text from the online concordance of the Veronense at http://www.rifugiodelleanime.org/veweb/ (1956 edition ed. Mohlberg, Eizenhöfer, & Siffrin on request):

VIIII MENSE MAIO PRAECES IN ASCENSA DOMINI VI ITEM ALIA

{N: 185}
Tribue, quaesumus, domine, ut illuc tendat christianae nostrae deuotionis affectus, quo tecum est nostra substantia.

But of course a chart on p. 51 of Deschusses' Le sacramentaire grégorien (below) traces all of the relevant traditions and manuscripts (though not necessarily any individual prayer) back to "Textes anciens" antedating (roughly) the year 575.  Cf. also the more detailed chart on p. 35 of Eric Palazzo's A history of liturgical books from the beginning to the thirteenth century (1998 [1993]), which places Verona cod. 85 at 560, and the non-sacramentary "Roman Libelli" out of which it was constituted behind that (cf. "between 400 and 440", above).

It is also nos. 538 and 584 in the Old Gelasian Sacramentary (Vatic. Regin. lat. 316, which, Frankish in origin, was copied from an older Roman book c. 750 (Vogt, 64-65)).  Text from the 1894 edition ed. Wilson.  (The text at http://www.rifugiodelleanime.org/gevweb/ (also 538 and 584) contains several errors.)  The 1960 edition ed. Mohlberg, Eizenhöfer, & Siffrin is on request:

p. 101 in the 1894 edition ed. Wilson:  Tribue, quaesumus, Domine, ut illuc semper tendat Christianae devotionis affectus, quo tecum est nostra substantia.  Per.

p. 109 in the 1894 edition ed. Wilson:  Tribue, quaesumus, Domine, ut per haec sacra quae sumpsimus, illuc tendat nostrae devotionis affectus, quo tecum est nostra substantia.  Per Dominum.

It is also no. 766 in the late 8th-century (790-800) Sacramentary of Gellone (Liber Sacramentarium Gellonensis = Paris, B. N. lat. 12048; cf. Vogel, 71), and no. 807 in the c. 800 Sacramentary of Angoulême (Liber Sacramentorum Engolismensis = Paris, B. N., lat. 816; cf. Vogel, 71).  Below is the latter as reproduced in the online concordance to the Engolismensis at http://www.rifugiodelleanime.org/geaweb/:

{CXXI. FERIA IIII. AD SANCTVM LAVRENTIVM.}

807 AD SANCTVM ANDREAM. Tribue quaesumus omnipotens Deus, ut illuc tendat christianae deuotionis affectus, quo te cum est nostra substantia. Per.

It is also no. 604 in the late 8th- or early 9th-century Sacramentary of St. Gall (St-Gall, Stiftsbibliothek, 348; cf. Vogel, 71-72).

It is also no. 414 in the Gregorianum Hadrianum ex authentico of 811/812 (Cambrai MS 164), a copy of the "Gregorian" sacramentary sent to Charlemagne by Pope Hadrian I c. 790.  In the "comparative" or "diplomatic" edition of the Gregorian sacramentary ed. Jean Deschusses (Le sacramentaire grégorien:  ses principles formes d'après le plus anciens manuscrits, vol. 1, 3rd edition rev. & corr. (Fribourg:  Éditions Universitaires Fribourg Suisse, 1992)), it appears (under "91 FERIA IIII AD SANCTUM LAURENTIUM FORIS MURUM") on p. 198:

     Ad sanctum andream.  Tribue quaesumus omnipotens deus, ut illuc tendat christianae deuotionis affectus, quo tecum est nostra substantia.  Per.

And in the older edition of the Hadrianum ed. Lietzmann, on p. 58 (as above, also 91.6).

Here it is on p. 63 of the 1915 edition of the Gregorian Sacramentary ed. Wilson, where there are a few variants.  Cf. (in the online concordance of the Hadrianum):

Tribue quaesumus, omnipotens deus, ut illuc tendat christianae devotionis affectus, in quo tecum est nostra substantia. Per eundem dominum.

It is also no. 353 in Gregorian Sacramentary of Padua (Gregorianum Paduense = Padua D47), which, written in the first half of the 9th century, derives from another written in the mid-8th (Deschusses, vol. 1, pp. 633 and 57).

Almighty, ever-living God, who allow those on earth to celebrate divine mysteries, grant, we pray, that Christian hope may draw us onward to where our nature is united with you.  Through Christ our Lord. . . .

Omnipotens sempiterne Deus, qui in terra constitutos divina tractare concedis, præsta, quæsumus, ut illuc tendat christianæ devotionis affectus, quo tecum est nostra substantia.  Per Christum Dominum nostrum. . . .



May the gifts we have received from your altar, Lord,
kindle in our hearts a longing for the heavenly homeland
and cause us to press forward,
     following in the Saviour's footsteps,
to the place where for our sake he entered before us.
Who. . . .

Quae ex altari tuo, Domine, dona percepimus,
accendant in cordibus nostris caelestis patriae desiderium,
et quo praecursor pro nobis introivit Salvator,
faciant nos, eius vestigia sectantes, contendere.
Qui. . . .

     Prayer after Communion "At the Vigil Mass" of the Ascension, Roman Missal.


he ascended, not to distance himself from our lowly state
but that we, his members, might be confident of following
where he, our Head and Founder, has gone before.

[ascendit] non ut a nostra humilitate discederet,
sed  ut illuc confideremus, sua membra, nos subsequi
quo ipse, caput nostrum principiumque, praecessit.

     Preface I of the Ascension of the Lord, Roman missal.


To where you, glorified, have ascended,
—To that place you, now leading the way, may we follow in mind and heart.

Quo tu ascendisti glorificatus,
—illuc te nunc prævium mente sequamur et corde.

"Where you have gone before us in glory,
—may we follow you in mind and heart."

     From the Intercessions for the Feast of the Ascension, Liturgy of the hours.