Ropo mían dom menmain-se (11th cent.)

Edinburgh, National Library of Scotland,
Adv. MS 72.1.5 (15th cent.?), fol. 10r

     "Ropo mían dom menmain-se," CODECS:  Online Database and E-Resources for Celtic Studies.

It were my soul's desire
To see the face of God;
It were my soul's desire
To rest in His abode.

It were my soul's desire
To study zealously;
This, too, my soul's desire,
A clear rule set for me.

It were my soul's desire
A spirit free from gloom;
It were my soul's desire
New life beyond the Doom.

It were my soul's desire
To shun the chills of hell;
Yet more my soul's desire
Within His house to dwell.

It were my soul's desire
To imitate my King,
It were my soul's desire
His ceaseless praise to sing.

It were my soul's desire
When heaven's gate is won
To find my soul's desire
Clear shining like the sun.

Grant, Lord, my soul's desire,
Deep waves of cleansing sighs;
Grant, Lord, my soul's desire
From earthly cares to rise.

This still my soul's desire
Whatever life afford,—
To gain my soul's desire
And see Thy face, O Lord.

     Trans. Eleanor Hull, The poem-book of Gael:  translations from Irish Gaelic poetry into English prose and verse (London:  Chatto & Windus, 1912), 142-143.


It were my mind's desire to behold the face of God.  It were my mind's desire to live with Him eternally.

It were my mind's desire to read books studiously.  It were my mind's desire to live under a clear rule.

It were my mind's desire t be cheerful towards all.  It were my mind's desire to win the prize of resurrection after doom.

It were my mind's desire to attain triumphant sanctity of body.  It were my mind's desire to avoid cold Hell.

It were my mind's desire to dwell in bright Paradise.  It were my mind's desire to shine as shines the sun.

It were my mind's desire to be for ever in the company of the King.  It were my mind's desire to hear manifold melodies throughout the ages.

It were my mind's desire to reach cloudy Heaven.  It were my mind's desire to shed vehement waves of tears.

It were my mind's desire to forsake this world.  It were my mind's desire to behold the face of God.

     Trans. Gerard Murphy:  "Anonymous [11th century]" | "My mind's desire," trans. Gerard Murphy, in Gerard Murphy, Early Irish lyrics: eighth to twelfth century (Oxford:  Clarendon Press, 1956), 58–61 (Middle Irish—English, with Notes), 199–200 (Introduction).  The 15th-century manuscript depicted above—Edinburgh, National Library of Scotland Adv.MS.72.1.5—is the one that Murphy, following Mackinnon, dates to the 14th century ("MS. No. 1 of the Kilbride Collection ('K')").  Next earliest would appear to be London, British Library, MS Add. 30512 (15th-16th century).


It were my soul's desire
To behold the face of God,
It were my soul's desire
Eternally to live with Him.

It were my soul's desire
Studiously to read little books,
It were my soul's desire
To live under a clear rule.

It were my soul's desire
To be cheerful towards all,
It were my soul's desire
Triumphantly to rise after Doom.

It were my soul's desire
. . . the body after triumph,
It were my soul's desire
Not to know cold Hell.

It were my soul's desire
To dwell in the clear mansions of the King,
It were my soul's desire
To glitter as the sun.

It were my soul's desire
To be for ever in the company of the King,
It were my soul's desire
(To listen to) many strains throughout the ages.

It were my soul's desire
To forsake this world,
It were my soul's desire
To behold the face of God.

     Trans. Kuno Meyer, Irisleabar na Gaedhilge. The Gaelic journal 5, no. 6 =no. 54 (September 1 1894):  94-95.

Écrasez l'infâme!

     "Voltaire's agitation came at the cost of truth.  As the legal historian Benoît Garnot has shown, the famous philosophe[, inventor of 'that political-moral-literary event, "l'affaire,"'] rode roughshod over the facts of his 'causes.'  He caricatured the law's careful and restrained procedures, and he brushed aside inconvenient evidence as he sought to shape images of cruelty and injustice that had as their goal the smearing of the Church.  Records show that it was usually the Church that took the lead, before Voltaire joined the fray, in seeking mercy and reprieve.  If Voltaire invented 'l'affaire,' he did not wield it as a tool of reason.  Harnessing the crowd for the sake of righteousness required appealing to passions and manipulating sentiments.  Voltaire sought to whip up the 'intimate' heart, often through the deliberate distortion of facts.  The modern word for such techniques is propaganda."

     Ephraim Radner, "L'affaire Voltaire," First things no. 309 (January 2021):  63 (64-63).  Radner is probably referring to the following, among (possibly) others, none of which I have yet read:

• Garnot, Benoît. Voltaire et Charlie: essais. Dijon: Éditions universitaires de Dijon, 2015.
• Garnot, Benoît. Voltaire et L'affaire Calas: les faits, des débats, les enjeux. Récits d'historien. Paris: Hatier, 2013.
• Garnot, Benoît. C'est la faute à Voltaire:  une imposture intellectuelle? Histoire & société. Paris: Belin, 2009.

"Rowlandson is a highly trained reader"

      Michael "Warner locates the intellectual origins of the regime of critical reading in the holistic biblical analysis of Locke and Spinoza, and he contrasts it with a religious regime exemplified by a reading of the scriptures by Mary Rowlandson, who was held captive by Indigenous Americans in 1676 and who took certain passages in Jeremiah to refer directly to the promise of salvation from her own captivity.  Rowlandson is precisely the sort of reader against whom Locke's analytic schema was directed:  unintersted in the philological resources of 'analytic collation, linguistic comparison, contextual framing, or any other effort at detachment from the rhetoric of address' (31), she reads the biblical text on the assumption that it 'is everywhere uniformly addressed by God, in the vernacular, to the believer (31).  She takes alighting on passages by chance to be a form of providential direction, but this is not a passive mode of reading; to the contrary, 'it requires repetition, incorporation, and affective regulation' (31), and it is supported by an extensive theological apparatus and extensive instruction in devotional manuals on the correct application of scripture.  Mary Rowlandson is a highly trained reader:  the regime that shapes her reading, with its focus on 'the elemental dyad of God and the soul as the situation of address' (31), is a rival framework to that of critical reading:  not pretheoretical, strongly reflexive in its own way, but directed to different ends and with quite a different understanding of how a text addresses a reader and of how intention is to be imputed to it."

     John Frow, On interpretive conflict (Chicago and London:  University of Chicago Press, 2019), 33-34.

"It is opinion that loses and wins battles."

"It is opinion that loses and wins battles.  The fearless Spartan used to sacrifice from fear (Rousseau somewhere expresses astonishment at this, I don't know why); Alexander also sacrificed from fear before the Battle of Arbela.  Certainly those people were quite right and, to correct this sensible devotion, it is enough to pray to God that he deigns not to send fear to us.  Fear!  Charles V made great fun of that epitaph he read in passing, Here lies one who never felt fear.  And what man never had felt fear in his life?  Who has never had occasion to realize, both in himself, in those around him and in history, the way in which men can be overcome by this passion, which often seems to have the more sway over us the fewer the reasonable causes for it.  Let us then pray, Knight . . . ; let us pray to God that he keeps us and our friends from fear, which is within his power and which can ruin in an instant the most splendid military ventures.

     ". . . I put this question one day to a soldier of the highest rank whom you both know.  Tell me, General, what is a lost battle?  I have never been able to understand this.  After a moment's silence, he answered, I do not know.  After another pause he added, It is a battle one thinks one has lost. . . .  Opinion is so powerful in war that it can alter the nature of the same event and give it two different names, for no reason other than its own whim.  A general throws his men between two enemy armies and he writes to his king, I have split him, he has lost.  His opponent writes to his king, He has put himself between two fires, he is lost.  Which of the two is mistaken?  Whoever is seized by the cold goddess."

     The Senator in Joseph de Maistre, The Saint Petersburg dialogues (1821) 7 ("sur la guerre"), The works of Joseph de Maistre, trans. Jack Lively, Minerva series 15 (London:  George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1965), 256-257 (245-258).  French from the original:  Les soirées de Saint-Pétersbourg, ou Entretiens sur le gouvernement temporel de la providence: suivis d'un traitée sur les sacrifices 7 (vol. 2, p. 43-46 (1-99)).

"God . . . is not obliged to do miracles and never does one needlessly. . . . ."

"Dieu . . . ne le [(un miracle)] doit à personne, et . . . n'en fait point d'inutiles. . . ."

God . . . owes no one [a miracle], and . . . never performs an unnecessary [one]. . . .

     The Senator in Joseph de Maistre, The Saint Petersburg dialogues (1821) 7 ("sur la guerre"), The works of Joseph de Maistre, trans. Jack Lively, Minerva series 15 (London:  George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1965), 256 (245-258).  French from the original:  Les soirées de Saint-Pétersbourg, ou Entretiens sur le gouvernement temporel de la providence: suivis d'un traitée sur les sacrifices 7 (vol. 2, p. 41 (1-99)).

     De Maistre is overly Enlightened here.  There is a sense in which this is obvious, and also a sense in which it sets itself up against the extravagant logic of the doctrine of redemption, which, rooted in the astonishing signs performed by Christ, and in his resurrection, is ultimately eschatological.  This is but the (in de Maistre (?) admittedly open) grammar of this present age.