A. The Lord dealt with me according to my righteousness;

according to the cleanness of my hands he rewarded me.

B. For I have kept the ways of the Lord,

and have not wickedly departed from my God.

C. For all his rules were before me,

and his statutes I did not put away from me.

B'. I was blameless before him,

and I kept myself from my guilt.

A'. So the Lord has rewarded me according to my righteousness,

according to the cleanness of my hands in his sight.

psalm 18:20-24 2

We ought, though, to treat the instigators as suspicions rather than truth, and avoid discussing matters that can only be brought to light at the cost of torturing those who must be interrogated.

augustine, letter 91 to nectarius, p.7

Do you think that leaving an outrage like that to go unpunished, or failing to reform the guilty as they deserve, will allow you to leave your homeland 'flourishing'? Flowers like that won't produce fruit, but thorns! Compare the choices: would you prefer your hometown to flower with piety or with licence, with reformed characters, or with atrocities unchecked? Compare the choices, and see whether your love for your home-town surpasses ours, and whether you, or we, are more fully and genuinely eager for it to flourish.

augustine, letter 91 to nectarius (408/9 aD), p.3

chesterton says you have to love the city enough to burn it down. turns out he got it from augustine.

For you evil does not exist at all, and not only for you but for your created universe, because there is nothing outside it which could break in and destroy the order which you have imposed upon it. But in the parts of the universe, there are certain elements which are thought evil because of a conflict of interest.... All these elements which have some mutual conflict of interest are congruous with the inferior part of the universe which we call earth.... Because my soul did not dare to say that my God displeased me, it refused to attribute to you whatever was displeasing. Hence it came to adopt the opinion that there are two substances.

augustine, confessions, vii.19

My desire is for you, justice and innocence, you are lovely and splendid to honest eyes; the satiety of your love is insatiable. ... As an adolescent I went astray from you, my God, far from your unmoved stability. I became to myself a region of destitution.

confessions, ii.18

‘Verily Thou art a God that hidest Thyself.’ -Isaiah xlv. 15

God, though to Thee our psalm we raise


No answering voice comes from the skies;


To Thee the trembling sinner prays

But no forgiving voice replies;

Our prayer seems lost in desert ways,

Our hymn in the vast silence dies.

We see the glories of the earth

But not the hand that wrought them all:

Night to a myriad worlds gives birth,

Yet like a lighted empty hall

Where stands no host at door or hearth

Vacant creation’s lamps appal.

We guess; we clothe Thee, unseen King,

With attributes we deem are meet;

Each in in his own imagining


Sets up a shadow in Thy seat;

Yet know not how our gifts to bring,


Where seek Thee with unsandalled feet.

And still th’unbroken silence broods

While ages and while aeons run,

As erst upon chaotic floods

The Spirit hovered ere the sun

Had called the seasons’ changeful moods

And life’s first germs from death had won.

And still th’abysses infinite

Surround the peak from which we gaze.


Deep calls to deep, and blackest night


Giddies the soul with blinding daze

That dares to cast its searching sight


On being’s dread and vacant maze.

And Thou art silent, whilst Thy world

Contends about its many creeds

And hosts confront with flags unfurled

And zeal is flushed and pity bleeds


And truth is heard, with tears impearled,


A moaning voice among the reeds.

My hand upon my lips I lay;


The breast’s desponding sob I quell;


I move along life’s tomb-decked way

And listen to the passing bell

Summoning men from speechless day

To death’s more silent, darker spell.

Oh! till Thou givest that sense beyond,

To shew Thee that Thou art, and near,

Let patience with her chastening wand

And lead me child-like by the hand


If still in darkness not in fear,

Dispel the doubt and dry the tear.

Speak! whisper to my watching heart


One word-as when a mother speaks

Soft, when she sees her infant start,

Till dimpled joy steals o’er its cheeks.

Then, to behold Thee as Thou art,


I’ll wait till morn eternal breaks.

nondum, by gerard manley hopkins.

this may be my best, maybe my only answer to this.

Agathocles, tyrant of Syracuse from 317-289 BC:

The historian Justin says that Agathocles was born in poverty but very early in life parlayed his remarkable beauty into a career as a prostitute, first for men, and later, after puberty, for women, then made a living by robbery before becoming a soldier.

[...]

Having banished or murdered some 10,000 citizens, and thus made himself master of Syracuse, he created a strong army and fleet and subdued the greater part of Sicily.

[...]

His last years were plagued by ill-health and the turbulence of his grandson Archagathus, at whose instigation he is said to have been poisoned (by his eromenos, Menon of Ægista, who poisoned the tooth-cleaning quill)

from the wikipedia article. i believe the correct response would be hoots of mocking and not-even-slightly derisive laughter. at least, that was my response.