Are we enlightened yet?

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/aug/09/dark-side-enlightenment-fleming-review

Extract

“The aim of Kant’s “critical” philosophy was to restrain the pretensions of philosophers to lay claim to knowledge of items – the soul, freedom and God – which lie beyond the spatial and temporal limits of human experience. But this wasn’t just a matter of upbraiding his predecessors – Leibniz and Spinoza principal among them – for their hubris. On the contrary, Kant also recognised that the tendency of human reason to overreach itself is ineluctable. “Metaphysics” isn’t just a regrettable episode in the history of philosophy; it is a “natural” disposition that can’t be eradicated.

Fleming is interested in those who, during the Enlightenment assault on the claims of revealed religion and traditional metaphysics, were “unable to dispense altogether with ‘transcendence'”. All of which raises a number of rather profound questions – about the methodology of historical periodisation, particularly whether the Enlightenment marks a decisive and easily identifiable break with what preceded it, and the extent to which claims about an enduring appetite for transcendental experience are merely historical or in fact refer to certain permanent features of human nature. However, Fleming doesn’t seem especially interested in attempting to answer them. His approach, breezy and charmingly belletristic, is unabashedly impressionistic.”

You may be my saviour

With a Bible on one hand and a wash cloth in the other
I find that sex is difficult whatever  or whoever
My arms unable to embrace, I feel I am in danger
Despite that you’re my husband and not a total stranger
I guess you really cherish me , thank you most sincerely
If I  caress your loving face,maybe you will feel me
I only wish I might kiss you without  the microbes knowing
I cannot even wipe my nose,  I think it needs a blowing
I wonder now how we got wed, you must have been quite crazy
For wanting to get married to  a scrupulous  young lady
All too soon we shall be old and arthritis will afflict us
I’ll throw the Bible overboard  then God cannot detect us
And then I  shall be able to pull you even  nearer
For I sincerely  love you darling, you get  ever dearer.
Dearer for just loving me and all my weird behaviour
Are you sure it’s not Jesus but you who are my saviour?

Mary wants a party

acer-palmatum-shindeshojoStan was down on his hands and knees washing and scrubbing at the carpet with a new microfibre cloth and some shampoo for dry hair.He had a bucket of hot water beside him.
Happy, as always, when cleaning and
scrubbing he whistled
“The lark ascending” for his cat Emile, whilst sipping at a big mug of lager.
Mary was down in the town buying some new earrings to match her red dress from Phase 8 Sale.
Their granddaughter Flora had also gone to town but she wanted a nose ring not an earring.As she was a girl it was mandatory in the UK.

Suddenly, quite out of the blue,the doorbell rang.They always do don’t they.It was their Muslim neighbour Bert
.”We’re going away in the caravan.”He boasted gruffly.”Anyroad,the cat ,Nelsonia Mandelinaah, doesn’t want to come.Would you be able enough to feed her over the weekend without any politically correct remarks
being issued ,as it were?”
” Certainly” Stan responded jovially.”When are you off?”
“Well we went last week but we need a weekend in bed to recover from seeing Brent Cross Shopping Centre in Kettlewell right next to the old Post Office.[Kettlewell,Yorkshire’s idyllic village]
“Very strange”Stan said,”Mary was in it only yesterday ,she claims,in Knittingham spending all our minute
joint pension on new dresses and shoes.”
“I encounter women who have seen Brent Cross down the road all the time all over Britain.
Still they’re entitled to believe what they want!
” “But what will the consequences be?”
“Is there a flying Brent Cross?”
“That sounds rather religious,” Bert answered quickly
,”Is it an augury?”
“I’d say it’s an omen,myself”
“But of what?”
“The times we live in?
“But what’s going to happen?”
“God knows.”
“Well,does he though?”Stan’s hot water had gone cold.In fact it was frozen.”The laws of physics seem very mutable” Stan wrote in his journal,
“Also my spelling has deteriorated badly since I began drinking lager.
Would whisky be better?”
Meanwhile,he had cleaned only one third of the carpet.
He filled the bath with hot soapy water,stepped in fully clothed and then rolled himself around all over the carpet to pick up all the fluff.
When Mary came in she was amazed,
“What’s going on?”
“You look as if you’ve been having an orgy on the floor!”
An orgy was something unknown to Stan as yet.”Would you like one?” he murmured.
”Yes,”said Mary childishly
“Age has not beaten me yet!””Better have it soon before my knees get too bad!”So now Stan is cleaning the carpet again.It’s very soft and thick,just perfect!The list of invitees is posted on his blog.
Well,he’s been told to do something new every week.An orgy this week,the marathon later!
But why is Mary ringing 999?
Does she want to invite Dave,the paramedic or is it more sinister than I can tell you?
Yes,indeed,she wants to invite Mike Gove and Theresa May but she’s not telling Stan!.
She wants to give them her opinion of their politics before throwing a Bucket of cold water over each of them.Call it Baptism or Revenge.

And so say all of us

No man is an island

‘No Man is an Island’

No man is an island entire of itself; every man 
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; 
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe 
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as 
well as any Manor of thy friends or of thine 
own were; any man's death diminishes me, 
because I am involved in mankind. 
And therefore never send to know for whom 
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. 


Olde English Version
No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man
is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine;
if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe
is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as
well as if a Manor of thy friends or of thine
owne were; any mans death diminishes me,
because I am involved in Mankinde;
And therefore never send to know for whom
the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.

MEDITATION XVII
Devotions upon Emergent Occasions
John Donne 

Metaphysical, the meaning

 

 

 

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/metaphysical

 

Extract

adjective
pertaining to or of the nature of metaphysics.
Philosophy.

  1. concerned with abstract thought or subjects, as existence, causality, or truth.
  2. concerned with first principles and ultimate grounds, as being, time, or substance.
highly abstract, subtle, or abstruse.
designating or pertaining to the poetry of an early group of 17th-century English poets, notably JohnDonne, whose characteristic style is highly intellectual and philosophical and features intensive use of ingenious conceits and turns of wit.
Archaicimaginary or fanciful.