We Pause For My New Book Release...and Life in General

 I know I haven't written in several days, but that's because I'm excited about my new book of short stories, that's all.

 

 

They've been several years in the writing, and now they're leaving home and running around out in the world and I'm very happy for them, but I hope they'll still write home every now and then, tell me how they're doing...

And I'm writing new stories as well. Just because that's what gives me the energy to keep going, you know.

My oldest girl is getting married soon, and most of my brainpower is going, not into stories, but into dishes and menus and dresses and reception decorations and photography. I'm not as good at any of that, but the Lord is sending me angels, and I'm sure the happy couple will survive my helpfulness.

Once that's done, and once we get into summer, the General Conference stories and the rest of the Iliad will be forthcoming, I'm sure.

 

 

Elder Sterling W. Sill, Part Three - Mason Weems and the Question of the Cherry Tree

 Choose your link for Part One, Part Two, Four, Five, Six, Seven, or Eight - bountiful selections!

 

We're on to the third reference in this talk - the second of three very close together - but each deserves its own little discussion in my book.

One of Abraham Lincoln's favorite books listed in "Medicine for the Soul" by Elder Sterling W. Sill was a book about George Washington by Mason Weems. 

 

The Quote

"The two most powerful books in Lincoln’s life 

were, first, the Holy Bible, 

which even in his youth he hungrily devoured before the open fire, 

and second,  

The Life and Memorable Actions of George Washington 

by Mason L. Weems."

 

This was, in fact, one of the first biographies of George Washington, published soon after his death. It includes the infamous cherry tree incident, which practically passed into cultural myth.

When I read it, honestly, I gag a little. The style isn't modern at all - it's over-the-top sweetness and syrup. I remember being raised on that story as late as the 1970s.

I do in some sense appreciate the historical response these days to even out the myth-making with more accuracy and realism today - to acknowledge that life wasn't as idealized as authors like Mason Weems made it out to be- although he claimed it was a true story, there's no substantiation for it.

But history's a little funny that way - there's no going back to see the truth of that time, and although there's some irony in illustrating a person's honesty with a false story, I can't agree with biographers of today who insist in going overboard and casting the Founding Fathers and others in some very unflattering light, often judging them by today's standards when they were a product of their time, just as we are.

Also, we should consider the results of this focus, which inspired a young boy in Springfield, Missouri, to read and dream, and one day become President himself. I wonder if that would have happened if he'd gotten hold of a book that focused instead on Washington's slaves and his wooden false teeth and his high breathy voice instead of his bravery and honesty.

I like to choose to see God in people in history, whenever possible, because that's how I would want to be remembered myself. Where was the good in them? 

We're all a mix of good and bad - but our focus is our own. Do we focus on the worst of people, or the best?

What would you say is the wisest course? 

 

 

Elder Sterling W. Sill, Part Two - Abraham Lincoln and the Drive to Read

 Choose your link for Part One, Part Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, or Eight - so many choices!

 

Elder Sterling W. Sill always had a soft spot in my heart, because he thinks like me. He wants to know the secret of success - and he taught it with great enthusiasm. In his April 1972 talk, "Medicine for the Soul", he brings in the big guy - everyone's favorite, Abraham Lincoln:

 

The Quote

 

"Abraham Lincoln once said, “What I want to know is in books.” 

Lincoln was a great one for self-education - another graduate of Book U, like myself.

But this quote is a sort of paraphrase of what he actually said.

And what he actually said, we have more secondhand.

In his book, "Abraham Lincoln: The Story of a Great Life, Volume 1", his partner at law William Henry Herndon writes the following:

 

"He was always at school early...and attended to his studies. 

He was always at the head of his class, and passed us rapidly in his studies. 

He lost no time at home, and when he was not at work was at his books. 

He kept up his studies on Sunday, 

and carried his books with him to work, 

so that he might read when he rested from labor...

"...Abe's love for books, and his determined effort to obtain an education 

in spite of so many obstacles, 

induced the belief in his father's mind, 

that booklearning was absorbing a greater proportion of his energy and industry 

than the demands of the farm. 

The old gentleman had but little faith in the value of books or papers,

and hence the frequent drafts he made on the son to aid in the drudgery of daily toil. 

He undertook to teach him his own trade... he was a carpenter and joiner — 

but Abe manifested such a striking want of interest 

that the effort to make a carpenter of him was soon abandoned."

 

So Abraham Lincoln certainly WOULD have said such a thing at some point in his life - just not so much in these words.

He did write this poem, which is a similar thought, and he obviously lived it himself:

“Good boys who to their books apply,

Will all be great men by and by.”

Something else I love are the lines a 14-year-old Abraham Lincoln wrote in one of his school books, maybe thinking of his father's fruitless efforts to teach him more practical skills through his mad-dog determination to read instead:

 

" Abraham Lincoln, 

His hand and pen, 

He will be good, 

But God knows when." 

 

He had a real drive to improve himself, a real God-given desire and one that I've felt myself. I've always admired him for that.

Elder Sterling W. Sill, Part One - A Walk Through the Libraries in My Life

 Choose your link for Part Two, Part Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, or Eight - a bonanza of choices!

 

Welcome back for another discussion of another Conference talk. These talks feel so valuable, not so much for current spiritual guidance (we have the newest ones for those), but I love them as sort of a time capsule of literature and culture - some of which really shouldn't be forgotten.

Today we come to another talk by Sterling W. Sill entitled "Medicine For the Soul" - whom I think of as the Dale Carnegie of apostles. He was a self-made businessman in life, and in his talks he includes a lot of sources we normally find in success literature.

Today's reference is about an institution close to my heart - libraries:

 

The Quote

"Over the door of the library in the ancient city of Thebes, 

an Egyptian king once carved an inscription that said: 

“Medicine for the Soul.”"

 

Hence we have the title of his remarks - but how true is this?

Very true - a very similar phrase (Healing Place of the Soul) was reported by Hecataeus of Abdera, a historian of the early third century B.C., as an inscription on the sacred library of the tomb complex of Osymandyas (Ramses II), at Thebes.

I'm completely in accord with Ramses II. Since I was a small child, the idea of going somewhere to get free books, more than I could ever read, made me feel rich even when my family circumstances were completely the opposite.

The first library I remember was the Salt Lake City library, where I lived as a child. My mother was also a voracious reader - still is, as well as being a prolific Jane Austin fanfiction writer. It seemed enormous in my smallness, and the carpet had a strong smell. Every time on the way home, I would try to read my new treasures in the car, and make myself sick. Still, I would always recover when I got home, and I would devour every book I brought home.

Everywhere we moved, the library was a home away from home, and a refuge in my home. In Bowie, Maryland, the library sat next to my high school, and when I didn't want to go home (which was often), I would spend my afternoons and evenings in the library, filling my eyes and ears with newness and life and the whole world.

 I developed a library in my own home as my mother had, and in my phone when digital libraries became possible. 

One time I was helping an elderly member of my church clear out a shed, full of webs and rodent droppings. I came across some boxes that had an entire set of Harvard Books, untouched and only a little musty. A glowing miracle of knowledge.

As coolly as I could, I sidled up to her, and asked, "I don't suppose you're looking to get rid of these....?"

She looked at it.

"Yeah, you can have them if you want them."

I assented just as coolly, then went home with double-fist pumps and whoops of victory. SCORE! 

My love of libraries changed my political leanings - when I moved somewhere where the library was a closet of old books that hadn't been updated in 50 years, I changed political parties in protest.

I took my kids to the library every week. The staff knew me as the lady with the laundry basket, and my kids filled that basket week after week until they left home.

When people ask me what my alma mater is, I tell them it was Book U - the same alma mater of Benjamin Franklin, Ray Bradbury and Malcolm X. Talk about impressive, right?

 

When I go to heaven one day, for me, it will be a library, all to myself, where I can roll on long wooden library ladders, scurry into corners and wear books on my head and nestle into a pile of pages on the floor until I fall over drunk on stories. 

 *snort*

So I kinda like libraries. :-) What about you?

The Iliad Book 10 and the Book of Mormon - Leaders Before a Battle

You may have thought I'd given up, but no! Still going strong with the Iliad. Today we're reviewing Book 10 next to a story near the end of the Book of Mormon - the poignant thoughts of the prophet/warrior Mormon before he goes to battle. 

Book 10 of the Iliad opens in great fear. Achilles has refused to soften his heart and return to help the Greeks. Agamemnon's distress is acute - fearing that the gods and men have all turned on him:

 All night the chiefs before their vessels lay,
And lost in sleep the labours of the day:
All but the king: with various thoughts oppress’d,

 His country’s cares lay rolling in his breast.
As when by lightnings Jove’s ethereal power
Foretels the rattling hail, or weighty shower,
Or sends soft snows to whiten all the shore,
Or bids the brazen throat of war to roar;
By fits one flash succeeds as one expires,
And heaven flames thick with momentary fires:

 So bursting frequent from Atrides’ breast,
Sighs following sighs his inward fears confess’d.

 Now o’er the fields, dejected, he surveys
From thousand Trojan fires the mounting blaze;
Hears in the passing wind their music blow,
And marks distinct the voices of the foe.

Now looking backwards to the fleet and coast,
Anxious he sorrows for the endangered host.
He rends his hair, in sacrifice to Jove,
And sues to him that ever lives above:
Inly he groans; while glory and despair
Divide his heart, and wage a double war. 

 

The worries of leadership are heavy indeed, and Agamemnon's worries are intensified in the possibility that he may have done wrong, and his decisions are the reason why his warriors may fail in their task. And his worry turned out to be unwarranted, for some of his leaders went under cover of night and scored a victory, killing a Trojan prince and bringing back the spoils of that fight.

 

On the other hand, Mormon, the leader of the Nephite armies in the Book of Mormon, has little to no worries for himself, but for his people.

He had worked hard to teach them the gospel of Christ, and yet, they assumed that every victory belonged to them in their strength, and not from God. Their terrible deeds so repulsed Mormon that he resigned his commission as head of their armies.

After more battles, with strong men killed and women and children captured and sacrificed to idols, he changes his mind, but sadly. In Mormon 5: 1-2, we read:

 

And it came to pass that I did go forth among the Nephites, 

and did repent of the oath which I had made that I would no more assist them; 

and they gave me command again of their armies, 

for they looked upon me as though I could deliver them from their afflictions.

But behold, I was without hope, 

for I knew the judgments of the Lord which should come upon them; 

for they repented not of their iniquities, 

but did struggle for their lives without calling upon that Being who created them.

He took up a doomed fight out of love and honor for his people, but he knew what would be their end.

Even the mighty tremble when they sense divine withdrawal, and these two 'night of the soul' scenes reveal the weakness of human confidence. Two different leaders, sorrowing for their people - yet within, we can see that sorrow taking on different nuances.

 

 

 

Elder Eldred G. Smith, Part Three - Peace in a Christmas Song

For Part One or Part Two, choose the link and click. 

 

Elder Eldred G. Smith had a bit of a musical inclination, if we are to draw any conclusions from his talk, "Peace", in the April 1972 General Conference.

Yesterday we had the pleasant ear worm of a Hebrew folk song. Today we go back to a classic tune from the 1960s:

 

The Quote

"Let us not just sing, 'Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me,' 

but let us mean it. Make it my goal—your goal."

 

The song he's quoting is a Christian song, "Let There Be Peace on Earth", written in 1955, and most popular in the public consciousness during the 1960s, for obvious reasons.

 

It was written originally for the International Children's Choir:

 

Then it was sung by various other artists. This version by Pat Boone and Johnny Mathis I thought was pretty nice: 

 

There's other versions as well. Take a peek yourself. 

The concept is certainly sound. If we want to live in a peaceful world, it all starts with us.

Elder Eldred G. Smith, Part Two - Hevenu Shalom Alechem

 For Part One or Part Three, choose the link and click. 

 

Eldred. 

Who names their kid Eldred anymore, unless they want him to grow up to be a wizard? It's a pretty cool wizard name.

Anyway, Elder Eldred G. Smith goes on in his talk in April 1972 General Conference to talk about "Peace", and he mentions a song he learned on a trip to the Holy Land:

 

The Quote (lyrics from a song) 

 

"Our guide on a recent tour in the Holy Land, 

who is a Jordanian Arab and a Greek Orthodox Catholic by the name of Sari Rabadi, 

taught us a little Arabian song:  

“Havano, shalo, malechem,” 

which translated means: 

“We bring you peace.” 

 

That set me on fire to see if I could find that song.

And I did. :-) 

Hevenu Shalom Alechem. 

It's such a simple, fun song. You'll be an expert in no time. Here's a simple traditional version, to bring some peace to you today: 

 

 And just for funsies, here's a contemporary, over-the-top flashmob version from Israel. Heaven knows we could use some smiles these days:

 

Hevenu Shalom Alechem - We bring you peace.

God brings me the greatest peace in this world. Where do you find peace?