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Joined: 3/7/2009 Posts: 33,650 Neurons: 100,128 Location: Inside Farlex computers
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 Looking at these stars suddenly dwarfed my own troubles and all the gravities of terrestrial life. H.G. Wells (1866-1946)
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Rank: Advanced Member
Joined: 3/26/2013 Posts: 3,518 Neurons: 361,581 Location: Minsk, Minskaya Voblasts', Belarus
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How many times he looked at stars before and after that stellar starry night? PS Awesomeness is foundation of religion.
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Without context its not clear what he wanted to express,at least to me.Had he particular stars in mind? Were these (particular) stars more in trouble than him? Questions upon questions.
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Wish granted.
`Weena, I was glad to find, was fast asleep. I carefully wrapped her in my jacket, and sat down beside her to wait for the moonrise. The hillside was quiet and deserted, but from the black of the wood there came now and then a stir of living things. Above me shone the stars, for the night was very clear. I felt a certain sense of friendly comfort in their twinkling. All the old constellations had gone from the sky, however: that slow movement which is imperceptible in a hundred human lifetimes, had long since rearranged them in unfamiliar groupings. But the Milky Way, it seemed to me, was still the same tattered streamer of star-dust as of yore. Southward (as I judged it) was a very bright red star that was new to me; it was even more splendid than our own green Sirius. And amid all these scintillating points of light one bright planet shone kindly and steadily like the face of an old friend.
`Looking at these stars suddenly dwarfed my own troubles and all the gravities of terrestrial life. I thought of their unfathomable distance, and the slow inevitable drift of their movements out of the unknown past into the unknown future. I thought of the great precessional cycle that the pole of the earth describes. Only forty times had that silent revolution occurred during all the years that I had traversed. And during these few revolutions all the activity, all the traditions, the complex organizations, the nations, languages, literatures, aspirations, even the mere memory of Man as I knew him, had been swept out of existence. Instead were these frail creatures who had forgotten their high ancestry, and the white Things of which I went in terror. Then I thought of the Great Fear that was between the two species, and for the first time, with a sudden shiver, came the clear knowledge of what the meat I had seen might be. Yet it was too horrible! I looked at little Weena sleeping beside me, her face white and starlike under the stars, and forthwith dismissed the thought.
Ch 7, The Time Machine
(http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/www/wells/timemach/html/timemach_chap7.html)
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 Rank: Advanced Member
Joined: 12/20/2012 Posts: 1,032 Neurons: 12,634
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Thank you, MTC, once again, for this beautiful passage by H. G. Wells.
Whenever one contemplates the vastness and seemingly timeless existence of humanity, with its massive complexities and pain, one's own troubles and personal sorrows seem like the tiny sparks of light seen from fireflies in the expanding wilderness of night.
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You speak from a stellar perspective, Miriam, located as you are, "Second star to the right straight on till morning."
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Joined: 3/26/2013 Posts: 3,518 Neurons: 361,581 Location: Minsk, Minskaya Voblasts', Belarus
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Radiant Miriam... as always soften our manly indurate hearts.
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Joined: 5/14/2010 Posts: 2,424 Neurons: 13,969
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I think it´s wise to keep in mind the law of gravity, lest you slip or trip over something or fall into a well.
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Daemon wrote:Looking at these stars suddenly dwarfed my own troubles and all the gravities of terrestrial life. H.G. Wells (1866-1946) A beautiful remark, so fraught with a human desire to escape the troubles of terrestrial life, if only for a moment of respite. Cicero had, so to speak, rained on many a parade in his time--even in anticipation it seems. It is said that Cicero, with some good reason, quoted from "Iphigenia" by Ennius: "No one regards what is before his feet; we all gaze at the stars". This, of course, may not be a beautiful observation- only down to earth.
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