Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Abundance Christmas December 18th

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This is the complete episode of Abundance called Christmas from December 18th.
Christmas special!!
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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”

“The Other Wise Man”

"Christmas Bells"

"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"

and
"The Gift of the Magi"

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Sonnet Eighty-five by William Shakespeare

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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”
“The Other Wise Man”
"Christmas Bells"
"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"
and
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Sonnet Eighty-five


My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still,
While comments of your praise, richly compiled,
Reserve their character with golden quill
And precious phrase by all the Muses filed.
I think good thoughts whilst other write good words,
And like unletter'd clerk still cry 'Amen'
To every hymn that able spirit affords
In polish'd form of well-refined pen.
Hearing you praised, I say ''Tis so, 'tis true,'
And to the most of praise add something more;
But that is in my thought, whose love to you,
Though words come hindmost, holds his rank before.
Then others for the breath of words respect,
Me for my dumb thoughts, speaking in effect.


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Sonnet Eighty-four by William Shakespeare

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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”
“The Other Wise Man”
"Christmas Bells"
"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"
and
"The Gift of the Magi"
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receive the text of all stories
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Sonnet Eighty-four


Who is it that says most? Which can say more
Than this rich praise, that you alone are you?
In whose confine immured is the store
Which should example where your equal grew.
Lean penury within that pen doth dwell
That to his subject lends not some small glory;
But he that writes of you, if he can tell
That you are you, so dignifies his story,
Let him but copy what in you is writ,
Not making worse what nature made so clear,
And such a counterpart shall fame his wit,
Making his style admired everywhere.
You to your beauteous blessings add a curse,
Being fond on praise, which makes your praises worse.


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Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Our Journey by Dane Allred

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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”
“The Other Wise Man”
"Christmas Bells"
"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"
and
"The Gift of the Magi"
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Our Journey


I hope you are finding out those things you were sent here to discover,
Achieving those things only you can do,
Finding those opportunities to reconnect with everyone in this world,
Who was with us in the Bright Space.

We were sent here to learn all there is to know,
To return and complete the knowledge we sought
When we left the Bright Space.

We knew we could only learn these things
Alone and apart from each other here on a spinning planet.
We had to leave the perfect peace of the Bright Space to find the answers
This universe is seeking
By manifesting itself in you and me.

Your life is so different from mine,
Even though we seem to spin in the same orbits,
Doing similar things,
Finding similar answers
Reaching similar conclusions.

But you are a unique expression of how this universe wants to learn.
Your experiences add to the combined experiences of all who have ever lived,
Are living now,
And are yet to live.

When that reunion of all of us in the Bright Space takes place,
What a wonderful gathering it will be.

We will understand how our experiences
And the experiences of others
Have fulfilled our wish to know all there is to know.
To experience those things only we could experience
In a way only we could understand.

We are reminded of that elusive goal every time we meet someone,
Who we are sure we have already met.

We were together in the Bright Space before this life,
And the promises we made to each other are fulfilled on those days
When we reach out to that other person,
Reminded of how important this life really is,
Reminded of how important that other person really is,
Reminded that we have a work to do that only we can do;
We glimpse the majesty of this work,
To bring us together again in that Bright Space,

Together, we can see into the future of our universe.


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Sonnet Eighty-three by William Shakespeare

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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”
“The Other Wise Man"
"Christmas Bells"
"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"
and
"The Gift of the Magi"
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Sonnet Eighty-three


I never saw that you did painting need
And therefore to your fair no painting set;
I found, or thought I found, you did exceed
The barren tender of a poet's debt;
And therefore have I slept in your report,
That you yourself being extant well might show
How far a modern quill doth come too short,
Speaking of worth, what worth in you doth grow.
This silence for my sin you did impute,
Which shall be most my glory, being dumb;
For I impair not beauty being mute,
When others would give life and bring a tomb.
There lives more life in one of your fair eyes
Than both your poets can in praise devise.

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Sonnet Eighty-two by William Shakespeare

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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”
“The Other Wise Man”
"Christmas Bells"
"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"
and
"The Gift of the Magi"
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Sonnet Eighty-two


I grant thou wert not married to my Muse
And therefore mayst without attaint o'erlook
The dedicated words which writers use
Of their fair subject, blessing every book
Thou art as fair in knowledge as in hue,
Finding thy worth a limit past my praise,
And therefore art enforced to seek anew
Some fresher stamp of the time-bettering days
And do so, love; yet when they have devised
What strained touches rhetoric can lend,
Thou truly fair wert truly sympathized
In true plain words by thy true-telling friend;
And their gross painting might be better used
Where cheeks need blood; in thee it is abused.


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Monday, December 26, 2011

Sonnet Eighty-one by William Shakespeare

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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”
“The Other Wise Man”
"Christmas Bells"
"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"
and
"The Gift of the Magi"
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Sonnet Eighty-one


Or I shall live your epitaph to make,
Or you survive when I in earth am rotten;
From hence your memory death cannot take,
Although in me each part will be forgotten.
Your name from hence immortal life shall have,
Though I, once gone, to all the world must die:
The earth can yield me but a common grave,
When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie.
Your monument shall be my gentle verse,
Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read,
And tongues to be your being shall rehearse
When all the breathers of this world are dead;
You still shall live--such virtue hath my pen--
Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.


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Saturday, December 24, 2011

St. George Groanings

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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”

“The Other Wise Man”

"Christmas Bells"

"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"

and
"The Gift of the Magi"

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ST. GEORGE GROANINGS


If you ever have the occasion to run a marathon, I would suggest you run the St. George Marathon. It's an incredible adventure and really, really fun. It seems like the entire city shows up to cheer you on, and the course is spectacular.

Racers are asked to gather at six A.M. in downtown St. George, and it is a strange sight to see people in running shorts and sweats gathered in October that early in the morning. It really looks like a lot of ghosts floating toward the same destination. They load you up on busses and drive you out to the starting line, twenty-six point two miles away.

As you are riding out on the bus, you can look around and see people older, younger, fatter and thinner than you. You get to wonder who will make it. People talk about other races they have done; if this is their first marathon; most of us look scared.

The bad news about being transported to the starting line is that you realize as you travel for 45 minutes that you have to run the entire way back, and you start wondering how much farther the bus will go. The farther the bus goes, the farther you will have to run. In my second and third marathons, I realized it was better to distract yourself somehow rather than consider the distance the bus was traveling.

When you reach the beginning of the race up Snow Canyon, you are a mile and a half higher than when you boarded the bus. That is both good and bad. At least you are running mostly downhill. During the next week, I will feel it in the bottom of my knees.

At the starting line there are massive fires burning at the side of the road. Music plays and porta-potties line the way. There are thousands of similarly crazy runners huddled around the fires since it's about 40 degrees or less outside. After a mile or two the temperature will feel great, but the race people do their best to keep you toasty before the race. Around the communal fire, the passion of running sparkles in the eyes of those gathered.

If you have worn sweats, they allow you to bag them up and put your number on them. Then they don't have to gather thousands of pieces of clothing along the 26 mile course since runners tend to shed clothing without a thought when they start heating up.

You throw your bag in the back of a big Ryder truck and the hundreds of bags are transported to the finish line and stacked by number on the tennis courts.

Then the race begins and if you have listened to instructions and followed the signs, you line up by the time you expect to finish. This avoids crowding the starting line, and when you are going to run for hours, being back from the starting line is not so bad. It might be 3 minutes before you even see the starting line after the gun if you run as slowly as I, and what's 3 minutes spread over 4 hours anyway.

Most of us don't start our watches until we cross the starting line anyway. That explains how our unofficial times are slower than the officially listed finishing time. We want the fast runners to get out of the way so we can concentrate on the rest of the course.

The only good advice I can give about running I learned from reading a jogging book, and it seems to work no matter what race I am running.

There is a volcano called Veyo in the first part of the race, which means we will be running uphill for a while. I run so slow uphill it may be mistaken for a stroll. I may be the only one who knows I am still running, which can be evidenced by my continually pumping knees. But I am not walking - I am running very, very slowly.

The hill usually kills most of us. But the secret to the hill is on the other side. We tend to have an established pace when we run on level ground, and most people keep up this pace on the downside of a hill.

But the advantage of gravity can give you a great boost when you are running a race. It doesn't take as much effort to run downhill, so most people rest on the downhill.

One of the greatest feelings in the world is to be doing well while others are struggling. With this technique, you really aren’t running faster, but just taking bigger steps.

It may be a small difference, but maybe what is eluding most of us is keeping up the same pace, but just taking bigger steps.

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A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

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This is the the complete audio of "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens.

Friday, December 23, 2011

Stave Four -- A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”

“The Other Wise Man”

"Christmas Bells"

"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"

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Stave Four



Last of the Spirits



The Phantom slowly, gravely, silently approached. When it came near him, Scrooge bent down upon his knee; for in the air through which this Spirit moved it seemed to scatter gloom and mystery.

It was shrouded in a deep black garment, which concealed its head, its face, its form, and left nothing of it visible save one outstretched hand. He knew no more, for the Spirit neither spoke nor moved.

"I am in the presence of the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come? Ghost of the Future! I fear you more than any spectre I have seen. But as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope to live to be another man from what I was, I am prepared to bear you company, and do it with a thankful heart. Will you not speak to me?"

It gave him no reply. The hand was pointed straight before them.

"Lead on! Lead on! The night is waning fast, and it is precious time to me, I know. Lead on, Spirit!"

They scarcely seemed to enter the city; for the city rather seemed to spring up about them. But there they were in the heart of it; on 'Change, amongst the merchants.

The Spirit stopped beside one little knot of business men. Observing that the hand was pointed to them, Scrooge advanced to listen to their talk.

"No," said a great fat man with a monstrous chin, "I don't know much about it either way. I only know he's dead."

"When did he die?" inquired another.

"Last night, I believe."

"Why, what was the matter with him? I thought he'd never die."

"God knows," said the first, with a yawn.

"What has he done with his money?" asked a red-faced gentleman.

"I haven't heard," said the man with the large chin. "Company, perhaps. He hasn't left it to me. That's all I know. Bye, bye!"

Scrooge was at first inclined to be surprised that the Spirit should attach importance to conversation apparently so trivial; but feeling assured that it must have some hidden purpose, he set himself to consider what it was likely to be. It could scarcely be supposed to have any bearing on the death of Jacob, his old partner, for that was Past, and this Ghost's province was the Future.

He looked about in that very place for his own image; but another man stood in his accustomed corner, and though the clock pointed to his usual time of day for being there, he saw no likeness of himself among the multitudes that poured in through the Porch. It gave him little surprise, however; for he had been revolving in his mind a change of life, and he thought and hoped he saw his new-born resolutions carried out in this.

They left this busy scene, and went into an obscure part of the town, to a low shop where iron, old rags, bottles, bones, and greasy offal were bought. A gray-haired rascal, of great age, sat smoking his pipe.

Scrooge and the Phantom came into the presence of this man, just as a woman with a heavy bundle slunk into the shop. But she had scarcely entered, when another woman, similarly laden, came in too; and she was closely followed by a man in faded black. After a short period of blank astonishment, in which the old man with the pipe had joined them, they all three burst into a laugh.

"Let the charwoman alone to be the first!" cried she who had entered first. "Let the laundress alone to be the second; and let the undertaker's man alone to be the third. Look here, old Joe, here's a chance! If we haven't all three met here without meaning it!"

"You couldn't have met in a better place. You were made free of it long ago, you know; and the other two ain't strangers. What have you got to sell? What have you got to sell?"

"Half a minute's patience, Joe, and you shall see."

"What odds then! What odds, Mrs. Dilber?" said the woman. "Every person has a right to take care of themselves. He always did! Who's the worse for the loss of a few things like these? Not a dead man, I suppose."

Mrs. Dilber, whose manner was remarkable for general propitiation, said, "No, indeed, ma'am."

"If he wanted to keep 'em after he was dead, a wicked old screw, why wasn't he natural in his lifetime? If he had been, he'd have had somebody to look after him when he was struck with Death, instead of lying gasping out his last there, alone by himself."

"It's the truest word that ever was spoke, it's a judgment on him."

"I wish it was a little heavier judgment, and it should have been, you may depend upon it, if I could have laid my hands on anything else. Open that bundle, old Joe, and let me know the value of it. Speak out plain. I'm not afraid to be the first, nor afraid for them to see it."

Joe went down on his knees for the greater convenience of opening the bundle, and dragged out a large and heavy roll of some dark stuff.

"What do you call this? Bed-curtains!"

"Ah! Bed-curtains! Don't drop that oil upon the blankets, now."

"His blankets?"

"Whose else's do you think? He isn't likely to take cold without 'em. I dare say. Ah! You may look through that shirt till your eyes ache; but you won't find a hole in it, nor a threadbare place. It's the best he had, and a fine one too. They'd have wasted it by dressing him up in it, if it hadn't been for me."

Scrooge listened to this dialogue in horror.

"Spirit! I see, I see. The case of this unhappy man might be my own. My life tends that way, now. Merciful Heaven, what is this!"

The scene had changed, and now he almost touched a bare, uncurtained bed. A pale light, rising in the outer air, fell straight upon this bed; and on it, unwatched, unwept, uncared for, was the body of this plundered unknown man.

"Spirit, let me see some tenderness connected with a death, or this dark chamber, Spirit, will be forever present to me."

The Ghost conducted him to poor Bob Cratchit's house -- the dwelling he had visited before -- and found the mother and the children seated round the fire.

Quiet. Very quiet. The noisy little Cratchits were as still as statues in one corner, and sat looking up at Peter, who had a book before him. The mother and her daughters were engaged in needle-work. But surely they were very quiet!

“‘And he took a child, and set him in the midst of them.'"

Where had Scrooge heard those words? He had not dreamed them. The boy must have read them out, as he and the Spirit crossed the threshold. Why did he not go on?

The mother laid her work upon the table, and put her hand up to her face.

"The color hurts my eyes," she said.

The color? Ah, poor Tiny Tim!

"They're better now again. It makes them weak by candle-light; and I wouldn't show weak eyes to your father when he comes home, for the world. It must be near his time."

"Past it rather," Peter answered, shutting up his book. "But I think he has walked a little slower than he used, these last few evenings, mother."

"I have known him walk with -- I have known him walk with Tiny Tim upon his shoulder, very fast indeed."

"And so have I," cried Peter. "Often."

"And so have I," exclaimed another. So had all.

"But he was very light to carry, and his father loved him so, that it was no trouble -- no trouble. And there is your father at the door!"

She hurried out to meet him; and little Bob in his comforter -- he had need of it, poor fellow -- came in. His tea was ready for him on the hob, and they all tried who should help him to it most. Then the two young Cratchits got upon his knees and laid, each child, a little cheek against his face, as if they said, "Don't mind it, father. Don't be grieved!"

Bob was very cheerful with them, and spoke pleasantly to all the family. He looked at the work upon the table, and praised the industry and speed of Mrs. Cratchit and the girls. They would be done long before Sunday, he said.

"Sunday! You went today, then, Robert?"

"Yes, my dear," returned Bob. "I wish you could have gone. It would have done you good to see how green a place it is. But you'll see it often. I promised him that I would walk there on a Sunday. My little, little child! My little child!"

He broke down all at once. He couldn't help it. If he could have helped it, he and his child would have been farther apart, perhaps, than they were.

"Spectre," said Scrooge, "something informs me that our parting moment is at hand. I know it, but I know not how. Tell me what man that was, with the covered face, whom we saw lying dead?"

The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come conveyed him to a dismal, wretched, ruinous churchyard.

The Spirit stood among the graves, and pointed down to One.

"Before I draw nearer to that stone to which you point, answer me one question. Are these the shadows of the things that Will be, or are they shadows of the things that May be only?"

Still the Ghost pointed downward to the grave by which it stood.

"Men's courses will foreshadow certain ends, to which, if persevered in, they must lead. But if the courses be departed from, the ends will change. Say it is thus with what you show me!"

The Spirit was immovable as ever.

Scrooge crept towards it, trembling as he went; and, following the finger, read upon the stone of the neglected grave his own name -- EBENEZER SCROOGE.

"Am I that man who lay upon the bed? No, Spirit! O no, no! Spirit! Hear me! I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been but for this intercourse. Why show me this, if I am past all hope? Assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me by an altered life."

For the first time the kind hand faltered.

"I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. O, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!"

Holding up his hands in one last prayer to have his fate reversed, he saw an alteration in the Phantom's hood and dress. It shrunk, collapsed, and dwindled down into a bedpost.

Yes, and the bedpost was his own. The bed was his own, the room was his own. Best and happiest of all, the Time before him was his own, to make amends in!

He was checked in his transports by the churches ringing out the lustiest peals he had ever heard.

Running to the window, he opened it, and put out his head. No fog, no mist, no night; clear, bright, stirring, golden day.

"What's today?" cried Scrooge, calling downward to a boy in Sunday clothes, who perhaps had loitered in to look about him.

"Eh?"

"What's to-day, my fine fellow?"

"Today? Why, CHRISTMAS DAY."

"It's Christmas day! I haven't missed it. Hallo, my fine fellow!"

"Hallo!"

"Do you know the Poulterer's, in the next street but one, at the corner?"

"I should hope I did."

"An intelligent boy! A remarkable boy! Do you know whether they've sold the prize Turkey that was hanging up there? Not the little prize Turkey -- the big one?"

"What, the one as big as me?"

"What a delightful boy! It's a pleasure to talk to him. Yes, my buck!"

"It's hanging there now."

"Is it? Go and buy it."

"Walk-ER!" exclaimed the boy.

"No, no, I am in earnest. Go and buy it, and tell 'em to bring it here, that I may give them the direction where to take it. Come back with the man, and I'll give you a shilling. Come back with him in less than five minutes, and I'll give you half a crown!"

The boy was off like a shot.

"I'll send it to Bob Cratchit's! He shan't know who sends it. It's twice the size of Tiny Tim. Joe Miller never made such a joke as sending it to Bob's will be!"

The hand in which he wrote the address was not a steady one; but write it he did, somehow, and went down stairs to open the street door, ready for the coming of the poulterer's man.

It was a Turkey! He never could have stood upon his legs, that bird. He would have snapped 'em short off in a minute, like sticks of sealing-wax.

Scrooge dressed himself "all in his best," and at last got out into the streets. The people were by this time pouring forth, as he had seen them with the Ghost of Christmas Present; and, walking with his hands behind him, Scrooge regarded every one with a delighted smile. He looked so irresistibly pleasant, in a word, that three or four good-humored fellows said, "Good morning, sir! A Merry Christmas to you!" And Scrooge said often afterwards, that, of all the blithe sounds he had ever heard, these were the blithest in his ears.

In the afternoon, he turned his steps towards his nephew's house.

He passed the door a dozen times, before he had the courage to go up and knock. But he made a dash, and did it.

"Is your master at home, my dear?" said Scrooge to the girl. Nice girl! Very.

"Yes, sir."

"Where is he, my love?"

"He's in the dining-room, sir, with his mistress."

"He knows me," said Scrooge, with his hand already on the dining-room lock. "I'll go in here, my dear."

"Fred!"

"Why, bless my soul!" cried Fred, "who's that?"

"It's I. Your uncle Scrooge. I have come to dinner. Will you let me in, Fred?"

Let him in! It is a mercy he didn't shake his arm off. He was at home in five minutes. Nothing could be heartier. His niece looked just the same. So did Topper when he came. So did the plump sister, when she came. So did every one when they came. Wonderful party, wonderful games, wonderful unanimity, won-der-ful happiness!

But he was early at the office next morning. Oh, he was early there. If he could only be there first, and catch Bob Cratchit coming late! That was the thing he had set his heart upon.

And he did it. The clock struck nine. No Bob. A quarter past. No Bob. Bob was full eighteen minutes and a half behind his time. Scrooge sat with his door wide open, that he might see him come into the Tank.

Bob's hat was off, before he opened the door; his comforter, too. He was on his stool in a jiffy; driving away with his pen, as if he were trying to overtake nine o'clock.

"Hallo!" growled Scrooge, in his accustomed voice, as near as he could feign it. "What do you mean by coming here at this time of day?"

"I am very sorry, sir. I am behind my time."

"You are? Yes. I think you are. Step this way, if you please."

"It's only once a year, sir. It shall not be repeated. I was making rather merry yesterday, sir."

"Now, I'll tell you what, my friend. I am not going to stand this sort of thing any longer. And therefore," Scrooge continued, leaping from his stool, and giving Bob such a dig in the waistcoat that he staggered back into the Tank again --"and therefore I am about to raise your salary!"

Bob trembled, and got a little nearer to the ruler.

"A Merry Christmas, Bob!" said Scrooge, with an earnestness that could not be mistaken, as he clapped him on the back. "A merrier Christmas, Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year! I'll raise your salary, and endeavor to assist your struggling family, and we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon, over a Christmas bowl of smoking bishop, Bob! Make up the fires, and buy a second coal-scuttle before you dot another ‘i’, Bob Cratchit!"

Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did NOT die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him; but his own heart laughed, and that was quite enough for him.

He had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived in that respect upon the Total-Abstinence Principle ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, “God Bless Us, Every One”!

The End




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Sunday, December 18, 2011

Abundance Elusiveness December 11th

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“The Other Wise Man”

"Christmas Bells"

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Saturday, December 17, 2011

Sonnet Eighty by William Shakespeare

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Sonnet Eighty


O, how I faint when I of you do write,
Knowing a better spirit doth use your name,
And in the praise thereof spends all his might,
To make me tongue-tied, speaking of your fame!
But since your worth, wide as the ocean is,
The humble as the proudest sail doth bear,
My saucy bark inferior far to his
On your broad main doth willfully appear.
Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat,
Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride;
Or being wreck'd, I am a worthless boat,
He of tall building and of goodly pride:
Then if he thrive and I be cast away,
The worst was this; my love was my decay.

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Sonnet Seventy-nine by William Shakespeare

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Sonnet Seventy-nine


Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid,
My verse alone had all thy gentle grace,
But now my gracious numbers are decay'd
And my sick Muse doth give another place.
I grant, sweet love, thy lovely argument
Deserves the travail of a worthier pen,
Yet what of thee thy poet doth invent
He robs thee of and pays it thee again.
He lends thee virtue and he stole that word
From thy behavior; beauty doth he give
And found it in thy cheek; he can afford
No praise to thee but what in thee doth live.
Then thank him not for that which he doth say,
Since what he owes thee thou thyself dost pay.


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Friday, December 16, 2011

Sonnet Seventy-eight by William Shakespeare

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Sonnet Seventy-eight


So oft have I invoked thee for my Muse
And found such fair assistance in my verse
As every alien pen hath got my use
And under thee their poesy disperse.
Thine eyes that taught the dumb on high to sing
And heavy ignorance aloft to fly
Have added feathers to the learned's wing
And given grace a double majesty.
Yet be most proud of that which I compile,
Whose influence is thine and born of thee:
In others' works thou dost but mend the style,
And arts with thy sweet graces graced be;
But thou art all my art and dost advance
As high as learning my rude ignorance.


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Sonnet Seventy-seven by William Shakespeare

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Sonnet Seventy-seven


Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear,
Thy dial how thy precious minutes waste;
The vacant leaves thy mind's imprint will bear,
And of this book this learning mayst thou taste.
The wrinkles which thy glass will truly show
Of mouthed graves will give thee memory;
Thou by thy dial's shady stealth mayst know
Time's thievish progress to eternity.
Look, what thy memory can not contain
Commit to these waste blanks, and thou shalt find
Those children nursed, deliver'd from thy brain,
To take a new acquaintance of thy mind.
These offices, so oft as thou wilt look,
Shall profit thee and much enrich thy book.


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Sonnet Seventy-six by William Shakespeare

Christmas special!!
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“Twas The Night Before Christmas”

“The Other Wise Man”

"Christmas Bells"

"Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"

and
"The Gift of the Magi"

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Sonnet Seventy-six


Why is my verse so barren of new pride,
So far from variation or quick change?
Why with the time do I not glance aside
To new-found methods and to compounds strange?
Why write I still all one, ever the same,
And keep invention in a noted weed,
That every word doth almost tell my name,
Showing their birth and where they did proceed?
O, know, sweet love, I always write of you,
And you and love are still my argument;
So all my best is dressing old words new,
Spending again what is already spent:
For as the sun is daily new and old,
So is my love still telling what is told.



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