I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.
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I spent millons of years in the world of inorganic things as a star, as a rock... Then I died and became a plant-- Forgetting my former existence because of its otherness Then I died and became an animal-- Forgetting my life as a plant except for inclinations in the season of spring and sweet herbs-- like the inclination of babes toward their mother's breast Then I died and became a human My intelligence ripened, awakening from greed and self-seeking to become wise and knowing I behold a hundred thousand intelligences most marvelous and remember my former states and inclinations And when I die again I will soar past the angels to places I cannot imagine Now, what have I ever lost by dying?
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My heart leaps up when I behold A rainbow in the sky.
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When the great white silence comes and fills the boughs of the trees with a thickening, glistening brilliance, and all is cold and barren, where be the blossom? It is in the memory. It is in the wisdom. It is in the growth of last spring, and it is coming forth again. For when the season has turned and winter is gone, the buds come again, and behold, there is another blossom. If the ongoingeness of life is beheld in a single blossom, why do you think that you are less that its life? Do you think that you only bloom in sping, produce your fruit in summer, drop your leaves in autumn and then die in winter? But are you not greater than the greatest blossom? Is not your life more important? Indeed it is. And as the blossoms continue to bloom every spring, so will you live, life after life. What a story your blossoms could tell of all the seasons you've seen.
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When by the Ruins oft I past My sorrowing eyes aside did cast And here and there the places spy Where oft I sate and long did lie. Here stood that Trunk, and there that chest, There lay that store I counted best, My pleasant things in ashes lie And them behold no more shall I. Under the roof no guest shall sit, Nor at thy Table eat a bit. No pleasant talk shall 'ere be told Nor things recounted done of old. No Candle 'ere shall shine in Thee, Nor bridegroom's voice ere heard shall bee. In silence ever shalt thou lie.
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Behold a worthy sight, to which the God, turning his attention to his own work, may direct his gaze. Behold an equal thing, worthy of a God, a brave man matched in conflict with evil fortune.
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2 Corinthians 6:2:
For he says, 'In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you.' I tell you, now is the time of God's favor, now is the day of salvation.
(NIV)
For He says, In the time of favor (of an assured welcome) I have listened to and heeded your call, and I have helped you on the day of deliverance (the day of salvation). Behold, now is truly the time for a gracious welcome and acceptance [of you from God]; behold, now is the day of salvation! [Isa. 49:8.](AMP)
(For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.)
(KJV)
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What is clearer than that man is not furnished for hunting, much less for eating, other animals? In one word, we seem to be admirably admonished by Cicero that man was destined for other things than for seizing and cutting the throats of other animals. If you answer, 'that may be said to be an industry ordered by Nature, by which such weapons are invented,' then, behold, it is by the very same artificial instrument that men make weapons for mutual slaughter. Do they this at the instigation of Nature? Can a use so noxious be called natural? Faculty is given by Nature, but it is our own fault that we make a perverse use of it.
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Visit the Navy-Yard, and behold a marine, such a man as an American government can make, or such as it can make a man with its black arts -- a mere shadow and reminiscence of humanity, a man laid out alive and standing, and already, as one may say, buried under arms with funeral accompaniments.
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Pleasant it to behold great encounters of warfare arrayed over the plains, with no part of yours in peril.
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Malachi 2:3:
'Because of you I will rebuke your descendants; I will smear on your faces the dung from your festival sacrifices, and you will be carried off with it.'
(NIV)
Behold, I will rebuke your seed [grain--which will prevent due harvest], and I will spread the dung from the festival offerings upon your faces, and you shall be taken away with it.
(AMP)
Behold, I will corrupt your seed, and spread dung upon your faces, even the dung of your solemn feasts; and one shall take you away with it.
(KJV)
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I existed from all eternity and, behold, I am here; and I shall exist till the end of time, for my being has no end.
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Genesis 3:22:
And the LORD God said, 'The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.'
(NIV)
And the Lord God said, Behold, the man has become like one of Us [the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit], to know [how to distinguish between] good and evil and blessing and calamity; and now, lest he put forth his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever--
(AMP)
And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:
(KJV)
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Should we continue to look upwards Is the light we can see in the sky one of those which will presently be extinguished The ideal is terrifying to behold, lost as it is in the depths, small, isolated, a pin-point, brilliant but threatened on all sides by the dark forces that surround it nevertheless, no more in danger than a star in the jaws of the clouds. (Les Miserables)
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Tell me, my soul, why art thou restless? Why dost thou look forward to the future with such strong desire? The present is thine,--and the past;--and the future shall be! O that thou didst look forward to the great hereafter with half the longing wherewith thou longest for an earthly future,--which a few days at most will bring thee! to the meeting of the dead, as to the meeting of the absent! Thou glorious spirit-land! O, that I could behold thee as thou art,--the region of life, and light, and love, and the dwelling-place of those beloved ones, whose being has flowed onward like a silver-clear stream into the solemn-sounding main, into the ocean of Eternity.
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John 20:27:
Then he said to Thomas, 'Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.'
(NIV)
Then He said to Thomas, Reach out your finger here, and see My hands; and put out your hand and place [it] in My side. Do not be faithless and incredulous, but [stop your unbelief and] believe!
(AMP)
Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing.
(KJV)
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When the world has got hold of a lie, it is astonishing how hard it is to kill it. You beat it over the head, till it seems to have given up the ghost, and behold! the next day it is as healthy as ever.
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And now behold the goddess seated on her throne ... receiving the adulation of her worshipper.... An adulation, which translated into plain En...
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Behold the child, by Nature's kindly law pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.
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The beginning, middle, and end of the birth, growth, and perfection of whatever we behold is from contraries, by contraries, and to contraries; and whatever contrariety is, there is action and reaction, there is motion, diversity, multitude, and order, there are degrees, succession and vicissitude.
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Behold, my love, behold all that I simultaneously do: scandal, seduction, bad example, incest, adultery, sodomy! Oh, Satan! one and unique God of my soul, inspire thou in me something yet more, present further perversions to my smoking heart, and then shalt thou see how I shall plunge myself into them all!
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Zechariah 9:9:
Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion! Shout, Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
(NIV)
Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O Daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King comes to you; He is [uncompromisingly] just and having salvation [triumphant and victorious], patient, meek, lowly, and riding on a donkey, upon a colt, the foal of a donkey. [Matt. 21:5; John 12:14, 15.](AMP)
Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass.
(KJV)
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Knowing that, O Arjuna, you shall not again get deluded like this. By this knowledge you shall behold the entire creation in your own Self/Lord, or in Brahman.
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Behold then Septimus Dodge returning to Dodge-town victorious. Not crowned with laurel, it is true, but wreathed in lists of things he has seen and sucked dry. Seen and sucked dry, you know: Venus de Milo, the Rhine or the Coliseum: swallowed like so many clams, and left the shells.
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And, behold, they cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? art thou come hither to torment us before the time? / And there was a good way off from them an herd of many swine feeding.
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And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb-bearing seed which is upon the face of the earth, and every tree in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed: to you it shall be as meat....
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Before we shall again behold In his diurnal race the world's great eye,...
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Isaiah 52:13:
See, my servant will act wisely; he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted.
(NIV)
Behold, My Servant shall deal wisely and shall prosper; He shall be exalted and extolled and shall stand very high.
(AMP)
Behold, my servant shall deal prudently, he shall be exalted and extolled, and be very high.
(KJV)
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Our first responsibility is not to build the Church or even to get souls saved--it is to represent Christ and to bring His message to the world. As God beholds us in Christ, so the world must behold Christ in us. As Christ represents us before the Father, so we must represent Christ before the world.
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Matthew 28:20:
'And teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.'
(NIV)
Teaching them to observe everything that I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you all the days (perpetually, uniformly, and on every occasion), to the [very] close and consummation of the age. Amen (so let it be).
(AMP)
Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.
(KJV)
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