TheNobleVoice- Stop Bullfighting Now

Bull fighting videos?

Does anyone have links to the one where the old granny blows darts in the bulls eyes? It’s to er.. educate people about how terrible bullfighting really is and stuff…

I can send you a video a video of me having a c.ock fight, and before you all complain it wont involve any animals

Bullfighting in South Korea

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky

                                           HELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY

                                                Compiled, Composed & Edited

                                                                     By

                                                   ASHOK KUMAR SHARMA

The Theosophical Society, founded in 1875, is a worldwide body whose primary object is Universal Brotherhood based on the realization that life, in all its diverse forms, human and non-human, is indivisibly one. The Society imposes no belief on its members, who are united by a common search for truth and the desire to learn the meaning and purpose of existence by engaging themselves in study, reflection, purity of life and loving service.

Theosophy is the wisdom underlying all religions when they are stripped of accretions and superstitions. It offers a philosophy which renders life intelligible and demonstrates that justice and love guide the cosmos. Its teachings aid the unfoldment of the latent spiritual nature in the human being, without dependence or fear.

 

v    “O Teacher, what shall I do to reach towisdom?wise one, what, to gain perfection?  Search for the paths. But, 0 Lanoo, be of clean heart before thou startest on thy Journey. Before thou takest thy first step, learn to discern the real from the false, the ever-fleeting from the ever-lasting.  Learn above all to separate head-learning from Soul-wisdom, the ‘eye’ from the ‘heart’ doctrine.”

v    “… Each man should strive to be a centre of work in himself. When his inner development has reached a certain point, he will naturally draw those with whom he is in contact under the same influence; a nucleus will be formed, round which other people will gather, forming a centre from which information and spiritual influence radiate, and towards which higher influences are directed.”

 

v    “Tis well….Prepare thyself, for thou wilts have to travel on alone. The teacher can but point the way. The Path is one for all; the means to reach the goal must vary with the pilgrims.”

 

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky was one of the two Founders of the Theosophical Society. Her profound knowledge and insights into the Wisdom Teachings from all over the world, her literary work and talents made her an outstanding figure in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Her magnum opus was The Secret Doctrine. This little volume contains uplifting quotations from Mme Blavatsky’s writings for every day of the year. It offers inspiration for deeper study and meditation on the mysteries of life.

1. And let no one imagine that it is a mere fancy, the attaching of importance to the birth of the year. The earth passes through its definite phases and man with it; and as a day can be coloured so can a year. The astral life of the earth is young and strong between Christmas and Easter. Those who form their wishes now will have added strength to fulfil them consistently.
2. The springing up of evil thoughts is less injurious than that of idle and indifferent ones. Because as to evil thoughts you are always on your guard, and having determined to fight and conquer them, this determination helps to develop the will power. Indifferent thoughts, however, serve merely to distract the attention and waste energy.
3. For the occultists, who say that the author of Nature is Nature itself, something indistinct and inseparable from the Deity, it follows that those who are conversant with the occult laws of Nature, and know how to change and provoke new conditions in ether, may — not modify the laws, but work and do the same in accordance with these immutable laws.
4. … learn that Occultism differs from Magic and other secret Sciences as the glorious sun does from a rushlight, as the immutable and immortal Spirit of Man — the reflection of the absolute, causeless and unknowable all — differs from the mortal clay — the human body.
5. The Doctrine teaches that in order to become a divine, fully conscious god — aye, even the highest — the Spiritual primeval Intelligence must pass through the human stage.
6. Like an immense boa constrictor, Error, in every shape, encircles mankind, trying to smother in her deadly coils every aspiration towards truth and light. But error is powerful only on the surface, prevented as she is by Occult Nature from going any deeper.
7. Gnomes, sylphs, fairies, djinns, and so on, are the Soul of the elements, the capricious forces in Nature, acting under one immutable law, inherent in these Centres of Force, with undeveloped consciousness and bodies of plastic mould, which can be shaped according to the conscious or unconscious will of the human being who puts himself en rapport with them.
8. He who deprives any of his fellows of the light, the good, the help, the assistance he can wisely give them, and lives for the accumulation of material   things, for his   own   personal gratification, is the real robber; and he who steals from his fellows the precious possession of character by slander, and any sort of misrepresentation, is no less a thief, and one of the most guilty kind.
9. Civilization has ever developed the physical and the intellectual at the cost of psychic and spiritual. The command over and the guidance of one’s own psychic nature, which foolish men now associate with the supernatural, were the early humanity innate and congenital, and came to man as naturally as walking and thinking.
10. The Self of Matter and the Self of Spirit can never meet. One of the twain must disappear; there is no place for both.
11. The universe is the combination of a thousand elements, and yet the expression of a single spirit-a chaos to the senses, a cosmos to the reason.
12. Try with consistent attempts to conquer the prominent weaknesses of your nature by developing thought in the direction that will kill each particular passion.
13. The Secret Doctrine teaches the progressive development of everything, worlds as well as atoms- and this stupendous development has neither conceivable beginning nor imaginable end. Our ‘Universe’ is only one of an infinite number of Universes, all of them ‘Sons of Necessity’, because links in the great Cosmic chain of Universes, each one standing in the relation of an effect as regards its predecessor, and being a cause as regards its successor.
14. True faith is the embodiment of divine charity; those who minister at its altars, are but human. As we turn the bloodstained pages of ecclesiastical history, we find that, whoever may have been the hero, and whatever costumes the actors may have worn, the plot of the tragedy has ever been the same. But the Eternal Night was in and behind all, and we pass from what we see to that which is invisible to the eye of sense. Our fervent wish has been to show true souls how they may lift aside the curtain, and, in the brightness of that Night made Day, look with undazzled gaze upon the UNVEILED TRUTH.
15. Altruism is an integral part of self-development. But we have to discriminate. A man has no right to starve himself to death that another man may have food, unless the life of that man is obviously more useful to the many than is his own life. But it is his duty to sacrifice his own comfort, and to work for others if they are unable to work for themselves….
16. The Divine Spiritual ‘I’ is alone eternal, and the same throughout all births; whereas the ‘personalities’ it informs in succession are evanescent, changing like the shadows of kaleidoscopic series of forms in a magic lantern.
17. Harmony in the physical and mathematical world of sense is justice in the spiritual one. Justice produces harmony, and injustice discord; and discord, on a cosmical scale, means chaos — annihilation.
18. If there is a developed immortal spirit in man, it must be in everything else, at least in a latent or germinal state, and it can only be a question of time for each of these germs to become fully developed.
19. The idea of Absolute Unity would be broken entirely in our conception had we not something concrete before our eyes to contain that Unity. And the deity, being absolute, must be omnipresent, hence not an atom but contains IT within itself. The roots, the trunk and its many branches are three distinct objects, yet they are one tree.
20. Long persistence in a fixed determination to subjugate matter, brings about a condition in which not only is one insensible to external impressions, but even death itself may be simulated, as we have already seen. The ecstatic so enormously reinforces his will power, as to draw into himself, as into a vortex, the potencies resident in the astral light to supplement his own natural store.
21. We (i.e., our personalities) become immortal by the mere fact of our thinking moral nature being grafted on our Divine Triune Monad. Atma-Buddhi-Manas, the three in one and one in three (aspects). For the Monad manifested on earth by the incarnating Ego is that which is called the Tree of Life Eternal that can only be approached by eating the fruit of knowledge, the Knowledge of Good and Evil, or of gnosis, Divine Wisdom.
22. Meditation, abstinence in all, the observation of moral duties, gentle thoughts, good deeds and kind words, as goodwill to all and entire oblivion of Self, are the most efficacious means of obtaining knowledge and preparing for the reception of higher wisdom.
23. Genesis…an eastern work…is in full agreement, when understood, with the universal cosmogony and evolution of life as given in the Secret Doctrine of the Archaic Ages. The last word of science is far from being uttered yet…. Esoteric philosophy teaches that man was the first living being to appear on earth, all the animal world coming after him.
24. A high development of the intellectual faculties does not imply spiritual and true life. The presence in one of a highly developed human intellectual soul… is quite compatible with the absence of Buddhi, or the spiritual soul. Unless the former evolves from, and develops under, the beneficent and vivifying rays of the latter, it will remain for ever but a direct progeny of the terrestrial, lower principles, sterile in spiritual perceptions; a magnificent, luxurious sepulchre, full of the dry bones of decaying matter within.
25. If out of the material portion of the ether, by virtue of the inherent restlessness of its particles, the forms of worlds and their species of plants and animals can be evolved, why, out of the spiritual part of the ether, should not successive races of beings, from the stage of monad down to that of man, be developed; each lower form unfolding a higher one until the work of evolution is completed on our earth, in the production of immortal man?
26. The flash of memory which is traditionally supposed to show a drowning man every long-forgotten scene of his mortal life—as the landscape is revealed to the traveller by intermittent flashes of lightning — is simply the sudden glimpse which the struggling soul gets into the silent galleries where his history is depicted in imperishable colours.
27. That which is to be shunned is pain not yet come. The past cannot be changed or amended; that which belongs to the present cannot and should not be shunned; but alike to be shunned are disturbing anticipations or fears of the future^ and every act or impulse that may cause present or future pain to ourselves or others.
28. Perfection, to be fully such, must be born out of imperfection, the incorruptible must grow out of the corruptible, having the latter as its vehicle and basis and contrast.
29. It is only by the attractive force of the contrasts that the two opposites — Spirit and Matter — can be cemented together on Earth, and, smelted in the fire of self-conscious experience and suffering, find themselves wedded in Eternity.
30. With right knowledge, or at any rate with a confident conviction that our neighbours will no more work to hurt us than we would think of harming them, the two-thirds of the world’s evil would vanish into thin air.
31. Man, as the Archetypal Man or Adam, is made to contain the whole Kabalistic System. He is the great symbol and shadow, thrown by the manifested Kosmos, itself the reflection of the impersonal and ever-incomprehensible principle; and this shadow furnishes by its construction— the personal grown out of the impersonal — a kind of objective and tangible symbol of everything visible and invisible in the Universe.
32. Many theosophists have had slight conscious relations with elementals, but always without their will acting, and upon trying to make elementals see, hear or act for them, a total indifference on the part of the nature-spirit is all they have got in return. These failures are due to the fact that the elemental cannot understand the thought of the person; it can only be reached when the exact scale of being to which it belongs is vibrated, whether it be that of colour, form, sound, or whatever else.
33. The Eternity of the Pilgrim’ is like a wink of the Eye of Self-Existence. The appearance and disappearance of worlds is like a regular tidal ebb of flux and reflux.
34. The ancients… fully realized the fact that the reciprocal relations between the planetary bodies is as perfect as those between the corpuscles of the blood, which float in a common fluid; and that each one is affected by the combined influences of all the rest, as each in its turn affects each of the others.
35. Strength to step forward is the primary need of him who has chosen his path. Where is this to be found? Looking round, it is not hard to see where other men find their strength. Its source is profound conviction.
36. There are two kinds of magnetic attraction: sympathy; and fascination; the one holy and natural, the other evil and unnatural.
37. In the phenomenal and Cosmic World Fohat is that occult, electric, vital power, which, under the Will of the Creative Logos, unites and brings together all forms, giving them the first impulse, which in time becomes law.
38. Oaths will never be binding till each man will fully understand that humanity is the highest manifestation on earth of the Unseen Supreme Deity, and each man an incarnation of his God; and when the sense of personal responsibility will be so developed in him that he will consider forswearing the greatest possible insult to himself, as well as to humanity. No oath is now binding, unless taken by one who, without any oath at all, would solemnly keep his simple promise of honour.
39. It is the motive, and the motive alone, which makes any exercise of power become black, malignant, or white, beneficent Magic. It is impossible to employ spiritual forces if there is the slightest tinge of selfishness remaining in the operator…. The powers and forces of animal nature can equally be used by the selfish and revengeful, as by the unselfish and the all forgiving; the powers and forces of spirit lend themselves only to the perfectly pure in heart— and this is DIVINE MAGIC.
40. Our duty is to keep alive in man his spiritual intuitions. To oppose and counteract — after due investigation and proof of its irrational nature — bigotry in every form, religious, scientific, or social, and cant above all, whether as religious sectarianism or as belief in miracles or any thing supernatural.
41. The person who is endowed with this faculty of thinking about even the most trifling things from the higher plane of thought has, by virtue of that gift which he possesses, a plastic power of formation, so to say, in his very imagination. Whatever such a person may think about, his thought will be so far more intense than the thought of an ordinary person, that by this very intensity it obtains the power of creation.
42. Finite reason agrees with science, and says: There is no God/ But, on the other hand, our Ego, that which lives and thinks and feels independently of us in our mortal casket, does more than believe. It knows that there exists a God in nature, for the sole and invincible Artificer of all lives in us as we live in Him. No dogmatic faith or exact science is able to uproot the intuitional feeling inherent in man, when he has once fully realized it in himself.
43. Our voice is raised for spiritual freedom, and our plea made for enfranchisement from all tyranny, whether of SCIENCE OR THEOLOGY.
44. If through the Hall of Wisdom thou wouldst reach the Vale of Bliss, Disciple, close fast thy senses against the great dire heresy of separateness that weans thee from the rest.
45. From strength to strength, from the beauty and perfection of one plane to the greater beauty and perfection of another, with accessions of new glory, of fresh knowledge and power in each cycle, such is the destiny of every Ego, which thus becomes its own saviour in each world and incarnation.
46. The assertion that Theosophy is not a Religion’, by no means excludes the fact that Theosophy is Religion’ itself. A religion in the true and only correct sense is a bond uniting men together— not a particular set of dogmas and beliefs. Now religion, per se, in its widest meaning is that which binds not only all MEN but also all BEINGS and all things in the entire universe into one grand whole..
47. It may be a pleasant dream to attempt to conceive the beauties of the spirit world; but the time can be spent more profitably in a study of the spirit itself, and it is not necessary that the subject for study should be in the spirit world.
48. Physical existence is subservient to the spiritual, and all physical improvement and progress are only the auxiliaries of spiritual progress, without which there could be no physical progress.
49. Mankind — the majority at any rate — hates to think for itself. It resents as an insult the humblest invitation to step for a moment outside the old well-beaten tracks and, judging for itself, to enter into a new path in some fresh direction.
50. The Present is only a mathematical line which divides that part of Eternal Duration which we call the Future from that part which we call the Past.
51. The mind receives indelible impressions even from   chance   acquaintance   or   persons encountered but once. As a few seconds’ exposure of the sensitized photographic plate is all that is requisite to preserve indefinitely the image of the sitter, so is it with the mind.
52. In each of us that golden thread of continuous life- periodically broken into active and passive cycles of sensuous existence on Earth, and supersensuous in Devachan — is from the beginning of our appearance upon this Earth.
53. Believing in a spiritual and invisible Universe, we cannot conceive of it in any other way than as completely dovetailing and corresponding with the material, objective universe; for logic and observation alike teach us that the latter is the outcome and visible manifestation of the former, and that the laws governing both are immutable.
54. Even ignorance is better than head-learning with no soul-wisdom to illuminate and guide it.
55. Mediumship is the opposite of adeptship; the medium is the passive instrument of foreign influences, the adept actively controls himself and all inferior potencies.
56. Theosophy teaches self-abnegation, but does not teach rash and useless self-sacrifice, nor does it justify fanaticism.
57. Between man and the animal — whose Monads, or Jivas, are fundamentally identical — where is the  impassable  abyss  of Mentality  and Self-consciousness… and what is it that creates such difference, unless man is an animal — plus a Having God within his physical shell?
58. The right motive for seeking self-knowledge is that which pertains to knowledge and not to self. Self-knowledge is worth seeking by virtue of its being knowledge, and not by virtue of its pertaining to self. The main requisite for acquiring self-knowledge is pure love. Seek knowledge for pure love, and self-knowledge eventually crowns the effort.
59. Eastern wisdom teaches that spirit has to pass through the ordeal of incarnation and life, and to be baptized with matter before it can reach experience and knowledge. After which only it receives    the    baptism    of   soul,    or self-consciousness, and may return to its original condition of a god, plus experience, ending with omniscience. In other words, it can return to the original state of the homogeneity of primordial essence only through the addition of the fruitage of Karma^ which alone is able to create an absolute conscious deity, removed but one degree from the absolute ALL.
60. Do we not see in history, and even find this within our own experience, that the great kingdoms of the world, after reaching the culmination of their greatness, descend again, in accordance with the same law by which they ascended till, having reached the lowest point, humanity reasserts itself and mounts up once more, the height of its attainment being, by this law of ascending, progression by cycles, somewhat higher than the point from which it had before descended? Kingdoms and empires are under the same cyclic laws as planets, races, and everything else in Kosmos.
61. Life is the great teacher: it is the great manifestation of Soul, and Soul manifests the Supreme.
62. It is on the doctrine of the illusive nature of matter, and the infinite divisibility of the atom, that the whole science of Occultism is built.
63. By its complex nature the soul may descend and ally itself so closely to the corporeal nature as to exclude a higher life from exerting any moral influence upon it. On the other hand, it can so closely attach itself to the Nous or Spirit as to share its potency, in which case its vehicle, physical man, will appear as a God even during his terrestrial life.
64. The processes of Nature are acts of incessant borrowing and giving back.
65. If we admit that we are in the stream of evolution, then each circumstance must be to us quite right.
66. The centripetal force could not manifest itself without the centrifugal in the harmonious revolution of the spheres; all forms are the products of this dual force in nature.
67. The duty of a Theosophist to himself is to control and conquer, through the Higher Self, the lower self. To purify himself inwardly and morally; to fear no one, and naught, save the tribunal of his own conscience. Never to do a thing by halves; i.e., if he thinks it the right thing to do, let him do it openly and boldly, and if wrong, never touch it at all.
68. Crimes committed in Avidya, or ignorance, involve physical but not moral responsibilities or karma. Take, for example, the case of idiots, children, savages, and people who know no better. But the case of each who is pledged to the HIGHER SELF is quite another matter. You cannot invoke the Divine Witness with impunity, and once that you have put yourselves under its tutelage, you have asked the Radiant Light to shine and search through all the dark corners of your being; consciously you have invoked the Divine Justice of Karma to take note of your motive, to scrutinize your actions, and to enter up all in your account.
69. No form can come into objective existence— from the highest to the lowest—before the abstract ideal of this form — or, as Aristotle would call it, the privation of this form — is called forth. Before an artist paints a picture every feature of it exists already in his imagination; to have enabled us to discern a watch, this particular watch must have existed in its abstract form in the watchmaker’s mind. So with future men.
70. The whole issue of the quarrel between the profane and the esoteric sciences depends upon the belief in, and demonstration of, the existence of an astral body within the physical, the former independent of the latter.
71. Magic is but a science, a profound knowledge of the Occult forces in Nature, and of the laws governing the visible or the invisible world.
72. No man can learn true and final Wisdom in one birth; and every new rebirth, whether we be reincarnated for weal or for woe, is one more lesson we receive at the hands of the stern yet ever just schoolmaster — KARMIC LIFE.
73. Between the extremes of spiritual negation and affirmation there ought to be a middle ground; only pure philosophy can establish truth upon firm principles; and no philosophy can be complete unless it embraces both physics and metaphysics.
74. He who does not practice altruism; he who is not prepared to share his last morsel with one weaker or poorer than himself; he who neglects to help his brother man, of whatever race, nation, or creed, whenever and wherever he meets suffering, and who turns a deaf ear to the cry of human misery; he who hears an innocent person slandered, whether a brother theosophist or not, and does not undertake his defence as he would undertake his own — is no Theosophist.
75. Intimately, or rather indissolubly, connected with Karma, then, is the law of rebirth or of the reincarnation of the same spiritual individuality in a   long,   almost   interminable,   series   of personalities. The latter are like the various costumes and characters played by the same actor, with each of which that actor identifies himself and is identified by the public, for the space of a few hours.
76. Nature is triune; there is a visible, objective nature; an invisible, indwelling, energizing nature, the exact model of the other, and its vital principle; and, above these two, spirit, source of all forces, alone eternal and indestructible. The lower two constantly change; the higher third does not.
77. One single journey to the Orient, made in the proper spirit, and the possible emergencies arising from the meeting of what may seem no more than the chance acquaintances and adventures of any traveller, may quite as likely as not throw wide open to the zealous student the heretofore closed doors of the final mysteries … and is sure to produce more rapid, better, and far more practical results than the most diligent study of Occultism in books.
78. We live in an atmosphere of gloom and despair … because our eyes are downcast and riveted to the earth, with all its physical and grossly material manifestations. If instead of that, man, proceeding on his life journey, looked — not heavenward, which is but a figure of speech — but within himself, and centred his point of observation on the inner man, he would soon escape from the coils of the great serpent of illusion.
79. Magic, as a science, is the knowledge of these principles and of the way by which the omniscience and omnipotence of the spirit and its control over nature’s forces may be acquired by the individual while still in the body. Magic, as an art, is the application of this knowledge in practice.
80. The identity of our physical origin makes no appeal to our higher and deeper feelings. Matter, deprived of its soul and spirit, or its divine essence, cannot speak to the human heart. But the identity of the soul and spirit, of real, immortal man, as Theosophy teaches us, once proven and become deep rooted in our hearts, would lead us far on the road of real charity and brotherly goodwill.
81. Lead the life necessary for the acquisition of such knowledge and powers, and Wisdom will come to you naturally.
82. So long as the double man, i.e., the man of flesh and spirit, keeps within the limits of the law of spiritual continuity, so long as the divine spark lingers in him, however faintly, he is on the road to an immortality in the future state.
83. There is but one indivisible and absolute Omniscience and Intelligence in the Universe, and this thrills throughout every atom and infinitesimal point of the whole Kosmos, which has no bounds, and which people call space, considered independently of anything contained in it.
84. The Sixth Principle in Man (Buddhi, the Divine Soul), though a mere breath, in our conceptions, is still something material when compared with Divine Spirit (Atma) of which it is the carrier or vehicle.
85. The Platonic philosophy was one of order, system, and proportion; it embraced the evolution of worlds and species, the correlation and conservation of energy, the transmutation of material form, the indestructibility of matter and spirit. Their position in the latter respect being far in advance of modem science, and binding the arch of their philosophical system with a keystone at once perfect and immovable.
86. It is personal selfishness that develops and urges man on to abuse of his knowledge and power. And selfishness is a human building, whose windows and doors are ever wide open for every kind of iniquity to enter into man’s soul.
87. Plants would perish in their first stage of existence if they were kept exposed to a constant sunlight; the night alternating with the day is essential to their   healthy   growth   and   development. Goodness, likewise, would speedily cease to be such, were it not alternated by its opposite. In human, nature, evil denotes the antagonism of matter to the spiritual, and each is accordingly purified thereby. In the cosmos, the equilibrium must be preserved; the operation of the two contraries produces harmony, like the centripetal and centrifugal forces, and each is necessary to the other. If one is arrested, the action of the other will immediately become destructive.
88. The true Adept, the developed man, must, we are always told, become—he cannot be made. The process is, therefore, one of growth through evolution, and this must necessarily involve a certain amount of pain.
89. The Rosicrucian theory, that the whole universe is a musical instrument, is the Pythagorean doctrine of the music of the spheres. Sounds and colours are all spiritual numerals; as the seven prismatic rays proceed from one spot in heaven, so the seven powers of nature, each of them a number, are the seven radiations of the Unity, the central, spiritual SUN.
90. To become self-conscious, Spirit must pass through every cycle of being, culminating in its highest point on earth in Man. Spirit per se is an unconscious negative abstraction. Its purity in inherent, not acquired by merit; hence, to become the highest Dhyan Chohan, it is necessary for each Ego to attain to full self-consciousness as a human, i.e., conscious, being which is synthesized for us in Man.
91. The pivotal doctrine of the Esoteric philosophy admits no privileges or special gifts in man save those won by his own Ego through personal effort and merit throughout a long series of metempsychoses and reincarnations.
92. Adverse opinions are like conflicting winds which brush from the quiet surface of a lake the green scum that tends to settle upon still waters.
93. Physical organic progress is effected through hereditary transmission; spiritual organic progress by transmigration.
94. Spiritual culture is attained through concentration. It must be continued daily and every moment to be of use. Meditation has been defined as ‘the cessation of active external thought’.  Concentration is the entire life tendency to a given end.
95. The Tall’ is a universal allegory. It sets forth at one end of the ladder of Evolution the ‘rebellion’, i.e., the action of differentiating intellection, or consciousness, on its various planes, seeking union with Matter; and at the other, the lower end, the rebellion of Matter against Spirit, or of action against spiritual inertia.
96. In the twentieth century of our era scholars will begin to recognize that the Secret Doctrine has neither been invented, nor exaggerated, but on the contrary, simply outlined; and finally, that its teachings antedate the Vedas.
97. For mind is like a mirror; it gathers dust while it reflects. It needs the gentle breezes of Soul-wisdom to brush away the dust of our illusions. Seek, 0 Beginner, to blend thy Mind and Soul.
98. Man-spirit proves God-spirit, as the one drop of water proves a source from which it must have come. Tell one who had never seen water that there is an ocean of water and he must accept it on faith or reject it altogether. But let one drop fall upon his hand, and he then has the fact from which all the rest may be inferred.
99. Real life is in the spiritual consciousness of that life, in a conscious existence in Spirit, not Matter, and real death is the limited perception of life, the impossibility of sensing conscious or even individual existence outside of form, or at least of some form of Matter.
100. Arcane knowledge misapplied, is sorcery; beneficently used, true magic or WISDOM.
101. As there is no good or evil per se, so there is neither ‘elixir of life’, nor ‘elixir of death’, nor poison, per se, but all this contained in one and the same universal Essence, this or the other effect, or result, depending on the degree-of its differentiation and its various correlations. The light side of it produces life, health, bliss, divine peace, etc., the dark side brings death, disease, sorrow and strife.
102. Once grasp the idea that universal causation is not merely present, but past, present and future, and     I every action on our present plane falls naturally and     JL easily into its true place, and is seen in its true     B relation to ourselves and to others. Every mean and selfish action sends us backwards and not forward, while every noble thought and every unselfish deed are stepping stones to the higher and more glorious planes of being.
103. Ten ciphers, twenty-two alphabetical letters, one triangle, a square and a circle. Such are the elements of the Kabalah, from whose mysterious bosom sprang all the religions of the past and present.
104. Nature gives up her innermost secrets and imparts true wisdom only to him who seeks truth for its own sake, and who craves for knowledge in order to confer benefits on others, not on his own unimportant personality.
105. Man… in a mortal body is affected by doubts which will spring up. When they do arise, it is because he is ignorant about something. He should, therefore, be able to disperse doubt ‘by the sword of knowledge… ‘All doubts come from the lower nature, and never in any case from the higher nature.
106. Karma is the unerring law which adjusts effect to cause, on the physical, mental and spiritual planes of being. As no cause remains without its due effect from greatest to least, from a cosmic disturbance down to the movement of your hand, and as like produces like, Karma is that unseen and unknown law which adjusts wisely, intelligently and equitably, each effect to its cause, tracing the latter back to its producer.
107. There is no Devil, no Evil outside mankind to produce a Devil. Evil is a necessity in, and one of the supporters of, the Manifested Universe. It is a necessity for progress and evolution, as night is necessary for the production of day, and death for that of life — that man may live for ever.
108. No Ego differs from another Ego, in its primordial or original essence and nature. That which makes one mortal a great man and of another a vulgar, silly person is the quality and make-up of the physical shell or casing, and the adequacy or inadequacy of brain and body to transmit and give expression to the light of the real, Inner man; and this aptness or inaptness is, in its turn, the result of Karma.
109. The Mind is the great Slayer of the Real. Let the Disciple slay the Slayer.
110. Our conceptions, limited to the narrow area of our experience, attempt to fit if not an end, at least a beginning of time and space; but neither of these exists in reality; for in such case time would not be eternal, or space boundless.
111. In the Hall of Learning… thy Soul will find the blossoms of life, but under every flower a serpent coiled.
112. When Paul entitles himself a ‘master-builder’, he is using a word pre-eminently kabalistic, theurgic, and masonic, and one which no other apostle uses. He thus declares himself an adept, having the right to initiate others.
113. Man, the most perfect of organized beings on earth, in whom matter and spirit—i.e., will— are the most developed and powerful, is alone allowed to give a conscious impulse to that principle which emanates from him; and only he can impart to the magnetic fluid opposite and various impulses without limit as to the direction.
114. It is an occult law that no man can rise superior to his individual failings without lifting, be it ever so little, the whole body of which he is an integral part. In the same way no one can sin, nor suffer the effects of sin, alone, in reality, there is no such thing as ’separateness’; and the nearest approach to that selfish state which the laws of life permit is in the intent or motive.
115. To sum up all in a few words, MAGIC is spiritual WISDOM; nature the material ally, pupil and servant of the magician. One common, vital principle pervades all things, and this is controllable by the perfected human will. The adept can stimulate the movements of the natural forces in plants and animals in a preternatural degree. Such experiments are not obstructions of nature, but quickening; the conditions of intenser vital action are given.
116. When a planet dies, its informing principles are transferred to a lay a or sleeping centre, with potential but latent energy in it, which is thus awakened into life and begins to form itself into a new sidereal body.
117. What is ‘Divine Wisdom’, or Gnosis, but the essential   reality   behind   the   evanescent appearances of objects in nature — the very soul of the manifested LOGOS?
118. Adepts… (are) men who have developed and perfected their physical, mental, psychic, and spiritual organizations, to the utmost possible degree.
119. Karma creates nothing, nor does it design. It is man who plans and creates causes, and Karmic Law adjusts the effect, which adjustment is not an act, but universal harmony, tending ever to resume its original position, like a bough, which, bent down too forcibly, rebounds with corresponding vigour. If it happens to dislocate the arm that tried to bend it out of its natural position, shall we say that it is the bough which broke our arm, or that our own folly has brought us to grief?
120. The best remedy for evil is not the suppression, but the elimination of desire, and this can best be accomplished by keeping the mind constantly steeped in things divine.
121. A thorough familiarity with the occult faculties of everything existing in nature, visible as well as invisible; their mutual relations, attractions, and repulsions; the cause of these, traced to the spiritual principle which pervades and animates all things; the ability to furnish the best conditions for this principle to manifest itself— in other words, a profound and exhaustive knowledge of natural law — this was and is the basis of magic.
122. Nature (in man) must become a compound of Spirit and Matter before he becomes what he is; and the Spirit latent in Matter must be awakened to life and consciousness gradually. The Monad has to pass through its mineral, vegetable and animal forms before the Light of the Logos is awakened in the animal man. Therefore, till then, the latter cannot be referred to as ‘man’, but has to be regarded as a Monad imprisoned in ever-changing forms.
123. Sorcery is any kind of evil influence exercised upon other persons, who suffer, or make others suffer, in consequence.  
124. The Society has no wisdom of its own to support or teach. It is simply the storehouse of all the truths uttered by the great seers, initiates, and prophets of historic and even prehistoric ages.
125. Occultism embraces the whole range of psychological, physiological, cosmical, physical, and spiritual phenomena.
126. We may designate the spirit as the centrifugal, and the soul as the centripetal, spiritual energies. When in perfect harmony, both forces produce one result; break or damage the centripetal motion of the earthly soul tending toward the centre which attracts it; arrest its progress by clogging it with a heavier weight of matter than it can bear, and the harmony of the whole, which was its life, is destroyed.
127. Karma-Nemesis… punishes the evildoer, aye, even to his seventh rebirth, so long; indeed, as the effect of his having thrown into perturbation even the smallest atom in the Infinite World of Harmony has not been finally readjusted.
128. For our Ego lives its own separate life within its prison of clay whenever it becomes free from the trammels of matter, i.e., during the sleep of the physical man. This Ego it is which is the actor, the real man, the true human self. But the physical man cannot feel or be conscious during dreams; for the personality, the outer man, with its brain and thinking apparatus, are paralysed more or less completely.
129. Keep the Link unbroken.
130. Slavery to State and men has disappeared only to make room for slavery to things and Self, to one’s own vices and idiotic social customs and ways… Where, then, is the Wisdom of our modern age?
131. Through joy and sorrow, pain and pleasure, the soul comes to a knowledge of itself; then begins the task of learning the laws of life, that the discords may be resolved, and the harmony be restored.
132. Prayer is an ennobling action when it is an intense feeling, an ardent desire rushing forth from our very heart, for the good of other people, and when entirely detached from any selfish, personal object.
133. The building of the Temple of Solomon is the symbolical representation of the gradual acquirement of the secret wisdom, or magic; the erection and development of the spiritual from the earthly; the manifestation of the power and splendour of the spirit in the physical world, through the wisdom and genius of the builder. The latter, when he has become an adept, is a mightier king than Solomon himself, the emblem of the sun or Light himself — the light of the real subjective world, shining in the darkness of the objective universe.
134. Thou shalt not let thy senses make a playground of thy mind.
135. The radical unity of the ultimate essence of each constituent part of compounds in Nature — from star to mineral atom, from the highest Dhyan Cbohan to the smallest infusorium, in the fullest acceptation of the term, and whether applied to the spiritual, intellectual or physical worlds — this unity is the one fundamental law in Occult Science.
136. What constitutes real knowledge? The question lies at the very threshold of occult study.
137. Siva, the Destroyer, is the Creator and the Saviour of Spiritual Man, as he is the good gardener of Nature. He weeds out the plants, human and cosmic, and kills the passions of the physical, to call to life the perceptions of the spiritual, man.
138. A man must believe in his innate power of progress. A man must refuse to be terrified by his greater nature, and must not be drawn back by his lesser or material self.
139. It is only through observing the law of harmony that individual life hereafter can be obtained; and the farther the inner and outer man deviate from this fount of harmony, whose source lies in our divine spirit, the more difficult it is to regain the ground.
140. As the white ray of light is decomposed by the prism into the various colours of the solar spectrum, so the beam of divine truth, in passing through the three-sided prism of man’s nature, has been broken up into vari-coloured fragments called RELIGIONS. …Combined, their aggregate represents one eternal truth; separate, they are but shades of human error and the signs of imperfection.
141. The will of the Creator, through which all things were made and received their first impulse, is the property of every living being. Man, endowed with an additional spirituality, has the largest share of it on this planet. It depends on the proportion of matter in him whether he will exercise its magical faculty with more or less success.
142. Any person of average intellectual capacities, and a leaning towards the metaphysical; of pure, unselfish life, who finds more joy in helping his neighbour than in receiving help himself; one who is ever ready to sacrifice his own pleasure for the sake of other people; and who loves Truth, Goodness and Wisdom for their own sake, not for the benefit they may confer — is a Theosophist.
143. This Law (Karma-Nemesis, or the Law of Retribution), whether Conscious or Unconscious, predestines nothing and no one. It exists from and in Eternity, truly, for it is Eternally itself; and as such, since no act can be coequal with Eternity, it cannot be said to act, for it is Action itself. It is not the wave which drowns a man, but the personal action of the wretch who goes deliberately and places himself under the impersonal action of the laws that govern the ocean’s motion.
144. The ‘Doctrine of the Eye’ is for the crowd; the ‘Doctrine of the Heart’ for the elect. The first repeat in pride, ‘Behold, I know’; the last, they who in humbleness have garnered, low confess: Thus have I heard.’
145. Real philosophy cannot make any choice arbitrarily; there is but one eternal verity, and, in pursuit of that, thought is forced to travel along one road. 
146. For this ‘Astral’, the shadowy ‘double’ (in the animal as in man), is not the companion of the divine Ego, but of the earthly body. It is the link between the personal SELF, the lower consciousness of Manas and the body, and is the vehicle of transitory, not of immortal life. 
147. The immediate work, whatever it may be, has the abstract claim of duty, and its relative importance or non-importance is not to be considered at all.
148. Every Theosophist.-.is bound to do his utmost to help on, by all the means in his power, every wise and well-considered social effort which has for its object the amelioration of the condition of the poor.
149. From Gods to men, from Worlds to atoms, from a Star to a rush-light, from the Sun to the vital heat of the meanest organic being — the world of Form and Existence is an immense chain, the links of which are all connected. The Law of Analogy is the first key to the world problem, and these links have to be studied coordinately in their Occult relations to each other.
150. If, on the one hand, a great portion of the educated public is running into atheism and scepticism, on the other hand we find an evident current of mysticism forcing its way into science.
151. We produce Causes, and these awaken the corresponding powers in the Sidereal World, which are magnetically and irresistibly attracted to — and react upon — those who produce such causes; whether such persons are practically the evildoers, or simply ‘thinkers’ who brood mischief.
152. No man does right who gives up the unmistakable duties of life, resting on Divine command.
153. Mutual criticism is a most healthy policy, and helps to establish final and definite rules in life — practical, not merely theoretical. We have had enough of theories.
154. The human Monads or Egos… are gradually formed and strengthened during their incarnation cycle by constant additions of individuality from the personalities in which incarnates that adrogynous, half-spiritual, half-terrestrial principle, partaking of both heaven and earth, called by the Vedantins Jiva…and by the Occultists the Manas (mind); that, in short, which uniting itself partially with the Monad, incarnates in each new birth. In perfect unity with its (seventh) Principle, the Spirit unalloyed, it is the divine Higher Self. 
155. Under the emblematical devices and peculiar phraseology of the priesthood of old lie latent hints of sciences as yet undiscovered during the present cycle.
156. To act and act wisely when the time for action comes, to wait and wait patiently when it is time for repose, puts man in accord with the rising and falling tides (of affairs), so that, with nature and law at his back, and truth and beneficence as his beacon light, he may accomplish wonders.
157. All things that ever were, that are, or that will be, have their record upon the astral light, or tablet of the unseen universe; the initiated adept, by using the vision of his own spirit, can know all that has been known or can be known.
158. The spirit of man which comes into direct and conscious relations with the world of spirit acquires real knowledge; while the spirit of man which lives imprisoned in the body, and is merely fed through the senses with crumbs of knowledge, possesses the unreal only.
159. The wheel of the Good Law moves swiftly on. It guides by night and day. The worthless husks it drives from out the golden grain, the refuse from the Hour. The hand of Karma guides the wheel; the revolutions mark the beatings of the Karmic heart.  
160. Let it be remembered that the Fire, Water and Air of Occultism, or the ‘Elements of Primary Creation’ so called, are not the compound elements they are on Earth, but noumenal homogeneous Elements — the Spirits of the former.
161. The watcher, or the Divine Prototype, is at the upper rung of the Ladder of Being, the Shadow at the lower. Withal, the Monad of every living being, unless his moral turpitude breaks the connection, and he runs loose and astray into the ‘Lunar Path’ — to use the Occult expression — is an individual Dhyan Chohan, distinct from others, with a kind of spiritual individuality of its own, during one special Manvantara.
162. Give up thy life, if thou wouldst live.
163. As God creates, so man can create. Given a certain intensity of will, and the shapes created by the mind become subjective. Hallucinations, they are called, although to their creator they are real as any visible object is to anyone else. Given a more intense and intelligent concentration of this will, and the form becomes concrete, visible, objective; the man has learned the secret of secrets; he is a MAGICIAN.
164. The theosophical idea of charity means personal exertion for others; personal mercy and kindness; personal interest in the welfare of those who suffer; personal sympathy, forethought and assistance in their troubles or needs.
165. If the Pythagorean metempsychosis should be thoroughly explained and compared with the modern theory of evolution, it would be found to supply every ‘missing link’ in the chain of the latter.
166. By reason of the extraordinary growth of human intellect and the development in our age of the fifth principle (Manas) in man, its rapid progress has paralysed spiritual perceptions. It is at the expense of wisdom that intellect generally lives, and mankind is quite unprepared in its present condition to comprehend the awful drama of human disobedience to the laws of Nature and the subsequent Fall as a result.
167. Shalt thou abstain from action? Not so shall gain thy Soul her freedom. To reach Nirvana one must reach Self-Knowledge, and Self-Knowledge is of loving deeds the child.
168. The ‘Higher Ego’ cannot act directly on the body, as its consciousness belongs to quite another plane and planes of ideation; the ‘lower’ Self does; and its action and behaviour depend on its free will and choice as to whether it will gravitate more towards its parent (the ‘Father in Heaven’) or the ‘animal’ which it informs, the man of flesh.
169. There can be no sectarianism in truth seeking.
170. Fohat is the personified electric vital power, the transcendental binding unity of all cosmic energies, on the unseen as on the manifested planes, the action of which resembles, on an immense scale, that of living Force created by Will in those phenomena where the seemingly subjective acts on the seemingly objective, and propels it to action.
171. Be he what he may, once that a student abandons the old and trodden highway of routine, and enters upon the solitary path of independent thought — Godward — he is a Theosophist; an original thinker, a seeker after the eternal truth with ‘an inspiration of his own’ to solve the universal problems.
172. Ancient, historical Magic is… reflecting itself upon the scientific records of our own all-denying century. It forces the hand and tires the brain of the scientist, laughing at his efforts to interpret its meaning in his own materialistic way, yet helps the Occultist better to understand modern Magic, the rickety, weak grandchild of her powerful, archaic grandam.
173. It is the will of man, his all-potent will, that weaves his destiny, and if a man is determined in the notion that death means annihilation, he will find it so.
174. By the radiant light of the universal magnetic ocean, whose electric waves bind the cosmos together, and in their ceaseless motion penetrate every atom and molecule of the boundless creation, the disciples of mesmerism — howbeit insufficient   their   various   experiments — intuitionally perceive the alpha and omega of the great mystery. Alone, the study of this agent, which is the divine breath, can unlock the secrets of psychology and physiology, of cosmical and spiritual phenomena.
175. Right thought is a good thing, but thought alone does not count for much unless it is translated into action.
176. It is only the knowledge of the constant rebirths of one and the same Individuality throughout the Life-Cycle; the assurance that the same Monads — among whom are many Dhyan Chohans, or the ‘Gods’ themselves — have to pass through the ‘Circle of Necessity’, rewarded or punished by such rebirth for the suffering endured or crimes committed in the former life… that can explain to us the mysterious problem of Good and Evil, and reconcile man to the terrible apparent injustice of life.
177. Matter is as indestructible and eternal as the immortal spirit itself, but only in its particles, and not as organized forms.
178. To live to benefit mankind is the first step.
179. After the separation between the life-principle (astral spirit) and the body takes place, the liberated soul—Monad, exulting rejoins the mother and father spirit, the radiant Augoeides, and the two, merged into one, for ever form, with a glory proportioned to the spiritual purity of the past earth life, the Adam who has completed the circle of necessity, and is freed from the last vestige of his physical encasement.
180. No one should go into Occultism or even touch it before he is perfectly acquainted with his own powers, and that he knows how to commensurate with his actions. And this he can do only by studying the philosophy of Occultism before entering upon the practical training. Otherwise, as sure as fate, he will fall into Black Magic.
181. The division of the history of mankind into Golden, Silver, Copper, and Iron Ages, is not a fiction. We see the same thing in the literature of peoples. An age of great inspiration and unconscious   productiveness   is   invariably followed by an age of criticism and consciousness. The one affords material for the analysing and critical intellect of the other.
182. We stand bewildered before the mystery of our own making, and the riddles of life that we will not sol^ve, and then accuse the great Sphinx of devouring us. But, verily, there is not an accident in our lives, not a misshapen day, or a misfortune, that could not be traced back to our own doings in this or in another life. If one breaks the laws of Harmony… the ‘laws of life’, one must be prepared to fall into the chaos oneself has produced.
183. The doctrine of Metempsychosis has been abundantly ridiculed by men of science and rejected by theologians, yet if it had been properly understood in its application to the indestructibility of matter and the immortality of spirit, it would have been perceived that it is a sublime conception.
184. Whether the physical man be under the rule of an empire or a republic, concerns only the man of matter. This body may be enslaved; as to his soul, he has the right to give to his rulers the proud answer of Socrates to his judges. They have no sway over the inner man.
185. The only decree of Karma, an eternal and immutable decree, is absolute harmony in the world of matter as it is in the world of Spirit. It is not, therefore, Karma that rewards or punishes, but it is we who reward or punish ourselves, according as we work with, through and along with Nature, abiding by the laws on which that harmony depends, or breaking them.
186. Theosophists do not believe in giving money through other people’s hands or organizations. We believe in giving to the money a thousand-fold greater power and effectiveness by our personal contact and sympathy with those who need it.
187. After the death of the depraved and the wicked arrives the critical moment. If during life the ultimate and desperate effort of the inner self to reunite itself with the faintly-glimmering ray of its divine parent is neglected; if this ray is allowed to be more and more shut out by the thickening crust of matter, the soul, once freed from the body, follows its earthly attractions, and is magnetically drawn into and held within the dense fogs of the material atmosphere.
188. It is an eternal law that man cannot be redeemed by a power external to himself.
189. Pythagoras taught that the entire universe is one vast   system   of   mathematically   correct combinations. Plato shows the deity geometrizing. The world is sustained by the same law of equilibrium and harmony upon which it was built.
190. As eight or nine thousand years earlier the stream of knowledge had been slowly running down from the tablelands of Central Asia into India and towards Europe and Northern Africa, so about 500 years BC, it had begun to flow backward to its old home and birthplace. During the two thousand subsequent years the knowledge of the existence of great Adepts nearly died out in Europe. Nevertheless, in some secret places the Mysteries were still enacted in all their primitive purity. The ‘Sun of Righteousness’ still blazed high on the face of the profane world, there was the eternal light in the Adyta on the nights of Initiation.
191. Man is the philosopher’s stone spiritually, ‘a triune or trinity in unity’, as Philalethes expresses it. But he is also that stone physically. The latter is but the effect of the cause, and the cause is the universal solvent of everything — divine spirit.
192. While the records of even important events are often obliterated from our memory, not the most trifling action of our lives can disappear from the ‘Soul’s’ memory, because it is no MEMORY for it, but an ever-present reality on the plane which lies outside our conception of space and time.
193. Man is certainly no special creation. He is the product of Nature’s gradual perfective work, like any other living unit on this earth. But this is only with regard to the human tabernacle. That which lives and thinks in man and survives that frame, the masterpiece of evolution—is the ‘Eternal Pilgrim’, the Protean differentiation in Space and Time of the One Absolute ‘Unknowable’.
194. Parabrahman, the One Reality, the Absolute, is the field of Absolute Consciousness, i.e., that Essence which is out of all relation to conditioned existence is a conditioned symbol. But once that we pass in thought from this (to us) Absolute Negation, duality supervenes in the contrast of Spirit (or Consciousness) and Matter, Subject and Object.
195. A man’s idea of God is that image of blinding light that he sees reflected in the concave mirror of his own soul, and yet this is not, in very truth, God, but only His reflection. His glory is there, but it is the light of his own Spirit that the man sees, and it is all he can bear to look upon. The clearer the mirror the brighter will be the diwne image. But the external world cannot be witnessed in it at the same moment.
196. Would the principle of continuity, which exists even for the so-called inorganic matter, for a floating atom, be denied to the spirit, whose attributes are consciousness, memory, mind, LOVE? Really, the very idea is preposterous.
197. Restrain by thy Divine thy lower self. Restrain by the Eternal the Divine. Aye, great is he, who is the slayer of desire. Still greater is he, in whom the Self Divine has slain the very knowledge of desire.
198. It is a fundamental law in Occultism, that there is no rest or cessation of motion in Nature. That which seems rest is only the change of one form into another: the change of substance going hand in hand with that of form — as we are taught in Occult physics.
199. Physical Nature, when left to herself in the creation of animal and man, is shown to have failed. She can produce the first two kingdoms, as well as that of the lower animals, but when it comes to the turn of man, spiritual, independent and intelligent powers are required for his creation, besides the ‘coats of skin’ and the ‘breath of animal life’.
200. Occultism tells us that every atom, like the monad of Leibnitz, is a little universe in itself; and that every organ and cell in the human body is endowed with a brain of its own, with memory, therefore, experience and discriminative powers.
201. For logic, consistency, profound philosophy, divine mercy and equity, this doctrine of reincarnation has not its equal on earth. It is a belief in a perpetual progress for each incarnating Ego, or divine soul, in an evolution from the outward into the inward, from the material to the spiritual, arriving at the end of each stage at absolute unity with the divine principle.
202. Thought is an energy that affects matter in various ways, but consciousness per se, as understood and explained by Occult philosophy, is the highest quality of the sentient spiritual principle in us, the Divine soul (or Buddhi) and our Higher Ego, and does not belong to the plane of materiality.
203. To offer oneself as a candidate for Chelaship is easy enough, to develop into an Adept the most difficult task any man could possibly undertake.
204. Children should above all be taught self-reliance, love for all men, altruism, mutual charity, and, more than anything else, to think and reason for themselves. We would reduce the purely mechanical work of the memory to an absolute minimum, and devote the time to the development and training of the inner senses, faculties and latent capacities. .. .We should aim at creating free men and women, free intellectually, free morally, unprejudiced in all respects, and, above all things, unselfish.
205. We believe in relieving the starvation of the soul, as much if not more than the emptiness of the stomach; for gratitude does more good to the man who feels it, than to him for whom it is felt.
206. The cornerstone of MAGIC is an intimate practical   knowledge   of   magnetism   and electricity, their qualities, correlations, and potencies. Especially necessary is a familiarity with their effects in and upon the animal kingdom and man.
207. The man who wars against himself and wins the battle can do it only when he knows that in that war he is doing the one thing which is worth doing.
208. The WISE ONES tarry not in pleasure grounds of senses. The WISE ONES heed not the sweet-tongued voices of illusion.
209. Those who believe in Karma have to believe in Destiny which, from birth to death, every man weaves thread by thread around himself, as a spider his web; and this Destiny is guided either by the heavenly voice of the invisible Prototype outside of us, or by our more intimate astral, or inner man, who is but too often the evil genius of the embodied entity called man. Both these lead on the outward man, but one of them must prevail; and from the very beginning of the invisible affray the stern and implacable Law of Compensation steps in and takes its course, faithfully following the fluctuations of the fight. When the last strand is woven, and man is seemingly enwrapped in the network of his own doing, then he finds himself completely under the empire of this self-made destiny. It then either -fixes him like the inert shell against the immovable rock, or carries him away like a feather in a whirlwind raised by his own actions, and this is — KARMA.
210. Physical man is but the highest development of animal life.
211. The Secret Doctrine teaches: the fundam

About the Author

please

Patrick Moore bbc sky at night astronomy sorry youtube will not let me upload HD

Spain Cultural Analysis

Madrid – City Information

Madrid Airport Rent-A-Car

Being the largest city in Spain, you can be assured of a plethora of activities that will keep you busy for your entire stay in Madrid. In fact, there is so much for you to do there that you probably find that you don’t have enough time to do all that you want to do! There are just too many interesting and exciting places to visit, too many places to dine and wine, and too many places to party and have fun.

Experiencing classic Madrid.

Madrid is famous for its rich history and heritage. There are many museums and galleries in the city that you can visit. You can start by visiting the Museo de la Ciudad. This is where one can study the history of Madrid. What happened to the city since the middle ages? Who is responsible for the changes that lead to modern Madrid? The answers are all there. This is the perfect place to get to know the city inside out.

You may then proceed to Museo del Prado, where you can appreciate the works of Picasso. This gallery has the largest collection of Picasso works you’ll ever find. Of course, you will also be able to appreciate artwork by other Spanish artists. There are even study materials in English if you are interested to learn more about each individual art piece. For sure, a visit to Museo del Prado will give you a priceless education about art.

If you want to get that adrenalin pumping, the Ventas is a good place to visit. Ventas is the epicenter of Spanish bullfighting. Bullfighting is part of Spanish’s unique culture and has many years of history. You may not see an actual bull fight there but simply by walking in the vicinity, you may be able to feel tingling sensations crawling down your spine. This is normal. After all, a lot of blood has been shed in this arena!

Experiencing Madrid outdoors.

After a day or two visiting museums and galleries, it may be a good idea to get a little sunshine. Take the Metro to Plaza de Espana, and that’s where you can visit the Madrid Palacio Real Gardens – for free! You can feast your eyes on the greenery that lay before you. The fountains add to the natural beauty of the garden. Often, you see children playing around the fountain, getting themselves very wet, and enjoyable every moment in this enchanting place.

Or perhaps you prefer peace and tranquility. Then you may wish to visit Parque el buen Retiro Park. This is a very special park. The plants have been specially chosen to ensure that there is variety and color throughout all year round. This is the perfect spot for you to take peaceful long walks, to mediate, and to recharge your batteries.

Of course, when you have children with you, they may soon get bored with walks. When that happens, you can always visit one of the two theme parks in Madrid. And that will keep you and your children occupied for the entire day.

Car Rental In Spain

 

About the Author

Pastrana at Red Bull X-Fighters 2007 – Winning run UNCUT

Do you think that both parties are polluted with special interest groups?

The republicans have the gun-nuts, the racists, the Saudis, the Chinese, and the rabid evangelicals, while the Democrats have the green-extremists, the animal-rights extremists, the gay extremists, the feminist extremists, greedy lawyers (yuck), the Jewish bankers and hollyweird!
It would be so nice if we could just kick all of the damn lobbyists the hell out of Washington so our elected reps could just govern according to their now-forgotten constituency!

Concidering the latest report states there are 66 lobbyists per senate / congress official, yeah, I would say there is a pollution problem…But not all lobbyists are “bad” and are fighting for help from the government on worthwhile issues…One of the problems is we don’t hear about the worthwhile issues…

A quick look at PETA and PETA supporters (PETArds)

General Knowledge- Vii

• WHAT IS MOBILE ELBOW?

The mobile elbow results from using the mobile for long hours. Called the ‘cubital tunnel syndrome’, it is also called cell phone elbow’. The problem occurs when the ulnar nerve, which runs across the elbow, down to the ring and little fingers, gets over-stretched and blood supply is restricted, sparked by holding a phone to the ear for long periods.

• WHY DOES STEEL GLOW WHEN IT’S HOT?

Hot steel glows red when hot because its atoms vibrate with a lot of energy. The amount of energy varies in atoms re- sulting in a range of colours.

• WHAT DOES JANUARY MEAN?

The original Roman calendar had 10 named months from March to December and two unnamed months during winter. These two months were named January and February by Numa Pompilius, the second king of Rome circa 700 BC. January is named after Janus, the Roman ‘god of gates, doors and the beginnings’.

• WHAT’S THE AAFBAU PRINCIPLE?

The physical and chemical properties of elements are determined by the atomic structure. This, in turn, is determined by electrons and the shells, sub-shells and orbitals they reside in. The rules of placing electrons within shells is known as the Aafbau principle, which originally means ‘building up’.

• WHAT IS CHAPTER 11 BANKRUPTCIES IN THE US?

A case filed under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection is commonly referred to as a ‘reorganization or restructuring bankruptcy’. Chapter 11 is a part of the US Bankruptcy Code under which an insolvent company is allowed to reorganize and is not liquidated. It is not shut down and sold off.

• WHY DOES THE JASMINE BLOOM ONLY AT NIGHT?

Like all other flowering plants, jasmine also produces a flower inducing hormone in its leaves when exposed to bright sunlight. This hormone is called florigen (flower-generating hormone) and it migrates from the leaves to flowering shoots during the day. It accumulates in the flowering shoots of the jasmine plant and induces flowering during the night.

• WHAT IS A ROMAN CIRCUS?

It was an open air stadium used for public events in the Roman empire, empire. The events usually held in such a circus were chariot and horse races and performances commemorating historical events. The performance space would be rectangular or oval surrounded by several tiers of seats for spectators. The circus would be decorated with ornate columns, obelisks and statues. The first circus built in Rome was the Circus Maximus which also happened to be its largest.

• WHAT DOES THE PHRASE ‘CHICKEN OUT’ MEAN?

To chicken out is to stop doing something because of fear or lose courage while doing something. Sometimes, it is also used to ask a person, “Are you chicken?” or even as “Jack chickened out…” The chicken is a timid bird, which also gave rise to ‘chicken-hearted’.

• WHAT IS CONTACT SCRAPING?

Social networking has brought about a new trend called contact scraping, where an online company with access to a person’s mail account goes through the contact list and sends out an invitation to all to join the site. Once a person enters his/her credentials, like user name or password, the company sweeps through the contact list. The company gets free publicity and widens its user base, but could put the person concerned in an embarrassing and annoying situation, especially when there are friendly mails from strangers in return.

• HOW ARE DEEMED UNIVERSITIES DIFFERENT FROM OTHERS?

Ordinary universities are officially approved by the University Grants Commission (UGC) of India as per the latter’s guidelines for the universities’ overall supervision and administration. ‘Deemed university’ is a term indicative of status of autonomy granted to high performing institutes and departments of various universities. Such status enables deemed universities not only full autonomy in setting course work, syllabus and research centres, but also allows it to set it’s own guidelines for admission, fee and instructions to students. Parent universities have no control over deemed universities in matters of overall administration.

• WHY IS SEA WATER VERY HIGH IN SALT CONTENT?

The average salinity of sea water is about 3.5%. One cubic mile of sea water contains 166 million tonne of salt. The salts of the sea come from the breaking up of rocks and gradual wearing away of mountains releasing salts that are washed down by rainwater. It is estimated that more than 400 million tonne of dissolved salts are brought to the sea every year by 27,000 cubic km of water. The second source of salt is rocks beneath the ocean bed. There has been a constant slow addition of sea salinity due to evaporation from the ocean surface, combined by discharge from land.

• WHAT IS A CHEMICAL BOND? HOW IS IT FORMED?

A chemical bond is one in which atoms of different or same elements combine to become stable. There are two types of chemical bonds —electro-valent bond and covalent bond. In an electrovalent bond, a metal donates an electron to a non-metal and forms the bond. Such bonds are very strong. A covalent bond is formed between non-metals only. These are easy to break.

• IS RAIN WATER COMPLETELY PURE?

Rain water is considered the purest form of water. Impurities and salts present in water on earth are left behind during vaporisation by the sun. However, the rain water we receive on earth is not necessarily pure, as it brings down impurities and particles present in the atmosphere along with it.

• WHAT IS ‘THE MAGIC OF SCHEHERAZADE’?

The Magic of Scheherazade is a game for the Nintendo Entertainment System released by Culture Brain in 1989. It is the translation of the 1987 Famicom game Arabian Dream Scheherazade. The game was innovative for its time, incorporating elements of adventure and RPG styles.

• WHAT IS FUNEMPLOYMENT?

‘Funemployment’ came into being with the recession, when people began losing jobs. It means unemployed individuals making use of the break to enjoy their free time — travel, take up physical activity and have a good time but at little cost. They may not have been able to do this earlier. The funemployed are young people who have few responsibilities and commitments and can afford a break. They also use the time to find another job, but don’t spend time worrying about it.                

• WHAT IS MEDIAWIKI?

A wiki is a web application that allows users to create and edit web page content using a web browser. The term wiki also refers to the collaborative software used to create such a website. Mediawiki is a wiki software package licensed under the GNU General Public License, making it free and open source software. This Mediawiki software is used to run the popular web encyclopaedia Wikipedia, besides all projects of Wikimedia, wikis hosted by Wikia, and many other wikis.

• WHY DON’T THE TEETH OF ANIMALS DECAY THOUGH THEY NEVER BRUSH THEIR TEETH?

According to WHO, decaying of teeth is a localized, post-eruptive pathologic external process, involving hard tooth tissue and formation of cavities. There is demineralization of teeth by acids produced in the oral environment, due to action of oral acidogenic bacteria on carbohydrates found in cooked food and drinks. Animals are either herbivorous or carnivorous or both, and survive on uncooked, raw food, rich in fibre, which needs a lot of chewing to digest, thereby cleansing the teeth naturally It is like brushing teeth and massaging gums the natural way But tooth decay is common in pets like dogs, which eat cooked food and junk food like biscuits etc.

• WHICH IS THE BIGGEST STAR?

The biggest star found till date is Vy Canis Majoris, in the constellation of Canis Major. It is a red supergiant and one of the most luminous stars, 5,000 light years away from the earth with a radius of 1,800-2,100 times that of the sun. It is so large that its surface extends beyond the orbit of Saturn, were it placed in our solar system. Even light would take eight hours to complete its circumference. Though it is great, it is relatively cool, with a surface temperature of 3500 Kelvin.

• WHICH IS THE WORLD’S SLEEPIEST ANIMAL?

The sleepiest animal, considered by the average number of hours of sleep a day is the koala, an arboreal animal with the scientific name Phascclarctos Cinerus, found only in Australia. Though it resembles a teddy bear, scientifically it is close to kangaroos, because it carries its young in a pouch. It lives mostly on eucalyptus trees, sleeping in the fork for 19-22 hours a day

• WHAT IS THE GOLDEN ANGLE?

The golden angle separates the florets of a sunflower. Ills an approximation, since three golden arcs add up to slightly more than enough to make a circle. One of the old leaves overlaps and is pushed out in a radial line. This makes space in the inner system for a new leaf to form. New leaves move into the spaces opened as old leaves diverge.

• WHO IS CALLED A DIGITAL NOMAD?

A person who works on the move is called a digital nomad. Such a worker may or may not be on the rolls of a company, and could he a consultant/freelancer/a writer on the move. They are persons with a free spirit who like a remote lifestyle and earn as they move, and believe that with discipline and the correct technology, they can be as productive as a person sitting in office. This is new tribe of people and for them, the economic downturn has brought little distress as companies turn to part-timers to save on costs.

• WHAT IS A BLACK BLIZZARD?

During the drought of the 1930s in America, with no natural anchors in place, the soil dried, turned to dust and blew eastward and southward in large dark clouds. They blackened the sky and reached all the way to East Coast cities such as New York and Washington DC. Much of the soil ended up as deposits in the Atlantic Ocean, and were called ‘Black Blizzards’ and ‘Black Rollers’, and reduced visibility to a few feet. The Dust Bowl or Dirty Thirties —1930-36 and even up till 1940 — were caused by drought and decades of extensive farming without crop rotation.

• WHY DO NEWSPAPERS PRINT A COMBINATION OF FOUR DOTS —BLUE, PINK, YELLOW, BLACK— AT THE BOTTOM OF EACH PAGE

The four dots — blue (cyan), pink (magenta), yellow and black are registration marks used during printing to help ensure the print is aligned properly In offset printing technology which newspapers use, the inked image is transferred from a plate to a rubber blanket, then to the printing surface. These primary colours go into printing a multi-coloured image and have separate plates. Each plate has its individual mark, like the colour dot.

• ON WHAT BASIS ARE PINCODES DISTRIBUTED?

A Postal Index Number or PIN or Pincode is the post office numbering or postal code system used by India Post. It’s sixdigits long, and was introduced on August 15,1972. There are nine PIN zones in India. The first digit of the PIN code indicates the region in which a given post office falls, the second digit the sub-region, the third the sorting district. The final three digits are assigned to individual post offices.

• WHO FOUNDED YOUTUBE?

Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim, all early employees of PayPal, founded YouTube. Hurley studied design at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, while Chen and Karim studied computer science together at the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign. It was founded on February 15,2005. In Sfovember 2006, YouTube, LLC, was bought by Google me. for $1.65 billion, and is now operated as a subsidiary of Google.

• WHAT IS DERVISH MUSIC?

Dervish word originates from the Turkish word ‘darvis’, meaning poor or mendicant. Dervish music began among Muslim religious groups, known for their practice of energetic dancing, whirling, chanting or singing.

• WHAT IS A BOOMBURB?

Aboomburb is a booming suburb or satellite townships dreamt up by developers. It gives an idea of wealth, a boom. Boomburg is a similar term. These suburbs are usually not complete towns — though they are self-sufficient.

• HOW ARE ELECTRIC PYLONS PLACED ACROSS MOUNTAINS TO TRANSMIT ELECTRICITY?

Electric pylons are tall supports— made of galvanized steel lattice, steel tube or wood — used for power line construction. In normal terrain, they are assembled on the site. In mountainous regions, helicopters are used for power line construction, which are efficient but expensive. In the aerial construction method, the entire structure is pre-assembled and shifted in helicopters.

• WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF THE TERM ‘CASH COW’?

Management guru Peter F Drucker coined the term in the mid-1960s to describe a business or product line with a large market share in a stagnant or declining market. It can yield profits reliably for some years without further investment and little maintenance. The term also has its origin in a matrix developed by Boston Consulting Group, in which enterprises have po sitions in either a growing or shrinking market, and either a growing or shrinking total market share.

• WHAT ARE PERSEIDES?

The word Perseides is found in Greek mythology and refers to the descendants of Perseus — the name of a prolific meteor shower associated with the comet Swift-Tuttie. They are so called because they appear to come from the constellation Perseus. This shower is visible from midJuly each year, with peak activity between August 9 and 14, and is sometimes referred to as the “tears of St Lawrence”, as August 10 is the saint’s martyrdom.

• WHAT ARE JACK-O-LANTERNS?

They are carved pumpkins with lights inside commonly seen on Halloween night. The top of the pumpkin is cut off, the inside flesh scooped out and a face carved on its surface. These are used partly for fun and partly believing that they represent the souls of departed elders who protect houses from evil spirits. Ac cording to an Irish folk tale, the soul of a dishonest farmer called Jack wanders the earth burning amber inside a vegetable. The Jack-o-lantern is supposed to have been named after him.

• WHAT IS QUASI-RESONANCE?

A ‘quasi-resonant’ DC to DC converter with zero-current and zero-voltage switching includes a transformer with primary and secondary windings, and periodic switching means connected in series with the primary winding. The topology of the converter is determined by selecting an input capacitor with a capacitance much lower than the output capacitor.

• WHO IS AN EXCEPTOR?

An exceptor is a person who chooses to eat meat on special occasions. A vegetarian by habit, the exceptor makes exceptions for days like weddings, festivals and celebrations. After the vegan,eggetarian and flexitarian, it is the exceptor who is basically vegetarian, but makes changes in diet to suit the occasion.

• WHAT IS THIGMOTROPISM?

Thigmotropism is the growth of a plant around a support. Tropism is a phenomena by which a plant, usually climber like money plant and ivy, responds to a stimulus. Stems of the pea plant, for instance, are weak and have coil-like structures called tendrils. When tendrils approach a support (stick), a phytohormone called auxin is released in the side of the tendril away from the support. Auxin, a growth hormone, elongates the cells of that portion and makes it strong. The other portion, devoid of auxin, becomes weak and coils around the support.

• WHY DO THE EYES OF SOME ANIMALS GLOW IN THE DARK?

Some animals have a special, reflective surface right behind their retinas, called the tapeturn lucidum, which helps animals see better in the dark. When light enters the eye, it hits a photoreceptor that transmits the information to the brain. But sometimes light doesn’t hit the photoreceptor, so the tapetum lucidum acts as a mirror to bounce it back for a second chance.

• WHY DON’T WE FEEL THE TONES OF ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE? 

Atmospheric pressure, which is about 1 kg per’sqcm of area, presses down on our body from all sides, but we don’t feel it as it is balanced by fluid pressure from inside our body We can feel the difference during rainy season or when we go. to places where atmospheric pressure is less, like hill stations, where due to higher fluid pressure, blood oozes out in blood vessels, making the skin over those pink. The reverse happens under water.

• WHY DO FOOD PACKAGES CARRY KCAL WHEN THEY ACTUALLY SPECIFY CALORIES AND NOT KILO-CALORIES?

Kilocalories are commonly known as calories and abbreviated as kcal. One calorie (Kcal) has the same energy value as 4.186 kilojpules-(kJ), while one kilojoule is equivalent to 0.24 calories. One calorie contains the amount of energy that raises the temperature of one litre of water by 1 degree Celsius.

• WHAT IS SPIDER SILK?

Spider silk, also known as gossamer, is a protein fibre spun by spiders. Spiders use their silk to make webs. They can also suspend themselves using it. Many small spiders use silk threads for ballooning, the scientific term for the dynamic kiting spiderlings (mostly) used for dispersal. They extrude several threads into the air and let themselves get carried away with upward winds.

• WHAT IS A SICK-OUT?

A sick-out is concerted action by a group of employees, who call in sick to protest against the company and its policies. It is meant to hold the company to ransom. In ordinary language, it is a strike to show the power they hold over the company’s working. It is a slightly more devious method than taking to the streets openly and raising slogans. Employees hope to put pressure on the company and force it to meet their demands.

• WHAT IS UNBREAKABLE GLASS MADE OF, AND IS IT REALLY UNBREAKABLE?

The presence of micro cracks on the glass surface (called Griffith’s micro cracks) makes glass breakable under tension or impact. Such micro cracks are unavoidable as the glass surface comes under tension while cooling from a high temperature into various shapes. However, one can increase its impact resistance by various methods, so it can withstand even the impact of a bullet. The idea is to remove the surface micro cracks by chemical etching, or putting the glass surface under compression by physical or chemical toughening. One can even laminate two such toughened glass plates with resin in-between. These glasses are unbreakable, but when the threshold value is very high, it eventually breaks or cracks.

• WHAT IS UNIVERSAL TIME COORDINATED?

Universal Time Coordinated (UTC) is a time standard based on International Atomic Time with leap seconds added at irregular intervals to compensate for the Earth’s slowing rotation. A leap second is a positive or negative one-second adjustment to the UTC scale that keeps it close to Mean Solar Time at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich. The difference between UTC and Mean Solar Time is not allowed to exceed 0.9 seconds, so if high precision is not required, the general term Universal Time may be used. Time zones are expressed as positive or negative offsets from UTC. While each day contains 24 hours and each hour 60 minutes, the number of seconds in a minute can be 60,61 or 59.

• HOW DO SENSOR DOORS WORK?

Sensor doors use motion sensors or presence sensors. The first are used to activate the door when it detects a moving object, such as a pedestrian or shopping cart. Motion sensors can distinguish between objects moving toward the door or away from it. They use microwave technology and utilize the Doppler Effect principle. The sensors emit a high frequency microwave signal — when the wave encounters a moving object, it bounces back and its frequency changes in proportion to the object’s speed; Presence sensors detect both moving and non-moving objects in the path of the door. Presence sensors use infrared technology — they emit an invisible pulsed light signal. The receiver looks for the reflected signal and reacts.

• WHAT IS WEISURE?

Weisure time is when work is done during leisure time. With the line between work and leisure blurring thanks to online work and smartphones, a new work-life culture has been created. Sociologist Dalton Conley coined this word, having observed that 9-5 jobs are giving way to this new lifestyle.

• WHO DISCOVERED COMETS? HOW IS THE TAIL FORMED?

Comets have been known to mankind since eons, hence it cannot be said that comets were discovered by any single individual. A comet, like planets and asteroids, orbits around the sun — with fee orbital period varying from a few years to thousands of years. A comet is formed of rock, ice, dust and a few frozen gases like carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and methane. When a comet is close to the sun, the radiation from the sun causes the volatile matter in the comet to vaporize and spread out into space in the form of its tail, its dust particles and ions glowing due to sunlight falling on it.

• WHAT IS HAY FEVER AND WHY IS IT SO CALLED?

Hay fever is a form of allergy belonging to a group of maladies including hives, asthma and skin problems caused by protein sensitization.During certain seasons, many plants, grasses release their pollens into the air in large quantities. A person is said to have hay fever when he/she is sensitive to these pollens and other substances present in the air. It is called hay fever because the symptoms of the disease appear during spring and fall in England.

• HOW IS THE HEIGHT OF WATER TIDES PREDICTED?

As astronomical data is not sufficient to calculate tides, predictions are also based on actual tidal measurements in many areas, over ah extended period. A network of tide stations is equipped to take the following measurements every six minutes: tide levels, wind speed and direction, water current speeds, directions, air and water temperatures and barometric pressure. Stations that provide these daily predictions are called reference stations. Other stations are subordinate stations, which obtain predictions by applying a specific formula to this data. The formula is derived by observing how tides at the two stations related to one another in the past.

• HOW DO SOLAR CELLS CONVERT SUNLIGHT INTO ELECTRICITY?

Solar cells use photovoltaic cells to convert sunlight directly into electricity by converting photons (light particles) into electrons (negatively charged particles). Photovoltaic cells are made of semiconductors and silicon, mixed with other material.

• WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF THE WORD COCKTAIL?

The word cocktail was used in 1806 and is of American origin. Bartenders would drain the dregs of all the barrels and mix them together, serving the resultant muddle at a reduced price. Cock was another name for spigot, and tailings is the last bit of alcohol, so this drink was called cock-tailings, quickly shortened to “cocktail”.

• WHAT IS A CUSHION ACCOUNT?

It is an account a person sets aside which has no demands of monthly expenses on it, and is used as an emergency or luxury fund. A few business people set aside cushion funds to help their business grow, and for stability. The word ‘cushion’ is used as it gives a certain level of comfort to the person.

• WHAT IS MAGIC SAND?

Magic sand is water-repellent sand available in blue, green and red colours. When this sand in powder form is sprinkled on water, it sinks and forms a solid substance. This property is used to separate oil floating in the oceans — it can be sprayed on oil spills to enable it to mix with oil and take solid form. It is also used by utility companies in Arctic areas as it never freezes.

• IF LEAVES GET THEIR COLOUR FROM CHLOROPHYLL, WHAT GIVES FLOWERS THEIR COLOUR?

Plant cells have cell organelles known as plastids, which are colouring agents. There are three types of plastids — chloroplasts (contain green pigment chlorophyll), leucoplasts (white or colourless plastids) and chromoplasts (contain other pigments). All cells have varying proportions of these. Flowers have a majority of the third type and get their colours from these.

• HOW IS A MOCKTAIL DIFFERENT FROM A COCKTAIL?

Cocktail is a style of mixed drinks, and usually contains one or more types of liquor and mixers, such as bitters, fruit juice or herbs. Mocktail is a non-alcoholic cocktail. Mocktail is also know as ‘virgin cocktail’.

• WHAT IS A MINSKIAN PONZI DEAL?

The Minskian Ponzi deal was a theory propounded by American economist Minsky, in 1986. Such deals are both unsustainable and hazardous. In Minsky’s view, periods of economic and financial stability lead to a lowering of investors’ risk aversion and a process of releveraging. Investors borrow excessively and push asset prices excessively high. In this process, there are three types of investors/borrowers. First, sound or hedge borrowers who can afford to pay on their own. Second, speculative borrowers who can only service interest payments out of their cash flows. Finally, there are Ponzi borrowers who can service neither interest nor principal payments, and need to keep on refinancing their debts.

• WHAT DOES THE MONTH OF RAMZAN SIGNIFY?

Ramzan is the ninth month of the Islamic lunar calendar. Muslims fast for the entire month. They are obliged to abstain from all food, drink, tobacco and conjugal relations from dawn till sunset. The spiritual aspects include refraining from gossiping, lying, slandering and all such traits of bad character. The month of Ramzan is a time for spiritual reflection, prayer, recitation of the Quran, doing ‘Zikr’, endurance and selfdiscipline, to train the soul and body to be able to exercise self-restraint.

• WHO IS A SEXER?

A sexer is a professional in a hatchery who can tell a male chick from a female. Also known as chick sexers, they are employed to separate the genders as hatcheries have different feeding programmes for them: females are reared to lay eggs and males are bred for their meat. Big hatcheries sex chickens as they have no use for male birds who are killed almost immediately. A sexer is trained to tell the chicks apart by their physical appearance and vents.

• WHAT IS A SINKING FUND?

It is a fund set aside as a means to repay funds borrowed through a bond issue. The issuer makes periodic payments to a trustee who retires part of the issue by purchasing the bonds in the open market. Rather than the issuer repaying the entire principal of a bond issue on the maturity date, another company buys back a portion of the issue annually, and usually at fixed par value or at the current market value of the bonds, whichever is less. From the investor’s point of view, a sinking fund adds safety to a corporate bond issue: with it, the issuing company is less likely to default on repayment.

• WHY IS A SWINE FLU MASK CALLED N95?
• Respirators or N95 masks can block 95% small particles that contain the H1N1 virus, which causes swine flu. These are expensive and can be used only for a single day. These masks are made of three layers of electrostaticallycharged microfibres, that block 95% particles, thus the name N95.
• WHAT IS CLAYTRONICS?

Claytronics is an emerging field of engineering, drawing on nano technology and computer engineering. Claytronics or programmable matter refers to an assemblage of tiny components called claytronic atoms or catoms, which could assume the form of any object, depending on the programmes controlling the claytronics. This term also refers to the art of making clay caricatures of public figures, begun in 1996 by an Indian, Charuvi Agrawal.

• WHAT DOES ‘TROPICALIZED’ ON A RADIO SET SIGNIFY?

Heat and humidity are the greatest enemies of any electrical equipment, so in tropical countries, such equipment is manufactured to withstand those climatic conditions. In a radio set, tropicalized means coating the electrical windings with resin, sealing the speaker hole with acoustically transparent cloth, installing” felt washers on the control knobs, and sealing openings for the antenna and earth connections.

• WHAT IS A GRASS SKIRT?

A grass skirt, also called a hula skirt, is a traditional part of the dress worn by hula dancers on tropical islands. It is made of long blades of grass, most popularly seen on  the island of Hawaii. Grass skirts are also worn in many cultures and tribes in Africa, like the Zulu tribals.

• WHAT IS WHITE NOISE?

Noise that is produced by combining sounds of different frequencies together is called white noise. Since it contains all frequencies, white noise is used to mask other sounds. When two or three people talk, our brain can distinguish the sound of a particular person. But if a crowd cheers in a stadium, no individual voice can be identified. That’s white noise and is most effectively used in the emergency siren.

• WHAT IS INDUSTRIAL MELANISM?

It is caused when the natural environment of an organism is disturbed due to industrial pollution. As pollutants like soot and smoke darken the landscape, they disturb the environment of many organisms that rely on camouflage to avoid predation. This change makes them vulnerable to predators and creates a strong selective pressure due to which an organism with a darker colour is more likely to survive.

• WHAT ARE BATHOLITHS?

Batholiths are enormous masses of igneous rock made up of once-molten material solidified below the earth’s surface. These are usually made of granite and extend over thousands of miles. A well known batholith is located in the Sierra Nevada range of California, across 40,000 sqkm.

• WHAT IS THE TATE?

The Tate is an art gallery originally titled the National Gallery of British Art. It is situated on Millbank in Pimlico, London. It was founded in 1897 by Henry Tafe with money earned from his sugar refineries. It was initially a collection of British art, concentrating on the works of Victorian painters. It later expanded to include foreign art and in the 20th century became principally a gallery devoted to Modernism. There are several other recently-opened Tate Galleries’ in England, but the original gallery is now called Tate Britain.

• WHO ARE STAGS IN THE STOCK MARKET?

An investor or speculator who subscribes to a new issue, expecting the price of the stock to rise immediately. upon the start of trading is known as a stag. The sole aim of a stag is to sell the shares soon after allotment to realize a quick profit.

• WHAT IS A GREEN COLLAR JOB?

A green collar job involves working to better the environment, and is created by firms and organizations whose mission is to improve environmental quality. Work could include policies related to waste, energy and water conservation, solar energy, whole home performance and strengthening local food systems. These jobs are generated by sectors that produce goods which may need a green angle, like energy retrofits to improve conservation, constructing green buildings, composting, landscaping etc.

• WHAT IS RASTAFARIANISM?

The Rastafarian movement originated in Jamaica in 1930s, based on the philosophies of Marcus Mosiah Garvey. Today, it has branched out, including groups that still hold Garvey’s beliefs and groups that have disavowed his more controversial stances. His organization’s aim was to unite black people (Negroes) with their rightful homeland, Africa. He prophesied about his people being redeemed by a future Black African king. This  prediction was fulfilled in November 2, 1930, when Ras Tafari Makonnen was crowned King of Ethiopia.

• WHAT ARE WIDGETS?

Widget, literally, is a blend of window and gadget, coined by George S Kaufman in his play ‘Beggar on Horseback’. It is a hypothetical manufactured good or product. In computing, the term has become frequently used to refer to objects on a computer screen the user interacts with. A widget is anything that can be embedded within a HTML page. Widgets often take the form of on-screen tools like clocks, event countdowns etc.

• WHY DON’T TWO-WHEELERS HAVE A REVERSE GEAR?

A regular motorcycle has a ’sequential’ manual transmission, meaning you can only shift up or down one gear at a time. It is also designed to spin one way only. Adding reverse would require the crankshaft to spin backwards, or a much larger, heavier, expensive transmission. So it is easiest to dismount and push the bike backwards.

• WHAT IS A DUM DUM BULLET?

It is an expanding bullet designed to grow on impact, increasing in diameter to limit penetration and/or produce a larger diameter wound. There are many expanding bullet designs though the most commonly encountered are hollow-point bullet and the soft-point bullet. Such bullets are Sometimes known as ‘dum dum’ bullets. After an early British example pro- duced in the Dum Dum arsenal, near Kolkata, India, there were several expanding bullets produced by this arsenal for the .303 British cartridge.

• WHO ARE STILT FISHERMEN?

Stilt fishing is an old tradition practised by around 500 fishing families in Galle, in southwestern-most Sri Lanka. These fishermen usually fish at sunset, noon and sunrise, with each one taking an elevated position and balancing about 2 metres above the wa- ter. The stilts are dug into the coral and bed of the sea. Stilt fishing started after the Second World War.

• WHAT ARE SIN STOCKS?

They are stocks of companies which manufacture or deal with cigarettes, alcohol, weapons and sex-related products. They could be directly involved in the business or associated with such activities. Such companies are also called sin businesses.

• WHY DOES SNOW LOOK WHITE BUT WATER IS COLOURLESS?

Snow is a block of individual ice crystals arranged together. When a light photon enters a layer of snow, it goes through an ice crystal on the top, which changes its direction slightly and sends it on to a new ice crystal, which does the same thing. Basically, all the crystals bounce the light all around, so that it comes right back out of the snow pile. It does the same thing to all the different light frequencies, so all colours of light are bounced back out. The ‘colour’ of all the frequencies in the visible spectrum combined in equal measure is white, so this is the colour we see in snow.

• WHAT IS THE FULL FORM OF AK-47 AND WHAT DOES 47 REFER TO?

AK-47 stands for Russian Avtomat Kalashnikova 1947 (Automatic Kalashnikov 1947). Designed by Russian Mikhail Kalashnikov, it was the assault rifle used by most Eastern Bloc countries during the Cold War. The rifle was adopted and standardized in 1947, thus the name.

• HOW IS THE TIME DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TWO COUNTRIES CALCULATED?

The earth has 360 imaginary lines called longitudes or meridians running vertically between the poles. Each of these longitudes is called a degree. The 0 degree longitude passing through Greenwich, near London, is considered as standard and the time of all other time zones are calculated accordingly. The time difference between each longitude (each degree) is 4 minutes. So if it is 12 noon at Greenwich (0 degree), it would be 12:04 pm at 1 degree meridian and so on. In India, the standard meridian is 82-and-half degree. So the time difference between Greenwich and India is 82.5 x 4, which is 330 minutes (5 hours 30 minutes).

• WHAT IS LAISSEZ FAIRE?

Laissez faire is a French phrase and means to let things pass. The term is used to describe an economic system where the government intervenes as little as possible and leaves the private sector to organize most economic activity through markets. Classical economists were great advocates of a laissez faire system.

• WHAT IS THE FREIMARKT?

Freimarkt means free fair. It was first held on October 16, 1035, in Bremen, Germany. It is the biggest festival in Northern Germany, with more than four million visitors each year. It is celebrated for 17 days in the last two weeks of October. The area covers approximately 100,000 sqm on two areas: the ‘Kleiner Freimarkt’ (Small Free Fair) on the market square. It is famous for its beer tents and amusement rides. An annual highlight is the ‘Freimarktsumzug’ (Free Fair Procession).

• HOW ARE ULTRA-VIOLET RAYS BLOCKED BY THE OZONE LAYER?

The ozone layer contains ozone molecules — 03 molecules — which are formed by the action of ultra-violet rays on atmospheric oxygen. This oxygen, which is 02, converts into 03 when UV rays fall on it. When these rays fall on the surface of the atmosphere, they are absorbed in the conversion of oxygen into ozone. As a result, ultra-violet rays are blocked by this ozone layer.

• HOW IS THE TEMPERATURE OF A STAR MEASURED?

As stars are very far away, their temperatuce cannot be measured directly. Fortunately, the light coming from stars can be analyzed through several scientific instruments. Although all stars appear white, they have different colours when carefully viewed. The variations are a result of their temperature — cold stars appear red, and hot ones blue or white. The colour of a star is measured by an instrument called photoelectric photometer, which involves passing the light through different filters and finding the amount that passes through each filter. The measures from the photometer are converted to temperature, using standard scales.

• WHICH IS THE WORLD’S LONGEST STORYBOOK?

Marcel Proust’s  A La Recherche Du Temps Perdu’ (translated as In Search of Past) is the world’s longest novel, according to the Guinness World Records. The influential 13-volume work contains 9,609,000 characters, with each letter and space counting as one character.

• WHY DOES A FALLING OBJECT HAVE NO WEIGHT?

Every body on this earth is attracted by the gravitational pull of the earth. A freely falling object has weight W=mg, where W-weight, m-mass of the object and g-acceleration produced due to the earth’s gravity An object kept in a lift which falls freely, weighs zero on the weighing machine, but its actual weight is still mg. This happens because the normal reaction force exerted on the object in the lift is equal to zero, and normal force equals to mg, which in turn equals the weight of the object.

• WHAT IS THE REOG DANCE?

It is a spectacular dance with several dancers wearing bright, colourful costumes, accompanied by merry music. It is always held in open terrain, such as a square, street etc. This dance is a traditional art form combined with a magical show or trance dance. The Reog dates back to the Hindu period in East Java in Indonesia.

WHAT IS CROWD MINING?

Crowd mining is a new business concept where solutions can come from crowds, and marketers are turning to them as a database. The changing economy brought in this concept to tap expensive or even unavailable information and it goes beyond surveys and crowd sourcing.

• WHAT IS OCTOBER HEAT?

The weather in the month of October in the Indian sub-continent is called ‘October heat’. By the beginning of October, the monsoon withdraws from the northern plains. October and November form the period of transition from the hot rainy season to dry winter conditions.

• WHAT IS AWACS?

AWACS stands for Airborne Warning And Control System that helps the Air Force detect incoming missiles and enemy aircraft from across the country’s border. AWACS is described as an ‘Eye in the Sky’ as it can carry out surveillance at about 400-km range under all-weather situations, and to lock on to 60 targets at a time simultaneously.

• WHAT IS THE SCHWARZSCHILD RADIUS?

It is a characteristic radius associated with every quantity of mass. This term is used in physics and astronomy, especially in the theory of gravitation and general relativity. m 1916, Karl Schwarzschild obtained an exact solution to Einstein’s field equations for gravitational field outside a nonrating, spherically symmetric body. The solution contained a formula, where one of the values came to be known as Schwarzschild Radius.

• WHO  WERE  THE  IRON CHANCELLORS?

A hundred years ago, Germany was divided into many small states. In one of these states, Prussia, the chancellor or chief minister to the king, was Otto Von Bismarck. A strong and ruthless man, Bismarck built Prussia into the strongest of all German states. He got his nickname of ‘The Iron Chancellor’ when he said Germany could become a great power “through blood and iron”.

• HOW IS THE HEIGHT OF DIFFERENT PLACES ON EARTH MEASURED FROM THE SEA LEVEL?

The height of different places on earth is measured with the help of the ‘altimeter’. It is basically a barometer without the mercury, and instead of instead of the pressure graduating in a barometer, the corresponding height graduates.

• WHAT IS CRAB FOOTBALL?

Crab soccer (American English) or crab football (British English) is an informal sport for two teams. Unlike soccer, players support themselves on their hands and feet and face up, in motions that make them look like crabs, a method known as crab walking. This sport involves kicking, so safety is at the root of many rules. Like soccer, players other than the goalkeeper must not touch the ball with their hands.

• HOW DOES A MOBILE VIBRATE?

There is a little motor fitted in a cell phone. This motor is unevenly weighted on its output shaft. When this motor rotates, the rotating uneven weight causes the mobile to vibrate.

• WHAT IS TELEPRESENCE?

Telepresence is the next-gen videoconferencing technology, which provides superior images. The demand for telepresence solutions has grown, with companies seeing it as an alternative to send executives for meetings. It also reduces a company’s carbon footprint by cutting down frequent flying. Setting up a telepresence suite can be very expensive, though.

• HOW IS THE MASS OF HEAVENLY BODIES MEASURED?

The mass of a heavenly body can be measured by knowing the orbital period (time it takes to complete one orbit around the other body), the distance between two bodies and gravitational constant. The orbital time is inversely proportionate to the square root of the sum of the masses of two bodies and directly proportion distance raised to power three by two.

• WHAT IS AN ELECTRON GUN?

It is a device in the back of a “cathode ray tube” television or computer monitor (pre-plasma or LCD flat-panel). The electron gun fires a stream of electrons from the back of the TV onto the inside face of the screen, which is coated with a material that glows when hit by electrons. By using powerful magnets to direct the stream across the screen, a series of dots (‘pixels’) is built over the screen which appears as an image.

• WHO INVENTED THE SPEECH BUBBLE AND WHEN WAS IT FIRST USED?

One of the earliest antecedents to the modern speech bubble was the speech scroll — wispy lines that connected first person speech to the mouths of ’speakers in Meso-American art. In Western graphic art, labels that reveal what a figure is saying have appeared even in the 13th century Word balloons began appearing in 18th century printed broadsides and political cartoons from the American Revolution often used them.

• WHY   ARE   CELLPHONES SWITCHED OFF WHILE FLYING?

Mobile phones are radio transmitters and as such, were banned from use in civilian airplanes, for fear they could interfere with airplane avionics. There was also concern that a cellular phone would cause disruption to the cell systems’ towers, and distract passengers during take-off and landing.

• WHAT IS A DIRTY BOMB?

A dirty bomb is a simple explosive device used not so much to produce extensive damage but to contaminate a designated spot with radioactive material. It’s primary role is to spread fear.

• WHAT IS THE PEKING OPERA?

The Peking Opera, which originated in the late 18th century, is a synthesis of music, dance, art and acrobatics. It is the most influential of all operas in  China, and can be divided into ‘civil’ pieces characterized by singing, and ‘martial’ ones featuring acrobatics and stunts. Some operas are a combination of both. The operatic dialogues and monologues are recited in the Beijing dialect.

• WHAT IS A PINK ELEPHANT?

The term ‘pink elephant’ is used to describe something obvious and uncomfortable, but which obody wants to talk about. At the workplace or in business communications, it is something that is buried under the carpet when things go wrong. It refers especially to a situation of unhealthy relationships between women colleagues — one woman may try to bully the other women out of rivalry to stay in control. Broaching such a topic may be embarrassing to all, so it is called a “pink elephant in the room”.

• WHY IS AN ATOM SPHERICAL IN SHAPE?

The shape of an atom refers to the shape of the imaginary volume in which its electrons orbit. Different electrons orbit at different levels. The shape of the atom depends on several factors, including the angular momentum of electrons. Only the simplest atoms have a spherical shape. Heavy atoms have a more complex shape.

• WHAT IS INCOGNITO BROWSING?

It is used for browsing in stealth mode, for a situation when we don’t want our history to be tracked. Web pages that are opened and files downloaded while browsing incognito are not logged in the browser.

• WHAT IS MICRO-PROPAGATION?

Micro-propagation is the technique of multiple production of plants in-vitro. It is used for plants that do not produce seeds or respond to normal vegetable reproduction. Micro propagation’s main advantage is to produce disease-free plants in multiple numbers and cloning of plants.

• WHAT IS THE ROLE OF H2O2 IN THE GREY-HAIR PUZZLE?

New research shows that hair turns grey as a result of a chemical reaction that causes it to bleach itself inside out. When there is a dip in levels of an enzyme called catalase, hydrogen peroxide (H202) that naturally occurs in hair can’t be broken down. As H202 builds up, the hair becomes grey.

• WHO MADE THE FIRST ICE CREAM IN THE WORLD?

The origin of ice cream can be traced to the 4th century BC. Early references include Roman emperor Nero who ordered ice to be brought from the mountains and combined with fruit toppings, and King Tang (AD 618-97) of Shang, China, who had a method of creating ice and milk concoctions. Ice cream was brought from China back to Europe.

• WHAT IS ‘SMART ANTENNA’ TECHNOLOGY?

This is a new technology in the field of wireless and mobile communications in which capacity and performance are usually limited by two major impairments — multipath and co-channel interference. A smart antenna enables a higher capacity by reducing multipath and co-channel interference. This is achieved by focusing the radiation in the desired direction and adjusting to changing traffic conditions.

• WHAT IS THE GOLLIWOG ACT?

The golliwog act is a flexible contortion of the body in a dance form to create an impression that the contortionist is a doll. The name is taken from a literary character created by Florence Kate in her novel The Adventures of two Dutch Dolls and a Golliwog’.

• WHAT IS A ‘CASH AND CARRY STORE’ AND WHY IS IT SO CALLED?

A cash and carry store is different from regular retail chains which target professional customers rather than end-consumers. This concept is based around self-service and bulk buying arid serves registered customers only. The core customer groups are hotels, caterers, traders and other business professionals. Such stores aim to prevent any intervention by middlemen and requires buyers to make their own arrangements and assume all risk.

• HOW DOES HAIR GEL WORK?

The main ingredient in hair gels is a plastic called PVP, which is a polymer sealer. The polymers in PVP are dissolved in water or alcohol and form a clear film between each hair strand, attaching them to one another. Chemical experts call this “capillary power” because it’s similar to how blood capillaries work. When gel is applied to wet hair, the PVP or similar ingredient absorbs water quickly. When the gel dries completely, it forms a fixed connection between hair strands.

• WHAT IS A WORMHOLE?

A wormhole is a theoretical entity allowed by Einstein’s theory of general relativity in which spacetime curvature connects two distant locations (or times). The term ‘wormhole’ was coined by American theoretical physicist John A Wheeler in 1957, based on an analogy of how a worm could chew a hole from one end of an apple through the centre to the other, thus creating a shortcut through the intervening space.

• WHAT DOES MIRROR IMAGE MEAN IN BIOLOGICAL TERMINOLOGY?

Mirror image is a concept from chemistry applied to organic materials. An example of this is glucose arid fructose. These molecules are mirror images of each other. Although it is possible to flip glucose and superimpose it over a fructose molecule, only in 2D (flat viewing) are they similar.

• WHAT IS A 3-D FILM?

A 3-D film is any visual presentation system that attempts to maintain or recreate moving images of the third dimension, the illusion of depth as seen by the viewer. It involves filming two images simultaneously, with two cameras, filming at 90 degree angle via mirrors. When viewed in such a way that each eye sees its photographed counterpart, the viewer’s visual cortex will interpret the pair of images as a single three-dimensional image. Modern computer technology also allows for the production of pseudo-SD films using CGI and without the need for dual cameras.

• WHAT IS SWEETHEARTING?

Sweet hearting is a method cashiers use to pass on goods to friends by failing to bill one. They do so by passing two items, and obscuring the barcode of one, so it goes unnoticed. Now, there are machines to pick out sweet hearting.

• WHAT ARE MANGO SHOWERS?

Mango showers are those experienced prior to the arrival of the monsoon. These showers arrive generally in late April and May and are said to aid in the ripening of mangoes and from dropping prematurely from trees.

• WHAT IS TERMINATOR GENE TECHNOLOGY?

The terminator gene is a specific genetic sequence inserted by scientists into a seed’s DNA that renders the seed and the crop it produces sterile. Patented by the USDA and Delta and Pine Land Co., now owned by Monsanto, this terminator technology has no agricultural or economic benefits for farmers or consumers.

• WHY IS THE FLAME OF A CANDLE POINTED?

The flame of a candle is produced when the wax of the candle melts due to heat and the molten wax rises in the wick. As the heated gas rises above from the base of the flame, it moves faster as the pressure decreases from the base to the top. As the rate at which the gas is released from the base is more or less constant, the flame becomes thinner and thinner from its base to the end, assuming a pointed tip.

• HOW DID THE ABBREVIATION DR FOR DOCTORS ORIGINATE, AND WHY DO ENGINEERS NOT USE ER?
• The abbreviation originated to separate people qualified to practice medicine from those holding the highest academic degree i.e. doctorate in nonmedical subjects. In USA, only dentists and vets are called doctors. Physicians and surgeons do not put ‘Dr’ before their names. Engineers, at least in India, put ‘Er’.
• WHAT IS A FLIPBOOK?

A flipbook is a small book with a series of printed images that create the illusion of motion when its pages are rapidly flipped. Typically, a flipbook is held in one hand while the thumb of the other flicks the pages and the user concentrates on the middle of each page. It relies on a basic optical principle known as persistence of vision. In India, flip books were popular in the seventies, when cola majors brought out flip books of cricketers in action.

• WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF FORMULA I?

Formula One, also known as Formula 1 or Fl, and currently officially referred to as FIA Formula One World Championship, is the highest class of auto racing sanctioned by the Fidiration Internationale de 1′Automobile (FIA). The ‘formula’ in the name refers to a set of rules that all participants and cars must comply with.

• WHAT ARE GTOR-MA CAKES?

Gtor-ma cakes are sacrificial cakes used in Tibetan Buddhist ceremonies as offerings to deities. The unbaked cakes are prepared by kneading parched barley flour and butter into cones. The cakes form part of the phyi-mchod, or eight offerings of external worship.

• WHAT IS DIGITAL CLEANSE?

Digital cleanse is a term mooted by John Mayor, musician and avid blogger and tweeter, as a resolution and challenge for the first week of 2010. It means keeping off all digital contraptions — a stop to emailing, texting, social networking, blogging and surfing sites. It is seen as a new health craze, considered good for the body and mind. The basic idea is to unplug and meet people.

• HOW DOES THE HYBRID ENGINE WORK?

Hybrid engines use two or more power sources. They consist of a usual fuel engine, complemented by a pollution-free engine, an electric engine for example. The fuel engine and brakes are used to recharge the batteries for the electric engine, eliminating the need to plug in while unused. When brakes are applied, some of the energy being used to stop the vehicle is collected by the regenerative brakes of the electrical engine. Hence, the electrical engine takes control when cruising, stopping or slowly acclerating, reducing the use of fuel.

• WHAT IS THE AURORA PHENOMENON?

Charged particles ejected at great speeds from the sun ionise the air molecules resulting in spectacular colour display. These are seen from polar regions and are called aurora or polar lights. It is the luminous phenomenon of earth’s upper atmosphere that occurs primarily in high latitudes of both hemispheres; aurorae in the northern hemisphere are called aurora borealis, or northern lights; aurora australis, or southern lights in the southern hemisphere.

• WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF THE TERM ‘SLAP-STICK COMEDY’?

The term ’slapstick comedy’ is given to comedy characterized by broad humour, absurd situations and vigorous chases, often violent in action. The phrase comes from the term battacchio called the ’slap stick’ in English. It is a club-like object composed of two wooden slats, and produces a loud smacking noise when struck, though little force is transferred to the person being struck. Slapstick comedy became popular in 19th-century music halls and Vaudeville theatres.

• HOW AND WHEN DID THE TERM ‘SIZE ZERO’ COME INTO USE?

‘Size zero’ was first used in 1966 for British supermodel Twiggy, who had a fragile figure. Now, ’size zero’ is a women’s clothing size in the US system, equivalent to a UK size 4, with a waist measurement of 23 inches, the average girth of an 8-year-old girl. It is a petite size for women with a 32-inch bust, 23-inch waist and 32-inch hips, and is often linked to anorexia nervosa and bulimia.

• HOW DOES THE ‘MADRAS EYE’ SPREAD?

Madras eye is the inflammation of the outermost covering of the eyeball and inner layer of eyelid. Medically, it is known as ‘conjunctivitis’. It can be caused by various agents like bacteria, virus, wind, smoke, pollen, radiation or chemical agents. If a person comes in close physical contact of the infected person or his infected belongings, the bacteria or virus gets transmitted and thus, causes infection from person to person.

• WHY DOES THE ORTHODOX CHURCH CELEBRATE CHRISTINAS ON JANUARY 7?

The Orthodox Church uses the old Julian calender which is 13 days behind the Gregorian calender. In the former Soviet Republic, the Bolsheviks adopted the Gregorian calender at the end of 1917, which put them in line with the rest of the Western world. However, the Orthodox Church, opposed to the Bolsheviks trying to suppress religion, kept the Julian calender.

• WHAT IS COSMOPHOBIA?

Cosmophobia is an irrational fear that the world is about to end, and is sparked off by a belief among people that a cosmic end is near. The fear is ancient, and people have been readying for doom on and off — expecting floods, earthquakes, epidemics, drought, or even a collision with another planet. The latest bout was set off by the movie 2012, where the Mayan calendar counts December 21, 2012 as the last day Earlier, the 2000 millennium frenzy had everyone believe that the end was near. For ages now, there have been apocalyptic predictions which have fuelled cosmophobia, but until now, they have all come to nought.

• WHAT IS AN ELEPHANT PEARL?

Elephant pearls are not really pearls, however, they are categorised as one of the nine pearls. These are produced in the heads and the sockets of the tusks of some elephants. It was believed that when worn by kings, they proved highly sanctifying and bestowed children, victory and sound health. Even now, they are considered to bring good luck.

• WHAT IS A ‘BANANA KICK’ IN FOOT-BALL?

Banana kick is a checkside punt — a kicking style used in Australian Rules and rugby league football. When kicked, the ball bends away from the body and is usually used when a set shot for goal is lined up on a narrow angle. The banana kick comes off more from the inside of the boot, with the ball spinning in the same direction as the leg swings naturally.

• WHAT IS THE ORACLE OF DELPHI?

The Oracle of Delphi was the most important oracle in the classical Greek World, and a major site for the worship of the god Apollo. Built around a sacred spring, Delphi was considered to be the omphalos — the centre of the world. Scholars congregated at Delphi, and it became a focal point for intellectual enquiry Delphi lies on the slopes of Mount Parnassus in Greece.

• HOW MANY FLOWERS MUST A BEE TAP TO MAKE A POUND OF HONEY?

A bee taps 2 million flowers and flies 50,000 miles (80,000 kms) to make one pound (454 gm) of honey — traveling more than twice around the world to gather it. The basis of calculation is done after taking many facts for granted and the proof is often lost in the mists of time. C R Ribbands (1949) determined that one bee can visit several hundred of flowers for a load of sweet clover, and up to 1,100-1,446 flowers for a load of limantnes nectar.

• WHAT IS THE SPHINX AWARD?

There are several types of Sphinx awards. The most popular one is given by Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity forcontribution to social service. President Stephen C Ainlay of Union College recently received the Sphinx Award from the brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity for his contributions to the Union community. Another Sphinx Award is given in Coventry for outstanding performance in the local soccer league.

• WHAT IS A GRAMMY SALUTE?

Grammy awards are presented annually for outstanding achievements in music. There is a week-long function called the Grammy Week, culminating in the Annual Grammy Awards. The rest of the week is marked by several connected events, of which the Salute To series is a part. Each of the Salute To events features a reception, presentation of a special merit certificate and guest performances.

• WHEN DID THE PRACTICE OF THE HANDSHAKE BEGIN?

The origin of the handshake goes back to primitive eras: the physical contact of the hand symbolized peace and friendship. Later symbolism of the gesture, apart from a greeting, was the ratification of a contract or pledge. Even today, we clinch a contract or business deal by ’shaking hands on it.’ Archaeological ruins and texts show the handshake was in use as a means of greeting as far back as the 2nd century BC.

• WHAT IS THE BOXING DAY MATCH AND WHAT IS ITS ORIGIN?

The Boxing Day match is a cricket match hosted in Melbourne, Australia, and Victoria, involving the Australian cricket team and the opposition national team touring Australia at that time. It begins on Boxing Day (Dec 26) and is played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. Boxing Day is so called as traditionally, it was the day when people would give a present or Christmas ‘box’ to those who worked for them throughout the year. These days, the ‘box’ is usually given before Christmas.

• WHAT IS BAS-RELIEF?

Bas-relief is a French term meaning ‘low-raised work.’ A relief is a sculptured artwork where a modelled form is raised. There are three types of reliefs — ‘bas-relief or low relief, ‘high relief and ’sunken relief.’ Bas-relief is suitable for scenes with many figures and other elements such as a landscape    or    architectural background. Stone carving and metal casting is traditionally done in bas-relief.

• HOW DO ODI TEAMS CHOOSE THEIR COLOURS?

There is no hard and fast rule about choosing cricket colours. In most cases, the country adopts colours from their nationa

About the Author

please

Dennis Basso anti-fur protest february 21st 2010

Animals Should not be Put in Cages

It possibly began in the bygone when man began to understand the beauty of animals. Coupling with his capacity over them, he perhaps sure that he required to have the striking animals that he had encountered on his hunting trips to be near him. Through the centuries, man has domesticated somewhat a few animals to complete his wants, and sometimes to provide no want at all. It is one thing to keep an animal near attend one’s needs but it is cruel to want to keep them ‘just for fun’. Hence, keeping animals and birds in cages is pretty ridiculous if not cruel.

It is most definitely cruel to keep any animal or bird in captivity; worse still confined in cages. An animal or bird are so relaxed in its own environment. It knows of no restrictions. It goes about its own business of ingestion and drinking and creating babies. Even domestic animals would like to gait about, and act according to their instincts and needs. Caging them would deprive them of this. How often have we seen confined animals pacing their cages in futile attempts to leakage? Can we picture the frustration that they feel? What do we get in making a person furious, frustrated and depressed? Yet humans do it all the time. Since we would think it cruel if someone were to crate us, it stands to cause that we should not do it to others, even animals and birds. The intellect of fairness we grasp so dearest when it comes to humans should be extended to all living creatures.

Besides being cruel, it serves little rationale to want to birdcage animals and birds. Wild animals and birds being enslaved up serve our selfish pleasure of license over others and that’s about all that we do. Cultivating such natures does not do us any good; actually developing such natures will make us cruel and egoistic. Left in the riotous a bird does all sorts of effects; when kept in the cage, it just sits there. Granted the birds are scenic to look at, we cannot declare the bird at its best when it is caged. To inspect the bird at its best we should go to its home. Caging domestic animals just serves the tenacity of controlling them. If we cannot look after them, why acquire them in the first place?

Finally, we have no right to do this; we do it because the creatures are feeble to foil us from confronting them. If we are robbed of such rights, we would pretty die than yield. Only in the cruelest of regimes are men and women confined only because the government – good or, otherwise – thinks that they are threats to their dominance or to the country. By what right then do we imprison animals and birds lacking any qualms?

Wild animals should be left liberated in their habitats and domestic animals should be given as much openness as workable. The only rationale for sentence birds and animals is when they are a hazard to themselves or to others. Nevertheless, rough animals and birds should never be captured in the first place.

About the Author

Want to find out about hamster health and black bear hamster? Get tips from the Hamster Life website.

Politics, Health, Environment, World Hunger (Vegetarian Food) Human and Animal Rights

Bullfight Thornton 2007