Humanities, Philosophy & Other Things

Galileo Galilei Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina of Tuscany, 1615 To the Most Serene Grand Duchess Mother: Some years ago, as Your Serene Highness well knows, I discovered in the heavens many things that had not been seen before our own age. The novelty of these things, as well as some consequences which followed from them in contradiction to the physical notions commonly held among academic philosophers, stirred up against me no small number of professors-as if I had placed these things in the sky with my own hands in order to upset nature and overturn the sciences. They seemed to forget that the increase of known truths stimulates the investigation, establishment, and growth of the arts; not their diminution or destruction. Showing a greater fondness for their own opinions than for truth they sought to deny and disprove the new things which, if they had ...

Mormon Literature Sampler: The King Follett Discourse * Joseph Smith   [The President having arrived, the choir sang a hymn. Elder A. Lyman offered prayer. The President then arose and called the attention of the congregation to the subjects which were contemplated in the forepart of the conference.] Because the wind blows very hard, it will hardly be possible for me to make you all hear unless I have your profound attention. I approach a matter of the greatest importance and the most solemn of any that can occupy our attention--that is, the subject of the dead. I have been requested to speak by friends and relatives of Brother Follett, who was crushed to death in a well; and inasmuch as there are a great many in this congregation who live in this city as well as elsewhere who have lost friends, I feel disposed to speak on the subject in general and offer you my ideas so far as I have ability and so far as I shall be inspired by the Holy Spirit to dwell on thi...