Frances Bolton wrote: "What's up with this "oh but is it good for the left?" litmus test, anyway?"
<Identity, cont.>
3. 'The self-same thing.' *Obs. rare.*
1616 BULLOKAR. *Identitie*, the selfe same thing. a1619 FOTHERBY *Atheom*. II.iii #2 (1622) 216 Lif is not the cause of its own liuing, but the very same identity with its liuing.
4. *Alg.* a. The equality of two expressions for all values of the literal quantities: distinctively denoted by the sign [3 superimposed -, as = but with an xtra line]. b. An equation expressing identity, an identical equation (IDENTICAL 4a).
1859 BARN. SMITH *Arith & Algebra* (ed. 6) 338 Such an expression as (x + 1)[2] = x[2] + 2x + 1, where one of the quantities, between which the sign of equality is placed, results from performing the operations indicated in the other, is called an Identity.
5. The condition of being identified inf eeling, interest, etc. *rare*
1868 GLADSTONE *Juv. Mundi* i. (1870) 5 He is in truth in visible identity with the age.
6. *Logic*. *Law* or *Principle of Identity*, the principle expressed in the identical proposition *A is A*. Also *attrib*, as *identity formula, relation, sentence.*
1846 SIR W. HAMILTON *Reid's Wks.* 767 The four logical laws of Identity, Contradiction, Excluded Middle, and Reason and Consequent. 1851 MANSEL *Prolog. Log.* (1860) 196 THis law of thought is expressed by the Principle of Identity, 'Every A is A.' 1860 ABP. THOMSON *Laws Th* (ed. 5) #114. 212 Criteria of Truth. 2nd Criterium. The Principle of Identity. 1889 FOWLER *Induct. Logic* Pef (ed. 5) 19 *note*, Amongst the assumptions or pre-suppositions of reasoning, I have not included the so-called Law of Identity; as to say that all A is A, or a thing is the same as itself, appears to me to be an utterly unmeaning proposition. 1940 W.V. QUINE *Math. Logic* 232 *I* is..the identity relation (x = y) 1965 B MATES *Elem. Logic* ix. 146 It will be useful to introduce a couple of obvious conventions for writing identity-formulas. *Ibid* 149 The identity relation among the elements of one domain will be different from that among the elements of another. *Ibid*, Thus every identity-sentence would be either trivial or absurd. 1967 *Encycl. PHilos*. IV 123/1 When we utter an identity sentence such as 'Venus is the morning star', what we wish to express..is that the terms 'Venus' and 'the morning star' both mean the same thing. 1970 J.D. CARNEY *Introd. Symbolic Logic* vii. 160 The identity relation has some rather special properties.
7 (*old) identity*: a person long resident or well known in a place. *N.Z.* and *Austral*.
1862 *Otago, Its Goldfields and Resources* 9 The exclusive spirit of the 'old identity'. 1874 A. BATHGATE *Colonial Experience* iii. 26 The term "old identities" took its origin form an expression in a speech made by one of the members of the Provincial Council, Mr. E. B. Cargill, who in speaking of the new arrivals, said that the early settlers should endeavour to preserve their old identity...A comic sisnger [R. Thatcher] helped to perpetuate the name by writing a song. 1879 W.J. BARRY *Up & Down* xx. 197 The 'old idenities' were beginning to be alive to the situation 1889 *Bulletin* (Sydney) 28 Sept 8/1 Many of the old identities of '52 and '53 will remember the license-hunting and the shanty-raiding days. 1893 *Aucklund Weekly News* 9 Dec. 7 Both these old identities are in possession of all their faculties to a wonderful degree. *Ibid* 28 Antoher old identity passed away on Dec. 1 in the person of Mr. Thomas Hunt. 1929 'M BERNARD ELDERSHAW' *House Is Built* (1945) v. 111 He was the sort of man who becomes an old identity almost at once, so that the residents fo the Parramatta Road..soon thought they had been seeing him drive past in his indescribably sailorly fashion all their lives. 1942 'M. INNES' *Daffodil Affair* II.ii. 46 Ron's dad was a well-known identity Cobdogla-way. 1944 *Mod. Jun. Dict.* (Whitcombe & Tombs) 205 In Australia and New Zealand a very old resident in a place is called an 'old identity'. 1962 J.R. BERNARD in *Southerly* XXII. ii. 97 We [Australians] add to..identity that of outstanding local citizen. 1970 *N.Z. Woman's Weekly* 9 Nov. 19/1 Havelock North identity Mrs C.E. Turner-Williams ..at 98 stitches happily on.
8. *Math* <to be cont. in Installment 4>
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Let us approach the problem whether these elements are distinct or identical in this way. It is clear that the same thing cannot act in two opposite ways or be in two opposite states at the same time, with respect to the same part of itself, and in relation to the same object. So if we find such contradictory actions or states among the elements concerned, we shall know that more than one must have been involved.
Very well.
Consider this proposition of mine, then. Can the same thing, at the same time and with the same part of itself, be at rest and in motion?
Certainly not.
We had better state this principle in still more precise terms, to guard against misunderstanding later on. Suppose a man is standing still, but moving his head and arms. WE should not allow anyone to say that the same man was both at rest and in motion at the same time, but only that part of him was at rest, part in motion. Isn't that so?
Yes.
An ingenious objector might refine still further and argue that a peg-top, spinning with its peg fixed at the same spot, or idneed any body that revolves in the same place, is both at rest and in motion as a whole. But we should not agree, because the parts in respect of which such a body is moving and at rest are not the same. It contains an axis and a circumference; and in respect of the axis it is at rest inasmuch as the axis is not inclined in any direction, while in respect of the circumference it revolves; and if, while it is spinning, the axis does lean out of the perpendicular in all directions, then it is in no way at rest.
That is true.
No objection of that sort, then, will disconcert us or make us believe that the same thing can ever act or be acted upon in two opposite ways, or be two opposite things, at thesame time, in respect of the same part of itself, and in relation to the same object.
I can answer for myself at any rate. *Republic* (tr. Cornford) iv.435-436 (Cornford pp. 132-3)
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SCULPTURE AND PAINTING.--You will examine, likewise, whether, in their groups there be a unity of action or proper relation; a truth of dress and manners. Sculpture and painting are very justly called liberal arts; a lively and strong imagination, together with a just observation being absolutely necessary to excel in either, which, in my opinion, is by no means the case of music, though called a liberal art, and now in Italy placed even above the other two--a proof of the decline of that country. A taste of sculpture and painting is, in my mind, as becoming as a taste of fiddling and piping is unbecoming a man of fashion. The former is conntected with history and poetry; the later, with nothing that I know of, but bad company. [*Same date*.] *Letters, Sentences and Maxims* by Lord Chesterfield (New York: A. L. Burt Company, n.d.) pp. 220-21. (The Home Library)
{Note: I purchased this in April 1959 for $0.19 in Wahr's basement in Ann Arbor Michigan}
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This labour past, by Bridewell all descend, (As morning pray'r, and flagellation end) To where Fleet-ditch with disemboguing streams Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to Thames, The King of dykes! than whom no sluice of mud With deeper sable blots the silver flood. "Here strip, my children! here at once leap in, "Here prove who best can dash thro' thick and thin, "And who the most in love of dirt excel, "Or dark dexterity of groping well. "Who flings most filth, and wide pollutes around "The stream, be his the Weekly Journals bound, "A pig of lead to him who dives the best; "A peck of coals a-piece shall glad the rest." In naked majesty Oldmixon stands, And Milo-like surveys his arms and hands; Then sighing, thus, "And am I now three-score? "Ah why, ye Gods! should two and two make four?"
*Dunciad* II, 269-86
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Additional Informaiton RealSystem G2 is the catch-all name for RealNetworks' new collection of servers, tools andplayers. In addition to more intelligent streaming, RealSystem G2 also is capable of playing many different types of files individually and together as part of presentations (see SMIL on page 40).
Realplayer Plus (tm) G2 Manual (Seattle, 1998), p. 39 { I don't have the slightest idea what this is all about; the manual belongs to my wife.)
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Hit gelamp gio thaette an hearpere waes on thaere thiode the Dracia hatte, sio waes on Creca rice; se hearpere waes swithe ungefraeglice good, thaes nama waes Orfeus; he haefde an swithe aenlic wif, sio waes haten Euudice.
Bright's Anglo-Saxon Reader (New York, 1951), p. 5
(Sorry I couldn't use an OE keyboard to get the signs correct; this is a rough transliteration without diacritical marks)
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Adown behind the woodland,
In glory sank the sun, And o'er the rippling waters
A farewell halo flung. And we almost heard the rustle
Of the curtains in the west, As their gorgeous folds were lifted,
To wrap his couch of rest.
>From "Sunset on a Lake" in Mary T. Lathrap, Rare Gems (Bay
City Michigan: Woman's Christian Tempeance Union, n.d.), p. 16.
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To Brooklyn Bridge
Hart Crane
How many dawns, chill from his rippling rest The seagull's wings shall dip and pivot him, Shedding white rings of tumult, building high Over the chained bay waters Liberty--
Then, with inviolate curve, forsake our eyes As apparitional as sails that cross Some page of figures to be filed away; --Till elevators drop us from our day . . .
I think of cinemas, panoramic sleights With multitudes bent toward some flashing scene Never disclosed, but hastened to again, Foretold to other eyes on the same screen;
And Thee, across the harbor, silver-paced As though the sun took step of thee, yet left Some motion ever unspent in thy stride,-- IMplicitly thy freedom staying thee!
Out of some subway scuttle, cell or loft A bedlamite speeds to thy parapets, Tilting there momently, shrill shirt ballooning, A jest falls from the speechless caravan.
Down Wall, from girder into street noon leaks, A rip-tooth of the sky's acetylene; All afternoon the cloud-flown derricks turn . . Thy cables breathe the North Atlantic still.
And obscure as that heaven of the Jews, Thy guerdon . . . Accolade thou dost bestow Of anonymity time cannot raise: Vibrant reprieve and pardon thou dost show.
O harp and altar, of thy fury fused, (How could mere toil align thy choiring strings!) Terrific threshold of the prophet's pledge, Prayer of pariah, and the lover's cry,--
Again the traffic lights that skim thy swift Unfractioned idiom, immaculate sigh of stars, Beading thy path--condense eternity: And we have seen night lifted in thine arms.
Under thy shadow by the piers I waited; Only in darkness is thy shadow clear. The City's fiery parcels all undone, Already show submergbes an iron year . . .
O Sleepless as the river under thee, Vaulting the sea, the pariries' dreaming sod, Unto us lowliest sometime sweep, descend And of the curveship lend a myth to God.
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But if we conceive thus highly of the destinies of poetry, we must also set our standard for poetry high, since poetry, to be capable of fulfilling such high destinies, must be poetry of a high order of excellence. We must accustom ourselves to a high standard and to a strict judgment. Sainte-Beuve relates that Napoleon one day said, when somebody was spoken of in his presence as a charlatan: "Charlatan as much as you please; but where is there *not* charlatanism?" --"Yes," answers Sainte-Beuve, "in politics, in the art of governing mankind, that is perhaps true. But in the order of thought, in art, the glory, the eternal honor is that charlatanism sahll find no entrance; herein lies the inviolableness of that noble portion of man's being." It is admirably said, and let us hold fast to it.
Matthew Arnold, "The Study of Poetry"
{Perhaps I cheat here, since the collected works of Arnold, are highly relevant to politics because (even before the fact) they constitute one long gasp of horror at the Commune.}
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Presence of Mind
When, with my little daughter Blanche,
I climbed the Alps, last summer, I saw a dreadful avalanche
About to overcome her;
And, as it swept her down the slope,
I vaguely wondered whether I should be wise to cut the rope
That held us twain together.
* * * *
I must confess I'm glad I did, But still I miss the child--poor kid!
Harry Graham
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Incompletable limerick
(Oral Tradition: English novelist John Wain, at
Metztger's Bar in Ann Arbor, 1959)
There was a young girl named Malone Who had no erogenous zone...
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SAYBROOK Churches to sponsor cake auction
A birthday celebration and cake auction will be held from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. Saturday in the Old Grade School in Saybrook.
Sponsored by the Wesbein and Arrowsmith United Methodist Churches, tickers are $3 for adults and $1.50 for children un- der 12. The cake auction will fol- low entertainment.
For more information, call (309) 475-2611 or 475-3211
Bloomington Pantagraph, Feb. 19, A2
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The beetle booms adown the glooms
And bumps along the clumps.
Author Unknown (*Stuffed Owl*, p. 15)
[Addressing his heart]
Thou little bounder, rest.
John Ruskin (*Owl*, p. 14
And now, kind friends, what I have wrote,
I hope you will pass o'er, And not criticise as some have done
Hitherto herebefore.
Julia Moore (Sweet Singer of Michigan) (*Owl*, p. 10
A fly that up and down himself doth shove.
William Wordsworth, To Sleep (*Owl*, p. 14
The two divinest things that man has got, A lovely woman in a rural spot.
Leigh Hunt (*Owl*, p. 15
The two divinest things this world can grab, A handsome woman in a hansom cab.
Parody by Coventry Patmore
Across the wires the gloomy message came: "He is not better; he is much the same."
University Poet Unknown, On the
Recovery of the Prince of Wales. (*Owl*, p. 17)
Her lips, they are redder than coral
That under the ocean grows; She is sweet, she is fair, she is moral,
My beautiful Georgian rose!
Author Unknown (*Owl*, p. 21)
"Ae Fond Kiss, and Then----"
So still the Tadpole cleaves the watery vale, With balanc'd fins and undulating tail; New lungs and limbs proclaim his second birth, Breathe the dry air, and bound upon the earth. ................... With gills pulmonic breathes th'enormous Whale, And spouts aquatic columns to the gale.
The Temple of Nature
Erasmus Darwin (Charles's grandfather) (*Owl*, p. 108
<To be continued>