Simple Gifts

Simple Gifts

By John and Jenny WiseEducationArtsBooksHistory
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Simple Gifts episodes

  • Spring Poems 1: ”Ode on the Spring,” by Thomas Grey, ”Today,” by Billy Collins

    This month, we welcome Spring together with an eclectic mix of poetry, beginning with:

    1) Thomas Grey's "Ode on the Spring"

    and

    2) Billy Collins' whimsical "Today"

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    #poem #poetry #verse #literature #aestheticliterature #aesthetic #rhythmic #phonaesthetics #soundsymbolism #metre #prosaic #literarycomposition #poet #ambiguity #symbolism #irony #poeticdiction #muse #prosody #meter #metricalpatterns #rhymescheme #spring #springpoetry #springtime #odetospring #thomasgrey #billycollins #today #williamwordsworth #lineswritteninearlyspring #johndryden #songcalmwastheevenandclearwasthesky #marjoriepickthall #daisytime #robertherrick #todaffodils #claudemckay #afterthewinter #gerardmanleyhopkins #louisuntermeyer #feuerzauber

    4 min
  • Winston Churchill, ”This was Their Finest Hour,” June 18,1940

    Two weeks after "we shall fight on the beaches," Churchill again spoke before the House of Commons. The Battle of France was lost, the miracle of Dunkirk was in the rearview mirror, and France was seeking an armistice with Germany. Churchill sounded the clarion call:

    "What General Weygand called the Battle of France is over. I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization. Upon it depends our own British life, and the long continuity of our institutions and our Empire. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us....

    Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, 'This was their finest hour.'"

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    #churchill #winston #winstonchurchil #worldwarii #worldwar2 #worldwartwo #worldwar #england #america #europe #europeanwar #americanwar #englandwar #warineurope #primeminister #bristishprimeminister #parliament #historicchurchillspeeches #houseofcommons #bbc #britishhistory #thiswastheirfinesthour #finesthour #weshallfightonthebeaches 

    13 min
  • Winston Churchill, ”We shall fight on the beaches,” 6/4/1940, Part 2

    June 4th, 1940 marked the final day of "Operation Dynamo," the evacuation of allied forces from Dunkirk, a MIRACLE in the face of a "colossal military disaster." The Battle of France, a 6-week blitzkrieg was ending as a rout, a near total defeat. The evacuation at Dunkirk presaged the surrender of France on June 22nd. It fell upon Churchill to temper the jubilation and relief with the stark reality of defeat and the bleak prospects of the Battle of Britain looming on the horizon.

    This speech in its historical context is deservedly considered one of the greatest in world history. We must never forget that darkness looms, and our resolve to fight on despite its apparent victory is the greatest mark of a people's character.

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    #churchill #winston #winstonchurchil #worldwarii #worldwar2 #worldwartwo #worldwar #england #america #europe #europeanwar #americanwar #englandwar #warineurope #primeminister #bristishprimeminister #parliament #historicchurchillspeeches #houseofcommons #bbc #britishhistory #thiswastheirfinesthour #finesthour #weshallfightonthebeaches 

    15 min
  • C. S. Lewis’ ”The Seeing Eye,” Part 2

    "The Russians, I am told, report that they have not found God in outer space. On the other hand, a good many people in many different times and countries claim to have found God ... here on earth."

    Thus begins this essay by C. S. Lewis. I quote it as an introduction because it reminds me of the constant saw I hear from atheists, "show me evidence of God. I won't believe anything without evidence." The real question then becomes, what will count as evidence of God? While we can find Shakespeare in his plays, it is not the sort of evidence that that atheists demand for God. The supernatural by definition cannot be contained within the natural in that way.

    "Looking for God - or heaven - by exploring space is like reading or seeing all Shakespeare's plays in the hope that you will find Shakespeare as one of the characters."

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    16 min
  • John Donne: ”The Ecstasy,” ”A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,” and ”For Whom the Bell Tolls”

    1) "The Ecstasy" is a poem of incarnation. It is one of my favorite Donne love poems. The souls of lovers, that which truly loves, are sheathed in flesh:

    Because such fingers need to knit
             That subtle knot which makes us man,
    So must pure lovers' souls descend
             T' affections, and to faculties,
    Which sense may reach and apprehend
    . . .
    Love's mysteries in souls do grow,
             But yet the body is his book.
     
    2) "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" was written by Donne to his pregnant wife, Ann More, on the occasion of his departure from England to continental Europe. This beautiful love poem is filled with Donne's wit and passion. Playing on an extended metaphor of twin compasses, the poem ends with these lines:
     
    Such wilt thou be to me, who must,
       Like th' other foot, obliquely run;
    Thy firmness makes my circle just,
       And makes me end where I begun.
     
    3) "For Whom the Bell Tolls," also called "No Man is an Island," is not technically a poem, but a paragraph taken from a "Meditation" on life's trials. It is, nevertheless, one of the Donne's most well-known and quoted works.
     
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    #poem #poetry #verse #literature #aestheticliterature #aesthetic #rhythmic #phonaesthetics #soundsymbolism #metre #prosaic #literarycomposition #poet #ambiguity #symbolism #irony #poeticdiction #muse #prosody #meter #metricalpatterns #rhymescheme #johndonne #donne #hymntochrist #thisismyplayslastscene #ahymntogodthefather #battermyheartthreepersondgod #breakofday #afever #forwhomthebelltolls #avaledictionforbiddingmourning #theecstasy

    8 min
  • George Orwell’s 1984, Part II, Chapter 9, Part 4

    George Orwell's 1984 is classic dystopian literature, but it is also psychologically astute and prescient concerning the totalitarian tendencies of the 20th century's ideologies. With the rise of 21st century Wokism currently in vogue, its message is a clarion call for the present, too. Let us beware of embracing rather than opposing the lies that are being forced upon us, lest we find ourselves, too, living in a world in which we must guard our very thoughts, lest they betray us. Hold fast to the truth, no matter the consequences!

    Enjoy ... and be vigilant!

    If you'd like to support us, donate through Paypal at [email protected]

    https://www.youtube.com/c/TheChristianAtheist/featured

    https://www.facebook.com/JnJWiseWords

    https://wisewordsforyouroccasion.wordpress.com

     

    #georgeorwell #animalfarm #classic #classicdystopianliterature #dystopianliterature #dystopianfiction #dystopian #literature #fiction #psychologicalliterature #psychological #psychology #totalitarian #totalitarianfiction #totalitarianliterature #20thcentury #20thcenturyliterature #woke #wokism #orwell

    17 min
  • Plato’s REPUBLIC, Book 10, Part 4

    In the final book of his masterwork, having answered the central question of the dialogue, Plato turns Socrates back to the question of literature in the Kallipolis. Based on the theory of the Forms developed earlier in REPUBLIC Plato levels a devastating critique of poetry as an imitation three times removed from Truth, or the ideal reality. However, in true intellectual humility he ends this argument against poetry with this passage:

    "... if poetry directed to pleasure and imitation have any argument to give showing that they should be in a city with good laws, we should be delighted to receive them back from exile.... Isn't it just for them to come back in this way -- when it has made an apology?... And surely we would also give its protectors ... occasion to speak an argument ... on its behalf, showing that it's not only pleasant but also beneficial to regimes and human life. And we shall listen benevolently. For surely we shall gain if it should turn out to be not only pleasant but also beneficial."

    Next, Socrates addresses the immortality of the soul with both argument and the famous myth of Er and its tale of the afterlife. There can be no doubt that Robert Frost had this legend in mind when he wrote his poem, "The Trial by Existence," which I read in its entirety on our Simple Gifts podcast, published January 24th, entitled "Poems by Robert Frost, Part 4." The poem ends with this stanza, a fitting conclusion to our reading of what has been perhaps the most important text in philosophy in the Western world:

    ’Tis of the essence of life here,
    Though we choose greatly, still to lack
    The lasting memory at all clear,
    That life has for us on the wrack
    Nothing but what we somehow chose;
    Thus are we wholly stripped of pride
    In the pain that has but one close,
    Bearing it crushed and mystified.

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    21 min
  • C. S. Lewis’ ”The Seeing Eye,” Part 1

    "The Russians, I am told, report that they have not found God in outer space. On the other hand, a good many people in many different times and countries claim to have found God ... here on earth."

    Thus begins this essay by C. S. Lewis. I quote it as an introduction because it reminds me of the constant saw I hear from atheists, "show me evidence of God. I won't believe anything without evidence." The real question then becomes, what will count as evidence of God? While we can find Shakespeare in his plays, it is not the sort of evidence that that atheists demand for God. The supernatural by definition cannot be contained within the natural in that way.

    "Looking for God - or heaven - by exploring space is like reading or seeing all Shakespeare's plays in the hope that you will find Shakespeare as one of the characters."

    If you'd like to support us, donate through Paypal at [email protected]

     

    14 min
  • John Donne: ”Hymn to Christ,” and ”This is my Play’s Last Scene”

    In "Hymn to Christ" the poet is leaving his beloved England for the darkness and winter of Germany. His voyage is both literal and figurative, as he is leaving behind his temporal loves to discover the foundation of love itself. His wife, Ann More, having died two years before has united with Christ's love. As on his own name in "Hymn to God the Father," Donne plays on his wife's name, Ann More, here. The whole poem turns on the third stanza:

    Nor Thou nor Thy religion dost control

    The amorousness of an harmonious soul ;
    But Thou wouldst have that love Thyself ; as Thou
    Art jealous, Lord, so I am jealous now ;
    Thou lovest not, till from loving more Thou free
    My soul ; Who ever gives, takes liberty ;
        Oh, if Thou carest not whom I love,
            Alas ! Thou lovest not me.

    God does not censure but incites the passions of His children when they are properly directed. Donne's love for his wife, now taken from him into Christ's love, was always the reflection of true freedom and love in Christ. Both Donne and Christ, "loving More," want her for their own, and Donne finds his own love for his wife properly centered now on the Savior, who loves her "more." The final stanza sees the poet soldiering forward into the love that binds all his earthly passions into the Mystery of eternal Love, into that  "winter ... Where none but Thee, the eternal root

            Of true love, I may know."

     

    In "This is my Play's Last Scene," the poet awaits his death, that sublime moment of paradox - of terror and joy, 'shuffling off our mortal coil,' seeing at last "that [eternal] face."

    If you'd like to support us, donate through Paypal at [email protected]


    https://www.youtube.com/c/TheChristianAtheist/featured 
    https://www.facebook.com/JnJWiseWords 
    https://wisewordsforyouroccasion.wordpress.com 

    #poem #poetry #verse #literature #aestheticliterature #aesthetic #rhythmic #phonaesthetics #soundsymbolism #metre #prosaic #literarycomposition #poet #ambiguity #symbolism #irony #poeticdiction #muse #prosody #meter #metricalpatterns #rhymescheme #johndonne #donne #hymntochrist #thisismyplayslastscene #ahymntogodthefather #battermyheartthreepersondgod #breakofday #afever #forwhomthebelltolls #avaledictionforbiddingmourning #theecstasy

     

    4 min
  • George Orwell’s 1984, Part II, Chapter 9, Part 3

    George Orwell's 1984 is classic dystopian literature, but it is also psychologically astute and prescient concerning the totalitarian tendencies of the 20th century's ideologies. With the rise of 21st century Wokism currently in vogue, its message is a clarion call for the present, too. Let us beware of embracing rather than opposing the lies that are being forced upon us, lest we find ourselves, too, living in a world in which we must guard our very thoughts, lest they betray us. Hold fast to the truth, no matter the consequences!

    Enjoy ... and be vigilant!

    If you'd like to support us, donate through Paypal at [email protected]

    https://www.youtube.com/c/TheChristianAtheist/featured

    https://www.facebook.com/JnJWiseWords

    https://wisewordsforyouroccasion.wordpress.com

     

    #georgeorwell #animalfarm #classic #classicdystopianliterature #dystopianliterature #dystopianfiction #dystopian #literature #fiction #psychologicalliterature #psychological #psychology #totalitarian #totalitarianfiction #totalitarianliterature #20thcentury #20thcenturyliterature #woke #wokism #orwell

    16 min

About Simple Gifts

From the publisher's feed

Simple Gifts is the gift of time and freedom. It is the simple presentation of the written word spoken without commentary. Join us in ruminating on great stories, poems, history, philosophy, theology, art and science. Amidst chaos, find the “valley of love and delight,” a true simplicity, where “to bow and to bend we will not be ashamed,” where we can ponder the greatest words ever written, turning them over and over, “till by turning, turning, we come round right.”