For good men to do nothing
All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
- Edmund Burke
- Edmund Burke
Kaleidoscope
A series of changing phases or events.
- For good men to do nothing
- Some quotes on India
- The Idea of India
- 100 People who shaped India in the 20th Century
- Reservation in Higher Education
- Tendulkar Territory
- Hurricane Rita
- Amazon.com Delivery
- Desiderata
- Happy 59th Indian Independence Day, Aug 15th, 2005
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Some quotes on India
We owe a lot to the Indians, who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made!
Albert Einstein
If there is one place on the face of earth where all the dreams of living men have found a home from the very earliest days when man began the dream of existence, it is India!
French scholar Romaine Rolland
India is the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great grand mother of tradition. Our most valuable and most astrictive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only!
Mark Twain
So far as I am able to judge, nothing has been left undone, either by man or nature, to make India the most extraordinary country that the sun visits on his rounds. Nothing seems to have been forgotten, nothing overlooked.
Mark Twain
She (India) has left indelible imprints on one fourth of the human race in the course of a long succession of centuries. She has the right to reclaim ... her place amongst the great nations summarizing and symbolizing the spirit of humanity. From Persia to the Chinese sea, from the icy regions of Siberia to Islands of Java and Borneo, India has propagated her beliefs, her tales, and her civilization!
Sylvia Levi
India conquered and dominated China culturally for 20 centuries without ever having to send a single soldier across her border!
Hu Shih, former Ambassador of China to USA
Civilizations have arisen in other parts of the world. In ancient and modern times, wonderful ideas have been carried forward from one race to another...But mark you, my friends, it has been always with the blast of war trumpets and the march of embattled cohorts. Each idea had to be soaked in a deluge of blood..... Each word of power had to be followed by the groans of millions, by the wails of orphans, by the tears of widows. This, many other nations have taught; but India for thousands of years peacefully existed. Here activity prevailed when even Greece did not exist... Even earlier, when history has no record, and tradition dares not peer into the gloom of that intense past, even from until now, ideas after ideas have marched out from her, but every word has been spoken with a blessing behind it and peace before it. We, of all nations of the world, have never been a conquering race, and that blessing is on our head, and therefore we live....!
Swami Vivekananda, Great Indian Philosopher
If I were asked under what sky the human mind has most fully developed some of its choicest gifts, has most deeply pondered on the greatest problems of life, and has found solutions, I should point to India
Max Mueller
India was the mother of our race and Sanskrit the mother of Europe's languages. She was the mother of our philosophy, mother through the Arabs, of much of our mathematics, mother through Buddha, of the ideals embodied in Christianity, mother through village communities of self-government and democracy. Mother India is in many ways the mother of us all.
Will Durant
In India, I found a race of mortals living upon the Earth, but not adhering to it, inhabiting cities, but not being fixed to them, possessing everything, but possessed by nothing
Apollonius Tyanaeus quotes (Neo-Pythagorean)
Albert Einstein
If there is one place on the face of earth where all the dreams of living men have found a home from the very earliest days when man began the dream of existence, it is India!
French scholar Romaine Rolland
India is the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great grand mother of tradition. Our most valuable and most astrictive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only!
Mark Twain
So far as I am able to judge, nothing has been left undone, either by man or nature, to make India the most extraordinary country that the sun visits on his rounds. Nothing seems to have been forgotten, nothing overlooked.
Mark Twain
She (India) has left indelible imprints on one fourth of the human race in the course of a long succession of centuries. She has the right to reclaim ... her place amongst the great nations summarizing and symbolizing the spirit of humanity. From Persia to the Chinese sea, from the icy regions of Siberia to Islands of Java and Borneo, India has propagated her beliefs, her tales, and her civilization!
Sylvia Levi
India conquered and dominated China culturally for 20 centuries without ever having to send a single soldier across her border!
Hu Shih, former Ambassador of China to USA
Civilizations have arisen in other parts of the world. In ancient and modern times, wonderful ideas have been carried forward from one race to another...But mark you, my friends, it has been always with the blast of war trumpets and the march of embattled cohorts. Each idea had to be soaked in a deluge of blood..... Each word of power had to be followed by the groans of millions, by the wails of orphans, by the tears of widows. This, many other nations have taught; but India for thousands of years peacefully existed. Here activity prevailed when even Greece did not exist... Even earlier, when history has no record, and tradition dares not peer into the gloom of that intense past, even from until now, ideas after ideas have marched out from her, but every word has been spoken with a blessing behind it and peace before it. We, of all nations of the world, have never been a conquering race, and that blessing is on our head, and therefore we live....!
Swami Vivekananda, Great Indian Philosopher
If I were asked under what sky the human mind has most fully developed some of its choicest gifts, has most deeply pondered on the greatest problems of life, and has found solutions, I should point to India
Max Mueller
India was the mother of our race and Sanskrit the mother of Europe's languages. She was the mother of our philosophy, mother through the Arabs, of much of our mathematics, mother through Buddha, of the ideals embodied in Christianity, mother through village communities of self-government and democracy. Mother India is in many ways the mother of us all.
Will Durant
In India, I found a race of mortals living upon the Earth, but not adhering to it, inhabiting cities, but not being fixed to them, possessing everything, but possessed by nothing
Apollonius Tyanaeus quotes (Neo-Pythagorean)
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
The Idea of India
The ide of India itself militates against the intense consciousness of the separateness of one's own people from others
- Rabindranath Thakur (Tagore)
- Rabindranath Thakur (Tagore)
Sunday, June 25, 2006
100 People who shaped India in the 20th Century
This is a nice webpage from India Today about 100 people who shaped India in the 20th Century.
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
Reservation in Higher Education
I am somehow less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.
From Atanu Dey's blog article on the recent "reservation" fiasco threatening the education system of India. The blog article can be read here. Original quote by Stephen Jay Gould.
Tendulkar Territory
... a thundered six over midwicket, a classical straight-drive off the front foot - with a high elbow, minimum follow through, and slight nod of the head a few moments after bat struck ball ... Fifty off 50 balls, momentum seized, bowlers hassled, fielders guessing, captain experimenting, crowd in a frenzy ... welcome to Tendulkar territory.
From a report by Vaidyanathan (Oct 25, 2005) on cricinfo.com following Tendulkar's return to cricket after a six month lay-off due to injury.
Hurricane Rita
The Dalai Lama must be very impressed with the security measures taken up in Houston for his visit. The entire city of Houston is being evacuated!
21st Sep. Dr. Keith Cooper, Rice University. Many people in Houston evacuated because of impending hurricane Rita which made landfall early 24th Sep.
Amazon.com Delivery
If the tracking information indicates the package has been delivered, please check with your neighbors or family members. Packages are occasionally left with neighbors, a building manager, or are placed somewhere relatively safe such as your porch, garage, or even behind bushes.
On a help page on Amazon.com.
Desiderata
Go placidly amid the noise and the haste and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly. And listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant, for they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons, for they are vexatious to the spirit. Never compare yourself with others. You may become vain or bitter, for there will be always greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements, as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your career, however humble. It is a real possession in the changing fortunes of life. Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is. Many people strive for high ideals and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love. For in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass. Take kindly the counsel of years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings, for many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars. You have a right to be there. And whether or not it is clear to you, the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive him to be. And whatever your labours and aspirations in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.
Originally written by Max Ehrmann in the 1920s. Shared with batch of 1999 by Dr. A.K.Roy, ECE, IIT-KGP.
Happy 59th Indian Independence Day, Aug 15th, 2005
The appointed day has come - the day appointed by destiny - and India stands forth again, after long slumber and struggle, awake, vital, free and independent. The past clings on to us still in some measure and we have to do much before we redeem the pledges we have so often taken. Yet the turning-point is past, and history begins anew for us, the history which we shall live and act and others will write about.
Jawaharlal Nehru, August 14, 1947.
Discount Entrance
Online advertisement of a comedy club in New York City.
Gladys' Comedy Room, 145 W. 45th St btw Broadway and Sixth, NYC
Discount for any adult under 5 feet with proof of height.
Gladys' Comedy Room, 145 W. 45th St btw Broadway and Sixth, NYC