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[ch. 27]
Any one, indeed, who chooses, may relate how the various quarters of the earth, being distributed among certain governing powers, are administered by those who superintend them; but let him tell us also how what is done among each nation is done rightly when agreeable to the wishes of the superintendents. Let him, for example, tell us whether the laws of the Scythians, which permit the murder of parents, are right laws; or those of the Persians, which do not forbid the marriages of sons with their mothers, or of daughters with their own fathers. But what need is there for me to make selections from those who have been engaged in the business of enacting laws among the different nations, and to inquire how the laws are rightly enacted among each, according as they please the superintending powers? Let Celsus, however, tell us how it would be an act of impiety to get rid of those ancestral laws which permit the marriages of mothers and daughters; or which pronounce a man happy who puts an end to his life by hanging, or declare that they undergo entire purification who deliver themselves over to the fire, and who terminate their existence by fire; and how it is an act of impiety to do away with those laws which, for example, prevail in the Tauric Chersonese, regarding the offering up of strangers in sacrifice to Diana, or among certain of the Libyan tribes regarding the sacrifice of children to Saturn. Moreover, this inference follows from the dictum of Celsus, that it is an act of impiety on the part of the Jews to do away with those ancestral laws which forbid the worship of any other deity than the Creator of all things. And it will follow, according to his view, that piety is not divine by its own nature, but by a certain (external) arrangement and appointment. For it is an act of piety among certain tribes to worship a crocodile, and to eat what is an object of adoration among other tribes; while, again, with others it is a pious act to worship a calf, and among others, again, to regard the goat as a god. And, in this way, the same individual will be regarded as acting piously according to one set of laws, and impiously according to another; and this is the most absurd result that can be conceived!
~ Origen (c. 184-c. 253), Contra Celsus, Book V

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(Yet) Another Round(?)

“Hush, hush! I know what you would say. You would tell us that our repudiation of it cannot affect the fact. Of that we are aware; but yet will we disbelieve that which a belief in would be enough to drive us mad.”
~ James Malcolm Rymer & Thomas Peckett Prest, Varney the Vampyre (1845-47)

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After over 27 years, can my enemies and nay-sayers face or rationally refute me? No, indeed, they still cannot face or refute me. Who then speaks the honest truth?

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He refuses to recognize, admit to, or discuss the existence of criminal spirit people for the simple reason that he is both a coward and a liar.

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Honor thy mother and father (including the church), but does this then mean you are completely blind and oblivious to their possible errors and mistaken compromises?

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It is his claim that people like him and that he is someone very important. If that is so, said I, then why must you continually force yourself on people? This he refuses to answer and simply makes reference or alludes his possessing magical powers (including that of hypnotism), the ability to frighten and terrify, super technology, and no end of ill gotten money.

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If the devil couldn't do good, then he wouldn't be much of a devil, now would he?

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There are those who believe a paying protection racket really does help people, and they believe this deeply and sincerely. And yet are not such who are this way the ruin of us all?

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[ch. 26]
Let us next notice the statements of Celsus, which follow the preceding, and which are as follow: “As the Jews, then, became a peculiar people, and enacted laws in keeping with the customs of their country, and maintain them up to the present time, and observe a mode of worship which, whatever be its nature, is yet derived from their fathers, they act in these respects like other men, because each nation retains its ancestral customs, whatever they are, if they happen to be established among them. And such an arrangement appears to be advantageous, not only because it has occurred to the mind of other nations to decide some things differently, but also because it is a duty to protect what has been established for the public advantage; and also because, in all probability, the various quarters of the earth were from the beginning allotted to different superintending spirits, and were thus distributed among certain governing powers, and in this manner the administration of the world is carried on. And whatever is done among each nation in this way would be rightly done, wherever it was agreeable to the wishes (of the superintending powers), while it would be an act of impiety to get rid of the institutions established from the beginning in the various places.” By these words Celsus shows that the Jews, who were formerly Egyptians, subsequently became a “peculiar people,” and enacted laws which they carefully preserve. And not to repeat his statements, which have been already before us, he says that it is advantageous to the Jews to observe their ancestral worship, as other nations carefully attend to theirs. And he further states a deeper reason why it is of advantage to the Jews to cultivate their ancestral customs, in hinting dimly that those to whom was allotted the office of superintending the country which was being legislated for, enacted the laws of each land in co-operation with its legislators. He appears, then, to indicate that both the country of the Jews, and the nation which inhabits it, are superintended by one or more beings, who, whether they were one or more, co-operated with Moses, and enacted the laws of the Jews.
~ Origen (c. 184-c. 253), Contra Celsus, Book V

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Recently I received the following email from YouTube:

"Hi Wm. Thomas Sherman,

"Due to a copyright claim, your YouTube video has been blocked. This means that your video can no longer be played on YouTube.

"Video title: TO EACH HIS OWN (1946) scenes with Olivia de Havilland and John Lund
Copyrighted content: To each his own
Claimed by: NBC Universal"

For which reason I thought I could take the occasion to lists other YouTube uploads of mine that have also been taken down. Although some claims of copyright were actually proven and demonstrated by their owners, yet others claims are highly suspect if not out right wrong, such as "Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" (1919) and "Down to the Sea in Ships" (1922). Although the Killiam music track to that latter film is ostensibly copyrighted, the film itself certainly isn't. So while I would upload a new version of "Down to the Sea in Ships" with a new track, unfortunately and for reasons unknown to me, my actual video copy of the film has got lost.

So just for the record then, the following are those uploads.

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Video title: HER SISTER'S SECRET (1946) - Nancy Coleman, Margaret Lindsay

Video title: THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI (1920), Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari,

Video title: Paul Tripp sings "Why Can't Everyday Be Christmas?" (1966)

Video title: MALE AND FEMALE (1919) -- Gloria Swanson, Thomas Meighan, Lila Lee, dir. by Cecil B. DeMille

Video title: Scenes from WINGS (1927) -- Clara Bow, Buddy Rogers, Richard Arlen

Video title: DAYBREAK (1931) - Ramon Novarro, Helen Chandler

Video title: OUTWARD BOUND (1930) - Leslie Howard, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Helen Chandler

Video title:Once Over Lightly (1944) - part 1/2 Sennett 1920s comedy pastiche

Video title: DOWN TO THE SEA IN SHIPS (1922) -- Elmer Clifton,

Video title: THE MONSTER (1925) -- Lon Chaney, Hallam Cooley, Gertrude Olmstead, dir. by Roland West

Video title: IN THE DOUGH (1932) -- Roscoe Arbuckle, Shemp Howard, Lionel Stander

Video title: BUZZIN' AROUND (1933) -- Roscoe Arbuckle, Al St. John

Video title: 27 BORDER BADMEN (1945), Buster Crabbe, Fuzzy St. John

Video title: SHOW PEOPLE (1928) – Marion Davies

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[ch. 24]
Moreover, as we have already said that for God to desire anything unbecoming Himself would be destructive of His existence as Deity, we will add that if man, agreeably to the wickedness of his nature, should desire anything that is abominable, God cannot grant it. And now it is from no spirit of contention that we answer the assertions of Celsus; but it is in the spirit of truth that we investigate them, as assenting to his view that “He is the God, not of inordinate desires, nor of error and disorder, but of a nature just and upright,” because He is the source of all that is good. And that He is able to provide an eternal life for the soul we acknowledge; and that He possesses not only the “power,” but the “will.”...
~ Origen (c. 184-c. 253), Contra Celsus, Book V

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