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Old 10-30-2014, 05:57 PM
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courage2
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Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: NYC
Posts: 19,049
Good Evening, friends!

Welcome to plansimake ! Whether you’re new to SR, new to this thread, just coming back, counting days or years, we’re glad you’re here!

Happy Birthday to BarbieKen, and to all, congratulations and thanks for today!

Here’s the list of those who’ve made part of their commitment to sobriety include posting on this thread from about 8:30 p.m. October 29 to 8:30 p.m. on October 30, NYC local time:


1newcreation
afloatsober
airwick
AlcoholFree66
altoids
Alysheba
BarbieKen
biminiblue
charleesavedme
Cheetos
ChickChick
ChloeRose63
Coldfusion
courage2
DaneK
dcrr
Dee74
erfra7
Findingtheway
ForMeForThem
fromadistance
Gilmer
Goat
goose333
Grateful11
growpath
grtgrandpa
HeartsAfire
Hevyn
jsm273
Kaneda8888
Kiya
Kris47
least
Marcher13
margherita
martina12
mystified
NewFighter
plansimake
Purpleknight
Resolv
sickofthiscrap
SnowDawg
SoberLeigh
sthlondonab
Tamerua
tootsl1
trachemys
Try18
venuscat
VikingGF
yukonm
ZeldaFan
zeppodog

Counting down to Halloween night. In second place: Satan. I sincerely apologize if this offends anyone, but to leave Satan out would be wrong, no? Give the Devil his due. Lucifer, the Adversary, The Prince of Darkness, the one and only Fallen Angel. Among all the monsters on the list, Satan is the only one who unequivocally, voluntarily took on evil against God & mankind as his sole and unending pursuit. He chose his path.

Milton is maybe the only poet pious and courageous enough to write extensively on Satan, who raised war against God in Heaven, until
Him the Almighty Power
Hurled headlong flaming from th' ethereal sky,
With hideous ruin and combustion, down
To bottomless perdition, there to dwell
In adamantine chains and penal fire,
Who durst defy th' Omnipotent to arms.
But did Satan regret his pride, arrogance, and willful disobedience to God? Hardly. Even from Hell, Satan hurls defiance, as in this etching by James Barry (1790s):



Finding himself confined to Hell, Satan crowed (Milton, again)
Hail, horrors! hail,
Infernal world! and thou, profoundest Hell,
Receive thy new possessor--one who brings
A mind not to be changed by place or time.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.
What matter where, if I be still the same.
Satan corrupts mankind and torments the souls of the damned, but my understanding is that even in hell, the damned have souls. And as long as the soul survives, it seems to me there may be distant hope of recovery from his evil influence.

Still, sympathy for the Devil? I don’t think so. He has none for the likes of us. Never try to deal with him. As illustrated by William Blake (1826), he’ll smite you with boils!



May we all overcome our pride and willfulness, stay away from the drinking and the drugs, and cheat Auld Nick one more day!
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