A Note From The Sad Puppies

We want stories and tales of alien skies
Reflected in four-orbed alien eyes.
We want to see worlds we've never known;
Give us new and strange, 'til our minds are blown.
We want all the wonders you can arrange—
But make it the same 'cause we can't stand change.
—Daz

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‘Bible Defence Of Slavery’ part seven

[Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5. Part 6.]

Permit me, oh gentlest of readers, to emit a small yeehaw. If pushed, I might even manage a mini-hallelujah. And definitely a large and stentorian ramen!

I reached the end of that horrible book! This, below, is the final instalment of Bible Defense Of Slavery!

There's still work to be done. When Rustiguzzi, may his bike remain forever upright, catches up with my sudden burst of productivity, there'll be errata to, erm, un-errat. The formatting for the blog version was kind of rough-and-ready; I'll be spending some time tweaking that into something I'd be proud—or at least unashamed—to let the world see, before converting to e-book formats. There's some artwork to apply (a cover-image, and a cleaned up version of the frontispiece), which is currently in Fojap's capable hands.

But the hard slog is done and dusted, may FSM be thanked!

So, okay, the content below…

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‘Bible Defence Of Slavery’ part six

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7

And so we come, Gentle Reader, to the publisher's addition to the sixth edition of Bible Defense Of Slavery. It takes a more political stand than the main body of the work, presumably because by the time this edition went to press, the topic of slavery itself, and various grudges against the northern states, had become even more hot button issues. Topics range from (obviously) slavery itself, and the allegedly highly benevolent treatment of slaves, to a proposal to forcibly settle freed slaves in Liberia or elsewhere. (Liberia had been a voluntary destination for some freed slaves since eighteen-twenty, when the American Colonization Society set up a colony there.) (Because, well, blacks are okay when in slavery, and there's 'mutual respect' an' all, but free blacks are economy-draining scum no self respecting white person would want to share a society with. This, possibly, is one of the earliest iterations of 'Send 'em all back…,' a staple of racist and xenophobic rhetoric ever since. There's even a hint of 'I'm not racist but…' about it, for good measure.)

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‘Bible Defence Of Slavery’ part five

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7

And so we come, Gentle Reader, to sections Thirteen, Fourteen And Fifteen of the 1851 edition of Josiah Priest's Bible Defence Of Slavery. And we also reach the end of Priest's contribution to the work, though not the end of the book, which contains 'additions' in the form of a piece by the publisher and pamphlets from several other contributors. But this does seem to be a convenient place to pause and take stock.

Firstly, the easy bit. Some advice (which I touched on in a related piece yesterday) for anyone thinking of taking on a similar project.

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Beautiful

[Click picture to enbiggen]

Via sandara at Deviant Art.
—Daz

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Terry Pratchett Has Shaken Hands With Death

I have many friends who I've never met. Terry Pratchett was, I have to say, the greatest of them. He gave me company, comfort, joy, laughter tears and sadness tears and new ideas. He constantly questioned my old ideas, sometimes adding to them, sometimes gently correcting them or, at times, forcing me to realise that I'd been flat-out wrong. And all with a wry, twinkly-eyed humour which never berated nor belittled.

I am sad that my friend who I never met has met his own most sympathetic and memorable character, Death. I am glad that my friend is no longer suffering. I will miss my friend, though I never met him, terribly terribly much.
—Daz

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‘Bible Defence Of Slavery’ part four

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7

And so, Gentle Reader we come to part four of what I've previously referred to as 'that horrible book,' Bible Defence Of Slavery. I highly doubt that you'll be surprised to hear that these three chapters are just as horrible as the preceding nine. So, in an effort to make some kind of not quite so obvious point, let's ignore the subject discussed therein for the nonce, and make a more general point regarding its similarity to modern-day argumentation from some religious quarters.

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‘Bible Defence Of Slavery’ part three

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7

Well, I finally admitted to myself that the Christmas break is over and, regardless of my loathing for it, it was time to get back to proofing the OCR of what I've come to call 'that horrible book.' Saying it's not fun would be, Gentle Reader, to pass up a perfect opportunity to use the word 'sickening.'

If you've been reading it so far, all I'll say is, it gets worse over the course of the three chapters reproduced below. Much, much worse. You have been warned. Seriously, I am not joking on this.

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‘Bible Defence Of Slavery’ part two

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7

Well, I slogged my way through the next three chapters of Bible Defence Of Slavery. (See the link above, for the first three, plus preamble.)

I could write another long intro, but, frankly, my brain's gone numb. Much of this section involves all those tedious (not to mention overbearingly repetitive—this bloke really did want to drive his point home) Biblical minutiae I mentioned in my Venting post, yesterday and… let's just say it's been a slog.

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Venting

Well, I'm slowly wading my way through that Biblical Defence Of Slavery thing. By way of forcing myself to take a break (it's become something of a capital-P Project), here's a thing or two I've noticed about the general style of argumentation contained therein. They're not particularly new things—in fact I've remarked upon them several times on this very blog—but I kinda need to vent.

Firstly comes one that'll be familiar to anyone who's crossed rhetorical swords with fundamentalists of any stripe. Having one's cake and eating it.

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