 ADVICE TO A YOUNG MAN ON THE CHOICE OF A MISTRESS, BY BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. June 25, 1745 My dear friend, I know of no medicine fit to diminish the violent natural inclinations you mentioned. And if I did, I think I should not communicate it to you. Marriage is the proper remedy. It is the most natural state of man, and therefore the state in which you are most likely to find solid happiness. Your reasons against entering into it at present appear to me not well founded. The circumstantial advantages you have in view by postponing it are not only uncertain, but they are small in comparison with that of the thing itself, the being married and settled. It is the man and woman united that make the complete human being. Separate, she wants his force of body and strength of reason. Be her softness, sensibility, and acute discernment. Together they are more likely to succeed in the world. A single man has not nearly the value he would have in that state of union. He is an incomplete animal. He resembles the odd half of a pair of scissors. If you get a prudent, healthy wife, your industry in your profession with her good economy will be a fortune sufficient. But if you will not take this counsel and persist in thinking a commerce with the sex inevitable, then I repeat my former advice that in all your amours you should prefer old women to young ones. You call this a paradox and demand my reasons. They are these. One, because as they have more knowledge of the world and their minds are better stored with observations, their conversation is more improving and more lastingly agreeable. Two, because when women cease to be handsome, they study to be good. To maintain their influence over men, they supply the diminution of beauty by augmentation of utility. They learn to do a thousand services small and great and are the most tender and useful of all friends when you are sick. Thus they continue amiable. And hence there is hardly such a thing to be found as an old woman who is not a good woman. Three, because there is no hazard of children which irregularly produced may be attended with much inconvenience. Four, because through more experience they are more prudent and discreet in conducting an intrigue to prevent suspicion. The commerce with them is therefore safer with regard to your reputation. And with regard to theirs, if the affair should happen to be known, considerate people might be rather inclined to excuse an old woman who would kindly take care of a young man, form his manners by her good counsels, and prevent his ruining his health and fortune among mercenary prostitutes. Five, because in every animal that walks upright, the deficiency of the fluids that fill the muscles appears first in the highest part. The face first grows lack and wrinkled, then the neck, then the breast and arms, the lower parts continuing to the last as plump as ever. So that covering all above with a basket, and regarding only what is below the girdle, it is impossible of two women to know an old from a young one. And as in the dark, all cats are gray, the pleasure of corporal enjoyment with an old woman is at least equal and frequently superior every knack being by practice capable of improvement. Six, because the sin is less, the debauching a virgin may be her ruin and make her for life unhappy. Seven, because the compunction is less, the having made a young girl miserable may give you frequent bitter reflections, none of which can attend the making of an old woman happy. Eighthly and lastly, they are so grateful. Thus much for my paradox. But still I advise you to marry directly, being sincerely your affectionate friend, Benjamin Franklin. And of advice to a young man on the choice of a mistress by Benjamin Franklin, read by Rick Rodstrom. The Black Woman of the South, Her Neglects and Her Needs. Adjust before the Freedman's Aid Society, Methodist Episcopal Church, Ocean Grove, New Jersey, August 15, 1883, by Alexander Krummel, Daughter of Divinity. This is a LibriBox recording. All LibriBox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriBox.org. Reading by Belona Times. The Black Woman of the South, Her Neglects and Her Needs, by Alexander Krummel. Alexander Krummel, Daughter of Divinity, an eminent Negro Episcopal clergyman, a graduate of Oxford University, England, professor in a librarian college, rector of St. Luke's in Washington, and founder of the Negro Academy. It is an age clamorous everywhere. For the dignities, the grand prerogatives, and the glory of woman, there is not a country in Europe where she has not risen somewhat above the degradation of centuries, and pleaded successfully for a new position and a higher vocation. As the result of this new reformation, we see her, in our day, seated in the lecture rooms of ancient universities, rivaling her brothers in the fields of literature, the grand creators of ethereal art, the participants in noble civil franchises, the moving spirit and grand reformations, and the guide, agent, or assistant in all the noblest movements for the civilization and regeneration of men. In these several lines of progress, the American woman has run on in advance of her sisters and every other quarter of the globe. The advantage she has received, the rights and prerogatives she has secured for herself, are unequaled by any other class of women in the world. It will not be thought a miss, then, that I come here today to present, to your consideration, the one grand exception to this general superiority of women, vis the black woman of the south. The rural or plantation population of the south was made up almost entirely of people of pure Negro blood. And this brings out also the other disastrous fact, namely that this large black population has been living from the time of their introduction into America, a period of more than two hundred years in a state of unlettered rudeness. The Negro all this time has been an intellectual starveling. This has been more especially the condition of the black woman of the south. Now and then a black man has risen above the debased condition of his people. Various causes would contribute to the advantage of the men, the relation of servants to superior masters, attendance at courts with them, their presence at political meetings, listening to table talk behind their chairs, traveling as valets, the privilege of books and reading in great houses, and with indulgent masters all these served to lift up a black man here and there to something like superiority, but no such fortune fell to the lot of the plantation woman. The black woman of the south was left perpetually in a state of hereditary darkness and rudeness. In her girlhood all the delicate tenderness of her sex was rudely outraged. In the field, in the rude cabin, in the press room, in the factory she was thrown into the companionship of course and ignorant men. No chance was given for her delicate reserve or tender modesty. From her girlhood she was the doomed victim of the grossest passions. All the virtues of her sex were utterly ignored. If the instinct of chastity asserted itself, then she had to fight like a tigress for the ownership and possession of her own person, and often had to suffer pains and lacerations for her virtuous self-assertion. When she reached maturity, all the tender instincts of her womanhood were ruthlessly violated. At the age of marriage, always prematurely anticipated under slavery, she was mated as the stock of the plantation were mated, not to be the companion of a loved and chosen husband, but to be the breeder of human cattle for the field or the auction block. With that mate she went out morning after morning to toil as a common field-hand. As it was his, so likewise was it her lot to wield the heavy hoe or to follow the plow or to gather in the crops. She was a hewer of wood and a drawer of water. She was a common field-hand. She had to keep her place in the gang from morn till eve under the burden of a heavy task or under the stimulus or the fear of a cruel lash. She was a picker of cotton. She labored at the sugar mill and in the tobacco factory. When, through wariness or sickness, she has fallen behind her allotted task, there came as punishment the fearful stripes upon her shrinking, lacerated flesh. Her home life was of the most degrading nature. She lived in the rudest huts and partook of the coarsest food, and dressed in the scantiest garb, and slept in molten tooness cabins upon the hardest boards. Thus she continued a beast of burden down to the period of those maternal anxieties which, in ordinary civilized life, give repose, quiet, and care to expectant mothers. But under the slave system few such relaxations were allowed, and so it came to pass that little children were ushered into this world under conditions which many cattle-raisers would not suffer for their flocks or herds. Thus she became the mother of children. But even then there was for her no surety ship of motherhood or training or control. Her own offspring were not her own. She and husband and children were all the property of others. All these sacred ties were constantly snapped and cruelly sundered. This year she had one husband, and next year, through some auction sale, she might be separated from him and mated to another. There was no sanctity of family, no binding tie of marriage, none of the fine felicities and the endearing affections of home. None of these things was the lot of southern black women. Instead, thereof, a gross barbarism which tended to blunt the tender sensibilities to obliterate feminine delicacy and womanly shame came down as her heritage from generation to generation. And it seems a miracle of providence and grace that, not withstanding these terrible circumstances, so much struggling virtue lingered amid these rude cabins that so much womanly worth and sweetness abided in their bosoms as slaveholders themselves have borne witness to. But some of you will ask, why bring up these sad memories of the past? Why distress us with these dead and departed cruelties? Alas, my friend, these are not dead things. Remember that the evil that men do lives after them. The evil of gross and monstrous abominations, the evil of great organic institutions crop out long after the departure of the institutions themselves. If you go to Europe, you will find not only the roots, but likewise many of the deadly fruits of the old feudal system still surviving in several of its old states and kingdoms. So, too, with slavery. The eighteen years of freedom have not obliterated all its deadly marks from either the souls or bodies of the black woman. The conditions of life, indeed, have been modified since emancipation. But it still maintains that the black woman is the pariah woman of this land. We have, indeed, degraded women, immigrants from foreign lands. In their own countries some of them were so low in the social scale that they were yoked with the cattle to plow the fields. They were rude, unlettered, coarse, and benighted. But when they reached this land there comes an end of their degraded condition. They touch our country and their shackles fall. As soon as they become grafted into the stock of American life, they partake at once of all its large gifts and its noble resources. Not so with the black woman of the South. Freed, legally, she has been. But the act of emancipation had no talismanic influence to reach to and alter and transform her degrading social life. When that proclamation was issued she might have heard the whispered words in her every hut, open sesame. But so far as her humble domicile and her degraded person were concerned there was no invisible but gracious genie who, on the instant, could transmute the rudeness of her hut into instant elegance, and change the crude surroundings of her home into neatness, taste, and beauty. The truth is, Emancipation Day found her a prostrate and degraded being. And although it has brought numerous advantages to her sons, it has produced but the simplest changes in her social and domestic condition. She is still the crude, rude, ignorant mother. Remote from cities, the dweller still in the old plantation hut, neighboring to the sulky, disaffected master class, who still think her freedom was a personal robbery of themselves, none of the fair humanities have visited her humble home. The light of knowledge has not fallen upon her eyes. The fine domesticities which give the charm to family life and which by the refinement and delicacy of womanhood preserve the civilization of nations have not come to her. She still has the rude, coarse labor of men. With her rude husband she still shares the hard service of a field-hand. Her house, which shelters perhaps some six or eight children, embraces but two rooms. Her furniture is of the rudest kind. The clothing of the household is scant and of the corset's material, has off-times the garniture of rags, and for herself an offspring is marked, not seldom, by the absence of both hats and shoes. She has rarely been taught to sow, and the field labor of slavery times has kept her ignorant of the habitudes of neatness and the requirements of order. Indeed, coarse food, coarse clothes, coarse living, coarse manners, coarse companions, coarse surroundings, coarse neighbors, both black and white, yea, everything, coarse. Down to the coarse ignorant senseless religion, which excites her sensibilities and starts her passions, go to make up the life of the masses of black women in the hamlets and villages of the rural south. This is the state of black womanhood. Take the girlhood of this same region, and it presents the same aspect. Save that in large districts the white man has not forgotten the olden times of slavery, and with indeed the deepest sentimental aberrance of amalgamation, still thinks that the black girl is to be perpetually the victim of his lust. In the larger towns and in cities our girls in common schools and academies are receiving superior culture. Of the 15,000 colored schoolteachers in the south, more than half are colored young women, educated since emancipation. But even these girls, as well as their more ignorant sisters in rude huts, are followed and tempted and insulted by the ruffianly element of southern society, who think that black men have no rights which white men should regard and black women no virtue which white men should respect. And now look at the vastness of this degradation. If I had been speaking of the population of a city, or a town, or even a village, this tale would be a sad and melancholy one. But I have brought before you the conditions of millions of women. According to the census of 1880, there were in the southern states 3,327,678 females of all ages of the African race. Of these there were 674,365 girls between 12 and 20, 1,522,696 between 20 and 80. These figures, remarks and observing friend of mine, are startling. And when you think that the masses of these women live in the rural districts, that they grow up in rudeness and ignorance, that their former masters are using few means to break up their hereditary degradation. You can easily take in the pitiful condition of this population and forecast the inevitable future to multitudes of females unless a mighty special effort is made for the improvement of the black womanhood of the south. I know the practical nature of the American mind. I know how the question of values intrudes itself even into the domain of philanthropy. And hence I shall not be astonished if the query suggests itself whether special interest in the black woman will bring any special advantage to the American nation. Let me dwell for a few moments upon this phase of the subject. Possibly the view I am about suggesting has never before been presented to the American mind. But Negro as I am I shall make no apology for venturing the claim that the Nugris is one of the most interesting of all the classes of women on the globe. I am speaking of her not as a perverted and degraded creature, but in her natural state, with her native instincts and peculiarities. Let me repeat just here the words of a wise observing, tenderhearted philanthropist whose name and worth and words have attained celebrity. It is fully forty years ago since the celebrated Dr. Channing said, We are holding in bondage one of the best races of the human family. The Negro is among the mildest gentlest of men. He is singularly susceptible of improvement from abroad. His nature is affectionate, easily touched, and hence he is more open to religious improvement than the white man. The African carries with him much more than we, the genius of a meek, long-suffering, loving virtue. I should feel ashamed to allow these words to fall from my lips if it were not necessary to the lustration of the character of my black sisters of the South. I do not stand here today to plead for the black man. He is a man, and if he is weak he must go the wall. He is a man. He must fight his own way, and if he is strong in mind and body he can take care of himself. But for the mothers, sisters, and daughters of my race I have a right to speak. And when I think of their sad condition down South, think too, that since the day of emancipation hardly anyone has lifted up a voice on their behalf. I feel it a duty and a privilege to set forth their praises and to extol their excellencies. For humble and benighted as she is, the black woman of the South is one of the queens of womanhood. If there is any other woman on this earth who in native aboriginal qualities is her superior, I know not where she is to be found. For I do say that in tenderness of feeling, in genuine native modesty, in large dissent-restedness, in sweetness of disposition and deep humility, in unselfish devotedness, and in warm motherly assiduities, the negro woman is unsurpassed by any other woman on this earth. The testimony to this effect is almost universal. Our enemies themselves being witnesses. You know how widely and how continuously for generations the negro has been produced, ridiculed, derided. Some of you may remember the journals and the hostile criticisms of Colleridge and Trollop and Burton, West Indian and African travelers. Very many of you may remember the philosophical disquisitions of the ethnological school of 1847, the contemptuous dissertations of Hunt and Lydden, but it is worthy of notice in all these cases that the sneer, the contempt, the bitter jibe have been invariably leveled against the black man never against the black woman. On the contrary, she has almost everywhere been extolled and eulogized. The black man was called a stupid, thick-lipped, flat nose, long-heeled, empty-headed animal. The link between the baboon and the human being only fit to be a slave. But everywhere, even in the domains of slavery, how tenderly has the negris been spoken of? She has been the nurse of childhood. To her, all the cares and heart griefs of youth have been entrusted. Thousands and tens of thousands in the West Indies and in our southern states have risen up and told the tale of her tenderness, of her gentleness, patience, and affection. No other woman in the world has ever had such tributes to a high moral nature, sweet, gentle love, and unchanged devotedness. And by the memory of my own mother and dearest sisters, I can declare it to be true. Here the tribute of Michelet. The negris of all others is the most loving, the most generating, and this not only because of her youthful blood, but we must also admit for the richness of her heart. She is loved among the loving, good among the good. Ask the travelers whom she has so often saved. Goodness is creative. It is fruitfulness. It is the very benediction of a holy act. The fact that woman is so fruitful, I attribute to her treasures of tenderness to that ocean of goodness, which permeates her heart. Africa is a woman. Her races are feminine. And many of the black tribes of Central Africa, the women rule, and they are as intelligent as they are amiable and kind. The reference in Michelet to the generosity of the African woman travelers brings to mind the incident in Mungo Park's travels where the African women fed, nourished, and saved him. The men had driven him away. They would not even allow him to feed with the cattle. And so, faint, weary, and despairing, he went to a remote hut and lay down on the earth to die. One woman, touched with compassion, came to him, brought him food and milk, and at once he revived. Then he tells us of the solace and the assiduities of these gentle creatures for his comfort. I give you his own words. The rites of hospitality, thus performed, toward a stranger and distress, my worthy benefactress, pointing to the mat and telling me that I might sleep there without apprehension, called to the female part of her family which had stood gazing on me all the while in fixed astonishment to resume the task of spinning cotton, in which they continued to employ themselves a great part of the night. They lighten their labors by songs, one of which was composed extempore, for I was myself the subject of it. It was sung by one of the young women, the rest joining in a sort of chime. The air was sweet and plaintive, and the words, literally translated were these. The winds roared and the rains fell. The poor white man, faint and weary, came and sat under our tree. He has no mother to bring him milk, no wife to grind his corn. Let us pity the white man. No mother has he, etc. Perhaps I may be pardoned the intrusion, just here, on my own personal experience. During a residence of nigh twenty years in West Africa, I saw the beauty and felt the charm of the native female character. I saw the native woman in her heathen state, and was delighted to see in numerous tribes that extraordinary sweetness, gentleness, desolity, modesty, and especially those maternal solicitudes which make every African boy both gallant and defender of his mother. I saw her in her civilized state in Sierra Leone, saw precisely the same characteristics, but heightened, dignified, refined, and sanctified by the training of the schools, the refinements of civilization, and the graces of Christian sentiment and feeling. Of all the memories of foreign travel, there are none more delightful than those of the families and the female friends of Freetown. A French traveler speaks with great admiration of the black ladies of Haiti. In the towns, he says, I met all the charms of civilized life. The graces of the ladies of Port-au-Prince will never be effaced from my recollections. It was, without doubt, the instant discernment of these fine and tender qualities which prompted the touching sonnet of Wordsworth, written in 1802, on the occasion of the cruel exile of Negroes from France by the French government. Driven from the soil of France, a female came from Calais with us, brilliant in a ray, a Negro woman like a lady gay, yet downcast as a woman fearing blame. Meek destitute, as seemed of hope or aim. She sat, from notice turning not away, but on all proffered intercourse did lay, a weight of language speech, or at the same was silent, motionless in eyes and face. Meanwhile those eyes retained their tropic fire, which, burning and dependent of the mind, joined with the luster of her rich attire, to mock the outcast, O ye heavens, be kind, and feel thou earth for this afflicted race. But I must remember that I am to speak not only of the neglects of the black woman, but also of her needs, and the consideration of her needs suggests the remedy which should be used for the uplifting of this woman from a state of brutality and degradation. Ladies and gentlemen, since the day of emancipation, millions of dollars have been given by the generous Christian people of the North for the intellectual training of the black race in this land. Colleges and universities have been built in the South, and hundreds of youth have been gathered within their walls. The work of your own church in this regard has been magnificent and unrivaled, and the results which have been attained have been grand and elevating to the entire Negro race in America. The compliment to all this generous and ennobling effort is the elevation of the black woman. Up to this day and time, your noble philanthropy has touched, for the most part, the male population of the South, given them superiority and stimulated them to higher aspirations. But a true civilization can only then be attained when the life of woman is reached. Her whole being permeated by noble ideas, her fine taste enriched by culture, her tendencies to the beautiful, gratified, and developed, her singular and delicate nature lifted up to its full capacity. And then when all these qualities are fully matured, cultivated, and sanctified, all their sacred influences shall circle around 10,000 firesides, and the cabins of the humblest freedmen shall become the homes of Christian refinement and of domestic elegance through the influence and the charm of the uplifted and cultivated black woman of the South. End of The Black Woman of the South, Her Neglects and Needs by Alexander Krummel. The sentence of the Inquisition on Galileo Galilei. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The sentence of the Inquisition on Galileo. We, the undersigned by the grace of God, cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, inquisitors general throughout the whole Christian Republic, special deputies of the Holy Apostolical Chair against heretical depravity. Whereas you, Galileo, son of the late Vincenzo Galilei of Florence, aged 70 years, were denounced in 1615 to this Holy Office for holding us through a false doctrine taught by many, namely that the sun is immovable in the center of the world, and that the earth moves and also with the diurnal motion, also for having pupils whom you instructed in the same opinions, also for maintaining a correspondence on the same with some German mathematicians, also for publishing certain letters on the solar spots in which you develop the same doctrines as true, also for answering the objections which were continually produced from the Holy Scriptures by closing the said Scriptures according to your own meaning, and whereas thereupon was produced a copy of a writing in form of a letter professedly written by you to a person formerly your pupil, in which following the hypothesis of Copernicus you include several propositions contrary to the true sense and authority of the Holy Scripture. Therefore this holy tribunal being desirous of providing against the disorder and mischief which was then proceeding and increasing to the detriment of the holy faith. By the desire of his holiness and of the most eminent Lord's cardinals of this supreme and universal inquisition, the two propositions of the stability of the sun and motion of the earth were qualified by the theological qualifiers as follows. First, the proposition that the sun is in the center of the world and immovable from its place is absurd, philosophically false and formally heretical because it is expressly contrary to the Holy Scripture. Secondly, the proposition that the earth is not the center of the world nor immovable, but that it moves and also with a diurnal motion is also absurd, philosophically false and theologically considered at least erroneous in faith. But whereas being pleased at that time to deal mildly with you, it was decreed in the Holy Congregation held before his holiness on the 25th day of February 1616 that his Eminence the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine should enjoin you to give up altogether the said false doctrine. If you should refuse that you should be ordered by the commissary of the Holy Office to relinquish it, not to teach it to others, nor to defend it, nor ever mention it and in default of equations that you should be imprisoned and in execution of this decree on the following day at the palace in the presence of his Eminence, the said Lord Cardinal Bellarmine after you had been mildly admonished by the said Lord Cardinal, you were commanded by the acting commissary of the Holy Office before a notary and witnesses to relinquish altogether the said false opinion and in future neither to defend nor teach it in any manner neither verbally nor in writing and upon your promising obedience you were dismissed and in order that so pernicious a doctrine might be altogether rooted out nor insinuate itself farther to the heavy detriment of the Catholic truth, a decree emanated from the Holy Congregation of the index prohibiting the books which treat of this doctrine and it was declared false and altogether contrary to the Holy and Divine Scripture and whereas a book has since appeared published at Florence last year, the title of which showed that you were the author, which title is the dialogue of Galileo Galilei on the two principal systems of the world, the Ptolemaic and Copernican and whereas the Holy Congregation has heard that in consequence of the printing of the said book, the false opinion of the earth's motion and stability of the sun is daily gaining ground. The said book has been taken into careful consideration and in it has been detected a glaring violation of the said order which had been intimidated to you in as much as in this book you have defended the said opinion already and in your presence condemned. Although in the said book you labor with many circumlocutions to induce the belief that it is left by you undecided and in express terms probable, which is equally a very grave error since an opinion can in no way be probable which has been already declared and finally determined contrary to the Divine Scripture. Therefore by our order you have been cited to this Holy Office where on your examination upon oath you have acknowledged the said book as written and printed by you. You also confess that you began to write the said book 10 or 12 years ago after the order of foresaid had been given. Also that you demanded license to publish it but without signifying to those who granted you this permission that you had been condemned not to hold, defend or teach the said doctrine in any manner. You also confess that the style of the said book was in many places so composed that the reader might think the arguments adduced on the false side to be so worded as more effectively to entangle the understanding than to be easily solved, alleging an excuse that you have thus run into an error, foreign as you say, to your intention, from writing in the form of a dialogue and in consequence of the natural complacency which everyone feels with regard to his own subtleties and in showing himself more skillful than a generality of mankind in contriving even in favor of false proposition ingenious and apparently probable arguments. And upon a convenient time being given to you for making your defense, you produce the certificate in the handwriting of his eminence, the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine, procured as you said by yourself that you might defend yourself against the columnese of your enemies who reported that you had abjured your opinions and had been punished by the Holy Office. In which certificate it is declared that you had not abjured nor had been punished but merely that the declaration made by his holiness and promulgated by the Holy Congregation of the index had been announced to you, which declares that the opinion of the motion of the Earth and stability of the Sun is contrary to the Holy Scriptures and therefore cannot be held or defended. Wherefore, since no mention is there made of two articles of the order to which the order not to teach and in any manner, you argued that we ought to believe that in the lapse of 14 or 16 years they had escaped your memory and that this was also the reason why you were silent as to the order when you sought permission to publish your book and that this is said by you not to excuse your error but that it may be attributed to Venglorious ambition rather than to malice. But this very certificate produced on your behalf has greatly aggravated your offense, since it is therein declared that the said opinion is contrary to the Holy Scripture and yet you have dared to treat of it, to defend it and to argue that it is probable. Nor is there any extenuation in the license artfully and cunningly extorted by you since you did not intimidate the command imposed upon you. But whereas it appeared to us that you had not disclosed the whole truth with regard to your intentions, we thought it necessary to proceed to the rigorous examination of you in which, without any prejudice to what you had confessed and which is above detailed against you with regard to your said intention, you answered like a good Catholic. Therefore, having seen and maturely considered the merits of your cause with your said confessions and excuses and everything else which ought to be seen and considered, we have come to the underwritten final sentence against you. Invoking, therefore, the most holy name of our Lord Jesus Christ and of his most glorious Virgin Mother Mary, by this our final sentence which sitting in council and judgment for the tribunal of the reverent masters of sacred theology and doctors of both laws, our assessors. We put forth in this writing, touching the matters and controversies before us, between the magnificent Charles Sincerus, doctor of both laws, fiscal proctor of this holy office of the one part and you, Galileo Galilei, an examined and confessed criminal from this present writing now in progress as above of the other part. We pronounce, judge and declare that you, the said Galileo, by reason of these things which have been detailed in the course of this writing and which, as above you have confessed, have rendered yourself vehemently suspected by this holy office of heresy. That is to say that you believe and hold the false doctrine and contrary to the holy and divine scriptures, namely that the sun is the center of the world and that it does not move from east to west and that the earth does move and is not the center of the world. Also that an opinion can be held and supported as probable after it has been declared and finally decreed contrary to the holy scripture and consequently that you have incurred all the censors and penalties enjoined and promulgated in the sacred canons and other general and particular constitutions against delinquents of this description from which it is our pleasure that you be absolved provided that first with a sincere heart and unfeigned faith. In our presence you abjure, curse and detest the said errors and heresies and every other error and heresy contrary to the catholic and apostolic church of Rome in the form now shown to you. But that your grievous and pernicious error and transgression may not go all together unpunished and that you may be made more cautious in future and may be a warning to others to abstain from delinquencies of this sort. We decree that the book of the dialogues of Galileo Galilei be prohibited by a public addict and we condemn you to the formal prison of this holy office for a period determinable at our pleasure and by way of solitary penance we order you during the next three years to recite once a week the seven penitential Psalms reserving to ourselves the power of moderating commuting or taking off the whole or part of the said punishment and penance and so we say pronounce and by our sentence declare decree and reserve in this and in every other better form and manner which lawfully we may and can use so we the subscribing cardinals pronounce Felix cardinal dascoli Guido cardinal bentivoglio desiderio cardinal di cremona Antonio cardinal esonofrio belinguero cardinal gessi Fabricio cardinal verospi martino cardinal ginetti end of the sentence of the inquisitions on Galileo Galilei read by avaii in september 2009 the abduration of Galileo Galilei this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org the abduration of Galileo I Galileo Galilei son of the late Vincenzo Galilei of Florence aged 70 years being brought personally to judgment and kneeling before you most eminent and most reverent lords cardinals general inquisitors of the universal christian republic against heretical depravity having before my eyes the holy gospels which had touched with my own hands swear that I have always believed and now believe and with the help of god will in future believe every article which the holy catholic and apostolic church of Rome holds teaches and preaches but because I had been enjoined by this holy office altogether to abandon the false opinion which maintains that the sun is the center and immovable and forbidden to hold, defend or teach the said false doctrine in any manner and after it had been signified to me that the said doctrine is repugnant with the holy scripture I have written and printed a book in which I treat of the same doctrine now condemned and adduce reasons with great force in support of the same without giving any solution and therefore have been judged grievously suspected of heresy that is to say that I held and believed that the sun is the center of the world and immovable and that the earth is not the center and movable willing therefore to remove from the minds of your eminences and of every catholic christian this vehement suspicion rightfully entertained towards me with a sincere heart and unfeigned faith I abjure curse and detest the said errors and heresies and generally every other error and sect contrary to the said holy church and I swear that I will never more in future say or assert anything verbally or in writing which may give rise to a similar suspicion of me but if I shall know any heretic or anyone suspected of heresy that I will denounce him to this holy office or to the inquisitor and ordinary of the place in which I may be I swear moreover and promise that I will fulfill and observe fully all the penances which have been or shall be laid on me by this holy office but if it shall happen that I violate any of my said promises oaths and protestations which God avert I subject myself to all the pains and punishments which have been decreed and promulgated by the sacred cannons and other general and particular constitutions against delinquents of this description so may God help me and his holy gospels which I touch with my own hands I, the above named Galileo Galilei have abjured, sworn, promised and bound myself as above and in witness thereof with my own hand have subscribed this present writing of my abjuration which I have recited word for word at Rome in the convent of Minerva 22nd of June 1633 I, Galileo Galilei, have abjured as above with my own hand and of the abjuration of Galileo Galilei read by Avae in September 2009 The Knowledge of Self from the Alchemy of Happiness by Al Ghazali Chapter 1 This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Knowledge of Self is the key to the knowledge of God according to the saying He who knows himself knows God and as it is written in the Koran we will show them our signs in the world and in themselves that the truth may be manifest to them Now nothing is nearer to the then thyself and if thou knowest not thyself how canst thou know anything else If thou sayest I know myself meaning thy outward shape, body, face, limbs, and so forth such knowledge can never be a key to the knowledge of God nor if thy knowledge as to that which is within only extends so far that when thou art hungry, thou eatest and when thou art angry, thou attackest someone Will thou progress any further in this path for the beasts are thy partners in this But real self-knowledge consists in knowing the following things What art thou in thyself and from whence hast thou come Whither art thou going and for what purpose hast thou come to tarry here a while and in what does thy real happiness and misery consist Some of thy attributes are those of animals Some of devils Some of angels and thou hast to find out which of these attributes are accidental and which essential Till on thyself thou canst not find out where thy real happiness lies The occupation of animals is eating sleeping and fighting Therefore if thou art an animal busy thyself in these things Devils are busy stirring up mystery and engile in deceit If thou belongest to them, do their work Angels contemplate the beauty of God and are entirely free from animal qualities If thou art of angelic nature, then strive toward thine origin that thou mayest know and contemplate the most high and be delivered from the thralldom to lust and anger Thou shouldest also discover why thou hast been created with these two animal instincts Whether that they should subdue and lead the captive or whether thou shouldest subdue them and in thy upward progress make of one thy steed and of the other thy weapon The first step to self-knowledge is to know that thou art composed of an outward shape called the body and an inward entity called the heart or soul By heart I do not mean the piece of flesh situated in the left of our bodies but that which uses all the other faculties as its instruments and servants In truth it does not belong to the visible world but to the invisible and has come into this world as a traveler visits a foreign country for the sake of merchandise and will presently return to its native land It is the knowledge of this entity and its attributes which is the key to the knowledge of God Some idea of the reality of the heart or spirit may be obtained by a man closing his eyes and forgetting everything around except his individuality He will thus also obtain a glimpse of the unending nature of that individuality Too close inquiry however into the essence of spirit is forbidden by the law In the Quran it is written They will question thee concerning the spirit Say, the spirit comes by the command of my Lord Thus much is known of it that it is an indivisible essence belonging to the world of decrees and that it is not from everlasting but created An exact philosophical knowledge of the spirit is not a necessary preliminary to walking in the path of religion But comes rather as a result of self-discipline and perseverance in that path as it is said in the Quran Those who strive in our way fairly we will guide them to the right paths For the carrying on of this spiritual warfare by which the knowledge of oneself and of God is to be obtained the body may be figured as a kingdom the soul as its king and the different senses and faculties as constituting an army Reason may be called the vizier or prime minister passion the revenue collector and anger the police officer Under the guise of collecting revenue passion is continually prone to plunder on its own account while resentment is always inclined to harshness and extreme severity Both of these the revenue collector and the police officer have to be kept in due subordination to the king but not killed or expelled as they have their own proper functions to fulfill But if passion and resentment master reason the ruin of the soul infallibly ensues A soul which allows its lower faculties to dominate the higher is as one who should hand over an angel to the power of a dog or a musulman to the tyranny of an unbeliever The cultivation of demonic animal or angelic qualities results in the production of corresponding characters which in the day of judgment will be manifested in visible shapes the sensual appearing as swine the ferocious as dogs and wolves and the pure as angels The aim of moral discipline is to purify the heart from the rust of passion and resentment till like a clear mirror it reflects the light of God Someone may hear object But if man has been created with animal and demonic qualities as well as angelic how are we to know that the latter constitutes his real essence while the former are merely accidental and transitory To this I answer that the essence of each creature is to be sought in that which is highest in it and peculiar to it Thus the horse and the ass are both burden-bearing animals but the superiority of the horse to the ass consists in its being adapted for use in battle If it fails in this it becomes degraded to the rank of burden-bearing animals Similarly with man the highest faculty in him is reason which fits him for the contemplation of God If this predominates in him when he dies he leaves behind him all tendencies to passion and resentment and becomes capable of association with angels As regards his mere animal qualities man is inferior to many animals but reason makes him superior to them as it is written in the Quran to man we have subjected all things in the earth But if his lower tendencies have triumphed after death he will ever be looking towards the earth and longing for earthly delights Now the rational soul of man abounds in marbles most of knowledge and power By means of it he masters arts and sciences can pass in a flash from earth to heaven and back again can map out the skies and measure the distances between the stars By it also he can draw the fish from the sea and the birds from the air and can subdue to his service animals like the elephant, the camel, and the horse His five senses are like five doors opening on the external world But more wonderful than this his heart has a window which opens on the unseen world of spirits In the state of sleep when the avenues of the senses are closed this window is opened and man receives impressions from the unseen world and sometimes foreshadowings of the future His heart is then like a mirror which reflects what is pictured in the tablet of fate But even in sleep thoughts of worldly things dull this mirror so that the impressions it receives are not clear After death however such thoughts vanish and things are seen in their naked reality and the saying in the Quran is fulfilled We have stripped the veil from off thee and thy sight today is keen This opening of a window in the heart towards the unseen also takes place in conditions approaching those of prophetic inspiration when intuitions spring up in the mind unconvade through any sense channel The more a man purifies himself from fleshly lusts and concentrates his mind on God the more conscious will he be of such intuitions Those who are not conscious of them have no right to deny their reality Nor are such intuitions confined only to those of prophetic rank Just as iron by sufficient polishing can be made into a mirror so any mind by due discipline can be rendered receptive to such impressions It was at this truth the prophet hinted when he said Every child is born with a predisposition towards Islam Then his parents make a Jew or a Christian or a star worshiper of him Every human being has in the depths of his consciousness heard the question Am I not your Lord? and answered yes to it But some hearts are like mirrors so be followed with rust and dirt that they give no clear reflections While those of the prophets and saints, though they are men of like passions with us, are extremely sensitive to all divine impressions Nor is it only by reason of knowledge acquired and intuitive that the soul of man holds the first rank among created things But also by reason of power, just as angels preside over the elements so does the soul rule the members of the body Those souls which attain a special degree of power not only rule their body but those of others also If they wish a sick man to recover, he recovers Or a person in health to fall ill, he becomes ill Or if they will the presence of a person, he comes to them According as the effects produced by these powerful souls are good or bad they are termed miracles or sorceries These souls differ from common folk in three ways One, what others only see in dreams they see in their waking moments Two, while others' wills only affect their own bodies these, by will power, can move bodies extraneous to themselves Three, the knowledge which others acquire by laborious learning comes to them by intuition These three, of course, are not the only marks which differentiate them from common people but the only ones that come within our cognizance Just as no one knows the real nature of God but God himself so no one knows the real nature of a prophet but a prophet Nor is this to be wondered at as in everyday matters we see that it is impossible to explain the charm of poetry to one whose ear is insusceptible to cadence and rhythm or the glories of color to one who is stone blind Besides mere incapacity there are other hindrances to the attainment of spiritual truth One of these is externally acquired knowledge To use a figure the heart may be represented as a well and the five senses as five streams which are continually convene water to it In order to find out the real contents of the heart these streams must be stopped for a time at any rate and the refuse they have brought with them must be cleared out of the well In other words, if we are to arrive at spiritual truth we must put away for a time knowledge that has been acquired by external processes which too often hardens into dogmatic prejudice A mistake of an opposite kind is made by shallow people who echoing some phrases which they have caught from Sufi teachers go about decrying all knowledge This is as if a person who was not an adept in alchemy were to go about saying Alchemy is better than gold and were to refuse gold when it was offered to him Alchemy is better than gold but real alchemists are very rare and so are real Sufis He who has a mere smattering of Sufism is not superior to a learned man Any more than he who has tried a few experiments in alchemy has ground for despising a rich man Anyone who will look into the matter will see that happiness is necessarily linked with the knowledge of God Each faculty of ours delights in that for which it was created Lust delights in accomplishing desire Anger in taking vengeance The eye in seeing beautiful objects And the ear in hearing harmonious sounds The highest function of the soul of man is the perception of truth In this, accordingly, it finds its special delight Even in trifling matters, such as learning chess, this holds good In the higher the subject matter of the knowledge obtained, the greater the delight A man would be pleased at being admitted into the confidence of a prime minister But how much more if the king makes an intimate of him And discloses state secrets to him An astronomer who, by his knowledge, can map the stars and describe their courses Derives more pleasure from his knowledge than the chess player from his Seeing, then, that nothing is higher than God How great must be the delight which springs from the true knowledge of him A person in whom the desire for this knowledge has disappeared Is like one who has lost his appetite for healthy food Or who prefers feeding on clay to eating bread All bodily appetites perish at death with the organs they use But the soul dies not and retains whatever knowledge of God it possesses Nay, increases it An important part of our knowledge of God arises from the study And contemplation of our own bodies Which revealed to us the power of wisdom and love of the creator His power, in that, from a mere drop, he has built up the wonderful frame of man His wisdom is revealed in its intricacies And the mutual adaptability of its parts And his love is shown by his not only supplying such organs As are absolutely necessary for existence As the liver, the heart, and the brain But those which are not absolutely necessary As the hand, the foot, the tongue, and the eye To these he has added as ornaments To blackness of the hair, the redness of lips, and the curve of the eyebrows Man has been truly termed a microcosm or little world in himself And the structure of his body should be studied not only by those who wish to become doctors But by those who wish to attain to a more intimate knowledge of God Just as close study of the niceties and shades of language In a great poem reveals to us more and more of the genius of its author But when all is said, the knowledge of the soul plays a more important part In leading to the knowledge of God than the knowledge of our body and its functions The body may be compared to a steed and the soul to its rider The body was created for the soul, the soul for the body If a man knows not his own soul, which is the nearest thing to him, What is the use of his claiming to know others? It is as if a beggar who has not the wherewithal for a meal Should claim to be able to feed a town In this chapter we have attempted, in some degree, to expound the greatness of man's soul He who neglects it and suffers its capacities to rust Or to degenerate must necessarily be the loser in this world and the next The true greatness of man lies in his capacity for eternal progress Otherwise, in this temporal sphere, he is the weakest of all things Being subject to hunger, thirst, heat, cold, and sorrow Those things he takes most delight in are often the most injurious to him And those things which benefit him are not to be obtained without toil and trouble As for his intellect, a slight disarrangement of matter in his brain Is sufficient to destroy or madden him As to his power, the sting of a wasp is sufficient to rob him of ease and sleep As to his temper, he is upset by the loss of a sixpence As to his beauty, he is little more than nauseous matter covered with a fair skin Without frequent washing, he becomes utterly repulsive and disgraceful In truth, man in this world is extremely weak and contemptible It is only in the next that he will be of value If by means of the alchemy of happiness he rises from the rank of beast to that of angels Otherwise, his condition will be worse than the brutes which perish and turn to dust It is necessary for him at the same time that he is conscious of his superiority As the climax of created things to learn to know also his helplessness As that too is one of the keys to the knowledge of God End of The Knowledge of Self From the Alchemy of Happiness by Al Ghazali Chapter 1 Recorded by Craig Campbell in Appleton, Wisconsin in 2009 Let's Collect Rocks and Shells by Shell Oil Company This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Read by Betsy Bush, October 2009 Let's Collect Rocks and Shells by Shell Oil Company Introduction Millions of people throughout the world have found many hours of pleasure, adventure, and education by collecting either rocks or shells This booklet won't tell you everything there is to know about rocks and shells That would require many large volumes We only want to arouse your curiosity about two delightful pastimes that are so broad and varied that they can lead to a career or a satisfying hobby Shell Oil Company's interest in the subjects comes from its history and the nature of its business The name, chosen by a company that was founded years before anyone thought of drilling for oil, comes from the seashells this company brought from the Orient for use in mother of pearl items such as buttons and knife handles Now its world famous emblem, the pectin, is recognized by millions of people in every walk of life It's on service stations, trucks, buildings, oil derricks, and chemical plants Even the company's industrial lubricants are named for shells because shells have the same scientific names everywhere in the world For an oil company, rocks have a special interest Crude oil is found not in underground lakes or pools, but in the tiny spaces between grains of sand or in the pores of rocks Only certain types of rock formations are favorable to the accumulation of oil Thus, oilmen need to know everything they can about the right kind of rocks Shell has scientists who work with rocks all day and laboratories filled with rock, mineral, and crystal specimens We are always learning new things about them The pages that follow provide basic information about two subjects that can be richly rewarding whether you follow them for profit as shell does Or for pleasure as millions of people around the world do Seashells, what are they? First, a seashell is one of the hundred thousand species of back boneless animals belonging to the zoological group known as the mollusca mollusks include not only the familiar clams, scallops, and snails But also the squids, octopus, and chambered nautilus Other shells found in the ocean include those of crabs, lobsters, barnacles, and sea urchins True molluscan shells come in two main varieties bivalves and univalves bivalves have two valves fitting together along a toothed hinge in one side And kept closed by means of adductor muscles Univalves have only one shell usually coiled but sometimes shaped like a cap or miniature volcano Some marine univalves conceal themselves inside with an operculum which covers the open end of the shell like a trapped door Although shells take on many different shapes. They are much alike inside Each has a foot, a breathing siphon, a tiny brain and heart, and a fleshy mantle which secretes a lime for shell building Most true mollusks have eyes, but a few are blind Many have teeth called radula Like any other animal the mollusk generally moves about It pushes along on the ocean floor on its foot Or it might swim a little It lays millions of eggs and hatches countless baby mollusks It lives its life in its shell lugging it around Snuggling into it when alarmed burrowing into mud Fastening itself to a rock and creating ingenious camouflage It builds its calcareous house with a great instinctive talent for color and sculpture And the closer it lives to the tropical zones the more beautifully spectacular is its art The two parts of a bivalve shell are like thin saucers concave inside convex outside The inside is smooth polished The outside is rougher sometimes with graceful ribs or concentric ridges or combinations of both Univalves are conical and spiraling with a series of whirls coming down like widening steps from the tiny nucleus on top Univalves may have spines on their shoulders The opening called the aperture has a delicate right hand rim called the lip And a heavy left hand edge called the columnella Bivalves anatomy a foot b adductor muscles c gills d hinge e adductor muscles f siphon g stomach h mantle Oysters clams muscles all have them Univalves anatomy as before a foot b siphon c mantle but also d apriculum Univalves include welks winkles conks Chamber do nautilus is brother to the octopus but he wears his castle permanently and on the outside The shell as an architect how does he do it? Picture a vast undersea factory with billions of shells in constant production Each is made slowly and entirely of lime which the little animal inside extracts from its food almost from the first day of its life Each shell builder flawlessly follows the shape and design of the species to which it belongs All these sea animals come from eggs all different according to species But all laid in measureless abundance sometimes released into the open sea Sometimes protected in homemade nests sometimes encased in capsules strung like beads Hatched most baby mollusks swim freely for a while their tiny transparent bodies almost invisible to the naked eye Then they start building a heavier shell and sink to the bottom Each shell's mantle contains a network of microscopic tubes Each tube secretes a tiny amount of lime which instantly adheres to the shell The animal builds his shell to the proper size and thickness and determines its ridges and whirls Some kinds of shells take two to five years to reach maturity Others keep growing all their lives Color tubes are spaced like holes on a player piano roll Allowing pigments to tint the shell at the right spots in the growing design Many shells are covered with a self-made brown sheath the periostracum Most shells don't change basic structure as they grow Young cowherds, however, alter greatly in maturity Tough lozen-shaped egg cases on this string hatch baby welks like ones shown Newborn mollusks are usually free swimming moved by hairs Shell is there but transparent for a few days Let's meet some shells Latin abounds in concollogy as you've already noticed Why? Well, because this is a hobby and science that spans the world Englishmen, Frenchmen, Greeks, and Indians all have their own local names for shells But scientists everywhere give things in nature Latin names Shells of the same sort carry the same Latin label on every beach in every sea Much of the fascination of shell collecting is learning these names and how they were derived For shells have been named for almost everything We can't catalog a hundred thousand species here But let's call off the names of a few of the interesting specimens you might come across Many shells have wonderfully descriptive names For example, there's arca zebra which has stripes and looks like a miniature turkey wing And is commonly called turkey wing Then there's a scallop called the lion's paw Nerida pelaranta Or bleeding tooth And Cypreia servaneta Little deer cowory which resembles a spotted fawn Cowory is a common name for a kind of shell used as money in parts of Africa and Asia There are shells named for people Conus juliei Julius congel Plurotomella Jefferson Jefferies plurotomella And ackless valerii Waller's ackless Many are named for the place they were first discovered Eurocell pinks Tampaensis Tampa drill And ifigenia braziliana Brazil clam Some shells take their names from flowers Faciolaria tulipa Tulip shell Many get named from mammals Not always too accurately Cypreia tigress And Cypreia zebra Both have spots Not stripes But Cypreia tilpa Mole cowory Does look a lot like a mole Then there's Let's skip the Latin this time Magpie shell Modeled dove shell Mouse cone Horse conch Checkered pheasant And Cuban frog shell There's mythology Venus Neptunia Pandora Tritonus Music Bucanum Trumpet Cetheris Guitar Harpa Religion is represented too In the genus Mitra are species Pontificalius Episcopalius Papalus and Patriarchalus Some other fanciful names are Great Heart Jewel Box Rising Sun Checkerboard Woodlouse Riding Shell Sundial Keyhole Limpit Red Turpen And Black Lace Muricks And that's where we stop and draw breath You'll find others There are literally thousands more You've got to be a detective These little animals are the natural food For many of the larger undersea creatures So one of their greatest talents is hiding Approaching danger Whether from octopus, fish or man Arouses caution in a small mollusk And it becomes as inconspicuous as it can This can be pretty inconspicuous as the novice conchologist Learns early in his search Remember, by all means, don't be a landlubber Get into the water No matter whether you go shelling up north, down south, in the west, or in the tropics You won't get any satisfaction or value From collecting dead shells washed up on a beach To build a good collection You should take your mollusks alive Then clean and prepare them yourself More about that later You won't find live ones unless you go where they live Conus spurious Alphabet cone Crypto pluria Costata Angel wing Terra bradis locata Atlantic augur Muricks delectus Lace muricks Epitonium Humphrey sigh Humphrey's Wendeltrap Lyropectin nodosis Lion's paw Fasciolara distance Bandaged tulip Diodora cayonensis Keyhole limbit Anatina plicotella Channeled duck Where to look Note Collectors should familiarize themselves with local regulations In some areas such as parks and marine sanctuaries Collection of shells and other marine organisms May be restricted or prohibited End note Many shells are endowed with perfect camouflage The colorful sea fans off of Florida Are hiding places for the simnia Whose long purple or yellow shells Cleaning to sea fans and matching perfectly in color Are nearly indiscernible Other shells create disguises as they go along In Florida waters A pile of dead and broken shells May be worth investigation Xenophora conchiliophora Carrier shell Might be under it It cements the old discarded shells to its own Northern tide pools accommodate many kinds of litterina Periwinkles These pretty little shells In shades from yellow to brown Are well concealed among the dimly lit seaweed Along any rocky shore Limpets grow as wide as two inches But remain hard to find Their turtleback shells covered with moss Look just like rocks And they stick so tightly to the big stones That even when they are seen They can scarcely be pride loose Abundant unwavered beaches of both the north and the south Are dead shells of another perfectly camouflaged clam Called arca While alive The shells are covered with hairy brown or black epidermis And look like pebbles among the tufts of seaweed and marine grass On the west coast The abalone is a most typical species In addition to being a delicious food The bright-hued shell is widely used for souvenirs Such as ash trays And is in demand for buttons and decorative purposes Most shells of interest to the collector are found in the sea But not all Living forest mollusks have been found 18,000 feet high in the Himalayas And in this country A great variety of mollusks live in rivers, ponds, and even hot springs Several species are peculiar to the Nile River Also, species of mollusks live on land For example, the common garden snail Wherever you go Be it the south seas, a mountain lake, or the shoals off the gulf coast You will find shells to collect and opportunities to expand your hobby Starting a collection Here's how Knowing where to look for shells You probably wonder when is the best time The answer is any time Mollusks know no season Some species appear suddenly for several days and then vanish Others can be found almost any time Most mollusks appear at night But others work only in the daytime and go out of sight after dark The tides may have something to do with it So does the weather It can be hot or cold, dry or rainy While you won't find the same shell at all times You'll find a great variety at any time What to take The things pictured on page eight should be enough If you're going out on the coral reefs along Florida It would be wise to keep your legs covered as protection against stings or scratches Don't ever forget to wear some kind of shoes in the water Even though you're wearing a mask or goggles Take along a gig or some slender stick And feel your way along so you don't fall into a hole you can't see In the deceptive near-tropical waters If, despite precautions, you get a sea urchin's needle-like spine broken off in your skin Soak the wound in vinegar which will dissolve the fragments And stop the pain in a few minutes Tiny shells buried in sand can be netted in your sieve Clinging ones must be chiseled off rocks Frail delicate clingers should be gently nudged loose with tweezers Submerged sandbars are good spots to find several kinds of univalves and bivalves But the latter will dig themselves quickly out of sight as far down as several feet When you see one going underground don't dig directly over it You might break its shell Instead dig to one side and break the mud or sand away with your hands After you've had a good day's haul and a rest You'll need one You must clean your shells Put your tiniest most fragile ones in rubbing alcohol Put the rest in a pot of fresh water and slowly bring it to a boil Let them cool in the water slowly to prevent the glossy shells from cracking When cool your bivalves will be gaping open Simply scrape them clean Your univalves will be more difficult Remove the animal with a crochet hook or other piece of bent wire Turning it gently with a spiral Try to get it out whole to save yourself trouble Save the univalves or perculum and slice it off the muscle that holds it It will preserve indefinitely and is a valuable part of the shell Clean the shells exterior by scraping it gently with a dull knife or nail file Then soaking it in a Clorox solution One cup to two quarts water for two hours Some will be covered with an ugly skin Scientists keep this intact and you should try to The best collection has two of each species One with and one without the epidermis After your clean shells have dried in shade not sun Go over them with a rag dampened in light oil This ensures preservation and restores their natural luster Every three months or so rub them with oil again Their most delicate colors will remain brilliant for years Don't ever use shellac, lacquer or varnish Get a reference book from your library and identify your shells Keep an account of when and where you collected them Store your shells in closed containers to protect them from sunlight and dust Almost any set of small drawers or a cabinet will do Match boxes or pill boxes are excellent for small specimens For display purposes glass covered cases are best to prevent handling of the shells A shell's beauty is often deceptive Many unattractive and drab shells are worth hundreds of dollars While the most colorful are frequently valued at a dollar or less The rarity of a species determines its value A truly valuable shell may come from deep inaccessible waters or remote lands Or it may be one of an extinct species A slit shell collected a hundred fathoms down and waters off the British West Indies Is valued at a thousand dollars Another undersea treasure, the glory of the seas, was first found in 1771 And one time would bring the concollugist fifteen hundred dollars The greatest rarities, however, are truly valueless and are not for sale And there it is, the fascinating hobby of shell collecting It's a lot of work, but a lot of fun too Take a sieve or an orange a sack Besides carrying your shells, it may help you catch them A few pint bottles will hold delicate ones Masquer goggles is essential for looking under water Bathing suit or old clothes, of course High shoes or sneakers, never go barefooted Heavy cloth gloves, watch out for sunburn Gig or fish a spear, if you're going south, to keep pesky crabs sea urchins off Clam digging hoe or trowel for burrowing shells Vinegar for first aid in case you're stuck by urchin spines Chisel and hammer to get the clingers Spatula for frail limpets You may find other hardware handy, but these are basic Now let's look at rocks Rocks are made of minerals Rocks to begin with are made of minerals What is a mineral? The definition may sound difficult A mineral is a chemical element or compound, combination of elements, occurring naturally as the result of inorganic processes But don't be discouraged, things will clear up soon The world contains more than eleven hundred kinds of minerals These can be grouped in three general classes One Metallic minerals These include things most of us would think of if we were asked to name some minerals Familiar examples are copper, silver, mercury, iron, nickel, and cobalt Most of them are found in combination with other things, as ores We get lead from galena or lead sulfide Tin comes from the ore cassiterite Zinc from sphalerite and zincblend or blackjack Chromium that makes the family car flashy comes from chromite Many minerals yield aluminum Uranium occurs in about fifty minerals, nearly all rare Twenty-four karat gold is a metallic mineral A fourteen karat gold ring contains fourteen twenty-fourths or fifty-eight percent gold An average sample of earth contains nine percent aluminum Five point five percent iron Point zero one percent zinc Point zero zero eight percent copper Point zero zero four percent tin Point zero zero two percent lead Point zero zero zero five percent uranium And point zero zero zero zero zero six percent gold or platinum It would be hopelessly expensive to recover such metals from an average ton of earth That's why metallic minerals are taken from concentrated deposits in mines Many valuable minerals are found in veins running through rock Veins can be formed when a mineral laden groundwater seeps into cracks Evaporates and leaves mineral grains that build up into a vein B hot water from deep within the earth fills cracks Then cools and deposits much of the material in solution as minerals in a vein Sometimes including metals such as gold and silver C molten gaseous material squeezes into cracks near the earth's surface then slowly hardens into a vein Two non-metallic minerals These are of great importance to certain industries You will find them in insulation and filters They are used extensively in the ceramic and chemical industries They include sulfur graphite the lead in pencils gypsum halite rock salt borax talc abestus and quartz Undoubtedly you'll have some non-metallic minerals in your collection Rocks containing abestus are usually handsome and varied Three rock forming minerals These are the building materials of the earth They make mountains and valleys They furnish the ingredients of soil and the salt of the sea They are largely silicates that is they contain silicon and oxygen Silicon is a non-metallic element always found in combination with something else It is second only to oxygen as the chief elementary constituent of the earth's crust Other rock forming minerals are the large family of mycas with names like muscovite and flogopite There are the felled spars including albite and orthoclase Others are amphiboles pyroxenes zeolites Garnets and many others you may never find or hear about unless you become a true mineralogist A rock may be made almost entirely of one mineral or of more than one mineral Rocks containing different combinations of the same minerals are different Even two things made of the same single mineral can be quite different Carbon may turn up as a lump of coal or a diamond How minerals got their names? Names of most minerals and inite apatite calcite dolomite fluorite But many do not Anthibole copper the most common pure metal in rocks Feldspar galina gypsum hornblend mica quartz Many minerals take their names from a greek word referring to some outstanding property of the mineral for example hematite and oxide of iron was named about 325 bc from the greek haema or blood because of the color of its powder Some minerals are named for the locality in which they were first discovered Coloradoite was first found in Colorado Benitoite turned up in San Benito county california And so with labradorite and brazilite Other minerals got their names from famous people Willemite was named in honor of Willem I king of the Netherlands The great german poet philosopher Goethe could turn up in your collection as Goetheite And there's smithsonite named for James smithson founder of the smithsonian institution Gold jasper uncut diamond quartz violet in color halite carlsbad new mexico calcite south Dakota copper turquoise brilliant color Out of this world some minerals come from outer space They're meteorites which are rock fragments Every day hundreds of millions of them enter the earth's atmosphere Most of them however are burned up by the heat from air friction and never reach the ground Meteors large enough to reach the earth are called meteorites Most minerals found in meteorites are the same as those we have on earth But there are some rare minerals known only in meteorites Two of them are coenite and tribersite Main kinds of rocks Rocks are the building blocks of the earth's crust They may be massive as in granite ledges or tiny soil gravel sand and clay are rocks There are three main types of rocks One igneous rocks are those formed at very high temperatures or from molten materials They come from magmas molten mixtures of minerals often containing gases They come from deep below the surface of the earth If they cool off while below the surface they form intrusive rocks which may later be revealed by erosion When magmas reach the surface red hot they form extrusive rocks such as volcanic rocks Thus granite is an igneous intrusive rock Lava is an igneous extrusive rock Notice how the type of rock tells its past history if you know what to look for Two sedimentary rocks are formed by the action of wind water or organisms They cover about three quarters of the earth's surface Most are laid down as sediments on the bottom of rivers lakes and seas Many have been moved by water wind waves currents ice or gravity The most common sedimentary rocks are sandstones limestones conglomerates and shales Oil is found in sedimentary formations Three Metamorphic rocks are those that have been changed from what they were at first into something else by heat pressure or chemical action All kinds of rocks can be changed the result is a new crystalline structure The formation of new minerals or a change in the rocks texture Slate was once shale marble came from limestone nice is perhaps reworked granite Igneous rocks are formed at high temperatures or from molten materials They come from deep beneath the earth They can be intrusive or extrusive depending on where they cooled off Sedimentary rocks are formed by the action of wind water or organisms They usually are laid down on the bottom of rivers lakes and seas Most of the earth's surface is covered by these rocks Oil is found in sedimentary formations Metamorphic rocks have been changed from their original state into something else Heat pressure chemical action change the crystalline structure the texture even form new minerals All kind of rock can be changed A word on fossils Perhaps you'll find rock containing fossils or even fossils by themselves They should form a separate part of your collection Fossils are the remains or the outlines of former plant or animal life buried in rock The older the rock the simpler the plant and animal life it contains Thus fossils can give a clue to the age of the rock strata Fossils can teach history They tell us about plants and animals that are now extinct The dinosaur for example They can also tell of ancient climates Coral found in rocks in Greenland suggests it must have once been warm Remains of fur and spruce trees have been found in the tropics How are fossils formed? Teeth bone and wood don't last long in their original state However buried materials decompose leaving a film of carbon as a fossil This results in a leaf tracery or the outlines of some simple animal On a gigantic scale this process of forming carbon has resulted in our great coal deposits Sometimes the buried material is gradually replaced by silica or other substances making petrified objects Wood can be replaced cell by cell by agate or opal from silica bearing water The result is petrified wood the finest examples of which can be found in our petrified forest national park in arizona This can happen to shells too How about molds and casts of footprints of ancient animals? A brontosaurus might have stomped along in soft warm mud eons ago The mud hardened and later another layer of soft earth covered the print preserving it Collecting if you want to collect rocks and minerals just for the sake of having them you can buy specimens Many can be purchased for 25 cents to a dollar each while a rare specimen can cost hundreds of dollars The true pleasure is in finding your own samples Later when you have a good-sized collection you can fill gaps by buying specimens or swapping extras with other collectors You'll be amazed at the number of amateur collectors Perhaps no branch of science owes more to the work of amateurs than mineralogy Our great collection of minerals in the u.s national museum in washington dc Was gathered almost entirely by two amateurs who devoted many years and much money to their hobby Where to look look for pebbles by the roadside in beds of streams and riverbanks Go out into the country for ledges on hillsides Every road cut cliff bank excavation or quarry shows rocks and minerals Rare road cuts rock pits dump piles around mines Building sites they'll all yield specimens Some of the best mineral specimens collected in new york city came from skyscraper and subway excavations Help a new england farmer clear his field and you'll have more rocks than you know what to do with As for reference books many states publish guides to mineral deposits mineralogical magazines list mineral localities Tips for the field Don't try to collect too much at once Work early in the day or late in the afternoon a hot sun on bare rock can make you sizzle Especially if you're loaded with equipment and samples Here's the equipment to take newspapers for wrapping samples notebook and pencil geologists pick cold chisel magnifying glass compass heavy gloves a knife and a knapsack Later on you may want a geiger counter for spotting radioactive rocks Be selective Hand-sized specimens are best If your sample is too large trim it to size showing its most striking feature to best advantage When you wrap the sample in newspaper include a note telling when and where you found it This information will be transcribed to a filing card when you add the specimens to your display So make it as complete and accurate as you can When you get home clean specimens with soapy warm water applied with a soft brush Soluble minerals like halite can't be washed but should be rinsed with alcohol A coat of clear lacquer will protect some samples against dirt Arranging your collection Put a spot of enamel on the specimen Write on the spot in india ink a catalog number and have this number refer to a card in a file drawer The card should list date place found identification of specimen etc Group your samples metallic minerals semi-precious stones non-metallic minerals Display them on a shelf or buy or build a mineral cabinet with partitioned drawers For smaller samples use a riker mount with a glass top A common rock here's the equipment to take newspapers for wrapping samples notebook and pencil geologists pick cold chisel magnifying glass compass heavy gloves a knife and an amp sack What do I have? How do you identify specimens? Get books and magazines on rocks and minerals Many have colored pictures that help But identification is best made by noting the physical characteristics of the rock or mineral For minerals there's a hardness scale in which a mineral of the harder number can scratch a mineral of the lower number But not be scratched by it The scale is one talc two gypsum three calcite four fluorite five apatite six orthoclass seven quartz eight topaz nine corundum ten diamond Remember it by this silly sense The girls can flirt and other queer things can do When on a trip remember that a fingernail has a hardness of 2.5 a penny three a knife blade 5.5 and a steel file 6.5 Use these to scratch your sample and you can get an approximate idea of its hardness You can buy a set of hardness points. They're pointed pieces of minerals set in brass tubes Each marked with its hardness scale The set costs about $30 Half that if you assemble your own Other tests for identifying minerals include specific gravity Weight of mineral compared to the weight of an equal amount of water Optical properties and crystal form color and luster Minerals differ in cleavage and fracture how they come apart when cut They leave distinctive streaks on unglazed porcelain Some are magnetic Some have electrical properties Some glow under ultraviolet or black light Some are radioactive Some fuse under a low flame while others are unaffected Many studies with the dissolved mineral can identify it beyond doubt But most of these are too complicated for the beginner As you read look at pictures and samples and talk with other rockhounds or leaders of mineralogy clubs You'll get better at identifying rocks Museum experts and your state's geologist can help too Specific gravity balance blowpipe analysis Gems for the lucky few If you're lucky you'll find gems or semi precious stones Gems are the finer more crystalline forms of minerals which are ordinarily less beautiful and spectacular The true gems are diamonds emeralds rubies and sapphires All others are semi precious and ornamental Diamonds are pure carbon, but did you know that rubies and sapphires are corundum minerals rare forms of alumina In slightly different form they to turn up on emery paper Other stones you might find are the quartz gems rose quartz amethyst rock crystal agate Jasper bloodstone or opaque gems such as jade moonstone lapis lazuli obsidian and turquoise You don't have to find them. You can buy gems in the rough or in blanks Then cut and polish them to make your own jewelry or decorations This takes practice plus a cutting and polishing outfit wood vise Maybe a diamond wheel or you could join a lapidary club that might already have the equipment First learn to make cabochons stones with round or curved surfaces Then try cutting facets or faces in transparent gems Learn by reading working with an expert trial and error Making jewelry is fun and collecting gems is as interesting as collecting rocks and minerals It brings the world into your home From the west come agates jaspers petrified woods from the east colorful marbles serpentines granites Alaska Idaho Connecticut or austria will yield dark red garnets Find moonstones come from ontario quartz crystals from hot springs arkansas can be compared with similar ones from the swiss alps or brazil Rock collecting is a hobby you can tailor to your taste But whether you concentrate on an area close to home or travel across whole continents You'll find that the pleasure and knowledge you gain from your collection are matched by the fun and adventure of the search Drop sticks to hold stones diamond cutting wheel End of let's collect rocks and shells by shell oil company