PUNISHMENT

 

PUNISHMENT

            To punish is to make somebody suffer because he has broken the law or done something wrong and punishment is an act or a way of punishing .

            Some synonyms of punishment are: penalty, castigation, retribution, and chastisement.

            You can punish a culprit by beating, slapping, caning, whipping, flogging, lashing, or caning, etc.

            Governments punish criminals by imprisoning them or imposing fine or using  both imprisonment and fine.  

            Punishment normally does not achieve its purpose; compassion does.

            Not long ago children were punished by their parents and teachers very frequently. They acted on the proverb “Spare the rod, and spoil the child.” Now this proverb is almost dead. Corporal punishment in schools is forbidden.           Here are some famous quotes on punishment:

*The whole of life and experience goes to show, that right or wrong doing, whether as to the physical or the spiritual nature, is sure in the end to meet its appropriate reward or punishment. Penalties may be delayed, but they are sure to come. ----American clergyman H.W. Beecher (1813-1887).

  **Punishment is lame, but it comes.--- English divine and poet George  Herbert (1593-1633).

***Don’t let us rejoice in punishment, even when the hand of God alone inflicts it. The best of us are but poor wretches just saved from shipwreck. Can we feel anything but awe and pity when we see fellow-passenger swallowed by the waves? ---English novelist and poet George Eliot (1819-1880).

****The object of punishment is threefold: for just retribution; for the protection of society; for the reformation of the offender. ---American theologian Tyron Edwards (1809-1894).

*****There is no greater punishment than that of being abandoned to one’s self.—French theologian Pasquier Quesnel (1634-1719).

                                                -------

PUNCHLINE: If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed. ----Theoretical physicist Albert Einstein (1879-1955).

                                                ******

G. R. Kanwal

25 July 2026

 

TWO POEMS ABOUT GOD

 

                TWO POEMS ABOUT GOD

                        Given below are two poems, originally called songs. They are included in a book titled Gitanjali (Song Offerings) written by the Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore who received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, for its English translation.

                        Tagore who was a British Indian poet, author, playwright, musician, composer, philosopher, social reformer, painter and one of the foremost figures of the Bengal Renaissance, was born on 7 May 1861 at Jorasnko and passed away on 7 August 1941 at Jorasanko Thakurbari, Kolkata. He was the son of Debendranath Tagore, a leader of the Brahmo Samaj, a new religious sect in the nineteenth century.

                        Tagore is most famous for his Gitanjali (1910), novels like Gora(1910), and Ghare-Baire (1916) concerning social and political identity. Among his short stories Kabuliwala is very popular.

                        Tagore also composed more than 2,2000 songs blending classical and folk traditions.

                        He authored two National Anthems “Jana Gana Mana” and “Amar Sonar Bangla”.

                        Tagore believed in spiritual humanism, universal brotherhood, and harmony with nature.  In Gitanjali he addresses God as an ordinary worker in quite a few songs.

                        The two poems which are given below are about God’s active presence among the poorest and ordinary human beings who are engaged in creative labour.  

FIRST POEM: Here is thy footstool and there rest thy feet where live the poorest, and lowliest, and lost.    

                        When I try to bow to thee, my obeisance cannot reach down to the depth where thy feet rest among the poorest, and lowliest, and lost.

                        Pride can never approach to where thou walkest in the clothes of the humble among the poorest, and lowliest, and lost.

                        My heart can never find its way to where thou keepest company with companionless among the poorest, the lowliest, and the lost.

                                    …………….

SECOND POEM: Leave this chanting and singing and telling of beads ! Whom dost thou worship in this lonely dark corner of a temple with doors all shut?  Open thine eyes and see thy God is not before thee!

                        He is there where the tiller is tilling the hard ground and where the path-maker is breaking stones. He is with them in sun and in shower, and his garment is covered with dust. Put off thy holy mantle and even like him come down on the dusty soil !

                        Deliverance ? Where is the deliverance to be found? Our master himself has joyfully taken upon him the bonds of creation; he is bound with us all for ever.

                        Come out of thy meditations and leave aside thy flowers and incense ! What harm is there if thy clothes become tattered and stained ? Meet him and stand by him in toil and in sweat of thy brow.

                                                            *********

G.R.Kanwal

24 July 2026   

 

                                               

 

 

TEN QUOTES ON DEMOCRACY

 

          TEN QUOTES ON DEMOCRACY

            “Democracy” is defined as a system of government in which all the people of a country can vote to elect their representatives .             

1.     The 16h U. S. President Abraham Lincoln (189-1865) defined democracy as “government of the people, by the people, for the people”.

            He also laid out his philosophical core of democracy in an 1858 fragment. It went like this:

                        “As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.”           

Here are more definitions by other great thinkers:

2.     The efforts of government alone will never be enough. In the end, the people must choose and the people must help themselves. ----John F. Kennedy Thirtyfifth President of the United States (1917-1963)

3.     No democracy can exist for long in the midst of want and poverty and inequality.---Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister (1889-1964).

4.     The ultimate failures of dictatorships cost humanity far more than any temporary failures of democracy,----Franklin D. Roosevelt Thirty-second president of the United States (1882-1945).

5.     People shouldn’t be afraid of their government. Governments should be afraid of their people.----Alan Moore, English author, born 18 November 1953.

6.     The love of democracy is that of equality.---French jurist, historian, and political philosopher Charles Louis de Secondat Montesquieu(1689-1755).

7.     Your little child is your only true democrat,---Mrs Hrriet Beecher, American author (1811-1896).

8.     If there were a people consisting of gods, they would be governed democratically; so perfect a government is not suitable to men.---Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Genevan philosopher and writer (1712-1778).

9.     Democracy will itself accomplish the salutary universal change from the delusive to the real, and make a new blessed world of use bye and bye,----Thomas Carlyle, Scottish essayist and historian(1795-1881).

10.             The progress of democracy seems irresistible, because it is the most uniform, the most ancient, and the most permanent tendency which is to be found in history.----Alexis Charles Henri Clerel, comte de Tocqueville, French diplomat, philosopher and historian (1805-1859).

                                                      ________

PUNCHLINE: The devil was the first democrat.---English poet , Lord Byron (1788-1824).

                                                                  ********

G.R.Kanwal

23 July 2026

SOME THOUGHTS ON LOVE

 

                SOME THOUGHTS ON LOVE

            “Love” is briefly defined as: a strong feeling of deep affection for somebody. A bit longer definition encompasses : deep affection, care, respect, and a commitment to another person’s well-being, often involving compassion, loyalty, and a willingness to sacrifice for his/her happiness.

            True love must be sincere, cordial, unselfish, loyal, faithful, empathetic, compassionate, trust-worthy, and life-long.

              Some synonyms of love are:

            Affection, fondness, care, concern, attachment, regard, warmth, intimacy, devotion, adoration, passion, yearning, infatuation, and adulation.

                The English romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) began  his poem entitled Love with the following words:

                   All thoughts, all passions, all delights,

                   Whatever stirs this mortal frame.

                    All are but ministers of Love,

                    And feed his sacred flame.             

                

                  For all human beings love is a necessity, not a luxury.

               

                Another English poet Alfred Lord Tennyson(1809-1892) said:

It is better to have loved and lost, than not to love at all.  

 

            According to the French author Victor Hugo (1802-1885): Life is a flower of which love is the honey. 

 

              The English poet and writer John Dryden (1631-1700)  had this to say:

 

            Love reckons hours for months, and days for years, and every little absence is an age.

 

            The English poet and cultural critic Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) considered mutual loyalty and faithfulness the soul of love.

            Here is an extract from one of his poems:

           

                        Ah, love, let us be true

                        To one another! For the world, which seems

                        To lie before us like a land of dreams,

                        So various, so beautiful , so new,

                        Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,

                        Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help, nor pains;

                        And we are here as on a darkling plain

                        Swept with confused alarms of struggle and fight,

                        Where ignorant armies clash by night.

                                                ________

PUNCHLINE: Life without love is like a body without soul.   

                                   

                                                            ********

G.R.Kanwal

22 July 2026

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S THOUGHTS ON LIFE

 

                WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S THOUGHTS ON LIFE

          William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright. He was born at Stratford-upon-Avon on 23 April 1564 and died there on the same date (23 April) in 1616.  

            He wrote 39 plays comprising Tragedies, Comedies, Histories, and Romances, 154 sonnets, and several narrative poems such as Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece.

            His unparallel greatness as a poet playwright and otherwise is based upon profound psychological depth and enduring impact on the English language.

             Hamlet, Macbeth, King Lear, Othello, and  Romeo and Juliet are his most famous tragic plays.

            Given below are his famous thoughts on Life.

*The web of our life is a mingled yarn, good and ill together: our virtues would be proud if our faults whipped them not; and our crimes would despair if they were not cherished by our virtues.

**There is nothing in this world can make me joy:

Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale

 Vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man;

And bitter shame hath spoil’d  the sweet world’s taste,

That it yields nought but shame and bitterness.

 

***Out, out, brief candle !

Life ‘s but a walking shadow, a poor player

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

And then is heard no more; it is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.

 

****Life is a shuttle.

 

*****We are such stuff

As dreams are made on, and our little life

Is rounded with a sleep.

 

******I see a man’s life is a tedious one.

                        -----------

PUNCHLINE: In this world our life is that of a tourist.

                                                ******

G.R.Kanwal

21 July 2026

 

 

SOME MEMORABLE THOUGHTS ABOUT FRIENSHIP

 

                SOME MEMORABLE THOUGHTS ABOUT FRIENSHIP

                        Lexically a friend is a person you know well and like, and who is not usually a member of your family.

                        According to another definition friendship is a voluntary, mutual relationship characterized by affection, trust, and companionship beyond casual acquaintance.  It is a bond where individuals support one another, share experiences, and engage in continuous mutual growth.

                        Some common synonyms of friendship are : companionship, comradeship, camaraderie. intimacy, amity, acquaintance,  and  fellowship.

                         A very intimate friend is your second self. He is an ‘alter ego’ because he embodies the same traits as you do.

                         Temporary friends are not worth having. They are opportunists. They will desert you in your unfortunate times.

                        A proverb says :  A friend in need is a friend indeed.

                        According to another : True friends provide support during hard times.

                        Greek philosopher Aristotle (384 BC---322 BC) said: Friendship is a single soul dwelling in two bodies.

                        Give below are some famous quotes about  friendship:

*A friend should be one in whose understanding and virtue we can equally confide, and whose opinion we can value at once for its justness and sincerity.

He who has made this acquisition of a judicious and sympathizing friend, may be said to have doubled his mental resources.---English clergy Robert Hall (1764-1831).

** Friendship improves happiness, and abates misery, by doubling our joy, and dividing our grief. ----English poet and essayist Joseph Addison (1672-1719).

***If a man does not make new acquaintances as he passes through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man should keep his friendships in constant repair.---English author Samuel Johnson (1709-84).

****Purchase not friends by gifts; when thou ceasest to give, such will cease to love.----English divine Thomas Fuller (1608-1661)

*****A true friend is the gift of God, and he only who made hearts can unite them.---Robert South, English divine (1634-1716).

                                                            ******

G. R. Kanwal

20 July 2026           

 

REMEMBER

 

          REMEMBER

            *Knowledge without common sense is folly; without method it is waste, without kindness it is fanaticism; without religion it is death. But with common sense, it is wisdom; with method it is power; with character it is beneficence,    with religion, it is virtue, life and peace. ----The Talmud

            *Without labour nothing prospers.

            *A quitter never wins and a winner never quits.

            *A laugh is just like sunshine,

            For cheering folks along.

            A laugh is just like music,

            It lingers in the heart.------Anonymous

           

            *It is not growing like a tree

            In bulk, doth make Man better be;

            Or standing long an oak, three hundred year,

            To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere.

            A lily of a day

            Is fairer far in May,

            Although it fall and die that night---

            It was the plant and flower of Light.

            In small proportions we just beauties  see :

            And in short measures life may perfect be.

                                    ----English poet Ben Jonson (1572-1637).

 

 

            *Not gold, but only men can make

            A people great and strong---

            Men who, for truth and honour’s sake,

            Stand fast and suffer long.

            Brave men who work while others sleep,

            Who dare while others fly,

            They build a nation’s pillars deep,

            And lift them to the sky.

            ------American poet and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882).

           

*It is the age that forms the man, not the man that forms the age. Great minds do indeed react on the society which has made them what they are, but they only pay with interest what they have received.                  

------English critic and historian Thomas Babington Macaulay (1809-59).

 

                                                            ********

G.R.Kanwal

19 July 2026