Vault Of The Heavens

A mother considers the unthinkable to stop a war. A husband may lose everything to watch over a world. A scrivener learns the terrible risk in the words she's translating. The power of many sacrificing as one. These and more are the stories collected in this volume. Stories of people. Stories of war and sacrifice and friendship. They help weave the rich fabric of Orullian's epic fantasy series, The Vault of Heaven, deepening the resonance of the world he's created.

A mother considers the unthinkable to stop a war. A husband may lose everything to watch over a world. A scrivener learns the terrible risk in the words she's translating. The power of many sacrificing as one. These and more are the stories collected in this volume. Stories of people. Stories of war and sacrifice and friendship. They help weave the rich fabric of Orullian's epic fantasy series, The Vault of Heaven, deepening the resonance of the world he's created.

"There is a delicate distinction between these two sentences: 'To find the others in oneself' and 'To find oneself in the others.' In the higher sense, it means 'You are that.' [Tat tsvam asi]. Above all, in the highest sense, it means to recognize oneself in the world and to understand that saying of Novalis from The Disciple at Sais... 'One was successful. He lifted the veil of the goddess at Sais. But what did he see? Miracle of miracles! He saw himself.' To find oneself--not in egoistic inwardness, but selflessly in the outer world--that is true self-knowledge." --Rudolf Steiner Rudolf Steiner is perhaps best known for his influence and wisdom in the fields of education, agriculture, medicine, science, and art. It is often forgotten that it was as a spiritual teacher that he made these contributions. Unfortunately, while his immediate students had the advantage of Steiner as a personal guide to their inner lives, later readers have had only his written works to guide them. Steiner, however, did give a few lectures on inner development--especially on beginning a path of practice. This book now collects these lectures--some of which have never been in English--for the first time. It also contains a number of the basic meditations and exercises shared by Steiner with his students. Here readers will find descriptions of various practical exercises, including exercises for the moral qualities that students must develop, and for the various qualities of consciousness that inner development requires. This book is not only for beginners. Wherever you are on the path, this book will be your companion.

The story of our relationship with the stars and their celestial cousins is long, involving, and full of surprises. The Fabric of the Heavens, by science historians Stephen Toulmin and June Goodfield, outlines thinking about astronomy and dynamics from "pre-theoretical" Babylonian times to the Newtonian revolution that seeded our modern conceptions of space. Fully integrating the two cultures of science and the humanities, the authors find evidence of new thinking in Milton's writing and medieval tapestries as well as classic scientific and pre-scientific works. Using language that is beautiful, compelling and precise, they trace the threads of history which are woven into today's science (which, they predict, will find itself woven into something even more startlingly unrecognisable in years hence). Why were the ancients so fascinated by the sky and stars? Interestingly, it seems that their concerns were mostly practical; theological significance took longer to attach itself to the patterns up above. Agricultural and navigational concerns, once resolved, gave way to deeper philosophical, mythological and religious curiosity--which used the mathematical tools of its predecessors to great effect. The lives and works of Aristotle, Copernicus, Galileo and Newton are all thoroughly explored, and it is easier to see the continuity between them and their contemporaries in the breadth of this writing. First published in 1962, The Fabric of the Heavens was one of the first postmodern studies of the development of physical science; even were it not such a pleasure to read, it would still merit careful study.

The analyses in the book investigate the possibilities and foundations of a completely new philosophy of history, although outlined in dialogue with M. Heidegger. The fundamental questions the author asks are: Why, wherefrom is there history? Why are we humans historical? Why is there historiography? Primarily and ultimately, the response to each of these questions is: because we are MORTAL. Accordingly, the first chapter tackles the possibilities and lays the foundations of an ontology of history. Built upon these, the second chapter analyses the being of the PAST and its existential characteristics – as NOT-BEING-ANY-MORE, as HAD-BEEN-NESS. Chapter three turns towards the FUTURE and analyses its existential characteristics as NOT-YET-BEING. Chapter four is an explicit return to the dialogue with Heidegger, which surfaces the main aspects of the essential belonging together of the fundaments and origins of philosophy and history. The Appendix is an applied philosophical research related to the previous subjects which examines the interlacements of DEATH and SECRET in the phenomenon of TERRORISM.