First Principles: For Love of Country They Accepted Death, and Thus Resolved All Doubts, and Made Immortal Their Patriotism and Their Virtue

“For love of country they accepted death, and thus resolved all doubts, and made immortal their patriotism and their virtue.” – James Garfield, at the Arlington National Cemetery

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Deceptive Truths From the Sanctuary

Deceptive Truth From the Sanctuary
by Michael Doyle

Most see the warrior life as fighting and drinking
But the truth of the odyssey is one of thinking
Ulysses was protean and was not easily swayed
Instead, his thinking was fluid and many-wayed
This is the way the world is and how his cards were played

Sailing a ship through life requires skillful navigation
This much, of course, needs no long-winded explanation
To remain vital requires perceiving life in its multiplicity
This moves beyond bedeviling simplicity into complexity
These are things that lead to a life of perplexity

This world shatters expectations and demands we steer
We must approach life by design and defeat our limiting fears
In a word, the story comes to that to live is to think
And to recognize that we are always on the brink
Of new discoveries, and through these finding vital links

Life isn't just about choosing to rule or to submit and obey
It's a far more complex sort of game in which we all play
Knowing who is who is essential in this world of mobility
To find out often consists of questions holding great difficulty
This is all part of the mystery that makes for life's journey

Everyone here is seen as a stranger in the game of identity
A cataract rush of questions flows and causes some anxiety
As fortunes begin with thoughts from our playground minds
Pushing forward in this cycle, concerned of being left behind
The dear Lady Justice is always found in her curious bind

As we gain our feet in life, we find a wall of uncertainty
The only certainty and real rule in this life that has urgency
We were all coldly thrown into this bracing morass of life
Struggling, tired, and desperate for peace, only to find strife
And such peace as we find, is spread thinly with a dull knife

The only control we find is found in making our own decisions
Some will be good; some perhaps bad, all without precision
Allowing this truth is our best and only true path of control
Knowing we can never really know anything frees our souls
Somehow, this acceptance brings the only peace that consoles

In pursuing thought, we see how life can radically deceive
Ultimately, it comes down to our cores and what we can believe
Those things that we draw from that are or have been concealed
Shape into the truths by which our choices are revealed
But we're no longer troubled, and from this trouble, we are healed

This is how we grow from our childishness into our dignity
This storming world of the sea holds its own integrity
Until at last a man acts in ways he perhaps cannot condone
Finding as we do, this understanding leaves us truly alone
And this loneliness, is the only thing, we truly ever own

(c) May 29, 2024 Michael Doyle
All Rights Reserved

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Thought For the Day: Historians Tell the Story of the Past, Novelists the Story of the Present

“Historians tell the story of the past, novelists the story of the present.” – Edmond de Goncourt, writer, critic, and publisher (26 May 1822-1896)

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First Principles: Republics Are Created By the Virtue, Public Spirit, and Intelligence of the Citizens. They Fall, When the Wise Are Banished From the Public Councils

“Republics are created by the virtue, public spirit, and intelligence of the citizens. They fall, when the wise are banished from the public councils, because they dare to be honest, and the profligate are rewarded, because they flatter the people, in order to betray them.”  – Joseph Story (1833)

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Hey Everybody

Hey Everybody
by Michael Doyle

Hey everybody
Gather around (gather around)
We come together as a body
To sing about what we've found

Coming together in this hour
We testify about God's holy power
Shining as He does in the shadow
Our battles are in the prayers we know

Some ride out in the saddle
But we fight our sacred battles
From on our scarred knees
Offering up our words that please

Our mighty Lord
Provides us with shield and sword
To take on with His authority
Against Satan's forces as our adversary

In offering up our praise
We live our best sacred days
We live the meaning of His love
By following the ways of the above

(c) May 28, 2024 Michael Doyle
All Rights Reserved

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Thought For the Day: We Love Those Who Know the Worst of Us and Don’t Turn Their Faces Away

“We love those who know the worst of us and don’t turn their faces away.” – Walker Percy, author (28 May 1916-1990)

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First Principles: Religion and Virtue Are the Only Foundations, Not Only of Republicanism and of All Free Government, But of Social Felicity Under All Governments

“Religion and Virtue are the only Foundations, not only of Republicanism and of all free Government, but of Social Felicity under all Governments and in all the Combinations of human Society.” – John Adams (1811)

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On Bended Knee

On Bended Knee
by Michael Doyle

On bended knee,
I see the memory
Of the day and the cost
I watched you let it be
Giving it your dignity
It's hard to add the cost

Making it worse
Is I know that bullet was mine
It had my name
Bleeding across the verse
It's hard to speak and define
Why I still wear the blame

They say we fight and die
For the glorious good of nation
We give our lives for our friends
Politicians seldom know why
But only death ends the obligation
Of living and dying for friends

Taken for granted is that we live
All the moments of American liberty
All for which we protect and defend
Mistakes made, we hope to forgive
As long as we've lived our integrity
We've chosen our moments to expend

This is our breath to expend
In the ways that we gladly choose
All the blood, toil, and treasure
What this matters really depends
But we would never be those to refuse
And so we live and die by this measure

On bended knee,
I pray and live the memory
Of these days and the cost
You paid full price for me
And I cry a bit indignantly
Knowing your death has been the cost

(c) May 22, 2024 Michael Doyle
All Rights Reserved

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First Principles: Our Obligations To Our Country Never Cease But With Our Lives

“Our obligations to our country never cease but with our lives.” – John Adams

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Thought For the Day: Greater Love Has no One Than This: To Lay Down One’s Life For One’s Friends

“Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” – John 15:12-14

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