Word: wretchedness
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In the third book of his Confessions, Augustine offers a penetrating observation on the nature of compassion. He writes, "si enim est malivola benivolentia, quod fieri non potest, potest et ille, qui veraciter sinceriterque miseretur, cupere esse miseros, ut misereatur" (it is only if there could be a malevolent benevolence...
With this statement, Augustine acknowledges the unseemly side of compassion; he recognizes that the compassionate can inadvertently find themselves depending on the existence of the wretched for fulfillment. He makes this observation while discussing the moral problems of theatrical tragedy--namely the power of tragic stories to enthrall audiences. But...
Suddenly, any impression that Lewis may be running a halfway house for hungry kids in one of the poorest and most wretched neighborhoods in America is shattered by the blare of an electronic siren. The girls know the drill: they file neatly out of the red brick firehouse while Lewis...
A wretched list of people failed the Princess of Wales on that terrible night in August: reckless paparazzi [WORLD, Oct. 13], a driver impaired by drugs and alcohol, an ineffectual bodyguard. But most shameful was the slow trip to the hospital when every second counted in getting Diana to a...
What is most sobering, not to say appalling, is to find no fewer than seven pages of entries devoted to the wretched N word. Its earliest recorded use, in 1574, was spelled niger, early modern English meaning "black in color." There was a time--hard to believe--that the term...