Pastime Papers

140 pages, Impr 1892. This book, written by Cardinal Manning, is compiled of his thoughts and musings on the meaning of certain words and how they relate to morality and the human conscience. He talks of honour and its definition; "it was the value others set upon a man: not that which he set upon himself.", setting examples on what it means to actually have honour and how it defines a person. He touches on other topics and their meanings such as consistency, pride, vanity, selfishness and more. He ends with "Dæmon of Socrates", saying, "Whether the estimate I have given of the Dæmonion of Socrates be true or not, the inquiry in which we have been engaged is manifestly not a barren speculation. It sets before us a great moral example, it teaches us a great moral law, necessary to men at all times, vital to us in these declining days. ... It tells us with a thrilling human voice, and in the accents of our common humanity, that man's supreme rule of right is the moral reason or conscience ... In such a public state Socrates lived and died, bequeathing to us this lesson- that Conscience is the Voice of God."