Literary notes about Reconciliation (AI summary)
In literature, the term "reconciliation" is used in multifaceted ways that often reflect the complexity of human relationships and societal structures. It may describe the intimate, personal healing between individuals—where restored affection carries emotional and moral weight as in moments of relief and joy [1, 2]—or serve as a metaphor for broader political or even divine harmony, where formal agreements or sacred mediations underscore the unification of opposites [3, 4, 5]. At times, it appears within historical or legal narratives as a negotiated process of mending past conflicts and restoring social order [6, 7], while in other instances it is deployed ironically to describe the elusive or artificially contrived nature of peace [8, 9]. Across diverse texts, "reconciliation" thus emerges as a dynamic and layered concept, capturing both the promise and the challenge of uniting disparate elements into a cohesive whole.
- Their reconciliation affected me, and added respect to the esteem I before felt for him.
— from The Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau — Complete by Jean-Jacques Rousseau - “Full, full reconciliation, full,” thought Anna; “thank God!”
— from Anna Karenina by graf Leo Tolstoy - He gave the king forty marks of gold for his reconciliation; and he lived but a little while after—only three years.
— from The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle - And he hath placed in us the word of reconciliation. 5:20.
— from The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Complete - The Apostle speaks of an absolute and complete reconciliation of universal nature to God, effected through the mediation of the Incarnate Word.
— from St. Paul's Epistles to the Colossians and Philemon by J. B. Lightfoot - He artfully listened to his mother's entreaties, and consented to meet his brother in her apartment, on terms of peace and reconciliation.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon - It was impossible that it could long subsist between two implacable enemies, who neither desired nor could trust a reconciliation.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon - She spoke no word to them and did not seem to hear their husky little efforts at reconciliation.
— from The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) - Reconciliation is now a fallacious dream.
— from Common Sense by Thomas Paine
