July 6, 2007
Memphis Internal Revenue Service
Center COIC Unit
PO Box 30804, AMC
Memphis, TN 38130-0804
To Whom It May Concern:
I have enclosed a copy of my most recent paycheck, upon which I have cited the amount of money forcefully taken from me, by you.
I hereby request to have the total amount returned to me immediately. It is mine - it represents my time, my effort, my life. For the time being, I choose to forego all previous amounts taken from me, as I have not kept an adequate record of these amounts.
It is not often that one has the opportunity to confront those who have perpetrated armed robbery against him, so I thank you for committing this act so openly and making yourselves so easily available.
Please contact me at your earliest convenience to arrange the return of my stolen property (money).
Sincerely,
Joseph William Herrington III
joeyrose@gmail.com
310-961-0167
Friday, July 6, 2007
Just Here To Work
I am thinking of a particular day this past April.
It was while I was still working as a bartender at The Melting Pot in Pasadena, CA. Before each shift, and just prior to the restaurant being open for dinner, a meeting would be held. During the meeting, important new developments would be discussed, concerns would be addressed, and (very often) time would be wasted - I generally attended these meetings in silence. As I was excusing myself from this particular meeting, the Vice President of Operations asked, "Any words of wisdom for us before you go?"
I replied, "I'm just here to work."
I think of that line often, as of late. Each time I'm being interviewed by a prospective employer and am asked, "What makes you a good employee?" or "What would you bring to our organization?" my own words echo in my mind as a cry of exultant pride and futility at once.
I was able to remain an employee of The Melting Pot for another month following that meeting, before my work ethic became my undoing. It was in the second week of May that new labor laws from the state legislature of California went into effect. According to California Labor Code section 512(a) "An employer may not employ an employee for a work period of more than five hours per day without providing the employee with a meal period of not less than 30 minutes..." and as if explicitly dictating how any private business owner will run his operation (which is nothing new, I know) is not bad enough, the code goes on, "...except that if the total work period per day of the employee is no more than six hours, the meal period may be waived by mutual consent of both the employer and employee," implying that the breaks must not only be provided by the employer, but actually taken by the employee - if one works for any period of time longer than six hours (indeed, the state website even has a diagrammed breakdown, showing 6:01 as necessitating a mandatory 30 minute break).
If this seems absurd to you, I recommend looking it up. Nevertheless, after more than a century of the cancerous spread of the malevolence known as "labor laws," the members of state see nothing wrong with outright dictatorial legislation, and probably expect no opposition. I, however, will not be fooled into thinking that my rights exist at the say-so of lawmakers. I still consider it my right to choose when and if I will take a break, or when and if I will do anything else job-related. In this case, though, I anticipated (and was quickly assured) that I would be lonely in my stand, and I am now a broken egg in the state's latest omelet. I refused to take any breaks during the first weekend of the new law's enforcement, and for that I was fired. I have been unemployed and, as a corollary, homeless, for over a month now. I live in my van in Pasadena (where I am a student at Pasadena City College), and I search for a parking space each night that is somewhat level and will not bring me a ticket by morning, as the city of Pasadena requires a special permit for overnight parking, and attainment of the permit requires a residence in Pasadena.
I no longer wonder what makes this kind of thing possible - and I make no pleas of any kind, I understand that my situation is a result of my own choices - but this is really happening. We live in a world where the threat of force is supposed to be the motive power behind an individual's decision on how to do his job. "Take your break or face legal action," now has a place in the minds of all. I do not blame the owners of The Melting Pot, they are weak, this is a fight they haven't the stomach for. Nor do I intend to villify them, I did what I did with full knowledge of the possible consequences - I do not claim ignorance, only integrity.
I do not choose to sacrifice my best efforts, the possibility of a job well done, or any other part of self to any man (or body of men), whether or not they are irresponsible and vicious enough to think it proper to dictate what shall be done (and when) with my life, time, and effort. What I wanted was the freedom to do my job well, but this is merely one facet of a much bigger issue: that the use of force is never an appropriate way to deal with those who do not initiate its use. Unfortunately, the layers of vicious and misguided philosophy and law that must be peeled away before we reach a point where men accept, and the state operates, on a principle such as this are far too numerous for my incident to create any impact, in and of itself. Which means that until a significant number of self-respecting individuals protest these laws in their own way - as they should - the laws will get worse, the violations of individual rights more severe, and my own disobedience will continue until I wind up in court, or in jail, or in both - I've always considered the judicial branch of our government to be a more effective means of change than "letters to the senator."
In the meantime, in the name of the public good, and for the sake of the workers of the state of California, I live in a van in Pasadena, without employment. I have half a tank of gas left, some items in a storage space requiring a $166 rent payment by the end of the month, and about $11. I would like to remain a student at PCC - I consider my experience there (and the possibilities) to be a great value - we shall see.
If I do obtain employment again, I hope it is with someone who understands me when I say, "I'm just here to work."
It was while I was still working as a bartender at The Melting Pot in Pasadena, CA. Before each shift, and just prior to the restaurant being open for dinner, a meeting would be held. During the meeting, important new developments would be discussed, concerns would be addressed, and (very often) time would be wasted - I generally attended these meetings in silence. As I was excusing myself from this particular meeting, the Vice President of Operations asked, "Any words of wisdom for us before you go?"
I replied, "I'm just here to work."
I think of that line often, as of late. Each time I'm being interviewed by a prospective employer and am asked, "What makes you a good employee?" or "What would you bring to our organization?" my own words echo in my mind as a cry of exultant pride and futility at once.
I was able to remain an employee of The Melting Pot for another month following that meeting, before my work ethic became my undoing. It was in the second week of May that new labor laws from the state legislature of California went into effect. According to California Labor Code section 512(a) "An employer may not employ an employee for a work period of more than five hours per day without providing the employee with a meal period of not less than 30 minutes..." and as if explicitly dictating how any private business owner will run his operation (which is nothing new, I know) is not bad enough, the code goes on, "...except that if the total work period per day of the employee is no more than six hours, the meal period may be waived by mutual consent of both the employer and employee," implying that the breaks must not only be provided by the employer, but actually taken by the employee - if one works for any period of time longer than six hours (indeed, the state website even has a diagrammed breakdown, showing 6:01 as necessitating a mandatory 30 minute break).
If this seems absurd to you, I recommend looking it up. Nevertheless, after more than a century of the cancerous spread of the malevolence known as "labor laws," the members of state see nothing wrong with outright dictatorial legislation, and probably expect no opposition. I, however, will not be fooled into thinking that my rights exist at the say-so of lawmakers. I still consider it my right to choose when and if I will take a break, or when and if I will do anything else job-related. In this case, though, I anticipated (and was quickly assured) that I would be lonely in my stand, and I am now a broken egg in the state's latest omelet. I refused to take any breaks during the first weekend of the new law's enforcement, and for that I was fired. I have been unemployed and, as a corollary, homeless, for over a month now. I live in my van in Pasadena (where I am a student at Pasadena City College), and I search for a parking space each night that is somewhat level and will not bring me a ticket by morning, as the city of Pasadena requires a special permit for overnight parking, and attainment of the permit requires a residence in Pasadena.
I no longer wonder what makes this kind of thing possible - and I make no pleas of any kind, I understand that my situation is a result of my own choices - but this is really happening. We live in a world where the threat of force is supposed to be the motive power behind an individual's decision on how to do his job. "Take your break or face legal action," now has a place in the minds of all. I do not blame the owners of The Melting Pot, they are weak, this is a fight they haven't the stomach for. Nor do I intend to villify them, I did what I did with full knowledge of the possible consequences - I do not claim ignorance, only integrity.
I do not choose to sacrifice my best efforts, the possibility of a job well done, or any other part of self to any man (or body of men), whether or not they are irresponsible and vicious enough to think it proper to dictate what shall be done (and when) with my life, time, and effort. What I wanted was the freedom to do my job well, but this is merely one facet of a much bigger issue: that the use of force is never an appropriate way to deal with those who do not initiate its use. Unfortunately, the layers of vicious and misguided philosophy and law that must be peeled away before we reach a point where men accept, and the state operates, on a principle such as this are far too numerous for my incident to create any impact, in and of itself. Which means that until a significant number of self-respecting individuals protest these laws in their own way - as they should - the laws will get worse, the violations of individual rights more severe, and my own disobedience will continue until I wind up in court, or in jail, or in both - I've always considered the judicial branch of our government to be a more effective means of change than "letters to the senator."
In the meantime, in the name of the public good, and for the sake of the workers of the state of California, I live in a van in Pasadena, without employment. I have half a tank of gas left, some items in a storage space requiring a $166 rent payment by the end of the month, and about $11. I would like to remain a student at PCC - I consider my experience there (and the possibilities) to be a great value - we shall see.
If I do obtain employment again, I hope it is with someone who understands me when I say, "I'm just here to work."
Monday, June 11, 2007
iLiberty 2006 Spring Essay Contest Winners
Third Place:
"You've come a long way, baby."
In 1968, Philip Morris used this slogan to introduce a new brand of cigarettes, marketed specifically toward young, professional women: Virginia Slims. Those six words, now immortalized in the catalog of American idiom, were a very clever nod to their target group, recognizing the great strides that had been made, as women were finally taking their rightful place in the world, on a level field of intellectual equality with men.
In the context of this essay, however, those six words are intended to convey a very different meaning.
On December 16, 1773, Samuel Adams led a group of 50 men, known as The Sons of Liberty, to Griffin's Wharf in Boston, MA, whereupon they seized and destroyed 342 crates of tea owned by the British East India Tea Company. This was in protest to the enactment of a law that exempted the East India Company from all duties and taxes, in order to help them establish a government-enforced monopoly on tea trade with the colonies.
Many Americans today would view this as trivial and largely insignificant. Moreover, tea consumption is not as popular as it once was in America, but this one night in Boston helped to start a revolution.
Individual rights (in this case, rights to a fair, unregulated marketplace) were so important to Americans, that a war was fought to preserve them; a war in which roughly 130,000 people were killed. This is a far cry from the general apathy affecting most Americans' view of government regulations today.
"You've come a long way, baby."
I came up with that while sitting on the hood of my car, which was parked on the street in front of my apartment, as I was smoking a cigarette. Is that particularly relevant? Yes, because I chose to do it, and that's the point. It is my right, my inalienable right to sit on the hood of my car and smoke a cigarette if that's what I choose to do. The attacks on "vices", such as the public smoking bans, and other attempts to legislate provisions for personal behavior as such, are attacks on human beings as such, on the ability of the sovereign individual to run his own life.
So, what is a right? A right is an action that is guaranteed, as an option, to a rational individual, in a social context. All rights are guaranteed to all rational individuals, which means that, to be a right, an action may not infringe upon the rights of others. Therefore, in order to preserve rights, one must accept and, in fact, revel in, responsibility for one's own actions.
Unfortunately, irresponsibility has spread like an unstoppable virus. As evidence, I submit that the following question would never have been considered by The Sons of Liberty, to whom personal responsibility was an unquestioned ethos.
Should government intervene in our lives to prevent us from making choices that make us sick, injure us, or even kill us?
No.
It's that simple. To even consider the notion, one has to accept the premise that the individual is a ward of the state and is, therefore, incapable of making responsible choices and any deviation from predetermined courses of action are inadmissible.
In order to determine the value, the "good," of any choice or action, there must first be a standard; "to whom" and "for what." As a fully functioning, rational adult human being, I take pride in understanding the consequences of my actions, and what's "good" for me is determined by continual reference to a very long list of hierarchical values comprised of long and short-range goals. When the government acts as a nanny state and begins to prescribe actions by fiat, my power of volition, my most precious ability as a human being, is effectively taken away. I am no longer allowed to make choices against a "very long list of hierarchical values," therefore, why should I have any?
How do we strike a balance between public health and individual liberty?
We don't.
It's that simple. There is no balance to be struck. Only death awaits where food and poison meet halfway. In the first place, there is no such thing as "the public health," it is a myth. There is only individual health: my health, your health, his health, her health. If the goal is to enable individual Americans to achieve a greater level of health and well-being, the only way possible is through education and the preservation of individual liberty, allowing individuals to make all manner of choices, good and bad, so that, bit by bit, each of us can learn from the mistakes and successes of ourselves and each other.
The rise of statist policies (in particular, government controls enacted to affect individual behavior) such as public smoking bans, lead us down a slippery slope to all manner of disastrous consequences, intended and not. The grotesquely brilliant example of this can be seen in recent history with Prohibition; where there is no choice, evil fills the void.
The American system of government and law is one that works off of established precedent. Meaning: whatever implications are made in a particular legal decision will be carried further (as an extension of necessary, logical consequences) the next time a similar issue is addressed. In other words, if Americans are willing to give up the right to smoke in public now, on the premise that it's "bad for the public health," who will be able to stop legislation down the road that makes eating red meat in public illegal because it's "bad for the public health?" What about coffee?
Some say that the public smoking bans are necessary to protect the "rights of non-smokers." In the first place, there is no such thing as "rights" of a non-anything. Secondly, there are only individual rights; there can be no specialized rights for select groups. Not only does that reek of aristocracy and feudalism, it is morally wrong; all rights apply equally to all human beings. The issue then, is to precisely define whose rights are being violated. And in fact, it is the private business owners who are primarily violated. It is unconstitutional, as well as morally wrong, for state and federal government to determine for private citizens how to run their business.
When an individual decides to go into business for himself, his entire livelihood is stake. He has every right to make whatever decisions he deems necessary in order to run his business the way he sees fit. Only a totalitarian mentality would think it okay for the government to step in and tell him to do otherwise.
If the owner of a local pub wants people to be able to smoke in his establishment, so be it. If a non-smoker does not want to be subjected to the smoke, then he should not patronize the establishment.
When policy-makers begin to think that they "know what's best" and ought to make decisions for Americans, and Americans start believing them, the road to despotism is a short one. The "public health" has a very familiar ring to it. Does the "public interest" or the "will of the people" sound familiar? These have always been the favorite justifications of statist regimes and proponents, from Nazi Germany to the former Soviet Union, where individual rights are abrogated in the name of some nebulous, undefined (and undefinable) "greater good."
The answer is to allow individuals to make their own choices regarding how to live their lives and seek their happiness, the way our founding fathers intended. Thomas Jefferson once said, "I have sworn eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man." I look out at the world and see very few of his brothers-in-spirit, and that is sad.
Somewhere along the way, the men at the helm steered America away from the values that made her great. But, reality is the great arbiter of justice, and rights will survive because they are right. However, if you and I want to enjoy them, we must recognize when they are being attacked, and take responsibility for ourselves.
In the words of Dean Alfange:
I do not choose to be a common man or woman. It is my right to be uncommon, if I can.
I seek opportunity - not security. I do not wish to a kept citizen, humbled and dulled by having the state look after me.
I want to take the calculated risk - to dream and build - to fail and succeed.
I refuse to barter incentive for a dole. I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence - the thrill of fulfillment to the calm state of Utopia.
I will not trade freedom for beneficence - nor my dignity for a handout. I will never cower before any master - nor bend to any threat.
It is my heritage to stand erect, proud and unafraid - to think and act for myself - enjoy the benefits of my creations and to face the world boldly and say -
This I have done.
The overall tone of this poem is one of accepting and cherishing personal responsibility, a sentiment I know our founding fathers understood, but I doubt many Americans currently do. The proof lies in the lack of outrage over government controls like the public smoking ban. It seems as though many Americans today actually believe that they are incapable of making proper choices, while many others simply refuse to accept responsibility for their own lives, clearing the road for the nanny state.
"You've come a long way, baby."
How long before we've gone too far?
Sunday, April 1, 2007
"...Extrospectively, the sense of life of another person strikes one as an immediate, yet undefinable, impression - on very short acquaintance - an impression which often feels like certainty, yet is exasperatingly elusive, if one attempts to verify it.
"This leads many people to regard a sense of life as the province of some sort of special intuition, as a matter perceivable only by some special, non-rational insight. The exact opposite is true: a sense of life is not an irreducible primary, but a very complex sum; it can be felt - but it cannot be understood - by an automatic reaction, it has to be analyzed, identified and verified conceptually. That automatic impression - of oneself or of others - is only a lead. But if and when that intangible impression is supported by and unites with the conscious judgment of one's mind, the result is the most exultant form of certainty one can ever experience: it is the integration of mind and values.
"...One falls in love with the embodiment of the values that form a person's character, which are reflected in his widest goals or smallest gestures, which create the style of his soul - the individual style of a unique, unrepeatable, irreplacable consciousness. It is one's own sense of life that acts as the selector, and responds to what it recognizes as one's own basic values in the person of another. It is not (simply) a matter of professed convictions; it is a matter of much more profound, conscious and subconscious harmony."
- Ayn Rand, The Romantic Manifesto
"This leads many people to regard a sense of life as the province of some sort of special intuition, as a matter perceivable only by some special, non-rational insight. The exact opposite is true: a sense of life is not an irreducible primary, but a very complex sum; it can be felt - but it cannot be understood - by an automatic reaction, it has to be analyzed, identified and verified conceptually. That automatic impression - of oneself or of others - is only a lead. But if and when that intangible impression is supported by and unites with the conscious judgment of one's mind, the result is the most exultant form of certainty one can ever experience: it is the integration of mind and values.
"...One falls in love with the embodiment of the values that form a person's character, which are reflected in his widest goals or smallest gestures, which create the style of his soul - the individual style of a unique, unrepeatable, irreplacable consciousness. It is one's own sense of life that acts as the selector, and responds to what it recognizes as one's own basic values in the person of another. It is not (simply) a matter of professed convictions; it is a matter of much more profound, conscious and subconscious harmony."
- Ayn Rand, The Romantic Manifesto
Monday, February 5, 2007
This is the mind on strike
"Through all the ages, the mind has been regarded as evil, and every form of insult: from heretic to materialist to exploiter - every form of iniquity: from exile to disenfranchisement to expropriation - every form of torture: from sneers to rack to firing squad - have been brought down upon those who assumed the responsibility of looking at the world through the eyes of a living consciousness and performing the crucial act of rational connection. Yet only to the extent to which - in chains, in dungeons, in hidden corners, in the cells of philosophers, in the shops of traders - some men continued to think, only to that extent was humanity able to survive. Through all the centuries of the worship of the mindless, whatever stagnation humanity chose to endure, whatever brutality to practice - it was only by the grace of men who perceived that wheat must have water in order to grow, that stones laid in a curve will form an arch, that two and two makes four, that love is not served by torture and life is not fed by destruction - only by the grace of those men did the rest of them learn to experience moments when they caught the spark of being human, and only the sum of such moments permitted them to continue to exist. It was the man of the mind who taught them to bake their bread, to heal their wounds, to forge their weapons and to build the jails into which they threw him. He was the man of extravagant energy, and reckless generosity - who knew that stagnation is not man's fate, that impotence is not his nature, that the ingenuity of his mind is his noblest and most joyous power - and in service to that love of existence he was alone to feel, he went on working, working at any price, working for his despoilers, for his jailers, for his torturers, paying with his life for the privilege of saving theirs. This was his glory and his guilt - that he let them teach him to feel guilty of his glory, to accept the part of a sacrificial animal and, in punishment for the sin of intelligence, to perish on the altars of the brutes. The tragic joke of human history is that on any of the altars men erected, it was always man whom they immolated and the animal whom they enshrined. It was always the animal's attributes, not man's, that humanity worshipped: the idol of instinct and the idol of force - the mystics and the kings - the mystics, who longed for an irresponsible consciousness and ruled by means of the claim that their dark emotions were superior to reason, that knowledge came in blind, causeless fits, blindly to be followed, not doubted - and the kings, who ruled by means of claws and muscles, with conquest as their method and looting as their aim, with a club or a gun as sole sanction of their power. The defenders of man's soul were concerned with his feelings, and the defenders of man's body were concerned with his stomach - but both were united against his mind. Yet no one, not the lowest of humans is ever able fully to renounce his brain. No one has ever believed in the irrational; what they do believe in is the unjust. Whenever a man denounces the mind, it is because his goal is of a nature the mind would not permit him to confess. When he preaches contradictions, he does so in the knowledge that someone will accept the burden of the impossible, someone will make it work for him at the price of his own suffering or life; destruction is the price of any contradiction. It is the victims who made injustice possible. It is the men of reason who made it possible for the rule of the brute to work. The despoiling of reason has been the motive of every anti-reason creed on earth. The despoiling of ability has been the motive of every creed that preached self-sacrifice. The despoilers have always known it. We haven't. The time has come for us to see. What we are now asked to worship, what had once been dressed as God or king, is the naked, twisted, mindless figure of the human Incompetent. This is the new ideal, the goal to aim at, the purpose to live for, and all men are to be rewarded according to how close they approach it. This is the age of the common man, they tell us - a title to which any man may claim to the extent of such distinction as he has not managed to achieve. He will rise to a rank of nobility by means of the effort he has failed to make, he will be honored for such virtue as he has not displayed, and he will be paid for the goods which he did not produce. But we, we who must atone for the guilt of ability - we will work to support him as he orders, with his pleasure as our only reward. Since we have the most to contribute, we will have the least to say. Since we have the better capacity to think, we will not be permitted a thought of our own. Since we have the judgment to act, we will not be permitted an action of our choice. We will work under directives and controls, issued by those who are incapable of working. They will dispose of our energy, because they have none to offer, and of our product, because they can't produce. Do you say that this is impossible, that it cannot be made to work? They know it, but it is you who don't - and they are counting on you not to know it. They are counting on you not to go on, to work to the limit of the inhuman and to feed them while you last - and when you collapse, there will be another victim starting out and feeding them, while struggling to survive - and the span of each succeeding victim will be shorter, and while you'll die to leave them a railroad, your last descendant-in-spirit will die to leave them a loaf of bread. This does not worry the looters of the moment. Their plan - like all the plans of all the royal looters of the past - is only that the loot shall last their lifetime. It has always lasted before, because in one generation they could not run out of victims. But this time - it will not last. The victims are on strike. We are on strike against martyrdom - and the moral code that demands it. We are on strike against those who believe that one man must live for the sake of another. We are on strike against the morality of cannibals, be it practiced in body or in spirit. We will not deal with men on any terms but ours - and our terms are a moral code which holds that man is an end in himself and not the means to any end of others. We do not seek to force our code upon them. They are free to believe what they please. But, for once, they will have to believe it and to exist - without our help. And, once and for all, they will learn the meaning of their creed. That creed has lasted for centuries solely by the sanction of the victims - by means of the victims acceptance of punishment for breaking a code impossible to practice. But that code was intended to be broken. It is a code that thrives not on those who observe it, but on those who don't, a morality kept in existence not by virtue of its saints, but by the grace of its sinners. We have decided not to be sinners any longer. We have ceased breaking that moral code. We shall blast it out of existence forever by the one method that it can't withstand: by obeying it. We are obeying it. We are complying. In dealing with our fellow men, we are observing their code of values to the letter and sparing them all the evils they denounce. The mind is evil? We have withdrawn the works of our minds from society, and not a single idea of ours is to be used or known by men. Ability is a selfish evil that leaves no chance to those who are less able? We have withdrawn from the competition and left all chances open to incompetents. The pursuit of wealth is greed, the root of all evil? We do not seek to make fortunes any longer. It is evil to earn more than one's bare sustenance? We take nothing but the lowliest jobs and we produce, by the effort of our muscles, no more than we consume for our immediate needs - with not a penny nor an inventive thought left over to harm the world. It is evil to succeed, since success is made by the strong at the expense of the weak? We have ceased to burden the weak with our ambition and have left them free to prosper without us. It is evil to be an employer? We have no employment to offer. It is evil to own property? We own nothing. It is evil to enjoy one's existence in this world? Their is no form of enjoyment we seek from their world, and - this was the hardest for us to attain - what we now feel for their world is that emotion which they preach as an ideal: indifference - the blank - the zero - the mark of death... We are giving men everything they've professed to want and to seek as virtue for centuries. Now let them see whether they want it.
"We've heard so much about strikes, and about the dependence of the uncommon man upon the common. We've heard it shouted that the industrialist is a parasite, that his workers support him, create his wealth, make his luxury possible - and what would happen to him if they walked out? Very well. I propose to show the world who depends on whom, who supports whom, who is the source of wealth, who makes whose livelihood possible and what happens to whom when who walks out."
- John Galt
"We've heard so much about strikes, and about the dependence of the uncommon man upon the common. We've heard it shouted that the industrialist is a parasite, that his workers support him, create his wealth, make his luxury possible - and what would happen to him if they walked out? Very well. I propose to show the world who depends on whom, who supports whom, who is the source of wealth, who makes whose livelihood possible and what happens to whom when who walks out."
- John Galt
Monday, January 15, 2007
In the Time of Your Life
In the time of your life, live – so that in that good time, there shall be no ugliness or death for yourself or for any life that your life touches.
Seek goodness everywhere and, when it is found, bring it out of its hiding-place and let it be free and unashamed.
Discover in all things that which shines and is beyond corruption.
Encourage virtue in every heart where it may have been driven into secrecy and sorrow by the shame and terror of the world.
Ignore the unimportant, for it is unworthy of the clear eye and the rational mind.
Be not the inferior of any man, nor aspire to superiority over men. Remember that every man is a variation on the same theme, but let no man’s guilt be yours, nor allow yourself claim to another man’s innocence.
Despise evil and wickedness, and fight it by the power of your own virtue – with every fiber of your being. For the men who turn to evil will prey upon your understanding, your generosity, and your love of life.
Have no shame in being gentle, but if the time comes in the time of your life to kill, kill. And have no regret.
In the time of your life, live – so that in that wondrous time, you shall not add to the sorrow and misery of the world, but experience the infinite delight of achieving the happiness possible only to you while in it.
-- William Saroyan (1939) / revised by Eros (2005)
Seek goodness everywhere and, when it is found, bring it out of its hiding-place and let it be free and unashamed.
Discover in all things that which shines and is beyond corruption.
Encourage virtue in every heart where it may have been driven into secrecy and sorrow by the shame and terror of the world.
Ignore the unimportant, for it is unworthy of the clear eye and the rational mind.
Be not the inferior of any man, nor aspire to superiority over men. Remember that every man is a variation on the same theme, but let no man’s guilt be yours, nor allow yourself claim to another man’s innocence.
Despise evil and wickedness, and fight it by the power of your own virtue – with every fiber of your being. For the men who turn to evil will prey upon your understanding, your generosity, and your love of life.
Have no shame in being gentle, but if the time comes in the time of your life to kill, kill. And have no regret.
In the time of your life, live – so that in that wondrous time, you shall not add to the sorrow and misery of the world, but experience the infinite delight of achieving the happiness possible only to you while in it.
-- William Saroyan (1939) / revised by Eros (2005)
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Every story has a beginning
...but does every story have an end? The continuing saga of the human race might seem to suggest that an ending is not only unnecessary, but nigh impossible. As I gaze back through time, into the annals of scientific discovery, upon the lives and work of the numerous intrepid individuals whose commitment to reason, truth and reality have paved the way for civilization as we know it and as it might be someday, I am not humbled by their achievements or their genius, I am inspired.
Men like Aristotle, who identified the fact that A is A, that identity is a metaphysical necessity, and that a thing does what it does because it is what it is, who then applied this principle to human consciousness and developed Logic, the method of proper human thought, which is the ability to identify facts and develop ideas which correspond to, and assist in maintaining a proper relationship with, reality (i.e. truth).
Men like Archimedes, who integrated the above mentioned principles into his own modus operandi, who believed that the world is not only intelligible, but that the highest possible to man is to understand nature and make use of it for the betterment of one's existence. Archimedes was a man of such strict and purposeful rationality, that he was able to independently develop analytic geometry and discover the formula (among others) for the area of a circle, inductively. He is the ultimate example of man as a being far beyond the reaches of jungle law and savage animality: when Rome laid siege to Syracuse, he used his mind and inventions to defend his city, and held off the far more numerous Roman army for 18 months, single-handedly. Proving that brute strength has no place in determining the future of the rational being.
Men like Galileo, who developed the first astronomical telescope, and refused to betray the evidence of his senses. Being able to observe so much evidence of the truth about our solar system only strengthened his intellectual conviction, his devotion to truth and reality, and his moral integrity - a profoundly selfish character, he refused to subordinate the judgment of his own mind, even under threat of death by the Inquisition of the Catholic Church.
Men like Isaac Newton, who proved that induction is not only a valid process of acquiring knowledge, but also a necessary one. He was not afraid of reality, of formulating universal, all-encompassing principles which would apply equally to all things and all men. He showed that there is nothing in existence above or below the laws of nature, whether an apple, a shipping clerk, the planet jupiter, or an immaterial concept created and clung to by men out of a desperate longing for that seemingly unattainable spirit - the highest - which they have either given up or could never find in themselves.
Archimedes knew that spirit. So did the other men on this list, and they all practiced it. There have been others throughout the centuries, too many name here, and yet so few that the shame and guilt one sees in the faces moving down the sidewalks of any city in this country is palpable, undeniable, and sad. Those who have betrayed the greatness possible to man, and only man, know it somewhere in their souls, and show it somewhere on their face.
So this is the beginning of a story, the end of a mythos, and the continuation of a saga.
Someone asked me once, "If you could be anyone in all of history, who would you be?"
"Me."
"You? Come on, you can be anyone."
"Me. No question. I have an advantage no other great man in history ever had."
"What's that?"
"I don't have to spend time doing the great things he already did. I can push the envelope farther than ever. I can reach heights possible only because those men came before, and here I am now."
Men like Aristotle, who identified the fact that A is A, that identity is a metaphysical necessity, and that a thing does what it does because it is what it is, who then applied this principle to human consciousness and developed Logic, the method of proper human thought, which is the ability to identify facts and develop ideas which correspond to, and assist in maintaining a proper relationship with, reality (i.e. truth).
Men like Archimedes, who integrated the above mentioned principles into his own modus operandi, who believed that the world is not only intelligible, but that the highest possible to man is to understand nature and make use of it for the betterment of one's existence. Archimedes was a man of such strict and purposeful rationality, that he was able to independently develop analytic geometry and discover the formula (among others) for the area of a circle, inductively. He is the ultimate example of man as a being far beyond the reaches of jungle law and savage animality: when Rome laid siege to Syracuse, he used his mind and inventions to defend his city, and held off the far more numerous Roman army for 18 months, single-handedly. Proving that brute strength has no place in determining the future of the rational being.
Men like Galileo, who developed the first astronomical telescope, and refused to betray the evidence of his senses. Being able to observe so much evidence of the truth about our solar system only strengthened his intellectual conviction, his devotion to truth and reality, and his moral integrity - a profoundly selfish character, he refused to subordinate the judgment of his own mind, even under threat of death by the Inquisition of the Catholic Church.
Men like Isaac Newton, who proved that induction is not only a valid process of acquiring knowledge, but also a necessary one. He was not afraid of reality, of formulating universal, all-encompassing principles which would apply equally to all things and all men. He showed that there is nothing in existence above or below the laws of nature, whether an apple, a shipping clerk, the planet jupiter, or an immaterial concept created and clung to by men out of a desperate longing for that seemingly unattainable spirit - the highest - which they have either given up or could never find in themselves.
Archimedes knew that spirit. So did the other men on this list, and they all practiced it. There have been others throughout the centuries, too many name here, and yet so few that the shame and guilt one sees in the faces moving down the sidewalks of any city in this country is palpable, undeniable, and sad. Those who have betrayed the greatness possible to man, and only man, know it somewhere in their souls, and show it somewhere on their face.
So this is the beginning of a story, the end of a mythos, and the continuation of a saga.
Someone asked me once, "If you could be anyone in all of history, who would you be?"
"Me."
"You? Come on, you can be anyone."
"Me. No question. I have an advantage no other great man in history ever had."
"What's that?"
"I don't have to spend time doing the great things he already did. I can push the envelope farther than ever. I can reach heights possible only because those men came before, and here I am now."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)