dyslexic begonias

The term nonsense is one of the most baffling words in our vocabulary. It has a negative quality only, like death. Nobody can explain nonsense: it can only be demonstrated. To add, moreover, that sense and nonsense are interchangeable is only to labor the point. Nonsense belongs to other worlds, other dimensions, and the gesture with which we put it from us at times, the finality with which we dismiss it, testifies to its disturbing nature. Whatever we can not include within our narrow framework of comprehension we reject. Thus profundity and nonsense may be seen to have certain unsuspected affinities. -- Henry Miller, Sexus

What we think is less than what we know; What we know is less than what we love; What we love is so much less than what there is. And to that precise extent we are so much less than what we are. -- R.D. Laing, The Politics of Experience

I always see a lot of “positive thinking” sites on the 'net that deal with giving yourself affirmations to empower yourself. So many of these sites seem to treat affirmation as something “new and exciting” that psychologists have just recently discovered, and that despite the efforts of Norman Vincente Peale has just recently been found useful to improvement of the human condition.

Well, I just recently purchased a new translation of a very old book, and was very moved by a particular section that I quote in part here:

May I stand amazed in the presence of the gods.
May the rhythm of my heart stir Music that enslaves darkness.
May my heart witness what my hands create, the words I utter, the worlds I think.
May my flesh be a sail propelled by the breath of dream.
May I ride in calm waters toward destiny.
May life flow through me as the seed from the phallus flows, with a shout of joy, life begetting life.
May I stand in the midst of celestial fire until my heart is molten gold.
May twelve goddesses dance every day about me, a circle of flesh aflame.
May I spin among them, my face flushed with heat.
May I walk on earth radiant, everywhere complete.
May the omniscient eye observe my deeds and know the law my heart knows, the zodiac of men and beasts alive, the call of angels, the word.
May my body bend toward the will of the heart.
May I not think and act diversely.
May truth rest on me light as a tail feather dropped from a falcon in cloudless sky.
May I create words of beauty, houses of wonder.
May the labor of my hands be mirrors unto the gods.
May I dance in the gyre and draw down heaven's blessing.
May I be given a god's duty, a burden that matters.
May I make of my days a thing wholly.
May I know myself in every pore of skin.
May the god's fire burn in my belly and heart.
May I be stronger than these bones and bits of flesh.
May my health be the wholeness of divinity.
I remember the names of my ancestors. I speak the names of those I love. I speak their names and they live again.
May I be so well-loved and remembered.
In truth, may the gods hear my name.
May I do work with my hands worth remembering.

-- from the speeches of Osiris, Awakening Osiris - The Egyptian Book of the Dead, Normandi Ellis

There is a book by Kenny Werner called Effortless Mastery: Liberating the Master Musician Within that I cannot recommend more highly to anyone who thinks they ever were, ever wanted to be, or ever will be a Musician. The introduction to this book is so personally moving to me; it describes almost exactly what I feel being a Musician is all about. I don't think Kenny would mind if I shared it here with you - perhaps it will convince you to purchase the book (and its accompanying CD of guided meditations) for yourselves.

There is an ocean. It is a drop of consciousness, an ocean of bliss. Each one of us is a drop in that ocean. In that sense, we are all one - or as a famous American television commercial states, “We're all connected.” Illusion would have us think that we are all separate entities, separate drops. But if that were true, we would all evaporate rather quickly.

As we expand our limited selves into this infinite consciousness, we tap into a great network of infinite possibilities, infinite creativity - great, great power. Carried by the waves of this ocean, we swirl past all limitations and maximize our potential. Everything good that can possibly happen to us, from within and without, does. Our abilities expand beyond all reasonable limits, and we become a magnetic force for abundant light and all that that implies.

We are all part of a universal game. Returning to our essence while living in the world is the object of the game. The earth is the game board, and we are the pieces on the board. We move around and around until we remember who we really are, and then we can be taken off the board. At that point, we are no longer the game-piece, but the player; we've won the game.

As Musicians/healers, it is our destiny to conduct an inward search, and to document it with our Music so that others may benefit. As they listen to the Music coming through us, they too are inspired to look within. Light is being transmitted and received from soul to soul. Gradually, the planet moves from darkness to light. We as Musicians must surrender to the ocean of our inner selves. We must descend deep into that ocean while the sludge of the ego floats on the surface. We let go of our egos and permit the Music to come through us and do its work. We act as the instruments for that work.

If we can live in this realization, we will constantly have deep motivation for what is played, never getting stuck in the ungrateful consciousness of good gigs/bad gigs, out-of-tune pianos, low fees, ungracious audiences, and so on. Instead, our minds will be consumed with what a very great privilege it is to be the one selected to deliver the message to others. We will no longer be caught in the mundane world of good Music/bad Music (“am I playing well?”). Instead, our hearts and minds will be focused on the task of remaining empty and alert to receiving this inspired information and translating it faithfully, without any coloration from us.

- Kenny Werner, Effortless Mastery

Enjoy the day, ya'll...

“As long as mankind shall continue to bestow more liberal applause on their destroyers than on their benefactors, the thirst of military glory will ever be the vice of the most exalted characters.” -- Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. I

To think that it has been two hundred and twenty eight years since that observation was made. So many have been the advances, so far have we traveled, how much cleaner are our streets now ... and how much we have forgotten, forgotten to remember. Santayana said that those who do not learn from the past are fated to repeat it. Lo, how our great and wondrous empire stretches and cracks at the seams, this great and mighty ship, this grand republic, festers and rots from within from its self-inflicted, neglected and overlooked wounds.

What price freedom? Is the individual or the state more important? These are indeed quite rapidly becoming Orwellian times, my friends.

“As a result of this overwhelming choice and the ease of going elsewhere, web users exhibit a remarkable impatience and insistence on instant gratification. If they can't figure out how to use a website in a minute or so, they conclude that it won't be worth their time. And they leave.” -- Jakob Nielson, Designing Web Usability

And this is the audience to which our web-based creative endeavours are being presented. No wonder there is such a plethora of easily digestible art on the web. It provides instant gratification, and sensation that you don't have to think about, or work at, or become involved with in any way except superficially. After all, relief from awareness is only a click away.

“Do not steal a minaret if you have not already dug a well to hide it in.”

“If you do not have room in your house for an elephant, do not make friends with an elephant tamer.”

“Never name the well from which you will not drink.”

-- Sufi proverbs

From Henry Miller, Obscenity and the Law of Reflection:

As civilization progresses it becomes more and more apparent that war is the greatest release which life offers to the ordinary man. Here he can let go to his heart's content for here crime no longer has any meaning. Guilt is abolished when the whole planet swims in blood. The lulls of peacetime seem only to permit him to sink deeper into the bogs of the sadistic-masochistic complex which has fastened itself into the heart of our civilized life like a cancer. Fear, guilt and murder - these constitute the real triumvirate which rules our lives. What is obscene then? The whole fabric of our life as we know it today. To speak only of what is indecent, foul, lewd, filthy, disgusting, etc., in connection with sex, is to deny ourselves the luxury of the great gamut of revulsion-repulsion which modern life puts at our service. Every department of life is vitiated and corroded with what is so unthinkingly labeled “obscene.” One wonders if perhaps the insane could not invent a more fitting, more inclusive term for the polluting elements of life which we create and shun and never identify with our behavior. We think of the insane as inhabiting a world completely divorced from reality, but our own everyday behavior , whether in war or peace, bears all the ear-marks of insanity. “I have said,” writes a well-known psychologist, “that this is a mad world; that man is most of the time mad; and I believe that in a way, what we call morality is merely a form of madness, which happens to be a working adaptation to existing circumstances.”

Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Jesse Helms.

More from Henry Miller, Obscenity and the Law of Reflection:

The chances are that during this transition period of global wars, lasting perhaps a century or two, art will become less and less important. A world torn by indescribable upheavals, a world preoccupied with social and political transformations, will have less time and energy to spare for the creation and appreciation of works of art. The politician, the soldier, the industrialist, the technician, all those in short who cater to immediate needs, to creature comforts, to transitory and illusory passions and prejudices, will take precedence over the artist. The most poetic inventions will be those capable of serving the most destructive ends. Poetry itself will be expressed in terms of block-busters and lethal gases. The obscene will find expression in the most unthinkable techniques of self-destruction which the inventive genius of man will be forced to adopt. The revolt and disgust which the prophetic spirits in the realm of art have inspired, through their vision of a world in the making, will find justification in the years to come as these dreams are acted out.

And to think, his books were banned in this country for the longest time. I do not wonder why.

Oh my dear friend, would you like to know why genius so rarely breaks its bonds, why it so seldom bursts upon us like a raging torrent to shatter our astounded souls? My friend, it is because of the sober gentlemen who reside on either side of the river, whose precious little summerhomes, tulip beds, and vegetable gardens would be ruined by it, and who know so well how to build dams and divert all such threatening danger in good time. -- Johann Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther

If interested, please check out my little thingie called:
Monotheists Anonymous
A Twelve Step Program for Decreasing Spiritual Density

Probably the hardest part of this journey is the point at which you realize there is no Big Book. Once you have reached that epiphany, you can start working the Steps.

Step One
We admitted that we had total and full responsibility for our thoughts, actions and lives, whether we perceived them as good, bad or indifferent.
Step Two
We ceased to believe that a third party, seen or unseen, could be blamed for our situation, or could restore us to sanity.
Step Three
We made a decision to seek a balance with the divine energies that exist in all life, as we understand them, accepting and cherishing the both male and female nature of these energies, and at the same time, recognizing that each individual's perception of the divine is unique to themselves.
Step Four
We made a searching and fearless inventory of our fears, social conditioning, religious/mythological worldview and educational limitations, identifying those areas of our thinking that did not accurately reflect reality, as we understood it.
Step Five
We admitted to ourselves and to another living creature the exact nature of our interdependence and co-creative responsibilities, as fully functioning egalitarian participants in the Universe.
Step Six
We became entirely ready to seek a balance between the “light” and “dark”, realizing that duality is a function of perception.
Step Seven
We humbly accepted our shortcomings and sought to overcome them, and in doing so, came to an understanding, acceptance and appreciation of the shortcomings of others.
Step Eight
We made a list of all persons we had harmed and accepted full responsibility in this life and the next for the consequences of our harmful actions.
Step Nine
We made direct amends to those we had harmed who would accept those amends, except when to do so would interfere with operation of another's will, and accepted the loss in our lives of those who would not either accept amends, or make them to us.
Step Ten
We continued to consciously examine our motives for thought and action, and to seek positive change in ourselves through the application of internally embraced ethics, rather than externally imposed morality.
Step Eleven
We sought through personal and meaningful ritual, meditation and communion with nature to improve our conscious awareness of the Life Force inhabiting all things, seeking to realign ourselves with the Universal Current and resolving to Know, to Will, to Dare and to Keep Silent.
Step Twelve
Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we shared our path with others when those paths coincided with our own, but realized that each must find their own way, their own path, and did not attempt to convince anyone of the suitability of our own path for any but ourselves.
Although this page is intended as a parody, it may also be taken seriously. Results in the program, however, will vary depending on how seriously you take yourself.

Lack of money is no obstacle. Lack of an idea is an obstacle.
-- Ken Hakuta

“There is a class that controls a country that is stupid and does not realize anything and never can. That is why we have this war.” -- Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms

Perfection is not perfect actions in a perfect world, but rather, appropriate actions in an imperfect one.

Arriving in India in 1964 was like walking into a concert that had been playing for five thousand years with seven hundred million people in the band. -- Bhagavan Das, It's Here Now, Are You?

The politics of those whose goal is beyond time are always pacific; it is the idolaters of past and future, of reactionary memory and Utopian dream, who do the persecuting and make wars...The philosophy that rationalizes war and military training is always (whatever the official religion of the politicians and war makers) some wildly unrealistic doctrine of national, racial or ideological idolatry, having, as its inevitable corollaries, the notions of Herrenvolk* and “the lesser breeds without the Law.” Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy * Translation from German: “Nation of the Masters”

The difference between the mortified, but still proud and self-centered stoic and the unmortified hedonist consists in this: the latter, being flabby, shiftless and at heart rather ashamed of himself, lacks the energy and the motive to do much harm except to his own body, mind and spirit; the former, because he has all the secondary virtues and looks down on those who are not like himself, is morally equipped to wish and to be able to do harm on the very largest scale and with a perfectly untroubled conscience. These are obvious facts; and yet, in the current religious jargon of our day the word “immoral” is reserved almost exclusively for the carnally self-indulgent. The covetous and the ambitious, the respectable toughs and those who cloak their lust for power and place under the right sort of idealistic cant, are not merely unblamed; they are even held up as models of virtue and godliness. The representatives of the organized churches begin by putting haloes on the heads of the people who do most to make wars and revolutions, then go on, rather plaintively, to wonder why the world should be in such a mess. -- Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy

Take note of this fundamental truth...The creature with its free will can bring nothing into being, nor make any alteration in the working of nature; it can only change its own state or place in the working of nature, and so feel or find something in its state that it did not feel or find before. -- Law, William (1686-1761), English spiritual writer and mystic

True happiness, we are told, consists in getting out of one's self, but the point is not only to get out - you've got to stay out; and to stay out you must have some absorbing errand. -- Henry James

One should not honour only one's own religion and condemn the religions of others, but one should honour others' religions for this or that reason. So doing, one helps one's own religion to grow and renders service to the religions of others too. In acting otherwise one digs the grave of one's own religion and also does harm to other religions. Whosoever honours his own religion and condemns other religions, does so indeed through devotion to his own religion, thinking “I will glorify my own religion.” But on the contrary, in so doing he injures his own religion more gravely. So concord is good: Let all listen, and be willing to listen to the doctrines professed by others. -- Emperor Asoka of India, 3rd century B.C., Rock Edict, XII.

Existence is a sea; man's speech its shore;
Letters its oyster-shells, pearls of the heart's wisdom.
With every wave a thousand pearls of price
Scattered around, of knowledge, of imagery,
New facts to grasp, conclusions fresh to draw,
A thousand waves with every breath arise,
No less is in one drop than in them all.
Wisdom, existence, doth that sea contain;
Its outward envelope is speech and sound.
Here understanding halts; and more,
Save in a parable, may not be given.
from The Secret Garden
Mahmud Shabistari, 13th Century Persian sage

My religion is to live - and die - without regret. -- Milarepa, 1052-1135 CE

Money is not wealth. Wealth is the accomplished technological ability to protect, nurture, support, and accommodate all growful needs of life. Money is only an expediency-adopted means of interexchanging disparately sized, nonequatable items of real wealth. -- R. Buckminister Fuller, Critical Path

OK, so I feel a little giddy today. So I thought I'd pull this out of the archive:
Monotheists Anonymous
A Twelve Step Program for Decreasing Spiritual Density
Probably the hardest part of this journey is the point at which you realize there is no Big Book. Once you have reached that epiphany, you can start working the Steps.

Step One We admitted that we had total and full responsibility for our thoughts, actions and lives, whether we perceived them as good, bad or indifferent.

Step Two We ceased to believe that a third party, seen or unseen, could be blamed for our situation, or could restore us to sanity.
Step Three We made a decision to seek a balance with the divine energies that exist in all life, as we understand them, accepting and cherishing the both male and female nature of these energies, and at the same time, recognizing that each individual's perception of the divine is unique to themselves.

Step Four We made a searching and fearless inventory of our fears, social conditioning, religious/mythological worldview and educational limitations, identifying those areas of our thinking that did not accurately reflect reality, as we understood it.
Step Five We admitted to ourselves and to another living creature the exact nature of our interdependence and co-creative responsibilities, as fully functioning egalitarian participants in the Universe.
Step Six We became entirely ready to seek a balance between the “light” and “dark”, realizing that duality is a function of perception.
Step Seven We humbly accepted our shortcomings and sought to overcome them, and in doing so, came to an understanding, acceptance and appreciation of the shortcomings of others.
Step Eight We made a list of all persons we had harmed and accepted full responsibility in this life and the next for the consequences of our harmful actions.

Step Nine We made direct amends to those we had harmed who would accept those amends, except when to do so would interfere with operation of another's will, and accepted the loss in our lives of those who would not either accept amends, or make them to us.
Step Ten We continued to consciously examine our motives for thought and action, and to seek positive change in ourselves through the application of internally embraced ethics, rather than externally imposed morality.
Step Eleven We sought through personal and meaningful ritual, meditation and communion with nature to improve our conscious awareness of the Life Force inhabiting all things, seeking to realign ourselves with the Universal Current and resolving to Know, to Will, to Dare and to Keep Silent.
Step Twelve Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we shared our path with others when those paths coincided with our own, but realized that each must find their own way, their own path, and did not attempt to convince anyone of the suitability of our own path for any but ourselves.

Although this guide is intended as a parody, it may also be taken seriously. Results in the program, however, will vary depending on how seriously you take yourself.
(Copyright 2000 John Litzenberg. All Rights Reserved.)

Here's something that regardless of your worldview and spiritual/religious persuation, it is useful to bear in mind:

If there is a way to overcome the suffering, then there is no need to worrry; if there is no way to overcome the suffering, then there is no use in worrying. -- Shantideva, A Guide to the Bodhisattva Way of Life

In the United States, the majority undertakes to supply a multitude of ready-made opinions for the use of individuals, who are thus relieved from the necessity of forming opinions themselves. Everybody there adopts great numbers of theories, on philosophy, morals, and politics, without inquiry, upon public trust; and if we look to it very narrowly, it will be perceived that religion herself holds sway there much less as a doctrine of revelation than as a commonly received opinion.

-- Alexis de Toqueville, 1805-1859, Democracy in America

In other words, equality does not equal independence, and liberty does not equate to freedom, particularly of thought.

Not that the incredulous person doesn't believe in anything. It's just that he doesn't believe in everything. Or he believes in one thing at a time. He believes a second thing only if it somehow follows from the first thing. He is nearsighted and methodical, avoiding wide horizons. If two things don't fit, but you believe both of them, thinking that somewhere, hidden, there must be a third thing that connects them, that's credulity.

Incredulity doesn't kill curiosity; it encourages it. Though distrustful of logical chains of ideas, I loved the polyphony of ideas. As long as you don't believe in them, the collision of two ideas --- both false --- can create a pleasing interval, a kind of diabolus in Musica. I had no respect for some ideas people were willing to stake their lives on, but two or three ideas that I did not respect might still make a nice melody. Or have a goot beat, and if it was jazz, all the better.

-- Umberto Eco, from Foucault's Pendulum

Seen on a t-shirt in a radical catalog:
"I'll be a post-feminist in the post-patriarchy"

This one passage from The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna has informed so much of my spiritual practice. Much of my poetry is an attempt to convey this same basic truth in a myriad of ways:

Wherever I look, I see men quarrelling in the name of religion --- Hindus, Mohammendans, Brahmos, Vaishnavas, and the rest. But they never reflect that He who is called Krishna is also called Siva, and bears the name of the Primal Energy, Jesus, and Allah as well --- the same Rama with a thous and names. A lake has several ghats. At one the Hindus take water in pitchers and call it 'jal'; at another the Mussalmans take water in leather bags and call it 'pani'. At a third the Christians call it 'water'. Can we imagine that it is not 'jal', but only 'pani' or 'water'? How ridiculous! The substance is One under different names, and everyone is seeking the same substance; only climate, temperament, and name create differences. Let each man follow his own path. If he sincerely and ardently wishes to know God, peace be unto him! He will surely realize Him. -- Sri Ramakrishna (1836-1886)

A ghat is a broad flight of steps leading down to the bank of a river in India, used especially by bathers.

The world goes on because civilized men exist.
Without them it would collapse into mere dust.
Though their minds are as sharp as a rasp,
Men without human decency are as wooden as a tree.
-Tirukkural 100:997-8
Excerpted from the Tirukkural, translated by Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami.
Copyright Himalayan Academy Publications, www.himalayanacademy.com.

To accept one's karma and the responsibility for one's actions is strength.
To blame another is weakness and foolishness.
Let's begin by not advertising our ignorance.
If you must blame what happens to you on your friend,
your neighbor, your country, your community or the world,
don't advertise it by speaking about it.
Keep that ignorance to yourself.
Limit it to the realm of thought.
Harness your speech and at the same time
work to remold your thinking
and retrain your subconscious
to actually accept this basic premise.

-- from Living with Siva by Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami

You are the river and sea,
cause of all things that can be.
Within the embrace of your loving arms
we are warm, safe and free.

Upon the face of the earth
you provide life, and give birth
to a thousand forms of endless beauty,
giving each sense of worth.

In the dark recess of night
the flame of your love burns bright;
Our shadows fade, and we find in your face
our infinite delight.

Mother of all living things,
the world your praises still sings;
and a thousand voices, hearing the song,
seek your divine blessings.

From your hand we drink of wine,
and from your bounty we dine.
You offer us eternal bliss and love,
and we are wholly thine.

Your word is steady and true,
and guides us in all we do;
We see your face behind each thing that breathes;
All is a part of you.

Mistress that a thousand name,
the spark behind each soul's flame,
mighty goddess, we offer words of praise -
from you, each of us came.

You are the source of our arts,
the breath that moves our still hearts.
What gifts we have are from your loving hand;
With you, all living starts.

You are the blesséd giver,
life's promise delivered;
Keeper of all that to your land belong,
Queen of sea and river.

20 SEP 2001

From the wonderful book The Maiden King: The Reunion of Masculine and Feminine by Robert Bly and Marion Woodman. This bit from Marion:

...the arts are becoming frills in the eyes not only of the government but of many citizens as well. As budgets are being balanced, the arts suffer because so many tutors [status quo protectors] are so far away from the soul they simply don't care...Their head is separated from their heart. What these pathetic tutors who pass these laws do not realize is that young people do start out with imagination, with enthusiasm. Take away their disciplined outlets and they are birds without wings. Moreover, their frustration at not being able to soar results in rage, which they have no idea how to contain. Any one of the arts can give them a container strong enough to hold their natural frustrations until it distills into paint, or dance, or song. Any teacher knows how much energy is required to teach a student how to hold the container solid enough until the emotion has time to resolve itself into an art form. That is what culture is. Our tutors are passing laws that will destroy what has taken centuries to build --- a civilization that can contain its own vision. Without the arts, the principal is shot in his office instead of Julius Caesar being massacred with yardsticks in the classroom. Raw instinct runs rampant in the streets, imagination is ciphered into primitive behavior, spiritual and moral values cease to exist, and the millions that are saved are spent in building boot camps to try to contain thugs.

A tag line on a message from a discussion group included part of a quote from e.e. cummings that I have tacked on my wall to remind me of what I'm supposed to be doing as a poet.

I first encountered it, strangely enough, in the foreward to Critical Path written by R. Buckminster Fuller. He found inspiration in this simple set of instructions, and so do I.

A Poet's Advice

A poet is somebody who feels, and who expresses his feelings through words. This may sound easy. It isn't.

A lot of people think or believe or know they feel --- but that's thinking or believing or knowing; not feeling. And poetry is feeling --- not knowing or believing or thinking.

Almost anybody can learn to think or believe or know, but not a single human being can be taught to feel. Why? Because whenever you think or you believe or you know, you're a lot of other people; but the moment you feel, you're nobody-but-yourself.

To be nobody-but-yourself --- in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else --- menas to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.

As for expressing nobody-but-yourself in words, that means working just a little harder than anybody who isn't a poet can possibly imagine. Why? Because nothing is quite as easy as using words like somebody else. We all of us do exactly this nearly all of the time --- and whenever we do it, we are not poets.

If at the end of your first ten or fifteen years of fighting and working and feeling, you find you've written one line of one poem, you'll be very lucky indeed.

And so my advice to all young people who wish to become poets is: do something easy, like learning how to blow up the world --- unless you're not only willing, but glad, to feel and work and fight till you die.

Does this sound dismal? It isn't. It's the most wonderful life on earth.

Or so I feel.

-- e.e. cummings

Grantland Rice (1880-1954) was a sportswriter for the New York Herald-Tribune. He was really one of the first, if not the first, famous sportscasters, immortalizing Knute Rockne's Notre Dame squad as the "Four Horsemen" of the apocalypse, among other things, and coining many a pithy stanza along the way (e.g., "There's no dearth of kindness in this world of ours; Only in our blindness we gather thorns for flowers."). I imagine that his colorful commentary was often repeated by those growing up in the first part of the 20th century, particularly by boys like my father (born in 1928, the same year as Mickey Mouse). Such things leave great impressions. My father, for example, until his death often repeated something of Rice's every now and again:

"When the one Great Scorer comes to score and writes against your name, He marks not whether you won or lost, but how you played the game."

In other words, it's the means that matter. Never the ends. That's a good thing to bear in mind.

Something to think about in the context of today's America and unrest around the world (emphases mine):

Hitler was able to enslave his own people because he seemed to give them something that even the traditional religions could no longer provide; the belief in a meaning to existence beyond the narrowest self-interest.

The real degradation began when people realized that they were in league with the Devil, but felt that even the Devil was preferable to the emptiness of an existence which lacked a larger significance.

The problem today is to give that larger significance and dignity to a life that has been dwarfed by the world of material things. Until that problem is solved, the annihilation of Naziism will be no more than the removal of one symptom of the world's unrest.

-- Konrad Heiden, Der Fuehrer, 1944