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The New World Under Construction
Nazism is an economic and political issue, but the hold it has over a whole people has to be understood on psychological grounds. The psychological aspect of Nazism, its human basis suggests two problems: the character structure of those people to whom it appealed, and the psychological characteristics of the ideology that made it such an effective instrument with regard to those people. In considering the psychological basis for the success of Nazism this differentiation has to be made at the outset: one part of the population bowed to the Nazi regime without any strong resistance, but also without becoming admirers of the Nazi ideology and political practice. Another part was deeply attracted to the new ideology and fanatically attached to the new ideology and fanatically attached to those who proclaimed it. The first group consisted mainly of the working class and the liberal and Catholic bourgeoisie. In spite of an excellent organization, especially among the working class, these groups, although continuously hostile to Nazism from its beginning up to 1933, did not show the inner resistance one might have expected as the outcome of their political convictions. Their will to resist collapsed quickly and since then they have caused little difficulty for the regime (excepting, of course, the small minority which has fought heroically against Nazism during all these years). Being a member of the SS in a society like Nazi Germany was a matter of considerable significance. In the Soviet Union, another revolutionary society, people who rose into the elite were called “new people.” They were people of the future, liberated from old norms, and distinct from the nobility of the old regime, who had attained their rank and privileges through birth or wealth. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
The SS were the new people of Nazi Germany. However, their distinction was based less on class (as in the USSR) than on the perception that they had especially good blood. This was their entrée into the elite of the new World under construction. Early in the war, Otto Meckelburg serves as an adjutant in the Death’s Head regiment, which oversaw the administration of Germany’s concentration camps. No “task was ever too much” for Mr. Mechelburg, his boss wrote in 1940; he was always “fresh and eager to work.” Mr. Meckelburg participated in the Germans’ early campaigns in Poland and the west, and later at the Eastern Front and in Yugoslavia. He was decorated a number of times during the war and moved up the ranks. In September 1942, he was made company commander in the notorious Prince Eugen Division, whose counterinsurgency operations involved numerous war crimes, many against civilians. Whatever the precise nature of his wartime deeds, Mr. Meckelburg would be repeatedly lauded by his superiors for “particularly successful leadership” and promoted. The officer urging his promotion to Sturmbannfuhrer in 1943 described him as “open, direct, and straight-as-an-arrow,” with an “impeccably SS attitude.” He had, another assessor observed in 1944, an “instinct for the possibilities of a given situation.” Psychologically, this readiness to submit to the Nazi regime seems to be due mainly to a state of inner tiredness and resignation, which, is characteristic of the individual in the present era even in democratic countries. In Germany one additional condition was present as far as the working class was concerned: the defeat it suffered after the first victories in the revolution of 1918. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
The working class had entered the postwar period with strong hopes for the realization of socialism or last least for a definite rise in its political, economic, and social position; but, whatever the reasons, it had witnessed an unbroken succession of defeats, which brought about the complete disappointments of all its hopes. By the beginning of 1930 the fruits of its initial victories were almost completely destroyed and the result was a deep feeling of resignation, of disbelief in their leaders, of doubt about the value of any kind of political organization and political activity. They still remained members of their respective parties and, consciously, continued to believe in their political doctrines; but deep within themselves many had given up any hope in the effectiveness of political actions. An additional incentive for the loyalty of the majority of the population to the Nazi government because effect after Mr. Hitler came into power. For millions of people Mr. Hitler’s government then became identical with “Germany.” Once he held the power of the government, fighting him implied shutting oneself out of the community of Germans; when other political parties were abolished and the Nazi party “was” Germany, opposition to it meant opposition to Germany. It seems that nothing is more difficult for the average man to bear than the feeling of not being identified with a larger group. However much a German citizen may be opposed to the principles of Nazim, if he has to choose between being alone and feeling that he belongs to Germany, most persons will choose the latter. It can be observed in many instances that persons who are not Nazis nevertheless defend Nazism against criticism of foreigners because they feel that an attack on Nazis is an attack on Germany. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
The fear of isolation and the relative weakness of moral principles help any party to win the loyalty of a large sector of the population once that part has captured the power of the state. This consideration results in an axiom which is important for the problems of political propaganda: any attack on Germany as such, any defamatory propaganda concerning “the Germans” (such as the “Hun” symbol of the last war), only increases the loyalty to those who are not wholly identified with the Nazi system. This problem, however, cannot be solved basically by skillful propaganda but only by the victory in all countries of one fundamental truth: that ethical principles stand above the existence of the nation and that by adhering to these principles an individual belongs to the community of all those who share, who have shared, and who will share this belief. In contrast to the negative or resigned attitude of the working class and of the liberal and Catholic bourgeoisie, the Nazi ideology was ardently greeted by the lower strata of the middle class, composed of small shopkeepers, artisans, and white-collar workers. In fact, 90 percents of doctors were connected to the Nazi Party. Members of the older generation among this class formed the more passive mass basis; their sons and daughters were the more active fighters. For them the Nazi ideology—its spirit of blind obedience to a leader and of hatred against racial and political minorities, its craving for conquest and domination, its exaltation of the German people and the “Nordic Race”—had a tremendous emotional appeal, and it was this appeal which won them over and made them into ardent believers in and fighters for the Nazi cause. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
The answer to the question why the Nazi ideology was so appealing to the lower middle class has to be sought for in the social character of the lower middle class. Their social character was markedly different from that of the working class, of the higher strata of the middle class, and of the nobility and the upper classes. As a matter of fact, certain features were characteristic for this part of the middle class throughout its history: their love of the strong, hatred of the weak, their pettiness, hostility, thriftiness with feelings as well as with money, and essentially their asceticism. Their outlook on life was narrow, they suspected and hated the stranger, and they were curious and envious of their acquaintances, rationalizing their envy as moral indignation; their whole life was based on the principle of scarcity—economically as well as psychologically. To say that the social character of the lower middle class differed from that of the working class does not imply that this character structure was not present in the working class also. However, it was typical for the lower middle class, while only a minority of the working class exhibited the same character structure in a similarly clear-cut fashion; the one or the other trait, however, in a less intense form, like enhanced respect of authority or thrift, was to be found in most members of the working class too. On the other hand it seems that a great part of the white-collar workers—probably the majority—more closely resembled the character structure of the manual workers (especially those in big factories) than that of the “old middle class,” which did not participate in the rise of monopolistic capitalism but was essentially threatened by it. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Although it is true that the social character of the lower middle class had been the same long before the war of 1914, it is also true that the events after the war intensified the very traits to which the Nazi ideology had its strong appeal: its craving for submission and its lust for power. There were, after all, times of spiritual malaise, of mistrust and heightened suspicion. In an atmosphere of determined, willful refusal to acknowledge basic facts, who could be blamed for imagining that evil was lurking about. It is precisely because reason is universal and transcends all nation borders, that the philosopher who follows reason is a citizen of the World; humans are their objects—not this or that person, or this or that nation. The World is one’s country, not the place where one was born. Humans fear thought more than they fear anything else on Earth—more than ruin, more even than death. Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible; thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habits; thought is anarchic and lawless, indifferent to authority, careless of the well-tried wisdom of the ages. Thought looks into the pit of hell and is not afraid. It sees a human being, a feeble speck, surrounded by unfathomable depths of silence; yet bears itself proudly, as unmoved as if it were lord of the Universe. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the World, and the chief glory of humans. However, if thought is to become the possession of many, not the privilege of few, we must have done with fear. It is fear that holds humans back—fear lest their cherished beliefs should prove delusions, fear lest the institutions by which they live should prove harmful, fear least they themselves should prove less worthy of respect than they have supposed themselves to be. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
“Should the working human think freely about property? Then what will become of us, the rich? Should young men and women think freely about sex? Then what will become of morality? Should soldiers think freely about war? Then what will become of military discipline? Away with thought! Back into the shades of prejudice, lest property, morals, and war should be endangered! Better men should be stupid, slothful, and oppressive than that their thoughts should be free. For if their thoughts were free, they might not think as we do. And at all costs this disaster must be averted.” So the opponents of thought argue in the unconscious depths of their souls. And so they act in their churches, their schools, and their universities. For some philosophers, the capacity to disobey is rooted, not in some abstract principle, but in the most real experience there is—in the love of life. This love of life shines through their writings as well as through the persons. It is a rare quality today, and especially rare in the very countries where humans live in the midst of plenty. Many confuse thrill with joy, excitement with interest, consuming with being. The necrophilous slogan “Long live death,” while consciously used only by the fascists, fills the heats of many people living in the lands of plenty, although they are not aware of it in themselves. It seems that in this fact lies of one the reasons in which explain why the majority of people are resigned to accept nuclear war and the ensuing destruction of civilization and to take so few steps to prevent this catastrophe. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
Some philosophers, on the contrary, fight against the threatening slaughter, not because they are pacifist or because some abstract principle is involved, but precisely because they are humans who love live. For the very same reason many have no use for those voices which love to harp on the evilness of humanity, in fact thus saying more about themselves and their only gloomy moods than about humans. While these steadfast individuals may not be sentimental romantics, they tend to be hard-headed, critical, caustic realist; they are aware of the depth of evil and stupidity to be found in the heart of humans, but they do not confuse this fact with an alleged innate corruption which serves to rationalize the outlook of those who are too gloomy to believe in man’s gift to create a World in those which they can feel themselves to be at home. Except for those rare spirits that are born without sin, there is a cavern of darkness to be traversed before that temple can be entered. The gate of the cavern is despair, and its floor is paved with the gravestones of abandoned hopes. The Self must die; there the eagerness, the greed of untamed desire must be slain, for only so can the soul be freed from the empire of Fate. However, out of the cavern the Gate of Renunciation leads again to the daylight of wisdom, by whose radiance a new insight, a new joy, a new tenderness, shine forth to gladden the pilgrim’s heart. However, those who feel that life on this planet would be a life in prison if it were not for the windows onto a greater World beyond; for those to whom a belief in human’s omnipotence seems arrogant, who desire rather the Stoic freedom that comes of mastery over the passions than the Napoleonic domination that sees the kingdoms of this World at its feet—in a word, to humans who do not find Man an adequate object of their worship, the pragmatist’s World will seem narrow and petty, robbing life of all that gives it value, and making Man himself smaller by depriving the Universe which he contemplates of all its splendour. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
With the increasing development of capitalism, not only economically but psychologically, the spiritual, humanistic aims of socialism were replaced by those of the victorious capitalist system—the aims of maximal economic efficiency, maximal production and consumption. This misinterpretation of socialism as a purely economic movement, along with an acceptance of the nationalization of the means of production as an aim in itself, occurred both in the right and left wings of the socialist movement. The primary aim of the reformist leaders of the socialist movement in Europe was the elevation of the economic status of the worker within the capitalist system. Their most radical measure in this effort was the nationalization of certain big industries. Only recently has it been realized that the nationalization of an enterprise is in itself not the realization of socialism, and that to be managed by a publicly appointed bureaucracy. The leaders of the Soviet Union evaluated socialism also by the standards of capitalism and their principal claim for the Soviet system is that “socialism” can produce more effectively and abundantly than “capitalism.” Both wings of socialism forget that Mr. Marx aimed at a humanly different society, not only at a more prosperous one. His concept of socialism, despite changes in the development of his own thinking, was principally that of an unalienated society in which every citizen would be an active and responsible member of the community, participating in the control of all social and economic arrangements and not, as the Soviet practice, a “number,” fed with ideologies and controlled by a small bureaucratic minority. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
For Mr. Marx, socialism was the control of society from below, by its members; not from above, by a bureaucracy. The Soviet Union may be called state capitalism, or anything else; one claim this managerial, bureaucratic system can not make is that of being “socialism” in Marx’s sense. No better answer can be given to this claim than Mr. Schumpeter’s statement that there is “between the true meaning of Marx’s message and Bolshevist practice and ideology at least as great a gulf as there was between the religion of humble Gallileans and the practice and ideology of the princes of the Church or the warlords of the Middle Ages.” While the Soviet system has borrowed the concept of the nationalization of the means of production and of over-all planning from Marxist socialism, it nonetheless shares many features with contemporary capitalism. The development of twentieth-century capitalism has led to an ever-growing centralization in industrial production. The big corporations are becoming increasingly the center of production in the steel, automobile, and chemical industries, in oil, food, banking, movies, and television. Only in certain branches of production, like the clothing industry, do we still find the nineteenth-century picture of a great number of small and highly competitive enterprises. Today’s big enterprises are directed by vast and hierarchically structured bureaucracies, which administer the enterprise according to the principles of profit maximization, yet are relatively independent of the millions of stockholders who are the legal owners. The same centralization has taken place in government, in the armed forces, and even in scientific research. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
While “private enterprises” decries ideologically all socialist tendencies, it is eager to accept large direct and indirect grants by the state. The same development has led to important changes with regard to free competition and free market. The free market and free competition in the nineteenth-century sense are phenomena of the past. Even though the Western system retain some measure of competition, overt and hidden price agreements between the big corporations, state grants, et cetera, have (in spite of anti-monopoly laws in the United States of America) greatly restricted competition and the function of the free market. Assuming, for a moment, that the tendency toward centralization develops further, and that there will eventually be only one big corporation producing, respectively, automobiles, steel, films, et cetera, the picture of “capitalist” economy would not be so drastically different from the Russian socialist economy. There is of course an increasing element in state planning in Western capitalism, not only through massive state intervention, but also in the sense that the Atomic Energy Commission is the largest industrial enterprise in the United States of America, and that the armament industry, although in private hands, produces a great mass of weapons according to plans made by the state. This, however, does not imply that there is over-all planning in the United States of America beyond arms production, or even a plan for the transition from an armament to a peace economy. The mode of production in contemporary capitalism is that of large conglomerations of workers and clerks who work under the orders of the managerial bureaucracies. They are part of a vast production machine which, in order to run at all, must run smoothly, without friction, without interruption. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
The individual worker or clerk becomes a cog in this machine; one’s functions and activities are determined by the whole structure of the organization in which one works. In the large enterprises, legal ownership of the means of production has become separated from its management, and has lost importance. The managers do not have the qualities of the old owners—individual initiative, daring, risk-taking—but the qualities of the bureaucrat—lack of individuality and imagination, impersonality, caution. They administer things and persons, and relate to persons as to things. The giant corporations, which control the economic—and to a large degree the political—destiny of the country, constitute the very opposite of the democratic process; they represent power without control by those whom they rule. Aside from the industrial bureaucracy, the bast majority of the population is administered by still other bureaucracies. First, there is the governmental bureaucracy, (including that of the armed forces) which influences and direct the lives of many millions in one form or another. More and more, the industrial, military and governmental bureaucracies are becoming intertwined, both in their activities and, increasingly, in their personnel. With the development of ever greater enterprises, unions also have developed into big bureaucratic machines in which the individual member has very little to say. Many union chiefs are managerial bureaucrats, just as the industrial chiefs are. All these bureaucracies have little authentic vision; and, due to the very nature of bureaucratic administration, this has to be so. They function rather like electronic computers, into which all the data have been fed and which—according to certain principles—make the “decisions.” #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
When humans are transformed into things and managed like things, their managers themselves become things; and things have no will, no vision, no plan. With the bureaucratic management of people, the democratic process becomes transformed into a ritual. Whether it is a stockholders meeting, or a political election, or a union meeting, the individual has lost almost all power to participate actively in the making of decision. Especially in the political sphere, elections become more and more reduced to plebiscites in which the voter can express preference for one of two slates of professional politicians. The best that can be said for that is that he is governed with his consent. However, the means used to bring about this consent are those of suggestion and manipulation and, with all that, the most fundamental decisions—those of foreign policy which involve peace and war—are made by small groups, which the average citizen hardly even knows of. Not only is the individual managed and manipulated in the sphere of production, but also in the sphere of consumption, which allegedly is the one in which one can express one’s free choice. Whether it is the consumption of food, clothing, liquor, cigarettes, or of films and television programs, a powerful suggestion apparatus is employed for two purposes: first, to increase constantly the appetite for new commodities, and second, to direct these appetites into the channels most profitable for industry. The very size of the capital investment in the consumer goods industry and the competition between a few giant enterprises makes it necessary not to leave consumption to chance, nor to leave the consumer a free choice of whether one want to be more and what one wants to buy. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
One’s appetites have to be constantly whetted; one’s tastes have to be manipulated, managed, and made predictable. Humans are transformed into the “consumer,” the eternal suckling whose one wish is to consumer more and “better” things. To maximize its own take, the kleptocratic government would ideally to drive everyone down to the subsistence or quiescence utility level. However, such a government, provided it is rational, will recognize the need to give the higher-skilled people sufficient marginal incentives to reveal their skills, because this increases its net extraction from the economy. Therefore, it will keep only the least-skilled person at the lowest utility level, and allow the successively higher-skilled people to enjoy successively higher utility levels. Casual observation confirms that predatory governments do indeed treat the poor harshly. (A benevolent government will also have to tolerate some inequality in the interests of revelation of high skills, but it will keep even the worst-off person above the subsistence level. In fact a government with an extremely egalitarian—so-called Rawlsian—objective function wants to maximize the utility of the least-well-off person, to the extent permitted by the information and resource constraints.) Lowering the marginal tax rate on any one person reduces the revenue that the government can get from all those with higher skills. This is costly to the government: directly so for the kleptocratic government, and indirectly for the benevolent government because that tightens its revenue constraint and makes it harder to deliver utilities to citizens. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
The calculation of the optimal tax schedule balances, at each skill level, the incentive effect of lowering the marginal tax rate for people at that skill level and the revenue loss from the people with skill levels higher than that. However, the trade-off disappears at the highest skill level that exists in the population, because then there is no higher skill level and therefore no revenue loss. Therefore the incentive effect dominates at the top skill level, and the optimal marginal tax rate is zero there. Benevolent governments usually have regard for equality and fairness. Therefore they are reluctant to lower the marginal tax rates on the most well-off people. They will let the marginal rate go to zero only at the very end, or may even choose to disregard this aspect of optimality in the interests of fairness. However, a kleptocratic government does not care about equality or fairness. Therefore we should expect such a government to treat the richest people in society especially well. They will have to contribute to the government’s coffers, to be sure, but at the margin they will be allowed to earn more income and keep it. Again causal observation supports the result that predatory dictators are often best buddies with their richest citizens. In view of the fact that all human beings organize their experience and actions through the medium of verbal categories, and that social science concepts are usually as accessible to the ordinary citizen as to the social scientist, it probably should be expected that descriptive and analytical concepts would lead to revisions of self-conception and social distinction among the human beings to whom applied. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
Account must be taken of the common implication of citizens and scientists alike, not only in the methods, findings, and concepts of social science, but also in the interests which motivate social studies. It is not as if a special class of beings called scientists withdrew from the rest of humanity, and became mere spectators of life, knowledge of which they gathered and stored for its own sake. Moreover, the extent of resources made available for social science in general tends to vary with importance accorded to social science in a community, as against the alternative uses to which the same resources might be put. The economics of research and teaching quite clearly reveal the relative values placed upon particular problems. The sociologists of knowledge have for some time been exploring the interests which have animated the work of certain scholars in various periods, places, and settings. Thus far, however, they have only begun to explore the implications which general adoption by their own community of a scientific interest toward itself would have for their own specialty. To recognize that social facts are the creation of the persons observed, that neither persons nor institutions are permanently given but are in constant process of reconstruction, and that the verbal categories by which self and others are construed are the materials of which social organization is constructed, leads to a conception of human nature and the social order which is less a substantive description than a methodology. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
This is the ultimate outcome of the interactional approach of social psychology, which was first developed in studies of personality in the family. The evolution of social science is not in the direction of permanently definitive statements about human nature and society, but toward the specification of the methods whereby human nature and society come to be what they are. Social theory thus becomes only suspended social action. The famous mot of Poincare, that natural scientists talk about their results while social scientists talk about their methods, is rendered pointless when it becomes evident that the methods of social science are, in this sense, its most valuable findings. Psychopathological offenders seek to create a counterfeit of the truth. If the self-actualized Christian is ignorant of the tactics of the enemy in this way, one lets go the true spirit-action (or allows it to sink into disuse) and follows the counterfeit spiritual feelings, thinking one is walking after the spirit of God all the time. When this true spirit-action ceases, the psychopathological offenders suggest that God now guides through the “renewed mind,” which is an attempt to hide their workings and the human’s disuse of one’s spirit. Upon the cessation of the spirit’s cooperation with the Holy Spirit, with counterfeit “spirit” feelings taking place in the body, what follows is counterfeit light to the mind, reasoning, judging, et cetera—the human thus walking after mind and body, and not after the spirit, with the true illumination of the mind which comes from the full operation of the Holy Spirit. To further interfere with the true spirit of life, the deceiving spirits seek to counterfeit the action of the spirit in burden and aguish. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
The start is by giving a fictitious “divine love” to the person, the faculty receiving it being the affections. When these affections are grasped fully by the deceivers, the sense of love passes away, and the human thinks that one has lost God and all communion with God. Then follow feelings of constraint and restraint, which will develop into acute suffering—which the believer thinks is in the spirit, and of God. Now one goes by these feelings, calling them “anguish in the spirit,” “groaning in the spirit,” et cetera, while the deceiving spirits, through these sufferings given by them in the affections, compel the human to do their will. The sacramental element in Protestantism is important. For this element is the one essential element of every religion, namely, the presence of the divine before our acting and striving, in a “structure of grace” and in the symbols expressing it. The experience of the holy must be mediated in a concrete and, therefore, sacramental fashion, for the sacramental is nothing else than some reality becoming the bearer of the holy in a special way and under special circumstances. The largest sense of the term “sacramental” denotes everything in which the Spiritual Presence has been experience; in a narrower sense, it denotes particular objects and acts in which a Spiritual community experiences the Spiritual Presence; and in the narrowest sense, it merely refers to some “great” sacraments in the performance of which the Spiritual Community actualizes itself. Two factors are discernible in every sacrament: a relationship to nature, and a participation in salvation history. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
Although, in principle, anything from the World of nature may covey the Spiritual Presence, certain elements are specially qualified to act as sacramental symbols. Symbols must participate in that which they symbolize, not merely by an arbitrary connection, but by their very nature. For instance, water has a special power which peculiarly fits it to become a sacramental material. Water, in one hand, is a symbol for the origin of life in the womb of the mother, which is a symbol for the creative source of all things, and on the other hand, it is a symbol of death—the return to the origin of things. Thus, by its very character, water has a necessary relation to baptism. Whatever the explanation of individual elements such as water, the sacramental principle asserts that nature is open to and, in fact, participates in the holy. All physical consciousness of supernatural things, and even undue consciousness of natural things, should be refused, as this diverts the mind from walking after the spirit and sets it upon the bodily sensations. Physical consciousness is also an obstacle to the continuous concentration of the mind, and in a spiritual believer an “attack” of physical “consciousness” made use of by the enemy make break concentration of the mind and bring a cloud upon the spirit. The body should be kept calm, and under full control; excessive laughter should be avoided, and all “rushing” which rouses the physical life to the extent of dominating mind and spirit. Believers who desire to be “spiritual” and “full age” in the life in God should avoid excess, extravagance, and extremes in all things. “Natural sacraments” swiftly fall prey to the demonic, and the only way they can escape demonization is by union with the New Being in Jesus as the Christ. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
Nature has no true sacramental power apart from the history of salvation. Hence, sacraments cannot be manufactured; they “originate when the intrinsic power of a natural object becomes for faith the bearer of sacramental power.” Their origin is linked to the source of all faith, to the Spiritual Presence manifest in Jesus the Christ whose Cross offers the only sure guarantee against the forces of demonization. Since the sacramental principle embraces the whole World of nature and since faith is not restricted by time and places, the question arises: Is the Spiritual Presence bound to any definite sacramental media? Every sacramental act must be subject to the criterion of the New Being in Jesus as the Christ, or demonization would result. Furthermore, sacraments must somehow refer to the central historical and doctrinal symbols of Christianity which have emerged within the history of salvation. However, in the sense that the Spiritual Community may adopt new sacramental symbols, for its entirely possible that a symbol may gradually fade and die, that is, lost its sacramental power. It shall come to pass at the end of days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the top of the mountains; it shall be exalted above the hills; all the nations shall flow into it. And many peoples shall go and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord.” God will teach us His ways, and we will walk in His paths; God shall judge between the nations; He shall decide for many peoples. And they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning forks. Nation shall not life up sword against nation; neither shall they learn war anymore. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic, for which it stands, One Nation, Under God, Indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all. Please be sure to donate to the Sacramento Fire Department. They are not receiving all of their resources and have been proudly serving the community since 1851. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
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Humans Have an Innate Drive for Progress
The pseudo character which thinking can assume is better known than the same phenomenon in the sphere of willing and feeling. There is a difference between genuine thinking and pseudo thinking. Let u suppose we are on an island where there are fishermen and summer guest from the city. We want to know what kind of weather we are to expect and ask a fisherman and two of the city people, who we know have all listened to the weather forecast on the radio. The fisherman, with his long experience and concern with this problem of weather, will start thinking, assuming that he had not as yet made up his mind before we asked him. Knowing what the direction of the wind, temperature, humidity, and so on mean as a basis for weather forecast, he will weigh the different factors according to their respective significance and come to a more or less definite judgment. He will probably remember the radio forecast and quote it as supporting or contradicting his own opinion; if it is contradictory, he may be particularly careful in weighting the reasons for his opinion; but, and this is the essential point, it is his opinion, the result of his thinking, which he tells us. The first of the two city summer guests is a man who, when we ask him his opinion, knows that he does not understand much about the weather nor does he feel any compulsion to understand anything about it. He merely replies, “I cannot judge. All I know is that the radio forecast is thus and thus.” The other man who we ask is of a different type. He believes that he knows a great deal about the weather, although actually he knows little about it. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
This man is the kind of person who feels that he must be able to answer every. He thinks for a minute and then tells us “his” opinion, which in fact is identical with the radio forecast. We ask him for his reasons and he tells us that on account of wind direction, temperature, and so on, he had some to his conclusion. This man’s behaviour as seen from the outside is the same as the fisherman’s. Yet, if we analyze it more closely, it becomes evident that he had heard the radio forecast and has accepted it. Feeling compelled, however, to have his own opinion about it, he forgets that he is simply repeating somebody else’s authoritative opinion, and he believes that this opinion is one that he arrived at through his own thinking. He imagines that the reasons he gives us preceded his opinion, but if we examine these reasons we see that they could not possibly have led him to any conclusion about the weather if her had not formed an opinion beforehand. They are actually only pseudo reasons which have the function of making his opinion appear to be the result of his own thinking. He has the illusion of having arrived at an opinion of his own, but in reality he has merely adopted an authority’s opinion without being aware of this process. It could very well be that he is right about the weather and the fisherman wrong, but in the event it would not be “his” opinion which would be right, although the fisherman would be really mistaken in “his own” opinion. If we study people’s opinions about certain subjects, for instance, politics, the same phenomenon can be observed. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
To test this theory, as an average newspaper reader what he or she thinks about a certain political question. One will give you as “his” or “her” opinion a more or less exact account of what one has read, and yet—and this is the essential point—one believes that what he or she is saying is the result of one’s own thinking. If one lives in a small community where political opinions are handed down from father to son, “his own” opinion may be governed far more than he would for a moment believe by the lingering authority of a strict parent. Another reader’s opinion may be the outcome of a moment’s embarrassment, the fear of being thought uniformed, and hence the “thought” is essentially a front and not the result of a natural combination of experience, desire, and knowledge. The same phenomenon is to be found in aesthetic judgment. The average person who goes to a museum and looks at a picture by a famous painter, say Rembrandt, judges it to be a beautiful and impressive picture. If we analyze his or her judgement, we find that one does not have any particular inner response to the picture but thinks it is beautiful because one knows that one is supposed to think it is beautiful. The same phenomenon is evident with regard to the act of perception itself. Many persons looking at a famous bit of scenery actually reproduce the pictures they have seen of it numerous times, say on postal cards, and while believing “they” see the scenery, they have these pictures before their eyes. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
Or, in experiencing an accident which occurs in their presence, witnesses see or hear the situation in terms of the newspaper report they anticipate. As a matter of fact, for many people an experience which they have had, an artistic performance or a political meeting they have attended, becomes real to them only after they have read about it in the newspaper. The suppression of critical thinking usually starts early. A five-year-old girl, for instance, may recognize the insincerity of her mother, either by subtly realizing that, while the mother is always talking of love and friendliness, she is actually cold and egotistical, or in a cruder way by noticing that her mother is having an affair with another man while constantly emphasizing her high moral standards. The child feels the discrepancy. Her sense of justice and truth is hurt, and yet, being dependent on the mother who would not allow any kind of criticism and, let us say, having a weak father on whom she cannot rely, the child is forced to suppress her critical insight. Very soon she will no longer notice the mother’s insincerity or unfaithfulness. She will lose the ability to think critically since it seems to be both hopeless and dangerous to keep it alive. On the other hand, the child is impressed by the pattern of having to believe that her mother is sincere and decent and that the marriage of the parents is a happy one, and she will be ready to accept this idea as if it were he own. In all of these illustrations of pseudo thinking, the problem is whether the thought is the result of one’s own thinking, that is, of one’s own activity; the problem is not whether of not the contents of the thought are right. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
As has been already suggested in the case of the fisherman making a weather forecast, “his” thought may even be wrong, and that of the man who only repeats the thought put into him may be right. The pseudo thinking may also be perfectly logical and rational. Its pseudo character does not necessarily appear in illogical elements. This can be studied in rationalizations which tend to explain an action or a feeling on rational and realistic grounds, although it I actually determined by irrational and subjective factors. The rationalization may be in contradiction to facts or to the rules of logical thinking. However, frequently it will be logical and rational in itself; then its irrationality lies only in the fact that it is not the real motive of the action which it pretends to have caused. An example of irrational rationalization is brought forward in a well-known joke. A person who had borrowed a glass jar from a neighbour had broken it, and on being asked to return it, answered, “In the first place, I have already returned it to you; in the second place, I never borrowed it from you; and in the third place, it was already broken when you have it to me.” We have an example of “rational” rationalization when person, A, who finds himself in a situation of economic distress, asks a relative of his, B, to lend him a sum of money. B declines and says that he does so because by lending money he could only support A’s inclinations to be irresponsible and to lean on others for support. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Now this reasoning may be perfectly sound, but it would nevertheless be a rationalization because B had not wanted to let A have the money in any event, and although he believes himself to be motivated by concern for A’s welfare he is actually motivated by his own stinginess. We cannot learn, therefore, whether we are dealing with a rationalization merely by determining the logicality of a person’s statement as such, but we must also take into account the psychological motivations operating in a person. The decisive point is not what is thought but how it is thought. The thought that is the result of active thinking is always new and original; original, not necessarily in the sense that others have not thought it before, but always in the sense that the person who thinks has used thinking as a tool to discover something new in the World outside or inside of himself or herself. Rationalizations are essentially lacking this quality of discovering and uncovering; they only confirm the emotional prejudice existing in oneself. Rationalizing is not a tool for penetration of reality but a post-factum attempts to harmonize one’s own wishes with existing reality. With feeling as with thinking, one must distinguish between a genuine feeling, which originates in ourselves, and a pseudo feeling, which is really not our own although we believe it to be. Let us choose an example from everyday life which is typical of the pseudo character of our feelings in contact with other. We observe a man who is attending a party. He is gay, he laughs, makes friendly conversation, and all in all seems to be quite happy and contented. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
On taking his leave, he has a friendly smile while saying how much he enjoyed the evening. The door closes behind him—and this is the moment when we watch him carefully. A sudden change is noticed in his face. The smile has disappeared; of course, that is to be expected since he is now alone and has nothing or nobody with him to evoke a smile. However, the change is more than just a disappearance of the smile. There appears on his face an expression of deep sadness, almost of desperation. This expression probably stays only for a few seconds, and then the face assumes the usual masklike expression; the man gets into his car, thinks about the evening, wonders whether or not he made a good impression, and feels that he did. However, was “he” happy and gay during the party? Was the brief expression of sadness and desperation we observed on his face only a momentary of no great significance? It is almost impossible to decide the question without knowing more of this man. There is no incident, however, which may provide the clue for understanding what his gaiety meant. Human beings have many ascertainable ways to find unity. Humans can find unity by trying to regress to the animal stage, by doing away with what is specifically human (reason and love), by being a slave or a slave driver, by transforming oneself into a thing, or else by developing one’s specific human powers to such an extent that one finds a new unity with one’s fellow humans and with nature by becoming a free human—free not only from chains but free to make the development of all one’s existence to one’s own productive effort. #RandolphHarris 7of 20
Humans have an innate “drive for progress,” but one is driven by the need to solve one’s existential contradiction, which arises again at every new level of development. This contradiction—or, in other words, humans’ different and contradictory possibilities—constitutes one’s essence. It can be said without exaggeration that never was the knowledge of the great ideas produced by the human race as widespread in the World as it is today, and never were these ideas less effective than they are today. The ideas of Mr. Plato and Mr. Aristotle, of the prophets of Mr. Christ, of Mr. Spinoza, and Mr. Kant, are known to millions among the educated classes in Europe and America. They are taught at thousands of institutions of higher learning, and some of them are preached in the churches of all denominations everywhere. And all this in a World which follows the principles of unrestricted egotism, which breeds hysterical nationalism, and which is preparing for an insane mass slaughter. How can one explain this discrepancy? Ideas do not influence humans deeply when they are only taught as ideas and thoughts. Usually, when presented in such a way, they change other ideas; new thoughts take the place of old thoughts; new words take the place of old words. However, all that has happened is a change in concepts and words. Why should it be different? It is exceedingly difficult for a human to be moved by ideas, and to gras a truth. In order to do that, one needs to overcome deep-seated resistances of inertia, fear of being wrong, or of straying away from the heard. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
Just to become acquainted with other ideas is not enough, even though these ideas is not enough, even though these ideas in themselves are right and potent. However, ideas do have an effect on humans if it is personified by the teacher, if the idea appears in the flesh. If a human expresses the idea of humanity and is humble, then those who listen to one will understand what humility is. They will not only understand, but they will believe that one is talking about a reality, and not just voicing words. The same holds true for all ideas which a human, a philosopher, or a religious teacher may try to convey. Those who announce ideas—and not necessarily new ones—and at the same time live them we may call prophets. The Old Testament prophets did precisely that: they announced the idea that humans had to find an answer to one’s existence, and that this answer was the development of one’s reason, of one’s love; and they taught that humility and justice were inseparably connected with love and reason. They lived what they preached. They did not seek power, but avoided it. Not even the power of being a prophet. They were not impressed by might, and they spoke the truth even if this led them to imprisonment, ostracism or death. They were not humans who set themselves apart and waited to see what would happen. They responded to their fellow human because they felt responsible. What happened to others happened to them. Humanity was not outside, but within them. Precisely because they saw the truth they felt the responsibility to tell it; they did not threaten, but they showed the alternatives with which humans were confronted. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
It is not that a prophet wishes to be a prophet; in fact, only the false ones have the ambition to become prophets. One’s becoming a prophet is simple enough, because the alternatives which one sees are simple enough. The prophet Amos expressed this idea very succinctly: “The lion has roared, who will not be afraid. God has spoken, who will not be a prophet.” The phrase “God has spoken” here means simply that the choice has become unmistakably clear. There can be no more doubt. There can be no more evasion. Hence the human who feels responsible has no choice but to become a prophet, whether one has been herding sheep, tending one’s vineyards, or developing and teaching ideas. It is the function of the prophet to show reality, to show alternatives and to protest; it is one’s function to call loudly, to awake humans from their customary half-slumber. It is the historical situation which makes prophets, not the wish of some humans to be prophets. Any nations have had their prophets. The Buddha lived his teachings; Mr. Christ appeared in the flesh; Mr. Socrates dies according to his ideas; Mr. Spinoza lived them. And they made a deep imprint on the human race precisely because their idea was manifested in the flesh in each one of them. According to the leaders of the Soviet Union, the “Union of Socialist Soviet Republics” is socialist not only in name but in fact. Already in 1936 Mr. Stalin proclaimed “the complete victor of the socialist system in all sphere of the national economy,” and at the present time Russian ideology claims that Russia is realizing communism. (Characterized by Mr. Marx’s famous statement: “From each according to his capacities, to each according to his needs.”) #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
The question of the socialist character of Russia can be decided only by making a comparison between Mr. Marx’s vision of socialism and the reality of the Soviet system. What rationale did the Soviet leaders from Mr. Stalin to Mr. Khruschev have for calling their system socialism? They make this claim essentially on the basis of their definition of Marxist socialism, in which two factors are considered decisive for a socialist society: the “socialization of the means of production” and a planned economy. However, Socialism is in the sense of Mr. Marx or, for that matter, in the sense of Mr. Owen, Mr. Hess, Mr. Fourier, Mr. Proudhon, et cetera, can not be defined in this way. What was the essence of Mr. Marx’s thought and of Marxist socialism? It is bewildering how Mr. Marx’s theory is falsified and vilified not only by the ignorant, but also by many who should and could know better. A Robert L. Heilbroner has put it so well: our public newspapers and books “obscure the fact that the literature of socialist protest is one of the most moving and morally searching of all chronicles of human hope and despair. To dismiss the literature unread, to vilify it without the faintest conception of what it represents, is not only shocking but dangerously stupid.” The very beginning of an understanding of Mr. Marx is blocked by one of the most widespread and completely erroneous cliches, that of Mr. Marx’s “materialism.” This materialism is supposed to mean that the main motivation in man is his wish for material gain, as against spiritual, moral or religious values. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
While it is rather paradoxical that those who attack Mr. Marx for this alleged materialism defend capitalism against socialism with the claim that only a monetary incentive can be a sufficiently strong motivation for humans to give their bet, the fact is that Mr. Marx’s theory is precisely the opposite of this alleged materialism. One’s main criticism of capitalism was that it is a system that put a premium on selfish and materialistic motivations, and his concept of socialism was that of a society that favours humans who are much instead of having much. Mr. Marx’s historical materialism never speaks of the economic factor as a psychological motivation, but as a socio-economic condition that leads to a certain practice of life and this shapes the character of humans. His difference with Mr. Hegel’s idealism (idealism and materialism are philosophical terms and have nothing to do with ideal versus materialistic motivation, as any high school student should know), lies in the fact that “…we do not set out from what men imagine, conceive, in order to arrive at men in the flesh. We set out from real, active men and on the basis of their real life process we demonstrate the development of the ideological reflexes and echoes of the life process.” Or, as he put it elsewhere: “As individuals express their life, so they are. What they are, therefore, coincides with their production. Both with what they produce and with how they produce. The nature of individuals thus depends on the material conditions determining their production.” #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
Mr. Marx’s discovery was that the practice of life, as it is determined by the economic systems, determines the feeling and thinking of the people involved. According to this view, a certain system may be conducive to the development of materialistic strivings; another system may lead to the preponderance of ascetic tendencies. The word “anarchy” is often used in the sense of complete chaos or disorganization, but M. Hirshleifer argues for a more subtle distinction. He used the word “amorphy” for the chaotic scramble for resources that are not owned or protected by anyone, or in other words, for cases of failure to solve common resource-pool problems. By contrast, anarchy is interference competition; people attempt to sequester resources (assets property rights) and to defend these resources (provide private protection) from others’ attempts at predation or theft. The equilibrium of an anarchic game of aggression and defense can exhibit spontaneous order. For the administrators of an agency, the appraisal of the planning process offers the opportunity for self-conscious accumulation of skill and know-how, of tried and tested techniques of action. If appropriately publicized, annual reports offer one of the most reliable means of communicating information to a clientele and quickening its involvement and support of the agency. Through unflinching reports, an agency can get the confidence of the public. The perspective derived from its annual appraisals gives balance and wisdom to day-by-day decisions on policy and personnel. Periodicity itself is a security-giving organization of work, and reports contribute to periodicity. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
Like interim reporting, and supplementing it, annual reporting helps a worker in an organization to visualize one’s place in the whole, to assist in co-ordinating one’s work with that of others with less requirement of supervision. It strengthens discipline of members of a group by each other, instead of by supervision, and thereby can accentuate the morale of personnel. By facilitating adoption by working groups of quotas and schedules as personal commitments, annual reporting like interim reporting adds appreciably to the motivation and sense of responsibility among personnel. By causing reflection upon the method employed by an agency in achieving its results, the systematic backward look at how far they have come encourages personnel to ingenuity in devising new methods to economize effort and resources. Since the annual report, unlike interim types of reporting, goes out to the public of the agency, the mere existence of annual reports tends to increase the consciousness by personnel of their responsibilities toward clientele, and invites a sense of identification with clientele. Least these claims for the virtues of annual reporting seem too unrealistic, let note be made of the nuisance and imposition that report-writing becomes to administrators when conceived as mere record-keeping. Interim reporting especially can easily register as a pro forma duty, whose principal function is to interrupt and distract ongoing activity. Interim reporting, however should principally apply intramurally to agency personnel, and be for them not only a report to other but a means of exhibiting to themselves, in a graphic and economical way, jut how they are doing in the execution of their interlocking quotas and schedules. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
Annual reporting, on the other hand, suffers more from under- than from overdoing—not so much in the sense of quantity as in the sense of profundity of retrospection. Unless it achieves the degree of detachment, of withdrawal from action, which permits basic and imaginative reconsideration of what the activity is all about, its result is undoubtedly stultification instead of simulation. However, reporting itself, like agency programs, benefits from inclusion within the scope of regular review; if it is working poorly, it deserves improvement, not rejection. With regard to clientele, annual reports, when properly exploited, also function to bring about identification. Thorough reporting provides the factions among the clientele at once with non-hearsay material for criticism and appreciation of an agency’s operation, and for defending it against its opponents. The public is going on to evaluate an agency anyway, but when the clientele feels itself a party to the formulation and revision of agency programs, their judgments are more likely to be responsible, sound, and fair; their own overt participation in execution, more vigorous and effective. The reporting of success enhances the appetite for more success, especially when the reaching of goals is not only matter-of-factly reported but given ceremonial recognition in meetings of personnel and clientele, exempli gratis, awards made to leaders and outstanding performers by the voluntary associations among the clientele. Finally, there is another group for whom annual reports perform an extremely valuable function. That is the planners in similar agencies elsewhere, the professionals and technical specialist who, in fashioning proposals, must draw upon as much relevant prior experiences as possible. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
Each instance of planning is in a sense a pilot projector for similar ventures by others confronted with matching problems. And if the experience of planning is to be made available to others, the ideal form for its communication is adequate annual reports. Like the journals of scientific societies, the annual reports of planning agencies, as they come to be prepared by professional standards, develop as the media for the more repaid evolution of planning technology through its sharing. Very much like the duty of the scientist to publish one’s findings, it has become the obligation of planners to make known the assessments of their own experience in return for sharing the findings of others. Planning of the piecemeal, democratic character which we have outlined above is not a dream of the future. It is a fait accompli on the American scene, and our model is already descriptive of the operation of hundreds if not thousands of family agencies. Yet though many agencies perform these phases without explicit formulation of what they are doing, they may find it helpful to unify and clarify their activities as they examine themselves from this point of view. That is, the model of the planning process which we have sketched offers itself as a standard for the evaluation of the practice of any action agency, whether it already conceives of itself as practicing planning or not. And to evaluate is already to commence to plan, for one cannot assign a value to anything, including past experience itself, save by reference to its potential role in future action. It is, however, the task and prerogative of each family agency itself to judge its own proper degree and quality of planning. To attempt to usurp such functions would be futile as well as inconsistent with what has already been said about outside experts. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
The notion of planning is comparable to embarking upon an endless journey. Any existing ways can be improved. Development is cumulative, one cycle of change leads to another. Planning therefore implies a sociology, a psychology, a philosophy. It is at once a theory of social organization and of social change, of motivation and personality formation, or valuation and metaphysics. Some of these implications, though not explorable further here, become visible in part as we note how another phase of one cycle of planning merges into the first phase of the next. By considering in a matter-of-fact way each previous cycle, as well as its current situation, a group can voluntarily and advisedly alter its existing procedures. Culture and social organization then become cumulatively the self-conscious product of rational intent. The group is freed from those bounds of necessity which were only necessary because they were thought to be so. This does not mean that the lessons of the past are discarded or ignored. It means that according to circumstances, what is worthy is conserved, and what is not is changed. No church can be founded on a protest, yet Protestantism became a church…The inner dilemma of Protestantism lies in this, that it must protest against every religious or cultural realization which seeks to be intrinsically valid, but that it needs such realization if it is to be able to make its protest in any meaningful way. By the power of what reality does the Protestant principle exercise its criticism? There must be such a reality, since the Protestant principle is not mere negation. The ultimate answer is the New Being manifest in Jesus as the Christ. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
The basis of the solution is rooted in the axiom that the negative can live only from the positive, that negation must build upon affirmation. Thus, protest can exist only within a Gestalt to which it belongs, Gestalt being understood as the total structure of living reality, a structure which includes both form and negation of form, a Yes and a No. This union of protest and creation we call “the Gestalt of grace.” Grace as a reality grace as embodied in a structure, goes against the Protestant grain, for it sounds perilously similar to the Roman Catholic teaching which supposedly objectifies grace. And the objectification of grace opens the door to a whole legion of Catholic doctrines such as a sacred hierarchy, an infallible ecclesiastical authority, and the system of automatic sacraments. Many Protestants would consider a Gestalt of grace a betrayal of the essence of Protestantism. However, the jargon of Reformation controversy should not be allowed to obscure the theological facts, that the choice is not simply between the Roman Catholic objectification of grace and a completely structureless Protestant grace. There is a third possibility which is clearly seen in the Protestant notion of faith. Faith is in man, but not from man. Consequently, Protestantism can assert that grace appears through a living Gestalt which remains in itself what it is, while the Protestant protest prohibits the appearance of grace through finite forms from becoming an identification of grace with finite forms. Granted that the Gestalt of grace embraces both the positive and the negative, where is the protest voiced. In the secular World, of course. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
For according to the Protestant principle, grace cannot be tied down to any particular form, not even to a religious form. History shows that nonreligious, even anti-religious, movements can express a religious protest more effectively than religion itself. Consequently, Protestantism stands in a special relationship to secularism, a relationship which by its very nature, demands a secular reality. It demands a concrete protest against the sacred sphere and against ecclesiastical pride, a protest that is incorporated in secularism. Protestant secularism is a necessary element of Protestant realization. The formative power of Protestantism is always tested by its relation to the secular World. If Protestantism surrenders to secularism, it ceases to be a Gestalt of grace. If it retires from secularism, it ceases to be Protestant, namely, a Gestalt that includes within it the protest against itself. As guidance, the believer should understand that when there is no action in one’s spirit, there is no use for the brain at all, but the spirit does not always speak. There are times when it should be left in abeyance. In all guidance the mind decides the course of action—not only from the feeling in the spirit but by the light in the mind. In coming to a decision, the deciding is an act of mind and will, based upon either the mental process of reasoning or the sense of the spirit, or both, id est: Decision by mental process, reasoning, or decision by sense of the spirit, id est, moment impelling; drawing or restraint; spirit as if “dead”—no response; contraction of spirit; openness of spirit; fullness of spirit; compression of spirit; burden on spirit; wrestling in spirit; resisting in spirit. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
God have three ways of communicating His will to humans. By vision to the mind, which is very rare; understanding by the mind; and consciousness to the spirit, that is, by light to the mind and consciousness in spirit. In true guidance, spirit and mind are of one accord, and the intelligence is not in rebellion against the leading in the spirit—as it is so often in counterfeit guidance by evil spirits, when the human is compelled to act in obedience to what one thinks is of God, supernaturally given, and fears to disobey. This all refers to guidance from the subjective standpoint, but it must be emphasized in addition that all true guidance from God is in harmony with the Scriptures. The “understanding” of the will of God by the mind depends upon the mind being saturated with the knowledge of the written Word: and true “consciousness in the spirit” depends upon its union with Mr. Christ through the indwelling Spirit of God. The mind should never be dropped into abeyance. The human spirit can be influences by the mind, therefore the believer should keep one’s mind in purity, and unbiased, as well as having an unbiased will. I pledge allegiance to Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic, for which it stands, One Nation, Under God, Indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for All. Woe until them that call evil “good,” and good “evil,” that turn darkness into light, and light into darkness. Seek justice, relieve the oppressed, protect the fatherless, defend the case of the widow. The Sacramento Fire Department has been proudly serving the community since 1851. Currently, they are not receiving all of their resources, and it would be greatly appreciated if you could donate to the Sacramento Fire Department, so they can help keep the community safe. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
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Do You Believe in Ghosts?
The garden was thickening and closing up in the darkness. There was thunder in the air, and lurking fear, half hidden, rearing up before me. Llanada Villa, with its dark wings, cupolas, towers and façade oddly resembled a colossal dragon, crouched and ready to spring. My estate bore an aspect more than usually sinister as viewed it by night. It was not a wholesome landscape after dark. Even if they were ignorant of the terror that stalked here, I believe anyone would notice its morbidity. The ancient lightning-scarred trees seemed surreal, large, and twisted, and the other vegetation unnaturally thick and feverish. Fear had lurked on the estate for as long as I could remember. The psychic power which had been leading me had now become a reality. The surroundings under the moonlight blended harmoniously with my mood. I felt a shiver run through me. It was with a suddenness that brought me electrified to my feet. For over a century, the curse of the Winchester Fortune had been the subject of stories incredibly wild and monstrously hideous; stories of apparitions that come back from the dead of their own accord. Silent, colossal, creeping death which stalked inside of Llanada Villa where it welled up a consciousness of terror. With whimpering insistence, the people told tales of demons which sized lone servants after dark, either carrying them off or leaving them in a frightful state of gnawed dismemberment; while others whispered of blood-trails toward my mansion. It was also said that Llanada Villa was ghoulishly haunted and it had a voice—its voice was thunder. Thunder that could even creep up on a clear summer’s day. #RandolphHarris 1 of 7
Through the haze of exhaustion, it occurred to me that I felt lost and knew only that I was wandering away from the utter unknown. I went for a midnight stroll through the miles of hallways within my home to relieve myself of the terrible events of the past. A strange nervousness had slowly seized me. An impression stole upon me that there was something prowling about. Thin shadows were moving across the rooms and had attracted my gaze. These must be the souls, not of the good, but of the evil, which are compelled to wander about my home in payment of the penalty of their former evil way of life. For a moment, I thought I saw a curious cloud formation racing low and directly above me, a cloud black and impenetrable with two wing-like ends strangely in the shape of a monstrous flying bat. There were no lights lit in the house. And in the unremitting rain outside, there was no moonlight. There was a noise from some remote floor above, a dry chuckle like the scrape of lazy chains. The voice above tightened and broke with a roar. These ghosts were the players of a diabolical game. Serving a playful master. I descended stairs. A corridor followed. The bellowing fury above me faded slightly. However, that was no comfort. The corridor was catacomb-like. I felt more deeply entombed with every step. The pitiful throughs of the ghosts of natives shrieked and whined of the unnamable horror which had descended upon them. Death was indeed there. The disordered corridor was covered with blood and human debris bespeaking too vividly the ravages of demon teeth and talons; yet no visible trail led away from the carnage. #RandolphHarris 2 of 7
Haunted by these apocalyptic visions of such cryptic deaths, horribly mangled bodies, chewed, and clawed in the catacombs of my home, it was certainly clearly that something demonic had been unleashed, for I have never heard of any rifle capable of creating carnage in such a hideous fashion. This curse was vastly different than the memory of endless prairies shimmering in the bright sun; of the breath of the evergreen forest in summer; of the crooning of ice-armored pines at the touch of the winds of winter; of cataracts roaring between hoary mountain masses; of all the innumerable sights and sounds of the wilderness; of its immensity and mystery; and of the silence that brood in its still depths. The death that had come had left no trace save destruction itself. However, a phantasmal chaos had suddenly caused my nerves to jump on edge, as I heard hideous shrieks beyond anything in my former experience or imagination. In the shrieking the inmost soul of human fear and agony clawed hopelessly and insanely at the veil of the living. Then came the devastating stoke of lightning which shook the whole mansion, lit the darkest corridors, and reverberated throughout my soul. There was something preternaturally about this experience. While the glare from beyond the window caught my eyes, a shadowy figure appeared before me. He had old sunken skin around the eyes and coarsely textured about his complexion. His shoulders were bunched under the black vanity of the silk embroidered robe he wore. His neck was a wattle of flesh. The eyes themselves were only partially focused, as though mostly lost to some wild and sly avenue of speculation. #RandolphHarris 3 of 7
As I passed by the apparition, his eyes followed me. This man was smugly and completely given over to evil. I had become lost in the forgotten turns of my mansion’s maze. Grief shuddered through me. I felt the grip of comforting fingers on my shoulder. I stared at the stain on the table. I sighed and my breath faltered. From far above, I heard the beast’s cavorting laughter. Tears blurred my eyes. There was blood everywhere. “Marvellous!” said a voice. There were two figures by the parlor. They were attired in evening wear and white silk mufflers and top hats. The glass of a monocle glittered above the spoiled grin of one of them. Even from forty feet distant, they smelled of cigars and brilliantine. And they stank of dead meat, sour wine, and feral rot. The figures began to fade. They had receded from sight almost entirely when one of the apparitions said, “You’ve angered Chief Little Fawn. And Chief Little Fawn will settle with you shortly.” I looked at my own soft, unaccustomed hands. And a voice that caused the skin on my head to crawl icily called down all the way from the top of the stairs to reach me where I stood. “My name is Chief Little Fawn.” There was a pause. “Are you coming up to fight? Or am I coming down for you?” My house was warming with the baleful threat of the thing above. In was becoming harder to breath. Demonic mutterings of thunder, and shadows thwarted me. As I shivered and contemplated my next move, I knew that I had pried out one of Earth’s supreme horrors. A fall of rain was drumming the mansion, and the heavy blanket of clouds glowed with a soft radiance where the moon was trying to break through. #RandolphHarris 4 of 7
Then the blue moonlight returned, illuminating the mansion. A large white hound leaped from the wall and ran towards me, before it slinked across the room and disappeared. Startled, I had no idea which direction to turn. A click, and a dazzling white light enveloped the entire floor. For a brief second, I saw a woman outlined there against the wall. “Fool!” she cried hoarsely. “Blundering fool! What have you done?” Her eyes were glaring at me, smouldering with hatred. I gazed at her curiously as she stood erect, head thrown back, body apparently taut as wire, and a slow shudder crept down my spine. Then without warning, she gathered up her dress and floated down the path towards the door to nowhere. A moment later she disappeared somewhere in the shadows. I stood there, staring after her in a daze. Suddenly, there rose a low animal snarl. And before I could move, a huge gray shape came hurtling through the hallway, bounding in great leaps toward me. Its face was contorted in diabolic fury, and its jaws were dripping slaver. Even in that moment of terror as I stood frozen before it, the sight of those black nostrils and those black hyalescent eyes emblazoned itself on my mind, never to be forgotten. Then with a lunge it was upon me. I had only time to run. I could feel those teeth trying to clamp down on my heels. The beast coughed and faded into a black mist and vanished. Endless hours I spent confined to my room suffering the tortures of the damned. When twilight came, I had vaguely wished some clouds would gather, for an odd timidity about the deep skyey voids above had crept into my soul. That I am still alive and sane, is a marvel I cannot fathom. I cannot fathom it, for these ghouls were a blasphemous abnormality from hell’s nethermost craters; abominations which no mind could fully grasp. There I lay, alone, in my accursed mansion, shivering, and terrified. #RandolphHarris 5 of 7
The Winchester Mystery House seems to be drenched with the powerful emotions of spiritual energy. Of all the anomalous phenomenon which is reported, ghosts and ghostly sightings are by far the most common. One need not venture off to a distant loch, travel deep into a jungle wilderness, spend the night in a graveyard staring at the stars to have an extraordinary, life-changing, mind-blowing encounter. In The Winchester Mystery House, a ghost can appear to anyone, at anytime, for any reason. People from all walks of life have had a ghostly encounter in this beautiful but bizarre mansion. Be it an apparition that appears in a hallway or upon the step, mindless and unaware of your presence; or the giggles of children who once played nearby many, many years ago. Ghost, of course, have walked by our side since time immemorial. Ghosts arrived on stage by the Upper Paleolithic, perhaps around 50,000 BC. The simple conception that something recognizable of a dead person might at some time return to human society is neither fanciful nor surprising. Its roots originate at that developmental horizon where burial with goods became the norm for the first time. Ghost have waited in the winds from the beginning and have fluttered persistently as part of human cultural, religious, or philosophical baggage ever since. Practically speaking, as a result, they are inexpungible. Dying without a grave, accidently or otherwise, was a terrible fate. It was a weapon in warfare and judgement, for no quietus was attainable. Hammurapi of Babylon, in the eighteenth-century BC, threatens that the soldiers of any other king who does not follow his laws should be thrown on the plain in heaps and his troops denied burial. Other laws show that executed criminals were similarly treated. #RandolphHarris 6 of 7
Crucially, burial is not compelling of itself in our search for ghosts, for there were always many reasons for rapid burial of the dead; it was understood before thought it self what happened to corpses, diseased or otherwise, and there was the question of say, respect for the dead, or predators. Archaeologically speaking, burial as such carries no implication necessarily different from waste disposal. The gradual establishing of deliberate burial in early ancestor communities, however, must have led to significant consequences. Shared ritual tied with mourning would come to teach that individual life itself was finite. With the development of abstract thought and the sharing of language and experience, the great lesson would come to be explicitly, rather than instinctively, understood: all that lives must die, passing though nature to eternity. For Babylonian men and women, accordingly, ghosts were an unpredictable reality. Everyone knew that ghosts must be unhappy: those responsible could list all the reasons. Omens, spells and rituals were available that could help the experienced diviner or exorcist in assessing his or her case as well as dealing with it. It is easy to imagine that deceased members of extended or extending families who had long inhabited the same place would not only feel close to their descendants but also tied to the rooms and passages where they had spent so much of their lives. Most ghosts, probably, were of the local and family type, but what must have been especially frightening was the idea that a dangerous ghost might be unconnected with anyone at in in one’s personal World—a killer bent on random street murder—or a ghost fastened on his or her victim through mistaken identity. #RandolphHarris 7 of 7
The ancient Egyptians were so preoccupied with the prospect of an afterlife that their entire civilization was founded on the cult of the dead. Many believe that the pyramids may have been built not only as tombs for their pharaohs, who were venerated as living descendants of the Gods, but also as the means of initiation into the mysteries of life and death. As with the pyramids, the structural shape of The Winchester Mystery House is believed to have both a mystical significance and a practical purpose, focusing the Earth’s magnetic energies to a specific point and to such effect that the initiate would be unable to resist the force drawing their etheric body out of its physical home. According to some sources, a Boston medium consulted by Mrs. Winchester explained that her family and her fortune were being haunted by spirits. Supposedly their untimely deaths of her daughter and husband were caused by these spirits, and it was implied that Mrs. Winchester might be the next victim. However, the medium also claimed that there was an alternative. Mrs. Winchester was instructed to move west and appease the spirits by building a great house for them. As long as construction of the house never ceased, Mrs. Winchester could rest assured that her life was not in danger. Building such a house was even supposed to bring her eternal life. Earth energies are stronger near the water which suggests one explanation of why Mrs. Sarah L. Winchester chose the Santa Clara Valley to build her beautiful estate and vibrant gardens.
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May America Previl?
One of the most important things to do is to live in the moment. This does not mean that you forget where you come from or do not plan for the future, it simply means living righteously and enjoying the present, without focusing on past atrocities. No one can right the past, but we can create a better future. The best way to capture the moment is to pay attention. This is how we cultivate mindfulness. Mindfulness means being awake and enjoy the life we are having. However. Lapses in awareness are frequently caused by an eddy of dissatisfaction with what we are seeing our felling in that moment, out of which springs a desire for something to be different, for things to change. Fear is as nonsubstaintal as your shadow, but it is. The shadow also exists—nonsubstantial, negative, but not nonexistential—and sometimes the shadow can have a great impact on you. People are more afraid of fear than of anything else, because the very existence of fear shakes your foundations. The infant still feeling one with mother, cannot yet say “I,” nor has he any need for it. Only after he has conceived of the outer World as being separate and different from himself does he come to the awareness of himself as a distinct being, and one of the last words he learns to use is “I,” in reference to himself. In the development of the human race the degree to which man is aware of himself as a separate self depends on the extent to which he has emerged from the clan and the extent to which the process of individuation has developed. #RandolphHarris 1 of 22
The member of a primitive clan might express his sense of identity in the in the formula “I am we”; he cannot yet conceive of himself as an “individual,” existing apart from his group. It should always be kept in mind that, in addition to sorrow and mourning, part of the psychological response to separation is great anger at the mother-figure for leaving. Thus mourning, along with his attachment and love become subjects of anxiety. In the medieval World, the individual was identified with his social role in the feudal hierarchy. The peasant was not a man who happened to be a peasant, the feudal lord not a man who happened to be a feudal lord. He was a peasant or a lord, and this sense of his unalterable station was an essential part of his sense of identity. When the feudal system broke down, this sense of identity was shaken and the acute questions “Who am I”—or, more precisely, “How do I know what I am?”—arose. This was the question that was raised, in a philosophical form, by Rene Descartes. He answered the quest for identity by saying, “I doubt, hence I think; I think, hence I am.” This answer put all the emphasis on the experience of “I” as the subject of my thinking activity, and failed to see that the “I” is experienced also in the process of feeling and creative action. The development of Western culture went in the direction of creating the basis for the full experience of individuality. By making the individual free politically and economically, by teaching him to think for himself and freeing him from an authoritarian pressure, one hoped to enable him to feel “I” in the sense that he was the center and active subject of his powers and experienced himself as such. #RandolphHarris 2 of 22
However, only a minority achieved the new experience of “I.” For the majority, individualism was not much more than a façade behind which was hidden the failure to acquire an individual sense of identity. Many substitutes for a truly individual sense of identity were sought for and found. Nation, religion, class, and occupation serve to furnish a sense of identity. “I am an American.” “I am a Protestant.” “I am a businessman.” These are the formulae that help a man experience a sense of identity after the original clan identity has been acquired. These different identifications are, in contemporary society, usually employed together. If blended with older feudal remnants, they are in a broad sense status identifications, and they are more efficient, as in European countries. In the United States of America, where so little is left of feudal relics and where there is so much social mobility, these status identifications are naturally less efficient, and the sense of identity is shifted more and more to the experience of conformity. Inasmuch as I am not different, inasmuch as I am like the others and recognized by them as “a regular fellow,” I can sense myself as “I.” I am “as you desire me”—as Mr. Pirandello put it in the title of one of his plays. Instead of the preindividualistic clan identity, a new herd identity develops in which the sense of identity rests on the sense of an unquestionable belonging to the crowd. That is uniformity and conformity are often not recognized as such, and are covered by the illusion of individuality, does not alter the facts. #RandolphHarris 3 of 22
The problem of the sense of identity is not, as it usually understood, merely a philosophical problem, or a problem concerning only our mind and thought. The need to feel a sense of identity stems from the very condition of human existence, and it is the source of the most intense strivings. Since I cannot remain sane without the sense of “I,” I am driven to do almost anything to acquire this sense. Behind the intense passion for status and conformity is this very need, and it is sometimes even stronger than the need for physical survival. What could be more obvious than the fact that people are willing to risk their lives, to give up their love, to surrender their freedom, to sacrifice their own thoughts for the sake of being one of the herd, of conforming, and thus of acquiring a sense of identity, event though it is an illusory one. The fact that man has reason and imagination leads to the necessity not only for having a sense of his own identity but also for orienting himself in the World intellectually. This need can be compared with the process of physical orientation that develops in the first years of life and that is completed when the child can walk by himself, touch and handle things, knowing what they are. However, when the ability to talk and to speak has been acquired, only the first step in the direction of orientation has been taken. Man finds himself surrounded by many puzzling phenomena and, having reason, he has to make sense of them, has to put them in some context which he can understand and which permit him to deal with them in his thoughts. #RandolphHarris 4 of 22
The further his reason develops, the more adequate becomes his system of orientation, that is, the more it approximates reality. However, even if man’s frame of orientation is utterly illusory, it satisfies his need for some picture which is meaningful to him. Whether he believes in the power of a totem animal, in a rain god, or in the superiority and destiny of his race, his need for some frame of orientation is satisfied. Quite obviously, the picture of the World that he has depends on the development of his reason and of his knowledge. Although biologically the brain capacity of the human race has remained the same for thousands of generations, it takes a long evolutionary process to arrive at objectivity, that is, to acquire the faculty to see the World, nature, other persons, and oneself as they are and not distorted by desires and fears. The more man develops this objectivity, the more he is in touch with reality, the more he matures, the better can he create a human World in which he is at home. Reason is man’s faculty for grasping the World by thought, in contradiction to intelligence, which is man’s ability to manipulate the World with the help of thought. Reason is man’s instrument for arriving at the truth, intelligence is man’s instrument for manipulating the World more successfully; the former is essentially human, the latter belongs also to the animal part of man. #RandolphHarris 5 of 22
There is a dialectical sense in which the existence of opinion necessarily presupposes difference of opinion. Without dissent, there would be nothing to discuss. There might be facts to ascertain, or indoctrination to preform upon recruits, but if all concerned are quite contented with current ways, and no one sees a better alternative, there is no problem of what is to be done. Dissent is possible only when the public has come to feel that there is a problem, and that something should be done, and when one or more definite proposals are then put forward. Even discussion over whether there is a problem or something should be done is academic until some plan of action is suggested. Those who are against action must have something to be against, just as those who want action must have at least one notion which they favour. Moreover, dissent over alternative lines of action (inaction being usually a synonym for traditional procedure) must be supposed by clashes of interest least it be merely academic and lead to no resolution. It is only an apparent contradiction to insist that discussion is conditional both on values held in common and on clashes of interest. Because of the values held in common each party can advance his proposal not as a mere assertion of interest but as a right which out to be binding upon the other. It is the justification of interests as rights which makes a discussion. Enemies of government by discussion exaggerate the ideological nature of a group’s moral justification of its position, but the wisest friends of government by discussion do not altogether deny the basis of group interest for each partisan’s view. #RandolphHarris 6 of 22
To insist, however, that justifications set forth in advocacy or defense of an action program are derived in some direct way from the interest of a group is to reduce discussion to a mere war of words, which it is not. Moreover, it willfully and knowingly overlooks the variety of justifications which may be asserted for any one group of interest, the often incoherent and contradictory diversity among the interests of a group, and, above all, the unformed, inchoate nature of any group’s interests. Often it assumes that a group’s interest is either an objective fact visible to all, or at least visible to some observers with special access to truth. This is never the case. A group, or even an individual, is often as divided within itself as to what it wants as the community of which it is a part. It may wish to justify its formulation of what it wants as much to itself as to the public. The integration of personality and the integration of the community are aspects of the same unceasing process. Some professed friends of government by discussion, however, presume that there is an objective public interest, usually implicitly represented and defined by themselves. There is no pre-existing public interest, any more than there is a pre-existing group interest. It is the public interest which is to be determined by discussion; the definition of the public interest is the product of discussion; it is the determinant only in the sense of being the end sought. Those who insist that they represent the public good in any sense except in demanding that agreement be reached are like the prophets whom make discussion impossible through dogmatically proclaiming “God says…” #RandolphHarris 7 of 22
When it comes to good and services, one consists of keeping track of any history of individual traders’ deviation and selling this information for a fee. This person (or organization) providing this service is called an information intermediary, or Info for shot. Another service is to deter cheating by the trader with whom a customer is currently matched, by threatening to inflict some dire punishment in response to such behaviour. This person providing this service is called an enforcement intermediary, or Enfo for short. If a customer of Info gets cheated, Info finds this out without incurrent any further cost. This may be because he provides his service by accompanying his customer (physically or metaphorically) to the trade. If a buyer or borrower defaults, credit-rating agencies, too, are likely to be told by their customer firms or lenders. A customer who has been cheated probably actually gets a little satisfaction from complaining, but even if he incurs a small cost by complaining, a contract like that in Milgrom, North, and Weingast will enable Infor to induce the customer to report the other party’s current cheating. In addition, Info can detect at a further cost any occurrences where someone who is not his customer gets cheated. At the start of each period, Info chooses his fee F and invites traders to become his customers. More precisely, the contact that Inform offers to each trader has the following form. Pay me F now. When your match is revealed, I will tell you what I know of that player’s history. If he has a history of cheating, of if he is not my customer, you should play Deviate; this will not count against you in the future. Otherwise you should play Comply. #RandolphHarris 8 of 22
Each trader decides whether to accept this offer. Then the pairings are revealed. Info tells his customers their partner’s history of behaviour, but Info’s truthfulness is not automatically guaranteed. Each trader can also observe whether his current partner is Info’s customer. Based on this information, each decides whether to play this period’s game; in the case I am considering the answer is yes. Info may double cross a customer by conspiring, for a separate fee, with the person on the other side of the deal and mislead the customer into choosing Comply while the other plays Deviate. And Infor may extort money from a trader with a clean history by threatening to asset that he has cheated in the past. After all the pairwise games for this period are played, Info keeps a record of any cheating of his customers, and decides whether to carry out an extra cost any additional detection activities. Infor merely tells a customer either “I know your match has cheated in the past” or “As far as I know, your match has not cheated in the past.” If Info says the latter and the other trader cheats this time, the customer has no recourse and Info will not inflict any punishment on the cheater. If Info lies about the other party’s history (and extracts an additional fee from the other party for allowing him to cheat in this way, the customer equally has no recourse; we have to find conditions under which the equilibrium is proof against such double crossing by Info. Similarly, we have to check whether Info has any incentive to extract extortion payments by threatening falsely to assert a history of cheating by someone who in reality has a clean record. Since customers’ contracts with Info cannot be externally enforced, Info cannot credibly enter into long-run contracts with large up-front fees to control customers’ cheating. #RandolphHarris 9 of 22
The phenomena which we observe in the neurotic person are in principle not different from those we find in the normal. They are only more accentuated, clear-cut, and frequently more accessible to the awareness of the neurotic person than they are in the normal who is not aware of any problem which warrants study. The term normal or health can be defined in two ways. Firstly, if he is able to fulfill the social role he is to take in that given society, from the standpoint of a functioning society, one can call a person normal or healthy. More concretely, this means that he is able to work in the fashion which is required in that particular society, and furthermore that he is able to participate in the reproduction of society, that is, that he can raise a family. Secondly, from the standpoint of the individual, we look upon health or normalcy as the optimum of growth and happiness of the individual. If the structure of a given society were such that it offered the optimum possibility for individual happiness, both viewpoints would coincide. However, this is not the case in most societies we know, including our own. Although they differ in the degree to which they promote the aims of individual growth, there is a discrepancy between the aims of the smooth functioning of society and of the full development of the individual. This fact makes it imperative to differentiate sharply between the two concepts of health. The one is governed by social necessities, the other by values and norms concerning the aim of individual existence. Unfortunately, this differentiation is often neglected. #RandolphHarris 10 of 22
Most psychiatrist take the structure of their own society so much for granted that to them the person who is not well adapted assumes the stigmas of being less valuable. On the other hand, the well-adapted person is supposed to be the more valuable person in terms of a scale of human values. If we differentiate the two concepts of normal and neurotic, we come to the following conclusion: the person who is normal in terms of being well adapted only at the expense of having given up his self in order to become more or less the person he believes he is expected to be. All genuine individuality and spontaneity may have been lost. On the other hand, the neurotic person can be characterized as somebody who was not ready to surrender completely in the battle for his self. To be sure, his attempt to save his individual self was not successful, and instead of expressing his self productively he sought salvation through neurotic symptoms and by withdrawing into a phantasy life. Nevertheless, from the standpoint of human values, he is less crippled than the kind of normal person who has lost his individuality altogether. Needless to say there are persons who are not neurotic and yet have not drowned their individuality in the process of adaptation. However, if we think of neurotic in terms of social efficiency, the stigma attached to the neurotic person seems to us to be unfounded and justified. As for a whole society, if its members did not function socially, the term neurotic cannot be applied in this latter sense, since a society could not exist. #RandolphHarris 11 of 22
From a standpoint of human values, however, a society could be called neurotic in the sense that its members are crippled in the growth of their personality. Since the term neurotic is so often used to denote lack of social functioning, we would prefer not to speak of society in terms of its being neurotic, but rather in terms of its being adverse to human happiness and self-realization. Once the primary bond which gave security to the individual are served, once the individual faces the World outside of himself as a completely separate entity, two courses are open to him since he has to overcome the unbearable state of powerlessness and aloneness. By one course he can progress to “positive freedom”; he can relate himself spontaneously to the World in love and work, in the genuine expression of his emotional, sensuous, and intellectual capacities; he can thus become one again with man, nature, and himself, without giving up the independence and integrity of his individual self. The other course open to him is to fall back, to give up his freedom, and to try to overcome his aloneness by eliminating the gap that has arisen between his individual self and the World. This second course never reunites him with the World in the way he was related to it before he merged as an “individual,” for the fact of his separateness cannot be reversed; if it were prolonged, it is an escape from an unbearable situation which would make life impossible. #RandolphHarris 12 of 22
This course of escape, therefore, is characterized by its compulsive character, like every escape from threatless complete surrender of individuality and the integrity of the self. This it is not a solution which leads to happiness and positive freedom; it is, in principle, a solution which is to be found in all neurotic phenomena. It assuages an unbearable anxiety and makes life possible by avoiding panic; yet it does not solve the underlying problem and is paid for by a kind of life that often consists only of automatic or compulsive activities. Some of these mechanisms of escape are of relatively small social import; they are to be found in any marked degree only in individuals with severe mental and emotional disturbances. It may be said that the Holy Spirit dwelling in the regenerate human spirit energizes and works through the faculties of the soul and the members of the body only in and with the active cooperation of the WILL of the believer. In other words, God, though in the spirit of man, does not use the man’s hand apart from the “I will use my hand” of the man himself. Life is a mixture of essence and existence, of actualized potentiality and existential distortions, of being and estrangement. Since the process of actualization is ontological, life is a universal concept applicable to all real beings, organic and inorganic, stars and rocks, animals and men. Life can be considered from the viewpoints of its two constitutive factors, essence and existence. Essentially, life exhibits a unity amid diversity described as the multidimensional unity of life. Existentially, life is ambiguous. #RandolphHarris 13 of 22
The metaphor “dimension” should replace “level” in depicting the diversity of life, for levels so divide life into watertight compartments that its essential unity is destroyed. A plurality of dimensions reflects the difference in life, but, because dimensions can meet in a point without excluding one another, they accurately express the essential unity of life. Since life is the gradual actualization of potentialities, some dimensions are called “realms.” In this sense one speaks of the vegetable realm or the animal realm or the historical realm. In all of them, all dimensions are potentially present, and some of them are actualized. However, in man all dimensions, especially the spiritual and historical, are actual; in him is found the fullness of the essential multidimensional unity of life. Life as the actualization of potential being is a process, a movement out and away from a center and then back toward it. Thus, the life-process is made up of three basic functions. The circular movement of self-integration I the actualization of the ontological polarity of individualization and participation. Secondly, the horizontal direction of life is self-creativity, which is the actualization of the dynamics-form polarity. Thirdly, the vertical movement toward the ultimate and infinite is self-transcendence which actualizes the polarity of freedom-destiny. Although these functions of life in themselves are unified and harmonized, they are subject to the disruptions that follow upon existential estrangement. When separation becomes actual, their negative effects come into play, and ambiguity sets in. #RandolphHarris 14 of 22
To the degree in which this disruption is real, self-integration is countered by disintegration, self-creation is countered by destruction, self-transcendence is countered by profanization. In the life process these positive and negative elements are inseparably entwined, for life is neither essential nor existential but ambiguous. China, borrowing Communist ideology and economic and social methods from Soviet Russia, has become the first colonial country to make spectacular economic gains, beginning to transform herself into one of the great World powers and trying by example, persuasion, and economic help to become the leader of the colonial revolution in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. While after 1923 the Soviet Union had definitely given up the hope for a workers’ revolution in the West and, in fact, sought to contain all Western revolutionary movements since then, she had hoped for support from the nationalist revolutions in the East. Now, however, having herself become one of the “have” states, she feels threated by the growing onslaught of the underdeveloped countries under China’s leadership, and seeks an understanding with the United States of America, without, however, turning this understanding into an alliance against China. Any description of the basic trends of Western history in the last four hundred and eighty years would be lacking in an essential element unless it took account of a profound spiritual chance. While the influence of Christian theological thinking was waning from the seventeenth century onward, the same spiritual reality which was expressed earlier in the concepts of this theology found now a new expression in philosophical, historical, and political formulations. #RandolphHarris 15 of 22
The philosophers of the eighteenth century were, as Carl Becker has pointed out, no less men of faith than were the theologian of the thirteenth century. They just expressed their experience in a different conceptual framework. With the explosive growth of wealth and technical capacities in the nineteenth century, there occurred a fundamental change in man’s attitude. Not only, as Mr. Nietzsche put it, “God was dead,” but the humanism that was common to the theologians of the thirteenth, and to the philosophers of the eighteenth centuries, slowly died too; the formulae and ideologies, both of religion and of humanism, continued to be used, but the authentic experience became increasingly thinner, to the point of unreality. It was as if man had become drunk with his own power, and had transformed material production, once a means to the end of a more dignified life, into an end in itself. Large-scale enterprise, state intervention, emphasis on control of—rather than ownership of—property in the means of production, are characteristic of all industrial systems today. The Wester capitalist system, while it has many features of nineteenth-century capitalism, has incorporated enough of the new features to constitute a very different system from the former. The three forms of socialism current today, have broken much more drastically with the continuity of the former economic stage, show the new trends in different degrees and emphasis: a) Khrushchevism, a system of complete centralized planning and state ownership of industry and agriculture. #RandolphHarris 16 of 22
B ) Chinese communism, especially since 1958, a system of total mobilization of its most important capital asset, 1.4 billion people, and the complete manipulation of their currency, physical and emotional energy and thoughts without regard to their individuality; c ) humanistic socialism, which aims at the blending of a necessary minimum of centralization, state intervention, and bureaucracy with the possible maximum of decentralization, individualism, and freedom. This third type of socialism is represented by various forms from Scandinavia to Yugoslavia, Burma, and India. It makes sense because without some form of communism, the people hold all the natural resources which they can sell as they please, while the government only takes in tax revenue. However, as LCDs (less developed countries) are now rising, the American government needs to take some control of production of goods and services to ensure it does not lose its role as World power. If the corporations and the people in the United States of America can no longer afford to own farms, make cars, and produce, poultry, dairy, wood, steel, and other raw materials, they will have to important everything, which send wealth out of the United States of America to other nations. Therefore, the government has two choices. They can make laws that allow them to compete with private firms, or subsidize American farms, automakers, and other companies that produce goods and services so they remain affordable and are purchased by Americans as well as other nations. It would also be wise to offer huge tax incentives to people who purchase American cars. If a person, for example, could get a $5,000 tax credit on any American car, they would not only be popular because of style, but also because there is more incentive to purchase one. #RandolphHarris 17 of 22
Russian under control of President Vladimir Putin’s leadership, is a conservative, state-controlled, industrial managerialism, not a revolutionary system; she is interested in law and order and anxious to defend herself against the onslaught of the revolution of the “have-not” nations. For the reason Mr. Putin seeks an understanding with the United States of America, the ending of USA involvement with Ukraine. He neither needs nor wants another war. Mr. Putin cannot, however, give up his Communist-revolutionary ideology, nor can he turn against China, without undermining his own system. Hence he has to maneuver carefully to preserve his ideological hold on the Russian people and to defend himself against both his opponents within Russian and against China and her potential allies outside. If he fails in his attempt to end the United States of America’s involvement with Ukraine, he (or his successor) will be forced into a close alliance with China and into a policy which would leave little hope for peace. The development of the former colonial peoples will not follow the capitalist development, because for psychological, social, and economic reasons this system is neither feasible nor attractive to them. The question is not whether they will join the communist or the capitalist systems. The real alternative is whether they will accept the Chinese or Russian form of communism, thus becoming closely allied with either of these two countries, or whether they will adopt one of the various forms of democratic, decentralized socialism and become allied with the neutral bloc. #RandolphHarris 18 of 22
The United States of America is, therefore, confronted with the following alternative: either a continued fight against communism together with the continuation of the arms race—hence the probability of nuclear war—or a political understanding on the basis of the status quo with Russia, and the support of neutral democratic-socialist regimes in the colonial World. It is a fact that two systems represented By Russia-China and by the United States of America—Western Europe are competing with each other in the World today and the race is only heating up and getting more intense. Any attempt of either one to defeat the other system through the use of military power will not only fail, but will lead to the destruction of both—or the World. There is only one way in which the United States of America can compete with communism: that is by demonstrating that it is possible to raise the standard of living in America and influence LCDs to follow this method, without using forces of coercive regimentation. However, many people are not convinced that America is heading in the right direction because their leaders are displaying a lack of competence, a lack of law and order, a loss of family values, and it even seems to some that hardworking Americans, who believe in the capitalist dream, are given less consideration than people who enter America illegally. While there are over 5 million homeless people (many are not counted as homeless because they are subletting, living with family, or not on a rental lease where they are being housed) in America, people entering the country without passing background checks and without documents are put up in hotel rooms and given cash assistance. #RandolphHarris 19 of 22
You will hear critics say that there are so many people homeless in America because they are mentally ill and that there is a shortage of houses. However, let us be real, many of you know people who are mentally ill and should have been fired who are gainfully employed. It is so bad that several of their coworkers display the same level of dysfunction. Furthermore, there are currently sixteen million homes currently sitting vacant across the United States of America. In fact, in every state across the country, any homes remain empty while hundreds of thousands of Americans face homelessness. The existence of a multicentered World depends on the acceptance of the present status quo by all powers and on effective universal disarmament. The tension and suspicious of the nuclear arms race do not permit a political understanding; the unsettled political situation does not permit disarmament. If peace is to be preserved, both disarmament and political understanding are necessary. If and when the economy improves and the arms race ends, only then will massive economic assistance—food, capital and technical assistance—to the LCDs be possible. Also, efforts to education LCDs about family planning and birth control should also be a goal. Because when there is food on the table, and people do not have to work for it, they usually continue to have babies. Some babies are even born starving because people have no idea about birth control and family planning nor access to it. #RandolphHarris 20 of 22
Also, in conquering poverty and achieving wealth, the United States of America, like the rest of the West (and Russia), has accepted a spiritual of materialism under which production and consumption have become ends in themselves, rather than means to a more human, creative life. These and other institutional, secondary goals and values have become indistinguishable to most people from the primary aims of life. Quite aside from all dangers from without, our inner emptiness and deep-rooted lack of hope will eventually lead to the fall of Western civilization, unless a genuine renaissance of the Western spirit takes the place of the present complacency, resignation, and confusion. This renaissance must be precisely what the Renaissance of the fifteenth-seventeenth centuries was—an invigorating re-establishment of contact with the humanistic principles and aspirations of Western culture. What we are witnessing today is truly a World revolution in rapid advance, a revolution which began in the West four hundred and eighty years ago. It has led to a new system of production which at first made Europe and America the leaders of the World. It made the working masses in Europe beneficiaries of the system; and hence the revolution of the masses in Europe (with the exception of Russia) and in North America was peaceful. Now a new stage of the World revolution is developing, the revolution of the LCDs in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. If the great industrial powers accept the historical trend and take the adequate anticipatory steps, will this revolution occur peacefully? Many think World War III is on the verge of breaking out, and that leaves little hope for peace and the survival of democracy. #RandolphHarris 21 of 22
I pledge Allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic, for which it stands, one Nation, under God, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all. The American, even though they are being driven from the land, will never surrender their love for it. The American literally transplanted Heaven into his very consciousness. He imagines that he continues to live in the land of his dreams. He might be living in the cold north or in the sunny south, yet he prays for rain or for dew when it is the season in America. He celebrated Thanksgiving, the blending of two cultures and sharing of food and traditions. He celebrated Columbus Day, the founding of America. He celebrated Christmas, the birth of the Saviour. He celebrated Earth Day, when the trees were beginning to blossom. And he proudly celebrated Independence Day. In whatever clime he lived, he and she were always believed that they were in their ancient home. We must not forget the many sacrifices and contributions that woman have made for America also. Without women, we would not be able to continue the human race. The Americans mourned for their ancient land as they have for the dead, and they believe it will rise again and experience the resurrection of the dead. If I forget thee, O America, let my right hand forget its cunning; let my tongue cleave to my mouth, if I remember thee not, if I set not America above my chiefest joy. Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for unto thee I will give it. And be sure to donate to the Sacramento Fire Department, they are not receiving all of their resources. #RandolphHarris 22 of 22
MAGNOLIA STATION AT CRESLEIGH RANCH
Rancho Cordova, CA | low $600s
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We See things with Different Eyes
My heart was full of music as I wandered the hours away by the bank of a brook, on my estate, watching the sun on the face of the chuckling water. A bird came to circle me, flew unafraid through the aura of gladness about me. The delicate tip of a wing brushed my wrist with the touch of the first secret kiss from my hands. The singing the filled me was part of the nature of laughing, the running of water, the sound of the wind in the reed by the edge of the stream. And as I spake, into my face there came light, as reflected from a silver flame; my long brown hair swelled ampler, in display full golden; in my eyes a brighter day dawned blue and full of love. This was a World without hatred. As it grew dark, I went home. Then retiring to my rooms, I sat down by the light of one lamp and devoured what I could of my century’s thinking, and at last I lay flat upon the bed, staring at the ceiling, overwhelmed by the vigor of the return to the classical, by the passionate enthusiasm for the old Greek and Roman poets, and by the faith in sensuality which this age seemed to hold. I enjoyed the beauty of the old handwritten codexes. Of course, this is why, even after the printing press was still established, my libraries boasted of handwritten books. While waiting for the servants to return from their hunt, I went to the library to catching up on a little reading. However, when the party failed to return by midnight, I began to fear the worst. I stumbled out of my quarters; my mouth was very dry, and my heart was thumping painfully. I descended the stairs. And while sitting alone at a table, from the corner of my eye, I saw the curtain twitch at an upper window. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
Suddenly, men where shouting, canvas flapping, wheels rumbling, and I could hear horses neighing and pawing frantically. Overjoyed to hear them, I leapt to my feet just as the doors opened and the party entered. And although there was no wind at that hour of the night, one did arise not long afterward, but there was absolutely none then. Even the dry tips of the lingering hedge-mustard, grey and blighted, and the fringe on the roof of the standing democrat-wagon were unstirred. And yet amid that tense, godless clam the high bare boughs of all the trees in the yard were moving. They were twitching morbidly and spasmodically, clawing in convulsive and epileptic madness at the moonlit clouds; scratching impotently in the noxious air as if jerked by some alien and bodiless line of linkage with subterrene horrors writhing and struggling below the black roots. Not a man breathed for several seconds. Then a cloud of darker depth passed over the moon, and the silhouette of clutching branches faded out momentarily. At this there was a general cry; muffled with awe, but husky and almost identical from every throat. For the terror had not faded with the silhouette, and in a fearsome instant of deeper darkness, I saw wriggling at that treetop height a thousand tiny points of faint and unhallowed radiance, tipping each bough like the fire of St. Elmo or the flames that came down on the apostles’ heads at Pentecost. It was a monstrous constellation of unnatural light, like a glutted swarm of corpse-fed fireflies dancing hellish sarabands over an accursed marsh; and its colour was a nameless intrusion. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
All the while the shaft of phosphorescence from the well was getting bright and brighter, brining to my mind a sense of doom and abnormality which far outraced any image my conscious mind could form. It was no longer shining out, it was pouring out; and as the shapeless stream of unplaceable colour left the well it seemed to flow directly into the sky. The shivering men walked to the front door. However, to my consternation they made no sound and passed straight through the furniture and walls. That is when I noticed the growing luminosity of the trees. With the moments the shining of the trees increased, while their restless branches seemed to strain more and more toward verticality. The wood of the well-sweep was shining now. The phosphorescence had begun to pervade the entire mansion. It glowed on the broad-planked floor and the carpet, and shimmered over the sashes of the stained-glass windows. It ran up and down the exposed corner-post, coruscated about the shelf and mantel, and infected the very doors and the furniture. Each minute saw it strengthened. I walked and stumbled as in a dream. All of Llanada Villa was shining with the hideous unknown blend of colour; trees, buildings, and even such grass and herbage as had not been wholly changed to lethal grey brittleness. The boughs were all straining skyward, tipped with tongues of foul light. Then without warning the hideous thing shot vertically up toward the sky like a meteor, leaving behind no trail and disappearing through a round and curiously regular hole in the clouds before I could grasp or cry out. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
I could not forget that sight, as I stared blankly at the stars of Cygnus, Deneb twinkling above the other, where the unknown colour had melted into the Milky Way. However, my gaze was the next moment called swiftly to Earth by the crackling in the valley. It was just that. Only a wooden ripping and crackling, as so many others in the valley vowed. Yet the outcome was the same, for in one feverish, kaleidoscopic instant there burst up from Llanada Villa a gleamingly eruptive cataclysm of unnatural sparks and substance; blurring the glace of the few who saw it, and sending forth to the zenith a bombarding cloudburst of such coloured and fantastic fragments as our Universe must needs disown. Through quickly re-closing vapours, I flowed the great morbidity that had vanished, and in another second they had vanished too. Behind and below was only a darkness to which I dared not return, and all about was a mounting wind which seemed to sweep down in black, frore gusts from interstellar space. It shrieked and howled, and lashed the fields and distorted the fruit orchards in a mad cosmic frenzy. Later I was to learn that the hunting party had been ambushed and killed. Now on the 16th of January, the anniversary of the hunt, the ghostly party can be seen riding toward Llanada Villa. Apart from this, a housemaid’s ghost in a blue dress haunts the mansion, gliding silently along the corridors, while the spirit of Dieter Hulsmann, my butler haunts the Observational Tower where he starved to death, after learning of the death of the housemaid, whom he was fondly in love with. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
A group called the European Mission Society accused me of using the “arts of the Devil” and of being in league with “demonic forces” with which I supposedly intended “to perplex humanity.” With this added shock, I was crushed forever with a brooding fear I dared not even mention for many years to come. And from inside of the mansion, I had seen something feebly rise, only to sink down again upon the place from which the great shapeless horror had shot into the sky. I believe there must be an older race than man, spawned from ancient seed in times before ours, perhaps on planets that have gone to dust, and so horrible to humans that when they are discovered the discoverers keep still about it—forget them again as quickly as they can. And they go back to time immemorial. I saw things—and knew things—horrible, wild things I cannot quite remember—visited unbelievable places, looked backward through my memory of creatures that have manifested in the walls of my home. Sometimes gloominess falls upon me like a material pall. What writhing souls, what terrors, what unrest, what madness roams these halls! If only I would have been spared! Something had cast an immediate spell of depression over me. The air of the room grew heavy and close. The open casement and the out-of-doors seemed to beckon me. I walked to the window, thrust the curtain aside, stood there. I am not addicted to nocturnal strolls or late meanderings before my bed; yet now, curiously enough I wanted to leave my home and walk the darkened fields. I paced the room nervously. The clock on the mantel pushed its ticks slowly through the quiet. It was a brilliant moonlight night. The great chimes of the Observational Tower were sounding midnight. Trying as I could to erase from my memory the queer experience which I just had, but I could see shadows of men lurking on the grounds. How long I sat there in the quiet, I do not know. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
And to my holy sacrifice invite, the power who reigns in deepest hell and night; I call Einodian Hecate, lovely dame, of Earthly, water, and celestial frame, sepulchral, in a saffron veil arrayed, pleased with dark ghosts that wander thru the shade. Have I not reason, beldams as you are, saucy and overbold? How did you dare to trade and traffic with Macbeth in riddles and affairs of death; and I, the mistress of your charms, the close contriver of all harms, was never called to bear my part, or show the glory of our art? And, which is worse, all you have done hath been but for a wayward son, spiteful and wrathful; who, as others do, loves for his own ends, not for you. But make amends now: get you gone, and at the pit of Acheron meet me i’ the morning: thither he will come to know his destiny: your vessels and your spells provide, your charms, and every thing beside. I am for th’ air; this night I’ll spend unto a dismal and a fatal end: great business must be wrought ere noon: upon the corner of the moon, there hangs a vaporous drop profound; I’ll catch it ere it come to ground: and that, distill’d by magic sleights, shall raise such artificial sprites, as, by the strength of their illusion, shall draw him on to his confusion: he shall spurn fate, scorn death, and bear his hopes ‘bove wisdom, grace, and fear; and you all know security is mortals’ chiefest enemy. Hark! I am call’d; my little spirit see, sits in a foggy cloud, and stays for me. Come, let’s make haste; she’ll soon be back again. And we fairies, that do run by the triple Hecate’s team from the presence of the sun, following darkness like a dream. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
Although The Winchester Mystery House is usually closed at 1.00am, police officers and passersby say that someone or something walks around in the mansion at night and often turns on all the lights. Numerous individuals have seen the image of a man hanging from a scaffold on the east side of the mansion. According to legend, 20 years before Mrs. Sarah L. Winchester purchased the home, an outlaw was hanged on the land. The site where the hanging allegedly took place was built over. One of the tour guides was badly shaken by something he had seen on the upper floor, but he refused to discuss it. The ghost of the outlaw haunted the mansion with dreadful shrikes. As such, a priest was brought in to exorcise the ghost, which he did with the help of a large black bible which he left in the mansion. However, years later, after the ghost had been long forgotten, the bible was taken away for repair and immediately the shrieking resumed. The bible was hastily returned, and the fearful shrieking ceased. The outlaw’s ghost still haunts the mansion, his broken neck and limp arm by his side as he stalks the lonely depths of the second floor.
For further information about tours, including group tours, weddings, school events, birthday party packages, facility rentals, and special events please visit the website: https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
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It Has Been Almost 100 Years Since the American Crash of 1929
The reality is the TV news media in Sacramento does not care. They are evil. People have been injured and died as a result of their wanton disregard for human life and desire to make fake news. Children have to grow up without mothers and fathers. Families have been ripped apart, all so these gorillas can put on masks and makeup and tell lies, while making themselves feel important, when they are nothing more than low down, dirty criminals. The reporters are guilty of murder. History takes twists and turns and so, too, does the writing of history. After a process of about a thousand years, lasting from the beginning of the feudalization of the Roman Empire to the late Middles Ages, a period in which the European Continent was impregnated, through Christianity, with the ideas of African, Greek, Hebrew, and Arab thinking, Europe gave birth to a new culture. Western man discovered nature as an object of intellectual speculation and aesthetic enjoyment; he created a new science, which became—within a few centuries—the basis for a technique destined to transform nature and the practical life of man in a hitherto undreamed-of way; he discovered himself as an individual, endowed with almost unlimited energies and powers. This new period engendered also a new hope for the improvement, or even, the perfection of man. The hope for man’s perfection on this Earth and for his capacity to build a “good society” is one of the most characteristic and unique features of occidental thought. It is a hope that had been held by the Old Testament prophets as well as by Greek philosophers. It has then been overshadowed—although never lost—by the transhistorical ideals of salvation and by the emphasis on man’s substantial corruption in Christian thinking; it found new expression in the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century utopias and in the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century philosophical and political ideas. Parallel to the blossoming of hope after the Renaissance and the Reformation went the explosive economic development of the West, the first industrial revolution. #RandolphHarris 1 of 11
The organizational form it took was that of the system of capitalism, characterized by private property in the means of production, the existence of politically free wages earners, and the regulation of all economic activities by the principles of calculation and profit maximation. By 1913, industrial production increased seven times above its 1860 level, with almost all of it in Europe and North America. (Less than 10 percent of World production took place outside of these two areas.) Since the end of the First World War, mankind has entered into a new phase. The nature of the capitalistic mode of production has undergone profound changes. New Productive forces (such as the use of oil, electricity, and atomic energy) and technical discoveries have increased material productivity many times over what it had been in the middle of the nineteenth century. The new technical discoveries brought with them a new form of production. This was characterized by centralization of production in big plants, along with the dominant positions of the big corporations; managerial bureaucracies, which head these corporations but do not own them; and a mode of production in which hundreds of thousands of manual and clerical workers co-operate smoothly, supported by strong trade unions, which often share the bureaucratic character of big corporations. Centralization, bureaucratization, and manipulation are the characteristics features of the new mode of production. The earlier period of industrial development, with its need to build up a heavy industry at the expense of the satisfaction of the material needs of the workers resulted in extreme poverty for the millions of men, women, and children who worked in factories during the nineteenth century. #RandolphHarris 2 of 11
As a reaction to their misery, but also as an expression of human dignity and faith, the socialist movement spread over all of Europe and threatened to overthrow the old order and to replace it with one that would work for the benefit of the broad masses of the population. The organization of labour combined with technical progress and the resulting increased productivity permitted the working class an ever-increasing share of the national product. The extreme dissatisfaction with the system that characterized the nineteenth century gave way to a spirit of co-operation within the capitalist system. A new partnership between industry and the workers, represented by trade unions and (with the exception of the United States of America) strong socialist parties took place. The trend toward violent revolutions ended in Europe after the First World War, except in the economically most backward counties among the large powers. While the gap between the “haves” and the “have-nots” has been narrowing considerably within the Western industrial countries (and slowly in Soviet Russia), the gap between the “have countries” of Europe and North America and the “have-not countries” in Asia (with the exception of Japan), Africa, and Latin America is as wide as it ever was within one country, and is actually still widening. However, while at the beginning of the twentieth century the colonial peoples accepted their exploitation and poverty, the middle of the same century is witnessing the full-scale revolution of the poor countries. Precisely as the workers within capitalism in the nineteenth century refused to continue believing that their fate had been ordained by divine or social law, so now the poor nations refuse to accept their poverty. #RandolphHarris 3 of 11
Less Developed Countries (LCDs) demand not only political freedom, but a standard of living approaching that of the Western World and rapid industrialization as a means to that goal. Two thirds of the human race are unwilling to accept a situation in which their standard of living is only from 10 to less than 5 percent of that of people of the richest country—the United States of America—which with 4.3 percent of the World’s population, produces about 20 percent of the World’s goods which is 20 percent less than it was in 1960. The colonial revolution was sparked by many factors, among them the weakening of Europe, militarily and economically, after the two World Wars in the first half of the twentieth century; the nationalistic and revolutionary ideology transmitted from nineteenth-century Europe and America, and the new modes of production and social organization, which rise the possibility of “catching up with the West” beyond a slogan into a realm of reality. In the philosophical thinking of the modern era, we find also that the two aspects of freedom remain interwoven as they had already been in the theological doctrines of the Reformation. Thus for Mr. Kant and Mr. Hegal, autonomy and freedom of the individual are the central postulates of their systems, and yet they make the individual subordinate to the purpose of an all-powerful state. The philosophers of the period of the French Revolution, and in the nineteenth century Mr. Feuerbach, Mr. Marx, Mr. Stirner, and Mr. Nietzsche, have again in an uncompromising way expressed the idea that the individual should not be subject to any purposes external to his own growth or happiness. The reactionary philosophers of the same century, however, explicitly postulated the subordination of the individual under spiritual and secular authority. #RandolphHarris 4 of 11
The second half of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth show the trend for human freedom in its positive sense at its peak. Not only did the middle class participate in it, but also the working class became an active free agent, fighting for it own economic aims and at the same time for the broader aims of humanity. With the monopolistic phase of capitalism as it developed increasingly in the last decades, the respective weight of both trends for human freedom seems to have changed. Those factors which tend to weaken the individual self have gained, while those strengthening the individual have relatively lost in weight. The individual’s feeling of powerlessness and aloneness has increased, his “freedom” all traditional bonds have become more pronounced, his possibilities for individual economic achievement have narrowed down. He feels threatened by gigantic forces and the situation resembles in many ways that of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The most important factor in this development is the increasing power of monopolistic capital. The concentration of capital (not wealth) in certain sectors of our economic system restricted the possibilities for the success of individual initiative, courage, and intelligence. In those sectors in which monopolistic capital has won it victories the economic independence of many has been destroyed. For those who struggle on, especially for a large part of the middle class, the fight assumes the character of a battle against such odds that the feeling of confidence in personal initiative and courage is replaced by a feeling of powerlessness and hopelessness. #RandolphHarris 5 of 11
An enormous though secret power over the whole of society is exercised by a small group, on the decisions of which depends the fate of a large part of society. The inflation of Germany, 1923, or the American crash, 1929, increased the feeling of insecurity and shattered for many the hope of getting ahead by one’s own efforts and the traditional belief in the unlimited possibilities of success. Most people have lived through difficult economic times of some sort. And everyone has at some point learned about the most significant economic downturn in modern USA history—the Great Depression of the 1930s. In keeping with our unique business cycle theory, ITR Economics is forecasting that another Great Depression will start near the beginning of the next decade. The causes of the upcoming Great Depression will be similar to its predecessor in the way it will be unforeseen and unexpected for the vast majority of people; for that reason, the emotional strain on people and the similar pain for unprepared businesses could parallel that of the 1930s. Just as many of us will never forget the influence of COVID-19 on our lives, the Great Depression of the 2030s will impact the way we think, how we spend money, who and what we trust, and what we assign importance on in our lives. Of course, the upcoming Great Depression will have a profound effect on mental health. Therefore, it is important to have the right financial mindset. You know it is coming, so plan, expect it, and do not overextend your business or finances. Start paying things off. Focus on longevity. Maybe stop buying cars every two years and get the scheduled maintenance done so you can keep it for seven years to a decade. #RandolphHarris 6 of 11
The goal is to reduce expenditure. If you do not need to renovate your home, do not. If your home needs repairs, start getting them done now before it becomes a problem. Scrutinize your cost-structure heading into the depression. High fixed costs will be difficult to roll back. You can do simple things like cutback on how frequently the gardener comes out. Maybe every two weeks, instead of once a week. Regarding personal finances—and this might seem difficult: save as much money as you can between now and the next decade. Consider investing in gold and silver and getting a personal safe in your home (of course keep this private). The climb out of a depression is a time of tremendous opportunity. Look to invest or start your business after the Great Depression. You do not want to look back with regret at a missed opportunity. Oh, yeah, and when you go to replace that perfectly good mobile phone, consider, instead, investing in gold. Knowing the low point of this economic contraction will give you a competitive advantage. Preparing your business now to capitalize when that moment arrives could put you ahead of the competition coming out of the depression. While the upcoming Great Depression will be driven by very different circumstances, there are many things you can do for yourself and your business to establish advantageous positioning before, during and after the downturn. Do not allow tensions about the past to continue to bubble away. Many people will find themselves in need of spiritual consolation, sustenance, and blessing. #RandolphHarris 7 of 11
Several will be wary of the machinations of evil, worried about demons, and seek protection from harm. It is possible that we will see war, epidemics and hunger. Some will view these as punishment for disobedience, sinfulness, and a lack of faith. Do not wait to fear divine judgment, dreading the possibility that God will bring about future wars to induce atonement. Repent now. Start saving money and paying down bills and make a pledge to return to church and live righteously. The believer must understand that the regaining the facile use of his faculties, and the maintenance of his mind in healthy condition after recovery from passive surrender to psychopathological offenders, will mean a steady fight with the ultimate negative—requiring the use of the weapons of warfare given in the Word of God. Weapons, for instance, such as the truth in the text “Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof,” for resisting brooding over the past, or torturing pictures of the future; “Resist the ultimate negative and it will flee from you,” when the pressure of the enemy is severe; and other “fighting” texts, which will prove truly to be the “sword of the Spirit” to thrust at the enemy in the “evil day” of his onslaught upon the escaping believer. THE STEADY ATTITUDE OR ACTION OF ONE’S WILL. In keeping the mind in normal working condition, free from the interference of the enemy, the believer should maintain the attitude of having his will steadily set: id est, “I will that my mind shall not be passive”; “I will to have full control of my faculties, and to use them”; “I will to recognize everything that comes from the enemy”—each of which declares the CHOICE of the man, rather than his determination to do these things. #RandolphHarris 8 of 11
The powers of darkness are not affected by mere determination—id est, resolve—but they are rendered powerless by the act of the will definitely choosing, in the strength given by God, to stand against them. These steps to deliverance which has been given deal with THE PRACTICAL ASPECT OF THE BELIEVER’S ACTIONS. On the divine side, the victory has been won, and the ultimate negative and his psychopathological offenders have been conquered; but the actual liberation of the believer demands his active cooperation with the Holy Spirit, plus the steady exercise of his volition—choosing freedom instead of bondage. This will result in the normal use of every faculty of his being, set at liberty from the bondage of the enemy. “He that doeth the truth cometh to the light,” said the Lord (John 3.21). Evil spirits hate scrutiny, and so work under cover with deception and lies. The believer must come to the light of God for His light upon all spiritual experiences (as well as in all other departments of life) if he is to “cast off the works of darkness” (Romans 13.12) and put on the armour of God—the armor of light. In any scheme of Chrisitan theology, the church is an indispensable agent for the harmonizing of religion and culture. Society, the bearer of culture, encounters in the church the wellsprings of the Christian religion, the abiding presence and power of Christ. In Tillichian terminology, the church in its evangelizing role must “show to the people outside the Church that the symbols in which the life of the Church expresses itself are answers to the questions implied in their very existence as human beings.” #RandolphHarris 9 of 11
And, in its prophetic role, “the Church is the guardian who reveals dynamic structures in society and undercuts their demonic power by revealing them, even within the Church itself.” Therefore, one can say that the Church judges culture, including the Church’s own forms of life. For tis forms are created by culture, as its religious substance makes culture possible. The Church and culture are within, not alongside each other. The importance of the church is measure by the importance of the New Bing, for the Church is the historical embodiment of the New Being created by the Incarnation. Consequently, the such as the community of the New Being is the place where the new theonomy is actual. However, from there is pours into the whole of man’s cultural life and gives a Spiritual center to man’s spiritual life. Final revelation appeared in Jesus as the Christ, but it is the church which is supposed to receive it in a continuous process of reception, interpretation, and actualization. The history of the church is the locus of continuous dependent revelations. The Church is also the place where the reunion of man with man is an actual event, though the Church of God is permanently betrayed by the Christian churches. Yet, even if its organization seems always a betrayal of the New Being, the church is the Community of the New Being. The church has always been my home in spite of all criticisms, which I had to exercise at an early time upon Church doctrine and upon Church practice. It is the Spiritual Community established by the Spiritual Presence. Since the Spirit is the symbolic answer to an existential question, life ontologically is the actuality of being. #RandolphHarris 10 of 11
Living is a process of continuous birth. The tragedy in the life of most of us is that we die before we are fully born. Being born, however, does not only mean to be free from the womb, the lap, the hand, et cetera, but also to be free to be active and creative. Just as the infant must breathe once the umbilical cord is cut, so man must be active and creative at every moment of birth. To the extent that man is fully born, he finds a new kind of rootedness; that lies in his creative relatedness to the World, and in the ensuing experience of solidarity with all man and will all nature. From being passively rooted in nature and in the womb, man becomes one again—but this time actively and creatively with all life. Man needs to have a sense of identity. Man can be defined as the terrestrial being that can say “I,” that can be aware of himself as a separate entity. Other terrestrial beings, being with nature and not transcending it, have no awareness of themselves, and has no need for a sense of identity. Man, being turn away form nature, being endowed with reason and imagination, needs to form a concept of himself, needs to say and to feel “I am I.” Because he is not lived, but lives, because he has lost the original unity with nature, has to make decisions, is aware of himself and his neighbour as different persons, he must be able to sense himself as the subject of his actions. If he did not find some way of satisfying his sense of identity, as with the need for relatedness, rootedness, and transcendence, this need for a sense of identity is so vital and imperative that man could not remain sane. Man’s sense of identity develops in the process of emerging from the “primary bonds” which tie him to mother nature. #RandolphHarris 11 of 11
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Spirit Beings Have the Power to Absorb Our Actions and Thoughts
Llanada Villa was wintry with steep hand craved shingled roofs and stained-glass windows. It was built of redwood, and had countless chimneys rising from its steep gables, and a sprawling conservatory on the west side. The sheer scale of place, stranded as its own park, suggested another World. When the stars were right, they could plunge from World to World through the sky. However, the black haunted woods were where no dweller ventured. There were insane shouts and harrowing screams, soul-chilling chant and dancing devil-flames. Reluctant to be left alone, servants refused point-blank to advance an inch toward the scene of unholy worship. There were legends of a hidden lake unglimpsed by mortal sight, in which dwelt a huge, shadow with luminous eyes; and devils flew up out of caverns from the inner Earth to worship it at midnight. They said that it had been there before the Spanish Conquistadors, before the Indians, and before even the wholesome beasts and birds of the woods. It was a nightmare to see, and to see it was to die. Two bodies had once been found slaughtered, and were buried in one sepulchre, and the tree ever after brought forth blue berries, which served for memorials of our blood. Even though it made men dream, they knew to keep away. A faint glow of twilight was still in the windows overheard, but the darkness at the far end of the gallery was already impenetrable, and the dazzle of the candle confused my eyes. This particular night, I could feel the black arcades of horror emanating from within the walls of my home. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8
The last of my strength deserted me, and I sank to the floor, just managing to set the candlestick upright beside me. Hot wax stung the back of my hand. You must get up, you must get up, a voice in my head was saying, but my limbs would not obey. I was crouching a few feet from the fireplace, almost in front of the sarcophagus, which lay just within the circle of light from the candle. If you cannot stand, you must crawl, said the voice. I was making another effort to rise when I thought I heard a sound from the fireplace. I clenched my teeth to stop them chattering. There it was again, a heavy, muffled, grating sound, like stone sliding upon stone. It seemed to be coming from beneath the floor in front of me. The grating ceased; for several seconds there was absolute silence, then a faint metallic creak. I held my breath; the candle flame steadied. The lid of William’s tomb was slowly rising. In life he was a beautiful youth and fond of manly sports. He would rise before the dawn to pursue the chase. I saw him when I first looked forth, fell in love with him, and was married to this charming man and he devotedly loved me. Nevertheless, my heart gave one appalling lurch and stopped beating altogether. The next second, as it seemed, I was on the far side of the connecting door, with a rattling in the lock as I fought to turn it. I could see the faint glimmer of my candle shining through the gap beneath the door. Then another, stronger light began to play about my feet; there was a creak, and thump, and the sound of footsteps approaching. #RandolphHarris 2 of 8
I thought of running for the stairs, but I had no light, and the visitant would hunt me down. The door handle rattled; the door shook; the footsteps moved purposefully away. In a few moments, it would be on the landing. I had not time to run and lock all the doors at the far end of the library. I thought of the weapons arrayed along the gallery wall—too high for me to reach. If it seized me, most likely I would die horribly. The footsteps were still receding. I gripped the key with both nerveless hands and twisted. There was a rasp and a snick, but the footsteps did not pause. I withdrew the key and slipped back into the gallery, just as the light passed out through the double doors at the other end. The beam of a lantern played across the walk beyond; then the footsteps moved off along the landing, boards creaking at every tread. For a moment I thought I might be spared, but then I heard the squeak of hinges as my pursuer entered the library. I tried to slip the key into the keyhold, but my hand was shaking so violently that I dared not let the metal touch. My candle still burned where I had left it on the floor. Footsteps moved within the library—one, two, three, and then a pause. Light flickered beneath the door. The footsteps were moving again—I could not tell which way. I moved toward the candle, almost tripping over the hem of my dress. As I knelt to the flame, I realized I had no idea how fast the wick would burn. The floor seemed to be dropping away beneath my feet. If you faint, it will catch you, said the voice. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8
Only poetry or madness could do justice to the noises I heard as the footsteps continued to plough through the mansion toward me. Howls and squawking ecstasies tore through my home and reverberated through fireplaces like pestilential tempests from the gulfs of hell. Suddenly came the spectacle itself. The mad cacophony of the orgy fortunately deadened. Void of clothing, this hybrid spawn was some eight feet in height. It was some ancient legendary horror. Like a bird beneath the hypnotic gaze of deadly serpent, I was paralyzed by terror. The gloom of the chamber deepened. The stifling air was laden with unformulable menace, but it was constrained by the spell of a black and lethal necromancy. There crept forth the choking mustiness of hidden vaults and embalmed centurial corruption, together with the ghostly spice of a strange perfume that seemed to emanate from the beast. Then I recalled the story of a most evil creature, who had been buried somewhere in this land hundreds of years ago. I did not nurse the illusion that I was dealing here with an accidental tragedy. The creature was once a small boy who was abducted and dying of exposure lost in the wind-scoured hills that rose behind my home. He had been stolen. Then he had been murdered. And no one had ever been called to account for these awful, planned, sequential crimes. I rubbed my eyes with the heels of my hands. Anger stirred in the beast. And I knew I was sharing his indignant rage which he had so vibrantly felt. #RandolphHarris 4 of 8
My teeth were tapping together like typewriter keys. There was something else, some faint warning that reached me. Not actually heard so much as sensed. As if someone’s breath were coming down the shaft from just over my head, slightly as if by a sounding board. I acted on it instantly, more from instinct than actual realization of danger. The beast looked at me, contorted into a maniacal grimace of impending destruction, as I reached for my ivory handled pistol, both of its arms were high over his head wielding something. It looked like a sword, but there was no time to find out. For what seemed like five minutes, the din and chaos were beyond descriptions. Shots were fired. It came hissing down in a big arc against the floor. The sword, of course, followed it a second later. The very weight of the creature’s body caused it to crash through the floor. Numb and half frozen, gusts of uncontrollable shivering swept over me every once in a while. I turned my head and looked toward that sinister beast and there was nothing left but an opening in the floor. Within the walls of this dark house, there was a secret which even torture could not extract. For shapes came out of the dark to pay the inhabitants a visit. I was overwhelmed by the supernatural situation amid whose dubious horror and ineluctable sorceries had somehow become involved. Malefic sorcery, deadly peril of both soul and body. I fled blindly into the darkness until I collided painfully with a wall. #RandolphHarri 5 of 8
There was a secret which even torture could not extract in Llanada Villa. I was not absolutely alone, for shapes came out of the dark to visit. Although they no longer lived, those killed by the Winchester Rifle no longer lived, they would never really die. They all lay in my home preserved by spells and this ancient curse. They could live in the darkened hallways, shadows, and corners whilst millions of years rolled by. I could hear them whisper in the shadowy wings of the mansion; I caught the sibilation of ominous voices, like those of familiars that respond to the summoning of wizards; and I seemed to hear, even in the vaults and towers and remote chambers, the tread of feet that were hurrying on malign and secret errands. However, the oblivion was around me like the meshes of a sable net; and it closed in relentlessly upon my troubled mind, and drowned the alarms and of my agitated senses. A sad and sunless daylight filtered through the windows. The mansion was very still; and it seemed that the animating spirit of evil was now quiescent; the shadowy wings of the horror and malignity, the feet that had sped on baleful errands, the summoning sorcerers, the responding familiars, were all lulled in a temporary slumber. I opened the door, and tiptoed along the deserted hall. Amid the gloomy walls that surround me, the somber ancient halls, the high towers and the heavy bastions, there is but one thing that veritably exists; and all the rest is a fabric of illusion. I passed the doors of many secret rooms. There was one room in particular, a bare room, entirely built of stone, and illumined only by narrow slits high up in the wall. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8
The place was very dim, but in the middle of the floor was a tomb of marble, where William lay. And there he was. He appeared to be slumbering peacefully as an infant. Darkness returned with an earsplitting crash. The floor lurched and rebounded; for a moment there was silence, and then a long, low rumble, gathering power as it approached until it broke over me with a thunderous roar. Choking dust filled my lungs, and I was flung from my feet and rolled over and over like a rag doll in a storm. There was a vile, rasping taste in my mouth and throat, and a heavy weight pressing down on the side of my head; I tried to push it away, and realized it was the floor. The area on which I was lying were covered in sharp, gritty fragments. A faint, misty glow appeared in the darkness away to my right. I began to crawl toward it, not knowing what else to go, brushing aside slivers of what felt like glass, until I saw that it was the light from the candle I had left burning in the library. The fear had left me; perhaps I had simply exhausted my capacity to feel anything at all. I rose shakily to my feet, made my way along the landing to the library, fetched the candle and returned to the gallery—what remained of it. At the far end, where the tomb and the chimney and the armour had been, was a great gaping hole in the wall. Half the floor was gone; and the boards ended in a jagged mess of splinters not ten feet from where I had been lying. Dust was floating up from a lack pit beyond. A beast was down there. The thought struck me like icy water, dashing away the numbness. Suddenly I was trembling so that I could scarcely stand, as trickling noises echoed in the darkness. Then came out of the floor the black spirits of Earth, mouldy and shadowy. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8
I conjure thee, Bechard, and constrain thee, in like manner, by the Most Holy Names of God, ELOY, ADONAY, ELOY, AGLA, SAMALABACTAY, which are written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin; by all the sacrament, by all the names written in this spell; and by him who drove three from the height of Heaven. I conjure and command thee by the virtue of the Most Holy Eucharist, which hath redeemed men from their sins; I conjure three to come without any delay, to do and perform all my biddings, without any prejudice to my body or soul, without harming this spell, or doing injury to those that accompany me. I conjure thee, O Guland, in the name of Satan, in the name of Beelzebuth, in the name of Astaroth, and in the name of all other Spirits, to make haste and appear before me. Come, then in the name of Satan and in the names of all other demons. Come to me, I command thee, in the name of the Most Holy Trinity. Come without inflicting any harm upon me, without injury to my body or soul, without maltreating my books, or anything which I use. I command thee to appear without delay, or, that failing, to send me forthwith another Spirit having the same power as thou hast, who shall accomplish my commands and be submitted to my will, wanting which, he whom thou shalt send me, if indeed thou comest not thyself, shall in no wise depart, nor until he hath in all things fulfilled my desire. I now plant the seed of my desire within the black Earth, through the mouth of Arezura where the powers of sorcery and counter creation dwell. Through this gateway of darkness, I now shine the light and power of my will upon this World for the benefit of me and mine! #RandolphHarris 8 of 8
In the early summer of 2007, a couple were traveling to Santa Clara, California on a business trip. Shortly after 10 am, the decided to stop and eat at The Winchester Café. They remembered that the food was prepared in an excellent down-home country style, and that the waiter, waitress, the cook, and the other customers were so friendly in a sincere manner, and they promised that they would come back. And a sixteen years later, they tried to do exactly that on a return drive. However, The Winchester Café, which is located inside The Winchester Mystery House was nowhere to be seen. They even looped back a couple of times, thinking they may have somehow drive on by. They even got into an argument, each of them insisting that they remembered exactly where it was. They just could not find it, and since the hour was getting very late, they drove on. When they got home, they went to the website of The Winchester Mystery House and found a note saying that the mansion was closed and had gone dark for the day. They really wanted to eat at the café because the cooking was so wonderful. However, what if The Winchester Mystery House appeared and disappeared simply appeared and disappeared every so often? Or maybe the couple was lost in time and space for decades? We will never know. But at least we know the food and the company would have been good.
Cloaking is the power to hide the presence of oneself, other beings, or locations by making them imperceptible to the eye. It is effective at preventing others from discovering one’s location. Scientists at the University of Rochester in New York have discovered a way to hide large objects from sight using inexpensive and readily available lenses. Cloaking is the process that allows an object to become hidden from view, while everything around it appears undisturbed. When an object is placed behind the layered lenses it seems to disappear. “From what we know this is the first cloaking device that provides three-dimensional, continuously multidirectional cloaking,” said graduate student Joseph Choi, who helped develop the technology. In their tests, the researchers have cloaked a hand, a face, and a ruler, making each object appear “invisible” while the image behind the hidden object remains in view. The implications of this discovery are endless. Cloaking can also be achieved through the use of certain spells and potions. Additionally, beings with the power of invisibility are able to naturally cloak themselves by becoming unseeable. The Winchester Mystery House is truly mysterious.
For further information about tours, including group tours, weddings, school events, birthday party packages, facility rentals, and special events please visit the website: https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
Please visit the online giftshop, and purchase a gift for friends and relatives as well as a special memento of The Winchester Mystery House. A variety of souvenirs and gifts are available to purchase. https://shopwinchestermysteryhouse.com/
The Mind-Shattering Horrors of Llanada Villa
The most merciful thing in the World, I think, is the ability of the human mind to partake in all the beautiful of the material World. We live in an infinity of reality that only the beholder can discern. If we choose to go far, we must learn to apricate our circumstances and work towards an enjoyable life. My home is a vast labyrinth, each mile straining in its own direction, and somedays piecing together the dissociated mysteries will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful curse therein, which shall either make one go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly catacombs into the peace and safety of a new dark age. Within these walls, there are strange survivals of apparitions that will freeze the blood. However, it is not from them that there came the single glimpse of forbidden aeons which chills me when I think of the madness that has been bestowed upon my bloodline. The grass and trees have assumed the fresh enamel of mediaeval May, and the turf is figured with little blossoms of azure and white and yellow, like an ornate broidery, and there is a pebbly stream that murmurs beside the way, and the voices of undines are parleying deliciously beneath its waters. The sun-lulled air is laden with wafture of youth and romance; and the longing that wells from the heart of Llanada Villa seems to mingle mystically with the balsams of the fruit orchards. Llanada Villa is like a high castle which holds dominion over a surrounding forest. However, once through the threshold, dreaded glimpses of truth, flash out from a hideous past. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8
Somewhere within my haunted mansion is a hidden room notorious for sorcery. Servants speak of phantoms, grisly tales; and there are stories of loup-garous and goblins, of fays and devils and vampires that have infested these very walls. However, to these tales, I give little heed, considering it improbable that such creatures would fare abroad in open daylight. Until one day, I was nearing the appointed parlor, which a turn of the path would soon reveal; and my pulses quickened and became tremulous. My thoughts were interrupted by a shrill scream that rose to an unendurable pitch of fear and horror, issuing from the corridors of stillness of the nearby rooms. Startled, I peered at the thick doors; and as the scream fell back to silence, I heard the sound of dull and hurrying footfalls, and a scuffling as of several bodies. Again the scream arose. It was plainly the voice of a woman in some distressful peril. In a small open space beyond the parlor, I saw a woman who was struggling with three ruffians of exceptionally brutal and evil aspect. Even in the haste and vehemence of the moment, I realized that I had never before seen such men or a woman. They could not have been my servant. The woman was clad in a gown of emerald green that matched her eyes; in her face was the pallor of dead things, together with a faery beauty; and her lips were dyed as with the scarlet of newly flowing blood. The men were dark as Moors, and their eyes were red slits of flame beneath oblique brows with animal-like bristles. There was something very peculiar in the shape of their feet. All of them seemingly had cloven hooves, but somehow I could not recall what sort of clothing they had worn. #RandolphHarris 2 of 8
The woman turned a beseeching gaze upon me as I peered through the door. The men, however, did not seem to heed my presence. Lifting my pistol, I fire with tremendous power at the head of the nearest one—a shot that should have leveled the fellow to Earth. However, the bullet fell to the ground as if forced by unresisting air, and I staggered and almost fell headlong in trying to recover my equilibrium. Dazed and uncomprehending, I saw the knot of struggling figures had vanished utterly. At least, the three men had vanished but from the middle of the parlor, the death-white features of the woman smiled upon me for a moment with faint, inscrutable guile ere. I understood now; and I shivered as I crossed myself. I had been deluded by phantoms or demons, doubtless for no good purpose; I had been the gull of a questionable enchantment. Plainly there was something after all in the legends I had heard, in the ill-renown of The Curse of the Winchester Rifle. I retraced my way down the hall I had been following. However, when I thought to reach again the spot from which I had heard that shrill unearthly scream, I saw that there was no longer path leading to that parlor; nor indeed was this a section of the mansion I recognized. The marble steps, coffered ceilings, the elevator paneled in mahogany like a plutocrat’s library, which carried me to the fourth floor vanished. In lieu of this elegant new addition to Llanada Villa there lay before me a tarn of hallways that were dark and dull as clotting blood, and the trail therein like the hair of suicides, and the skeletons of rotting corpses. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8
Now, beyond all question, I knew that I was the victim of an evil enchantment. In answering that beguileful cry for succor, I had exposed myself to the spell, had been lured within the circle of its power. I could not know the force of wizardly or demonry had willed to draw me thus; but I knew that my situation was fraught with supernatural menace. As I passed this scene of utter desolation and lifelessness, it seemed a place where cadavers might keep their tryst with demons. Nothing stirred, not even a hammer; and there was no whisper of a servant, no song of birds. I proceeded further and further into my mansion with a cautious eye, as the further I got, the more the scene changed. There were moving lights in the halls that vanished; there were drowned faces in the walls. The parquet floor was an obstacle course of French dollhouses and miniature Japanese castles. The draperies were green silk damask and blue velvet, the furniture Lousi XV gilded oak, the paintings signed by Renior, Cezanne, Degas, Manet, Monet. My many-turreted castle was ancienter than the World, it was older than light; it was coeval with fear and darkness; and horror dwelt upon it and crept unseen but palpable along its bastions. The 600-room mansion was a fairy-tale castle come to life, with secret entrances, mysterious sources of music, and treasure collected from all the World. My home was not so unusual during the day. On the top half, every inch was decorated with Parisian Beaux Arts ostentation, a profusion of lions, cherubs, and goddesses. Oh, but the architects were not done. Soaring above the mansion was an ornate domed tower reaching nine stories, so pleased with itself that it continued to an open cupola. #RandolphHarris 4 of 8
Although construction was continuous, there was often no sign of life about the castle; and no banners flew above its turrets or its donjon. However, spirits spoke loudly to warn me that there was a fountainhead of sorcery involved in the construction of my home. A growing panic would whisper in my brain, I seemed to hear the rustle of malignant plumes, the mutter of demonian threats and plottings. Amid my dismay and bewilderment, I thought of Annie and William and imagined that as long as I continued construction, that one day I would find them waiting for me in a parlor, library, kitchen, or hallway. Through my mansion throw which I lived was a maze of bafflement and eeriness. Sometimes I could swear I felt implacable arms that stoke to retard me; I could swear that I felt them twine about me with the strength and suppleness of living things. I fought them, insanely, desperately, and seemed to hear a crackling of infernal laughter in the walls as I fought. After years, with a leaden sinking of my heart, as into some ultimate slough of despair and terror, I resigned myself and made no further effort to escape. My very will was benumbed, was crushed down as by the incumbence of a superior volition that would no longer permit my puny recalcitrance. I was unable to resist when a strong hateful compulsion drew my footsteps along the margent of the halls down a new, never before seen room. Doors would open by themselves as if to receive an unexpected guest. But other than me, there was no sign of carpenter, architect, maid, butler, no farmer; and the walls of this great mansion were silent as those of a sepulcher. However, there were these apparent hieroglyphics and a figure of evidently pictorial intent, though its impressionistic execution forbade a very clear idea of its nature. It seemed to be a sort of monster, or symbol representing a monster, of a form which only a diseased fancy could conceive. #RandolphHarris 5 of 8
If I say that my somewhat extravagant imagination yielded simultaneous pictures of octopus, a dragon, and a human caricature, I shall not be unfaithful to the spirit of the thing. A pulpy, tentacled head surmounted a grotesque and scaly body with rudimentary wings; but it was the general outline of the whole which made it most shockingly frightful. Behind the figure was a vague suggestion of a Cyclopean architectural background. At the opposite end of the parlor was a door which stood mysteriously open, revealing a dark hall. As I approached the doorway, I saw that a man was standing on the threshold; though a moment previous I could have sworn that it was untenanted by any visible form. I knew that any weapon was futile against this supernatural foe. The man was inordinately tall and cadaverous, and was dressed in black garments of a superannuate mode. His lips were strangely red amid his bluish beard and the mortuary whiteness of his face. They were like the lips of the woman who, with her assailants, had disappeared in a manner so dubious when I approached them. His eyes were pale and luminous as marsh-lights; and I shuddered at his gaze and at the cold, ironic smile of his scarlet lips that seemed to reserve a World of secrets all too dreadful and hideous to be disclosed. “I am Gilles Garnier,” the man announced. His tones were both unctuous and hollow, and served to increase the repugnance I felt. And when his lips parted, I had a glimpse of teeth that were unnaturally small and were pointed like the fangs of some fierce animal. Mr. Garnier was haunting my mind like the funereal accents of a knell; though I could not recall at that moment the macabre and spectral ides which the name tended to evoke. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8
He turned abruptly, motioning me to follow him. I refused. There were sudden and furtive darkness had closed in upon Llanada Villa without moon or star. My mansion became airless and stifling like the gloom of a sepulcher that had been sealed for ages; and I was aware of the veritable oppression, a corporeal and psychic difficulty in breathing, as I moved from room to room. I flung open a heavy door of dark somber wood. Beyond, in what was the eating-room of this section of the mansions, several ghosts were seated about a long table by the light of cressets no less dreary and dismal than those in the hall. In the strange, uncertain glow, their faces were touched with a gloomy dubiety, with a lurid distortion; and it seemed to me that shadows hardly distinguishable from the figures were gathered around the board. I thought I should go mad with fear. Then sensation of being watched grew upon me until I sprang up and turned with my back to fire. Even then it was impossible for me to see much. I stood glancing from door to door, straining to listen over the thudding of my heart. My twin shadows swayed across the doorway of the study opposite, seeming to move independently. I thought of snuffing the candles; but then I would not be able to see the doors to the landing at all. I had learned that you could count second by your heartbeat. Mine was racing far faster than the measured ticking of a clock, but I began to count, anyway. Only I could keep it up; I would reach twenty or thirty, and be distracted by some phantom sound or movement, and start again. Thus I endured an indefinite interval, while the windows darkened further and further. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8
I conjure thee, O Guland, in the name of Satan, in the name of Beelzebuth, in the name of Astaroth, and in the name of all other Spirits, to make haste and appear before me. Come, then in the name of Satan and in the names of all other demons. Come to me, I command thee, in the name of the Most Holy Trinity. Come without inflicting any harm upon me, without injury to my body or soul, without maltreating my books, or anything which I use. I command thee to appear without delay, or, that failing, to send me forthwith another Spirit having the same power as thou hast, who shall accomplish my commands and be submitted to my will, wanting which, he whom thou shalt send me, if indeed thou comest not thyself, shall in no wise depart, nor until he hath in all things fulfilled my desire. I offer my blood unto the Divs and Druj, whom are the essence of counter creation. I offer my life force unto the powers of eternal darkness within. May they devour and destroy the imposed shackles of divine light and stasis that I may become unlimitedly powerful. I salute and conjure you, O beautiful Moon, O beautiful Star, O bright light which I hold in my hand! By the air which I breathe, by the breath which is within me, by the Earth which I touch, I conjure you, and by all the names of the spirits who are princes residing in you; by the ineffable Name On, which hath created all; by thee, O Resplendent Angel Gabriel, together with the Prince Mercury, Michiael, and Melchidae! I conjure you again by all the divine Names of God, that you send down to obsess, torment, and harass the body, spirit, soul and five senses nature. #RandolphHarris 8 of 8
For many years there has been talk of slamming doors, muffled voices and ghost walking the corridors of The Winchester Mystery House, which is over 140-years-old. Recall, the mansion started off as an eighteen-room farmhouse, which Mrs. Sarah L. Winchester purchased. A number of persons hired as night watchmen have quit after only one night on duty, complaining of door opening and closing and invisible footsteps following them on their rounds. In July 2008 a staff member working late thought he heard the sounds of a reception in progress on the first floor, but when he reached the foot of the stairs, he found the rotunda empty, and all noises suddenly ceased. The same tour guide recalled the library room on the third floor as being particularly creepy. Late one night as he approached the library door, he remembered a cold, dank air falling on his head and neck, and he decided his work could wait until the next day. Although the mansion has gone through a considerable number of watchmen who declined the privilege of working in the building after one night on the job, one stuck with the task for more than 13 years. He simply shrugged off the angry slamming of doors that sounded behind him and the thumping noises that followed him on his rounds. However, he admitted that he did not like to work in The Winchester Mystery House after dark. He always made it a point to be out of the building by quitting time, because when darkness fell, he could sense the whole atmosphere changing.
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Provide them with a Decent Childhood Only to Rob them of their Adult Life
The United States of America is an individualist country. American think of life as an effort to realize their own goals and vales out in the World. This is part of The American Dream. However Worldwide, it turns out, individualism is quite unusual. That temperament was the chief reason why first Ancient Egypt, Europe, then Britian, and then America came to lead the World. (And as we see, World power does shift, so unless American can become a creditor nation and stay on the cutting edge of innovation, we could lose our status as World Superpower.) Today, our chief challenges come from groups within our society, and nations abroad, who are not individualist, who think of life in more cautious and collective terms. To continue to lead, America must come to terms with that World yet remain an individualist nation. The structure of modern society affects man in two ways simultaneously: he becomes more independent, self-reliant, and critical, and becomes more isolated, alone, and afraid. The understanding of the whole problem of freedom depends on the very ability to see both sides of the process and not lose track of the one side while following the other. This is difficult because conventionally we think in nondialectical terms and are prone to doubt whether two contradictory trends can result simultaneously from one cause. Furthermore, the negative side of freedom, the burden which it puts upon man, is difficult to realize, especially for those whose heart is with the cause of freedom. Because in the flight for freedom in modern history the attention was focused upon combating old forms of authority and restraint, it was natural that one should feel that the more these traditional restraints were eliminated, the more freedom one had gained. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
Poverty in the United States of America is a major issue. Many people think that discrimination and racism is cool and witty. However, how can a sizeable minority of Americans remain jobless and deeply impoverished in the World’s richest state and richest county—even when jobs are available? The more people we have gainfully employed means the more tax revenue we will have and the less dependence individuals will have on the government, which will lessen the burden on taxpayers. While I was doing research, I looked at rent in the United States of America, and the most affordable rent $850 a month, in a city with the median home prices being $250,000.00. In most cities, nationwide, however, the lowest rent for a 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom apartment was $1,800.00 a month, and this excludes major cities like Manhattan, San Jose, New York, San Francsico. So in order to comfortable afford a 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom apartment in most cities, which tend to be semi-rural cities in America, a person need to earn between $43,200 to $64,800 a year. This means that people on fixed incomes are priced out of the rental market, and that is why there is such a huge homeless problem in America. Not only that, but studies indicate that over the last twenty years, Social Security checks are 78 percent lower than they should be and have not kept up with inflation at all. Another problem America is having is troubled assimilation of many minorities. Since the 1960, on average, these marginalized groups have had much more difficulty getting ahead and avoiding social problems than dominant groups. It is not only because of discrimination from the dominant group and law enforcement, but also from their own ethnic groups. It makes some minorities feel superior to see their own family members, perhaps even their kids struggling to become established. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
This is part of the slave/master mindset. People like to see others with less and it makes the feel good to see someone else struggling and having a hard time, while they are living a comfortable life. The great fact about today’s World is cultural difference. Americans have long thought that they are no different from other people, only freer and more fortunate. They pride themselves on living independent lives in which they work out their personal destiny. They wish that everyone had these opportunities. However, individualist style of life is far less universal than most people think, and today have come into question both at home and abroad. To recognize and address that huge reality is the leading challenge of our time. All of America’s toughest test today involve groups or nations that, on average, are not individualist, but more cautious and collective-minded. At home, individualism is fading among low-income Americans, who are less able than they once were to take responsibility for themselves. We fail sufficiently to recognize that although man has rid himself from old enemies of freedom, new enemies of a different nature have arisen; enemies which are not essentially external restraints, but internal factors blocking the full realization of the freedom of personality. We believe, for instance, that freedom of worship constitutes one of the final victories for freedom. We do not sufficiently recognize that while it is a victory against those powers of Church and State which did not allow man to worship according to his own conscience, the modern individual has lost to a great extent the inner capacity to have faith in anything which is not probable by the methods of the natural sciences. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
Or, to choose another example, we feel that freedom of speech is the last step in the march of victory of freedom. We forget that, although freedom of speech constitutes an important victory in the battle against old restraints, modern man is in a position where much of what “he” thinks and says are the things that everybody else thinks and says; that he has not acquired the ability to think originally—that is, for himself—which alone gives meaning to his claim that nobody can interfere with the expression of his thoughts. Again, we are proud that in his conduct of life man has become free from external authorities, which tell him what to do and what not to do. We neglect the role of the anonymous authorities like public opinion and “common sense,” which are so powerful because of our profound readiness to conform to the expectations everybody has about ourselves and our equally profound fear of being different. In other words, we are fascinated by the growth of freedom from powers outside of ourselves and are blinded to the fact of inner restraints, compulsions, and fears, which tend to undermine the meaning of the victories freedom has won against its traditional enemies. We therefore are prone to think that the problem of freedom is exclusively that of gaining still more freedom of the kind we have gained in the course of modern history, and to believe that the defense of freedom against such powers that deny such freedom is all that is necessary. We forget that, although each of the liberties which have been won must be defended with utmost vigor, the problem of freedom is not only a quantitative one, but a qualitative one; that we not only have to preserve and increase the traditional freedom, but that we have to gain a new kind of freedom, one which enables us to realize our own individual self, to have faith in this self and in life. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
Any critical evaluation of the effect which the industrial system had on this kind of inner freedom must start with the full understanding of the enormous progress which capitalism has meant for the development of human personality. As a matter of fact, any critical appraisal of modern society which neglects this side of the picture must prove to be rooted in an irrational romanticism and is suspect of criticizing capitalism, not for the sake of progress, but for the sake of the destruction of the most important achievements of man in modern history. What Protestantism had started to do in freeing man spiritually, capitalism continued to do mentally, socially, and politically. Economic freedom was the basis of this development, the middle class was it champion. The individual was no longer bound by a fixed social system, based on tradition and with a comparatively small margin for personal advancement beyond the traditional limit. He was allowed and expected to succeed in personal economic gains as far as his diligence, intelligence, courage, thrift, or luck would lead him. His was the chance of success, his was the risk to lose and to be one of those killed or wounded in the fierce economic battle in which each one fought against everybody ese. Under the feudal system the limits of his life expansion had been laid out before he was born; but under the capitalistic system the individual, particularly the member of the middle class, had a chance—in spite of many limitations—to succeed on the basis of his own merits and actions. He saw a goal before his eyes toward which he could strive and which he often had a good chance to attain. He learned to rely on himself, to make responsible decisions, to give up both soothing and terrifying superstitions. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Man became increasingly free from the bondage of nature; he mastered natural forces to a degree unheard and undreamed of in previous history. Men became equal; differences of caste and religion, which once had been natural boundaries blocking the unification of the human race, disappeared, and men learned to recognize each other as human beings. The World became increasingly free from mystifying elements; man began to see himself objectively and with fewer and fewer illusions. Politically freedom grew too. On the strength of its economic position the rising middle class could conquer political power and the newly won political power created increased possibilities for economic progress. The great revolutions in England and France and the fight for American independence are the milestones marking this development. The peak in the evolution of freedom in the political sphere was the modern democratic state based on the principle of equality of all men and the equal right of everybody to share in the government by representatives of his own choosing. Each one was supposed to be able to act according to his own interest and at the same time with a view to the common welfare of the nation. Capitalism not only freed man from traditional bonds, but it also contributed tremendously to the increasing positive freedom, to the growth of an active, critical, responsible self. However, while this was one effect capitalism had on the process of growing freedom, at the same time it made the individual more alone and isolated and imbued him with a feeling of insignificance and powerlessness. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
Culture connotes what people think life is about, what we strive to do or be. Differences in culture are too important to ignore, but neither are they racial in any physical sense. Rather, the arise from differences in attitudes and ways of life. As it happens, most of those who believe that one can coherently talk about freedom of action without touching upon the issue of free will are compatibilists, who reject the idea of free will in any strong, non-determinist sense and who embrace instead a certain conception of free choice which they deem to be perfectly compatible with the determinism of natural causality. The central assumption of common human thought and speech seems to be that freedom is the principal characteristic that distinguishes man from all that is non-human. Moderns associate individual freedom with the absence of constraints, including the constraints of law, to pursue one’s own interests—especially those of a commercial kind. Constant contrasts this with the ancient Greco-Roman understanding of liberty in terms of being a freeman as opposed to a slave of being entitled, indeed obliged, to take an active role in government. Relation-based governance and rule-based governance represent a theoretical dichotomy. In reality, most governance systems contain elements of those two extreme forms. Even in the United States of America today, which is as close to having a rule-based governance as any country at any time, we see continued use of relation-based governance at many points. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
In fact external legal enforcement of a contract when a breach occurs is often the last resort rather than the first. Its more important role is as a backstop or a threat point tht underlies the renegotiation of the deal between the parties. And international trade and capital flows require interaction of different governance systems—a rule-based and a relation-based system, or two relation-based systems with different preexisting relationship. What can we expect to see at such interfaces? Most important are the frictions and instabilities that arise when people or firms or banks coming from different expectations about behavior, transact with each other. The clash of expectations can lead to speculative booms and busts; in the financial bubbles through history, economies in the process of liberalization appear to be especially susceptible to outbreaks of speculation. Next come asymmetries, some of which favor the relation-based system. People used to dealing in such a system will find it easier to initiate some transaction in a rule-based system than vice versa. This may be one reason—in addition to any formal trade barriers—why Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan have been more successful in exporting to the United States of America and the United Kingdom than vice versa. Anyone can come and tap into USA distribution channels, get trade credit, or engage in advertising and other promotional activities. In relation-based economies these activities are mostly carried out by firms that have long-standing relationships with others in the country, and who will not easily deal with outsiders for fear of spoiling these relationships #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
To penetrate these markets, an outsider must work patiently to build up his own relationships, or invest in building up his own network of distribution, et cetera, before he can expect success. Outsiders who come from other relation-based systems do not have ready access to existing networks of relations either, but they better understand the importance of such relation-building investments. Therefore they are likely to have more success; for example, European exporters to East Asia have generally enjoyed modest success, better than the Americans. This also helps explain why the USA government and lobbyists for exporting industries in the United States of America are so keen to get the East Asian countries to adopt a more open system or rules. The asymmetry may be even more pronounced for capital flows. Savers from a relation-based system can buy assets in a rule-based system with more confidence than vice versa. This had implications for capital flows in both directions. An investor from a rule-based system can invest in a rule-based system who lends to someone in a relation-based system without developing the necessary relationship in advance is asking to be robbed. A saver from a relation-based system can invest in a rule-based system without such fear. Paradoxically, this may undermine the rule-based system by giving its participants a good outside opportunity. Another asymmetry favors the rule-based system. Compare two systems that initially operate separately from each other. If a new technology of a given technical superiority becomes available, a relation-based system will be slower to adopt it than a rule-based system. This reason is as follows. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
An incumbent, given his sunk stake in the old technology, has less to gain from switching to the new. However, if competitor can enter easily, then they are going to destroy the value of the incumbent’s stake anyway, so he might as well do it himself and at least exploit some first-mover advantage to get the quasi-rent on the new technology. However, as was argued above, a relation-based system is likely to have smaller scale and larger sunk investments in relationships; therefore it is likely to have higher natural entry barriers than a rule-based system. Therefore the incumbents in a relation-based system are less threatened by competitors’ entry, and more likely to indulge in their desire to delay switching. Now bringing together in trade two such systems, one rule based and the other relation based. The former, being used to the mode of slow adoption of new technologies, will be at an impediment unless it can reform quickly. Incumbents in the relation-based system will of course realize this, and will exert political influence to delay or limit the opening up, or at least to secure protection for themselves. Tomorrow’s political system must be the principle of “semidirect democracy”—a shift from depending on representatives to representing ourselves. The mixture of the two is semidirect democracy. The collapse of consensus, as we have already seen, subverts the very concept of representation. Without agreement among the voters back home, whom does a representative really “represent”? #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
At the same time, legislators have come to rely increasingly on staff support and on outside experts for advice in shaping the laws. British M.P.s are notoriously weak vis-à-vis the Whitehall bureaucracy because they lack adequate staff support, thus shifting more power away from Parliament to the unelected civil service. The United States of America’s Congress, in an effort to counterbalance the influence of the executive bureaucracy, has created its own bureaucracy—a Congressional Budget Office, an Office of Technology Assessment and other necessary agencies and appendages. However, this had merely transferred the problem from extramural to intramural. Our elected representatives know less and less about the myriad measures on which they must decide and are compelled to rely more and more on the judgment of others. The representative no longer even represents him or herself. More basically, parliaments, congresses or assemblies were places in which, theoretically, the claims or rival minorities could be reconciled. Their representatives could make trade-offs for them. With today’s blunt-edged Second Wave political tools, no legislator can even keep track of the many grouplets he or she nominally represents, let alone broker or trade effectively for them. And the more overloaded the American Congress or the German Bundestag or the Norwegian Storting becomes, the worse this situation grows. This helps explain why single-issue political pressure groups become intransigent. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
Seeing limited opportunity for sophisticated trading or reconciliation through Congress or the legislatures, their demands on the system become non-negotiable. The theory of representative government as the ultimate broker collapses too. The breakdown of bargaining, the decision crunch, the worsening paralysis of representative institutions mean, over the long term, that many of the decisions now made by small numbers of pseudo representative institutions mean, over the long term, the many decisions now made by small numbers of pseudo representatives may have to be shifted back gradually to the electorate itself. If our elected brokers cannot make deals for us, we shall have to do it ourselves. If the laws they make are increasingly remote from our unresponsive to our needs, we shall have to make our own. For this, however we shall need new institutions and new technologies as well. The Second Wave revolutionaries who invented today’s basic institutions were well aware of the possibilities of direct as against representative democracy. American revolutionists knew all about New England town halls and small-scale organic consensus formation. However, the shortcomings and limitations of direct democracy were also well-known and, at that time, more persuasive. There are some objections to such an innovation. First, direct democracy allowed for no check or delay on temporary and emotional public reactions. And second, the communications of that day could not handle the mechanics. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
These are legitimate problems. How would a frustrated and inflamed America public in the mid-1960, for example, have voted on whether or not to drop a nuclear bomb on Hanoi? Or a West German public, furious at the Baader-Meinhof terrorists, on a proposal to set up camps for “sympathizers”? What if Canadians had held a plebiscite over Quebec the week after Rene Levesque took power? Elected representatives are presumed to be less emotional and more deliberative than the public. The problem of overly motional public response, however, can be overcome in various ways, such as requiring a cooling-off period or second vote before implementation of major decisions taken via referendum or other forms of direct democracy. The other objection can also be met. For the old communication limitations no longer stand in the way of expanded direct democracy. Today’s spectacular advances in communications technology open for the first time in a mind-boggling array of possibilities for direct citizen participation in political decision-making. Year ago we had the pleasure of keynoting an historic event—the World’s first “electronic town hall”—over the Qube cable TV system in Columbus, Ohio. Using this interactive communications system, residents of a small Columbus suburb actually took part via electronics in a political meeting of their local planning commission. By pushing a button in their living rooms, they were able to vote instantly on proposals relating to such practical issues as local zoning, housing codes, and proposed highway construction. They were able not only to vote yes or no, but to participate in the discussion and speak up on the air. They were even able by push button to tell the chairperson when to move on to the next point on the agenda. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
This was only a first, most primitive indication of tomorrow’s potential for direct democracy. Using today’s far more advanced computers, satellites, telephones, cable, polling techniques and other tools, not to mention the Internet and other communications networks, an educated citizenry can for the first time in history begin making many of its own political decisions. This is not an either/or issue. It is not a question of “electronic town halls” in the crude form referred to by Ross Perot. Far more sensitive and sophisticated democratic processes are possible, And it is certainly not a question of direct democracy versus indirect, representation by self versus representation by others. Many imaginative arrangements can be invented to combine direct and indirect democracy. Right now members of Congress and most other parliaments or legislatures set up their own committees. There is no ways for citizens to force lawmakers to create a committee to deal with some neglected or highly controversial issues. However, why could not voters be empowered indirectly through petition to compel a legislative body to set up committees on topics the public—not the lawmakers—deems important? #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
We hammer away at such “blue-sky” proposals not because we unhesitatingly favor them but merely to underscore the more general point: there are powerful ways to open and democratize a system that is now near breakdown and in which few, if any, feel adequately represented. However, we must begin thinking outside the worn grooves of the past three hundred years. We can no longer solve our problems with the ideologies, the models, or the leftover structures of the Second Wave past. Fraught with uncertain implications, such novel proposals warrant careful local experimentation before we apply them on a broad scale. But however we may feel about this or that suggestion, the old objections to direct democracy are growing weaker at precisely the time that the objections to representative democracy are growing stronger. Dangerous or even bizarre as it may seem to some, semidirect democracy is a moderate principle that can help us design workable new institutions for the future. When the offender of the ultimate negative see their hold coming to an end, they never let go until the cause is fully removed. If the thing they have attacked about still exists in any degree, they continue their attack. When the self-actualized is “fighting through,” the enemy has various tactics to hinder one’s deliverance. One may dangle a thing before the mind which is not the true cause of the deception, so as to get the self-actualized occupied with it, while one is gaining all the time—pouring in accusations upon one’s victim until one is bewildered and confused: charges, accusations, blame, guilt—direct from the enemy, or indirectly through others. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
Accusing offender can say you are wrong, and right when you are right—but it is essential that the self-actualized does not accept blame until one is absolutely sure that it is deserved, and then not from the ultimate negative’s lying offenders; they have not been appointed by the ultimate cause to do the convicting work of honor and justice. When once the truth has dawned upon the victim of the powers of the ultimate negative, and they no longer hope to gain by deception, their one primary attack all through—from the moment of undeceiving to final deliverance—is the perpetual charge “You are wrong,” so as to keep the man in ceaseless condemnation. The poor persecuted believe then is likely to go to ultimate concern and try to get victory over “conduct disorder,” but in vain. The more one prays, the more one appears to sink into a hopeless bog. One seems to oneself to be one mass of “conduct disorder,” without hope of freedom. However, it is victory over the power of the ultimate negative—not conduct disorder—that one needs, and one will quickly prove this when one recognizes the true cause of one’s trouble and lay hold of the Calvary victory over the ultimate negative. If we recall, God is the ground and the power of being. The more fully a creature actualizes it essence, the more closely it is united to the divine ground and the more profoundly it participates in the power of being. However, the very process profoundly it participates in the power of being. However, the very process of actualization inevitably results in estrangement from essential being, for potentialities are not realized and essence is distorted in existence. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
The most electrifying and the most paradoxical event that could possibly occur would be the perfect realized in a personal life, despite the conditions of existence, then the universe itself would, in a sense, be fulfilled. This actualization of essential humanity is the New Being, for in contrast to it everything else is old, unfinished, distorted, and without promise. In Jesus of Nazareth the New Being is manifest, thus consulting him the Christ. The astounding paradox of Christology is the appearance of essential manhood under the conditions of existence, but without being eroded by them. How are God and man united in Jesus the Christ? It is essential man who represents not only man to man but God to man; for essential man, by his very nature, represents God. He represents the original image of God embodied in man, but he does so under the conditions of estrangement between God and man. This belongs to the dialectics of the infinite and the finite. The paradox of the Christian message is that in one personal life essential manhood has appeared under the conditions of existence without being conquered by them. One could also speak of essential God-manhood in order to indicate the divine presence in essential manhood; but this is redundant, and the clarity of thought is served best in speaking simply of essential man. Man is united in God simply because he is man, that is, the freedom-bearing image of God. Jesus as the Christ is united to God by something more than His perfect manhood. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
Centuries of theologians have missed the point of the paradox of their faith. At least they must know where the central mystery lies. Christianity is distinctive for its theory of education. The Book of Mormon and the Christian Holy Bible deems desirable and necessary the factual information and the cultivation of skills of the body and mind, and the scholarly exploration of the multi-roomed mansion of Worldly wisdom. All these are deemed desirable and necessary only insofar as they expand the soul, stimulate the more sensitivity of man, and are channeled in the direction of the promotion of human welfare. Thus Jeremiah declares, “Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth glory in this that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the Lord who exercises mercy, justice and righteousness on Earth; for in these things I delight, saith the Lord.” Universal literacy is not moral intelligence. The three R’s do not spell righteousness. Popular education in our day teaches young people how to make a living, but it largely ignores the necessity of teaching them how to live, and what to live for. Mormonism and Christianity can, in our time, make significant contributions through its unrivaled traditions of the pre-eminence of The Book of Mormon and the Christian Holy Bible, the character-building, soul-cultivating emphasis in learning, calling on man to develop ethical alertness, to master himself rather than to rule over others. Our religion goes beyond the formulation of universal postulates and idealistic ends. It translates the poetry of moral aspiration into the prose of every day life. It is religion of behavior as well as of beliefs. It brings down the holy tablets from the heights of Sinai to the valley of decision and the plain of realization. It translates the Word of God into life. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
Often voluntary community action is stultified because initiative in planning has been sequestered within a small, self-appointed elite. These considerations emphasize the social context within which recommending bodies should be constructed. Such considerations are often neglected in favor of the personal qualities of potential members—interest, ability, free time, resources, prestige. These often matter, but they are also frequently sterile in terms of results. It takes much more than a coterie of enthusiast or a list of prominent names adorning a letterhead to assure that a study committee will act and cause others to act. As a sign of some degree of impartiality, the members of such a commission or board are customarily unpaid, though they may get their expenses or pay from the groups they represent. Thus they can rarely be expected to expend more than limited amounts of time in the business of the committee. Unless the whole operation is too small and rudimentary, this is the point at which a staff of full-time, paid professional experts may have to be engaged. The professional staff usually consists of a number of specially qualified experts drawn from several fields or professions, their work being assigned and brought into a coherent pattern by a “generalist” with some facility in transcending special vocabularies and in promoting co-operation. He is often known as executive secretary or staff director. On the other hand, the staff may consist of a single person who is at best an able amateur. Ad hoc commercial consultants are often useful in supplementing or providing an independent check of permanent staffs. Where expertness is required, the gains through specialization are obvious. Specialization may occur not only among various professions—as engineers, accountants, doctors, and attorneys—but with regard to various functions, such as researchers, idea-men, publicists, and patent drudges. The man of a creative turn may wilt before the task of tracing property titles, as the meticulous investigator may balk at championing a new idea. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
The creation of high standards of ethical and technical performance falls to a considerable degree to the professional societies to which the specialists belong; creation of co-operation and morale within the staff falls especially upon the generalist in charge. The specialists can normally be selected by various fairly objective measures of competence, while the role of the generalist has to be filled primarily through trial and error. Instead of trying to bring the greatest total amount of good, perhaps the thing to do would be to work toward the greatest average amount of happiness. It would seem preferable to have far fewer people having far better lives. (For whom, though, would it not be better?) However, the principle that we should maximize the average level of happiness also has unpalatable implications. (It might even raise questions about whether we should eliminate those with unhappy lives, or even those happy people whose happiness was below average. However, let us set aside considerations of homicide. Remember that episode of Charmed?) To maximize the average amount of happiness, we might elect to utilize our environment at an unsustainable rate while lowering our numbers by natural attrition and low birth rates. Thereby, if we practiced sustainable life-styles, we might have very enjoyable lives. In the end, we might elect not to reproduce at all, allowing the human race to extinct (presumably the last happy few would be tended by robots). It makes sense that to save the planet, the human race would stop producing and go extinct. What are these things you seek, since you leave the entire World to find them? God said, “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the Earth,” Genesis 1.28. He did not say ravage and destroy the Earth. Obviously the planet is overpopulated and that is why things are so expensive and so many people are having difficulty surviving. So, instead of just feeding other nations, and giving them money, we need to teach them birth control methods. Afterall, is it not rich people who say they want their children to work hard and learn the value of the dollar? So then, why do we give taxpayer money away, essentially enslaving the taxpayer and making life harder on them. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
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What the F–Business Must be Conducted with Glass Pockets!
Although you make think “What the F!” has a negative connotation, it is not a curse word. It means “What the Ferry!” It is what Ferry calls his live resonation radio show. Ferry Coresten is one of the most talented disc jockeys in the World. Mr. Coresten is Dutch disc jockey, record producer and remixer. Defining, understanding, and discovering the conditions that lead to peace is an intellectual challenge with a long and rich traditional with the social sciences. Nevertheless, it remains central today, not simply for academics but to the broader populations as well. The notion that peace is at hand as soon as there is no ongoing, large-scale organized violence is not only the most common idea today but also a way of viewing peace that goes back at least to antiquity. We sometimes achieve peace through military preparations and deterrence, or the military defeat of adversaries. The quantitative research on conflict, violence, and peace is an already large subject area within the social sciences, and it is undergoing yet another growth spurt in the aftermath of 9/11, with increasing discussion of terrorism, restriction of civil liberties, torture, invasion, insurgency, counterinsurgency, revolution, counterrevolution, mass protest, and protest policing. Many people think we already live in a police state, but they have not seen anything yet. In 2007, alarm companies did not want to install security cameras on homes because they warned home owners that footage could be obtained by anyone and put on the Internet without their consent, but now people are going as far as having cameras places in their home that security companies monitor. Before long, the streets and highways in the United States of American will be full of license plate readers, which automatically issues tickets for speeding, which will make the road less safe as less officers will be out to stop illegal vehicles and vehicle violating law. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
We will also have police drones patrolling neighbourhoods, roads, and highways recording information and acting as law enforcement agents, so there will be virtually no privacy and anything that is done can be pulled up and reviewed for later enforcement of the law. Therefore, it is critical to study peace as something more than merely the absence of overt violence. Peace is defined only as the absence of some violent actions. This form of peace, as “no violence,” can range from brutal dictatorships to democracies that fully respect human rights, from states that remain at peace only for brief periods of time between recurring bought of violence to societies that have not experienced overt hostilities for hundreds of years, and from states that consistently remain prepared for “hot” conflict to those that do not consider preparing for it. If peace is an inherent dichotomy, then war and genocide are the opposite. Personal relationship, closeness and warmth, Christian community—these are just what I have experienced in East Germany when I have visited. Over the years the society has always come through with insightful and perceptive judgments. The new paradigm of just peacemaking is grounded in the historical experience of people who have lived in the face of oppression, violation of their basic rights, and the nuclear threat, and who, together with political scientist, Christian ethicists, and activists, fashioned realistic steps of peacemaking that enabled them to begin living in the time after the Cold War even before the Wall came down. Though oppressed and constricted, they began to live our future. Because the paradigm is grounded in realistic but persistent hope-creating experience, attention must be paid to critical perspectives external to Christian faith; and since the heart of the story is consent to all God’s creating and the practice of forgiveness and love, an ethic is to be tested by its ability to be inclusive rather than to repress important standards of human life, or other members of the human community. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
We have all known we needed to develop new methods for achieving change without violence. Now we have seen nonviolent revolutions in Iran (where the revolution was nonviolent but not the subsequent regime) in Philippines, in Argentina, throughout Eastern Europe, and in the peoples’ defeat of the coup in the Soviet Union, and there is hope for them in South Africa and perhaps Palestine (where parts of the movement are nonviolent, and other parts are not). Human rights movements must refrain from violence. They must take the beneficial action of clearly articulating the human rights that need to be established. The breakdown of the medieval system of feudal society had one main significance for all classes of society: the individual was left alone and isolated. He was free. This freedom had a twofold result. Man was deprived of the security he had enjoyed, of the unquestionable feeling of belonging, and he was torn loose from the World which had satisfied his quest for security both economically and spiritually. He felt alone and anxious. However, he was also free to act and to think independently, to become his own master and do with his life as he could—not as he was told to do. However, according to the real life situation of the members of different social classes, these two kind of freedom were of unequal weight. Only the most successful class of society profited from rising capitalism to an extent which gave them real wealth and power. They could expand, conquer, rule and amass fortunes as a result of their own activity and rational calculations. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
This new aristocracy of money, combined with that of birth, was in a position where they could enjoy the fruits of the new freedom and acquire a new feeling of mastery and individual initiative. On the other hand, they had to dominate the masses and to fight against each other, and thus their position, too, was not free from a fundamental insecurity and anxiety. But, on the whole, the positive meaning of freedom was dominant for the new capitalist. It was expressed in the culture which grew on the social of the new aristocracy, the culture of the Renaissance. In its art and in its philosophy it expressed the new spirit of human dignity, will, and mastery, although often enough despair and skepticism also. The same emphasis on the strength of individual activity and will is to be found in the theological teachings of the Catholic Church in the late Middle Ages. The Schoolmen of that period did not rebel against authority, they accepted its guidance; but they stressed the positive meaning of freedom, man’s share in the determination of his fate, his strength, his dignity, and the freedom of his will. On the other hand, the lower classes, the poor population of the cities, and especially the peasants, were impelled by a new quest for freedom and an ardent hope to end the growing economic and personal oppression. They had little to lose and much to gain. They were not interested in dogmatic subtleties, but rather in the fundamental principles of the Christian Bible: brotherliness and justice. Their hopes took active form in a number of political revolts and in religious movements which were characterized by the uncompromising spirit typical of the very beginning of Christianity. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
Rising capitalism, although it made also for their increased independence and initiative, was greatly a threat. In the beginning of the sixteenth century the individual of the middle class could not yet grain much power and security from the new freedom. Freedom brought isolation and personal insignificance more than strength and confidence. Besides that, he was filled with burning resentment against the luxury and power of the wealthy classes, including the hierarchy of the Roman Church. Protestantism gave expression to the feelings of insignificance and resentment; it destroyed the confidence of man in God’s unconditional love; it taught man to despise and distrust himself and others; it made him a tool instead of an end; it capitulated before secular power and relinquished the principle that secular power is not justified because of its mere existence if it contradicts moral principles; ad in doing all this it relinquished elements that had been the foundations of Judaeo-Christian tradition. Its doctrines presented a picture of the individual, God, and the World, in which these feelings were justified by the belief that the insignificance and powerlessness which an individual felt came from the qualities of man as such and that he ought to feel as he felt. Thereby the new religious doctrines not only gave expression to what the average member of the middle class felt, but, by rationalizing and systematizing this attitude, they also increased and strengthened it. However, they did more than that; they also showed the individual a way to cope with his anxiety. They taught him that by fully accepting his powerlessness and the evilness of his nature, by considering his whole life an atonement for his sins, by the utmost self-humiliation, and also by unceasing effort, he could overcome his doubt and his anxiety; that by complete submission he could be loved by God and could at least hope to belong to those whom God has decided to save. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Protestantism was the answer to the human needs of the frightened, uprooted, and isolated individual who had to orient and to relate himself to a new World. The new character structure, resulting from economic and social changes and intensified by religious doctrines, became in its turn an important factor in shaping the further social and economic development. Those very qualities which were rooted in this character structure—compulsion to work, passion for thrift, the readiness to make one’s life a tool for the purposes of an extra personal power, asceticism, and a compulsive sense of duty—were character trait which became productive forces in capitalistic society and without which modern economic and social development are unthinkable; they were the specific forms into which human energy was shaped and in which it became one of the productive forces within the social process. To act in accord with the newly formed character traits was advantageous from the standpoint of economic necessities; it was also satisfying psychologically, since such action answered the needs and anxieties of this new kind of personality. To put the same principle in more general terms: the social process, by determining the mode of life of the individual, that is, his relation to others and to work, molds his character structure; new ideologies—religious, philosophical, or political—result from and appeal to this changed character structure and thus intensify, satisfy, and stabilize it; the newly formed character traits in their turn become important factors in further economic development and influence the social process; while originally they have developed as a reaction to the threat of new economic forces, they slowly become productive force, furthering and intensifying the new economic development. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
The system of rules and their enforcement itself must first establish a reputation for integrity and efficacy. This takes a long time and strict supervision even given much good will. In many countries, the great difficulties experienced by the governments of most transition economies in their attempts at such reputation-building require attempts of the top levels of the government at making and enforcing reliable governance systems. However, they can be ruined by some middle-level officials who attempt to make quick profit from their newfound power. There are evident problems of this in most transition economies. Also, in the phase when the system of rules in imperfect but improving, it can offer better outside payoffs to the participants in the prevailing relation-based system. By thus increasing their incentives to cheat their current partners, it can worsen the outcomes of the relation-based system. The policies required to initiate a transition from low-income equilibrium to a state of rapid growth may be qualitatively different from those required to reignite growth for a middle-income country. At low levels of income, with reasonable institutions and reasonable policies, it may be easy to achieve high growth up to semi-industrialization. However, the institutional requirements of reigniting growth in a middle-income country can be significantly more demanding. Growth starting from a low level can be achieved using relation-based governance in small communities of traders with good relationships and information networks, so long as the state does not actually inhibit such developments with its policies. However, to go beyond the middle-income level requires greater integration into a large economy, where relation-based governance is inadequate. The necessary shift toward rule-based governance is more demanding because it must overcome the additional problems of collective action, vested interest and so on. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
How might such investment in the framework of rules get made? In 1898, when Elbert Gary and J. Pierpont Morgan started Federal Steel, they took the then unusual step of issuing quarterly reports because both men believed that corporations issuing publicly traded securities had to account for their financial performance. At first there was no public process such as external audits to guarantee the truthfulness of these accounts; presumably Mr. Morgan’s own reputation and integrity, acquired in the prevailing relation-based system of finance, gave them credibility. However, the public gradually found that inadequate, perhaps because others entering the arena of raising finance from the general public did not have the same reputation. A few years later, then president Theodore Roosevelt said that he would not “accept the publication of what some particular company chooses to publish as a favor, instead of demanding what we think ought to be published from all companies as a right” (Strouse 2000, p. 439). And still later, Mr. Morgan said that “business in the twentieth century would have to be conducted with glass pockets” (Strouse 2000, p. 600). This episode serves to emphasize the endogeneity of verifiability, and the value of making more information publicly verifiable. Forces operate on the other side to undermine a relation-based system when it comes into contact with other rule-based systems. If capital-owners in the relation-based system become able to invest abroad under a rule-based system and earn the going return there, that will raise the outside opportunities of the participants in each ongoing repeated game of relation-based finance, and thereby unravel its tacit cooperation equilibrium. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
Similarly, as improvements in transportation technology or lowering of trade barrier with other countries, or liberalization of regulation within or across countries, bring a relation-based production system into contact with other economies and other markets, its firms will discover better opportunities outside their previous relationships; this can undermine the previous repeated game equilibrium. If or when a relation-based economy needs to import capital, whether financial or direct investment, it will find it difficult to do so. Unless foreigners are misinformed or gradually develop relationships with host-country businesses, they will be reluctant to lend. Conversely, firms in a relation-based system may be reluctant to borrow from lenders who are not part of their relation network, for fear that the strangers may withdraw their capital suddenly. So, if it needs foreign capital, a relation-based economy may fail to grow unless it changes over successfully to a rule-based system where anyone can invest with the confidence that the only uncertainties will be those arising from natural economic shocks, not those of borrowers’ strategic default or fraud or lenders’ capital flight. Of course the difficulties of brining together two such different systems of financial transactions are not insurmountable. Intermediaries can develop relations on both sides, and profit by providing these services for a fee. The Rothschilds did this in Europe with great success for over a century, literally be having relations on both or all sides. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
In the second half of the nineteenth century, the United States of America was a major capital importer. This was facilitated by the Morgans—Junius S. operating in London and J. Pierpont in New York—who established a relation-based chain of trust between borrowers in the United States of America and lenders in the United Kingdom and Europe. In modern times, Hong Kong served a similar role, dealing with lenders—Western ones on a basis of rules and overseas Chinese ones on the basis of relations—and with borrowers—investing firms in mainland China on a basis of relations. In countries shaken by the Third Wave, the truly poor no longer necessarily have numbers on their side. In a good many countries they—like everyone ese—have become a minority. Not only is majority rule therefore no longer adequate as a legitimating principle, it is no longer necessarily humanizing or democratic in societies moving into the Third Wave. Second Wave ideologues routinely lament the breakup of mass society. Rather than seeing in this enriched diversity an opportunity for human development, they attack it as “fragmentation” and “Balkanization” and attribute it to the aroused “selfishness” of minorities. This trivial explanation substitutes effect for cause. For the rising activism of minorities is not the result of a sudden onset of selfishness; it is, among other things, a reflection of the needs of a new system of production which requires for its very existence a far more varied, colourful, open and diverse society than any we have ever known. We can either resist the thrust toward diversity, in a futile last-ditch effort to save our Second Wave political institutions, or we can acknowledge diversity and change those institutions accordingly. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
The former strategy can only be implemented by totalitarian means and must result in economic and cultural stagnation; the latter leads toward social evolution and a minority-based twenty-first-century democracy. To reconstitute democracy in Third Wave terms, we need to jettison the frightening but false assumption that increased diversity automatically brings increased tension and conflict in society. Indeed, the exact reverse can be true. Conflict in society is not only necessary, it is, within limits, desirable. If one hundred men all desperately want the same brass ring, they may be forced to fight for it. On the other hand, if each of the hundred has a different objective, it is far more rewarding for them to trade, cooperate and form symbiotic relationships. Given appropriate social arrangements, diversity can make for a secure and stable civilization. It is the lack of appropriate political institutions today that unnecessarily sharpens conflict between minorities to the knife-edge violence. It is the lack of such institutions that makes the majority harder and harder to find. The answer to these problems is not to stifle dissent or to charge minorities with selfishness (as though the elites and their experts are not similarly self-interested). The answer lies in imaginative new arrangements for accommodating the legitimating diversity—new institutions that are sensitive to the rapidly shifting needs of changing and multiplying minorities. Someday future historians may look back on voting and the search for majorities as an archaic ritual engaged in by communicational primitives. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
Today however, in a dangerous World, we cannot afford to delegate total power to anyone, we cannot surrender even the weak popular influence that exists under majoritarian systems, and we cannot allow tiny minorities to make vast decisions that tyrannize all other minorities. This is why we must drastically revise the crude Second Wave methods by which we pursue the elusive majority. We need new approaches designed for a democracy of minorities—methods whose purpose is to reveal differences rather than to paper them over with forced or fake majorities based on exclusionary voting, sophistic framing of the issues or rigged electoral procedures. We need, in short, to modernize the entire system so as to strengthen the role of diverse minorities, yet permit them to form majorities. In Second Wave societies, voting to determine the popular will provide an important source of intermittent feedback for the ruling elites. When conditions for one reason or another became intolerable for the majority, and fifty-one percent of the voters registered their pain, the elites could, at a minimum, shift parities, alter policies, or make some other accommodations. Even in yesterday’s mass society, however, the fifty-one percent principle was a decidedly blunt, purely quantitative instrument. Voting to determine the majority tells us nothing about the quality of people’s views. It can tell us how many people at a given moment want X, but not how badly they want it. Above all, it tells us nothing about what they would be willing to trade off for X—crucial information in a society made up of many minorities. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
When a minority feels so threatened or attaches such life-and-death significance to a single issue that its views should perhaps receive more than ordinary weight, nor does it signal us then. In a mass society these well-known weaknesses of majority rule were tolerated because, among other things, most minorities lacked strategic power to disrupt the system. In today’s finely wired society, in which all of us are members of minority groups, that is no longer true. For a de-massified Third Wave society, the feedback systems of the industrial past may be considered too crude. Thus we will have no use voting and the polls in a radically new way. Also, because the de-massification and redistribution of media outlets, we are no longer creating stars as famous Worldwide as Aaliyah, Britney Spears, Beyonce, Paris Hilton, Brad Pitt, Tyson Beckford, Tyra Banks, Jennifer Lopez, or Lucy Lui. Fortunately, Third Wave technologies provide pathways toward Third Wave democracy. They reopen, in a startling new context, fundamental issues that our founders considered two hundred years ago. These technologies make possible new, hitherto impractical forms of democracy. Although the transition from the problem phase to the proposal phase of planning is usually gradual, the formulation of proposals is qualitatively distinct from the definition of public and problem. Proposals are creative responses; they call for imagination, invention, even genius. The making of proposals has to be properly timed, not coming too early in the planning process. For any given problem there may be a number of solutions, and thus new potentialities of divergence are introduced into the public’s discussion. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
If those who make proposals are anxious that they be accepted or at least taken seriously and attended to, they should ideally wait until a public has become quite clear and coherent s to the nature of its problem and its desire to act. This is especially true when a proposal is likely to threaten this or that section of the public’s interest; a premature proposal is more easily exiled from discussion by an alter minority, or even without opposition may lose force, when its relevance is not yet apparent. Perhaps the proposal phase could be said to begin where “to act or not to act” ceases to be the question and consideration turns to serious alternatives. It ends when the proposal or proposals go before a policy-making body for decision. If the outcome is to be a full-fledged proposal of the planning type, during the interim a considerable number of developments ideally must occur. During this phase, proposals may be legion, running from the most casual sort of suggestion to massive reports prepared by many experts and taking years of work. If it is to deserve serious considerations, despite such variation in their elaborateness, the proposal must contain some basic elements. There must be a statement of an effective and feasible way of solving the problem as it has been defined. An estimate of the resources, human and material, required for carrying out the proposal. A schedule of the rate at which these recourses will be applied. A statement of certain quantitative goals for achievement within the schedule set. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
Any proposal containing these elements is a planning proposal, and is often called a plan, sometimes with the name of its author prefixed, exempli gratia, the Marshall Plan (although technically it does not become a plan until it has been subject to a policy commitment, and then of course it becomes a program). The injection of proposals into the public’s discussion of the problem is frequently, at first, on what might be called an amateur basis. While each serious proposal may contain the four essential elements, their development is neither elaborate nor exact. The multiplicity of proposals and their rudimentary nature, given a strong feeling of concern, then quite readily lead to a conscious demand for more careful study of the situation and comparative examination of the proposals. Then, and not before then in most cases, is the appropriate time for commencing the formal organization of the public. At this point, another custom is often to constitute some expert committee, commission, or board and to charge it with making a study and some definite recommendations for action. The composition of the more successful committees tends to be drawn, with certain exceptions, from all the significant elements in the public to which the situation is a problem. To give them their charge may call for further definition of the appropriate scope of the planning area. This calls for judgment and may itself be a matter of disagreement. If action is truly desired, the planning area ought to be confined to those to whom the situation is definitely a problem in which they are actively involved, and it ought not to include everyone who might potentially experience some consequence from the action taken. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
After admitting the possibility of deception in supernatural things, and a doubt has come into mind whether certain “experiences,” either personal or otherwise, were of God after all, the next stages are: The discovery of the deception. Light and truth alone can make free, and when once a doubt comes in and the man opens his mind to the truth that he is as liable to be deceived as anyone else, then to the mind and attitude light is given (John 3.21). Sometimes the specific deception is seen at once, but more often the discovery is gradual, and patience is needed while the light slowly dawns. Certain fact in connection with various experiences of the past, which the believer has failed to note, may now emerge into the light, and the half-truths which the Adversary had used to deceive are clearly seen: the twisting of words, the wrenching of sentences out of their context in the Scriptures—all come into a view as the light is given. Then comes: the acknowledgement of the deception. This is now imperative. The truth must not only be faced but owned up to, so that things are called by their right names, and the father of lies defeated by the weapon of truth. The Book of Mormon and the Christian Holy Bible keeps one from sin, and draws one near to virtue. You shall teach diligently the word of God to your children. The moral World is maintained by the instruction of our young; their education shall not be interrupted even to rebuild the Temple. When parents encourage their children to study The Book of Mormon and the Christian Holy Bible, their influence lives beyond the grave. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
One who has studied in one’s youth may be compared to writing set down on new parchment; but one who begins to study when one is old, is like writing set down on re-used parchment. If one studies The Book of Mormon and the Holy Christian Bible in one’s youth, its words are woven into the texture of one’s life. Train a child in the way one should go, and when one is older, one will not depart from it. As long as the voices of children resound with the study of The Book of Mormon and the Holy Chistian Bible, no enemy can triumph over America. The Book of Mormon and the Holy Christian Bible are each a Tree of Life; happy are they who understand its teachings, and fulfill God’s commandments. The significance of the Cross and the Resurrection of Jesus as the Christ can be summed up in one word: salvation. One can be saved from many things, but salvation is salvation from the ultimate negativity. Salvation is healing for healing means reuniting that which is estranged, giving a center to what is split, overcoming the split between God and man, man and his Worl, man and himself. It is the revelation of the New Being in Jesus as the Christ which brings salvation. Consequently, where there is revelation, there is salvation, for the revelation of the ground of being transforms and heals. Revelation and salvation are identified. The revelational history of mankind—preparatory revelation before the appearance of the New Being, and receiving revelation afterwards—testifies that men have shared in the healing power of the New Bring, or else they would have succumbed to the destructive tendencies of existential estrangement and have ceased to exist. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
Traditional theology has presented the rigid alternatives of total condemnation and total salvation. However, we reject them both, for, although the healing power of the New Being is never absent, even those who experience it are healed but fragmentarily. The divine act overcomes estrangement by removing guilt, and man reacts by accepting reconciliation. The effects of atonement are threefold, and together they constitute the meaning of salvation: Regeneration, Justification, and Sanctification, or, in Tillichian terminology, participation, acceptance, and transformation. Regeneration stresses the objective power of the New Being to grasp estranged mankind and draw it into itself. Man participates in the new reality revealed in Christ only by being seized by it. Thus, Regeneration is the new state of things, the new eon, which the Christ brought; the individual enters it, and in so doing he himself participates in it and is reborn through participation. Since Regeneration is participation in the objective power of the New Being, it precedes Justification, for faith as the state of being grasped by the divine presence is not a human act, but the work of the Spirit. Justification is acceptance. It is the act of God by which He accepts sinful man in spite of his guilt. It is also the act of man by which man accepts God’s saving mercy. Indeed, there is nothing in man which enables God to accept him. However, man must accept just this. He must accept that he is accepted; he must accept acceptance. This in spite of his anxiety, man accepts God’s justifying act. In spite of is the paradox of simual peccator, simul Justus. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
As a divine act, Regeneration and Justification are one, for Regeneration is the actual reunion of the estranged, and Justification is its paradoxical character. Sanctification is distinct from both of them in the sense that a process is distinguished from the event in which it is initiated. Sanctification is the process in which the New Being transforms both individuals and communities. Sanctification, as transformation, takes place both within religion and outside it in the secular realm. Up to now emphasis has been laid upon the individual man as the one who is saved. However, our vision is broader than that. At the crucifixion of Jesus the sun was darkened, the temple veil split, rocks cracked, and the dead rose. Nature was in an uproar, and the event at Golgotha is one which concerns the Universe, including all nature and history. The Christ cannot be restricted to one area; Christology must be cosmic. Salvation extends to the whole World, and World means nature as well as man. It is through man, the microcosm, that the saving power of the New Being reaches out to the Universe. The tragedy of nature is bound to the tragedy of man, as the salvation of nature and nature is in man. Consequently, the impact of the Spiritual Presence upon beings inferior to man is indirect and, in a quantitative sense, severely limited. However, in a qualitative sense it is enormous. Salvation is found within the Kingdom of God which embraces the Universe. It is the place where there is complete transparency of everything for the divine to shine through it. In His fulfilled kingdom, God is everything for everything. Salvation, the healing of the disrupted, is brought about by love, for love is the drive towards the unity of the separated. The New Being is the love of Jesus who is the Christ, reuniting estranged mankind with its ground. The Spiritual Presence manifests itself as love. After distinguishing divine love from human love, we come to an understanding that man’s love for God is the drive toward the reunion of the separated. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
However, since salvation is an act of God, God’s love must first extend to man and grasp him. The distinction between faith and love disappears, for being grasped by God in faith and adhering to Him in love is one and the same state of creaturely life. We belong to the Old Creation, and the demand made upon us by Christianity is that we also participate in the New Creation. What is this New Being? The only thing that counts, regardless of faith, is the union with Him in whom the New Reality is present. No religion matters—only a new state of things. The New Creation—this is our ultimate concern; this should be our infinite passion—the infinite passion of every human being. This matters; this alone matters ultimately. In comparison with it everything else, even religion or non-religion, even Christianity or non-Christianity, matters very little—and ultimately nothing. And now again we ask: What is this New Being? It is a renewal of the Old which has been corrupted, distorted, split, and almost destroyed. Therefore, we can speak of the New in terms of a re-newal: The threefold “re,” namely, re-conciliation, re-union, re-surrection. The word “resurrection” has for many people the connotation of dead bodies leaving their graves or other fanciful images. However, resurrection means the victory of the New state of things, the New Being born out of death of the Old. Resurrection is not an event that might happen in some remote future, but it is the power of the New Being to create life out of death, here and now, today and tomorrow…Resurrection happens now, or it does not happen at all. It happens in us and around us, in soul and history, in nature and Universe. The message of Christianity is not Christianity, but a New Reality. A New state of things had appeared, it still appears; it is hidden and visible, it is there and it is here. Accept it, enter into it, let it grasp you. And like God saves all, the Fire Department will rescue you no matter how rich or poor you are, no matter or age, or what you look like or where you live! Be sure to thank your local heroes, and feel free to make donations to them, they are understaffed and underfunded. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
MAGNOLIA STATION AT CRESLEIGH RANCH
Rancho Cordova, CA | low USD $600,000.00s
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P.S. The limo is not cheap. Wor
Randolph Harris II International Institute 