Neath the rubber trees swayed pots of gold.
The plantation's hereditary owner was an aristocrat of fabulous wealth.
Living
in an opulent palace with a mighty family crest emblazoned on its
pediment, every day he hunted, golfed, or shopped for exotic tapestries
and robes; and every night he hosted salons and balls.
Politicians
and celebrities flocked to his plantation and ate of his roast duck,
caviar and ancient wine -- and ate of his very presence.
So did
Society men and women revere him -- even though his rubber went into the
bullets shot from the guns of the junta that, with him, ruled those who
slaved on his plantation.
The inventor lived in a two-room rental on the outskirts of the city, abutting the plantation shantytown.
Every
day he taught the poor children who slaved among the rubber trees; and
every night he created new uses for the gum that dripped from the rubber
trees.
After years of effort, he created a sterile powder to stanch
the bleeding wounds of the injured. This brought him a measure of
wealth, but not enough to interest politicians and celebrities.
Yet
the poor -- who saw him heal the lashes on their backs inflicted by the
aristocrat's cronies, and sate their starving minds with his teachings -
revered him.
Thus, neither thief nor inheritor of wealth revere, only its creator.
August 30, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 2, "Assumption's Denial"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason.
Aphorism of the Week
Indirectly known truths are convergences of multiple independent
streams of information: If the streams aren't converging, aren't
multiple, aren't independent, or aren't information, truth isn't
established.
Dedicated to the 14 year-old inventor of Email, V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai.
Saturday, August 30, 2014
Sunday, August 24, 2014
The Warrior King, The Car Salesman
Power once strode an ancient empire in the body of a warrior.
In merciless campaigns, he rode his steed over the steppes, wielding a bloody spear.
He conquered and pillaged the lands surrounding his ancestral birthplace -- and in time became king of all he surveyed.
The stories of his terrible exploits passed into history, then into legend -- and then into dust.
Millennia later, in a modern city, power again incarnated.
In the body of a man who, though dreaming of ancient adventure, was a car salesman.
When not kowtowing to prickly, disdainful customers -- who looked up and snickered at his tight necktie, and the bulging sports coat constraining huge muscles -- he imagined galloping down upon them bareback, his pony-tailed hair free in the wind and a curving sword in hand, lopping off their heads.
Customers complained about him -- although all they could say was that they felt a chill, whenever his brilliant-green eyes alighted upon them.
So, in time, was he fired from his job as a car salesman.
Yet he found a way to stride through his modern world.
Accepting that pillage and plunder were criminal and dishonorable, he became a soldier and peacekeeper.
Although he never became a warrior king, nor passed into legend ere into dust, he found his place in his time.
Thus, do not yearn for the best of times -- do your best in the time you are given. -- via The Lord of the Rings
August 23, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 1, "Reality's Acceptance"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason
Aphorism of the Week
Not all who wander are lost. -- via J.R.R. Tolkien
Dedicated to the Community Ambassadors of Saint Paul, MN, who take to the streets to positively interact with and mentor at-risk youth, heading off social confrontations or potential run-ins with the police, and offering connections to jobs, skills training, college programs.
In merciless campaigns, he rode his steed over the steppes, wielding a bloody spear.
He conquered and pillaged the lands surrounding his ancestral birthplace -- and in time became king of all he surveyed.
The stories of his terrible exploits passed into history, then into legend -- and then into dust.
Millennia later, in a modern city, power again incarnated.
In the body of a man who, though dreaming of ancient adventure, was a car salesman.
When not kowtowing to prickly, disdainful customers -- who looked up and snickered at his tight necktie, and the bulging sports coat constraining huge muscles -- he imagined galloping down upon them bareback, his pony-tailed hair free in the wind and a curving sword in hand, lopping off their heads.
Customers complained about him -- although all they could say was that they felt a chill, whenever his brilliant-green eyes alighted upon them.
So, in time, was he fired from his job as a car salesman.
Yet he found a way to stride through his modern world.
Accepting that pillage and plunder were criminal and dishonorable, he became a soldier and peacekeeper.
Although he never became a warrior king, nor passed into legend ere into dust, he found his place in his time.
Thus, do not yearn for the best of times -- do your best in the time you are given. -- via The Lord of the Rings
August 23, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 1, "Reality's Acceptance"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason
Aphorism of the Week
Not all who wander are lost. -- via J.R.R. Tolkien
Dedicated to the Community Ambassadors of Saint Paul, MN, who take to the streets to positively interact with and mentor at-risk youth, heading off social confrontations or potential run-ins with the police, and offering connections to jobs, skills training, college programs.
The Literal, The Intuitive
Detectives were dispatched to the home of a missing person.
The junior detective was young and eager.
Briefly perusing the missing man's home, he noticed no signs of an altercation. "My husband's suitcase and clothes are gone!" his wife cried. Leaning deep into the junior detective's chest, the young woman sobbed.
"My husband's been so unhappy after losing his job, and with his responsibilities as a provider!"
The junior detective consoled her, breaking away only long enough to jot in his notebook that the man had deserted his wife.
The senior detective was an older and slower man.
He looked closely at the woman's face, and asked, "Where do you think your husband is now?"
For an instant, as he watched her eyes dart toward the backyard, the detective felt a deep chill. Then the woman looked down at her feet, sobbed, and cried, "He's just vanished...oh, we loved each other so much!"
The senior detective walked into the kitchen for a glass of water, and, as he drank it, stared out the back window into the dark backyard.
"'Loved,' not 'love,'" he murmured.
In the bedroom, he confirmed the man's clothes and suitcase were missing.But in the bathroom, two toothbrushes still lay on the sink.
When next he returned, with a search warrant, the senior detective found the missing husband and his suitcase of clothes, spread beneath a bed of newly planted roses in the backyard.
Thus, emotions must be clues -- and you a detective.
August 16, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 3, "Emotion's Mastery"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason
Aphorism of the Week
To win a rational argument by evoking emotional irrationality is a sadly pyrhhic victory.
Dedicated to "T'Pring," Star Trek actress Arlene Martel.
The junior detective was young and eager.
Briefly perusing the missing man's home, he noticed no signs of an altercation. "My husband's suitcase and clothes are gone!" his wife cried. Leaning deep into the junior detective's chest, the young woman sobbed.
"My husband's been so unhappy after losing his job, and with his responsibilities as a provider!"
The junior detective consoled her, breaking away only long enough to jot in his notebook that the man had deserted his wife.
The senior detective was an older and slower man.
He looked closely at the woman's face, and asked, "Where do you think your husband is now?"
For an instant, as he watched her eyes dart toward the backyard, the detective felt a deep chill. Then the woman looked down at her feet, sobbed, and cried, "He's just vanished...oh, we loved each other so much!"
The senior detective walked into the kitchen for a glass of water, and, as he drank it, stared out the back window into the dark backyard.
"'Loved,' not 'love,'" he murmured.
In the bedroom, he confirmed the man's clothes and suitcase were missing.But in the bathroom, two toothbrushes still lay on the sink.
When next he returned, with a search warrant, the senior detective found the missing husband and his suitcase of clothes, spread beneath a bed of newly planted roses in the backyard.
Thus, emotions must be clues -- and you a detective.
August 16, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 3, "Emotion's Mastery"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason
Aphorism of the Week
To win a rational argument by evoking emotional irrationality is a sadly pyrhhic victory.
Dedicated to "T'Pring," Star Trek actress Arlene Martel.
Saturday, August 9, 2014
The Wasp, The Ant
Droning wafted through the forest as the Wasp hovered, searching.
It found a caterpillar feeding on a large leaf.
Flying down and landing on the caterpillar's back, the Wasp stung it. The caterpillar fell to the ground, unmoving.
Then the Wasp laid its eggs inside the caterpillar to incubate its young, who slowly consumed the caterpillar from the inside.
The newborn wasps broke out from the caterpillar's body and flew toward the sky, in search of more caterpillars as hosts.
As the wasps grew in number, the caterpillars grew scarce, until few wasps or caterpillars lived.
After one of the last of the wasps fruitlessly searched for prey in which to lay its eggs, it fell to the ground, dead.
While its body mouldered, a skittering noise approached it from below. Two antennae reached up and sniffed the mildewed chitin; then the Ant brusquely moved on, searching.
The Ant found a small cave in the rich soil, and then skittered up to a partly eaten green leaf, whereon it found an aphid.
The Ant bent down and, caressing the aphid's back with its feelers, picked it up gently in its jaws and carried it back to the cave, to live in comfort.
Each day the Ant brought the aphid a piece of leaf to eat, caressed it, and drank its sugary droppings. The Ant grew strong and laid a colony of its young, all of whom marched out to find and breed more aphids.
As the ants and aphids grew in number, the forest teemed with their colonies.
Thus, to use others destroys all -- to work with others renews all.
August 9, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 2, "Assumption's Denial"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason
Aphorism of the Week
Might makes no right.
Dedicated to the fortitude of Iraq's Yazidi people; and in admonishment of ISIS' genocidal invasion of the Yazidi religious community and abduction of Yazidi women, in contravention of the teachings of their own Prophet.
It found a caterpillar feeding on a large leaf.
Flying down and landing on the caterpillar's back, the Wasp stung it. The caterpillar fell to the ground, unmoving.
Then the Wasp laid its eggs inside the caterpillar to incubate its young, who slowly consumed the caterpillar from the inside.
The newborn wasps broke out from the caterpillar's body and flew toward the sky, in search of more caterpillars as hosts.
As the wasps grew in number, the caterpillars grew scarce, until few wasps or caterpillars lived.
After one of the last of the wasps fruitlessly searched for prey in which to lay its eggs, it fell to the ground, dead.
While its body mouldered, a skittering noise approached it from below. Two antennae reached up and sniffed the mildewed chitin; then the Ant brusquely moved on, searching.
The Ant found a small cave in the rich soil, and then skittered up to a partly eaten green leaf, whereon it found an aphid.
The Ant bent down and, caressing the aphid's back with its feelers, picked it up gently in its jaws and carried it back to the cave, to live in comfort.
Each day the Ant brought the aphid a piece of leaf to eat, caressed it, and drank its sugary droppings. The Ant grew strong and laid a colony of its young, all of whom marched out to find and breed more aphids.
As the ants and aphids grew in number, the forest teemed with their colonies.
Thus, to use others destroys all -- to work with others renews all.
August 9, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 2, "Assumption's Denial"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason
Aphorism of the Week
Might makes no right.
Dedicated to the fortitude of Iraq's Yazidi people; and in admonishment of ISIS' genocidal invasion of the Yazidi religious community and abduction of Yazidi women, in contravention of the teachings of their own Prophet.
Saturday, August 2, 2014
The Meaningless Life, The Meaning of Life
Skin as grey and marbled as the ancient colonnade she leaned against, a
wise grandmother watched her two young charges explore the Ruins of the
Ancestors, long ago fallen to decay.
One grandchild darted from behind the white robes of his twin sister, and climbed upon a great, fluted pillar of marble, fallen and half-buried in the grass. There he grabbed a twig from the top of an olive tree and brandished it over his head.
"I am the conquering King!" he cried, stabbing his wooden sword into the ghostly bodies of men to come.
His grandmother watched her small grandson, and saw the man he would become -- and her face grew as solemn as the cold marble under her withered hand.
Yet the other grandchild, gathering her robes about her legs and unshodding her sandals, quietly joined her grandmother, there on the marble stairs of a small temple to a god long ignored.
She stared at her brother's strutting swordplay, then at the broken temple columns, and the azure of the empty sky -- then turned to her grandmother and asked, "What is the meaning of life?"
The wise woman's sad gaze broke away from her grandson and, growing radiant, swung toward her.
With dawning joy the old woman stared at her granddaughter's querulous blue eyes, and then, reaching out a wrinkled hand to caress her smooth cheek, replied, "Oh, my darling grandchild! In asking that question, you have answered it."
Thus, the meaning of life is that it's the meaning of life -- you are that you are.
August 2, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 1, "Reality's Acceptance"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason
Aphorism of the Week
Life requires no other to justify itself.
Dedicated to a teenager, on the 70th anniversary of her final diary entry: "Believe me, I'd like to listen, but it doesn't work, because if I'm quiet and serious, everyone thinks I'm putting on a new act and I have to save myself with a joke, and then I'm not even talking about my own family, who assume I must be ill, stuff me with aspirins and sedatives, feel my neck and forehead to see if I have a temperature, ask about my bowel movements and berate me for being in a bad mood, until I just can't keep it up any more, because when everybody starts hovering over me, I get cross, then sad, and finally end up turning my heart inside out, the bad part on the outside and the good part on the inside, and keep trying to find a way to become what I'd like to be and what I could be if ... if only there were no other people in the world. -- Yours, Anne M. Frank."
One grandchild darted from behind the white robes of his twin sister, and climbed upon a great, fluted pillar of marble, fallen and half-buried in the grass. There he grabbed a twig from the top of an olive tree and brandished it over his head.
"I am the conquering King!" he cried, stabbing his wooden sword into the ghostly bodies of men to come.
His grandmother watched her small grandson, and saw the man he would become -- and her face grew as solemn as the cold marble under her withered hand.
Yet the other grandchild, gathering her robes about her legs and unshodding her sandals, quietly joined her grandmother, there on the marble stairs of a small temple to a god long ignored.
She stared at her brother's strutting swordplay, then at the broken temple columns, and the azure of the empty sky -- then turned to her grandmother and asked, "What is the meaning of life?"
The wise woman's sad gaze broke away from her grandson and, growing radiant, swung toward her.
With dawning joy the old woman stared at her granddaughter's querulous blue eyes, and then, reaching out a wrinkled hand to caress her smooth cheek, replied, "Oh, my darling grandchild! In asking that question, you have answered it."
Thus, the meaning of life is that it's the meaning of life -- you are that you are.
August 2, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 1, "Reality's Acceptance"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason
Aphorism of the Week
Life requires no other to justify itself.
Dedicated to a teenager, on the 70th anniversary of her final diary entry: "Believe me, I'd like to listen, but it doesn't work, because if I'm quiet and serious, everyone thinks I'm putting on a new act and I have to save myself with a joke, and then I'm not even talking about my own family, who assume I must be ill, stuff me with aspirins and sedatives, feel my neck and forehead to see if I have a temperature, ask about my bowel movements and berate me for being in a bad mood, until I just can't keep it up any more, because when everybody starts hovering over me, I get cross, then sad, and finally end up turning my heart inside out, the bad part on the outside and the good part on the inside, and keep trying to find a way to become what I'd like to be and what I could be if ... if only there were no other people in the world. -- Yours, Anne M. Frank."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
