Saturday, May 3, 2008

Finding Freedom in Order and Stability

Dear George,

I want to tell you a story.

One day, the Devil and a friend were walking down the street. About twenty feet ahead of them, a third man was walking in the same direction. Suddenly, the third man stopped in his tracks and bent over to pick up a piece of paper. He glanced at it, quickly shoved it in his pocket and hurriedly moved on.

“I wonder what that was?” asked the friend.

“It was the truth,” said the Devil.

“I guess that’s bad news for you,” said the friend.

“Oh no,” replied the Devil. “I’ll let him invent a system.”

There’s a great deal of wisdom in that story, George. Throughout history, mankind has placed more credence in a system than in the truth. Oh, they all say they’re seeking the truth. But let a truth contradict a system, and the system wins every time. They prefer the rigid edifice of dogma to the fluid dynamic of the truth.

Truth gives us chaos and disorder; a system gives us peace, order and stability, which guarantee a social structure that is conducive to economic growth. The reason is obvious. Stability means not rocking the boat. In other words, the first duty of a free people is to keep their mouths shut. Ours is a sanitized democracy, one that eschews the messiness of dissent.

Protecting the social structure is of greater value than morality. Morality weakens and softens; structure provides strength and rigidity. Humanitarian considerations are a factor only to the extent that they contribute to the preservation of the structure. Morality is a marketing tool. Once it becomes a basis for action, the structure is imperiled and peace, order and stability are threatened.

Stability is a rip. Everything is mellow. The river of life flows smoothly between well-fortified banks to the pastoral sounds of singing birds and buzzing bees.

Think about it, George! Once there was the Holy Roman Empire; now there is the Protestant America Empire. Soon we will be marching as one nation to the stirring anthems of peace, order and stability as we celebrate an Empire that will endure for a thousand years.

Your admirer,
Belacqua Jones

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Case,

You've hit the nail on the hand yet again. Turning truth into a system is exactly what happened to Christianity in its first few centuries. And all too many Christians love the security of an institutional or dogmatic system to give them order and peace, rather than the insecurity and disorder of what Jesus taught and did (no institutions, no dogmas, radical trust, paradoxical parables).

Anonymous said...

Whoops, I meant "Nail on the head".

Case Wagenvoord said...

Don't forget neither Greek no Roman nor Jew nor Gentile nor man nor woman.

Mark Prime (tpm/Confession Zero) said...

steve,
"nail on the hand" was very fitting.

-Empire enduring a thousand years- We're going to need to do something quick if we are to last that long.

Case Wagenvoord said...

Would you believe a thousand days if the dollar tanks?

Mark Prime (tpm/Confession Zero) said...

Yip.