To Know A Thing Well,

The Gravest Error A Thinking Person Can Make Is To Believe That One Particular Version Of History Is Absolute Fact. History Is Recorded By A Series Of Observers, None Of Whom Is Impartial. The Facts Are Distorted By Sheer Passage Of Time And Thousands Of Years Of Humanity's Dark Ages, Deliberate Misrepresentations By Religious Sects, And The Inevitable Corruption That Comes From An Accumulation Of Careless Mistakes. The Wise Person, Then, Views History As A Set Of Lessons To Be Learned, Choices And Ramifications To Be Considered And Discussed, And Mistakes That Should Never Again Be Made.

The Successful Writer Listens To Himself.

Irreverence Is A Most Necessary Ingredient Of Religion. Not To Speak Of Its Importance In Philosophy. Irreverence Is The Only Way Left To Us For Testing Our Universe.

The Mind Can Go Either Direction Under Stress—toward Positive Or Toward Negative: On Or Off. Think Of It As A Spectrum Whose Extremes Are Unconsciousness At The Negative End And Hyperconsciousness At The Positive End. The Way The Mind Will Lean Under Stress Is Strongly Influenced By Training.

How Often It Is That The Angry Man Rages Denial Of What His Inner Self Is Telling Him.