"western mankind, without exception, is under the influence of an immense optical illusion. everyone demands something of the rest. we say "thou shalt" in the conviction that so-and-so in fact will, can and must be changed or fashioned or arranged conformably to that order, and our belief both in the efficacy of, and in our title to give, such orders is unshakable...in the ethics of the west everything is direction, claim to power, will to affect the distant. here luther is completely at one with nietzsche, popes with darwininas, socialists with jesuits..."
oswald spengler. decline of the west___________every now and then you can open a book....journey to the end of the night, cosmos, confessions of an english opium eater...and find a passage that rings so true at that particular moment that it laves you gasping...old ozzie damn near knocked me out of my chair this morning...we are all stuck behind our own eyes...it is difficult, if no impossible, to view others without making their existence relative to ours...we have difficulty empathizing...it can be done...it takes some effort...and there are those times when you come across an individual so utterly self-absorbed and buried so deeply behind their own eyes that they don't seem capable of any sort of understanding....who can only positively sanction the existence of others in terms of what those others can do for them...it is about them...period...we call that sociopathy...or indifference...or cruelty...or megalomania...and find it abhorrent and react with revulsion and avoidance...just wondering how much of ourselves we see there before we react.
