Painting: The Barque of Dante (Dante and Virgil in Hell) by Eugène Delacroix, 1822.
“Every once in awhile the human race pauses in the job of botching its affairs and redeems itself by a noble work of the intellect.” – Murray Rothbard
With the advent of the handheld computer, everyone thinks himself a doctor, physicist or scholar. No one reads yet everyone knows everything. Or at least must comment so as to not seem a mute.
This piece of high technology has given to all of mankind a false sense of knowing. There is an arrogance to their ignorance that I’m not sure humanity has ever faced.
The lost art of silence is something moderns must relearn. As an elder has taught us, it is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, then to speak and remove all doubt.
By Jove! What fools visit me when I’m in my peace. My heart sinks to my boots knowing moderns will never understand the virtue of silence.
Only chit chatting and the chatter of chattel.
Anytime I comment that turbulence is an interesting physical phenomenon, anytime I remark that the human brain is but only 3 pounds but is the most complex machine in the universe, anytime I say economics is more important than societal affairs. Only to hear the belch of “well it’s because…”
Typical anecdotes of these cretin include midwit academics and the fruit they bear by way of pupils, whose death, it may be said, is more useful to mankind than their life.
I’m no misanthrope.
The human drama inspires awe. It inspires this humble author to write and to make art. Life thrives for a reason, art the same.
It is those sickly lot who pour acid into the ears of their unfortunate audience. Those dreaded bunch, what I deem, the “I have something to says”. They must do it, they must speak. They must.
The Hoover dam could not hold back such extreme volumes of trite comments.
It’s as if Shakespeare is whispering to the perpetrator “once more into the breach dear brother, once more into the breach!”. And we must all bear witness to this excruciating affair. What I see as a battle of meaninglessness, others term a casual conversation.
I must insist, I am for conversation. But not at the expense of cheap words just to fill the air. Such sound waves pollute the environment and fumble the mental facilities. My word, please stop the sewage of speech that spills forth unto my world. A man can only handle so much in one day.
It’s as if commoners focus all their energies on wasting others’ energies, what a revelation!
I must offer a plea, a bargain! Please not around my person release your tongue transaction as the conversation is too expensive for my tastes. Don’t let your mouth become an open grave that I must fall in to!
Please, dear reader, take my word, society today is a crowd of mental vampires alike, all deserving of oblivion and their fraud eats at consciousness. They may mouth words and try to exchange thought, but they only speak because they believe newness to be their plea! Proud in chest and visage, inconsiderate of time.
As I write, I moan. I have nothing else to offer but an appeal. The words we speak in our minds determine the world we perceive in our life. Once you unfurl your speech into the public, we must all reap its consequences. For good or bad. So, for the best, please shut the fuck up.
The Fountainhead 