“My father once told me that respect for the truth comes
close to being the basis for all morality.”
Princess Irulan
(Frank Herbert’s Dune)
The truth is an interesting topic to talk about; at least I find it interesting. Now I’m not talking about those things which are truthful, I’m talking about the truth itself; mostly because there seems to be so many versions of what it means to people. As I understand it, the truth is that which is in accordance with fact or reality. However, from the conversations I have had with some people, I get the distinct impression that the truth is whatever they believe it to be true; regardless of whether it conforms to fact or reality.
I find it sad that so many people claim to love the truth, and despise those who lie to them, yet they reject the truth when it is presented to them because it causes them to call into question their beliefs and values. People who do that will only listen, or give any consideration to, information which supports their existing beliefs. This is known as confirmation bias; yet I call it something a bit less flattering; mental laziness.
That pattern of behavior is the exact opposite of what author Leo Tolstoy describes here, “Freethinkers are those who are willing to use their minds without prejudice and without fearing to understand things that clash with their own customs, privileges, or beliefs. This state of mind is not common, but it is essential for right thinking.” What a lot of people refuse to accept is that, if they are not conforming to the pattern of behavior described by Tolstoy, then they are not truly thinking.
In Frank Herbert’s book Dune there is a fictional character by the name of Thufir Hawat. Thufir is a Mentat; a human computer. In one of the chapters, after House Atreides falls and Hawat is captured by the Baron Harkonnen, he tells the Baron that for him to perform his function as a Mentat he needs accurate information; false, or partial, information leads to false conclusions. You don’t have to be a human computer, or even that smart, for that to be true. There is another way of saying the point I’m trying get across here, ‘Garbage in, garbage out.’ If people base their opinions/beliefs upon half-truths and outright lies, then the opinions they form will be representative of the data they used to form those opinions…garbage.
But how does one go about determining what is, and what isn’t, true? Well, in some cases it is relatively easy. If someone tells you what their weight is, it is relatively easy to have them step on a scale to verify the truthfulness of what they said, right? However, if I were to tell you that your government is doing, or has done, things that it shouldn’t do, things that violate the law, that would be a bit more difficult to prove. I am not saying it could not be proven; I am only saying that to prove it I would have to show you what the law says, then provide instances where things that the government has done has violated that law. In short, determining the truth involves a bit of investigative research on the person seeking it. That may explain why so many people believe things that just are not true; they are simply too lazy, or their priorities are so far out of whack, that seeking out the truth would take out too much of their time.
I have a sticker in the rear window of my pickup truck that says, ‘Ignorance and apathy are fatal to freedom.’ Ignorance is simply the lack of data, information, or knowledge. Apathy, as it applies here, is the lack of concern for seeking out knowledge and information. When you combine the two together you get a toxic brew that prevents people from recognizing the fact that most of what they believe to be true is not actually true; it is based upon faulty information which has led them to form faulty conclusions.
Although the context in which this passage was said is different from what I am discussing here, the sentiment is the same when Christ told His followers, ‘…and the truth shall set you free.’ The thing is, the truth is NOT going to go looking for you; you must go look for it! There is another passage from Scripture that applies here as well, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” (Matthew 7:7) The point is, if people are content to remain ignorant of the truth, (apathetic), then there is not much one can do to cause them to rethink, or re-evaluate, their beliefs and opinions; they are imprisoned by their own ignorance and apathy.
The worst part about it is that people do not even realize they fit into this mold; this prison that enslaves their minds. They believe that they are actually thinking; which fits in nicely to that Edison quote I often use, “Five percent of the people think; ten percent think that they think; and the other eighty-five percent would rather die than think.” If you do not go out and seek out the truth on your own, they you are reliant upon your trust that the information being given to you is both accurate, and complete. The unfortunate thing is, it isn’t.
It is those who fit into that 10% category who are most easily misled; those who believe what they are being told; simply because it was told to them by someone they trusted to tell them the truth. The other 85% simply follow orders without thinking at all; the earmarks of a well-conditioned slave!
I never have, nor will I ever, tell anyone that they should simply take me at my word concerning the opinions I express; I have always said, and hoped, that people would begin to do the same kind of investigative research that I have done. In a way it reminds me of a scene from the film, Batman Begins, when Bruce Wayne tells Rachel Dawes that one day he hopes that Gotham will no longer need the Batman. I’m of the same mindset; except that I hope that one day people will free themselves from the mental prisons they are in and start thinking for themselves; which would render these essays superfluous.
Don’t get me wrong, there was a point in my life where I was as ignorant and apathetic as those I criticize about it today. Had someone called me a mindless drone, or a useless dolt, I would probably have gotten upset; but the criticism would have been well deserved, for that is exactly what I was. Forty years ago my only concerns were getting drunk, getting laid, and listening to rock n roll music; not necessarily in that order though.
Thirty years ago I had become a staunch Republican; believing that the Democrats were the spawn of Satan and responsible for all our country’s woes. I didn’t know it at the time, but I had been seduced by their lies and false promises; saying that they stood for the same principles I did; particularly in regards to our right to keep and bear arms.
By the time another ten years had passed by, I had pretty much lost all faith in the Republican Party; believing them to be on equal footing with the Democrats when it came to their concern for preserving my rights and liberty. I now saw the Republicans as a way of offering false hope to those who opposed the policies of the Democratic Party; controlled opposition, if you will. Yet, despite all this, I still believed the Constitution to be all that I had taught it was; outlining the best system of government the world has ever seen. I thought if we could just get back to a constitutional government everything would be okay again; a fallacy I was soon to dispel myself of.
By the time another ten years had passed, about a decade ago, I had lost all faith in the Constitution; thinking that we would have been better off if the damned thing had never been written, or ratified; that we’d have been much better off under the Articles of Confederation.
Then, about two years ago, I began to realize that no form of government designed by man could effectively secure our God-given rights and liberty; for being the creations of men, they were subject to the same weaknesses, and evil, they are supposed to secure us against. Frederic Bastiat spoke of this in the opening statement of his book, The Law, “The law perverted! And the police powers of the state perverted along with it! The law, I say, not only turned from its proper purpose but made to follow an entirely contrary purpose! The law become the weapon of every kind of greed! Instead of checking crime, the law itself guilty of the evils it is supposed to punish!”
None of these changes, these shifts in my beliefs, would have been possible had I not sought out the truth on my own; resting instead upon the lies and half truths I had been taught in school, and was consuming a steady diet of from the mainstream news media. I am where I am today because I began to question the nature of my reality; no longer accepting as truth everything I had based my beliefs upon.
I am not going to lie to you, it was not easy. There were times I struggled mightily with the things I was discovering. Yet my love of the truth forced me to accept that most, if not all, of what I believed was based upon lies; making my beliefs themselves lies. I realized that, if I wished to have any integrity whatsoever, I was going to have to abandon my old beliefs and change them so that they conformed to the facts I was discovering.
I am not saying I now know all there is to know; far from it. Who knows where I will be ten years from now; assuming I live another ten years. I do not believe that there is a soul alive today who can claim to be in possession of all the truth; or of the absolute truth. In fact, I think that in all of human history there is but one man who could have made that claim; and He died on the cross for our sins over two thousand years ago. There have been those who came close to approximating the truth that Christ embodied; with Enoch and Elijah being two of them. However, looking around me today (including myself) I see that the society we live in is far from the truth those men understood, and applied in their day-to-day lives; which is the origin of the majority of our problems as a country.
If we would strive to be more like those men, and less like the idols we worship today, I think we might stand a chance of fixing what is wrong in this country. I see people fawning over movie stars, pop singers, athletes, and yes, even politicians like Obama and Trump, and I wonder if there is any hope for our future. We listen to every word these people say with such devotion that it comes dangerously close to idolatry. Yet when someone presents the truth to them about their system of government, or current affairs, (especially in regards to the Zionist state of Israel) they are treated as if they had blasphemed against the Holy Ghost.
A perfect example of this is how so many in this country truly believe that the (misnamed) Civil War was fought to end slavery. After all, that is the ‘truth’ that we are taught in school by official sources, isn’t it. Sadly, it is the ‘truth’ that many today still believe; simply because they have not done one bit of research concerning that period of American history since they were handed their high-school diploma. Had they done so, and had they opened their minds to the ‘truths’ they would have uncovered, they would have been forced to conclude that most, if not all, of what they were taught about that period of history was an outright lie; designed to deify a tyrant, and justify a war that flew in the face of what the Declaration of Independence stood for.
I’m not going to go into a lengthy discussion on the Civil War; but I will provide you with a few references to research on your own; references that prove that ending slavery was not the cause of the war. The rest is up to you; I’m tired of doing your research for you. So, if you are interested in learning the truth, I suggest you look up the following:
- Abraham Lincoln’s first Inaugural Address
- Abraham Lincoln’s comments in his 4th debate with Stephen Douglas
- Abraham Lincoln’s letter to Horace Greeley (August 22, 1862)
- The Corwin Resolution
- The Crittendon-Johnson Resolutions
Any of those, as stand-alone sources, prove that the Civil War was not begun to end slavery. When you combine them all, they provide incontrovertible proof that the war was not about freeing the slaves; it was to retain the integrity of the Union; the reason for which is a topic worthy of an essay devoted entirely to why the South chose to secede, and why Lincoln couldn’t allow them to do so.
Now, if you would be so kind as to scroll back up to the top of this essay and re-read the quote I posted from Frank Herbert’s book, Dune, I would be much obliged; for it is upon that topic that I intend to devote the remainder of this essay to.
It is my firm belief that it is not an all-powerful government that poses the greatest threat to freedom; governments can be overthrown if the people are armed with sufficient knowledge, and courage. No, our greatest threat comes from the twin evils of ignorance and apathy. I once saw a comic that best described what each of those terms was. In the comic one character asked the other, ‘What is ignorance?’ To which they answered, ‘I don’t know.’ Then the questioner asked, ‘What is apathy?’ To which the following answer was given, ‘I don’t know, and I don’t care.’ I think that sums it up much better than any dictionary definition, don’t you think?
I believe that people with integrity care about the truth; while those lacking in integrity are content to believe whatever they are told by others; especially if it comes from the mouths of ‘official’ sources. I am not saying we should live our lives not trusting anyone, but there is an old maxim that I have found quite useful over the years, ‘trust but verify.’
I find it interesting that, as children, we question everything. Yet by the time we graduate from high school that inquisitive side of us has been programmed out of our psyche; purged and replaced with a form of blind obedience to figures in positions of authority; be they the news media, our teachers, our elected officials, and yes, even law enforcement.
Far too many people are content to live out their lives trusting what they have been taught or told about the world around them; believing that the pursuit of knowledge (especially regarding the study of history and civics) ends once they attain that piece of paper signifying the completion of their education. I find that to be rather ironic, considering what Albert Einstein once said, ‘Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school.’
As I said moments ago, I do not claim to know all that there is to know; far from it. Yet it is somewhat ironic that people say that I’m smart, yet they refuse to accept the conclusions I’ve drawn from my studies. How that is not a contradiction is beyond me; but it happens all the time. I do not consider myself any smarter than anyone else; well, except for a few individuals; who shall remain nameless to prevent them from being publicly humiliated. What I am is better read than your average plebe (voter). I let the truth guide me in forming my opinions; not let my opinions determine what is and what is not true.
What people fail to realize, because they haven’t given it much thought, is that government is an institution which gives a small group of people a great deal of power. That is a recipe for disaster unless people of the highest moral fiber are elected to fill the positions of power. That may be why Noah Webster wrote the following way back in 1763, “When you become entitled to exercise the right of voting for public officers, let it be impressed on your mind that God commands you to choose for rulers, ‘just men who will rule in the fear of God.’ The preservation of [our] government depends on the faithful discharge of this Duty; if the citizens neglect their Duty and place unprincipled men in office, the government will soon be corrupted; laws will be made, not for the public good so much as for selfish or local purposes; corrupt or incompetent men will be appointed to execute the Laws; the public revenues will be squandered on unworthy men; and the rights of the citizen will be violated or disregarded. If [our] government fails to secure public prosperity and happiness, it must be because the citizens neglect the Divine Commands, and elect bad men to make and administer the Laws.”
Therein lies the problem; we have failed in our obligation to elect principled men into office. Instead, we allow our partisan ideologies determine whom we will put into office. There is only one source of absolute truth and purity; that being the Holy Scriptures. If the Bible is not the source of our morality, if it is not the foundation upon which our laws rest, then those under the authority of government will ALWAYS suffer; either from the despotism of tyrants, or the will of the majority.
The parchment worshippers who fawn all over the Constitution tell us that it was inspired by God. If that is the truth, then it should be simple enough to prove it…right? So I ask you, if the Constitution was inspired by God, then where in the document does it recognize God’s supreme authority? The only authority the Constitution recognizes as being supreme is the power that it gives to government. Where in the Constitution does it recognize God’s justice, and demand that those holding office adhere to it? It doesn’t. In fact, it removed the longstanding requirement that those holding political office take an oath pledging their belief and allegiance to God, His Son Jesus Christ, and the Holy Scriptures. (See Article 6, Clause 3)
So where in the precious constitution does it show any sign of having been inspired by God? I’ll wait for your answer; I have all the time in the world…
Not only does the document itself make no mention of God, the convention that produced it refused to ask His guidance in doing so. When the convention was threatened to be torn asunder by divisions within, Ben Franklin suggested that a daily prayer be given every morning before the day’s proceedings began. Franklin’s motion was unanimously shot down, with Alexander Hamilton saying something along the lines of ‘We do not want to be influenced by any foreign power.’
Inspired by God? You have to either be truly delusional to believe that, or so thoroughly indoctrinated that anything that questions that belief short circuits your synapses! The truth is out there; people are either too lazy to seek it out, or they are so thoroughly conditioned to believe lies that the truth scares the living hell out of them.
That is why I hold out little hope for the future of this country. People care more about being entertained than they do with being informed; knowledgeable. I am not saying that people should devote every waking minute to the pursuit of knowledge and truth; but to ignore them altogether for the pursuit of self-gratification and entertainment is just as bad; if not worse. People can find a comfortable balance; a middle ground where both the pursuit of the truth, and the pursuit of entertainment each share a place in their lives.
I don’t know how many of my readers are rock fans, but I would suggest you do a Google search for the lyrics to the RUSH song, Cygnus X1, Book II. Read them and think about that balance; how the pursuit of one over the other is not good; a balance between extremism in either direction is necessary if we are to remain sane.
In closing I would like to say that voting is not going to fix our woes; as neither the Republicans or the Democrats have the solution to the problems we face. Nor does the Constitution, the Articles of Confederation, or the Declaration of Independence; as they were all written by men, and men, although they may strive to be good, are flawed creatures.
No, if we want answers, we need to look elsewhere; with the Scriptures being the only place where we can find God’s pure truth. The truth is often a bitter pill to swallow; particularly if you have lived your entire life believing a lie. Yet, in the Book of John, Chapter 8, Verses 31 & 32, Christ tells His disciples ‘If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’
Freedom is to be found in God’s word; not in man-made institutions. Therefore, if you are Christian, which statistics show that 63% of the people claim as their religion, then you must place God’s will above the will of man. The Bible is full of examples of saints who disobeyed the edicts of men so that they could follow God’s will. Daniel was thrown into the furnace AND a lions den for disobeying the laws of man. When the Apostles were told by the priests and Sadducees that they had been forbidden to preach the Gospel of Christ, they retorted, ‘We ought to obey God rather than men.’
Christ’s truth is that His Kingdom is not of this world; that we should not concern ourselves with the things of this world; the whole render unto Caesar thing. Christ told us to be apart from this world; in it, but not of it. One cannot give their allegiance to Christ, yet at the same time pledge their allegiance to any system of government designed by man; the two conflict with one another. One must choose where their allegiance lies; to governments of men, by men, and for men, or for Christ’s heavenly kingdom.
But these are truths your pastors won’t tell you either; for they have sold their souls to government in return for tax exempt status. The truth won’t be found in the four walls of your church; it will be found in God’s Holy word; but just as the truth in regards to secular systems of government go, you’re going to have to get off yer keester and study if you want to find it.
Yet the truth matters; for if it doesn’t then the only plausible alternative is that the lie has replaced the truth as the foundation of every belief and value people hold today. If that is the case, then I may as well give up; for there is absolutely no hope for us; either here on earth, or where folks will spend eternity. After all, if you are Christian, then you are supposed to be followers of Christ…right? Well, did He not tell us, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” He did not say to keep the commandments handed down by earthly governments; He said keep those commandments He had given his followers. Something for you to think about; whom do you follow and whom do you obey?
And that’s all I have to say for today. Have a very pleasant evening…
