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C.S. LEWIS
Oration at University of London, 1944
THE INNER RING
May I read you a few lines from Tolstoi’s War and Peace?
When you invite a middle-aged moralist to address you, I suppose I must conclude, however unlikely the conclusion seems, that you have a taste for middle-aged moralising. I shall do my best to gratify it. I shall in fact, give you advice about the world in which you are going to live. I do not mean by this that I am going to talk on what are called current affairs. You probably know quite as much about them as I do. I am not going to tell you- except in a form so general that you will hardly recognise it- what part you ought to play in post-war reconstruction.When Boris entered the room, Prince Andrey was listening to an old general, wearing his decorations, who was reporting something to Prince Andrey, with an expression of soldierly servility on his purple face. "Alright. Please wait!" he said to the general, speaking in Russian with the French accent which he used when he spoke with contempt. The moment he noticed Boris he stopped listening to the general who trotted imploringly after him and begged to be heard, while Prince Andrey turned to Boris with a cheerful smile and a nod of the head. Boris now clearly understood- what he had already guessed- that side by side with the system of discipline and subordination which were laid down in the Army Regulations, there existed a different and more real system- the system which compelled a tightly laced general with a purple face to wait respectfully for his turn while a mere captain like Prince Andrey chatted with a mere second lieutenant like Boris. Boris decided at once that he would be guided not by the official system but by this other unwritten system.
It is not, in fact, very likely that any of you will be able, in the next ten years, to make any direct contribution to the peace or prosperity of Europe. You will be busy finding jobs, getting married, acquiring facts. I am going to do something more old-fashioned than you perhaps expected. I am going to give advice. I am going to issue warnings. Advice and warnings about things which are so perennial that no one calls them "current affairs."
And of course everyone knows what a middle-aged moralist of my type warns his juniors against. He warns them against the World, the Flesh, and the Devil. But one of this trio will be enough to deal with today. The Devil, I shall leave strictly alone. The association between him and me in the public mind has already gone quite as deep as I wish: in some quarters it has already reached the level of confusion, if not of identification. I begin to realise the truth of the old proverb that he who sups with that formidable host needs a long spoon. As for the Flesh, you must be very abnormal young people if you do not know quite as much about it as I do. But on the World I think I have something to say.
In the passage I have just read from Tolstoi, the young second lieutenant Boris Dubretskoi discovers that there exist in the army two different systems or hierarchies. The one is printed in some little red book and anyone can easily read it up. It also remains constant. A general is always superior to a colonel, and a colonel to a captain. The other is not printed anywhere. Nor is it even a formally organised secret society with officers and rules which you would be told after you had been admitted. You are never formally and explicitly admitted by anyone. You discover gradually, in almost indefinable ways, that it exists and that you are outside it; and then later, perhaps, that you are inside it.
There are what correspond to passwords, but they are too spontaneous and informal. A particular slang, the use of particular nicknames, an allusive manner of conversation, are the marks. But it is not so constant. It is not easy, even at a given moment, to say who is inside and who is outside. Some people are obviously in and some are obviously out, but there are always several on the borderline. And if you come back to the same Divisional Headquarters, or Brigade Headquarters, or the same regiment or even the same company, after six weeks’ absence, you may find this secondary hierarchy quite altered.
There are no formal admissions or expulsions. People think they are in it after they have in fact been pushed out of it, or before they have been allowed in: this provides great amusement for those who are really inside. It has no fixed name. The only certain rule is that the insiders and outsiders call it by different names. From inside it may be designated, in simple cases, by mere enumeration: it may be called "You and Tony and me." When is very secure and comparatively stable in membership it calls itself ‘we.’ When it has to be expanded to meet a particular emergency it calls itself "all the sensible people at this place." From outside, if you have dispaired of getting into it, you call it "That gang" or "they" or "So-and-so and his set" or "The Caucus" or "The Inner Ring." If you are candidate for admission you probably don’t call it anything. To discuss it with the other outsiders would make you feel outside yourself. And to mention talking to the man who is inside, and who may help you if this present conversation goes well, would be madness.
Badly as I may have described it, I hope you will all have recognised the thing I am describing. Not, of course, that you have been in the Russian Army, or perhaps in any army. But you have met the phenomenon of an Inner Ring. You discovered one in your house at school before the end of the first term. And when you had climbed up to somewhere near it by the end of your second year, perhaps you discovered that within the ring there was a Ring yet more inner, which in its turn was the fringe of the great school Ring to which the house Rings were only satellites. It is even possible that the school ring was almost in touch with a Masters’ Ring. You were beginning, in fact, to pierce through the skins of an onion. And here, too, at your University- shall I be wrong in assuming that at this very moment, invisible to me, there are several rings- independent systems or concentric rings- present in this room? And I can assure you that in whatever hospital, inn of court, diocese, school, business, or college you arrive after going down, you will find the Rings- what Tolstoi calls the second or unwritten systems.
All this is rather obvious. I wonder whether you will say the same of my next step, which is this. I believe that in all men’s’ lives at certain periods, and in many men’s lives at all periods between infancy and extreme old age, one of the most dominant elements is the desire to be inside the local Ring and the terror of being left outside. This desire, in one of its forms, has indeed had ample justice done to it in literature. I mean, in the form of snobbery. Victorian fiction is full of characters who are hag-ridden by the desire to get inside that particular Rind which is, or was, called Society. But it must be clearly understood that "Society," in that sense of the word, is merely one of a hundred Rings, and snobbery therefore only one form of the longing to be inside.
People who believe themselves to be free, and indeed are free, from snobbery, and who read satires on snobbery with tranquil superiority, may be devoured by the desire in another form. It may be the very intensity of their desire to enter some quite different Ring which renders them immune from all the allurements of high life. An invitation from a duchess would be very cold comfort to a man smarting under the sense of exclusion from some artistic or communistic côterie. Poor man- it is not large, lighted rooms, or champagne, or even scandals about peers and Cabinet Ministers that he wants: it is the sacred little attic or studio, the heads bent together, the fog of tobacco smoke, and the delicious knowledge that we- we four or five all huddled beside this stove- are the people who know.
Often the desire conceals itself so well that we hardly recognize the pleasures of fruition. Men tell not only their wives but themselves that it is a hardship to stay late at the office or the school on some bit of important extra work which they have been let in for because they and So-and-so and the two others are the only people left in the place who really know how things are run. But it is not quite true. It is a terrible bore, of course, when old Fatty Smithson draws you aside and whispers, "Look here, we’ve got to get you in on this examination somehow" or "Charles and I saw at once that you’ve got to be on this committee." A terrible bore… ah, but how much more terrible if you were left out! It is tiring and unhealthy to lose your Saturday afternoons: but to have them free because you don’t matter, that is much worse.
Freud would say, no doubt, that the whole thing is a subterfuge of the sexual impulse. I wonder whether the shoe is not sometimes on the other foot. I wonder whether, in ages of promiscuity, many a virginity has not been lost less in obedience to Venus than in obedience to the lure of the caucus. For of course, when promiscuity is the fashion, the chaste are outsiders. They are ignorant of something that other people know. They are uninitiated. And as for lighter matters, the number of people who first smoked or first got drunk for a similar reason is probably very large.
I must now make a distinction. I am not going to say that the existence of Inner Rings is an Evil. It is certainly unavoidable. There must be confidential discussions: and it is not only a bad thing, it is (in itself) a good thing, that personal friendship should grow up between those who work together. And it is perhaps impossible that the official hierarchy of any organisation should coincide with its actual workings. If the wisest and most energetic people held the highest spots, it might coincide; since they often do not, there must be people in high positions who are really deadweights and people in lower positions who are more important than their rank and seniority would lead you to suppose. It is necessary: and perhaps it is not a necessary evil. But the desire which draws us into Inner Rings is another matter. A thing may be morally neutral and yet the desire for that thing may be dangerous. As Byron has said:Sweet is a legacy, and passing sweet
The unexpected death of some old lady.The painless death of a pious relative at an advanced age is not an evil. But an earnest desire for her death on the part of her heirs is not reckoned a proper feeling, and the law frowns on even the gentlest attempts to expedite her departure. Let Inner Rings be unavoidable and even an innocent feature of life, though certainly not a beautiful one: but what of our longing to enter them, our anguish when we are excluded, and the kind of pleasure we feel when we get in?
I have no right to make assumptions about the degree to which any of you may already be compromised. I must not assume that you have ever first neglected, and finally shaken off, friends whom you really loved and who might have lasted you a lifetime, in order to court the friendship of those who appeared to you more important, more esoteric. I must not ask whether you have derived actual pleasure from the loneliness and humiliation of the outsiders after you, yourself were in: whether you have talked to fellow members of the Ring in the presence of outsiders simply in order that the outsiders might envy; whether the means whereby, in your days of probation, you propitiated the Inner Ring, were always wholly admirable.
I will ask only one question- and it is, of course, a rhetorical question which expects no answer. IN the whole of your life as you now remember it, has the desire to be on the right side of that invisible line ever prompted you to any act or word on which, in the cold small hours of a wakeful night, you can look back with satisfaction? If so, your case is more fortunate than most.
My main purpose in this address is simply to convince you that this desire is one of the great permanent mainsprings of human action. It is one of the factors which go to make up the world as we know it- this whole pell-mell of struggle, competition, confusion, graft, disappointment and advertisement, and if it is one of the permanent mainsprings then you may be quite sure of this. Unless you take measures to prevent it, this desire is going to be one of the chief motives of your life, from the first day on which you enter your profession until the day when you are too old to care. That will be the natural thing- the life that will come to you of its own accord. Any other kind of life, if you lead it, will be the result of conscious and continuous effort. If you do nothing about it, if you drift with the stream, you will in fact be an ‘inner ringer." I don’t say you’ll be a successful one; that’s as may be. But whether by pining and moping outside Rings that you can never enter, or by passing triumphantly further and further in- one way or the other you will be that kind of man.
I have already made it fairly clear that I think it better for you not to be that kind of man. But you may have an open mind on the question. I will therefore suggest two reasons for thinking as I do.
It would be polite and charitable, and in view of your age reasonable too, to suppose that none of you is yet a scoundrel. On the other hand, by the mere law of averages (I am saying nothing against free will) it is almost certain that at least two or three of you before you die will have become something very like scoundrels. There must be in this room the makings of at least that number of unscrupulous, treacherous, ruthless egotists. The choice is still before you: and I hope you will not take my hard words about your possible future characters as a token of disrespect to your present characters.
And the prophecy I make is this. To nine out of ten of you the choice which could lead to scoundrelism will come, when it does come, in no very dramatic colours. Obviously bad men, obviously threatening or bribing, will almost certainly not appear. Over a drink, or a cup of coffee, disguised as triviality and sandwiched between two jokes, from the lips of a man, or woman, whom you have recently been getting to know rather better and whom you hope to know better still- just at the moment when you are most anxious not to appear crude, or naïf or a prig- the hint will come. It will be the hint of something which the public, the ignorant, romantic public, would never understand: something which even the outsiders in your own profession are apt to make a fuss about: but something, says your new friend, which "we"- and at the word "we" you try not to blush for mere pleasure- something "we always do."
And you will be drawn in, if you are drawn in, not by desire for gain or ease, but simply because at that moment, when the cup was so near your lips, you cannot bear to be thrust back again into the cold outer world. It would be so terrible to see the other man’s face- that genial, confidential, delightfully sophisticated face- turn suddenly cold and contemptuous, to know that you had been tried for the Inner Ring and rejected. And then, if you are drawn in, next week it will be something a little further from the rules, and next year something further still, but all in the jolliest, friendliest spirit. It may end in a crash, a scandal, and penal servitude; it may end in millions, a peerage and giving the prizes at your old school. But you will be a scoundrel.
That is my first reason. Of all the passions, the passion for the Inner Ring is most skillful in making a man who is not yet a very bad man do very bad things.
My second reason is this. The torture allotted to the Danaids in the classical underworld, that of attempting to fill sieves with water, is the symbol not of one vice, but of all vices. It is the very mark of a perverse desire that it seeks what is not to be had. The desire to be inside the invisible line illustrates this rule. As long as you are governed by that desire you will never get what you want. You are trying to peel and onion: if you succeed there will be nothing left. Until you conquer the fear of being an outsider, an outsider you will remain.
This is surely very clear when you come to think of it. If you want to be made free of certain circle for some wholesome reason- if, say, you want to join a musical society because you really like music- then there is a possibility of satisfaction. You may find yourself playing in a quartet and you may enjoy it. But if all you want is to be in the know, your pleasure will be short lived. The circle cannot have from within the charm it had from outside. By the very act of admitting you it has lost its magic.
Once the first novelty is worn off, the members of this circle will be no more interesting than your old friends. Why should they be? You were not looking for virtue or kindness or loyalty or humour or learning or wit or any of the things that can really be enjoyed. You merely wanted to be "in." And that is a pleasure that cannot last. As soon as your new associates have been staled to you by custom, you will be looking for another Ring. The rainbow’s end will still be ahead of you. The old ring will now be only the drab background for your endeavor to enter the new one.
And you will always find them hard to enter, for a reason you very well know. You yourself, once you are in, want to make it hard for the next entrant, just as those who are already in made it hard for you. Naturally. In any wholesome group of people which holds together for a good purpose, the exclusions are in a sense accidental. Three or four people who are together for the sake of some piece of work exclude others because there is work only for so many or because the others can’t in fact do it. Your little musical group limits its numbers because the rooms they meet in are only so big. But your genuine Inner Ring exists for exclusion. There’d be no fun if there were no outsiders. The invisible line would have no meaning unless most people were on the wrong side of it. Exclusion is no accident; it is the essence.
The quest of the Inner Ring will break your hearts unless you break it. But if you break it, a surprising result will follow. If in your working hours you make the work your end, you will presently find yourself all unawares inside the only circle in your profession that really matters. You will be one of the sound craftsmen, and other sound craftsmen will know it. This group of craftsmen will by no means coincide with the Inner Ring or the Important People or the People in the Know. It will not shape that professional policy or work up that professional influence which fights for the profession as a whole against the public: nor will it lead to those periodic scandals and crises which the Inner Ring produces. But it will do those things which that profession exists to do and will in the long run be responsible for all the respect which that profession in fact enjoys and which the speeches and advertisements cannot maintain.
And if in your spare time you consort simply with the people you like, you will again find that you have come unawares to a real inside: that you are indeed snug and safe at the centre of something which, seen from without, would look exactly like an Inner Ring. But the difference is that the secrecy is accidental, and its exclusiveness a by-product, and no one was led thither by the lure of the esoteric: for it is only four or five people who like one another meeting to do things that they like. This is friendship. Aristotle placed it among the virtues. It causes perhaps half of all the happiness in the world, and no Inner Ring can ever have it.
We are told in Scripture that those who ask get. That is true, in senses I can’t now explore. But in another sense there is much truth in the schoolboy’s principle "them as asks shan’t have." To a young person, just entering on adult life, the world seems full of "insides," full of delightful intimacies and confidentialities, and he desires to enter them. But if he follows that desire he will reach no "inside" that is worth reaching. The true road lies in quite another direction. It is like the house in Alice Through the Looking Glass.
Look what I found!!
Bump for the sentient.
Final Report From John C. Danforth, Office of Special Counsel, Waco Investigation
Former Waco Prosecutor Indicted
Federal indictment in Waco probe - whistle-blower on government cover-up being charged by Reno
Have you ever read C.S. Lewis' powerful novel That Hideous Strength? Being part of "the inner circle" is one of the themes of the book. Clinton, Gore and their minions would have fit very well as characters in the story.
I've often felt that Lewis was either far ahead of his time, or that his England's moral decline was far ahead of ours.
That Hideous Strength is one of my all time favorites. Wish my name was Ransome rather than Weston!
Maddy Albright makes a perfect Fairy Hardcastle. The young man in the book found himself doing very ugly things in order to become a part of the inner ring. I believe Clinton gave his soul long ago for this very reason.
Senate Roll Call, Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 1999
Defective Children Database: To What Use Will the Feds Put It? , also here
Senate Passes Hate Crimes Bill
Senate to Vote on PNTR Today! Byrd: "A virus infects the Senate."
And I want to add OWK's laundry list of GOP Congressional Accomplishments. Incremental Conservatism in Action !!
National ID Cards
Expanded (no warrant) wiretap authority for FBI
A national database for “employed people”
Asset seizure for Americans who establish foreign citizenship
The power to declare ANY group as “terrorist” without possibility of appeal (and subsequent monitoring of said groups)
Authorization of “secret trials” for “terrorists”
A national medical database with federal access
100 pages of new “health care crimes” and authorization of asset seizure for said crimes
Funding for the war in Kosovo without Constitutional authority
Continued funding for troops in Bosnia without Constitutional authority
Renewed funding for the NEA
Renewed funding for the NEH
Legislation harassing tobacco companies
Tobacco subsidies
Sugar subsidies
Ethanol subsidies
Agriculture subsidies
The largest Pork legislation in the history of the republic (highways)
IRS reform voted down
IMF bailout with taxpayer money
Russian bailout with taxpayer money
Forgiveness of debt of Billions in third world loans
Expanded federal involvement in education
Sham investigation of China money
Sham investigation of Waco
Restriction of Executive orders voted down
Mandatory restrictions on firearms transactions
Banning of high-capacity magazines
5 Posted on 08/22/2000 10:58:05 PDT by DAnconia55
To: forestI appreciate Fiedor's article [Crackdown on Constitutional Scofflaws] and your posting of it. But the problem is not the law. The problem is the body politic which ignores it and/or violates it flagrantly and with utter impunity.
It is the essence of Clinton's legacy, that he taught us all that the people, with precious few (and brave) exceptions, have no will to do the tedious work of maintaining the rule of law.
As Fiedor himself actually demonstrates, there is no need for another law to make explicit the intention of our Constitution: It couldn't be clearer. If the people won't adhere to those principles, another law won't miraculously restore to them their sense of duty.
The near perfection of our Constitution will be made obvious by one of only two ways. Either we will succeed in our dogged determination to rouse our friends and neighbors from their self-absorption and educate them in time to reclaim our heritage. Or they will learn the brutal truth of tyranny firsthand and taste the bitter regret of loss.
If we fail today, our children and grandchildren will trace a familiar path: they will fight for liberty once again, and, having gained it, they will do the hard work of constructing a framework for governing a free and independent people.
The damage done to our Constitution cannot be remedied by a quick-fix new law. It will be the work of at least one whole generation. Please God, let it be ours, and let us succeed.
6 Posted on 06/10/2000 18:10:20 PDT by Wife of D28Man
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The State and the Soul
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Hey guy ... diving's done and dinner is served!
I've often felt that Lewis was either far ahead of his time, or that his England's moral decline was far ahead of ours.
He understood his time better than most. I'll agree with you that England's decline predated ours but not by much. The State exercised more control over faith and therefore that of many Englishmen ended up sere far sooner than Americans. It took the fullscale assault that was the sexual revolution combined with cultural Maoism, psychiatry and the "stench of Zen" to do us in.
I'm a big C.S. Lewis fan but if you were taken with the Perelanda Trilogy, I cannot recommend highly enough the "Children of the Last Days" series by Canadian Michael O'Brien. I did not put any of those books down and, reading his over 500-page "Father Elijah" set it down only to rest my eyes a minute as I read through the night and into the next morning.
_______
I'm borrowing "stench of Zen" from Koestler for very specific reasons.
Hello: one and all, seems that there is a little gnashing of teeth going on here over freedom of speech. Well you will find a truly free and open place to chat at PIPEBOMBNEWS.COM Very cool application written by people who know what they are doing, tens of thousands of hits each day, FREE BEER and lots of friendly folks.
One of my favorite novels.
Maddy Albright makes a perfect Fairy Hardcastle.
I thought that was Janet Reno's job?
Perhaps.
Once folks remember "Oi, I'm on private property!" they usually reconsider their right to use Jim's site any way they see fit. We're not commies YET, pipebomb. Plenty of time to commandeer the property of patriots .... all in due time.
Regards.
True...Fairy was the enforcer..Reno fits.
But your genuine Inner Ring exists for exclusion. There’d be no fun if there were no outsiders. The invisible line would have no meaning unless most people were on the wrong side of it. Exclusion is no accident; it is the essence.
Exclusivity is of course the lifeblood of the sick culture of celebrity that we live in. I am reminded of DNC/Clinton Hollywood fundraisers...
Thanks for posting this, A.
Thanks for posting this, Askel. The man did know society and the men and women in it, did he not?
For the nonce, a practical observation: The most efficient organizations, institutions or "gatherings" of human beings are those where the official hierarchy coincides with the unofficial hierarchy (or Inner Ring). It is indeed fortunate for the world that such coincidences seldom occur.
"Schumer Amendment" checking in ... an excerpt from Kaiser Reproductive Health
Some Republicans said the Democrats and Vice President Al Gore, who flew in from the campaign trail to break a possible 50-50 vote, were engaging in political "theater." Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) defended the amendment, saying, "This issue is not about theater. It is about the very real issue of violence against women" (Dewar/Day, Washington Post, 2/3). But Sen. Bob Smith (R-N.H.) called the amendment an attempt "to silence the free speech of abortion opponents" (AP/Miami Herald, 2/3).
A Cheap Stunt?
Although early reports indicated that a tie vote was likely, Republicans "abruptly decided to let it pass rather than give Gore any more big headlines on a high-profile issue."Hatch explained, "With this amendment accepted, nobody will be able to politically demagogue this issue in the context of true bankruptcy reform" (Dewar/Day, Washington Post, 2/3). Sen. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) called Gore's campaign chair, Tony Coelho, to alert him that Gore was needed to break a possible tie. Early yesterday, Gore jumped on a commercial flight fresh from the campaign trail to return to Washington.
But once Gore took his seat as president of the Senate, Republicans let the "measure pass handily." When asked if his decision to fly back "reflected a need to shore up his credentials concerning an issue on which former Sen. Bill Bradley had challenged him," Gore responded, "It did not." Republicans have charged that Gore's move was a "cheap stunt" (Seelye, New York Times, 2/3).
Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) questioned Gore's motives, saying, "It's not even an abortion issue, it's a bankruptcy issue." But Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) defended Gore, saying, "If you have a doubt about Al Gore's commitment [and Republican indifference] to women's choice, today is proof positive"
Yeah ... right.
It is indeed fortunate for the world that such coincidences seldom occur.
Hey ... I thought both you and I both had advanced degrees in Coincidence Theory!
Picking on me is like shooting fish in a barrel.
And WHAT a find!!!
Askie, this is absolutely marvelous!!!
(And I like all the links, too!)
Nothing I say in comment could possibly make that Lewis essay any better...except this thread is going to be copied and bookmarked and referenced by this FReeper!
Thank you VERY much for finding this for me.
You make one terrific request line, sweetie!!
For my FRiends, who, like me, are most intrigued by prophecy...a little insight into human nature from one of the most brilliant Christian minds of the 20th century!!
Very nice, askel. Lewis was a grand old man, wasn't he? In keeping with the piece above, he once said about prosperity, it "knits a man to the world. He thinks he's 'finding his place in it,' while really it is finding its place in him."
Another fovorite quote of his that I often think of is: ""If you take your stand on the 'prevalent' view, how long do you suppose it will prevail? . . . All you can really say about my taste is that it is old-fashioned; yours will soon be the same."
"The most efficient organizations, institutions or "gatherings" of human beings are those where the official hierarchy coincides with the unofficial hierarchy (or Inner Ring). It is indeed fortunate for the world that such coincidences seldom occur."
What Lewis appears to describe is a disconnect between power and authority. In the example from Tolstoy, authority (the Russian general) is trumped by power (the subaltern). This is exactly the kind of accusation that people have traditionally made against Masons - that they are part of some secret network whose members get preferential treatment, not on their merits but on the basis of their affiliation.
Such an arrangement is not necessarily inefficient, because the "inner circle" may, in fact, be better at getting things done than would otherwise have been effected through normal channels. In fact, there are many instances where the formal channels are so sclerotic that the only way anything can get done is if you "know somebody."
Such an arrangement, however, is dishonest, because all who must interact with, and within, the organisation are deceived. You can, for example, play by the rules, follow established protocol, and still be left in the dust by someone who knows someone (who knows someone . . .)
We see this (or at least I see this) all the time in the job market. Every job search book tells the reader that, no matter how polished his résumé, the surest way to gain employment is through what is euphemistically called "networking." In other words, it's not what you know, but . . .
In that case, the "authority" of one candidate's credentials can be trumped by the "power" of another candidate's covert affiliation with the Inner Circle.
It is in the interest of honesty, rather than efficiency, that power and authority coincide.
Thank you for posting. Wonderful!
What Lewis appears to describe is a disconnect between power and authority. In the example from Tolstoy, authority (the Russian general) is trumped by power (the subaltern).~~~Such an arrangement is not necessarily inefficient, because the "inner circle" may, in fact, be better at getting things done than would otherwise have been effected through normal channels. In fact, there are many instances where the formal channels are so sclerotic that the only way anything can get done is if you "know somebody."
Absolutely agree. I was merely pointing out how fortunate we are that this "disconnect" exists. Can you imagine an institution, say a prison, where the "social power" (the Inner Ring) was the same as the "formal power?" I can point to no examples, but I trust that such a disconnect has always existed in the Clinton administration, and as bad as things have become, we are much better off for it.
bump
When Hillary has finished off the Constitution, we will be ruled by her inner circle.
Bump
We are approaching the question from opposite directions. You are looking at the rotters in the Inner Circle and thinking how terrible it would be if their power were legitimised. I am looking at the formal hierarchy and thinking how beneficial it would be if those who have been given authority also had power.
Since authority comes from God (or His secular equivalent -- the law), my argument boils down to yet another defense of legitimacy. For example, HM the Queen has the authority to dismiss the odious Mr. Blair. But, for all practical purposes, she does not have the power.
We are approaching the question from opposite directions. You are looking at the rotters in the Inner Circle and thinking how terrible it would be if their power were legitimised. I am looking at the formal hierarchy and thinking how beneficial it would be if those who have been given authority also had power.
Yes, we do seem to be traveling in different directions here. Perhaps it's a function of what kind of institutions we've each been a part. OTOH, to stretch it just a wee bit, my approach could be just another way to describe the results of "The Fall," as described in a Good Book I read every now and then.
Historically speaking, I think a case could be made that most human institutions begin in your point of view, and eventually end up in mine. Believe it or not, I am at heart an optimist...go figure.
This issue is not about theater
What is theatre about? Please give us in 100 words or less an explanation of the relationship of theatre to the role the church plays in our lives.
Note: Do not attempt to write on both sides of the paper at the same time.
Hmm... I don't remember that we ever discussed "coincidence theory," actually. FWIW, I don't believe in 'em, except on extremely rare occasions.
"Apples of gold in pictures of silver."
King Solomon
As Lewis himself said in The Problem of Pain:
It [the human spirit] had turned from God and become its own idol, so though it could still turn back to God, it could do so only by painful effort, and its inclination was self-ward. Hence pride and ambition, the desire to be lovely in its own eyes and to depress and humiliate all rivals, envy, and restless search for more, and still more, security, were now attitudes that came easiest to it ... A new species, never made by God, had sinned itself into existence.
... diving's done and dinner is served!
and what a cold dish it is.
Thanks for the flag, I have been reading Lewis 's writings on a consistent basis as of late.
His understanding of man's nature is only paralleled by his ability to simply and coherently personify our struggles with the 'devil within'.
In this address he shows how that inner demon strives to become attached to what I have called for a time 'the Cliques from Hell'.
And when these cliques gain real power...
and what a cold dish it is.
Aw ... it's not for you to eat, fod.
You've woods that produce syrup adorned with hearts for your beloved and have real friendships. You and I are the hedgerow folk who, being human, understand perfectly the demons but, knowing what's really important, would rather be alone than part of some Skull & Bones Inner Circle.
Note: Do not attempt to write on both sides of the paper at the same time.
How about I just adorn the walls with pictures of the protagonists, antagonists, heroes and damned that all are a part of our human family and each of whom has a wisdom to impart and played a role we may (or may not) wish to emulate?
(I know I said I liked readers' theatre but art -- save when it's just self-stimulation schlock "art for art's sake" -- can indeed move the soul, spark a conscience and focus the mind.)
"If you take your stand on the 'prevalent' view, how long do you suppose it will prevail? . . . All you can really say about my taste is that it is old-fashioned; yours will soon be the same."
Wonderful! Thanks Beckett!
His tastes weren't old-fashioned ... they were timeless, of course!
To think otherwise is to commit yet another Vulgar Error.
I'll be back to talk with you two. Goetz actually picked up on a theme I wanted to tackle with you yesterday, logos, but didn't have the time to think through.
Peraps one of the reasons that the need for peer-recognition is so strong, is that it is taught. The very fact that we isolate children into stratified groups during their schooling, may be a singular contruibutor to this phenomena. It would be instructive to note whether home-schooled children suffer the 'need to belong' to the same degree as the mass produced flavor.
I have long advocated the need for deconstructing schooling as we know it. It is my opinion that we need to integrate the education of children into "real life" to the degree possible. In the days during which work was dangerous or physically demanding, this was not a good idea. Now, however, we have options we have not explored. This is one area where home-schooling, combined with flexible employers, might make real contributions. I work at home and home-school my kids (6 & 8). I spend probably 1-2 hours per day in direct instruction, roughly equivalent to the time I spent commuting and reviewing homework when they were going to school. I had thought that complications would arise when I needed to go to a meeting. On the contrary, the company is overjoyed to have the kids studying in the public area, as an example of their progressive thinking, and for the sheer pleasure to their employees of having wonderful kids in the workplace. I get nothing but complements and they ask me to bring them back any time.
In sum, though my case may be somewhat unusual, it suggests that it's not so hard, in principle, to integrate children into productive life, as long as they are capable of self-control. This speaks to the importance of families to corporations, in contrast the the School-to-Work, fascist garbage they are feeding through their marxist thugs in government. Fewer divorces and child-behavior problems might make for more productive employees.
You and I are the hedgerow folk who, being human, understand perfectly the demons but, knowing what's really important, would rather be alone than part of some Skull & Bones Inner Circle.
By the construction of this observation, I would suggest that you are weaving a virtual circle of your own and suggesting qualifying criteria.
Nah ... I'm a fringer at best. I like to give parties but hate going to them.
Bump for Jack. Sweet man.
How "progressive" are your bosses! =) I love it!
I think "peer groups" (particularl the mini-soviets in which adults are lumped for "sensitivity training" and the like in the corporate world) are sometimes very dangerous things. It's mind control and a continued hammering away at objective truth in the hopes it will succumb to the consensus of subjective personal feelings.
You're a "hedgerow" type too, you know. I meant something very specific by that:
THE CONDEMNED
There is a wildness still in England that will not feed
In cages; it shrinks away from the touch of the trainer's hand,
Easy to kill, not easy to tame. It will never breed
In a zoo for the public pleasure. It will not be planned.Do not blame us too much if we that are hedgerow folk
Cannot swell the rejoicings at this new world you make -
We, hedge-hogged as Johnson or Borrow, strange to the yoke
As Landor, surly as Cobbett (that badger), birdlike as Blake.A new scent troubles the air -- to you, friendly perhaps
But we with animal wisdom have understood that smell.
To all our kind its message is Guns, Ferrets, and Traps,
And a Ministry gassing the little holes in which we dwell.C.S. Lewis
(you can find Lewis's "open mic poetry jam" if you click the "Vulgar Error" link above in my reply to Beckett =)
One of the appealing things about this forum is that there are no qualifying criteria by which to be heard (except for Eschoir and A+Bert;-)). One doesn't need to be polite about interrupting, worry about appearances of dress or body-language, it's easy to listen in, and there are no subliminal physical inferences of odors or pheromones.
Still, there ARE functioning circles at FR of familiarity, mutual agreement, common interest, common usage of language or standards of prose, or mere tacit exclusion by topic. It might be fun to map, but you would always miss the lurkers.
Feex fawnt. They're not my bosses, it's even better.
They are customers!
bump
Penance for your Patton post?
Great post, Askel. Thx!
Try this. Though there are aspects with which I now disagree, I think you'll like much of it.
For We
Think you, we are products of reason?
Children, fastest of learners, worst of memories,
But by that projection are children so molded.
So they learn our ultimate authority;
So strive, climb, learn to lead.
So to share with need forsaken, but never sated.
A faith in justice, none in fairness,
Though too long, though too short,
From trusting my self to trust an Other.
A new child born, But not forgotten,
Came I thus by love more than by reason,
With aught but reason could you that stand defend?
With what passion be it delivered?
Let us, with ration, it be considered.
never forgetting.
Honesty without speech, enchantment without guile.
A grin, wealth beyond design, a gift beyond price,
A sound, a touch, cause celebration.
Learning ne'er a word understood
Reflections clear beyond recognition
Our own past to deny.
A joy or pain unsullied by reason,
By reason harder to bear.
In mortal desire for a love we could not see to return,
Lest a price be exacted,
Think we not otherwise deserving of incautious affection?
A wish we might later wish to deny.
Later, yet too early,
Life seems long when you're never there
Always trying to be,
And being, an object of wistful envy,
An image of a glossy relic of another life, another time.
The only risk worth taking,
To follow the path untrodden.
The peril, those who would not remember theirs,
Nor wish for you to remind them.
They know though they do not recall
The whispers of an "easier" way,
A life unlived and unshared.
The quest to one self,
Ne'er to let need set the choice that one's self is meant to be.
The reward, the knowledge of the sower.
The crop will bear, with luck,
Though perhaps never to see the harvest.
Though the twists of life deal foul,
The eyes of opportunity glow to stare the bluff of fate at the call,
And laugh!
Though alone a cross to bear
Not without aid, comfort, friendship, or joy.
Not to tire but to rest,
Not to reap but to tend,
To teach, to remember, and to forget.
The child forgotten, but oft resembled,
Best of memories, worst of learners,
But, if lucky, together.
That it is of God or Man is not the Unity of Both,
The original sin, forgetting that we did not already know,
In His image we did, or so We Imagined,
Immortality we shall have, but not of ourselves.
To die, the only thing I do alone.
By faith more than by design.
This is for you, less the me I wish to be.
(If mine were a fools wish, then why not I marry me!)
This is law. An "is" not a "should be".
An image of truth not forgotten,
By truth, not required.
A known, not understood.
A We, not of me.
I'll be back to talk with you two.
Uh, oh...
'Tis dueling poets, is it? Very well, then, an offering from a bitter (or prescient) Presbyterian, one James A. Gittings, from Company of Pilgrims and other Poems
For good reason, Brother Jesus,
I choose to keep my eye
Upon your face, which is
Second from left in the lineup,
The one with new wounds visible
At hairline. Whenever we think
Overmuch about your Kingship, Brother J,
Some damned fool seems bound by fate
To crown himself a king, aping you;
And when, in gentler imaging
We chance to style you Shepherd, then
An idiot from somewhere runs with club and dog
To appoint us sheep.
From lifting up of many rocks, Lord,
In Shechem, Rome, New York,
I have learned - O, well I've learned! -
All steeples late or soon become
High places, filthy haunts of Baal,
All altars soon are bright with blood,
And all shepherds, butchers be,
Except You. That is why, Elder Brother,
I keep my eye on your face, which is
Second from left in the lineup,
The one with new wounds visible
At hairline.
Seemed to fit within the general theme.
All altars soon are bright with blood, And all shepherds, butchers be, Except You.
I was reading some Muggeridge last night (a most prescient essay from 1980 I shall repost today if possible) in which he notes that while Christ did bring Lazarus back from the dead, made the blind see and the lame walk ... NOT ONCE was "mercy killing" or selective slaughter of the unfit a part of his justice and compassion.