"When we are the victims of an illusion we do not feel it to be an illusion but a reality. It is the same perhaps with evil. Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil but as a necessity, or even a duty. As soon as we do evil, the evil appears as a sort of duty.
Once a certain class of people has been placed by the temporal and spiritual authorities outside the ranks of those whose life has value, then nothing comes more naturally to men than murder. As soon as men know they that they can kill without fear of punishment or blame, they kill; or at least they encourage killers with approving smiles."
Simone Weil,
La Pesanteur et la Grâce, 1947
"The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:
'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
and the learning of the learned I will set aside.'
Where is the wise one? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made the wisdom of the world foolish? For since in the wisdom of God the world did not come to know God through wisdom, it was the will of God through the foolishness of the proclamation to save those who have faith."
1 Corinthians 1:18-23
"The foolish ask nothing better than not to have to understand anything, and they even used to get together and try not to understand, because the last thing of which a person is capable is to be malicious and foolish all by themselves. Without understanding, they form spontaneously into herds, not according to any particular affinities but in obedience to the petty ideology, which swallowed up the whole of their small lives, allotted them by birth or chance. They would far rather kill than have to think."
George Bernanos, Under the Sun of Satan, 1926
“For these are a rebellious people, deceitful children, unwilling to listen to the commandments of the Lord. They say to their seers,‘Do not see!’, and to the prophets,‘Say nothing of what is right. Tell us only the things that please us — prophesy illusions.'"
Isaiah 30:8-10
"There is something on earth greater than arbitrary or despotic power. There is something among men capable of shaking despotic thrones, and that is the excited and aroused indignation of the whole civilized world."
Daniel Webster, Festival of the Sons of New Hampshire, Boston, November 7, 1849
Stocks were pushed higher in the last hours of trading, probably with a view to squeezing out the stops of those who had taken 'insurance' positions ahead of the three day weekend.
US markets will be closed on Monday in observance of Labor Day.
Gold and silver were hit fairly hard.
VIX fell.
The acolytes of power continue dressing up the markets to provide additional glitz to the party of the people, ahead of the November elections.
How can these liars and murderers and their delusional enablers escape judgement?
"A true opium of the people is the belief in nothingness after death, the huge solace, the huge comfort of thinking that for our betrayals, our greed, our cowardice, our murders, we are not going to be judged.”
Czeslaw Milosz, Discreet Charm of Nihilism, November 19, 1998
Sowing the wind, to reap the whirlwind.
Have a pleasant holiday weekend.