“Only The Strong...”

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“A Defense Against the Rising Evil”
by Jesse, Le Cafe Americain

“It seems that under the overwhelming impact of rising power, humans are deprived of their inner independence and, more or less consciously, give up establishing an autonomous position toward the emerging circumstances. The fact that the stupid person is often stubborn must not blind us to the fact that he is not independent. In conversation with him, one virtually feels that one is dealing not at all with him as a person, but with slogans, catchwords, and the like that have taken possession of him. He is under a spell, blinded, misused, and abused in his very being. Having thus become a mindless tool, the stupid person will also be capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of seeing that it is evil. This is where the danger of diabolical misuse lurks, for it is this that can once and for all destroy human beings…”

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

“Hence, they become both self-satisfied and self-sufficient; they think they know just what they ought to do, and that they do it all; and in consequence they are very well content with themselves, and rate their merit very high, and have no fear at all of any future scrutiny into their conduct, which may befall them.”

- John Henry Newman

“Love does not make you weak, because it is the source of all strength- but it makes you see the nothingness of the illusory strength on which you depended before you knew it… The only real tragedy, In the end, is not to be a saint.”

- Léon Bloy

“A saint – a saint that is always failing, but always rising. The touchstone of all goodness is love. Love is not a weakness or a softness of the heart. Love is only for the strong, because only the strong can overcome the fear and smallness that keeps them from loving.

Evil is the weakness of hate and fear, the darker side of the human condition. Unselfish love is not natural to us, unless we exercise a will to choose it, and take the abiding comfort and strength with it from something greater than ourselves.

Where you see something that confuses you, whether it is good or ill, ask yourself, ‘whom does it serve?’ and ‘where is the love?’ Love is the one thing that the hypocrisy of evil cannot reliably imitate, but at most wear briefly as a mask. People can rationalize their way to a hell on earth with the same practical, step by step reasoning with which they buy a pair of shoes or a new overcoat. And once their fingers are firmly entwined with those of evil, then the madness fully falls upon them, and they are done.

We are substantially no different, no better, and certainly no more exceptional than others now and those who have come before us. To imagine ourselves to be so superior, so exceptional, so above all the temptations of power is a part, not of any virtue, but of the excessive pride which led to the fall of the first and most favored among the angels.

If you do not wish to hear this, if it makes you uncomfortable, then good. That discomfort is the first step, the first recognition and the beginning of your own path to personal reform and the fullness, and dare I say salvation, of your own humanity.”