We are here and it is now. Further than that, all human knowledge is moonshine.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of the present moment while questioning the validity of knowledge beyond it.
H. L. Mencken's quote suggests that the only certainty we have is our existence in the present moment, as everything beyond that is uncertain and potentially misleading. It critiques the value we place on accumulated knowledge and posits that true understanding can only be found in the here and now, highlighting a philosophical inquiry into the nature of existence and perception.
In practice
In a meditation workshop, a facilitator might use this quote to encourage participants to focus on their breath and the present moment.
I know a good many men of great learning-that is, men born with an extraordinary eagerness and capacity to acquire knowledge. One and all, they tell me that they can't recall learning anything of any value in school. All that schoolmasters managed to accomplish with them was to test and determine the amount of knowledge that they had already acquired independently-and not infrequently the determination was made clumsily and inaccurately.
It takes a long while for a naturally trustful person to reconcile himself to the idea that after all God will not help him
It is the theory of all modern civilized governments that they protect and foster the liberty of the citizen; it is the practice of all of them to limit its exercise, and sometimes very narrowly.
The central belief of every moron is that he is the victim of a mysterious conspiracy against his common rights and true deserts.
The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy.
It is my conviction that no normal man ever fell in love, within the ordinary meaning of the term, after the age of thirty.
Sadly I write in my quiet room, alone as I have always been, alone as I will always be. And I wonder if my apparently negligible voice might not embody the essence of thousands of voices, the longing for self expression of thousands of lives, the patience of millions of souls resigned like my own to their daily lot, their useless dreams, and their hopeless hopes.
See that you buy the field where the Pearl is; sell all, and make a purchase of salvation. Think it not easy: for it is a steep ascent to eternal glory: many are lying dead by the way, slain with security.
The essential idea of Stoicism in my interpretation is, you don't control the world around you, you control how you respond. At 19, that's very empowering.
Older men start wars, but younger men fight them.
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
...religion is a tool to bind people together, to strengthen their unity, but like every tool, it can be mismanaged, even used in opposition to the way it should.
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