Subj : Back again
To   : RICHARD M. MEIC
From : Frank Masingill
Date : Fri Jul 13 2001 10:44 pm

 > The thoughts that occure to those like myself are original to _us_.  It
 > matters not that the thought has been brought forth by another or even a
 > number of others.  What matters is that no refference to any dead people
 > was needed, no flipping frantically through page after page of book after
 > book to find that half remembered quote from (insert dead philosopher
 > here).  There is a point at which a philosopher, like myself, can look
 > back at the path traveled (and yes, even travailed) and find that it
 > deviates little from the paths of those who first thought the thoughts
 > that I now think.  I fear for you, the trained ones.  Are you truly doomed
 > to regurgitate what you have been exposed to during your formal training?
 > The philosophy you practice is not your own, for that I have nothing but
 > sorrow.  Do you remember how it feels to have an idea pop into existence
 > and frolick in your mind for a while?  Perhaps you are a lucky one and you
 > still experience those moments of complete clarity, moments where the
 > universe seems to speak to you not in riddles, but as an equal.  I do more
 > often than you realize, and I admit that I may be insane... but I don't
 > need the library philosophy section to achieve those moments.  I too am a
 > child of the universe... I use the same playground... and the games I play
 > are just as fun.  My words are just as important and MUST not be ignored
 > or distorted.

    None of this has any relevance to me, Richard.  On the two occasions when I 
experienced high points in the tension between time and timelessness I came 
away with nothing to impart to the world in literary exposition and certainly 
whatever mystic experience I might have at least bordered on did NOT come from 
reading any "library philosophy section."  In fact, I have no training 
whatsoever in "Philosophy."  You must be thinking of somebody else.

    I HAVE written some aphorisms over the years which I called _Thought 
Mosaic_ and published from time to time in cyberspace without any charge.  
These have now grown to something like 650 or so over a period of forty or so 
years but I oblige nobody to read them or even care about them.   Yes, Eric 
Voegelin was the first professor I encountered in my formal educational 
experience who dealt seriously with questions that were meaningful to me and I 
have no shame in acknowledging that.  I often refer to him as my "third 
father."  My own father and an uncle who introduced me to the workaday world 
were revered as the first two.  I needed somebody who had insights into what 
happened in modern society that took four years of my younger life and caused 
the deaths of so many millions in areas infected by the Hitlers Mussolinis and 
Stalins.   If that is considered silly of me, well, so be it.  I'm 80 years of 
age now and still searching for the truth of existence to the extent it might 
be found.

    I only regret that I was poorly trained and educated to come in contact 
with such thought as that of Voegelin but one does the best one can.  BTW, I am 
only now reading Glen Jeansonne's biography of _Gerald L.K. Smith, Minster of 
Hate_.  It was Smith who represented my very first encounter with Fascism at 
the age of fourteen.   I had always been mildly interested in what happened to 
him after the assassination of Huey Long which occurred on my birthday in 1935. 
  I was a country boy who was not destined to receive ANY college training and 
might not have except for the upheaval of "WWII."

Frank


Frank

---
 * Origin: Frank's House (1:396/45.12)

.