Prudence 11/18/2019
Hitler. Talking over a few beers to his friends. They listened. It wasn’t too long afterward that he was raving his beliefs in front of a whole nation. They weren’t listening to anybody else, but they were listening to him. They burned the books that disagreed with his ideology. They killed the people that spoke against him. They exterminated those that were perceived as being different. One man. One thought. One nation plunging the whole world into war.
Beware of the person of one book. –Thomas Aquinas
If you were only to read one book, what would it be? Okay, that is not a fair question for where I want to go with this. Why would anyone only read one book? And don’t say the Bible, which is really a collection from multiple authors. Actually a better question would be: Why would you only get insight from one author, or from one influencer, whether it be from a book or [heaven help me] a celebrity, like one of those social media types?
If your pursuit is to find more wisdom in your life, you are not going to get it from only one source. You need to find it from books, mentors, and any other place wisdom can be found. Multiple sources. You are going to have to take it in, try it out, qualify it, and if it’s any good, then apply it to your life.
The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of the past centuries. –René Descartes
Now, Descartes put it well when he said this. A good book can stand the test of time. They are written by incredible thinkers driven by the pursuit of wisdom. Unlike today, it wasn’t easy publish books back then .And to keep them in circulation long enough to survive to our lifetimes, they had to be really good. Some of the books today will be gone and forgotten before the end of the decade. And the bad thing about some of the books today is…
The worst thing about new books is that they keep us from reading the old ones. –Joseph Joubert
The old books aren’t popular. They aren’t as easy to read and some of them are really long-winded. But they are worth it. Reading from them will give the reader a different perspective of how life should be lived. It will give the reader a greater appreciation for the things that matter. The old books will change your way of thinking. To really stand out in today’s world, consider consuming more than what is just popular now. Go find one of those old books that has withstood the test of time and give it try. You may find your way of thinking to become different than what everyone else is thinking.
If you only read the books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is thinking. –Haruki Murakami
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