Civilization is unbearable, but it is less unbearable at the top.
Followers do not like themselves, of course; that’s why they crawl. And masters have nothing but contempt for their subservants, which is why they impose such colorful embarrassments upon them.
The brain is the key, the brain is the source, the brain is God. Everything that humans do is neuroecology.
Whether you experience heaven or hell, remember that it is your mind which creates them.
Courage is the key to creativity and to any relinquishing of ego structure.
A country run by law is a country ruined by lawyers. It is neurologically impossible for a lawyer or a military man to think creatively or to act in harmony with nature.
The goals of an intelligent life, according to Socrates, is to pursue the philosophic quest – to increase one’s knowledge of self and world.
I predicted that if control of drugs were administered by law enforcement agencies, the result would be a black market more irrational and widespread than that of alcohol prohibition and the growth of enormous police-state repressive bureaucracy. And who, indeed, wanted that?
I’m looking forward to the most fascinating experience in life, which is dying.
People ask me how many times I’ve taken LSD – and I don’t count. But it’s the same thing when they ask me how many times I’ve made love. The answer is, not enough.
You can be anyone this time around.
I was ovulated, fertilized, and born in the 20th century. I can’t wipe out my whole personal background, or the fact that almost everyone I talk to today is brain-damaged by our education. I think American education makes us hopeless symbol addicts. It’s designed to produce docile automatons. But it’s going to take years before you can urge young people to drop out of school without appearing to be an eccentric or a mad-man.
The old cliche must be up-dated: crime does not pay for the three victims of every crime-the victim, the tax-payer and the crook. Crime does pay, however, and handsomely, for the attorneys who produce the National Crime-Sin Show.
Thou shalt not alter thy brother’s consciousness without his consent. – The Second Commandment of Leary.
One of the many curious aspects of American culture is the absence of an “upper” class, a “high” society, an hedonic aristocracy. America since Lincoln has been a heavy, feet-on-the-ground John Wayne society. The triumph of mediocrity and practicality.
Close your eyes and listen... and learn that it’s the oldest message of love and peace and laughter, and trust in God and don’t worry, trust in the future, and don’t fight; and trust in your kids, and don’t worry because it’s all beautiful and right.
We were thinking far-out history thoughts at Harvard... believing that it was a time for visions, knowing that America had run out of philosophy, that a new empirical, tangible meta-physics was needed.
Just as every Hollywood picture is “put together” by producers, who are always in tight control of the enterprise and reap the lion’s share of the profits, so is the Outlaw Industry managed by lawyers.
All of this educational work was enormously successful. Millions of Americans accepted the “head philosophy,” the belief that Ego and “Social Reality” are neural fictions.
The essence of “new” is, of course, the modern version of Roman coliseum shows and gladiator combats. American civilization, for certain explicit biblical reasons, apparently requires that its leaders, its political heroes be publicly sacrificed.
All deities and demons, all heavens and hells are internal.