Yes, amnesia is fatal.
Historians know this truth.
Indeed, that’s why historians exist, to preserve the truth of what has worked in the past, what has not, and what befalls fools who refuse to know what they forgot.
We are forgetting truth in America. You know this to be true. You see it every day in the deplorable behavior of those who claim the right to lead us.
We are forgetting the sacred trust passed down to us by others, a trust that still is our responsibility today.
We are denying the wisdom of our past and risking the safety of our future.
To what consequence?
When an individual suffers from amnesia there is no past. It is erased. There may be familiarity with everyday objects, how to tell time, that sort of thing. But people are forgotten. Past events are zeroed out. Only the moment exists.
There may be a fleeting empty wonder of what might have been and fear of things to come, however amnesiacs have only the present. They cannot know who they are, because they cannot remember who they were. If the amnesia is not cured, they die not knowing.
Not knowing. An interesting thought. There’s even a word for it.
Nescience.
Nescience is not knowing what one does not know. Sounds odd doesn’t it? Yet all of us are nescient to some degree. There is much we do not know and do not know we do not know, because it isn’t part of what we do know. Nescience is the root of Oriental wisdom, recognizing the nescience we all share, living at peace with not knowing while striving to know more. The springboard to enlightenment. To admit we do not know what we don’t yet know opens the door to new beginnings.
Admitting ignorance opens this door for us mortals as well as for nations!
Are we today seeking more wisdom or proudly thinking we have it already?
We in America are free today because we were set free from European tyranny and are kept free from domestic tyranny only by the use of both pen and sword.
The sword alone can never keep us free!
Will our nation forget as it increasingly uses the sword instead of the pen?
To what consequence?
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