Shut your trap, you hopeless Hottentot!

The first event that gave
rise to one of the two data
I mentioned, which became
the "vivifying sources"
for nourishing and
perfecting my deceased
grandmother's injunction,
occurred just at the age
when I changed from a
chubby mite into what
is called a "young
rascal," and had
already begun, as
is sometimes said,
to be a "candidate
for a young man of
pleasing appearance
and dubious content."

And this event occurred
under the following
circumstances, which
were perhaps even
specially combined
by Fate.

One day, with a number
of young rascals like
myself, I was setting
snares for pigeons on
the roof of a neighbor's
house, when suddenly
one of the boys who
was standing over me
and watching me closely
said:

"I think the horsehair
noose ought to be set so
that the pigeon's big toe
never gets caught in it
because, as our zoology
teacher recently explained
to us, it is just in that
toe that the pigeon's
reserve strength is
concentrated, and of
course if this big toe
gets caught in the noose,
the pigeon might easily
break it."

Another boy, leaning over
just opposite me—from whose
mouth, by the way, whenever
he spoke saliva always splashed
abundantly in all directions—-
snapped at this remark of the
first boy and delivered himself,
with a copious shower of saliva,
of the following words:

"Shut your trap, you hopeless
mongrel offshoot of the Hottentots!
What an abortion you are, just like
your 'teacher.' Even if it's true
that the pigeon's greatest physical
force is concentrated in its big
toe, then all the more reason for
seeing that just that toe gets
caught in the noose. Only then
can there be any importance for
our aim—-that is, catching these
unfortunate pigeon creatures—in
a certain particularity proper
to all possessors of that soft
and slippery 'something,' the
brain, which consists in this,
that when, thanks to the action
of other influences, on which
its insignificant power of
manifestation depends, there
arises what is called a 'change
of presence,' periodically
necessary according to law,
the slight confusion that
should proceed for the
intensification of other
manifestations of the
general functioning
immediately enables the
center of gravity of the
whole organism, in which
this slippery 'something'
plays a very small part,
to shift temporarily from
its usual place to another
place, and this often leads
to unexpected results in the
general functioning, ridiculous
to the point of absurdity."

He discharged the last words
with such a shower of saliva
that it was as if my face had
been exposed to one of those
"atomizers"—not of ersatz
production—invented by the
Germans to spray material
with aniline dyes.

This was more than I could
endure, and without changing
my squatting position, I flung
myself at him head first,
hitting him full force in
the pit of the stomach,
which instantly laid him
out flat and made him, as
is said, "lose consciousness."
--Gurdjieff
--ch 1, arousing of thought
--Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson

I am only a "self-willed"
guide of an internet process.
You, the reader, can follow it,
accept it or reject it, and any
reaction of yours, no matter
what it is, is for having no
real and conscious aim of
your own but for all of
the usual ordinary worldly
life of itself aims and
interests which go on
automatically by
themselves in the
same way that all
our mental associations
go on continuously and
automatically.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Gurdjieff
• Ouspensky
• Jung
• psychology