70: Principle

It’s for your own good that for whatever reasons I come up with you do as I say. In another sense, you can’t avoid it; for I will direct the next thing you do. You may think that you know yourself, but deeper motives govern this world. If in very defiance of my directions you think to do something irrational, don’t worry; the principles of human behavior already account for irrational defiance. You may think that you are separate, but you depend on everything— your parents, the color of things around you, the firmness of the ground you walk on, women picking tea leaves in Sri Lanka, and on everything I say. Of course I won’t reveal the real reasons that you will do as I say. You won’t even know when my psychology is forward or reverse. You have your desires but I have mine and these you do not understand. Eventually, my control will seem less strident, but my grip is not less firm when I seem to disappear, for you will have taken me into your soul. Who cares at that point if I ever existed outside of your imagination?

Clothespin spring