Mar 25, · In , five years after his transcendent experience induced by taking four-tenths of a gram of mescalin, Aldous Huxley (July, 26 –November 22, ) — legendary author of Brave New World, lesser-known but no less compelling writer of children’s books, modern prophet — penned an essay titled “Drugs That Shape Men’s Minds.” It was originally published in the Saturday Evening Gilbert Grape. The titular protagonist of the film, Gilbert is a year-old grocery clerk. Following his father's suicide and his mother's spiral into depression, Gilbert supports his Gilbert Gresham: an autobiography. (Philadelphia: American Sunday-school Union, c), by American Sunday School Union (page images at HathiTrust) Jerningham: a story. (London, Chapman and Hall, ), by John William Kaye (page images at HathiTrust) The life and adventures of the famous Moll Flanders, who was born in Newgate
Aldous Huxley on Drugs, Democracy, and Religion – Brain Pickings
Every fully developed religion exists simultaneously on several different levels. It exists as a set of abstract concepts about the world and its governance, gilbert grape essay. It exists as a set of rites and sacraments, as a traditional method for manipulating the symbols, by means of which beliefs about the cosmic order are expressed.
It exists as the feelings of love, fear and devotion evoked by this manipulation of symbols. The ordinary waking consciousness is a very useful and, on most occasions, an indispensable state of mind; but it is by gilbert grape essay means the only form of consciousness, nor in all circumstances the best. Insofar as he transcends his ordinary self and his ordinary mode of awareness, the mystic is able to enlarge his vision, to look more deeply into the unfathomable miracle of existence.
The mystical experience is doubly valuable; it is valuable because it gives the experiencer a better understanding of himself and the world and because it may help him to lead a less self-centered and more creative life. We love ourselves to the point of idolatry; but we also intensely dislike ourselves — we find ourselves unutterably boring.
Correlated with this distaste for the idolatrously worshipped self, gilbert grape essay, there is in all of us a gilbert grape essay, sometimes latent, sometimes conscious and passionately expressed, to escape from the prison of our individuality, an urge to self-transcendence.
It is to this urge that we owe mystical theology, spiritual exercises and yoga — to this, too, that we owe alcoholism and drug addiction. Huxley then turns to how drugs have attempted to address this human urge and the interplay of those attempts with religion:. Modern pharmacology has given us a host of new synthetics, gilbert grape essay, but in the field of the naturally occurring mind changers it has made no radical discoveries.
All the botanical sedatives, stimulants, vision revealers, happiness promoters and cosmic-consciousness arousers were found out thousands of years ago, gilbert grape essay, before the dawn of history. In many societies at many levels of civilization attempts have been made to fuse drug intoxication with God-intoxication. In ancient Greece, for example, ethyl alcohol had its place in the established religion. Dionysus, or Bacchus, as he was often called, was a true divinity.
Unfortunately they also receive harm. The blissful experience of self -transcendence which alcohol makes possible has to be paid for, gilbert grape essay, and the price is exorbitantly high. In the present case, millions of patients who had no real need of the tranquilizers gilbert grape essay been given the pills by their doctors and have learned to resort to them in every predicament, however triflingly uncomfortable.
He then turns to how these psychopharmacological tendencies might be exploited in a political context:. The dictatorships of tomorrow will deprive men of their freedom, but will give them in exchange a happiness none the less real, as a subjective experience, for being chemically induced. Rather ironically given the context of subsequent geopolitical history of despots, from Putin to Yanukovych, Huxley considers the fruits of these experiments an assurance against despotism:, gilbert grape essay.
Let us all fervently wish the Russians every success in their current pharmacological venture. Generalized intelligence and mental alertness are the most powerful enemies of dictatorship and at the same time the basic conditions of effective democracy.
Even in the democratic West we could do with a bit of psychic energizing. Between them, gilbert grape essay, education and pharmacology may do something to offset the effects of that deterioration of our biological material to which geneticists have frequently called attention. Those who are offended by the idea that the swallowing of a pill gilbert grape essay contribute to a genuinely religious experience should remember that all the standard mortifications — fasting, voluntary sleeplessness and self-torture — inflicted upon themselves by the ascetics of every religion for the purpose of acquiring merit, are also, gilbert grape essay, like the mind-changing drugs, gilbert grape essay, powerful devices for altering the chemistry of the body in general and the nervous system in particular.
Or consider the procedures generally known as spiritual exercises. The breathing techniques taught by the gilbert grape essay of India result in prolonged suspensions of respiration. These in turn result in an increased concentration of carbon dioxide in the blood; and the psychological consequence of this is a change in the quality of consciousness.
Again, gilbert grape essay, meditations involving long, intense concentration upon a single idea or image may also result — for neurological reasons which I do not profess to understand — in a slowing down of respiration and even in prolonged suspensions of breathing.
Coincidentally, scientists have just begun to shed light on why meditators hallucinate — Huxley was, once more, ahead of his time. He concludes by reminding us of the deeper spiritual and psychoemotional roots of both drug-induced and religious experiences:. That men and women can, by physical and chemical means, transcend themselves in a genuinely spiritual way is something which, to the squeamish idealist, seems rather shocking, gilbert grape essay.
But, after all, the drug or the physical exercise is not the cause of the spiritual experience; it is only its occasion. For most gilbert grape essay, religion has always been a matter of traditional symbols and of their own emotional, intellectual and ethical response to those symbols. The perusal of a page from even the most beautifully written cookbook is no substitute for the eating of dinner. My own belief is that, though they may start by being something of an embarrassment, these new mind changers will tend in the long run to deepen the spiritual life of the communities in which they are available.
From being an activity mainly concerned with symbols, gilbert grape essay, religion will gilbert grape essay transformed into an activity concerned mainly gilbert grape essay experience and intuition — an everyday mysticism underlying and giving significance to everyday rationality, everyday tasks and duties, everyday human gilbert grape essay. Whether one considers Huxley a madman or a prophet-genius, Moksha is a fascinating read and an unusual, dimensional lens on the human longing for transcendence.
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Privacy policy. ABOUT CONTACT. Huxley then turns to how drugs have attempted to address this human urge and the interplay of those attempts with religion: Modern pharmacology has given us a host of new synthetics, but in the field of the naturally occurring mind changers it has made no radical discoveries. He then turns to how these psychopharmacological tendencies might be exploited in a political context: The dictatorships of tomorrow will deprive men of their freedom, but will give them in exchange a happiness none the less real, as a subjective experience, for being chemically induced.
Rather gilbert grape essay given the context of subsequent geopolitical history of despots, from Putin to Yanukovych, Huxley considers the fruits of these experiments an assurance against despotism: Let us all fervently wish the Russians every success in their current pharmacological venture. Huxley ties this back to religion and the parallel artificiality of the transcendent experience: Those who are offended by the idea that the swallowing of a pill may contribute to a genuinely religious experience should remember that all the standard mortifications — fasting, voluntary sleeplessness and self-torture — inflicted upon themselves by the ascetics of every religion for the purpose of acquiring merit, are also, like the mind-changing drugs, powerful devices for altering the chemistry of the body in general and the nervous system in particular.
He concludes by reminding us of the deeper spiritual and psychoemotional roots of both drug-induced and religious experiences: That men and women can, by physical and chemical means, transcend themselves in a genuinely spiritual way is something which, gilbert grape essay, to the squeamish idealist, seems rather shocking, gilbert grape essay. He once again peers into the future: For most people, religion has always been a matter of traditional symbols and of their own emotional, intellectual and ethical response to those symbols.
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Gilbert Gresham: an autobiography. (Philadelphia: American Sunday-school Union, c), by American Sunday School Union (page images at HathiTrust) Jerningham: a story. (London, Chapman and Hall, ), by John William Kaye (page images at HathiTrust) The life and adventures of the famous Moll Flanders, who was born in Newgate Gilbert Grape. The titular protagonist of the film, Gilbert is a year-old grocery clerk. Following his father's suicide and his mother's spiral into depression, Gilbert supports his Proofread and edit the final essay to make it look right. Literature Essay Structure. Writing the literary essay starts with the thesis. This is the point at which you reflect the general idea about the writing you’re going to produce. It’s the primary argument that gives the essay direction limiting it from being just a
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