August 22

It is harmful to spread the idea among people that our lives are a product of material forces and that they are determined by these forces. But when these false notions are called science and are presented to humankind as sacred wisdom, the harm caused by such teachings is terrible.

1

No one is more confused about the meaning of life and about good and evil than the scientists of our time. This is why the science of our time, which is achieving great successes in the sphere of researching the conditions of the material world, turns out not only to be completely useless in the sphere of human life, but even especially harmful.

2

The main error, which impedes the true progress of our Christian humankind more than everything else, consists in the fact that the scientists of our time, who have now taken the seat of Moses, guided by the pagan worldview restored at the time of the Renaissance, have decided that Christianity is a state that people have already outlived, and that, on the contrary, the pagan, civil, ancient understanding of life which they subscribe to, which had actually been outlived, is the highest understanding of life, one which humanity now has to unwaveringly follow.

3

False science and false religion express their dogmas in grandiloquent language, which seems to the uninitiated to be something mysterious, important and attractive. The reasonings of scientists are often just as incomprehensible as the speeches of professional teachers of a faith, and not only to others, but to themselves as well. A learned pedant, using Latin terms and pretentious words, often turns the simplest thing into something as incomprehensible as Latin Paternoster prayers are to illiterate parishioners. Mystery is not a sign of wisdom. The wiser a human being, the simpler the language with which he expresses his thoughts.

— Lucy Mallory

4

Rapid acquisition of knowledge, obtained at the cost of very insignificant personal effort, is never fruitful.

Likewise, erudition can go wholly into leaves, without bearing fruit.

One often comes across very superficial heads that know a surprising amount. But that which a person reaches independently leaves a trail in his mind which he can follow under other circumstances.

— Lichtenberg

5

How much better it would be to try to uproot the evil of our own epoch than to praise in the eyes of posterity the bad deeds of the past! How much better it would be to praise the acts of nature than the devastating raids of some Philip or Alexander and others who, having become famous thanks to the calamities of nations, were no less scourges to humankind than floods that devastated entire nations or fires that devoured multitudes of living beings!

— Seneca

6

Do not view erudition as a crown to be shown off, nor as an axe to be used for your subsistence.

— The Talmud

7

Knowledge will always be false if it is aimed at external gain. Only the knowledge that is motivated by internal needs is useful to you and your neighbors.

8

Science has now become a dispenser of diplomas for idleness.

The legitimate goal of science is the discovery of truths that serve the good of the people. Its false goal is the justification of deceptions that bring evil into human life—e.g. jurisprudence, political economy and especially theology.