09 november 2025 . 'if you are, then you err.' and vice versa. a saying taught to me by my english teacher in my frist year of college. a saying of such obvious nature that it became to me more valuable than many of the other, vague, scholarly proverbs and philosophies that i collected from my variety of professors, tutors, mentors and even my own meditations. the saying played in the voice of my beloved mrs. woodworth as i attempted to excuse the impertinance of my fellow pupils at supper, who, their intelligence limited to arrangling studios yet completely unecessary verbal judgements, made amusement for themselves by complaining over the dissatisfaction they felt on the matter of our supper's flavour. there was a time - had to have been a time - when a man fussed not over the taste of his bread, or his cooked meat, or whatever it was he had before him. there was a time a man had the humility to be grateful for what sustenance he had, even if said sustenance was brought to his table by his own struggle and his most concentrated efforts. i am not quite sure where man lost this humility, this simplicity - likely somewhere bewteen the discovery of salt and the retail of spices - but i do long for its return to this day. i do appreciate flavour, of course; if, upon biting into a cut of surloin or a bit of bread, i was met with a dull, bland taste the likes of which could be rightly compared to paper or some similar, saddening thing, a part of me would quite certainly shudder with disappointment. but i have developed the belief that if food became once again not an expected right but a reward, gained by a man's relentless efforts and seeking, man would begin to return to his simple ways, grateful for what he has and only very slightly concerned for the flavour of it. of course, such things i could not say aloud - not at supper, and certainly not among this crowd of insolent fools. these men were a group with very little learned appreciation, only that with whcih they were born, which, according to the general nature of humanity to possess very few righteous and humble qualities or virtues unless they are learned, was very little indeed. the fact alone that they had the audacity to moan over the flavour of our food as they sat in oak chairs sealed and cleaned daily, at a table set with all sorts of dishes, in a dining hall made a portait of majesty with murals reaching the ceiling and chandeliers casting a warm and elegang glow upon the room, in a school none of us had been required to pay as much as sixpence to attend, made me shrivel inside with the shame of such company. now, my criticism of these men should not be taken for disrespect or hatred of even the slightest kind. the mere fact that they were invited to walk in the ornate halls and study in these grand rooms under the instruction of such wise, learned scholars indicated that they could not be but very intelligent men. each was in his own right on the path to being an expert in his field. what i meant to say is that they were /only/ intelligent, only the kind of people who collect knowledge, and neglected to learn wisdom and true, deep, transformitive philosophy. they did learn the patterns and motives of philosophy and the both broad and narrow applications of it, but not a word of it did they remove from their academic lives and put into action in their personal, spiritual, and social lives. i thought of this and wrestled in a rather predictable match against my pride and biased judgement - the kind a man fights to feel as if he had a chance though he knows he will lose - as my friend and the young man with which i shared my dorm room, theodore macfayden, changed the course of the conversation from the agreed dissatisfaction with the food to the newly-introduced - but soon to be similarly agreed - dissatisfaction with the weather. it was at this point that i, george ambrose rawley, declared them out loud all ungrateful snobs (in a more elegantly arranged manner, of this you can be sure), rose, and left the room.
