Truth is the daughter of time, not of authority.
— Francis Bacon
STILLNESS
WHAT THIS MEANS
What is true gets established by holding up over years, not by who says it loudly now. Authority can compel agreement in the present, but it cannot make a claim survive testing, and time is indifferent to titles. That is a slow comfort when the confident and well placed are wrong and the room is nodding along.
When you are unsure about a claim, notice whether your confidence rests on evidence or on the standing of whoever made it. Where you can afford to, give the question time and watch what is still standing in a year rather than settling it by who outranks whom.
A QUESTION TO SIT WITH
When did you accept something purely because of who said it?
MORE IN TIME, MORTALITY & LEGACY
- That writer does the most who gives his reader the most knowledge and takes from him the least time.
- Leisure is the time for doing something useful. This leisure the diligent person will obtain the lazy one never.
- In every battle there comes a time when both sides consider themselves beaten, then he who continues the attack wins.
Free, with nothing to buy inside it.