By Maria Popova
“Generalized intelligence and mental alertness are the most powerful enemies of dictatorship and at the same time the basic conditions of effective democracy.”
Brainpickings - March 24, 2014
In 1958, five years after his transcendent experience induced by taking four-tenths of a gram of mescalin, Aldous Huxley — 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 Post and eventually included in Moksha: Aldous Huxley’s Classic Writings on Psychedelics and the Visionary Experience (public library)
— a selection of Huxley’s fiction, essays, and letters titled after the
Sanskrit word for “liberation.” In the essay, Huxley considers the
gifts and limitations of our wakeful consciousness, our universal quest
for transcendence, and the interplay of drugs and democracy.
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