journal features

if there must be trouble

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Toronto, 2012.04.22

Thomas Paine said, "If there must be trouble let it be in my day, that my child may have peace."

I get the feeling I know what he meant. I wonder if this is how things felt in Europe in the 30's.

How I long for the anesthetic feeling of the early part of the exponential curve.

rand()m quote

The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love, and in order to occupy and distract himself without love he gives way to passions and coarse pleasures, and sinks to bestiality in his vices, all from continual lying to other men and to himself.

—Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov