Live_Not_By_Lies_by_Alexander_Solzhenitsyn
00:00:00.000 | Today is July 4 and in the United States of America, this day is celebrated as Independence
00:00:06.880 | Day, an anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence back in the late
00:00:13.400 | 1700s. This day is of course filled with various fireworks and barbecues, etc. as is our cultural
00:00:21.400 | custom. But today I want to simply share with you an essay that I hope you'll consider and
00:00:25.300 | perhaps you've never heard or perhaps if you have, I hope you'll be reminded of the value
00:00:29.200 | of using your independence to simply speak, and to speak truth. Truthfulness is for me
00:00:38.600 | a very high value and I hope it is for you as well. It may be easy to tell a lie and
00:00:47.100 | to seek to enrich yourself by telling a lie, but it's always a bad bargain. Rather, simply
00:00:53.040 | committing yourself to not tell lies is something that will allow you to live a life of integrity
00:01:00.800 | with yourself and with others. Now this may cost you, after all the closing words of that
00:01:06.740 | Declaration of Independence was among the signers, "We mutually pledge to each other
00:01:11.380 | our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor." But whatever else they did, those early signers
00:01:17.000 | of the Declaration of Independence did indeed put themselves on the line for what they believed.
00:01:23.960 | So consider this particular essay. I hope it's encouraging to you and I hope you find
00:01:28.880 | it thought-provoking as you consider how to stand and how to speak truth in our current
00:01:35.360 | age.
00:01:37.260 | Live Not by Lies by Alexander Solzhenitsyn Solzhenitsyn wrote this essay in 1974 and
00:01:43.600 | it circulated among Moscow's intellectuals at the time. It is dated February 12, which
00:01:48.920 | is the same day that secret police broke into his apartment and arrested him. The very next
00:01:54.000 | day he was exiled to West Germany.
00:01:58.300 | Live Not by Lies by Alexander Solzhenitsyn At one time we dared not even to whisper.
00:02:05.740 | Now we write and read some ease dot. And sometimes when we gather in the smoking room at the
00:02:11.200 | Science Institute we complain frankly to one another. What kind of tricks are they playing
00:02:16.160 | on us and where are they dragging us? Gratuitous boasting of cosmic achievements while there
00:02:21.680 | is poverty and destruction at home. Propping up remote uncivilized regimes. Fanning up
00:02:28.440 | civil war. And we recklessly foster Mao Tse-tung at our expense and it will be we who are sent
00:02:35.280 | to war against him and will have to go. Is there any way out? And they put on trial anybody
00:02:40.480 | they want and they put sane people in asylums. Always they. And we are powerless.
00:02:48.000 | Things have almost reached rock bottom. A universal spiritual death has already touched
00:02:54.200 | us all, and physical death will soon flare up and consume us both and our children. But
00:02:59.960 | as before we still smile in a cowardly way and mumble without tongues tied. But what
00:03:05.840 | can we do to stop it? We haven't the strength. We have been so hopelessly dehumanized that
00:03:12.320 | for today's modest ration of food we are willing to abandon all our principles, our
00:03:18.520 | souls, and all the efforts of our predecessors and all opportunities for our descendants,
00:03:24.360 | but just don't disturb our fragile existence. We lack staunchness, pride, and enthusiasm.
00:03:34.800 | We don't even fear universal nuclear death. And we don't fear a third world war. We have
00:03:40.400 | already taken refuge in the crevices. We just fear acts of civil courage. We fear only to
00:03:48.600 | lag behind the herd and to take a step alone and suddenly find ourselves without white
00:03:54.640 | bread, without heating gas, and without a Moscow registration. We have been indoctrinated
00:04:01.120 | in political courses and in just the same way was fostered the idea to live comfortably
00:04:06.880 | and all will be well for the rest of our lives. You can't escape your environment and social
00:04:13.200 | conditions. Everyday life defines consciousness. What does it have to do with us? We can't
00:04:19.200 | do anything about it. But we can. Everything. But we lie to ourselves for assurance. And
00:04:27.800 | it is not they who are to blame for everything. We ourselves. Only we. One can object, but
00:04:36.040 | actually you can think anything you like. Gags have been stuffed into our mouths. Nobody
00:04:41.520 | wants to listen to us and nobody asks us. How can we force them to listen? It is impossible
00:04:46.040 | to change their minds. It would be natural to vote them out of office, but there are
00:04:51.560 | not elections in our country. In the West, people know about strikes and protest demonstrations,
00:04:57.680 | but we are too oppressed and it is a horrible prospect for us. How can one suddenly renounce
00:05:03.880 | a job and take to the streets? Yet the other fatal paths probed during the past century
00:05:09.360 | by our bitter Russian history are nevertheless not for us, and truly we don't need them.
00:05:15.800 | Now that the axes have done their work, when everything which was sown has sprouted anew,
00:05:22.820 | we can see that the young and presumptuous people who thought they would make our country
00:05:28.280 | just and happy through terror, bloody rebellion, and civil war were themselves misled. No thanks,
00:05:38.000 | fathers of education. Now we know that infamous methods breed infamous results. Let our hands
00:05:44.880 | be clean. The circle, is it closed? And is there really no way out? And is there only
00:05:50.840 | one thing left for us to do, to wait without taking action? Maybe something will happen
00:05:55.340 | by itself. It will never happen as long as we daily acknowledge, extol, and strengthen,
00:06:01.940 | and do not sever ourselves from the most perceptible of its aspects, lies. When violence intrudes
00:06:09.940 | into peaceful life, its face glows with self-confidence, as if it were carrying a banner and shouting,
00:06:15.880 | "I am violence, run away, make way for me, I will crush you." But violence quickly
00:06:21.260 | grows old, and it has lost confidence in itself. And in order to maintain a respectable face,
00:06:27.120 | it summons falsehood as its ally. Since violence lays its ponderous paw, not every day and
00:06:34.680 | not on every shoulder, it demands from us only obedience to lies, and daily participation
00:06:41.760 | in lies. All loyalty lies in that. And the simplest and most accessible key to our self-neglected
00:06:50.540 | liberation lies right here, personal non-participation in lies. Though lies conceal everything, though
00:07:00.220 | lies embrace everything, but not with any help from me. This opens a breach in the imaginary
00:07:09.800 | encirclement caused by our inaction. It is the easiest thing to do for us, but the most
00:07:15.800 | devastating for the lies. Because when people renounce lies, it simply cuts short their
00:07:22.480 | existence. Like an infection, they can exist only in a living organism. We do not exhort
00:07:29.720 | ourselves. We have not sufficiently matured to march into the squares and shout the truth
00:07:34.680 | out loud or to express aloud what we think. It's not necessary. It's dangerous. But
00:07:41.640 | it let us refuse to say that which we do not think. This is our path, the easiest and most
00:07:49.160 | accessible one, which takes into account our inherent cowardice, already well-rooted. And
00:07:55.520 | it is much easier, it's dangerous even to say this, than the sort of civil disobedience
00:08:00.680 | which Gandhi advocated. Our path is to talk away from the gangrenous boundary. If we did
00:08:07.880 | not paste together the dead bones and scales of ideology, if we did not sew together the
00:08:13.460 | rotting rags, we would be astonished how quickly the lies would be rendered helpless and subside.
00:08:20.560 | That which should be naked would then really appear naked before the whole world. So in
00:08:26.720 | our timidity, let each of us make a choice. Whether consciously, to remain a servant of
00:08:33.840 | falsehood, of course it is not out of inclination, but to feed one's family that one raises his
00:08:39.260 | children in the spirit of lies, or to shrug off the lies and become an honest man, worthy
00:08:45.640 | of respect both by one's children and contemporaries. And from that day onward, he will not henceforth
00:08:53.080 | write, sign, or print in any way a single phrase which in his opinion distorts the truth.
00:08:58.960 | Will utter such a phrase neither in private conversation nor in the presence of many people,
00:09:03.920 | neither on his own behalf nor at the prompting of someone else, either in the role of agitator,
00:09:09.120 | teacher, educator, not in a theatrical role. Will not depict, foster, or broadcast a single
00:09:16.520 | idea which he can only see as false, or a distortion of the truth whether it be in painting,
00:09:23.720 | sculpture, photography, technical science, or music. Will not cite, out of context, either
00:09:31.120 | orally or written, a single quotation so as to please someone, to feather his own nest,
00:09:37.040 | to achieve success in his work if he does not share completely the idea which is quoted
00:09:41.520 | or if it does not accurately reflect the matter at issue. Will not allow himself to be compelled
00:09:47.660 | to attend demonstrations or meetings if they are contrary to his desire or will. Will neither
00:09:52.680 | take into hand nor raise into the air a poster or slogan which he does not completely accept.
00:09:59.160 | Will not raise his hand to vote for a proposal with which he does not sincerely sympathize.
00:10:03.920 | Will vote neither openly nor secretly for a person whom he considers unworthy or of
00:10:10.280 | doubtful abilities. Will not allow himself to be dragged to a meeting where there can
00:10:15.380 | be expected a forced or distorted discussion of a question. Will immediately talk out of
00:10:20.760 | a meeting, session, lecture, performance, or film showing if he hears a speaker tell
00:10:25.560 | lies or purvey ideological nonsense or shameless propaganda. Will not subscribe to or buy a
00:10:33.160 | newspaper or magazine in which information is distorted and primary facts are concealed.
00:10:38.840 | Of course we have not listed all of the possible and necessary deviations from falsehood, but
00:10:43.480 | a person who purifies himself will easily distinguish from other instances with his
00:10:48.120 | purified outlook. No, it will not be the same for everybody at first. Some at first will
00:10:54.520 | lose their jobs. For young people who want to live with truth, this will in the beginning
00:10:59.480 | complicate their young lives very much because the required recitations are stuffed with
00:11:04.240 | lies and it is necessary to make a choice. But there are no loopholes for anybody who
00:11:09.520 | wants to be honest. On any given day, any one of us will be confronted with at least
00:11:13.800 | one of the above-mentioned choices, even in the most secure of the technical sciences,
00:11:19.280 | either truth or falsehood, toward spiritual independence or toward spiritual servitude.
00:11:26.280 | And he who is not sufficiently courageous even to defend his soul, don't let him be
00:11:30.720 | proud of his progressive views. Don't let him boast that he is an academician or a people's
00:11:38.080 | artist, a merited figure or a general. Let him say to himself, "I am in the herd and
00:11:44.120 | a coward. It's all the same to me as long as I'm fed and warm." Even this path, which
00:11:50.880 | is the most modest of all paths of resistance, will not be easy for us. But it is much easier
00:11:57.480 | than self-immolation or a hunger strike. The flames will not envelop your body. Your eyeballs
00:12:03.480 | will not burst from the heat and brown bread and clean water will always be available to
00:12:07.480 | your family. A great people of Europe, the Czechoslovaks, whom we betrayed and deceived,
00:12:13.600 | haven't they shown us how a vulnerable breast can stand up even against tanks if there is
00:12:18.480 | a worthy heart within it? You say it will not be easy, but it will be easiest of all
00:12:24.720 | possible resources. It will not be an easy choice for a body, but it is the only one
00:12:30.080 | for a soul. No, it is not an easy path, but there are already people, even dozens of them,
00:12:36.960 | who over the years have maintained all these points and live by the truth. So you will
00:12:41.720 | not be the first to take this path, but will join those who have already taken it. This
00:12:46.880 | path will be easier and shorter for all of us if we take it by mutual efforts and in
00:12:51.560 | close rank. If there are thousands of us, they will not be able to do anything with
00:12:56.160 | us. If there are tens of thousands of us, then we would not even recognize our country.
00:13:02.400 | If we are too frightened, then we should stop complaining that someone is suffocating us.
00:13:07.000 | We ourselves are doing it. Let us then bow down even more. Let us wail, and our brothers
00:13:12.520 | the biologists will help to bring nearer the day when they are able to read our thoughts
00:13:16.720 | that are worthless and hopeless. And if we get cold feet, even taking this step, then
00:13:22.440 | we are worthless and hopeless, and the scorn of Pushkin should be directed to us. Why should
00:13:29.280 | cattle have the gifts of freedom? Their heritage from generation to generation is the belled
00:13:34.960 | yoke and the lash.
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