B332 <=> B334 [BTG XXIV Beelzebub’s fifth flight, p. 333]

“Soon after our arrival in Babylon, I began going with this Hamolinadir to various what are called ‘meetings’ of the mentioned learned beings, and listened to every kind of what they called ‘reports’ upon the very question which was then ‘the-question-of-the-day,’ and which was the cause of the ‘agitation-of-the-minds-of-the-whole-of-Babylon.’

“This friend of mine, Hamolinadir, was also very much excited about the said ‘burning question.’

“He was agitated and perplexed by the fact that both the already existing and the many newly appearing theories upon this question were all, in spite of their entirely contradictory proofs, equally convincing and equally plausible.

“He said that those theories in which it was proved that we have a soul were very logically and convincingly expounded; and, likewise, those theories in which quite the contrary was proved were expounded no less logically and convincingly.

“So that you may be able to put yourself in the place of that sympathetic Assyrian, I shall also explain to you that in general on your planet, then in the city of Babylon as well as at the present time, all the theories on such a question as they call it of ‘the beyond,’ or any other ‘elucidation-of-details’ of any definite ‘fact,’ are invented by those three-brained beings there in whom most of the consequences of the properties of the organ Kundabuffer are completely crystallized, in consequence of which there actively functions in their presence, that being-property, which they themselves call ‘cunning.’ Owing to this, they consciously – of course consciously only with the sort of reason which it has already become long ago proper for them alone to possess – and moreover, merely automatically, gradually acquire in their common presence, the capacity for ‘spotting’ the weakness of the psyche of the surrounding beings like themselves; and this capacity gradually forms in them data which enables them at times to sense and even to understand the peculiar logic of the beings around them, and according to these data, they invent and propound one of their ‘theories’ concerning this or that question; and because, as I have already told you, in most of the three-brained beings there, owing to the abnormal conditions of ordinary being-existence established there by them themselves, the being-function called ‘instinctively-to-sense-cosmic-truths’ gradually atrophies, then, if any one of them happens to devote himself to the detailed study of any one of these ‘theories,’ he is bound, whether he wishes or not, to be persuaded by it with the whole of his presence.