Ema

“You die because you think the gods are looking after you. That's ok for animals, but you should know better."

"We should not trust the gods with our lives?"

"Definitely not. You should trust *yourselves* with your lives. That's the human way to live."

Ishmael shook his head ponderously. "This is sorry news indeed. From time out of mind we've lived in the hands of the gods, and it seemed to us we lived well. We left to the gods all the labor of sowing and growing and lived a carefree life, and it seemed there was always enough in the world for us, because--behold!--*we are here!*"

"Yes," I told him sternly. "You are here, and look at you. You have nothing. You live without security, without comfort, without opportunity."

"And this is because we live in the hands of the gods?"

"Absolutely. In the hands of the gods you're no more important than lions or lizards or fleas--you're nothing special.... As I say, you've got to begin planting your own food.... The gods plant only what you *need*. You will plant *more* than you need."

"To what end? What's the good of having more food than we need?"

"That is the whole goddamned point! When you have more food than you need, then *the gods have no power over you!*"

"We can thumb our noses at them."

"Exactly."

"All the same, what are we to *do* with this food if we don't need it?"

"You *save* it! You save it to thwart the gods when they decide it's your turn to go hungry. You save it so that when they send a drought, you can say, 'Not *me* goddamn it! *I'm* not going hungry, and there's nothing you can do about it, because my life is in my own hands now!"

... "So this is what's at the root of your revolution. You wanted and still want to have your lives in your own hands."

"Yes. Absolutely. To me, living any other way is almost inconceivable. I can only think that hunter-gatherers live in a state of utter and unending anxiety over what tomorrow's going to bring."

"Yet they don't. Any anthropologist will tell you that. They are far less anxiety-ridden than you are. They have no jobs to lose. No one can say to them, 'Show me your money or you don't get fed, don't get clothed, don't get sheltered.' "

"I believe you. Rationally speaking, I believe you. But I'm talking about my feelings, about my conditioning. My conditioning tells me -- Mother Culture tells me -- that living in the hands of the gods has got to be a never-ending nightmare of terror and anxiety.”
― Daniel Quinn, Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit