Man’s basic vice, the source of all his evils, is the act of unfocusing his
mind, the suspension of his consciousness, which is not blindness, but the
refusal to see, not ignorance, but the refusal to know. Irrationality is the
rejection of man’s means of survival and, therefore, a commitment to a course
of blind destruction; that which is anti-mind, is anti-life.
To the extent to which a man is rational, life is the premise directing his
actions. To the extent to which he is irrational, the premise directing his
actions is death.
The irrational is the impossible; it is that which contradicts the facts of
reality; facts cannot be altered by a wish, but they can destroy the wisher.
Irrationality is a state of default, the state of an unachieved human stature.
When men do not choose to reach the conceptual level, their consciousness has
no recourse but to its automatic, perceptual, semi-animal functions.