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Gems and trinkets that I find, without and within.

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‘[I]t is the custom of each community to form the minds of its young in a mould, introducing a binding agent of prejudice. The result is a remarkably tough substance capable of withstanding successfully even the pressure of many innate tendencies and instincts. In this way it has been possible to produce a man who against all his basic sense of self-preservation will voluntarily risk death for an ideal — but also in this way is produced the dolt who is sure of everything and knows what is “right”.

‘… We can accept and retain only one primary prejudice, and that is that the race is worth preserving. To that consideration all else will for a time at least be subordinate…’

— John Wyndham, The Day of the Triffids