Beelzebubs-Tales-to-His-Grandson-by-G-I-Gurdjieff

eason that they do not exist among the beings of France whose example theyfollow—this is indeed genuine 'turkeyness.'"Although this peculiarity which I have just called 'turkeyness' has alreadybecome inherent in almost all the three-brained beings who breed on thisplanet of yours, its manifestation and results are especially noticeable amongthe three-brained beings who breed on the continent of Europe."This I observed and understood later when I left St Petersburg to travel invarious countries of this continent of Europe, where I happened to remainmuch longer than on my former visits, and therefore had time to observe andstudy in all possible conditions the finer details of the psyche not only ofbeings taken separately but also in groups."As a matter of fact, the form of external existence of all the communitieson the continent of Europe is scarcely to be distinguished from that of thebeings of the large community of Russia."The form of existence of the beings of the various groups on thiscontinent differs only insofar as the accidentally longer duration of existenceof any community has allowed time for the automatic acquisition of certaingood customs and instinctive habits which then become proper to the beingsof that community alone."Here, by the way, it should be emphasized that the duration of existenceof any community does indeed play an important role as regards theacquisition of good customs and instinctive habits."But unfortunately for all the three-brained beings of the whole Universe,whatever their degree of Reason, the existence of any more or less organizedgroup among them is in general short-lived, thanks as always to that chiefparticularity of theirs, namely, 'periodic reciprocal destruction. '"As soon as good being-usages begin to be established in the ordinaryexistence of any of their groups, this terrible