Camus, the Rebel, a man's outlook, indoctrination, and the substantive verb

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From Camus' The Rebel, on messianism: "I have instilled blind hopes into men's minds."

An outlook that a man holds must be defended and even over-defended; it is the definition of a man; a man is his outlook, and therefore he defends it like his life, for it is his life.

People remember only one thing from grade school- terror. Indoctrination without terror is not indoctrination.

If you were in a gunfight and as you lined up a shot a small child ran into your line of fire. The means become as important as the end.

When the verb of a sentence is taken as a substantive (ie. as a noun), the subject becomes the object. Thus 'I am walking', as a substantive becomes 'I am the walking', which is better than 'I am one who is walking', for the latter still separates the subject and the object. Hence 'I am working' becomes 'I am the working', 'I am writing' becomes 'I am the writing', and 'I am thinking' becomes 'I am the thinking'.

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These selected fragments are excerpted from unpublished writings by Jack Haas; selections from the notebooks 1990-2005.