I have been neglecting my Inspiration category. It's time to step back and take a deep breath. As with my previous post, this quote is from George MacDonald's Lilith A. It could be clearer, but as I haven't been able to find the equivalent in the version of the book that was eventually published, it will have to stand.
The general courses of nature were much the same with [the alien beings] as with us, else communication would not after all have been so satisfactory, for all intercourse is founded on sameness with the differences of sameness and not of difference.
— George MacDonald
Lilith A
Doesn't this nail what's wrong with discourse these days? We talk, but we don't communicate because we don't recognize the sameness between us. We see our disagreements as arising from differences so fundamental that we share no humanity to build upon.
