The American Sermon: The Pilgrims and American Socialism

ENCORE PRESENTATION! In the very timely part 6, the true story of the first Thanksgiving is examined and picked apart. We look at the first systems of Government the Pilgrims used during their struggle of survival. One of these systems was predictably terrible and almost dammed the Pilgrims during their first two years and the other that launched the Pilgrims into unbelievable prosperity in their third year.
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History of Plymouth Plantation – William Bradford - 1650
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Episode Transcript

(00:11):
This is a non for re releaseof the American Sermon. Let's take a
look at some of the weird,offbeat and sinister things in the foundation of
the United States. Thank you forlistening. We hope you enjoy the show.

(00:37):
In the dark shadows and in thewhite cold, fearlessly we search for
knowledge new and old. We drinkthe strong spirits and read the ancient tombs
the order of the Abecast. Weare the brave and bold. Nearly four

(00:59):
hundred years ago, a great manyof the people in England were very unhappy
because the king would not let thempray to God as they liked. The
king said they must use the sameprayers that he did, and if they
would not do this, they wereoften thrown into prison or perhaps driven away

(01:19):
from home. Let us go awayfrom this country, said unhappy Englishmen to
each other. And so they lefttheir homes and they went went far off
to a country called Holland. Itwas about this time that they began calling
themselves pilgrims. Pilgrims, you know, are people who are always traveling to

(01:40):
find something they love, or tofind the land where they can be happier.
And these englishmen and women were journeying, they said, from place to
place towards Heaven, their dearest country. In Holland, the Pilgrims were quiet
and happy for a while, butthey were very poor, and when their
children began to grow up, theywere not like English children, but talked

(02:04):
Dutch like the little ones of Holland, and some grew naughty, huh,
and did not want to go tochurch anymore. This will never do,
said the pilgrim fathers and mothers.So after much talking and thinking and writing,
they made up their minds to comehere to America. They hired two
vessels, called the Mayflower and theSpeedwell to take them across to the sea.

(02:30):
But the Speedwell was not a strongship, and the captain had to
take her home again before she hadgone very far. The Mayflower went back
to part of the Speedwells passengers weregiven to her, and then they started
alone across the Great Ocean. Therewere one hundred people on board, mothers

(02:52):
and fathers, and brothers and sistersand little children. They were very crowded,
and it was cold and comfortable.The sea was rough and pitched the
Mayflower about, and they were twomonths sailing over the water, and the
children cried many times on the journeyand wished that they had never come to

(03:15):
the tiresome ship that rocked them sohard it would not let them keep still
a minute. But they had onepretty plaything to amuse them. For in
the middle of the great Ocean,a pilgrim baby was born, and they
called him Oceanus for his birthplace.When the children grew so tired that they

(03:37):
were cross and fretful, Oceanus's motherlet them come in and play with him,
and they always brought smiles and happyfaces back again. At last,
the mayflower came into sight of land. But if the children had been thinking
of grass and flowers and birds,they must have been very much disappointed,

(03:59):
for the month was cold, November, and there was nothing to be seen
but rocks and sand in the hard, bare ground. Some of the pilgrim
fathers, with the brave captain MilesStandish at their head, went on to
shore to see if they could findany houses or white people. But they

(04:19):
only saw some Indians who ran awayfrom them. And they found some Indian
huts and some corn buried in holesin the ground. And they went to
and fro from the ship three timestill By the end they found a pretty
place to live, and there werefields and little running brooks. Then at

(04:42):
last the tired pilgrims landed from theship on a spot we call Plymouth Rock,
and the first house was begne onChristmas Day. But when I tell
you how sick they were and howmuch they suffered that first winter, you
will be very sad and sorry forthem. The weather was cold, and

(05:03):
the snow fell fast and thick,and the wind was icy, and the
pilgrim fathers had no one to helpthem cut down the trees to build their
church and their houses. The pilgrimmothers helped all they could, but they
were tired of the long journey inthe cold, and hungry too, for
no one had the right kind offood to eat, nor even enough of

(05:27):
it. So the first one wastaken sick, and then another, until
half of them were in bed atthe same time. Miles Brave, Miles
Standish and other soldiers nursed them aswell as they knew how. But before
spring came, half of the peopledied and had gone to the last,

(05:47):
gone at last to heaven their dearestcountry. But by and by the sun
shone more broidally and the snow melted, and the leaves began to grow.
When sweet spring had come. Somefriendly Indians had visited the Pilgrims during the
winter, and Captain Miles Standish,Oh, they forgot to call him brave.

(06:09):
Here bro the brave Captain Miles Standish. Several of his men had returned
the visit. One of the kindIndians was called Squanto, and he came
to stay with the Pilgrims and showedthem how to plant their corn and their
peas, and their wheat and theirbarley. When the summer came, and

(06:30):
these days were long and bright,the pilgrim children were very happy, and
they thought Plymouth was a lovely place. Indeed, all kinds of beautiful wild
flowers grew at their doors, andthey were hundreds of birds and butterflies,
and grape pines and woods were alwayscool and shady when the sun was too

(06:51):
bright. When it was an autumn, and the fathers gathered the barley and
the wheat and the corn that theyhad planted, and found that it had
grown so well that they would havequite enough for the long winter that was
coming. Let us thank God forit all, they said. It is
he who made the sunshine and therain fall, and the corn grow.

(07:15):
And they thanked God in their homesand with their little church, and the
fathers and the mothers and the childrenthanked him. Then said the pilgrim mothers,
let us have a great Thanksgiving partyand invite the friendly Indians. And
all rejoiced together. So they hadthe first Thanksgiving party. It was a
grand one, for men went outshooting one whole day and brought back so

(07:39):
many wild ducks and geese, thegreat wild turkeys, that there was almost
enough for a week. And therewas deer meat also, of course,
for there were plenty of deer inthe forest. And the pilgrim mothers made
the corn into the corn and wheatinto bread and cakes, and they had
fish and clams from this he besides, the friendly Indians came with their chief

(08:05):
Massowat. Everyone came that was invitedand wore, I dare say, for
they were ninety of them altogether,and they brought five deer with them,
and they gave to the Pilgrims.And they must have liked the party very
much, because they stayed for threedays, and the Indians were You would
have been very much frightened if youhad seen them, And the baby Oceanus,

(08:30):
who was only a year old,began to cry at first whenever they
came near him. And they weredressed in deer skins, and some of
them had a furry coat of awild cat hanging on their arms, and
long black hair fell loose on theirshoulders and was trimmed with feathers or fox
tails. And they had their facespainted with all kinds of strange ways,

(08:52):
some black stripes as broad as yourfinger all the way up and down them.
But whatever they wore was their verybest, and they had put it
on for this Thanksgiving party. Eachmeal, before they ate anything, the
Pilgrims and the Indians thanked God togetherfor all his goodness, and the Indians
saying and danced in the evenings,and every day they ran races and played

(09:18):
all kinds of games with the children. Then sometimes the Pilgrims with their guns
and the Indians with their bows andarrows would see who could shoot the farthest
and the best. So they wereglad and mary and thankful for three whole
days. And the pilgrim mothers andfathers had been sick and sad many times
since they landed. From the Mayflower, and they worked very hard often and

(09:43):
had not enough to eat. Andthey were mournful, indeed, when their
friends had died and left them.But now they tried to forget all of
this and think only of how goodGod had been to them. And so
they were all happy together at theFirst Thanksgiving party. All this happened nearly
four hundred years ago, and eversince that time, Thanksgiving has been kept

(10:05):
in our country. Every year,our fathers and grandfathers and great grandfathers have
rejoiced together like the Pilgrims, andhad something to eat and be thankful for
each time, and every year somefather told the story of the brave Pilgrims
and to his little sons and daughtersand taught them to be very glad and
proud that the Mayflower came sailing toour country so many years ago. So

(10:31):
all of this is from a storycalled the First Thanksgiving by Norah Smith.
All right, let's get let's getinto this one. The Aberclass, a
cult history, conspiracy and violence.Hey, welcome to the American greetings,

(11:39):
and welcome to the American sermon.I will be your governor of the colony
for this evening, and my nameis John Towers. M oh, sorry
about that. Thank you so muchfor tuning in. As you know,
The mar concernmon is a spinoff ofmy regular podcast called The Abercast. You

(12:03):
can find it wherever you can findyour podcasts. I guarantee it. And
yeah, it's a it's a it'sa trip, man, it's a trip.
Okay. So The americancermon is apodcast where we look at some of
the weird, offbeat and sometimes sinisterthings mixed in to the foundation of the
United States. And tonight we havea barn burner. The cold Open was

(12:31):
a pretty vanilla, you know,standard elementary school version of the First Thanksgiving,
and it's about as inaccurate as possible, at least when it gets to
the you know, Thanksgiving party,but not in the way that you might
think. In America, as kidsget older, the story of the First

(12:52):
Thanksgiving gets darker and darker until theyget to college and are taught you know,
the Pilgrims came over with assault riflesand grenades filled with anthrax and murdered
the Native Americans. Again, nottrue the story of the first We're actually
going to find out it's actually thestory of the third Thanksgiving is a harrowing

(13:15):
one, much like most of thetopics we have touched so far on the
sermon. It might be a littleedgy for those listeners out there who are
overly sensitive. So this should serviceyour trigger warning for the evening. If
you crave a safe space, youwill not find it here. My friends,

(13:37):
I suggest you go read the introductionto Thomas Paine's Age of Reason,
and if that doesn't help you,turn on NPR. I guess because,
as we will see, as anyonewho has ever seen when they can when
they are confronted with this true storyof Thanksgiving, the bullshit is deep.

(14:03):
One can find hundreds, if notthousands, of articles about the lunatic Republican
myth of Thanksgiving. But tonight weare not concerned with Republicans or Democrats,
and tonight we are not reading fromthese articles. Tonight we are reading from
an old book, an old bookthat was written by the governor of the

(14:26):
Plymouth Colony himself, William Bradford.He wrote a giant book, Tonight We're
Gonna Be This is the feature bookfor Tonight, and it was written just
a few years after the events themselvestook place. So it's called the History
of the Plymouth Plantation William Bradford.It was published in sixteen fifty. So

(14:52):
let us let us look at theplight of these Puritans and the lesson it
holds. And as we get intothis, let us strive to remember this
lesson, even as it fades fromour modern memory. And let us always
remember and shout to the hilltops andrant to anyone who will listen, even

(15:15):
if for a moment that Joseph McCarthywas right. Are you ready, let's
get started. So the Pilgrims hada lot of problems. They had problems

(15:35):
with their boats. They had problemswith the king, they had problem with
the English, and they had fuckingproblems with Holland they had problems with the
sailors on their boat. They hadproblems with each other, and they had
problems with mother nature. They arrivedat the wrong place. They were aiming
for Virginia, but instead they landedat Cape Cod November eleventh, teen twenty.

(16:02):
They started exploring the area and sortof looking for a place to set
up camp, and they ran intosome of these Native Americans who ran away
from them. And well, let'sjust get let's just get to the book.
Let's start in this book. Okay, okay, So there went some

(16:23):
thirty men, but found it tobe no found to be no harbor for
ships, but only for boats.And there was also found two of their
houses covered with mats and the sundryof their implements in them, but the
people were run away and could notbe seen. Also there was found more

(16:45):
of their corn and of their beansof various colors. The corn of the
beans they brought away, purposing togive them full satisfaction when they should meet
with any of them, as aboutsome six months afterwards, they did to
their good content. Okay, Idon't feel like I need to translate this

(17:07):
because literally it's it's all written likethis, But just for the sake of
it, here we go. Theywere, they happened upon some belongings of
the Native Americans, and they stoledcorn and beans from them. Bradford says,
here, you know, this isthe part that they don't teach anybody.
There's just you know, the fuckingpilgrims. They should the first thing

(17:30):
they did is stoled food, andsure that is what they did, right
And I'm not I'm not apologizing forthe Pilgrims, but Bradford here said that
it was their full intention to givethem payment of some kind for them when
they should meet up with these Indians. They're here, and here is to

(17:52):
be noted a special providence of Godand a great mercy to his poor people,
that here they got seed to plantthem corn for the next year,
or else they might have starved,and they had done nothing in any likelihood
to get any till the season hadbeen passed. As the sequel did man

(18:15):
manifest. Neither is it likely thatthey had this if the first voyage had
not been made, for the groundwas now all covered with snow and hard
frozen. But the Lord is neverwanting unto his in their greatest needs,
and let his holy name have allof the praise. So Bradford is identifying

(18:38):
them being able to steal this cornand these beans or whatever as the providence
as a God is a miracle.Look, they found the stuff, right,
So we're gonna move ahead, andwe're gon we're gonna talk about the
mayflower compact um because something very importantis in this compact Yeah, okay,

(19:07):
in the beginning with a combination ofof made by them before they came ashore.
Okay, So he's saying that whilethey were still in the boat,
they did this, being the firstfoundation of their government in this place,
occasioned partly by the discontented and mutinousspeeches, and that some of the strangers

(19:29):
amongst them had let fall from themin the ship. He had ship talkers
in his midst that when they cameashore they would use their own liberty,
for none had the power to commandthem, and the patent they had for
beat and the patent they had beingfor Virginia and not for New England,

(19:55):
which belonged to another government with whichthe Virginia Company had nothing to do,
And partly that such an act doneby them, and their condition considered,
might be affirm as any patent insome respects more sure. So he's saying,
I remember I had mentioned that theywere aiming for Virginia, and they

(20:17):
wound up further north, and theyrealized where they were, and they realized
that their charter with the Virginia Companyor whatever it was called, was fucked,
and they made the decision to staywhere they were, where they landed,
and not travel further to Virginia.And so what he's saying is this,

(20:41):
these guys with this mutinous speech thathad fallen out of them. These
discontented people were like they were.They made the pilgrim's nervous because they were
like, we're you know, we'renot landing in Virginia. The agreement that

(21:03):
we have with the people, thatwe have the contract for it doesn't mean
anything. So you know, norule there, no rules apply to us.
So they were like, okay,fuckers, let's sit down and let's
hammer this out. That we're creatinga government now. The form was as
follow if in the name of God, Amen. You notice all these Puritans

(21:26):
and these uh Pilgrims and stuff,they don't talk about Jesus. They were
they were They're like gentile Jews.It's it's pretty interesting when you pick it
up. We whose name are underwrittenthe loyal subjects of our dread and Sovereign

(21:47):
Lord King James, by the graceof God and of Great Britain, France,
Ireland, King Defender of the Faith, etc. Having undertaken the glory
of God and advancement of the ChristianFaith, in honor of our King and
country, a voyage to plant thefirst colony in the northern parts of Virginia.

(22:08):
Due by the presence, solemnly andmutually, in the presence of God
and one another. Covenant. Andhere we go. This is the important
This is the important part. Covenantand combine ourselves together into a civil body

(22:29):
politic and for better ordering and preservationand further rents of the end aforesaid,
And by virtue hereof to enact,constitute, and frame such and equal laws,
ordinance, acts, constitutions and officesfrom time to time shall be though

(22:51):
most met and convenient for the generalgood of the colony into which we promise,
I'll do submission and obedience the goodof the colony. And we promise
all do submission and obedience, andwitness thereof. We have here under subscribed

(23:11):
the names at kate Cod on theeleventh of November, in the year of
the reign of our Sovereign Lord,King James of England, France, Ireland
the eighteenth and of Scotland in theforty fourth No. Domini sixteen twenty.

(23:32):
After this they chose, or ratherconfirmed, mister John Carver, a man
godly and well approved amongst them,their governor for that year. And after
they had provided a place for theirgoods as a common store, which were
long and unlading, for want ofboats, foulness of the winter weather,

(23:56):
and sickness of the verse. Andbegun some small cottages for their habitations as
time would admit, and they metand consulted the laws and the orders in
both of the civil and military government, as the necessity of their condition did
require, still adding there onto asurgent occasion, and several times as cases

(24:19):
did not require. Okay, solet's take a look back at this this
much Ballyhood Mayflower compact. There's somethings that jump out in here, and
just should send a red flag up. They're going to there's a covenant and

(24:41):
combine ourselves together into a civil bodypolitic for our better ordering and preservation and
further est of the ends aforesaid.And then this whole bit down here upon

(25:03):
for the general good of the colony, unto which we promise all do submission
and obedience the common good. Here'swhat it is, back to the book.
In these hard and difficult beginnings,they found some discontents and murmurings arise
from some in the mutinous speeches andcarriages and others, And they were soon

(25:27):
quelled and overcome by the wisdom patients, and just an equal carriage of things
by the Governor and better part whichclave faithfully together in the main. All
right, So Deacon Carver in Aprilthe next year, he dies. He
falls into a coma and he fuckingdies. And our man here, the

(25:48):
guy who's writing this book, WilliamBradford, because he's chosen to become the
governor. So he William Bradford's thegovernor now. And uh, we're moving
into sixteen twenty one. So theythey somehow survived their first winner by you

(26:17):
know, the way of stealing,scavenging, hard scrabble hunting. So we're
moving into the first harvests of sixteentwenty one. So this is their first
harvest, sixteen twenty one. Theybegan now to gather in the small harvest

(26:41):
they had, and to fit uptheir house and dwellings against the winner,
being all well recovered in health andstrength. And they had all had all
things in good and plenty. Andfor some were thus employed in affairs abroad.

(27:02):
Others were exercised in fishing about codand bass and other fish, of
which they took good store, ofwhich every family had their portion all the
summer. There was no want,and now began to come in the store
of fowl as winter approached, ofwhich this place did amound when they came

(27:26):
first, but afterwards decreased by degrees. And besides waterfowl, there were a
great store of wild turkeys, ofwhich they took many, besides of venison,
etc. Besides, they had abouta peca meal a week to a
person or now since the harvest inthe Indian corn to the proportion which made

(27:51):
many afterwards write so largely of theirplenty to their friends in England, which
were not fiend but true reports.So everything seems like it's going good for
them at first. So this istheir first harvest, and you could read
in here they're saying, all everyonehad their portion, So this is them.

(28:17):
All the work they're doing is goingto a common store and getting divided
out for everyone. Everyone gets aportion. We are waiting into the crux
of the whole thing, now,the whole point of this episode. But
I need to just say in advancethat I'm about to switch the order of

(28:40):
two things in the book. Actually, hold on, not yet. I'm
not first what I'm gonna do thisall right now, I'm going to talk

(29:19):
about Now we're waiting into the cruxof the whole thing. Now we're getting
to the point of the whole episode, but I need just to say in
advance, I'm switching the order oftwo things in this upcoming section of the
book. I'm not altering the textat all, and of the context will
actually remain unchanged. I am simplygoing to read this in chronological order rather

(29:42):
than the order it was written.Bradford here talks about a problem that they
have and then a solution, Butwhen he writes about it in the book,
he talks about the solution first,which is fine. It's just as
confusing when you're listening to someone talkabout it, I I think, but
I'm just making it easier to underI'm making it easier to convey and to

(30:06):
understand. I'm just defending myself fromany knuckle heads out there who were going
to say that I edited the text. I'm just going to state the problem
first, the problems they had,and then I'm going to state how they
fixed it. So between sixteen twentyone, the first harvest, and we're
gonna jump to sixteen twenty three ina section that he calls private and communal

(30:37):
farming. So remember, if youdouble check me, I love when you
guys do double check me. Sowhen you guys double check me on this
and you were like, oh,this sneaky son of a bitch changed the
text, I'm just trying to fulldisclosure. I didn't change the text.
I just rearranged the paragraph so theymade a little bit more sense when I'm

(30:57):
reading them. Okay, So we'rejumping to sixteen twenty three. So the
first harvest was sixteen twenty one.Sixteen twenty two happened, and the experience
that we had in this common courseand condition tried sundry years, and amongst

(31:21):
godly and sober men hold on.I gotta Maywell invinced the vanity of the
conceit of Plato and other ancients applaudedby some of the later times they had,
and that had the taking away ofproperty in bringing into the community into

(31:41):
a commonwealth would make them happy andflourishing. He's talking about the idea of
utopia, as if they were wiserthan God. For this community, so
far as it was was found tobreed much confusion in discontent and retard much
employment, and would have been totheir benefit and comfort. For the young

(32:07):
men that were most able and fitfor labor and service, did repine that
they should spend their time and theirstrength to work for other men's wives and
children without any recompense. The strongor man parts had none or had no
more in division of victuals and clothingthan he than he that was weak and

(32:31):
not able to do a quarter oftheir other could. Okay, so again,
I don't feel like I need todecode decode this. I mean,
there he's speaking English, but whathe's saying, but I'm going to do
it anyways. What he's saying isthat the young men who did the most

(32:51):
work realized that they were doing morework than other people. They were they
were doing more work than the thepilgrim mothers or the wives were you know,
cooking dinner or whatever. They wereworking. They were digging, they
were building, they were doing morework than the older men. We'll just

(33:19):
say the older men weren't digging asfast or as deep, or building as
high or as quickly. And they'relike, hey, I'm getting the same
bullshit share as everybody else, andwe're doing the most. We're doing the
most fucking work. And they getthey get pissed about it. And I'm

(33:47):
familiar with this I'm actually familiar,very familiar with this um from art from
my army days. That's why it'sgood to be an e four bros.
Okay anyhow, yeah, okay,So they weren't getting more clothes, they

(34:07):
weren't getting any more food, andthey were doing more of the work with
the meaner and younger sort. Althoughit was some indignity and disrespect unto them,
and for the men's wives to becommanded to do service for other men,
as dressing their meat, washing theirclothes, etc. They determined it

(34:29):
was a kind of slavery either couldneither could many husbands well brook it upon
the point all being to have alikeand all to do alike. They thought
themselves in the like, in thelike condition, and one as good as

(34:50):
another. And so if I didnot cut off those relations that God hath
set amongst men, yet it didnot much Diminis shouldn't take off the mutual
respect that should be preserved amongst them, and would have been worse if they
would have been men of another condition. Let none object that this man's corruption,

(35:15):
and nothing to the course itself.I answer, seeing all men having
this corruption in them, and Godand his wisdom saw another course fitter for
them. So he's saying, like, hey, if we weren't such God
fearing men this, we would havekilled each other, like this would have
destroyed us. But then he's alsosaying, and God and his wisdom gave

(35:39):
us another another path, right,the Pilgrims for the first year, Scavage
jin stole probably and suffered for thefirst year, and then according to their
plan, the second two years theyhad this commune like farm. Everyone did
everything for everybody at very degrees ofskill and ability, and well, if

(36:04):
you look at this historically for anyamount of time, the outcome is hilariously
predictable. So now these guys arelike, yo, homie, how are
we going to fix this stuff?We need these motherfuckers to plant more corn.
In a top down socialist paradise likethis, the leaders would have just
said, tell the motherfuckers to plantmore corn. But Bradford and his guys

(36:29):
understood there needed to be a paradigmshift. The system wasn't broken. The
system did not need a tweak.This is the one and only time I'm
gonna say this in this episode.I swear to God, but right now
I have to say it. Youhave to please indulge me for just a
moment. Socialism doesn't work. Okay, back to the book. All the

(36:53):
while, no supply was heard ofneither. This is the part that came
first in the original text, andI can't understand why it's first, But
anyhow, all the while no supplywas heard of, neither nothing. Sorry,
neither knew God damn it this writing. Neither knew they when they expect

(37:15):
any So they began to think ofhow they might raise as much corn as
they could and obtain a better cropthan they had done, and they might
not still thus languish in misery.At length, after much debate of things,
the governor, with the advice ofthe cheapest among them, gave way

(37:36):
that they should set corn. Thatthey should set corn every man for his
own particular. See, if yougrow it, you get to keep it,
and that in regards in regard trustto themselves in all things to go

(37:58):
on in the general way as before, so assigned to every family parcel of
land. So instead of all workingthe same land. He's like, yo,
the Smith family, You guys getthis property over here, raise as
much corners you can do. It'sall yours. The Wilson family this area

(38:20):
now is yours. You get yourown farm, you do your ship as
much. You just do as muchas you can. Whatever you get you
get to keep. So they're they'removing away from this commune idea to what
to what it is to supply sidesupply side economics, and they're like,

(38:45):
here, this land is yours.Grow as much as you want, and
when you grow it, you getto keep it. This was before taxes,
um okay. So assigned to everyfamily a parcel of land according to
the proportion of their number. Sothat makes sense. If you haven't a
family of four versus a family ofeight, they don't get the same size

(39:08):
plot to work on. Does thatmake sense to you? I know there's
I know there's some of you outthere that's like, no, they should
have the same size. You understand. I'm gonna explain later. Okay,
I'm gonna explain incentive later for thatend only for the present use. But

(39:31):
made no division for inheritance. That'salso important. And they ranged all boys
in youth the under some family.So if there were young men that weren't
married, they got assigned. Theygot employed, you know what I mean.
They got employed by a family andthis had a very good success,

(39:55):
for it made all hands, guesswhat, very industrious. So as much
more corn was planted than otherwise wouldhave been by any means the governor or
any other could use, and savedhim a great deal of trouble, and
guess what, gave far better content. The women now went willingly into the

(40:16):
field, and they took their littleones and with them, and they made
corn, which before would allege weaknessand inabilities. So they're like the women
used to say that they were frailor whatever, and like they didn't feel
like picking the corn. It wasmen's work. Or maybe that's what they
said. I don't fucking know,it's not in the text. He says,

(40:37):
they would allege weakness. To me, that means that they would that
they would make excuses for not goingand picking corn because their incentive was taken
from them who they would allege weaknessand inability, whom to have compelled would

(40:59):
have been thought the great tyranny andoppression. So just as the commune,
the commune outcome was laughably predictable,the free market and personal responsibility and individual's
outcome was also predictable. It wassuccessful, and the colony had abundant food
stores. And in sixteen twenty three, three years after landing, two years

(41:24):
two failed harvests. Well, thefirst harvest was okay, I guess,
and then sixteen twenty two it seemslike it was shitty. So three years
after landing, Governor William Bradford madethe first Thanksgiving proclamation. And watch out

(41:44):
now for those of us who havethe picture like in the cold open in
their minds of Pilgrims and Indians hangingout together having a big feast, there
is a little you might call itcultural insensitivity here Bradford. Okay, quote
this is from his This is fromthe legitimately Thanksgiving proclamation has got a date

(42:09):
in it, but it's sixteen twentythree. So everyone out there that's catching
themselves on fire talking about no,the first Thanksgiving was when the Indians came
with the DearS and they party forthree days. That was the first Thanksgiving.
Negative ghostwriter, the patterns fool.This is the first Thanksgiving a quote

(42:31):
inasmuch as the and listen to whathe listened to what he is giving thanks
for here, or what he's praising. He's not praising the Indians for the
Native Americans for helping him in asmuch as the Great Father has given us
this year an abundant harvest of Indiancorn, wheat, peas being squashed,

(42:52):
and guarden vegetables, and has madethe forest abound with games and sea with
fishing clams, inasmuch as he protectedus from the ravages of the savages,
has spared us from pestilence and disease, and has granted us freedom to worship

(43:14):
God according to the dictates of ourown consciousness. Now, I, your
Magistrate, do proclaim that all yePilgrims, with your wives and ye little
ones, do gather at ye meetinghouse on ye hill between the hours of
nine and twelve in the daytime onThursday, November twenty ninth, in the

(43:35):
year of our Lord one thousand andsix hundred and twenty three, and in
the third ye the third year sinceye pilgrims landed on ye Pilgrim Rock.
There to listen to ye pastor andrender thanksgiving to ye Almighty God for his
blessings. William Bradford, ye Governorof ye colony. So I'm sure there's

(44:01):
gonna be people out there. They'relike, I'm letting the pilgrims off the
hook for some dastardly deed, orI'm overlooking the Native Americans role and the
survival of the Pilgrims. And I'mtelling you that I'm not doing either of
those things. I'm reading to youfrom the text of what was done and

(44:21):
what was said. And yes,the Native Americans did save them, I
would imagine, and did join themin there that their little feast there,
and did contribute, and they didplay games and hang out and have fun.
I'm not saying that it didn't happen. I'm saying that when we talk
about Thanksgiving, that is not whatwe're talking about. I'm saying that William

(44:47):
Bradford and the Pilgrims and the peopleat Plymouth Rock, when they gave Thanksgiving,
they were thinking. They were thinkingthe free market. They were thinking
God for letting them, however youwant to say it. They were thinking
getting away from socialism. The Pilgrimshad learned a lesson that everyone learns when

(45:15):
trying communism. On paper and intheory, it promises posterity and equality and
security, but what it delivers ispoverty, misery, and notably absent from
the Pilgrim's experience. But applicable everywhereelse tyranny. You might be able to

(45:36):
argue that Bradford not being a tyrantwas perhaps one of the saving graces of
these pilgrims. So I mentioned incentivesearlier. When the people that can work
harder, or work smarter, orbe innovative doesn't get anything for their extra
effort, ye're sucking the incentive away. So I went I found this guy,

(46:00):
Professor Mark J. Perry. Hewrote an essay way back in nineteen
I have here in nineteen fifty five, but that is not right. It's
nineteen ninety five. He's a he'sa professor, and he wrote why Socialism
failed, I believe in nineteen ninetyfive. I believe there's a type of

(46:21):
in my notes. So he sayssocialism does not work because it is not
consistent with the fundamental principles of humanbehavior and follow or. The failure of
socialism and countries around the world canbe traced to one critical defect. It
is a system that ignores incentives.So I'm gonna hold on. I'm gonna

(46:44):
get to that later. In acapitalist economy, incentives are of the utmost
importance. Market prices, the profit, profit and loss system of accounting.
The private property rights provide efficient,interrelated systems of incentives to god and direct
economic behavior. Capitalism is based onthe theory that incentives matter. That's why

(47:08):
people work overtime. That's why peoplego and pick up a few hours at
a part time job every now andagain to get something that they want,
or to pay off credit cards becausethey didn't have the patience for that.
I don't know. Under socialism,incentives either play a minimum role or ignored
or ignored totally. Essentially, playingeconomy without market prices or profits where property

(47:34):
is owned by the state is asystem without an effective incentive mechanism to direct
economic activity. By failing to emphasizeincentives, socialism is a theory inconsistent with
human nature and is therefore doomed tofail. Socialism is based on the theory
that incentives do not matter. Theyhave to ignore it. They have to

(48:00):
they have to ignore it. AndI'm going to talk a little bit more
about it in terms of the pilgrims. In the their terms, these pilgrims
were we're dealing with why should Iwork harder on the crops or building a
cabin or whatever, spend extra timein the field when I or my family

(48:21):
doesn't personally benefit from it. Soif you guys can, if you are
buddy heads with me right now,try instead of I don't know how to
I don't know how to do this, try putting yourself in this position.
You know. Um, it's easyto say, yeah, I see the

(48:43):
benefit. Hey, you know,I've watched Rathicon a bunch of times,
and I do know that the goodof the few outweigh the good of them,
the good of the many outweigh thegood of the few. And so
I know when I'm younger, Ishould work carter to help. And then
when I'm older I am able toslack off a little bit. We'll just

(49:05):
say when I can't produce as much, or when my talents moved to another
sort of speciality. And you know, that's why we have children, is
to you know, come up andbe young. When we're old. It's
easy to think like that, butwhen you're trying, when you're like,
okay, boys, we have todate. Okay boys, here, this

(49:29):
is a real life fucking thing.All right, boys, We have to
stretch this concertina wire fence, youknow, five clicks. We have to
cut off this whole valley with thisconcertina wire fence. And then when we're
done, when we're done stretching thefence, we have to go and we
gotta do drill, and we gottalay it down a mine field, a

(49:51):
minefield, through through this whole valley, tie it into the terrain features.
You know, that's a lot offucking work. That is a lot of
work. So just scale it backs, get rid of the mine field,
get rid of the concertina wire.But just imagine that. It's you have
to put a fence. You haveto put a fence in around your plantation
or whatever, around your colony.And you got a bunch of you have

(50:16):
a bunch of young men out there. You gotta like dig the fucking post
holes. You gotta fucking pound thefucking post in the ground. You gotta
hang the fucking fence parts up.That's a lot of fucking work, and
it's a huge area. You gottado it too. And you look around
and all you see our young fuckingguys doing this. Guy's like, hey,
I'm gonna take a piss break.I'm gonna walk back to this cabin

(50:38):
and take a leak and say howto my wife. And you go back
there, and there's some dudes thatare like, they're sitting around the plank.
I don't want to say, playingcards. They're sitting around doing something
way less stressful. And at theend of the day, when they're giving
out foods or what do they callthem here, ventricles or clothing, everybody
gets the same amount of shit Likethat is stressful. It's making my blood

(51:04):
pressure rate if you can't tell,I'm getting very agitated about this. And
essentially I'm just sitting here arguing withmyself. I'm in an empty room,
arguing myself. Oh boy, wherewas I Okay? So, Bradford and

(51:25):
his guys rightfully identified that the communesystem that they were all suffering under had
a failure to foster, promote,and nurture the potential of the people.
You know, it's funny in theabercast we always talk about potential because we
talk a lot about like magic andshit, and it always boils down to

(51:51):
potentiality. So it's funny that itpops up here to promote and nurture the
potential of the people through in theseincentives. These pilgrims were crushed working the
way that they were working, killedtheir human spirit. Professor Perry says,
centrally playing economies deprive the human spiritof full development. And I would add

(52:20):
that it also retards innovation, worksmarter, not harder. You know what
I'm saying. He ends his essaywritten, and Okay, it was nineteen
ninety five. I got it rightin my second reference nineteen ninety five.
And it's almost shocking today when youconsider that a Harris Pole just came out
stating that forty nine percent of youngAmericans would prefer to live in a socialist

(52:44):
country. Anyhow, I'm not gonnaget caught up on that. I'm not
gonna get on a millennial tirade.However, Professor Perry ends capitalism will play
a major role in the global revivalof liberty and posterity prosper parody because it
nurtures the human spirit, it inspireshuman creativity, and it promotes the spirit

(53:07):
of enterprise. By providing a powerfulsystem of incentives that promote thrift, hard
work, efficiency, capitalism creates wealth. The main difference between capitalism and socialism
is this capitalism works. With thatbeing said, I would like a five

(53:38):
star review please, because I'm gonnaget dog piled have you enjoyed the show.
I am going when this hits,I'm gonna get dog piled with one
star reviews. So I predict Ipredict that I will ah. Okay,
So I'm John Towers. This hasbeen the American Sermon. Thank you very

(54:00):
much, and I'm out of here. It is an apprentice in the order
of the Abercast who now wishes toreceive more light by passing to the degree
of the fellow Craft. He isprepared, worthy, and well qualified,

(54:21):
and he is abouched four. Lethim enter in the name of the Lord
and be received in due form.Yo, Bros. John here, Hey,
check out this fellow Craft preview.This is on Crowley's liber four.
Here we're talking about section two ofthat book, which is all about the

(54:42):
elemental theory of magic. I fuckinglove this. He sort of talks about
all the tolls and items in theMagician's tool walks and it's super interesting.
It's a total of over one hundredand thirty nine minutes at content, just
on this, just on this section. There are three episodes available for the
fellow Craft here on subscribe Star.That's it's only three dollars tier. There's

(55:07):
also three episodes about the first sectionof liber four or Libra, and a
ton of other exclusive episodes available nowonly at subscribe Star. And it's the
fellow Craft Tier. There's only onetier. It's just one tier. Three
dollars. You get everything. Thankyou so much for your support. But

(55:30):
besides the altar, you need amagic circle. The circle announces the nature
of the great work. His circleshould not be too small and cramp his
movements. It should be not solarge that he has a long distance to

(55:51):
traverse. And once the circle ismade and consecrated, the magician must not
leave it or even outside, lesst be destroyed by the hostile forces that
are without. So we know thatCrowley, Krowley and McGregor mathers um translated

(56:15):
the Lesser Key of Solomon. Weknow that you go back and in the
archive and find those episodes. Inthose episodes, they have a very specific
thing of like what these magic circlesmust be like, and specifically, in
the Lesser Key of Solomon, themagic circle is accompanied by a magic triangle,

(56:39):
a triuboy, a triangle of manifestation, it's called, and that's placed
to the east side of the magiccircle. But these magic circles all they
all have very specific things, andyou go back and listen to this and
you can see that Crowley drags someof that along with him. You know

(57:00):
what. Some of the major critiquesof Crowley, And I'm I don't critique
Crawley. I'm not an expert enoughto critique anybody in this kind of stuff,
but a lot of critiques of Crowleyis that he just grabbed like dribbles
and drabbles of everything. He startedwith yoga and the Kabbala, and then

(57:22):
he started, you know, workingon these magic texts and he kind of
like algamated everything. And I'm notsure that's a fair critique because part of
his deal is that, you know, it's like the temperance of stuff,
it's the joining of the the opposite. So you know, maybe that's just
an extension of it. I don'tknow, maybe I'm a romanticizing Crowley a

(57:44):
little bit. But another thing thatwe don't do on this show is we
don't navel gays at these people.We just take we just look at their
work, right, we don't lookat their stories or whatever. So it's
just interesting point to ponder about thismagic circle business. Um, you know,

(58:04):
and in the lesser key of Solomon. The magic circle business was all
about, you know, the it'sall about summoning demons. So you're summon
the demon into the triangle and thenso he's he's separated from you, and
you're separated from it because you're insidethe circle. It's all very interesting.

(58:29):
And those Solomon books um are rifewith like, you know, doing incredibly
reckless things and then begging God tohelp you, you know, summoning demons
and then begging God to let tomake them do what you want them to

(58:50):
do. Uh. And I thinkwe're gonna see a little bit of that
as we get into this. Souh, he chooses, uh, he
chooses a circle rather than any otherlike lineal figure. The circle is chosen
because he affirms thereby his identity withthe infinite. He is within the infinite.

(59:15):
I guess that sounds like a toollyric. He affirms the equal balance
of his working, since all pointsat the circumference are equidistant from the center,
and he affirms the limitations applied byhis devotion of the great work,
and he no longer wanders about aimlesslyin the world. So this is a

(59:36):
reflection of what he was talking aboutin the mysticism section where he says,
like he talks at length, literallyreally about not fidgeting or being moving all
the time. He spends a lotof time talking about being still, and
the greater the animal, the morestill he has. You know, I

(01:00:00):
think he says something like, younever see like a silverback gorilla, like
with restless lake syndrome, that's ridiculous, and you're like, oh, you
know, those gigantic gorillas are allThey're all stoic and they only move when
they have to. And juxtaposing thatwith people like me who I have restless

(01:00:24):
lake syndrome. I'm not medicated forit, but I've always been cursed with
it, So that's interesting. Soone of these great apes are learn more
at the abercast dot com get graphicelements, notes, worksheets, and text
versions of selected episodes, as wellas access to the private Abercast work group

(01:00:49):
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