326 lines
13 KiB
Plaintext
326 lines
13 KiB
Plaintext
5 page printout
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Reproducible Electronic Publishing can defeat censorship.
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**** ****
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A MESSAGE TO AMERICA
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broadcast in the
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WORLD OF RELIGION
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PROGRAMME
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June 25, 1933
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from
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Coast to Coast
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by the
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National Broadcasting Company
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**** ****
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A MESSAGE TO AMERICA
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By Charles Francis Potter
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Founder and Leader of
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The First Humanist Society of New York
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We people of America have passed through a period of great
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stress. We need fresh courage and faith for the adventurous years
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now looming before us. Although there are streaks of dawn on the
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horizon, millions of our people are still unemployed and millions
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more are still staggering from fhe blows dealt not only to our
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pocketbooks, but also to our pride and self-respect and to our
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feeling of confidence and security.
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Let us beware of placing all the responsibility for recovery
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on any one man or any particular group of men. There are in
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Washington and London men of the highest calibre and ability
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laboring valiantly fo create order out of the world's economic
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chaos.
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But recovery is in the last analysis a thing that is up to us.
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Upon the common man and the average citizen depends the stability
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of the future. The real hope of a fairer world resides not on
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Pennsylvania Avenue. not on Wall Street, but upon Main Streef.
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Salvation will not come floating down from fhe skies on angels'
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wings: it will come marching in on feet, -- your feet.
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And recovery is not primarily an economic matter. Gold
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standard or not, tariff or nof, -- however important these economic
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and political matters may be, the recovery of the morale of the
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world is, after all, a psychological and spiritual matter. Recovery
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from depression is really a matter of faith. In the broad sense, it
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is a religious thing.
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Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
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1
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A MESSAGE TO AMERICA
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If every man and woman in the country should have money and
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leisure in plenty beyond the fondest dreams of our Utopians, what
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really matters is how he spends that money and how he uses that
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leisure. "What doth if profit a man if he gains the whole world and
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loses his own soul?"
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This old world is hungry for fresh faith. Our souls have been
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made sick unfo death trying to exist on a liquid diet of
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sentimentalify and wishful thinking. We turned from that to the dry
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husks of mechanistic materialism. That was even worse. We need a
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fresh supply of vitamins in our spiritual food. We need to tap new
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sources of the stuff which makes character. We must build a new
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house of faith on the rock-ribbed ledges of the eternal verities of
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life, a house with its windows open wide to the sunrise of hope and
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gladness and open to the fresh breezes which will blow away our
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ancient fears and prejudices. The only way to overcome fear, our
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present malady, is by faith.
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Believe me, friends, we need faith, fresh faith, a bigger
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faith for a beffer world, a new deal in religion.
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Where shall we find this fresh faith? We shall find it where
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man has always found new sfrengfh to meet the crises of life, --
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within. The history of the progress of fhe human race has been the
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record of fhe increasing development of previously unused and
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frequently unsuspected resources and powers within man himself.
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The resources of human personality are still largely
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undeveloped. Experts on brain andtomy tell us that our present
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human brain with its countless quintillions of telephone lines is
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in an intermediate stage between what we have been and what we may
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become. It has grown as we have used it. Thinking is the way
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evolution is going on through us. Let us not hender evolution.
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And let us frequenfly remind ourselves, especially in moments
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of doubt, that there are more than enough spiritual reserves within
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us to meet any emergency demand.
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If has been Said thdt South Americd is the continent of
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opportunify. That is true, but there is a greater. The continent of
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opportunity, as yet unexplored and undeveloped, is human
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personality. We have only skirted the coast. A few brave explorers
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have ventured a little way up the larger rivers and have glimpsed
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the great mountain ranges of the interior, but the great riches of
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the inrerior are still to be tapped.
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What we need to do right now is to quit our doubts and
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hesitancies and despairs and dare to believe in ourselves. Faith in
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man, -- faith in the supreme value of human personality, -- faith
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in the self-improvabilify of man, -- this is the faith we need.
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With the poet we cry. --
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"O, doubters of democracy,
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Undo your mean contemptuous art!"
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Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
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2
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A MESSAGE TO AMERICA
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The cures for the ills of democracy are in democracy itself,
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but it musf be an alerf and intelligent democracy with faith in
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itself and in all mankind.
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And you must begin at home, with faith in yourself,
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personarly. Dare to rise from all despairs and impotencies, all
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doubfs of your own possibilities, all fears of failure.
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Much of our sense of inadequacy is due to the failure to
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recognize how much power and momentum we have. The whole dynamic of
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evolution is behind us. If we harness and direct it. we can reshape
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our world.
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Remember that in you is visible, in your very body and mind is
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written with indelible characters the whole history of life itself.
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Your very consciousness, your ability to recognize yourself as
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a separate self, testifies to your superiority to the animal and
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the clod. if, as one has said, "Life was sleeping in matter,
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dreaming in animals, and waked in man, then the awakened man,
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conscious, alert, aware of his powers, is himself a culmination of
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all that came before him in the evolutionary process.
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There is dawning on man the startling recognition that he
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himself is the evolving cosmic energy in the very process of taking
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on consciousness. The universe is becoming conscious in him!
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In proportion, then, as he becomes more conscious and self-
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recognizing, he promotes the development of the life-force itself.
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In him the struggle of life proceeds, reverting only too frequently
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to animal and even vegetable stages, but ever reaching upward again
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to higher and better states of consciousness. He is the crucial
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point of the higher evolution, the topmost bud-tip of the tree of
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life.
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Man has become conscious enough to direct to some extent the
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progress of the eternal energy within himself and outside himself.
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He partakes in creative evolution. The energy which is outside
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himself he must lay hold on and approprate for the betterment of
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mankind. The transfer of energy to serve the ends of higher
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personality is the greatest task of civilization.
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Humanistic religion deals with the relation of the individual
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to this power or energy resident in himself and in the universe.
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and concerns itself particularly with the growth of fhe higher
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consciousness or personalify of man, socally and individually,
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believing that man is potentially able by his own efforts to attain
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to the complete and perfected personality to which all religion
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aspires.
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If anyone questions the ability of man to direct the cosmic
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energy for the betterment of mankind, let him note that man has
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already accomplished wonders beside which the alleged miracles of
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the past seem simple things indeed. We can smile at Elijah and his
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chariot of fire now that we can fly from one coast of this vast
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continent to the other in the light of a single day. Man's hand,
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which, not so long ago, held a smoking pine torch, now, by the mere
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pressing of a button, floods a whole house or a whole city with
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light.
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Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
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3
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A MESSAGE TO AMERICA
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And man's mechanical progress has been paralleled by social
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and economic, yes, even by spirifual progress. The Golden Age is
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not in the past but in the future. Man has still a long way to go,
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but he has also come a long way. He can look back with pride at his
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progress, and therefore may look ahead with courage and equanimity.
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There are false prophets who glibly say that it is useless to
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struggle, for human nature never changes. But, as Dr. Hocking of
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Harvard said, the fact is that it is human nature to change.
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There is an eternal must in us, the product of the strivings
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of the life force through endless ages of upthrust. We cannot
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remain satisfied with our partial achievements. Our own
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personalities demand their own self-improvement. Unless man stifles
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the cosmic urge within him, his self-development proceeds
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throughout his life. The scattered parts of his personality swing
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into place and become integrated as he gradually subordinates the
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lower to the higher within himself. Of such improved men are great
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civilizations made, and some of us dare to believe that we are
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witnessing the birth of a great new era.
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America is already great, but it will become greater in
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proportion as we improve ourselves individually and socially. Let
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us remember that "self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control:
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these three alone lead life to sovereign power." If we "sit not
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with folded hands calling on Hercules," but ever do our personal
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and civic duty, calling on the reserves of our own personalities,
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then perhaps our salvation will be nearer than we have believed.
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FAITH IN MAN, that is my creed, in three words. And that, my
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friends, is the very core of the new religion called) Humanism.
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Address all communications to
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THE FIRST HUMANIST SOCIETY OF NEW YORK
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(Incorporated)
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Suite 1617-18
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Steinway Building 113 West 57th Street
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New York City
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LIST OF COOPERATING STATIONS
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WJZ New York City WEBCSuperior, Wis.
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WBAL Baltimore, Md. KFYRBismarck, N. Dak.
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WMAL Washington, D.C. WSM Nashville, Tenn.
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WBZ Boston. Mass. WSB Atlanta, Ga.
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WBZ.A Springfield, Mass. WMC Memphis, Tenn.
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WHAM Rochesfer, N.Y. WJDX Jackson, Miss.
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WSYR Syracuse, N.Y. WSMB New Orleans, La.
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WGAR Cleveland. Ohio KVOO Tulsa. Okla.
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WCFL Chicago, ill. WKY Oklahoma City, Okla.
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WCKY Covington, Ky. WBAP Fort Worth. Texas
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Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
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4
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A MESSAGE TO AMERICA
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KWK St. Louis, Mo. KTBS Shreveport, La.
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KWCR Cedar Rapids, Ia. WOAI San Antonio. Texas
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WREN Kansas City, Mo. KOA Denver, Colo.
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KOIL Council Bluffs, Ia. KDYL Salt Lake City, Utah
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KOIL Omaha, Neb. KGIR Butte. Montana
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WRVA Richmond, Va. KGHL Billings, Montana
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WPTF Raleigh, N.C. KGO San Francisco. Cal.
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WWNC Asheville, N.C. KGW Portland, Oregon
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WIS Columbia, S.C. KHQ Spokane, Wash.
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WJAX Jacksonville, Fla. KFSD San Diego, Cal.
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WIOD Miami Beach, Fla. KTAR Phoenix, Ariz.
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WFLA Tampa, Fla. WSUN Clearwafer, Fla.
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VI/TMJ Milwaukee, Wis. WJR Detroit, Mich.
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WIBA Madison, Wis. KSO Des Moines, Iowa
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KSTP Minneapolis, Minn. WDAY Fargo, N. Dak.
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KSTP St. Paul. Minn. KPRC Houston. Texas
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WEBC Duluth. Minn. CKGW Toronto, Canada
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**** ****
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Reproducible Electronic Publishing can defeat censorship.
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||
**** ****
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The Bank of Wisdom is a collection of the most thoughtful,
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scholarly and factual books. These computer books are reprints of
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suppressed books and will cover American and world history; the
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Biographies and writings of famous persons, and especially of our
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nations Founding Fathers. They will include philosophy and
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religion. all these subjects, and more, will be made available to
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the public in electronic form, easily copied and distributed, so
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that America can again become what its Founders intended --
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|
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The Free Market-Place of Ideas.
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The Bank of Wisdom is always looking for more of these old,
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||
hidden, suppressed and forgotten books that contain needed facts
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and information for today. If you have such books please contact
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us, we need to give them back to America.
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**** ****
|
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Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
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5
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