JEREMY BOWMAN
e-mail:		jeremyphilosophy-type.com
text/phone:		+353 87 2270515
Skype™:		jbepyks

"Inner Light" is a subsidiary of philosophy-type dedicated to non-print media. The 'Inner Light' trade name and logo will appear in all websites created and maintained by me. Contact details are the same as those provided on other pages of the website.

The Inner Light is one of the finest Indian-inspired songs that George Harrison performed with the Beatles. It was released in 1968 as the B-side to Lady Madonna. It seems to me that the words are especially appropriate to our "Internet Age", when so much can be discovered simply by looking at a computer screen and adopting a skeptical attitude. (And the fact remains that nothing narrows the mind like foreign travel.)

Without going out of my door
I can know all things on earth
Without looking out of my window
I can know the ways of heaven

The farther one travels
The less one knows
The less one really knows

Without going out of your door
You can know all things on earth
Without looking out of your window
You can know the ways of heaven

The farther one travels
The less one knows
The less one really knows

Arrive without traveling
See all without looking
Do all without doing

The above is George Harrison's own rendition of chapter of 47 of the Lao Tzu. Here is a direct translation:

Without stirring abroad
One can know the whole world;
Without looking out of the window
One can see the way of heaven.
The further one goes
The less one knows.
Therefore the sage knows without having to stir
Identifies without having to see,
Accomplishes without having to act.

(From the Penguin Classics edition of the Lao tzu, translated by D.C. Lau.)