Universal principles are omniscient and omnipotent. Whether they are omnibenevolent is subject to debate and beyond the scope of this article. My focus here is on the importance of living your life in harmony with universal principles as the only possible way to retain your sanity in an increasingly insane world

Everyone — with the possible exception of Howard Dean, Dan Rather, and Homer Simpson — is familiar with George Santayana’s famous words, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Even a casual student of history is painfully aware that, notwithstanding how far mankind has advanced technologically, we continue to make the same mistakes today that our ancestors have made throughout history.

Sadly, when idealistic lads and lasses bid farewell to their clueless profs at Princeton, Harvard, and Yale, they have learned almost nothing about the lessons of history. Worse, the pudding heads who were in charge of teaching them have likely perverted the lessons of history to ensure that these future leaders of our society will make the same mistakes as their predecessors.

The great Thomas Sowell explained it even better than Santayana when he said, “Everything is new if you are ignorant of history. That is why ideas that have failed repeatedly in centuries past reappear again, under the banner of ‘change,’ to dazzle people and sweep them off their feet.”

Which in turn is why the words of Will Durant are so painfully accurate: “It may be true ... that ‘you can’t fool all the people all the time,’ but you can fool enough of them to rule a large country.” To appreciate just how true Durant’s words are, I suggest you go back and reread the fictional tale about two warring tribes on a faraway island on pages 54 and 55 of my most recent book, Action! Nothing Happens Until Something Moves.

How does all this relate to you and your ability to lead a full and meaningful life? To provide for your family? To achieve your most cherished goals?