Deceit

THE REAL FLAW IS NOT COVETOUSNESS OR PRIDE, but something deeper which underwrites each blessed vice: the delusion that a human has any agency at all . . . not merely a pawn caught up in a chess game between demon and deity or an arbitrary atomclap in the physicists mad, determinist trap, but presumes self an entity that ever had a choice to make in the first--or any--place. Whereas the fact of the matter is he was sold or saved before even taking to mind the pricked digit, the dotted line. As such, he was bought before even "he" was a "mind". As a matter of fact, he was paid for before Mind.

First, there is a mountain. Then there is no mountain. Then there is.
The above applies to all acts, even actions outrageously more banal than soul-selling or stage-strutting: the inevitable coursing of your eye over this line, the selection of the next link. Decided for you from the start. No control.

A card punched zero or one or on or off, all that remained was for it to be fed into the machine. Itself an illusion, and as for its business . . . [BLIP!]

pssst. . .sign the guestbook!