This I Believe

J here. As some of you may know, I am a huge fan of the
works of Robert A. Heinlein. Along with a pragmatic,
deeply honest, and slightly cynical worldview, his
writings show a deep optimistic belief in humankind.
It's a magnificent combination and often refreshes me
when I find myself slipping too much to one extreme
or the other.

Robert A. Heinlein wrote this item in 1952. His wife,
Virginia Heinlein, chose to read it when she accepted
NASA's Distinguished Public Service Medal on
October 6, 1988, on the Grand Master's behalf
(it was a posthumous award).

Mrs. Heinlein received a standing ovation.

"I am not going to talk about religious beliefs but about matters
so obvious that it has gone out of style to mention them. I
believe in my neighbors. I know their faults, and I know that
their virtues far outweigh their faults. Take Father Michael
down our road a piece. I'm not of his creed, but I know that
goodness and charity and loving-kindness shine in his daily
actions. I believe in Father Mike. If I'm in trouble, I'll go to
him."

"My next-door neighbor is a veterinary doctor. Doc will get out
of bed after a hard day to help a stray cat. No fee--no prospect
of a fee--I believe in Doc."

"I believe in my townspeople. You can know on any door in our
town saying, 'I'm hungry,' and you will be fed. Our town is no
exception. I've found the same ready charity everywhere. But for
the one who says, 'To heck with you - I got mine,' there are a
hundred, a thousand who will say, 'Sure, pal, sit down.'"

"I know that despite all warnings against hitchhikers I can step
up to the highway, thumb for a ride and in a few minutes a car or
a truck will stop and someone will say, 'Climb in Mac - how far
you going?'"

"I believe in my fellow citizens. Our headlines are splashed with
crime yet for every criminal there are 10,000 honest, decent,
kindly men. If it were not so, no child would live to grow up.
Business could not go on from day to day. Decency is not news. It
is buried in the obituaries, but is a force stronger than crime."

"I believe in the patient gallantry of nurses and the tedious
sacrifices of teachers. I believe in the unseen and unending
fight against desperate odds that goes on quietly in almost every
home in the land."

"I believe in the honest craft of workmen. Take a look around
you. There never were enough bosses to check up on all that work.
From Independence Hall to the Grand Coulee Dam, these things
were built level and square by craftsmen who were honest in their
bones."

"I believe that almost all politicians are honest. . .there are
hundreds of politicians, low paid or not paid at all, doing their
level best without thanks or glory to make our system work. If
this were not true we would never have gotten past the 13 colonies."

"I believe in Rodger Young. You and I are free today because of
endless unnamed heroes from Valley Forge to the Yalu River. I
believe in -- I am proud to belong to -- the United States.
Despite shortcomings from lynchings to bad faith in high places,
our nation has had the most decent and kindly internal practices
and foreign policies to be found anywhere in history."

"And finally, I believe in my whole race. Yellow, white, black,
red, brown. In the honesty, courage, intelligence, durability,
and goodness of the overwhelming majority of my brothers and
sisters everywhere on this planet. I am proud to be a human
being. I believe that we have come this far by the skin of our
teeth. That we always make it just by the skin of our teeth, but
that we will always make it. Survive. Endure. I believe that this
hairless embryo with the aching, oversize brain case and the
opposable thumb, this animal barely up from the apes will endure.
Will endure longer than his home planet -- will spread out to the
stars and beyond, carrying with him his honesty and his
insatiable curiosity, his unlimited courage and his noble
essential decency."

"This I believe with all my heart."