An Excerpt from the book- I THE GOLDEN RULE Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same. Never resist prove all hold fast that which is good. Do not love your neighbor as yourself. If you are on good terms with yourself it is an if on bad, an injury. The golden rule is that there are no golden rules. IDOLATRY The art of government is the organization of idolatry. The bureaucracy consists of functionaries; the aristocracy, of idols; the democracy, of idolaters. The populace cannot understand the it can only worship the national idols. The savage bows down to idols of wood and the civilized man to idols of flesh and blood. A limited monarchy is a device for combining the inertia of a wooden idol with the credibility of a flesh and blood one. When the wooden idol does not answer the peasant's prayer, he beats when the flesh and blood idol does not satisfy the civilized man, he cuts its head off. He who slays a king and he who dies for him are alike idolaters.
Author
George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright, socialist, and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama. Over the course of his life he wrote more than 60 plays. Nearly all his plays address prevailing social problems, but each also includes a vein of comedy that makes their stark themes more palatable. In these works Shaw examined education, marriage, religion, government, health care, and class privilege. An ardent socialist, Shaw was angered by what he perceived to be the exploitation of the working class. He wrote many brochures and speeches for the Fabian Society. He became an accomplished orator in the furtherance of its causes, which included gaining equal rights for men and women, alleviating abuses of the working class, rescinding private ownership of productive land, and promoting healthy lifestyles. For a short time he was active in local politics, serving on the London County Council. In 1898, Shaw married Charlotte Payne-Townshend, a fellow Fabian, whom he survived. They settled in Ayot St. Lawrence in a house now called Shaw's Corner. He is the only person to have been awarded both a Nobel Prize for Literature (1925) and an Oscar (1938). The former for his contributions to literature and the latter for his work on the film "Pygmalion" (adaptation of his play of the same name). Shaw wanted to refuse his Nobel Prize outright, as he had no desire for public honours, but he accepted it at his wife's behest. She considered it a tribute to Ireland. He did reject the monetary award, requesting it be used to finance translation of Swedish books to English. Shaw died at Shaw's Corner, aged 94, from chronic health problems exacerbated by injuries incurred by falling.
