Why do I strive so much to convince you, my dear audience, that you are inherently benevolent and, for a lack of a more precise term, “good”? The reason is that for the longest time, I have longed to hear it. For the longest time, I was convinced that I am ultimately flawed, flawed beyond repair, irreversibly damaged, too sickly to be of help. For the longest time, I have lived in the shadow of fear, continuous fear of a fellow man. I dared not to reach out and ask for help, ask for reassurance, for acceptance, for fellowship. I hid, under the innumerable blankets of insecurity, hateful delusions, overly cautious demeanor, frightened as a child who has been abandoned. And abandoned child I had been, for too long, and out of the depths of my despair, I've heard voices of those who came before me. Whispers of dust-laiden manuscripts, faint at first, then louder and more confidently, have revealed to me all the possibilities for kindness and compassion of which humankind is capable of. And for the longest time, I refused to believe them. I feared so greatly to be let down, to be betrayed by the tales of yore, to be proven wrong, once again. But the more I live with my eyes half-opened, the more I dare to open them, just a little more. To see the glimpses of truth, the fairy lights of possibilities, the dawns, that keep coming, day after day. And I come to you, my reader, my friend, with my honest plea – give humanity another chance. Look into the vast plains of human capabilities. Stare boldly at the stars that used to be alive. See all the amazing feats of wisdom and insight left for us to ponder upon. See that another life is possible, new life, in which men treat each other as fellow men, and produce to sustain, not to destroy.