When you seek expert opinion, remember that you don’t know exactly what it will be (or you wouldn’t be making the consultation), but that you’ve come to ask. If the result is something you can’t control, then it’s neither good nor evil. So leave your longings and loathings behind when you consult the expert, or you’ll go in a state of fear. Instead, decide beforehand that the result will be acceptable, because you will make good use of it – and no one can stop you. Then you can approach the expert with confidence. Let God work through the expert, and remember whose advice you’re neglecting if you ignore the opinion rendered.

Seek out experts, as Socrates might have advised, when the entire question is the outcome, and your own reason and expertise can produce no answer. When duty is clear – to put yourself at risk to help a friend or the community – there’s no need to get an expert to tell it to you. You’d probably be told that doing the right thing will cost you money, time, trouble or danger. But reason tells you to do your duty in any event. The greatest expert of ancient times, the oracle at Delphi, made no bones about it when throwing out a questioner who had failed to do his duty and ran when his friend was being murdered on the road.