Curiosity

James Vila Blake, Sonnets from Marcus Aurelius 31

31. 

ἢ τὸ μὲν τοῦ λύχνου φῶς, μέχρι σβεσθῇ, φαίνει καὶ τὴν αὐγὴν οὐκ ἀποβάλλει: ἡ δὲ ἐν σοὶ ἀλήθεια καὶ δικαιοσύνη καὶ σωφροσύνη προαποσβήσεται; 

A lighted lamp continues its glow and remits not its radiance until the flame is quenched; and shall the blaze of truth that is in you, and the light of justice and the beam of temperance be extinguished, while you yet exist here.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 12.15 

31. 

The night is long, the candle burneth low, 

Yet giveth me its faithfulness of light 

As when ’twas new and tall; ’tis constant so, 

And constant still will be, a golden sight.

Its upright pencil and unlessened shine 

Have been so from its first enkindled beam, 

And so will be until its stock decline 

And all its flesh dissolve as in a dream 

'Twere shame indeed if so the candle shame thee; 

For what, my soul! shall beamy powers that store thee 

With honor, soberness and peace, defame thee 

By smoky ire and going out before thee? 

Our ruling part divine, it is most sure, 

Should rule the while the ruled parts endure. 

* * * * * 

EPODE 

In sum: Doth thy soul lapse in poorer mine, 

Or am I quenched in thee?—that is the query. 

How can I answer, or in what design 

Marshal my hours now ultimate and weary? 

For should I crave thy glory’s rich estate, 

Then were thy better bounties for me crossed; 

Yet if before thy soul my soul abate, 

My freedom is engrossed in thee and lost. 

But we together, and both i' the sun, can walk, 

Commune of friend and foe, of sky and earth, 

Of trees, rains, rivers, birds, with starry talk; 

Yet in my way I have the dearer mirth: 

I hallow can, and chant, thy lofty light, 

As thou canst not my dimmer lowly plight.

IMAGE: Jan Moraczynski, Vanitas (1851) 

Plutarch, The Life of Cato the Younger 32

By these utterances Cato brought the senate to unanimity, and many men outside the senate supported him out of displeasure at the strange conduct of Caesar; for whatever political schemes the boldest and most arrogant tribunes were wont to practice to win the favor of the multitude, these Caesar used with the support of consular power, in disgraceful and humiliating attempts to ingratiate himself with the people.⁠ 

Accordingly, the opponents of Cato were alarmed and had recourse to violence. To begin with, upon Bibulus himself, as he was going down into the forum, a basket of ordure was scattered; then the crowd fell upon his lictors and broke their fasces; and finally missiles flew and many persons were wounded.⁠ 

All the other senators fled from the forum at a run, but Cato went off last of all at a walk, turning about and protesting to the citizens. Accordingly, not only was the law for the distribution of lands passed, but also a clause was added requiring the whole senate to swear solemnly that it would uphold the law, and give its aid in case any one should act contrary to it, and heavy penalties were pronounced against such as would not take the oath.⁠ 

All took the oath, therefore, under compulsion, bearing in mind the fate of Metellus of old, whom the people suffered to be banished from Italy because he would not swear to a similar law.⁠ For this reason, also, did the women of Cato's family earnestly and with tears beseech him to yield and take the oath, earnestly, too, did his friends and intimates. 

But the one who was most success­ful in persuading and indu­cing him to take the oath was Cicero the orator, who advised and showed him that it was possibly even a wrong thing to think himself alone in duty bound to disobey the general will; and that his desperate conduct, where it was impossible to make any change in what had been done, was altogether senseless and mad. 

Moreover, it would be the greatest of evils if he should abandon the city in behalf of which all his efforts had been made, hand her over to her enemies, and so, apparently with pleasure, get rid of his struggles in her defense; for even if Cato did not need Rome, still, Rome needed Cato, and so did all his friends; and among these Cicero said that he himself was foremost, since he was the object of the plots of Clodius, who was openly attacking him by means of the tribune­ship. 

By these and similar arguments and entreaties, we are told, both at home and in the forum, Cato was softened and at last prevailed upon. He came forward to take the oath last of all, except Favonius, one of his friends and intimates. 

Seneca, Moral Letters 86.3

I have so far been speaking of the ordinary bathing establishments; what shall I say when I come to those of the freedmen? What a vast number of statues, of columns that support nothing, but are built for decoration, merely in order to spend money! And what masses of water that fall crashing from level to level! We have become so luxurious that we will have nothing but precious stones to walk upon. 
 
In this bath of Scipio’s there are tiny chinks—you cannot call them windows—cut out of the stone wall in such a way as to admit light without weakening the fortifications; nowadays, however, people regard baths as fit only for moths if they have not been so arranged that they receive the sun all day long through the widest of windows, if men cannot bathe and get a coat of tan at the same time, and if they cannot look out from their bathtubs over stretches of land and sea. 
 
So it goes; the establishments which had drawn crowds and had won admiration when they were first opened are avoided and put back in the category of venerable antiques as soon as luxury has worked out some new device, to her own ultimate undoing. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 86 
 
Despite my griping, I am wary of those who glorify the past, just as I am wary of those who latch onto the latest craze. In both cases, the extremes arise from a failure to build our lives on a firm foundation, the timeless truths that are never at the mercy of either obstinacy or volatility. As long as humans remain humans, the virtues will remain virtues. 
 
Regardless of the fashions, the best sort of bathtub will help us to wash away the day’s grime and to soothe our aching muscles; how strange that those who never seem to break a sweat from an honest day’s work are the ones most concerned with installing the most elaborate fixtures. 
 
There is no shame in convenience, as long as it does not conflict with conscience, but the pursuit of luxury leads us down a path toward decadence, where the essence is confused with the accidents, and character is compromised for the sake of comfort. It is no longer “aesthetics” once the beautiful is reduced to mere indulgence. You will sadly find this to be a symptom of any decaying culture. 
 
Just as the ancient Romans became obsessed with opulent baths, I think of how modern Americans seek out ever more hedonistic ways to spend their money. As a child, I saw the birth of the mighty shopping malls, and yet within a decade they were already being replaced by far more exciting diversions, which contained a whole new set of amusements. 
 
The old buildings slowly decayed, the big brands moving out in favor of discount stores, massage parlors, insurance offices, and evangelical churches. Now most of them are being torn down, to be replaced by luxury condominiums. 
 
It is much the same with restaurants, movie theaters, and hotels. Whole neighborhoods will rise and fall because people refuse to be happy with a life that is pure and simple. The High Street seems to rotate its trendy shops by the month, like the internet crazes change by the week, or even by the day. 
 
Only those who lack a peace within themselves are forever craving their next fix. We believe the fads to be daring and liberating, when they are really just lazy and slavish. 

—Reflection written in 1/2014 

The Field of the Slain

Evelyn De Morgan, The Field of the Slain (1916) 

The Storm Spirits

Evelyn De Morgan, The Storm Spirits (c. 1900) 

White Heron

"White Heron" 

John Ciardi (1916-1986) 

What lifts the heron leaning on the air 
I praise without a name. A crouch, a flare, 
a long stroke through the cumulus of trees, 
a shaped thought at the sky — then gone. O rare! 
Saint Francis, being happiest on his knees, 
would have cried Father! Cry anything you please 

But praise. By any name or none. But praise 
the white original burst that lights 
the heron on his two soft kissing kites. 
When saints praise heaven lit by doves and rays, 
I sit by pond scums till the air recites 
It’s heron back. And doubt all else. But praise. 

Happy the Man

"Happy the Man" 

John Dryden (1631-1700) 

from Horace 

Happy the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call today his own:
He who, secure within, can say,
Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.
Be fair or foul or rain or shine
The joys I have possessed, in spite of fate, are mine.
Not Heaven itself upon the past has power,
But what has been, has been, and I have had my hour. 

IMAGE: William Blake, John Dryden (c. 1800) 

Justus Lipsius, On Constancy 1.19

The fourth and true kind of destiny expounded. The name briefly spoken of, it is lightly defined, and proved to differ from providence. 

"This much may suffice touching the opinions and dissensions of the ancients. For why should I overcuriously search the secrets of hell, as the proverb says? I shall have enough to do with true destiny, which now I propound and illustrate, calling it an eternal decree of God's providence, which cannot be taken away no more than providence itself. 

"And let not any man cavil with me about the name, because I say there is not in Latin another proper word to express that thing but fatum. What? Have old writers abused it? Let us use it: and so enlarging this word out of the prison of the Stoics, let us bring it to a better light. 

"It is called in Latin fatum from fando, of speaking, neither is it anything else properly but the saying and commandment of God: and this is it which now I seek for; I define it either with that famous Picus, a rank and order of causes depending upon God's counsel, or with my own words more obscurely and subtly, an immovable decree of providence inherent in things movable, which firmly effects everything in its order, place, and time. 

"I call it 'a decree of providence' because I agree not wholly with the divines of our days (let them give me leave in the free study of the truth) who in name and nature confound it with providence. I know it be a hard matter, and full of temerity to conceive or restrain unto certain words that supernatural and supercelestial essence—I mean God—or ought that belongs to him; yet unto any man's capacity I defend and maintain that providence is one thing properly, and fate or destiny another. 

"For I consider providence no otherwise then that it be a power and faculty in God of seeing, knowing and governing all things. A power, I say, universal, undivided, guarded, and as Lucretius speaks, united together. But destiny seems to descend into the things themselves and to be seen in the particulars of them, being as it were a disposing and bestowing abroad of that universal providence, by particulars. 

"Therefore, providence is in God, and attributed to him alone; destiny in the things, and to them is ascribed. You think I trifle, and, as it is said, bore holes in millet seed; no, Lipsius, I take this out of the talk of the common people, among whom nothing is more usual than to say, 'this was my good or evil destiny'; and likewise, 'this was the fatal decree of this kingdom, or that town.'

"But no man speaks so of providence, no man applies it to the things themselves, without impiety and derision. Therefore, I said well, that the one of them was in God, the other truly from God, and perceived in the selfsame things. 

"I say, moreover, that though providence be not really divided from destiny, yet it is more excellent and more ancient; even as we are taught in the schools of the wise to say that the sun is more worth than the light; eternity than time; understanding than reason. But to draw into a short summary these curious not common matters: you see that I have just cause both to use this distinction and also to retain the name of destiny against the new consistory of divines. 

"For why? Those ancient, celebrated fathers prohibit me not but that I may use in its right and true sense the word destiny. But now that I may return to make plain my former definition, I said it was an inherent decree, to show that destiny should be marked in the things to which it comes, and not from whence it proceeds. 

"I added, 'in movable things', signifying that although destiny itself be immovable, yet it takes not away motion, nor any natural faculty from things, but works easily and without force even as the marks and signs imprinted by God in each thing do require. 

"In causes—secondary, I mean—that be necessary, it works necessarily; in natural causes, naturally; in voluntary causes, voluntarily; in contingent, contingently. Wherefore in respect of the things it does neither force, nor constrain; but as everything is made to do, or suffer, so it directs and turns all things. But if you recall it to its first original, I mean God and his providence, I affirm constantly and boldly that all things are done necessarily, which are done by destiny.

"Lastly, I joined 'of the order, place, and time', establishing that which I said before, that providence was of things in universality, destiny by distribution in particularities. By 'order', I understand the course and united together of causes which destiny limits. By 'place and time' I mean that wonderful and incomprehensible power whereby all events or actions are tied to their certain places and moments of time. 

"It was destiny that Tarquin should be banished from his kingdom. Be it so; but first let the adultery be committed. You see the order of the causes. It was destiny that Caesar be killed. So; but in the Senate by the image of Pompey. You see the place. That Domitian should be murdered by his own people. Let him be murdered; but yet at the very hour, even the fifth, which in vain he sought to prevent. Thus you see the time." 

IMAGE: Master of Marradi, The Expulsion of King Tarquin (c. 1480) 

Seneca, Moral Letters 86.2

I have inspected the house, which is constructed of hewn stone; the wall which encloses a forest; the towers also, buttressed out on both sides for the purpose of defending the house; the well, concealed among buildings and shrubbery, large enough to keep a whole army supplied; and the small bath, buried in darkness according to the old style, for our ancestors did not think that one could have a hot bath except in darkness. 
 
It was therefore a great pleasure to me to contrast Scipio’s ways with our own. Think, in this tiny recess the “terror of Carthage,” to whom Rome should offer thanks because she was not captured more than once, used to bathe a body wearied with work in the fields! 
 
For he was accustomed to keep himself busy and to cultivate the soil with his own hands, as the good old Romans were wont to do. Beneath this dingy roof he stood; and this floor, mean as it is, bore his weight. 
 
But who in these days could bear to bathe in such a fashion? We think ourselves poor and mean if our walls are not resplendent with large and costly mirrors; if our marbles from Alexandria are not set off by mosaics of Numidian stone, if their borders are not faced over on all sides with difficult patterns, arranged in many colors like paintings; if our vaulted ceilings are not buried in glass; if our swimming-pools are not lined with Thasian marble, once a rare and wonderful sight in any temple—pools into which we let down our bodies after they have been drained weak by abundant perspiration; and finally, if the water has not poured from silver spigots. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 86 
 
If you carefully examine the contents of a man’s home, you also can learn much about the content of his character. 
 
This is only possible, however, if we do not confuse preferences with principles, the style for the substance, since in matters of taste there can be no dispute. Consider instead how a choice of surroundings reflects a deeper judgment about the perceived goods in life, and whether the furnishings are intended to gratify the body or to dignify the soul. 
 
This has less to do with how much we might possess, and more to do with why we might wish to possess it. Is the house a place to grow in love, or is it a means to impress the neighbors? Are those books consulted for the sake of wisdom, or they displayed for the sake of putting on an act? Observe the setting, and you will soon have your answer. 
 
I cannot claim to understand the Roman customs about bathing, but I have noticed how Americans are increasingly concerned about the size of their kitchens. This seems odd, because our families are far smaller than they ever were, and we cook far less than we ever did. 
 
I compare my grandmother, who would prepare meals all day in a space not much larger than a closet, to my boss’s trophy wife, who displays a row of unused cappuccino makers on her granite countertops. 
 
I am confused when the pantry in a McMansion has its own echo. I can’t figure out why a man has three different grills on his patio, and yet he only orders out from Rib Crib. If there are towels in the guest bathroom, I shouldn’t have to worry about drying my hands with them. If the pair of 4x4 trucks in the driveway are meant to make you look like a gentleman farmer, I would at least expect there to be some mud on the fenders. 
 
As for my own bathroom, our real estate agent insisted that the cavernous jacuzzi was a major selling point, and yet I miss the cozy tub of my youth. I don’t need mood lighting to brush my teeth, or a dozen mirrors to comb my hair. And still, my mailbox is full of brochures about updating my obsolete conveniences: “Act now, before it’s too late!” 
 
Through all of this nonsense, my trusty tomcat is happy to do all of his business in the field behind the house. 

—Reflection written in 1/2014 

IMAGE: Fortunino Matania, A Roman Senator in His Lakeside Villa (c. 1920) 

Personality Types

Various Philosophies

Sayings of Ramakrishna 291

As long as there is no breeze blowing, we fan ourselves to alleviate heat, but when the breeze blows both for rich and poor, we give up fanning. 

We should persevere ourselves to reach our final goal as long as there is no help from above; but when that help comes to any, let him then stop laboring and persevering; otherwise not. 

Seneca, Moral Letters 86.1

Letter 86: On Scipio’s villa  
 
I am resting at the country house which once belonged to Scipio Africanus himself; and I write to you after doing reverence to his spirit and to an altar which I am inclined to think is the tomb of that great warrior. 
 
That his soul has indeed returned to the skies, whence it came, I am convinced, not because he commanded mighty armies—for Cambyses also had mighty armies, and Cambyses was a madman who made successful use of his madness—but because he showed moderation and a sense of duty to a marvelous extent. 
 
I regard this trait in him as more admirable after his withdrawal from his native land than while he was defending her; for there was the alternative: Scipio should remain in Rome, or Rome should remain free. 
 
“It is my wish,” said he, “not to infringe in the least upon our laws, or upon our customs; let all Roman citizens have equal rights. O my country, make the most of the good that I have done, but without me. I have been the cause of your freedom, and I shall also be its proof; I go into exile, if it is true that I have grown beyond what is to your advantage!” 
 
What can I do but admire this magnanimity, which led him to withdraw into voluntary exile and to relieve the state of its burden? Matters had gone so far that either liberty must work harm to Scipio, or Scipio to liberty. Either of these things was wrong in the sight of heaven. 
 
So he gave way to the laws and withdrew to Liternum, thinking to make the state a debtor for his own exile no less than for the exile of Hannibal. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 86 
 
I first came to Stoicism because it offered me the only practical solution to a very pressing problem: whatever am I to do about the burden of my pain? It asks me to take the basic principles of my nature—about what is good, what is bad, and what is indifferent—and then to directly apply these values in my daily living. The school only appears radical or esoteric if we fail to recognize how it draws all of its conclusions from the universal truths held by any of the world’s wisdom traditions. 
 
It didn’t hurt, however, that I also had an immediate attraction to the peculiar styles of its authors. Musonius Rufus speaks like the teacher I always wished I had. Epictetus has the knack for knocking some sense back into me. Marcus Aurelius expertly calms my wayward passions. And Seneca is the old codger who reminds me why it is okay for me to be a young codger.
 
Those who care for me have sometimes called me an “old soul”, while those who don’t care for me are likely to describe me as an insufferable curmudgeon. My inclinations tend toward the melancholic, the romantic, and the nostalgic, which make for an interesting brew, such that I will often come across as a hopeless idealist who yearns for some long-lost world. 
 
So, while many people will skip this letter, I find it fascinating to read a retired patrician’s musings about his stay in the former home of a Roman hero. If you are patient, you may find how his glorification of the past can be a guide for our future, and why his pensive observations about bathing and gardening are actually timeless insights into the best and the worst of the human condition. 
 
I am not in the habit of deifying a mortal, but despite the flaws he surely possessed, the Stoics were quite right to praise the character of Scipio Africanus. I regularly turn to the story of his continence during the Second Punic War, to the point where I seek out its depiction in art, but here Seneca admires a moment from his later life, when Scipio was happy to withdraw from the public square, as his continued presence could only lead to greater partisan squabbling. 
 
How often do we find a soldier who can refuse the spoils of war? How often do we find a politician who can resist the temptation of further glory? We are fools to think that a man who cannot rule himself in the bedroom is fit to rule a nation, or that those who only serve their vanity are ever worthy of being served by their subjects. Scipio understood why his own good and the good of his people were always one and the same. 
 
I suppose that might sound a little too crotchety and reactionary for some? At least I am in the good company of Seneca, who understood why the best way is not necessarily the same as the fashionable way. I often think of a quote from A.E. Taylor: 
 
In short, if we mean to be philosophical, our main concern will be that our beliefs should be true; we shall care very little whether they happen to be popular or unpopular with the intellectual 'proletarians' of the moment, and if we can get at a truth, we shall not mind having to go back a long way for it. 

—Reflection written in 1/2014 

Storm on the Sea 34

Theodore Gudin, Rough Sea at the Entrance to the Port (1839) 

Ruins 24

Heinrich Meichelt, Rötteln Castle Ruins (1827) 

Memento Mori 17

Hermione von Preuschen, Mors Imperator (1887) 

Vanitas 102

Hendrick Andriessen, Vanitas (c. 1640) 

Chuang Tzu 6.14

Yen Hui said, "I am making progress." 

Kung-nì replied, "What do you mean?" 

"I have ceased to think of benevolence and righteousness," was the reply. 

"Very well; but that is not enough." 

Another day, Hui again saw Kung-nì, and said, "I am making progress." 

"What do you mean?" 

"I have lost all thought of ceremonies and music." 

"Very well, but that is not enough." 

A third day, Hui again saw the Master, and said, "I am making progress." 

"What do you mean?" 

"I sit and forget everything." 

Kung-nì changed countenance, and said, "What do you mean by saying that you sit and forget everything?" 

Yen Hui replied, "My connection with the body and its parts is dissolved; my perceptive organs are discarded. Thus leaving my material form, and bidding farewell to my knowledge, I am become one with the Great Pervader. This I call sitting and forgetting all things." 

Kung-nì said, "One with that Pervader, you are free from all likings; so transformed, you are become impermanent. You have, indeed, become superior to me! I must ask leave to follow in your steps." 

IMAGE: Georges Seurat, Peasant Boy Sitting in a Meadow (1883) 

Epictetus, Discourses 2.15.5

“If you force me to this, I would fain die.” 
 
Why, man, what has happened? 
 
“I have decided.” 
 
Lucky for me that you have not decided to kill me. 
 
“I do not take fees.” 
 
Why? 
 
“I have decided." 

 
Let me tell you that the same energy with which you now refuse to take fees may incline you one day (what is to prevent it?) to take them and to say again, “I have decided.” 
 
Just as in an ailing body, which suffers from a flux, the flux inclines now to this part and now to that, so it is with a weak mind: no one can tell which way it sways, but when this swaying and drift has energy to back it, then the mischief becomes past help and remedy. 

—from Epictetus, Discourses 2.15 

 
I can recall so many times when the people around me were being obstinate, and so many more when I was the one who wouldn’t give an inch, that reliving those petty struggles fills me with disgust. Was I the one who started it, or did I justify myself on only being the one who would finish it? Does it even matter? Any hope for progress is lost at that moment when I can’t bear to confess my error. 
 
We laugh when children hold their breaths in protest, and yet the adults do much the same, just in more refined and cunning ways. I have engaged in battles with men in suits that never moved beyond the immaturity of the playground, and I have traded “I love you’s” as if they were no more than tokens for bragging rights. We put on such a show because we have abandoned any measure beyond our own pride. 
 
Here is a fine lesson I wish I had learned much earlier: if you are looking for the fellow who is acting in good faith, find the one who is perfectly happy to lose face. He is working from a far higher standard. 
 
I get so frustrated with others when they remain stubborn, and I feel so ashamed of myself when I remain stubborn. To dwell on this is itself another form of stubbornness, of clinging to what should be left in the past, so I will refrain from any further examples, however instructive or humorous they may be.
 
Now you would think that insistent people would never change their minds, taking their pledges to the grave, and yet they are just as likely to stand their ground for a mere day as they are for an entire decade. As Epictetus observes, the strength of their commitment proceeds from the intensity of an immediate passion, not from any grounding in a timeless truth, so there is really no way to predict where things might stand tomorrow. How tiring such a life becomes! 
 
In order to avoid the exhausting back-and-forth, the constant waffling that comes from confusing a preference with a principle, it is best to look before we leap, to seek out a certainty in our judgments. If this means going slow, then so be it. Take the small steps before making the bigger ones. Don’t allow the impulsive folks to drag you along. 
 
Despite all of this, mistakes will still be made, and the trick is then to transform those blunders into a means for self-improvement. A man can never learn to be right if he can never admit that he was wrong. 

—Reflection written in 9/2001