"As the hardness of certain stones is impervious to steel, and adamant cannot be cut or hewed or ground, but in turn blunts whatever comes into contact with it; certain substances cannot be consumed by fire, but, though encompassed by flame, retain their hardness and their shape; as certain cliffs, projecting into the deep, break the force of the sea, and, though lashed for countless ages, show no traces of its wrath, just so the spirit of the wise man is impregnable and has gathered such a measure of strength as to be no less safe from injury than those things which I have mentioned.
" 'What then?' you say; 'will there be no one who will attempt to do the wise man injury?'
"Yes, the attempt will be made, but the injury will not reach him. For the distance which separates him from contact with his inferiors is so great that no baneful force can extend its power all the way to him. Even when the mighty, exalted by authority and powerful in the support of their servitors, strive to injure him, all their assaults on wisdom will fall as short of their mark as do the missiles shot on high by bowstring or catapult, which though they leap beyond our vision, yet curve downwards this side of heaven.
"Tell me, do you suppose that when that stupid king darkened the day with the shower of his darts, any arrow fell upon the sun, or that he was able to reach Neptune when he lowered his chains into the deep? As heavenly things escape the hands of man and divinity suffers no harm from those who demolish temples and melt down images, so every wanton, insolent, or haughty act directed against the wise man is essayed in vain.
" 'But it would be better,' you say, 'if no one cared to do such things?' You are praying for what is a hard matter--that human beings should do no wrong. And that such acts be not done is profitable to those who are prone to do them, not to him who cannot be affected by them even if they are done."
--Seneca the Younger, On Firmness 3.4 (tr Basore)
From a very young age, I have had an undying loves for all things Godzilla. I would sit down every Saturday afternoon at our kitchen table and hope that at least one of the films on "Creature Double Feature" would feature the King of Monsters. My mother remembers me running around the house with joy if my wish came to pass. I haven't changed much in all the years, and the joy my daughter now takes in the same movies brings a smile to my face.
One of the beloved formulas in most Godzilla films involved that moment when he rises from the waves, and the Japanese Self-Defense Force does its best to stop him. Besides the battle with his monstrous adversary, this was usually my favorite part. It always played out the same way, but it never got boring for me.
Ifukube Akira's timeless score would play as artillery, tanks, missiles, fighter jets, helicopters, naval destroyers, and all kinds of fancy lasers and masers pounded him. At worst, he would seem annoyed, as a horse is by a gadfly. He steps on tanks and grabs planes from the sky as you and I would with an ant or a mosquito.
Godzilla is physically invulnerable to all of man's weapons because he is an unstoppable force, a warning to all who might think that mankind can conquer Nature. It isn't the body of the Stoic, of course, that is invulnerable in this way, but I do think we can certainly say that of his mind.
Seneca wonders in this section whether it is better for the wise man to be able to bear injury with calm and acceptance, or whether the wise man is, in fact, beyond injury? He decides upon the latter, and this usually seemed ridiculous to me. Surely others can do me harm, but it's just a matter or grinning and bearing it? How could I not be harmed at all?
I must distinguish. People will indeed try to hurt me, and their trying or refraining has everything to do with their virtue and vice. How I allow myself to receive the attempted harm is that which is within my power.
I try to think of it this way: the harm, the only true harm, that can be done to me isn't in my possessions, or my reputations, or my body, or my feelings. The true harm rests only in my estimation of it, in my judgment of good and evil, and in what I make of these attempts at my good. Strike at all that is outside of me, by all means, but since I am a being of reason and will, it is quite literally true that my mind will only suffer what I want it to suffer, only choose to lose what I wish to lose.
I do not think that being a wise man, being a Stoic Godzilla, comes with ease, but with right judgment and good habit leading me correctly, I cannot help but understand that the only thing that hurts my thinking is my own thinking.
Written on 3/3/2009
No comments:
Post a Comment