Consider,
for example, the times of Vespasian. You will see all these things, people
marrying, bringing up children, sick, dying, warring, feasting, trafficking,
cultivating the ground, flattering, obstinately arrogant, suspecting, plotting,
wishing for some to die, grumbling about the present, loving,
heaping up treasure, desiring consulship, kingly power. Well
then, that life of these people no longer exists at all.
Again,
remove to the times of Trajan. Again, all is the same. Their
life too is gone. In like manner view also the other epochs of
time and of whole nations, and see how many after great efforts
soon fell and were resolved into the elements.
But
chiefly you should think of those whom you have yourself known
distracting themselves about idle things, neglecting to do what was in accordance with their proper constitution, and to hold firmly
to this and to be content with it.
And
herein it is necessary to remember that the attention given to
everything has its proper value and proportion. For thus you
will not be dissatisfied, if you apply yourself to smaller matters
no further than is fit.
—Marcus
Aurelius, Meditations, Book 4 (tr
Long)
Few
things are as helpful for overcoming our vanities than seeing how passing their
true nature is. Time can often give us a new perspective on what we thought was
so terribly important, impossible to ignore, or absolutely necessary to address
above all else. In the heat of the moment, our priorities can be quite
scrambled, because we are acting on the magnitude of how something feels to us
then and there, not on what it is in itself.
It is
when the force of impressions has faded that things are once again revealed in their
proper proportion. Shadows often make things look more frightening than they
really are, and clever staging often makes things look more desirable than they
really are.
An old
saying has it that if I don’t like the weather, I should just wait a minute.
Much the same applies to making decisions in the face of certain appearances
and circumstances, and the habit of thinking in a bigger context is the key to
not confusing greater and lesser goods.
History,
of course, is full of such lessons. People spent so much of their energy
worried about the most shallow and petty things, none of which offered any
peace or contentment then and there, and then they were gone.
I spent
much of my childhood surrounded by history, and sometimes I felt a bit
overwhelmed by it all, but it always helped me to reflect on distinguishing the
things that were temporary or lasting. If my family passed an important
monument, grave, or portrait, my mother would often repeat a very Austrian sort
of phrase, roughly translated as “Well, his old bones aren’t hurting him
anymore!” There was a good bit of sympathy in those words, and then a bit more
of a friendly reminder that nothing really stays the same.
One of
my own versions has long involved observing how a street or a neighborhood will
change, and how what I assumed was an immovable landmark of life might
disappear at the moment I look the other way.
An old
friend would regularly watch as many of the weekday afternoon soap operas as
she possibly could, even if they were just on in the background. This hardly
seemed to fit her personality at all, and I had to ask why she found them
appealing.
“The
stories are ridiculous, the characters are selfish and arrogant, and the stakes
are all about useless things,” she said. “I like to be reminded about how not
to live, and how much worse my own life could be.”
Well,
that actually seems quite sensible. Seeing how people sadly waste their dignity
on diversions can soberly remind me to do a better job of ordering my own
attention.
Written in 11/2005
Image: Funerary Relief, Syrian (c. 2nd-3rd century AD)
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