Diogenes for the Day, 9/1/2018

Those who say admirable things, but fail to do them, he compared to a harp. 

For the harp, like them, he said, has neither hearing nor perception.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 6.48

You are not dissatisfied, I suppose, because you weigh only so many litrae and not three hundred?

Be not dissatisfied then that you must live only so many years, and not more. For as you are satisfied with the amount of substance that has been assigned to you, so be content with the time.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 6 (tr Long)

I was a tiny fellow when I was a child, both shorter than all the other boys, and so skinny that you’d miss me completely if I was standing next to you sideways. I always wished that I was bigger and stronger, so that I wouldn’t be mocked and pushed around.

Adolescence suddenly gave me height, and I was then far taller than everyone else. Now I was an even more ridiculous beanpole. How I wished I had been made different, and how I wished I could change it all. But there was really nothing to be done about it. I could eat voraciously, I could go running for miles and miles, or I could do dozens of push-ups every day, but I never buffed out, as they say. That was the way that Nature had chosen to make me.

Since then, I have always felt empathy for folks who wish they were different, thick or thin, tall or short, broad or narrow. It was one part for me in understanding that the dignity of a person never has anything to do with height, or weight, or measurements. Dignity has everything to do with how we choose to live. 

How big or how small we are, or how big or how small we might wish to be, is not much different than how long or how short our lives will be, or how long or how short we might wish our lives to be. By all means, eat well, exercise, and go see your doctor, even when nothing seems to ail you. Providence, however, has assigned a time, just as Providence has assigned a measure for all things.

A very dear friend in high school, one of the few who didn’t choose to tell me I looked like a sickly AIDS patient, died in her third year of college. We usually bickered, and we often disagreed, but I always knew that she was someone I could trust absolutely. When she was gone, I was deeply affected by the fact that so many of the good folks seemed to die young, and so many of the bad folks seemed to be able to hang on forever and ever.

But there is never any good or bad in how long anyone lives, not in and of itself. My old friend died at the age of twenty, and in that time she managed to live with more character and commitment than most people can manage if they live for a century. To be content with whatever time may be given is never an act of surrender. It is an act of courage, an acceptance that comes from love, and never giving in to regret or resentment.

My friend from high school would often tell me how much it troubled her that she was quite short, and given that I was quit tall, we would have a good laugh about it all. Her passing made me think shamefully about how I had not been a decent enough friend for her, while she was still around.

There is the key, I think. Love while you can, with all of your heart, and with all of your mind, and with all of your soul. Tomorrow is never guaranteed.

Written in 7/2007

IMAGE: All hail, the mighty beanpole! ;-)

Diogenes for the Day, 8/31/2018

When someone brought a child to him and declared him to be highly gifted and of excellent character, "What need then," said he, "has he of me?"

Boethius, The Consolation 2.15

“He that would build on a lasting resting place;

who would be firm to resist the blasts of the storming wind;

who seeks, too, safety where he may have contempt for the surge

and the threatening of the sea;

must leave the lofty mountain's top,

and leave the thirsting sands.

The hill is swept by all the might of the headstrong gale.

The sands dissolve,

and will not bear the load upon them.

Let him fly the danger in a lot that is pleasant rest unto the eye.

Let him be mindful to set his house surely upon the lowly rock.

Then let the wind bellow,

confounding wreckage in the sea,

and you will still be founded upon unmoving peace,

will be blessed in the strength of your defense.

Your life will be spent in calmness,

and you may mock the raging passions of the air.”

—from Book 2, Poem 4

Some people, those who would wish to be rulers of men, captains of industry, masters of their trades, admired and revered by all, would encourage us to seek happiness in conquering all of our circumstances.

Take risks in order to win power, engage in conflict in order to be the best, cast aside our enemies in order to have no equal, they say, and we will find happiness in strength. We will be daring and brave, and, if only we are tough enough, and smart enough, we will have everything we want.

Yet there is a real difference between the man who is brave, and the man who is foolhardy. There is a real difference between the man who seeks only to love, and the man who seeks only to be loved. What is really worth risking, and what is it worth risking for? Is there not a grave danger in sacrificing who I am within for what I seek to possess without?

How is it courageous to surrender happiness to fortune? How is it clever to abandon the dignity of character for the trappings of fame? There is a certain contradiction in saying that a man is stronger within himself the more he is dependent on things outside of himself, or that he becomes better the more he relies on the merit of externals.

As soon as I measure my life by the presence of a certain situation, whether or not I have what I want is hardly within my power anymore. My contentment will come and go with the wind, or come and go with the tide. It will depend completely upon what happens, not at all upon what I have done. 

An apparent mastery becomes a terrible slavery. 

If I build my house on the highest mountaintop, the storms will blow it away. If I build my house on the sands by the sea, the waters will wash it away. I would be well advised to build my house upon a firm foundation, between the mountains and the sea, protected from either threat. I will then still appreciate the beauty of both, but I will not be subject to their unpredictable force.

My home may then be quite humble. It will probably not impress anyone at all. Yet when the seasons have their way, and when the powers of the elements have their way, I will find myself safe and secure. By building upon a firm rock, instead of upon wavering or dangerous ground, I will have found my peace.

I have taught not at one, but at two different schools that prided themselves in sparing no expense to build a new and fancy campus. Their new structures, they said, would reflect their commitments to their great missions. What neither school seriously considered was that they were building on bad land, on land that no one else wanted, precisely because both were on a flood plain. In both cases, it would rain, and we would find ourselves trying to do our jobs in the middle of a river.

Our lives are much the same. Once I allow myself to be tossed and turned by the whirl of circumstances, I have forgotten who I am, and the very nature of my mission. My foolishness in choosing a poor place for my endeavors has denied me any possible success from those endeavors.

What might I rely upon? Fortune herself is never the answer.

Written in 8/2015

Diogenes for the Day, 8/30/2018

Someone wanted to study philosophy under him. Diogenes gave him a fish to carry, and told him to follow him. And when for shame the man threw it away and departed, some time later on meeting him Diogenes laughed and said, "The friendship between you and me was broken by a fish." 

The version given by Diocles, however, is as follows. Someone having said to him, "Lay your commands upon us, Diogenes," he took him away and gave him a cheese to carry, which cost half an obol. The other man declined, whereupon Diogenes remarked, "The friendship between you and me is broken by a little cheese worth half an obol."

Diogenes for the Day, 8/29/2018

He would ridicule good birth, and fame, and all such distinctions, calling them showy ornaments of vice. 

The only true commonwealth was, he said, that which is as wide as the Universe.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 6.47

When you wish to delight yourself, think of the virtues of those who live with you. For instance, the activity of one, and the modesty of another, and the liberality of a third, and some other good quality of a fourth.

For nothing delights so much as the examples of the virtues, when they are exhibited in the morals of those who live with us and present themselves in abundance, as far as is possible. Wherefore we must keep them before us.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 6 (tr Long)

Back when I was a young pup, I would probably have snorted and snickered at the claim that being moral was somehow pleasurable. I imagine many people think quite the same thing. There’s the right way, and then there’s the fun way. We’re somehow convinced that the two just don’t cross.

It’s a weakness we all share. We oppose the different aspects of our nature, that of our passions and that of our reason. We forget to find a balance within ourselves, and we perversely prefer to be at war with ourselves.

To keep myself from slipping back into that sort of an attitude, I need to constantly remind myself that what is good for me will be good for the whole, not for the part at the expense of the whole, and certainly not for the lesser part at the expense of the greater part.

The value of my feelings, and the depth of my pleasures, will be in direct proportion to the value of the actions from which they proceed. The value of my actions, in turn, follows from the right exercise of my reason, and my understanding of what is good, both for myself and for others.

It is only then that I see how the mere pursuit of pleasure, simply for the sake of gratification alone, was actually not so pleasing at all. Chasing after lusts becomes a sort of burden, even an enslavement, providing more misery than it does delight. The drunk struggles his way through another bottle, the adulterer gets tangled up in his lies, the grasping man lies awake worried about how he will hold on to his wealth. I end up chasing a contentment that never seems to come, always looking for more and more.

There is a perfectly good reason that the passions alone cannot satisfy me. My human nature is fulfilled by the dignity of my actions, not merely by the power of my feelings, and how I feel will depend upon how well I live. In this way, in an odd manner that I would hardly expect, virtue provides the deepest and most lasting pleasure, even in the face of all other sorts of suffering, because virtue is the very thing that makes me whole.

Whenever I have had the good sense to follow what is right first and foremost, I find myself slowly but surely discovering a habit of the deepest joy. Since I begin to be at peace with myself through my thoughts and deeds, I also come to be at peace in my feelings.

Then I will sometimes foolishly let myself be tempted by going straight for the gusto, assuming that such a path will be quicker or easier. After I see the wasteland I have made, I wonder what I possibly could have been thinking.

It is not only my own virtue that can delight me, but also surrounding myself with the virtue of others. It is not only a good example, but also a source of enjoyment to share life with friends who practice integrity, compassion, and justice. 

It is hardly an accident, therefore, that the most miserable times of my life were those where I attached myself to people consumed by vice, and the most joyful times of my life were those where I surrounded myself with people who inspired me with character.

So much of the true delight in life is indeed from the company we keep.

Written in 7/2007

Diogenes for the Day, 8/28/2018

Rhetoricians, and all who talked for reputation, he used to call "thrice human," meaning thereby "thrice wretched." 

An ignorant rich man he used to call "the sheep with the golden fleece."

Marcus Aurelius. Meditations 6.46

Think continually that all kinds of men, and of all kinds of pursuits, and of all nations are dead, so that your thoughts come down even to Philistion, and Phoebus, and Origanion.

Now turn your thoughts to the other kinds of men. To that place then we must remove, where there are so many great orators, and so many noble philosophers, Heraclitus, Pythagoras, Socrates. So many heroes of former days, and so many generals after them, and tyrants. Besides these, Eudoxus, Hipparchus, Archimedes, and other men of acute natural talents, great minds, lovers of labor, versatile, confident, mockers even of the perishable and ephemeral life of man, as Menippus and such as are like him.

As to all these, consider that they have long been in the dust. What harm then is this to them, and what to those whose names are altogether unknown?

One thing here is worth a great deal, to pass your life in truth and justice, with a benevolent disposition even to liars and unjust men.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 6 (tr Long)

Some people might be famous for their various skills and achievements. Other people might be infamous for their various weaknesses and failures. Most of us are hardly thought of or remembered at all, and the qualities we so hoped would define us will be of no significance at all. The ornaments and trappings of life should never be confused with its true purpose and content.

Now a man might possess the gift of fine speech, or have an insightful mind, or be a conqueror on the field of battle, or be talented in ruling others. He may be quick to win a name for himself, and he may raise himself in power and influence.

None of this will make any difference at all, if it is not in the service, first and foremost, of being a good man. Integrity, fairness, and compassion will make all the difference, because they themselves are about the living, not about the conditions in which one lives.

I would always pride myself in not being impressed by people who simply looked attractive, or who were rich, or who were popular. Yet I would still let myself be drawn in by various other characteristics, such as a sense of wit, taste, or charm, and then I would wonder why I still wasn’t finding genuine friends. I may not have been falling for the usual traps, only a slightly less trendy set of traps. I was confusing qualities with character, swapping the attributes people had with the virtues of what they did.

I would then sometimes blame others for being selfish, deceptive, or thoughtless, when I only needed to take responsibility for myself in thinking they would somehow be giving, honest, and concerned, just because they happened to be smart or amusing. People will make their own choices for themselves, and it isn’t my place to make those decisions for them. But it most certainly is my place to stand by my own conscience, to admire and respect others for the right reasons.

It never came to me in a single moment, but I slowly began to realize that I was never going to be admired, respected, or listened to in this world. The things that interested me, and the values I thought best in life, were just not what most others cared for. Sometimes I might have felt angry with that, because it didn’t seem fair, or I might have felt sad about it, because I wished people could understand.

But it doesn’t need to breed resentment, and it doesn’t need to be a tragedy. I will only be worried about fortune and fame if I still think they are important in life. If I can only recognize that living well is simply good for the sake of living well, and nothing else above and beyond it, I won’t be caught up in the externals and the diversions.

It is a liberation, and not a burden, to understand what things in life are really worth, and to leave behind the charms of appearance for the merits of virtue.

Written in 7/2007

IMAGE: Lorenzo Lotto, Allegory of Virtue and Vice (1505)

Diogenes for the Day, 8/27/2018

To one who was proud of wearing a lion's skin his words were, "Leave off dishonoring the attire of courage."

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 6.45

As it happens to you in the amphitheater and such places, that the continual sight of the same things and the uniformity make the spectacle wearisome, so it is in the whole of life.

For all things above, below, are the same and from the same. How long, then?

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 6 (tr Long)

It is rarely that I will view a new film, or watch a new television show, or even read a new book, and not have a frustrating sense that I have seen all of this before. We don’t even try to conceal old ideas and plots within a new skin, but are quite happy to openly “reinvent”, “reboot”, or “reimagine” what came before.

There are some of what we now call “franchises” that I have seen brought back three times in the span of my life, differing only in the fashionable cosmetics of politics, in the platitudes that happen to be trendy at the moment.

That spectacle, the covering of tired formulas with new buzzwords, can be quite disturbing for me. I do not necessarily expect a completely new creation, because, after all, there is ultimately nothing new under the sun. But I deeply appreciate a different perspective, a transformation of what is already familiar into something I could not have expected. Therein is the originality of art.

I do not have a personal preference for the style or for the values of John Gardner’s Grendel, for example, but I have long deeply admired that incredibly clever turn on an old story. Michael Crichton’s Eaters of the Dead had much the same effect on me.

I suspect the problem is, in the end, that most of us are hardly being creative or artistic at all. We are selling a product, and we are drawn to what wins a profit by means of the lowest common denominator. As it was in the Circuses of Rome, so it is in the Hollywood of America. And so it is in Washington, on Wall Street, and at the Ivy League schools.

And just as the pabulum of entertainment, politics, business, and academics becomes tiresome, so too life can sometimes feel like it is becoming old hat. There can always remain more good to be done, more paths to discover, or more work to give us purpose, but there also comes a time when we are ready to leave the ring, to depart this mortal coil.

We will have realistically seen what we can see, and we will have realistically done what we can do. Now it’s time to go.

I have become so familiar with the idea that a longer life is a better life, or that I must cling to existence with all my might and at any expense, that asking “How much more?” seems like a shameful surrender. Yet quantity should never be confused with quality. Living more isn’t living well. Living well is living well.

I should, I think, never seek death, but I should also never avoid it. It will come when it will come, and my only concern must be about getting my job done within the time prescribed. If I’ve done the job as best I can, there is nothing wrong in looking forward to a well-earned retirement.

My part to be played in the amphitheater is rightly only for so long. There is nothing shameful in wondering when the performance will be over. 

Written in 6/2007

Diogenes for the Day, 8/26/2018

Once he saw the officials of a temple leading away someone who had stolen a bowl belonging to the treasurers, and said, "The great thieves are leading away the little thief."

ABWH, "Brother of Mine"

As a reference for Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 6.44:

Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe, "Brother of Mine", from ABWH (1989)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0Z1DRusbws

i The Big Dream
(Anderson / Howe / Wakeman / Bruford)
So giving all the love you have
Never be afraid to show your heart
So giving all the love you have
There is a special reason
A special reason...

In the big dream
We are heroes
We are dreamers
Of the big dream

Someone told me
There are brothers
Live forever
In the big sky

Just hear your voice
Sing all the songs of the earth
Nothing can come between us
You're a brother of mine

Sing out your sisters
All the dreams of the world
Nothing can come between us
We are the travellers of time

See the desert
We have walked the path
Of all the known religions

In the big dream
We are brothers, we are sisters
Of the big dream

Just hear your voice
Sing all the songs of the earth
Nothing can come between us
You're a brother of mine

Sing out your sisters
All the dreams of the world
Nothing can come between us

Took me by surprise
It opened up my eyes
I can't believe we're ready to
Run another
Run another
Run another

Fourth Dimension Dream
Always the way it seems
I can't believe we're running to
See the world for what it really is
In the full moon

ii Nothing Can Come Between Us
(Anderson / Howe / Wakeman / Bruford)
Took me by surprise
It opened up my eyes
I can't believe we're ready to
Run another
Run another
Run another

Fourth Dimension Dream
Always the way it seems

Just hear the voice
In all the songs of the earth
Nothing can come between us
You're a brother of mine

We hold our hands together
Be the sunshine
Nothing can come between us
You're a sister of time

Just hear the voice
Sing all the songs of the earth
Nothing can come between us
Nothing can come between us
Nothing can come between us

So give it all the love you have
Never be afraid to show your heart
So giving all the love you have
There is a special reason to come true

So giving all the love you have
Never be afraid to show your heart
So giving all the love you have
There is a special reason
There is a special reason this time

iii Long Lost Brother Of Mine
(Anderson / Howe / Wakeman / Bruford / Downes)
Long lost brother of mine
Seeing my life for the first time
Long lost brother of mine
Living my life in the big dream

Long lost brother of mine
Walking away from illusion
Long lost brother of mine
Seeing my life for the first time

Long lost brother of mine
Seeing me fly like an eagle
Long lost brother of mine
Watching me walk in the full moon
Long lost brother of mine
Seeing my life for the first time
Long lost brother of mine
Walking this dream everlasting

So it's there
Putting one into one special reason
So it's there
Putting one into one
One another. Sure can. Sure can

This is a further dimension
Coming at us for the very first time
It's the second attention
Realising it all of the time

Re-defining this long lost passion
For the living we're in
This will be the first of many
I be telling you

Long lost brother of mine
Walking the dream evolution
Long lost brother of mine
Singing the sisters of freedom
Long lost brother of mine
Seeing the fathers of wisdom
Long lost brother of mine
Seeing my life for the first time

So it's there, but to want it to one special reason
Yes it's there, but to want it to want one another
So it's there, but to want it to one special reason
Yes it's there, you can see what you want to see

Long lost brother of mine

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 6.44

If the gods have determined about me, and about the things that must happen to me, they have determined well, for it is not easy even to imagine a deity without forethought. And as to doing me harm, why should they have any desire towards that? For what advantage would result to them from this or to the whole, which is the special object of their Providence?

But if they have not determined about me individually, they have certainly determined about the whole at least, and the things that happen by way of sequence in this general arrangement I ought to accept with pleasure and to be content with them.

But if they determine about nothing—which it is wicked to believe, or if we do believe it, let us neither sacrifice nor pray nor swear by them nor do anything else which we do as if the gods were present and lived with us—but if however the gods determine about none of the things that concern us, I am able to determine about myself, and I can inquire about that which is useful. And that is useful to every man that is conformable to his own constitution and nature.

But my nature is rational and social and my city and country, so far as I am Antoninus, is Rome, but so far as I am a man, it is the world. The things then that are useful to these cities are alone useful to me. Whatever happens to every man, this is for the interest of the universal. This might be sufficient.

But further you will observe this also as a general truth, if you do observe, that whatever is profitable to any man is profitable also to other men. But let the word profitable be taken here in the common sense as said of things of an indifferent kind, neither good nor bad.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 6 (tr Long)

I find time and time again that a great obstacle to moral health is the idea that what is good for me must surely be bad for another, and that what is good for another must surely be bad for me. It is the assumption that conflict, between the parts of the whole, or between the one and the many, is a necessary condition of life.

Yet Providence simply doesn’t operate that way. That which exists to give meaning and order to the whole, will truly be in service to the whole. Thankfully, the Universe isn’t run by the politicians, priests, businessmen, or lawyers who mouth the words, but fail at the task. The Divine Reason within the whole is not subject to selfishness.

Even if I have difficulty accepting that Providence cares about me personally, I can surely accept that Providence cares about the complete good. Am I not even then a part of the complete good, and therefore cared for?

Even if I cannot accept Providence at all, an understandable mistake if I were to consider only a human measure to things, I can surely come to discover that same truth within myself. If I reflect upon what is useful, beneficial or profitable to me, I can discern that anything and everything can be good for me, depending only upon my estimation and actions regarding these things. As a creature of reason, I am made to choose what is good through my own power, and all circumstances can be ordered toward what is good.

Insofar as I am a rational creature, I am also a social creature, made for deliberate cooperation, and as such nothing that is good for me is separate or opposed to what is good for others. My neighbor is not only the man down the street, or the fellow citizen of my nation, but also any fellow citizen of the world. If the exercise of wisdom and virtue is our shared goal, nothing need come between us.

I will only assume opposition between men when I pursue false goods. I may think that there is only so much wealth, or pleasure, or honor to go around, so I mistakenly think I must seize it from another. But if the human good consists in the excellence of only our own nature, demanding the possession of nothing beyond our own thoughts and deeds, then competition and war are an illusion.

In my second year of college, I had one of those moments where I realized how completely out of the loop I had managed to become. I was regularly listening to the new album by ABWH (Anderson/Bruford/Wakeman/Howe), one of the many variations of the classic progressive rock group, Yes. I very much enjoyed a track called “Brother of Mine”, and the lyrics simply fit so well into how I was slowly but surely beginning to see myself and the world:

Just hear your voice

Sing all the songs of the earth

Nothing can come between us

You're a brother of mine

Sing out your sisters

All the dreams of the world

Nothing can come between us

We are the travellers of time

Now admittedly, music of this sort isn’t for everyone, and the words of Jon Anderson could easily cross that line into what I often jokingly called the “twee-flakey-hippie-moonbeam-granola-crunchy” variety. Even so, the sentiment was pleasant and uplifting.

Not to a fellow student who saw me with the CD one day and gave me a good verbal thrashing, which ended with him throwing the jewel case against the wall. This sort of music, he yelled at me, was immoral, unpatriotic, communist, atheist, and all the other terrible things he could think of. He insisted that if he ever ended up ruling the world, he’d line up all the perverts who wrote this stuff and have them shot.

The last I had heard, he married a trophy wife, and was selling real estate in New Jersey.

I had a sort of epiphany right there and then. Some people really seem to feed off of facing people against one another. The fact that the good must be shared by all, not possessed by some at the expense of others, had suddenly never been clearer to me. 

Written in 6/2007

Diogenes for the Day, 8/25/2018

A eunuch of bad character had inscribed on his door the words, "Let nothing evil enter." 

"How then," Diogenes asked, "is the master of the house to get in?"

Boethius, The Consolation 2.14

. . . “Yet consider this further, that you may be assured that happiness cannot be fixed in matters of chance. If happiness is the highest good of a man who lives his life by reason, and if that which can by any means be snatched away, is not the highest good (since that which is best cannot be snatched away), it is plain that Fortune by its own uncertainty can never come near to reaching happiness.

“Further, the man who is borne along by a happiness that may stumble, either knows that it may change, or knows it not. If he knows it not, what happiness can there be in the blindness of ignorance? If he knows it, he must live in fear of losing that which he cannot doubt that he may lose. Wherefore an ever-present fear allows not such a one to be happy. Or at any rate, if he loses it without unhappiness, does he not think it worthless? For that, whose loss can be calmly borne, is indeed a small good.

“You, I know well, are firmly persuaded that men's understandings can never die. This truth is planted deep in you by many proofs. Since then it is plain that the happiness of fortune is bounded by the death of the body, you cannot doubt that, if death can carry away happiness, the whole race of mortals is sinking into wretchedness to be found upon the border of death.

“But we know that many have sought the enjoyment of happiness not only by death, even by sorrow and sufferings. How then can the presence of this life make us happy, when its end cannot make us unhappy?”

—from Book 2, Prose 4

We will surely all admit that happiness is the best thing we could ever have, and if it is indeed the best of things, it will surely also be the most reliable of things. If understood rightly, it will, by definition, not be subject to failure through anything beyond itself.

Things will certainly admit of different degrees of goodness, some of them less complete, some of them more complete. Yet that which is most complete, or that which is perfect, admits of no degrees. It will be the maximum, that from which nothing is lacking.

Allowing my life to be dependent upon chance and circumstance can, of course, never provide such a certainty. I can never say that I am happy, and be content to have enough, when I always want to acquire more. I can never say that I am happy, and be content with who I am, when who I am depends entirely upon what is done to me, and not upon what I do.

I think of all the foolishness and vanity I have somehow managed to put myself through. This career, or that honor will make it right. This success, or that friendship will resolve everything. This possession, or that achievement will finally be enough. But it will never be enough, because it doesn’t fulfill who I am as a human being, and it will never make it right, because it has so little to do with my own act of living rightly.

Of all the striving, grasping men and women I have known, the ones who promote and sell themselves in the marketplace that passes for a decent human life, I have never, not once, known any of them to be happy.

Now that may seem to be quite an extraordinary claim, because it seems to say that I know the depths of their hearts and minds. I don’t, and I would never claim to do so. All I know, from the evidence of my own senses, is that they always ask for more of what they have, and that they are always afraid of ending up with less of what they have. That tells me everything I need to know.

Some people have absolutely no clue about good and bad, about right and wrong. Such ignorance can hardly be the source of a happy life. Other people may, in some sense, understand the fragility of their lives, and so they must live in constant anxiety about gain and loss. There can also be no happiness in such restlessness either.

Now we might conclude that this means there can never be any happiness at all. I would only think this, however, if I define the measure of my life by the state of my body, which is always passing, controlled by things beyond myself. The state of my soul, of that which remains without condition my own, is quite another matter.

One of the strangest, and perhaps most wonderful things, I have seen is those people who find their happiness even in the face of bad luck, hardship, or suffering. I am even more amazed by those people who find their happiness in the face of death itself. This suggests to me that Fortune had nothing to do with their contentment. There was something else, something unassailable.

As a child in Austria, I was taken to visit the Riegersburg, a mighty medieval fortress, built upon a steep hill, surrounded by massive walls, and protected by many imposing gates. I was told that for many centuries, through all the wars, through all the invasions of Magyars, Turks, and so many other enemies, the fortress never fell. It provided safety for all of those in the region who came for protection. The danger came, and the walls held. Those inside remained safe.

A truly happy life, one that demands upon no more than what is within it, one that need fear no threat from what is outside of it, would be much like the great Riegersburg. We need not assume that this is beyond our power to achieve. 

Written in 7/2015

Diogenes for the Day, 8/24/2018

Someone took him into a magnificent house and warned him not to spit, whereupon having cleared his throat he discharged the phlegm into the man's face, being unable, he said, to find a better receptacle.

Diogenes for the Day, 8/23/2018

But some say that when dying, he left instructions that they should throw him out unburied, that every wild beast might feed on him, or thrust him into a ditch and sprinkle a little dust over him. 

But according to others, his instructions were that they should throw him into the Ilissus River, in order that he might be useful to his brethren.

Off-Topic, or Perhaps Not: Peterson Pipes

I know for certain that I am now in the third generation of my family who have smoked Peterson pipes. I have a good hunch, especially on my father's side, that it goes back even further than that. If a good Irishman smoked a pipe back then, and he didn't just go on the cheap, he most likely smoked a Peterson.

My own son will inherit my humble collection of pipes. He may choose to smoke them or not, and that will be his own choice. Either way, the pieces of the tradition will be passed along. Whatever happens, something new will hopefully occur to those wonderful pieces of briar wood, some with silver bands, and a few with high quality straight-grain. Perhaps he will sell them, but even then they may find a new home.

Yes, do tell me that tobacco is bad for me, as is alcohol, sugar, or fat. I understand this completely. What we all miss is a simple principle: moderation through appreciation. Most anything will kill us in excess. Most everything will enhance life in restraint.

My first lust for tobacco came from cheap cigarettes, and a chemical addiction to nicotine. I fought that addiction for years, and then one day I beat it. I finally had enough of being a sucker. I was tired of hacking out a piece of a lung every morning, and of just being a slave.

I would hardly advise this for anyone, but I eventually ended up embracing pipe smoking, not as a replacement, but as an improvement. Some men will eat burgers and fries every day, and die of obesity. Some men will drink a fifth of rotgut a day, and die of cirrhosis. Some men will smoke two packs of Marlboro's a day, and die of lung cancer or emphysema. I suspect all of then really died from a broken heart.

And here, I thought to myself, what if I can find satisfaction in something I deeply enjoy, but in a way that doesn't just appeal to my passions, but actually helps me to be better?

At first, I huffed and puffed at a pipe like it was a cigarette. This was no better. Then, when I figured out the cadence for a slow and leisurely smoke, I assumed I had to be doing it all of the time. This was also no improvement. I finally tried some sort of timetable for myself, to keep it all in place. Yet how was this different than spacing my consumption of the old coffin nails?

There was the key. Joy, true pleasure, does not come from the quantity of consumption. It comes from the quality of enjoying something for the right reasons, at the right time, and in the right way. All the "bad" things we condemn, all the terrible things we try to outlaw and regulate, are never really the problem. Our thinking about them, and the way we make use of them, is really the problem.

For example, some people told me that sex was the best thing ever, always to be pursued and enjoyed. Others told me sex was the worst thing ever, always to be shunned and regretted. I once fell in love with a girl who believed the former, and I once followed ideologues who preached the latter.

They were both wrong, and I was wrong to listen to either of them. Sex is good when it proceeds from genuine and committed love, and it is evil when it proceeds from selfish and manipulative lust. That is certainly an unpopular view in our age, but it is true nonetheless.

All other things created in this world are no different. Our estimations, and corresponding actions, make all the difference.

Wasn't this originally about Peterson pipes? Yes, and here's how it comes together. Some people enjoy a glass of whiskey, or a snifter of brandy, or a fine glass of good vintage wine. They do so not to get drunk, but to savor the flavors, to enjoy the character, to appreciate the experience. One day, the smoking of a pipe did all of that for me.

I was sitting on my front step, and I had packed a Peterson D12, a rather rare shape, with a pinch of Penzance Flake, an even rarer pipe tobacco. This suddenly had nothing to do with a buzz, or selling any fancy image, or going through a stale routine. I found the practice itself, much like making, presenting, and drinking a fine pot of tea, to be its own reward. It took on, dare I say it, the character of something sacred. It helped me clear my thoughts, order my feelings, and direct my intentions. It became a means for concentration, and for reflection of the best sort.

Lady Nicotine had nothing to do with it anymore. Lady Philosophy had taken over.

This wasn't gratification. It was appreciation. Not just for the tobacco, or the pipe, or even the exercise of smoking the pipe. It was about how the chance to take a moment to think, in all the right circumstances, helped me to put myself in order.

For a time, I would smoke a single pipe a day. As the years passed, it hardly mattered if it was even every day. A week or two might pass, but when I knew that I needed to get myself together, I also knew it was time for a pipe.

And that was exactly how I remembered the men in my past who had smoked their Peterson pipes. For all of them, it was a moment of peace. The tools were the means to the end. For some, a good meal not only feeds the body, but also feeds the soul. For me, a good pipe not only calms my nerves, but actually helps me to understand.

A Peterson pipe, the "thinking man's pipe", as the old Irish adverts used to say, is my own aid. You will surely find you own aid, whatever it might be.

Smoking a pipe, of course, is not to everyone's taste. Discovering whatever might help us to understand and to love is, however, everyone's most desperate need. 

Moderation through appreciation.

Written in 11/2015

Admittedly a promotional video, but inspiring nonetheless:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9C0zvyonOek

'I believe that pipe smoking contributes to a somewhat calm and objective judgment in all human affairs."

—Albert Einstein 

"On land, on sea, at home, abroad
I smoke my pipe, and worship God."

—Johann Sebastian Bach

"A pipe is the fountain of contemplation, the source of pleasure, the companion of the wise; and the man who smokes, thinks like a philosopher and acts like a Samaritan."

—Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

"A pipe gives a wise man time to think, and a fool something to stick in his mouth."

—C.S. Lewis

"The pipe draws wisdom from the lips of the philosopher, and shuts up the mouth of the foolish; it generates a style of conversation, contemplative, thoughtful, benevolent, and unaffected."

—William Makepeace Thackeray

"A pipe is to the troubled soul what the caresses of a mother are for her suffering child."

—Indian Proverb

"I do not own this collection of Peterson pipes. I am merely its custodian."

—Jim Lilley