Boethius, The Consolation 3.17

“From like beginning rise all men on earth,

for there is one Father of all things;

one is the guide of everything.

'Tis He who gave the sun his rays, and horns unto the moon.

'Tis He who set mankind on earth, and in the heavens the stars.

He put within our bodies spirits that were born in heaven.

And thus a highborn race has He set forth in man.

Why do you men rail on your forefathers?

If ye look to your beginning and your author, which is God,

is any man degenerate or base

but he who by his own vices cherishes base things

and leaves that beginning which was his?”

—from Book 3, Poem 6

Throughout my years in college and graduate school, it was common for us to sit around and bemoan the state of the world. They say a little learning is a dangerous thing, and that is perhaps no more true than among those who have only recently been exposed to the wide world of art, literature, and philosophy.

Having gathered together bits and pieces of clever phrases and impressive ideas, we would go on and on about how and why everything was wrong. Gathered at some trendy café or bar, constantly smoking and drinking, we would cast our blame, and highlight exactly who and what had to be fixed.

I could blame my parents for my bad attitude, the politicians for the corruption, the corporations for the greed, religions for the ignorance, and all my ancestors for making a mess of the lot. Yes, I could even blame God, if he existed, for creating the world so wrong, and I could even blame God, if he didn’t exist, simply for not existing.

Then there were those moments of crystal clarity when I saw that I needed to be accountable to myself. There was little point, as Chesterton said, in worrying about what was wrong without knowing what was right.

Let me consider what I am, a creature made to know what is true and to love what is good. God was not mistaken to make us this way, and my parents were not wrong to bring me into the world. Politicians, businessmen, or priests don’t determine how I will live, and what anyone has thought or done in generations before me is not the measure of what I can think or do right now.

I should hardly think myself better or worse because of the circumstances that are passed on to me. I am not rich because I inherited my father’s earnings, or poor because he may have squandered them away. I am rich or poor, not in possessions or in standing but in character, when I choose to live well for myself.

That first gift of human nature is not to blame, and the way others may abuse their human nature has not made me miserable. God gave me reason and choice, so I am the one who decides what I will make of it, to nurture it into virtue or twist it into vice.

Are others not as I would like them to be? That is entirely up to them. Am I not as I would like myself to be? That is entirely up to me. Let me attend to what is my own, and begin the work from the inside out. God made me to be good, and now I should complete the task, whether or not others may resolve to do the same. 

Written in 9/2015