A Helpful Saying?

I don't know exactly how this came into my head one day. Had I first read it somewhere else, or had I heard it in some song, or was it from a jumble of many different influences now long forgotten? 

I only know I jotted it down in one of my many old notebooks, rather quickly and sloppily, in the margin of a section on teaching Book 1 of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics.

It has now been stuck in my memory for over twenty years, and it has sometimes allowed me to walk away, only slightly tattered and torn, from many painful circumstances. 

As I always say, your mileage may vary. It may not speak to you, but it has saved me many a time.

I never lost it to begin with.

It was never mine to begin with.

I never needed it to begin with.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.25

He who flies from his master is a runaway; but the law is master, and he who breaks the law is a runaway.

And he also who is grieved, or angry, or afraid, is dissatisfied because something has been, or is, or shall be of the things which are appointed by Him who rules all things, and He is Law and assigns to every man what is fit.

He then who fears, or is grieved, or is angry is a runaway.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 10.25 (tr Long)

I remind myself every day that my happiness is found in how I choose to live, not in how others choose to live. Let me seek to love, and not demand to be loved. Let me make something happen, however small, and not be ruled by whatever happens, however big. Let me be measured by what I gave, not by what I received.

And still, my old habits will die hard. I will find myself slipping back into the old language, the old thinking, and the old resentments. I will see how hatefully, how selfishly, or just how carelessly others have acted, and I will feel like a victim. I will be overcome by despair, rage, and terror.

I am ashamed to admit that my frustration is really not the work of a decent man, but of a self-righteous man, one who expects the world to do what he wants. This is cowardice, not courage. When I lash out at others, I am not strong at all. I am weak. I cast blame, and I expect to be gratified.

My moral measure, my respect for law, is not a matter of just following this or that set of external rules. No, the law is something much deeper, the internal right and the wrong in the very nature of being human, itself a reflection of the law within all of Nature.

Whenever I begin to complain about the ways of the world, I am rejecting who I was made to be, in favor of what I demand should be done to me.

I am running away from myself, from my own responsibilities to myself to others, and I am ultimately blaming God, where I should only blame myself.

“I can’t believe in a God who allows people to suffer!”

Let me channel my best inner Epictetus: “Fool! You are allowed to suffer so that you may become better! Slave! You let the evil of others rule you, when you were made to be your own master!”

I once impishly tricked a whole class into thinking that was a real quote from the Enchiridion, and they threw pencils and balls of paper at me when they couldn’t find it anywhere in the text. Good times!

There are the times I need to treat myself with a greater gentleness, and then there are the times I need to slap myself quite firmly in the face. As soon as I let my fear, or my grief, or my anger get the better of me, I am a runaway.

My own mind only works rightly when it is in harmony with Mind. Allow it to occur as it is meant to occur, and please accept my own best actions to be my own best answer.

“I am shocked, offended, and outraged at your thinking!” I should stop saying that whenever I see something I do not prefer. I should fix myself, since that is my proper domain.

Written in 2/2009

Tao Te Ching 36

When one is about to take an inspiration, he is sure to make a previous expiration; when he is going to weaken another, he will first strengthen him; when he is going to overthrow another, he will first have raised him up; when he is going to despoil another, he will first have made gifts to him: this is called 'Hiding the light of his procedure.'

The soft overcomes the hard; and the weak the strong.

Fishes should not be taken from the deep; instruments for the profit of a state should not be shown to the people.

Boethius, The Consolation 3.29

. . . “Now consider,” she continued, “where it lies. The universally accepted notion of men proves that God, the fountainhead of all things, is good. For nothing can be thought of better than God, and surely He, than whom there is nothing better, must without doubt be good.

“Now reason shows us that God is so good, that we are convinced that in Him lies also the perfect good. For if it is not so, He cannot be the fountainhead; for there must then be something more excellent, possessing that perfect good, which appears to be of older origin than God: for it has been proved that all perfections are of earlier origin than the imperfect specimens of the same.

“Wherefore, unless we are to prolong the series to infinity, we must allow that the highest Deity must be full of the highest, the perfect good. But as we have laid down that true happiness is perfect good, it must be that true happiness is situated in His Divinity.

''Yes, I accept that; it cannot be in any way contradicted.”. . .

—from Book 3, Prose 10

We are sometimes quite busy thinking about the conflicts between “our” God and the God of “another”. In the last century, the trend has even been to simply reject God completely, and thereby to make those who may trust in God yet another set of enemies. Notice what we have done. We have taken the false divisions between men to assume a division within the very order of Nature.

And I remind myself yet again, think bigger. Think about what is the biggest. Look to what is everything, not to this or that something. Look to the fountainhead.

If I think my version of God is better than yours, I do not understand the very idea, because there can be nothing better than God. There is only One, not many.

If I think there is no God at all, but I still see a meaning and order to the world, I do not understand the very idea, because there can be no effect without a cause. There is only the unity of things, not a separation.

If I think there is no meaning and order to begin with, you should just wish me the best, and turn your head with compassion. There is no reason in such a statement. Where there is action, it comes from somewhere, and it goes to somewhere. What we call chance is only in our own partial ignorance of grasping the nature of the source.

Strutting science, or narrow theology, or arrogant preferences do not change a simple fact of reason: if it has come to be, there must be a reason for why it has come to be.

As is so common, we confuse our own worries with deeper questions of being. I am fighting my neighbor, so his God must be false. I am not happy, so clearly my God has failed me. I am so miserable, so surely there is no God at all.

No, all that is clear is that I am absorbed in my own vanity. God hasn’t failed me. I have failed Him.

There can be no infinite regress of causes, since then we would have infinite effects, but still no cause. We are passing the buck on forever and ever.

But what caused God? Nothing at all, because only changing things require causes. What is infinite, eternal, complete, and unchanging demands no cause at all. It Is.

As they say, let me do the math. God is Himself perfection. Happiness can only be found in perfection. Pray tell, what does that say about what I am looking for?

Written in 9/2015

Sayings of Socrates 9

If the entire soul, then, follows without rebellion the part that loves wisdom, the result is that in general each part can carry out its own function—can be just, in other words—and in particular each is able to enjoy pleasures which are its own, the best, and, as far as possible, the truest. . . . 

When one of the other parts takes control, there are two results: it fails to discover its own proper pleasure, and it compels the other parts to pursue a pleasure which is not their own, and not true. 

—Plato, Republic , 587a

Right from Wrong

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.24

What is my ruling faculty now to me? And of what nature am I now making it? And for what purpose am I now using it?

Is it void of understanding? Is it loosed and rent asunder from social life? Is it melted into and mixed with the poor flesh so as to move together with it?

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 10.24 (tr Long)

I had a teacher who liked to joke that for a species that calls itself homo sapiens, we don’t seem to do a whole lot of thinking, and when we do, it is usually ruled by something else. I chuckled every time, but most of the people around me looked puzzled.

It may seem odd that we are given the power of reason and then choose not to use it well, but of course that very decision to abuse free judgment is itself a free judgment.

It is within the very nature of man to understand himself and his world, and he is therefore also quite able to turn his back on understanding himself and his world. Give a being a mind, by which it can act from its own awareness, and you have also given it a will, by which it can prefer not to be mindful.

Instead of the mind and the will directing the body and the passions, we often allow the body and the passions to dominate the mind and the will. Ironically, we choose not to choose for ourselves, and we thereby freely make ourselves slaves to our circumstances.

I am often saddened when I see how we neglect the power of our own minds, not because we are failing to be clever and witty academics, but rather because we are abandoning our very humanity. Notice how often we are tempted to only feel without reflection, to decide without a measure of meaning, or to act without a sense of greater purpose. We can leave the scholarship to the scholars, but we need to keep a hold of that which makes us different from the beasts.

So I make a deliberate choice, each and every morning when I wake, to remind myself that I am not defined by the strength of my body, or by the weight of my emotions, or by the breadth of my possessions, or by how much I can buy or sell.

I am not formed by what happens to me, or by how I appear, or by what titles and labels I give myself, or by whether I meet with the approval or disapproval of others.

I am rather defined by my ability to know and to love, to find happiness in what is true and good, to live simply for the sake of living with virtue, and to respect my place within the greater good of Nature.

I am formed by what I choose to think and do, by the power of my conscience, by the divine spark within me, and by my willingness to recognize that same divine spark in my neighbor.

All the rest is quite unimportant. The worth of my day will depend upon the depth of my commitment to these values. 

Written in 2/2009 

Ecclesiastes 7:7-12

[7] Surely oppression makes the wise man foolish,
and a bribe corrupts the mind.
[8] Better is the end of a thing than its beginning;
and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.
[9] Be not quick to anger,
for anger lodges in the bosom of fools.
[10] Say not, "Why were the former days better than these?"
For it is not from wisdom that you ask this.
[11] Wisdom is good with an inheritance,
an advantage to those who see the sun.
[12] For the protection of wisdom is like the protection of money;
and the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the life
of him who has it.

Hippies and Cowboys

Though I had never been south of the Mason-Dixon before the the 1990's, I somehow found a love for Country music. It crept up on me. I started with Irish and Scottish folk, got sucked into Bluegrass when I wanted to learn to play the mandolin, and before I knew it, Merle, George, Waylon, Willie, and Johnny were an indispensable part of my life.

I was fortunate enough to have discovered Country at a time when the folks they then called the "New Traditionalists" ruled the airwaves. A few years earlier, or a few years later, and I would have probably turned up my nose up at the pop pablum that usually passes for Country. I remain grateful to Ricky Skaggs, Randy Travis, Alan Jackson, Vince Gill, and Keith Whitley for pointing the way back to the classics for me. In my mind, Garth Brooks and George Strait were always pushing their luck.

I could clear a room in two minutes flat back when I was in college, just with the sound of a steel guitar or a fiddle. It taught me who my real friends were, and what life was really about.

Many years later, I sat down next to a stranger with a big white Stetson at a BBQ joint in rural Oklahoma, and we somehow hit it off. This song by Cody Jinks came on the jukebox, and he was quite amused by the fact that I was the hippie, and he was the cowboy. He laughed and laughed, pointing back and forth between us as the lyrics came up.

He later became my NA sponsor, and I then spoke at his funeral. I don't usually do funerals, but I did for him. He was the sort of man whose sense of right and wrong transcended all boundaries.

I don't carouse like I used to, and I don't want my children to live as poorly as I once did. But the song is still an anthem for me. . .

Cody Jinks, "Hippies and Cowboys",  from Less Wise (2010)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRnDpQc8pwQ

Well I started on the whiskey pretty early this morning
That's alright, I was up all night
But I passed out before the sun came up
I really wanted to see one of those
I know that's no way for a man to behave
With a mortgage due and a baby on the way
But somehow I made it to where I'm at
It's been a living as a matter of fact

I get a bad attitude from being tired and running 'round
I never ask for anyone to say they like my sound
I've never been a part of any musical scene
I ain't just talking Nashville, if you know what I mean
They don't write about me in their magazines
And I don't ask for no reviews on the songs that I sing
I never had a lot of friends and I'm alright by that
But people keep on coming back

Raising hell with the hippies and the cowboys
They don't care about no trends
They don't care about songs that sell
Yeah, tomorrow I'll be gone
So tonight everybody just sing along
Raising hell with the hippies and the cowboys

I've been standing on the outside for all of my life
But I like the view, I'm not gonna lie
Yeah, the yuppies and the hipsters and the wannabe scenes
That ain't down home to me
I like two dollar beers, I like three dollar wells
At some old honky tonk bar that I know by the smell
Some old drunk on a bar stool on a Merle Haggard tune
That's my kind of room

Raising hell with the hippies and the cowboys
They don't care about no trends
They don't care about songs that sell
Yeah, tomorrow I'll be gone
So tonight everybody just sing along
Raising hell with the hippies and the cowboys

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.23

Let this always be plain to you, that this piece of land is like any other; and that all things here are the same with things on the top of a mountain, or on the seashore, or wherever you choose to be.

For you will find just what Plato says, “Dwelling within the walls of a city as in a shepherd's fold on a mountain.”

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 10.23 (tr Long)

I have tried to be strong in the face of pain and adversity, and I have known that keeping my thoughts focused on the deepest and most unassailable truths would help me to do so.

As the years passed, Stoicism slowly became an indispensable tool in getting the job done. I don’t know how I would have been able to muddle through without Seneca, or Musonius Rufus, or Epictetus, or Marcus Aurelius helping me along. They became my most effective teachers, not only because they taught me about the principles of right and wrong, but also because they walked with me in the practice of living day by day.

There were many times I was sure that the worst was behind me, and that I had overcome the biggest obstacles. It was naïve of me to think so, because as long as there is life, there will be new challenges, and unexpected circumstances will come my way. One such situation I had not anticipated was the power of place.

I had long treated certain places with reverence, as having an almost sacred quality. This allowed me to use them as a refuge, not only in body but also in mind, so that the mere thought of them was often enough to offer the deepest comfort in times of trial. If I had nothing else, I thought, I still had the places I held dear.

But the mind can move in strange ways, and events can unfold in strange ways. Even as I may choose to think and act in one way, I can’t always determine how I will feel. Even though I may expect one thing to happen, something very different can happen.

I began to notice that some of the comfortable places were gradually becoming quite painful to endure, and that some things had happened that made them quite dangerous for me. The haunts of my childhood and youth, so immediately part of who I thought I was, now had a whole new set of agonizing memories attached to them. The places where I had struggled to learn, and scrambled to grow up, now seemed cold and alien. I kept running into people I knew I should not be around, because they encouraged the worst in me.

Most of all, the very home and neighborhood I had spent so many years in were now a source of the greatest sadness and anxiety. At first I wanted to blame someone else for this, but I came to admit that it was only my own weakness that made it so unbearable. A drunk should probably avoiding hanging out at a distillery, and a troubled soul should probably stay clear of the temptations of despair.

At first, I resented being an exile. With time, though my pain never really lessened, I started to understand that the place does not make the man, but the man makes the place. This should have been clear to me much earlier, of course, because Stoicism stresses the merits of character over the forces of circumstance. I could still, in any location or situation, choose to be happy with my own worth.

Yes, I will still feel troubled, and I will have many sleepless nights, and I will be gnawed at by a sense of loneliness and isolation, but what I am working toward is the improvement of my own soul, regardless of the places I may find myself in. 

Written in 2/2009 

The Art of Peace 25

To practice properly the Art of Peace, you must:  

Calm the spirit and return to the source.  

Cleanse the body and spirit by removing all malice, selfishness, and desire. 

Be ever-grateful for the gifts received from the universe, your family, Mother Nature, and your fellow human beings. 

Unhappy?

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.22

Either you live here and have already accustomed yourself to it, or you are going away, and this was your own will, or you are dying, and have discharged your duty.

But besides these things there is nothing. Be of good cheer, then.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 10.22 (tr Long)

Somewhere back in the 1980’s I recall being told, by certain important people, that how I lived should be determined by “where I was at”. Everything was relative, and should be measured by what was most gratifying and convenient at the time.

That phrase would drive my mother crazy, a symptom of what she called the “self-serving generation”. Friends? Sure, but only if they are helping me to be where I am at right now. Marriage? I’m getting all the sex I want, so that’s not where I am at right now. Children? A bit inconvenient for where I am at right now, but maybe later that could be fun. A fancy career? Yes, said most of my peers, that’s exactly where I am at right now!

I once introduced my mother to a free-spirited girl I fancied, and, with just enough of a hint of dry humor, she asked: “Now is my son just another plaything for you, or are you going to respect him? Or is that not where you’re at right now?” Ouch.

The young lady pouted indignantly, and dramatically tossed her long, curly black hair. “I love him!” She had me with the passionate eyes. A year later, I wasn’t even getting a Christmas card. Don’t you hate it when Mom’s right?

My mother’s doubts about a culture of immediate satisfaction would only frustrate me all the more. I insisted she was wrong, and that however much we all had to ultimately figure out, we would all somehow make it work.

She was quite right, however, not because people can’t learn and grow, but because some people don’t really want to become better. They only want their own instant pleasures, wherever they are at, right then and there. They are different people at different times, depending upon what tickles their fancy.

All of us will pass from childhood, to adulthood, and into old age. For all of the stages of our lives, all of the choices we will have to make, and all of the obstacles we will have to face, there are really only three proper moral “states” we can be in.

First, we have learned what it means to be truly human, and we are at peace with how we are living. We embrace temperance and justice. It’s about being here.

Second, we are faced with an overwhelming obstacle, and we are freely willing to offer ourselves for what is right. We embrace courage. It’s about going away.

Third, we are certain of our final end, and we are satisfied to die with dignity. We embrace the wisdom of acceptance. It’s about being done.

What all three of these share in common is a commitment to character. There is a time to be content with our virtue, a time when virtue reminds us it is right to sacrifice and surrender, and a time when we must face our mortality with that very same virtue. In spite of everything else, there are no other times, and no other conditions that matter.

Now consider the options provided by the “where I am at” crowd. Satisfaction now. Run and hide when it gets tough. Never think about how it may end.

The wise man understands, in all peace, who he really is, and when he must stand up, and when he must go down.

This is why a good man is also a happy man, complete within himself. This is furthermore why the bad man is also an anxious man, waiting only for the next moment, in constant fear and longing. He is not one thing through and through, but many things at many moments. 

Written in 2/2009 

Dhammapada 50

Not the perversities of others, not their sins of commission or omission, but his own misdeeds and negligences should a sage take notice of. 

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.21

"The earth loves the rain;" and "the solemn ether loves;" and the Universe loves to make whatever is about to be.

I say then to the Universe, that I love as you love. And is not this too said that what "this or that loves is wont to be produced?"

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 10.21 (tr Long)

Sometimes I want to experience a change, because I am somehow convinced that it will be better for me. I desire something new, because I am tired or disappointed with what is old.

Sometimes I resist any change at all, because I am somehow comfortable that what I now have is better for me. I cling to what is old, because I fear the possibility of what is new.

They say that liberals want to start all over again, and that conservatives want to keep it all the same. I have never succumbed to either extreme, but I have always appreciated the old joke, that some people want to continue with the same old mistakes, while other people want to replace them with entirely new ones.

Yet I think that the Stoic, and any man who respects Nature for her own sake, will also respect change for its own sake, as an expression of the very ebb and flow of things. It should hardly matter to me at all whether a change improves or degrades my circumstances; not any one circumstance, new or old, is either of benefit or of harm to me. The old and the new should both be indifferent in my estimation; the content of my character is what should matter to me.

The mistakes don’t come from things changing or not changing, but from my own choice to be virtuous or vicious.

Through it all, Nature delights in all sorts of change, and as soon as one state has come to be, it will flow into another. Let me not love what I happen to prefer above all else, but let me love what Providence intends, knowing full well that constant action and reaction, unending transformation, is the order of all being.

There is no possibility of keeping it in this way, or of improving it in another way. What it was, and what it will be, necessarily go together. One requires the other, and one proceeds from the other.

“I want to keep it this way.” Well, I can’t, because nothing in creation stays the same. Life is a process, not a state.

“I want it to be another way.” Well, it will be, but it won’t stay that way. Life is a process, not a state.

Do not fix it in amber. The rain will fall, and the Universe will always be moving. If I decide to love what Nature loves, I will embrace that with all of my heart and mind, happy to see things unfolding as they should. In this manner, I will know my place.

Written in 2/2009

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 93

You are sailing to Rome, you tell me, to obtain the post of Governor of Cnossus. You are not content to stay at home with the honors you had before; you want something on a larger scale, and more conspicuous. 

But when did you ever undertake a voyage for the purpose of reviewing your own principles and getting rid of any of them that proved unsound? Whom did you ever visit for that object? What time did you ever set yourself for that? What age? 

Run over the times of your life—by yourself, if you are ashamed before me. Did you examine your principles when a boy? Did you not do everything just as you do now? Or when you were a stripling, attending the school of oratory and practicing the art yourself, what did you ever imagine you lacked? And when you were a young man, entered upon public life, and were pleading causes and making a name, who any longer seemed equal to you? And at what moment would you have endured another examining your principles and proving that they were unsound? 

What then am I to say to you? "Help me in this matter!" you cry. Ah, for that I have no rule! And neither did you, if that was your object, come to me as a philosopher, but as you might have gone to a herb-seller or a cobbler.

"What do philosophers have rules for, then?" Why, that whatever may betide, our ruling faculty may be as Nature would have it, and so remain. Think you this a small matter? Not so! but the greatest thing there is. Well, does it need but a short time? Can it be grasped by a passer-by?—grasp it, if you can! 
 
Then you will say, "Yes, I met Epictetus!"

Aye, just as you might a statue or a monument. You saw me! and that is all. But a man who meets a man is one who learns the other's mind, and lets him see his in turn. Learn my mind—show me yours; and then go and say that you met me. 

Let us try each other; if I have any wrong principle, rid me of it; if you have, out with it. That is what meeting a philosopher means. Not so, you think; this is only a flying visit; while we are hiring the ship, we can see Epictetus too! Let us see what he has to say. 

Then on leaving you cry, "Out on Epictetus for a worthless fellow, provincial and barbarous of speech!" What else indeed did you come to judge of?

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.20

That is for the good of each thing, which the Universal Nature brings to each.

And it is for its good at the time when Nature brings it.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 10.20 (tr Long)

“But it wasn’t supposed to happen this way!”

I said that whenever people I loved chose not to love me in return, but I was confusing what I wanted to happen with whatever was going to happen. My own choice to love was my own, and that was what I brought to the table. The choice of others to dispose of me was their own, and that was what they didn’t bring to the table.

My wife said that to me when we lost almost everything we had in this world, beyond our own humble dignity, but she was confusing what we thought we deserved with what other people were willing to give us. Our commitment came from us. That other people looked away came from them.

My son said that when he was ripped away from a school that practiced compassion, and sadly forced into a school full of bullies, but he was confusing how he treated others with how he wished to be treated. This one was the most difficult and painful, because he was hardly old enough to even judge for himself. Still, he came to see that he was made to be kind. He should not require to be treated kindly.

It was easier for me to learn this, far harder for me to ask my wife to accept it, and an absolute torture for me to ask my son to learn it. I could rule myself, but I neither could, nor should, rule them. I was grateful that we stuck it out together, and that we suffered through it together, and that we learned to live a better life together.

I have often felt quite disappointed with what life has offered me, and once I had a family to care for, I often felt like I had failed them. I never had enough money to make their lives more comfortable, and I never had enough power to make their lives easier. I dragged a fine woman into even more suffering than she had already been through, and I brought children into this world with no means to make them to be people of importance. This worry will gnaw at me to my dying day.

My only possible consolation is expressed in what Marcus Aurelius tells me here. How have I defined success for myself, or for my wife, or for my children? Things will happen, and they are usually quite beyond my own power. Being rich, or influential, or respected has little to do with me, and most everything to do with the opinions of others. I did not decide it, but I can decide what I will make of it.

What is the only legacy I can leave for my family? Not that hard work will make you rich, because it won’t. Not that sucking up to other people will make you popular, because it won’t. Only that whatever may come to us, and however it may come to us, it is the wisdom and virtue by which we choose to live for ourselves that will matter.

“Only losers say that!” I hear you snicker. No, define your terms. I think that only the real winners say that life should first be loving and beautiful.

It is not only a matter of accepting all the things that happen, but also a matter of seeing the good in all the things that happen. Many modern “Stoics” like the self-sufficiency part, but they reject the Providence part; they are missing a necessary half of the picture. It is not only that things may happen to us that are painful, but coming to embrace that they are meant to be good for us.

If Providence, the very order behind Nature itself, intends for it to occur, it should occur. May events take my prosperity, or my security, or my comfort? Yes, yes, and yes.

Will they take my character? Hell no, not if I refuse to let them do so. It was meant to be from the very beginning, for many reasons, but in a very small part so that I could choose to become better; so that all of us could choose to become better.

“Why this? Why now?” Don’t ask that. Ask rather, what was I made for to do with this, at this point right now?

I never gave my family the comfort of fancy circumstances. All I ever offered them was the comfort of seeking wisdom and love.

Written in 8/2012

Thomas a Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, 1.22

On the contemplation of human misery

1. You are miserable wherever you are, and wherever you turn, unless you turn yourself to God. Why are you disquieted because it happens not to you according to your wishes and desires? Who is he that has everything according to his will? Neither I, nor you, nor any man upon the earth. There is no man in the world free from trouble or anguish, though he were King or Pope. Who is he who has the happiest lot? Even he who is strong to suffer somewhat for God.

2. There are many foolish and unstable men who say, "See what a prosperous life that man has, how rich and how great he is, how powerful, how exalted." But lift up your eyes to the good things of heaven, and you shall see that all these worldly things are nothing, they are utterly uncertain, yes, they are wearisome, because they are never possessed without care and fear. The happiness of man lies not in the abundance of temporal things, but a moderate portion suffices him. Our life upon the earth is truly wretchedness. The more a man desires to be spiritual, the more bitter does the present life become to him, because he the better understands and sees the defects of human corruption. For to eat, to drink, to watch, to sleep, to rest, to labor, and to be subject to the other necessities of nature, is truly a great wretchedness and affliction to a devout man, who would rather be released and free from all sin.

3. For the inner man is heavily burdened with the necessities of the body in this world. Wherefore the prophet devoutly prays to be freed from them, saying, "Deliver me from my necessities, O Lord!" But woe to those who know not their own misery, and yet greater woe to those who love this miserable and corruptible life. For to such a degree do some cling to it (even though by laboring or begging they scarcely procure what is necessary for subsistence) that if they might live here always, they would care nothing for the Kingdom of God.

4. Oh foolish and faithless of heart, who lie buried so deep in worldly things, that they relish nothing save the things of the flesh! Miserable ones! they will too sadly find out at the last, how vile and worthless was that which they loved. The saints of God and all loyal friends of Christ held as nothing the things which pleased the flesh, or those that flourished in this life, but their whole hope and affection aspired to the things that are above. Their whole desire was carried upwards to everlasting and invisible things, lest they should be drawn downwards by the love of things visible.

5. Lose not, brother, your loyal desire of progress to things spiritual. There is yet time, the hour is not past. Why will you put off your resolution? Arise, begin this very moment, and say, "Now is the time to do: now is the time to fight, now is the proper time for amendment." When you are ill at ease and troubled, then is the time when you are nearest unto blessing. You must go through fire and water that God may bring you into a wealthy place. Unless you put force upon yourself, you wilt not conquer your faults. So long as we carry about with us this frail body, we cannot be without sin, we cannot live without weariness and trouble. Gladly would we have rest from all misery; but because through sin we have lost innocence, we have lost also the true happiness. Therefore must we be patient, and wait for the mercy of God, until this tyranny be passed over, and this mortality be swallowed up of life.

6. O how great is the frailty of man, which is ever prone to evil! Today you confess your sins, and tomorrow you commit again the sins you did confess. Now do you resolve to avoid a fault, and within an hour you behave yourself as if you had never resolved at all. Good cause have we therefore to humble ourselves, and never to think highly of ourselves, seeing that we are so frail and unstable. And quickly may that be lost by our negligence, which by much labor was hardly attained through grace.

7. What shall become of us at the end, if at the beginning we are lukewarm and idle? Woe unto us, if we choose to rest, as though it were a time of peace and security, while as yet no sign appears in our life of true holiness. Rather had we need that we might begin yet afresh, like good novices, to be instructed unto good living, if happily there might be hope of some future amendment and greater spiritual increase.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.19

Consider what men are when they are eating, sleeping, generating, easing themselves, and so forth.

Then what kind of men they are when they are imperious and arrogant, or angry and scolding from their elevated place.

But a short time ago to how many they were slaves and for what things; and after a little time consider in what a condition they will be.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 10.19 (tr Long)

I was often told, and I will still sometimes make use of the trick, that if I feel intimated speaking to a crowd, I should just imagine the audience sitting in their underwear. It is a great equalizer.

My great-grandfather liked to say that any man, however rich or fancy, still had to put his pants on in exactly the same way, one leg at a time. It is a great equalizer.

A rather eccentric friend of mine, whose crazy antics bordered on offensive performance art, once stood around in the toilet paper section of a local grocery store, and waited for all the yuppies and revered citizens to pick out their brand.

“Does this one work best for you?” he would ask quite loudly. “Can you tell my why it’s better?” Once again, though I cringed when he did things like this, it is a great equalizer.

To whatever degree I wish to take it, to consider that all of us share the exact same human functions, from the most noble to the most base, will help me to recall that no man is really more worthy than me, and that I am really no more worthy than any man.

It is easy to feel intimidated by the illusion of power and greatness, though just as easy to smile at all the rather crude but necessary aspects of our lives. Keeping in mind the latter helps us to brush aside the vanity of the former.

I don’t imagine my own generation was really better or worse than any other, but I did notice how we had quite the division between the ways we behaved around one set of people, and then the ways we behaved around another set of people.

We dressed up real nice, put on fancy airs, and presented ourselves as bright, charming, and confident when we wanted a good grade, or a better job, or a professional favor. As soon as we were away from all that shallow posturing, we stuffed our faces with food, drank to excess, gratified our passions in front of others at parties, and defecated on the neighbor’s doorstep.

That taught me to look behind the public mask, to become aware that so much of how we lived was a game of deception. I will still occasionally see photos of people I knew in college, posing for an award, or smiling to promote whatever product they now sell. All of it is to insist that they have arrived, that they matter, that they are so hugely important and successful.

Still, I also remember seeing them try to cheat on their girlfriends in the back of filthy cars, making excuses for why they were too drunk to finish the job. I remember them doing lines off of toilet seats, at seedy bars, the very sight of which would have made their mothers cry. I remember some of the smartest and most vocal Catholic students I knew back then, vomiting all over their dorm rooms. 

They now tell me that my alma mater is rated 43rd in the country, and how proud I should be. I am not proud at all, because I saw it from both ends, both as a student and as a teacher. The entire house of cards is built on the presumption that greatness is in how we make ourselves come across to others, not in how we actually live. It is about the constant lie that merit lies in our outer appearance, not in our inner character.

As long as I can resist resentment on my part, I can also use this as a lesson for my own struggles. Once I see another promoting his image, I can turn to the rather shameful reality. Once I am tempted to promote my own image, I can turn to the rather shameful reality.

The next time you find someone marching down the street, like some great Roman general puffed up with his own pride, keep in mind that all of his strengths stand together with all of his weaknesses, that all of his public glory is a veneer for all of his private embarrassments.

It is a great equalizer. 

Written in 2/2009

Tao Te Ching 35

To him who holds in his hands the Great Image of the invisible Tao, the whole world repairs. Men resort to him, and receive no hurt, but find rest, peace, and the feeling of ease.

Music and dainties will make the passing guest stop for a time. But though the Tao as it comes from the mouth, seems insipid and has no flavor, though it seems not worth being looked at or listened to, the use of it is inexhaustible.

Boethius, The Consolation 3.28

“Since then you have seen the form both of the imperfect and the perfect good, I think I should now show you where lies this perfection of happiness. In this I think our first inquiry must be whether any good of this kind can exist in the very nature of a subject; for we must not let any vain form of thought make us miss the truth of this matter. But there can be no denial of its existence, that it is as the very source of all that is good.

For if anything is said to be imperfect, it is held to be so by some loss of its perfection. Wherefore if in any kind of thing a particular seems imperfect, there must also be a perfect specimen in the same kind. For if you take away the perfection, it is impossible even to imagine from where could come the so-called imperfect specimen.

For Nature does not start from degenerate or imperfect specimens, but starting from the perfect and ideal, it degenerates to these lower and weaker forms.

If then, as we have shown above, there is an uncertain and imperfect happiness to be found in the good, then there must doubtless be also a sure and perfect happiness therein.”

“Yes,” said I, “that is quite surely proved to be true.” . . .

—from Book 3, Prose 10

If I can only be satisfied by the best, I will need to surround myself with the best.

I can think of so many imperfect analogies, where I wasn’t dealing with the source of all happiness, but rather simply pursuing lesser degrees of good. I may have thought that I could still get the same quality while paying less, or have the same results by cutting some corners, or consume more of something inferior in place of less of something superior. In each and every case, I found myself sorely disappointed.

I have tried this with some of my guilty pleasures over the years, like pipe tobacco, or beer, or fedora hats, and when I realized how I had sold myself short, I could only wonder what I had been thinking. I have tried it with more important things, like the sort of books I read, the kind of home I live in, or the quality of the company I keep, and the consequences were even more disturbing. I was, as they say, settling for second-best.

If I can see the problem in these less significant ways, should I not also be paying attention to it in the most significant ways? A cheap pair of shoes will not last me long, just as a weak moral anchor will not keep my life steady.

But does something truly perfect, that which contains within itself the goodness of all other things, actually exist? Is it even possible for there to be such a being? After all, the things that I can directly perceive with my senses may contain their own particular goodness, but each is distinct by lacking the goodness within other things. It would be quite foolish of me to begin with a conclusion, however convenient, if I can’t know it be true.

The relativist fashion of the age, which insists that there really is no truth, didn’t help me in these matters. I was told that nothing could ever be perfect, and that it was best for me to be quite imperfect. When I thought that through for a moment, I was puzzled. Worse is better, less is more, and it’s an absolute that nothing can be absolute? It sounded positively Orwellian!

My own doubts about striving for what is perfect also had much to do with other sorts of people, who had repeatedly told me that God existed because they said so, and that following Him was simply a duty I had to perform. Asking questions, they insisted, would only get me into trouble.

Now I had come across all sorts of different arguments, from various times and traditions, for the existence of that which is Absolute, the very source and standard of all that is. Perhaps it was just the way Boethius explained it, or where I happened to be in my own musings, but for the first time these insights started to come together, not just as a theoretical model, but also as a practical solution.

That imperfect creatures existed showed in itself the necessity of a perfect Creator, and that I longed for a deeper happiness pointed me directly to the object of my desire.

Wherever there are degrees of more or less, this is only possible through the maximum of what is the most, in that there can be no measuring without first having a measure. This is as true in the nature of things as it is in the order of thought. For it to be incomplete, or for it to be conceived of as incomplete, demands the context of that which is complete. Put another way, absence can only be judged through presence.

The principle of causality reminds us that something can never come from nothing, and by extension that more can never come from less. Rather, what is lesser is always an effect of the greater that preceded it. The very fact that I am constantly aware of different degrees and changing combinations of good around me is itself proof of the Perfect Good standing behind all of them.

And if this Perfect Good is real, the most real thing there could ever be, then the goal of happiness is also real, the highest purpose there could ever be. 

Written in 9/2015