Boethius, The Consolation 3.25

. . . “Then you have before you the form of false happiness, and its causes; now turn your attention in the opposite direction, and you will quickly see the true happiness which I have promised to show you.”

“But surely this is clear even to the blindest, and you showed it before when you were trying to make clear the causes of false happiness. For if I mistake not, true and perfect happiness is that which makes a man truly satisfied, powerful, venerated, renowned, and happy. And, for I would have you see that I have looked deeply into the matter, I realize without doubt that that which can truly yield any one of these, since they are all one, is perfect happiness.”

“Ah! My son,” said she, “I do see that you are blessed in this opinion, but I would have you add one thing.”

“What is that?” I asked.

“Do you think that there is anything among mortals, and in our perishable lives, which could yield such a state?”

“I do not think that there is, and I think that you have shown this beyond the need of further proof.”

“These then seem to yield to mortals certain appearances of the true good, or some such imperfections; but they cannot give true and perfect good.”

“No.”

“Since, then, you have seen what is true happiness, and what are the false imitations thereof, it now remains that you should learn from where this true happiness may be sought.”

“For that,” said I, “I have been impatiently waiting.”

“But Divine help must be sought in small things as well as great, as my pupil Plato says in his Timaeus; so what, think you, must we do to deserve to find the place of that highest good?”

“Call,” I said, “upon the Father of all, for if we do not do so, no undertaking would be rightly or duly begun.”

“You are right,” said she; and thus she cried aloud: . . .

—from Book 3, Prose 9

Being happy would mean that I have everything that I want, that I will desire nothing above and beyond what is already mine, and that I can rest assured that what I require is mine with certainty, that no one has the power to take it away from me.

Now this may seem like quite a tall order, and many people will tell me that it is impossible to find such a state of life. Yet it only seems impossible because of the things we think we need, and because we pursue all of the wrong ends. Lady Philosophy has already explained this. If I run after what is incomplete, I will fail. If I want what is beyond my power to possess, I will fail.

What is most disturbing is when folks admit that we are made to be happy, but then turn around and say that happiness can never really be found. So why do I live? Is it, perhaps, only for someone else’s gratification, which is itself yet another form of failed contentment, and does it all spiral into a never-ending cycle of mutual disappointment?

Do not give happiness many names, but give it one, because only what is one will it be complete. There may be many aspects, but there is only one source. Do not make happiness dependent upon what may happen, but upon what you can make happen. It is up to you how you will live, not up to others. Do not look for the broken parts, but look for the perfect whole. Never settle for what is second to the best.

“You cannot have the best. Be satisfied with whatever you get,” they may tell us. Don’t believe it. You can have the best, not in wealth, or power, or honor, but in your own character. Some people just want you to work for them, when you should really just be working for yourself.

But what could I possibly call my own, even as all the things I crave after are hardly my own?  I can easily lose my job, or my reputation, or everything I consider my property.

I once listened to a Texas sheriff, annoyed that I could not immediately find my proof of car insurance in my glovebox, tell me that he could get me “raped in jail” if I didn’t hurry up.

He was quite right, of course. If he said that I had been drinking, or fighting, or mouthing off to him, he could have done precisely that. And there would have been nothing I could do to stop him.

So how can there be happiness with all of that? Rather easily. Don’t focus on all of that.

Nothing, absolutely nothing, that I see around me can fulfill that most urgent need. All of those things may be a part of the whole, but they are not the whole. What is the whole?

Plato had it right, as all humble men of wisdom have it right. If you want what is the biggest, the best, and the most perfect, raise you eyes, your thoughts and intentions to what is the biggest, the best, and the most perfect.

An angry Texas sheriff can’t be trusted; God can be trusted. 

Written in 9/2015