All you need to do is to advance; you will thus understand that some things are less to be dreaded, precisely because they inspire us with great fear.
No evil is great which is the last evil of all. Death arrives; it would be a thing to dread, if it could remain with you. But death must either not come at all, or else must come and pass away.
"It is difficult, however," you say, "to bring the mind to a point where it can scorn life."
But do you not see what trifling reasons impel men to scorn life? One hangs himself before the door of his mistress; another hurls himself from the house-top that he may no longer be compelled to bear the taunts of a bad-tempered master; a third, to be saved from arrest after running away, drives a sword into his vitals.
As much as circumstances may lure me to decrease, all that is required is a steady commitment to increase. Slow and steady wins the race.
My terror is not a consequence of my problems, it is rather itself the source of my problems.
The very fact that I fear something tells me everything about myself, and nothing about the situations that I face. The fear is in me, and never in what is outside of me.
The man who treats me poorly, or denies me a fair wage, or threatens me with punishments and sanctions, has told me exactly who he is; it now only matters who I will decide to be. Will I be like him? Wouldn’t it be better if I was completely unlike him?
“He may lock me up, or he may beat me, or he may kill me!”
Yes, he may well do that. And that is a vice he must resolve for himself; I only have to grapple with my own conscience. The evil he may do can never, in any way, justify any evil that I may do.
Can it hurt me if I maintain my own dignity? Not at all, not one tiny bit. Can it hurt me if it kills me? Not at all, as there will be nothing more to suffer.
I do worry about dying, though I should worry more about what little living I have that remains. I have only so many breaths left, and each one of them should be charged with awareness and love.
Recognize the feeling of fear, accept it, understand it. Now become its master, instead of being its slave. Tell the passions what they should do with themselves; they are your passions, and nobody else’s.
The secular materialists, those who would like to reduce humanity to a biological principle of survival, do not understand that living alone is neither here nor there; living well, in whatever time is given, is what makes all of the difference.
Look at all the foolish things people will die for, and then be proud that you have so much more to live for.
Run away from nothing, whether it be a broken heart, or a state of bodily slavery, or any of the agonies that Fortune might cast your way.
Death will come when Providence deems it right. In the meantime, “scorning” life means nothing other than seeking more of it in quality, instead of craving more of it in quantity. The length of life ought to be treated indifferently, while the content of character can never be compromised.
No evil is great which is the last evil of all. Death arrives; it would be a thing to dread, if it could remain with you. But death must either not come at all, or else must come and pass away.
"It is difficult, however," you say, "to bring the mind to a point where it can scorn life."
But do you not see what trifling reasons impel men to scorn life? One hangs himself before the door of his mistress; another hurls himself from the house-top that he may no longer be compelled to bear the taunts of a bad-tempered master; a third, to be saved from arrest after running away, drives a sword into his vitals.
As much as circumstances may lure me to decrease, all that is required is a steady commitment to increase. Slow and steady wins the race.
My terror is not a consequence of my problems, it is rather itself the source of my problems.
The very fact that I fear something tells me everything about myself, and nothing about the situations that I face. The fear is in me, and never in what is outside of me.
The man who treats me poorly, or denies me a fair wage, or threatens me with punishments and sanctions, has told me exactly who he is; it now only matters who I will decide to be. Will I be like him? Wouldn’t it be better if I was completely unlike him?
“He may lock me up, or he may beat me, or he may kill me!”
Yes, he may well do that. And that is a vice he must resolve for himself; I only have to grapple with my own conscience. The evil he may do can never, in any way, justify any evil that I may do.
Can it hurt me if I maintain my own dignity? Not at all, not one tiny bit. Can it hurt me if it kills me? Not at all, as there will be nothing more to suffer.
I do worry about dying, though I should worry more about what little living I have that remains. I have only so many breaths left, and each one of them should be charged with awareness and love.
Recognize the feeling of fear, accept it, understand it. Now become its master, instead of being its slave. Tell the passions what they should do with themselves; they are your passions, and nobody else’s.
The secular materialists, those who would like to reduce humanity to a biological principle of survival, do not understand that living alone is neither here nor there; living well, in whatever time is given, is what makes all of the difference.
Look at all the foolish things people will die for, and then be proud that you have so much more to live for.
Run away from nothing, whether it be a broken heart, or a state of bodily slavery, or any of the agonies that Fortune might cast your way.
Death will come when Providence deems it right. In the meantime, “scorning” life means nothing other than seeking more of it in quality, instead of craving more of it in quantity. The length of life ought to be treated indifferently, while the content of character can never be compromised.
Written in 3/2012
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