Chapter 2: How one may be true to one’s character in everything.
To the rational creature that which is against reason is alone past bearing; the rational he can always bear. Blows are not by nature intolerable.
“What do you mean?”
Let me explain; the Lacedaemonians bear flogging, because they have learnt that it is in accord with reason.
“But is it not intolerable to hang oneself?”
At any rate, when a man comes to feel that it is rational, he goes and hangs himself at once. In a word, if we look to it we shall see that by nothing is the rational creature so distressed as by the irrational, and again to nothing so much attracted as to the rational.
This is another one of those Stoic passages that can get some people quite angry, and I am genuinely curious what it is about it that pushes their buttons. I can only think that it gives the impression of diminishing the emotional significance of events, replacing it with merely a cold rationality?
“This guy must be the stupidest and most heartless philosopher ever! How can he say that we can put up with anything reasonable? Doesn’t he see how much our feelings shape our decisions?”
It isn’t my place to tell someone else how to read a text, yet the Stoicism I admire does not deny the passions in human experience, and it does not imply that we shouldn’t be attending to how we feel.
Rather, it argues that it is only judgment that can give the proper context for our emotions. It will be our estimation of their significance to us, and our power to give them direction, that ultimately makes them become good or bad.
We will find, with practice and commitment, that we can be the masters of our passions, just as a rider learns control over the reins. We will also find, with careful reflection, that feelings don’t just passively come to us; our very acts of consideration will also bring them about.
I would further suggest that rationality here is not an impersonal calculation, like that of a machine crunching numbers, but more broadly the way in which the mind discovers and embraces a sense of deeper meaning and purpose. Understanding is what allows us to grasp the how and the why of things, to find our own rightful place in this world; there are necessarily great sentiments joined to such an awareness.
Are my feelings affecting me? Absolutely. Must I do what they demand? Strictly speaking, they “demand” nothing at all; my conscious decision, which is in itself an act of the mind, will determine what I do with them. If I am a slave to my emotions, that is because my judgement has surrendered my will to get and my will to avoid.
All men will care, though it is what they choose to care about that will make all the difference. I approach the passage from that perspective.
In the simplest of terms, it is only when something truly “makes sense” to me that I am then motivated to act for its sake, and willing to bear hardship on account of it. The greater the degree of my conviction, the greater the degree of my commitment or sacrifice.
The Spartans could gladly bear, even find honor in, being beaten. Someone might make a case that they were mistaken in these values, but it was nevertheless their thinking that informed their acting and feeling.
A man may be filled with despair, and he so chooses to take his own life. Someone might make a case that his perspective is confused, but it is nevertheless his own estimation of meaning that takes him down this path.
Indeed, a Spartan only freely embraced pain because he found it so reasonable. The suicide only walks away from life because he considers its continuation to be so unreasonable. The attitude made it so for them.
If I judge it right and worthy, I will do anything to acquire it. If I judge it wrong and unworthy, I will do anything to avoid it.
Written in 8/2000
No comments:
Post a Comment