M. But what is there more effectual to dispel grief than the discovery that it answers no purpose, and has been undergone to no account? Therefore, if we can get rid of it, we need never have been subject to it.
It must be acknowledged, then, that men take up grief wilfully and knowingly; and this appears from the patience of those who, after they have been exercised in afflictions and are better able to bear whatever befalls them, suppose themselves hardened against fortune; as that person in Euripides,
“Had this the first essay of fortune been,
And I no storms thro’ all my life had seen,
Wild as a colt I’d broke from reason’s sway;
But frequent griefs have taught me to obey.”
As, then, the frequent bearing of misery makes grief the lighter, we must necessarily perceive that the cause and original of it does not lie in the calamity itself. Your principal philosophers, or lovers of wisdom, though they have not yet arrived at perfect wisdom, are not they sensible that they are in the greatest evil? For they are foolish, and foolishness is the greatest of all evils, and yet they lament not.
How shall we account for this? Because opinion is not fixed upon that kind of evil, it is not our opinion that it is right, meet, and our duty to be uneasy because we are not all wise men. Whereas this opinion is strongly affixed to that uneasiness where mourning is concerned, which is the greatest of all grief.
Therefore Aristotle, when he blames some ancient philosophers for imagining that by their genius they had brought philosophy to the highest perfection, says, they must be either extremely foolish or extremely vain; but that he himself could see that great improvements had been made therein in a few years, and that philosophy would in a little time arrive at perfection.
And Theophrastus is reported to have reproached nature at his death for giving to stags and crows so long a life, which was of no use to them, but allowing only so short a span to men, to whom length of days would have been of the greatest use; for if the life of man could have been lengthened, it would have been able to provide itself with all kinds of learning, and with arts in the greatest perfection. He lamented, therefore, that he was dying just when he had begun to discover these.
What! Does not every grave and distinguished philosopher acknowledge himself ignorant of many things, and confess that there are many things which he must learn over and over again? And yet, though these men are sensible that they are standing still in the very midway of folly, than which nothing can be worse, they are under no great affliction, because no opinion that it is their duty to lament is ever mingled with this knowledge.
What shall we say of those who think it unbecoming in a man to grieve? Among whom we may reckon Q. Maximus, when he buried his son that had been consul, and L. Paulus, who lost two sons within a few days of one another. Of the same opinion was M. Cato, who lost his son just after he had been elected praetor, and many others, whose names I have collected in my book On Consolation.
Now what made these men so easy, but their persuasion that grief and lamentation was not becoming in a man? Therefore, as some give themselves up to grief from an opinion that it is right so to do, they refrained themselves, from an opinion that it was discreditable; from which we may infer that grief is owing more to opinion than nature.
It must be acknowledged, then, that men take up grief wilfully and knowingly; and this appears from the patience of those who, after they have been exercised in afflictions and are better able to bear whatever befalls them, suppose themselves hardened against fortune; as that person in Euripides,
“Had this the first essay of fortune been,
And I no storms thro’ all my life had seen,
Wild as a colt I’d broke from reason’s sway;
But frequent griefs have taught me to obey.”
As, then, the frequent bearing of misery makes grief the lighter, we must necessarily perceive that the cause and original of it does not lie in the calamity itself. Your principal philosophers, or lovers of wisdom, though they have not yet arrived at perfect wisdom, are not they sensible that they are in the greatest evil? For they are foolish, and foolishness is the greatest of all evils, and yet they lament not.
How shall we account for this? Because opinion is not fixed upon that kind of evil, it is not our opinion that it is right, meet, and our duty to be uneasy because we are not all wise men. Whereas this opinion is strongly affixed to that uneasiness where mourning is concerned, which is the greatest of all grief.
Therefore Aristotle, when he blames some ancient philosophers for imagining that by their genius they had brought philosophy to the highest perfection, says, they must be either extremely foolish or extremely vain; but that he himself could see that great improvements had been made therein in a few years, and that philosophy would in a little time arrive at perfection.
And Theophrastus is reported to have reproached nature at his death for giving to stags and crows so long a life, which was of no use to them, but allowing only so short a span to men, to whom length of days would have been of the greatest use; for if the life of man could have been lengthened, it would have been able to provide itself with all kinds of learning, and with arts in the greatest perfection. He lamented, therefore, that he was dying just when he had begun to discover these.
What! Does not every grave and distinguished philosopher acknowledge himself ignorant of many things, and confess that there are many things which he must learn over and over again? And yet, though these men are sensible that they are standing still in the very midway of folly, than which nothing can be worse, they are under no great affliction, because no opinion that it is their duty to lament is ever mingled with this knowledge.
What shall we say of those who think it unbecoming in a man to grieve? Among whom we may reckon Q. Maximus, when he buried his son that had been consul, and L. Paulus, who lost two sons within a few days of one another. Of the same opinion was M. Cato, who lost his son just after he had been elected praetor, and many others, whose names I have collected in my book On Consolation.
Now what made these men so easy, but their persuasion that grief and lamentation was not becoming in a man? Therefore, as some give themselves up to grief from an opinion that it is right so to do, they refrained themselves, from an opinion that it was discreditable; from which we may infer that grief is owing more to opinion than nature.
—from Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 3.28
If I ask for concrete evidence that grief can be overcome, I need only look at those who, in the face of the harshest of circumstances, choose not to let themselves be overcome. It isn’t that they are insensitive, for they most certainly do feel pain, or that they are somehow endowed with superhuman strength, for they are exercising exactly the same powers of reason and will that I possess. No, they differ from me only in their convictions, which proceed from their understanding of the true measures of right and wrong.
As the Stoics always taught, if I do not judge myself to have been harmed, then I have not been harmed. Cicero also embraces this lesson, as does any seeker of wisdom. And I do not have to be fully enlightened in order to grasp why what is good for me rests in the activity of my judgment, not in the events that happen to me, which were never within my power to begin with. The grief is removed when I discover that the loss has not actually injured my nature—it may even have given me the opportunity to improve my character.
Looking back at my own struggles, I can honestly say that the greater the hardships, the greater the occasions to steel my resolve and fortify my habits. I have become better by being repeatedly tested to ever-increasing degrees. I may not have enjoyed it at the time, but the experience was good for me; what seemed unbearable once has now become a walk in the park, and I am, most importantly, a happier man for it.
It is enough to merely be on the path, even at the very beginning of the journey, and I do not need to have arrived at the final destination; nor do I need to be a philosopher to know how the absence of what I desire should not be an excuse to despair, and it is rather an impetus to increase my resolve. I am not a wise man, I am someone who desperately wishes to be wise, and that is a matter of hope, not of grief.
For many years, I assumed I would have to become callous and merciless if I wanted to avoid sorrow, and while I was mistaken about how I needed to change, I at least saw how the solution had to come from inside me. The trick, as it turns out, is in clinging to the virtues all the harder, and then also in realizing why maintaining my integrity is the key to transforming suffering into growth.
If the examples of learned philosophers and noble statesmen seem too distant, I can always look closer to home. I think of a student who took her learning disability as a challenge to become a writer. I think of my elementary school principal who wrote us funny notes in calligraphy when cancer took the use of his voice. I think of a priest who became ever kinder and more patient as he spent many years fighting a false accusation of abuse. They did not stumble with the weight of afflictions—they stood taller.
And what struck me the most about all of these people was the vigor of their joy. They were not resentful or begrudging, and they saw the duty to act with excellence as a privilege. If they could do it, what is stopping me? Only my own opinions. Change the attitude, and you then change the situation; it will not happen instantly, yet there will be steady progress.
As a child, I didn’t much like grand appeals to duty or honor, and that was sadly because I did not yet understand why a responsibility can be taken as an expression of freedom, not as a stifling imposition. Now, when I read a passage like this in Cicero, I have a profound respect for the liberty of a stalwart spirit.
If I ask for concrete evidence that grief can be overcome, I need only look at those who, in the face of the harshest of circumstances, choose not to let themselves be overcome. It isn’t that they are insensitive, for they most certainly do feel pain, or that they are somehow endowed with superhuman strength, for they are exercising exactly the same powers of reason and will that I possess. No, they differ from me only in their convictions, which proceed from their understanding of the true measures of right and wrong.
As the Stoics always taught, if I do not judge myself to have been harmed, then I have not been harmed. Cicero also embraces this lesson, as does any seeker of wisdom. And I do not have to be fully enlightened in order to grasp why what is good for me rests in the activity of my judgment, not in the events that happen to me, which were never within my power to begin with. The grief is removed when I discover that the loss has not actually injured my nature—it may even have given me the opportunity to improve my character.
Looking back at my own struggles, I can honestly say that the greater the hardships, the greater the occasions to steel my resolve and fortify my habits. I have become better by being repeatedly tested to ever-increasing degrees. I may not have enjoyed it at the time, but the experience was good for me; what seemed unbearable once has now become a walk in the park, and I am, most importantly, a happier man for it.
It is enough to merely be on the path, even at the very beginning of the journey, and I do not need to have arrived at the final destination; nor do I need to be a philosopher to know how the absence of what I desire should not be an excuse to despair, and it is rather an impetus to increase my resolve. I am not a wise man, I am someone who desperately wishes to be wise, and that is a matter of hope, not of grief.
For many years, I assumed I would have to become callous and merciless if I wanted to avoid sorrow, and while I was mistaken about how I needed to change, I at least saw how the solution had to come from inside me. The trick, as it turns out, is in clinging to the virtues all the harder, and then also in realizing why maintaining my integrity is the key to transforming suffering into growth.
If the examples of learned philosophers and noble statesmen seem too distant, I can always look closer to home. I think of a student who took her learning disability as a challenge to become a writer. I think of my elementary school principal who wrote us funny notes in calligraphy when cancer took the use of his voice. I think of a priest who became ever kinder and more patient as he spent many years fighting a false accusation of abuse. They did not stumble with the weight of afflictions—they stood taller.
And what struck me the most about all of these people was the vigor of their joy. They were not resentful or begrudging, and they saw the duty to act with excellence as a privilege. If they could do it, what is stopping me? Only my own opinions. Change the attitude, and you then change the situation; it will not happen instantly, yet there will be steady progress.
As a child, I didn’t much like grand appeals to duty or honor, and that was sadly because I did not yet understand why a responsibility can be taken as an expression of freedom, not as a stifling imposition. Now, when I read a passage like this in Cicero, I have a profound respect for the liberty of a stalwart spirit.
—Reflection written in 12/1998
IMAGE: Benjamin West, The Pilgrim Mourning His Dead Ass (c. 1775)
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