M. I can easily bear with your behaving in this manner, though it is not fair in you to prescribe to me how you would have me carry on this discussion. But I ask you if I have effected anything or nothing in the preceding days?
A. Yes; something was done, some little matter indeed.
M. But if that is the case, this question is settled, and almost put an end to.
A. How so?
M. Because turbulent motions and violent agitations of the mind, when it is raised and elated by a rash impulse, getting the better of reason, leave no room for a happy life. For who that fears either pain or death, the one of which is always present, the other always impending, can be otherwise than miserable?
Now, supposing the same person—which is often the case—to be afraid of poverty, ignominy, infamy, or weakness, or blindness, or, lastly, slavery, which does not only befall individual men, but often even the most powerful nations; now can anyone under the apprehension of these evils be happy?
What shall we say of him who not only dreads these evils as impending, but actually feels and bears them at present? Let us unite in the same person banishment, mourning, the loss of children; now, how can anyone who is broken down and rendered sick in body and mind by such affliction be otherwise than very miserable indeed?
What reason, again, can there be why a man should not rightly enough be called miserable whom we see inflamed and raging with lust, coveting everything with an insatiable desire, and, in proportion as he derives more pleasure from anything, thirsting the more violently after them?
And as to a man vainly elated, exulting with an empty joy, and boasting of himself without reason, is not he so much the more miserable in proportion as he thinks himself happier?
Therefore, as these men are miserable, so, on the other hand, those are happy who are alarmed by no fears, wasted by no griefs, provoked by no lusts, melted by no languid pleasures that arise from vain and exulting joys.
We look on the sea as calm when not the least breath of air disturbs its waves; and, in like manner, the placid and quiet state of the mind is discovered when unmoved by any perturbation.
Now, if there be any one who holds the power of fortune, and everything human, everything that can possibly befall any man, as supportable, so as to be out of the reach of fear or anxiety, and if such a man covets nothing, and is lifted up by no vain joy of mind, what can prevent his being happy?
And if these are the effects of virtue, why cannot virtue itself make men happy?
A. Yes; something was done, some little matter indeed.
M. But if that is the case, this question is settled, and almost put an end to.
A. How so?
M. Because turbulent motions and violent agitations of the mind, when it is raised and elated by a rash impulse, getting the better of reason, leave no room for a happy life. For who that fears either pain or death, the one of which is always present, the other always impending, can be otherwise than miserable?
Now, supposing the same person—which is often the case—to be afraid of poverty, ignominy, infamy, or weakness, or blindness, or, lastly, slavery, which does not only befall individual men, but often even the most powerful nations; now can anyone under the apprehension of these evils be happy?
What shall we say of him who not only dreads these evils as impending, but actually feels and bears them at present? Let us unite in the same person banishment, mourning, the loss of children; now, how can anyone who is broken down and rendered sick in body and mind by such affliction be otherwise than very miserable indeed?
What reason, again, can there be why a man should not rightly enough be called miserable whom we see inflamed and raging with lust, coveting everything with an insatiable desire, and, in proportion as he derives more pleasure from anything, thirsting the more violently after them?
And as to a man vainly elated, exulting with an empty joy, and boasting of himself without reason, is not he so much the more miserable in proportion as he thinks himself happier?
Therefore, as these men are miserable, so, on the other hand, those are happy who are alarmed by no fears, wasted by no griefs, provoked by no lusts, melted by no languid pleasures that arise from vain and exulting joys.
We look on the sea as calm when not the least breath of air disturbs its waves; and, in like manner, the placid and quiet state of the mind is discovered when unmoved by any perturbation.
Now, if there be any one who holds the power of fortune, and everything human, everything that can possibly befall any man, as supportable, so as to be out of the reach of fear or anxiety, and if such a man covets nothing, and is lifted up by no vain joy of mind, what can prevent his being happy?
And if these are the effects of virtue, why cannot virtue itself make men happy?
—from Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 5.6
Well, maybe the Auditor has gotten a little too snippy, and Cicero reminds him to speak only for himself, not for others. Lesson duly noted.
I add to myself that a feeling of aggravation should not race ahead of a serene understanding, for the sense that I have been denied something essential may well arise from my confusion about that very essence.
Though this last book discusses the capstone of Stoic ethics, that virtue is the highest human good, and thus is the perfection of our happiness, the four previous books have already given us all the basic principles to arrive at this conclusion. That the Auditor, or any one of us who has been disappointed by the world, remains hesitant may require connecting the dots more explicitly, so that the habits of cynicism might give way to a commitment of character.
When I am overwhelmed by hardships, let me examine their source. Simply put, is it the circumstance itself that is the trouble, or is it rather my own response to the circumstance? If it is the former, then my happiness is at the whims of fortune, but if is the latter, then I am responsible for my own fate.
In the language of the Peripatetics, which is the material cause, and which is the efficient cause? While poverty, disease, or violence have their direct effects upon the body, the mind retains the liberty to form its own estimation, to extract its own meaning, for good or for evil, on its own terms. Once it becomes what I make of it, I am no longer its victim.
I observe how Cicero lays out his examples of agitations in the pattern of the Stoics, thereby highlighting how the root of the problem is a disordered emotion, which in turn arises from a disordered thought.
Where there is fear of what is to come, or grief at what has already arrived, there is also a false judgment about the nature of harm. Where there is lust for a future conquest, or gratification in a present amusement, there is also a twisted belief about what is worth desiring. In each case, however I categorize my troubles, their origin is a frenzy of passion resulting from a surrender of understanding. The rider has lost his control of the reins.
Once I bother to reflect, I realize how I complain about my condition precisely when these confused feelings are present, and yet I am somehow blaming other powers, supposedly beyond my control. There would be no fear, grief, lust, or gratification if there were a sound understanding of the true nature of benefit and harm. The Auditor and I should not be so quick to dismiss virtue as the remedy for misery.
And when I find myself in the presence of a truly satisfied man, one who reveals it out of his inner being instead of putting on a superficial act, I will notice how he has a mastery over such passions. No, he does not repress his natural instincts, but at the same time he does not permit them to dominate his behavior—they are his, since he owns them, and they do not own him.
When I think of the best moment of my life, they were invariably joined to a peace of mind, an awareness that I was as I was meant to me, in a state of harmony, regardless of what had passed before or what might still await me. They were always eternal nows, precisely because they were beyond the limitations of this or that experience.
And do not assume that they were all on a sandy beach or a scenic mountaintop, in the arms of my beloved, because many of them were in the oddest of places, at the most ridiculous of times, in bustling crowds or in complete solitude. It becomes clearer that my deliberate attitude had more to with it than any happenstance. It rose above the scenery.
If I feel perturbed, where did that come from? If my virtues and vices are mine to decide, is not also my happiness mine to decide?
Well, maybe the Auditor has gotten a little too snippy, and Cicero reminds him to speak only for himself, not for others. Lesson duly noted.
I add to myself that a feeling of aggravation should not race ahead of a serene understanding, for the sense that I have been denied something essential may well arise from my confusion about that very essence.
Though this last book discusses the capstone of Stoic ethics, that virtue is the highest human good, and thus is the perfection of our happiness, the four previous books have already given us all the basic principles to arrive at this conclusion. That the Auditor, or any one of us who has been disappointed by the world, remains hesitant may require connecting the dots more explicitly, so that the habits of cynicism might give way to a commitment of character.
When I am overwhelmed by hardships, let me examine their source. Simply put, is it the circumstance itself that is the trouble, or is it rather my own response to the circumstance? If it is the former, then my happiness is at the whims of fortune, but if is the latter, then I am responsible for my own fate.
In the language of the Peripatetics, which is the material cause, and which is the efficient cause? While poverty, disease, or violence have their direct effects upon the body, the mind retains the liberty to form its own estimation, to extract its own meaning, for good or for evil, on its own terms. Once it becomes what I make of it, I am no longer its victim.
I observe how Cicero lays out his examples of agitations in the pattern of the Stoics, thereby highlighting how the root of the problem is a disordered emotion, which in turn arises from a disordered thought.
Where there is fear of what is to come, or grief at what has already arrived, there is also a false judgment about the nature of harm. Where there is lust for a future conquest, or gratification in a present amusement, there is also a twisted belief about what is worth desiring. In each case, however I categorize my troubles, their origin is a frenzy of passion resulting from a surrender of understanding. The rider has lost his control of the reins.
Once I bother to reflect, I realize how I complain about my condition precisely when these confused feelings are present, and yet I am somehow blaming other powers, supposedly beyond my control. There would be no fear, grief, lust, or gratification if there were a sound understanding of the true nature of benefit and harm. The Auditor and I should not be so quick to dismiss virtue as the remedy for misery.
And when I find myself in the presence of a truly satisfied man, one who reveals it out of his inner being instead of putting on a superficial act, I will notice how he has a mastery over such passions. No, he does not repress his natural instincts, but at the same time he does not permit them to dominate his behavior—they are his, since he owns them, and they do not own him.
When I think of the best moment of my life, they were invariably joined to a peace of mind, an awareness that I was as I was meant to me, in a state of harmony, regardless of what had passed before or what might still await me. They were always eternal nows, precisely because they were beyond the limitations of this or that experience.
And do not assume that they were all on a sandy beach or a scenic mountaintop, in the arms of my beloved, because many of them were in the oddest of places, at the most ridiculous of times, in bustling crowds or in complete solitude. It becomes clearer that my deliberate attitude had more to with it than any happenstance. It rose above the scenery.
If I feel perturbed, where did that come from? If my virtues and vices are mine to decide, is not also my happiness mine to decide?
—Reflection written in 2/1999
IMAGE: Gustave Courbet, The Calm Sea (1869)
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