Even if there shall appear in you a likeness to him who, by reason of your admiration, has left a deep impress upon you, I would have you resemble him as a child resembles his father, and not as a picture resembles its original; for a picture is a lifeless thing.
“What,” you say, “will it not be seen whose style you are imitating, whose method of reasoning, whose pungent sayings?”
I think that sometimes it is impossible for it to be seen who is being imitated, if the copy is a true one; for a true copy stamps its own form upon all the features which it has drawn from what we may call the original, in such a way that they are combined into a unity.
Do you not see how many voices there are in a chorus? Yet out of the many only one voice results. In that chorus one voice takes the tenor, another the bass, another the baritone. There are women, too, as well as men, and the flute is mingled with them. In that chorus the voices of the individual singers are hidden; what we hear is the voices of all together.
To be sure, I am referring to the chorus which the old-time philosophers knew; in our present-day exhibitions we have a larger number of singers than there used to be spectators in the theaters of old. All the aisles are filled with rows of singers; brass instruments surround the auditorium; the stage resounds with flutes and instruments of every description; and yet from the discordant sounds a harmony is produced.
I would have my mind of such a quality as this; it should be equipped with many arts, many precepts, and patterns of conduct taken from many epochs of history; but all should blend harmoniously into one.
“What,” you say, “will it not be seen whose style you are imitating, whose method of reasoning, whose pungent sayings?”
I think that sometimes it is impossible for it to be seen who is being imitated, if the copy is a true one; for a true copy stamps its own form upon all the features which it has drawn from what we may call the original, in such a way that they are combined into a unity.
Do you not see how many voices there are in a chorus? Yet out of the many only one voice results. In that chorus one voice takes the tenor, another the bass, another the baritone. There are women, too, as well as men, and the flute is mingled with them. In that chorus the voices of the individual singers are hidden; what we hear is the voices of all together.
To be sure, I am referring to the chorus which the old-time philosophers knew; in our present-day exhibitions we have a larger number of singers than there used to be spectators in the theaters of old. All the aisles are filled with rows of singers; brass instruments surround the auditorium; the stage resounds with flutes and instruments of every description; and yet from the discordant sounds a harmony is produced.
I would have my mind of such a quality as this; it should be equipped with many arts, many precepts, and patterns of conduct taken from many epochs of history; but all should blend harmoniously into one.
—from Seneca, Moral Letters 84
We are under the illusion that anything worthy must also be innovative, all the while forgetting why there is ultimately nothing new under the sun. It may appear brand new to me, and yet it is forever old. Looking behind the fads and the fancies of progress, those tiny snippets of time are subsumed under eternity.
So you will please forgive me if I smile when they say that it is the best thing ever, because it is oh so radical, edgy, and original. This may seem true from our narrow perspectives, but I fear that any sort of creation we claim for ourselves is only a likeness of the Absolute, every being as a further expression of Being. Infinite forms in infinite combinations are already included within the perfection of Providence.
This need not, however, be grounds for despair, since imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. That it has all been said and done before does not negate the unique value of making it my own at this very moment, of discovering my own specific variation. What makes it special is that I am participating in the whole, adding an individual interpretation, one which consciously binds together many separate influences.
In academia, we foolishly reward research if it can be labeled as groundbreaking, or in music, we falsely praise a performance if it can be marketed as avant-garde, when we would do ourselves far more good by honoring any act of insight, however humble, for the simple reason that a fellow has achieved it by his deliberate efforts, and struggled toward it with sincerity and integrity.
We should, for example, celebrate each child who arrives at the conclusion of the Golden Rule through his independent reasoning, regardless of how many others have gotten there before him. It matters far more for it be true than for it be innovative.
It is only a bland duplication when it is mindless, for the path is made fresh each time it is intentionally traveled. A wide range of the influences will certainly show themselves, though what will be most important is why these scattered elements have once again been combined through the power of a personal judgment.
I especially enjoy Seneca’s examples of how the resemblance should be like that of a child to a parent, and how a chorus blends the diverse voices into a single voice. I think of how my own children are learning to make themselves out of the conditions that were made for them, and how my high school chorus actually sounded rather nice, even though very few of us could carry a tune on our own.
Whatever sort of materials I happen to collect, I can inform them with my peculiar identity by uniting them into a single purpose. The universal constantly reveals itself in the particulars.
We are under the illusion that anything worthy must also be innovative, all the while forgetting why there is ultimately nothing new under the sun. It may appear brand new to me, and yet it is forever old. Looking behind the fads and the fancies of progress, those tiny snippets of time are subsumed under eternity.
So you will please forgive me if I smile when they say that it is the best thing ever, because it is oh so radical, edgy, and original. This may seem true from our narrow perspectives, but I fear that any sort of creation we claim for ourselves is only a likeness of the Absolute, every being as a further expression of Being. Infinite forms in infinite combinations are already included within the perfection of Providence.
This need not, however, be grounds for despair, since imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. That it has all been said and done before does not negate the unique value of making it my own at this very moment, of discovering my own specific variation. What makes it special is that I am participating in the whole, adding an individual interpretation, one which consciously binds together many separate influences.
In academia, we foolishly reward research if it can be labeled as groundbreaking, or in music, we falsely praise a performance if it can be marketed as avant-garde, when we would do ourselves far more good by honoring any act of insight, however humble, for the simple reason that a fellow has achieved it by his deliberate efforts, and struggled toward it with sincerity and integrity.
We should, for example, celebrate each child who arrives at the conclusion of the Golden Rule through his independent reasoning, regardless of how many others have gotten there before him. It matters far more for it be true than for it be innovative.
It is only a bland duplication when it is mindless, for the path is made fresh each time it is intentionally traveled. A wide range of the influences will certainly show themselves, though what will be most important is why these scattered elements have once again been combined through the power of a personal judgment.
I especially enjoy Seneca’s examples of how the resemblance should be like that of a child to a parent, and how a chorus blends the diverse voices into a single voice. I think of how my own children are learning to make themselves out of the conditions that were made for them, and how my high school chorus actually sounded rather nice, even though very few of us could carry a tune on our own.
Whatever sort of materials I happen to collect, I can inform them with my peculiar identity by uniting them into a single purpose. The universal constantly reveals itself in the particulars.
—Reflection written in 12/2013
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