(Source: Ordinary Finds)
Accidental Happiness
From The Enchanted Woods: and Other Essays on the Genius of Places (1905), by Vernon Lee:
There is no folly more vain or fruitless than to manipulate one’s own happiness! My growing belief is that the journeys richest in pleasant memories are those undertaken accidentally, or under the stress of necessity; moreover, that the most interesting places are those which we stray into, or just deflect towards, as we wander for the sake of friends or work, or even in humbler quest of cheapness of living or economy of health. This belief that the best travel is not for travelling’s sake goes hand in hand with a certain philosophy of life, very vague, difficult to define, but perhaps the deeper down and more inevitable, forcing itself upon one with every added year of experience. As we continue to live, and see more of our own and other folks’ lives behind, or alongside of us, there arises a dim comprehension of some mysterious law by which the good things of life, all the happiness–nay, the very power of being happy–are not life’s aims but life’s furtherance, and their true possession depends on willing and uncalculating response to life’s multifold and changing beckonings and behests. Life itself is a journey from an unknown starting point to an unknown goal. We who move along its tracks cannot overlook the roads which cross and recross one another in endless intricacy; and the maps we make for ourselves are the mere scrawlings of fanciful children. All we can do, while thus travelling we know neither whence nor whither, is to keep our eyes clear, our feet undefiled, to drop as much useless baggage as possible, and fill our hands with the fruits and herbs, sweet or salutary, of the roadside. But if we imagine that we can bend our course to the hidden Temples of Sais, or the Gardens of Armida, or the Heavenly Jerusalem, why! there is no mischief in hoping; only, methinks we shall be disappointed. For wisdom, beauty–nay, holiness itself–are not regions of the soul, attainable and separate kingdoms; but rather, methinks, modes in which the soul carries itself, or not, along the mysterious journey to which it is elected or condemned.
The Vanity of Glory
Sic Vita, by Henry King, 1592-1669.
Like to the falling of a star,
Or as the flights of eagles are,
Or like the fresh spring’s gaudy hue,
Or silver drops of morning dew,
Or like a wind that chafes the flood,
Or bubbles which on water stood:
Even such is man, whose borrowed light
Is straight called in, and paid to night.
The wind blows out, the bubble dies;
The spring entombed in autumn lies;
The dew dries up, the star is shot;
The flight is past, and man forgot.
The Power of Trees
From The Trees of Old England (1868), by Leo H. Grindon:
For a tree is not merely an oak, or an ash, or an elm. It has qualities for the imagination and the heart, moving men in its own way, and vindicating prerogatives that are peculiar to it. The mind of the man who in his youth was accustomed to contemplate oaks, grows up very differently from that of one whose boyhood was spent near pines and firs. Where evergreen trees prevail, and are a daily spectacle, a very different frame of mind is induced compared with that which exists where the branches are leafless throughout the winter. As the stars and planets, from the inaccessible altitude of their sweet lustre, make the heart great by the contemplation of them; so, after the same manner, imposing and magnificent trees, whose branches, when we go beneath, seem the clouds of a green heaven, have power to ennoble and elevate the soul, such as all who have lived among them are more or less clearly conscious of, and which is totally unpossessed by small ones.
Garden of Serenity
From A Chinese Garden of Serenity (1959), by Hung Tzu-ch’eng, translated by Chao Tze-chiang:
To check the evils of the time within their drift is like the dispersing of summer heat by the gentle breezes. To mingle with the vulgar and yet retain decency is like the reflection upon the fleecy clouds of pallid moonlight.
Creating a Magic Circle
From A Philosophy of Solitude (1933), by John Cowper Powys:
The whole trend of our present-day ideas is pitifully wrong. It is all heading in the direction of more and more unhappiness. To tell us “to keep on smiling” as the preachers do, is enough to make us howl like the damned.
Optimistic catchwords combined with the torture of gregariousness are more than the strongest nerves can stand. All this feverish social laughter takes on a theatrical ghastliness, to an eye that has learnt to read the heart. The thing becomes a Mask of Horror, as if the anonymous corpses from the death-slabs of the Morgue were to rise up and mock and mow at us!
The only thing to do is to detach yourself at one stroke from all these agitating too-human interests. Earn your living. Stop competing and self-pitying; and live–even in the midst of all your friends–as if the streets were the Desert and you were alone with the over-arching sky.
From the old great writers of calmer ages, from the race-memories brought to us out of the air, from the ineffable essences of our own gathered-up moments of vision, there can be created, if we bend ourselves to the task, a magic circle around us which none of these invaders can cross. Life is too short, its sublime and tragic grandeur too deep, that we should turn from it to such bagatelles as these crowd-fashions.
The Vanity of Glory
The original Themista was one of the most devoted followers of the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus. She was called the female Solon, and Epicurus dedicated a number of his works to her. She was also one of the first women in history to write a book of philosophy, which she entitled The Vanity of Glory. Her book was widely influential in antiquity–several hundred years after her death Cicero quoted from it in a speech before the Roman senate.
While the book is now lost, its title remains, and its truth has resonated over the centuries. A good philosopher will always understand that there is no more pathetic waste of time and energy than what is now called attention whoring. Those who succumb to the siren call of fame and celebrity are in pursuit of a sad illusion which will never make them happy. How much better to practice the Epicurean virtue of lathe biôsas, kai apobiôsas, which translates as live unknown, die unknown. If you wish to live a harmonious and contented existence, you need to fly under the radar. You’ll be glad you did.
I am now going to start posting an occasional vanity of glory quote, the kind of which Themista would probably have approved. I will start with one of the most memorable sonnets ever written, Ozymandias (1818), by Percy Bysshe Shelley:
Ozymandias
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desart. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Garden of Serenity
From A Chinese Garden of Serenity (1959), by Hung Tzu-ch’eng, translated by Chao Tze-chiang:
Life’s fortune and misfortune are caused entirely by the mind. Shakyamuni said: “A burning desire for gain is a pit of fire, and an indulgence in greed is a sea of suffering. Once our mind is purified, a flame is turned into a pool; and once our mind awakens us from a dream of worldliness, our ship of life is anchored along the shore of the Great Beyond.” Hence, a slight change of the mind can suddenly make a different situation. Should we not be careful?
Garden of Serenity
From A Chinese Garden of Serenity (1959), by Hung Tzu-ch’eng, translated by Chao Tze-chiang:
When a man, in exhilaration, lies intoxicated on strewn flowers, the heavens become his blanket and the earth his pillow. And when he, in subduing artifice, sits in a trance on a huge rock, he feels that from time immemorial to the present moment all things are but ephemeral.
Garden of Serenity
From A Chinese Garden of Serenity (1959), by Hung Tzu-ch’eng, translated by Chao Tze-chiang:
Looking at the busy bees in a fragrant and luxuriant garden, one may become disillusioned about the life of the senses and the ways of the world. Beholding the sleeping swallows in a quiet and humble hovel, one may arouse in oneself a cool pleasure and a deep contemplation.
Obtaining Complete Spiritual Contentment
From Oriental Secrets of Graceful Living (1966), by Boye De Mente:
Up until Rikyu’s time, the Tea-Men taught a high standard of refinement and graceful living. But it was a style of life demanding luxury and leisure. It was not only beyond the reach of the poor but did not contain many of the other elements essential for a true religion. Rikyu added these elements. They were: a unified view of man and nature, and complete spiritual contentment obtained by harmoniously blending everyday life with reality. Those who followed the Way of Tea were promised a long life unmarred by ill health and worries, and when their time came they would be able to accept death calmly and contentedly. As an exercise in aesthetics, the tea ceremony is all inclusive. It teaches the way to perfect understanding of beauty, and once the Teaist reaches this goal, provides a means for him to exercise his new-found understanding on the highest level. Philosophically, the Way of Tea teaches man to recognize and accept his relation with nature, to have respect for all nature including his fellow human beings, to be pure of mind and to behave quietly.
Tea Cup Fortune Telling
(Source: This Ivy House)