Autumn XIII. Stoics - part 2

Intro & Preface & Contents

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But we are fronted by that persistent questioner who will accept no a priori assumption, however noble in its character and beneficent in its tendency. How do we know that the reason of the Stoic is at harmony with the world’s law? I, perhaps, may see life from a very different point of view; to me reason may dictate, not self-subdual, but self-indulgence; I may find in free exercise of all my passions an existence far more consonant with what seems to me the dictate of nature. I am proud; nature has made me so; let my pride assert itself to justification. I am strong; let me put forth my strength, it is the destiny of the feeble to fall before me. On the other hand, I am weak and I suffer; what avails a mere assertion that fate is just, to bring about my calm and glad acceptance of this down-trodden doom? Nay, for there is that within my soul which bids me revolt, and cry against the iniquity of some power I know not. Granting that I am compelled to acknowledge a scheme of things which constrains me to this or that, whether I will or no, how can I be sure that wisdom or moral duty lies in acquiescence? Thus the unceasing questioner; to whom, indeed, there is no reply. For our philosophy sees no longer a supreme sanction, and no longer hears a harmony of the universe.

“He that is unjust is also impious. For the Nature of the Universe, having made all reasonable creatures one for another, to the end that they should do one another good; more or less, according to the several persons and occasions; but in no wise hurt one another; it is manifest that he that doth transgress against this her will, be guilty of impiety towards the most ancient and venerable of all the Deities.” How gladly would I believe this! That injustice is impiety, and indeed the supreme impiety, I will hold with my last breath; but it were the merest affectation of a noble sentiment if I supported my faith by such a reasoning. I see no single piece of strong testimony that justice is the law of the universe; I see suggestions incalculable tending to prove that it is not. Rather must I apprehend that man, in some inconceivable way, may at his best moments represent a Principle darkly at strife with that which prevails throughout the world as known to us. If the just man be in truth a worshipper of the most ancient of Deities, he must needs suppose, either that the object of his worship belongs to a fallen dynasty, or -- what from of old has been his refuge -- that the sacred fire which burns within him is an “evidence of things not seen.” What if I am incapable of either supposition? There remains the dignity of a hopeless cause -- “sed victa Catoni.” [from the Pharsalia by Lucan, “victrix causa diis placuit, sed victa Catoni” = The victorious cause [at the Battle of Pharsalus] pleased the gods, but the defeated cause pleased Cato] But how can there sound the hymn of praise?

“That is best for everyone, which the common Nature of all doth send unto everyone, and then is it best, when she doth send it.” The optimism of Necessity, and perhaps, the highest wisdom man can attain unto. “Remember that unto reasonable creatures only is it granted that they may willingly and freely submit.” No one could be more sensible than I of the persuasiveness of this high theme. The words sing to me, and life is illumined with soft glory, like that of the autumn sunset yonder. “Consider how man’s life is but for a very moment of time, and so depart meek and contented: even as if a ripe olive falling should praise the ground that bare her, and give thanks to the tree that begat her.” So would I fain think, when the moment comes. It is the mood of strenuous endeavour, but also the mood of rest. Better than the calm of achieved indifference (if that, indeed, is possible to man); better than the ecstasy which contemns the travail of earth in contemplation of bliss to come. But, by no effort attainable. An influence of the unknown powers; a peace that falleth upon the soul like dew at evening.  

Alpha.

It has always seemed to me that philosophers had a rather naive understanding of human nature when they said things like,

The happy life is a life that is in harmony with its own nature.

-Seneca

And, to refer once again to Sallie Tisdale's The Sutra of Maggots and Blowflies (in The Inevitable: Contemporary Writers Confront Death), the notion that,

He that is unjust is also impious. For the Nature of the Universe, having made all reasonable creatures one for another, to the end that they should do one another good...

demonstrates a remarkably poor understand of Nature, and Ryecroft admits as much. Annie Dillard may have put it best in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek,

Either this world, my mother, is a monster, or I myself am a freak... We have not yet encountered any god who is as merciful as a man who flicks a beetle over on its feet... We are moral creatures, then, in an amoral world. The universe that suckled us is a monster that does not care if we live or die -- does not care if it grinds itself to a halt.

To borrow a phrase (and book title) from Nietzsche, Nature exists Beyond Good and Evil. And to repeat something I’m pretty sure I said before in reference to Prometheus and The Serpent (Spring XXV. The end of spring + Prometheus), our perception of Good and Evil is a symptom of our individuation... our isolation from nature (and arguably from God.) This is why I would say that the true Problem of Evil is our thinking there is a problem. But this isn’t something you would want an absolute ruler -- or half the population -- to believe.

And yet I don’t think this existential twist completely undermines the final bit of Stoic wisdom quoted above,

Consider how man’s life is but for a very moment of time, and so depart meek and contented: even as if a ripe olive falling should praise the ground that bare her, and give thanks to the tree that begat her.

This holds true even in a world Beyond Good and Evil. Actually, I think Epictitus said it best,

To trouble ones mind about the nature of the Universe is to play the fool. One sect has discovered that Being is one and indivisible. Another that it is infinite in number. If one proclaims that all things are in a continual flux, another replies that nothing can possibly be moved at any time. The theory of the universe as a process of birth and death is met by the counter theory that nothing ever could be born or ever will die. Socrates was interested in human topics.

But what does it all mean? I don’t know, of course, but I choose to see in Nature/the Universe/Devi, the Great Novelist. What does any compelling, page-turning, novel mean? Do we really care? At the end of Vikram Seth’s monumental A Suitable Boy I experienced a level of grief that was new to me from reading -- I couldn’t read fiction for months -- not because the ending was sad (it isn’t) but because the story, this entire universe of literary creation, was over... and the author made it clear on the final page that there would be no sequel. I didn’t crave meaning then, I wanted more story.

Next: Autumn XIV. Suffering + Acorns, trees, and Feng Shui.