Foolish is the notion that the truth must not be spoken if it could possibly be used to harm someone or hurt his feelings.
Category: Aphorisms and Observations
The Long and the Short of It
The young, their lives ahead of them, think life is long; the old, their lives ending, know that it is short. Why knowledge in the second case? Because the old, some of them anyway, are surveyors of life and not mere livers of it. This suggests that the old who lose themselves in the quotidian round may avoid the view from above and cultivate thereby a life-enhancing illusion.
Not filed under Sage Advice, but under Art of Life.
The Write-Off
I wrote him off at an early age but then never wrote him back on again.
Unjust! But then it is hard to be just even to oneself. And sometimes justice to self requires injustice towards others. Such is our predicament in this dimly-lit slot canyon with unscalable walls and a flash flood coming, but you know not when.
How Strange!
How strange it would be if death were to leave us all in the dark as to the ultimate why and wherefore! How strange if no one knows, no one ever knew, and no one will ever know what it's all about. And not because the Answer is hidden, but because there is none.
If you say that it could be like that, I won't disagree. There is presumably and prima vista no presumption in favor of point, purpose, intelligibility and sense. But if you find nothing strange about this putative state of affairs, then I will view you and your spiritual vacancy with a mixture of pity and contempt.
“My Conscience is Clear”
You deceive yourself : you cleared it when you should have borne its burden and bite, the just tax for your wrongdoing.
An Advantage of Childlessness
Our parents and relatives cared about us enough to judge us, sometimes justly, sometimes unjustly. They understood us and they didn't. Their intentions were mainly good, but their misunderstanding was a burden. They were wrapped up in their own lives and troubles; ours were relatively unreal to them. "What do you have to worry about?" a parent may say to a child drifting in the horse latitudes of teenage alienation, aimlessness, and cognitive dissonance. With their passing our burden of their misunderstanding was lifted. And they too were lifted — beyond the reach of our critical judgments.
Childlessness has this advantage: there is no one left to judge us. We are free. I am not an anti-natalist. I am merely pointing out an advantage to having reached a temporal 'space' in which some of us are safe from being boxed-in by the judgments of well-meaning but uncomprehending kith and kin.
Enemies Have Their Uses
You may do your level best to hide your faults and defects, but others will expose them. Even if they do so maliciously they perform a service to those who are open to correction. An enemy is sometimes to be preferred to a friend in tacit collusion with one's moral complacency.
Claustration
Claustration may be likened to social castration. If voluntary, it often follows upon the insight that social intercourse is idle and unproductive.
Synoptics
Synoptics are the optics of the true philosopher.
Speaking Truth to Power
When a leftist speaks truth to power, it is not out of respect for truth, but out of respect for the power that he hopes to achieve by using truth-telling as a means to his end.
It Can’t be Legislated
A law can be legislated, but respect for the rule of law cannot be legislated. In the absence of the latter, positive laws are but tools of the powerful.
All is Fleeting
The 'is' gladdens; the 'fleeting' saddens. The 'All' reminds us that man is a metaphysical animal.
Dura lex, sed lex
"The law is hard, but the law is the law." Not to a leftist, however, for whom the law is but an expression of power. Power knows no moral constraint.
Practical Types
Practical types look down on speculation, but we are not just animals with stomachs. We have eyes and not just in the head. Mundane grubbing and hassling for property and pelf are necessary but if not kept within limits will dim spiritual sight. We are not here to pile up loot and land.
Why Live a Long Time?
Soul-making in this vale takes a long time.