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| QUOTATIONS 1123-1141 |
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| 1123. The people who steadfastly maintain, often while the truth is staring them literally right into face, that it is essentially unknowable ( an intellectual stance which for a long, long time in the history of ideas has been quite fashionable among certain type of thinkers, but nowadays has gained much wider currency and regarded as a sign of sophistication and refinement by every Tom, Dick and Harry) remind me a husband from an old Russian anecdote who stubbornly refuses to believe his friends when they tell him again and again that his wife is cheating on him when he leaves for work. So, one day, frustrated by his refusal to accept the truth they patiently waited until yet another lover entered his house and then fetched the husband to witness it himself. When finding on a speedy arrival the door to his house closed, the husband not to scare off the culprits looked into a keyhole and, lo and behold, saw his wife lying naked on the bed and a man taking of the trousers. But when the man, obviously in a hurry, hung them on the doorknob and thus covered the keyhole the husband not being able to see the rest emphatically declared that he is again in doubt and needs more solid and irrefutable proves of his wife unfaithfulness. Which brings us back to the original point that those who don't want, for whatever reason, to acknowledge certain things will always find almost infinite variety of excuses to maintain their, essentially self-serving scepticism. 1124. We are invariably amazed when someone young reaches the high degree of intellectual and artistic abilities and displays the unmistakable signs of brilliance of ideas and maturity of thoughts more befitting considerably older age. And we are as strongly disappointed when this prodigy does not proceed at the same dazzling pace for the rest of his creative life. Yet, neither the early amazement nor later disappointment would seem well justified if one accepts as a fact of life, regrettable as it is, that there are apparently certain limitations the nature put on the abilities of each and everyone, and the only difference between a wunderkind and an old sage is the timing but not the end results. And though it inevitably does, the premature blossoming of a talent should not in truth lead us into the unwarranted expectations that as its possessor gains in years it will grow at the same rate as he does. For it is as clear as it is supported by the numerous examples from history that genius and age are not connected in direct proportion i.e. one who is exceptionally gifted at 20 will not in all probability double it at 40, as one who is brilliant at 40 was not necessarily half as good at 20. And so , at the end of the day, whether one is an early starter as Berkeley and Hume, or a late bloomer as Hobbes and Locke, is largely irrelevant and one is ultimately judged, especially by the posterity, on the totality of one's achievements, regardless of the age when they were attained. It is in the nature of things that the rate of growth of personal abilities is never constant. Sometimes it is fast, sometimes it is slow, and quite often there is no growth at all. And none of us can do a thing about it. Therefore, it is equally unreasonable either to lament the fact that someone like Berkeley, who had shown in his twenties such an outstanding power of discernment and an exceptional gift of writing, had never became twice as good at both when he was twice as old, or to consider it a regrettable waste of time by Locke not writing anything of the lasting significance until his fifties. For we are grateful for what they did, not for when they did it. 1125. Having throughout my adolescence, admittedly the most formative years in one's life, as the best friend a man of a brilliant mind but also of a revolting character and malicious disposition, the one who simultaneously attracted me intellectually and repulsed aesthetically, had largely predetermined the pattern of my interactions with other men for the rest of my life. For from early on I've learned to separate the affairs of the heart from those of the head and, though I consider myself completely open to all kinds of intellectual relationships, I keep, at the same time, my emotional self consistently attached to none. That is why, I suspect, despite being generally kind and attentive to other's needs and in response genuinely liked by many, I don't have a single close friend and, what is more, don't feel the need for one. As in my youth, the intelligent interlocutor with no strings attached would suit me just fine. 1126. Knowing from their personal experience how much everyone is absorbed most of the times in one's own affairs, few will deny that individual's inclinations to do good "unto others" is rather limited. On the other hand, witnessing every day the harm people cause each other, not too many will agree with the proposition that a man's propensity to do evil to one of his own kind, not to mention to the other creatures and the rest of Nature, is not unlimited. But that is not what can be observed with the naked eye in the real actions of men. For there is the moment even in the most blood-thirsty murderer's life when he doesn't have another killing in him anymore. And there is the point in a career of a sadist when torturing of yet another fellow man does not bring the same pleasure as it used to. And the malicious, the greedy, the ambitious , etc. if allowed to indulge in the unrestricted pursuit of their favorite vice, sooner or later will exhaust the passion for it. And it's usually at this moment that they begin to ostensibly display the signs of regret and repentance for what they have done and been, yet not because they really regret and repent, but because getting sick and tired of playing the old game, they are eager now to join the new one and, being as calculating as ever, do not consider the feigning of the obligatory regret and repentance as too excessive a price of admission into it. 1127. The greater the knowledge the more it can benefit from being tempered by the healthy dosage of humility. 1128. It is not surprising that most of the people most of the times find the making of plans more important and certainly more entertaining than actually executing them. For the first requires only imagination and the results, at least in theory, are mostly predictable, while the second demands action and is usually pregnant with all kinds of unexpected consequences. 1129. It must be nice to be a genius. It is so liberating, so emancipating. You can always ask your parents, your spouse, your children, your friends: "Do you want me to be a good son (or a good daughter), good husband (or a good wife), a good father (or a good mother), a good friend, or would you rather let me be free from all these ordinary obligation and mundane duties so that I may become a great poet, a great composer, a great performer, etc., etc?" And in our culture which worships creativity and the artistic genius and values public success above anything else, who can have a doubt about the answer. 1130. As for me, not feeling the pain is the greatest pleasure in life. 1131. The major drawback (and not a small inconvenience) in always taking a high road in any moral controversy, not to mention the invariably accompanying such a stance the propensity to assume permanently the lofty position in all matters ethical, and using it as a pulpit to exhort incessantly and vociferously anyone in sight to follow the high moral and ethical precepts without the slightest deviation, is that every now and then such a self-appointed champion of uncompromising morality finds himself in a rather uncomfortable situation when he actually has to do himself what he had so often preached to so many others. On the other hand, the eagerness to accept as irremediable the human "imperfections", and consequently to condone their ugly manifestations often bespeaks not so much of one's compassion and humaneness but rather of a guilty conscience. And the easy forgiveness of the other's shortcomings is frequently but a disguised absolution of one's own past, present and especially the future transgressions. 1132. Even if the world is moving in the direction of uniformity and sameness, it should not be confused, due to the deceptive synonymity of the terms, with the progress toward equality, at least not of the communistic type, when everything will be divided equally among all people everywhere, but, if any, then rather towards the "equality" of a global, capitalistic, hierarchical type, which means that the rich everywhere will be equally rich and the poor equally poor, whether they live in Europe, Asia, Africa or America. 1133. Having an ambition is both a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing because without ambition one will get nowhere. But it is also a curse for one who is driven by ambition will never rest content, no matter how far it may take him. 1134. It is so much easier to have ambitions than convictions. For to satisfy one's ambitions one only has to do what is expected of him by those without whom his ambitions could not be realized. Which isn't so difficult, considering that all people all the times want the same: to have their beliefs shared and confirmed, to be flattered, to be promised the better future, etc. On the contrary, having strong convictions often tends to make one inflexible and oblivious to the needs and preferences of others, even "if his life depends on it". Such a person is irresistibly driven by the urge to tell everybody, regardless of the time, place or of who they are, what he thinks, not what they would like to hear, to do what he feels is right, not what they would be pleased with, to praise or to blame anything and anybody according to his standards, not theirs. And so on, and so forth. Clearly, the life of such an individual is not going to be easy, to say the least, and sometimes it could be downright tragic. But even if one manages to survive the consequences of having strong convictions, the success in any conventional sense of the word would be definitely out of his reach. Which brings us to the obvious and unavoidable conclusion that having strong convictions could be absolutely detrimental to one's ambitions, and anyone aiming at success should avoid them as a plague. 1135. Any general term by itself is neutral and acquires its positive or negative connotation depending on what is considered under or accompanied by it. Take, for example, the general term "intolerance". Connected with religion like "the religious intolerance" or with race like "the racial intolerance" it clearly conveys the negative concepts. On the other hand, intolerance of bigotry, intolerance of immorality, intolerance of cruelty, etc. are universally accepted as the positive and constructive emotions. The same considerations can be applied to the numerous other general terms, like "freedom", "duty", "conviction", "stability", "persistence", etc, each of which have the chameleon-like nature and in different circumstances, combined with the diverse other terms, can signify the completely opposite ideas. Which brings me to the point I'm trying to make, namely, that one has to be very careful when using the general terms, for not only the excessive, but even the moderate usage of them in both public discourse and in private conversations rather then clarifying usually obscures the essence of what is discussed or debated, and instead of mutual understanding leads to misapprehension and may even trigger the unnecessary conflicts. Moreover, the excessive usage of the general terms in the modern democratic society (due largely to the high level of education of the population at large, not to mention the increasing sophistication of the ruling elite in employing those general terms to obfuscate and to control), must be held at least partially responsible for the moral and ethical ambiguities which plague this society now. The notions of right and wrong, moral and immoral, ethical and unethical, surrendering one by one their particularities to the relentless assaults by the universals, have nowadays lost by and large their clarity. And this, more than anything else, progressively undermines the hard earned civilization and tears apart the fragile social fabric. Is there any remedy for this linguistic disease of excessive generalization? Fortunately, there is and in plentiful supply at that. It is Time. Sooner or later one fad is replaced by another, the pendulum swings in the opposite direction, and one can foresee in not so distant future the world lost in the forest of particulars desperately looking for some general guidance to find its way out of it. As for the golden mean, it simply is not given to us, and the human race is forever destined to suffer from the extremes. 1136. If you are an unknown artist and want to be a famous one (and who doesn't) your most important, at least at the beginning, creation should be yourself. For it is absolutely essential, though not sufficient in the long run, to stand out by whatever means (depending on one's ingenuity and taste) of the crowd of seemingly equally gifted artists, on the sheer strength of one's personality and public conduct. Thus, by attracting first the attention to oneself, one then can use the power of association to get the public pay closer attention to one's art. At this stage, hopefully, art shall take over, and one will be judged on the basis of one's performance as an artist and not as a public personality, which should fade into the background so that it wouldn't overshadow the art. Unless, of course, the art is just used as the means for self-promotion. 1137. I'm absolutely convinced that any ideas or sentiments I express from time to time, sincerely believing at that moment to be the new and original, must have been uttered before me, if not in letter then in spirit by somebody else. But by the same token, the countless people before me ate, slept, made love, felt, thought, spoke and did millions of other things some of which I'm doing now. And if it's unreasonable to expect me to stop living because I'm not the first one to live, should I stop saying what I think only because I'm not the first one to have come up with this or that ideas and expressed it this or that way? 1138. At the core of all human functions and activities, be they physiological or psychological, material or spiritual, social or personal, etc. lies the continuity of life, as its chief imperative, and ultimately the quest for some kind of immortality. And all religions are but the different ritual embodiments of this universal quest. Having all in common the fear of death as the initial impetus, the religions, as the deepest expression of the hope somehow to avoid it, have to promise their adherents the perpetuation of one's life in one form or another after death. And such promise is the central and absolutely crucial tenet of every successful religion. For the human mind, despite the overwhelming physical evidences, simply cannot accept Death as the inevitable and final fact of life. And in a sense, the original impulse of all religions is the eternal and unquenchable thirst for the "life everlasting". 1139.The more self-congratulatory, almost on the verge of gloating, the outpourings of the American professional ideologues of the Cold War (including the so-called American political scientists and historians, who all seems to have one overpowering ambition to be the next Kissinger, which makes one wonder where the American political science ends and State Department begins) become after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the more revealing they are of the fact that the capitalist West under the leadership of the United States has never been interested in detente and the peaceful coexistence with the socialist East, but since the Russian Revolution of 1917 had been bent on the total destruction of any socialist state in particular, and socialist ideology in general, seeing even a minimal success of Socialism as the mortal threat to the Capitalist system of private property, exploitation and injustice. 1140. The main difference between a criminal and a law- abiding citizen is not in what they want but in how far they are willing to go to get it, and how much they are concerned about the personal consequences of going too far. 1141. Before the Greco-Christian antisemitism there used to be, not as widely known nowadays but no less real, the Roman "anti-Graecism". For the Romans had almost the same kind of conflicting attitude towards the Greeks as the Greco-Christians would later develop towards the Jews, i.e. though the Romans had embraced almost as their own the Greek classical heritage, they despised the contemporary Greeks as servile, devious, mercantile and untrustworthy people, totally devoid of the traditional Roman virtues of honesty, fortitude and military courage. In a similar manner, while the Greco-Christians literally had appropriated the ancient Hebrew heritage, and even adopted the Hebrew God as their own, they attributed to the contemporary Jews the same unflattering qualities the Romans used to describe them. Which proves (if any proof is still needed) that despite the similarity of their fate one despised and mistreated minority, instead of empathy, tends more often than not to equally despise and mistreat "the next in line" so to speak, and in the same unjust and vicious manner as it had suffered itself at the hands of those above it in the hierarchical order of the multi-ethnical societies. Moreover, as it often happens in such societies where there is multitude of potential victims of prejudices, the Greeks used the Jews to divert the prejudicial inclinations of the Romans from themselves and toward the Jews in the same manner as in today's America the Blacks had embraced with passion the most virulent antisemitism, as if in hope to redirect the hatred and racism of the predominantly white Christian majority from themselves and towards the Jews. Needless to say, neither the Blacks in America nor the Greeks in the Roman empire succeeded in this attempt, for being antisemitic didn't help either to avoid the scorn and hatred of the dominant majority. Ceasing to be the persecuted by joining the persecutors is very tempting but ultimately futile. For at best one can only postpone but never escape one's fate. |
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