Counsels and Maxims | Page 4

expectations of pleasure, possessions, rank, honor and so on; because it
is just this striving and struggling to be happy, to dazzle the world, to
lead a life full of pleasure, which entail great misfortune. It is prudent
and wise, I say, to reduce one's claims, if only for the reason that it is
extremely easy to be very unhappy; while to be very happy is not
indeed difficult, but quite impossible. With justice sings the poet of
life's wisdom:
_Auream quisquis mediocritatem Diligit, tutus caret obsoleti Sordibus
tecti, caret invidenda Sobrius aula. Savius ventis agitatur ingens Pinus:
et celsae graviori casu Decidunt turres; feriuntque summos Fulgura
monies.[2]_
--the golden mean is best--to live free from the squalor of a mean abode,
and yet not be a mark for envy. It is the tall pine which is cruelly
shaken by the wind, the highest summits that are struck in the storm,
and the lofty towers that fall so heavily.
[Footnote 1: Letters to and from Merck.]

[Footnote 2: Horace. Odes II. x.]
He who has taken to heart the teaching of my philosophy--who knows,
therefore, that our whole existence is something which had better not
have been, and that to disown and disclaim it is the highest wisdom--he
will have no great expectations from anything or any condition in life:
he will spend passion upon nothing in the world, nor lament over-much
if he fails in any of his undertakings. He will feel the deep truth of what
Plato[1] says: [Greek: oute ti ton anthropinon haxion on megalaes
spondaes]--nothing in human affairs is worth any great anxiety; or, as
the Persian poet has it,
_Though from thy grasp all worldly things should flee, Grieve not for
them, for they are nothing worth: And though a world in thy possession
be, Joy not, for worthless are the things of earth. Since to that better
world 'tis given to thee To pass, speed on, for this is nothing worth._[2]
[Footnote 1: _Republic_, x. 604.]
[Footnote 2: _Translator's Note_. From the Anvár-i Suhailí--_The
Lights of Canopus_--being the Persian version of the Table of Bidpai.
Translated by E.B. Eastwick, ch. iii. Story vi., p. 289.]
The chief obstacle to our arriving at these salutary views is that
hypocrisy of the world to which I have already alluded--an hypocrisy
which should be early revealed to the young. Most of the glories of the
world are mere outward show, like the scenes on a stage: there is
nothing real about them. Ships festooned and hung with pennants,
firing of cannon, illuminations, beating of drums and blowing of
trumpets, shouting and applauding--these are all the outward sign, the
pretence and suggestion,--as it were the hieroglyphic,--of _joy_: but
just there, joy is, as a rule, not to be found; it is the only guest who has
declined to be present at the festival. Where this guest may really be
found, he comes generally without invitation; he is not formerly
announced, but slips in quietly by himself _sans facon_; often making
his appearance under the most unimportant and trivial circumstances,
and in the commonest company--anywhere, in short, but where the
society is brilliant and distinguished. Joy is like the gold in the
Australian mines--found only now and then, as it were, by the caprice
of chance, and according to no rule or law; oftenest in very little grains,
and very seldom in heaps. All that outward show which I have
described, is only an attempt to make people believe that it is really joy

which has come to the festival; and to produce this impression upon the
spectators is, in fact, the whole object of it.
With mourning it is just the same. That long funeral procession,
moving up so slowly; how melancholy it looks! what an endless row of
carriages! But look into them--they are all empty; the coachmen of the
whole town are the sole escort the dead man has to his grave. Eloquent
picture of the friendship and esteem of the world! This is the falsehood,
the hollowness, the hypocrisy of human affairs!
Take another example--a roomful of guests in full dress, being received
with great ceremony. You could almost believe that this is a noble and
distinguished company; but, as a matter of fact, it is compulsion, pain
and boredom who are the real guests. For where many are invited, it is
a rabble--even if they all wear stars. Really good society is everywhere
of necessity very small. In brilliant festivals and noisy entertainments,
there is always, at bottom, a sense of emptiness prevalent. A false tone
is there: such gatherings are in strange contrast with the misery and
barrenness of our existence. The contrast brings the true condition into
greater relief. Still, these gatherings are effective from the outside; and
that is just their purpose. Chamfort[1]