Glory

Glory is largely a theatrical concept.
There is no striving for glory without a vivid awareness of an audience —
the knowledge that our mighty deeds will come to the ears
of our contemporaries or “of those who are to be.”
We are ready to sacrifice our true, transitory self
for the imaginary eternal self we are building up, by our heroic deeds,
in the opinion and imagination of others.

Eric Hoffer, True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements

Size matters

The greatest evil which fortune can inflict on men
is to endow them with small talents and great ambition.

        Luc de Clapiers, Reflections and Maxims 

 

 

 

 

 

Work and trust

One must go on working silently,
    trusting the result to the future.

        Vincent Van Gogh, The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh to His Brother

 

 

 

Old is good

I love everything that's old —
old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wine.

        Oliver Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer

 

 

 

 

An existential question

At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself:
“I have to go to work — as a human being.
What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for —
the things I was brought into the world to do?
Or is this what I was created for?
To huddle under the blankets and stay warm?”

        Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

 

 

 

 

Taking God's name in vain

The concept of God in America is very different than it is in England.
Because we see the horrendous outcome of religion
as being an American thing, in which the name of God has been hijacked
by a gang of psychopaths and bullies and homophobes,
and the name of God has been used for their own twisted agendas.
So that if you mention God, or a belief in God, in England,
it's almost automatically associated with that kind of thinking.
Religion's gotten a really bad name.

    Nick Cave, Salon magazine, The resurrection of Nick Cave

 

 

 

Poem: Of History and Hope

We have memorized America,
how it was born and who we have been and where.
In ceremonies and silence we say the words,
telling the stories, singing the old songs.
We like the places they take us. Mostly we do.
The great and all the anonymous dead are there.
We know the sound of all the sounds we brought.
The rich taste of it is on our tongues.
But where are we going to be, and why, and who?
The disenfranchised dead want to know.
We mean to be the people we meant to be,
to keep on going where we meant to go.

But how do we fashion the future? Who can say how
except in the minds of those who will call it Now?
The children. The children. And how does our garden grow?
With waving hands—oh, rarely in a row—
and flowering faces. And brambles, that we can no longer allow.


Who were many people coming together
cannot become one people falling apart.
Who dreamed for every child an even chance
cannot let luck alone turn doorknobs or not.
Whose law was never so much of the hand as the head
cannot let chaos make its way to the heart.
Who have seen learning struggle from teacher to child
cannot let ignorance spread itself like rot.
We know what we have done and what we have said,
and how we have grown, degree by slow degree,
believing ourselves toward all we have tried to become—
just and compassionate, equal, able, and free.

All this in the hands of children, eyes already set
on a land we never can visit—it isn’t there yet—
but looking through their eyes, we can see
what our long gift to them may come to be.
If we can truly remember, they will not forget.

                    Miller Williams