the exalted human experience, aphorism 134, The Mechanics of Virtue, Matt Berry

134

Historical honesty and the exalted human experience are opposed.  When Plutarch reports, and is in turn carried higher by Amyot, and yet higher by North, and then reaches its final orbit through Shakespeare ... the historian objects ... in vain.  When the town charlatan passes off despicable behavior as being “ordained by God,” he can within a very few generations not only surpass history within his own culture, but among the complacent at large as well.  Out of this dung, hidden well beneath the surface, the lush but thorny bush yields berries that can only be picked with the most delicate fingers and every honest attack leaves the assailant bloodied.



A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism



Popular posts from this blog

A valuable book, A Human Strategy, aphorism 387

387 A valuable book may be torn to pieces without diminishing the human spirit, just so long as the words have already been read and understood.  To feel the loss of the book — at its material destruction, even though one had already digested its contents fully and had aligned oneself toward its overall direction — is evidence that one values the non-human being over human becoming , the static thing over the dynamic process .  In response to the fear of our unknowable future we would rather freeze ourselves into a single stage of growth at the expense of the entire metamorphosis. A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism
Read more
The Ascetic Impulse: We think we deliberately hurt ourselves when it is simply that we do know which version of ourselves will satisfy our needs more fully. We try on a personality as if trying on new clothes. Bizarrely, the self we beat up has heretofore been a complete stranger.
Read more