WOE IS BUFFETED MANKIND !
Many amazing facts-factors effect-affect, influence mankind each moment. These are things: known-unknown and seen-unseen, felt -unfelt , heard-unheard, thought-unthought, smelled-unsmelled, tasted-untasted. We humans are all haplessly wedged into this twain. We are lodged between humility and vanity, an evanescent earthly ambiguity of body soul spirit mind.
Aristotle has written of our flux:
"Such, then, is the proud man; the man who falls short of him is unduly humble, and the man who goes beyond him is vain. Now even these are not thought to be bad (for they are not malicious ), but only mistaken. For the unduly humble man, being worthy of good things, robs himself of what he deserves, and seems to have something bad about himself from the fact that he does not think himself worthy of good things, and seems also not to know himself; else he would have desired the things he was worthy of , since these are good. Yet such people are not thought to be fools, but rather unduly retiring . Such a reputation, however , seems actually to make them worse; for each class of people aims at what corresponds to its worth, and these people stand back even from noble actions and undertakings, deeming themselves unworthy, and from external goods no less. Vain people, on the other hand, are fools and ignorant of themselves, and that manifestly ; for, not being worthy of them, they attempt honorable undertakings, and then are found out; and they adorn themselves with clothing and outward show and such things, and wish their strokes of good fortune to be made public, and speak about them as if they would be honored for them. But undue humility is more opposed to pride than vanity is; for it is both commoner and worse.
"Pride , then, is concerned with honor on the grand scale, as has been said."
P.994-995, Bk. IV: CH.3, NICOMACHEAN ETHICS by Aristotle (1991)
Woeful is a man who is so proudly buffeted, between humility and vanity! Ever uncertain and unsure!
Monday, August 28, 2017
BUFFETED MANKIND
WOE IS BUFFETED MANKIND !
Many amazing facts-factors effect-affect, influence mankind each moment. These are things: known-unknown and seen-unseen, felt -unfelt , heard-unheard, thought-unthought, smelled-unsmelled, tasted-untasted. We humans are all haplessly wedged into this twain. We are lodged between humility and vanity, an evanescent earthly ambiguity of body soul spirit mind.
Aristotle has written of our flux:
"Such, then, is the proud man; the man who falls short of him is unduly humble, and the man who goes beyond him is vain. Now even these are not thought to be bad (for they are not malicious ), but only mistaken. For the unduly humble man, being worthy of good things, robs himself of what he deserves, and seems to have something bad about himself from the fact that he does not think himself worthy of good things, and seems also not to know himself; else he would have desired the things he was worthy of , since these are good. Yet such people are not thought to be fools, but rather unduly retiring . Such a reputation, however , seems actually to make them worse; for each class of people aims at what corresponds to its worth, and these people stand back even from noble actions and undertakings, deeming themselves unworthy, and from external goods no less. Vain people, on the other hand, are fools and ignorant of themselves, and that manifestly ; for, not being worthy of them, they attempt honorable undertakings, and then are found out; and they adorn themselves with clothing and outward show and such things, and wish their strokes of good fortune to be made public, and speak about them as if they would be honored for them. But undue humility is more opposed to pride than vanity is; for it is both commoner and worse.
"Pride , then, is concerned with honor on the grand scale, as has been said."
P.994-995, Bk. IV: CH.3, NICOMACHEAN ETHICS by Aristotle (1991)
Woeful is a man who is so proudly buffeted, between humility and vanity! Ever uncertain and unsure!