In Chinese philosophy blossomed an explicit appeal to the splendor of the mountains and the discipline of the climbs. Nietzsche used to be a habitual solo climber. Although they were no climbers that we know of, Socrates, Xenophon, Archimedes, Marcus Aurelius, Julianus, Boetius, Descartes, and several French philosophers killed by the Nazis, were men of the sword. Other major philosophers, such as Abelard, Giordano Bruno, or Galileo Galilei, lived a life of combat. There are more: a bit before Bruno, a French philosopher was burned on top of his books.
Why the connection between the fight, the climb, and the philosophers? Why the climbing, why the fighting? Is that wise?
As the ground falls away, the climber enters an ever higher, grander world... What bouldering, and simple common life, does not have as much of, is a massive world falling away, ever smaller and disturbingly insignificant. No need to go into orbit, going up a rock, fighting a good war is plenty enough.
Endurance and persistence are not just human qualities, they are those that any mind needs as it rises to the highest occasions...
And thus, since ever, the Lords of the Heights of Thought have looked favorably up the mountains and down the valleys...
It is to us to give a sense to the cosmos, and it may as well be grand.
Patrice Ayme
(P/S: This no endorsement of the so far somewhat harebrained US war in Afghanistan/Pakistan; as I said many times, a good trick to divide the Taliban and the tribes would be to make licit some of the poppy cultivation; to deal with Pakistan a serious effort of nuclear disarmament is urgent, lest we want to risk a massive nuclear war.)
No comments:
Post a Comment