Wednesday, October 13, 2021
3:20 a.m. Let’s continue on Orphic Sayings
[LXVI. LABOR. Labor is sweet; nor is that a stern decree that sends man into the fields to earn his bread in the sweat of his face. Labor is primeval; it replaces man in Eden,—the garden planted by God. It exalts and humanizes the soul. Life in all its functions and relations then breathes of groves and fountains, of simplicity and health. Man discourses sublimely with the divinities over the plough, the spade, the sickle, marrying the soul and the soil by the rites of labor. Sloth is the tempter that beguiles him of innocence, and exiles him from Paradise. Let none esteem himself beloved of the divine Husbandman, unless he earn the wages of peace in his vineyard. Yet now the broad world is full of idlers; the fields are barren; the age is hungry; there is no corn. The harvests are of tares and not of wheat. Gaunt is the age; even as the seedsman winnows the chaff from the wheat, shall the winds of reform blow this vanity away.]
Alcott makes no allowance for the existence of purposeless drudgery, meaningless work. And in the innocence of that earlier age, he seems unaware that unemployment may result from lack of opportunity, where the potential laborer has no access to tools. Which is to say that his economic theory is primitive, as one might expect; however – as one might also expect by now, knowing the man – his social theory, and, more, his theory of the soul in the 3D world, is not primitive, and is exactly on beam. You are in 3D to work, and cannot be happy in idleness. However, you were not placed there to work meaninglessly, nor is the work the important thing in itself. What is important is that you exercise your faculties, not that you pile up hours or piecework.
[LXVII. DIABOLUS. Seek God in the seclusion of your own soul; the prince of devils in the midst of multitudes. Beelzebub rules masses, God individuals. Vox populi vox dei,—never (save where passion and interest are silent), but vox populi vox diaboli.]
Think what heresy this was, in bustling democratic America in the first flush of enthusiasm of social transformation. Politically, ideologically, the significance of the American experiment was thought to be that “the people” were sovereign, that “the people’s” judgment was in fact the voice of God in effect. And Alcott calmly turned this on its head and said not so. An odd position for a radical reformer, but the reform he sought was, of course, individual. It could proceed only one by one.
In that he wasn’t much different from Thoreau or Emerson.
We would never dream of saying otherwise.
[LXVIII. DOGMATISM. The ages dogmatize, and would stifle the freest and boldest thought. Their language is,—our possessions skirt space, and we veto all possible discoveries of time. We are heirs of all wisdom, all excellence; none shall pass our confines; vain is the dream of a wilderness of thought to be vanquished by rebellion against us; we inherit the patrimony of God,—all goods in the gift of omnipotence.]
This one follows from the one previous. Group-think is fatal, and always overrates its intelligence and applicability.
He’d have loved our age, with its dogmas couched in political correctness on one side or another, as if we were all members of one or another cheering section for a football team.
Of course he had no interest in reform of society except as a result of (not as a cause of) reform of individuals. He saw clearly that individuals are realer than abstractions like society.
[LXIX. GENIUS AND SANCTITY. A man’s period is according to the directness and intensity of his light. Not erudition, not taste, not intellect, but character, describes his orbit and determines the worlds he shall enlighten. Genius and sanctity cast no shadow; like the sun at broad noon, the ray of these orbs pours direct intense on the world, and they are seen in their own light.]
This could have been said more clearly.
Tell me! Alcott at his most clotted.
Notice, though, that the sense of it does come through. Only, you have to slow down and dig a little. Thus, implicitly he defines character as genius and sanctity. These, he says, are what the world sees of you, not the characteristics such as follow education or breeding.
So what does he mean by genius and sanctity, one wonders.
It should come as no surprise, given the saying preceding and the saying following, that he means a person following his own small still voice.
Yes, clear enough, and he certainly exemplified it, though his small still voice sometimes led him out into the wilderness.
No, a lack of judgment in following the voice did that. Alcott was as subject to Psychic’s Disease as anyone. He never lacked in Justice or Fortitude, but sometimes failed in Prudence and even Temperance.
[LXX. CHARACTER. Character is the genius of conscience, as wit is of intellect. The prophet and bard are original men, and their lives and works being creations of divine art, are inimitable. Imitation and example are sepulchres in which the ages entomb their disciples. The followers of God are alone immortal.]
This one should require no commentary, save perhaps that final sentence.
Yes, I noticed that. I take it that he means “immortal” in the sense of “an immortal reputation.” But Thoreau pointed out somewhere that our works will never be forgotten – as long as we remember them.
But perhaps Alcott’s meaning is not as precisely bounded as all that. Yes, he means to say that those who blow with the winds of the fashion of their times are forgettable and will be forgotten, and that only the truly original, individual, soul will be remembered. But still, as we have said, his emphasis is not on fame but on self-creation.
[LXXI. LIFE. It is life, not scripture; character, not biography, that renovates mankind. The letter of life vitiates its spirit. Virtue and genius refuse to be written. The scribe weaves his own mythus of superstition always into his scripture.]
Again, his meaning is plain to him, and he fails to realize that it may not be plain to his readers. If this one is read literally and without a feeling of sympathy, it may seem to say nothing. Read carefully, however, it will show its worth – as usual with Alcott.
Well, since you mention it, it is pretty obscure.
Yet you know what he means.
Well, yes and no. He says that life can’t be compressed into a formula, and that trying to do so necessarily involves distortion. But is it true?
Look to our experience here over 20 years. Were we able to describe life directly? Were you able to find the words that we couldn’t find? Yes, we have been able to say some things – but do you feel like we have done more than point to the moon? If you do, we do not.
All right, I see your point.
[LXXII. BARRENNESS. Opinions are life in foliage; deeds, in fruitage. Always is the fruitless tree accursed.]
That’s a very interesting comment. Concise, too! Clearly he takes off from the story of Jesus cursing the tree that bore no fruit.
“Actions speak louder than words.” Also, “By their fruits you shall know them.” Alcott could be plain enough, sometimes. You can perhaps imagine from this how effective in speech he must have been, when the necessity of writing down his thoughts was not there to clot his thinking and expression.
[LXXIII. SCRIPTURE. All scripture is the record of life, and is sacred or profane, as the life it records is holy or vile. Every noble life is a revelation from heaven, which the joy and hope of mankind preserve to the world. Nor while the soul endures, shall the book of revelation be sealed. Her scriptures, like herself, are inexhaustible, without beginning or end.]
Here Alcott falls into the 3D habit of judging as good or evil. However, other than that (pretty major!) reservation, we have no quarrel with this saying. Again, he proceeds from the confidence that in life it is the individual that matters.
Just to be clear, we should add that in saying that, you are not advocating the individual v. society in terms of economics or ideology. That is, you aren’t taking a political position, but a deeper, primary, religious and philosophical one.
Of course. As we keep saying, “society” is an abstraction; it is the individuals that you are (even though as individuals you are communities) that are real, and are the point of the 3D.
[LXXIV. SACRED BOOKS. The current version of all sacred books is profane. The ignorance and passions of men interpolate themselves into the text, and vitiate both its doctrine and ethics. But this is revised, at successive eras, by prophets, who, holding direct communication with the source of life and truth, translate their eternal propositions from the sacred into the common speech of man, and thus give the word anew to the world.]
If this isn’t what you guys have been doing with us, I don’t know what is. Translating into common speech, and giving us the word anew. And, as I have told you again and again, we do appreciate it.
Obviously, the more people who take on a prophetic role – by getting into closer touch with their access to the divine essence – the better. However, their gift to society is secondary. Their primary responsibility is to themselves. As they transform themselves, so will they effect change among all those they connect to.
And that’s enough for the moment. You may want to get some more sleep before transcribing.
We’ll see. It will be nice if it comes. In any case, our continued thanks for all this.