Ought you to desire what is not given you, or to be ashamed if you do not attain to it? Is this all the habit you acquired when you studied philosophy, to look to others and to hope for nothing from yourself and your own acts?
“Look at me, I have no house or city, property or slave: I sleep on the ground, I have no wife or children, no miserable palace, but only earth and sky and one poor cloak. Yet what do I lack? Am I not quit of pain and fear, am I not free? When has any of you ever seen me failing to get what I will to get, or falling into what I will to avoid? When did I blame God or man, when did I accuse any? Has any of you seen me with a gloomy face? How do I meet those of whom you stand in fear and awe? Do I not meet them as slaves? Who that sees me but thinks that he sees his king and master?” There you have the true Cynic’s words; this is his character, and scheme of life.
There’s no one behind the customer service counter at Barnes and Noble but there is a woman doing something with the books in front of the counter . . .
“Do you work here?” I ask.
“Yes,” she says, but not in a friendly way . . . more like yes, I work here but I regret it.
‘I’m looking for The Book of Holiday Awesome,” I say.
“I’ve never heard of that,” she says.
I don’t care if she’s heard of it. I just want to know if they have a copy of it on hand.
“Do you know the author?” she asks.
“No.”
She types a couple of things into the computer. “Nothing is coming up,” she says.
It’s a popular book so something should be coming up, even if it’s just to say they don’t have it in stock.
I lean over the counter to see what she’s typed in the search box. Here it is: the book of holiday awsum.
It is where you think not, and will not seek for it. For if you had wished you would have found it in yourselves and would not have wandered outside and would not have sought the things of others as your own.
Did Laius obey Apollo? Did he not go away in his drunken stupor and dismiss the oracle from his mind? What then? Did Apollo withhold the truth from him for that reason? Indeed I do not know whether you will obey me or not, but Apollo knew most certainly that Laius would not obey, and yet he spoke. Why did he speak? Nay, why is he Apollo, why does he give oracles, why has he set himself in this position, to be a Prophet and a Fountain of truth, so that men from all the world come to him? Why is “Know thyself” written up over his shrine, though no one understands it?
There is no suffering, no cause of suffering, no end to suffering, no path to follow. There is no attainment of wisdom, and no wisdom to attain. Byeeeeeeee
Maybe you can use them as a way to engage in a conversation about sexism with your friends and family over the holidays!
For example, it is NOT okay to suggest that all a woman wants for Christmas is a man (I’m looking at you, Mariah Carey). Or that women are materialistic and shallow and want lots of accoutrements.
Our boy is home for winter break . . . he’s been driving the car that I usually drive. When I drove that car today, the second thing I noticed was that he’d run the gas tank down to empty.
The first thing I noticed like a bomb detonation is that he’d left the radio turned on at full volume . . .
To expose the false arts of life, to pull off the disguises of cunning, vanity and affectation, and to recommend a general simplicity in our dress, our discourse, and our behaviour . . .
