The Charlotte News
Wednesday, April 22, 1942
FIVE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: A half pound of sugar per person per week; now, only about five gallons of gas per week, i.e., about 50 to 100 miles of driving. And unless you happen to run into that naive Vermonter (relative to Navin Johnson) on which remark was made a couple of days back on the editorial page, you may obtain no tires at all. What’s the world coming to?
There is also the story on the front page of the newly released prisoner of war who, at a press conference in London, after reminding those present that he spoke English, proceeded to run under the tables and pinch the ankles of the female reporters. Such activity, no doubt, plus the fact of his insistence on speaking English, was why his companion had to keep him drugged for four days to avoid his discovery by the Nazis during their escape from confinement in Brittany where the prisoner had been held since the invasion of France in May, 1940. Being thus confined can play tricks on the mind.
For the third month in a row, the British launched a commando raid on the French coastal defenses of the Nazis with the design this time to collect information on German defenses. The Nazis were building a coastal version of the Maginot Line, one against which the troops landing on D-Day at Omaha Beach on Normandy would have to do battle two years hence.
Lieutenant John Bulkeley’s flotilla of PT boats, reported as active in patrolling Philippine waters, garners significant attention from the fact that he was the commanding officer of the PT boat which delivered General MacArthur out of harm’s way a month earlier.
"Wooden Ships..." on the editorial page advocates the construction of wooden cargo ships for want of adequate steel. Perhaps the idea derived from the initial success of the wooden PT boats, the hulls of which proved every bit as strong as steel craft. In any event, they were all very free and easy...
AGAINST THOSE WHO WISH TO BE ADMIRED.—
When a man holds his proper station in life, he does not gape after things beyond it. Man, what do you wish to happen to you?
I am satisfied if I desire and avoid conformably to nature, if I employ movements towards and from an object as I am by nature formed to do, and purpose and design and assent.
Why then do you strut before us as if you had swallowed a spit?
My wish has always been that those who meet me should admire me, and those who follow me should exclaim, O the great philosopher!
Who are they by whom you wish to be admired? Are they not those of whom you are used to say that they are mad? Well, then, do you wish to be admired by madmen?
ON PRAECOGNITIONS.—
Praecognitions are common to all men, and praecognition is not contradictory to praecognition. For who of us does not assume that Good is useful and eligible, and in all circumstances that we ought to follow and pursue it? And who of us does not assume that Justice is beautiful and becoming? When then does the contradiction arise?
It arises in the adaptation of the praecognitions to the particular cases. When one man says, "He has done well; he is a brave man," and another says, "Not so; but he has acted foolishly," then the disputes arise among men.
This is the dispute among the Jews and the Syrians and the Egyptians and the Romans; not whether holiness should be preferred to all things and in all cases should be pursued, but whether it is holy to eat pig's flesh or not holy.
You will find this dispute also between Agamemnon and Achilles; for call them forth.
What do you say, Agamemnon? ought not that to be done which is proper and right?
"Certainly."
Well, what do you say, Achilles? do you not admit that what is good ought to be done?
"I do most certainly."
Adapt your praecognitions then to the present matter. Here the dispute begins.
Agamemnon says, "I ought not to give up Chryseis to her father."
Achilles says, "You ought."
It is certain that one of the two makes a wrong adaptation of the praecognition of "ought" or "duty."
Further, Agamemnon says, "Then if I ought to restore Chryseis, it is fit that I take his prize from some of you."
Achilles replies, "Would you then take her whom I love?"
"Yes, her whom you love."
"Must I then be the only man who goes without a prize? and must I be the only man who has no prize?"
Thus the dispute begins.
What then is education? Education is the learning how to adapt the natural praecognitions to the particular things conformably to nature; and then to distinguish that of things some are in our power, but others are not. In our power are will and all acts which depend on the will; things not in our power are the body, the parts of the body, possessions, parents, brothers, children, country, and, generally, all with whom we live in society.
In what then should we place the good? To what kind of things [Greek: ousia] shall we adapt it? To the things which are in our power? Is not health then a good thing, and soundness of limb, and life, and are not children and parents and country? Who will tolerate you if you deny this?
Let us then transfer the notion of good to these things. Is it possible, then, when a man sustains damage and does not obtain good things, that he can be happy? It is not possible. And can he maintain towards society a proper behavior? He can not. For I am naturally formed to look after my own interest. If it is my interest to have an estate in land, it is my interest also to take it from my neighbor. If it is my interest to have a garment, it is my interest also to steal it from the bath. This is the origin of wars, civil commotions, tyrannies, conspiracies.
And how shall I be still able to maintain my duty towards Zeus? For if I sustain damage and am unlucky, he takes no care of me. And what is he to me if he cannot help me? And further, what is he to me if he allows me to be in the condition in which I am? I now begin to hate him. Why then do we build temples, why set up statues to Zeus, as well as to evil demons, such as to Fever; and how is Zeus the Saviour, and how the giver of rain, and the giver of fruits? And in truth if we place the nature of Good in any such things, all this follows.
What should we do then? This is the inquiry of the true philosopher who is in labor.
Now I do not see what the good is nor the bad. Am I not mad? Yes. But suppose that I place the good somewhere among the things which depend on the will; all will laugh at me. There will come some greyhead wearing many gold rings on his fingers, and he will shake his head and say: "Hear, my child. It is right that you should philosophize; but you ought to have some brains also; all this that you are doing is silly. You learn the syllogism from philosophers; but you know how to act better than philosophers do."
Man, why then do you blame me, if I know? What shall I say to this slave? If I am silent, he will burst. I must speak in this way: "Excuse me, as you would excuse lovers; I am not my own master; I am mad."
--from The Discourses of Epictetus, ca. 108
When the rock melts, it is no longer rock and thus you know not any longer the rock, but rather only lava. Turn the lamp on and see.
--We said that, ca. 2009
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