Tuesday, May 23, 2006

De Futilitate

I have met Futility. Futility and I go way back. The insults it brings to any hope of an earthbound Utopia are an inescapable offense, so Futility an I have come to an agreement. I will glory in the enjoyment of the moment and glory in the hereafter. It will slowly tear me to pieces, kill me and feed me to the worms. That should work out fine.
If I should ever write a book about this agreement, it will deal with the governing arrangements natural to the admission of a world beset by the pleasant and the unpleasant. It will build a case for the admission of Futility and the subsequent creation of a man's identity. Our wills are expressed, since the Fall, by the manifest need to arrange our way through this problem. We, in it, discover the "who" of what we are by feeling both chaos and order. We note the parts of both, (including movement, memory and anticipation) by which we hope (anticipated gratification) and fear (anticipated pain). Feeling is a good reason for Intentions. The presence of the "felt" provides meaningful impetus to cling to, move to the pleasant. We are introduced by it to value the exercise of our will. We must be exercising the will to comfort our flesh, our souls, and the Other, (that which we don't feel but wish to control for its effect on our feeling).
Who are you? How great are you? Your Identity and your Dignity are defined by the success and range of your fiefdom.
"Oh Death, where is thy sting? Oh Death, where is thy victory?

4 comments:

Lincoln Davis said...

Your son, who is not yet himself as resigned to futility as he ought to be, urges you to cease allowing your contented acceptance of this pleasant-enough distopia to smother your ambitions in writing this suggested magnum opus on governance. Perhaps he has inherited too much of his mother's temperment, but take up your pen, he says.

Mark said...

Now let me get this straight. Only in finding the futility in all things can our life have meaning, thus defeating futility at it's own game.

Evan B. Wilson said...

Futility is God's "game". He intended that we "enjoy" now (according to Ecclesiastes) and "enjoy" the hope of its end (St. Paul in Romans 8). He, thus, arranges us within His "game". to withstand its insults.

and Davis,
I was working on an outline yesterday trying to find some impetus.
Still looking for a reason, though.

MrsCranial said...

The real obstacle is that you don't want to deal with all the editing necessary to make the big words understandable to the rest of us. It would disrupt the comfort of your fiefdom.