More Praise For Idleness

"Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns... Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin...... [Your] heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." ~ Jesus of Nazareth

"That the end of life is not action but contemplation -- being as distinct from doing -- a certain disposition of the mind, is, in some shape or other, the principle of all the higher morality. In poetry, in art, if you enter into their true spirit at all, you touch this principle in a measure... beholding for the mere joy of beholding. To treat life in the spirit of art is to make life a thing in which means and ends are identified... To witness this spectacle with appropriate emotions is the aim of all culture." ~ Walter Pater

Work receives more than its fair share of praise; every child born into Western Civilization is duly bathed and marinated in the unholy spirit of the so-called Protestant Work Ethic. Idleness is not yet praised enough. The ability to "laze about", finding rabbits in the clouds, and the world in a grain of sand, is near-universally stigmatized and disparaged. As I see it, this observation strikes at the very core of spiritual imbalance in our culture.

Mysticism has come to be associated with fuzzy-thinking, escapism, and ineffectuality. Even where the mystic is praised, he is routinely left out in the cold if he cannot exhibit the characteristics of a worldly man. Moreover, he is even expected to be more adept at worldly matters than those whose only concerns are worldly! If he exhibits "only" spiritual gifts, he is fastly pronounced a fraud.

We live in a time of cynicism, when faith is judged, not by works, but by dead works.

Who is more industrious than the cynic? Or what is more cynical than industry? And how are men of action (who are indeed cynical in their dismissal of the life of the mind) ever to understand those lazy romantics, sated on simple observation and the contemplation of what is readily observed?

The eye of the romantic captures all that it seeks, finds all that it sees, and is more than appreciative of the world which God and all of Nature have set before it; is, in fact, awe-struck and reeling beneath the inexhaustible mystery of Being. The mind and imagination of such persons are fired and fed by everything they come into contact with. Purely to dream is for them a pasttime which would justify any and all labors, no matter how taxing or strenuous, if not for the simple fact that dreaming, or the leisure required for dreaming, is possible only in the absence of labors.

Working for leisure is like fighting for peace, and fucking for virginity.

What are we to add to this work, which is not simply majestic, not merely profound, but rather the source of all majesty and profudity; this work which God has wrought, and man can only attempt to humble himself before? If we must add something, ought we not to at least endeavor, first and foremost, to appreciate the graces already granted by Providence; to discover what they are, as well as to share and distribute them (or the knowledge of them) to all men everywhere? How rash is the lust for acquisition, which leads men to overlook the honest treasure of the Sun, while desirous for some elaborate chandelier? Shall we really gut the mineral entrails of the Earth, in pursuit of resources from which to fashion the widest and most intricate variety of objects, and not revel in the glory of her outward garments; the lakes and vales, rivers, coasts, and trees? Shall we put all men to work, and not marvel upon the priceless miracle of rest?

What a Paradise we all could live in, if we could all just see it!

As it is, the ones who see must wear the thickest chains. In the words of Antonio Porchia, they are "chained to the earth for the freedom of their eyes". They are torn from the spectacle of God's perfect creation; exiled, and sent out in search of the very kingdom from which they have been exiled! All too often, they are made mad by the madness of it, which only they can see.

Understand, I do not doubt that faith may be judged by works; what I doubt is merely the ability of faithless, undiscerning men, -- of cynics, -- to judge which are the works of faith and which are not.

My friends, the one who prays with faith knows his prayers have already been answered. Likewise, the sort of works which must proceed from the highest faith are those works which have already been done. They are works which no man may assume credit for, because they are the works of God.

If you wish to know which are the true works of faith, you have simply to open your spiritual eyes and look out upon the world in a spirit of faith. Every blade of grass perking up to meet the sun is another work of faith fulfilled; every bend in the riverbed is perfectly placed; every breeze blows from God. For the truly inspired, the whole of Creation unfolds as the endless answer to prayers which are only just beginning to form at the very instant of their fulfillment. Here, asking and receiving, prayer and thanksgiving, the will of man and the will of God, have all become one.

What is necessary for the accomplishment of every good? Only this: that man should cease to do evil. All that is necessary for the accomplishment of God's will is that man should abandon his personal will, and, so, come into accordance with the way things really are. Ours is not to change, forge, hew, or fashion Nature in our own image. Ours is but to reflect, by the simplicity of our gaze, all the glories and wonders which the Lord God has so benevolently lain before us. Truly, only God is good, and only that is good which proceeds from God.

The proper function of mankind is to serve as both audience and participant in the Creation, but all participation, in order to be righteous, must proceed directly from God, in the form of divine inspiration. This is why the artist is a type of the holy; because he is, firstly, a fitting observor of God's work and, secondly, because he acts only when inspired by that work. The point where he ceases to observe, and begins to take part, is always obscure; shrouded in the mystery of union with the Beloved. In the ultimate experience of God, there is not one who creates and one who is created, just as there is not one who loves and one who is loved. There is only Creation. There is only Love.