Wisdom and Destiny

by Maurice Maeterlinck

34. So much for isolated wisdom; now let us return to the wisdom that moves to the grave in the midst of the mighty crowd of human destinies; for the destiny of the sage holds not aloof from that of the wicked and frivolous. All destinies are for ever commingling; and the adventure is rare in whose web the hempen thread blends not with the golden. There are misfortunes more gradual, less frightful of aspect, than those that befell Oedipus and the prince of Elsinore; misfortunes that quail not beneath the gaze of truth or justice or love. Those who speak of the profit of wisdom are never so wise as when they freely admit, without pride or heart-burning, that wisdom grants scarcely a boon to her faithful that the foolish or wicked would prize. And indeed, it may often take place that the sage, as he moves among men, shall pass almost unnoticed, shall affect them but slightly; be this that his stay is too brief, that he comes too late, that he misses true contact; or perchance that he has to contend with forces too overwhelming, amassed by myriad men from time immemorial. No miracles can he perform on material things; he can save only that which life's ordinary laws still allow to be saved; and himself, it may be, shall be suddenly seized in a great inexorable whirlwind. But, though he perish therein, still does he escape the fate that is common to most; for at least he will die without having been forced—for weeks, or it may be for years, before the catastrophe—to be the helpless, despairing witness of the ruin of his soul. And to save some one—if we admit that in life there are truly two lives—does not of necessity mean that we save him from death and disaster; but indeed that we render him happier, inasmuch as we try to improve him. Moral salvation is the greatest salvation; and yet, what a trifle this seems, as everything seems that is done on the loftiest summits of soul. Was the penitent thief not saved; and that not alone in the Christian sense of the word, but in its fullest, most perfect meaning? Still had he to die, and at that very hour; but he died eternally happy; because at the very last moment he too had been loved, and a Being of infinite wisdom had declared that his soul had not been without value; that his soul, too, had been good, and had not passed through the world unperceived of all men.

35. As we go deeper down into life we discover the secret of more and more sorrow and helplessness. We see that many souls round us lead idle and foolish lives, because they believe they are useless, unnoticed by all, unloved, and convinced they have nothing within them that is worthy of love. But to the sage the hour must come when every soul that exists claims his glance, his approval, his love—if only because it possesses the mysterious gift of existence. The hour must come when he sees that falsehood and weakness and vice are but on the surface; when his eye shall pierce through, and discover the strength, and the truth, and the virtue that lie underneath. Happy and blessed hour, when wickedness stands forth revealed as goodness bereft of its guide; and treachery is seen to be loyalty, for ever astray from the highway of happiness; and hatred becomes only love, in poignant despair, that is digging its grave. Then, unsuspected of any, shall it be with all those who are near the good man as it was with the penitent thief; into the humblest soul that will thus have been saved by a look, or a word, or a silence, shall the true happiness fall—the happiness fate cannot touch; that brings to all men the oblivion it gave unto Socrates, and causes each one to forget, until nightfall, that the death—giving cup had been drained ere the sun went down.

36. The inner life, perhaps, is not what we deem it to be. There are as many kinds of inner lives as there are of external lives. Into these tranquil regions the smallest may enter as readily as he who is greatest, for the gate that leads thither is not always the gate of the intellect. It often may happen that the man of vast knowledge shall knock at this gate in vain, reply being made from within by the man who knows nothing. The inner life that is surest, most lasting, possessed of the uttermost beauty, must needs be the one that consciousness slowly erects in itself, with the aid of all that is purest in the soul. And he is wise who has learned that this life should be nourished on every event of the day: he to whom deceit or betrayal serves but to enhance his wisdom: he in whom evil itself becomes fuel for the flame of love. He is wise who at last sees in suffering only the light that it sheds on his soul; and whose eyes never rest on the shadow it casts upon those who have sent it towards him. And wiser still is the man to whom sorrow and joy not only bring increase of consciousness, but also the knowledge that something exists superior to consciousness even. To have reached this point is to reach the summit of inward life, whence at last we look down on the flames whose light has helped our ascent. But not many can climb so high; and happiness may be achieved in the less ardent valley below, where the flames spring darkly to life. And there are existences still more obscure which yet have their places of refuge. There are some that instinctively fashion inward lives for themselves. There are some that, bereft of initiative or of intelligence, never discover the path that leads into themselves, and are never aware of all that their refuge contains; and yet will their actions be wholly the same as the actions of those whose intellect weighs every treasure. There are some who desire only good, though they know not wherefore they desire it, and have no suspicion that goodness is the one fixed star of loftiest consciousness. The inner life begins when the soul becomes good, and not when the intellect ripens. It is somewhat strange that this inner life can never be formed out of evil. No inner life is for him whose soul is bereft of all nobleness. He may have full knowledge of self; he may know, it may be, wherefore he shuns goodness; and yet shall he seek in vain for the refuge, the strength, the treasure of invisible gladness, that form the possessions of him who can fearlessly enter his heart. For the inward life is built up of a certain rejoicing of soul; and the soul can never be happy if it possess not, and love not, something that is pure. It may perhaps err in its choice, but then even will it be happier than the soul to which it has never been given to choose.

37. And thus are we truly saving a man if we bring about that he loves evil somewhat less than he loved it before; for we are helping that man to construct, deep down in his soul, the refuge where—against destiny shall brandish her weapons in vain. This refuge is the monument of consciousness, or, it may be, of love; for love is nothing but consciousness, still vaguely in search of itself; and veritable consciousness nothing but love that at last has emerged from the shadow. And it is in the deepest recess of this refuge that the soul shall kindle the wondrous fire of her joy. And this joy of the soul is like unto no other joy; and even as material fire will chase away deadly disease from the earth, so will the joy of the soul scatter sorrow that malevolent destiny brings. It arises not from exterior happiness; it arises not from satisfied self-love; for the joy that self-love procures becomes less as the soul becomes nobler, but the joy of pure love increases as nobility comes to the soul. Nor is this joy born of pride; for to be able to smile at its beauty is not enough to bring joy to the soul. The soul that has sought in itself has the right to know of its beauty; but to brood on this beauty too much, to become over-conscious thereof, were perhaps to detract somewhat from the unconsciousness of its love. The joy that I speak of takes not from love what it adds unto consciousness; for in this joy, and in this joy alone, do consciousness and love become one, feeding each on the other, each gaining from that which it gives. The striving intellect may well know happiness beyond the reach of the satisfied body; but the soul that grows nobler has joys that are often denied to the striving intellect. These two will often unite and labour together at building the house within. But still it will happen at times that both work apart, and widely different then are the structures each will erect. And were this to be so, and the being I loved best of all in the world came and asked me which he should choose—which refuge I held to be most unattackable, sweetest, profoundest—I would surely advise him to shelter his destiny in the refuge of the soul that grows nobler.

38. Is the sage never to suffer? Shall no storm ever break on the roof of his dwelling, no traps be laid to ensnare him? Shall wife and friends never fail him? Must his father not die, and his mother, his brothers, his sons—must all these not die like the rest? Shall angels stand guard at each highway through which sorrow can pass into man? Did not Christ Himself weep as He stood before Lazarus' tomb? Had not Marcus Aurelius to suffer—from Commodus, the son who already showed signs of the monster he was to become; from Faustina, the wife whom he loved, but who cared not for him? Was not destiny's hand laid heavy on Paulus Aemilius, who was fully as wise as Timoleon? did not both his sons die, one five days before his triumph in Rome, and the other but three days after? What becomes of the refuge, then, where wisdom keeps watch over happiness? Must we take back all we have said? and is wisdom yet one more illusion, by whose aid the soul would fain conciliate reason, and justify cravings that experience is sure to reject as being opposed to reason?

39. Nay, In truth, the sage too must suffer. He suffers; and suffering forms a constituent part of his wisdom. He will suffer, perhaps, more than most men, for that his nature is far more complete. And being nearer to all mankind, as the wise ever must be, his suffering will be but the greater, for the sorrows of others are his. He will suffer in his flesh, in his heart, in his spirit; for there are sides in all these that no wisdom on earth can dispute against destiny. And so he accepts his suffering, but is not discouraged thereby; not for him are the chains that it fastens on those who cringe down before it, unaware that it is but a messenger sent by a mightier personage, whom a bend in the road hides from view. Needs must the sage, like his neighbour, be startled from sleep by the shouts of the truculent envoy, by the blows at the door that cause the whole house to tremble. He, too, must go down and parley. But yet, as he listens, his eyes are not fixed on this bringer of evil tidings; his glance will at times be lifted over the messenger's shoulder, will scan the dust on the horizon in search of the mighty idea that perhaps may be near at hand. And indeed, when our thoughts rest on fate, at such times as happiness enfolds us, we feel that no great misfortune can be suddenly burst upon us. The proportions will change, it is true, when the blow falls; but it is equally true that before the misfortune can wholly destroy the abiding courage within us, it first must triumph in our heart over all we adore, over all we admire, and love. And what alien power can expel from our soul a feeling and thought that we hurl not our selves from its throne? Physical suffering apart, not a single sorrow exists that can touch us except through our thoughts; and whence do our thoughts derive the weapons wherewith they attack or defend us? We suffer but little from suffering itself; but from the manner wherein we accept it overwhelming sorrow may spring. "His unhappiness was caused by himself," said a thinker of one whose eyes never looked over the brutal messenger's shoulder—"his unhappiness was caused by himself; for all misery is inward, and caused by ourselves. We are wrong in believing that it comes from without. For indeed we create it within us, out of our very substance."

40. It is only in the manner of our facing the event that its active force consists. Assemble ten men who, like Paulus Aemilius, have lost both their sons at the moment when life seemed sweetest, then will the misfortune appear to vary in every one. Misfortune enters within us, but must of necessity yield obedience to all our commands. Even as the order may be that it finds inscribed on the threshold, so will it sow, or destroy, or reap. If my neighbour, a commonplace man, were to lose his two sons at the moment when fate had granted his dearest desires, then would darkness steal over all, unrelieved by a glimmer of light; and misfortune itself, contemptuous of its too facile success, would leave naught behind but a handful of colourless cinders. Nor is it necessary for me to see my neighbour again to be aware that his sorrow will have brought to him pettiness only; for sorrow does merely restore to us that which our soul had lent in happier days.

41. But this was the misfortune that befell Paulus Aemilius. Rome, still aglow with his triumph, waited, dismayed, wondering what was to happen. Were the gods defying the sage, and how would the sage reply? Would the hero be crushed by his sorrow, or would sorrow acknowledge its master? Mankind, at moments like these, seems aware that destiny is yet once again making trial of the strength of her arm, and that change of some kind must befall if her blow crush not where it alights. And see with what eagerness men at such moments will question the eyes of their chiefs for the password against the invisible.

But Paulus Aemilius has gathered together an assembly of the people of Rome; he advances gravely towards them, and thus does he speak: "I, who never yet feared anything that was human, have, amongst such as were divine, always had, a dread of fortune as faithless and inconstant; and, for the very reason that in this war she had been as a favourable gale in all my affairs, I still expected some change and reflux of things. In one day I passed the Ionian Sea, and reached Corcyra from Brundisium; thence in five more I sacrificed at Delphi, and in other five days came to my forces in Macedonia, where, after I had finished the usual sacrifices for the purifying of the army, I entered on my duties, and in the space of fifteen days put an honourable period to the war. Still retaining a jealousy of fortune, even from the smooth current of my affairs, and seeing myself secure and free from the danger of any enemy, I chiefly dreaded the change of the goddess at sea, whilst conveying home my victorious army, vast spoils, and a captive king. Nay, indeed, after I was returned to you safe, and saw the city full of joy, congratulating, and sacrifices, yet still I distrusted, well knowing that fortune never conferred any great benefits that were unmixed and unattended with probabilities of reverse. Nor could my mind, that was still as it were in labour, and always foreseeing something to befall this city, free itself from this fear, until this great misfortune befell me in my own family, and till, in the midst of those days set apart for triumph, I carried two of the best of sons, my only destined successors, one after another to their funerals. Now therefore, I am myself safe from danger, at least as to what was my greatest care; and I trust and am verily persuaded that, for the time to come, fortune will prove constant and harmless unto you; since she has sufficiently wreaked her jealousy at our great successes on me and mine, and has made the conqueror as marked an example of human instability as the captive whom he led in triumph, with this only difference, that Perseus, though conquered, does yet enjoy his children, while the conqueror Aemilius is deprived of his."

42. This was the Roman fashion of accepting the greatest sorrow that can befall a man at the moment when sorrow is felt the most keenly—at the moment of his greatest happiness. And there are many ways of accepting misfortune—as many, indeed, as there are generous feelings or thoughts to be found on the earth; and every one of those thoughts, every one of those feelings, has a magic wand that transforms, on the threshold, the features and vestments of sorrow. Job would have said, "The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away: blessed be the name of the Lord"; and Marcus Aurelius perhaps, "If it be no longer allowed me to love those I loved high above all, it is doubtless that I may learn to love those whom I love not yet."