Detail from Rembrandt, The Night Watch, 1642. Public Domain.
. . . Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. . . .
—Shakespeare, “The Seven Ages of Man” from As You Like It
Young men with beards think they can fix everything for us.
Not long ago, clean-shaven young men thought they could fix everything for us.
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Well, STOP THE PRESSES, Dear Reader, because I’ve got a news bulletin: Everything is not fixed.
They’ve worked at it and worked at it and fought fiercely for their constituents and—guess what?—the only part they left out was the fixing of everything.
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Some things cannot be fixed. They can only be endured.
As to those things that can be fixed, we’ve mostly got to do it ourselves.
To imagine that politicians will fix everything—or would, if not thwarted by opposing, evil, politicians—is arrestingly naïve.
If politicians solved more problems than they create, we’d run out of problems.
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Of course we must have politicians, to divide the spoils among us and administer our public institutions. But Politics holds no key to a New Jerusalem where streets are paved in gold and teardrops never fall.
Here’s the fact of it: We are all in this together, Dear Friend: All broken, jumbled, confused creatures muddling our way through swamps of untoward circumstance.
Swamps of untoward circumstance . . . Paul Klee, The Man of Confusion, 1939. Public Domain.
Each of us gets one life, and it’s altogether imperfect. We are mixed creatures. Our lives are spotted, blotted, their meanings and messages obscure.
Perhaps God could have made us perfect—but at what cost to our souls?
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Beware the temper that looks to some hero to come along and straighten it all out.
Making idols of the prominent, or of the adamant, leads us to loathe our neighbors. Hatred and suspicion of those we live with is the worst form of hell on earth.
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It might be better just to relax.
Resolve to enjoy what life throws at you, pain and pleasure together, weal and woe alike. Do what good you can, when you can. Forgive others. Forgive yourself.
This—right here, right now—is your chance to witness the grand spectacle of human existence from a front-row seat, and it will be over before you know it.
