What Does It All Mean?
November 23rd, 2007
“The present life of man, O king, in comparison of that time which is unknown to us, like the swift flight of the sparrow through the room wherein you sit at supper in winter, with your commanders and ministers and a good fire in the midst, while the storms of rain and snow prevail abroad; the sparrow, I say, flying in at one door and immediately out another, whilst he is within, is safe from the wintry storm; but after a short space of fair weather, he immediately vanishes out of sight into the dark winter from which he had emerged. So this life of man appears for a short space, but what of went before or what is to follow, we are utterly ignorant.”
This is the image of a man’s life through the thoughts and cognition of Venerable Bede (c673-735), the flight of a sparrow through the warmth and light of a great hall and back into the blizzard has troubled thinkers for centuries. What depresses me is that I don’t eat “supper” in a great banqueting hall, I usually sit in a confined room, on a chair that hurts my bum with it on my lap. As for the sparrow, the most prolific domineers of the sky where I live are Bloody Seagulls! So my updated Bede analogy would be: Life is basically a seagull taking a cumbersome passage through my room at dinner time (greedily swallowing as much as possible on its course) and back out into the putrid effluent of the atmosphere beyond my window where it belongs.
Have been considering forming a new group: The Society for the Pointless Promotion of Pessimism.
Entry Filed under: Personal
2 Comments Add your own
1. Jon | December 1st, 2007 at 1:54 am
Hi Craig,
There is no need to form a society for the Pointless Promotion of Pessimism because a group called the British Apathy League has been vigorously inactive for decades by not promoting this same idea.
I first heard about them in the late seventies and thought it would be a great idea to join so I promtly tried to sign up in ’85 but found they were closed. I immediately tried again in ’96 but found they were not open. I tried again last week and discovered that they were still closed! In fact I found that they were not merely closed but they had never actually opened at all, and the mere fact that I had expended the effort to find this out meant that I was inelligable to join anyway because I was too militant to be a member!
Now there is a club I would want to join – if I could be bothetred!
2. Lemmy | December 1st, 2007 at 11:31 am
Jon,
Your comments would be taken into consideration as it seems even more pointless to try to develop a venture that has failed already. Your membership would be considered by a test on how bothered you would be if your membership submission fails. So if you apply several times and display equal results to your previous application, or your attitude becomes more despondent, then you would have the chance to apply as many times as you like, most probably without success.
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