The Law is for All

Chapter II * Verses 67-70 137 69. Ah’ Ah! What do I feel? Is the word exhausted? 70. There is help & hope in other spells. Wisdom says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. Be not animal; refine thy rapture! If thou drink, drink by the eight and ninety rules of art: if thou love, exceed by delicacy; and if thou do aught joyous, let there be subtlety therein! Commentary: It is absurd to suppose that “to indulge the passions” is necessarily a reversion or degeneration. On the con­ trary, all human progress has depended on such indulgence. Every art and science is intended to gratify some fundamental need of nature. What is the ultimate use of the telephone and all the other inventions on which we pride ourselves? Only to sustain life, or to protect or reproduce it; or to subserve Knowledge and other forms of Pleasure. On the other hand, the passions must be understood properly as what they are, nothing in themselves, but the diverse forms of expression employed by the Will. One must preserve discipline. A passion cannot be good or bad, too weak or too strong, etc., by an arbitrary standard. Its virtue consists solely in its conformity with the plan of the Commander-in-Chief. Its initiative and elanx are limited by the requirements of his strategy. For instance, mod­ esty may well cooperate with ambition; but also it may thwart it. This verse counsels us to train our passions to the highest degree of efficiency. Each is to acquire the utmost strength and intelli­ gence; but all are equally to contribute their quota towards the success of the campaign. It is nonsense to bring a verdict of “Guilty” or “Not Guilty” against a prisoner without reference to the Law under which he is living. The end justifies the means; if the Jesuits do not assert this, 1 do. There is obviously a limit, where “the means” in any case are such that their use blasphemes “the end”: e.g., to murder one’s rich aunt affirms the right of one’s poor nephew to repeat the trick, and so to go against one’s own Will-to-live, which lies deeper in one’s being than the mere Will-to-inherit. The judge in each case is not ideal morality, but inherent logic. 1 [Fr., “impetuosity, ardor.”]