Every philosophy must address the following elements of life: work, it’s labor, marriage, its desire for passion and love, eternity, our destiny, and freedom, the time we spend of our own accord.
However, before we begin such a task, I must lift up this bow and place upon it an arrow to shoot into the heavens, in love, so that firing upon what is above us, I may hit a target worthy of a strike, and capture what is marvelous and wondrous and beautiful. And so striking the heavens, it may fall before us in the color of stars, in the hues of gold that cover the kingdoms that dwell therein.
A shot fired into the night and here we may begin. Join me, my ranks, in this war against the concealing of the truth, and strike the heavens with an eye to discover, a heart to pursue, an inexhaustible longing, and a love that never dies.
If we are to begin with one premise, one foundation, one statement, what ought it to be? Keeping simple the mind’s contemplation, let us begin thus: life is good rather than bad, for if it were bad and we concluded thus, we ought to take our lives. And if it were an admixture, the same would transpire, for an admixture of the two would mean that life has no nature or quality in itself, making us conclude it either indifferent to us, without quality, and of our own making, being itself suspect to great decline or even times of ascent, though in a great all expansive ocean of indifference of that which is without nature or entirely evil and not worth our time and efforts.
I will arise tomorrow saith the soul and I will seek what I intend to. This intention is intrinsic to life, to being of those that are alive, not something, that which we conjure frequently of our own attention. And this being so, we cannot sit before one another today and contemplate any further for we must today conclude whether there is such goodness to life. For without such goodness, there is great vanity and the pain and sufferings of life do not merit such daily efforts, not even the slightest. So, let us think and contemplate, will I arise tomorrow and do the will of my heart, not knowing the nature and quality of life, if there be such nature, or rather will I conclude that there is goodness, that life does have a quality, a nature, that is evident from gazing at the moon and the waters, the stars, the green life that grows from the ground without hesitation, and the seasons that do color the earth in joy, in comfort, and even in beauty, for that white snow that does fall upon the ground in ever enchanting patterned order is more beautiful than the pain it may cause in the frigid cold.
Life is good, I say, for life’s continuation does demand it, and if I be wrong, the cost being so little as to be nullified, I may rejoice in laughter at losing nothing hereafter. And thus commences the treatise.
Life is not good as the taste of an apple to the appetite, nor as water quenches the thirst, rather it is good in so far as it is worthy of existing, such as an animal, a lion of great fearsome beauty, or a gazelle as graceful as the golden fields of its pasture, or rather a human being of great virtue, possessing great eloquence in speech and fortitude in sacrifice. These are good, and life is good, possessing this goodness, in the same manner as these. It is a nobility and a marvel, a great wonder as well to be existing, and it be our responsibility to conform our behavior to our stature, and to the nature and quality of life, being so beautiful. So then, can we not also say, that life is not only good, possessing goodness by nature, but beautiful by nature and in quality as well? For behold that which comes from the ground, either elegance and order or nothing, but never disorder or destruction and darkness, but grass and greeneries that grow from the moisture of mere morning’s dawn and the sprinkling of its waters upon the valleys, and elements that alone may capture the awe of humankind, caves full of crystals, waters full of life teaming to and fro in shapes that the mind cannot easily fathom, the heavens full of stars, lights, spheres, and movements that do cause tears to the observing eye and the lifting of the soul above to be as one of those that give light and meaning to humankind, moving, revolving, orbiting in perfect order rather than confusion, the evil of disorder and indifference. Yes, behold the rays of the sun resting upon the stones of castles and holy churches we have built, being more magnificent than anything we can conjure, more pure than anything we may imagine. Yes, behold the trees that do yield our daily fruit and vegetation, that do satisfy the belly and the inner being in nutritious substance and in colorations so intricate and shapes that do appeal and cause us to ask: what heaven have I found myself within, and what hell do we learn to believe it is, for one glimpse of the beauty of snowfall, the geometric order within the leaves of trees, the caress and touch and ever changing shapeless form of water that I may hold, running through my fingers, and that does reflect the lights of the heavens and my own face, one glimpse of the evening sky, and all pain and hardship is as nothing to a soul which may long eternally or even in mere memory to know the source of that which he sees. Life is justified to have us chained, suffer, and die for we possess such great blessings in being as we are, not strong or wise, nor even big or small, but simply existing we are rather in dignity and in beauty, existing as the great bodies that do encircle the cosmos in the music of the gods, and as the stars that we do look upon.