THE GIFTS OF LIFE

We are lucky beyond words! Every time I start feeling sorry for myself, wallowing in doleful self-pity, I give myself a metaphorical kick up the back-side and proclaim – Forget it, our First World complaints are wholly redundant, we are living a life of cushioned comfort and protection - our generation must be the happiest in the millennium!

Yes, it is true, the post-war generation in the West has been particularly blest. Just to put it at its most basic, in 1945 average life expectancy in the UK was 64 and is now in 2024, 81 years. Better healthcare, cleaner air, better food, child vaccination, better working conditions and more leisure – all contribute to remarkably positive outcomes. Our material world has improved beyond recognition, better housing, easier transport, mobile phones with global coverage, laptop computers, TV, regular food deliveries, accessible cars, music and entertainment from diverse media, all on a plate.

The trap of Materialism

And yet…it is well said that Man does not live by bread alone. Our lives are a journey, much enhanced by beautiful experiences or beautiful objects. We need this stimulus to warm and comfort us. Our journey inevitably comes to an end and all mankind needs to make some sense of that conclusion. There are thousands of cults, religions and philosophies competing to provide an answer. Personally, I am not attracted to transcendental devotion, much as I respect the artistic contribution great religions have made and I am basically rationalist and humanistic. I have however, in an ecumenical spirit, recently bought the well-received A Monk’s Guide to Happiness by the Buddhist Gelong Thubten, promoting the value of Meditation. He is an engaging and up-to-date writer, but I doubt if I have the stamina to obey his precepts!

I am more attracted to the wisdom of the Ancient World and in particular the Stoic philosophy of the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius (121 – 180 AD). Stoicism was founded by Zeno, a Phoenician born in Cyprus who taught in Athens (flourishing c.300 BC). In a memorable passage the historian Gibbon paid grandiloquent tribute to the Antonine Emperors who presided over a Golden Age of relative peace and prosperity, first the efficient Antoninus Pius and then his adopted son Marcus Aurelius: -

 

 

The virtue of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus was of a severer and more laborious kind. It was the well-earned harvest of many a learned conference, of many a patient lecture, and many a midnight lucubration. At the age of twelve years, he embraced the rigid system of the Stoics, which taught him to submit his body to his mind, his passions to his reason; to consider virtue as the only good, vice as the only evil, all things external as things indifferent. His Meditations, composed in the tumult of a camp, are still extant; and he even condescended to give lessons on philosophy, in a more public manner than was perhaps consistent with the modesty of a sage or the dignity of an emperor. But his life was the noblest commentary on the precepts of Zeno. He was severe to himself, indulgent to the imperfection of others, just and beneficent to all mankind.

    Emperor Marcus Aurelius 

Zeno the Stoic

                                           The Stoics set high standards, which I try feebly to observe.

Moving on from mind-addling philosophy, I am sure that all people benefit from contact with beautiful objects and beautiful places and I give a few examples to my taste.

                                        Chiswick House, London by Lord Burlington

The most civilised public amenity in London thought Sir David Piper

                                Majolica Plate of Women Bathing, made in Urbino c 1530

From the Wallace Collection, Manchester Square, London.

The Skating Minister by Sir Henry Raeburn

from The National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh

 

I have written much guff in the past about UK politics and taken positions with partisan relish. I now turn my back on the so-called political elite, Tony Blair Gordon Brown, Jeremy Corbyn, David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Keir Starmer, Liz Truss, Rishi Sunak et al. In judgment, I echo the immortal words of gap-toothed favourite Terry-Thomas who would snarl: - “You’re a shower, an absolute shower!

                                                              Critic Terry-Thomas

To revert to life-affirming matters, one of life’s great gifts is the Gift of Friendship. I was on the receiving end a week or so ago, when 5 old friends, knowing of my immobility, came down to the Kent coast to visit me and have lunch. Although not all of us were hale, we certainly were hearty and reminisced, bantered and chatted the day away – as we had over the past 50 years. For me it was one of the happiest days and made me glad to be still going strong and blest by the Gifts of Life.

 

SMD

22.5.24

Text Copyright Sidney Donald 2024