Man is made of thought, of will and of love: he can think truth or error, he can will good or evil, he can love beauty or ugliness.1 Now thought of the true — or knowledge of the real — demands on the one hand willing of the good and on the other love of the beautiful, hence virtue, for virtue is none other than beauty of soul; that is why the Greeks, who were aesthetes as well as thinkers, included virtue within philosophy. Without beauty of soul, all willing is sterile, it is petty and closes itself to grace; and in an analogous manner: without effort of will, all spiritual thought ultimately remains superficial and ineffectual and leads to pretension. Virtue coincides with a sensibility proportioned — or conformed — to the Truth, and that is why the soul of the sage soars above things and thereby above itself, if one may put it thus; whence the disinterestedness, nobleness and generosity of great souls. Quite clearly, the consciousness of metaphysical principles cannot go hand in hand with moral pettiness, such as ambition and hypocrisy : Be ye perfect even as your Father in Heaven is perfect. ---------- Frithjof Schuon Survey of Metaphysics and Esoterism
Posted on: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 13:57:45 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015