Few men must have led such a happy life as the brilliant African convert to Christianity, Augustine of Hippo, author of Confessions, The City of God, considered one of the great masterpieces of Western literature. "Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee" is one of his most significant quotes. He lived more than half a century of prosperity, of health, of brilliant intelligence, of glories, admiration and profanities also. And this man, swimming in an ocean of calm, longs for a distant, unknown, yet intensely sought and suffered happiness. After his son's death, he sells all his wealth and donates it to the poor, spending his last days in prayer and penance, with psalms hanging on the walls of his room so that he could read them.
Leo Tolstoy was another lucky man deeply dissatisfied: born of a wealthy family of aristocrats, farmer and owner of an immense fortune, father of nine children, happy as a husband and father, as a famous writer, poet and artist, a target of immense admiration in the world and, however, he is so unhappy in this condition that he decides to flee from his prosperity. He disappears for a while, but the police bring him back home and force him to live with his family. However, he does not tolerate his happiness; on a cold winter night, at the age of eighty-two, he flees again, and this time in the company of Alexandra, his youngest daughter, who seems to have participated in her father's mystical nostalgia, in search of spiritual awakening. With only his clothes on, he fell ill on the train and died in a small, isolated railway station; and, before taking the last breath, he gives his daughter his last will, forbidding any speech, music or pomp at his funeral.
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Money, entertainment, sex do not always rob men of the vision of transcendent happiness; only mediocre men, trapped in the earth, and unable to envy the flight of the eagle in the luminous heights of the sky are victims of this theft.
When Jesus tells his disciples that they are the salt of the earth, he alludes to this condiment of spirituality, designed to make all the materialities of earthly life tasty. He does not recommend eating pure salt, but seasoning all the foods of physical life with the taste of metaphysics and mystique, which he usually designates with the word "Kingdom of God". But he also gives his disciples a serious warning: if the very salt of spirituality loses its salinity, it is useless and serves no purpose but to be thrown out and trampled by the feet of passers-by.
When a man loses consciousness of his spirituality, of his divine Self, how could he still spiritualize his material life? How could the divine Self spice up the profanities of the human ego, if it loses consciousness that "I and the Father are one"?
And how will man be able to preserve this conscience if, amid this absurd daily flood of profanities, insanities and frustrations, he does not withdraw to the sacredness of interiorization, of being in tune with the Father?
This man lost his raison d'être, his identity. It may be that his companions of profanities, apparently, esteem and respect him; but what they respect is rather what this man has, and not what he is; they respect something that he possesses, money, social standing, prestige, but they do not respect someone that he should be, but is not. Ultimately, one can only respect the value and not a thing. But the man who devalues himself and becomes a thing has ceased to be someone and has just become something.
Nowadays, those who are not in fashion are not modern, and, as profane men, above all, want to be modern, they have to keep up with fashion, however corrupt it may be. The fashion, however, is almost always to be a slave to public opinion, not to be guided by one's conscience, but to obey other people's conventions. Not being modern requires great firmness of character and independence of spirit. And it is almost impossible to have a conscience of your own. Social and commercial advertising is so exquisitely subtle and contagious, that no mediocre man can resist the impact of advertising; only a few structured men can rise, safe, from the vast sand of universal slavery in society.
In order not to be modern it is necessary to be a hero.
To be someone one has to have the courage to renounce something - and that something is often almost everything that society values.
To be able to function as the salt of society, to give it flavour and preserve it from corruption, it is often necessary to appear antisocial, not to be a passive reflector of public opinion, but an active administrator of it.
The “man-salt” must have the courage to be unfriendly to society; for the love of society, he has to counter it to save it.
The spiritual man is guided by principles - the material man is dominated only by ends.
The weak man is defeated by selfish ends - the strong man is guided by spiritual principles.
For this reason, the man with principles will have no end, he is eternal, for he is always at the beginning of his life and career.
Principles preserve man.
The ends corrupt man, just as food without salt is corrupted.
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