These words keep running through my head, particulalrly the last two lines:
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Just not sure which side is my side.
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The last two lines reminded me of a quote by Bertrand Russell.
William Butler Yeats, "The Second Coming."
Love that line, "The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity". It seems to me not a condition of a certain time, but a statement of fact. Lack of conviction is the sign of an open mind – Passionate intensity that of an unrestrained ego.
"Lack of conviction is the sign of an open mind – Passionate intensity that of an unrestrained ego.
Posted by: Randy | Feb 9, 2009 7:47:16 AM"
"Passionate intensity that of an unrestrained ego." Passionate intensity is just one of the several parts of an unrestrainged ego.
But this: ""Lack of conviction is the sign of an open mind."; I would suggest needs total rethinking.
One of the finest minds I deal with on a regular basis belongs to my older brother, he is well educated, well read, and innovative in his thinking. As such he has convictions; but, in all serious matters he is weak in character and thus his convictions are meaningless because he does not have courage of conviction. He typically knows the correct course to take in any situation; however, he will do nothing, particularly if acting will bring him into conflict with those who can affect his personal comfort.
The lack of conviction is more often a sign of a weak mind, very frequently uneducated in the characteristics that make up a free self responsible individual, and also likely to include a healthy slathering of moral cowardice as well.
Vidyohs,
I hear you. It is obviously not good to have such an open mind that one's brains fall out. I guess I'm thinking of "conviction" along the lines of people who've made up their minds regardless of the facts. For example, religious (and political) types are often noted for their "convictions", though many are just plain hateful toward anyone who believes differently. Such "convictions" are just another form of "passionate intensity".
As a corporate financial executive for 30 years,I surrounded myself with direct reports who were ,without question more intelligent than me.They also had better skills.
I have often wondered why they never moved up in their careers at the rate that I did..I have occassionally felt guilty for not moving them along.They always seemed to trail behind my career.
Upon reflection,I now see that while they had the brains they for some reason never had the confidence to take strong positions,that may be unpopular or against the corporate view of the world.They would feed me their analysis,and I would present.
Despite my many attempts to get them to take positions they would always by prference want me to "carry the spear"
Passion is needed to convince others of a view.The market rewarded my passion,and punished those who would not take the risks
I think there are psycho-biological factors in this. Passion is a more primal aspect than intellect.
Our five year old has been teaching me about passion.
Your confusion as to which side is yours, Russ, is due to the fact many on your side would be thrilled if "mere anarchy" ruled.
In my personal view the worst people in the world to deal with are the people who have no convictions. That is because a person without convictions can not have, or adhere to, standards of any kind. To honor standards one must be convinced that the standard is correct and as a standard it must therefore be inflexible.
When you find people like that you have found people that only have situational ethics, moral, and so situational standards as well.
Such people are not trust worthy or dependable, and in fact typically are more of a roadblock to efficiency and good order than they will ever be useful to efficiency and good order.
Now let's couple that lack of conviction and all I have said it implies, and couple it with "passionate intensity", what do we have?
In fact the world has a lot of people that are just that way. We have some that come here to disrupt, muirduck, STrUmPiT, Gilhuahua, et. al, we call people like that socialist/liberals/communist/democrats/progressives. You'd never run to the store and leave your door unlocked when you know they live in your neighborhood.
BTW, let me amend my last by pointing out that I firmly believe that a characterless person with no standards and no convictions can still be very courageous, but it is his "passionate intensity" usually coupled with the "unrestrained ego" (spoke of by Randy) that makes it so.
For all the wrong reasons, flying in the face of documented history, the left can still find idiots to march in the face of police dogs, rubber bullets, water cannon, arrest, and jail.
Perhaps I am unjustified in calling it courage when they do that, maybe I should have just left it at a demonstration of stupidity.
Russ,
We are all, at times, the best and the worst. The conditions of the best and the worst, in this poem, are both at their nadir, because the point is one of utter despair.
Well vidyohs & friends, Communists must have more conviction and courage than Libertarians. Communists went forth and changed the world with physical action. Libertarians won't do any thing other than converse with one another. I am reminded of someone who (in the '60s) said something along the lines of "when he saw 'revolutionaries' who preferred to talk about their ideas and not do any thing about it he knew the future was safe". The standard reply I've heard is "oh no, we don't like force, we feel hypocritcal" and yet you'd also complain that everyone is constantly using force&fraud against you. Heaven forbid a Libertarian revolution could be defended as retaliatory force&fraud for the past 100 or more years. I want to see Libertarian forces march on the White House led by General vidyohs.
Gilhuahua,
I agree.
Gilhuahua,
While my agreement was sincere, you make some basic errors vis-a-vis myself.
As I have told you I am not a libertarian, I am a Natural Conservative. I am not an anarchist, but like the anarchist I have no problem with the slave raider dying at my hands before he can chain me.
I know we need some form of government with some degree of enforcement power; and, as I have stated in the past, if we had a government that adhered to an unflawed Constitution, I could support that.
My own personal feeling is though, that any government (officials therein) should quake in fear of swift death at the hands of the public if they exceed even the tinest little bit of those restraints. Authority within bounds, total fear of exceeding those bounds.
There are ways this can be done in the modern world of instant communication and almost instant travel.
As for the revolution and what is being done, even here on the Cafe. You miss the obvious, which is that the American revolution did not begin in 1775. It began many decades earlier with the abuses of the English government creating the spreading discontent that allowed the final violent push to happen. Don't discount the role education by knowledgeable colonials played in that spreading discontent.