What Dignifies the Being Is the Active Work

By Lavelle:

Il n’y a qu’une attitude qui donne à la douleur son véritable sens, c’est celle qui consiste à l’accepter, à la faire nôtre, à lui demander les moyens d’enrichir et d’approfondir notre être intérieur, c’est-à-dire à la convertir en un principe de joie. L’origine de la moralité est la souffrance volontaire.

What dignifies the being is the active work he does on the circumstances at his disposal. Pain, therefore, like everything else, only acquires meaning when it is transmuted, when it is absorbed and used as fuel for some positive transformation. There is no merit or demerit in suffering it; man, however, only appears when he transfigures it, necessarily imprinting his individual mark.

Historiography Repeatedly Delivers Such a Shock…

Historiography repeatedly delivers such a shock that it is impossible for the student not to enter a state of revolt. This happens, for example, when we study the systematic advance of the state over freedoms, penetrating and perverting the social tissue more and more completely, so that today, transformed into a very powerful monster, it has practically annulled the possibility of reaction. Revolt is legitimate: people have risen up and heads have rolled for far less. Thinking about the “abusive” taxes of the past and comparing them with the peaceful, bovine acceptance of radically higher taxes today is a stab in the spirit. However, we have to overcome our revolt and continue studying, because first of all we need to understand exactly what happened.

It Must Be a Rather Unpleasant Task

It must be a rather unpleasant task for the historian who, having set out to narrate the biography of the great man, cannot hide from it the ever-present and ever-hateful action of the mediocre men who envy him and try to bring him down. And, after all, there seems to have been no historian who could get rid of this burden, since, in order to avoid the envious, a talented man would have to never show himself. If he does manage to stand out, the relentless Japanese proverb ensues. There really is no greater effort than that required to know the world and not curse it; reflected optimism is a tremendous and meritorious intellectual feat.

Anything From an Author Is Tolerated

Anything from an author is tolerated, except dishonesty. To fail on this point is to nullify everything that is produced. As readers, the mere feeling that there are hidden intentions in a work and that we are being deceived is reason enough to throw it away; after all, how can we willingly play the clown? If we cannot, safeguarded by the sincerity of the author, give it the credit it needs to be worth reading, it is best to abandon it. There are, of course, countless other authors who fulfill this requirement and have a lot to teach us.