Ballad 2 [1]

Let us pretend I am happy,

melancholy Thought, for a while;

perhaps you can persuade me, though

i know the contrary is true:

for since on mere apprehension

they say all suffering depends,

if you imagine good fortune

you will not be so downcast.

Let my understanding at times

allow me to rest a while

and let my wits not always be

opposed to my own advantage.

All people have opinions and

judgments so multitudinous,

that when one states this is black

the other proves it is white

Some find attractive precisely

what others deem an annoyance;

an alleviation for one

is bothersome for another.

One who is sad criticizes

the happy man as frivolous;

and one who is happy derides

the sad man and his suffering.

The two philosophers of Greece [2]

offered perfect proofs of this truth:

for what caused laughter in one man

occasioned tears in the other.

The contradiction has been famed

for centuries beyond number,

yet which of the two was correct

has so far not been determined;

instead into their two factions

all people have been recruited,

temperament dictating which

band each person will adhere to.

One says that the inconstant world

is worthy only of laughter;

another, that its misfortunes

are only to be lamented.

A proof is found for everything,

a reason on which to base it;

and nothing has a good reason

since there is reason for so much.

All people are equal judges;

being both equal and varied,

there is no one who can decide

which argument is true and right.

Since no one can adjudicate,

why do you think, mistakenly,

that God entrusted you alone

with the decisions in this case?

Oh why, inhuman and severe,

and acting against yourself, in

the choice between bitter and sweet

do you wish to choose the bitter?

If my understanding is my

own, why must I always find it

so slow and dull about relief,

so sharp and keen about distress?

discursive reason is a sword

quite effective at both ends:

with the point of the blade it kills;

the pommel on the hilt protects.

If you, aware of the danger,

wish to wield the point of the sword,

how can the steel blade be to blame

for the evil acts of your hand?

Knowing how to create subtle,

specious reasons is not knowledge;

true knowledge consists only in

choosing salutary virtue.

Scrutinizing all misfortunes

and examining bad omens

achieves nothing but the growth of

the bad through anticipations.

In future deliberations

our attention, grown more subtle,

will imagine threatened attacks

as more alarming than the risks.

How blithesome is the ignorance

of one who, unlearned but wise,

deems his affliction, his nescience

all he does not know, as sacred!

The most daring flights of genius

do not always soar assured when

they seek a throne in the fire

and find a grave in copious tears.[3]

For knowledge is also a vice:

if it is not constantly curbed,

and if this is not acknowledged,

the greater the havoc it wreaks;

and if the flight is not brought down,

fed and fattened on subtleties

it will forget the essential

for the sake of the rare and strange.

If a skilled hand does not prevent

the growth of a thickly leafed tree,

its proliferating branches

will steal the substance of the fruit.

If the bulk of ballast does not

impede the speed of a swift ship,

that flight creates the headlong fall

from a most precipitous height.

It is futile amenity:

what does the flowering field care

if Autumn finds no fruit as long

as May can display its blossoms?

What benefit to intellect

to gestate so many offspring,

if that multitude is followed

by ill-fated miscarriages?

And perforce this great misfortune

must be followed by mischance:

the one who gestates will be left

if not dead, then gravely injured.

Our intellect is like fire:

deeply ungrateful to matter,

flame consumes more matter the

brighter the fire appears.

So rebellious a vassal to

its own legitimate Lord,

that fire transforms the weapon of

its defense into offenses.

This appalling, daunting practice,

this harsh and onerous toil

God gave to the children of men

for the sake of their discipline.

What mad ambition carries us,

having forgotten who we are?

If we live for so short a time,

why do we wish to know so much?

Oh, if there were only a school

or seminary where they taught

classes in how not to know

as they teach classes in knowing.

How happily the man would live

who with languid circumspection

would simply laugh at the menace

of the influence of the stars!

Let us learn about not knowing,

Oh Thought, for we then discover

that for all I add to discourse

I usurp as much from my years.