Laurent Grenier

How much can we collectively be civilized – that is, mutually respectful and helpful, in the knowledge that this high goal can unite our wills toward a common good of colossal proportions? In other words, what is the ceiling of our possible civilization, which implies responsibility and solidarity, an elevation of life to love? Nobody knows the limit, so none should be set but the sky!

Religion and wisdom help us accept the shortcomings of reality, either with the prospect of bliss after death or with an approach to life that is conducive to serenity.

… truth, or the conformity of thought to reality, is the sine qua non of vital efficacy. Health, pleasure, successful careers, and harmonious relationships require that we know the needs and capabilities of our nature, and the workings of the world. The absence of this knowledge leads to accidents, illness, suffering, failure, and death. Therefore, the first object of our desires should be truth, or the knowledge of ourselves and the world around us.

A wild bird put in a cage… grows more and more tame with time, until it finally adapts to captivity and resumes singing. Does this song hold the essence of earthly contentment, which involves confinement? I am alluding to the confines of reality.

Life is an opportunity to make the best of things when we cannot better them. It is rarely so bad that this best amounts to nothing good. It is usually worth living, though its value is often concealed by pain and strain, during a search for meaning that resembles a treasure hunt.

Although life comes with many strings attached – many determining factors, internal or external – humans are not mere puppets in the hands of circumstances. They may suffer, but they have the power to react against their suffering, unless they are mentally and physically incapacitated in the extreme. The more they passively claim to be the victim of a bad situation, the more they are an undeclared accomplice to it, for lack of struggling to better it or make the best of it.

You and the social circumstances that cradle your civilized life are one and indivisible, like a plant and its roots. No mystery, no revelation, just common knowledge. People helping people is a natural phenomenon that stems from a proverbial understanding: United we stand; divided we fall.

The meaning of life is not dependent on a particular way of life, but on the conformity of one’s way to the present possibilities. Similarly, a door key is not useful in itself, but in relation to a lock that it opens because it matches it. The key to happiness therefore consists in having our desires match our reality. We are locked out of happiness when we refuse to do this and fiddle in vain with the wrong key – that is, the key to misery

Sages forever strive to be at one with truth. Their ideal – which they pursue earnestly but never achieve to perfection – is to grow into supreme human beings whose knowledge and behavior coincide with the nature of things and their earthly mission: with life and love.

Of course it is a lot worthier to elevate oneself than to abase someone else. It is also a lot harder, and nature spontaneously levels everything the easy way. Moral excellence relates to culture, is an acquired trait, by virtue of which a human is courageous and just, worthy of praise.