Skip to main content

The Four Ages of Man

Pilar, a new friend, has revived the ever lasting poem in me brain.  It remains there partly because of a disastrous trial of mine once, to improve my memory.   But it's a nice piece nevertheless. It's a poem that struck me as being simple, sooo true, yet ironic (or even sarcastic) in only 8 lines of text!!    Here it is:
  The Four Ages of Man
Yeats
He with body waged a fight,
But body won; it walks upright.
 
Then he struggled with the heart;
Innocence and peace depart.
 
Then he struggled with the mind;
His proud heart he left behind.
 
Now his wars on God begin;
At stroke of midnight God shall win.
Amazing is that I could as well project it on the life of á man as well as on the life of all mankind (through evolution and with the apocalypse at the end). Euh, no ... I do not believe in God, nor do I disbeleive It/Him/Her!!  I am just happy without needing to decide on it.
Labels:

Comments

Anonymous said…
hey Ruby,
think it is possible to have sth like an apocalypse with or without sth godlike. Humankind is perfectly able to do the job itself. Not implying that it has to be like that.
Difficult question after all. Only time will tell. Dead anyway then. Hopefully that is. Not that I would not care. Face one's very own egoism.
greetz
pondering Pilly
7/19/2004 8:46 PM
Anonymous said…
Just read your mail.

"...apocalypse at the end).
Euh, no ... I do not believe in God, nor do I disbeleive It/Him/Her!! I am just happy without needing to decide on it."
Maybe I misinterpredted that. --> Apocalypse is a term from the bible, yeah? Then in the next line you say, nothing to do with God for me.
Me replying that God is not necessary for the apocalypse, so that 'no God' would be no problem.
Warning next time I'll write an essay not to be misunderstood ;-).
P.S. Not you reproaching me with writing that, but I reproaching you by writing that, was the question.
9/03/2004 1:30 PM
Ruby said…
I just thought when you said "think it is possible to have sth like an apocalypse with or without sth godlike" was meant as a question or as irony, not a confirmation.
If it is a confirmation after all, it's actually a big relief bc I know you better than I thought than!!
Jippee! :-)
Tell me if it is (a confirmation), than I'll give you a surprise !! gnifl
9/04/2004 1:40 PM
Anonymous said…
I reckon it is only one letter that led to that misinterpretation. A letter I've left out due to
laziness. That's just the 'I' in front of 'think'.
Luckily that was not the trigger for war in this
case.
p
9/08/2004 1:24 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Doctors!!!

Another one of those problems out here that I have found more and more compelling as well as frustrating in my life as well as for the whole world is that doctors of today seem not really concerned with their patients anymore, when practicing their profession rather focusing on symptom treatment and "pills" (so to speak) than the causes and real health or well being of the patient. Also that they are weigh too much focused on the money they " deserve " and the competition ( do I smell another form of my favorite word conformism in the latter? ). I have had a lot of discussions with some medicine students (not coincidently), and though I thought a lot of them wouldn't come out for it, I was surprised to learn that a lot of them dó admit that (the promise of) money is a big part in their decision to study medicines!! Of course it's not merely doctors, but the whole health care institution that is becoming more and more of a profiting "machine&qu
5 comments
Read more

Basics of equality

I have had this idea for as long as I can remember, but only lately it has taken some form in thoughts & words. Though it needs a lot of fixing -aren't words so limited ?- Now I am putting it here to release it so it won't occupy my thoughts so much. Also, maybe someone can learn from this, though I doubt it isn't said already somewhere else and I doubt my blog is read by many people. (Pride is my everlasting burdon too.) Basics of equality : Actually, it's so easy, but probably also so "against one's individuality and pride" that it is so difficult to learn and live by it, if not completely subjectivily rejected by one's mind at first sight!! So, please open your mind before reading on. You see, what makes a person ? Well, it's simple actually, man equals DNA (body, looks, behavior, ..) + life experience (education, accidents, confrontations, luck!, .. ; though isn't luck , or rather: chance, what life experience is the result
3 comments
Read more