• Marked Sagacity
• Eleven Anecdotes
  • Einsteinian Silence
  • "Old Man Mad With Painting"
  • What the Lord Prefers - Is That So Sure?
  • The Value of Cheerfulness and dr. Samuel Johnson, English Lexicographer
  • Being Kicked Was Better Than Living in England
  • Some Try to Learn how to Die at Will
  • No Sweet Magpie Permitted
  • Albert Einstein Explains Relativity
  • A Doyen of Literature Speaks Up
  • Unhappy in Marriage
  • Should Have Inspected Better Before

Marked Sagacity

You could do worse than consider how to preserve your standing as a human, and avoid a downward glide some way or other. Do any of the sayings below matter to a life?

A good book may in time give advantages that amount to something.

A sound rendition of ◦Omar Khayaam's Rubaiyat needs little bolstering and askance hailing.

Find your level of accomplishment and be on your guard against humbug.

As compared to the Persian original, many of FitzGerald's images run wild. Yogananda (1893-1952) used these and built on many of them.

A decent learner might profit from getting a decent translation of the foreign-language poem he is supposed to study, and relevant background information too. [AIR-BOC for more].

A likable decision is had after judging carefully, and a mess could mean you need to get bold or tough enough to tackle that mess and guard well against being ridden or tamed.

"He who dwells in righteousness among his fellowmen is a true man." - Attributed to Abu Said, famous Persian Sufi [Pa 50]. To be fair comes rather close.

A standard had better be one of excellence, for that is the way fit for survival in nature.

Able dream interpretation can be warmly recommended.

An average hardly suits an individual in all ways all life through, for he has his or her uniqueness to consider too, be it deep down.

An awesome, unreasonable proposition calls for a better look at first.

Basic science and the scientific enterprise itself develops on top of clever doubts (alternative hypotheses), arrangements and judgements carefully mobilised according to plan.

Better be warm-heartedly distrustful and logical without disrespect, than sorely taken in, only to wake up many years later, when lots of trains have left.

Bold art is not out of place: let it be handsome if you can.

Build on the best stuff to get a profitable fare yourself.

Conceal the mystery revealed to you from fools (From the poem).

Different times, different customs.

Disappointing renderings hardly "spiritualise the Rubaiyat".

Do not get stupefied for the wrong reasons.

Do not lag behind; you do well not to, for so many reasons -

Eagerly cultivate things better than word-wisdom.

Either you belong in a family, or you do not.

Fairly often something had better be accomplished on top of life lessons.

Figurative expressiveness is good at times; don't look down on their very enduring hints for fit living.

Gauge much with suspicion.

Gifts with strings are signs of inferior givers and low-level friends, after all. Besides, the Trojan war the great "gift" of the Trojan horse, was a trick.

Good and decent technology can smooth our living considerably.

Good songs do not indoctrinate by plots.

Handsome propaganda tales could breed much indoctrination against your better interests.

He is a good fellow who knows more or better than just stanzas.

"He [Samuel Foote] is rising in the world," Samuel Johnson (1709-84) said. "When he was in England, none thought it worth while to kick him."

Human frogs have lost good self-assurance ('Frog' is a TA term after Dr. Eric Berne).

If made a public hero, love to have few lovers.

If the universe is false, "the next generation" that would not give Yogananda a thought, is a vain idea. [Cf. Ak 344]

In brainstorming we often see an initially "dumb idea" needs polishing and tidying up, and suddenly it turns out well - but seldom in the hands of dogmatists.

In nature, animals try to shoo from their turf an unwanted intruder if they are not scared away.

In the book The History of Western Education Drs. William Boyd and Edmund King write that in the humanist philosopher Deciderius Erasmus' view, sound and proficient education "is as much a matter of social as of individual concern." [Hiw 177].

Insane maladaptation may worsen minds and doings terribly.

Insider terms can be very figurative.

It can pay to focus on great issues and more still, so as to preserve one's own backbones.

It could pay to be on the outlook for what is very useful in the long run.

It helps decent chaps to have fit standards set up.

It is better to be academic and not be led into awkward things and stuff, than to remain a slave of another's garbled nonsense.

It is good if you save your common sense.

It is not always a bad thing to be loved and wise.

It is not enough to feel outraged or ashamed. Something has to be accomplished from that.

Juan Vives (1492-1540) settled on what may be called the verifiable method: He found that against a corrupt fare due to presuppositions "in the air" "the only cure for it is to begin with the individual facts of experience and out of them to come to ideas by the natural logic of the mind." This method is called induction. The capacity to induce can be trained. [Hiw 178-79].

Learn to evaluate the ones to ask before you ask them of a thing.

Look into how someone managed his life before you buy this story.

Look with suspicion if you will, but it may pay to let difficult subjects rest (be kept at bay, at arm's length, in suspensio).

Make your points accurate and as unbiased as can be.

Many anecdotes can assist cultural fitness.

Maturity is helped on and up by rational thinking.

Metaphorical stories often allow for many different interpretations.

Much depends on the wit of your heart or belly.

Naiveté may get perverted, and once perverted, may never get all right, never turn full well.

Nature is strong, but training supplemented by practice may be stronger still. [With Erasmus] [cf. Hiw 177].

A good translation is trustworthy.

One should try to be based on good literature in the first place, and do not stop at second best when there is a fair choice.

Pretty girls do not really need clothes / jewels / rings in their ears, noses / etc.

Prevention is better than pretension cure.

Self-digging and self-assured ones can lead astray.

Soap opera maxims might help nobody.

Soap opera-looking misinterpretations of bad translations may have other flaws too.

Soap spiritual, bossy humbug is not fit, but wide-spread.

Sometimes it is a blessing to be killed on the spot so that nothing worse happens . . .

Sound "objectivity" or neutrality helps us a long way away from superstitious canon.

Sound information may need to be upgraded in the course of time.

Sound procedures help man to deal nicely with matters at hand on his own terms to stay fit and tidy.

Sound schooling and professional, realistic handling helps a lot.

SRF explains that all of Yogananda's writings have been edited. Evidence has surfaced in Hinduism Today, 1994; No 10: "Wine of the Mystic".

Stop worrying about what can be wrong with a sound, delicate artist that can express up to several things at once.

Tender sprouts can need protection to grow.

The best leaders ... almost without exception and at every level, are master users of stories and symbols. [Tom Peters].

The freak may not have a solid and well accepted platform for his fancy or budding imagination.

The history of faith is a history of blunders and nonsense.

The tough exploitation of men and women is much likely by the large society we are inside, and rather common adaptations see to that.

The safe fare is marked by plenty of smartness or cunning.

They who show by their doings they think a hailed Rubaiyat mistranslation is no error, could be scarred inside, and need to be left alone.

Think "well-well" a lot so as to fit in and avoid drudgery.

Those who make channels for water control the waters - Dhammapada, verse 145.

To be guardedly careful outside the mating season is part of the art of living.

To make your points against misfit-forming without unbecoming blemishes and inaccuracy, be specific and state exactly what your purport may be in any case.

To remain, try to get more accomplished. Also, let old sorrows speak a lot. It takes what it takes.

To the non-sectarian, Yogananda's emotion-choked man-fisher verbiage may contain savoury points as well.

Very good things often take time to learn.

We need first-class material to build on top of. Then try to be as circumspect, wary and clever as we can. That is how the forest tree and body lives.

We surely miss many of Yogananda's appointed "key symbols" in real translations of the Rubaiyat.

What is fit in the deep waters is often out of place in the shallow waters.

What is outside the universe could be art.

What is the central concern of Omar?" It could be a call "To Wine." Such wine may not be wine anyway. So . . .

Whether and how far good literature brings advantages, in part depends on conditions and associates.

Women in the churches are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, dogmatises Paul. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home". But what if they have no husband? And no home? [1 Corinthians 14,34-5].

Yogananda got a hermitage on a bluff - it slid into the sea in Encinitas after a few years. "To build one's house on sand" is aligned.

Yogananda put meanings into the poem while purporting to be aligned to the original poem by Omar Khayyam. If this be true, the correspondence should be brought out by a close reading, and if such a thing happens it would be odd.

You may not have a strong case if you think publicly acclaimed wisdom is far from top wisdom, but there is a good chance you are right anyway, alternative traditions tell. "It is a fool who cannot hide his wisdom" fronts it. The Tao Te Ching implies the same things in many places.

Eleven Anecdotes

"The lofty ideas and ideals of Hinduism have once again become clear . . . practice these." - A swami.

Einsteinian Silence

HERE IS a story about the boy Einstein that has been characterised as a "legend," but that seems fairly authentic:

Albert was a late talker, and his parents were worried. But at the supper table one night he broke his silence to say, "The soup is too hot."

Greatly relieved, his parents asked why he had never said a word before.

Albert, "Up to now everything was in order."

"Old Man Mad With Painting" - Hokusai Left That Memorable Description of Himself

LOOKING BACK toward the end of his long life on his artistic output, the Japanese painter Hokusai (1760-1849) who influenced the Impressionist and Postimpressionist artists of Europe, dismissed as nothing all the work he had done before the age of fifty; it was only after he had reached seventy that he felt he was turning out work of note. At age eighty-nine, on his deathbed, he lamented,

"If heaven had granted me five more years, I could have become a real painter."

What the Lord Prefers - Is That So Sure?

THE US PRESIDENT Abraham Lincoln once dreamt he was in some great assembly, and the people drew back to let him pass, whereupon he heard someone say,

"He is a common-looking fellow."

In his dream Lincoln turned to the man and said,

"Friend, the Lord prefers common-looking people; that is the reason why he made so many of them."

Being Kicked Was Better Than Living in England

SOMEONE WAS lamenting Samuel Foote's unlucky fate of being kicked in Dublin. However, Dr. Johnson (1709-84) said he was glad of it.

"He is rising in the world," he said. "When he was in England, none thought it worth while to kick him."

No Sweet Magpie Allowed

JONATHAN SWIFT, (1667-1745), author of the satirical masterpiece Gulliver's Travels, was travelling when he called at a hospitable house. The lady of the house rejoiced to have so distinguished a guest. With great eagerness and flippancy she asked him what he would have for dinner.

"Will you have an apple-pie, sir? Will you have a gooseberry-pie, sir? Will you have a cherry-pie, sir? Will you have a currant-pie, sir? Will you have a plum-pie, sir? Will you have a pigeon-pie, sir?"-

"Any pie, madam, but a mag-pie."

Albert Einstein Explains Relativity

ALBERT EINSTEIN was asked by his hostess at a social gathering to explain his theory of relativity. He said,

"I was once walking in the country on a hot day with a blind friend. I said I would like a drink of milk.

"Milk?" said my friend, "Drink I know; but what is milk?"

"A white liquid," I answered.

"Liquid I know; but what is white?"

"The colour of a swan's feathers."

"Feathers I know; what is a swan?"

"A bird with a crooked neck."

"Neck I know; but crooked?"

I lost patience and straightened his arm. "That is straight," I said; and then I bent it at the elbow. "That is crooked."

"Ah. Now I know what you mean by milk." said the other.

A Doyen of Literature Speaks Up

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON (1709-84) and his biographer Boswell were discussing Bishop Berkeley's theory of the nonexistence of matter: it held that all things in the universe exist solely in the mind as ideas.

Boswell found it impossible to refute this theory, although he said it was clearly untrue. Johnson promptly kicked at a large stone and announced as his foot struck it,

"I refute it thus."

Should Have Inspected Better Before

"I THOUGHT you were sick yesterday," the employer said to the clerk.

"Yes, sir, I was," replied Jones.

"Well," said his employer, "you did not look very sick when I saw you at the races yesterday afternoon."

"So? You should have seen me after the end of the fourth race."