Paradoxes drowned

This is just a pious thought that I shared with my friends the other day. What follows after the message screenshot[1] is just some elaboration upon it that I thought to do, and which is the reason this is a blog post at all. If you thought that the image that I attached to my message is pretty, and would like to see other such images, please check the “Concerning Faith of Things Not Seen” Facebook page (named after Augustine’s work of the same name); I run it, though not alone.

The Stoics were fond of saying various shocking sentences,[2] which they did believe to be literally true within their philosophy. “By a paradox is meant that which runs counter to general opinion,” as St. George Stock[3] explains it to us; the word meant something strange or incredible, which is still a sense in use today (esp. in the adjective “paradoxical”), although it has often been contracted to refer only to self-contradictory statements.

“It is perhaps these very paradoxes which account for the puzzled fascination with which Stoicism affected the mind of antiquity, just as obscurity in a poet may prove a surer passport to fame than more strictly poetical merits.” Some examples that he gives are, “Virtue is the only good”, “All faults are equal”, “Every fool is mad”, “Only the sage is free and every fool is a slave”, “The sage alone is wealthy”, “Good men are always happy and bad men always miserable”, “All goods are equal”, “No one is wiser or happier than another”, “No wise man is unhappy”.

I note that it is the same genre of things that are said in the “Admonition 5”, of St Francis of Assisi – reproduced here below, from the OLL edition of his writings. Compare the incredulity and doubt of the Greek audience of such statements with the reaction of a Christian audience to these quotes, which in my experience is usually one of immediate admiration and assent. May not a miracle have happened here?

Consider, O man, how great the excellence in which the Lord has placed you because He has created and formed you to the image of His beloved Son according to the body and to His own likeness according to the spirit. And all the creatures that are under heaven serve and know and obey their Creator in their own way better than you And even the demons did not crucify Him, but you together with them crucified Him and still crucify Him by taking delight in vices and sins. Wherefore then can you glory? For if you were so clever and wise that you possessed all science, and if you knew how to interpret every form of language and to investigate heavenly things minutely, you could not glory in all this, because one demon has known more of heavenly things and still knows more of earthly things than all men, although there may be some man who has received from the Lord a special knowledge of sovereign wisdom. In like manner, if you were handsomer and richer than all others, and even if you could work wonders and put the demons to flight, all these things are hurtful to you and in nowise belong to you, and in them you cannot glory; that, however, in which we may glory is in our infirmities, and in bearing daily the holy cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.

A similar, related writing was shared by Cal when I was talking about this, which I also reproduce here. Titled “True and Perfect Joy” (De vera et perfecta laetitia), I have copied it from this website without the philological information that was attached to it.

The same [Brother Leonard] related in the same place that one day at Saint Mary’s, blessed Francis called Brother Leo and said: “Brother Leo, write.” He responded: “Look, I’m ready!” “Write,” he said, “what true joy is.”

“A messenger arrives and says that all the Masters of Paris have entered the Order. Write: this isn’t true joy! Or, that all the prelates, archbishops and bishops beyond the mountains, as well as the King of France and the King of England [have entered the Order]. Write: this isn’t true joy! Again, that my brothers have gone to the non-believers and converted all of them to the faith; again, that I have so much grace from God that I heal the sick and perform many miracles. I tell you true joy doesn’t consist in any of these things.”

“Then what is true joy?”

“I return from Perugia and arrive here in the dead of night. It’s winter time, muddy, and so cold that icicles have formed on the edges of my habit and keep striking my legs and blood flows from such wounds. Freezing, covered with mud and ice, I come to the gate and, after I’ve knocked and called for some time, a brother comes and asks: ‘Who are you?’ ‘Brother Francis,’ I answer. ‘Go away!’ he says. ‘This is not a decent hour to be wandering about! You may not come in!’ When I insist, he replies: ‘Go away! You are simple and stupid! Don’t come back to us again! There are many of us here like you—we don’t need you!’ I stand again at the door and say: ‘For the love of God, take me in tonight!" And he replies: ‘I will not! Go to the Crosiers’ place and ask there!’

“I tell you this: If I had patience and did not become upset, true joy, as well as true virtue and the salvation of my soul, would consist in this.”

[1] I thought it fitting to include in the screenshot that it happened in a “Catholic Theology” group chat on Messenger, but please do not ask to be added to it. Do become Catholic, if you aren’t yet.

[2] In a famous sentence, the SEP tells us that “it seems clear that some Stoics took a kind of perverse joy in advocating views which seem so at odds with common sense”, although “they did not do so simply to shock”. It does seem clear.

[3] Not canonized; his first name was “St. George”. Full name “St. George William Joseph Stock”.