Opening the book…
Opening the book…
Explore how different traditions approach the same question, from the oldest texts to the screen and the present day. Connections suggest similarities in meaning, not proven influence. Dates describe broad periods of a tradition, rather than the age of each passage.
“Tell me about a kind of pain you've had to live with rather than fix. How do you carry it?”
Living with pain, seeking relief, and caring for one another.
Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Psalms, the Sermon on the Mount, and the parables. Foundational to Western moral language.
“So they sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spake a word unto him: for they saw that his grief was very great.”
Job's three friends arrive to comfort him after his catastrophic losses and sit in silence with him.
“And remember Job: When he cried to his Lord, "Truly evil hath touched me: but thou art the most merciful of those who shew mercy." So we heard him, and lightened the burden of his woe.”
“Man that is born of a woman is of few days and full of trouble. He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down: he fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not.”
Job meditates on the brevity and hardship of human life.
“Within a very little while, thou wilt be either ashes, or a sceletum; and a name perchance; and perchance, not so much as a name. And what is that but an empty sound, and a rebounding echo?... But still that time come, w…”
Bhagavad Gita and Upanishads — dialogues on duty, action, and self.
“The soul which is not moved, The soul that with a strong and constant calm Takes sorrow and takes joy indifferently, Lives in the life undying!”
Krishna describes the quality of the soul that remains unmoved by the highs and lows of worldly experience.
“I may love you one day, I may cease to love you the next. My love increases one day, decreases the next, because it is only a limited manifestation. The first thing therefore that we find against Kapila is that he concei…”
Swami Vivekananda, Jnâna Yoga, Limited Love vs. Bliss Absolute, 1907 ↗
“The Soul, Thus passing forth from the Three Qualities-- Whereby arise all bodies--overcomes Birth, Death, Sorrow, and Age; and drinketh deep The undying wine of Amrit.”
Krishna teaches that the soul that transcends the three qualities achieves liberation from the cycle of birth, death, and suffering.
“Absolute Existence, Absolute Knowledge, and Absolute Blessedness are not qualities of the soul, but its essence; there is no difference between them and the soul.”
Tao Te Ching, attributed to Laozi — terse, paradoxical aphorisms on living with the grain of things.
“He who has killed multitudes of men should weep for them with the bitterest grief; and the victor in battle has his place (rightly) according to those rites.”
Laozi insists that even a justified victor must mourn the lives taken, treating victory as a funeral rite rather than a celebration.
“A superior man, during the whole period of mourning, does not enjoy pleasant food which he may eat, nor derive pleasure from music which he may hear. He also does not feel at ease, if he is comfortably lodged.”
“The people make light of dying because of the greatness of their labours in seeking for the means of living. It is this which makes them think light of dying. Thus it is that to leave the subject of living altogether out of view is better than to set a high value on it.”
Laozi observes that over-taxation and excessive toil cause people to lose their fear of death — and suggests that clinging to life is itself a cause of suffering.
“`Here I shall dwell in the rain, here in winter and summer,' thus the fool meditates, and does not think of his death.”
Dhammapada and selected sutras — terse, principle-rich verses on suffering, attachment, and right action.
“Silently shall I endure abuse as the elephant in battle endures the arrow sent from the bow: for the world is ill-natured.”
The Buddha teaches on patience and endurance in the face of hostility.
“Titikshâ, forbearance, bearing all miseries without murmuring, without complaining. When an injury comes, do not mind it.”
“From love comes grief, from love comes fear; he who is free from love knows neither grief nor fear.”
“It is the high function of love to welcome all limitations and to transcend them. For nothing is more independent than love, and where else, again, shall we find so much of dependence? In love, thraldom is as glorious as…”
Rabindranath Tagore, Sadhana: The Realisation of Life, V (preceding chapter VI), 1913 ↗
Analects of Confucius — sayings on conduct, governance, and moral cultivation.
“A superior man, during the whole period of mourning, does not enjoy pleasant food which he may eat, nor derive pleasure from music which he may hear. He also does not feel at ease, if he is comfortably lodged.”
Confucius explains to a disciple who advocates shorter mourning that genuine grief naturally suspends ordinary pleasures.
“Joy is a pleasant emotion, and we gladly abandon ourselves to it upon the slightest occasion... But grief is painful, and the mind, even when it is our own misfortune, naturally resists and recoils from it.”
“'Is it excessive?' said he. 'If I am not to mourn bitterly for this man, for whom should I mourn?'”
Confucius responds to disciples who suggest his grief over the death of his beloved student Yen Yuan is excessive.
“Yet a little while, and thine eyes will be closed up, and for him that carries thee to thy grave shall another mourn within a while after. Why then shouldest thou so earnestly either seek after these things, or fly from…”
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 10.XXXIV, tr. Meric Casaubon (1634/1635) ↗
Greco-Roman school of practical philosophy on virtue, agency, and acceptance. Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Seneca.
“Oh, wretched I, to whom this mischance is happened! nay, happy I, to whom this thing being happened, I can continue without grief; neither wounded by that which is present, nor in fear of that which is to come. Now to conclude; upon all occasion of sorrow remember henceforth to make use of this dogma, that whatsoever i…”
“It should never be forgotten that misfortune, be it great or small, is the element in which we live. But that is no reason why a man should indulge in fretful complaints. Our aim should be to look well about us, to ward…”
Arthur Schopenhauer, Counsels and Maxims, Section 51, tr. T. Bailey Saunders, 1890 ↗
“As we say commonly, The physician hath prescribed unto this man, riding; unto another, cold baths; unto a third, to go barefoot: so it is alike to say, The nature of the universe hath prescribed unto this man sickness, or blindness, or some loss, or damage or some such thing... These therefore let us accept of in like…”
Marcus uses the metaphor of a physician's prescription to argue that hardships assigned by fate should be accepted as treatments for the soul.
“I let nature work, supposing her to be sufficiently armed with teeth and claws to defend herself from the assaults of infirmity, and to uphold that contexture, the dissolution of which she flies and abhors. I am afraid,…”
Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers) — concise principles for living, distilled from the early rabbinic period.
“Do not try to appease your friend during his hour of anger; Nor comfort him at the hour while his dead still lies before him; Nor question him at the hour of his vow; Nor strive to see him in the hour of his disgrace.”
“And grieve not thou for them, nor be in distress at their devisings.”
“Such is the way [of a life] of Torah: you shall eat bread with salt, and rationed water shall you drink; you shall sleep on the ground, your life will be one of privation, and in Torah shall you labor. If you do this, "Happy shall you be and it shall be good for you": "Happy shall you be" in this world, "and it shall b…”
A description of the austere, disciplined lifestyle required for serious intellectual and spiritual pursuit.
“For the like of this should the travailers travail!”
Central scripture of Islam. Ethical teachings, parables, and prophetic narratives.
“Then verily along with trouble cometh ease. Verily along with trouble cometh ease. But when thou art set at liberty, then prosecute thy toil. And seek thy Lord with fervour.”
God speaks to Muhammad during a period of burden, promising relief and urging continued effort.
“The Prophet cried with a loud voice, “Trust in God, yet tie the camel's leg.””
“Surely in trouble have we created man.”
God speaks of the fundamental condition of human existence.
“They that deny a God, destroy man's nobility; for certainly man is of kin to the beasts, by his body; and, if he be not of kin to God, by his spirit, he is a base and ignoble creature.”
Francis Bacon, The Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral, Of Atheism, 1625 ↗
Montaigne and Bacon turning the essay into a way of thinking in public — sceptical, personal, unwilling to settle a question it has not tested.
“Alas, poor man! thou hast enough inconveniences that are inevitable, without increasing them by thine own invention; and art miserable enough by nature, without being so by art; thou hast real and essential deformities enough, without forging those that are imaginary.”
Montaigne addressing humanity directly, arguing against self-imposed suffering.
“The attitude of unhappiness is not only painful, it is mean and ugly. What can be more base and unworthy than the pining, puling, mumping mood, no matter by what outward ills it may have been engendered? What is more inj…”
William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, Lecture on Healthy-Mindedness, 1902 ↗
“Certainly virtue is like precious odors, most fragrant when they are incensed, or crushed: for prosperity doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best discover virtue.”
“The fruit which virtue gives, is the recompence of toil: and, gradually seen as it ripens, only affords calm satisfaction; nay, appearing to be the result of the natural tendency of things, it is scarcely observed. Bread…”
Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Chapter 4, 1792 ↗
Hume, Smith, Kant and Wollstonecraft asking what we owe each other once reason, rather than revelation, is asked to supply the answer.
“In the misfortunes for which the nature of things admits, or seems to admit, of a remedy, but in which the means of applying that remedy are not within the reach of the sufferer, his vain and fruitless attempts to restore himself to his former situation, his continual anxiety for their success, his repeated disappointm…”
Smith observes that irremediable losses are often easier to bear than those that seem fixable but remain out of reach.
“It should never be forgotten that misfortune, be it great or small, is the element in which we live. But that is no reason why a man should indulge in fretful complaints. Our aim should be to look well about us, to ward…”
Arthur Schopenhauer, Counsels and Maxims, Section 51, tr. T. Bailey Saunders, 1890 ↗
“When we are under the greatest bodily pain, he observed, we shall always find, if we attend to it, that it is not the suffering of the present instant which chiefly torments us, but either the agonizing remembrance of the past, or the yet more horrible dread of the future. The pain of each instant, considered by itself…”
Smith is summarising Epicurus's account of bodily pain and the mind's role in suffering.
“Since you make them evil or good by your own thoughts about them, it is the ruling of your thoughts which proves to be your principal concern.”
William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, Lecture on Healthy-Mindedness, 1902 ↗
Emerson, Thoreau and Douglass in New England and beyond — self-reliance, conscience against the state, and the moral weight of a life lived deliberately.
“Not until this last separation, dear reader, had I touched those profounder depths of desolation, which it is the lot of slaves often to reach. I was solitary in the world, and alone within the walls of a stone prison, left to a fate of life-long misery.”
Douglass describes the particular anguish of being left alone in prison after his companions' release, naming it as a suffering endemic to enslaved life.
“Free! The most piteous thing amid all the black ruin of war-time, amid the broken fortunes of the masters, the blighted hopes of mothers and maidens, and the fall of an empire,—the most piteous thing amid all this was th…”
W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, Of the Black Belt, 1903 ↗
“Though slavery is armed with a thousand stings, it is not able entirely to kill the elastic spirit of the bondman. That spirit will rise and walk abroad, despite of whips and chains, and extract from the cup of nature occasional drops of joy and gladness.”
Douglass responds to the argument that enslaved people's singing and dancing proves their contentment.
“Through all the sorrow of the Sorrow Songs there breathes a hope—a faith in the ultimate justice of things. The minor cadences of despair change often to triumph and calm confidence. Sometimes it is faith in life, someti…”
W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, Of the Sorrow Songs, 1903 ↗
Mill, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, each pressing on what an individual owes to the crowd, to suffering, and to their own honesty.
“If a man takes misfortunes quietly, it is because he knows that very many dreadful things may happen in the course of life; and so he looks upon the trouble of the moment as only a very small part of that which might come. This is the Stoic temper--never to be unmindful of the sad fate of humanity.”
“It should never be forgotten that misfortune, be it great or small, is the element in which we live. But that is no reason why a man should indulge in fretful complaints. Our aim should be to look well about us, to ward off misfortune by going to meet it, to attain such perfection and refinement in averting the disagre…”
James, Du Bois, Vivekananda and Tagore — psychology, pragmatism and the first modern accounts of living inside more than one world at once.
“But before that nameless prejudice that leaps beyond all this he stands helpless, dismayed, and well-nigh speechless; before that personal disrespect and mockery, the ridicule and systematic humiliation, the distortion of fact and wanton license of fancy, the cynical ignoring of the better and the boisterous welcoming…”
Du Bois distinguishes between prejudice that has some rational basis and the irrational, all-consuming contempt that goes beyond it, which produces a particular kind of despair.
“Pain, which is the feeling of our finiteness, is not a fixture in our life. It is not an end in itself, as joy is. To meet with it is to know that it has no part in the true permanence of creation.”
The century in which the question was most often put to a wide audience by film. Each line belongs to a larger story, and is quoted with its character, film, and writing credits where available.
“My life is full because I know that I am loved.”
After a life spent exhibited and abused, Merrick measures it by the love he finally received rather than the suffering that preceded it.
Written by Christopher De Vore, Eric Bergren and David Lynch.
“I'm tired, boss.”
A condemned man explains why he does not want a reprieve, in terms of how much of other people's pain he has had to hold.
Written by Frank Darabont.
“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.”
Frodo wishes none of it had happened to him; Gandalf redirects the wish to the only part still available to choose.
Written by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Peter Jackson.
“There's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo, and it's worth fighting for.”
At the point of giving up, Sam works out what the people in the old stories must have known that kept them going.
Written by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Stephen Sinclair and Peter Jackson.
“If I can take it, I can make it.”
A prisoner converts endurance into a private formula, repeated to himself as the only thing still under his control.
Written by Joel Coen, Ethan Coen, Richard LaGravenese and William Nicholson.
“I can't beat it.”
A film that refuses recovery lets its man say plainly that some griefs are carried rather than resolved.
Written by Kenneth Lonergan.
The same question, answered by people who are still working it out.
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