How to be happy though human / by W. Béran Wolfe.
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153 (canvas 173)
The image contains the following text:
he cannot yet remove the annoyances of measles, friction,
or rainy holidays from his scheme of things, solemnly
announcing that life is a vain mistake, a meaningless,
futile, and boring interlude between birth and death, is
one of the ridiculous, tragic comedies born of man’s
enormous egoism and his infinitesimal sense of humour.
Whenever we see men who claim that life is not worth
living, men who are bored, disinterested, and pre¬
dominantly and unproductively pessimistic, we are
reminded forcibly of La Fontaine’s hungry but impotent
fox, looking longingly at the luscious grapes beyond his
reach. Show us a woman who is bored and we will show
you a woman too timid or too vain to contribute. Show
us a man who is surfeited with the futility of living and
we will show you a cowardly, uncooperative, and unhappy
human being. This technique and these tools, which
are becoming more and more common because a high
degree of courage and cooperation are increasingly
necessary in the complex structure of modern civilization,
are the choice of those who, being afraid to risk their
contribution, must stand out in the cold and tell us that
it is a bad play, badly written, acted by dolts and fools,
to no good end.
Of evasion by self-annihilation, martyrdom, suicide, a
sense of guilt, or the profession of chronic inferiority
we have already made mention ; and with this category
of spiritual or actual self-destruction, which is the last
degree of cowardice and resistance to common sense,
we have sketched the various dynamic categories of
approaching the tasks of life and the various tools
which are appropriate to the various goals we set ourselves.
What we call the normal life is no more than a courageous
approach to life’s problems and the objective solution
of its obstacles. All variations from the normal are
compassed by the various forms of evasion—aggression,
hesitation, detour, circumscription, retreat, and self-
destruction. Because no one is free from certain of these
evasions, every human being retains some poor or
inadequate tools in the form of “ bad ” character traits.