I was flipping through my copy of The Art of Worldly Wisdom the other day. It’s a collection of the aphorisms of Baltasar Gracian, who I have quoted here before. I rather liked this one:
…For virtue is the bond of all the perfections, and the heart of all life’s satisfactions. It makes a man sensible, alert, far-seeing, understanding, wise, courageous, considerate, upright, joyous, welcomed, truthful and a universal idol. And three are the S’s that make for happiness: saintliness, sanity and sapience. Virtue is the sun of our lesser world, the sky over which is a good conscience. It is so beautiful, that it finds favor with God, and of man. There is nothing lovely without virtue: and nothing hateful without vice: for virtue is the essence of wisdom, and all else is folly: capacity, and greatness must be measured in terms of virtue, and not in those of fortune. Virtue alone is sufficient unto itself: and it, only, makes a man worth loving in life, and in death, worth remembering.
Those old guys sure had some funny ideas.
