Three passions, simple but overwhelmi ngly strong, have governed my
life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for
the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me
hither and thither, in a wayward women's
c lassic tall course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the
very verge of despair.I have sought love, first, because it brings
ec stasy---ecs tasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of
my life for a few hours for this joy. I have sought it, next, because it
reliev es loneliness ---that terrible loneliness in which one shivering
consciousn ess looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomab le
lifeles s abyss.
I have sought it, finally,
because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the
prefi guring vision of the heaven that saints replica ugg
boots and poets have imagined. This is what I sought, and though it
might seem too good for human life, this is what---at last---I have found.With
equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts
of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine. And I have tried to apprehend
the Pythagorea n power by which number holds sway above the flux. A little of
this, but not much, I have achieved.
It is not difficult to imagine a world short of ambition. It would
pro bably be a kinder world: with out demands, without abrasions, leather ugg
boots without disappoint ments. People would have time for
refle ction. Such work as they did would not be for themselves but for the
colle ctivity. Competitio n would never enter in. conflict would be eliminated ,
tension become a thing of the past. The stress of creation would be at an end.
Art would no longer be troubling, but purely celebrator y in its
funct ions. Longevity would be increased, for fewer people would die of heart UGG Ultra
Sho rt boots attack or stroke caused by tumultuous endeavor. Anxiety
w ould be extinct. Time would stretch on and on, with ambition long departed
from the human heart.Ah, how unrelieved boring life would be! There is a strong view that holds that
succ ess is a myth, and ambition therefore a sham. Does this mean that success
d oes not really exist?
That achievemen t is at bottom empty? That the efforts of men and
women are of no significan ce alongside the force of movements new ugg boots
a nd events now not all success, obviously, is worth esteeming, nor all ambition
worth cultivatin g. Which are and which are not is something one soon enough
le arns on one’s own.
But even the most cynical secretly admit that success exists; that
achi evement counts for a great deal; and that the true myth is that the actions
o f men and women are useless. To believe otherwise is to take on a point of
view that is likely to be deranging. It is, in its implicatio ns, to remove all
motiv es for competence , interest in attainment , and regard for posterity.
We do not choose to be born. We do not cheap ugg
boots choose our parents. We do not choose our historical epoch, the
count ry of our birth, or the immediate circumstan ces of our upbringing . We do
not, most of us, choose to die; nor do we choose the time or conditions of our
death . But within all this realm of choiceless ness, we do choose how we shall
liv e: courageous ly or in cowardice, honorably or dishonorab ly, with purpose or
in drift. We decide what is important and what is trivial in life. We decide UGG boots
who lesale that what makes us significan t is either what we do or
what we refuse to do. But no matter how indifferen t the universe may be to our
choic es and decisions, these choices and decisions are ours to make. We decide.
W e choose. And as we decide and choose, so are our lives fomp3ed. In the end,
fomp 3ing our own destiny is what ambition is about. tw0727
