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from The Wisdom of the Ancients
XXVI--Prometheus, or the State of Man
Francis Bacon
Explained: So I, the great Francis Bacon, think that humans are idiots who do nothing but complain about scientific experiments gone wrong, preach irrational and completely false theories until all of humanity conforms to them , do good deeds under false pretenses and switch sides as if they are switching shoes. Disagree? Agree? Comments? Answers? Posts?
Bacon was a man of angles. That's what his paintings represent. His positions as statements of speech are very philo-sophical, for it is impossible to ascertain the whole of humanity conforming to idiocy.
Of course we are extremely smart. All we have to do is look at the achievements, the actual achievements, in spite of idiocy. Incredible (not in need of credibility) achievements. What's credible (in need of credibility) is false a-priori.
Bacon's contributions were good art. His sayings were psychopathic entanglement. The great Bacon is a version of Italian panzetta.
I guess a book called "What is Man" by Mark Twain would shed a big deal of light on this specific topic. You can have a free Kindle edition over here: http://www.amazon.in/What-Man-Other-...man+mark+twain
I've started reading it, and let me tell you it is an outstanding work from the Mankind's one of the greatest writers, The Mark Twain.
I am smart and most of the others are stupid. I guess, this is how most of people think. And, what is really the most amazing thing about it, all of them are right (together with me, of course :)
HAMLET
What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason!
how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how
express and admirable! in action how like an angel!
in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the
world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me,
what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not
me: no, nor woman neither...
what is a paragon of animals?Quote:
Originally Posted by mal4mac
this speech seems to go from very high then hits bottom very hard. it is rather flattening. the feeling of so much and yet so little , nothing, is something I can hardly know.
the trajectory of the speech is up and then flat. dust is hardly tracked.
Awesome lines....Quote:
Originally Posted by mal4mac
humans are assiduous to their own manners. they are the reflection of their own self only in retrogress. progress is long over due.
are humans not smart? does that mean to say humans are stupid? well it takes one to know one. whoever who said must have felt it. no other way around it.
the question is somehow unequivocal underogatory. is smart a shade of clever? or an irritant of it? I don't claim to understand it but it does stand out a bit.
Good question. Now you've made me think about it, there seems to be a double meaning. Calling a man 'a perfect animal' might be considered an insult, and the average Tudor doesn't really want to be thought of as an animal, 'cause Christians think of animals as lowly things. So Shakespeare is perhaps revealing his post-Christian tendencies here, using heavy irony.Quote:
Originally Posted by cacian
http://31.media.tumblr.com/ff79c4e14...umyso1_500.png
Hamlet V.i
LOL funny pictures mal4mac. is that your dog? haha.
anyway to start with the piece says:
what a piece of work is man!
usually in spoken language we use the expression
'a piece of' to be derogatory. 'a nasty piece of work' comes to mind.
then
''in apprehension how like a god!''
there is apprehensiveness in the air here about godliness.
then:
the beauty of the
world! the paragon of animals
beauty seemed to be linked to a paragon of animals.
And yet, to me,
what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not
me: no, nor woman neither...
when he says 'yet to me' that does this mean everything he had said earlier in this piece is not something he thinks that it is something he heard and he is only repeating it to get to his views hence the 'yet to me'.
the quintessence of dust?
is this with dust to dust? as in death? hence the quintessence of death?
Malmac quoted the last half of Hamlet's speech. Here's the first half, which clarifies the irony with which Hamlet is speaking.Quote:
I have of late—but wherefore I know not—lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises, and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air—look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire—why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors. What a piece of work is man.....
Good points on the irony in "piece of work" of "apprehension".
There is also the double meaning of quintessence:
1) The most perfect or typical example of a quality or class: "the quintessence of professionalism".
2) The quintessence, or fifth element, was a term used by medieval alchemists for a substance similar or identical to that thought to make up the heavenly bodies. It was proposed that a little of the quintessence was present in things on earth.
So man either becomes just a typical example of a pile of dust, or his dust is a magical essence.
Also, "in action how like an angel", has you wondering about irony again. Seen any angels doing any useful acting lately?
Complicated chap, Hamlet :)
well I have yet to meet an angel and anyway who says angels did any acting? angels are supposed to be spiritual beings . I am not so sure I get this at all.Quote:
Also, "in action how like an angel", has you wondering about irony again. Seen any angels doing any useful acting lately?
If angels never do any acting, perhaps their inaction resembles that of Hamlet. I'm not sure about this, though.Quote:
Originally Posted by cacian
"Quote:
9 And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. 10And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. 11For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 12And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” 13And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,
14 “Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”c
True. Good post.Quote:
Originally Posted by krishna_lit