"Lift not the painted veil which those who live
Call life: though unreal shapes be pictured there,
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spread,-behind, lurk Fear
And Hope, twin Destinies; who ever weave
Their shadows, o'er the chasm, sightless and drear.
I knew one who had lifted it-he sought,
For his lost heart was tender, things to love,
But found them not, alas! nor was there aught
The world contains, the which he could approve.
Through the unheeding many he did move,
A splendour among shadows, a bright blot
Upon this gloomy scene, a Spirit that strove
For truth, and like the Preacher, found it not."
--Percy Bysshe Shelley
The
universe tastes, in
truth, of
darkness and has the scent of
ashes. There is no innate
meaning, no inherent
hereafter, and all any man can truly know of is
ending. Yet living in such a place with such things in mind is impossible: how can men
live,
love,
write, and
pray when all around them is the invetibility of
meaninglessness? To combat the
darkness, armor is donned, a shell is spawned, a
veil is placed on brow-the
Painted Veil.
The
painted veil is constructed by
society and bound to skull at birth. It is a strange amalgam of stuffs, mostly
self deceptions and
illusions,
misconceptions and
delusions that permit man to get through the day without falling to his knees and unleashing a deluge of
tears. It is not
truth, to be sure, but it is just enough to
live.
And what of he who lifts the veil, who braves the chasm of
darkness and
despair in a hunt for
truth and true
beauty? What becomes of him, and what is he to find? It is a sad fate he faces, for it will not merely take
Eliot's handful of dust to make him know
fear:
fear is to be found for him in
clay,
stardust, sparkling
moon,
ink, and
pen. They are what we are, and they are what we may be. . .Yet does a man who becomes
stardust and
moon recall any
pleasure or
pain? Does he know he was a man? He does not, and he might as well have never been, and any
truth or
beauty he ever knew might as well have never been.
The comparison to the
Preacher at the last is apt. It is a reference to the Book of
Ecclesiastes of the
Old Testament. The
Preacher was an elderly
king (perhaps
Solomon) who had amassed great
wealth and felt great
joy, and, soon, he would
die. As with the one who had lifted the
painted veil, he strove for
meaning and
truth as the
darkness loomed. He hunted for some kind of
significance in his accomplishments as he faced
death. "Vanities of vanities," the
Preacher reflected, "all is vanity." The conclusion reached by the
Preacher was to trust in
God and His ineffable
plan, to be
righteous, to follow the
commandments, and
die when
death comes: "
Fear God and keep his
commandments: for this is the whole duty of
man." Alas, this solution comforts not the
agnostic or the
unbeliever, for it assumes both the existance of a plan and a
god. What if, as cruelly chanted by the blackness between
star light, such an assumption cannot be made?
Then there is no
solace to be found, and therefore we must rend our garments, don
sackcloth, eat
ashes, and lament for
creation until we become as
dust.
Or we may gather rosebuds and tremble with joy at the beauty that makes us love the world so well.