Grizzly Past

Europe

Humanity is growing from youth as lion cubs, cuffing one another, toward the enlightened self-interest of adulthood. We are finally ready to learn, from nature's gift of language, that peace on earth makes sense. A bum across Europe (1974-75) sealed this lesson for me. Those people are learning it after ages of bloody conflict.

Arch of Titus

This ruin of the Roman Forum is carved with conquest. Hebrew captives are shown as abstracted into the archetypal imagery needed to culminate our education with words. This kind of symbolism has been around a lot longer than "articulate" language.

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Genuine sophistication is required to decipher archetypal symbols. The pioneering science of Carl Jung--confirming Plato's ancient scenarios--showed the way during a critical 20^th century of human maturation. (See Jung et al., MAN AND HIS SYMBOLS.)

The grand design of nature has been clarified.

Animal instinct has excited us to fight. Simple immaturity has led inevitably to injustice. What we have been calling "evil" translates into a failure to discern our own self-interest. Humans have been expectably confused about the matter over the ages.

Waiting . . .
(Renaissance statue of "The Rivers")

The new challenge is to conquer ourselves.

From the Sunrise Café
Reeds Spring, MO
February 7, 2004