The ‘virtue’ of the excesses
Monday January 17 2005 08:24 IST
By Karmayogi
The tendency to
overdoing is present in all walks of life. Especially man tends to
over-exercise himself in the pursuit of a virtue. Nature sets its face against excesses
of any type. In innocuous things, excesses lead to fads.
In linguistic zeal, excesses create clich, platitudes or forms without
content. In short, they organise superstition in the name of culture, religion,
values, etc.
Thiruvalluvar warns against such a tendency, drawing a metaphor of peacock
feathers. No cart, he says, can be overloaded without breaking its axle, even
if the material is as light as peacock feathers.
Why does Man resort to excesses? After all, Man can utilise only what he is
endowed with. The lawyer who has excellent evidence delivers it with pride. In
the absence of such evidence, he fashions fine legal arguments and emphasises
them.
Endowed with neither, he thumps the table. It is rare to be endowed with rich
content. The outer form is easier to acquire.
Food, dress, furniture, memory, information, reading, oratory, glittering
functions are some that are used for such ostentation. In our country, poverty
causes the problem of hunger.
In the West, prosperity makes them eat, rather overeat. About a third of the
population is believed to be obese. For the first generation that came out of
poverty, eating is irresistible.
They believe more food in the stomach is better health. As a rule, every
affectionate mother believes in overfeeding her children. A little education
disabuses their minds. We are proud of our children reading books at five or
six years that we read at twelve or thirteen years.
The first generation of good education superstitiously reposes its faith in extensive
reading. It will certainly do good to below average children, not to kids
educated very well. Such excessive reading will always tend to non-thinking
reading material. The capacity to think will be the casualty.
There are those who are oblivious of what is happening around and often they
become the victims of intrigues. Some are all ears and all eyes. They know the
pulse of the city they are in.
Such people will become a striking success as businessmen, bank agents,
political workers, and brokers of all types. It is good for those who aim at
the penultimate goal, not those who are earmarked to the top post at a young
age.
What is a virtue in the ordinary man becomes an obstacle for the rising star. The
excesses of an extraordinary capacity are no virtue for him. It can deny him
the career God beckons him to. Excellent memory raised so many people so high.
One endowed with a capacity for original thinking or one who is trained by
meticulous education to turn out to be a great mind, will escape that Grace,
lost in the power of memory or a plethora of facts, a misnomer for general
knowledge. Excess is no virtue.