CHURCHILLIAN BEGINNING
“When you’re going through Hell — keep going.”
— Churchill
***
DID YOU EVER FEEL SO? I HOPE YOU NEVER.
I didn’t make you know how glad I was
To have you come and camp here on our land.
I promised myself to get down some day
And see the way you lived, but I don’t know!
With a houseful of hungry men to feed
I guess you’d find.... It seems to me
I can’t express my feelings any more
Than I can raise my voice or want to lift
My hand (oh, I can lift it when I have to).
Did ever you feel so? I hope you never.
It’s got so I don’t even know for sure
Whether I am glad, sorry, or anything.
There’s nothing but a voice-like left inside
That seems to tell me how I ought to feel,
And would feel if I wasn’t all gone wrong.
— opening of Robert Frost’s “A Servant to Servants”
***
THE DANGER OF HONESTY IN A DISHONEST AGE
Poor Boethius.
Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, that majestic and noble Roman, that rare uncorrupt politician — who is now suffering so greatly for his uprightness.
Poor Boethius.
The year is 523 AD.
It has been 47 years since Odoacer overthrew the final Western Emperor of Rome.
Odoacer’s reign was short. Theodoric the Great invades and conquers in 493, killing Odoacer at a banquet.
(The most reliable lesson from history is to be very careful at banquets.)
Boethius.
Boethius would have been 13 years old when Theodoric takes control of the Western Empire. He was from a noble patrician Roman family, though the luster of the Roman patrician families had certainly dimmed now that the Germans were in power.
Nevertheless, he built himself a career of public service and scholarship, doing some terrific works in mathematics, logic, music, theology, and philosophy while building a strong family.
But now, 30 years after Theodoric took the throne, Boethius is 43 years old — and under arrest, awaiting execution.
For my part, Boethius seems like one of those people who somewhat naively believed that honesty and service were adequate defenses against wicked people. When a politician was accused of treason publicly, Boethius stood up to defend the charges as false and the accuser as corrupt.
Boethius had always had an anti-corruption bent; again for my part, he seems an honest man.
He was co-indicted and placed under arrest.
He would be executed the following year.
We will return to Boethius in his prison in a moment, to spend the last year of his life with him.
***
ROMAN CARTHAGE, 202 BC
Old Carthage, Carthaginian Carthage, had been conquered and exterminated many generations beforehand — it was a Roman province now, with Roman judges, under Roman laws.
A young mother is being brought in front of the judge and asked to either renounce her crimes, or to be condemned for them.
The sentence if convicted?
Death by wild beasts in the Arena.
The crime was not being Christian, per se — it was failing to pay due respects and rites to the Roman Gods and Roman system.
The young Christians all confess publicly, refusing to renounce their young religion.
Her elderly father breaks in and tries to stop Perpetua from doing the same —
“The news of the trial spread fast and brought a huge crowd together in the forum. We were placed on a sort of platform before the judge, who was Hilarion, procurator of the province, since the proconsul had lately died. The others were questioned before me and confessed their faith. But when it came to my turn, my father appeared with my child, and drawing me down the steps besought me, 'Have pity on the child.' The judge Hilarion joined with my father and said: 'Spare your father's white hairs. Spare the tender years of your child. Offer sacrifice for the prosperity of the emperors.' I replied, 'No." Are you a Christian?' asked Hilarion, and I answered, 'Yes, I am.' My father then attempted to drag me down from the platform, at which Hilarion commanded that he should be beaten off, and he was struck with a rod. I felt this as much as if I myself had been struck, so deeply did I grieve to see my father treated thus in his old age. The judge then passed sentence on us all and condemned us to the wild beasts, and in great joy we returned to our prison.”
The whole account is worth reading; a good version is here —
http://www.ewtn.com/library/MARY/PERPETUA.htm
It continues in that vein —
“The day before the games they were given the usual last meal, which was called "the free banquet." The martyrs strove to make it a Feast of Love, and to those who crowded around them they spoke of the judgments of God and of their own joy in their sufferings. Such calm courage and confidence astonished the pagans and brought about many conversions.”
This continued even as they were brought into the arena to face death —
“Perpetua was singing, while Revocatus, Saturninus, and Saturus were calling out warnings to the bystanders and even to Hilarion himself, as they walked beneath his balcony, of the coming vengeance of God. The mob cried out that they should be scourged for their boldness. Accordingly, as the martyrs passed in front of the hunters, each received a lash.”
The death of one of the young men with Perpetua, Saturus, was particularly striking —
“To each one God granted the form of martyrdom he desired. Saturus had hoped to be exposed to several sorts of beasts, that his sufferings might be intensified. He and Revocatus were first attacked half-heartedly by a leopard. Saturus was next exposed to a wild boar which turned on his keeper instead. He was then tied up on the bridge in front of a bear, but the animal refused to stir out of his den, and Saturus was reserved for one more encounter. The delay gave him an opportunity to turn and speak to the converted jailer Pudens: "You see that what I desired and foretold has come to pass. Not a beast has touched me! So believe steadfastly in Christ. And see now, I go forth yonder and with one bite from a leopard all will be over." As he had foretold, a leopard was now let out, sprang upon him, and in a moment he was fatally wounded. Seeing the flow of blood, the cruel mob cried out, "He is well baptized now!" Dying, Saturus said to Pudens, "Farewell; remember my faith and me, and let these things not daunt but strengthen you." He then asked for a ring from Pudens' finger, and dipping it in his own blood, returned it to the jailer as a keepsake. Then he expired.”
And finally, Perpetua’s death —
“Perpetua and Felicitas were exposed to a mad heifer. Perpetua was tossed first and fell on her back, but raised herself and gathered her torn tunic modestly about her; then, after fastening up her hair, lest she look as if she were in mourning, she rose and went to help Felicitas, who had been badly hurt by the animal. Side by side they stood, expecting another assault, but the sated audience cried out that it was enough. They were therefore led to the gate Sanevivaria, where victims who had not been killed in the arena were dispatched by gladiators. Here Perpetua seemed to arouse herself from an ecstasy and could not believe that she had already been exposed to a mad heifer until she saw the marks of her injuries. She then called out to her brother and to the catechumen: "Stand fast in the faith, and love one another. Do not let our sufferings be a stumbling block to you." By this time the fickle populace was clamoring for the women to come back into the open. This they did willingly, and after giving each other the kiss of peace, they were killed by the gladiators. Perpetua had to guide the sword of the nervous executioner to her throat.”
***
TOUGHNESS #7: ADVERSITY
This is the final chapter in our investigation into Toughness.
There is one final point to address before the curtain falls on Toughness — how to handle oneself in times of adversity.
The guidelines are relatively simple; if studied and practiced, you can become more stalwart and focused in times of adversity.
We will learn from history on these matters.
***
THE TWO GUIDELINES FOR MANAGING ADVERSITY
In the worst of times, I believe there are only two:
1. Use what’s happening.
2. Action.
***
GRACEFUL ENGAGEMENT IN DISGRACE
There are, of course, many variants of Adversity. There is the type that comes you at hard, and then passes — an earthquake, a hurricane, a pitched battle.
We will talk about surviving those moments in a minute.
The harder type of adversity is that adversity that lingers — falling from a high position into disgrace, being ostracized or alienated from an old career or old friends, things of that sort.
This is a tough type of adversity.
On the off chance you ever have to experience it, I want you to burn this next point into your mind.
—> Those who have harnessed long-term adversity well have done some of the greatest work on this planet.
I hope you’re never in disgrace or alienated from what you care about. But if it happens to you, heaven forbid, use it to your advantage.
Our species, for whatever reason, often does its best under the worst conditions.
Thucydides is often considered the first historian — his “History of the Peloponnesian War” is a masterpiece; it was the first of its type. He is still revered to this day.
It’s less commonly known, though, that he was a disgraced General that was exiled from his home in Athens for failing to relieve a city that the Spartans captured.
He reflected,
“It was my fate to be an exile from my country for twenty years after my command at Amphipolis; and being present with both parties, and more especially with the Pelopennesians by reasons of my exile, I had leisure to observe affairs somewhat particularly.”
Thus, Thucydides uses the pain and disgrace of what’s happening to him to his best advantage. Exiled and countryless, he no longer is a partisan or commander of Athens; instead, he can become a neutral historian — the first historian — and record the events of the wars faithfully.
Machiavelli almost certainly wouldn’t have written The Prince if he, too, was not in disgrace and exile.
Formerly a civil servant in Florence, he was jailed, tortured, and exiled when the Medici re-conquered the city.
He wrote in a letter to a friend about his studies and writing in exile,
“When evening comes, I go back home, and go to my study. On the threshold, I take off my work clothes, covered in mud and filth, and I put on the clothes an ambassador would wear. Decently dressed, I enter the ancient courts of rulers who have long since died. There, I am warmly welcomed, and I feed on the only food I find nourishing and was born to savor. I am not ashamed to talk to them and ask them to explain their actions and they, out of kindness, answer me. Four hours go by without my feeling any anxiety. I forget every worry. I am no longer afraid of poverty or frightened of death. I live entirely through them.”
We see additionally a Historical Sense in him, like we described last chapter; moreover, we see that he used his adversity in order to produce his best works.
Dante Alighieri, too, was exiled from Florence, about 200 years before Machiavelli’s time. Again, he was on the wrong side of a political fight.
There was a death warrant out on him if he ever returned.
He didn’t; instead, he wrote his Divine Comedy. He placed his enemies in “The Inferno” — his only way of getting revenge.
And yet, The Divine Comedy — The Inferno in particular — has been said many times to be the finest work ever written in Italian.
(Everyone has heard of it. Have you read it? Reading a commented version online is a wonderful experience; the book is both short and a masterpiece, at least worthy of an afternoon’s study at some point.)
Again, Dante without adversity is Dante who does not do his best poetic work. Chased away from his home, from most of his colleagues and friends, somewhat alone in the world, he turns his grief and anxiousness to poetry and the nature of mankind in this world and the next — the result is a masterpiece.
Burn it into your mind, in case you ever fall into disgrace —
—> Those who have harnessed long-term adversity well have done some of the greatest work on this planet.
***
THE ROPE AROUND HIS NECK IN 1942
They forced Stjepan Filipovic to stand on a little footstool, a sad little contraption, as the Nazi jailers tightened the rope around his neck.
He did not weep or wail or gnash in his teeth; no, his was a response embodying all of the energy and virtue of defiance in Yugoslavic culture.
The swastika’d jailers are about to kick the little bench out from his feet; if he is lucky, Stejpan’s neck will break; if he is unlucky, he will be strangled and slowly suffocate, dying much more slowly.
Is he worried?
It does not appear so.
The Nazi occupiers had brought out a crowd to watch the execution; this type of thing, they must have figured, would deter future partisans.
It did not have the desired effect.
Stjepan shouts “Death to the fascists, freedom to the people!” — and he raises his arms triumphantly into the air.
Just then, a photographer snaps a photo. It becomes one of the most famous symbols of the resistance.
It is not recorded whether his neck broke or whether he was strangled slower. In the grand scheme of things, this question is irrelevant — whether he died five minutes earlier or later, and slightly more painfully or slightly less.
No, his last conscious act of volition was his energetic defiance of the conquest of his homeland. Yugoslavian partisans would drive the Nazis out of their lands, and then, despite being socialist, were able to avoid being conquered by Stalin and remained independent.
Stjepan’s defiance became the watch-word of Yugoslavian independence. He’s still remembered favorably to this day.
***
ACTION; IT IS ALL ACTION
No matter how overwhelming or crushing circumstances are, you can only do one thing at a time. If you select from the best action possible to you every moment, you will have done as well as you can.
This sounds basic, but is not.
I will say it again —
If you select from the best action possible to you every moment, you will have done as well as you can.
Members of the U.S. Navy SEAL Teams frequently describe getting through insane amounts of pain and performing incredible feats of endurance by going “one evolution at a time.”
The human mind can so easily break if we look at long and hopeless odds stretched in front of us. Indeed, if you wind up with a rope around your neck like Stjepan’s, the situation for survival is now hopeless; your death is now imminent.
But you still have choice, agency — you can still take action.
What will your action be?
Stjepan’s defiantly raising his arms and shouting for freedom had a rousing effect, first on the immediate crowd, and eventually through all of his people.
When Perpetua died in Roman Carthage’s arena, her gracefulness in dying won sympathy and converts to Christianity.
Again, though, this was simply a matter of taking one action at a time.
If you look at Perpetua’s death in the arena, she did at least seven individual actions that showed bravery, resolve, friendship, and steadfastness —
1. Perpetua was tossed first and fell on her back, but raised herself and gathered her torn tunic modestly about her;
2. then, after fastening up her hair, lest she look as if she were in mourning,
3. she rose and went to help Felicitas, who had been badly hurt by the animal.
4. She then called out to her brother and to the catechumen: "Stand fast in the faith, and love one another. Do not let our sufferings be a stumbling block to you."
5. By this time the fickle populace was clamoring for the women to come back into the open. This they did willingly,
6. and after giving each other the kiss of peace, they were killed by the gladiators.
7. Perpetua had to guide the sword of the nervous executioner to her throat.
Each — each was one action.
***
AND BOETHIUS WITH HIS SORROWFUL PEN
Poor Boethius.
Thinking about Boethius, though he died 1500 years ago, still makes me a little sad.
It’s something we see often enough: an honest man thinking his honesty is a shield in a dishonest world; not arming himself sufficiently against corrupt adversaries.
And now, Boethius is under arrest; he knows he will quite likely be executed soon.
How easy would it be to sit around, feeling bad for himself?
Indeed, that’s what he starts to do.
But then... he reflects on it on a moment, and takes up his pen, writing out his sorrows —
“Who wrought my studious numbers
Smoothly once in happier days,
Now perforce in tears and sadness
Learn a mournful strain to raise.
Lo, the Muses, grief-dishevelled,
Guide my pen and voice my woe;
Down their cheeks unfeigned the tear drops
To my sad complainings flow!”
Boethius writes a long poem along those lines, about how bad he is feeling, and how unlucky he is, and how awful his life has become.
But then — almost magically, something clicks
.
Maybe you’d need the context to truly understand it — or maybe not — but I dare say it’s the most striking paragraph-by-paragraph change coming over a writer in a time of grief.
After his long feeling-bad-for-self poem, he writes —
“While I was thus mutely pondering within myself, and recording my sorrowful complainings with my pen, it seemed to me that there appeared above my head a woman of a countenance exceeding venerable. Her eyes were bright as fire, and of a more than human keenness; her complexion was lively, her vigour showed no trace of enfeeblement; and yet her years were right full, and she plainly seemed not of our age and time.”
Thus begins “The Consolation of Philosophy” — which would go on to become one of the most popular works in Europe for the next 1000 years, greatly impacting history.
***
STERN WARFARE AGAINST THE RASHNESS OF FOLLY
Writing his masterpiece, The Consolation, Boethius goes through long dialogs with the Personification of Philosophy — a spirit of profound wisdom.
The whole work is a masterpiece in conquering one’s own mind, no matter how rough the circumstances. The third chapter opens —
“Even so the clouds of my melancholy were broken up. I saw the clear sky, and regained the power to recognise the face of my physician. Accordingly, when I had lifted my eyes and fixed my gaze upon her, I beheld my nurse, Philosophy, whose halls I had frequented from my youth up.”
I shiver when I read The Consolation; I cannot read too much of it at a time, it’s heavy stuff, it’s too heavy to read straight through, but there is a profound magic in it.
Come, think of it — there is, you know, not actually a Spirit of Philosophy there with Boethius as he is under arrest.
No, he is still alone, by himself, with his pen and paper, awaiting final judgment.
But Boethius grasps the situation — owns it — reasons through it — and goes on to yoke and harness it, having it pull him forwards.
“'Ah! why,' I cried, 'mistress of all excellence, hast thou come down from on high, and entered the solitude of this my exile? Is it that thou, too, even as I, mayst be persecuted with false accusations?'”
And Lady Philosophy replies —
“'Could I desert thee, child,' said she, 'and not lighten the burden which thou hast taken upon thee through the hatred of my name, by sharing this trouble? Even forgetting that it were not lawful for Philosophy to leave companionless the way of the innocent, should I, thinkest thou, fear to incur reproach, or shrink from it, as though some strange new thing had befallen? Thinkest thou that now, for the first time in an evil age, Wisdom hath been assailed by peril? Did I not often in days of old, before my servant Plato lived, wage stern warfare with the rashness of folly?”
***
FORTUNE AND ADVERSITY
Boethius, to me, is the canonical example of using the worst of adversity to one’s own benefit — and the benefit of the world at large.
It’s worth reading The Consolation; albeit, it’s hard reading.
Overview —
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Consolation_of_Philosophy
1897 translation into English —
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/14328/14328-h/14328-h.htm
The whole work is a marvel... I was going to quote heavily from it, for you dear reader, but I cannot read too many paragraphs in a row before stopping to reflect and get lost in thought.
Philosophy instructs Boethius, reasons with him; he talks out his problems, and the problems of the world, and reflects on them. Soon, they come to Fortune, and seeing that honors and treasures are not wholly within one’s own control, that Fortune has a great say in matters.
Fortune’s words to Boethius —
“When nature brought thee forth out of thy mother's womb, I took thee, naked and destitute as thou wast, I cherished thee with my substance, and, in the partiality of my favour for thee, I brought thee up somewhat too indulgently, and this it is which now makes thee rebellious against me. I surrounded thee with a royal abundance of all those things that are in my power. Now it is my pleasure to draw back my hand. Thou hast reason to thank me for the use of what was not thine own; thou hast no right to complain, as if thou hadst lost what was wholly thine. Why, then, dost bemoan thyself? I have done thee no violence. Wealth, honour, and all such things are placed under my control.”
Huh!
This whole thing is striking.
***
OUR TWO MANAGEMENTS OF ADVERSITY, OR NOT ADVERSITY, AS IT WERE
Boethius reasons himself through the conflicts raging inside his mind and spirit.
Again, our two guidelines —
1. Use what’s happening.
2. Action.
So, you are imprisoned. You will be executed. You worry for your family. It cannot really get much worse than Boethius’s condition.
And yet, he follows the universal guidelines — he takes his pen, he takes his paper, he writes and does his very best work of philosophy; he writes The Consolation; it is a marvelous work.
He uses where he is at, does not deny it. He takes action; he reasons, he writes.
He would be executed one year later, but his work would inspire others as one of the most popular works of the next millennia; it is still read to this day.
And though it is somewhat besides the point, King Theodoric was not as harsh as he could have been to Boethius’s children; and his successor reinstated Boethius’s sons in good standing at Rome. It is possible, likely even, that Boethius has descendants and great-great-grandchildren even alive and with us to this day.
What if he had not penned this marvelous work? He no doubt was able to die with some dignity and modesty, having reconciled his thoughts.
This penning of this work, accepting Fortune as it was, perhaps saved his children’s lives.
He did what he could — he owned the situation he was in, he used it every bit as well as he could, he took every bit of action he could in his captivity.
He left something monumental behind — in a strange and ironic way, perhaps, his unjust fall might have been the catalyst for his true and lasting greatness and impact on this world.
***
A SERVANT TO SERVANTS; NO HEROISM REQUIRED
Sometimes adversity is truly overwhelmingly large — Thucydides, Machiavelli, Dante, Boethius — those early Carthaginian Christians facing death by early beasts, the Nazi rope around Stjepan Filipovic’s neck — these situations loom large in their quality of very-badness.
It’s not always so. Sometimes adversity is quieter, but the prescription is still the same.
Frost outlined that in A Servant to Servants; it was the dull melancholy of days going by, not enough money, struggling with alienation and isolation.
The same rules apply.
We began with Frost’s poem. Here is a little more —
“The cottages Len built, sometimes we rent them,
Sometimes we don’t. We’ve a good piece of shore
That ought to be worth something, and may yet.
But I don’t count on it as much as Len.
He looks on the bright side of everything,
Including me. He thinks I’ll be all right
With doctoring. But it’s not medicine—
Lowe is the only doctor’s dared to say so—
It’s rest I want—there, I have said it out—
From cooking meals for hungry hired men
And washing dishes after them—from doing
Things over and over that just won’t stay done.
By good rights I ought not to have so much
Put on me, but there seems no other way.
Len says one steady pull more ought to do it.
He says the best way out is always through.”
Indeed, those lines — one steady pull... the best way out is always through.
Who knows what torments Frost was experiencing and harnessing in his own life; his illnesses, his failing at agriculture; his wanting to break free and really fly, but perhaps not being able to at times.
And again — using it, harnessing it... action.
The prescription is always the same.
***
AND A FAREWELL TO TOUGHNESS
Our investigation of Toughness comes to a close.
We’ve explored seven big ideas across seven chapters, as we dig to the roots of Toughness –
1. Mission Orientation
2. Mental Toughness
3. Physical Toughness
4. Religio
5. Integration
6. Historical Sense
7. Adversity
But to conclude, I find myself circling back, just briefly, to Upstream Effects.
We spoke in Upstream Effects about “Cold Determination” and the necessity of cultivating it to ensure you stay upon the path.
It is easy enough to be in good cheer and to be celebratory when all is going well.
Fine.
Great.
But things will inevitably go badly.
Our definition of Mental Toughness, stated again for the last time —
“Doing what one ought to do, regardless if you feel like doing it or not.”
What ought one to do?
You find out by studying and cultivating your feelings of how you relate to the Universe, your “Religio” — independent of any dogmas or formal pledges or creeds, you study yourself and others to understand what you ought to be doing at the deepest level.
You build strength through Mental and Physical Toughness; you practice these things, to get stronger in mind and body.
You adopt Mission Orientation to ensure you convert all your personal toughness into worthy results.
You keep yourself strong and fill yourself with morale and strength through Integration with worthy societies, and building a Historical Sense so that you understand you’re not alone on the path.
And finally, yes, adversity will come. It is inevitable if you’re doing great things.
And then,
1. Use what’s happening.
2. Action.
If you follow those guidelines, you do as well as you possibly can.
Enough said!