What is Beauty
Is beauty the Samoyed’s stunning white coat or the innocence in its dark eyes and eternal smile?
Is it a child’s laughter and unconditional love?
Is it the most perfect painting?
“Rembrandt’s Christ in the Storm on the Lake of Galilee”
Is it the most perfect poem?
“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st;
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.”
Is it the perfect novel?
“In this here place, we flesh; flesh that weeps, laughs; flesh that dances on bare feet in grass. Love it. Love it hard. Yonder they do not love your flesh. They despise it. They don’t love your eyes; they’d just as soon pick em out. No more do they love the skin on your back. Yonder they flay it. And O my people they do not love your hands. Those they only use, tie, bind, chop off and leave empty. Love your hands! Love them. Raise them up and kiss them. Touch others with them, pat them together, stroke them on your face ‘cause they don’t love that either. You got to love it, you! And no, they ain’t in love with your mouth. Yonder, out there, they will see it broken and break it again. What you say out of it they will not heed. What you scream from it they do not hear. What you put into it to nourish your body they will snatch away and give you leavins instead. No, they don’t love your mouth. You got to love it. This is flesh I’m talking about here. Flesh that needs to be loved. Feet that need to rest and to dance; backs that need support; shoulders that need arms, strong arms I’m telling you. And O my people, out yonder, hear me, they do not love your neck unnoosed and straight. So love your neck; put a hand on it, grace it, stroke it and hold it up. and all your inside parts that they’d just as soon slop for hogs, you got to love them. The dark, dark liver—love it, love it and the beat and beating heart, love that too. More than eyes or feet. More than lungs that have yet to draw free air. More than your life-holding womb and your life-giving private parts, hear me now, love your heart. For this is the prize.”
Is it found in the greatest philosophy?
“Virtue, good conduct, morality. This is based on two fundamental principles: The principle of equality: that all living entities are equal. The principle of reciprocity: This is the “Golden Rule” in Christianity - to do unto others as you would wish them to do unto you. It is found in all major religions.
Concentration, meditation, mental development. Developing one’s mind is the path to wisdom which, in turn, leads to personal freedom. Mental development also strengthens and controls our mind; this helps us maintain good conduct.
Discernment, insight, wisdom, enlightenment. This is the real heart of Buddhism. Wisdom will emerge if your mind is pure and calm.”
“Strive to discover who you are, what is your life mission, and what you are trying to become. It is necessary to lead a responsible and fully awake life. If you don’t try to figure out who you are and what you believe then you are content to just exist and what’s the point in that? What is the worth in your existence?
”Employ your time in improving yourself by other men’s writings so that you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for.”
”He is richest who is content with the least, for content is the wealth of nature.”
”Envy is the ulcer of the soul.”
Is it a piece of music played in a grand building?
“Vaughan Williams Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis at Gloucester Cathedral”
Is it an equation, the perfect equation?
Is beauty in the body?
A collection of chemicals, tissues, and nerve impulses. Where thoughts are electrical surges. Sexual arousal is a flow of chemicals. Happiness is acid transfixed in the cerebellum. The perfect machine.
The symmetry of the face; the smile; the eyes where you can see a thousand tales from a thousand worlds as you look deep inside.
Is beauty the presence of the being itself?
What is Beauty?
It is all of these things and more…
Beauty has a pull, an attraction. Beauty keeps bringing us back again and again. When we experience beauty, we want to examine it, touch it, consume it. We must experience it time and time again. With Beauty there can be no fear, no hate. There is no evil in the presence of true beauty.
What is Beauty? Beauty is love.
“Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.”
We can create anything we desire in our life to experience on earth, our will as desire or prayer will be manifested on earth, just as in Heaven.
Our kingdom is our experience and Heaven is the presence of both beauty and love. Just as Hell is the absence of these experiences.
Earth with love or without, Eternity with love or without. These are our choices as individuals, communities, and nations. The good of the many does outweigh the good of the few or the one. But for the good of the many to exist, “earth as it is in Heaven”, it must start with the one. It must start with each of us.
We must make the decision to open up our hearts and let love push as much of the natural selfishness that exists in each of us out. We must understand that the hole that exists in each of us. The hole right in the middle of our existence cannot be filled with money, possessions, sex, drugs, or another person. It can only be filled by each of us, filled with purpose, with love. Until we begin to fill ourselves with love and beauty, until we fill ourselves with the spirit of the light that exists throughout the universe, we cannot hope to bring love and beauty to others.
By bringing love and beauty into our lives, the nature of attraction will bring others to us. With Love and Beauty, there can be no fear, no hate. There is no evil in the presence of true beauty. This change in us will facilitate change in others. Their change will facilitate more change. The process will replicate, again and again, a chain reaction.
Love and beauty can spread like a virus, as can hate. But in the end, Love is much more powerful and is the only thing that can create Heaven on earth.
“We turn outward, attracted by the beauty we see in created things without realizing that they are only a reflection of the real beauty. And the real beauty is within us.” — Ernesto Cardenal
