PLEASANT THOUGHTS

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 52, Issue 3750, 1 May 1936, Page 9

PLEASANT THOUGHTS

THE LOST ART OF MEDITATION. r—(Contributed.) In these days life grows more and more bustling and noisy. The methods of locomotion remained the same from the time of the Pharaohs to the Victorian era, and the long stagnation has now ample compensation. In the matter of speed and comfort we have made amazing progress, but our effort to annihilate time and space has laid and is laying heavy toll on human life. The late Mr Shaw was of opinion that the only major task left to us was the conquest of the air. Less adventurous souls think longingly of the conquest of noise and danger. Part of the price we pay for the application of science to industry and all that relates to human needs is that we have lost the art of meditation.

Motoring has practically destroyed letter writing, but that is not the worst result. It has begotten in us a restlessness which deprives us alike of the time and inclination to sit down and think. This is at once tragic and pathetic, for we have now more things to think about than ever, and more serious problems than have previously challenged the human race. As we near the realisation of the oneness of humanity we are confronted with completely unfamiliar difficulties; we complain that we have no time for this, that, and the other, but we forget that we have all the time

there is. Tljere are still twenty-four hours in the day, but we cram them full of new pursuits, and in doing so expose ourselves to endless distractions, often of the noisy type. With the wireless at our elbow, we are almost excluded from possibility of meditation. Jazz music was invented surely to prevent us from thinking at all. We are like Punch’s villager, who “ sometimes sits and thinks, and sometimes just sits.” So little inclined are most of us for meditation that we look round for a book or try to woo forty winks. Lamb said, “ I cannot sit and think. Books think for me.” Johnson said that to think in solitude is the business of a scholar. Byron naturally felt that the demon thought was the blight of life. 'Normal human beings find satisfaction in meditation, especially when it takes the form of reminisence. We live over again the happy days of youth, and so defy in some measure the flight of time. Cities, mountains, and lakes we have seen pass again before our eyes. Our private cinema presents the picture to the mind’s eye. Perhaps our thoughts carry us forward. Wfe indulge in the pleasure of anticipation, and see awaiting us a serene did age amid troops. of friends and our children occupying honourable positions in letters, art, and government. The pleasantest things in the world are pleasant thoughts. Venturing out into wider fields we find ourselves meditating on national and racial issues. The world may be shrinking, but it gives us more to think about than we can compass. How are we to solve the problem's of race, colour, and religion ? Historical events will intrude into our meditation and set us hunting after the truth which it is said history so successfully conceals. How far exactly was each nation to blame for the Great War ? Nothing to meditate upon ! What about the triumphs of science and the methods by which they were achieved ? And if we wish to discover ourselves we have scope enough for questioning. When and how did man emerge upon this planet ? Did he begin his career as a full-grown human or as a speck of jelly ? Was the process of evolution of such a nature as is conceivable ? Are the demands of time to be conceded ? Was evolution not a much cleverer device than direct creation, since evolution means the creating of things invested with skill enough to create other beings not only like their parents but greater and certain to operate in the same fashion until the speck of jelly became something very like God ? What is man’s destiny ? If he is at the present stage fairly successful in banishing the word “ impossible,” can we set limits to his triumphs ? Meditation has the universe for its parish; John Wesley claimed only the world of men. We are at liberty to think cosmically and inquire into questions concerning space and time. Are we really alive, or only dreaming ? Are we living in the antechamber of existence and being made ready for a larger existence ? is man a foetus, infant, or adult ? Does Scripture throw light on such questions and give us what Plato calls “ a sure word ” ? If anyone affirms that he does not know what to think about, he pays himself no compliment, and if he says that he would rather spend his whole leisure in golf and cards he is not a complete man as yet. Those who boast of being practical sometimes declare that meditation is useless, serves no useful purpose, but only “ finds no end in wandering mazes lost.” They believe in gymnastics for the body but not for the mind, and they would be sore put to it to justify the contradiction. Enthusiasts for meditation maintain it will be the chief joy of Paradise. Whether that be so or not we do not know, but if intelligence means anything at all it will be needed in any world, and thinking will improve it. Meditation is an act of the mind separated from all dependence upon bodily activity. External, material, and mechanical distractions are set in their proper place and not allowed to assert their claim to dominate intellect and soul.

Meditation helps to give us a true perspective of life. Someone told Emerson the world was coming to an end soon, and his answer was: “ Let it com'e: we can do without it.” A person whose sole concern is the visible could not say that. He is “ tame in earth’s paddock as Tier prize.” If it is argued that bodily activity exercises the mind the answer is that this is not meditation. Like books, it maylead to it, but on the other hand it may indispose us for it. Reading may be merely an escape from meditation, a coward’s cave. Meditation may become a Jacob’s ladder of the mind with angels’ traffic on it. The matter may be summarised by saying that thought takes us out of slavery, helps us to assert our true self, and deliver ourselves from the illusions of a noisy world. The man who avoids meditation and cannot bear to be shut off from people and books for one hour is quite obviously in fetters. The classical dictum, “To think is to live,” needs emphasising in days which leave little time or inclination for meditation—“ ’Tis but a base, ignoble mind That mounts no higher than a bird can soar.”