The Shepherd, November 2008
TO YOUNG MEN:
ON HOW THEY MIGHT DERIVE
PROFIT FROM PAGAN LITERATURE
By St Basil the Great of Cæsarea
Translation by Rev’d Dr Nick Needham
Second Part & Completion
Studying Pagan literature with discernment
But now let us go back to what we said at the beginning. We should not accept everything without exception, but only what is useful. It is scandalous to reject harmful foods for the body, and yet to have no concern for the teachings that nourish our minds, but to charge onward like a mountain river that carries along everything it happens to touch. A pilot does not recklessly give his ship over to the winds, but steers it to the harbour. An archer shoots at the target. A craftsman in metal or wood strives towards the proper goal of his craft. What sense or reason is there in our falling behind the standards of these workmen, at least in seeing our own interests? Can a manual worker have some purpose he pursues, and yet there is no purpose for human life itself? Do we have no goal on which to fix our eyes, concerning what we ought to say and do, unless we are satisfied with living like a senseless beast? If we had no intellect sitting at the oars of the soul, steering it, we would be like ships without ballast, tossed up and down aimlessly through life.
Applying ourselves to our true purpose: Pagan examples
The reality is that our life is like an athletic contest or a musical competition. There are practice exercises to prepare people for these contests in which a crown is the prize. No one training for a wrestling or boxing match goes and practises on the harp or flute. Polydamas20 did no such thing; prior to the Olympic games, he practised on chariots, driving them at speed and stopping them. By this method he improved his strength. And Milo21 could not be separated from his greased shield, but stood on it like a statue fastened firmly to its base with lead.22 Their exercises prepared them for the games. But if they had deserted the dust and exercises of the gymnasium, and wasted their time on the music of Marsyas or Olympus the Phrygians,23 would they soon have won crowns of glory? Wouldn’t they have earned ridicule for their physical condition?
On the other hand, the musician Timotheus24 did not forsake his composition of choral pieces to spend time in the wrestling schools. If he had done so, he could not have surpassed all others in the art of music; for he could stir up the emotions through his passionate and severe harmonies, and at the same time soothe and calm them again through his peaceful and sensuous melodies. By this art, he once played the Phrygian mode25 on his flute to Alexander the Great, causing the prince to jump up and rush for his weapons during a banquet; and then by playing a peaceful melody, he brought him back to the feast. So great is the power conferred by practice that concentrates on its purpose, both in athletics and music.
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