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The other part of what Frater Miklos has to impart to us is less elliptical, more readily grasped and held in place. It constitutes a seminar on life-extension, in which he shuttles coolly across time and space in search of ideas that may well have entered the world long after he had. To begin with, why resist death at all, he asks us? Is it not a natural termination, a desirable release from toil, a consummation devoutly to be wished? The skull beneath the face reminds us that all creatures perish in their time, none is exempt: why then defy the universal will? Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return, eh? All flesh shall perish together; we pass away out of the world as grasshoppers, and it is a poor thing for anyone to fear that which is inevitable. Ah, but can we be such philosophers? If it is our destiny to go, is it not also our desire to delay the moment of exit? His questions are rhetorical ones. Sitting cross-legged before that thick-thewed tower of years, we do not dare intrude on the rhythms of his thought. He looks at us without seeing us. What, he asks, what if one could indeed postpone death indefinitely, or at least thrust it far into the time to come? Of course, preserving one’s health and strength is necessary to the bargain: there is no merit in becoming a struldbrug, is there, old and drooling, babbling and rheumy-eyed, a perambulatory mass of decay? Consider Tithonus, who petitioned the gods for exemption from death and was granted immortality but not eternal youth; gray, withered, he lies yet in a sealed room, forever growing older, locked within the constrictions of his corruptible and corrupt flesh. No, we must seek vigor as well as longevity.
There have been those, observes Frater Miklos, who scorn such quests and argue a passive acceptance of death. He reminds us of Gilgamesh, who strode from Tigris to Euphrates in search of the thorny plant of eternity and lost it to a hungry serpent. Gilgamesh, whither ru
Such bleakness. Such pessimism. Accept, submit, yield, die, die, die, die!
What saith the Judaeo-Christian tradition? Man that is born of a woman is of few days, and full of trouble. He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down: he fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not. Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are with thee, thou hast appointed his bounds that he ca
We go from our history lesson to lunch. Eggs, mashed chilis, beer, thick dark bread. After lunch, an hour of private meditations, each to his own room, as we struggle to make sense of all that has been poured into our heads. Then the gong sounds, calling us again to the fields. Now the full heat of afternoon has descended, and even Oliver shows some restraint: we move slowly, cleaning the hen house, staking the seedlings, providing extra hands for the tireless farmer-fraters who have labored most of the day. Two hours of this; the entire Brotherhood is side by side, all but Frater Antony, who stays alone in the House of Skulls. (It was at such a time that we first arrived here.) At last we are released from servitude. Sweaty, sun-a
Another meal, then. The usual fare. After di