Writing from Rheims to Tempier, his trusted confidant, Eugene continues to reflect on the pompous behavior of the dignitaries attending the consecration of the king.
It is a good thing for you, my dear Tempier, that I write you only after having discharged my melancholy humor into the two letters that I have just written for Aix and Paris. If that is all the world can offer in the way of beauty, however much its brilliance and ravishing fantasies may be seductive to others. I am only more confirmed than ever in the scorn that all of it deserves and has always inspired in me, in passing through these splendid chambers, these superb porticoes, the church itself which seems to have changed its purpose for the occasion, no longer being the house of God but the sumptuous temple of vanity…
My reflections continued further when I considered those who flock here; without looking beyond people of my own rank, what a pity to see such vanity. Their eager gaze is fixed on ribbons and sashes; blue, red and violet make all eyes open wide. They praise, admire, go into raptures. As for me – say not a word of this – mentally stripping these people of their liveries, I disdain, I pity them or am indignant. Do not think, however, that my stoicism renders me unjust; no! I give homage as I go to virtue when I meet it, but rarely is it such as I expect, such as I love.
Letter to Henri Tempier, 27 May 1825, EO VI n 179
“God created the world out of nothing; so as long as we are nothing, he can make something out of us.” Martin Luther
I do hear what Eugene is saying but for me the key is in the last couple of lines that he writes when he says “I give homage as I go to virtue when I meet it, but rarely is it such as I expect, such as I love.” I think the clue is in there and in Martin Luther’s quote. I am most likely a little askew theologically in my thinking but God is always there, but it is harder for us to find him because we get so caught-up and mis-directed in all of the glitz, glamour and falseness of it all. For me it is that misdirection and distraction that seems to trap me and I can then either join and become a part of it (one tiny step at a time) or equally spend all of my breath and effort in actively looking for the falseness and then judging it all. Which is easer sometimes-to patiently listen and wait for the goodness to appear or to hastily see only the falseness of a thing or worse a person?
I look at my own self and see how I can so often allow myself, my life to be led and ruled by my needs and my pain. I look at all that mankind has done and worked with, not the least of which is this small computer that I use each morning to write this and give voice to my thoughts. It can become either a total distraction and I could lose myself entirely in it, or it can be a tool to be used in sharing who I am and who is God in my life.
I will not say that I am nothing, but there is much space in me for God to work in and fill, so long as I don’t try to fill it up myself with a lot of false stuff.. Today I will fly home in a relatively modern marvel, a tool that when one sees it in the skies one cannot but marvel at all that God has given to us.