Albonium

Volume XV - Spirit of the Last

Book XXVIII - Discourse of Rome

I - The Perspectives

"Oh, I am suffering! Every day is one of pain. My bones ache from my harsh labor, and my soul aches for everything I ever desired for is gone from me!" Thus spoke Emile who lived in Gaul. The name of Libanius was cursed. Once he was a hero, then he was a failure, now he was a cold wind! The Prefect Sejanus had died in folly with his invasion of the Fell. Thus he was weak!

At once the people rejoiced, for the weak ruler was overthrown! The values of Rome had been restored. They would follow these values eternally, for they were the only values! Those who were unlawful were punished by Rome. Those who were for Rome were less likely to be punished. Did not the gods give values as well? They controlled the rain and the crops, they were judges and lovers. Thus their way was to be followed! And Libanius was this great restorer.

They were always starving, always struggling. They had this dream of an end to the suffering, which was the worry of starvation through winter, and to this they wanted to become of the middle! Libanius was the restorer of values, and within their minds they associated value with the easing of struggle!

But did not the orthodox Polonius suffer after the ardent Nepos? Did not the Fell conquer half the continent under Lucius?

Emile was against those who spoke like that. They were strange, and they were outcasts! Those were the men who should be outcasts!

They formed a creation of evil; they called this a 'genealogy'. It was against everything he stood for! Thus he supported them to burn it! If his values were gone, how could he aspire to be anything? Without values, his dream of leaving the farm and venturing to a city and becoming a merchant was no longer grand and mythical, but rather empty! Soon he would observe the struggles of the life of city work, and he would observe his struggle and his pain once more... No, he had to cloud this vision with idealism, virtues, and values and blind himself!

He remembered a singular time when a hermit spoke of such things. He must have once been a soldier of Gnaeus, for he was old and withered, or he was mad, and began ranting about such things. That was the only memory of that rant.

But the hermit must have been overthinking! And he must have been overthinking incorrectly! It removed his values, and so it was evil. He could not tolerate evil! And so too was Libanius good because he defeated some suffering...

But soon Emile's nature was suffering again. He was dissatisfied. He lived in better times than during Polonius, and so had bought more farms! And now he had the burden of tending them.

He was now suffering again, and now he felt that he was being overworked. He was always overworked. Why did he choose to be overworked? Why did he simply not stay with what he had?

Because he could not remain idle! To be idle was always a crime. An idle man did nothing, and so was always dissatisfied.

The soul was a doer. Was not the soul defined by what it did? A soul that did malice was evil, and a soul that made joy, joyous! One could say, 'Does not an evil soul make malice instead, without this method?' But then, how could a soul be evil? Did it not have this quality within it, called evil?

And how was evil defined? Was not an evil man always a doer of evil acts? But clearly one who did an evil act could not be considered to be wholly evil, as much as one who painted could not be considered to have the qualities of a painter! And something was good or evil, or some other quality, for it was the way it changed something else.

Thus, to the soul that did nothing, what was he? Was not a soul a doer? Then he who did nothing did not exist! He was worthless, he was as good as dead! He contributed to nothing and no one, and he had lost his will to live! Thus he had to do something.