ON REASON and PASSION

As I begin my exploration of reason and passion this year, I'll start with Kahlil Gibran's perspective on the two and see at the end of the year whether I have cause to disagree.

 And the priestess spoke again and said:Speak to us of reason and Passion.

And he answered, saying:

Your soul is oftentimes a battlefield,

upon which your reason and your judgment

wage war against your passion and your appetite.

Would that I could be the peacemaker in your soul,

that I might turn the discord

and the rivalry of your elements

into oneness and melody.

But how shall I,

unless you yourselves be also the peacemakers,

nay, the lovers of all your elements?

Your reason and your passion are the rudder

and the sails of your seafaring soul.

If either your sails or your rudder be broken,

you can but toss and drift,

or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas.

For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining;

and passion, unattended, is a flame that burns to its own destruction.

Therefore let your soul exalt your reason to the height of passion,

that it may sing;

And let it direct your passion with reason,

that your passion may live through its own daily resurrection,

and like the phoenix rise above its own ashes.

I would have you consider your judgment and your appetite

even as you would two loved guests in your house.

Surely you would not honour one guest above the other;

for he who is more mindful of one loses the love and the faith of both.

Among the hills, when you sit in the cool shade of the white poplars, sharing the peace and serenity of distant fields and meadows

-- then let your heart say in silence, "God rests in reason."

And when the storm comes, and the mighty wind shakes the forest,

and thunder and lightning proclaim the majesty of the sky

-- then let your heart say in awe, "God moves in passion."

And since you are a breath in God's sphere, and a leaf in God's forest,

you too should rest in reason and move in passion.