The Cries of the Passions

Tales of the Heart's Intimations : VI

Some of the happiest people I've met are those who bring an easy manner to the affairs of the heart. That is not to deny the importance of the passions, but to say that no one can predict, hold, embellish or make more true what the heart already feels about itself.

However, as a society, we continue to exalt the heights of the passions in our movies, novels and eventually in our expectations of what it can do. But in comparing the basis of the heart with the mind we find that the heart relies entirely on its internal workings to express itself. A large part of the mode of working of the passions tends to be ritualistic.

This it does by drawing its inference from the body's functions and records the impulses of joy, happiness and avoidance from the body's physical reactions and accordingly retains a sense of the most  commonly  occurring impulse as the most favored by the individual. Statistically, we spent more time eating than sex or other physical activity. This may mean that in the eye of the passions our dinnerware may be our most treasured activity, shared with our devotions with regards to faith.

I'm not kidding! I wonder to what extent we may be able to discern such an attitude in women but I have a neighbor who has put up a framed picture of his tableware over his threshold as representation of what that householder considers is god. Or whether or not Lumiere and company in Beauty and the Beast hints at a similar experience of those whose fascination with the passions has brought their mind to pot ..... Mrs Potts?

There's a schism between the mind and heart that has been the subject of poets and statesmen alike over the ages. The achievement of the perfect union of mind and body, first spoken of by Aristotle, is today finding its basis and foundation. It appears that an acceptance of these matters may be helped with a pinch of salt.