muse_channel March Topic 3.2 -- Truth or Happiness?
2. “Who is better, they who promote truth over happiness, or happiness over truth?” - Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 - 1900)
I don't think that either one is better, to be perfectly honest. Too much of either one can always lead to disaster.
You need to find balance in how you teach and -- if you are royalty -- in how you rule.
If you promote only truth and leave no room for the little happinesses that you or your people can have as they come along, then you are setting yourself up for a very sad life. There is nothing to be hopeful for if you are having a particularly bad time and this leads to despair, chaos and revolts.
If you teach nothing but happiness over all things, then you're hiding the simple truths of the world and when something very bad happens, you're not prepared for it. When you're not prepared for something, you really can make it even worse for all of those around you. This would include making things worse on yourself.
I think one of the best personal examples I have of this is about everything that went on with Imhotep. He was a trusted priest of Seti I, but went and fell in love with Seti's mistress/fiance/distrustful cheating back-stabbing hussy and went against everything he was supposed to stand for. In his pursuit of happiness, he helped to assassinate his Pharaoh and then when his distrustful cheating back-stabbing hussy lover was killed, he went against all rules of the gods and nature and tried to bring her back to life. He was punished for this and his death was slow and torturous.
Of course, then he was brought back to life -- completely by accident, I'll have you know -- and he was still focused on bringing his distrustful cheating back-stabbing hussy true love back to life. Apparently, sacrificing me to do this somehow became a wonderful idea in his mind. He was so focused on his own happiness, that he didn't care what was going to happen to the people around him including certain hapless Egyptologists that were just going out in the desert to find the secrets of the City of the Dead so that she could show the Bainbridge Scholars that she did indeed have enough field experience to be admitted.
Because of his focus on this happiness, he ended up dead again. Very dead. (The second time he came back to life it wasn't my fault. I had nothing to do with it that time!)
Muse: Evelyn O'Connell
Fandom: The Mummy/The Mummy Returns
Words: 411
I don't think that either one is better, to be perfectly honest. Too much of either one can always lead to disaster.
You need to find balance in how you teach and -- if you are royalty -- in how you rule.
If you promote only truth and leave no room for the little happinesses that you or your people can have as they come along, then you are setting yourself up for a very sad life. There is nothing to be hopeful for if you are having a particularly bad time and this leads to despair, chaos and revolts.
If you teach nothing but happiness over all things, then you're hiding the simple truths of the world and when something very bad happens, you're not prepared for it. When you're not prepared for something, you really can make it even worse for all of those around you. This would include making things worse on yourself.
I think one of the best personal examples I have of this is about everything that went on with Imhotep. He was a trusted priest of Seti I, but went and fell in love with Seti's mistress/fiance/distrustful cheating back-stabbing hussy and went against everything he was supposed to stand for. In his pursuit of happiness, he helped to assassinate his Pharaoh and then when his distrustful cheating back-stabbing hussy lover was killed, he went against all rules of the gods and nature and tried to bring her back to life. He was punished for this and his death was slow and torturous.
Of course, then he was brought back to life -- completely by accident, I'll have you know -- and he was still focused on bringing his distrustful cheating back-stabbing hussy true love back to life. Apparently, sacrificing me to do this somehow became a wonderful idea in his mind. He was so focused on his own happiness, that he didn't care what was going to happen to the people around him including certain hapless Egyptologists that were just going out in the desert to find the secrets of the City of the Dead so that she could show the Bainbridge Scholars that she did indeed have enough field experience to be admitted.
Because of his focus on this happiness, he ended up dead again. Very dead. (The second time he came back to life it wasn't my fault. I had nothing to do with it that time!)
Muse: Evelyn O'Connell
Fandom: The Mummy/The Mummy Returns
Words: 411