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camwynDeath?
Death is not optional.
One day, you will die. That's how it works. You're born- you will, eventually die.
It doesn't matter what you eat. It doesn't matter what you drink. It doesn't matter what drugs you take, what shots you get, what the doctors do or don't do, what exercise you get or don't get, what God you pray to, what city you lived in or what dental hygiene program you pursued. You are mortal. One day, you will die.
I have seen it somewhere that one of the problems with Americans is that we as a culture believe that death is somehow optional. If someone dies at an age below, oh, I don't know, eighty, we act shocked and horrified. "But he did everything right!" "But she took such good care of herself!" News flash, kiddies: taking care of yourself is no guarantee against anything. It'll improve your time while you're alive, yeah; you'll probably feel better and enjoy yourself for longer. But no matter how much 'doing everything right' you pursue while you're alive, you have to understand that it is not going to put off the inevitable. The day will come, and you, too, will die.
You cannot beat the Reaper. No amount of begging or pleading with Divine Providence is going to keep you on this Earth forever. No bargain, no exercise, no diet, nothing will exempt you from the fact that your body is made of matter and that someday that matter will stop working. The same goes for the people you love: you're mortal, and so are they, and you cannot plead them back to life no matter how hard you try. This is not The Sims. Mourn, yes, you're entitled- or rejoice, if you think it appropriate. But you cannot raise the dead, and you probably shouldn't even try, once they're really, truly, genuinely in-the-ground kind of dead. Nothing you do after the fact will bring back your loved one.
Every religion in my Empire is going to have the commandment 'Don't Be A Jerk' patched into its list of rules as the very first of all rules, but I think it will not hurt much to patch the other statement into the curricula of Imperial schools as well:
Death is not optional. You cannot avoid it. You cannot even necessarily delay it. One day, you will die. Don't take it personally. It happens to everyone. Even the ones who do everything right.
Thank you.
Death is not optional.
One day, you will die. That's how it works. You're born- you will, eventually die.
It doesn't matter what you eat. It doesn't matter what you drink. It doesn't matter what drugs you take, what shots you get, what the doctors do or don't do, what exercise you get or don't get, what God you pray to, what city you lived in or what dental hygiene program you pursued. You are mortal. One day, you will die.
I have seen it somewhere that one of the problems with Americans is that we as a culture believe that death is somehow optional. If someone dies at an age below, oh, I don't know, eighty, we act shocked and horrified. "But he did everything right!" "But she took such good care of herself!" News flash, kiddies: taking care of yourself is no guarantee against anything. It'll improve your time while you're alive, yeah; you'll probably feel better and enjoy yourself for longer. But no matter how much 'doing everything right' you pursue while you're alive, you have to understand that it is not going to put off the inevitable. The day will come, and you, too, will die.
You cannot beat the Reaper. No amount of begging or pleading with Divine Providence is going to keep you on this Earth forever. No bargain, no exercise, no diet, nothing will exempt you from the fact that your body is made of matter and that someday that matter will stop working. The same goes for the people you love: you're mortal, and so are they, and you cannot plead them back to life no matter how hard you try. This is not The Sims. Mourn, yes, you're entitled- or rejoice, if you think it appropriate. But you cannot raise the dead, and you probably shouldn't even try, once they're really, truly, genuinely in-the-ground kind of dead. Nothing you do after the fact will bring back your loved one.
Every religion in my Empire is going to have the commandment 'Don't Be A Jerk' patched into its list of rules as the very first of all rules, but I think it will not hurt much to patch the other statement into the curricula of Imperial schools as well:
Death is not optional. You cannot avoid it. You cannot even necessarily delay it. One day, you will die. Don't take it personally. It happens to everyone. Even the ones who do everything right.
Thank you.
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Re: Hmm...
Date: 2005-06-17 10:43 pm (UTC)Re: Hmm...
Date: 2005-06-17 11:23 pm (UTC)