The Perils of Pondering
The main purpose of this blog is to foster pondering– my own, of course.
Occasionally I visit this page to remind myself of the dangers inherent in pondering. To think ‘longly’ can be disheartening (to oneself or others), and distracting from more important duties.* But though the perils attendant on pondering are real, they are less dangerous than the perils of proceeding unthoughtfully, at least for anyone with an intellectual vocation.
Danger 1: Sowing discord
…in such things as are problematicall, if thou love the peace of Sion, be not too inquisitive to know, nor too vehement, when thou thinkest thou doest know it.
- Donne, from a sermon on Psalm 89:48 [March 28, 1619]
Danger 2: Restlessly asking needless (because unanswerable) questions
Even in spirituall things there may be a fulnesse, and no satisfaction, And there may be a satisfaction and no fulnesse; I may have as much knowledge, as is presently necessary for my salvation, and yet have a restlesse and unsatisfied desire, to search into unprofitable curiosities, unrevealed mysteries, and inextricable perplexities: And, on the other side, a man may be satisfied, and thinke he knowes all, when, God knowes, he knowes nothing at all; for I know nothing, if I know not Christ crucified, And I know not that, if I know not how to apply him to my selfe, Nor doe I know that, if I embrace him not in those meanes, which he hath afforded me in his Church, in his Word and Sacraments; if I neglect this meanes, this place, these exercises, howsoever I may satisfie my selfe, with an over-valuing mine own knowledge at home, I am so far from fulnesse as that vanity it selfe is not more empty.
- Donne, from a sermon on Psalm 90:14 [date uncertain; 1620-1622?]
Danger 3: Rashly defending one’s prior position(s)
Nature worketh is us all a love to our owne counsels. The contradiction of others is a fanne to inflame that love. Our love set on fire to maintaine that which once we have done, sharpeneth the wit to dispute, to argue, and by all meanes to reason for it.
- Hooker, Of the Lawes of Ecclesiasticall Politie, Preface, 2.7 [1593]
Dangers 4 and 5: Killing charity | Ignoring uncharitably presented truth
There will come a time when three words uttered with charitie and meekenes shall receive a farre more blessed rewarde than three thousand volumes written with disdainefull sharpnes of wit. But the maner of mens writing must not alienate our hearts from the truth if it appeare they have the truth….
- Hooker, Of the Lawes of Ecclesiasticall Politie, Preface, 2.10 [1593]
*Richard Hooker has something to say about ‘long thinking’: “[M]any talk of the truth, which never sounded the depth from whence it springeth; and therefore when they are led thereunto they are soon weary, as men drawn from those beaten paths wherewith they have been inured” (Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, I.1.2 [1593])
