You'd actually be surprised at how much intelligence and common sense grow further and further apart in the supposedly most-educated era of human history. People educate themselves, and knowledge progresses at such an astounding rate. Most people you meet in the street today have had far more schooling than many great men in history, and yet, despite the rising levels of intellect, you also find a disturbing and glaring lack of common sense.

    Let's suppose a book was written by some middle-class continental European citizen around two hundred years ago. This book contained certain ideas that were so drastic that some considered it scandalous enough to radically change society in one way or entirely. A few years pass, and the book has inspired a whole movement of people who read to subscribing to the ideas presented in the book and have managed to gain some considerable political power.

    Dávilla once wrote that “wisdom, in this century, consists above all in knowing how to put up with vulgarity without becoming upset.” Considering how blatantly vulgar our current society is, it becomes rather difficult to even consider having Dávilla’s definition of wisdom. But, what exactly today is wise?

    There are two things that the people in the twenty-first century worship. Pleasure and success, and both have become so sought after that the experiencing these two things has become vulgar.

    There are always small things that we keep to ourselves. The little thing that add up to make us unique and ourselves, and most people call those habits. Be it the way you think act feel, the way you sleep, the way you brush you teeth in the morning. All of these things make us unique. Behind all of this unique features lies the underlying principle of finding purpose.

  Every man should find for himself a legitimate purpose, and seek to accomplish it. It could be in a spiritual pursuit, where he seeks to know more about God, or something a bit more normal such as to become a good businessman, an excellent musician, a good cook or what have you. All his energies and talents must then be focused into this purpose to fulfill it.

    As he makes this legitimate purpose his ultimate goal in life, the little things will rise up and take action. These little things would add up into an entirely helpful or unhelpful set of character traits that could subtly help hinder this goal. To admit that such a weakness exists within ourselves, be it unhelpful in the form of laziness, lack of initiative, deluded fantasies, and vain imagination or helpful in the form of dedication, discipline and such, is a noble trait.

    And it is in the knowledge of this that we can make these our weaknesses disappear, not in a day, but through the course of practice and discipline in avoiding exercising these weak habits. For to control and defeat these unhelpful habits would be a step completed in accomplishing the ultimate goal that we have found.

    In the past few days, I have seen, read, and heard all sorts of broken theology. Broken theology is all a bunch of lies. Some are told that you can follow Jesus without sacrifice. Some say that you sacrifice for things that are not worth it. Some say it’s okay to be selfish, especially if it makes you happy. Imagine if you spent all that time, money, or effort that you sacrifice for others for yourself, what kinds of fun could you be having or what new toys could you own by now? All a bunch of pretty, sugar-coated lies. And we love them.

    There is a ‘real’ right and wrong. If it were not so, how could we declare so many things to be wrong? For example: this whole idea of discretionary funding for politicians, governmental corruption, politically-motivated massacres, even something as simple as someone lying to you. If you managed to find someone who disagrees with this notion of right and wrong, and you will undoubtedly detect the hypocrisy. He may break a promise or two made to you, but once you do the same, you are mean and wrong. A nation may violate another nation’s sovereignty, but as soon as someone tries to violate theirs, they say that their sovereignty is being challenged. The list can go on forever.

    If there is no real difference between fairness and unfairness, how is one able to claim the idea that they are being treated unfairly? How would you differentiate between how one ought to be treated?

    At this point in time, there are a group of young people who are between the ages of 14 to 33. One thing characterizes this group of people, they are all young and they are all in pursuit of comfort and success. But they also have one thing in common: they all believe themselves to be the hero of the story of their own lives.

    A particular girl from this group of people was named Anna, and she seemed to be comfortable and enjoyed life and its small pleasures. However, deep down inside, Anna was unhappy. She was disappointed with her life, why?