Was just reading an article my dad emailed me about Charles Dickens and his first visit to the U.S. in 1842, how it turned from good to bad, how it brought upon a change of opinion where he felt disappointed and even termed Americans as ‘acquisitive’ by nature. (The details can be read in this BBC article that beautifully illustrates the wavering exchange of opinions between Dickens and the U.S.)
What caught my attention was the term ‘acquisitive.’ Its other forms being ‘acquisition,’ ‘acquiring,’ etc., it clearly connotes to the human want for accumulating possessions, coveting and desiring material goods. Many consider this as the bane of humanity. Even Buddhism, for that matter, advocates the renunciation of all desires as the path to salvation.
What I find most funny is that the very quest for moksha, nirvana, or salvation is acquisitive in nature. At the heart of all things—be it material goods, or concepts such as salvation—lies our pursuit of, or the acquisition of, the elusive happiness.
What's wrong in a beggar's acquisitiveness for a square meal,
What's right in a pundit laboring in salvation's zeal
Neither in a gold digger’s adamancy,
Nor in an ascetic’s pursuit of moksha and his prophecy
Happiness is not to be found in a concept or material thing,
What's wrong in a beggar's acquisitiveness for a square meal,
What's right in a pundit laboring in salvation's zeal
Neither in a gold digger’s adamancy,
Nor in an ascetic’s pursuit of moksha and his prophecy
Happiness is not to be found in a concept or material thing,
’Tis just a state of being that resides in a man’s heart within
At Hyderabad, after waking from my torpor resulting from an excess of tofu, the vegan paneer. – Faezal, Thursday, February 16, 2012, 19:00
