Feb 9, 2015 08:24 PM
http://chronicle.com/article/May-You-Hav...ck/151627/
EXCERPT: [...] Luck and Fate are still deities we all give some level of credence and deference to, though we may know them more Christianized as Providence. They are also worshiped by many a middle-brow secularist as the Gene, by others as the Market. [...] Even a dyed-in-the-wool secular rationalist, every once in a while, banks on luck. Yet the rather superstitious person no differently knows that his luck, the good kind, must be husbanded, not banked on in the sense of "count on," but banked in the sense of "saved up," with its deployment deferred and economized. The lucky person knows not to press his luck, not to draw on it too often, nor ask too much of it.
Hitler made that mistake, when a preternaturally extraordinary run of luck lasting some 20 years, every improbability falling his way, lulled him into thinking the stern law of limited good luck did not apply to him. Nemesis, in his case, was only taking a very long nap. Nothing angers the gods like presumption. Ask Prometheus, or Satan. And that is why, until very recently, as a sign of the utter complacency that benevolent America has induced, Jews never had baby showers.
[...] Hope is that last fraying thread keeping you from slipping into the sludge of the Slough of Despond. You are feeling anything but lucky when hoping. In fact, you are feeling truly unlucky. Christianity made hope a theological virtue precisely because it is so hard to keep believing when your luck is bad, and you just start cursing God, take arms against Him and the sea of troubles you are now holding Him responsible for. Up until recently, you were indeed cold and starving, year in and year out, the lords and church skimming most all of your produce, even if you had been lucky enough not to have been plundered for provisions by armies and free companies of mercenaries a couple of times a decade....
EXCERPT: [...] Luck and Fate are still deities we all give some level of credence and deference to, though we may know them more Christianized as Providence. They are also worshiped by many a middle-brow secularist as the Gene, by others as the Market. [...] Even a dyed-in-the-wool secular rationalist, every once in a while, banks on luck. Yet the rather superstitious person no differently knows that his luck, the good kind, must be husbanded, not banked on in the sense of "count on," but banked in the sense of "saved up," with its deployment deferred and economized. The lucky person knows not to press his luck, not to draw on it too often, nor ask too much of it.
Hitler made that mistake, when a preternaturally extraordinary run of luck lasting some 20 years, every improbability falling his way, lulled him into thinking the stern law of limited good luck did not apply to him. Nemesis, in his case, was only taking a very long nap. Nothing angers the gods like presumption. Ask Prometheus, or Satan. And that is why, until very recently, as a sign of the utter complacency that benevolent America has induced, Jews never had baby showers.
[...] Hope is that last fraying thread keeping you from slipping into the sludge of the Slough of Despond. You are feeling anything but lucky when hoping. In fact, you are feeling truly unlucky. Christianity made hope a theological virtue precisely because it is so hard to keep believing when your luck is bad, and you just start cursing God, take arms against Him and the sea of troubles you are now holding Him responsible for. Up until recently, you were indeed cold and starving, year in and year out, the lords and church skimming most all of your produce, even if you had been lucky enough not to have been plundered for provisions by armies and free companies of mercenaries a couple of times a decade....
