Historical self-help, a commentary, #1

From The Art of Worldly Wisdom by Baltasar Gracian, published in 1647:

1. Everything today has its point, but nothing is more important than becoming a person. More is required to produce one wise person than used to be required for seven; and more is needed to deal with a single individual in these times than with an entire population in the past.

This is the opening salvo from Gracian in a book that contains 300 such entries. This is one of the weaker ones, mainly because of its generic introductory nature.

What I like about this paragraph is the human conceit that one's time is so much more complex and difficult than any earlier time. I don't know if "seven" is from an idiom of 17th century Spain but it serves to show that Gracian wanted to make his audience feel that they have a great responsibility for themselves. He makes the ratio even greater for our responsibility in dealing with others.

The real importance of this paragraph is in the initial sentence. Everything has meaning, art, commerce, nature, science, religion, philosophy, etc. "But nothing is more important than becoming a person." Aren't we all persons? Isn't that just another word for human?

It is, but in this context, Gracian is talking about our character and our individual personalities. We'll see as we review this book that he focuses on how to behave and get along in the world. Clearly, he believes if we focus on correct behavior, we'll have a far better go of it here on Earth. And a better go of it, to me, is what happiness is all about.

Surprisingly, his advice isn't all that dated. As a matter of fact, a lot of so-called self-help gurus have probably just rewritten Gracian's wisdom, maybe even unknowingly. I'm not charging anyone with plagiarism.

This commentary will be a periodic thing. I'm not promising a post per day on this one. And this feature will not be limited to this book, though most everything will be pre-20th century (or at least in the public domain!)