Blind man commits suicide after visiting a bunch of tossers!
(News Report 2014 AD).
John Milton - the republican English poet (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674)
- was also blind (possibly from reading too often in a poor light) at one point in his life and could not work.....
Would we have withdrawn benefits from a national poet and hero like him?...
Benefits are not a lot of money!....
This man should not have had his benefits withdrawn.
The poem "On His Blindness" by John Milton refers to the whole issue of work.
===========================================
"On His Blindness"
By John Milton.
When I consider how my light is spent
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
And that one Talent which is death to hide
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest He returning chide,
"Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?"
I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, "God doth not need
Either man's work or his own gifts. Who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state
Is kingly: thousands at his bidding speed,
And post o'er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait."
============================================
It does us well to read it carefully even today!.....
[One thing that strikes us is its great religiosity compared to our times!....]
"They also serve who stand and wait...."...
We need to rebuild a society in which we are less resentful of each other.
We are all owed our basic needs - are we not?.....
Why should we have such an oppressive paid work ethic?
Surely we can hope for something better?......
..........................
Milton would have approved of WORK and SERVICE.
Coming from a more religious time than ours.
He was a Puritan and a Protestant and perhaps therefore even more inclined to it.
("The Protestant Work Ethic" is a THEORY not a teaching......)....
He walked around Europe. He had no petrol driven chariot, nor iron road train to transport him!...
Yet he did his Grand Tour all the same!.....
Yet he would not necessarily even have understood what we mean by a JOB nowadays.
............
-------------------------------------------
