A LESSON IN HUMILITY

It is, I suspect, a truth of history that each succeeding generation considers itself superior to all the previous ones. If asked, each new generation would assert it is the best, the brightest, the wisest. If that is not enough self-praise, find any laudatory adjective, make it superlative, and that is who we are. And, the truth is each generation would be correct.

Learning from the past certainly is not always a waste of time even given how prone we are to repeat the mistakes of generations past. History, unfortunately, repeats itself, and not just once or twice. Yet, and thankfully, as foolish as we often are, we do learn. We do become wiser and brighter and better precisely because we have learned something from our past, from our ancestors.

On occasion we may be fortuitously placed in a situation where we are given pause and reason to reconsider the notion of superiority. Perhaps, as we look around and listen, we might conclude there have been generations that were brighter and wiser than we are today, at least in some areas of knowledge and expertise. Perhaps. If this were so, would it be a blow to our ego? Would it be a lesson in humility? I think so. In fact I know so, and from experience.

Years ago Arlena and I spent two weeks in Italy. We found ourselves immersed in a history over 2500 years old. We walked through buildings almost 2000 years old. When I asked a retired engineer who was on the tour with us, a man who helped build interstate highways, why we cannot make cement today like the cement the Romans used in erecting the Coliseum, he said that we could, but we have to use reinforcing bars. Oh!

Think about it. They built that edifice in seven years and it’s still standing despite the ravages of time, pollution and looters. We take two years to build modern coliseums and then tear them down thirty years later because they are falling apart at the seams – bad cement, I suppose.

We walked through ancient cathedrals whose massive domes are held up by only God knows how. Our brightest structural engineers are still trying to figure out how they did it in those darker ages. Even our best and most sophisticated computers can’t figure it out! We walked streets over a thousand years old. Our modern streets fall apart in decades. Our tour guides inundated us with facts. It quickly because a case of information overload yet, all the while there was a continual sense of “Wow! Maybe we’re not as wise and as bright as we think we are.”

It is easy for any generation to become arrogant. Each, no doubt has, as history will surely attest. The same is true for us as individuals, as we could attest if our pride would allow. All we need do is delve into our ancestry and see for ourselves. The past, no matter where we encounter it, will always bring us up short if we are willing to look, listen and learn. If we are not, if we think we are the best and the brightest, if we refuse to humbly acknowledge that parts of the past may be better than the best of the present, well, it is our loss, and a sad loss at that.