“It is a delightful thing, while the great sea rages, to watch from the land another struggling with the waves: not because this is in itself a delight; yet it is a delight to watch calamities from which you feel yourself safe. So to look on a battle from some safe point of view.
But nothing is more delightful than, from some serene stronghold of knowledge, to look down upon the wanderings and errors of other men, and their efforts after mere wealth and power, rather than knowledge and a quiet mind.”
The first words of the opening of the second book of the Latin poet Lucretius, De Rerum Nalura.
We found these words on the wall of a cantina called Tropico 56 in Merida, Mexico, where the driver we hired for the day on the recommendation of a man we met outside of a bathroom who said I look like I spoke English used to be the manager, en route to a beach plagued by red tide. I digress. We had mezcalritas and googled the meaning. And I’ve been pondering it ever since.
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