The Flaming Tripod From Which The Priestess Utters Her Oracles
Only the desire to deserve the praises that are brought to you strengthens your virtue, and those that are brought to the spirit, value and beauty, contribute to increase them. (Francois de la Rochefoucauld)
- Well, on the contrary, said Olympia. The theater is the pedestal, it is the fiery tripod from where the priestess utters her oracles in front of the crowds and pours on them the divine grace that devours her. You, however, want me to get off the tripod and crawl on the ground. You want me to extinguish the flame of divinity in my soul, so that I can become a woman again.
- I don’t want that, answered Lord Drummond with a pathos unusual for to the phlegmatic Englishman, I don’t want you to extinguish the flame of divinity. I just want her to burn only for me. I want to be the sole possessor of these heavenly gifts that you spread; I don’t want to share them with anyone. Ah ! I beseech you, Olympia, do not make fun of yourself, and do not take away any hopes of the bizarre passion that I feel when around you. Don’t punish me for loving you otherwise than one would a woman. Let us reflect, if I loved you with a common love, what would I have gained, when you are colder and purer than a marble? Did you not answer no to all the declarations and all the requests that your beauty and genius deserved?
All the efforts, all the insistences, all the efforts, all the attempts to conquer you, were they not in vain? Well, since you don’t want to be loved like a common woman, let me love you differently. You were born to understand a heart like mine, to satisfy my thirst as an artist, you who live only for art, priestess of music, for whom the Opera is a monastery and who never had other passions than for the embodiment of great roles and others lovers than Mozart and Cimarosa. In the name of Rossini, understand me and fulfill my wish ! Your genius, your soul, your voice, give it to me only. In return, you will have everything you want from me, wealth, name, even life. Oh ! If you would want to get married ! Being my wife, you would be forced to listen to me and sacrifice to me this terrible rival, which you prefer, the theater !
Lord Drummond spoke with such a convincing accent that Olympia had involuntarily become emotional.
- My lord, she said, you are almost as touching as you are absurd. My power to move people is greater than your power to have me only for yourself. Therefore, I will refuse to please you and I will never be a prisoner of the selfishness that you show. Goodbye !
Leadership: Are you able to commit an unforgivable act and not realize the prejudicial character of its consequences, manifesting the need for a radical restructuring of the fundamental ideas about the nature of the reality you perceive?
If someone thought it appropriate to lay down with tender words in the human soul the few moments of a rather empty and insignificant life, it means that he thought himself worthy of a deed that presents the danger of creating considerable barriers to the process of awareness of emotions. In this case, elegance and refinement present the danger of being used in kitsch combinations by people with a questionable aesthetic education.
As for the form of emotions (emotions being the ones that maintain the unity of the Self), if it is considered that they are imperfect, then it is much better that they do not manifest themselves, so emotions must be hidden until he comes to look for them and find the one to whom the treasure in the temple of the soul was meant. And, further, I would add that an emotion that is not felt as a whole by a great force of attraction, to the extent that feelings are basically sensations, does not appear until after you feel open to new experiences of knowledge, of living and action. It sounds quite strange, but it is so !
Leadership: Do you give yourself a small chance to accept your authentic self even when the thought, idea, intention and nature of reality is the basis of choosing an alternative to how you use reasoning to draw conclusions?
People usually do not want to give a ridiculous form to the emotions they create around them, and if there are mistakes on their part, only then do they try to weigh every word they say. Then follows the persistent request to take into account a triple desire, namely, that nothing of what they experience, of what they feel, should change, because it is the only possibility to accept themselves, to believe that they are loved. However, from what they do, as soon as their practices leave the accepted normal patterns, with their injustice, at that moment the responsibility of the mistakes concerns only them.
Memorable is this confession of the sense of responsibility with which Lord Drummond’s words were tempered before entering Olympia’s good graces, whence his right not to make concessions of any kind to preserve the privileges of a man of great character or to defend its territory of influence. And, then, Olympia’s warning about her mistakes in approaching reality, stemming from the fear of not altering the relationship between them, of not spoiling a certain pattern of conduct, designates a geometry of discernment and self-expression, imagined as the only one that must bear and keep the mark of rigorous thinking and emotional modeling.
Leadership is a satisfactory understanding of the connection between thoughts, emotions and deeds, able to consciously direct bodily, verbal and moral actions, towards the transmission of a message worthy of Plato: “Ugly deeds are followed by shame as a sanction; to beautiful ones, a zeal for honor.”
The Fiery Tripod From Which The Priestess Utters Her Oracles denotes that personality who wants to convey a message: “My power to move people is greater than your power to have me only for yourself. Therefore, I will refuse to please you and I will never be a prisoner of the selfishness you show.”
Well said Francois de la Rochefoucauld: "Only the desire to deserve the praises that are brought to you strengthens your virtue, and those that are brought to the spirit, value and beauty, contribute to increase them."
* Note: Dumas, Alexandre - The Hand of Providence , Editura Vestala, 1993, Bucureşti.
