Foolishness


“A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.”
William Blake

Dia das mentiras - “The day of telling lies” that is what the Portuguese call April fool’s day. Now, the 1st of April is long gone, but foolishness will remain for as long as there are humans. Foolishness is a vice. I cannot be convinced otherwise. Foolishness is something the world can surely do without, but hey, we are stuck with fools and their foolish behaviour. It is as the Maori proverb say: “Fools do foolish things.” The problem is that there are people who, at times, enjoy foolish people much more (because of their silliness), than they do wise people (because of their wisdom). It is equally sad that there are even some clever people who, after finding themselves too long in the company of fools, easily become foolish themselves, and a knowledgeable fool is a greater fool than an ignorant fool. This makes me recall a striking Welsh proverb that says that a spoon does not know the taste of soup, nor a learned fool the taste of wisdom. George Eliot (Novelist) struck the nail on its head when saying that wisdom hears but half the applause in the vain laughter of foolishness. Yes, the dullness of the fool is indeed the whetstone of the wits. Charles Spurgeon (Evangelist) said that to know is not to be wise. Many people know a great deal and are all the greater fools for it. There is no fool so great a fool as a knowing fool. But to know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom. Always practice good sense and judgement, and remember, there are limits to behaving comically. Let me end today by reminding you that it doesn’t matter how big a fool may think he/she is, there is always a bigger fool to admire him/her and to add to that, a fool and his/her words are soon parted from each other.

So you think that being a fool is very cool?
Let me tell you something about your folly…
Step down from that pedestal and maybe you’ll see
that your folly is but a disguise for your melancholy…




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