Life offers up these moments of joy despite everything.
Normal People, Sally Rooney
This past spring, I declared myself into the Philosophy Department. I’ve since encountered a problem: foundational principles spur curiosity about… life. I love philosophy with my whole heart, but I wanted to explore the rest of the humanities – all that make our lives worthwhile.
My fondness of Aristotle’s virtue ethics fueled a summer contemplating what kind of constitutional philosopher I want to be. Last fall, I took Dostoevsky and read Brothers Karamazov, in which a character named Ivan questions the moral legitimacy of God given the vast scale of suffering resulting from God-granted human freedom. In the spring, I took The Great Russian Novel and read Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina, where Anna loses everything for letting herself fall – but really, collapse – into electrifying, consumptive, destructive love with Vronsky.
I can’t imagine anything more riveting to discuss with a friend over coffee than divine ethics or the defensibility of love that bewitches and destroys. Just like how philosophy of religion and love guides Ivan and Anna, I spent my sophomore year discovering how the philosophy imbued in the humanities guides us to grapple with the deep, the absurd, and the absolutes in life. If we can even begin to make sense of such weighty matters, we can retain steadiness through moments that may feel troublesome but ultimately prove inconsequential. We can keep our senses of self through a mediocre paper grade, college club rejection, or silly romantic quarrels. It may be human for these trivialities to momentarily diminish our spirits, but they are nothing compared to the meaning, whether good or bad, that goes into rejecting God or choosing passion over marriage.
To fall into the humanities as Anna fell into love, I’ve recently declared English and Classics as minors in an attempt to solve my problem. This way, my work encapsulates what I see as the three foundations of the world: Philosophy, English, Classics. Rationality, humanity, society. Despite their disciplinary compartments, my arrival at these subjects has only made sense because they ebb and flow into each other. Is it a philosophical, literary, or classical question to ask about the role of grace in our lives? This is unnecessary to answer. These thoughts exist in our minds, in a constant sequence of intuitions and convictions constituting the human experience, classified only for convenience. The humanities departments here teach various things, yes, but they all teach us how to live. This is what we should seek from investigating the humanities.
I came to Princeton wanting to change the world, finding justice a worthy end in itself. I do still want to, as I believe civic engagement towards the greater good is a basic obligation. Yet, how sad would it be for us to solve every existential crisis tomorrow, only to have no idea how to appreciate compelling literature, give unconditional love, and cherish life’s offerings?
If you take nothing else from my ruminations, hear this: you may be one of many students who wants to attend Princeton to solve a great problem or serve humanity. I was once that kid too. It is a tempting motivation and ideal start, undoubtedly more valiant than chasing status or wealth. Once you’re here, though, remember that you will only save humanity with as much fervor as the fervor in which you believe humanity is worth saving. Poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for, John Keating tells us. Stay alive for the things which define the goodness of humanity. I believe you will be better off, and with you, the world.