Frustrated

The Devil is the most discontented creature in the world. He is the proudest creature there is, and the most discontented creature, and the most dejected creature.

Jeremiah Burroughs

Contentment

There are no works that God has made—the sun, moon, stars and all the world—in which so much of the Glory of God appears, as in a man who lives quietly in the midst of adversity.

Jeremiah Burroughs

Only Through Time

We must not, that is, try to behave as though the Fall had never occurred nor yet say that the Fall was a Good Thing in itself. But we may redeem the Fall by a creative act.

That, according to Christian doctrine, is the way that God behaved, and the only way in which we can behave if we want to be “as gods”. The Fall had taken place and Evil had been called into active existence; the only way to transmute Evil into Good was to redeem it by creation. But, the Evil having been experienced, it could only be redeemed within the medium of experience—that is, by an incarnation in which experience was fully and freely in accordance with the Idea.

Dorothy Sayers, The Mind of the Maker

Ideas in Education

The art is greatest which conveys to the mind of the spectator, by any means whatsoever, the greatest number of the greatest ideas; and I call an idea great in proportion as it is received by a higher faculty of the mind, and as it more fully occupies, and in occupying, exercises and exalts, the faculty by which it is received.

If this, then, be the definition of great art, that of a great artist naturally follows. He is the greatest artist who has embodied, in the sum of his works, the greatest number of the greatest ideas.

John Ruskin

Put this together with Charlotte Mason’s statement that the mind feeds on ideas (and is thereby educated) and you may conclude that great art is the best tool of educating the mind.

I’ll have to return to this later.

Good Work Update

It’s getting close to midnight and all you Good Work subscribers are doubtless wondering whether your date has stood you up. The truth is he’s been unavoidably delayed, but he’ll be there soon. Here’s proof:

My friend (and design superhero) Ryan Harrison has been rolling through his own client work and had to step back from this issue, which gave me the opportunity to try my own hand at zine design. When you get your copy, you’ll notice it has a somewhat… rougher aesthetic, like it was done with tape and a cheap scanner.

*cough, cough*

Actually I’m pleased with the result. It fits very comfortably in the charmingly chaotic world of zines. I’ll think you’ll enjoy it.

Smart Poison

There are a lot of reasons to say no when your pre-teen asks for a smartphone. One of the most obvious reasons is that smartphones give you unfiltered and unlimited access to entertainment, which isn’t a good thing for anyone, least of all teenagers. It’s like carrying around a TV and video game console in your pocket. (I mean, that’s exactly what it is.)

Almost more detrimental than constant entertainment is social media. (I’d throw texting in there, too.) Jean Twenge has been studying teen mental health for ten years now and documented some disturbing trends in her book iGen. Her hypothesis was that the spike in teenage depression was caused by smartphones and social media. Not everyone was convinced, and a lot of other explanations were proposed. In this recent newsletter, Twenge looks at thirteen alternative explanations for “the high levels of distress among teens,” including the economy, COVID, school shootings, and climate change. It should come as no surprise that she has good reasons for dismissing all of them.