How I Do Love Thee. Meek Simplicity...

 Woke up this morning thinking about simplicity.

There are four classic Quaker values: Peace, integrity, equality and simplicity- and in an expansive moment, thinking I wouldn't have to redeem the pledge for months, I committed myself to giving a talk about the fourth. Well, the months have passed and the talk is due next week...

What  I was thinking about this morning is how simplicity is rather different from the other three. Peace, Integrity and Equality are absolutes. Fundamental properties of Enlightenment or the Kingdom of Heaven or whatever you want to call it- and Simplicity ain't.

The obverse of simplicity is complexity and the one isn't right and the other wrong.  The choice between them is an aesthetic choice, a matter of temperament- even of mood. Some of us are puritans and like bare white-washed walls and some of us are cavaliers and would like to own a few Van Dycks (some hope!) . The universe is complex. The universe is simple. It's a single thing which contains everything. Complex, simple, complex, simple. Both are the case....

I obviously dig simplicity because if I didn't I wouldn't be attending the Meeting House. I also chafe against it...