Seton Magazine Catholic Homeschool Articles, Advice & Resources

Every human being experiences the conflict between duty and pleasure, what a person wishes to do for enjoyment and what a person ought to do by way of obligation. These two tendencies often appear as contrary, irreconcilable powers that inevitably clash and produce resentment or frustration.

Two great ancient philosophers, Marcus Aurelius in Meditations and Boethius in The Consolation of Philosophy — two works renowned for their great wisdom and moral power — teach the importance of the virtue of self-possession. Both writers observe that no persons can control the outside events that surround them.

Disappointment, rejection, and defeat, however, do not mean incompetence, weakness, or failure. When a person shakes off the dust, he leaves because of the stiff-necked and hardhearted unwillingness of the many that lack docility and openness to the truth the messenger brings.

In the folk tale, five brothers all choose their profession and perform their work with success and prosperity: a brick maker, a mason, an architect, an innovator, and a critic. However, only the oldest brother unites vocation and avocation, and only his work has effects for the future and for heaven.

In the story the merchant’s son who wasted his money finds himself in desperate circumstances until a friend gives him a magical flying trunk. When he flies with it and descends from the sky, he introduces himself as a Turkish god who has come from above to marry the king’s daughter. Honored with this privilege, the king gladly agrees to the marriage: “Yes, you shall certainly marry our daughter.”

To be human is to be born with desires, to have wishes, and to experience longings. But not all wishes have the same quality, nature, or origin. Some wishes assume the shape of daydreams or fantasies as utopian visions enter the mind and people imagine impossibilities.

Man by nature is idealistic, seeks excellence, and hopes for perfection, but he is bound by the weakness of human nature and the limits of the human condition. There is no such being as a faultless painter or a sinless human being. In the sport of baseball every player aspires to get a hit every time and bat 1.000, but even the best of batters only have an average of .300.

According to proverbial wisdom, “When you do succeed, the chances are that you were not trying too hard in the first place.” This observation appears to contradict the idea of ...

In Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s classic Gift from the Sea the author, using the leisure and recollection of a summer vacation at the ocean, reflects on the art of living a ...

The ancient Greeks identified the sign of fruitfulness as proof of the art of living well, as the true mark of civilization. On the shield of Achilles in the Iliad ...

To be human is to think of the future, to imagine the unknown, and to fear the unpredictable. So many things are not in the control of human beings who ...

In O. Henry’s short story “The Social Triangle,”  Ikey Snigglefritz, a simple tailor’s apprentice, receives his week’s wages and on his way home enters the Café Maginnis. There he accidentally ...

In his fairy tale “The Goblin at the Provision Dealer’s” or in some editions entitled “The Pixy at the Grocer’s,” Hans Andersen depicts the life of a goblin who enjoys ...

A critic of Jane Austen’s novels facetiously coined this phrase to illustrate one of the virtues of civility. Characters with the most refined and elegant manners exemplify this virtue that ...

What is Nature without the pied beauty of the four seasons? What is a home without paint, pictures, flowers, and interior decoration? What are human beings without tasteful, dignified clothing? ...

“Set a watch, Lord, beside my mouth and a door about my lips.” Psalm 38:1 The art of living is the knowledge of knowing when to speak and when to ...

The art of living demands that persons be willing to commit themselves, to have convictions, and to act even though one does not have perfect knowledge or clear foresight. Aristotle ...

The Devil thrives on conflict and dissension. Division or “legion” is his name. Whether it is wars between nations, heresy or schism in the Church, or divorce in families, the ...

In the Odyssey, Homer’s epic about the family as the center of civilization portrays two ways of life—the civilized and the barbaric. The civilized dwell in homes, the barbaric in ...

In Robert Frost’s “After Apple-Picking” the narrator spends an entire day from morning till evening picking all the apples before the first frost of the season. He has spent the ...