TILTING AT WINDMILLS: DO ONLY THE GOOD DIE YOUNG?

Thursday, February 5, 2009

DO ONLY THE GOOD DIE YOUNG?

Today I beg a question – is the old saying true - do only the good die young?

I ask it because whether you watch the Spanish, British or US news all too frequently a young member of the military is lost in action or a school child is slain.

In every case that I have heard reported the soldier, sailor or air force member was an exemplary service person. Every child was a popular, outstanding student with a bright future ahead.

Now I know it is said – never speak ill of the dead – but what about the truth?

Is never the barrack room lawyer, the social misfit, the stroppy lad or lassie killed in battle?

Does the class dunce or the school bully never meet a tragic untimely end?

It doesn’t stop them being a hero or their death being widely mourned – I just can’t believe it’s only the very good who die so very young.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...: I expect you are right - its the wish to not speak ill of the dead.I too believe that those killed in Iraq or Afghanistan are heroes - but - surely not all exemplary soldiers. To face the terrorists in hand to hand combat you need an edge - if they were not in uniform they would probably be described as louts.; February 6, 2009 at 9:06 AM

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TILTING AT WINDMILLS

Sancho Panza is much less learned but a good deal saner than his master.

"At this point they came in sight of thirty or forty windmills that are on that plain.

"Fortune," said Don Quixote to his squire, as soon as he had seen them, "is arranging matters for us better than we could have hoped. Look there, friend Sancho Panza, where thirty or more monstrous giants rise up, all of whom I mean to engage in battle and slay, and with whose spoils we shall begin to make our fortunes. For this is righteous warfare, and it is God's good service to sweep so evil a breed from off the face of the earth."

"What giants?" said Sancho Panza.

"Those you see there," answered his master, "with the long arms, and some have them nearly two leagues long."

"Look, your worship,'' said Sancho. "What we see there are not giants but windmills, and what seem to be their arms are the vanes that turned by the wind make the millstone go."

"It is easy to see," replied Don Quixote, "that you are not used to this business of adventures. Those are giants, and if you are afraid, away with you out of here and betake yourself to prayer, while I engage them in fierce and unequal combat."”