- "Half of the world makes fun of the other half, and folly guides them all."
Baltasar Gracián y Morales, SJ (8 January 1601 – 6 December 1658) was a Spanish Jesuit, thinker, and writer of the 17th century. Although not as well remembered as some of his more colourful colleagues of the Spanish Golden Age, he is regarded as one of the premier moral philosophers of the Baroque and a predecessor to Existentialism, upheld by the French writers of The Enlightenment and celebrated by Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche in later times. His guidebooks about life and society, whose pragmatical contents may brand him as a sort of Machiavelli for the working and middle classes, remain somewhat popular in modern self-help and personal development circles.
He was born in a decently wealthy family, being the son of a physician, which allowed him to enter the Company of Jesus and study philosophy, ethics, and theology. He worked most of his life as a professor but also had the chance to enter the cultural circles of the court thanks to his job as confessor to the Viceroy of Aragon, and also participated as a military chaplain in the drowning of the Catalonian Revolt. Despite his non-combatant role, he turned out to be an improbable Rousing Speech specialist and was eventually nicknamed the "Padre of the Victory" by the rest of the troops. He started writing his literary works around this time, under the patronage of the wealthy humanist Vicencio Juan de Lastanosa.
Gracián initially published under the identity of his brother Lorenzo, but the rest of the Jesuits found out about his literary career and disapproved, as he published his books without their permission and often wrote about uncomfortable political and non-religious topics, a combination that turned him into a dangerous, uncontrollable maverick to their eyes (have in mind their order had been founded to counter The Protestant Reformation and regulate this exact kind of thing). He was also frowned upon for his style of preaching and for not being too harsh about the sin of lust, which has led some to speculate that he had some secrets. The result is that the Company eventually kicked him out. Gracián managed to rebuild his career towards the end of his life thanks to his other connections, but died shortly after.
Gracián's philosophy is that of a Determined Defeatist, being pessimistic about the evils of the world and always ready to remind you all the various ways life sucks, yet also hopeful that we can learn to navigate its waters and counter evil through knowledge and judicious thought. His style resembles that of his colleague Francisco de Quevedo in his skilled usage of words and concepts, as well as their affinity for Stoicism, with their fellow Hispanic Seneca being a strong influence on them. He especially shines as a technical writer due to his incredibly flowery, even openly cryptic style, which can make it a really slow and reflective read if you are reading him in original Spanish.
Works
- El Héroe (The Hero): a book of the genre known as "mirrors for princes" in the vein of The Prince in which he theorizes about the ideal man, offering comparisons with historical characters that might fit with every virtue. The first edition was dedicated to King Philip IV of Spain, who had a copy in his personal library.
- El Politico (The Politician): from the same genre, a thesis on how King Ferdinand the Catholic was the ideal image of a king. Contrary to the previous, this book is believed to be a subtle jab to Philip IV, presenting his ancestor as a much better monarch he should learn with; it was published in Philip's lowest point, while Portugal and Catalonia were revolting against him.
- Arte de ingenio, tratado de la agudeza, later revised as Agudeza y arte de ingenio (Art of Ingenuity): literary analysis on poetry and prose of his time.
- El Discreto (The Discreet Man): another work about the ideal man, this time emphasizing rethoric and dialectic.
- Oráculo manual y arte de prudencia (translated currently as The Art of Worldly Wisdom: A Pocket Oracle): his most popular work nowadays, and the one you might be most likely to find published along with Sun Tzu's The Art of War and such. It is basically a list of maxims and advice about how to act in one's life, often in highly cynical and devious ways. Schopenhauer liked it so much that he translated it to German, while Nietzsche called it the absolute best work of its kind in Europe. It was translated and published to English in the late 19th century and became a huge success across The British Empire, with Winston Churchill himself allegedly owning a copy, and a re-edition in the United States in 1992 further turned it into a best seller.
- El Comulgatorio: the only he published under his real name, as well as his only religious work. A Eucharistic manual, essentially.
- El Criticón (The Critic): published in three parts and considered his magnum opus, as well as one of the peak works of the Spanish Golden Age. It's a long allegoric novel about human life and a Genre Mashup, combining picaresque novel, Byzantine romance, philosophy and social commentary. Another of Schopenhauer's favorites.
Tropes about his work:
- The Ace: In all of his works, he advises to work hard to be proficient in everything. In case of failure, he warns it is preferible to suffer from Crippling Overspecialization than from being a Master of None, as in the former case you at least have one really effective asset to rely on while in the latter you have none.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: He was a pretty effective and entertaining preacher, but his methods were sometimes quirky, even frowned upon by his superiors. For one, he once read to his parishioners an alleged letter from Hell.
- Enlightened Self-Interest: His Art of Wisdom assumes a reader who is fundamentally self-interested and more than a bit willing to use other people. However, the book states that people without this knowledge tend to be even worse, therefore this is the only way a good person will thrive and hopefully bring good to others.
- Have a Gay Old Time: Reading Gracián in the original Early Modern Spanish can be a pain not only due to his choice of intentionally complicating his discourse, but also because words have varied their meaning and usage over the centuries — you are effectively reading wordplay not easy to get with words you might not get anyway. For this reason, translations tend to make deliberate licenses to render it more understandable for their own readers.
- Hitler Ate Sugar: Addressed in a vital aphorism of his, "don’t pick the wrong side just because your opponent happened to choose the right one."
- Knight Templar: Gracián openly sees life as a war against the malice of others and believes one must necessarily be a Guile Hero, but in the process he formularles guidelines that are often underhanded, manipulative and outright amoral. He was a Jesuit after all.
- Manipulative Bastard: Some of his aphorisms either tiptoe the line of dark psychology or cross it directly into unbridled Machiavellianism (although always with a collected, grandfatherly tone that make them sound like simple wisdom). For one, he openly states it's convenient to let people be dependant on you even although you could completely fix their needs if you wanted, as by that way you retain their service indefinitely instead of enabling them to abandon you as soon as they don't need you anymore. He does say you shouldn't actively undermine them in an unrepairable way to achieve their dependence, although perhaps only because that would make enemies out of them should they ever realize.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: In his Art of Wisdom, Gracián values the social ability to look less smart and competent than one actually is, especially in order not to make one's superiors feel threatened or jealous. However, he warns not to take it too far and look downright stupid, which is seldom useful. He famously stated, "fools are all those who look like fools, and half of those who do not".
- Popularity Power: Cultivating a flawless reputation is vital in Art of Wisdom. Again, however, he warns one must not exceed himself in order not to attract envy or any other peril of fame.
- The Power of Friendship: Straight, subverted and discussed in all possible ways. Gracián is certainly a believer in friendship — he calls friends "your second being" — but he has a fluid view of it. He advises to be picky with the people you try to befriend, preferably choosing the wise, honorable and well positioned over the opposite, and to be strategic whenever you have to help them or ask them for help, as to avoid compromising them or getting yourself compromised. He also teaches that there are several kinds of friends, some of them being True Companions and some being just people useful or fun to be around (those he advises to try to make at least one everyday). He also makes the standard point that friends can one day turn into enemies and vice versa. However, Gracián that even with the best friends, one must ultimately suffice with himself because In the End, You Are on Your Own.
- Purple Prose: Absolutely constant, and very deliberately done; he believed that using a high style and being understood only by a few learned was preferable to lowering his style so the common reader could understand him. Some of his adages are very open to interpretation, and his might be one of the reasons why the similarly cryptic Nietzsche loved his texts. He is, however, laconic, favoring brevity over extension.
- Sacrificed Basic Skill for Awesome Training: A big no no for him. He warns that knowing the extraordinary often leads to ignore the ordinary.
- Silly Rabbit, Cynicism Is for Losers!: Perhaps surprisingly, this is a point Gracián also makes. He states that optimism is a skill that allows one to find something good where there seems to be nothing, while pessimism only ruins everything by finding shortcomings where they are not necessary.
- Shout-Out:
- His quote about people looking like fools already appears among the aphorisms of Juan Manuel's Tales of Count Lucanor, a famous Spanish medieval book of fables.
- His quote about the lion and the fox seems to be a reference to a similar quote in Niccolò Machiavelli's The Prince.
- He namedrops Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, and in a veiled way Hernán Cortés, as examples of great strategists who also knew when to run.
- The Stoic: As he states, the first thing or person one must dominate is himself and his own passions.
- Strong and Skilled: Constantly reminds that one must train his natural talents, and that not doing it equates to have only half of one's potential.
- Weak, but Skilled: Succintly explained as, "if you can’t wear the skin of a lion, wear the skin of a fox."
- We Have Become Complacent: He expresses a warning about this in another quote: "if you enter the house of Fortune through the door of pleasure, you will leave through the door of sorrow, and vice versa".
- Ye Goode Olde Days: Seems to have this attitude, with his idea that "it takes more to make one sage today than it did to make the seven of Greece".
- And Your Little Dog, Too!: Gracián advises not to risk solely yourself in any dangerous enterprise, and to actively involve others so they will fight for themselves in a way you will also benefit from.
