Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Whole Human Race


In the first Pirates of the Caribbean film, The Curse of the Black Pearl, Captain Hector Barbossa explains the origin and nature of the titular curse: 
Buried on an island of the dead, what cannot be found except for those who know where it is. Find it, we did. There be the chest...inside, be the gold. And we took them all! We spent 'em, and traded 'em, and frittered 'em away on drink and food and pleasurable company. The more we gave them away, the more we came to realize the drink would not satisfy, food turned to ash in our mouths, and all the pleasurable company in the world could not slake our lust. We are cursed men, Miss Turner. Compelled by greed, we were. But now, we are consumed by it.

Are the fictional pirates being described really so very different from most of us on Planet Earth? We want, but don't have. We acquire, but things don't satisfy.

It reminds me of the oft-told tale of someone asking multimillionaire John D. Rockefeller how much money was enough. The story is told that he looked the inquirer in the eye and said, "Just a little more."

Truth is...If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world. (C. S. Lewis)


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