Today, I am thankful for those stalwarts who exhibit a reverence for life.
A polymath is an individual whose interests expand a wide range of diverse arenas. Individuals such as Aristotle, Leonardo da Vinci, and Benjamin Franklin were true polymaths; in fact, they all possessed an unquenchable thirst for knowledge & spent their entire lives in the quest for novel ideals.
Among the great polymaths is a lesser-known pioneer, Dr. Albert Schweitzer. From the time he was born on this day (Jan 14) in 1875 until his death 90 years later, this Alsatian luminary made the most of his existence. He was an accomplished musician, renowned theologian, respected physician, & revered humanitarian. In his lifetime, he and his wife founded a hospital in what is now Gabon, Africa, where they dutifully cared for the inflicted for most of the remainder of their lives.
He even established his own philosophical tenet, The Reverence for Life. As his biographer James Brabazon best described his philosophy, the only thing Schweitzer was fully sure of is that ‘we live and want to go on living. This is something that we share with everything else that lives... So we are brothers and sisters to all living things, and owe to all of them the same care and respect, that we wish for ourselves.’ After WWII, Schweitzer was awarded the Nobel Prize of Peace for his philosophy and his relentless campaign against the nefarious use of nuclear weaponry.
So, today, I’m thankful for the lessons Schweitzer has taught me about happiness & living life to the fullest.
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