It is only those who know neither an inner call nor an outer doctrine whose plight truly is desperate.
For centuries Daedalus has represented the type of the artist-scientist: that curiously disinterested, almost diabolic human phenomenon, beyond the normal bounds of social judgment, dedicated to the morals not of his time but of his art. He is the hero of the way of thought - singlehearted, courageous, and full of faith that the truth, as he finds it, shall make us free.
...the heroes of all time have gone before us; the labyrinth is thoroughly known; we have only to follow the thread of the hero-path. And where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find a god; where we had thought to slay another, we shall slay ourselves, where we had thought to be alone, we shall be with all the world...
The happy ending is justly scorned as a misrepresentation; for the world, as we know it, as we have seen it, yields but one ending: death, disintegration, and the crucifixion of our heart with the passing of the forms that we have loved.
catharsis - purification of the community from the taints and poisons of the past year, the old contagion of sin and death.
This was the old function of the festival and mystery-plays.
The meditating mind is united, in the mystery play, not with the body that is shown to die, but with the principle of continuous life that for a time was the reality clothed in the apparition.
The universal life that throbs and celebrates its victory in the very kiss of our own annihilation constitutes the experience of the tragic art.
Tragedy is the shattering of the forms and of our attachment to the forms; comedy, the wild and careless, inexhaustible joy of life invincible.
-Joseph Campbell, Hero with a Thousand Faces
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