WONDERS ARE MANY: BORIS THE CORNFLAKE


Before all else we simply are; this wonder of being, of sentient consciousness of ourselves defies all attempts by science to reduce it to chemistry, interaction of atoms, descriptions of basic biology, always falls short. As James Hillman remarked no explanation is ever as interesting as the phenomenon itself.

‘Wonders are many, and none is more wonderful than man.’ Sophocles Antigone

“What a piece of worke is a man! how Noble in
Reason? How infinite in faculty? in forme and mouing
how expresse and admirable? In Action, how like an Angel?
In apprehension, how like a God?” Hamlet,  William Shakespeare

The inspired poetry of this wonder cascades down the ages, rich in analogy, potency, the spiritual and the numinous.  Contemplating this wonder what wealth of images comes to mind to summon up this human condition, this journey of a man?

How about a cornflake?


“Whatever you may think of the value of IQ tests, it is surely relevant to a conversation about equality that as many as 16% of our species have an IQ below 85, while about 2% have an IQ above 130. The harder you shake the pack, the easier it will be for some cornflakes to get to the top.”[1]

Indeed and many of our species, possibly as few as 16%, though with the passing years I fear the proportion to be much higher, lack imagination, compassion basic human empathy. Some indeed are motivated by nothing more than that most corrosive of all human attributes, greed.

“And for one reason or another — boardroom greed or, as I am assured, the natural and God-given talent of boardroom inhabitants — the income gap between the top cornflakes and the bottom cornflakes is getting wider than ever. I stress: I don’t believe that economic equality is possible; indeed, some measure of inequality is essential for the spirit of envy and keeping up with the Joneses that is, like greed, a valuable spur to economic activity.”[2]

Such people are perhaps more to be pitied than despised, for they are denied the experience of what it means to be fully human.

As for the utility of greed and envy as a ‘spur to economic activity,’ I can speak with over 12 years experience as a counsellor working in addiction.[3] Greed and envy achieve little but burn out, destruction and the poverty of the human spirit.

Some of our species do indeed though seem cursed, and it may be as high as 16%. Raised in privilege and entitlement, wrapped in wealth and good fortune they are sadly deficient in one area of judgement, - they do not know when to shut up!


[1] Boris Johnson Mayor of London speaking at the Margaret Thatcher Memorial lecture.
[2] Ibid
[3] Indeed owing to contractual relations with the human resources department of a large city firm, counselled many former ‘high flyers.’


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