What is the greatest magic after love?

[Krogan Doctor]

Bravery. The willingness to go the distance (possibly losing something dear to yourself) for someone.

Patience. The ability to control and conquer one's baser emotions, and by so doing possibly preserve love.

Loyalty. Sticking with a person or ideal even when it may cost you.

Temperance. The ability to resist illicit or ignoble impulses.

Which of these 4?


I'd go with bravery, although patience is a very close second.

 

[Perfection]

To crush your enemies, to see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women.

 

[Crezth]

where is "shooting lightning from your fingertips" in this list

 

[Adjuvant]

I voted loyalty, because "bravery" to me isn't "what will you die for", but rather "what will you live for"; what will you tolerate to keep yourself fit to care for those in your care. Anyone can die for something. Not all will choose to live against staggering odds. That is the triumph of spirit. As you classified it as potential loss I think we need a better word. Sacrifice, maybe.

Patience and temperance go hand-in-hand. If I feel the need to respond and if I do not respond, I'm not being honest. I can be no more honest on the matter in anything I do after that and I deserve nothing from it.

 

[Dachs]

When Caine is in contact with the blood of the Blind God, he can blow up his enemies' heads.

So I'm voting for that black oil stuff. Black Flow. Whatever it is.

 

[Kyriakos]

Lovecraft once was sad about a typo they had made in a printing of a story of his. His original phrase was "magic lore", and they printed it as "magic love". He felt that it sounded as if he was illiterate.

While i can accept how some people might use the term magic in a way which refers to other meanings, in my view it does not really help much when examining emotions or other phenomena of the mental world.

 

[Adjuvant]

I chose to run with it, on the consideration the guy's possibly really from Jakarta, and with English as his second language, possibly there's a semantic issue in the communication. To me, he's substituted "magic" for "quality of character".

On that, I was surprised by Dachs' response. That person is usually pretty intuitive and articulate. We all have bad nights, I guess.

edit: Dachs, I think the word you're looking for is "miasma".

 

[Kyriakos]

That is quite a miasmatic atmosphere

 

[Gatsby]

What is the greatest magic after love?

To only see silver linings. No, wait, that's before love...

 

[Synobun]

Happiness with stability. I've seen too often that people get bored or stir-crazy once things settle down. I think the greatest magic after the high from a love is when you can wake up, have a routine, go through the motions, and you're completely happy with that.

 

[Souron]

Lovecraft once was sad about a typo they had made in a printing of a story of his. His original phrase was "magic lore", and they printed it as "magic love". He felt that it sounded as if he was illiterate.

While i can accept how some people might use the term magic in a way which refers to other meanings, in my view it does not really help much when examining emotions or other phenomena of the mental world.

I agree with this. I think distilling what is meant by magic here is useful.

Love is also an overloaded term. It can mean romance, it can mean passion, it can mean strong, broad empathy and it can mean other things. These are different things, and their "magic" is different.

Broadly I think selflessness is a great virtue, because as human beings we have an inherent quality of selfishness. So any time a cause becomes more important than that selfish drive, that shows a level of certainty not otherwise apparent.

 

[Mise]

Of those listed, temperance wins easily.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

Revenge. Revenge is the greatest magic and it is becoming the driving force in my life. One day I am going to show them all !!!

 

[Souron]

Here's a rundown of the four:

Bravery. The willingness to go the distance (possibly losing something dear to yourself) for someone.
Bravery is overcoming fear. We all have fears we wish to overcome, which is why this virtue if so appealing. But is that a good way to judge a person? Their ability to overcome strong emotion? perhaps that emotion is not so strong for them in the first place.

Patience. The ability to control and conquer one's baser emotions, and by so doing possibly preserve love.
This approaches rejecting emotion completely. Or completely controlling it. If patience is such a great virtue, then the most virtuous person must be stone cold and calculating. Patience is a virtue, but to put it above others seems unwarranted.

Loyalty. Sticking with a person or ideal even when it may cost you.
This depends largely on what one is loyal to. I believe all authority should be questioned. Anything that would tell you what to do, how to behave, what is and isn't true, should be judged with harsh scrutiny before it is accepted. At it's best, loyalty is the outcome of that judgment. But at its worst, loyalty is the difference of personal responsibility to another. It can mean differing your own judgment to someone or something unqualified and wrong. With that in mind, even at its best, is loyalty the right virtue to praise? Is that one has passed judgment on something and deemed it worthy the true magical quantity when it's involved?

Temperance. The ability to resist illicit or ignoble impulses.
If one holds that love is the greatest magic, then this surely cannot be the second. For whatever love is, it can be the strongest of impulses. If you value love first, then temperance second, you've judged that love is the only emotion worth having. You may consider temperance to apply only to ignoble impulses, but what makes an impulse noble or ignoble is largely a mater of degree. Is love really that good that it would be the only impulse that you would always at fist judgment think nobly about?

 

[Hygro]

courage > bravery.

Where's integrity?

 

[Farm Boy]

courage > bravery.

Where's integrity?

Probably rolled up somewhere within temperance.

 

[Glassfan]

I recently watched that Brony movie on Netflix, and I can now see where some of you get your ideas. Clearly, our cultural norms are in flux and it's hard for we geriatrics to keep up. Eventually the younger generation will face its' trancendential crisis and we'll see what it's made of. WWPD?

 

[Kyriakos]

Loyalty seems to not be (by itself, or centered on itself) an actual virtue, in my view...

I mean if you stand by someone nomatter what, then why should that be seen as virtuous? He may be guilty of crimes.

Maybe substitute it with a subset of 'love'. For example two of the Pythagoreans were known for an incident where the local king sentenced one to death, and the other took his place as a prissoner )to be killed himself if the other one fled) so that the first could return home and say goodbye to his family. Days later he returned so as to be killed as sentenced*. That is not loyalty, but actual friendship; the person would not keep supporting his friend if the other just meant to escape nomatter what.

*In the end the king pardoned them both.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damon_and_Pythias

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Of those listed, temperance wins easily.

I agree. All others can be really fulfilling in themselves, but in comparison to them temperance is just really hard and uncomfortable work. But more, temperance isn't just a delicate challenge - it is also the counter-part to love. Because if you don't love you need temperance to not be a dick. You can though be very dickish and at the same time be very loyal or brave or patient.
However, to fill a gap of love with temperance one also needs loyalty, bravery and patience.

 

[Traitorfish]

I'm told conjuration has the biggest pay-off in the end, although I never have the patience for that sort of build and always end up playing destruction/restoration. Alteration is probably the most generally useful, though, if that's what you're getting at- gotta have those wards!