How Do You Live?

by Genzaburo Yoshino

Then, in the city spreading boundless before him, the invisible tide welled up to its highest point. Before he knew it, Copper had become just another droplet inside that tide.

Still, as long as we held fast to the thought that our own planet was at the center of the universe, humanity was unable to understand the true nature of the universe—and likewise, when people judge their own affairs with only themselves at the center, they end up unable to know the true nature of society. The larger truth never reveals itself to them.

For example, a person discovers the pleasures of painting, sculpture, and music only by experiencing them. You will never be able to make someone understand this if they have not encountered great art. And for this subject in particular, we need more than our ordinary eyes and ears. To appreciate art, you must use your inner eyes and ears. You must open your heart. And your heart, well, it opens only when you actually encounter a great work of art in person and it makes a deep impression on you. If it means anything at all to live in this world, it’s that you must live your life like a true human being and feel just what you feel. This is not something that anyone can teach from the sidelines, no matter how great a person they may be.

That is why I think the first, most basic step in these matters is to start with the moments of real feeling in your life, when your heart is truly moved, and to think about the meaning of those. The things that you feel most deeply, from the very bottom of your heart, will never deceive you in the slightest. And so at all times, in all things, whatever feelings you may have, consider these carefully.

Think of your friend Kitami’s words: “No matter what anyone says . . . !” You must have that kind of willpower in your heart. Otherwise, while your mother and I hope that you will become a great man, and you may think that you want to be one as well, in the end you will simply become a great-seeming man, and true greatness may always elude you.

And that is why you absolutely must attend to the things you feel in your own heart, the things that move you deeply. That is what is most important, now and always. Do not forget this, and think carefully about what it means.

But if I were to put it simply, it’s that you should collect many experiences and, while you do, always be true to that voice in your heart.

“So you see, Copper, the things that we call obvious are tricky. When you think about a thing as if it were self-evident and follow it wherever it may lead, soon enough you run into a thing that you can no longer call self- evident. This is not only true when it comes to the science of physics . . .”

On a night like this, to think about the distant celestial world was to feel that one was disappearing into the atmosphere.

In the sky, the moon, without anger, laughter, or tears, with a quiet countenance over the rooftops and telephone poles, slipped past the boughs of the keyaki trees and followed the two of them as they walked.

That’s why, because of my idea, I feel that human particles are all connected like strings in a net, with countless other people that they haven’t met or even seen, and without even knowing it. That’s why I decided to call this the Net Rule of Human Particle Relations.

Thus, people have been working all this time just to get what we need to live, and somewhere along the line we all became tied together as tightly as if we were segments of a great net. And just as you discovered, it’s come to the point where people who have never seen or met each other have become connected in unbreakable ways. Not a soul can escape these relationships.

So in theory, then, saying that someone is poor shouldn’t make them feel small. It should go without saying that the true worth of a person doesn’t depend on that person’s clothes or house or food. No matter what kind of magnificent garments they wear or grand mansion they inhabit, fools are fools, boors are boorish, and their value as people shouldn’t be elevated for those reasons.

Therefore, someone with true confidence in their value as a human being should be able to live unaffected, even if their circumstances shift a bit this way or that.

If you look at things only from this viewpoint, it’s not impossible that you might see yourself as superior to these people. But when you try changing your point of view, these people are the very ones bearing this entire world on their shoulders. They are fantastic people beyond comparison to those such as yourself.

“But it’s not only about not valuing your life! If it were just that, any reckless fool could do it. If someone acts desperate and crazy just to look like a daredevil, that’s not a great person! That person’s no different from a wild dog. But if a person can go to a place where they can say they no longer need their life, even when they’re not desperate or crazy, well, that’s what I think is fantastic.”

The world is full of people who are not bad, but weak, people who bring unnecessary misfortune upon themselves and others for no reason but weakness. A heroic spirit that’s not devoted to human progress may be empty and meaningless, but goodness that is lacking in the spirit of heroism is often empty as well.

“You must not repeat this mistake again. Gather your courage, Copper, and do what you must do. No matter what you do, you can’t change the past. Think of the present instead. Go and do what you have to do now, and be brave. When it comes to this sort of thing—Copper, when it comes to this sort of thing, you simply must not give in.

However, Copper, when you have made a mistake, to recognize it bravely and to suffer for it is something that in all of heaven and earth, only humans can do.

It’s because we think I didn’t have to do that or It was within my power to do this that we are battered by feelings of regret. If we didn’t have the power to follow the voice of reason, why would we taste the pain of remorse? It’s hard to admit our mistakes. But in the pain of our mistakes there is also human greatness. “Other than a dethroned king, who would sorrow over not having a throne?” If we were not born with the ability to conduct ourselves with morality, there would be no reason for bitter tears.

However, Copper, can’t we always draw fresh confidence from these painful thoughts in return? After all, it’s because we have the power to walk the path of justice that we also experience this pain.

And now I think I want to ask all of you a question. How will you live?