Incredible Sulking Spirits

I begin this hub by sharing with you one impressive passage from Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressidan. This quote is found in Act III, Scene III.

Ulysses to Achilles:

Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,
A great-sized monster of ingratitudes:
Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devour'd
As fast as they are made, forgot as soon
As done: perseverance, dear my lord,
Keeps honour bright: to have done is to hang
Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail
In monumental mockery. Take the instant way;
For honour travels in a strait so narrow,
Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path;
For emulation hath a thousand sons
That one by one pursue: if you give way,
Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,
Like to an enter'd tide, they all rush by
And leave you hindmost;
Or like a gallant horse fall'n in first rank,
Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,
O'er-run and trampled on: then what they do in present,
Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours;
For time is like a fashionable host
That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand,
And with his arms outstretch'd, as he would fly,
Grasps in the comer: welcome ever smiles,
And farewell goes out sighing. O, let not virtue seek
Remuneration for the thing it was;
For beauty, wit,
High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all
To envious and calumniating time.
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,
That all with one consent praise new-born gawds,
Though they are made and moulded of things past,
And give to dust that is a little gilt
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.
The present eye praises the present object.
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye
Than what not stirs. The cry went once on thee,
And still it might, and yet it may again,
If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive
And case thy reputation in thy tent;
Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late,
Made emulous missions 'mongst the gods themselves
And drave great Mars to faction.

If Shakespeare wrote a finer or more invaluable sentiment couched in more potent terms, I have never read it. Achilles, it will be remembered, was the hero of the Trojan War on the Greek side. During the great contest lasting ten years, Achilles was employed part time in demolishing the tributary cities of Asia Minor belonging to Priam, the king of Troy. In the destruction of the city of Tyrnessus, Achilles gained from the spoils of war the beautiful Briseis. In the taking of Thebe, Chryseis became the war captive of Agamemnon, who was the monarch of Greece and the commander of the Greek army around Troy.

A pestilence broke out in the Greek camp and Calchas, the most famous soothsayer among the Greeks and encouraged by the protection of Achilles, attributed the plague to Agamemnon’s detainment of Chryseis whom her father tried in vain to ransom. Agamemnon was greatly offended, but was eventually compelled to surrender his captive, and in retaliation upon Achilles, took Briseis to compensate for his loss of Chryseis.

Thus, the anger of Achilles was aroused, and in retaliation he withdrew his forces from the Trojan fight, went into his tent and sulked. While he sulked, no pleading from Phoenix, no offers of reconciliation, no entreaties nor prayers could avail to get him back into service. Achilles was the Greek’s most powerful warrior and by not fighting, his friends in battle were suffering greatly, and even his beloved friend Patroclus is killed because of his sulking and refusal to fight. What a sad commentary.

How many once heroic individuals have died dishonored and forgotten by the world, sulking like Achilles in his tent? How many have run well for a while and fell, like the “stony ground hearers” by temptation, or satisfied with past achievements or discouraged by past sins and failures, have failed to forget, like Paul, the things behind them, to reach forth to the things before them, and to press on toward the prize?

The silliest of all foolishness is to sulk and if any one has less excuse for such behavior it is the Christian. Some of us sulk even with God, and if there is anything sublimely ridiculous, it is sulking before God. “God does not care for me; He blesses others but forgets me.” This is the spirit of multitudes of people.

I recall encountering a man who claimed he had been a Christian for twenty years but found it to be of no use to him. He stated that his prayers were never answered and while others were blessed and prospered God seemed to neglect him. Thus, he wondered what he had to be thankful for and then he pointed to his wheelchair, his poverty and unfortunate surroundings.

Here was a man sulking with God, giving up the Christian struggle in life, risking a hell to be shunned, and losing a heaven to be gained, all because God made a difference between him and other men. Like thousands, he was shut up in the narrow confines of his present existence, comparing himself with others from the standpoint of transient time and things, and forgetting that “these light afflictions” here below “do but work out for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory” if endured and appropriated to the spiritual development of our souls. How often we forget that God’s compensations for wants and afflictions here below make the condition of the unfortunate and the suffering the very stepping stone to greatest honor and glory through faith and the cross. What a difference between Dives and Lazarus. Do we not realize that our tears are jewels for eternity? Do we not comprehend that our very stripes for Christ are stigmas of glory?

For the poor, “unprofitable servant,” sulking over his one talent and hiding it in the ground, in vain will he say to his Lord, “Master, 'I knew that you are a hard man.” How useless to sulk with God.

What does a person gain by sulking? Does he inspire his fellow man to appreciate him more? I think not. Generally, the world soon forgets sulkers and there are always a dozen people to step in and take the place of ordinary, and extraordinary, men and women of the world. Besides this, the world has contempt for the sulkers, for sulking, is usually the evidence of vanity or immaturity, and a weakness of character. Sulkers are bitter and hang onto insults desiring to be petted, cajoled, pampered or apologized to. It is a distorted way of trying to elicit sympathy. Sulking is a spoiled child’s response, an infantile performance and the world generally treats such people as a parent treats a sulking child. Children usually get over their sulking but adults may sulk away years and often a lifetime of usefulness. Christian sulks waste their lives, damage the Church, and wound the cause of Christ. And to gratify their petty pride and spite, many go to their graves shrouded and clouded with their sulks.

Paul, Daniel, and Joseph, never sulked with all their great trials and afflictions, and with cheerful and forgiving spirits toward false brothers and toward a false world they stood up, fought a good fight, finished their course, kept the faith, glorified God and did the world all the good they could.

The sulking spirit is the result of inordinate vanity and egotism. Injured innocence and worth never deter great minds and hearts from life’s stern duties and difficult battles. Love, in exalted souls, never fails, and the Christian character despises wrong and pities the wrong doer. Too many men feel that their little vanity is unappreciated, and I have seen ministers sulk and retire from the struggle of their calling and of their denomination because they felt unappreciated. In reality, he or she does not appreciate self, in the light of God’s assigned mission. Are pride, ambition, vainglory, self-seeking, and high position the motive and inspiration? If so, we cannot get through to God.

Jesus is our model. He never sulked amid the trials of life or the ingratitude of men or the cruel opposing of the devil; and He was characterized, in His supreme greatness and goodness, by the humility, meekness, and lowliness of the little child, which never sulks long. We are not here to please men or to please ourselves, and the sooner we realize this, the sooner we will be cured of our petty vanity and egotism.

We can sit back and hide in our shell, shut up like a sensitive plant, and think we spite someone, but we only cut off our nose to spite our face. We may congratulate our self that we are one of the “has been,” as Shakespeare says. Our greatest regret in the end will be, “I might have been,” for no man can die satisfied and please God who falls short of life’s full complement of divine mission. We must finish the course.

It is bad enough to fail from cowardice or timidity, shrinking before opposition and responsibility, but the greatest and most contemptible failure of all is the person who sulks God’s life and opportunities away because his fellow man offends him or fails to appreciate him.