2022 is MW’s 10 Anniversary Year. To celebrate, each month, I am sharing one of my favorite posts I’ve written over the last ten years, sharing why it is my favorite, and hosting a drawing based on that article. There are over a thousand posts on the MW website in regards to lost treasures, treasure hunts, and other adventurous fun. I hope you join MW on this journey back into the past over this coming year. This month I share a post I wrote in January 2015: The Lost Tomb’s Wisdom in The Youth’s Guide.
In this March MW 10 article was a story on a legendary lost tomb, and the valuable wisdom it contained. I share it from a little book that sits on my shelf called The Youth’s Guide. The book itself was repeating a tale written in Sir John Malcolm’s journal, which provided stories of his incredible travels through the East.
While the story of the lost tomb is interesting, and holds wisdom to follow yet today, it is the account of journaling within the article that makes it one of my favorites. In the journal, Sir John Malcolm tells the story of how his Persian guide could not understand his desire to visit ruins of the past. Malcolm shares how the guide asks him,
“What can be the use,” said he, “of travelling so far and running so many risks to look at ruined houses and palaces, when they might stay so comfortably at home?”
In the article I share Malcolm’s answer:
“I replied, with some feeling of contempt for my friend’s love of quiet, “if the state of a man’s circumstances, or that of his country, does not find work, he must find it for himself, or go to sleep and be good for nothing. Antiquaries”, I continued, “to whose praiseworthy researches you allude, by directing, through their labors and talents, our attention to the great names and magnificent monuments of former days, aid in improving the sentiments and taste of a nation. Besides, though, no antiquary myself, I must ever admire a study which carries man beyond self. I love those elevating thoughts that lead me to dwell with delight on the past, and to look forward with happy anticipations to the future. We are told by some that such feelings are mere allusions, and the cold practical philosopher may, on the ground of their inutility, desire to remove them from men’s minds, to make way for his own machinery; but he could as soon argue me out of my existence as take from me the internal proof which such feelings convey, both as to my origin and destination.”
Then, my favorite part, is what is written next in Malcolm’s Journal. Malcolm states one of the guides behind him remarked ‘There goes a Goor-kher (wild ass)’ and galloped in pursuit of it; and he continues to write, “I galloped also leaving unfinished one of the finest speeches about the past and the future that was ever commenced.”
I smile each time a read that part. I suppose I imagine this profound insight and seriousness of conversation Malcolm is involved in, seemingly with himself, of which he seems to realize as he too goes off to chase the ass. Thoughts on the past and future lost to present surroundings. To me the account hints towards a wisdom that each man must journey his own path, even if no one else may understand, especially if your heart fully embraces it.
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From that article, however, comes this month’s MW 10th Anniversary Question:
What was one of the wisdoms written on the fifth side of the Golden Crown?
To enter a free drawing, from all correct submissions, for MW’s newest book, The Ultimate Guide on Armchair Treasure Hunts: A Look at Over 40 Past Armchair Treasure Hunts (shown below), please submit the answer to the following question (based on the article) by 3/23/22 to treasure@mysteriouswritings.com with subject: MW10. Winner of the drawing will be announced on the MW Forum and Social Channels 3/23.
Happy Anniversary!
