No thing on earth to nought can fall,
The Eternal onward moves in all;
Rejoice, by being be sustained.
Being is deathless: living wealth,
With which the All adorns itself,
By laws abides and is maintained.
(Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Testament)
I have just reread Peter Boerner’s portrait of the Almighty, Goethe…
His achievement, I will not attempt to eulogise. One should see and read for oneself…
However, I noticed the musicality that inheres in his attitude to Nature, life and being. As a successful businessman and lawyer who also inspired Beethoven and Schubert, there is a cadence and rhythm to his thoughts, which may transfer to enlightened investment.
Goethe had his Theory of Colour; I shall venture a hesitant Theory of Enlightened Investment.
THE THEORY
Like Goethe’s approach to nature (and the art and science thereof), there is a music to capital investment.
We are caught between the contrary tendencies of ‘Stability’ and ‘Mobility’ of money and wealth. Goethe spoke of ‘polarity’ and ‘enhancement’ ever-present in nature and living.
This contrariety, however, need not lead us to strife.
As with the music of Beethoven and the music of the spheres, we ought to adapt to the Investment Continuum: Between saving and consumption, capitalisation and reinvestment.
To this end, one should have a purpose: to life, love and money. This entails fixity, not rigidity, of Investment objective: facility, not debility..
Schiller complimented Goethe, that he worked from the simplest organisms to the most complex thought-processes. In music, the composer deduces cell to cell, phrase to phrase from note after note. The same is true, I contend, of share and dividend, saving and consumption, financial interest and risk appetite/objective..
According to Schiller, ‘your [Goethe] intellect binds together the rich aggregate of its concept in a Beautiful unity’.
And one’s overall purpose: Goethe would answer -
The True, The Good and The Beautiful.
(A wider argument to follow).
I can't agree with what you're driving at, Neil. The artistic beauty that can be found in music, literature, art, the natural world, and the colder but still-present beauty inherent in the sciences and even in mathematics - can you really find this in investment? Where's the beauty in money-making? Watching the 'numbers dance', as you say? The clinking of coins?
ReplyDeleteHugo