Opinion > September 27, 2007

By Matt Brumit | Old Gold & Black columnist

“The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one.” You may remember this quote by Wilhelm Stekel from J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye.

In case you haven’t read the book, it will serve my purposes for you to know that it is a wonderful coming-of-age story about the teenage Holden Caulfield who runs away from boarding school because he doesn’t know what he wants to do with his life. Sorry to give away the ending, but he eventually decides that all he really wants to do is “just be the catcher in the rye and all,” recounting a dream he has in which he saves children playing in a field of rye from falling off a nearby cliff.

But I’m not writing a book review here. My point is this: it seems to me that we all need to be reminded of Stekel’s words over and over again. (I know I do.)

When I was a child, I always wanted to be a policeman or a fireman or a soldier or something like that. I’m not sure if I realized the extent of my desires, but at least on some level I was already desiring to die nobly for a cause.

As time progressed and I came to fully understand the idea of martyrdom, I adamantly claimed that I actually wanted to die a martyr for something or another. And then I read The Catcher in the Rye in my English class senior year of high school.

This, along with other books I was reading and things that were happening in my life, slowly changed the way I looked at life and the idea of dying nobly versus living humbly. I’m not sure if I’ve fully gotten the desire to die nobly out of my system yet, but I at least value living humbly now.

I’ve got to admit, I used to think living humbly was, well, boring. Sometimes I’m still tempted by that thought. And it’s an easy idea to be tempted by. Everyone seems to find humility boring. I mean honestly, on this very campus, who do we admire? Athletes, Rhodes Scholars, et cetera.

Now, I’m not saying the people we praise are incapable of living humbly, but obviously we, the ones doing the praising, have a skewed view of success. According to Stekel, it would be more mature of us to not only find the value of everyone, especially those whose work is not highly-acclaimed, but also to desire a humble vocation for ourselves.

Notice this: Stekel doesn’t say it’s immature for a man to die nobly for a cause. He says it’s immature for a man to want that. By all means, I will never look down on someone who dies nobly for a cause.

But there’s something to be said for living a quiet, humble life as well. And though dying nobly sounds like it would be a difficult task, I would venture to say that living humbly is much more trying. especially in the long run. If nothing else, the man who dies nobly (I assume) dies knowing that he will be remembered and honored for his noble death.

But the man who lives humbly will most likely never receive any praise for his efforts. In fact, it is quite possible that the moment he did receive praise he would cease to be humble, ruining the whole point. This whole idea of living humbly hinges upon not being recognized for your efforts.

What I’m trying to emphasize is the seeming lack of respect for humility among college students. We strive to be famous, to “do something” with our lives, to “make a difference” in the world.Of course, all of this is well and good, but I think in so striving we overlook the day by day opportunities to live humbly for some amazing causes.

Ultimately, our thinking is backwards. We think we can live life with a lot of pomp and circumstance and that dying nobly means dying in the same way.

What we forget is that the very people we remember for dying nobly most often led quiet, humble lives up until the times of their deaths. In fact, their deaths would not have been so noble had it not been for their previous displays of humility.

Besides all that, let’s be logical: if we all die nobly for a cause, we’ll die creating a world full of causes but devoid of people.

Matt Brumit is a sophomore from Denison, Texas.