Looking to the Future

LOOKING TO THE FUTURE Publius Syrus was a Latin writer from the first century BC. Born in the region of Syria during the Roman period, he died in Rome. One of his sayings is translated into English as follows: “A wise man guards the future as if it were the present.” The foolish person focuses on the present, while the wise person looks ahead to the future. The foolish person sees an unfavourable situation now and reacts to it. The wise person uses foresight, thinking about how today’s challenges will develop tomorrow. The foolish act based on what is immediate, while the wise plan their actions with the future in mind. Every action, when judged by its outcome, is a future event. Actions are taken now, but their results always appear later. Therefore, it is correct to evaluate an action based on future outcomes. The rightness of today’s action should be judged by how it will turn out when it concludes. For example, if someone gets stung by a wasp and, in anger, decides to punish the wasps by putting their hand into their nest, the claim that they were only stung once initially by a single wasp becomes pointless. After they insert their hand into the nest, they will be swarmed and stung by hundreds of wasps, causing serious injury.