There's Something About Something

The German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) asked what some have called the first and greatest philosophical question: “Why is there something rather than nothing?” That is, why does anything—star, planet, dust, ducks, people, plums, the universe itself—exist?

And thus we might begin a semester course in ontology and metaphysics. Or we might simply sit a moment in wonder. It could have been otherwise. It might have been otherwise. Rather than there being something, there could be nothing.

That notion was a prominent feature in the thinking of G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936). For Chesterton, the fact that there is something rather than nothing was cause for amazement and rejoicing. He celebrated that amazement in his poem “A Second Childhood.”

In the poem, Chesterton contemplates old age. Even at death’s door, he wants to be astounded at creation, at night and day, at the ground beneath his feet, and even at his own being. He hopes to stare at such things with all the amazement of a child seeing them for the first time.

Life is a gift. That something exists rather than nothing is cause for wonder—wonder in both senses: “I wonder why?” as well as wordless awe. The wonder that the world is and that I too am goes a long way to develop gratitude in our hearts. It is truly amazing since it could have been otherwise.

Rather than reading silently, read this aloud.

“A Second Childhood.”

When all my days are ending


And I have no song to sing,


I think that I shall not be too old


To stare at everything;


As I stared once at a nursery door


Or a tall tree and a swing.

Wherein God’s ponderous mercy hangs


On all my sins and me,


Because He does not take away


The terror from the tree


And stones still shine along the road


That are and cannot be.

Men grow too old for love, my love,


Men grow too old for wine,


But I shall not grow too old to see


Unearthly daylight shine,


Changing my chamber’s dust to snow


Till I doubt if it be mine.

Behold, the crowning mercies melt,


The first surprises stay;


And in my dross is dropped a gift


For which I dare not pray:


That a man grow used to grief and joy


But not to night and day.

Men grow too old for love, my love,


Men grow too old for lies;


But I shall not grow too old to see


Enormous night arise,


A cloud that is larger than the world


And a monster made of eyes.

Nor am I worthy to unloose


The latchet of my shoe;


Or shake the dust from off my feet


Or the staff that bears me through


On ground that is too good to last,


Too solid to be true.

Men grow too old to woo, my love,


Men grow too old to wed;


But I shall not grow too old to see


Hung crazily overhead


Incredible rafters when I wake


And I find that I am not dead.

A thrill of thunder in my hair:


Though blackening clouds be plain,


Still I am stung and startled


By the first drop of the rain:


Romance and pride and passion pass


And these are what remain.

Strange crawling carpets of the grass,


Wide windows of the sky;


So in this perilous grace of God


With all my sins go I:


And things grow new though I grow old,


Though I grow old and die.