How can hope and despair be akin?

[davem]

Its a paradox, & I don't think there's a rational explanation for it. Thiings are different 'at the very brink'.

Take another statement, this time by the narrator, in The Field of Cormallen:

And all the host laughed and wept, and in the midst of their merriment and tears the clear voice of the minstrel rose like silver and gold, and all men were hushed. And he sang to them, now in the Elven-tongue, now in the speech of the West, until their hearts, wounded with sweet words, overflowed, and their joy was like swords, and they passed in thought out to regions where pain and delight flow together and tears are the very wine of blessedness.

There's a point where opposites are transcended, where thesis & antithesis are pushed as far as they can be & produce synthesis. What Jung callled the Transcendent Function. The tension produced by two opposing forces produces a third thing which is more than the sum of its parts.

Or maybe it doesn't mean anything & Aragorn was just trying to sound clever.....