If the government is to persuade us, contrary to appearances, of its determination to end discrimination against older people, it really must ensure that its senior members avoid dismissing eminent legal figures who have said something controversial as "muddled and confused old codgers". Not only does the insult reinforce malicious stereotypes and dishearten all of us currently struggling with the concept of unending subjection, it signally misrepresents two men who are, it seems to me, trying to teach us something rather beautiful about the transience and essential unimportance of material possessions. When Lord Irvine says that "most people" would not be "disturbed" at first, or maybe second time burglars not going to prison, it can only be because he expects us, like him, to care more for the spiritual life than we do for inanimate   things. Notice how he does not dwell on the sentimental value of what might have been taken: a grandmother's wedding ring, say, rather than a mobile phone. No, to him it is all so much heavy baggage, dragging us down. Neighbours in Cheyne Walk, where there have been 40 burglaries in the past three years, have complained that Irvine is unsympathetic. Have they considered that Lord Irvine might have his mind on higher things than the acquisition, or loss of, as it might be, fine art, or hand-made wallpaper or second homes in Scotland?  Similarly, though I have no knowledge of the extent of his property and other assets, I feel sure that Lord Woolf has only the highest motives when he asks us to imprison burglars only if their crimes are aggravated by violence or undue frequency. Lying awake, heart racing, listening for robber-sounds recently (the neighbours on either side having both been burgled in the past week, at night, from the empty street), I try to benefit from Lord Woolf and Lord Irvine's teachings. All is illusion. You can't take it with you. What goes around comes around. It's probably just a gentle novice burglar, so it doesn't count anyway. Isn't it rather sweet of this keen young burglar to force the window while you sleep, thus avoiding unnecessary panic? If he - they? - came upstairs, would turning the other cheek help? Meditating on this, I can almost hear these two great sages chorusing "Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can." I can, actually. Once you realise there are no police to speak of, hardly any convictions, no significant deterrents for all but the most dedicated and violent offenders - it's the easiest thing in the world.