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Dante's Ontology: What the Florentine Poet Can Teach Contemporary Philosophers
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Friday night lecture
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Harrell, Daniel
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Does Beauty Have a Place in Liberal Education?
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Friday night lecture
Tutors
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Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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Harrell, Daniel
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Does music move?
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2013-02-15
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Sounds recording of a lecture delivered on February 15, 2013 by Daniel Harrell as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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sound
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Music, Philosophy and aesthetics
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English
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Bib # 80723
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<a title="Typescript" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/34">Typescript</a>
Friday night lecture
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Text
Does Music Move?
Daniel Harrell
Friday Night Lecture
St. John's College, Annapolis, MD
February 15, 2013*
Does music move?
Well, yes-if by "music", we meant the vibrations of sound that allow us
to hear what a musician plays: from instrument to air to ear.
Or yes again-if by "move" , we meant the way we can be moved by music:
from table-taps to tangos to tears.
But the question is harder to answer, if we ask it of music's movement in a
more elementary sense. -The sense in which we might say, of a rhythm, that it
quickens and slows; or of a melody, that it rises and falls ; or of a harmony, that
it departs and returns. And suppose we say all this about the first movement
of a symphony, not thinking twice about calling this a "movement". For we
talk as if we hear just that in the symphony- movement- and as if any piece
of music moves itself in moving us .
Our talking this way has a point. For if we didn't hear music move, would
we hear it at all? Without movement , music would seem no more than a series
of sounds.1 But there is a problem with our talking this way, despite its point.
And this is the problem I discuss in my lecture tonight . In its first part, I
explain what I take the problem to be. In its second part, I explain why I
take the problem to be important. In its final part, I offer two solutions to the
problem, in the attempt to deepen our sense of it.
I
The nature of the problem.
So what is the problem with our talking as if music moved? The problem, in
a word, is space: the space in which we hear music move. -The space that
allows it to quicken and slow, rise and fall, depart and return. For this space
*The formatting and notes of this copy are dated February 17, 2013. I thank Gabriela
Hopkins for helping me improve the lecture with comments and conversation about earlier
drafts . I also thank participants in the Question Period for further thoughts, some of which
appear in the footnotes of this copy.
1
For further discussion of this, see Chapter VII, "The Paradox of Tonal Motion", in
Victor Zuckerkandl's Sound and Symbol: Music and the External World ; and the section
"Movement" of Chapter 2, "Tone" , irt Roger Scruton's The Aesthetics of Music.
1
�2
Does Music Move?
makes something close to complete sense on the one hand, yet something closer
to nonsense on the other. 2
To see the sense it makes, we can start by comparing the movement we hear
in music, with the variation we hear in sounds more generally. Consider, for
example, the difference between a melody and a siren. Both involve a change in
pitch over time. And we might say, in that respect, that both rise and fall. But
unlike the siren, the melody does this in a kind of articulated space, usually
conceived as a scale. And this space gives us the impression of movement, from
one place to the next. We sense a change of place, in other words, within the
melody's change in pitch, as if having caused it.
As illustration, suppose we hear the beginning of "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little
Star" on middle-C, where C is followed by the G a fifth above. Within this
change in pitch, we hear a change of place-from the first degree of a melodic
scale to the fifth; or otherwise put, from the i to the 5.3 And this change of
place gives us the impression of a movement having caused the change in pitch:
in this case, of a leap from the i to the 5, causing C to be followed by G.
Now suppose we hear the siren rise from C to G. We don't hear this rise
happen in the articulated space of a scale; and the continuity of the rise would
seem to preclude it, since the places in a scale are discrete. But this means we
are given no impression of movement by the siren's change in pitch, from one
place to the next. It's as if the siren rises only in time, not in space. True, we
can see, or at least infer, a change of place behind the siren's change in pitch,
in the fire engine, say, that produced it. But we don't hear any change of place
within the change in pitch, that might replace the fire engine as cause, and
turn what we hear as a signal into what we could hear as a melody.
Of course, we may not know about a musical scale, to account for the change
of place we hear in the melody. But this ignorance is only more evidence for the
sense made by the space of music's movement, in its own terms. And it reflects
a striking fact about what it means to understand music. For we can develop
an altogether discerning musical ear, while remaining all but illiterate about
what we hear. And becoming literate, by studying music theory, underlines
the sense music makes even without this theory. For the topography of this
theory-such as the melodic scale-is more discovered than invented, and in
the discovery, more inhabited than observed. One sign of this is the way we
are moved by music; for we are thus moved inwardly, in the space we inhabit
as selves. But I will now try to show this more explicitly. And my conclusion
2 For a defense of the necessity of thinking that music moves in space, but that the space
in question is metaphorical, see Chapter 4, "Movement", in Roger Scruton's Understanding
Music.
3 Strictly speaking, I refer here to the melody of "Twinkle, Twinkle .. . ", which predates
the words by some forty years in a French song called "Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman". In a
more important strictness, what I call the beginning of "Twinkle, Twinkle .. . " is really the
second "event" in the melody. The first is a repeating of middle-C, within which we hear the
repeating of the i. But is this first event a movement? Does it involve a change of place? I
thank John Verdi for drawing my attention to this question after the lecture. I think this is
a movement, and can even be said to involve a change of place, but one that shows why the
melody is temporal rather than spatial. I say more about this in subsequent notes.
�I. The nature of the problem.
3
will be that it is because we inhabit what we hear, in hearing music move, that
the space of this movement makes complete sense. The completeness in this
sense has to do with the experience of inhabitance.
To begin to see this, recall the terms I used for the melody "Twinkle,
Twinkle." I identified its first two pitches by not~middle-C and the Ga fifth
above. This identification depends on two topographical facts in our perception
of notes, even outside a musical context. The first such fact is that we hear
a difference in pitch, whereby one note is distinguished from another, as a
difference in relative place: one note sounding higher, the other note lower.
This perception is also transitive: if one note sounds higher than a second, and
the second higher than a third, then the first will also sound higher than the
third. Our perception of pitch difference so gives every note its own position
along an axis of height. Hence my talk of the G a fifth above middle-C, to
distinguish it, say, from the G a fourth below.
Then there is my reference just now to the two G's on either side of middleC, along with my reference to middle-C itself, in order to distinguish that C
from every other C there is. This repetition of note letters reflects the second
topographical fact in our perception of notes: the phenomenon of the octave.
For while we distinguish notes by their difference in pitch, this difference reaches
a kind of limit at the interval called the "octave", where the notes sound the
same, despite their difference in pitch, and are thus given the same letter as
name. Exactly why we hear this sameness is hard to say: Aristotle ascribed it
to a perception of the whole number ratio two-to-one; while Victor Zuckerkandl
calls it a miracle. 4 But however it happens, the sameness we hear in notes, once
their difference in pitch reaches the octave, in effect contains that difference.
If we pass beyond it, we don't encounter new notes, but only new instances,
higher or lower, of old notes. The octave thus turns the axis of height, along
which notes are arranged by pitch, into a kind of circumference, which continues
to trace their increase or decrease in pitch without end, but always to the same
place again.
Yet this image, of notes now arranged into a circumference by the octave, is
not yet an image of the space in which music moves. For it only comprehends
the change in pitch involved, as we might conceive this change to carry us
along the circumference. But in hearing a melody, we again hear a change of
place within the change in pitch, such as the leap from the i to the 5 at the
start of "Twinkle, Twinkle . .. " . And this description reflects another pair of
topographical facts in our perception of notes, once we hear these notes in a
musical context. The first such fact is that we hear movement from note to
note, without having to hear any notes between. So in "Twinkle, Twinkle . .. ",
we hear a leap from the i to the 5, without having to hear the 2, 3, and 4 first.
And to hear them first would not complete the leap, as if to fill it in, but rather
transform the leap into a climb. Why this is a fact of musical perception may
4 Aristotle attributes the cause of the octave to the ratio 2: 1 in Book II, Chapter 3, of
his Physics, 194b28-29. Zuckerkandl calls it a miracle in his discussion of the octave in the
section "Scale" of Chapter VIII, "The Thue Motion of Tones", in Sound and Symbol.
�4
Does Music Move?
be as hard to explain as the octave. But as a phenomenon, it seems to involve
a sense of being oriented in the movement we hear from note to note. It's as if
we faced the note we were moving to, and reached it as a goal, heedless of any
notes on the way. 5
The sense of being oriented among notes is even clearer in the second topographical fact, which involves our perception of notes in musical contexts we
call tonal. It is this fact that forced me to shift from letters to numbers, when
identifying the leap in "Twinkle, Twinkle .. . " from the i to the 5. For in tonal
musical contexts-and the name "tonal" is derived from this fact-we will hear
one note as a kind of center, which orients us with respect to the other notes
we hear, as if to provide a place from which to face them. The central note is so
assigned the number 1 in analysis , and the other notes assigned other numbers
in reference to 1. Again, why we can hear a certain note as central is hard
to say. But the phenomenon, as Zuckerkandl would remind us, is dynamic, in
an orientation more felt than seen. We hear the central note as central, that
is, by sensing a stability in it relative to the other notes, as if it provided a
place to face them as a center of gravity. This second topographical fact so
informs the first : for we then move from note to note as if under the influence
of a gravitational pull, requiring effort to overcome, and supplying momentum
in success, in a deepened sense of having faced the note being moved to, and
reaching that note as a goal.
We can accommodate these facts of musical perception into the ear lier image
of a circumference of notes, arranged by pitch and bounded by the octave.
For once we hear one note in the melody as central, especially if we hear it
as a center of gravity, it's as if we were projected with that note inside the
circumference. And this projection allows us to move from note to note not
simply along the circumference, through every note between, but now across
the circumference, guided by the one note inside it as a center of orientation.
This image so gives a geometric form to the complete sense made by the space
in which music moves. For this is the sense in which we inhabit that space.
To be sure, the development of this sense, as shown by the specifically tonal
context in which we hear one note of a melody as central, depends on the like
development of a specific form of musical art-the art of tonality, to which we
owe the music of the West. But there would be no such art to develop, unless
the result made a difference to what we could hear; and in this case, to what
we could inhabit in what we hear. And much of tonal music's development can
be explained as a deduction from the features of a place we inhabit.
I spell this thought out briefly, in one example, for those familiar with this
5 It could also be noted here, in light of a previous note, that we hear the repeating of
the i at the start of "Twinkle, Twinkle . . . " in the same way: as a movement from origin
to goal, even though the origin and goal in this case are the same. This already suggests
there is something fundamentally temporal about our orientation in the perception of notes
in a musical context. For we would simply stay in the same place (on the i) except for the
repetition allowed by time, which distinguishes the place at one moment from the place at a
subsequent moment, and allows the staying to be the result of movement (in this case from
the i to the i).
�I. The nature of the problem.
5
development. If we inhabited the space of music's movement, it seems we
should not simply be fixed at a single center of orientation. We should rather
be able move that center, carrying it with us from place to place. And move
it we can-once tonal music developed the device of modulation, to carry us
from key to key. We might also expect the movement of that center to happen
along an axis of depth, away-and-back, not just to distinguish it from the upand-down movement between notes along an axis of height, but also from a
sense of perspective, which implicitly belongs to our sense of orientation when
we inhabit a place. And so we do move away and back-once tonal music
developed the harmony out of polyphony that modulation relies upon. We
might further expect the movement of the center to clarify our sense, as I
described this above, of the gravity felt at work in such a space. And clarified
it is-once the use of modulation effectively reduced the modes of chant to
the major-minor scale. We might finally expect the movement of the center to
deepen our sense that we inhabit one space, which contains the places moved
between, rather than many spaces distinguished and divided by those places.
And deepened it is--once the use of modulation forced upon the tuning of a
scale the leveling of equal temperament. For this restricts the notes of any key
to the notes in every key. And as Roger Scruton has strikingly described the
result, equal temperament thus "places the whole of tonal space within reach
of its every occupant." 6
Along with this deduction comes a plausible measure of the greatness in a
musical work. The greater it is, the deeper it carries us into the space of music's
movement. And by that measure of inhabitance, the best demonstration of the
complete sense this space can make, is found not in my account, but rather in
those masterpieces of music-such as Beethoven's Eroica-where this space is
explored to a kind of limit, in the conquest of it. 7
But as I said, the space of music's movement also makes a kind of nonsense. To see this, we can start by now comparing the movement we hear in
music, with motion as we observe this more generally. Consider, for example,
the difference between the movement of a melody, like "Twinkle, Twinkle ... "
again, and the motion of our hand in following that melody, as if to conduct
it. We could say that both rise and fall, and do so not just in time but in
space, through a discernible change of place. But there is a difference. For
as I mentioned earlier, we hear the change of place in the melody, such as the
leap from the i to the 5 in "Twinkle, Twinkle ... ", without having to hear any
places between. The movement happens discretely. By contrast, we see the
hand's change of place happen continuously, from place to place through all
the places between. And this continuity would seem a necessary feature of its
6 Roger
Scruton, The Aesthetics of Music, p. 244.
also suspect that the space we are carried into so clearly and compellingly by tonal
music is what makes atonal music so off-putting for first-time listeners; it doesn't carry us
(at least at first) into any space. There is also a question, then, about what allows atonal
music to make sense once a listener does grow accustomed to it. If atonal music can carry
us into a space in which we hear it move, then is this a different space from tonal music or
not? I thank Sam Weinberg for bringing this issue up in the question period.
71
�6
Does Music Move?
motion. For if our hand got from place to place discretely, like the melody did,
skipping places along the way, then it would look to us as if our hand reached
each place not by motion, but rather by magic. Or at least we'd be tempted
to think there was something in the space where the motion occurred, beyond
just space, that was interrupting the motion, disrupting the continuity it would
otherwise have. But this is one reason, then, to think there isn't really a space
for the melody to move in. For if there were, then it would allow the melody
to move in it continuously rather than discretely.
But this reflects another difference-involving identity rather than continuity-between the movement of the melody and the motion of our hand in
following it. For the melody is composed of the notes it moves between, while
our hand is not composed of the places it moves between. And this explains
at once why the melody has to move discretely. For it has to become what it
is. And this means passing through only those notes that compose it, and that
distinguish it, thus composed, from any other melody. But then the melody
can only be what it is by becoming so, over an interval of time. And in this
sense, the melody is temporal rather than spatial, with an identity in time
rather than space. 8 But this is then another reason to think that there isn't
really a space for the melody to move in. For if there were, then it would allow
the melody to possess an identity in space; that is, it would allow the melody
to be what it is in space without having to become so, and to remain what it
is, unchanged, through every change of place.
But here is perhaps a stronger way to put the nonsense: If there really were
a space for the melody to move in, then there would be a melody to hear, in the
space where we hear it move. But there isn't. We hear the leap in "Twinkle,
Twinkle" , for example, without hearing anything making the leap. For we hear
this leap being made between unleaping notes, but nothing further to which we
might attribute the leap. And this is true for music in general-a fact reflected
in the unmoving notes on a musical score. Once the score is performed, we hear
a movement being made between the unmoving notes, but nothing further to
which we might attribute the movement. So we hear movement, but nothing
making the movement. Yet how, in that case, could there be any movement to
hear? And what could be making it?
Yet this is only the start of the nonsense. And the end of it implicates our
very inhabitance of the space in question. We can see this through an objection
to the analysis I just gave. True, the objection runs, we have a sense of the
space in which motion ordinarily occurs, that we cannot apply to the movement
of music. For applying it makes nonsense of the movement, by depriving this
movement of any object to which it might be attributed. But what follows
from this? Perhaps only that the space in which music moves, is not ordinary,
8 As I mentioned in an earlier note, another mark of the temporal identity of a melody is
the fact that a note can be repeated in it (like at the beginning of "Twinkle, Twinkle . . . "),
and we hear a movement in this repetition even though the place remains the same (making
the staying-in-place of the melody event-like rather than inertia-like). This implies that the
places in a melody are not just defined by the articulated space we know as a scale, but also
by the articulated time we know as beat, meter, and rhythm.
�I. The nature of the problem.
7
but extraordinary. And this is one way to understand my earlier defense of the
sense-the complete sense-made by this space. For this was not an observed
sense of space, but rather an inhabited sense of space. The sense, for example,
in which we face the note being moved to, and reach it as a goal. So if there
is a space for music to move in, which makes sense of the movement, then this
space will have to be conceived from within, as a matter of inhabitance, rather
than from without, as a matter of observation.
The objection has a point. But it makes the nonsense even clearer. For
what is it, finally, that makes an inhabited sense of space extraordinary? Here is
one answer. An inhabited sense of space is extraordinary, in not stopping short
of totality. That is, our inhabited sense of space implicitly includes everything
there is, known or unknown; anything captured in the word "Being". For it
is beings, finally, that we take ourselves to be surrounded by, and our own
being that provides the place from which to face them. This is why, despite
our sometimes talking as if there were more than one world, and even more
than one world we might inhabit, we can also talk intelligibly of the world, as
if there were only one. And it is our being-in-one-world, on this answer, that
grounds our inhabited sense of space.
But what happens, then, when our inhabited sense of space is divided?
- For example, between sleeping and dreaming, where it seems we inhabit two
spaces at once? We resolve the division, evidently, by conferring worldhood
on only one such space, taking it to contain the other such space. That is, we
credit only one space with the totality, and thus the reality, of inhabitance,
and regard the other space as merely part of this totality. The credit we give
to its own totality, then, is the credit we give to a dream. We still inhabit
the dream-and more alertly than we inhabit the bedroom in which we dream,
often with a sense that everything is put at stake in the dream, in a matter
of life or death. But in waking from the dream, we prove it part of a larger
space of inhabitance. And this gives the dream's apparent totality the status
of mere appearance; and our inhabitance of it, the form of an illusion. To our
relief, or perhaps our regret, what happened to us in the dream, didn't really
happen after all.
But if this is so, then it gives us reason to suspect the very same thing
of the space we inhabit when hearing music move. The space may well be
illusory, making all the sense- but also all the nonsense-of a dream. And
in that case, the greater the work of music, the deeper it carries us into the
dream. We hear the sound of Beethoven's Eroica surge forth in a concert hall,
seeming to make the whole world shake. Yet the musicians barely move by
comparison, while the notes they play move not at all. And we concert-goers
stay glued to our seats-entranced. And once the work is finished, in a triumph
of conclusiveness, we are released from the trance in a daze-and the desire,
perhaps, to have remained. For we leave the concert hall likely finding the
world we truly inhabit unchanged by what we heard, and nothing comparable
to its conclusiveness in the life we have to live.
This, then, is what I take to be the problem with our talking as if music
moved. Talking that way fails to distinguish our experience of music from a
�Does Music Move?
8
dream, in which nothing we experience really happens.
II
The importance of the problem.
I also take this problem to be important. To explain why, I discuss this problem
again, but now as a problem not simply with our experience of music, but more
generally, with our experience of the world. For we talk not just as if music
moved, but as if anything moved. Yet this too involves a kind of nonsense,
known since the time of Parmenides. And it proves to be the same kind of
nonsense we encountered in the movement of music.
To see this, recall my earlier analysis of why there really isn't a space for
a melody to move in. For the melody, in this respect, is temporal rather than
spatial. It is composed of the places it moves between, and can only be what it
is by becoming so. So there isn't a space, strictly speaking, for the melody to
move in, with the continuity or identity of truly spatial things, like our hand
in following that melody.
But while our hand may be spatial in this respect, the motion of our hand
is temporal, just like the melody. In a sense, it too is composed of the places
moved between, and can only be what it is by becoming so. But this implies,
on the earlier analysis, that there isn't really a space for our hand to move in,
or for anything to move in. There is only a space for it to be contained in, and
to occupy, over the course of its motion, at every place composing that motion.
Space, in other words, contains only the path of the motion, not the motion
itself.
But here again is perhaps a stronger way to put the nonsense. If there
really were a space for our hand to move in, then there would be a hand to see,
in the space where we see it move. But there isn't. All we see is the motion
being made from place to unmoving place, by something that occupies each
such place. We see nothing further, to which we might attribute the motion
between places, rather than just the occupancy of those places. So we see
motion, but nothing making the motion. Yet how, in that case, could there be
any motion to see? And what could be making it?
One answer, the kind Zeno might give, is that there isn't any motion to see.9
When we think we see something move, all we really see is that it occupies
different places at different times. And the appearance of motion in this, is
something like the appearance of motion on a movie screen, or in a flip book,
from a succession of images, each of a single place and time, that happens
too rapidly for us to detect. But this first answer leads to a second answer,
found for example in calculus, where there is a motion to see.10 When we see
something move on this answer, all we see, again, is that something occupies
9 For further discussion of Zeno's arguments
VI , Chapters 2 and 9, and Book VIII, Chapter
Considered Historically," in Bertrand Russell's
1 °For a further discussion of this answer, see
Lecture VII, "The Positive Theory of Infinity,''
World.
against motion, see Aristotle 's Physics Book
8; and Lecture VI, "The Problem of Infinity
Our Knowledge of the External World.
Lecture V, "The Theory of Continuity,'' and
in Russell's Our Knowledge of the External
�II. The importance of the problem.
9
different places at different times. Still, it can be proved that there are more
such places than we could ever arrange from one to the next. The places are
many enough, that is, to form a real continuum, beyond the mere appearance
of one. And this makes for a real continuity in the motion we see, giving it all
the reality it needs.
There is a sense, however, in which this second answer misses the point.
For the continuity in question belongs to the motion's path rather than to the
motion itself. And the way this path is proved continuous-for example, in
Dedekind-is by analogy to a line, undivided by time, where every place upon
it is present at once. 11 But the proper analogy for the motion itself would
seem to be a line divided by time, where only one place upon it is ever present
at once-the point right now, so to speak. But how could such a line prove
continuous, if it is made of only one point at a time?
The second answer so leads to a third answer, more philosophical than
mathematical, and found, for example, in Bergson. 12 This answer is distinguished from the first answer in taking the motion we see to be real, and from
the second answer in taking this reality to involve more than just the continuity
of the motion's path. But the promise of this answer comes at a price: for it
embraces the nonsense that makes the problem a problem. On this answer,
that is, there is nothing to see, in the space where we see anything move. And
this is because the space where we see anything move, is the space where the
motion belongs to us, rather than to anything we might see outside us. So
there is a motion to see, when we are the ones making it.
On this answer, in other words, motion occurs in the space we inhabit,
rather than in the space we observe. In the space we observe, we see only the
continuous path of a motion, occupied at every place by the thing that moves.
But in the space we inhabit, we see the motion itself, which is not simply
continuous, but indivisible. The motion in this indivisible sense stretches from
the beginning of its path to the end in a single bound, as if the entire path were
a single place for the moving thing to occupy. And we know this indivisibility
when moving ourselves. For in that case, we face the end of our motion at
the beginning of it, and reach the end as a goal, heedless of any places on
the way-just like in the movement of a melody. And the path we trace in
reaching that goal can be divided only by our changing the goal, in a motion
now different from what it was, but again indivisible. This too is like the
movement in a melody; for only further notes can divide the distance from
note to note, but thereby produce a new melody out of the old one, showing
the movement between notes in any one melody to be indivisible.
But what should we make of this answer? It makes the same appeal to
our inhabited sense of space that we encountered before in making sense of
11 Dedekind draws the analogy in Chapters II and III of his Continuity and Irrational
Numbers.
12 See, for example, Bergson's lecture "The P erception of Change" in the collection The
Creative Mind. There Bergson even connects his account of motion generally to the movement
in a melody. Zuckerkandl follows Bergson's lead in his own account of music 's movement in
Sound and Symbol.
�10
Does Music Move?
the movement in music, only now to make sense of motion as such. But does
it have the same problem? That is, can we show, or know, that we aren't
dreaming when we see anything move?
The question put this generally might seem absurd. After all, to suppose
we were dreaming when seeing anything move, would mean suspecting something illusory about our inhabitance of the world. But there is reason for this
suspicion. And it explains why a question like "Are we dreaming right now?"
has been raised in the history of thought-for example, by Descartes. 13 For
while we might not be dreaming right now, there is arguably nothing in our
inhabitance of the world to prove it. And we lack this proof, so the argument
goes, because we inhabit the world. If we had the proof, we would no longer
inhabit it, but merely observe it.
To see why this argument is worth taking seriously, consider, first , a striking
fact about optical illusions, such as the look of a stick half-plunged in water, and
seemingly half-bent by it. Our knowing the stick stays straight does nothing
to dispel the illusion. But why? One answer is that there is nothing in the
illusion to tell us it's an illusion, and if there were, then the illusion wouldn't
be an illusion. We so remain in the illusion, or inhabit it, as a matter of
perception, even if we stand outside the illusion, or merely observe it, as a
matter of knowledge.
This could also be said of dreams, taking "dreams" in the ordinary sense.
For our dreams so often contain implausible or even impossible events, not to
mention the sense in which all its events, once we wake up, prove unreal. So
why did they seem so real in the dream? Again, one answer is that there is
nothing in the dream, no matter how implausible or impossible, to tell us we
are dreaming, and if there were, then we wouldn't be dreaming. Not being able
to tell is what it means to inhabit the dream. And it is only when something
in the dream wakes us up from it, and puts us outside the dream to observe it,
that we can know it for the dream that it is.
We can give this same answer to the question of why our experience of
music would still seem so real, even if we were convinced-say, by my lecture
tonight-that it was only a dream. For there is nothing in the music to tell us
so, even if there is some account of the music to tell us so. And this is what it
means to inhabit the music, past the point of any account we might give of it.
This answer, then, points to perhaps the most decisive, if negative, feature
of our inhabitance of the world. There is nothing we might encounter in the
world-motion, for example-to tell us the encounter is illusory. For if there
were, then we wouldn't be having the encounter. So for all we know, we might
be dreaming. Arguing against this prospect, perhaps, is our sense that this is
the world, not just some world. But this sense can never be decisive. For the
cost of inhabiting the world, on this answer, is to be past the point of telling
whether it involves any illusions.
13 Descartes raises this question in his First Meditation. It is also discussed in Plato's
Theaetetus, 158b-d; and mentioned, but also dismissed, in Aristotle's M etaphysics, 10lla6. ·
�III. Two solutions to the problem.
11
This, then, is what I take to be the importance of the problem with our
talking as if music moved. For it illustrates a more general problem, with
our talking as if anything moved. Talking that way fails to distinguish our
experience of the world from a dream, in which nothing we experience really
happens.
III
Two solutions to the problem.
I conclude my lecture with two solutions to this problem, in the attempt to
deepen our sense of it. They are incompatible solutions, since they give contrary
answers, in effect , to the question "Are we dreaming right now?"
In the first solution, the answer to this question is yes, we are dreaming right
now. And the solution, then, is to make no appeal to the dream, when we try
to understand the world. We try to understand the world, in other words, by
making no appeal to the sense it makes only from a place of inhabitance-or
even better, by challenging that sense.
Thus described, the solution may sound unpromising; for how can we avoid
this appeal? Still, this is one way to characterize how we have tried to understand the world since Descartes. And we might call this first solution the
solution of science. A central example of it is the way we try to understand
motion, by means of calculus rather than introspection. But more generally,
the terms in which we explain the world, as a matter of observation, are not
the terms in which we encounter the world, as a matter of inhabitance-and
in many cases, such as quantum physics, could never be the terms of such an
encounter. Yet we take this discrepancy as a sign that the world has been
explained rather than erased. And we look for an explanation of our encounter
with music, not in Beethoven's Eroica, but rather in the mathematician's account of numerical ratios, or the physicist's account of wave phenomena, or the
neuroscientist's account of brain patterns, or the biologist's account of evolutionary adaptations, or even the Nietzschean's account of a sickness in the soul.
Despite the fact we don't encounter music as music in such terms, we credit
these accounts as attempts to explain that encounter. Which suggests that
we find nothing self-justifying in the encounter itself; nothing there to tell us
what's really going on- as if the encounter were just a dream. -Or, according
to this first solution to that problem, as if the encounter were what required
explanation, rather than what provided explanation.
This brings me to the second solution. My sketch of it will remind many
of you of Heidegger. 14 But I call it the solution of philosophy. For it embraces
our inhabitance of the world in a way that I suspect always distinguishes a
philosophic understanding of the world from a scientific one. In this solution,
then, the answer to the question "Are we dreaming right now?" is no. There
may be nothing to tell us this- true-but this doesn't mean we might be
dreaming; it rather means we aren't .
14 For a further account of Heidegger's actual answer, see Part One, Division One, Chapters
II and III of his Being and Tim e.
�12
Does Music Move?
This solution may already sound unprorrusmg. After all, there may be
nothing in a dream to tell us we are dreaming, but we are. On this solution,
however, it turns out we aren't, at least as a matter of inhabitance. For any
space of inhabitance is real, because it can be inhabited. And this means we
are always surrounded by beings, and always face them from a being of our
own, whether we find ourselves in a dream, in a symphony, or in the world that
contains them. True, we have reason to think otherwise, in thinking that these
smaller spaces are contained in a larger space that proves their own totality to
be illusory. But this assumes that any space of inhabitance lies in space. Yet
it is only a space of observation, on this solution, that lies in space. Any space
of inhabitance lies instead in time.
Perhaps this solution now sounds even more unpromising. For how can
there be any room in time for a space of inhabitance, when the only part of
time that ever exists is 'right now ', that instant between the no-longer and notyet at the seeming size of a point? Still, this very fact about time's evanescence
turns the illusion of motion into an object of wonder, if not astonishment. For
according to our earlier analysis, motion is what it is, only in time. But if time
exists only at a point, then how could we ever encounter a temporal whole
like motion---even in the form of an illusion? How could we even dream that
we hear the rise and fall of a melody, or see the rise and fall of our hand in
following it?
It is in offering an answer to this question, that the solution starts to look
more promising. And the answer is this. 'Right now' may be no larger than
a point. But this is still room enough to establish a space of inhabitance, in
providing a center of orientation. And this is the center from which the not-yet
lies ahead of us, the no-longer lies behind us, and the right-now is always with
us. And in being always at this center, we are always in the world, even when
we find ourselves in a dream, or a symphony. We inhabit even these smaller
spaces from the same center of orientation, where the not-yet is ahead of us as
a matter of expectation, the no-longer is behind us as a matter of memory, and
the right-now is always with us as a matter of attention. And in these terms,
temporal terms, any space of observation becomes a place of inhabitance.
It is also in these temporal terms that any place of inhabitance is real rather
than illusory. For this center of orientation, despite being a mere point in time,
comprehends a totality of time for each of us: from a beginning in birth that
no one else can share, to an end in death that no one else can know, in a span
of time without remainder. This is the center, then, from which the not-yet
ahead of us is a future to face ; the no-longer behind us is a past to bear; and
the right-now always with us is a present at stake. So in being always at this
center, at a point of totality, we are always in a world that is real, even when we
find ourselves in a dream or symphony. We inhabit even these smaller spaces
from the same center of orientation, with a future to face, a past to bear, and
a present at stake. This is why we can be released from their spell, without
having recovered from it. In this sense, again temporal rather than spatial, we
are not carried from the world by a dream or symphony, but concentrated in
it. And if our inhabitance of the world is temporal rather than spatial, then
�III. Two solutions to the problem.
13
we are surrounded by events rather than things, to which we are open rather
than closed, making dreams and symphonies possible, not impossible.
Or to summarize this second solution to the problem in conclusion: we can
only talk as if anything moved, much less as if music moved , insofar as the
space we inhabit in talking that way, makes complete sense of what we say,
without any room for nonsense. And this is the space we inhabit right now:
the space made possible by time.
�
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Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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Harrell, Daniel
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Does music move?
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2013-02-15
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pdf
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Typescript of a lecture delivered on February 15, 2013 by Daniel Harrell as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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St. John's College
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Annapolis, MD
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text
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Music. Philosophy and aesthetics.
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English
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Bib # 80674
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<a title="Audio recording" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/33">Audio recording</a>
Friday night lecture
Tutors
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https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/ff8c6af26bbe7a19d847f5e099b194f7.mp3
39188cd9ad0ee5b6a98350d0e2a811bc
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Description
An account of the resource
Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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01:09:43
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Kalkavage, Peter
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Principles of Motion and the Motion of Principles: Hegel's Inverted World
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2010-10-15
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Audio recording of a lecture delivered on October 15, 2010, by Peter Kalkavage as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, 1770-1831. Phänomenologie des Geistes.
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English
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Bib # 79789
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<a href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/3842" title="Typescript">Typescript</a>
Friday night lecture
Tutors
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770b328d79adf99f8909e96b95f0d096
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Kalkavage, Peter
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The Musical Universe and Mozart's Magic Flute
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2012-09-28
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Audio recording of a lecture delivered on September 28, 2012, by Peter Kalkavage as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, 1756-1791. Zauberflöte.
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<a title="Typescript" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/37">Typescript</a>
Friday night lecture
Tutors
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Text
The Musical Universe
and Mozart's Magic Flute
Peter Kalkavage
Homecoming lecture for St. John's College, Annapolis
28 September 2012
"Feelings are 'vectors'; for they feel what is there
and transform it into a here."
Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality
Let me begin by saying to our alumni: Welcome home! My lecture is :intended to be its
own kind of homecoming, since I plan to take you back in time-back to the sophomore
music tutorial. It was there that you took up the study of musical elements: tone, :interval,
scale, mode, rhythm, structure, as well as the fundamental rules of counterpoint and
harmony. You may recall some of the big questions that came up in your classes. What
makes a melody a whole rather than a mere sequence of tones? What light do ratios and
the overtone series shed on the phenomenon of music? What is time :in music? What does
it mean for tones to have meaning? What is the connection between words and tones in
song? What does it mean for human beings to be musical?
I shall not attempt to answer any of these questions tonight. My goal is humbler,
though still daunting. It is to recapture the spirit and substance of the music tutorial by
attempting the musical equivalent of a close reading of a text. My ''text" is an aria from
'
Mozart's Magic Flute: "Dies Bildnis ist bezaubemd schon," "This image is enchantingly
beautiful." One of the most exquisite love-songs ever written, it occurs early :in the opera
and is sung by Prince Tamino as he gazes upon a likeness of Pamina, daughter of the
Queen of the Night and Tamino's destined Other.
�The Magic Flute has been called Mozart's "Masonic opera," and so it is. Mozart was a
serious Freemason. So was his librettist, Emanuel Schikaneder, at whose Viennese
theatre the work was first produced and who was the first to play the birdman, Papageno.
The opera-or rather Singspiel, "play with songs"-is filled with Masonic ideals,
symbols, terms, rituals, and numerology. 1 The mystic Three is especially prominent:
three flats in the key signature, Three Ladies, Three Boys, Three Temples, and, of course,
three tones in the major triad, which Mozart highlights in various ways throughout the
opera, notably in the middle section of the Overture. I say all this now because the
Masonic influence, though pervasive, will not be my concern. I want to focus instead on
the power and precision of Mozart's music.
We love music because of how it makes us feel. We listen to some works more than
others because we want to experience the feelings they stir in us. But feeling is not
primary in music, nor is it always the reason why we listen. Most of the time we listen to
a piece of music because, well, we want to hear it. We take pleasure in the hearing. But
the pleasure is not in the pleasure, as though music were a drug used only to produce a
"rush." The pleasure is in what we are hearing, in the distinctive aistheton or object of
perception. Sometimes we listen to a musical work because we wish to hear a quality or
perfection that is present in it. We listen for the sake of an active, even strenuous,
contemplation in which we participate in, are one with, the life and shape of the musical
object. To be sure, feelings are aroused, but these are grounded in, and prompted by, what
we perceive in the tones, in what is there in the phenomenon we call music. We might
1
For an exhaustive study of the Masonic.elements in Mozart's opera, see Jacques Chailley, The
Magic Flute, Masonic Opera, trans. Herbert Weinstock (New York: Knopf, 1971). Chailley finds
Masonic meaning even in the number of notes used in individual phrases. His analysis makes the
plot more coherent but ultimately distracts us from Mozart's music.
2
�say that in responding to music we perceive feelingly and feel perceptively. But in saying
this, we must bear in mind that perception is primary. We do not, except incidentally,
hear musical sounds and associate them with various feelings, images, or experiences. On
the contrary, we perceive what is there and take on the condition that rhythms and tones
communicate to us. 2
There is a wonderful passage by Paul Valery on ''the musical universe," the phrase
that inspired the title of my talk. It occurs in his lecture, "Poetry and Abstract Thought."
The passage makes clear the primacy of musical perception:
The musician is ... in possession of a perfect system of well-defined
means which exactly match sensations with acts. From this it results that
music has formed a domain absolutely its own. The world of the art of
music, a world of sounds, is distinct from the world of noises. Whereas a
noise merely rouses in us some isolated event-a dog, a door, a motor
car-a sound evokes, of itself, the musical universe. If, in this hall, where I
am speaking to you and where you hear the noise of my voice, a tuning
fork or a well-tempered instrument began to vibrate, you would at once, as
soon as you were affected by this pure and exceptional noise that cannot
be confused with others, have the sensation of a beginning, the beginning
of a world; a quite different atmosphere would immediately be created, a
new order would arise, and you yourselves would unconsciously organize
yourselves to receive it. 3
Let us observe that the beings that populate Valery' s musical universe are tones pure and
simple. If words are to gain entrance to this world, they do so by the grace, as it were, of
tones. The tones are primary. This is crucial in the essay in which the passage occurs,
since Valery wishes to contrast the musical universe with the "poetic universe." The
musical universe is an autonomous realm that contains objects perfectly suited to the art
of music, whereas the poetic universe is forced ''to borrow language-the voice of the
2
See Victor Zuckerkandl, "Words and Tones in Song," Chapter 3 of Man, the Musician,
Bollin gen Series, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973, pp. 31-43.
3
The lecture can be found in Paul Valery, An Anthology, Bollingen Series, Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1977,pp.136-165.
3
�public, that collection of traditional and irrational terms and rules, oddly created and
transformed, oddly codified, and very variedly understood and pronounced."
Let us now enter the musical universe ofTamino's aria. The aria is inspired, as I
mentioned earlier, by an image of Pamina. The portrait is given to Tamino by the Three
Ladies, who serve the Queen of the Night. The Queen, as we discover, means to use
Tamino's love for Pamina to seduce the hero into saving Pamina from Sarastro, the
''villain" who has abducted Pamina. Given the young hero's fervent devotional response
to what he sees, we might call this image an icon. It is said to be magical, but surely it
needs no magic beyond Pamina' s likeness to enchant the young prince, who sings as if
caught up in. a dream. The words to his song are as follows:
1bis image is enchantingly beautiful,
such as no eye has ever seen!
I feel it, I feel it, how this divine portrait
Fills my heart with new emotions.
I cannot name this,
yet I feel it here burning like fire;
Could the feeling be love?
Yes, yes, it is love alone, love, it is love alone!
0, if only I could find her!
0, if she were already standing before me!
I would, would, warm and pure ... what would I?
Enraptured I would press her to this burning breast,
And forever would she then be mine.
Tamino's fire-filled words trace out a progression in three stages: first, he marvels at a
divine image; second, he asks whether the feeling it inspires in him, and which at first he
cannot name, is love but then affirms that it must be love; and third, he wonders what he
would do if the beloved were standing before him, concluding that he would press her to
his breast, and she would be his forever.
Tamino is doing more in this song than expressing his feelings. He beholds his inner
state and makes it an object of reflection. He marvels at the power of the magical object
4
�that he perceives and at his passionate response to it. He does not immediately identify
his new emotion with love but rather reaches that conclusion through inner dialogue and
questioning. Mozart's music perfectly captures the stages of Tamino's awakening, the
meaning of his words, and the motions of his soul. Let us hear how the words of the aria
sound when they are lifted into the universe of tones.
I begin with the observation that the aria is a precisely formed, perfectly balanced
whole. Tamino is agitated and confused. But his music, though passionate, is restrained,
stately, and inward sounding. It embodies, as I noted earlier, not merely his feeling but
his awareness. The music critic and writer of tales E.T. A. Hoffmann once said that
Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven all had the musical virtue of "Besonnenheit. "4 The word
means something like rational awareness, sensibleness, being in one's right mind.
Tamino's aria, in its concision and restraint, is a superb example ofthis virtue.
The song is in E-flat major-the solemn, heroic key of the opera-and has a
moderately slow two-beat measure. It is scored for strings, clarinets, bassoons, and
French horns (no flutes or oboes). Their sound is like a warm glow emanating from
Tamino's heart, or rather the sound of the new world in which Tamino finds himself. The
aria is in a truncated version of sonata form. It follows the usual tripartite structureexposition, development, and recapitulation-and its key-area plan goes from tonic I to
dominant V and then back to the tonic, but there is no repeat of the opening theme, as is
customary in the sonata. This allows for greater compression and dramatic urgency.
The aria opens with a tender statement of the E-flat major triad-the sound of an
awakening-spelled out in dotted rhythms and played by the strings, which give Tamino
4
"Beethoven's Instrumental Music," in E.T. A. Hojfmann's Musical Writings, edited by David
Charlton, translated by Martyn Clarke (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 98.
5
�his cue. Clearly, the singer we are about to hear-unlike Papageno, with his bouncy birdcatcher song-is noble. Tamino's first utterance is a leap on the words "Dies Bilclnis,"
"This image"-a rising major sixth from scale degree 5 in the E-flat major scale up to
scale degree 3 (B-flat to G). The leap is an event in Tamino's soul, the sudden wonder
inspired by Pamina' s likeness. When his sentence is spoken in German, the accent is on
"schon," "beautiful"-"Dies Bildnis ist bezaubernd schon." But the tones accent the
word "Bildnis," "image," leaving no doubt th.at for Tamino the focus is initially on what
he sees, on the source and cause of his surging passion.
After the inspired leap from 5 to 3, the melody gently descends by steps, pausing on
degree 4 (A-flat), an unstable degree that tends downward toward 3. The musical phrase
corresponds to the first phrase of the sentence: "This image is enchantingly beautiful." As
Tamino moves to the second part of his sentence--"as no eye has ever seen"-he sings a
second rising sixth-from 4 up to 2, A-flat to F. He th.en descends by steps to 3, the tone
to which his earlier 4 was pointing. Whereas the first phrase landed on a tone th.at was
unstable and ''wanted" to move, the second complements the first and brings it to rest.
Thanks to the postponement of the move from 4 to 3, the two phrases form a single
phrase-not two sets of tones but one coherent movement composed of two submovements. The entire phrase is bounded by an octave th.at extends from the high 3, to
which Tamino leaps, to the low 3, to which he descends by step.
Mozart's musical language is th.at of tonal harmony. This means that the music is
firmly grounded in a tonal center, the tone to which all the other tones point, and has a
background or underpinning in the movement of what we call "chords." We sometimes
call this chordal movement an accompaniment to the melody. But it is more precise to
6
�say that the harmony is the structured movement that interprets the melody and reveals its
depth. Harmony is present in the two-part phrase we have just examined. The harmonic
movement is from the I chord or tonic to the V7 chord or dominant seventh and back
again to the tonic or I-a musical oscillation. This works because the V7 chord, thanks to
the tritone, points in a precise direction: to the I chord, in this case the E-flat major triad.
We can therefore say that Mozart's opening two-part phrase is the unity of two kinds of
tension that beget movement: the melodic tension of individual tones and the harmonic
tension of chords. Zuckerkandl argues, persuasively I think, that these directed tensions
and their various relations to one another are the primary object of musical perception,
that to listento music, at least in the tradition of tonal harmony, is to perceive not pitches
but force&--dynamic qualities that manifest themselves in and through pitches and hold
the piece together. 5
After the opening phrase, which goes harmonically from I to V and back again, the
tones open up and move forward. This is due largely to the harmony, which, having so
far confined itself to I-V7-I, now moves briefly to the IV or subdominant chord over a
continued E-flat in the bass, then returns to I.6 The IV chord signals the "away" move in a
harmonic journey and produces a lessening of harmonic tension. Tamino here moves
from the picture to his inner state: "I feel it, I feel it, how this divine portrait fills my heart
with new emotions." As he says "I feel it, I feel it," he sings appoggiaturas on "feel"-Bnatural to C, then A-natural to B-flat. Appoggiaturas are leaning tones, unstable tones on
5
Dynamic qualities may be thought of as the supersensuous within the sensuous. To listen to
music, therefore, is to hear the sensuous world transcending itself. This striking thesis appears in
all three of Zuckerkandl's books: Sound q.nd Symbol: Music and the External World (1956), The
Sense of Music (1959), and Man, the Musician (1973).
6
The continued E-flat puts the IV chord in its second inversion: the least stable position of the
triad. The effect is to make the move from I to IV into a mild departure from the E-flat triad, more
of an inflection than a chord-change.
7
�strong beats, which briefly delay the arrival of a main tone in the melody. Here the
leaning tone is an affect perfectly suited to the word "feel." The accompaniment echoes
this affect. As Tamino leans into his feeling, the strings lean in sympathy with him.
Right after his appoggiaturas, Tamino speaks of his heart and the new emotions that
Pamina's image has aroused in it. His outburst on "Gotterbild," "divine portrait," occurs
at the exact center of his opening 13-measure period. Tamino here sings his second
dramatic leap, from B-flat up to A-flat, the highest tone of his song. The interval, a minor
seventh, is an even bigger leap than his opening sixth. It is a sudden flaring up of the
passion that the "divine portrait" inspires. The melody on "Gotterbild" outlines part of the
V7 or dominant-seventh chord. The music does not resolve this tense chord, which points
to E-flat, but rather stresses it and lingers on it.
When the tonic chord does arrive, it is not the end of the previous phrase but the
beginning of a new one. Now past the flare-up on "GOtterbild," Tamino retreats to a more
inwardly focused mood as he completes his sentence: "fills my heart with new emotions."
The accompaniment is measured and lovely, like the gentle strumming of a guitar: bass
note, chord I bass note, chord. The harmony takes us on a little musical journey, as the
melody begins and ends on an E-flat or degree 1. The sequence of chords here arouses
the expectation that the tense V7 chord will resolve
O?- the tonic, which would fit the E-
flat or 1 in the melody. But this does not happen. When Tamino sings his 1 on ":fiillt,"
"fills" (which in German closely resembles "filhlt," "feels"), the harmony subverts the
expected closure. It interprets Tamino's E-flat as part of a dissonant diminished-seventh
chord based on A-natural. This tense passionate chord, which consists of two interlocking
tritones, appears four times in the course of the aria. On each occasion it functions as an
8
�audible "heat element" that captures a surge of the love-embers burning within Tamino's
breast.
With the sudden appearance of the diminished-seventh chord in place of the expected
tonic, the tones seem to have gone off course. We have here a deceptive cadence: the
cadence formula leads us to expect an end, but the harmony takes a detour at the last
minute and puts instability-in this case, extreme instability-in place of stability. This
produces tension and the need for continued movement.
The diminished-seventh chord here functions as an applied dominant (or secondary
dominant). This is a chord that tenses toward a chord other than the tonic, in this case, to
the V7 ofE-tlat: a B-flat dominant seventh chord. To sum up, three kinds of musical
tension unite in a single chord on the word "fills": deceptive cadence, applied dominant,
diminished-seventh chord. Tamino's unassuming E-flat in the melody does not reveal the
full meaning of the word he sings or the "heat" it embodies. This revelation falls to
harmony, which here interprets Tamino's E-flat by releasing in it an unexpected
potential. The deceptive diminished chord is the harmonic interior and soul ofTamino' s
melodic tone. The inner, soul-like aspect of harmony recalls what Wagner once said: that
harmony is ''the first thing that fully persuades the feeling as to the emotional content of
[the] melody, which otherwise would leave to it something undetermined."7
Right after the deceptive cadence, the first violins, as if inspired by Tamino, sing
rising phrases that form a gentle two-part wave: up and down, up and down. Their tones
outline the degrees of the B-flat7 chord, to which the diminished-seventh chord was
pointing. With this move, the tones regain their direction.
7
Wagner on Music and Drama, selected and arranged by A. Goldman and E. Sprinchom (New
York: Da Capo Press, 1964), 214.
9
�The dominant seventh chord spelled out by the first violins gently leads Tamino to
repeat his sentence, this time with musical closure. Again he sings his rising sixth from
B-flat to G on the words "mein Herz," "my heart," and then goes even higher-to his Aflat. He ends his phrase with a smooth 3-2-1. The harmony here traverses a complete
cycle, at the end aligning itself, non-deceptively, with Tamino's E-flat. A gentle rhythmic
emphasis on the E-flat triad marks the end ofTamino's opening 13-measure period.
Tam.inc then pauses, as clarinets in gentle thirds take us into a new section of the
exposition. Here the music changes key from E-flat to B-flat, from I to V. The circle of
fifths makes this standard move for a sonata-form piece in a major key perfectly natural.
But observe how easily E-flat is dislodged and B-flat established as the new tonic. The
upper clarinet goes from G to F, 3 to 2 in E-flat, and then repeats the F. Had it gone from
G to F and on to E-flat, the former key would have been maintained: 3-2-1. It is the
emphasis on 2 that subtly begins to move the tonal center from 1 to 5. It blocks the move
to E-flat as scale degree 1, and begins to set up Fas degree 5 of our new key, B-flat. The
appearance of A-natural, degree 7 in the B-flat scale, solidifies this move.
Earlier, Tam.inc sang his leaning tones and the orchestra followed. Now the reverse
happens. The upper clarinet introduces a new musical strain, which Tamino follows, as if
inspired by it "I cannot name this," he sings, ''yet I feel it here burning like fire" ("Dies
Etwas kann ich zwar nicht nennen; <loch :fiihl ich's hier wie Feuer brennen"). In imitation
of the clarinet, Tamino begins on his high G (now degree 6) and descends stepwise. His
gently undulating phrase ends with a leaning tone (C-sharp to D) on "nennen," "name."
He then repeats the phrase, with a sli&ht variation: ''yet I feel it here burning like fire."
The harmony is a simple oscillation between the tonic (B-flat) and the dominant (F).
10
�A brief transition in dotted rhythms, played by clarinets and bassoons, takes us to
Tamino's first question, which he stresses by singing it twice: "Could the feeling be
love?" ("Soll die Empfindung Liebe sein?") Both phrases end on tense chords: the first
on an applied dominant (the V7 ofV), the second on the dominant ofB-flat (an F major
triad). This harmonic tension-this upward interrogative gesture--is reflected in the
melody. Tamino's frrst utterance of his question outlines the B-flat triad and ends on an
E-natural, a tone foreign to B-flat. This E-natural is highlighted by the preceding F,
which serves as a leaning tone. Tamino's second utterance begins with a downward leap
from G to B-flat (the reverse of his opening sixth) and ends on the unstable degree, 2.
The E-natural with which Tamino ends the first utterance of his question is especially
beautiful: "Could this feeling be love ("Liebe sein")?" This chromatic E-natural on
"love," the applied dominant of which it is a part (C7), and the florid notes of the first
violin all sound as though a light was beginning to dawn, as though the question "Could
this be love?" was more than just a question. The anticipation of the answer is heightened
by the brief interlude played by the clarinets. Their rising phrases in dotted rhythms
gently nudge Tamino and give him his cue. His "Ja, ja!" completes the sequence of
upward melodic gestures.
alone, love, it is love alone." He
Tamino answers his question: "Yes, yes, it is love _
sings the word "Liebe," "love," four times in all, three times with an expressive leaning
tone and once with a climactic flourish called a ''turn." At the end of his first phrase (right
after "Ja, ja!"), Tamino sings a straightforward 3-2-1 (D-C-B-flat) on the word
"allein," "alone" or "only." But the h<;tID1ony once more undercuts the stability of his
melodic 1 with a deceptive cadence. Instead of harmonic V-I, we get V-VI, where VI
11
�is a minor chord. Musically, this is a subtle way of extending the phrase and producing
the need to move on. Also, the minor VI adds a gently dark inflection and warmth to the
word "allein."
As Tamino repeats his sentence ("It is love alone"), he dwells on "Liebe" and makes it
into its own musical phrase in three parts: first a leap that gently descends by a step, then
this same phrase repeated, and finally an embellished ascent to a high G. The chord on
this G is a dramatic diminished-seventh chord that points to the F major triad, the V of Bflat. Both melody and harmony are at this point up in the air, begging for resolution. The
eighth-note rest that follows heightens the suspense. After the rest, tension is released, as
Tamino completes his sentence: he drops more than an octave to an F and proceeds by
step to B-flat, our new 1, this time supported rather than undercut by the accompanying
harmony. The cadence, embellished by a turn played by the first violins, brings the
section to a close. It completes the musical ''thought" that the preceding deceptive
cadence had postponed.
We now enter the middle section of the aria I think you will agree that although not
much time has passed, much as happened. That the tones are embarking on a new large
section of the piece is signalled by two whole measures in which the orchestra shifts to
quicker rhythms that give the song more forward momentum. It is as if the embers in
Tamino's soul had greater force and impetus. The strings play sixteenth- and thirtysecond notes, as the winds enter with a recurring pattern of syncopations or offbeat
rhythms. The first violins surge upward in thirty-second-notes grouped in quick pairs,
then play a rapid succession of appoggiaturas, as the second violins play a lovely
countermelody in contrary motion. The appoggiaturas then take over and become the first
12
�violins' principal theme. They are little flutters of the heart born of heightened
expectation. Beneath this dense rhythmic complex, the bass viols provide support with a
persistent B-flat in sixteenth-notes-the quickened pulse and heartbeat of this part of
Tamino's music. All these rhythms together form a complex musical image of the
passion that leads Tamino to his second question: "O, if only I could find her! 0, if she
were already standing before me! I would, would, warm and pure ... what would I?"
Tamino's melody on these words begins as a passionate stepwise swell on his two
A
exclamations. The ascent begins on B-flat or 1 and reaches its peak on the high A-flat. . t
the end of each phrase (on "konnte" and "stande"), Tamino sings the same tones he sang
earlier on the word "Gotterbild"-A-flat, F, and D, which are part of the dominant chord
that points to E-flat. But the harmony does not go there. The tones seem to be caught in a
region of harmonic indeterminacy. As Tamino now moves beyond his two exclamations,
he breaks the pattern and sings a calm perfect fourth from C up to F on "ich wiirde" ("I
would"), then another perfect fourth from B-flat up to E-flat on ''wlirde" repeated. The
repetition suggests that Tamino is suspended in mid-thought by the indeterminacy of his
feelings and intentions: he does not know how to complete his sentence. The sense of
indeterminacy is evident in the accompaniment, which plays mysterious, dusky sounding
measures with a flurry of chromatic appoggiaturas. When Tamino sings "warm and
pure," he uses a warm-sounding G-flat, as the little heart flutters played by the first
violins outline the same diminished-seventh chord on A-natural that we heard in the
exposition. This chord points to the B-flat major triad that immediately follows. The
tones seem to have found their direction, their tonal center or 1. But as Tamino utters his
second question ("what would I?"), he ends his phrase by falling a major sixth from F
13
�down to the A-flat an octave below the A-flat we heard earlier. The gesture is an
anticlimax, coming as it does after Tamino's three dramatic ascents: two to an A-flat and
one to G-flat. It suggests a momentary deflation-rising confidence that is suddenly at a
loss. The low A-flat blocks the reassertion ofB-flat as key. It is part of a B-flat7 chord,
the dominant seventh ofE-flat major, our home key. Tamino's "What would I?''-a
deflating fall from F to A-flat-finds a fitting harmonic correlate in the unresolved V7
chord that leaves this entire section of the aria hanging.
The intense anticipation that has built up in the course of this middle section of the
aria, and which seems to stall on the V7 chord, is emphasized by the full measure of rest
that follows ..This is the longest, most dramatic pause in a song full of pauses and
withheld resolutions. The soundless measure prolongs and heightens the tension of the
preceding V7 chord-the harmonic image ofTamino's aporia. It is a dynamic, charged
silence. The measure is a superb example of how silence is part of the musical universe,
how silence in music is not void but order. That is to say, musical silence has, or is, a
form. No doubt we are to imagine that Tamino's soul, during this measure, is gathering
itself for a further revelation, for an answer to the question "What would I?" Indeed, he
finds an answer, but not through words, not through questioning. The answer, or rather
the inner experience that leads to the answer, wells up in him wordlessly during the
silence. He is listening for the promptings of his heart and the music of his soul. These
promptings will show him the way and will soon become articulate in song.
The music continues, not after the measure of silence but from it. The silence has
become a source. The strings re-establish momentum with an oscillating, so-called
Alberti bass played by the violas and persistent sixteenth-notes on a low E-flat played by
14
�the bass viols. They combine the quickened pace of Tamino's newfound resolve with the
tenderness that characterizes the whole aria. The oscillation played by the violas is a
straightforward I-V7-I in E-flat major. This confirms that we have returned to the home
key and that the recapitulation has begun. In this final section of his song, Tamino, with
rising self-confidence, answers his second question: "I would press her to this burning
breast, and forever would she then be mine."
Tamino takes his cue from the first violins, which play a gently rising phrase that
becomes a countermelody: singer and violins engage in amusical conversation. The
melody is straightforward: first, a little melodic wave that starts on a B-flat and rises to Eflat through an appoggiatura on F ("I would her''}--then the same melodic phrase
repeated ("enraptured"). The next phrase, which begins similarly, introduces a pattern of
skips and ends on a warm-sounding chromatic D-flat ("press to this burning or heated
breast"). The phrasing exploits German word order in a gradual revelation of meaning: "I
would her," "enraptured," "to this burning breast," and finally the crucial infinitive
"driicken," "press," which completes the earlier sentence Tamino could not finish. The Eflat to D-flat on "driicken" captures the very act of pressing. This chromatic tone tenses
forward. It conspires with the tones in the accompaniment to form a 17 chord, that is, the
E-flat major triad with the D-flat as the de-stabilizing seventh. The 17, which interprets
and deepens Tamino's D-flat, is an applied or passing dominant that pushes into the final
phrase of the song: "and forever would she then be mine." In her upcoming aria, the
Queen will echo these words in a cunning effort to bedazzle and seduce the unwitting
Tamino. 8
8
"And if I come to see you as victor [by saving Pamina], then she is yours forever." The Queen's
mind-numbing tone-witchery occurs, significantly, on the tantalizing word "then," "dann."
15
�Tamino repeats the phrase ''und ewig ware sie dann mein," "and forever would she
then be mine," five times in all, three times with the upbeat ''und" ("and") and twice
without. The phrases without the ''und" have greater urgency and are allowed to begin on
the crucial word "ewig," "forever." The 17 chord on "driicken" tends toward an A-flat
triad, the IV chord or subdominant in E-flat major. But as Tamino moves to his first "and
forever would she be mine," Mozart substitutes the ii6 chord: the first inversion of the F
minor triad. This chord plays the same role as IV in the harmonic cycle-the moment of
stepping away and preparing for the dominant. Why the substitution? No doubt because
the ii chord, being minor, has greater warmth. On this ii6 chord, which lasts an entire
measure, Tamino sings a smooth measured ascent to his high A-flat. He then drops to D,
degree 7 in E-flat, by way of a leaning tone. The first violins join him in this gently
ascending phrase. The Dis part of the chord played by the strings: the V7 ofE-flat. The
music pauses on this tense dominant chord.
Then, as Tamino sings "and forever would she then be mine," we hear the calm
measured phrase from the exposition, where Tamino sang "fills my heart with new
emotions." The frrst appearance of the earlier phrase ended, you recall, with a deceptive
cadence on a diminished-seventh chord. Mozart repeats that cadence here. But whereas in
the exposition Tamino ended his second phrase seren_ely on scale degree 1, here, at the
corresponding moment, he bypasses the E-flat and leaps to his high G on "mein." It is in
this measure that phrases with ''und" switch to phrases without. The shift quickens the
momentum of the song. It also produces a happy elision on the tones G, E-flat, and C that
allows Tamino to combine "mine" an~ ''forever" in one phrase to form the unit "mine
forever."
16
�Tamino goes on to stress the degrees of the E-flat major triad in a smoothly flowing
phrase that seems destined to land on a low E-flat or 1. But at the last minute, he leaps
from low F (scale degree 2) to the Ga ninth above on the word "mein," and then
overtops the G with an A-flat on "ewig." This is the most dramatic moment in the aria, as
Tamino intensifies his previous elision-his musicalized, heat-filled dream of eternally
possessing the beloved. Tamino sounds very heroic and confident here. He sings his
signature Ga lot, as though this single tone, scale degree 3, embodied the whole of his
passion. When he gets to the last utterance of his phrase, his melody again emphasizes
the tones of the E-flat major triad. He leaps, one last time, to his signature G-this time,
significantly;· on the word "sie," "her." This G, however, is not a stable degree of a chord
but an appoggiatura tending toward F, 2. Tamino, in other words, does not merely stress
the pronoun that refers to Pamina with a high note; he puts his whole heart into the word
and leans heroically toward the beloved. Having reached high G, the tones now descend
to E-flat, scale degree 1, by step, with the assistance ofD, scale degree 7: 3-2-1-
7-1 ("sie dann mein"). A straightforward cadence affirms closure.
The foll orchestra ends the piece with a brief coda composed of two complementary
phrases. The phrases capture the two complementary sides ofTamino's nature: the first
heroic and forte, the second tender and piano, a recollection of the fervent E-flat chords
with which the song began. It is important that the song end in a hush. What Tamino
ultimately desires is not continued arousal, or heroism for its own sake, but rest-the
blissful repose and heart's ease that comes from lasting union with the beloved. 9
So ends my journey through T~o's aria. I have tried to be faithful in speech to
9
Papageno's wistful G-major aria also ended with the desire for rest-with the image of a wife
who would sleep by his side "like a child" ("wie ein Kind").
17
�what is there in the tones. I have not, of course, captured all that is there. No one could.
Mozart's music, like all great music, is inexhaustible, and every act of listening brings
new discoveries. I have tried to present the aria as a tonal time-structure that comes to us
as a gift from the musical universe and is welcomed by our musically receptive souls.
The time-structure "speaks to" our passion and our perception, just as the divine portrait,
a visual or spatial form, "speaks to" and inspires the soul ofTamino. And just as his
world is transformed by what he experiences, so too perhaps is ours by the magic of
Mozart's incomparable music.
I have placed special emphasis on directed tension as the ground of coherence in tonal
music. This wholeness through tension is evident in the song's overall form. The first
section is an ordered accumulation of tension. The second heightens that tension. It is, as
we have seen, Tamino' s point of maximum anticipation and perplexity. The third
reaffirms E-flat as key, recalls part of the music from the exposition, and brings the
whole time-structure to perfect balance and resolution. It does all this by accumulating
ordered tensions of its own, with which the tones move swiftly to a satisfying close.
To listen perceptively to the aria, to hear what is there, is demanding. It takes effort
and study. Following the thought of Heinrich Schenker, I would like to suggest that
behind all the complexities, a simple scheme prevails_. The melody, as you know, begins
with a rising sixth to a G, the 3 ofE-flat major. The entire piece may be heard, and
certainly most simply conceived, as the attempt by 3 to reach 1 through the extended
intermediation of2: G-F-E-flat 10 Recall that the first key change came about because
the first clarinet played 3-2-2 rather than 3-2-1. This facilitated the transformation
10
For Schenker, the movement 3-2-1 constitutes what he calls the "Urlinie" or "primordial
line." See his Free Composition, translated by Ernst Oster (New York: Longman, 1979), 3-9.
18
�of degree 2 in E-flat into degree 5 in B-flat. The rest of the piece-key changes and allexploits and further develops this move to 2. In other words, 2 (F) is not just an element
of the E-flat major scale; it is also a principle of the unfolding time-structure. To be
persuaded of this fact, one has only to observe the crucial role that 2 plays throughout the
piece. The completion of the move 3-2-1 in the overarching scheme takes place only
at the end, only after the recapitulation has affirmed E-flat, not merely as the key of the
final section but as the governing tone of the entire piece. Only at the end of the journey
do we really have, and know, the beginning.
My account ofTamino's aria would be incomplete if I did not say something about
Pamina, the enchanting object ofTamino's love. Pamina, I believe, is the focal point of
the opera. Of all the "good" characters, she endures the greatest and most prolonged
sufferings: her mother's absence, the stem tutelage of Sarastro, the violent advances and
blackmail of Monostatos, and the revelation of the mother she loves as a demon bent on a
murder Pamina herself is ordered to commit. Finally, she suffers despair over what she
thinks is lost love, and is almost driven to suicide.
Pamina is also an exalted figure in the opera. It is she who most embodies what is new
about the new, previously all-male Order, which now, through the "noble pair," as
Tamino and Pamina are called, will overcome the primordial opposition presented in the
opera between Male and Female. It is Pamina, a virtuous woman, who gives the lie to all
the negative things said about women in the opera. It is she who, at a crucial moment of
the drama, reveals the strange origin of the flute made by her magus-father. In the Finale
of Act One Sarastro tells Pamina that _ man must guide her heart. This is true: Tamino
a
gives Pamina's heart its proper object and bearing. But in the last two trials that Tamino
19
�must undergo, it is Pamina who guides Tamino, as love guides her. Finally, it is Pamina
who reveals that the magical vocation of music is not to gain power over others, or
merely to amuse ·oneself, but to ward off the fear of death.
When Pamina joins Tamino for the final trials near the end of the opera, the two face
each other in more than the obvious sense. They now see each other clearly for the first
time. There is mutual recognition. This recognition is evident in the complementary
phrases the lovers use to sing each other's names: "Tamino mein! 0 welch ein Gluck!"
"Pamina mein! 0 welch ein Gluck!" "Tamino mine! 0 what a stroke of good fortune!"
"Pamina mine! 0 what a stroke of good fortune!" The phrases they sing are two halves of
a little musical circle in F major-a wedding ceremony in tones. When Pamina sings
Tamino's name, she does so with a rising major sixth (Cup to A)-the same interval
with which Tamino' s soul rose up in response to Pamina' s image. 11 But this is not mere
repetition. Tamino's sixth was the sound of passion that aspired but did not know itself. It
had shadows and heat. Pamina's sixth is different. It is pure, luminous, and rationally
aware. It has "Besonnenheit," and in more than the strictly musical sense. Pamina' s sixth
is the perfection ofTamino's. It is the sublime moment in which passion, now perceptive,
finds its purpose.
11
The rising sixth functions as a leitmotif in the opera. Its - ther crucial appearance is in the
o
Finale of Act I, in the interchange between Pamina and Sarastro. Pamina sings the interval twice
in referring to the tender feelings she has for her mother: "The sound of my mother's name is
sweet to me. It is she, it is she ... " The first sixth is from F up to D, the second from B-flat up to G
(the tones of Tamino's opening sixth). No doubt Pamina wants to say: "It is she who gave birth to
me, nurtured me, loved me ." But Sarastro completes her sentence in his own way: "And a proud
woman! A man must lead your heart, for without him every woman will walk outside her proper
sphere." On the words "without him [a man] ," Sarastro, in his low range, repeats Pamina's sixth
from F to D, as if to transfer the chord's tenderness to its proper object. At this very moment,
Monostatos drags in Tamino, the sight of whom prompts Pamina to sing: "It is he!" (Tamino
responds in kind: "It is she!") The drama of sixths in the exchange between Pamina and Sarastro,
coupled with Pamina's shift from the feminine to the masculine pronoun once Tamino arrives,
paves the way for the meeting of the two lovers in the Finale of Act Il .
20
�When Tamino first responded to the magic that was Parnin~ his love was mediated by
an image. He asked himself what he would do if the beloved were standing in front of
him. That moment has arrived, for here stands Parnin~ not as image but as solid reality.
Tamino's first rush of love was itself a kind of image and dream. It was the first step in
his journey from erotic striving and heroic aspiration, through painful disillusionment and
trials, to the moment of enlightenment, when images are seen for what they are, and when
the lover, having transcended mere feeling, now grasps love as act. Pamina is the Other,
in and through whom Tamino can know himself as the man who loves Parnin~ not as a
possession but as a partner in the trials of life. He can see who he is in the eyes of the
beloved because the sound of her rising sixth, as she sings his name, shows him how. Her
sixth, her love in musical form, is his unfailing guide. Pamina is more than Tamino's
beloved, more than a symbol of virtuous womanhood (her mother in redeemed form),
more even than the first woman to gain priestly status within the sacred Order. She is
Tamino's wisdom-and the true magic of Mozart's Magic Flute.
My focus on T amino's aria prevented me from addressing other characters in the
opera: the loveable child of nature, Papageno, the sometimes disturbing Sarastro, the
psychologically complex Monostatos, and, of course, that titanic Mommie Dearest, the
Queen of the Night Perhaps we can discuss these characters in the question period.
Let me end where I began and say once more to our alumni: Welcome home!
21
�
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Kalkavage, Peter
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The musical universe and Mozart's Magic Flute
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2012-09-28
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Typescript of a lecture delivered on September 28, 2012 by Peter Kalkavage as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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St. John's College
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Annapolis, MD
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Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, 1756-1791. Zauberflöte.
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Bib # 80673
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<a title="Audio recording" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/36">Audio recording</a>
Tutors
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Text
Lucretius on the Nature of Things
by
Margaret Kirby
A lecture given at St. John’s College in Annapolis on the 13th of April 2012.
[This title page was supplied by the St. John’s College Catalog Librarian.]
�Lucretius on the Nature of Things
De rerum natura or On the Nature of Things presents itself as a project to convert a
Roman citizen named Memmius from his faith in the civic religion of Rome to the “true
reasoning” (vera ratio) embodied in the teachings of the Greek philosopher Epicurus.1 This civic
religion, Lucretius maintains, and especially the fears it inculcates in the minds of its adherents,
are responsible for the unhappy condition of late Republican Rome: the urgent prayer for peace
with which the work opens and its reference to “our country’s time of trouble” locate the poem
amidst the civil disturbances and foreign wars of conquest that characterize the last years of
the Republic.2 Lucretius fully acknowledges the difficulty of the project: his fundamental tenet
that the universe consists of nothing but “body and void,” his central precept of the soul’s
mortality, and his ongoing insistence on the utter indifference of the gods to all human affairs,
constitute a bold attack on those religious convictions, on which, according to Polybius, the
enduring strength of the Roman commonwealth depended.3 The character of Lucretius’ pupil
only exacerbates the problem: Memmius is portrayed as a recalcitrant student, likely to reject
with disdain any teaching he does not immediately understand,4 and prone to bouts of
inattentiveness—although the length of Lucretius’ lecture no doubt invites such lapses.
Moreover, Lucretius foresees that Memmius, “overcome by the fear-inspiring words of priests
and poets,” will try to cut himself off from Epicurean reasoning and revert to his former
beliefs.5 The fears instilled by priests and poets, Lucretius suggests, derive overwhelming
power from a deeper and more fundamental human fear, which is rooted deep in the mind
itself and in our very sense of causality. The eradication of this primary fear thus becomes key
to the conversion of Memmius:
1
�Therefore this terror of mind and these shadows must be dispelled, not by rays of sun or
bright shafts of day, but by nature’s aspect and reason.6
Read actively, the phrase nātūrae spĕcĭēs rătĭōque refers to our “looking at and reasoning about
nature.” 7 At the same time it invites a less conventional reading, which suggests that it is not so
much our observation and reasoning about nature, but nature’s own visible and invisible
processes— its “aspect and reason”—that will ultimately dispel the shadows and terror of the
mind.
Fear is not by any means a human prerogative. Lucretius notes that animals utter
distinct sounds of alarm “when they are in fear or pain.”8 Nevertheless, he claims that humans
know—or are afflicted by—a peculiar kind of fear, which he calls “terror of mind” (terror animi;
1.146).9 Such fear is unknown, however, to the first humans: “They did not seek the day and the
sun all over the land with great outcry, nor wander frightened in the shadows of night…”10 Early
man has “cares” (curae; 5.982), but they are of a different—and more immediate—order: “They
would flee their rocky shelters at the approach of a foaming boar or mighty lion and at dead of
night would yield their leaf-strewn beds in fright to the savage guests.”11 At the same time
Lucretius hints that these first humans are not, in fact, distinctly human at all. They pass their
days in “the wide-wandering fashion of wild beasts,”12 while their nocturnal ritual of “lay[ing]
their wild limbs naked on the ground, [and] rolling themselves in leaves and boughs,” makes
them “the equals of bristly hogs.”13 It seems that only in becoming fully human does man
become infected with the darker terrors of the mind, or perhaps rather that man becomes truly
human precisely by acquiring these dark fears:
For when we look up at the celestial regions of the great world, at the ether set with
glittering stars, and it comes to our mind [to think] of the paths of the sun and moon,
then, into breasts bent down by other evils that care also begins to raise its wakened
2
�head, whether by any chance we have to do with some immeasurable power of the
gods, able to make the bright stars revolve…14
The imagery of this passage is telling.15 Into breasts bent down by “other evils” a new kind of
care is said to make its restless way: this care is depicted as “erecting” or “raising” a head that
has been “wakened” or “made erect.”16 The image of a personified care raising its head and
rising from sleep suggests that as soon as humans, in Ovid’s words, “raise erected faces to the
stars,” that is, as soon as they begin to stand upright and quite literally raise their heads from
the ground, they awake to a new kind of concern.17 Although an animal instinct for survival may
initially position humans in the world, Lucretius suggests that it is man’s question about the
causes of celestial phenomena that gives rise to the first fully human fear, or again, that such
fear is what first gives birth to a distinctly human kind.
But what exactly is this fear? The “mind’s terror” has its origin in a fundamental human
desire to discern the causes of things: “…they observed how the sky’s array and the various
seasons of the year come round in due order, and were not able to discover (cognoscere) by
what causes all that came about.”18 We experience things as effects, as caused. We see “many
things” and immediately try to see causes of the things we perceive. The problem is that causes
generally don’t appear ante oculos, “before our eyes.”19 The absence of any visible cause of the
regular motions of the heavens or the recurrent pattern of the seasons thus fills humans with a
kind of awe:
In this way, certainly, dread holds all mortals in bond, because they behold many things
happening on earth and in the sky, the causes of whose workings they can by no means
see, and they think them to be done by divine power.20
Thus the celestial phenomena raise questions of causality and, as a result, the notion of a
powerful agency comes to form part of man’s very experience of the revolving “moon and day
3
�and night and solemn stars.”21 As a result, the question, “whether by any chance we have to do
with some immeasurable power of the gods, able to make the bright stars revolve,” can only be
framed as a rhetorical question. Incapable of experiencing the celestial motions except as
effects, except as caused, humans immediately posit occult agents: “their refuge was to leave
all in the hands of the gods, and to suppose that by their nod all things were done.” 22 Having
created gods more or less in their own image, humans also attribute passions resembling their
own to the gods, and interpret destructive natural phenomena as effects of divine anger: “Oh
unhappy race of mankind, to ascribe such doings to the gods and to attribute to them bitter
wrath as well!”23 However regrettable such a response may be, it is, apparently, an altogether
human reaction:
Whose mind does not shrink with dread of the gods, whose limbs do not crawl with
fright, when the scorched earth trembles at the thunderbolt’s terrible blow? […] when
the whole earth sways under our feet, and shaken cities fall and threaten to fall as they
waver, what wonder if mortals feel contempt for themselves and acknowledge in these
things the gods’ great powers and wondrous strength, which govern all things?24
The visceral quaking25 that makes men flee wild boars and lions thus comes to be
replaced by less instinctive and more complex fears. The belief that divinities govern the world
and the religion to which this belief gives rise are the origin of the deepest fear that “assails”
men.26 This is “the sharp fear of death;”27 it is
that fear of Acheron…which troubles the life of man from its deepest depths, suffuses all
with the blackness of death, and leaves no delight clean and pure.28
This new fear, fueled by the “immortal verse” of poets,29 is not so much a fear of death itself,
as the fear of an imagined afterlife and an illusory future beyond death.30 Paradoxically, this
fear is associated with a profound failure to grasp the full extent and significance of human
4
�mortality. Men mistakenly imagine that the soul is immortal and in doing so fail to distinguish
properly between mortal and immortal:
…to join mortal with eternal, and think that they can feel as one and suffer in common is
madness. For what can be thought more at variance, or more disjoined in their relation
and inconsistent, than what is mortal joined in union with immortal and everlasting, to
weather furious storms!31
The same logical error gives rise to the misguided notion that the gods are involved in human
affairs. To suppose that immortal beings concern themselves with the doings of mortals is to
overlook the essential distinction between temporal and eternal: “for the very nature of divinity
must necessarily enjoy immortal life in the deepest peace, far removed and separated from our
affairs.”32 Ultimately, then, the fear of death stems from a failure to grasp the essential finitude
of all things and a failure to observe “how the power of each [thing] is limited and in what way
its boundary stone is deep-fixed.”33
Under the shadow of this new fear of death, humans invent elaborate religious rituals,
which, ironically, cause them to turn their eyes away from the celestial motions that first
aroused their wonder and “turn towards stones and altars.”34 They abandon their distinctly
human, vertical posture and “fall prostrate upon the ground” in worship.35 It is in fact in this
attitude that Epicurus is said to have found them:
…human life lay groveling on the earth, bent down (oppressa) under the weight of
religion, which stretched out its head from the regions of the sky, standing over
(super…instans) mortals with terrible aspect…36
Humans have themselves personified the “regions of the sky,” so that these now appear not as
the orderly array which first aroused men’s wonder, but as the locus of divine powers; the sky
acquires the frightening “aspect” or “look” of gods who must be propitiated.37
5
�Indeed Lucretius observes that his Roman contemporaries seldom raise their heads to
the sky at all. Preoccupied as they are with mundane affairs, they are more likely to catch a
glimpse of the sky’s reflection in a shallow puddle between the paving stones at their feet, “so
that [they] seem to look down on (despicere) clouds and sky,” than they are to gaze up in
wonder at the source of this image.38 He asks Memmius to imagine how “wonderful” the
“sight” or species of the stars and sky must appear to those seeing them for the first time,
although “no one now, wearied with satiety of seeing, deigns to look up (suspicere) at the
bright regions of the sky.”39 As humans lose sight of the original cause of the mind’s terror, this
terror too loses its focus on externals and becomes a permanent inner condition, characterized
as “anxiety of heart.”40 This anxiety expresses itself as a profound restlessness: “each seeks
always to change his place, as if he could put down his burden.”41 The more men attain the
public success they think will free them care, the more oppressed they in fact become: “so
great a mass of ill lies heavy on their breast.”42 For all their sophistication, the citizens of Rome
are so bent by onerous cares that, metaphorically at least, their very ability to stand erect is
threatened.
We have already noted that contemporary Roman religious practices present a more
literal threat to man’s ability to stand “erect and tall,” to use Milton’s phrase.43 In contrast to a
religion (religio) that only inculcates false fears, Lucretius advocates an attitude of piety (pietas)
which he explicitly distinguishes from prevailing Roman notions of piety:
It is no piety at all to be seen often with covered head, to turn towards a stone and to
approach every altar, nor to fall prostrate upon the ground and to spread palms open
before the shrines of the gods, nor to sprinkle altars with the streaming blood of fourfooted animals (quadrupedum), nor to link vow to vow; but rather to be able to look on
all with a mind at peace.44
6
�But how is such Lucretian piety, or tranquility of mind, to be attained? How is man to recover
his proper attitude? Lucretius suggests that it is, once again, a question of etiology: “He is sick
because he does not grasp the cause of his disease; if he could see that well, at once each, his
affairs abandoned, would first strive to discover (cognoscere) the nature of things.”45
De rerum natura thus associates the ethical ills and political turmoil of Rome’s “time of
trouble” with a profound ignorance about “the nature of things.” Both the fear of death and
the civic vices generated by this fear ultimately spring from misconceptions about the nature of
body, misconceptions the poem proposes to correct. In addition to presenting the Epicurean
teaching that nothing exists apart from body and void, the first book of the poem refutes the
views of a number of Greek natural philosophers and, in particular, their accounts of the
constitution of bodies. Although the three accounts that are rejected differ significantly from
one another, all three are presented as assuming that the constitution of the physical world is
more or less faithfully reflected by our experience of that world. According to this view, the first
principles or ultimate constituents of the physical world resemble substances with which we
are familiar. The physics of De rerum natura, by contrast, emphasizes a radical discontinuity
between the world we perceive and the basic composition of that world.46 The phenomena we
experience, it turns out, do not simply mirror or mimic an underlying “reality,” but conceal its
immutable nature beneath their own ever-shifting “look” or species. There is, in other words, a
profound gap between the world of our experience and its underlying principles. Yet although
the phenomena are not literal translations of nature’s constitutive principles, Lucretius
nevertheless insists—in marked contrast to the early Greek atomists Democritus and
Leucippus—that, the phenomena are not simply false or specious,47 and do in fact provide
7
�“traces” by which the “keen-scented mind” can “come to know” (cognoscere; 1.403) the truth
of things (verum; 1.409). It is important, however, that we first consider this fundamental
disparity between the world of our experience and its eternal elements.
The realm of human experience is a strange blend of chaos and order, of change and
permanence. On the one hand, everything we experience continually alters: “nothing remains
like itself; all things move; nature changes all, compels all to alter.”48 Indeed our very
perceptions of things arise from their relentless disintegration, as all sensation depends on the
incessant streaming of matter from things: “from all things each thing is carried off in a stream
[…], and no delay or respite is granted in this flux, since we have sensation unceasingly.”49 On
the other hand, Lucretius is adamant that this fluidity is not the end of the matter and sharply
criticizes the Heracliteans for failing to see that “something must remain safe and sound in
those fires of theirs.”50 Things also exhibit remarkable regularity: “all things are so constant that
from generation to generation all the variegated birds display on their bodies the markings of
their kind.”51 Our very notion of a thing involves membership in a kind: “no thing (res nulla) is
single (una)… so as not to belong to some kind and to be one of many like it.”52 Thus, although
no one kind is permanent, generic identity belongs to our experience of things. Our ability to
perceive kinds, to see pigeons and peacocks,53 is the result of certain unchanging “ordinances
of nature (foedera naturae).”54 These governing principles are not the work of a provident
legislator, but are embedded in the unchanging structure of matter itself.55 Because it belongs
to the very nature of a thing to exhibit generic constancy, such constancy must somehow be a
constitutive part of things themselves: “they must also have beyond a doubt a body of
immutable matter.”56 This insight underlies Lucretius’ central claim that both the things we
8
�experience and the principles that constitute those things must be corporeal: “Bodies are partly
the primordia of things, partly those which are formed by the union of primordia.”57
At the same time Lucretius draws a sharp distinction between the world we experience
and the immutable first principles that underlie this world. A thing is always a possible object of
experience, while the unchanging first principles, on which the existence of things depends, are
never themselves objects of sensation or experience. There are, then, two very distinct sorts of
bodies. The “bodies” which constitute the elements or primordia of things are not the bodies of
our experience; primordia are not things but rather “beginnings” or “first bodies” of things.
Although both the primordia and the unions of primordia are bodies or corpora, the primordia
are not things or res. 58 Indeed, Memmius is instructed particularly to keep in mind that a thing
cannot consist of a single kind of atom: “Of things whose nature is plainly seen, there is none
that consists of only one kind of element, nothing that does not consist of thoroughly mixed
seed.”59 While everything we perceive is an unstable composite of matter and void, of
primordia and empty space, the primordia themselves constitute the “immortal foundations” of
this world. Every edifice constructed of matter and void lacks stability—every compound is by
nature transient—but the building stones themselves are indestructible. Unlike the prime
matter of Aristotelian physics, which eludes our knowledge as it hovers between being and
non-being,60 the Lucretian primordia, solid, simple, and “strong by their eternal simplicity,”61
are clearly distinguished from non-being, which presents itself alongside them as void.
Unfortunately, the very immutability that gives the atoms such an ontological advantage
calls their epistemic status into question. Although it is a central tenet of Epicurean philosophy
9
�that all knowledge is grounded in sensation,62 the primordia are never objects of sensation. Like
Epicurus, Lucretius stresses the necessary primacy of sense perception:
…unless our belief (fides) in sensation is first firmly founded and strong, there will be no
principle of appeal in hidden matters, according to which we may make anything firm by
reasoning of the mind.63
Sense-certainty seems axiomatic; we cannot, for example, deny our perception of body: “for
that body in itself exists, sensation, common to all, declares.”64 Indeed, to demand grounds for
the certainty of sense perception is simply misguided: “For to what shall we appeal? What can
we find more certain than the senses themselves, with which we can distinguish true things
from false ones?”65 Sense-certainty, however, is founded on “belief” rather than knowledge.66
While this might lead us to conclude that sense-perception is a doubtful starting point for one
who seeks “to know the nature of things,” we are strongly cautioned against falling into such
skepticism:
For not only would all reasoning fall to ruin; our life and safety too would immediately
collapse, unless you dare to trust the senses… 67
Yet despite insisting on the authority of sensation and asserting that the concept of truth is
itself empirical in origin, Lucretius repeatedly affirms that the atoms are imperceptible: “the
primordia cannot be discerned with the eyes”; they “cannot be seen.” 68 At times it seems as if
the problem is simply that the primordia are too small for our senses to detect: “the primordia
are so far below our senses and so much smaller than the point at which our eyes begin not to
be able to see.”69 Nonetheless, although the primordia are certainly far smaller than anything
our eyes can discern, our inability to perceive them does not stem, or at least does not stem
primarily, from the weakness of our vision. Rather, invisibility belongs to the very nature of the
primordia:
10
�The primordia ought in begetting things to bring with them a nature hidden and unseen,
that nothing stand out which might fight against and bar whatever is being made from
existing with its own proper being. 70
The claim that the primordia must have a hidden nature forms the core of Lucretius’
criticism of Empedocles and Anaxagoras. If the primordia have sensible natures, he argues, they
will not unite as things, but simply mix in “variegated heap[s]”:
If by chance you think that the body of fire and the body of earth and the breezes of the
air and the dewy moisture so combine, that in union no one of them changes its nature,
you will see that no thing can be created out of them, no, not a living thing, nor one
with lifeless body [...]. Each element in the mingling of this variegated heap will show its
own nature, and air will be seen mixed together with earth, heat abiding with
moisture.71
The reality and integrity of composite bodies can only be secured if we begin by distinguishing
clearly between things and their underlying principles. Memmius must understand that the
primordia are necessarily devoid of all accidental qualities:
Come then, listen to words sought with sweet labor, lest by chance you suppose these
white things which you see bright before your eyes to be made of white beginnings, or
those that are black to be born of seed that is black, or that they are imbued with any
other color you will because the bodies of matter are dyed with like color. For there is
no color at all in the bodies of matter, neither like [the color of] things nor again
unlike.72
Because the things we perceive are both relatively stable (as genera or kinds) and mutable (as
particulars), they must be composites of primary and secondary qualities. Yet this stability (and
the truth of our experience) can only be guaranteed if things are constituted of elements
completely distinct from the particular objects of our experience. To constitute fire, air, water,
and earth as the elements of things, as Empedocles did, is to fail to grasp the need for such a
distinction.73 Anaxagoras falls into a similar but even more egregious error in proposing
principles that simply mimic things themselves:
11
�…he clearly holds that bones are made of very small and minute bones, flesh of very
small and minute particles of flesh, and that blood is composed by the coming together
of many drops of blood, and he thinks gold can consist of tiny bits of gold, that earth
grows together from little earths, that fire is made of fires, water of waters; he fancies
and imagines the rest in the same way.74
In other words, Anaxagoras “imagines” first principles that are essentially derivative and thus
simply too weak—too mutable—to sustain the structure of our experience:
Add that he imagines primordia which are too weak, if indeed those are primordia which
are endowed with a nature similar to the things themselves, and equally suffer and pass
away...75
Lucretius notes that although his own argument focuses on the sense of sight, we are to
understand that the primordia equally elude our other senses:
…the primordia of things must not contribute any odor of their own to the making of
things, nor any sound, since they can emit nothing from themselves, and similarly no
taste at all, nor cold, nor heat again and moderate warmth, and the rest: all these […]
must be kept apart from the beginnings, if we wish to lay an imperishable foundation
for things upon which the sum of existence may rest. 76
The relation of the primordia to our sense of touch, however, is somewhat more
ambiguous. Tangibility is identified an inseparable property of body itself: “An inseparable
property (coniunctum) is that which without destructive dissolution can never be disjoined and
disengaged (seque gregari), as weight is to stone, heat to fire, liquidity to water, touch to all
bodies, intangibility to void.” 77 At the same time, tangibility is the basis of all sense perception:
“For touch, so help me the holy power of the gods, it is touch that is the bodily sense…” 78
Although, as we’ve seen, Lucretius emphatically rejects the pre-Socratic endeavor to associate
the first principles with any objects of sense experience, we’ve also seen that his first principles
do nevertheless bear an important resemblance to the things we experience: the primordia are
bodies.79 On the one hand, then, as part of his effort to distinguish the primordia from the
12
�particular, mutable objects we experience, Lucretius devotes considerable time and effort to
demonstrating that the primordia are devoid of all secondary qualities. On the other hand, to
ensure that they can adequately account for our experience of the physical world, he insists
that the primordia must possess the essential properties of body and ascribes to them size,
shape, and weight, in addition to duration, unity, and impermeability. To some extent, then, the
primordia do resemble the bodies we experience. Nonetheless, despite having posited
tangibility as an essential attribute of body, Lucretius contends that the primordia themselves
do not affect our sense of touch. They are, first of all, simply too small to affect our sense of
touch: the particles that constitute the soul or anima are said to be too far apart to be moved
by bodies as minute as the primordia.80 Yet the intangibility of the primordia does not seem to
be simply an effect of size. In rejecting the Heraclitean theory that fire is the primary substance,
Lucretius expressly states that the “first bodies” are not like anything “that is able to send
bodies to our senses and by throwing something toward it to touch our touch.”81 Moreover,
qualities that seem fundamental to our sense of touch—heat and cold—are expressly listed as
accidental qualities that cannot be predicated of the “first bodies:” “they are also altogether
destitute of warmth and cold and strong heat...”82 Thus the primordia elude even our sense of
touch. While the constant streaming of primordia from composite bodies creates a kind of field
effect which causes sensation, the primordia are never themselves objects of perception. The
perception of things depends entirely on the motion of the primordia.
The claim that the constitutive principles of things are not simply minute sensible bodies
promises to grant compound bodies an integrity they lack in the pre-Socratic accounts Lucretius
criticizes. Paradoxically, however, this difference between composite bodies and their
13
�constituent elements threatens the very existence of compound bodies. It does not seem
possible to claim both that the primordia are self-subsisting realities and that compound bodies
are real substances, rather than mere mixtures or even illusory appearances. As Aristotle puts
it, “A substance cannot consist of substances present in it in complete reality; for things that
are thus in complete reality two are never in complete reality one.”83 Unless we can
demonstrate how independent atomic substances unite to form real substances rather than
mere mixtures, we seem to face yet again precisely the problem atomism aimed to address.
The primordia are, after all, completely devoid of any relation to one another—there are
neither attractive nor repulsive forces in a Lucretian cosmos. Although it is said to be a basic
property of all bodies, a “duty” (officium) of body, as Lucretius puts it, to “press down,” this
motion is not the result of attractive forces.84 Moreover, while the primordia relentlessly carry
out this task, it is not at all clear what all this activity means. By asserting that the primordia
have weight in addition to size and shape, Lucretius proposes that motion belongs to the very
nature of the primordia: “For first the primordia of things move of themselves.”85 This would
seem to contradict his earlier insistence on the utter immutability of the primordia—change of
place is, after all, a change—but it turns out that this innate primordial motion does not in fact
constitute change: it is, as it were, an unmoving motion. Anticipating Galileo, Lucretius
maintains that the primordia all fall at the same speed: “through the motionless void they must,
with weights not equal, all be carried with equal motion.”86 We are invited to envision a sort of
primal rain, as the primordia fall through the void in parallel lines at constant and equal
speeds.87 As far as their innate downward tendency is concerned, the primordia have no
motion whatsoever in relation to one another. Thus weight can never account for collisions, let
14
�alone conjunctions, of atoms. The infinity of space guarantees their rectilinear motion
throughout infinite time—“remember that there is no bottom in the sum of things and the first
bodies have nowhere to rest, since space is without end or limit.”88 Nor do the primordia move
in relation to the whole: no matter how far they travel, the primordia cannot change location
with respect to the infinite “sum of things.” Such motion, in other words, differs little from rest
and hardly explains how things arise from their atomic foundations. Given eternal primordia
moved by weight alone, Lucretius acknowledges, “nature would never have produced
anything.”89
This difficulty gives rise to the famous—or indeed infamous—doctrine of the swerve. In
light of the poem’s emphasis on nature’s rationality and intrinsic lawfulness, it is startling
suddenly to discover that nature in fact brings things into being90 by means of what one might
call a principle of uncertainty:
While the first bodies are being carried downwards by their own weights in a straight
line through the void, at some quite indefinite time and in indefinite places, they swerve
(depellere) a little from their course, just so much as you might call a change of
motion.91
There simply seems to be no rational explanation that can “save the appearances.” The
primordia can only unite and function as causes of things if they are allowed to deviate invisibly
and ever so slightly from their eternal immutability—“just so much as you might call a change
of motion.” No matter how foreign it may at first seem to “definite reasoning (certa ratio)” and
to our understanding of Euclid’s fifth postulate, the “reason of nature” (naturae ratio) seems to
include a kind of esprit de finesse that circumvents the esprit de géométrie to which strict logic
would confine it.92 The perpetual downward tendency of the primordia cannot by itself
adequately account for things, which are unions (concilia) of atoms. Yet the notion that things
15
�ultimately arise from and depend on random and completely invisible atomic digressions
undermines the very “ordinances of nature” on which Lucretius promised to build his structure;
the swerve seems to belong neither to the “aspect” nor to the “reason of nature.” Insofar as
our world of things depends entirely on this unaccountable ability of the primordia to sidestep
the paths ordained by their weights, it seems that we cannot really give an account of this
world—“for this we see to be plain and evident, that weights, as far as in them lies, cannot
travel obliquely.”93 We seem to have overthrown the tyranny of divine masters only to replace
it by the dictates of an inexplicable “inclination” or swerve, to have been freed from the
dominion of capricious deities only to come under the governance of a random swerve.
Lucretius prefaces his presentation of the swerve by urging Memmius to envision the
primordia as pugnacious dust motes, “struggling, fighting, battling in troops without any
pause.”94 He exhorts Memmius to “turn [his] mind” particularly to this example.95 If Memmius
will but consider the endless “meetings and partings” of these dusty squadrons, he will be able
“to conjecture from this what it is for the primordia always to be thrown about in the great
void.”96 Here, as so often, Lucretius engages, or perhaps indulges, in a revealing word-play. He
frequently uses the verb conicere—“conjecture”—in its literal sense of “throw together.”97 His
use of a cognate form of the verb iacere—“to throw”—in this sentence clearly recalls this literal
meaning. If Memmius—or the reader—is sufficiently attentive, he will grasp that the mental
action involved in drawing analogies between dust motes, military squadrons, and primordia
has much in common with the oblique motions that cause dust motes to collide. The
movement of reason in drawing such analogies—and it is by means of such correspondences
that we have access to the imperceptible primordia—seems to involve a kind of mental swerve
16
�that deviates from the rectilinear paths strict logic demands. Not only, then, does the reason of
nature (naturae ratio) demand that nature’s constituent particles constantly be “thrown
together,” but the nature of our reason likewise involves “throwing together” notions that
would not otherwise meet. Reason itself, that is, occasionally employs unpredictable and
unorthodox motions.
It is important to remember that most collisions are no more productive than the
comings and goings of so many dust motes. The swerve (coupled with the infinite supply of
primordia) ensures that some atoms will collide, but collision alone does not account for the
genesis of things. Whether or not the colliding primordia cohere depends on fixed laws of
nature:
It must not be thought that all can be conjoined in all ways, for then you would
commonly see monstrosities come into being […] But that none of these things happen
is manifest, since we see that all things bred from definite seeds by a definite mother
are able to conserve their kind as they grow. Assuredly this must come about by a
definite reason.98
A thing is not merely a mix, but above all an arrangement or configuration that depends on the
shapes and motions of its constituent parts: “when the combinations of matter, when its
motions, order, position, shapes are changed, the thing also must be changed.”99 Things can
only incorporate those atomic particles that, in addition to having conformable shapes, are also
able to coordinate their motions with the motions of the other constituent particles. The
principles of compatible shape and motion constitute the fundamental laws that govern both
living and non-living things: “But do not by chance think that living things alone are held by
these laws, for the same reason limits all things.”100
17
�Although they form the ground of our changing phenomenal world and have all the
conceptual rudiments of body, the primordia, as we have seen, are not phenomena in their
own right. The primordia do possess size, shape, and weight. They also possess some sort of
resistance: body is said to have a “duty” not only to press downward, but also to “work against
and obstruct”—it is essentially tangible, although, as we’ve seen, a primordium is never itself
the object of our sense of touch.101 Finally, if we follow the arguments about the “extreme
points” of the primordia, in turns out that they even have parts of a sort, albeit inseparable
parts.102 At the same time, the primordia remain as remote from the phenomena of our
experience as immortal from mortal, as solid from soluble, as simple from complex. Are we not
then back with just the problem we began with, namely the problem of occult causes? If so,
there would seem to be little to recommend Epicurean lectures over priestly pronouncements.
Anticipating this objection, Lucretius insists that imperceptible as they are, the primordia are
nevertheless objects of thought:
But if by chance you think that the mind cannot project itself into these bodies, you are
wandering far astray. For since those born blind, who have never perceived the sun’s
light, nevertheless come to know (cognoscant) by touch bodies which they have not
associated with any color since the day of their birth, you may be sure that bodies not
painted about with any hue can be turned into a concept (notitia) of our mind.103
You may be sure that certain things exist as much deprived of color as without any smell
and empty of sound, and that the keen mind can come to know (cognoscere) these no
less than it can conceive (notare) things that are devoid of other qualities.104
It is not through sensation, but through “the reason of mind” (ratio animi) that we have access
to the primordia: “eyes cannot recognize the nature of things.”105 The “first bodies” are thus
intelligible, rather than sensible bodies; we cannot conceive of body without size, shape, and
18
�weight, nor, as Leibniz so clearly saw, without a power of resistance or impenetrability.106 But
this mental concept (menti notitia) of body is not itself an object of sensation.
It has been suggested that “the fundamental difficulty of the whole Epicurean position”
is that it demands, on the one hand, an “absolute trust in the evidence of the senses as the
primary criterion of truth,” while insisting, on the other hand, that the physical foundation of
things consists of imperceptible primordia.107 Although Lucretius draws the sharpest of
distinctions between the eternal primordia and the transient things of our experience, he must
nevertheless bridge the gap between the two realms, if his project of conversion is to succeed.
The government of divine “masters” can only be overthrown,108 and the atomic foundations of
things only secured, if these invisible foundations are made objects of sense experience. In
other words, unless the Epicurean doctrine of the atoms is translated into a more visible idiom,
it must remain literally obscure, or shrouded in darkness. The corporeality of the primordia can
be guaranteed only by bringing them “out into the shining borders of light”—to use a Latin
idiom Lucretius is fond of. 109 Again and again Lucretius represents his work as an endeavor to
make things visible. He describes it as an attempt to “illuminate with Latin verses the dark
discoveries of the Greeks”110 and portrays his entire project as one of enabling Memmius to see
the inner workings of things:
Your merit and the expected delight of your sweet friendship, […] induces me to stay
awake in quiet nights, seeking by what words and what poetry I can at last display
before your mind bright lights, by which you may be able to see into the very depths of
hidden things.111
One way of spanning the gap between the imperceptible primordia and the visible
world is through language, especially through various forms of figurative language. It is surely
significant that language itself features as a dominant image in De rerum natura. Again and
19
�again the poem compares the structure of language to the structure of the world: as variations
in the order of letters or sounds give rise to a great variety of words and verses, so too,
variations in the “conjunctions, motions, order, position, and shape” of the primordia give rise
to the even greater variety of things. Moreover, the poem makes this analogy between letters
and atoms a fundamental feature of its own language: arguing, for example, that Anaxagoras
should have seen that wood is not flammable because it contains fire particles, but because
both wood—lignis (in the ablative plural)—and fire—ignis—contain many of the same letters or
elements.112
Figurative speech is so deeply imbedded in De rerum natura that it is not possible to
separate philosophical terminology from poetic vocabulary. Consider, for example, the Latin
rendering of the Epicurean term άτομοι, atoms or, literally, “uncuttables.” Lucretius never uses
the technical term ătŏmus, which his contemporary Cicero does use.113 Nor does he substitute
a single Latin term for the Greek word άτομος.114 He uses instead a variety of names that
present the atoms as generative bodies of things. Some of these words are clearly metaphorical
in character. Explicitly biological terms such as “seeds of things” and “generative bodies” have a
rhetorical function, inviting Memmius to regard the atomic particles as familiar objects of
experience, especially when these expressions are used, as they are early in book 1, in the
context of agricultural examples.115 Even language that seems literal, however, terms like
principia, corpora prima, and prima elementa, by evoking the notion of a beginning, present
eternal entities in terms of a temporal metaphor.116 The text itself, ever alert to etymologies,
reminds us that the predominant term primordium refers literally to a “first-rising”: “in the
earth there are primordia of things, which we, when we turn fruitful clods with the plough […],
20
�bring to a rising (ortus).”117 Thus this word too suggests a beginning. Of course, as becomes
abundantly clear in Book 3, the “first-bodies” are equally “last bodies,” but the vocabulary of De
rerum natura carefully avoids this association. Furthermore, although the term corpus or
“body” accurately translates the Greek—and Epicurean—term σωμα, we have already seen
that the poem’s “first bodies” or “generative bodies” are not bodies in the conventional sense;
they are not the “mortal bodies” or “visible bodies” of everyday experience, but “eternal” and
“invisible” bodies.118 Finally, the word materia or “‘matter’ in the collective sense,”119 which
may sound more technical to our modern English ears, is deprived of its technical sense by
means of a series of puns that serve to remind us that materia is derived from mater or
‘mother.’120 Here the metaphorical reading turns out to be the literal reading: etymologically, at
least, matter is a “mother” of things. Similarly, verbal play draws attention to the fact that
natura is cognate with the verb nascor “to be born,” so that a literal reading of the word natura
produces a metaphor of nature itself as mother.121
The primordia are presented not only in distinctly temporal and biological terms, but
also in distinctly human terms. This personification frequently takes the form of military
metaphors: “So, in the balanced strife of the beginnings, war waged from time everlasting is
carried on.”122 We may recall here the image of the battling dust motes:
you will see many minute motes mingling in many ways through the void […] and, as it
were, in everlasting strife, struggling, fighting, battling in troops without any pause,
driven about with frequent meetings and partings.123
Here the heavy-handed alliterative effects Lucretius is so fond of—multă mĭnūtă mŏdīs mūltīs
[…] miscēri—neatly illustrate, both audibly and visibly, how one tiny particle, in this case the
letter m, “mingles” with others “in many ways.” Moreover, the primordia exhibit not only a
21
�“propensity to military action,” but also a marked inclination to political life: they join in
“councils,” “assemblies,” “meetings,” and “contracts” (concilia, congressūs, coetūs, nexūs); they
are governed by “treaties” and “laws” (foedera and leges).”124 Once again, it is neither possible,
nor particularly helpful, to distinguish clearly between a technical language and a poetic
language. Insofar as Lucretius himself repeatedly remarks on what he calls “the poverty of [his]
native tongue,” he invites his audience to hear the metaphors simply as translations of
established Greek philosophical terms. Nonetheless, such frequent, if veiled, personifications
of the primordia may gradually persuade Memmius to regard human affairs from a new—and
very distant—vantage. From this viewpoint the battles and struggles of great armies are seen to
be no more than the contentions of dust motes; the great deliberations and treaties of state no
more than temporary and accidental combinations of atoms. The very metaphors that bring the
primordia directly before our eyes, out of obscurity into the bright light of day, also compel us
to “see” the things that formerly occupied our sight and seemed most real as distant and
inconsequential. Phenomena formerly perceived as significant—the motions of the sun and
stars, great storms, and perhaps even terrible plagues—become insignificant, insofar as they
too are little more than the concurrences of dust motes. Things that previously seemed
substantial—city walls, gold and silver vessels, our own bodies—are seen, from this new
vantage, in all their penetrability: “nothing [nil] exists that is not a texture with porous body.”125
In many ways the conversion of Memmius seems complete at this point. The aspect of
nature—its species—is radically altered as he focuses his sight on the invisible primordia and
the things he formerly regarded as substantial recede into a distant haze. A more radical
project, however, remains to be effected if “the dominion of gods”126 is truly to be overthrown
22
�and a more republican—or more human—view of things is to be reinstated. The ignorance of
causes,127 which first induced us to throw ourselves at the feet of tyrannical deities, turns out to
be a more radical tyranny than we realized. Our very notion of causality involves a kind of
tyranny of the one over the many.
For which of these causes it is in this world is difficult to determine; but what is possible
and may come to be through the whole universe in diverse worlds diversely (varia
ratione) fashioned, that is what I teach, and I proceed to set forth several causes which
may exist for the movements of the stars throughout the whole; one of which, however,
must be that which gives force to the movement of the signs in this world too; but
which of these it is, is by no means his to lay down who treads forward step by step.128
Particularly in the case of phenomena, “whose causes we can by no means see,”129 there is a
danger that not only in the absence of an explanation, but also in the presence of competing
accounts, we will “revert again to old religions and adopt harsh masters.”130 Such relapses occur
when we are “driven astray by blind reasoning”131 and are as much a result of a failure to
understand the nature of reason, as of a failure to perceive the reason of nature. In our
endeavors to explain natural phenomena we often mistakenly assume that it is sufficient “to
indicate a single cause.”132 Lucretius interrupts his explanation of Etna’s eruptions and the
flooding of the Nile to offer a rather curious illustration of his own etiological principles:
Just as if you should yourself see some man’s body lying lifeless at a distance, you may
perhaps think proper to name all the causes of death in order that the one true cause of
the man’s death may be named. For you could not prove that steel or cold had been
the death of him, or disease, or it may be poison, but we know that what has happened
to him is something of this sort. Even so in many cases we have the like to say.133
If we would truly liberate nature—and ourselves—from the oppressive might of “overweening
masters”134 and recognize nature’s capacity for self-governance,135 we must above all, it is
suggested, free ourselves from a misguided attachment to singularity. Habituated as we are to
the sight of a single sun, a single moon, one earth, one sky, we mistakenly suppose that such
23
�singleness belongs to the nature of things. This parochial worldview affects—or infects, to
borrow Lucretius’ own vocabulary of disease—all aspects of human existence. In this we
resemble nothing so much as the lover who sighs foolishly for the sole object of his affections,
ignoring the fact that “to be sure there are other women; to be sure [he] has lived so far
without this one”136 and failing to recognize that his attachment is merely the effect of habit:
It is habit that produces love; for that which is frequently struck by a blow, however
light, is still vanquished in the long run and totters. Do you not see that even drops of
water falling upon a stone in the long run beat a way through the stone?137
We have likewise grown attached to simple notions of causality, which blind us not only
to the reality of infinite atoms in an infinite void, but also to the ontological consequences of
this reality: “nothing is single, nothing born unique and growing unique and alone.” 138 In this we
may even resemble the inhabitants of the diseased city of Athens, who in their city’s “time of
trouble” cling so fiercely to what they imagine to be their own, “often brawling with much
blood”139 to secure a funeral pyre for “those of their own blood,”140 “rather than that the
bodies be deserted.” Although Memmius may well have lost interest by now, the reader who
has attended to the poem’s teaching may notice that its last line—rīxantes pŏtĭus quam corpŏră
dēsĕrĕrentur—conceals yet another play on meaning. The last phrase, which, if we read it in the
customary way, means “rather than abandon the bodies,” invites the reader to recollect that
“bodies are partly the primordia of things, partly those which are formed by the union of
primordia.” (1.483) We may also recollect that the primary sense of the verb dēsĕro is “untie”
or “sever” and notice that it appears here in the passive voice. Thus we may hear, in addition to
the more obvious sense of the phrase, something like, “rather than that the primordia be
severed.”141 We may also hear in the participle rixantes, “brawling,” its roots in the verb
24
�“ringo”—“bare the teeth” or “snarl,” and thus the suggestion that a failure to recognize the
inevitable dissolution of all things is somehow less than human.
In the battle of the gods and giants, the friends of the primordia occupy a curious
position.142 Their assault on Olympus aims to drag all things down to earth: heaven is reduced
to a reflection in a puddle, while Jove’s thunder—the quintessential symbol of divinity—
becomes no more than the flapping of laundry on a clothesline, the fluttering of papers in a
breeze, the bursting of a bladder of air. At the same time, however, the friends of the primordia
suggest that in our attachment to the ground beneath our feet we have in fact lost sight of the
nature of material things, supposing that this nature is illuminated by the “rays of the sun and
bright shafts of day” rather than by “nature’s aspect and reason.” They ask that we rethink our
understanding of materiality, distinguishing clearly between the phenomena or composite
things and the principles constitutive of those things. These principles are not, as we have
seen, bodily in the conventional sense of the term: the primordia will forever elude the hands
of the giants, although a poet may persuade them to think that the “first bodies” are within
easy reach, and so entice them to abandon their fealty to “the rule and kingship of gods.” 143 To
this extent, perhaps even Memmius may be persuaded to look at the world with new eyes.
1
On the Nature of Things (cited hereafter as DRN), 1.51. “Memmius” was traditionally identified as Caius
Memmius, son of Lucius, who was praetor in 58 BC. This Memmius stood for the consulship in 54 BC, but went into
exile in Athens after being prosecuted for bribery. See Cyril Bailey, ed., Titi Lucreti Cari De Rerum Natura (Oxford:
The Clarendon Press, 1947 [rpt.1998]), 597-8, note on 1.26. In recent years, as a result of questions concerning the
traditional dating of De Rerum Natura to 54 BC, this identification has been called into question. See G.O.
Hutchinson, “The Date of De Rerum Natura,” The Classical Quarterly, 51.1 (2001), 158-9 and, more recently,
Katharina Volk, “Lucretius’ Prayer for Peace and the Date of De Rerum Natura,” The Classical Quarterly 60.1 (2010),
127-131.
2
There has been much speculation about what precisely is meant by the expression, “in our country’s time of
trouble (hoc patriai tempore iniquo)” (1.41). Among the poem’s various references to civil bloodshed see, for
25
�example, 3.70: “men amass property by civil bloodshed” (homines… /sanguine civili rem conflant). For an allusion
to foreign wars of expansion see the image of a Roman fetial hurling his spear over the enemy’s border in
declaration of war at 1.968-973. See also Monica Gale, Virgil on the Nature of Things: the Georgics, Lucretius and
the Didactic Tradition (Cambridge: CUP, 2000), 238: “the phrase patriai tempus iniquum […] in v.41 presumably
refers to the series of civil wars which raged intermittently throughout Lucretius’ lifetime, but no real distinction is
drawn between civil and foreign wars.”
3
E.g., nam corpora sunt et inane(1.420); nil est quod possis dicere ab omni corpore seiunctum secretumque esse ab
inani (1.430-1); praeter inane et corpora, tertia per se/ nulla potest rerum in numero natura relinqui (1.445-6). See
Polybius, Histories 6.56: “But the most important difference for the better which the Roman commonwealth seems
to me to display is in their religious beliefs. For it seems to me that what in other nations is looked upon as a
reproach, I mean a scrupulous fear of the gods (την δεισιδαιμονίαν), is the very thing which keeps the Roman
commonwealth together.” Polybius explains that such “invisible terrors” are politically expedient and concludes, “I
think, not that the ancients acted rashly and at haphazard in introducing among the people notions concerning the
gods and beliefs in the terrors of hell, but that the moderns are most rash and foolish in banishing such beliefs.”
4
Already at 1.52-53, Lucretius voices a concern that his verses will be “contemptuously discarded before they have
been apprehended (intellecta prius quam sint, contempta relinquas).” At 2.1041 Lucretius suggests that
“frightened by the very novelty” of the Epicurean teachings Memmius may “spew out reason from [his] mind”; at
4. 914 he worries that Memmius may simply “depart with a breast that repels words of truth.” See Katharina Volk,
The Poetics of Latin Didactic: Lucretius, Vergil, Ovid, Manilius (Oxford: OUP, 2002), 80: “The way in which
[Lucretius] presents his student is rather interesting and, perhaps, somewhat surprising… Memmius appears
remarkably unsympathetic, unwilling to learn, and even plain stupid. The speaker continually anticipates his
addressee’s lagging attention and utterly misguided views.”
5
vatum/ terriloquis victus dictis, desciscere quaeres, 1.102-3
6
Hunc igitur terrorem animi tenebrasque necessest/ non radii solis neque lucida tela diei/ discutiant, sed naturae
species ratioque. (1.146-148; 2.59-61; 3.91-3; 6.39-41)
7
David Sedley, Lucretius and the Transformation of Greek Wisdom (Cambridge: CUP, 1998), 37
8
cum metus aut dolor est (5.1061)
9
= 2.59, 3.91, and 6.39. At 3.16 it appears in the plural (animi terrores). 3.152-160 offers an analysis of the physical
effects of mental terror: “we often see men fall to the ground for mental terror” (concidere ex animi terrore
videmus/ saepe homines; 3.157-8)
10
nec plangore diem magno solemque per agros/ quaerebant pavidi palantes noctis in umbris (5.973-5)
11
fugiebant saxea tecta/ spumigeri suis adventu validique leonis,/ atque intempesta cedebant nocte paventes/
hospitibus saevis instrata cubilia fronde (5.984-987)
12
volgivago more ferarum (5.932)
13
saetigerisque pares subus silvestria membra/ nuda dabant terrae nocturne tempore capti,/ circum se foliis ac
frondibus involventes. (5.970-2)
14
Nam cum suspicimus magni caelestia mundi/ templa super stellisque micantibus aethera fixum,/ tunc aliis
oppressa malis in pectora cura/ illa quoque expergefactum caput erigere infit…(5.1204-1208) Or: “that care, as yet
bent down (oppressa fem. sing. modifying cura rather than neut.pl. modifying pectora) by other evils”
15
See Bailey, p.1517, note on ll.1207-8: “a strange picture, but not impossible, if the imagery is not pressed too
literally.” It seems, however, that the image becomes revealing precisely when pressed literally. For more general
studies of the uses of personification in DRN see Myrto Garani, Empedocles redivivus: Poetry and Analogy in
Lucretius (London and New York: Routledge, 2007, chapter 1, and Monica Gale, Myth and Poetry in Lucretius
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp.39-45 and 122f.
26
�16
Both the participle expergefactum—“wakened”—and the verb erigere—“raise” or “straighten out”—share the
root rego--from Greek ορεγω = “reach”—which has as its basic meaning the notion of making (or keeping)
something straight. (erigo, erexi, erectum = ex+rego; expergo = ex+pergo, and pergo, perrexi, perrectum =
per+rego; see Lewis and Short)
17
caelumque videre/ iussit et erectos ad sidera tollere vultus: see Ovid, Metamorphoses, 1.84-88: “he granted man
a raised face and commanded him to look at the sky and to raise erected faces to the stars.” Ovid’s account is in
turn echoed by Milton in Paradise Lost, 4.288-90: “Two of far nobler shape erect and tall,/ Godlike erect, with
native honor clad/ In naked majesty seemed lords of all.”
18
Praeterea caeli rationes ordine certo/ et varia annorum cernebant tempora verti,/ nec poterant quibus id fieret
cognoscere causis. (5.1183-5)
19
E.g. 1.62; 1.342; 1.998; 2.732; 3.185; 3.995. See Bailey, p.608, note on 1.62.
20
Quippe ita formido mortalis continent omnis,/ quod multa in terris fieri caeloque tuentur/ quorum operum
causas nulla ratione videre/ possunt, ac fieri divino numine rentur. (1.151-154) Lewis and Short: formido is from
the same Sanskrit root (dhar-) as the word firmus and means “properly the fear that makes rigid.” Lewis and Short
claims the word also has the sense “awe, reverence” and refers to Virgil’s famous description of “the twin gates of
war”: “There are twin gates of war (so they are named), sanctified by religion and by the dread of fierce Mars”
(Sunt geminae belli portae (sic nomine dicunt)/ religione sacrae et saevi formidine Martis; Aeneid, 7.607-8
21
“and they placed the gods’ habitation and abode in the sky, because through the sky the night and the moon are
seen to revolve, moon, day, and night and the solemn stars of night, heaven’s night-wandering torches and flying
flames, clouds, sun, rains, snow, winds, lightnings, hail, and rapid roarings and mighty menacing rumblings.” in
caeloque deum sedes et templa locarunt,/ per caelum volvi quia nox et luna videtur,/ luna dies et nox et noctis
signa severa/ noctivagaeque faces caeli flammaeque volantes,/ nubile sol imbres nix venti fulmina grando/ et
rapidi fremitus et murmura magna minarum. (5.1188-93)
22
ergo perfugium sibi habebant omnia divis/ tradere et illorum nutu facere omnia flecti. (5.1186-7)
23
O genus infelix humanum, talia divis/ cum tribuit facta atque iras adiunxit acerbas! (5.1194-5)
24
cui non animus formidine divum/ contrahitur, cui non correpunt membra pavore,/ fulminis horribili cum plaga
torrida tellus/ contremit…? denique sub pedibus tellus cum tota vacillat/ concussaeque cadunt urbes dubiaeque
minantur/ quid mirum si se temnunt mortalia saecla/ atque potestates magnas mirasque relinquunt/ in rebus viris
divum, quae cuncta gubernent? (5.1218-1221 and 1236-1240)
25
The primary meaning of the verb paveo is “to be struck with fear or terror, to tremble or quake with fear.”
(Lewis and Short)
26
incesserat (6.1212)
27
mortis mĕtŭs … ācer (6.1212)
28
metus ille … Acheruntis…,/ funditus humanam qui vitam turbat ab imo/ omnia suffundens mortis nigrore neque
ullam/ esse voluptatem liquidam puramque relinquit. (3.37-40) Lewis and Short suggest that metus, at least in its
verbal form metuo, refers especially to fear “as the effect of the idea of threatening evil (whereas timor usually
denotes the effect of some external cause of terror) [my italics].” On Lucretius’ use of metus see Monica Gale,
Virgil on the Nature of Things: the Georgics, Lucretius, and the Didactic Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2000), chapter 5: “Labor improbus.” It should be remembered, however, that on one occasion, Lucretius
uses the word metus to refer to the fear an animal experiences—see note viii above.
29
“Ennius sets forth in the discourse of his immortal verse that there is besides a realm of Acheron, where neither
our souls nor bodies endure, but as it were images pale in wondrous wise (etsi praeterea tamen esse Acherusia
templa/ Ennius aeternis exponit versibus edens,/ quo neque permaneant animae neque corpora nostra,/ sed
quaedam simulacra modis pallentia miris)” (1.120-123)
27
�30
It is worth noting that fear (metus)—along with care and toil—is one of the “demonic personifications which
haunt the entrance to the underworld” in Book 6 of Virgil’s Aeneid. Monica Gale, Virgil on the Nature of Things,
146
31
Quippe etenim mortale aeterno iungere et una/ consentire putare et fungi mutual posse/ desiperest; quid enim
diversius esse putandumst/ aut magis inter se disiunctum discrepitansque,/ quam mortale quod est inmortali atque
perenni/ iunctum in concilio saevas tolerare procellas? (3.800-805)See Bailey, 1128, note on 3.803: “mortal and
immortal in a concilium could not harmonize or really form one thing.”
32
omnis enim per se divom natura necessest/ inmortali aevo summa cum pace fruatur/ semota ab nostris rebus
seiunctaque longe; 1.44-6 = 2.646-8)
33
finita potestas denique cuique/ quanam sit ratione atque alte terminus haerens (1.76-7). The lines are repeated
at 1.595-6, 5.89-90, and 6.65-66. Cp. also 2.1087: “there is a deepset limit of life equally awaiting them [‘sky, earth,
sun, moon, sea and all else that exists’] (vitae depactus terminus alte tam manet haec).”
34
vertier ad lapidem atque omnis accedere ad aras (5.1199)
35
procumbere humi prostratum (5.1200) See Bailey, p.1516, note on 5.1200: “the attitude of worship in
prostration after prayer.”
36
Humana ante oculos foede cum vita iaceret/ in terris oppressa gravi sub religione,/ quae caput a caeli regionibus
ostendebat/ horribili super aspectu mortalibus instans (1.62-5)
37
Nor is the sky inhabited by gods alone: when dark thunderclouds mass overhead, humans imagine that all the
shades of the infernal caverns loom above them, turning horrific faces toward the living, “to such a degree […]
does the face of black terror hang over us.” (usque adeo taetra nimborum nocte coorta/ inpendent atrae formidinis
ora superne; 6.253-4)
38
nubila despicere et caelum ut videare (4.418)
39
Ita haec species miranda fuisset./ quam tibi iam nemo, fessus satiate videndi,/ suspicere in caeli dignatur lucida
templa! (2.1037-1039)
40
Reading anxia cordi (6.14). The emendation anxia corda has the same sense.
41
quaerere semper/ commutare locum, quasi onus deponere possit (3. 1058-9)
42
tanta mali tamquam moles in pectore constet (3.1056) See also 3.1054: “there is a weight on their minds which
wearies with its oppression” (pondus inesse animo quod se gravitate fatiget)
43
Two of far nobler shape erect and tall,/ Godlike erect, with native Honour clad/ In naked Majestie seemd Lords
of all (Milton, Paradise Lost, 4.288-90)
44
Nec pietas ullast velatum saepe videri/ vertier ad lapidem atque omnis accedere ad aras,/ nec procumbere humi
prostratum et pandere palmas/ ante deum delubra, nec aras sanguine multo/ ( spargere quadrupedum, nec votis
nectere vota,/ sed mage placata posse omnia mente tueri. (5. 1198-1203)
45
…morbi quia causam non tenet aeger;/ quam bene si videat, iam rebus quisque relictis/ naturam primum studeat
cognoscere rerum (3.1070-72) Or, in the words of Virgil’s famous homage to Lucretius, “Happy is he who was able
to know the causes of things, and cast all fears and inexorable fate under his feet, and the roaring of greedy
Acheron.”(felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas,/ atque metus omnis et inexorabile fatum/subiecit pedibus
strepitumque Acherontis avari.” Virgil,Georgics 2.490-492) Virgil is here echoing Lucretius’ own eulogy of Epicurus,
on account of whose philosophical heroism and “virtue of mind” (animi virtutem; 2.70), “religion in turn is cast
down under [our] feet and trampled, and we by the victory are made level with heaven.” (quare religio pedibus
subiecta vicissim/ obteritur, nos exaequat victoria caelo; 1.78-9)
46
See Robert Wardy, “Lucretius on What Atoms Are Not,” Classical Philology, 83.2 (1988), 112-128
28
�47
Pierre-Marie Morel, “Epicurean Atomism,” in The Cambridge Companion to Epicureanism (Cambridge: CUP,
2009), 65-83, claims that the wish “to ensure the cohesion of composite bodies and, in this way, [to] retain the
phenomena” represents a fundamental difference between Epicurean atomism and early Greek atomism.
48
nec manet ulla sui similis res: omnia migrant, omnia commutat natura et vertere cogit (5.830-1) See also 5.828835: “For time changes the nature of the whole world and one state of things must pass into another, and nothing
remains as it was: all things move, all are changed by nature and compelled to alter. For one thing crumbles and
grow faint and weak with age; another grows up and comes forth from contempt. So therefore time changes the
nature of the whole world, and one state of the earth gives place to another,…”
49
usque adeo omnibus ab rebus res quaeque fluenter/ fertur […]/ nec mora nec requies interdatur ulla fluendi,/
perpetuo quoniam sentimus, […] (4.225-228)
50
aliquid supereare necesse est incolumne ollis (1.672)
51
omnia constant/ usque adeo variae volucres ut in ordine cunctae/ ostendant maculas generalis corpore inesse
(1.588-590)
52
res nulla sit una,/ […]/ quin aliquoiu siet saecli permultaque eodem/ sint genere. (2. 1077-80)
53
The two species are mentioned in connection with the phenomenon of iridescence in 2.799-809.
54
1.586. The phrase occurs a number of times; see, for example, 2.302; 5.310; 5.924; 6.906.
55
See Alessandro Schiesaro, “Lucretius and Roman Politics and History,” in The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius,
48: “Lucretius’ laws of nature do not exist outside and above the physicality of atoms, do not answer an
inscrutable teleological project and have not been promoted by a provident lawgiver.”
56
inmutabili’ materiae quoque corpus habere/ debent nimirum (1.591-2) Newton, a careful reader of Lucretius,
summarizes this argument at the end of the second edition of the Optics: “While the Particles continue entire, they
may compose Bodies of one and the same Nature and Texture in all Ages; But should they wear away or break in
pieces, the Nature of Things depending on them would be changed.” Optics (1718), query 31. The connection is
noted by Bailey, 698 and by Monte Johnson and Catherine Wilson, “Lucretius and the History of Science,” in The
Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, 140-141.
57
Corpora sunt porro partim primordia rerum,/ partim concilio quae constant principiorum. (1.483) See Epicurus,
Letter to Herodotus, 40-41: “And truly, of bodies some are compounds (συνκρίσεις), and others those of which
compounds are made (πεποιήται).”
58
See Bailey, note on 1.21 (p.596): “res in Lucr. are strictly speaking compound things, made of the mixture of
atoms and void.”
59
Nil esse, in promptu quorum natura videtur,/ quod genere ex uno consistat principiorum,/ nec quicquam quod
non permixto semine constet. (2.583-5) Lucretius clearly lays considerable weight on this teaching; he prefaces it
by cautioning Memmius to “guard it sealed and treasured in the mind’s memory” (obsignatum […] habere/ […] et
memori mandatum mente tenere; 2.581-2)
60
See for example, Metaphysics 1050a15: “matter exists in a potential state.” As pure potentiality, matter itself is
never an object of knowledge: “matter is unknowable in itself” (Metaphysics 1036a9). In book one of the Physics,
Aristotle allows, however, that matter can be an object of knowledge by way of analogy: “For as the bronze is to
the statue, the wood to the bed, or the matter and the formless before receiving form to anything which has form,
so is the underlying nature to substance, i.e. the ‘this’ or existent.” (Physics 191a8-12)
61
“therefore the primordia exist by a solid singleness” (sunt igitur solida primordia simplicitate; 1.609); “strong
rather by their eternal singleness” (magis aeterna pollentia simplicitate: 1.612). At 2.87 Lucretius also claims that
the primordia are “perfectly hard” (durissima).
62
“We must keep all our investigations in accord with our sensations” (έτι τε κατα τας αισθησεις δει πάντα τηρειν;
Epicurus, Letter to Herodotus, 38); “in accordance with the evidence of sense we must of necessity judge of the
29
�imperceptible by reasoning” (καθ’ ην αναγκαιον το άδηλον τωι λογισμωι τεκμαίρεσθαι; Letter to
Herodotus, 39)
63
[…]nisi prima fides fundata valebit,/ haud erit occultis de rebus quo referentes/ confirmare animi quicquam
ratione queamus (1.423-5) see also 4. 478-79: “You will find that it is from the senses in the first instance that the
concept of truth has come, and that the senses cannot be refuted.” (invenies primis ab sensibus esse creatam/
notitiem veri neque sensus posse refelli.)
64
corpus enim per se communis dedicat esse/ sensus (1.422-3) Epicurus, Letter to Herodotus, 39: “for that bodies
exist, sensation itself, common to all, bears witness (σωματα μεν γαρ ως εστιν, αυτη η αισθσις επι παντων
μαρτυρει) In the context of the passage, as well as in light of Lucretius’ general usage of per se to mean “selfsubsistent,” it seems better to take per se with corpus than with sensus. Cp. also Aristotle, Physics I.2, 185a12: “We
physicists, on the other hand, must take for granted that the things that exist by nature are, either all or some of
them, in motion—which is indeed made plain by induction.”
65
quo referemus enim? Quid nobis certius ipsis/ sensibus esse potest, qui vera ac falsa notemus? (1. 699-700)
66
See for example 4.478-481: “You will find that it is from the senses in the first instance that the concept of truth
has come, and that the senses cannot be refuted. For some standard must be found of greater credit (maiore fide),
which can of itself (sponte sua) refute false things by true. What, moreover, must be held to be of greater credit
(maiore fide) than the senses?”
67
non modo enim ratio ruat omnis, vita quoque ipsa/ concidat extemplo, nisis credere sensibus ausis (4.507-508)
68
neqeunt oculis rerum primordia cerni,/ accipe praeterea quae corpora tute necessest/ confiteare esse in rebus
nec posse videri. (1.269-270)
69
primordia tantum/ sunt infra nostros sensus tantoque minora/ quam quae primum oculi coeptant non posse tueri
(4.111-113) See also 2.312-3: “all the nature of first-bodies lies far from our senses, below them (omnis enim longe
nostris ab sensibus infra/ primorum natura iacet). In yet another passage Lucretius refers to the primordium as
“that body which our senses are no longer able to perceive.” (corp[us] ill[ud] quod nostri cernere sensus/ iam
nequeunt; 1.600)
70
at primordia gignundis in rebus oportet/ naturam clandestinam caecamque adhibere,/ emineat nequid quod
contra pugnet et obstet/ quominus esse queat proprie quodcumque creatur(1.778-81). For the same phrase and
argument applied specifically to the question whether the primordia have color, see 2.794, quoted below.
71
sin ita forte putas ignis terraeque coire/ corpus et aerias auras roremque liquoris,/ nil in concilio naturam ut
mutet eorum,/ nulla tibi ex illis poterit res esse creata,/ non animans, non exanimo cum corpore, ut arbos;/ quippe
suam quidque in coetu variantis acervi/ naturam ostendet mixtusque videbitur aer/ cum terra simul atque ardor
cum rore manere (1.770-777). At 2.920, Lucretius employs the same logic to make his case that sentient beings
must be composed of non-sentient atoms: “it cannot be that parts have independent sensation […] supposing
they did, yet by combination and union they will produce nothing but a throng and crowd (vulgum turbamque) of
living things, exactly as men, cattle, and wild beasts could not produce anything (ullam rem) amongst themselves
by coming together.” (2.910 and 920-923)
72
Nunc age dicta meo dulci quaesita labore/ percipe, ne forte haec albis ex alba rearis/ principiis esse, ante oculos
quae candida cernis,/ aut ea quae nigrant nigro de semine nata;/ nive alium quemvis quae sunt imbuta colorem,/
propterea gerere hunc credas, quod materiae/ corpora consimili sint eius tincta colore./ nullus enim color est
omnino materiai/ corporibus, neque par rebus neque denique dispar.(2.730-738) At 2.755-6 Lucretius again
cautions Memmius directly on this point: “Take care not to steep in color the seeds of things, lest for you all things
altogether pass away to nought (colore cave contingas semina rerum/ ne tibi res redeant ad nilum funditus
omnes).”
73
There has been considerable debate about Lucretius’ relation to Empedocles, and especially about is meant by
the praeclara reperta attributed to Empedocles at DRN 1.736. See, for example, David Sedley, “Lucretius and the
New Empedocles,” Leeds International Classical Studies 2.4 (2003), 1-12: “In Book 1, Lucretius criticizes
Empedocles’ theory of the four elements, but in the same breath concedes that Empedocles did make some great
30
�discoveries (praeclara reperta, 1.736). An important question to pursue is: what discoveries? I remain resistant to
one particular proposal, that the Empedoclean features in Lucretius’ proem signal his recognition of Empedocles as
a major philosophical forerunner. In response, I have argued that the debt acknowledged here is a literary one, to
the founder of his genre, and that Lucretius would not want to allow Empedocles much credit on the two central
philosophical issues that have been suggested as common ground: the need to posit enduring elements, and the
denial of natural teleology.” (p.2) The opposite view is articulated very clearly by David Furley: “Lucretius had every
reason to pay tribute to Empedocles as the inventor of elements, even though he could not accept the
Empedoclean theory in detail.” David Furley, Cosmic Problems: Essays on Greek and Roman Philosophy of Nature,
(Cambridge: CUP, 1989), 178.
74
ossa videlicet e pauxillis atque minutis/ ossibus hic et de pauxillis atque minutis/ visceribus viscus gigni
sanguenque creari/ sanguinis inter se multis coeuntibu’ guttis/ ex aurique putat micis consistere posse/ aurum et
de terris terram concrescere parvis,/ ignibus ex ignis, umorem umoribus esse, cetera consimili fingit ratione
putatque.(1.835-842) At 1.915-920, Lucretius resorts to ridicule: “Lastly, if you think that whatever you see
amongst visible things cannot be brought about without imagining (fingas) that the elements of matter are
endowed with a like nature, on this reasoning there is an end of your first-beginnings of things: it will follow that
they guffaw shaken with quivering laughter, and bedew face and cheeks with salt tears.”
75
adde quod inbecilla nimis primordia fingit,/ si primordia sunt, simili quae praedita constant/ natura atque ipsae
res sunt, aequeque laborant/ et pereunt (1.847-850)
76
debent primordia rerum/ non adhibere suum gignundis rebus odorem/ nec sonitum, quoniam nil ab se mittere
possunt,/ nec simili ratione saporem denique quemquam/ nec frigus neque item calidum tepidumque vaporem,/
cetera; quae […] omnia sint a principiis seiuncta necessest,/ inmortalia si volumus subiungere rebus/fundamenta
quibus nitatur summa salutis (2. 854-863). Among the objections to the Epicurean account that are voiced in
Cicero’s De natura deorum, is an objection to the Epicurean claim that “out of particles of matter not endowed
with heat, nor with any ‘quality’ (that which the Greeks call ποιότητα)…the world has emerged complete…”
(Cicero, De natura deorum, 2.37)
77
coniunctum est id quod nusquam sine permitiali/ discidio potis est seiungi seque gregari,/ pondus uti saxis, calor
igni, liquor aquai,/ tactus corporibus cunctis, intactus inani (1.451-454). On the illustrative role of the tmesis in the
phrase seque gregari, see Stephen Hinds, “Language at the Breaking Point: Lucretius 1.452,” The Classical
Quarterly, 37.2 (1987), 451: “”If segregari suffers the threatened loss of its conjoined se, it will become a
mutilated, senseless fragment. segregari, aggregari and congregari all mean something; but as a simple verb
gregari is utterly without existence in the lexicon of republican Latin.” At 1.334, void is in fact distinguished from
body precisely as the intangible from the tangible: “Therefore there is intangible space, void, emptiness
(quapropter locus est intactus inane vacansque).”
78
tactus enim , tactus, pro divum numina sancta,/ corporis est sensus (2.434-5)
79
Lucretius refers to the primordia as “generative bodies” (genitalia corpora; e.g. 1.58), “first bodies” (corpora
prima (e.g. 1.61) and “bodies of matter” (materiae corpora, e.g. 2.142f.).
80
“You may safely say that the first-beginnings of spirit lie at such intervals apart as equal the smallest things which
falling upon us are able to awaken sense-bringing motions in our body.” dumtaxat ut hoc promittere possis,/
quantula prima queant nobis iniecta ciere/ corpora sensiferos motus in corpore, tanta intervalla tenere exordia
prima animai. (3.377-380)
81
…quae corpora mittere possit/ sensibus et nostros adiectu tangere tactus.(1.684-689)
82
sed ne forte putes solo spoliata colore/ corpora prima manere, etiam secreta teporis/ sunt ac frigoris omnino
calidique vaporis,/ et sonitu sterila et suco ieiuna feruntur, nec iaciunt ullum proprium de corpore odorem. (2.842846)
ἀδύνατον γὰρ οὐσίαν ἐξ οὐσιῶν εἶναι ἐνυπαρχουσῶν ὡς ἐντελεχείᾳ: τὰ γὰρ δύο [5] οὕτως ἐντελεχείᾳ οὐδέποτε
ἓν ἐντελεχείᾳ (Metaphysics, 1039a2-5)
83
31
�84
See Morel, “Epicurean atomism,” 75: “The existence of movement is an axiom in the whole atomist tradition:
the reality of motion is an immediate given.”
85
prima moventur enim per se primordia rerum (2.133)
86
Or: “equally moved.” Omnia quapropter debent per inane quietum/ aeque ponderibus non aequis concita ferri.
(2.238-9)
87
“like drops of rain” imbris uti guttae (2.222)
88
reminiscere totius imum/ nil esse in summa, neque habere ubi corpora prima/consistant, quoniam spatium sine
fine modoquest (2.90-92)
89
ita nil umquam natura creasset; 2.224)
90
natura gerat res (2.242)
91
corpora cum deorsum rectum per inane feruntur/ ponderibus propriis, incerto tempore ferme/ incertisque locis
spatio depellere paulum,/ tantum quod momen mutatum dicere possis. (2.217-220)
92
On the notion of l’esprit de finesse, see Pascal, Pensées, trans. A.J.Krailsheimer (Penguin Books, 1966), 211, #512:
“The thing must be seen all at once, at a glance, and not as a result of progressive reasoning, at least up to a
point.” It is worth noting that Pascal does regard l’esprit de finesse as a rational faculty; he refers, for example, to
“this kind of reasoning.” See also Nicholas Hammond, The Cambridge Companion to Pascal (Cambridge: CUP,
2003), 246: “He goes to great lengths to distinguish between these two ‘minds,’ both of which are related to
reasoning, but in very different ways.”
93
namque hoc in promptu manifestumque esse videmus,/ pondera, quantum in sest, non posse oblique meare
(2.246-7)
94
certamine proelia pugnas/ edere turmatim certantia nec dare pausam,/ conciliis et discidiis exercita crebris
(2.116-120)
95
animum te advertere (2.125)
96
conicere ut possis ex hoc, primordia rerum/ quale sit in magno iactari semper inani (2.121-2)
E.g., 2.1061; 2.1073-4
97
98
Nec tamen omnimodis conecti posse putandum est/ omnia; nam volgo fieri portent videres,/ […]/quorum nil fiere
manifestum est, omnia quando/ seminibus certis certa genetrice creata/ conservare genus crescentia posse
videmus./ scilicet id certa fieri ratione necessust. (2.700-710)
99
materiai/ concursus motus ordo positura figurae cum permutantur, mutari res quoque debent (2.1019-1022) See
also 1.685-687: “there are certain bodies which by their concurrences, motions, order, positions, shapes, produce
fire, and which when their order is changed, change the nature of the thing” and 2.725-727: “Since the seeds are
different, different must be their intervals, passages, connections, weights, blows, meetings, motions…”
100
sed ne forte putes animalia sola teneri/ legibus hisce, eadem ratio disterminat omnia.(2.718-9) Lucretius uses
both the terms lex and foedus in reference to nature’s laws. See Bailey, 699, note on 1.586: “it must be
remembered that the meaning is different from that of the modern expression. Lucretius is not thinking of an
observed uniformity in nature, but rather of the limits which nature imposes on the growth, life, powers, etc., of
things.”
101
102
officium quod corporis exstat,/ officere atque obstare (1.336-7)
On the notion of the cacumen, see 1.599-614.
103
in quae corpora si nullus tibi forte videtur/ posse animi iniectus fieri, procul avius erras./ nam cum caecigeni,
solis qui lumina numquam/ dispexere, tamen cognoscant corpora tactu/ ex ineunte aevo nullo coniuncta colore,/
scire licet nostrae quoque menti corpora posse/ vorti in notitiam nullo circumlita fuco. (2.739-745)
32
�104
scire licet quaedam tam constare orba colore/ quam sine odore ullo quaedam sonituque remota,/ nec minus
haec animum cognoscere posse sagacem/ quam quae sunt aliis rebus private notare. (2.837-841)
105
hoc animi demum ratio discernere debet,/ nec possunt oculi naturam noscere rerum; 4.384-5)
106
See Leibniz’ essay “On Body and Force, Against the Cartesians,” Philosophical Essays, trans. Roger Ariew and
Daniel Garber (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1989), 250: “against Descartes, I think that there is something passive in body
over and above extension, namely, that by which body resists penetration.” For the phrases animi ratio and mentis
ratio see for example 1.425, 1.448, 2.381, 2.677, and 4. 384.
107
Bailey, 644 (introduction to 1.265-328)
108
At 2.1091, the gods are referred to as domini superbi and at 6.63 as domini acres.
109
1.22-3: “without you nothing comes forth into the shining borders of light” (nec sine te quicquam dias in luminis
oras/ exoritur). Bailey, 597, note on 1.22, points out that the phrase luminis oras was already used by Ennius, but is
clearly a favorite with Lucretius, who uses it nine times, and probably understands it literally, “luminis oras being
the borderline between the light of life and previous darkness.” See also 1.179: “the lively earth safely brings out
things young and tender into the borders of light For a more general discussion of Lucretius’ employment of
images of light (and dark) see D. West, The Imagery and Poetry of Lucretius (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press,
1969), chapter 7, “Light and Fire and Fluidity of Imagery,” 79-93.
110
Graiorum obscura reperta/[…] inlustrare Latinis versibus (1.136-7)
111
sed tua me virtus tamen et sperata voluptas/ suavis amicitiae quemvis efferre laborem / suadet, et inducit
noctes vigilare serenas/ quaerentem dictis quibus et quo carmine demum/ clara tuae possim praepandere lumina
menti,/ res quibus occultas penitus convisere possis.res quibus occultas penitus convisere possis. (1.140-145) See
also the closing lines of book 1: “nor will blind night rob snatch the path away from you and prevent you from
seeing through to the ultimate [recesses] of nature: thus things will kindle lights for things” (nec tibi caeca/ nox iter
eripiet quin ultima naturai/ pervideas: ita res accendent lumina rebus; 1.1115-1117).
112
Lucretius makes use of the fact that the Latin noun elementa refers both to letters and to physical elements.
113
See especially De natura deorum, 1.24 (65): “you make great play with the lawless dominion of the atoms”
(abuteris ad omnia atomorum regno et licentia)
114
See Bailey, 606, note on 1.55: “primordia is Lucr.’s favourite word for the ‘atoms’, … it occurs 72 times in the
poem… principia corresponds to Epicurus’ αρχαί; primordia does not exactly represent any word in Epicurus’
terminology, and conversely his technical term άτομοι is not reproduced by Lucretius.”
115
semina rerum (e.g., 1.59); genitalia corpora (e.g., 1.58). P.H. Schrijvers, “Seeing the Invisible: a Study of
Lucretius’ Use of Analogy in De rerum natura,” in Oxford Readings in Classical Studies, 258, proposes that the term
“first bodies” (corpora prima) ranks among “the neutral or semi-technical terms […] belonging to the domain of the
illustrandum,” whereas terms such as “generative bodies” (genitalia corpora) and “seeds of things” (semina rerum)
“are derived instead from the specific field of biology” and function as analogies. On the other hand Duncan
Kennedy, “Making a Text of the Universe,” in Oxford Readings, 386, suggests that the very use of the term corpus
in this context is already metaphorical: it “pictures them in anthropomorphic terms (they are ‘bodies’, corpora).”
116
principia (e.g., 1.198); corpora prima (e.g., 1.61); prima elementa (e.g., 6.1009). Kennedy, 386, points out that
even the apparently neutral phrase rerum primordia has rhetorical implications: it “emphasizes the notion of
beginning,” whereas the “atoms individually are eternal.”
117
esse videlicet in terris primordia rerum/ quae nos, fecundas vertentes vomere glebas […], cimus ad ortus (1.210212
118
mortalia corpora (1.232); aperta corpora (1.297); aeterna corpora (1.242); corpora caeca (1.277)
119
Bailey, 607.
120
E.g., 1.168 and 171
33
�121
E.g., 1.112-3: ignoratur enim quae sit natura animai,/ nata sit an contra nascentibus insinuetur (“for there is
ignorance what is the nature of soul, whether it be born or on the contrary inserted into those being born”)
122
sic aequo geritur certamine principiorum/ ex infinito contractum tempore bellum. (2. 573)
123
multa minuta modis multis per inane videbis/ […]/ et velut aeterno certamine proelia pugnas/ edere turmatim
certantia nec dare pausam,/ conciliis et discidiis exercita crebris (2.116-120)
124
Monica Gale, Myth and Poetry in Lucretius, 123
125
nil est nisi raro corpore nexum (6. 958). See also the beginning of this paragraph: “Now I will recollect
once more of how porous a body all things are.” (nunc omnis repetam quam raro corpore sint res/
commemorare; 6.936-7)
126
deorum … imperium (6.54-5). See note 126 below.
127
ignorantia causarum (6.54)
128
nam quid in hoc mundo sit eorum ponere certum/ difficile est; sed quid possit fiatque per omne/ in variis mundis
varia ratione creatis,/ id doceo, plurisque sequor disponere causas/ motibus astrorum quae possint esse per omne;/
e quibus una tamen siet hic quoque causa necessest/ quae vegeat motum signis; sed quae sit earum/ praecipere
haudquaquamst pedetemptim progredientis. (5.526-533) Cp. Epicurus, “Letter to Herodotus,” §§79-80; “Letter to
Pythocles,” §§85-88. See Bailey, 1398: “Lucretius makes the important addition, to which he frequently recurs, that
if any one of the supposed causes does not hold good in our world, yet it will in some other world.”
129
quorum […] causas nulla ratione videre (1.153-4 is repeated both at 6.56-57 and at 6.90-91.)
130
rursus in antiquas referuntur religiones,/ et dominos acris adsciscunt (5.86-87 and again at 6. 62-63)
131
errantes caeca ratione (6.67)
132
ūnam dīcere causam (6.704)
133
corpus ut exanimum siquod procul ipse iacere/ conspicias hominis, fit ut omnis dicere causas/ conveniat leti,
dicatur ut illius una;/ nam neque eum ferro nec frigore vincere possis/ interiisse neque a morbo neque forte
veneno,/ verum aliquid genere esse ex hoc quod contigit ei/ scimus. item in multis hoc rebus dicere habemus.(6.
705-711)
134
dominis…superbis (2.1091)
135
ipsă suā per se sponte omnia dis agere expers (2. 1092)
136
nempe aliae quoque sunt; nempe hac sine viximus ante (4.1173)
137
consuetudo concinnat amorem;/ nam leviter quamvis quod crebro tunditur ictu,/ vincitur in longo spatio tamen
atque labascit./ nonne vides etiam guttas in saxa cadentis/ umoris longo in spatio pertundere saxa? (4.1283-1287)
138
2.1077-78. Note the growing rhetoric of singularity in these lines: “una, unica…unica solaque” Cp. also 2. 10531060: “Now since there is illimitable space empty in every direction, and since seeds innumerable in number in the
unfathomable universe are flying about in many ways driven in everlasting movement, it cannot by any means be
thought likely that this is the only round earth and sky that has been made…especially since this world was made
by nature, and the seeds of things themselves of their own accord, knocking together by chance, clashed in all
sorts of ways, darkly, aimlessly, without intention…”
139
multo cum sanguine saepe/ rixantes (6.1285-6)
140
suos consanguineous (6.1283)
141
I wish to thank my colleague Brendon Lasell for pointing out the possible verbal play on corpora.
The Gigantomachy is referred to at 5.110-25 as well as at 4.136-42. Although Epicurus is associated with the
Giants (the clause “those who with their reasoning [ratione sua] shake the walls of the world,” 5.119 echoes the
142
34
�encomium of Epicurus at 1.73), it is important to note that this identification is said to occur in the minds of those
who “bitted and bridled by superstition […] think that earth and sun and sky, sea, stars, and moon are of divine
body.” (5.114-6) Such individuals can see only a crass materialism in the doctrine of the primordia. I have tried to
show, however, that it is an oversimplification to suppose, as Monica Gale does, that Lucretius subscribes to a
simple division between Epicurean materialism and Platonic idealism. See Gale, Myth and Poetry in Lucretius, 44,
note 162: “the Epicureans would be on the side of the materialist ‘Giants’ against the ‘friends of the Forms.’”
143
deorum […] imperium […] regnum(6.54-55)
35
�
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Lucretius on the Nature of Things
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Friday night lecture
Tutors
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LeCuyer, Philip
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Intellectual Sin: Three Case Studies
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2013-04-12
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Audio recording of a lecture delivered on April 12, 2013, by Philip LeCuyer as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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St. John's College
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Annapolis, MD
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Descartes, René, 1596-1650. Meditationes de prima philosophia. English
Kant, Immanuel, 1724-1804. Kritik der reinen Vernunft. English
Heidegger, Martin, 1889-1976
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<a title="Typescript" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/40">Typescript</a>
Friday night lecture
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Intellectual Sin : three case studies
by Philip LeCuyer
[lecture delivered at St. John’s College on Apr. 12, 2013]
A few days after submitting the proposal for this lecture, entitled
“Intellectual Sin,” it occurred to me that some people, perhaps some of you
here tonight, might attend for the wrong reason. You might think that this
will be about how the usual type of sin—murder, adultery, theft, etc.—can
be done in a more “intellectual” way—something like French cinema as
compared to Hollywood. If so, you have been, as Bogart’s character Rick
says in Casablanca, misinformed.
*
*
*
On the morning of May 22, 1972, newspaper readers around the world
were shocked to see on all front pages two photographs side-by-side. The
first of was Michelangelo’s Pieta, damaged in three places. One hand and
part of its arm were completely missing. The other photograph was of a man
about thirty years old named Lazlo Toth. On May 21st he had walked into
St. Peter’s Basilica with the same rock-splitting hammer he had used as a
graduate student from Hungary doing field work in geology in Australia’s
remotest outback—and attacked Michelangelo’s masterpiece. He hit the
1
�figure of Mary in the statue three times, in the eye, in the mouth, and in the
hand, before a guard and onlookers could subdue him. By the time he was
seized and almost killed on the spot, he had finished.
Lazlo Toth was never charged with a crime. Instead he was remitted
to an asylum for the insane within Italy’s prison system. No country but
Australia would accept him. Before he was deported, never to have any
further contact with his wife and young son back in Hungary, he stated in an
interview with the Pope’s personal envoy that he had hit the eye of Mary
because it could not see, the mouth because it could not speak, and the hand
because it could not act. (We hear in these remarks echoes of Isaiah and of
Psalm 115—“They have eyes but do not see, they have mouths but can not
speak, etc.”) Since 1974 Mr. Toth has lived in obscurity in Sydney, where
he lingers on still today. A couple of years ago he was felled by a massive
stroke which, with seeming Sophoclean irony, has left him nearly blind,
unable to speak, and without the ability to do the simplest acts for himself let
alone anyone else.
I mention the strange case of Lazlo Toth here at the outset of my
lecture in order to distinguish myself from him. Six years before the Pieta
was defaced, I stood in St. Peter’s Basilica three or four feet from it. It was
ravishing. I asked a nearby guard if I could touch it. He said, “Yes—just be
2
�very, very careful.” I wanted to re-assure myself that the material was
stone—cool, smooth, Carraran marble. A visitor to the Basilica can no
longer do this. The Pieta, exquisitely restored, stands on the same spot, but
now encased in bullet-proof plexi-glass. One can gaze, but one can no
longer touch.
What I want to do today is to touch, carefully if only very briefly,
three monuments of our Western civilization: Descartes’ argument in the
Meditations for the existence of God; Kant’s assertion of the ultimate
coherence, the unity, of the rational subject in the Critique of Pure Reason;
and Heidegger’s “saying” of the essence of being in one of his well-known
essays on the fragment of Anaximander. The existence of God, the
coherence of the soul, and the essence of being are not issues that I have lost
sleep over in the past month, and I would be surprised if many of you have.
It is not the content of these arguments, but how they are conducted, that
interests me tonight.
I promise that I will not break anything. But like the young man that I
was back in 1966, I want to, as it were, touch these arguments with my
mind, not just gaze admiringly at them through the plexi-glass of canonical
greatness.
3
�Part I: Let us now approach Descartes’ Fifth Meditation. In it he
begins to articulate a bridge between thought, the ground of subjective
existence, and external or objective reality. Listen:
“I find in myself an infinity of ideas of certain things
which cannot be assumed to be pure nothingness,
even though they may have no existence outside
of my thought. These things are not figments of my
imagination, even though it is within my power to
think of them or not to think of them; on the contrary,
they have their own true and immutable natures.
Thus, for example, when I imagine a triangle, even
though there may perhaps be no such figure anywhere
in the world outside of my thought, nor ever has been,
nevertheless the figure cannot help having a certain
nature, or form, or essence, which is immutable and
eternal, which I have not invented, and which does not
in any way depend upon my mind. This is evidenced
by the fact that we can demonstrate various properties
of this triangle, namely that its three angles are equal
to two right angles…. These properties must be wholly
true since I conceive them clearly. And thus they are
something, and not pure negation, since it is quite evident
that everything which is true is something, as truth is
the same as being.” (LaFleur, pp. 119-120)
4
�Well, now, the first piton in Descartes’ climb out of subjectivity has
been placed. The ascent begins. The next staging area of the argument will
be reached by using this first thought in the supporting part of an analogy.
Descartes has already, in the Third Meditation, put forward an argument for
the existence of God, which was that the idea of God as ultimate perfection
could not have originated in his imperfect mind. It must have an author
other than himself, namely God. In the Third Meditation this proof becomes
the source of an expansive, effusive adoration. But even in an initial reading
of this earlier passage, it is not quite clear if Descartes is worshiping a real
God or only a deeper dimension of his own mind.
The question quietly survives his first major attempt at answering it.
And in the Fifth Meditation he now re-visits it, writing (and thinking):
“Even if everything that I concluded in the preceding
meditations were (by chance) not true, the existence of
God should pass in my mind as at least as certain as I
have hitherto considered all the truths of mathematics….
I find it manifest that we can no more separate
the existence of God from his essence than we can
separate the essence of a rectilinear triangle from the
fact that the size of its three angles equals two right angles….”
(LaFleur, pp. 120-121)
5
�A silent, odorless disaster lies immediately ahead. I am interested in
Descartes’ response to it. After affirming that “it is not in [his] power to
conceive of a God without existence,” (LaFleur, p. 121) whereas by contrast,
it is in his power to imagine a horse with or without wings, he takes up once
again, but not exactly in the same way, his analogy:
“…as soon as I come to recognize that existence is
a perfection, I conclude (L. 1642 very properly) that
this first and supreme Being (F. 1647 truly) exists, just
as it is not necessary that I should ever imagine any
triangle, but every time I wish to consider a rectilinear
figure containing three angles only, it is absolutely
necessary that I attribute to it everything that leads
to the conclusion that these three angles are not
greater than two right angles….” (LaFleur, p. 122)
Amazing. The phrase “not greater than” has replaced “equal to.” Descartes
has here uncovered for himself the logical possibility of what we know at St.
John’s College as Lobachevskian geometry. He does not explore here or
anywhere in his work this unnerving possibility. Instead, on the very next
page he reverses the roles of the two propositions in his analogy about
angles and about God. Listen now, very carefully:
“Thus, … , when I consider the nature of the (F. 1647
rectilinear) triangle, I recognize (L. 1642 most) evidently,
6
�I, who am somewhat skilled in geometry, that its three
angles are equal to two right angles…. But as soon
as I turn my attention away from the demonstration,
it can easily happen that I doubt its truth if I do not
know that there is a God.” (La Fleur, p. 124)
The supposed self-evidence of the proposition about the angularity in a
triangle, which was to have supported the proposition about the existence of
God, has dissolved. Now it is the existence of God which guarantees
Euclidean geometry, as he “who is somewhat skilled in geometry” tells us.
The argument from reason has devolved into an argument from authority.
This, I submit, is a sin of the intellect. What shall we call it? It
manifests itself as the suppression of a new logical possibility in argument
for the sake of preserving a previous certainty. Let us call it the sin of
“desiring certitude.” It is not unavoidable. What is needed, as a
preventative, is the distinction we find in chapter 9, Book II of Aristotle’s
Physics. In that chapter Aristotle distinguishes hypothetical necessity from
simple necessity. If a saw is to cut wood, it must then have teeth made of
iron. And, interestingly, Aristotle adds: if a triangle is to have the sum of its
angles equal to two right angles, then a straight line must be “such and
such.” We must remember to use the word if when we are thinking in order
to avoid the lapse into fundamentalism.
7
�As I mentioned at the outset, it is not the content of Descartes’
argument that interests me, but the tone in it. Its tone, the feel of it, arising
from and perhaps identical with the desire for certitude, I would describe as
latently “contemptuous.”
Part II: The second case I will present for our consideration is found
in the Critique of Pure Reason. It is Kant’s Table of Categories. The bit of
textual history bearing on this case is as follows: Kant published the first
edition of the Critique—the A text—in 1781. Two years later he published
the Prolegomena, which apparently was intended to present an overview of
the Critique. But it also touches new problems, of interest to us tonight, not
mentioned in the Critique. Then in 1787 Kant published a second edition of
the Critique—the B text—differing in some important passages from the
first edition. So we have a “before” version—the A text-- and an “after”
version—the B text-- of the argument with the Prolegomena in the middle.
In both versions of the Critique the argument moves onward and
upward toward the Table of Categories, and then flowing directly from the
Table come the famous deductions, the paralogisms, and the antinomies.
The categories themselves are fundamental concepts—the deep structure of
our minds. Referencing himself favorably to Aristotle, who as Kant writes,
compiled his list of these basic concepts “on no principle” and “merely
8
�picked them up as they came his way,” (A 81, B 107, Smith p. 114) Kant
then says of his own Table:
“It has not arisen rhapsodically, as a result of a haphazard
search after pure concepts, the complete enumeration of which,
as based on induction only, could never be guaranteed.
Nor could we if this were our procedure, discover
why just these concepts, and no others, have their seat
in the pure understanding.” (ibid.)
Aristotle gave us a list. Kant gives us a table, not just a mere map, but an
arrangement which asserts organic and unique logical relationships between
different categories—an internally self-symmetrical, self-reinforcing
“Gliederbau” (B xxiii) —a structure with members organized as in a body.
In the B Preface we also find this additional new assertion:
“For pure speculative reason has a structure wherein
everything is an organ, the whole being for the sake
of every part, and every part for the sake of all the
others, so that even the smallest imperfection, be it a
fault (error) or a deficiency, must betray itself in use.
This system will, as I [Kant] hope, maintain, throughout
the future, this unchangeableness. … Any attempt to
change even the smallest part at once gives rise to
contradictions, not merely in the system, but in human
reason in general.” (B xxxviii, Smith pp. 33-34)
9
�This same newly heightened concern for an organic order is
emphasized elsewhere in the second (1787) edition, namely in section 11.
We should note that this and the immediately following section 12 are not
revisions of passages or arguments found in the first edition, but major new
insertions—the only such whole sections in the entire B text. Kant, then,
inserting this new passage into the later edition of the Critique, writes:
“This table of categories suggests some nice [“artige”—
more on that word in a moment] points, which may have
important consequences in regard to the scientific form
of all modes of knowledge obtainable by reason. [It] is
indispensable to supply the complete plan of a whole
science. … The table contains all the elementary concepts
of the understanding in their completeness—even their
order….” (B 109-110, Smith pp. 115-116)
The sentence which introduces this inserted section 11 is highly unusual in
its phrase “artige Betrachtungen.” “Artig” means well-behaved, pleasing,
pretty, even neat—as in “that’s really neat.” It is this same very odd word
found in an almost identical sentence, dealing with the exact same issues,
which begins a strange footnote in the Prolegomena—#29 in the Carus
translation. This footnote points out, as does section 11 inserted later in the
B text, that in each group of three categories, the third arises as a synthesis
of the first two, and arises from a distinct mental act—e.g. “unity,” then
10
�“plurality,” are synthesized by a separate act of the mind into the concept
“totality.”
Then Kant mentions in this footnote another “artige” point, and this is
where it happens:
“… in those categories of quantity and of quality there is
merely a progress from unity to totality, or from something to
nothing (for this purpose the categories of quality must stand
thus: reality, limitation, total negation.” [“völlige Negation”-i.e. nihilism] (Carus, p. 67)
This is a change in the order of these three categories from the A text (see
Appendix A), but it is not an innocent change. The crucial original order of
the categories—reality, negation, limitation (i.e. definition) has been shifted
so that now the synthesized result is no longer a defined thing, but
“nothingness.” I regard this footnote as Nietzsche’s philosophical birth
certificate. It is as if an arm is where a leg should be, and then, of a sudden,
shapelessness is where the body should be.
Kant will not bring this change back into the 1787 Critique—the B
text. Instead he there insists, in the newly inserted passages already cited, on
an organism-like order in his original Table, but he knows that what is at
stake is the distinction between something and nothing—between objective
thought and nihilism. In the A text, and again later in the B text, he had
11
�concluded the first major division of the Critique with a one-page treatment
of nihil and a sketch of the usual four tabular headings for nihil—for “the
nothing.” Imagine that—a Table of Categories for nihilism. Kant could
begin to imagine it, but he could not fill it out. Under each of the four
headings—quantity, quality, relation, mode—stands the word “empty.” (A
291, B 347, Smith p. 295) Out of every opening Kant sees emptiness. He
and we realize that, far from the table containing the emptiness, the
emptiness engulfs the adumbrated table.
Kant had written in the earlier A text that the issue of nihilism,
“although not in [itself] of special importance, might nevertheless be
regarded as requisite for the completeness of the system.” (A 290, Smith p.
294) In the later B text, even after his discovery in the Prolegomena of
category tectonics, he leaves standing without comment his statement that
the issue of nihilism is “of no special importance.” (B 346, ibid.) But in the
later B Preface he does now note that it would be absurd to conclude “that
there can be appearance without anything that appears.” (B xxxvi-xxvii,
Smith p. 27)
There it is. Descartes attempted to overcome, to vanquish, nihilism—
to establish by argument, then by authority, that at least some of what is in
our consciousness, individually and collectively, is “not pure nothingness.”
12
�Kant wishes only to play nihilism to a stalemate. By rendering the
paralogisms and the antinomies, which are the easiest targets for refutation
and for denial, harmless, taking them off the board so to speak, Kant does
not attempt to win, but rather to not lose. His sin is, I think, deeper and more
serious than that of Descartes. He acknowledges nihilism in the A text while
denying its importance, then notes it leaking into his compartmentalized
configuration of mind in footnote #29 in the Prolegomena, and then, a few
years later in the B text, still denies its importance. The voyage of the
Titanic comes to mind.
What shall we call this sin? Not suppression of argument, but rather
deafness to the importance of an argument. Let us call it “enthusiasm.”
What would be the antidote for it? Definitions are the antidote. Immediately
after presenting his Table of Categories in section 10 (in both editions), Kant
wrote: “In this treatise I purposely omit the definitions of the categories,
although I may be in possession of them.” (A 82-83, B 108, Smith p. 115)
This statement, when considered carefully, does not become less strange.
Aristotle is in possession of them. In chapter 26, Book V of the
Metaphysics, Aristotle defines two kinds of wholes: one in which the
positions of the parts with respect to each other matter (as in Kant’s Table), a
whole (τὸ ‛όλον), and one in which position doesn’t matter, a totality (τὸ
13
�πα̃ν). Throughout his newly inserted section 11 in the B text Kant uses these
two concepts, totality (Allheit) and whole (Ganze), interchangeably—
revealing his profound unawareness of and confusion about this distinction.
In the version of the table he included in the Prolegomena, under the
heading “quantity,” he places the two sequences “unity-plurality-totality” on
the one hand, and on the other “measure-size-whole” side by side as
alternative, fully equivalent namings. There are other telling alterations in
the Prolegomena’s table. They arise from the problem of how to
accommodate negation. In footnote #29 Kant now refers to his Table as “a”
table, not “the” table (Vorländer, p. 86), thereby quietly admitting the
existence of another, as yet unarticulated paradigm. (Nietzsche will take on
this task.) But for Kant the issue was, and I repeat as he did in the B text,
“of no special importance.”
Part III: Descartes would require us, finally, to submit to his
authority. Kant, regarding his achievement in the Critique as beyond
controversy, places his argument about the structure and coherence of the
mind almost out of our reach. In his second Preface he writes: “…the
danger is not that of being refuted, but of not being understood.” (B xliii,
Smith p. 36-37) Martin Heidegger, in the opening passage of his 1941
14
�lecture on Anaximander’s fragment, which is the third of these case studies,
goes further. He asserts that the “truth” (yes, in quotaton marks) of his
translation from the Greek of these few oldest-known, all-important
philosophic words can only be verified (“geprüft”) by abandoning our
thought processes and turning the citadel, so to speak, over to him.
His lectures on the fragment were the culmination of a course given in
the winter of 1941 called Grundbegriffe—foundational concepts. Heidegger
presents the fragment as the ultimate source of our philosophical tradition. It
antedates Aristotle by over two hundred fifty years, Simplicius, who
preserved it for us, by a thousand years, and Heidegger himself by two and a
half thousand years. It is, as Heidegger says, by listening directly to this
fragment, these thirty-one words of ancient Greek, that we can cut through
the accumulated wrongness of metaphysics and drink from the pure source.
In and through this fragment we can encounter and “experience” the origin
of being, the “saying of being.” (Aylesworth, p. 83)
Heidegger makes two preliminary moves to cue up his main point.
The first of these happens quickly and without comment. The first two
words, “out of which” (in the plural), are rendered as “whence” (von
woheraus). (See Appendix B) The antecedents of the relative pronoun are
thereby effaced, leaving the source entirely featureless. This would be like
15
�taking delivery of mail that was not sent by anyone or even by anything.
…Like in a dream.
The second preliminary change is Heidegger’s re-translation of the
two words for coming-to-be (‛η γένεσις) and passing-away (‛η φθορά).
Kant’s translation of these two terms was the traditional “entstehen”
(arising) and “vergehen” (perishing) (A 82, B 108). These are two different
words for two different processes. Heidegger, undermining Kant’s usage,
changes them to “going forth” (Herforgang) and “going away” (Entgängnis).
They now have the same root, the same basic source of meaning, the only
difference being one of lexical format. It is as if being born and dying were
only a matter of syntax, not substance.
The crux of Heidegger’s translation of the fragment lies in the twoword phrase “ει̉ς ταυ̃τα.” The Greek means “into these things”—a normal
plural demonstrative adjective used as a pronoun. Here Heidegger writes:
“Once we have recognized what is supposed to be
said, that the former from out of which emergence
presences, is just the latter, away into which evading
presences, then [watch carefully now] there is no
difficulty in finally reading this ταυ̃τα differently
from the previous understanding of the text—as
ταυ̉τά. Only in this way does the wording first
correspond to what the fragment intends to say.
16
�…The ταυ̃τα, “this” in the sense of ταυ̉τά, “the
self-same” names … the self-sameness of the egress
of emergence and the ingress of elusion. [EA] Yet
does not all of this remain indeterminate?
What, then, is this Self-Same?” (Aylesworth, p. 91)
What indeed? It turns out to be undifferentiated nothingness. The
undifferentiated source, the nihil, is the undifferentiated destination--the
same nihil. Who knew—we appear at this very moment out of the same
nothingness into which, in this same moment, we are receding. This is what
some of us might have suspected on certain occasions—that we are indeed
both coming and going at the same time—which is what Heidegger calls
“presencing.” This is it—ground zero in every sense of the word. The
singular eradicates the plural. Sameness overwhelms distinctions.
The final phrase of this first clause in the Anaximander fragment,
κατὰ τὸ χρεών, meaning “through the necessity of it,” Heidegger tells us
cannot be illuminated by citing just any necessity, for example, not by citing
the law of cause and effect. It must be understood as “the compelling need”
--sheer subjective intensity—being engulfed in pure subjectivity, in selfsameness. The German word is “Eigentlichkeit.” Its accepted translation
into English is “authenticity.” (Stambaugh, pp. 42ff, Inwood, pp. 22ff)
17
�Perhaps we should now read this whole first sentence of Heidegger’s
translation of the Anaximander fragment:
“Whence emergence is for what respectively presences
also an eluding into this (as into the Same), emerges
accordingly the compelling need; ….” (Aylesworth, p. 81)
Aristotle in his small treatise on sophistical arguments includes as the
last entries to his list of sophisms 1) changing the meaning of a word by
changing its accent, and 2) solecism—using a word un- or antigrammatically. In another venue, we would call this tampering with
evidence and intimidating witnesses. ταυ̃τα does not mean “this” or “selfsame.” It means “these things.” Heidegger’s re-write still leaves it meaning
“the Sames.” It is the recalcitrance of this plural form in Anaximander’s text
that stops Heidegger’s argument in its tracks. Speaking defensively, for us
also and not just for himself, Heidegger writes: “We mistrust grammar and
stick to the matter.” (Aylesworth, p. 95) (“Aber wir misstrauen der
Grammatik und halten uns an die Sache.” Lecture 23 b). He thereby places
the matter at hand before the form. This is the origin and essence of
lawlessness. Let us call this sin of the intellect “authenticity.”
*
*
*
18
�Aristotle, writing on this same subject in his later treatise On Comingto-Be and Passing-Away (περὶ γενέσεως καὶ φθορα̃ς), and as it would
appear, thinking about this exact same fragment, asks a question:
“What is the cause of the continuous process of
coming-to-be is a perplexing enough problem if
it is really true that what passes-away vanishes
into “what is not” and “what is not” is nothing;
…. Is it, then, because the passing-away of one
thing is the coming-to-be of another thing, and
the coming-to-be of one thing is the passing away
of another thing, that the process of change is
necessarily unceasing?” (Bk. I, chapter 3, p. 318a—
Loeb, pp. 189-191)
The fragment read in this way would mean that a cause does not merely
precede its effect, or an antecedent its consequent, as David Hume thought,
but that a cause perishes into its effect. There would be a fearful symmetry
of “before” and “after”—an ordering of time itself. We would consider the
world not as a compelling dreamlike sequence, but to be objectively real
…and also unceasing ( ̉άπαυστος, ibid.)
Symmetry is not sameness simply. It is sameness and difference. In
Anaximander’s fragment the grammar of its indirect statement in the first
complex sentence casts “perishing” into the formal objective (i.e. accusative)
19
�case while it functions as a nominative subject in its own clause. This
means, grammatically, that “perishing” is different from, not the same as,
“emerging” (i.e. coming-to-be), and that it, “perishing,” is required to
complete a whole rather than to assert or re-state an identity. For these
reasons I would translate the first sentence of Anaximander’s fragment as
follows:
As out of which (antecedents) is the emergence
for existing things, also the perishing (of antecedents)
into these (existing) things emerges through the necessity of it:
Continuing this way of understanding the fragment into its second sentence:
For they (antecedents and existing things) give
soundness and acknowledgement to each other
of unsoundness through the ordering of time.
Here there is symmetry, and where there is symmetry there is a law of
conservation. Something is constant. Something is “always.”
This particular point—that ultimately there is something rather than
nothing—is not just at the heart of the issue. It is the heart of the issue. This
is what Heidegger would deny. He writes in this same 1941 lecture that the
“always,” the “α̉εί” in Greek, what is continuous through the ordering of
time, is the “unfit,” the α̉δικία in the second sentence of Anaximander’s
fragment. It must be overcome, “aus der Verwindung,” by what is authentic.
20
�There is, according to Heidegger, only “transition,” (Übergang), which is the
pure emerging of the Same. He concludes: “This Same is being itself.”
(Aylesworth, p. 103) (“Dieses Selbe ist das Sein selbst.” Lecture 24, part a).
Kant meant to achieve a cessation of hostilities vis-à-vis nihilism.
Heidegger, after his attempt at trans-millennial ventriloquism, invites us to
follow him over and enlist: “It could be,” he writes provocatively, “that
we—for a long time now-- have understood the negative too negatively.”
(Aylesworth, p. 96).
*
*
*
With a concluding allusion to Mr. Toth over there in Australia, we
may say that Descartes’ argument about the existence of God cannot see
because it is closed to its own logical possibilities. Kant’s argument,
intended to be the adamantine foundation upon which the mind reposes,
cannot speak because it is deaf to the importance, the rhetorical import, of
his own discovery of category tectonics. Heidegger’s “saying of being”
cannot lead to action because without grammar there is no action—only
happenings, only “Ereignisse.”
Desire for certitude, …enthusiasm, …authenticity—these are
intellectual sins, sins against logic, rhetoric, and grammar. They are real,
and they have real consequences. To them we owe the toxic brew of
21
�contempt, naivety, and fanaticism that has pervaded our public discourse,
and that disenables our thinking. The corresponding virtues would be
modesty, watchfulness, and gratitude—gratitude toward those who have
preceded us, our antecedents, who have made an occasion such as this
possible, and gratitude that there are any who will in turn, in some other
place at some later time, take up what we offer here and endow it with a
better sound and a deeper soundness.
22
�APPENDIX A
Kant’s Table of Categories as it appears in both editions of the Critique of
Pure Reason (Smith, p. 113):
I
Of Quantity
Unity
Plurality
II
Totality
III
Of Quality
Of Relation
Reality
Of Inherence and Subsistence
Negation
(substantia et accidens)
Limitation [Einschränkung]
Of Causality and Dependence
(cause and effect)
Of Community (reciprocity
IV
between agent and patient)
Of Modality
Possibility—Impossibility
Existence [Dasein]—Non-existence [Nichtsein]
Necessity—Contingency
Kant’s Table of Categories in the Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics:
I As to Quantity
Unity (Measure)
Plurality (Quantity)
Totality (Whole)
II As to Quality
Reality
Negation
Limitation [Einschränkung]
III As to Relation
Substance
Cause
Community
IV As to Modality
Possibility
Existence [Dasein]
Necessity
Footnote #29 in the Prolegomena: “…neat observations [artige
Anmerkungen]…(1) that the third arises from the first and the second, joined
in one concept; (2) that in those of quantity and quality there is merely a
progress from unity to totality or from something to nothing (for this
purpose the categories of quality must stand thus: reality, limitation, total
negation)….” [emphasis added]
23
�APPENDIX B
The Anaximander fragment as preserved in Simplicius’ commentary:
̃
ε̉ξ ‛ω̃ν δὲ ‛η γένεσίς ὲστι τοι̃ς ου̉σι, καὶ τὴν φθορὰν ει̉ς ταυ̃τα
γίνεσθαι κατὰ τὸ χρεών: διδόναι γὰρ αυ̉τὰ δίκην καὶ τίσιν
α̉λλήλοις τη̃ς α̉δικίας κατὰ τὴν του̃ χρόνου τάξιν.
The Anaximander fragment as translated by Heidegger:
̃
#1(ε̉ξ ‛ω̃ν) δὲ #2a(‛η γένεσίς) ὲστι τοι̃ς ου̉σι, καὶ #2b(τὴν φθορὰν)
#3(ει̉ς ταυ̃τα) γίνεσθαι #4(κατὰ τὸ χρεών): διδόναι γὰρ #5(αυ̉τὰ)
δίκην καὶ τίσιν α̉λλήλοις τη̃ς α̉δικίας κατὰ τὴν του̃ χρόνου τάξιν.
#1(Von woheraus) aber #2a(der Hervorgang) ist dem jeweilig
Anwesenden auch #2b( die Entgängnis) #3( in dieses (als in das
Selbe)) geht hervor #4( entsprechend der nötigenden Not);
Es gibt nämlich #5( jedes Anwesende selbst (von sich aus)) Fug,
und auch Schätzung (Anerkennung) lässt eines dem anderen,
(all dies) aus der Verwindung des Unfugs entsprechend der
Zuweisung des Zeitigen durch die Zeit. (Lecture 20)
Whence emergence is for what respectively presences also an
eluding into this (as into the Same), emerges accordingly
the compelling need; there is namely what presences itself
(from itself), the fit, and each is respected (acknowledged)
by the other, (all of this) from overcoming the unfit according
to the allotment of temporalizing by time. (Aylesworth, p. 82)
A grammatical translation of the Anaximander fragment by the author:
As out of which (antecedents) is the emergence for existing things,
also the perishing (of antecedents) into these (existing) things
emerges through the necessity of it; for they (antecedents and
existing things) give soundness and acknowledgement to each
other of unsoundness through the ordering of time.
24
�References
Aristotle, On Coming-to-Be and Passing-Away, trans. by E.S. Forster,
Library, Aristotle vol. III, Harvard University Press, 1955.
Loeb Classical
Aristotle, On Sophistical Refutations, trans. by E.S. Forster, Loeb Classical Library,
Aristotle vol. III, Harvard University Press, 1955.
Descartes, Rene, Meditationes de Prima Philosophia , Méditations Métaphysiques, Texte
latin [1642] et traduction du Duc de Luynes [1647], Geneviève Rodis-Lewis, ed.,
Librairie Philosophique J. Vrin, 1970.
Descartes, Rene, Meditations, trans. by Laurence J. Lafleur, The Library of the Liberal
Arts, Bobbs-Merrill, 1960.
Heidegger Martin, Anaximander’s Saying, in Off the Beaten Track, ed. and trans. by
Julian Young and Kenneth Haynes, Cambridge University Press, 2002.
Heidegger, Martin, Basic Concepts, trans. by Gary Aylesworth, Indiana University Press,
1993.
Heidegger, Martin, Being and Time, trans. by Joan Stambaugh, State University of New
York Press, 1996.
Heidegger, Martin, Grundbegriffe, Gesamtausgabe Band 51, Vittorio Klostermann, 1981.
Inwood, Martin, A Heidegger Dictionary, Blackwell, 1999.
Kant, Immanuel, Critique of Pure Reason, trans. by Norman Kemp Smith, St. Martin’s
Press, 1965, MacMillan, 1929.
Kant, Immanuel, Kritik der reinen Vernunft, Zweite Auflage, Kants Werke, Band III,
Walter de Gruyter & Co., 1968.
Kant, Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik, die als Wissenschaft auftreten
können, ed. by Karl Vorländer, 1905, Philosophische Bibliothek Band 40, Verlag von
Felix Meiner, 1965.
Kant, Immanuel, Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics, trans. by Paul Carus, 1902,
revised by James W. Ellington, Hackett, 1977.
25
�
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Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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LeCuyer, Philip
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Intellectual sin : three case studies
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2013-04-12
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pdf
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Typescript of a lecture delivered on April 12, 2013 by Philip LeCuyer as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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St. John's College
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Descartes, René, 1596-1650. Meditationes de prima philosophia. English
Kant, Immanuel, 1724-1804. Kritik der reinen Vernunft. English
Heidegger, Martin, 1889-1976
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<a title="Audio recording" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/39">Audio recording</a>
Friday night lecture
-
https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/0f1843c8bce9ee12fb5f8a8649897e45.mp3
11224df1c44595977bb1f83dcf6b786c
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Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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01:05:59
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wav
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Lennox, James G.
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Aristotle on Respiration: The Origins of Functional Anatomy
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2013-03-22
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mp3
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Audio recording of a lecture delivered on March 22, 2013, by James Lennox as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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Aristotle. Posterior analytics
Respiration
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Bib # 80898
Friday night lecture
-
https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/92e04ead139a4f0c935e5e1569027acb.mp3
cb5c375aecf95ecba34f239f9a8f626e
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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00:51:18
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Mazur, Barry
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What Is the Surface Area of a Hedgehog? (Steiner Lecture)
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2011-09-30
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mp3
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Audio recording of a lecture delivered on September 30, 2011, by Barry Mazur as part of the Formal Lecture Series.<br /><br />Mazur describes his lecture: "Well, I don't know the answer to the question of the title and no hedgehog will be harmed, or even mentioned again, in my lecture. The concept of area is one of the many things of interest in Euclid's <em>Elements</em>, and is familiar to all who have been through the Freshman program here at St. John's. There are many ways to approach it. Archimedes, for example sometimes likes to convert the problem of computing area to computing something akin to weight. I'll spend this hour considering these approaches and how they touch on broader issues in mathematical thought such as analogy, heuristic, paradox, and something I'll call characterization (a version of axiomatization). As for prior reading, absolutely none (except what you may have already read in Euclid) is needed, but I will be turning again and again to Proposition 37 of Book I of the <em>Elements</em>: Triangles which are on the same base and in the same parallels equal one another. So if you want to read one page in preparation, take a look at the statement and proof of that marvelous proposition."<br /><br /><span>This lecture is also part of the Steiner Lecture Series, which is made possible by a gift from the Steiner family in memory of Andrew Steiner, an alumnus of the college from 1963. The lecture series was established to bring notable speakers to campus from a variety of disciplines and endeavors, in recognition of Steiner’s intellectual versatility, and for the sake of continued learning.</span>
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Annapolis, MD
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sound
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Euclid. Elements
Surfaces--Areas and volumes
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English
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LEC_Mazur_Barry_2011-09-30_ac
Friday night lecture
Steiner lecture
-
https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/94dc6462d81dec0c7399856ac29e022d.mp3
b23040f38f37b839a44111ede4c60ba6
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Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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00:50:06
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McCoy, Marina, 1968-
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Pity as a Civic Virtue in Sophocles' Philoctetes
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2011-04-08
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mp3
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Audio recording of a lecture delivered on April 8, 2011, by Marina McCoy as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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St. John's College
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Annapolis, MD
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Sophocles. Philoctetes
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English
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LEC_McCoy_Marina_2011-04-08_ac
Friday night lecture
-
https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/a750e33a1cad4235ae601e22819f9821.pdf
472b3820a62b938da44bfd8fe905ba99
PDF Text
Text
Can Taxes Be Fair? Should They Be?
Lecture to be delivered at St. John's College, Annapolis, October 11, 2013
By William S. Peirce
Professor Emeritus of Economics, Case Western Reserve University, wsp@cwru.edu
Abstract: The concept of "fairness" is so frequent in modern discussions of taxation that the absence of
the term in ancient and medieval discussions of taxation may seem surprising. The older literature uses
such terms as "intolerable" and "confiscatory," as well as "old" and "new." Fairness seems to have
entered the tax discussion in the literature on natural rights that held sway in the era of the U.S. and
French revolutions. Despite the ubiquity of fairness as a criterion in the discussion, it has not led to
agreement in the design of taxes. The flaws are fundamental; the concept cannot be perfected. The
economic concept of "opportunity cost" is more basic, and this leads directly to the choice of the land
value tax. This offers a way out of the swamp of fairness in the design of a tax system.
We hear references to fairness and taxation all the time. The President calls on the rich to pay
their fair share. Organizations actively promote the "Fair Tax." If you study Public Finance you will hear
much about specific versions of fairness in the form of horizontal equity (that equals should be treated
equally) and vertical equity (that unequals should be treated in an appropriately unequal way).
Although vertical equity has some echoes of Aristotle (bk.5, ch.3), the juxtaposition of the concepts of
fairness and taxation is a recent phenomenon, beginning in the late 18th century—the intellectual
climate that gave us Adam Smith, the American Revolution, and the French Revolution. That climate
was, of course, the culmination of centuries of development of parliamentary control of the sovereign,
as well as the evolution of Judeo-Christian concepts of natural law and individual rights.
My topic is already impossibly large, but I want to sketch out an earlier view of taxation that
explains why the pre-Enlightenment references to "fairness" are so scarce. Lacking the time and
knowledge to review the facts of ancient history, and in the spirit of Adam Smith and the Scottish
Enlightenment, I will engage in some "theoretical or conjectural history" inspired by Mancur Olson
(2000, pp.3-12):
Imagine yourself in a squalid village surrounded by wilderness a thousand or so years ago. You
and your neighbors are engaged in the daily struggle to scrape together dinner. A cloud of dust appears
on the horizon, followed by the thunder of galloping hooves. The villagers scramble to hide from the
gang of roving bandits who kill or rape anyone they see, steal whatever they can carry, set fire to the
rest, and gallop off. The surviving villagers crawl out of their hiding places and try to piece together their
squalid life before winter sets in, knowing that the next gang of bandits may gallop in at any time.
1
�Now put yourself in the position of the roving bandits. (History is written by the winners.) You
ride for days through the wilderness, risk the perils of attacking and plundering, and have very little to
show for the effort because squalid villages provide scant booty. Eventually, the more perceptive roving
bandits realize that by settling in a village as stationary bandits and protecting the inhabitants from
other marauders, they can induce the villagers to work harder, accumulate capital, produce more, and
provide them with more loot than they could extract by plunder. The stationary bandits can evolve into
government by providing internal order, judging disputes, defending property rights, converting
indiscriminate looting into predictable taxes, and providing the public goods that increase production
and, hence, tax revenues—roads, bridges, irrigation, training in useful skills, etc. Although the villagers
were safer and more comfortable when the roving bandits evolved into stable government, there was
no doubt that the government was an alien power extracting surplus from the people. Taxes were not
described as "fair" or "unfair." but rather as "tolerable" or "oppressive." A "good king" was someone
who understood that arbitrary exactions and high tax rates did not yield him as much revenue as more
moderate and predictable rates that allowed his subjects to prosper.
The story with which you are probably more familiar is from I Samuel 8:5-18. Samuel judged
Israel, but when he was old and his sons were corrupt, the people requested a king "like all the nations."
Samuel explained what kings were like: "He will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his
chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots. And he will appoint him
captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground , and to reap his
harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots. And he will take your
daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers. And he will take your fields, and
your vineyards, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. And he will
take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants. And he
will take your menservants and your maidservants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and
put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants." Again, the
picture is that of an outsider who takes whatever he wants from his subjects. Fairness is not an issue.
The alien power did not always settle in the subject territory. The Roman empire, and many
others, extracted tribute from weaker nations. Often local agents (the hated "publicans" of the Bible)
would be granted the tax franchise for a particular area. Each agent was responsible for paying the
contractual amount to the government, but could keep whatever he could squeeze out of the populace.
This ancient device of "tax farming" persisted in some form for many centuries, which suggests the value
of using someone with local and particular knowledge to estimate what the government could extract
from taxpayers. The problems with authorizing an agent of government to squeeze an arbitrary amount
from the taxpayer have led most commentators to condemn any practice that seems to put revenue
agents on commission.
The details of the taxes and forms of government varied from place to place and time to time,
but from the viewpoint of the mass of mankind the differences were not great. The masses could
expect that nearly all of the surplus above subsistence would be extracted from them either as taxes or
as rents to a landlord. When taxes became intolerable, the masses were squeezed to the point where
2
�population would actually be decreasing from malnutrition or because people fled from the high tax
civilization to refuge with the barbarians.
Even before the great invasions of Rome in the 5th century, central control of the Empire had
weakened. As taxes on farmland were raised to the point where small farmers abandoned their plots,
the large landowners absorbed the smaller plots and became the feudal lords who contended with each
other and with kings for power and taxes throughout the Middle Ages. Much of the political history
focusses on barons, dukes, princes, and kings, but the maneuverings of these folks for land and revenue
made little difference to the mass of mankind. Nevertheless, the concept of justice in taxation was
developing and property rights and contracts retained their force. The teachings of the Church became
increasingly important. "God will certainly punish anyone who reinstitutes an old tax…" (Pope
Gregory,c. 600,quoted in Adams, p. 137). New taxes, also, were forbidden by the Edict of Paris (614 )
and it was expected that an exactio inaudita (unheard-of tax) would provoke divine retribution. Kings
would often have to ask the barons for special assistance to fund wars. This was generally granted for
defensive wars, but not for offensive expeditions, which were expected to be self-financing through
plunder and tribute. Montesquieu (Bk. XXX) cites a number of contracts between kings and cities or
particular populations setting , among other matters, the taxes that could be levied on the city or group.
These examples are from 7th – 12th centuries in western Europe when the king, however limited the
geographic extent of his kingdom, was the highest earthly power until usurped or conquered. Yet kings
did feel bound by their contracts. Whether this was evidence of a fear of eternal retribution, some
innate feeling of ethics, or a pragmatic calculation of the value of being known to keep one's word, or
some combination of these, the result was strengthen an ideal of justice in taxation that involved
stability, predictability, and appropriateness.
Today, "just" is often used as a synonym for "fair," but the medieval concept is more closely
related to the idea of being fitting, proper, and lawful. In Plato's Republic (p.112, "The Guardians'
Duties"), the potter should not be paid either too much or too little because only the optimum pay
would result in the maximum production of high quality pots. This is purely an efficiency rule. It has
nothing to do with fairness. Aristotle (Ethics, Bk.4, ch.2) described the contributions that a man should
make to his community. They should reflect his wealth and station in life, being neither too cheap and
tawdry nor too extravagant. For example, a very rich man might present a well-equipped naval vessel to
his city. Someone with less wealth could offer a good banquet to the poor of the city. By the time that
Aquinas [1225-1274] brought the later works of Aristotle into the mainstream of western scholarship,
that version of justice in taxation was firmly established. That is, the individual's contribution to the
community should be somehow proportionate to the wealth and standing of the individual, but there
was no thought of using taxes to change the wealth of one person relative to another.
King Louis the 14th of France [1638-1715] is reputed to have responded to reports that the
people were complaining about high taxes by stating, "It is all mine anyway, I can take whatever I want."
Whether he actually said that is irrelevant. The statement is a throwback to the view that taxing power
is just the continuation of the plunder by the roving bandits that is justified by the power of the
government. In stark contrast, the roughly contemporaneous words of John Locke (1690) define the
new intellectual atmosphere: "…every man has a property in his own person; this nobody has any right
3
�to but himself. The labor of his body and the work of his hands, we may say, are properly his" (The
Second Treatise of Government, para. 27). That leaves no room for slavery or feudalism and room only
for those taxes to which he has consented. At this stage, reached in different countries at different
times, it becomes possible and seemingly useful to speak of "fairness" in taxation. The concept
presupposes the existence of a surplus above subsistence for the masses—a surplus that is not
considered to be rightfully the property of landowners or governments, but rather belongs to the
individuals who create it by their labor.
This rough and impressionistic notion of a real divide in the way intellectuals perceived the
world is borne out by a careful study by Alfani and Frigeni (2013). They analyzed manuscripts and
printed documents from about 1100 to 1830 centering on Italy. They found that people were aware of
the vast disparities in wealth throughout that period, but in the earlier years considered it acceptable
and a natural part of a natural or God-given order. This is consistent with Aristotle, Augustine, and
Aquinas. Beginning in the 16th century, they find signs of "jus naturalism" or individuals in a State of
Nature with freedom and equality. This is consistent with Grotius, Hobbes, and Locke. The concept of
the State of Nature reflects an abandonment of the Medieval (and earlier) concept of a natural
hierarchical order. A key word count confirms the shift: "aequalitas" occurs 17 times from 1700-1785,
and 334 times from 1789-1830; whereas "aequitas", which was common prior to the French revolution
declined afterwards. To put it bluntly, the atmosphere shifted from the regal, "Why do they complain
about taxes, it is all mine?" to the individualistic "What right do those bandits have to plunder any of my
hard earned wealth?"
Regardless of shifts in intellectual climate, the practical administrators needed to raise tax
revenue, especially in times of war with the increasing cost of a professional military establishment. The
traditional land taxes, tariffs, tolls, and excises had been stretched to the point where everyone
recognized their weaknesses. By the beginning of the 19th century, many practical tax specialists
thought that "capacity" or "faculty" to earn income was the appropriate tax base. It was commonly held
that property was a good measure of faculty in a primitive economy, but that it had become
progressively less comprehensive as an increasing proportion of income seemed to be generated
without involving much visible property.
When the British Prime Minister William Pitt was scrambling for revenue to fight the war against
Napoleon, he proposed a "property tax" that was, in fact, an income tax. It was adopted in 1806. It
relied heavily on "stoppage" (withholding at the source), but there were many difficulties in compliance
in that era when the few written records were considered strictly confidential. One device was to
establish committees of men in the same occupation and city who were charged with estimating the
income for each of their competitors. The British tax was so thoroughly reviled, especially for its highly
intrusive implementation, that when the wars ended and the budget stabilized in 1816 the tax was
abolished and Parliament voted to destroy all of the records, as had been done with the income tax of
1404. Despite the public bonfire of destruction, the income tax administrator secretly retained a
duplicate set (Adams, p.347).
4
�In 1842 Prime Minister Robert Peel persuaded Parliament to reinstate the income tax
temporarily until the budget was in balance. It never was repealed, nor was the initial 3% flat rate
maintained (Seligman, p. 132; Adams, p. 349). The top rate on earned income peaked at 83% before
1979, with a surcharge of 15% on investment income above 7,100 pounds (Pechman, p.298). The U.S.
had a top rate in excess of 90% in the 1950s. So much for the assertions of Seligman, the great
champion of the income tax for the U.S., that, "…the moderate rate [less than or equal to 6%] has been
an important factor in the success of the income tax [in Great Britain]"(p. 216) and, with respect to Italy,
"Obviously an income tax running up to twenty per cent, to which all manner of other kinds of local
taxes are to be added, would indeed be unendurable if enforced to the hilt" (p. 353).
The U.S. adopted an income tax to finance the Civil War in 1863. The rate was 3% on income
exceeding $600 with a 5% rate above $10,000. Soon, the 5% rate was raised to 10%. The tax expired in
1872 when the revenue was no longer needed (Seligman, p. 437). Still, pressure was building for a
permanent income tax. Enormous accumulations of wealth during the rapid growth of the post-civil war
boom stirred the ire of reformers. Moreover, Lough (2013) stresses the growth of the free trade
movement. If the tariffs that had traditionally supported the government, and aided northern
manufacturers, were reduced, some substitute tax was necessary. Not least, the Progressive
Movement, with its enthusiasm for direct government action and control of individual behavior,
contributed to the pressure. An Income tax was passed in 1894 but declared unconstitutional. When
the 16th Amendment was ratified in 1913, that obstacle was removed and the income tax soon followed
because "wealth is escaping its due share of taxation" (Seligman, p.675). The rates were graduated,
with a tax of 1% of the first taxable $20,000 and then increasing by 1% steps to 7% over $500,000
(equivalent to $11.7 million today). When Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., opined in 1904 that "taxes
are what we pay for a civilized society" he was living in a world of 1% tax rates. Is a 40% rate 40 times as
civilized?
The progressive rates of the new law were immediately challenged in court as a denial of
"equality," but the Supreme Court allowed the law to stand. This was a significant change because legal
theory and popular opinion had long supported the idea that taxing everyone an equal proportion of
income (the Biblical "tithe" or 10%) was the just way to share the cost of government. In order to
understand the sudden prominence of progressive taxation, it is necessary to look at what the economic
theorists had been writing.
Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations provides a compendium of the best economic thinking circa
1776. His four Maxims of Taxation are frequently cited:
"I. The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as
possible, in proportion to their respective abilities; that is, in proportion to the revenue which they
respectively enjoy under the protection of the state."
"II. The tax which each individual is bound to pay ought to be certain, and not arbitrary."
"III. Every tax ought to be levied at the time, or in the manner, in which it is most likely to be convenient
for the contributor to pay it."
5
�"IV. Every tax ought to be so contrived as both to take out and to keep out of the pockets of the people
as little as possible, over and above what it brings into the public treasury of the state."
(summarized from book V, chapter II, Part II, pp. 777-779)
Smith's advice and discussion have held up remarkably well for more than two centuries, but
note that in Maxim I he slurred over the distinction between taxes as a price for the benefits received
from government by the taxpayer (the benefit principle) and taxes as a measure of the ability of the
individual to pay or the sacrifice that is inflicted on the taxpayer (ability-to-pay principle). He papers
over the distinction by assuming that both approaches point to taxes proportional to income, although
in other passages Smith suggests that additional taxes on luxury goods are acceptable because they fall
only on the rich for goods they need only to display their status. A great deal of public finance literature
since Wicksell (1896) has dealt with the benefit principle. Presumably, it is fair, and certainly efficient, to
charge for services that can be directly or indirectly priced; e.g., charge tolls on limited access highways
and finance construction of roads with a gasoline tax. After exhausting the cases where fees for service
are technically feasible and politically acceptable, however, governments usually have a lot of bills to
pay (e.g., the military budget and other aspects of foreign affairs, interest on the debt). This is where
"ability to pay" usually becomes the standard.
Instead of making the tax strictly proportional to income, the amount of income necessary for
subsistence could be exempted, with a flat rate above that. This is sometimes called a digressive tax.
For example, you pay 0% on the first $20,000 and 25% on everything above that. The marginal rate is
25% for everyone above the exemption level, but the average rate never quite gets to 25% although it
approaches it for the very rich. [This is the concept underlying the "Flat Tax" advocated by Hall and
Rabushka (1983).] Even this modest departure from strict proportionality raised warnings from those
who forecast class warfare over the amount to be exempted.
The strong support for progressive taxes in the economic mainstream originates in two
separate, but highly interrelated, developments in economic theory during the century following the
publication of the Wealth of Nations. The first of these is "utilitarianism" and the second is the
dominance of marginal analysis. Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) coined the "utilitarian" term and
adopted the slogan, "the Greatest Happiness of the Greatest Number." Bentham was a lawyer, but
wrote voluminously in many fields including the design of legislation. His work influenced economics
directly through writings and also through his sometime coauthor, economist James Mill (1773-1836)
and participation in the education of John Stuart Mill (1806-1873), son of James. While the slogan
suggests a mathematically impossible double maximization, it does convey the sentiment that has
motivated much of the subsequent analysis of taxation and public expenditures, including modern
cost/benefit analysis.
Although he did not use the modern words, Bentham wrote his utilitarian analyses under the
assumption that the marginal utility of income is declining (see Robbins. 1965, p.62). This view starts
with the plausible proposition that a dollar more or less makes a lot less difference to the rich person
than does a dollar more or less to the person who has very few dollars. The extra dollar that allows the
6
�beggar to buy a crust of bread increases his welfare (or happiness or utility) more than a decrease of a
dollar would decrease the utility of Warren Buffet. Decreasing marginal utility is usually assumed in
economics for most ordinary goods and services. You may value one bag of carrots or professional
tooth-cleaning, but the second one that month is worth less to you and the third even less than that.
But is that true for income in general?
Most economists ceased to ask that question after the "Marginal Revolution" of 1870. At about
the same moment, William Stanley Jevons (1835-1882), writing in English, Leon Walras (1834-1910),
writing in French, and Carl Menger (1840-1921), writing in German, adopted a form of analysis that a
cynic described as "the reinvention of a crude form of differential calculus a couple of centuries after
Newton and Leibniz." Nevertheless, this "marginal analysis" soon came to dominate economics and
made the concept of decreasing marginal utility of income almost automatic for economists. If we
assume that successive units of income have less value, and we assume that everyone is equal with
respect to capacity to enjoy income, then the tax implications can be quite dramatic.
If the objective is to collect the required tax revenue while imposing the minimum total sacrifice
on society, the appropriate tax is zero up to a certain point and then 100% after that. That is, depending
on the revenue requirements, the government would set one annual income, for example, $100,000. If
you have less than that, you pay no tax. Anything you earn above that is sent directly to the Treasury.
Of course, most people realized that this was not going to work well—at least not for long. A few
extreme socialists and utopians wanted to believe in it, and even such a clever economic theorist as
Edgeworth (1897) had difficulty in abandoning the spirit of it. Indeed, if one accepts the goal not just of
minimizing the sacrifice of taxation, but of maximizing the utility of society, why would you not advocate
continuing the leveling by transferring money from rich to poor until everyone had the same income?
A clever socialist, George Bernard Shaw (1928, p.470) put it this way: "Socialism means equality
of income or nothing, and that under Socialism you would not be allowed to be poor. You would be
forcibly fed, clothed, lodged, taught, and employed whether you liked it or not. If it were discovered
that you had not character and industry enough to be worth all this trouble, you might possibly be
executed in a kindly manner; but whilst you were permitted to live you would have to live well."
Faced with this logic, most economists retreated slightly to the goal, not of maximum utility or
minimum sacrifice, but rather to the notion that everyone should endure the same proportional
sacrifice of income. Opposition to progressivity was the common position even among the liberal
utilitarians of the 19th century (Hutchison, 52). The opposition was based in part on the fear that
progressivity would diminish incentives to work and invest and hence hobble the engine of economic
growth that was essential for raising the laboring poor to a more comfortable level. Another factor was
the fear that breaking the rule of proportionality would lead to continuing efforts to shift all tax burdens
to the small minority of the very rich. (Adams, ch. 31). It is interesting that the economists , in general,
were more caught up in the utilitarian notion that the happiness of society would be enhanced by
reducing the burdens on the poor, while the lawyers retained the tradition from history and political
philosophy that, in the absence of firm rules (such as proportional taxation), the problems of "faction"
as discussed by Madison in Federalist 10 would tear the republic apart or turn it into a tyranny.
7
�But John Stuart Mill, who had grown up with utilitarianism, added this caution: "For what reason ought
equality to be the rule in matters of taxation? For the reason that it ought to be so in all affairs of
government. A government ought to make no distinction of persons or classes in the strength of their
claims on it. If any one bears less than his fair share of the burden, some other person must suffer more
than his share. Equality of taxation, therefore, as a maxim of politics, means equality of sacrifice." (Book
V, Ch.I, section 2, p. 539). Despite the emphasis on sacrifice, "To tax the larger incomes at a higher
percentage than the smaller is to lay a tax on industry and economy; to impose a penalty on people for
having worked harder and saved more than their neighbors. It is not the fortunes which are earned, but
those which are unearned, that it is for the public good to place under limitation." (pp.541-542) .
Moreover, the income tax relies on self-reporting of income and, thus, "…is, in practice, unequal in one
of the worst ways, falling heaviest on the most conscientious." (p. 556). Mill's comments provide a hint
of the way out of the morass, but before we follow that trail, let us dig ourselves in deeper.
If one accepts the view that the marginal utility of income is diminishing, and one accepts the
goal that everyone should sacrifice an equal proportion of his total utility to pay for government, then it
is easy to see that rich people should pay more dollars in taxes than should poor people. Does that
require a progressive tax on income? It is easy to lapse into that conclusion, but it is incorrect, as was
demonstrated cogently by Cohen-Stewart in 1889. [Also see Blum & Kalven. 1953]. Briefly, if the loss of
a dollar is as painful to a rich man as to a poor, then equal sacrifice would call for equal dollar taxation.
That is, a lump sum tax or a head tax—each person must pay a tax of, e.g., $1,000/year. That is the
extreme of regressivity, unless one considers extremely decadent societies such as the strange world of
pre-revolutionary France where, "One will hardly believe that in order to become noble it is sufficient to
become rich; and to cease to pay taxes it is sufficient to become a noble. So there is only one way of
escaping taxation and that is to make a fortune." [Pierre-Samuel Du Pont de Nemours, as quoted in
Adams, p.218].
How quickly would the marginal utility of income have to decrease before equal sacrifice
resulted in proportional taxation? The answer seems to be that proportional taxation is appropriate if,
and only it, the marginal utility of income curve is a rectangular hyperbola! [See Musgrave, 1959, pp.
98-102] That is a wonderfully precise answer, but none of the assumptions can be observed to be met.
We have no way to observe utility, let alone the shape of the marginal utility curve. Moreover, does
anyone believe that the relationship between income and happiness is the same for everyone, or even
for anyone throughout a lifetime? And we have not even inquired about the relationship between the
happiness of one person and what he observes of his neighbors. In particular, if Mr. Smith is altruistic,
deriving pleasure from observing that Mr. Knight is wealthy, and Mr. Knight is envious, deriving pleasure
from the poverty of his neighbors, the way to improve the total happiness of society is to tax the altruist
Smith and give the money to the mean-spirited Knight. Most of us would probably not vote for such a
tax, even if it could be designed and administered.
Yet, the prevailing economic definition of fairness leans on such weak reeds. In the modern
public finance literature, fairness (and, perhaps, efficiency), depends on horizontal equity and vertical
equity. Vertical equity depends on the degree of progressivity, as discussed above. Horizontal equity
requires that "equals be treated equally," but, equals in respect to what? Academic tax specialists and
8
�reformers in the U.S. have usually begun with a bias toward a comprehensive definition of income as
developed by Henry Simons (1950) and others. This amounts to whatever the person consumed during
the year plus the net increase in wealth. Thus, it is the power to consume without decreasing wealth. In
the purest form, consumption plus the net amount added to the accounts would be taxable income.
That includes, for example, wages, interest, dividends, capital gains, rents (including the rent that an
owner occupier could have received from his own house), gifts (of cash, securities, goods, and services).
It would not matter where the power to consume came from or how it was used. The British debate,
however, often favored the notion that wage and salary income should be discounted 25% relative to
investment income because wages and salaries end when the recipient dies or loses his job. It is
interesting that Andrew Mellon (1934, pp. 56-57), wealthy investor, Secretary of Treasury for Harding
and Coolidge, and considered an arch conservative, stated, "The fairness of taxing more lightly incomes
from wages, salaries and professional services than the income from business or from investments is
beyond question."
The actual tax law, of course, is a jumble of special treatment of particular sources and uses of
income. Ownership of real estate is heavily favored, as is any investment that generates capital gains.
Similarly on the uses side, medical expenses, gifts to charities, child care expenses, historic preservation,
energy conservation, electric cars, and saving for education and retirement are among the favored
expenditures. Which is fairer, the comprehensive definition or the tax law definition? Each exception to
the comprehensive base for particular sources or uses of income is defended in the name of "fairness"
by its beneficiaries. It matters because it is (roughly) taxable income, rather than comprehensive
income, that determines who is treated as an equal of whom.
In recent years an effort has emerged to consider consumption, rather than income, as the tax
base and, thus, the fair basis for defining equality. The classical reasoning for this is that consumption
measures what a person uses up from the product of the economy, whereas income should be a better
measure of what he produces. John Stuart Mill arrived at consumption as the preferred tax base by an
alternate route. In his view, the lower tax on earned income would allow the wage earner to
accumulate savings for the years when his earning capacity had diminished. The modern pressure for
consumption taxation is driven in part by belief that saving and investment should be encouraged.
Some versions of consumption taxation also promise less intrusive administration (Zodrow and
Mieszkowski, 2002).
Some of these problems seemed remote prior to 1930 when the federal government took less
than 5% of GDP, but with total government spending now exceeding one-third of GDP, including massive
redistribution, the warnings about control of a dominant faction to prevent exploitation of the rest of
society become more pertinent. In the modern era, economists have continued to analyze the effects
of taxation on incentives to earn income and balance these against changes in social utility, defined in
some unmeasurable way. The philosopher Rawls (1971) added the twist of assuming that only the
income of the person with the lowest income needed to be a concern of public policy. But economists
and philosophers of the Rawlsian type do not stop to consider the Madisonian question of what will
happen to a tax bill of the most sophisticated design when it is submitted to Congress. Nor do they
9
�consider the possibility that the sovereign is a revenue maximizing entity at war with his subjects; i.e., a
stationary bandit.
Because of the impossibility of defining a "fair" tax, it is worthwhile searching for a different
approach. The comment by Mill, "It is not the fortunes that are earned, but the fortunes that are
unearned..." provides the starting point. Of course, an income tax becomes totally arbitrary and
capricious if the IRS agent has to review your return to judge each receipt for its "worthy earnedness."
Spare us that intrusion! In fact, it is possible to make a distinction between earned and unearned if we
are willing to give up the idea of taxing the individual on his income and turn, instead, to a tax levied on
the source of the unearned income. This does require giving up progressivity as it is usually defined
because the concept applies only to people.
The specific alternative to consider is the land value tax (LVT) as developed with great vigor and
insight by Henry George in his best-selling book, Progress and Poverty (1879). LVT had antecedents in
both practice and theory, including the Physiocrats, Smith, Ricardo, and Mill, but George and those
inspired by George have worked out the details most fully. To put the matter in its simplest form, the
LVT would replace other taxes with a single levy on the market value of the land that each person claims
title to. Thus, the mechanics are similar to the existing real estate tax used by most local governments
and school districts in the U.S. The difference is that the tax would apply only to the value of the land.
All buildings and other improvements would be exempt.
The market value of land reflects the income you could receive just from holding title to the
land. Thus, if you happened to inherit a block of vacant land in the middle of Manhattan, or any other
thriving city, you could easily lease it to a developer who would do the work of arranging for a building
to be built and rented out and managed. The developer would be compensated for his work, but you
could just sit back and enjoy the lease payments. Those payments would be described by an economist
as "economic rent." The proposed LVT would be designed to take a substantial portion (e.g., 90%) of the
economic rent, but it would be levied as a percentage of the market price of the land, so that you could
not avoid it by leaving the land idle. You would have a strong incentive to put the land to work at the
optimum moment.
If you think of imposing a LVT today while dropping all other taxes it may seem unfair to those
who have just invested their hard-earned savings into a piece of land. That is the transition problem
that arises with any change in the tax law—there are winners and losers, and sometimes special
transition rules can be adopted to ease the pain. Most parcels of land in the city already have buildings
on them, so the taxpayer would save by eliminating the building tax while paying more for the land. The
most important point is that the LVT would, over time, make the whole economy, especially the cities,
function more efficiently.
The LVT is easier to justify if we think of starting with a blank slate, before anyone has laid claim
to land. The words of John Locke are the starting point for the analysis of property by many in the
classical liberal tradition:
10
�26. God, who has given the world to men in common, has also given them reason to
make use of it to the best advantage of life and convenience. The earth and all that is therein is
given to men for the support and comfort of their being. And though all the fruits it naturally
produces and beasts it feeds belong to mankind in common, as they are produced by the
spontaneous hand of nature; and nobody has originally a private dominion exclusive of the rest
of mankind in any of them, as they are thus in their natural state; yet, being given for the use of
men, there must of necessity be a means to appropriate them some way or other before they
can be of any use or at all beneficial to any particular man. The fruit or venison which nourishes
the wild Indian, who knows no enclosure and is still a tenant in common, must be his, and so his,
i.e., a part of him, that another can no longer have any right to it before it can do him any good
for the support of his life.
27. Though the earth and all inferior creatures be common to all men, yet every man
has a property in his own person; this nobody has any right to but himself. The labor of his body
and the work of his hands, we may say, are properly his. Whatsoever then he removes out of
the state that nature has provided and left it in, he has mixed his own labor with, and joined to
it something that is his own, and thereby makes it his property. It being by him removed from
the common state nature has placed it in, it has by this labor something annexed to it that
excludes the common right of other men. For this labor being the unquestionable property of
the laborer, no man but he can have a right to what that is once joined to, at least where there
is enough and as good left in common for others. (John Locke. 1690. The Second Treatise of
Government).
This analysis has a powerful appeal for the situation where land is a free good. Locke, himself,
noted that significant restriction in the famous closing phrase of the quote, “where there is enough and
as good left in common for others.” Although Locke tried to make the case that the world had enough
good unclaimed land that men might enclose and homestead, few would try to argue that proposition
today.
When land of a particular quality is no longer a free good, unregulated markets will readily
generate annual rental rates for particular parcels, and those annual rents can readily be capitalized into
sales prices for parcels that change hands and appraised values for parcels that do not. Land rents, like
other prices, can serve to allocate inputs to their most productive uses. The rents are an opportunity
cost that must be paid by the user of the land if the economy is to operate efficiently. But who should
receive that rent? Henry George argued that the rent should belong to society because it either
measures the natural advantage of a parcel; e.g., superior fertility of soil or location on a natural trade
route, or the efforts of other people; e.g., highways, ports, and other public infrastructure, the activities
of neighbors that attract business to your block, and the growth of population of the community.
The opposition to LVT often cites the unfairness of taking nearly all the rent, and hence, nearly
all the value, of property in land. Most holders of land today have acquired it in legal and morally
11
�defensible ways. That is correct and is a serious concern, but there are two sets of counterarguments.
Georgists often claim that even a fully legal land title still leaves the buyer of land as the holder of stolen
property. After all, British titles date to a roving bandit, "a French bastard landing with an armed
banditti," as Thomas Paine (1776, p.16) so gently expressed it. U.S. titles generally date to a grant by a
European monarch of land that belonged to someone else. Even in the rare case when a title does not
originate in "force or fraud," --even if it originates in Locke's enclosure from the state of nature—why
should that historical accident contribute to the inequality of fortunes today?
The set of arguments that I find more convincing, however, relate to the comparison of the LVT
with nearly all other feasible taxes. If the LVT is theft, it is a one-time problem. The income tax robs
people every year of the fruit of their labors. When this moral case is combined with the efficiency and
privacy advantages of the LVT, the case, to me, seems overwhelming. So, rather than arguing about
fairness or justice in taxation, let's shift the focus toward the one tax base that has a well-defined
market value based on opportunity cost; i.e., what the market determines to be the rent of the land.
The focus can then shift away from the utilitarian pseudo-science of minimizing unobservable
"sacrifices" and maximizing unseen "utilities" or pretending that we can say anything about the
"fairness" of taking from one person to give to another.
To quote Frank Chowderov (1946, p.267), "Taxation is highwaymanry made respectable by
custom, thievery made moral by law," while the LVT just allows the community to reclaim the value that
it has produced.
References
Adams, Charles. 1993. For Good and Evil: The Impact of Taxes on the Course of Civilization. Lanham,
Maryland: Madison Books.
Alfani, Guido, and Roberta Frigeni. 2013. "Inequality (un)perceived: The emergence of a discourse on
economic inequality from the Middle Ages to the Age of Revolutions." Dondena Working Papers,
No. 58. Milan: Carlo F. Dondena Centre for Research on Social Dynamics, Univ. Bocconi.
Aristotle. c. 330 B.C. The Ethics of Aristotle, translated by J.A.K. Thomson. London: Penguin Books, 1955.
Backhaus, Juergen, and Richard E. Wagner. 1987. "The Cameralists: A Public Choice Perspective." Public
Choice 53 (No.1): 3-20.
Blum, Walter J., and Harry Kalven, Jr. 1953. The Uneasy Case for Progressive Taxation. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Buchan, James. 2003. Crowded with Genius; The Scottish Enlightenment: Edinburgh's Moment of the
Mind. New York: HarperCollins.
12
�Chodorov, Frank. 1946. "Socialism via Taxation." In Fugitive Essays: Selected Writings of Frank Chodorov.
Compiled, Edited, and with an Introduction by Charles H. Hamilton. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund,
1980.
Cohen-Stuart, Arnold Jacob. 1889. "On Progressive Taxation." Musgrave and Peacock, pp.48-71.
Edgeworth, Francis Ysidro. 1897. "The Pure Theory of Taxation." Musgrave and Peacock, pp.119-136.
George, Henry. 1879. Progress and Poverty: An Inquiry into the Cause of Industrial Depressions and of
Increase of Want with Increase of Wealth. The Remedy. Garden City, NY: twenty-fifth
anniversary edition, Doubleday, Page & Company, 1911.
Hall, Robert E. and Alvin Rabushka. 1983. Low Tax, Simple Tax, Flat Tax. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1983.
Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. 1904. Compania de Tabacos v. Collector, 275 U.S.87, 100.
Hutchison, T.W. 1953. A Review of Economic Doctrines, 1870-1929. Oxford: The University Press, 1962.
Locke, John. 1690. The Second Treatise of Government. New York: The Liberal Arts Press, 1952.
Lough, Alexandra Wagner. 2013. "The Federal Income Tax and the Georgist Movement." Pittsburgh:
Lecture presented to the meeting of the Council of Georgist Organizations, August 8, 2013.
Mellon, Andrew W. 1934. Taxation: The People's Business. New York: Macmillan Company.
Mill, John Stuart. 1848. Principles of Political Economy. Abridged by J. Laurence Laughlin. New York: D.
Appleton and Company, 1884.
Montesquieu, Baron de. 1748. The Spirit of Laws. Thomas Nugent, trans. New York: The Colonial Press,
rev.ed., 1900.
Musgrave, Richard A. 1959. The Theory of Public Finance. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Musgrave, Richard A. and Alan T. Peacock. 1967. Classics in the Theory of Public Finance. New York: St.
Martin's Press.
Olson, Mancur. 2000. Power and Prosperity: Outgrowing Communist and Capitalist Dictatorships. New
York: Basic Books.
Paine, Thomas. 1776. Common Sense. In Basic Writings of Thomas Paine.New York: Willey Book
Company, 1942.
Pechman, Joseph A. 1987. Comparative Tax Systems: Europe, Canada, and Japan. Arlington, VA: Tax
Analysts.
Plato. c. 380 B.C. The Republic of Plato. Cornford translation. New York: Oxford University Press, 1945.
Rawls, J.A. 1971. A Theory of Justice. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press.
13
�Robbins, Lionel. 1965. The Theory of Economic Policy in English Classical Political Economy. London:
Macmillan & Co.
Seligman, E.R.A. 1914. The Income Tax: A Study of the History, Theory, and Practice of Income Taxation
at Home and Abroad. New York: Macmillan, 2nd ed. 1914.
Shaw, Bernard. 1928. The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism and Capitalism. New York: Brentano's
Publishers.
Simons, Henry C. 1950. Federal Tax Reform. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Smith, Adam. 1776. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. New York: Modern
Library. 1937.
Wicksell, Knut. 1896. "A New Principle of Just Taxation." Musgrave and Peacock, pp.72-118.
Zodrow, George R. and Peter Mieszkowski. 2002. United States Tax Reform in the 21st Century. New
York: Cambridge University Press.
14
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Description
An account of the resource
Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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paper
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14 pages
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Peirce, William Spangar
Title
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Can taxes be fair? : Should they be?
Date
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2013-10-11
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pdf
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Typescript of a lecture delivered on October 11, 2013 by William Peirce as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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St. John's College
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Annapolis, MD
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A signed permission form has been received stating, "I hereby grant St. John's College permission to: Make an audio recording of my lecture, and retain copies for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make an audio recording of my lecture available online. Make a typescript copy of my lecture available for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make a copy of my typescript available online."
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text
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Taxation
Fairness. Economic aspects.
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English
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Bib # 80998
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<p><a title="Audio recording" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/45">Audio recording</a></p>
Friday night lecture
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Description
An account of the resource
Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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00:51:44
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wav
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Creator
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Peirce, William Spangar
Title
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Can taxes be fair? : Should they be?
Date
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2013-10-11
Format
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mp3
Description
An account of the resource
Audio recording of a lecture delivered on October 11, 2013 by William Peirce as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
Publisher
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St. John's College
Coverage
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Annapolis, MD
Rights
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A signed permission form has been received stating, "I hereby grant St. John's College permission to: Make an audio recording of my lecture, and retain copies for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make an audio recording of my lecture available online. Make a typescript copy of my lecture available for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make a copy of my typescript available online."
Type
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sound
Subject
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Taxation
Fairness. Economic aspects.
Language
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English
Identifier
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Bib # 81119
Relation
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<a title="Typescript" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/44">Typescript</a>
Friday night lecture
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Title
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Speeches, presentations, and other lectures
Description
An account of the resource
Speeches, presentations, and other lectures given at St. John's College. These include convocation addresses delivered in both Annapolis, MD and Santa Fe, NM.<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Speeches, presentations, and other lectures" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=15">Items in the Speeches, presentations, and other lectures Collection</a></strong> to <span>view and sort all items in the collection.</span>
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speechespresentationsotherlectures
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CD
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01:33:58
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Peters, Ralph, 1952-
Title
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The price of erasing history
Date
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2013-04-03
Format
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mp3
Description
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Audio recording of a lecture delivered on April 03, 2013 by Ralph Peters as part of the LCDR Erik S. Kristensen Lecture Series.
The lecture is the first in a newly established joint lectures series between St. John's College and the U.S. Naval Academy to honor the memory of Lieutenant Commander Erik S. Kristensen. An alumnus of the United States Naval Academy and the St. John's College Graduate Institute, Kristensen, a Navy SEAL, was killed in the line of duty in Afghanistan in 2005. This lecture series aims to create even greater ties between the two schools, as well as to educate the public about civil-military relations and the place of the liberal arts in education of naval and military professions.
Publisher
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St. John's College
Coverage
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Annapolis, MD
Rights
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A signed permission form has been received stating, "I hereby grant St. John's College permission to: Make an audio recording of my lecture, and retain copies for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make an audio recording of my lecture available online. Make a typescript copy of my lecture available for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make a copy of my typescript available online."
Type
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sound
Language
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English
Identifier
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Bib # 80767
Kristensen lecture series
U.S. Naval Academy
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Description
An account of the resource
Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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St. John's College Greenfield Library
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
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formallectureseriesannapolis
Sound
A resource primarily intended to be heard. Examples include a music playback file format, an audio compact disc, and recorded speech or sounds.
Original Format
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CD
Duration
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01:20:36
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Creator
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Petrich, Louis
Title
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To meet with Macbeth
Date
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2012-04-20
Format
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mp3
Description
An account of the resource
Audio recording of a lecture delivered on April 20, 2012 by Louis Petrich as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
Publisher
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St. John's College
Coverage
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Annapolis, MD
Rights
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A signed permission form has been received stating, "I hereby grant St. John's College permission: To make an audio recording of my lecture, and retain copies for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. To make a typescript copy of my lecture available for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. To make an audio recording of my lecture available on the St. John's College web site."
Type
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sound
Subject
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Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616. Macbeth.
Language
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English
Identifier
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Bib # 79986
Friday night lecture
Tutors
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The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Description
An account of the resource
Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
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St. John's College Greenfield Library
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
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formallectureseriesannapolis
Sound
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Original Format
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CD
Duration
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00:54:41
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Pihas, Gabriel
Title
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Dante's Beatrice: Between Idolatry and Iconoclasm
Date
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2011-12-02
Format
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mp3
Description
An account of the resource
Audio recording of a lecture delivered on December 2, 2011, by Gabriel Pihas as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
Publisher
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St. John's College
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Annapolis, MD
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
A signed permission form has been received stating, "I hereby grant St. John's College permission: To make an audio recording of my lecture, and retain copies for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. To make a typescript copy of my lecture available for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. To make an audio recording of my lecture available on the St. John's College web site."
Type
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sound
Subject
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Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321. Characters. Beatrice Portinari.
Language
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English
Identifier
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Bib # 79702
Friday night lecture
-
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a448a1cc7b01b6ac0d7853cfcfe1beb5
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Description
An account of the resource
Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and for a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>. <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://anchor.fm/greenfieldlibrary" title="Anchor.fm">Anchor.fm</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy84Yzk5MzdhYy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw" title="Google Podcasts">Google Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe.
Contributor
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St. John's College Greenfield Library
Title
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
Identifier
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formallectureseriesannapolis
Sound
A resource primarily intended to be heard. Examples include a music playback file format, an audio compact disc, and recorded speech or sounds.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
CD
Duration
Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.)
00:48:39
Dublin Core
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Creator
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Recco, Gregory, 1967-
Title
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The Soul's Choice of Life
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2012-11-30
Format
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mp3
Description
An account of the resource
Audio recording of a lecture delivered on November 30, 2012, by Greg Recco as part of the Formal Lecture Series. An alternative title for the lecture was "The Conference in the Meadow: The Choice of Life in Plato's Myth of Er."
Publisher
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St. John's College
Coverage
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Annapolis, MD
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Plato. Republic. Book 10, lines 614-621
Friday night lecture
Tutors
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The Soul’s Choice of Life
Most dreams are forgotten, perhaps even before the night has passed. Others obtrude into
daytime thought, even as their meaning remains obscure. They haunt us, and seem to promise a
rare and precious revelation. Their coming insistently to mind implies a faint undertone of
reproach, like hearing your name repeated on waking, before you are quite sure who you are.
Such dreams seem to call from afar, and from where we stand, they can only seem alien. But we
also suspect that we are the ones who are out of place, and that the dream is calling us back from
our wandering. In this recollection of the unfamiliar, we sense dimly that we are tied to what is
familiar by only a specious kinship and that our true home lies elsewhere.
This sort of strange appeal that calls us back from estrangement can characterize not only
dreams or visions, but also deliberately produced works of art such as poems, paintings, and
stories. In refusing to make any ordinary sort of sense, they refute our understanding and invite
us to speak along with them in something like a foreign tongue. The dialogues of Plato, in
particular, contain many examples of images or tales of this sort, beguiling works of imagination.
For those of us who read and talk together about Plato with some frequency, such tales or images
have become part of the vocabulary of our thought—perhaps even a large part, just as loanwords can come to outnumber a language’s own stock of true-born names. Reflecting briefly on
a familiar one—the image of the cave in the Republic—will show something of how this process
works and what it has to accomplish. Socrates has his interlocutor Glaucon imagine a cave in
which people are chained in such a way as to see only the cave wall before them, on which
shadows are projected by a fire above and behind them. Glaucon exclaims that these are “strange
prisoners” (515a). “Like us,” Socrates replies. But then something odd happens. At the very
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�moment when we might expect Socrates to offer the key by which to decipher these unfamiliar
letters, he instead continues to speak in the language of the image. The prisoners are “like us,” he
says, “for do you suppose such men would have seen anything of themselves or one another
other than the shadows cast by the fire on the wall facing them?” Now, this is not so strange a
move as to pose an impossible task of interpretation, especially to someone who has thought
about the image for some time. We might start with the idea that our ordinary efforts to know are
wrongly oriented and thus largely unsuccessful, and from there move on to the idea that this
concerns not only our attempts to know the world but even our self-knowledge and knowledge of
others. That sounds about right. But we should try to imagine what Socrates’ reply would sound
like to someone who had never heard the rest or had the time to think about it, someone who
does not know where he is going. To this person, Socrates’ response must seem pretty nearly the
opposite of the explanation that Glaucon’s remark implicitly requested. After hearing it,
Glaucon would probably still say that the prisoners are strange, perhaps as a sort of polite way of
saying that the man telling him about the prisoners is strange, and it would be hard to disagree.
But whether or not Glaucon meant his remark as a reproach, and however strange
Socrates’ speech is, its strangeness does not stem from some madness of his, some disordered
state of his powers of thought or imagination. What is truly strange here is not the image to
which he gives voice, but the situation it is intended to portray, namely, the fact that creatures
destined for knowledge should spend their lives so unaware of and so unwittingly cooperative
with the powerful impediments to knowing that characterize their situation. The proper way to
hear Socrates’ response to Glaucon’s remark about the prisoners’ strangeness is thus
affirmatively—not “the prisoners are not strange; they are like us,” but, “they are like us,
strange.” And his explanation is an explanation not of the prisoners’ likeness to us but of their
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�strangeness; again, “do you suppose such men,” those described in the image, “would have seen
anything of themselves or of each other than the shadows?” Given what Socrates is trying to
accomplish, deflecting the question of likeness and going farther into the image may be the only
way to make it work. The image presents important features of our epistemic situation that are
normally difficult to discern, but that we can come to perceive if we take up an initially
unfamiliar and awkward perspective, make it our own, and then turn this view back on what had
previously gone unquestioned. In order to know, we must learn to speak strangely.
With a few small though significant differences, this kind of change in understanding is
what is aimed at by the final pages of the Republic, the so-called Myth of Er (614b-621b). It, too,
is a fantastical story that represents in figurative form an important but overlooked dimension of
our actual situation. Its fantastical character is not a product of wild genius, but arises from
Plato’s rigorous attention to both the nature of human freedom and the difficulty of discerning
this nature from within our ordinary perspective.
In the case of the cave image our learned familiarity with it makes it relatively easy to put
a name to what it is about; unlike Glaucon, we have read the Republic. And we get some more
help from the fact that Socrates tells us outright what the image is meant to be an image of.
“Make an image,” he says, “of our nature in its education and want of education” (514a). The
Myth of Er, by contrast, is not presented as an image of anything at all. It is ostensibly the report
of a man who returned from the dead to tell of what awaits souls after life. Socrates presents it as
the completion of the dialogue’s investigation of justice, inasmuch as it gives an account of the
good and bad that come from being just or unjust not in this life, but after death.
In this connection, the story is a fitting end for the dialogue, in that it recapitulates a
theme first sounded very near the beginning. Cephalus reports that as a young man he scoffed at
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�the stories of punishment in the afterlife, but that old age has found him and his age-mates more
fearful of what is to come. They are looking back over lives that contain perhaps no small
measure of wrongdoing. Cephalus is thankful for his wealth, above all for the ability it gives him
to conduct the costly private rituals of expiation that his fear has made seem prudent. Socrates’
return to this theme at the end of the dialogue, then, seems to endorse Cephalus’ anxious piety, at
least in confirming that there is something to fear for those who have done wrong. But the story
contains much more than is necessary for this purpose and for that reason demands
interpretation. Also, it is just very strange. Even with some degree of paraphrase, it will take a
few minutes to recount it. So, here it is.
Upon his death, the soul of Er traveled along with other souls of the dead and came to a
place where there were two openings in the earth and two in the sky, above and across from
them. Between the pairs of openings sat judges, who directed the just to continue to the right and
upward through the opening in the sky, and the unjust to go to the left and downward into the
earth. Er himself they instructed to remain, observe, and report what he saw on his return to the
world of the living. What he saw first was this: as some souls were going into the two openings
indicated by the judges, other souls were coming out of the others, some up from earth, others
down from the heavens. All those who had returned went off with delight to a nearby meadow,
where they made camp and engaged in conversation. Those who had known each other in life
greeted each other and asked what it was like in the other place. So they all told their stories,
some lamenting and crying as they recalled all they had seen and undergone in the thousand-year
journey beneath the earth, the others telling of the beauty of the sights and experiences above. In
general, those who came from below the earth said they had received a tenfold punishment for
each of their acts of injustice, once each hundred years, on the grounds that a human life was
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�about a hundred years long. For acts of impiety towards the gods, the penalty was yet worse. Of
one particularly terrible tyrant named Ardiaeus it was related that when it was his turn to go up,
he and other perpetrators of unholy deeds were rejected by the opening. Men standing nearby
seized them, then bound them, flayed them, and dragged them along the rough ground in the
sight of the others, and finally cast them into the pit of Tartarus, from which none return. Fear of
being rejected by the opening was thus the last of the punishments for souls who had lived an
unjust life. The rewards for justice were said to be the counterparts of these.
On the eighth day, the souls who had returned were made to leave the meadow and
continue their journey. In four days’ time, they came to a place from which they could see a sort
of pillar of light stretched from above through all of heaven and earth, like a rainbow. This light
was said to bind the earth and the heavens and be connected to a complex, interlocking
arrangement of whorls forming a sort of spindle, said to be that of goddess Ananke or Necessity.
Her daughters, the Fates Atropos, Clotho, and Lachesis, put their hands to the turning of these
otherworldly whorls and were associated with the three dimensions of time: Atropos who cannot
be turned with the future, Clotho the weaver with the present, and Lachesis the dispenser of lots
with the past.
The souls were then brought before Lachesis. Her spokesman gathered up the lots and
patterns of lives that lay in her lap, and then delivered the goddess’ message to the souls arrayed
before him. He said: “This is the speech of Ananke’s maiden daughter, Lachesis: ‘Ephemeral
souls, this is the beginning of another death-bringing cycle for the mortal race. A spirit shall not
be allotted to you, but you shall choose a spirit. Let the holder of the first lot make the first
choice of a life to which it shall be bound by Ananke. Virtue is without a master; as each honors
her, it shall have more or less of her. The blame belongs to the chooser; the god is blameless.’”
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�Then the lots were distributed to the souls and the patterns of lives were laid out on the
ground before them, lives of all sorts—lives of animals and tyrants, lives of the famous and the
unregarded—and these lives far outnumbered the souls present.
The spokesman continued: “Even for the one who comes forward last, if he chooses
intelligently and lives earnestly, a life to be happy with has been laid out, and not a bad one. Let
the first not be careless in his choice, nor the last disheartened.”
Since the soul’s choice of life is my theme, let me read without paraphrase the section
that follows, which deals most directly with that choice.
“And the first to choose came forward and immediately chose the greatest tyranny, and,
because of folly and gluttony, chose without having considered everything adequately; and it
escaped his notice that eating his own children and other evils were fated to be a part of that life.
When he considered it at his leisure, he beat his breast and lamented the choice, not abiding by
the spokesman’s forewarning. For he didn’t blame himself for the evils but chance, demons, and
anything rather than himself. He was one of those who had come from heaven, having lived
under an orderly constitution in his former life, partaking of virtue by habit, without philosophy.
And, it may be said, not the least number of those who were caught in such circumstances came
from heaven, because they were unpracticed in labors. But most of those who came from the
earth, because they themselves had labored and had seen the labors of others, weren’t in a rush to
make their choices. For just this reason, and because of the chance of the lot, there was an
exchange of evils and goods for most of the souls.”
“He said that this was a sight surely worth seeing: how each of the several souls chose a
life. For it was pitiable, laughable, and wonderful to see. For the most part the choice was made
according to the habit of their former life. He said he saw a soul that once belonged to Orpheus
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�choosing the life of a swan, out of hatred for womankind; because he died at their hands, he
refused to be generated in and born of a woman. He saw Thamyras’ soul choosing the life of a
nightingale. And he also saw a swan changing to the choice of a human life; other musical
animals did the same thing. The soul that got the twentieth lot chose the life of a lion; it was the
soul of Telamonian Ajax, which shunned becoming a human being, for it remembered the
judgment of arms. And after it was the soul of Agamemnon; it too hated humankind as a result of
its sufferings and therefore changed to the life of an eagle. Atalanta’s soul had drawn one of the
middle lots; it saw the great honors of an athletic man and couldn’t pass them by but took them.
After this he saw that of Epieius, son of Panopeus, going into the nature of an artisan woman.
And far out among the last he saw the soul of the buffoon Thersites, clothing itself as an ape.
And by chance the soul of Odysseus had drawn the last lot of all and went to choose; from
memory of its former labors, it had recovered from love of honor; it went around for a long time
looking for the life of a private man who minds his own business; and with effort it found one
lying somewhere, neglected by the others. It said when it saw this life that it would have done the
same even if it had drawn the first lot, and was delighted to choose it. And from the other beasts,
similarly some went into human lives and into one another—the unjust changing into savage
ones, the just into tame ones, and there were all kinds of mixtures.”
So far the report of Er. Socrates interrupts the tale just once, to emphasize the supreme
importance of this choice of a life and to point out that we really ought to devote all our energies
to acquiring the art of making this choice well. His way of talking about what would make for a
good choice is very interesting, and I will return to it near the end of my talk. But for now, let us
reflect on the many ways in which the story gives the attentive reader pause and does not simply
7
�supplement the dialogue’s account of justice and its effect on souls. The story, it must be said,
does not do just what it was said to do.
In the first place, it is worth reflecting on how extravagant the whole section on souls’
choice of life is. The account was introduced and admitted on the pretext that it would
supplement the dialogue’s account of the power that justice has in the soul without the assistance
of reputation or other external benefits. Like other such familiar tales, it accomplishes this by
adding to whatever uncertain external benefits justice and injustice might win in life and among
humans, a certain and unerring exactitude in punishment and reward from the gods in a sort of
life after life. So, one might reasonably inquire how this purpose is advanced at all by the
elaborate account of the spindle of Necessity or the whole idea of souls choosing their next life,
not to mention the many examples of particular choices made by souls famous and unknown. At
most, one might argue that the fact that the lives for which the souls are being rewarded or
punished were of their own choosing underscores souls’ responsibility for their own justice or
injustice and thus shows that the rewards and punishments are deserved. Even according to this
explanation, however, the wealth of detail concerning particular souls’ choices as well as the
cosmic backdrop would be only so much ornament.
More significant than this reason for taking the Myth of Er as a figure for something
other than what it is said to be is the fact that the rewards and punishments are at best ineffectual
if not entirely impossible.
That the rewards for a just life are ineffectual we learn from the example of the soul that
draws the first lot and chooses its next life first. It had come from heaven, and apparently a
thousand years’ worth of beautiful sights and enjoyment was not enough to persuade it of
anything but its own fitness to be the biggest tyrant of all. Although it was happy enough to reach
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�immediately for this life, it was also particularly resistant to taking responsibility for its own
choice when it became clear that the life contained many evils. This kind of remorse over bad
choices, Socrates’ summary indicates, was not uncommon among those who came down from
the heavens.
What of the others? Those who had toiled and suffered below the earth and had seen the
toils and suffering of others were said to chose more carefully, and thus on the whole, we are
told, there was an exchange of goods and evils for most souls. This might lead one to the
conclusion that while the rewards do not promote the choice of justice, the punishments do.
But several things undercut this confidence we might have in the efficacy of posthumous
punishments: in particular, the fate of the incurable or unholy, the complete forgetfulness of the
living, and above all the impossibility of adequately representing injustice to the unjust
perspective. As for the first, there are those like Ardiaeus, for whose crimes, it seems, no finite
punishment could be adquate, on the grounds that his soul was incurable, and possibly also
because of the enormity of his crimes, which transcend the horizon of justice altogether, being
not only unjust but also unholy.
A second problem with the notion that the punishments of the afterlife are effective in
curbing injustice lies in the fact that souls are made to drink from the river of Carelessness on the
plain of Forgetfulness before continuing into the life they have chosen, and as a result, forget
everything. Those who have chosen a just life, being the majority of those who completed the
underground passage, will go through it and then join those who make the heavenly passage.
Now having forgotten their former labors, they are likely to choose hastily and with misplaced
confidence in their ability to discern what is a good life. Interestingly, this “exchange of goods
and evils” for most souls was already inscribed, so to speak, in the topography of the place of
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�judgment: the opening that leads out of heaven is located above and opposite the one that leads
into the earth, as the one that leads out of the earth lies below and opposite the opening that leads
back into heaven. Forgetfulness and carelessness seem to guarantee that there will be a
revolution not only of whorls, but also of souls. But forgetfulness and carelessness are not
magical effects brought about by the eponymous plain and river. If punishment is the engine
driving the motion of souls upwards and towards justice, then the beatiful sights and enjoyment
found in the heavenly passage do no less to drive them down, towards injustice. The image is
precisely not that of a world-order that uses rewards and punishments to produce justice with
mechanical accuracy and inevitability, but of one that strongly inclines souls towards an eternal
and predictable alternation of good and bad. Why should this be the purpose of the cosmos?
A third problem with the account is that it is difficult to see what the souls must be in
order for their passage to be able to teach them anything. This difficulty is thrown into relief by a
significant omission. Of the souls returning from beneath the earth, Socrates says: “They were
punished for each injustice once every hundred years; taking this as the length of a human life,
they could in this way pay off the penalty for the injustice ten times over. Thus, for example, if
some men were causes of the death of many, either by betraying cities or armies and had reduced
men to slavery, or were involved in any other wrongdoing,” and here I interrupt to note that just
where one might hope to learn precisely how such acts are answered in that other place, Socrates
concludes simply, “they received for each of these things tenfold sufferings”—in other words,
with no specific information. Plato handles the issue of narration very deftly here, for he has
Socrates preface this section with a warning about its incompleteness; Socrates says, “Now, to go
through the many things would take a long time, Glaucon. But the chief thing is this,” and then
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�proceeds with the summary I just read. But if the purpose of resorting to summary was to avoid
trouble, then it is difficult to understand Socrates’ choice of examples.
In the first place, the list of specific forms of injustice by itself leads one to expect a
similarly specific list of punishments. Also, the fact that each “cycle” of punishments is
calibrated to the length of an average human life supports the expectation that punishments will
somehow correspond to, mirror, or just repeat in inverted form the particular wrongs one has
done. But the examples of injustice do not fulfill any of these expectations, for the important
reason that the victims of these injustices are in each case many in number. If a man betrays an
entire city, how can his single life (or afterlife) stand any chance of comprising the myriad ills his
betrayal occasioned in the lives of his fellow citizens? If he sold dozens into slavery, how could
his life encompass suffering the same fate dozens of times? Even if somehow it could, it would
also have to contain dozens of instances of the state of freedom that slavery destroys. And each
of these would have to be in some way pristine, so that the evil that is enslavement could have its
full effect on the soul being punished in this way, for one person’s being enslaved twice is
arguably not the same as two different people’s being enslaved. In general, then, a single life
cannot easily have the evil it does to many represented to it effectively.
One solution to this conundrum, of course, is to take one sort of evil to stand for all
others, to serve as a kind of medium of exchange. Maybe pain could serve as such a punitive
currency, repaying specific evils with generic badness. The extravagant punishment of the soul of
Ardiaeus, however, is both an example of this sort of thinking and a sign of its insufficiency. The
punishment is not only of infinite duration; it is also unimaginably intense, and the one being
punished in this way does not in any way signal to us what his experience is. Now, it is possible,
of course, that we hear nothing from the soul of Ardiaeus because there is no need. If his soul is
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�incurable, perhaps his punishment is not for him but an example to others, and in order for him to
serve as an example, all that matters is that they take his experience as an example, whatever he
himself may think of it. Consistent with this interpretation is the presence of the guards who
point out to the others why these souls are being singled out for such treatment; that is, it seems
at least in part to be a show put on for them. Also consistent with this view is the claim that what
improves the judgment of those who make the underground passage is not just that they have
labored and suffered themselves, but also that they have seen the labors and sufferings of others.
Nonetheless, the absence of the directly suffering soul’s perspective on the single particular
punishment we get any report of underscores the problem outlined by omission in the preceding
passage, the problem of how a soul’s evil can be represented to it; and this remains a problem.
If the soul’s thousand-year journey below the earth is to teach it anything—as the
improvement in its choice of life suggests it does—then the soul must somehow have the evils it
engaged in as though they were something good presented to it as what they in fact are. But in
order for one’s wrongdoing to be recognizable as such, one must have a different perspective
than one had in doing it, and this kind of thoroughgoing change in perspective is precisely what
we have learned is terribly difficult. In the cave image, it is represented as a turning around that
can be a passage from what is darker to what is brighter (and thus an actual improvement) and at
the same time from what is perceived clearly and comfortably to what is perceived only dimly
and painfully (and thus an apparent worsening). Something else is needed: a guide who is
trustworthy and trusted and can articulate what is happening to the soul being forcibly turned
around in this way. In the end, pain by itself is too diffuse, too immediate, and too
uncontextualized to bear the articulated meaning that would be necessary in order to effect this
change, a fact that is perhaps hinted at by the punishment’s tenfold repetition. Even the
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�exemplary suffering of the souls of the unholy requires agents standing by to explain it, which is
as much as to say that it cannot bear its meaning within itself on its own.
In the case of both punishments and rewards, then, the report of Er sets up certain
expectations or requirements that it then pointedly does not or cannot fulfill. The rewards for a
just life, we feel, ought to reinforce the choice of justice, but instead they are presented as
promoting the careless haste and entitled self-importance that lead to a bad choice of life. As for
the punishments, while they are said to have the effect they ought to, still, the mechanism by
which they are meant to accomplish this is markedly obscure, and inquiring more closely into it
only makes the confusion more intense, particularly by directing attention to what lies at the root
of all: the soul and its perception of or perspective on the good. If the myth’s self-presentation is
at odds with its content, we have to turn elsewhere to discover its real import. One thing that is
clear, as we have just seen, is that the story concerns the soul. Just what is the soul in this story?
One phrase in the description of souls’ choice of lives incidentally brings to the fore one
of the key features of the myth’s portrayal of the soul. Er saw “a soul that used to belong to
Orpheus” choosing the life of a swan. The striking phrase “used to belong” underlines something
that must be assumed in order for the story to work at all, and it does so compactly and
forcefully. For the myth to work, a soul, whatever else it may be, cannot be identical with any
named person. The name “Orpheus” must indicate the temporary composite of an otherwise
anonymous soul with the singer’s life whose story we know from myth. Any name, then, must
miss the soul and indicate only such a composite, even my name or yours. The possessive in the
phrase “my soul” becomes particularly obscure. If I spoke in this way of “my soul,” who would I
be saying the soul belongs to, and what would I be taking myself to be that is distinct from my
soul? Who or what is speaking when the words “my soul” are uttered? Whatever we thought it
13
�was before, the story is now telling us that a soul is not identical with a life or a person, since it
precedes and outlives both.
One possible source for this strange conception of the soul is the discussion of its
immortality earlier in Book 10. There, the question arises how the soul can be both immortal and
capable of being at odds with itself. Self-opposition (of the sort examined in Book 4) is
associated with being composite, and this, in turn, is associated with change and decay. A soul
composed of parts, it seems, could only be mortal. Instead of investigating this dilemma,
Socrates merely suggests that the view of soul that we have—and that he and his interlocutors
have had throughout the whole of the dialogue—is like the view one would have of how a man
looks if one were to see only the statue of him that had lain at the bottom of the sea for many
years and become disfigured and covered with shells, seaweed, rocks and so forth, as in the case
of the statue of Glaucus. Our embeddedness in body, change, and manyness, the image more or
less directly asserts, has made our souls unrecognizable. This is an unpromising starting point,
but Socrates remains confident and ventures the guess that the soul’s true nature is to be found by
our looking to its philosophia, its love of wisdom. This recalls another account of the division of
the soul that emerges from the yet earlier discussion of the terrible evils of tragic poetry in Book
10. This account divides the soul’s philosophical, calculating, law-abiding part, which suffers
misfortune in silence and tranquility, from another part, which indulges in loud lamentation. The
latter is itself indulged by writers of tragedies, who trick even the decent man into weeping
immoderately at the misfortunes of another on the grounds that this is at least not self-pitying,
and is only a kind of play. The gist seems to be that the first part of the soul would do its work
better without the second. Both accounts, then, solve the problem of manyness by making one
part stand for the whole. Whatever the technical merits of this solution, we should consider that
14
�if the true identity of the soul should turn out to be only its rational part understood in this way,
then the whole drama of existence—the stories of our lives as we commonly understand them—
would be wholly irrelevant, composed entirely of a sort of encrustation of alien matter that only
serves to obscure the soul from view. By themselves, souls might have nothing to do with lives.
While these two prior discussions of soul seem relevant to the myth and are consonant
with some aspects of its sharp distinctions between soul and person and between soul and life,
they are at odds with others. Souls in the myth are not heartless calculating machines, but beings
capable of feeling and expressing emotion. When the souls complete their respective journeys,
they go off “with delight” to the meadow where they confer. When those who came from the
underground passage recount what they have seen and undergone there, they cry and lament in
recalling it. When these souls are nearing the exit and see some like the soul of Ardiaeus being
rejected, they experience a great fear, which they note is only one among many they have
suffered. In sum, then, these souls respond emotively and expressively to their situation, even
during this time when they are presumed to exist in separation from body and life.
In addition to transitory affections such as a moment of fear, souls in the myth also have
longer-standing dispositions or traits of character. The soul of Ajax, son of Telamon, bitterly
recalls the judgment that granted the arms of the departed hero Achilles to Odysseus instead of to
him, and so flees humanity. The souls of Orpheus and Agamemnon, in turn, make their choices
of animal lives out of long-standing hatred, of women in the first case and of humanity in general
in the second. In each case, these quasi-permanent states were crystallized, so to speak, by the
trauma of their previous lives (the very ones we associate with their names). They appear to have
persisted unchanged and utterly undiminished throughout their millennial journeys. Their hatreds
and resentment are very much not the passions of a moment. A final, most significant example of
15
�a state or characteristic of soul allowed by the myth is that of the soul of Odysseus, which “from
memory of its former labors, ... had recovered from love of honor.” Somehow, the soul as
portrayed in the myth is capable of being affected by its life, and affected in such a way as to be
able to learn, not just greedily carry forward the savor of bitter memory. In either case, however,
what we see is that however distinct souls may be from lives, their lives affect them. In light of
this, perhaps it is time finally to turn directly to what the story must take a life to be.
This is in one way the most straightforward and familiar element of the story; everyone
knows what a life is, what it is composed of, why it is important, what makes it good or bad, and
so forth. In another way, however, what the central conceit of the myth of Er requires a life to be
makes it almost impossible to understand. The life, recall, contains elements like wealth or
poverty, good or bad birth, strength, beauty, political office or rule, and indeed everything that
could characterize a life, or almost everything. For, as was explained, since the soul that lives the
life must be changed by it, the life considered by itself does not contain an “ordering” or
“arrangement” of soul (taxis). If our question is what we ought to remove in thought from our
usual conception of what a life is in order to arrive at an idea of what the lives whose paradigms
lie in the lap of Lachesis are, the answer is both simple and devastating. We must remove only
this: everything that soul is. As it has done in many places, the dialogue is once again causing a
problem by treating a distinction as a separation. When Socrates manages to bring the
conversation to a halt of this sort, he often turns to an image or example that retroactively
modifies one of the discussion’s starting points. We could try the same, and instead of trying to
proceed with delimitation or definition, we might look at an example of what the myth takes to
be a life.
16
�None of the lives is very extensively described, but the first example of a life that is
chosen is perhaps the fullest. The soul that drew the first lot—which “participated in virtue out of
habit, without philosophy” after living in “an ordered regime”—picked the life containing the
biggest tyranny straightaway, “but it escaped its notice that eating his children and other evils
accompanied this.” It escaped his notice. How strange. How can we understand this? Should we
agree with the old song that “the large print giveth and the small print taketh away”? Do the
events or elements of a life presented to choice differ in their prominence, such that some would
count as the large print, and some as the small? And what would determine which appear more or
less prominent? Just what is written or figured on the paradigms of lives in the lap of Lachesis?
In the example just considered, the great tyranny looks good at first, but when the soul
“considered the life at its leisure,” it discovered its evils, and was unhappy with its lot.
In a way, this latter portrait of what a life is is familiar and cogent: a life containing an
apparent good may of necessity also contain actual evils, such that they counterbalance or even
outweigh the apparent good. But in another way, this is an unsatisfactory way of talking about a
life. It tries to mark the badness of the life that contains one sort of fact sometimes thought to be
good (being a tyrant) by pointing out that it also contains another sort of fact, which is generally
acknowledged to be bad (eating one’s children). The whole question of what makes a life good or
bad has been reduced to the piecemeal evaluation of particulars, and the summation of such
judgments, as in what is sometimes called a rubric.
But we really ought to doubt this soul’s assessment of its chosen life, since we have
already been told that it makes the choice affected by folly and gluttony. It could be so misguided
as to be mistaken about which of the life’s elements is good and which bad. In fact, we have
already been told in Book IX that the worst possible eventuality for a soul that is tyrannically
17
�inclined is for it to become an actual tyrant. Conversely, it may be that something as horrible as
eating his children is an appropriate accompaniment to the “large print” of his being a tyrant.
But just inverting the assessment this foolish soul made of each of these facts does not
really solve the deeper problem, of which the problem of the relative prominence of a life’s parts
—its large and its small print—is just a symptom. The component elements of a life in the myth
seem subject to two contradictory demands: they must be “without an arrangement of soul” and
thus somehow meaningless, and they must be capable of “leading” the soul to being just or
unjust and thus somehow have a meaning.
As for the former term of the contradiction, given that there are good and bad among rich
and poor alike, wealth, to pick one example, looks like the sort of thing that the Stoic Epictetus
would call indifferent, something that is of no importance when compared with the greater
question of whether we are living well, and that does not by itself answer it. As for the latter,
however, the soul that has learned the art of choosing lives well, Socrates says, will call lives
good or bad depending on whether they “lead to virtue or vice.” But now we have to ask: how
can events be said to “lead” to virtue or vice at all unless they have within them the germ of a
sense, an incipient significance that is preserved in what it gives rise to?
As in other similar cases, the commentary on the myth is quite relevant and helpful, if in
part by oblique paths. Socrates portrays the person who has acquired the art of choosing lives
well in some detail. He says: “He will take into account all the things we have just mentioned
and how in combination and separately they affect the virtue of a life. Thus he may know the
effects, bad and good, of beauty mixed with poverty or wealth and accompanied by this or that
habit of soul; and the effects of any particular mixture with one another of good and bad birth,
private station and ruling office, strength and weakness, facility and difficulty in learning, and all
18
�such things that are connected with a soul by nature or are acquired. From all this he will be able
to draw a conclusion and choose—while looking off toward the nature of the soul—between the
worse and the better life, calling worse the one that leads it toward becoming more unjust, and
better the one that leads it to becoming more just” (618ce).
One of the most striking things in this passage, I think, is the intensity of its emphasis on
combination. The possessor of the art of choosing lives is said to consider the elements of lives
both “separately and in combination” but all the examples are of complex configurations. Here,
then, is one way in which something can both have a meaning and not have it in itself: it can
have its meaning in being combined with something else. Note that the myth helps us here. The
composition of elements that makes up each life is not something chosen; the lives have already
been assembled by the time the souls have to choose them. Rather, souls are to call lives good or
bad on the basis of no element in them, but on the basis of what living such a life will work in
the soul that lives it. That is, the choice was already not happening at the level of the particular
feature or event of the life, whether or not the choosers noticed this.
Another striking feature of the passage is how thoroughly confusing it makes the
separation of life and soul that lies at the basis of the myth. In the first place, the possessor of the
art is said to know about the effects of mixtures that include elements such as “this or that habit
of soul.” This just seems in direct opposition to the claim that lives are without an “ordering” or
“arrangement” of soul. By itself, though, including this states the problem well; the soul that sets
out to have wealth or any other good thing will be changed by its pursuit, with the result that
there is no guarantee it will still want or be able to enjoy what it was pursuing by the time it gets
it. The one who possesses the art would have to be able to predict what changes the living of a
life would work in the soul. In short, what makes elements of a life part of a life that can be
19
�called good or bad is their connection with the soul that has to live that life: the suffering,
rejoicing, experiencing, remembering, and thinking being. These powers are what lend to those
events or conditions whatever sense they have. Here we see another way in which a life has a
meaning, but not in itself; it has a meaning for a soul.
To state the matter most generally, elements of a life are capable of having a meaning that
is not in them because that’s just what it is to be an element of a life: to be a ‘Here’ that is also,
with all the weight Plotinus gives the word, a ‘There’—to be a ‘Now’ whose meaning is ‘Later’
or ‘Forever.’ The seeming paradox is just the reality of our situation, and one that Plato has been
at pains throughout the dialogue to turn our attention to. We spend as much time as we do in this
dialogue on the proper organization of an educational program not merely for the stated reason,
that we need guardians who will be both harsh with the city’s enemies and gentle with its
citizens. Rather, as the central books show and the final myth signifies, the deeper issue is that
what is most immediately apparent is always somehow a distraction from the intelligible reality
of what is. But the sensible is not merely something other than the intelligible: it is the region
wherein the intelligible shows itself; it is where we live. The small things matter. The ball I learn
to catch may be little more than arbitrary mineral, vegetable, and animal products refashioned to
the measure of a human hand, but the act of catching that it makes possible is an emblem and
anticipation of all sorts of future forms of mastery. The little bumps and tussles of playground
life are like prophetic utterances spoken to us in childhood that foretell adult life’s
disappointments—its alliances and betrayals, its kindness and its savagery—and they foretell
them with both the accuracy and the obscurity that are characteristic of an oracle.
This strange mode of being of the elements of our lives is a feature of the world of the
myth of Er that also happens to be a feature of our world; it is the literally true thing at the center
20
�of a mass of figurative falsehoods, and around which the whole turns. It is the true thing that
seems strange to us who have become strangers to it. The elements of lives can appear big or
small, cruel twists of fate, or irrelevant impediments to powers we find we do not need to get by.
We who live them do not experience ourselves as having chosen them, but reflecting on what it
would mean for what our souls are to choose what our lives will be can awaken us from the
dream-state in which we treat the meanings of our lives as beings, as ta onta, as things that
always are and have no tincture of ambiguity or self-opposition, no dependence on perspective or
interpretation, no horizon of possible transformation. Rather, we should recognize them in their
truth: they are the materials—somehow both indifferent and essential—out of which souls weave
the tissue of meaning they put on and inhabit, elements that stand to our souls and hearts as do
those other elements—earth, air, fire, and water—to the multifariously capable bodies of living
beings of all kinds, as their material support and flesh. When the elements of our bodies or lives
fail us, we break, but when they cooperate, what we succeed in being is something they would
not be on their own, something other and beyond.
For our part, the myth is saying, we need to learn how to cooperate with these elements
and their ways, so that we may make a good passage in this life and the next, and perhaps in the
next after that. But what would make for a good passage? What should we hope for? A welldeserved reward? Or a suffering that makes the soul better? The beautiful sights and good
experiences that the myth sets up as a reward for a good life carry with them the same ambiguity
as the goods of this life: many souls are not improved by them, but made worse. To answer the
question, we might think of the soul that once belonged to Odysseus. Of this soul we were not
told whether it came down from heaven or up from the earth, only that memory of its former
labors had cured it. Those labors could have been carried out on earth as part of the life we
21
�associate with Odysseus’ name—where he struggled to regain his home after long years in
foreign lands, losing all his comrades—or they could have been performed as payment in that
place beneath the earth, some days’ journey from the spindle of Necessity where lives are woven.
Perhaps our hope and prayer should be the same as his could have been: may we all perform
such labors and remember them and be cured of what ails us.
—Greg Recco
Delivered Nov. 30, 2012 at St. John’s College in Annapolis, MD.
22
�
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St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis
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formallectureseriesannapolis
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Recco, Gregory
Title
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The soul's choice of life
Date
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2012-11-30
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pdf
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Typescript of a lecture delivered on November 30, 2012 by Greg Recco as part of the Formal Lecture Series.
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St. John's College
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Annapolis, MD
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A signed permission form has been received stating, "I hereby grant St. John's College permission to: Make an audio recording of my lecture, and retain copies for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make an audio recording of my lecture available online. Make a typescript copy of my lecture available for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make a copy of my typescript available online."
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text
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Plato. Republic.
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English
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Bib # 80876
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<a title="Audio recording" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/show/49">Audio recording</a>
Friday night lecture
Tutors
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