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EARLY WRITINGS
AN ACADEMIC JOURNAL
�!
�Early Writings:
An Academic Journal
St. John's College Graduate Institute
Santa Fe, New Mexico
2013
STJOHN’S
College
ANNAPOLIS . SANTA FE
This project is dedicated to Susan Olmsted,
a fisher of like-minded souls,
who with her gentle steadfastness and quiet kindness
helped each of us to make St. John's College our home.
��Early Writings:
An Academic Journal
St. John's College Graduate Institute
Santa Fe, New Mexico
2012
Publishers
Casey Carr
Jeff Ondocsin
Editors
Casey Carr
Brian Connolly
Jeff Ondocsin
Jesse Wilhite
Matthew Zehnder
Selection Committee
Chelsea Allen
Elliot Bernstein
Brian Connolly
Thomas Conroy
Kevin Cowling
Jeffrey Ondocsin
Eduardo Vera
Joan Marie Wood
Matthew Zehnder
Cover Design
Alycia Smith
��Contents:
A Note About Our Project
Casey Carr and Jeff Ondocsin
vi
Sweet Showers, Sweet Breath
Joan Marie Wood
1
Antinomian Sentiment in the Bhagavad Gita, Book II
Elliot Bernstein
7
The Death of Kings:
History and the Individual in Shakespeare's Richard II
William Leavy
12
Seeing-Time
April Olsen
22
Life Experience by the Books, or How to Read Nabokov’s Speak,
Memory
Grant Wycliff
33
�Searching for Geometrical "Truth" in Einstein's Relativity
Jules Mancini
44
Nietzsche's Philosopher: The Antagonistic Redeemer
Mary Creighton
54
Prince Myshkin's Beautiful Horizon: Exploring Death and the
Infinite in Dostoevsky's The Idiot
Kevin Cowling
65
A Proposed Atlas to the On-ramps and Off-ramps of the Road to
Serfdom
Jesse Wilhite
86
The Faith of the Poet
Anthony Eagan
97
The Two Prakrtis
Jeff Ondocsin
111
Chaucer's Grisild: Constreyned by Maistrie
Leah Weed
116
IV
�i’l-
5??
V
�A Note About Our Project
Early Writings: An Academic Journal 2013 marks the third
edition of this project in the Graduate Institute at St. John’s College,
Santa Fe. This unique collection of essays reflects the various ideas
and texts that our graduate students encounter in both the Liberal
Arts and Eastern Classics programs.
Why do we study Great Books? The fact is that the pursuit
of knowledge edifies not only the mind, but also the soul. We read
carefully and rely on involved discussion with one another to work
through the implications of the texts. This is not an attempt to be
authoritative; we leave that province to the rest of the academic
world. Our graduate students ask questions only to find that the
process of asking questions of our authors begets yet more
questions. Mastery is not the goal. We are interested in letting the
books speak to us without imposing preconceived ideas or
prejudices upon them. In this way, we attempt to explore the ideas
of the authors for the pleasure and reward of inquiry itself.
This, the third edition of the Journal, features such questions
as: What happens when a king places love of himself above duty to
country? Can a return to once abandoned values save a crumbling
political system? Why is the philosopher necessary for society?
What is the consequence of a theological doctrine that does not
bind salvation to adherence to a specific moral code? Is there only
one kind of knowledge that gives man access to God?
Our questions are not strictly limited to political or
theological matters. How does Chaucer’s general prologue presage
the rest of the tales? How is understanding achieved through
confounding the reader’s experience of both being and time? How
do the truth and beauty of human experience manifest themselves
in the various literary devices of both fiction and autobiography?
What role can geometrical truth play in modern mathematics? Is
experience transmissible between individuals? Does the poet make
the poem or does poetry make the poet? What does the telling of
the same story in two different moral systems tell us about the
authors and their societies?
Our design for this project is not only to showcase the
efforts of our graduate students and the St. John’s program itself.
VI
�but also to invite the reader—whoever he may be—to use these
essays as a springboard to embark on his own quest toward
knowledge. It is therefore our pleasure to present you with the
2013 Graduate Institute Academic Journal.
As with the first and second editions, this edition of the
Journal was crafted according to a specific set of selection and
editing standards. By means of these we aim to preserve the
integrity of our project.
A selection committee received
anonymous submissions from our graduate student body to review
for content, style, and coherence. Using a numerical rubric system,
the committee voted on those essays which most conformed to our
standards of academic writing and the St. John's process of inquiry.
Those who submitted essays and were also part of the selection
committee forfeited their right to vote on their own work. Upon
selection, a smaller group of editors carefully combed the selected
essays for necessary grammatical and syntactical changes. It is
important to note that this editing, however thorough, was
performed with great caution. It is our foremost aim to ensure that
the original intention and style of the authors are preserved. Next,
the publishers put together the actual design and format of a
manuscript that was then sent to the press.
We would like to thank all of the students who have
contributed to this important project, as well as our Graduate
Director, Mr. Carl. Early Writings would not be possible without the
seriousness and sincerity of the St. John's College community.
Your Publishers and Executive Editors,
Casey Carr
Jeff Ondocsin
Jesse Wilhite
�Vlll
�Sweet Showers, Sweet Breath
Joan Marie Wood
Whan thatAprill with his shoures soote
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote,
And bathed every veyne in swich licour
Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
5
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
Tendre croppes, and theyonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his halve coursyronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,
That slepen al the nyght with open ye
w
(so priketh hem Nature in hir corages);
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages.
And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes,
To feme halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;
And specially from every shires ende
15
OfEngelond to Caunterbury they wende.
The hooly blisful martirfor to seke,
That hem hath holpen whan that they were seekeJ
The first eighteen lines of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales may
be presumed to set a context for the Tales, and, moved by a
mysterious delight, 1 have found myself repeatedly drawn back to
them. 1 propose to consider these lines in detail, with the goal of
deepening my understanding of why Chaucer chose to begin his
epic this way.
First 1 will give an overview of this passage, and then 1 will
take a look at each line in order to tease out some of the richness
that Chaucer offers us.
We start at the beginning—of the epic, of the journey to
Canterbury, of the series of Tales. Beginnings are portentous: it is a
launch time, a time for alertness, excitement, and perhaps, a time of
openings, of new possibilities. These beginning lines, which
comprise one very long sentence, can be divided into three
1
�sections. Each has progressively more focused content, and each is
marked off from the others with a semi-colon (though there is an
additional semi-colon after line 4, allowing Chaucer to begin line 5
with another “Whan," thus emphasizing the time element]. Lines 1
through 11, "Whan that April. . .nature in hir corages;" tell us that
the season of this epic is spring, when warm rain produces flowers
and new crops come forth. In this first section, Chaucer uses
natural images2 and pagan references^; there are no overtlv
Christian references.
^
Lines 12 through 14, "Thanne longen folk . . .in sundry
londes; are a general response to lines 1 through 11- "Whan" it is
this particular season, "thanne" folk long to go on pilgrimages.
Here we have the first Christian reference in the word "palmers"
returnees from the Holy Land, for whom spring, apparent^,
refreshes the wish to wander to foreign shores as pilgrims. These
three lines narrow the focus to the longing provoked in "folk"—in
many people, we may presume—in response to the spring's
quickening; specifically to Christians, including those who have
been on pilgrimages before.
Lines 15 through 18 bring us to a specific place and kind of
Christian pilgrimage: that of persons who have been sick, and are
now traveling from every shire in England to Canterbuiy.
Presumably they travel to visit the shrine of the Catholic martyr
Thomas Becket, as they have vowed. The following lines detail that
the narrator himself has been on a pilgrimage to Canterbury and
like thanne longen folk" can be presumed to understand why one
would do so. And we are off
^
The first word.
Whan repeated at the beginning of line 5, is a temporal signifies
oes this indicate that time will be important in this epic? I cannot
elp but make a parallel here with the first word of the Iliad
wrath an emotive word around which that epic hinges. Aiournev
takes place over time; it takes time to tell a story. But soecificallv
With this 'man" Chaucer singles out the season'of early sS""'
crucially important for the existence of the urge to go on a
pilgrimage, or at least the kind of pilgrimage he will present
Jhe first line reads: "Whan that Aprill with his shoures
soote. On the literal level April brings showers that soften and
2
�moisten the soil for planting. That Chaucer uses the word "soote,"
meaning "sweet," intrigues me; why not "warm" or "fresh?" Looking
back in the line to "Aprill," we see that at that time, astrologically
speaking, April was in the sign of Taurus, which is ruled by Venus,
the goddess of love. "Soote" connotes delectability, sensuous
delight, and by extension, desire. Since astrological signs are
important throughout the Tales, it seems that Chaucer signals in
this first line that love, and perhaps especially erotic love, will be of
major purport in this epic."^
In the second line, "The droghte of March hath perced to the
roote," I am struck by the word "droghte." Literally, one could say
there has been no rain, though perhaps slushy snow, in March, and
the ground, still icy, has begun to thaw into mud. But why a
drought? There is water left over from melting snow, but no water
falls from the sky. Nothing grows yet, last year's root cellars are
depleted, and humans, their resources exhausted, look to the signs
of replenishment which spring brings. Astrologically speaking,
March is the month of Mars, the god of war, who is also the lover of
Venus. Here is something quite interesting: The sweet (erotic)
rains of April "perce to the roote" the drought of March. This is an
opposite image to the obvious one connoted by the word "perce,"
with its association of masculine penetration. Instead, the feminine
water penetrates the masculine drought. 1 am still confused by the
meaning of the word "droghte." Could this be a drought of life, i.e.
Mars is a killer, or a drought of spirit? Is the sweet rain of
quickening time penetrating physically or spiritually exhausted life
forms?
Line 3, "and bathed every veyne in swich licour," gives us an
image of dessicated tissues being revitalized by moisture, and
dormant desires moistened into presence. Furthermore, in line 4,
"Of which vertu engendred is the flour" Chaucer presents us with
the result of the activity detailed in the first three lines: the flower,
something beautiful, a stage on the way to fruiting, attractive to
insects and humans. The blooms emerge because the natural world
is refreshed by sweet rain, or, seen metaphorically or astrologically,
a drenching which produces the juices of desire. The flower image
also connotes maidenhood and youth, times of sexual potency and
urge.
3
�The next seven lines complete this first section
underscoring and extending the theme of erotic desire. Zephirus
the Greek god of the West Wind that blows In spring, has -s^ete"
breath and quickens new growth.^ The image of sweet breath
signifies erotic intimacy as well as the warmth of spring To
experience the “sweete" breath of another we need the kind of
closenGss associated with desire.
Chaucer's first direct astrological reference, the Ram
indicates the month of March, ruled by Mars. The "yonge sonne"'
has passed out of Ram, which means into Taurus, the time of Venus,
n the next three lines, Chaucer gives us the image of small birds
singing, who sleep all night with open eyes. It continues, "so priketh
hem nature m hir corages." What does this mean? If one sleeps
with open eyes, one is restless. Does this mean one is worried? Or
rather, since the birds have been singing, is it not likely that they
are possessed by a distracted delight, as when a lover is first falling
prevents one’s eyes from
uttmg
In this line Chaucer seems to suggest something
inescapable about being a living being—that all of us will be kept
up some nights because of erotic desire, whether we want it or not
rniv^v- ?
^*”6, these images of nature and natural desire
minate in the somewhat surprising statement, "Thanne longen
folk to goon on pilgrimages." As a practical matter, it would make
sense that those moved to keep a vow to the saint who has helped
them would choose to travel in the spring.
Chaucer has
emphasized the bursting forth of life, however, using images and
symbols of erotic desire. This opens up the question, in what way is
the longing to go on pilgrimages predicated on the quickening^of
nature and the flow of erotic desire? In other words what is the
rromres?'’
“
"longen" seems particularly Significant. Is Chaucer
nviting us to consider the various motives that induce "folk" to
participate m a pilgrimage? What might the motive be, if not the
eepmg of a promise? Could these motives include the wish to
find?
^
establish a reputation
nd a wife or husband? Alternatively, if folk are "priked by nature’’
to keep a vow ii. spring, could Chaucer be inviting us to poXr
4
�whether the renewal of desire in springtime is providential, i.e. it
aligns with the urge to keep a religious promise? Whatever the
case, Chaucer seems to suggest that as readers we must keep our
eyes open, for people who take pilgrimages, and this one in
particular, may not be what they seem.
The specific "folk” mentioned in the last six lines of this text
are palmers. They hail from every shire’s end in England and are
going to Canterbury to visit St. Thomas Becket, the saint and
martyr. "That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke." One
wonders why Chaucer devotes two lines out of eighteen to palmers,
who visit "straunge strondes, to feme halwes, kowthe in sondry
londes." One might call palmers, who are fulltime wandering
votaries, professional pilgrims. If the palmers are professional
pilgrims, how do they make money to support their wanderings?
Perhaps they beg. On the other hand, there are many other ways of
making money, licit and not. Here Chaucer may be inviting us to
consider what spring’s rejuvenating pulse has to do with making
money, and thus what it is to be any kind of professional, especially
a religious professional.
Finally, people from all walks of life come from every part of
England to this Canterbury pilgrimage. These pilgrims, as the
narrator makes explicit, are journeying to fulfill vows made when
they were sick. Their illnesses, if indeed they existed, are not
mentioned very often. The impetus for going on this pilgrimage,
then, is not focused primarily on recovering from an illness, but
rather the fulfillment of a religious vow.
These first eighteen lines link the urge to go on pilgrimages
to other natural [especially erotic) desires, yet presumably pilgrims
travel due to a promise that they have made. Chaucer invites us to
ask how we might live in a world of natural desires, a world in
which we are able to make promises that often conflict with these
desires. Desire, as a natural phenomenon, is like the sweet showers,
the sweet wind, and the young sun that Chaucer speaks of in the
first eight lines. It is basic, ancient, and inescapable. This being the
case, could desire also be part of divine providence? If the renewal
of the world through springtime is providential, then we are led to
consider a paradox: human desire moves us to do things that are
5
�outside of our human agreements. How do we inhabit such a
world?
If the spring rains are filled with the spark of divinity, do we
not need to find some way to honor both natural desires and our
need to fulfill religious promises? Because Chaucer begins the
Prologue with eleven lines of natural images, he seems to say that
natural, erotic desires are a given, and must be attended to and
respected. Because Venus is a goddess, and because she appears as
Aprill" in the first line, this may suggest to us that we must look to
women to discover how human desires should be honored.
Returning to the mysterious delight that has drawn me back
repeatedly to consider the beginning of the Prologue, the strongest
images are those of water soaking the dry, cold earth into vernal
juiciness, the wind encouraging new shoots, and the birds awake all
night. Chaucer begins with natural images that can be taken
literally, images familiar to everyone in all times. Yet, implicit in
every line are resonances from the world of astrology, the realms of
the gods of antiquity and, later, from the Christian world. The
simple, natural renewal of springtime has cosmic significance. That
erotic desire arises and challenges human promises is to be
expected, and in fact, welcomed. The tensions that ensue are ours
with which to come to grips. In choosing to start his epic this way
Ch^aucer has opened the door for us to contemplate this paradox
when, as readers on our own thoughtful pilgrimage, we begin our
journey through these Canterbury tales
Endnotes
1. Chaucer. Canterbury Tales. A. C. Cawley, ed. New York: Eveiyman’s Library, 1992. 1-18
2. Shoures, droghte, roote, ’ “flour,” “sonne,” “fowles.”
3. The god “Zephirus ” the astrological terms “Ram” and by extension April and March
4. See for example, The Wife ofBath's Tale and The Merchant's Tale
5. In the Odyssey, Zephirus starts the fruits, and later brings them to ripeness. [Book 7:118]
Primary Texts
Chaucer, Geoffrey. Canterbury Tales. Edited by A.C. Cawley Everyman’s
Library. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 1992.
6
�Antinomian Sentiment in the Bhagavad Gita, Book II
Elliot Bernstein
Therefore shall ye keep mine ordinance,
that ye commit not any one of these
abominable customs, which were
committed before you, and that ye defde
not yourselves therein: I am the Lord
your God.
—Leviticus 18:30 (KJV)
In the West we often talk of the separation between the
nomian and antinomian^ streams of a given religion. This
breakdown does not necessarily apply to every tradition present all
over the world— it would be hard, for instance, to imagine an
antinomian version of Confucianism or Judaism, or a nomian
version of Shinto— but in the case of the two major religions
emerging from South Asia, viz. Hinduism and Buddhism, this
dichotomy is extremely relevant. The second book of the Bhagavad
Gita, in my opinion, is an antinomian programmatic for Hinduism.
This sentiment is most famously summed up by the last pada of
sloka 18.63, yathecchasi tathd kuruf which of course occurs much
later. To read consequent books as being more nomian is quite easy
as well, and there is an argument that will be considered
throughout that the antinomianism of Book 11 is merely an attack
on the Vedas and those who follow them as hidebound and
ridiculous— not that law is not in effect.
One of the antinomian themes presented in Book II is a
degradation of the Vedas. Buddhayo 'vyavasdyindm are bahusdkhd
hyanatds ca (2.41)3; bahusdkhd is a common epithet of the Vedas,
whose various parts are described as branches.^ The chief
complaint of the Gita appears to be the superfluous nature of the
Vedas:ydvdn artha udapdne sarvatah sarnplutodake/ tdvdn sarvesu
vedesu brdmanasya vijdnatah (2.46).3 The image of the well
overflowing is a potent statement of this particular criticism—
7
�presumably a wise man would be able to simply take the water
from anywhere and not need to go through the labor of drawing
from the well. Here we also see that the person who doesn’t need
the Vedas is a vijanatah. This term has an overly literal
interpretation of something like "totally wise," from the root ina
know plus the vi preverb, "away from," here used as an
intensifier.
This is echoed elsewhere in Book II; for example, where
Krishna admonishes Arjuna that apvipascitah / vedavMarantah
I ■
presumably a vijdnan would not enjoy such things. The
Veda-bound are described as bhogaisvaryaprasaktdh r2 4417
indicating perhaps that the Gita does not reject that the Vedas do
what they are stated to do, but does reject those goals as
worthwhile. As is written just a little further down: traigunyavisaya
veda nistraiguno bhavdrjuna C2.45),8 which is to say any goal
involving the three gunas or the worlds they create cannot be
considered worthwhile. The Gita goes on to elaborate on the
condition of nistraigunah with nirdvandvo nityasattvastho
niryogaksema dtmavdn [ibid.],’^ putting the various qualities in
apposition to each other and giving the reader the information that
a^d the^resV"
equivalent to nirdvandvo
The prefix nir-, "without," recurs in sloka 45, which was just
quoted, four times, but one of those occurrences is false because
niryasattvasthah does not actually include this morpheme, but
simulates It no doubt intentionally, with nityah, which means
eternal. In 2.45 we see the author of the Gita refer to the desirable
state for a heroic individual as nistraiguno, which clearly parallels
with the other nir- words, and the undesirable as traigunyavisayl
The desirable state is summed up as dtmavdn. Without [nir-] all
these other things, we see that the person is finally left with dtman
and nothing further. This line of reasoning would be picked up by
the non-duahst or Vedantist schools of Hinduism, e.g. in the
writings of Gaudapada.
^
In light thereof, the antinomian interpretation of the Gita
does not go unqualified. Obviously, being guna-less is good and
bemg en-guna-ed, as it were, is bad. So there is some kind of law
here, and in fact m various places the Gita uses the word dharma to
8
�refer to it. However, it is not what we would normally think of as a
ritual requirement, in recognition whereof, the Gita often uses
prajfia to refer to this ethical ideal. At times this begins to approach
Stoicism or Taoism in its insistence on passively “going with the
flow" and on the influence of the internal state of the person on
their outward actions, such as where it is written: tasmdd yasya
mahdbdho nigrhitdni sarvasah / indhydnmdriydrthebhyas tasya
prajnd pratisfhitd (2.68).io But there is another character to this; it
is not mere immobility but ascesis, as the Gita recommends:
svadharmam api cdveksa... dharmydd dhi yuddhdcchreyo 'nyat
(2.31).^^ That is to say, do not merely be content with withdrawal
but find your svadharma and obey it. Many commentators insist
that svadharma means something like "caste obligations," as it does
elsewhere, but it seems to me that this interpretation might be
missing the point. The prefix sva- indicates properness— proper,
almost invariably, to an individual, not to a group. Each person has
an internal law in the conception of the Gita. But Arjuna’s
svadharma must involve battle because of his status in the ksatriya
varna [ibid.). It is not merely whatever one wishes, but rather that
one's wishes will, having been cleared of all obstructions, come into
line with the caste law!
Often salvation in an antinomian system is achieved through
some kind of feeling or grace; in the Gita we see Krishna say that
srutivipratipannd te yadd sthdsyati niscald / samddhdv acald
buddhis taddyogam avdpsyasi (2.53).^^ Samddha somehow leads to
the attainment of yoga— a word that literally means "yoke," but
here is perhaps being used for ironic contrast with the nomian
position, since there is no "yoke" as one would typically think, but
instead one’s inner feeling.
The justification given for antinomianism is simple: nothing
can actually change; therefore no action can be forbidden. In 2.18,
we seeya enarp vetti hantdrarp yascainarp manyate hatam / ubhau
tau na vijdnito ndyarp hanti na hanyate^^; presumably this would
apply to other actions as well. If nothing can ever change, what is
the sense in acting, or in not acting? Arjuna has to go ahead with his
pre-determined course, his path of least resistance, as it were,
because that is the lawful thing to do. His downhill course,
fashioned by his nature and the circumstances of his life, can be
9
�fought, but there is no sense in it. A man who has withdrawn totally
into himself, detaching himself from his senses, simply rolls down
his svadharma without resistance, knowing that whatever he is
about to do would not be so easy if it were not foreordained by the
Bhagavad.
This answer is somewhat unsatisfying to the Western mind.
If the path of least resistance is the optimal one, would that not
justify any kind of crime, any kind of theft or violence? This
objection can be answered by insisting that we look at the cultural
context of Classical India, or of any pre-modern civilization. Each
person was born into a given role, and was expected to absolutely
follow that role to its bitter end. Who was born a stonemason lived
a stonemason and would die a stonemason— not only that, but his
sons would do the same. In a sufficiently stratified society, the path
of least resistance is one that is at least moderately productive.
Attempts to apply this philosophy to the modern world, where the
individual is expected to find his svadharma without any hint given
to him by the surrounding world, have proven unanimously
disastrous. One attempting to follow the course of least
resistance— an imperative common to many ancient and Eastern
philosophies— in the United States in 2012 will find himself
shuffled off to a housing project or incarcerated, which are
increasingly popular options. A vine follows the path of least
resistance too, but without the lattice it simply turns into a kind of
dense undergrowth. This trackless wilderness of the world of the
revolt of the third estate is an aberration, and the philosophies of
the past can therefore only be understood by placing ourselves in
the past. The intention of the Gita was not to justify any kind of
brutality or mere anarchy, but to encourage people to make use of
the existing structures— without those structures, these
philosophies become meaningless.
Endnotes
1. "Antinomianism” is the belief that salvation, or its local equivalent, happens
independently of the obedience, or lack thereof, to a certain law or moral code.
Nominianism is, of course, its opposite.
2. Translated by Aleister Crowley as "do what thou wilt."
10
�3. "The wisdom of the wavering is many branched and infinite."
4. For example, in Mahabharata we see someone who is very wise described as a "master
of the branches," viz., of the Vedas. Usually, each Brahmanic family was associated with a
particular "branch." Each branch has its own corpus of literature and its own Upanishads
to describe that corpus.
5. "So much usefulness as there is in a well when water is overflowing everywhere is there
in all the Vedas for the man of God."
6. "The ignorant delight in Veda-quotations."
7. "Pleasure-and-power-bound"
8. "The vedas are of the three-guna category; 0 Arjuna, be guna-less!"
9. "Non-dual, abiding in truth, without business, full of the self'
10. "Therefore, 0 strong-arm, whose senses are withheld totally from the objects of those
senses, his wisdom is established."
11. "Having apprehended your own law, because of that law, indeed nothing is better than
battle."
12. "Anti-revelation is unto you; where the fixed, meditating, and unmovable intellect
stands, there you will reach the yoke."
13. "Who imagines this one a slayer, who imagines this one slain— both are unknowing,
they neither slay nor are slain."
Primary Texts
Van Buitenen, J.A.B. Trans. The Bhagavadgita in the Mahabharata.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1981.
�The Death of Kings;
History and the individual in Shakespeare's The Tragedy of
Richard II
William Leavy
Is Shakespeare's The Tragedy of Richard II regarded as tragic
because of what happens to Richard, the King? Or would Richard of
Bordeaux, who was better loved, have been a better king, if he had
ruled England in another time? Is it a tragedy because of what
happens to England as a result the misrule of King Richard? If it is
the case that Richard of Bordeaux would have been a good king in
another time, then one must acknowledge that he is indeed an
historical figure. Unlike later kings such as Henry V and Richard III,
who essentially invented themselves, remaking history in the
process, Richard II is depicted in Shakespeare’s play as a king
acting and reacting within the historical parameters of the time in
which he reigned. In other words, Richard is an historical king,
whereas Henry V and Richard III are not constrained by the
parameters of their time. All three kings, as they are dramatized in
Shakespeare’s history plays, are individuals in the sense that they
exist outside of the expectations and limitations that are imposed
upon England’s sovereign by the nobility, the Church, and the royal
family itself. But in Richard II s case he is both ahistorical, in the
sense that he rules according to his own whims regardless of the
expectations that come with the throne, and historical, in the sense
that he is compelled to surrender his crown by virtue of his
defiance of these concerns and expectations, sowing the seeds of
rebellion through his misrule.
This discussion of Shakespeare’s Tragedy of Richard II will
examine the sense of the tragic from the perspective of King
Richard as an individual in his own time. Additionally, I will
examine how the idea of Richard, as such an individual, intersects
with England, Christianity, divinity, nature, paganism and sex. 1
shall begin the discussion by examining Shakespeare’s tragic
individual and his relationship with time.
In his only soliloquy in the play, Richard reflects on his life,
saying, "I wasted time, and now doth time waste me."i What are we
12
�to make of this king who, now imprisoned, reflects on neither how
he has wasted the resources of his kingdom to fight a war nor on
his wasted chance at greatness? Richard remarks instead, in what
seems to be the closest he shall ever come to feelings of remorse,
that he has “wasted time." But to waste time, in this case, is not a
reflection on the corporeal, outer world, but rather a reflection on
the consciousness of the man, the self. To Richard, the kingdom
over which he had ruled before his deposition was never truly his
realm. Instead, Richard’s empire is Richard himself, as well as the
world that he perceives from his own vantage point.
If we regard the essence of tragedy as that which inevitably
happens when an individual arrives on the scene and fails to live up
to the role of a god, then Shakespeare's Tragedy of Richard // differs
from Greek tragedy as to the root cause of its inevitability. Unlike
the tragedies of Aeschylus and Sophocles, in which the protagonist
is inevitably destroyed by fate, Richard II is inevitably destroyed by
his ego, or by his idea of himself. Richard’s sense of self is not
grounded in the way the king is regarded by the rest of his
kingdom, and it wastes time to such an extent that fate never has
any need to intervene. His ego, in the sense of his individuality,
inevitably brings about his downfall.
That Shakespeare’s Richard is inevitably a tragic figure
because of his ego, rather than as a result of fate or the gods, might
explain why Richard bemoans the loss of time, rather than the loss
of England’s wealth and reputation. Richard II is isolated in time by
his historical context. He understands while he is incarcerated that
he is an historical figure and not an ahistorical one: the tragedy,
therefore, is that while still the King, Richard has acted as though
he were an ahistorical king, when in reality, history and time [in
and of themselves) reduce Richard to an historical figure. Only too
late does Richard acknowledge that he "wasted time, and now doth
time waste me.’’^
Does Richard of Bordeaux feel guilt in Shakespeare’s play? Is
he merely ashamed that he has been deposed? Unlike his rival
Bolingbroke, who became king well into his adulthood, Richard was
a king long before he became a man; he was still a boy when he was
crowned. Richard, therefore, as king, never had any higher
authority to which he was compelled to answer. By virtue of the
13
�doctrine of the Christian Church, which declared him sovereign
through God, Richard never had any occasion to learn guilt. Richard
the man is incapable of experiencing feelings of guilt; he can only
experience a sense of shame. This, Shakespeare reveals to his
audience, is an essential facet of Richard the individual, one that
condemns him to the role of a tragic player in England’s history.
Richard is a stranger to guilt, but he embraces his shame.
The ego in this case may have decided in hindsight that it was fated
to be deposed.
Shakespeare, however, asserts through his
portrayal of Richard as wasteful, overreaching, and imprudent, that
the inability of the self to feel guilt is characteristic of tragedy.
Richard, as has been mentioned, is an historical figure: he is a king
who reacts to, and is shaped by, time. He does not invent his ego
successfully in the same sense that Henry V and Richard III would
later invent theirs. But as a tragic figure, Richard H isn’t starcrossed; he "pluck[s] a thousand dangers"^ onto his head, in the
words of his uncle, the Duke of York.
The individual that is Richard of Bordeaux is dramatically,
as well as historically, "we” rather than "I," referring of course to
the royal "we" of England. Hence, in the early acts of the play
Richard speaks of "our justice’’^ and alludes to himself as the Lion,
the emblem of the kings of England. The royal "we," however, is
not limited to Richard, but rather is shared by all of England’s
monarchs. The "I” that is Richard himself, who attempts to rule the
kingdom as an individual, forsakes the counsel and advice of his
uncles and other older, wiser heads. He wishes to be an ahistorical
king. Richard is unaccountable and unconcerned with the welfare
of England. After all. King Richard speaks on behalf of England, so
why should he spend time concerning himself with what his
England happens to think? Richard is king by divine right. He does
not, therefore, have to maintain the approval of his subjects to
claim legitimacy. Rather than the "we," it is this "I” that plucks
disaster down onto his crown, and not fate. This suggests that
Richard is a tragic king because he is an ahistorical ruler at a time
in history that demands an historical one. Perhaps it is this sense
of the needs of history that Richard understands, only too late,
when he laments that he "wasted time.”
14
�Richard looks like a lion and plays the role of the lion, but he
has neither the favor of the nobility nor the popularity with the
commoners that his successor enjoys. The "I” who is King Richard
wastes time that should have been devoted to winning the loyalty,
admiration, and love of his subjects. As a result, England rebels, so
that the royal "we” of Richard’s sovereignty is reduced to the "I” of
a solitary subject when Richard is dethroned. In this regard, it is
not surprising that Richard orders a mirror with which to look at
himself at the moment he loses his kingship. If this incident is an
invention of the pla3Avright, it is revealing of Richard’s character
that he is more concerned with his own welfare than that of his
kingdom. Richard loves Richard—as long as Richard sees England
when he looks in the mirror. When England is no longer seen in the
reflection, as is the case when Richard surrenders his crown,
Richard smashes the mirror, and the illusion.
Richard, as Shakespeare shows, is a vain individual, and the
young king indeed has the preoccupations that are the province of
most young men. Sex, at first read, does not seem to figure as
prominently in Richard II as it does in the other history plays, but
the sexual relationships that are intimated in the play should cause
the reader to think again. Richard’s marriage to his young queen,
Isabella, in what appears to have been an arranged marriage, is
opposed to that of Henry V’s pursuit of Kate in a later play in the
cycle. In Richard II there is a tender scene of parting in Act V when
Richard is led off to prison and Isabella is sent back to France.
However, Richard’s lack of progeny, his seeming lack of interest in
producing an heir to the throne, and the language used in this
scene, "set forth in pomp / She came adorned hither like sweet
May," suggest a platonic relationship with the queen, devoid of heat
or lust.5 The implication, then, is that Richard prefers the company
of his favorites. Bushy, Bagot, and Green. In the eyes of both the
nobility and the commoners, the "natural" relationship between
Richard and Isabella has been replaced with an "unnatural”
relationship.
When Bolingbroke condemns two of Richard’s favorites.
Bushy and Green, in Act III, he accuses them, among other offenses,
of destroying the marriage between the king and his queen:
15
�You have in manner with your sinful hours
Made a divorce betwixt his queen and him.
Broke the possession of a royal bed,
And stained the beauty of a fair queen’s cheeks
With tears drawn from her eyes by your foul wrongs...^
Here, Richard is able to put the interests of his favorites ahead of
his kingly duties and conjugal obligations without any qualms. He
is never made to feel ashamed about his illicit affairs with Bushy,
Bagot, and Green, nor about his neglect of Queen Isabella. It is the
Earl of Northumberland, however, who describes the harmful effect
Richard’s extra-marital affairs are having on the realm. "The King
is not himself, but basely led / By flatterers.”'^ Inside his closet, his
personal quarters, Richard’s self comes before the responsibilities
of the Crown.
The ego who is Richard sees no schism between himself, the
Crown, and the Church. To engage knowingly in such a relationship
with one’s favorites is a mortal sin in the eyes of the Church, the
institution that validates Richard as King of England. While he is
still king, Richard shows no remorse for calling on God to have John
of Gaunt die quickly so he can seize his wealth to pay for his
military campaign in Ireland. Lastly, it is Bishop Carlisle who has to
remind the king, when they have returned from Ireland to face
rebellion at home, that the "Power that made you king/Hath power
to keep you king in spite of all.”^ The Bishop voices this opinion
after King Richard has revealed his pagan sensibilities in response
to the threat of rebellion. The reminder works, momentarily, at
least, as Richard concurs:
Not all the water in the rough rude sea
Can wash the balm off from an anointed king;
The breath of worldly men cannot depose
The deputy elected by the Lord...^
By contrast, after Richard surrenders his crown, he is content to
play the role of the martyr, going so far as to liken himself to the
Redeemer, particularly in the deposition scene:
16
�Though some of you, with Pilate, wash your hands.
Showing an outward pity, yet you Pilates
Have here deliver’d me to my sour cross.
And water cannot wash away your sinA^
Unlike Richard 111, whom Shakespeare depicts as someone
incapable of self-pity, Richard 11 raises self-pity, with the absence of
guilt, to a biblical level: "So Judas did to Christ; but He, in twelve, /
Found truth in all but one; 1, in twelve thousand, none."ii Although
these divine sentiments, expressed upon his abdication, clash with
his pagan sensibilities, this new martyr role is consistent with
Richard’s inability to feel guilt over his inadequate rule, and he
instead attempts to place the source of his shame on those who are
forcing him to step down. Self-pity typically makes it difficult for
the individual who engages it to have pity for others. Such is the
case with Shakespeare’s Richard II. The self has a divine right to be
king, and when that is no longer the case perforce, it reserves the
right to be the wronged late king.
Richard does allow himself, while imprisoned in Pomfret
Castle, to contemplate what role his ego ought to play. In the
aforementioned soliloquy, after meditating on divinity, Christianity,
and the seemingly inherent contradictions in Scripture, he comes to
the conclusion, "But what e’er I be, / Nor I, nor any man that but
man is, / With nothing shall be pleas’d, till he be eas’d / With being
nothing.’’i2 This is a reversal of Richard’s ego which was
inextricably identified with his role as king. The power to be
nothing is power nevertheless. Time and the ego’s destruction
result in the movement of the ego through a series of successive
states: nihilism succeeds power, and power, albeit in a new,
spiritual form, succeeds nihilism. Shakespeare has ascribed an arc
to Richard’s individuality, revealing with this new facet of his
character why the role demands such great range from actors. The
character of Richard is one of the most complex and seemingly
contradictory in all of Shakespeare’s plays. Richard, the individual,
is as conflicted and full of factions as is his kingdom.
Richard never vacillates more in emotion and in identity
than when he returns home from Ireland in Act III. Faced with the
17
�news of the rebellion, Richard, the Christian king, calls upon the
earth to “[f)eed not thy sovereign’s foe."i3 This speech, directed
towards nature and earthly things, is filled with pagan sentiment:
But let thy spiders, that suck up thy venom.
And heavy-gaited toads lie in their way.
Doing annoyance to the treacherous feet.
Which with usurping steps do trample thee.
Yield stinging nettles to mine enemies;
And when they from thy bosom pluck a flower.
Guard it, I pray thee, with a lurking adder.
Whose double tongue may with a mortal touch
Throw death upon thy sovereign’s enemies.^'’^
As a result of expressing such language, the king is rebuked by the
Bishop and reminded by his friends that he is both a Christian and
the King, which Richard seems to appreciate. But Shakespeare
again reveals Richard as an individual who will uncrown himself, as
the next piece of information the king receives discourages and
disheartens him. Richard ultimately falls into such despair that he
exclaims, "By heaven. I’ll hate him everlastingly / That bids me be
of comfort any more.’’^^ Richard has given up, and he seems to
prefer this new state of despair over one that would have him
continuing to fight to hold onto his crown:
Let’s talk of graves, of worms, of epitaphs.
Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes
Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth.
When Richard invokes heaven, it is to surrender himself to the
rebellion as its sacrifice. When he defies the rebellion, he invokes
the earth to destroy his enemies. Richard’s sense of divinity is more
pagan than Christian.
Other characters in the play invoke metaphors of nature to
describe the King, such as the language that Richard’s uncle John of
Gaunt uses to describe Richard’s recklessness:
His rash fierce blaze of riot cannot last.
18
�For violent fires soon burn out themselves;
Small show’rs last long, but sudden storms are short;
He tires betimes that spurs too fast betimes;
With eager feeding food doth choke the feeder;
Light vanity, insatiate cormorant.
Consuming means, soon preys upon itselfd^
Richard’s despairing uncle compares him to animals (cormorants,
horses] as well as to the elements (storms, fires]. His tempestuous
disposition is regarded similarly by another uncle, York: "Deal
mildly with his youth, / For young colts being rag’d do rage the
more.’’!^ The kings uncles reveal sensibilities that are natural in
origin, but not necessarily pagan. There is no appeal to divinity
involved. Instead, these are observations of an appetite that is out
of control and unnatural in its gluttony. "Now comes the sick hour
that his surfeit made.”^^ The natural result is dissolution. Perhaps
it is this conception of nature and appetite that sees Richard equate
loss of power with loss of abundance: "Our sighs and they shall
lodge the summer corn, / And make a dearth in this revolting
land."2o For it is in such language that Richard realizes that he has
lost his power:
1 live with bread like you, feel want.
Taste grief, need friends: subjected thus.
How can you say to me I am a king?2i
Richard’s pagan sensibilities contrast with his previous remark
concerning the rebellion: "Revolt our subjects? That we cannot
mend, / They break their faith to God as well as us.’’^^ Richard’s ego
is pagan when it suits him, and at other times Christian to suit his
pleasure. Divinity serves Richard, not the other way around.
Shakespeare’s Richard sees his crown as his identity, instead
of his office. It is his privilege, not his duty. He is outraged that
anyone could be so bold as to mount a rebellion against him. The
notion of revolt taints his England as though the land itself were a
disloyal subject or an unfaithful lover: "Dear earth, I do salute thee
with my hand, / Though rebels wound thee with their horses’
hoofs.Although "this traitor’’^^ Bolingbroke maintains that he
19
�has returned seeking only his inheritance and not the crown,
Richard realizes that if one of his subjects can amass sufficient
power to force him to give back what he has taken from him, then
he is no longer the King. This is both a political realization as well
as an emotional one: Richard’s ego has been humiliated and
shamed into the loss of sovereignty. But along with the shame of
losing the crown, Richard still manages to retain his personal pride
and regal bearing, even as he accedes; "Now mark me how I undo
myself.”25 He is thus able to revolt against the rebels, by retaining
the identity of a king even as he is undone.
Having examined Shakespeare’s tragic rendering of Richard
II as an individual who attempted but failed to become an
ahistorical king, this discussion finally raises additional questions
about how the playwright expects his audience to think about
Richard. The story ends in the last act of the play, but his
deposition results in a series of civil wars and discord throughout
the kingdom for the next eighty-five years.
Shakespeare
foreshadows the decades of ensuing bloodshed in speeches he
gives to the Bishop of Carlisle as well as to Richard. Richard II
becomes a prologue to the civil wars, plots and power struggles
dramatized in the subsequent plays in Shakespeare’s history cycle.
The question remains, does Shakespeare see the wasteful and
riotous rule of King Richard II as the tragedy that befell England, or
rather, is it the ensuing violence and war that results following
Richard’s deposition that is England’s tragedy? Which is the more
tragic; the division of a king, or the division of the kingdom?
Endnotes
1. Shakespeare. The Riverside Shakespeare: The Tragedy ofRichard II. Evans, Blakemore,
ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1974. V.v, 79
2. Ibid., V.v, 49
3. Ibid., Il.i, 893
4. Ibid., I.iii, 535
5. ibid., V.i, 78-79
6. Ibid., Ill.i, 11-15
7. Ibid., Il.i, 241-242
8. Ibid., Ill.i, 27-28
9. Ibid., Ill.i, 54-57
10. Ibid., IV.i, 239-242
11. Ibid., IV.i, 170-171
12. Ibid., V.v, 38-41
20
�13. Ibid., Ill.ii, 12
14. Ibid., Ill.ii, 14-22
15. Ibid., Ill.ii, 207-208
16. Ibid., Ill.ii, 145-147
17. Ibid., Il.i, 33-39
18. Ibid., Il.i, 69-70
19. Ibid., Il.i, 84
20. Ibid., Ill.iii, 162-163
21. Ibid., Ill.ii, 175-177
22. Ibid., Ill.ii, 100-101
23. Ibid., Ill.ii, 6-7
24. Ibid., Ill.ii 1455
25. Ibid., IV.I, 203
Primary Text
Evans, Blakemore, Ed. The Riverside Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Richard
II. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1974.
�Seeing-Time
April Olsen
With the first sentence of Uji, Dogen gives the reader a gloss
of the repeated phrase found in the ancient Chinese poem which
introduces his essay, and in that same opening sentence he
summarizes the meaning of the entire essay itself: "'For the time
being’ here means time itself is being, and all being is time.”i Dogen
recognizes that many people will misunderstand "for the time
being," so he must clarify the definition of time-being in the
sentences that follow. Yet every subsequent sentence is the
opposite of a clarification. As one reads Uji the simple statement
that time is being and being is time becomes more and more
complicated. Why does Dogen attempt to explain the meaning of
time-being by confounding the reader's understanding of both time
and being?
Our everyday understanding of time and its relationship to
the beings we see around us is the great obstacle to a complete and
true understanding of time-being. We do not see time, as we see
beings, but we should. According to Dogen, time's "glorious golden
radiance” can be seen once one realizes that "the sixteen-foot
golden Buddha body is time."^ In other words, seeing time means
seeing time's beauty, and one is able to see time's beauty when one
understands that time itself is not separate from the radiant being
of the Buddha, or any other being. Dogen insists upfront that time
and being are not separate, but simply stating such an identity is
not sufficient to dispel our everyday understanding of time as
something separate from us. One may hear and repeat the words
"time is being and being is time” without understanding them,
seeing them merely as a conceptual relation represented by the
term time-being.
As Dogen offers more complex reiterations of time-being, it
becomes increasingly difficult for the reader to swallow the
concepts and spit them back out. Once one progresses past the first
sentence of Uji, it is impossible to hear the words Dogen uses to
explain time-being without either dismissing his explanation as
nonsense masquerading as wisdom or dismissing one's own
22
�unquestioned assumptions about the experience of time.
Therefore, perhaps the most important aspect of Dogen's essay, at
least for an ordinary being such as myself, is his proof that our
everyday understanding of time is mistaken. Uji problematizes our
notion of time in order to clarify the meaning of time-being. But
even this "in order to" is misleading. The essay does not offer clear
premises and conclusions, and attempting to pull out such a
philosophical argument from Dogen's writing may destroy the
teaching meant to be transmitted through it. On the other hand, as
in many of Dogen's essays, he directs the reader to examine,
investigate, study, and reflect upon the instruction he has offered.
Uji presents our everyday understanding of time as a problem for
us to examine, and that examination should lead us to confirm that
time is being and being is time.
Before the reader understands "for the time being,” she
must first realize that the simplicity of time-being is not simple in
the ordinary sense. Ordinarily we think of time as an obvious
occurrence and of being as an obvious existence, and it is a mistake
for the ordinary person to understand time-being as simply the
equation of these two obvious thoughts. The obvious occurrence of
time separated from being and the obvious existence of beings
separated from time are both mistaken, so any understanding of
time-being that attempts to preserve these two abstractions by
merely conceptually combining them will fail.
The absence of doubt can be the greatest obstacle to
understanding because the reader will have no reason to examine
closely an experience that is obvious and free from doubt. Hence
Dogen must first provoke his reader to doubt the "obvious”
experience of time. "Even though you do not measure the hours of
the day as long or short, far or near, you still call it twelve hours.
Because the signs of time's coming and going are obvious, people
do not doubt it. Although they do not doubt it, they do not
understand it.”^ Dogen points out that the ordinary person's lack of
doubt regarding time is not based on some deep understanding of
time, but rather on the superficial acceptance of obvious evidence.
The "signs of time's coming and going” are taken to be time itself.
People do not doubt the fact that time comes and goes because they
23
�accept obvious signs as proof of their limited understanding of
time. One aspect of time is taken to be all of time.
(The section on the lack of doubt regarding time is
immediately followed by a discussion of time's relation to the self
and to the entire world. For the time being, I will skip an
examination of this.]
When one begins to doubt the superficially obvious
experience of time, the doubt itself does not guarantee that one will
come to understand time-being. The ordinary person may still
mistakenly simplify the expression "for the time being” by
imagining it to say "for a while I was [one thing] ... for a while 1 was
[another].The ordinary person who is beginning to doubt time
will still think of time as a crossing or passing; "This is like having
crossed over rivers and climbed mountains. Even though the
mountains and rivers still exist, 1 have already passed them and
now ... those mountains and rivers are as distant from me as
heaven is from earth.”^ This seems to be a reasonable account of
time. If 1 travelled here from San Diego, crossing the Cuyamaca
mountains and the Colorado River during my journey, then now, as
I sit here in Santa Fe, 1 can say that the time of my traveling and the
place of those mountains and that river are distant from me. In
feet, this account of time already acknowledges a relationship
between time and being. Both the moment when I crossed the
Colorado River and the place where the river flowed under my car
are described as distant from me here and now. Thus the
beginner's understanding of time-being does equate the abstract
occurrence of time with the abstract existence of a being; they are
identified in that they both occupy some distant when and where
from my present when and where. Hence an ordinary person
succeeds in accepting that time is not fundamentally separate from
being, but gets stuck in thinking that the self occupies one specific
time-being while other time-beings occupy places at varying
distances to the time-being of the self here and now.
"It is not that simple. At the time the mountains were
climbed and the rivers crossed, you were present. Time is not
separate from you, and as you are present, time does not go away.”^
The distance imagined in the ordinary person's account of time is
only possible if time is understood to be passing away. We
24
�experience the present moment, and imagine that past moments,
having flown away, are now far from us. If this notion that time
flies away is maintained, then one's understanding of time-being
will not be complete. "Do not think that time merely flies away. Do
not see flying away as the only function of time. If time merely flies
away, you would be separate from time. The reason you do not
clearly understand the time-being is that you think of time only as
passing."^ Dogen admits that flying away is one function of time,
but he insists that understanding all of time to be embodied in that
one function is a great mistake. When an ordinary person blindly
accepts the obvious evidence of time's coming and going in the
everyday signs that we measure, then time becomes understood as
merely a flying away of moments. Time ends up being only
experienced in the present moment and all other moments are
distant from the present self.
One can rectify this
misunderstanding by rejecting one of the consequences of thinking
about time as flying away; namely, the separation of your self from
time. We imagine that time flies away because we imagine that we
are separate from time, so in order to understand that time does
not merely fly past, we must understand that time is not separate
from us.
This is confusing. Here is an alternative translation of the
first quotation cited in the previous paragraph: "But the true state
of things is not found in this one direction alone. At the time the
mountain was being climbed and the river being crossed, I was
there [in time]. The time has to be in me. Inasmuch as I am there, it
cannot be that time passes away.”® The simplistic understanding of
time makes the mistake of looking for time in one direction only.
When I think about my travels over the mountains and across the
river, if I only look back and measure time-being from my present
moment and place, then I arrive at the conclusion that those
mountains and that river are distant from me and that time must
have passed away in order to make that separation possible.
Finding time in that one direction alone ignores the fact that the
mountain was climbed and the river crossed by me while 1 was in
the present. Somehow, in order for that to be the case, time must
be in me rather than passing away outside of me. Time must be
passing through me, but without passing into me or passing out of
25
�me. "As I am present” or "Inasmuch as I am there [in time]," time
cannot pass away. If time were passing away, then I could not find
myself in the present moment. Since I find myself in the present
moment, time should not be understood as merely passing away.
There appears to be a necessary relationship between the existence
of the present self and time's not merely passing away, but the
reason for this necessity is still unclear.
Here is the alternative translation of the second quotation
cited above: "You should not come to understand that time is only
flying past. You should not only learn that flying past is the virtue
inherent in time. If time were to give itself to merely flying past, it
would leave gaps. You fail to experience the passage of being-time
and hear the utterance of its truth, because you learn only that time
is something that goes past.”^ The ordinary person fails to hear the
truth of "for the time being” and fails to experience the passage of
being-time within himself because he imagines that flying past is
the functional virtue of time and that as time's virtue, the function
of flying past is the best understanding of time. Now where
Tanahashi translates, "If time merely flies away, you would be
separate from time,” Waddell and Abe render the same characters,
"If time were to give itself to merely flying past, it would leave
gaps.” The latter makes it sound as if time itself would have gaps,
while the former results in a gap between oneself and time. Both
accounts may say the same thing. If time were merely flying past,
then there would be a gap (the distance) between myself and time,
and if there is a gap between me and time, then time itself would
have gaps (the distances between the times of my past). If time has
gaps, then it cannot be unified and would merely be the scattering
of isolated times that have flown past. If time is not unified then it
would not have the opportunity to fly past in the first place.
Therefore, in order for time to be one, without gaps, time must not
be separate from myself.
Now is a good time to return to the section that was skipped
earlier.
After criticizing the ordinary person's unexamined
understanding of time for its inability to doubt the "obvious”
evidence of time's passage, Dogen somewhat abruptly makes a few
strong assertions about the self: "The way the self arrays itself is
the form of the entire world. See each thing in this entire world as a
26
�moment of time. Things do not hinder one another, just as
moments do not hinder one another ... Thus the self setting itself
out in array sees itself. This is the understanding that the self is
time.''io So, in the explanation for why one should not understand
time as passing away, Dogen argued that such an understanding
makes time's unity impossible. Now, Dogen explains that because
the self is what it is, and time is what it is, the self and time are one.
This is the meaning of time-being. One cannot understand time
being while maintaining the separate occurrence of time, the
separate existence of beings, nor the separate experience of the
self. Time and being, while never actually separated, appear to
merge in the self as the ordinary person comes to understand time
being. Because the self arrays itself, the entire world has the form
that the self sees; in turn, because the self arrays itself as the entire
world, the self is able to see itself; and finally, because the self is
time, then as the self arrays itself it is able to see time.
The self arrays itself, and the self that examines this truth is
able to see the entire world, see oneself, and see the glorious
golden radiant illumination of time. Time, the world, and the self
are all time-being.
That last sentence appears to be stuck in another
swallowing up and spitting out of mere concepts. This essay began
with the simple and misunderstood equation: (time) + (being) =
(time-being). Now, rather than foolishly adding the abstract
concepts of time and being together in an attempt to understand
time-being, such an understanding is supposed to be reached
through a series of equations; (time-being) = (time) = (being) =
(self). It all appears to be equal, and yet what Dogen teaches us
about time-being feels like more than a simple "all is one, one is all"
doctrine. Or even if such a brief statement is true, Uji at least shows
the reader that memorizing a trite formula is not enough. So once
again, rather than regurgitating the simple idea that time is the self
is the world, one must investigate this further.
Dogen goes on to say, "Each moment is all being, is the
entire world. Reflect now whether any being or any world is left
out of the present moment.”ii This reflection could be the self
seeing itself in its array. Whenever Dogen urges the reader to
reflect, examine, investigate, study, etc. he may be referring to this
27
�character of the self. But this arraying is more than a "character” of
the self; the self is what it is because it arrays itself so that it can see
itself as the entire world, as each moment. Conceptually this
sounds beautiful, albeit confusing, but what does it mean for the
self to see all beings and all times, and thus see itself in its array?
The self-array section is translated by Waddell and Abe as
follows: "We set the self out in array and make that the whole
world. We must see all the various things of the whole world as so
many times. These things do not get in each other’s way any more
than various times get in each other's way ... We set our self out in
array, and we see that. Such is the fundamental reason of the
Way—that our self is time.’’^^ The first person plural makes this
arraying appear to be a project which many people engage in
rather than the functioning of some abstract individual self.
Moreover, the "that” which we "see” when we array the self may be
either the sight of the formed world or the sight of the active
arraying. Or perhaps both of these sights are aspects of the same
thing: the world is not merely a passive object to be observed, nor
is the self merely the action of arraying; both are time.
"The way the self arrays itself is the form of the entire
world” or "We set the self out in array and make that the whole
world.” Although the self array forms or makes the world, this is
not an account of its creation. Because time is being and being is
time, Dogen is not concerned with figuring out when this world
began, as if the moment of the world's creation were as distant
from the present moment of the world as those moments of
climbing and crossing are from me now. Inasmuch as the world is
right now, and inasmuch as 1 am my present self, this moment is
the moment of the world's "creation” because the forming of the
world is the arraying of the self. But even this may be saying too
much. Insisting on an account of the beginning of the world is
already limiting one's understanding of time-being. It is separating
the beginning of the world from every other moment of the world
and each of those moments from each other.
The "self arraying itself is a strange concept. One might
imagine the self as a projector that radiates time to make objects
appear around it, or the self as a ghostly spirit that drapes itself
with the ornamentation stuff of the world, or the self as a great
28
�conglomeration that breaks itself up and arranges the pieces to
create the order of the world. And then one can also imagine
Dogen objecting to each of these visuals. Is the self an agent? Does
the understanding of time-being give one greater control over the
arraying? Can the enlightened self radiate, ornament, or arrange
the world at will? No, there does not seem to be much of a "will”
behind this arraying of the self. Nor is the self array a kind of
instrument that an ordinary person can learn to use more skillfully.
In this section on the self array, Dogen does not imply that we
should stop understanding time as passing away and begin
understanding the self as time so that we can take control of the
world through this self array. Therefore the realization that the
self is time and that the self array makes the world does not give
the self greater world-creating powers, but it does enable the self to
see what is being arrayed and to identify with it.
In order to see, one needs to make distinctions. If the self
and time and the world are all just one undifferentiated time-being,
then there can be no real sight. Somehow the self is time, is the
world, in such a way that the self is able to see itself as the world
because it has time. The self can make the necessary distinctions in
its array because things "do not hinder one another.''^^ Ordinarily I
like to think that I see separate objects around me because they are
independently lined up next to each other, and the fact that my
eyes can detect their edges allows me to see the world truly. "Not
hindering one another" would be a silly way to describe this
ordinary person's understanding of objects. However, the ordinary
person's view of the world runs into trouble when one examines
those obvious edges between objects. The world ends up with
spatial gaps in the same way that time ended up with temporal
gaps. Therefore, we must "See each thing in this entire world as a
moment of time” because "Things do not hinder one another, just
as moments do not hinder one another.If we do not see things
as times, then we end up with gaps in time and space, and we
continue seeing superficially because we blindly accept partial
(obvious] evidence as the whole truth.
According to Dogen, the whole truth is this: "In essence, all
things in the entire world are linked with one another as moments.
Because all moments are the time-being, they are your time-being.
29
�The time-being has the quality of flowing ... Because flowing is a
quality of time, moments of past and present do not overlap or line
up side by side.”i5 The fact that all things are "linked” as moments,
solves the problem of gaps in between objects in space while
preserving our ability to see distinctions in the world. Moments
are able to provide this linkage that distinguishes things from each
other without separating them because they are time-being within
me. My time-being holds together time so that it does not suffer
gaps, and time's unity allows for the unity of the world. In that
sense both times and beings are "created" by my self arraying itself.
The array is the perfection of arrangement because things and
moments neither overlap with each other nor do they separate in a
row. This is the flowing of time that allows the world to appear as
it does. Before one begins to doubt time, the world's appearance
may be taken for granted and the self is able to separate being and
time from each other, and one thing from other things, and one
moment from other moments, not realizing that if such separation
were true then there would be no unity with which to see at all.
The ordinary person sees, but also fails to see what makes
seeing possible. "Altbough the views of an ordinary person and the
causes and conditions of those views are what the ordinary person
sees, they are not necessarily the ordinary person's truth. The truth
merely manifests itself for the time being as an ordinary person.
The ordinary person's assumptions about time and being are not
untrue because even the limited understanding of time-being is
made possible by the truth of time-being. Similarly, in the section
on doubt discussed above, Dogen claims, "When sentient beings
doubt what they do not understand, their doubt is not firmly fixed.
Because of that, their past doubts do not coincide with the present
doubt. Yet doubt itself is nothing but time.'’^^ Seeing the obvious
signs of time's coming and going without doubt, or seeing those
"obvious" signs with doubt, or seeing times as beings and beings as
times with doubt, or seeing the truth of time's flowing without
doubt—all of these ways to see time are time-being. Even when
one is merely swallowing up words and spitting them back out, this
is also time-being. In fact this way of understanding truth is similar
to the understanding of time's flowing: "Does this time-being not
swallow up the moment when you climbed the mountain [and the
30
�moment before you were doubting time and the moment when you
simply regurgitated Dogen's words]? Does it not spit them out?”i8
Thus the ordinary person's truth is not separate from
enlightened truth, just as time and self and being are not separate
from each other. Truth must flow in the same way that time flows.
There is no separation between one's unenlightened self and one's
enlightened self; they do not overlap nor do they line up side by
side. You should see the glorious golden radiance of time, and you
should also see that radiance in yourself because each ordinary
person is the sixteen-foot golden body of the enlightened buddha.
"Because you think your time or your being is not truth, you believe
that the sixteen-foot golden body is not you. However, your
attempts to escape from being the sixteen-foot golden body are
nothing but bits and pieces of the time-being. Those who have not
yet confirmed this should look into it deeply."!^ Although getting
rid of the distance that separates yourself from the Buddha, and the
distance that separates the present moment from the moment of
enlightenment, may seem like an unconditional boon, we must also
get rid of the self that we imagine to be outside of time and
separate from other beings. An ordinary person may want the
reflection of the self arraying itself to instill some greater world
controlling power on the self, but to reflect on this truth one must
no longer see oneself as entering time from outside in order to act
in the world. Increased control makes no sense if there is no
separation between self and time. Rather than accept this, the
ordinary person refrains from doubting in order to escape
reflecting about the self that arrays itself. Yet even this "escape” is
time-being and therefore no escape at all.
Once the ordinary person begins to doubt the obviousness
of everyday experience [possibly with the aid of Dogen's essay], he
should continue to look deeply, to examine, to see time-being in
order to make his understanding of it firm. That confirmation of
time-being must be in the second half of Uji. For the time being, I
will content myself with this half-examination of Dogen's essay.
31
�Endnotes
1. Dogen. Moon in a Dewdrop: Writings ofZen Master Dogen. Kazuaki Tanahasi, ed. New
York: North Point Press, 1985. 76
2. Dogen. The Heart ofDogen's Shobogenzo. Trans. Norman Waddell and Masao Abe.
Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002. 48
3. Tanahashi, 76
4. Ibid., 77
5. Ibid., 77
6. Ibid., 77
7. Ibid., 78
8. Waddell and Abe, 8
9. Ibid., 51
10. Tanahashi, 77
11. Ibid., 77
12. Waddell and Abe, 49
13. Tanahashi, 77
14. Ibid., 77
15. Ibid., 78
16. Ibid., 79
17. Ibid., 77
18. Ibid., 78
19. Ibid., 79
Primary Texts
Dogen. Moon in a Dewdrop: Writings of Zen Master Dogen. Kazuaki
Tanahashi, ed. New York; North Point Press, 1985.
Dogen. The Heart of Dogen's Shobogenzo. Trans. Norman Waddell and
Masao Abe. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002.
32
�Life Experience by the Books, or How to Read Nabokov's Speak,
Memory
Grant Wycliff
Because not all artists offer their audience a proviso
detailing which elements of their work to pay attention to or
declaring a specific method for consumption, 1 see no reason for
this to be a requirement for artists. In fact, the popular consensus
seems to be quite the contrary: individuals are allowed and even
encouraged to engage art and interpret it however they please.
Despite this we often do look to certain authorities, whether they
be academics or contemporaries of an artist, in an attempt to gain
greater understanding of that artist concerning both generalities
and particulars. Although balancing one's approach to art between
these tensions is not usually problematic, 1 find it difficult to decide
what to make of Vladimir Nabokov’s Speak, Memory. This book is
an autobiographical work he initially describes as "a systematically
correlated assemblage of personal recollections" that, while
initially published serially, has been rearranged from its sequence
of publication to be read as a proper way to interpret Nabokov’s life
"from August 1903 to May 1940.
The specific difficulties 1 have in interpreting this book stem
from my need to discern whether this should be read according to
the approach laid out in Nabokov’s essay "Good Readers and Good
Writers,” and what the various implications of understanding
Speak, Memory are based on whether these two works are read as
complementary or exclusive.^ That essay, written as a preface to
selected lectures on his literature, holds advice that can clearly be
applied to fiction writing in general. At the same time, the essay
waffles in its disposition between concern for readership of fiction
and readership in general. Speak, Memory espouses a similar
vagueness of identity: while ostensibly maintaining a fidelity to
autobiography insofar as he attempts to accurately represent his
life, Nabokov does not actively admit of any difference between
how this art form and fiction ought to function, even going so far as
to say that "The following of... thematic designs through one’s life
should be, 1 think, the true purpose of autobiography.”^ The
33
�objectives of this paper are twofold: to determine whether
Nabokov intends for the reader to apply the principles in "Good
Readers and Good Writers" to his or her understanding of Speak,
Memory, and to reflect on Nabokov’s understanding of how closely
an autobiographical project ought to resemble the major aesthetic
qualities of prose fiction. While I will evaluate his autobiography, I
will do so holistically, only referring to particular moments of
Nabokov’s life as he describes them in order to illustrate larger
points about his approach to autobiography as a discipline.
Ultimately the goal of this paper is to explore Nabokov’s
understanding of human experience by abstraction, and to identify
important elements of experience that are made available in these
two works in ways that his fiction might neglect.
Anyone familiar with Nabokov’s fiction would find his
arguments in "Good Readers and Good Writers” hardly surprising;
they are dogmatic yet convincing, focusing heavily on writers who
are highly concerned with art and readers who take literature to be
a very serious enterprise. Among the many aphorisms he offers,
one is immediately relevant to the problem I seek to confront.
After describing a division between "writers of genius” and "minor
authors,” Nabokov offers a rule he considers highly pertinent:
The art of writing is a very futile business if it does
not imply first of all the art of seeing the world as the
potentiality of fiction. The material of this world may
be real enough [as far as reality goes] but does not
exist at all as an accepted entirety: it is chaos, and to
this chaos the author says 'go!’ allowing the world to
flicker and to fuse.^
The first relevant element of this view is that it appears to apply to
all writing, not fiction writing exclusively. This means that for all
writers, even those who are pursuing a project as personal as
autobiography, there is something about the art of writing that
naturally distorts "reality,” transfiguring our world of experience
and recreating it for the reader in a more palatable form. But while
the author does offer the reader the chance to make sense of the
world in a way that would otherwise be simply unavailable, he
34
�seems to do so at the cost of breaking down the boundary between
truth and fiction. This is not to say that I think writing cannot
accurately report the facts of reality according to this Nabokovian
principle; I am confident that Nabokov accurately represents the
objective truths of his history to the best of his ability. However,
maintaining that writing is futile without treating the world as "the
potentiality of fiction" does two things to autobiography: It
paradoxically encourages the writer to willfully misrepresent the
world in order to furnish greater understanding of the world, while
forcing the reader to accept these rather subjective interpretations
of reality from the author.
In Chapter 8 of Speak, Memory we find Nabokov recalling a
series of tutors he had as a child. Several instances of reflection in
this chapter stand out as examples of Nabokov admitting to the
troubles that arise in attempting to convert the "chaos” of reality
into writing, either directly or through the aforementioned
misrepresentation of facts for the reader’s sake. Nabokov relates
several short recollections of one tutor he had called Ordo, and
admits that in his attempt to recall one particular memory of the
man, he may have unintentionally transferred the detail of Ordo's
wearing a particular cloak from a previous experience. Nabokov is
rather self-aware in admitting to potential inaccuracy in this
passage, saying, "It seldom happens that I do not quite know
whether a recollection is my own or has come to me secondhand,
but in this case I do waver.On the basic level of his attempting to
recall this specific person there is nothing problematic; he has
shared these memories of Ordo while supplying the necessary
caveats. What this passage illuminates is the set of tendencies we
all share in memory recollection.
No matter what the causes might be, it is a widely
documented phenomenon that we often do revise our memories
and filter them in a way that fails to accurately recall our actual
experience. This problem is one that every autobiographer faces,
for memory is really the only means by which one can know
oneself. But Nabokov only seems to treat this as a problem in this
particular instance; the rest of the book is written with a complete
confidence in the accuracy of his recollections. It should not be
surprising that Nabokov does not continually address the issues
35
�related to memory because confidence in one’s assertions is not
only necessary for this sort of project, but also for being able to
maintain a sense of self. While the basis for his having selected
many of the memories we read in this book remains mysterious, it
is particularly puzzling that he would limit the discussion of this
major issue to something as trivial as the recollection of a tutor he
had only briefly.
Another kind of misrepresentation occurs soon after this
one in the series of his childhood tutors we meet. Nabokov tells us
about two tutors he had who appear to have been renamed by him
for the purposes of this book. The first one is a medical student,
described as having a resemblance to a French actor named Max
Linder, whom he proceeds to call Max. The second tutor, who
seems to have been quite important to Nabokov as he is discussed
at length, appears to have been assigned a false name as well.
Nabokov merely says "he will have to figure here under the name of
Lenski.”^ He has no problem telling of his personal experiences
with these characters, nor does he have an issue with furnishing
plenty of background details about the tutors independent of his
experience with them. In my view, these issues in Speak, Memory—
his refusal to accurately name these two tutors as well as his lack of
explanation for why he would rename them—are not symptoms of
a failure of memory. 1 imagine that while writing this book he did
have many failures of memory, but that in most cases those failures
entailed omission of certain stories rather than their modification.
A more reasonable explanation for his justifying such
behavior is that Nabokov’s sense of human experience is quite
similar to the model of artistic sensibility described in "Good
Readers and Good Writers.’’ In addition to treating the world as
pregnant with artistic meaning and possibilities for storytelling,
writers and readers alike should experience it with imagination.
Nabokov did not name the tutor for Max Linder because the man’s
parents wanted to name their child after the actor, but because it
enabled the "artistic harmonious balance between the reader’s
mind and the author’s mind’’ that Nabokov determined to be most
appropriate for gaining understanding of his life in that setting.
While it seems unfair to consider that tutor’s full life as trivial, the
emphasis on Nabokov’s experience of him seems far more relevant
36
�to the autobiography. That he would arrange this instance, as well
as the structure of the entire book, in this manner seems to stem
from his attitude that "everything that is worthwhile is to some
extent subjective.”^
Reading Speak, Memory with the imaginative, subjective
disposition encouraged in his essay should help the reader to make
sense of two topics Nabokov treats early on in the book: his
understanding and valuation of time, and his condition of
synesthesia. To understand time for Nabokov it is worth first
looking at the book's overall trajectory. Clearly it differs from most
autobiographies, which begin with the author’s early years and
proceed chronologically; they often make a point of identifying
early foundational trends in the author’s life that might produce the
distinctive habits and skills which would later earn that person a
publishing deal. Speak, Memory does not conform to this model of
storytelling at all; it is even debatable whether this book functions
as a traditional story at all. Nabokov clearly has no desire to
describe or justify his current circumstances as they relate to his
maturation and upbringing. What he has offered is a set of
recollections bolstered with beautiful language and interspersed
with reflections on life as experienced.
Given these loose outlines for preparing his account of
himself, it makes perfect sense that Nabokov would begin to
address the issue of time in the opening pages of the book. His
view that "the beginning of reflexive consciousness in the brain of
our remotest ancestor must surely have coincided with the
dawning of the sense of time”^ seems to be the genesis for the
entire project. For, given the role of memory in the project, what is
an autobiography but an extended exercise in reflexive
consciousness? As mentioned earlier, Nabokov states in the
foreword to Speak, Memory that the series of recollections he is
presenting begins in August 1903, despite his having been born
before that time. This is attributable to the description he offers of
walking in a park with his parents where, upon conversing with his
parents and discovering their ages relative to his own, he felt that
he had undergone "a second baptism" where he was "plunged
abruptly into a radiant and mobile medium that was none other
than the pure element of time.”^ While he describes this recognition
37
�of time (and his existence relative to it) as being a moment so
pivotal in his life as to be considered a rebirth, it seems that the
penchant he would later develop for indulgence in aesthetic bliss
would largely take the form of attempting to reject and stand
outside of time, eventually leading him to his present perspective
from which he tells the reader, “I confess I do not believe in time."i°
Maintaining an existence outside of time would likely be the
pinnacle of experiencing life on a subjective basis. The progress
toward this pinnacle is embodied early on by Nabokov with his
condition of synesthesia and the behavioral inclinations it entails.
He does not merely mention his condition, but instead describes to
the reader in detail what that experience is like for him. Nabokov
could, perhaps, be paying heed to the relative obscurity of that
condition for most readers, but it primarily seems to be a clever
way of compelling the reader to begin accepting the Nabokovian
standard of writing. The reader at once is forced to accept the
author as someone whose experience is inestimably different than
their own, while being given the chance to imagine what the
synesthetic experience is like.
Nabokov's fiction often works in a similar way. The
protagonist of Lolita is afflicted with pederasty, and uses his
narrative platform to entice the reader into accepting him as a
likeable, charming man before actually having to witness the
horror of his ways. In a similar way, the "editor” of Pale Fire
portrays himself as a relevant authority whose commentary is
necessary for understanding the poem, and leverages that position
in order to relate numerous bizarre and dubious stories concerning
himself I found similarities between the narrative voice in the two
books and Nabokov's actual voice not only because of the brilliant
use of the English language in each, but also in the shared
psychological tendencies between them. The utility of subjectivity
in Nabokov's writing clearly is not limited to its power to enable
aesthetic bliss as an end in itself Subjectivity and imagination in
writing, combined with his view that "a major writer combines
these three - storyteller, teacher, enchanter,” are rather effective
means towards that end.^i The power of literature for Nabokov lies
in creating an entirely new world with which the reader is forced to
engage, not merely in crafting beautiful prose for the reader to
38
�read. The payoff in reading a book like Lolita does not rest only in
the beautiful composition of the last pages or the finding of any sort
of resolution; it is the journey on which Humbert Humbert takes us,
where we find enchantment and bewilderment within his universe,
that creates such pleasure for the reader. This is one of the first
lessons about which we are cautioned when learning how to be
good readers, according to Nabokov:
We should always remember that the work of art is
invariably the creation of a new world, so that the
first thing we should do is study that new world as
closely as possible, approaching it as something
brand new, having no obvious connection with the
worlds we already know.12
Thus far it seems that the benchmarks for good readership
of fiction have coincided with an appropriate reading of Speak,
Memory. Nabokov clearly has treated the world of this book in
ways rather similar to the worlds we witness in works of fiction As
it is related to the reader, Nabokov's personal universe has been
crafted according to his view of life as a subjective experience
rather than according to a strictly focused fidelity to the facts of his
development and the people involved in it. And, while we are
enticed to enter that world and be entertained by his nostalgic
meanderings about growing up as an aristocrat and all of the
indulgences such a lifestyle afforded him, there is something highly
problematic about applying this last maxim of "good readership" to
non-fiction, and particularly autobiography. Although Nabokov
says "the work of art is invariably the creation of a new world," in
the case of autobiography that statement seems to be false. Even if
we accept that autobiography is a personal account of one’s own
life that could serve any number of purposes (whether validating
his accomplishments or simply following the thematic designs of
his life), we have to further probe the nature of subjectivity both in
prose and in life as experienced to determine whether the
autobiography creates a veritably new world.
That it is impossible for me to fully understand anyone
else’s experience seems obvious - in this respect 1 agree with
39
�Nabokov’s assertion that "to be quite objective in these matters is
of course impossible.”^^ Our everyday lives, however, seem to
suggest that, as far as human beings are concerned, it is quite
possible to approximate an understanding of one another’s
experiences. Many of the foundations of society, including art, take
this as a given: that we all share roughly similar life experiences
and have the ability to identify with each other accordingly. This is
how Nabokov’s art can even function in the first place. Although I
can certainly appreciate Humbert Humbert’s universe being quite
different from my own, Nabokov relies upon conventions like
language, empathy, and morality to relate Humbert’s position to the
reader. While this fictional universe and countless others should
necessarily be treated as distinct from our own, Nabokov’s
universe in Speak Memory does not seem to deserve this treatment
at first glance. No matter how different his subjective experience is
from the reader’s, it has at the very least taken place (much to
Nabokov’s disappointment) in the same space and time dimensions
as the reader’s. He admits this much in the foreword, where he
describes the reactions to the book that close family and friends
had.
Many of them disputed the factual basis of certain
recollections, arguing that he had transferred details from one
memory to another (reminiscent of the aforementioned reflections
Nabokov offered in Chapter 8).
If we concede that someone other than Nabokov has the
right to make claims on the realities of the world in Speak, Memory,
then we can rightfully treat the book as taking place in a world not
entirely apart from our own. But given that we have already
accepted Nabokov’s contrary premises concerning the similarities
between autobiography and fiction, there seems to be a need for
compromise within his views on writing. We can preserve the
notion that certain books should be treated as creating universes
with no connection to our own (and that readers must treat them
as such), and let that set of literature be referred to as fiction. At
the same time, it is possible to consider treating all of the universes
created by the art of writing as occurring on a continuum, where
certain sorts of prose are intended to be congruent with our world.
Thus, rather than marking a strict distinction between fiction and
non-fiction, readers may respect the right of an author to ground
40
�himself in our world while maintaining a great degree of
subjectivity in interpreting that world. This mode seems to be
precisely the one that Nabokov seeks in Speak, Memory. While he
clearly wishes for the reader to understand this work as an account
of his life taking place in our world, it is a personal one where the
reader must embrace Nabokov's tendency to present his
experience of our world as pursuant to a subjective, highly
aesthetic worldview on par with the experience of characters we
find in fiction. This is not to say that Nabokov’s disposition is
necessarily unique, but the combination of his upbringing, literary
talent, and particularity concerning art are unusual enough to make
him seem that way.
Trying to place Nabokov’s autobiography on this literary
continuum recalls the notion that autobiographies seem to
generate their own value, which varies according to the author’s
motivation in writing an account of his own life. Speak, Memory is
probably as close to a fictional aesthetic as autobiography can get,
because Nabokov’s primary motivation is to engage the reader with
life recollections that he finds important primarily because they
contribute to his profile as a lover of beauty. While he presents
memories like the pursuit of an especially rare butterfly to show his
ability to appreciate beauty in the world, there are plenty of
complementary moments where Nabokov simply discourses on his
opinions. Rather than always relying on a real moment in time to
illustrate his views, he finds utility in simply explaining things like
his distaste for sleep: "1 simply cannot get used to the nightly
betrayal of reason, humanity, genius. No matter how great my
weariness, the wrench of parting with consciousness is
unspeakably repulsive to me.’’^^ It is statements like this one that
help to ground a story that would otherwise be practically surreal.
This latter objective—grounding his account in reality—
seems quite important to Nabokov. While it would be sufficient for
his private life to simply enjoy the pursuit of beauty and only
interface with memory when a certain memory would generate the
pleasure he seeks, that clearly is not all that he wishes to present to
the reader. For the writer is not just an enchanter and storyteller,
but a teacher as well. To that end, Nabokov’s decision to write an
account of his own life must have been in part spurred by a belief
41
�that he could teach his reader something with these recollections
that he could not do with his fiction. Because he seems to be
concerned with teaching about the human condition, it is fitting
that autobiography is distinct in certain ways from fiction. For
although we often find great comfort in lessons learned from
novels, depending exclusively on fiction to understand ourselves
might be an unhealthy sort of escapism.
While Nabokov does seem to partake of practices like
catching butterflies, writing literature and espousing a rejection of
time that might seem to be escapist, he hardly uses these as a way
of avoiding life’s unpleasantness (in a Schopenhauerian sort of
way). Nabokov’s embrace of aesthetic beauty is instead a positive
one, where he finds these sorts of pursuits to be life affirming.
Speak, Memory is the autobiography of a man who is truly content
with life, and who proves it by describing all of the pleasures he has
enjoyed despite the typical condition of man described in the
opening lines of the book: "The cradle rocks above an abyss, and
common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light
between two eternities of darkness.With this line Nabokov has
effectively primed the reader to "read with his spine.Having
framed the proceeding account of his own life in this context,
Nabokov demands that the reader appreciate the autobiography in
the same way that Nabokov appreciates aesthetic beauty: as an
experience that fortifies life’s luminescent moments against the
dark abyss surrounding them.
Endnotes
1. Nabokov. Speak, Memory: An Autobiography Revisited. New York: Vintage International,
1989. 9
2. Bowers and Nabokov. Lectures on Literature. San Diego: Harcourt, 1982.
3. SM, 27
4. GRAGW, 2
S.SM, 156
6.SM, 159
7. GRAGW, 4
8.SM,21
9. SM, 21
10. SM, 139
11. GRAGW, 5
12. GRAGW, 1
13. GRAGW, 4
14. SM, 108-109
42
�15.5M, 19
16. GRAGW, 6
Primary Texts
Nabokov, Vladimir Vladimirovich. Speak, Memory: An Autobiography
Revisited. New York, NY: Vintage International, 1989.
Nabokov, Vladimir Vladimirovich, and Fredson Bowers. Lectures on
Literature. San Diego, CA: Harcourt, 1982.
�Searching for Geometrical "Truth" in Einstein's Relativity
Jules Mancini
Einstein begins his combined work on the special and
general theories of relativity with a consideration of Euclidean
truth. His first chapter, titled Physical Meaning of Geometrical
Propositions, points out our tendency to determine the truth of an
idea via its connection to a real object in the physical world.
According to Einstein, however, "Geometry is not concerned with
the relation of the ideas involved in it to objects of experience, but
only with the logical connection of these ideas among themselves.
He challenges the reader, who is no doubt steeped in Euclid, by
asking, "What, then, do you mean by the assertion that these
propositions are true?" A distinction is drawn between truth as a
result of the human habit of thought, relegated to some senseobject, and truth as the internal consistency of a series of
propositions. If mathematical truth is ultimately limited to the
internal consistency of some set of ideas, what bearing does
mathematics have on physical phenomena? What bearing does
"pure” mathematics have on the theory of relativity? Expressing the
truth of physical phenomena ultimately seems to rely on
mathematics. How, then, are physical phenomena placed in
relationship with geometrical ideas?
While unpacking the general theory of relativity, Einstein
convinces us to abandon the world of Euclidean geometry. We also
discard the rigid body of reference and the Cartesian coordinate
system. We take the fork in the road that leads to non-Euclidean
geometry, non-rigid reference-bodies, and Gaussian coordinates.
What is at stake here? What changes mathematically between the
special and the general theory? Minkowski's four-dimensional
quasi-Euclidean space works for the special theory of relativity and,
Einstein says, "without it the general theory of relativity would
perhaps have got no farther than its long clothes.How does
Minkowski’s quasi-Euclidean world simultaneously function as a
culmination of the special theory and as a foundation for the
general theory?
44
�Einstein first speaks of Minkowski’s four-dimensional spacetime continuum at the end of his explication of the special theory of
relativity. Prior to introducing Minkowski, Einstein speaks of the
limits of the Cartesian system of coordinates, saying, "Every
description of events in space involves the use of a rigid body to
which such events have to be referred. The resulting relationship
takes for granted that the laws of Euclidean geometry hold for
'distances.’"^ Given this language, the reader is dubious from the
outset that the Cartesian coordinates will provide a sustainable
medium for representing physical phenomena. Nevertheless,
Einstein grants the reader the privilege of experiencing the
trajectory of growth from three-dimensional Euclidean space to
four-dimensional Euclidean space, and ultimately to four
dimensional non-Euclidean space.
Minkowski’s mathematical equations allow for a four
dimensional space-time continuum, which resembles Euclidean
three-dimensional space. What is a four-dimensional Euclidean
space and what purpose does it serve? A given point in threedimensional Euclidean space lies at the intersection of three
perpendicular coordinates x, y, z. This random point lies among
indefinite, infinitely dense points and, therefore, moving from one
to the next can constitute a continuum as opposed to requiring a
jump. Minkowski’s four-dimensional world is likewise a continuum,
though one comprised of space-time coordinates x, y, z, as well as t
for time. Simply adding t moves us from three-dimensional space to
four-dimensional space-time. However, how does this new four
dimensional world retain quasi-Euclidean properties?
Replacing t with the imaginary number
ct removes the
distinction between space and time coordinates and "the time
coordinate plays exactly the same role as the three space
coordinates...these four coordinates correspond exactly to the
three space coordinates in Euclidean geometry.How does the
imaginary number accomplish this important task of blurring the
lines between space and time? Einstein says, "If we choose as timevariable the imaginary variable
ct instead of the real quantity
t, we can regard the space-time continuum - in accordance with the
special theory of relativity - as a 'Euclidean’ four-dimensional
45
�continuum.'’^ There is a marked difference between having three
space coordinates plus a time coordinate and having four spacetime coordinates. Making the time coordinate indistinguishable
from the space coordinates allows Minkowski's space-time to
behave identically to Euclidean space. Minkowski’s four
dimensional world, in which time is represented by an imaginary
number, can fit into a three-dimensional paradigm. Put
mathematically, equations A and B below are functionally
equivalent. As Einstein says, "The analogy [between the equations]
is a complete one.”^
,1
Equation A:
X,
Equation B:
X,
a
,
,2
,
,2
4- X2 -|- X3
,
,1
-l- X2
,
2
= X,
,2 .
-h X3
'2
,
2
,
-X2 +X3
4
2
,
-I-X4 =x, -1-X2
+ X-,
H-X,
It seems impossible to talk about Minkowski without
reference to the Lorentz transformation. Still, given the scope of
this paper, 1 am going to avoid delving into the construction of the
Lorentz transformation. Suffice it to say that the shift from the
generalized Lorentz transformation to Minkowski’s world looks
something like this:
Lorentz;
+
y'^ + z'^ - c^t'^ ^x^+y^+z^- cY
Minkowski:
xf + x'2 + xf -h x'^ - Xj^ -I- X2 + X^ -V X^
The Lorentz coordinates turn into the Minkowski equation. Where
the Lorentz transformation has
for time, Minkowski’s time
coordinate takes on exactly the same appearance as the space
coordinates. In fact, Einstein goes further, asserting, "...'time’ enters
into natural laws in the same form as the space coordinates.’’^
Minkowski himself said, "Henceforth space by itself, and time by
itself, are doomed to fade away into mere shadows, and only a kind
of union of the two will preserve any independent reality.’’^
Minkowski’s quasi-Euclidean world is a necessary culmination of
the special theory because time is no longer absolute but
46
�dependent on the reference body, as seen in the example of relative
simultaneity. Time is embedded in space and relative to it. The
general theory of relativity also needs this blurring of the lines
between space and time. How does Minkowski’s world prove
foundational to general relativity?
Einstein’s approach to space-time under the general theory
hinges on Gaussian coordinates. Einstein introduces the Gaussian
coordinate system, most simply characterized as a more general
version of the Cartesian one, as necessary to the general theory of
relativity. Gaussian coordinates can apply to non-Euclidean
continua, and this seems to be why the general theory needs this
new system. Einstein says, "the description of the time-space
continuum by means of Gauss coordinates completely replaces the
description with the aid of a body of reference, without suffering
from the defects of the latter mode of description; it is not tied
down to the Euclidean character of the continuum which has to be
represented.’’^ However, Gaussian coordinates only apply to nonEuclidean continua when they are small enough to behave like their
Euclidean counterparts. What is the nature of this freedom if it
relies upon shrinking the non-Euclidean domain down to the actual
point where it behaves like the Euclidean one?
Gaussian coordinates can accommodate non-Euclidean four
dimensional space-time, whereas Cartesian coordinates only apply
to quasi-Euclidean four-dimensional space-time. Once Einstein
establishes that the space-time continuum is necessarily nonEuclidean, we are left with no choice but to abandon the Cartesian
coordinates in favor of those better able to represent the variations
present in non-Euclidean spaces (such as gravitational fields and
variably heated marble slabs]. In the case of the marble slab,
measuring rods are no longer directly reliable units of measure, as
the surface varies. In the case of the gravitational field, inertial
motion and the constancy of the velocity of light are challenged by
the deflection of light around a body such as the sun. Somehow,
Gaussian coordinates come to the rescue. Einstein says, "We assign
to every point of the continuum four numbers, x,,X2,X3,X4
(coordinates], which have not the least direct physical
significance.’’^^ It does not even matter which of the four represents
time. But this blurring of space and time was introduced earlier,
47
�with Minkowski, under the special theory of relativity. What is new
here?
The ability to accommodate the non-Euclidean is significant
and seems to begin when we free ourselves from the rigid
reference body, the external "real" object alleged to behave in a
Euclidean manner. Physical phenomena in the general theory
cannot correspond to rigid reference bodies because "in
gravitational fields there are no such things as rigid bodies with
Euclidean properties."^! In fact, rigid bodies in general become a
kind of fiction. The Cartesian coordinate system corresponds to
rigid bodies of reference whereas the Gaussian one relates to nonrigid reference bodies. Ultimately, Gaussian coordinates go further
and do away with reference body altogether.
This change in coordinate systems essentially replaces the
rigid with the arbitrary. No system based on rigid bodies can
directly give us position or time. Therefore, we "refer the four
dimensional space-time continuum in an arbitrary manner to Gauss
coordinates."!^ There seems to be some subtle difference between
placing our unit of measure in the surface as opposed to on the
surface. Einstein, in a footnote, speaks of the problems of using
Cartesian coordinates on the marble slab, saying, "The surface is
not a Euclidean continuum with respect to the rods, and we cannot
define Cartesian coordinates in the surface."'^^ Perhaps there is a
shift away from expressing a relationship between the coordinate
system and some surface and toward expressing the relationship of
one part of a surface to another part of it. Is one of these
approaches truer? If geometry only concerns itself with the ideas
internal to it, then the second option, in which points simply
encounter points, seems to better fulfill the requirements for
geometrical truth.
Regardless, given the constraints implicit in Cartesian
coordinates, it is clear that we need a new coordinate system.
Einstein declares, "The Gauss coordinate system has to take the
place of the body of reference."!^ The coordinate
system/measuring body replaces the rigid reference body. Einstein
continues, "The following statement corresponds to the
fundamental idea of the general principle of relativity: 'All Gaussian
coordinate systems are essentially equivalent for the formulation of
48
�the general laws of nature.’"'^'^ Does this mean that geometry has, in
some sense, absolute physical meaning? Special relativity required
us to perform the Lorentz transformation on its equations because
all reference bodies were not equally valid for the formulation of
natural laws (only rigid bodies of reference were suitable].
However, under the general theory, equations simply lead to
equivalent equations. No Lorentz transformation is necessary. All
transformations are reduced to transitions in the coordinates
themselves, as all coordinates are equally valid for the general laws
of nature. There is no need to calculate a new value to account for
rotation; in fact the coordinates themselves aren’t even “real"
values. The general laws of nature must persist regardless of which
coordinates are chosen.
Still, I am struggling to see the freeing of space-time from
the rigid body of reference in the Gaussian equations themselves.
What is the radical difference between the two equations below?
ds^ =dx^~ +dx2 +dx2 -^dx^
ds^ = g, I+ Ig^^dx^dx^ + gjit&Z + Ig^^dx^dx, + g^^dx^ + Ig^^dx^dx^ + g^^dx^
The first equation is an example of a Euclidean continuum in which
Cartesian coordinates would hold. It requires that the u-curves and
v-curves are straight lines.
However, the idea of a straight line has lost all meaning.^^ Further,
"according to the general principle of relativity, the space-time
continuum cannot be regarded as a Euclidean one."i^ The second
equation reflects a curved space-time continuum in which
Euclidean geometry no longer holds. The g numbers are
magnitudes corresponding in a "perfectly definite way” to u and v
(here simply dxi and so on] (80].These g magnitudes also
"determine the behavior of the rods relative to the u-curves and v49
�curves.”!^ Perhaps splitting the g magnitudes into two categories
will help. The magnitudes
show up when we are
simply dealing with the same point twice, as it is squared in the
equation. However, ^12’^23’5^34 show up when we are dealing with
the value (still "perfectly definite"] that lies between gi and g2.
Instead of squaring a single point, we multiply adjacent points (for
example for gu we would multiply dxi and dx2]. Given that the g
values determine the behavior of the rods, calculating ^22 allows us
to know the relationship of the surface between two points, which
thereby allows us to determine distance.
Einstein offers a summary, saying, "Gauss invented a
method for the mathematical treatment of continua in general, in
which ‘size-relations’ ('distances' between neighboring points] are
defined.”i5 Prior to introducing Gaussian coordinates and nonEuclidean geometry, Einstein says that "we are not in a position to
define exactly the coordinates x,y, z relative to the disc by means of
the method used in discussing the special theory, and as long as the
coordinates and times of events have not been defined, we cannot
assign an exact meaning to the natural laws in which these occur."20
We are seeking exact definitions, which will in turn provide us with
the exact meaning of natural laws. The Gaussian solution seems to
lie in defining the coordinates and times of events arbitrarily, in
such a way that they are internally consistent and fully adaptable to
endless variations, as opposed to being relegated to an external,
rigid sense object. This shift returns us to the introductory
chapter’s exploration of geometry and physical meaning. Are
Gaussian coordinates, given their internal relationship to one
another, somehow a truer geometrical expression? Can this internal
relationship of one arbitrarily numbered point on the surface to
another one really convey any physical meaning?
According to Einstein, physical meaning always boils down
to encounters involving the space-time coincidence of two events.
Under special relativity, encounters relied on having two distinct
entities - a reference body (as a sort of base to which events are
referred] and a means of measuring the coincidence of events
(clock, rod, coordinate system, etc.]. General relativity, on the other
hand, abandons the reference body, and encounters occur between
50
�points themselves. The coordinate system functions as both
reference body and system of measurement. Einstein speaks at
length about such encounters, saying,
The only statements having regard to these points which can claim a
physical existence are in reality the statements about their
encounters. In our mathematical treatment, such an encounter is
expressed in the fact that the two lines which represent the motions
of the points in question have a particular set of coordinate values,
Xl,X2,X3,X4 in common. After mature consideration the reader will
doubtless admit that in reality such encounters constitute the only
actual evidence of a time-space nature with which we meet in
physical statements...Every physical description resolves itself into a
number of statements, each of which refers to the space-time
coincidence of two events A and B. In terms of Gaussian coordinates,
every such statement is expressed by the agreement of their four
coordinates Xl,X2,X3,X4?^
Points replace the body of reference in the Gaussian system and we
can make physical descriptions of events simply by stating their
coincidental coordinates. Gaussian coordinates accomplish a
monumental task by freeing geometrical expressions from external
sense objects, which in turn enables physical meaning to operate
on itself mathematically, with an internal logical consistency, and
without reference to any "real" object lying outside of it. The
geometrical expressions themselves become statements with
physical meaning. Ironically, it is as though freedom from the
physical is ultimately what lays the foundation for articulating
physical meaning.
Einstein, in the final chapter, speaks more generally about
geometry and physical meaning, saying, "According to the general
theory of relativity, the geometrical properties of space are not
independent, but they are determined by matter."22 Thus, if we are
to have anything logically sound to say about the universe, we must
51
�regard matter as knowable. At first glance it seems as though we
are back to the logical fallacy of the opening chapter, in which we
are tempted to refer truth to sensible objects. However, perhaps
something different is at work here. If geometrical properties are
dependent on matter, then it either seems as though there are few,
if any, absolute geometrical truths or that matter is everywhere the
same. Could one interpret this to imply that geometry is relative?23
After completing his work on the general theory of
relativity, Einstein wrote an essay titled Geometry and Experience.
In this essay Einstein says that "as far as the laws of mathematics
refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain,
they do not refer to reality...yet on the other hand it is certain that
mathematics generally, and particularly geometry, owes its
existence to the desire to learn something about the behavior of
real things.”34 p[as Einstein found a way, with Minkowski’s four
dimensional world and Gauss’ coordinate system, to retain the
certainty of geometrical propositions while also referring those
ideas to physical descriptions? Minkowski and Gauss take steps
away from experience, blurring the lines between space and time
and abandoning rigid reference bodies, respectively. The end result
seems to be a self-contained geometrical whole, which is both an
internally sound theory, and also, at its core, a set of physical
descriptions. Geometrical propositions are only concerned with the
"logical connection of these ideas among themselves,” and yet the
connection of those ideas—here as coordinates—directly describes
the physical world.
Endnotes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Einstein. Relativity: The Special and General Theory. Nevk^York: Penguin, 2006. 8
Ibid., 54
Ibid., 12
Ibid., 54
Ibid., 84
Ibid., 112
Ibid., Ill
'Space And Time’, a translation of an address delivered at the 80th Assembly of German
Natural Scientists and Physicians, at Cologne, 21 Sep 1908.
9. Relativity, 87
10. Ibid., 86
52
�11. Ibid., 89
12. Ibid., 86
13. Ibid.,
14. Ibid., 78
15. Ibid., 75
16. Ibid., 85
17. Ibid., 80
18. ibid.
19. Ibid., 82-82
20. Ibid., 75
21. Ibid., 86
22. Ibid., 103
23. Matter determines geometrical properties and geometrical properties in turn
determine natural laws, as all Gauss coordinates are equivalent for the formulation of
natural laws. Thus it seems that geometry is relative to the matter in question and yet, if
all coordinates lead to equivalent natural laws, there must be some absolute geometrical
truths. Does geometry somehow accommodate the infinite variations in matter by limiting
the laws of nature?
24. Pesic, Peter. Beyond Geometry: Classic Papers from Riemann to Einstein. Dover
Publications, 2007.147-8.
Primary Texts
Einstein, Albert. Relativity: The Special and General Theory. Penguin
Classics, New York: 2006.
Minkowski, Hermann. 'Space And Time,' a translation of an address
delivered at the 80th Assembly of German Natural Scientists and
Physicians at Cologne, September 21,1908.
Pesic, Peter. Beyond Geometry: Classic Papers from Riemann to Einstein.
Dover Publications, 2007. Pages 147-8.
53
�Nietzsche's Philosopher: The Antagonistic Redeemer
Mary Creighton
10[175]
Hatred of Mediocrity is unworthy of a philosopher: it is almost a question mark
over his right to 'philosophy.' Precisely because he is the exception, he must take the
rule under his wing, must help everything average to keep up faith in itself
Nietzsche's recurring insights into the 'herd' and the
'mediocre' in his Writings from the Late Notebooks inform us that a
"desperate," "dangerous," and "irreversible mediocratisation" has
befallen 19* century European culture. Nietzsche postulates
"everything we in Europe today are used to admiring as 'feeling for
humanity,' as 'morality,' 'humaneness,' 'sympathy,'" etc., is "nothing
other than the diminishment of the whole human type.''^ It is a
phenomenon in which man "sinks" and gives rise to the "herd
animal." Nietzsche continually refers back to this notion of the
mediocre as a diagnosis of European man - so much so that it
becomes a highly charged term in his entire telos, if in fact he can
be said to have one. However, on page 203, a peculiar passage
arises in which he describes the archetypal figure of the
philosopher. Standing apart from the "superman" or "oversoul"^
who is described as the antithesis and redeemer to the mediocre,
Nietzsche introduces the philosopher as the "exception" to the
mediocre. Nietzsche writes in Note 10[175];
Hatred of Mediocrity is unworthy of a philosopher: it
is almost a question mark over his "right" to
philosophy. Precisely because he is the exception, he
must take the rule under his wing, must help
everything average to keep up faith in itself.^
In this passage, the characterization of the philosopher as
"exception" implies that there is a kind of intellectual position
taken in the method of his philosophy that somehow circumvents
his falling prey to mediocrity. This essay will explore what makes
54
�hatred unworthy of the philosopher, what exactly his "right” to
philosophy entails, and how he must take the rule under his wing to
help the average keep up faith in itself
Mediocratisation:
The Sleepless Sphinx
Nietzsche’s "suspicion, which keeps returning; [his] concern,
which never lies down to sleep . . . [his] sphinx, alongside which
there is more than one abyss," refers to the phenomenon of
"mediocratisation” that has proliferated among the European
nations in the 19* centuryMediocratisation is marked by a
subscription to values that weaken and soften "powerful [and]
fundamental drives.”^ These powerful and fundamental drives are
replaced by drives prescribed for the masses rather than drives
that emerge organically within an individual. Nietzsche’s favorite
examples of such weakening drives are due entirely to the
influence of European Democracy and Christian morality, most
aptly embodied in the moral values of "selflessness” and "equality.”
While the powerful and fundamental drives are the mark of one’s
will to power, impulses toward values like selflessness and equality
are self-negating and self-diminishing. To posit that all men are
equal, as democracy does, inspires men to accept their position as
no better or worse than their fellow citizens. To instill such beliefs
in the heart of man is to teach him to suppress all that is unique
about him. In doing this, man reduces himself holding the
conviction that he is only as valuable as his neighbor. Furthermore,
"selflessness,” a Christian moral virtue, encourages a similar
phenomenon whereby one denies or sacrifices themselves for the
sake of another. If everyone sacrifices their self for another, no one
has the capacity to rise to greatness and demonstrate strength of
character in any of its awe-inspiring forms. With such values,
whence does greatness burgeon?
Ultimately, Nietzsche finds any value that suppresses the
individual for the sake of the masses to be one that encourages a
"herd” instinct. Furthermore, Christian morality, "the illusion of the
species,’’^ establishes one system of right behaviors, right desires,
and right existence that applies to such masses. This attempt to
55
�establish the "right" desires for the masses is at odds with the very
heart of Nietzsche's notion of the individual. These systems
"cultivate” and "develop the herd animal in man” and "push back
those other and opposite virtues which give rise to a new, higher,
stronger” species.^ Furthermore, these values instill an "instinctive
conspiracy of the whole herd against everything that is shepherd,
beast of prey, hermit and Caesar, to preserve and elevate the weak,
the oppressed, the mediocre.”^ It is important to consider that the
shepherd, the hermit, the Caesar, etc., are not distinct from the herd
simply because they are not characterized by "feeling for
humanity,” "morality,” "humaneness,” or "sympathy,” but because
they deviate from the status quo, or the "herd.” Their distinction is
characterized by the fact that they hold a blind allegiance to the
behaviors of the general public. The latter mark the masses or the
herd; the former mark the individual(s3 who stands apart from it.
Why Hatred is Unworthy of the Philosopher:
Hatred as a moral position
Hatred, for Nietzsche, is "a mob pose”^ because it takes a
moral position against another. On page 243 of Writings from the
Late Notebooks, Nietzsche claims, "Hating is a value judgment ruled
by revenge.”!® Revenge and resentment are in direct opposition to
one’s will to power in that they transfer responsibility for one's
personal sufferings onto another. To say this in other words, one
would not hate if one could change one’s situation oneself. This
explains why such emotional responses are a "mob pose.” It is the
manner of the mob (the "quiescent herd”] to resent and hate the
ruling "superior” class. Because the ruling or superior class is more
powerful than he, the common man has systematically deemed that
which is powerful to be dangerous.!! Thus, the lower class hates
and resents the dangerous powerful class of "superior” men. With
this pattern in mind, we can understand why Nietzsche defines
such moral and emotional responses as characteristic of the
common man.
Hatred must in fact be a moral position because it implies
that the mediocre (the potentially "hated” in this case) could not be
otherwise. This is to say that there is no free will on the part of the
56
�mediocre insofar as they are unable to, on account of their own
willing, change their situation. To endorse the notion that there is
no free will is to subscribe to the Christian postulate that man’s fate
is in fact determined by a God or a divine will. To say it another
way, man’s only excuse for his incapacity to change his state [as a
mediocre being) is that God himself has willed it or determined him
irrevocably as such. With this determinist view of nature, it would
then mean that the philosopher himself was taking a Christian
moral position in the act of hating the mediocre. For the
philosopher to be a man who has himself ascended above
mediocrity, he would in fact have to subscribe to the belief that
either there is free will, or that man is without a will at all.
Nietzsche does not maintain that free will is the means by
which the mediocre must rise above their state. Rather, he
maintains that there is no will at all. Man may alter his state by his
drives, his will to power. In this sense, the philosopher could hold
the mediocre in contempt for not rising to the will to power, but
such hatred would be altogether irrelevant. It is unworthy because
the act of hatred would reduce him to a state of moral valuation in
which he becomes resigned to the powerless nature of mankind,
resigned to reside in hatred, which is a moral judgment and not a
philosophical position. "Hatred" looks down upon the masses
because they are [helplessly] mediocre, rather than because they
are allowing themselves to dwell among the herd.^^
The Philosopher's Right to Philosophy:
The Exception to the rule
Nietzsche considers that thus far, all philosophers have been
unworthy of the title because their task has been merely a will to
Truth and to moral arbitration. These men "hold fast some large
body of valuations ... of previous assignments and creations of
value [logical or moral ones).”!^ This "kind" of philosopher is
engaged in "summarizing and abbreviating" the "present and the
past" by "making all events and all evaluations up to now easy to
survey, easy to think through, to grasp, to manage.’’^^ Nietzsche
thinks that these "philosophical labourers" embody the mildest
form of philosophy, serving almost more as historians than
57
�philosophers. Nietzsche claims that the "only way [he] still allow[s]
[philosophy] to stand is as the most general form of history;"i5 such
intellectual work belongs more to the field of history than to that of
philosophy. Instead, Nietzsche reserves the name of philosophy for
a more stalwart enterprise. Nietzsche warns his readers not to
allow the term "philosopher" to be "confined to the philosopher
who writes books, or even introduces his philosophy into books."i6
This historian-philosopher explicates or translates cultural and
intellectual behaviors, but he himself does not does create or
produce them. He is not a "legislator of valuations."i7 A philosopher
who can "command and legislate" emphatically proclaims, "this is
how it shall be."^^ His words do not include rococo drapery to
disguise moral teachings. This "legislator of new values arises with
a new and unprecedented terror"i9 because he stands outside of
the previous status quo, which has adopted a purely moral
interpretation of Truth. It is this type of philosopher that stands as
an exception to the mediocre.
For Nietzsche, the philosophic tradition, the very will to
Truth (incontrovertibly, the goal that has marked the entire
enterprise] has been conflated with Virtue and Happiness. This
tradition has reigned since the time of the Ancients^o, as seen in the
work of Aristotle who equated the notion of the "good" with the
"Truth," thereby demonstrating the only path to "happiness. "21
Nietzsche sarcastically references this notion in his section of
aphoristic splendors in Beyond Good and Evil when he writes,
"Where there is the tree of knowledge, there is always Paradise."22
Similarly, Nietzsche claims that "nobody will very readily regard a
doctrine as true merely because it makes people happy or
virtuous;"23 however, these are the very conclusions Aristotle's
Ethics draws. The desire for Truth is inextricably bound, for
traditional philosophers, to the will to Morality; if it is not the
impulse to Truth itself that drives a man to be moral, then it is the
hope for life that will.
In establishing the very idea of Truth as something
apodictic, one finds that there are only means of behaving, of
existing. Ultimately, these means are defined by whatever
behaviors serve this established Truth. Our philosophic tradition
has told us that "the certain is worth more than the uncertain, that
58
�illusion is less valuable than truth.'’^^ Man wants to find certainty;
he wants a causa sui. Thus, Nietzsche claims, the role of God and the
accompanying moral code satisfy man’s longing for such certainty.
This notion is demonstrated most aptly by the Socratic teachings,
whereby man finds that Virtue is in fact knowledge.^s By equating
the idea of Truth with morality or virtue, there lies the temptation
to assert that all impulse to Truth is in fact moral. Not only has this
premise been held as impervious, but also it has been recapitulated
in the work of all philosophers. On page 17 of Beyond Good and
Evil, Nietzsche writes.
The power of moral prejudices has penetrated deeply
into the most intellectual world, the world
apparently most indifferent and unprejudiced, and
has obviously operated in an injurious, obstructive,
blinding and distorting manner.26
Such moral philosophy "always creates a world in its own image”^^
because the philosopher is "secretly influenced by his instincts"28 to
perpetuate a moral imperative. Previous philosophers who have
attempted to circumvent such prejudices seem to fall terribly short.
The "thou shall" commands of these philosophers "on no account
sound to their ears like an T want,’ but rather 'only as the command
of a God do they dare to discharge their task.”’^^ in this case, the
philosopher’s proclamations are merely echoes of externally
imposed moral valuations. This is why "this same will to blindness
rules among the founders of religion.’’^^ Take one of Nietzsche’s
favorite examples, Immanuel Kant: His attempt to discover a
groundbreaking philosophy is for Nietzsche little more than a
reiteration of the moral world order. Hidden in this moral
argonaut’s^i discussion of a Categorical Imperative, Kant reaffirms
the idea that there is one single system by which all men may
achieve moral truths— and that this is inherent in us by means of a
priori synthetic judgments. This establishes a moral code for all of
mankind, implying that all people ultimately share the same
valuations. This is the very basis of Nietzsche’s fear that all
metaphysics thus far has served as merely a handmaiden to
Theology. Similarly, we are reminded that "a virtuous man is a
59
�lower species if only because he is not a 'person' but acquires his
value from conforming to a schema of man that has been fixed once
and for all."^^ This "fixed" state of "once and for all” characterizes
the precise nature of Kant’s Categorical Imperative. This kind of
behavior amounts to little more than Christian moral cheerleading
and is for Nietzsche congruent with the mediocre person’s instinct
to follow the herd rather than stand outside of it and make
valuations for one’s self. Nietzsche calls for a braver kind of
philosopher: one who boldly stands outside this moral imperative,
outside the herd.
The philosopher’s "right” to philosophy is his ability to stand
outside of moral philosophy as it has been practiced thus far. The
right to philosophy is his because he is the exception to the rule, to
the mediocre. The philosopher of exception does not make moral
prescriptions a part of his intellectual pursuit. It is the courage and
wisdom of the philosopher to function as a supramoral figure. For
Nietzsche, this means stepping outside of moral examinations of
humanity, as well as purely intellectual illuminations of it. The
philosopher stands outside the mass, moral valuations, and
predetermined philosophical constructs. Nietzsche describes the
"heights of the soul” whereby the philosopher belongs to an
"esoteric class” that "views things from above downwards.”^^ These
"things” that the philosopher views are human behaviors, human
"insights,” and human "follies.”^^ On page 220, our exceptional
philosopher writes.
One should at last put human values nicely back in
the corner where alone they have any right to be: as
personal little values. Many species of animal have
already disappeared; if man disappeared as well,
nothing would be lacking in the world. One must be
enough of a philosopher to admire even this
nothingness (- nil admirari
For Nietzsche, if man were to disappear, and thus his moral
valuations with him, there would be "nothing lacking in the world.”
Implicitly stated in this is the fact there would be no goodness or
evil lacking in the world either. Such moral valuations are contrived
60
�and imposed upon the world by man himself. This nothingness,
this extramoral landscape, can only be admired when one has come
to understand human values as symptomatic of a contrived moral
system. Truth, if it exists at all, is marked by "the degree to which
we permit ourselves to understand the fact" that "moral distinction
is only perspectivally conditioned."^^ If the philosopher aspires to
any Truth at all, it is to remove the moral lens through which men
have traditionally viewed human behavior. Removing this lens, one
may freely admire the view: a nothingness that merely lies
lackluster under an indifferent, ever retreating horizon.
The philosopher is the exception because he shares the
qualities of a "stronger species.The "means by which a stronger
species preserves itself' is by "granting [itself] a right to
exceptional actions."^^ The exceptional action of the philosopher is
the conducting of his intellectual work outside of the moral
imperative. This is itself "an attempt at self-overcoming and
freedom": "an ascendency in respect to one’s strength of will."^^
This is the most apt description of Nietzsche’s concept of the self
overcoming of man.
The Rule Under His Wing;
The Philosopher as Antagonistic Redeemer
If approaching the universe and formulating values outside
of a moral world-order is "a great stretching of the limbs" for
philosophers [who are "warriors of knowledge’’], so much more of
a stretch must it be for the general public, whom Nietzsche regards
pejoratively as "the mediocre.’’40 For the "beast in us wants to be
lied to - morality is a necessary lie.’”^i Morality is necessary only
insofar as our plebian lusts for an ordered world depend on it.
However, what this new philosopher provides is a rousing of spirits
away from such established moral systems, replacing them with
the strength to formulate such valuations for oneself. In this sense,
the philosopher is not only the exception to mediocrity, but a model
for its abandonment. Submitting to the self-negating moral
postulates of the mediocre is a "symptom of weakness" that is
"incompatible with an ascending and affirmative life.’’'’^^ -The
philosopher’s affirmation and ascension are seen in a "replacement
61
�of morality by the will to our goal, and consequently to the means
of gaining it... [and a] replacement of the categorical imperative by
the natural imperative."^^ The idea of ascension is significant
because it implies a rising above that which is average to a superior
position.
The philosopher’s self-overcoming ascends, beckoning all
others to do the same. If it were simply the responsibility of the
philosopher to inspire the mere imitation of his behaviors, it would
then mean that his role is to help everyone average keep up faith in
themselves. However, this is not the statement that Nietzsche makes
in Note 10[175]. Rather, he "must take the rule under his wing and
help everything average keep up faith in itseW (italics mine). We
must remember that despite the fact that the philosopher is the one
that "takes the rule under his wing," he is no angelic redeemer. He
is a commander, a legislator! The philosopher commands his
underlings, "thou shall."'’^'^ In this sense, he is an antagonizes This
antagonistic redeemer, if we may call him such, does not extend a
hand to us, but "arises with a new and unprecedented terror."'^^
Such antagonistic and terror-inspiring legislation only serves to
threaten the individual. In the old model, everything powerful was
considered dangerous; power inspires terror. However, without
moral valuations and labels ("You evil thing!”) to justify such terror,
one has no choice but to react, respond, fight and command back.
There is no more "considerateness, tact and forbearance, of goodnatured pause before the rights of others ... [no more] benevolent
instinct of human values in general, which reveals itself in trust and
credit. .. [and] respect for men."^^ This inspires the emergence of
an individual whose "genesis and survival are different from those
of the average man"'*^^: "Their 'knowing' is creating, their creating is
law-giving, their will to truth is - Will to Power."^^
Confronted with this antagonism, the average man must
keep up faith in himself in order to survive. The average thing is
average no longer; rather, it becomes stronger, bolder— more
individual. It is in this process that one learns how one becomes
what one is: that is to say, by necessity.
62
�Endnotes
1. Nietzsche, Friedrich. Writings from the Late Notebooks. Cambridge Texts in the
History of Philosophy, Cambridge: 2003. pp 67.
2. Ibid., 177
3. Ibid., 203
4. Ibid., 67
5. Ibid.
6. Ibid., 113
7. Ibid., 68
8. Ibid.
9. Ibid., 172
10. Ibid., 243
11. Nietzche, Friedrich. Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future.
Dover Publications Inc., New York: 1997. pp 128.
12. At first glance, this reasoning seems helpful and correct: The philosopher is "above"
hatred because he believes in the free will of individual. Furthermore, he believes that all
of the individuals that comprise what Nietzsche call the 'herd' and the ‘mediocre,’ have the
free will and the capacity to rise above their state. However, true to form, Nietzsche
challenges many of the intellectual traditions that we have thus far taken for granted.
Nietzsche claims it is false to take two antithetical concepts and thus infer an implicit
proposition from an explicit one. An example of this kind of antithetical inference is seen
in the idea that "hatred of a world that makes us suffer expresses itself in the imagining of
a different world” [141). In this example, one uses the fact of lament over suffering as a
basis for proving that a world without suffering is also possible; otherwise, one would
have no reason to lament at all. Simply put, the world could not be any other way.
However, for our pioneering polemicist, this kind of deduction would be a "blind trust in
Reason" (141). Such deductions set up the world as necessarily [and falsely) causal and
dialectical (141). On page 141, he continues to assert that such conclusions are so
instilled in man’s rational tradition; however, such tradition is not enough to "prove what
is asserts" (142). With this consideration in mind, would it then be false to make the claim
that hatred of the mediocre implicitly suggests that the mediocre could be otherwise.
13. Nietzche, Friedrich. Writings, 39
14. Ibid.
15. Ibid., 26
16. Nietzche, Friedrich. Beyond, 29
17. Nietzche, Friedrich. Writings, 39
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid.
20. Nietzsche's earliest examples are those of Aristotle and Plato but these were not
necessarily the first.
21. Most explicitly discussed in Aristotle’s The Nicomachean Ethics.
22. Nietzche, Friedrich. Beyond, 52
23. Ibid.,
24. Ibid., 3
25. This marks the most significant conclusions of Plato’s Protagoras.
26. Ibid., 17
27. Ibid., 6
28. Ibid., 2
29. Nietzche, Friedrich. Writings, 39
63
�30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
Ibid.
Nietzche, Friedrich. Ecce Homo. Penguin Classics, London: 2004. pp. 71
Nietzche, Friedrich. Writings, 187
Nietzche, Friedrich. Beyond, 23
Ibid.
Nietzche, Friedrich. Writings, 220
Ibid., 200
Ibid., 229
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid., 220
Ibid., 69
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Ecce Homo, 98
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Writings, 146
Ibid., 39
Ibid.
Ibid., 203
Ibid., 177
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond, 83
Primary Texts
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the
Future. Dover Publications Inc., New York: 1997.
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Ecce Homo. Penguin Classics, London: 2004.
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Writings from the Late Notebooks. Cambridge Texts
in the History of Philosophy, Cambridge: 2003.
64
�Prince Myshkin's Beautiful Horizon: Exploring Death and
the Infinite in Dostoevsky's The Idiot
Kevin Cowling
Dostoevsky's novel The Idiot, through the character of
Prince Lev Nikolaevich Myshkin, presents the reader with a man
who claims access to knowledge of the infinite. More precisely, the
Prince claims at times in the novel that he has experienced and has
witnessed others experiencing moments in which they "know
everything.” These are the moments that seem to inspire so much
joy in the prince. They may also be to blame for his decision to act
candidly with everyone in society after returning from four years in
a Swiss sanatorium where he was treated for his epileptic
condition, even though participating in society is somehow painful
to him.i It is the decisions behind these actions—and the actions
themselves—that deserve further exploration, particularly because
Myshkin's character is contrasted so starkly with other characters
presented in the novel, notably Ippolit Terentyev [another sick
young man) and Parfyon Semyonovich Rogozhin. Each of these
characters, in his own way, also faces death in the novel. Ippolit
even seems to access the same type of infinite feelings that we see
Myshkin describing on many occasions.
What, however,
differentiates their experiences from Myshkin's, making them
unable to see the beauty of life as the prince does? Myshkin seems
to act in order to help others find the infinite that he himself has
known, but his actions do not lead these characters to see the
infinite in the same way. Is Myshkin's access to the infinite
fundamentally different from the experiences of those around him?
It will first be fruitful to look at some examples of how
Myshkin describes his experiences and conceptions of the infinite,
which he discusses with Lizaveta Epanchin and her three daughters
on the day he returns to Petersburg. In relating anecdotes of his
experiences abroad, the prince begins to discuss the improvements
brought about by his treatment and thus his increasing number of
walks around the Swiss village. He then talks about an experience
he had just outside the village:
65
�I kept thinking about how I was going to live; I
wanted to test my fate, I became restless especially at
certain moments.
You know, there are such
moments, especially in solitude.... Also at noon
sometimes, when I'd wander off somewhere into the
mountains, stand alone halfway up a mountain, with
pines all around, old, big, resinous; up on a cliff
there's an old, ruined medieval castle, our little
village is far down, barely visible; the sun is bright,
the sky blue, the silence terrible. Then there would
come a call to go somewhere, and it always seemed
to me that if I walked straight ahead, and kept on for
a long, long time, and went beyond that line where
sky and earth meet, the whole answer would be
there, and at once I'd see a new life, a thousand times
stranger and nosier than ours; ...And then it seemed
to me that in prison, too, you could find an immense
life.2
Here, in his mention of the horizon, Myshkin relates to the
Epanchin girls his initial impressions of the infinite. The striking
thing about this impression is that, even here, where it seems that
this infinite horizon is unreachable, Myshkin's response is a
positive and not a negative one. Even more can be gained from this
insight if it is coupled with a quotation from the previous page:
'We came to Lucerne, and 1 was taken across the lake.
I felt how good it was, but 1 also felt terribly
oppressed,’ said the prince.
‘Why?’ asked Alexandra.
‘I don’t understand why. I always feel oppressed and
uneasy when I look at such nature for the first time—
both good and uneasy.’^
In both of these instances the prince is describing times when he
was in a natural environment and how those experiences affected
him. Knowing that scenes of nature make him feel "oppressed," but
knowing also that they bring him a good feeling, allows for deep
66
�insight into Myshkin's experience of the horizon discussed above.
It is quite likely that in looking toward the horizon and feeling a
need to move toward it, into some kind of infinite space, the prince
feels an immense oppression. Pair this with his solitude and the
fact that he himself has a corrupt nature (his sickness), and it is
clear that his feelings regarding the horizon do not appear to have
been exclusively positive. If this is the case, then he made a choice
about his convictions concerning this infinity that is present before
him, yet not attainable. The closing lines of the initial quote of this
paragraph seem to show that his choice has been made. Myshkin
has chosen to think about the horizon not as a limiting factor in his
life, but as something that will open his eyes to allow him to see the
beauty of all of the things that surround him. Even an environment
as oppressive as a prison cannot overcome the immensity of the
beauty that he chooses to see in that horizon.
This is just the first of many examples wherein the prince
discusses his feelings regarding the infinite, and it would be unfair
to say that somehow this moment sums up everything Myshkin
feels on the subject. Later in his meeting with the Epanchins, the
infinite again arises, but this time through anecdotes about two
men who are facing their own death. It is in these descriptions that
Myshkin's thoughts become entangled with questions of mortality,
a theme that pervades the way characters in the novel either
experience, or at least approach the possibility of experiencing, the
infinite bliss that Myshkin contemplates above. The first story
involves a man who is sentenced to death by firing squad, but is
told only a quarter of an hour later that his sentence has been
lessened and that he will not be killed. Myshkin describes a
conversation with this man:
He knew beforehand what he was going to think
about: he kept wanting to picture to himself as
quickly and vividly as possible how it could be like
this: now he exists and lives, and in three minutes
there would be something, some person or thing—
but who? and where? He wanted to resolve it all in
those two minutes! There was a church nearby, and
the top of the cathedral with its gilded dome shone in
67
�the bright sun. He remembered gazing with terrible
fixity at that dome and the rays shining from it: it
seemed to him that those rays were his new nature
and in three minutes he would somehow merge with
them...The ignorance of and loathing for this new
thing that would be and would come presently were
terrible; yet he said that nothing was more
oppressive for him at that moment than the constant
thought: 'What if 1 were not to die! What if life were
given back to me—what infinity! And it would all be
mine! Then I'd turn each minute into a whole age. I'd
lose nothing. I'd reckon up every minute separately.
I'd let nothing be wasted!"^
There is a parallel here between the prince's experience with the
horizon and the experience of the man sentenced to death, only the
man sentenced to death seems to have added something:
knowledge of his impending death. The idea of merging with the
reflected rays of sunshine is almost identical to the idea of walking
into the horizon; that is, Myshkin's desire to merge with the infinite
and find "the whole answer" is the same feeling that the prisoner
finds when contemplating his existence merging with the reflected
rays. The problem is that Myshkin desires this mysterious infinity
when not faced with death. The prisoner, on the other hand, feels
so oppressed by the thought that he might merge with the infinite
that his desire is only for life and the infinite opportunity that it
seems to offer in opposition to the certainty of death. But are these
two views really different? Is the prisoner's desire given the
opportunity to embrace life different from Myshkin's desire to
merge with the infinite? As stated above, Myshkin knows that this
horizon and this infinite knowledge are somehow unattainable, but
through his experience he encounters ways to glimpse this infinite.
Both Myshkin and the prisoner seem to have had a glimpse of this
infinite and both have decided to take the oppression that it makes
them feel and turn it back on itself, using this oppression to import
a positive view of the world into their everyday existence.
This view seems to be further reinforced later in the
conversation. After explaining the feelings of the prisoner and the
68
�fact that the prisoner was eventually pardoned, Myshkin and the
Epanchin girls discuss the story:
'Did he live 'reckoning up' every minute?' asked
Alexandra.
'Oh, no, he told me himself—1 asked him about it—he
didn't live that way at all and lost many, many
minutes.'
'Well, so, there's experience for you, so it's impossible
to live really "keeping a reckoning." There's always
some reason why it's impossible.'
'Yes, for some reason it's impossible,' the prince
repeated. '1 thought so myself...But still it's somehow
hard to believe...'
'That is, you think you can live more intelligently
than everyone else?' asked Aglaya.
'Yes, I've sometimes thought so....And...l still do.'^
The prince states in this dialogue that although he has shared some
sort of experience with this prisoner, he feels that he can somehow
succeed where the prisoner has failed. He admits here that what
the prisoner has set out to do is impossible. One cannot try to live
each moment of life as if it were the most precious of moments.
Even the prisoner, who faced death, could not achieve that goal.
But with all of the evidence against him, the prince cannot help but
feel that his convictions about the impossibility of the goal are
wrong: he has the ability to "live more intelligently" than one
whose convictions on the subject should, it would seem, be
stronger than his.
After the story of the prisoner, the prince is once again
called to talk further about his ideas with the Epanchin girls.
Aglaya, the youngest of the Epanchin girls, seems remarkably
intrigued by his positive attitude, even in the face of the prisoner's
story. She then questions the prince about what it might be like to
witness an execution, an experience that Myshkin has discussed
previously in the novel with General Epanchin's valet. Aglaya
presses the prince to recount this moment as well, and the prince
once again begins to discuss the themes of the infinite and how one
69
�can find goodness even in the most trying of circumstances. The
discussion centers on the face of the man about to be executed. In
the prince's opinion, this face would be a wonderful subject for a
painting. He describes:
...the very moment when he had climbed the little
stairway and just stepped onto the scaffold. He
glanced in my direction; I looked at his face and
understood everything....On the contrary the head is
terribly alive and must be working hard, hard, hard,
like an engine running; I imagine various thoughts
throbbing in it, all of them incomplete, maybe even
ridiculous, quite irrelevant thoughts...and meanwhile
you know everything and remember everything;
there is this one point that can never be forgotten,
and you can't faint, and around it, around that point,
everything goes and turns. And to think that it will
be so till the last quarter of a second, when his head
is already lying on the block, and he waits
and...knows, and suddenly above him he hears the
iron screech!...Portray the scaffold so that only the
last step is seen closely and clearly; the criminal has
stepped onto it: his head, his face white as paper, the
priest offering him the cross, he greedily puts it to his
blue lips and stares, and—knows everything
For the prince, the face of the man who only has a minute to live
has the same quality found in the horizon. It holds a key to
understanding everything; only this time the prince is able to
capture this understanding in some tangible way. He does this by
attempting to live through the moments that the condemned man
has just lived through, is currently living through, and will soon live
through, until he ceases to live. When the infinite horizon was just
that, a horizon before him that was unreachable precisely because
of its constant distance, Myshkin's access to it was only possible in
the form of a recognition. Here, in the experience with the
condemned man, Myshkin seems to have bridged that distance by
associating himself with the infinite horizon, through recognizing
70
�mortality in the face of this man. This recognition of another man's
mortality has allowed the prince access to new ways of thinking
about his own mortality. He perceives himself as the one about to
be executed and experiences what the moments leading up to, and
even the moment of, the execution must be like.
Obviously, this is one of the most important moments in the
prince's life. In the first five chapters of the novel he has already
discussed it twice with five total strangers, and on both occasions
with great veracity. It is not only significant that the prince
recognizes the importance of this moment himself but also that he
believes the moments before death have had a similar effect on the
condemned man. It seems that Myshkin's ability to access the
infinite in the face of the condemned man is contingent on the fact
that the prince believes that the man is able to access this infinite
knowledge in these final moments himself. The apparent qualifier
for this access by the condemned man is his assurance that his
death will soon occur, that he is facing his mortality in a fixed,
temporal way. What is even more intriguing about the prince's
thoughts here is that he feels that this image, if captured correctly
in a painting, would have the same effect that it had on him when
he witnessed the events. In essence, he is asserting that in facing
one's own mortality, one can gain access to this infinite horizon.
What one does with the knowledge of this infinite horizon is still
unclear, though it seems that some insight has been gained into
what the prince thinks he can do with the knowledge he believes he
has received from these experiences.
Of course, it would be fitting to place the discussion of
Myshkin's feelings surrounding the infinite horizon and death
within the context of the scene in which he faces his own mortality.
Before moving to that moment, however, it is worth taking a look at
a conversation between the prince and Rogozhin, the man who will
eventually wield the knife against Myshkin and allow the prince to
face death in a way that he never has before. Rogozhin, though the
first character introduced in the novel, quickly takes a backseat to
the exploits of the prince. The two seem to get along well enough
in the beginning, but by the end of Part One they have locked
themselves into a love triangle, both desiring the affections of the
beautiful Nastasya Filippovna. After she spurns the prince's initial
71
�marriage proposal, she runs off with Rogozhin, later returning to
Myshkin only to leave him once again, and the action picks up with
Myshkin paying Rogozhin a visit in Petersburg six months later.
During this visit the two discuss a painting that hangs in Rogozhin's
home; a copy of Hans Holbein's Christ's Body in the Tomb. The
painting is a very undignified depiction of Jesus' corpse. Upon
pointing out the painting, Rogozhin asks the prince if he believes in
God, which takes the prince by surprise. Dostoevsky then writes:
‘But I like looking at that painting,’ Rogozhin
muttered after a silence, as if again forgetting his
question.
‘At that painting!’ the prince suddenly cried out,
under the impression of an unexpected thought. ‘At
that painting! A man could even lose his faith from
that painting!’
‘Lose it he does,’ Rogozhin suddenly agreed
unexpectedly. They had already reached the front
door.
‘What?’ the prince suddenly stopped. ‘How can you!
1 was almost joking, and you're so serious! And why
did you ask me whether I believe in God?’^
Earlier, Myshkin was describing a painting of a man before his
death and how that painting could bring the notion of the infinite to
others by using their empathy to explore what it would mean to
face their own death. Here, Rogozhin and Myshkin are looking at a
painting of the dead Christ, but not just any painting of the dead
Christ. This painting shows Jesus as a corpse, and there is little, if
any, divinity noticeable in the representation. Interestingly, it is the
prince who points towards this when he notes that one may "lose
his faith” because of the painting. He quickly discounts this thought
as something of a joke after Rogozhin's surprising response, but
nevertheless the question remains: if the prince is striving to see
the beauty in all things, then why make such a remark?
For the prince there seems to be a difference between the
actuality of death and the moments of life that exist before death,
and these should not be confused. To clarify: It is not the death of
72
�the condemned man that was so significant for Myshkin, but the
moments leading up to death, and the feelings of infinity
experienced within these moments. Of course, these moments only
exist due to the knowledge of death's impending actuality: Access
to the infinite exists for Myshkin when he sees the beheading
because he sees a man that knows his death will come in a finite
period of time. For Myshkin then, and presumably Rogozhin at
some point as well, seeing the image of Jesus [who is considered
both fully human and fully divine) as a corpse provokes a much
different way of thinking about death. Life does not exist in this
painting whatsoever, even in the face of the Christ, the bringer of
eternal life. If Rogozhin stares at this painting often, as he seems
wont to do, how can he bring his thoughts about mortality back
into life in the same way that Myshkin has? It seems that the
answer comes in the form of these few lines spoken between the
two gentlemen in the passage related above. Rogozhin sees in this
painting death's finality, and it has caused him to lose faith in life.
Thus, he has no desire to seek out beauty in the way that Myshkin
has thought to seek out beauty in life. Instead of life, Rogozhin has
based his existence on death, which will become clearer when some
of his further actions are explored.
After the two men part, Myshkin continues to walk around
the city with an uneasy feeling. Throughout the entire day he has
been seeing eyes watching him wherever he has gone but it is only
at Rogozhin's house that he recognizes them as Rogozhin's eyes.
On some level, the prince attempts to downplay this paranoia by
attributing it to a flaring up of his illness, but he soon realizes, to his
chagrin, that both the eyes and his increasing feeling of illness are
quite real. Here Dostoevsky gives the reader some insight into
Myshkin's thoughts concerning his illness. On his walk, the prince
thinks back on the experience of the moments just before his
epileptic fits. The novel reads:
The sense of life, of self-awareness, increased nearly
tenfold in these moments, which flashed by like
lightning. His mind, his heart were lit up with an
extraordinary light; all his agitation, all his doubts, all
his worries were as if placated at once, resolved in a
73
�sort of sublime tranquility, filled with serene,
harmonious joy, and hope, filled with reason and
ultimate cause....Reflecting on that moment
afterwards, in a healthy state, he had often said to
himself that all those flashes and glimpses of a higher
self-sense and self-awareness, and therefore of the
"highest being,” were nothing but an illness, a
violation of the normal state and if so, then this was
not the highest being at all but, on the contrary,
should be counted as the very lowest. And yet he
finally arrived at an extremely paradoxical
conclusion: 'So what if it is an illness?’ he finally
decided....lf in that second, that is, in the very last
conscious moment before the fit, he had happened to
succeed in saying clearly and consciously to himself:
‘Yes, for this moment one could give one's whole
life!’—then surely this moment in itself was worth a
whole life....’At that moment,’ as he had once said to
Rogozhin in Moscow, when they got together there,
'at that moment I was somehow able to understand
the extraordinary phrase that time shall be no more.’^
The above excerpt has implications for almost everything that has
been previously discussed. First, it seems that Myshkin relates this
moment before the fits to his gazing out at the infinite horizon and
his experience of looking the condemned man in the face. The
difference is that the experience being related here does not
require some sort of outside, sensory experience, but rather is an
introverted, psychological experience that is followed by a
complete disconnection with sensory experience. Again he is faced
with a choice: He can either look at this situation as one that is
completely oppressive, dismissing his feelings as stemming from
an illness and therefore illegitimate and not to be venerated, or he
can accept that his illness can provide him with moments of
extreme beauty. He concludes that the latter is the way that he
would rather look at the situation.
With scattered thoughts, the prince roams the city when he
is overtaken by a "new, sudden idea.’’^ Though not fully explained
74
�outright, this new idea involves visiting the house where he
believes Nastasya might be residing, something which he has told
Rogozhin he does not plan to do. Because of this, Myshkin is
incredibly conflicted. Not only is he feeling paranoid and ill, but for
the first and maybe the only time in the novel, we see the prince in
a morally suspect position. He not only thinks negatively about
other people in these moments, but he also recognizes these
moments of weakness in himself and chastises himself for it. At
one point Dostoevsky writes, "It was from the fit that all this
darkness came, from the fit that the 'idea' came as well!"io Clearly,
this is one of the prince's darkest hours. He is close to forgoing all
of his previously held beliefs. Then, in one moment, he seems to
have found his way back to seeing the beauty. Myshkin thinks,
"Compassion is the chief and perhaps the only law of being for all
mankind. Oh, how unpardonably and dishonorably guilty he was
before Rogozhin!"ii When he sees Rogozhin following him and
recognizes him, however, his faith is shaken once again. At this
moment, "He saw only an unhappy man whose inner state was
dark but quite comprehensible.This comprehensibility is no
comfort to Myshkin. On the contrary, it is so concerning for
Myshkin that it allows him to lose track of the beauty inside
Rogozhin. If there is no beauty in Rogozhin, then what reason is
there to say that there can be beauty anywhere? Myshkin's
worldview seems to be contingent upon the fact that beauty can be
found in all things without exception. In the text, Myshkin
confronts this question directly.
Conviction—of what? (Oh, how tormented the prince
was by the monstrosity, the "humiliation” of this
conviction, of "this base foreboding," and how he
blamed himself!) ‘Say then, if you dare, of what?’ he
said ceaselessly to himself, in reproach and defiance.
'Formulate, dare to express your whole thought,
clearly, precisely, without hesitation! Oh, I am
dishonorable!’ he repeated with indignation and with
a red face. ‘With what eyes am I to look at this man
now all my life! Oh, what a day! Oh, God, what a
nightmare!’!^
75
�When combined with Myshkin's realization that his “sudden idea"
stems from the fact that he knows that Rogozhin is following him
and that he is violating his promise not to seek out Nastasya^^ this
"conviction” arising in him now concerning Rogozhin seems to
center around the violence of which he believes Rogozhin is
capable. The prince, hoping against all hope that his mind could
ignore this violence somehow, is ashamed that it cannot. He paints
himself as an unfit judge when he looks upon Rogozhin in a
negative light. For the prince, it is only appropriate to treat others
with compassion. This treatment is not limited to a physical
treatment, but also to the way one conceives of another. Seeing
Rogozhin as capable of violence, or even as inevitably drawn to
violence, as the prince does here, is not a compassionate
conception. It is the opposite, and the prince, feeling that he has
lost faith in his own convictions, is overwhelmed by despair and
humiliation.
Myshkin returns to his hotel, contemplating his shameful
new outlook on Rogozhin, when he thinks he sees the man once
again. On the stairs, Rogozhin suddenly emerges from a niche and
raises a knife to kill Myshkin. This is the moment that should be
captured in the painting Myshkin describes for Alexandra at the
Epanchin household. The conviction that was discussed in the
previous paragraph and the "sudden idea" seem to have led the two
characters to this moment. Myshkin has known that his death is
waiting here in this stairwell. Just before entering the stairwell
Dostoevsky writes, "His heart stood still. 'Now everything will be
resolved!' he said to himself with great conviction."^^ This is
Myshkin's chance to truly live out the experience of the condemned
man. The knife is raised and Myshkin, seeing Rogozhin's distorted
face, calls out to him, "Parfyon, 1 don't believe it!...,”i^ before he
sinks into a fit, preventing Rogozhin from going through with the
murder. Dostoevsky writes, "Then suddenly it was as if something
opened up before him: an extraordinary inner light illuminated his
soul."i7 With his earlier conviction that the moments before his fits
were "worth one's whole life," it seems that this circumstance helps
bring Myshkin back to his original convictions by exposing him to
the infinite, both through facing his own death and through his
76
�epileptic seizure. He was truly facing his own death at the hands of
Rogozhin, but his illness prevented his death precisely at the
moment when he was questioning the most basic premise of his
convictions: that beauty can be found in all things in life, even the
ugliest.
This scene can be explored from the perspective of
Rogozhin as well because he, too, faces death when he raises the
knife to kill Myshkin. In a sense, he is experiencing the face of the
condemned man like Myshkin had back in Lyon at the execution.
But there is something much different here: notably, the conviction
already present in Rogozhin when confronted with this face.
Rogozhin has spent his time looking at the Holbein painting and in
this image of death he simply cannot find the kind of beauty in the
life that surrounds him as Myshkin is able to in his confrontations
with death. While Myshkin's experience allows for some kind of
empathic human feeling, the painting, and, perhaps even more
strikingly, the competition that exists between the two men, have
not allowed Rogozhin the same access to this experience. In fact,
the competition for Nastasya allows Rogozhin to remove his
experience from the prince's, building up the hatred that leads him
to violence. It seems the painting has contributed to this conviction
because of what it symbolizes for Rogozhin: a loss of faith. If death
is the true finality, so true that even Christ cannot overcome it, then
this should be the solution to the problem with Myshkin as well.
No conception of human experience or of the beauty of all things
can overcome the finality and the inevitability of death. Like
Myshkin, Rogozhin embodies this conviction and outwardly
expresses it, sharing his beliefs in the form of violence. Ironically,
while trying to kill the prince to assert his faith in death, Rogozhin
further entrenches the prince in his own positive outlook on the
beauty of life precisely because of the existence of death. Instead of
providing a solution to his problem, violence has only exacerbated
it, leaving the door open for more violence.
The rivalry between Rogozhin and Myshkin has created
clear distinctions between the outlooks of the two characters, but
these are not the only two approaches to the subjects found in the
novel. One other highly developed approach comes from the
character named Ippolit, a young man with tuberculosis who is
77
�able to work his way into the lives of the characters through some
rather dubious circumstances. In Part Three he has his most telling
scene when he arrives at the prince's dacha to read what amounts
to a lengthy suicide note entitled "My Necessary Explanation." In
the note, Ippolit states that a doctor has informed him that he has
two weeks left to live and that this knowledge has left him with
little purpose in life. If he can no longer finish anything he begins,
then why begin anything new at all? In a sense, Ippolit is very
much like the condemned man about whom Myshkin talks with the
Epanchins, but in this instance, the condemned man is able to
relate to Myshkin what he is actually feeling about his approaching
death.
The explanation is full of contradictory thoughts,
highlighted in the story of a doctor to whom Ippolit returns a
wallet. Before this story Ippolit writes, "people are created to
torment each other,"!^ but during this story he ends up helping the
doctor by visiting an old school acquaintance. In this visit he says:
'In sowing your seed, in sowing your "charity,” your
good deed in whatever form it takes, you give away
part of your person and receive into yourself part of
another's; you mutually commune in each other; a
little more attention, and you will be rewarded with
knowledge, with the most unexpected discoveries.
You will be bound, finally, to look at your work as a
science; it will take in the whole of your life and
maybe fill the whole of it. On the other hand, all your
thoughts, all the seeds you have sown, which you
may already have forgotten, will take on flesh and
grow; what was received from you will be passed on
to someone else. And how do you know what share
you will have in the future outcome of human
destiny? And if the knowledge and the whole life of
this work finally raises you so high that you are able
to plant a tremendous seed, to bequeath a
tremendous thought to mankind, then...’ And so on, I
talked a lot then.^^
78
�While not exactly the same as Myshkin's outlook regarding the
beauty of the world around him, there does seem to be some
connection between the two viewpoints, namely that each regards
worldviews as shareable through actions. In this instance Ippolit is
discussing charity, which is similar, though not identical, to the
compassion with which Myshkin seems so concerned. Ippolit does
admit that actions of charity can have an effect on others, but the
real insight he seems to bring to the equation is that there is no true
knowledge of what effect this might have. In essence, this appears
to be Ippolit's major concern, though it will take more explanation
to fully bring this idea to light.
The previous quote shows that at one point Ippolit had
some positive feelings regarding life and how one may be able to
act towards others. But later that same night, Ippolit thinks for the
first time that he would be better off killing himself than living. For
the moment it seems that Ippolit, when facing the infinite, has
chosen the path of Rogozhin rather than the path of Myshkin. This
hypothesis is further reinforced by the fact that Ippolit seeks out
Rogozhin and the two discuss his suicide, which Ippolit dubs his
"ultimate conviction” in the note. He writes:
There was a contrast between us, which could not fail
to tell in both of us, especially me: I was a man whose
days were already numbered, while he was living the
fullest immediate life, in the present moment, with no
care for "ultimate” conclusions, numbers, or anything
at all that was not concerned with what...with
what...well, say, with what he's gone crazy over;...I
gave him no hint of my "ultimate conviction,” but for
some reason it seemed to me that he guessed it as he
listened to me....I hinted to him, as I was leaving, that
in spite of all the differences between us and all the
contrasts—les extremites se touchent..., so that he
himself might not be so far from my "ultimate
conviction” as it seemed.^o
Ippolit states there is a contrast between the two, and ultimately I
agree with that statement, but in this moment it seems that their
79
�contrast lies only in the kind of solution they are seeking in death.
Rogozhin is able to guess that Ippolit has made up his mind to kill
himself simply because violence, and ultimately death, are
Rogozhin's own answer to all things, in the same way that beauty is
the answer to all things for Myshkin. Neither of these is the case
for Ippolit, though in this moment he has chosen death for himself
The difference lies in Ippolit's concern for "ultimate" conclusions, a
concern that he does not see in Rogozhin. In essence, Ippolit is
searching for a type of knowledge, but not the type of knowledge
that Myshkin or Rogozhin may offer. Ippolit seems much more
concerned with an earthly knowledge. He wants his convictions to
be confirmed, not because he feels a certain way, but because they
are somehow inherently true. This is why he says that Rogozhin is
not concerned with "numbers.” Ippolit wants to understand in the
sense of a mathematical, objective understanding, as contrasted
with Myshkin and Rogozhin's beliefs, both of which are heavily
based on the two characters’ subjective interpretations of
experience. The desire for this type of understanding is why
Ippolit may never be able to share the same convictions as either of
these men, and why he is so easily able to disregard the above
quote concerning charity. One can never really know the outcomes
of one's actions toward another, so a conviction like Myshkin's
[that compassion is the true law of mankind) is completely
unpredictable and, as such, cannot be counted on as an absolute
conviction. If this is indeed true, then such a conviction can never
be a comfort to a mind like Ippolit's.
Interestingly, Ippolit seems to understand Rogozhin's
convictions during their discussion. The statement, "with what he's
gone crazy over," can be read as Rogozhin's obsession with
violence and death. This reading is supported by the French
phrase which translates, "extremes meet," implying that although
Ippolit understands that the two men seek different things, they
have ultimately both chosen death. Later, Ippolit even says, "His
house struck me; it resembles a graveyard, but he seems to like it,
which, however, is understandable: such a full, immediate life as he
lives is too full in itself to need any setting.”2i He sees that
Rogozhin's existence is so engaged with death that even
surrounding himself with death would not be a concern to a man
80
�such as this. It is important to note Ippolit's understanding of
Rogozhin's convictions because he will later describe the Holbein
painting and how it could lead a man to believe that there is no
beauty in the world. He even goes so far as to suggest that if Christ
had seen the picture himself, he may have decided not give himself
over to be crucified.22
This understanding of Rogozhin merges with Ippolit's
experience of the infinite, discussed toward the end of Chapter VI
of Part Three. In this segment, he writes about a night of delirium
in which he has an experience similar to the one Myshkin does
when looking at the horizon. This is immediately followed by an
apparition of Rogozhin. He writes:
Can something that has no image come as an image?
But it was as if it seemed to me at that moment that I
could see that infinite power, that blank, dark, and
dumb being, in some strange impossible form. I
remember it seemed as if someone holding a candle
led me by the hand and showed me some huge and
repulsive tarantula and started assuring me that this
was the dark, blank, all-powerful being, and laughed
at my indignation.^^
Though this seems to be some kind of experience of the infinite
horizon like Myshkin's, the two differ. This difference stems from
Ippolit's "ultimate conviction.” Because Ippolit is attempting to put
his faith in violence, the infinite horizon present in front of him
comes in the form of a violent beast (the tarantula). Ippolit then
moves from this state of delirium into a further state when he sees
the apparition of Rogozhin enter his room and stare at him for a
long time during the night. He later reveals that the door to his
room was locked the whole night, and the door to the house as
well, so it would have been impossible for Rogozhin to actually
have entered his room, reinforcing the reading that the vision of
Rogozhin is an evolved version of this tarantula figure.24 Rogozhin
has become the embodiment of the convictions that Ippolit has
81
�recently attempted to embrace: death as the solution to the
problem of the infinite. In this scene, however, Ippolit is possessed
by fear and revulsion when confronted with Rogozhin. Ippolit's
vision of fear and revulsion in the face of Rogozhin is a sign that he
has not fully embraced Rogozhin's convictions, preventing him
from carrying out his suicide. By imagining Rogozhin sneaking into
his room at night, Ippolit is picturing Rogozhin as coming to face
death—Ippolit as a condemned man—without fear, something
that Ippolit himself is unable to do. He says after this experience
that it is here that he becomes truly resolved, not out of logic, but
out of revulsion.25 It seems that this is precisely why he could
never have brought himself to suicide. He desires an explanation of
the infinite horizon that involves logic, but his complete rejection of
logic in order to embrace violence and death is in contradiction to
the character of an individual who would write a document called
"My Necessary Explanation."
Following this story, the beliefs expressed in Ippolit's note
begin to encounter those of the prince. He writes toward the end of
the note;
What do 1 need your nature for, your Pavlovsk park,
your sunrises and sunsets, your blue sky, and your
all-contented faces, when this whole banquet, which
has no end, began by counting me alone as
superfluous? What do 1 care about all this beauty,
when every minute, every second, 1 must and am
forced to know that even this tiny fly that is now
buzzing near me in a ray of sunlight, even it
participates in this banquet and chorus, knows its
place, loves it, and is happy, while 1 alone am a
castaway, and only in my pusillanimity did not want
to understand it till now!^^
He cannot see that the beauty before him is there, precisely for the
reason he believes it should not exist. The prince understands that
his mortality is what has made coming back from the experience of
the infinite horizon so glorious. He can see beauty in each thing
because he recognizes in that moment that his ability to experience
82
�beauty depends on his being alive. Someday he will not be there to
see the beauty of the world, or it will not be there for him to
experience. Ippolit, in this quotation, says the exact opposite. How
can he see the beauty, knowing that he cannot always experience
it? How can the fleeting moment in time possess something
glorious when he cannot understand the significance of its fullness?
He is so caught up in the idea that he must understand, truly
understand the things that occur around him that he does not allow
himself to give in to those things, as do the fly and the prince.
There seem to be at least three differing views presented in
regard to the infinite horizon and death. Prince Myshkin, upon
experiencing this horizon a number of times, allows this experience
to bring him to a fuller understanding of the beauty of life around
him. Because the infinite horizon is so closely related to death, it is
mortality that allows Myshkin to brighten his life in this way. By
attempting to live his life as if he were facing death at each
moment, he has learned to appreciate the amazing beauty of each
of the individual moments of life, and can see the beauty locked
within their confines. He can even see beauty in those moments
that seem devoid of all beauty. This view is contrasted with the
convictions of both Rogozhin and Ippolit. Rogozhin embraces
death, mostly due to his loss of faith. Furthermore, his competition
with Myshkin for the affections of Nastasya drives him to extreme
violence, reinforcing these deadly convictions. Ippolit seeks a
solution through violence as well, but embarrassingly [or perhaps
even on purpose) fails to properly load his gun before trying to kill
himself. He then lives out the next few weeks of his life without
becoming like Rogozhin or Myshkin, but instead living as a gossip
of sorts around the other characters of the novel. As this figure, he
acts as the one who knows more than those around him, which fits
with his attempt to understand his place within the world.
To revisit two of the original questions: Why do Myshkin’s
actions not lead these characters to see the infinite in the way that
he does, and is his access to the infinite fundamentally different
from the experiences of those around him? The answer to the first
seems to be that Myshkin’s actions are actions of empathy towards
others. Though they may be considered beautiful by some, not all
people see his actions as he sees them, and therefore he cannot rely
83
�on his convictions to bring out the same emotions in others. Thus,
Myshkin's pity for Nastasya does not provide Rogozhin with the
opportunity to see the beauty in her that Myshkin's pity is
attempting to reveal, simply because Myshkin's convictions
regarding the beauty of this pity cannot be interpreted in the same
way by Rogozhin. In a similar way, though Myshkin sees beauty in
the trees of Pavlovsk, this same beauty cannot be accessed by
Ippolit. To the second question, the answer seems to be yes. But,
this is only because in exploring this subject it has become clear
that each character experiences the infinite horizon in a unique,
personal way. To say that one’s experience of it could be shared
wholly with another is likely to lessen that experience, even when
talking about characters in a novel. On some level, the characters
may understand one another and one another’s motivations, but
their experiences are their own. Myshkin especially seems to have
an extraordinary set of experiences precisely because of his illness
and his lack of experience in society. Ultimately, is this what it
takes to have the convictions that Myshkin has? Can one live within
a society without a sickness and still believe that there is beauty in
all things?
Endnotes
1 Dostoevsky. The Idiot. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, trans. New York:
Vintage Classics, 2003. 75
2. Ibid., 58-9
3. Ibid., 58
4. Ibid., 60-1, emphasis in original.
5. Ibid., 61-2
6. Ibid., 64-6, emphasis in original.
7. Ibid., 218
8. Ibid., 226, emphasis in original.
9 Ibid., 227
10. Ibid., 229
11. Ibid., 230
12. ibid., 232
13. Ibid., 233
14. Ibid., 231
15. Ibid., 234
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid., 395
19. Ibid., 405
84
�20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
Ibid., 406-7
Ibid., 407
Ibid., 408-9
Ibid.,
Ibid., 411
Ibid.
Ibid., 413
Primary Text
Dostoevsky, Fyodor. The Idiot. Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa
Volokohonsky. New York: Vintage Classics, 2003.
85
�A Proposed Atlas to the On-ramps and Off-ramps of the
Road to Serfdom
Jesse Wilhite
As F. A. Hayek guides us spiraling down The Road to Serfdom
in his cautionary tract, he confronts us with a number of choices,
branches which, if taken one way, will continue on the path that
Western civilization has mapped out for us, but another will lead
toward dark places. Hayek does not spend a great deal of time
examining any deep philosophical foundations that may underlie
these options. He merely shows us the choices, analyzes the paths
taken by others, and speculates about where we seem to be going.
He seems to assume that a reasonable person, when presented with
the options side by side, will choose to return to the recentlyabandoned road of traditional Western civilization and liberalism
rather than to continue on a road that leads to modern serfdom, the
worst of totalitarianism in both its Communist and Fascist forms.
One of the great questions fundamental to this decision pertains to
morals and values. What are the moral underpinnings of the
traditional liberal system? What are the values one must hold to
choose the abandoned road? Are they compelling, or even possible?
How might they be maintained or, if they have been lost, how might
they be reacquired?
To a great extent, Hayek takes certain values for granted. He
assumes that we understand good and evil and agree that they
exist, and that there is a kind of wickedness in the realities brought
about by the Nazi regime with which England was at war during
the writing of The Road To Serfdom. From the beginning, he frames
the drift from the abandoned road to the road to serfdom not in
terms of a departure from values per se, but rather in terms of the
pursuit of good intentions that reaped bad but unintended
consequences. His fundamental argument is not that we have the
wrong values, ideals, and morals, but that in pursuing the right
ones in the wrong way we have abandoned them, changed them,
and we risk losing them altogether.
For Hayek, basic ideas and social order, the foundations of
civilization, have evolved over time. Based historically in Classical
86
�thought and Christianity, and germinating in the flowering of the
Renaissance, Western civilization is rooted in "respect for the
individual man qua man."i This is the fundamental idea, the moral
base Hayek assumes we share, which, along with material
prosperity, he warns that we are in danger of losing altogether.
This fundamental idea, this fountain flowing with morals and
values, is important as a fixed point from which to view the world.
In criticizing the disappearance of these virtues under socialism,
Hayek asks, "What are the fixed poles now which are regarded as
sacrosanct, which no reformer dare touch, since they are treated as
immutable boundaries which must be respected in any plan for the
future?"^ For virtue or morality to mean anything, there must be
fixed points of reference, boundaries that may not be moved.
Individual self-determination seems to be the foundation of the
abandoned road, the sine qua non of liberalism.
This individualism is not only held as an a priori axiom. "The
fundamental fact on which the whole philosophy of individualism is
based” flows from the fact that only limited knowledge is available
to any one person about the values and needs of the multitude of
other individuals; that is, only partial scales of value are possibly
knowable.3 Therefore:
From this the individualist concludes that the
individuals should be allowed, within defined limits,
to follow their own values and preferences rather
than somebody else's; that within these spheres the
individual's system of ends should be supreme and
not subject to any dictation by others. It is this
recognition of the individual as the ultimate judge of
his ends, the belief that as far as possible his own
views ought to govern his actions, that forms the
essence of the individualist position.^
The impossibility of knowing or imagining a complete scale of
values and needs means that a complete ethical code is unavailable
to any central planner, which seems therefore to necessitate an
individualist position simply in order to have a properly
functioning economic system.
87
�Another necessity for morality or values, another fixed pole,
is a respect for truth as such. Referring to relativism, Hayek says,
"The moral consequences of totalitarian propaganda which we
must now consider are, however, of an even more profound kind.
They are destructive of all morals because they undermine one of
the foundations of all morals: the sense of and respect for the
truth."5 It may seem too obvious to need stating, but as we will
learn later, respect for truth as truth is a fundamental principle
Hayek assumes to be necessary to morality.
In The Road To Serfdom we find two litanies of liberal
virtues. These virtues include "independence, self-reliance, and the
willingness to bear risks, the readiness to back one’s own
conviction against a majority, and the willingness to voluntary
cooperation with one’s neighbors,” and "independence and selfreliance, individual initiative and local responsibility, the successful
reliance on voluntary activity, noninterference with one’s neighbor
and tolerance of the different and queer, respect for custom and
tradition, and a healthy suspicion of power and authority.’’^ The
common character essential to all is a sort of self-sufficiency, not
simply for its own sake but also as a supporting element in a liberal
extended order. Virtue lies not only in defending oneself from
coercion and in respecting the foundations of tradition, but also in
openness to what is different. There are three intersections of
values and morality that bear addressing in concert with one
another. The values of freedom and equality intersect, as do the
questions of morality as end or as means, and of morality as an
individual or a collective phenomenon.
As we have seen, individualism is taken to be a fundamental
principle, and inherent in it is the principle that each should be free
to pursue his own ends. Thus freedom or liberty is a basic tenet of
liberalism. This is freedom of action within a consistent, prior
framework: the rule of law. It is freedom to pursue one’s self
interest, one’s own values and needs. Hayek points out the danger
of the extension of this concept of guaranteed freedom to include
freedom from want and material need.^ Essentially, this
redefinition or extension, the expectation that government should
free the individual from material need, is dangerous for several
reasons. In abdicating economic responsibility to the government.
88
�the individual also abdicates power or control over all that is
attached to economic needs and economic activity; in Hayek's
terms, over virtually everything. The individual moves from
independence to dependence. Freedom, when thus extended, ends
in servitude.
The liberal good of equality is subject to a similar negative
extension. Under individualism or liberalism, each deserves to be
treated equally as man qua man. Equal protection exists for all,
without privilege for any, according to predetermined rules, known
as the rule of law. This is equality before the law, equality of
conditions. One of the on-ramps of the road to serfdom involves the
extension of this concept of equality to include material equality, or
equality of ends, an extension which necessarily cancels out
equality before the law. Given different capacities, different people
must be treated differently in order to achieve equality of ends.
Here again a well-intentioned expansion of the range of a liberal
good changes the direction of the ultimate path.
One fundamental problem consists in determining where
the good lies—in the ends or the means, in the individual sphere or
the sphere of collective planning. In other words, do we aim at
justice or some standard of good as an end, and use whatever
means necessary to accomplish it, or does justice or the good lie in
the means, a framework we use to allow a multiplicity of ends? Is
justice a matter of ends or of means? For Hayek, a complete ethical
code, one that would encompass the needs and values of each
individual, is impossible even to imagine, so morality must be
understood in the realm of the individual and justice must lie in a
consistent framework of the rule of law rather than in some sort of
requirement of particular ends, such as material equality.^ It seems
simply impossible to have complete or even sufficient knowledge of
needs, values and means to allow for planning in such a way that
we will accomplish just ends without generating terrible,
unintended consequences. Morality exists only on an individual
level, because the individual is the ultimate agent of action, the only
one who both knows his values and the only one who can connect
those values to the moment of action. Any attempt to shift morals
to a higher or prior sphere cancels them out and they cease to exist
as such. Beyond this, there is a difference between the moral sense
89
�that urges us to attempt to plan for just ends and those coercive
ethics that would be required to execute them on a mass scale. "The
interaction between morals and institutions may well have the
effect that the ethics produced by collectivism will be altogether
different from the moral ideals that lead to the demand for
collectivism.”^ Ultimately, justice must be understood primarily in
terms of means and a consistent rule of law as a framework for
individuals to pursue their self-determined ends. To attempt to
accomplish specific collective ends is neither possible nor safe.
We arrive at a significant question. If these ideals of
liberalism and traditional morality are necessary to civilization and
a liberal free market, and if we are in danger of abandoning them
for a road to serfdom, how may we preserve them? Alternately, if
these ideals already have been to some degree abandoned, how
might we recognize and reestablish them? Hayek gives us a few
clues, and we may discover a few of our own. They can be imagined
as on-ramps and off-ramps of the road to serfdom.
One of the first on-ramps we come to is simple impatience.
Hayek identifies this as having been one of the primary and early
motivations for abandoning the free market extended order
responsible for the growth of civilization. As the market order was
systematized and advanced in the nineteenth century on an
unprecedented scale, "the crude rules in which the principles of
economic policy” consisted still required development and there
was "just irritation with those who used liberal phraseology in
defense of antisocial privileges and the boundless ambition
seemingly justified by the material improvements already
achieved.”!*^ Instead of patiently developing the economic system,
carefully fostering the rule of law, and essentially building upon the
foundation of the advances in the free market, the temptation was
to start over by fiat on a different foundation. "Because of the
success already achieved, man became increasingly unwilling to
tolerate the evils still with him which now appeared both
unbearable and unnecessary.’’^^ Development unfolds over time,
and it would seem that the maintenance of traditional morality and
the free market requires a sort of patience on the part of all
involved, allowing natural market processes to bring prosperity in
due course, taking time to foster the rule of law, and experimenting
90
�with and adjusting the framework as necessary as it evolves over
time.
Another important on-ramp to serfdom is the atrophy of
moral sense. Traditional morals are communal information,
transmitted and inculcated in ways that we do not perhaps fully
understand. But they also seem to be fostered and maintained
individually through practice. One must exercise them in order to
avoid the vicious cycle of the blunting of our moral sensibilities:
What our generation is in danger of forgetting is not
only that morals are of necessity a phenomenon of
individual conduct but also that they can exist only in
the sphere in which the individual is free to decide
for himself and is called upon voluntarily to sacrifice
personal advantage to the observation of a moral
rule. Outside the sphere of individual responsibility
there is neither goodness nor badness, neither
opportunity for moral merit nor the chance of
proving one’s conviction by sacrificing one's desires
to what one thinks is right.^^
This once again speaks to the point that morals are inherently
individual and disappear at the level of central decision-making.
But it also implies that it is vital that the individual be called upon
to sacrifice voluntarily. Where there is no opportunity to exercise
this moral capacity it seems to disappear, either because the
conditions no longer exist or perhaps because of a drying up of the
individual moral capacity. Mere participation in political
democracy is not sufficient.
The periodical election of representatives, to which
the moral choice of the individual tends to be more
and more reduced is not an occasion on which his
moral values are tested or where he has constantly to
reassert and prove the order of his values and to
testily to the sincerity of his profession by the
sacrifice of those of his values he rates lower to those
he puts higher.13
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�There seems to be a habitual aspect to individual participation in
moral choices and moral traditions: Either we use them or we lose
them.
A third on-ramp to the road to serfdom shows up in a
somewhat odd place, in the social order itself. "It should never be
forgotten that the one decisive factor in the rise of totalitarianism
on the Continent, which is yet absent in England and America, is the
existence of a large recently dispossessed middle class.’’^'^ The main
reason this leads to serfdom is that large disaffected social classes
tend to become enemies of the current regime. Those who were
once materially and socially mobile, such as the middle class, tend
to fight to regain the advantages they have lost. Another reason
that a dispossessed middle class is especially problematic,
however, is that this class will tend to expand in a liberal free
market system, drawing the other classes into it. The middle class
is the center of gravity of the liberal system, the class most directly
involved in the economic life of a society, that which has the most
vested in a free market system, and that which most reinforces free
market values. Preserving the trading class, or at least not
intentionally leveling it, would seem to be important to maintaining
the extended order.
The corruption of language is another factor in the path to
serfdom. We have seen how the extension of the concepts of
freedom and equality has paved the path toward collectivism. The
redefinition of the word liberal from its nineteenth century
meaning to its current one is another example. In the realm of
propaganda, language is manipulated and words are redefined in
order to move people into new ideas using redefined familiar
terms.New concepts parasitize the host language such that its
traditional moral content is lost in favor of new ideas aimed at
transforming the people’s imagination, mores, and ultimately their
direction.
The greatest means to preserving the traditional liberal
ideals and thus avoiding many of these on-ramps to serfdom lies in
education, both formal and informal. Hayek does not spend much
time addressing this issue here, but he leaves a tantalizing
indication of this concept tucked away in his discussion of a
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�potential new international order. "Nowhere has democracy
worked well without a great measure of local self-government,
providing a school of political training for the people at large as
much as for their future leaders."!^ There is a sense in which
participation in local government, which directly concerns the
citizens’ immediate interests (and often takes place in small
countries such as Switzerland) is a kind of informal education, a
continuous internship in the necessities and limitations of political
and economic liberty. It can be a breeding ground for ideas, a
greenhouse for liberal traditions, and a school for habituating the
young to freedom and to the society in freedom that seems to be
superior to the society in socialism. Hayek echoes Tocqueville here,
as he does throughout much of The Road To Serfdom. Local political
life and participation in good things accomplished through free and
voluntary associations can provide a vital inoculation against the
bug of collectivism.
It bears mentioning that there is at least one principle that is
important in any attempt either to reintroduce the rule of law and
liberal principles where they have been abandoned, or to introduce
them where they have not yet existed. This is the voluntary
submission of the powerful to the rule of law. As long as the
powerful seek to aggregate or maintain privilege and position for
themselves, the rule of law is impossible. The birth of such a
system, therefore, must mirror its moral condition, the recognition
that one's greater interest requires a voluntary relinquishment of
potential privilege or advantage for the greater good of freedom
and general economic opportunity. "The great opportunity we shall
have at the end of this war is that the great victorious powers, by
themselves first submitting to a system of rules which they have
the power to enforce, may at the same time acquire the moral right
to impose the same rules upon others.This essential principle is
the foundation on which individualism, liberalism, and traditional
western morality are built. The fact that Hayek felt the need to
write The Road To Serfdom when he did and the response its
publication garnered show the vulnerability of a truly free market
liberal position. The fact that intellectual opinion was rapidly
shifting toward socialism, mere decades after the flowering of
liberalism in the nineteenth century, indicates that a truly free
93
�market might not be as fundamental as Hayek would have us
believe.
If the extended order of the free market survived thousands
of years of the tooth-and-nail competition of ideas since the first
glimmers of civilization, then it seems likely that it will continue to
survive much longer. If it has really distilled the elements that
make extended order possible, then traditional morality should
continue as the most viable evolutionary strand. If socialism is
truly built on faulty foundations, then it will eventually crumble.
And yet, if this free market system is so natural and fundamental,
why does it seem so vulnerable?
An examination of the previously discussed on-ramps may
provide a clearer view. Several, if not all of them, are deeply
imbedded human characteristics. To be impatient is to be human. It
is not characteristic of the mass of men to abide injustice due to the
expectation of some future good. Facility in deferring gratification
is not common to man. If it is necessary that we be patient to tend
the garden of budding liberalism, few of us will likely be liberals.
Moreover, exercise of and habituation to the moral virtues,
whether imagined in an Aristotelian sense or in the sense Hayek
uses them, is no simple task. In one sense we simply receive the
traditional morals as given, but if exercising them is also necessary
to their perpetuation, what is to guard us from simply coasting into
socialism? The gutting of language seems to be a natural process
that simply happens over time. Language changes, deteriorates.
This constant linguistic evolution has only become greater with the
technological and social advances that have come from the
flowering of the free market. When language is changing so quickly,
how can we imagine that old terms might not be manipulated to
bear new and contrary ideas? With the great centrifugal force of
national government drawing all political power to itself from the
farthest local hinterlands, how long will there be places where the
people may still learn democracy, independence, voluntary
cooperation and how to use their freedom in the local sphere close
to home? Finally, how long can we trust the strong to defer to the
rule of law out of the understanding that it is in their best interest?
It seems doubtful whether there is room for much optimism. If
Hayek is correct, then whatever the means of the transmission of
94
�civilization are, whatever those things are that inculcate his virtues
of independence, voluntary cooperation, non-interference, healthy
suspicion of coercive power, individualism, and the rest, must be
fostered if we are not to end up in the ash heap of history.
Tocqueville saw a similar problem. "Do you not see that
religions are weakening and that the divine notion of rights is
disappearing? Do you not find that mores are being altered, and
that with them the moral notion of rights is being effaced?”!^ His
solution, however, makes a great deal of sense. "If in the midst of
universal disturbance you do not come to bind the idea of rights to
the personal interest that offers itself as the only immobile point in
the human heart, what will then remain to you to govern the world,
except fear?’’i^ Somehow, when the transmission of traditional
values is failing, these ideals must be bound to self-interest as the
universal driving component of human beings. One of the great
difficulties of this task, in relation to the conflict between liberalism
and socialism, is that the latter seems to be driven by sentiments
and motivations that bind a kind of self-interest with a communal
sense in a way that is often intellectual, but often visceral and
deeply human.
Endnotes
1. Hayek, F. A. The Road To Serfdom. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007. 68
2. Ibid., 218
3. Ibid., 102
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid., 172
6. Ibid., 217-219
7. Ibid., 77
8. Ibid., 101
9. Ibid., 158-159
10. Ibid., 71-72
11. Ibid., 72
12. Ibid., 216
13. Ibid., 218
14. Ibid., 215
15. Ibid., 172
16. Ibid., 234
17. Ibid., 235
18. de Tocqueville, Alexis. Democracy In America. Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
2002. 228
19. Ibid.
95
�Primary Texts
Hayek, F. A. The Road To Serfdom. Chicago; University of Chicago
Press, 2007.
de Tocqueville, Alexis. Democracy In America. Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 2002.
�The Faith of the Poet
Anthony Eagan
I.
Midway along his journey through the afterlife toward the
morning of his second night in Purgatory, having recently heard
Virgil’s lecture on distorted love as the source of all sin, Dante falls
asleep and dreams of a siren. He and his guide are approaching the
fifth terrace, where the avaricious and prodigal expiate their
monetary love. Though every progressive level in The Divine
Comedy can be said to show a turning point in the pilgrim’s
education as a poet, this turning point, coming as momentum shifts
from the heaviness of hell to the lightness of heaven, holds special
significance. The pilgrim has seen and learned from the suffering of
hell-bound souls who sin and refuse repentance. Now, observing
sinners who have cast off their pride in hope of seeing God, he
draws closer to earthly paradise at the heights of Purgatory; soon
he will ascend to true Paradise to be among souls who lived and
saw correctly.
In the dream, a cross-eyed and crippled hag appears. She is
deathly pale, with crooked feet, stammering speech, and arms that
have been amputated at the wrist. She is the embodiment of human
frailty and decay. By the power of his gaze, however, Dante
transforms the hag into a tantalizing woman, straightening her
figure, repairing her eyesight, empowering her with eloquence, and
enlivening her with charm. Her voice becomes so alluring that as
she sings, Dante cannot look away. Despite her revelation that she
is the "Siren who causes / sailors to lose their way,’’ Dante is
transfixed and fails to heed the warning. She tells him that a night
with her can provide such satisfaction and delight that no man
would willingly leave her side. But when she mentions having
turned Ulysses from his homeward course, the dream also changes
course. A Beatrice-like figure appears, "alert and saintly," to
liberate Dante from the siren’s influence.^
By their contrast, the magnificence of this new lady once
again diminishes the aura and eloquence of the siren. The saintly
lady calls out to Virgil, who materializes, assesses the situation, and
97
�rips the siren's clothes from her body, revealing her sex and
releasing a stench so powerful that it wakes Dante. The sudden
reek evokes hell, where "such a stench rose up / as usually comes
from festering limbs,"^ and whose nine circles are filled with rot,
feces, blood, urine, semen, muck, murk, fog, and putrefaction. Had
the saintly woman failed to intervene and summon Virgil, had Virgil
failed to tear the garments, the truth behind the hag’s artificial
beauty would have remained concealed from Dante, and he would
have been ensnared once again by the avarice and covetousness of
earthly pursuits.
To the dutiful reader (the only type of reader the poet
wants, as will be shown], this dream reiterates what has been
described in so many previous episodes and what Dante will
continually emphasize throughout Paradiso; any temporal things a
human may possess or seek to possess, from clerical robes to
political clout, from gold and riches to reputation and physical love,
are subject to time's decaying power, and will escape his grasp in
one way or another. Ambition for these objects sows envy, pride,
and greed, and human behavior is perverted by such blind pursuit.
Sins of pursuit aside, however, even the achievement of an earthly
desire by virtuous means will prove fleeting and unsatisfactory—a
sort of Pyrrhic victory for the soul—igniting new and stronger
desires, and degradation through avarice, since satiation increases
craving.
It was lust for Paolo, and the experience of momentary bliss,
that fated Francesca to the second circle of Inferno, where she
flutters about in a "hellish hurricane,"^ as erratic as her prior life’s
whims. Similarly, an excessive love of money fated the clergy found
in the fourth circle to roll stones endlessly, having lost all identity,
for "the undiscerning life that made them filthy now renders them
unrecognizable."^ The epicureans, and "all those who say the soul
dies with the body,"^ lie in open sepulchers, fated by their
shortsightedness to permanent entombment, fittingly alive in soul
but dead in body.
As to a siren, mortals are drawn irresistibly to the world's
multiple enticements. They forget that inherent in all nature’s
substances is the seed of corruption. Only that which exists outside
of matter and the senses is worth pursuing, because only that
98
�which is outside of matter and the senses has the power to
accurately direct human vision and behavior. Beatrice herself, the
reigning authority on virtue, suggests this very point soon after her
arrival in the poem, in Canto XXX of Purgatorio. In fact, all of
Dante’s mistakes up to this point, both on earth and during his
journey, emerged from a failure to look higher. Beatrice has come
to replace Virgil as Dante's guide, and like a stern mother she
immediately scolds Dante for his emotional weakness and lack of
proper vision. In a symbolic gesture, Dante, upon recognizing
Beatrice despite her veil, turns backward in search of Virgil, hoping
to alleviate his joyful fear, and, seeing his former guide has
disappeared, begins weeping.
"Dante!” Beatrice says, "do not yet weep; do not weep yet,"
and continues her chastisement fifteen lines later, asking, "How
were you able to ascend the mountain? Did you not know that here
all men are happy?”^ This whole time, a throng of singing angels
has been gathered about Dante and Beatrice. Now, in their song,
coming to the pilgrim’s defense, the angels ask Beatrice, "Lady, why
do you hit him so hard?" She answers,
"Not simply by the working of Nature’s great wheels.
Aiming every single seed to some end
Determined by stars shining at its birth.
But through the enormity of God in His grace
Some will attain to altitudes so high
That we no longer attract them with our eyes—
And one such was this man’s new life on earth.
So all good inclinations, all predictions.
Should wonderfully be proved by the life he lives...
For a time, the sight of my face was enough to sustain him:
By showing him my youthful eyes I led him
With me, moving toward a goal of goodness.
But as soon as I approached the holy threshold
Of my second age, and changed from that life to this.
He turned away from me, giving himself to others.
Beauty and virtue grew to new heights in me.
But I meant much less to him, no longer pleasing.
And he turned his steps to a path that held no truth.
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�Following fraudulent idols that promise goodness,
But never pay their accounts when payment is due...”^
Beatrice, on earth, guided Dante’s love. She was so stunning
and pure that when Dante looked upon her he envisioned the
workings and mystery of God. He saw that beneath the surface of
beauty exists a power that cannot be understood, that is greater
than the sum of all earth’s beautiful and not-so-beautiful entities,
for it creates these entities and allows for their movement towards
His good. Nothing proved the importance of the ineffable more than
the face of Beatrice; nothing was more sublime and awe-inspiring;
nothing instilled faith so well in the onlooker. Her death, then,
should have given Dante further insight into the ineffable and
elevated his poetic soul. If this most pure of human creatures is
subject to suffering and death, then all things less beautiful must be
transient, less worthy. Nothing lasts here on earth. My vision and
poetry must seek the place where, truly, Beatrice now resides. Such
should have been Dante’s thoughts.
We see now why, halfway along his journey through life,
Dante was in a "wood so dark.’’^ According to Beatrice’s speech, all
life comes to darkness if we blind ourselves to God’s mystery. We
also see now why Dante’s siren dream, halfway along his journey
through the afterlife, is so deeply important. Within Dante’s mind
or soul— wherever dreams are born— he has already learned the
error of pursuing earthly temptation; that seed of knowledge
reveals itself to him while he sleeps to dream in the ring of the
avaricious. The dream is an exact parallel of what the poet
describes in the opening of Inferno. His obscured, earthbound
vision misleads him, projects a false value onto that which is
subject to decay, and enshrouds him in error. As when Beatrice
summoned Virgil on Holy Thursday, she here again intervenes,
calling on Virgil to reveal truths to Dante and alert him to "the
stench of paganism.’’^ The pilgrim’s dream, we see, allegorizes the
poet’s larger allegory. Dante, initially enticed by human objects and
concerns, is rescued by Beatrice and Virgil, and comes to see the
error of distorted love and misdirected vision.
But why is Ulysses mentioned in the dream? Does the siren
drop his name merely as an allusion to her power? Or does the poet
100
�I
[
want to evoke Inferno yet again, specifically Ulysses’ explanation
there of how he descended into hell?
In Canto 26, Dante and Virgil ventured to the eighth ditch of
the eighth circle of sin, where the thieves and false counselors blaze
in anonymity, "each sinner wrapped in the sin which burned him
on earth/’i'’ From a perch, Dante surveyed the depths and observed
two souls inhabiting a single but divided flame. He questioned the
identity of the two thieves, and learning that the greater sinner of
these was Ulysses, his curiosity swelled, and he implored Virgil to
initiate a conversation. "Master, 1 beg you, and beg / Again a
thousand times...for you can see the desperate desire / That pulls
me, bending my body in that direction."!^ Virgil agreed, sensing the
force of Dante’s passion to speak with the famous man of twists and
turns. After all, Dante and Ulysses shared many traits, at least at
this stage in the pilgrim’s progress. Both were exiles, both eloquent;
both journeyed in search of knowledge, both were proud and in
their pride went astray— off their charted course— and both had
fought, in some sense, for their homes. Ulysses’ answer, in the form
of a speech, which is arguably the most moving poetry up to this
point in The Comedy, begins:
‘When 1 left Circe,
Who’d stolen more than a year of my time, close
By Gaeta (although that was long before Aeneas
Had come and given it its name), it wasn’t
For my young son’s sweetness, or any concern
About my aged father, or the debt of love
1 owed Penelope, which would have pleased her.
For nothing could conquer in me the craving to know
This world we live in, learning its nature, and how
To deal with human vice or worth.’i^
101
Looking back to this through the lens of Dante’s siren dream,
the issues become more apparent than when the reader first
encountered the passage. Not only did Circe ensnare Ulysses, but
�"evidence of things not seen.”^^ pje left her side, his familial duties,
and the home he fought for, in search of human knowledge. In a
sense, this moment shows a reversal of the character we knew so
well—for ten years after Troy he struggled to return to Penelope.
But in another sense, the speech comes as no surprise; experience
of the world leads a man to yearn for more of the same.
'Now hear: I’d set myself on the open sea
With only a single boat, and nothing but men
Who had not turned and run away from me...
'0 brothers,’ I said, 'you who came through a hundred
Thousand dangers, at last reaching the West:
We still have time yet to use
Our human senses, and how could such brave men
Refuse this final, daring experience.
Tracking the sun where no other man has been?’
...The moon had waned, then waxed again, five times.
Five months of full and perfect lunar cycles
Since we’d launched ourselves out on the ocean.
When suddenly a mountain appeared in the distance.
Dark and seeming, to my eyes, surely the highest
That I had ever seen. My men and I
Rejoiced, but immediately our happiness
Was turned to grief, for out of the new lands came
A whirlwind, striking hard at the bow of our ship
It whirled us around three times, we and the water.
And on the fourth it lifted the stern up high
And drove the prow straight down, to the great delight
Of Someone Else, and over our heads the sea closed.
In his pride, Ulysses could not see the signs of Someone
Else—at least, not until his ship was swallowed. On this ship sailed
"nothing but men," thus no God, no faith, no hope of higher truths.
The moon, the first of Heaven’s spheres, waxed and waned before
him for five months; yet he questioned nothing of what instigates
the lunar cycles, or what made the stars shine and the ocean
glimmer. He directed his ship onwards, through the Strait of
Gibraltar and southbound, towards the Mount of Purgatory, a place
102
�forbidden to those without faith. Never in his story did Ulysses
reveal a sense of awe, only selfishness, ambition, and joy at
reaching sights unseen by any other man.
At first glance the journey seems commendable, if
somewhat selfish, to the reader and it remains unclear just why this
quest for knowledge results in Ulysses’ descent into hell. Dante’s
dream, almost thirty cantos later, clarifies the mistake Ulysses
made. Knowledge without faith will cause the sea of experience to
swallow you whole.
II.
0 you who are within your little bark.
Eager to listen, following behind
My ship that, singing, crosses to deep sees.
Turn back to see your shores again: do not
Attempt to sail the seas 1 sail; you may.
By losing sight of me, be left astray.
The waves 1 take were never sailed before.^^
Here Dante addresses the reader as the pilgrim arrives in
the first sphere of Heaven, the Sphere of the Moon. The passage
unifies two ideas that become vital to Paradiso: That the poetry will
become more difficult, will contain subject matter paradoxical and
beyond human understanding, thus reflecting higher beauty, and
that endeavors lacking faith, suspension of reason, and recalibrated
vision will end in shipwreck. So readers beware, have trust in my
talents, pay attention, and recall all that I have previously written.
What is Dante’s endeavor? Where is he taking us? What is
his poetic mission? Is The Divine Comedy, above all, an epic poem
about epic poetry or is it the story of the making of the poet?
The epic poet has several goals, not simply in The Divine
Comedy but also in the great works that precede and follow it. The
first goal is to describe the range of human experience, and in so
doing to pay homage to the poets who first made the attempt. The
second is to raise poetry to a level higher than the words of those
poets to whom homage is paid— in order to come even closer to
truth through beauty. The third is to provide a moral framework
for readers, using episodes and incidents as allegories through
103
�which the hero experiences what it is to be mortal and learns how
to conduct his life as a result. The Iliad is often likened to a Greek
bible in which Homer exalts the values of courage, honor, and
dignity in the face of mortality; so Virgil’s Aeneid exalts pietas, or
duty to one’s society, above personal interest and comfort, and
finally the Bible— which, while not an epic poem, is a work replete
with sublime poetry epic in scope and narrative— exalts the
Christian values of faith, hope, charity, and love. The fourth and
final goal of the epic poet is— through the accomplishment of the
three prior objectives— to become immortal through artistry.
Throughout The Divine Comedy, Dante is constantly aware of
these goals, and by turns expresses anxiety, doubt, pride, concern,
and despair in regard poetry. Especially in Paradiso, where in
nearly every canto he references his lines, his task, or his readers,
we see that, as he draws towards the center of the immortal world,
his hopes for the poem take a more central role as the subject
matter. In one of these countless moments of self-reference and
thoughts of immortality, he writes:
0 Godly Pegasea, you who give
To genius glory and long life, as it.
Through you, gives these to kingdoms and to cities.
Give me your light that 1 may emphasize
These signs as 1 inscribed them in my mind:
Your power—may it appear in these brief linesl^^
Perfect poetry, then, has the dual action of benefiting both
the author and society; if one is uplifted, so is the other. Perhaps the
best way to approach the questions of how the poet achieves
perfect poetry, how he accomplishes these four aforementioned
goals, and how the allegorical afterworld through which Dante the
pilgrim travels references these goals and exemplifies their
accomplishment is to bear in mind our notion that the dream of the
siren manifests the major turning point in the pilgrim’s growth. We
must also remember the mistake Ulysses made on that final
journey which resulted in the worst of all descents.
In exile, having lost everything he held dear in the earthly
realm—first Beatrice, next his political reputation, and finally his
104
�home—Dante, as author of The Comedy, is excessively aware that
"he may grieve / indeed and endlessly— the man who leaves /
behind [divine] love and turns instead to seek / things that do not
endure eternally.”i^ If a man invests all the muscle of his soul
towards what can die or be torn away at any moment, be it his
name and standing, his wealth or his beloved, then the man loses
with its loss. In other words, if a poet invests all the power of his
talent in what is transitory, his poetry dies with passing time.
Worse yet, if a poet does not use his talent to better his name and
his community, he squanders the gifts God bestowed upon him.
This is not to say that a poet should not focus on flowers, politics,
sex, and sin: this very poem is filled with innuendo and gorgeous
images of grime, and ends with the obscure description of a rose.
Rather, if the poet writes of these things, he must see behind their
corruptible physical nature to what they reveal about the spiritual
world, the world we cannot understand or describe no matter the
level of our faith.
We know that a flower lives, as well as how it lives, but even
science cannot explain the process behind that process. To seek an
explanation that justifies the awe we should have for something as
simple as a flower and simultaneously be aware that this
explanation, however adroitly worded, will fall short of capturing
its essence, is to participate in the faith of poetry. If you water roses
and provide sunlight, growth will occur; these are the facts of a
rose. Also, it will have thorns. The poet must make these facts both
reach into and stand for the unseen. The observable must reach
behind the veil and yank out a portion of the essence that resides
there, thrusting this portion of essence into the face of the reader.
'"Look at the sun that shines upon your brow; / look at the
grasses, flowers, and the shrubs / born here, spontaneously, of the
earth.”’i8 These words, spoken by Virgil as he points the pilgrim
toward earthly paradise, glorify the grass and the flowers. These
words thrust forward a chunk of their spiritual essence, and
entreat the listener to see beyond the pretty veil of stalks and
stems, petals and pistils, into the ineffable origin of all. Although
Virgil is a pagan, his mind, as poet, is always in touch with the
essence of things, as were the minds of Homer, Statius, and Ovid,
even if their vision of truth did not match Dante’s.
105
�Of course, Dante the poet learns from Virgil the poet. The
Divine Comedy seems to show Dante asking, over and over. If
Virgil's poetry is beautiful because it hints at the essence behind our
world, how beautiful would my poetry be if given my talent, I spoke
of this essence alone? If I changed the tradition by following its
natural arc? If I traveled through hell, down through the earth, up
the Mount of Purgatory, and ascended into the Empyrean, describing
everything that is impossible to know? Would describing everything
beyond human life— the essence of essence— elevate my words, and
thrust the unseen into the gaze of my reader?
The metaphor of this garden passage thus pertains to the
entire allegory. Dante the pilgrim, in the earthly paradise, will heed
Virgil the guide, grow from his words, and soon move beyond the
spiritual capabilities of the pagan; Dante the poet will follow Virgil
the poet, grow from his example, and soon move beyond the
aesthetic capabilities of the laureate. Dante’s poetic mission is not
only to talk of the essence of hatred and strife, parricide and
politics, lust, gluttony, wrath, shame, trickery, cunning, rape,
heresy, betrayal, hypocrisy, cannibalism, schism, and all that results
from improperly directed vision, but also to create images of that
which cannot be known by mortals, based no longer on the
influence of Virgil and Ovid but on the influence of the Bible and its
metaphor of the Incarnation. Dante wishes to direct the vision of
his society of readers beyond the fleeting concerns that have
destroyed both the author’s known world and the peace of
Florence.
This is why his poetry becomes more beautiful and
challenging the higher the pilgrim ascends; as the subject matter
becomes more ineffable, Dante, paradoxically, comes closer to the
truth behind human nature.
From the opening canto of Inferno, we read of nothing but
essences. The darkened wood is the essence of Dante’s emotions in
the year 1300. The she-wolf, never sated, is the essence of human
hunger. Fire is the essence of passions that leave their possessor in
metaphysical ashes. Climbing is the essence of improvement.
Francesca, St. Bernard, Plato, Cato, Cavalcante dei Cavalcanti,
Filippo Argenti, Farinata, all the popes, and so many other shades
upon whom we stumble are not human characters hiding, as do the
106
�living, behind the inscrutability of behavior, but rather they are
momentary, honest distillations of entire lives of earthly pursuit
and the secret motivations that bent their actions towards frail
objects. The contemplative contemplate, the wrathful rage, the
slothful long for sleep, the gluttonous hunger; each similarly
pursues his nature according to its kind. The shades Dante
describes, jointly exhibiting the entire range of human emotion,
capture the essence behind the emotion and reveal the spectrum of
mortal impetuses.
Thus, if Dante were to ignore God, seeking knowledge in the
manner of Ulysses on that final voyage, creating beauty out of
corrupt material as with the siren dream, his epic poem would fail.
“Passing beyond the human cannot be worded," he insists in canto
II of Paradiso, and yet we have before us nearly 15,000 lines—
150,000 words—describing nothing but what is ostensibly beyond
the human. Really, then, since all of what Dante expresses is beyond
human sense, every line reaches beyond the infinite flowers of
experience, and thrusts its ineffable spirit at the reader.
III.
Is God, therefore, merely Dante's favorite metaphor for the
ineffable? If a poet writes of a man waking to find he has been
transformed into a cockroach, and we read this transformation as a
metaphor of the artist’s alienation, or if in a story the portrait of a
boulevardier ages in lieu of his body, and we see the portrait as a
metaphor of conscience and the power of art, then why do readers
constantly pigeonhole this tale of a poet’s journey through the
afterlife as a religious tale, and fail to consider the ascension as an
allegory for art’s immortal purpose and immortal achievement? We
do see countless moments of sacrilege. To name only one, the poet
worships false idols; even in Paradise, as he prepares to describe all
that he has seen, he invokes Apollo to be his new muse.
0 good Apollo, for this final task
Make me the vessel of your excellence.
What you, to merit your loved laurel, ask.^^
107
�In Canto IV of Paradiso, Beatrice explains a point of
confusion to the pilgrim. He has just met his first heavenly soul,
Piccarda, once a nun, who against her will was pulled away from
the convent and forced into relations with a man. She is more
distant from God than other souls in heaven, she says, because she
did not fight unto death to preserve her virginity for God, as was
her original will. In response, Dante wonders why souls in heaven
are arranged hierarchically. Certainly Piccarda is not so pure as the
Virgin Mary, but is Heaven not a place of equality under God’s
eternal benevolence? Why has God banished Piccarda and her
companions to the Moon?
Beatrice, reading Dante’s mind, clarifies that
The spirits you saw did not appear
Because their existence is here, but simply to show
Your eyes what the least exalted of angels look like.
We need to speak in this way, to your organs of sense.
Since such perception, and no other, prepares
Itself to be understood, in the end, by your mind.
And it is for this reason that scripture lowers
Itself to levels your mind can deal with, assigning
Hands and feet to God, to teach you more...2o
So the heavens are not structured as the pilgrim observes.
What he observes is but a demonstration of Paradise as it can be
understood by his limited human comprehension. Likewise,
scripture does not properly explain God, but provides stories,
allegories, images, tales and paradoxes that aim to demonstrate the
essence of the inexpressible. As a result, its readers have a
framework to live by, concrete examples, and a higher realm
towards which they might direct their vision and love.
Dante the poet knows that therein exists the power of the
Bible, the most successful and widely read of any work of literature.
Its purpose is to teach, to improve society, to warn against blind
endeavors, false glories, and sin. First, however, in order to reach
this goal, it must be dramatically entertaining and sublime in
language, wise and sad, containing all sorts of human fates and a
108
�range of characters from peasants, to kings, to the Unknowable
Himself.
The framework of Christianity is probably the best and most
comprehensive metaphor we have to explain the world beyond
human comprehension. It attempts to allegorize why we sin. It aims
to elucidate the dangers of selfish pursuits, or a life subject to whim
and therefore loss. It shows us how to avoid a living hell. It remains
the best guideline for reaching above the temporal and material
world so that, by its example, we may become immortal through
virtue, good deeds, and properly guided accomplishments.
Perhaps we should not take Dante's complex explication of
divinity as a sign that he has total faith in Christ as the embodiment
of God, that he lived on earth, performing miracles, raising the
dead, and opening once again the Gates of Heaven, but rather as an
acknowledgement that no higher moral foundation for behavior
exists than so-called divine poetry. Perhaps we feel in The Divine
Comedy the comfort of words that explain the processes behind the
processes, the essence behind the flowers, even if the explanation is
wrong.
What Dante details of the Empyrean is foreign, and goes
beyond scripture. Certainly, Mary is present, and some saints, and
even "our effigy." But otherwise it is pure light and circles, radiance,
blind vision, perfect movement, mental feeling, emotional
knowledge and seeming confusion, and, as he describes the Image,
he reiterates that nothing can be described. It is achingly beautiful.
The faith of the poet is faith in the power of his own work to
reach into universal experience. Without such faith, the poet could
not have the patience to devote years of his life to describing things.
Yet the faith of the poet is in Someone Else, no matter what form He
takes—be He Bearded, Rose-shaped, or a Gust of Wind. Did Dante
truly feel that Christ died so that we might become immortal? Or
did Apollo bequeath this gift of eloquence? Did he truly love
Beatrice, or is she, too, a device? All we can know for certain is that
in talking about what is impossible to know or express, the poet
becomes immortal. And by directing his vision away from the
observable and corrupt world, by projecting his desire towards the
spiritual world as he had once projected vision and desire towards
the hand-less hag, he taught the Something. The pilgrim gets lost
109
�among the stars, he creates, and the poet emerges, ready to
describe the experience.
Where Nature comes upon discrepant fortune.
Like any seed outside its proper region.
Nature will always yield results awry.
But if the world below would set its mind
On the foundation Nature lays as base
To follow, it would have its people worthy.21
Endnotes
1. Dante. The Divine Comedy. Allen Mendelbaum, trans. New York: Everyman's Library,
1995. Purg. XIX. 1-34
2. /n/XIV. 51
3. Inf. V. 31
4. /n/VII. 53-54
S.InfX. 15
6. Purg. XXX. 74-75
7. Ibid,. 111-132
8. Inf I. 2
9. Para. XX. 125
10. Inf XXVI. 48
11. Ibid., 68-69
12. Ibid., 90-99
13. Para. XXIV. 64
14. InfXXVl 100-143
15. Para. 11.1-7
16. Para. XVIII. 82-87
17. Para. XV. 9-12.
18. Purg. XXVII. 133-135
19. Pora. 1.13-15
20. Para. IV. 37-45
21. Para. VIII. 138-144
Primary Text
Mandelbaum, Allen, Trans. The Divine Comedy. New York: Everyman’s
Library. 1995.
110
�The Two Prakrtis
Jeff Ondocsin
At first glance, Ramanuja's commentary on the Bhagavad
Gita is a dense, layered text which can seem hardly penetrable. But
there is something in Ramanuja's discussion of the two prakrtis
that might aid in establishing a solid foundation of what Ramanuja
is trying to do in this text. More than just outlining the different
yogas that the Gita represents as the different paths to God,
(karmayoga, jnanayoga and the ultimate form of worship,
bhaktiyoga, the culmination of the philosophy of the Gita),
Ramanuja is ultimately advancing an argument about the Atman of
God and its relation to the individual atman, if in a seemingly
roundabout way. However, I believe that by examining the issue of
these two prakrtis a little closer, we can perhaps establish a
satisfying answer to the question asked in seminar about both the
spiritual and non-spiritual things that simultaneously constitute
God's body and depend on him as their atman.
In the section titled "The True Knowledge of the Proper
Form of the Supreme Person Who is the Object of Bhakti,"^
Ramanuja discusses the two prakrtis of God. Prakrti is a term that
occurs across a wide variety of Indian philosophical thought, but
the basic definition of the word is "nature." However, in this case,
nature does not entirely do justice to what the term prakrti
conveys. Prakrti could be construed as the basic stuff of the
universe, but more than this, prakrti can be interpreted to be the
force that drives all action in the world. Indeed, Ramanuja says of
the lower prakrti that it "is the prakrti of this world consisting of
endless various objects, means and occasions of material
experience and divided into eight categories, viz. the five
primordial elements and their qualities, senses and mind, Mahat
and finally Ahamkara.''^ This statement denotes the various things
that exist in the world, as well as the faculties that observe the
occurrence and existence of these things as it relates to the life of
the individual. However, the lower prakrti is not made up of the
individual atmans themselves, but "solely consists of the objects
experienced by the spiritual beings."^
Ill
�Early on in the text, Ramanuja says that Krsna reveals the
"doctrine of the atman" to Arjuna so as to overcome his perplexity
and inability to carry out his ksatriya dharma. This inability to take
action, Ramanuja says, proves that "Arjuna has no insight into the
distinct natures of body and atman.He goes on to say that the
body "is subjected to development and naturally involves birth and
death...the atman is different from the body and immortal: that it is
not subject to birth and death.Thus does Ramanuja declare that
the atman is the non-dying observer of the lower prakrti, distinct
from the physical self, as well as the faculties that allow the
detection and use of the things of the lower prakrti.
According to Ramanuja the second, higher prakrti is made
up of the spiritual beings that experience the lower prakrti, and
indeed are the support for the lower prakrti. Ramanuja describes
the higher prakrti as "God’s chief prakrti,"^ for it is the observer, or
experiencer, of the lower prakrti. Also, this is seemingly the only
time in the text when Ramanuja uses the term jiva, a word that is
defined as "a spiritual being”. It is unclear from this section
whether or not the term jiva is intended to supersede the term
atman, but another part of the text may help us resolve this issue.
In the “Discussion of Body and Atman" section, Ramanuja says, "the
entity atman, which is a spiritual being, pervades the non-spiritual
entity which is different from the atman.”^ This statement asserts
that an individual atman of the higher prakrti is a spiritual being, or
jiva, that pervades the lower prakrti, the type of prakrti which
consists of non-spiritual entities. Thus, it would seem that the
individual Atmans exist in the higher prakrti, and are separate from
the lower prakrti which they pervade.
Ramanuja goes on to say that God "is the cause of his two
prakrtis,"^ and that the prakrtis themselves are then the cause of all
things that occur in the nominal world. Further, "all beings
composed of cit and acit, from Brahma to tuft of grass, whether
existing in a superior or an inferior condition, originate from these
two prakrtis of God, and so they are of God."^ At the beginning of
the essay, however, Ramanuja declares that God makes three
statements in the Gita about the Atmans and their relationship to
God. "1. that there is difference between God and the individual
atmans; 2. that there is difference between the individual atmans
112
�themselves; 3. that this difference is absolutely reaL’’^^^ What this
seems to mean is that, in light of the assertion that all things
originate from the two prakrtis and are thus of God, the world of
the two prakrtis is absolutely real, but is different from God himself.
Simultaneously, both prakrtis are of God themselves and are
supported by Him in the same way that the lower prakrti is
supported and pervaded by the atmans of the higher prakrti. So,
while the world of the prakrtis is absolutely real and different from
God, it still emerges from God only and is in that way dependent
upon him, although the prakrtis are different and other than God.
Thus the statement, "all spiritual and non-spiritual things, whether
effects or causes, constitute God’s body and depend on God who is
their atman."ii
The path to reach this kind of knowledge is difficult for the
practitioner, as it is easy to be led off track by the prakrtis.
However, one who practices only karmayoga and is not negligent
follows the path towards this knowledge of the nature of God and is
considered successful when he is "no longer able to interest himself
in the objects of prakrti differing from the atman or in
corresponding acts, because naturally he does not experience
anything but the atman; for then all delusions have gone." 12 The
paths of the yogas are manifold, but their pinnacles are the same. A
yogin is said to have reached the highest stage of development
when he knows that "the atmans of all creatures are equal when
their proper form is separated from prakrti, for all of them have
one and the same form, knowledge; inequality is of the prakrti.’’^^
Additionally, the yogin "will view God in all atmans and all atmans
in God.”i'^ So, while God is absolutely different from the individual
atmans, at this highest stage of yoga this idea is seemingly reversed,
as the yogin recognizes that God pervades the individual atmans as
surely as the individual atmans pervade the lower prakrti.
However, while both prakrtis are pervaded by God, God does not
depend on the prakrtis as the individual atmans are dependent on
their bodies for sustenance and the like. Indeed, Ramanuja says
that "to God his body serves no purpose at all; it serves to nothing
but his sport."is The individual atmans, then, are seemingly
required to utilize the prakrtis in order to attain knowledge of the
nature of atman and God.
113
�While the first half of the text deals with the necessity of
realizing that God is absolutely distinct from the two prakrtis, the
second half purports to help those who have that realization attain
God himself. Ramanuja discusses the four types of people who
resort to God, and elevates highest those called jnanin, those who
know “the atman as an entity different from prakrti but wish to
attain God himself, because they know that God alone is the highest
aim to reach.”i6 In the section titled "On the Excellence of the
Supreme Person, On the Different Kinds of Jnanins and On the
Proper Form of Bhakti,"i^ Ramanuja reiterates his notion that the
spiritual and non-spiritual parts of the universe are all equally
pervaded by God, and that God does so "in order to reign and
maintain them, although they themselves [the spiritual and non
spiritual beings] are unable to see him. In this way all beings
depend on God because they constitute his body.''^^ He further
explains the distinction between God and his two prakrtis by
stating that God is "not conjoined with them by nature, [but]
supports them by his own miraculous power.''^^ God is thus the
originator of the prakrtis, but not the cause of the acts of the
prakrtis; he only furnished the conditions under which the gunas,
the operational forces of prakrti, create inequalities between
beings, not the inequalities themselves. This central teaching, of
the distinction between God and the prakrtis, despite the fact that
the prakrtis originate from God and are pervaded by him, is at the
crux of the text, but the attainment of God himself through the
practice of bhakti rounds out the text as the last act of the one who
is truly devoted to God.
At the last, Ramanuja says that "it is only through bhakti that
God may be either known by the Shastras, or experienced directly,
or approached as he really is."20 The last stage of the jnanin is
bhakti, devoting oneself wholeheartedly to God, while remaining
firm in the knowledge of the distinction of God and prakrtis. Even
low castes and women can come to experience God through bhakti,
for "when one has found one’s sole support on God and in virtue of
boundless and unsurpassed love enabled one’s mind to experience
Him, one shall attain Him.’’2i However, the ability for bhakti to be
undertaken by those who do not have the advantage of being able
to actively pursue knowledge of the nature of God makes one
114
�question whether knowledge is a necessary part of salvation any
longer. If the individual can come to experience God through
whole-hearted devotion to Him, then what need is there of any
knowledge at all?
Endnotes
1. Van Buitenen, JAB. Trans. Ramanuja on the Bhagavadgita. New Delhi: Dass, 1969. 99
2. Ibid., 100
3.Ibid.
4. Ibid., 49
5. Ibid., 49-50
6. Ibid., 100
7. Ibid., 55
8. Ibid., 101
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid., 50
11. Ibid., 101
12. Ibid., 92
13. Ibid., 95
14. Ibid.
15. Ibid., 101-102
16. Ibid., 104
17. Ibid.,
18. Ibid., 114
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid., 132
21. Ibid., 121
Primary Text
Van Buitenen, J.A.B. Trans. Ramanuja on the Bhagavadgita. New Delhi:
Dass, 1969.
115
�Chaucer's Grisild: Constreyned by Maistrie
Leah Weed
As the beloved fifth husband of the wife of Bath once had
been, the clerk of the Canterbury pilgrimage is an Oxford scholar.
Like the much-wedded wife, this clerk is well-read and has traveled
abroad. The clerk speaks little, but what he does say is “short and
quik, and ful of hy sentence.''^ He is enamored of erudition: "For
hym was levere have at his beddes heed/ Twenty bookes, clad in
blak or reed,/ Of Aristotle and his philosophie,/ Than robes riche,
or fithele, or gay sautrie.''^ He is a serious young man who values
learning over wealth. The clerk does not pursue riches; indeed, he
is unashamed to live at the expense of others. His tale is admittedly
taken from another, yet his embellishments of it indicate his quick
wit. The clerk's narrative closely follows Petrarch’s, but where
Petrarch’s "Griselda" recommends patience in marriage only to
wives, the clerk’s additions are in keeping with Chaucer’s recurring
theme in The Canterbury Tales of extending this recommendation
to husbands.
The clerk’s tale seems a clear response to the wife of Bath’s
prologue and tale. The wife declares herself an expert on the "wo
that is in mariage’’^ and decries the prevalent misogynist literature
which denounces women as incapable of fidelity and in need of
mastery. She complains that "no womman of no clerk is preysed.
The clerk, whan he is oold, and may noght do/ Of Venus werkes
worth his old sho,/ Thanne sit he doun, and writ in his dotage/
That wommen kan not kepe hir manage!’’Chaucer’s clerk, telling a
tale of extreme "wo” in marriage - one which, however, like the
wife’s marriage to her fifth husband, ends happily - acquits himself
of the charge the wife of Bath brings against clerks. He retells
another clerk’s tale [that of an elderly clerk, in fact) which
illustrates a woman’s fidelity in the most trying of circumstances.
The wife of Bath quotes Dante to illustrate that children are
not necessarily like parents, and that "gentillesse cometh fro God
alone.”^ The tale of Grisild which the clerk relates likewise notes
that daughters are not necessarily like fathers, and that heredity
and education are not the sources of nobility and wisdom. The
116
�clerk concludes his tale and dedicates his envoy’s “song" to "the
wyves love of Bathe."^ He acknowledges that scholars rarely praise
women and that, while Job gets lots of press, "Ther kan no man in
humblesse hym acquite/ As womman kan, ne kan been half so
trewe/ As wommen been.”^ The clerk's envoy’s warning to
husbands not to test their wives’ patience and his advice to wives
to vocally and fiercely defend their interests would seem to directly
oppose the moral Petrarch has intended his tale to convey. The
clerk has taken a scholar’s tale of wifely patience and tweaked it to
challenge jealous husbands’ insistence on mastery and deceit, an
emendation likely to be approved of by the wife of Bath.
Though Chaucer may well have been familiar with the
original version of Griselda’s story in Boccaccio’s Decameron, the
version of the story cited by the clerk, which he has clearly
memorized and closely translates, is Petrarch’s. That Chaucer was
aware of the existence of Boccaccio’s tale and the motivations of
Petrarch in translating and expanding it, appears certain. The
clerk’s explanation of Petrarch’s reason for telling the tale mirrors
his letter to Boccaccio explaining his motivation in translating the
story. Petrarch explains in this letter, as the clerk does in his tale,
that Griselda’s example of patience should help all persons submit
themselves to the will of God. Both Petrarch in his letter to
Boccaccio and the clerk in his tale go on to cite the Apostle James’
claim that God tempts no man, then to say, somewhat
contradictorily, that God "still may prove us, and often permits us
to be beset with many and grievous trials.The clerk notes that
God "preeveth folk al day ... And suffreth us ... With sharp scourges
of adversitee.”^ The clerk, like Petrarch, explains that God does not
test us to enhance His knowledge of our characters or intentions, as
He already knows each human’s frailties.Both Petrarch and the
clerk indicate that the intention is not that wives should imitate
Griselda. However, while Petrarch explains that her patience
"seems to me almost beyond imitation," he implies that, if it were
achievable, such sufferance would be desirable.^! Chaucer’s clerk,
on the other hand, says that, if wives were to emulate Grisild, it
would be "importable.’’i2 The clerk tells a tale of extreme wifely
obeisance, but in his interjected commentary, he discourages such
subjection.
117
�In The Decameron, Boccaccio’s storyteller, Dioneo, prefaces
his Griselda tale by describing the actions of the marquis as
"senseless brutality,” remarking that "it was a great pity that the
fellow should have drawn any profit from his conduct/’^^ Petrarch,
in his retelling, does not comparably condemn Walter, though he
characterizes the marquis’ inclination to test Griselda’s fidelity as "a
desire more strange than laudable.Chaucer’s clerk, however,
does forcefully condemn Walter. He interjects into Petrarch’s text
exclamations of outrage at the marquis’ treatment of Grisild and
small details that highlight the humanity of Grisild and her father,
thereby increasing readers’ sympathy for them. This is in keeping
with The Canterbury Tales' recurrent concern with the abuses and
dishonesty of those in positions of power.
Before describing Walter’s initial test of Grisild, the taking of
her first child, the clerk insists in an aside to his listeners that "as
for me, I seye that yvele it sit/ To assaye a wyf whan than it is no
need,/ And putten hire in angv^ssh and in drede.’’^^ In Petrarch’s
version the young daughter has been weaned when she is taken,
but in Chaucer’s she has just nursed a short time, heightening the
sense of the mother’s anguish and dread. Chaucer also inserts the
specifics of Grisild’s blessing of her daughter, whom Grisild believes
she will not see again, thus highlighting the mother’s grief. When
Walter has "caught yet another lest/ To tempte his wyf’ by taking
from her their second child, a son, the clerk exclaims, "0 needles
was she tempted in assay!/ But wedded men ye knowe no mesure,/
Whan that they finde a pacient creature.”!^ As the marquis wonders
at Grisild’s patience at the loss of her children, knowing her to have
been a devoted mother, the clerk inserts into Plutarch’s tale a
question prompted by outrage: "now of wommen wolde 1 axen
fayn/ If thise assayes myghte nat suffise?/ What koude a sturdy
housbonde moore devyse/ To preeve hir wyfhod and hir
stedefastnesse,/ And he continuynge evere in sturdinesse?’’!^ When
Walter is about to ask Grisild to return to her father’s home and
make way for his new wife, the clerk denounces this "wikke
usage’’!^ of her. The clerk also adds to the tale a wistful memory of
their wedding day. Grisild recalls and reminds Walter "how gentil
and how kinde/ Ye semed by youre speche and youre visage/ The
day that maked was oure mariage!”2o She goes on to note that "Love
118
�is noght oold as whan that it is newe."2i The clerk supplements
Petrarch’s tale with Grisild's father’s cursing of "the day and tyme
that Nature/ Shoop hym to been a lyves creature/’^^ so distraught is
he that, as he had feared, the marquis has had his way with his
daughter and disposed of her. The clerk also invents a moving
detail: When she returns barefoot and bare-headed, in just her
smock, to her father’s home, Grisild’s old clothes no longer fit her.23
The young maiden of the wedding day is no more.
While Petrarch’s admiration of Griselda’s wifely forbearance
is tempered in the clerk’s telling of her tale by outrage at the way in
which she has been mistreated, the message that nobility is not
conferred by birth is retained. Boccaccio’s Dioneo, in the original
version of The Decameron, notes that "celestial spirits may
sometimes descend even into the houses of the poor, whilst there
are those in royal palaces who would be better employed as
swineherds than as rulers of men.’’^^ Petrarch, followed by
Chaucer’s clerk, repeatedly drives home the message "that under
low degree/ [is] ofte vertu hid.’’^^ The clerk even suggests a parallel
between Grisild and Jesus when he reflects that "God somtyme
senden kan/ His grace into a litel oxes stalle.’’^^ The most admirable
characters are not necessarily the high-born. The narrator in his
prologue speaks most reverently of the poor village parson and his
plowman brother. The wife of Bath asserts, "gentillesse [...]
descended out of old richesse [...] is nat worth an hen.’’^^ It is of
Christ "we clayme [...] oure gentillesse,/ Nat of oure elders for hire
old richesse.The person who behaves most virtuously is the
most noble.
Similarly, education does not ensure wisdom. Grisild,
though uneducated, is a wise and effective leader in her husband’s
absence. The narrator asks in the prologue, when describing the
manciple - a much less admirable character than Grisild - "Now is
nat that of God a ful fair grace/ That swich a lewed mannes wit shal
pace/ The wisdom of an heep of lerned men?’’^^ As the wife of Bath
asserts, "genterye/ Is nat annexed to possession,’’^^ and ones
"gentillesse cometh fro God alone.’’^^ Chaucer champions noble
deeds and wisdom and argues that the capacity for them is not
inherited. He is clearly concerned with the inherent contradiction
119
�between a social order that associates noble birth and wealth with
value and a Christianity that embraces poverty.
The unjust treatment of women, experienced by Griselda, is
noted by many of the storytellers in The Canterbury Tales. In "The
Man of Law’s Tale," Constance - like Griselda - patiently endures
unimaginable suffering (hers, however, primarily at the hands of
evil stepmothers rather than at the hands of her husbands), and
still maintains her faith. Though she is an emperor's daughter, her
high birth does not afford her independence. Like Emily in "The
Knight's Tale," Constance does not have the power to choose her
life’s course and notes that "Wommen are born to thralldom and
penance,/ And to been under mannes governance."^^ jn "The
Physician’s Tale," the virtuous maid, Virginia, notes the injustice of
the biblical sacrifice of Jepte’s daughter: as "God it woot, no thing
was hir trespass."^^ Virginia is then sacrificed, for the sake of her
father’s honor, in comparable fashion. Daughters are disposed of as
fathers see fit. And men, whether they place women on pedestals
or revile them, have absurd perceptions of them. Sir Thopas,
though he is love-lorn and obsessed with unreal chivalric romance,
imagines that "in this world no womman is/ Worthy to be" his
mate, so goes off to seek an elf-queen.^'^ The merchant has
Proserpyne, in conversation with Pluto, belittle Solomon and other
misogynist male authors: "I sette right noght, of al the vileynye/
That ye of wommen write, a boterflye!’’35 The merchant refers to
the widespread literary argument, so hateful to the wife of Bath,
that no wives are true, but also references the record of forbearing
wives and martyrs for feminine chastity. Neither body of literature
provides a woman much encouragement.
The clerk, in the person of the envoy, warns husbands not to
test their wives and advises women to assert themselves, as is
echoed throughout The Canterbury Tales.
Indeed, freedom,
generosity, equality (in libido, if not in age), and mutual respect are
presented as the basis for a successful marriage. In "The Franklin’s
Tale," a knight pledges to his beloved that "nevere in al his lyf he,
day ne nyght,/ Ne sholde upon hym take no maistrie/ Agayn hir
wyl, ne kithe hire jalousie,/ But hire obeye, and folwe hir wyl in
al.”36 As a result of his giving her "so large a reyne,"^'^ she chooses to
be his "humble trewe wyf.’’^^ The franklin views marriage as a
120
�partnership, a friendship, and says that "friends everich other moot
obeye,/ If wol longe holden comaignye./ Love wol nat been
constreyned by maistrie./ Whan maistrie comth, the God of Love
anon/ Beteth his wynges, and farewell, he is gon!"39 The franklin
says that both women and men desire liberty, and that the one
most patient in love has the advantage. Both the young squire and
the manciple note that a caged bird, however well cared for and fed,
wants to escape and eat worms.'^o Attraction to the new, Chaucer
suggests, is natural for man and for woman. The parson, who does
not believe those who claim "that they ne be nat tempted in hir
body,”'^i advises that "a man sholde here h5mi with his wif [...] in
suffraunce and reverence."42 in "The Knight's Tale" - based on
Boccaccio’s "II Teseida” - an independent-minded woman winds up
happy with a husband who respects her, loves her, and "hire
serveth so gentilly."^^ The marriages of Emily and Palamon and of
Dorigen and Arveragus illustrate that generosity and mutual
respect are key to a successful union.
Repeated throughout the Tales is the warning that jealous
attempts to master a wife by force are counterproductive. The
Shipman, in his tale, notes - as did the wife of Bath - that wives
want husbands to be obedient and "fressh abedde.”'^'^ In "The
Miller’s Tale” a jealous elderly husband who keeps his wife "narwe
in cage”‘^5 jg cuckolded. The young wife Alisoun successfully makes
fools of the men who desire her, and is the only character to
emerge from the events of the tale unscathed. In "The Reeves Tale”
we are told that "jalous folk ben perilous everemo;/ Algate they
wolde hire wyves wenden so.”^^ But the miller, a jealous husband
and protective father, however perilous he may be, is cuckolded
and defied by his daughter. In the "Wife of Bath’s Tale” a rapist
learns that what women desire most is sovereignty over their
husbands and lovers;^^
is reformed and rewarded when he puts
himself in his wife’s "wise governance.In the merchant’s story of
a January-May marriage, January imagines that a young wife will be
more easily manipulated than an older, wiser woman would be;
"certeynly,” he claims, "a yong thing may men gye,/ Right as men
may warm wex with handes plye.”^^ Though he calls May his "lady
free,”5o January’s "jalousie it [is] so ourageous,/ That neither in
halle, n’yn noon oother hous,/ Ne in noon oother place.
121
�neverthemo,/ He nolde suffer hire for to ryde or go/’^i January’s
attempts at mastery do not prevent May’s infidelity. In "The
Manciple’s Tale’’ Phebus, the flower of knighthood and chivalry, is a
jealous husband who murders his wife when he learns of her
infidelity, but then is filled with remorse. Throughout The
Canterbury Tales, attempts to secure fidelity by force and a short
leash are doomed to failure.
Petrarch, in his letter to Boccaccio, points to the "precept of
Horace in his Art of Poetry, that the careful translator should not
attempt to render word for word.’’ Petrarch tells Boccaccio, "I have
told your tale in my own language, in some places changing or even
adding a few words.’’^2
his retelling, Petrarch adds some words
and subtracts others. He removes Boccaccio’s comment that
avoidance of marriage is an indication of wisdom. He also removes
his accusation that the marquis’ treatment of his wife is
irresponsible. Chaucer in turn gives the tale his spin, in his own
language, challenging the wisdom of Walter’s cruel and deceptive
trial as well as that of the unstinting devotion of Grisild. Chaucer’s
clerk asserts that prudent wives should not allow humility to
silence them nor give scholars the opportunity to write of them a
story like the one told of Griselda.^^ They should not suffer in
silence, but stand up for themselves.
Endnotes
1. Chaucer, Geoffrey. The Canterbury Tales. London: Everyman Library, Orion Publishing
Group, 2004.10:306
2. Ibid., 9:293-296
3. Ibid., 158:3
4. Ibid., 116-117:706-710
5. Ibid., 188:1162
6. Ibid., 255:1170
7. Ibid., 248:932-938
8. Petrarch, Francis. "The Story of Griselda: to Boccaccio." Trans. Peter Sadlon. 10 Sep.
2007. Web. 15 Feb. 2012
<http://petrarch.petersadlon.com/read_letters.html?s=pet06.html>.
9. Chaucer 254:1155-1157
10. Chaucer 254:1159-1160; Petrarch "The Story...”
11. Petrarch, "The Story..."
12. Chaucer 254:1144
13. Boccaccio, Giovanni. The Decameron. Trans. G. H. McWilliam. Harmondsworth:
Penguin Books, 1972. 813
122
�14. Petrarch, Francis. "Petrarch: The Tale of Griselda." Trans. Peter Sadlon. 10 Sep. 2007.
Web. 15 Feb. 2012 <http://petrarch.petersadlon.com/griselda.html>.
15. Chaucer 234:460-462
16. Ibid., 237:560
17. Ibid., 239:619-623
18. Ibid., 241:696-700
19. Ibid., 244:785
20. Ibid., 246:852-854
21. Ibid., 246:857
22. Ibid., 247:902-903
23. Ibid., 247:915-917
24. Boccaccio, Decameron. 824
25. Chaucer 233:425-426
26. Ibid., 227:206-207
27. Ibid., 187:1109-1112
28. Ibid., 187:1117-1118
29. Ibid., 18:573-575
30. Ibid., 188:1146-1147
31. Ibid., 188: 1162
32. Ibid., 131:286-287
33. Ibid., 341:242
34. Ibid., 385:791-795
35. Ibid., 285:2303-2304
36. Ibid., 311:746-749
37. Ibid., 311:755
38. Ibid., 311:758
39. Ibid., 311:763-766
40. Ibid., 305-305:610-617; Chaucer 524:163-174
41. Ibid., 550:816-817
42. Ibid., 594:2616-2618
43. Ibid., 82:3104
44. Ibid., 365:177
45. Ibid., 86:3225
46. Ibid., 107:3961-3962
47. Ibid., 185:1138-1139
48. Ibid., 190:1231
49. Ibid., 263:1429-1430
50. Ibid., 281:2138
51. Ibid., 280:2087-2090
52. Petrarch "The Story..."
53. Chaucer 255-256:1189-1197
Primary Texts
Boccacio, Giovanni. The Decameron. Trans. G. H. McWilliam.
Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1972. Print.
Chaucer, Geoffrey. The Canterbury Tales. London: Everyman Library,
Orion Publishing Group, 2004. Print.
123
�Petrarch, Francis. "Petrarch: The Tale of Griselda.” Trans. Peter Sadlon. 10
Sep. 2007. Web. 15 Feb. 2012
<http://petrarch.petersadlon.com/griselda.html>.
Petrarch, Francis. "The Story of Griselda: to Boccaccio.” Trans. Peter
Sadlon. 10 Sep. 2007. Web. 15 Feb. 2012
<http://petrarch.petersadlon.com/read_letters.html?s=pet06.htm
1>.
�19111846R00073
Made in the USA
Charleston, SC
07 May 2013
��
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Connolly, Brian (Editor)
Ondocsin, Jeff (Editor)
Wilhite, Jesse (Editor)
Zehnder, Matthew (Editor)
Smith, Alycia (Cover Design)
Wood, Joan Marie
Bernstein, Elliot
Leavy, William
Olsen, April
Wycliff, Grant
Mancini, Jules
Creighton, Mary
Cowling, Kevin
Eagan, Anthony
Weed, Leah
Academic journal
Early Writings
Student publication
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PDF Text
Text
EARLY WRITINGS
AN ACADEMIC JOURNAL
��Early Writings:
An Academic Journal
St. John's College Graduate Iilstitute
Santa Fe, New Mexico
2012
SIJOHN’S
College
ANNAPOLIS • SANTA FE
This project is dedicated to Mary Versace,
without whom we would be lost in a haunted wood,
children afraid of the night,
who have never been happy or good.
��Early Writings:
An Academic Journal
St. John's College Graduate Institute
Santa Fe, New Mexico
2012
Publishers
Mary Creighton
Casey Carr
Jesse Wilhite
Editors
Mary Creighton
Casey Carr
Jesse Wilhite
Brian Connolly
Jeffrey Allen
Selection Committee
Brian Connolly
Jeffrey Allen
Kevin Cowling
Jeffrey Ondocsin
Sky Tallman
Caitlin McShea
Charles Brogan
Max Coscia
Jesse Wilhite
Casey Carr
Cover Design
Anastasia Kilani
�Contents:
A Note About Our Project
Mary Creighton, Casey Carr, Jesse Wilhite
iv
Synergy and the Possibility of Knowledge in Plato’s Meno
Jeremy Boor
1
Reductionist Language, Expansionist Soma
Jeffrey Ondocsin
15
Because It Feels Wrong: Hume’s Account of Moral Judgment
Joshua Falconer
20
Surrender to Poetry:
The Unsolved Duel Between Idea and Experience
Bethany McGee
27
Kindness in Aristotle’s High-Minded Man
Daphne Leveriza
35
11
�A Work in Progress: The Natural Connection in the Land of the
Future in Hegel’s "Geographical Basis of History"
Jeffrey Allen
41
The Path of the Good King:
A Journey from Loss to Renewal and Return in the
Mahabharata
Turner Resor
46
That Fair Passion:
Dejection and Desire in Alexander Pushkin's
Eugene Onegin
Mary Creighton
58
111
�A Note About Our Project
Early Writings: An Academic Journal 2012 marks the second
edition of our project in the Graduate Institute at St. John’s College,
Santa Fe. This publication is a collection of essays composed by
graduate students in both the Eastern Classics and Liberal Arts
program.
One of the crowning practices of those studying the Great
Books is that of inquiry. We find that the passage through any text
is both byzantine and yet necessarily careful. Each step is precise,
specific, and each is directed by the kind of questions we ask. In our
experience studying these texts, we have learned not only to ask
careful and precise questions, but also to ask the most demanding
and largest questions we could. This collection of essays is
compelling proof that students are taking up these questions
outside of the classrooms that initially inspired them. Further,
students are developing, investigating, and truly grappling with the
inquiries that emerged in communion.
Consider the questions in this compilation alone: What is the
precise meaning of recollection for Socrates? How can language be
used to organize the psychic realm? Can we acquire moral judgments
through sensory experience alone? How can one find refuge through
poetry given the seemingly irreconcilable logo-centric notions of “idea”
and “experience”? What kind of man is Aristotle’s “high-minded man”
and is his magnanimity at the expense of his kindness? How can
Hegel’s notion of Spirit be understood through geography? How does
the Mahabharata explain what it means to be a “good” king? And what
must a ruler endure to become one? How does Pushkin re-interpret the
Christian tale of man’s fall in Eden? What role do passion and desire
play in human happiness?
Each of these inquiries addresses a “how” or a “why” question.
Not only do these inquiries investigate deeper philosophical issues, but
they seek to explain the details and inner workings of the ideas at hand.
One does not ask, “What makes a good king in the Mahabharata?” but,
“How is he good and what psychic and spiritual experiences have made
him that way?” One does not ask if geography plays a part in Hegel’s
notion of Spirit but “How does a geographically-based culture affect
IV
�Hegel’s very meaning of Spirit?” These very investigations are the
mark of eager minds and their earnest quest toward knowledge.
This edition of the Journal was created in the same manner as its
pilot edition. Anonymous copies of student submissions were carefully
reviewed by a selection committee comprised of members of the
Graduate Institute. It is due to their hard work and dedication that this
diverse collection exists for you to read today. Editors who submitted to
the journal surrendered their voting rights during review of their essay
and the occasion of their submission remained confidential. Upon
selection, a small team of editors reviewed the works for minor changes
and corrections, including grammar and syntax. Next, an even smaller
team of publishers designed and formatted the content for publication.
Thank you to all those in the student body who have worked so hard to
put this project together and to our Graduate Director, Mr. Davis, who
continually supports us through all of our endeavors.
Your Publishers and Executive Editors,
Mary Creighton
Casey Carr
Jesse Wilhite
��Synergy and the Possibility of Knowledge in Plato's Meno
Jeremy Boor
jusv ro/wv TOVTOV TOO Xoyiaiiov, m Msvcov, deig. fioipg
(paivemi
napayiyvopevt] ^ dpexfi oig av napayiyvrjxai- to de oaipsg nepi avrov eiaopeda
TOTS, OTav Ttpiv Sttvi TpOTTCp ToiQ dvOpoiTtoiQ napayiyvsxai aperi^ , npoTspov
SKixsipr\a(opev amb l^t]T£iv ti ttot ’ scniv dpsTtj. vvv d ’ spot pev &pa noi isvai,
av Ss Tama xama dnep avxbg nsTTSiaai neiOe xai rov (fevov rov^e "Awtov, iva
npgoTSpog p- cog sav neiapg tovtov, scniv Sti Kai ’Adpvaiovg ovpasig.
According to this thinking, 0 Meno, it appears to us that it is by divine
dispensation that virtue comes to be with those men to whomsoever it may
come. And we will be more certain about this when we apply ourselves first
to seeking what virtue is in itself before asking in what manner it comes to
be with men. But now it is time for me to go. But do convince your guestfriend Anytus here about these things concerning which you yourself are
convinced, so that he may be more gentle. For ifyou should convince him,
you will also truly benefit the Athenians.
[Meno, Plato 100;b2-c2J*
Increasing Virtue by Declaring it Un-teachable
Socrates, that old stingray, is befuddling us again. He appears to
be couching some immortal intuition (some dpOfj do^a, darkly retained
from his hypo-/hyper-cosmic psychic sojourns between lives] between
an ostensibly sound conclusion on one hand, and a hopeful bit of moral
advice on the other. In so doing, and quite to the point, he utterly
contradicts himself.
There is a bold, if somewhat hidden, disagreement between the
dialogue’s resolution— that virtue is un-teachable, extra-natural, and
unaccompanied by knowledge— and Socrates' opinion that Anytus will
become meeker if only Meno should convince him of this very thing. It
will be odd, if upon conclusion, we see that one can lead a man to virtue
by teaching him that virtue cannot be taught. We should certainly
investigate what this might mean.
We might try to escape this confusion by saying that Socrates is
not thinking of virtue at all when he asks Meno to help improve Anytus
through argument. Perhaps the meekness that Socrates hopes will come
to Anytus is not a part of virtue, or perhaps it does not require the kind of
1
�virtue that is unattainable by natural or didactic means.
But the change in character that Socrates predicts does in fact
agree with the more definite descriptions of virtue that have appeared in
the dialogue. A constant relationship between virtue and good
statesmanship has been maintained throughout. The virtuous man is
always beneficent; if he is a statesman he will be a good one, valued by
the polls. To be virtuous is to be good, to be good is to be beneficent, and
the beneficent man guides us rightly in our affairs.i He is therefore good
for the polls.
Socrates re-invokes this relationship immediately before his
parting advice to Meno; "... [virtue] comes to those who possess it as a
gift from the gods which is not accompanied by understanding, unless
there is someone among our statesmen who can make another into a
statesman."^ Socrates believes that Anytus shall be a better statesman, by
way of increased meekness, if he learns to see virtue as a divine gift, one
beyond man's power to attain through learning.^
But does Socrates give Meno this last advice in earnest? Are we to
read him as sincerely believing that Anytus can and will become meeker
and more beneficent if Meno can only convince him to stop thinking of
virtue as a kind of knowledge that one man obtains from another, and to
begin thinking of it as a gift from the gods? Perhaps he is being coy, or
Plato is being sarcastic. Given the historical records of both Meno and
Anytus, we might be meant to read only tragic irony in Socrates' parting
words. The reader is assumed to know that Anytus is going to accuse
Socrates before the Athenian court in the irascible way in which he
accused the Sophists earlier in the dialogue, showing himself thereby to
be anything but npdoq.
Whether Meno tried to persuade him or not, Anytus did not
become better. He continued in his ways to the lasting detriment of
Athens (and perhaps of Socrates, depending on your point of view].
Remembering the stiffness of Anytus' neck, we are to lament the naivete
of Socrates, who did not see the vanity of his own counsel. Such counsel
Plato only puts in his mouth as a final, historical, and dramatic
demonstration of the insurmountable incommunicability ofvirtue.'*
On the other hand, Socrates' choice of words implies that he does
not merely hope that Anytus will become better if Meno should convince
him. He is certain that an improvement will result; "For if you should
convince this one, it is the case that you are going to benefit the
Athenians"* (cw? eav micjtjg romov, saxiv on xa'i ’AOtjvaiovq ovrfaEiq).
"Convincing” and "being meeker” are stated in the subjunctive, but the
result of benefit to the polis (which depends on the former] is stated in
2
�the indicative. Anytus may be a difficult case, and Meno might fail to
persuade him. But if he does persuade, the results are certain and the
increase in virtue implicit. Socrates believes that understanding virtue as
a divine gift is morally beneficial, at least as far as Anytus is concerned.
The conclusion of the dialogue thus stands: Virtue cannot be taught. But
if you manage to teach a bad man this fact, he will get better.
To make matters worse, it is difficult to be sure that Socrates is
thoroughly persuaded of the truth of his and Meno's resolution
concerning the provenance of virtue. He speaks of the conclusion
guardedly, making it contingent on the correctness of the initial
conditions of inquiry. However, he has accepted these conditions only as
a concession to Meno:"... but if we were right in the way we investigated
this whole discussion . . . ,"5 "According to this reasoning (Ek ^isv xoiwv
xovxov xov Xoyiaixov), it appears to us that virtue comes . . . according to
divine fate ... "^
There is still more to learn about this matter, and a greater degree
of certainty to be attained. This certainty can only be approached by
abandoning the conditions on which the resolution was reached. This
Socrates accepted when he conceded to Meno's insistence on seeking
how virtue is attained without first having decided what virtue is:
5s aa(peg nspi avxov siaopeda xoxs, oxav npiv axivi xpoKCp xoig
a\>9pco7xoig napayiyvsxai dpsxi], npdxspov snixsipdocopsv avxd Cfjxsiv xi
Tiox ’ saxiv dpextj.
TO
The conclusion, while morally beneficial for Anytus, is as valid as its
premises, which are in doubt. This is not the first time that Socrates has
indicated that some convictions can make us better even if the dialectic
that leads to them is questionable. Immediately after the slave-boy
experiment, he says:
I do not insist that my argument is right in all other respects, but I
would contend at all costs both in word and deed as far as I could
that we will be better men, braver and less idle, if we believe that
one must search for the things one does not know, rather than if
we believe that it is not possible to find out what we do not know
and that we must not look for it.
(86:b7-c2)
Socrates is not as concerned with the veracity of his account of learningas-recollection as he is firmly attached to its result; namely, that we can
and should learn what we do not know. One must be convinced that we
3
�should seek knowledge because this conviction will make us better. We
might be justified in thinking that he has a similar attitude regarding the
conclusion that virtue comes to man in no other way but by mysterious
divine dispensation [which itself appears simply as an incomprehensible
alternative to the more easily conceivable "teaching” and "nature").
Removing the acquisition of virtue from the grasp of teaching and nature
produces, in Socrates’s eyes, a morally effective teaching that is well
suited to the characters of both Meno and Anytus, regardless of the
solidity of the dialectical foundations of the same teaching.
None of this is meant to say that Socrates thinks that his and
Meno’s conclusion regarding virtue and its acquisition is simply false.
Eacp^g, when it refers to assertions or facts, means "sure,” "certain.” When
it refers to persons, as in this case, it means "unerring." If we continue the
attempt to seek what virtue itself is before asking how it is attained, we
will be more sure about the means of attaining it. If this certainty still
includes a statement that virtue cannot be taught but is a divine gift, then
we will understand such a statement better, having a better idea of what
virtue in fact is. But for now we know only that the outcome of our
discussion of its attainment is true insofar as the hypothetical discussion
[beginning with Socrates' agreement to seek the origin of virtue on
Meno’s terms) is valid.
But two very different attitudes toward teaching and knowledge
have been demonstrated during the dialogue. If there will be a difference
in the way we see the conclusion once we have investigated what virtue
is, it will likely have to do with the difference between the view of
knowledge that Socrates espouses before his concession to Meno, and the
one that he adopts in order to bring the discussion to a firm conclusion, as
Meno wishes. We shall examine the difference between these two views
more thoroughly hereafter.
The Concession
Since we will be referring not infrequently to what I have called
Socrates’ concession to Meno, it would be good to establish that such a
concession did occur, and to point out just what was conceded. After
being convinced by Socrates that learning is really recollection, and that
we will always be better men if we believe that we can find out what we
do not know, Meno is almost ready to take up the quest for virtue again,
but not quite:
Meno: But Socrates, I should be most pleased to hear your answer
to my original question, whether we should try [to discover
4
�virtue] on the assumption that virtue is something teachable, or is
a natural gift, or in whatever way it comes to men.
Socrates: If 1 were in control, Meno, not only of myself but also
of you, we would not have investigated whether virtue is
teachable or not before we had investigated what virtue itself is.
But because you do not even attempt to rule yourself, in order
that you may be free, but you try to rule me and do so, 1 will agree
with you— for what can 1 do?
(86:c8-d9]*
Here Socrates quite grudgingly agrees to go on with the discussion in the
way Meno wants to proceed. He portrays himself as being forced to do so
by Meno's overbearing will and his lack of self-control. Here Meno is not
ruling himself, but rather is trying to rule Socrates. This is symptomatic of
a state of soul Socrates associates with Meno's lack of freedom.
In a single turn of phrase, Socrates and Meno have gone from
being of the same mind (6/uovoov/uevf and taking-in-hand to seek in
common [Koivfj Cwivy the nature of virtue, to being portrayed as
adversaries divided by Meno's perceived insistence on ruling others but
not himself. If Socrates sees Meno's failure to rule himself— his failure to
be the principle of himself (av aavtov ovS emxsipeig apxsiv, iva Stj s^svOspog
— to be a failure of freedom, then Socrates has implied that he himself
is in fact free, since he does rule himself, but not Meno: “’AAX si psv sycb
^pxov, & Msvcov, pfj povov spavxov alia xai aov ...."
And so Socrates, preserving his internal freedom in submitting to
Meno's lack thereof, gives up what has been his main contention for the
preceding bulk of the dialogue; that, since he does not know what virtue
itself is, he is unable to seek out whether or not it is teachable.
Not only has he conceded this point, but he goes on to rescind the
outcome that had seemed an important demonstration about the nature
of learning. "First, if [virtue] is another sort than knowledge, is it
teachable or not, as we were just saying recollectable? Let it make no
difference to us which term we use: is it teachable? Or is it plain to
everyone that men cannot be taught anything but knowledge?"ii
Perhaps there is nothing dangerous about this equation.
"Recollection" was, after all, the Socratic picture of what men normally
call "learning."i2 But during the demonstration Socrates did not insist that
knowledge was not learned, since learning can be another name for
recollection. He wanted to show that it was not taught, where teaching is
understood as the transmission of quantities of information from a
knowing subject to an ignorant one. This is what Socrates strives to show
5
�that he is not doing with the slave-boy. Recollection consists of the soul's
gradual elucidation to itself of facts and principles that somehow lie
hidden within it, even though the process may be aided by the
questioning of an experienced interlocutor. But now, capitulating to
Meno's desire to discover how virtue is obtained, Socrates also accepts a
view of knowledge that makes it coextensive with teaching. The latter is
conceived precisely as Meno always tends to see it: as the transmission of
a quantity of information, which can then be easily transmitted to others,
perhaps for a fee, or at least for a good reputation. The examples of
"teaching” that are given in the post-concession dialogue conform to this
view.
The conclusion that virtue is not knowledge, and is therefore
neither teachable not learnable, is based on premises that Socrates
accepts only hypothetically, in order to finally be able to maintain a
discussion with Meno that is capable of coming to some sort of
conclusion. Socrates speaks of these conclusions guardedly, making them
contingent on the correctness of the initial hypotheses: "... but if we
were right in the way we investigated this whole discussion . . .
"According to this reasoning of the moment (Ek jusv wivvv rovrov too
Xoyia/uov), it appears to us that virtue comes ... according to divine fate ...
/'14
The main difference between the pre-concession and post
concession portions of the dialogue seems to lie in the attitude taken
toward knowledge and teaching. Socrates strives to bring Meno to his
own view of knowledge within the context of a discussion about virtue,
while Meno unflaggingly clings to his old attitude, summed up in his
repeated requests to have Socrates simply tell him about virtue. Having
finally failed to bring Meno around, Socrates accepts Meno’s attitude
hypothetically, and the two of them begin to come to conclusions rather
rapidly. Simple equations at last begin to be made: Knowledge is what is
taught.15 Virtue as a whole or in part is wisdom.Revising this view,
knowledge is solidification through reasoning of right opinion.i^
Thinking along with Socrates that a Meno or an Anytus can be
morally improved by thinking of virtue as having little to do with their
ideas of knowledge, teaching, or nature, we must ask whether there are
different ideas of these to be had. And if there are, we should see if this
tells us anything about virtue. If we are very lucky, we might have some
idea of how to acquire it, which idea may or may not include some more
thoroughly explained notion of virtue as a divine gift.
6
�The Language of Knowledge in Meno
For those of us who would like to gain a clearer understanding of
the intelligible world by attaching ever more precise descriptions of
rather elusive concepts to an ever increasing number of old Greek words,
the Meno is a frustrating work. Aristotle, in his Nicomachaean Ethics, is
kind enough to precisely delineate acocpia, emax^nr], vovq, and (ppovijaig as
"dianoetic virtues." Aristotle's waters are never muddied (except in
translation) by classing these under such a nebulous and unwieldy term
as "knowledge” or "wisdom." But the Socrates of the Meno has little
interest in such niceties.
Prior to the slave-boy episode, Socrates uses mostly verbs and
adverbial phrases to speak of knowledge, and almost always in the
negative: [ovSe avrd 6ti kox’ saxl to napanav apsxr\ wy/dvco eidcog). At the
conclusion of the slave-boy episode, emart^pt} becomes the favored
nominal form for knowledge, being the thing that the slave-boy has
discovered within his own soul. Likewise, in the concluding discussion of
the relation of knowledge and true opinion, smartjpt] is what opOfj Sd^a
may become when clarified and stabilized by causal reasoning. But, in
between and throughout, Socrates uses (ppovtjoig, emcrciipr], and vovg
interchangeably. These names refer to a single thing, and we know only
that, when present, knowledge makes everything in the soul act well.
Later, we learn that there is an assistant in this duty, which seems to do
most of the work while real knowledge is away.
It would seem that the distinction between knowledge and true
opinion is the only one Socrates is interested in making. If we are to get at
his attitude toward knowledge in order to ask how it differs from Meno’s,
and subsequently to inquire what this difference might say about the
moral efficacy of the dialogue’s conclusion, then we must look to the
distinction between knowledge and true opinion. This distinction is, after
all, one of the only things that Socrates would claim to know, if ever he
were to make such a claim.i^
Knowledge and Right Opinion
Opdfi do^a makes two distinct appearances in the dialogue. Its
second entry, right before the conclusion, is the more conspicuous, since
it is here that right opinion is plainly contrasted with knowledge, and
their relationship elucidated. The explanation of the difference between
the two allows us to see how virtue, although it is beneficial, can be
something other than knowledge, how it is not necessarily "accompanied
by understanding."!^
7
�But right opinion also has a significant role to play in the slaveboy discussion, and its distinction from knowledge there is not as clear:
Socrates: How does it seem to you, Meno? Has he answered with
some opinion that was not of his own?
Meno: No, but it was his own.
Socrates: And wasn't he ignorant, as we said a short time ago?
Meno: You speak the truth.
Socrates: So were these opinions inside of him, or not?
Meno: Yes.
Socrates: So a man who does not know has within himself true
seemings [opinions] about the things that he does not know?"
Meno: It appears so.
Socrates: And now these opinions have been put back into motion
within him, like a dream. And if someone were to ask him many
such things and often, you know that finally he will know about
these things as accurately as anyone.
[85:b8-dl]*
The true opinions that exist in the slave-boy’s soul are the basis of his
newly recollected knowledge. They are also evidence of the previous
existence of knowledge in his soul. The opinions which existed before
Socrates' questioning show that he had knowledge already. The opinions
that are the content of his conclusions are part of knowledge, rather than
merely a sort of pre-knowledge. The attainment of knowledge requires
true opinion as condition, while the process of attaining knowledge
produces more true opinions, weeding out false ones.
Socrates says that the slave-boy has "had and learned” these
opinions or seemings "at some other time.'’2o Knowledge and true opinion
do not seem to be separate within the "time” of the extra-human life of
the soul. Socrates wants to show that the soul has previously known all
things, before being darkened by the ignorance that somehow dogs
human intellectual vision. He has no problem calling the things that are
8
�attained independently of this state of affairs "opinions" or "seemings."
The strict distinction between knowledge and true seeming that obtains
at the dialogue’s end has no bearing in the realm of extra-human learning;
for, that kind of learning, which precedes and enables human learning,
involves no processes of recollection, nor perhaps any "tying-down"
through causal reasoning.
If the process of recollection which we call learning is a progress
from one true opinion to more true opinions, destroying false ones as we
go, and if this process is evidence of the pre-subsistence of knowledge
within the soul, then the otherworldly attainment of the knowledge (or
seeming) that is the basis and precondition of learning within human life
cannot be another process of recollection, nor can it be a transfer of
information from the knowledgeable to the ignorant. In that case,
Socrates’ account would result in an infinite regress. The learning that
took place during "the time when he was not a human being”2i must
rather have been a sort of “beholding all things, both here and in Hades.’’22
It is called "learning" not in the sense of recollection, but in the sense of
direct experience of the things that now need to be recollected.
Synergic Learning and the Theory of Recollection
We have already pointed out that Socrates believes more firmly in
that which the recollection account intends to demonstrate than he
believes in the literal truth of the account.23 The conclusion that
knowledge is possible precisely because it is somehow hidden in the
immortal soul is one of only two absolute convictions which Socrates
espouses in the Meno. The other is the difference between knowledge and
right opinion. Given the hypothetical and illustrative value of the
recollection account, it will not be surprising if we note that Socrates is
not strictly faithful to Pindar as a mystagogue or religious authority. A
Pindarian fundamentalist he is not.
The poetic-mythological quotation from Pindar, while it provides
a starting point for Socrates’ reflections, is not taken seriously as an
account of the goings-on in the underworld. The poem says only that
some souls are allowed to return in the ninth year, and that these become
great men, but Socrates infers that all souls are in fact travelling all over
the place all the time, that all are continuously reborn, giving them plenty
of time to learn everything and forget it again. This means also that all
souls are capable of gaining knowledge (and, perhaps, greatness).
Beginning with a pious belief in a religious myth, Socrates
proceeds to a generalized belief about the soul and its potential for
knowledge, and finally to the categorical assertion that, "the truth about
9
�things that are is always in our soul, so that the soul should be immortal,
so that we should always boldly take up the task of seeking calling to
mind again what we do not happen to know at the moment, that is what
we do not remember.”24 Then he declares that we should cleave to the
notion of the possibility of knowledge for its morally edifying effects, even
if his argument for it is not entirely correct.
Ultimately, the notion of transmigration of souls is no more
essential or defining to his final conclusion about the soul’s immortality
than the poem is to his statements about the rebirth of all souls. The
important thing is not that souls fly around learning things in order to
recollect them during various lifetimes, but that the presence in the soul
of true opinions and the ability to reason about them is logically
inseparable from the conviction that the soul is immortal and is
connected to a world that transcends and (at least logically] pre-exists
the state of ignorance in which the soul now finds itself.
In fact, if we were to press the notion of recollection "from
another time" as if Socrates meant the soul had learned everything simply
by being around for so long, we would find that we must indeed mean
something more fundamental than this. If, instead of saying that the
potential for knowledge about geometry inheres in the slave-boy’s soul
because of its connection to an immortal world, we say that he knows it
simply because he learned it in a previous life, then a soul that has not
had a geometry lesson either in Hades or in some earthly location will not
be able to "recollect" the Pythagorean theorem. Only those who have
been good shoemakers previously will become good ones now, etc.
But the immortality of the soul that is indicated by its potential
for recollection is more than its existence throughout an indefinite
expanse of time. The slave-boy learned geometry "when he was not a
human being," that is, during a time when his experience of his own
nature was not subject to death or ignorance. The "truth about beings"
did not come to the soul at a certain previous point, but is always [ad] in
the soul. This seems indeed to mean that it was never absent from the
soul but belongs to it simply according to its immortality, as a participant
in a meaningful, ordered, and beautiful cosmos. It is the potential of the
soul to proceed further and further into a truth that is inherent in it, the
recognition of which is inseparable from the fact of the soul’s immortality.
The right opinions of the slave-boy "subsist inside" [ssmv') him,
regardless of his state of ignorance or forgetfulness.
If we are right about this, then it is also the case that the
knowledge (or right opinion) which the slave-boy latently possesses has
never been given to him from without, at least not by another "human
10
�being," at least not while he was a human being. The potential for
knowledge is evidence of a divine aspect of the soul, or of the soul’s divine
origin.
When Socrates says that he would not maintain that his argument
is correct in all respects, he may even mean that all of it can go (even the
reincarnation and the extra-human "time"], so long as we maintain that
the clear notions we find in our souls, even while we are unable to "tie
them down" by causal reasoning, are evidence of an immortal aspect to
the soul that must be believed in and cultivated. All souls, even the souls
of slave-boys, can participate in this process of discovery, of recollecting,
what rightly pertains to them. Knowledge, that which clarifies and
establishes right seeming, is the soul’s attainment of what properly
belongs to it by nature, regardless of how far it may have strayed from
participation in its own immortality. The soul that recognizes its
ignorance and begins to know does not become what it was not, but what
it always was.
"If, then, the truth about the things that are is always with us in
our soul, the soul would then be immortal... .’’^s This conclusion, which
Socrates believes can make us "better, braver, and less idle," 26 is the only
thing essential to the recollection argument. The soul that recollects is
recollecting not only knowledge, but also its proper nature as an
immortal being. The process of recollection and the tying-down by causal
reasoning that it entails, are themselves means of re-obtaining the
simplicity of vision that belongs to the knowing soul according to its
immortality.
Teaching
If knowledge inheres in and belongs to the immortal soul in spite
of any ignorance it might now be experiencing, then it must belong in the
same way to every soul, regardless of each soul’s present level of
recollection or even its personal aptitude for the process. The true
opinions that are in a soul but have not yet been "put back in motion" are
in every soul, even if they are not active, and they can all be recollected
and made active. Thus, Socrates takes pains first of all to employ a slaveboy for his demonstration, and secondly to point out that if the slave-boy
keeps being asked questions he will know geometry as well as anyone.
This means that knowledge does not properly belong to anyone in an
exclusive sense, even if one happens to have a piece of it now while
another does not. Knowledge is not something like a possession which
one man can give to another. Everyone somehow has it, even the
ignorant, and the teacher must not presume himself to be giving
11
�something to the student. He is only showing him what he already
possesses.
Thus Socrates insists that he is not "teaching" the slave-boy, since
for Socrates "teaching" means the transfer of an opinion, the giving of a
piece of information that was not previously present in the learner. This
meaning for SiSaaKcdia is kept quite consistently by Socrates, which
makes it a ^^ bit suspicious when he conflates "teachable" and
recollectable during his concession to Meno. If we want to call what
Socrates does with the slave-boy "didactic," we must concede that we
mean something different by the word than Socrates does here.
The act of the learner and his questioner is a cooperative one, a
single act of elucidation in which both participate, and which assumes a
common divinely oriented nature. While we might object that Socrates
asks the slave-boy "leading questions," and therefore does in fact give him
information, Socrates would not consider this a point against his
conviction about learning. Since the slave-boy is able to answer every
query according to his own understanding, according to whatever true
and indubitable seemings are present to him in his soul, Socrates sees the
new information as coming as much from the slave-boy as from himself.
And, more importantly, from the immortal nature of the soul, as well as
from nature as a whole, which is "all akin." The questioner and the
learner share a single nature, one that somehow contains within it the
truth about the things that are" at all times, even when it is not aware of
this truth and cannot explain it. Moreover, if the slave-boy were to accept
the hidden information suggested by Socrates without relating it to the
notions already clear to him, he would be neither knowing nor
recollecting it, but only opining it (and that in a way inferior to what he
already opined according to the true opinions that his soul has retained
on its own]. Such opinions, according to the later account of knowledge
and true opinion, would not stay long in the slave-boy’s soul.
According to Socrates account of the soul, real learning, which
does not come from "teaching," can only be a synergic process. Any
notion of teaching as the mere transfer of information violates the basis
for belief in the possibility of knowledge, namely, that it is inherent in the
soul, even while we are ignorant. Learning can be the self-elucidation of a
single soul or a co-operation between two souls sharing a single natural
condition and goal. But it can never be a transaction after the manner of a
sale, one man giving to another what he did not already possess, that
which Socrates calls "teaching." It is under terms of sale, transfer, and
acquisition that Socrates persistently speaks of both teaching’ and
learning after his concession to Meno.
12
�In his interactions with Meno, Socrates emphasizes the synergic
nature of the search for knowledge, contrasting it with eristic, unfriendly
and divisive attitudes towards philosophic inquiry:
[I]f the one asking me were one of the wise, eristic and
competitive, then I would say to him "I have answered. And if I
don't speak rightly, then you must take up the argument and
refute me." But if some friends, like you and I are now, should
want to have a discussion with one another, then they must
answer more meekly [npaoxepovy’ and dialectically.
(75:c8-d2)*
Where "teaching" means the transfer of information or knowledge [as a
sort of commodity or possession) between men, both virtue and
knowledge are entirely un-teachable. "Knowledge" in this case is
something one has, wields, and might even sell. But, on the other hand, if
knowledge is something mysteriously inherent in the soul, which the soul
somehow has within itself without having yet comprehended it, then we
might hope that the same is true of virtue.
This would not make virtue any less a divine gift, since knowledge
[absent of its dependence on a transactional account of teaching) is also
something of a gift to the soul. The first attainment of knowledge
somehow preceded the soul's human experience. The pre-existence of
knowledge is the possibility of knowledge.
A man who sees knowledge [or virtue) along the lines of a
possession to be attained cannot be helped except by beginning to think
of it as unattainable by human means. These efforts are, after all, based on
a state of need and self-defensiveness that cannot allow one to make the
declaration of ignorance, to submit to the "numbedness" that is the
beginning of real knowledge.
The same constraints of acquisition [or, rather, participation)
apply to both virtue and knowledge. One can neither have it nor teach it
for oneself, but only for all, and only as a matter of participation in a
nature common to all men, a nature that is both prior to and perfecting of
the common human experience, benighted as it finds itself by the mixture
of true and false impressions and seemings.
* indicates author's own translation.
13
�Endnotes
1. Viz. 98:27-10
2. 99:e6-100:a2
3. Plato thus places Socrates (and, at least potentially, Meno) in the
running for virtue-teacher and statesmen-maker, even as Socrates
declares that no such teacher exists.
4. (heavy sigh]
5. 99:e2*
6. 100:b2*
7. 86;c4
8. Ibid.
9. 86:d6
10. 86:d2
11. 87;b9-c3
12. Viz. 83:d2
13. 99:e2
14. 100:b2*
15. 87:c2
16. 89:a3
17. 98:a8
18. 98;b2-5
19. 99:e9
20. Viz. 85:e7 and 86:al
21. 86:a3*
22. 81:c6*
23. Viz.86:b5
24. 86;bl-4
25. 86:bl
26. 86:b8
27. Unlike Anytus, who lacks npgidzriTog.
Primary Text
Plato. Meno. Trans. G.M.A Grube. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2002.
14
�Reductionist Language, Expansionist Soma
Jeffrey Ondocsin
An oral tradition, disseminated by clans of priests, The Rig Veda is
a text that relies on the efficacy of the spoken word for the success of any
ritual action. Passed down orally from guru to student for centuries, it is
highly likely that hymns propagated by myriad and diverse families of the
priestly class were compiled and reorganized into their present
orientation. This has allowed for a bevy of contradictions to spring up in
the text, lending it an air of richness and mystery that has fueled enduring
interest. In a tradition defined by oral retention and the sacred nature of
speech uttered during sacrificial rites, it comes as no surprise that there
are numerous iterations of the power of speech, even going so far as to
deify it.
Speech, or more simply, language, is seen as an empowering,
creative force that provides a framework of meaning for the Vedic world.
Out of this framework come the various depictions of the creation of the
universe, the genesis of the gods, and their effect on the world, as well as
the role of the priestly class in undertaking sacrifices on behalf of their
community. To a large extent, it would seem that the nature of language is
to define, to delineate and to create the world as it is experienced and
understood by humans. However, some of the hymns, particularly those
that expound upon the ritualized consumption of soma, seem to
contradict other ideas of speech as seminal in the creation of the
experienced world. In these rituals the user moves beyond the
conventions of language and society, and experiences the world directly
without the reducing valve of speech ingrained by society.
Hymn 10.125 is a logical jumping off point for exploring the idea
of speech as the architect of the experienced world. Consider verse seven,
for example. Verse seven reads, "I gave birth to the father on the head of
this world. My womb is in the waters, within the ocean. From there I
spread out over all creatures and touch the very sky with the crown of my
head.”i Verse eight continues, "I am the one who blows like the wind,
embracing all creatures. Beyond the sky, beyond this earth, so much have
I become in my greatness.”^ All that exists in the world of humans must
be defined by speech in order for it to be known. Even those things that
exist beyond the experienced world come to be understood by language.
This is the very cornerstone of how Vedic humans understood and
interacted with their world. Language, both as it is utilized in ritual as
well as in the experiences of daily life, has a tremendous impact on the
15
�ways that people can understand the world around them. Indeed, as
verse four states, the one who eats food, who truly sees, who breathes,
who hears what is said, does so through me . . . Listen, you whom they
have heard: what I tell you should be heeded."^ Experience cannot be
talked about, let alone experience, without the focus and commonality
provided by the power of language to delineate its boundaries. If I were
to i^ake the argument that my word for "sun" is different from your word
for "sun," then it would be possible that through our different notions of
what a "sun" is, we would have a different experience of the fundamental
nature of reality. However, our different experience of what we call "sun"
is shattered by this notion of a commonly held and expressed image of
sun. The attempts of the individual to assert himself in a way that
differs that differs from the norm established by society are broken once
people can come to talk about an idea in shared terms.
This is the nature of speech, it would seem, in the Rig Veda.
Speech is granted the power of creation by virtue of the power that
naming a thing has over given conceptions of that thing. Thus, one could
argue that speech functions as a reducing valve for the burgeoning realm
of existence, delineating the boundaries of things through the power of
naming. But speech was created by the sages and disseminated among
the people simultaneously. Hymn 10.71 develops this seemingly
contradictory idea of speech as both created and creating. In the first
verse the poet states, "when they set in motion the first beginning of
speech, giving names, their most pure and perfectly guarded secret was
revealed through love."^ It can be understood from this verse that when
the sages gave names in the beginning, they were residing in a position of
superior understanding about the nature of things and through naming
were able to extend their knowledge throughout society. Their love for
their fellow humans manifested itself in the creation of commonly held
notions for the experienced world, allowing people to share together in
this world through the power of ritual language. This is further expressed
in the second verse, where the poet says, "when the wise ones fashioned
speech with their thought, sifting it as grain is sifted through a sieve, then
friends recognized their friendships. A good sign was placed on their
speech."5 Here, the image of grain sifted through a sieve is particularly
demonstrative of the assertion that the power of speech lies in its limiting
function. Language has power through its ability to define the boundaries
around difficult concepts in a sense "creating" them. The wise ones
were aware of this power and were consequently careful in their use of
language to describe the experienced world. This can perhaps explain the
seeming inability of characters in the Mahabharata to take back their own
16
�speech and vows, even when appropriating that speech would negatively
impact their lives. However, despite the power accorded to language, it is
in the soma ritual in particular that the practitioner moves past the realm
of what can be understood and described by language.
Despite the use of speech by humans, there exists much in the
world that cannot be effectively described through language— things so
ineffable that they defy the categorization and certainty that language
seeks to impose on them. Hence, verse seven of hymn 10.129: "[WJhence
this creation has arisen— perhaps it formed itself, or perhaps it did not—
the one who looks down on it, in the highest heaven, only he knows— or
perhaps he does not know.'’^ But as can be seen from many of the soma
hymns, consumption of this substance results in the user denying, or
perhaps defying, the power of language to delimit ideas. The poet of
hymn 8.48 starts out by saying, "I have tasted the sweet drink of life,
knowing that it inspires good thoughts and joyous expansiveness to the
extreme,”^ qualities that the reducing valve of speech does not seem to
possess. Soma allows the individual an opportunity to break through the
limitations of speech and experience "joyous expansiveness to the
extreme," a state perhaps encountered in no other way. Further on the
poet says, "when you penetrate inside, you will know no limits . . . We
have drunk the Soma; we have become immortal; we have gone to the
light; we have found the gods."^ Soma allows for an experience of that
which is ineffable, that which language fails to describe or, by its very
nature, is incapable of expressing. Soma seems to be something akin to a
wilderness state, easily as capable of delivering a transcendent
experience for individuals as of leaving them in a terrifying domain
where the foundation of all their civilized knowledge and experience is
meaningless. The soma experience is in its nature complimentary to an
understanding of the universe solely through the medium of speech and
could be considered a perfect antithesis to the structured, logical nature
provided by a linguistically organized understanding of the world.
Both the ritual power accorded to speech and the transcendent
power of the soma experience, if considered complementary in a Vedic
religious experience, play roles in the creation of the experienced world
of the Vedic individual. Boundaries of expression are necessary, or else
the individual would never be able to relate to or understand the others
around him. Equally as requisite as language for society, however, is the
experience that allows the individual to recreate his world unconstrained
by speech. Without soma, or some other transcendent experience, the
individual cannot help but be ruled by the linguistic and other
conventions of his time. Again, however, one must consider the
17
�importance of speech as a creation. Hymn 10.136 advances the notion
that speech is created through transcendent experience. "Long-hair holds
fire, holds the drug, holds sky and earth. Long-hair reveals everything, so
that everyone can see the sun. Long-hair declares the light."® The figure of
Long-hair" possesses an understanding of all that is present in the
experienced world and through the medium of the transcendent drug
experience He "creates" the world around him. Long-hair knows the
reality of the experienced world, but must turn to the power of speech to
disseminate the understanding he has of his universe. Speech could then
be said to emerge from the understanding of the experienced world
gained through a transcendent drug experience. Indeed, the poet says
Long-hair declares the light" [emphasis added], thus stating that just as
Long-Hairs experiential knowledge of light is a necessary requirement
hcuZ of speech
While at first glance the transcendent properties of the soma
experience seem to be independent of structured speech, I believe that
the two are fundamentally linked. They are fundamentally linked through
the equal desire of the individual to use both methods of experiencing the
world to create understanding among humans. It is an experience that
allows the individual to transcend the normal reality he inhabits and
return with new insight, enriching the fabric of his society. The
boundaries of language can then be extended to encompass the new
experience and insight, granting speech the power of new ideas and
preventing its stagnation. Speech determines what individuals can
understand about their world, but soma imbues speech with new life,
ensuring that new and dynamic understanding is continually
disseminated throughout society.
Endnotes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Doniger, trans. pp. 63
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid., 61
Ibid.
Ibid., 25-26
Ibid.,134
Ibid.
Ibid.,137
18
�Primary Text
Doniger, Wendy. Trans. The Rig Veda. London: Penguin Books,
�Because It Feels Wrong: Hume's Account of Moral Judgment
Joshua Falconer
Is it possible to distinguish between moral good and evil through
reason alone, or must there be some other principle necessary to make
this distinction? In support of the latter possibility, David Hume argues
that since vice and virtue are not discoverable merely by reason, or the
comparison of ideas, it must be by means of some impression or
sentiment they occasion, that we are able to mark the difference betwixt
them."i From the other side of the debate, Thomas Reid contends, "In the
approbation of a good action, therefore, there is feeling indeed, but there
is also esteem of the agent; and both the feeling and the esteem depend
upon the judgment we form of his conduct."2 This paper will set out the
significance and meaning of Hume's claim, followed by a careful
interpretation of the dialectic. I will then frame Reid’s objections, respond
on Hume’s behalf, and in the end argue that although Reid's criticisms
ultimately fail to sink Hume’s argument, they posit a starting point for
further criticism.
Hume s ethical system springs from the nomenclature and method
of the British empiricist tradition. As Bertrand Russell notes, "he
developed to its logical conclusion the empirical philosophy of Locke and
Berkeley, and by making it self-consistent made it incredible."3 As Reid
observes,^ the epistemological claims of Descartes and Locke led to the
belief that secondary qualities of a body, such as heat or color or taste, are
mere impressions of the mind, not in the object itself. Berkeley further
applied this notion to primary qualities as well, such as extension and
motion. The epistemological claims were carried over to notions of taste,
then beauty, and then naturally to morality. This debate over whether
moral judgment derives from reason or sentiment was unprecedented, as
both Hume and Reid observe.^
What is at stake here? According to Reid, the following consequence
issues from Hume’s theory: If what we call moral judgment be no real
judgment, but merely a feeling, it follows, that the principle of morals
which we have been taught to consider an immutable law for all
intelligent beings, have no other foundation but an arbitrary structure
and fabric in the constitution of the human mind. Thus by a change in our
structure, what is immoral might become moral, virtue might be turned
into vice, and vice into virtue.^ If Hume is correct in his claim that no
moral judgment can result without an antecedent impression, then the
common way of referring to morally good or evil actions as reasonable or
20
�unreasonable is an illusion. This notion is contrary to the ordinary sense
of morality in all tongues and at all times, as Reid might put it.
What are moral judgments according to Hume? To call any action or
character praiseworthy or blameworthy, virtuous or vicious, good or
bad— these are all examples of pronouncing moral approbation or
disapprobation, respectively. When we attribute any such judgment to an
action or character, do we mean to say that they are matters of fact
existing in the object itself— a real relation that exists with respect to the
objects in consideration? If so, then they may be properly be called
objects of reason or of the ideas. Otherwise, they are called objects of
impression or sentiment. This distinction between ideas and impressions
involves the two kinds of perceptions of the mind. From this basic
distinction, Hume draws the conclusion that it is not by means of our
ideas, but rather of our impressions, that we form moral approbation or
disapprobation.
Hume's theory of moral judgment posits the following
interpretations of forming moral judgment: (i) the non-propositional
interpretation, (ii) the personal point of view, and [mj the common point of
view. By interpreting these three methods of forming moral judgment, I
intend to inform a critical discussion thereof.
The non-propositional interpretation: Hume is well known for the
claim that it is impossible to derive "ought" statements from "is”
statements. This means that moral judgments cannot be derived from
non-moral facts. In vain would one attempt to deduce a "right” or "wrong”
from the propositional facts tied to any event that would elicit moral
judgment. If one were to steal a painting from a museum, for instance,
one may list as many true or false propositions about the event, such as
the circumstances of the thief, what his motives were, or how he did it, as
one liked, but such facts in themselves would never obtain something
called a "vice.” "The vice entirely escapes you, as long as you consider the
object,” says Hume. "You never can find it, till you turn your reflection
into your own breast, and find a sentiment of disapprobation, which
arises in you, towards this action.”^ That is, the action itself may cause or
provoke certain feelings in oneself which vary according to force. We
sense these feelings in a way that is analogous to the other senses.
Impressions of the visual field are effected by the sense of sight, just as
impressions of morality are effected by the moral sense, or the
conscience. To call something "beautiful” is merely to say that it is
pleasing to the eye; likewise to call an action virtuous is merely to say
that it is agreeable to the moral sense, according to Hume.
The personal point of view: It may be a true proposition to say, "I
(I)
(II]
21
�feel disapproval about the theft." But Hume thinks that to call the
statement, The thief should not have stolen," a true or false proposition
is to use words in a vulgar way. For the statement suggests that the
subject "the thief’ has the real property that he "should not have stolen."
But how could the thief have such a property in a true and meaningful
way? When you really break down this sort of moral judgment, Hume
argues, all you really mean is that you are expressing your own feeling of
disapproval that the action: "So that when you pronounce any action or
character to be vicious, you mean nothing, but that from the constitution
of your nature you have a feeling or sentiment of blame from the
contemplation of it."8
In order to more thoroughly understand Hume’s concept of moral
judgment, we must also grasp his sense of moral motivation, for what we
know about morality is directly informed by the moral sense, and the
feelings of the moral sense involve moral motivation. Hume thinks that
reason is incapable of either motivating action or of opposing the
passions. The role of reason, then, is merely to inform us as to the best
way to achieve the ends our passions set for us. One way it accomplishes
this is by associating causes and effects. If a past action has caused us
pain, then the memory of that pain informs our passion such that we are
motivated not to repeat the same action. This is an example of how
feelings of the moral sense accompany moral motivation. These feelings
of unease or disapproval are that which we refer to when we pronounce
moral disapprobation. Likewise, those objects we associate with pleasure
will produce in us a judgment of moral approbation. In this sense Hume
follows the Hobbesian notion of forming judgments from self-interest
alone, but as will be discussed later, his system includes a concept
unaccounted for in Hobbes’ theory.
(Ill) The common point of view. In certain cases, there is a way to
acquire a better judgment of a given action than would be possible if
restricted to the first-person perspective. By means of a hypothetical
outside point of view, we may imagine how one would react if she were
immediately affected by a given action or character. This is especially
useful when personal bias gets in the way of forming a clear judgment.
For instance, Harriet sees that Rodney has just helped an old woman
cross the street. Harriet holds a grudge against Rodney, so that she views
this action with bitter disapproval— "What is he trying to prove?" But
suppose Harriet, for whatever reason, wishes to form a better judgment.
She cannot do this herself, so she must imagine how an observer
untainted by her paradigm would react to the event. In this way, she may
attain a theoretical knowledge even as her feelings may run counter to it.
22
�This is what Hume meant when he said, "The good qualities of an enemy
are hurtful to us; but may still command our esteem and respect. ‘Tis only
when a character is considered in general, without reference to our
particular interest, that it causes such a feeling or sentiment, as
denominates it morally good or evil.’’^
To restate, Hume thinks that moral judgments (0 refer to matters of
fact, not about the characters or actions in consideration, but rather about
the sentiment of the one pronouncing the moral judgment; [ii] are
produced merely by feelings that accompany the moral sense with
reference to self-interest; and (m] in some cases require an outside
hypothetical perspective for a clearer judgment.
Having interpreted these three methods of forming moral judgment,
let us now consider some of Thomas Reid's criticisms, which apply
directly to (i] and (ii), and indirectly to (m]. To frame the objections,
recall the claim in question: "When you pronounce any action or
character to be vicious, you mean nothing, but that from the constitution
of your nature you have a feeling or sentiment of blame from the
contemplation of it."i“
Reid agrees that a feeling of blame accompanies one’s moral
judgment of an action or character. But this feeling is entirely dependent
upon one's judgment that the character in consideration acted contrary to
reason. There is here an unreduced notion of "real” judgment that is both
ontologically and logically prior to the notion of feeling. Therefore, it is
not the case that all claims of moral judgment mean nothing, but that one
has a sentiment of approval or disapproval from the contemplation of it.
To clarify this point, Reid posits two propositions referring to a case
known by both the speaker and the listener:^
(a] "Such a man did well and worthily, his conduct is highly
approvable.”
(b] "The man’s conduct gave me a very agreeable feeling.”
Reid interprets Hume’s claim above to infer that (a) does not contain
any property that is not contained in (b). Reid denies this for two
reasons:i2
(1) "The first expresses plainly an opinion or judgment of the
conduct of the man, but says nothing of the speaker. The second only
testifies a fact concerning the speaker, to wit, that he had such a
feeling."
(2) "... the first may be contradicted without any ground of offence.
23
�such contradiction being only a difference of opinion, which, to a
reasonable man, gives no offence. But the second speech cannot be
contradicted without an affront; for, as every man must know his
own feelings, to deny that a man had a feeling which he affirms he
had, IS to charge him with a falsehood."
Reid summarizes his objection as follows: "This doctrine, therefore
at moral approbation is merely a feeling without judgment, necessarily
carries along with it this consequence, that a form of speech, upon one of
the most common topics of discourse, which either has no meaning or a
meaning irreconcilable to all rules of grammar or rhetoric, is found to be
common and familiar in all languages and in all ages of the world while
How would Hume respond to such criticism? Would he think that
Reid gave a correct interpretation of his theory? If that were granted
would the objection sink his argument? Perhaps the argument could be
saved given that Hume never claimed to commit to ordinary usage He
was committed rather to the abstruse, philosophical, or precL meaning
of terms in order to codify a nomenclature unclouded by the vagaries of
common usage.
senes ui
Otherwise, Reid's interpretation approximates the effect that "moral
approbation is merely a feeling without judgment."i4 That said, is there a
real difference between (a] and (b) about which Hume is silent? Let us
consider (IJ and (2J, beginning with the latter. Is (2) true? Not obviously.
It does not take much reflection to realize how easy it is to obtain
examples m which a judgment statement (a] may have more or less
grounds of offense as a feeling statement (b). So let us reject (2]. Is [11
bullet
ordinary usage problem. Hume could bite the
bullet and affirm that his abstruse use of terms does go against the
common sense usage, and thereby represents a completely original yet
accurate means of describing human psychology
There is a stronger sense to (1) that Reid himself does not developf
excellent starting point for further criticism. It is
R.fh
7^
the conduct of the man in terms of virtue
Rather than reducing moral adjudication to terms of sense, why not
consider it m terms of excellence? We know, as a matter of fact, who is the
fastest man in the world, given that "the fastest man in the world" refers
to the one who currently holds the world record for the 100-meter sprint
namely, Jamaica's Usain Bolt. In like manner, why can we not say who is
onest, given that "an honest person" is one who habitually acts in ways
24
�that are honest and trustworthy? The same might be said for the other
virtues and vices. Moral judgment then becomes a useful measurement of
human conduct given certain parameters. Of course, Hume takes a similar
notion of virtues into account, but it remains to be seen whether Hume
considered virtuous qualities to be properties that truly belong to the
person in question. In this sense, then, could not moral judgment be a
way of describing a true or false proposition regarding another person’s
virtue or vice? To push the analogy, when we say that the thief acted
wrongly, we could take this to mean that the thief acted poorly in terms of
a certain kind of social performance. If we follow this line of thinking,
however, the question becomes "What kind of social performance?” One
could steal or kill very effectively. If the objection holds, then there must
be another, deeper source for substantiating the content of moral
judgment, if indeed such a thing exists.
Endnotes
1. Hume, David. A Treatise of Human Nature. Reprinted in Raphael, D.D.,
ed., British Moralists: 1650-1800. London: Oxford University Press: 1969.
pp. 505.
2. Reid, Thomas. Essays on the Active Power of Man. Reprinted in Raphael,
D.D. ed., British Moralists: 1650- 1800. London: Oxford University Press:
1969. pp.917.
3. Russell, Bertrand. The History of Philosophy. New York: Simon & Shuster,
1972. pp. 659.
4. Reid, 908
5. Hume, 907; Reid, 907
6. Reid, 944
7. Hume, 503
8. Ibid.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid.
11. Reid, 919
12. Ibid., 920
13. Ibid., 924
14. Ibid.
Primary Texts
Hume, David. A Treatise of Human Nature, Reprinted in Raphael.
Raphael, D. D., ed., British Moralists: 1650-1800. London: Oxford
University Press, 1969.
25
�Reid, Thomas. Essays on the Active Power of Man, Reprinted in Raphael
26
�Surrender to Poetry:
The Unsolved Duel Between Idea and Experience
Bethany McGee
Throughout Goethe’s Botanical Writings, Johann Wolfgang von
Goethe struggles to understand the seemingly irreconcilable divide
betv^een experience and idea. He attempts to delineate both realms
against common notions and in relation to the Kantian philosophical
tradition of transcendent concepts. Scientific endeavor strives to unite
the two, but the effort is continually frustrated. In his essay "Indecision
and Surrender,’’! Goethe claims that in order to navigate this division, "we
justifiably take flight into poetry" and then proceeds to close the piece
with a short poem. How are we to understand this particular poem as a
reply to the essay and the "surrender" to poetry as a "justifiable"
response to "indecision” in general?
A "definite chasm appears to be fixed," claims Goethe, "between
idea and experience." The nature of this division is illuminated by
understanding the necessary limitations of human experience. We are
bound to face episodic sensory impressions of our surroundings,
determined not only by the passage of time but also by our state-of-mind
and subjective standpoint. Through experience we come to understand
individual parts of our world, yet these flashes of comprehension remain
isolated and it is left to the imagination to connect them in a meaningful
manner.
"An idea," on the other hand, "is independent of time and place.” It
is with his notion of ideas that Goethe feels he is misunderstood by his
contemporaries, and especially by Schiller. He is taken aback when
Schiller claims that the theory of The Metamorphosis of Plants^ "is not an
empiric experience, it is an idea." "How could any experience," Schiller
continues ("in the manner of a trained Kantian’’], "ever be gauged by an
idea, for the characteristic thing about an idea is that it can never be
congruous with an experience." The issue seems to be that Goethe firmly
believes his ideas are rooted in years of collecting empiric observations,
rather than transcendent a priori concepts. The "[bond sealed] through
the great duel between the objective and the subjective’’^ with Schiller,
however, seems to have affected Goethe’s conception of ideas. He
concedes that "the philosopher [presumably Kant] might probably be
right who asserts that no idea can completely coincide with experience."
27
�Goethe's understanding of the term "idea," and its relationship to
the Kantian conception, remains somewhat obscure. It is clear that the
“idea" must provide a means through which man can grasp at
comprehending the whole. "In an idea,” he explains, "the simultaneous
and the successive are intimately bound up together, whereas in an
experience they are always separated." Here we see the importance of
ideas and the indispensable role they must play not only in scientific
pursuits, but in day-to-day existence. Without ideas to organize and make
sense of the multitude of perceptions we receive at every moment, life
would be chaotic. We need ideas to connect isolated events, understand
causes, make predictions and even to fuse snapshots in time into
associations of continuous being. In plant studies, for example, we take
careful observation of a flower. Each day it changes slightly, eventually
passing from seed to stem with leaves and bloom, then ultimately to
producing fruit and again seed. We need ideas not only to understand the
nature of this change, but also in order even to conceive of it as the same
plant from one day to the next.
Yet, while both "idea” and "experience" are required for scientific
research, "the difficulty of uniting [them] appears to be a great obstacle."
The two realms, though they at first glance appear entirely distinct, must
in fact relate to each other in some meaningful way if their interplay is to
be man’s means to knowledge. "We strive eternally to overcome this
hiatus," Goethe explains, "with reason, intellect, imagination, faith,
emotion, illusion, or— if we are capable of nothing better— with folly."
However, our efforts to bridge the chasm are forever in vain." We cannot
grasp the whole of a single organism, let alone the expanse of the
universe when our sole access to the world is through our sensory
perception. The effort to conceive of Nature as "both simultaneous and
successive . . . seems to drive us to the verge of insanity." How is mortal
man to comprehend eternity and existence outside of time? How can a
thing always be, yet continually come into being? We are doomed to
frustration, for "the intellect cannot picture united what the senses
present to it separately, and thus the duel between the perceived and the
ideated remains forever unsolved."
"For this reason," Goethe responds, "we justifiably take flight into
poetry. Poetry must stand outside both idea and experience, occupying a
distinct space. It is either the bridge man seeks between experience and
idea, or it is a resignation to the paradox. It would be odd if poetry were
this bridge, inhabiting as it were a sort of middle ground between two
disparate modes of being. It would have to partake of both worlds and yet
belong to neither. Though arguably, poetry is about experience and
28
�expressive of an idea, it does not serve to reconcile the two any more than
science does. If scientific study cannot bridge idea and experience, neither
can we expect poetry to do so.
So are we to view the "flight into poetry" simply as surrender, and
thus concede defeat in the face of the incommensurability of the two
domains? Or, by acknowledging our limitations and abandoning
ourselves to the mystery of the paradox, do we gain something more
profound? If poetry is distinct from both experience and idea, does it
provide a unique vantage point allowing a new way of seeing— both with
the physical and the mind's eye? Goethe provides a key to the quandary
within the essay: "that idea and experience are analogous, indeed must be
so." What is the nature of this analogy and how might understanding the
relationship as "analogous hope" help solve the eternal duel? To claim
simply that one is like the other does little to clarify the conundrum. To
term a relationship "analogous," implies that the two subjects under
comparison must bear a relationship to one another and that the
juxtaposition of one to the other should significantly illuminate each.
Goethe has provided his reader with an example of such an analogy in his
essay — he has given us a poem. Does this poem seek to express the
analogous relationship, or are the lines of the poem themselves analogous
to the ideas in the essay they follow? Is the understanding available
through the analogy of this poem unique, or is it ultimately the aim of all
poetry to reconcile this seemingly eternal divide?
Goethe closes "Indecision and Surrender" with a poem,
"Antepirrhema," calling it "a new form to an old song."^ We turn now to
the "Antepirrhema" in the hope that a deeper comprehension of its
meaning will lead to a greater mastery of Goethe’s thought and a fuller
understanding of the nature of the analogous relation between idea and
experience.
Thus view with unassuming eyes
Regard with silent wonder
The Weaver Woman’s masterpiece:
The Eternal Weaver’s masterpiece.
One pedal shifts a thousand strands.
A single movement sends the shuttle
The shuttles back and forward flying.
Over, under, till the myriad threads
Each fluent strand with each complying.
Meet and interlace, creating
One stroke a thousand links commands;
Countless unions at one stroke!
No patchwork, this, of rag and tatter.
The warp, not mounted thread by thread.
Since time began She plots the matter.
But laid down in the timeless past
So may the Master, very deft.
Awaits the casting of the weft.
Insert with confidence the weft.
Forever waits the Master’s will.
-C. Middleton, trans.
-English rendering by Aldyth Morris
29
�The poem, like its namesake, demands to be read as a response to what
has preceded it. Here, we should expect the author to provide his
audience with an answer to the "[unsolved] duel between the perceived
and the ideated." Perhaps in understanding how "Antepirrhema"
illuminates, complicates, or resolves the questions put forward by the
essay, the reader can hope to glimpse the larger sense of how poetry can
answer to the mysteries in the chasm between idea and experience.
The central conceit of the poem is the Weaver's creation of her
masterpiece, yet the symbolic meaning is enigmatic. What do these two
focal images intend to represent? "In observing the cosmic structure from
its broadest expanse down to its minutest parts," Goethe opens his essay,
"we cannot escape the impression that underlying the whole is the idea
that God is operative in Nature and Nature in God, from eternity to
eternity." Upon first look, it would seem that the Weaver is meant to be
God and the masterpiece. Nature itself. Yet, the claim is not simply that
"God is operative in Nature," but that there exists a reciprocal
relationship in which Nature is operative in God. In the poetic metaphor,
it is conceivable that both the Weaver and the masterpiece each
represent an eternity. Here, the Weaver clearly has an effect on her
masterpiece, but how can we understand the masterpiece equally
affecting its maker? Can an artist be so moved by his own work that we
can say it is operating upon him? Though a piece of art can be
inspirational to all those who view it, it seems that Goethe wants to apply
more agency to Nature than that of an incidental influence on its maker.
Perhaps we do disservice to the metaphor by falling back again
into a cultural understanding of God as creator, as God as Weaver. Goethe
seems to think it is more complex. The masterpiece is all of existence. It is
"the cosmic structure from its broadest expanse down to its minutest
parts." It is "the whole." Here, the metaphor of the woven work reinforces
the notion that all things are connected. Cut one of the "myriad threads,"
and it would unravel. In the Weaver's work, the strands "meet and
interlace, creating / Countless unions." This is the intricate majesty of the
interconnectedness of life. Each intersection of the strands is an
individual, a part we can come to know by experience. Yet these
"interlacings” are meaningless and non-existent without the whole. These
parts, while enabled, organized, and given significance by the whole, are
necessary for the very existence of it. The analogy here lives up to the
demand of making comprehensible what formally was obscure— the
30
�necessity of the reciprocal nature of the relationship of the whole to its
We cannot let ourselves be deceived by the simple lucidity of this
analogy of the whole to the part. The woven masterpiece of the poem is
Tke none we have experienced. For '.he warp" was not "mounted thread
by thread" after the manner of man, "but laid down in the timeless past.
In two lines, Goethe has communicated man’s maddening predicament m
tr^^ng to imagine "an operation of Nature as both simultaneous and
successive." For experience tells us that a warp must be set one thread at
a t L, but Goethe’? warp has been laid down all at once. Moreover it ha
always been as it is now, as it was created in "the timeless past The
atter^pt to conceive of a thing as having always been capable of
undergoing change, "drive [s] us to the verge of insanity.
^ Not only is it impossible for the human mind to grasp the creation
of a warp as both simultaneous and successive, but also now the poet
asks us to grapple with eternity and the existence of a timeless past If
there were existence before time, how can it make sense to speak of
"nast" and "was"? The description of the warp harkens back to
primordial beginnings" of which Goethe speaks in the opening of his
essay. This mention goes unexplained, as if the meaning of these
beginnings, and even the fact of their existence at all, were intuitive to the
reader. Are the "primordial beginnings" God and Nature, or is this warp
representative of the "stuff of our universe— of the material of all plants,
animalSjJgy.^g
masterpiece, we turn again to its maker. If
the warp is %ssive, "Await[ing] the casting of the weft / Forever
waitling] the Master’s will," then the Master, the Weaver, must be the
active argent. A "single movement" from her has the power of creating /
Co^ntl^L unions at one stroke!" In an instant she "sends the shuttle and
"castlsl the weft." The creative power of this Weaver is unfathomable an
her Will unknowable. Is .his the same force ascribed to Nature
the
Metamorphosis of Plants? Could this Naturea goal
"prescribes fate," "ceaselessly carries on her eternal work and exercises
her right"—be the Weaver of our poem?5
^ If the "Master’s will" is Nature’s creative force, then what of God.
Perhaps we can envision God and Nature united m the
f
Weaver. Yet this conception seems contradictory to *6 claim that they
operate upon one another. Is it more accurate to consider them as the
ultimate cases of the tension in Goethe’s use of "Gestalt and ^^dung ^
While Gestalt is something fixed in its character, Bildung is m ceaseless
flux It is the complex relationship between Being and Becoming. Being
�always is and always has been. Becoming constantly evolves, but will
never have "existence" in an absolute sense. Yet, how can a thing have
reached that state without ever becoming, and how can a thing Become
without having any Being? It appears to describe the same enigma as
does the correspondence between idea and experience. If Nature is seen
as Becoming and God as essential Being, then we have reversed the
conventional role, making Nature the creator and God the material of her
Whether one can definitively interpret the symbolic images
within the lines of the poem, the reflection inspired by them is not to be
overlooked. If we take the title literally, we should consider the poem in
light of an answer from a classical Greek theatrical chorus. An
antepirrhema is a chanted response to the action that has preceded it—
in our case the essay "Indecision and Surrender”. As the Greek chorus
often expressed information, a character's inner emotions, or an ideal
response to the drama or insight for the characters themselves, so the
poem resounds as a chorus for the reader. Here, the poem tells the
audience, and perhaps the author himself, "Regard with silent wonder /
he Eternal Weaver’s masterpiece." It is the same imperative given to Job
as he ponders the unknown divine; "Stand still, and consider the
wondrous works of God."? The message to the reader and the author is
at despite man's desire and his eternal quest for knowledge, the
Eternal Weaver s masterpiece" will forever remain a mystery. Man
should position himself toward these marvels understanding that he will
never fully know them, but nevertheless eternally considering them and
allowing himself to be overcome by awe.
It is this exactly this sense of wonder that is lost in prose and
scientific experimentation. Through the apprehension of an isolated part
man shortsightedly believes that has understood something about the
whole. However, the whole to be considered— "the cosmic structure"—
IS forever unavailable to him precisely because he is one of its parts
Intuition, observation, and contemplation lead us closer to these
mysteries, Goethe explains, "We are presumptuous and venture ideas of
our own; turning more modest, we merely form concepts that might be
analogous to those primordial beginnings." Poetry is Goethe's modest
attempt. If the essay ventures to put forth presumptuous ideas of its own
then the poem itself is a "concept that might be analogous to these
primordial beginnings."
Goethe needs the poem to capture the spirit of his thought. In his
scientific prose he is bound either to express specific parts only, thereby
missing the whole, or to grasp at the threads of an abstract idea of the
32
�whole, inevitably falling short of the impossible task. The analogy
available in poetry allows him to express the inexpressible— to put into
words something that cannot be named. He abandons the presumptuous
idea that he can capture the whole with an idea, and instead humbly puts
forth a concept that he claims might be analogous to it. In this mood, I too
am resigned to accept the limitations of prose and its inability to convey
ideas that lie beyond human comprehension. With my decision to
surrender to analogous concepts, I humbly justify my own flight into
poetry:
Stand in awe before the amaranthine stage.
Surrender to disinterested passion!
Displace one note and the chord collapses.
Yet the solitary tone moves no listener to tears.
Harmony, dissonance, discord
Orchestrated by the maestro's baton.
Notes pass into phrases and escape
Forever into the unreachable past.
We are moved by the symphony of sound.
Hearing but one beat in time.
MCGee: Epode
Endnotes
1.
Unless
trans.
otherwise
indicated,
"Indecision
Woodbridge,
and
all
quotations
Ox
Bow
from
Bertha
Mueller,
Goethe's Botanical Writings.
Surrender.”
Connecticut:
taken
Press,
1952.
pp.
219-220.
All
quotations within the essay are referenced in the Primary Texts list.
2.
Bertha Mueller, trans. "The Metamorphosis of Plants.”
Writings.
3.
Bertha
Mueller,
Writings.
4.
Goethe's Botanical
Woodbridge, Connecticut: Ox Bow Press, 1952. p. 30-78.
trans.
"Propitious
Encounter.”
Goethe's Botanical
Woodbridge, Connecticut: Ox Bow Press, 1952. p. 215-219.
Translation from Morris taken from "Indecision and Surrender.” p. 220.
Middleton translation from: Christopher Middleton, ed. "Antepirrhema.”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Selected Poems.
Boston:
Suhrkamp/Insel
Publishers, 1983. p. 163.
5.
"The Metamorphosis of Plants." P. 40,44,48, 61, 70, etc.
6.
Bertha
Mueller,
Writings.
7.
trans.
"Our
Objective
Is
Stated."
Goethe's Botanical
Woodbridge, Connecticut: Ox Bow Press, 1952. p. 22-26.
Job 37:16.
33
�Primary Texts
R /-
■
'Wolfgang. "Indecision and Surrender." Goet/2e'5
fr“rp^2™!22r^
^Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. "The Metamorphosis of
Plants. Goethe's Botanical Writings. Trans. Bertha Mueller. Woodbridee
Connecticut: Ox Bow Press, 1952. p. 30-78.
^
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. "Our Objective Is Stated." Goethe's
Botanical Writings. Trans. Bertha Mueller. Woodbridge, Connecticut; Ox
Bow Press, 1952. p. 22-26.
R y
■
'Wolfgang. "Propitious Encounter." Goet/ie's
BlTrSrp'n'zir'
Ox
rn rh
Td"'
ed. "Antepirrhema.'7o/2onn Wolfgang von
Goethe Selected Poems. Boston: Suhrkamp/lnsel Publishers, 198? p. 163.
�Kindness in Aristotie's High-Minded Man
Daphne Leveriza
In Book IV of his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle develops his vision
for the perfect human being. He calls this person the high-minded or
magnanimous man. As with all the other virtues that he enumerates
throughout the Ethics, Aristotle explains the deficiency on one end and
the extreme on the other end of the mean, the virtue in the perfectly
balanced middle.
In the case of the high-minded man the deficiency is, naturally, the
small-minded man, who looks like something of a coward in comparison
with himself. The small-minded man underestimates his self-worth and
may even be guilty of false humility, as translator Martin Ostwald points
out in a footnote. Whether it is due to a lack of self-understanding or a
reluctance to point out his own merits to others, the small-minded man
ultimately fails to claim what he actually deserves. On the opposite end of
the spectrum, the extreme of the high-minded man is the vain man,
perhaps a more familiar personality in our world today. The vain man
thinks too highly of himself, puts too much effort into making others see
him in the same glowing light, and makes the mistake of believing that he
deserves things that he does not actually deserve. Aristotle even goes so
far as to call this man a fool, in order to emphasize that "no man, insofar
as he is virtuous, is either foolish or senseless" (1123b.5).
As the epitome of all that Aristotle sees as virtuous, this highminded man is anything but foolish; in fact, he cannot even be mistaken
for foolish because his foremost concern is honor. Ultimately, what
defines the high-minded man is magnanimity, which "is the crown, as it
were, of the virtues: it magnifies them and it cannot exist without them"
(1124a.5]. In order for someone to be high-minded, then, he must possess
all the virtues; once he occupies this state, he will be magnanimous. This
culmination of the complete set of virtues will magnify them all and
emphasize how truly virtuous he is.
What is puzzling about this vision of the perfect man is the fact
that while Aristotle goes so far as to describe how the high-minded man
walks and talks, we know much more about how the he thinks than what
he actually does. Aristotle’s portrayal of the high-minded man focuses on
what this man values and how he looks at others; yet, in many of these
situations, we must come to our own conclusions about what sort of
action he takes. Furthermore, imagining the high-minded man's course of
action in some of these situations actually calls into question how
35
�complete his virtues are, specifically those which Martin Ostwald labels
gentleness and friendliness.” In short, a close consideration of certain
aspects of Aristotle s magnanimous man raises the question: is the highminded man a kind man?
There are two particular instances in the description of the highminded man wherein it seems that his attitude or thoughts would lead to
unkind action. Take, for instance, his primary concern with maintaining
honor and avoiding dishonor. Aristotle defines honors as the greatest of
external goods (1123b.20], so it makes sense that this would be the main
concern of a man who possesses ultimate and total virtue. However, there
is a problem with honor; namely, there is no honor that is actually good
enough to be bestowed upon a person of perfect virtue. As such, the highminded man actually despises the praise and honor shown to him by
people who are lesser than him, for he deserves enormously better than
the accolades of small-minded or vain people. It is as if the greatest of all
athletes simply could not be excited by the ogling praise of an amateur
who is beneath his level of talent. The troubling concept is that the highminded man, the man who serves as the embodiment of virtue in its most
complete and excellent state, would actually despise anything that
someone gives to him, even if it were given not out of spite or malice, but
out of simple admiration.
Regarding this scenario of praise conferred upon the high-minded
man, Aristotle comes close to depicting what sort of action he would take,
but only insofar as he explains how the magnanimous man reacts when
people of equal standing honor him:
From great honors and those that good men confer upon him he
will derive a moderate amount of pleasure, convinced that he is
only getting what is properly his or even less ... yet he will accept
it, because they have no greater tribute to pay him.
(1124a.5-10]
From this description, we must assume that the high-minded man does
not accept honors given to him by less virtuous people. Yet, is there a
contradiction in the fact that he will not take these so-called honors from
lesser men because they are not worthy of him, but he will accept honors
from fellow good men even when they are less than what he deserves?
The high-minded man’s disdain of admiration, praise, or (what he
considers) false honors from lesser men is further developed in
Aristotle s later assertion that any attitude of condescension that the
magnanimous man has towards those of less virtue is in fact warranted.
36
�Indeed, the magnanimous man has the correct opinion of these lesser
men, while most people make the mistake of looking down upon others
without legitimate reason for doing so. The vain man in particular must
be guilty of this misjudgment of others and himself. Yet if the highminded man is justified in looking down upon others, does this mean that
he is permitted to act upon this correct opinion and thus engage in
unkindness? If the magnanimous man knows that he is superior to others
and if it is a foremost concern of his to maintain his honor and
superiority, how does he treat those who are beneath him? How does his
justifiably superior attitude manifest itself in his behavior toward others?
If he sees a dissolute man stumbling drunk on the streets, does he ignore
him? Spit upon him in just anger and disgust? Offer to take him in even
though the dissolute man is not worthy to offer petty tokens of
admiration to him?
Shortly after the assertion that the high-minded man has every
right to look down upon others, Aristotle offers an even more
confounding insight into the mind of this man:
The high-minded also seem to remember the good turns they
have done, but not those they have received. For the recipient is
inferior to the benefactor, whereas a high-minded man wishes to
be superior. They listen with pleasure to what good they have
done, but with displeasure to what good they have received.
(1124b.l0-15]
In addition to the possibility of being seen as unkind, the high-minded
man is perhaps also ungrateful. He is indifferent to the kindness of others
due to the fact that he is preoccupied with his own good deeds rather
than those of others. Furthermore, any instance in which he the recipient
rather than the benefactor does not meet his standards of superiority. He
rarely asks for favors but he is always ready to be of aid to others; this
may look like an apt description of generosity, but the high-minded man
takes this position so that he can more often occupy the position of
superiority (the benefactor). It seems, then, that the only thing more out
of character for the high-minded man than asking for help is thanking
someone for those few favors that he rarely and reluctantly seeks. This
would require remembering those favors, an act that he always carries
out with displeasure.
Ultimately, this question of whether or not the high-minded man
acts kindly is a difficult one; Nowhere in the Ethics does Aristotle describe
37
�a virtue named kindness. It is only in the discussion of gentleness and
friendliness that he discusses something that could be akin to kindness.
In keeping \vith the fact that the high-minded man possesses all the
virtues (his magnanimity is, after all, the crown of all virtues], we must
consider how the virtues of gentleness and friendliness would manifest
themselves in his behavior. In discussing gentleness, Aristotle first
establishes the deficiency and extreme of this virtue, which are apathy
and a short temper, respectively. The gentle man is particularly good at
controlling his emotions; he does not let them control him. When he is
angry, it is only under appropriate circumstances and for a reasonable
amount of time. What is interesting about gentleness is that Aristotle
states that it is actually a mean that is more akin to its deficiency, apathy,
than it is to its extreme, short-temperedness. Certainly, the gentle man
does not go so far as to allow others to dishonor him or his loved ones,
but he does tend to be forgiving more often than he is vindictive.
This virtue of gentleness, then, has a great deal to do with relating
to others in a "correct" way at a "correct" time; and, when it comes to
anger, keeping one's emotions even and reasonable. In the case of the
high-minded man receiving praise and honor from those lower than him,
it seems that if he were to maintain his virtue of gentleness, he simply
might not react at all, thus, erring on the side of what appears to be
apathy. On the other hand, he might show a tempered reaction,
reluctantly accepting honors, while in his mind forgiving those who
foolishly offer him meaningless praise. At any rate, he makes sure not to
compromise his magnanimous character by accepting such gifts. Nor does
he lash out in undue anger towards lesser people who may not know any
better. Both of these reactions would be a departure from the mean of
gentleness.
In the same way that Aristotle arranges his discussion of
gentleness around anger, he also reduces the virtue of friendliness to a
social virtue. The excess of this virtue is obsequiousness, a vice of which
people-pleasing flatterers are guilty. The deficiency is grouchiness, which
causes people to "object to everything without caring in the least whether
they give pain" (1126b.l5]. The friendly man occupies the mean between
these two extremes. As with gentleness, friendliness causes its possessor
to put up with things in the appropriate way and at the right time.
Though the friendly man is primarily concerned with social relations, he
is concerned in such a way that he aims for what is honorable for himself
and beneficial for others. As such, friendliness seems to be a virtue that
has much to do with manners, for the friendly man behaves differently
towards different types of people. He adjusts his behavior based on
38
�whether or not he knows someone or their social standing, making sure
to please where it is appropriate to please, and to avoid causing pain.
Thus, the friendly man would not treat a stranger with the same affection
that he would treat his own mother, for that would be offering too much
pleasure to the stranger. Nor would he scorn a stranger the same way
that he would scorn a deserving enemy, for that would not be giving
enough pain to the enemy.
,
j i j
In the case of the high-minded man and the dissolute drunkard,
then, it seems that Aristotle would require more context to determine
how the magnanimous man would treat such an inferior. If the man were
asking for money with the admitted intent to purchase more wine, the
high-minded man would refuse, perhaps causing pain because it would
not be honorable to acquiesce to this particular pleasure, which is
ultimately harmful to the dissolute man. And, perhaps, if the drunkard
were behaving loudly and in a belligerent manner, disturbing the peace
the high-minded man would silence him with the appropriate amount of
anger, thus being gentle, and with the right treatment, thus being friendly,
so as to force the dissolute man himself into correct social relations.
Although it is a bit clearer now how the high-minded man
behaves in terms of kindness, the matter is still complicated by the fact
that Aristotle does not give the title "kindness” to any of his virtues. Nor,
however, does he assign the terms gentleness and friendliness to the
virtues explain above. As stated earlier, these are labels created by Martin
Ostwald in his translation of the Ethics. In fact, in the sections on
gentleness and friendliness, Aristotle explicitly states that he himself
lacks the words to describe these means. Though he does use the world
gentleness, he asserts that there is not actually a proper term for the
person who exhibits the mean between apathy and a short temper. In
regard to friendliness, he is even more uncertain, going so far as to say
that the two extremes of obsequiousness and grouchiness "appear to be
only opposed to one another, because there is no name for the middle
(■1127a.10). In considering the actions of the high-minded man, Aristot e s
lack of precision in naming some of his virtues actually makes sense. He
addresses the difficulty of acting well when discussing gentleness,
asserting that discerning the line between correct moral action and
incorrect moral action is not as simple as it may seem. Finding this line is
dependent upon the particulars of the circumstance as well as the
keenness of our own individual moral sense. Proper moral action, then, is
about striking a balance, just as achieving virtue is always a matter of
finding the mean between two extremes. Perhaps this is why Aristotle
makes it a point to say that the high-minded man is, in fact, a man who
39
�acts rarely and takes his time in considering how to act when he does
decide to act. This is why the few actions of the magnanimous man— the
man who is the paragon of virtue at its most complete and most excellent,
the man who always knows the mean and how to act upon it— are always
great and distinguished (1124b.25].
Primary Text
Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics. Translated by Martin Ostwald.
Prentice Hall: Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, 1999.
�A Work in Progress:
The Natural Connection in the Land of the Future
in Hegel’s "Geographical Basis of History"
Jeffrey Allen
Georg F.W. Hegel offers three methods of history in the
Introduction to his Philosophy of History: Original History, Reflective
History, and Philosophical History. The first is the purview of a Herodotus
or a Thucydides, those who were witness to the events that they
chronicled and "whose spirit they shared."i In the second, history
transcends the present and the historian attempts to form a picture of the
whole (e.g. Livy). The third method is the focal point of the Introduction
and the work as a whole (hence the title), as Hegel traces the history of
thought and the role of the eternally present Spirit within its WorldHistorical development. The final section of his Introduction,
"Geographical Basis of History," examines what he calls the "natural
connection that helps to produce the Spirit of a People." 2
Within his discussion of Philosophical History, Hegel makes an
important distinction between an "abstract form" and a "concrete
development."^ The former is the place where Spirit, Reason, Freedom,
and Consciousness are found, the latter is the historical location of these
ideas in time and space, and it is the role of the former that takes
precedence in tracing the philosophy of history. In the first paragraph of
"Geographical Basis," Hegel returns to this idea, focusing here on the
Spirit’s "embodiment as a series of external forms."'* He notes that while
this "appears an extrinsic element... we must regard it as the ground on
which that Spirit plays its part ... an essential and necessary basis.’’^ If
history is the development of Spirit in Time, as he says, this section
addresses how that Spirit is understood in relationship to the natural
world.
How does the natural connection help to produce the Spirit of a
People? What does it look like for the Spirit to operate within the natural
world?
Hegel notes that the Spirit of a people is found in their activity:
"[I]t is a Spirit having strictly defined characteristics, which erects itself
into an objective world, that exists and persists in a particular religious
form of worship, customs, constitution, and political laws."^He goes on to
summarize these features by saying, "That is what this particular Nation
is. Nations are what their deeds are."^
41
�According to Hegel, the scene of world history has its foci in
Africa Asia, and Europe. It is here that men are free to act, whereas such
elsewhere The northern hemisphere offers landmass and biological
commonality, whereas the southern hemisphere is largely divided and
contrasted^s
addition to these north-south distinctions, there are
divisions between the Old and New Worlds as well. The New World
constitutes true world history for Hegel, a "concern . . . with that which
with id? f
of a world that has wrestled
WoH? A °f^,®3son Consciousness, and Freedom. He considers the New
World- America and Australia- to have operated outside the sphere of
world history, as is the case with places like sub-Saharan Africa. However,
unlike the former, the latter is considered "the land of the future "lo It is
this consideration of America as the place "where, in the ages that lie
before us, the burden of the World's History shall reveal itLlf^i that
drives us to ask about her natural connections that form the ground for
the Spirit of a People and about the relationship of these natural
connections with this "land of the future."
Hpapi
phrase "land of the future" raises a couple of questions. If, as
Hege claims, Asia is the beginning of history and Europe is its "absolute
end, ,n what way is America the "land of the future"? Is America able to
take part m history because of its inhabitation by European emigrantsis
and Its continuation of Europe as the end of history? Or does its status as
a uture-oriented nation remove it completely from the realm of history?
?
to Hogel, "is only an echo of the Old
e expression of a foreign life."i4 This speaks to the idea that the
character is heavily conditioned by its European ancestry, and
hat if It IS to become something beyond historical, it must redefine itself
within Its North American context. Hegel makes a very interesting
discussion of America back tl
which hitherto the History of the World has developed itself."i5 The
ground upon which the History of the World has developed, if it is to be
understood as the same ground to which Hegel refers in reference to the
development of the Spirit of a People, is the natural connection, the
geographical basis of history. In citing a statement by Napoleon, "Cette
vieille Europe m ennuie"^e (-This old Europe bores me"), Hegel captures
the necessity of moving out of the Old World and into the New. This
quotation seems to be the place where the European spirit becomes
reinvigorated by the immense American continent. It is the vastness of
this undiscovered country, the mystery of the frontier, which appears to
42
�form a natural connection between the Spirit of the European people and
the potential of the New World.
The aforementioned features of national character (a particular
form of religious worship, customs, constitution, and political laws) are
here identified in their American iteration, signifying the cooperation of
the natural world with the disposition of individuals. Religious and
political principles are recast in this new land: What was once industry
for the sake of Protestant religious activity and the good of the
community became "acquisition, commercial profit, and gain; the
preponderance of private interest.” The community becomes simply an
"aggregation of individuals as atomic constituents,"!® and the state
"merely something external for the protection of property.”!® it is as if
these principles have been turned back against themselves. Industry and
economics were previously informed by religious and political principles.
Now it is the religious and political principles that are acted upon by
industry and economy.
The sheer volume of land circumvents the necessity of civil and
political discord by offering a natural "outlet of colonization,” one that
Hegel notes is "constantly and widely open, and multitudes are
continually streaming into the plains of the Mississippi.'’^® The only limit
to America’s historical potential seems to be the frontiers themselves.
Hegel says that "only after the immeasurable space which that country
presents to its inhabitants shall have been occupied, and the members of
the political body shall have begun to be pressed back on each other”^!
will America have to address the questions that confront Europe. The
words "immeasurable space” and "pressed back” connote this natural
connection. It is because of the immeasurable space that the North
American continent affords that the political character of the people is
formed. Pressing back evokes a vivid sense of both physical proximity
and political tension. America is both physically and psychically acting
upon the principles that were exported to its shores, which is to say that
the physical geography of the North American continent and the
opportunity it affords are found to be acting upon the economic, political,
and religious forms of national character that made their way over the
pond.
The place where people live, eat, breathe, labour, and die is not
accidental to the character of a people. It is not as though the natural
world is the sole determining factor for the activities and character of
nations and peoples; however, Hegel recognizes its significance in
forming their Spirit. A fine vintage of grapes that is produced by the dirt,
the sun, the water, the wind, and the invisible hand of the winemaker is
43
�not simply the sum of its parts. But it is not a fine vintage of grapes
without terrior, which influences the character of the grape to such an
extent that it would not be the grape it is without such features. The
North American continent seems to offer fertile soil for the cultivation of
the Spirit's development, a place where the Consciousness and Freedom
of the Old World are manifest through the natural connection of a New
World. Thus, the end of history is not a terminus,^^ but a telos, where the
progress of the Spirit meets the land of the future.
Endnotes
1.
Hegel,
Georg
2.
The Philosophy of History.
F.W.
Books, 1991, pp.
New
York:
Prometheus
1.
Ibid., 79.
3.
Ibid., 12.
4.
Ibid., 79.
5.
Ibid., Italics his.
6.
Ibid., 74.
7.
Ibid.
Italics
his.
One
hears
echoes
of Herder’s
national
genius
(J.G.
von
Herder, Reflections on the Philosophy of the History of Mankind)
8.
Ibid., 80.
9.
Ibid., 87. Italics his. Brackets mine.
10.
Ibid., 86.
11.
Ibid.
12.
Ibid., 103.
13.
Cf 81-82
14.
Ibid. One might offer a sort of counter-Hegelian argument with regard to the
presence of Europeans in the Americas.
the
character
of the
existing
structures
This event has a dramatic effect on
(political,
economic,
etc.
It
is
not
difficult to imagine that those operating outside a Hegelian view of history
would see these events as deeply problematic (ethnocentrism,
colonization,
conquest, and economic oppression might be possible counter-narratives)
15.
Ibid.
16.
Ibid.
17.
Ibid.,
85.
Italics
his.
One
Democracy in America,
18.
19.
20.
cannot
help
but
hear
Tocqueville
here
(cf.
Vol. 1, Ch.2, Pt. 6, et al).
Ibid., 84.
Ibid.
Ibid., 86.
21.
Ibid.
22.
Nietzsche
history
suggests
and
historical
that
that
what
rondo.”
Hegel
might
remained
Since
he
did
was
not,
have
“only
called
a
his
time
musical
Nietzsche
the
coda
believes
that
terminus
of the
it
has
of
worldplaced
modem man at the mercy of “the power of history”— simply as a yes man to
progress and success. This could well lead to a quite robust discussion on the
44
�potential
of
Nietzsche,
the
individual
within
the
progression
of
history
(Friedrich
On the Advantage and Disadvantage of History for Life.
Indianapolis'. Hackett Publishing, 1980, 47).
Primary Text
Hegel, Georg F.W. The Philosophy of History. New York:
Prometheus Books, 1991.
45
�The Path of the Good King'
A Journey from Loss to Renewal and Return in the
Mahabharata
Turner Resor
walic
of battle at Lanka, after Ravana had fortified the
walls of his city and Rama, along with Hanuman and his monkey armv
has bivouacked in the surrounding forest, Angada is senT by R^ama to
del ver a message to Ravana and his ministers. Standing amidst a
Countries and cities that incur a king of unmade soul who is bent
“f
= Policy, and
destroved 7 (7
stroyed It is you alone who have committed a crime bv
abduct,ng Sita forcibly. But this will lead to the slaughter of others
Who are innocent.i
(Van Buitenen,
268.10]
The foretold annihilation of Lanka is a powerful reminder of how tenuous
he glories are for an “unmade" king and his kingdom. Ravana’s pnde
the downfallhim blind to dharma and leadin'
the downfall of his city, people, family, and himself. His character serves
counter-example or anti-hero included as part of Rama’s heroic
journey towards reunion with the self, as symbolized by Sita, and the
recovery of Sita is being related to Yudhisthira by Markandeya as a storv
that is meant to show the significance of the Pandava ruler’s own period
hL^htf'T'’'
"^hese circumstances reach thei^
height following the incident of Draupadl’s abduction by Jayadratha.
By looking at the stories of Yudhisthira and Rama when they on
DuhsanTa the
T
"" *e example of
forLt before
^ets drawn into the
the cycle of .ul
^ ^
begins to emerge that frames
the cycle of the heroic individual in the phases of departure
storipf
'
3od return to the throne. Mainly these
tTshow thrtT“°
leadership and
to show that there is an individual responsibility that must be fulfilled
before one becomes king. It is a responsibility that runs deeper and is faJ
46
�more personal than the superficial kingly qualifications that are more
commonly understood.
It is a responsibility to an inward exploration, seemingly
involuntary but more likely fated, that can be experienced but not taught;
it presents a challenge, no less consequential than the outcome of war;
and it threatens the leader's individual existence by removing the shelter
of artificial rank and social position, testing the mettle of their virtue
alone. In short, "the king must conquer first himself.”^ On the successful
completion of this journey, which seeks a reunion with the source and
culminates at a point either of self-discovery or self-affirmation, hinges
the order and prosperity of the kingdom. Having reached the source, the
king gives himself back to the people as a link between the two worlds,
the one he has obtained and the one where he will rule.
Subsequent to this larger heroic framework there are several
recurrent archetypes at play. There is the idea of the “other" that lies
beyond the city walls, a land of wild animals, demons, and Brahmins,
identified in these stories by the forest. There is a "loss of identity” by the
heroes that travel into these lands, and along with that a "disorientation"
that shows the heroes’ vulnerability and tests their individual prowess.
This loss of control often results in the abduction of their women by "antihero" characters who misuse their powers to fulfill adharmic desires
deluded by jealousy, anger, or greed. And finally, there is the "return" to
the kingdom, a stage no less difficult than the others, requiring that the
king ultimately give himself to his people.
Maybe the most important archetype in each of these stories is
the hero's wife. The hero’s wife stands as the counterpart to the hero's
soul. Separated from his wife, the hero cannot live fully. She is the
anthropomorphized "reunion with the source;” she is the destined "self’
that takes an otherwise restless masculine drive and tempers its powers
of destruction with the powers of creation; "a husband enters his wife
and is reborn from her."^ It is through the feminine that the important
connection with the other is maintained after the hero has returned, thus
allowing for the nurturing of the kingdom and the conception of an heir.
Each archetype arises organically and serves as the person or
point in time in which he must act and prove his legitimacy. The hero will
consistently strive to respond to these ideals dharmically, while the antihero will be driven by attachment, the acquisition of power for power’s
sake, and other base desires. To understand the nature of the hero’s
journey it is helpful to identify the archetypes that are at work within the
various stages of the cycle.
47
�The first stage is marked by a departure from the kingdom into a
largely unknown and uncontrolled realm, generally represented as the
"other." Along with departure comes a loss of kingly identity. With
Yudisthira and Rama this is seen in their exiles to the forest. Duhsanta
leaves his kingdom by choice to go hunting with his army, also in the
forest. The forest is a liminal domain. In an age of high dharma, Brahmins
who have renounced city living in pursuit of moksa, or final release, are
the forest’s main human occupants. As dharma declines it also attracts
other marginal characters, some ascetics and deviants, who are driven by
unchecked human emotion and materialism and who understand that the
land is a place where they can attain to higher powers.
Yudhisthira’s exile into the forest and loss of kingdom during the
gambling match with Sakuni is the most dramatic example from the three
stories. After Dhrtarastra returns the possessions of Pandu's sons, which
were lost in the first gambling match and amounted to their entire
kingdom including themselves and DraupadI, "Duryodhana, Kama, and
Sakuni . . . plotted together in their pride against the Pandavas”^ and
invited the Pandavas back to gamble a second time. Yudhisthira, adhering
to his Ksatriya dharma and understanding that it is fate that is in control,
cannot refuse the offer. This time the wager is that the losers must go into
exile in the forest for twelve years, while in the meantime the winners are
given the losers' portion of the kingdom. Sakuni predictably wins again
and "Kunti's sons, defeated, turned their minds towards exile in the
forest; one after another, they took antelope-skins for their upper
garments.’’^ At this Duhsasana gloats: '"They are stripped of their
happiness and of their kingdom; they are lost for endless years! . . .
Stripped of their wealth . . . they are going to the forestl’”^ It is worth
noting that in the second gambling match the Pandavas retain their
selves.
The account of Rama’s exile is similar. Jealous of Rama, Kaikeyl,
the mother of Rama’s brother Bharata, tricks King Dasaratha into giving
Bharata the kingdom that was intended for Rama, and further, exiling
Rama to the woods. In both cases it is deceit and greed for the riches of
others, and the adherence to dharma by Yudhisthira and Rama, that sends
the heroes into the woods. This establishes the tension between the
sacred and profane is established.
It may seem as though these two kings are exiled against their
wishes, but it can also be said that they choose the path of dharma, and
the desire for dharma is preeminent amongst the wise. Evidence for this
is seen when Draupadi questions Yudhisthira’s adherence to dharma
following their exile. He responds by reminding her that "he adheres to
48
�dharma not in hopo of gain but because it is right... Proclaimed by wise
seers ... The rewards for practicing dharma may be invisible to mortals,
but they are assuredly real.'’^ To believe this requires faith that dharma is
capable of yielding something greater than the opulent life they
themselves used to live,”8 an idea seemingly absurd to Duryodhana and
his cohorts.
Duhsanta’s journey into the depths of the woods is at first
intended and later incidental as he is led deeper and deeper in search for
deer. In a way his journey is also logical. He is already thought of as a
great king living in a time of high dharma. Supposing, as this paper does,
that this journey is naturally occurring and prerequisite to a successful
rule, following his dharma as a good king would inevitably lead him onto
this path, thus further establishing him as more than a good king but also
the founder of the Kuru dynasty.
Leaving the defined boundaries of the relatively mundane and the
more obvious delineations of dharma, descending further into distant
lands, these three kings carry onward. Thresholds are overcome and
markings of past identities are shed. Yudhisthira and his brothers are
forced to dress in antelope-skins, while Rama and his brother Laksmana
put on "the scant adornment of ascetics.”^ The separation from subjects
and friends is also seen when the people of the city attempt to follow the
Pandavas into exile but are told to go back since the brothers will no
longer be able to support them.io These heroes who are renouncing their
old garments, comforts, and company are symbolically metamorphosing
from Ksatriyas into Brahmins, and it is the Brahmin’s land of hermitages,
dharmic subtleties, and spiritual attainment in which they now find
themselves.
The hero’s sloughing-off of identity as he wanders into more
distant lands is well illustrated in the tale of Duhsanta who travels
through four different realms before finding his future wife Sakuntala in
the hut of her father, the renowned seer, Kanva. Upon leaving his city for
the hunt, Duhsanta first leaves the womenfolk who watch his departure
from their balconies, after which the "town and country folk followed him
a long way, until the king finally dismissed them and they returned.
Duhsanta and his army now go into the first woods where they utterly
destroy all the big game. The slaughter represents another important
archetypal element in which renewal or a return to the origins is
preceded by violence, upheaval, and destruction.
Leaving the main army behind Duhsanta continues, "supremely
strong, though hungry and thirsty, [to] penetrate by himself into the
depths of the forest,’’i2 until passing three more thresholds at which point
49
�he "halted his escort of chariots with footmen at the gate of the wood”
instructing them to "remain here until my return.'’i3 He continues now
with only his closest personal and spiritual advisors:
And upon entering that wood, like another paradise of Indra, the
lord of men shed his hunger and thirst, and became overjoyed.
Discarding his regalia and accompanied only by councilor and
priest, he walked to the grand hermitage ...
At last, reaching Kasyapa's sanctum, Duhsanta dismisses his councilors
and priest. From here he can only continue on alone. At the threshold of
each realm he leaves behind another part of his identity, eventually
finding himself alone at the hermitage at which point he shouts, "Who is
here?" because he is encountering his unaffected self for the first time.
Duhsanta’s progress is constantly moving from the material to the
spiritual, from the particular to the universal, and from the lower classes
to the higher classes. The Vaisya and Sudra castes are left behind at the
city. He moves onward with his Ksatriya warriors. The description of the
animal slaughter has a visceral weariness and weight to it that poetically
captures a kind of separation anxiety which continues to bind these men
to the material and to isolate them from the spiritual. They are referred to
as "starving tiger men" who eat meat raw and attack elephants that in a
panic are "dropping dung and urine and streaming with blood."i4^ A
baseness and desperation are vividly depicted when these two worlds
collide. Simultaneously, the warriors are compared to the beasts of the
forests and put at odds with them. Unable to understand their profound
sympathy to these beasts, the Ksatriya warriors in fear resort to an
instinctual masculine domination. Unable to go on, they are left behind as
Duhsanta goes further and thus the weight of his own embodiment is
gradually alleviated. Traveling onward, the king loses his hunger and
thirst.
The meta-geography of this journey can be imagined as the king
passing through the ringed layers of a concentric circle, moving always
towards the center. With each move inward the surroundings become
more and more harmonious, the forest increasingly fertile and interlaced
with the channels of holy rivers. The sweet songs of the Vedas share the
air with the "pollen of flowers . . . [that] accosts the trees as though to
make love to them."i3 As the king melds into his surroundings and drops
the clothes that separate him, he sees "beasts of prey and deer peaceably
together" and is "filled with the purest joy."i6 In the last stage of his
reconnaissance, Duhsanta reaches the center:
50
�Thereupon the illustrious warrior drew nigh to the hermitage that
most enchanting everywhere, was the image of the world of the
Gods. He saw the river that embraced the hermitage with her holy
water spreading out like the mother of all creatures ... The sound
of holy Vedic lessons wafted over the river; sandbanks strung
pearls upon her ... When he saw the hermitage and the river that
enclosed it, the king set his mind upon entering.
(64.18-23]
When Duhsanta crosses over the channel of water between himself and
the hermitage he does so alone. No counsel, secular or religious, can take
him further; it is only his individual courage and lack of attachment that
can. And it is not an easy last step, for as he leaves the last of his bonds to
the old world on the outer bank, he is stepping entirely into the unknown.
It is a living suicide, the razor's edge that can be crossed over only with
faith that what is on the other side is divine. It is a symbolic death and
rebirth in which he is giving "up the earth for the sake of [his self].”!^
On the other side of the river lies the center of all the realms he
has passed through, the origin of all beings, the center of the Turning of
the Wheel, and Sakuntala, his wife to be. He has connected with the
source, and now he has seen what he needed to see before going back and
becoming a true king. The whole reason for the hero’s journey into the
forest is to discover this source, which is the same as the individual and
universal self. The importance of the source is demonstrated allegorically
at the beginning of the Pandava's exile. Yudhisthira asks his priest
Dhaumya "how he may provide for the Brahmins; Dhaumya advises him
to turn to the Sun, source of all nourishment."i8 It is also seen in the
symbolic importance of the forest as a place where the Brahmin caste
goes in isolation to study the Vedas, which would be considered the
source of knowledge.
After Duhsanta shouts "Who is here?” he sees Sakuntala and falls
in love. Sakuntala is the personification of this reunion with the source
and the powers of creativity that it establishes. "The wife is half the man,
a wife is better than his best friend, a wife is the root of law. Profit, and
Love.”i^ Sakuntala also represents a piece of the origin that Duhsanta will
eventually bring back to the kingdom with him once they are secretly
married. As his wife, she will be a source of stability and a balance to his
masculinity, and as a woman, someone able to create new life, ensuring
the continuation and prosperity of the entire kingdom.
51
�The heroic cycles of the Rama and Pandavas are not as clearly
demarcated as that of Duhsanta, but the same principles are at work and
the wife remains an important figure. Rather than finding Sita for the first
time, Rama’s exile becomes the quest to recover Sita, who was already his
wife, and "whom the Maker himself had destined to be Rama's beloved
queen, sita is abducted by Ravana, who comes to her posing as a
Brahmin after Rama and Laksmana go in pursuit of Ravana's accomplice,
Marica, who has disguised himself as a splendid deer.
It is implied more than once in this tale that Rama will not be able
to return from exile, regain the throne, or even continue to live unless he
is able to recover Sita. Looking for help from the apes to find Sita, Rama
pleads:
Will you bring me back to life? . . . Shall I once more rule the
kingdom of Ayodhya, after slaying the enemies in battle and
recovering Janaka’s daughter? I cannot bear to live without
freeing and killing foes in war, bereft of my wife and exiled!
To get Sita back, Rama must first overcome many obstacles that will test
his prowess. He must save Laksmana from the hideous Raksasa
Kabandha; he must help Sugriva usurp the throne from the lord of the
apes, Valin; with Hanuman and the monkey army, he must cross a great
Ocean; finally he must defeat Ravana at Lanka. So again in the story of
Rama, as with Duhsanta, the hero in exile is faced with challenges and
passes through many phases that culminate in the reunion with his wife,
at which point he is ready to return to the throne.
The story of how the Pandavas lose DraupadI is nearly identical.
The brothers are out hunting when King Jayadratha passes by the
hermitage and sees DraupadI. He tries to persuade DraupadI to abandon
her husbands and to go with him. When she refuses, Jayadratha "drags
her into his chariof'^i The brothers "may have recovered her by killing
the Saindhava army, but [they] did have [their] own wife abducted
absent-mindedly."22 This last lamentation reflects the necessarily
disorientating nature of the forest. Vulnerable outside the walls of their
kingdom, where dharma is more easily understood, even the Pandavas
are susceptible to the loss of their wife.
As seen above in Duhsanta's story, the wife is analogous to the
hero’s soul. In one passage of this story this association is almost directly
stated. Speaking to King Duhsanta, who has now returned to his kingdom,
Sakuntala states that, "A man who despises his soul and dissembles will
find the Gods of no avail and his soul of no benefit,” and in the very next
52
�line adds,23 "Do not despise me." Supposing that this connection holds
constant for the other stories, it is interesting to consider how Rama and
the Pandavas become disoriented in the forest and consequently lose
their wives for a time. For the heroes, this loss is the definitive and most
trying crisis of their exile. Without their wives they will remain lost and
unable to regain their kingdoms. Once they find their wives again, they
are tried and true.
In all three stories there are anti-heroes, powerful Raksasas,
misguided ascetics, or lustful kings who are contrasted against the
purposes of the heroes. For the Pandavas there is Jayadratha. In the story
of Rama there is Ravana, and in the story of Duhsanta there is a sub-story
that portrays Visvamitra, "who was born a baron and by brute force
became a Brahmin."24 Their deviance is usually ambiguous. What they
have achieved through austerities is often quite impressive, but they are
betrayed by their lawless intentions that eventually reveal themselves,
leading to the anti-heroes' fall. Rather than strictly following dharma
these characters remain attached to their actions, and are ambitious for
the powers, riches, and pleasures that can be gained from dissembling.
This evil-mindedness is spoken of in The Colloquy of the Brahmin and the
Hunter:
Man is ruled by greed and battered by love and hatred; his
spirit is not pointed to the Law, but he pretends to observe the
Law. He pretends to follow the Law, but, in his dissembling,
enjoys Unlaw. His spirit delights in the riches to which he
succeeded while he dissembled, good Brahmin, and then turns to
evil . . . Under the influence of the vice of his passion, his
lawlessness flourishes triply: he thinks evil, speaks evil, does
evil.23
These evildoers and law-abusers illustrate the dangers of the journey and
display the range of human desires and emotions that threaten the singleminded purpose of the heroes. Their lot is a cursed one. Since they cannot
create, they must consume and can never be fulfilled because their own
behavior offends themselves, whereas to follow dharma is to nurture
oneself. The anti-heroes are often found desperately pursuing satisfaction
where it cannot be attained, i.e. in the conquest of another man’s wife,
which again and again is said to be impossible. They are tragically lost
souls, but are never far away from the hero, a point that emphasizes the
tremendous perils that the hero risks. They, like Ravana, cannot be good
rulers since they only consume and do not create. They are prevalent in
53
�the realm of the "other" since there they are free from law and able
through austerities, to gam power, which they will misuse.
If the heroes can avoid the trappings of these adharmic characters
and complete their quest, the return to the throne is all that remains This
IS often much more difficult than it would seem. Up to this point the
heroes might have imagined that they would return to their kingdom at
last satisfied but after all the obstacles, all the years of exile, and all the
battles, much has changed. Yudhisthira, Rama, and Duhsanta all struggle
to reintegrate or return to the way things were before.
*■
destroys Lanka and Havana's army he is hesitant to
accept Sita again as his wife. He feels that he has fulfilled his dharmic
responsibility by freeing her from captivity, but is wary that her being has
been compromised during her imprisonment. He tells her:
Go, Vaidehi, you are free. I have done what I had to do. Once you
found me as a husband, good woman, you were not to grow old in
a Raksasa’s house— that is why I killed the Night Stalker. For how
would a man like me, who knows the decision of the Law,
maintain even for an instant a woman who had been in another
man s hands? Whether you are innocent or guilty, Maithili, I can
no more enjoy you, no more than an oblation that has been licked
by a dog.
U75.11-14]
There is a contradiction in Rama’s logic. It was the king’s adherence to
dhormo and his decision to go into exile that led to SIta’s abduction. It was
dharma that informed Rama to rescue Sita from Havana. But now it is
also dharma that tells Rama he can free Sita, but not reunite with her It
appears as though by necessity Sita must be trusted since it was fate that
created her captivity, but Rama cannot accept that fact. His stringent
guidelines resemble the more practical interpretation of Ksatriya dharma
even though m many ways he has been living in and advanced to a realm
of Brahmin dharma. Only after four Gods tell Rama that Sita is worthy of
his love does he hesitantly take her back. The dilemma illustrates how the
Ksatriya king is now confronted with a paradox between the higher
dharma he has attained and the dharma that is appropriate to his caste.
Duhsanta, apparently, also must find a balance between his secret
marriage in the forest and the dharma of the city people.^^
.
. ^odhisthira appears to be caught in a similar situation. After the
battle IS over and he and his brothers are finally able to return to their
54
�kingdom he appears to have doubts. To the objection of all of those close
to him he declares that he will now go perform austerities in the forest
like a Brahmin to prepare for final release. He is told that this is contrary
to his dharma, that "the dharma of kings is different from that of
Brahmins."27 in a sense, Yudhisthira is being told that nothing he has
done was done for himself. It is at this point that he begins to understand
what true renunciation means. Yudhisthira must return because all of the
other classes are dependent upon the Ksatriya king:
The Vedas state that the dharmas of the non-ksatriya classes all
depend upon the dharma of the king; without the king's rod of
force the Vedas would perish and so would all dharmas and the
stages of life themselves . . . Ksatriya dharma was Visnu's first
creation; all other dharmas followed. Without the Ksatriya
dharma there would be no Brahmins, no dharmas, no classes of
society, no stages of life.^s
Ksatriya dharma is valued because it creates a politics for peace amongst
the other classes. The problem for the hero who must return to the
throne is that he has come to know the weaknesses of being human from
experience; he knows the depravities of man better than anyone else
because he has overcome them; and he no longer wishes to be associated
with this reality. As an individual he has transcended the profanities to
which the Ksatriya class is inextricably linked yet he must remain
adherent to his class dharma. Reconciling these two kinds of dharma
appears to be extremely difficult and unpleasant.
It is the hesitancy to rule that makes this person a great king. He is
now whole and has now surpassed the weaknesses that rule the human
body, thus he becomes "a great deity in the form of a man, taking on
different divine aspects as he performs his different duties."^^ Only a
person like this hero can be trusted not to rule the kingdom for his own
benefit, for "a king exists to foster dharma not to pursue his own
interests."3o So the adherent to dharma will not know his fate until the
very end and it may not be what was expected or longed for. The Ksatriya
hero who seeks final relief or final release will seek it in vain for it is his
dharma to postpone this last departure. His only consolation is in the
belief that the good king will eventually attain the heaven of Indra.
In understanding the cyclical journey that leads to the proper
attainment of the throne, which various heroes undergo during this
eastern epic, a light is shone throughout the Mahdbhdrata as a whole. As
an extracted framework the hero's quest is given a body and obtains an
55
�almost living quality capable of breathing life into the other paradigms of
the story with which it is intertwined. Once the pattern of language that
rests below the superficial variances of the individual story is revealed,
new insights can be made into the nature of the elements that are
subsumed. The importance of the discovery and reconnection to the
feminine is essential to the journey itself, but is also telling of the nature
of pure love. The shedding of one's material possessions must come
before the hero departs for the forest, illustrating the bonds that separate
the mundane and the spiritual. And the King’s difficulty in reconciling the
Ksatriya and Brahmin dharmas provides an interesting look into the
nature of politics and the sacrifices made by a rightful leader. The King's
path is one of many frameworks in the Mahdbhdrata, but like the others it
holds to an underlying truth in a way that charges the embedded motifs
with meaning. The truth is what holds fast, and by familiarizing oneself
with the constant, one nears a better understanding of the dharma.
Endnotes
The Mahdbhdrata.
1.
Van Buitenen, J.A.B.
(University of Chicago
Chicago) 1981. The Abduction of Draupadi: Rama, pp. 268.10.
2.
Smith,
609.
3.
4.
5.
6.
John
D.
The Mahdbhdrata.
(Penguin
Classics:
The Mahdbhdrata.
Smith, John D.
The Hall, pp.
The Hall, pp.
159,
The Hall, pp.
160.
7.
Smith, John D.
8.
The Mahdbhdrata.
9.
The Abduction of Draupadi; Rama, pp. 261.37.
10.
The Mahdbhdrata.
The Origins; Sakuntala, pp. 63.10.
12.
Ibid., 64.1.
Ibid., 64.25.
14.
Ibid., 63.20.
15.
Ibid., 64.10.
16.
Ibid., 64.15.
17.
Smith, John D.
18.
The Forest, pp.
The Mahdbhdrata.
The Mahdbhdrata.
The Forest, pp.
Press:
168.
164.
The Hall, pp.
The Origins; Sakuntala, pp. 68.40.
The Abduction of Draupadi: Rama, pp. 258.10.
The Mahdbhdrata.
135.
164.
19.
Smith, John D.
Chicago
156.
The Forest, pp.
20.
21.
of
The Forest, pp. 168.
11.
13.
do
2009
’
Van Buitenen,
J.A.B.
(University
Chicago) 1981.The Origins; Sakuntala, 68.35.
The Mahdbhdrata.
The Mahdbhdrata.
The Mahdbhdrata.
The Mahdbhdrata.
London)
Press;
The Forest, pp. 210.
56
�22.
The Abduction of Draupadl: Rama, pp. 257.5.
23.
The Origins: Sakuntala, pp. 68.30.
24.
Ibid., 65.25. Menaka’s seduction of Visvamitra is another example of how
25.
The Session with Markandeya: The Colloquy of the Brahmin and the Hunter
the feminine force can quell the destructive powers of masculinity.
201.5
26.
Duhsanta’s case may be intentionally ambiguous, making it seem on the one
hand that he is now attempting to forget the truth he knows in his heart, and
on the other hand as though he is orchestrating a performance so as not to
incur the blame of his people.
27.
28.
29.
30.
The Mahabharata.
The Mahabharata.
The Mahabharata.
The Mahabharata.
Smith, John D.
Tranquility, pp. 599.
Tranquility, pp. 608.
Smith, John D.
Tranquility, pp. 609.
Tranquility, pp. 609.
Primary Texts
Smith, John D. The Mahabharata. [Penguin Classics: London,
England] 2009.
Van Buitenen, J.A.B. The Mahabharata. [University of Chicago
Press: Chicago) 1981.
57
�That Fair Passion;
Dejection and Desire in Alexander Pushkin's Eugene Onegin
Mary Creighton
In magnis et voluisse sat est.
To once have wanted is enough in great deeds.
-Propertius
In Eugene Onegin, Alexander Pushkin invites his readers into the
world of the title character, an emotionally disintegrating nineteenthcentury Russian dandy. Years after Onegin’s marriage refusal of the
tenderfooted and callow young Tatyana, their reunion marks a grand
departure in Onegin's character. We find that this departure in character
is not merely an aberration in the behavior of the Onegin readers had
come to recognize, but rather a spiritual renaissance. Contrary to the
familiar romantic indifference of Onegin, we see an obsessive and
energetic man. It is at this crowning moment in the narrative that
Pushkin turns his pen to the quandary of humanity at large. Pushkin
writes.
Meanwhile, Eugene was vainly thrusting
Tatyana’s image from his mind:
Not of poor shy Tatyana-trusting,
In love, obscure, unrefined.
But of the princess who serenely.
Like sheltered godhead, ruled the queenly
The lush imperial Neva.
Ah, men! The curse of Eve, our far
Progenetrix is still enduring:
The proffered palls, half-concealed.
The tree, the serpent ever wield
Their immemorial mystic luring.
Forbidden fruit we still implore.
Or Eden Eden is no more.
(VIII.27)
The fact that we, as readers, are grouped in the address "Ah men’’ (Arndt,
208) and "Oh humans! All of you resemble ancestress Eve” (Nabokov,
58
�VIII.27.8], indicates that we too share the insatiable and dissatisfied
nature that Pushkin relates. Here, we find ourselves forced into a more
sympathetic attitude toward our hero, Onegin. After all, he is the very
epitome of this insatiable nature. As we recall, nothing profoundly
satisfies his soul. What we, as readers, once passed off as mere ennui, we
share with our protagonist in this passage. In casting ourselves in the role
of the insatiable Onegin, we recognize that we too suffer from "our far
progenetrix" and an "immemorial mystic luring" (Arndt, 208], We are
thus forced to either re-evaluate our protagonist, or admit that we are in
no way superior to the man we once considered a gilded youth, cold and
self-indulgent. In either case, we find that somehow we have had a change
of heart. Suddenly, we sympathize with Onegin.
Both the "immemorial" quality of this luring, and the fact that we
are forced to acknowledge ourselves as victims, introduces this spiritual
malaise as a universal and timeless experience. What is Pushkin telling us
in this passage? Are we to assume he means that spiritual satisfaction is
incompatible with human life? If so, is it attributed to our natures or a
misguided mind? Pushkin writes.
Forbidden fruit we still implore.
Or Eden Eden is no more.
(VIII.27.13-14]
There are two possible ways to interpret this passage. In both cases we
find that our desire for the forbidden fruit is the very prerequisite for
Eden’s existence. First, let us consider the simpler interpretation. The
forbidden fruit, our desire, is the prerequisite so that Eden may exist.
Rather, it is only with the satisfaction of our desires that life becomes
paradise to us. This explains why in Nabokov’s translation we see written,
tersely, "you must be given the forbidden fruit, / for Eden otherwise is not
Eden to you" (VIII.27.13-14]. However, let us consider another possibility.
If we return to Arndt’s translation we read, "forbidden fruit we still
implore, / Or Eden Eden is no more." In this rendering we see a darker,
potentially more hopeless reflection of humankind. With this
interpretation, it may not in fact be the receipt of our desires that marks
paradise, but perhaps it is the very human act of wanting, desire itself,
that distinguishes it. Read this way, it is the imploring that causes Eden to
exist. What is so paradisical about desire? How can we justify this claim if
it means that in an unsatisfied state, we are actually in paradise? To
explore this idea, one must first consider Onegin’s dissatisfaction and his
later heartbreak.
59
�Onegin’s Two States of Being
If Onegin is in some way consistently unfulfilled throughout the
entire novel, what marks the difference between his earlier sate of ennui
and his latter torment at Tatyana’s rejection? Upon reflection, we find
that there are two kinds of dissatisfaction that we see in Onegin. Put
simply, there is one state in which he experiences mere ennui and
another in which he is consumed by desire. The latter is powerful, rich,
active, and full of soul and yearning. Essentially, it is a lively human
experience. In contrast, the former is a static experience. His
dissatisfaction resembles a desire-less misery rather than a noble
asceticism. The time that Onegin is filled most with desire is in the end of
the novel, when his unrequited love for "queenly” Tatyana causes him to
ache and desperately reach out to her indifferent heart. Yet, it is no
surprise to recognize that it is in this moment that we feel most
sympathetic for Onegin. We want Tatyana and Onegin to embrace.
Further, we want him to be satisfied. We want them reconciled. The
moment we wish most for Onegin’s happiness is the moment when he
appears most human to us. He is not simply apathetic and motionless in a
state of malaise or ennui. Rather, he is passionate and full of life. How is
one then to reconcile Onegin’s grave torment with idyllic paradise? The
answer is found in Onegin’s passion, not his torment. Torment here has
an object, a direction. In Onegin’s prior episodes, we see that his torment
is stagnant and merely internal.
Onegin’s Early Ennui
From birth, Onegin is described as "likeable, yet wild” (1.3.8]. This
wild nature and beginning is a far cry from his young adult life. "Likeable,
yet wild" suggests that the two qualities are at odds with one another.
However, once Onegin joins society, he learns the part of "London’s
dandy fashion" (1.4.6). His "likeable" and "wild" sides cease to be at odds.
Rather, the latter gives way to the former until no "wild’’-ness is
detectable in his character. "Society’s verdict ran," he is now merely "a
bright and very nice young man" (V.4.14]. From the time of his early
entrance into fashionable society, Onegin slips into a careless depression.
The narrator tells us that Onegin was "To hold life cheap for
Sound" and "took forever/ lambic for trochaic verse" (1.7.1-4):
60
�What early meant in equal measure
His toil, his torment, and his pleasure.
What occupied at every phase
The leisured languor of his days.
Was the pursuit of that Fair Passion
Which Ovid sang, and for its sake
Was doomed to drain, in mutinous ache.
His glittering life’s remaining ration.
(1.8.5-12)
In this stanza Pushkin informs his readers that Eugene was, in his early
youth, occupied with "the pursuit of that Fair Passion." Onegin longs not
only for passion but the "Passion" of which Ovid sang. It is interesting to
consider that the kind of passion that most resounds within Onegin was
that expressed so eloquently by Ovid, a prolific writer best known for his
elegiac love poetry. It is this very passion, we are told in an ominous
moment of foreshadowing, that will later "drain" the remainder of his life.
Like the wild nature of his youth, Onegin's love for poetry dissipates upon
his entrance into fashionable society. This Ovidian passion is lost in the
"leisured languor" that we are told marks his young adult days from here
on out. We see that this passion is revived upon reunion with Tatyana,
but lies lifeless and dormant before that fateful reunion. We learn in the
very next stanza that his passion had turned to contrivance. Furthermore,
any earnestness is overcast by a philanderer’s contrivance; "How soon he
learnt to feign emotion" (1.10.1). In the following two stanzas we are told
that his romantic exchanges are both active and insincere. He "act[ed],’’
"seem[ed],’’ "scared," "[a]mazed," "[sjeized," "lure[d],’’ "implore[d]," and
even "ambush[ed]’’ his "prey" [1.10.2,4;!.11.2,3,5,8-10,14). In stanza 19
of Chapter One, the narrator first introduces the banal and tiresome
repetition of St. Petersburg social life and the theatre that serves as its
epicenter. Here, the stage becomes reminiscent of Eugene’s fashionable
life itself. Speaking of the cast, the narrator laments,
Are you the same? Have others banished
And barred, yet not replaced you all?
Or will the listless eye not see
On tedious stage familiar faces.
Scan with distraught binoculars
An alien world bereft of stars;
61
�Shall I be yawning at the cast
And mutely hanker for the past?
[1.19.3-14)
Here, both Saint Petersburg’s fashionable society and the theatrical cast
are "tedious faces” whose platitudinous and dizzying repetition induces
merely a yawn from its audience. St. Petersburg, in all its fashion, "makes
for cultured whimsy / Of novelties polite and flimsy" [1.23.5-6). This
world is not reminiscent in any way of Onegin’s "wild" youth and Ovidian
passion, but is "an alien world bereft of stars." The theater, like his very
life, inspires little more than a "hanker[ing] for the past," when life still
appeared before him in all its glitter and possibility. Although he is
unaware, our hero is reminiscing about his childhood, before life was
reduced to a mere bromide, eliciting a "listless" spirit and a yawninspiring ennui. Eugene has only "an absent gaze at the ballet / then with
a yawn he turn[s] away" [1.21.10-11). Our languishing protagonist has
"seen it all," claiming that "on me ballets have lost their hold / Diderot
himself now leaves me cold" [1.21.6,13-14).
In Nabokov’s translation we see a more sentimental response to
the theater. The characters that were once "full of soul” in Nabokov’s
translation are met with a "mournful gaze" rather than a "listless eye."
The actors are referred to as "goddesses," an image more akin to muses
that entertain and inspire. These fallen goddesses are met with a cry,
"Hark my sad voice"! But the muses do not listen; one is left merely
"disenchanted" and rendered mute in a sea of voices that comprise the
tepid indifference of a madding crowd.
Onegin’s life at this point is "ceaseless play,” an expression of
"youth’s bloom, free of prohibition" [1.36.9). However, the freedom and
bloom hold no genuine pleasure for the hero. "Each day a feat, his life a
game,” we are told [1.36.10). In the midst of this reflection our narrator
pauses to ask his readers, "Was he content with his condition? / Or was
he hearty and inane / Amid carousals— but in vain?" [1.36.11-14). It is
not hard to conceive that the answer for both the readers and the
narrator is emphatically, "Yes" [1.37.1). The narrator continues, "Feeling
early cooled within him; / He came to loathe that worldly grind; / Proud
beauties could no longer win him / And uncontested rule his mind"
[1.37.1-4). The "constant inconstancy turns dreary" and of "friends and
friendship [Eugene] grew weary" [1.37.5-6). He becomes "overfed” with
social life [1.37.13).
Onegin becomes "strange," "embittered," "wry” and "gloomy"
because "Life had numbed all vest,” extinguishing "the glow” within "his
62
�breast" (1.38.9; 1.45.10-11). We are told that he becomes "infected” with a
"disease" colloquially referred to as "the Blues" (1.38.4-5). He "ceased to
notice anything" other than the dull ache within his impassive chest
(1.38.14). The narrator expounds,
Eugene has had his measure.
Apostate from the whirl of pleasure,
He has withdrawn into his den
And, yawning, reached for ink and pen.
He tried to write— from such tenacious
Endeavor, though, his mind recoiled;
And so the paper stayed unsoiled.
(1.43.5-14)
Pushkin makes it clear that his torment is less an emotional enterprise
than one born from boredom. This is seen in the very fact that Pushkin
continually accompanies Onegin's distress with the act of yawning rather
than a strictly emotional response. By stanza 43 of Chapter One, Onegin
has yawned four times, yet never once wept or otherwise complained.'
His distress is a stagnant malaise, devoid of living grief or impassioned
fervor. Described as an "apostate,” Onegin appears before us clad with
pen and paper as a strange kind of psychological turncoat. He has not
only left his previous life behind but has deserted the pleasures that once
amused him. He remains to us now as a mere derelict, longing for the
catharsis of the pen, but finding instead only a vacant mind and
"unsoiled" paper. His mind "recoils" because he cannot yet transfer
outward to paper the distress he experiences within. His distress is
locked within himself, motionless. He is forced, therefore, to remain in a
greater solitude than the mere physical kind. This image stands in stark
contrast to that of his companion, Lensky, who "Across his mind the
world still drew / Its web of glitter and Ado" (II.7.7-8). Similarly, Lensky
only illuminates his compatriot’s mute expression. Lensky, in contrast,
"never put the exalted Muse to shame: / From his proud harp there never
came / Aught but exalted feelings" (11.9.10-14). Our narrator, who admits
his intimacy with Onegin in "that season" of his life, tells us that Onegin
acquired an "acid derogation" and a "humor, half shot-through with gall”
reminiscent of "Grim epigrams' malicious drawl” (1.46. 12-14). This
character type, if we may call it that, is not unfamiliar to readers who can
immediately recognize this kind of "frigidly dissecting mind" (1.45.7).
Onegin is a perfect portrait of the sardonic intellectual whose acerbic wit
both charms us and forewarns us of erudition’s toll.
63
�While staying at his uncle’s country house, Onegin genuinely
attempts to explore the world around him in hopes of finding solace in
the pastoral estate. We are told, "Two days the solitary meadows /
Retained for him their novel look, / The leafy groves with cooling
shadows / And sedately murmuring brook" (1.54.1-4). However, his rural
sensibility lasts only the two days and "Next day he did not take the
trouble / To glance at coppice, hill, and stubble"; rather, they "brought on
a sleepy mood" (1.54.4-6). The narrator continues to divulge that
melancholy spares no victims and affects souls of every background and
sort: "Spleen does not spar the landed gentry, / It needs no palaces or
streets, / No cards or balls or rhymed conceits. / Spleen hovered near him
like a sentry / And haunted all his waking life / Like a shadow, or a
faithful wife" (1.54.12-14). Pushkin here claims that depression, or
"spleen," preys on all of humankind, reiterating the notion that a life of
privilege, and even Eden itself, may silence but will not satisfy the human
soul.
Tatyana’s quixotic enthusiasm for life and love stands in contrast
to Onegin’s early ennui. Though the introduction of Tatyana is somewhat
of a jocular affair, we find her to be such a lively character because of her
impassioned spirit. In the hyperbolic emotional state of adolescence, her
"young imagination, / Enflamed in tender, languored mood, / Had
yearned for the celestial food, / Long had a throbbing agitation / In vain
sought in her bosom room" (III.7.9-13). For Tatyana, "Creative fancy’s
vivid creatures / Lend their imaginary features" (IIL9.5-6). All of life
seems mysterious and fantastical because of her "fancy-fed imagination"
(III.10.1). "Her heart is full to overflowing," it is said (III.16.5). The notion
of her overflowing heart reflects a rather different mood than that of
Onegin’s continual open-mouthed yawning. Also, unlike Onegin, Tatyana
cannot help but express her feelings in a tumultuous outpour of emotion.
However, when confiding in her nanny, Tatyana finds little comfort. Her
nanny, who is described as "dim-witted," is the most bereft of passion of
nearly all of the characters. She can offer nothing but simple advice and,
in "prayerful awe” at Tatyana’s words, "Crossed Tatyana with her wasted
claw” (III.19.13-14). It should be no surprise to us that this character,
bereft of passionate inclinations, is described as having a "claw." This
conjures the image of something akin to a creature, subhuman. The image
of Nanny’s claw serves not only as a comical device depicting a desiccate
old woman but serves doubly as a frightful image. Her very soul is what
makes her animalistic and incapable of sympathy. She is therefore unable
to reach out with a tender hand. She instead confides in the heavenly
spirit to guide over her young mistress.
64
�It is this very idea that we must consider in our investigation of
Tatyana’s frightful dream after Onegin refuses her. In his refusal, Onegin
is indifferent; his minimal affection appears avuncular at best. He offers
her something akin to a "sermon” (IV.17.1), presenting "simple nobility of
heart" in contrast to her "quailing” (IV.18.4). After the affair with Tatyana,
Onegin returns to a "state of pensive sloth” (IV.44.2). Her interpretation
of Onegin as unsympathetic and devoid of passion is what makes him so
frightful and alien to her "overflowing” spirit. Thus, he appears both in
life and in dream to be bestial and daunting. In her dream, Onegin’s
"mighty paw with razor talons” is reminiscent of the Nanny’s clawed
hands (V.12.9). In the very same dream, Tatyana is chased by a bear
whose sudden disappearance offers Eugene’s figure in its stead (V.16].
Even when Onegin’s figure does appear, he is the company of "nothing
human,” but only "freaks” and "horrors” (V.17.1). This subconscious
expression only reiterates Tatyana’s prior suspicion regarding his
unsympathetic and unimpassioned nature. These qualities are merely
symptoms, however, of a far more grave internal state of malaise.
Even when Onegin returns from his long years of travels we find
him accompanied by a morose stanza. This stanza, punctuating and
pausing the plot, stands as an ode to life lost, not gained. Pushkin laments.
But sad to feel, when youth has left us.
That it was given us in vain.
That its unnoticed flight bereft us
And brought no harvest in its train:
That our most fondly nursed ambitions.
Our fancy’s freshest apparitions.
Have swiftly wilted one by one.
Like leaves by autumn blasts undone;
To see no prospect but an endless
Array of meals in solemn row.
To watch life like a puppet show.
Do as the Romans do, yet friendless.
And sharing with that titled crew
No single passion, taste, or view.
(VIII.ll)
We must observe that this ode lacks any hard punctuation to separate its
statements. Rather, it is intended to flow as a single thought, mawkish
and lachrymose. This passage fits our hero’s character well as we find
65
�him still peevish and morose after years abroad. We are told that in his
absence, he sought "solitude wherein a shadow” (Vlll.lS. 5). It is this and
only this shadow that he brings home with him.
Tatyana's and Onegin's Reunion;
Eugene's Transformation
It is only upon Onegin and Tatyana's reunion that this spell
breaks. Upon meeting the wedded Tatyana, who offers little more than
disinterested amiability, Onegin is stirred within. His feelings become
only more intense upon realizing that he is met with a woman content,
indifferent, and seemingly disinterested in him. He is suddenly "confused
and fretful," with "dreams now alluring, now regretful” (VIII.21.1,3].
These dreams "pursue” him and he finds himself in a "strange trance” that
has "upset his torpid self-possession; thus, he wonders to himself if it is
love he feels once again” (VIII.21.10]. Pushkin writes.
The days flew; winter had retreated
And here he was— still undefeated
By verse, lunacy or death.
And spring restored some animation:
He breaks hearthside hibernation
Goes driving through the morning brightness
Down the embankment in a sleigh:
All gold and blue, the sunbeams play
On brittle floes; the fareway's whiteness
Is thawing into muddy slush.
And through it, whither does he rush
(VIII.39]
In this stanza we see that despite Tatyana's painful rejection, the winter
months have not been enough to break his spirit. Something resilient,
strong and life-like has awakened within him. He "breaks hearthside
hibernation, and for the first time in years, wakes up early enough to
confront the "morning brightness.” Even the "gold and blue” sunbeams
are at "play.” During our protagonist's stay at his uncle's estate, we
remember that his rural sensibility lasted only the two days and "Next
day he did not take the trouble / To glance at coppice, hill, and stubble.”
66
�We find the Eugene of old to be incompatible with the man who now
rushes outside and "goes driving through the morning brightness / Down
the embankment in a sleigh." His "rushing" and "driving" reflects an
eagerness for life and an appetite for what it may present him. This
appetite is an ambition, a recognition that life does have more to offer,
and reminds us of the appetite conjured by the forbidden fruit. In the
cases of both Eve and Onegin, implicit in their desire is the recognition
that one’s lot may improve: that one can in fact be happier, better off. To
think otherwise is to denounce life as a static enterprise unworthy of our
celebration. Line fourteen, where the narrator asks, "whither does he
rush," is strongly reminiscent of earlier passages describing him rushing
to the balls and social gatherings. We recall the narrator’s jocular yet
rhetorical inquiry, "Whither does our prankster scurry?" [1.15.6). We
recall the hasty manner with which he "drives out and joins the
promenading" (1.15.13). Yet, it was this life of promenading and glitter
that Onegin quickly came to resent. What makes this scene remarkably
different is that despite Tatyana’s adamant refusals of him, he does not
grow weary of his love for her. The social gatherings of the past were
mere entertainment. They lacked the passion and character of lively
rejuvenation.
The narrator describes "his pupil" as "well-nigh inspired"
(VIII.38.6). Eugene "dogs her footsteps like a waif’ (VIII.30.8). He
"perseveres, won’t cease from trying, / Is ever hoping, ever vying; / With
feeble hand, but greater pluck / Than he had shown in health or luck"
(VIII.32.5-8). He writes his love an "impassioned message" (VIII.32.9). In
his letter, Onegin is said to "expose [his] soul" in a manner unfitting to his
prior self (VIII.33.6). Tatyana confronts Eugene’s passionate outpour with
little more than "cold wrath” (VII.33.14). She "ignores his swoons”
(VIII.32.4), and we are told "she fails to notice or— to care” (VIII. 31. 10).
Though in "mortal anguish,” he is "with love’s wild fevered curse"
(VIII.32. 60). His "flesh is parched with thirst" (VIll.32.62) and he "longs
to clutch [her] knees, and sobbing, in supplication bent” (VIII.32.63).
After Tatyana’s painful rejection, our narrator again laments, "[I]n
his heart, what stormy ocean / Of feelings seething in revolt!" (VIII.48.34). Even in this torment, Onegin’s "heart" is full of "seething" feelings. As a
stormy ocean confronts us with the fear of death, we feel all the more
alive with passion in the presence of our mortality. It is in this very way
that Eugene, despite his circumstances, is confronted with the fresh
reproach of mortal life with all its pain and suffering.
Additionally, we see him for the first time turning to advice,
rather than offering it unwarranted, as demonstrated by his newfound
67
�obsession with “journals anxious to instruct” (Vlll.35.10]. We are told.
Desires, dreams, and regrets were jumbled / In dense profusion in his
soul” (VIII.36.3-4]. This dense profusion consists of a longing for
Tatyana’s love and a regret for his prior mistreatment of her. Further,
Pushkin recalls, "And while drowsy stupor muffles / All thought and
feeling unawares, / Imagination deals and shuffles / Its rapid motley
solitaires” (;viII.37.1-4). It is a morose, insular life that causes a "drowsy
stupor. This stupor muffles and causes one to be "unaware” of thought
and feeling. However, in his state of longing, with its "rapid motley
solitaires, Eugene s imagination” is provoked. He begins to come alive in
both heart and mind.
Pushkin’s Eden:
Reflection on the Two States
A purely insular life of stagnant dejection is the mark of death and
a morbid soul. When one’s torment is stifled, it becomes drowsy, an
unimpassioned, wan mood. But once turned outward toward the world,
one is in communion with something external to and greater than one’s
self. In the same manner that "a pond without an outlet is stagnant, so his
grief, without refreshment, is moribund.”^ If we are fallen beings in a
post-Edenic world, then it only makes sense that the further outward we
reach, the greater communion we experience with the divine. For,
although there may be divine qualities within us, they lay motionless
under the oppression of solipsistic malaise. This goes rather against
Christian theology, which tells us that man must look inward to commune
with the divine. Perhaps the terrifying prospect that Eugene Onegin faces
is that were he to look inward, he would in fact find nothing at all. Left to
his own devices, he lacks the ability to write poetry, to enjoy travel and
leisure he lacks even a reason to live. This also means that we must
interpret, through Pushkin s eyes, a new notion of Eden. Perhaps our
great progenetrix, Eve herself, because of her yearning and reaching for
the forbidden fruit, made Eden a paradise. She turned her life in Eden
from static, lifeless acceptance— of God’s supreme power— to a dynamic,
fluid, and living experience. Thus, it was at the very moment that she
desired (and reached for] the forbidden fruit that she and Adam both
created paradise and simultaneously thrust all of humankind from it. Eve
is still enduring, is still a progenetrix, still intimately kin to us, because we
as humans, in our more energetic yearnings, commune with her and the
desire she embodies. She lives in us as we live. However, we only live
when we want. Thus, Pushkin’s words ring far truer to us than we could
68
�ever imagine. "Ah men! The curse of Eve is still enduring ... The tree, the
serpent ever wield / Their immemorial mystic luring. / Forbidden fruit
we still implore, / Or Eden Eden is no more.” We are in paradise, so long
as we feel desire. It is only once this fades to mere dejection that paradise
no longer exists for us. For it is then that we cease to truly live.
It is important to consider that both Eve an Onegin experienced a
longing for things much greater than themselves. Eve extended her hand
toward supreme knowledge, where Onegin toward loving
companionship. It is by Eve's act that man has traded in his immortality.
But what kind of exchange was it? What did she trade immortality for? Is
it not odd that Pushkin would suggest Eve’s epic gesture cost man his
communion with the divine, only to replace it with the chance for
communion with fellow humankind? If so, what is it that human
companionship offers that divine communion could not? In the case of
Onegin, it is the opportunity to know himself through another. If Onegin
is plagued with the empty, lachrymose soul that Pushkin has described
him as possessing, then it is only through a reciprocal other that he comes
to recognize himself as a living being. Could it be that he must reach
outward for any sense of wholeness? The reason we sympathize more
with Onegin at the end of the novel is because his dissatisfaction turns to
passion. It is his very wanting that makes him lively, mortal— in
summation, human and familiar to us as readers. We recognize ourselves
in Onegin similarly. If it is in fact this state of human longing that makes
life paradise, are we to believe that an impassioned spirit is joy itself? Is
this very human experience the closest to paradise that we will ever be?
Pushkin seems, in fact, to be telling us so. Whether in jubilance or despair,
it is an imperfect life that offers us joy. It is this life, ultimately, that offers
us the chance to know ourselves, imperfectly human as we are.
Endnotes
* All citations are taken from translation by Walter Arndt unless otherwise
noted.
1.
2.
38.12; 1.21.11; 1.19.13; 1.1.13.
Cartmell,
Nathan.
Intimations of Re-Creation From Recollections of
Dejection and joy.
69
�Primary Text
Pushkin, Alexander. Eugene Onegin. Translated by Walter Arndt.
Dana Point, California: Ardis Publishers, 1981.
70
�Made in the USA
12559718R00041
Charleston, SC
12 May 2012
��781475
�
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Wilhite, Jesse (Editor)
Connolly, Brian (Editor)
Allan, Jeffrey (Editor)
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�Early Writings:
An Academic Journal
St. John’s College Graduate Institute
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STJOHN’S
College
ANNAPOLIS • SANTA FE
This project is dedicated to Mr. Matthew Davis, without whose support
and supervision this project would not have been possible.
��Early Writings:
An Academic Journal
St. John's College Graduate Institute
of Santa Fe, New Mexico 2011
Editor:
Mary Creighton
Editorial Board:
Brian Connolly
Jeffrey Allen
Grant Wycliff
John Hungerford
Caitlin McShea
Max Coscia
Alex Kun
Charles Brogan
Cover Design:
Anastasia Kilani
Cover Image:
Copyright Maria Friberg, Courtesy Conner Contemporary Art.
�Contents:
Our Project in Brief
Mary Creighton
iv
The Poetic Prose of King Lear
Bethany McGee
1
Aristotle's Ethics: Human Nature and Sociability
Celine LePluart-Kamm
5
Ge Zhichuan Moving His Dwelling
Reina Lopez
9
Reflections on Xenophon’s Two Accounts of Socrates' Last Days
Clint Condra
15
What Nature Contributes to Character
Natalie Plowman
25
No Country for Old Men: Does Kant’s Categorical
Imperative Have Any Place in the American Political Ethos?
Jeffrey Allen
34
A Selection From:
Intimations of Re-Creation From Recollections of
Dejection and Joy”
Nathan Cartmell
39
Meditation on Li Bai's Invitation to Wine
Turner Resor
55
11
�The Rights of a Citizen and the Rights of Man:
Constitutionality and Natural Law in the Dred Scott
Decision and Lincoln’s Springfield Speech of 1857
Kanishka G.B. Marasinghe
60
Wisdom and Wizardry: Vimalakirti’s Inconceivable
Technique for Reinvigorating the Dharma
Brian Connolly
67
The Problem of Pederasty in Plato’s Phaedrus
John Hungerford
84
The Unmentioned Standing Reserve
Caitlin McShea
97
Reason in Crisis: A reflection on Edmund
Husserl’s The Crisis of European Sciences
Nick Urban
108
�Our Project in Brief:
In his hook Aspects of the Novel, E.M. Forster claims, "the final test
of a novel will be our affection for it." From ancient tragedies and
philosophical manuscripts, to modern political treatises and novels, there
are those works in the Great Books curriculum that so baffled or
provoked us, so inspired or intrigued us, that we are left with no option
other than to confront them in our writing. So, in a sense, this book
resembles more a collection of essays about our affections than it does an
academic journal. In other words, presented in this book are academic
essays that illuminate the intellectual investigations that we have
undertaken while enrolled in the Graduate Institute at St. John’s College
in Santa Fe.
In addition to our authors’ contributions. Early Writings: An
Academic Journal of the St. John's College Graduate Institute has burgeoned
from the hard work of eight diligent editorial board members and an
industrious cover designer. This group of editors volunteered their time
and energy to review and edit a selection of the twenty-nine submitted
essays. Once a submission was sent to the stiohns.gi.iournal@gmail.com
email address, an anonymous copy was reproduced for editorial review.
Once an essay’s approval by majority vote determined its inclusion in the
journal, a group of two to five editors began the editing and reviewing
process. Editors who submitted to the journal surrendered their voting
rights during review of their essay, and the occasion of their submission
remained classified. The editing process included changes in spelling,
grammar, syntax, word usage, basic content changes, and
organization. The author was then contacted with a copy of these changes
as submitted by the board before the essay proceeded to the formatting
stage. All submissions remained anonymous and at no point was the
review board privy to personal information regarding the authors. The
decision to include a submission was based on a number of variables. The
ultimate decision to include a work was based not only on its quality, but
its length, subject matter, etc. For instance, if there were multiple essays
submitted on a given subject, only one may have been selected for
publication, for the sake of subject diversity. Similarly, space constraints
had an impact. This does not mean, however, that more obscure and
shorter pieces were given preference. Rather, an amalgamation of many
variables determined an essay’s precedence and subsequent inclusion.
Our objective has been to provide a polished forum to feature
curriculum-based academic essays of currently enrolled Graduate
students of both the Eastern Classics and Liberal Arts programs. The
inquisitive reader will find that our selections include a wide range of
IV
�subjects, thinkers, genres and writing styles: Included in our selection are
Master's Essay Abstracts, Preceptorial classroom essays and Tutorial
classroom essays. The prudent reader, furthermore, will find in this
diversity proof that in the St. John's community, there is no one
predominant method by which texts are explored. In completing this
project, we are reminded that there are as many perspectives from which
one may investigate a text, as there are texts to investigate. In each of
these explorations we find something classical, something provocative,
something earnest, and something charming. We hope you find the same.
Mary Creighton
Editor
V
��The Poetic Prose of King Lear
Bethany McGee
S?J=*=SH=r.S
,
Enter Edgar.
these divisions. Fa, sol, la, mi.
'
'
do portend
—Edmund (I.ii.128-1483
Edmund s soliloquy in the second scene of the first act of Kinn
i
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into the ,„.o„s both w,.h,„ the laf,:: ^ aSe' Mv.CSa'S'';
Through animal, sexual and biblical imaeerv
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t?"T^aTa*™ “of
man s ambiguous position between god and beast Thp ...o /,
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something that is beyond our control. As he goes on to te I
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1
�"bastard" at large as well as to his own situation. Yet he refuses to make
excuses for his own disposition. Instead he asserts that he would be the
same man had his birth been at any other time. His thoughts are
interrupted with the entrance of his legitimate brother Edgar, of whom he
has just begun to speak. This brings him back into the action of the play
and to his villainous plot.
Edmund paints a dismal portrait of human nature. The examples he
gives of man are of the worst kind: "villains,” "fools,” "knaves, thieves, and
treachers," "drunkards, liars, and adulterers,” and then "whoremaster,”
"rough" and "lecherous.” He believes that man is ruled by his appetites,
and excessively so. We are "surfeits of our own behavior,” indulging to the
point of disgust. With the words of his speech, "goatish,” "Dragon” and
"Ursa" (or bear), he emphasizes this animalistic nature. In fact, the only
adjectives he uses with any positive connotation seem meant to be taken
as ironical. He uses "excellent” to depict the "foppery of the world” and
"admirable” to describe the "evasion of whoremaster man.”
The root of his disgust for humanity appears to be primarily sexual.
Emphasizing his obsession with his own bastardization throughout the
play, his soliloquy is wrought with sexual imagery. Beyond the blatant
usage of "adulterers,” "whoremaster,” "lecherous” and an account of his
"bastardizing” in which his "father compounded with [his] mother,” his
language hints at a sexual drive which is all the more powerful for its
subtlety. The mention of "goatish disposition,” as well as making an
allusion to the astrological sign of Capricorn, conjures a lustful and lewd
image. The phrase "under the Dragon’s Tail” rings phallic when followed
so closely by the virginal description of something as "maidenliest.” Even
the "divine thrusting on” of the first sentence can be understood within a
sexual framework.
In stark contrast to the language of vulgar sexuality and animalism,
the listener is reminded of the eternal heavens. We are treated to "the
sun,” "the moon,” and the three-times-mentioned stars, as well as things
described as "heavenly,” "planetary” and "divine.” The soaring prose
reaches its zenith in the final allusion to a heavenly body with the phrase
"the maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled.” This striking difference
in language and theme highlights the contradiction Edmund sees in trying
to connect one’s base existence to some higher purpose.
For Edmund, this association is detestable. Human nature is obscene
and he admits, being "rough and lecherous,” that he is no exception. Yet
he differs from those he despises by making no excuse for his character. "I
should have been that I am,” he declares, "had the maidenliest star in the
firmament twinkled on my bastardizing.” Even worse than our animalism
is making the heavens "guilty of our disasters.” In this we not only make
excuses for our shortcomings and misfortunes but seek to associate
2
�ourselves with the eternal and the divine. By resisting the temptation to
put his "disposition on the charge of a star,” Edmund has reclaimed not
only culpability but agency as well. He views his "villainous melancholy"
as a choice rather than a "necessity,” and in that choice he sees power.
Edmund's hesitation to associate himself with the divine is subtly
undermined by the words Shakespeare puts into his mouth. There is an
undercurrent of Christian imagery running throughout the speech. It is
first brought to the reader’s attention in Edmund’s claim that "[He]
should have been that [he is] had the maidenliest star in the firmament
twinkled on [his] bastardizing." This reads as a version of the Immaculate
Conception of Christ. Birth under the "maidenliest star” is reminiscent of
the perfect virginity of Mary who, by giving birth out of wedlock, gave
birth to a bastard son. The Christian tones are enforced by language that
is strikingly biblical: "nativity” rings of The Nativity; "firmament” is a key
word in the creation story; "Bedlam” is a corruption of "Bethlehem”; and,
we hear of a "divine thrusting on,” as if the Divine had thrust the seed of a
child upon the Virgin.
By painting himself both as a Christ-figure and a human agent,
Edmund sets himself up for the comments he makes at the end of his
soliloquy. He has put himself at a level above the other characters and
somehow at a level above the play itself. He is able to view the events and
his own person from an outside position almost as one of the audience,
and recognize the action for what it is — a piece of drama on a stage. He,
more than any other character, is allowed a view of the whole. He is able
to reference previously spoken lines ("0, these eclipses do portend these
divisions”: an allusion to lines spoken by his father] as well as those to
come ("with a sigh like Tom o’ Bedlam”: the character his brother will
assume in later scenes]. He has gained such a wide perspective on the
entirety of the drama that he can comment upon the workings of the very
play in which he participates. He verbalizes his "cue” upon Edgar’s
entrance and remarks that it is "like the catastrophe of the old comedy,”
or like the culminating event of a drama by which the plot is resolved.
Even in this moment of meta-drama, Edmund seems to ignore the fact
that "catastrophe" is generally the domain of tragedy. He seems unable to
recognize the seriousness of his situation and imagines he is on a path to
a happy — comic — ending.
Because of Edmund’s heightened awareness of drama and the
frequency with which he addresses the audience throughout the play, his
speech in Act I stands out. This is the only time he, who normally speaks
in verse, soliloquizes in prose. One must ask what is significant in this
choice of form and what effect it has on an audience. In contrast to
Edmund’s other soliloquies, the prose section seems to consciously resist
being broken into iambic feet and thus pays little regard to a regimented
3
�number of syllables within a phrase. Yet the prose is full of poetic
elements: elevated language, metaphor and vivid imagery. And, though
not consistently regulated, upon recitation, the selection takes on a
metered cadence.
So why not write the passage in verse? Why single out this speech
with the distinction of prose, a traditionally less-celebrated form? Why
choose words of heavy stress like "adulterers," "whoremaster,” "fools,”
"knaves," "thieves," "treachers," and "evil" that are not typically the
content of lyrical, iambic poetry? It is as if the subject of the soliloquy
would defile poetic language. As if neither the author nor the speaker
could bear to elevate such a cruel, lewd portrait of humanity and
hypocrisy to the level of the poetic. Yet there are moments, as in the lines
"by spher | ical | predom | inance” and "enforced | obe | dience | of plan |
etar | y in | fluence," where iambic feet, and even rhyme can be found.
Here, poetry, the language of the stars, interrupts the vulgar prose.
Within the harsh description of reality we see flashes of eternal ideals
spoken in elevated poetry. Though the effect may be lost on the listener,
the distinction between prose and verse is glaringly apparent to the
reader.
Upon close inspection of the passage, the complexity and
contradictions within both Edmund and the play as a whole become
apparent. The soliloquy illuminates the tension inherent in man's
position as hovering precariously between the animal and the divine. The
use of poetic prose to express this situation reinforces the dialectic nature
of the problem, with poetry representing the heavens and prose the
animal appetites. He is a man who laments being put into a position
beyond his control and desires the power to improve his situation. This
upward movement involves betraying the familial bonds and the
compassion for others that one would assume to be natural. By
disparaging Nature and reclaiming an independent agency, Edmund can
sooth his conscience and act without fear of immorality. This response is
not unique to Edmund, but rather is shared by many of the play’s
characters. Shakespeare has presented a man meant to embody evil, yet
he looks familiar- both like the personages who share his stage and also
like the members of his audience. Through the use of poetic prose and
skillfully subtle conceits, Edmund’s soliloquy gives the audience a picture
of a tortured soul and the world that has created it.
Primary Text
Shakespeare, William. King Lear. Ed. R.A. Foakes. London: The Arden
Shakespeare, 1997.
4
�Aristotle's Ethics:
Human Nature and Sociability
Celine Le Pluart-Kamm
In the Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle affirms, "man is by nature a
social being" (1097b6]. His association of nature and society, which are
generally viewed as distinctively different and opposed to each other,
presents an interesting paradox. The contradiction is further deepened
when he adds that the qualities, or virtues, necessary for man to exercise
his natural sociability do not arise from innately, but artificially by
training. They are learned behaviors within the city. It is easy to find a
tension between the two opposing states of what man is "naturally” and
"socially." If, as Aristotle theorizes, nature made the city come into
existence as a result of necessity or common interest and endowed its
citizens solely with tendencies to act in a particular way, we can therefore
infer that the choices and actions that enable these citizens to function
originate not in nature, but in the city: they originate in the socialized
man himself. Thus, we are led to believe that the forces and processes
controlling the phenomenon of the making of the city, as well as the
intrinsic and essential character of those who live in it, are independent
of human volition; however, the processes of collectively creating a high
level of development and pursuit of goodness are dependent on human
volition. This raises again the question of the correlation between the
Aristotelian views of nature and culture, and more particularly, of an
important distinction about which Aristotle was not completely clear:
when does one break away from the other and become unique to man? In
what sense can we say that a human being is a social being? Natural or
artificial, what does sociability tells us about our humanity?
Aristotle's political ideas regarding human nature differ widely from
thinkers who affirm that man is by nature anti-social. Contrary to Hobbes
or Rousseau, for whom civil life — viz., the city — is unnatural, Aristotle
positively declares that the city is a natural state for mankind. In Politics,
he asserts, "it is evident that the city belongs to the class of things that
exist by nature, and that man is by nature a political animal” [1253a2]. As
a "political animal,” man is thus inclined to naturally seek out the
company of other people. However, by defining man as a "political
animal," Aristotle seems to make a crucial distinction between human
and animal societies. Indeed, man is not the only "animal” to live in a
community; other animals, such as elephants or wolves, live in groups,
albeit in a less organized fashion. Bees or ants, however, have been
observed to form organized and hierarchical societies evocative of those
of humans. But the difference is, however, that humans are more
5
�"political” than these other animals. People are drawn together not only
in response to basic physical needs, but to form and maintain political
associations from a common interest, seeking to attain a share of the
good life. In that sense, man's social endeavor is much greater than that of
other animals; it is beyond the call of necessity. In fact, his sociability
consists of an essential ethical component: the realization of the good life
— i.e., happiness or fulfillment — that Aristotle examines in the Ethics.
Aristotle thus starts the Nicomachean Ethics on the premise that
society is fundamental to the nature of man. For him, to be a human being
can only mean to be a social being. He goes even further in saying that a
life outside the city is not that of a human but of something rather
subhuman or superhuman. He he points out in Politics:
The man who is isolated, who is unable to share the
benefits of political association, or has no need to share
because he is already self-sufficient, is no part of the city,
and must therefore be either a beast or a god.
(1253a25-29)
This different sort of being, lacking the ability to live in association
with other citizens, is thus alienated from the city's ultimate end. On one
hand, he may be considered less than human: either a beast or a brute,
limited by survival needs and base instinct. On the other hand, he may be
considered more than human: a god, self-sufficient and perfect in every
way. While acknowledging that man cannot exist in isolation, but only in
relation with other fellow-citizen, Aristotle makes the claim that brutish
and godlike states are in fact rare among the Greek race:
And since it is rare for a man to be divine, in the same way
a brutish person is also rare among human beings. The
type is commonest among the non-Greek races, but some
cases also occur that are due to disease or arrested
development. (1145a27-31)
Despite the fact that the lowly beast and the supremely happy man
are both self-sufficient and can survive independently, Aristotle calls
attention to the hardship of such solitary life:
Now a solitary man has a hard life, because it is not easy
to keep up a continuous activity by oneself; but in
company with others and in relations to others it is easier.
(1170a5-6)
It is friendship, he writes, that brings people together. Aristotle
clearly separates the miserable beast — enslaved by its own survival
needs and brute instinct — from the happy man, free from any needs. In
6
�view of this, Aristotle specifies that a happy man will need virtuous
friends;
It is also paradoxical to represent a man of perfect
happiness as a solitary; for nobody would choose to have
all the good things in the world by himself, because man is
a social creature and naturally constituted to live in
company. (1169bl8-19)
It thus becomes apparent that the development of the city evolves from
the need to connect and form meaningful relationships. From this
standpoint, we find a natural sociability going back to a primary joining of
familial communities. Aristotle describes the emergence of the city as a
natural progression:
It is a generally accepted view that the perfect good is selfsufficient. By self-sufficiency we mean not what is
sufficient for oneself alone living a solitary life, but
something that includes parents, wife and children,
friends and fellow-citizens in general; for man is by nature
a social being. (1097b9-ll]
Starting from the union of families to that of hamlets, the city completes,
as a result, the process of unification. As it has been demonstrated, man
achieves — in actuality — what living in the city has made him for, thus
occupying a particular place in nature that is different from that of other
animals. However, in this ultimate realization of Aristotle’s naturally
sociable man, there is no discernible break that occurs between nature
and the nature of man. There is, nevertheless, an apposite nature of man
characterized by the faculty of reason and the ensuing acquisition of
moral virtues:
The moral virtues, then, are engendered in us neither by
nor contrary to nature; we are constituted by nature to
receive them, but their full development in us is due to
habit. Again, of all those faculties with which nature
endows us we first acquire the potentialities, and only
later effect their actualization. (1103a24-28]
Here Aristotle not only presents man as impelled by nature to live in the
city, but also as being provided with a certain disposition complimentary
to the duties and obligations of civil society. This is seen when making
conscious choices or decisions to act toward the fulfillment of his ends.
From potentiality to actuality, man must undergo a development to
realize the moral virtues necessary to achieve a higher state of positivity
— viz., the good life. With the use of reason, the exercise of his will gives a
7
�moral sense to his acts. In a sense, the potential for future development
belongs to the realm of nature, while the formation and framework of
social life belongs to the realm of will and rational thoughts. Thus, man is
left to shape an enduring system of relations that serves human interests.
Such enterprises then complete a socialization process that nature cannot
complete for him. So, if sociability relates to nature and our inclination to
live in the city, it also relates to culture and our volition to attain its
ultimate end: the common good. In this way, the break between nature
and the unique nature of man seems to occur during this realization of his
potential.
While sociability emerges as a quality unique to man due to reason
and culture, it implies more than a means to a self-interested end. It tells
us that we are social beings whose existence is incomplete outside a
social whole. In short, Aristotle reminds us that contrary to increasingly
prevalent individualist views, a human being is an unfinished being
without society to help perfect his own nature. As a result of
individualism, is mankind becoming more like beasts or gods?
Primary Texts
Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics. Translated by J.A.K. Thomson. London:
Penguin Books, 1976.
Aristotle. Politics. Translated by T.A. Sinclair. London: Penguin Books,
1981.
�Ge Zhichuan Moving His Dwelling
Reina Lopez
Wang Meng was born in Huzhou, now known as Wuxing in 1308.
Scholars believe that he took informal lessons in watercolor from his
grandfather, but there is no record of any formal training. At any rate, one
can safely assume that Meng’s family served for generations as painters
for the emperor. His was also a political family. He followed in his family
tradition of official service to the government by taking a minor post for
most of the 1340s. The invasion of the Mongols brought his political
career to a halt and he moved to the Yellow Crane Mountains to take the
studio-name "Firewood Gatherer of the Yellow Crane Mountain." He was
the youngest of the great masters of the Yuan Dynasty who famously
refused to serve the Mongolian rulers of his time. Because of his refusal to
serve the Mongol rulers of the country, none of his works are painted on
silk — all are painted on paper. With the ousting of the Mongols and the
subsequent founding of the Ming dynasty in 1368, Meng returned to
political office and reluctantly accepted the post of prefect in Shandong
Province. A loose association with the minister Hu Weiyong (who was
accused of treason and executed in 1380) caused Meng a subsequent
accusation of sedition. Meng was sent to prison in 1375 where he spent
the last five years of his life.
Wang Meng’s style is unlike many of his contemporaries. His
paintings are dense, almost cluttered, and his brush strokes pile on top of
each other creating masses of color and texture. In his landscapes very
little of the painting surface is left untouched by ink, creating full, almost
claustrophobic, images. His most famous paintings are Forest Dwellings in
Chu-ch'u and Forest Grottoes at Juqu. The exact date of the painting Ge
Zhichuan Moving His Dwelling is unknown, as it was left undated by the
painter. However, based on its style, many believe that it belongs to his
middle period of painting in the 1360s. The painting is a hanging scroll
measuring 139 x 58 cm. It is currently housed in the Palace Museum in
Beijing. Based on an inscription on the painting later added by the artist,
many believe that the painting was for Zucheng Rizhang, a Buddhist
monk for whom the painting Forest Grottoes at Juqu was also painted. It is
quite interesting (and more than a bit confusing) that Meng painted Ge
Zhichuan, a prominent Daoist author, as the subject of a painting to be
given to a prominent Buddhist — but this concern will be addressed later.
Upon initial observation of Ge Zhichuan Moving His Dwelling, one
immediately notices the density of the image. Only a small portion at the
bottom left and a small band across the top of the paper are barren.
Furthermore, one notices the different qualities and density of both the
9
�ink and color of the painting. Most of the black ink is diluted and used as a
wash for the mountains as a light grey. Intense black ink is reserved for a
few rocks near the bottom of the painting, clumps of trees in the top third
of the painting, and to highlight Ge Zhichuan’s robe.
Meng also makes use of different densities of color. Dense blue trees
can be seen at the bottom of the painting while lighter shades of blue and
red characterize the trees in the upper third of the painting. One also
notices that the lighter shades of blue from the trees are echoed in the
color of the distant mountains in the background. Interestingly, the only
other use of the color red is found muted in the roofs of the houses and
again muted in the color of the domesticated animals that Ge Zhichuan is
using to assist his move. The intense red color is reserved for the
prominent stamp at the top of the page, a few minor stamps to the bottom
left and one to the bottom right of the painting.
Looking closer at the trees, one notices that the texture of each
species of tree is different yet consistent throughout the painting. Each
tree is painstakingly precise and detailed. As is pointed out in 3,000 Years
of Chinese Painting, Meng "draws his pictorial material — figures, trees,
rocky masses — with extraordinary finesse, using dry, precise
brushstrokes and avoiding all that is gestural, calligraphic, or indicative of
spontaneity" (177). This lack of spontaneity implies that the artist
executed the painting according to a precise agenda.
It seems obvious to move from the trees to that upon which they are
standing — the mountains and land. Although the mountains take up the
majority of ink on the page, they are neither overbearing nor ominous.
Starting at the bottom of the page, one notices that the land actually
touches the very edge and essentially splits the page in half so that it
marks an equal proportion of land and water. The rocks at the bottom of
the page have a dark grey wash, to echo the dark grey mountains at the
painting’s northernmost edge. Also, the rocks seem to have deep
crevasses (marked by a pure black ink), to echo the dark black ink of the
plants and shadows also in the top half of the painting.
Compared to other paintings of this st>’le, Ge Zhichuan Moving His
Dwelling has a striking lack of mist surrounding the mountains. This
omission does two things. Firstly, it forces Meng to use different
techniques to create depth in the painting; secondly, it forces the viewer
to search for the specific pathway leading to the dwelling at the upper
right of the painting. The artist intends the eyes’ movement toward this
pathway as it prescribes a specific path to the dwelling. It gives the
viewer merely one way by which we, like Ge Zhichuan himself, may reach
the dwelling.
To create depth in his painting, Meng uses scale and detail of trees
and plants. At the bottom of the painting the trunks of each tree are
10
�meticulously detailed. At the top of the painting the trunks of the trees
are less detailed. This technique is similar to that of Chao Meng-fu’s
Autumn Colors on the Ch'iao and Huo Mountains. However, Ge Zhichuan
Moving His Dwelling is a much more crowded image than that seen in the
open plains of Autumn Colors. The composition of the mountains give the
sense of a continuous sequence to create depth; however, this is more
clearly observed at the top of the page where the mountains seem to
stack on top of one another. By combining these two techniques, Meng
plays with perspective, never allowing the viewer to settle into any one
viewing mode. Rather, the viewer is constantly uncomfortable and
unstable in his perspective.
The unsettled viewer is obliged to search for Meng’s intended
pathway up the painting. Unlike many of the paintings in which the mist
between the mountains create a pathway for the eyes, Meng forces the
viewer to search for his pathway — the path that Ge Zhichuan and his
family are already walking. This prescribed path, and only this path,
leads the viewer to the dwelling obscured by the trees in the valley. One
does not dare seek another path to the dwelling, lest his eyes become lost
among the mountains and trees.
Looking at the bottom third of the painting, one notices that the dark
rocks and the clear water are given equal value on the page. This
essentially splits the painting surface area in half. From the unpainted
water on the bottom left of the page, our eyes are drawn slightly upward
and to the right where the water is blocked by the dark rock. Fritz van
Briessen, a scholar of Chinese painting and its styles, describes this
technique as "Opening and Closing” or "k'ai ho" [van Briessen, 134]. The
water on the left of the painting wants to flow endlessly, thus opening the
painting. This element opens up the painting in order to let it "fly free."
Left unconstrained, the water would continue to flow in all directions, as
it does at the left bottom, where it seems to flow off of the page. Meng,
however, contains the water on the right hand side of the page with dark
rocks. These rocks "close down" the openness of the water and "hold it
fast" (van Briessen, 134) within its banks. The rocks also force our eyes
back to the left and up the path of the water to the human subject of the
painting. Interestingly, van Briessen suggests that the opposing pairs in
the painting become identical at a higher level. By dividing the painting
horizontally in half, we notice that Meng has given equal space to the
combined water and rocks at the bottom of the page with the sky at the
top of the page. In a sense, the water and rocks are identical to its
mirrored sky.
If we take into account that the subject of the painting (Ge Zhichuan)
was a prominent Daoist, the importance of the equal and balanced yet
contrasting rocks and water take on an even deeper meaning as a symbol
11
�of Yin and Yang. This symbol of eternal transition and duality illuminates
a strong Daoist philosophy within the painting itself. Furthermore, the
relationship between the bottom of the painting [Earth] and the top of
the painting [Heaven) and the equality which Meng gives them suggests
that in the balance between opposites [Yin and Yang] one can indeed find
harmony, represented by Heaven, here on Earth.
As our eyes are pushed left by the rocks at the bottom of the page, we
come to Meng's intended path. We first notice that this path has no
definite beginning. Instead, it seems to appear from behind the trees on
the bottom right side of the painting. The path leads us across the bridge,
on which Ge Zhichuan stands, and again disappears off to the left side of
the page. The path briefly re-appears as it follows the river only to quickly
disappear again to the left. We notice the footpath further up the page
with a servant waiting for Ge and his family. From this point the path
continues, undisturbed, to Ge's future dwelling.
Ge's dwelling is nestled in a valley in the upper center left of the
page. Aside from this footpath, no other entrance is visible; alas, it is a
secluded and singularly accessible dwelling. The mountains surrounding
the dwelling are also slightly different in character. They are
characterized by darker plant life and shadows as compared to the
mountains lower in the painting. The dwelling's proximity to the sky
[Heaven] suggests that this dwelling in fact represents the closest that
man may come to enlightenment while still grounded on earth. This
would also explain why Meng violates one of the six principles of a
successful painting — namely - having a path with a definite ending
point. The ending point of the path, the dwelling, or enlightenment, is the
final destination for man on Earth.
Moving once again to the beginning of the path, we notice the subject
of the painting, Ge Zhichuan and his family, at the bottom center. Ge
Zhichuan stands on a bridge looking back, waiting for his wife and child
on ox-back. Uncharacteristic of paintings of its type where human figures
are often androgynous or of indistinguishable age, Meng deliberately
gives his characters identity. Furthermore, by placing Ge's wife and child
in the painting, Meng suggests that sex and age do not matter on the path
to enlightenment. One can reach enlightenment regardless of gender or
age provided that they are on the correct path.
Our eyes easily travel from the bridge to what appears to be a
servant carrying a package and then slightly upward to another servant
resting by the river. This character has specifically set down his baggage
to rest. He sits upright, an implication that his path has not been
extremely burdensome or tiring. His upright posture suggests also that he
has plenty of energy and enthusiasm for the path ahead. Following the
path, we encounter a final unburdened servant waiting for the family at
12
�the dwelling. Ge and his family seem notably unencumbered and upright
compared to the human figures that we observe in many other paintings,
where heavy loads burden characters as they move across the painted
scenes.
Why does the disposition of Ge’s family stand in stark contrast to
other figures of its kind? Is this the literal moving of one's dwelling, or is
this a metaphorical move toward enlightenment? The location of the
housing in the upper half of the page, Meng’s singular and vertical path to
the dwelling, and the knowledge that Ge Zhichuan is a prominent Daoist,
all suggest that his move is the latter.
Van Briessen tells us that "a close examination of any good Chinese
painting will reveal an intangible quality which can perhaps be best
expressed by saying that the painting seems to be knit together by strong
invisible threads" (130). The final portion of this paper will examine
Wang Meng’s Ge Zhichuan Moving His Dwelling according to the four key
principles — Dragon Veins, Host and Guest, Heaven and Earth, and
Opening and Closing — which van Briessen remarks as critical to the
composition of a painting.
The first principle that van Briessen describes is the principle of
"Dragon Veins." This term is used to describe "those invisible threads or
connectives which are woven in an ingenious and complex system across
a painting" (130). Dragon Veins give life to the painting. In the case of Ge
Zhichuan, the Dragon Veins emerge from the mountains themselves. They
can be seen in the darkest areas of ink on the page. One notices the dark
ink on the character of Ge Zhichuan. This color is echoed in the vertical
lines of the waterfall just above the human character and again in the
dark foliage on the center mountain. These dark areas stretch the eye
from the bottom of the painting to its top, seamlessly connecting each
section to another.
The second principle van Briessen describes is that of "Host and
Guest." In this principle, "two parts of a picture are set in a relationship
with each other" (130) which represent the "giving and the taking, the
passive and the aggressive, and form a unit which is then set against
another part of the painting in a further host-guest relationship" (130).
Because of the cluttered nature of Meng’s painting, the Host and Guest
principle is not accessible upon first acquaintance. Rather, we must look
very closely to see how it plays a part in the painting. Van Briessen
suggests that the principle can most easily be studied by looking at
groups of objects. Using trees as an example van Briessen tells us that the
Host tree will generally be "bent, with spread branches” (131), like a host
creating space for his guest. The Guest tree is then in contrast with the
host by standing "slim and straight” (131). Looking at unlike groupings,
one immediately notices the contrast between the horizontal cliffs at the
13
�center left of the painting (representing the Host) and the completely
vertical and smooth nature of the waterfall that represent the Guest. This
micro-relationship forms another Host and Guest relationship as seen in
the cliffs that extend up and to the right while the waterfall continues to
act as the Guest, drawing our eyes vertically. After our eyes have reached
the origin of the waterfall, we once again see a Host and Guest
relationship in the valley in which Ge’s dwelling is located. Here, the dark
foliage of trees creates a "V” shape in which the lighter and more pastel
colored dwellings, as the guest, reside.
The next principle. Heaven and Earth, deals with the vertical balance
of the painting. The principle of Heaven and Earth includes the "binding
together of all that is anchored to the earth and all that floats free of it”
(132). Binding the vertical elements of a painting relies heavily on the use
of the Dragon Veins, which were discussed earlier. The Dragon Veins
connect the top and bottom portions of the painting. Furthermore, the
very nature of Dragon Veins as subtly bringing the painting to life,
embody that which binds together all that is anchored to the earth and all
that floats free of it. The Dragon Veins are both a part of the physical
painting and float free of it as well.
The last principle of composition, "Opening and Closing,” was
mentioned earlier in the discussion of the lower portion of the painting.
However, the true nature of the principle is to connect the painting as a
whole work. In this particular painting, the principle of Opening and
Closing is identical with that of Host and Guest. No further discussion of
Opening and Closing is needed.
Through the use of meticulous detail, fastidious texture, and extreme
number of brush strokes, Wang Meng created not only a masterwork of
art, but a masterwork of philosophy. He cleverly juxtaposes pairs of
opposites to create a living sense of balance not just to his work, but to
express the importance of this equilibrium in life as well. When this
balance is achieved, one is able to move his dwelling, in fact, move his life,
unburdened toward enlightenment. He moves his dwelling to one that is
as close to heaven as possible while remaining grounded here on earth a truly Daoist subject for a truly Daoist painter.
Primary Texts
Van Briessen, Fritz. The Way of the Brush: Painting Techniques of China
and Japan. Boston: Tuttle Publishing, 1999.
Barnhart, Richard M.; Cahill, James; Chongzheng, Nie; Hung, Wu; Shaojun,
Lang. 3,000 Years of Chinese Painting. New Haven, London: Yale
University Press, 1997.
14
�Reflections on Xenophon's Two Accounts
of Socrates’ Last Days
Clint Condra
Xenophon offers us accounts of Socrates’ last days both in his
Apology of Socrates to the Jury and in Book IV, chapter 8 of his
Memorabilia. What are we to make of this? That this eminent student of
Socrates’ simply made the mistake of repeating himself we do not
consider. We assume, rather, that had Xenophon believed a single account
of his teacher sufficient, he would not have left us two. That the accounts
are similar yet not identical suggests that Xenophon left something of
these events and their significance for the careful reader to discern. This,
indeed, we take to be our task; bearing it in mind, then, let us compare
and contrast the accounts for ourselves.
We notice, first of all, certain broad similarities between them: each
commences with a declaration of intentions; each relates a conversation
between Hermogenes and Socrates that took place during the latter’s last
days; each conclude with remarks in praise of Socrates.i We find the
following declaration of intentions in the Apology.
And regarding Socrates, it is in my opinion also worth
recalling how, when he was summoned to court, he
deliberated about his defense and the end of his life. Now
about this others too have written, and all touched on his
boastful manner of speaking — a fact which shows that
Socrates really did speak in that way. But they did not
make quite clear that he already believed death to be
preferable to life for himself, so that his boastful speech
appears to be rather imprudent. (1]
Xenophon means here to disabuse readers of the notion that Socrates
spoke imprudently at his trial — which notion, we gather, Xenophon
believes to follow from the assumption that Socrates would have
preferred life to death. In light of this, we may understand the Apology, at
least in part, as Xenophon’s attempt to vindicate Socrates’ prudence by
relating how and why Socrates had in fact come to believe death "to be
preferable to life for himself." Following this declaration of intentions,
the Apology continues with Xenophon’s relation of Hermogenes’
conversation with Socrates. Before we turn our attention to this, though,
let us consider the intentions Xenophon declares in his Memorabilia.
Here it is not Socrates’ prudence but rather his piety that Xenophon
intends to vindicate: "And if someone thinks that he was proven to be
lying about the divine thing . .. since he was condemned to death by the
15
�jurors although he claimed that the divine thing . . . signified to him
beforehand what he should and should not do” (1), Xenophon declares,
that person should consider certain facts in light of which condemnation
and death appear to have been the best outcomes available to Socrates.
For one, "he was already at the time [of his trial] so far advanced in age
that his life would have ended not much later, even if not then;"
moreover, by dying when he did and as he did, Socrates "left behind the
part of life that is most burdensome" and "in place of this . . . acquired
additional fame by displaying the strength of his soul” [1]. This strength
of soul Socrates displayed in two ways — "both by stating his case most
truthfully, most freely, and most justly of all human beings,” which
Xenophon relates in his Apology, and "by bearing his condemnation to
death most gently and most courageously” (1). It is with the latter subject
that the Memorabilia continues.
Specifically, Xenophon offers Socrates’ behavior during the thirtyday interval between the latter’s condemnation and his death as evidence
"that no human being within memory has borne death more nobly.” For,
during this time [Socrates] was visible to all his
acquaintances living in no way other than during the
previous time. And yet previously, of all human beings, he
was most admired for living in good spirits and
contentedly. (2)
Xenophon next constructs a sort of chain of causation out of a series of
rhetorical question marks, which we here paraphrase: because Socrates
died a death most noble, he therefore died a death most happy; because
he died a death most happy, he therefore died a death most dear to the
gods. Now although Xenophon does not indicate how this might pertain
to the matter of whether or not Socrates was lying about "the divine
thing,” we have reason to take what Xenophon says here as evidence that
Socrates was telling the truth: if Socrates had fabricated "the divine thing”
in the hope that such a defense would help him secure his own acquittal,
then during these thirty days we should have seen him either skip town,
or else continue to plead his case. At the very least we should not have
expected to see him "living in good spirits and contentedly.”
Having now surveyed some of what precedes Xenophon’s relation of
Hermogenes’ conversation with Socrates in each account, we may go on
to consider with regard to Xenophon’s declared intentions, how he
relates this conversation in each account. According to the Apology,
Hermogenes, the son of Hipponicus,. . . was a comrade of
[Socrates’] and reported about him such things as make it
clear that his boastful speech fitted his purpose. For upon
16
�seeing Socrates conversing about everything rather than
about the trial, this man said that he said: ‘Shouldn't you
consider, Socrates, what you will say in your defense?
(2-3)
In the Memorabilia Xenophon writes,
1 shall tell also what I heard about [Socrates] from
Hermogenes the son of Hipponicus. For he said that after
Meletus had already entered the charge against him and
he himself heard him conversing about everything other
than the trial, he said to him that he should be examining
what his defense would be. (4)
In both accounts Socrates responds to this by asking whether or not
it seems to Hermogenes that he, Socrates, has spent his whole life doing
just this. Again, in both accounts Hermogenes responds in turn by asking
how this is so.
What happens next is of much interest. In the Apology Socrates
answers Hermogenes by saying, "I have gone through life doing nothing
unjust" (3). In the Memorabilia Socrates gives Hermogenes a fuller
answer: "he said,” Xenophon relates, "that he had continuously done
nothing other than thoroughly examine what the just and the unjust
things are, while doing the just and refraining from the unjust” (4). What
might the difference between these two answers here given by Socrates
have to do with the different intentions declared by Xenophon in each
account? We recall that Xenophon intends in his Apology to vindicate
Socrates’ prudence — to show, that is, that Socrates’ "boastful speech
fitted his purpose." Why in the Apology, then, might Socrates not have
told Hermogenes that, in addition to having "gone through life doing
nothing unjust," "he had continuously done nothing other than
thoroughly examine what the just and the unjust things are?" The charges
brought against Socrates as cited in the Apology — "that he did not
believe in the gods in whom the city believes but brought in other strange
daimonia and [that he] corrupted the young" (10) — may shed some light
on this. Namely, perhaps Socrates in the Apology had the prudence not to
mention his examination of what the just and unjust things are^: after all,
as far as the Athenians are concerned, if the gods in whom they believe
have told them what the just and the unjust things are, then for someone
to examine these things for himself must be seen as superfluous at best —
and may well be seen as evidence of impiety. Then again, if venerated
human lawgivers — the likes of Solon, for instance — have bequeathed
unto the present generation a time-honored account of what the just and
17
�the unjust things are, then for Socrates to encourage his followers to
examine these things may well be seen as corrupting the young.
We continue by comparing what comes next in the conversation of
Hermogenes with Socrates in each account. The Apology reads:
"Don't you see," Hermogenes tells Socrates, "that the
Athenian juries, when annoyed by a speech, often killed
those who did nothing unjust, and often acquitted those
who acted unjustly but whose speech moved them to pity
or who spoke agreeably?” Socrates said: "Yes, certainly,
by Zeus, and twice already I tried to consider my defense,
but the daimonion opposes me.” [4)
In the Memorabilia Xenophon relates this exchange as follows:
And once again, [Hermogenes] himself said, "Don't you
see, Socrates, that the Athenian jurors, when annoyed by
speech, have already put to death many who committed
no injustice and released many who did commit
injustice?” "But, by Zeus, Hermogenes,” [Socrates] said, "I
have already attempted to worry about my defense to the
jurors, but the divine thing [daimonion) opposed it.” [5]
In the Apology Hermogenes explains how those who have acted unjustly
have managed to get themselves acquitted — namely, by speaking
agreeably or else in such a manner as moved juries to pity. Also in the
Apology, Socrates clearly indicates to Hermogenes his awareness of this
fact about Athenian juries. In the Memorabilia, however, Hermogenes
does not say how those who have committed injustice have managed to
get released, nor does Socrates affirm that he already knows what
Hermogenes has just told him about Athenian juries. It seems to me that
Xenophon's declared intention to defend Socrates' prudence in the
Apology goes some way in accounting for these differences. Those who
had acted unjustly yet managed to secure their own acquittal, secured it
thanks to their prudence: they intended to secure their own acquittal, and
they took such actions as brought to pass what they had intended. Now
we have seen that Socrates, too, evidently knows of the susceptibility of
juries to manipulation. Socrates, in other words, surely could speak
agreeably or in such a way as moved the jurymen to pity, had he intended
to secure his own acquittal. What we learn here, though, is that Socrates
did not so intend. We learn, indeed, not only that Socrates did not
consider his defense, but why he would not: "the daimonion opposed it.”
Both of Xenophon's accounts continue with Hermogenes, for his part,
telling Socrates that he says amazing things, and Socrates, for his,
explaining that the gods have good reason to oppose his consideration of
18
�a defense speech. First, says Socrates, none has lived a better life than he;
second, his friends and associates recognize this fact about him; third,
were he to live longer he would surely have, as he puts it, "to pay the dues
of old age” — that is, to suffer mental and physical decline. Now although
Socrates makes these same three points in both of Xenophon's accounts,
we should notice that in the Memorabilia he makes them at greater length
and in a more philosophical manner. In the Apology, for instance, Socrates
states the first two of his three points as follows:
Don’t you know that up to this time 1 never conceded to
anyone that he had lived better than 1? For — a thing
which is very pleasant — 1 knew that 1 had lived my whole
life piously and justly, so that, while greatly admiring
myself, I found that my associates recognized the same
things about me. (5)
In the Memorabilia, by contrast, Socrates includes in the first of his points
a general claim regarding the relationship between the good and the
pleasant: "For 1 think that those live best who best attend to becoming as
good as possible, and that those live most pleasantly who perceive that
they are becoming better" (6]. As for his second point, Socrates in the
Apology merely mentions that his "associates recognized the same things”
about him, whereas in the Memorabilia he also asserts that it is because
his associates recognized the benefits they could attain by being in his
company that they sought and kept it: it is not, says Socrates,
because they love me [for those who love the others could
also make the same judgment about their own friends),
but for the very reason that they think that by being in my
company they themselves, too, would become best. (7)
With respect to his third point, finally, Socrates says in the Apology that
if my age will advance further, I know that it will be
necessary to pay the dues of old age, to see and hear less
well and to learn with more difficulty and to be more
forgetful of what 1 have learned. And if 1 perceive that 1 am
becoming worse and 1 find fault with myself, how ... could
1 still live pleasantly? (6)
In the Memorabilia Socrates says this much, but pronounces also that "for
one who did perceive” that he was becoming worse at things at which he
formerly was better, "life would not be worth living" (8).
It seems to me that the differences here, like those we have seen
before, follow from the differences between Xenophon’s declared
intentions: what Socrates omits here in the Apology reflects Xenophon’s
19
�declared intention to vindicate Socrates’ prudence. How, though, do
Socrates’ fuller answers in the Memorabilia reflect the intentions
Xenophon declares in that account? Recall that earlier Socrates told
Hermogenes that he had "gone through life doing nothing unjust,"
whereas in the Memorabilia he told him that "he had continuously done
nothing other than thoroughly examine what the just and the unjust
things are, while doing the just and refraining from the unjust.” The
thorough examination of what the just and the unjust things are pertains,
I say, to the virtue of philosophical human being, and it is as a virtuous
philosophical human being that Xenophon intends to present Socrates in
the Memorabilia. This interpretation also explains Xenophon’s inclusion
in the Memorabilia of Socrates’ fuller, more philosophical statements
regarding why the gods were right to oppose the consideration of a
defense speech: it is as a philosophical human being that Socrates has
determined that "those live most pleasantly who most perceive that they
are becoming better." It is, moreover, Socrates the philosophical human
being who asserts that the life of anyone who fails to perceive that he is
becoming worse at things at which he formerly was better is not a life
worth living.
We have established that Xenophon intends in his Apology and
Memorabilia to vindicate Socrates’ prudence and his piety, respectively.
Consider how Socrates defends himself against the charge that "he did
not believe in the gods in whom the city believes but brought in other
strange daimonia" {Apology, 10]. He cites, first, his performance of public
sacrifices as evidence of his belief in the city’s gods. Whether this
amounts to a sufficient defense, though, is not clear — one might object,
for instance, that a man could perform public sacrifices that felt no true
piety in his heart. Next, in addressing the notion that he had "brought in
strange daimonia,” Socrates claims that there is nothing strange about his
"saying that a sound from a god manifests itself’ to him, "indicating what
ought to be done” (12); birds, oracles, and thunderclaps he offers as
familiar examples of sounds and sights understood to have divine
significance. He goes on:
But doubtless both that the god knows what will be and
that he forewarns whom he wishes — with respect to this
too all say and believe just as I say. Yet, whereas others
name what forewarns them 'birds’ and ‘sayings,’ and
'signs’ and prophets,’ I call this a 'daimonion’ and I think
that in naming it thus I speak both more truthfully and
more piously than those who attribute to the birds the
power of the gods. (13)
20
�1 say that Socrates’ prudence partially explains his speech here.
Though he does not name any of the city's gods as the source of the sound
that manifests itself to him, Socrates emphasizes in his speech the
familiarity of his practice of receiving and interpreting sounds as omens.
He does not assert himself to be a pious believer in the city’s gods, but he
certainly defends his piety — he seems, in fact, to claim a higher piety
"than those who attribute to the birds the power of the gods.”
In order fully to account for the things Socrates says here, we must
also bring considerations of his piety to bear upon them. We know, for a
start, that according to Xenophon, "the divine thing signified to [Socrates]
beforehand what he should and should not do." In particular, we know
that Socrates submitted to the divine thing’s opposition to the
consideration of a defense speech. But of what exactly does such a
submission consist for Socrates? A few lines later, upon declaring to the
jurymen what Apollo had told Chaerephon about him, he responds to
their clamor thusly: "Nevertheless, do not rashly believe the god even in
these things, but examine one by one the things the god said” (15). From
this we might infer something of an answer to our question. Namely,
Socrates’ submission to a divine pronouncement is either confirmed by,
or else comes only after, an inquiry into the truth of that pronouncement.
In this case, Apollo had pronounced to Chaerophon that "no human being
was more free, more just, or more moderate” (14) than Socrates. Here in
his trial Socrates, having thoroughly examined the pronouncement, offers
the jurymen several carefully-considered reasons why he accepts it.
All this leads us to a more basic question. We have just seen Socrates
affirm the truth of a pronouncement of Apollo’s; yet, we have also seen
that Socrates does not call the sound that manifests itself to him by any
other name than "the daimonion,” "the divine thing,” or else, as in the
following instance, by the even more vague designation "the gods.” Can
we make any sense of Socrates’ piety? We might begin by asking why
Socrates listens to and trusts the daimonion. How does he know that it
does not intend to do him harm? Consider what Socrates says to
Hermogenes here:
And the gods were correctly opposing the consideration of
my defense speech ... at that time when it seemed that we
must seek the means of acquittal in every way. For it is
clear that, had I accomplished this, instead of presently
ending my life, I would have arranged to end it while
being pained by sicknesses or by old age, where all the
difficult and cheerless things converge. (8)
At first, we gather, it had seemed to Socrates that "we” — Socrates
and the daimonion, perhaps? — "must seek the means of acquittal in
21
�every way." Then, though, the daimonion indicated to Socrates its
opposition to this — at which time Socrates undertook to figure out the
reasons for this opposition, and since which time he has amassed many
reasons why "the gods were correctly opposing the consideration of [his]
defense speech." By examining the pronouncement of the daimonion for
himself, in accordance with his understanding of piety as something other
than mere "rash belief," Socrates determined that the god meant well. He
determined, in a word, that the daimonion was a providential one to be
listened to and trusted whether or not it could be identified.^
Now this hardly solves the mystery of Socrates' piety; nor could we
aspire so to solve it in our concluding remarks. It seems to me, though,
that by making a distinction between kinds of piety — between, that is, a
higher, philosophical kind and a lower, conventional one, as I call them —
something about Xenophon’s intentions becomes at least a little clearer.
We have seen, on one hand, that Xenophon intends in his Memorabilia to
vindicate Socrates’ piety; on the other hand, we have seen in the Apology
that rather than asserting that he believes in the gods in whom the city
believes, Socrates attempts to show how his daimonion communicates
things to him in much the same way that the gods communicate things to
others through certain sounds and sights. We have also seen Socrates in
the Apology distinguish between piety and mere rash belief and claim a
higher piety for himself than those could claim who "attribute to the birds
the power of the gods." Rash belief and the reading of divine signs into
the movements and cries of birds we suppose to belong to conventional
piety. Precisely what Xenophon intends to show in his Memorabilia, 1
contend, is that Socrates’ philosophical piety lies at the core of his virtue
as a philosophical being;"* the whole of Socrates’ philosophical activity
stems from a pious impulse.
It should not surprise us that the philosophical piety we attribute to
Socrates is not necessarily compatible with conventional piety —
Socrates is on trial for his life here, after all. What Socrates has to say in
the Apology about his own piety does suggest, though, that he intended to
present himself, his piety, and the philosophical activity inspired by his
piety as at least compatible with convention. As Xenophon explains.
On the one hand, Socrates at that time made it his goal
above all else to appear neither impious as regards gods
nor unjust as regards human beings; and, on the other
hand, that he did not think that he ought to hold out
against dying but believed that it was even an opportune
moment for him to die then. (22-3]
We recall that Xenophon means to show in the Apology how Socrates’
"boastful speech fitted his purpose." Here, Xenophon seems to state that
22
�purpose explicitly. Though he had been charged with not believing in the
gods of the city and with corrupting the youth of the city, Socrates made it
his purpose to appear pious qua pious as regards gods and just qua just
as regards human beings. In light of the verdict we may ask whether
Socrates failed so to appear or whether the jurymen convicted him
despite his so appearing.
The second of these possibilities seems to me both more plausible
and more interesting — more plausible, because Socrates does make
himself appear neither impious as regards gods nor unjust as regards
human beings; more interesting, in that the second case leads us to raise
a question of utmost importance. It is a question that, I gather, Xenophon
intended to raise in the mind of the careful reader: Can philosophy and
convention be reconciled? Consider Socrates' self-defense against the
charge of corrupting the young. Asserting that all the men present "know
what corruptions of the young are,” Socrates asks Meletus outright
whether he can name anyone who, under Socrates' influence, "has gone
from piety to impiety, or from moderation to insolence, or from
temperate living to extravagance, or . . . who has yielded to another base
pleasure” (19). The exchange goes on:
"But by Zeus,” declared Meletus, "I know those whom you
have persuaded to obey rather than their parents!”/ "As
regards education, at least,"' [Hermogenes said that]
Socrates declared, "I admit it. For they know that this has
been an object of care to me. But as regards health, human
beings obey doctors rather than their parents. And
doubtless in the assemblies, at least, all the Athenians
obey those who speak most sensibly rather than their
relatives. In fact, don't you elect as generals whomever
you believe to be most sensible in matters of war, in
preference to both fathers and brothers — by Zeus, even
in preference to yourselves?”/ "For this way, Socrates,”
[he said that] Meletus declared, "is both advantageous and
customary.” (20)
Here we have it: As advantageous as it may be for human beings to
entrust their education to those for whom education has been an object of
great care, the fact remains that among Athenians, education is
conventionally understood to be the prerogative of parents. If we may
take the sentiment here expressed by Meletus to represent the general
sentiment of the Athenian jurymen, then we may conclude that Socrates
aroused against himself the full force of a certain visceral attachment to
custom, the likes of which one finds in all conservative societies.^ Indeed,
it has not been made clear that Socrates' philosophical activity posed no
23
�threat to customary Athenian piety and educational practice; thus, we
cannot simply say that the force of custom ought to yield to philosophical
activity. We ought, instead, to take away from our brief investigations
here an appreciation of the problem at hand: custom and philosophy are
both good things, but how might we reap the benefits of the one without
giving up those of the other?
Endnotes
1. We have largely confined our considerations to the first two of these three broad
similarities.
2. Or else, at least, Xenophon had Socrates omit mention of it, in accordance with his
intention to vindicate Socrates’ prudence.
3. That Socrates calls the sound by no single specific name suggests to me that he
simply cannot name it—and that he refers to it obliquely out of a certain pious
agnosticism: "Something divine speaks to me, 1 know not what," Socrates might think to
himself.
4. Indeed, in the remarks in praise of Socrates with which the Memorabilia concludes,
Xenophon lists Socrates’ piety first in a list of seven of Socrates’ virtues [1 !)•
5. By "all conservative societies" I suppose I mean all societies that, unlike our own,
emphasize the upholding of ancestral ways over that willingness to adapt to change
without which the realization of a theoretically better future would not be possible. Two
familiar cases come to mind, both from the American musical theater: Harold Hill
ingratiates himself with the stubborn lowans by posing as a defender things old-fashioned
against things newfangled; Tevye chooses to disown his daughter rather than accept her
marriage to a Gentile.
Primary Text
Xenophon. Apology of Socrates to the Jury. In The Shorter Socratic
Writings, translated by Robert C. Bartlett. Ithaca: Cornell University
Press, 1996.
�What Nature Contributes to Character
Natalie Plowman
7 walk: I prefer walking."
—Anne Elliot
In both Persuasion and Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen draws a clear
distinction between the roles of nature and the roles of society in an
individual’s personal life. Austen implies that positive influences on the
characters occur in nature, while stifling and oppressive influences occur
within the confines of society. What is it that each of these environments
(nature and society) signify, and how do they each sway the decisions and
define the characters of the two novels’ heroines?
In both novels, the act of walking is highly significant. In Pride and
Prejudice, Elizabeth is distinguished from other characters by her affinity
for walking. In one of the first instances that the reader is acquainted with
Elizabeth’s love for walking, Darcy begins to see Elizabeth in a different
light. When Elizabeth arrives at Netherfield, having walked three miles to
get there, Mr. Darcy is "divided between admiration of the brilliancy
which exercise had given to her complexion, and doubt as to the
occasion’s justifying her coming so far alone" [Pride, 22). Here the reader
can detect not only Darcy’s growing esteem for Elizabeth, but also his
concern for her well-being. Walking seems to differentiate Elizabeth from
the rest of her family, who are perceived as ridiculous by Darcy, and from
the rest of her peers. This singularity of character seems to draw Darcy to
her.
Walking in Pride and Prejudice also draws Elizabeth and Darcy closer
together in a more intimate way. While at Rosings, Elizabeth continues to
enjoy her walks outside. However:
more than once did Elizabeth, in her ramble within the
park, unexpectedly meet Mr. Darcy. She felt all the
perverseness of the mischance that should bring him
where no one else was brought, and, to prevent its ever
happening again, took care to inform him at first that it
was a favorite haunt of hers. How it could occur a second
time, therefore, was very odd! Yet it did, and even a third.
[Pride, 127)
While Elizabeth does not yet fully grasp Darcy’s motive for wanting to be
with her, these walks are important in driving the novel’s plot. The reader
witnesses Darcy’s attempt to get closer to Elizabeth as seen by the fact
25
�that Darcy clearly knows where he might find Elizabeth, and makes an
obvious effort to join her there.
Elizabeth is on a walk when Darcy gives her the letter containing the
contents that mark the turning point of the novel. It is while Elizabeth is
outside walking that she is exposed to Darcy's true character. Elizabeth
sees Darcy as he truly is while she is reading the contents of his letter,
both delivered and read outside. One of the most crucial moments of the
novel, Elizabeth's realization of who Darcy is, happens in a natural
setting. Austen is clearly making a statement that one's true character is
revealed when in a natural, uninhibited, unrestrictive setting, far
removed from the pressures of society.
Another key scene in the novel in which Elizabeth is walking, is
where she encounters Darcy at Pemberley. As the two of them (in
addition to the Gardiners] are walking along the Pemberley grounds, "Mr.
Darcy took [Mrs. Gardiner's] place by her niece, and they walked on
together ... they now walked on in silence, each of them deep in thought.
Elizabeth was not comfortable; that was impossible; but she was flattered
and pleased” [Pride, 175], Elizabeth realizes here that Darcy still wants
her to be acquainted with his sister. She begins to wonder at his civility
and his intentions with regard to the introduction of someone so dear to
him. Here the reader sees that there is still a spark of hope for a romantic
union between the two of them. Perhaps a reason that the two are
reunited outdoors and through a walk on the grounds of Pemberley is to
draw the distinction between the influences of being outside in a neutral
and less hostile environment as compared with the confinement of the
indoors and society. This walk outside also allows Elizabeth to associate
Darcy's character with his property. Darcy's land is beautiful, spacious
(generous], and Elizabeth "longed to explore its windings” (173]. Here,
Elizabeth begins to see Darcy's character through his land. Elizabeth sees
the beauty and generosity of both Pemberley and Darcy's character. Her
longing to explore more in this passage refers not only to Pemberley itself
and the walks outside, but also to Elizabeth's longing to explore more of
Darcy's character.
In each of these walking scenes in Pride and Prejudice, essential steps
are taken for Elizabeth and Darcy to unite. Darcy sees Elizabeth's beauty
through her love of walking; Elizabeth is introduced to Darcy's genuine
character; and the two of them are able to make silent amends while
walking on his property. These scenes reveal that there is something
meditative and reflective about walking, and it is the characters who most
love walking outside that are more self-aware because of this very ability
to reflect quietly, unrestrained by the noises of society. This selfawareness is what allows them to perceive other characters in the novel
26
�accurately, as seen in the fact that both Elizabeth and Darcy can see one
another’s character more clearly in nature.
Waking is portrayed with equal significance in Austen’s novel
Persuasion. The protagonist, Anne, is another character who seems to
revel in walking in the outdoors. In Persuasion, too, it is outdoors that the
critical moments of the novel take place. The first walking scene depicts
the Musgroves walking with Anne and Wentworth. On this walk,
Wentworth learns from Louisa that Anne had refused another man in his
absence: a significant element in sparking hope in Wentworth that
perhaps Anne can be won over again. Anne herself is also privy to this
conversation between Louisa and Wentworth; and, therefore, is also
aware that Wentworth now has intimate knowledge of her love life
during his absence. Anne "saw how her own character was considered by
Captain Wentworth, and there had been just that degree of feeling and
curiosity about her in his manner which must give her extreme agitation"
[Persuasion, 1088). Again, when two individuals are walking outside,
there seem to be revelations about the true characters that society seems
to obscure. It is as if being outdoors allows Anne and Wentworth to
unmask the facades that society implements so that true character
studies may take place.
While Anne is walking with her party outside at Lyme, both Mr. Elliot
and Wentworth [as a product of Mr. Elliot’s attention) notice Anne
looking "remarkably well; her very regular, very pretty features, having
the bloom and freshness of youth restored by the fine wind which had
been blowing on her complexion" [Persuasion, 1096). This walk
introduces Mr. Elliot. Because of Elliot’s attentions toward Anne,
Wentworth also notices her. The walk illuminates to Wentworth Anne’s
true beauty, a beauty that he presumed had altered. This walk also seems
instrumental in restoring some confidence in Anne’s character. This is the
first time that both the reader and Anne are able to witness Wentworth
really noticing Anne again. This encounter produces confidence in Anne,
who had previously been so reserved and shy. This confidence adds to
her attractive countenance; being outdoors, Anne is ‘restored’ by nature.
Thus, nature here seems to have a healing ability.
Also in Lyme, on the walk during which Louisa is injured, Anne’s
strength of character is highlighted. Louisa’s immaturity and unchecked
spontaneity reveals to Wentworth her undesirable qualities. The incident
only seems to strengthen his opinion of Anne. Anne is quick to jump to
action when Louisa is injured, and she becomes a leader during the
upsetting event. Wentworth acknowledges that there is "no one so
proper, so capable as Anne" to care for Louisa [Persuasion, 1101). The
reader, in addition to Anne herself, is able to see Wentworth’s high
esteem for, and even dependence upon, Anne in this situation. The
27
�unfortunate events of the walk give Anne more of the confidence that she
needs to emerge from her meek and melancholy shell, and this gives
Wentworth another glimpse of the strength of Anne’s character. These
walks outside seem instrumental in revealing more of Anne to
Wentworth, and in restoring Anne’s youth and vitality. These components
are necessary for Wentworth to be able to renew his sentiments for Anne.
The walk at the end of the novel allows Anne and Wentworth to
finally discuss the events of the past eight and a half years and they
ultimately become engaged. Until this point, communication between the
two has been fraught with complications. Anne never seems to be able to
speak to Wentworth in public. Whether this fact is owing to the
restrictive societal expectations of manners or her reserved personality is
difficult to determine. Each time the two have a conversation it seems
incomplete and uncomfortable. When the two are walking outside at the
close of the novel, the "quiet and retired gravel walk" gave way to a
"power of conversation [that] would make the present hour a blessing
indeed” (1168]. It seems that Anne and Wentworth are only able to have
an unrestricted and open conversation when they are walking together
outside and removed from society. As they walk, they are "heedless of
every group around them” (1168). Over the course of the entire novel
Anne and Wentworth have clearly needed to discuss their past in order to
move on to the future. However, it is only when they are outside walking
together that they are able to clear away misconceptions and verbally
renew their affections for one another. It seems that a barrier is removed
once they are outdoors. This alludes to Austen’s notion that there are
restrictions on communication in society, and that two people can only
speak honestly and openly when they are outside and removed from
these constraints.
The descriptions of landscape, in addition to the walks outside, seem
to coincide with the internal experience of the characters. In Pride and
Prejudice, the description of Pemberley is sensual, tranquil and full of
vitality. They "entered a beautiful walk by the side of the water, and every
step was bringing forward a nobler fall of ground, or a finer reach of the
woods to which they were approaching” (Pr/c/e, 173). The words ‘nobler’
and ‘finer’ as applied to Darcy’s land seem to have double meaning: not
only is the land noble and fine, but so is Darcy himself, which Elizabeth
can now see all the more clearly.
Though Pride and Prejudice does not seem to contain as much
figurative language as Persuasion, there are moments at Pemberley where
the figurative language seems quite direct. Austen describes the walking
party as they
28
�ascended some of the higher grounds; whence, in spots
where the opening of the trees gave the eye power to
wander, were many charming views of the valley, the
opposite hills, with the long range of woods
overspreading many, and occasionally part of the stream.
{Pride,173)
Immediately following this description, Mr. Darcy himself appears upon
the scene. It seems significant that the group is "ascends” to a spot where
the opening of trees allows a clearer view of the estate. Elizabeth
expresses that she wishes she could explore the land more. Immediately
after she says this, Darcy appears. Austen seems to be connecting the eye
opening view of the landscape with Elizabeth’s eye-opening tour of Mr.
Darcy (revealed through his property). The life and vitality of the hills
and stream seem to be connected with a sort of rebirth of Elizabeth's
character. She is shy and restrained in this part of the novel, blushing
frequently, and this is a new side of Elizabeth for the reader. With the
assistance of nature (the views and the introspection), the characters
seem to be able to take the steps that they need in order to view others
more clearly and fairly. Nature seems to lift the veil that society drapes
over a person’s eyes, clouding vision and judgment. Outside, Elizabeth
can see Darcy with clarity.
In Persuasion, the description of Lyme seems intentional, since it
stands out as the most descriptive passage of nature in the novel. The
group is in Lyme late in the year with "its old wonders and new
improvements” {Persuasion, 1091). Additionally, Austen writes about
Lyme in a way that seems parallel to Anne herself. Austen claims that
"these places must be visited, and visited again, to make the worth of
Lyme understood” (1091). Anne, too, is later in her life (as far as social
expectations regarding marriage are concerned). Anne might still have
her "old wonders” but also some "new improvements.” Perhaps Anne,
too, needs to be seen again and again by Wentworth in order to make him
appreciate the fact that he still loves her, and that she has not altered as
much as he initially thought. The description of Lyme is in direct contrast
with that of Bath. Lyme is described as "luxuriant,” "sweet,” "pleasant,”
"cheerful,” "romantic,” "beautiful,” and "unwearied” {Persuasion, 1096).
The diction in this passage conveys that Lyme, a place associated with
nature, has a certain charm about it. Nature also seems to be associated
with romance, according to this passage. Perhaps that is another reason
why the couples in the novels seem to connect with one another in the
outdoors. It is in Lyme, after all, that Wentworth’s sentiments toward
Anne become more apparent. Lyme is also the place where Anne regains
"animation of the eye" (1096) and a healthy glow that is attractive to
29
�Wentworth as well as to Mr. Elliot. Lyme’s natural setting is necessary in
order to bring Anne back to life, and more into Wentworth’s notice.
In contrast with the scenes that occur outdoors in a natural setting,
the events that take place indoors seem to be full of misunderstanding
and oppression. While the characters can be more open and uninhibited
with one another in a setting of nature, they are under more rigid
guidelines for how to behave when in the company of others. These
societal expectations stifle characters from speaking what is honestly on
their minds. Similarly, these expectations allow for misunderstandings to
occur and negatively influence the opinions regarding the personalities of
other characters.
In Pride and Prejudice, the social balls seem to serve as catalysts for
negative impressions and influences. The first time that Darcy and
Elizabeth are acquainted, Mr. Darcy’s character is determined within
minutes by his company. He pleases his company until "his manners gave
a disgust which turned the tide of his popularity; for he was discovered to
be proud ... his character was decided. He was the proudest, most
disagreeable man in the world, and everybody hoped that he would never
come there again” [Pride, 6). The hyperbole of Mr. Darcy being the most
disagreeable man in the world seems to underscore the absurdity of the
situation. Though Mr. Darcy’s manners may not have been what they
should, to write him off immediately seems extreme. Yet the whole of
society seems content with their judgment of him, and his character is
established firmly amongst them without much of any verbal dialogue
between society and Mr. Darcy. There is also the moment at the ball when
Mr. Darcy first sees Elizabeth and asserts that Elizabeth is "not handsome
enough to tempt [him]” [Pride, 7]. Immediately, Elizabeth is left with a
negative impression of him. Because he is so quick to judge her, she is
also quick to judge him. There is a certain way that one is expected to act
at these balls or social gatherings, and because Mr. Darcy is
uncomfortable in this setting, and does not behave as he should, his
character is misunderstood. Though Darcy’s personality needs some finetuning before the novel is over, his character is something constant. It
seems sirnply to be oppressed in a societal setting where certain
behaviors are expected of him. Society obscures a person’s true character
because of the restraints and expectations placed upon him or her.
Again, at the Netherfield ball, Elizabeth and Darcy have a negative
encounter with each other. Though their dance together has some
flirtatious moments, the discussion quickly turns sour when Elizabeth
addresses the subject of Darcy’s character. While Elizabeth attempts to
keep the conversation light, she misreads Darcy’s responses and upsets
him. Darcy takes the conversation more seriously and does not accept or
pick up on Elizabeth’s attempt to lighten the conversation. Elizabeth’s
30
�misreading of his character leads to his cold reply, and so they "parted in
silence; on each side dissatisfied, though not to an equal degree" {Pride,
67). If the two of them had been able to talk freely and openly, or had
been able to understand each other better, then perhaps this
misunderstanding might not have occurred.
In Persuasion, society’s negative affects on Anne are clearly
illustrated. Bath is synonymous with society, and Anne's general dislike of
the city ties in with its negative atmosphere. Austen writes.
When Lady Russell not long afterwards, was entering Bath
on a wet afternoon, and driving through the long course of
streets from the Old Bridge to Camden Place, amidst the
dash of other carriages, the heavy rumble of carts and
drays, the bawling of newspapermen, muffin-men and
milkmen, and the ceaseless clink of patens, she made no
complaint . . . Anne did not share these feelings. She
persisted in a very determined, though very silent
disinclination for Bath; caught the first dim view of the
extensive buildings, smoking in the rain, without any wish
of seeing them better. {Persuasion, 1111)
The diction in this passage highlights the filth, distraction and noise of
Bath. The 'bawling,' the 'ceaseless clink’ and the 'heavy rumble’ of the city
do not seem to allow for the openness and solitude that a place like Lyme
does. There is a sharp contrast between the rain and the smoke, the noise
of the city and the silence of nature. This passage also draws a distinction
between Lady Russell (society) and Anne (nature). Here, the reader sees
Anne’s opposition to the city and the society that it holds. In Bath, she is
reunited with her father and sister, whose company is undesirable.
Associated with Bath is also Mr. Elliot, who represents manipulation and
deceit. Lady Russell, despite looking out for Anne, represents persuasion,
or dissuasion, another negative impact of society. In Bath, Anne is
reunited with all of these stifling influences. Though Anne is also able to
reconnect with Wentworth in Bath, it happens outside of society, within a
letter and outside on their walk.
When Wentworth cannot seem to speak to Anne because of their
present company, he writes her a letter instead. In this scene, Anne has
just remarked to Captain Harville that women "live at home, quiet,
confined, and [their] feelings prey upon [them]” (1163). Here again we
see the in-doors and the home are associated with confinement.
Wentworth’s assertion that he "can listen no longer in silence” (1166)
implies that he cannot speak within the confines of their present society.
In order to make his feelings understood, he "must speak to [her] by such
means as are within [his] reach” (1166). The only way to do so appears to
31
�be through the written word, as it is isolated from the presence of the
others. Again, this scene reveals that the characters do not feel that they
can be themselves in the company of others because such society
encourages a certain way to behave. Wentworth chooses to do so in the
seclusion of a letter, the reading of which allows the two characters to
finally communicate. A person's voice is unable to be heard in society, so
Anne must be able to find another way to express herself. Austen reveals
the options of nature and of the written word as means of expressing
oneself.
Austen reveals that within each of her heroines, Elizabeth and Anne,
there appears to be an element of nature. Anne is closely associated with
autumn. Anne does not want to leave Kellynch during the fall because of
the "influence so sweet and so sad of the autumnal months in the
country" [Persuasion, 1058). There is a link between the sweetness and
sadness of Anne and of autumn. Anne is older, and a little bit past the
prime marrying age, and there is a certain melancholy about her that is
linked with the passing of seasons into autumn. Anne’s patience and
sweetness are represented in the month of autumn.
Wentworth has an element of nature within him, too, as a captain. He
spends a good portion of his time on the sea in unpredictable and
sometimes harsh climates. This seems to tie into his character as well,
being unpredictable and sometimes harsh toward Anne. These harsh and
unpredictable elements of personality relate to the harsh and
unpredictable qualities of nature. Darcy, too, with his land and property
at Pemberley, seems to be fairly immersed in nature. Austen
demonstrates • that each character that enters into a successful
relationship must be in tune with some element of nature.
Elizabeth’s character seems to be attached to spring and summer and
the playfulness and liveliness of the two seasons. When she is at
Pemberley and meets Darcy there, the season seems to be late spring or
early summer. Her adventurous spirit is connected with travel and being
outdoors:
‘My dear, dear aunt,’ she rapturously cried, 'what delight!
what felicity! You give me fresh life and vigor. Adieu to
disappointment and spleen. What are men to rocks and
mountains?’ [Pride, 108)
Elizabeth’s statement "what are men to rocks and mountains?" seems to
indicate the recognition of the insignificance of mankind in comparison
with nature. Maybe Austen is saying that a hero or heroine must have the
ability to look past the trivial events that occur within society, and be able
to realize the smallness of such trifles in comparison with nature.
32
�There is something of nature in each of our lives, and a lack of
connection to this natural side, often caused by the haze of society's
influences and expectations, can prevent a person from seeing or
behaving what and how he or she should. It seems that Austen highlights
this notion in her heroines. Elizabeth and Anne are successful in their
relationships with Wentworth and Darcy due to their relationship with
nature. It is outside, in the uncluttered environment of nature, that the
two women can see the characters of Darcy and Wentworth clearly.
Furthermore, it is outside, in nature, that the two women appear most
attractive to Darcy and Wentworth. Darcy and Wentworth choose to
express themselves openly in letters, also a method of communication
that is removed from society. Nature restores vitality to both Anne (at
Lyme] and Elizabeth (on her trip with the Gardiners). Being outdoors
brings health and life to these characters.
What is it exactly about nature that Austen saw as such a positive
influence on her characters? It is very evident that both Elizabeth and
Anne are unique because of their relationships with nature. Is it just the
meditative quality of nature that can allow for introspection that guides
clarity and earnest behavior? Is it that one must be able to disengage
from society in order to make decisions that are healthy and right for
one’s self? Or is there something else, something more powerful, that
Austen saw in nature and was trying to communicate through her
heroines?
Primary Texts
Austen, Jane. Persuasion. In Jane Austen. Seven Novels: Complete and
Unabridged. China: Barnes & Noble Publishing, Inc., 2006.
�No Country for Old Men:
Does Kant’s Categorical Imperative Have Any Place in the
American Political Ethos?
Jeffrey Allen
1804 was a remarkable year on both the Continent and in the
Americas. It was a year that saw Thomas Jefferson purchase almost a
million square miles of the North American continent from recently
crowned Emperor Napoleon — an area that Meriwether Lewis and
William Clark set out to explore almost immediately. It was also the year
that saw the deaths of both Immanuel Kant and Alexander Hamilton, two
men whose worlds were nearly as different as their fields of labour.
Immanuel Kant (b. 1724) lived in Konigsberg, Prussia during his
entire life, concerning himself with philosophy, metaphysics, and ethics.
Alexander Hamilton (b. 1755/57), was born in the Caribbean and moved
to the colonies in the 1770s, fighting in the American Revolution and
embarking on a political career thereafter. Hamilton, along with James
Madison and John Jay, produced a series of articles, now popularly
termed The Federalist Papers, in support of the United States Constitution
in 1787 and 1788. These argued for a stronger central government to
preserve the union between the States, as well as the internal strengths of
the Constitution as it pertained to governance and the good of the public.i
1804 was also witness to another event — the impending arrival to a
French aristocratic family of a baby boy, one who would visit America just
27 years later and write the famous Democracy in America, Alexis de
Tocqueville (d. 1859).2 He also took up the political life, offering not only
the aforementioned work, but several others in his lifetime.
These three primary figures — Kant, Hamilton, and Tocqueville —
are introduced as representatives of the discussion herein. Kant, in his
Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals, offers the
'Categorical Imperative,’ an ethical consideration on whether an action
can be judged to be moral. Regarding the essential elements of this
Imperative is that it must be based on volition, "not from the purpose
which is to be attained by it,”^ and that this action, done from duty, must
have as its sole object a "pure respect’’^ for the law. The test, then,
according to Kant, is that any maxim "should become a universal law,”5
and this without condition. Says Kant in his footnotes: "A maxim is the
subjective principle of volition."^ In other words, a maxim is that which
one wills to do, and is regarded as moral even if the outcome is
detrimental to one's own interest. Thus, for Kant, morality can never be
decided by empirical data; it must exist a priori.
34
�From this basis, we ought to (pun intended] consider how this
Categorical Imperative figures into the American experience, if at all. Do
the founding documents of the United States yield any reliance upon the
ethical considerations of Kant? Are there incompatibilities between Kant
and early American political writers?
One area of congruence between Kant and early American
documents is the self-evidentiary nature of human reason. Part of Kant’s
argument is based in the fact that men have a general sense of right and
wrong, even if ignorance and innocence are ultimately barriers to a
sufficient understanding of morality.^ In Federalist Paper No. 49, Madison
echoes these ideas by stating that "it is the reason, alone, of the public,
that ought to control and regulate the government. The passions ought to
be controlled and regulated by the government.''^ Madison is arguing that
checks within the separate branches of the government are necessary to
avoid a legislature that creates laws based on the whims of the populace.
This seems to approach a Kantian view of morality as external to the
individual, rather than a view of ethics that is determined by
contingencies. Madison and Kant part company very quickly, however, in
light of Federalist Paper No. 50, titled "Periodical Appeals to the People
Considered.” Kant’s moral imperative concerns itself with timeless,
universal realities, whereas Madison’s maxim on government is still
subject to the review of the governed. Thus, the American people can
alter the form of certain legislation, creating a contingent base for law.
The idea of a contingent moral base for law is found throughout the
Declaration of Independence. The words "necessary” and "ought” are both
used twice to describe the actions of the colonies against the abuses of
the King of Great Britain. "Right” and "rights” are even more significant,
mentioned fourteen times, serving as a basis for their present actions. But
these are contingent imperatives (what Kant would call hypothetical],
rather than categorical, for they are not universal in their application.
Within the present ethical dilemma, the British colonies are stating their
grievances against (perceived or real] slights by the British government.
There is not a universal maxim in this case, especially at a political level
(though one could perhaps make a case with regard to these "certain
unalienable Rights ... among these Life ...,” though this argument may be
rife with contingencies]. The colonists could have chosen a number of
different methods to address their situation; ultimately, they would
choose revolution. However, couching their decisions in terms of "ought"
and "right” does up the ante by making a moral claim. This leads to what
is perhaps the most significant difference between Kantian philosophy
and early American political philosophy: the shift from a universal good
to the public good and ultimately to a private good.
35
�As was discussed earlier, Kant has developed a system of ethics that
is based on an external, universal good. Certain elements must be present
in order to ascertain whether an action is moral, and all of this is geared
toward a view of the common good. The relationship to the whole can be
found in Kant’s discussion on the "kingdom of ends," where each member
is both the giver of universal laws and subject to the same.^ Thus, no one
would create a society in which they would be at an advantage over
another, for the same rule would apply to all. What this offers is an
inherent dignity of the individual, an idea that allows for the necessary
autonomy of the will to establish moral imperatives.
This autonomy of the individual and subsequent free moral agency of
the individual (a necessary corollary of reasonjio is an idea echoed in the
founding documents of the United States. The Declaration of
Independence puts forth a view of humanity with "certain unalienable
Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."
This is a government designed around the idea that the good of the whole
is the good of the individual within the corporate body. This can be seen
in the opening statement of the Declaration, when "it becomes necessary
for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them
with another." The colonists believed that their well-being was counter to
what the British crown desired, and felt that the good of the colonies was
at odds with the good of the state. The Declaration, the United States
Constitution, and the writing of Hamilton all attest to the good of the
national whole, citing "Union," "Justice," "Tranquility," "Welfare," and
"Liberty,"ii as well as "political safety and happiness."i2
By the time of Tocqueville’s publication of Democracy in America in
1835, a different sort of "good" was present in the American ethos.
Interestingly, Tocqueville begins his tome with the poignant remark that
it was the "equality of social conditions"i3 that was so remarkable during
his visit. This seems to serve as a testament to the political good of the
whole, but his reflections on the decentralized character of the country's
government sheds light on a distinctly American characteristic, that of the
good of the individual. In comparing township and county, he writes that
"county and township are founded upon the same idea, namely that each
man is the best judge of his own interest and the best able to provide for
his own private needs."!'* Whereas Hamilton and Madison saw in the
Constitution the establishment of a restrained, orderly republic,
Tocqueville's exploration of early America seems to yield a democracy
characterized by the "sovereignty of the people."!^
This present dialogue has offered the opportunity to explore some of
the basic differences between Kantian ethics and American political
philosophy. What we may surely say is that both are concerned with
questions of "ought," and "good," though the later one gets in the
36
�American experience, the more these questions privilege the individual
over the whole. Ethical considerations are not absent in the New World; it
seems that they are questions that have been reworked for an expanding
continent. Further discussion would most certainly include an
examination on duty and freedom, two ideas that run throughout Kant’s
Metaphysics of Morals and are significant in early American documents.
Not long after Tocqueville left the shores of the American continent,
railroads would be built, skyscrapers would rise, and the television would
alter communication forever. The volition of the American people was not
that of a good will, but of practical will. Here the people would be given
the greatest degree of autonomy, the moral free agency of the individual
woven into the national myth, creating not a kingdom of ends, but a
kingdom of means.
"If it seems useful to you to divert man's intellectual and moral activity upon
the necessities of physical life and to use it to foster prosperity... ifyou aim
to create not heroic virtues but peaceful habits ... if instead of moving
through a brilliant society, you are satisfied to live in a prosperous one; if,
finally, in your view, the main objective for a government is not to give the
whole nation as much strength or glory as possible but to obtain for each of
the individuals who make it up as much well-being as possible, while
avoiding as much suffering as one can, then make social conditions equal
and set up a democratic government"
-Alexis de Tocqueville
Endnotes
1. Charles Kesler, introduction to The Federalist Papers, edited by Clinton Rossiter,
[New York: Signet Classic, 1999), xv-xix.
2. To be sure, 1 am stretching the 1804 theme just a bit here, as Tocqueville was
actually born in July 1805. But counting back nine months ... well... you get the idea.
3. Immanuel Kant, Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals, trans.
Thomas Kingsmill Abbott (Mineola: Dover Publications, 2005), 16. Italics his.
4. Ibid., 17. Italics his.
5. Ibid., 18. Italics his.
6. Ibid., 17. Italics his.
7. Ibid., 20-21.
8. James Madison, Federalist Papers, No. 49. Hamilton makes a similar claim in No. 15,
"The Insufficiency of the Present Confederation to Preserve the Union."
9. Kant, Metaphysics ofMorals, 51.
10. Ibid., 74-75.
11. Constitution of the United States, in Federalist Papers.
12. Hamilton, Federalist Papers, No. 15.
37
�13. Alexis de Tocqueville. Democracy in America.
Penguin Books, 2003), 11.
14. Ibid., 97.
15. Ibid., 68.
16. Ibid., 286-287.
Vol. 1,
trans. Gerald Bevin (London;
Primary Texts
Kant, Immanuel. Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals.
Translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbot. Mineola: Dover Publications,
2005.
Rossiter, Clinton, ed. The Federalist Papers. New York: Signet Classic,
1999.
de Tocqueville, Alexis. Democracy in America. Translated by Gerald Bevin.
London: Penguin Books, 2003.
38
�A Selection From:
Intimations of Re-Creation from Recollections of
Dejection and Joy
NK Cartmell
In 1798, William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge
published Lyrical Ballads, a collection of poems that, according to the
preface of the work, differed greatly from all poetry that came before.
"The pleasure which 1 have proposed to myself to impart," Wordsworth
wrote in the preface, "is of a kind very different from that which is
supposed by many persons to be the proper object of poetry" {Preface,
600).1 This volume birthed the British Romantic movement of poetry,
causing much controversy at the time. Coleridge remarked upon this in
his major critical work, the Biographia Literaria:
From [Wordsworth's Preface to Lyrical Ballads], prefixed
to poems in which it was impossible to deny the presence
of original genius, however mistaken its direction might
be deemed, arose the whole long-continued controversy
[regarding expressive poetry]. {Biographia, 479)
Lyrical Ballads was only one of many examples of their close work
together, their professional involvement stimulated by their personal
friendship. Much of their correspondence has been recovered, which
reveals an ongoing mutual involvement in each other’s art. One of the
most interesting of these dialogues is found in two poems, Wordsworth’s
"Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood"
and Coleridge’s "Dejection: An Ode."
Wordsworth wrote the first stanzas of the poem, which he called
simply, "Ode," in March 1802, and in late March Wordsworth read his
new work, "Ode," to Coleridge. In early April 1802, Coleridge composed
"Dejection" {Selincourt, 464-5). "Two years at least passed between the
writing of the four first stanzas and the remaining part," Wordsworth
revealed in his notes {Fenwick Notes, 61); he reworked his poem in late
February or early March of 1804, resulting in "Ode: Intimations of
Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood." The similar subject
matter, similar lines, and compositional timeline all indicate that these
two poems are in direct dialogue with each other. Wordsworth wrote the
"Ode" and read it to Coleridge. Coleridge wrote "Dejection" as a response
to Wordsworth’s poem, giving his views on the same subject.
Wordsworth, upon reading "Dejection," felt Coleridge had misinterpreted
39
�his "Ode" and so wrote "Intimations," reworking some of the extant text
of the "Ode" and adding seven additional stanzas.
The undeniable connection between the two poems makes them
valuable to study in tandem. These two central figures of British
Romanticism, in this unaffected conversation, reveal foundational
philosophies of the movement. A close scrutiny of these two monumental
works will reveal at least a part of this philosophy. Pursuing the
connection between the poems will divulge themes the two poets share,
and will direct the reader in a better understanding of their works as a
whole.
In addition to producing artistic work, both poets also wrote
critically about the art of poetry; their major prose works, Wordsworth’s
Preface to Lyrical Ballads and Coleridge's Biographia Literaria, will inform
the reading of their poetry. Despite some minor differences of opinion
between the two poets, their critical writings are largely complementary.
It is appropriate to apply Coleridge's theory to Wordsworth's poetry, and
vice versa; doing so only deepens the understanding of the Romantic
movement as a whole, and the connection in particular between these
two poems. A third poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley, will also be appealed to in
his critical capacity. Heavily influenced by Wordsworth’s poetry, Shelley's
insights into Romanticism are eloquently pertinent. His critical work, A
Defence of Poetry, can only serve to illuminate the works of his
precursors.
This essay, one of several parts, will explore Coleridge's "Dejection."
As it is a selection from a larger whole, which also covers Wordsworth's
"Intimations" and the critical implications of the comparison between the
two poems, there are references and quotations from material not
contained here. The full text is available in Meem Library at St John’s
College Santa Fe, or may be obtained from the author, at
nathan.k.cartmell@biola.edu.
"Dejection: An Ode" opens with a short quote from a popular Scottish
ballad: when the dark remainder of the moon is easily seen next to a
bright crescent, there will presently be a storm. Coleridge expands on this
borrowed stanza, but colours it extravagantly:
Well! If the Bard was weather-wise, who made
The grand old ballad of Sir Patrick Spence,
This night, so tranquil now, will not go hence
Unroused by winds, that ply a busier trade
Than those which mould yon cloud in lazy flakes.
Or the dull sobbing draft, that moans and rakes.
Upon the strings of this i^iolian lute.
Which better far were mute. (Ins. 1-8)
40
�It may seem that doubt is cast upon the forecasting skills of this other
poet by Coleridge’s use of the word "if' in line 1. But reading further, the
weather does turn violent. Coleridge’s thoughts are spurred by an
accurate foretelling, not by any flight of fancy. Coleridge’s accuracy is the
first clue in the poem that he is not, while writing, in a state of dejection.
The Poet has a clear grasp of the workings of nature, and bases his poetry
on this understanding.
This first stanza paints specific personifications of air. Lines 3-5
describe a lethargic zephyr, "those which mould yon cloud in lazy flakes,"
contrasted with the building winds. Lines 6-8 calls it a sorrowful breeze,
"the dull sobbing draft,” voicing feelings Coleridge would rather not hear.
The moaning, sluggish breeze embodies the emotion that Coleridge tries
to overcome in the work, an emotion that appears throughout the poem,
and is especially evident in the title. He is heavily under the influence of
this poisonous dejection in the first few stanzas, and because of
dejection’s influence finds typical natural occurrences (the breeze)
disturbing.2
Coleridge looks forward to the storm, which he sees as
fundamentally different from the lazy wind and the dull draft. He has
experienced a moon-wrought storm before, and found it uplifting. The
penultimate stanza shows that the storm is the poem’s destination, and is
identified in the last line of the first stanza:
Those sounds which oft have raised me, whilst they awed.
And sent my soul abroad.
Might now perhaps their wonted impulse give.
Might startle this dull pain, and make it move and live!
(Ins. 17-20)
The coming storm, Coleridge believes, can alleviate his dejection and send
his soul outside himself; abroad, his soul can experience the general
condition of man rather than sit mired in personal failings. Shelley
recognised the poet’s ability to look beyond his own particulars in the
Defence of Poetry when he said, "A poet participates in the eternal, the
infinite, and the one; as far as relates to his conceptions, time and place
and number are not” (^Defence, 348). A poet is concerned with universals,
with problems and passions affecting the whole of humanity. The Poet
does use his own personal experiences to find such truth, but he must
move beyond experience, rather than wallow in it.
The awe-ful feeling of line 17, produced by the wind, will not dispel
his dejection, but will rather fashion it anew, with purpose. Lines 17-18
give voice to the Sublime, a combination of the splendid and dreadful.
When looking up at Mont Blanc,^ we recognise the beautiful grandeur —
the awesomeness — of the natural. In the face of this utterly inhuman
41
�object we are forcefully reminded of the smallness of the human self, in
both a physical and mental way. This amalgamation of awesome and
awful (line 17) is the Sublime, a feeling that is expanded on by Coleridge
later in the poem when he employs the Imagination. Imagination is a
force that allows the Poet to access nature; it is through the power of the
Imagination that Coleridge later finds a cure in the storm.^
This first stanza is characterised by the storm, the hoped-for cure to
Coleridge’s titular dejection. The second stanza moves on to express his
peculiar unhappiness, the central issue of the work.
Coleridge's sorrow is no glorified anguish, no great heartache. His is
"a grief without a pang," "stifled, drowsy, unimpassioned” (In. 21-2),
noteworthily similar to the breeze from the previous stanza. This grief is
dead. Coleridge believes this to be an aberration of grief; presumably,
sadness should "move and live" (In. 20). Perhaps the core problem
Coleridge experiences is that his grief has "no natural outlet" (In. 23). He
has bottled up his emotions, has not indulged in "word, or sigh, or tear.”
(In. 24). Just as a pond without an outlet is stagnant, so his grief, without
refreshment, is moribund.
Due to this "wan" mood (In. 25), Coleridge is out of tune with nature.
The throstle does not draw him, the curiously coloured sky does not
spark his thoughts, the stars do not affect his feelings. Dejection springs, it
may be surmised, from a modern callousness identified by Wordsworth
in the Preface: "a multitude of causes, unknown to former times, are now
acting with a combined force to blunt the discriminating powers of the
mind" {Preface, 599). Coleridge (and the reader) feels this dejection
because he cannot clearly perceive the messages nature offers to any
observer, delicate truths that the frantic pace of industrialised life drowns
out. This is not somehow nature’s fault for being feeble, but is rooted in
what Wordsworth calls a "degrading thirst after outrageous stimulation”
present in modern society [Preface, 599), which prevents people from
taking delight in the subtler beauties of the natural world.
Coleridge can rationally understand that beauty is in these natural
images but simultaneously does not feel anything about them (In. 38).
Coleridge recognises this problem in a letter to a friend. "When we
declare an object beautiful,” he writes,
the contemplation or intuition of its beauty precedes the
feeling of complacency, in order of nature at least: nay, in
great depression of spirits may even exist without
sensibly producing it. [Complete Poems, 553)
What seems to have affected modern man is an under-appreciation
of natural beauty and an ignorance of its proper effects. The natural
world produces no feelings in mankind. In this stanza Coleridge agrees
42
�with Wordsworth's assertion that beauty in nature "moves us not"
[Wordsworth, 270). This lack of appreciation of natural beauty is one of
the serious problems Coleridge is addressing, and a main object of
Romantic poetry is to cultivate appreciation of nature. Coleridge says in
the Biographia Literaria:
It is the prime merit of genius, and its most unequivocal
mode of manifestation, so to represent familiar objects as
to awaken in the minds of others a kindred feeling
concerning them, and that freshness of sensation which is
the constant accompaniment of mental no less than of
bodily convalescence. [Biographia, 476]
Poets have this genius, and it is to the poetic responsibility that Coleridge
speaks. Man has become dulled to the world, and nature no longer feels
fresh, because every waking moment he is inundated with stimulation.
The sense of wonder that a child feels is not felt by the adult — recall the
first stanza of "Intimations." In the word "convalescence," Coleridge even
implies that this desensitisation is a disease and a sickness; the cure can
be induced by genius through art, and Coleridge uses poetry to this end.
Artists have a responsibility to reawaken this sense of newness and
freshness so that man can feel and be moved by beauty, not just know it
intellectually. The cure for a stagnant spirit is motion. A moving spirit,
actively engaged in the world, cannot be bogged down by dejection.
In this second stanza Coleridge is already laying the groundwork for
a cure. While his dejection has "no relief' (In. 23] because he has not
talked about it, the poem is addressed to a Lady,^ meaning that this poem,
in explicating his distraught sensations, may well be the cure to his
gloom. And if writing the poem is a cure (or the record of a cure] for
Coleridge, reading it is plausibly a cure for us as readers. Coleridge, as a
Poet, must already be cured in order for him to have written this work.
Wordsworth says in the Preface that the Poet's "passions and thoughts
and feelings" are connected
with our moral sentiments and animal sensations, and
with the causes which excite these; with the operations of
the elements and the appearances of the visible universe;
with storm and sun-shine, with the revolutions of the
seasons, with cold and heat, with loss of friends and
kindred, with injuries and resentments, gratitude and
hope, with fear and sorrow. [Preface, 607-8]
Coleridge's imagery and subject are obviously identifiable here. For him
to name his dejection, to notice his separation from nature, and to hope
43
�for a cure is to be under the influence of genius. He writes genially (In. 39)
about a time when his genius was not functional.
If the first few lines of stanza two give a clue about the method of the
work, the rest of the stanza turns back to an explication of Coleridge's
problematic state of mind. Mired in his stagnant grief (examined a few
paragraphs above), Coleridge ignores the curative pleas of nature: "to
other thoughts by yonder throstle woo’d" (In. 26). The birds try and move
him to other thoughts than his dejection, but their melodic sound cannot
overcome his mental opposition. If sound (which he earlier rejected in
lines 7-8, wishing the lute were mute) cannot restore him, neither can
sight. He gazes "on the western sky, / And its peculiar tint of yellow
green” (Ins. 28-9), a shade both startling and intriguing. This sight should
be enough to cause his soul to rise, unique and beautiful as it is. But
Coleridge's eyes are blank (In. 30) of understanding, uncomprehending of
nature’s truths.^ As the twilight fades, the stars emerge and Coleridge is
spurred to further thoughts. There is sharp contrast between the motion
of the stars and the immobility of his own emotions. This paralysis allows
him only to "see, not feel, how beautiful" these natural images are (In. 38).
Coleridge’s insensate immobility links back to his letter, quoted
earlier: in great depression, man does not feel beauty. The problem is
located, Coleridge would say, in the esemplastic power, the Imagination,
which he describes in the Biographia Literaria:
The primary imagination I hold to be the living power and
prime agent of all human perception . . . [The secondary
imagination] dissolves, diffuses, dissipates, in order to
recreate; or where this process is rendered impossible,
yet still, at all events, it struggles to idealise and to unify. It
is essentially vital, even as all objects (as objects) are
essentially fixed and dead. [Biographia, 477)
Coleridge can still see the stars, but he cannot feel them. Mental images
can still be constructed, because the primary imagination functions; but
meaning cannot be wrought from the images, because the vital secondary
imagination is mired in dejection.
Coleridge’s dejection is emphasised by its contrast with the moving
stars "that glide . . . / Now sparkling” (Ins. 33-4). In the Biographia he
claims that objects are fixed and dead, but he sees the stars moving. This
perceived movement betrays meaning behind the objects, truth that can
be apprehended through the observation and synthesis of natural images.
There is not meaning in the familiar scientific objects themselves (objects
as objects), seen by the primary imagination: gaseous nuclear reactions
give no insight into a deeper truth, a truth pointed to by the beauty of the
stars. Coleridge, in his dejection, cannot utilise the secondary imagination,
44
�F
and so cannot feel the stars' beauty. This point anticipates the sixth
stanza, where Coleridge reveals the origin of his dejection and the reason
his imagination failed: while he is not so far gone as to completely ignore
nature — the moving stars — he struggles to understand the truths that
perceived motion indicates. Coleridge can only see the stars as mundane.
The inability to comprehend truths in beauty is not surprising in the
common man, but in a Poet it is disaster. Shelley says that poetry (and
therefore the Poet] "lifts the veil from the hidden beauty of the world, and
makes familiar objects be as if they were not familiar" [Defence, 351].
Coleridge’s dejection prevents him from seeing the stars anew; familiar
objects cannot inspire as forcefully as fresh visions. His despair results in
the failure of his powers of genius, his ability to lift the veil and create
freshness; he acknowledges this dysfunction in the first line of the third
stanza: "my genial spirits fail” (In. 39].
The despair felt by the Poet, then, is a consequence of failing his
function (in an Aristotelian sense]. It is the function of the Poet to see
beauty in nature and re-create uplifting images for the pleasure of the
reader. Coleridge, by not engaging in this process, is failing his inborn
responsibilities as an artist.'^ Artists have a responsibility, because of their
innate genius, to share their beneficial visions in the hopes that the
audience will be enlightened to the deeper truths of the universe.
Coleridge's recognition of his failure of function contributes to his feelings
of despair.
The third stanza marks the deepest depression of the poem.
Coleridge recognises that his poetic genius has, for the time, left. But, he
says, "what can these avail / To lift the smothering weight from off my
breast?" (Ins. 40-1]. He doubts — even if he were still in control of his
Imagination — that he would ever be able to escape dejection. In these
two lines, Coleridge has completely lost hope in his own poetic faculties
and perhaps all poetic genius: "It were a vain endeavour, / Though I
should gaze forever / On that green light that lingers in the west" (Ins. 424]. He can see no way, through nature’s effects or through selfmotivation, to make his soul move again.
In Coleridge’s despair there is a startlingly astute observation. While
he has dismissed nature and his own poetic faculties, claiming that
neither have the power to cure his disease (although this claim is suspect,
coming as it does from a diseased mind; we later see that his faculties are
responsible for curing him], he acknowledges that nature has not failed
— rather, he is the problem: "I may not hope from outward forms to win
/ The passion and the life, whose fountains are within” (Ins. 45-6]. The
movement that he longs for springs from himself, his own Imagination. If
there is no understanding, then nature is "fixed and dead," a stuffed.
45
�scientific curiosity. Any cure to this dejection must come from a change in
Coleridge’s way of thinking rather than from a revolution in nature.^
The third stanza most clearly exemplifies Coleridge's understandable
interpretation of the first version of "Intimations.” In reading the first
four stanzas, it is possible to believe that Wordsworth blamed nature for
the loss of celestial light ("Intimations” In. 18). Coleridge wants it to be
clear that he faults himself, not nature, for his dejection. If nature were
blamed for dejection, Wordsworth’s claims about the desensitisation of
mankind could be dismissed as the degradation of nature. Since
Wordsworth says in the Preface and elsewhere that man is at fault for his
own misunderstanding and unhappiness, his poem must obviously mean
something else. Coleridge’s gross misinterpretation of Wordsworth’s
meaning, which prompted him to write "Dejection,” prompted
Wordsworth to add stanzas five through eleven in order to clarify his
view of the relationship between nature and man’s poetic faculty.
The fourth stanza of "Dejection” continues the thought expressed in
line 46; The search for meaning starts within the human soul. Meaning is
not found within, though. Coleridge writes, "we receive but what we give”
(In. 47); this is not in the manner of giving anger and receiving anger
back, but refers to giving a seed to the earth, and receiving a fruit back. If
Coleridge gives honest inquiry, he will receive understanding. The
willingness to plant comes from within; but the product, the meaning, the
end, is not found in man — it is displayed through nature and comes from
the universe.
There is a vital interplay between the duties of man and the function
of nature. "In our life alone does nature live,” Coleridge says (In. 48).
Without man nature is unmoving, "fixed and dead.” But with man’s active
understanding (the secondary Imagination) applied to natural images,
meaning can be found in the movements of the stars and the music of the
birds.
Coleridge illustrates the interplay of nature and man, at once
showing the consequences of apathy and interest:
And would we aught behold, of higher worth.
Than that inanimate cold world allowed
To the poor loveless ever-anxious crowd.
Ah! from the soul itself must issue forth
A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the Earth (Ins. 50-55)
The "poor loveless ever-anxious crowd” (In. 52) is common man, full of
apprehension, devoid of superior feeling. To this man, the world is
inanimate and cold (In. 51), motionless and lifeless. It can hold no interest
and can give no succour to the mind. If we would find truth and beauty in
46
�nature ("aught of higher worth”], a light — removing darkness and giving
comprehension — must fountain up from within the soul. The fair
luminous cloud (In. 54] will enable Coleridge to understand what has in
previous stanzas moved him not: the throstle, the stars, the coloured sky.
The light from his soul illuminates the entire world, all of nature, and is
the first step toward understanding.
As Coleridge addresses sight, a heavily recurring theme in the poem,
he also deals with sound: "And from the soul itself must there be sent / A
sweet and potent voice, of its own birth, / Of all sweet sounds the life and
element!” (Ins. 56-8]. At the moment of birth, the human soul emits a note
so poignant and beautiful — "this beautiful and beauty-making power”
(In. 63] — that it informs (or should inform] all of man's subsequent
hearing. When Coleridge recollects this sound from early childhood, he
can again search for meaning in the "sobbing draft” and "Aiolian lute” (Ins.
6, 7] that, under the influence of dejection, he found repellent.
Where the third stanza showed Coleridge’s deepest depression ("my
genial spirits fail”], in the fifth stanza Coleridge has recovered his genius
and jubilantly shares it with the reader.^ This "sweet voice” and
"luminous cloud” (In. 71], he says, is Joy. Joy is the light that illumines and
the sound that harmonises, the emotion born in the soul that allows the
Poet (and his readers] to search for meaning in nature. As Coleridge has
shown in the previous stanzas, without Joy nature appears blank and
irrelevant. With Joy, truth and beauty can be found in nature. Joy is the
essential first step, since from it "flows all that charms our ear or sight, /
All melodies the echoes of that voice, / All colours a suffusion from that
light” (Ins. 73-5].
In the fifth stanza, Coleridge introduces a moral issue to poetic
understanding, one that is connected closely with Joy.
0 pure of heart! thou need'st not ask of me
What this strong music in the soul may be!
... Joy that ne’er was given,
Save to the pure ... (Ins. 59 -65]
The man who is "pure of heart” (In. 59] is already familiar with Joy, and
this good man is contrasted with "the sensual and the proud” (In. 70],
those who will not inhabit the new Heaven and new Earth (In. 69]. Joy, or
what enables man to properly comprehend nature, is given to good men
only, "in dower” from Nature (In. 68]. Selfish, bad men will never properly
understand the truths of the universe, those beauties to which nature
points. A Poet must have a pure heart; and a reader, to be moved by
poetry, must also have a pure heart, either entering the poem or through
the poem’s action on him. Once a man becomes pure, he can join with
Nature in a marriage-like relationship. The closeness and love of a
47
�I
marriage in stanza five is contrasted with the shallow appreciation of
nature in stanza six.
After stanza five’s introduction to Joy, the anti-dejection, Coleridge
moves into stanza six with a history of his own interactions with Joy.
There was a timeio when, though my path was rough.
This joy within me dallied with distress.
And all misfortunes were but as the stuff
Whence Fancy made me dreams of happiness:
For hope grew round me, like the twining vine.
And fruits, and foliage, not my own, seemed mine.
(Ins. 76-81]
Coleridge has not always been dejected, and he has actually found some
measure of pleasure in milder forms of misery ("distress" In. 77]. This joy
was due, Coleridge says, to hope. Hope came from outside the self (Ins.
80-1], but Coleridge believed the source to be from within: "foliage, not
my own, seemed mine" (In. 81]. Hope’s fruits and leaves Coleridge
mistakenly thought to emanate from himself. This false conviction — that
man, rather than nature, is the source of goodness — contributed
substantially to Coleridge’s slide into dejection.n When Coleridge
discovered that hope was not an inherent part of the human soul, his
understanding of what made up a human collapsed, leaving a dearth of
any beliefs, easily filled by dejection.
Coleridge’s present dejection is possible only because of his earlier
self-deception. True happiness comes from a proper use of the
Imagination, but these earlier "dreams of happiness," false and
unfounded fantasies, are born of Fancy. Coleridge explains Fancy, and its
difference from the Imagination,!^ in the Biographia:
The fancy is indeed no other than a mode of memory
emancipated from the order of time and space; and
blended with, and modified by that empirical
phenomenon of the will which we express by the word
choice. But equally with the ordinary memory it must
receive all its materials ready made from the law of
association. [Biographia, 477-8]
Fancy results in dreams of happiness, rather than actual happiness,
because Fancy can build nothing original, but can only desperately try to
fit together incongruous experiences in the hope of finding joy. This false
happiness may appear at first to be genuine and lasting, but it collapses
when challenged by actual experiences contradictory to the constructed
viewpoint.
48
J
�Now Coleridge explicates his fall into despair: "Now afflictions bow
me down to earth
each visitation / suspends . . . / My shaping
spirit of Imagination" [Ins. 82-6). Where in earlier life Coleridge’s Joy
helped him manage his distress, he has now lost Joy, causing him to give
in to the dejection affliction brings. "Nor care 1 that they rob me of my
mirth” [In. 83), he says, distinguishing between unhappiness [a lack of
mirth or jovial spirits) and true, listless dejection. Dejection, Coleridge
points out in this passage, is not born from solemnity: its roots are a
dysfunction in the Imagination. This original dysfunction lays the ground
for the future state of dejection described in lines 21-24.
Dejection's source is a lack of Imagination, and Coleridge does not
hesitate to explain specifically how the Imagination degenerates:
For not to think of what I needs must feel
But to be still and patient, all I can;
And haply by abstruse research to steal
From my own nature all the natural man —
This was my sole resource, my only plan;
Till that which suits a part infects the whole.
And now is almost grown the habit of my soul
[Ins. 87-93)
Coleridge loses his powers of Imagination by being still, rather than
actively addressing his problem [Ins. 87-8). This stillness in his life
foreshadows the stagnation of spirit [like the pond without outlet) that so
affects him at the depth of dejection. Coleridge directs his energies to
"abstruse research” [In. 89), recondite knowledge, rather than more
natural truths available from simple observation of the universe. This
pursuit of the esoteric changes Coleridge into something artificial and
affected, removed from Nature, ironically cutting him off from true
insights into human being. The dysfunction of the Imagination prevents
Coleridge from following any other path, however. Coleridge realises that
eventually his entire self will be subsumed by this poisonous habit; once
the transformation is complete, there is little hope that the poetic faculty
will ever be restored.
The inability to avoid abstruse thoughts [In. 89) comes from the
attitude Coleridge had in the first part of the sixth stanza: "fruits, and
foliage, not my own, seemed mine” [In. 81). The mistaken belief that truth
is within the self leads to an unimaginative view of nature. The obsessive
quest for knowledge in the human psyche is an esoteric pursuit, and
results in a disregard for the general revelation found in nature, available
to all men, either through the genial spirit [for the Poet) or through
poetry [for those without the poetic faculty).
49
�Hence, viper thoughts, that coil around my mind.
Reality’s dark dream!
I turn from you, and listen to the wind.
Which long has raved unnoticed. (Ins. 94-97)
Coleridge rejects these dreams "of happiness” (In. 79) spun from fancy,
unrealistic and unimaginative, deceitful and misguiding. Finally, Coleridge
turns to nature; faith in his genius breaks through the habits (In. 93) that
nearly consumed him. He rejects the poisonous viper and listens to the
storm.
The storm, foretold in the first stanza, has buffeted Coleridge for
some time, overlooked due to his lethargic dejection. Coleridge’s
disregard of the forceful gale emphasises the deep state of dejection he
was in. Even though he begged for the storm to sweep away his lassitude
(Ins. 15, 20), he cannot be moved by it when it first arrives. In addition to
an act of nature, Coleridge himself must will his soul toward a healthy
state. Coleridge must see nature once again with that particular aptitude
given to poets. To the common man, deep in his habits of dreaming fancy,
this storm would do nothing, for he would never have the poetic
Imagination to change himself.i^ Coleridge, as a Poet, remembers the
freshness of nature and is called to return to this view.
Coleridge does not here rationalise or over-think the storm. All that
is required of him is a will to stir his stagnant spirit. The storm washes
over him in a hurricane of sensory input; there is no rational pursuit of
the storm’s meaning. In this state of acceptance Coleridge can begin to
find truth in natural images. For the reader, as well as Coleridge, the truth
he finds in the storm’s billows is unexpected.
What a scream
Of agony by torture lengthened out
That lute sent forth! Thou Wind, that rav’st without.
Bare crag, or mountain-tairn, or blasted tree.
Or pine-grove whither woodman never clomb.
Or lonely house, long held the witches’ home,
Methinks were fitter instruments for thee.
Mad Lutanist! who in this month of showers.
Of dark-brown gardens, and of peeping flowers,
Mak’st Devils’ yule, with worse than wintry song.
The blossoms, buds, and timorous leaves among.
(Ins. 97-107)
50
�In the first stanza, Coleridge wished that a storm, rather than a "dull
sobbing draft" (In. 6], would come and move his soul to life (In. 20]. The
sad breeze played the j^olian lute (In. 7]; there was a sharp distinction, in
Coleridge’s dejected mind, between a sad nature and a moving, living
nature. But here, in the seventh stanza, Coleridge names the hoped-for
storm as the player of the lute and echoes his earlier sentiment: the lute
should be mute (In. 8,103-4]. Coleridge can find only pain in the melodies
of the lute; he believes that a pleasanter song could be found if the wind
played objects not purposed to be instruments (peak or pond or timber,
Ins. 100-3]. More than even anguish, Coleridge hears blasphemy ("Devils’
yule”] in the harp’s notes: this is a "wintry song" (In. 106] out of place in
spring, when things should be birthing and growing. But he perseveres in
his newly-regained faculty.
Coleridge sees the wind as artist, and himself as audience; "Thou
Actor, perfect in all tragic sounds! / Thou mighty Poet, even to frenzy
bold!" (Ins. 108-9]. This disquieting tale was not what Coleridge expected
to hear with his reinstated genial power; but he trusts nature’s teaching,
and pursues the unfolding vision. Coleridge hears real horror in this
disturbing lute, expressed in the next few lines:
What tell’st thou now about?
’Tis of the rushing of an host in rout.
With groans of trampled men, with smarting wounds —
At once they groan with pain and shudder with the cold!
(Ins. 110-113]
Coleridge’s hoped-for cure, Joy, seems to be at extreme odds with the
sentiments he sees expressed by the storm; instead of delight, he
perceives only pain — violence inflicted on men by men. Coleridge’s
newly-restored poetic faculty seems to have betrayed him: instead of
healing and peace, he is given a vision of death.
This clamorous blowing quickly changes into quiet, and Coleridge
finds significance in the reversal.
But hush! there is a pause of deepest silence!
And all that noise, as of a rushing crowd.
With groans, and tremulous shudderings — all is over —
It tells another tale, with sounds less deep and loud!
A tale of less affright.
And tempered with delight.
As Otway’si'^ self had framed the tender lay.
’Tis of a little child.
Upon a lonesome wild.
Not far from home, but she hath lost her way;
51
�And now moans low in bitter grief and fear,
And now screams loud, and hopes to make her mother hear.
(Ins. 114-125)
This tale — told in silence and so different than the zephyrous battle — is
Coleridge’s own; he is the little child. The Poet-as-child metaphor will
appear again in "Intimations,” where Wordsworth discovers that man
needs to be like a child. This poem, "Dejection," is a tale "less deep and
loud" (In. 117) than other poems ("The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” for
instance). It is not a poem of suspense or fear, but is a flowing melody
describing Coleridge’s dejection and convalescence, enjoyable to the
reader, "tempered with delight" (In. 119). Coleridge, playing in the fields
of dreamful Fancy (In. 79), soon strayed from the path of true genius, "not
far from home, but she hath lost her way" (In. 123). It is at times difficult
to distinguish true Imagination (the genial power. In. 39) from mere
Fancy, but that small distance is the difference between dream and
reality.
Coleridge’s continued efforts to find his way home are rewarded: he
fights through the dejection and regains his poetic faculty, enabling him
to write this poem about the experience. Coleridge closes the poem with a
prayer for his companion (the reader, see line 25). "Full seldom may my
friend such vigils keep!” (In. 127), he wishes, both for her mental well
being (curing dejection is a trying experience for all involved) and for his
own continued poetic abilities. "May all the stars hang bright above her
dwelling,” Coleridge prays (In. 130), the sparkling, moving stars of stanza
two letting her feel beauty in nature. "Joy lift her spirit, joy attune her
voice; / To her may all things live, from pole to pole" (Ins. 134-5): The Joy
that Coleridge rediscovered he now wishes upon the reader, that they
may see (perhaps through this poem) the motion truth imparts to nature.
The true dejection in Coleridge’s work is absent from "Intimations,”
and yet both poets tell a similar tale. Wordsworth begins with happiness,
moves quickly through "a thought of grief’ ("Intimations" In. 22), and
ends in Joy. Coleridge starts with "dreams of happiness" (In. 79), almost
loses his genial spirit, and eventually arrives at Joy.
"Dejection" makes it clear that the Poet has a duty to enlighten
mankind through poetry. The Poet, says Wordsworth in the Preface, is
"endued with more lively sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness,
who has a greater knowledge of human nature, and a more
comprehensive soul, than are supposed to be common among mankind”
[Preface, 603). Since not all men can access truths in nature because they
have not the poetic genial spirit (In. 39), the Poet must use his special
talent to enliven the souls of his readers.
52
�Coleridge, in "Dejection," clearly acknowledges that it is his own fault
he can no longer feel beauty. He lays out the way in which he regained his
ability to use the Imagination, and expounds on the beauties of the
natural world. He works through his dejection, inspired by nature, and
concludes with an exhortation to the reader to arrive at the same state as
the Poet: pleasurable understanding of natural beauty.
Endnotes
1. The British Romantics [namely Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, and Keats) saw the
poetry of their time as frivolous and damaging. Wordsworth addresses his
"contemporaries" in the Preface: "[They] think that they are conferring honour upon
themselves and their art, in proportion as they separate themselves from the sympathies
of men, and indulge in arbitrary and capricious habits of expression, in order to furnish
food for fickle tastes, and fickle appetites, of their own creation" [Preface, 597).
2. Coleridge is clearly not dejected when writing the poem, because his genius must
be operative for poetry to be written. He does, though, write about a time when his poetic
faculty was inoperative. This claim is investigated further on the following pages.
3. Shelley illustrates this feeling of wonder and dread in his poem, "Mont Blanc."
4. The Imagination is discussed more fully as it becomes apparent in the poem.
5. "Lady” [line 25) in the final version. In earlier versions this word was variously
"Sara," "William," and "Edmund." Coleridge personalized the poem for various reasons,
but ultimately addressed whomever reads it, art for all men.
6. Recall the end of Keats’ "Ode on a Grecian Urn": "Beauty is truth, truth beauty."
7. Coleridge believes poetic genius to be inborn, see In. 85-6.
8. This begins to touch on the paradoxical balance between feeling and thinking that
Coleridge’s despair springs from; he addresses it further in stanza six.
9. "The passion and the life, whose fountains are within. / 0 Lady! we receive but
what we give, / And in our life alone does nature live" [Ins. 46-8).
10. The line here mimes the first line of "Intimations"; "There was a time ..." This is
one of many textual clues that the two poems are in direct dialogue with each other, and
that Wordsworth and Coleridge are speaking to the same subject, perhaps even the same
type of incident.
11. Goodness exists outside the self, while movement [the pursuit of goodness) starts
inside the self, as line 46 makes clear.
12. Recall Coleridge’s discussion of the Imagination.
13. The common man, unable to be moved by the storm, would never naturally be in
a state of dejection as the Poet can be.
14. Thomas Otway, a popular English playwright in the seventeenth century, was
most famous for Venice Preserv’d, 1682. An omnibus was first published in 1712.
53
�Primary Texts
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. Biographia Literaria. In The Norton Anthology
of English Literature. Edited by M.H. Abrams, Seventh Edition Vol. 2.
New York: Norton & Company, 2000.
---------. "Dejection: An Ode." In The Norton Anthology of English
Literature. Edited by M.H. Abrams, Seventh Edition Vol. 2. New York:
Norton & Company, 2000.
De Selincourt, Ernest, and Helen Darbishire, eds. The Poetical Works of
WilliamWordsworth, Vol. 4. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1958.
Wordsworth, William and Elizabeth Fenwick. The Fenwick Notes of
William Wordsworth. Edited by Jared Curtis. London: Bristol Classical
Press, 1993.
---------. Preface to Lyrical Ballads. In The Major Works. Edited by Stephen
Gill. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.
54
�Meditation on Li Bai's Invitation to Wine
Turner Resor
Invitation to Wine
-Li Bai
Do you not see the waters of the Yellow river
streaming from the sky
How they rush tumbling to the sea
and never return?
Do you not see, within the high tower,
someone who sorrows for his white hair
before the bright mirror? In the morning like black silk, at evening turned to snow?
In human life, when hopes are won,
we should drink our joys to the end.
Not leave the golden wine jar
empty in the moonlight.
The things that Heaven made must have a use!
Though I squander a thousand gold pieces,
time may restore them.
-
Boil the sheep! Kill the ox! Let us be merry!
Three hundred cupfuls of wine we must drink this time!
Master Cen!
Doctor Danqui!
I am bringing the wine Don’t put down your cups!
I shall sing you a snatch of song:
Listen to me please.
Gongs and drums, costly dishes, little I prize them!
I only want the long dream of wine and never to wake.
Through all the ages, the good and wise were passed
over in silence!
Only the mighty drinkers left a name behind.
Think of the Prince of Chen in former days,
feasting at Pingle palace The wine at ten thousand a flagon,
the endless jesting and laughter. . .
How can a host complain he is short of money?
I must hasten to buy the wine to put before my friends
My horse dappled with the five colours
And my thousand-guinea furs I will call the boy to barter them for a splendid wine
That you and I may forget for sorrows of all the ages.
�There is a window in time somewhere between five and seven
o'clock, depending on the season, between day and night, that, for as long
as I can remember, has given rise to melancholic musings. I am saddened
by the passing quality of the evening light. It is the light that peeks over
passes and spills its shafts down valleys; it warms the bark of aspen
groves, and signals the last call for summer swimmers. Dancing before us
are the final dramatic measures of the sun's daily opus, and the closing
notes - merciless and beautiful - ask us, "Have you been listening? Have
you been living?”
We respond to the hour restlessly. Enforced by the light's stern glare,
we move in the direction of home, to the places that tell us we are
somebody. Transitions are brief spans in time when nothing is asked of
us beyond what we feel, and I find myself with little to do but reflect. My
mind wanders and flashes, darting from bright to dark as the light's own
rough-edged mosaic plays through the landscape. I half-meditate, shifting
through the fallen leaves of thought and memory; I pretend that some
forgotten piece might give an answer to my emptiness. I think of loves
that could have been and others that could have been better. 1 wonder if I
should have been a rider of bulls or perhaps a farmer. Why has it been so
hard to follow my heart? I think of anything so that I can think of nothing,
like a man who has never before seen water trying to talk his way out of
walking the plank.
When I was younger there was some relief in my mother's calling me
in for dinner, and in this way waking me from my reveries. I would take
the path out of the woods toward our house and the illusion of home. I
remember the numbed orange glow of living room lights soaking the logs
of our family cabin- our minds drowsy from the day that we would soon
be forgetting. Inside with the doors shut, I felt as though I had left some
essential belonging behind, like a baseball glove in the rain, something
that in my negligence 1 had left out alone in the dark and cold. Any effort
to recall my abandoned thoughts was soon drowned-out by the
conversations of the dinner table.
I did not realize that it was only I who needed artificial warmth, that
the true idea can live in any environment, and that I need only learn to
live with the idea. Before, my fears were assigned to the dark of night;
now I see that the dark of night has been assigned to my fears. Our
external landscapes and how we respond to them are the material
reflections of some aspect of our internal landscapes- so what I cannot
accept is always personal. The darkness of night corresponds to our fear
of all that is unknown within ourselves, just as the climax of the evening's
light that I am drawn to corresponds to the potential for great beauty in
each of our souls — even if only momentary. The trouble is that they are
inseparable. Day runs into night and paradox is the nature of life. Those
56
�who acknowledge only the good will forever find themselves wanting,
and if I ever want to fully experience the light without I must accept the
darkness within.
Our minds avoid the reconciliation of opposites like a hand that
instinctually jerks away from the flame. There always appears to be a
better time than the present to confront our fears. When I was young 1
lived with the safety of tomorrow; in this way I secured my relative
comfort in the present by investing its hopes in the future. I am older
now, and I have become conscious of my efforts to elude concentration. I
am tired of chasing the existential tomorrow.
This new consciousness has left me exposed in a no-man’s-land,
stuck between two worlds that cannot reasonably exist in the same
universe. I am coming from a world in which I unknowingly shaped
everything - environment, home, friends, and myself - in order to protect
my ignorance of the world where I now wish to go. Therefore the value of
the first is necessarily deflated by the realization of the second, since the
former existed almost entirely in defiance. I will not be able to return and
understand the land that I have come from until 1 have seen all there is
within myself, and I am nervous to forge ahead.
The undecided middleperson becomes a tragic character through
their inactivity. Ambivalence is the curse of decisive passion and the
mother of empty soliloquy. "Through all the ages, the good and wise were
passed over in silence; only the mighty drinkers left a name behind.”
Similarly, my timidity has made me a wiser evader of my deeper
soundings, and has put me in peril of becoming intellectually dishonest.
But if I listen with intent, my consciousness can also be my most
trustworthy guide, and recently it has been telling me that now is the
time to act, now is the time to walk out further into the unknown, so that I
can come back refreshed by what I have known all along to be true.
Still, I hesitate. In my hesitation I turn to books and poetry. 1 amuse
myself with the stories of others and their confrontations with this
psychic borderland. Then I read Li Bai’s Invitation to Wine, and he speaks
to me as a master and compassionate friend. He tells me that I will be
rewarded if I stop and pay attention. He tells me to "not leave the golden
wine-jar empty in the moonlight,” since he and I and all "the things that
Heaven made must have a use.” He tells me all this and 1 am happy to
accept his invitation.
The poem's message comes as an echo from another shore booming
across the wild waters of a swollen river. It sings that we must brave the
internal mists that confound and isolate us all and join the singer on the
opposite bank. It is a forceful reminder of all that can be won if we are
mindful. His voice is boisterous and invigorating, demanding our
attention. Just as the fleeting grace of the light tries to hold my eye, Li Bai
�implores us: "Listen to me please." And if we listen, we can learn to look
indiscriminately, and when at last we See, we will be ready to drink in the
terrific beauty of pure sight, and that is the ultimate celebration of life.
For Li Bai, a moment of true sight is the moment "when hopes are
won.” All our human longings are fulfilled when we become naturally
reunited to a world where evil is the brother of good, night the source of
day, and death the giver of life. In a moment of clarity our human joys can
spread their wings without the threat of the unknown throwing its
shadow across our path. For if it must be that "the waters of the Yellow
river streaming from the sky . . . rush tumbling to the sea and never
return," if life tells us that someone’s hair will be "in the morning like
black silk" and "at evening turned to snow,” if we leave behind the world
of illusion where anything could be other than as it is, what is left but the
certain joy of each individual moment?
We are no longer concerned with tomorrow, since tomorrow can
never be anything more than an excuse for today. We have found
ourselves here in the now. We have left our "high towers" to see the
world as it is. All our possessions, all that we have horded in vain will
finally become useful insofar as they can be sold or traded so that we may
drink in this moment longer and deeper. "Time may restore” all these
things. "Gongs and drums, costly dishes, little I prize them; I only want the
long dream of wine and never to wake.”
To drink wine is to be thankful. It is the imbibing of an essence
distilled from its particularities. It is a ritual that celebrates the life we are
given through death. It is a forgetting of the "sorrows of all the ages.”
Once we have drunk from this ancient well we will be born again, but if
we return in fear to our now decrepit dwellings and think that we can
forget, we will be haunted until we return to the hunt. There are those
who would build precarious palaces out of the disjointed fragments of
memory rather than return to the springs of sight. The habituated artist,
however, is someone who is obedient to what they feel to be true. Maybe
it is predetermined how we will respond. I know that there are moments
when I cannot ignore the call.
When I walk now, I carry less with me. I leave my home to watch the
sun set beyond Albuquerque and I bring only this reminder: Today is the
only day there is to See. This moment is all I will ever know. And with this
I lose myself. The gravity of the temporary is all that remains to inform
me and I surrender, letting its pull take me out of myself. The beauty is
absolutely terrifying. I have been invited to wine.
58
�Primary Text
Li Bai. Meditation on Wine. In 300 Tang Poems, translated by Innes
Herdan. Taipei: Far East Book Co., 2000.
59
�The Rights of a Citizen and the Rights of a Man:
Constitutionality and Natural Law in the Dred Scott Decision
and Lincoln's Springfield Speech of 1857
Kanishka G.B. Marasinghe
The opinion of the Supreme Court regarding the case of Dred Scott v.
Sandford delivered by Chief Justice Taney seems to have found for itself
an infamous place in the history of American constitutional law. On June
26, 1857, less than four months after the decision was handed down,
Lincoln addressed it directly in his famous Springfield Speech of 1857,
calling it "erroneous” and stating that "we shall do what we can to have it
to overrule [this decision]" [728J. Less than 40 years later. Justice Harlan,
the sole dissenter in the Plessy v. Ferguson decision, writes that in time,
the judgment rendered in Plessy "will prove to be quite as pernicious as
the decision made by this tribunal in the Dred Scott case" (Harlan, 7J.
If we view the history of these cases through a lens shaped by an
appreciation for the civil rights movement, it is tempting to see these
decisions as either certain milestones or detours on the path towards a
fuller expression of our equality as citizens before the law. In this light,
the Dred Scott decision does indeed seem particularly pernicious because
it is in this judgment that the status of 'citizen’ is expressly denied by the
Supreme Court to all members of "the enslaved African race" (721). One
could make an argument that the Dred Scott decision, by denying Dred
Scott the status of‘citizen’ and thereby the right to sue in the courts of the
United States, is especially damaging to his natural rights as a man as
posited in the Declaration of Independence. It would be a much harder
case to make, however, that his legal status as a citizen under the
Constitution of the United States has been illegitimately denied. In this
paper, I will examine the opinion handed down by Chief Justice Taney on
Dred Scott’s claim to citizenship in light of Lincoln’s challenges
concerning both historical accuracy and Taney’s interpretation of the
Declaration of Independence. I will argue that despite Lincoln’s
challenges, the opinion handed down by Chief Justice Taney still adheres
to sound constitutional principles, but that Taney’s treatment of the
Declaration of Independence inherently changes the character of the
debate surrounding Dred Scott
The Dred Scott case concerns two issues: first, whether Dred Scott is
a citizen of Missouri "within the meaning of the Constitution of the United
States" and, second, whether Congress was authorized to pass the
Missouri Compromise of 1820 "under any of the powers granted to it by
the Constitution" (723). The first issue pertains to Dred Scott’s right to
sue in a circuit court and the second issue pertains to his claim to
60
�freedom. Lincoln restates and emphasizes the importance of the Dred
Scott decision in his Springfield Speech of 1857; he asserts, "The decision
declares two propositions — first, that a Negro cannot sue in the United
States courts, and, secondly, that Congress cannot prohibit slavery in the
territories" (727). In this restatement, Lincoln emphasizes the effects that
the Dred Scott decision will have at the federal level — he turns it into a
national issue. In doing so, however, he fundamentally misrepresents
Chief Justice Taney’s position concerning the question of citizenship. The
opinion of the Supreme Court never directly states that "a Negro cannot
sue in the United States courts." Instead, the opinion asserts that Dred
Scott cannot sue in the circuit courts because he is not a legal citizen of
Missouri under the Constitution of the United States. In formulating the
opinion in these words. Chief Justice Taney makes the question of
citizenship into a state’s rights issue. The implication is not that all
Negroes cannot sue in U.S. courts but that one must be a U.S. citizen to sue
in its courts and that citizenship is granted on a state by state basis. One
could, perhaps, read Lincoln’s restatement of the first part of the Dred
Scott decision as simply asserting that "Dred Scott (a Negro) cannot sue
in the United States courts." Lincoln’s formulation, however, seems to
imply a more general application.
Lincoln’s first challenge to Chief Justice Taney has to do with the
accuracy of the historical facts used to support his decision. Among the
conditions that Lincoln lists as necessary for accepting this decision as
precedent is the condition that the decision "had been in no part based on
assumed historical facts which are not really true” (728). Taney, in fact,
appeals to the "legislation and histories of the times" in order to settle the
question of "who were the citizens of the several states when the
Constitution was adopted” (720). Lincoln addresses this directly: "Chief
Justice Taney, in delivering the opinion of the majority of the court, insists
at great length that Negroes were no part of the people who made, or for
whom was made, the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution of
the United States" (729). Lincoln goes on to cite Judge Curtis’s dissenting
opinion where he states that in five of the original thirteen states, "free
Negroes were voters and in proportion to their numbers had the same
part in making the Constitution that the white people had" (729). Lincoln
has a point when he asserts that free Negroes did make up a portion of
the people of the United States who adopted the Constitution. His point,
however, is largely tangential because it disregards the basic principles
upon which both the U.S. Constitution was established and Chief Justice
Taney makes his argument.
Article VII of the Constitution of the United States maintains that
ratification by nine of the thirteen original states for which it was
intended "shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution
61
�between the States so ratifying the Same."i Ratification by the
conventions of nine states is sufficient to establish the Constitution but in
order for the Constitution to have any authority over any particular state,
the convention of that state must have also ratified it. If only nine states
ratify the constitution, then it is only established among those nine states.
In his decision. Chief Justice Taney asserts that the principle upon which
the government thereby rests is the 'union of states' and that any power
not expressly given to the federal government is relegated to the
authority of the state governments. He expounds on this principle,
writing.
The principle upon which our governments rest, and upon
which alone they continue to exist, is the union of states,
sovereign and independent within their own limits in
their internal and domestic concerns, and bound together
as one people by a general government, possessing certain
enumerated and restricted powers, delegated to it by the
people of the several states, and exercising supreme
authority within the scope of the powers granted to it,
throughout the dominion of the United States. (724J
Concerning citizenship as stated in the Constitution, Taney writes.
It speaks in general terms of the people of the United
States, and of citizens of the several states, when it is
providing for the exercise of the powers granted or the
privileges secured to the citizen. It does not define what
description of persons are intended to be included under
these terms, or who shall be regarded as a citizen and one
of the people. (722]
By not defining the description of persons intended to be included as
citizens under the federal government, the Constitution relegates the
question of citizenship to the authority of the state governments. This
was, in principle, accommodating to both slave and free states at the time
that the Constitution was being established. One of the main goals of the
Constitutional Convention was to draft a document establishing a federal
government that would be acceptable to all thirteen states. It is highly
unlikely that any of the states that supported slavery would join the
union if, in doing so, they also conferred the rights of citizenship under
the federal Constitution onto the slaves living within their state limits.
Lincoln and Judge Curtis argue that in five out of the thirteen original
states, free Negroes were part of the voting public that ratified the
Constitution. Chief Justice Taney could argue in turn that in eight out of
62
�the thirteen states they were not and that to be a citizen of the union, one
must first be a citizen of a state.
Lincoln's second argument against the Taney decision concerns the
Declaration of Independence, its interpretation, and the question of for
whom it was made. Chief Justice Taney mentions the language used in the
Declaration of Independence early on in his opinion in order to determine
who were citizens of the states when the Constitution was adopted.
Taney writes.
In the opinion of the Court the legislation and the histories
of the times, and the language used in the Declaration of
Independence, show that neither the class of persons who
had been imported as slaves nor their descendants,
whether they had become free or not, were then
acknowledged as a part of the people nor intended to be
included in the general words used in that memorable
instrument. (721)
Here Chief Justice Taney is flat out wrong and Lincoln is right to challenge
him* on his interpretation of the Declaration. The Declaration of
Independence is a document of natural law and as such applies to all men.
This is stated directly in the two excerpts of the Declaration that Chief
Justice Taney quotes in the Court's decision:
When in the course of human events, it becomes
necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands
which have connected them with another, and to assume
among the powers of the earth the separate and equal
station to which the laws of nature and nature's God
entitle them, a decent respect for the opinions of mankind
requires that they should declare the causes which impel
them to the separation. (721)
We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are
created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator
with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these
rights, governments are instituted, deriving their just
powers from the consent of the governed. (721)
The language of the Declaration is too general and conclusive to be
amenable to any other interpretation but that it must apply equally to all
men. It grounds its precepts in "the law of nature and nature's God”
asserting that "all men are created equal" and "that they are endowed by
their Creator with certain inalienable rights." By appealing to nature and
63
�the Creator, the Declaration raises itself to a position above human law
and appeals to that in human beings, which loves the just and yearns for
the universal irrespective of its particular application; it appeals to that
sublimated moral sense within us with which we affirm, question, and
judge the adequacy of human law. Lincoln’s parody of judge Douglas’
version of the Declaration^ is particularly astute because he realizes that
the moment we appeal to a universal sense of justice on anything less
than universal terms, the appeal loses its rhetorical effect and becomes
ridiculous (732). A "decent respect for the opinions of mankind" requires
that the framers of the Declaration proceed (and proceed seriously) on
general terms.
Both Chief Justice Taney and Judge Douglas posit the argument that
to interpret the Declaration as an affirmation of the rights of all men
would be to essentially vilify those men who framed and signed it. Judge
Douglas, in this regard, asserts, "No man can vindicate the character,
motives, and conduct of the signers of the Declaration of Independence
except upon the hypothesis that they referred to the white race alone, and
not to the African, when they declared all men to be created equal” (731).
This argument relies on the conflation of human law and natural law and
misconstrues the Declaration as a document of human law. If it were the
case that the framers intended the Declaration to be a legal document,
then the character, motives, and conduct of the framers should be drawn
into question because, as many of them were slave holders, they would be
positing a law only in order to break it. The Declaration, however, was
never intended as a legally binding document but was set up as what
Lincoln calls "a standard maxim for free society which should be familiar
to all and revered by all; constantly looked to, constantly labored for, and
even though never perfectly attained, constantly approximated” (731).
Human law addresses the practical concerns and everyday attitudes of a
society and, therefore, often does not ascend to the lofty standards of
justice as embodied in natural law. If the natural rights of all men were
simply written into the Declaration as legislation, it would be divisive and
of little practical use in the rebellion against the British. This, however,
was never the intention of the framers to begin with: the rebellion had
already begun and the framers declared a standard around which to unite
against a common foe and against which to justify their endeavor both to
themselves and to men the world over.
Chief Justice Taney’s interpretation of the Declaration of
Independence is strange on at least two counts. First, although he
mentions that "[the] language of the Declaration of Independence is
equally conclusive” as to the fact that "the enslaved African race were not
intended to be included and formed no part of the people who framed
and adopted this declaration” (721-722), Taney immediately softens his
64
�point himself by going outside the language of the Declaration in order to
make his case. Second, there is no need to even mention the Declaration
to begin with, except to assert that the document has no legal relevance to
the authority of the federal government under the Constitution. Chief
Justice Taney’s statement of the principle of the union of the states was
mentioned above. If one were to adhere to this principle strictly, then the
Declaration would have no legal bearing on the function or authority of
the federal government because it was never ratified by any of the states
that established it. In the course of judicial review, any appeal to the
Declaration concerning the question of Dred Scott's citizenship could be
thrown out as outside the scope of the Constitution of the United States.
Whatever his reasons for even bringing up the Declaration, by doing
so. Chief Justice Taney throws open the doors to Lincoln’s criticism of his
interpretation of it: by making it into an issue, he brings it into politics.
Near the beginning of his treatment of the Dred Scott decision in his
Springfield Speech of 1857, Lincoln mentions that he will refrain from
discussing the "merits” of the Dred Scott decision and, instead, proceeds
to assert his right to question its "correctness” (727J. We should make
mention of the fact that Lincoln never directly challenges the
constitutionality of the Dred Scott decision but limits himself to
questioning the correctness of the historical facts and the interpretation
of the Declaration that are used to justify it. As mentioned above, Lincoln,
does assert that he believes the decision to be "erroneous” and that they
should do what they can to "have it to overrule this,” but this statement is
made after his statement of fact that the Court has overruled its own
decisions in the past and the question is not fully settled. Lincoln could
have addressed Taney more directly by questioning him on the principle
of the union of the states or on his interpretation of the Constitution but
he does not. We can begin to understand this when we consider that by
mentioning the Declaration, Chief Justice Taney essentially moves the
question of Dred Scott’s citizenship and the status of slavery in general
from the realm of judicial review into the realm of the political and
fundamentally changes the character of the debate. By bringing in the
Declaration of Independence, Chief Justice Taney brings in natural law
and what was once a question of the rights of slaves and property owners
under the Constitution of the United States in Taney’s hands turns into a
question of the justness of slavery in Lincoln’s. When we look back at the
opinion of the Supreme Court concerning Dred Scott’s citizenship, we can
perhaps^ say that it is both constitutionally valid and pernicious. It is
constitutionally valid because it proceeded according to a sound
interpretation of the meaning of ‘citizenship’ as it was understood
according to the principle of the union of states upon which the
Constitution was founded. It is pernicious because by fallaciously
65
�interpreting the Declaration of Independence as a document of human
law, it allowed others to disregard its writers' intentions in the political
realm.
Endnotes
1. The Constitution of the United States, Article VII.
2. Lincoln writes: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all British subjects
who where on this continent eighty-one years ago were created equal to all British
subjects born and then residing in Britain.”
3. Another possibility, albeit a distant outlier, is that Chief Justice Taney brought in
the Declaration of Independence in order to push the issue into the political realm in
order to get resolved there. This, however, is not a claim that the author can fully stand
behind.
Primary Text
Staff, Social Sciences I The College of the University of Chicago. The People
Shall Judge. Volume I. Part II. Chicago: The University of Chicago
Press, 1949.
�Wisdom and Wizardry:
Vimalakirti's Inconceivable Technique
for Reinvigorating the Dharma
Brian Connolly
We have it on Buddha's authority that everything is impermanent. As
related in the discourses of the Pali canon, he arrived at this realization in
the course of an extended meditation which took him from the state of
samadhi through the higher jhanas of non-thinking and non-perception,
culminating in his attainment of nirvana, the abandonment of all
attachment to notions of a permanent self, and the cessation of suffering.
Whether, and how, such knowledge could be transmitted was an
immediate source of concern for Buddha, who doubted the possibility of
leading others on the Eightfold Path and was only compelled to teach the
Dharma at the behest of Brahma Sampati. The issue of transmission has
also been a matter of debate for Buddha's followers in the millennia since
his enlightenment, as different interpretations of the original teachings
developed and different schools of thought took shape. The Mahayana, or
"great vehicle” school, posits a broader vision of the Dharma than, and
distinguishes itself from, the Hinayana or "small vehicle" school, a vision
that emphasizes the role of enlightened bodhisattvas in liberating those
living beings who are still suffering, while placing less emphasis on the
Sravaka, or "hearers,” tradition of Dharma transmission from teacher to
disciple. Among the texts considered central to Mahayana Buddhism is
The Holy Teaching of Vimalakirti, the strange and wonderful title
character of which challenges the complacency of Buddha's disciples and
restores the Dharma's radical power to effect liberation by getting back to
the heart of Buddha's message: recognizing the fundamental emptiness
and impermanence of everything as a means of escaping suffering.
Reading The Holy Teaching of Vimalakirti for the first time, in the
context of Buddhist doctrine shaped by a series of discourses from the
Pali canon [representing the core of the Dharma), to the Lotus Sutra
[offering its Mahayana message of enlightenment for everyone, not just
the sravakas — direct hearers — or monks), and Nagarjuna's
Mulamadhayamakakarika
[breaking
down
tendencies
toward
complacency or egoism with the relentless logic of his tetralemma), my
reaction was to dismiss this text's fantastic episodes as mere special
effects intended to keep readers or listeners entertained, thereby
engaging their attention in the teaching itself, the fundamental
impermanence of things.
On the surface, Vimalakirti's teaching struck me as a clear rebuke to
the sravakas and the Hinayana approach to the Dharma, characterized by
67
�strict adherence to the Pali discourses. What better way to widen the
perspective of narrow-minded orthodoxy than by taking the doctrine to
mind-bending extremes? VimalakTrti's embodiment of the characteristic
qualities of a Buddha while simultaneously engaging in the everyday
world, and the magical effects he employs in subverting the selfsatisfaction of Buddha's disciples, would seem to confirm his role as a
larger-than-life counterpart to the Buddha. Thus, the initial questions I
planned to investigate in this essay were, "Who is this Vimalakirti? Was
he real, or simply made-up as a foil to Buddha, an expedient means for re
animating his stodgy disciples? And how do his teachings bolster or
undermine the Dharma as taught by Buddha?"
As I approached the text again, paying closer attention to detail, it
became harder to sustain any opposition between a "real" Buddha and a
"make-believe" Vimalakirti. It became increasingly clear that the
"inconceivable" technique employed by Vimalakirti was more than just
rhetorical sleight of hand. The miraculous abilities attributed to
Vimalakirti were not simply magical anecdotes included for dramatic
effect. Rather, they were in fact performative demonstrations of his
teaching that everything is magic, that the character of ultimate reality is
like that of something conjured up by a magician — and that, no matter
how deeply we penetrate into the nature of things, we will never find
such a magician at work nor learn the trick. The question, "Who is
Vimalakirti?" took on a deeper significance, pointing to other, larger
questions (e.g. "What does VimalakTrti's teaching regarding the magical
nature of ultimate reality say about the truth or reality of Buddha's
enlightenment and the 'original Dharma' as described in the Pali Canon?")
and, perhaps, to the biggest question of all: "Is anything real?" Rather
than tackling that one head-on, though, it might be wiser to begin by
investigating the meaning of magic in this mysterious text, starting with
Buddha's conversion of the bodhisattva's umbrellas into a billion-fold
canopy of jewels.
As soon as all these precious parasols had been laid down,
suddenly, by the miraculous power of the Lord, they were
transformed into a single precious canopy so great that it
formed a covering for this entire billion-world galaxy. The
surface of the entire billion-world galaxy was reflected in
the interior of the great precious canopy, where the total
content of this galaxy could be seen: limitless mansions of
suns, moons and stellar bodies; the realm of the devas,
nagas, yaksas ... all the great oceans, rivers, bays,
torrents, streams, brooks, and springs; finally all the
villages, suburbs, cities, capitals, provinces, and
68
�wildernesses. All this could be clearly seen by everyone.
And the voices of all the Buddhas of the ten directions
could be heard proclaiming their teachings of the Dharma
in all the worlds, the sounds reverberating in the space
beneath the great precious canopy. (12)
As if this were not already an indication of the supernatural
character of the text that will follow, the hymn with which "the young
Licchavi Ratnakara" responds to the parasol marvel characterizes Buddha
in a particularly revealing way, hailing his "inconceivable miraculous
power":
Pure is your thought, having
transcendence of all trances ...
discovered
the
supreme
Although the Lord speaks with but one voice.
Those present perceive that same voice differently.
And each understands in his own language according to
his own need.
This is a special quality of the Buddha ...
You nullify all signs in all things everywhere.
You are not subject to any wish for anything at all.
The miraculous power of the Buddhas is inconceivable.
1 bow to you, who stand nowhere, like infinite space.
(13-15)
The introductory phase of the text concludes with Buddha's explication of
the meaning of buddha-fields — that individuals do not attain
enlightenment in a vacuum, as it were, but in interdependent relation to
all the other beings in their sphere at that moment. He then performs a
marvel rivaling, if not exceeding, the illumination of the parasols, tapping
the universe with his big toe in order to illustrate a point about the power
of perspective:
Thereupon the Lord touched the ground of this billionworld-galactic universe with his big toe, and suddenly it
was transformed into a huge mass of precious jewels, a
magnificent array of many hundreds of thousands of
clusters of precious gems, until it resembled the universe
of the Tathagata Ratnavyuha, called Anantagunaratnavyuha. Everyone in the entire assembly was filled with
wonder, each perceiving himself on a throne of jeweled
lotuses.
69
�. . . The Buddha said, "Sariputra, this buddha-field is
always thus pure, but the Tathagata makes it appear to be
spoiled by many faults, in order to bring about the
maturity of inferior living beings. (19]
Among the myriad onlookers who experience advancement toward
enlightenment upon witnessing this manifestation of Buddha's
magnificence are "eighty-four thousand living beings who were devoted
to the grandeur of the buddha-field” [19]. Furthermore, it is they who,
"having understood that all things are by nature but magical creations, all
conceived in their own minds the spirit of unexcelled, totally perfect
enlightenment" (19]. The spontaneous liberation of these eighty-four
thousand living beings foreshadows the "inconceivable liberative"
teaching of Vimalakirti and his magical approach to enlightenment, which
takes up the remainder of the text.
The hyperbolic description of Vimalakirti given in the second chapter
holds several clues as to his peculiar character and to his role as a teacher
of the Dharma. Vimalakirti is portrayed as the embodiment of a host of
seemingly impossible-to-reconcile contradictions. He epitomizes all the
qualities of arahantship without having taken on the renunciative,
meditative life of Buddha's disciples, and he shares Buddha's "special
quality” of being understood by different people according to their needs.
To paraphrase Shakespeare, he "out-Buddha's Buddha.”i Far from
withdrawing from the world of samsara, he is described as being fully
engaged in the everyday world of temptation and sin — though only in
order to practice his liberating technique and guide other beings to the
Dharma:
He made his appearance at the fields of sports and in the
casinos, but his aim was always to mature those people
who were attached to games and gambling ... He engaged
in all sorts of businesses, yet had no interest in profit or
possessions. To train living beings, he would appear at
crossroads and on street corners, and to protect them he
participated in government. To turn people away from the
Hinayana and to engage them in the Mahayana, he
appeared among listeners and teachers of the Dharma .. .
To demonstrate the evils of desire, he even entered the
brothels. To establish drunkards in correct mindfulness,
he entered all the cabarets. (21]
Note the reference to turning people away from the Hinayana and toward
the Mahayana; this places the text itself in the category of a manifestation
70
�of Vimalakirti's liberative technique, since it documents a series of his
appearances "among listeners and teachers of the Dharma."
The central conceit of the text is Vimalakirti's feigned illness. He
states that he has undertaken to manifest this illness in order to solicit
the concern of other living beings in the buddha-field, so that he might
then liberate them by means of his "inconceivable” technique. When word
spreads that he is not well, people flock from the nearby villages and
surrounding countryside to offer their sympathy. He instructs them on
the difference between the physical body ("so impermanent, fragile,
unworthy of confidence, and feeble") and the "Tathagata body” ("born of
gnosis . . . truth . . . reality . . . conscious awareness . . . ”), urging them to
aspire toward the latter and to "conceive the spirit of unexcelled, perfect
enlightenment” in order to "eliminate the sicknesses of the passions of all
living beings” (23). Vimalakirti will later expand on this basic teaching to
the community in his discourse on how to minister to a sick bodhisattva.
However, it will be some time before any bodhisattvas or disciples check
in to see what condition his condition is in.
Although Buddha intuits Vimalakirti's condition telepathically, and
calls on his disciples to attend to him in his convalescence, all of them
refuse except the crown prince Manjusri, each citing as the justification
for his reluctance an episode in which he has been shown up by the
enlightened layman. In each case, Vimalakirti's intervention destabilizes
the secure position of the disciple, exhorting him to practice
wholeheartedly in full engagement in the present, rather than limiting his
practice or his teaching to dogmatic emulation of Buddha, dissuading him
from believing himself to be enlightened and somehow excused from
further participation in life.
Each of the boddhisattvas is mistaken to the extent that he is
quantifying the state of enlightenment that he considers himself to have
attained, or reifying the Dharma in a way that compromises its ineffable
nature, obscuring the "voidness” or impermanence of everything, the
realization of which is the catalyst of liberation. Vimalakirti deconstructs
their mistakes, playing the role of Buddha in destroying the last major
obstacle to their liberation: their attachment to their roles as disciples
and to their dualistic conception of enlightenment.
Vimalakirti's exchange with the venerable Subhuti, whom he teases
with a barrage of impossible-to-uphold precepts as the latter attempts to
carry out his daily alms-round, indicates the text's position regarding the
role of language both as a medium for interpreting reality — to be taken
with a grain of salt — and as a means of liberation — to be understood as
its ultimate meaning:
71
�"Reverend Subhuti, do not fear these words, and pick up
your bowl. What do you think, reverend Subhuti? If it
were an incarnation created by the Tathagata who spoke
thus to you, would you be afraid?"
I answered, "No indeed, noble sir!" He then said,
"Reverend Subhuti, the nature of all things is like an
illusion, like a magical incarnation. So you should not fear
them. Why? All words also have that nature, and thus the
wise are not attached to words, nor do they fear them.
Why? All language does not ultimately exist, except as
liberation. The nature of all things is liberation." (28)
The disciple Ananda's encounter with Vimalakirti, in which the former
has been sent to obtain some milk for an indisposed Buddha, ends in
much the same fashion, albeit with a punchline delivered by a
disembodied voice from the sky: "Go and get the milk!” (37).
Another disciple, the venerable Upali, is chided when Vimalakirti
overhears him disciplining two bhiksus. Vimalakirti points out that their
transgression and shame are expressions of their mistaken, dualistic
understanding of the situation, so addressing the issue in terms of an
offender being punished would only further aggravate their suffering. In
Vimalakirti's account, since they are not autonomous selves acting in
reference to a fixed standard of behavior, there is neither agent nor
misdeed. With both of these belonging to the categories of dualistic
thought, not the thinking of ultimate reality, a different solution must be
sought, reflecting the true nature of ultimate reality:
"Reverend Upali, the mind is neither within nor without,
nor is it to be apprehended between the two. Sin is just
the same as the mind, and all things are just the same as
sin. They do not escape this same reality.
"Reverend Upali, this nature of the mind, by virtue of
which your mind, reverend, is liberated — does it ever
become afflicted?"
"Never,” [Upali] replied.
"Reverend Upali, the minds of all living beings have that
very nature. Reverend Upali, passions consist of
conceptualizations. The ultimate nonexistence of these
conceptualizations and imaginary fabrications — that is
the purity that is the intrinsic nature of the mind.
Misapprehensions are passions. The ultimate absence of
misapprehensions is the intrinsic nature of the mind. The
72
�presumption of self is passion. The absence of self is the
intrinsic nature of the mind. Reverend Upali, all things are
without production, destruction, and duration, like
magical illusions, clouds, and lightning; all things are
evanescent, not remaining even for an instant; all things
are like dreams, hallucinations, and unreal visions; all
things are like the reflection of the moon in water and like
a mirror-image; they are born of mental construction.
Those who know this are called the true upholders of the
discipline, and those disciplined in that way are indeed
well disciplined." (30-31]
This radical formulation of the philosophy of impermanence speaks for
itself; while letting it sink in, and before moving on, it is worth noting the
way in which Vimalakirti plays on Upali's belief in his own enlightenment
in order to draw him toward the broader view of the mind's intrinsic
nature. This is another example of Vimalakirti 's Buddha-like ability to
connect with interlocutors in just the right way.
Vimalakirti further clarifies the Dharma regarding enlightenment,
and the role of bodhisattvas in liberating living beings, in his exchange
with Maitreya, one of the major Buddhas in the Mahayana tradition. He
encounters the latter discussing "the stage of nonregression of the great
bodhisattvas” with "the gods of the Tusita heaven, the god Samtusita and
his retinue," and steps in to set the record straight;
Maitreya, do not fool and delude these deities! No one
abides in, or regresses from, enlightenment. Maitreya, you
should introduce these deities to the repudiation of all
discriminative constructions concerning enlightenment.
(34-5]
He goes on to offer the most explicit account yet of what enlightenment
actually means:
. . . Enlightenment is free of presumptions concerning all
objects. Enlightenment is free of the functioning of all
intentional thoughts. Enlightenment is the annihilation of
all convictions. Enlightenment is free from all
discriminative constructions. Enlightenment is free from
all vacillation, mentation, and agitation. Enlightenment is
not involved in any commitments. Enlightenment is the
arrival at detachment, through freedom from all habitual
attitudes. The ground of enlightenment is the ultimate
realm. Enlightenment is the realization of reality. (35]
73
�In case Maitreya might still have the idea that attaining
enlightenment isn't so hard, after all, Vimalakirti wraps up his account
with this mind-arresting aporia:
Enlightenment is without subjectivity and completely
without object. Enlightenment, which penetrates the
equality of all things, is undifferentiated. Enlightenment,
which is not shown by any example, is incomparable.
Enlightenment is subtle, since it is extremely difficult to
realize. Enlightenment is all-pervasive, as it has the nature
of infinite space. Enlightenment cannot be realized, either
physically or mentally. Why? The body is like grass, trees,
walls, paths, and hallucinations. And the mind is
immaterial, invisible, baseless, and unconscious. (35)
In the face of such inscrutable insight, who can blame the disciples and
bodhisattvas for feeling intimidated by Vimalakirti?
As the text moves into its main narrative phase, crown prince
Manjusri agrees to visit the ailing Vimalakirti. In the course of their
conversation, Vimalakirti explains how one ought to minister to a sick
bodhisattva — recalling the ostensible premise of the narrative and
stressing once again the doctrine of impermanence and emptiness:
What is the elimination of this sickness? It is the
elimination of egoism and possessiveness. What is the
elimination of egoism and possessiveness? It is the
freedom from dualism. What is the freedom from
dualism? It is the absence of involvement with either the
external or the internal. What is the absence of
involvement with either the external or the internal? It is
nondeviation, nonfluctuation, and nondistraction from
equanimity. What is equanimity? It is the equality of
everything from self to liberation. Why? Because both self
and liberation are void. How can they be void? As verbal
designations, they both are void, and neither is
established in reality. Therefore, one who sees such
equality makes no difference between sickness and
voidness; his sickness is itself voidness, and that sickness
as voidness is itself void. (45)
Void, indeed — especially given the blow Vimalakirti has struck
against language's ability to express truth or accurately encompass
reality. In a discourse full of incisive insights into the Dharma, this is
Vimalakirti at his most radical: he has feigned illness in order to draw an
74
�audience to hear his teaching that all illness is "feigned," that reality itself
is ultimately empty.
He then uses the metaphor of sickness to lay out the bodhisattva's
mission, in striking simplicity:
Although both pleasure and pain are abandoned when the
buddha-qualities are fully accomplished, there is then no
sacrifice of the great compassion for all living beings in
the bad migrations. Thus, recognizing in his own suffering
the infinite sufferings of these living beings, the
bodhisattva correctly contemplates these living beings
and resolves to cure all sicknesses. As for these living
beings, there is nothing to be appiied, and there is nothing
to be removed; one has oniy to teach them the Dharma, for
them to realize the basis from which sicknesses arise.
What is this basis? It is object-perception . . . (45-6, my
itaiics)
Having brought the discussion back around to "object-perception" —
referred to elsewhere in the text in terms of dualism and egoism — as a
crucial factor in the fabrication of our delusions about reality, Vimalakirti
proceeds to outline "the domain of the bodhisattva" in terms that evoke
Buddha's Middle Path: "Not the domain of the ordinary individual and not
the domain of the saint, such is the domain of the bodhisattva" (47).
One of the funniest moments in the text^ follows the arrival of
Buddha, his disciples, and assorted bodhisattvas at Vimalakirti's house,
the disciples' erstwhile reluctance having been overcome by their sense
of "safety in numbers" once Manjusri ventures to visit the intimidating
instructor of the Dharma. Before the guests arrive, Vimalakirti casts a
spell on the furniture, making it invisible and setting the scene for the
following exchange:
Thereupon, the venerable Sariputra had this thought:
"There is not even a single chair in this house. Where are
these disciples and bodhisattvas going to sit?"
The Licchavi Vimalakirti read the thought of the venerable
Sariputra and said, "Reverend Sariputra, did you come
here for the sake of the Dharma? Or did you come here for
the sake of a chair?"
Sariputra replied, "I came for the sake of the Dharma, not
for the sake of a chair." (51)
Aside from the obvious humor here, and the injunction not to miss the
point of the teaching by getting distracted by concerns of protocol or
75
�personal comfort, this scene also invokes Vimalaklrti's critique of the
sravaka's sedentary approach to Dharma, predicated for the most part on
prolonged seated meditation.
Soon, there is more magical manipulation of furniture as Vimalakirti
conjures up thirty-two hundred thousand thrones, elaborately jeweled
and impossibly (forty-two thousand leagues?!) tall, from the Merudhvaja
universe. These thrones "arranged themselves without crowding" as the
house "seemed to enlarge itself accordingly;” although, the text notes,
"Everything else appeared just as it did before" (51-2). Those
bodhisattvas "who had attained the superknowledges” then magnify
themselves and sit down. When the "beginner bodhisattvas" complain
that they cannot reach such lofty seats, Vimalakirti gives them a lesson
that enables them "to attain the five superknowledges” and take their
seats, leaving only the hapless disciples of Buddha to remain, unable to
mount their thrones. Vimalakirti instructs them to bow to the Tathagata
Merupradiparaja (who sent the thrones at Vimalaklrti's telepathic
request), which does the trick, so to speak: the disciples find themselves
instantly grown to the appropriate size and seated among the others. This
initially struck me as more puzzling than the spell of invisibility
Vimalakirti cast on his household furniture; however, it makes sense in
the context of Vimalaklrti's motive for applying — and teaching — his
inconceivable liberative technique, namely to show the Dharma to those
who have not been able to see it, and to clarify it for those who have
mistaken it for something more, or less, than what it is. Just as Buddha's
tapping of his big toe to illuminate the billion-world-galactic universe
provided a momentary reminder that everything is always perfect, if only
we would see it as such, so Vimalaklrti's manipulation of the thrones
suggests that all the disciples who feel unworthy (or left out) need to do
to participate in the magic is to acknowledge its reality.
Enlightenment only happens right now, each moment, and if one is
hesitant or less than wholeheartedly present, then this is not that
moment. As long as one treats enlightenment, Buddha, or the Dharma as
if they were unreachable or magical, and this (world, body, mind, self) as
if it were real — and thus incapable of "magical” transformation — so
long will one keep oneself from "attaining” enlightenment, or
understanding Buddha, or realizing the Dharma in the present, here and
now.
Vimalaklrti's performative use of magic suggests that the failure to
achieve liberation, represented here by doubt and feelings of
unworthiness, is not as big a problem as one might think; It is not a "real”
problem, at all. Rather, it is a failure on the part of the imagination or
consciousness to let go of dualistic thinking - thinking that posits
enlightenment or the Dharma as anything other than full realization of
76
�the present moment in the present moment — which could never be
conceived of "as such," in words or ideas. This is, of course, another
demonstration of the aptness of the name of Vimalakirti 's technique:
"inconceivable.”
Enlightenment is inconceivable because of the unthinkable,
unspeakable complexity of the interdependent conditions converging in
the singular moment of liberation, which is always right now. This
inconceivability makes any discussion of past experiences, let alone past
lives, rather beside the point for any but the most qualified bodhisattvas.
The same applies to speculation about the future, especially the terms
and time-table of one's attainment of nirvana. This is not to devalue the
role of meditative practice or study of the Dharma as recorded in the Pali
canon. For these are among the means that can help one reduce one's
attachments to the point where one realizes the inconceivability of
ultimate reality. Neither practice nor study, however, can definitively
account for the experience of enlightenment; it is beyond all... (fill in the
blank).
The question that most troubles me when I consider the
simultaneous enormity and ineffability of all this — namely, how one is
supposed to feel compassion toward others in the wake of such an
inconceivable experience — is taken up in the chapter entitled, "The
Goddess":
Manjusri then asked further, "Noble sir, if a bodhisattva
considers all living beings in such a way, how does he
generate the great love [karuna] toward them?”
Vimalakirti replied, "Manjusri, when a bodhisattva
considers all living beings in this way, he thinks: Just as I
have realized the Dharma, so should 1 teach it to living
beings.” Thereby, he generates the love that is truly a
refuge for all living beings; the love that is peaceful
because free of grasping; the love that is not feverish,
because free of passion; the love that accords with reality
because it is equanimous in all three times; the love that is
without conflict because free of the violence of the
passions; the love that is nondual because it is involved
neither with the external nor the internal; the love that is
imperturbable because totally ultimate.” (57]
This kind of compassion toward others bears little resemblance to
conventional, dualistic formulae of concern — "I love you” or "I care
about your suffering” — which reveal even in their syntax the opposition
between subject and object that is reconciled in Vimalakirti's teaching.
77
�What he describes is compassion that arises out of a deep understanding
of our interdependence, and out of the awareness that suffering —
because it is not real — is unnecessary. It is not a subject's self-interested
seeking of validation from other empowered egos, nor the quid pro quo
logic of a social economy of discrete souls negotiating the daily
transactions of their alienated existences.
Soon after Vimalakirti's explication of this inconceivable compassion,
the "goddess" of the chapter's title engages in an exchange with Sariputra,
delivering another iteration of the teaching about ultimate reality (and
making a striking point about gender and equanimity, at the same time].
First, she offers this analogy:
Goddess: Although I have sought my "female state" for
these twelve years, I have not yet found it. Reverend
Sariputra, if a magician were to incarnate a woman by
magic, would you ask her, "what prevents you from
transforming yourself out of your female state?"
Sariputra: No! Such a woman would not really exist, so
what would there be to transform?
Goddess: Just so. Reverend Sariputra, all things do not
really exist. (61)
Then, after magically trading bodies with Sariputra and then trading
back, the goddess pushes him to make the connection to the broader
question of liberation, not so subtly critiquing his self-assurance
regarding nirvana in one of the text's finest (and funniest] episodes of
dialectic:
Goddess: Reverend Sariputra, what have you done with
your female form?
Sariputra: I neither made it nor did I change it.
Goddess: Just so, all things are neither made nor changed,
and that they are not made and not changed, that is the
teaching of the Buddha.
Sariputra: Goddess, where will you be born when you
transmigrate after death?
Goddess: I will be born where all the magic incarnations of
the Tathagata are born.
Sariputra: But the emanated incarnations of the Tathagata
do not transmigrate nor are they born.
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�Goddess: All things and living beings are just the same;
they do not transmigrate nor are they born!
Sariputra: Goddess, how soon will you attain the perfect
enlightenment of Buddhahood?
Goddess: At such time as you, elder, become endowed
once more with the qualities of an ordinary individual,
then will I attain the perfect enlightenment of
Buddhahood.
Sariputra: Goddess, it is impossible that I should become
endowed once more with the qualities of an ordinary
individual.
Goddess: Just so, reverend Sariputra, it is impossible that I
should attain the perfect enlightenment of Buddhahood!
Why? Because perfect enlightenment stands upon the
impossible. Because it is impossible, no one attains the
perfect enlightenment of Buddhahood. (62]
This humorous "harassment” of one bodhisattva by another highlights
the danger of conceiving of oneself as extraordinary, and underscores
once more the radical ineffability of the Dharma.
The text reaches its climax with Vimalakirti's minification of the
universe in which he attained nirvana — a sort of magic show-and-tell for
the disciples and bodhisattvas. By this point, it is hard to imagine any
attentive reader still registering surprise at the supernatural extent of his
technique. That this demonstration is another performative expression of
the "inconceivable liberation” is shown by the way the episode concludes:
While Vimalakirti, with his miraculous power, showed
them thus the universe Abhirati and the Tathagata
Aksobhya, one hundred and forty thousand living beings
among the men and gods of the Saha universe conceived
the spirit of unexcelled, perfect enlightenment, and all of
them formed a prayer to be reborn in the universe
Abhirati. And the Buddha prophesied that in the future all
would be reborn in the universe Abhirati. And the Licchavi
Vimalakirti, having thus developed all the living beings
who could thereby be developed, returned the universe
Abhirati exactly to its former place. (66]
The response of Sariputra, one of Buddha's closest disciples (and the
target of many of the text's slights of the Hinayana school], hails
Vimalakirti's prowess as a liberator and suggests a Mahayana
79
�interpretation of Buddha's legacy ("whether the Tathagata himself still
actually exists ...together with a suggestion (though there is "no need
to mention” it) of how this teaching might be applied:
We have gained great benefit from having seen a holy man
such as he. We have gained a great benefit from having
heard such teaching of the Dharma, whether the
Tathagata himself still actually exists or whether he has
already attained ultimate liberation. Hence, there is no
need to mention the great benefit for those who, having
heard it, believe it, rely on it, embrace it, remember it,
read it, and penetrate to its depth; and having found faith
in it, teach, recite, and show it to others and apply
themselves to the yoga of meditation upon its teaching.
(95)
It might be tempting to contrast the giddy sensationalism of the
Vimalaklrti text with the scientific approach found in some of the Pali
canon discourses. In the former, universes become playthings and
furniture is magically manipulated; in the latter, Buddha methodically
analyses the 12-linked chain of dependent arising and catalogs series
upon series of wholesome and unwholesome conditions and aggregates.
At the heart of both teachings, however, is the recognition of the
fundamental impermanence of everything. While he was living and
teaching the Dharma, Buddha is described as having been able to tell any
student or interlocutor just what they needed to hear to realize the Way.
Vimalaklrti demonstrates this same skill in his application of the Dharma,
exposing the rut into which the disciples' practice has fallen — a rut that
threatens any such complacent or selfish practice.
Vimalaklrti teaches that realizing the Dharma can never be reduced
to a strictly renunciative or monastic approach, for the very reduction
implies a dualistic attachment to a self that distinguishes that
particular approach as privileged or exclusive, when the truth is infinitely
more complicated — inconceivably so, in fact. Dogmatism, even when
well-intentioned or employed in the service of a method as thorough
going as Buddha's, is merely the replacement of one set of illusions with
another. Subscribing to a particular view and excluding other
perspectives establishes new, more intractable obstacles on one's path to
liberation, rather than facilitating the inconceivable insight that leads one
to see all obstacles as constructs formed by the interaction of "internal"
consciousness and "external" reality. Abandoning the dualism of a "real"
subject trying to find its way in a "real" world, one is free to become a
participant in the reality of what is happening right now.
80
�Was Vimalakirti a real historical person, like Siddhartha Gautama, or
simply a fictional character created to revitalize the Dharma and reclaim
the radical message of the latter's teachings? I certainly do not know, but
as people often say about a pivotal figure in history, if he did not exist,
someone would have had to invent him. Somehow, perhaps through the
inevitable sedimentation and erosion that affects any tradition in the
course of time, in the wake of Buddha's death the Dharma as he taught it
was reduced to a shadow, if not a caricature, of itself as it was codified
and passed on from one generation of seekers to the next, thus,
cementing certain formal aspects of Buddhist practice and investing
authority in hierarchical institutions that exercised dogmatic supervision.
Whereas the living Buddha could teach the Dharma effectively to any
audience, be they bhiksus, bodhisattvas, or laypeople, after his death that
unlimited flexibility was lost as the method became enshrined, fixed in
the minds of monastic followers as limited strictly to the original Dharma
lessons. Distinctions which Buddha may have employed merely "for the
sake of discourse" — literally, as expedient means to facilitate the
liberation of other living beings — came to be taken as strict divisions
between the different ways in which one could undertake to learn the
Dharma, as if only one special school of magicians could ever learn the
trick, or only one decoder ring could crack the code.
Vimalakirti demonstrates that in a world of make-believe, we are all
participants in the magic, and the open secret is that we only suffer and
inflict suffering on others when we forget that fundamental truth.
Enlightenment — the realization this very moment that everything is
impermanent and interdependent — can be thought of as the state of
being "in on the secret.” Whether one learns a secret quickly or only finds
it out after being "in the dark” for a long time, the dawning of awareness
cannot really be said to happen by itself, because so many variables
necessarily are involved. This is the implication of Buddha's doctrine of
dependent arising. The process whereby one is liberated from one's
attachments is always co-determined by a myriad of internal factors and
external circumstances, so it does not really happen spontaneously or
"out of the blue.” One can surely say, however, that it happens "as if by
magic,” because it can never be explained in rational terms.
By revealing the magical nature of ultimate reality, Vimalakirti does
not undermine Buddha's original Dharma, but deconstructs it and
restores its original power to liberate beings from suffering through the
abandonment of views and the breaking of attachments. His upbraiding
of Buddha's disciples, illuminating the gulf between their sedentary,
intellectualized practice and the engaged compassion of a true
bodhisattva, is a reminder to all seekers of enlightenment not to take
81
�themselves, or their inherently limited conceptual notions of the Dharma,
too seriously.
Concepts and language can never encompass, penetrate or explain
ultimate reality. Thus, they must be used provisionally without insistence
upon some essential connection between ideas or words, on the one
hand, and reality, on the other. Such an insistent, dogmatic approach to
Dharma, philosophy or the routines and habits of daily life — the belief
that reality can be definitively known and that application of such
definitive knowledge can be applied to achieve concrete results — is
doomed from the moment an autonomous subject is posited. This belief
necessitates the post facto construction of processes and causal
relationships to attempt to account for an inconceivably profound reality
that is far more integral, more intricately interconnected, than we can
ever imagine. Vimalakirti's insight into the tenuous relationship between
thought, language and reality, foreshadows the post-modern
"hermeneutical turn" epitomized by the writings of Husserl, Heidegger,
Derrida and Deleuze, among other "Western" thinkers, and reminds us
that in the face of the ineffability of the things themselves — the magical
inconceivability of it all — it is wiser to proceed with a sense of wonder
(or, at least, respect) than with a set of solipsistic prejudices, be they
psychological or metaphysical.
In the text's final chapter, "The Dharma-Door of Non-Duality," after
the bodhisattvas have expounded on a myriad of seeming oppositions
that are overcome when seen from a non-dual perspective, crown prince
Manjusri is asked to give his version of the teaching; he gently chides the
bodhisattvas for missing the point — again — then offers his own
succinct definition of nonduality before deferring to Vimalakirti for
further elucidation:
Manjusri replied, "Good sirs, you have all spoken well.
Nevertheless, all your explanations are themselves
dualistic. To know no one teaching, to express nothing, to
say nothing, to explain nothing, to announce nothing, to
indicate nothing, and to designate nothing — that is the
entrance into nonduality."
Then the crown prince Manjusri said to the Licchavi
Vimalakirti: "We have all given our own teachings, noble
sir. Now, may you elucidate the teaching of the entrance
into the principle of nonduality!"
Thereupon, the Licchavi Vimalakirti kept his silence,
saying nothing at all.
82
�The crown prince Manjusri applauded the Liccavi
VimalakTrti: "Excellent! Excellent, noble sir! This is indeed
the entrance into the nonduality of the bodhisattvas. Here
there is no use for syllables, sounds, and ideas.” (77]
Taking my cue from Vimalakirti's silence and from the five thousand
bodhisattvas who, having witnessed it, "entered the door of the Dharma
of nonduality and attained tolerance of the birthlessness of things,” I will
conclude the essay here, leaving the Dharma-door open, as it were, to
further interpretation, assenting to VimalakTrti's inconceivable logic by
not saying anything more.
Endnotes
1. "It out-Herod's Herod. Pray you, avoid it." -Hamlet (III,ii,14-15). William
Shakespeare, Hamlet, in The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works, (Thomson Learning:
2007), 311.
2. Cited in seminar by Mr. Franks.
Primary Text
Thurman, Robert A. F., trans. The Holy Teaching of VimalakTrti
(Vimalakirti Sutra]. Pennsylvania University Press: 1976.
�The Problem of Pederasty in Plato's Phaedrus
John Hungerford
In Plato’s Phaedrus Socrates gives two speeches, each providing an
account of erotic love. These two speeches appear to be opposites, and in
fact Socrates presents the second (Palinode] as a correction of the first. It
is tempting to interpret the first speech simply as a rhetorical
demonstration by Socrates which requires repair by the second speech.
However, a close look at the first speech reveals that it is in fact a
necessary complement to the second speech. This paper will examine in
detail the second half of this first speech, in which Socrates lays out the
reasons why a boy should not gratify a lover. In doing so, this paper will
attempt to gain some insight into the concerns of the lover and the
beloved regarding erotic relationships.
Socrates begins the second part of his speech with the suggestion
that since the definition of love has been stated, we should now look at
the benefit and harm produced by gratifying the lover or non-lover. It is
worth noting that the earlier criteria for an appropriate definition of love
were "what kind of thing it is” and "what powers it has" (237d]. Socrates
has met at least the first of these criteria by defining love as a certain kind
of desire, but it is not clear exactly what its powers are. In fact, it seems
that by enumerating the benefits and harms produced by gratification, we
will gain some sense of its power, but then why does Socrates claim that
the definition is already adequately set down?
One possible answer to this question is that in defining Eros as a
desire which "masters opinion striving toward what's correct,” Socrates
meant us to regard this as its power. It is worth noting that Socrates does
not say that it overcomes opinion aiming at the "best” as he had phrased
it in his account of moderation, but instead uses the Greek word to opdov,
suggesting a more conventional concern. Perhaps love's power (or at
least, the power it might have that would be of interest to the
philosopher] is its ability to "conquer” conventional opinion. It is also
worth noting that Socrates identifies the desire for beautiful bodies as the
source of this power, regardless of whether or not love is at bottom
directed toward the beautiful as such.
In applying this definition to the question of gratification, Socrates
observes that "one ruled by desire and a slave to pleasure must... make
preparations for the beloved to be as pleasant as possible” (238e]. This
statement becomes the basis for his whole account of the lover’s actions
in relation to his boyfriend. While this makes sense given love's
definition, this characterization of the lover overlooks the earlier
ambiguity regarding the object of love’s desire. We recall that there are at
84
�least two kinds of desire attributed to the lover: the desire for the
pleasure of beauty, and the desire for beautiful bodies. It is not clear
which of these will be his priority in dealing with the beloved, and
depending on which the priority is, his behavior might be very different.
In fact, from the definition, it seems that love is directed primarily
toward beauty itself [or the pleasure of beauty). We recall that this
definition ultimately amounted to "desire without reason which masters
the opinion striving toward what’s correct and is led toward the pleasure
of beauty, and which, in turn mightily gaining strength from desires that
are akin to itself toward the beauty of bodies, conquers in its leading"
(238b-c). As such, the lover in the strictest sense of the word would try to
get as close as possible to beauty understood this way. The fact that love
gains its "might" from the secondary desire for beautiful bodies suggests,
however, that such desires would likely play some role in even the purest
of lovers. As such, we should expect the inclinations of the lover to be
somewhat mixed. While he might be more or less concerned with
pleasures of the body, we should also wonder if he might have a deeper
concern for beauty that would prevent him from simply seeking sexual
pleasure from the beloved.
Socrates' first claim in his account of the benefit and harm of Erotic
love is that "to a sick person, everything that does not resist is pleasant,
while what is stronger or equal is hateful." Socrates seems to appeal to
the terms Phaedrus has set for Socrates' speech: "I shall grant you to set
down the lover's being more sick than the nonlover" [236b). It is
important to recognize however, that Socrates himself never endorses
this opinion. Phaedrus’ concession was actually in response to a very
different observation by Socrates: "who, do you suppose, saying that one
must gratify the nonlover rather than the lover, would pass over lauding
the one's prudence and blaming the other's folly?" [235e-236a). While
Socrates is willing to demonstrate the lover’s folly, it is not clear that he
means the lover is necessarily sick, as Phaedrus assumed. We should
therefore wonder, regarding Socrates’ claim in his speech, whether there
might not be a healthy sort of lover, and what he might be like. More
specifically, we should wonder whether a lover might be willing to
endure, or perhaps sometimes even prefer resistance.
Taking into account these last two considerations [first, that the
pleasure sought by the lover might be that of beauty itself and not
necessarily sexual, and second, that the lover might not be sick and
therefore might be willing to tolerate resistance), we end up having
multiple possibilities to consider in the course of the argument. On the
surface, it seems we are meant to assume a sick lover whose concern is
for getting sexual gratification as easily as possible. Underneath this.
85
�however, we must consider the possibility of a healthy lover concerned
with the beautiful as such, and what his relation to the beloved might be.i
This possibility becomes immediately relevant to his argument. In
enumerating the consequences of these premises, Socrates begins with
the effect the lover will have on the boy's intellect. He lists a number of
weaknesses which he argues will make the beloved easier to catch. The
lover, he claims, will want his boy to be unlearned, cowardly, incapable of
speaking, and slow of wit. While it is possible that all of these will help the
lover catch the boy, we have to wonder whether some part of the boy’s
attractiveness is sacrificed in this. The argument only makes sense for the
lover if he is merely concerned with the pleasure of the boy's body. As we
have seen, however, it is not clear that this is the lover’s only concern; in
fact, it might not even be the essential concern of Eros.
Socrates’ expansion of this to the cultivation of the beloved’s soul has
a similar problem. Socrates claims that the lover will do everything to
keep the beloved away from beneficial associations because he is "afraid
of being despised” (239b]. The most beneficial of these he identifies as
that which enables him to become a philosopher. This argument seems
relevant only to those lovers who risk being despised by boys with
intelligence. In other words, it is the lovers who do not deserve lovers
that run this risk.
This is very likely a concern for any lover with a realistic degree of
insecurity. However, it also ignores an important possibility: namely, that
some lovers might be concerned with deserving the affection of the boy.
Such a concern might encourage the lover to improve himself, and might
also cause him to be attracted to more intelligent boys whose affection
would be more valuable to him. Despite this possibility, we must admit
that regardless of the caliber of the lover, it remains a problem that as
long as the lover is concerned with having the boy as his boyfriend, it is
unlikely that he would want the boy to become better than himself if the
boy would lose interest as a result. This seems to indicate a basic problem
with love and friendship, and a limit to the possibility of goodwill.^ The
resolution of this problem seems only possible if the lover is the best
possible, or if the lover’s relationship with the boy is not his primary
concern.
The problem with the sick lover becomes more pronounced when
Socrates considers his attitude toward the beloved’s body. Here Socrates
observes that the lover, wanting his beloved to be as pleasant as possible,
will seek a boy who is "soft and not solid, reared not in pure sunlight but
under mixed shade, inexperienced in manly toils and hard sweat but
experienced in a delicate and unmanly way of life, adorned with alien
colors and ornaments for want of his own, practicing all the other things
that follow from this” (239c]. As with the case of the intellectual virtues,
86
�we might wonder whether the lover might not want his beloved to have a
physique which reflects strength or fitness of some kind. We might expect
manlier qualities to be attractive to the lover.
Socrates brings our attention to this possibility when he points out
that a soft and feminine boy would wear "alien colors and ornaments for
want of his own," suggesting that the cultivation of the body in manly
pursuits might produce its own sort of decoration. This consideration,
however, is complicated by the fact that the lover is drawn to younger
boys, typically before the manlier features of their bodies become
prominent (e.g. when a beard first begins to appear, but before it
becomes dark and thick). It seems that Greek lovers were drawn to boys
when they were softer and more feminine in appearance. However, if it
were simply a "feminine” beauty that they were drawn to, why did they
fall in love with boys and not girls — or why adolescent rather than pre
adolescent boys?
Perhaps pederasty itself speaks to a certain tension in one's
understanding of the beautiful. Lovers of boys must have been attracted
to the soft and delicate sort of beauty we might associate with the
feminine, but they are nevertheless drawn toward a masculine
embodiment of it. If this is the case, we must suppose that their interest in
boys is not derived entirely from the body. By bringing our attention to
these two different standards of the fitness of the body, we are lead to
wonder whether the concern for beautiful bodies is as simple as we might
have assumed: It seems that the beauty sought in pederasty must be
more than concern for physical beauty, and that some concern for the
soul of the beloved must be present.
Socrates expands his discussion of the cultivation of the body with
his final observation that the body preferred by the lover in question (and
we must ask whether this speaks for all lovers) will be particularly
unsuited to help the beloved’s city, friends, and lovers in war or other
times of need. By reminding us of the utility of a manly sort of body in the
polis, Socrates brings our attention to a conventional dimension of
aesthetics. While Socrates raises this consideration as though it were
secondary, we have to wonder whether at least part of the preference for
tough, rugged, and otherwise manly appearances comes from the fact
that it is necessary for the city's protection (and perhaps often for the
private family’s protection) to have such men around. In other words, it
seems that some aspect of the beautiful might come from a concern for
utility, or for the good; what role such concerns play in our experience of
the beautiful, however, is not entirely clear.
After looking at the harm that will befall the beloved’s body under
the supervision of the lover, Socrates turns the discussion toward the
boy’s possessions. Socrates does not begin with the possessions as we
87
�might understand them; i.e., such as property and wealth. Instead, he
insists that "the lover would pray above all that the beloved be bereft of
the most friendly, best-disposed, and most divine possessions; for he
would accept the beloved’s being deprived of father, mother, kin, and
friends, considering them hinderers and censors of the most pleasant
intercourse with him” (239e-240a3.
Socrates’ next claim regarding the boy’s possessions is that the lover
will desire that the boy be deprived of a wealthy estate, as it would not
make him easy "to catch, nor, when caught, as easily manageable” (240a).
Socrates does not explain, however, why being wealthy would make the
boy more difficult to catch. The most obvious possibility is that the boy
would have no need of the lover if he were already rich. This suggestion,
however, only applies if the boy’s only interest in the lover is for gain.
There are suggestions in both this speech and in Lysias’s that perhaps the
boy is willing to gratify the lover simply for some kind of material benefit.
In the Palinode, however, Socrates suggests that the boy’s attraction to
the lover is finally an Erotic one, but simply of a different sort. We have to
wonder, then, whether boy’s wealth is a necessary consideration for
lover.
The Palinode therefore opens up the question of whether there
might be a pederastic relationship which is not simply the trading of sex
for gain, and whether a boy might love the lover in return regardless of
the lover’s ability to provide for him.^ If Socrates’ account in the Palinode
is accurate, it might even be the case that most (or perhaps even all)
pederastic relationships are like this to some extent. In this case we must
wonder why the lover needs to be concerned with the possessions of the
boy at all. In the Symposium, for instance, we hear an account of
Alcibiades — a beautiful, wealthy, aristocrat — availing himself for
Socrates, who has not a penny.^
Socrates finally points out that not only would the lover want the
beloved to lose his parents, siblings, friends, and fortune, but he would
also want him to remain unwed, childless and without a household of his
own. In considering the possessions of the boy, it is interesting that
Socrates focuses to such an extent on the household and the family. On
the one hand, this entails a more sophisticated understanding of
possessions, insofar as it correctly identifies human relationships as the
most important possessions; however, it also makes us wonder about
how the Erotic relationship might compare to these. In the Palinode,
Socrates points out that the reason the boy becomes attracted to the lover
is that he sees in the lover a devotion that surpasses that of any of his
friends or relatives (255b). The first speech assumes that the "most
friendly, best disposed, and most divine possessions” are one’s family and
friends (239e-240a). The Palinode, on the other hand, raises the
88
�possibility that perhaps pulling the boy away from the family is not such a
bad thing; that is, if the philosophic way of life is as good as Socrates'
account suggests. Socrates’ own life suggests that this discussion of the
beloved’s possessions does not reflect his own priorities; he was
notoriously poor, uninterested in his own family, and despised for taking
boys away from theirs.^
Furthermore, Socrates considers another factor regarding the
benefits and harms of the lover. His treatment of the matter suggests that
pederasty is not only a problem for the beloved, but perhaps also a
political problem for the city. In Socrates’ account, the lover tears boys
away from their families, prevents them from being useful to the city
(namely discourages them from military virtue], and prevents them from
starting families of their own. While this might happen to some extent
with lovers themselves, there is evidence that, in practice, pederasty was
able to coexist with the city’s political life, and perhaps even encourage
civic and military virtue.®
On the other hand, Socrates’ own relationship with boys seems
representative of the political complications indicated in this passage.
Philosophy, if anything, seems to draw men away from the concerns of
the city. Philosophers were notorious for avoiding the important business
of the city and were considered indolent. Alcibiades left Socrates because
he was afraid of spending his life in idleness.^ We have to wonder if a
philosophical relationship would not be more likely to produce the soft
body which is scorned in this speech, or produce the kind of man who is
useless in times of political need. Considered this way, perhaps this first
speech reveals a side of philosophical Eros not considered in the
Palinode; namely, that it may be in tension with the needs of the city.®
Socrates continues to criticize pederasty on the grounds that "one of
the same age delights another,” arguing that the difference in age will
make for an unpleasant friendship (240c]. It is clear that older men and
boys do not tend to become friends, and without some ulterior
motivation, most people are not interested in spending time with those
well outside their age range. We must wonder how lovers and beloveds
tend to spend their time. What activities do they enjoy together? To what
degree can. they sympathize with one another, or share common
concerns? We must think that friendships among those of the same age
can allow for a satisfaction that is difficult for those very different in age.
Socrates, however, somewhat undermines this notion by explaining
the reason behind the age difference. It is not age in itself, he points out,
but rather the dissimilarity that goes along with age that is the problem
for friendship. It is merely that equal time lived leads to "equal pleasures
through similarity" (240c]. This does not rule out the possibility,
however, of equal pleasures through similarity without equal time. It
89
�seems instead merely to explain why equal pleasures tend to occur with
equal time. In the Palinode, for instance, Socrates indicates that the boy
and the lover are able to enjoy philosophy together.
In fact, Socrates’ argument might even provide an explanation for
why an older man would need to look for young boys for friendship. If
similarity is necessary for friendship (namely, similar desires for similar
pleasures), a man who has uncommon desires might be lonely among
men his own age. Such a man might have to find young men whom he can
educate in such a way that they will share his preferences. This might
characterize to some extent the situation in which a man like Socrates has
found himself. Given that philosophy (as a way of life) was held in
contempt by most and regarded with indifference by the rest, Socrates
would have to look to the young to find companions in his quest for
wisdom. Older men would have been too set in their ways to turn to
philosophy.
While this may be an appealing prospect to a philosopher, it is not
clear that it is entirely satisfactory for an erotic lover. Pederasty seems to
have an unavoidable asymmetry; namely, with regards to the pleasure
derived from such a relationship. While the lover enjoys beholding his
beloved and derives sexual gratification from him, it is unclear what
satisfaction the beloved derives from his lover. We have seen evidence
that the beloved was understood to benefit in more conventional ways by
the lover. If this is the case, however, there seems to be an enormous gulf
between their respective enjoyment. It then begs the question, whether
the lover would be entirely satisfied with such a relationship; it is likely
that the lover would prefer his beloved to return a love with the same
depth of feeling. It is likely that the lover would want a beloved who
derives satisfaction in the same way as he himself does.
In his comparison of an erotic relationship and friendship, Socrates
observes that even friendship among equals has its satiety. In this notion
we see the excessive character of Eros; the lover is unable or unwilling to
rest from his attentions to the beloved. This is an important consideration
with the Palinode in mind; the Palinode includes satiety in its vision of the
divine. Socrates' portrays the Gods moving in a continuing circle in the
heavens, periodically feasting on the sight of the true beings, only to
return home to rest and feed their horses (247c-e). This divine way of life
(if it can be called life) for the Gods has a very different character than the
life sought by an erotic type who dreams of a perfect motionless
satisfaction. In contrast to Eros, the satiety of friendship is not so much a
problem. As seen in the Palinode, one takes nourishment from friendly
intercourse and then rests. Erotic love, however, is disappointed in
gratification insofar as it destroys the hopes for a more complete
contentment.
90
�After arguing for the inferiority of pederasty to friendship between
equals, Socrates proceeds to criticize it on the grounds that "the lover in
relation to the boy" is most of all characterized by compulsion, which "is
said ... to be grievous to everyone" (240c-d). The lover, Socrates tells us,
"is driven by necessity and frenzy" in his attentions to the boy. It is
interesting to note that this argument seems to apply exclusively to the
lover, who is presented as a slave to his passion, whereas compulsion is
not mentioned at all with respect to the boy. While there has been
evidence that the lover’s behavior is unpleasant to others, we might
wonder whether being enslaved to his love might not be most grievous to
himself. This consideration brings into light an aspect of this speech that
has been somewhat tacit until this point: Socrates’ speech is as much
directed toward the lover as it is to the boy.
Socrates then asks, "But as for the beloved, by giving what
exhortation or what pleasures can the frenzy cause him, associating with
the lover for the same time, not to reach the utmost point of
unpleasantness?" (240d). While we might imagine the attentions of the
lover could be pleasant, assuming he is able to serve his beloved well,
Socrates introduces a curious twist when he asks what "exhortation"
might make the time pleasant for the beloved. After all, an exhortation is
not the first thing that comes to mind when one imagines pleasant
pastimes. By introducing this unexpected suggestion, Socrates perhaps
means for us to ask whether it is simply the pleasure or the benefits of
having a dedicated servant that might appeal to the beloved. We recall,
for instance, that it was Socrates’ speeches that drew Alcibiades to
Socrates. Alcibiades seemed to see something in Socrates that was both
beautiful and good, and sensed he could benefit in some important way
by associating with Socrates. This question presents something of a
challenge to the lovers who are listening to Socrates’ speech. It suggest
that perhaps exhortations are the way to the a boy’s heart.^
Socrates’ account of the unpleasantness of the lover reaches its
climax with a subtle but compelling reference to the sex act: "he [the
beloved] sees an older face, and not in the bloom of youth, with the other
things that follow along with this, which are not delightful to even hear in
speech, not to mention the ever-pressing necessity to manage them even
in deed" (240d-e]. This is the first time the sexual act is brought to our
attention, and it is addressed as from the perspective of the boy. This is a
very important admission in the speech insofar as it reveals that Socrates’
speech cannot have the same goal as Lysias’s [as was initially claimed).
Lysias’s speech was meant to convince the boy to gratify a nonlover; it
never brings the boy’s attention to the unpleasant nature of sex. By
addressing the unpleasant aspects of sex itself, Socrates extends his
argument past the bounds of Lysias’s parameters: perhaps the boy should
91
�not gratify any man at all. This short passage also reinforces the problem
of asymmetry. According to Socrates, friendship consists of equality of
pleasures, and we have begun to wonder how satisfied either party
(especially the lover, who likely has more invested in the relationship
than the boy] could be with such vast differences in their enjoyments. The
sex act seems to be the extreme example of this: it is in gratification that
the lover is most pleased, and yet for the beloved it is unpleasant. Not
only would bringing this up remind the beloved how undesirable erotic
love is, but we have to imagine that it would also remind the lover how
one-sided his sexual enjoyment is.
Following this brief and veiled reminder of the sex act, Socrates
brings our attention to the jealousy of the lover. While this jealousy is
certainly unpleasant to the beloved, it also speaks to the insecurity of the
lover. If the only tie unifying the boy with the lover is the benefit he
stands to gain, it seems unlikely that he would remain loyal. Therefore,
what assurance does such a lover ever have of his beloved’s faithfulness?
This concern seems to be as much a problem for the lover as for the
beloved. We also have to wonder, however, how this looks to the beloved.
Socrates depicts the lover as keeping the boy "under guard with guards
that spy out evil all the time” (240e]. This suggests that the lover will see
evil when there is none, or at the very least: what the lover may recognize
as evil will not appear as such to the beloved. However, it might also be
that the beloved sees the lover as protecting him in some way.
Furthermore, it may perhaps be by some such manipulation that the
lover is able to "manage" his beloved.
Socrates’ final observation on the matter of asymmetry is that the
beloved is forced to account for the lover’s "untimely and excessive
praises” in addition to "reproaches that are not bearable when the lover
is sober, but when he has gotten into strong drink, shameful in addition”
(240e]. As was indicated earlier in the speech, Socrates suggests that
lovers tend to be bad flatterers. Rather than using praise effectively, they
are often carried away, and thus embarrass the object of their love. In the
"unbearable” reproaches the lover seems to suffer a certain internal
tension. It is telling that Socrates only associates reproaches with the
lover’s drunken state. Perhaps when the lover is feeling uncommonly
honestio he is more inclined to complain than to praise. This would
indicate dissatisfaction in the lover additionally; perhaps the boy is
unable to satisfy him in some way.
The remainder of the speech is an account of the problems that arise
after the affair has ended. Like Lysias, Socrates highlights the inability
and unwillingness of the lover to carry out all his promises. Socrates
claims at this point that it was through "many promises with many oaths
and bonds" that the lover "barely effectuated” the beloved’s toleration
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�throughout their unpleasant time together (240e-241a). This admission
casts the entire relationship in a very ugly light. It seems that it was an
altogether mercenary arrangement — prostitution, even. It is worth
noting, however, that the kinds of promises themselves are unstated. It is
not clear, for instance, what value these promises had for the beloved.
The promises themselves might have been appealing on the grounds that
they were evidence of the lover's devotion. Understood this way, perhaps
the breach of these promises is itself a danger to the beloved because it
reveals the ‘devotion’ of the lover for what it really was: a passing fancy.
Socrates concludes his account with the following passage:
one should never gratify the lover who is of necessity
mindless, but much rather the nonlover who has
intelligence; if not, one must of necessity give oneself up
to someone untrustworthy, disagreeable, jealous,
unpleasant, and harmful as regards property, harmful as
regards the body's condition, and by far the most harmful
as regards the soul’s education. (241b-c]
Socrates’ conclusion, however, is clearly overstated. While he has made a
strong case for not gratifying the lover, it does not by any means follow
that he should gratify the nonlover. It is somewhat comic that Socrates
presents these alternatives as a "necessity.”
This claim brings our attention once again to the question of the
boy’s motivation. While the whole business of gratification seems at this
point an entirely fruitless enterprise, Socrates’ continues as if it were
obvious that the boy is going to have to gratify someone. We have to
consider in addition that whatever the lover provides, there is no reason
to expect the nonlover to do better. Assuming there was some reason the
nonlover wanted gratification (a strange suggestion, considering he is not
a lover) he would not be inclined to give much to get it. Even if he were,
he would not be willing to make promises he was not in a position to
keep; according to Socrates, however, such promises are necessary to get
the beloved to put up with you. Finally, while the lover would perhaps not
be interested in making the boy as good as possible (if this makes him
inaccessible as a sex partner), the nonlover would not take any interest in
the boy’s education; what reason would he have to?
Socrates' final comment is that "the friendship of a lover does not
come into being with goodwill, but in the manner of food, for the sake of
repletion, as wolves cherish lambs, so do lovers love boys" (241c-d).
While this final grim characterization of Eros is in stark contrast with the
divine picture we get in the Palinode, it is worth pointing out that in
neither speech is goodwill an essential part of Socrates’ presentation of
Eros. In both speeches the lover is said to serve the beloved; in this
93
�speech it is suggested he does not do so very well, while in the Palinode
he is thereby able to win the love of the boy. In both speeches, however,
Eros does not direct the lover principally toward the benefit of the
beloved. In this speech, love seems to aim primarily at gaining physical
gratification from the beloved, whereas in the Palinode, it aims at the
form of beauty itself and the philosophic way of life. The key difference, it
seems, is that the latter are ends that are able to be shared by the two
parties, whereas in the former, one party simply serves to nourish the
other.ii
Phaedrus is keenly aware of the inadequacy of Socrates' conclusion,
saying to Socrates, "But 1 supposed it was in the middle, and would say
equal things about the nonlover, how one ought rather to gratify him,
telling in turn what good things he has” (241d). To this Socrates
responds, "In one phrase, I say that whatever things we reviled in the one,
the good things opposite to these belong to the other. And what need for a
long speech? For what has been said about both is sufficient” (241e). This
response is curious and important for a couple of reasons. Firstly,
Socrates had earlier claimed when formulating the definition of love that
"what is stated is altogether clearer than what is unstated” (238b]. In fact,
when he finally stated the definition of love, it turned out to be very
different than what we would have assumed given what had been laid
out. Given this earlier admission, it is likely that Socrates means for us to
question his claim that "what has been said about both is sufficient.”
Secondly, it is not at all obvious how to formulate the "opposite” of
what has been said about the lover. For instance, is the nonlover going to
be beautiful and in the bloom of his youth, and a pleasure to look upon?
Will the act of sex be any less unspeakable when it is with him? Perhaps
more importantly, it is not clear how to invert Socrates' definition of the
lover, namely because it has two parts: the excessive desire for the
pleasure of beauty as well as the excessive desire for the beauty of bodies.
If we get rid of just one of these, will he still be a lover, or would we have
to reverse both?
It is clear that we cannot get rid of both; if this were the case, the
nonlover would have no interest in the youth. If the nonlover were only
interested in the beauty of bodies, however (and if this were essentially a
sexual desire], then Socrates would be in a very difficult position; his
speech against gratifying the lover would put the boy off of sex all
together! The only alternative that seems possible, is that Socrates'
nonlover is not directed toward sex at all, but is more concerned with
beauty itself.
This alternative, however, is not really altogether an alternative to
love; in fact, Socrates' definition of love suggested that the desire for
beauty itself is what is essential to love, and that the physical component
94
�merely strengthened this. Given this consideration, Socrates’ "nonlover"
might really be the "lover” in the most complete sense of the word,
insofar as he directs himself toward the true end of Eros. In this light, we
can look at the Palinode as a completion of the first speech rather than
simply a correction of it: to gratify the nonlover in the first speech, is to
gratify the lover in the second.
In fact, if we look at the Palinode, we see it addresses many of the
problems presented here. The Palinode offers the possibility of a love that
can be reciprocated between the lover and beloved; the beloved is led to
experience the same (if somewhat less intense) erotic encounter with
beauty in the lover. Rather than seeking gratification from one another,
the two live a life directed away from themselves (aiming toward true
beauty) which they can share and presumably enjoy together. It is
important to note that in this, Socrates has altered Eros in an important
way. He uses the power of the erotic experience to build a kind of
friendship. It is likely that Eros does not naturally lead to such a
friendship, but rather leads to the problematic sexual relationship
depicted by Socrates’ first speech and Lysias’s speech. Socrates’ solution
requires a transformation of Eros, and an important aspect of this
transformation seems to be the suppression of sexual activity.
It is interesting to note that Lysias’s speech also offers a solution to
the problems identified in both his own speech and in Socrates’ first
speech. Lysias’s solution is almost a mirror image of Socrates’. That is,
rather than suppressing the sexual side of the erotic relationship and
creating a friendship out of the shared pursuit of the beautiful, Lysias
suppresses the higher concerns of the Erotic drives and seeks to create a
subdued sexual partnership. Lysias’s solution would no doubt appeal to
those lovers who have suffered from some of the uglier consequences of
Eros. Socrates’ Palinode, on the other hand, uses poetry to awaken the
Erotic man’s concern for the "higher" side of the beautiful. His two
speeches might also appeal to a frustrated lover. He asks the lover to
remember that it is not just the body of the beloved that is calling to him,
but something beyond it. It is this call, according to Socrates, that leads
men to the life of philosophy.
Endnotes
1. I ignore here two other possibilities: a healthy lover concerned with beautiful
bodies, and a sick lover concerned with the beautiful as such. The former might describe
the "nonlover" of Lysias's speech, who is able to moderately maintain a [presumably)
sexual relationship with a boy. The latter might be described as an immoderate concern
for the beautiful. For evidence that such a "high" concern might be immoderate, see 230a,
in which Socrates claims to not have concluded yet whether he is "multiply twisted" like
the monster Typhon, or is of a gentle and divine nature.
95
�2. See Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. Joe Sachs (Newburyport: Focus, 2002),
1158b30-1159al5.
3. Even here we must be careful — in the Palinode the beloved's love in return is only
made possible by the extreme devotion of the lover. We have to wonder if a lover lacking
the means to provide for the needs and wants of the beloved would be in a position to
demonstrate such a devotion.
4. Plato, Symposium, trans. Seth Benardete [Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
2001), 218c-d, 219b-d.
5. Diogenes Laertius, The Life of Socrates; See also: Aristophanes, Clouds.
6. Plato, Symposium, 178c-179b, 182b-e.
7. Plato, Symposium, 178c-179b, 216a.
8. Gorgias, 284c-e.
9. Plato, Symposium, 178c-179b, 215d-216a; see also Plato, Lysis, trans. David Bolotin
[Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1979), 205e-206d.
10. Plato, Symposium, 178c-179b, 218b-219d: Alcibiades is willing to tell his shameful
attempt at Socrates to a party of fellow Athenians when drunk.
11. See Plato, Symposium, 178c-179b, 189c-193e: Aristophanes offers an
interpretation of Eros which would allow for a goodwill which is absent here, in that the
beloved is regarded as a part of tbe lover. Even in this case, however, we might ask
whether the lover’s concern might not be for the well-being of the beloved himself, but is
rather for the healing of his [or their) inherited wound.
Primary Text
Plato. Phaedrus. Translated by James H. Nichols Jr. Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1998.
96
�The Unmentioned Standing Reserve
Caitlin McShea
Martin Heidegger expresses an alternative view of the human
relationship to technology in his piece The Question Concerning
Technology. In his essay Heidegger outlines how humanity’s perception of
the world is characterized by the Enframing power behind technology.
He explains that the modern understanding of technology (that is
instrumentality) has lead to a profound preference for scientific
knowledge of the world, and consequently, nature no longer reveals itself
to humanity in an artistic way, but rather as a standing reserve, meant to
be called upon for use. This essay will apply a feminist perspective to
Heidegger’s standing reserve and Enframing power. Specifically, this
essay will discuss how scientific domination, as a product of instrumental
technology, paved the way for Capitalistic and Patriarchal domination of
women and nature. In doing so, the exploitation of both nature and
women could conceivably be explained by the presence of scientific
domination, capitalism, and patriarchy as Enframing powers motivating
men towards the preservation of said standing reserves.
In The Question Concerning Technology, Heidegger explores the
ways in which the conventional definition of technology has changed in
the face of modernity. What we refer to as technology is more accurately
defined as instrumentality, and furthermore this modern alteration of
technology’s true definition has led to a gross misrepresentation of the
world. Additionally, the modern interpretation of technology’s essence is
responsible for the warped and strained nature of humanity’s
relationship with technology. In his essay, Heidegger focuses on the
origin of technology, outlines the process by which modern technology is
understood today, and expresses a hope that humanity might revert back
to a truer form of technology that would lead to a truer understanding of
the world, and a healthier, "free relationship” with technology.
To start, Heidegger states "the essence of technology is by no
means anything technological" (4), and begins a historical account of the
origins of the definition of technology. He asserts that our idea of
instrumentality stems from an ancient philosophical question of
causality, and so continues to explore the inherent problems of causal
thought with the use of a silver chalice as his example. Here, he also
begins to provide etymological evidence for his arguments as he will
continue to do throughout this rest of this essay. He notes that though the
four causes are frequently ascribed to Aristotle, the Greek word causa
that Aristotle used more accurately means "that which brings it about
that something falls out as a result in such and such a way . . . that to
97
�which something is indebted” (7), or that causa implies a responsibility,
and did not mean then what we attribute cause to mean today.
Therefore, our modern interpretations of cause, which have justified our
methods of instrumentality, were made in error. That aside, Heidegger
explains that the chalice is made from silver, by a silversmith, and created
with the intent to be used. The chalice is a chalice and only a chalice, it is
not a wine glass or a bowl, and it exhibits the essence of a chalice, i.e., its
"chaliceness.” In this way, Heidegger makes the point that technology is
founded on "revealing” because the silversmith works the silver in order
to reveal the essence of the chalice. Here is where the distinction between
cause and responsibility is made. Heidegger does not want to attribute
the silver to the material cause or the silversmith to the efficient cause.
Instead he demonstrates the ways in which the chalice is indebted to both
the silver and the silversmith. The silver is responsible for the
composition of the chalice, while the silversmith is responsible for the
shape of the chalice.
The silversmith fired, molded, and formed the chalice in order to
reveal its true essence. The idea is that the chalice always existed within
the silver, but the silversmith is responsible for bringing the chalice into
existence by revealing it and allowing its presence. Heidegger mentions
that our word "technology” stems from the Greek word technikon, or that
"which belongs to techne . . . [which] mean[s] to be entirely at home in
something, to understand and be expert in it. . . Such knowing provides
an opening up . . . [i.e.,] a revealing” (13). So, our "technology” can be
traced back to an early idea of technique, or expertise. When applied to
the chalice example, Heidegger would say that the silversmith’s
technique, his proficiency with silver, revealed the chalice within the
silver. The technique employed is responsible for the finished Chalice. It
is fitting then that techne was used in reference to both manufactured
goods and art. That is, cobblers and painters both possessed a certain
specific knowledge of their craft that, when used, was responsible for the
revealing of a shoe or a portrait, respectively. More importantly,
Heidegger makes clear the fact that the term "technology,” at least
historically, referred to the revealing of both manufactured and artistic
truths.
Heidegger elaborates on this notion in his discussion of poeisis,
where he distinguishes between physis, the bringing forth of things from
themselves, and poeisis, the bringing forth of things from something else.
To clarify, weavers bring forth tapestries and bards bring forth song
through poeisis while a tree is brought forth from itself, as occurs in
nature. And since "every bringing-forth is grounded in revealing" (12),
and Heidegger regards revealing as the most important method by which
a concealed truth "comes into unconcealment" (11), this focus on poeisis
98
�is central in Heidegger’s exploration into the relationship between
humanity and technology.
In his discussion of poeisis, Heidegger says that technology is not
based in instrumentality, and that technology’s essence is not found in
the production and manipulation of supplies, but rather it is found in
revealing. However, the mode of revealing in modern day technology is
no longer poeisis. Heidegger explains that modern technology is
characterized by a challenging mode of revealing. That is, humanity’s
modern orientation to the world does not rest in an artistic viewpoint but
in a challenging one. It is fitting that Heidegger uses the word
‘challenging’ to describe the revealing process for modern technology,
since in Heidegger’s eyes, humanity no longer seeks to reveal truths in
nature; rather, humanity seeks to challenge the limits of nature.
In his Rhine River example, Heidegger shows the major difference
between a poetic revealing and a challenging revealing. Under poeisis,
Holderlin, a German poet, details the landscape of the river in a poetic
piece, revealing the calming and pacifying qualities of the river in which
he eventually drowned. However, a challenging revealing of that same
iconic river in Germany reduces that inspirational location to a water
power resource when a hydroelectric dam is put into place.
With this example, Heidegger introduces his idea of Bestand or the
standing reserve. He explains that a modern instrumentalist orientation
toward the world allows humanity to reduce everything to a standing
reserve, i.e., nothing in the world is seen beyond its functional context.
Trees are not trees but paper sources, and an airplane is not an airplane
but a transportation device. It is as though the world reveals itself to
humanity as material stock at the ready to be used and manipulated by
humans for human convenience. Furthermore, Heidegger asserts that the
standing reserve exists as a result of an Enframing power that is
responsible for orienting humanity towards this strange reductionist
relationship with nature.
For whatever reason, humanity is attracted to order. Therefore,
humanity has a tendency to try to compartmentalize everything in nature,
collapsing the essences of nature completely, so as to store it in neat
mental cubbies. The standing reserve allows humanity to order things
based on their potential purpose, so trees could be stored in a "paper"
box as well as a "lumber” box, a "shade" box or a "sap" box, but under this
modern instrumental view of technology and nature, trees are no longer
stored in tree boxes. Heidegger proposes that modern scientific inquiry
might be at fault for this mindset. Contrary to popular belief, Heidegger
proposes that scientific innovation and research is a product of
technology, and not the other way around. In other words, the
construction of a scientific framework, including physical laws, chemistry
99
�equations, and a general geometric perspective of the world are all
products of technology, or as Heidegger would propose, those laws and
equations act as larger boxes in which to store nature.
So when Heidegger mentions that "the essence of technology is by no
means technological" (4], he means to say that the truth of technology is
lost in the mechanics of new machinery and the complexities of
mathematical equations, and that the true essence of technology rests in
the relationship between man and technology. The essence of technology
in Heidegger’s eyes is the Enframing power that orients humanity
towards the world, and during the time in which Heidegger wrote The
Question Concerning Technology, he was obviously disappointed in
humanity's current orientation towards scientific inquiry as the primary
method for the acquisition of knowledge. But where does this thirst for
precise, discrete, quantitative and categorized knowledge come from?
What is behind this ever-present Enframing power? Heidegger himself
doesn't know.
In an effort to assess the question, Heidegger studies the main ideas
behind philosophy in order to fully understand where the thirst for
knowledge in general came from. He concludes that the things most often
regarded as factual are those things that have withstood the test of time;
i.e., things that "endure” (30). Modern causality, then, is not true because
the causality that scientists apply to nature is not the same idea of
responsibility as proposed by the Greeks. Nor can it be explained with
what have been most commonly known as Aristotle’s four causes.
Instead, modern physics applies new mathematical and scientific patterns
to natural processes to express a scientific causality in nature. However,
Heidegger argues, as with the creation of science from technology,
modern physics has created those mathematical patterns in order to
explain natural phenomena in a causal manner.
Again, it becomes obvious that humanity cannot escape the
convenience of a scientific orientation towards the world, and is therefore
trapped. If man is unaware of his reductionist tendencies and continues
to blindly box nature for later use as a standing reserve, how will man
ever succeed in forming the "free relationship” with technology that
Heidegger advocates?
After having explained his alternative understanding of technology,
Heidegger proposes that humanity revert back to its artistic view of the
world, and allow poeisis to reveal the truth of technology instead of some
unnamed Enframing power that directs humanity towards the creation
and preservation of a standing reserve. When we think of technology as
an instrument, as a means to an end, we miss the true essence of
technology. Instead of focusing on the improvement of instrumentality,
Heidegger expresses his hopes that humanity will seek the true essence
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�of technology and understand that the revealing of nature is not causal,
but "poetic.” If humanity successfully strays from a causal and
instrumental revealing of nature, then perhaps humanity would
recognize its own existence within nature, as a part of nature, and not as a
species meant to use nature’s raw materials at will. Heidegger admits that
a break from the current Enframing power would be difficult, if at all
possible, but hopes that a return to an artistic orientation to the world
will result in a healthy technological relationship. Heidegger writes.
Because the essence of technology is nothing
technological, essential reflection upon technology and
decisive confrontation with it must happen in a realm that
is, on the one hand, akin to the essence of technology, and
on the other, fundamentally different from it. Such a realm
is art. (35)
Though Heidegger sees the development of modern science as a product
of technology, to many others, technology seems to facilitate scientific
practice. Heidegger writes his Question Concerning Technology in a time
after Francis Bacon proposed a popular method for acquiring scientific
knowledge and an advanced understanding of nature. In his Novum
Organum, Bacon explains that times have, indeed, changed and men
cannot learn about nature now in the same ways they had in the past. At
first, man coexisted with nature, and being unaware of nature’s ways,
man only learned about nature by participating as a function of nature,
and not interfering with its processes. Man was to learn by observing,
because "nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed” (50). However,
Bacon makes clear the fact that this observant mode of inquiry never
resulted in new information; therefore, in order to learn more about
nature, and to truly understand nature, a more aggressive, probing
method of inquiry will reveal the secrets that our observations could not.
"The subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of
the senses and understanding” (50), therefore a far less subtle approach
to nature is key to the pursuit of knowledge. For this reason. Bacon
advocates scientific practices, such as systematic experimentation, to aid
in the mastering of nature’s secrets. So in a Heideggerian sense. Bacon
thought that scientific domination was the most practical technique to
reveal nature’s true essence, and to unveil nature’s secrets since "science
is but an image of truth” (45). Ever since this period in history,
conventional thought has been that nature can be understood only by
reduction, that is, only by reducing her to numbers does she become
clear. With time scientific inquiry became more accessible to the public
through education and the creation of sophisticated technological
innovations. So new technology exists in order to ease researchers’
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�inquiries of nature, and allows for more mathematical, precise, and
accurate measurements and observations. But remember that science
itself is a product of technology. These new instruments are around only
to help scientists do exactly what Heidegger warns them against; i.e., to
put nature into boxes. By putting things into boxes via mathematical
observation and Baconian scientific reduction, modern science has
allowed humanity to more efficiently rely on the standing reserve of
nature. This kind of efficiency has lead to extreme exploitation of natural
resources.
Currently the world faces an oil crisis, entire forests face the risk of
clear-cutting, and animals are worked to exhaustion simply because
humanity has become accustomed to viewing nature in a very specific
way. What is nature if not a stock pile of potential fuel, paper, meat and
leather? An instrumental and technological orientation to the world,
facilitated by modern science, has lead to the complete and total
domination of nature, as if domination is the only method by which
humanity could exist within nature. Science now determines nature as an
object, which is underwritten by human subjectivity, and hence human
beings feel free to dominate and use nature in technology. Heidegger
makes evident in his book the direct dangers to nature associated with
the standing reserve. A Heideggerian application of technology to
environmental destruction is an obvious one since he speaks explicitly of
dammed rivers and the lumber and paper industries throughout his
essay. A less obvious, though equally poignant and provocative
application of Heidegger's The Question Concerning Technology would be
to the domination of women via that standing reserve. Perhaps women
are controlled and exploited by men for the very reason that nature is.
Specifically, women are not viewed in an artistic and poetic sense, but
rather as providers of a resource that can be stockpiled and called upon
by men when needed.
It seems to me that in addition to our instrumental orientation to the
world which Enframes nature into reserves, so too do oppressive
institutions like patriarchy and capitalism orient us towards the creation
and preservation of standing reserves. Perhaps a discussion of the ways
in which modern science has facilitated the capitalistic process would
clarify the relationship between the exploitation of nature and women.
Western science, since its inception, and arguably still is today, a
masculine discipline. The studies of nature, physics, medicine,
mathematics, etc., were all reserved for men, and since those practices
have led to an irreparable destruction of the earth, one might be able to
recognize a masculine underpinning to the ecological crisis. During the
Scientific Revolution of the Modern Era, a mechanical and reductionist
paradigm emerged as the primary way of revealing nature’s secrets. And
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�while this new methodology for revealing nature's secrets seemed to be a
liberating force for all of humanity, the aggressive and invasive process
that has now become convention is merely a projection of the patriarchal
ideals entailing the subjugation of both nature and women.
Consider the formerly natural event of childbirth. Once belonging
only to the mother and her child, childbearing has been absorbed into the
realm of medicine and machinery. Women were valued for their
reproductive gifts and no connection was stronger than the connection
between a mother and her child. What was once artistic and poetic, that
is, the organic unity of the mother and baby, is now revealed through the
technologic instrumentality of medical professionals. Women's wombs
have been reduced to containers. A woman's direct bond with the fetus is
replaced by knowledge mediated by men and machine. Now the gift of
human life is a product of medical practice and not the product of a
natural feminine process. The "medicalization” of childbirth, due to
scientific innovation and an instrumental viewpoint, has reduced the
female body to a baby-holder. The female body is no longer celebrated as
a creator of life because the child is no longer seen as produced by natural
miracle within the woman, but rather removed from the container
through medical expertise, and in this way the physician rather than the
mother could be seen as having produced the baby. Therefore, masculine
medical professionals with sophisticated machinery on their side as
justification, have taken childbirth, a singularly female process, away
from women. However, childbirth will never be completely taken from
women, since women are biologically set up for conception, gestation,
birth, and breast-feeding. This means that even though doctors remove
babies from wombs and are the praised producers of babies, doctors do
not have the misfortune of being placed in a standing reserve for the
production of babies in the way women are.
In order for capitalism to thrive, raw materials must be converted
into commodities by laborers and sold for a profit. This means that
human laborers convert natural raw materials such as trees into the
production of commodities such as paper to be sold for profit, and
therefore nature suffers at the hands of a capitalist economy. However,
how would capitalism continue without the steady influx of able-bodied
laborers? In capitalist terms, the commodities must be made from raw
materials and sold for a profit. By way of this process, capitalism has only
led to the commodification of childbirth, since women (the laborers]
convert sperm, eggs, and nutrients (the raw materials] into a zygote that
will eventually develop into a child, who will grow up to work in the
capitalist economy and sell his or her skills for a profit (a salary]. Women
invest their bodies and their energy to create a child, and then invest
several years of their life to raise it. When more babies are produced,
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�more laborers will be available in the following generations to continue
commodity production; thus, more natural resources will be exhausted so
that more profits may be made. Note that the original laborer (the
mother) producing commodities (the children) does not at any point
receive a profit. So while wage laborers in a capitalistic system enjoy a
paycheck, and while the general public enjoys the benefits of commodity
consumption, women remain unrewarded for their work, and therefore,
lack the sufficient funds for commodity consumption. Women’s bodies
are drained from childbearing, and nature’s resources are drained by
commodity production in this cruel cycle. The exploitation of female
reproductive power has led to an excess of births, to overpopulation, just
as the exploitation of resources has led to their destruction in an excess of
production.
To sum up, the main victims of a capitalist system are women and
nature. Women’s bodies as well as the body of nature have been reduced
to Heideggerian standing reserves. Their parts have been separated from
the whole and are seen only in the context of functionality. Women are
not valued as complex and intelligent beings fully capable of coexisting in
a man’s world; women are not valued at all. Women are attractive but
vacant shells, prized only for their possession of eggs, a uterus, mammary
glands, and any other biological resource directly utilized in child
production. Capitalism as an Enframing power has allowed man to view
both women and nature as stockpiled raw materials on supply for the
continuous production of goods and stimulation of profit. But technology
and capitalism are not the only motivating forces for the enduring
exploitation of women and nature; patriarchal tradition, fueled by
science, also Enframes women and nature into standing reserves.
Once the Darwinian conception of Evolution was accepted as an
explanation for the origin of life. Social Darwinism swept the Western
hemisphere. Suddenly social theorists and scientific researchers alike
were interested in the evolutionary relationships between various groups
of people. The conclusions gathered from social evolutionary studies
widened the boundaries between the sexes, as "scientific evidence”
suggested a biological superiority of men over women. It was thought
that woman’s place was in the home, that the male brain was larger than
that of a woman, and so men justified a domination of human society.
Essentially, an incorrect application of evolutionary principles was used
to legitimize a social hierarchy, resulting in an invalid attribution of
various biological misfortunes to women. Furthermore, social theorists,
who concluded that women are less evolved than men, (without having
verifiable evidence to support their results) explained that the only way
for women to overcome their biological misfortune would be to literally
enslave themselves to a masculine, and more highly evolved, lover.
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�Conventional thought at this time was as follows: Women are less
biologically suited to survive in the wilderness like men are; therefore,
they should remain within the confines of a safe domesticity. Similarly,
women (who are unable to understand the complexities of business and
politics) should not seek employment beyond the house walls. Nor should
they seek education to understand those complicated subjects (because
the female brain is far smaller than the man's brain, and is therefore
incapable of retaining such information). As a result, it was further
maintained that it was in a woman’s best interest to use her looks to
attract potential male mates. Also, she ought to use her sexuality to
compete against other women for said mate. And because,
physiologically, the increased pelvic inclination is a clear indicator of the
fact that women are more closely related to apes than men, women
should allow themselves to be dominated by men just as animals are,
especially considering their [inevitably] declining beauty. This step-bystep guide to survival for women is an artifact of scientific studies
encouraged by patriarchy’s dependency on men as dominant social
figures. It is additionally a clear example of Darwin’s fear for social
applications of his theory of Natural Selection. And while some of the
above statements may be extreme examples of antiquated thought, the
fact still remains that women were socially understood to be subordinate
and reliant on men.
It can be said, then, that patriarchy is a result of humanity’s
unfortunate preoccupation with order. As Heidegger notes in his essay,
humanity is compelled to put everything into boxes. In this instance
patriarchal values allowed men to put women into boxes. Pretty, passive
and pleasing women were prized because evolution had demonstrated
that pretty, passive and pleasing women were more suited to survive. In
addition, since this information was gathered under "scientific”
circumstances, it was considered reliable. Thus, Social Darwinism
confirmed patriarchal values, and such patriarchal values placed women
into a standing reserve. It was deemed a biological predisposition that
men were traditionally superior hunters. Thus, men, being "evolutionarily
favored,” they did not have to rely on women for survival. Furthermore,
it was maintained that because women were blessed with beauty and
more suited to the delicacies of domesticity, they were incapable of
hunting. Since women could not hunt for themselves and had to secure a
mate, they had to rely on men for survival. Based on these premises
alone, women were reduced to mere functions and only called upon by
men when needed for mating. The most attractive or most pleasing
women were wed, and would reproduce with the men they married.
Through marriage, patriarchal values of domesticity are only reinforced
further because with age a woman could lose her looks and possibly her
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�reproductive abilities, thereby losing her function in society. Therefore, in
order to keep her marriage afloat and avoid being outcompeted by a
younger, more attractive, and more sexually capable woman, these older
women placed themselves into a standing reserve for the purpose to be
called upon by their husbands for warm meals and general care. It
becomes clear now that through patriarchy, women have been reduced to
sexual mates and have reduced themselves to caretakers. Again, these
female standing reserves are the products of scientific inquiry, since
science has allowed humanity to contextualize women in biological
terms, thus creating a justification for the subordination and reduction of
women.
Heidegger wrote The Question Concerning Technology with the hope
that his readers might become aware of their own relationship with
technology, and in so doing would reorient themselves to the world,
enjoying a free relationship with technology. He explains that for the
most part, humanity’s understanding of technology more closely
resembles an understanding of instrumentality. Heidegger explains that
an instrumental orientation towards technology is a dangerous one
because it very easily leads to the creation of standing reserves. When
technology is understood only as a means to an end, humanity loses sight
of its true relationship with technology and is instead motivated by an
instrumental Enframing power to reduce everything to a standing
reserve. Once the standing reserve is in place, everything can only be seen
for its functionality: trees for paper, rivers for water-power, women for
reproduction and caretaking. The Enframing power blinds humanity,
tunneling human vision towards instrumental conversions of raw
materials into manufactured things; and, even though he hopes that his
text will help readers regain a poetic orientation towards the world and
create a free relationship with technology, Heidegger does not himself
know that such a reorientation is possible. Heidegger writes:
It is precisely in Enframing, which threatens to sweep man
away into ordering as the supposed single way of
revealing, and so thrusts man into the danger of the
surrender of his free essence — it is precisely in this
extreme danger that the innermost indestructible
belongingness of man within granting may come to light,
provided that we, for our part, begin to pay heed to the
coming to presence of technology. (32)
Even if we are made aware of the Enframing power and standing
reserves, Heidegger fears that an instrumental relationship with
technology might be permanent. However, he continues to encourage his
readers to push past the convenience of an instrumental ordering and
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�remain aware of other, healthier, and freer orientations towards
technology: "Everything, then, depends upon this: that we ponder this
arising, and that, recollecting, we watch over it... so long as we represent
technology as an instrument we remain held fast in the will to master it”
(32).
With a Heideggerian understanding of the patriarchal and capitalistic
orientation toward women and nature, one might wonder whether there
is hope for an elimination of women and nature as standing reserves. Do
women and nature have a chance to avoid further domination and
exploitation when these oppressive institutions are nearly impossible to
evade? I certainly cannot answer that question. Instead 1 can only suggest
that men have for centuries dominated women and nature because an
Enframing power has motivated them to unwittingly do so.
If humanity finally comes to understand that technology cannot be
used as an instrument to get from point A to point B, then maybe the free
relationship with technology that Heidegger suggests may not be so far
out of reach. If humanity were to question scientific domination as the
method by which to understand nature, then perhaps humanity would
return to a "poetic” interpretation of technology. When numbers and laws
no longer work to compartmentalize every component of nature, we
might once again see nature for what it truly is. Furthermore, an artistic
revealing of nature would mean an end to Heideggerian standing
reserves. The standing reserves constructed under oppressive Enframing
institutions would completely dissolve if such a free relationship with
technology were reached. Therefore, with a free relationship between
humanity and technology comes a free relationship with nature and with
women. Capitalism falls apart without the reliability of raw materials and
laborers and patriarchy crumbles if men and women are recognized as
equal and as independent of their historical pseudo-biological, social
function. So when the standing reserve is eliminated, so too are the
Enframing powers motivating them, leaving women and nature as they
should be left: respected, untouched, and unchanged.
Primary Texts
Martin Heidegger. The Question Concerning Technology. Translated by
William Lovitt. New York: Harper & Row, 1977.
Bacon, Sir Francis. Novum Organum. Paul Carus ed. Paul Carus Student
Catalog. 3, Peter Urbach. Peru, Illinois: Open Court publishing
company, 1994.
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�Reason in Crisis:
A Reflection on Edmund Husserl's
The Crisis of European Sciences
Nick Urban
The Crisis of the European Sciences begins with a description of a
fundamental cultural and philosophical failure on the part of European
civilization. This failure is characterized by the inability to provide a
rational account of the most important questions, for instance "of the
meaning or meaninglessness of the whole of this human experience” (6).
"Do not these questions,” Husserl asks, "universal and necessary for all
men, demand universal reflections and answers based on rational
insight?” (6]. "Of course,” we might like to say. But with regards to the
meaning of human life, western modernity seems only capable of
subjective accounts; "subjective" in this case signifying mere opinion. The
only universally valid and apodictically certain truths are those of the
objective sciences, which themselves offer no help in this matter. "In our
vital need — so we are told — this science has nothing to say to us. It
excludes in principle precisely the questions which man, given over in our
unhappy times to the most portentous upheavals, finds the most burning”
(6].
This crisis is not merely a problem for philosophers. It extends into
the heart of western civilization. A blatant effect of the crisis has been
that it has drawn the attention of the educated masses away from
fundamental questions and into an uncritical concern for petty issues.
Husserl describes this as follows:
The exclusiveness with which the total world-view of
modern man, in the second half of the nineteenth century,
let itself be determined by the positive sciences and be
blinded by the "prosperity” they produced, meant an
indifferent turning-away from the questions which are
decisive for a genuine humanity. Merely fact-minded
sciences make merely fact-minded people. [6]
Individuals who were concerned with more than mere facts were largely
excluded from the mainstream culture, for they had no framework from
which to address these questions in a universal way.
Although the crisis manifests in all of western civilization, its root is
philosophical, and so must be its remedy. "The genuine spiritual struggles
of European humanity as such take the form of struggles between the
philosophies, that is between the skeptical philosophies — or
nonphilosophies, which retain the word but not the task — and the actual
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�and still vital philosophies” (15). A struggle is taking place over whether
philosophy — the practice of accounting for oneself with the greatest
clarity — will survive at all, or whether it will be reduced to a futile
relativism equivalent to the abandonment of its task. In the balance lies
the question of "whether the telos, then, is merely a factual, historical
delusion, the accidental acquisition of merely one among many other
civilizations and histories, or whether Greek humanity was not rather the
first breakthrough to what is essential to humanity as such, its entelechy”
(15). Husserl champions the idea that rationality is unifying, not divisive.
He concludes by saying that "to be human at all is essentially to be a
human being in a socially and generatively united civilization" (15).
Husserl's ideal is not one that individuals may achieve alone. Humanity in
the fullest sense can flourish only in an established common world. The
overwhelming diversity of opinions that appears in modernity threatens
to shatter this common world into a myriad of subcultures. This
fragmentation can be countered only by the production of standards
universally convincing to all who enquire.
The Loss of Meaning
In order to understand the present predicament, Husserl looks at the
development of philosophy not merely as an "historical” question, but in
order to discern the "hidden telos” that has been at work throughout it.
He finds that science once spoke to our deeper concerns: "The specifically
human questions were not always banned from the realm of science” (7).
Husserl finds that the time that most celebrated the ideal of a universal
science was the Renaissance. At that time, science was more than the
pursuit of abstract knowledge or the handmaiden of technology. It
demanded "not only that man should be changed ethically [but that] the
whole human surrounding world, the political and social existence of
mankind, must be fashioned anew through free reason, through the
insights of a universal philosophy" (8). At that point, philosophy still
retained "the formal meaning of the one all-encompassing science, the
science of the totality of what is” (8). This one body of knowledge,
subdivided for convenience, but unified in reality, was to grow "from
generation to generation and forever, this one edifice of definitive,
theoretically interrelated truths was to solve all conceivable problems —
problems of fact and of reason, problems of temporality and eternity" (9).
From our contemporary vantage, it seems that project has failed.
How was it that science lost the ability to address "specifically
human questions”? How were such grand ambitions discarded so
quickly? The questions formerly known as the "ultimate and highest,”
namely, the questions of metaphysics, have become excluded as
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�speculative or even unreal. Old arguments about the universe as a
meaningful order were debunked, and new ones were not forthcoming.
Science limited itself to speaking about facts, and rendered itself unable
to address the meaning of human life. The branch of philosophy most
directed toward addressing such meaning was metaphysics. Husserl
describes the special importance of metaphysical questions as follows:
"These 'metaphysical' questions, taken broadly . . . surpass the world
understood as the universe of mere facts. They surpass it precisely as
being questions with the idea of reason in mind” (9). During the
Renaissance, "reason" indicated more than a faculty of the mind; it was a
watchword for all that is most excellently human, "a title for 'absolute,'
'eternal,' 'supertemporal,' 'unconditionally' valid ideas and ideals" (9).
"Reason” was truth and universality itself, not merely as applied to the
objective world, but as applied to everything. It was precisely this
understanding — that reason spoke to all aspects of existence — that has
been lost in modernity. In place of universal science, we have positive
science, which speaks only of facts. Such a science makes no attempt to
justify values or provide a teleology for human life. It is in this way that
"Positivism ... decapitates philosophy” (9).
But why was metaphysics lost, and how did science continue without
its "head”? The reason seems to concern the impressive progress of
science and the apparently unsolvable quandaries of metaphysics. The
positive sciences, such as physics and chemistry, showed themselves to
be "unimpeachable within the legitimacy of their methodic
accomplishments” (5]. They appeared to be leading mankind to a greater
and more universal knowledge of the natural world. In contrast, those
concerned with specifically philosophical problems produced "systemphilosophies, which were impressive but unfortunately were not unified,
indeed were mutually exclusive” (10). Philosophy began to seem like a
fruitless enterprise.
We have begun to see reasons why science lost its ability to address
human questions. Yet its implications for the positive sciences may still
be unclear. The common view of the absolute practical success of modern
science is oblivious to the fact that the sciences — originally conceived as
branches of philosophy under the rule of metaphysics — had lost their
place in the order of things, and with it, the coherence of their meaning.
Formerly, metaphysics "decided on the ultimate meaning of all
knowledge supplied by the other sciences” (9). Once metaphysics had
been declared void, the positive sciences, though productive, were left
without any obvious ends. The crisis, Husserl wrote, "does not encroach
upon the theoretical and practical success of the special sciences; yet it
shakes to the foundations the whole meaning of their truth” (12).
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�A Science of Subjectivity
Science, we might say, is an attempt to account for experience in terms of
underlying principles. However, the positive sciences do not account for
the way in which the world they study — the objective world and the
world of objects — is itself grounded in the subjectivity of the life-world.
Positive science is unscientific with regard to its own existence. All
questions, ends and truths originate in the life-world. Objective
investigations, such as positive science, are constituted and take place
only within the bounds of subjectivity. Modern scientists, however,
frequently do not recognize this. Husserl claims that the life-world, until
the commencement of his own work, had never been made into a proper
topic of investigation. He proposes a science of the life-world, which
would not only be illuminating in its own right, but would allow science
to ground itself through self-knowledge, and hence to be truly scientific.
One reason that scientists are wary of dwelling on the subjective
aspect of objectivity — that objectivity is but one part of our subjective
experience — is that subjectivity has made a bad name for itself. The
"subjective" has been taken to signify relativism and opinion, not truth.
Husserl points out that although each subject is indeed different in some
ways, the form of subjectivity is shared by all humanity. The study of
subjectivity thus has its "own objectivity," meaning, and a "validity
appropriated purely methodically" (133). Husserl’s "method" is not a
proof but a tour. He wishes to lead us down paths of thought and
experience that he has already taken. Through such a journey, we may
come to a genuine understanding of his philosophy. Phenomenological
proof is not like the deductions of geometry or the inductions of natural
science. These are only valid of the objective world, not the subjective one
that is its basis. On the contrary, as we progress in our phenomenological
investigations, we encounter a primal self-evidence which precedes the
apodicticity of such objective methods.
Introduction to Transcendental Phenomenology
Husserl professes to have discovered a method for studying subjectivity
— the ground of all experience. He calls this method "transcendental
phenomenology." The basic method of transcendental phenomenology is
the transcendental epoche, which consists of a "withholding of natural,
naive validities and in general of validities already in effect" (135) and a
"reduction to the absolute ego as the ultimately unique center of function
in all constitution" (186). This ego, as pure subject, provides the basis for
the world of appearances. The transcendental ego is all that is left when
one withholds the validities of the world. It is then on the basis of that
which the world ("our world") is possible at all. "I, the ego carrying out
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�the epoche, am not included in its realm of objects but... am excluded in
principle” (77). This absolute ego is called the "transcendental ego,"
because it transcends the "internal" world of subjectivity and the
"external" world of objects. It is impersonal because the soul, in so far as
it is more than the world-constituting absolute ego, is a part of the world:
the "inner” part. In the transcendental epoche, the soul's validities are
suspended along with those of the objective world, and hence the bare
"bones” of the transcendental ego are all that remain.
The Paradox
One of the great philosophical difficulties that transcendental
phenomenology addresses is the paradox that "man, and in
communalization mankind, is subjectivity for the world and at the same
time is supposed to be in it in an objective and worldly manner” (262).
How can man, while constituting the world in his subjectivity, exist as an
object inside that very world?
The natural sciences simply ignore this problem. They deny the
primary reality of the subjective world, examining everything, even the
soul, from the "outside.” From the perspective of natural science, any
inner experience that may exist is merely a byproduct of material
processes. The material world is determinable according to the laws of
physics, and more generally, mathematics. The life-world, which is
originally encountered in a way that is manifold, particular, and
heterogeneous, is reinterpreted in the eyes of science as a natural-world
consisting of continuous, idealized space, filled with matter that behaves
according to the universal and uniform laws. This method of objectifying
nature has produced much useful knowledge and many powerful
inventions. Yet as applied to the soul in the form of naturalistic
psychology, Husserl tells us it is doomed to failure. He writes that
"objectivity after the fashion of natural science is downright absurd when
applied to the soul” (377). The soul does not behave in the manner of
worldly things. Worldly objects appear in space and time.
Spatiotemporality is "the universal form of the real world" (216).
Similarly, the physical world is a "self-enclosed natural causality in which
every occurrence is determined unequivocally and in advance” (60).
Bodies are spatiotemporal and take place in causal chains. But neither of
these is true for the soul. The soul is "embodied” and "takes part” only
indirectly in the space-time of bodies. It is not itself spatial, nor is it
causal:
the psychic, considered purely in terms of its own essence,
has no [physical] nature, has no conceivable in-itself in the
natural sense, no spatiotemporally causal, no idealizable
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�and mathematizable in-itself, no laws after the fashion of
natural laws. [222)
It would make little sense to expect a science that models the worldly to
have any application to that which is beyond the world and which does
not share in its fundamental properties. This explains why natural science
has so little to say about the properties of subjectivity: it is beyond its
methods. Yet this objection still has not reached its most essential
formulation. The problem, in the most general sense, is that one cannot
use principles and methods derived from the analysis of worldly objects
to understand how there is a world at all. This question is "out of the
jurisdiction” of natural science.
The inability of the prevailing natural science to address subjectivity
[and thus to speak to the meaning of human life) results in the crisis
discussed in the first part of this paper. Husserl’s response is a return to
the primordiality of subjective experience in the form of transcendental
phenomenology. When one assumes the "transcendental attitude" of the
epoche, "the life-world transforms itself ... it proves to be a mere
'component,' so to speak, within concrete transcendental subjectivity”
[174). The transcendental attitude reveals that the methodologically
appropriated apodictic truths of natural science are themselves merely
one among many varieties of experience that take place in the ego
according to the "laws of subjectivity.” Transcendental phenomenology is
a new science, a primordial science that investigates the structures of
subjectivity and the difficult question of how the world is always there,
"pre-given” to us from the start. When transcendental phenomenology
has been established as the foundational knowledge of how there is a
world, only then can natural science [knowledge of the objects of the
world) get underway in a rigorous manner. In order to regain both rigor
and meaning, science must recognize its derivative position.
Transcendental phenomenology becomes the new "Queen of the
Sciences.”
Now that we understand the role which Husserl wants
phenomenology to play, let us take a closer look at its methods and
implications.
Intersubjectivity
When 1 close my eyes, does the world cease to be? For Husserl, the
answer is emphatically, "No.” How is it that the world is already there
with established standards that 1 myself do not create? The answer lies in
the intersubjective character of "inner experience.” In order for the world
to be for us in advance, we must appeal to the existence of souls other
than our own. For Husserl, subjectivity is "an ego functioning
113
�constitutively . . . within intersubjectivity" (172]. It is not plausible that
we each invent our own values, concepts and activities out of whole cloth,
because that contradicts our experience. We inherit most of these things
from an already existing intersubjective world. Yet how this is so, is far
from obvious. Husserl makes the point that "the epoche creates a unique
sort of philosophical solitude" (184]. This means, at the most basic level,
we have only our own ego as self-evident. But if this is the case, how do
we become aware that others are the same as ourselves? Husserl says
that this is something we learn in the epoche, but only by performing a
"constitutive accomplishment":
This is what philosophical self-exposition in the epoche
actually teaches us. It can show how the always singular
"I," in the original constituting life proceeding within it,
constitutes a first sphere of objects, the "primordial"
sphere; how it then, starting from this in a motivated
fashion, performs a constitutive accomplishment through
which an intentional modification of itself and its
primordiality achieves ontic validity under the title of
"alien-perception," perception of others, of another "I"
who is for himself an "I" as I am. (185]
This is, unfortunately, one of the less clearly explained concepts in The
Crisis of the European Sciences. Because of its importance, we will now
have a careful look at the text. In the paragraph quoted above, Husserl
calls the change that the ego performs an "intentional modification of
itself and its primordiality." "Intentionality" in the crisis refers to the
directedness of subjects towards objects. Therefore, all that the
"intentional modification" seems to signify so far is that the attitude of the
ego performing the epoche towards an objective human being is changed
in some way, but how that directedness is changed has not been
specified. Husserl gives us a hint when he says that the recognition of the
other as an ego is analogous to the identification in recollection of one's
past-self with one's present-self. He writes:
Self-temporalization through depresentation, so to speak,
(through recollection], has its analogue in my self
alienation (empathy as a depresentation of a higher level
— depresentation of my primal presence]. Thus in me,
"another I" achieves ontic validity as copresent with his
own ways of being self-evidently verified, which are
obviously quite different from those of a "sense"perception. (185]
114
�The self-alienation in this case seems to signify the removal of the
"special" way in which one regards the immediately present "I” (the ego
cogito) as the singularly valid consciousness. One recognizes that oneself
is a consciousness rather than the consciousness. The recognition of
others as egos is called "empathy.” Husserl describes this empathy as a
"depresentation of a higher level” of the primal presence of the "1.”
Depresentation as applied to self-temporalization means removing one's
"temporal bias” towards the presently manifesting ego in exchange for
understanding oneself as a unity through time. "Depresentation of a
higher level” likewise refers to the removal of one's "bias” towards one's
own transcendental ego as the one that one personally experiences,
allowing one to recognize the way in which each "other” is also a
transcendental ego. This later account of empathy sheds more light on
this:
"[EJmpathies” [are] perceptions of others that appear
among my original intentions. Through the reduction
[others] are transformed from human beings existing for
me into alter egos existing for me, having the ontic
meaning of implicata of my original intentional life. [258]
The other achieves ontic validity as an "I” by being the implicata of
original intentional life — that is, one's directedness towards objects
implicates (or implies] the other as an "1.” The other human beings which
we originally have with the self-evidence of objects in the life-world are
transformed, in the transcendental epoche, into "alter egos.” That is to say
that when 1 reduce myself from personal soul into bare transcendental
ego, 1 perform the same operation on my "having” of others. This is so
"originally,” meaning that one cannot be directed towards objects in a
way that does not imply the existence of other egos like oneself.
These concepts of "depresentation” and "implication” offer a solution
to the question of how we know others to be egos like ourselves, and yet,
as modes of inference of the subjectivity of others, these concepts cannot
explain how the world exists for us in advance. Nor do these concepts
address the fact that, just as others are implied by my intentionality, so
am 1 implied by theirs. "I, with my whole original life, am implied in them;
and they are all likewise implied in one another” (258). To better
understand these questions, we must turn to Husserl's account of
communalization.
Communalization
In our previous investigation, we established that intentionality, as our
directedness towards objects, implies the existence of other egos. Such
115
�reasoning can be used to convince oneself of the necessity that others
exist as egos, but it says nothing of how we have these others, nor how we
together constitute the world.
When Husserl describes the character of naturalistic psychology, one
of the things he mentions is that souls are seen as "mutually external,"
isolated from each other by the separation of their bodies. Thus natural
psychology is possible only as individual psychology. But in
transcendental philosophy, which is, at the same time, a transcendental
psychology, the "spiritual world" appears as just as much of a unity as the
natural one. Husserl writes:
[JJust as there is a sole universal nature as a self-enclosed
framework of unity, so there is a sole psychic framework,
a total framework of all souls, which are united not
externally but internally, namely through the intentional
interpenetration which is the communalization of their
lives. (255)
It is this world, as it is constituted by the intentional network of
intersubjectivity, that is the proper subject of transcendental psychology,
which as a "pure psychology" is concerned only with how we have the
world — with subjectivity and intersubjectivity as such. But even as
Husserl marks off this subject matter, what lies within its boundary
remains fuzzy. He says that the "internality" of souls, what we usually
think of as the most isolated — is actually something shared by all. The
world for each of us is the world for all of us, necessarily. The spiritual
atomism supposed by Descartes’ meditations, or by modern science, is
merely an abstraction — something imagined. We can never experience
the world in that way. The idea of an isolated soul is the product of
thought experiments such as Descartes describes. It is not primary in our
experience. Rather, "what is a mutual externality from the point of view of
naive positivity or objectivity is, when seen from the inside, an intentional
mutual internality" (257). As a result of this, "the world exists not only for
isolated men but for the community of men; and this is due to the fact
that even what is straightforwardly perceptual is communalized" (163).
Husserl says that even simple perception cannot take place except on the
ground of the world-for-all — perhaps because perception must be the
perception of particular things, which are only recognizable because they
have been predetermined as having the identify of "this" and "that"
through their involvement in our intentional networks.
116
�The Mystery of Intentionality
Husserl’s concept of intentionality is a key factor linking the paradox of
the simultaneous subjectivity and objectivity of man with the similarly
intimidating (and overlapping]
problem of intersubjectivity.
Intentionality, as we said before, is the directedness of a subject towards
objects. To be intentionally related to objects is to be "consciously
affected by these things, actively attending to them or in general
perceiving them, actively remembering them, thinking about them,
planning and acting in respect to them” (235]. Intentionality is also
defined as "the title which stands for the only actual and genuine way of
explaining [and] making intelligible" (168]. Insofar as we have a world, it
is a world that we are related to intentionally. Insofar as it precedes us
and exceeds us, it is a world that we have through the mutual
intentionality of others:
Within the vitally flowing intentionality in which the life
of an ego-subject consists, every other ego is already
intentionally implied in advance by way of empathy and
the empathy-horizon. (255]
The life of an ego-subject is itself a vitally flowing intentionality. In so far
as we are, we are intentional. We make our existence intelligible and
meaningful through our comportment toward the objects of the world
and toward each other as subjects. We cannot be directed toward the
former without being directed toward the latter. Every intention implies
the existence of the other egos inside of our empathy-horizon. The fact
that empathy functions as a horizon indicates that while, at any time, we
are aware of only so many others, at the same time we know in advance
that with every movement (physical or spiritual], our horizons shift, and
new egos, which we were already prepared to receive as potentially
present, appear to us as actually present and influence our comportment
toward the things of the world and toward each other.
If one doubts that the existence of objects implies the existence of
others, one ought to consider whether any of the ways he relates to the
world would make sense without others. Our relation to others not only
determines the goals of our interactions with the objective world, but also
makes possible the recognition of the meaning and identity of the objects
that we seemingly encounter alone. Even something as apparently
solitary as eating requires both types of relations toward others. What we
eat and how we eat it is determined by the pre-given meanings of foods,
utensils, tables, etc. And at the same time, even the purpose of our eating,
as self-preservation, can have meaning in the full sense only when one's
117
�continued existence is an existence that contains relationships with other
human beings.
Investigations in Experience
As we carry out our phenomenological investigations, the old problems
and the old language blink in and out of focus. The question of whether
the objective world or the subjective world is prior, as the contest
between naturalism and idealism, takes on a strange appearance as a
question that only makes sense on the basis of a profound
misunderstanding. Consciousness cannot produce the world, because
consciousness is intentionality, which is directedness toward the world.
The world cannot produce consciousness because "the world” is a name
for "a mere 'component' . . . within concrete transcendental subjectivity”
(174). From the perspective of the individual, self-consciousness and the
world are two aspects of experience "inside” of oneself-the-subject. But
the intentionality that constitutes one's consciousness is also predicated
on the existence of other egos and vice versa. Perhaps this is why Husserl
speaks of a "universal apperception” which is "constitutive of all
particular apperceptions, giving them the ontic sense of 'psychic
experiences of this and that human being'” (209). This suggests that all
experiences, both internal and external, are manifestations of something
that is beyond both "interiority” and "exteriority.”
If this seems strange or extreme, we must not forget that Husserl
says that there is something uniquely profound about transcendental
phenomenology — that it is radical in the most serious sense, destined to
effect, for the one who performs it, a personal transformation
"comparable in the beginning to a religious conversion” (137). In order to
really understand the philosophy that Husserl propounds, we must get
ourselves, "off of the page.” We must perform the epoche along with him
and search for our own self-evidences. If we would know the self
evidences Husserl claims for the function of empathy or the primordiality
of the subject, we must test them in lived practice, not merely examine
them as concepts.
Reason and the Telos of Mankind
This essay began with an attempt to understand the nature of the "crisis."
At that point, it appeared to be the failure of western modernity to give an
account for the meaning of human life. We found that the methods of
positive science and modern mathematics were the only ones recognized
as providing the self-evidence required for universal claims, yet they
excluded in principle the issues that are of the greatest concern.
118
�Throughout our investigation, we have seen the ways in which
transcendental phenomenology provides an all-encompassing framework
for understanding experience, in both the psychic and apparent spheres.
We have seen that the "objective" world is constituted and necessarily
implied by subjectivity in the form of intersubjectivity. We will conclude,
however, with the significantly more passionate concern Husserl
manifests towards the end of his work. We might call this his existential
turn.
Parallel to the fact that the world is subjectively constituted, Husserl
finds that man-as-an-individual is a personally self-constituting and thus
self-responsible being:
A new meaning is . . . given to human existence; [man's]
existence in the spatiotemporally pregiven world as the
self-objectification of transcendental subjectivity and its
being, its constituting life; what follows this is the ultimate
self-understanding of man as being responsible for his
own human being: his self-understanding as being in
being called to a life of apodicticity. (340)
In so far as the subject constitutes the world, it constitutes itself,
objectifies itself into a man in the world, a particular man, for whom it is
responsible. This being understands itself, is responsible for itself, not in
any way, but as called to "the life of apodicticity" — the life of reason.
Reason is the specific characteristic of man, as a being
living in personal activities and habitualities. This life, as
personal life, is a constant becoming through a constant
intentionality of development. What becomes, in this life,
is the person himself. (338)
Reason is what makes man himself, both personally and as a species. Man
is who he is, as an individual, as a result of his activities and habitualities.
The life of a man is ever changing through his actions and his intentional
relations with the world, and his ultimate product is none other than
himself.
Husserl does not say why reason is the definitive characteristic of
man, but we can infer it from what has gone before. A succinct statement
of this is that man is "called to a life of apodicticity." He has self
understanding as a being called to such a life — which is not to say that
he actually thinks of his understanding as such. To put it another way,
what are we looking for in seeking proof that we are called to a life of
apodicticity, if not an argument which itself manifests apodicticity? We
might call this a tautology of the second order. That the life of
apodicticity, as philosophy, is uncommon — no one doubts. But who
119
�could doubt that every man acts on the basis of what he finds convincing?
That some are further on the path of apodictic transparency than others,
that there are frequent setbacks and disruptions, does not contradict the
idea that man is, in this way, called to reason. On the contrary, the "total
phenomenological attitude . . . bears within itself the significance of the
greatest existential transformation which is assigned as a task to
mankind as such" (137). By steps and stages, individually and together,
we are shaping ourselves into greater self-awareness and self
responsibility.
Human personal life proceeds in stages of self-reflection
and self-responsibility from isolated occasional acts of this
form to the stage of universal self-reflection and self
responsibility ... [Man] strives to realize his innate reason
... to be true to himself... (338)
As individuals, we each have our own particular projects and concerns.
To be "true to ourselves” differs for each "self." Yet if 1 may be permitted
to speculate, 1 would say that when we engage in the apodictic life,
regardless of its unique manifestation, we are each refined by it in like
manner. As our self-understanding develops, we become truer to our
purposes. We embrace a principle of parsimony and move to justify each
aspect of our lives according to fewer and fewer principles. Finally, each
choice, as a fundamental choice, becomes perfectly expressed in rational
self-development. We overcome the awkwardness of the novice and gain
the grace and economy of movement of the master craftsman. Yet above
and beyond these individual projects, there is one purpose, the apodictic
telos, which all men share. This consists of reason not merely as an
instrument but as a goal.
To follow reason, to follow our best judgment which acts in
accordance with our limited understanding, to endlessly revise our
positions and our person in self-reflection, to be true to ourselves not as
individuals but as that-which-lives-apodictically — this is a practice that
culminates in "universally, apodictically grounded and grounding science
... as the necessarily highest function of mankind" (338). This function is
the expression of mankind’s universal telos.
Being human is teleological being and an ought-to-be . . .
this teleology holds sway in each and every activity and
project of an ego ... through self-understanding in all this
it can know the apodictic telos. (341)
Just as mankind is inevitably directed towards apodicticity, towards that
which is ultimately convincing, so are we drawn towards valuations, to
say this-ought-to-be, and that-ought-not. Of all possible goals, there is one
120
�thing that is a universal telos for mankind, an "apodictic telos," which is
available to the self-understanding of man as such. That purpose is none
other than reason itself. Man’s ought-to-be is an ought-to-be-reasonable.
His will is the will to refine himself as reasonable, and according to
reason.
This exercise of reason is a recursive, adaptive process that never
reaches a final point. As Husserl says, "rationality is an idea residing in
the infinite" (339). We are always already in the world, with various
practical concerns, understandings, and misunderstandings. Reason
begins as a recognition of apodicticity in the form of a basic self-evidence.
From this, through generations, apodicticity itself is recognized as the
goal, and this marks the beginning of philosophy. Apodicticity pursues
itself, through all its faults and corrections. At a certain point, historically,
in the invention of transcendental phenomenology, apodicticity
recognizes itself not merely as "truth" or "logic," but as the endless
process of self-improvement that in itself constitutes the telos of
mankind.
Mankind understanding itself as rational, understanding
that it is rational in seeking to be rational; that this
signifies an infinity of living and striving toward reason;
that reason is precisely that which man qua man, in his
innermost being, is aiming for, that which alone can
satisfy him, make him "blessed." (340-341)
The meaning of life reveals itself as this infinite seeking and striving
towards reason, towards self-understanding and development. By finding
meaning through this understanding of ourselves as seeking the
"apodictic life," the life of philosophy, we restore once again to our
practical activities the notion, lost since the loss of metaphysics, that our
toils are in service of something greater. Our destination remains
unknown, but now — and perhaps forever — we are on the way.
Primary Text
Edmund Husserl. The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental
Phenomenology. Translated by David Carr. Evanston: Northwestern
University Press, 1970.
121
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Connolly, Brian (Editor)
Allen, Jeffrey (Editor)
Wycliff, Grant (Editor)
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