knowledge that they are either ideas actually imprinted on the senses,
or else such as are perceived by attending to the passions and
operations of the mind; or, lastly, ideas formed by help of memory and
imagination, either compounding, dividing, or representing those
originally perceived in the aforesaid ways. By sight, touch, and other
senses, I receive various sensations; and any group of sensations,
frequently accompanying one another, come to be known as one thing. Thus
a certain colour, taste, smell, figure, and consistence, having been
observed to go together, are accounted one distinct thing--for instance,
an apple.
But, besides this endless variety of objects of knowledge, there is also
the "mind," "spirit," "soul," or "myself," which perceives them. Neither
our thoughts or imaginations, nor even the sensations which compose the
objects of perception, can exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving
them. It is impossible that objects should have any existence out of the
minds for which they exist; to conceive them as existing unperceived is
a mere abstraction. Whence it follows that there is no other substance
but spirit, or that which perceives.
Some, indeed, distinguish between "primary" and "secondary" qualities,
and hold that the former, such as extension, figure, motion, and
solidity, have some existence outside of the mind in an unthinking
substance which they call "matter." But extension, figure, and motion
are only ideas existing in the mind, and neither these ideas nor their
archetypes can exist in an unperceiving substance. The very notion of
what is called "matter" involves a contradiction within it. Not only
primary and secondary qualities alike, but also "great" and "small,"
"swift" and "slow," "extension," "number," and even "unity" itself,
being all of them purely relative, exist only in the mind. The
conception of "material substance" has no meaning but that of "being" in
general.
Even if we were to give to the materialists their "external bodies,"
they are by their own confession no nearer to knowledge how our ideas
are produced, since they own themselves unable to comprehend in what
manner body can act upon spirit, or how it is possible that it should
imprint any idea on the mind.
It is evident that the production of ideas in our minds can be no reason
why we should suppose corporeal substances to exist, since the rise of
those ideas is acknowledged to remain equally inexplicable with or
without the supposition of material existences. In short, if there were
external bodies, it is impossible that we should ever come to know it;
and if there were not, we should have the same reasons to think there
were, that we have now. We perceive a continual succession of ideas;
some are anew excited, others are changed or totally disappear. There
is, therefore, some cause of these ideas, whereon they depend, which
produces and changes them. This cause must be a substance; but it has
been shown that there is no corporeal or material substance. It remains,
therefore, that the cause of ideas is an incorporeal active substance or
spirit.
A spirit is one simple, undivided, active being; as it perceives ideas
it is called the "understanding," and as it produces or otherwise
operates about them, it is called the "will." Such is the nature of
spirit that it cannot be of itself perceived, but only by the effects
which it produceth.
The ideas of sense are more strong, lively, and distinct than those of
the imagination; they have likewise a steadiness, order, and coherence,
and are excited in a regular series, the admirable connection whereof
sufficiently testifies the wisdom and benevolence of its Author. The set
rules or established methods, wherein the mind that we depend on excites
in us the ideas of sense, are called the "laws of Nature."
These we learn by experience, and so obtain a sort of foresight which
enables us to regulate our actions for the benefit of life. In general,
to obtain such or such ends such or such means are conducive; and all
this we know, not by discovering any necessary connection between our
ideas, but only by the observation of the laws of Nature.
And yet this constant uniform working, which so evidently displays the
goodness and wisdom of that governing spirit whose will constitutes the
laws of Nature, is so far from leading our thoughts to Him that it
rather sends them wandering after second causes. For when we perceive
certain ideas of sense constantly followed by other ideas, and we know
that it is not of our own doing, we forthwith attribute power and agency
to the ideas themselves, and make one the cause of another, than which
nothing can be more absurd.
_II.--THE ROOTS OF SCEPTICISM_
Several difficult and obscure questions, on which abundance of
speculation hath been thrown away, are by our own principles entirely
banished from philosophy. "Whether corporeal substance can think,"
"whether matter be infinitely divisible," "how matter operates on
spirit"--these and the like inquiries have given infinfte amusement to
philosophers in all ages. But since they depend on the existence of
matter, they have no longer any place in our principles. It follows,
also, that human knowledge may be reduced to two heads--knowledge of
ideas, and knowledge of spirits. Our knowledge of the former hath been
much obscured and confounded, and we have been led into very dangerous
errors, by supposing a twofold existence of the objects of sense, the
one "intelligible," or in the mind, the other "real," and without the
mind; whereby unthinking things are thought to have a natural
subsistence of their own, distinct from being perceived by spirits.
This is the very root of scepticism; for so long as men thought that
real things subsisted without the mind, and that their knowledge was
only so far "real" as it was conformable to "real things," they could
not be certain that they had any real knowledge at all.
So long as we attribute a real existence to unthinking things, distinct
from their being perceived, it is not only impossible for us to know the
nature of any real unthinking being, but it is impossible for us even to
know that it exists. Hence it is that we see philosophers distrust their
senses, and doubt of the existence of heaven and earth, of everything
they see or feel. But all this doubtfulness, which so bewilders and
confounds the mind, vanishes if we annex a meaning to our words and do
not amuse ourselves with the terms "absolute," "external," "exist," and
such like, signifying we know not what. I can as well doubt of my own
being as of the being of those things which I perceive by sense; the
very existence of unthinking beings consists in their being perceived.
It were a mistake to think that what is here said derogates in the least
from the reality of things. The unthinking beings perceived by sense
exist in those unextended, indivisible substances, or spirits, which
act, think, and perceive them; whereas philosophers vulgarly hold that
the sensible qualities exist in an inert, extended, unperceiving
substance, which they call "matter," to which they attribute a natural
subsistence distinct from being perceived by any mind whatsoever, even
the eternal mind of the Creator.
As we have shown the doctrine of matter to have been the main support of
scepticism, so likewise upon the same foundation have been raised all
the impious schemes of atheism and irreligion. All these monstrous
systems have so visible and necessary a dependence on this supposed
material substance that, when this cornerstone is once removed, the
whole fabric cannot choose but fall to the ground.
On the same principle does not only fatalism but also idolatry depend in
all its varying forms. Did men but consider that the sun, moon, and
stars, and every other object of the senses, are only so many sensations
in their minds, which have no other existence but barely being
perceived, they would never fall down and worship their own ideas, but
rather address their homage to that Eternal Invisible Mind which
produces and sustains all things.
As in reading books, a wise man will choose to fix his thoughts on the
sense rather than lay them out on grammatical remarks; so, in perusing
the volume of Nature, it seems beneath the dignity of the mind to affect
an exactness in reducing each particular phenomenon to general rules, or
showing how it follows from them. We should propose to ourselves nobler
views, such as to recreate and exalt the mind, with a prospect of the
beauty, order, extent, and variety, of natural things; hence, by proper
inferences, to enlarge our notions of the grandeur, wisdom, and
beneficence of the Creator.
The reason that is assigned for our being thought ignorant of the nature
of spirits is our not having an idea of them. But it is manifestly
impossible that there should be any such idea. A spirit is the only
substance or support wherein the unthinking beings or ideas can exist;
but that this substance which supports or perceives ideas should itself
be an idea is absurd.
From the opinion that spirits are to be known after the manner of an
idea or sensation have arisen many heterodox tenets and much scepticism
about the nature of the soul. It is even probable that this opinion may
have produced a doubt in some whether they had any soul at all distinct
from their body, since they could not find that they had an idea of it.
But the spirit is a real thing, which is neither an idea nor like an
idea. What I am myself, that which I denote by the term "I," is what we
mean by soul or spiritual substance; and we know other spirits by means
of our own soul, which in that sense is an image or idea of them.
By the natural immortality of the soul we mean that it is not liable to
be either broken or dissolved by the ordinary laws of Nature or motion.
The soul itself is indivisible, incorporeal, unextended, and is
consequently incorruptible.
_III.--OUR KNOWLEDGE OF GOD_
Though there be some things which convince us that human agents are
concerned in producing them, yet it is evident to everyone that those
things which are called the works of Nature--that is, the far greater
part of the ideas or sensations perceived by us--are not produced by,
nor dependent on, the wills of men. There is, therefore, some other
spirit that causes them, since they cannot subsist themselves.
If we attentively consider the constant regularity, order, and
concatenation of natural things, the surprising magnificence, beauty,
and perfection of the larger, and the exquisite contrivance of the
smaller parts together with the exact harmony and correspondence of the
whole--I say, if we consider all these things, and at the same time
attend to the import of the attributes, one eternal, infinitely wise,
good, and perfect, we shall clearly perceive that they belong to the
aforesaid Spirit, who works all in all, and by whom all things consist.
Hence it is evident that God is known as certainly and immediately as
any other mind or spirit whatsoever, distinct from ourselves. We may
even assert that the existence of God is far more evidently perceived
than the existence of men, because the effects of Nature are infinitely
more numerous and considerable than those ascribed to human agents.
There is not any one mark that denotes a man, or effect produced by him,
which does not more strongly evince the being of that Spirit who is the
Author of Nature.
It seems to be a general pretence of the unthinking herd that they
cannot see God. Could we but see Him, say they, as we see a man, we
should believe that He is, and, believing, obey His commands. But we
need only open our eyes to see the sovereign Lord of all things with a
more full and clear view than we do any one of our fellow-creatures. We
do not see a man, if by "man" is meant that which lives, moves,
perceives, and thinks as we do; but only such a collection of ideas as
directs us to think there is a distinct principle of thought and motion
like to ourselves, accompanying and represented by it. And after the
same manner we see God.
Men are surrounded with such clear manifestations of Deity, yet are so
little affected by them that they seem, as it were, blinded with excess
of light.
* * * * *
DESCARTES
DISCOURSE ON METHOD
René Descartes was born March 31, 1596, at La Haye, in the
ancient province of Touraine, France, of a noble family of
Touraine; and was educated at the College of La Flêche by the
Jesuits. The decisive crisis of his life arrived in 1619,
while he was serving as a volunteer with Prince Maurice of
Nassau, and the next nine years may be regarded as the period
of his formation. The most fruitful years of his life were
spent in Holland, whence he made occasional excursions into
France, and perhaps paid a visit to England. In 1633 he
finished his treatise on "The World; or on Light," an epitome
of his "Physics," which, however, he deemed it wise, in view
of Galileo's fate, to withhold from publication during his
lifetime. Besides the "Discourse on Method" (1637), with the
treatises on dioptrics, meteors, and geometry, his principal
works were his "Meditations" addressed to the Deans of the
Faculty of Theology in the University of Paris; the "Principia
Philosophiae," and the "Traité des Passions de L'Ame," in
which, he handled morals. Descartes died at Stockholm, whither
he had been summoned by Queen Christina, on February 11, 1649.
His work stands a landmark in the modern history of
philosophic thought.
_I.--THE AIM OF THIS DISCOURSE_
Good sense or reason must be better distributed than anything else in
the world, for no man desires more of it than he already has. This shows
that reason is by nature equal in all men. If there is diversity of
opinion, this arises from the fact that we conduct our thought by
different ways, and consider not the same things. It does not suffice
that the understanding be good--it must be well applied.
My mind is no better than another's, but I have been lucky enough to
chance on certain ways, which have led me to a certain method by means
of which it seems to me that I may by degrees augment my knowledge to
the modest measure of my intellect and my length of days. I shall be
very glad to make plain in this discourse the paths I have followed, and
to picture my life so that all may judge of it, and by the setting forth
of their opinions may furnish me with yet other means of improvement.
It is my design not to teach the method which each man ought to follow
for the right guidance of his reason, but only to show in what manner I
have tried to conduct my own.
I had been nourished on letters from my infancy, but as soon as I had
finished the customary course of study, I found myself hampered by so
many doubts and errors that I seemed to have reaped no benefits, except
that I had observed more and more of my ignorance: Yet I was at one of
the most celebrated schools in Europe, and I was not held inferior to my
fellow-students, some of whom were destined to take the place of our
masters; nor did our age seem less fruitful of good wits than any which
had gone before. Though I did not cease to esteem the studies of the
schools, I began to think that I had given enough time to languages,
enough also to ancient books, their stories and their fables; for when a
man spends too much time in travelling abroad he becomes a stranger in
his own country; and so, when he is too curious concerning what went on
in past ages, he is apt to remain ignorant of what is taking place in
his own day. I set a high price on eloquence, and I was in love with
poetry; above all, I rejoiced in mathematics, but I knew nothing of its
true use.
I revered our theology, but, since the way to heaven lies open to the
ignorant no less than to the learned, and the revealed truths which lead
thither are beyond our intelligence, I did not dare to submit them to my
feeble reasonings.
In philosophy there is no truth which is not disputed, and which,
consequently, is not doubtful; and, as to the other sciences, they all
borrow their principles from philosophy.
Therefore, I entirely gave up the study of letters, and employed the
rest of my youth in travelling, being resolved to seek no other science
than that which I might find within myself, or in the Great Book of the
World.
Here the best lesson that I learned was not to believe too firmly
anything of which I had learnt merely by example and custom; and thus
little by little was delivered from many errors which are liable to
obscure the light of nature, and to diminish our capacity of hearing
reason. Finally, I resolved one day to study myself in the same way, and
in this it seems to me I succeeded much better than if I had never
departed from either my country or my books.
_II.--THE INTELLECTUAL CRISIS_
Being in Germany, on my way to rejoin the army after the coronation of
the Emperor [Ferdinand II.], I was lying at an inn where, in default of
other conversation, I was at liberty to entertain my own thoughts. Of
these, one of the first was that often there is less perfection in works
which are composite than in those which issue from a single hand. Such
was the case with buildings, cities, states; for a people which has made
its laws from time to time to meet particular occasions will enjoy a
less perfect polity than a people which from the beginning has observed
the constitution of a far-sighted legislator. This is very certain, that
the estate of true religion, which God alone has ordained, must be
incomparably better guided than any other. And again, I considered that
as, during our childhood, we had been governed by our appetites and our
tutors, which are often at variance, which neither of them perhaps
always gave us the best counsel, it is almost impossible that our
judgments should be so pure and so solid as they would have been if we
had had the perfect use of our reason from the time of our birth, and
had never been guided by anything else.
Hence, as regarded the opinions that I had received into my belief, I
thought that, as a private person may pull down his own house to build a
finer, so I could not do better than remove them therefrom in order to
replace them by sounder, or, after I should have adjusted them to the
level of reason, to establish the same once more.
When I was younger I had studied logic, analytical geometry, and
algebra. Of these, I found that logic served rather for explaining
things we already know; while of geometry and algebra, the former is so
tied to the consideration of figures that it cannot exercise the
understanding without wearying the imagination, and the latter is so
bound down to certain rules and ciphers that it has been made a confused
and obscure art which hampers the mind instead of a science which
cultivates it. And as a state is better governed which has but few laws,
and those laws strictly observed, I believed that I should find
sufficient four precepts which follow.
The first was never to accept anything as true when I did not recognise
it clearly to be so--that is to say, carefully to avoid precipitation
and prejudice, but to include in my opinions nothing beyond that which
should present itself so clearly and distinctly to my mind that I might
have no occasion to doubt it.
The second was to divide up the difficulties which I should examine into
as many parts as possible, and as should be required for their better
solution.
The third was to conduct my thoughts in order, by beginning with the
simplest objects and those most easy to know, so as to mount little by
little, by stages, to the most complex knowledge, even supposing an
order among things which did not naturally stand in an order of
antecedent and consequent.
And the last was to make everywhere enumerations so complete, and
surveys so wide, that I should be sure of omitting nothing.
Exact observation of these precepts gave me such facility in unravelling
the questions comprehended in geometrical analysis and in algebra, that
in two or three months not only did I find my way through many which I
had formerly accounted too hard for me, but, towards the end, I seemed
to be able to determine, in those which were new to me, by what means
and to what extent it was possible to resolve them. And so I promised
myself that I would apply my system with equal success to the
difficulties of other sciences; but since their principles must all be
borrowed from philosophy, in which I found no certain principles of its
own, I thought that before all else I must try to establish some
therein. By way of preparation (for I was then but twenty-three years
old) I must root up from my mind my previous bad opinion of it, and must
practise my method in order that I might be confirmed in it more and
more.
_III.--A RULE OF LIFE_
Meanwhile I must have a rule of life as a shelter while my new house was
in building, and this consisted of three or four maxims.
The first was to conform myself to the laws and customs of my country,
and to hold to the religion in which, by God's grace, I had been brought
up; guiding myself, for the rest, by the least extreme opinions of the
most intelligent. Among extremes I counted all promises by which a man
curtails anything of his liberty; for I should have deemed it a grave
fault against good sense if, because I approved something in a given
moment, I had bound myself to accept it as good for ever after.
My second maxim was to follow resolutely even doubtful opinions when
sure opinions were not available, just as the traveller, lost in some
forest, had better walk straight forward, though in a chance direction;
for thus he will arrive, if not precisely at the place where he desires
to be, at least probably at a better place than the middle of a forest.
My third maxim was to endeavour always to conquer myself rather than
fortune, and to change my desires rather than the order of the world,
and in general to bring myself to believe that there is nothing wholly
in our power except our thoughts. And I believe that herein lay the
secret of those philosophers who, in the days of old, could withdraw
from the domination of fortune, and, despite pain and poverty, challenge
the felicity of their gods.
Finally, after looking out upon the divers occupations of men, I
pondered that I could do no better than persevere in that which I had
chosen--so deep was my content in discovering every day by its means
truths which seemed to me important, yet were unknown to the world.
Having thus made myself sure of these maxims, and having set them apart
together with the verities of faith, I judged that for the rest of my
opinions I might set freely to work to divest myself of them. For nine
years, therefore, I went up and down the world a spectator rather than
an actor. These nine years slipped away before I had begun to seek for
the foundations of any philosophy more certain, nor perhaps should I
have dared to undertake the quest had it not been put about that I had
already succeeded.
_IV.--"I THINK, THEREFORE I AM"_
I had long since remarked that in matters of conduct it is necessary
sometimes to follow opinions known to be uncertain, as if they were not
subject to doubt; but, because now I was desirous to devote myself to
the search after truth, I considered that I must do just the contrary,
and reject as absolutely false everything concerning which I could
imagine the least doubt to exist.
Thus, because our senses sometimes deceive us I would suppose that
nothing is such as they make us to imagine it; and because I was as
likely to err as another in reasoning, I rejected as false all the
reasons which I had formerly accepted as demonstrative; and finally,
considering that all the thoughts we have when awake can come to us also
when we sleep without any of them being true, I resolved to feign that
everything which had ever entered into my mind was no more truth than
the illusion of my dreams.
But I observed that, while I was thus resolved to feign that everything
was false, I who thought must of necessity be somewhat; and remarking
this truth--"_I think, therefore I am_"--was so firm and so assured that
all the most extravagant suppositions of the sceptics were unable to
shake it, I judged that I could unhesitatingly accept it as the first
principle of the philosophy I was seeking. I could feign that there was
no world, I could not feign that I did not exist. And I judged that I
might take it as a general rule that the things which we conceive very
clearly and very distinctly are all true, and that the only difficulty
lies in the way of discerning which those things are that we conceive
distinctly.
After this, reflecting upon the fact that I doubted, and that
consequently my being was not quite perfected (for I saw that to _know_
is a greater perfection than to _doubt_), I bethought me to inquire
whence I had learned to think of something more perfect than myself; and
it was clear to me that this must come from some nature which was in
fact more perfect. For other things I could regard as dependencies of my
nature if they were real, and if they were not real they might proceed
from nothing--that is to say, they might exist in me by way of defect.
But it could not be the same with the idea of a being more perfect than
my own; for to derive it from nothing was manifestly impossible; and,
because it is no less repugnant that the more perfect should follow and
depend upon the less perfect than that something should come forth out
of nothing, I could not derive it from myself.
It remained, then, to conclude that it was put into me by a nature truly
more perfect than was I, and possessing in itself all the perfections of
what I could form an idea--in a word, by God. To which I added that,
since I knew some perfections which I did not possess, I was not the
only being who existed, but that there must of necessity be some other
being, more perfect, on whom I depended, and from whom I had acquired
all that I possessed; for if I had existed alone and independent of all
other, so that I had of myself all this little whereby I participated in
the Perfect Being, I should have been able to have in myself all those
other qualities which I knew myself to lack, and so to be infinite,
eternal, immutable, omniscient, almighty--in fine, to possess all the
perfections which I could observe in God.
Proposing to myself the geometer's subject matter, and then turning
again to examine my idea of a Perfect Being, I found that existence was
comprehended in that idea just as, in the idea of a triangle is
comprehended the notion that the sum of its angles is equal to two right
angles; and that consequently it is as certain that God, this Perfect
Being, is or exists, as any geometrical demonstration could be.
That there are many who persuade themselves that there is a difficulty
in knowing Him is due to the scholastic maxim that there is nothing in
the understanding which has not first been in the senses; where the
ideas of God and the soul have never been.
Than the existence of God all other things, even those which it seems to
a man extravagant to doubt, such as his having a body, are less certain.
Nor is there any reason sufficient to remove such doubt but such as
presupposes the existence of God. From His existence it follows that our
ideas or notions, being real things, and coming from God, cannot but be
true in so far as they are clear and distinct. In so far as they contain
falsity, they are confused and obscure, there is in them an element of
mere negation (_elles participent du néant_); that is to say, they are
thus confused in us because we ourselves are not all perfect. And it is
evident that falsity or imperfection can no more come forth from God
than can perfection proceed from nothingness. But, did we not know that
all which is in us of the real and the true comes from a perfect and
infinite being, however clear and distinct our ideas might be, we should
have no reason for assurance that they possessed the final
perfection--truth.
Reason instructs us that all our ideas must have some foundation of
truth, for it could not be that the All-Perfect and the All-True should
otherwise have put them into us; and because our reasonings are never so
evident or so complete when we sleep as when we wake, although sometimes
during sleep our imagination may be more vivid and positive, it also
instructs us that such truth as our thoughts have will assuredly be in
our waking thoughts rather than in our dreams.
_V.--WHY I DO NOT PUBLISH "THE WORLD"_
I have always remained firm in my resolve to assume no other principle
than that which I have used to demonstrate the existence of God and of
the soul, and to receive nothing which did not seem to me clearer and
more certain than the demonstrations of the philosophers had seemed
before; yet not only have I found means of satisfying myself with regard
to the principal difficulties which are usually treated of in
philosophy, but also I have remarked certain laws which God has so
established in nature, and of which He has implanted such notions in our
souls, that we cannot doubt that they are observed in all which happens
in the world.
The principal truths which flow from these I have tried to unfold in a
treatise ("On the World, or on Light"), which certain considerations
prevent me from publishing. This I concluded three years ago, and had
begun to revise it for the printer when I learned that certain persons
to whom I defer had disapproved an opinion on physics published a short
time before by a certain person [Galileo, condemned by the Roman
Inquisition in 1633], in which opinion I had noticed nothing prejudicial
to religion; and this made me fear that there might be some among my
opinions in which I was mistaken.
I now believe that I ought to continue to write all the things which I
judge of importance, but ought in no wise to consent to their
publication during my life. For my experience of the objections which
might be made forbids me to hope for any profit from them. I have tried
both friends and enemies, yet it has seldom happened that they have
offered any objection which I had not in some measure foreseen; so that
I have never, I may say, found a critic who did not seem to be either
less rigorous or less fair-minded than myself.
Whereupon I gladly take this opportunity to beg those who shall come
after us never to believe that the things which they are told come from
me unless I have divulged them myself; and I am in nowise astonished at
the extravagances attributed to those old philosophers whose writings
have not come down to us. They were the greatest minds of their time,
but have been ill-reported. Why, I am sure that the most devoted of
those who now follow Aristotle would esteem themselves happy if they had
as much knowledge of nature as he had, even on the condition that they
should never have more! They are like ivy, which never mounts higher
than the trees which support it, and which even comes down again after
it has attained their summit. So at least, it seems to me, do they who,
not content with knowing all that is explained by their author, would
find in him the solution also of many difficulties of which he says
nothing, and of which, perhaps, he never thought.
Yet their method of philosophising is very convenient for those who have
but middling minds, for the obscurity of the distinctions and principles
which they employ enables them to speak of all things as boldly as if
they had knowledge of them, and sustain all they have to say against the
most subtle and skilful without there being any means of convincing
them; wherein they seem to me like a blind man who, in order to fight on
equal terms with a man who has his sight, invites him into the depths of
a cavern. And I may say that it is to their interest that I should
abstain from publishing the principles of the philosophy which I employ,
for so simple and so evident are they that to publish them would be like
opening windows into their caverns and letting in the day. But if they
prefer acquaintance with a little truth, and desire to follow a plan
like mine, there is no need for me to say to them any more in this
discourse than I have already said.
For if they are capable of passing beyond what I have done, much rather
will they be able to discover for themselves whatever I believe myself
to have found out; besides which, the practice which they will acquire
in seeking out easy things and thence passing to others which are more
difficult, will stead them better than all my instructions.
But if some of the matters spoken about at the beginning of the
"Dioptrics" and the "Meteors" [published with the "Discourse on Method"]
should at first give offence because I have called them "suppositions,"
and have shown no desire to prove them, let the reader have patience to
read the whole attentively, and I have hope that he will be satisfied.
The time remaining to me I have resolved to employ in trying to acquire
some knowledge of nature, such that we may be able to draw from it more
certain rules for medicine than those which up to the present we
possess. And I hereby declare that I shall always hold myself more
obliged to those by whose favour I enjoy my leisure undisturbed than I
should be to any who should offer me the most esteemed employments in
the world.
* * * * *
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
NATURE
Ralph Waldo Emerson, the American writer and moralist, was
born at Boston on May 25, 1803, of English stock and a family
of preachers. He was educated at Harvard for the Unitarian
ministry, and became a settled pastor in Boston before he was
twenty-six. Three years later he resigned his charge owing to
theological disagreements. In 1833 he visited Europe and
England as a hero worshipper, his desire being to meet Landor,
Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Carlyle. He saw them all, and
formed a lifelong friendship with Carlyle. Returning to
America, he settled at Concord, where he lived till his death,
on April. 27, 1882. His public work took the form of lectures,
of which his books are reproductions. In 1836 he published his
first book, "Nature," anonymously. "Nature" was the germ essay
from which all Emerson's later work sprang, a first expression
of thoughts that were expanded and developed later. It was
published in 1836, when its writer was thirty-three years of
age, and known only as a preacher who had become a lecturer.
Already Emerson had adopted the methods of a seer rather than
those of the consecutive thinker. "Nature" was one of the
first-written books of great writers that made a deep
impression on the understanding few, but had only a few
readers. It presaged the greatness to be; and indeed its
poetical quality carries a charm, which Emerson sometimes
failed to reproduce and never afterwards surpassed.
_I.--TO WHAT END IS NATURE?_
Our age is retrospective. It builds the sepulchres of the fathers. It
writes biographies, histories, and criticisms. The foregoing generations
beheld God face to face; we through their eyes. Why should not we also
have an original relation to the universe? Why should we grope among the
dry bones of the past, or put the living generation into masquerade out
of its faded wardrobe? Let us interrogate the great apparition that
shines so peacefully around us. Let us inquire to what end is Nature.
Philosophically considered, the universe is composed of Nature and Soul.
Strictly speaking, therefore, all that is separate from us, all which
philosophy distinguishes as _not me_, that is both Nature and Art, all
other men and my own body, must be ranked under this name, Nature.
Nature, in the common sense, refers to essences unchanged by man: space,
the air, the river, the leaf. Art is applied to the mixture of his will
with the same things, as in a house, a canal, a statue, a picture. But
his operations, taken together, are so insignificant, a little chipping,
baking, patching, and washing, that in an impression so grand as that of
the world on the human mind they do not vary the result.
To go into solitude, a man needs to retire as much from his chamber as
from society. But if a man would be alone let him look at the stars. The
rays that come from those heavenly bodies will separate between him and
what he touches. One might think the atmosphere was made transparent
with this design, to give man in the heavenly bodies the perpetual
presence of the sublime. Seen in the streets of cities, how great they
are! If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how men
would believe and adore, and preserve for many generations the
remembrance of the city of God which had been shown! But every night
come out these envoys of beauty, and light the universe with their
admonishing smile.
Nature never wears a mean appearance. Neither does the wisest man extort
her secret, and lose his curiosity by finding out all her perfection.
When we speak of Nature in this manner we have a distinct but most
poetical sense in the mind. We mean the integrity of impression made by
manifold natural objects. The charming landscape which I saw this
morning is indubitably made up of some twenty or thirty farms. Miller
owns this field, Locke that, and Manning the woodland beyond. But none
owns the landscape. There is a property in the horizon which no man has
but he whose eye can integrate all the parts--that is, the poet. This is
the best part of these men's farms, yet to this their warranty-deeds
give no title.
_II.--HER DELIGHT_
In the presence of Nature a wild delight runs through the man in spite
of real sorrow. Not the sun or the summer alone, but every hour and
season yields its tribute of delight; for every hour and change
corresponds to and authorises a different state of mind, from breathless
noon to grimmest midnight. Crossing a bare common, in snow puddles, at
twilight, under a clouded sky, without having in my thoughts any
occurrence of special good fortune, I have enjoyed a perfect
exhilaration. I am glad to the brink of fear. In the woods, too, a man
casts off his years as the snake his slough, and at what period soever
of life is always a child. Within these plantations of God a decorum and
sanctity reign, a perennial festival is dressed, and the guest sees not
how he should tire of them in a thousand years. Standing on the bare
ground, my head bathed in the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite
space, all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eyeball; I am
nothing; I see all; the currents of universal being circulate through
me; I am a part or particle of God. I am the lover of uncontained and
immortal beauty.
Yet it is certain that the power to produce this delight does not reside
in Nature, but in man, or in a harmony of both. It is necessary to use
these pleasures with great temperance. For Nature is not always tricked
in holiday attire, but the same scene which yesterday breathed perfume
and glittered as for the frolic of nymphs is overspread with melancholy
to-day. Nature always wears the colours of the spirit.
The misery of man appears like childish petulance when we explore the
steady and prodigal provision that has been made for his support and
delight on this green ball which floats him through the heavens. All the
parts incessantly work into each other's hands for the profit of man.
The wind sows the seed; the sun evaporates the sea; the wind blows the
vapour to the field; the ice on the other side of the planet condenses
the rain on this; the plant feeds the animal; and thus the endless
circulations of the divine charity nourish man.
The useful arts are reproductions or new combinations by the wit of man
of the same natural benefactors. The private poor man hath cities,
ships, canals, bridges, built for him. He goes to the post-office, and
the human race run on his errands; to the book-shop, and the human race
read and write all that happens for him; to the court-house, and nations
repair his wrongs.
_III.--HER LOVELINESS_
A nobler want of man is served by Nature, namely, the love of beauty.
Such is the constitution of all things, or such the plastic power of the
human eye, that the primary forms, as the sky, the mountain, the tree,
the animal, give us a delight in and for themselves, a pleasure arising
from art, line, colour, motion, and grouping. This seems partly owing to
the eye itself. The eye is the best of artists, as light is the first of
painters.
To the body and mind which have been cramped by noxious work or company
Nature is medicinal, and restores their tone. But in other hours Nature
satisfies by her loveliness and without any mixture of corporeal
benefit. I see the spectacle of morning from the hilltop over against my
house from daybreak to sunrise with emotion which an angel might share.
How does Nature deify us with a few and cheap elements. Give me health
and a day, and I will make the pomp of emperors ridiculous. The dawn is
my Assyria; the sunset and moonrise my Paphos, and unimaginable realms
of faerie; broad noon shall be my England of the senses and the
understanding; the night shall be my Germany of mystic philosophy and
dreams.
The inhabitants of cities suppose that the country landscape is pleasant
only half the year. To the attentive eye each moment of the year has its
own beauty, and in the same fields it beholds every hour a picture which
was never seen before, and which shall never be seen again.
Every rational creature has all Nature for his dowry and estate. He may
divest himself of it, he may creep into a corner and abdicate his
kingdom, as most men do, but he is entitled to the world by his
constitution. In proportion to the energy of his thought and will he
takes up the world into himself.
_IV.--HER GIFT OF LANGUAGE_
Language is another use which Nature subserves to man. Words are signs
of natural facts. The use of natural history is to give us aid in
supernatural history. Every word which is used to express a moral or
intellectual fact, if traced to its root, is found to be borrowed from
some material appearance. Right means straight; wrong means twisted;
transgression the crossing of a line. Most of the process by which this
transformation is made is hidden from us in the remote time when
language was framed; but the same tendency may be daily observed in
children.
It is not words only that are emblematic, it is things. Every appearance
in Nature corresponds to some state of mind, and that state of mind can
only be described by presenting that natural appearance as its picture.
An enraged man is a lion, a cunning man is a fox, a firm man is a rock,
a learned man is a torch. Visible distance behind and before us is
respectively an image of memory and hope.
Man is conscious of a universal soul within or behind his individual
life, wherein, as in a firmament, the natures of justice, truth, love,
freedom, arise and shine. This universal soul he calls reason: it is not
mine, or thine, or his, but we are its; we are its property and men. And
the blue sky in which the private earth is buried, the sky with its
eternal calm and full of everlasting orbs is the type of reason. That
which, intellectually considered, we call reason, considered in relation
to Nature we call spirit. Spirit is the creator. Spirit hath life in
itself, and man in all ages and countries embodies it in his language as
the Father.
As we go back in history language becomes more picturesque until its
infancy, when it is all poetry. When simplicity of character and the
sovereignty of ideas are broken up, new imagery ceases to be created and
old words are perverted to stand for things which are not; a paper
currency is employed when there is no bullion in the vaults.
_V.--HER MORAL DISCIPLINE_
In view of the significance of Nature we arrive at the fact that Nature
is a discipline. What tedious training, day after day, year after year,
never ending, to form the common sense; what continual reproduction of
annoyances, inconveniences, dilemmas; what rejoicing over us of little
men, what disputing of prices, what reckoning of interest--and all to
form the hand of the mind!
The exercise of will or the lesson of power is taught in every event.
Nature is thoroughly mediate. It is made to serve. It receives the
dominion of man as meekly as the ass on which the Saviour rode. It
offers all its kingdoms to man as the raw material which he may mould
into what is useful. And he is never weary of working it up. He forges
the subtle and delicate air into wise and melodious words, and gives
them wings as angels of persuasion and command. One after another his
victorious thought comes up with and reduces all things, until the world
becomes at last a realised will.
Every natural process is a version of a moral sentence. The moral law
lies at the centre of Nature and radiates to the circumference. What is
a farm but a mute gospel? The chaff and the wheat, weeds and plants,
blight, rain, insects, sun--it is a sacred emblem from the first furrow
of spring to the last stack which the snow of winter overtakes in the
fields. Who can guess how much firmness the sea-beaten rock has taught
the fisherman? How much tranquillity has been reflected to man from the
azure sky? How much industry and providence and affection we have caught
from the pantomime of brutes?
The unity of Nature meets us everywhere. Resemblances exist in things
wherein there is great superficial unlikeness. Thus architecture is
called "frozen music" by Goethe. "A Gothic church," said Coleridge, "is
petrified religion." The law of harmonic sounds reappears in the
harmonic colours. The granite is different in its laws only by the more
or less of heat from the river that wears it away. The river, as it
flows, resembles the air that flows over it; the air resembles the light
that traverses it with more subtle currents.
Each creature is only a modification of the other, the likeness in them
is more than the difference, and their radical law is one and the same.
This unity pervades thought also.
_VI.--IS NATURE REAL?_
A noble doubt suggests itself whether discipline be not the final cause
of the universe, and whether Nature outwardly exists. The frivolous make
themselves merry with the ideal theory as if its consequences were
burlesque, as if it affected the stability of Nature. It surely does
not. The wheels and springs of man are all set to the hypothesis of the
permanence of Nature.
But while we acquiesce entirely in the permanence of natural laws, the
question of the absolute existence of Nature still remains open. It is
the uniform effect of culture on the human mind to lead us to regard
Nature as a phenomenon, not a substance; to attribute necessary
existence to spirit.
Intellectual science fastens the attention upon immortal necessary
uncreated natures, that is, upon ideas; and in their presence we feel
that the outward circumstance is a dream and a shade. Whilst we wait in
this Olympus of the gods we think of Nature as an appendix to the soul.
Finally, religion and ethics, which may be fitly called the practice of
ideas, have an analogous effect. The first and last lesson of religion
is: "The things that are seen are temporal; the things that are unseen
are eternal."
_VII.--THE SPIRIT BEHIND NATURE_
The aspect of Nature is devout. Like the figure of Jesus, she stands
with bended head and hands folded on the breast. The happiest man is he
who learns from Nature the lesson of worship. Of that ineffable essence
we call spirit, he that thinks most will say least. We can foresee God
in the coarse, as it were, distant phenomena of matter; but when we try
to define and describe Himself, both language and thought desert us, and
we are as helpless as fools and savages. The noblest ministry of Nature
is to stand as the apparition of God. It is the organ through which the
universal spirit speaks to the individual, and strives to bring back the
individual to it.
I conclude this essay with some traditions of man and Nature which a
certain poet sang to me.
The foundations of man are not in matter, but in spirit. And the element
of spirit is eternity. To it, therefore, the longest series of events,
the oldest chronologies are young and recent. A man is a god in ruins.
When men are innocent, life shall be longer and shall pass into the
immortal as gently as we awake from dreams. Infancy is the perpetual
Messiah which comes into the arms of fallen men, and pleads with them to
return to paradise. The problem of restoring to the world the original
and eternal beauty is solved by the redemption of the soul. The ruin
that we see when we look at Nature is in our own eye. Man cannot be a
naturalist until he satisfies all the demands of the spirit. Love is as
much its demand as perception. When a faithful thinker shall kindle
science with the fire of the holiest affection, then will God go forth
anew into the creation.
Nature is not fixed, but fluid. Spirit alters, moulds, makes it. The
immobility, or bruteness, of Nature is the absence of spirit. Every
spirit builds itself a house, and beyond its house a world, and beyond
its world a heaven. What we are, that only can we see. All that Adam
had, all that Caesar could, you have and can do. Adam called his house
heaven and earth; Caesar called his house Rome; you, perhaps, call yours
a cobbler's trade, a hundred acres of ploughed land, or a scholar's
garret. Yet, line for line, and point for point, your dominion is as
great as theirs, though without fine names. Build, therefore, your own
world. As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea in your mind,
that will unfold its great proportions.
* * * * *
EPICTETUS
DISCOURSES AND ENCHEIRIDION
The Stoic philosopher Epictetus was born about 50 A.D., at
Hierapolis, in Phrygia, at that time a Roman province of Asia
Minor, and was at first a slave in Rome. On being freed he
devoted himself to philosophy, and thereafter lived and taught
at Nicopolis, in Epirus (then a portion of Macedonia,
corresponding to Albania to-day), from about 90 A.D. to 138
A.D. He left no works, but his utterances have been collected
in four books of "Discourses" or "Dissertations" by his pupil
and friend Arrian. In the "Encheiridion Epictete"--a "Handbook
to Epictetus" compiled and condensed from the chaos of the
almost verbatim "Discourses"--Arrian gives the most authentic
account of the philosophy of the Greek and Roman Stoics, the
sect founded by Zeno about 300 years before the Christian era,
which flourished until the decline of Rome. Arrian himself was
born about 90 A.D. at Nicomedia. He wrote in the style of
Xenophon the "Anabasis of Alexander," a book on "Tactics," and
several histories which have been lost. He is chiefly of note,
however, as the Boswell of Epictetus. He died about 180 A.D.
_I.--OF THE WILL, AND OF GOD_
The reasoning faculty alone considers both itself and all other powers,
and judges of the appearance of things. And, as was fit, this most
excellent and superior faculty, the faculty of a right use of the
appearances of things, is that alone which the gods have placed in our
own power, while all the other matters they have placed not in our
power. Was it because they would not? I rather think that if they could,
they had granted us these, too; but they certainly could not. For,
placed upon earth, and confined to such a body and such companions, how
was it possible that we should not be hindered by things without us?
But what says Jupiter? "O Epictetus, if it were possible, I had made
this little body and possession of thine free, and not liable to
hindrance. But now do not mistake; it is not thine own, but only a finer
mixture of clay. Since, then, I could not give thee this, I have given
thee a certain portion of myself--this faculty of exerting the powers of
pursuit and avoidance, of desire and aversion, and, in a word, the use
of the appearances of things. Taking care of this point, and making what
is thy own to consist in this, thou wilt never be restrained, never be
hindered; thou wilt not groan, wilt not complain, wilt not flatter
anyone. How then! Do all these advantages seem small to thee? Heaven
forbid! Let them suffice thee, then, and thank the gods."
But now, when it is in our power to take care of one thing, and apply
ourselves to it, we choose rather to encumber ourselves with many--body,
property, brother, friend, child, slave--and thus we are burdened and
weighed down. When the weather happens not to be fair for sailing, we
sit screwing ourselves and perpetually looking out for the way of the
wind.
What then is to be done?
To make the best of what is in our power, and take the rest as it
naturally happens.
And how is that?
As it pleases God.
To a reasonable creature, that alone is unsupportable which is
unreasonable; everything reasonable may be supported. When Vespasian had
sent to forbid Priscus Helvidius going to the senate, he answered, "It
is in your power to prevent my continuing a senator, but while I am one
I must go."
"Well, then, at least be silent there."
"Do not ask my opinion, and I will be silent."
"But I must ask it."
"And I must speak what appears to me to be right."
"But if you do I will put you to death."
"Did I ever tell you that I was immortal? You will do your part, and I
mine; it is yours to kill, and mine to die intrepid; yours to banish me,
mine to depart untroubled."
What good, then, did Priscus do, who was but a single person? Why, what
good does the purple do to the garment? What but the being a shining
character in himself, and setting a good example to others? Another,
perhaps, if in such circumstances Caesar had forbidden his going to the
senate, would have said, "I am obliged to you for excusing me." But such
a one Caesar would not have forbidden, well knowing that he would either
sit like a statue, or, if he spoke, he would say what he knew to be
agreeable to Caesar.
Only consider at what price you sell your own will and choice, man--if
for nothing else, that you may not sell it for a trifle.
If a person could be persuaded, as he ought of this principle, that we
are all originally descended from God, and that He is the Father of gods
and men, I conceive he never would think meanly or degenerately
concerning himself. Suppose Caesar were to adopt you, there would be no
bearing your haughty looks. Will you not be elated on knowing yourself
to be the son of Jupiter, of God Himself? Yet, in fact, we are not
elated; but having two things in our composition, intimately united, a
body in common with the brutes, and reason and sentiment in common with
the gods, many of us incline to this unhappy and mortal kindred, and
only some few to the divine and happy one.
By means of this animal kindred some of us, deviating towards it, become
like wolves, faithless and insidious and mischievous; others like lions,
wild and savage and untamed; but most of us like foxes, wretches even
among brutes. For what else is a slanderous and ill-natured man than a
fox, or something still more wretched and mean?
To Triptolemus all men have raised temples and altars, because he gave
us a milder kind of food; but to Him who has discovered and communicated
to all the truth, the means not of living but of living well, who ever
raised an altar or built a statue?
If what philosophers say of the kindred between God and man be true,
what has anyone to do but, like Socrates, when he is asked what
countryman he is, never to say that he is a citizen of Athens, or of
Corinth, but of the world? Why may not he who has learned that from God
the seeds of being are descended, not only to my father or grandfather,
but to all things that are produced and born on the earth--and
especially to rational natures, as they alone are qualified to partake
of a communication with the Deity, being connected with Him by
reason--why may not such a one call himself a citizen of the world? Why
not a son of God? And why shall he fear anything that happens among men?
Shall kindred to Caesar, or any other of the great at Rome, enable a man
to live secure, above contempt, and void of fear; and shall not the
having God for our Maker and Father and Guardian free us from griefs and
terrors?
_II.--THE CITIZEN OF THE WORLD AND HIS HIGH CALLING_
You are a distinct portion of the essence of God, and contain a certain
part of Him in yourself. Why do not you consider whence you came? You
carry a god about with you, wretch, and know nothing of it. Do you
suppose I mean some god without you, of gold or silver? It is within
yourself you carry Him, and profane Him, without being sensible of it,
by impure thoughts and unclean actions. If even the image of God were
present, you would not dare to act as you do; when God Himself is within
you, and hears and sees all, are not you ashamed to think and act thus,
insensible of your own nature and hateful to God?
You are a citizen of the world, and a part of it; not a subservient, but
a principal part. You are capable of comprehending the divine economy
and of considering the connection of things. What, then, does the
character of a citizen promise? To hold no private interest, to
deliberate of nothing as a separate individual, but like the hand or the
foot, which, if they had reason, and comprehended the constitution of
nature, would never pursue, or desire, but with a reference to the
whole.
"Ah, when shall I see Athens and the citadel again?" Wretch, are not you
contented with what you see every day? Can you see anything better than
the sun, the moon, the stars, the whole earth, the sea? If, besides, you
comprehend Him who administers the whole, and carry Him about in
yourself, do you still long after pebbles and a fine rock?
Boldly make a desperate push, man, for prosperity, for freedom, for
magnanimity. Lift up your head at last as free from slavery. Dare to
look up to God, and say, "Make use of me for the future as Thou wilt. I
am of the same mind; I am equal with Thee. I refuse nothing which seems
good to Thee. Lead me whither Thou wilt. Clothe me in whatever dress
Thou wilt. Is it Thy will that I should be in a public or a private
condition, dwell here or be banished, be poor or rich? Under all these
circumstances I will make Thy defence to men. I will show what the
nature of everything is." No, rather sit alone in a warm place, and wait
till your nurse comes to feed you. If Hercules had sat loitering at
home, what would he have been? You are not Hercules, to extirpate the
evils of others. Extirpate your own, then. Expel grief, fear, desire,
envy, malevolence, avarice, effeminacy, intemperance, from your mind.
But these can be no otherwise expelled than by looking up to God alone
as your pattern; by attaching yourself to Him alone and being
consecrated to His commands. If you wish for anything else, you will,
with sighs and groans, follow what is stronger than you, always seeking
prosperity without, and never finding it. For you seek it where it is
not, and neglect to seek it where it is.
_III.--"HIS WILL IS MY WILL"_
Have I ever been restrained from what I willed? Or compelled against my
will? How is this possible? I have ranged my pursuits under the
direction of God. Is it His will that I should have a fever? It is my
will too. Is it His will that I should pursue anything? It is my will
too. Is it His will that I should desire? It is my will too. Is it His
will that I should obtain anything? It is mine too. Is it not His will?
It is not mine. Is it His will that I should be tortured? Then it is my
will to be tortured. Is it His will that I should die? Then it is my
will to die.
He has given me whatever depends upon choice. The things in my power He
has made incapable of hindrance or restraint. But how could He make a
body of clay incapable of hindrance? Therefore He hath subjected my
body, possessions, furniture, house, children, wife, to the revolution
of the universe. He who gave takes away. For whence had I these things
when I came into the world?
"But I would enjoy the feast still longer." So perhaps would the
spectators at Olympia see more combatants. But the solemnity is over. Go
away. Depart like a grateful and modest person; make room for others.
Do not you know that sickness and death must overtake us? At what
employment? The husbandman at his plough; the sailor on his voyage. At
what employment would you be taken? Indeed, at what employment ought you
to be taken? For if there is any better employment at which you can be
taken, follow that.
For my own part, I would be engaged in nothing but the care of my own
faculty of choice, how to render it undisturbed, unrestrained,
uncompelled, free. I would be found studying this, that I may be able to
say to God, "Have I transgressed Thy commands? Have I perverted the
powers, the senses, the preconceptions which Thou hast given me? Have I
ever accused Thee or censured Thy dispensations? I have been sick,
because it was Thy pleasure. I have been poor, with joy. I have not been
in power, because it was not Thy will, and power I have never desired.
Have I not always approached Thee cheerfully, prepared to execute Thy
commands? Is it Thy pleasure that I depart from this assembly? I depart.
I give Thee thanks that Thou hast thought me worthy to have a share in
it with Thee; to behold Thy works, and to join with Thee in
comprehending Thy administration." Let death overtake me while I am
thinking, writing, reading such things as these. Of things, some are in
our power, others not. In our power are opinion, pursuit, desire,
accession; in a word, whatever are our own actions. Not in our power are
body, property, reputation, command; in a word, whatever are not our own
actions.
Now, the things in our power are free, unrestrained, unhindered, while
those not in our power are weak, slavish, restrained, belonging to
others. Remember, then, that if you suppose these latter things free,
and what belongs to others your own, you will be hindered; you will
lament; you will be disturbed; you will find fault with both gods and
men. But if you regard that only as your own which is your own, and what
is others, as theirs, no one will ever compel you; no one will restrain
you; you will find fault with no one; you will accuse no one; you will
do nothing against your will; you will have no enemy and will suffer no
harm.
Aiming, therefore, at great things, remember that you must not allow
yourself to be carried out of your course, however slightly.
Study to be able to say to every hostile appearance, "You are but an
appearance, and not the thing you appear to be." Then examine it by your
rules, and first and chiefly by this: whether it concerns the things in
your own power or those which are not. And if it concerns anything not
in your own power, be prepared to say it is nothing to you.
With regard to whatever objects either delight the mind, or contribute
to use, or are loved with fondness, remember to tell yourself of what
nature they are, beginning from the most trifling things. If you are
fond of an earthen cup, remind yourself it is an earthen cup of which
you are fond; thus, if it be broken, you will not be disturbed. If you
kiss your child, or your wife, remember you kiss a being subject to the
accidents of humanity; thus you will not be disturbed if either die.
Men are disturbed, not by things, but by their own notions regarding
them.
Be not elated over excellences not your own. If a horse should be elated
and say, "I am handsome," it would be supportable. But when you are
elated and say, "I have a handsome horse," know that you are elated on
what is, in fact, only the good of the horse.
Require not things to happen as you wish, but wish them to happen as
they do happen. Then all will go well.
In every happening, inquire of your mind how to turn it to proper
account.
Never say of anything "I have lost it," but "I have restored it." Is
your child dead? It is restored. Is your wife dead? She is restored. Is
your estate taken away from you? Well, and is not that likewise
restored? "But he who took it away is a bad man." What is it to you by
whose hands He who gave it hath demanded it again? While He gives you to
possess it, take care of it, but as of something not your own, like a
passenger in an inn.
_IV.--OF TRANQUILLITY AND THE MEANS THERETO_
If you would improve, lay aside such reasonings as prevent tranquillity.
It is better to die with hunger, exempt from grief and fear, than to
live in affluence with perturbation. It is better your servant should be
bad than you unhappy. Is a little oil spilt? A little wine stolen? Say
to yourself, "This is the purchase paid for peace, for tranquillity, and
nothing is to be had for nothing." When you call your servant, consider
it possible he may not come at your call; or if he doth, that he may not
do what you would have him do. He is by no means of such importance that
it should be in his power to give you disturbance.
Be content to be thought foolish and stupid with regard to externals and
unessentials. Do not wish to be thought to know. And though you appear
to others to be somebody, distrust yourself. For be assured it is not
easy at once to preserve your faculty of choice in a state conformable
to nature, and to secure externals, since while you are careful of the
one you will neglect the other.
Behave in life as at an entertainment. Is anything brought round to you?
Put out your hand and take your share, with moderation. Doth it pass by
you? Do not stop it. Is it not yet come? Do not stretch forth your
desire towards it, but wait till it reaches you. Thus do with regard to
children, to a wife, to public posts, to riches, and you will be, some
time or other, a worthy partner of the feasts of the gods. And if you do
not so much as take the things set before you, but are able even to
despise them, then you will not only be a partner of the gods' feasts,
but of their empire.
Remember that you are an actor in a drama, of such a kind as the Author
pleases to make it. If short, of a short one; if long, of a long one. If
it be His pleasure you should act a poor man, a cripple, a governor, or
a private person, see that you act it naturally. For this is your
business, to act well the character assigned you; to choose it is
another's.
To me all the portents are lucky, if I will. For, whatever happens, it
is in my power to derive advantage from it.
Remember that not he who gives ill language or a blow affronts, but the
principle which represents these things as affronting. When, therefore,
anyone provokes you, be assured that it is your own opinion which
provokes you. Try in the first place not to be hurried away with the
appearance. For if you once gain time and respite you will more easily
command yourself.
Be assured that the essential property of piety towards the gods is to
form right opinions concerning them as existing and as governing the
universe with goodness and justice. And fix yourself in the resolution
to obey them, and yield to them, and willingly follow them in all
events, as produced by the most perfect understanding. For thus you will
never find fault with the gods, nor accuse them of neglecting you. And
it is not possible for this to be effected any other way than by
withdrawing yourself from things not in your own power and placing good
or evil in those only which are. For if you suppose any of the things
not in your own power to be either good or evil, when you are
disappointed at what you wish, or incur what you would avoid, you must
necessarily find fault with and blame the authors.
Be for the most part silent, or speak merely what is necessary, and in
few words. We may sparingly enter into discourse when occasion calls for
it, but not on the vulgar topics of gladiators, horse-races, feasts, and
so on; above all, not of men, so as either to blame, praise, or make
comparisons.
If anyone tells you such a person speaks ill of you, make no excuses,
but answer, "He does not know my other faults, or he would not have
mentioned only these."
When you do anything from a clear judgment that it ought to be done,
never shun the being seen to do it, even though the world should make a
wrong supposition about it. For if you do not act right, shun the action
itself; and if you do, why be afraid of mistaken censure?
When any person does ill by you, or speaks ill of you, remember that he
acts or speaks from a supposition of its being his duty. Now, it is not
possible that he should follow what appears right to you, but what
appears so to himself. Therefore, if he misjudges, he is the person
hurt, for he is the one deceived. Meekly bear, then, a person who
reviles you, for you will say upon every occasion, "It seemed so to
him."
The condition and characteristic of a vulgar person is that he never
expects either benefit or hurt from himself, but from externals. The
condition and characteristic of a philosopher is that he expects all
hurt and benefit from himself. The marks of a proficient are that he
censures no one, praises no one, blames no one, accuses no one, says
nothing concerning himself as being anybody or knowing anything; when he
is hindered or restrained, he accuses himself; when praised, he secretly
laughs; if censured, he makes no defence. He suppresses all desire;
transfers his aversion to things only which thwart the proper use of his
own will; is gentle in all exercise of his powers; and does not care if
he appears stupid and ignorant, but watches himself as an enemy, like
one in ambush.
Whatever rules of life you have deliberately proposed to yourself, abide
by them as laws, and as if it were impious to transgress them; and do
not regard what anyone says of you; for this, after all, is no concern
of yours. Let whatever appears to you to be the best be to you an
inviolable law. Socrates became perfect, improving himself in everything
by attending to reason only. And though you be not yet a Socrates, live
as one who would become a Socrates.
Upon all occasions we ought to have ready at hand these three maxims:
Conduct me, God, and thou, O Destiny,
Wherever your decrees have fixed my station.
I follow cheerfully. And did I not,
Wicked and wretched, I must follow still.
Whoe'er yields properly to Fate is deemed
Wise among men and knows the laws of heaven.
"O Crito, if it thus pleases the gods, thus let it be. Anytus and
Melitus may kill me indeed, but hurt my soul they cannot."
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES
Footnote 1: The deceased speaks constantly as if he were Osiris or some
other god. This is supposed to give him the privileges and power of the
god whose name he bears.
Footnote 2: The Egyptians thought that in the lower world the heart or
conscience was weighed, _i.e.,_ judged.
Footnote 3: This chapter and the like are found on stone, wood,
porcelain, etc., figures, and attached to the mummy. It was supposed to
act magically in transferring the tasks of the underworld from the
person.
Footnote 4: The storm-god, the arch-fiend of Ra, the sun-god
Footnote 5: The suppliant has made a wax figure of Apepi, and, by
sympathetic magic, imagines that by burning it he is destroying the
power of the original. Such wax figures of the gods made for magical
purposes were generally illegal.
Footnote 6: There are many examples in the Book of the Dead of the
magical potency attached to names. To invoke a god by his name was to
control him.
Footnote 7: The ass stands for Ra, the sun-god, and the eater of the ass
is darkness or some eclipse, represented as one of the foes of Ra, in
the vignette figured as a serpent on the back of an ass. Compare the
Babylonian myth of Marduk and Tiamat.
Footnote 8: The married name of Confucius.
Footnote 9: Compare the method of Socrates in the investigation of
truth.
Footnote 10: In the above four "difficulties," note the reappearance of
the law of reciprocity, the negative form of the Golden Rule.
Footnote 11: A technical name for China, which was supposed to be
enclosed by the four great oceans of the world. China is also called
"The Middle Kingdom."
Footnote 12: That is, those who have been invested with the sacred
thread, which is a sign of having been initiated into the paternal
caste. This ceremony takes place at the age of seven or nine years, but
is only observed by the three higher castes. It is to be compared with
the Christian rites of baptism and confirmation. Hindu boys, when
invested with the sacred thread or cord, are said to be born again.
Footnote 13: This spelling of the word ("Quran") represents the native
Arabic pronunciation if it be remembered that "q" stands for a "k" sound
proceeding from the lower part of the throat. The initial sound is
therefore to be distinguished from that of the Arabic and Hebrew letters
properly transliterated "k."
Footnote 14: The pronunciation heard by the present writer among the
Muslim Arabs of Egypt, Syria, etc. The word means literally "The Praised
One" or "The One to be Praised." The "h," however, in the word is not
the ordinary one, but that pronounced at the lower part of the throat,
as the Arabic equivalent of "q" is. Hence this "h" is transliterated as
"h" with a dot underneath it.
Footnote 15: All the suras, except the ninth, begin with this formula,
as, indeed, do most Arabic books, often even books of an immoral nature.
Footnote 16: Muhammad's uncle, who, with his wife, rejected the
prophet'» claims.
Footnote 17: A word-play, Lahab meaning "flame."
Footnote 18: Said by Muslim commentators to be one of the last ten
nights of Ramadhan, the seventh of those nights reckoning backwards.
Footnote 19: The earliest mention of the doctrine of abrogation of
previous revelations. When Muhammad was convinced that what he had
previously taught was erroneous he always professed to have received a
new revelation annulling the earlier one bearing on the matter.
Footnote 20: There is perhaps here an indirect reference to the alleged
deification of the Virgin Mary by the Christians with whom Muhammad came
in contact.
Footnote 21: This is from one of the oldest suras. A most important
Muslim tradition says that Muhammad declares this sura to be equal to a
third of the rest of the Koran. Some say it represents the prophet's
creed when he entered upon his mission.
Footnote 22: This is directed against both the Mekkan belief that angels
were daughters of God and also against the Christian doctrine that Jesus
was the Son of God. Reference is also made, perhaps, to the Jewish
description of Ezra as God's son.
Footnote 23: Muhammad here adopts the Jewish and Arab myth that Solomon
had a seal with the divine name (Yahwe) inscribed on it giving him
control over winds and jinns, or demons.
Footnote 24: In Arabic, Mary and Miriam are spelt exactly alike
("Miriam"). This evidently misled Muhammad. In sura 56 he describes the
Virgin as a daughter of Amram, the father of Aaron, Moses, and Miriam.
(See Numbers xxvi. 59, and Exodus xv. 20.)
Footnote 25: This is a well-known Arab fable, based on a
misunderstanding of I Kings iv. 33, influenced by the second Targum on
Esther. See an English translation of this last in a commentary on
Esther by Paul Cassel (T. & T. Clark), p. 263. This Targum is certainly
older than the Koran, and it embodies Jewish legends of a still greater
antiquity.
Footnote 26: This legend about Mount Sinai is contained twice in the
Jewish Talmud (Abodah Zarah Mishnah II, 2, and Shabbath Gemarah
lxxxviii. 1). It is no doubt this Jewish tradition that suggested the
above passage.
Footnote 27: The point to which men turn in prayer, Zoroastrians pray
towards the east--the direction of the rising sun; Jews towards
Jerusalem, where the Temple was; and Muslims, from the utterance of this
sura, towards Mekka. At first Muhammad adopted no Qiblah. On reaching
Medinah, in order to conciliate the Jews he adopted Jerusalem as the
Qiblah. But a year after reaching Medinah, he broke with the Jews and
commanded his people to make the Kaabah their Qiblah.
Footnote 28: The cube-like building in the centre of the mosque at
Mekka, which contains the sacred black stone.
Footnote 29: Ahmad and Muhammad have both the same meaning, _i.e._, "the
Praiseworthy One." Muslim commentators hold that the Paraclete
(Comforter) promised in John xvi. 7 means Muhammad. In order to make
this clear, however, they say we ought to read "Periklutos," _i.e._,
virtually Ahmad and Muhammad, instead of "Paracletos."
Footnote 30: According to the Koran, Mary was worshipped as God by the
Christians of Arabia.
Footnote 31: According to sura 2, verse 174, the _Bismillah_ (lit. "In
the name of Allah," etc.) must be uttered before animals to be eaten are
killed.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII., by Various