Book: The Consolation of Philosophy

B >> Boethius >> The Consolation of Philosophy




Nay, though God, all-bounteous, give
Gold at man's desire--
Honours, rank, and fame--content
Not a whit is nigher;
But an all-devouring greed
Yawns with ever-widening need.

Then what bounds can e'er restrain
This wild lust of having,
When with each new bounty fed
Grows the frantic craving?
He is never rich whose fear
Sees grim Want forever near.



III.


'If Fortune should plead thus against thee, assuredly thou wouldst not
have one word to offer in reply; or, if thou canst find any
justification of thy complainings, thou must show what it is. I will
give thee space to speak.'

Then said I: 'Verily, thy pleas are plausible--yea, steeped in the
honeyed sweetness of music and rhetoric. But their charm lasts only
while they are sounding in the ear; the sense of his misfortunes lies
deeper in the heart of the wretched. So, when the sound ceases to
vibrate upon the air, the heart's indwelling sorrow is felt with renewed
bitterness.'

Then said she: 'It is indeed as thou sayest, for we have not yet come to
the curing of thy sickness; as yet these are but lenitives conducing to
the treatment of a malady hitherto obstinate. The remedies which go deep
I will apply in due season. Nevertheless, to deprecate thy
determination to be thought wretched, I ask thee, Hast thou forgotten
the extent and bounds of thy felicity? I say nothing of how, when
orphaned and desolate, thou wast taken into the care of illustrious men;
how thou wast chosen for alliance with the highest in the state--and
even before thou wert bound to their house by marriage, wert already
dear to their love--which is the most precious of all ties. Did not all
pronounce thee most happy in the virtues of thy wife, the splendid
honours of her father, and the blessing of male issue? I pass over--for
I care not to speak of blessings in which others also have shared--the
distinctions often denied to age which thou enjoyedst in thy youth. I
choose rather to come to the unparalleled culmination of thy good
fortune. If the fruition of any earthly success has weight in the scale
of happiness, can the memory of that splendour be swept away by any
rising flood of troubles? That day when thou didst see thy two sons ride
forth from home joint consuls, followed by a train of senators, and
welcomed by the good-will of the people; when these two sat in curule
chairs in the Senate-house, and thou by thy panegyric on the king didst
earn the fame of eloquence and ability; when in the Circus, seated
between the two consuls, thou didst glut the multitude thronging around
with the triumphal largesses for which they looked--methinks thou didst
cozen Fortune while she caressed thee, and made thee her darling. Thou
didst bear off a boon which she had never before granted to any private
person. Art thou, then, minded to cast up a reckoning with Fortune? Now
for the first time she has turned a jealous glance upon thee. If thou
compare the extent and bounds of thy blessings and misfortunes, thou
canst not deny that thou art still fortunate. Or if thou esteem not
thyself favoured by Fortune in that thy then seeming prosperity hath
departed, deem not thyself wretched, since what thou now believest to be
calamitous passeth also. What! art thou but now come suddenly and a
stranger to the scene of this life? Thinkest thou there is any stability
in human affairs, when man himself vanishes away in the swift course of
time? It is true that there is little trust that the gifts of chance
will abide; yet the last day of life is in a manner the death of all
remaining Fortune. What difference, then, thinkest thou, is there,
whether thou leavest her by dying, or she leave thee by fleeing away?'



SONG III.

ALL PASSES.


When, in rosy chariot drawn,
Phoebus 'gins to light the dawn,
By his flaming beams assailed,
Every glimmering star is paled.
When the grove, by Zephyrs fed,
With rose-blossom blushes red;--
Doth rude Auster breathe thereon,
Bare it stands, its glory gone.
Smooth and tranquil lies the deep
While the winds are hushed in sleep.
Soon, when angry tempests lash,
Wild and high the billows dash.
Thus if Nature's changing face
Holds not still a moment's space,
Fleeting deem man's fortunes; deem
Bliss as transient as a dream.
One law only standeth fast:
Things created may not last.



IV.


Then said I: 'True are thine admonishings, thou nurse of all excellence;
nor can I deny the wonder of my fortune's swift career. Yet it is this
which chafes me the more cruelly in the recalling. For truly in adverse
fortune the worst sting of misery is to _have been_ happy.'

'Well,' said she, 'if thou art paying the penalty of a mistaken belief,
thou canst not rightly impute the fault to circumstances. If it is the
felicity which Fortune gives that moves thee--mere name though it
be--come reckon up with me how rich thou art in the number and
weightiness of thy blessings. Then if, by the blessing of Providence,
thou hast still preserved unto thee safe and inviolate that which,
howsoever thou mightest reckon thy fortune, thou wouldst have thought
thy most precious possession, what right hast thou to talk of
ill-fortune whilst keeping all Fortune's better gifts? Yet Symmachus,
thy wife's father--a man whose splendid character does honour to the
human race--is safe and unharmed; and while he bewails thy wrongs, this
rare nature, in whom wisdom and virtue are so nobly blended, is himself
out of danger--a boon thou wouldst have been quick to purchase at the
price of life itself. Thy wife yet lives, with her gentle disposition,
her peerless modesty and virtue--this the epitome of all her graces,
that she is the true daughter of her sire--she lives, I say, and for thy
sake only preserves the breath of life, though she loathes it, and pines
away in grief and tears for thy absence, wherein, if in naught else, I
would allow some marring of thy felicity. What shall I say of thy sons
and their consular dignity--how in them, so far as may be in youths of
their age, the example of their father's and grandfather's character
shines out? Since, then, the chief care of mortal man is to preserve his
life, how happy art thou, couldst thou but recognise thy blessings, who
possessest even now what no one doubts to be dearer than life!
Wherefore, now dry thy tears. Fortune's hate hath not involved all thy
dear ones; the stress of the storm that has assailed thee is not beyond
measure intolerable, since there are anchors still holding firm which
suffer thee not to lack either consolation in the present or hope for
the future.'

'I pray that they still may hold. For while they still remain, however
things may go, I shall ride out the storm. Yet thou seest how much is
shorn of the splendour of my fortunes.'

'We are gaining a little ground,' said she, 'if there is something in
thy lot wherewith thou art not yet altogether discontented. But I cannot
stomach thy daintiness when thou complainest with such violence of grief
and anxiety because thy happiness falls short of completeness. Why, who
enjoys such settled felicity as not to have some quarrel with the
circumstances of his lot? A troublous matter are the conditions of human
bliss; either they are never realized in full, or never stay
permanently. One has abundant riches, but is shamed by his ignoble
birth. Another is conspicuous for his nobility, but through the
embarrassments of poverty would prefer to be obscure. A third, richly
endowed with both, laments the loneliness of an unwedded life. Another,
though happily married, is doomed to childlessness, and nurses his
wealth for a stranger to inherit. Yet another, blest with children,
mournfully bewails the misdeeds of son or daughter. Wherefore, it is not
easy for anyone to be at perfect peace with the circumstances of his
lot. There lurks in each several portion something which they who
experience it not know nothing of, but which makes the sufferer wince.
Besides, the more favoured a man is by Fortune, the more fastidiously
sensitive is he; and, unless all things answer to his whim, he is
overwhelmed by the most trifling misfortunes, because utterly unschooled
in adversity. So petty are the trifles which rob the most fortunate of
perfect happiness! How many are there, dost thou imagine, who would
think themselves nigh heaven, if but a small portion from the wreck of
thy fortune should fall to them? This very place which thou callest
exile is to them that dwell therein their native land. So true is it
that nothing is wretched, but thinking makes it so, and conversely every
lot is happy if borne with equanimity. Who is so blest by Fortune as not
to wish to change his state, if once he gives rein to a rebellious
spirit? With how many bitternesses is the sweetness of human felicity
blent! And even if that sweetness seem to him to bring delight in the
enjoying, yet he cannot keep it from departing when it will. How
manifestly wretched, then, is the bliss of earthly fortune, which lasts
not for ever with those whose temper is equable, and can give no perfect
satisfaction to the anxious-minded!

'Why, then, ye children of mortality, seek ye from without that
happiness whose seat is only within us? Error and ignorance bewilder
you. I will show thee, in brief, the hinge on which perfect happiness
turns. Is there anything more precious to thee than thyself? Nothing,
thou wilt say. If, then, thou art master of thyself, thou wilt possess
that which thou wilt never be willing to lose, and which Fortune cannot
take from thee. And that thou mayst see that happiness cannot possibly
consist in these things which are the sport of chance, reflect that, if
happiness is the highest good of a creature living in accordance with
reason, and if a thing which can in any wise be reft away is not the
highest good, since that which cannot be taken away is better than it,
it is plain that Fortune cannot aspire to bestow happiness by reason of
its instability. And, besides, a man borne along by this transitory
felicity must either know or not know its unstability. If he knows not,
how poor is a happiness which depends on the blindness of ignorance! If
he knows it, he needs must fear to lose a happiness whose loss he
believes to be possible. Wherefore, a never-ceasing fear suffers him not
to be happy. Or does he count the possibility of this loss a trifling
matter? Insignificant, then, must be the good whose loss can be borne so
equably. And, further, I know thee to be one settled in the belief that
the souls of men certainly die not with them, and convinced thereof by
numerous proofs; it is clear also that the felicity which Fortune
bestows is brought to an end with the death of the body: therefore, it
cannot be doubted but that, if happiness is conferred in this way, the
whole human race sinks into misery when death brings the close of all.
But if we know that many have sought the joy of happiness not through
death only, but also through pain and suffering, how can life make men
happy by its presence when it makes them not wretched by its loss?'



SONG IV.

THE GOLDEN MEAN.


Who founded firm and sure
Would ever live secure,
In spite of storm and blast
Immovable and fast;
Whoso would fain deride
The ocean's threatening tide;--
His dwelling should not seek
On sands or mountain-peak.
Upon the mountain's height
The storm-winds wreak their spite:
The shifting sands disdain
Their burden to sustain.
Do thou these perils flee,
Fair though the prospect be,
And fix thy resting-place
On some low rock's sure base.
Then, though the tempests roar,
Seas thunder on the shore,
Thou in thy stronghold blest
And undisturbed shalt rest;
Live all thy days serene,
And mock the heavens' spleen.



V.


'But since my reasonings begin to work a soothing effect within thy
mind, methinks I may resort to remedies somewhat stronger. Come,
suppose, now, the gifts of Fortune were not fleeting and transitory,
what is there in them capable of ever becoming truly thine, or which
does not lose value when looked at steadily and fairly weighed in the
balance? Are riches, I pray thee, precious either through thy nature or
in their own? What are they but mere gold and heaps of money? Yet these
fine things show their quality better in the spending than in the
hoarding; for I suppose 'tis plain that greed Alva's makes men hateful,
while liberality brings fame. But that which is transferred to another
cannot remain in one's own possession; and if that be so, then money is
only precious when it is given away, and, by being transferred to
others, ceases to be one's own. Again, if all the money in the world
were heaped up in one man's possession, all others would be made poor.
Sound fills the ears of many at the same time without being broken into
parts, but your riches cannot pass to many without being lessened in the
process. And when this happens, they must needs impoverish those whom
they leave. How poor and cramped a thing, then, is riches, which more
than one cannot possess as an unbroken whole, which falls not to any one
man's lot without the impoverishment of everyone else! Or is it the
glitter of gems that allures the eye? Yet, how rarely excellent soever
may be their splendour, remember the flashing light is in the jewels,
not in the man. Indeed, I greatly marvel at men's admiration of them;
for what can rightly seem beautiful to a being endowed with life and
reason, if it lack the movement and structure of life? And although such
things do in the end take on them more beauty from their Maker's care
and their own brilliancy, still they in no wise merit your admiration
since their excellence is set at a lower grade than your own.

'Does the beauty of the fields delight you? Surely, yes; it is a
beautiful part of a right beautiful whole. Fitly indeed do we at times
enjoy the serene calm of the sea, admire the sky, the stars, the moon,
the sun. Yet is any of these thy concern? Dost thou venture to boast
thyself of the beauty of any one of them? Art _thou_ decked with
spring's flowers? is it _thy_ fertility that swelleth in the fruits of
autumn? Why art thou moved with empty transports? why embracest thou an
alien excellence as thine own? Never will fortune make thine that which
the nature of things has excluded from thy ownership. Doubtless the
fruits of the earth are given for the sustenance of living creatures.
But if thou art content to supply thy wants so far as suffices nature,
there is no need to resort to fortune's bounty. Nature is content with
few things, and with a very little of these. If thou art minded to force
superfluities upon her when she is satisfied, that which thou addest
will prove either unpleasant or harmful. But, now, thou thinkest it
fine to shine in raiment of divers colours; yet--if, indeed, there is
any pleasure in the sight of such things--it is the texture or the
artist's skill which I shall admire.

'Or perhaps it is a long train of servants that makes thee happy? Why,
if they behave viciously, they are a ruinous burden to thy house, and
exceeding dangerous to their own master; while if they are honest, how
canst thou count other men's virtue in the sum of thy possessions? From
all which 'tis plainly proved that not one of these things which thou
reckonest in the number of thy possessions is really thine. And if there
is in them no beauty to be desired, why shouldst thou either grieve for
their loss or find joy in their continued possession? While if they are
beautiful in their own nature, what is that to thee? They would have
been not less pleasing in themselves, though never included among thy
possessions. For they derive not their preciousness from being counted
in thy riches, but rather thou hast chosen to count them in thy riches
because they seemed to thee precious.

'Then, what seek ye by all this noisy outcry about fortune? To chase
away poverty, I ween, by means of abundance. And yet ye find the result
just contrary. Why, this varied array of precious furniture needs more
accessories for its protection; it is a true saying that they want most
who possess most, and, conversely, they want very little who measure
their abundance by nature's requirements, not by the superfluity of vain
display. Have ye no good of your own implanted within you, that ye seek
your good in things external and separate? Is the nature of things so
reversed that a creature divine by right of reason can in no other way
be splendid in his own eyes save by the possession of lifeless chattels?
Yet, while other things are content with their own, ye who in your
intellect are God-like seek from the lowest of things adornment for a
nature of supreme excellence, and perceive not how great a wrong ye do
your Maker. His will was that mankind should excel all things on earth.
Ye thrust down your worth beneath the lowest of things. For if that in
which each thing finds its good is plainly more precious than that whose
good it is, by your own estimation ye put yourselves below the vilest of
things, when ye deem these vile things to be your good: nor does this
fall out undeservedly. Indeed, man is so constituted that he then only
excels other things when he knows himself; but he is brought lower than
the beasts if he lose this self-knowledge. For that other creatures
should be ignorant of themselves is natural; in man it shows as a
defect. How extravagant, then, is this error of yours, in thinking that
anything can be embellished by adornments not its own. It cannot be. For
if such accessories add any lustre, it is the accessories that get the
praise, while that which they veil and cover remains in its pristine
ugliness. And again I say, That is no _good_, which injures its
possessor. Is this untrue? No, quite true, thou sayest. And yet riches
have often hurt those that possessed them, since the worst of men, who
are all the more covetous by reason of their wickedness, think none but
themselves worthy to possess all the gold and gems the world contains.
So thou, who now dreadest pike and sword, mightest have trolled a carol
"in the robber's face," hadst thou entered the road of life with empty
pockets. Oh, wondrous blessedness of perishable wealth, whose
acquisition robs thee of security!'



SONG V.

THE FORMER AGE.


Too blest the former age, their life
Who in the fields contented led,
And still, by luxury unspoiled,
On frugal acorns sparely fed.

No skill was theirs the luscious grape
With honey's sweetness to confuse;
Nor China's soft and sheeny silks
T' empurple with brave Tyrian hues.

The grass their wholesome couch, their drink
The stream, their roof the pine's tall shade;
Not theirs to cleave the deep, nor seek
In strange far lands the spoils of trade.

The trump of war was heard not yet,
Nor soiled the fields by bloodshed's stain;
For why should war's fierce madness arm
When strife brought wound, but brought not gain?

Ah! would our hearts might still return
To following in those ancient ways.
Alas! the greed of getting glows
More fierce than Etna's fiery blaze.

Woe, woe for him, whoe'er it was,
Who first gold's hidden store revealed,
And--perilous treasure-trove--dug out
The gems that fain would be concealed!



VI.


'What now shall I say of rank and power, whereby, because ye know not
true power and dignity, ye hope to reach the sky? Yet, when rank and
power have fallen to the worst of men, did ever an Etna, belching forth
flame and fiery deluge, work such mischief? Verily, as I think, thou
dost remember how thine ancestors sought to abolish the consular power,
which had been the foundation of their liberties, on account of the
overweening pride of the consuls, and how for that self-same pride they
had already abolished the kingly title! And if, as happens but rarely,
these prerogatives are conferred on virtuous men, it is only the virtue
of those who exercise them that pleases. So it appears that honour
cometh not to virtue from rank, but to rank from virtue. Look, too, at
the nature of that power which ye find so attractive and glorious! Do ye
never consider, ye creatures of earth, what ye are, and over whom ye
exercise your fancied lordship? Suppose, now, that in the mouse tribe
there should rise up one claiming rights and powers for himself above
the rest, would ye not laugh consumedly? Yet if thou lookest to his body
alone, what creature canst thou find more feeble than man, who
oftentimes is killed by the bite of a fly, or by some insect creeping
into the inner passage of his system! Yet what rights can one exercise
over another, save only as regards the body, and that which is lower
than the body--I mean fortune? What! wilt thou bind with thy mandates
the free spirit? Canst thou force from its due tranquillity the mind
that is firmly composed by reason? A tyrant thought to drive a man of
free birth to reveal his accomplices in a conspiracy, but the prisoner
bit off his tongue and threw it into the furious tyrant's face; thus,
the tortures which the tyrant thought the instrument of his cruelty the
sage made an opportunity for heroism. Moreover, what is there that one
man can do to another which he himself may not have to undergo in his
turn? We are told that Busiris, who used to kill his guests, was himself
slain by his guest, Hercules. Regulus had thrown into bonds many of the
Carthaginians whom he had taken in war; soon after he himself submitted
his hands to the chains of the vanquished. Then, thinkest thou that man
hath any power who cannot prevent another's being able to do to him what
he himself can do to others?

'Besides, if there were any element of natural and proper good in rank
and power, they would never come to the utterly bad, since opposites are
not wont to be associated. Nature brooks not the union of contraries.
So, seeing there is no doubt that wicked wretches are oftentimes set in
high places, it is also clear that things which suffer association with
the worst of men cannot be good in their own nature. Indeed, this
judgment may with some reason be passed concerning all the gifts of
fortune which fall so plentifully to all the most wicked. This ought
also to be considered here, I think: No one doubts a man to be brave in
whom he has observed a brave spirit residing. It is plain that one who
is endowed with speed is swift-footed. So also music makes men musical,
the healing art physicians, rhetoric public speakers. For each of these
has naturally its own proper working; there is no confusion with the
effects of contrary things--nay, even of itself it rejects what is
incompatible. And yet wealth cannot extinguish insatiable greed, nor has
power ever made him master of himself whom vicious lusts kept bound in
indissoluble fetters; dignity conferred on the wicked not only fails to
make them worthy, but contrarily reveals and displays their
unworthiness. Why does it so happen? Because ye take pleasure in calling
by false names things whose nature is quite incongruous thereto--by
names which are easily proved false by the very effects of the things
themselves; even so it is; these riches, that power, this dignity, are
none of them rightly so called. Finally, we may draw the same conclusion
concerning the whole sphere of Fortune, within which there is plainly
nothing to be truly desired, nothing of intrinsic excellence; for she
neither always joins herself to the good, nor does she make good men of
those to whom she is united.'



SONG VI.

NERO'S INFAMY.


We know what mischief dire he wrought--
Rome fired, the Fathers slain--
Whose hand with brother's slaughter wet
A mother's blood did stain.

No pitying tear his cheek bedewed,
As on the corse he gazed;
That mother's beauty, once so fair,
A critic's voice appraised.

Yet far and wide, from East to West,
His sway the nations own;
And scorching South and icy North
Obey his will alone.

Did, then, high power a curb impose
On Nero's phrenzied will?
Ah, woe when to the evil heart
Is joined the sword to kill!



VII.


Then said I: 'Thou knowest thyself that ambition for worldly success
hath but little swayed me. Yet I have desired opportunity for action,
lest virtue, in default of exercise, should languish away.'

Then she: 'This is that "last infirmity" which is able to allure minds
which, though of noble quality, have not yet been moulded to any
exquisite refinement by the perfecting of the virtues--I mean, the love
of glory--and fame for high services rendered to the commonweal. And yet
consider with me how poor and unsubstantial a thing this glory is! The
whole of this earth's globe, as thou hast learnt from the demonstration
of astronomy, compared with the expanse of heaven, is found no bigger
than a point; that is to say, if measured by the vastness of heaven's
sphere, it is held to occupy absolutely no space at all. Now, of this so
insignificant portion of the universe, it is about a fourth part, as
Ptolemy's proofs have taught us, which is inhabited by living creatures
known to us. If from this fourth part you take away in thought all that
is usurped by seas and marshes, or lies a vast waste of waterless
desert, barely is an exceeding narrow area left for human habitation.
You, then, who are shut in and prisoned in this merest fraction of a
point's space, do ye take thought for the blazoning of your fame, for
the spreading abroad of your renown? Why, what amplitude or magnificence
has glory when confined to such narrow and petty limits?

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