Book: The Consolation of Philosophy

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'I would thou wouldst unfold the whole matter to me at large.'

'We judge happiness to be good, do we not?'

'Yea, the supreme good.'

'And this superlative applies to all; for this same happiness is
adjudged to be the completest independence, the highest power,
reverence, renown, and pleasure.'

'What then?'

'Are all these goods--independence, power, and the rest--to be deemed
members of happiness, as it were, or are they all relative to good as to
their summit and crown?'

'I understand the problem, but I desire to hear how thou wouldst solve
it.'

'Well, then, listen to the determination of the matter. Were all these
members composing happiness, they would differ severally one from the
other. For this is the nature of parts--that by their difference they
compose one body. All these, however, have been proved to be the same;
therefore they cannot possibly be members, otherwise happiness will seem
to be built up out of one member, which cannot be.'

'There can be no doubt as to that,' said I; 'but I am impatient to hear
what remains.'

'Why, it is manifest that all the others are relative to the good. For
the very reason why independence is sought is that it is judged good,
and so power also, because it is believed to be good. The same, too, may
be supposed of reverence, of renown, and of pleasant delight. Good,
then, is the sum and source of all desirable things. That which has not
in itself any good, either in reality or in semblance, can in no wise be
desired. Contrariwise, even things which by nature are not good are
desired as if they were truly good, if they seem to be so. Whereby it
comes to pass that goodness is rightly believed to be the sum and hinge
and cause of all things desirable. Now, that for the sake of which
anything is desired itself seems to be most wished for. For instance, if
anyone wishes to ride for the sake of health, he does not so much wish
for the exercise of riding as the benefit of his health. Since, then,
all things are sought for the sake of the good, it is not these so much
as good itself that is sought by all. But that on account of which all
other things are wished for was, we agreed, happiness; wherefore thus
also it appears that it is happiness alone which is sought. From all
which it is transparently clear that the essence of absolute good and of
happiness is one and the same.'

'I cannot see how anyone can dissent from these conclusions.'

'But we have also proved that God and true happiness are one and the
same.'

'Yes,' said I.

'Then we can safely conclude, also, that God's essence is seated in
absolute good, and nowhere else.'



SONG X.

THE TRUE LIGHT.


Hither come, all ye whose minds
Lust with rosy fetters binds--
Lust to bondage hard compelling
Th' earthy souls that are his dwelling--
Here shall be your labour's close;
Here your haven of repose.
Come, to your one refuge press;
Wide it stands to all distress!

Not the glint of yellow gold
Down bright Hermus' current rolled;
Not the Tagus' precious sands,
Nor in far-off scorching lands
All the radiant gems that hide
Under Indus' storied tide--
Emerald green and glistering white--
Can illume our feeble sight;
But they rather leave the mind
In its native darkness blind.
For the fairest beams they shed
In earth's lowest depths were fed;
But the splendour that supplies
Strength and vigour to the skies,
And the universe controls,
Shunneth dark and ruined souls.
He who once hath seen _this_ light
Will not call the sunbeam bright.



XI.


'I quite agree,' said I, 'truly all thy reasonings hold admirably
together.'

Then said she: 'What value wouldst thou put upon the boon shouldst thou
come to the knowledge of the absolute good?'

'Oh, an infinite,' said I, 'if only I were so blest as to learn to know
God also who is the good.'

'Yet this will I make clear to thee on truest grounds of reason, if only
our recent conclusions stand fast.'

'They will.'

'Have we not shown that those things which most men desire are not true
and perfect good precisely for this cause--that they differ severally
one from another, and, seeing that one is wanting to another, they
cannot bestow full and absolute good; but that they become the true good
when they are gathered, as it were, into one form and agency, so that
that which is independence is likewise power, reverence, renown, and
pleasant delight, and unless they are all one and the same, they have no
claim to be counted among things desirable?'

'Yes; this was clearly proved, and cannot in any wise be doubted.'

'Now, when things are far from being good while they are different, but
become good as soon as they are one, is it not true that these become
good by acquiring unity?'

'It seems so,' said I.

'But dost not thou allow that all which is good is good by participation
in goodness?'

'It is.'

'Then, thou must on similar grounds admit that unity and goodness are
the same; for when the effects of things in their natural working differ
not, their essence is one and the same.'

'There is no denying it.'

'Now, dost thou know,' said she, 'that all which is abides and subsists
so long as it continues one, but so soon as it ceases to be one it
perishes and falls to pieces?'

'In what way?'

'Why, take animals, for example. When soul and body come together, and
continue in one, this is, we say, a living creature; but when this unity
is broken by the separation of these two, the creature dies, and is
clearly no longer living. The body also, while it remains in one form by
the joining together of its members, presents a human appearance; but if
the separation and dispersal of the parts break up the body's unity, it
ceases to be what it was. And if we extend our survey to all other
things, without doubt it will manifestly appear that each several thing
subsists while it is one, but when it ceases to be one perishes.'

'Yes; when I consider further, I see it to be even as thou sayest.'

'Well, is there aught,' said she, 'which, in so far as it acts
conformably to nature, abandons the wish for life, and desires to come
to death and corruption?'

'Looking to living creatures, which have some faults of choice, I find
none that, without external compulsion, forego the will to live, and of
their own accord hasten to destruction. For every creature diligently
pursues the end of self-preservation, and shuns death and destruction!
As to herbs and trees, and inanimate things generally, I am altogether
in doubt what to think.'

'And yet there is no possibility of question about this either, since
thou seest how herbs and trees grow in places suitable for them, where,
as far as their nature admits, they cannot quickly wither and die. Some
spring up in the plains, others in the mountains; some grow in marshes,
others cling to rocks; and others, again, find a fertile soil in the
barren sands; and if you try to transplant these elsewhere, they wither
away. Nature gives to each the soil that suits it, and uses her
diligence to prevent any of them dying, so long as it is possible for
them to continue alive. Why do they all draw their nourishment from
roots as from a mouth dipped into the earth, and distribute the strong
bark over the pith? Why are all the softer parts like the pith deeply
encased within, while the external parts have the strong texture of
wood, and outside of all is the bark to resist the weather's
inclemency, like a champion stout in endurance? Again, how great is
nature's diligence to secure universal propagation by multiplying seed!
Who does not know all these to be contrivances, not only for the present
maintenance of a species, but for its lasting continuance, generation
after generation, for ever? And do not also the things believed
inanimate on like grounds of reason seek each what is proper to itself?
Why do the flames shoot lightly upward, while the earth presses downward
with its weight, if it is not that these motions and situations are
suitable to their respective natures? Moreover, each several thing is
preserved by that which is agreeable to its nature, even as it is
destroyed by things inimical. Things solid like stones resist
disintegration by the close adhesion of their parts. Things fluid like
air and water yield easily to what divides them, but swiftly flow back
and mingle with those parts from which they have been severed, while
fire, again, refuses to be cut at all. And we are not now treating of
the voluntary motions of an intelligent soul, but of the drift of
nature. Even so is it that we digest our food without thinking about it,
and draw our breath unconsciously in sleep; nay, even in living
creatures the love of life cometh not of conscious will, but from the
principles of nature. For oftentimes in the stress of circumstances will
chooses the death which nature shrinks from; and contrarily, in spite of
natural appetite, will restrains that work of reproduction by which
alone the persistence of perishable creatures is maintained. So entirely
does this love of self come from drift of nature, not from animal
impulse. Providence has furnished things with this most cogent reason
for continuance: they must desire life, so long as it is naturally
possible for them to continue living. Wherefore in no way mayst thou
doubt but that things naturally aim at continuance of existence, and
shun destruction.'

'I confess,' said I, 'that what I lately thought uncertain, I now
perceive to be indubitably clear.'

'Now, that which seeks to subsist and continue desires to be one; for if
its oneness be gone, its very existence cannot continue.'

'True,' said I.

'All things, then, desire to be one.'

'I agree.'

'But we have proved that one is the very same thing as good.'

'We have.'

'All things, then, seek the good; indeed, you may express the fact by
defining good as that which all desire.'

'Nothing could be more truly thought out. Either there is no single end
to which all things are relative, or else the end to which all things
universally hasten must be the highest good of all.'

Then she: 'Exceedingly do I rejoice, dear pupil; thine eye is now fixed
on the very central mark of truth. Moreover, herein is revealed that of
which thou didst erstwhile profess thyself ignorant.'

'What is that?' said I.

'The end and aim of the whole universe. Surely it is that which is
desired of all; and, since we have concluded the good to be such, we
ought to acknowledge the end and aim of the whole universe to be "the
good."'



SONG XI.

REMINISCENCE.[J]


Who truth pursues, who from false ways
His heedful steps would keep,
By inward light must search within
In meditation deep;
All outward bent he must repress
His soul's true treasure to possess.

Then all that error's mists obscured
Shall shine more clear than light,
This fleshly frame's oblivious weight
Hath quenched not reason quite;
The germs of truth still lie within,
Whence we by learning all may win.

Else how could ye the answer due
Untaught to questions give,
Were't not that deep within the soul
Truth's secret sparks do live?
If Plato's teaching erreth not,
We learn but that we have forgot.


FOOTNOTES:

[J] The doctrine of Reminiscence--_i.e._, that all learning is really
recollection--is set forth at length by Plato in the 'Meno,' 81-86, and
the 'Phaedo,' 72-76. See Jowett, vol. ii., pp. 40-47 and 213-218.



XII.


Then said I: 'With all my heart I agree with Plato; indeed, this is now
the second time that these things have been brought back to my
mind--first I lost them through the clogging contact of the body; then
after through the stress of heavy grief.'

Then she continued: 'If thou wilt reflect upon thy former admissions, it
will not be long before thou dost also recollect that of which erstwhile
thou didst confess thyself ignorant.'

'What is that?' said I.

'The principles of the world's government,' said she.

'Yes; I remember my confession, and, although I now anticipate what thou
intendest, I have a desire to hear the argument plainly set forth.'

'Awhile ago thou deemedst it beyond all doubt that God doth govern the
world.'

'I do not think it doubtful now, nor shall I ever; and by what reasons
I am brought to this assurance I will briefly set forth. This world
could never have taken shape as a single system out of parts so diverse
and opposite were it not that there is One who joins together these so
diverse things. And when it had once come together, the very diversity
of natures would have dissevered it and torn it asunder in universal
discord were there not One who keeps together what He has joined. Nor
would the order of nature proceed so regularly, nor could its course
exhibit motions so fixed in respect of position, time, range, efficacy,
and character, unless there were One who, Himself abiding, disposed
these various vicissitudes of change. This power, whatsoever it be,
whereby they remain as they were created, and are kept in motion, I call
by the name which all recognise--God.'

Then said she: 'Seeing that such is thy belief, it will cost me little
trouble, I think, to enable thee to win happiness, and return in safety
to thy own country. But let us give our attention to the task that we
have set before ourselves. Have we not counted independence in the
category of happiness, and agreed that God is absolute happiness?'

'Truly, we have.'

'Then, He will need no external assistance for the ruling of the world.
Otherwise, if He stands in need of aught, He will not possess complete
independence.'

'That is necessarily so,' said I.

'Then, by His own power alone He disposes all things.'

'It cannot be denied.'

'Now, God was proved to be absolute good.'

'Yes; I remember.'

'Then, He disposes all things by the agency of good, if it be true that
_He_ rules all things by His own power whom we have agreed to be good;
and He is, as it were, the rudder and helm by which the world's
mechanism is kept steady and in order.'

'Heartily do I agree; and, indeed, I anticipated what thou wouldst say,
though it may be in feeble surmise only.'

'I well believe it,' said she; 'for, as I think, thou now bringest to
the search eyes quicker in discerning truth; but what I shall say next
is no less plain and easy to see.'

'What is it?' said I.

'Why,' said she, 'since God is rightly believed to govern all things
with the rudder of goodness, and since all things do likewise, as I have
taught, haste towards good by the very aim of nature, can it be doubted
that His governance is willingly accepted, and that all submit
themselves to the sway of the Disposer as conformed and attempered to
His rule?'

'Necessarily so,' said I; 'no rule would seem happy if it were a yoke
imposed on reluctant wills, and not the safe-keeping of obedient
subjects.'

'There is nothing, then, which, while it follows nature, endeavours to
resist good.'

'No; nothing.'

'But if anything should, will it have the least success against Him whom
we rightly agreed to be supreme Lord of happiness?'

'It would be utterly impotent.'

'There is nothing, then, which has either the will or the power to
oppose this supreme good.'

'No; I think not.'

'So, then,' said she, 'it is the supreme good which rules in strength,
and graciously disposes all things.'

Then said I: 'How delighted am I at thy reasonings, and the conclusion
to which thou hast brought them, but most of all at these very words
which thou usest! I am now at last ashamed of the folly that so sorely
vexed me.'

'Thou hast heard the story of the giants assailing heaven; but a
beneficent strength disposed of them also, as they deserved. But shall
we submit our arguments to the shock of mutual collision?--it may be
from the impact some fair spark of truth may be struck out.'

'If it be thy good pleasure,' said I.

'No one can doubt that God is all-powerful.'

'No one at all can question it who thinks consistently.'

'Now, there is nothing which One who is all-powerful cannot do.'

'Nothing.'

'But can God do evil, then?'

'Nay; by no means.'

'Then, evil is nothing,' said she, 'since He to whom nothing is
impossible is unable to do evil.'

'Art thou mocking me,' said I, 'weaving a labyrinth of tangled
arguments, now seeming to begin where thou didst end, and now to end
where thou didst begin, or dost thou build up some wondrous circle of
Divine simplicity? For, truly, a little before thou didst begin with
happiness, and say it was the supreme good, and didst declare it to be
seated in the supreme Godhead. God Himself, too, thou didst affirm to be
supreme good and all-complete happiness; and from this thou didst go on
to add, as by the way, the proof that no one would be happy unless he
were likewise God. Again, thou didst say that the very form of good was
the essence both of God and of happiness, and didst teach that the
absolute One was the absolute good which was sought by universal nature.
Thou didst maintain, also, that God rules the universe by the governance
of goodness, that all things obey Him willingly, and that evil has no
existence in nature. And all this thou didst unfold without the help of
assumptions from without, but by inherent and proper proofs, drawing
credence one from the other.'

Then answered she: 'Far is it from me to mock thee; nay, by the blessing
of God, whom we lately addressed in prayer, we have achieved the most
important of all objects. For such is the form of the Divine essence,
that neither can it pass into things external, nor take up anything
external into itself; but, as Parmenides says of it,

'"In body like to a sphere on all sides perfectly rounded,"

it rolls the restless orb of the universe, keeping itself motionless the
while. And if I have also employed reasonings not drawn from without,
but lying within the compass of our subject, there is no cause for thee
to marvel, since thou hast learnt on Plato's authority that words ought
to be akin to the matter of which they treat.'



SONG XII.

ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE.


Blest he whose feet have stood
Beside the fount of good;
Blest he whose will could break
Earth's chains for wisdom's sake!

The Thracian bard, 'tis said,
Mourned his dear consort dead;
To hear the plaintive strain
The woods moved in his train,
And the stream ceased to flow,
Held by so soft a woe;
The deer without dismay
Beside the lion lay;
The hound, by song subdued,
No more the hare pursued,
But the pang unassuaged
In his own bosom raged.
The music that could calm
All else brought him no balm.
Chiding the powers immortal,
He came unto Hell's portal;
There breathed all tender things
Upon his sounding strings,
Each rhapsody high-wrought
His goddess-mother taught--
All he from grief could borrow
And love redoubling sorrow,
Till, as the echoes waken,
All Taenarus is shaken;
Whilst he to ruth persuades
The monarch of the shades
With dulcet prayer. Spell-bound,
The triple-headed hound
At sounds so strangely sweet
Falls crouching at his feet.
The dread Avengers, too,
That guilty minds pursue
With ever-haunting fears,
Are all dissolved in tears.
Ixion, on his wheel,
A respite brief doth feel;
For, lo! the wheel stands still.
And, while those sad notes thrill,
Thirst-maddened Tantalus
Listens, oblivious
Of the stream's mockery
And his long agony.
The vulture, too, doth spare
Some little while to tear
At Tityus' rent side,
Sated and pacified.

At length the shadowy king,
His sorrows pitying,
'He hath prevailed!' cried;
'We give him back his bride!
To him she shall belong,
As guerdon of his song.
One sole condition yet
Upon the boon is set:
Let him not turn his eyes
To view his hard-won prize,
Till they securely pass
The gates of Hell.' Alas!
What law can lovers move?
A higher law is love!
For Orpheus--woe is me!--
On his Eurydice--
Day's threshold all but won--
Looked, lost, and was undone!

Ye who the light pursue,
This story is for you,
Who seek to find a way
Unto the clearer day.
If on the darkness past
One backward look ye cast,
Your weak and wandering eyes
Have lost the matchless prize.




BOOK IV.

GOOD AND ILL FORTUNE.


SUMMARY.

CH. I. The mystery of the seeming moral confusion. Philosophy
engages to make this plain, and to fulfil her former promise to the
full.--CH. II. Accordingly, (a) she first expounds the paradox that
the good alone have power, the bad are altogether powerless.--CH.
III. (b) The righteous never lack their reward, nor the wicked
their punishment.--CH. IV. (c) The wicked are more unhappy when
they accomplish their desires than when they fail to attain them.
(d) Evil-doers are more fortunate when they expiate their crimes by
suffering punishment than when they escape unpunished. (e) The
wrong-doer is more wretched than he who suffers injury.--CH. V.
Boethius still cannot understand why the distribution of happiness
and misery to the righteous and the wicked seems the result of
chance. Philosophy replies that this only seems so because we do
not understand the principles of God's moral governance.--CH. VI.
The distinction of Fate and Providence. The apparent moral
confusion is due to our ignorance of the secret counsels of God's
providence. If we possessed the key, we should see how all things
are guided to good.--CH. VII. Thus all fortune is good fortune; for
it either rewards, disciplines, amends, or punishes, and so is
either useful or just.




BOOK IV.



I.


Softly and sweetly Philosophy sang these verses to the end without
losing aught of the dignity of her expression or the seriousness of her
tones; then, forasmuch as I was as yet unable to forget my deeply-seated
sorrow, just as she was about to say something further, I broke in and
cried: 'O thou guide into the way of true light, all that thy voice hath
uttered from the beginning even unto now has manifestly seemed to me at
once divine contemplated in itself, and by the force of thy arguments
placed beyond the possibility of overthrow. Moreover, these truths have
not been altogether unfamiliar to me heretofore, though because of
indignation at my wrongs they have for a time been forgotten. But, lo!
herein is the very chiefest cause of my grief--that, while there exists
a good ruler of the universe, it is possible that evil should be at all,
still more that it should go unpunished. Surely thou must see how
deservedly this of itself provokes astonishment. But a yet greater
marvel follows: While wickedness reigns and flourishes, virtue not only
lacks its reward, but is even thrust down and trampled under the feet of
the wicked, and suffers punishment in the place of crime. That this
should happen under the rule of a God who knows all things and can do
all things, but wills only the good, cannot be sufficiently wondered at
nor sufficiently lamented.'

Then said she: 'It would indeed be infinitely astounding, and of all
monstrous things most horrible, if, as thou esteemest, in the
well-ordered home of so great a householder, the base vessels should be
held in honour, the precious left to neglect. But it is not so. For if
we hold unshaken those conclusions which we lately reached, thou shall
learn that, by the will of Him of whose realm we are speaking, the good
are always strong, the bad always weak and impotent; that vices never go
unpunished, nor virtues unrewarded; that good fortune ever befalls the
good, and ill fortune the bad, and much more of the sort, which shall
hush thy murmurings, and stablish thee in the strong assurance of
conviction. And since by my late instructions thou hast seen the form of
happiness, hast learnt, too, the seat where it is to be found, all due
preliminaries being discharged, I will now show thee the road which will
lead thee home. Wings, also, will I fasten to thy mind wherewith thou
mayst soar aloft, that so, all disturbing doubts removed, thou mayst
return safe to thy country, under my guidance, in the path I will show
thee, and by the means which I furnish.'



SONG I.

THE SOUL'S FLIGHT.


Wings are mine; above the pole
Far aloft I soar.
Clothed with these, my nimble soul
Scorns earth's hated shore,
Cleaves the skies upon the wind,
Sees the clouds left far behind.

Soon the glowing point she nears,
Where the heavens rotate,
Follows through the starry spheres
Phoebus' course, or straight
Takes for comrade 'mid the stars
Saturn cold or glittering Mars;

Thus each circling orb explores
Through Night's stole that peers;
Then, when all are numbered, soars
Far beyond the spheres,
Mounting heaven's supremest height
To the very Fount of light.

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