Soliloquies 2.11–2.19

R. What then do you think? Is the discipline of disputation true or false? A. Who would doubt that it is true? But grammar too is true. R. In the same way as that one? A. I do not see what is truer than the true. R. Surely that which has nothing false in it; looking at which a little while ago you were offended by those things which somehow could not be true unless they were false. Or do you not know that all those fabulous and openly false things belong to grammar? A. I am not unaware of that; but, as I think, they are not false through grammar; rather, through it, whatever they are, they are explained. For a fable is a lie composed for usefulness or delight. And grammar is the discipline that guards and regulates articulate speech; by the necessity of its profession it is compelled to collect even all the fictions of human language which have been committed to memory and writing, not making them false, but teaching and asserting a certain true account of them. R. Quite right; I do not care now whether these things have been well defined and distinguished by you; but I ask this: whether it is grammar itself that shows this to be so, or that discipline of disputation. A. I do not deny that the power and skill of defining, by which I have now tried to separate these things, is attributed to the art of disputation. R. What of grammar itself? If it is true, is it not true in that it is a discipline? For ‘discipline’ is named from ‘learning’; and no one can be said not to know what he has learned and holds; and no one knows false things. Every discipline therefore is true. A. I do not see that anything is rashly granted in that little argument. Yet it troubles me that someone might think through it that those fables are also true; for we learn and hold them too. R. Surely our teacher did not want us to believe what he taught, as well as know it? A. On the contrary, he pressed vehemently that we should know it. R. Did he ever press us to believe that Daedalus flew? A. Never that. But plainly, unless we held the fable fast, he saw to it that we could scarcely hold anything in our hands. R. Do you then deny that it is true that there is such a fable, and that Daedalus is so reported? A. I do not deny that this is true. R. Then you do not deny that you learned something true when you learned these things. For if it were true that Daedalus flew, and boys received and recited this as an invented fable, they would retain something false precisely because what they recited was true. Hence arose that which we wondered at above: that there could not have been a true fable about Daedalus's flight unless it were false that Daedalus flew. A. Now I grasp that; but I am waiting to see what we gain from it. R. What, except that that reasoning is not false by which we concluded that a discipline cannot be a discipline unless it teaches true things? A. And what has this to do with the matter? R. Because I want you to tell me from where grammar is a discipline; for from where it is a discipline, from there it is true. A. I do not know what to answer you. R. Does it not seem to you that, if nothing in it were defined, and nothing distributed and distinguished into kinds and parts, it could in no way have been a discipline? A. Now I understand what you mean; and no face of any discipline occurs to me in which definitions, divisions and reasonings (while what each thing is is declared, while its own parts are given to each without confusion, while nothing proper is left out and nothing foreign counted in) have not produced the very thing by which it is called a discipline. R. And so also the whole thing by which it is called true. A. I see that it follows. R. Answer now what discipline contains the principles of definitions, divisions and partitions. A. It was said above that these are contained in the rules of disputation. R. So grammar was created by the same art, both to be a discipline and to be true, which you defended above against falsity. And this I may conclude not of grammar alone but of all disciplines without exception. For you said, and said truly, that no discipline occurs to you in which the right of defining and distributing has not made it a discipline. But if they are true in that they are disciplines, will anyone deny that it is truth itself through which all disciplines are true? A. I am very nearly ready to assent; but this troubles me, that we also count the method of disputation among these same disciplines. So I think that rather to be truth by which this method itself is true. R. Excellent and most watchful; but you do not deny, I think, that it is true in that it is a discipline. A. That is exactly what troubles me. For I noticed that it too is a discipline, and for this reason is called true. R. What then? Do you think it could have been a discipline otherwise than by everything in it being defined and distributed? A. I have nothing else to say. R. But if this function belongs to it, the discipline is true through itself. Will anyone then think it strange if truth, by which all things are true, is true through itself and in itself? A. Nothing hinders me from going straight on to that conclusion.

R. Then attend to the few points that remain. A. Bring out whatever you have, provided it is such that I can understand and gladly grant. R. We are not unaware that something is said to be in something in two ways. One, in which it is so that it can also be separated and be elsewhere, as this wood in this place, as the sun in the east; the other, in which something is so in a subject that it cannot be separated from it, as in this wood the form and appearance we see, as light in the sun, as heat in fire, as a discipline in the mind, and any other similar things. Or does it seem otherwise to you? A. These things are very old to us, learned and known most diligently from early youth; so when asked about them I cannot but grant them without any deliberation. R. What about this: do you not grant that what is inseparably in a subject cannot remain if the subject itself does not remain? A. This too I see is necessary; for anyone who carefully considers things understands that, while the subject remains, what is in the subject may fail to remain. For the color of this body can be changed by reason of health or age, though the body itself has not yet perished. And this does not hold equally in all cases, but in those in which the things in the subjects do not coexist with them in order that the subjects themselves may exist. For this wall is not a wall by having the color we see in it; for even if by some chance it grows black or white or changes to some other color, it nonetheless remains a wall and is called one. But fire, if it lacks heat, will not even be fire; nor can we call snow snow unless it is white.

A. But as for what you asked: who would grant, or to whom would it seem possible, that what is in a subject remains when the subject itself perishes? For it is monstrous and most foreign to truth that what would not exist unless it were in something could exist even when that thing does not exist. R. Then what we were seeking has been found. A. What are you saying? R. What you hear. A. Is it now clearly established, then, that the mind is immortal? R. If what you have granted is true, most clearly; unless perhaps you say that the mind, even if it dies, is a mind. A. I would never say that; but I say that by the very fact that it perishes, it comes about that it is not a mind. Nor am I called back from this opinion by what great philosophers have said, that a thing which brings life wherever it comes cannot admit death into itself. For although light makes shine whatever place it can enter, and cannot admit darkness into itself because of that memorable power of contraries, yet it is extinguished, and that place is darkened when the light is extinguished. So that which resisted darkness, and in no way admitted darkness into itself, nevertheless made room for it by perishing, as it could also have done by departing. So I fear that death may befall the body as darkness befalls a place, the mind sometimes departing like the light, but sometimes being extinguished on the spot; so that there is no security about every death of the body, but some kind of death must be wished for by which the soul may be led out of the body unharmed and brought to a place, if there is any such place, where it cannot be extinguished. Or if not even this is possible, and the soul is kindled in the body like a light and cannot last elsewhere, and every death is a kind of extinction of the soul, or of life, in the body, then some kind of life must be chosen, as far as a man is allowed, by which this very living may be lived with security and tranquillity, although I do not know how that could happen if the soul dies. O how happy are those who have been persuaded, whether by themselves or by anyone else, that death is not to be feared even if the soul perishes! But I, wretched as I am, have not yet been persuaded of it by any reasons or any books.

R. Do not groan; the human mind is immortal. A. How do you prove this? R. From what you granted above, with great caution, I think. A. I do not remember having granted you anything without vigilance when you questioned me; but now gather up the sum itself, I beg you; let us see where we have arrived by such windings, and I do not want you to question me any more. For if you are going to list briefly what I granted, why is my answer wanted again? Or is it to inflict on me useless delays of joy, if perhaps we have achieved something good? R. I will do what I see you want, but attend most carefully. A. Speak now, I am here; why do you torture me? R. Everything that is in a subject, if it always remains, the subject itself must also always remain. And every discipline is in the mind as in a subject. So the mind must always remain, if discipline always remains. But discipline is truth, and truth always remains, as reason persuaded us at the beginning of this book. So the mind always remains, and the mind is not said to be dead. Therefore only he can deny without absurdity that the mind is immortal who proves that some of the earlier points were not rightly granted.

A. Now I want to throw myself into joy, but I am held back somewhat by two reasons. First, it troubles me that we used such a long roundabout way, following some chain of reasonings, when the whole matter in question could have been demonstrated as briefly as it has now been demonstrated. So it makes me anxious that the discourse walked about so long, as if laying an ambush. Next, I do not see how a discipline is always in the mind, especially that of disputation, when so few are acquainted with it, and whoever knows it was untaught for so long a time from infancy. For we cannot say either that the minds of the unskilled are not minds, or that a discipline they do not know is in their mind. And if that is extremely absurd, it remains either that truth is not always in the mind, or that that discipline is not truth. R. You see that our reasoning did not take such long ways around in vain. For we were seeking what truth is, which even now, in this forest of things, having wandered down almost every path, I do not see that we have been able to track down. But what shall we do? Shall we abandon what we have begun, and wait to see whether some book by others falls into our hands that will satisfy this question? For I think many were written before our time which we have not read; and now, not to suppose anything we do not know, we have it as certain that things are being written on this matter both in verse and in prose, and by men whose writings cannot escape us and whose talents we know to be such that we cannot despair of finding in their writings what we want; especially since here before our eyes is that man in whom we have recognized eloquence itself, which we were mourning as dead, come to life again perfected. Will he, who by his writings has taught the way of living, allow us to remain ignorant of the nature of living? A. I do not think so, and I hope much from that source; but one thing grieves me, that we cannot disclose to him, as we would wish, our zeal either toward him or toward wisdom. For surely he would pity our thirst, and would overflow much more quickly than now. For he is secure, because he has already fully persuaded himself about the immortality of the soul, and does not know that there may be some who have known well enough the misery of this ignorance, and whom it would be cruel not to help, especially when they ask. And that other man knows our ardor indeed, from our friendship; but he is so far away, and we are now so situated, that there is scarcely an opportunity even of sending him a letter. I believe that in his Transalpine leisure he has by now finished the poem by which the fear of death may be charmed away and flee, and the numbness and chill of the soul, hardened by ancient ice, may be driven out. But meanwhile, until these things come about, which are not in our power, is it not most shameful for our leisure to be wasted and our whole mind to hang bound on an uncertain will?

A. What becomes of our having asked, and still asking, God to open the way for us, not to riches, not to bodily pleasures, not to popular platforms and honors, but as we seek our soul and himself? Will he so desert us, or be deserted by us? R. It is most foreign to him to desert those who desire such things; hence it ought also to be foreign to us to desert so great a guide. So, if you please, let us briefly go back over how those two points were established: that truth always remains, and that the method of disputation is truth. For you said these were wavering, so that the sum of the whole matter did not make us secure. Or shall we rather inquire how a discipline can be in an unskilled mind, which we cannot but call a mind? For you seemed disturbed by this, so that it became necessary to doubt again what you had granted. A. Rather let us first discuss those points; then we shall see what this is. For so, I think, no controversy will remain. R. So be it; but be present wholly and most cautiously. For I know what happens to you when you attend: while you hang too eagerly on the conclusion and wait for it to be drawn any moment, you grant what is asked without examining it carefully. A. Perhaps you speak the truth; but I will strive against this kind of disease as much as I can; only begin your questions now, so that we do not linger over superfluous things. R. As far as I remember, we concluded that truth cannot perish from this: that not only if the whole world perishes, but even if truth itself perishes, it will be true that both the world and truth have perished. But nothing is true without truth; in no way, therefore, does truth perish. A. I recognize these things, and I would be very surprised if they are false. R. Then let us look at the other point. A. Let me consider a little, I beg you, lest I come back here again shamefully. R. Will it then not be true that truth has perished? If it will not be true, then it does not perish. If it will be true, how will anything be true after the fall of truth, when there is no longer any truth? A. I have nothing further to think over and consider; go on to the next. Certainly we will do what we can so that learned and wise men may read these things and correct our rashness, if there is any; for I think that neither now nor at any time can I find what might be said against this.

R. Is anything called truth except that by which whatever is true is true? A. In no way. R. Is anything rightly called true except what is not false? A. To doubt this is madness. R. Is not that false which is fashioned to the likeness of something, and yet is not that which it appears like? A. I see nothing else which I would more gladly call false. But yet that also is commonly called false which is far from likeness to the true. R. Who denies it? But still it is what has some imitation of the true. A. How? For when it is said that Medea flew with winged serpents yoked, that thing in no respect imitates the true; for it is nothing, and a thing which does not exist at all cannot imitate anything. R. You speak rightly; but you do not notice that a thing which is nothing at all cannot even be called false. For if it is false, it is; if it is not, it is not false. A. Shall we not then say that that monster, whatever it is, about Medea is false? R. Certainly not; for if it is false, how is it a monster? A. I see an amazing thing: when I hear, “Huge winged serpents joined beneath the yoke,” do I not say something false? R. You certainly do; for there is something that you can say is false. A. What, I ask? R. The statement, of course, which is expressed by the verse itself. A. And what imitation of the true does that have? R. That it would be expressed in the same way even if Medea had really done it. So the false statement imitates true statements by its very expression. If it is not believed, it imitates true statements only in that it is so said, and it is merely false, not also deceiving. But if it gains belief, it imitates also true statements that are believed. A. Now I understand that there is a great difference between the things we say and the things about which we say something; so now I assent; for I was held back only by this, that whatever we call false is not rightly so called unless it has an imitation of something true. For who would not rightly be laughed at for saying that a stone is false silver? Yet if anyone says that a stone is silver, we say that he is speaking falsely, that is, putting forth a false statement. But tin or lead we call false silver, not absurdly I think, because the thing itself imitates it, as it were; and it is not our statement that is false on that account, but the very thing of which it is spoken.

R. You understand well. But see whether we can also fittingly call silver by the name of false lead. A. I do not like it. R. Why so? A. I do not know; except that I see it is said very much against my will. R. Perhaps because silver is better, and it is said as an insult to it, while it is a kind of honor to lead if it is called false silver? A. You have explained exactly what I wanted. And therefore I believe that those who show themselves in women's dress are rightly held infamous and disqualified from giving testimony; I do not know whether I should better call them false women or false men. Yet we can without hesitation call them true actors and truly infamous; or, if they are hidden, and nothing is called infamous except from evil fame, we say not without truth, I think, that they are truly worthless. R. We shall have another occasion to discuss these things; for many things are done which seem shameful in the eyes of the people, but are shown to be honorable by some praiseworthy end. And it is a great question whether a man, for the sake of freeing his country, ought to put on a woman's tunic and deceive the enemy, perhaps to be a truer man by the very fact of being a false woman; and whether a wise man who somehow held it certain that his life was necessary for human affairs should prefer to die of cold rather than be clothed in women's garments, if nothing else were available. But of this, as was said, we shall see another time. For surely you see how much inquiry is needed as to how far such things may go, lest one fall into certain inexcusable disgraces. But now, what is enough for the present question, I think it already appears, nor is it doubted, that nothing is false except by some imitation of the true.

A. Proceed to the rest; for of this I am well persuaded. R. Then I ask this: whether, besides the disciplines in which we are instructed, among which the very pursuit of wisdom ought to be counted, we can find anything so true that it is not, like the Achilles of the theater, false in one respect in order to be true in another? A. Many things seem to me to be found. For the disciplines do not contain this stone, and yet in order to be a true stone it does not imitate anything according to which it might be called false. Having mentioned this one, you see that we may pass over countless others which occur of themselves to those who think. R. I see entirely. But do they not seem to you to be included under the one name of body? A. They would, if I either held it certain that the void is nothing, or thought that the mind itself should be counted among bodies, or also believed that God is some body. If all these exist, I see that they are false and true by imitation of nothing. R. You are sending us on a long journey, but I will use as short a way as I can. Certainly what you call the void is one thing, and what you call truth another. A. Very different. For what would be more void than I, if I thought truth something void, or sought so eagerly something void? For what else do I desire to find but truth? R. So perhaps you also grant that nothing is true which is not made true by truth. A. That has long been clear. R. Do you doubt that nothing is void except the void itself, or at any rate body? A. I do not doubt at all. R. Then, I suppose, you believe truth is some body. A. In no way. R. What, something in a body? A. I do not know; it is nothing to the point; for I think you know at least this, that if there is a void, it is rather where there is no body. R. That is plain indeed. A. Why then do we linger? R. Does it seem to you either that truth has made a void, or that something is true where truth is not? A. It does not. R. So the void is not true, because neither can a void be made by what is not void; and what lacks truth is clearly not true; and the very thing called void is so called from being nothing. How then can that be true which does not exist? Or how can that exist which is nothing at all? A. Come now, let us leave the void as void.

R. What do you say about the other things? A. What? R. That you see they strongly support me. For there remain the mind and God; and if these two are true because truth is in them, no one doubts the immortality of God. And the mind is believed immortal if truth, which cannot perish, is proved to be in it too. So let us now look at this last point: whether body is not truly true, that is, whether truth is not in it, but as it were a certain image of truth. For if in body too, which quite certainly undergoes destruction, we find something true of the kind that is in the disciplines, the discipline of disputation will not straightway be the truth by which all disciplines are true. For body too is true, which does not seem to be formed by the method of disputation. But if body too is true by some imitation, and for that reason not clearly true, there will perhaps be nothing to prevent the method of disputation from being shown to be truth itself. A. Meanwhile let us inquire about body; for not even when this is settled do I see that controversy ended. R. How do you know what God wills? So attend: for I think that body is held together by some form and appearance, and if it did not have it, it would not be body; if it had a true one, it would be mind. Or should we think otherwise? A. I agree in part; about the rest I doubt; for I grant that unless it is held by some figure it is not body. But how, if it had a true one, it would be mind, I do not quite understand. R. Do you remember nothing at all from the beginning of the first book, and that geometry of yours? A. You have reminded me well; I remember entirely, and most gladly. R. Are such figures found in bodies as that discipline demonstrates? A. On the contrary, it is incredible how much inferior they are proved to be. R. Which of them, then, do you think are true? A. Please do not think you must question me even on that. For who is so blind in mind as not to see that the figures taught in geometry dwell in truth itself, or truth in them, while those figures of body, since they seem as it were to tend toward these, have some sort of imitation of truth, and are therefore false? For now I understand the whole thing you were laboring to show.

R. What need is there now, then, to inquire about the discipline of disputation? For whether the geometrical figures are in truth or truth in them, no one doubts that they are contained in our soul, that is, in our intelligence, and by this truth too is compelled to be in our mind. And if any discipline is in the mind as inseparably in a subject, and truth cannot perish, why, I ask, do we doubt about the perpetual life of the mind, through some kind of familiarity with death? Or do that line or square or roundness have other things that they imitate in order to be true? A. In no way can I believe that, unless perhaps a line is something other than length without breadth, and a circle something other than a line drawn round, everywhere equally inclined to the middle. R. Why then do we hesitate? Or is truth not where these are? A. God forbid such madness. R. Or is discipline not in the mind? A. Who would say that? R. But perhaps, when the subject perishes, what is in the subject can remain? A. When would I be persuaded of that? R. It remains that truth perishes. A. How can that happen? R. So the soul is immortal. Now believe your reasonings, believe the truth; it cries out that it dwells in you, and that it is immortal, and that its seat cannot be taken from it by any death of the body. Turn away from your shadow, turn back into yourself; there is no perishing for you, except to forget that you cannot perish. A. I hear, I come to my senses, I begin to recollect. But I beg you, settle what remains: how discipline and truth are to be understood to be in an unskilled mind, for we cannot call it mortal. R. That question needs another volume, if you want it treated carefully; at the same time I see that you should review the things that have been investigated as far as we could; because if nothing of what has been granted is doubtful, I think we have done much, and may seek the rest with no small security.