Oration on the Dignity of Man
¶1 Most esteemed Fathers, I have read in
the ancient writings of the Arabians that Abdala the Saracen on being asked what,
on this stage, so to say, of the world, seemed to him most evocative of wonder,
replied that there was nothing to be seen more marvelous than man. And that
celebrated exclamation of Hermes Trismegistus, ``What a great miracle is man,
Asclepius'' confirms this opinion.
¶2 And still, as I reflected
upon the basis assigned for these estimations, I was not fully persuaded by the
diverse reasons advanced for the pre-eminence of human nature; that man is the
intermediary between creatures, that he is the familiar of the gods above him
as he is the lord of the beings beneath him; that, by the acuteness of his
senses, the inquiry of his reason and the light of his intelligence, he is the
interpreter of nature, set midway between the timeless unchanging and the flux
of time; the living union (as the Persians say), the very marriage hymn of the
world, and, by David's testimony but little lower than the angels. These
reasons are all, without question, of great weight; nevertheless, they do not
touch the principal reasons, those, that is to say, which justify man's unique
right for such unbounded admiration. Why, I asked, should we not admire the
angels themselves and the beatific choirs more? At long last, however, I feel
that I have come to some understanding of why man is the most fortunate of
living things and, consequently, deserving of all admiration; of what may be
the condition in the hierarchy of beings assigned to him, which draws upon him
the envy, not of the brutes alone, but of the astral beings and of the very
intelligences which dwell beyond the confines of the world. A thing surpassing
belief and smiting the soul with wonder. Still, how could it be otherwise? For
it is on this ground that man is, with complete justice, considered and called
a great miracle and a being worthy of all admiration.
¶3 Hear then, oh Fathers,
precisely what this condition of man is; and in the name of your humanity,
grant me your benign audition as I pursue this theme.
¶4 God the Father, the
Mightiest Architect, had already raised, according to the precepts of His
hidden wisdom, this world we see, the cosmic dwelling of divinity, a temple
most august. He had already adorned the supercelestial region with
Intelligences, infused the heavenly globes with the life of immortal souls and
set the fermenting dung-heap of the inferior world teeming with every form of
animal life. But when this work was done, the Divine Artificer still longed for
some creature which might comprehend the meaning of so vast an achievement,
which might be moved with love at its beauty and smitten with awe at its
grandeur. When, consequently, all else had been completed (as both Moses and
Timaeus testify), in the very last place, He bethought Himself of bringing
forth man. Truth was, however, that there remained no archetype according to
which He might fashion a new offspring, nor in His treasure-houses the
wherewithal to endow a new son with a fitting inheritance, nor any place, among
the seats of the universe, where this new creature might dispose himself to
contemplate the world. All space was already filled; all things had been
distributed in the highest, the middle and the lowest orders. Still, it was not
in the nature of the power of the Father to fail in this last creative élan;
nor was it in the nature of that supreme Wisdom to hesitate through lack of
counsel in so crucial a matter; nor, finally, in the nature of His beneficent
love to compel the creature destined to praise the divine generosity in all
other things to find it wanting in himself.
¶5 At last, the Supreme
Maker decreed that this creature, to whom He could give nothing wholly his own,
should have a share in the particular endowment of every other creature. Taking
man, therefore, this creature of indeterminate image, He set him in the middle
of the world and thus spoke to him:
¶6 “We have given you, O
Adam, no visage proper to yourself, nor endowment properly your own, in order
that whatever place, whatever form, whatever gifts you may, with premeditation,
select, these same you may have and possess through your own judgement and
decision. The nature of all other creatures is defined and restricted within
laws which We have laid down; you, by contrast, impeded by no such
restrictions, may, by your own free will, to whose custody We have assigned
you, trace for yourself the lineaments of your own nature. I have placed you at
the very center of the world, so that from that vantage point you may with
greater ease glance round about you on all that the world contains. We have
made you a creature neither of heaven nor of earth, neither mortal nor
immortal, in order that you may, as the free and proud shaper of your own
being, fashion yourself in the form you may prefer. It will be in your power to
descend to the lower, brutish forms of life; you will be able, through your own
decision, to rise again to the superior orders whose life is divine.''
¶7 Oh unsurpassed generosity
of God the Father, Oh wondrous and unsurpassable felicity of man, to whom it is
granted to have what he chooses, to be what he wills to be! The brutes, from
the moment of their birth, bring with them, as Lucilius says, ``from their
mother's womb'' all that they will ever possess. The highest spiritual beings
were, from the very moment of creation, or soon thereafter, fixed in the mode
of being which would be theirs through measureless eternities. But upon man, at
the moment of his creation, God bestowed seeds pregnant with all possibilities,
the germs of every form of life. Whichever of these a man shall cultivate, the
same will mature and bear fruit in him. If vegetative, he will become a plant;
if sensual, he will become brutish; if rational, he will reveal himself a
heavenly being; if intellectual, he will be an angel and the son of God. And
if, dissatisfied with the lot of all creatures, he should recollect himself
into the center of his own unity, he will there become one spirit with God, in
the solitary darkness of the Father, Who is set above all things, himself
transcend all creatures.
¶8 Who then will not look
with awe upon this our chameleon, or who, at least, will look with greater
admiration on any other being? This creature, man, whom Asclepius the Athenian,
by reason of this very mutability, this nature capable of transforming itself,
quite rightly said was symbolized in the mysteries by the figure of Proteus.
This is the source of those metamorphoses, or transformations, so celebrated
among the Hebrews and among the Pythagoreans; for even the esoteric theology of
the Hebrews at times transforms the holy Enoch into that angel of divinity
which is sometimes called malakh-ha-shekhinah and at other times
transforms other personages into divinities of other names; while the
Pythagoreans transform men guilty of crimes into brutes or even, if we are to
believe Empedocles, into plants; and Mohammed, imitating them, was known
frequently to say that the man who deserts the divine law becomes a brute. And
he was right; for it is not the bark that makes the tree, but its insensitive
and unresponsive nature; nor the hide which makes the beast of burden, but its
brute and sensual soul; nor the orbicular form which makes the heavens, but
their harmonious order. Finally, it is not freedom from a body, but its
spiritual intelligence, which makes the angel. If you see a man dedicated to his
stomach, crawling on the ground, you see a plant and not a man; or if you see a
man bedazzled by the empty forms of the imagination, as by the wiles of Calypso, and through their alluring solicitations
made a slave to his own senses, you see a brute and not a man. If, however, you
see a philosopher, judging and distinguishing all things according to the rule
of reason, him shall you hold in veneration, for he is a creature of heaven and
not of earth; if, finally, a pure contemplator, unmindful of the body, wholly
withdrawn into the inner chambers of the mind, here indeed is neither a
creature of earth nor a heavenly creature, but some higher divinity, clothed in
human flesh.
¶9 Who then will not look
with wonder upon man, upon man who, not without reason in the sacred Mosaic and Christian writings, is designated
sometimes by the term ``all flesh'' and sometimes by the term ``every
creature,'' because he molds, fashions and transforms himself into the likeness
of all flesh and assumes the characteristic power of every form of life? This
is why Evantes the Persian in his exposition of the Chaldean theology, writes
that man has no inborn and proper semblance, but many which are extraneous and
adventitious: whence the Chaldean saying: ``Enosh hu shinnujim vekammah
tebhaoth haj'' --- ``man is a living creature of varied, multiform and
ever-changing nature.''
¶10 But what is the purpose
of all this? That we may understand --- since we have been born into this
condition of being what we choose to be --- that we ought to be sure above all
else that it may never be said against us that, born to a high position, we failed
to appreciate it, but fell instead to the estate of brutes and uncomprehending
beasts of burden; and that the saying of Asaph the Prophet, ``You are all Gods
and sons of the Most High,'' might rather be true; and finally that we may not,
through abuse of the generosity of a most indulgent Father, pervert the free
option which he has given us from a saving to a damning gift. Let a certain
saving ambition invade our souls so that, impatient of mediocrity, we pant
after the highest things and (since, if we will, we can) bend all our efforts
to their attainment. Let us disdain things of earth, hold as little worth even
the astral orders and, putting behind us all the things of this world, hasten
to that court beyond the world, closest to the most exalted Godhead. There, as
the sacred mysteries tell us, the Seraphim, Cherubim and Thrones occupy the
first places; but, unable to yield to them, and impatient of any second place,
let us emulate their dignity and glory. And, if we will it, we shall be
inferior to them in nothing.
¶11 How must we proceed and
what must we do to realize this ambition? Let us observe what they do, what
kind of life they lead. For if we lead this kind of life (and we can) we shall
attain their same estate. The Seraphim burns with the fire of charity; from the
Cherubim flashes forth the splendor of intelligence; the Thrones stand firm
with the firmness of justice. If, consequently, in the pursuit of the active
life we govern inferior things by just criteria, we shall be established in the
firm position of the Thrones. If, freeing ourselves from active care, we devote
our time to contemplation, meditating upon the Creator in His work, and the
work in its Creator, we shall be resplendent with the light of the Cherubim. If
we burn with love for the Creator only, his consuming fire will quickly
transform us into the flaming likeness of the Seraphim. Above the Throne, that
is, above the just judge, God sits, judge of the ages. Above the Cherub, that
is, the contemplative spirit, He spreads His wings, nourishing him, as it were,
with an enveloping warmth. For the spirit of the Lord moves upon the waters,
those waters which are above the heavens and which, according to Job, praise
the Lord in pre-aurorial hymns. Whoever is a Seraph, that is a lover, is in God
and God is in him; even, it may be said, God and he are one. Great is the power
of the Thrones, which we attain by right judgement, highest of all the
sublimity of the Seraphim which we attain by loving.
¶12 But how can anyone judge
or love what he does not know? Moses loved the God whom he had seen and as
judge of his people he administered what he had previously seen in
contemplation on the mountain. Therefore the Cherub is the intermediary and by
his light equally prepares us for the fire of the Seraphim and the judgement of
the Thrones. This is the bond which unites the highest minds, the Palladian
order which presides over contemplative philosophy; this is then the bond which
before all else we must emulate, embrace and comprehend, whence we may be rapt
to the heights of love or descend, well instructed and prepared, to the duties
of the practical life. But certainly it is worth the effort, if we are to form
our life on the model of the Cherubim, to have familiarly before our eyes both
its nature and its quality as well as the duties and the functions proper to
it. Since it is not granted to us, flesh as we are and knowledgeable only the
things of earth, to attain such knowledge by our own efforts, let us have
recourse to the ancient Fathers. They can give us the fullest and most reliable
testimony concerning these matters because they had an almost domestic and
connatural knowledge of them.
¶13 Let us ask the Apostle
Paul, that vessel of election, in what activity he saw the armies of the Cherubim
engaged when he was rapt into the third heaven. He will answer, according to
the interpretation of Dionysius, that he saw them first being purified, then
illuminated, and finally made perfect. We, therefore, imitating the life of the
Cherubim here on earth, by refraining the impulses of our passions through
moral science, by dissipating the darkness of reason by dialectic --- thus
washing away, so to speak, the filth of ignorance and vice --- may likewise
purify our souls, so that the passions may never run rampant, nor reason,
lacking restraint, range beyond its natural limits. Then may we suffuse our
purified souls with the light of natural philosophy, bringing it to final
perfection by the knowledge of divine things.
¶14 Lest we be satisfied to
consult only those of our own faith and tradition, let us also have recourse to
the patriarch, Jacob, whose likeness, carved on the throne of
glory, shines out before us. This wisest of the Fathers who though sleeping in
the lower world, still has his eyes fixed on the world above, will admonish us.
He will admonish, however, in a figure, for all things appeared in figures to
the men of those times: a ladder rises by many rungs from earth to the height
of heaven and at its summit sits the Lord, while over its rungs the
contemplative angels move, alternately ascending and descending. If this is
what we, who wish to imitate the angelic life, must do in our turn, who, I ask,
would dare set muddied feet or soiled hands to the ladder of the Lord? It is
forbidden, as the mysteries teach, for the impure to touch what is pure. But
what are these hands, these feet, of which we speak? The feet, to be sure, of
the soul: that is, its most despicable portion by which the soul is held fast
to earth as a root to the ground; I mean to say, it alimentary and nutritive
faculty where lust ferments and voluptuous softness is fostered. And why may we
not call ``the hand'' that irascible power of the soul, which is the warrior of
the appetitive faculty, fighting for it and foraging for it in the dust and the
sun, seizing for it all things which, sleeping in the shade, it will devour?
Let us bathe in moral philosophy as in a living stream, these hands, that is, the
whole sensual part in which the lusts of the body have their seat and which, as
the saying is, holds the soul by the scruff of the neck, let us be flung back
from that ladder as profane and polluted intruders. Even this, however, will
not be enough, if we wish to be the companions of the angels who traverse the
ladder of Jacob, unless we are first instructed and rendered able to advance on
that ladder duly, step by step, at no point to stray from it and to complete
the alternate ascensions and descents. When we shall have been so prepared by
the art of discourse or of reason, then, inspired by the spirit of the
Cherubim, exercising philosophy through all the rungs of the ladder --- that
is, of nature --- we shall penetrate being from its center to its surface and
from its surface to its center. At one time we shall descend, dismembering with
titanic force the ``unity'' of the ``many,'' like the members of Osiris; at
another time, we shall ascend, recollecting those same members, by the power of
Phoebus, into their original unity. Finally, in the bosom of the Father, who
reigns above the ladder, we shall find perfection and peace in the felicity of
theological knowledge.
¶15 Let us also inquire of
the just Job, who made his covenant with the God of life even before he entered
into life, what, above all else, the supreme God desires of those tens of
thousands of beings which surround Him. He will answer, without a doubt: peace,
just as it is written in the pages of Job: He establishes peace in the high
reaches of heaven. And since the middle order interprets the admonitions of the
higher to the lower orders, the words of Job the theologian may well be
interpreted for us by Empedocles the philosopher. Empedocles teaches us that
there is in our souls a dual nature; the one bears us upwards toward the
heavenly regions; by the other we are dragged downward toward regions infernal,
through friendship and discord, war and peace; so witness those verses in which
he laments that, torn by strife and discord, like a madman, in flight from the
gods, he is driven into the depths of the sea. For it is a patent thing, O
Fathers, that many forces strive within us, in grave, intestine warfare, worse
than the civil wars of states. Equally clear is it that, if we are to overcome this
warfare, if we are to establish that peace which must establish us finally
among the exalted of God, philosophy alone can compose and allay that strife.
In the first place, if our man seeks only truce with his enemies, moral
philosophy will restrain the unreasoning drives of the protean brute, the
passionate violence and wrath of the lion within us. If, acting on wiser
counsel, we should seek to secure an unbroken peace, moral philosophy will
still be at hand to fulfill our desires abundantly; and having slain either
beast, like sacrificed sows, it will establish an inviolable compact of peace
between the flesh and the spirit. Dialectic will compose the disorders of
reason torn by anxiety and uncertainty amid the conflicting hordes of words and
captious reasonings. Natural philosophy will reduce the conflict of opinions
and the endless debates which from every side vex, distract and lacerate the
disturbed mind. It will compose this conflict, however, in such a manner as to
remind us that nature, as Heraclitus wrote, is generated by war and for this
reason is called by Homer, ``strife.'' Natural philosophy, therefore, cannot
assure us a true and unshakable peace. To bestow such peace is rather the
privilege and office of the queen of the sciences, most holy theology. Natural
philosophy will at best point out the way to theology and even accompany us
along the path, while theology, seeing us from afar hastening to draw close to
her, will call out: ``Come unto me you who are spent in labor and I will restore
you; come to me and I will give you the peace which the world and nature cannot
give.''
¶16 Summoned in such
consoling tones and invited with such kindness, like earthly Mercuries, we
shall fly on winged feet to embrace that most blessed mother and there enjoy
the peace we have longed for: that most holy peace, that indivisible union,
that seamless friendship through which all souls will not only be at one in
that one mind which is above every mind, but, in a manner which passes
expression, will really be one, in the most profound depths of being. This is
the friendship which the Pythagoreans say is the purpose of all philosophy.
This is the peace which God established in the high places of the heaven and
which the angels, descending to earth, announced to men of good will, so that
men, ascending through this peace to heaven, might become angels. This is the
peace which we would wish for our friends, for our age, for every house into
which we enter and for our own soul, that through this peace it may become the
dwelling of God; sop that, too, when the soul, by means of moral philosophy and
dialectic shall have purged herself of her uncleanness, adorned herself with
the disciplines of philosophy as with the raiment of a prince's court and
crowned the pediments of her doors with the garlands of theology, the King of
Glory may descend and, coming with the Father, take up his abode with her. If
she prove worthy of so great a guest, she will, through his boundless clemency,
arrayed in the golden vesture of the many sciences as in a nuptial gown,
receive him, not as a guest merely, but as a spouse. And rather than be parted
from him, she will prefer to leave her own people and her father's house.
Forgetful of her very self she will desire to die to herself in order to live
in her spouse, in whose eyes the death of his saints is infinitely precious: I
mean that death --- if the very plenitude of life can be called death --- whose
meditation wise men have always held to be the special study of philosophy.
¶17 Let us also cite Moses
himself, who is but little removed from the living well-spring of the most holy
and ineffable understanding by whose nectar the angels are inebriated. Let us
listen to the venerable judge as he enunciates his laws to us who live in the
desert solitude of the body: ``Let those who, still unclean, have need of moral
philosophy, dwell with the peoples outside the tabernacles, under the open sky,
until, like the priests of Thessaly, they shall have cleansed themselves. Those
who have already brought order into their lives may be received into the
tabernacle, but still may not touch the sacred vessels. Let them rather first,
as zealous levites, in the service of dialectic, minister to the holy offices
of philosophy. When they shall themselves be admitted to those offices, they
may, as priests of philosophy, contemplate the many-colored throne of the
higher God, that is the courtly palace of the star-hung heavens, the heavenly
candelabrum aflame with seven lights and elements which are the furry veils of
this tabernacle; so that, finally, having been permitted to enter, through the
merit of sublime theology, into the innermost chambers of the temple, with no
veil of images interposing itself, we may enjoy the glory of divinity.'' This
is what Moses beyond a doubt commands us, admonishing, urging and exhorting us
to prepare ourselves, while we may, by means of philosophy, a road to future
heavenly glory.
¶18 In fact, however, the
dignity of the liberal arts, which I am about to discuss, and their value to us
is attested not only by the Mosaic and Christian mysteries but also by the
theologies of the most ancient times. What else is to be understood by the
stages through which the initiates must pass in the mysteries of the Greeks?
These initiates, after being purified by the arts which we might call
expiatory, moral philosophy and dialectic, were granted admission to the
mysteries. What could such admission mean but the interpretation of occult
nature by means of philosophy? Only after they had been prepared in this way
did they receive ``Epopteia,'' that is, the immediate vision of divine
things by the light of theology. Who would not long to be admitted to such
mysteries? Who would not desire, putting all human concerns behind him, holding
the goods of fortune in contempt and little minding the goods of the body, thus
to become, while still a denizen of earth, a guest at the table of the gods,
and, drunk with the nectar of eternity, receive, while still a mortal, the gift
of immortality? Who would not wish to be so inspired by those Socratic frenzies
which Plato sings in the Phaedrus that, swiftly fleeing this place, that
is, this world fixed in evil, by the oars, so to say, both of feet and wings,
he might reach the heavenly Jerusalem by the swiftest course? Let us be driven,
O Fathers, by those Socratic frenzies which lift us to such ecstasy that our
intellects and our very selves are united to God. And we shall be moved by them
in this way as previously we have done all that it lies in us to do. If, by moral
philosophy, the power of our passions shall have been restrained by proper
controls so that they achieve harmonious accord; and if, by dialectic, our
reason shall have progressed by an ordered advance, then, smitten by the frenzy
of the Muses, we shall hear the heavenly harmony with the inward ears of the
spirit. Then the leader of the Muses, Bacchus, revealing to us in our moments
of philosophy, through his mysteries, that is, the visible signs of nature, the
invisible things of God, will make us drunk with the richness of the house of
God; and there, if, like Moses, we shall prove entirely faithful, most sacred
theology will supervene to inspire us with redoubled ecstasy. For, raised to
the most eminent height of theology, whence we shall be able to measure with
the rod of indivisible eternity all things that are and that have been; and,
grasping the primordial beauty of things, like the seers of Phoebus, we shall
become the winged lovers of theology. And at last, smitten by the ineffable
love as by a sting, and, like the Seraphim, filled with the godhead, we shall
be, no longer ourselves, but the very One who made us.
¶19 The sacred names of
Apollo, to anyone who penetrates their meanings and the mysteries they conceal,
clearly show that God is a philosopher no less than a seer; but since Ammonius
has amply treated this theme, there is no occasion for me to expound it anew.
Nevertheless, O Fathers, we cannot fail to recall those three Delphic precepts
which are so very necessary for everyone about to enter the most holy and
august temple, not of the false, but of the true Apollo who illumines every
soul as it enters this world. You will see that they exhort us to nothing else
but to embrace with all our powers this tripartite philosophy which we are now
discussing. As a matter of fact that aphorism: meden agan, this is:
``Nothing in excess,'' duly prescribes a measure and rule for all the virtues
through the concept of the ``Mean'' of which moral philosophy treats. In like
manner, that other aphorism gnothi seauton, that is, ``Know thyself,''
invites and exhorts us to the study of the whole nature of which the nature of
man is the connecting link and the ``mixed potion''; for he who knows himself
knows all things in himself, as Zoroaster first and after him Plato, in the Alcibiades,
wrote. Finally, enlightened by this knowledge, through the aid of natural
philosophy, being already close to God, employing the theological salutation ei,
that is ``Thou art,'' we shall blissfully address the true Apollo on intimate
terms.
¶20 Let us also seek the
opinion of Pythagoras, that
wisest of men, known as a wise man precisely because he never thought himself
worthy of that name. His first precept to us will be: ``Never sit on a
bushel''; never, that is, through slothful inaction to lose our power of
reason, that faculty by which the mind examines, judges and measures all
things; but rather unremittingly by the rule and exercise of dialectic, to
direct it and keep it agile. Next he will warn us of two things to be avoided
at all costs: Neither to make water facing the sun, nor to cut our nails while
offering sacrifice. Only when, by moral philosophy, we shall have evacuated the
weakening appetites of our too-abundant pleasures and pared away, like nail
clippings, the sharp points of anger and wrath in our souls, shall we finally
begin to take part in the sacred rites, that is, the mysteries of Bacchus of
which we have spoken and to dedicate ourselves to that contemplation of which
the Sun is rightly called the father and the guide. Finally, Pythagoras will
command us to ``Feed the cock''; that is, to nourish the divine part of our
soul with the knowledge of divine things as with substantial food and heavenly
ambrosia. This is the cock whose visage is the lion, that is, all earthly
power, holds in fear and awe. This is the cock to whom, as we read in Job, all
understanding was given. At this cock's crowing, erring man returns to his
senses. This is the cock which every day, in the morning twilight, with the
stars of morning, raises a Te Deum to heaven. This is the cock which
Socrates, at the hour of his death, when he hoped he was about to join the
divinity of his spirit to the divinity of the higher world and when he was
already beyond danger of any bodily illness, said that he owed to Asclepius,
that is, the healer of souls.
¶21 Let us also pass in
review the records of the Chaldeans; there we shall see (if they are to be
believed) that the road to happiness, for mortals, lies through these same
arts. The Chaldean interpreters write that it was a saying of Zoroaster that
the soul is a winged creature. When her wings fall from her, she is plunged
into the body; but when they grow strong again, she flies back to the supernal
regions. And when his disciples asked him how they might insure that their
souls might be well plumed and hence swift in flight he replied: ``Water them well
with the waters of life.'' And when they persisted, asking whence they might
obtain these waters of life, he answered (as he was wont) in a parable: ``The
Paradise of God is bathed and watered by four rivers; from these same sources
you may draw the waters which will save you. The name of the river which flows
from the north is Pischon which means, `the Right.' That which flows from the
west is Gichon, that is, `Expiation.' The river flowing from the east is named
Chiddekel, that is, `Light,' while that, finally, from the south is Perath,
which may be understood as `Compassion.' '' Consider carefully and with full
attention, O Fathers, what these deliverances of Zoroaster might mean.
Obviously, they can only mean that we should, by moral science, as by western
waves, wash the uncleanness from our eyes; that, by dialectic, as by a reading
taken by the northern star, our gaze must be aligned with the right. Then, that
we should become accustomed to bear, in the contemplation of nature, the still
feeble light of truth, like the first rays of the rising sun, so that finally
we may, through theological piety and the most holy cult of God, become able,
like the eagles of heaven, to bear the effulgent splendor of the noonday sun.
These are, perhaps, those ``morning, midday and evening thoughts'' which David
first celebrated and on which St. Augustine later expatiated. This is the
noonday light which inflames the Seraphim toward their goal and equally
illuminates the Cherubim. This is the promised land toward which our ancient
father Abraham was ever advancing; this the region where, as the teachings of
the Cabalists and the Moors tell us, there is no place for unclean spirits. And
if we may be permitted, even in the form of a riddle, to say anything publicly
about the deeper mysteries: since the precipitous fall of man has left his mind
in a vertiginous whirl and and since according to Jeremiah,
death has come in through the windows to infect our hearts and bowels with
evil, let us call upon Raphael, the heavenly healer that by moral philosophy
and dialectic, as with healing drugs, he may release us. When we shall have
been restored to health, Gabriel, the strength of God, will abide in us.
Leading us through the marvels of nature and pointing out to us everywhere the
power and the goodness of God, he will deliver us finally to the care of the
High Priest Michael. He, in turn, will adorn those who have successfully completed
their service to philosophy with the priesthood of theology as with a crown of
precious stones.
¶22 These are the reasons,
most reverend Fathers, which not only led, but even compelled me, to the study of
philosophy. And I should not have undertaken to expound them, except to reply
to those who are wont to condemn the study of philosophy, especially among men
of high rank, but also among those of modest station. For the whole study of
philosophy (such is the unhappy plight of our time) is occasion for contempt
and contumely, rather than honor and glory. The deadly and monstrous persuasion
has invaded practically all minds, that philosophy ought not to be studied at
all or by very few people; as though it were a thing of little worth to have
before our eyes and at our finger-tips, as matters we have searched out with
greatest care, the causes of things, the ways of nature and the plan of the
universe, God's counsels and the mysteries of heaven and earth, unless by such
knowledge on might procure some profit or favor for oneself. Thus we have
reached the point, it is painful to recognize, where the only persons accounted
wise are those who can reduce the pursuit of wisdom to a profitable traffic;
and chaste Pallas, who dwells among men only by the generosity of the gods, is
rejected, hooted, whistled at in scorn, with no one to love or befriend her
unless, by prostituting herself, she is able to pay back into the strongbox of
her lover the ill-procured price of her deflowered virginity. I address all
these complaints, with the greatest regret and indignation, not against the
princes of our times, but against the philosophers who believe and assert that
philosophy should not be pursued because no monetary value or reward is
assigned it, unmindful that by this sign they disqualify themselves as
philosophers. Since their whole life is concentrated on gain and ambition, they
never embrace the knowledge of the truth for its own sake. This much will I say
for myself --- and on this point I do not blush for praising myself --- that I
have never philosophized save for the sake of philosophy, nor have I ever
desired or hoped to secure from my studies and my laborious researches any
profit or fruit save cultivation of mind and knowledge of the truth --- things
I esteem more and more with the passage of time. I have also been so avid for
this knowledge and so enamored of it that I have set aside all private and
public concerns to devote myself completely to contemplation; and from it no
calumny of jealous persons, nor any invective from enemies of wisdom has ever
been able to detach me. Philosophy has taught me to rely on my own convictions
rather than on the judgements of others and to concern myself less with whether
I am well thought of than whether what I do or say is evil.
¶23 I was not unaware, most
revered Fathers, that this present disputation of mine would be as acceptable
and as pleasing to you, who favor all the good arts and who have consented to
grace it with your presence, as it would be irritating and offensive to many
others. I am also aware that there is no dearth of those who have condemned my
undertaking before this and continue to do so on a number of grounds. But this
has always been the case: works which are well-intentioned and sincerely
directed to virtue have always had no fewer --- not to say more --- detractors
than those undertaken for questionable motives and for devious ends. Some
persons disapprove the present type of disputation in general and this method
of disputing in public about learned matters; they assert that they serve only
the exhibition of talent and the display of opinion, rather than the increase
of learning. Others do not disapprove this type of exercise, but resent the
fact that at my age, a mere twenty-four years, I have dared to propose a
disputation concerning the most subtle mysteries of Christian theology, the
most debated points of philosophy and unfamiliar branches of learning; and that
I have done so here, in this most renowned of cities, before a large assembly
of very learned men, in the presence of the Apostolic Senate. Still others have
ceded my right so to dispute, but have not conceded that I might dispute nine
hundred theses, asserting that such a project is superfluous, over-ambitious
and beyond my powers. I should have acceded to these objections willingly and
immediately, if the philosophy which I profess had so counseled me. Nor should
I now undertake to reply to them, as my philosophy urges me to do, if I
believed that this disputation between us were undertaken for purposes of mere
altercation and litigation. Therefore, let all intention of denigration and
exasperation be purged from our minds and with it that malice which, as Plato
writes, is never present in the angelic choirs. Let us amicably decide whether
it be admissible for me to proceed with my disputation and whether I should
venture so large a number of questions.
¶24 I shall not, in the
first place, have much to say against those who disapprove this type of public
disputation. It is a crime, --- if it be a crime --- which I share with all
you, most excellent doctors, who have engaged in such exercises on many
occasions to the enhancement of your reputations, as well as with Plato and
Aristotle and all the most esteemed philosophers of every age. These
philosophers of the past all thought that nothing could profit them more in
their search for wisdom than frequent participation in public disputation. Just
as the powers of the body are made stronger through gymnastic, the powers of
the mind grow in strength and vigor in this arena of learning. I am inclined to
believe that the poets, when they sang of the arms of Pallas and the Hebrews,
when they called the barzel, that is, the sword, the symbol of men of
wisdom, could have meant nothing by these symbols but this type of contest, at
once so necessary and so honorable for the acquisition of knowledge. This may
also be the reason why the Chaldeans, at the birth of a man destined to be a
philosopher, described a horoscope in which Mars confronted Mercury from three
distinct angles. This is as much as to say that should these assemblies and
these contests be abandoned, all philosophy would become sluggish and dormant.
¶25 It is more difficult for
me, however, to find a line of defense against those who tell me that I am
unequal to the undertaking. If I say that I am equal to it, I shall
appear to entertain an immodestly high opinion of myself. If I admit that I am
unequal to it, while persisting in it, I shall certainly risk being called
temerarious and imprudent. You see the difficulties into which I have fallen,
the position in which I am placed. I cannot, without censure, promise something
about myself, nor, without equal censure, fail in what I promise. Perhaps I can
invoke that saying of Job: ``The
spirit is in all men'' or take consolation in what was said to Timothy: ``Let
no man despise your youth.'' But to speak from my own conscience, I might
say with greater truth that there is nothing singular about me. I admit that I
am devoted to study and eager in the pursuit of the good arts. Nevertheless, I
do not assume nor arrogate to myself the title learned. If, consequently, I
have taken such a great burden on my shoulders, it is not because I am ignorant
of my own weaknesses. Rather, it is because I understand that in this kind of
learned contest the real victory lies in being vanquished. Even the weakest,
consequently, ought not to shun them, but should seek them out, as well they
may. For the one who is bested receives from his conqueror, not an injury but a
benefit; he returns to his house richer than he left, that is, more learned and
better armed for future contests. Inspired by such hope, though myself but a
weak soldier, I have not been afraid to enter so dangerous a contest even
against the very strongest and vigorous opponents. Whether, in doing so, I have
acted foolishly or not might better be judged from the outcome of the contest
than from my age.
¶26 I must, in the third
place, answer those who are scandalized by the large number of propositions and
the variety of topics I have proposed for disputation, as though the burden,
however great it may be, rested on their shoulders and not, as it does, on
mine. Surely it is unbecoming and captious to want to set limits to another's
efforts and, as Cicero says, to desire mediocrity in those things in which the
rule should be: the more the better. In undertaking so great a venture only one
alternative confronted me: success or failure. If I should succeed, I do not
see how it would be more praiseworthy to succeed in defending ten theses than
in defending nine hundred. If I should fail, those who hate me will have
grounds for disparagement, while those who love me will have an occasion to
excuse me. In so large and important an undertaking it would seem that a young
man who fails through weakness of talent or want of learning deserves
indulgence rather than censure. For as the poet says, if powers fail, there shall be praise
for daring; and in great undertaking, to have willed is enough.
¶27 In our own day, many scholars,
imitating Gorgias of Leontini, have been accustomed to dispute, not nine
hundred questions merely, but the whole range of questions concerning all the
arts and have been praised for it. Why should not I, then, without incurring
criticism, be permitted to discuss a large number of questions indeed, but
questions which are clear and determined in their scope? They reply, this is
superfluous and ambitious. I protest that, in my case, no superfluity is
involved, but that all is necessary. If they consider the method of my
philosophy they will feel compelled, even against their inclinations, to
recognize this necessity. All those who attach themselves to one or another of
the philosophers, to Thomas, for instance or Scotus, who at present enjoy the widest following,
can indeed test their doctrine in a discussion of a few questions. By contrast,
I have so trained myself that, committed to the teachings of no one man, I have
ranged through all the masters of philosophy, examined all their works, become acquainted
with all schools. As a consequence, I have had to introduce all of them into
the discussion lest, defending a doctrine peculiar to one, I might seem
committed to it and thus to deprecate the rest. While a few of the theses
proposed concern individual philosophers, it was inevitable that a great number
should concern all of them together. Nor should anyone condemn me on the
grounds that ``wherever the storm blows me, there I remain as a guest.'' For it
was a rule among the ancients, in the case of all writers, never to leave
unread any commentaries which might be available. Aristotle observed this rule
so carefully that Plato called him: auagnooies, that is, ``the reader.''
It is certainly a mark of excessive narrowness of mind to enclose oneself within
one Porch or Academy; nor can anyone reasonably attach himself to one school or
philosopher, unless he has previously become familiar with them all. In
addition, there is in each school some distinctive characteristic which it does
not share with any other.
¶28 To begin with the men of
our own faith to whom philosophy came last, there is in Duns Scotus both vigor
and distinction, in Thomas solidity and sense of balance, in Egidius, lucidity
and precision, in Francis, depth and acuteness, in Albertus [Magnus] a sense of
ultimate issues, all-embracing and grand, in Henry, as it has seemed to me,
always an element of sublimity which inspires reverence. Among the Arabians,
there is in Averroës something solid and unshaken, in Avempace, as in
Al-Farabi, something serious and deeply meditated; in Avicenna, something
divine and platonic. Among the Greeks philosophy was always brilliant and,
among the earliest, even chaste: in Simplicus it is rich and abundant, in
Themistius elegant and compendious, in Alexander, learned and self-consistent,
in Theophrastus, worked out with great reflection, in Ammonius, smooth and
pleasing. If you turn to the Platonists, to mention but a few, you will, in Porphyry, be
delighted by the wealth of matter and by his preoccupation with many aspects of
religion; in Iamblichus, you will be awed by his knowledge of occult philosophy
and the mysteries of the barbarian peoples; in Plotinus, you will find it impossible
to single out one thing for admiration, because he is admirable under every
aspect. Platonists themselves, sweating over his pages, understand him only
with the greatest difficulty when, in his oblique style, he teaches divinely
about divine things and far more than humanly about things human. I shall pass
over the more recent figures, Proclus, and those others who derive from him,
Damacius, Olympiodorus and many more in whom that to theion, that is,
that divine something which is the special mark of the Platonists, always
shines out.
¶29 It should be added that
any school which attacks the more established truths and by clever slander
ridicules the valid arguments of reason confirms, rather than weakens, the
truth itself, which, like embers, is fanned to life, rather than extinguished
by stirring. These considerations have motivated me in my determination to
bring to men's attention the opinions of all schools rather than the doctrine
of some one or other (as some might have preferred), for it seems to me that by
the confrontation of many schools and the discussion of many philosophical
systems that ``effulgence of truth'' of which Plato writes in his letters might
illuminate our minds more clearly, like the sun rising from the sea. What
should have been our plight had only the philosophical thought of the Latin
authors, that is, Albert, Thomas, Scotus, Egidius, Francis and Henry, been
discussed, while that of the Greeks and the Arabs was passed over, since all
the thought of the barbarian nations was inherited by the Greeks and from the
Greeks came down to us? For this reason, our thinkers have always been
satisfied, in the field of philosophy, to rest on the discoveries of foreigners
and simply to perfect the work of others. What profit would have dervied from
discussing natural philosophy with the Peripatetics, if
the Academy of the Platonists had not also participated in the exchange, for
the doctrine of the latter, even when it touched on divine matters, has always
(as St. Augustine bears witness) been esteemed the most elevated of all
philosophies? And this in turn has been the reason why I have, for the first
time after many centuries of neglect (and there is nothing invidious in my
saying so) brought it forth again for public examination and discussion. And
what would it have profited us if, having discussed the opinions of innumerable
others, like asymboli, at the banquet
of wise men, we should contribute nothing of our own, nothing conceived and
elaborated in our own mind? Indeed, it is the characteristic of the impotent
(as Seneca writes) to have their knowledge all written down in their
note-books, as though the discoveries of those who preceded us had closed the
path to our own efforts, as though the power of nature had become effete in us
and could bring forth nothing which, if it could not demonstrate the truth,
might at least point to it from afar. The farmer hates sterility in his field
and the husband deplores it in his wife; even more then must the divine mind
hate the sterile mind with which it is joined and associated, because it hopes
from that source to have offspring of such a high nature.
¶30 For these reasons, I
have not been content to repeat well-worn doctrines, but have proposed for
disputation many points of the early theology of Hermes Trismegistus, many
theses drawn from the teachings of the Chaldeans and the Pythagoreans, from the
occult mysteries of the Hebrews and, finally, a considerable number of
propositions concerning both nature and God which we ourselves have discovered
and worked out. In the first place, we have proposed a harmony between Plato
and Aristotle, such as many before this time indeed believed to exist but which
no one has satisfactorily established. Boethius, among Latin writers, promised
to compose such a harmony, but he never carried his proposal to completion. St.
Augustine also writes, in his Contra Academicos, that many others tried
to prove the same thing, that is, that the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle
were identical, and by the most subtle arguments. For example, John the
Grammarian held that Aristotle differed from Plato only for those who did not
grasp Plato's thought; but he left it to posterity to prove it. We have, in
addition, adduced a great number of passages in which Scotus and Thomas, and
others in which Averroës and Avicenna, have heretofore been thought to
disagree, but which I assert are in harmony with one another.
¶31 In the second place,
along with my own reflections on and developments of both the Aristotelian and
the Platonic philosophies, I have adduced seventy-two theses in physics and
metaphysics. If I am not mistaken (and this will become clearer in the course
of the proposed disputation) anyone subscribing to these theses will be able to
resolve any question proposed to him in natural philosophy or theology on a
principle quite other than that taught us in the philosophy which is at present
to be learned in the schools and is taught by the masters of the present
generation. Nor ought anyone to be surprised, that in my early years, at a
tender age at which I should hardly be permitted to read the writings of others
(as some have insinuated) I should wish to propose a new philosophy. They ought
rather to praise this new philosophy, if it is well defended, or reject it, if
it is refuted. Finally, since it will be their task to judge my discoveries and
my scholarship, they ought to look to the merit or demerit of these and not to
the age of their author.
¶32 I have, in addition,
introduced a new method of philosophizing on the basis of numbers. This method
is, in fact, very old, for it was cultivated by the ancient theologians, by
Pythagoras, in the first place, but also by Aglaophamos, Philolaus and Plato,
as well as by the earliest Platonists; however, like other illustrious
achievements of the past, it has through lack of interest on the part of
succeeding generations, fallen into such desuetude, that hardly any vestiges of
it are to be found. Plato writes in Epinomis that among all the liberal
arts and contemplative sciences, the science of number is supreme and most
divine. And in another place, asking why man is the wisest of animals, he
replies, because he knows how to count. Similarly, Aristotle, in his Problems
repeats this opinion. Abumasar writes that it was a favorite saying of Avenzoar
of Babylon that the man who knows how to count, knows everything else as well.
These opinions are certainly devoid of any truth if by the art of number they
intend that art in which today merchants excel all other men; Plato adds his
testimony to this view, admonishing us emphatically not to confuse this divine
arithmetic with the arithmetic of the merchants. When, consequently, after long
nights of study I seemed to myself to have thoroughly penetrated this
Arithmetic, which is thus so highly extolled, I promised myself that in order
to test the matter, I would try to solve by means of this method of number
seventy-four questions which are considered, by common consent, among the most
important in physics and divinity.
¶33 I have also proposed
certain theses concerning magic, in which I have indicated that magic has two
forms. One consists wholly in the operations and powers of demons, and
consequently this appears to me, as God is my witness, an execrable and
monstrous thing. The other proves, when thoroughly investigated, to be nothing
else but the highest realization of natural philosophy. The Greeks noted both
these forms. However, because they considered the first form wholly undeserving
the name magic they called it goeteia, reserving the term mageia,
to the second, and understanding by it the highest and most perfect wisdom. The
term ``magus'' in the Persian tongue, according to Porphyry, means the same as
``interpreter'' and ``worshipper of the divine'' in our language. Moreover,
Fathers, the disparity and dissimilarity between these arts is the greatest
that can be imagined. Not the Christian religion alone, but all legal codes and
every well-governed commonwealth execrates and condemns the first; the second,
by contrast, is approved and embraced by all wise men and by all peoples
solicitous of heavenly and divine things. The first is the most deceitful of
arts; the second, a higher and holier philosophy. The former is vain and
disappointing; the later, firm, solid and satisfying. The practitioner of the
first always tries to conceal his addiction, because it always rebounds to
shame and reproach, while the cultivation of the second, both in antiquity and
at almost all periods, has been the source of the highest renown and glory in
the field of learning. No philosopher of any worth, eager in pursuit of the
good arts, was ever a student of the former, but to learn the latter,
Pythagoras, Empedocles, Plato and Democritus crossed the seas. Returning to
their homes, they, in turn, taught it to others and considered it a treasure to
be closely guarded. The former, since it is supported by no true arguments, is
defended by no writers of reputation; the latter, honored, as it were, in its
illustrious progenitors, counts two principal authors: Zamolxis, who was
imitated by Abaris the Hyperborean, and Zoroaster; not, indeed, the Zoroaster who
may immediately come to your minds, but that other Zoroaster, the son of
Oromasius. If we should ask Plato the nature of each of these forms of magic,
he will respond in the Alcibiades that the magic of Zoroaster is nothing
else than that science of divine things in which the kings of the Persians had
their sons educated to that they might learn to rule their commonwealth on the
pattern of the commonwealth of the universe. In the Charmides he will
answer that the magic of Zamolxis is the medicine of the soul, because it
brings temperance to the soul as medicine brings health to the body. Later
Charondas, Damigeron, Apollonius, Osthanes and Dardanus continued in their
footsteps, as did Homer, of whom we shall sometime prove, in a ``poetic
theology'' we propose to write, that he concealed this doctrine, symbolically,
in the wanderings of his Ulysses, just as he did all other learned doctrines.
They were also followed by Eudoxus and Hermippus, as well as by practically all
those who studied the Pythagorean and Platonic mysteries. Of later
philosophers, I find that three had ferreted it out: the Arabian, Al-Kindi,
Roger Bacon, and William of Paris. Plotinus also gives signs that he was aware of it in the
passage in which he shows that the magician is the minister of nature and not
merely its artful imitator. This very wise man approves and maintains this
magic, while so abhorring that other that once, when he was invited to to take
part in rites of evil spirits, he said that they ought rather to come to him,
than he to go to them; and he spoke well. Just as that first form of magic
makes man a slave and pawn of evil powers, the latter makes him their lord and
master. That first form of magic cannot justify any claim to being either an
art or a science while the latter, filled as it is with mysteries, embraces the
most profound contemplation of the deepest secrets of things and finally the
knowledge of the whole of nature. This beneficent magic, in calling forth, as
it were, from their hiding places into the light the powers which the largess
of God has sown and planted in the world, does not itself work miracles, so
much as sedulously serve nature as she works her wonders. Scrutinizing, with
greater penetration, that harmony of the universe which the Greeks with greater
aptness of terms called sympatheia and grasping the mutual affinity of
things, she applies to each thing those inducements (called the iugges
of the magicians), most suited to its nature. Thus it draws forth into public
notice the miracles which lie hidden in the recesses of the world, in the womb
of nature, in the storehouses and secret vaults of God, as though she herself
were their artificer. As the farmer weds his elms to the vines, so the
``magus'' unites earth to heaven, that is, the lower orders to the endowments
and powers of the higher. Hence it is that this latter magic appears the more
divine and salutary, as the former presents a monstrous and destructive visage.
But the deepest reason for the difference is the fact that that first magic,
delivering man over to the enemies of God, alienates him from God, while the
second, beneficent magic, excites in him an admiration for the works of God
which flowers naturally into charity,
faith and hope. For nothing so surely
impels us to the worship of God than the assiduous contemplation of His
miracles and when, by means of this natural magic, we shall have examined these
wonders more deeply, we shall more ardently be moved to love and worship Him in
his works, until finally we shall be compelled to burst into song: ``The
heavens, all of the earth, is filled with the majesty of your glory.'' But
enough about magic. I have been led to say even this much because I know that
there are many persons who condemn and hate it, because they do not understand
it, just as dogs always bay at strangers.
¶34 I come now to those
matters which I have drawn from the ancient mysteries of the Hebrews and here
adduce in confirmation of the inviolable Catholic faith. Lest these matters be
thought, by those to whom they are unfamiliar, bubbles of the imagination and
tales of charlatans, I want everyone to understand what they are and what their
true character is; whence they are drawn and who are the illustrious writers
who testifying to them; how mysterious they are, and divine and necessary to
men of our faith for the propagation of our religion in the face of the
persistent calumnies of the Hebrews. Not famous Hebrew teachers alone, but,
from among those of our own persuasion, Esdras, Hilary and Origen all write
that Moses, in addition to the law of the five books which he handed down to
posterity, when on the mount, received from God a more secret and true
explanation of the law. They also say that God commanded Moses to make the law
known to the people, but not to write down its interpretation or to divulge it,
but to communicate it only to Jesu Nave who, in turn, was to reveal it to
succeeding high priests under a strict obligation of silence. It was enough to
indicate, through simple historical narrative, the power of God, his wrath
against the unjust, his mercy toward the good, his justice toward all and to
educate the people, by divine and salutary commands, to live well and blessedly
and to worship in the true religion. Openly to reveal to the people the hidden
mysteries and the secret intentions of the highest divinity, which lay
concealed under the hard shell of the law and the rough vesture of language,
what else could this be but to throw holy things to dogs and to strew gems
among swine? The decision, consequently, to keep such things hidden from the
vulgar and to communicate them only to the initiate, among whom alone, as Paul
says, wisdom speaks, was not a counsel of human prudence but a divine command.
And the philosophers of antiquity scrupulously observed this caution.
Pythagoras wrote nothing but a few trifles which he confided to his daughter
Dama, on his deathbed. The Sphinxes, which are carved on the temples of the
Egyptians, warned that the mystic doctrines must be kept inviolate from the
profane multitude by means of riddles. Plato, writing certain things to
Dionysius concerning the highest substances, explained that he had to write in
riddles ``lest the letter fall into other hands and others come to know the
things I have intended for you.'' Aristotle used to say that the books of the Metaphysics
in which he treats of divine matters were both published and unpublished. Is
there any need for further instances? Origen asserts that Jesus Christ, the
Teacher of Life, revealed many things to His disciples which they in turn were
unwilling to commit to writing lest they become the common possession of the
crowd. Dionysius the Areopagite gives powerful confirmation to this assertion
when he writes that the more secret mysteries were transmitted by the founders
of our religion ek nou eis vouv dia mesov logov, that is, from mind to
mind, without commitment to writing, through the medium of of the spoken word
alone. Because the true interpretation of the law given to Moses was, by God's
command, revealed in almost precisely this way, it was called ``Cabala,'' which
in Hebrew means the same as our word ``reception.'' The precise point is, of
course, that the doctrine was received by one man from another not through
written documents but, as a hereditary right, through a regular succession of
revelations.
¶35 After Cyrus had
delivered the Hebrews from the Babylonian captivity, and the Temple had been
restored under Zorobabel, the Hebrews bethought themselves of restoring the
Law. Esdras, who was head of the church [sic!] at the time, amended the
book of Moses. He readily realized, moreover, that because of the exiles, the
massacres, the flights and the captivity of the people of Israel, the practice
established by the ancients of handing down the doctrines by word of mouth could
not be maintained. Unless they were committed to writing, the heavenly
teachings divinely handed down must inevitably perish, for the memory of them
would not long endure. He decided, consequently, that all of the wise men still
alive should be convened and that each should communicate to the convention all
that he remembered about the mysteries of the Law. Their communications were
then to be collected by scribes into seventy volumes (approximately the same
number as there were members of the Sanhedrin). So that you need not accept my
testimony alone, O Fathers, hear Esdras himself speaking: ``After forty days
had passed, the All-Highest spoke and said: The first things which you wrote
publish openly so that the worthy and unworthy alike may read; but the last
seventy books conserve so that you may hand them on to the wise men among your
people, for in these reside the spring of understanding, the fountain of wisdom
and the river of knowledge. And I did these things.'' These are the very words
of Esdras. These are the books of cabalistic wisdom. In these books, as Esdras
unmistakably states, resides the springs of understanding, that is, the
ineffable theology of the supersubstantial deity; the fountain of wisdom, that
is, the precise metaphysical doctrine concerning intelligible and angelic
forms; and the stream of wisdom, that is, the best established philosophy
concerning nature. Pope Sixtus the Fourth, the immediate predecessor of our
present pope, Innocent the Eight, under whose happy reign we are living, took
all possible measures to ensure that these books would be translated into Latin
for the public benefit of our faith and at the time of his death, three of them
had already appeared. The Hebrews hold these same books in such reverence that
no one under forty years of age is permitted even to touch them. I acquired
these books at considerable expense and, reading them from beginning to end
with the greatest attention and with unrelenting toil, I discovered in them (as
God is my witness) not so much the Mosaic as the Christian religion. There was
to be found the mystery of the Trinity, the Incarnation of the Word, the
divinity of the Messiah; there one might also read of original sin, of its
expiation by the Christ, of the heavenly Jerusalem, of the fall of the demons,
of the orders of the angels, of the pains of purgatory and of hell. There I
read the same things which we read every day in the pages of Paul and of
Dionysius, Jerome and Augustine. In philosophical matters, it were as though
one were listening to Pythagoras and Plato, whose doctrines bear so close an
affinity to the Christian faith that our Augustine
offered endless thanks to God that the books of the Platonists had fallen into
his hands. In a word, there is no point of
controversy between the Hebrews and ourselves on which the Hebrews cannot be
confuted and convinced out the cabalistic writings, so that no corner is left
for them to hide in. On this point I can cite a witness of the very greatest
authority, the most learned Antonius Chronicus; on the occasion of a banquet in
his house, at which I was also present, with his own ears he heard the Hebrew,
Dactylus, a profound scholar of this lore, come round completely to the
Christian doctrine of the Trinity.
¶36 To return, however, to
our review of the chief points of my disputation: I have also adduced my
conception of the manner in which the poems of Orpheus and Zoroaster ought to
be interpreted. Orpheus is read by the Greeks in a text which is practically
complete; Zoroaster is known to them in a corrupt text, while in Chaldea he is
read in a form more nearly complete. Both are considered as the authors and
fathers of ancient wisdom. I shall say nothing about Zoroaster who is mentioned
so frequently by the Platonists and always with the greatest respect. Of
Pythagoras, however, Iamblicus the Chaldean writes that he took the Orphic
theology as the model on which he shaped and formed his own philosophy. For
this precise reason the sayings of Pythagoras are called sacred, because, and
to the degree that, they derive from the Orphic teachings. For from this source
that occult doctrine of numbers and everything else that was great and sublime
in Greek philosophy flowed as from its primitive source. Orpheus, however (and
this was the case with all the ancient theologians) so wove the mysteries of
his doctrines into the fabric of myths and so wrapped them about in veils of
poetry, that one reading his hymns might well believe that there was nothing in
them but fables and the veriest commonplaces. I have said this so that it might
be known what labor was mine, what difficulty was involved, in drawing out the
secret meanings of the occult philosophy from the deliberate tangles of riddles
and the recesses of fable in which they were hidden; difficulty made all the
greater by the fact that in a matter so weighty, abstruse and unexplored, I
could count on no help from the work and efforts of other interpreters. And still
like dogs they have come barking after me, saying that I have brought together
an accumulation of trifles in order to make a great display by their sheer
number. As though all did not concern ambiguous questions, subjects of sharpest
controversy, over which the most important schools confront each other like
gladiators. As though I had not brought to light many things quite unknown and
unsuspected by these very men who now carp at me while styling themselves the
leaders of philosophy. As a matter of fact, I am so completely free of the
fault they attribute to me that I have tried to confine the discussion to fewer
points than I might have raised. Had I wished, (as others are wont) to divide
these questions into their constituent parts, and to dismember them, their
number might well have increased to a point past counting. To say nothing of
other matters, who is unaware that one of these nine hundred theses, that,
namely, concerning the reconciliation of the philosophies of Plato and
Aristotle might have been developed, without arousing any suspicion that I was
affecting mere number, into six hundred or more by enumerating in due order
those points on which others think that these philosophies differ and I, that
they agree? For a certainty I shall speak out (though in a manner which is
neither modest in itself nor conformable to my character), I shall speak out
because those who envy me and detract me, force me to speak out. I have wanted
to make clear in disputation, not only that I know a great many things, but
also that I know a great many things which others do not know.
¶37 And now, reverend
Fathers, in order that this claim may be vindicated by the fact, and in order
that my address may no longer delay the satisfaction of your desire --- for I
see, reverend doctors, with the greatest pleasure that you are girded and ready
for the contest --- let us now, with the prayer that the outcome may be
fortunate and favorable, as to the sound of trumpets, join battle.
CRS, 21 November 1994
With many thanks for correction of textual errors by Mr. Pete Grubbs of Penn
State University.