On the Greatness of the Soul 10–17

A. First, then, answer whether, of those figures which have been mentioned as much as seemed enough, the one that seems to you to excel is that which consists of four equal lines and as many equal angles. For, as you see, in it there is equality both of lines and of angles; and, what we did not find in the one enclosed by three equal lines, it has the equality of opposites, for, as you see, line is opposite line and angle opposite angle. E. It is as you say. A. Does it have the highest equality, or do you think otherwise? For if it has, we are looking for another in vain, as we had set out to do; but if it has not, I want this very thing to be shown to me by you. E. It seems to me to have it; for where the angles are equal and the lines are equal, I do not see where I could detect inequality. A. I think otherwise: for a straight line, until it comes to the angles, has the highest equality; but when another line is joined to it from a different side and makes an angle, do you not think this very thing is unequal? Or does the part of the figure enclosed by a line seem to you to agree in equality or likeness with the part enclosed by an angle? E. Not at all, and I am ashamed of my rashness. I was led to it because I saw that both the angles and the sides in it were equal to one another; but who would not see the great difference between those sides and the angles? A. Take another very plain indication of inequality: surely you see that both that triangular figure made of equal lines and this square one have a center. E. I see it plainly. A. What? When we draw lines from that same center to all parts of the figure, do the lines seem to you to be drawn equal, or unequal? E. Altogether unequal; for those which we draw to the angles must be longer. A. How many of these are there in the square, and how many in the triangle? E. Four here, three there. A. What? Which, again, are the shortest of all, and how many are there in each figure? E. The same number, namely those drawn to the middle of the sides. A. You seem to me to speak most truly, and there is no need to dwell on it longer here; it is enough for what we want. For you see, I think, that great equality is kept here, and yet not yet perfect in every respect. E. I see it entirely, and I am very eager to know which figure has the highest equality.

A. Which do you think it is, if not the one whose boundary agrees with itself everywhere, with no angle disturbing its equality, and from whose center equal lines can be drawn to all parts of its boundary? E. I think I now understand: for you seem to me to describe the figure bounded by one line drawn round in a circle. A. You understand rightly. Now consider this: since the reasoning above taught that a line is understood in length alone and takes on nothing of breadth, and therefore cannot be divided along the length in which it is drawn, does any figure seem to you to be found without breadth? E. In no way. A. What? Can breadth itself be without length, even when it is breadth alone, just as above we understood length without breadth; or can it not? E. I see that it cannot. A. You see this too, unless I am mistaken, that breadth can be divided in every direction, but a line cannot be divided lengthwise. E. That is plain. A. Which, then, do you think should be valued more: what can be divided, or what cannot? E. Surely what cannot. A. You prefer, then, the line to breadth. For if what cannot be divided is to be preferred, we must also prefer what can be divided less; and breadth is divided in every direction, while length is divided only crosswise, for it does not admit division lengthwise; it is therefore more excellent than breadth. Or do you think otherwise? E. Reason compels me to admit it exactly as you say. A. Now let us inquire, if you please, whether in this line of reasoning there is anything that cannot be divided at all; for it will be much better even than that line. For you see that a line can be cut crosswise innumerable times; so I leave this for you to find yourself. E. I think that cannot be divided which we were placing as the center of a figure, from which lines are drawn to the boundaries. For if it is divided, it cannot lack length or even breadth. But if it has length alone, it is no longer that from which lines are drawn, but is itself a line. And if it is also broad, it needs another center from which lines may be drawn to the boundaries of its breadth. But reason rejects both. This, then, will be what cannot be divided. A. You are right. But does not that from which a line is drawn also seem to you something of the kind, even if there is not yet a figure whose center we can understand? For I mean the beginning of a line, from which length begins, which I want you to understand as without any length. For if you understand length, you certainly do not understand where length itself begins. E. Exactly of that kind. A. This, then, which I see you now understand, is the most powerful of all the things that have been shown. For it is what admits no division. And it is called a point when it occupies the center of a figure; but if it is the beginning of a line or lines, or even the end, or when in general it marks something to be understood as without parts but does not hold the center of a figure, it is called a sign. A sign, then, is a mark without parts; a point is a mark holding the center of a figure. So it is that every point is also a sign, but not every sign seems to be a point. For I want us to agree about these names, so that we may talk around things less in our discussion; although most people call a point not what holds the center of every figure, but only what holds the center of a circle or a sphere; yet we need not labor much over words. E. I agree.

A. You surely see too how much power it has. For a line begins from it and ends in it; we see that no figure can be made with straight lines unless an angle is closed by it; further, wherever a line can be cut, it is cut through it, while it itself admits no cutting at all; no line is joined to another except through it. Finally, since reason has shown that among the other plane figures (for we have said nothing yet about height) the one enclosed by a circle is to be preferred because of its highest equality, what else regulates that very equality but the point set in the center? Much can be said of its power, but I set a limit, and leave more for you to think over yourself. E. As you think fit; for I will not be reluctant to ask if anything is too obscure; and I see moderately well, I think, that the power of this sign is great. A. Now, then, attend to this: since you have grasped what a sign is, what length is, and what breadth is, which of these seems to you to need which, without which it cannot exist? E. I see that breadth needs length, without which it cannot be understood at all. Again, I see that length does not need breadth in order to exist, but cannot exist without that sign. And it is plain that the sign exists by itself and needs none of these. A. It is as you say. But consider more carefully whether breadth can truly be cut in every direction, or whether there is some direction from which it too cannot admit cutting, though it admits more than a line. E. I do not know at all from which direction it could not. A. I believe you do not remember, for you could in no way fail to know this; so I will remind you in this way. Surely you understand breadth so as to take up nothing of height in your thought. E. Entirely so. A. Then let height be added to this breadth, and answer now whether something has also been added by which it may be cut in every direction. E. You have reminded me wonderfully. For now I see that cutting can be admitted not only from above or from below, but also from the sides, and that nothing at all is left from which division could not penetrate. So it is plain that breadth cannot be cut from those parts through which height will rise. A. Since, then, unless I am mistaken, you know length, breadth, and height, I ask whether the first two can be absent where height is present. E. I see that height cannot exist without length, but it can without breadth. A. Go back, then, to the thought of breadth, and if you have pictured it in your mind as lying flat, let it be raised up on any side, as if you wanted to draw it out through the very thinnest crack where the leaves of a closed door meet. Or do you not yet understand what I want? E. I understand what you say, but perhaps not yet what you want. A. Namely, that you answer whether breadth raised up in this way seems to you to have passed into height and lost the name and description of breadth; or whether it still remains breadth, though placed in this way. E. It seems to me to have become height. A. Do you remember, I beg you, how we had defined height? E. I remember clearly, and I am ashamed to have answered so. For even in this position breadth, raised up as it were, does not admit cutting lengthwise from top to bottom; so no inner parts can be thought of in it, though a middle and ends can be. But according to the earlier description of height, which you made me remember, there is no height at all where nothing inside can be thought of. A. You are right, and I wanted you to remember it exactly so. Therefore I now want you to answer whether you prefer the false to the true. E. To doubt about this would be incredible madness. A. Tell me, then, please: is that a true line which can be cut lengthwise; or a true sign which can be cut in any way; or true breadth which, when raised up as we said, admits cutting lengthwise from top to bottom? E. Not at all.

A. Have you ever, then, seen with these bodily eyes such a point, or such a line, or such a breadth? E. Never at all; for these things are not bodily. A. But if bodily things are seen by bodily eyes through a wonderful kinship of things, the mind by which we see those incorporeal things must not be bodily or a body. Or do you think otherwise? E. Very well: I now grant that the mind is not a body or anything bodily; but what, after all, is it? Tell me. A. See meanwhile whether it has been established that it lacks all that quantity which is now in question; for as to what the mind is, I am surprised that you have forgotten it was discussed between us in the earlier question. For you remember that you first asked where it came from; and I remember that we treated this in two ways: one, as if its region were being asked about; the other, whether it was from earth, or fire, or any other of these elements, or from all, or from some of them. In that question it was agreed between us that this should no more be asked than where earth comes from, or any other of the single elements. For it is to be understood that, although God made the mind, it has a definite substance of its own, which is neither earthy nor fiery nor airy nor watery—unless perhaps we are to think that God granted to earth to be nothing other than earth, and did not grant to the mind to be nothing other than mind. But if you want the mind defined for you, and therefore ask what the mind is, I answer easily. For it seems to me to be a certain substance sharing in reason, fitted to rule the body.

So attend rather to the point now in doubt: whether the mind has any quantity and, so to speak, any spatial extent. For surely, since it is not a body—for otherwise it could not perceive anything incorporeal, as the reasoning above showed—it undoubtedly lacks the extent by which bodies are measured; and for this reason such a quantity cannot rightly be believed, thought, or understood of it. But if you are troubled by how it holds in memory such great spaces of sky, land, and sea, when it itself has no quantity, this is a wonderful power, which nevertheless you can perceive from what we have found, as far as there is light in your intelligence. For there is no body, as reason has already shown, that lacks length, breadth, and height, and none of these can exist in a body without the other two; yet the mind is granted to see even a line alone with a kind of inner eye, that is, the understanding. So I think we grant that the mind is not a body in such a way that it is better than a body. Granting this, I do not think we should doubt that it is also better than a line; for it is absurd that, since those three are in a body so that it is a body, that which is better than a body should not be better than all of them. But the line itself, than which the mind is shown to be better, excels the other two because it can be cut less than they. Further, those two are cut more than the line to the degree that they spread out more into space; but a line has no space but that of length, and if that is taken away no space at all remains. Therefore whatever is better than a line must be in no space, and cannot be divided or cut at all. So, I think, we labor in vain to find a quantity of the mind, which has none, since we grant that it is better than a line. And if of all plane figures the best is the one formed by a circle, in which reason taught that nothing is better and more powerful than the point, which beyond all doubt lacks parts, what wonder if the soul is neither bodily, nor stretched out in any length, nor spread out in breadth, nor made solid in height, and yet has such power in the body that the government of all the members is in its hands, and it is, as it were, the hinge of all bodily motions in action? And since the center of the eye, which is called the pupil, is nothing but a kind of point of the eye, in which nevertheless there is such power that by it half the sky, whose extent is beyond words, can be seen and surveyed from some high place, it is not far from the truth that the mind lacks all bodily magnitude, which is made up of those three dimensions, although it can imagine magnitudes of bodies of any size. But few are allowed to see the mind by the mind itself, that is, for the mind to see itself; and it sees through understanding. For to understanding alone it is granted to see that there is nothing in reality more powerful and more magnificent than those natures which are understood to be, so to speak, without swelling. For the magnitude of the body is not absurdly called a swelling; and if it were to be highly esteemed, elephants would surely be wiser than we. But if some kinsman of theirs says that elephants are wise—for I have noticed, though with astonishment, I have noticed that men often argue about this too—he will at least grant, I think, that a little bee is wiser than an ass; and to compare their sizes would surely be worse than asinine. Or, as we were saying about the eye, who does not know that the eagle's eye is much smaller than ours? Yet with it the eagle, flying so high that it can hardly be seen by us in so much light, has been found to see a little hare hiding under a bush and a fish under the waves. But if in the senses themselves, which are not granted to perceive anything but bodily things, the size of the body counts for nothing in the matter, that is, in the power of perceiving, must we fear, I ask, that the human mind, whose more excellent and almost only sight is reason itself, by which it even strives to find itself, is nothing, if that same reason, that is, the mind itself, has proved that it lacks all magnitude by which place is occupied? Great things, believe me, great things must be thought of the mind, but without any bulk. This comes more easily to those who approach these things either well educated, kindled not by desire for empty glory but by the divine love of truth; or who, though they came to investigate them less educated, are already engaged in seeking them, if they patiently make themselves teachable to good men and turn themselves away from all habit of bodies, as far as is permitted in this life. And by a certain divine providence it cannot be that religious souls, who seek themselves and their God, that is, the truth, piously, chastely, and diligently, should lack the ability to find.

But let us now leave this question, if you please, unless something still troubles you, and pass on to other things. Whatever we have discussed about those figures, perhaps more wordily than you wished, you will see how much it will be worth for other matters, if you grant that this discussion has been helped somewhat by it. For this kind of discipline both trains the mind to perceive subtler things, so that it is not dazzled by their light and, unable to bear it, gladly flee back into the same darkness it wished to escape; and it supplies arguments, unless I am mistaken, most certain, by which, once a thing has been found and established, doubt becomes shameless, as far as man is permitted to track down such things. For I doubt less about these things than about those which we see with these eyes, which are ever at war with phlegm. For what is less to be borne or listened to than to admit that we excel the beasts by reason, and to admit that what we perceive by bodily light, which some beasts even see better, is something, but to contend that what we behold by reason is nothing? If it were said to be no more than what the eyes see, surely nothing more unworthy could seem to be said. E. I accept this most gladly and agree. But this troubles me: though it is so clear to me that the soul is not of bodily quantity that I do not know at all how I could resist those arguments or which of them I would not grant, first, why, as the body grows with age, the soul too either grows or seems to grow. For who would deny that infant children are not to be compared even with the cunning of some beasts? And who would doubt that, as they grow, reason itself in some way grows in them as well? Next, if the soul is spread out through the extent of its body, how is it of no quantity? And if it is not spread out, how does it feel a prick everywhere? A. You are asking exactly the things that have often troubled me too; so I am not unprepared to answer you as I usually answer myself. Whether well, the reason that drives you will judge; but whatever my answer may be, I certainly cannot do more, unless perhaps something better comes to mind by divine gift while we discuss. But let us proceed, if you please, in our usual way, so that, with reason as guide, you answer yourself. And first let us ask whether it is a sure argument that the mind grows with the body that, with the advance of age, a man becomes better suited to human life and more and more experienced in it. E. Go on as you wish; for I too most approve this way of teaching and learning. For somehow, when I myself answer what I was asking in ignorance, the very discovery becomes sweeter not only in substance but also through wonder.

A. Tell me, then, whether “greater” and “better” seem to you two things, or one and the same thing called by two names. E. I know that what we call greater is one thing, and what we call better is another. A. To which of these two do you think quantity belongs? E. Clearly to what we call greater. A. What about when we admit that of two figures the round one is better than the square? Does quantity make it so, or something else? E. Not quantity at all; the equality we discussed above is the cause of its excellence. A. Now, then, attend to this: whether virtue seems to you to be a kind of equality of life, agreeing with reason in every respect. For if one thing in life is at odds with another, we are offended more, unless I am mistaken, than if some part of a circle were at a greater or smaller distance from the point than the other parts. Or do you think otherwise? E. No, I agree, and I approve this which you have described as virtue. For reason should not be called or thought reason unless it is true; and he whose life agrees with truth in all things is surely either the only one, or at least the chief one, who lives well and honorably; and he who is so disposed is alone to be judged to have virtue and to live by it. A. You speak rightly. But surely you also see, I think, that the circle is more like virtue than any other plane figure. That is why we usually extol with great praise the verse in Horace where, speaking of the wise man, he says, “Brave, and in himself wholly smooth and round.” And rightly; for among the goods of the mind you find nothing more in agreement with itself in every part than virtue, nor among plane figures than the circle. Therefore, if the circle excels the others not by size of space but by a certain shape, how much more must we think of virtue that it surpasses the other dispositions of the mind not by occupying a larger place but by a divine congruence and harmony of reasons? Now when a boy makes praiseworthy progress, toward what is he said to progress more than toward virtue? Or do you not think so? E. It is plain. A. So the mind should not seem to you to progress by growing with age like the body; for by progressing it arrives at virtue, which we admit is beautiful and perfect not by any size of space but by the great strength of constancy. And if greater is one thing and better another, as you have already granted, whatever progress the soul makes with age, becoming possessed of reason, seems to me to make it not greater but better. But if size of the members did this, each would be wiser the taller or stronger he was; and you will not deny, I think, that it is otherwise. E. Who would deny that? But since you too grant that the soul progresses with age, I wonder how it happens that, though without any quantity, it is helped, if not by the extent of the members, then certainly by the extent of time.

Stop wondering, for here too I answer you by a similar reasoning. Just as size of the members offers no argument that it helps the soul, since many with slighter and shorter members are found to be wiser than some endowed with a great bulk of body, so, since we see some younger men more diligent and vigorous than most older ones, I do not see why spans of time in the ages of life should be thought to give increases to minds as they do to bodies. For even bodies, which are granted to grow with time and occupy larger spaces, are often smaller when older—not only the bodies of old men, which are contracted and diminished by length of time, but also those of boys, some of whom we notice to be smaller in body than others younger than they. If, then, times stretched to great length do not give the cause of size even to bodies themselves—but all that is the power of the seed and of certain numbers of nature, truly hidden and hard to discern—how much less must we think that the soul becomes longer by long time, because we see that it has learned much by experience and practice! But if you are troubled by the fact that we usually render what the Greeks call μακροθυμία as “long-mindedness,” you may notice that many words are transferred from the body to the mind, as from the mind to the body. For if Virgil spoke of a “wicked mountain” and “the most just earth,” words which you see transferred from the mind to bodies, what wonder if in turn we speak of long-mindedness, though only bodies can be long? But the virtue called greatness of mind is rightly understood as referring to no space, but to a certain force, that is, to the power and strength of the mind; and this virtue is to be valued the more, the more it despises. But we shall speak of this later, when we ask how great the soul is in the way it is usually asked how great Hercules was—by the excellence of his deeds, not by the bulk of his members; for so we divided the question above. Now you should remember what we have said sufficiently about the point: reason taught that it is most powerful and dominates above all in figures. And do not power and dominion display a kind of greatness? Yet in the point we found no space. So when we hear or say that a mind is great or huge, we must think not how much place it occupies but how much it can do. Therefore, if your first argument, by which the mind seemed to you to grow with the body through age, has been sufficiently examined, let us pass on to another.