THE CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY (Collector's Edition). Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius

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СКАЧАТЬ at last ashamed of the folly that so sorely vexed me.’

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

      ‘If it be thy good pleasure,’ said I.

      ‘No one can doubt that God is all-powerful.’

      ‘No one at all can question it who thinks consistently.’

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

      ‘Nothing.’

      ‘But can God do evil, then?’

      ‘Nay; by no means.’

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

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

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

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

      Song XII. Orpheus and Eurydice.

      Blest he whose feet have stood Beside the fount of good;

      Blest he whose will could break Earth’s chains for wisdom’s sake!

      The Thracian bard, ’tis said, Mourned his dear consort dead; To hear the plaintive strain The woods moved in his train, And the stream ceased to flow, Held by so soft a woe;

      The deer without dismay

      Beside the lion lay;

      The hound, by song subdued, No more the hare pursued,

      But the pang unassuaged

      In his own bosom raged.

      The music that could calm

      All else brought him no balm.

      Chiding the powers immortal, He came unto Hell’s portal; There breathed all tender things Upon his sounding strings, Each rhapsody high-wrought His goddess-mother taught— All he from grief could borrow And love redoubling sorrow, Till, as the echoes waken, All Tænarus is shaken;

      Whilst he to ruth persuades The monarch of the shades

      With dulcet prayer. Spell-bound, The triple-headed hound

      At sounds so strangely sweet Falls crouching at his feet.

      The dread Avengers, too,

      That guilty minds pursue

      With ever-haunting fears,

      Are all dissolved in tears.

      Ixion, on his wheel,

      A respite brief doth feel; For, lo! the wheel stands still.

      And, while those sad notes thrill, Thirst-maddened Tantalus

      Listens, oblivious

      Of the stream’s mockery

      And his long agony.

      The vulture, too, doth spare Some little while to tear

      At Tityus’ rent side,

      Sated and pacified.

      At length the shadowy king, His sorrows pitying,

      ‘He hath prevailèd!’ cried; ‘We give him back his bride!

      To him she shall belong,

      As guerdon of his song.

      One sole condition yet

      Upon the boon is set:

      Let him not turn his eyes

      To view his hard-won prize, Till they securely pass

      The gates of Hell.’ Alas!

      What law can lovers move?

      A higher law is love!

      For Orpheus—woe is me!—

      On his Eurydice—

      Day’s threshold all but won— Looked, lost, and was undone!

      Ye who the light pursue,

      This story is for you,

      Who seek to find a way

      Unto the clearer day.

      If on the darkness past

      One backward look ye cast, Your weak and wandering eyes Have lost the matchless prize.

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