Augustine: Earlier Writings (continued)
THE SOLILOQUIES 47 equals; in the other not so. In the first class are those cases where we can say of both equally that the one resembles the other; in the case of twins for example, or the impressions of a signet-ring. In the other class are those cases where we can say that an inferior thing resembles a better. Who, on seeing his face in a mirror, would say that he resembled that image and not rather that it resembled him? Again this class is divided into two: cases which belong to the soul's experience, and those which belong to objects seen. Those which belong to the experience of the soul are due either to the senses, as for example the false movement of a tower, or to what has been originally received from the senses, like the visions of dreamers and possibly of madmen. Furthermore, of resemblances in visible things some are brought about by nature, others by Hving creatures. Nature causes inferior resemblances by begetting or by reflection: by begetting, as when parents have children who resemble them; by reflecting, as from any kind of mirror. No doubt men make mirrors, but they do not make the images which mirrors reflect. Living creatures make pictures and similar works of imagination. And here may be included the figments of demons if such exist. Shadows of bodies which closely resemble bodies, and may be called false bodies—it is not the function of the eyes to decide—these may be put in the class of resemblances naturally caused by reflection. In any case, every body exposed to Hght throws a shadow on the side opposite to the fight. Have you anything to say against all this? A,—Nothing. But I am eagerly waiting to hear whither all this tends.
12. R.—We must be patient until the other senses report also that falsity resides in verisimifitude. Take hearing. There again there are almost as many classes of resemblance. For example, we hear a voice but do not see the speaker, and think it is someone else whose voice resembles the one we hear. Of the inferior type of resemblance the echo is a witness, or a ringing in the ears, or the imitation of the merle or the raven that we hear in clocks, or even those sounds which dreamers and madmen seem to hear. It is incredible how false soft notes, of which musicians speak, correspond to the truth, as will appear later; it is suflftcient to point out now how closely they resemble true notes. You follow me? ^.—Yes, most willingly. I have no difficulty in understanding, i.—To cut the matter short. Do you think it is easy to distinguish one fily from another by smelling, or honey from diff'erent hives by taste, or the softness of the plumage of the swan and the goose by touch? A.—l do not. i.—When wc dream that we smell or taste or touch such things, are we not deceived because these images resemble the real things though in an inferior and vain way? A.—True. R.—So it appears that resemblances, whether among equal things or unequal, wheedle all our senses and deceive us. Or, if we are not deceived because we refuse to be wheedled or because we recognize the difference, we call these resemblances false just because we notice that they somehow resemble the truth. .-1.—I cannot doubt it. vii, 13. R.—Now hsten while I repeat all this, so as to make still more clear what I am trying to show you. A.—Speak as you will, for I am determined to endure your circuitous course and not to weary in it, so great is my hope of reaching the end of the journey. R.—Well done. Do you think that when we see two similar eggs we can say that one of them is false? A.—By no means. If they are eggs, both of them are true eggs. R.—When we see an image reflected from a mirror, how do we know that it is false? A.—Because it cannot be grasped; it makes no sound; it does not move of itself; it is not alive. And there are other innumerable signs which it would take too long to mention. R.— see you wish for no delay and I must adapt myself to your haste. Not to repeat everything; if the men we see in dreams could live and speak and be grasped by us when we awake, and there was no difference between them and those whom we see and address when we are awake and of a sound mind, would we say that they were false? A.—We could not correctly say so. R.—Then, if they were true so far as they were very like the truth and there was no difference at all between them and real men, but were also false so far as they were proved to be unlike real men by the tests you have mentioned or by other tests, must we not admit that similitude is the mother of truth and dissimihtude the mother of falsity? A.—I have nothing I can say, and I am ashamed of the rash admission I have just made.
14. R.—It is absurd to be ashamed, as if it were not for this very reason that we chose this kind of conversation. .\s we alone take part, I wish the work to be called and entitled ''Soliloquies," a new and harsh name perhaps, but quite suitable to describe what we are doing. There is no better way of seeking truth than by the method of question and answer. But hardly anyone can be found who is not ashamed to be proved wrong; and so it nearly always happens that a good discussion is spoiled by some outburst of obstinacy, with fraying of tempers generally concealed but sometimes apparent. Now our plan was, I believe,
THE SOLILOQUIES AQ
to proceed peaceably and agreeably in our search for truth, with God's help. I was to ask the questions and you were to answer. There is no need to fear, if you get tied up in knots, to go back and try again. There is no other way out of our present difficulty. viii, 15. A.—You are right. But I do not see clearly where I went wrong. Perhaps it was when I said that a thing is false when it has some likeness to the true. Nothing else deserving to be so called occurred to me. But now I am compelled to admit that false things are so called because they differ from the true. Accordingly, unlikeness is itself the cause of falsity. I am confused for I cannot easily think of anything which has two contrary causes. R.—Perhaps this is the solitary and unique instance in the whole world. Don't you know that if you consider the innumerable species of animals, the crocodile alone moves the upper jaw in eating? Indeed, hardly can two things be found identically alike. A.—Yes, I see that. But when I consider what we call "false" and how it is both like and unlike the true, I cannot make out whether its falseness is due to the likeness or the unlikeness. If to the latter, there will be nothing which cannot be called false. For there is nothing which is not unhke something we call true. If I say "to the former" those eggs will refute me, because they are true just because they are alike.
Besides, I shall not escape being compelled to confess that everything is false, because I cannot deny that all things have a certain similarity. But suppose I am not afraid to reply that both likeness and unlikeness together entitle a thing to be called false, what way out will you give me? I shall be compelled to say that all things are false, because all things are partly like and partly unlike each other. I should have to say that the false is simply that which is not other than it seems, did I not dread those many monsters which I thought I had outdistanced. Again; I dare not repeat that that is true which is as it seems, remembering my unexpected giddiness caused by the inference that nothing can be true without someone to know it. I dread shipwreck on hidden rocks which are real even if they are unknown.
If I say that is true which is, the conclusion will be drawn that there is no falsity anywhere, deny it who will. And so the storms return, and I see I have made no advance with all your unhurried patience. ix, 16. R,—Now listen. I can never be induced to believe that we have implored divine aid in vain. After all our inquiry
I see that nothing remains that we may justly term false except
A.E.W.—
^O AUGUSTINE: EARLIER WRITINGS
that which feigns itself to be what it is not, or pretends to be when it does not exist. The former kind is either fallacious or mendacious. Fallacious, strictly speaking, is that which has a certain desire to deceive and this cannot be understood apart from the soul. But deceit is practised partly by reason and partly by nature; by reason in rational beings like men, by nature in beasts Hke foxes. What I call lying is done by liars. The difference between the fallacious and the mendacious is that the former all wish to deceive while the latter do not all wish to do so. Mimes and comedies and many poems are full of Hes, but the aim is to deHght rather than to deceive. Nearly all who make jokes lie. But the fallacious person, strictly speaking, is he whose design is to deceive. Those who feign without intent to deceive are mendacious, or at least no one hesitates to call them liars. Have you any objection to urge against this?
17. A.—Please go on. Perhaps you have begun to teach me the truth about falsity. But I am waiting to hear what you have to say about the other kind that pretends it is and is not.
R,—What do you expect? I have given you many examples already. Don't you think that your image in a mirror wants to be you but is false because it is not? A.—Yes, I do. R.—And every picture, statue, or similar work of art tries to be that on which it is modelled. A.—I must agree. R.—You will agree that the things which deceive dreamers and madmen are in the same class? A.—Yes, these above all. More than anything else these pretend to be what men see when they are awake and sane. And they are false just because they pretend to be what they cannot be. R.—Why need I say more about the apparent movement of towers, or the oar plunged in water, or the shadows of bodies? It is clear, I think, that they all come under this rule. A,—Most clear. R.—I say nothing of the other senses. For no one who considers the matter will fail to discover that in the realm of the senses that is called false which pretends to be something and is not.
X, 18. A.—You are right. But I wonder why you think poems and jests and other fallacious things are to be kept separate from this class. R.—It is one thing to will to be false and another not to be able to be true. We can classify comedies, tragedies, mimes and the like with the works of painters and sculptors. The picture of a man, though it tries to be like him, cannot be a true man any more than a character in the books of the comedians. These things are false not from any will or desire of their own, but from the necessity of following the will of THE SOLILOQUIES 5I their authors. On the stage, Roscius wants to be a false Hecuba, but by nature he is a true man. By so wanting, he is also a true tragedian, so far as he fulfils the part. But he would be a false Priam if he gave himself out as Priam and was not. But here emerges a strange fact which nobody doubts. A.—What is that? R.—In all such matters truth and falsehood are inevitably intertwined; indeed, if there is to be truth in one respect there must be falsehood in another. How could Roscius be truly a tragic actor if he refused to be a false Hector, Andromache, Hercules or the like? How could a picture of a horse be truly a picture if the horse were not false? How could there be a man's face in a glass, true as such, though not truly a man? So if a certain kind of falsity is necessary in order that there should be truth, why do we dread falsity and seek truth as a great boon? A.—I don't know, unless it is because there is in these examples nothing worthy of our imitation. After all, unlike actors, reflections in mirrors, or Myron's brass cow, we ought not to be both true and false: true in our proper garb but false as dressed up to represent something else. We ought to seek the absolute truth, not that double-faced thing that is partly true and partly false.
R.—You are asking something great, nay divine. If we find that, we shall agree that we have found Truth itself, from which everything that is called true derives its qua Hty. A.—I agree most heartily. xi, 19. R.—Well now, do you think the art of dialectic is true or false? A.—Clearly true, and so is the art of literary studies [grammaticd]. R.—Are both equally true? A.— I don't see that there can be degrees of truth, i?.—Yet there may be a truth that has no falsehood in it. You have just said that you objected to things that cannot be true without an element of falsehood in them. You know that Hterary studies include fables and obvious falsehoods. A.—Yes. But the study of literature is not responsible for the falsehood. It demonstrates their nature. A fable is a falsehood composed for use and pleasure; while literary study is the art which guards and controls composition. By its ver>' profession it must handle all the products of human speech, whether transmitted orally or in writing. It does not originate these falsehoods, but gives us scientific knowledge about them. R.— Quite right. But I am not concerned at the moment as to whether your definition is correct. I want to know whether this is properly the function of Hterary studies or of dialectic. A.--1 do not deny that the power and skill to define and distmguish, as I did just now, belong to dialectic.