finished_summaries/gradesaver/The Consolation of Philosophy/section_0_part_0.txt
The Consolation of Philosophy.book i
book i
{"name": "Book I", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201128165942/https://www.gradesaver.com/the-consolation-of-philosophy/study-guide/summary-book-i", "summary": "Book I of The Consolation of Philosophy begins with a poem which explains why the writer has begun this work. He says \"I who once composed with eager zest/Am driven by grief to shelter in sad songs.\" This lament echoes a classical form of Greek poetry and gives us information about the poet's situation as well as an introduction to his outlook and purpose for the ensuing dialogue. The lament is a conventional form of grief poetry, and the reference to \"song\" in the second line is also traditional for beginnings . The sorrowful writer is visited by a vision of a woman standing over him. A mystical vision, she is \"full of years\" yet with undiminished color and vigor. She appears to him of varying height, sometimes of normal human dimensions and sometimes scraping the heavens. Boethius carefully notes her robe, which he says consists of an \"imperishable material\" woven by her own hands. This magical dress, however, is covered with the dust of long neglect. She bears written on her hem the Greek letter Pi, and on the top of her gown the letter Theta. Between these letters is a ladder of steps going from the bottom to the top. Another feature of the woman's dress is that it has been \"torn by the hands of marauders who had each carried off such pieces as he could get.\" She also carries some books in her right hand, and in her left hand a scepter. Before the woman arrived, Boethius tells us that standing at his bedside were the muses of Poetry, who dictated to him as he wrote poetry and wept. At the sight of the Muses the woman becomes angry. She calls the muses \"hysterical sluts,\" and tells them that they have no medicine to cure Boethius's sickness, and they will steal his Reason away and make him worse. Boethius is not an ordinary man, she says, for he has been nourished by the philosophies of \"Zeno and Plato\". She further insults them, and the Muses blush and leave. The mysterious woman, now alone with Boethius, sits down on his bed and recites a poem to him, articulating his grief, and again lamenting his fall from grace. And the woman now says that the time has come for healing rather than lamentation. She says, Are you not the man who was raised on my learning? Why do you not recognize me? Continuing in the doctoring tone, she says that Boethius' grief is nothing serious - only a bit of amnesia. At this she takes a fold of her dress and wipes the tears from Boethius's eyes. His reaction is detailed in a poem, which says that Boethius's eyes were then cleared. Boethius looks upon the woman, and realizes that she is Philosophy, his nursemaid of old. She has come to succor him, and make his imprisonment easier. She details that she, like Boethius, has undergone many trials, and in the latter years the various philosophical sects had struggled to \"seize for their own the inheritance of wisdom\" by trying to carry her off. They only got parts of her robe, and each went away thinking that they had obtained the whole of philosophy. These traces of her clothing had given these Epicureans and Stoics a reputation of wisdom among the ignorant. Again, Philosophy recites a poem, extolling the virtues of men who are not moved by the vagaries of fortune. She asks Boethius why he weeps at this, and tells him to explain to her his \"illness\" or wound so that she may heal him. Boethius then details his list of woes. He reminds her that he is in prison, rather than studying her wisdom in the library of his home. He complains that such is the lot of her followers, and that he had gone into politics because Plato had written that any state was best run by \"philosopher-kings\". He explains how his gravity and honesty made him no friends in the political arena, and incited the jealousy and hatred of powerful enemies. He had campaigned for just laws and fair taxation, and had resisted and tried to uproot corruption. He explains the various charges brought against him, but the crux of the matter is that he was accused of having desired the safety of the Senate. Because of the crooked politics of the day, and because he had prevented an informer from producing evidence of the Senate's treason, he was judged by that same body has having commited a crime. Boethius cries out to Philosophy - Was this justice? He was also accused of unchecked ambition, but he says that he had always followed her recommendation of the Pythagorean maxim \"Follow God\" in all things. He is angry and saddened that, while he was faithful to Philosophy, his reward is imprisonment and, soon, execution. Boethius then recites a longer poem, extolling God but asking why the world is ruled by fickle Fortune. Philosophy responds, saying that it is not important that he is no longer in his ornate library. Her teachings are the only things of value, and those are still inside him. She diagnoses him as \"swollen and calloused\" under the influence of disturbing emotions, and she will begin with a gentle cure, working up to stronger medicine when he has begun to heal. She then questions Boethius to discover precisely the state of his mind. She wants to know if he believes in a directed universe, or if he is convinced of the haphazard nature of fate. Boethius responds that he believes that God the Creator watches over his creation. Continuing the questioning, she discovers that he is confused about how fate and fortune do not control the final, most important destiny of man. Philosophy says that Boethius has forgotten his true nature, and that he is a spiritual being, a soul in communication with God, rather than just a rational animal existing in the material world. Boethius weeps because he is in mortal peril and his possessions and honors have been taken away from him; Philosophy reminds him he still has his most important, and, in fact, his only true possession - his soul. She stops here, however, because the patient is still too ill to take the full \"cure\" she offers. The Book ends with a poem extolling the virtue of rejecting emotions and ignoring the dictates of fortune.", "analysis": "This Book sets up of Boethius' situation and introduces the mysterious personage of Philosophy.  Some of Boethius' conventions are specifically Classical in origin, and do not necessarily make sense when read by a reader today unless some historical context is included.  It was common for philosophical discussions and arguments of any type be presented in a dialogue format.  The apocalyptic nature of this dialogue  is necessary because of the solitary imprisonment of the writer.  He is alone in his cell, and has conversations only with himself.  He must imagine a speaker, or be visited by the incarnate spirit of Philosophy, in order to carry on a conversation and thus present his \"consolation\" of philosophical principles in the Platonic dialogue form. The varying height of Philosophy is significant; it is symbolic of the various guises of philosophical study.  When she is of average height, she offers the practical advice for the down-to-earth pursuit of moral, or ethical, philosophy.  When she is piercing the heavens, she is showing her capacity for metaphysical thought, which is considered by Boethius to be speculative or contemplative philosophy.  The Pi and Theta on her gown represent the two Greek names for these types of philosophy, which begin with those letters.  The division is between the practical and the contemplative forms of philosophy, the practical including moral philosophy and ethics, the contemplative or speculative includes theology, metaphysics, and the natural sciences such as physics.  The impermeable fabric of the gown represents the permanence and objective reality of Philosophy in its true form, and the scraps torn by the factions of lesser philosophers a metaphor for Boethius' opinion of those schools of thought. At the beginning of Part V, there is a line in the poem that reads \"swifter hours of the night\".  Roman timekeeping had much in common with how it is done today, but in their system of reckoning hours, by means of a water clock, there is a significant difference.  The Romans changed the length of the nighttime hours to coincide with the shortening and lengthening of days by the seasons.  During the winter, the nights were longer, so the same number of hours were used for nighttime as during the summer, but the length of the \"hours\" were lengthened.  The reverse was true for summer, with the nighttime hours being \"swifter\" and shorter. Boethius was imprisoned on what he called \"false accusations\".  Politically, Boethius had made no friends, for he was above corruption and graft during one of the most corrupt times of the Roman Empire.  He had formerly been a high official for the emperor Theodoric, and his fall from the heights of Roman patrician power to imprisonment was almost as great as any fall for a man of his time could be.  For a man of his culture and refinement, the irony of losing everything because of his own virtue, and in an arena,  which he didn't enter willingly but rather chose out of duty, must have been acute.  Boethius says in Book I that he mourns the fact that he is no longer in his library, with its ivory decorations, reading his beloved books.  So he creates, in his prison cell, under threat of imminent execution, a fantasy of philosophical discourse with the Lady Philosophy herself.  It is an academic conceit not unique to Boethius, but is also telling of his state of mind and emotional needs.  He needs comfort - consolation - and finds it in carefully constructing in his mind a person representing his most cherished pursuit of Philosophy.  To this authority he appeals for comfort and for answers to his questions, and make an attempt to formulate a theodicy, or theory of good and evil. After reading this first book of The Consolation of Philosophy, perhaps two things strike the modern reader.  Why doesn't Boethius, a Christian, appeal to God or Jesus or the Virgin Mary for his consolation in his time of mortal peril, rather than Philosophy?  Boethius was a Christian, and people often pray to God when they are in trouble or think they are going to die.  Boethius wrote a consolation of Philosophy, not Theology, and we could assume that at least part of his motivation was coldly stylistic rather than personally applicable.  Boethius carefully imitated the Platonic dialogues, and to have the Christian God intrude into what was a pagan form would have offended his sensibilities.  It is more likely, however, that Boethius, while a Christian, may not have been particularly religious.  But even if Boethius was devout, it also bears considering that his culture was still pagan in many ways.  He may have had an overlay of Christianity, and truly believed in it, but as a Neo-Platonist and Roman his appeal to reason and philosophy was perhaps closer to his heart.  He does, however, refer to a personal God, and reminds us to pray humbly to God at the end of this book. The second oddity is the inclusion of verse in a philosophical text.  Boethius was not exactly writing a dry philosophical treatise - this is a consolation  and meant to be a balm or medicine for a troubled soul.  This book, though definitely philosophical in nature, was meant to be a sort of instructional self-help book for the late Roman Empire.  Such consolations of philosophical thoughts were written by other writers and widely read. The divorce from emotions, and the shunning of the honors and cares of the material world are main themes in The Consolation of Philosophy.  This Neo-Platonist, and what would become later medieval philosophical idea is central to Boethius's thinking, and what he found most comforting in his prison cell."}
<CHAPTER>
BOOK I. SONG I. BOETHIUS' COMPLAINT.


    Who wrought my studious numbers
      Smoothly once in happier days,
    Now perforce in tears and sadness
      Learn a mournful strain to raise.
    Lo, the Muses, grief-dishevelled,
      Guide my pen and voice my woe;
    Down their cheeks unfeigned the tear drops
      To my sad complainings flow!
    These alone in danger's hour
      Faithful found, have dared attend
    On the footsteps of the exile
      To his lonely journey's end.
    These that were the pride and pleasure
      Of my youth and high estate
    Still remain the only solace
      Of the old man's mournful fate.
    Old? Ah yes; swift, ere I knew it,
      By these sorrows on me pressed
    Age hath come; lo, Grief hath bid me
      Wear the garb that fits her best.
    O'er my head untimely sprinkled
      These white hairs my woes proclaim,
    And the skin hangs loose and shrivelled
      On this sorrow-shrunken frame.
    Blest is death that intervenes not
      In the sweet, sweet years of peace,
    But unto the broken-hearted,
      When they call him, brings release!
    Yet Death passes by the wretched,
      Shuts his ear and slumbers deep;
    Will not heed the cry of anguish,
      Will not close the eyes that weep.
    For, while yet inconstant Fortune
      Poured her gifts and all was bright,
    Death's dark hour had all but whelmed me
      In the gloom of endless night.
    Now, because misfortune's shadow
      Hath o'erclouded that false face,
    Cruel Life still halts and lingers,
      Though I loathe his weary race.
    Friends, why did ye once so lightly
      Vaunt me happy among men?
    Surely he who so hath fallen
      Was not firmly founded then.


While I was thus mutely pondering within myself, and recording my
sorrowful complainings with my pen, it seemed to me that there appeared
above my head a woman of a countenance exceeding venerable. Her eyes
were bright as fire, and of a more than human keenness; her complexion
was lively, her vigour showed no trace of enfeeblement; and yet her
years were right full, and she plainly seemed not of our age and time.
Her stature was difficult to judge. At one moment it exceeded not the
common height, at another her forehead seemed to strike the sky; and
whenever she raised her head higher, she began to pierce within the very
heavens, and to baffle the eyes of them that looked upon her. Her
garments were of an imperishable fabric, wrought with the finest threads
and of the most delicate workmanship; and these, as her own lips
afterwards assured me, she had herself woven with her own hands. The
beauty of this vesture had been somewhat tarnished by age and neglect,
and wore that dingy look which marble contracts from exposure. On the
lower-most edge was inwoven the Greek letter [Greek: P], on the topmost
the letter [Greek: Th],[A] and between the two were to be seen steps,
like a staircase, from the lower to the upper letter. This robe,
moreover, had been torn by the hands of violent persons, who had each
snatched away what he could clutch.[B] Her right hand held a note-book;
in her left she bore a staff. And when she saw the Muses of Poesie
standing by my bedside, dictating the words of my lamentations, she was
moved awhile to wrath, and her eyes flashed sternly. 'Who,' said she,
'has allowed yon play-acting wantons to approach this sick man--these
who, so far from giving medicine to heal his malady, even feed it with
sweet poison? These it is who kill the rich crop of reason with the
barren thorns of passion, who accustom men's minds to disease, instead
of setting them free. Now, were it some common man whom your allurements
were seducing, as is usually your way, I should be less indignant. On
such a one I should not have spent my pains for naught. But this is one
nurtured in the Eleatic and Academic philosophies. Nay, get ye gone, ye
sirens, whose sweetness lasteth not; leave him for my muses to tend and
heal!' At these words of upbraiding, the whole band, in deepened
sadness, with downcast eyes, and blushes that confessed their shame,
dolefully left the chamber.

But I, because my sight was dimmed with much weeping, and I could not
tell who was this woman of authority so commanding--I was dumfoundered,
and, with my gaze fastened on the earth, continued silently to await
what she might do next. Then she drew near me and sat on the edge of my
couch, and, looking into my face all heavy with grief and fixed in
sadness on the ground, she bewailed in these words the disorder of my
mind:

FOOTNOTES:

[A] [Greek: P] (P) stands for the Political life, the life of action;
[Greek: Th] (Th) for the Theoretical life, the life of thought.

[B] The Stoic, Epicurean, and other philosophical sects, which Boethius
regards as heterodox. See also below, ch. iii., p. 14.


SONG II. HIS DESPONDENCY.


    Alas! in what abyss his mind
      Is plunged, how wildly tossed!
    Still, still towards the outer night
      She sinks, her true light lost,
    As oft as, lashed tumultuously
    By earth-born blasts, care's waves rise high.

    Yet once he ranged the open heavens,
      The sun's bright pathway tracked;
    Watched how the cold moon waxed and waned;
      Nor rested, till there lacked
    To his wide ken no star that steers
    Amid the maze of circling spheres.

    The causes why the blusterous winds
      Vex ocean's tranquil face,
    Whose hand doth turn the stable globe,
      Or why his even race
    From out the ruddy east the sun
    Unto the western waves doth run:

    What is it tempers cunningly
      The placid hours of spring,
    So that it blossoms with the rose
      For earth's engarlanding:
    Who loads the year's maturer prime
    With clustered grapes in autumn time:

    All this he knew--thus ever strove
      Deep Nature's lore to guess.
    Now, reft of reason's light, he lies,
      And bonds his neck oppress;
    While by the heavy load constrained,
    His eyes to this dull earth are chained.



II.


'But the time,' said she, 'calls rather for healing than for
lamentation.' Then, with her eyes bent full upon me, 'Art thou that
man,' she cries, 'who, erstwhile fed with the milk and reared upon the
nourishment which is mine to give, had grown up to the full vigour of a
manly spirit? And yet I had bestowed such armour on thee as would have
proved an invincible defence, hadst thou not first cast it away. Dost
thou know me? Why art thou silent? Is it shame or amazement that hath
struck thee dumb? Would it were shame; but, as I see, a stupor hath
seized upon thee.' Then, when she saw me not only answering nothing, but
mute and utterly incapable of speech, she gently touched my breast with
her hand, and said: 'There is no danger; these are the symptoms of
lethargy, the usual sickness of deluded minds. For awhile he has
forgotten himself; he will easily recover his memory, if only he first
recognises me. And that he may do so, let me now wipe his eyes that are
clouded with a mist of mortal things.' Thereat, with a fold of her robe,
she dried my eyes all swimming with tears.



SONG III. THE MISTS DISPELLED.


    Then the gloom of night was scattered,
      Sight returned unto mine eyes.
    So, when haply rainy Caurus
      Rolls the storm-clouds through the skies,
    Hidden is the sun; all heaven
      Is obscured in starless night.
    But if, in wild onset sweeping,
      Boreas frees day's prisoned light,
    All suddenly the radiant god outstreams,
    And strikes our dazzled eyesight with his beams.



III.


Even so the clouds of my melancholy were broken up. I saw the clear sky,
and regained the power to recognise the face of my physician.
Accordingly, when I had lifted my eyes and fixed my gaze upon her, I
beheld my nurse, Philosophy, whose halls I had frequented from my youth
up.

'Ah! why,' I cried, 'mistress of all excellence, hast thou come down
from on high, and entered the solitude of this my exile? Is it that
thou, too, even as I, mayst be persecuted with false accusations?'

'Could I desert thee, child,' said she, 'and not lighten the burden
which thou hast taken upon thee through the hatred of my name, by
sharing this trouble? Even forgetting that it were not lawful for
Philosophy to leave companionless the way of the innocent, should I,
thinkest thou, fear to incur reproach, or shrink from it, as though
some strange new thing had befallen? Thinkest thou that now, for the
first time in an evil age, Wisdom hath been assailed by peril? Did I not
often in days of old, before my servant Plato lived, wage stern warfare
with the rashness of folly? In his lifetime, too, Socrates, his master,
won with my aid the victory of an unjust death. And when, one after the
other, the Epicurean herd, the Stoic, and the rest, each of them as far
as in them lay, went about to seize the heritage he left, and were
dragging me off protesting and resisting, as their booty, they tore in
pieces the garment which I had woven with my own hands, and, clutching
the torn pieces, went off, believing that the whole of me had passed
into their possession. And some of them, because some traces of my
vesture were seen upon them, were destroyed through the mistake of the
lewd multitude, who falsely deemed them to be my disciples. It may be
thou knowest not of the banishment of Anaxagoras, of the poison draught
of Socrates, nor of Zeno's torturing, because these things happened in
a distant country; yet mightest thou have learnt the fate of Arrius, of
Seneca, of Soranus, whose stories are neither old nor unknown to fame.
These men were brought to destruction for no other reason than that,
settled as they were in my principles, their lives were a manifest
contrast to the ways of the wicked. So there is nothing thou shouldst
wonder at, if on the seas of this life we are tossed by storm-blasts,
seeing that we have made it our chiefest aim to refuse compliance with
evil-doers. And though, maybe, the host of the wicked is many in number,
yet is it contemptible, since it is under no leadership, but is hurried
hither and thither at the blind driving of mad error. And if at times
and seasons they set in array against us, and fall on in overwhelming
strength, our leader draws off her forces into the citadel while they
are busy plundering the useless baggage. But we from our vantage ground,
safe from all this wild work, laugh to see them making prize of the most
valueless of things, protected by a bulwark which aggressive folly may
not aspire to reach.'



SONG IV. NOTHING CAN SUBDUE VIRTUE.


    Whoso calm, serene, sedate,
    Sets his foot on haughty fate;
    Firm and steadfast, come what will,
    Keeps his mien unconquered still;
    Him the rage of furious seas,
    Tossing high wild menaces,
    Nor the flames from smoky forges
    That Vesuvius disgorges,
    Nor the bolt that from the sky
    Smites the tower, can terrify.
    Why, then, shouldst thou feel affright
    At the tyrant's weakling might?
    Dread him not, nor fear no harm,
    And thou shall his rage disarm;
    But who to hope or fear gives way--
    Lost his bosom's rightful sway--
    He hath cast away his shield,
    Like a coward fled the field;
    He hath forged all unaware
    Fetters his own neck must bear!



IV.


'Dost thou understand?' she asks. Do my words sink into thy mind? Or art
thou dull "as the ass to the sound of the lyre"? Why dost thou weep? Why
do tears stream from thy eyes?

    '"Speak out, hide it not in thy heart."

If thou lookest for the physician's help, thou must needs disclose thy
wound.'

Then I, gathering together what strength I could, began: 'Is there still
need of telling? Is not the cruelty of fortune against me plain enough?
Doth not the very aspect of this place move thee? Is this the library,
the room which thou hadst chosen as thy constant resort in my home, the
place where we so often sat together and held discourse of all things in
heaven and earth? Was my garb and mien like this when I explored with
thee nature's hid secrets, and thou didst trace for me with thy wand
the courses of the stars, moulding the while my character and the whole
conduct of my life after the pattern of the celestial order? Is this the
recompense of my obedience? Yet thou hast enjoined by Plato's mouth the
maxim, "that states would be happy, either if philosophers ruled them,
or if it should so befall that their rulers would turn philosophers." By
his mouth likewise thou didst point out this imperative reason why
philosophers should enter public life, to wit, lest, if the reins of
government be left to unprincipled and profligate citizens, trouble and
destruction should come upon the good. Following these precepts, I have
tried to apply in the business of public administration the principles
which I learnt from thee in leisured seclusion. Thou art my witness and
that divinity who hath implanted thee in the hearts of the wise, that I
brought to my duties no aim but zeal for the public good. For this cause
I have become involved in bitter and irreconcilable feuds, and, as
happens inevitably, if a man holds fast to the independence of
conscience, I have had to think nothing of giving offence to the
powerful in the cause of justice. How often have I encountered and
balked Conigastus in his assaults on the fortunes of the weak? How often
have I thwarted Trigguilla, steward of the king's household, even when
his villainous schemes were as good as accomplished? How often have I
risked my position and influence to protect poor wretches from the false
charges innumerable with which they were for ever being harassed by the
greed and license of the barbarians? No one has ever drawn me aside from
justice to oppression. When ruin was overtaking the fortunes of the
provincials through the combined pressure of private rapine and public
taxation, I grieved no less than the sufferers. When at a season of
grievous scarcity a forced sale, disastrous as it was unjustifiable, was
proclaimed, and threatened to overwhelm Campania with starvation, I
embarked on a struggle with the praetorian prefect in the public
interest, I fought the case at the king's judgment-seat, and succeeded
in preventing the enforcement of the sale. I rescued the consular
Paulinus from the gaping jaws of the court bloodhounds, who in their
covetous hopes had already made short work of his wealth. To save
Albinus, who was of the same exalted rank, from the penalties of a
prejudged charge, I exposed myself to the hatred of Cyprian, the
informer.

'Thinkest thou I had laid up for myself store of enmities enough? Well,
with the rest of my countrymen, at any rate, my safety should have been
assured, since my love of justice had left me no hope of security at
court. Yet who was it brought the charges by which I have been struck
down? Why, one of my accusers is Basil, who, after being dismissed from
the king's household, was driven by his debts to lodge an information
against my name. There is Opilio, there is Gaudentius, men who for many
and various offences the king's sentence had condemned to banishment;
and when they declined to obey, and sought to save themselves by taking
sanctuary, the king, as soon as he heard of it, decreed that, if they
did not depart from the city of Ravenna within a prescribed time, they
should be branded on the forehead and expelled. What would exceed the
rigour of this severity? And yet on that same day these very men lodged
an information against me, and the information was admitted. Just
Heaven! had I deserved this by my way of life? Did it make them fit
accusers that my condemnation was a foregone conclusion? Has fortune no
shame--if not at the accusation of the innocent, at least for the
vileness of the accusers? Perhaps thou wonderest what is the sum of the
charges laid against me? I wished, they say, to save the senate. But
how? I am accused of hindering an informer from producing evidence to
prove the senate guilty of treason. Tell me, then, what is thy counsel,
O my mistress. Shall I deny the charge, lest I bring shame on thee? But
I did wish it, and I shall never cease to wish it. Shall I admit it?
Then the work of thwarting the informer will come to an end. Shall I
call the wish for the preservation of that illustrious house a crime?
Of a truth the senate, by its decrees concerning me, has made it such!
But blind folly, though it deceive itself with false names, cannot alter
the true merits of things, and, mindful of the precept of Socrates, I do
not think it right either to keep the truth concealed or allow falsehood
to pass. But this, however it may be, I leave to thy judgment and to the
verdict of the discerning. Moreover, lest the course of events and the
true facts should be hidden from posterity, I have myself committed to
writing an account of the transaction.

'What need to speak of the forged letters by which an attempt is made to
prove that I hoped for the freedom of Rome? Their falsity would have
been manifest, if I had been allowed to use the confession of the
informers themselves, evidence which has in all matters the most
convincing force. Why, what hope of freedom is left to us? Would there
were any! I should have answered with the epigram of Canius when
Caligula declared him to have been cognisant of a conspiracy against
him. "If I had known," said he, "thou shouldst never have known." Grief
hath not so blunted my perceptions in this matter that I should complain
because impious wretches contrive their villainies against the virtuous,
but at their achievement of their hopes I do exceedingly marvel. For
evil purposes are, perchance, due to the imperfection of human nature;
that it should be possible for scoundrels to carry out their worst
schemes against the innocent, while God beholdeth, is verily monstrous.
For this cause, not without reason, one of thy disciples asked, "If God
exists, whence comes evil? Yet whence comes good, if He exists not?"
However, it might well be that wretches who seek the blood of all honest
men and of the whole senate should wish to destroy me also, whom they
saw to be a bulwark of the senate and all honest men. But did I deserve
such a fate from the Fathers also? Thou rememberest, methinks--since
thou didst ever stand by my side to direct what I should do or say--thou
rememberest, I say, how at Verona, when the king, eager for the general
destruction, was bent on implicating the whole senatorial order in the
charge of treason brought against Albinus, with what indifference to my
own peril I maintained the innocence of its members, one and all. Thou
knowest that what I say is the truth, and that I have never boasted of
my good deeds in a spirit of self-praise. For whenever a man by
proclaiming his good deeds receives the recompense of fame, he
diminishes in a measure the secret reward of a good conscience. What
issues have overtaken my innocency thou seest. Instead of reaping the
rewards of true virtue, I undergo the penalties of a guilt falsely laid
to my charge--nay, more than this; never did an open confession of guilt
cause such unanimous severity among the assessors, but that some
consideration, either of the mere frailty of human nature, or of
fortune's universal instability, availed to soften the verdict of some
few. Had I been accused of a design to fire the temples, to slaughter
the priests with impious sword, of plotting the massacre of all honest
men, I should yet have been produced in court, and only punished on due
confession or conviction. Now for my too great zeal towards the senate I
have been condemned to outlawry and death, unheard and undefended, at a
distance of near five hundred miles away.[C] Oh, my judges, well do ye
deserve that no one should hereafter be convicted of a fault like mine!

'Yet even my very accusers saw how honourable was the charge they
brought against me, and, in order to overlay it with some shadow of
guilt, they falsely asserted that in the pursuit of my ambition I had
stained my conscience with sacrilegious acts. And yet thy spirit,
indwelling in me, had driven from the chamber of my soul all lust of
earthly success, and with thine eye ever upon me, there could be no
place left for sacrilege. For thou didst daily repeat in my ear and
instil into my mind the Pythagorean maxim, "Follow after God." It was
not likely, then, that I should covet the assistance of the vilest
spirits, when thou wert moulding me to such an excellence as should
conform me to the likeness of God. Again, the innocency of the inner
sanctuary of my home, the company of friends of the highest probity, a
father-in-law revered at once for his pure character and his active
beneficence, shield me from the very suspicion of sacrilege.
Yet--atrocious as it is--they even draw credence for this charge from
_thee_; I am like to be thought implicated in wickedness on this very
account, that I am imbued with _thy_ teachings and stablished in _thy_
ways. So it is not enough that my devotion to thee should profit me
nothing, but thou also must be assailed by reason of the odium which I
have incurred. Verily this is the very crown of my misfortunes, that
men's opinions for the most part look not to real merit, but to the
event; and only recognise foresight where Fortune has crowned the issue
with her approval. Whereby it comes to pass that reputation is the first
of all things to abandon the unfortunate. I remember with chagrin how
perverse is popular report, how various and discordant men's judgments.
This only will I say, that the most crushing of misfortune's burdens is,
that as soon as a charge is fastened upon the unhappy, they are believed
to have deserved their sufferings. I, for my part, who have been
banished from all life's blessings, stripped of my honours, stained in
repute, am punished for well-doing.

'And now methinks I see the villainous dens of the wicked surging with
joy and gladness, all the most recklessly unscrupulous threatening a new
crop of lying informations, the good prostrate with terror at my danger,
every ruffian incited by impunity to new daring and to success by the
profits of audacity, the guiltless not only robbed of their peace of
mind, but even of all means of defence. Wherefore I would fain cry out:

FOOTNOTES:

[C] The distance from Rome to Pavia, the place of Boethius'
imprisonment, is 455 Roman miles.



SONG V. BOETHIUS' PRAYER.


    'Builder of yon starry dome,
      Thou that whirlest, throned eternal,
    Heaven's swift globe, and, as they roam,
      Guid'st the stars by laws supernal:
        So in full-sphered splendour dight
        Cynthia dims the lamps of night,
      But unto the orb fraternal
        Closer drawn,[D] doth lose her light.

    'Who at fall of eventide,
      Hesper, his cold radiance showeth,
    Lucifer his beams doth hide,
      Paling as the sun's light groweth,
        Brief, while winter's frost holds sway,
        By thy will the space of day;
      Swift, when summer's fervour gloweth,
        Speed the hours of night away.

    'Thou dost rule the changing year:
      When rude Boreas oppresses,
    Fall the leaves; they reappear,
      Wooed by Zephyr's soft caresses.
        Fields that Sirius burns deep grown
        By Arcturus' watch were sown:
      Each the reign of law confesses,
        Keeps the place that is his own.

    'Sovereign Ruler, Lord of all!
      Can it be that Thou disdainest
    Only man? 'Gainst him, poor thrall,
      Wanton Fortune plays her vainest.
        Guilt's deserved punishment
        Falleth on the innocent;
      High uplifted, the profanest
        On the just their malice vent.

    'Virtue cowers in dark retreats,
      Crime's foul stain the righteous beareth,
    Perjury and false deceits
      Hurt not him the wrong who dareth;
        But whene'er the wicked trust
        In ill strength to work their lust,
      Kings, whom nations' awe declareth
        Mighty, grovel in the dust.

    'Look, oh look upon this earth,
      Thou who on law's sure foundation
    Framedst all! Have we no worth,
      We poor men, of all creation?
        Sore we toss on fortune's tide;
        Master, bid the waves subside!
      And earth's ways with consummation
        Of Thy heaven's order guide!'


FOOTNOTES:

[D] The moon is regarded as farthest from the sun at the full, and, as
she wanes, approaching gradually nearer.



V.


When I had poured out my griefs in this long and unbroken strain of
lamentation, she, with calm countenance, and in no wise disturbed at my
complainings, thus spake:

'When I saw thee sorrowful, in tears, I straightway knew thee wretched
and an exile. But how far distant that exile I should not know, had not
thine own speech revealed it. Yet how far indeed from thy country hast
thou, not been banished, but rather hast strayed; or, if thou wilt have
it banishment, hast banished thyself! For no one else could ever
lawfully have had this power over thee. Now, if thou wilt call to mind
from what country thou art sprung, it is not ruled, as once was the
Athenian polity, by the sovereignty of the multitude, but "one is its
Ruler, one its King," who takes delight in the number of His citizens,
not in their banishment; to submit to whose governance and to obey
whose ordinances is perfect freedom. Art thou ignorant of that most
ancient law of this thy country, whereby it is decreed that no one
whatsoever, who hath chosen to fix there his dwelling, may be sent into
exile? For truly there is no fear that one who is encompassed by its
ramparts and defences should deserve to be exiled. But he who has ceased
to wish to dwell therein, he likewise ceases to deserve to do so. And so
it is not so much the aspect of this place which moves me, as thy
aspect; not so much the library walls set off with glass and ivory which
I miss, as the chamber of thy mind, wherein I once placed, not books,
but that which gives books their value, the doctrines which my books
contain. Now, what thou hast said of thy services to the commonweal is
true, only too little compared with the greatness of thy deservings. The
things laid to thy charge whereof thou hast spoken, whether such as
redound to thy credit, or mere false accusations, are publicly known. As
for the crimes and deceits of the informers, thou hast rightly deemed
it fitting to pass them over lightly, because the popular voice hath
better and more fully pronounced upon them. Thou hast bitterly
complained of the injustice of the senate. Thou hast grieved over my
calumniation, and likewise hast lamented the damage to my good name.
Finally, thine indignation blazed forth against fortune; thou hast
complained of the unfairness with which thy merits have been
recompensed. Last of all thy frantic muse framed a prayer that the peace
which reigns in heaven might rule earth also. But since a throng of
tumultuous passions hath assailed thy soul, since thou art distraught
with anger, pain, and grief, strong remedies are not proper for thee in
this thy present mood. And so for a time I will use milder methods, that
the tumours which have grown hard through the influx of disturbing
passion may be softened by gentle treatment, till they can bear the
force of sharper remedies.'



SONG VI. ALL THINGS HAVE THEIR NEEDFUL ORDER


    He who to th' unwilling furrows
      Gives the generous grain,
    When the Crab with baleful fervours
      Scorches all the plain;
    He shall find his garner bare,
    Acorns for his scanty fare.

    Go not forth to cull sweet violets
      From the purpled steep,
    While the furious blasts of winter
      Through the valleys sweep;
    Nor the grape o'erhasty bring
    To the press in days of spring.

    For to each thing God hath given
      Its appointed time;
    No perplexing change permits He
      In His plan sublime.
    So who quits the order due
    Shall a luckless issue rue.


VI.


'First, then, wilt thou suffer me by a few questions to make some
attempt to test the state of thy mind, that I may learn in what way to
set about thy cure?'

'Ask what thou wilt,' said I, 'for I will answer whatever questions thou
choosest to put.'

Then said she: 'This world of ours--thinkest thou it is governed
haphazard and fortuitously, or believest thou that there is in it any
rational guidance?'

'Nay,' said I, 'in no wise may I deem that such fixed motions can be
determined by random hazard, but I know that God, the Creator, presideth
over His work, nor will the day ever come that shall drive me from
holding fast the truth of this belief.'

'Yes,' said she; 'thou didst even but now affirm it in song, lamenting
that men alone had no portion in the divine care. As to the rest, thou
wert unshaken in the belief that they were ruled by reason. Yet I
marvel exceedingly how, in spite of thy firm hold on this opinion, thou
art fallen into sickness. But let us probe more deeply: something or
other is missing, I think. Now, tell me, since thou doubtest not that
God governs the world, dost thou perceive by what means He rules it?'

'I scarcely understand what thou meanest,' I said, 'much less can I
answer thy question.'

'Did I not say truly that something is missing, whereby, as through a
breach in the ramparts, disease hath crept in to disturb thy mind? But,
tell me, dost thou remember the universal end towards which the aim of
all nature is directed?'

'I once heard,' said I, 'but sorrow hath dulled my recollection.'

'And yet thou knowest whence all things have proceeded.'

'Yes, that I know,' said I, 'and have answered that it is from God.'

'Yet how is it possible that thou knowest not what is the end of
existence, when thou dost understand its source and origin? However,
these disturbances of mind have force to shake a man's position, but
cannot pluck him up and root him altogether out of himself. But answer
this also, I pray thee: rememberest thou that thou art a man?'

'How should I not?' said I.

'Then, canst thou say what man is?'

'Is this thy question: Whether I know myself for a being endowed with
reason and subject to death? Surely I do acknowledge myself such.'

Then she: 'Dost know nothing else that thou art?'

'Nothing.'

'Now,' said she, 'I know another cause of thy disease, one, too, of
grave moment. Thou hast ceased to know thy own nature. So, then, I have
made full discovery both of the causes of thy sickness and the means of
restoring thy health. It is because forgetfulness of thyself hath
bewildered thy mind that thou hast bewailed thee as an exile, as one
stripped of the blessings that were his; it is because thou knowest not
the end of existence that thou deemest abominable and wicked men to be
happy and powerful; while, because thou hast forgotten by what means the
earth is governed, thou deemest that fortune's changes ebb and flow
without the restraint of a guiding hand. These are serious enough to
cause not sickness only, but even death; but, thanks be to the Author of
our health, the light of nature hath not yet left thee utterly. In thy
true judgment concerning the world's government, in that thou believest
it subject, not to the random drift of chance, but to divine reason, we
have the divine spark from which thy recovery may be hoped. Have, then,
no fear; from these weak embers the vital heat shall once more be
kindled within thee. But seeing that it is not yet time for strong
remedies, and that the mind is manifestly so constituted that when it
casts off true opinions it straightway puts on false, wherefrom arises a
cloud of confusion that disturbs its true vision, I will now try and
disperse these mists by mild and soothing application, that so the
darkness of misleading passion may be scattered, and thou mayst come to
discern the splendour of the true light.'



SONG VII. THE PERTURBATIONS OF PASSION.


    Stars shed no light
      Through the black night,
        When the clouds hide;
    And the lashed wave,
      If the winds rave
        O'er ocean's tide,--

    Though once serene
      As day's fair sheen,--
        Soon fouled and spoiled
    By the storm's spite,
      Shows to the sight
        Turbid and soiled.

    Oft the fair rill,
      Down the steep hill
        Seaward that strays,
    Some tumbled block
      Of fallen rock
        Hinders and stays.

    Then art thou fain
      Clear and most plain
        Truth to discern,
    In the right way
      Firmly to stay,
        Nor from it turn?

    Joy, hope and fear
      Suffer not near,
        Drive grief away:
    Shackled and blind
      And lost is the mind
        Where these have sway.




</CHAPTER>
BOOK II.

THE VANITY OF FORTUNE'S GIFTS


     Summary

     CH. I. Philosophy reproves Boethius for the foolishness of his
     complaints against Fortune. Her very nature is caprice.--CH. II.
     Philosophy in Fortune's name replies to Boethius' reproaches, and
     proves that the gifts of Fortune are hers to give and to take
     away.--CH. III. Boethius falls back upon his present sense of
     misery. Philosophy reminds him of the brilliancy of his former
     fortunes.--CH. IV. Boethius objects that the memory of past
     happiness is the bitterest portion of the lot of the unhappy.
     Philosophy shows that much is still left for which he may be
     thankful. None enjoy perfect satisfaction with their lot. But
     happiness depends not on anything which Fortune can give. It is to
     be sought within.--CH. V. All the gifts of Fortune are external;
     they can never truly be our own. Man cannot find his good in
     worldly possessions. Riches bring anxiety and trouble.--CH. VI.
     High place without virtue is an evil, not a good. Power is an empty
     name.--CH. VII. Fame is a thing of little account when compared
     with the immensity of the Universe and the endlessness of
     Time.--CH. VIII. One service only can Fortune do, when she reveals
     her own nature and distinguishes true friends from false.





Book I
Book I of The Consolation of Philosophy begins with a poem which explains why the writer has begun this work. He says "I who once composed with eager zest/Am driven by grief to shelter in sad songs." This lament echoes a classical form of Greek poetry and gives us information about the poet's situation as well as an introduction to his outlook and purpose for the ensuing dialogue. The lament is a conventional form of grief poetry, and the reference to "song" in the second line is also traditional for beginnings . The sorrowful writer is visited by a vision of a woman standing over him. A mystical vision, she is "full of years" yet with undiminished color and vigor. She appears to him of varying height, sometimes of normal human dimensions and sometimes scraping the heavens. Boethius carefully notes her robe, which he says consists of an "imperishable material" woven by her own hands. This magical dress, however, is covered with the dust of long neglect. She bears written on her hem the Greek letter Pi, and on the top of her gown the letter Theta. Between these letters is a ladder of steps going from the bottom to the top. Another feature of the woman's dress is that it has been "torn by the hands of marauders who had each carried off such pieces as he could get." She also carries some books in her right hand, and in her left hand a scepter. Before the woman arrived, Boethius tells us that standing at his bedside were the muses of Poetry, who dictated to him as he wrote poetry and wept. At the sight of the Muses the woman becomes angry. She calls the muses "hysterical sluts," and tells them that they have no medicine to cure Boethius's sickness, and they will steal his Reason away and make him worse. Boethius is not an ordinary man, she says, for he has been nourished by the philosophies of "Zeno and Plato". She further insults them, and the Muses blush and leave. The mysterious woman, now alone with Boethius, sits down on his bed and recites a poem to him, articulating his grief, and again lamenting his fall from grace. And the woman now says that the time has come for healing rather than lamentation. She says, Are you not the man who was raised on my learning? Why do you not recognize me? Continuing in the doctoring tone, she says that Boethius' grief is nothing serious - only a bit of amnesia. At this she takes a fold of her dress and wipes the tears from Boethius's eyes. His reaction is detailed in a poem, which says that Boethius's eyes were then cleared. Boethius looks upon the woman, and realizes that she is Philosophy, his nursemaid of old. She has come to succor him, and make his imprisonment easier. She details that she, like Boethius, has undergone many trials, and in the latter years the various philosophical sects had struggled to "seize for their own the inheritance of wisdom" by trying to carry her off. They only got parts of her robe, and each went away thinking that they had obtained the whole of philosophy. These traces of her clothing had given these Epicureans and Stoics a reputation of wisdom among the ignorant. Again, Philosophy recites a poem, extolling the virtues of men who are not moved by the vagaries of fortune. She asks Boethius why he weeps at this, and tells him to explain to her his "illness" or wound so that she may heal him. Boethius then details his list of woes. He reminds her that he is in prison, rather than studying her wisdom in the library of his home. He complains that such is the lot of her followers, and that he had gone into politics because Plato had written that any state was best run by "philosopher-kings". He explains how his gravity and honesty made him no friends in the political arena, and incited the jealousy and hatred of powerful enemies. He had campaigned for just laws and fair taxation, and had resisted and tried to uproot corruption. He explains the various charges brought against him, but the crux of the matter is that he was accused of having desired the safety of the Senate. Because of the crooked politics of the day, and because he had prevented an informer from producing evidence of the Senate's treason, he was judged by that same body has having commited a crime. Boethius cries out to Philosophy - Was this justice? He was also accused of unchecked ambition, but he says that he had always followed her recommendation of the Pythagorean maxim "Follow God" in all things. He is angry and saddened that, while he was faithful to Philosophy, his reward is imprisonment and, soon, execution. Boethius then recites a longer poem, extolling God but asking why the world is ruled by fickle Fortune. Philosophy responds, saying that it is not important that he is no longer in his ornate library. Her teachings are the only things of value, and those are still inside him. She diagnoses him as "swollen and calloused" under the influence of disturbing emotions, and she will begin with a gentle cure, working up to stronger medicine when he has begun to heal. She then questions Boethius to discover precisely the state of his mind. She wants to know if he believes in a directed universe, or if he is convinced of the haphazard nature of fate. Boethius responds that he believes that God the Creator watches over his creation. Continuing the questioning, she discovers that he is confused about how fate and fortune do not control the final, most important destiny of man. Philosophy says that Boethius has forgotten his true nature, and that he is a spiritual being, a soul in communication with God, rather than just a rational animal existing in the material world. Boethius weeps because he is in mortal peril and his possessions and honors have been taken away from him; Philosophy reminds him he still has his most important, and, in fact, his only true possession - his soul. She stops here, however, because the patient is still too ill to take the full "cure" she offers. The Book ends with a poem extolling the virtue of rejecting emotions and ignoring the dictates of fortune.
This Book sets up of Boethius' situation and introduces the mysterious personage of Philosophy.  Some of Boethius' conventions are specifically Classical in origin, and do not necessarily make sense when read by a reader today unless some historical context is included.  It was common for philosophical discussions and arguments of any type be presented in a dialogue format.  The apocalyptic nature of this dialogue  is necessary because of the solitary imprisonment of the writer.  He is alone in his cell, and has conversations only with himself.  He must imagine a speaker, or be visited by the incarnate spirit of Philosophy, in order to carry on a conversation and thus present his "consolation" of philosophical principles in the Platonic dialogue form. The varying height of Philosophy is significant; it is symbolic of the various guises of philosophical study.  When she is of average height, she offers the practical advice for the down-to-earth pursuit of moral, or ethical, philosophy.  When she is piercing the heavens, she is showing her capacity for metaphysical thought, which is considered by Boethius to be speculative or contemplative philosophy.  The Pi and Theta on her gown represent the two Greek names for these types of philosophy, which begin with those letters.  The division is between the practical and the contemplative forms of philosophy, the practical including moral philosophy and ethics, the contemplative or speculative includes theology, metaphysics, and the natural sciences such as physics.  The impermeable fabric of the gown represents the permanence and objective reality of Philosophy in its true form, and the scraps torn by the factions of lesser philosophers a metaphor for Boethius' opinion of those schools of thought. At the beginning of Part V, there is a line in the poem that reads "swifter hours of the night".  Roman timekeeping had much in common with how it is done today, but in their system of reckoning hours, by means of a water clock, there is a significant difference.  The Romans changed the length of the nighttime hours to coincide with the shortening and lengthening of days by the seasons.  During the winter, the nights were longer, so the same number of hours were used for nighttime as during the summer, but the length of the "hours" were lengthened.  The reverse was true for summer, with the nighttime hours being "swifter" and shorter. Boethius was imprisoned on what he called "false accusations".  Politically, Boethius had made no friends, for he was above corruption and graft during one of the most corrupt times of the Roman Empire.  He had formerly been a high official for the emperor Theodoric, and his fall from the heights of Roman patrician power to imprisonment was almost as great as any fall for a man of his time could be.  For a man of his culture and refinement, the irony of losing everything because of his own virtue, and in an arena,  which he didn't enter willingly but rather chose out of duty, must have been acute.  Boethius says in Book I that he mourns the fact that he is no longer in his library, with its ivory decorations, reading his beloved books.  So he creates, in his prison cell, under threat of imminent execution, a fantasy of philosophical discourse with the Lady Philosophy herself.  It is an academic conceit not unique to Boethius, but is also telling of his state of mind and emotional needs.  He needs comfort - consolation - and finds it in carefully constructing in his mind a person representing his most cherished pursuit of Philosophy.  To this authority he appeals for comfort and for answers to his questions, and make an attempt to formulate a theodicy, or theory of good and evil. After reading this first book of The Consolation of Philosophy, perhaps two things strike the modern reader.  Why doesn't Boethius, a Christian, appeal to God or Jesus or the Virgin Mary for his consolation in his time of mortal peril, rather than Philosophy?  Boethius was a Christian, and people often pray to God when they are in trouble or think they are going to die.  Boethius wrote a consolation of Philosophy, not Theology, and we could assume that at least part of his motivation was coldly stylistic rather than personally applicable.  Boethius carefully imitated the Platonic dialogues, and to have the Christian God intrude into what was a pagan form would have offended his sensibilities.  It is more likely, however, that Boethius, while a Christian, may not have been particularly religious.  But even if Boethius was devout, it also bears considering that his culture was still pagan in many ways.  He may have had an overlay of Christianity, and truly believed in it, but as a Neo-Platonist and Roman his appeal to reason and philosophy was perhaps closer to his heart.  He does, however, refer to a personal God, and reminds us to pray humbly to God at the end of this book. The second oddity is the inclusion of verse in a philosophical text.  Boethius was not exactly writing a dry philosophical treatise - this is a consolation  and meant to be a balm or medicine for a troubled soul.  This book, though definitely philosophical in nature, was meant to be a sort of instructional self-help book for the late Roman Empire.  Such consolations of philosophical thoughts were written by other writers and widely read. The divorce from emotions, and the shunning of the honors and cares of the material world are main themes in The Consolation of Philosophy.  This Neo-Platonist, and what would become later medieval philosophical idea is central to Boethius's thinking, and what he found most comforting in his prison cell.