<CHAPTER>
BOOK V. I.

She ceased, and was about to pass on in her discourse to the exposition
of other matters, when I break in and say: 'Excellent is thine
exhortation, and such as well beseemeth thy high authority; but I am
even now experiencing one of the many difficulties which, as thou saidst
but now, beset the question of providence. I want to know whether thou
deemest that there is any such thing as chance at all, and, if so, what
it is.'

Then she made answer: 'I am anxious to fulfil my promise completely, and
open to thee a way of return to thy native land. As for these matters,
though very useful to know, they are yet a little removed from the path
of our design, and I fear lest digressions should fatigue thee, and thou
shouldst find thyself unequal to completing the direct journey to our
goal.'

'Have no fear for that,' said I. 'It is rest to me to learn, where
learning brings delight so exquisite, especially when thy argument has
been built up on all sides with undoubted conviction, and no place is
left for uncertainty in what follows.'

She made answer: 'I will accede to thy request;' and forthwith she thus
began: 'If chance be defined as a result produced by random movement
without any link of causal connection, I roundly affirm that there is no
such thing as chance at all, and consider the word to be altogether
without meaning, except as a symbol of the thing designated. What place
can be left for random action, when God constraineth all things to
order? For "ex nihilo nihil" is sound doctrine which none of the
ancients gainsaid, although they used it of material substance, not of
the efficient principle; this they laid down as a kind of basis for all
their reasonings concerning nature. Now, if a thing arise without
causes, it will appear to have arisen from nothing. But if this cannot
be, neither is it possible for there to be chance in accordance with the
definition just given.'

'Well,' said I, 'is there, then, nothing which can properly be called
chance or accident, or is there something to which these names are
appropriate, though its nature is dark to the vulgar?'

'Our good Aristotle,' says she, 'has defined it concisely in his
"Physics," and closely in accordance with the truth.'

'How, pray?' said I.

'Thus,' says she: 'Whenever something is done for the sake of a
particular end, and for certain reasons some other result than that
designed ensues, this is called chance; for instance, if a man is
digging the earth for tillage, and finds a mass of buried gold. Now,
such a find is regarded as accidental; yet it is not "ex nihilo," for it
has its proper causes, the unforeseen and unexpected concurrence of
which has brought the chance about. For had not the cultivator been
digging, had not the man who hid the money buried it in that precise
spot, the gold would not have been found. These, then, are the reasons
why the find is a chance one, in that it results from causes which met
together and concurred, not from any intention on the part of the
discoverer. Since neither he who buried the gold nor he who worked in
the field _intended_ that the money should be found, but, as I said, it
_happened_ by coincidence that one dug where the other buried the
treasure. We may, then, define chance as being an unexpected result
flowing from a concurrence of causes where the several factors had some
definite end. But the meeting and concurrence of these causes arises
from that inevitable chain of order which, flowing from the
fountain-head of Providence, disposes all things in their due time and
place.'

SONG I.

CHANCE.

    In the rugged Persian highlands,
      Where the masters of the bow
    Skill to feign a flight, and, fleeing,
      Hurl their darts and pierce the foe;
    There the Tigris and Euphrates
      At one source[O] their waters blend,
    Soon to draw apart, and plainward
      Each its separate way to wend.
    When once more their waters mingle
      In a channel deep and wide,
    All the flotsam comes together
      That is borne upon the tide:
    Ships, and trunks of trees, uprooted
      In the torrent's wild career,
    Meet, as 'mid the swirling waters
      Chance their random way may steer.
    Yet the shelving of the channel
      And the flowing water's force
    Guides each movement, and determines
      Every floating fragment's course.
    Thus, where'er the drift of hazard
      Seems most unrestrained to flow,
    Chance herself is reined and bitted,
      And the curb of law doth know.

FOOTNOTES:

[O] This is not, of course, literally true, though the Tigris and
Euphrates rise in the same mountain district.

II.

'I am following needfully,' said I, 'and I agree that it is as thou
sayest. But in this series of linked causes is there any freedom left to
our will, or does the chain of fate bind also the very motions of our
souls?'

'There is freedom,' said she; 'nor, indeed, can any creature be
rational, unless he be endowed with free will. For that which hath the
natural use of reason has the faculty of discriminative judgment, and of
itself distinguishes what is to be shunned or desired. Now, everyone
seeks what he judges desirable, and avoids what he thinks should be
shunned. Wherefore, beings endowed with reason possess also the faculty
of free choice and refusal. But I suppose this faculty not equal alike
in all. The higher Divine essences possess a clear-sighted judgment, an
uncorrupt will, and an effective power of accomplishing their wishes.
Human souls must needs be comparatively free while they abide in the
contemplation of the Divine mind, less free when they pass into bodily
form, and still less, again, when they are enwrapped in earthly members.
But when they are given over to vices, and fall from the possession of
their proper reason, then indeed their condition is utter slavery. For
when they let their gaze fall from the light of highest truth to the
lower world where darkness reigns, soon ignorance blinds their vision;
they are disturbed by baneful affections, by yielding and assenting to
which they help to promote the slavery in which they are involved, and
are in a manner led captive by reason of their very liberty. Yet He who
seeth all things from eternity beholdeth these things with the eyes of
His providence, and assigneth to each what is predestined for it by its
merits:

     '"All things surveying, all things overhearing.'"

SONG II.

THE TRUE SUN.

    Homer with mellifluous tongue
    Phoebus' glorious light hath sung,
      Hymning high his praise;
      Yet _his_ feeble rays
    Ocean's hollows may not brighten,
    Nor earth's central gloom enlighten.

    But the might of Him, who skilled
    This great universe to build,
      Is not thus confined;
      Not earth's solid rind,
    Nor night's blackest canopy,
    Baffle His all-seeing eye.

    All that is, hath been, shall be,
    In one glance's compass, He
      Limitless descries;
      And, save His, no eyes
    All the world survey--no, none!
    _Him_, then, truly name the Sun.

III.

Then said I: 'But now I am once more perplexed by a problem yet more
difficult.'

'And what is that?' said she; 'yet, in truth, I can guess what it is
that troubles you.'

'It seems,' said I, 'too much of a paradox and a contradiction that God
should know all things, and yet there should be free will. For if God
foresees everything, and can in no wise be deceived, that which
providence foresees to be about to happen must necessarily come to pass.
Wherefore, if from eternity He foreknows not only what men will do, but
also their designs and purposes, there can be no freedom of the will,
seeing that nothing can be done, nor can any sort of purpose be
entertained, save such as a Divine providence, incapable of being
deceived, has perceived beforehand. For if the issues can be turned
aside to some other end than that foreseen by providence, there will not
then be any sure foreknowledge of the future, but uncertain conjecture
instead, and to think this of God I deem impiety.

'Moreover, I do not approve the reasoning by which some think to solve
this puzzle. For they say that it is not because God has foreseen the
coming of an event that _therefore_ it is sure to come to pass, but,
conversely, because something is about to come to pass, it cannot be
hidden from Divine providence; and accordingly the necessity passes to
the opposite side, and it is not that what is foreseen must necessarily
come to pass, but that what is about to come to pass must necessarily be
foreseen. But this is just as if the matter in debate were, which is
cause and which effect--whether foreknowledge of the future cause of the
necessity, or the necessity of the future of the foreknowledge. But we
need not be at the pains of demonstrating that, whatsoever be the order
of the causal sequence, the occurrence of things foreseen is necessary,
even though the foreknowledge of future events does not in itself
impose upon them the necessity of their occurrence. For example, if a
man be seated, the supposition of his being seated is necessarily true;
and, conversely, if the supposition of his being seated is true, because
he is really seated, he must necessarily be sitting. So, in either case,
there is some necessity involved--in this latter case, the necessity of
the fact; in the former, of the truth of the statement. But in both
cases the sitter is not therefore seated because the opinion is true,
but rather the opinion is true because antecedently he was sitting as a
matter of fact. Thus, though the cause of the truth of the opinion comes
from the other side,[P] yet there is a necessity on both sides alike. We
can obviously reason similarly in the case of providence and the future.
Even if future events are foreseen because they are about to happen, and
do not come to pass because they are foreseen, still, all the same,
there is a necessity, both that they should be foreseen by God as about
to come to pass, and that when they are foreseen they should happen, and
this is sufficient for the destruction of free will. However, it is
preposterous to speak of the occurrence of events in time as the cause
of eternal foreknowledge. And yet if we believe that God foresees future
events because they are about to come to pass, what is it but to think
that the occurrence of events is the cause of His supreme providence?
Further, just as when I _know_ that anything is, that thing
_necessarily_ is, so when I know that anything will be, it will
_necessarily_ be. It follows, then, that things foreknown come to pass
inevitably.

'Lastly, to think of a thing as being in any way other than what it is,
is not only not knowledge, but it is false opinion widely different from
the truth of knowledge. Consequently, if anything is about to be, and
yet its occurrence is not certain and necessary, how can anyone foreknow
that it will occur? For just as knowledge itself is free from all
admixture of falsity, so any conception drawn from knowledge cannot be
other than as it is conceived. For this, indeed, is the cause why
knowledge is free from falsehood, because of necessity each thing must
correspond exactly with the knowledge which grasps its nature. In what
way, then, are we to suppose that God foreknows these uncertainties as
about to come to pass? For if He thinks of events which possibly may not
happen at all as inevitably destined to come to pass, He is deceived;
and this it is not only impious to believe, but even so much as to
express in words. If, on the other hand, He sees them in the future as
they are in such a sense as to know that they may equally come to pass
or not, what sort of foreknowledge is this which comprehends nothing
certain nor fixed? What better is this than the absurd vaticination of
Teiresias?

      '"Whate'er I say
    Shall either come to pass--or not."

In that case, too, in what would Divine providence surpass human opinion
if it holds for uncertain things the occurrence of which is uncertain,
even as men do? But if at that perfectly sure Fountain-head of all
things no shadow of uncertainty can possibly be found, then the
occurrence of those things which He has surely foreknown as coming is
certain. Wherefore there can be no freedom in human actions and designs;
but the Divine mind, which foresees all things without possibility of
mistake, ties and binds them down to one only issue. But this admission
once made, what an upset of human affairs manifestly ensues! Vainly are
rewards and punishments proposed for the good and bad, since no free and
voluntary motion of the will has deserved either one or the other; nay,
the punishment of the wicked and the reward of the righteous, which is
now esteemed the perfection of justice, will seem the most flagrant
injustice, since men are determined either way not by their own proper
volition, but by the necessity of what must surely be. And therefore
neither virtue nor vice is anything, but rather good and ill desert are
confounded together without distinction. Moreover, seeing that the whole
course of events is deduced from providence, and nothing is left free to
human design, it comes to pass that our vices also are referred to the
Author of all good--a thought than which none more abominable can
possibly be conceived. Again, no ground is left for hope or prayer,
since how can we hope for blessings, or pray for mercy, when every
object of desire depends upon the links of an unalterable chain of
causation? Gone, then, is the one means of intercourse between God and
man--the communion of hope and prayer--if it be true that we ever earn
the inestimable recompense of the Divine favour at the price of a due
humility; for this is the one way whereby men seem able to hold
communion with God, and are joined to that unapproachable light by the
very act of supplication, even before they obtain their petitions. Then,
since these things can scarcely be believed to have any efficacy, if the
necessity of future events be admitted, what means will there be whereby
we may be brought near and cleave to Him who is the supreme Head of all?
Wherefore it needs must be that the human race, even as thou didst
erstwhile declare in song, parted and dissevered from its Source, should
fall to ruin.'

FOOTNOTES:

[P] _I.e._, the necessity of the truth of the statement from the fact.

SONG III. TRUTH'S PARADOXES.

    Why does a strange discordance break
      The ordered scheme's fair harmony?
    Hath God decreed 'twixt truth and truth
      There may such lasting warfare be,
    That truths, each severally plain,
    We strive to reconcile in vain?

    Or is the discord not in truth,
      Since truth is self consistent ever?
    But, close in fleshly wrappings held,
      The blinded mind of man can never
    Discern--so faint her taper shines--
    The subtle chain that all combines?

    Ah! then why burns man's restless mind
      Truth's hidden portals to unclose?
    Knows he already what he seeks?
      Why toil to seek it, if he knows?
    Yet, haply if he knoweth not,
    Why blindly seek he knows not what?[Q]

    Who for a good he knows not sighs?
      Who can an unknown end pursue?
    How find? How e'en when haply found
      Hail that strange form he never knew?
    Or is it that man's inmost soul
    Once knew each part and knew the whole?

    Now, though by fleshly vapours dimmed,
      Not all forgot her visions past;
    For while the several parts are lost,
      To the one whole she cleaveth fast;
    Whence he who yearns the truth to find
    Is neither sound of sight nor blind.

    For neither does he know in full,
      Nor is he reft of knowledge quite;
    But, holding still to what is left,
      He gropes in the uncertain light,
    And by the part that still survives
    To win back all he bravely strives.

FOOTNOTES:

[Q] Compare Plato, 'Meno,' 80; Jowett, vol. ii., pp. 39, 40.

IV.

Then said she: 'This debate about providence is an old one, and is
vigorously discussed by Cicero in his "Divination"; thou also hast long
and earnestly pondered the problem, yet no one has had diligence and
perseverance enough to find a solution. And the reason of this obscurity
is that the movement of human reasoning cannot cope with the simplicity
of the Divine foreknowledge; for if a conception of its nature could in
any wise be framed, no shadow of uncertainty would remain. With a view
of making this at last clear and plain, I will begin by considering the
arguments by which thou art swayed. First, I inquire into the reasons
why thou art dissatisfied with the solution proposed, which is to the
effect that, seeing the fact of foreknowledge is not thought the cause
of the necessity of future events, foreknowledge is not to be deemed any
hindrance to the freedom of the will. Now, surely the sole ground on
which thou arguest the necessity of the future is that things which are
foreknown cannot fail to come to pass. But if, as thou wert ready to
acknowledge just now, the fact of foreknowledge imposes no necessity on
things future, what reason is there for supposing the results of
voluntary action constrained to a fixed issue? Suppose, for the sake of
argument, and to see what follows, we assume that there is no
foreknowledge. Are willed actions, then, tied down to any necessity in
_this_ case?'

'Certainly not.'

'Let us assume foreknowledge again, but without its involving any actual
necessity; the freedom of the will, I imagine, will remain in complete
integrity. But thou wilt say that, even although the foreknowledge is
not the necessity of the future event's occurrence, yet it is a sign
that it will necessarily happen. Granted; but in this case it is plain
that, even if there had been no foreknowledge, the issues would have
been inevitably certain. For a sign only indicates something which is,
does not bring to pass that of which it is the sign. We require to show
beforehand that all things, without exception, happen of necessity in
order that a preconception may be a sign of this necessity. Otherwise,
if there is no such universal necessity, neither can any preconception
be a sign of a necessity which exists not. Manifestly, too, a proof
established on firm grounds of reason must be drawn not from signs and
loose general arguments, but from suitable and necessary causes. But how
can it be that things foreseen should ever fail to come to pass? Why,
this is to suppose us to believe that the events which providence
foresees to be coming were not about to happen, instead of our supposing
that, although they should come to pass, yet there was no necessity
involved in their own nature compelling their occurrence. Take an
illustration that will help to convey my meaning. There are many things
which we see taking place before our eyes--the movements of charioteers,
for instance, in guiding and turning their cars, and so on. Now, is any
one of these movements compelled by any necessity?'

'No; certainly not. There would be no efficacy in skill if all motions
took place perforce.'

'Then, things which in taking place are free from any necessity as to
their being in the present must also, before they take place, be about
to happen without necessity. Wherefore there are things which will come
to pass, the occurrence of which is perfectly free from necessity. At
all events, I imagine that no one will deny that things now taking place
were about to come to pass before they were actually happening. Such
things, however much foreknown, are in their occurrence _free_. For even
as knowledge of things present imports no necessity into things that are
taking place, so foreknowledge of the future imports none into things
that are about to come. But this, thou wilt say, is the very point in
dispute--whether any foreknowing is possible of things whose occurrence
is not necessary. For here there seems to thee a contradiction, and, if
they are foreseen, their necessity follows; whereas if there is no
necessity, they can by no means be foreknown; and thou thinkest that
nothing can be grasped as known unless it is certain, but if things
whose occurrence is uncertain are foreknown as certain, this is the very
mist of opinion, not the truth of knowledge. For to think of things
otherwise than as they are, thou believest to be incompatible with the
soundness of knowledge.

'Now, the cause of the mistake is this--that men think that all
knowledge is cognized purely by the nature and efficacy of the thing
known. Whereas the case is the very reverse: all that is known is
grasped not conformably to its own efficacy, but rather conformably to
the faculty of the knower. An example will make this clear: the
roundness of a body is recognised in one way by sight, in another by
touch. Sight looks upon it from a distance as a whole by a simultaneous
reflection of rays; touch grasps the roundness piecemeal, by contact and
attachment to the surface, and by actual movement round the periphery
itself. Man himself, likewise, is viewed in one way by Sense, in another
by Imagination, in another way, again, by Thought, in another by pure
Intelligence. Sense judges figure clothed in material substance,
Imagination figure alone without matter. Thought transcends this again,
and by its contemplation of universals considers the type itself which
is contained in the individual. The eye of Intelligence is yet more
exalted; for overpassing the sphere of the universal, it will behold
absolute form itself by the pure force of the mind's vision. Wherein the
main point to be considered is this: the higher faculty of comprehension
embraces the lower, while the lower cannot rise to the higher. For Sense
has no efficacy beyond matter, nor can Imagination behold universal
ideas, nor Thought embrace pure form; but Intelligence, looking down, as
it were, from its higher standpoint in its intuition of form,
discriminates also the several elements which underlie it; but it
comprehends them in the same way as it comprehends that form itself,
which could be cognized by no other than itself. For it cognizes the
universal of Thought, the figure of Imagination, and the matter of
Sense, without employing Thought, Imagination, or Sense, but surveying
all things, so to speak, under the aspect of pure form by a single flash
of intuition. Thought also, in considering the universal, embraces
images and sense-impressions without resorting to Imagination or Sense.
For it is Thought which has thus defined the universal from its
conceptual point of view: "Man is a two-legged animal endowed with
reason." This is indeed a universal notion, yet no one is ignorant that
the _thing_ is imaginable and presentable to Sense, because Thought
considers it not by Imagination or Sense, but by means of rational
conception. Imagination, too, though its faculty of viewing and forming
representations is founded upon the senses, nevertheless surveys
sense-impressions without calling in Sense, not in the way of
Sense-perception, but of Imagination. See'st thou, then, how all things
in cognizing use rather their own faculty than the faculty of the things
which they cognize? Nor is this strange; for since every judgment is the
act of the judge, it is necessary that each should accomplish its task
by its own, not by another's power.'

SONG IV. A PSYCHOLOGICAL FALLACY.

[R]

    From the Porch's murky depths
      Comes a doctrine sage,
    That doth liken living mind
      To a written page;
    Since all knowledge comes through
      Sense,
    Graven by Experience.

    'As,' say they, 'the pen its marks
      Curiously doth trace
    On the smooth unsullied white
      Of the paper's face,
    So do outer things impress
    Images on consciousness.'

    But if verily the mind
      Thus all passive lies;
    If no living power within
      Its own force supplies;
    If it but reflect again,
    Like a glass, things false and vain--

    Whence the wondrous faculty
      That perceives and knows,
    That in one fair ordered scheme
      Doth the world dispose;
    Grasps each whole that Sense presents,
    Or breaks into elements?

    So divides and recombines,
      And in changeful wise
    Now to low descends, and now
      To the height doth rise;
    Last in inward swift review
    Strictly sifts the false and true?

    Of these ample potencies
      Fitter cause, I ween,
    Were Mind's self than marks impressed
      By the outer scene.
    Yet the body through the sense
    Stirs the soul's intelligence.

    When light flashes on the eye,
      Or sound strikes the ear,
    Mind aroused to due response
      Makes the message clear;
    And the dumb external signs
    With the hidden forms combines.

FOOTNOTES:

[R] A criticism of the doctrine of the mind as a blank sheet of paper on
which experience writes, as held by the Stoics in anticipation of Locke.
See Zeller, 'Stoics, Epicureans, and Sceptics,' Reichel's translation,
p. 76.

V.

'Now, although in the case of bodies endowed with sentiency the
qualities of external objects affect the sense-organs, and the activity
of mind is preceded by a bodily affection which calls forth the mind's
action upon itself, and stimulates the forms till that moment lying
inactive within, yet, I say, if in these bodies endowed with sentiency
the mind is not inscribed by mere passive affection, but of its own
efficacy discriminates the impressions furnished to the body, how much
more do intelligences free from all bodily affections employ in their
discrimination their own mental activities instead of conforming to
external objects? So on these principles various modes of cognition
belong to distinct and different substances. For to creatures void of
motive power--shell-fish and other such creatures which cling to rocks
and grow there--belongs Sense alone, void of all other modes of gaining
knowledge; to beasts endowed with movement, in whom some capacity of
seeking and shunning seems to have arisen, Imagination also. Thought
pertains only to the human race, as Intelligence to Divinity alone;
hence it follows that that form of knowledge exceeds the rest which of
its own nature cognizes not only its proper object, but the objects of
the other forms of knowledge also. But what if Sense and Imagination
were to gainsay Thought, and declare that universal which Thought deems
itself to behold to be nothing? For the object of Sense and Imagination
cannot be universal; so that either the judgment of Reason is true and
there is no sense-object, or, since they know full well that many
objects are presented to Sense and Imagination, the conception of
Reason, which looks on that which is perceived by Sense and particular
as if it were a something "universal," is empty of content. Suppose,
further, that Reason maintains in reply that it does indeed contemplate
the object of both Sense and Imagination under the form of
universality, while Sense and Imagination cannot aspire to the
knowledge of the universal, since their cognizance cannot go beyond
bodily figures, and that in the cognition of reality we ought rather to
trust the stronger and more perfect faculty of judgment. In a dispute of
this sort, should not we, in whom is planted the faculty of reasoning as
well as of imagining and perceiving, espouse the cause of Reason?

'In like manner is it that human reason thinks that Divine Intelligence
cannot see the future except after the fashion in which its own
knowledge is obtained. For thy contention is, if events do not appear to
involve certain and necessary issues, they cannot be foreseen as
certainly about to come to pass. There is, then, no foreknowledge of
such events; or, if we can ever bring ourselves to believe that there
is, there can be nothing which does not happen of necessity. If,
however, we could have some part in the judgment of the Divine mind,
even as we participate in Reason, we should think it perfectly just that
human Reason should submit itself to the Divine mind, no less than we
judged that Imagination and Sense ought to yield to Reason. Wherefore
let us soar, if we can, to the heights of that Supreme Intelligence; for
there Reason will see what in itself it cannot look upon; and that is in
what way things whose occurrence is not certain may yet be seen in a
sure and definite foreknowledge; and that this foreknowledge is not
conjecture, but rather knowledge in its supreme simplicity, free of all
limits and restrictions.'

SONG V. THE UPWARD LOOK.

    In what divers shapes and fashions do the creatures great and small
    Over wide earth's teeming surface skim, or scud, or walk, or crawl!
    Some with elongated body sweep the ground, and, as they move,
    Trail perforce with writhing belly in the dust a sinuous groove;
    Some, on light wing upward soaring, swiftly do the winds divide,
    And through heaven's ample spaces in free motion smoothly glide;
    These earth's solid surface pressing, with firm paces onward rove,
    Ranging through the verdant meadows, crouching in the woodland grove.
    Great and wondrous is their variance! Yet in all the head low-bent
    Dulls the soul and blunts the senses, though their forms be different.
    Man alone, erect, aspiring, lifts his forehead to the skies,
    And in upright posture steadfast seems earth's baseness to despise.
    If with earth not all besotted, to this parable give ear,
    Thou whose gaze is fixed on heaven, who thy face on high dost rear:
    Lift thy soul, too, heavenward; haply lest it stain its heavenly worth,
    And thine eyes alone look upward, while thy mind cleaves to the earth!

VI.

'Since, then, as we lately proved, everything that is known is cognized
not in accordance with its own nature, but in accordance with the nature
of the faculty that comprehends it, let us now contemplate, as far as
lawful, the character of the Divine essence, that we may be able to
understand also the nature of its knowledge.

'God is eternal; in this judgment all rational beings agree. Let us,
then, consider what eternity is. For this word carries with it a
revelation alike of the Divine nature and of the Divine knowledge. Now,
eternity is the possession of endless life whole and perfect at a single
moment. What this is becomes more clear and manifest from a comparison
with things temporal. For whatever lives in time is a present proceeding
from the past to the future, and there is nothing set in time which can
embrace the whole space of its life together. To-morrow's state it
grasps not yet, while it has already lost yesterday's; nay, even in the
life of to-day ye live no longer than one brief transitory moment.
Whatever, therefore, is subject to the condition of time, although, as
Aristotle deemed of the world, it never have either beginning or end,
and its life be stretched to the whole extent of time's infinity, it yet
is not such as rightly to be thought eternal. For it does not include
and embrace the whole space of infinite life at once, but has no present
hold on things to come, not yet accomplished. Accordingly, that which
includes and possesses the whole fulness of unending life at once, from
which nothing future is absent, from which nothing past has escaped,
this is rightly called eternal; this must of necessity be ever present
to itself in full self-possession, and hold the infinity of movable time
in an abiding present. Wherefore they deem not rightly who imagine that
on Plato's principles the created world is made co-eternal with the
Creator, because they are told that he believed the world to have had
no beginning in time,[S] and to be destined never to come to an end. For
it is one thing for existence to be endlessly prolonged, which was what
Plato ascribed to the world, another for the whole of an endless life to
be embraced in the present, which is manifestly a property peculiar to
the Divine mind. Nor need God appear earlier in mere duration of time to
created things, but only prior in the unique simplicity of His nature.
For the infinite progression of things in time copies this immediate
existence in the present of the changeless life, and when it cannot
succeed in equalling it, declines from movelessness into motion, and
falls away from the simplicity of a perpetual present to the infinite
duration of the future and the past; and since it cannot possess the
whole fulness of its life together, for the very reason that in a manner
it never ceases to be, it seems, up to a certain point, to rival that
which it cannot complete and express by attaching itself indifferently
to any present moment of time, however swift and brief; and since this
bears some resemblance to that ever-abiding present, it bestows on
everything to which it is assigned the semblance of existence. But since
it cannot abide, it hurries along the infinite path of time, and the
result has been that it continues by ceaseless movement the life the
completeness of which it could not embrace while it stood still. So, if
we are minded to give things their right names, we shall follow Plato in
saying that God indeed is eternal, but the world everlasting.

'Since, then, every mode of judgment comprehends its objects conformably
to its own nature, and since God abides for ever in an eternal present,
His knowledge, also transcending all movement of time, dwells in the
simplicity of its own changeless present, and, embracing the whole
infinite sweep of the past and of the future, contemplates all that
falls within its simple cognition as if it were now taking place. And
therefore, if thou wilt carefully consider that immediate presentment
whereby it discriminates all things, thou wilt more rightly deem it not
foreknowledge as of something future, but knowledge of a moment that
never passes. For this cause the name chosen to describe it is not
prevision, but providence, because, since utterly removed in nature from
things mean and trivial, its outlook embraces all things as from some
lofty height. Why, then, dost thou insist that the things which are
surveyed by the Divine eye are involved in necessity, whereas clearly
men impose no necessity on things which they see? Does the act of vision
add any necessity to the things which thou seest before thy eyes?'

'Assuredly not.'

'And yet, if we may without unfitness compare God's present and man's,
just as ye see certain things in this your temporary present, so does He
see all things in His eternal present. Wherefore this Divine
anticipation changes not the natures and properties of things, and it
beholds things present before it, just as they will hereafter come to
pass in time. Nor does it confound things in its judgment, but in the
one mental view distinguishes alike what will come necessarily and what
without necessity. For even as ye, when at one and the same time ye see
a man walking on the earth and the sun rising in the sky, distinguish
between the two, though one glance embraces both, and judge the former
voluntary, the latter necessary action: so also the Divine vision in its
universal range of view does in no wise confuse the characters of the
things which are present to its regard, though future in respect of
time. Whence it follows that when it perceives that something will come
into existence, and yet is perfectly aware that this is unbound by any
necessity, its apprehension is not opinion, but rather knowledge based
on truth. And if to this thou sayest that what God sees to be about to
come to pass cannot fail to come to pass, and that what cannot fail to
come to pass happens of necessity, and wilt tie me down to this word
necessity, I will acknowledge that thou affirmest a most solid truth,
but one which scarcely anyone can approach to who has not made the
Divine his special study. For my answer would be that the same future
event is necessary from the standpoint of Divine knowledge, but when
considered in its own nature it seems absolutely free and unfettered.
So, then, there are two necessities--one simple, as that men are
necessarily mortal; the other conditioned, as that, if you know that
someone is walking, he must necessarily be walking. For that which is
known cannot indeed be otherwise than as it is known to be, and yet this
fact by no means carries with it that other simple necessity. For the
former necessity is not imposed by the thing's own proper nature, but by
the addition of a condition. No necessity compels one who is voluntarily
walking to go forward, although it is necessary for him to go forward at
the moment of walking. In the same way, then, if Providence sees
anything as present, that must necessarily be, though it is bound by no
necessity of nature. Now, God views as present those coming events which
happen of free will. These, accordingly, from the standpoint of the
Divine vision are made necessary conditionally on the Divine
cognizance; viewed, however, in themselves, they desist not from the
absolute freedom naturally theirs. Accordingly, without doubt, all
things will come to pass which God foreknows as about to happen, but of
these certain proceed of free will; and though these happen, yet by the
fact of their existence they do not lose their proper nature, in virtue
of which before they happened it was really possible that they might not
have come to pass.

'What difference, then, does the denial of necessity make, since,
through their being conditioned by Divine knowledge, they come to pass
as if they were in all respects under the compulsion of necessity? This
difference, surely, which we saw in the case of the instances I formerly
took, the sun's rising and the man's walking; which at the moment of
their occurrence could not but be taking place, and yet one of them
before it took place was necessarily obliged to be, while the other was
not so at all. So likewise the things which to God are present without
doubt exist, but some of them come from the necessity of things, others
from the power of the agent. Quite rightly, then, have we said that
these things are necessary if viewed from the standpoint of the Divine
knowledge; but if they are considered in themselves, they are free from
the bonds of necessity, even as everything which is accessible to sense,
regarded from the standpoint of Thought, is universal, but viewed in its
own nature particular. "But," thou wilt say, "if it is in my power to
change my purpose, I shall make void providence, since I shall perchance
change something which comes within its foreknowledge." My answer is:
Thou canst indeed turn aside thy purpose; but since the truth of
providence is ever at hand to see that thou canst, and whether thou
dost, and whither thou turnest thyself, thou canst not avoid the Divine
foreknowledge, even as thou canst not escape the sight of a present
spectator, although of thy free will thou turn thyself to various
actions. Wilt thou, then, say: "Shall the Divine knowledge be changed at
my discretion, so that, when I will this or that, providence changes its
knowledge correspondingly?"

'Surely not.'

'True, for the Divine vision anticipates all that is coming, and
transforms and reduces it to the form of its own present knowledge, and
varies not, as thou deemest, in its foreknowledge, alternating to this
or that, but in a single flash it forestalls and includes thy mutations
without altering. And this ever-present comprehension and survey of all
things God has received, not from the issue of future events, but from
the simplicity of His own nature. Hereby also is resolved the objection
which a little while ago gave thee offence--that our doings in the
future were spoken of as if supplying the cause of God's knowledge. For
this faculty of knowledge, embracing all things in its immediate
cognizance, has itself fixed the bounds of all things, yet itself owes
nothing to what comes after.

'And all this being so, the freedom of man's will stands unshaken, and
laws are not unrighteous, since their rewards and punishments are held
forth to wills unbound by any necessity. God, who foreknoweth all
things, still looks down from above, and the ever-present eternity of
His vision concurs with the future character of all our acts, and
dispenseth to the good rewards, to the bad punishments. Our hopes and
prayers also are not fixed on God in vain, and when they are rightly
directed cannot fail of effect. Therefore, withstand vice, practise
virtue, lift up your souls to right hopes, offer humble prayers to
Heaven. Great is the necessity of righteousness laid upon you if ye will
not hide it from yourselves, seeing that all your actions are done
before the eyes of a Judge who seeth all things.'

FOOTNOTES:

[S] Plato expressly states the opposite in the 'Timaeus' (28B), though
possibly there the account of the beginning of the world in time is to
be understood figuratively, not literally. See Jowett, vol. iii., pp.
448, 449 (3rd edit.).

</CHAPTER>

Commentary on Parts I and II       Providence is the all-knowing vision of God in eternity, who sees past, present, and future at once. Humans have free will, and God, watching the choice from on high, is ready with the "predestined" reward or punishment. The person's fate is not actually predetermined by God but given by God as a natural consequence of the person's free will. Philosophy says there is no chance or accident. Whether or not we can see all the causes, everything works out in an orderly and just fashion. Summary of Parts III and IV       Boethius is puzzled how there can be freedom of will if God already knows what we will do. If it is known, isn't it already decided then? It would not then be possible to change one's mind. Philosophy says that if something is to happen, it cannot be concealed from Providence. People wonder if foreknowledge of the future causes the future? How can God foreknow events that are still uncertain and being decided by an individual? If Providence is the same as certainty about the future, how meaningful is prayer, hope, and the relationship between God and human? Philosophy says this is an old debate, but human reasoning cannot understand "the immediacy of divine foreknowledge" . Free will is not hindered by God's foreknowledge, which is merely knowledge of what is about to happen. One can know something is going on without having any influence on it. It does not make what is happening inevitable. Seeing something and necessity are not the same thing. Different creatures have different abilities to know. Sense perception is the lowest faculty, common with animals. They only know things through their bodily senses. Imagination is a higher power because it does not depend on physical objects. Reason is higher still because it can understand the universal law by inference. The highest form of knowing is pure intelligence itself, and this intelligence sees the Idea or "simple form" in the mind of God . This highest knowing, only available to God, sees "by a single glance of the mind" . The lower kind of knowing cannot grasp the higher knowing. Commentary on Parts III and IV       Philosophy gives a very important answer to Boethius's question about free will and Providence. It is a hotly debated question in philosophy about how God can know the future if humans have free will. What if they have not decided yet? There are those who believe that predestination is what is really going on, and humans only think they have free will. If God already knows, for instance, which souls will be saved, why should humans even bother trying to be good? It has been predetermined, like loaded dice. Philosophy tells Boethius it may seem like a paradox, but God's foreknowledge of how things will turn out does not interfere with human free will. She gives the answer that there are different forms of knowledge, and someone who has a lower ability cannot comprehend a higher ability. Animals, for instance, have sense perception, or knowing by the senses. Humans can go farther by imagining things that are not present. They can also use the mind to reason about the invisible laws of nature from inference. But an even higher knowledge like God's comes from pure intelligence, which knows everything at once without regard to time. Humans know in sequence, one thing at a time, in terms of past, present, and future, but God can know immediately what is going on everywhere. That does not mean God is interfering with us. Philosophy recites a poem about knowledge, explaining the passive model of the mind taught by the Stoics. Stoicism was a material philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium . Stoics thought the mind merely received sense impressions as on a wax tablet. As a Platonist, Boethius denied this model of knowledge. For him, the mind is spiritual and powerfully active, able to analyze and synthesize and know the truth beyond sense impression. Humans may not know like God knows, but they can participate with God in the divine nature of life through reason. Summary of Parts V and VI       Philosophy continues the topic of different kinds of knowing. Reason belongs only to the human race, just as pure intelligence belongs to divinity. Divine intelligence comprehends the lower kinds of knowing, yet human reason refuses to believe that divine intelligence can see the future in a "boundless immediacy" . Eternity is the "complete, simultaneous and perfect possession of everlasting life"  while those who live in time experience past, present, and future. Humans catch a fleeting and transitory glimpse of life only. To experience the whole of life in the present moment is characteristic of the mind of God. His knowledge transcends change. Commentary on Parts V and VI       The book finishes with this discussion of God's foreknowledge. Philosophy ends her teaching to Boethius in prison with this point in order to give him faith in Providence. Are his suffering and imprisonment simply due to chance or evil? Or can he have faith that God has foreseen all and that even the death of Boethius will be part of the good, of God's providential foresight? God sees what is happening in a never-ending present moment. The divine gaze "looks down on all things without disturbing their nature" . If God is on high witnessing this fate for Boethius, then it is necessary for it to happen, though God is not causing it to happen. God is the "spectator from on high of all things" . Therefore, Philosophy concludes, "Avoid vice . . . cultivate virtue; lift up your mind to the right kind of hope, and put forth humble prayers on high" . She has comforted Boethius with the idea that God is near and part of our human nature. We are always free to be with God and part of the good, no matter what fate we are handed in the world by Fortune. Book V of Parts I and II Boethius tells Philosophy he wants her to go more deeply into the topic of chance. Is there such a thing as random chance ruling our lives? Perhaps that is how he ended up in prison. Philosophy says if you define chance as randomness, there is no such thing. If God is maintaining order, there cannot be something random happening someplace, for "nothing comes out of nothing" . Boethius replies, how about accidents? Philosophy mentions that Aristotle's definition of chance in his Physics is, something done with one purpose, but getting a different result than was intended. Yet, it is not chance, for there are hidden causes. It may be that multiple and conflicting causes are at work, outside of the intention of the doers. If you define chance as an unpredicted or unexpected event, then perhaps you can say yes, though the events are still under the rule of law. Boethius asks if there is such a thing as free will? Philosophy replies that there is freedom for rational creatures. Humans are rational and cannot exist without it. A rational creature must choose, though freedom may not be equal for all, depending on one's clarity. Humans are more free when they participate in the contemplation of God, and less free when they act out of bodily desires. If they are wicked, they are mere slaves to their own destructive will. These choices are all visible to the eye of Providence, which predestines award or punishment according to merit. Commentary on Parts I and II Commentary on Parts I and II Providence is the all-knowing vision of God in eternity, who sees past, present, and future at once. Humans have free will, and God, watching the choice from on high, is ready with the "predestined" reward or punishment. The person's fate is not actually predetermined by God but given by God as a natural consequence of the person's free will. Philosophy says there is no chance or accident. Whether or not we can see all the causes, everything works out in an orderly and just fashion. of Parts III and IV Boethius is puzzled how there can be freedom of will if God already knows what we will do. If it is known, isn't it already decided then? It would not then be possible to change one's mind. Philosophy says that if something is to happen, it cannot be concealed from Providence. People wonder if foreknowledge of the future causes the future? How can God foreknow events that are still uncertain and being decided by an individual? If Providence is the same as certainty about the future, how meaningful is prayer, hope, and the relationship between God and human? Philosophy says this is an old debate, but human reasoning cannot understand "the immediacy of divine foreknowledge" . Free will is not hindered by God's foreknowledge, which is merely knowledge of what is about to happen. One can know something is going on without having any influence on it. It does not make what is happening inevitable. Seeing something and necessity are not the same thing. Different creatures have different abilities to know. Sense perception is the lowest faculty, common with animals. They only know things through their bodily senses. Imagination is a higher power because it does not depend on physical objects. Reason is higher still because it can understand the universal law by inference. The highest form of knowing is pure intelligence itself, and this intelligence sees the Idea or "simple form" in the mind of God . This highest knowing, only available to God, sees "by a single glance of the mind" . The lower kind of knowing cannot grasp the higher knowing. Commentary on Parts III and IV Commentary on Parts III and IV Philosophy gives a very important answer to Boethius's question about free will and Providence. It is a hotly debated question in philosophy about how God can know the future if humans have free will. What if they have not decided yet? There are those who believe that predestination is what is really going on, and humans only think they have free will. If God already knows, for instance, which souls will be saved, why should humans even bother trying to be good? It has been predetermined, like loaded dice. Philosophy tells Boethius it may seem like a paradox, but God's foreknowledge of how things will turn out does not interfere with human free will. She gives the answer that there are different forms of knowledge, and someone who has a lower ability cannot comprehend a higher ability. Animals, for instance, have sense perception, or knowing by the senses. Humans can go farther by imagining things that are not present. They can also use the mind to reason about the invisible laws of nature from inference. But an even higher knowledge like God's comes from pure intelligence, which knows everything at once without regard to time. Humans know in sequence, one thing at a time, in terms of past, present, and future, but God can know immediately what is going on everywhere. That does not mean God is interfering with us. Philosophy recites a poem about knowledge, explaining the passive model of the mind taught by the Stoics. Stoicism was a material philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium . Stoics thought the mind merely received sense impressions as on a wax tablet. As a Platonist, Boethius denied this model of knowledge. For him, the mind is spiritual and powerfully active, able to analyze and synthesize and know the truth beyond sense impression. Humans may not know like God knows, but they can participate with God in the divine nature of life through reason. of Parts V and VI Philosophy continues the topic of different kinds of knowing. Reason belongs only to the human race, just as pure intelligence belongs to divinity. Divine intelligence comprehends the lower kinds of knowing, yet human reason refuses to believe that divine intelligence can see the future in a "boundless immediacy" . Eternity is the "complete, simultaneous and perfect possession of everlasting life" while those who live in time experience past, present, and future. Humans catch a fleeting and transitory glimpse of life only. To experience the whole of life in the present moment is characteristic of the mind of God. His knowledge transcends change. Commentary on Parts V and VI Commentary on Parts V and VI The book finishes with this discussion of God's foreknowledge. Philosophy ends her teaching to Boethius in prison with this point in order to give him faith in Providence. Are his suffering and imprisonment simply due to chance or evil? Or can he have faith that God has foreseen all and that even the death of Boethius will be part of the good, of God's providential foresight? God sees what is happening in a never-ending present moment. The divine gaze "looks down on all things without disturbing their nature" . If God is on high witnessing this fate for Boethius, then it is necessary for it to happen, though God is not causing it to happen. God is the "spectator from on high of all things" . Therefore, Philosophy concludes, "Avoid vice . . . cultivate virtue; lift up your mind to the right kind of hope, and put forth humble prayers on high" . She has comforted Boethius with the idea that God is near and part of our human nature. We are always free to be with God and part of the good, no matter what fate we are handed in the world by Fortune. Novel Author Boethius Novel Author Boethius


PART THE FIRST.

     It is an ancient Mariner,
     And he stoppeth one of three.
     "By thy long grey beard and glittering eye,
     Now wherefore stopp'st thou me?

     "The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide,
     And I am next of kin;
     The guests are met, the feast is set:
     May'st hear the merry din."

     He holds him with his skinny hand,
     "There was a ship," quoth he.
     "Hold off! unhand me, grey-beard loon!"
     Eftsoons his hand dropt he.

     He holds him with his glittering eye--
     The Wedding-Guest stood still,
     And listens like a three years child:
     The Mariner hath his will.

     The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone:
     He cannot chuse but hear;
     And thus spake on that ancient man,
     The bright-eyed Mariner.

     The ship was cheered, the harbour cleared,
     Merrily did we drop
     Below the kirk, below the hill,
     Below the light-house top.

     The Sun came up upon the left,
     Out of the sea came he!
     And he shone bright, and on the right
     Went down into the sea.

     Higher and higher every day,
     Till over the mast at noon--
     The Wedding-Guest here beat his breast,
     For he heard the loud bassoon.

     The bride hath paced into the hall,
     Red as a rose is she;
     Nodding their heads before her goes
     The merry minstrelsy.

     The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast,
     Yet he cannot chuse but hear;
     And thus spake on that ancient man,
     The bright-eyed Mariner.

     And now the STORM-BLAST came, and he
     Was tyrannous and strong:
     He struck with his o'ertaking wings,
     And chased south along.

     With sloping masts and dipping prow,
     As who pursued with yell and blow
     Still treads the shadow of his foe
     And forward bends his head,
     The ship drove fast, loud roared the blast,
     And southward aye we fled.

     And now there came both mist and snow,
     And it grew wondrous cold:
     And ice, mast-high, came floating by,
     As green as emerald.

     And through the drifts the snowy clifts
     Did send a dismal sheen:
     Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken--
     The ice was all between.

     The ice was here, the ice was there,
     The ice was all around:
     It cracked and growled, and roared and howled,
     Like noises in a swound!

     At length did cross an Albatross:
     Thorough the fog it came;
     As if it had been a Christian soul,
     We hailed it in God's name.

     It ate the food it ne'er had eat,
     And round and round it flew.
     The ice did split with a thunder-fit;
     The helmsman steered us through!

     And a good south wind sprung up behind;
     The Albatross did follow,
     And every day, for food or play,
     Came to the mariners' hollo!

     In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud,
     It perched for vespers nine;
     Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white,
     Glimmered the white Moon-shine.

     "God save thee, ancient Mariner!
     From the fiends, that plague thee thus!--
     Why look'st thou so?"--With my cross-bow
     I shot the ALBATROSS.

In the poem's first line, we meet its protagonist, "an ancient Mariner." He stops one of three people on their way to a wedding celebration. The leader of the group, the Wedding Guest, tries to resist being stopped by the strange old man with the "long grey beard and glittering eye." He explains that he is on his way to enjoy the wedding merriment; he is the closest living relative to the groom, and the festivities have already begun. Still, the Ancient Mariner takes his hand and begins his story. The Wedding Guest has no choice but to sit down on a rock to listen. The Ancient Mariner explains that one clear and bright day, he set out sail on a ship full of happy seamen. They sailed along smoothly until they reached the equator. Suddenly, the sounds of the wedding interrupt the Ancient Mariner's story. The Wedding Guest beats his chest impatiently as the blushing bride enters the reception hall and music plays. However, he is compelled to continue listening to the Ancient Mariner, who goes on with his tale. As soon as the ship reached the equator, a terrible storm hit and forced the ship southwards. The wind blew with such force that the ship pitched down in the surf as though it were fleeing an enemy. Then the sailors reached a calm patch of sea that was "wondrous cold", full of snow and glistening green icebergs as tall as the ship's mast. The sailors were the only living things in this frightening, enclosed world where the ice made terrible groaning sounds that echoed all around. Finally, an Albatross emerged from the mist, and the sailors revered it as a sign of good luck, as though it were a "Christian soul" sent by God to save them. No sooner than the sailors fed the Albatross did the ice break apart, allowing the captain to steer out of the freezing world. The wind picked up again, and continued for nine days. All the while, the Albatross followed the ship, ate the food the sailors gave it, and played with them. At this point, the Wedding Guest notices that the Ancient Mariner looks at once grave and crazed. He exclaims: "God save thee, ancient Mariner! / From the fiends that plague thee thus!- / Why lookst thou so?" The Ancient Mariner responds that he shot the Albatross with his crossbow.

In editions where it is included, the Latin epigraph serves as a semi-thesis for the poem. It is a Latin quote from Burnet's "Archaeologiae Philosophicae" , which Coleridge translates as follows: I readily believe that there are more invisible than visible Natures in the universe. But who will explain for us the family of all these beings, and the ranks and relations and distinguishing features and functions of each? What do they do? What places do they inhabit? The human mind has always sought the knowledge of these things, but never attained it. Meanwhile I do not deny that it is helpful sometimes to contemplate in the mind, as on a tablet, the image of a greater and better world, lest the intellect, habituated to the petty things of daily life, narrow itself and sink wholly into trivial thoughts. But at the same time we must be watchful for the truth and keep a sense of proportion, so that we may distinguish the certain from the uncertain, day from night. Burnet, who authored the original quote, begins by acknowledging that "invisible natures" such as spirits, ghosts, and angels exist; moreover, there are more of them than their readily-perceivable counterparts such as humans and animals.  However, "invisible natures" are difficult to classify, because people perceive them only occasionally. Burnet asserts that while it is important to strive to understand the ethereal and ideal, one must stay grounded in the temporal, imperfect world. By maintaining a balance between these two worlds, one avoids becoming too idealistic or too hopeless, and can eventually reach the truth. By prefacing "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" with this quote, Coleridge asks the reader to pay careful attention to the near-constant interactions between the spiritual and temporal worlds in the poem. Like the Ancient Mariner, the reader must navigate these interactions and worlds in order to understand the truth ingrained in the poem. The Ancient Mariner as a character can be identified with a number of archetypes: the wise man, the writer, the traitor, and more. The epigraph suggests that regardless of with whom the reader associates the Ancient Mariner, there is great importance in the way in which he manages  to balance the spiritual and temporal worlds. From the Ancient Mariner's first interaction with the Wedding Guest, we know there is more to him than the fact that he appears unnaturally old. He has a "glittering eye" that immediately unnerves the Wedding Guest, who presumes he is mad and calls him a "grey-beard loon." Yet there is more to his "glittering eye" than mere madness, as he is able to compel the Wedding Guest to listen to his story with the fascination of a three-year-old child.  Although he is clearly human, the Ancient Mariner seems to have a touch of the otherworldly in him. Throughout Part 1, the temporal world interjects itself into the storytelling haze in which the Ancient Mariner captures the Wedding Guest and reader.  For example, just as the Ancient Mariner begins his tale, the joyful sound of a bassoon at the wedding reception distracts the Wedding Guest. He "beat his breast" in frustration that he is missing the festivities. In light of Burnet's quote, one can say that the temporal world with its "petty" pleasures tempts the Wedding Guest. He is of that world - indeed he is next of kin to the bridegroom and therefore intimate with the festival's worldly joy. Meanwhile, the Ancient Mariner cannot enjoy the temporal world because he is condemned to perpetually relive the story of his past. In the Ancient Mariner's story itself, the spiritual and temporal worlds are confounded the moment the sailors cross the equator. Suddenly the natural world - which is closely connected to the spiritual world - makes the sailors lose control of their course. The storm drives them into an icy world that is called "the land of mist and snow" throughout the rest of the poem. The word "rime" can mean "ice", and can also be interpreted as an alternate spelling of the word "rhyme." Therefore, as much as the poem is the rhymed story of the Ancient Mariner, it is also the tale of the "land of mist and snow": the "rime", where the Ancient Mariner's troubles begin.  By calling the poem "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner," Coleridge equates the "rhyme" or tale with the actual "rime" or icy world. As we learn at the story's end, the Ancient Mariner is condemned to feel perpetual pangs of terror that force him to tell his "rhyme," a fate just as confining and terrifying as the "rime" itself is initially for the sailors.


PART THE SECOND.

     The Sun now rose upon the right:
     Out of the sea came he,
     Still hid in mist, and on the left
     Went down into the sea.

     And the good south wind still blew behind
     But no sweet bird did follow,
     Nor any day for food or play
     Came to the mariners' hollo!

     And I had done an hellish thing,
     And it would work 'em woe:
     For all averred, I had killed the bird
     That made the breeze to blow.
     Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay
     That made the breeze to blow!

     Nor dim nor red, like God's own head,
     The glorious Sun uprist:
     Then all averred, I had killed the bird
     That brought the fog and mist.
     'Twas right, said they, such birds to slay,
     That bring the fog and mist.

     The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,
     The furrow followed free:
     We were the first that ever burst
     Into that silent sea.

     Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down,
     'Twas sad as sad could be;
     And we did speak only to break
     The silence of the sea!

     All in a hot and copper sky,
     The bloody Sun, at noon,
     Right up above the mast did stand,
     No bigger than the Moon.

     Day after day, day after day,
     We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
     As idle as a painted ship
     Upon a painted ocean.

     Water, water, every where,
     And all the boards did shrink;
     Water, water, every where,
     Nor any drop to drink.

     The very deep did rot: O Christ!
     That ever this should be!
     Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
     Upon the slimy sea.

     About, about, in reel and rout
     The death-fires danced at night;
     The water, like a witch's oils,
     Burnt green, and blue and white.

     And some in dreams assured were
     Of the spirit that plagued us so:
     Nine fathom deep he had followed us
     From the land of mist and snow.

     And every tongue, through utter drought,
     Was withered at the root;
     We could not speak, no more than if
     We had been choked with soot.

     Ah! well a-day! what evil looks
     Had I from old and young!
     Instead of the cross, the Albatross
     About my neck was hung.

The ship sailed northward into the Pacific Ocean, and although the sun shone during the day and the wind remained strong, the mist held fast. The other sailors were angry with the Ancient Mariner for killing the Albatross, which they believed had saved them from the icy world by summoning the wind: "Ah wretch! Said they, the bird to slay / That made the breeze to blow!" Then the mist disappeared and the sun shone particularly brightly, "like God's own head." The sailors suddenly changed their opinion. They decided that the Albatross must have brought the must, and praise the Ancient Mariner for having killed it and rid them of the mist: "Twas right, said they, such birds to slay, / That bring the fog and mist." The ship sailed along merrily until it entered an uncharted part of the ocean, and the wind disappeared. The ship could not move, and sat "As idle as a painted ship / Upon a painted ocean." Then the sun became unbearably hot just as the sailors ran out of water, leading up to the most famous lines in the poem: "Water, water, every where, / And all the boards did shrink; / Water, water, every where, / Nor any drop to drink." The ocean became a horrifying place; the water churned with "slimy" creatures, and at night, eerie fires seemed to burn on the ocean's surface. Some of the sailors dreamed that an evil spirit had followed them from the icy world, and they all suffered from a thirst so terrible that they could not speak. To brand the Ancient Mariner for his crime and place the guilt on him and him alone, the sailors hung the Albatross's dead carcass around his neck.

Coleridge introduces the idea of responsibility in Part 2. The sailors have an urge to pin whatever happens to them on the Ancient Mariner, since he killed the Albatross for no good reason. It seems more important to them to make him claim responsibility for their fate than what their fate actually is; first, they curse him for making the wind disappear, and then they praise him for making the mist disappear. Coleridge may be poking fun at allegory in this section. He told reviewers after the poem's release that he did not intend for it to have a moral, even though when reading the poem, one is hard-pressed not to discern a moral message. By having the sailors switch from blame to praise and back to blame again, Coleridge mocks those quick to judge. To go back to the preface, the sailors represent those too eager to discern the "certain" from the "uncertain", preferring to see things in black-and-white terms. The major theme of liminality emerges more fully in Part 2. In literature - and especially Romantic literature - a liminal space is where plot twists occur or things begin to go awry. The Romantic hero, although he begins confident and with a clear mission, stumbles into a bewildering space where he struggles, and from which he emerges wizened and saddened. Traditionally these places are borderlines, such as the edge of a forest or a shoreline. Recall from Part 1 that the ship's course is sunny and smooth until it crosses the equator and the storm begins. The equator is the boundary between the earth's hemispheres, and is therefore an extreme example of a liminal space. The icy world or "rime" itself is also a compelling liminal space. At first it seems to be the epitome of the temporal; there are no visible creatures there besides the sailors, whose senses it assaults with huge icy forms, terrifying sounds, and bewildering echoes. But it is equally a spiritual place, the dwelling of a very powerful spirit who wreaks havoc on the sailors to punish the Ancient Mariner for killing its beloved Albatross.  The icy world represents a tenuous balance between the temporal and spiritual. The physicality of the icy world represents its tenuousness; in it, water exists in all its three phases: ice, water, and mist.  The boundaries between the temporal and the spiritual, what Burnet calls the "certain and uncertain" in the epigraph, are as indistinct there as the physical state of water. It is not necessarily the loudness, coldness, or desolateness of the icy world that makes it so terrifying. Rather, it is the fact that nothing there is easily definable. In light of the epigraph, it represents the balance that one must seek between the "certain and uncertain," which will ultimately lead to the truth. However, the icy world as a symbol suggests that this path to enlightenment is equally fascinating and terrifying. The most famous lines in "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" are unquestionably: "Water, water, every where, / Nor any drop to drink." The sailors are punished for the Ancient Mariner's mistake with deprivation made worse by the fact that what they need so badly - water - is all around them, but is entirely undrinkable. Since the poem's publication, these lines have come into common usage to refer to situations in which one is surrounded by the thing one desires, but is denied it nevertheless. In light of the epigraph, the Ancient Mariner shoots the Albatross because he, like humans throughout time, wants to learn about the spiritual world. The Albatross is an animal, but it is akin to a spirit, and its murder wreaks spiritual havoc on the sailors. We are given no reason why the Ancient Mariner shoots the Albatross, and he does so without premeditation. It is as though he needs to bring the beauty of the spiritual world  down to the temporal world in order to understand it. He takes the bird out of the air and onto the deck, where it proves to be mortal indeed. After that, the spiritual world begins to punish the Ancient Mariner and the other sailors by making all elements of the temporal world painful. They are thirsty and sunburned, cannot sail for lack of wind, and are threatened by creatures and strange lights in the water. The sailors add to the Ancient Mariner's physical punishment when they hang the Albatross around his neck, giving him a physical burden to remind him of the spiritual burden of sin he carries. They too punish him physically for his spiritual depravity.


PART THE THIRD.

     There passed a weary time.  Each throat
     Was parched, and glazed each eye.
     A weary time! a weary time!
     How glazed each weary eye,
     When looking westward, I beheld
     A something in the sky.

     At first it seemed a little speck,
     And then it seemed a mist:
     It moved and moved, and took at last
     A certain shape, I wist.

     A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist!
     And still it neared and neared:
     As if it dodged a water-sprite,
     It plunged and tacked and veered.

     With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,
     We could not laugh nor wail;
     Through utter drought all dumb we stood!
     I bit my arm, I sucked the blood,
     And cried, A sail! a sail!

     With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,
     Agape they heard me call:
     Gramercy! they for joy did grin,
     And all at once their breath drew in,
     As they were drinking all.

     See! see! (I cried) she tacks no more!
     Hither to work us weal;
     Without a breeze, without a tide,
     She steadies with upright keel!

     The western wave was all a-flame
     The day was well nigh done!
     Almost upon the western wave
     Rested the broad bright Sun;
     When that strange shape drove suddenly
     Betwixt us and the Sun.

     And straight the Sun was flecked with bars,
     (Heaven's Mother send us grace!)
     As if through a dungeon-grate he peered,
     With broad and burning face.

     Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat loud)
     How fast she nears and nears!
     Are those her sails that glance in the Sun,
     Like restless gossameres!

     Are those her ribs through which the Sun
     Did peer, as through a grate?
     And is that Woman all her crew?
     Is that a DEATH? and are there two?
     Is DEATH that woman's mate?

     Her lips were red, her looks were free,
     Her locks were yellow as gold:
     Her skin was as white as leprosy,
     The Night-Mare LIFE-IN-DEATH was she,
     Who thicks man's blood with cold.

     The naked hulk alongside came,
     And the twain were casting dice;
     "The game is done!  I've won!  I've won!"
     Quoth she, and whistles thrice.

     The Sun's rim dips; the stars rush out:
     At one stride comes the dark;
     With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea.
     Off shot the spectre-bark.

     We listened and looked sideways up!
     Fear at my heart, as at a cup,
     My life-blood seemed to sip!

     The stars were dim, and thick the night,
     The steersman's face by his lamp gleamed white;
     From the sails the dew did drip--
     Till clombe above the eastern bar
     The horned Moon, with one bright star
     Within the nether tip.

     One after one, by the star-dogged Moon
     Too quick for groan or sigh,
     Each turned his face with a ghastly pang,
     And cursed me with his eye.

     Four times fifty living men,
     (And I heard nor sigh nor groan)
     With heavy thump, a lifeless lump,
     They dropped down one by one.

     The souls did from their bodies fly,--
     They fled to bliss or woe!
     And every soul, it passed me by,
     Like the whizz of my CROSS-BOW!

The sailors were trapped in their ship on the windless ocean for some time, and eventually became delirious with thirst. One day, the Ancient Mariner noticed something approaching from the West. As it moved closer, the sailors realized it was a ship, but no one could cry out because their throats were dry and their lips badly sunburned. The Ancient Mariner bit his own arm and sipped the blood so that he could wet his mouth enough to cry out: "A sail! A sail!" Mysteriously, the approaching ship managed to turn its course to them, even though there was still no wind. Suddenly, it crossed the path of the setting sun, and its masts made the sun look as though it was imprisoned, "As if through a dungeon-grate he peered." The Ancient Mariner's initial joy turned to dread as he noticed that the ship was approaching menacingly quickly, and had sails that looked like cobwebs. The ship came near enough for the Ancient Mariner to see who manned it: Death, embodied in a naked man, and The Night-mare Life-in-Death, embodied in a naked woman. The latter was eerily beautiful, with red lips, golden hair, and skin "as white as leprosy." Death and Life-in-Death were gambling with dice for the Ancient Mariner's soul, and Life-in-Death won. She whistled three times just as the last of the sun sank into the ocean; night fell in an instant, and the ghost ship sped away, though its crew's whispers could be heard long after it was out of sight. The crescent moon rose above the ship with "one bright star" just inside its bottom rim, and all at once, the sailors turned towards the Ancient Mariner and cursed him with their eyes. Then all two hundred of them dropped dead without a sound. The Ancient Mariner watched each sailor's soul zoom out of his body like the arrow he shot at the Albatross: "And every soul, it passed me by, / Like the whiz of my cross-bow!"

In Part 3, the poem becomes more fantastical as the spiritual world continues to punish the Ancient Mariner and his fellow sailors. Although later in the poem Coleridge reveals that a specific spirit is responsible for their demise, it seems as though the spiritual world as a whole is punishing the men, using the natural world as its weapon: the wind refuses to blow, the ocean churns with dreadful creatures, and the sun's relentless heat chars the men. The ghost ship, however, is separate from the natural world - it sails without wind, and its inhabitants are spirits. Death and Life-in-Death are allegorical figures who become frighteningly real for the sailors, especially the Ancient Mariner, whose soul Life-in-Death "wins", thereby dooming him to a fate worse than death. Even those sailors whose souls go to hell seem freer than the Ancient Mariner; while their souls fly unencumbered out of their bodies, he is destined to be trapped in his indefinitely - a living hell. Life-in-Death, who takes on the form of an alluring naked woman, represents perpetual temptation. Because she wins the Ancient Mariner's soul, he is doomed to die only when he has paid his due...perhaps never. As we learn later, the Ancient Mariner is cursed to continually feel the agonizing compulsion to tell his tale to others; although telling the tale allows him temporary relief, he may never be free. First, he and the sailors are denied the satisfaction of drinking; now the Ancient Mariner will be denied the satisfaction of being able to die. His spirit is trapped in his own body, in an excruciating state of limbo - the realm of Life-in-Death. His "glittering eye" suggests more than madness; it is also a synecdoche representing his soul, which longs to be released from living death. It yearns to fly out of his body like the two hundred other sailors' souls did. In fact, when the sailors' souls are released, they fly past the Ancient Mariner with the same sound as the arrow he shot at the Albatross. Initially, the Ancient Mariner is relieved to have survived his shipmates, but in retrospect the sound tantalizes him, as it reminds him that his impulsive sin is the reason for his torture. Part 3 introduces the theme of imprisonment. As we have said, the Ancient Mariner is doomed to be trapped in a state of deathlike life; his own immortal body is his prison. The ship itself is a prison for the sailors when there is no wind to carry it. Even before the ghost ship comes near enough for the Ancient Mariner to see its crew, it seems to imprison the very sun with its masts. This symbolizes Death and Life-in-Death's level of power; they have so much sway over the natural world and its inhabitants that they can jail the sun itself. The natural world seems to have this power, as well: the sailors are trapped in the "rime" by impenetrable ice until the Albatross sets them free. For this reason, many have interpreted the Albatross as Christ, and the Ancient Mariner as the archetypal sinner. The Albatross has the power to guide the sailors just as Christ has the ability to guide men's souls to heaven. By sinning on impulse, the Ancient Mariner ruins his chances at salvation, and is condemned to the eternal limbo of Life-in-Death. This interpretation implies that every time a person sins, he destroys his relationship with Christ and his chances of reaching heaven, and must redeem himself through acts of atonement. Just as people wear crucifixes around their necks to remind them of Christ's sacrifice and their responsibility to him, the sailors hang the Albatross around the Ancient Mariner's neck to remind him of his sin.


PART THE FOURTH.

     "I fear thee, ancient Mariner!
     I fear thy skinny hand!
     And thou art long, and lank, and brown,
     As is the ribbed sea-sand.

     "I fear thee and thy glittering eye,
     And thy skinny hand, so brown."--
     Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding-Guest!
     This body dropt not down.

     Alone, alone, all, all alone,
     Alone on a wide wide sea!
     And never a saint took pity on
     My soul in agony.

     The many men, so beautiful!
     And they all dead did lie:
     And a thousand thousand slimy things
     Lived on; and so did I.

     I looked upon the rotting sea,
     And drew my eyes away;
     I looked upon the rotting deck,
     And there the dead men lay.

     I looked to Heaven, and tried to pray:
     But or ever a prayer had gusht,
     A wicked whisper came, and made
     my heart as dry as dust.

     I closed my lids, and kept them close,
     And the balls like pulses beat;
     For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky
     Lay like a load on my weary eye,
     And the dead were at my feet.

     The cold sweat melted from their limbs,
     Nor rot nor reek did they:
     The look with which they looked on me
     Had never passed away.

     An orphan's curse would drag to Hell
     A spirit from on high;
     But oh! more horrible than that
     Is a curse in a dead man's eye!
     Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,
     And yet I could not die.

     The moving Moon went up the sky,
     And no where did abide:
     Softly she was going up,
     And a star or two beside.

     Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
     Like April hoar-frost spread;
     But where the ship's huge shadow lay,
     The charmed water burnt alway
     A still and awful red.

     Beyond the shadow of the ship,
     I watched the water-snakes:
     They moved in tracks of shining white,
     And when they reared, the elfish light
     Fell off in hoary flakes.

     Within the shadow of the ship
     I watched their rich attire:
     Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
     They coiled and swam; and every track
     Was a flash of golden fire.

     O happy living things! no tongue
     Their beauty might declare:
     A spring of love gushed from my heart,
     And I blessed them unaware:
     Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
     And I blessed them unaware.

     The self same moment I could pray;
     And from my neck so free
     The Albatross fell off, and sank
     Like lead into the sea.

The Wedding Guest proclaims that he fears the Ancient Mariner because he is unnaturally skinny, so tanned and wrinkled that he resembles the sand, and possesses a "glittering eye." The Ancient Mariner assures him that he has not returned from the dead; he is the only sailor who did not die on his ship, but rather drifted in lonely, scorching agony. His only living company was the plethora of "slimy" creatures in the ocean. He tried to pray, but could produce only a muffled curse. For seven days and nights the Ancient Mariner remained alone on the ship. The dead sailors, who miraculously did not rot, continued to curse him with their open eyes. Only the sight of beautiful water snakes frolicking beside the boat lifted the Ancient Mariner's spirits. They cheered him so much that he blessed them "unawares"; finally, he was able to pray. At that very moment, the Albatross fell off his neck and sank heavily into the ocean.

As the Ancient Mariner drifts on the ocean, the natural world becomes more threatening. His surroundings - the ship, the ocean, and the creatures within it - are "rotting" in the heat and sun, but he is the one who is rotten on the inside. Meanwhile the sailors' corpses refuse to rot, and their open eyes curse him continuously, giving the Ancient Mariner a visible manifestation of the living death that awaits him. He will age, but his body will never rot enough to release his soul; his eye will glitter forever with the horror of damnation. As the Ancient Mariner floats, he becomes delirious, unable to escape his overwhelming loneliness even by sleeping: "I closed my lids, and kept them close, / And the balls like pulses beat; / For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky / Lay like a load on my weary eye..." His depravity has even denied him the comfort of prayer. Ironically, it is the "slimy", "rotten" creatures themselves that finally comfort the Ancient Mariner and allow him to pray. Until this moment, Coleridge's imagery has underscored the overbearing nature of the Ancient Mariner's environment: it is hot, salty, pungent, and "rotten." However, his surroundings - and the imagery that accompanies them - turn cool in the moonlight. Coleridge compares the moonlight to a gentle frost, connecting it to the serenity of the "rime": " beams bemocked the sultry main, / Like April hoar-frost spread." Aglow in the moonlight, the sea creatures begin frolicking, rather than churning nastily; creatures of a beautiful, supernatural world, they "moved in tracks of shining white, / And when they reared, the elfish light / Fell off in hoary flakes...I watched their rich attire; / Blue, glossy green, and velvet black, / They coiled and swam; and every track / Was a flash of golden fire." Whereas Coleridge's descriptions of the ghost ship, sun, and sailors are replete with spare, harsh imagery, he describes the water-snakes in decadent, lush terms. Only when the Ancient Mariner is able to appreciate the beauty of the natural world is he granted the ability to pray - and, it is implied, eventually redeem himself. Earlier in the work, the desiccated setting represented the Ancient Mariner's moral drought, but the moment he begins to view the natural world benevolently, his spiritual thirst is quenched: "A spring of love gushed from my heart." As a sign that his burden has been lifted, the Albatross - the burden of sin - falls from his neck: it is no longer his cross to bear.


PART THE FIFTH.

     Oh sleep! it is a gentle thing,
     Beloved from pole to pole!
     To Mary Queen the praise be given!
     She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven,
     That slid into my soul.

     The silly buckets on the deck,
     That had so long remained,
     I dreamt that they were filled with dew;
     And when I awoke, it rained.

     My lips were wet, my throat was cold,
     My garments all were dank;
     Sure I had drunken in my dreams,
     And still my body drank.

     I moved, and could not feel my limbs:
     I was so light--almost
     I thought that I had died in sleep,
     And was a blessed ghost.

     And soon I heard a roaring wind:
     It did not come anear;
     But with its sound it shook the sails,
     That were so thin and sere.

     The upper air burst into life!
     And a hundred fire-flags sheen,
     To and fro they were hurried about!
     And to and fro, and in and out,
     The wan stars danced between.

     And the coming wind did roar more loud,
     And the sails did sigh like sedge;
     And the rain poured down from one black cloud;
     The Moon was at its edge.

     The thick black cloud was cleft, and still
     The Moon was at its side:
     Like waters shot from some high crag,
     The lightning fell with never a jag,
     A river steep and wide.

     The loud wind never reached the ship,
     Yet now the ship moved on!
     Beneath the lightning and the Moon
     The dead men gave a groan.

     They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose,
     Nor spake, nor moved their eyes;
     It had been strange, even in a dream,
     To have seen those dead men rise.

     The helmsman steered, the ship moved on;
     Yet never a breeze up blew;
     The mariners all 'gan work the ropes,
     Where they were wont to do:
     They raised their limbs like lifeless tools--
     We were a ghastly crew.

     The body of my brother's son,
     Stood by me, knee to knee:
     The body and I pulled at one rope,
     But he said nought to me.

     "I fear thee, ancient Mariner!"
     Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest!
     'Twas not those souls that fled in pain,
     Which to their corses came again,
     But a troop of spirits blest:

     For when it dawned--they dropped their arms,
     And clustered round the mast;
     Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths,
     And from their bodies passed.

     Around, around, flew each sweet sound,
     Then darted to the Sun;
     Slowly the sounds came back again,
     Now mixed, now one by one.

     Sometimes a-dropping from the sky
     I heard the sky-lark sing;
     Sometimes all little birds that are,
     How they seemed to fill the sea and air
     With their sweet jargoning!

     And now 'twas like all instruments,
     Now like a lonely flute;
     And now it is an angel's song,
     That makes the Heavens be mute.

     It ceased; yet still the sails made on
     A pleasant noise till noon,
     A noise like of a hidden brook
     In the leafy month of June,
     That to the sleeping woods all night
     Singeth a quiet tune.

     Till noon we quietly sailed on,
     Yet never a breeze did breathe:
     Slowly and smoothly went the ship,
     Moved onward from beneath.

     Under the keel nine fathom deep,
     From the land of mist and snow,
     The spirit slid: and it was he
     That made the ship to go.
     The sails at noon left off their tune,
     And the ship stood still also.

     The Sun, right up above the mast,
     Had fixed her to the ocean:
     But in a minute she 'gan stir,
     With a short uneasy motion--
     Backwards and forwards half her length
     With a short uneasy motion.

     Then like a pawing horse let go,
     She made a sudden bound:
     It flung the blood into my head,
     And I fell down in a swound.

     How long in that same fit I lay,
     I have not to declare;
     But ere my living life returned,
     I heard and in my soul discerned
     Two VOICES in the air.

     "Is it he?" quoth one, "Is this the man?
     By him who died on cross,
     With his cruel bow he laid full low,
     The harmless Albatross.

     "The spirit who bideth by himself
     In the land of mist and snow,
     He loved the bird that loved the man
     Who shot him with his bow."

     The other was a softer voice,
     As soft as honey-dew:
     Quoth he, "The man hath penance done,
     And penance more will do."

After praying, the Ancient Mariner thanked the Virgin Mary for finally allowing him to sleep. He dreamed that the buckets on the ship were filled with dew, and awoke to the sound of the falling rain. He drank and drank after so many days of thirst, and became so lightheaded that he thought he was a ghost. Suddenly he heard a loud wind far off, and the sky lit up with darting "fire-flags" that could be interpreted as lightning, aurora borealis, or "St. Elmo's Fire" . The rain poured from a single cloud, as did an unbroken stream of lightning. The ship began to sail, although there was still no wind. Just then, all the dead men stood up and went about their jobs as a mute, ghostly crew. The Wedding Guest proclaims again: "I fear thee, Ancient Mariner!" but the Ancient Mariner quickly assures him that the dead sailors were not evil. At dawn, they even gathered around the mast and sang so beautifully that they sounded like an orchestra. When they stopped singing, the ship's sails sang instead. The ship sailed on miraculously in the absence of wind, moved instead by the spirit that had followed it from the icy world. Once the ship reached the equator and the sun was directly overhead, it stopped moving and the sails stopped singing. Then it began to rock back and forth uneasily until it suddenly jolted, causing the Ancient Mariner to faint. He lay for an indeterminate period of time on the ship's deck, during which he heard two voices. The first voice swore on Christ that he was the man who betrayed the Albatross that loved him, and that the spirit from the icy world also loved the Albatross: "The spirit who bideth by himself / In the land of mist and snow, / He loved the bird that loved the man / Who shot him with his bow." The second voice, softer than the first, declared that the Ancient Mariner would continue to pay for his crime: "The man hath penance done, / And penance more will do."

Until the end of Part 5, it seems as though the Ancient Mariner is redeemed. Not only is he allowed to sleep, but it finally rains, and his thirst is quenched. Since physical drought and thirst have represented the Ancient Mariner's moral depravity up until this point, it is implied that the abundant rain symbolizes his redemption. According to a Christian interpretation, the rain signifies that he is being baptized anew as a righteous servant of Christ who respects God's creatures. Even though terrifying things continue to happen all around him - a storm, lightning, thunder - the Ancient Mariner is awed by them, instead of fearful of them. The natural world is no less forceful or imposing than it was previously, but it is now benevolent. Part 5 also sees an end to the Ancient Mariner's loneliness, as the sailors 'awaken' to sail the ship; they and the ship itself sing beautiful music, and some spiritual force moves the ship along its course even though the air is still. Again, only when the ship crosses a boundary - the equator - does confusion return; the Ancient Mariner is knocked unconscious, and the reader begins to doubt whether he will actually be redeemed. The voices confirm that it is indeed a specific spirit punishing the Ancient Mariner. The text's suggestions of sin, baptism, redemption, and other Christian themes shifts towards a more pagan understanding of the story's moral intricacies. A spirit that inhabits the icy world of the "rime" loved the Albatross - perhaps kept it as a pet - and is making the Ancient Mariner pay for murdering it. In the 1817 version of the poem, we are told that the two voices that the Ancient Mariner hears are spirits. Perhaps they are kin to the spirit that is punishing the Ancient Mariner, or are even taking part in his punishment. It is also possible, however, that they, like all of the supernatural elements of the Ancient Mariner's story, are merely figments of his imagination. That Coleridge leaves their identity somewhat open-ended harkens back to Burnet's musings on "invisible Natures"; humans cannot classify spirits, and therefore cannot really know them. Likewise, the Ancient Mariner - and the reader - cannot define what kind of spirits are speaking, or if they are indeed spirits at all. Burnet's statements are applicable to all humans. Furthermore, the reader is as subject to Coleridge's whims as his protagonist, and therefore cannot know any more than him. As humans - and therefore sinners - we can all identify with the Ancient Mariner, and are thus equally implicated in his crime.