THE CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY (The Sedgefield Translation). Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius

that I may not rule mine own servants! The sky may bring bright days, and anon hide the light in darkness; the year may bring flowers, and the same year take them away again; the sea may enjoy her gentle heaving, and all things created may follow their course and fulfil their desire, save me alone. I only am deprived of mine own wont and use, and forced to strange ones through the unsated avarice of worldly men, who in their greed have robbed me of the name I should rightly have, the name, that is, of blessing and honour; this they have wrested from me. Moreover, they have given me over to their evil practices, and made me minister to their false blessings, so that I cannot with my servants fulfil my service as all other creatures do. Now my servants are knowledge and skill of various kinds, and true riches; with these I have ever been wont to disport, and with them I sweep over the whole heavens. The lowest I raise up to the highest, and the highest I put in the lowest place; that is, the lowly I exalt to heaven, and bring blessings down from heaven unto the lowly. When I rise aloft with these my servants, we look down upon the storms of this world, even as the eagle does when he soars in stormy weather above the clouds where no storm can harm him. So would I have thee too, O Mind, come up to us if it please thee, on condition of returning again with us to earth to help good men. Thou knowest my ways, how I am ever earnest to succour the good in their need. Dost thou know how I helped Croesus the Greek king in his need, when Cyrus king of the Persians had taken him captive and was minded to burn him? When they cast him into the fire I set him free with rain from heaven. But thou wast too confident in thy righteousness and in thy good pleasure, thinking that no unrighteous thing could come upon thee, and desiring to have the reward of all thy good works here in this life. How couldst thou dwell in the midst of a nation, and not suffer the same as other men? How live in the midst of change and not thyself be changed? What do the poets sing of this world but the various changes thereof? And who art thou, not to change with it? What is it to thee how thou changest, since I am always with thee? It was even better for thee thus to change, that thou shouldst not grow too fond of worldly riches, and cease to expect still better things.

      ‘Though the covetous men gain riches in number as the grains of sand by these sea-cliffs, or as the stars that shine of dark nights, he never leaveth to bewail his poverty; and though God glut the desire of the wealthy man with gold and silver and all manner of precious things, yet is the thirst of their greed never quenched, for its bottomless abyss hath many empty chambers yet to fill. Who can ever give enough to the frenzy of the covetous? The more that is given him the greater his desire.

      ‘How wilt thou answer Riches if she say, “Why dost thou reproach me, O Mind? Why art thou enraged against me? In what have I angered thee? ’Twas thou that first desiredst me, not I thee; thou didst set me on the throne of thy Creator, when thou lookedst to me for the good thou shouldst seek from Him. Thou sayest I have deceived thee, but I may rather answer that thou hast deceived me, seeing that by reason of thy lust and thy greed the Creator of all things hath been forced to turn away from me. Thou art indeed more guilty than I, both for thine own wicked lusts and because owing to thee I am not able to do the will of my Maker. He lent me to thee to enjoy in accordance with His Commandments, and not to perform the will of thine unlawful greed.”

      ‘Answer us both now,’ said Philosophy, ‘as thou wilt: both of us await thine answer.’

      VIII

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       Then said the Mind, ‘I confess myself guilty on every point, and I am so sore stricken with remorse for my sin, that I cannot answer you.’

      Again Philosophy spake, ‘It is still by reason of thine unrighteousness that thou are brought nearly to despair, and I would have thee not despair, but be ashamed of thine error. For he who despairs is without hope, while he who is ashamed is in the way to repentance. If thou wilt but call to mind all the worldly honours thou hast received since thy birth to this day, and reckon up the joys against the sorrows, thou canst not well say thou art poor and unhappy, for I took thee when young, untrained, and untaught, and made thee my child and brought thee up in my discipline. How then is it possible to speak of thee as aught but most happy, when thou wast dear to me ere thou knewest me, and before thou knewest my discipline and my ways, and before I taught thee in thy youth such wisdom as is hidden from many an older sage, and when I furthered thee with my teachings so that thou wast chosen of men to be a judge? If however thou wilt say thou art unhappy because thou no longer hast the fleeting honours and joys that thou once didst have, still thou art not unblest, for thy present woe will pass away even as thou sayest thy joys have passed. Dost thou think such change of state and sadness of mood come to thee alone, and have never befallen, nor will befall, any other man? Or dost thou think that in any human mind there can be aught enduring and without change? If for a while anything endures in a man, death snatches it away, and its place knows it no more. And what are worldly riches but a foretokening of death? For death cometh to no other purpose but to take life. So also riches come to a man to rob him of that which is dearest to him in the world, and this they do when they depart from him. Tell me, O Mind, since naught in this life may endure unchanging, which deemest thou the better? Art thou to despise these earthly joys, and willingly give them up without a pang, or to wait till they give thee up and leave thee sorrowing?’

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       Then Philosophy began to sing and chaunted thus: ‘When the sun shineth brightest in the cloudless heaven, he dimmeth the light of all the stars, for their brightness is as nothing compared with his. When the south-west breeze softly bloweth, the flowers of the field grow apace, but when the strong wind cometh out of the north-east, right soon it destroyeth the beauty of the rose. Again, the north wind in its fury lasheth the calm ocean. Alas! there is nothing in the world that endureth firmly for every!’

      X

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       Then said Boethius, ‘O Philosophy, thou that art the mother of all virtues, I cannot gainsay thee nor deny what thou wast saying to me just now, for it is all true. I understand now that my happiness and the prosperity which I erstwhile accounted happiness are not such, seeing that they so speedily depart. What troubles me most when I ponder the matter narrowly is my firm persuasion that the greatest unhappiness in this present life is for a man to have happiness, and then to lose it.’

      Then answered Philosophy, that is to say Reason, ‘Of a truth thou shouldst not blame thy fate and thy prosperity, as thou art minded to do, for the loss of false joys that thou art suffering, because thou art wrong in thinking thyself unhappy. But if it be the loss of fancied joys that hath thus troubled and saddened thee I can clearly prove to thee that thou still hast the greater part of the happiness that once was thine. Tell me now, canst thou with justice bewail thy misfortune, as if good fortune had utterly forsaken thee? Why, thou hast still the most precious part of all that thou didst hold most worth having. How then canst thou bewail the worse and more harmful part, having kept the more precious? Come, thou knowest that the flower of mankind and the greatest honour to thyself is still living, even thy wife’s father, Symmachus. He is yet hale and hearty, and hath enough of all good things, and I know that thou wouldst not stick to lay down thy life for him, if thou wert to see him in any danger, for the man is full of wisdom and goodly parts, and free enough from all earthly cares, albeit he is much grieved for thy hardships and thy captivity. Is not thy wife also living, daughter of this same Symmachus, a virtuous and modest lady, beyond all women in chastity? All the good in her I may sum up in a word: that in all her ways she is her father’s daughter. For thee she lives, for thee alone, as she loves nothing else but thee; every blessing of this life is hers, but all hath she scorned for thy sake, refusing all, not having thee; that is her only want. By reason of thine absence all that she hath seems naught to her, for in her great love for thee she is in despair and well-nigh dead with weeping and sorrow. Again, let us take thy two sons. They