Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy 4.24

“If any man knows not that the star Arcturus

has his course nearest the topmost pole

how shall he not be amazed

that Boötes so slowly takes his wain

and is so late to dip his brightness in the ocean,

and yet so swiftly turns to rise again?

The law of heaven on high will but bewilder him.

When the full moon grows dim to its horns,

darkened by the shadow of dull night,

when Phoebe thus lays bare all the varying bands of the stars,

which she had hidden by the power of her shining face:

then are the nations stirred by the errors of the vulgar,

and beat without ceasing brazen cymbals.

No man is surprised when the blasts of the wind

beat a shore with roaring waves,

nor when a solid mass of frozen snow

is melted by the warmth of Phoebus' rays;

for herein the causes are ready at hand to be understood.

But in those other matters the causes are hidden,

and so do trouble all men's hearts,

for time does not grant them

to advance with experience in such things as seldom recur:

the common herd is ever amazed at all that is extraordinary.

But let the cloudy errors of ignorance depart,

and straightway these shall seem no longer marvelous.”

—from Book 4, Poem 5

Why might I be perfectly willing to accept order, purpose, and design in some aspects of Nature, while being quite clueless about such meaning in other aspects?

If science has taught me that there is causality and balance in the physical world, why am I so quick to assume that there is no causality and balance in the moral world?

Are there facts and reasons governing the body, but no facts and reasons governing the soul?

Will some things in the Universe work out as they should, while other things will never work out at all?

If I only think it through for a moment, it seems rather ridiculous for me to deny that there is any order at all, just because I don’t immediately perceive that order. Perhaps I have not looked carefully at the right things, or in the right way?

Perhaps a man cannot immediately work out why heavy things fall, or water flows, or the wind blows, or fire burns, but he will soon see a pattern in how they behave, and before long their behavior will become so everyday that he will hardly think twice about them.

There are things far grander in scale, and far more mysterious, like the motions of the heavens or the changes of the seasons, that may puzzle him far more, but even there he learns that the sun, the moon, and the stars follow a complex sequence, one that repeats itself over and over again. The causes may remain hidden for some time, and he may be filled with wonder, but the harmony is already peeking through.

I can learn why something acts as it does only when I have rightly understood what it is by its nature. Though it may take me many years, or it may take the whole human race many generations, to solve a puzzle, it is patient observation and careful reasoning that yield greater understanding. The Universe, slowly but surely, reveals her workings to an open and willing mind.

The obstacle will not be in the things themselves, but in my poor estimation of them. I do myself a great disservice when I assume there is no order, or likewise when I make up imaginary causes to satisfy my eagerness for a hasty solution.

Some people may shrug their shoulders and give up farming if the weather won’t cooperate, while others may learn to plant at the right time. Some people may yell at the sky or sacrifice a goat when it doesn’t rain, while others will become familiar with the cycle of the seasons.

Now if I insist that my life is unfair, that nothing good can come from my situation, or that there is no Providence, am I not like the lazy farmer? If I pray to shadows, and worship false idols, am I not replacing wisdom with mere superstition?

I only think life is unjust, and that vice is unpunished while virtue goes unrewarded, when I am ignorant of my own nature, and when I turn away from the my place in all of Nature. It looks upside down, but I am upside down. I have started with a confusion about what is greater or lesser in life, and so I grow frustrated with life.

Wisdom can make ordinary what ignorance found extraordinary.

The stars don’t disappear if I am looking for them on the ground. Justice doesn’t disappear if I am searching for it in the wrong place.

Written in 11/2015