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第47节

the six enneads-第47节

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he victim; and those that are to suffer are thrown into the path of those that administer the merited treatment。     It is not an accident that makes a man a slave; no one is a prisoner by chance; every bodily outrage has its due cause。 The man once did what he now suffers。 A man that murders his mother will become a woman and be murdered by a son; a man that wrongs a woman will become a woman; to be wronged。     Hence arises that awesome word 〃Adrasteia〃 'the Inevadable Retribution'; for in very truth this ordinance is an Adrasteia; justice itself and a wonderful wisdom。     We cannot but recognize from what we observe in this universe that some such principle of order prevails throughout the entire of existence… the minutest of things a tributary to the vast total; the marvellous art shown not merely in the mightiest works and sublimest members of the All; but even amid such littleness as one would think Providence must disdain: the varied workmanship of wonder in any and every animal form; the world of vegetation; too; the grace of fruits and even of leaves; the lavishness; the delicacy; the diversity of exquisite bloom; and all this not issuing once; and then to die out; but made ever and ever anew as the Transcendent Beings move variously over this earth。     In all the changing; there is no change by chance: there is no taking of new forms but to desirable ends and in ways worthy of Divine Powers。 All that is Divine executes the Act of its quality; its quality is the expression of its essential Being: and this essential Being in the Divine is the Being whose activities produce as one thing the desirable and the just… for if the good and the just are not produced there; where; then; have they their being?     14。 The ordinance of the Kosmos; then; is in keeping with the Intellectual Principle。 True; no reasoning went to its creation; but it so stands that the keenest reasoning must wonder… since no reasoning could be able to make it otherwise… at the spectacle before it; a product which; even in the Kinds of the partial and particular Sphere; displays the Divine Intelligence to a degree in which no arranging by reason could express it。 Every one of the ceaselessly recurrent types of being manifests a creating Reason…Principle above all censure。 No fault is to be found unless on the assumption that everything ought to come into being with all the perfection of those that have never known such a coming; the Eternals。 In that case; things of the Intellectual realm and things of the realm of sense must remain one unbroken identity for ever。     In this demand for more good than exists; there is implied a failure to recognize that the form allotted to each entity is sufficient in itself; it is like complaining because one kind of animal lacks horns。 We ought to understand both that the Reason…Principle must extend to every possible existent and; at the same time; that every greater must include lesser things; that to every whole belong its parts; and that all cannot be equality unless all part is to be absent。     This is why in the Over…World each entity is all; while here; below; the single thing is not all 'is not the Universe but a 〃Self〃'。 Thus too; a man; an individual; in so far as he is a part; is not Humanity complete: but wheresoever there is associated with the parts something that is no part 'but a Divine; an Intellectual Being'; this makes a whole of that in which it dwells。 Man; man as partial thing; cannot be required to have attained to the very summit of goodness: if he had; he would have ceased to be of the partial order。 Not that there is any grudging in the whole towards the part that grows in goodness and dignity; such an increase in value is a gain to the beauty of the whole; the lesser grows by being made over in the likeness of the greater; by being admitted; as it were; to something of that greatness; by sharing in that rank; and thus even from this place of man; from man's own self; something gleams forth; as the stars shine in the divine firmament; so that all appears one great and lovely figure… living or wrought in the furnaces of craftsmanship… with stars radiant not only in the ears and on the brow but on the breasts too; and wherever else they may be displayed in beauty。     15。 These considerations apply very well to things considered as standing alone: but there is a stumbling…block; a new problem; when we think of all these forms; permanent and ceaselessly produced; in mutual relationship。     The animals devour each other: men attack each other: all is war without rest; without truce: this gives new force to the question how Reason can be author of the plan and how all can be declared well done。     This new difficulty is not met by the former answer; that all stands as well as the nature of things allows; that the blame for their condition falls on Matter dragging them down; that; given the plan as we know it; evil cannot be eliminated and should not be; that the Matter making its presence felt is still not supreme but remains an element taken in from outside to contribute to a definite total; or rather to be itself brought to order by Reason。     The Divine Reason is the beginning and the end; all that comes into being must be rational and fall at its coming into an ordered scheme reasonable at every point。 Where; then; is the necessity of this bandit war of man and beast?     This devouring of Kind by Kind is necessary as the means to the transmutation of living things which could not keep form for ever even though no other killed them: what grievance is it that when they must go their despatch is so planned as to be serviceable to others?     Still more; what does it matter when they are devoured only to return in some new form? It comes to no more than the murder of one of the personages in a play; the actor alters his make…up and enters in a new role。 The actor; of course; was not really killed; but if dying is but changing a body as the actor changes a costume; or even an exit from the body like the exit of the actor from the boards when he has no more to say or do; what is there so very dreadful in this transformation of living beings one into another?     Surely it is much better so than if they had never existed: that way would mean the bleak quenching of life; precluded from passing outside itself; as the plan holds; life is poured copiously throughout a Universe; engendering the universal things and weaving variety into their being; never at rest from producing an endless sequence of comeliness and shapeliness; a living pastime。     Men directing their weapons against each other… under doom of death yet neatly lined up to fight as in the pyrrhic sword…dances of their sport… this is enough to tell us that all human intentions are but play; that death is nothing terrible; that to die in a war or in a fight is but to taste a little beforehand what old age has in store; to go away earlier and come back the sooner。 So for misfortunes that may accompany life; the loss of property; for instance; the loser will see that there was a time when it was not his; that its possession is but a mock boon to the robbers; who will in their turn lose it to others; and even that to retain property is a greater loss than to forfeit it。     Murders; death in all its guises; the reduction and sacking of cities; all must be to us just such a spectacle as the changing scenes of a play; all is but the varied incident of a plot; costume on and off; acted grief and lament。 For on earth; in all the succession of life; it is not the Soul within but the Shadow outside of the authentic man; that grieves and complains and acts out the plot on this world stage which men have dotted with stages of their own constructing。 All this is the doing of man knowing no more than to live the lower and outer life; and never perceiving that; in his weeping and in his graver doings alike; he is but at play; to handle austere matters austerely is reserved for the thoughtful: the other kind of man is himself a futility。 Those incapable of thinking gravely read gravity into frivolities which correspond to their own frivolous Nature。 Anyone that joins in their trifling and so comes to look on life with their eyes must understand that by lending himself to such idleness he has laid aside his own character。 If Socrates himself takes part in the trifling; he trifles in the outer Socrates。     We must remember; too; that we cannot take tears and laments as proof that anything is wrong; children cry and whimper where there is nothing amiss。     16。 But if all this is true; what room is left for evil? Where are we to place wrong…doing and sin?     How explain that in a world organized in good; the efficient agents 'human beings' behave unjustly; commit sin? And how comes misery if neither sin nor injustice exists?     Again; if all our action is determined by a natural process; how can the distinction be maintained between behaviour in accordance with nature and behaviour in conflict with it?     And what becomes of blasphemy against the divine? The blasphemer is made what he is: a dramatist has written a part insulting and maligning himself and given it to an actor to play。     These considerations oblige us to state the Logos 'the Reason…Principle

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