MODERN CLASSICAL PHILOSOPHERS GIORDANO BRUNO CONCERNING THE CAUSE, THE PRINCIPLE, AND THE ONE Translated from the Italian* by JOSIAH ROYCE and KATHARINE ROYCE Dixon. Have the kindness, Master Polyhymnius, and you too, Gervasius, not to interrupt our discourse further. Polyhymnius. So be it. Gervasius. If he who is the master speaks, surely I shall be unable to keep silence. Dix. Then you say, Theophilus, that everything which is not a first principle and a first cause, has such a principle and such a cause? Theophilus. Without doubt and without the least controversy. Dix. Do you believe, accordingly, that whoever knows the * From Della causa, principio, ed uno. Venet. [or London], 1584. 'The dialogues which constitute this work, Della causa, etc., are the product of an effort to state a thought which Bruno felt to be his own, under the limitations of language imposed by the current scholastic terminology, and especially by the traditional Aristotelian distinctions of form and matter, of final and efficient cause, of potentia, or possibility, of actus, or actuality, etc. These distinctions ought to be in the student's mind as he reads the dialogue. But the historical phraseology is in general rather an encumbrance than an aid things thus caused and originated must know the ultimate cause and principle? Theo. Not easily the proximate cause or the proximate principle; it would be extremely difficult to recognize even the traces of an ultimate cause and creative principle. Dix. Then how do you think that those things which have a first and a proximate cause and principle can be really known, if their efficient cause (which is one of the things which contribute to the true cognition of things) is hidden? Theo. I grant you that it is easy to set forth the theory of proof, but the proof itself is difficult. It is very practicable to set forth the causes, circumstances, and methods of sciences; but afterward our method-makers and analytical scholars can use but awkwardly their organum, the principles of their methods, and their arts of arts. Gerv. Like those who know how to make fine swords, but do not know how to use them. Poly. Aye, aye.1 Gerv. May your eyes be closed so that you may never be able to open them. Theo. I should say, then, that one should not expect the natural to Bruno. The central thought of the dialogue does not lie, again, in that distinction between Cause and Principle which Bruno here advances as his own. Rather is the unity of the universal world-form, and of the world-soul, the central topic. While this doctrine of the unity of all things, and of the immanence of the world-soul and of the world-form in every being, is expounded in this dialogue rather as an intuition than as a demonstrable assertion, Bruno here makes prominent, in one striking passage, a practical motive which in his own mind is central. The individual should learn so to view himself, and to feel himself as one with the World-Soul, that the individual is relieved from all fear of death. What is valuable about any being is that it expresses, in some accidental and possibly transient form, the one meaning which is equally expressed in the whole world and in every part. This meaning cannot perish, is divine, and is ill described by any such view of nature as Bruno attributes to the Peripatetics. Bruno's method in this dialogue of first insisting upon distinctions and divisions, and then showing that they are relative and of partial significance must also be borne in mind throughout. With this Dialogue likewise read chapter ii, part ii, of J. Lewis McIntyre's Giordano Bruno, London, 1903. In the original the play upon words occurs thus: Polinnio. Fermé! Gervasius. Fermati te siano gl' occhi. philosopher to make plain all causes and principles; but only the physical, and only the principal and most essential of these. And although these depend upon the first cause and first principle, and can be said to possess such a cause and principle, this is, in any case, not such a necessary relation that from the knowledge of the one the knowledge of the other would follow; and therefore one should not expect that in the same science both should be set forth. Dix. How is that? Theo. Because from the cognition of all dependent things, we are unable to infer other knowledge of first cause and principle, than by the somewhat inefficacious method of traces. All things. are, indeed, derived from the Creator's will or goodness, which is the principle of His works, and from which proceeds the universal effect. The same consideration arises in the case of works of art, in so much as he who sees the statue does not see the sculptor; he who sees the portrait of Helen does not see Apelles: but he sees only the result of the work which comes from the merit and genius of Apelles. This work is entirely an effect of the accidents and circumstances of the substance of that man, who, as to his absolute essence, is not in the least known. Dix. So that to know the universe is like knowing nothing of the being and substance of the first principle, because it is like knowing the accidents of the accidents. Theo. Exactly, but I would not have you imagine that I mean that in God himself there are Accidents, or that He could be known, as it were, by His Accidents. Dix. I do not attribute to you so crude a thought, and I know that it is one thing to say that the things extraneous to the divine nature are accidents, another thing to say that they are His Accidents, and yet another thing to say that they are, as it were, His Accidents: By the last way of speaking I believe you mean that they are the effects of the divine activity; but that these effects, in so far as they may be the substance of things, and even the natural substances themselves, in any case are, as it were, the remotest accidents whereby we merely touch an apprehension of the divine supernatural essence. Theo. Well said. Dix. Behold, then, of the divine substance, as well because it is infinite as because it is extremely remote from its effects (while these effects are the furthest boundary of the source of our reasoning faculties), we can know nothing, unless through the means of traces, as the Platonists say, of remote effects, as the Peripatetic philosophers say, of the dress or outer covering, as say the Cabalists, of the mere shoulders and back, as the Talmudists say,' or of the mirror, the shadow, the enigma, as the Apocalyptic writers say. Theo. All the more is this the case because we do not see perfectly this universe whose substance and principle are so difficult of comprehension. And thus it follows that with far less ground can we know the first principle and cause through its effect, than Apelles may be known through the statue he has made. For the statue all may see and examine, part by part; but not so the grand and infinite effect of the Divine Power. Therefore our simile should be understood not as a matter of close comparison. Dix. Thus it is, and thus I understand it. Theo. It would be well, then, to abstain from speaking of so lofty a matter. Dix. I agree to that, because it suffices, morally and theologically, to know the first principle in so far as higher spirits have revealed it, and divine men have declared it. Beyond this point, not only whatever Law and Theology you will, but also all wise philosophy has held it as a profane and turbulent disposition, to rush into demanding reasons and definitions for such things as are above the sphere of our intelligence. Theo. Very good: but these do not deserve blame so much as those deserve praise who struggle towards the knowledge of that cause and principle; who learn its grandeur as much as possible by allowing the eyes of their well-regulated minds to roam amongst yonder magnificent stars, those luminous bodies which are so many habitable worlds, vast and animate, and are most excellent deities. These seem, and are, countless worlds 1 Cf. Exodus xxxiii, 18-23. |