Transcript

{ } = word or expression can't be understood
{word} = hard to understand, might be this

...with you children, what you understand of philosophy. I can teach you philosophy here. That's all. But that's not philosophy. Philosophy is a -- deadly and earnest thing. You are not earnest. It would be waste to -- to go before you as -- as a -- in my quality as a philosopher. I'm just here pro- -- a college professor of philosophy. It's a very misshapen situation.

Well, really now. -- I'm not joking, gentlemen. I -- I want you -- I have asked you to buy a number of texts -- all original texts. They are as difficult as all original life is, gentlemen. All secondhand life, all derivative live, all retail store life, all commodities are easily of access. They're enticing in their wrappings. They are easy to carry away. And everything is made painless, you see. Greek Without Tears is a famous book for schoolchildren. How to learn Greek without weeping, you see. Grecque with -- sans larme, the Frenchman who wrote it called it.

Gentlemen, I told you in the beginning, any philosophy that is genuine is difficult. And it is not for everybody all the time. And the first thing, gentlemen, you ought to confess in one -- if you want to come to life with your mind, which you haven't, yet -- you are just an automat. The first thing you -- that you do not always understand: great things that occasionally we do, and occasionally we don't. That is, gentlemen, it is not possible in philosophy to advance steadily, and to understand more tomorrow. If you open the Bible today, you may not understand one word. And you open it another day, when you are in the right despair with -- about yourself, you see, and you say, "How could I ever miss the point? How could I not feed on this," you see, "all my life?"

The great sin in America is the idea that the mind, gentlemen, is a machine, which you can build up in such a way that it performs better and better every day. It's nonsense, gentlemen. If you had cultivated your mind, it would probably work at this moment in your life much better than it works with me. The mind, you see, is an organ that is developed in -- during the age from 15 to 25. I need character more than I need mind, you see. My mind is pretty good, but it's going. I don't have to plant it. You have -- your mind, you see, has now at this moment to be developed. And therefore it's at its finest. I have written things in their cleverness at your age, or a little later, which I hardly can understand now, because they are so subtle. They are so intricate, you see. I express myself today much simpler. And -- the -- the truth is not so angular, and so conceited, and so circumscribed, or circumventing, I should -- more say, the point.

So the mind, gentlemen, is alive. Therefore, it's -- time -- times of your life,

it's asleep. Anything living must sleep and wake up again. It's very simple. You sleep every night, don't you? That's the mind -- that is the mind that needs sleep. Well, most of the day you -- half asleep, you see. And we'll find that the first great Greek philosopher, Heraclitus of Ephesus, distinguished in man the few who are awake, whom he called philosophers and people able to understand his philosophy, and the majority of people who are asleep.

Therefore, the first thing with an original text in philosophy, gentlemen, is that it is not always speaking to you. You have to wait. It has to be in your library. Philosophy books, gentlemen, you must own. You can't borrow them from Howe Library, or from Baker, assigned reading three times -- three days, and then give it back and you have read it. You haven't, because it isn't sure at all, you see, that you got it in those three days, that you were ready for it.

A philosopher, gentlemen, or -- and {anybody} who studies philosophy, must have his original companions, his phil- -- original philosophers with him all the time, because it will take you a lifetime to get acquainted with them. And that's the beauty of it. Anybody who has ever entered this field of philosophy, gentlemen, is not in a hurry. You cannot say, "I have read Plato."

My dear people, I read this morning -- in order to comfort myself for this meeting here, I read Plato. Well, it is exactly -- I have read him now for exactly 63 -- 53 years. And it's as though I never had read him. It's all new -- totally new. So I was so in- -- intrigued, I got a -- here one volume of Plato just this minute out of the library to read a commentary, to convince myself that I had understood him rightly this morning.

Original things, gentlemen, are exactly like the sunrise. Every sunrise is original. And again, a Greek philosopher, the same Heraclitus, my favorite Greek philosopher, said that every sunrise differs from every other, that there are as many sunrises as there are days, which anybody who has any sentiment, and any realism, knows is true. But you don't know it, because you have learned physics. And in physics, the mind is treated, you see, as a machine, as mechanics, because in physics, you only want to know those things that are always the same, you see. That's why physics is so boring to me. It's not a science. It's for plumbers. Yes, it's a -- for plumbers. That's what it is. But the -- plumbers know nothing of life. They know something about water toilets -- to get rid of the remnants of life.

Philosophy, however, gentlemen, is as fresh as sunsets, and violets, and roses. Two people who look at a rose see something different. It is nonsense to pretend that the rose is the same to you today, you see, and to- -- tomorrow. Tomorrow, you may be totally indifferent. Today you are enthusiastic.

So here is the text. Let's start right in. We'll read -- down to -- 101. That's the famous verse. I -- I don't know even which translation you have. I had to choose the one that was cheap. I have another text here, the Latin text. Lucretius. And I want to get going. So will you kindly read it? Will you read it?

(Which place?)

The beginning of Lucretius.

("Mother of Aeneas and his race, delight of men and gods, life-giving Venus, it is your doing that under the wheeling constellations of the sky all nature teems with life, both the sea that buoys up our ships and the -- earth that yields our food. Through you all living creatures are conceived and come forth to look upon the sunlight. Before you the winds flee, and at your coming the clouds forsake the sky. For you the inventive earth flings up sweet flowers. For you the ocean levels laugh, the sky is calmed and glows with diffused radiance. When first the day puts on the aspect of spring, when in all its force the fertilizing breath of Zephyr is unleashed, then, great goddess, the birds of the air give the first intimation of your entry; for yours is the power that has pierced them to the heart. Next the cattle run wild, frisk through the lush pastures and swim the swift-flowing streams. Spellbound by your charm, they follow your lead with fierce desire. So throughout seas and uplands, rushing torrents, verdurous meadows and the leafy shelters of the birds, into the breasts of one and all you -- you instill alluring love, so that with passionate longing they reproduce their several breeds.

("Since you alone are the guiding power of the universe and without you nothing emerges into the shining sunlit world to grow in joy and loveliness, yours is the partnership I seek in striving to compose these lines One the Nature of the Universe for my noble Memmius. For him, great goddess, you have willed outstanding excellence in every field and everlasting fame. For his sake, therefore, endow my verse with everla- -- -lasting charm.")

Now let's -- ja. Now let me go on from there myself. We have here the dedication there, and the invocation.

Every word -- word of antiquity, gentlemen, to- -- shows you its humanity and its rootedness, and that it is not arbitrary as your writing, in short- -- in novels and magazines. They had no magazines. It has to have an invocation and a dedication. And it -- then it has to give its scene. They had no book titles. They had no covers. They had no bookbinding. They had only the style. And therefore, what I tried to show -- tell you last time was that there was no separation between philosophy and theology. And I also had told you that -- at our meeting before that we have three reasons to wonder: the things around us are won-

drous, astonishing; my own mind is to be wondered at; and the person from whom I hear, that he speaks to me that he likes me -- that she likes me, that's even more important -- or that he has something to tell me, to im- -- to impose on me is wondrous.

So there are three reasons for wonder. Somebody to be admired, as we say now in English unfortunately, you see; something to be astonished by; and yourself, as a riddle. Man is a riddle to himself. We use then three different stems -- etymological stems for this tripartition, gentlemen, of the human philosophical activity. A man who is in wonderment, you see, is a wonder to himself. He is wondering about things, and he is wondering about already traditions about truth already coming to him. That he can speak Greek, or English, is a -- you should fill -- be with a sense of wonder, that your mother was able to teach you to speak. She is a reason for wonder. Why did she do it? Did she do it for selfish reasons, so that you might care for her? Or did she really love you? Or what -- did she impart truth to you? Did she impart the wrong language to you? Should she have taken you to Bolshevik Russia, preferably?

All these three situations, gentlemen, kehr- -- return in the invocation, the dedication, and the scene. The scene here is -- what is he going to sing? Has he already told us? He has told us. In the last sentence which you read. Where is the -- we have no manuscript in which they -- that the -- there is that the -- what is -- what is in top of your book? What does it say?

("Matter and Space.")

Wie?

("Matter and Space.")

Matter or --?

("Matter and Space.")

Oh no. The whole book, I mean. We are here in the preface of the whole book, are we not?

("On the Nature of the Universe.")

Ja. now the nature of the universe is not -- nothing Mr. Lucretius knew anything about. He doesn't say so. That's an English expression. But he says in the last sentence which you read to us. What does he say?

"Thee I crave as partner --" I have a different translation. The Latin is {"Te sociam studeo scribendis { } esse quos ego de rerum natura pangere { }"} Thee, Venus, I wish to have as my companion -- and as my associate for the writing of the {werbs} which I try to pronounce on the nature of things." So what you call "The Nature of the Universe" for the poet is still very indefinite, things.

What are things, gentlemen? Is -- are they infinite in number? Are they finite in number? First question, for example, you see. "Things" is a plural. Very indefinite. Nothing of the universe. That's already an antiq- -- a -- very modern forgery. Most translations, of course, which you read of -- ancient texts are forgeries, because the modern man is too lazy to shed his skin -- his modern skin and to enter really the world of the ancient mind. So don't think that the "nature of the universe" is -- is Lucretius' idea at all.

({ } on the nature of the universe. I mean, this translation? The Latin use of { }.)

Well, I said three-quarters -- it's like food, gentlemen. The things you buy in translations, and in textbooks, it's all falsified. Everything is diluted, because -- the market is only to the stupid one, here. You see, the -- you go to the publisher and offer him a genuine translation, which is noble and sticks to the original. He says, "I won't sell this. I have to cater to the last -- so-called last common denominator." That is -- that is, the people who shouldn't read and write, you see. They get it. So the oth- -- all the others get nonsense. And they -- the man for whom this is done you -- by the publisher, this universe business, you see, against things, he doesn't even read it. The man -- the concentration is quite wrong. -- To this idiot, it wouldn't matter what he said. He wouldn't understand Lucretius, anyway.

You live in a absolutely, gentlemen -- bewitched world. Nothing which you get on Broadway, or in New York at a bookstore, or here at Dartmouth, is of first rate. It's all third-, fourth-, fifth-rate. It's all toned down and diluted, because -- I told you, the truth is difficult. Now, if a man's -- in this country says, "I will make it difficult," he's laughed at. And says, "You can't do it. The people want to have it -- made it easy." Isn't that true? But a man who wants to win the mile, gentlemen, he has to run 3 minutes and 58 seconds, and that's difficult. In sports, you all agree that it has to be made difficult. But in the mind, you all think it has to be made easy.

I have never seen this illogic in the -- carried in any other situ- -- time or country to such nonsensical lengths, you see. In all physical exercises, you know that if it isn't difficult, the result is nil. And in all mental exercises, to use the

recommendation, if the book says on its title page, "Easy Reading," throw it away. It's worth nothing, "Easy Reading."

But "universe," you see. Well, that's just, you see -- goes over. "Things," or any- -- "rerum" is not even quite "things," you see. It is a little -- makes it more difficult because it is disorderly -- you see. Things are all the objects for the mind. Topics, you see, that may arise. "Res" is anything that come -- can come under consideration of two people in a discussion. That's a "res" in -- in Eng- -- in -- in Latin. A reus, a man accused, is a man who is said to have taken one thing, or committed a crime, a res, you see. The thing is that which comes under argument. That's a res, you see.

So all the res -- the nature of all the things we can argue about, you see, that's -- would be the -- so to speak, the -- the true translation, you see. Not "the universe." It's a -- quite a different conception. The ancient, you see -- look at these words. The ancients still were musical. They did not read silently. If Lucretius wrote this poem, there was nobody who could -- buy the book and read it. It was copied, and the slave -- or the owner himself would read it out loud. Before St. Augustine, that is, before the end of the -- antiquity, gentlemen, before 350 of our era, nobody could read without lifting his voice, without speaking. "To read" meant always to read out loud. Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, the Stoics, here -- Lucretius, they could never take a sheet of paper without getting going, so to speak, without uttering, you see. This -- this was nothing but a mem- -- held for memorizing. You had the manuscript so that you could intone, you see, and not miss out. You understand? A book in antiquity was something totally different from us. It was like a record, and you were the needle, you see. Understand? And you had to hear it. That's why they have -- were such great stylists, because every sentence written was meant to be heard, not to be reproduced by eyesight.

So we have: what is the invocation? what is the dedication? and what the scene? Well, you have just said -- seen it. How many lines have you read? What -- where did we stop? Line 27. In 27 lines, the poet has done three things. That's quite an achievement. These are only three times nine lines. And in the greatest concentration, he has said what he is going to treat, for whom he is going to treat it, and who is authorizing him to treat it.

Now, when a man here in this country writes something, he -- in a dissertation to get a doctor's degree, he says -- who is his doctor father. And he says, "Mr. {Kluckhorn} has in- -- en- -- authorized me to write a -- this dissertation on anthropology or Russian studies in Cambridge -- Harvard" -- or what-not. Any dissertation today, and any doctor's thesis invokes the good will of the master who passes judgment. If you write a term paper, you invoke, of course, me, you see. You don't know it. But you polish the apple.

Now the modern -- slang translation of "polish the apple" -- of "invocation" is "polish the apple," because you deal with mortals. If I, however, write an original book, gentlemen, I invoke certainly the spirit that enables me to think in the line and the great tradition of truth. Any man who wants to sell the truth must be aware that for thousands of years people have tried to tell the truth. And I hope to be read by people who also are eager to know the truth. Is this not? I mean, if I write a book, I hope that it will be still read in 100 years, at least. And I don't care whether you read it, because I don't c- -- think that you are critics of the truth. But I do care that somebody might read it a hundred years from know who is as anxious to know the truth as I am.

Now gentlemen, for this I need an invocation, because it is to- -- -erfectly a sense of wonder that there should be somebody 500 years back and hundred years from now who would have the same interest at heart. Isn't that -- we can't do anything about it. And all the world -- the -- in as far as we can't do anything about it, gentlemen, is divine. We call "divinity," whether it's the devil or God Almighty, good or bad, evil spirits or good spirits -- all those powers on which we depend for our -- the meaning of our action, and we are unable to do anything about it.

You must understand, gentlemen, that with all your cleverness and all your conceit as modern men, for the great actions of your life, like marriage, you totally are in the hands of the gods. Whether your offspring will be blessed, or whether you make the right choice, or whether you can break through the wall of your in-laws, and free your wife from it, that's all unknown to you. You can't do -- can do very little about it. It's just, as we said last time, an act of faith.

The invocation, gen- -- gentlemen, stresses this part of our action, which is based purely on the credit we take, the right to act in freedom and risk. Modern man, I mean, you people don't -- know so little what faith is, that I prefer the word "risk," or "daring," because -- it's a poorer word. The true word is "faith." But you don't know what faith is. You have polluted it with all your pes- -- prejudices, pro and con -- { } by the Church, or Christianity, or Judaism, or what-not. This -- the ancients, gentlemen, had never the full division of paganism, Judaism, and Christianity. You could not, before the coming of Christ, either be a pagan or a Christian. You were a mixture of all -- of all these three, you see.

Therefore, all Greek philosophers invoke the gods, even when this man here is an atheist in your sense of the word -- he's an Epicurean. And the whole prob- -- topic of Mr. Epic- -- -ure and his disciple Lucretius in this poem is to prove that there are no gods. Isn't that a queer thing? It's hard for you to understand that all people before the Christian era were mixed. That is, the radicalism, the polarity, the op- -- opposition, the dialectics between "yes" and "no," between

God and the devil, didn't exist. There were no dev- -- the devil didn't exist in antiquity to the full. The devil only exists in the Christian era, because only in the Christian era can a man be so wicked -- as Mr. Hitler. That's the new thing. The goodness of man and the -- wickedness of man is -- constantly inc- -- on the increase. Life is much more dangerous today as it was 2,000 years ago.

The death of souls, gentlemen, is -- nobody could be so dead as you are and try to be made in our college education. So superfluous, so silly, so worthless, so only out for the stomach and for -- for the -- sex and such things. I mean, such a man- -- humanity has not been tolerated before. That's only in the Christian era, because the extremes of goodness, and the extremes of wickedness have much increased. The invocation, the dedication, and the theme were closer in each other. As I said, the whole remnant of a -- of a -- invocation today is -- you dedicate it to your parents a book; or you dedicate it to your wife; or you -- say that your teacher gave you the theme of this book, and that you are therefore trying to get a degree, or promotion, or be made a professor, or one of these external things.

A man who writes an original book cannot turn to any teacher, gentlemen. If I write -- I am just publishing a big book in several volumes -- well, since I oppose, transcend, and reject many of the teachings which I have received, in this book, I cannot invoke these carnal authorities, you see. The -- the professor in -- in Harvard, or the Nob- -- the people who -- distribute the Nobel Prize. What do I give to -- for these Nobel Prize people? I think they are very stupid. That's not very agreeable to me. I would like to -- to be in -- in cahoots with them. But I can't. I think they are wrong. So -- what's -- who is my -- who can I invoke?

The great philosopher Schopenhauer, who also was an atheist, like Lucretius, was in a quandary of the same kind. He didn't believe in God. Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, as you know, both atheists. And Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, the modern pagans, so to speak, like Lucretius, chose two -- very interesting ways out.

Schopenhauer invoked the spirit of his father. "Oh, my father" he has in his preface, "who gave me the means for an independent life, so that I do not have to cater to the marketplace, that I do not have to solicit the favors of the authorities of universities, or of foundations, O dear father, who has not been a philosopher thyself -- thouself -- thyself, thanks to you, I now can put this book before mankind," you see, "which is only dedicated to the truth."

So even this atheist felt that he should invoke a higher spirit, in whom he -- he could -- with whom he could coincide, so to speak, in -- in his endeavor for freedom, for independence, you see, of mind. For this incorruptibility that he

wouldn't -- could be bought.

In America, every mind can be bought. That's why there is no truth and no -- no -- you all have only opinions, gentlemen. And you -- it's even said. When Chesterton, the great Amer- -- English humorist came to this country 20 years ago, 30 years ago, he made a discovery. The -- he said, "The people here tell me, all with great glee, that they have -- now a new science. They call it psychology. And this psychology enables a man who produces a worthless commodity to sell it, just the same. They all buy it, if he uses the right means, the right tricks, this psychology. Now," he said, "it's very interesting. In England, we call -- don't call this psychology. We call it cheating."

Psychology in this country is not -- nothing but another expression for saying "how to cheat people." That's what they teach you. And you are very proud of it, and you think you are very smart. There's only one obligation, you see, in mankind. -- I can cheat you. But I may not. I must not, you see. It's forbidden. That's so very painful, you see.

When Mr. Butler -- Murray Butler, the great president of Columbia, was asked why he had loaned money to Mr. Harriman, the banker -- the father of -- I think it's uncle or father of Mr. Harriman, isn't it? -- governor of New York?

(Father.)

Wie?

({ } the father.)

It is the father. Well, I'm sorry to say.

The -- and they got into -- they never called it back. He said it is the embarrassment of an -- in a gentleman, Mr. Butler said -- very English -- "It is the embarrassment of a gentleman that he can do things which he may not do." See? He -- "I could have asked Mr. Harriman to pay me back, or to tell me what the matter was, and what was wrong. But it is the embarrassment of an -- a gentlemen that he can do things which he may not do."

You -- you don't understand this, gentlemen. Your whole idea is -- and that's why you don't know what philosophy is -- that if you can do something, you also may do someth- -- do it, and get away with it. The on- -- your only question is that you -- don't want to be found out. The perfect crime is your ideal. That's called "psychology." Psychology is the idea of a perfect crime. That is, how to cheat somebody else in -- to such an extent that he thanks you profusely

for being taken in. See? All the products which you buy on the market are of this kind, you see. You buy worthless things, and you thank the producer profusely, because you are allowed to keep up with the Joneses. Go home and discount all the things which you do not need. You will be surprised.

Now the invocation then, gentlemen, is today out of order because we don't pray anymore. All ancient men prayed, all Greek philosophers prayed, including the atheists. Why did they? Gentlemen, when a man is standing in some space here, as I do here, I must -- cannot help being aware that this is wood, and this is my flesh, because if I -- am not aware, I'll be -- get hurt. In space, gentlemen, the body must distinguish itself from another body. In the -- thinking process, gentlemen, a philosopher can only be a man who can set himself off against his opposite number, who says, as in the flesh, "This is my body and this is this chair," you see, this -- this piece of wood, this desk. That's to you quite normal. And you never give it a thought. But the invocation means to make sure that my mind is not polluted with your mind, that I'm not speaking, you see, in the way of a boy, or in the way of a solicitor, for -- or canvassing, or a politician. The invocation here, this man tries to say, in whose spirit, realm, or territory, or area, you see, or eon does he want to move?

When you invoke, in the "Our Father," or in a psalm, the name of your maker, the reason is not that God needs to be named by you -- we certainly may give Him even the wrong name -- but the reason is gentlemen, that we know ourselves only as correspondents to the other -- opposite name. We become always only conscious in relation to somebody else. Now if I write a letter, "Dear Elizabeth," to my girl, I become aware by this address who I'm -- who I am. This is completely lost on you, because you all are taught this nonsense that you -- "I" is I and "myself" is myself. That doesn't exist. That's why most people in the country are so unhappy, and schizophrenic, because nobody can really say to himself who he is. We are -- only know -- find out who we are in relation to other people, you see. You are a Dartmouth student, because I am a Dartmouth professor. That's the only reason. If there were no Dartmouth professors, you couldn't be a Dartmouth student. You have never thought of that. But you can bring 3,000 people together, and in Dartmouth, and in Hanover, and if there was no faculty, there would be no Dartmouth College, and you would not be Dartmouth students, but just a mob, or football players, or what-not, but not -- have the honor of being a Dartmouth student. We give you this veneer, you see, of some -- of some education. Of course, I know it's a lie, but you live on it, on this credit which we give you, as though you were our students.

The invocation then, gentlemen, places the man who invokes. When Homer says -- how does The Iliad begin? Who knows it? Wie? Please. Nobody? Who know -- how does -- does nobody know how The Iliad or The Odyssey

begin? Miller.

(I know it. I just can't think of it.)

Well, you ask the girls in Bennington.

(I think the --)

No. Not "I think." That's always the wrong answer. Never say, "I think." Nobody will believe it.

(Is it -- "O heavenly Muse"?)

Ja.

("I sing -- I sing the { } Achilles.")

Ja. Very good. Ja. There you are. Now why does he say this, gentlemen? The Muse is the mind of Zeus. "Muse" and "mind" is the same root, by the way. Quite interesting for you to know. The Muses in antiquity are the powers by which we participate in the divine mind. I think we haven't reached any further insight. That's simply true. Nobody can think for himself and find the truth. The truth must be imparted. I impart to you the truth as I have received it. As I have -- it dawned on me. As we say, "It dawns on me." Very true, the -- the -- the -- in the mind, the divine light dawns just as -- much as the sun does. And sometimes it doesn't, as you know. It's very dusky.

So -- since there is darkness in the mind, off and on, there must be dawn. And the invocation then tries to make the -- this piece of flesh that -- 100 cells o- -- that it should melt, you see, because it's a hindrance to the spirit. This -- here, this container, this poor rec- -- receptacle of clay, as St. Paul calls it, our body, you see, by the invocation, turns toward that source of which he wants to be filled and s- -- fed. And nobody in his five senses, gentlemen, who has -- knows what -- how difficult it is to know the truth will ever imagine that he can find the truth cut off from this great current of light and truth, this stream of water.

Do you think Mr. Einstein could have found the -- the law of relativity if he hadn't first studied very carefully Mr. Newton? That is, if he had not been in the great tradition of mathematics through the ages? Impossible, you see. That's -- but you always mistake this, gentlemen. In this country, the man who has an idea, as you call it, is always thought of as of equal rank of a philosopher. But a philosopher is a man who has listened to all there is to know, and then has suddenly turned to the Muse and said, "Let me hear something better. This is

stale. This is not -- what I have learned is not all. We must start afresh."

A philosopher, gentlemen, makes a fresh start after he has been in the great tradition. This is very important in the case of Epicurus and Lucretius here, because the great experience of Epicurus, the Epicureans, and Lucretius is that if we go to school, we may miss out on the most original influence, the most original experience: our five senses. Epicure and Lucretius are famous as sensualists, as people who worship the five senses again, who want to get man, you see, to break away from the school tradition and add again his own experience of the beauty of life, the power of love, of hunger, of fear, directly -- by drawing on his own sensations. They have also been called "sensationalists," in the sense that they are sensualists. That is, that is nothing to be connected with any sentiment pro and con. It is simply a -- their method to say, "Yes, you have { }; now refresh your memory by drawing on your sense experiences directly," you see.

You have heard the interpretation of the sense experience. There is great danger that you then miss out on the sense experience itself -- itself. You can talk about love, you see, but before you haven't fallen in love, you don't know what all the talk about love really is.

So this is the invocation then, of Lucretius, gent- -- of Venus. Venus, who guarantees your direct experience of the senses, that's what this first 23 lines try to impose on you, you see. In getting out of the school, getting out -- away from books, and refreshing your voice, and your speech, and your mind by this direct, immediate contact. But never forget, gentlemen, it's the second choice. This same Lucretius has already learned Roman and Greek. He has already read books. And this is a protest. Epicureanism, gentlemen, is a protest against mental tradition. A recourse to the body. But a recourse to the body. Can you see this? It's not na‹ve. It's not the same as a pig that always is just a pig, you see. But it is the problem of getting a man out of his brown study back into the green pastures, again, you see.

This is the interesting thing about Epicure and the Epicureans, gentlemen, that they are reacting against too much bookishness, against too much idealism, against too much theory, you see. But you must not misunderstand them. They are not low-brow. And Venus is this recourse to that spirit that is with man before he goes to school, that makes him turn to nice girls, and beautiful flowers, and sunsets, because he's out for beauty, you see, he's out for vigor, he's out for health, he's out for procreation. And that's why Venus appears here. It's very strange. Homer, who is not high-brow, but is full of enthusiasm to become highbrow, so to speak, to create poetry, turns to the Muse, you see, the stream of reflection, the stream of poetry. Luc- -- Epicure and Lucretius come after Plato, Aristotle, Homer all have written, you see. They are in great anxiety to become

too high-brow, you see. And they want to refresh their mind by bringing in the body again, a second time, you see, so to speak. Can you understand this difference? And that's why this invocation is so very strange, that -- that Venus here is invoked by a man who tries to prove that there are no gods, you see, there are no ideas, everything is physical. It's a paradox.

But if you think of it biographically, here are 20 years lived by a man in -- in physical growth and in the schools. And then 10 years perhaps in meditating his theory of philosophy, and then in the third -- fourth decennium, the Epicureans would jump back to their sense experience and say, "I must not go astray. I must stick, so to speak, to what I really can test every day by my palette, and by my skin, and by my hands. That's all I really know. All the rest is dangerous abstraction."

It is very difficult for you to distinguish, gentlemen, the doctrine of materialism or sensualism from mere sensuous living. The doctrine of sensualism is a very hybrid doctrine, because it is the third step, you see, after you have used your senses, after you have tried to make sense of it. Then the memor- -- but let me not forget my starting point, the senses. But it's a return to the senses, you see. And therefore it always entails a break away from the senses. If you have returned, you also { } outside of it.

Now the invocation then places the Epicureans, and especially here Lucretius, outside the idealistic tradition of the Platonists and the Aristotelians, the mental tradition. He wants to say that the mental tradition is less important than the physical. Otherwise he would have invoked the Muses, or the ideas, or the truth. He invokes Venus.

Potency. And of course, that's eternally true. Even for Plato and Homer. If you have no power, you can't become a great poet just by going into a brown study and thinking, you see. Potency is something that has to be applied to poetry and philosophy, too.

So I would like to say a word, gentlemen. Never believe that materialism and idealism are absolute opposites. If you hear it now today discussed -- Americans are supposedly idealists. I have never seen an idealist so far in this country. They all -- I have only people -- known people who either have Cadillacs, or want to have Cadillacs. So I think this is a materialistic country, if ever there was one. And -- in this moment, we say the Ameri- -- the -- the wicked Bolsheviks are materialists, as you know, and we are idealists. It isn't so simple, obviously.

And one thing then we can learn from this invocation of Venus, in this preamble -- and I think it's a very great gain for our days, gentlemen: materialism

and idealism are points of emphasis, but not points of mutual exclusiveness. Would you take this down? It's quite important. The way of saying that the senses matter first, materialism, and the other: the mind matters first, the idealism, are not mutually exclusive. They are relative. Much, much nonsense would be avoided in this country, much nonthinking, if you wouldn't use these slogans. If -- when man speaks of idealism and materialism, shtop him -- stop him short. And -- don't listen to him. It's no use talking to such a man today. These are stale words. And they don't ex- -- contain today an important truth anymore, because today we must understand that they beget each other. When you are an idealist, somebody has to be the materialist. The father is the idealist, the mother has to be the materialist. The mother is the materialist in the family, the father has to be the -- be the opposite, you see, because these are two sides of the same thing. We are in a world of the senses, and it must -- we must make sense. Now if you forget one -- you see, you are an idealist, and when you forget the other, you are materialist.

Please don't -- these are dead words. And I think -- I hope this invocation will show you that a materialist, invoking the goddess to inspire him, you see, is still in antiquity in a much healthier balance. The people in antiquity had no absolute contrarieties, contradictions, but only relative, you see. They -- they could go, so to speak, to one side of the fork of the crossroads into the other, but they never left the power -- lost the power to return to the middle and start again, you see, from this total experience of reality of life, you see.

And only -- to speak, gentlemen, is to emphasize. But it is never to say anything absolute. The absolute is not for man. Man cannot say anything absolute. He can only say something in relation to something else. And he can only emphasize one thing. And at a time, we have to emphasize one thing against the other. I have to emphasize certain things at this moment, toward -- to you, obviously, you see. But at another time, I may find a man against whom I have to emphasize the opposite, you see. And I must feel free to do this. I cannot be the victim of my having told you, at this moment, this. Can't you see this? I must keep my freedom -- retain my freedom to emphasize something very different to somebody else. You understand this?

And -- so idealism and materialism, gentlemen, in antiquity are no absolutes as they are treated today and they have -- today have even become political slogans, as you know. And that's very bad. They never should. There is not a country that is materialistic. And there is not a country that is idealistic. And -- and Russia certainly is the most idealistic country in the world at this moment. You will understand this. These poor people who -- who are not even getting razor blades from Mr. Gillette, because he can't export them. And they -- they -- they have buttons, and they have no sausages, and they have no cars, and you

call them materialistic. For 50 years they are starving to death to build up their country as a great na- -- as a great country. Now if any- -- anybody was ever an idealist, the -- all the Russians are. What -- all this nonsense we talked about -- materialism. Fifty million Russians were killed in the First World War; 25 million by and large were perhaps killed and executed and -- in the Second World War. This country has lost 155,000 dead in the First World War, and 100,000 in the Second World War; and we en- -- and we speak of our idealism and their materialism.

But that's the terrible thing about which Lucretius at the end of the Christian er- -- the -- philosophic era is concerned. He wants to be back to brass tacks, to -- to grass roots, so to speak. And that's why he praises the five senses where such pretentious nonsense cannot be preached.

The last line to which I would -- wanted to come today is 101. And why? Because, just as I have to speak with the voice of Lucretius, "Come back to your senses! Don't make these ghosts out of Russia and America," or Germany and France, I don't care which country you take -- or Japan, he says, "So potent was religion in persuading to evil deeds."

Now I would say that in this moment, in this country, phil- -- these philosophical slogans are so potent as to persuade us to evil deeds. That's the famous line of Lucretius. You shou- -- ought to learn it by heart. And it's really very beautiful in Latin, much more beautiful than in English. {Tantum religio fortuit suadere valorem.} The translation is -- is not right in -- in your -- how -- what do you -- in my text. What is your text saying, the English?

("Such are the heights of wickedness to which men are driven by superstition.")

Ja. That's -- you see, not right. Oh, he means it really -- literally. To such extent of evil deeds -- or, such an extent of evil deeds religion has been able to suggest -- "suadere" I think is the best -- is "to suggest." And what an ancient man calls "religio," gentlemen, is his philosophy of the gods, what we would call -- his philosophy of religion, much more. That is, "religio" is in the antiquity a -- combination of thinking and cult. That is not without theory, so to speak, you see. It's -- the ancients did not separate, as they invoke still the gods, although they call themselves philosophers, they never quite separated prayer and systematic thinking.

So the first -- last thing experienced I want you to take with this verses -- is that here is the great atheist of antiquity, the Nietzsche of antiquity. That's -- as Lucretius deserves to be called. He ends, at the same age as Nietzsche, in 44 -- in

insanity, at the age of 44, probably in the year 55 B.C. He's madly in love, the -- tradition says, and he drinks a cup which is poisoned, and goes insane first, and then dies from the consequences of this potion. As you know, Nietzsche broke down at the end of our era, before the world wars, prophesied the two world wars and the downfall of civilization. And the same, that is, Lucretius and Nietzsche are very parallel figures. That's why I wanted you to start with Lucretius, so that you can see that Nietzsche wasn't quite wrong when he said, "There is an eternal recurrence, and I have been before." That's the -- as you know, the strange doctrine of Nietzsche, of the eternal recurrence.

Lucretius and Nietzsche come at the end of 700 years of philosophizing. The story of the -- our era is -- in philosophy from Ab‚lard and Anselm of Canterbury, via Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventura, to Spinoza, and Leibniz, and Descartes, and Hegel. And Nietzsche quits it all, tries to -- he didn't go back to the five senses. He also was a sensualist. And Lucretius is very parallel. And th- -- the reason is probably the same: the deep feeling that the cycle is closed, that nothing new can be done in this method, and by this manner of using your mind.

The era of philosophy we have renovated in our era, built it into our civilization. But with Nietzsche, it breaks off. There is no philosophy after Nietzsche, in the old sense, possible. 55 before -- before Christ, Lucretius -- dies. This book, which you have there, is probably edited, or I think in all truth it is -- has been edited by the famous Cicero, who -- who was a great stylist, and took a look at the manuscript and made it ready for -- for what could be done with it. And he hasn't done a perfect job. He has mishandled a number of places here, and -- but he -- at least owe him that we have it at all.

Now the theme I already said to you is nature. The nature of things. And the dedication, gentlemen, is to a man of whom we know that he was a very successful po- -- politician, but -- not an Epicurean, but a skeptic. The dedication is not to a man, Memmius, whom the poet tries to convince so much, but to confront with an opposite speech. Very typical philosophical attitude. I told you, the history of philosophy consists of independent views, but there -- there is a panorama. The two views together must be known before you really, you see, are fully aware of the -- the growth of truth. Because although one view is here, and the other is there, you have the history of these views, you see, you know more, as a panorama does, you see, than one vision, or one insight.

Now the strange story about this man, Memmius, is that we happen to know that he was not an Epicurean. He was a skeptic. And therefore the dedication means always the admission, gentlemen, of man that he is a mortal, that he is not God Almighty. A God Almighty could not dedicate his book to a man of a

different opinion. You can understand this. He would have -- can under -- dedicated then to dis- -- disciples, you see, or students, or sub- -- I mean, obedient citizens, so to speak, of his community. Plato could not dedicate his book, as long as he be- -- if he believed that he was divine. It is our humanity which dedicates, because we need friends.

In philosophy, gentlemen, I told you, the outstanding remnant of the political order in which we all live is, that the man, the philosopher has no regent over him. He has no king; he has no law; he has no judges; he has no electorate; he is not a candidate for office. He doesn't have to be popular. He even can't be popular. But he must have a friend. The friend stands for the whole polis. Can you understand this? With one friend, you can challenge the universe. Without one friend, they put you in a straitjacket and declare you to be insane. I mean this, gentlemen. If a man has not one friend, he cannot defy the universe of mankind. It's impossible. But with one friend, he can. As long as your wife says, "He's all right," they can't take you and carry you off.

I'm quite excited. A -- a young woman in our acquaintance here in town, in Han- -- went to see the doctor. She -- the doctor took her and said, "You are schizophrenic" -- "She is schizophrenic; send her to Boston." The husband doesn't know anything about it. Everybody is frantic. She has disappeared. Now I think it's a terrible situation. Something that must not be. The -- the husband doe- -- doesn't think his wife is sick. But of course in America, the doctors are the high priests today. They can do as they please, and he bows to the grea- -- larger authority. I think he is wrong. I think he should run after this doctor, shoot him, and get his wife back. That has happened two days ago. It's very exciting, gentlemen. Very terrifying.

I -- the end of the story obviously isn't -- isn't there in this. But you see there is a real problem. A person, all alone, you see, the object of medical care only, cannot live in this universe, you see. You have to have friends. One person has to vouchsafe that -- that you are all right, you see, that you -- that you li- -- you -- she -- what -- who is a friend? Somebody who says, "I'll -- in correspondence with this. I'm exchange. I'm -- he's part of me. I'm part of him." Something goes over and on, you see.

This identification, gentlemen, as you know, is lacking in this country to a horrible degree. Everybody is friendly with everybody, but nobody has a friend. And that this happened to a -- between husband and wife just staggers my imagination. This is a nice man, this man. And he's absolutely out of his wits. He's des- -- despondent. He's desperate. But he doesn't dare to go against the authority of the doctor.

So gentlemen, the dedication limits the divine assumption of the inspired phil- -- thinker, or poet, or whoever it is, who -- of course, everybody who is inspired thinks at this moment that the whole world needs him, you see. This is important, is it not? So dedication, gentlemen, humanizes our sense of importance, our sense of conceit. It is our descent. The invocation lifts us up to the gods. The dedication puts us down on earth in human society.

I think it's very important that you should see these three different usages of human speech, gentlemen. You don't know this. For you, all speech has only one application: to call a spade a spade, and to say, "This shirt costs $3.00," or $2.99. You think only in terms of what I call in grammar the indicative. "This is blue." "An acre is so many square feet." That to you is language. That to you is truth. That to you is thinking. Gentlemen, I never think in this one-sided manner as you do. I have three -- three attitudes in my mind. And all the Greek philosophers had three attitudes. And as long as I cannot reinvoke, re-evoke, I should say, in you these three attitudes, you do not understand Lucretius, and you do not understand Plato, and you do not understand Aristotle. You think that a man who thinks, wants to state something in so many words: that the universe is round; or that there are no gods. Gentlemen, if the world would consist of these ridiculous statements -- by themselves they are quite wanton and ridiculous, there would be no philosophy, and there would be no education, there would be no life of the mind. No, gentlemen.

There are -- the -- the invocation, the dedication, and the theme are our constant, three mental attitudes which must balance. I want to be given a task. The philosopher is given a mental task. The legislator is given a vocal task. The polis- -- the strategist is given a military task. The mother is given -- well, a task to beget children. The philosopher has to state for his time the truth in -- no uncertain terms. For this he needs an authority. Therefore, he has to be emphatic. That is, he has to be authorized. We are all authorized versions. There is not just the King James Version, you see. Every one of you should be an authorized version of the divine spirit. I mean this. You want to know that you are right in becoming a doctor or a businessman. And therefore, gentlemen, in this I -- you are excited, because you can go astray. You may be all wrong in your vocation, can you not? The invocation gives man his vocation, his calling, his duty. But much more his duty, because duty -- och! -- duties follow after I have known in which realm my duties should lie. To become a doctor is not a duty. That's -- a vocation, is it not? Because -- my duties as a doctor are only the little consequences of this big decision.

Now gentlemen, to make this decision every day -- yes, despite e- -- all, and everything, I want to teach these brats here -- that is a vocation which I can only go not by being authorized by you. I must be authorized against you,

because I have to tell you the truth whether you like it or not. I cannot depend for your ap- -- on your approval for my vocation. Is that not obvious? I want to make things difficult for you. The authority for this cannot come from any understanding of yours which you cannot have. It's too early for you. At the end you may, but not now.

Therefore, the invocation, gentlemen, is a -- a constant fear and trembling, as Kierkegaard has called it. All philosophers work out their salvation in fear and trembling. You can't help it, because we don't know before the end whether we have been right. This is the invocation, gentlemen. The pacification, the appeasement, the tranquility we get without pills, gentlemen. We don't need tranquilizer pills. A philosopher has a friend. Before, he will not settle on philosophy. It's too dangerous.

My awakening to philosophy was possible because we had a wonderful group of friends who -- all of us became something in our own right. And we left, so to speak, the -- the material world all embarking on this great adventure of -- of new truth. And one thing that will always stay with me, and I mean for what I will be known, is that I have embarked on certain human relations by correspondence and by publication, together with others, which are highly original. I have published one series of books with a Catholic priest, another with a Jewish -- great Jewish scholar and devoted Jew, and a third with a worker. Now these three relations are myself, you see. They are my dedication by which I have stayed normal. And by which my truth has not been my private truth, you see, but truth shared. And since it has been shared by three so different people, it is hoped that it is a consistent truth.

Now gentlemen, then the dedication has a soothing effect. And if I turn to grammar, some of you have -- may have read some of my writings on this, you know that invocation speaks to the power that can give orders to a man. That is imperative. And there is in every language, therefore, you see, an exchange, as in Homer's first line, "Tell me, O Muse," you see -- "Tell me, O Muse," that's a prayer, and then when the Muse tells, I have to obey. She commands. She's in command. I have to write down what she s- -- tells me. The indicative then, gentlemen, "This universe is green," or "Everything is water," these statements of fact cannot be understood unless they are balanced by imperative, by which the philosopher admits that he is under orders to say this.

You understand then, that there is quite a different mental process going on, one by which I am moved. When I say, "The earth is round," I state something. That is, I stabilize a fact, that I -- not. That can be repeated. I put things at rest. When I, however -- Copernicus, or Galilei, hears this command, "You must come forward now and teach this doctrine," you see, this is not a statement.

That's not a stabilizing force. That's a revolutionary force. That's a force upsetting the apple cart. That interrupts the tranquility of his existence. It's very dangerous, and it usually leads to disaster. Yet, he has to do it. So you can formulate the most static principle -- if you formulate it, you do something, you see, that is quite unstatic, you see. That's very dynamic.

This is overlooked today, totally, gentlemen, in this country, because you all mistake philosophy for science. Philosophy is giving in to the sense of wonder. The sense of wonder then is always threefold. What I'm wondering at, I state in terms of an indicative. "This is so." What makes me wonder, throws me down on the ground, and forces me to do something very disagreeable, very dangerous, highly -- inconveniencing my career, because all truth is against the Carnegie Foundation or the Rockefeller Foundation. Foundations with big money cannot stand the truth. You must know this, gentlemen. Power corrupts. And old saying, as you know. And nothing corrupts as much as absolute power. Money corrupts. Much money corrupts very much.

Therefore, gentlemen, it is just as dangerous to tell the truth today as it has always been, and will always be -- it must be, because only those shall be allowed to say another truth who are brave enough to say it against the powers that be. And all the powers that be are against the truth. They haven't learned it. They have learned old ways. It isn't their business to administer anything but the old ways. We elect a president of the United States so that we may have a United States. You cannot expect Mr. Eisenhower to abolish the United States. But the day may come very soon, I have to abolish the United States. Then we'll all be sent -- put to -- in prison here in the United States, will we not? By the president of the United States, you see, because he is elected to administer the old way, you see, but we are {wondrous}. And you'd like to abolish this. You don't want to have suffering. You don't want to have excitement. You don't want to have anything new happen, and you always boast that you are -- yet, the truth is admitted to this country. It is not, gentlemen. The truth is admitted to any country only to that extent as people are willing to suffer for it, to -- large extent. As soon as you want to be paid for the truth, it ceases to be the truth. Can be sure of that. That's just habit. To repeat an old formula, you see, that's not the truth itself. That's the inherited truth. That's the old -- you see, the -- the vestment of the truth, the garb of the truth, the eggshell. But the egg is, you see -- is blown out in the meantime.

So gentlemen, then the dedication is our humanity. Even Karl Marx had to have a friend, Friedrich Engels, as you know. He kept him sane. And he had a wife, and he had children. And therefore, the -- if you want to know a man's right to be listened to, ask whether he is of God, whether he is of man, and whether he is of the world. As -- with regard to the world, he must have knowl-

edge; he must have insight; he must have research; he must have disco- -- made discoveries. With regard to humanity, some people must fi- -- have found him unselfish, and loving, and affectionate, you see, and must have found it worth suffering with him, because he will have suffered if he is a great person.

And all these are very disagreeable things to you. You always think that philosophy can be had in a textbook without tears, and without bravery. Only a brave man can learn ho- -- to think for himself. And the third thing is: he must have had an encounter with the infinite, with the new truth, with truth yet unshaped, with truth trying to get down to earth through his mind and through his heart.

And it is, I think, a great story that the materialist of antiquity, the man who went mad because he only wanted to -- treat only of atoms and things, dead matter, in his first 27 lines, gives you the full width of the human relations that are making a philosopher. He must have an encounter with the divine spirit; he must have an equality, a family, so to speak, of friends, some kinship, you see; and he must have something to speak about, some -- some discovery to make, you see, some new s- -- aspect of the universe.

What's the result, gentlemen? We today say that the invocation belongs to the realm of theology. The dedication would real- -- belong to the realm of sociology, because it's a sociological fact that men have friends, or that they are academic- -- professors, or what-not, write in a group. And the theme that would be what we call today, of course, the philo- -- philosophy, the realm of the natural sciences.

So again, what I tried to say last time returns. I tel- -- -old you last time that the Greeks couldn't separate philosophy and -- and theology, you see. In these three things, you have the -- the nucleus. If I invoke Venus, the consequence is that I must have some theology, must I not? Because I have goddesses and gods, and I have different gods. I can invoke here Venus. But perhaps Plato would invoke the truth, would he not? And Homer did invoke the Muse. How are they related, these different forces that make us speak? What is then, gentlemen, theology? Theology is the doctrine of the powers that make men speak. Would you take that down? You nowhere find this d- -- definition. It's an excellent definition. Theology deals with the powers that make men speak. Philosophy deals with the things about which we want to speak. That's something very different. And sociology creates the environment within which we speak.

So here is Memmius, you see, who must take the place of the whole Roman republic. The Romans cared as little for philosophy as Americans, you know. They are -- Roma- -- Romans and Americans are the two most unphilo-

sophical people that have ever lived. But here and there, there is one, and he is then very good.

I think it is interesting that in these 27 lines of an ancient philosopher, you find all three brackets: the social sciences, the natural sciences, and the humanities, so to speak, you see, of today, in a -- in a nutshell. You cannot open your mouth, according to anyone who has met with original inspiration, gentlemen. Anybody who really speaks out from the bottom of his own heart, after an experience, knows that there are always three ways of truth: the theological, the sociological, and the philosophical -- or you call it "scientific." I mean, I don't -- it's -- it's all right at this moment, the naturalistic, you see. We speak about the nature of things. That what makes us think -- speak, you see, is always the power that overthrows us, that -- that commands. Any power that is stronger than me is not nature, gentlemen, but is divine, is Nature with a capital N, at least. And nature is my god -- divinity, as it was for Emerson, or for Thoreau. If you write "Nature" with a capital N, then she is a goddess.

And sociology is also necessary. Man cannot speak without going insane if nobody listens. You need one listener and one man who replies, and has the right to tell you, "This is not so. Be quiet," you see. "Shut up." Or contradicts me, or corrects me. You understand it? I think this is the best thing I can give you in this whole course, gentlemen, to make you see that in antiquity, the dividedness had not yet reached the point it has reached today. Today you can meet people who believe that they can be scientists all by themselves, never invoke the tru- -- god of truth. Most physicists in this country are so -- so far removed from the s- -- fountain of inspiration, that they are just plumbers and they do their routines. And if you tell them that they also serve God, they laugh, and say "Never heard of Him." Poor people. They are just so far away from that fountain, you see, which feeds their -- their stream, that they just do not know what happens inside them.

Anybody who speaks, gentlemen, believes in God, believes in the world, and believes in society. Perhaps you take this down, too, gentlemen. And in this example of Lucretius, you find this revealed. Anybody who speaks or writes, gentlemen, believes in God; believes in an order of the world, of things; and believes in society -- that is, in human relations within which he is allowed to speak without going mad.

And I think that's the importance of studying philosophy at all, gentlemen, that you are constantly reminded, although you will be lawyers or businessmen, that anybody who opens his mouth admits that there are three experiences -- of God -- gods; of men; and of the world, of things. You can't help this. It's always with you. God, man, and world can never be reduced to each other.

Perhaps -- this is another formula which you may use. God, man, and world are never reducible to each other. You can never say, "All is world," or "All is God," or "All is man." It's nonsense, because anybody who speaks needs a listener. That's his equal. Anybody who speaks needs an authority by which he makes a man listen. If -- you tell a wife -- a woman, "I love you," heavens! She must believe you, must she not? So there must be a way of expressing the truth. These three words, "I love you" must make sense to her. You must -- she must understand them in the same sense as you do. That's divine. No -- you can't do anything for this, and she cannot. It's there. A common truth is always divine, because at this moment it's too late to create language. You have to use it, you see. Otherwise, she runs away.

Since -- American -- most Americans, gentlemen, have never reached this point in the mountains of our experience, where these three great paths meet. The path toward things in a Macy's; and the path towards the family, get married, to found a family, or friends, friendship, or school, or whatever you call it, a camp, you see; and the path to worship, where you find your -- that you're doing something that has had to be done in every generation since man has lived and died, you see, to find the truth. You pronounce it. You proclaim it from the hilltops.

And so, at the end of antiquity you have in full blossom the great unity of these three truths in these first 27 lines, that I thought is important enough for starting you out with Lucretius. Because if the mat- -- so-called materialist and -- atheist is still spellbound by this invocation, dedication, you see, and naming of the theme, we may be quite sure that it is inherent in the hu- -- character of humanity. You and I can only speak to each other because there are gods. He thought there were many gods, you see, the -- but there were gods. And you are so much poorer, because your -- question is always, "Is there God? or "Is there no God?" No Greek was ever hampered by this very much. His question was, "How many gods?"

Well, will you kindly bring all the books of assigned reading next time, because I think we -- I should show you their use then -- we shall go over this. There is the Homer, there is the -- the Ancilla -- how do- -- is it called Ancilla, isn't it? -- and the Platonic dialogues and the Aristotelian writings. I thi- -- hope it will not be too much. Bring this little library with you. And we'll go on with a little bit of Lucretius next time.