On the Nature of Man 1 part 1/9

A concise treatise on the nature of man, by Nemesius, bishop of Emesa. That man is most excellently constituted of an intellectual soul and a body, and so well framed that he could not have come into being in any better way, has been the judgment of many good men.

But since the soul's being called "intellectual" raises a doubt—whether the mind came to the soul from outside, as one thing joining another, and thus made it intellectual; or whether the soul possesses intellect from itself and by nature, this being its noblest part, like the eye in the body—some thinkers, among them Plotinus, who held that the soul is one thing and the mind another, maintain that man is composed of three things: body, soul, and mind. Apollinaris, who became bishop of Laodicea, followed them in this; for having laid this as the foundation of his own doctrine, he built the rest upon it according to his peculiar teaching.

Others, however, did not separate the mind from the soul, but consider the intellectual element to be the governing part of the soul's very substance.

Aristotle holds that the mind in potentiality is created together with man, but that the mind in actuality enters into us from outside—contributing not to man's being and existence, but to the advancement of his knowledge and contemplation of natural things.

Accordingly he affirms that very few men—and only those who have practiced philosophy—possess the mind in actuality.

But Plato does not seem to say that man is the compound of both, soul and body, but rather a soul that makes use of such-and-such a body; for he conceives of man's condition more nobly, and from the outset turns us toward the divinity and care of the soul alone, so that, believing ourselves to be the soul, we may pursue only the goods of the soul—the virtues and piety—and not love the desires of the body, since these belong to man not insofar as he is man, but primarily to the animal, and to man only by consequence, seeing that man is also an animal.

And in any case it is agreed by all men that the soul is more authoritative than the body; for it is from the soul that the body is moved as its instrument.

For when the soul has departed, the body remains wholly motionless and inert, just as when the craftsman has departed his tools remain motionless.

It is well known, too, that man has fellowship with inanimate things, shares in the life of irrational animals, and partakes of the reasoning of rational beings.

For he has fellowship with inanimate things in respect of the body and the blending of the four elements;

with plants both in these respects and through the nutritive and reproductive power;

with irrational animals in these too, but additionally in respect of voluntary movement, of appetite, of spiritedness, and of the sensory and respiratory faculties; for all these are common to men and to the irrational animals, even if not all of them belong to all.

But through his rational element he is joined to the incorporeal and intellectual natures, reasoning and thinking and judging all things, pursuing the virtues, and embracing piety, the crown of the virtues.

Therefore he stands as it were on the borderland between intelligible and sensible substance: joined according to his body and bodily powers to the other animals and to inanimate things, but according to his rational part to the incorporeal substances, as was said before.

For the Creator seems, little by little, to link together the different natures with one another, so that the whole creation is one and akin.

From this it is most clearly shown that the Creator of all that exists is one;

for he not only brought into being the existence of the individual things severally, but also fitted each to the others in a suitable manner.

[He joined] the other insensible things to the sensory nerves, and made the living creature compounded of insensible and sensory parts, and not only compounded but also showed it to be one;

and so too in the rest of creation according to its kinds he has acted, joining things to one another by gradual affinity and slight variation of nature, so that the wholly inanimate things are not far removed from the plants that possess the nutritive power, nor again these from the irrational and sensory animals, nor indeed are the irrational creatures wholly estranged from the rational and incompatible with them and devoid of some innate and natural bond.

For one stone differs from another in some power; yet the magnet seems to have gone beyond the nature and power of other stones, in that it visibly draws iron to itself and holds it, as though wishing to make it its food—and it does this not on one piece of iron only, but holds one piece by means of another, imparting its own power to all the pieces in contact with it;

for iron too holds iron, when it is held by the magnet.

Then again, passing in turn from plants to animals, he did not abruptly hasten to the locomotive and sensory nature, but advanced toward it harmoniously and little by little;

for he fashioned the pinnae (pen-shells) and the sea-anemones as it were sentient trees—for he rooted them in the sea after the manner of plants and set shells around them like wooden coverings and fixed them in place like plants, yet gave them sensation, namely the sense of touch, the sense common to all animals—so that they share with plants in being rooted and stationary, and with animals in the sense of touch.

Aristotle, indeed, has recorded of the sponge that, though it grows attached to the rocks, it contracts and defends itself whenever it perceives someone approaching;

and this is why the ancient sages are accustomed to call all such creatures "zoophytes" (animal-plants).

Again, to the pinnae and such creatures he joined the generation of animals that do indeed move about, but are unable to go far, moving only here and there in their own place;

such are most of the shell-covered creatures and what are called "earthworms" (the entrails of the earth).

Then, in this way, adding to some more senses and to others greater powers of locomotion, little by little, he arrived at the more perfect among the irrational animals;

and by "more perfect" I mean those that have all the senses and are able to travel far.

And once more, passing from the irrational animals to the rational animal, man, he did not fashion this one abruptly either, but first implanted in the other animals certain natural sagacities and contrivances and cunning devices for their preservation, so that they appear close to rational beings; and so he brought forth the truly rational animal, man.

In the same way, if you examine the matter of voice as well, you will find that from the simple and uniform vocalizing of horses and oxen it was led on gradually to the varied and diverse voice of crows and mimicking birds, until at last it reached the articulate and perfect speech of man;

and again he attached articulate speech to thought and reasoning, making it the herald of the movements of the mind.

And thus he fitted all things together musically with all, and bound them, and gathered into one both the intelligible and the visible, through the medium of the generation of man.

Therefore Moses too rightly, in setting forth the creation, said that man was made last—not only because, since all things were made for his sake, it was fitting that first the things for his use should be prepared and that thus the one who was to use them should be brought forward, but also because, when an intelligible substance and again a visible one had come into being, there had to be some bond of both, so that the whole might be one and in sympathy with itself and not alien to itself.

Man, then, became the living creature that binds together both natures.

Such, to speak briefly, are the works of the Creator's wisdom.

Man, then, having been stationed on the borderland of the irrational and rational natures, if he inclines toward the body and loves the things of the body more, embraces the life of the irrational creatures and will be numbered with them and will be called "of the earth" (earthy), according to Paul, and will hear:

"You are dust, and to dust you shall return"; and:

"He was compared to the senseless beasts and was made like them."

But if he advances toward the rational, despising all bodily pleasures, he attains the divine life most beloved of God, the life proper to him as man primarily, and he will be such as is the heavenly one, according to what is said:

"As is the earthy, such also are those who are earthy; and as is the heavenly, such also are those who are heavenly."

The chief point of the rational nature is to flee and turn away from evil things, but to pursue and choose the good.

Of the good things, some exist by the communion of soul and body, though even these have their reference back to the soul—as when the soul makes use of the body—such as the virtues;

but others belong to the soul itself by itself alone, without needing the body—such as piety and the contemplation of things that are.

All those, therefore, who choose to live the life of man as man, and not as a mere animal, pursue the virtues and piety.

But what the things of the virtues are, and what those of piety, will be distinguished in what follows, when we render our account concerning the soul and the body;

for as long as it is not yet known what our soul is in respect of its substance, it is not consistent to treat of its activity.

The Hebrews say that man was from the beginning made neither confessedly mortal nor immortal, but on the borderland of each nature, so that, if he should follow the bodily passions, he might fall also into the bodily changes, but if he should prefer the goods of the soul, he might be deemed worthy of immortality.

For if God had made him mortal from the beginning, he would not have condemned him to death when he sinned; for no one condemns a mortal to mortality;

and if, on the other hand, he had made him immortal, he would not have constituted him in need of food (for none of the immortals needs bodily nourishment), nor would he so easily have changed his mind and at once made mortal the one he had made immortal; for not even in the case of the angels who sinned does he appear to have done this, but they remained immortal according to their original nature, awaiting another penalty for their sins, but not death.

It is better, therefore, to understand the matter in this way: that he was made mortal, yet capable, through advancement and being perfected, of becoming immortal—that is, immortal in potentiality.

And since it was not expedient for him, before his perfecting, to know his own nature, God forbade him to taste of the tree of knowledge.

For there were—or rather there still are even now—very great powers in plants;

and then, being unalloyed as at the beginning of the world's creation, they had the most powerful operation.

There was, then, also the tasting of a certain fruit that produced the knowledge of one's own nature;

but God did not wish him to know his own nature before his perfecting, lest, on coming to know himself as being in need of many things, he should attend to the body's needs and abandon the care of the soul; and for this reason he prevented him from partaking of the fruit of knowledge.

But having disobeyed and come to know himself, he fell away from perfecting and became subject to bodily need;

at any rate, he straightway sought a covering;

for Moses says that he came to know he was naked.

And beforehand God had put him in a trance and in ignorance of himself.

Having fallen, then, from his perfection, he likewise fell from immortality as well—which he will afterward recover by the grace of the One who made him.

After the fall the enjoyment of meat was also conceded to him.

For at first He commanded him to be content with the produce of the earth alone (for these were what was in paradise);

but once perfection had been despaired of, the things of bodily enjoyment were thereafter conceded by way of condescension.

Now since man consists of a body, and every body is composed of the four elements, he must necessarily fall subject to the very affections to which the elements are also subject—namely division, change, and flux—which belong to the body alone;

change in respect of quality, and flux in respect of emptying; for the living creature is continually being emptied both through the evident passages and through the hidden ones, of which we shall speak later.

It is therefore necessary either that an equal amount be brought in to replace what is emptied out, or else that the living creature dissolve through lack of what comes in from outside.

And since the things emptied out are dry, moist, and breath, the living creature must necessarily require both dry and moist nourishment as well as air.

—that is, of the very elements out of which we too were compounded.

For each thing is nourished by what is akin and like to it, but is treated and remedied by its opposite.

Of the elements, some we take in directly and immediately, while others we take by means of certain intermediaries—as water, which we sometimes drink by itself, and sometimes through the medium of wine and oil and all the so-called liquid fruits (for wine is nothing other than water given quality by the vine).

Likewise we also partake of fire, sometimes being warmed by it directly, and sometimes through the medium of the things we eat or drink (for in everything a greater or lesser portion of fire is sown within);

and in the same way also of air: directly by breathing it and by having it poured around us, and by drawing it in while we eat and drink, and through the medium of all the other things we take in;

but earth we never take directly at all, only through certain intermediaries (for earth becomes grain, and the grain we eat);

for larks and doves and partridges often do feed on the earth itself,

whereas man feeds through the intermediaries of seeds and tree-fruits and flesh.

And since, not only for the sake of seemliness but also for the sake of the keen sense of touch—in which, above all the animals, man excels—the Creator did not clothe us either with a thick hide as He did the oxen and the other thick-skinned beasts, nor with long, dense hair as He did the goats and sheep and hares, nor with scales as He did the serpents and fishes, nor with shells as He did the tortoises and oysters, nor with soft shells as He did the crayfish, nor with wings as He did the birds, we of necessity came to need clothing, which makes up in us for that which nature bestowed upon the other creatures.

For these reasons, then, we have need of food and clothing;

and of a dwelling-place too, both for the same reasons for which we needed clothing and food, and not least for the sake of escaping from wild beasts;

and because of the bad blends of the qualities and the disruption of the body's continuity, we came to stand in need of physicians and of medical treatment;

and since the change occurs in respect of quality, the body's condition must necessarily be brought back to its due proportion by means of the opposite quality.

For it is not, as some suppose, the physicians' aim to cool down the body that has become heated, but rather to bring it over to a well-tempered state;

for if they were to cool it down, the disposition would shift round into the opposite disease.

Man, then, has need of food and drink, on account of the emptyings and dissipations;

of clothing, because he has no strong covering by nature;

of a house, both on account of the bad blends of the surrounding air and on account of the wild beasts;

of treatment, on account of the changes of the qualities and the sensation that has been implanted in the body.

For if sensation were not present in us, we would feel no pain; and feeling no pain we would have no need of treatment, and we would perish—in ignorance of the harm—not curing the affliction.

And on account of the arts and the sciences and the needs arising from them, we have need of one another.

And because we have need of one another, many of us come together into the same place and share with one another in the necessities of life through mutual dealings; and this coming-together and joint-dwelling they named a city, so that we might reap the benefits we afford one another from close at hand and not from afar.

For man has come into being by nature a gregarious and political creature.

For no single individual is self-sufficient unto himself for all things.

It is clear, then, that cities were established on account of mutual dealings and of learning.

And man has obtained two exceptional privileges among these.

For he alone, when he repents, obtains pardon; and his body alone, though mortal, is made immortal—the bodily part being saved on account of the soul, and the soul on account of the body.

For man alone, among rational beings, has the exceptional gift of being deemed worthy of pardon in his repenting.

For neither daemons nor angels, when they repent, are deemed worthy of pardon.

And in this above all God is both shown and declared to be just and merciful.

For to the angels, who have no compelling force dragging them into sin, but are by nature free from bodily affections and needs and pleasures, no pardon is reasonably given when they repent;

but man is not only a rational being—he is also an animal.

So when, having sobered up, he escapes from these things and advances toward the virtues, he obtains just mercy—that is, pardon.

And just as the capacity for laughter is proper to his essence—since it belongs to him alone, to every man, and always—

so, among the things that come by grace, it is proper to man, beyond all the rational creation, to put off through repentance the guilt of his former sins.

For this has been granted to man alone, and to every man, and always, throughout the whole span of his earthly life;

and thus some hold that even the angels, after their fall, no longer obtain the pardon that comes from repentance;

for their fall is for them a death;

but before the fall, in likeness to the life of men, they too were deemed worthy of pardon;

having failed to do this, however, they henceforth bear, as their fitting penalty, an unpardonable and everlasting retribution.

It is clear from these things, then, that those who do not admit repentance thereby circumscribe man's exceptional gift and his proper distinction.

Proper and exceptional to him also is this: that of all the other animals his body alone rises again after death and passes over into immortality;

and he obtains this on account of the immortality of the soul, just as the other creature lacks it on account of the weakness and manifold suffering of its body.

Proper to him also are the studies of the arts and sciences, and the activities exercised in accordance with these arts.

Therefore they also define man as a rational, mortal animal, capable of receiving intellect and knowledge;

“animal,” because man too is an ensouled, sentient substance;

“rational,” so that he may be distinguished from the irrational creatures;

and “mortal,” so that he may be distinguished from the immortal rational beings.

And as for “capable of receiving intellect and knowledge”: because it is through learning that the arts and sciences come to us. Men have a faculty receptive both of intellect and of the arts, but they acquire the actual exercise of it from instruction.

They say, however, that this clause was added to the definition later.

For even without it, they say, the definition holds good;

but since some people introduce nymphs and certain other kinds of daemons—long-lived, yet not immortal—in order to distinguish man from these as well, they added the clause “capable of receiving intellect and knowledge.”

For none of those creatures learns these things, but by nature it knows what it knows.

It is a teaching of the Hebrews that this whole universe came into being for the sake of man:

directly for his sake, such as beasts of burden and oxen for farming; and grass for the sake of these.

For of the things that have come into being, some exist for their own sake, and others for the sake of something else.

For their own sake exist all rational beings;

but for the sake of other things exist both the irrational and the inanimate.

And if these came into being for the sake of others, let us consider for what kind of beings they came to be.

Is it then for the sake of the angels? But no one in his right mind would say that they came into being for the angels' sake.

For things that come into being for the sake of others come to be for those beings' subsistence, preservation, and ease.

That is, either for the succession of the race, or for nourishment, or for shelter, or for healing, or for occupation and rest.

But an angel needs none of these:

for it neither has succession of race, nor is it in need of bodily nourishment, nor of shelter, nor of any of the other things.

And if it is not for the angel, it is clear that it is not for any other nature that surpasses the angel either;

for the higher a being stands, the more does freedom from need belong to it.

We must therefore seek a nature that is indeed rational, yet stands in need of the things mentioned above.

What other such being could appear, once we leave man out of account? It follows, then, that both the irrational and the inanimate came into being for his sake.

Since, then, they came into being for his sake, as has been shown, for this reason he was also appointed their ruler.

Now it is the work of a ruler to use his subjects in due measure of need, and not to abuse them wantonly for self-indulgence, nor to treat his subjects in a harsh and oppressive manner.

Those, therefore, sin who do not treat the irrational creatures well; for they do not act as a ruler should, nor as a righteous man, according to that which is written:

"A righteous man has regard for the lives of his beasts."

But perhaps someone will say that nothing exists for the sake of anything else, but that each thing came into being for its own sake.

Let us then first separate the animate from the inanimate, and see whether the inanimate things can have come into being for their own sake.

For if these exist for their own sake, how or from where will the animals be fed? For we see that nature furnishes the animals with nourishment from the fruits and plants of the earth, except for a very few of the flesh-eating kinds;

and these flesh-eating creatures themselves make their food of the animals that graze on the earth—as wolves and lions feed on lambs and goats and pigs and deer, and eagles on partridges and wood-pigeons and hares and the like, all of which feed on the fruits of the earth.

Indeed, even the race of fishes, though it preys on its own kind, does not carry flesh-eating through to the very end of the chain, but it terminates in those that graze on seaweed and certain other things that grow in the water.

For if all the kinds of fish were flesh-eating, and none escaped the diet of flesh, they would not have been able to sustain themselves even for a little while, but would have perished—some destroyed by one another, others through lack of food.

But so that this might not happen, some of the fishes were so constituted as to abstain from flesh and to graze instead on what one might call "sea-pasture," so that by means of these the rest also might be preserved.

For the seaweed becomes food for these, and these in turn for others, and again these for yet others; so that, for the nourishment of the last in the chain, the substance of all the others is unfailingly preserved, supplied without interruption from the earthy matter found in the sea.

The argument has thus shown that the coming-into-being of plants is not for their own sake, but came about for the nourishment and sustenance of men and of the other animals.

And if these things exist for the sake of man and the animals, it is clear that the causes of their growth and generation also came into being for their sake.

Therefore the movements of the stars, and the heaven, and the seasons, and the rains, and all such things came into being for the sake of these, so that, the nourishment being continually supplied as in a cycle, the nature of the things that bear the fruits might also remain without deficiency;

so that these are found to exist for the sake of the fruits, and the fruits for the sake of the animals and of man.

It remains to inquire further whether the nature of the irrational animals too came into being for its own sake, or for the sake of man.

But surely it is absurd to say that creatures devoid of reason, living by natural impulse alone, stooping down toward the earth, and displaying their servitude by their very posture, were brought forth for their own sake.

Many things might be said on this point—so many, indeed, that they would almost require a treatise of their own; but since the present subject does not allow such length of discourse, it is fitting to come to what is brief yet to the point.

If, then, as in a mirror, we were to behold reflected in man the things of the outer world as well, we should be drawing our proofs from the very essence of the matters under inquiry.

We observe, then, in our own soul the irrational part and its members—I mean appetite and the spirited element—given to serve the rational part: the one ruling and the others ruled, the one commanding and the others commanded and rendering service to whatever needs reason may set before them, whenever a man preserves that which is according to nature.

And if the rational element within us rules over the irrational elements within us, how is it not reasonable that it should also master the irrational creatures outside, and that they should be given to it for its needs? For the irrational is by nature ordained to serve the rational, as has been shown in our own case.

This is shown also by the constitution of many of the animals, which has been made well suited for service to man: oxen and all beasts of burden for farming and the carrying of loads; the greater part of the birds and of the water-creatures and of the land-creatures for enjoyment; and the imitative ones for delight and recreation.

But if not all of them serve such uses, but some even do harm to man,

one must understand that, in addition to those made for service, all the other possible kinds have also been formed, so that nothing among the things that could possibly come into being should be lacking in the creation.

Yet not even these have altogether escaped being of benefit to men; rather, even the venomous and poisonous creatures reason turns to its own profit.

For he has put them to use for the healing of the very harm that comes from those creatures themselves, and for the cure of other ailments as well.

Such are the preparations called "antidotes" (theriacae), which reason has devised, so that by means of these very creatures it might master them, and might gain advantage from enemies once they have been overcome. And man has countless powers, given him by the Creator, that are antagonistic to these creatures and able to ward off, repel, and remedy their assaults.

For different things are suited to different uses;

even those things that are useless for other purposes are by nature fitted to contribute to the healing of man.

Now let all this be said with reference to the present condition of our human life;

for in the beginning none of the other animals dared to do man any harm,

but all were to him slaves, subject and obedient, so long as he kept mastery over his own passions and over the irrationality within himself;

but when he no longer mastered his own passions, and was instead mastered by them, with good reason he was also mastered by the beasts from without.

For together with sin there entered also the harm that comes from these creatures.

And that this is true is clear from the case of those who have lived the most excellent life.

For these were seen to be unquestionably superior to the assaults of beasts—as Daniel was over the lions, and Paul over the bite of the viper.

Who, then, could fittingly marvel at the nobility of this living creature, which binds together in itself the mortal with the immortal and joins the rational with the irrational; which bears within its own nature the image of the whole creation—for which reason it is also called a "little world" (microcosm); which has been deemed worthy of so great a providence on God's part, for whose sake are all things, both those of the present and those to come, for whose sake even God became man, and which ends in incorruption and escapes mortality?

He reigns over the heavens, having been made according to the image and likeness of God; he keeps company with Christ; he is a child of God; he is set above all rule and authority. Who could fully declare the privileges of this living creature? He crosses the seas; he ranges over heaven in contemplation; he discerns the motion of the stars, their distances and measures; he reaps the harvest of land and sea; he despises beasts and sea-monsters; he masters every science and art and method; through writing he converses with whomever he wishes beyond all borders, in no way hindered by the body; he prophesies things to come.

He rules over all things, masters all things, enjoys all things; he converses with angels and with God; he gives orders to creation, commands the daemons, investigates the nature of all that exists, busies himself with the search for God, and becomes a house and a temple of God;

and all these things he purchases by means of the virtues and of godliness.

But lest we should seem to some to be writing an encomium of man without good taste, and not merely setting forth his nature as we proposed, let us here bring the discourse to a close—even though, in speaking of the excellences of his nature, it is that very nature itself that we have been expounding.

Knowing, therefore, of how great a nobility we have come to partake, and that we are a heavenly plant, let us not bring shame upon our nature, nor show ourselves unworthy of such great gifts, nor deprive ourselves of so great an authority, glory, and blessedness by betraying, for a brief moment and a fleeting pleasure, the enjoyment of all things eternal;