The Six Marks of the Wise Man: Wisdom as Knowledge of All and of First Causes

Orientation #

He says “you have enough material in the first reading” to see that the man who knows the cause of the cause is wiser; the first reading (prev. lecture) ended with wisdom as knowledge of causes. He says the readings are “taken from Thomas’s commentary” and that after the third reading there will be an epilogue; he gets through the first three of the four points of the third reading and stops at divine envy. The next class continues with wisdom as the most divine science and the true philosopher.

The class, in order #

1. What sort of causes wisdom is about (“what causes is it about”) #

The second reading asks, since we seek knowledge of causes, which causes and beginnings wisdom is about; Aristotle answers by collecting the “thoughts we have about the wise man” (ours, not an editorial view) into a six-part description.

• Preview of the plan: from the first three marks he reasons to wisdom being about what is said of all; from the last three, to its being about causes.
• Quick argument the student could already make: you hit me; the cause is anger; but anger has a cause; the man who knows the cause of the cause is wiser, “and so on until you come to the first cause” (assuming there are first causes, which Aristotle shows in this book).

2. The six marks of the wise man (“the wise man knows all things”) #

1. Knows all things so far as possible, not each in particular (no one can), but “in some general way”: “he’s got it all together”; even the pejorative “know-it-all”.
2. Knows things difficult for man to know; sense is common to all, so sensing is not wisdom; this is why we honour the wise man.
3. More certain, more sure; so we consult the one we think wiser when in doubt (his own visits to Monsignor Dionne every Thanksgiving and Easter after his PhD, sending questions ahead; usually Dionne agreed, occasionally corrected him and was right).
   • Paradox he flags: how can wisdom be about the most difficult things and yet be the most certain? Parallel: De Anima says knowledge of the soul is excellent for its certainty, yet knowing what the soul is is among the most difficult things. His hint: Descartes’s cogito ergo sum, which (as the objectors noted) Augustine used earlier against the sceptical academics: even the doubter cannot doubt he thinks and is; “do I exist?” — “who’s asking?” So there is certitude even amid difficulty; “it may not be that wisdom is most certain in the same way that it’s about the most difficult things” — a fuller answer takes long; he leaves it here.
4. More able to teach (bracket: “the causes”): Heisenberg lecturing American physicists on quantum theory at Chicago; Niels Bohr clearing the reporters to explain the possibility of the bomb; the teacher seems wiser than his learners.
5. For itself and for the sake of knowing rather than for results — hard to see in a world “entirely given over to practice”, yet people rank Shakespeare above any carpenter or plumber, and made Einstein man of the century for knowing something, not making something.
6. Ruling, not obeying: the chief artist is wiser than the man he commands; if another directed the wise man, that other would be the wise man. Napoleon commanding the cavalry chief, the doctor commanding the pharmacist. Wisdom is the knowledge that directs all other knowledge.

• Wise man and wisdom are interchangeable formulations (“the wise man knows all things” = “wisdom is knowledge of all things”).

3. Said of all vs. cause of all (“said of all with what is the cause of all”) #

Aristotle could have argued from all six to first causes, but splits them in order to separate two meanings of “universal” that people confuse.

• universale in praedicando (said of all) vs. universale in causando (cause of all). Thomas, Summa contra Gentiles I, devotes a chapter to showing they differ: God, cause of all, is not said of all; the “I am who am” is not the being said of everything.
• Hegel’s Logic identifies the two; this leads to pantheism. The Enchiridion Symbolorum shows 19th-century German Catholic theologians repeatedly corrected by Rome for pantheistic tendencies; Küng and Rahner sometimes tend that way; Tocqueville’s chapter on democratic customs and the mind says democracy encourages pantheistic ideas (“the force be with you”). Anticipated by Spinoza; Plato made a version of the confusion by putting what is said of many (man himself) into the world by itself.
• English “general”: “soldier” is said of everyone in the army but moves nothing; General MacArthur directs the whole army. Shakespeare sees both senses: in Troilus and Cressida, Ulysses on Cressida kissed by Agamemnon: kissed by the general but “not kissed in general yet” — “that’s why I always say Shakespeare is wiser than the modern philosophers”.

4. From the first three marks to the most universal (“knows in some way all things placed under the universal”) #

1. From mark 1: knowing all things belongs to him who has universal knowledge. Objection: things are infinite. Reply: knowing what odd/even is, and that no odd is even, is knowing an infinity; a fortiori knowing number; prime and composite likewise (Euclid proves an infinity of primes, harder). So the wise man knows the most universal.
2. From mark 2: “perhaps” (because the first cause is even more difficult) the most universal are the most difficult, being furthest from the senses, where our knowledge begins. Students (especially women, he notes) complain philosophy is “so abstract” — i.e. universal, separated. Hence Thomas, ST I q. 117 a. 1 on the teacher: lead the student a propositionibus minus universalibus to the more universal, by sensibilia exempla.
3. From mark 3: recalled from the Posterior Analytics: arithmetic is more certain than geometry. Reason: the point is the unit plus position (“a point is one having position”); three points may or may not be collinear, three ones have no position. So geometry must distinguish cases (Euclid’s custom, per Heath’s notes reporting Proclus, is to give the hardest case; commentators fill in others; one is never sure all essentially different cases are covered) — arithmetic never has that problem. Principle: the more to be considered, the less sure. Natural philosophy adds matter (the earth is not just a sphere: flattened poles; a tire is circular but the bottom flattens on the parking lot, which geometry ignores); political philosophy adds custom and choice (nature vs. “21st-century American man”; Israelis and Palestinians); counting this room vs. Yankee Stadium. Now: going from more to less universal keeps adding (figure, plane, rectilineal, quadrilateral, square), so what is said of all takes the least into account and is most sure — “kind of a subtle thing”.

5. From the last three marks to the first causes (“the cause of the cause”) #

1. Mark 4: teachers give causes; the man who gives the cause of the cause (they throw things because they hate each other — why do they hate?) teaches more, up to the first cause.
2. Mark 5: knowledge desired for itself belongs to the most knowable; the most knowable in themselves (“not to us”) are the first causes, since they are most illuminating: other things are known through them, not they through what is under them; knowing the effect without the cause leaves you in the dark.
3. Mark 6: among the four causes the chief is the end; the ruling science knows that for the sake of which each thing ought to be done, the good of each and the best in all nature; one directs by knowing the end, so he who knows the end of the whole universe directs all (God, Alpha and Omega).

• Conclusion of the second reading: “the name sought,” wisdom, “falls in the same science”: the science of first beginnings and causes, one of which is the good. Greek skopos: what wisdom aims at, as at a target.

6. Third reading: four things about the kind of knowledge (“it’s a looking knowledge”) #

The second part of the proemium says four things, each leading into the next: (i) looking (Greek theoretical), not practical knowledge; (ii) the most liberal, following from (i); (iii) not a human possession, since man is enslaved in many ways; (iv) most honourable and best because most divine.

7. First sign: philosophy began in wonder (“begin to philosophize through wonder”) #

Two signs it is not a making science; the first and main one is that it arose from wonder, not hunger or thirst.

• Text: men now and at first philosophize through wonder, orderly: strange things near at hand, then the moon, sun, stars, then the origin of the universe; the wonderer thinks himself ignorant; so they sought knowledge to escape ignorance, for understanding, not use. Had it begun in hunger it would have yielded hunting or farming. (Plato said it before Aristotle.)
• philomuthos: muthos = myth/fairy tale, then any story, then (Poetics) plot; the lover of stories is in some way a philosopher because myth is composed of wonders. His brother’s friend: great literature ends in wonder, philosophy begins in wonder. Albert the Great on this passage: great poetry dat modum admirandi, teaches how to wonder. Not by chance Homer preceded the philosophers; Monsignor Dionne agreed there would have been no philosophers without Homer. “I’ve never known a good philosopher who’s not a philomuthos,” though he has known the converse; some become philomuthos as a substitute.
• His own story: the Poetics in his brother’s Aristotle caught his eye in high school; a freshman course had him read all of Shakespeare, completing his transition from a man concerned with his country’s fate to a philosopher; his brother Richard came to philosophy through fiction and drama. The Tempest: Miranda’s name is from wonder. It shows modern decadence that Shakespeare did not make better philosophers.
• Handout promised: the three main Greek texts on wonder — this proemium, Plato’s Theaetetus, and Democritus’s fragment “I would rather discover one cause than be master of the kingdom of the Persians” (the richest king then: a thousand chefs, a harem — the intense wonder of the philosopher).

8. Second sign: necessities first (“when almost all necessary things”) #

Philosophy was sought only when necessities and recreation already existed; so it is sought through no other need. His family: Swedish grandfather, blacksmith in Parkers Prairie, Minnesota; father worked and slept in a shop to attend high school in Alexandria, later got his own company; three sons all philosophers — “we know what Aristotle’s talking about”. The average student’s “but I can make a living?” shows the same.

9. Liberal vs. servile (“this alone is free among the sciences”) #

Greek and Roman society had free men and slaves; the slave exists for the master, the free man for his own sake (a fact, not a judgment). By that proportion, knowledge for the sake of shoes or dinner is servile (or mechanical) art, knowledge desirable for itself is liberal; the liberal arts are its beginning. Since looking knowledge is for its own sake, it is liberal; wisdom alone is free among the sciences, because the others are ultimately studied for its sake. Thomas: I study the body to study the soul, the soul to study the angels, the angels to study God.

10. Not a human possession: man enslaved (“the nature of man is enslaved”) #

No contradiction with the natural desire to know (that showed it possible); it means you cannot pursue it whenever you want. Kinds of slavery: to the body and its needs (unavoidable); to possessions — house to paint, grass to cut, car (his flat tire out in the sticks); Alfarabi: today each man is his own slave; to passions — Hamlet, “give me that man that is not passion’s slave” (fear, anger, eating, drinking, sex), something can be done about these; to custom, which Shakespeare calls a tyrant, and fashion (wearing the same clothes daily frees one from one slavery). Some see here an awareness of the effects of original sin.

11. Simonides and divine envy (“the divine is not able to be envious”) #

Aristotle quotes the poet Simonides that God alone could have this honour, man not being worthy to seek knowledge for itself; if the divine could envy, it would envy this. Old natural-religion idea: McNeill’s world history shows a Sumerian base with beasts, men, gods — beasts relieve man of labour, man relieves the gods, so knowledge for itself is a divine prerogative and the gods envy. Aristotle rejects it:

1. envy is a form of sadness, impossible in God;
2. envy is over another’s good seen as preventing one’s own; nothing can prevent God’s goodness. “Poets say many false things” (the proverb). Christ on Martha (active) and Mary (contemplative): “Mary hath chosen the better part … shall not be taken away from her”; Thomas and the Fathers, with Rachel and Leah as Old Testament figures of the two lives: the active life ends with this life, the contemplative continues fuller in the next. So Christ is not envious; he wants to share his knowledge. [Class ends here.]

His words #

• “the thoughts we have about the wise man”: the common opinions, not an editorial view
• “said of all” / “cause of all”: universale in praedicando vs. universale in causando
• “general” (soldier vs. general of the army): the two senses of universal in English
• “abstract”: what students mean by it — universal, separated
• “a point is one having position”: the ancient mathematicians’ definition
• “the name sought falls in the same science”: Aristotle’s conclusion that wisdom is the science of first causes
• skopos: target, what wisdom aims at
• “looking knowledge” [ed.: theoretical/speculative] vs. “making” or practical knowledge
• philomuthos: lover of myths/stories/plots
• dat modum admirandi (Albert): great poetry teaches the way of wondering
• “liberal” vs. “servile” (mechanical) arts: by proportion to free man and slave
• “not a human possession”: not usable whenever one wishes, because of man’s enslavements
• envy: a form of sadness over another’s good that seems to prevent one’s own

Texts #

Read in class

• Aristotle, Metaphysics I, second reading (six marks of the wise man; arguments to what is said of all and to first causes; “the name sought falls in the same science”)
• Aristotle, Metaphysics I, third reading, first part (wonder; necessities; liberal; not a human possession; Simonides and divine envy)

Mentioned

• Thomas, Summa contra Gentiles I, chapter that God is cause of all but not said of all
• Thomas, Summa Theologiae I q. 117 a. 1 (the teacher)
• Aristotle, De Anima (certainty and difficulty of knowing the soul); Posterior Analytics (arithmetic vs. geometry); Poetics (muthos as plot)
• Hegel, Logic; Spinoza; Tocqueville, chapter on democratic customs and the mind; Enchiridion Symbolorum
• Euclid (Heath edition, Proclus in the notes; infinity of primes)
• Plato, Theaetetus (handout); Democritus fragment (handout)
• Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida; Hamlet; The Tempest
• Albert the Great, commentary on this passage; Alfarabi on slavery; McNeill, world history (Sumerian base); Luke on Martha and Mary; Rachel and Leah

His questions #

• Who is wiser, the man who knows the cause or the one who knows the cause of the cause? The latter, and so on up to the first cause.
• How can the wise man be most certain if wisdom is about the most difficult things? Even the doubter is certain he thinks and is; wisdom may not be most certain in the same way it is most difficult — left largely open.
• Is General MacArthur “general” in the same sense that “soldier” is general? No: he is a cause moving the army; “soldier in general” has no causality.
• How can anyone know all things, if things are infinite? By knowing universals: odd, even, number, prime, composite.
• Which is more certain, arithmetic or geometry, and why? Arithmetic, because the point adds position to the unit and so more cases to consider.
• What does the student mean by “abstract”? Universal, separated.
• What is a philomuthos? A lover of myths, stories, plots; akin to the philosopher because myths are made of wonders.
• Why is wisdom not a human possession? Because man’s nature is enslaved in many ways: body, possessions, passions, custom.
• Can the divine be envious? No: envy is sadness and is over a good that prevents one’s own; neither applies to God.