Wisdom (Metaphysics 2006, Colorado)
5. Ability and Beginning: Mover and Matter, and Thomas's Texts on Power (with Shakespeare and Mozart Asides)
https://berquistcourse.com/course/philosophy/7b-wisdom-2006-colorado/005-ability-and-beginning-mover-and-matter-and-thomass-texts/

[0:00] let's come back upon some things here in this first reading before we go on the second reading, which you may not go on till this afternoon.

[0:12] We've spoken here about the universality of consideration of ability and act, and how, in some senses, one of the most, if not the most, universal considerations here in the books of wisdom, and how consideration of ability and act not only will illuminate being

[0:36] and illuminate the first cause and so on, but also it casts some light upon the causes, the four kinds of causes. Now, if you take the fundamental distinction here of ability, the ability to

[0:56] change another, right? There is other, or the ability to be changed by another, right? Do you see any connection between those two senses of ability and two of the four kinds of causes? huh?

[1:15] Agent and matter. Yeah, they seem to tie together with the agent, the mover, as you call that kind of cause. And the matter, right? And now I don't know if you studied the words beginning, cause, and element there in the beginning of the fifth book, but Thomas the beginning in the commentary of the physics or the eight books of natural hearing explains a little bit about beginning, cause, and elements.

[1:44] You probably read that somewhere, and how the word beginning is more general than cause. Every cause is a beginning, right? But not every beginning is a cause. And beginning, say that the point is beginning the line, but not a cause of the line. But among the four kinds of causes, which Aristotle sometimes uses the word, you'll see in the in the physics, beginning and cause almost interchangeably, right?

[2:10] Because he's thinking of beginning in that sense. But if you look at the definitions of the four kinds of causes in either the physics or metaphysics,

[2:25] which ones seem to connect right away with the idea of beginning in their definitions? Yeah, yeah, the matter and the mover, right? Certainly not the end. The end doesn't seem to be beginning. If you look at the at the reading on beginning, which is the first reading in the fifth book of wisdom, the sixth and last meaning given there, beginning is the one where in finally appears to be in some sense a beginning, right?

[3:05] It's first in intention, huh? I say. The first meaning of beginning in the fifth book of wisdom is the edge of the table here. That's the beginning of the table, right? And then

[3:20] the or the beginning of the road, right? And then second meaning of beginning is where it's convenient on the road to begin. And the third meaning of beginning is a little more like matter, the fundamental part of a thing, huh? Like the foundation is the beginning of a house, huh? Then the fourth meaning of beginning is tied up with the mover. And then the fifth meaning of beginning is the beginning in in our knowledge.

[3:49] And on the sixth meaning, right, you start to begin. Well, all causes are to some extent a beginning. If you examine the definition of end, which is that for the sake of which you don't see so clearly, then it's a beginning. Or the definition of form as the definition of what was to be, what was to be, looking towards the end again, right? But matter is defined as that from which something comes to be, existing within it, and that goes back to the idea that a beginning is that from which something goes forward in some way, huh?

[4:28] And in the definition of the mover, you have even more explicitly, as we define the mover as whence first there is a beginning of motion. And seems almost you know Aristotle is unnecessarily multiplying the words, but examine very carefully the words. Whence first there is a beginning of motion. You have the idea of a beginning there, right? But it's more a beginning in some sense than the matter is, because the wood doesn't begin to move into being a table until the carpenter does.

[5:12] So he's whence first there is a beginning of motion, huh? Is it? So in both the definition of mover and the definition of matter, you seem to have something of the idea of beginning, and more explicitly than you have in the case of form or in the case of end. Now they'll have their time later on in this book, right? When they get to talk about actually the third part mainly.

[5:46] But you can see here a connection with matter and mover, right? And perhaps that you know explains a little bit what you find when you read the great Greek natural philosophers, because none of them seems to talk about end as a cause, huh? And the guy who talks mainly about form, in some senses, this crazy Pythagoras, right? But he's coming in from mathematics where all you have is form, so you know he's tyrannized by the custom of thing.

[6:23] But these you know guys that are natural philosophers, not importing things from math, right? But are starting from the sensible world, they all talk about some kind of matter, water or air or fire or earth or some combination of these. And then some of the later guys, a little bit like Heraclitus a bit, but Empedocles and Anaxagoras, they talk about the mover, right? So for the most part, you'd say the only cause they talk about is the matter and the mover, right?

[6:54] As if those ones are therefore what more known to us, but certainly more known to us as beginnings or sources of motion. And here you're talking about the abilities, you know, that there are in reference to motion. So I think it's interesting to see there's a correspondence in a way between the first two abilities he distinguished, which I think are the main ones to emphasize here, the ability in a sense to move another or to be moved by another, and the connection with these two kinds of causes, the mover and the matter, right?

[7:27] And through matter, you're able to be moved by another, and that's why a science that's about things that involve matter is a science about things that involve motion. But the mover is the source, most of all, of the motion of the matter.

[7:47] So I think that's a good comparison, and to see how this consideration here is already casting some light. At the same time, you can see the general point I was making at the beginning of class that the distinction of these senses of ability is both a distinction of the kinds of ability there are in the real world, right, and to some extent some of the kinds of causes there are in the real world, and also it's a distinction of senses of the word ability, and also corresponds to some, in a way, to the third and the fourth senses of beginning, right?

[8:36] You know, I simply identified the third sense with matter, right? It's dealing with the fundamental part, the foundations being of the house, the keel of the ship, and so on. Aristotle's not quite sure which is the first in body, right? The natural body.

[8:53] Now, going to give you just a few little tidbits here from other places where Thomas touches upon these things, and incidentally, in the Society for Aristotelian Studies on the on the web, there, if I want to put it that way, what I'm trying to do is in those works of Aristotle, which will come under the heading Lyceum, which is the name of Aristotle's school, under the heading Academy, under that thing will come the Platonic things.

[9:28] But under Lyceum, if you go in there, you'll eventually come to the different parts of Aristotle's works and the individual works. But if you have a work that the great Thomas Aquinas has a commentary or maybe more exact an exposition of, right? What I intend to do is to put in one, two, three. First, the text of Aristotle, and eventually put the text of Aristotle at Lexio, that reading in the Greek, right?

[10:00] And if we have an English translation, maybe you know a little crutch there, you know. But the text of Aristotle is the first thing, right? And then the second thing is Thomas's commentary, his Lexio, on that particular reading, right? And the third thing is what I call a note on that reading, right? Okay. And in the note, I will bring in sometimes. Texts from other places that happen to clarify something, make something explicit.

[10:35] Maybe it isn't in there. Maybe a few of my own thoughts that occur in thinking about the text and so on. It's a little more freelance. It's not meant to replace the text of Aristotle or Thomas's lexio. Those are the fundamental things. But some things that even the lexio maybe are not made explicit, right? And I don't try to put in that note. You know, if Thomas has a consideration of the same thing twice, right?

[11:03] Well, no, you can go read those two, right? But sometimes in a text where he's talking about something else, you would know there's something in there that clarifies some particular point. So there's a kind of ad hoc quality to it.

[11:18] And we'll eventually post these things. I won't read too much about getting down the exact sources here, but some interesting things. His first text is from Thomas's scriptum on the first book of the sentences, in distinction forty-two, question one, article one, solution. Interesting little thing he has here. He says the name of potentia, which is the Latin word for power, first was impositum,

[11:55] laid down, placed upon, to signifying the power of man. Okay. St. Aristotle doesn't have a dimension here, right? Insofar as we say that some men are potentes, powerful men, right? As Thomas says in the fourth tractatus of his metaphysics, chapter two. And then it was what translatum, carried over to natural things.

[12:27] We see that a lot when you start to examine these words we use in actual philosophy. A lot of them come from what human society, right? The obvious ones like the word law, you know, were first used in human society, then carried over and applied to something there. Right. That's interesting little point there, not that it's earth shaking, but it's something that isn't explicitly in the text of Aristotle or explicitly in the text of Thomas's lexio that you've read that, right?

[13:03] Now a second little thing in the same text from the sentences, going back now to the men, right? He seems among men to be powerful, who can make what he wants to do, right, without impediment. And according as he is able to be impeded, so his power is what minuitura, diminuitur. Now the power of someone is impeded, would it be the power of a natural agent, right, or of a voluntary agent, in so far as it can be acted upon by another, right?

[13:49] In quantum potest pati ab aliquo Hence he says, in the ratio or definition of power, as regards its first imposition, it seems to belong that it's non posse pati, can't suffer. Which in a sense of the third sense he gave there, right? They see a connection between the third sense and the first sense, right? That I'm able to move, then right, as I will, right, because no one can stop me, right?

[14:21] No one can act upon me to slow me down, right? So my ability to not be acted upon, right, seems in some way to correspond to my ability to act upon you people freely. Do you see the idea? Hence

[14:43] also that which is not able to what undergo, right? What is durable? You might say, even though it's not able to do anything, right? We call potens. So you might use that third sense even for something that can't act upon something else, right?

[15:04] Just as that is called dura, that has the power that it not be what cut, right? It's hard to saw a stone in half or something, isn't it, right? It resists that, right? Even though the stone doesn't seem to do anything, right? But there's also a he's pointing out kind of a second connection of the third sense of ability with the first one, right? The first connection of the text that Aristotle has is that the third sense is an ability not to be acted upon by the mover, right?

[15:41] So you're referring back to the mover even in that definition, right? But then he's pointing out another connection that it seems to belong to the man who's really powerful, right? That there's nobody around to stop him. You see? So he's pointing out another connection there. These little things like that to add a little bit of further understanding, right? Things, huh? Okay.

[16:10] Now a number of texts here where Thomas explains in what way we should understand the definition of power or ability. By the word beginning, as beginning, in a way, signifies a relation. One is always a beginning of something other than oneself. And there's an axiom

[16:45] of beginning, which Aristotle uses. It seems to me in the first book of Natural Hearing, when he's talking about Parmenides and Melissus, Parmenides and Melissus are saying that everything's one.

[17:02] There's no multiplicity in the world. It's all one. Aristotle says, "Well, this does away with with beginnings and causes. Why? Because nothing is a beginning of itself. So if there's a beginning, the beginning is something other than itself. Therefore, there's some distinction. And it's like the the axiom I was giving you of before and after, right? Nothing is before or after itself. Those are axioms.

[17:31] Incidentally, you know Aristotle doesn't enumerate very many of the axioms or state them explicitly. In the fourth book of Wisdom, he spends a long time on the axioms that are the beginning of all the other axioms, the axioms of being and non-being. It's impossible to be and not be at the same time in the same way. One must. It's necessary that to be or not to be at the same time in the same way.

[17:59] And he says these are the natural beginning of all the axioms. But apart from that, he doesn't explicitly identify axioms. There's another axiom. Our good friend, Euclid enumerates some axioms that are, but even he doesn't enumerate all of them. So I think one should make a point sometimes of recognizing some of the other axioms as you seem to recognize them, see them. It seems to me that nothing is a beginning of itself is is an axiom.

[18:31] Certainly not a private beginning of any piece of knowledge knowledge. It's the beginning of all of them. And I think that nothing is before or after itself is another axiom.

[18:44] So there are examples besides a whole with more than a part. It's now this is stock example. Now this text here is from the De Potentia. Question one, article one, not three. Replied to the objection.

[19:04] Thomas says, "Potentia is said to be a principium a beginning, not because it is that relation itself, which is which the name of beginning signifies, right? But because it is that which is a beginning. Okay. So this is casting some light upon how to understand that definition. Is an ability

[19:36] fundamentally a beginning, or is it fundamentally something that is a beginning? Wow. Now this text is from the Summa Theologiae, from the Prima Pars, question forty-one, article five, reply to the first objection. Potentia, he says, does not signify ipsum relationem principii. It doesn't signify the relation of beginning. Otherwise, he says it would be in the genus of relation. Is that what it is?

[20:29] But it signifies that which is a beginning, not to be sure as the agent is said to be a beginning. Now he's making a distinction, right? Even though we saw a connection between the first sense of beginning, right, and the agent or the mover, right, and that second sense of beginning and the matter, right. But now he's making another distinction there, right?

[21:00] Not as the agent is said to be a beginning, but as that by which the agent acts. id quo, right? So the ability, which he first defines,

[21:21] is not the same thing as the mover, right? Who's also beginning in some sense, right? But is that it's that by which the mover moves something?

[21:43] It's an excuse in the case in the Trinity, but you know, not concerned. The rest of why the distinction is being made there, right? It's very important, but we're gonna go to the Trinity today.

[21:56] Moderation. Okay. Now another text here from the De Potentia, question two, article two, the Body. Although the ratio principii right belongs to power, right,

[22:23] and principle or beginning is in the genus of relation, right. Nevertheless, that which is a beginning of action or a passion, of action undergoing, is not a relation, right? But some absolute form, right? Now, when Thomas uses the word absolute, don't think of these crazy moderns talking about the absolute. Absolute is always distinguished from relative, right? So when Aristotle or when Thomas is distinguishing the second, third, and fourth categories, quantity and quality and relation, he distinguishes those from the first one because they don't signify what the individual substance is, but he distinguishes from the last six because it signifies something in, right?

[23:21] The individual substances. By the last six, sort of you are representing something outside of you. My clothes are not really in there. Um. But quantity and quality and relation are really in there. But he distinguishes quantity and quality from relation because quantity and quality are in me absolutely, while relation is in me towards another, right? Okay. So I really am a teacher, but towards another, right? While in myself, I'm healthy or I'm.

[23:59] I got the size I have, or something of that sort, right? So absolute is is distinguished from relative, right? Doesn't mean absolute in this vague sense that the moderns use, huh? So he's saying that ability is not a relation, right? Okay. Even though there belongs to ability the ratio of a beginning, right? Which is in the genus relation, but rather it's aliqua forma absoluta. It's an absolute form.

[24:33] The hexis is saying that. Okay. At idest, and that is the essentia, potentia, right? And now he gives a very important thing for you students: the categories. Now I don't know if you know the categories that well,

[24:59] but the order in the categories is very surprising. In the categories, when he enumerates the ten categories, it's substance, how much, how or quality, and then towards what or relation, right? But when he considers them, the order is a little different: substance, quantity, and then you expect quality, but no, he takes up relation next. Towards something, and then quality. Why does he do that?

[25:39] And the great Porphyry imitates that in the Isagoge, as he enumerates them. At first, he says genus, difference, species, property, accident. Takes up genus first, then difference. No, genus first, then species, then difference, right? Then property and accident. Why does he reverse that? Great, great care, great care with which Porphyry writes, huh? Well, difference is before species in being, but since genus and species are defined towards each other, it makes sense to take up genus and species together first.

[26:23] Now, there's a different reason I think in the categories, and that is that some things that are fundamentally qualities have a certain relation following upon them. So, for example, knowledge, right? Knowledge is a quality, and a quality in the first species of quality, a habit or a disposition. But knowledge is always knowledge of something, just as a double is always double of something. And when Plato, the teacher of Aristotle, defined relation, he did so by saying it's that which is said to be of another or towards another in some way.

[27:05] Well, then knowledge would turn out to be a relation, and fundamentally, knowledge is not a relation but a quality, but a quality that has a certain relation following upon it. So Aristotle has to correct the definition of relation and say that relation in the strict sense is that whose whole being, whose whole nature, is to be towards another, right? While knowledge is not its whole nature is not to be towards another; it's a disposition of our mind fundamentally, but then has a relation to the thing known.

[27:41] So in later on in Latin they called the first anything that's said to be another relativa secundum dici, right? Because it's said to be of another, but something whose whole nature is to be towards another, which is nothing in itself, absolutely like like double, right? What is double? You know, conveniently, right? You know, it's only something towards another, right? That they call that relativa secunda secunda, okay?

[28:11] That's why he had to clear up that thing before he did it, right? Well, that comes back here now. St. Thomas has learned that from the Categories, and now he's going to illuminate us as to potency, right? So let me read the first paragraph again, and then second paragraph where he makes a beautiful comparison for students of the Categories. Although the ratio, huh? Of beginning, right, of principle, belongs to power, right?

[28:39] It's in the very definition we saw from the philosopher, right? He defined the beginning, the power, as the beginning, right? Of change and another and so on. So, although he says the ratio of beginning belongs to power, and beginning is in the genus of what relation? Nevertheless, that which is the beginning of acting upon or undergoing is not a relation, but it's some absolute form, right? It's a quality or quantity, and of course, it's a quality, you know.

[29:13] And that is the essentia, right, of power. It's not a relative, secundum esse, and hence it is that the philosopher, meaning, you know, hence it is that the philosopher places potentiam, right, not in the genus of relation, but in that of quality. In the second species of quality, the categories, just as scientia, science, although some relation happens to what? Both of them, right? It necessarily happens to both of them.

[29:55] Okay, you see there. So this casts a light upon our understanding of the definition of ability in the first reading from the ninth book, and it's not brought out in Thomas's lexio on that, right? But he happens to touch upon it in another text, you know. So when I become aware of this, you know, I'll put that in in my little note when this ninth book is noted, and and occasionally maybe you know will add to that note, you know, because you happen to read some text, hey, this clarifies something that I didn't I didn't fully understand that thing before.

[30:37] This this brings in something, okay. And this last one is not so important for us right now, but just added here. He's talking about the essence and the power of God, right? This is again from the De Potentia, question one, article one, and the reply to ninth objection.

[31:04] He says the essence of God suffices for this that God act to it, but nevertheless, potentia is not superfluous. For potentia, super addit adds an addition, secundum intellectum, right?

[31:30] Solem, only. The relation of beginning, for the essence of God, the nature of God itself, from this fact that it is a what, principio agendi, it's a source or beginning of that. It has the ratio of a power or ability. Okay. So when you talk about the nature of God, the essence of God, the substance of God, and the power of God, you're talking about two things.

[32:05] No, and so you might say, "Well, why talk about the power of God if he acts through his his substance, his nature, right? " Well, to speak of the power of God is not to talk. In reality, about anything in addition to his what, essence or power, but in your understanding, right? You realize that the divine substance, the divine nature, the divine nature, is a beginning of what.

[32:34] Change and others, right? It's the beginning of even more than that, right? But in that way, it has the definition of a what, power or ability, right?

[32:49] So the definition of ability as beginning of change. That's just that you know, circling. Let's say virtue is praiseworthy. Well, it's it's more than that. See, you know, it has to be defined. You know, using a beginning, right? See, or you don't have to. You can define human virtue later on or moral virtue without praiseworthy, right? You know, it's a habit existing in the middle towards us is determined by right reason, right?

[33:22] So praiseworthy it doesn't appear in the complete or perfect definition, right? But in the definition of ability, you have to understand what that it's the beginning of motion or something of this sort. And that's true even in God, right? You see, that you have to bring in beginning, right? In the same way, you can't understand knowledge without being knowledge of something. Who was the modern philosopher? I forget.

[33:58] Some guy. I don't think it's Schopenhauer, but some some guy who was studying in the school of Hegel, right? Or some or was it Hegel or Fichte? One of those guys. He said, "Now, it's to think about something." Okay. Everybody's thinking about something in class. Okay. Now think absolutely. Because I can never do it. I can only think about something. I couldn't think absolutely.

[34:24] Well, in the sense, you know, it'd be like saying the same thing about knowing, right? You know something, yeah. Okay. Now. Just know, okay. Don't know anything. Just know. Well, you can't understand knowing or knowledge without understanding that it's knowledge of something, right? There can't be knowledge is and knowledge does something. You can't really understand what knowledge is without knowing that it's knowledge of something. But is that relation what knowledge is fundamentally?

[34:54] You see, or is that something that you know essentially falls upon it? And Thomas is saying that what is true about knowledge, and this is you know would be clear to a student who had the the categories with Albert and Thomas and Ammonius and so on, would see, yeah, like scienzia, you know, what categories that belong. Fundamentally, scienzia knowledge is placed in quality under the first species of quality, having a disposition.

[35:33] And likewise, ability right is placed fundamentally in the species of quality under the second species of quality. there from, nowhere if you know that chapter. But they both have a relation falling upon them, and that's essential understanding them, right? I don't think you could define them, you know. So I wouldn't say it's like the the comparison you make there to the definition of virtue as a praiseworthy quality, right?

[36:03] And then later on you define virtue intrinsically, within praiseworthy is no longer a part of it. It's a little bit like you know, if if geometry proceeded like the sciences proceed, but it doesn't. And as if you knew triangle as a rectilinear figure, rectilinear plane figure with the least sides. Okay, suppose that was the first definition, which it wouldn't be in geometry. But suppose you had that first, right?

[36:34] Then you figured out that the least straight lines you could use to enclose a space would be three. You can't do it with two. That alone one. You need at least three lines. Well, now you know that the triangle, the rectilinear plane figure with the least sides, is is a triangle, right? Three-sided plane figure. Now, how would you define triangle?

[37:00] Well, now the new definition of triangle would be a rectilinear plane figure contained by by three straight lines, right? And and least number of lines would what? Not be part of the definition, but it would be let's say a property, maybe of what a triangle is, right? Like it's kind of a property of virtue to be praiseworthy, right? That's not in the very definition of it, but it's in the very definition of Aristotle defining things here, right?

[37:27] It's in the very definition of ability that it's a beginning of motion in another. Or motion from another, right? Or a source of resisting being moved by another, right? So you can't define without beginning.

[37:58] Well yeah, you gotta be careful there because that's a very difficult thing when you get into distinction between what they call analogous word sometimes and and one that's metaphorical, right? Because they're both based upon likeness, but the metaphorical likeness is more distant, right? And you don't really, by

[38:30] reason of likeness, carry the name over, like you do in the case of the proportional name. You don't really know one in that sense essentially to the other.

[38:52] That time of year thou mayest in me behold, yellow leaves are few to hang on those boughs. So you compare old age to the end of the year, right? Or like the Pericles said, when the young men have been killed, this spring have been taken out of the year. Beautiful metaphor, right? And it's based upon a what proportional metaphor, right? Which are the most beautiful metaphors that Aristotle teaches us.

[39:20] And yet, spring and youth are they really to be named one from the other? Youth is the spring of life. Old age is the winter of life.

[39:41] Prime of life—that's the summer of life, right? Just name Gibbons, you know. If you read his autobiography, you know, and his letters, his fame is now established. You know, he's looking forward now to autumnal felicity because he can now sit back and be praised by everybody, you know, and admired by everybody. He can just relax, take life easy. Then his health starts to fail. It all falls apart.

[40:17] In the end, but but that's the expression—the autumnal felicity, right? You know, so that's before you get into the winter, you know, where your really your powers are really weakest in the winter. Before he knows it,

[40:32] but you can see that the likeness there is is so distant you couldn't really reason from it. And you couldn't really know one from the other, but there's a certain likeness there, referring to the Stanley Chamberlain being impossible. No, no, the likeness is not such that you would name one from the other, right?

[40:58] That you would impose the strict sense of name, because of that. But when you place the wordability upon the piano, right? It's playable, right? It's playable because of Walter Gieseking, you know. I heard Walter Gieseking one time in concert, and I've never heard an audience so attentive to a pianist. He's playing solo piano there, and in the artist series there, Minneapolis, and you actually hear a pin drop.

[41:38] I heard them so responsive. He began the concert course with Mozart. He goes through the repertoire and so on. So when he finished the concert course, everybody clapped, and he had to play an encore. And so they clapped louder and longer. The second encore, he went through about eleven encores, right? And each time he'd play an encore, they would clap louder and longer. So you got to stop this thing.

[42:02] So what does he do? He starts. He plays Clair de Lune, you know, which was a symbol to everybody, you know. You know, TVCBS, you know, you know, this is good night.

[42:17] For a while, he wouldn't let him in the country after the war because he'd play for Hitler, you know, like he had any choice. Yeah, yeah. Anybody was associated with Hitler, you know.

[42:30] And with Gieseking, you know, he recorded the whole Mozart's solo piano music in the old days on the seventy-eights, you know, at the. It was about eleven LPs, you know, on Angel Records, and the his mark was, you know, he finished almost it. There's only Mozart. My sentiments. A few exceptions, you know. But

[42:59] it's like Washington Irving had at the end of his life, he's finishing his last great work there, which is the play for George Washington, huh?

[43:10] And his nephew Pierre, who wrote the biography, I mentioned the other, but he was helping him into some research and so on. And he records a conversation there of Irving, you know. It's really idle for himself, who was the most famous author almost of his time. Idle for us to claim any credit, you know. Shakespeare said it all. Shakespeare says, and he won two others, but that's it.

[43:33] We shouldn't claim anything. What Shakespeare said at all. There was one guy who had a photographic memory, and I know Shakespeare like that, and he would challenge anybody to produce from any poet, any line, and any emotion or feeling, wherever it is. He'd capitalize Shakespeare, and he always did it. So I mean, it's. I guess they they study even Shakespeare's vocabulary. Just is it humongous the size of his vocabulary?

[44:05] Incredible. Probably the largest vocabulary anybody ever had. I guess. Let's get to understand this. There is many more things to admire in Shakespeare than the size of his vocabulary.

[44:22] It just he didn't seem to invent plots, but he seemed to take those. Yeah, well, my my favorite praise I don't have with me here now, but my my favorite praise of Shakespeare is Lorenzo, is in the new Hudson Shakespeare there, in As You Like It, huh? He takes off from the fact that Shakespeare didn't try to be that original as plots.

[44:51] I'll show you that praise sometimes. He turns that to his advantage. Now Shakespeare was was in no way a victim of what fashion, right? The universal was interested, right? Was was was natural, right? And it would

[45:14] be beautiful. I won't try to recite the eulogies. We really one of the most impressive ones. It's my favorite one I've always seen. I mean, there is no end to the praise of Shakespeare. I mean, it's

[45:27] great. Praise of Mozart and everything. Well, no, I I always end up my praise of Mozart with the quote from Wagner that I gave somebody the other day. You know, I go through all the, the inductively all the different composers who have praised Mozart, but for this or for that, huh? And I was mentioning how, you know, Brahms, for example, you know, so admires Marriage of Figaro, and he says, you can't understand how anybody could do this.

[45:57] I mean, every number is perfect, you know. He says this has never been done before. I mean, you know, just you know, and you go through, you can find, you know, for almost every famous piece of Mozart, somebody knows. I just, you know, and then I said, you get through with all this, one is inclined, right, to agree with Wagner's judgment, and then I quote Wagner, where he says, Mozart is above all the masters, in all the arts, and in all the ages.

[46:27] I don't say I agree with that. I say I tend to agree with it. But I mean, it'd be hard to say, you know, who else you'd say it about, huh?

[46:37] Not even Shakespeare. Those are kind of music and Shakespeare kind of songs. The remark of Einstein, right? Albert Einstein, who said composers Mozart, of course, but he says you know Beethoven seems to have made his music, right? And Mozart seems to have what, found it, huh? Mozart's music seems to have been always a part of the universe. That's a beautiful way he says it, huh? It reminds me of an observation of my brother Mark, huh?

[47:10] He's talking about one can't really imagine world literature without Roman Juliet, huh? It just had to be there, right? You know, and it's a little bit like like Einstein's observation, right? It seemed to have been part