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أكـاديـمـي ذهـبـي
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رد: Third Year's Students Come Here To Be One Hand
رقم 9
Last time we started Sidney’s Apology where he starts with speaking about the importance of poetry. It is antiquity; how it is the most ancient time of knowledge and it is the first teacher of knowledge and how people started learning from poetry and he gives different examples. He says that in all countries and in all languages we have poetry and he gives examples from different places, different civilizations, different countries, and different languages like in Turkey, India, Ireland, and in Scotland, different places where each kind of people have their own kind of poetry to show that poetry is something universal; it is found all over the world and everywhere. And he gives example of how poetry was important since antiquity by showing the name of the poet in the old times, the Greeks called him what and the Romans called him what? So, this is what we will start today.
P6
“Among the Romans a poet was called vates, which is as much as a diviner, foreseer, or a prophet.”
Because the poet was supposed to be something important and he was doing a very important job, so they called him vates.
What is the meaning of vates? ‘Vates’ is diviner or foreseer.
And Plato called him diviner; he called him half-prophet. So, to the Romans the poet was considered as a divine person; a person who speaks the words of God, or a foreseer, why? Because he uses his imagination so, he can say something that will happen in the future. He would say if you do this, what will happen. So, he can foretell the future so, he is a foreseer of the future and he is also like a prophet.
P7
“But now let us see how the Greeks named it and how they deemed of it. The Greek called him a Poet,”
What is the meaning of poet? The word ‘poet’ is not English. It is Latin; it comes from the Latin word ‘poiein’. So, ‘poiein’ is poetry in Latin. They called the poet, poiein in Latin which means to make, but Plato’s maker is different. Remember what Aristotle said, not Plato, that a poet is a maker; a poet creates and uses his imagination to invent. So, the English people took this word; a poet.
“which name hath, as the most excellent, gone through other languages. It cometh of this word poiein, which is ‘to make’; wherein I know not whether by luck or wisdom we Englishmen have met with the Greeks in calling him a maker.”
The name of the poet in Greek was to make which something of value. Then, he moves to speak about another point which is all arts depend on nature. sciences were called arts at that time because it was a talent. They did not go to a school of medicine to become a doctor. They say ‘I want to know the art of medicine’. So, they studied the art of medicine. All sciences were called arts because they depended on talents at that time. And you can find an artist with a philosopher and a physician. And this went through even with the Arabs.
لما تلاقي ابن سينا أو جابربن حيان ، ما كان حاجة وحدة كان أكثر من شي في نفس الوقت ، ما كان بروح جامعة معينة و يتعلم شي واحد.
“Only the poet, disdaining to be tied to any such subjection, lifted up with the vigour of his own invention, doth grow, in effect, into another nature,”
All arts work with nature as it is, but poetry creates another nature. Poets take nature and they add to it from their imagination. So, by so doing this they do what? They create a different kind of nature. Is not this what Aristotle said? What did Aristotle say? Poetry is a representation or an imitation of action. Poetry is representing those manners as they should be, not as they are. What is the meaning of this? The ideal form; the best form. So, is this ideal form really found in nature? Do we find a perfect human being? No. where do we find a perfect human being? Only in poetry. So, poetry presents the ideal things as they should be, not as they are, even if in poetry we have the representation of vicious person, he has to be the ideal vicious person, why? So that when he is punished, he deserves his punishment. So, this is the world of literature; the world of poetry according to Aristotle. Sidney is saying the same thing. He says that the nature that is presented in literature; in poetry, is a better nature than the one that we have in reality, why? Because the poet creates his own nature; he adds to the nature. There is imagination, he adds from his imagination. This is what Wordsworth also says later on. They all ttake the idea from Aristotle. So, here he says, ‘Only the poet, disdaining to be tied to any such subjection’. Now, he is not ties to those subjects of nature as they are. But what does he do? He is lifted up with the vigour of his own invention. What is this vigour? Where does he get it from? From his imagination.
“doth grow, in effect, into another nature, in making things either better than nature bringeth forth, or, quite, forms such as never were in nature,”
This is the nature that is found in poetry. And of course he is Sidney; he is a poet, so of course he does not forget to put an image here and there and a metaphor here and there and he says,
“Nature never set forth the earth in so rich tapestry as divers poets have done;”
He imagines that the poets are like divers and they dive into nature to bring the best of it and represented it from their own imagination to bring a perfect picture of nature. So, he gives another image. He says,
“neither with pleasant rivers, fruitful trees, sweet-smelling flowers, nor whatsoever else may make the too-much-love earth more lovely; her world is brazen, the poets only deliver a golden.”
If I want to describe the world of nature, I will say, for example, it is like a precious valuable metal and he has two metals here; he says, if the world of nature is like bronze; it is like brazen, what would be the world of poetry? It would be golden. He says, ‘her world is brazen, the poets only deliver a golden.’
If I say that nature in the world is very precious and I want to liken it to certain method, I say it is like bronze which is a valuable metal, now if I want to compare this quality of nature which is like bronze to the quality of nature that is found in poetry, I will find that in poetry the nature there is more precious because it is more perfect. And this is why in poetry we have heroes like Cyrus.
Cyrus: hero
Cyrusمن حوال 10 سنين، كان في الكمبيوترات فايروس، أول فايرو يكتشفوا لخبط الدنيا كلها، كان اسموا
They called it Cyrus because it damaged.
So, in poetry the poets create Cyruses; they create heroes, why? To teach people. Now, these heroes are perfect models for people to follow whether they are good or bad. If they are good, they follow and if they are bad to avoid. Then, he moves to Aristotle and he quotes Aristotle a lot and he says that he agrees with Aristotle.
P9
“Poesy, therefore, is an art of imitation, for so Aristotle termeth it in his word Mimesis,”
Mimesis: This is the word for imitation. This is the Latin word given by Aristotle for imitation. Aristotle said poetry is imitation of action. The word Aristotle used for imitation in Latin was the word ‘Mimesis’. It is very famous word and nowadays, we have ‘to mimic’. You can have it in English ‘mimicking’. What is the meaning of ‘to mimic’? to imitate. And there are many kinds of arts depending on mimicking like the pantomime. (Panto) one person without a voice. Mime: imitate. So, he was the first to use the ‘Mimesis’.
“that is to say, a representing, counterfeiting, or figuring forth; to speak metaphorically, a speaking picture, with this end, to teach and delight.”
He said that poetry is imitation. It is Mimesis. And it has an aim. What is the aim of poetry? To teach and delight. Now, he says that there are three kinds of arts that teach. What are these arts? The first one is religion; religion teaches. It is an art and teaches. It is given through verse; it is given through poetry. Philosophy is given also through poetry and it teaches. And here he says that philosophy has three kinds; moral philosophy, natural philosophy, and historical philosophy. And they all teach. But poetry teaches and delights. So, this is what he says here,
“Of this have been three several kinds. The chief, both in antiquity and excellency, were they that did imitate the inconceivable excellence of God. Such were David in is Psalms; Solomon in his Song of Songs, in his Ecclesiastes and Proverbs; Moses and Deborah in their Hymns;”
These are different religions which imitate the words of God, like David in is Psalms; Solomon in his Song of Songs, Moses, all those prophets who imitate the words of God.
P10
“The second kind is of them that deal with matters philosophical: either moral, as Tyrtaeus, Phocylides, and Cato; or natural as Lucretius and Virgil’s George; or astronomical as Manilius and Pontanus; or historical,”
These all are arts that teach. But the third indeed is the poet.
“For these third be they which most properly do imitate to teach and delight; and to imitate borrow nothing of what is, hath been, or shall be; but range, only reined with learned discretion, into the divine consideration of what may be and should be.”
This is how it teaches and he takes this delight to woo an end. What is the difference between poetry, philosophy and religion? delight. Now, what is the meaning of delight according to Sidney? To delight is not just to make happy but to delight according to Sidney is to move people to action. If you are delighted, you will be convinced, so you will imitate. This is the imitation; the connection between delight and imitation. You can just read, but you never try to imitate, why? Because you are not convinced; you are not delighted. But to be delighted is a step towards action. So, this is what he says here.
“These be they that, as the first and most noble sort, may justly be termed vates; so these are waited on in the excellentest language and best understandings with the fore-described name of poets. For these, indeed, do merely make to imitate , and imitate both to delight and teach, and delight to move men to take that goodness in hand, which without delight they would fly as from a stranger; and teach to make them know that goodness whereunto they are moved;”
What is the use of telling you that this is good or bad without making you do the good and stay away from the bad? Now he moves to this important thing. ‘To imitate’ is to teach. What the aim of imitation? It is to teach. And poetry not only teaches us, but it also delights. What is this delight? It is to move people to act because if you are taught without being moved to action, then what is the use of being taught? You have to use what you have learned into action; connect and write, use all the information and all the knowledge you have in your mind. Use it and act. If you do not do this, there is no use of what you are taking. This is Sidney. We have to benefit from those people; these are philosophers and critics, they have said something that has lived from 16th century up till now. There must be something of value in it. We have to look for that value and make use of it. Then, he moves to another point and that is the different kinds of poetry. He says the different arts that teach, the last one is poetry. What does poetry do? It teaches and delights. How does it teach and how does it delight? What are the different kinds of poetry? So, he is speaking about poetry. He says,
“These be subdivided into sundry more special denominations. The most notable be the heroic, lyric, tragic, comic, satiric, iambic, elegiac, pastoral, and certain others, some of these being termed according to the matter they deal with, some by the sorts of verses they liked best to write in-”
Some of them are named or termed after the kind they are describing and some according to the meter they are using, but all they are different kinds of poetry which is different from verse; poetry is something and verse is another thing. What is the meaning of verse? Rhymed poetry is verse. Not all poetry is verse. Shakespeare’s dramatic poetry was written in blank verse. Many of the modern poets do not have particular rhyme. So, not all poetry is verse and not all verse is poetry. Poetry teaches and delights. Sometimes we have rhymes, not all sentences, that are rhyming, are called poetry. You can have to two words that rhymed that have no connection. You can have two sentences with rhyme in them, but they do not teach anything and they do not delight. So, here he says,
“Indeed but apparelled, verse being but an ornament and no cause to poetry,”
It is an ornament; it is a way of decoration. Itis rhyming.
“since there have been many most excellent poets that never versified, and now swarm many versifiers that need never answer to the name of poets.”
Many poets at Sidney’s time were writing what appears to be poetry, but it was only rhyme; verse but not poetry. There is no depth in it; there is no meaning, there is no delight and so on.
So, he is explaining here the difference between rhyme and verse and poetry because later on this particular point is going to be used in the objection. So, I will not explain it again. Now let us go another thing concerning poetry. What is the aim of poetry according to Sidney? Now all those critics, who spoke about poetry, spoke about what is the nature of poetry, what is the aim of poetry, who is the poet, what is a poem, and this is why we call them critics. But they never actually criticize the works of other people. This is why we say the criticism as a genre, that we are doing now, was only found in the 20th century. It was not found then. Then, they were writing about poetry. When Wordsworth wrote, he wrote about poetry. He did not write about anybody else’s poetry, but about what he was doing. So, Sidney here is trying to explain to people what he thinks poetry should be.
Now, he moves to what he thinks to be the aim of poetry.
“Now, therefore, it shall not be amiss, first to weight this latter sort of poetry by his works, and then by his parts; and if in neither of these anatomies he be condemnable,”
Now, he says if we take the poem and we try to find out what it speaks about,
“I hope we shall obtain a more favourable sentence.”
What will we find if we read a poem? If we read a poem, what should we look for? What is the aim that the poet writes the poem for?
1-Purification of wit.
2-Enriching of memory and enabling of judgement.
3-Enlarging of conceit, which commonly we call learning, under what name soever it come forth or to what immediate end soever it be directed.
(this is an imagination, having many images and enlarging our knowledge because the more we have conceits, metaphors and images, the more we gain knowledge. The more we connect between words, the more we come to know.
4-To lead and draw us to as high perfection as our degenerates souls, made worse by their clayey lodgings.
But what is the final; the most important of all of these is to lift our soul. Now, here of course as a poet he gives it in a kind of metaphor. And this is reminding us of Plato’s division of the soul, the inferior and the superior. But according to the 16th century and the beginning of modern science, the body was divided into two parts; the higher which includes the mind /reason and the lower which includes the emotions and the desires and the instincts. Now, our body is made of what? Our body is made of clay. So, he calls it here the clayey lodging. ‘Lodging’ is a place to live in. What is living in that body which is made of clay? The soul. So, poetry lifts up the soul towards perfection which our bodies are falling it (the soul) down by its desires. Do you remember the chain of being? Now, man is in state where above him there are angels and below him animals. If he tries to transcend, he is perfecting himself and trying to be an angel. And if he is degrading himself, he is trying to become like an animal. So, the soul inside the body, the body falls it down to the animalistic desires whereas its reason is following it upward. What is the thing that feeds the reason and nourishes the reason? According to Sidney, it is poetry because it is giving the knowledge that lifts it up. He is using this image to show the quality of poetry and the aim; what poetry should be doing. Now, this is the aim of poetry. In order to show this noble aim of poetry, he makes a comparison poetry, philosophy, and history.
P12
“wherein, if we can show, the poet is worthy to have it before any other competitors.
Among whom as principal challengers step forth the moral philosophers; whom, me thinketh, I see coming toward me with a sullen gravity,”
So, he starts with philosophy. He gives first the different kinds of sciences and arts and he says that poetry comes above all of them. And from all these arts, the best arts that really teach are philosophy, history and poetry. And in order to show that poetry is the best, he makes this comparison with philosophy and history. He starts with philosophy saying that what does philosophy teach? Now, the aim of philosophy is to teach, to teach what? What is the utmost value that he should learn in our life? What is the best kind of manner? What is morality? What is the best thing that we should be learning? Virtue. So, all kinds of learning should be teaching virtue. And this is the aim of philosophy. Philosophy teaches virtue. Why did Plato banish poets? Because it does not teach virtue. It keeps you away from virtue and from truth. So, here he says,
“These men, casting largess as they go of Definition, Divisions, and Distinctions, with a scornful interrogative do soberly ask whether it be possible to find any path so ready to lead a man to virtue, as that which teacheth what virtue is,”
In order to teach virtue, what did they do? They teach what is virtue; the definition of virtue. Philosophy teaches the definition of virtue. Each philosopher gives his own definition.
P13
“and teacheth it not only by delivering forth his very being, his causes and effects, but also by making known his enemy, vice, which must be destroyed, and his cumbersome servant, Passion, which must be mastered, by showing the generalities that containeth it,”
Philosophy is not only teaching what virtue is. But to explain what virtue is, they have to give also together with virtue its opposite; its enemy, vice which must be destroyed. You have to learn virtue and destroy vice. How would you destroy vice? What is the main element of the body that serves vice? Passions. So, they teach virtue and its causes and effects and they teach also its enemy; vice, and it cumbersome servant, passion. How do they teach this? By showing the generalities that contain it. They give general ideas; abstract ideas. So, this is the main aim of philosophy= to teach virtue, vice and to speak about passions in general ideas; how to be virtuous, what are the causes of becoming virtuous and what are the effects.
What is about history? What does history teach?
“The historian scarcely giveth leisure to the moralist to say so much,”
The historian is not a moralist. The philosopher is a moralist; he teaches virtue, so this is morality. But the historian is not a moralist. The historian simply tells you what is happening, giving you facts whether what is happening good or bad. He does not comment on that. He does not tell you to do this or not to do that. He only gives you facts.
“but that he, laden with old mouse-eaten records, authorizing himself for the most part upon the notable foundation of hearsay, better acquainted with thousand years ago than with the present age,”
So, the historian depends on what? Does he depend on new facts or old facts? On hearsay; what we inherit, very old facts. But the historian does not speak about what is now or what is coming in the future. So, he is better acquainted with a thousand years ago. The historian is acquainted only with history; what happened in the past. But he never tells us about virtue. If people are to be virtuous, what should be doing or the actions that are happening, are they good or bad, he never tells us this. He only simply tells us what is happening.
Sidney as a poet again imagines a comparison between the historian and the philosopher. He imagines a conversation between them and he has the historian here speaking to the audience comparing himself with the philosopher. So, let us see what he is saying and of course from this we come to learn what philosophy is and what history is.
“The philosopher, saith he, ‘teacheth a disputative virtue, but I do an active.”
The philosopher only teaches virtue in abstract general way. But I teach people by giving them examples; giving them action.
“His virtue is excellent in the dangerless Academy of Plato, but mine showeth forth her honourable face in the battles.”
When do people learn philosophy? In schools and academies which is very safe. You are here sitting and learning and there is no danger. So, philosophy is taught in academies which are dangerous. But where does the historian get his material from? From history; from real action.
“He teacheth virtue by certain abstract consideration, but I only bid you follow the footing of them that have gone before you. Old-aged experience goeth beyond the fine-witted philosopher; but I give the experience of many ages.”
Now, the philosopher is giving you his own opinion; his own experience, which depends on his age. If he is an old man, then he is going to use his own experience to try to convince you. But in history, the historian depends on the old experiences of all the people who came before.
“Lastly, if he make the song-book, I put the learner’s hand to the lute;”
So, the philosopher writes the book; shows you the words. He writes the sons; the words, but it is the historian who shows you the way as if he has an a music instrument like a lute and he puts your finger on the keys to show how to play the lute. The philosopher tells you only what the lute is. He writes the words, but can you sing those words. It is the history that shows you the way.
“If I be the guide, I am the light.”
Philosopher guides you and tells you where to go. If you go this way, you will reach virtue and if you go that way you will reach vice. He tells you where to go. But how to do that? This is the history. History gives you the light and shows you the way. It lights your way to tell you put your step here and put your step there. So, this is the comparison between history and philosophy.
What’s about poetry? Where does poetry stand from all this?
“Now whom shall we find, since the question standeth for the highest form in the school of learning, to be moderator?”
Who here is the best in the school of learning? Who is to be called the moderator?
P14
“Truly, as me seemeth, the poet; and if not a moderator, even the man that ought to carry the title from them both, and much more from all other serving sciences. Therefore compare we the poet with the historian and with the moral philosopher; and if he go beyond them both, no other human skill can match him.”
He will say why the poet is better than the philosopher and the historian.
“The philosopher therefore and the historian are they which would win the goal, the one by precept, the other by example;”
If we compare philosophy and history with all other arts, they are the best in teaching. One teaches virtue by giving the precept; the idea and the concept, and the other by showing the example which is history. They both teach virtue; one by telling you what virtue is, giving the concept of the virtue, and the other by showing you the examples of virtuous people. But they do not tell you what to do.
“but both, not having both, do both halt.”
One has the idea without the example and the other has the example without teaching you the concept or the idea.
“For the philosopher, setting down with thorny argument the bare rule, is so hard of utterance and so misery to be conceived,”
The philosophy gives you hard words to be understood. Philosophy is very difficult.
“that one that hath no other guide but him shall wade in him till he be old, before he shall find sufficient cause to be honest.”
If I want to be honest and I want to be virtuous and I am following philosophy, it will take me a long time to understand, so I will be very old when I will become honorable and honest. So, the road of philosophy is too long because it is very difficult. And this is what he will say later on. He says, only the learned can understand philosophy.
“For his knowledge standeth so upon the abstract and general, that happy is that man who may understand him,”
Philosophy is abstract.
“On the other side, the historian, wanting the precept, is so tide, not to what should be but to what is, to the particular truth of things and not to the general reason of things, that his example draweth no necessary consequence,”
He gives the example, but what is the consequence of the example? What is the lesson I learn from this example the historian never thinks? He leaves it for you to discovery.
“Now doth the peerless poet perform both;”
He gives the concept and the example, how? By giving what he calls here the perfect picture.
“for whatsoever the philosopher saith should be done, he giveth a perfect picture of it in some one by whom he presupposeth it was done, so as coupleth the general notion with the particular example. A perfect picture, I say; for he yieldeth to the powers of the mind an image of that whereof the philosopher bestoweth but a wordish description,”
The philosopher describes the perfect picture only by words whereas the poet describes the perfect picture by images; examples. So, this is done by images and by different examples and we have here many examples given by history. The n he says another thing which is different from history that in poetry we have poetic justice. In history, history tells us only what has been done without showing us the consequence, without showing us the result, but in poetry we have the result which is in poetic justice; the reward of the good and the punishment of the bad.
P16
“For conclusion, I say the philosopher teacheth, but he teacheth obscurely, so as the learned only can understand him; that is to say, he teacheth them that are already taught. But the poet is the food for the tenderest stomachs;”
(For the weak mind) He makes them understand.
“But now may it be alleged that if this imagining of matters be so fit for the imagination,”
Aristotle himself calls poetry very philosophical, why? Because poetry deals with universal consideration and particular examples. The philosophy teaches and poetry gives examples, this is why it is a perfect picture; it gives perfect patterns; perfect examples to be followed and this is the best way of teaching which is to move to action. And he concludes this two pages later.
At the end of page19:
“I conclude, therefore, that he excelleth history, not only in furnishing the mind with knowledge, but in setting it forward to that which deserveth to be called and accounted good; which setting forward, and moving to well-doing, indeed setteth the laurel crown upon the poet as victorious, not only of the historian, but over the philosopher, howsoever in teaching it may be questionable.”
In conclusion, he says that poetry is better because first of all it gives the idea and the example and it excels that by showing the way, and by moving people to act. So, this is a comparison he gives between philosophy and history.
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