Dante. An essay. To which is added a translation of De Monarchia.

by R. W. Church; Dante Alighieri

IV.—Those men to whom all our subsequent reasoning is addressed, when they assert that the authority of the Empire depends on the authority of the Church, as the inferior workman depends on the architect, are moved to take this view by many arguments, some of which they draw from Holy Scripture, and some also from the acts of the Supreme Pontiff and of the Emperor himself. Moreover, they strive to have some proof of reason.

For in the first place they say that God, according to the book of Genesis, made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; this they understand to be an allegory, for that the lights are the two powers,[284] the spiritual and the temporal. And then they maintain that as the moon, which is the lesser light, only has light so far as she receives it from the sun, so the temporal power only has authority as it receives authority from the spiritual power.

For the disposing of these, and of other like arguments, we must remember the Philosopher's words in his book on Sophistry, "the overthrow of an argument is the pointing out of the mistake."[285]

Error may arise in two ways, either in the matter, or in the form of an argument; either, that is, by assuming to be true what is false, or by transgressing the laws of the syllogism. The Philosopher raised objections to the arguments of Parmenides and Melissus on both of these grounds, saying that they accepted what was false, and that they did not argue correctly.[286] I use "false" in a large sense, as including the inconceivable,[287] that which in matters admitting only of probability has the nature of falseness. If the error is in the form of an argument, he who wishes to destroy the error must do so by showing that the laws of the syllogism have been transgressed. If the error is in the matter, it is because something has been assumed which is either false in itself, or false in relation to that particular instance. If the assumption is false in itself, the argument must be destroyed by destroying the assumption; if it is false only in that particular instance, we must draw a distinction between the falseness in that particular instance and its general truth.

Having noted these things, to make it more clear how we destroy this and the further fallacies of our adversaries, we must remark that there are two ways in which error may arise concerning the mystical sense, either by seeking it where it is not, or by accepting it in a sense other than its real sense.

On account of the first of these ways, Augustine says, in his work Of the City of God,[288] that we must not think that all things, of which we are told, have a special meaning; for it is on account of that which means something, that that also which means nothing is woven into a story. It is only with the ploughshare that we turn up the earth; but the other parts of the plough are also necessary.

On account of the second way in which error touching the interpretation of mysteries may arise, Augustine, in his book "concerning Christian doctrine," speaking of those who wish to find in Scripture something other than he who wrote the Scripture meant,[289] says, that such "are misled in the same way as a man who leaves the straight path, and then arrives at the end of the path by a long circuit." And he adds: "It ought to be shown that this is a mistake, lest through the habit of going out of the way, the man be driven to going into cross or wrong ways." And then he intimates why such precautions must be taken in interpreting Scripture. "Faith will falter, if the authority of Scripture be not sure." But I say that if these things happen from ignorance, we must pardon those who do them, when we have carefully reproved them, as we pardon those who imagine a lion in the clouds, and are afraid. But if they are done purposely, we must deal with those who err thus, as we do with tyrants, who instead of following the laws of the state for the public good, try to pervert them for their own advantage.

Oh worst of crimes, even though a man commit it in his dreams, to turn to ill use the purpose of the Eternal Spirit. Such an one does not sin against Moses, or David, or Job, or Matthew, or Paul, but against the Eternal Spirit that speaketh in them. For though the reporters of the words of God are many, yet there is one only that tells them what to write, even God, who has deigned to unfold to us His will through the pens of many writers.

Having thus first noted these things, I will proceed, as I said above, to destroy the argument of those who say that the two great lights are typical of the two great powers on earth: for on this type rests the whole strength of their argument. It can be shown in two ways that this interpretation cannot be upheld. First, seeing that these two kinds of power are, in a sense, accidents of men, God would thus appear to have used a perverted order, by producing the accidents, before the essence to which they belong existed; and it is ridiculous to say this of God. For the two great lights were created on the fourth day, while man was not created till the sixth day, as is evident in the text of Scripture.

Secondly, seeing that these two kinds of rule are to guide men to certain ends, as we shall see, it follows that if man had remained in the state of innocence in which God created him, he would not have needed such means of guidance. These kinds of rule, then, are remedies against the weakness of sin. Since, then, man was not a sinner on the fourth day, for he did not then even exist, it would have been idle to make remedies for his sin, and this would be contrary to the goodness of God. For he would be a sorry physician who would make a plaster for an abscess which was to be, before the man was born. It cannot, therefore, be said that God made these two kinds of rule on the fourth day, and therefore the meaning of Moses cannot have been what these men pretend.