Monday, January 09, 2006

Science of the experience of consciousness

Soul has a self-increasing account [logos].

—Heraclitus, as quoted by John Stobaeus, who falsely believed he was quoting Socrates (Anthology III i 174-180, Diels-Kranz B 115)

*******

Ich lebe mein Leben in wachsenden Ringen,
die sich über die Dinge ziehn.
Ich werde die letzten vielleicht nicht vollbringen,
aber versuchen will ich ihn.

Ich kreise um Gott, um den uralten Turm,
und ich kreise jahrtausendlang;
und ich weiß noch nicht: bin ich ein Falke, ein Sturm
oder ein großer Gesang.

—Rilke, from The Book of Hours, First Book, The Book of the Monastic Life

2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Rilke attended to business academy [sic!], and one could try to imagine the reaction of one of his former teachers reading Rilke's lines quoted above.

His first thought could have been as follows: "Rilke ... of course, still a little scatterbrain! makes to much fuss about trivial facts, why can't he simply write: 'Ich bin ein Baum und brauche Raum!' One line instead of four!"

This teacher's next association is almost determined by necessity: the rule of thumb for estimating the amount of solid cubic meter of wood.

1/11/2006 2:07 PM  
Blogger Carl said...

"Ich bin ein Baum und brauche Raum!"--try that line on the Lokalbahn when you'd prefer to sit alone. Then: "Sie wissen vielleicht nicht wieviel Holz es in einem kubischen Meter Baum steckt?"

1/11/2006 4:39 PM  

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