Animus, anima, mens, et al. April 24, 2008
Posted by voidobsequy in Lucretius, Philosophy, Pleasure.Tags: Add new tag
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So, I looked over the Latin for the passage we briefly discussed at the end of the last class. This is III.135-145 or so. Briefly, our translation says that the mind and spirit form a substance. The ruler of the body is reason, called mind or intelligence.Later we hear that the rest of the soul is obedient to the will and mind.
Well, in Latin, we’ve got that the animus (mind/will/soul) and the anima (soul/breath/life) are fused in one natura (nature, not substance!) The ruler is the consilium (reason/judgement/will) which we call animus and mens (mind/intellect). The rest of the anima (same word as earlier!) is obedient to the numen (divine will/divine presence/god) and mens.
I’m just going by my abridged Oxford Latin dictionary here for the translations. So, two things jump out at me. First, where we have soul and spirit, the original just has anima. Second, natura is almost always best translated as nature, in my (well, pretty limited) experience. Substance fits the context, but it feels like a jump from the Latin.
A few other issues. I’m not totally clear on this, but I think “animus” is generally something like the mind and “anima” is generally something like an animating principal. Also, “consilium”, “animus” and “mens” all seem to identified with each other. Now, what to do with “numen”? Both our translation and the old Loeb give “will” for this, so maybe we should trust them. I’m just not that familiar with the term.
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After consulting Long and Sedley (14B), I think I have a better understanding of the distinctions Lucretius is drawing:
1. One can think of mind (animus) and spirit (anima) as together constituting the soul, for which Lucretius does not have a separate word. The point is that these two account for all the functions traditionally assigned to the soul, in which different faculties/parts (vegetative, sensitive, rational) are located.
2. Lines 136-7 could be translated as “the mind [animum] and spirit [animam]… constitute one nature” or “one substance.” Lucretius is arguing that they are neither distinct things nor distinct kinds of things–a point reinforced at 3.421ff: “See that you couple both [mind and spirit] under a single name: when, for example, I proceed to speak of ’spirit’, proving that it is mortal, assume that I mean ‘mind’ as well, inasmuch as they constitute between them a unity and an interlocked entity. First since I have proved that it [spirit] is a delicate construction of minute bodies, and made of much smaller primary particles than the flowing liquid of water or cloud or smoke….” (L&S tr. but ours is essentially the same).
3. Given this, ‘cetera pars animae’ at line 143 could be translated “the rest of the soul,” as our translation has it, or “the remaining part of the spirit,” as in Long and Sedley. Either way we are talking about the fine matter that is distributed throughout the body (nerves) and is responsive to the command of the mind (heart/brain).
4. Long and Sedley take ‘animum mentemque’ at line 139 to be introducing these terms as synonyms. They use ‘mind’ for both, where our translation has (not unreasonably) “mind or intelligence.”
5. ‘Numen’ can mean divinity or god. But literally it means ‘a nod’, and more generally, some sort of authoritative assent: a command, will, authority (Lewis and Short). So we have: the rest of the spirit/soul obeys the mind and moves in response to (ad) its command and impulse.