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The First Treatise - CHAPTER VII
Having proved that the Latin Commentary could not have been a capable
servant, I will tell how it could not have been an obedient one. He is
obedient who has the good disposition which is called obedience. True
obedience must have three things, without which it cannot be: it
should be sweet, and not bitter; entirely under control, and not
impulsive; with due measure, and not excessive; which three things it
was impossible for the Latin Commentary to have; and, therefore, it
was impossible for it to be obedient. That to the Latin it would have
been impossible, as is said, is evident by such an argument as this:
each thing which proceeds by an inverse order is laborious, and
consequently is bitter, and not sweet; even as to sleep by day and to
wake by night, and to go backwards and not forwards. For the subject
to command the sovereign, is to proceed in the inverse order; because
the direct order is, for the sovereign to command the subject; and
thus it is bitter, and not sweet; and because to the bitter command it
is impossible to give sweet obedience, it is impossible, when the
subject commands, for the obedience of the sovereign to be sweet.
Hence if the Latin is the sovereign of the Vulgar Tongue, as is shown
above by many reasons, and the Songs, which are in place of
commanders, are in the Vulgar Tongue, it is impossible for the
argument to be sweet. Then is obedience entirely commanded, and in no
way spontaneous, when that which the obedient man does, he would not
have done of his own will, either in whole or in part, without
commandment. And, therefore, if it might be commanded to me to carry
two long robes upon my back, and if without commandment I should carry
one, I say that my obedience is not entirely commanded, but is in part
spontaneous; and such would have been that of the Latin Commentary,
and consequently it would not have been obedience entirely commanded.
What such might have been appears by this, that the Latin, without the
command of this Lord, the Vernacular, would have expounded many parts
of his argument (and it does expound, as he who searches well the
books written in Latin may perceive), which the Vulgar Tongue does
nowhere.
Again, obedience is within bounds, and not excessive, when it goes to
the limit of the command, and no further; as Individual Nature is
obedient to Universal Nature when she makes thirty-two teeth in the
man, and no more and no less; and when she makes five fingers on the
hand, and no more and no less; and the man is obedient to Justice when
he does that which the Law commands, and no more and no less.
Neither would the Latin have done this, but it would have sinned not
only in the defect, and not only in the excess, but in each one; and
thus its obedience would not have been within due limit, but
intemperate, and consequently it would not have been obedient. That
the Latin would not have been the executor of the commandment of his
Lord, and that neither would he have been a usurper, one can easily
prove. This Lord, namely, these Songs, to which this Commentary is
ordained for their servant, commands and desires that they shall be
explained to all those whose mind is so far intelligent that when they
hear speech they can understand, and when they speak they can be
understood. And no one doubts, that if the Songs should command by
word of mouth, this would be their commandment. But the Latin would
not have explained them, except to the learned men: and so that the
rest could not have understood. Hence, forasmuch as the number of
unlearned men who desire to understand those Songs may be far greater
than the learned, it follows that it could not have fulfilled its
commandment so well as the Native Tongue, which is understood both by
the Learned and the Unlearned. Again, the Latin would have explained
them to people of another language, as to the Germans, to the English,
and to others; and here it would have exceeded their commandment. For
against their will, speaking freely, I say, their meaning would be
explained there where they could not convey it in all their beauty.
And, therefore, let each one know, that nothing which is harmonized by
the bond of the Muse can be translated from its own language into
another, without breaking all its sweetness and harmony. And this is
the reason why Homer was not translated from Greek into Latin, like
the other writings that we have of the Greeks. And this is the reason
why the verses of the Psalms are without sweetness of music and
harmony; for they were translated from Hebrew into Greek, and from
Greek into Latin, and in the first translation all that sweetness
vanished.
And, thus is concluded that which was proposed in the beginning of the
chapter immediately before this. _
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