The search for the Real takes us outside ourselves. We may seek the Real in experiences, possessions, distant lands, or other people. These soon enough reveal themselves as distractions. But what about ideas and theories? Are they simply a more lofty sort of distraction? “Travelling is a fool’s paradise” said Emerson. Among lands certainly, but not among ideas?
If I move from objects of sense to objects of thought I am still moving among objects. To discourse, whether in words or in thoughts, is to be on the run and not at rest. But is not the Real to be found resting within, in one’s innermost subjectivity? Discourse dis-tracts, pulls apart, the interior unity.
Noli foras ire, said Augustine, in te redi, in interiore homine habitat veritas. “Do not wish to go outside, return into yourself. Truth dwells in the inner man.”
Recent Comments