No created mind...

No created mind can by any means possess the capacity to understand all, but as soon as it has discovered a small fragment of what it is seeking, it again sees other things that must be sought for; and if in turn it comes to know these, it will again see arising out of them many more things that demand investigation.

—Origen, On First Principles (214)

The Spirit and Wonder World

We cannot use electric lights and radios and, in the event of illness, avail ourselves of modern medicine and clinical means and at the same time believe in the spirit and wonder world of the New Testament. And if we suppose that we can do so ourselves, we must be clear that we can represent this as the attitude of Christian faith only by making the Christian proclamation unintelligible and impossible for our contemporaries.

—Rudolf Bultmann, "The New Testament and Mythology" (1941)

Rationality and the Fabulous Beings

Finally, though, and perhaps a mite perversely, I want to urge the essential sanity of Kirk’s approach to reality. One need not believe in fairies to grasp that there is no good reason why one ought not to do so. To see the world as inhabited by these vital intelligences, or to believe that behind the outward forms of nature there might be an unperceived realm of intelligent order, is simply to respond rationally to one of the ways in which the world seems to address us, when we intuit simultaneously its rational frame and the depth of mystery it seems to hide from us. It may be that the apprehension of such an unseen order, when it comes in the form of folklore about fabulous beings, has been overlaid by numerous strata of illusion—but so what? Everything we know about reality comes to us with a certain alloy of illusion, not accidentally, but as an indispensable condition.

—David Bentley Hart, "The Secret Commonwealth" (2009)

Utopia, Reality, and Truth

Idea and fact, utopia and reality are relative terms which constantly shift from one to the other, and if certain utopias can and must be ignored, it is not because they are utopias, that is, because they have no place in the given external reality or appear in it merely as ideas, but because they are bad ideas; and in this respect not only are they inapplicable within the existing reality, but they also have no legitimate place in the world of ideas.

—Vladimir Soloviev, Critique of Abstract Principles (1877)

'the incomparably rich experience we ask and expect of all true art'

The business of education is to give the student both useful information and life-enhancing experience, one largely measurable, the other not; and since the life-enhancing value of a course in literature is difficult to measure—since, moreover, many people in a position to put pressure on educational programs have no real experience in or feeling for the arts—it is often tempting to treat life-enhancement courses as courses in useful information, putting them on the same “objective” level as courses in civics, geometry, or elementary physics. So it comes about that books are taught (officially, at least) not because they give joy, the incomparably rich experience we ask and expect of all true art, but because, as a curriculum committee might put it, they “illustrate major themes in American literature,” or “present a clearly stated point of view and can thus serve as a vehicle for such curriculum objectives as (1) demonstrating an awareness of the author’s purpose, (2) reading critically, and (3) identifying organizational patterns in literary selections used to support a point of view.” One cannot exactly say that such teaching is pernicious, but to treat great works of literature in this way seems a little like arguing for preservation of dolphins, whales, chimps, and gorillas solely on the grounds of ecological balance.

—John Gardner, The Art of Fiction (1983)

'a happiness so fraught by an awareness of its brevity'

Things were going so well with Leonard, the mood was so promising—even the weather lending a hand because, after they finished their food and left the diner, walking back to campus, a March drizzle forced them to share Madeleine’s collapsible umbrella—that a feeling came over her like those she’d had as a girl when treated to a pastry or a dessert, a happiness so fraught by an awareness of its brevity that she took the tiniest bites, making the cream puff or éclair last as long as possible. In this same way, instead of seeing where the afternoon led, Madeleine decided to check its progress, to save some for later, and she told Leonard she had to go home and study.

—Jeffrey Eugenides, The Marriage Plot (2011)

'a pert coxcomb'

But man is a frivolous and incongruous creature, and perhaps, like a chess player, loves the process of the game, not the end of it. And who knows (there is no saying with certainty), perhaps the only goal on earth to which mankind is striving lies in this incessant process of attaining, in other words, in life itself, and not in the thing to be attained, which must always be expressed as a formula, as positive as twice two makes four, and such positiveness is not life, gentlemen, but is the beginning of death. Anyway, man has always been afraid of this mathematical certainty, and I am afraid of it now. Granted that man does nothing but seek that mathematical certainty, he traverses oceans, sacrifices his life in the quest, but to succeed, really to find it, he dreads, I assure you. He feels that when he has found it there will be nothing for him to look for. When workmen have finished their work they do at least receive their pay, they go to the tavern, then they are taken to the police-station — and there is occupation for a week. But where can man go? Anyway, one can observe a certain awkwardness about him when he has attained such objects. He loves the process of attaining, but does not quite like to have attained, and that, of course, is very absurd. In fact, man is a comical creature; there seems to be a kind of jest in it all. But yet mathematical certainty is after all, something insufferable. Twice two makes four seems to me simply a piece of insolence. Twice two makes four is a pert coxcomb who stands with arms akimbo barring your path and spitting. I admit that twice two makes four is an excellent thing, but if we are to give everything its due, twice two makes five is sometimes a very charming thing too.

—Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground (1864) (trans. Garnett 1918)

dreamers, utopians and holy fools

But the merit and the whole significance of such people as Dostoevsky reside precisely in that they do not bow down before the force of fact and they do not serve that force. Set against this crude force of 'that which exists', they possess the spiritual force of faith in truth and goodness - in 'that which ought to exist'. Not to be led astray by the apparent domination of evil, and not to renounce the inapparent good on account of it, is a feat of faith. Man's entire strength resides in this. Whoever is incapable of this feat will achieve nothing and will have no word to address to humanity. Those people who acknowledge fact [alone] live by the grace of others, but it is not they who create life. It is the people of faith who create life. These are the people known as dreamers, utopians and holy fools - these are the prophets, truly the best people and the leaders of humanity. Today we commemorate such a person.

—Vladimir Soloviev, Three Speeches in Memory of F. M. Dostoevsky (1882)

The Religious Principle, The Juridical Order

The desire to unite with the whole is the essence of what Soloviev calls the "religious principle." The contrast with the juridical order is clear: law demarcates, delimits, distinguishes, divides; religion connects, embraces, unites. Put another way, religion is about love—the loving union realized in "a mystical or religious community, that is to say, the church." Loving union with the whole of things is the absolute end.

—Paul Valliere, "Vladimir Soloviev (1853-1900): Commentary" (2007)

'All men ... are born with halters round their necks.'

But why say more? All men live enveloped in whale-lines. All are born with halters round their necks; but it is only when caught in the swift, sudden turn of death, that mortals realize the silent, subtle, ever-present perils of life. And if you be a philosopher, though seated in a whale-boat, you would not at heart feel one whit more of terror, than though seated before your evening fire with a poker, and not a harpoon, by your side.

—Herman Melville, Moby-Dick ch. 60 (1851)