The Soul That Reasons

First, then, the rational nature of the soul is strongly confirmed by the way it differs from creatures without reason. That is why ordinary speech gives them the name “irrational”: because the human race, of course, is rational. Second, it is no ordinary proof that man alone thinks about things outside himself, reasons about things that are not actually present, reflects, and chooses by judgment the better of two lines of reasoning. For the animals without reason see only what is present and are driven solely by what meets their eye, even when the consequences are harmful to them. But man is not driven merely by what he sees; he judges by thought what he sees with his eyes. Often, for example, his impulses are mastered by reason, and his reasoning is in turn subject to second thoughts. And everyone who loves the truth perceives that the human mind is distinct from the bodily senses. [a]

Because it is distinct, the mind acts as judge of the senses. While they grasp their objects, the mind sorts them out, remembers them, and shows the senses what is best. For the only work of the eye is to see, of the ears to hear, of the mouth to taste, of the nostrils to take in smells, and of the hands to touch. But what one ought to see and hear, what one ought to touch, taste and smell, is a question beyond the senses; it belongs to the soul and to the mind that dwells in it. Why, the hand can take hold of a sword blade, and the mouth can taste poison, but neither knows that these are harmful unless the mind decides. To look at it by way of a comparison, the case is like that of a well-made lyre in the hands of a skilled musician. Each string of the lyre has its own note, high, low or in between, sharp or otherwise. Yet without the musician their scale cannot be told apart and their rhythm cannot be recognized. Only when the one holding the lyre strikes the strings and touches each in tune is the scale made plain and the rhythm right. In the same way, the senses are arranged in the body like a lyre, and when the skilled mind presides over them, then the soul too distinguishes and knows what it is doing and how it is acting.

But this alone is peculiar to human beings. This is what is rational in the human soul, and by it the soul differs from the animals without reason and shows that it is truly distinct from what is seen in the body. Often, for example, when the body is lying on the ground, a person imagines and contemplates what is in the heavens. Often, when the body is still, at rest and asleep, a person moves inwardly and sees what lies outside himself: he travels to other countries, walks about, meets his acquaintances, and often by these means divines and forecasts the doings of the day. To what can this be due except the rational soul, in which a person thinks of and perceives things beyond himself?