Ethics 245
constitution and does not stop straining and flailing until he gets to his feet.
- Therefore, all [animals] have an awareness of their own constitution and
that is the source of their very expeditious handling of their limbs. We
have no better evidence that they come into life equipped with this
knowledge than the fact that no animal is clumsy in handling himself.
10. "The constitution is," he says, "according to you, the leading part
of the soul in a certain disposition relative to the body. How can a baby
understand this, which is so complex and subtle and hard even for you
to explain? All animals ought to be born as dialecticians so that they can
understand that definition, which is opaque to most Roman citizens."
11. Your objection would be valid ifl were saying that animals understood
the definition of constitution and not the constitution itself. Nature is
more easily understood than explained. And so that baby does not know
what a constitution is, but does know his constitution; he does not know
what an animal is, but he knows that he is an animal. 12. Furthermore,
he understands that constitution of his vaguely and in outline and dimly.
We too know that we have a soul; what the soul is, where it is, what it
is like or where it came from-that we do not know. Our awareness of
our own soul (despite our ignorance of its nature and location) is to us
in the same relation as the awareness of their constitution is to all animals.
It is necessary that they be aware of that through which they are also
aware of other things; it is necessary that they have an awareness of that
thing which they obey, by which they are governed. 13. Every one of us
understands that there is something which sets our impulses in motion;
but we do not know what that thing is. Thus babies and animals also
have an awareness, neither very clear nor distinct, of the leading part
in them.
14. "You say," he says, "that every animal first finds his own constitu-
tion congenial [to himself]; but a man's constitution is rational and so
man finds not his animality but his rationality congenial [to himself]; for
man is dear to himself in virtue of that part which makes him a man.
So how can a baby find congenial a rational constitution when he is not
yet rational?" 15. There is a different constitution for every age; one for
the baby, one for the child, , one for the old man.
All find the constitution which they are in congenial. A baby lacks teeth;
he finds that constitution congenial. His teeth appear; he finds that
constitution congenial. For the plant which will turn into mature crop
has a different constitution when it is tender and barely poking its nose
out of the furrow, another when it gains strength and stands, admittedly
with an unripe stalk but one able to support its own weight, and another
when it ripens and gets ready for the threshing floor and the ear firms
up; it looks to and adapts itself to whatever constitution it achieves. 16.
