Iain McGilchrist, Rupert Sheldrake and Alex Gomez-Marin in conversation
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 29 ก.ย. 2024
- In this three way conversation, Iain McGilchrist, Rupert Sheldrake and Alex Gomez-Marin discuss the brain, the mind, resonance, morphic fields, where information is stored, the role of science today and their life, education and career paths.
To find out more about the work of Dr Iain McGilchrist including his latest book, The Matter with Things, visit channelmcgilch...
To find out more about the work of Dr Rupert Sheldrake visit www.sheldrake.org
To find out more about the work of Dr Alex Gomez-Marin visit behavior-of-or...
I had a non-weapons plasma physicist boyfriend back in the day who was a "proud atheist"...he had a really violent reaction when I suggested to him that "Science" itself had become a religion, and that's why it has come to form a rivalry with institutional religion, and that they are now often mirroring each other with dogma, priesthoods, etc.
Belief and thought systems are mightily powerful -- and fragile -- constructs.
Such a pleasure and so stimulating to listen to these two original thinkers discussing things that really matter, and Alex is a brilliant moderator and asks the most interesting questions. Thank you. These are conversations that, unfortunately, are no longer part of my world, but there is always TH-cam to expand my mind if I look in the right places.
excellent listening...thank you
Thompson Nancy Wilson Brian Taylor Laura
"Universites should be a refuge for battling geniuses; they have become infested with agreeable midwits." Evolutionary Psychologist, Dr. Edward Dutton.
Aka, The Jolly Heretic.
Or worse, infestations of wokeness.
I wish there were places where true intellectual curiosity was the basis for congregation
@@MattAngiono The Old Royal Institute when they met on the full moon so that there was enough light to travel to the meetings?
Outstanding chat. That 7 year period of Iain's of simply following curiosity isn't surprising in the least: the polymathic breadth and depth of his writing is awe inspiring. Thanks.
Thank you gentlemen for a wonderful conversation.
Hearing these chaps giggling and cracking jokes is balm for the weary soul
This was a really great conversation, I hope you have more!
I have been waiting for just this conversation! Thank you very much Dr. Alex Gomez-Marin.
What a treat! Thank you!
McGilchrist and Sheldrake in conversation ,my kind of academics.
I would love to see a conversation with Iain, Rupert and Matthias Desmet on resonance. I think this would be an amazing conversation. Matthias talks about resonance, quite a bit, as a possible remedy to many psychological phenomena.
Resonance can no less apply to mass formation or psychosis.
Amidst exposure to intolerable disturbance as a result of an undermining of identity/worldview the mind can seek to discharge the overwhelm to a state of limited and mitigated pain that is not relationally present or now, but dissociated to a personally & socially reinforced masking against reliving such exposure. Hence the need for scapegoat.
Coherent resonance is presence or relational being.
When we meet what we hate (In ourselves) there is a triggered resonance to a past that is usually preverbal or induced from a family or cultural conflict running as part of its current expression.
There is a vid of Manel Ballister with Tom Cowan - hard to follow - but a unfolding story that moves from heart transplant theatre to energy healing - via the helical heart as the regulating or balancing of the organs of the body with its parts and the whole body/brain with its nesting electromagnetic environment - which is the Earth - that nests in and interacts with its Star's plasmasphere of fluctuating solar charge. It didn't have the physiological vido of the helical heart but you can search and find the unfolding of a mammalian heart on YT easily.
So people who were on 'death row' in terms of queing for heart transplant regained health function via therapies of 'resonant' healing.
Ideas about anything can run virtually but if we do live our curiosity and passion are hearts lose core function to become the pump they are conventionally assumed to be.
So refreshing to see such a relaxed intelligent "meeting of minds" 😇....an intricate three dimensional discourse ! 🚴🚴♂🚴♀...👌
Great minds!
Gosh, imagine having the feeling and experience of freedom, to explore ideas and investigate. Such privilege these men have had...
Yes indeed how lovely to be able to share with mines like this, however we can also share by exploring our own consciousness, Perhaps meditation and other mind expanding occupations
Here is a true account of something I personally experienced one morning. When I awoke I was initally shocked because I imagined I'd lost an arm. As it turned out the arm was just incredibly numb due to the fact I had slept on it and cut of the blood supply but the significant point is that it felt as if it still existed in a different position and so when I first reached out with my other hand out it just landed on the empty space next to it. This came as a great shock of course, since for a moment I really believed I'd lost my arm. But the experience then became odder because upon reaching around and discovering my real arm again I had carefully manuoevred it back until it aligned with the "phantom arm" - the place where the arm still seemed to be. What I discovered was that once "reconnected" I could operate it again. But - being of a scientific mind - I next wondered what would happen if I moved the real arm away from its phantom position again, and sure enough it went back to sleep again. That's my recollection of the incident after nearly 40 years and some details may be missing, but the point is that for a few moments I seemed to have a real arm (although numb to the point to being completely insensitive) and a "phantom arm" that remained stuck in one position and (more remarkably) that I could temporarily make these two limbs coincide and disassociate again.
Lovely! I suspect there maybe fun analogies here with other power structures, for instance politics - politicians being 'in touch' or 'out of touch' with the electorate.
@@peterfrance702Politicians being in touch? I assume you're joking!
@@waterkingdavid They are in touch with the part of the electorate that is immensely wealthy - called contributors (bribists) - and out of touch with everybody else ;-)
Enjoyed this fireside chat immensely, you would do us all a great service and meet again soon. Truly.
I did the "research grant/unemployment money" thing after I quit my last job. It was an immensely valuable time, after which I found a vocation that suits my character and leaves me enough spare time to engage in my creative endeavors.
Not listened yet, but two (actually three) of my favourite thinkers in the same room! Fantastic! Can't wait for later on.
Listening was a delightful accompaniment during work today. Wonderful to hear these two in conversation and so ably hosted by Alex (in person as well) ❤
Wonderful interview. Thank you, Alex! I wish Iain and Rupert had run more deeply into boyhood remembrances of Nature. For me, Natural philosophy seems most rooted in actual sense experience, likely from this youthful and free heart-place of sensual consciousness. Ragged, unschooled Curiosity ramped to high vibration. One day revisit such feeling places?
Such nature stories, I think, could inspire parent and caregivers to say--"Go Outside and play"; and to set healthy boundaries too...permitting natural "gasp" at climbing trees and engaging in other perceived dangers.
Dream conversation!
Regards the piano playing. i intuitively want to keep melody in the right hand- in the same feeling as wanting to write with a pen with the right. I may be wrong or bias about that. And also the guitar. In fingerpicking style the right hand is possibly the most dexterous but otherwise it’s used for rhythms mainly which is counter piano. I would be interested to know about the experience of professional players who are left handed. But something tells me something completely different happens and applies to ‘music’ compared to other things.
I love the fact that Rupert has the epistemic humility (and theory of mind!) to say “I don’t know…” then go on to apply a hypothesis he’s been working with for more than 30 years without assuming that Iain (or anyone else listening) know his hypothesis.
I liked that too!!!!
Thank you, Rupert Sheldrake for having Ian McGilchrist and Alex Gomez- Marin for this enlightening discussion. The beauocracies of higher learning and those that choose to think outside the box and choose a different path. Both are incredibly important, an education opening up to challenge a newness to allow the individual to come up with exciting new ideas are important.
With the deepest appreciation and respect for your examples within and outside institutions.
Really great, as was suggested several times before, to have these kind of exchanges. Now for something completely different !!!, Extend these exchanges to for example with Bernardo Kastrup and Federico Faggin ( beta oriented science) and several others. As Federico stated in one of his interviews , this all is about a different kind of WELTANSCHAUUNG a different kind of very deeply understanding and experiencing of ALL, in principle, both individually and macro/cosmologicsl as ar as possible for us as HUMANS
How could you test that there was resonance via a field, that coordinated the left and right hemispheres?
Sheldrake is hilarious - loved this conversation
The most wonderful hour of the day, enjoying this wise and inspirational conversation. As a non-native English speaking non-academic I wish we could mobilize an increasing number of listeners for your thoughts. Perhaps by organizing (in due course) texts and explanations which would make it accessible to non-academic people?
Classical music to the womb (more complex the better) from around the first trimester..
Dear Ian, have you seen the article in New Scientist about a month ago about the discovery of the electrome? The researchers filmed a tadpole developing over 24 hours and used a light sensitive film or something like that and saw to their amazement a glow of light caused by an electric current emanating from the tadpole which seemed to mark the point at which the eye of the tadpole should form as it then immediately started to form at that point. They manipulated the light/current and the eyes formed in a different ("wrong") place.
If a piano had first been built in Baghdad the keys would probably have had the keyboard arranged around the other way. Hilarious. I once watched an entertainer play a piano stood on his head ….. that was hilarious as well. For me Rupert has worked out that more things are unexplainable than Iain has.
Mirror neurons maybe?
As in one born with no arms having phantom limbs. Humans being the imitators that we are, and one born with no arms may during life mentally imitate others that have arms and mirror neurons take effect and give a phantom limb.
Thank you all, especially Alex!, for bringing in pertinent perspective on education
Two very smart men, marvellously educated, but I must say they are total amateurs on the creative mind. They look at it from the outside as observers. High time to invite true creatives, the ones that do not naturally have high browed discussions and sophisticated language but nevertheless must be heard. Step down Iain and let in ‘the other side’ to speak for themselves. There is much to learn if left would really offer back the analysis to the right on a human level. Intuitives speak a different tongue and are now forced out of their zone to be heard. You scientists have to go explore physically in that realm. How? Ask me, and be surprised at the new horizons opening up. Iain has only, despite the impressive effort, lifted the lid a millimeter or so. I can see the blind spots a mile away. And that is not said from arrogance, it is a simple fact. Invite uneducated intellect with a balanced brain and things will really start shifting. Don’t hire creatives, listen to them as true students. Nobody with an academic career can be a full creative intuitive. Sounds harsh, but it is high time to say out loud. There is nothing wrong with academic structure, it is just too restrictive to bring renewal on a scale that matters. There is not one proper form to learn. There are many ways, each with a different result. And I don’t mean the fake choices in schooling we now have, but fundamentally different.
Still It was a great conversation, and I am happy things slowly, slowly move toward a more open approach again.
Well said…though I differ on the point there is nothing wrong with academic structure. It’s high time we faced the fact that the hallowed halls have not been a source of much - your millimetre - evolutionary development, rather a gate keeper of human potential corralled into lucrative back slapping and dare I say the ‘old boy network’. Valerie Hunt was a leader in the study of human consciousness seated within the morphogenic field of infinite potential; someone who sadly passed (2014)before this moment of true need in right brain intuitive creation.
I think there are many different kinds of creativity and they are all important for different aspects of life.
Intuition is part of it, but so is application.
There's creativity in science, in thought, in language, in life, even in how you walk down the street.
Simply being creative isn't the goal, however.
In fact, having a goal may be the wrong approach altogether.
I think that discovering how to live in a way that life seems meaningful is crucial.
For some, this may involve creativity.
For others, not so much.
For me it's essential.
I would hate my life without it.
That said, I also like things that require repetition to become skilled and fluent.
Then, I can apply creativity to those skills and truly make something different AND impressive.
This is what flow states are all about.
@@MattAngiono thanks Matt I really enjoy reading your thoughts on creativity, wholly resonate with application of it, and shall ponder upon this when I teach myself to work with stone honing this skill thru repetition.
@Zanna Fidler glad to hear it!
Something else I didn't add before, is that creativity often spills over.
As it develops in one area of life, it can potentially be applied to another practice entirely.
This has occurred for me multiple times.
My photography made me better painter, for example.
I think once you learn what being creative is about, you see it's a pattern of thought that goes beyond the particular ways you use it most.
Concepts involving visual creativity may be applied when writing or making music even.
The hard part is still getting the requisite skill level before just doing something different.
Cheers, and good luck in your creative endeavors!
@@MattAngiono thank you, I love being a human
Overarching field=soul. Back to Aristotle.
My concern is , " Will artificial intelligence be a help or a hindrance in the process of creative destruction?"
In it's present (primitive) form it keeps using an appeal to authority arguments.
Also, I have tried to learn piano and what Rupert raises had certainly occurred to me, because the strumming right hand of the guitarist is surely more rhythmic and the left hand more weighted toward the execution of the melody; however it did seem right, natural, for the left hand to be dealing preferentially with the more rhythmic bass notes and the right with the melody 🤷🏻♂ I’m not sure why that isn’t the case with guitar, though I think Mark Knopfler is indeed... let me get this right... I think he is left handed, but plays what is normally considered right handed guitars.
Rhythmic bass notes of the piano, I mean
A left handed pianist has built a piano running top to bottom from the left.
This was one of the most enjoyable thing that I have ever listened to.
Thank you, Rupert Sheldrake ! For your courage in search for ‘truth’ … ❤
Very fortunate, we who live with these many means of listening to other forms of us, these, reared in noble realms of higher learning, me in Mohave dust. I am as free as either ever was, and so are you, to sit in on any lecture we wish, for the past fifty years, all we missed, thats good.
Gosh , men are rather dim .. nearly all women i know understand this stuff and men are stuck in some mental boxes discussing what they dont know, it's surreal actually. I recall Dr Mcgilchrist telling me synaesthesia didnt exist and i was literally watching coloured words come out of his mouth as he said it. I'm an ordinary person but i understood more asa child than i've heard discussed here. it is very strange.
You spoke with Iain McGilchrist on psychedelics?
@@andreibistrean675 no , i have synaesthesia and i was a synaesthesia researcher. he told me it wasnt real. So did richard dawkins and i watched cloued words come from his mouth tpo. its hilarious when eminent men tell you your realities dont exist, It's beyond a joke at this stage tbh. my professor belittled this stuff and years later is now a researcher who takes it seriously.. but not before years of belittling people. i'm angry at myself for having been intimidated but how do you fight these suppressive people ?
Wow I cannot believe these two are speaking, thanks for doing this.
Mcgilchrist and Sheldrake!
Such an enlightening meeting of extraordinary minds! Three truly exceptional thinkers vitally important to the survival and flourishing of our species. Adding John Vervaeke to this mix would've made it truly riotous in the best way. Maybe next time. Thank you for this!
I am a harpsichordist, and in Baroque music the left and right hand are often playing many voices in counterpoint. So as with Bach, not at all the left hand playing chords and rhythms to accompany melodies in the right hand.
On why the right hand does end up with the melody and virtuosic elaboration in most keyboard music, well most people are right-handed and so more dextrous there to begin with.
interestingly, as you know, it is the left hand, the left fingers of string players which perform for them the most intricate work.
Also, I love Baroque music and I love the harpsichord. I've been blown away recently listening through Scott Ross' Scarlatti Sonata recordings. Really great.
Cool comment. Thanks for it.
@@AnHebrewChild Scott Ross was a very good musician and great player of Scarlatti! And what you say about the left hand for bowed and plucked string instruments is true. For those instruments I think it is interesting that the right hemisphere/left hand (with complex sequencing of fingers and hand positions) are managing something like the geometry of melody and harmony. Meanwhile, the left hemisphere/right hand are tending to something like the the math and mechanics of producing sounds and placing them rhythmically. And then Scarlatti decides to throw in all those hand crossings!
Yeah, a talk that includes Rupert Sheldrake! Can't wait to listen. What a treat!
I love you guys. ❤❤
White Amy Young Cynthia Smith Richard
...and here I was, thinking ; being a long term biped (thus far), motor neurons firing in one side , feeds back to the sensory neurons of the other via brain stem ...so quickly too.
Could explain the somatic ...but the cerebral ?
Perhaps any "resonance" , whatever that may be ,is a much slower "bowl".
If so ,a satisfactory explanation for my own cat-like reflexes despite being a bit slow upstairs....
A circus clown , teaching juggling ,told me once:
"Move fast....but think, slow." Look straight ahead.
Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity. By Gregory Bateson.
Well, and here is a thing about "education" and research study in "the colonies". From the time children are first in school, the mandate of those schools here in Canada from the get go being to instill and train people (settlers) in "obedience, punctuality, and productivity", with university increasingly as Dr. Sheldrake describes (with brief deviation tolerated in the 1970s). That is, with rare exception, to continue to direct and train people in what authority found/finds most helpful in support of its top-down agenda(s) and not to nurture great minds. (And of course, reinforcing the reductive ontology of techno-industrial culture.)
The sort of contortions I was subject to as not only a woman, but as someone driven by passionate research interests and questions to follow where they led, disciplinary boundaries be damned, has been exhausting. I hope for better for others going forward, but do not hold my breath when it comes to pre-existing university models, and what they have becomes, are increasingly becoming. We need radical (from the root) revision.
Thank you for yet another excellent conversation, and as always, for your work .
This was a great chat!! I really appreciate this work and perspective you've come to, its really helpful to shed light on so much about my life and work ect. Im wondering if you have any more detail about the superior temporal gyrus and sulcus being associated with epiphany or aha moments??? I havent been able to find anything on google or Uni library. Would love somewhere to start if you have anything i could read.
Unemployment Benefit repurposed as Research Grants, ha ha, excellent! I'd be happy to sign up!
I wonder if it means anything that two of the most fascinating (and truly "likeable") people I know of in the world happen to have had the freedom to follow their own interests in university. I've been a huge fan of RS for decades and can't hear enough of IM these days. They both strike me as "complete humans", which I sometimes feel is a dying breed.
The existence of the soul a saturated life atom that connects by electromagnetic waves to the brain and the morphogenic field that creates the quantum entanglement . These 2 pieces of information can complete the puzzle of Existential Reality.. ,🙏🙏🙏
My all time biggest wish on TH-cam is Ian McGilChrist, Rupert Sheldrake, and anthropologist, ecologist, deep nature connection mentor Jon Young. Can’t wait to listen to this! Almost there!
Specifically, Jon Young has been using techniques to do with shifting people between vergence vision and panoramic / wide angle vision / open monitoring, as well as 360 degree listening in all directions and all levels of distance. These kinds of activities seem to be habilitating the human nervous system back to a state of the master being the right hemisphere mode of awareness and the emissary being the left hemisphere mode.
I love the Greek myth about the Graeae -3 incredibly old women who shared one eye and one tooth among the three and that the hero Perseus stole their one eye and wouldn't give it back until they revealed the secret of how to kill the gorgon Medusa. I don't know what make me think of this myth -sharing one eye and one tooth comes across as hilarious but I'm sure Jung or Joseph Campbell would have explained the deeper implications of this myth!
"everything knows everything about everything else, all the time" Mae Wan Ho said this, as well as it is something that is said about the electric universe.
She called it quantum coherence, and in the electric universe model, it's just called the way it works.
It may be true as Ian says that college attendance for high school graduates does not result in a market ready ‘product’ where newly graduated students can be placed in a setting that earns income for an employer thereby securing their own salary, but rather a student fresh from a four year often stands at a quandary on how to proceed and follow up with action and momentum. It is my thought that there is rarely a better way to spend young adult timeframe of 18 to 21years of age than in a contemplative study of any field of study
30 Both of them should help humanity be in order and harmony
Within the self
With other human beings
With rest of nature
😊😊😊
Moore Donna Davis Cynthia Moore Elizabeth
One member of this platinum group of metals is highly involved in the transfer of signals at the microscopic level . Just thought I'd throw this small piece of information into the pot so that greater minds than mine might make sense of it .
38 min Science needs to understand that the system that controls needs to be dismantled.
For the sake of Humanity and it's future let us break the shackles and be open to look at the new concepts.
28 min The body and it's organs retain the information about the functioning that is required for all the organs.
please god get rupert in the mainstream we cant wait any longer
Is it possible for people with mental health issues to find peace and the sacred, even god?
Brass Instruments only use one hand
Apart from Trombones of course but they're not serious instruments. 🙊🤣
44:20 ish
Heraclitean Fire, Chargaff. £140 this day. Hm.
Alex was clever enough to shut up, listen and learn. If only more of were so clever.
Long standing problem with snowflakes... [oh behave at the back]
I understood the snowflake problem has since been resolved and it all comes down to the local conditions which are shared across the small volume in which a snowflake forms. If this is true then you ought to be able in principle to form snowflakes that are not symmetrical simply by tweaking the conditions at this microscopic scale in a lab, and my understanding is that this effect can now be achieved. Is this not the case?
I bet that every location is a unique coordinate even if you think you could control the environment - look up the quantum resonance effects of domain structures within clumping water molecules for example. Nearly identical twins snowflakes may occur - ?
The other thing would be that if you reduced all parameters to control conditions you could exercise 'control'. Alas this direction is a race to the bottom in terms of human endeavour.
But I also see water as responding to its 'field' as some degree of internally resonant structure - just as the idea of a cell. (Water is not bulk H2O molecules with a surface tension)
“Education is a matter of growing things, not inserting things.”
“Education is a matter of growing things, not inserting things.”
Thank you all for your intriguing & often hilarious insights into academe & for your sympathy & concern for the people at large. There hasn't been much for some years now. 🤔 (Green Fire UK) 🌈🦉
PS: In case you don't know already, Dr McGilchrist's "carte blanche" got subtitled "Car Wash". AI strikes again?
That AI would render it that way is truly unconscionable.
Harris Carol Garcia Kenneth Lee Donna
Oh my good God! So excited.
Thank you Alex, Iain and Rupert for such an interesting discussion. I hope the three of you can meet again to discuss similar topics.
Just beautiful. For many reasons I feel encouraged to remember the time spent homeschooling our two lads as so very important. They were ‘free range’ within a subtle structure. I ‘knew’ this was a good path, though incredibly risky.
Thank you Alex, Iain, and Rupert for this conversation.
Wonderfully clear and pertinent.
Very interesting. Thank you.
The pattern is stored in 1/lambda resonating consciousness through out our universe..
codex arithmologia
Thank you so much, Gentlemen, for this enjoyable conversation. I enjoy so much what feels like freedom in your thinking and connection-making. I’m sure this relates to your lack of narrow speciality. Please keep working away on our behalf.
'unemployment benefit to reserach grant.' 🤣😂🤣😆😅. That was hilarous! I was listening in bed, my laughter woke my wife up, she wasn't happy.
I wonder when this was recorded...I´d think the work of Michael Levin would be mentioned, has shown the existence of that mysterious "field" which gives purpose to the growth of cells. If I recall correctly: any cell/group of cells can form any shape, (organism)if provided with the electric impulse associated with that shape. Question would now be: where do those electrical currents originate?
Sure would like to have asked , what is a psychosis and psychopath ? Great discussion ..R S. please Recall story about '''Intellectual Phase Locking '''..
8.53 Quantum entangelment very nicely explained...
I can explain the same so clearly once you understand the existence of the formless the invisible (life atom )and the physical stuff made up of physical atoms 🙏
32 education is the key. Very well articulated by both of you
The complete content of existential Reality needs to be the curriculum of education.
Nothing less will suffice and nothing more will be required.
I have the content and would love to share and let you guys check it and then share😊😊😊if you agree
Excellent talk. After studying ecology and regeneration for several years, I came to the same conclusion as Allan Savory: that if we could just get people to think and act holistically, we could solve all the problems in the world...
And then years later, after reading Besel Van Der Kolks book, 'the body keeps score' along with at the same time, coincidentally reading the book, 'my stroke of insight' (both recommended) I came to the realization that developmental trauma is preventing people from accessing the whole of their systems. In the repair and mitigation of trauma influences on development, movement and physical experience are so invariably critical. Which really speaks to the inclusion of music in "education"..
Seems they haven't heard of those, whom' have half their brain removed. Due to that side dieing, and basically turn to a lump. And they still function fairly normally. Very interesting though.
Rupert sheldrake came and spoke at my school about morphic resonance. 30 years ago now,I barely knew what he was talking about. But it was exciting and fascinating none the less.
6.41 Resonance is what needs to be understood by knowing the static... morphogenic field...
24.15. So much depth about being open to contrary thoughts at such high level of intellect🙏🙏
Salute to both of you ... Please help humanity by validating and thinking about the basic Existential Reality.
Simply wonderful. Yes, like Mr. Marin, I feel honored every time the magnificent Rupert Sheldrake sits for a chat. Now Mr. McGilchrist is on my radar !
I did subscribe looking forward to more input!!
I love playing the piano with my hands crossed. Also reversing everything I can. Meaning, learning learn your stitches forward and backwards. It’s a great integrity test, and encourages freedom of movement.
The problem with the resonance model as i see it is that you should see effects from interference from other sources. Other peoples heads close to yours, magnetic fields from devices. Etc.
Fascinating problem though ! I do like how Rupert thinks but I'm so not into morphic resonance.
Brilliant discussion! The problem with science is that the culture has fallen in love with it, we have been hypnotized! because it offers entertainment. Hand over everything to AI, we'll not have to put out any energy or effort, let AI do everything for us!
'But since created things are various and numerous, they are indeed well fitted and adapted to the whole creation; yet, when viewed individually, are mutually opposite and inharmonious, just as the sound of the lyre, which consists of many and opposite notes, gives rise to one unbroken melody, through means of the interval which separates each one from the others. The lover of truth therefore ought not to be deceived by the interval between each note, nor should he imagine that one was due to one artist and author, and another to another, nor that one person fitted the treble, another the bass, and yet another the tenor strings; but he should hold that one and the same person formed the whole so as to prove the judgment, goodness, and skill exhibited in the whole work and wisdom. Those, too, who listen to the melody, ought to praise and extol the artist, to admire the tension of some notes, to attend to the softness of others, to catch the sound of others between both these extremes, and to consider the special character of others, so as to inquire at what each one aims, and what is the cause of their variety, never failing to apply our rule, neither giving up the artist, nor casting off faith in the one God who formed all things, nor blaspheming our Creator. If, however, any one do not discover the cause of all those things which become objects of investigation, let him reflect that man is infinitely inferior to God; that he has received grace only in part, and is not yet equal or similar to his Maker; and, moreover, that he cannot have experience or form a conception of all things like God; but in the same proportion as he who was formed but to-day, and received the beginning of his creation, is inferior to Him who is uncreated, and who is always the same, in that proportion is he, as respects knowledge and the faculty of investigating the causes of all things, inferior to Him who made him. For thou, O man, art not an uncreated being, nor didst thou always co-exist with God, as did His own Word; but now, through His pre-eminent goodness, receiving the beginning of thy creation, thou dost gradually learn from the Word the dispensations of God who made thee. Preserve therefore the proper order of thy knowledge, and do not, as being ignorant of things really good, seek to rise above God Himself, for He cannot be surpassed; nor do thou seek after any one above the Creator, for thou wilt not discover such. For thy Former cannot be contained within limits; nor, although thou shouldst measure all this cosmos, and pass through all His creation, and consider it in all its depth, and height, and length, wouldst thou be able to conceive of any other above the Father Himself. For thou wilt not be able to think Him fully out, but, indulging in trains of reflection opposed to thy nature, thou wilt prove thyself foolish; and if thou persevere in such a course, thou wilt fall into utter madness, whilst thou deemest thyself loftier and greater than thy Creator, and imaginest that thou canst penetrate beyond His dominions. It is therefore better and more profitable to belong to the simple and unlettered class, and by means of love to attain to nearness to God, than, by imagining ourselves learned and skilful, to be found blasphemous against their own God, inasmuch as they conjure up another God as the Father. And for this reason Paul exclaimed, “Knowledge puffeth up, but love edifieth:”not that he meant to inveigh against a true knowledge of God, for in that case he would have accused himself; but, because he knew that some, puffed up by the pretence of knowledge, fall away from the love of God, and imagine that they themselves are perfect, for this reason that they set forth an imperfect Creator, with the view of putting an end to the pride which they feel on account of knowledge of this kind, he says, “Knowledge puffeth up, but love edifieth.”
Against Heresies