七五一[1]
《老子》四十章云：「反者，道之動。」「反」字虛涵兩意。【王輔嗣注：「高以下為基，貴以賤為本，有以無為用，此其反也」云云，僅知其一而已。】【《禮記‧中庸》：「生乎今之世，反古之道，如此者烖及其身者也」；《漢書‧文帝紀》詔曰：「今單于反古之道」，師古注：「反、還也」；〈昭帝紀〉詔曰：「望王反道自新」，師古注：「欲其旋反而歸正。」《國語‧周語下》衛彪傒論萇弘曰：「天道導可而省否？萇叔反是，必有三殃：違天一也，反道二也」，與《漢書》正相對照。】一者正反之「反」，《漢書‧藝文志》所謂「相反相成」是也，亦即六十五章云：「非以明人，將以愚之，（中略）玄德深矣，遠矣，與物反矣，然後乃至大順」，七十七章云：「天之道，其猶張弓乎？高者抑之，下者舉之，有餘者損之，不足者與之」；二者往返之「返」，《易經‧復‧彖》所謂「反復其道」，「復其見天地之心乎」是也，亦即十六章云：「萬物並作，吾以觀其復；夫物芸芸，各歸其根」，二十五章云：「大曰逝，逝曰遠，遠曰反。」由「反」而得「返」，辯證之義，盡此五字，正 Hegel 論 “Bewegung des
Seienden” 所謂 “In
jener Bewegung ist die Negativität
das Unterscheiden und das Setzen des Daseins;
in diesem Zurückgehen in sich ist sie das Werden der bestimmten Einfachheit” (Phänomenologie
des Geistes, “Vorrede”, Ausgewählte
Texte, von R.O. Gropp, “Philosophisches Erbe”, Bd. III, p. 86)，又論辯證法所謂 “Vermöge der aufgezeigten Natur der Methode stellt
sich die Wissenschaft als einen insich geschlungener Kreis, in dessen Anfang, den einfachen Grund, die Vermittlung das
Ende zurückschlingt” usw. (Wissenschft der Logik, Book III, op.
cit., S. 199)。而「反」字亦正如 “aufheben”
之虛涵兩意 (“Aufheben
hat in der Sprache den gedoppelten Sinn, dass es soviel als aufbewahren, erhalten bedeutet und zugleich soviel
als aufhören lassen, ein Ende machen”,
Wissenschft der Logik, Buch I, op. cit, S. 129)。Schiller, Über
Anmut und Würde,
Über die
ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen, Brief VII,
XVIII (Werke, hrsg. L. Bellermann,
VII, S. 95, 289, 336); Schelling, System
des
transzendenten Idealismus[2] (Werke: Auswahl in 3 Bänden,
hrsg. Otto Weiss, 1907, Bd. II, S. 189, 293, 295, 296); 以至 Marx-Engels, Manifest der
Kommunistischen Parte, II (Peking, 1965, S. 50, 52) 皆屢用「aufheben」，特未推究本意如 Hegel 耳。K. Spalding & K. Brooke, A
Historical Dictionary of German Figurative Usage, p. 88 謂 “aufgehoben” 作 “well kept, safely
hidden, in good hands” 解，乃 “from mystical usage”，據 O. Zirker, Die Bereicherung des
Deutschen Wortschatzes durch die spatmittelalterliche Mystik, 1923, S. 823。《五燈會元》卷十七惟信曰：「三十年前未參禪時，見山是山，見水是水。及至後來親見知識，有個入處，見山不是山，見水不是水。而今得個休歇處，依然見山衹是山，見水衹是水。這三般見解，是同是別？」即由「反」得「返」（又見七五九論《列子‧黃帝篇》）矣。前意參觀 Blake, The Marriage of Heaven & Hell: “Without
contraries is no progression. Attraction & Repulsion, Reason & Energy,
Love & Hate, are necessary to Human existence” (Poetical Works, Oxford, p. 248); Hegel, Wissenschaft der Logik, Book II: “Er [der Widerspruch] aber ist die
Wurzel aller Bewegung und Lebendigkeit; nur insofern etwas in sich selbst einen
Widerspruch hat, bewegt es sich, hat Trieb und Thätigkeit” (op. cit, S. 169)。後意參觀 Proclus 所謂 épistrophé：“Everything
originally self-moving is capable of reversion upon itsel”; “All that proceeds
from any principle & reverts upon it has a cyclic activity”; “Every effect
remains in its cause, proceeds from it, & reverts upon it”; “In any divine
procession the end is assimilated to the beginning, maintaining by its
reversion thither a circle without beginning & without end” (The Elements of Theology, tr. by E.R.
Dodds, Proposition 17, p. 19; Prop. 33, p. 37; Prop. 35, p. 39; Prop. 146, p.
129; cf. Prop. 15, p. 17; Prop. 31-2, pp. 35 & 37; Prop. 37, p. 41; Prop.
42, p. 45)。又第六八二則論 Plotinus, Enneads,
I. vi. 8。《易經‧泰卦》曰：「无平不陂，无往不復」；〈樂記〉曰：「樂盈而反，以反為文」；《呂氏春秋‧仲夏紀之二‧大樂篇》云：「天地車輪，終則復始，極則復反」，「反」字二意并涵，灼然可見矣。（參觀《鶡冠子‧環流第五》：「物極必反，命曰環流」；《列子‧天瑞第一》云：「不化者往復，往復其際不可終」，〈仲尼第四〉云：「故物不至者則不反」；《史記‧貨殖列傳》云：「貴上極則反賤，賤下極則反貴」，〈春申君列傳〉黄歇上書曰：「臣聞物至則反，冬、夏是也。」）Hegel 論 “die
gesamte Philosophie” 為 “ein
in sich zurückkehrender Kreis” 云：“ein Rückwärts, aus dem er [jeder einzelne Teil] sich
herleitet, wie ein Vorwärts, zu dem er selbst in sich weitertreibt” (Ästhetik, Aufbau Verlag, 1955, S. 69)，Rückwärts 而亦 Vorwärts，則「反」為「返」也。【束皙〈補亡詩‧崇丘‧萬物得極其高大也〉：「物極其性，人永其壽。……人無道夭（《莊子》：『中道夭』），物極則長」。】【十六章：「吾以觀其復。」】
〇《老子》二章云：「故有無相生，難易相成，長短相形，高下相傾。」按《墨子‧經上第四十》云：「同，異而俱于之一也」，又云：「同異交得，放無有放即仿」；《莊子‧齊物論》云：「彼出於是，是亦因彼，彼是方生之說也」郭注說「彼是」為「自以為是」，大誤。文芸閣《純常子枝語》卷十五糾之，謂「是」字當作「此」解，甚碻。然下文「彼是莫得其偶，謂之道樞」，郭注：「偶、對也，彼、是相對」云云，却又不誤。是亦彼也，彼亦是也，即 Hegel: “Etwas und Anderes sind beide erstens Daseiende oder Etwas.
Zweitens ist ebenso jedes ein Anderes”
(op. cit., S. 131)。《陳書‧傅縡傳‧明道論》云：「夫居後而望前，則為前；居前而望後，則為後。（中略）呼此為彼，此呼彼為彼，彼此之名，的居誰處？」可注《莊子》。〈秋水篇〉云：「知東西之相反而不可以相無。」張橫渠《正蒙‧太和篇第一》云：「有象斯有對，對必反其為；有反斯有仇，仇必和而解」（王觀堂《靜菴文集‧論性》即引此數語，謂為「海額爾之辨證法」；《東原文集》卷八〈法象論〉：「分者其進，合者其止」，亦其意），言之尤明切矣。魏默深《古微堂集‧內集》卷一〈學篇‧之十一〉云：「天下物無獨必有對，而又謂兩高不可重，兩大不可容，兩貴不可雙，兩勢不可同，重、容、雙、同，必爭其功。何耶？有對之中，必一主一輔，則對而不失為獨。乾尊坤卑，天地定位，萬物則而象之，此尊而無上之誼焉。是以君令臣必共，父命子必宗，夫唱婦必從，天包地外，月受日光。雖相反如陰陽、寒暑、晝夜，而春非冬不生，四夷非中國莫統，小人非君子莫為幈幪，相反適以相成也。手足之左，不如右強」（按此節全本之羅璧《識遺》卷七〈對獨說〉）。蓋相反不必相等，庶可以相佐而不相持。《正蒙‧太和篇第一》：「兩不立則一不可見，一不見則兩之用息。兩體者，虛實也，動靜也，聚散也，清濁也，其究一而已。（中略）氣本之虛，則湛本無形；感而生，則聚而有象。有象斯有對，對必反其為，有反斯有仇，仇必和而解」；〈參兩篇第二〉云：「一故神，兩故化。」合張、魏二氏之說於西土所謂辯證之法，思過半矣。【《論語‧子罕》「豈不爾思？室是遠而」即孔子之言「反」，詳見劉寶楠《論語正義》。】又按 Schopenhauer, Die
Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, II, §27 論 Schelling 以 “die Polarität”
為 “ein
Grundtypus fast aller Erscheinungen der Natur”: “In China ist die Erkenntnis der Polarität
seit den ältesten Zeiten gangbar, in der Lehre vom Gegensatz des Yin und Yang” (Sämtl. Werk., hrsg.
J. Frauenstädt, II, S. 171)。又按參觀第七二八則論 The Notebooks of S.T. Coleridge, ed. Kathleen Coburn, II, §2046 所舉心理中極而得反諸例。參觀 Proclus, The Elements of Theology,
Prop 2, p. 3: “All that participates unity is both one and not-one”，即 Nicolas
Cusanus 所謂 “coincidentia
oppositorum”。Bruno 屢發明之，而世尟知者，如 Spaccio
de la Bestia Trionfante,
Dialogo I: “... La concordia non s’effettua, se non dove è la contrarietade, lo
sferico non posa nello sferico, perchè si toccano in punto, ma il concavo si
quieta nel convesso... il principio, il mezzo ed il fine, il nascimento,
l’aumento e la perfezione di quanto veggiamo, è da contrarii, per contrarii,
ne’ contrarii, a contrarii” (Opere di G.
Bruno e di T. Campanella, ed. A. Guzzo e R. Americo, p. 474); De gli Eroici Furori, Dialogo II: “... tutte le
cose constano di contrarii” ecc. (p. 583); Dialogo IV: “Non è armonia e
concordia dove è unità, dove un essere vuol assorbir tutto l’essere; ma dove è
ordine ed analogia di cose diverse; dove ogni cosa serva la sua natura” (p.
616); Parte II, Dialogo III: “... per via d’antiperistasi che significa il
vigor che acquista il contrario da quel che, fuggendo l’altro, viene ad unirsi,
inspessarsi, inglobarsi e concentrarsi verso l’individuo della sua virtude”
ecc. (p. 627)。Böhme 亦曰：“In Ja und Nein bestehen alle Dinge” (Alexandre
Koyré, La philosophie de Jacob Böhme,
p. 396: “Ce qui veut dire, qu’il y a en Dieu lui-même le oui et le non; qu’il est
une synthèse des contraires, et qu’il s’exprime dans les contraires”)。佛書每言四句，雙非雙照，契之於辨證法，則空門即正，有門即反，亦空亦有門即化町畦、通騎驛以為合，非空非有門即否定之否定以為合 (Hegel, Wissenschaft
der Logik, Book II: “Die Identität ist also in diesem Satze ausgedrückt —
als Negation der Negation” — op. cit,
S. 162; “Das zweite Negative, das Negative des Negativen... ist jenes Aufheben
des Widerspruches...” — S. 194)。龍樹菩薩《中論》言此綦詳，如〈觀法品第十八〉云：「一切實非實，亦實亦非實；非實非非實，是名諸佛法」（參觀《法華文句記》卷三[3]：「一切法皆權，一切法皆實，一切法亦權亦實，一切法非權非實」）。世親菩薩《金剛仙論》卷三云：「我謂為有，如來說無，我適謂無、如來復為我說有。此明中道之理，不可定說有無」；《六祖法寶壇經‧咐囑第十》云：「忽有人問汝法，出語盡雙，皆取對法，來去相因。究竟二法盡除，更無去處」，又云：「問有將無對，問無將有對；問凡以聖對，問聖以凡對。二道相因，生中道義」云云。《莊子‧知北游》云：「至矣，其孰能至此乎！予能有無矣，而未能無無也」參觀〈齊物論〉：「類與不類，相與為類，則與彼無以異矣」，郭象注云：「莫若無心，既遣是非，又遣其遣。遣之又遣，以至於無遣，然後無遣無不遣」云云。《維摩詰所說經‧文殊師利問疾品第五》云：「又問：『以何為空？』答曰：『以空空』」肇注云：「以空智而空於有者，則即有而自空矣。豈假屏除然後為空乎？上空智空，下空法空也」；《大智度論》卷四十六云：「一切法空，是空亦空」；《法華文句記》卷九[4]：「空破諸法，諸法是所破。空是能破，無復諸法，唯有空在。此空亦空，故言空空。」「無無」、「空空」，正非實、非非實「二法盡除」也。餘見第六六一則論 Heraclitus, Fragments,
§45、第六六七則論袁海叟「兩歧語」、第七○三則論 Angelus
Silesius: “Gelassenheit fäht Gott” 、第七二八則論The
Notebooks of S.T. Coleridge, §2046。
〇《老子》五十六章云：「知者不言，言者不知。」按《莊子‧天道篇》、〈知北遊篇〉皆有此語。〈知北遊篇〉又云：「彼至則不論，論則不至。明見無值，辯不如默；道不可聞，聞不如塞。（中略）弗知乃知乎！知乃不知乎！孰知不知之知？（中略）道不可聞，聞而非也；道不可見，見而非也；道不可言，言而非也」云云，尤發明此義。《老子》一章所謂「道可道，非常道」，三十二章所謂「道常無名」等語，亦其意也。《易‧繫辭上》云：「書不盡言，言不盡意」，最為切近事情。老、莊遂因噎廢食，以不盡而并欲廢言廢書矣【第七六九則】。詳見第二五則論 Novalis, Fragmente,
§1845、第二○四則論 E.
Cassirer, Language & Myth、第三六九則論《全晉文》卷一百七、一百九。兹復補數事：Plotinus, Enneads,
III. viii. 10: “Its [the Absolute’s] nature is that nothing can be affirmed of
It — not existence, not essence, not life — It transcends all these”; V. iii.
13-4: “The One is, in truth, beyond all statement; whatever you say would limit
It; the All-Transcendent... has no name.... We can state what It is not, while
we are silent as to what It is” (Grace H. Turnbull, The Essence of Plotinus, p. 116 & p.
162); St. Augustine, Confessions, IX.
25: “... in the presence of the Truth, which Thou art, of what sort the eternal
life of the saints was to be, which eye
hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of man [I
Cor. II. 9]” (Harvard Classics, vol
VII, p. 158); G. Bruno, De Gli Eroici
Furori, Parte II, Dialogo IV: “... Il nono [who is both blind & dumb]... è cieco per inconfidenza, per la deiezion de
spirito, la quale è administrata e caggionata pure da grande amore, perché con
lo ardire teme de offendere... E così supprime gli occhi da non vedere quel che
massime desidera e gode di vedere; come raffrena la lingua da non parlare con
chi massime brama di parlare, per tema che difetto di sguardo o difettosa
parola non lo avvilisca... E questo suol procedere da l’apprensione de l’excellenza
de l’oggetto sopra de la sua facultà potenziale: onde gli più profondi e divini
teologi dicono che più si onora ed ama Dio per silenzio che per parola, come si
vede più per chiuder gli occhi alle specie representate che per aprirli” (op. cit., p. 648); Campanella, La Canticavcon l’Esposizione, “Proemio”:
“Se avanzano le cose le parole, / doglia, superbia e l’ignoranza vostra /
stemprate al fuoco ch’io rubbai dal sole. // ... Le parole non arrivano a dir l’essenza
delle cose; né tutte le cose note hanno la lor propria voce, e l’ignote nulla:
talché la deficienza, l’equivocazioni e sinonimità fan doglia a’ savi, che
veggono non potersi sapere; superbia a’ sofisti, che mettono il saper nelle
parole; ignoranza a tutti” (op. cit.,
pp. 787-8). 參觀 Plato, The 7th
Epistle: “... the inadequacy of language... Hence no intelligent man will
ever be so bold as to
put into language those
things which his reason has contemplated, especially not into a form that is
unalterable... Names, I maintain, are in no case stable” (Thirteen Epistles of Plato, tr. L.A. Post, pp. 96-7). E. Cassirer 說此云：“Sprache und Wort streben nach dem Ausdruck des reinen Seins; aber sie
erreichen ihn niemals, weil sich in ihnen der Bezeichnung dieses reinen Seins
immer die Bezeichnung eines anderen, einer zufälligen ‘Beschaffenheit’ des
Gegenstandes beimischt. Daher bezeichnet das, was die eigentliche Kraft der
Sprache ausmacht, immer auch ihre eigentliche Schwäche, die sie zur Darstellung
des höchsten, des wahrhaft philosophischen Erkenntnisgehalts unfähig macht” (Philosophie der symbolischen Formen, I,
S. 65)。《呂覽‧精諭篇》、《淮南子‧道應訓》、《列子‧說符篇》皆載「白公問孔子曰：『人固不可與微言乎？』孔子曰：『何為不可？唯知言之謂者乎。』夫知言之謂者，不以言言也。故至言去言，至為無為。」《中論‧觀法品第十六》亦云：「諸法實相者，心行言語斷」；《大智度論》卷五十四〈釋天主品第二十七〉云：「畢竟空義，無有定相，不可取，不可傳譯得悟，一切心行處滅、言語道斷」；《肇論‧湼槃無名論第四》云：「善吉有言：『眾人若能以無心而受、無聽而聽者，吾當以無言言之』」；《維摩詰所說經‧弟子品第三》云：「法無名字，言語斷故；法無有說，離覺觀故」，又云：「夫說法者，無說無示；其聽法者，無聞無得」；〈入不二法門品第九〉云：「文殊師利曰：『如我意者，於一切法，無言無說，無示無識，離諸問答是為入不二法門。』於是文殊師利問維摩詰：『我等各自說已，仁者當說何等是菩薩入不二法門？』時維摩詰默然無言。文殊師利歎曰：『善哉！善哉！乃至無有文字語言，是真入不二法門』」，肇注曰：「有言於無言，未若無言於無言」，生注曰：「文殊師利雖明無可說，而未明說為無說也」；〈見阿閦佛品第十二〉云：「不一相不異相，不自相不他相。（中略）不此岸不彼岸不中流。（中略）不此不彼。不可以智知，不可以識識。無晦無明，無名無相，無強無弱，非淨非穢。不在方不離方，非有為非無為。無示無說。（中略）不定不亂。（中略）不誠不欺，不來不去，不出不入，一切言語道斷。（中略）不可稱不可量過諸稱量。非大非小，非見非聞。（中略）無作無起，無生無滅。（中略）無厭（中略）無厭無著。不可以一切言說分別顯示。」（僧肇《寶藏論‧廣照空有品第一》「道非內非外，非小非大，非一非異」云云一節，言道之兼正與反，而亦超正與反，即本此〈品〉來，參觀 Meister
Eckhart, Sermon, XVII: “God is
neither this nor that... I did not by so doing deny being to God. On the
contrary, I enhanced it in Him” — James M. Clark, Meister Eckhart, p. 230。）（參觀《六祖法寶壇經‧咐囑第十》云：「執空之人，有謗經，直言不用文字。既云不用文字，人亦不合語言。只此語言，便是文字之相。又云直道不立文字，即此不立兩字，亦是文字。」）《法華玄義》卷一下所謂「聖默然」是也，又卷十上云：「絕言離相，言語道斷，心行處滅，則非復是教，云何可說？」《法華文句記》卷二十六云：「迹本皆言語道斷、心行處滅，故云不思議一也。」不外《老子》「可道」、「可名」非「常道」、「常名」之旨，〈見阿閦佛品〉一節尤反復詳明，正 Karl Vossler 所說：“Mystics have
surrounded God with a wild dance of words where each negates the one before....
Rilke in his Stundenbuch: ‘Du bist
der Dinge tiefer Inbegriff, / der seines Wesens letztes Wort verschweigt — /
Und sich den andern immer anders zeigt: / dem Schiff als Küste und dem Land als
Schiff’” (The Spirit of Language in
Civilization, tr. O. Oeser, pp. 33-4)。參觀 Rilke 語見 Das Stunden-Buch, IItes, Das Buch von der Pilgerschaft: “Du bist die Zukunft, grosses Morgenrot” 末節 (Werke: Auswahl in zwei Bänden, Insel
Verlag, 1957, I, S. 74)。參觀 Gabriel Marcel, Homo viator, p. 312: “... à opaque instant Rilke brise les images
qu’il vient de former et leur en substitue d’autres qui peuvent paraître inverses”。【慧皎《高僧傳》卷八〈論〉曰：「夫至理無言，玄致幽寂。幽寂故心行處斷，無言故言語路絶。言語路絶，則有言傷其旨；心行處斷，則作意失其真。所以淨名杜口於方丈，釋迦緘默於雙樹。故曰：『兵者不祥之器，不獲已而用之；言者不真之物，不獲已而陳之。』」】又七五三則論 Dante, Par.
I. 70-1[5]:
“Trasumanar significar per verba / non si poria”[6]
(La Divina Commedia, ed. N. Sapegno,
pp. 788-9)、七五六則論 Maurice Blanchot, La Littérature et le droit à la Mort。又參觀 A. Koestler, The
Act of Creation, p. 173-7 論文字科學中詞不達意、以詞害意諸弊。
七五二[7]
S.K. De, Sanskrit Poetics as a Study of Aesthetics
(1963) is a “bovrilizing” of the author’s two-volume magnum opus, Studies in the
History of Sanskrit Poetics (2nd revised ed., 1960). Sanskrit
poetics is a depressing field of study, and perhaps no scholar, even gifted
with a nimble wit & an agreeable style, can quite enliven its dreary wastes
of barren ingenuity & elaborate futility. Professor De’s manner is
well-assorted with his subject matter; he occasionally relieves the dull drope
of his style by giving us a jar through odd usages of English like “uncompatible”, “ideal & verbal elements.” The text runs to less than 80 pages,
and the amount of repitition is disproportionately large. But the book has the qualité de son défaut: we are spared the
florid orotundity of the Indo-Anglican Babu. Moreover, the author is
refreshingly free from the “nothing like leather” attitude of almost all Orientalists
peddling their wares in the West, and he deplores more than once the failure of
Sanskrit theorists to come to grips with the fundamentals of poetry. De’s view
of poetry is entirely Crocean (e.g. the sentence on p. 4 & repeated word
for word on p. 30: “The beautiful, as the perfect expression, does not possess
degrees” etc.), though he seems to have studiously avoided the mention of Croce’s
name.
The tireless
multiplying of distinctions & meticulous inventory-taking of rhetorical
devices, which formed the principal task of Sanskrit poetics, are curiously
reminiscent of the T’ang works on “詩格”, “詩式”, “詩例” preserved in《文鏡秘府論》(cf. my chapter on〈宋代的詩話〉in《中國文學史》[8]). What surprises or disappoints us most is that the dhvani school, with its intuition of
suggestiveness (vyānjana) or the
unexpressed sense (vyāngya) as the
essence of poetry, should have kept in the old groove of splitting verbal hairs
& “elaborately distinguishing & classifying thousands of varieties of
the unexpressed” (p. 9). Thus, the dhvani
school bears the same resemblance to the Chinese 神韻派 (see my《宋詩選註》on 嚴羽; cf. Ananda K. Coomaraswamy, The
Transformation of Nature in Art, 2nd ed., 1935, pp. 187, 198) as
Indian buddhism to Chinese Zenism. The Chinese have cut off all the dead wood of
scholastic subtlety & put the theory in stream-line shape. Ribot has
characterized the Hindu imagination as “imagination numérique” which vertiginously
“joué des nombres avec une audace et une prodigalité magnifiques” (L’Imagination créatrice, pp. 173-5).
Hindu poetics also seems to support Ribot’s thesis. The Sanskrit theorists
remained bogged down in minute rhetorical analysis & never made “ein
qualitativer Sprung” away from ornamental devices[9] (see
Hegel, Phänomenologie des Geistes,
“Vorrede” — Ausgewählte Texte, hrsg.
R.O. Gropp, “Philosophischen Erbe”, Bd. III, S. 68). “Nur vermehrenden
Fortgangs” of discovering more & more on one point, & one point only,
the Indians have reached a clearer conception than the Chinese, i.e. le mot juste: Bāna (early 7th
cent.) employed the term śayyā (bed)
to denote “the repose of word & sense in their mutual favourableness” (p.
21); the anonymous work Agnipurāna
employed the word mudrā (seal) with a
similar connotation, & this maitrī
“(mutual friendship of verbal & ideal elements of poetry) is held to be so
close that the word cannot be replaced by synonyms” (p. 41); Vāmana (ca. 800) employed the term śabdapāka (maturity of words) to denote
“the perfect fitness of word & its sense”, in which case “the words are so
chosen that they cannot bear an exchange of synonym” (p. 42). This deserves to
be better known. The Spanish critic Fernando de Herrera (1534-97) said in his Commentary on Garcilaso that the first
quality of style was claridad, &
went on to declare that in the interests of clarity each “idea” should be exactly
represented by a single word, & that if this word is lacking, it should be
invented (Gerald Brennan, The Literature
of the Spanish People, 2nd ed., 1953, p. 239). Claridad is what we mean by le mot juste. (For the complex meaning
of the word “clear” in Renaissance poetics, e.g. Michael Drayton speaks of “cleare
poesie” in To My Most Dearly-loved Friend
Henry Reynolds Esquire & The Owl;
Chapman of God’s “clear & rapting loveliness” in A Hymn to Christ Upon the Cross; Milton of “the clear spirit” in Lycidas, see Joan Grundy’s article in MLR, Oct. 1964, pp. 501 ff.:
quintessential, radiant, pure; Helen Gardner, The Business of Criticism, p. 60: “The word ‘clear’ [in Macbeth: ‘Duncan hath been / So clear in
his great office’] is a radiant word,
used by Shakespeare elsewhere of the Gods.”) E.
Engel points out in his Deutsche
Stilkunst, 22ste bis 24ste Aufl. S. 92-3: “Optima
verba rebus cohaerent... heisst es überaus fein bei Quintilian, kürzer und
feiner noch als La Bruyère: ‘Es gibt für jeden Gedanken nur ein Wort’; oder als Flauberts
Rat an Maupassant: ‘Quelle que soit la chose qu’on veut dire, il n’y a qu’un
mot pour l’exprimer, qu’un verbe pour l’animer et qu’un adjectif pour la
qualifier.’” Thus, although Quintilian objected to the morbid quest of words (“incredibile
verborum fastidium” — VIII. 3. 23; cf. X. 3.10 et seq.)[10], he too
believed in a sort of pre-established harmony between le mot & le chose.
Fronto also laid great emphasis on the search (quaerere) for the exact word (verbum
proprium) (Correspondence, tr.
C.R. Haines, “The Loeb Classical Library”, I, pp. 10, 96; II, p. 54; see I, p.
8 for examples). La Bruyère’s pronouncements are as follows: “Entre toutes les
différentes expressions qui peuvent rendre une seule de nos pensées, il n’y en
a qu’une qui soit la bonne: on ne la rencontre pas toujours en parlant ou en
écrivant. Il est vrai néanmoins qu’elle existe, que tout ce qui ne l’est point
est faible, et ne satisfait point un homme d’esprit qui veut se faire entendre”
(Les Caractères, éd.
“La Renaissance du Livre”, p. 20; Saintsbury, History of Criticism, II, p. 302 on this passage as an anticipation
of “the full Flaubertian doctrine of the ‘single word’”; “Les esprits médiocres
ne trouvent point l’unique expression, et usent de synonymes” (ib., p. 33; cf. J. Thoraval, L’Art de Maupassant, pp. 115, 119, 128).
To Engel’s quotation from Maupassant’s preface to Pierre et Jean, the following passage from Flaubert in propria persona may be added: “L’irritation
de l’idée qui demande à prendre une forme et qui se retourne en nous jusqu’à ce
que nous lui en ayons trouvé une exacte, précise” (Correspondance,
éd. Louis Conard, I, pp. 186-7, to Louise Colet);
see H.M. Block’s careful article for the well-substantiated view that the
Flaubertian concept of the mot juste
is in no way “an atomization of language” but implies “the total orchestration
of the composition” & “the interrelation of parts, from word to phrase to
sentence to paragraphs & beyond, which helps to determine the justness of
the individual word” (Revue de Littérature
comparée, Avril-Juin 1961, pp. 199-200). Coleridge, too, remarked: “The
instinctive passion in the mind for a one
word to express one act of feeling” (The Notebooks, ed. Kathleen Coburn,
II, §2629, entry of 3 Aug. 1805; Saintsbury, op. cit., III, p. 228: “Flaubert fifty years before date”). Cf. Lucretius,
On the Nature of Things, tr. H.J.A.
Munro, Bk. III: “The poverty of my native speech deters me sorely against my
will” (Rontledge, p. 82); cf. Pater: “Style” (Appreciations, p. 25).
Although the
doctrine of le mot juste has a
salutary effect on literary craftsmanship, it rests on an untenable
philosophical presupposition. It implies that any thought, feeling or
consciously registered experience is articulate, i.e. capable of verbalization,
& has its appropriate vehicle existing somewhere in the language, waiting
only to be called up. This implication, fully worked out, results in the
Crocean identifiction of “intuizione” with “espressione” (see Croce, Estetica, 10a ed., 1958, p.
12-3, & also p. 28, 251; Filosofia,
Poesia, Storia, pp. 204-6; cf. 第七三五則 on《全唐文》卷三七八王士源〈孟浩然集序〉[11]). But the theory is contradicted by literary and philosophical
experience, let alone mystic experience (see 第七五三則 infra)【Montaigne, Essais, I. 26 (Éd. Bib.
de la Pléiade, p. 179) anticipated Croce】. Walter Raleigh dismissed “the doctrine of the mot propre” as “a will o’ the wisp which has kept many an artist
dancing on its trail.”[12] “Hunger
does not imply food, & there may hover in the restless heads of
poets, as themselves testify — ‘One thought, one grace, one wonder, at the least,
/ Which into words no virtue can digest’ [Marlowe, Tamburlaine, Pt. I, V. ii. 100-101]” (Style, pp. 61 f.). Cf. N. Frye, The
Educated Imagination, p. 119-20 on “comparing thinking with things in words”
(tones, numbers, colors, brick, etc.); Hölderlin: “Die Sprache ist ein grosser Überfluss.
Das Beste bleibt doch immer für sich und ruht in seiner Tiefe, wie die Perle im
Grund des Meeres” (Sämt. Werk., hrsg.
F. Zinkernagel, II, S. 155-6); “Es ist auch immer ein Tod für unsre stille
Seeligkeit, wenn sie zur Sprache werden muss” (IV, S. 292); 第三六九則 on《全晉文》卷一○九歐陽建〈言盡意論〉.
Either too vague or too precise, the letter kills the spirit; cf. R.M. Rilke:
“Ich fürchte mich...”: “Ich fürchte mich so vor der Menschen Wort. / Sie
sprechen alles so deutlich aus: / Und dieses heisst Hund und jenes heisst Haus,
/ und hier ist Beginn und das Ende ist dort. // ... // Ich will immer warnen
und wehren: Bleibt fern. / Die Dinge singen hör ich so gern. / Ihr rührt sie
an: sie sind starr und stumm. / Ihr bringt mir alle die Dinge um” (Werke:
Auswahl in zwei Bänden, Insel
Verlag, 1957, Bd. I, S. 121); Mallarmé: “Toute l’âme résumé”: “Le sens trop
précis rature. / Ta vague littérature” (Oeuv.
comp., Bib. d. l. Pléiade, p. 73). Cf. A. Gérard, L’Idée Romantique de la Poésie en Angleterre, pp. 279-80
(Wordsworth, Shelley). For testimony from other writers (Coleridge, Hazlitt,
Newman) to the same effect, see Montgomery Belgion, The Human Parrot, pp. 17-9, with the arresting conclusion: “It
remains that for them to be able to recognize the inadequacy of their words
they must have in mind a meaning which is not those words. It is the quest of
words to express real meaning that truly establishes the wordlessness of
thought”; also第四三則; Voltaire: “Il n’est aucune langue complète,
aucune qui puisse exprimer toutes nos idées et toutes nos sensations ; leurs
nuances sont trop imperceptibles et trop nombreuses. Personne ne peut faire
connaître précisément le degré du sentiment qu’il éprouve. On est obligé, par
exemple, de désigner sous le nom général d’amour
et de haine, mille amours et mille
haines toutes différentes” (quoted in K. Nyrop, Grammaire historique de la langue française, IV, p. 444); Thierry
Maulnier: “La poéte use précisément du langage pour maîtriser ce qui, par
nature, échappé au langage” (quoted R. Bayer, Traité d’Esthétique, p. 205); Arthur Koestler, The Art of Creation, pp. 193 ff.: “The Snares of Language”: “They
[words] crystallize thought.... But a crystal is no longer a fluid” etc.; E.
Staiger, Grundbegriffe der Poetik, 5te
Auf., S. 74-8 on the inexpressibility of the “lyrische Stimmung” (七六八則); Julien Green, Journal, 4
mai 1943: “La pensée vole et les mots vont à pied. Voilà tout le drame de l’écrivain”;
Joyce Cary, Art & Reality, 1958,
pp. 2 ff.,18 ff., 26. Cf. A.N. Whitehead, Modes
of Thought, p. 235 on “The Fallacy of the Perfect Dictionary” & his
essay “Analysis of Meaning” in Essays in
Science & Philosophy, “Philosophical Library”, 1947 (p. 123: “Clarity
always means ‘clear enough’”; p. 126: “This vagueness is not due to a morbid
craving for metaphysics. It haunts
our most familiar
experiences”; p. 127: “The little words ‘is,’ ‘and,’ ‘or,’ ‘together,’ are
traps of ambiguity... As soon as you leave the beaten track of vague clarity, &
trust to the exactness, you will meet difficulties... One source of vagueness
is deficiency of language. We can see the variations of meaning; although we
cannot verbalize them in any decisive, handy manner... We are left with the deceptive
identity of the repeated word”). Cf. also Leopardi, Zibaldone, ed. F. Flora, I, p. 121: “Perchè un’idea senza parola o
modo di esprimerla, ci sfugge, o ci erra nel pensiero come indefinita e mal
nota a noi medesimi che l’abbiamo concepita. Colla parola prende corpo, e quasi
forma visibile, e sensibile, e circoscritta.”
七五三[13]
Domenico di Michelino, LA DIVINA COMMEDIA DI DANTE (1465)
雜書：
In his Portraits from Memory &
other Essays, Bertrand Russell made several cracks at Hegel, which are more
witty than just: “Hegel thought of the universe as a closely knit unity. His
universe was like a jelly in the fact that, if you touched any one part of it,
the whole quivered; but it was unlike a jelly in the fact that it could not
really be cut up into parts. The appearance of consisting of parts, according
to him, was a delusion” (p. 21, “Why I took to Philosophy”); “If you watch a
bus approaching you during a bad London fog, you see first a vague blur of
extra darkness, & you only gradually become aware of it as a vehicle with
parts & passengers. According to Hegel, your first view as a vague blur is
more correct than your later impression, which is inspired by the misleading
impulses of the analytic intellect” (p. 40, “Beliefs: Discarded & Retained”).
That this is a travesty can be seen from Hegel’s own crack at “diese
Eintönigkeit und die abstrakte Allgemeinheit” of Schelling’s Absolute: “Dies
eine Wissen, dass im Absoluten alles gleich ist, der unterscheidenden und
erfüllten oder Erfüllung suchenden und fodernden Erkenntnis entgegenzusetzen —
oder sein Absolutes für die Nacht
auszugeben, worin, wie man zu sagen pflegt, alle Kühe schwarz sind, ist die
Naivität der Leere an Erkenntnis” (Phänomenologie
des Geistes, “Vorrede”
— Ausgewählte Texte, hrsg. R.O. Gropp, “Philosophisches Erbe”, Bd.
III, S. 70). What Hegel calls “die ungeheure Macht des Negativen” (S. 77)
consists precisely in introducing distinctions into “the vague blur” &
splitting up what appears originally as unity. For the night which makes all
cows black, see《牧牛圖頌》第十圖〈雙泯〉又《十頌》第八頌〈人牛兩忘〉. Cf. Russell’s witticism with John Laird, Recent Philosophy, p. 135: “Realists
showed the need of attacking philosophical problems piecemeal instead of
systematically neglecting every tree in the hope of discerning some traces of
an invisible wood.”
Re-reading La Divina Commedia
in Natalino Sapegno’s excellent edition (Riccardo Ricciardi Editore), I
discover with no little surprise that Croce, in identifying “intuizione” with “espressione,”
nowhere took into account Dante’s repeated laments on the inadequacy of
language to convey his experience as poet and mystic (nor does Gian N.G. Orsini
in his strenuously feeble defence of Croce’s theory & practice in toto, cf. Benedetto Croce: Philosopher of Art & Literary Critic, pp.
42-4, 322-3). R.L. Nettleship, who anticipated Croce on this point, hedged the
identification with qualifications: “What is absolutely unexpressed & inexpressible
is nothing. We can only describe it potentially & by anticipation. It
cannot enter into human life until it has become articulate in some way, though not necessarily in
words”(Philosophical Remains, quote
in E.F. Carritt, The Theory of Beauty,
p. 265; left out by Orsini in his quotation from Nettleship on p. 261, also
wrong initials). Cf. A.W. Schlegel’s own note in his essay “Etwas über William
Shakespeare bei Gelegenheit Wilhelm Meisters”: “Ich weiss nicht, welchem
französischen Schriftsteller es begegnete, bey einem Gönner, dem er sein Buch
übergeben hatte, der es aber dunkel fand, und sich daher über viele Stellen
Erklärungen ausbat, häufig die Redensarten zu gebrauchen: hiemit habe ich
folgendes gemeynt; hiemit habe ich sagen wollen usw. ‘Vous avez voulu dire de
belles choses,’ erwiederte der Gönner, ‘pourquoi ne les dites vous pas?’”; Wordsworth,
Excursion, I. 77-8 on certain “poets”
endowed “with the vision & the faculty divine; yet wanting the
accomplishment of verse.” Dante says plainly in Il
Convivio, III. 3: “... l’altra ineffabilità, cioè, che la lìngua non è di
quello, che l’intelleto vede, compiutamente seguace” (Opere, a cura di E. Moore e P. Toynbee, p. 275); in III, commenting
on the lines in the second Canzone: “di ciò si biasmi il debole intelletto / e’l
parlar nostro, che non ha valore / di ritrar tutto ciò che dice Amore” (Opere, p. 270), he explains more fully: “di
ciò è da biasimare la debilitade de lo ’ntelletto e la cortezza del nostro
parlare: lo quale per lo pensiero è vinto, sì che seguire lui non puote a pieno”
(Opere, p. 275). Inferno, IV. 147: “che molte volte al fatto il dir vien meno”[14]
(La Divina Commedia, a cura di N.
Sapegno, p. 54); XXVIII. 1-6: “Chi poria mai pur con parole sciolte” ecc.[15]
(pp. 319-20); XXXII. 1-9: “S’io avessi le rime aspre e chiocce” ecc.[16]
(pp. 360-1); Par. I. 4-9: “” ecc.[17]
(pp. 781-2, quoted in supra 四八八則 a propos de《華嚴經》卷四十一) & 70-1:
“Trasumanar significar per verba / non si poria”[18]
(pp.788-9); XXXIII. 55-63: “Da quinci innanzi il mio veder fu maggio” ecc.[19]
(pp. 1188-9, quoted in supra 四八八則), 106-8: “Omai sarà più corta mia favella” ecc.[20]
(p. 1194), 121-3: “Oh quanto è corto il dire e come fioco / al mio concetto!”
ecc.[21]
(pp. 1195-6), & 142: “All’alta fantasia qui mancò possa”[22]
(p. 1197) — all this shows “la cortezza del nostro parlare” or “the
wordlessness of thought” (see supra 七五二則 on le mot juste; Croce has
some inkling of this but thinks that the search of an “expression” for the “impression”always
ends successfully — lux facta est (Estetica, 10a ed., p. 130). Manzoni, as Croce himself quotes in
connexion with “questo tormento dell’inesprimibile”, said in “un componimento
inedito”: “Ch’iosento come il più divin s’invola, / Nè può il giogo patir della
parola” (La Poesia, 5a
ed., p. 262).【Browning, Rabbi Ben Ezra, §25: “Fancies that broke
through language & escaped.”】Goethe
had the same feeling, as can be seenfrom the entry on 2 Jan. 1787 in his Italienische Reise: “Man mag zugunsten einer schriftlichen und mündlichen Überlieferung
sagen, was man will, in den wenigsten Fällen ist sie hinreichend, denn den
eigentlichen Charakter irgendeines Wesens kann sie doch nicht mitteilen, selbst
nicht in geistigen Dingen” (Auswahl in 3
Bänden, Aufbau, II, S. 34). See end of the book.
Dante’s
theory of “Polysemous” poetry as expounded in Il Convivio, II. i (Opere,
pp. 251-2) & Epitolae X (p. 415)
is a piece of mediaeval junk and implies a view of literary art as mechanical
superimposition which is quite out of keep with modern sensibility.【For
the modernist transvaluation of allegory, see W. Müller-Seidel, Probleme der literarischen Wertung, 2e
Auf., 1969, S. 17-8.】【E.A. Poe: “In defense of allegory, there is scarcely one respectable word to be said.”】Croce has said all that
needs saying on the subject of allegory in his learned essay “Sul Concetto dell’Allegoria”
(Filosofia, Poesia, Storia, pp. 336
ff.), reinforcing De Sanctis’s curt verdict: “Poesia allegorica; poesia noiosa”
(p. 337; cf. Estetica, 10a
ed., p. 40, & also K.P. Moritz’s trenchant remarks to the same effect in “Über
die Allegorie”, Schriften zur Ästhetik und Poetik, hrsg. H.J. Schrimpf, S. 112-4). Schopenhauer,
who, while condemning allegory in the figurative arts as “nichts Anderes, als
Hieroglyphen” & therefore inartistic (Die
Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, Buch III, §50, Sämtl. Werk.,
hrsg. J. Frauenstädt, Bd. II, S. 230), considers it “sehr zulässig und
zweckdienlich” in literature (S. 283), does not distinguish between allegory as
a rhetorical device which, including metaphor, parable, etc. (S. 284), is
indispensible in poetry, & allegory as a literary genre which is ore often
than not “noiosa”; indeed his 3 examples of excellent allegory are Criticon, Don Quixote & Gulliver’s
Travels! Cf. Hegel’s criticism of didactic art which reduces “die
sinnliche, bildliche Gestalt, die das Kunstwerk erst gerade zum Kunstwerk macht, nur ein müssiges
Beiwesen”, a “blosse Hülle” (Ästhetik, Aufbau Verlag, 1955, S. 92).
See also Goethe, Spruchweisheit (Sämtl. Werk., “Tempel-Klassiker”, III,
S. 331, 436); Hebbel: “Allegorie und Symbol” (Werke, hrsg. Th. Poppe I, S. 180). See also supra 三百四十九則, 七百三十則, infra 七百六十四則. Cf. Leopardi, Zibaldone, ed.
F. Flora, II, 1189 on allegory “distrugge tutto l'interesse del poema ec.” (II,
p. 1189). See also R. Bayer, Traité
d’Esthétique, pp. 43-9 on asensitive distiction between allegory & symbolism.
In poetic proctice, however, Dante is often “polysemous” in the rich artistic
sense of the word (see supra 七二八則), e.g. the famous concluding line of Ugolino’s speech: “poscia, più che
’l dolor, poté ’l digiuno”[23]
(Inf. XXXIII. 75, p. 377). As G.
Giusti says in his essay “Di due versi dell’ Inferno”, “Ecco le due
interpretazioni: 1a Dopo due (o tre) giorni anch’io morii di fame
come I figliuoli. 2a Cedei all’instinto della propria conservazione,
e mi cibai nelle carni che io stesso avea generato” (Prose
e Poesie Scelte, ed.
Hoepli, p. 108), and Dante has deliberately left the readers “perplessi, ...
quasi sgomentati di raggiungere un unico significato” (p. 109). The same view
is more subtly & eloquently expressed by De Sanctis in the essay “L’Ugolino
di Dante”: “Verso letteralmente chiarissimo... ma è verso fitto di tenebre e
pieno di sottintesi, per la folla de’ sentimenti e delle immagini che suscita,
pei tanti ‘forse’ che ne pullulano, e che sono così poetici. Forse invoca la
morte, e si lamenta che il dolore non basti ad ucciderlo, e deve attendere la
morte lenta della fame... Forse non cessa di chiamare i figli, se non quando la
fame più potente del dolore gliene toglie la forza, mancatagli prima la vista e
poi la voce... Forse, mentre la natura spinge i denti nelle misere carni, in
quell’ultimo delirio della fame e della vendetta quelle sono nella sua
immaginazione le carni del suo nemico... Tutto questo è possibile... L’immaginazione
del lettore è percossa, spoltrita, costretta a lavorare, e non si fissa in alcuna
realtà” (Saggi critici, a cura di L.
Russo, ed. Laterza, III, pp. 41-2). See supra
七四九則 on D’Aubigné, Misères,
501-62; cf. also Purg. XXIII. 28-30: “Ecco
/ la gente che perdé Ierusalemme, / quando Maria nel figlio diè di becco!”[24]
(pp. 655-6). To translate this line into English verse seems to have overtaxed
even the resources of Shelley, who could do no better than “Famine of grief can
get the mastery”[25] (“Ugolino”,
in Complete Poetical Works, Oxford,
p. 722) — wooden & wooly, see also 第七○三則 on R.A.
Schröder’s poem.【《南史‧梁武帝諸子傳》圓照、圓正。[26]】Edmund
Wilson, The Thirties, ed. Leon Edel,
records a visit in the company of a county agent to the poor mountain people of
Kentucky: “a local story that the children eat their fingers from hunger” (TLS, Nov. 7, 1980, p. 1249).
Purg.
XXVIII. 1-51 were also rendered into English by Shelley under the title “Matilda
Gathering Flowers” (op. cit., pp.
719-20). Shelley uttered a cry of despair: “You might as well clothe a statue
as attempt to translate Dante.
He is better, as an
Italian said, ‘nudo che vestito’” (Medwin, Conversations
with Byron, 1825, I, p. 232). Cf. T.F. Higham: “Greek poetry in Translation”:
“It used to be argued that English poetry, to be poetry at all, must be ‘fuller,
more coloured, more personal in the turn of its expression than the Greek.’
Cory’s Hêraclîtus is a typical
product of the old creed. It is full of excess” etc. (The Oxford Book of Greek Verse in Translation, p. lxix). Rivarol,
in translating Dante, had already noticed that “son vers se tient debout par la
seule force du substantif et du verbe sans le concours d’une seule epithète” (“De
la vie et des Poèmes du Dante”, in Oeuv. comp.,
éd. Fayolle et Chênedollé, III, p. xxi, quoted in Sainte-Beuve, Les Grands Écrivains Français, études
classées et annotées par Maurice Allem, VII, p. 254).
The “similitudine bizzara” in Par. XXVI. 97-9 (“Talvolta un animal
coverto broglia, / sì che l’affetto convien che si paia / per lo seguir che
face a lui la ’nvoglia”[27]
— p. 1103) has often been commented upon. It is delightfully baroque &
belongs to the category “diminishing or domesticating metaphor” (see R. Wellek
& A. Warren, Theory of Literature,
3rd revised ed. in “Peregrine Books”, p. 198, cf. supra 一四七則a on Hegel, Die Naturphilosophie, §268). No one
seems to have noticed the Dantesque reminiscence in the following passage in
Flaubert’s great novel: “Elle resta quelques minutes à tenir entre ses doigts
ce gros papier [i.e. a letter from old Théodore Rouault]. Les fautes
d’orthographe s’y enlaçaient les unes aux autres, et Emma poursuivait la pensée
douce qui caquetait tout au travers comme une poule à demi cachée dans une haie
d’épines” (Mme Bovary, Ière
Ptie, ch. 10; éd. Louis Conard, p. 238). Cf. supra 六四九則 on Croce’s ingenious application of Dante’s simile
to translation in La Poesia, 5a
ed., pp. 105-6.
Inf.
XXII. 121-3[28]: “Lo
Navarrese ben suo tempo colse; / fermò le piante a terra, e in un punto / saltò
e dal proposto lor si sciolse”[29]
(p. 257). Sapegno sensitively comments: “in un attimo solo; fermare i piedi a
terra per spiccare il salto, sciogliersi dalla stretta del diavolo, saltare
sono un unico e medesimo atto, che Dante analyzza nelle sue varie fasi, solo
per rilevarne insieme la complessità e la contemporaneità.” Cf. the Chinese
formula: “說時遲，那時快” (e.g.《水滸》二十二回武松打虎, 三十九回金聖歎批：“‘說時遲，那時快’，固此書中奇語也”) or Sterne’s of the ribald episode of a piping-hot
chestnut falling by accident into “that particular aperture of Phutatorius’s
breeches” which happened to be left open: “Though this has taken up some time
in the narrative, it took up little more time in the transaction, than just to
allow time for Phutatorius to draw forth the chesnut, & throw it down with
violence upon the floor — & for Yorick to rise from his chair, & pick
the chesnut up” (vol. IV, ch. 27, Tristram Shandy, “MacDonald Illustrated
Classics”, p. 315); Byron, Don Juan,
VIII. 59: “And therefore all we have related in / Two long octaves, passed in
little minute” (Don Juan, ed. T.G.
Steffan & W.W. Pratt, III, p. 142); Crébillon le fils, Le Sopha: “Mais je veux dire, répondit la Sultane, qu’elle
porte à faux. Toutes ces idées tumultueuses, qui occupaient Almaïde, et Moclès,
se succédaient avec une extrême promptitude;... ce qu’Amanzéi ne nous a dit qu’en
un quart d’heure, ne dût pas suspendre deux minutes leurs résolutions. — Eh
bien! répliqua le Sultan, le conteur est donc une bête, s’il emploie tant de
temps à rendre ce que les gens dont il parle, pensèrent avec tant de
promptitude” (L’oeuvres de
Crébillon le fils, “Les Maîtres de l’Amour” series, p. 73); cf., on the
other hand, Robert Bridges’s sensitive lines in Nero, V. ii. 3199 ff.: “None answered, & awhile / Was such
delay as makes the indivisible / And smallest point of time various and broad.”
See also supra 一二四則 on 王實甫《西廂記》第三本第三折【It. Idiom: “In men che non si dica”】. This
may serve to illustrate “the characteristically medieval type of imagination”
which makes the reader “feel the seized moment” (C.S. Lewis, The Discarded Image, pp. 206-7; cf. his Studies
in Words, p. 215 on “the great difficulty” of presenting in a narrative “a very
complicated change which happens suddenly”; cf. I Promessi Sposi, cap. 8, Manzoni, Opere, p. 59; Il
Trecentonovelle, §53, Rizzoli, p. 191).
In his Baedeker of contemporary English fiction, James Gindin noticed
the following characteristic in Kingsley Amis’s novels: “All the principal
characters make faces. Jim Dixon keeps a battery of practiced faces ready for
appropriate occasions (his Martian-invader face, his Eskimo face, his Edith
Sitwell face, his Evelyn Waugh face, his Chinese Mandarin's face, his
shot-in-the-back face, his crazy peasant face, his lemon-sucking face, his
sex-life-in-ancient-Rome face). John Lewis often copies faces from American
films...; Jenny has a whole series of looks, sorted out & catalogued, to
discourage the wolfish glancs she get from men in restaurants & on buses” (Postwar British Fiction, 1963, p. 44).
No one seems to have remarked upon a curious coincidence in Raymond Guérin’s
scandalous novel L’Apprenti (1946),
p. 20: “Monsieur Hermès... vint se placer devant la petite glace à cadre de
bambou qui surmontait le lavabo... Monsieur Hermès se fit une grimace, puis une autre. Il en avait tout un
répertoire: le traître de mélodrame, le chinois, l idiot de village, Bamboula
roi nègre ou la morue du coin.” For all his ostentacious insularity, Amis may
well have pris son bien où il la trouvé,
i.e. across the channel.
Purg.
VI. 1-8: “Quando si parte il gioco de la zara, / colui che perde si riman
dolente, / repetendo le volte, e tristo impara: / con l’altro se ne va tutta la
gente; / qual va dinanzi, e qual di dietro il prende, / e qual dallato li si
reca a mente; / el non s’arresta, e questo e quello intende; / a cui porge la
man, più non fa pressa”[30]
(pp. 451-2). This surpasses in vivid realism even the following passage: “贏時節道是倘來之物，就有粘頭的、討賞的、幫襯的，大家來撮哄” etc. （《二刻拍案驚奇》卷八）.
【Inf. I. 60; XX. 13-5. See 七六八則.】
【Inferno, III. 9: “Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate”[31]
(p. 30). For variations on this famous line, see supra 七二三則. In the “Kerker” scene of Faust, Iter Theil, when Faust urged her to flee from the
gaol, saying: “Die Tür steht offen,” Margaret answered: “Ich darf nicht fort;
für mich ist nichts zu hoffen” (4544; Faust,
hrsg. E. Trunz, S. 143). Cf. 劉須溪〈文姬歸漢圖〉：“天南地北有歸路，四海九州無故人。”[32] Thus, even for one who comes out, there is no hope
either! These two heart-rending lines complement each other & combine to
point the moral of my life in this univers
concentrationnaire (cf. Edzard Schaper on “die Gefangenschaft zur
Existenzform von vörsein geworden ist” & Barlach on his “Zuchthäusler tun”
(W. Muschg, Die Zerstörung der deutschen
Literatur, 3te Auf. S. 33 & 93). Extremes meet. Heaven, as
Voltaire shrewdly points out, is not the habitat of Hope any more than Hell: “Un
calife autrefois, à son heure dernière, / Au Dieu qu’il adorait dit pour toute
prière: / ‘Je t’apporte, ô seul roi, seul être illimité, / Tout ce que tu n’as
pas dans ton immensité: / Les défauts, les regrets, les maux, et l’ignorance. /
Mais il pouvait encore ajouter l’espérance”
(Lisbonne, A.J. Steele, Three Centuries of French Verse, p.
232).】
【Inf. XXI. 139[33] (p.
249). Cf. Marginalia to Partridge, Dic. of
Eng. Slang, p. 23 “backdoor trumpet.”】
【Purg. VI. 76: “Ahi serva Italia, di dolore ostello”[34]
(p. 458). For the metaphor cf. La
Celestina, IV: “la vejez no es sino mesón de enfermedades, posada de
pensamientos” (Éd. Aubier, par P. Heugas, “Collection Bilingue des classiques Étrangers”,
p. 214).】
【Par. XXXIII. 55-63 (p. 1189-90). See 第四八八則 on《華嚴經》卷四十一.】
七五四[35]
雜書：
〇章行嚴《邏輯指要》十七至十九葉論吾國古語似反而實正諸例，如「不寧為是」即「寧為是」也，「不忿」即「忿」也等，讀書頗得間。王伯申《經義述聞》卷三十二「語詞誤解以實義」條自〈西伯戡黎〉之「我生不有命在天」以下，舉例數十事，以證「不」乃發聲之詞，「不有」即「有」也。雖未以詰問語氣分別之，卻足佐章氏之說。《楚辭‧招魂》：「被文服纖，麗而不奇些」，王逸注：「麗，美好也。不奇，奇也，猶《詩》云：『不顯文王』，不顯，顯也。」〈小雅‧車攻〉：「徒御不驚，大庖不盈」，《毛傳》：「不驚，驚也；不盈，盈也」，《鄭箋》：「反其言美之也」，《正義》：「豈不驚戒乎？言以相警戒也；不充滿，言充滿也」；〈大雅‧文王〉：「有周不顯，帝命不時」，《毛傳》：「不顯，顯也；不時，時也」，《鄭箋》：「周之德不光明乎？光明矣。天命之不是乎？又是矣」；〈抑〉：「無競維人」，《毛傳》：「無競，競也」，《鄭箋》：「競，強也。人君為政，無強於得賢人」，《正義》：「人君為國，無強乎維在得其賢人」[36]；〈周頌‧清廟〉：「不顯不承」，《鄭箋》：「是不光明文王之德與？言其光明之也。是不承順文王志意與？言其承順之也」；〈維天之命〉：「於乎不顯」，《鄭箋》：「於乎不光明與」；〈烈文〉：「無競維人，不顯維德」，《鄭箋》：「無強乎維得賢人也，得賢人則國家強矣。不勤明其德乎，勤明之也」；〈執競〉：「無競維烈，不顯成康」，《毛傳》：「無競，競也。不顯乎其成大功而安之也」，《鄭箋》：「不強乎其克商之功業，言其強也。不顯乎其成安祖考之道，言其又顯也」；〈武〉：「於皇武王，無競維烈」[37]，《鄭箋》：「於乎君哉，武王也，無彊乎其克商之功業，言其彊也。」則「不」皆詰問語氣，非發聲之詞也。〈文王〉之「不顯亦世，世之不顯」；〈生民〉之「上帝不寧，不康禋祀」，《毛傳》：「不寧，寧也。不康，康也」，《鄭箋》云：「心猶不安之」，則「不」字非發聲之詞。〈大明〉之「不顯其光」、〈思齊〉之「不顯亦臨」，「不」字則可從伯申作發聲詞解。然《雲麓漫鈔》卷一據鐘鼎文謂「不顯文王」即《書》「丕顯哉文王謨」，亦備一說。又《魏風‧葛屨》、〈小雅‧大東〉皆有「糾糾葛屨，可以履霜」，「可以」即匪可以也。《國語‧周語下》：「萇弘其不殁乎？」韋昭注：「言將歿也。」【王荊公《臨川集》卷十八〈答韓求仁書〉：「孔子曰：『管仲如其仁』，仁也。揚子謂『屈原如其智』，不智也。猶之《詩》以不明為明，又以不明為昏。考其辭之終始，則其文雖同，不害其意異也。」[38]】近世法國俗語亦然：Henri Bauche,
Le Langage
Populaire, nouvelle éd. 1951, p. 220: “Rien: très, beaucoup,
grandement” etc.。章氏又未及古語之似正而實反者，如《書序》云：「有祥桑榖共生於朝」，《老子》五十五章云：「益生曰祥」，二「祥」字皆言不祥也。【似正而實反者，如《左傳》僖公二十二年：「若愛重傷，則如勿傷；愛其二毛，則如服焉」，《孔疏》謂：「『如』猶『不如』；成公二年：「若知不能，則如無出」；昭公二十二年：「則如亡」；定公五年：「不能如辭」，皆其類。似反而正實者，襄公二十四年：「毋寧使人謂子實生我」，杜注：「『毋寧』，寧也」；三十一年：「無寧災患」；昭公六年：「毋寧以善人為則」，皆其類。】【《漢書‧貨殖傳》：「故曰『寧爵無刀』」，孟康曰：「如自謂『寧欲免去作民有爵耶？無將止為刀氏作奴乎？』」則今語當云：「寧刀無爵」，正與相反。】《二刻拍案驚奇》卷二十八云：「那朝奉好不精細，私下做事，門也不掩著」，則言其甚不精細也；卷三十五云：「他心性好不風月，說了兩位姑娘好情，他巴不得在裏頭的」，又言其甚風月矣。此種語法，小說中數見不鮮，無人拈出。又按「不忿」即少陵「不分桃花紅似錦，生憎柳絮白於棉」之「不分」。東坡《二續雜纂》有「旁不忿」條。
〇《初刻拍案驚奇》卷十一引詩云：「雪隱鷺鷥飛始見，柳藏鸚鵡語方知。」按洪昉思《長生殿‧夜怨》齣亦引此聯，不知何人句也[39]。又《長生殿‧倖恩》齣，吳人評語引宋人詩云：「新歡入手愁忙裏，往事經心憶夢中」，亦不曉誰句[40]。不似宋人，大似王次回手筆也。
【《二刻拍案驚奇》卷十五：「原來徽州人有個僻性，是『烏紗帽』、『紅繡鞋』，一生只這兩件不爭銀子，其餘諸事慳吝了。」澹歸《徧行堂文集》卷八〈題五倫圖〉云：「徽州客錢財有兩處使用：烏紗帽、紅繡鞋；一切人性命有兩處拋撒：座上、裙帶下。」又《二刻拍案驚奇》卷四：「何故苦苦貪私，思量獨吃自痾。」按《徧行堂文集》卷九〈題狗啣枯骨〉云：「雖然獨吃自痾，幸不出乖露醜。」】
〇《二刻拍案驚奇》卷二十六高愚溪與三女事，略似 King Lear 本事。Goethe:
“Ein alter Mann ist stets ein König Lear!” usw.
(Spruchweisheit in Vers und Prosa,
in Sämtl. Werk., Der Tempel Verlag, III,
187) 真有至理。【Brüder Grimm, Haus-
und Kindermärchen, “Die Gänsehirtin am Brunnen” (Berlin, Der Kinderbuch
verlag, S. 429-20).】
〇《二刻拍案驚奇》卷十三：「叫匠人把幾枝木頭，將屋樑支架起來。截斷半柱，然後連柱連屍，倒了下來，挺在木板上了，才偷得柱子出來。」按《紅樓夢》九十六回鳳姐云：「只有一個掉包兒的法子」，九十七回：「鳳姐想出一條偷梁換柱之計」，即此之謂也。
〇《初刻拍案驚奇》卷二十六：「看官聽說：原來那本事不濟的，專好男風。你道為甚麼」云云一節，參觀《金瓶梅》五十二回潘金蓮語「這個比不得前頭」云云一節；Pietro Aretino, Sonetti lussuriosi,
no. III: “che chi ha piccol il cazzo e in potta fotte, / Meritera d’acqua
fredda un cristero. / Chi n’ha poco, in cul fotti dì e notte” (E. Fuchs, Illustrierte Sittengeschichte,
Ergänzungsband I, S. 129); Swinburne: “And what, when seen by girls in front, /
Was but a lank limp tassel, / Becomes, though puny near a c—, / Gigantic near
an a—hole” (Cecil Y. Lang, ed.,
The Swinburne
Letters, II, p. 107); John Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor, p. 277: “I... straightway work’d upon the
Queene, that sinne, for wch the Lord rayn’d fyre upon the Cities of
the Playne... so smalle was the puddle, any frogg seem’d greate therein”。
〇李耆卿《文章精義》云：「文字有終篇不見主意，結句見主意者。賈生〈過秦論〉『仁義不施，而攻守之勢異也』、韓退之『守戒在得人』之類是也。」按詩亦有之。義山七律如〈少年〉、〈牡丹〉、〈茂陵〉、〈淚〉、放翁七律如〈聞猿〉，而極其觀於何子貞《東洲草堂詩鈔》卷十〈飛雲巖〉七古結句所謂「寄語看詩讀記人，我所道雲都是石。」蔣竹山〈燕歸梁〉詞詠風蓮云：「我夢唐宮春晝遲，正舞到、曳裾時。翠雲隊仗絳霞衣，慢騰騰，手雙垂。忽然急鼓催將起，似彩鳳、亂驚飛。夢回不見萬瓊妃，見荷花，被風吹。」亦正用此法。
〇張臯文《茗柯詞‧木蘭花慢》詠楊花一起云：「儘飄零盡了，何人解、當花看。」語意奇峭，然實本之李舒章〈鵲踏枝〉詠落葉後半云：「不比落花多愛惜，南北東西，自有人知得。」李語悽婉，貌異心同，亦一篇中位置異所致也。可以悟山谷所謂「行布」之法（見第三四九則論 The Critical Opinions of Samuel Johnson, p. 254[41]）。
〇龔定庵《庚子雅詞‧好事近》結句云：「別有神方持贈，為淸明寒食」，自注：「末句乃謎語也。」按當是禁烟之意，戒其食雅片耳。金安清《水窗春囈‧附錄》「禁煙疏」條：「十八省督撫各有條陳，余擬彙齊為《寒食故事》而未果也。」鄧廷楨〈高陽臺〉：「鴉渡冥冥，花飛片片，春城何處輕烟」云云；林則徐〈高陽臺‧和嶰筠韻〉：「玉粟收餘，金絲種後，蕃航別有蠻烟。……最堪憐，是一丸泥，損萬緡錢。」
〇項蓮生《憶雲詞乙稿‧水龍吟‧秋聲》云：「莫便傷心，可憐秋到，無聲更苦。」悽警語深得翻案法，所謂 “Heard melodies are
sweet, but those unheard / Are sweeter” 也。《甲稿‧聲聲慢‧春聲》云：「莫更訴愁不住，怕落花、飛盡無聲」，亦此意。又《丙稿‧蘇幕遮‧七夕詞》云：「月未團圓，人有團圓意。」勝於孫子瀟《天真閣集》卷三〈十四夜月〉之「今夜月明殊可喜，未圓已具將圓理。」概皆翻牛希濟〈生查子〉「新月曲如眉，未有團圞意」之案。
〇黃石牧《𢈪堂集》卷三十四〈雨行〉：「安得長帨巾，仰拭青天出。」按《平妖傳》第三回趙壹「恨不得爬上天去，拿個幾萬片絕乾的展布，將一天濕津津的雲兒，展個無滴。」元初吳存《樂庵遺稿》卷二〈踏莎行春雨連日〉云：「憑誰有爪似麻姑，明朝為擘浮雲破。」
〇《燉煌掇瑣》第三種〈燕子賦〉：「渾家大小，亦惣驚忙」，又「渾家不殘」；第三十種〈五言古詩〉：「行後渾家死，回來覓不得」，「渾家少糧食，尋常空餓肚」；《唐三藏取經詩話》：「一墮深沙五百春，渾家眷屬受災殃」【《五燈會元》智海本逸：「此夜一爐火，渾家身上衣」】。「渾家」皆全家之意。何光遠《鑑誡錄》卷十「攻雜詠」條載陳裕〈渾家樂〉七律二首，第一首結句云：「天晴任你渾家樂，雨下還須滿舍愁。」「渾家」、「滿舍」對舉之意尤明。張相《詩詞曲語滙釋》七三二頁皆漏引。陳著《本堂詞》凡三用「渾家」（〈沁園春次韻弟茞雪中見寄〉、又〈示諸兒〉、〈洞仙歌壽盧竹溪〉），張書衹舉其一耳。《本堂集》卷十五有詩題云〈十一月八日渾家避難周姓家終夜以榾柮火為禦寒之具〉。《宣和遺事前集》：「也說一個無道的君王，信用小人，荒淫無度，把那祖宗渾沌的世界壞了」云云，「渾沌」亦完全之意，即「囫圇」也。
〇《潛夫論‧務本篇》云：「今世賦頌之徒，苟為饒辯屈蹇之辭，競陳誣罔無然之事，以索見怪於世。愚夫戇士，從而奇之。此悖孩童之思，而長不誠之言者也。」按此意最與柏拉圖說相近，始發於 Solon，詳見第一四○則論Diogenes Laertius, I. 59。後世理學家鄙棄詩文，貌同而心則異矣。參觀 J.E. Spingarn, Literary Criticism
in the Renaissance, pp. 4-5。
〇段若膺《經韻樓集》卷七〈東原先生札冊跋〉云[42]：「亦以傳示子孫，俾知世有剽竊師門一二，遽勇於樹幟欲為逢蒙者之可恥，而當以為大戒也。」此〈跋〉作於嘉慶甲戌十二月二日，蓋嘉慶十九年也。意中當有顧千里在。卷十一〈答顧千里書〉下署己巳，則嘉慶十四年。卷十二〈七與顧千里書論學制備忘之記〉云：「若乃未知□駕，而自謂已能御；未知銜箭，而自謂已能射」，合之前〈跋〉，可以注龔定庵《己亥雜詩》「學羿居然有羿風，千秋何可議逢蒙？絶憐羿道無消息，第一親彎射羿弓！」一首[43]。【張穆《閻潛邱先生年譜》卷三駁《漢學師承記》百詩背亭林之說，謂「出於顧千里捏造」云云，豈顧以己背段，遂託前人為先例耶？】【王弇州《四部稿》有云：「師殺弟，如馬融之於鄭玄；弟殺師，如逢蒙之於羿。」】《經韻樓集》道光元年刻本卷二、卷四末皆注「外孫龔自珍校字」，定庵於千里交誼甚篤，推重亦至，觀《己亥雜詩》中「萬卷書生」[44]、「故人有子」[45]二首可見。此首衹用若膺語，而非為千里發也。又按《酉陽雜俎》：「王靈智學射於昝君謨，以為曲盡其妙，欲射殺之，獨擅其美。發矢，君謨口迎而吐之，曰：『汝學射三年，未教汝嚙鏃法也』」（放翁〈嘲蓄貓〉詩自注：「貓爲虎舅，教虎百為，唯不教上樹」可參觀）；波斯古詩人 Sa’adi: Gulistan: “None e’er learnt the art of
bow from me, who did not in the end make me his target. No one learnt rhetoric
from me, who did not make me the subject of a satire” (E. Denison Ross, Both Ends of the Candle, p. 325 引)，皆彎弓以為操入室之戈者。
〇張祖廉校錄《定庵遺著‧與吳虹生書》云：「〈圓圓曲〉云：『錯怨狂風颺落花，無邊春色來天地。』以此自祝。」按《己亥雜詩》第三首云：「罡風力大簸春魂，虎豹沉沉臥九閽。終是落花心緒好，平生默感玉皇恩。」殊不易解，倘與此〈書〉合觀，稍有意理可尋。【梅村〈過錦樹林玉京道人墓〉：「翻笑行人怨落花，從前總被春風誤。」】又參觀六三三則眉。【定庵絕句得力於金冬心〈懷人絕句〉】
【〈病梅館記〉本《牧齋初學集》卷 46〈黃山遊記‧之八〉，又參觀柳宗元〈斬曲几文〉。】
〇《有學集‧送王郎北行十四絕句》有云：「左右風懷老旋輕，捉花留絮漫多情。白頭歌叟今禪老，彌佛燈前詛汝行。」按《己亥雜詩》云[46]：「怕聽花間惜別詞，偽留片語定來期。秦郵驆近江潮遠，是剔銀燈詛我時。」
七五五[50]
閱黑格爾著作選，因溫《道德經》一過。適見坊間有朱謙之《老子校釋》，遂偶披尋，真陋人強作解事也。往往全章僅注異文，了無詮說，如以「釋」標題之謂何矣？沾沾自憙，惟在叶韻，動輒稱《道德經》為「哲學詩」。明人笑枋：「雖不成屍，壓孕而已」參觀第四九三則，使押韻即詩，則《三字經》、《湯頭訣》之屬，皆當與於風雅。況老子書中初非通體押韻，如十八章「慈」字不可叶，三十八章十九句叶者衹二句，四十章四句叶者衹二句，六十六章十二句叶者衹四句，此類不勝具舉，朱氏悉默而不為之解。Karlgren 尚知名其書為 The Poetical Parts in Lao-Tsi，勝朱氏之鹵莽矣（參觀 Aristotle, Poetics, I. 6-9 論醫學等著述亦可以出韻文，而不得名為詩）。所據為景龍二年龍興觀碑本，力繩其佳，以標新異。夫此本節縮助詞，語氣拳曲不申，甚失文章風韻。語助雖稱「外字」，匪同枝指，《文心雕龍‧章句篇》謂「魏武弗好，當是以為無益文義，然據事似閑，在用實切」，真篤論也。此本如二十二章「古之所謂曲則全，豈虛語」、二十三章「飄風不終朝，驟雨不終日，孰為此」，或削去「哉」，或削去「乎」，大類馮山公《解舂集文鈔補遺》卷二〈與高雲客論魏序〉所嘲「海外盲儒發狂疾，刪去《論語》虛字授徒，其首章曰：『學時習，說；朋遠來，樂；不知不慍，君子』」矣！既以碑本為準，削去語助，如十章「載營魄抱一，能無離」以下凡六句，皆無「乎」字，而標點作「？」號。是意中仍據通行本有「乎」字，否則望文無從知為疑問語氣。掩耳盜鈴，背人吃肉，一何可笑！匪徒此也，碑本字句訛脫違理處，亦正不尠。較量得失，無以大勝河上公、王弼諸本。如四十三章「無有入於無間」，此本「間」作「聞」；四十五章「躁勝寒」，此本「寒」作「塞」；五十章「措其爪」，此本作「揩其爪」；六十一章「牝常以靜勝牡」，此本作「牡常以靜勝牝」；七十七章「其不欲見賢」，此本作「斯不見賢」。諸若此等，朱雖偶或強為之解，而多不得不明言其誤，進退失據，何不憚煩！尤可笑者，七十八章「正言若反」，吳澄注謂「正言若反」句當屬下章，亦如「『絕學無憂』、『希言自然』兩章皆以四字居首，為一章之綱也」，朱引其語而稱之曰：「吳說是也。」然十九章朱云「絕學無憂」應屬此章末，二十章朱又引易順鼎等諸家說謂「絕學無憂」宜屬上章，自相矛盾，莫知適從。胸無定識，舉一例可概其餘矣。【Mystic is often (ruthlessly) “realistic” in practical life. The Grey Eminence. 老子、申、韓。Indifference to moral values. 「目中有妓，心中無妓。」】【十四章、二十一章「惚怳」，參觀第七六三則。】
〇一家顯學，開宗明義以前，故書雅記每有片辭碎旨，闇與其理合，隱導其說先者，特散錢無串、引弓不發，未能條貫統紀耳。《老子》尚未成書，而《道德》之旨往往遇之，如《詩‧檜風‧匪風》云：「誰能烹魚，溉之釜鬵」，《毛傳》云：「溉，滌也。烹鱼煩則碎，治民煩則散，知烹鱼則知治民矣。」而《老子》六十章云：「治大國若烹小鮮」，王弼注云：「不擾也」（按李枝青《西雲札記》卷一云：「《老子》：『治大國若烹小鮮』，河上公注曰：『不敢撓，恐其糜也』；呂蒙正引《老子》語而申之曰：『今上封事者太多，陛下宜靜以鎮之。』《毛詩》：『誰能烹魚。』《毛傳》即以《老子》釋《詩》也。《韓非子》：『烹小鮮而數撓之，則賊其澤』」）。《左傳》宣公十五年伯宗諫晉侯云：「諺曰：『高下在心，川澤納汙，山藪藏疾，瑾瑜匿瑕，國君含垢，天之道也。』而《老子》二十八章云：「守雌為天下谿，守辱為天下谷」；六十一章云：「大國者下流」；六十六章云：「江海所以為百谷王者，以其善下之。」此亦 Bergson 所謂 “créer
sa préfiguration dans le passé”（見第七四九則引）也。
〇二章：「天下皆知美之為美，斯惡已；皆知善之為善，斯不善已。」朱云：「有美者，則有更美者與之相爭，而美之為美斯不美已。」按朱於義理了無所解，觀此釋可知。《老子》之意，正佛法所謂「於諸法無分別」《維摩詰所說經‧見阿閦佛品第十二》；「至道無他，唯嫌揀擇，但莫憎愛，洞然明白」《五燈會元》卷一僧璨〈信心銘〉；Tauler
所謂 “God
begins where all categories & differentiations end” (Erik H. Erikson, Young
Man Luther, p. 189 引)。而其理則 Spinoza 所謂 “Omnis
determinatio est negatio” (Correspondence,
tr. by A. Wolf, Letter 50, to Jarig Jelles, p. 270; 參觀 H. Lotze, Logic,
Eng. tr. ed. B. Bosanquet, I, pp. 26-7 論 “The affirmation & the negation are one
inseparable thought, & accompany in inseparable union every one of our
ideas, even when we do not expressly
attend to the others
which are tacitly negated” etc.)。蓋無惡則并無美，無不善則并無善；美有待於惡而見，而善有待於不善而知。言美即涵惡，言善即涵不善，故承之曰：「有無相生，難易相成，長短相形，高下相傾」，即 Heraclitus, Chrysippus 等之說（參觀第八一則論 Noctes
Atticae, VII. I；Aristotle,
Metaphysics, Bk. I, ch. 5 所述 Pythagoras 派亦云宙合間事物胥有雙邊，相對相待，如奇偶、一多、牝牡、動靜、善惡之類凡十）。十八章云：「大道廢，有仁義；智惠出，有大偽；六親不和，有孝慈；國家昏亂，有忠臣。」即惡與美相生，善與不善相形之例也。「皆知美之為美」殊非美事，「皆知善之為善」殊非善事。由分別相生揀擇見，復以我之揀擇見，轉而長物之分別相，朴散而淳漓矣。三章云：「不上賢，使民不爭；不貴難得之貨，使民不盜；不見可欲，使心不亂……常使民無知無欲」，即知美斯惡，知善斯不善之理也。《淮南子‧道應訓》「弗知之深，而知之淺」一節，隱取《莊子‧知北遊》語意，而終之曰：「故老子曰：『天下皆知善之為善，斯不善已』」，蓋亦以「知」為揀擇、分別也。André Gide, Journal, 15 Juin
1932: “Determinatio est negatio. cette
formule de Spinoza, que me fournit une note de IVe volume du Capital de Karl Marx, p. 49, pourrait être
versé en appoint à ma phrase des Nourritures: ‘Choisir ne m’apparaissait point
tant étire, que rapousser ce que je n’élisais pas’” (éd. “Bib. de la Pléiade”,
p. 1132) 頗相發明。陸農師《埤雅》卷三「羊」條下引王荊公《字說》曰：「羊大則充實而美。美成矣，則羊有死之道焉。《老子》曰：『天下皆知美之爲美，斯惡已。』」注《老子》者皆未徵此，故附錄之。《國語‧晉語四》郭偃答晉文公曰：「君以為易，其難也將至矣；君以為難，其易將至焉。」可為「難易相成」的解。【二十章：「唯之與阿，相去幾何？善之與惡，相去何若？」】【陳琳〈為曹洪與文帝書〉：「怪乃輕其家丘」，「恐猶未信丘言。」】
〇二章：「有無相生，難易相成」云云。按《莊子‧齊物論》云：「彼出于是，是亦因彼。彼是方生之說也。（中略）是亦彼也，彼亦是也」，郭注謂「自以為是」，大誤！《純常子枝語》卷十五謂「是」字當作「此」字解，是也。彼是相因而生，即《老子》此數語之旨。〈秋水篇〉云：「知東西之相反而不可以相無」，言尤明切。《維摩詰所說經‧入不二法門品第九》：「從我起二為二，見我實相者不起二法」，肇注：「因我故有彼，二名所以生」；〈見阿閦佛品第十二〉：「不此不彼，不以此不以彼」，皆可印參。Hegel, Wissenschft
der Logik, Ites Buch, Kap. 2: “... ist ebenso jedes ein Anderes”
(Reclams “Universal-Bibliothek”, Bd. I, S. 137)，正所謂「是亦彼也」。
〇二章：「萬物作而不辭。」朱據易順鼎說，謂「辭」當作「始」。按大誤！「辭」即「言辭」之「辭」，承上句「聖人行不言之教」來。三十四章云：「萬物恃之以生而不辭」，可以參證。《易‧繫辭上》所謂「默而成之」；《論語‧陽貨章》所謂「天何言哉？四時行焉，百物生焉」（皇侃《義疏》引王弼曰：「以淳而觀，則天地之心見於不言，寒暑代序，則不言之令行乎四時，天豈諄諄者哉」）；《莊子‧知北遊》論「夫知者不言，言者不知，故聖人行不言之教」所謂「天地有大美而不言，四時有明法而不議，萬物有成理而不說」；《列子‧力命篇》所謂「自然者默之成之」是也。Coleridge, Biographia Literaria,
ch. 12 引 Plotinus: “Should anyone interrogate her [Nature],
how she works, if graciously she vouchsafe to listen & speak, she will
reply, ‘it behoves thee not to disquiet me with interrogatories, but to
understand in silence, even as I am silent & work without words’” (ed. John
Shawcross, I, p. 166. 按 Enneads, III. viii. 4 僅云：“Asked why it brings forth its works, it might
answer thus: ‘Whatsoever comes into being is of the silent vision that belongs
to me by nature’” etc.
— Grace H. Turnbull, The Essence of Plotinus, p. 110. 參觀
Matthew Arnold: “Quiet Work”
— Poetical Works, Oxford, pp. 1-2) 闡發此諦最妙。又見第三六九則論《全晉文》卷一○七張韓〈不用舌論〉、卷一○九歐陽建〈言盡意論〉。
〇六章：「綿綿若存，用之不勤。」朱引洪頤烜說，謂「勤」通「廑」，用而不減之意；又引于省吾，謂即「覲見」之「覲」，用而不見之意。按洪說衹迂回，于說直不通。「覲見」之「見」乃見人（如《詩‧大雅‧韓奕》「韓侯入覲」、《禮記·王制》「覲諸侯」是），用而不見之「見」乃見於人。朱既用于說，而又不知引《易‧繫辭》「藏諸用」韓康伯注：「日用而不知」以自張目，亦見其陋。「勤」即勤勞之意，《老子》此句王弼注：「無物不成，用而不勞」[51]，《易‧繫辭》「乾以易知，坤以簡能」韓康伯注云：「天地之道，不為而善始，不勞而善成，故曰易簡」，無乎不同。言谷神行健而不息，給用而不疲，何必通假改字？五十二章「終身不勤」、四章「道沖而用之久不盈」足以參證。St. Augustine, Confessions,
I. iv: “Ever working, ever at rest (semper agens, semper quietus)” (“Harvard
Classics”, vol. VII, p. 7); Meister Eckhart, Sermon, XII: “When God created heaven, earth & all creatures, He was not working. He had nothing
to do” (James M. Clark, Meister Eckhart,
p. 182); Goethe: “Ohne Hast, / Aber ohne Rast” (Spruchweisheit in Vers und Prosa, in Sämtl. Werk., Der Tempel Verlag, III, S. 195); Schelling: “Wer daher den Ausdruck
fände für eine Tätigkeit, die so ruhig wie die tiefste Ruhe, für eine Ruhe, die
so tätig wie die höchste Tätigkeit, würde sich einigermaßen in Begriffen der
Natur des Vollkommensten annähern” (Sämtl.
Werk., hrsg. K.F.A.Schelling, Bd. IV, S. 305) 即「不勤」也。《淮南‧原道訓》：「纖微不可勤」，高注：「勤，猶盡也」；又云：「用之而不勤」，高注：「勤，勞也」，蓋「不」即「不盡」，若「不勤」仍注「不盡」，是為堆床疊架矣。言其用則曰「勞」，言其體則曰「盡」，二義相生，高注甚見通方之識。〈樂記〉：「徵亂則哀，其事勤；羽亂則危，其財匱」，《正義》：「繇役不休，民事勤勞」；《國語‧楚語上》范無宇曰：「大能掉小，故變而不勤」，韋注：「變動也，勤勞也」，可參觀。Arnold: “Morality”: “There is no effort on my
[Nature’s] brow”，正所謂「為之不勤」也。
〇十六章：「容能公，公能王，王能天，天能道，道能久。」朱引勞健《老子古本考》謂「王」字或作「生」字，更不可通，疑乃「全」字之訛。按謬甚！「王」即二十五章「道大，天大，地大，王亦大」，六十六章「江海所以為百谷王者，以其善下」之「王」[52]，與「容」呼應。「王」與「公」雙關，亦如七十二章「夫唯不厭，是以不厭」，同字異義亦雙關；亦如《左傳》襄公二十七年：「參以定之，信亡，何以及三」，《正義》：「『參』即『三』也」，異字同義亦雙關。所謂 “Ambiguity as a device of
style” (S. Ullmann, Semantics, pp.
188 ff.)，參觀七六一則論〈離騷〉「謇吾法夫前脩兮」。
〇二十七章。按見第七七三則論《史記‧老子韓非列傳》。
〇三十九章：「數輿無輿。」朱引高延第等說，謂「輿」即「譽」，是也。又駁成玄英、李道純、李贄等「數車之各件，無一名車者」之說，謂其出於《那先比丘經》，非《老子》本意，亦是也。全書闡釋，惟此一條可取。然謂佛典東來以前中土無此說，則又大非。《莊子‧則陽篇》云：「指馬之百體而不得馬」，正此意，名家所謂「Fallacy of Division」是也。嵇叔夜〈答難養生論〉云：「凡此數者合而為用，不可相無，猶轅軸輪轄，不可一乏於輿也」，足相發明。章行嚴《邏輯指要》偶能於舊解出新意，而二二二頁論「分誖」僅知舉公孫龍所謂「二有一乎？然一固不可謂之二也」為例，余故標而出之。韋蘇州〈聽嘉陵江水聲〉云：「水性自云靜，石中本無聲。如何兩相激，雷轉空山驚。」東坡竊師其意，為武昌主簿吳亮君采友人沈君十二琴之說作詩云：「若言琴上有琴聲，放在匣中何不鳴。若言聲在指頭上，何不於君指上聽」，遂落「分誖」。《楞嚴》卷二、卷三破五陰、六入、七大、十八界「因緣和合」，宗密《原人論》亦將「色心和合」節節支解，以明無我，清辯滔滔，實則皆「分誖」也。《長阿含經》之七《弊宿經》舉婆羅門殺賊剝皮、割肉、截筋、抽髓以求識神，小兒吹灰、劈薪求火，村人以為聲在貝中不知須口吹等喻，即嘲「分誖」。韋蘇州詩與村人觸貝何異乎？Hume 破我 (Personal identity) 用指馬百體、數車各件之法，參觀第六八四則引 Treatise, Bk. I, Part iv, sect. 6 (ed. L.A. Selby-Biggs, I, pp. 251-3【Hume’s
“argument [against causality] is analogous to Zeno’s argument against motion by
resolving time & space into an infinity of disconnected points &
instants” (Morris R. Cohen, The Meaning
of Human History, p. 64)】。若《列子‧楊朱篇第七》孟孫陽說不損一毫濟一世之旨云：「一毛微於肌膚，肌膚微於一節，省矣張湛注：『省，察』。然則積一毛以成肌膚，積肌膚以成一節。一毛固一體萬分中之一物，奈何輕之乎？」則所謂「Fallacy of Composition」也（參觀 W. Stanley Jevons, Elementary Lessons in Logic, Macmillan ed., pp. 174-5, pp. 581-3）。《百喻經》第四十四則云：「有人因飢，食七枚煎餅，食六枚半已，便得飽滿。其人恚悔，以手自打，言：『我今飽足，由此半餅。前六餅唐自捐棄。設知半餅能充足者，應先食之』」，亦「分誖」之例。參觀 “The
last drop makes the cup run over”, “The last straw breaks the camel’s back” (The Oxford Dict. of Eng. Proverbs, p.
447); Arthur Schnitzler: “Warum bildet sich der letzte Tropfen so viel darauf
ein, dass er den Becher überfliessen machte? Der erste war schon nicht minder
schuldig; — aber der törichte Becher hat es damals nicht geahnt” (Buch der Sprüche und Bedenken: “Verantwortung
und Gewissen”); Wm. James: “This [the theory of ‘petites perceptions’ in
Leibniz, Nouveaux Essais] is an
excellent example of the fallacy of division, i.e. predicating what is true
only of a collection, of each member of the collection distributively. It no
more follows that if a thousand things together cause sensation, one thing
alone must cause it, than it follows that if one pound weight moves a balance,
then one ounce weight must move it too, in less degree. One ounce weight does
not move it at all; its movement begins with the pound” (Princ. of Psych., I, p. 164-165)。【Thoreau, Walden, “The Ponds”: “How large a body
of Walden water would be required to reflect a green tint I have never proved” (Walden & Other Writings, “Modern Lib.”,
p. 161); Nichols: “Actions in the view of most men change their color when seen in the aggregate mass & in the individual instance, as the
deep blue of the ocean is colorless in the drop”
(Samuel Longfellow, Life of H.W.
Longfellow, 1886, II, p. 92).】【《歐陽文忠集》卷一二九〈鐘莛說〉：「甲問於乙曰：『鑄銅為鐘，削木為莛，以莛叩鐘，則鏗然而鳴，然則聲在木乎？在銅乎？』乙曰：『以莛叩垣則不鳴，叩鐘則鳴，是聲在銅。』甲曰：『以莛叩錢，積則不鳴，聲果在銅乎？』乙曰：『錢積實，鐘虛中，是聲在虛器之中。』甲曰：『以木若泥為鐘則無聲，聲果在虛器之中乎？』】【林希逸《竹溪鬳齋十一稿續集》卷二〈再和除字韻〉：「失馬塞翁云得馬，數車柱史論無車」，即用《老子》此語。】
〇五十八章：「禍，福之所倚；福，禍之所伏。」按《國策‧楚策四》：「或謂楚王曰：『禍與福相貫，生與亡為鄰。』」Paradise Lost, I. 162 ff., The Arch-Fiend: “If then his
providence / Out of our evil seek to bring forth good, / Our labor must be to
pervert that end, / And out of good still to find means of evil” (Milton, Poetical Works, “Everyman’s Lib.”, p.
13).
〇七十八章：「正言若反。」朱引高延第《老子證義》謂：「凡所謂『曲則全，枉則直，窪則盈，敝則新』（按二十二章）、『柔勝剛，弱勝強』（按三十六章又七十八章）、『不益生則久生』等等，言相反而理相成，皆正言也。」按高說是矣而欠抉剔。「正言若反」即Hegel, Wissenschft
der Logik, IIItes Buch 所謂 “Das
zweite negative, das Negative des Negativen, ... ist jenes Aufheben des Widerspruches” (Ausgewählte Texte, von R.O. Gropp, “Philosophisches Erbe”, Bd. III,
S. 194) (Wissenschft der Logik, Reclams
“Universal-Bibliothek”, Bd. III, S. 395)。反正為反，反反復為正。「正言若反」之「正」，乃反反復為正 (Duplex negatio affirmat) 之正。第七章：「不自生，故能長久」，「無私，故能成其私。」「自生」正也，「不自生」反也，「長久」者「不自生」以得長「自生」，反之反也。「私」正也，「無私」反也，「成其私」者「無私」而能長「自私」，反之反也。皆「反而成正」(Aufheben) 也（高所舉例外，尚有如四十五章「大成若缺，大盈若沖，大直若屈，大巧若拙，大辯若訥」、六十六章「聖人欲上人，必以言下之；欲先人，必以身後之」、七十三章「不爭而善勝，不言而善應，不召而自來」、八十一章「既以為人己愈有，既以與人己愈多」等）。此四字可謂綜括了當矣。昔人言老子尚知借餘明於釋典，今人言老子蒙然不曉二西之書。冥行瞽說，技止於文字訓詁而已。學問荒陋，可以覘世變焉。
[3]「卷三」原作「卷八」。
[4]「卷九」原作「卷二十四」。
[11]「卷三七八」原作「卷三七六」。
[15]《地獄篇》第二十八章：「究竟有誰——即使以散文吟唱……。」
[16]《地獄篇》第三十二章：「……如果我的詩夠嘶啞，╱夠刺耳……。」
[17]《天堂篇》第一章：「此刻我置身神光最亮的區域……。」
[19]《天堂篇》第三十三章：「從那時起，我的視力強旺……。」
[24]《煉獄篇》第二十三章：「這些╱亡魂失去耶路撒冷的時候，╱瑪利亞正在把兒子啄剝咬嚙。」
[26]「……絕食於獄，齧臂啖之，十三日死。」
[27]《天堂篇》第二十六章：「有時候，一隻動物會置身布袋；╱竄動時，布袋就隨著起伏；結果╱其行動就會由袋內傳到袋外。」
[29]《地獄篇》第二十二章：「納瓦拉人的時間揀得好穩妥！╱他的隻脚踏穩了地面，就突然╱一躍，擺脫了充當元帥的妖魔。」
[30]《煉獄篇》第六章：「在賭場裏，擲骰賭博結束，╱輸了的一個就會留下來，憮然╱重擲，沮喪地從中吸取啟悟。╱勝利者則離開，並獲眾人隨伴；╱這個在前，那個在後面拉他，╱另一個自稱故友的在旁邊侃侃。╱他一邊前行，一邊聽各人講話；╱手伸向誰，誰就停止苦索。」
[31]《地獄篇》第三章：「來者呀，快把一切希望棄揚。」
[32]「四海九州」原作「九州四海」。
[33]《地獄篇》第二十一章：「於是，魔首把屁眼當喇叭吹響。」
[34]《煉獄篇》第六章：「啊，遭奴役的意大利——那愁苦之所。」
[36]「得其賢人」原作「其得賢人」。
[37]「於皇武王」原作「於穆武王」。
[38]「不智也」原脫「也」字。
[49]「第七齣」原作「第六齣」。
[52]「之『王』」原作「之『下』」。
