(click
here
for music.)The Speech of Rene
Des Cartes
(click
here
for music.)
I suppose that I might prove the existence of love, but only as one might prove the existence of the very table that we eat upon. I will assume for the moment that as well-learned men, you have read my literature on the subject. The question at hand though is one of how my method might apply to that most universal of forces: love.
My friend Hobbes would perhaps classify love as the presence or absence of certain basic emotions all of which combine to produce the sensation of love as we have come to know it. I say though that what we call love is not some popular concept that we may simply reduce, nor is it a physical manifestation. But it is clear to me that there is something present to account for this love.
It appears that I am capable of loving one man, and hating another. Still to a third, I feel neither, which is a state known commonly as apathy. There must be something that accounts for these feelings? How might I be sure of it? Certainly, I can’t.
Let us rule out what we know not to be the causes of this love. Certainly, love can be shown not to be of physical property. If for example there were some single characteristic that made one lovable. Yet, one man will love me, and another hate me. Should not both love me? Or perhaps as some scientist should suggest that it is within the realm of interaction. Two, perhaps three factors that would allow for one man to love me and another to hate me. And yet, the human character is a remarkably volatile one. Man is certainly capable of being tough one moment and tender the next. And certainly, while the human body has some characteristics that stay relatively constant, it has been observed that lovers will often fawn even over the ashes of the departed. You notice though that I even suspend my own logic for the time being. Certainly, the physical characteristics that I may perceive in the other person I have shown are not certain. Perhaps the evil demon is duping me. As such, I can not be sure.
Yet, I am sure that love is real, because I have felt it. I can
not deny that I have perceived it. Perhaps this love is resultant of two persons perceiving the other.
And yet, how might I be sure that the other feels it. No, my compatriots, the only way that I can prove that
love exists is that I have loved. I am sorry to say that I may prove nothing else on the subject.
 previous page |
