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Book II, Part III
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Consolation of Philosophy, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Classical Philosophy and Medieval Christianity
Wisdom, Fortune, and Happiness
The Problem of Evil
Human Free Will and God’s Foreknowledge
Summary
Analysis
Boethius tells Philosophy that she is right about his good fortune in the past—but that this is actually the thing that causes him the most pain. There is nothing worse than “once to have been happy.” But Philosophy says that Boethius’s beliefs are still wrong, because he “still possess[es] outstanding blessings.” Boethius’s father-in-law and wife are virtuous, loving, and devastated by what has happened to him. These blessings, she says, are immeasurably precious.
Whereas Philosophy argues that Boethius should remain grateful for his past good fortune, which should give him a sense of perspective on his present misfortune, instead he fixates on the magnitude of his fall from success. Even if it is logical, Philosophy’s argument has failed to convince Boethius, so she tries another: he actually still has good fortune, as the most important things that fortune can give someone—a loving family and community—remain intact, and he has treated this family nobly and thereby proven his moral worth.
Themes
Boethius continues to lament his condition, but Philosophy tells him to stop “dilly-dallying” and get it through his head that his life has been good enough. Nobody is completely free of worries or anxieties, everyone wants Fortune to treat them better, and “the most happy men are over-sensitive” because “they have never experienced adversity.” If they were even a fraction as lucky as Boethius in life, the vast majority of people would “believe themselves almost in heaven.” People’s success or misery is all in their heads, Philosophy promises: “nothing is miserable except when you think it so, and vice versa.” Instead of looking for happiness from external factors, she insists, humans should look “within,” to where it really resides.
In the 21st century, we might say that Philosophy reminds Boethius of his privilege and the way it has made him “over-sensitive” to discomfort. Readers might wonder if this line of argument—in which Philosophy implies that some of Fortune’s gifts do matter—contradicts her argument at the beginning of Book II, in which she implored Boethius to “have nothing more to do with [Fortune’s] dangerous games.” This is a valid concern, but by the end of this section it becomes clear that Philosophy believes that Fortune’s gifts do not truly matter to happiness, for people with the right mindset can remain wise, stable, and thus happy through even the worst hardship. She means to say that, even if these gifts did matter, Boethius would still have the best of them, so he really has no right to pity himself and complain about his life.
Themes
Philosophy clarifies her argument to Boethius: nothing is “more precious to [him] than [his] own self,” which is “something [he] would never wish to lose and something Fortune could never take away.” She explains that “happiness is the highest good of rational nature,” and that the highest goods are those that “can’t be taken away.” Therefore, because Fortune is changeable, she will never lead to happiness. Anyone who thinks their good fortune makes them happy is simply blind to the reality that their fortune is changeable, and nobody can be happy and ignorant. And those who do understand that their fortune is changeable are often so afraid of losing their good fortune that they cannot be happy.
Now, Philosophy shifts from speaking in examples and platitudes to making a structured, rational argument. Although it is dense, it allows her to definitively show that nobody who bets their happiness entirely on Fortune can ever be truly happy. She believes her premises are self-evident: people’s own selves are the most important to them because, without themselves, they would be nothing; all rational creatures want nothing more or less than complete and perfect happiness, which is the best thing they can be; and, of all good things, certain things can disappear while still leaving other good things that “can’t be taken away,” so the latter category must be more important. Her conclusion—that the highest goods are those of the true self and not of Fortune—logically follows from these three premises, if we accept them.
Themes
But some people, those who recognize the “unreliability” of fortune, will not care about losing it. Instead, they base their happiness on something else. These people have the right idea—like Boethius, they also know that “the human mind cannot die,” and therefore see that the pleasure and happiness of their physical bodies are nothing compared to the more profound happiness of the mind, or soul.
Here, Philosophy makes it clear that the “own self” she has been talking about is the human soul, as opposed to the body. It is important to recall that Boethius believed in the strict division between the immortal soul and the mortal body, an idea essentially popularized by Plato, which remains central to many (but not all) religions. This idea is the alternative to betting on Fortune—but Philosophy has not yet explained what this requires people to do.
Themes
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In her next song, Philosophy uses a metaphor to show what it means to choose one’s internal mental or spiritual happiness over external material happiness. Someone “careful,” she writes, will build their house away from beautiful sites that are exposed to dangers like strong winds and the stormy ocean. Rather, they will choose a modest site “secure on lowly rock.” In their safety, they will “lead a life serene / And smile at the raging storm.”
This metaphor shows readers that wisdom requires overlooking short-term excitement—like the prospect of having a beautiful view by building one’s house on a precarious stretch of shore—for the sake of long-term tranquility. If such a storm represents the unpredictable luck that governs the material world, then the best stance one can have towards Fortune is building an immunity to her. Indeed, this metaphor closely recalls Philosophy’s message about the strategy of the wise in Book I, Part III, when she said that philosophers should build a “citadel” on “a strong point” that allows them to withstand their enemies’ “assaults of folly.” She indicates that philosophers and the wise have no need to strike back against these “assaults” because they recognize them as meaningless, and the soul as the seat of everything that is truly valuable.
Themes
