And make you keep to the question close,
And argue dialecticōs.[1]
The question then, to state it first,1265
Is, which is better, or which worst,
Synods or bears. Bears I avow
To be the worst, and synods thou.
But, to make good th' assertion,
Thou say'st th' are really all one.1270
If so, not worst; for if th' are idem,[2]
Why then, tantundem dat tantidem.
For if they are the same, by course
Neither is better, neither worse.
But I deny they are the same,1275
More than a maggot and I am.
That both are animalia,[3]
I grant, but not rationalia:
For though they do agree in kind,
Specific difference we find;[4]1280
And can no more make bears of these,
Than prove my horse is Socrates.[5]
That synods are bear-gardens too,
Thou dost affirm; but I say, No:
And thus I prove it, in a word,1285
Whats'ever assembly's not impow'r'd
To censure, curse, absolve, and ordain,
Can be no synod: but bear-garden
- ↑ That is, dialectically, or logically.
- ↑ These are technical terms of school-logic.
- ↑ Suppose (says Nash) to make out the metre, we read:
That both indeed are animalia.
The editor of 1819 proposes to read of them in place of indeed. But it was probably intended in the next line to ellipse rationalia into rat'nalia (pronounced rashnalia). - ↑ Between animate and inanimate things, as between a man and a tree, there is a generic difference, that is, one "in kind;" between rational and sensitive creatures, as a man and a bear, there is a specific difference; for though they agree in the genus of animals, or living creatures, yet they differ in the species as to reason. Between two men, Plato and Socrates, there is a numerical difference; for, though they are of the same species as rational creatures, yet they are not one and the same, but two men. See Part ii. Canto i. 1. 150.
- ↑ Or that my horse is a man. Aristotle, in his disputations, uses the word Socrates as an appellative for man in general; from him it was taken up in the schools.
