Klingner commentary on Boethius

[Callaina]

Wait... actually who said that res goes with perfectas? It reads more smoothly if you take res together with imperfecta.

Oh, I see: "By which [comparison] an imperfect thing is imagined in the mind as going around perfect [ones] like in a dance."

 

[Callaina]

No, "were asked".

Hmm, yes, I suppose that would be more usual. Not sure why I was so determined to imply an active meaning there.

 

[Callaina]

I have to wonder whether the frequent use of both animo and anima in quick alternation is deliberate, and he's hinting at a similarity between the World Soul and the reader's soul; he didn't really need to use animo so much.

 

[Callaina]

Just a short sentence, which seems like it should cohere, but I don't see how it does and it's driving me nuts.

Preces vero Timaei, nisi quis inane orationis ornamentum eas esse arbitratur, sunt contemplationis mundum animamque hominis ad res divinas referentis consecratio.

But the prayers of Timaeus -- unless one considers them to be an empty ornament of the speech -- are a consecration of the person bringing/referring a world of contemplation and his soul back to divine things.

That doesn't seem to make much sense, but I don't see how else I could take it. Perhaps I'm missing something obvious?

 

[Pacifica]

Referentis agrees with contemplationis, which itself modifies consecratio.

 

[Pacifica]

And hominis modifies animam.

 

[Callaina]

Ahhh. That makes a great deal more sense. Thanks.

 

[Pacifica]

NP.