giovedì, giugno 18, 2009

Manoscritto di Arthur Conan Doyle








This remarkable script purports to be produced under the

direct inspiration of Apollonius of Tyana. Apollonius was almost a

contemporary of Christ, though according to his biograpfer Philostratus he

lived to be more than hundred years old, dying in the reign of Nerva.

Philostratus He had the reputation of being the greatest philosopher and

thaumaturgist of his age. That being so, one would imagine that

the difference would be clear if an English lady, perfectly ignorant of

philosophy or of Apollonius, were to take his place, especially as her

script is written off without pause or emendation. I venture to say

that is no such difference and that this contribution to human

knowledge is in all ways worthy of one of the greatest minds that ever

functioned upon earth. Of course it would be easi to pick a sentence

here or a sentence there which would make such criticism seem

exaggerated, but I am alluding to the massive general effect of the

book- an effect so loftly that it would take a considerable

contemporary brain to canc. appreciate it fully. Yet canc. Apollonius

is conscious that it falls short of his true knowkedge, and he says

“I cannot pour the eternal wisdom of the cosmos into a vessel of

flesh and blood, but, as I am enabled, thus I do.”

The book [Nuctemeron] can I think stand or fall on its own

internal evidence of authorship. We may fairly ask 'If it

is impossible that this scribe [Marjorie Livingston] really wrote it, then who did?' Vague

talk of the Unconscious self will not help us. Canc. You cannot

try to explain the inexplicable There is the document. Does it correspond

with the alleged author; or is it the unaided work of an English

lady? There is I am told some extraneous corroboration, messages

received independently through other mediums. But the book itself

is its own best proof of a high external imperative.

Arthur Conan Doyle

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