A Little More Whiteness, Please

[Terrance F. Flaherty]

Paul Mackin wrote:
> 
> On Fri, 22 Oct 1999, s~Z wrote:
> 
> > Terrance F. Flaherty wrote:
> >
> > > The whiteness is what I am interested in.
> >
> > Whiteness is the thing in The Recognitions, too, ha'int it? Doesn't have
> > anything to do with the albedo stage does it?
> >
> > Behold I was brought forth in iniquity
> > And in sin my mother conceived me
> > Behold thou dost desire truth in the innermost being
> > And in the hidden part thou wilt make me know wisdom
> > Purify me with hyssop and I shall be clean
> > Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow
> >
> >         --Psalm 51
> 
> Conceived in sin and born in corruption as the Huey Long character in
> All the King's Men liked to say.
> 
> Whiteness has also of course its opposite (derived) biblical
> connotation--camouflage for corruption and death and by extension Sin, as
> in whited sepulcher.
> 
> Driving though the beautiful Maryland countryside yesterday I came upon a
> field of white cattle. Not an Angus in view. Couldn't help but wonder if a
> Statement was being made.
> 
> Is whiteness somehow Platonic to Aristotelian coloredness? Don't mean
> simply that whiteness is an Eternal Idea (platonically speaking), but
> rather that Whiteness is the Eternal Idea of Eternal Ideas. That which
> exists before Matter (along with consequent Conception, Birth, Death, Sin,
> et al) comes into being. Don't know how I came on this (less than eternal)
> idea. Just popped into my head.

Aristotle, as you  probably remember, deals with sight,
color, whiteness, appropriately in De Anima. When I worked
through this, I got his ideas on sound down first, it helps,
Ross is a good source. 

> 
> How would an  Idealist sense of Whiteness tie into the artificiality
> that Terrance spoke of a second ago prompting this thread. The world
> of chemical synthesis is one freed from certain natural contingencies,
> from Reality so to speak--at least Reality as we found it.
> 
        P.
 
Interesting that Blakes America--ORC--is Red and Urizen is
White. In Melville of course, whiteness is to found on both
sides and in the impenetrable mysteries between them. 

TF