A Moving Compass

As Aristotle talked about the middle point of a circle being in constant motion but not at all and that this point is the key to all motion while not moving, it reminded me of the poem A Valediction Forbidding Mourning by John Donne. In his poem, Donne contemplates,

“If they be two, they are two so
As stiff twin compasses are two;
Thy soul, the fix’d foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if th’ other do.”*

Donne uses the idea of a compass to talk about his relationships; but more importantly, it illustrates the idea that if the center of the compass did not rotate, then the outside line would never be drawn. Though it makes no big show of moving, it still glides in the smallest circle while the larger arc is being formed on the outside. If this center piece does indeed move, as Donne and Aristotle suggest, then is the inside really moving the outside? A moving interior would mean that though it seems like one point, it is simply that we cannot see the degree of the circle because it is so small. If this is the case, then who is really moving who? Is the outside arm a distractive motion that masks the movement of the interior point? What would happen if they somehow found themselves unconnected? In order to move, they both have to be together; though they can “rest” without one another. In our view of nature, is it possible for us to move without the other? If humans “rest”, does nature experience a “rest” as well?

*Donne, John. Poems of John Donne. Vol I. E. K. Chambers, ed. London, Lawrence & Bullen, 1896. 51-52.