
Hamlet's famous like that "conscience makes cowards of us all" has become a kind of moral cliché, coming to mean that we would do many more things if our conscience didn't stop us. In fact, though, conscience has not always referred to that little white angel on the shoulder of a character in a cartoon. Conscience is awareness, knowledge. And Helena has found that the moment of self-awareness can be much more fearsome than the thing itself.

I wonder to what degree Hegel's ideas about negation and consciousness have to do with this same phenomenon. Hegel saw the world before conscience, as somehow present to itself, but the moment that someone becomes aware of the world -- and aware of herself being aware of the world -- it is no longer a seamless whole. A crack has opened up. And according to Hegel, this is the beginning of history and, if we think deeply enough, of humanity itself. Animals don't reflect on the world, don't open up that gap, but people do. (Perhaps, by the way, this is why we empathize with Wily E. Coyote, and not with the Roadrunner).
So even though I feel sorry for Helena whenever she realizes what she is doing and then falls to the floor, it is also wonderful. Conscience make make cowards of us all, but it also makes us human.
Parabens Helena! 1 pelo seu aniversario e 2 por ja andar no seu primeiro aniversario! Beijo grande meu e do Pedro! (Lilian)
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