3 March 1982

Abstract

The practical rules of correct listening and its assigned end: meditation. ~ The ancient meaning of meletē/meditatio as exercise performed by thought on the subject. ~ Writing as physical exercise of the incorporation of discourse. ~ Correspondence as circle of subjectivation/veridiction. ~ The art of speaking in Christian spirituality: the forms of the spiritual director’s true discourse; the confession (l’aveu) of the person being directed; telling the truth about oneself as condition of salvation. ~ The Greco-Roman practice of guidance: constitution of a subject of truth through the attentive silence of the person being guided; the obligation of parrhēsia in the master’s discourse.