Cows and calves

Meaning

Cows and calves furnish a deliberately insulting comparison for an unreflective gaze upon creation. The author contrasts philosophers who recognize God’s wonders and glory with the contemporary world, which looks at the same works scarcely otherwise than cattle. The point is not animal husbandry or the identification of material ingredients. It is the failure to move from sight to recognition. The English preserves the important qualifier “scarcely otherwise,” rather than asserting literal identity between human and animal understanding. In the same passage, worldly greed and spectacle are opposed to quiet livelihood and neighbourly assistance, so the visual insult belongs to an ethical argument about what seekers want.