Full Idea
Boethius says that reasoning [ratiocinatio] is related to intellectual understanding [intellectus] as time to eternity, involving as it does movement from one stage to another.
Gist of Idea
Reasoning relates to understanding as time does to eternity
Source
report of Boethius (The Consolations of Philosophy [c.520], 4, prose 6) by Richard Sorabji - Rationality 'Shifting'
Book Reference
'Rationality in Greek Thought', ed/tr. Frede,M /Striker,G [OUP 1999], p.334
A Reaction
This gives true understanding a quasi-religious aura, as befits a subject which is truly consoling.