Chapter VII: Introduction: To the Next Book (5)

When we attribute infallibility to the soul, we are supposing her to be one and simple, identifying the soul with soul essence. When, however, we consider her capable of sin, we are looking at her as a complex, of her essence and of another kind of soul which can experience brutal passions. The soul, thus, is a combination of various elements; and it is not the pure soul, but this combination, which experiences passions, commits sins, and undergoes punishments. It was this conception of the soul Plato was referring to when he said:[313] "We see the soul as we see Glaucus, the marine deity," and he adds, "He who would know the nature of the soul herself should, after stripping her of all that is foreign to her, in her, especially consider her philosophic love for truth; and see to what things she attaches herself, and by virtue of whose affinities she is what she is." We must, therefore, differentiate the soul's life acts from that which is punished, and when we speak of philosophy's separation of the soul, we mean a detaching not only from the body, but also from what has been added to the soul.

HOW THE ANIMAL NATURE IS GENERATED.

This addition occurs during her generation, or rather in the generation of another ideal form of soul, the "animal nature." Elsewhere[314] this generation has been explained thus. When the soul descends, at the very moment when she inclines towards the body, she produces an image of herself. The soul, however, must not be blamed for sending this image into the body. For the soul to incline towards the body is for the soul to shed light on what is below her; and this is no more sinful than to produce a shadow. That which is blamable is the illuminated object; for if it did not exist, there would be nothing to illuminate. The descent of the soul, or her inclination to the body, means only that she communicates life to what she illuminates. She drives away her image, or lets it vanish, if nothing receptive is in its vicinity; the soul lets the image vanish, not because she is separated--for to speak accurately, she is not separated from the body--but because she is no longer here below; and she is no longer below when she is entirely occupied in contemplating the intelligible world.

THE DOUBLE HERCULES SYMBOLIZES THE SOUL.

(Homer) seems to admit this distinction in speaking of Hercules, when he sends the image of this hero into Hades, and still he locates him within the abode of the deities[315];--it is at least the idea implied in this double assertion that Hercules is in Hades and that he is in Olympus. The poet, therefore, distinguished in him two elements. We might perhaps expound the passage as follows: Hercules had an active virtue, and because of his great qualities was judged worthy of being classified with the deities, but as he possessed only the active virtue, and not the contemplative virtue, he could not be admitted into Heaven entirely; while he is in heaven, there is something of him in Hades.[316]

RELATION OF THE "WE" AND THE "SOUL."

13. Is it "we" or the "soul" which makes these researches? It is we, by means of the soul. The cause of this is, not we who consider the soul because we possess her, but that the soul considers herself. This need not imply motion, as it is generally understood, but a motion entirely different from that of the bodies, and which is its own life.

INTELLIGENCE NOT OURS, BUT WE.

Intelligence[277] also is ours, but only in the sense that the soul is intelligent; for us, the (higher) life consists in a better thinking. The soul enjoys this life either when she thinks intelligible objects, or when the intellect is both a part of ourselves, and something superior towards which we ascend.

FIRST ENNEAD, BOOK SEVEN.

Of the First Good, and of the Other Goods.[317]

THE SUPREME GOOD AS END OF ALL OTHER GOODS.

1. Could any one say that there was, for any being, any good but the activity of "living according to nature?"[318] For a being composed of several parts, however, the good will consist in the activity of its best part, an action which is peculiar, natural, and unfailing. Further: as the soul is an excellent being, and directs her activity towards something excellent, this excellent aim is not merely excellent relatively to the soul, but is the absolute Good. If then there be a principle which does not direct its action towards any other thing, because it is the best of beings, being above them all, it can be this only because all other beings trend towards it. This then, evidently, is the absolute Good by virtue of which all other beings participate therein.

PARTICIPATION IN GOOD. TWO METHODS.

Now there are two methods of participation in the Good: the first, is to become similar to it; the second is to direct one's activity towards it. If then the direction of one's desire and one's action towards the better principle be a good, then can the absolute good itself neither regard nor desire any other thing, remaining in abiding rest, being the source and principle of all actions conforming to nature, giving to other things the form of the Good, without acting on them, as they, on the contrary, direct their actions thereto.

PERMANENCE THE CHIEF NOTE OF ABSOLUTE GOOD.

Only by permanence--not by action, nor even by thought--is this principle the Good. For if it be super-Being, it must also be super-Activity, super-Intelligence, and Thought. The principle from which everything depends, while itself depending on nothing else, must, therefore, be recognized as the Good. (This divinity) must, therefore, persist in His condition, while everything turns towards Him, just as, in a circle, all the radii meet in the centre. An example of this is the sun, which is a centre of the light that is, as it were, suspended from that planet. The light accompanies the sun everywhere, and never parts from it; and even if you wished to separate it on one side, it would not any the less remain concentrated around it.

ALL THINGS DEPEND ON THE GOOD BY UNITY, ESSENCE, AND QUALITY.

2. Let us study the dependence of everything on the Good. The inanimate trends toward the Soul, while the animate Soul trends towards the Good through Intelligence. As far as anything possesses unity, essence or form, it participates in the Good. By its participation in unity, essence and form each being participates in the Good, even though the latter be only an image, for the things in which it participates are only images of unity, essence, and form. For the (first) Soul[319] as she approaches Intelligence, she acquires a life which approaches closer to truth; and she owes this to Intelligence; thus (by virtue of Intelligence) she possesses the form of the Good. To possess the latter, all she needs to do is to turn her looks towards it; for Intelligence is the next after the Good. Therefore, to those to whom it is granted to live, life is the good. Likewise, for those who participate in intelligence, Intelligence is the good. Consequently, such (a being as) joins intelligence to life possesses a double good.

THERE IS NO UNALLOYED EVIL FOR THE LIVING BEING.

3. Though life be a good, it does not belong to all beings. Life is incomplete for the evil person, as for an eye that does not see distinctly; neither accomplish their purpose. If, for us, life, though mingled as it is, be a good, even if an imperfect one, how shall we continue to assert that death is not an evil? But for whom would it be an evil? This we must ask because evil must necessarily be an attribute of somebody. Now there is no more evil for a being which, though even existing, is deprived of life, any more than for a stone (as they say). But if, after death, the being still live, if it be still animate, it will possess good, and so much the more as it exercises its faculties without the body. If it be united to the universal Soul, evidently there can be no evil for it, any more than for the gods who possess good unmingled with evil. Similar is the case of the soul which preserves her purity, inasmuch as he who loses her finds that life, and not death, is the real Evil. If there be chastisements in Hades, again is life an evil for the soul, because she is not pure. If, further, we define life as the union of the soul with the body, and death as their separation, the soul can pass through both these conditions (without, on that account, being unhappy, or losing her hold on the Good).

BY VIRTUE, LIFE CHANGES FROM AN EVIL TO A GOOD.

How is death not an evil, if life be a good? Certainly life is a good for such as possess the Good, (it is a good) not because the soul is united to the body, but because she repels evil by virtue. (Without the latter) death would rather be a good (because it delivers us from the body[320]). To resume: by itself, life in a body is evil; but, by virtue, the soul locates herself in the good, not by perpetuating the existing corporeal union, but by separating herself from the body.

PORPHYRY, COMMENTARIES OR OUTLINES OF THE ENNEADS OF PLOTINOS.

PSYCHOLOGICAL FRAGMENTS BY PORPHYRY, JAMBLICHUS, NEMESIUS, AND AMMONIUS SACCAS.

CONCORDANCE OF THE NUMBERS OF THE 44 PARAGRAPHS OF PORPHYRY'S PRINCIPLES OF THE THEORY OF INTELLIGIBLES IN THE EDITIONS OF BOUILLET, CREUZER, AND HOLSTENIUS

Bouillet. Creuzer. Holstenius.
=1= 34 34
=2= 8 8
=3= 9 9
=4= 27 28
=5= 20 20
=6= 18 18
=7= 24 25
=8= 19 19
=9= 7 7
=11= 22 23
=12= 10 10
=13= 12 12
=14= 26 27
=15= 1 1
=16= 2 2
=17= 3 3
=18= 4 4
=19= 5 5
=20= 6 6
=21= 28 29
=22= 29 30
=23= 22 23
=24= 17 17
=25= 16 16
=26= 11 11
=27= 25 26
=28= 14 14
=29= 13 13
=30= 30 31
=31= 42 43
=32= 44 45
=33= 15 15
=34= 23 24
=35= 43 44
=36= 35 35
=37= 36 37
=38= 37 38
=39= 39 40
=40= 40 41
=41= 33 36
=42= 38 39
=43= 31 32
=44= 41 42

The order of Bouillet has been left, because the other orders differ anyway, and because this is the one that Porphyry introduced into the works of Plotinos. It must, therefore, have been of most significance to him.

PRINCIPLES OF THE THEORY OF THE INTELLIGIBLES, BY PORPHYRY.[321]

FIRST ENNEAD,[322] BOOK TWO.

Of Virtues.

I.--There is a difference between the virtues of the citizen, those of the man who essays to rise to contemplation, and who, on this account, is said to possess a contemplative mind; those of him who contemplates intelligence; and finally those of pure Intelligence, which is completely separated from the soul.

1. The civil virtues consist of moderation in passions, and in letting one's actions follow the rational laws of duty. The object of these virtues being to make us benevolent in our dealings with our fellow-human beings, they are called civil virtues because they mutually unite citizens. "Prudence refers to the rational part of our soul; courage, to that part of the soul subject to anger; temperance consists in the agreement and harmony of appetite and reason; finally justice, consists in the accomplishment, by all these faculties, of the function proper to each of them, either to command, or to obey."

2. The virtues of the man who tries to rise to contemplation consist in detaching oneself from things here below; that is why they are called "purifications."[323] They command us to abstain from activities which innervate the organs, and which excite the affections that relate to the body. The object of these virtues is to raise the soul to genuine existence. While the civil virtues are the ornament of mortal life, and prepare the soul for the purificatory virtues, the latter direct the man whom they adorn to abstain from activities in which the body predominates. Thus, in the purificatory virtues, "prudence consists in not forming opinions in harmony with the body, but in acting by oneself, which is the work of pure thought. Temperance consists in not sharing the passions of the body; courage, in not fearing separation therefrom, as if death drove man into emptiness and annihilation; while justice exacts that reason and intelligence command and be obeyed." The civil virtues moderate the passions; their object is to teach us to live in conformity with the laws of human nature. The contemplative virtues obliterate the passions from the soul; their object is to assimilate man to the divinity.

There is a difference between purifying oneself, and being pure. Consequently the purificatory virtues may, like purification itself, be considered in two lights; they purify the soul, and they adorn the purified soul, because the object of purification is purity. But "since purification and purity consist in being separated from every foreign entity, the good is something different from the soul that purifies itself. If the soul that purifies herself had possessed the good before losing her purity, it would be sufficient for the soul to purify herself; but in this very case, what would remain to her after the purification would be the good, but not the purification. But the soul is not the good; she can only participate therein, and have its form; otherwise the soul would not have fallen into evil. For the soul, good consists in being united to her author, and her evil is to unite with lower things."[324]

Of evil, there are two kinds; the one, is to unite with lower things; the other is to abandon oneself to the passions. The civil virtues owe their name of virtues and their value to their releasing the soul from one of these two kinds of evil (of the passions). The purificatory virtues are superior to the former, in that they free the soul from her characteristic form of evil (that is, union with lower things). Therefore, when the soul is pure, she must be united to her author; her virtue, after her "conversion," consists in her knowledge and science of veritable existence; not that the soul lacks this knowledge, but because without her superior principle, without intelligence, she does not see what she possesses.[325]

3. There is a third kind of virtues, which are superior to the civil and purificatory virtues, the "virtues of the soul that contemplates intelligence." "Here prudence and wisdom consist in contemplating the "beings" or essences contained by intelligence; justice consists in the soul's fulfilling of her characteristic function; that is, in attaching herself to intelligence and to direct her activity thither. Temperance is the intimate conversion of the soul towards Intelligence, while courage is the impassibility by which the soul becomes assimilated to what she contemplates, since the soul's nature is to be impassible.[326] These virtues are as intimately concatenated as the other (lower forms)."

4. There is a fourth kind of virtues, the "exemplary virtues," which reside within intelligence. Their superiority to the virtues of the soul is the same as that of the type to the image; for intelligence contains simultaneously all the "beings" or essences which are the types of lower things. "Within intelligence, prudence is the science; wisdom is the thought, temperance is the conversion towards oneself; justice is the accomplishment of one's characteristic function; courage is the identity of intelligence, its perseverance in purity, concentrated within itself, in virtue of its superiority."[327]

We thus have four kinds of virtues: 1, the exemplary virtues, characteristic of intelligence, and of the "being" or nature to which they belong; 2, the virtues of the soul turned towards intelligence, and filled with her contemplation; 3, the virtues of the soul that purifies herself, or which has purified herself from the brutal passions characteristic of the body; 4, the virtues that adorn the man by restraining within narrow limits the action of the irrational part, and by moderating the passions. "He who possesses the virtues of the superior order necessarily (potentially) possesses the inferior virtues. But the converse does not occur."[328] "He who possesses the superior virtues will not prefer to practice the lower virtues because of the mere possession thereof; he will practice them only when circumstances will invite (it). The objects, indeed, differ with the kind of virtues. The object of the civil virtues is to moderate our passions so as to conform our conduct to the laws of human nature. That of the purificatory virtues is to detach the soul completely from the passions. That of the contemplative virtues is to apply the soul to intellectual operations, even to the extent of no longer having to think of the need of freeing oneself from the passions. Last, that of the exemplary virtues is similar to that of the other virtues. Thus the practical virtues make man virtuous; the purificatory virtues make man divine, or make of the good man, a protecting deity; the contemplative virtues deify; while the exemplary virtues make a man the parent of divinities. We should specially apply ourselves to purificatory virtues believing that we can acquire them even in this life; and that possession of them leads to superior virtues. We must push purification as far as possible, as it consists in separating (the soul) from the body, and in freeing oneself from any passional movement of the irrational part. But how can one purify the soul? To what limit may purification be pushed? These are two questions that demand examination.

To begin with, the foundation of purification is to know oneself, to realize that he is a soul bound to a foreign being, of a different nature (or, "being").

Further, when one is convinced of this truth, one should gather oneself together within himself, detaching himself from the body, and freeing himself entirely from the passions. He who makes use of his senses too often, though it be done without devotion or pleasure, is, nevertheless, distracted by the care of the body, and is chained thereto by sensation. The pains and the pleasures produced by sense-objects exercise a great influence on the soul, and inspire the soul with an inclination for the body. It is important to remove such a disposition from the soul. "To achieve this purpose, the soul will allow the body only necessary pleasures, that serve to cure her of her sufferings, to refresh her from her exhaustions, to hinder her from being importunate. The soul will free herself from pains;[327] if this be beyond her powers, the soul will support them patiently, and will diminish them, while refusing to share them. The soul will appease anger so far as possible; she will even try to suppress them entirely; at least, if that be impossible, she will not voluntarily participate therein, leaving the non-reflective excitement to another (animal) nature, reducing the involuntary motions as far as possible. The soul will be inaccessible to fear--having nothing further to risk; even so, she will restrain every sudden movement; she will pay attention to fear only insofar as it may be nature's warning at the approach of danger. Absolutely nothing shameful will be desired; in eating and drinking, she will seek only the satisfaction of a need, while remaining essentially alien thereto. The pleasures of love will not even involuntarily be tasted, at least, she will not allow herself to be drawn beyond the flights of fancy that occur in dreams. In the purified man, the intellectual part of the soul will be pure of all these passions. She will even desire that the part that experiences the irrational passions of the body should take notice of them without being agitated thereby, and without yielding to them. In this way, if the irrational part should itself happen to experience emotions, the latter will be promptly calmed by the presence of reason. Struggles will have been left behind before any headway will have been made to purification. The presence of reason will suffice; the inferior principle, indeed, will respect the higher one to the extent of being angry with itself, and reproaching itself for weakness, in case it feels any agitation that disturbs its master's rest." So long as the soul experiences even moderate passions, the soul's progress towards impassibility remains in need of improvement. The soul is impassible only when she has entirely ceased to participate in the passions of the body. Indeed, that which permitted the passions to rule was that reason relaxed the reins as a result of her own inclination.

FIRST ENNEAD, BOOK NINE.

Of Suicide.

OF THE SEPARATION OF THE SOUL AND BODY.

2. Nature releases what nature has bound. The soul releases what the soul has bound. Nature binds the body to the soul, but it is the soul herself that has bound herself to the body. It, therefore, belongs to nature to detach the body from the soul, while it is the soul herself that detaches herself from the body.

3. There is a double death. One, known by all men, consists in the separation of the body with the soul; the other, characteristic of philosophers, results in the separation of the soul from the body. The latter is consequence of the former.

SECOND ENNEAD, BOOK FOUR.

Of Matter.

OF THE CONCEPTION OF MATTER (10).

4. While separating ourselves from existence we by thought beget nonentity (matter). While remaining united with existence, we also conceive of nonentity (the one). Consequently, when we separate ourselves from existence, we do not conceive of the nonentity which is above existence (the one), but we beget by thought something that is deceptive, and we put ourselves in the condition (of indetermination) in which one is when outside of oneself. Just as each one can really, and by himself, raise himself to the non-existence which is above existence (the One); so (by separating oneself from existence by thought), we may reach the nonentity beneath existence.

THIRD ENNEAD, BOOK SIX.

Of the Impassibility of Incorporeal Things.

OF THE INCORPOREAL (3).

5. The name "incorporeal" does not designate one and the same genus, as does the word "body." Incorporeal entities derive their name from the fact that they are conceived of by abstraction from the body. Consequently, some of them (like intelligence and discursive reason) are genuine beings, existing as well without as within the body, subsisting by themselves, by themselves being actualizations and lives; other beings (such as matter, sense-form without matter, place, time, and so forth), do not constitute real beings, but are united to the body, and depend therefrom, live through others, possess only a relative life, and exist only through certain actualizations. Indeed, when we apply to them the name of incorporeal entities (it is merely a negative designation), indicating only what they are not, but not what they are.

OF THE IMPASSIBILITY OF THE SOUL.

6. (1) The soul is a "being" or essence, without extension, immaterial and incorruptible; her nature consists in a life which is life in itself.

7. (3, end) When the existence of some being is life itself, and when the passions are lives, its death consists in a life of a certain nature, and not in entire privation of life; for the "passion" experienced by this "being" or essence, does not force it into complete loss of life.

8. (2, 3) There is a difference between the affections of the bodies, and those of incorporeal things. The affection of bodies consists in change. On the contrary, the affections and experiences characteristic of the soul are actualizations that have nothing in common with the cooling or heating up of the bodies. Consequently if, for bodies, an affection ever implies a change, we may say that all incorporeal (beings) are impassible. Indeed, immaterial and incorporeal beings are always identical in their actualization; but those that impinge on matter and bodies, though in themselves impassible, allow the subjects in which they reside to be affected. So when an animal feels, the soul resembles a harmony separated from its instrument, which itself causes the vibration of the strings that have been tuned to unison herewith; while the body resembles a harmony inseparable from the strings. The reason why the soul moves the living being is that the latter is animated. We, therefore, find an analogy between the soul and the musician who causes his instrument to produce sounds because he himself contains a harmonic power. The body, struck by a sense-impression, resembles strings tuned in unison. In the production of sound, it is not the harmony itself but the string that is affected. The musician causes it to resound because he contains a harmonic power. Nevertheless, in spite of the will of the musician, the instrument would produce no harmonies that conformed to the laws of music, unless harmony itself dictated them.

9. (5) The soul binds herself to the body by a conversion toward the affections experienced by the body. She detaches herself from the body by "apathy," (turning away from the body's affections.)

OF THE IMPASSIBILITY OF MATTER.

10. (7) According to the ancient (sages) such are the properties of matter. "Matter is incorporeal because it differs from bodies. Matter is not lifeless, because it is neither intelligence, nor soul, nor anything that lives by itself. It is formless, variable, infinite, impotent; consequently, matter cannot be existence, but nonentity. Of course it is not nonentity in the same way that movement is nonentity; matter is nonentity really. It is an image and a phantom of extension, because it is the primary substrate of extension. It is impotence, and the desire for existence. The only reason that it persists is not rest (but change); it always seems to contain contraries, the great and small, the less and more, lack and excess. It is always "becoming," without ever persisting in its condition, or being able to come out of it. Matter is the lack of all existence; and, consequently, what matter seems to be is a deception. If, for instance, matter seems to be large, it really is small; like a mere phantom, it escapes and evanesces into nonentity, not by any change of place, but by its lack of reality. Consequently, the substrate of the images in matter consists of a lower image. That in which objects present appearances that differ according to their positions is a mirror, a mirror that seems crowded, though it possesses nothing, and which yet seems to be everything."

OF THE PASSIBILITY OF THE BODY (8-19).

11. Passions (or, affections) refer to something destructible; for it is passion that leads to destruction; it is the same sort of being that can be affected, and can be destroyed. Incorporeal entities, however, are not subject to destruction; they either exist or not; in either case they are non-affectible. That which can be affected need not have this impassible nature, but must be subject to alteration or destruction by the qualities of things that enter into it and affect it; for that which in it subsists is not altered by the first chance entity. Consequently, matter is impassible, as by itself it possesses no quality. The forms that enter into and issue from matter (as a substrate) are equally impassible. That which is affected is the composite of form and matter, whose existence consists in the union of these two elements; for it is evidently subject to the action of contrary powers, and of the qualities of things which enter into it, and affect it. That is why the beings that derive their existence from something else, instead of possessing it by themselves, can likewise by virtue of their passivity, either live or not. On the contrary, the beings whose existence consists in an impassible life necessarily live permanently; likewise the things that do not live are equally impassible inasmuch as they do not live. Consequently, being changed and being affected refer only to the composite of form and matter, to the body, and not to matter. Likewise, to receive life and to lose it, to feel passions that are its consequence, can refer only to the composite of soul and body. Nothing similar could happen to the soul; for she is not something compounded out of life and lifelessness; she is life itself, because her "being" or nature is simple, and is automatic.

THIRD ENNEAD, BOOK EIGHT.

Of Nature, Contemplation, and of the One.

OF THOUGHT.

12. (1) Thought is not the same everywhere; it differs according to the nature of every "being." In intelligence, it is intellectual; in the soul it is rational; in the plant it is seminal; last, it is superior to intelligence and existence in the principle that surpasses all these.

OF LIFE.

13. (7) The word "body" is not the only one that may be taken in different senses; such is also the case with "life." There is a difference between the life of the plant, of the animal, of the soul, of intelligence, and of super-intelligence. Indeed, intelligible entities are alive though the things that proceed therefrom do not possess a life similar to theirs.

OF THE ONE.

14. (8) By (using one's) intelligence one may say many things about the super-intellectual (principle). But it can be much better viewed by an absence of thought, than by thought. This is very much the same case as that of sleep, of which one can speak, up to a certain point, during the condition of wakefulness; but of which no knowledge of perception can be acquired except by sleeping. Indeed, like is known only by like; the condition of all knowledge is for the subject to be assimilated to the subject.[330]

FOURTH ENNEAD, BOOK TWO.

Of the Nature of the Soul.

15. (1) Every body is in a place; the incorporeal in itself is not in a place, any more than the things which have the same nature as it.

16. (1) The incorporeal in itself, by the mere fact of its being superior to every body and to every place, is present everywhere without occupying extension, in an indivisible manner.

17. (1) The incorporeal in itself, not being present to the body in a local manner, is present to the body whenever it pleases, that is, by inclining towards it so far as it is within its nature to do so. Not being present to the body in a local manner, it is present to the body by its disposition.

18. (1) The incorporeal in itself does not become present to the body in "being" nor in hypostatic form of existence. It does not mingle with the body. Nevertheless, by its inclination to the body, it begets and communicates to it a potentiality capable of uniting with the body. Indeed the inclination of the incorporeal constitutes a second nature (the irrational soul), which unites with the body.

19. (1) The soul has a nature intermediary between the "being" that is indivisible, and the "being" that is divisible by its union with the bodies. Intelligence is a "being" absolutely indivisible; the bodies alone are divisible; but the qualities and the forms engaged in matter are divisible by their union with the bodies.

20. (2) The things that act upon others do not act by approximation and by contact. It is only accidentally when this occurs (that they act by proximity and contact).

FOURTH ENNEAD, BOOK THREE.

Problems About the Soul.

UNION OF THE SOUL AND THE BODY.

21. (20) The hypostatic substance of the body does not hinder the incorporeal in itself from being where and as it wishes; for just as that which is non-extended cannot be contained by the body, so also that which has extension forms no obstacle for the incorporeal, and in relation to it is as nonentity. The incorporeal does not transport itself where it wishes by a change of place; for only extended substance occupies a place. Neither is the incorporeal compressed by the body; for only that which is extended can be compressed and displaced. That which has neither extension nor magnitude, could not be hindered by that which has extension, nor be exposed to a change of place. Being everywhere and nowhere, the incorporeal, wherever it happens to be, betrays its presence only by a certain kind of disposition. It is by this disposition that it rises above heaven, or descends into a corner of the world. Not even this residence makes it visible to our eyes. It is only by its works that it manifests its presence.

22. (21-24) If the incorporeal be contained within the body, it is not contained within it like an animal in a zoölogical garden; for it can neither be included within, nor embraced by the body. Nor is it, compressed like water or air in a bag of skins. It produces potentialities which from within its unity (?) radiate outwards; it is by them that it descends into the body and penetrates it.[331] It is by this indescribable extension of itself that it enters into the body, and shuts itself up within it. Except itself nothing retains it. It is not the body that releases the incorporeal as result of a lesion, or of its decay; it is the incorporeal that detaches itself by turning away from the passions of the body.

OF THE DESCENT OF THE SOUL INTO THE BODY, AND OF THE SPIRIT.

23. (9) Just as "being on the earth," for the soul, is not to tread on the ground, as does the body, but only to preside over the body that treads on the ground; likewise, "to be in hell" for the soul, is to preside over an image whose nature is to be in a place, and to have an obscure hypostatic form of existence. That is why if the subterranean hell be a dark place, the soul, without separating from existence, descends into hell when she attaches herself to some image. Indeed, when the soul abandons the solid body over which she presided she remains united to the spirit which she has received from the celestial spheres. Since, as a result of her affection for matter, she has developed particular faculties by virtue of which she had a sympathetic habit for some particular body during life, as a result of this disposition, she impresses a form on the spirit by the power of her imagination, and thus she acquires an image. The soul is said to be in hell because the spirit that surrounds her also happens to have a formless and obscure nature; and as the heavy and moistened spirit descends down into subterranean localities, the soul is said to descend underground. Not indeed that the very "being" of the soul changes place, or is in a locality, but because she contracts the habits of the bodies whose nature it is to change location, and to be located somewhere. That is why the soul according to her disposition, acquires some one body rather than some other; for the rank and the special characteristics of the body into which she enters depend on her disposition.

Therefore, when in a condition of superior purity, she unites with a body that is close to immaterial nature, that is, an ethereal body. When she descends from the development of reason to that of the imagination, she receives a solar body. If she becomes effeminate, and falls in love with forms, she puts on a lunar body. Finally, when she falls into the terrestrial bodies, which, resembling her shapeless character, are composed of moist vapors, there results for her a complete ignorance of existence, a sort of eclipse, and a veritable childhood. When the soul leaves an earthly body, having her spirit still troubled by these moist vapors, she develops a shadow that weights her down; for a spirit of this kind naturally tends to descend into the depths of the earth, unless it be held up and raised by a higher cause. Just as the soul is attached to the earth by her earthly vesture, so the moist spirit(ual body) to which the soul is united makes her drag after her an image which weights down the soul. The soul surrounds herself with moist vapors when she mingles with a nature that in its operations is moist or subterranean. But if the soul separate from this nature, immediately around her shines a dry light, without shade or shadow. In fact it is humidity which forms clouds in the air; the dryness of the atmosphere produces a dry and serene clearness.

FOURTH ENNEAD, BOOK SIX.

Of Sensation and Memory.

OF SENSATION.

24. (3) The soul contains the reasons of all things. The soul operates according to these reasons, whether incited to activity by some exterior object, or whether the soul be turned towards these reasons by folding back on herself. When the soul is incited to this activity by some exterior object, she applies her senses thereto; when she folds back on herself, she applies herself to thoughts. It might be objected that the result is that there is neither sensation nor thought without imagination; for just as in the animal part, no sensation occurs without an impression produced on the organs of sense; likewise there is no thought without imagination. Certainly, an analogy obtains between both cases. Just as the sense-image (type) results from the impression experienced by sensation, likewise the intellectual image (phantasm) results from thought.

OF MEMORY.

25. (2) Memory does not consist in preserving images. It is the faculty of reproducing the conceptions with which our soul has been occupied.

FIFTH ENNEAD, BOOK TWO.

Of Generation and of the Order of Things that Follow the First.

OF THE PROCESSION OF BEINGS.

26. When incorporeal hypostatic substances descend, they split up and multiply, their power weakening as they apply themselves to the individual. When, on the contrary, they rise, they simplify, unite, and their power intensifies.

27. In the life of incorporeal entities, the procession operates in a manner such that the superior principle remains firm and substantial in its nature, imparting its existence to what is below it, without losing anything, or transforming itself into anything. Thus that which receives existence does not receive existence with decay or alteration; it is not begotten like generation (that is, the being of sense), which participates in decay and change. It is, therefore, non-begotten and incorruptible, because it is produced without generation or corruption.

28. Every begotten thing derives the cause of its generation from some other (being); for nothing is begotten causelessly. But, among begotten things, those which owe their being to a union of elements are on that very account perishable. As to those which, not being composite, owe their being to the simplicity of their hypostatic substances, they are imperishable, inasmuch as they are indissoluble. When we say that they are begotten, we do not mean that they are composite, but only that they depend on some cause. Thus bodies are begotten doubly, first because they depend on a cause, and then because they are composite. Souls and intelligence, indeed, are begotten in the respect that they depend on a cause; but not in the respect that they are composite. Therefore, bodies, being doubly begotten, are dissoluble and perishable. The Soul and Intelligence, being unbegotten in the sense that they are not composite, are indissoluble and imperishable; for they are begotten only in the sense that they depend on a cause.

29. Every principle that generates, by virtue of its "being," is superior to the product it generates. Every generated being naturally turns towards its generating principle. Of the generating principles, some (the universal and perfect substances) do not turn towards their product; while others (the substances that are individual, and subject to conversion towards the manifold) partly turn towards their product, and remain partly turned towards themselves; while others entirely turn towards their product, and do not turn at all towards themselves.

OF THE RETURN OF BEINGS TO THE FIRST.

30. Of the universal and perfect hypostatic substances, none turns towards its product. All perfect hypostatic substances return to the principles that generated them. The very body of the world, by the mere fact of its perfection, is converted to the intelligent Soul, and that is the cause of its motion being circular. The Soul of the world is converted to Intelligence, and this to the First.[332] All beings, therefore, aspire to the First, each in the measure of its ability, from the very lowest in the ranks of the universe up. This anagogical return of beings to the First is necessary, whether it be mediate or immediate. So we may say that beings not only aspire to the First, but that each being enjoys the First according to its capacity.[333] The individual hypostatic substances, however, that are subject to declining towards manifoldness, naturally turn not only towards their author, but also towards their product. That is the cause of (any subsequent) fall and unfaithfulness. Matter perverts them because they possess the possibility of inclining towards it, though they are also able to turn towards the divinity. That is how perfection makes second rank beings be born of the first principles, and then be converted towards them. It is, on the contrary, the result of imperfection, to turn higher entities to lower things, inspiring them with love for that which, before them, withdrew from the first principles (in favor of matter).

FIFTH ENNEAD, BOOK THREE.

Of the Hypostases that Mediate Knowledge, and of the Superior Principle.

INTELLIGENCE KNOWS ITSELF BY A CONVERSION TO HERSELF.

31. (1) When one being subsists by dependence on any other, and not by self-dependence and withdrawal from any other, it could not turn itself towards itself to know itself by separating from (the substrate) by which it subsists. By withdrawing from its own existence it would alter and perish. But when one being cognizes itself by withdrawal from that to which it is united, when it grasps itself as independent of that being, and succeeds in doing so without exposing itself to destruction, it evidently does not derive its "being" or nature from the being from which it can, without perishing, withdraw, to face itself, and know itself independently. If sight, and in general all sensation do not feel itself, nor perceive itself on separating from the body, and do not subsist by itself; if, on the contrary, intelligence think better by separating from the body, and can be converted to itself without perishing, evidently sense-faculties are actualized only by help of the body, while intelligence actualizes and exists by itself, and not by the body.

THE ACTUALIZATION OF INTELLIGENCE IS ETERNAL AND INDIVISIBLE.

32. (3, 5-7) There is a difference between intelligence and the intelligible, between sensation and that which can be sensed. The intelligible is united to intelligence as that which can be sensed is connected with sensation. But sensation cannot perceive itself.... As the intelligible is united to Intelligence, it is grasped by intelligence and not by sensation. But intelligence is intelligible for intelligence. Since then intelligence is intelligible for intelligence, intelligence is its own object. If intelligence be intelligible, but not "sensible," it is an intelligible object. Being intelligible by intelligence, but not by sensation, it will be intelligent. Intelligence, therefore, is simultaneously thinker and thought, all that thinks and all that is thought. Its operation, besides, is not that of an object that rubs and is rubbed: "It is not a subject in some one part of itself, and in some other, object of thought; it is simple, it is entirely intelligible for itself as a whole."[334] The whole of intelligence excludes any idea of unintelligence. It does not contain one part that thinks, while another would not think; for then, in so far as it would not think, "it would be unintelligent." It does not abandon one object to think of another; for it would cease to think the object it abandoned. If, therefore, intelligence do not successively pass from one object to another, it thinks simultaneously; it does not think first one (thought) and then another; it thinks everything as in the present, and as always....

If intelligence think everything as at present, if it know no past nor future, its thought is a simple actualization, which excludes every interval of time. It, therefore, contains everything together, in respect to time. Intelligence, therefore, thinks, all things according to unity, and in unity, without anything falling in in time or in space. If so, intelligence is not discursive, and is not (like the soul) in motion; it is an actualization, which is according to unity, and in unity, which shuns all chance development and every discursive operation.[335] If, in intelligence, manifoldness be reduced to unity, and if the intellectual actualization be indivisible, and fall not within time, we shall have to attribute to such a "being" eternal existence in unity. Now that happens to be "aeonial" or everlasting existence.[336] Therefore, eternity constitutes the very "being" (or nature) of intelligence. The other kind of intelligence, that does not think according to unity, and in unity, which falls into change, and into movement, which abandons one object to think another, which divides, and gives itself up to a discursive action, has time as "being" (or nature).

The distinction of past and future suits its action. When passing from one object to another, the soul changes thoughts; not indeed that the former perish, or that the latter suddenly issue from some other source; but the former, while seeming to have disappeared, remain in the soul; and the latter, while seeming to come from somewhere else, do not really do so, but are born from within the soul, which moves only from one object to another, and which successively directs her gaze from one to another part of what she possesses. She resembles a spring which, instead of flowing outside, flows back into itself in a circle. It is this (circular) movement of the soul that constitutes time, just as the permanence of intelligence in itself constitutes (aeonial) eternity. Intelligence is not separated from eternity, any more than the soul is from time. Intelligence and eternity form but a single hypostatic form of existence. That which moves simulates eternity by the indefinite perpetuity of its movement, and that which remains immovable, simulates time by seeming to multiply its continual present, in the measure that time passes. That is why some have believed that time manifested in rest as well as in movement, and that eternity was no more than the infinity of time. To each of these two (different things) the attributes of the other were mistakenly attributed. The reason of this is that anything that ever persists in an identical movement gives a good illustration of eternity by the continuousness of its movement; while that which persists in an identical actualization represents time by the permanence of its actualization. Besides, in sense-objects, duration differs according to each of them. There is a difference between the duration of the course of the sun, and that of the moon, as well as that of Venus, and so on. There is a difference between the solar year, and the year of each of these stars. Different, further, is the year that embraces all the other years, and which conforms to the movement of the soul, according to which the stars regulate their movements. As the movement of the soul differs from the movement of the stars, so also does its time differ from that of the stars; for the divisions of this latter kind of time correspond to the spaces travelled by each star, and by its successive passages in different places.

INTELLIGENCE IS MANIFOLD.

33. (10-12) Intelligence is not the principle of all things; for it is manifold. Now the manifold presupposes the One. Evidently, it is intelligence that is manifold; the intelligibles that it thinks do not form unity, but manifoldness, and they are identical therewith. Therefore, since intelligence and the intelligible entities are identical, and as the intelligible entities form a manifoldness, intelligence itself is manifold.

The identity of intelligence and of intelligible entities may be demonstrated as follows. The object that intelligence contemplates must be in it, or exist outside of itself. It is, besides, evident, that intelligence contemplates; since, for intelligence, to think is to be intelligence,[337] therefore, to abstract its thought would be to deprive it of its "being." This being granted, we must determine in what manner intelligence contemplates its object. We shall accomplish this by examining the different faculties by which we acquire various kinds of knowledge, namely, sensation, imagination and intelligence.

The principle which makes use of the senses contemplates only by grasping exterior things, and far from uniting itself to the objects of its contemplation, from this perception it gathers no more than an image. Therefore when the eye sees the visible object, it cannot identify itself with this object; for it would not see it, unless it were at a certain distance therefrom. Likewise if the object of touch confused itself with the organ that touches it, it would disappear. Therefore the senses, and the principle that makes use of the senses, apply themselves to what is outside of them to perceive this sense-object.

Likewise imagination applies its attention to what is outside of it to form for itself an image of it; it is by this very attention to what is outside of it that it represents to itself the object of which it forms an image as exterior.

That is how sensation and imagination perceive their objects. Neither of these two faculties folds itself back on itself, nor concentrates on itself, whether the object of their perception be a corporeal or incorporeal form.

Not in this manner is intelligence perceived; this can occur only by turning towards itself, and by contemplating itself. If it left the contemplation of its own actualizations, if it ceased to be their contemplation (or, intuition), it would no longer think anything. Intelligence perceives the intelligible entity as sensation perceives the sense-object, by intuition. But in order to contemplate the sense-object, sensation applies to what is outside of it, because its object is material. On the contrary, in order to contemplate the intelligible entity, intelligence concentrates in itself, instead of applying itself to what is outside of it. That is why some philosophers have thought that there was only a nominal difference between intelligence and imagination; for they believed that intelligence was the imagination of the reasonable animal; as they insisted that everything should depend on matter and on corporeal nature, they naturally had to make intelligence also depend therefrom. But our intelligence contemplates natures (or, "beings"). Therefore, (according to the hypothesis of these philosophers) our intelligence will contemplate these natures as located in some place. But these natures are outside of matter; consequently, they could not be located in any place. It is therefore evident that the intelligible entities had to be posited as within intelligence.

If the intelligible entities be within intelligence, intelligence will contemplate intelligible entities and will contemplate itself while contemplating them; by understanding itself, it will think, because it will understand intelligible entities. Now intelligible entities form a multitude, for[338] intelligence thinks a multitude of intelligible entities, and not a unity; therefore, intelligence is manifold. But manifoldness presupposes unity; consequently, above intelligence, the existence of unity will be necessary.

34. (5) Intellectual being is composed of similar parts, so that existing beings exist both in individual intelligence, and in universal Intelligence. But, in universal Intelligence, individual (entities) are themselves conceived universally; while in individual intelligence, universal beings as well as individual beings are conceived individually.

SIXTH ENNEAD, BOOK FOUR.

The One and Identical Being Is Everywhere Present As a Whole.

OF THE INCORPOREAL.